flashback -- Nature (in black and white) (pictures I like)

 

The Day of the Dead (moving pictures I like)

 

Husk (pictures I like)

 

Drained (pictures I like)

 

Cracked Air (pictures I like)

 

The Face of Death (pictures I like)

 

Welcome to my web... (pictures I like)

 

It's Time To 'Face the Music' (a movie review post)

Let's start out by laying the 80s out on the table and being upfront about it: It was a weird time.
We started the decade believing we were all going to die in a nuclear holocaust and ended it believing politicians and the people in power had finally realized that nukes were an unacceptable alternative. The Berlin Wall fell, and we all thought that things might be okay. In between, though... In between,
we knew saving the world would require a miracle. [As it turns out, we were probably right about that. Gen Z is probably our last chance for it.] For whatever reason, we believed that music could be that miracle.

It's not like we didn't have reason, I suppose. We had "We Are the World" and Live Aid and all sorts of similar things after that. The power of music to unite seemed to be a real thing. I suppose it's not surprising that it culminated in 1989s Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, in which music does literally unite the world. Or will. Or will have would have. At the time, Gen X fully bought into the idea that, in the end, people would do the right thing. That's what movies and TV taught us. All you needed to do was believe hard enough for things to turn out right. Bad guys would always see the error of their ways and make things right in the end. That or the idealistic earnest protagonist would show the world the true character of the bad guy and he would be defeated.

Of course, recent events have shown us that a significant number of people not just don't care about the true nature of the villain, they revel in it. Yes, white Boomers and other Trump (#fakepresident) supporters, I'm talking about you.

Which leads us to Face the Music in which we learn that music has not, in fact, saved the world or anything close to that. The idealistic earnest protagonists have failed. Their idealism was not enough. Their earnestness was not enough. They have, indeed, been defeated by windmills much like Don Quixote. And time is pretty much up.

The premise is more than apt.

Of course, the plot involves Bill and Ted attempting to finally write their song that will unite the world and save the universe from certain doom while being chased by a killer robot and trying to save their marriages. Or marriage. There is some amount of an inability for them to think of themselves as individuals. Also, their daughters get involved in trying to help out, which involves a whole separate time-travel adventure.

And that's about all I can say about the plot without getting spoilery, which I suppose I'll avoid.

I think we've all learned that music is never going to unite... anything, really. People don't seem much inclined to even agree on what music is, and music is more diverse than ever.
However, the movie is still on the "excellent" side of things.

Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter slip back into their roles as if these are their true personas. And they wouldn't be bad personas to have. If more people were like Bill and Ted, the world would be a better place.

Kristen Schaal replaces George Carlin. She's fine. I like Kristen Schaal, but they don't really give her much to do and her mere presence doesn't bring with it any kind of expectation or anticipation, unlike Carlin. Much of his role was accomplished just by his being there.

The killer robot, Dennis, is brought to us by Anthony Carrigan. I love Anthony Carrigan. Barry is a good show -- I strongly suggest it -- but, even if it wasn't, it would be worth watching for Carrigan.

The daughters are played by Samara Weaving and Brigette Lundy-Paine. I think it's pretty clear they are there to set the stage for future sequels in which they are the stars. That's more than okay with me. They were fun onscreen That said, it was Lundy-Paine who really stole the show. She really nailed the part of Ted's daughter. I felt like I was watching two Teds on the screen. She got his mannerisms, his mode of speech, everything. I was, like, totally impressed. Dude.

All of that and Death is back, too. Now that's an entertaining subplot.

Anyway, the movie is totally worth watching, and you don't even need to be all that familiar with the previous movies to enjoy it. Now I just need to sit down and watch them all three back to back to back.

Nature (pictures I like)

Rebels: "Dume" (Ep. 4.11)

-- "Kanan's gone."

Death is tough. I think there are not enough representations of it in media intended for children. And I get why: Parents don't want to deal with it and the questions it causes and having to try and explain what it means and... well, I'm sure you get the idea. It's a difficult topic and, even in fiction, it can be hard to process. And not just for children.

However, seeing how fictional characters handle death can be a good learning experience for kids. We get a wide range of examples here in Rebels.

Hera is busy blaming herself.

Ezra is lost and in despair.

Sabine and Zeb want revenge.

And the loth-wolves... Well, they want something, too.

We also get to see a little more of what Rukh can do in this episode as Sabine and Zeb end up going toe-to-toe with him.

Oh, and Thrawn? You'd expect him to be happy about the death of Kanan, right? Well, Thrawn will always surprise you.

This last arc is just something you need to watch.

"Expect them to strike out recklessly, and when they do, eliminate them."

"The Empire and us? We're not even yet."

Rebels: "Jedi Night" (Ep. 4.10)

-- "I don't care much for art."

Well... I know I have occasionally mentioned the reluctance in Star Wars for there to be meaningful sacrifices by the characters. That's generally true. Right up until it isn't.

So Hera was captured last episode, and it goes without saying that there will be a rescue attempt. I mean, half of Star Wars is rescuing people from being captured, right?

And...

I don't know. This episode is an actual punch in the gut. Hera finally declares her love for Kanan and...
well...
That's all I can really say.

"If we get spotted, we'll be at a pretty big disadvantage."

"Where do we get these gliders?"
"Easy. We make them."

"You know I never crash! I..."
"Have very exciting landings. Yes, I know."

Death (pictures I like)

Distortion (pictures I like)

My Empty Chair

The apartment was dark except for the flickering light of the television set. It had been like that for days, maybe weeks; I didn't really know. The concept of time had lost much of its meaning. I could tell that time was passing from the vague fluctuations of dimness through the blinds, but what did it really matter? I suppose realizing that you're dead has that kind of effect.

Finding myself dead in my easy chair had created a rather substantial existential crisis for me. What do you do with that kind of information? I mean, there I was, dead and bloated with a bottle of whiskey hanging from my stiff fingers and the TV flickering on and on. What was I supposed to do now?

Besides sitting here and staring at myself, that is. How morbid.

It was overwhelming. Sometimes so much so that I would find myself back at my door thinking I had just come home to find an intruder in my apartment. It took me a while to realize that's what was going on. I had to come to grips with my death over and over again, but each realization was a little easier, and those events were becoming less frequent. It's hard to go through that kind of trauma, especially when you have to relive it every time you begin to break down.

The worst part, though, was that I couldn't remember dying. Once I was able to get over... I was going to say "get over my death," but I wasn't over that. I don't think you can get over that. I was stuck in this room, now, with a corpse and, even if it was my own corpse, it was gruesome. If I could have left, I would have, but I couldn't move anything or affect anything. Everything was as solid as if it had been cast in stone. I couldn't even pry the whiskey bottle from my cold, dead fingers and, believe me, I needed a drink! It was the only thing I could think about other than my corpse.

My corpse and trying to figure out how I'd died, which I couldn't remember. Once I was able to focus beyond re-living the moment of discovering my body, I could remember leaving home for the bar a few blocks away: I remembered getting out of bed and puttering around with making coffee and eating something vaguely identifiable as leftover Chinese food. Opening the blinds and quickly closing them again, all of them, because of how bright it was and how much the light hurt my eyes. I remembered the splitting headache of my hangover. I contemplated turning on the TV but decided against it because that, too, would be too bright, and I didn't want any noise at all. Then deciding that what I needed was a drink and fumbling into my clothes and going to the bar...

That was pretty much it.

I didn't remember coming home again. Or turning on the TV, though, from the low volume, I must have still been suffering from being hung over and from being drunk. I didn't remember getting the whiskey, either, and I was only just realizing that I must have been a raging alcoholic. A breakfast of beer on cereal was pretty common for me, after all. But I couldn't remember how I died and wondered if that had been it.

There was a noise at the door and, as it opened, someone said, "It's not even locked." Then, "Holy Hell! That's a smell I'm never going to forget," and the door closed again. A few minutes later -- or hours, how would I know? -- two men came in with Matilda, my neighbor from down the hall, my only friend in the building.

Matilda was saying, "Of course, I knew it wasn't locked, but I couldn't just come in. That would be breaking and entering."

One of the men said, "No, Ma'am, that's not breaking, and you didn't have to come in. If you'd just looked in the door."

"But no one answered when I knocked."

"Because he was dead."

"Hey, how long do you think he's been dead?"

"I'm not the M. E., how should I know?"

"I've been knocking on his door for over a week."

I couldn't keep track of it all. Maltilda was crying. The men were looking around the apartment using sticks or something to poke at my stuff, and one of them was taking pictures of my body. It was enough to make me sick, and I gagged and dry-heaved and found myself back at my door disoriented and confused. Matilda walked straight through me as one of the men escorted her back to her apartment, and that made me feel even sicker but, still, nothing came out.

Somewhere in all that was happening another man and some other men came in. The first one poked and prodded my body and said his guess was that I'd been dead somewhere around three weeks, and the other men loaded me onto a stretcher and carried my body away. I felt like that should have made me cry or, at least, feel sad or a sense of loss or something, but I was actually kind of glad. I was tired of looking at my corpse.

Finally, I was left alone in the room; all of the men were gone. The TV had been turned off. The bottle of whiskey was sitting on the kitchen counter, and I still couldn't pick it up.

It was only then that I realized that I was alone in the room. Alone in the room! Again! And I couldn't get out. I didn't want to be stuck in this apartment that I'd died in. Stuck alone in this one room for the rest of my... life? Death? Un-life? I didn't even know what to call whatever kind of existence this was.

I think I went kind of crazy for a while, beating on the door and walls and screaming for someone to let me out, someone to help me, someone to do anything.

Even ghosts, or whatever I was, can get exhausted, I guess, because I woke up later lying on the floor near the door. There were people with weird equipment walking around the room, and Matilda was with them. She kept telling them that she thought I was still there and that she was sure she had heard me yelling to be let out. Then, at some point, she turned in my direction and looked... well, she didn't quite look at me, but it was close enough, I guess, and said, "It's okay, John. You can go now."

I blinked and looked at the open door. I looked back at her and she nodded. The other people milled about the room with their beeping and blinking equipment and talked in low voices about cold spots and electrosomethingorothers. I looked back at the door, and Maltida said again, "You can go."

So I did.

I walked out the door and into the world, and it felt like I had never been out in the world before. Like I was seeing everything for the first time. Like I was being reborn. Reborn without my addiction and without my bills to pay or, even, a need to eat anything. I walked out into the world and for the first time in a long, long time... I was happy.

*****

If you enjoyed this story (all three parts, so make sure you check the previous two days for parts one and two if you missed them), which I have posted here for free, I would strongly encourage that you support the author (that's me!) by buying one of my other works. Seriously, it really helps.

Also, if you enjoyed this story, please share it with your friends. That's not a difficult thing to do. You can share it on Facebook or Twitter or, even, google+ (for now, at least)! The point is, spread the word.

Oh, and this won't be up forever. I'll leave it here a few weeks, but, then, it's coming down to be collected together and will no longer be free. So enjoy it now. I sincerely hope you did!

Some Body in My Chair

The apartment was dark as I entered it, which was not unusual, as I never left the lights on when I left. It's just that it seemed darker than usual, more foreboding, even with the television set on, its light serving only to deepen the shadows in the rest of the room, broken only by the flickering of people moving about on the screen. The low murmur of voices, not quite intelligible, gave the room the feeling of a hospital room with doctors and family whispering just outside of the rooms of dying patients. It sent a chill through me and turned my arms to goose flesh.

The television being on was a problem; I was sure I hadn't left it on, hadn't even been watching it before I'd left my apartment earlier in the evening; yet, on it was. A shiver began to work itself through my body as I watched the eerie light glinting off of the hard surfaces in the room. The surface of my little dining table. The glass in the picture frame on the bookshelf. The whisky bottle dangling from the fingers of the body in my easy chair... The shiver turned violent as I realized there was somebody in my easy chair.

What the fuck! There was somebody sitting in my easy chair!

I stood by the door trying to get my shaking under control and trying not to breathe. Trying to hear beyond the sounds and knocking of my body. The beating of my heart. The rushing of my blood. The ocean roaring in my ears. Trying not to give in to the vertigo I felt as the room spun around me.

I stood there, frozen, like a squirrel in front of a car... like a squirrel in front of a car... like a squirrel...

There was something about a squirrel. A squirrel leaping from my hands and dying. Unless I was the squirrel. Was I the squirrel? Was I the squirrel about to leap and die, or was I stuck in place and about to get run down? Was death my only option here?

I stared at the body in my chair and realized that his face was turned toward me and that one large eye was open and staring at me. I quit breathing. I had already been seen!

Dizziness began to overtake me, and real panic set in. Even more real panic. I was going to pass out right in front of the intruder in my house! I was just going to fall down and die for him, and there was nothing I was going to be able to do about it. Not literally die, of course, except in the way that he would be able to kill me without a fight when I fainted. As if I was any kind of fighter to begin with.

Can you black out while standing up? I don't know if that's possible, but I think I did. All I know is that time passed, some quantity of time that I'm unaware of but enough of it that I knew that time had passed. Time had passed and the person in the chair hadn't moved. At all. Not even blinked, from what I could tell. At least, once I came back to my senses and continued to stare at the intruder, he never blinked. And his mouth was slightly ajar, chin slack, and he never closed his mouth. His tongue must have been completely dry; I had a sympathetic gush of saliva at the thought.

Was he asleep with his eye open? Because I realized, soon, that the eye wasn't looking at me. It was just staring... at I don't know what. It was flat and dull and as unmoving as the body. I felt drawn to it and, without really meaning to, took a step toward it.

There was a smell in the air, a stench. Or, at least, I imagined there was. Dead bodies are supposed to stink, right? But I don't know if there was anything I could smell or not. Even once I found myself standing over the body, the smell may have just been the result of my revulsion. My revulsion at having someone break into my apartment and die in my chair while drinking my whiskey. How sick is that?

The body was already bloated... Wait, how long did it take a body to become bloated? I don't think it's at all possible that there would have been time for that. I wasn't gone all that long. Had someone broken into my place for the purpose of dumping a bloated corpse? Who would do something like that? I felt sick...

But I kept staring at the dead thing in my chair, the t-shirt spread too tightly over the now expansive belly, the taut skin, ...the empty eyes. A chill spread through my body as I began to realize the person in the chair, the ex-person in the chair, seemed familiar. Very familiar.
The body in the chair... was me.

Bouquet of Death (pictures I like)

To Infinity (War) and Beyond! (more thoughts)

Okay, actually, not beyond. We're gonna stop right here and talk some more about this movie.

Or, more precisely, we're going to talk about stupid things people keep saying.
And, yes, I'm not going to be wary of spoilers, so you've had all the warning you're going to get.

Look, I understand if you're upset by all the deaths.You should be upset by all the deaths. Death is upsetting. BUT!
1. They're fictional characters.
2. There's another movie coming. Oh, wait, you didn't realize this was just the first part of two movies? Well...

• A. Where have you been?
• B. This is just the first movie of two.
• C. Even if you didn't know that, the end-credit scene should have clued you in that something was going on.
• D. WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?

In regards to all the death and the general bleakness of the ending, I have seen people protesting that it's a violation of the genre.

Wait... What?

What genre? The super hero genre? Because if that's what you're saying, you're obviously not very familiar with the actual super hero genre and only know about super heroes from movies. Comics have dark endings (and dark stories) all the time. ALL THE TIME! This movie doesn't stand out as an exception in that respect. Now, if you're saying it doesn't have the typical happy Hollywood ending, well, that's true. But, then, Marvel hasn't been doing anything the typical Hollywood way from the beginning. If they had been, we would never have arrived at this movie juncture. In fact, we would never have had Iron Man, either. Or Thor. And certainly not Ant-Man. Hollywood wisdom also said Black Panther was a movie that would never succeed. There's been a push for a Black Panther movie since the 90s and, even now, with all of the other Marvel successes, "Hollywood" believed the movie wouldn't succeed.

But as for genres, make sure you know what you're talking about before you open your mouth.

Speaking of genres, though, can we even call "super heroes" a genre anymore? Like sci-fi, I think it has to be more like a broad category in which you can write other genres of stories. Marvel's movies alone should show that. Hulk is a monster movie. Ant-Man is a heist flick. Captain America is World War II movie. None of them are really what you would call "super hero" films; they just happen to have super heroes in them. It's like Asimov said about sci-fi: It's just a framework to allow you to tell whatever kind of story you want to tell, whatever kind of genre you want to use.

So, no, Infinity War is no violation of genre.

But, yes, it has a sad, even depressing, ending. Heroes die. Because, you know what? The good guys don't always win. Our current political situation, with a wannabe dictator as president, should show you that evil sometimes, even frequently, wins. So, yeah, the bad guy wins. Thanos wins. And the movie ends with him enjoying his victory. You think Trump (#fakepresident) didn't enjoy his victory? You think he didn't go around pissing (figuratively, I hope, though with him it's hard to tell) in every corner of the White House?

I do understand that people are not used to movies where the antagonist wins and we haven't had a movie like this since, probably, The Empire Strikes Back, but people are acting as if this is it. The end of the story. The end of the franchise. No more movies from Marvel. BAM! All your heroes are dead, Suckers! So suck on that! It's the fucking end of the world!

Really?

I mean, really?

Haven't you learned from watching the... how many Marvel movies are there now? 18? Haven't you learned that they're all connected and that there are more movies coming? Wait and see what happens. IT'S NOT THE END OF THE STORY!

geez

And speaking of Thanos, I've heard people complain about the attempt to make Thanos a sympathetic character... What the fuck? What attempt to make Thanos a sympathetic character? Because he cried when he killed Gamora? That makes him sympathetic? Because he cried?

No! It makes him an asshole.

Let's look at this a moment:

Thanos lives on Titan, and Titan is on the verge of environmental collapse. Thanos tries warning everyone and even has a solution: put half of the population to death. Needless to say, the population doesn't like that idea and, evidently, they never figure out anything better. The planet ends up a lifeless husk with Thanos as its only survivor with a, "Well, I told you so," attitude about it. That's as constructive as he gets over the situation.
Except for then deciding that he'll put his "extinguish half the population" plan into effect on the entire universe.
NONE of this makes Thanos a sympathetic character. It makes him a conceited, small-minded asshole who can't think outside of his own box for other, more workable, solutions.

Then!
To get the Soul Gem, he has to sacrifice the thing he loves, which he happened to have with him: Gamora. The one thing Thanos loves. So he has an option, the Soul Gem or Gamora. Let's put this another way:
He can choose the good of himself by throwing Gamora in the pit and taking the Gem, or he can choose the good of Gamora by letting her live. That would be actual love, by the way, choosing the good of someone else over yourself. But what Thanos shows is that what he really loves above all is himself, so he throws Gamora in the pit. Asshole. There's nothing sympathetic in that action, either. And I just have to say, if that scene causes you to feel sympathy for Thanos, you need to do some soul-searching of your own.

There is nothing in this movie to make Thanos any kind of sympathetic character. He shows that he himself has no empathy or sympathy for anyone else, and I'm not really sure how anyone could arrive at the conclusion that anything shown about him was meant to do anything other than show just what a monster he is.

All of that said, I don't care whether you liked the movie or not, just have a valid reason for it, even if that valid reason is your emotional reaction to, say, Spider-Man dying and blowing away in the end (man, that one hurt, especially since there were little piece of Peter-ash all over Tony afterward). What you should not do is try to rationalize your reason by making shit up. It's fine for you to say, "I didn't like it. They killed everyone." And it's also fine for the rest of us to tell you you're crazy.

Angels Unbound: Samael (an a-to-z post)

Samael
No one knows how many Death angels there are, no one but the Father. Mostly, they don't reveal themselves except to those whom they are taking. But Samael is the "Severity of God" and an Archangel (though not the Archangel of Death), and everyone knows what he's about. It was Samael who waited to take Isaac once Abraham had plunged his dagger into Isaac's chest, and he was not completely pleased when given the Command to stay Abraham's hand. Also, he has a history with Lilith. There are whispers...


Already released:

Angels Unbound: Dumah (a-to-z) and Clone Wars -- "Clone Cadets" (Ep. 3.1)

Dumah

Having a body covered with eyes is not an uncommon thing among Angels. I don't know how often it occurs, but I've already included another of them, Uri'el, in the Shadow Spinner world. It's kind of freaky, if you ask me. Dumah is an Angel of Death, another recurring theme, and carries a fiery rod. He is the Angel of silence and the stillness of death. I like that. As quiet as the grave...

Clone Wars

-- Brothers in arms are brothers for life.

[Remember, you can sign up to join the Clone Wars Project at any time by clicking this link.]

Remember when I said these episodes were not all in order? Well, this is an example of that. "Clone Cadets" is the prequel to the season one episode "Rookies." It's an interesting story to tell considering that we already know what comes next. Bittersweet.

The five members of Domino squad do not get along and are considered jokes, at best, by everyone else. They are so bad that Shaak Ti, the Jedi onsite, is having to consider whether they will wash out of training, something, evidently, that just doesn't happen.

Shaak Ti is distressed enough by the evident failure of the squad that she talks to the Kaminoans about it, and they, in a round about way, blame the Jedi. The Jedi killed Jango Fett, their genetic source of clone material, so it's the Jedi's fault that the newer clones aren't holding up. They suggest finding a new source of genetic material or, the implication is, shut up about it.

There's an interesting character, a failed clone, called 99. He's in charge of maintenance, maintenance being where the failed clones go, apparently. 99, as is so often the case with service personnel, is able to see and hear things that probably he shouldn't be aware of. Mostly, though, he is just an outsider, an interesting perspective from one of the clones. Because of his position, though, he's able to offer valuable advice at a key moment and teach one of the clones a valuable lesson just because of the source. The whole relationship that happens there is rather touching. And, again, bittersweet, since we know what's going to happen to that trooper.

It's a good, very good, episode. It's another that explores the individuality of beings who should all be essentially the same and what can happen when the individuality is allowed to remain rather than trying to force them all into conformity.

Ghost Story (a book review post)

Here's the warning right  up front:
This review will be full of spoilers. Not spoilers about this book, specifically, but about the series in general. If you even think you might want to read these at some point, you do not want to read this review. At all. Any of it. If you are reading this series but aren't this far, yet, stop reading right now. Seriously, go find something else to do. Just be satisfied with me saying that this book is good, and go away. You will only be mad if you go farther.

Is there anyone left? Just Rusty? (Because he's read them all.) Oh, well, I'll just go ahead anyway.

The end of book twelve, Changes, leaves us with a major "cliffhanger." I say "cliffhanger" because it's not really a cliffhanger. A cliffhanger is when a story ends before the climax is resolved. In Changes, the climax is resolved, but a horrible thing happens during the denouement: Harry is killed. At least, as far as we can tell, Harry is killed. I can understand why people who were reading these as they came out were really pissed by the ending. I would have been pissed, too. Fortunately, I didn't have to wait, because I had Ghost Story (and Side Jobs) sitting here waiting for me when I finished Changes.

As the story hints, Ghost Story opens with Harry's ghost. He has, evidently, been killed. Why else would his spirit be roaming free, right? And that is the $64,000 question. And it's a question the book asks almost right away, but it takes Harry some time to figure it out. Which was, all things considered, kind of surprising. I mean, when someone tells you, "There were some irregularities with your death," you ought to start thinking things.

My big issue with the book is the whole "ghost whisperer" angle, and I mean Ghost Whisperer just like the TV show. Butcher even acknowledges it within the book, but I can't help but think, "Really? That's what you had to go with?" I don't know; maybe, that whole "unfinished business" notion is so pervasive that it's the only reasonable option you can go with, but it annoyed me.

Other than that, though, the book is, as the Dresden books tend to be, a very captivating read. You want Harry to figure out what's going on, because you want Harry to figure out that there's a way back to life. And I'm not saying that there is a way back to life, but you want Harry to figure that out. You want that to be a thing. I mean, how can the series go on if the protagonist is dead, right? Except that Butcher shows us that that's also a possibility. And that could be interesting, a dead protagonist. And that's the struggle of reading this book. And, of course, finding out who killed Harry.

I have to say, I didn't see that coming as more than a "nah, that couldn't be it" possibility in my head, and I kept trying to figure it out. I was surprised when that "nah" thought was the correct one, so that was pretty well done.

Look, this is what it comes down to:
If you've gotten this far into The Dresden Files, you must like them. Why would you read 13 books into a series you don't enjoy, right? If you like Dresden, you're going to like this book. It shows us a whole new side of the Dresden world despite the ghost whisperer issue. There's not much else to be said about it.

Oh, and I didn't see the end coming. I don't mean the answer to the "who shot Harry" question; I mean what came after that. That's going to make you happy that book 14 is already out.