december (some recent stuff)
Dec. 8th, 2023 12:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
girlrocki can't remember the last time i wrote a media round-up and i don't think anyone even reads dw anymore but i kind of wanted to get some thoughts out before the end of the year since it's been a while, plus i don't even know what i'll post in january. will most likely delete this later but T__T let me be brief...
music > getting my last-minute music listening in before december ends since i will probably make a year-end k-pop post if nothing else. also trying to slowly rate each song in my rym list even though it's all so completely arbitrary LOL but it is human nature to engage in meaningless activities. i can't help but be sooo disappointed by k-pop overall this year which is maybe just a me problem but also probably a mix of different factors, e.g.:
- no wjsn
- kwon eunbi did not serve nearly enough cunt
- ive fell off
- slayc fell off
- demise of fifty fifty
- xg baited us with a decent-ish debut and then proceeded to peddle unnecessarily elaborate music videos at the expense of making actually good music
- road-b donned the ultimate infinite cosplay for 2 singles last year and then dipped ???
but it could have definitely been worse!!! at least we still had newjeans... rv b-sides did not change my life but i found the album quite coherent overall, triples are good even if i can't get into them as much as i would like to, the deep and bΓ©be yana were bright spots of the sologurl dnb/2-step niche, aespa had a few stinkers but overall committed most consistently to actually inspired and unique sounds this year....... oec were fun too and chaeyeon randomly delivered phonk goodness that pleased me greatly. and fromis fromis'd!!!!! if newjeans disappoint me in 2024 i will actually cry though.
also i already knew it would be but my spotify wrapped was so bad. nothing to say
tv > again, i feel like i watched very limited good tv this year so i have no idea what i'm going to talk about during my year-end wrap-up, but in recent months/weeks i finally walked down the mike flanagan path and watched the haunting of bly manor & hill house (in that order). despite being generally horror-averse i did enjoy them! lesbian victoria pedretti is a delight for many obvious and predictable reasons, but i think i liked nell the most out of any character overall *__* bbygirl...
i can't remember whether i ever talked about watching beckham but i still think this series is so hilarious because it's just like well every famous man is an objectively horrible person but here's us trying to excuse his abject disregard for his wife and marriage over the span of three episodes anyway. the way pretty much every footballer & manager interviewed for it had one moderately serious past scandal or another attached to his name..... there is wag discourse i could go into here but i won't.
i also watched scott pilgrim takes off in november which killed me a little but i did like it. having the movie cast return was an interesting choice because i'm usually part of the "down with untrained voice actors being gifted roles simply for their celebrity" bus and it was sooooo so clear that some of the cast could not voice act for shit, but there was also a big element of sentimentality there and my young scott pilgrim-loving child heart did find it cute. o'malley attempting to subvert scott's protagonist misconceptions and refocusing the series on ramona was also mostly well-executed, and i liked that the art style was reminiscent of the source material but still had enough cosmetic changes to give it its own unique spirit. cool studio collab imo!!
film > watched may december last week after hearing so much about it and although there isn't much i can say that hasn't already been repeated timelessly it really does boast objectively fantastic performances (gay people will go as natalie portman's imitation of julianne moore's lisp for halloween etc.), and having never seen riverdale or watched him in anything else i thought charles melton and the way he so naturally embodied joe's pain and emotional subjugation was a welcome surprise. i also really enjoyed his interview with vanity fair and his meditations on playing joe and preparing for the role a lot, not that jacob elordi was necessarily "wrong" for any of his comments (he's just a clown for many different reasons!) but it is nice to see actors who unexpectedly make it past the confines of their trash ya beginnings and still manage to be graceful about the opportunities afforded to them from weathering the system.
i also watched tbosas and then went and did my duty as a media consumer (played a handful of promotional youtube content for the cast on 1.5x speed) and now my recs are overrun with the most RANDOM hunger games stuff i keep having to tell it i'm not interested π i was so shocked that 1) i completely missed the entire rachel zegler snow white controversy before??? and 2) THIS is what she's suddenly universally detested for??? miss rachel has had so many little (at times justified) personality controversies and i thought it would be so much worse but of course it's always the tamest comments that get you crucified by racist misogynists online. good lord the internet landscape...
the problem with me is that i spent half the movie being like wow blond wavy-haired tom blyth is so scorpius coded *__*......... anyway. lowkey the cast dynamic with her bf right there is crasyyyy but i will say nothing more, it was certainly interesting to uncover the vibes for 48 hours until i inevitably stopped caring about the movie again! i also rewatched catching fire and then half of mockingjay pt1 because i was drawing a complete blank on whether i'd actually seen these movies when they came out, but i definitely remember seeing catching fire now and then i think mockingjay pt1 was just so bad that i banished it from my memory afterward. unsure about pt2 though so i may have to continue watching...
my top movie of the month though was the holdovers which i saw in theaters this week π₯° i originally called angus tully clinically depressed finn wolfhard but then felt bad dragging dominic sessa like that so i took it back but goddddd why was angus tully written to appeal to me specifically. my new benji ovich :( i'm just a cynical bastard having a terrible time and i like watching other cynical bastards have a terrible time on screen as well but in of course an emotionally meaningful and narratively redemptive manner!
writing & reading > it's been rough i won't lie... the only things i seem to be able to read these past few months are sports books and gay graphic novels but as always c'est comme Γ§a. the other problem is that the only fic draft i have atm that i actually feel serious about working on is just a silly little 814 fic, except i really want it out of the way just so i can have it done because i'm not someone who writes regularly and i don't like having drafts hanging around. this is why everything i write is so awful because i do not trust in the process and i just want to finish everything as quickly as possible..... however in general i am struggling through so much X To Doubt about like 1) writing in general (because i'm bad at it), 2) writing sports rpf (not because i think it's cringe but just because i feel like i'm incapable of Doing It Right by fandom consensus lol), and then 3) writing 814 specifically (because they are a moderately big ship now and my introversion does not agree with decently sized fandoms. i get nervous and self-conscious π₯²). plus within 814 it's also like, i am comfortable writing 81 pov and can explore his character easily enough but i keep getting the biggest reality checks trying to induce any sincerity in 4 whatsoever even though i do think he has a lot of it, it just doesn't really work in the realm of GayFic that well for me LOL. i feel like his personality is something i can discuss candidly in casual posts because i do appreciate isolated manifestations of his interiority but there's a difference between pinpointing these moments now and then and then actively trying to contextualize them into a character capable of sustained romantic behavior for ao3 fanfiction π© why is it easier to write gayfic for a boring straight man than it is for a neurotic bisexual mess i honestly don't know the answer to that...
anyway. of course it does not matter. IT IS LITERALLY ALL SO STUPID!!! but i think reading a properly good book again could help with at least getting out of the pure writing rut. i don't know... why do i continue writing fic every year even though i hate everything i write so much???????? i feel like i need to learn to give things up to god and stop revisiting hobbies that do nothing but force me to reflect on my endless deficits. hm!
oh but i AM finally reattempting the you know what fic and i'm officially 200 chapters in. not even halfway yet but i want to catch up so badly now... i'll have you know that they've finally successfully adopted a child. it's getting Serious
misc. > some Bideo........
i really really enjoyed this alex appearance on high performance from last month. the bit about being forced into an act of selflessness that didn't "agree" with him was probably my favorite, but the general reflection on being rushed into the red bull seat, the constant desperation to prove himself and most of all treating karting and motorsport as much more of a relaxed hobby when he was younger up until his mother went to jail and he was suddenly no longer privy to his childhood privileges was all really interesting. imo alex is capable of being vulnerable in a very eloquent and efficient manner, and to hear him directly impart that he only developed his competitive drive out of necessity was a fascinating insight that i don't think a lot of athletes would be willing to candidly give up (the nature vs nurture of it all!). i fear that i personally subscribe to some mildly controversial red bull opinions (i.e. i am not as strongly against many of its machinations as most people are) which i mostly try to keep to myself, but there's a lot to chew on here re: lacking an early support system and delineating the struggle as ultimately being not "having bad moments" but rather "going an extended period of time without a single good moment", which i think very much parallels logan's rookie experience and makes it mildly fascinating that alex unintentionally complicated the year for him by contrasting it with his most mentally resilient season yet lol. alex is interesting because i think he understands logan's struggle very deeply from living through similar setbacks alongside max and is an "empathetic" person by nature but he is also not interested in relating his past experiences to another person's failures any more than necessary. i guess there is a nice/kind dichotomy you could argue he and oscar embody similar approaches to. i have to think about it more... the many ways he diverges from lando despite the both of them having similar base approaches to Mental Sports Coaching are quite interesting.
games > i am playing pikmin 4... π the only highlight of my life right now. barely halfway done but it's just the right difficulty level for me (read: very easy and methodical) so i'm enjoying myself!
anyway i'll stop here. happy holidays everyone, things never seem to be easy but i hope december is kind to you all and that 2024 is even better...
music > getting my last-minute music listening in before december ends since i will probably make a year-end k-pop post if nothing else. also trying to slowly rate each song in my rym list even though it's all so completely arbitrary LOL but it is human nature to engage in meaningless activities. i can't help but be sooo disappointed by k-pop overall this year which is maybe just a me problem but also probably a mix of different factors, e.g.:
- no wjsn
- kwon eunbi did not serve nearly enough cunt
- ive fell off
- slayc fell off
- demise of fifty fifty
- xg baited us with a decent-ish debut and then proceeded to peddle unnecessarily elaborate music videos at the expense of making actually good music
- road-b donned the ultimate infinite cosplay for 2 singles last year and then dipped ???
but it could have definitely been worse!!! at least we still had newjeans... rv b-sides did not change my life but i found the album quite coherent overall, triples are good even if i can't get into them as much as i would like to, the deep and bΓ©be yana were bright spots of the sologurl dnb/2-step niche, aespa had a few stinkers but overall committed most consistently to actually inspired and unique sounds this year....... oec were fun too and chaeyeon randomly delivered phonk goodness that pleased me greatly. and fromis fromis'd!!!!! if newjeans disappoint me in 2024 i will actually cry though.
also i already knew it would be but my spotify wrapped was so bad. nothing to say
tv > again, i feel like i watched very limited good tv this year so i have no idea what i'm going to talk about during my year-end wrap-up, but in recent months/weeks i finally walked down the mike flanagan path and watched the haunting of bly manor & hill house (in that order). despite being generally horror-averse i did enjoy them! lesbian victoria pedretti is a delight for many obvious and predictable reasons, but i think i liked nell the most out of any character overall *__* bbygirl...
i can't remember whether i ever talked about watching beckham but i still think this series is so hilarious because it's just like well every famous man is an objectively horrible person but here's us trying to excuse his abject disregard for his wife and marriage over the span of three episodes anyway. the way pretty much every footballer & manager interviewed for it had one moderately serious past scandal or another attached to his name..... there is wag discourse i could go into here but i won't.
i also watched scott pilgrim takes off in november which killed me a little but i did like it. having the movie cast return was an interesting choice because i'm usually part of the "down with untrained voice actors being gifted roles simply for their celebrity" bus and it was sooooo so clear that some of the cast could not voice act for shit, but there was also a big element of sentimentality there and my young scott pilgrim-loving child heart did find it cute. o'malley attempting to subvert scott's protagonist misconceptions and refocusing the series on ramona was also mostly well-executed, and i liked that the art style was reminiscent of the source material but still had enough cosmetic changes to give it its own unique spirit. cool studio collab imo!!
film > watched may december last week after hearing so much about it and although there isn't much i can say that hasn't already been repeated timelessly it really does boast objectively fantastic performances (gay people will go as natalie portman's imitation of julianne moore's lisp for halloween etc.), and having never seen riverdale or watched him in anything else i thought charles melton and the way he so naturally embodied joe's pain and emotional subjugation was a welcome surprise. i also really enjoyed his interview with vanity fair and his meditations on playing joe and preparing for the role a lot, not that jacob elordi was necessarily "wrong" for any of his comments (he's just a clown for many different reasons!) but it is nice to see actors who unexpectedly make it past the confines of their trash ya beginnings and still manage to be graceful about the opportunities afforded to them from weathering the system.
i also watched tbosas and then went and did my duty as a media consumer (played a handful of promotional youtube content for the cast on 1.5x speed) and now my recs are overrun with the most RANDOM hunger games stuff i keep having to tell it i'm not interested π i was so shocked that 1) i completely missed the entire rachel zegler snow white controversy before??? and 2) THIS is what she's suddenly universally detested for??? miss rachel has had so many little (at times justified) personality controversies and i thought it would be so much worse but of course it's always the tamest comments that get you crucified by racist misogynists online. good lord the internet landscape...
the problem with me is that i spent half the movie being like wow blond wavy-haired tom blyth is so scorpius coded *__*......... anyway. lowkey the cast dynamic with her bf right there is crasyyyy but i will say nothing more, it was certainly interesting to uncover the vibes for 48 hours until i inevitably stopped caring about the movie again! i also rewatched catching fire and then half of mockingjay pt1 because i was drawing a complete blank on whether i'd actually seen these movies when they came out, but i definitely remember seeing catching fire now and then i think mockingjay pt1 was just so bad that i banished it from my memory afterward. unsure about pt2 though so i may have to continue watching...
my top movie of the month though was the holdovers which i saw in theaters this week π₯° i originally called angus tully clinically depressed finn wolfhard but then felt bad dragging dominic sessa like that so i took it back but goddddd why was angus tully written to appeal to me specifically. my new benji ovich :( i'm just a cynical bastard having a terrible time and i like watching other cynical bastards have a terrible time on screen as well but in of course an emotionally meaningful and narratively redemptive manner!
writing & reading > it's been rough i won't lie... the only things i seem to be able to read these past few months are sports books and gay graphic novels but as always c'est comme Γ§a. the other problem is that the only fic draft i have atm that i actually feel serious about working on is just a silly little 814 fic, except i really want it out of the way just so i can have it done because i'm not someone who writes regularly and i don't like having drafts hanging around. this is why everything i write is so awful because i do not trust in the process and i just want to finish everything as quickly as possible..... however in general i am struggling through so much X To Doubt about like 1) writing in general (because i'm bad at it), 2) writing sports rpf (not because i think it's cringe but just because i feel like i'm incapable of Doing It Right by fandom consensus lol), and then 3) writing 814 specifically (because they are a moderately big ship now and my introversion does not agree with decently sized fandoms. i get nervous and self-conscious π₯²). plus within 814 it's also like, i am comfortable writing 81 pov and can explore his character easily enough but i keep getting the biggest reality checks trying to induce any sincerity in 4 whatsoever even though i do think he has a lot of it, it just doesn't really work in the realm of GayFic that well for me LOL. i feel like his personality is something i can discuss candidly in casual posts because i do appreciate isolated manifestations of his interiority but there's a difference between pinpointing these moments now and then and then actively trying to contextualize them into a character capable of sustained romantic behavior for ao3 fanfiction π© why is it easier to write gayfic for a boring straight man than it is for a neurotic bisexual mess i honestly don't know the answer to that...
anyway. of course it does not matter. IT IS LITERALLY ALL SO STUPID!!! but i think reading a properly good book again could help with at least getting out of the pure writing rut. i don't know... why do i continue writing fic every year even though i hate everything i write so much???????? i feel like i need to learn to give things up to god and stop revisiting hobbies that do nothing but force me to reflect on my endless deficits. hm!
oh but i AM finally reattempting the you know what fic and i'm officially 200 chapters in. not even halfway yet but i want to catch up so badly now... i'll have you know that they've finally successfully adopted a child. it's getting Serious
misc. > some Bideo........
i really really enjoyed this alex appearance on high performance from last month. the bit about being forced into an act of selflessness that didn't "agree" with him was probably my favorite, but the general reflection on being rushed into the red bull seat, the constant desperation to prove himself and most of all treating karting and motorsport as much more of a relaxed hobby when he was younger up until his mother went to jail and he was suddenly no longer privy to his childhood privileges was all really interesting. imo alex is capable of being vulnerable in a very eloquent and efficient manner, and to hear him directly impart that he only developed his competitive drive out of necessity was a fascinating insight that i don't think a lot of athletes would be willing to candidly give up (the nature vs nurture of it all!). i fear that i personally subscribe to some mildly controversial red bull opinions (i.e. i am not as strongly against many of its machinations as most people are) which i mostly try to keep to myself, but there's a lot to chew on here re: lacking an early support system and delineating the struggle as ultimately being not "having bad moments" but rather "going an extended period of time without a single good moment", which i think very much parallels logan's rookie experience and makes it mildly fascinating that alex unintentionally complicated the year for him by contrasting it with his most mentally resilient season yet lol. alex is interesting because i think he understands logan's struggle very deeply from living through similar setbacks alongside max and is an "empathetic" person by nature but he is also not interested in relating his past experiences to another person's failures any more than necessary. i guess there is a nice/kind dichotomy you could argue he and oscar embody similar approaches to. i have to think about it more... the many ways he diverges from lando despite the both of them having similar base approaches to Mental Sports Coaching are quite interesting.
games > i am playing pikmin 4... π the only highlight of my life right now. barely halfway done but it's just the right difficulty level for me (read: very easy and methodical) so i'm enjoying myself!
anyway i'll stop here. happy holidays everyone, things never seem to be easy but i hope december is kind to you all and that 2024 is even better...
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Date: 2023-12-08 09:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-12-08 10:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-12-09 01:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-12-09 06:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-12-08 11:43 pm (UTC)- very excited to listen to your curated kpop 2024 playlist... i know u were in the trenches (i was also, briefly, in the trenches)
- i wanna rewatch spvtw but then i don't feel like i would watch the adaptation... what do you think.
- i want to watch may december and the holdovers now but i'm glad we watched thg for Cultural rzns
- re: 814 i feel that so much. fascinating how the peak of content creation is like the age of 20 because you're decent enough to get an audience but not experienced enough to feel excessive shame about the quality of your work... but all i want to do is write something else before 2023 ends and i'm still naively hoping it will be 814
- don't have a lot to add on the videos i haven't watched but that i'm thankful you digest them for the unfamiliar reader
- asked my brother if he has pikmin 4 (he doesn't.... but i just read a lot of praise about it bc of the award it won)
no subject
Date: 2023-12-09 06:11 am (UTC)re: scott pilgrim movie the anime is very very different plotwise and i think rewatching the movie is a good basis to have before you start it!! they're like separate enough but still connected on a weird meta level that you'll get later so i'd recommend rewatching the movie first if you want to, although i also haven't watched the movie in a few years so we could stream that together if you're interested :') just lmk
AS ALWAYS CHEERING ON YOUR WRITING EFFORTS BUT YOU ALREADY KNOW THAT. and if you were able to sit through an hour of mfing dax shepard then i think you would enjoy & appreciate the alex interview, def recommend if you have the time T__T youtube recced me new zbrown podcast today and in the first 2 minutes he already started oversharing about his taste in hockey teams... so cursed. i will listen to the rest later though since this is the duty of a mcl shill...........
and i saw that about pikmin 4! i've actually read criticisms that the game mechanics are Too Kind and Forgiving lol but i like it that way and oatchi is such a fun character. i also quite enjoyed pikmin 3 though
no subject
Date: 2023-12-12 05:39 pm (UTC)watched the alex and margot/cillian videos during one of my long shifts :') and i do wanna try pikmin 4 hopefully it goes on sale or something
no subject
Date: 2023-12-18 06:08 pm (UTC)