The 2019 Totals

Site of the Year: tumblr
Obsession of the Year: Dolls, French, Victoria, chemistry, make-up, stand up
Movie of the Year: Captain Marvel
Series of the Year: Victoria
Documentary of the Year: Explained
TV Show of the Year: The Daily Show, RuPaul's Drag Race
Game of the Year: Drakensang Online, Surviving Mars, Solitaire
Purchase of the Year: Leah, Ryan, new PC, new mp3 player
Book of the Year: L'Etranger
Personality of the Year: RuPaul, Jordan Waller
Fic of the Year: Incubus
Ship of the Year: Tegoshige, BUT ALSO Seigi/Zero, Drumfred, minor Hijigin and Saitama/Genos
Artist of the Year: Michel Polnareff
Album of the Year: Not Worldista
Demise of the Year: career opportunities, broken friendships, Park Yoochun, X-men...

Soundtrack of the Year:
Lady Gaga, Bradley Cooper - Shallow, HYDE - Zipang, Tegoshi Yuya - Dolls, Kato Shigeaki - Sekai, Park Yu Chun - Slow Dance, Paulina Palmgren - Any Day Now, Surviving Mars OST, B. Miles - Salt, Michel Polnareff - Mes Regrets, Michel Polnareff - Sous quelle étoile suis-je né

Series:
Russian Doll
The Good Fight
GLOW
Silicon Valley
The Gifted
Las chicas del cable
The Crown
Fleabag
Victoria
The Politician
Dear White People
The Morning Show

Movies:
A Star is Born
Captain Marvel
Avengers: Endgame
The Aviator
Tolkien
Viceroy's House

Dramas:
Kirawareru Yuuki
Tourist 2018
ZERO

Anime:
One Punch Man

Games:
Sims 3
Drakensang Online
Mass Effect 2

Fanvideos finished:
The Mission trailer?

Fanfics finished:
The Mission
Follow suit
Masquerade
Incubus

This year took les than 2 pages.

@настроение: dull

@темы: Totals

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I just learned that over the past decade, "cursive writing" has been increasingly dubbed as obsolete and irrelevant and that makes me depressed. Like, how is that even a thing?? That-that's a basic skill, how the fuck will people not know how to write without their fucking computers? Not to mention the spelling is become increasingly worse. What's next? Abandoning math? I feel like people are int he process of outsourcing everything into computers so much that they won't know shit without them.

@темы: musings

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Had one of the coolest dreams in my life, and that including the ninja fight. I was space traveling but the travel itself was the best part. The real feeling of being pushed into my seat as the ship broke free of Earth's gravity. I assume the footage was borrowed from Captain Marvel, bless it. All the exciting stuff happens in the dreams, though that'snot something you even get to experience anyway. Even if go the offer somehow I'd reject it, as I would probably die.

@темы: Dreams

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They say women are irrational and sensitive but have you ever talked to tech guys? They lose their fucking minds if you change any of the settings they make on your PC. Like, each of them has their own set of software they call “essential” and get mad af if you change the perfect setup they made for you. Just today I talked to one and he got personally offended when he learned I deleted some of the progs he installed.

My Windows got deactivated and it was mildly annoying but I finally called the guy who set it up as frankly it was his problem but he was not helpful at all. He got annoyed I presumably uninstalled a prog for activation and mourned it like it was lost forever. So after I talked to him I found it, and in 3 minutes the problem was solved. Geez.

@темы: snapshot

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I guess in the end I always expected myself to turn out a mess, but not like this. I thought I'd be cool hot mess, not a helpless one. Someone who smokes, drinks wine, and wears dramatic make-up to cover up depression. Someone who can get by on their own, even if hardly. Someone who can have a dozen shots without wincing. Someone who doesn't give a fuck. Certainly not someone who can barely do basic errands, gets sick from 5 minutes in the car, and gets indigestion from a cup of coffee. I never dared to even yearn for conventional happiness, but I even failed at being a failure.

@музыка: Modron Cube Battle

@темы: myself, musings

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Queer Media

My path as a shipper has been a long one. Just 10 years ago it was desperately looking for any LGBT-themes movies, no matter how old or sad. Queer as Folk seemed like a gospel. Now we have actual LGBT characters in manstream TV shows and movies and more and more actors and celebrities come out (not in Japan though, dammit, Japan!). And sure, there's still a long way to go but I can't take it for granted, it still feels surreal when I come across any such thing in a show where I do not expect it.

We don't have to settle for tragedies of forbidden love and sassy hair stylists anymore (though Ugly Betty's Michael was everything), we can have interesting, complex characters with their own stories. There are same-sex romance options in games (although hidden), transgender characters who aren't there just for comic relief and Drag Race is in its 12th season.

The Real O'Neals was the first family sitcom with a gay boy as the main character and it was really nice but it failed, though probably due to criticism from the insatiable liberals rather than concerned conservatives. I was absolutely thrilled with Lee Pace's bisexual character in Half & Catch Fire and his relationship with androgynous Cameron. It was messy and complicated and it also left me heartbroken but it was such a breath of fresh air. Then there were some surprise lesbian couples in both series I was translating a few years ago - The Good Wife and Rookie Blue. But those left me with mixed feelings - on one hand, they were likeable, on the other - strangely similar: one bisexual woman and one lesbian, one blonde and one brunette, both very much conventionally attractive. What I'm saying is, the lesbian couples often seem to cater more to straight male fantasies than to LGBT representation.

This brings me to the reason I started to write this in the first place. I was taken completely by surprise when two characters in Victoria started exchanging glances that were both subtle and painfully obvious. At first, I thought it was just another case of queerbating as many viewers could easily dismiss it while I felt a jolt every single time their eyes met. But the relationship developed slowly throughout the whole season, it grew getting more tangible with each glance, each line until it was a real actual undeniable thing. The chemistry between the characters was off the charts. It might not as an exaggeration to say that was the most powerful relationship development I've seen of supporting characters, queer or straight. It all reached a peak when they finally kissed. It was an epiphany, pure and beautiful and perfect. I, as well as thousands of fans, felt thrilled. But if something is going so well, brace yourself for trouble. Not that I was expecting them to have happy ending. There was no real chance of it in Victorian England. But out of a dozen ways for it to go wrong, the way it did was the worst.

As a sad coincidence, just last week I stumbled upon an article about the Bury Your Gays trope. And sure they'd say that Drummond was supposed to die anyway. Except not really. Drummond was about 50 at the time he was shot and never even met Lord Alfred. And sure, some other straight characters were killed off as well, for dramatic effect. But some actually died while the people they were based on lived so they could easily do the opposite for Drummond. No matter what the reason is - the trope is still a trope.

What made it worse was that the next episode was Christmas special and taking place just months after the S2, Alfred suddenly proposes to the girl who supported him as a friend. And it wasn't so much that it happened, perhaps I wouldn't mind it eventually, but making it so soon was almost like shoving us with a heteronormative happy ending. Like, "there, we fixed it." And Season 3 does not even mention it, Alfred lives on but his story is closed and shall not be addressed anymore.

The actors themselves seemed thrilled to explore this storyline and disappointed for their fate. Leo said:
“I think it’s going to be quite heartbreaking, especially because people seem to have been so excited and so moved by Drummond and Alfred’s kiss last week. I think to have it snatched away from them will break some hearts.”
Indeed. My disappointment brought me to twitter, tumblr, and AOO. Though Victoria is not the biggest show on TV, I was pleasantly surprised to find some 247 fics on AOO and dozens of fanvideos.

We as fans are very used to just shipping characters together but to see actual love stories played out is almost surreal. Gems like these are still rare and precious but I'd like to believe at some point they'll stop being controversial and bold LGBT stories and will just become love stories.

@темы: the eternal debate, slash

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I binged so many shows this year and one thing I really hate is when a show goes into a new season by pretending half the old characters and their plotlines just didn't exist and replace them with new ones. Stop treating viewers like babies without object permanence!

@темы: musings

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Fleabag

Fleabag is so good though. It's the kind of good there's no need to discuss it.

@музыка: Akanishi Jin - A Page

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Autumn really came through. Last week it was T-shirts and now it's sweaters. I made a new Autumn playlist but I just ended up with 60 songs about rain and depression.

@темы: snapshot

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Summer Moved On

Another summer of running just not to fall. It's been tough but I guess what really matters is whether you enjoy running. It was full of content - rediscovering Games People Play, watching a course of chemistry, fixing a broken friendship and learning enough to fill a hundred papers. I almost got a job too. For a moment, it almost seemed like this was it - my step forward. I was ready to work harder than ever to make it. Though I never quite settled into the idea and for a good reason, as it turned out. In the end, I'm just no good at making compromises with my dignity. It's a bitter pill to swallow and it did make me slightly depressed because it meant cutting the already too few options I have. But I don't want to dwell on it. One of the shows I watched this summer involved making a bunch of people search a needle in a haystack. You know who found it? The one who kept looking.

@темы: work, snapshot

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Chemistry has always been my weakest subject at school. Even later, I was attached to physics but had very little concept of chemistry. I still do but this year I took some time to learn more through Crash Course on YT and other sources. Formulas scare me but I want to have a basic understanding of what the world is made of and what's going on with all the stuff.

@темы: i'm a geek

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The Gifted and more

I just finished watching The Gifted and I thought it was a long shot and I was prepared to be disappointed but it’s actually pretty good?? Good characters and character development and relationships. We finally got Thunderbird and he was awesome. There's a badass Polaris and Blink (which is already a second Blink on TV) and Stepford Cuckoos. All the characters and their relationships are dynamic. I was invested in this shit and they cut it off after 2 seasons?? It slightly reminds me of Dark Angel, the most underrated sci-fi series ever also incidentally cut at S2. I don’t know if it was the Disney acquisition or what but that’s bullshit. The second season got a little messy but Agents of Shield has gone to shit 4 seasons ago and it‘s still on air. The Gifted had some flaws but it also had a very solid core message regarding intolerance, human rights and minorities, like X-men always had, and that made it so much more meaningful than MCU. Im so stressed.

Being a fan of anything Marvel is so damn frustrating. All the TV/screen adaptations are an emotional roller-coaster, especially if you know anything about the comics. There's hardly a place to even discuss character and plot faitfulness. The MCU is fairly consistent but it still has enough issues. The X-men are totally fucked with most movies and TV series booting and rebooting and contradicting each other. And then there's Fantastic Four, which is 2 movies that have nothing in common except the actual character powers. The fans try to make sense of it but it's not really possible as the creators all realized their own vision in their own format aiming at revenue.

And it's all frustrating as fuck as no matter how bad it is, we still get attached to the characters and their stories. And it's sad that many of them just get scrapped, cancelled, discarded without conveying what they had to say. And even if some movies were disappointing you still like at least some parts of it, you just want them to be better not rebooted for the 4th time.

X-men is the worst. I liked most of both the first and the second cast and there were strong points in there, I just wish they could take the best of it and do something good with it. Yet, Dark Phoenix was so bad it feels like a renovation can't be done at this point, only demolition.

The Gifted started anew, taking a newer and virtually unknown corner of Marvel and making it its own. It finally introduced the Purifiers and Morlocks. It may have failed in some ways but it did a great job with highlighting the destructive nature of hate and intolerance, something MCU never really had. And now it's gone.

The Marvel world is s big, there are still so many places, factions and characters that can be used. But it feels like we just can't have good things.

@темы: Marvel

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Paulina

I heard on on the Surviving Mars soundtrack and I was captivated. I was also upset when I saw her videos only have 1-2k views on Youtube. This is just not right. She is so talented and her voice is beautiful. Someone's good music should not have less views than my less popular fanvideos.

@темы: video

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Yoochunnie got 2 years probation. Yoochunie got very lucky. I don't even know what I'm supposed to feel at this point but I still feel relief. While he did fuck up big time, it still isn't right putting someone in prison for using drugs several times.

@темы: Yoochunnie

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So that is the song

@темы: video

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Surviving Mars

Following the Mars series, I got into this game. It's been awhile since I was obsessed with a game, hooked on it but this was a case for a while. I've tried a number of games since Alpha Centauri but while the graphics were nice, the game mechanics just weren't engaging enough. Real-time strategy is like that, especially when you're struggling to survive. But Surviving Mars is very well-thought and well-designed and it encompasses you into a unique atmosphere, thanks in part to a great varied soundtrack. I've slowed down as I reached a stable phase but I've yet to see Mars turn green and I won't stop till then.

@музыка: Paulina Palmgren & Jonatan Järpehag - One Minute at a Time

@темы: Games