I really enjoy writing about my favorite things each month - it helps me remember what I was enjoying at certain times in my life and maybe introduces someone to a movie/book/game/show that they’ll like - but sheesh, it constantly feels weird to talk about fun movies and books when there is so much sadness and anger in the news every day. I had a little intro written where I talked about how great it was to have books and movies that exceeded my expectations in March and April, and then my brain instantly went into guilt mode for being happy when so many things are bad. It’s a weird mental road to navigate. But I think it’s important to find joy where you can, especially when things are dark, and writing my silly little blog about things that make me happy hopefully puts a speck of positivity into the universe.
MOVIES & TV
Our Flag Means Death
Led by Taika Waititi and Rhys Darby, I expected Our Flag Means Death to be a very silly pirate show, but it ended up being a very silly pirate show that is also a surprisingly genuine and sweet love story. The show follows super fictionalized versions of actual pirates Steed Bonnet and Blackbeard. Steed is a wealthy gentleman and a dandy, who is not at all cut out for pirate life yet persists at trying to be a pirate. His comically chaotic crew is equally unprepared for actual piracy. After bumbling their way through a few adventures, Steed draws the eye of the infamous pirate Blackbeard, who shows up intending to kill Steed and take over the ship, but ends up befriending the crew and falling in love. I desperately hope OFMD gets a second season since it ends on a major cliffhanger. (HBO Max)
Everything Everywhere All At Once
This movie is bananas. It’s simultaneously the emotional story of Evelyn, a frazzled Chinese American woman (played by the excellent Michelle Yeoh) learning to value her family and deconstruct generational stigmas while trying to get her taxes filed, a dimension-crossing sci-fi adventure involving a cosmic bagel, and a martial arts action epic. There are a couple scenes where the weirdness goes a bit overboard and detracts from the story (thinking of one fight in particular) but for the most part all these elements work really well together. Also Ke Huy Quan, who plays Evelyn’s optimistic and warm-hearted husband, is wonderful and steals every scene he is in.
The Batman
Batman adaptations that I tend to like best are ones set in a surreal sort of Gotham - I’m far more willing to suspend my disbelief and let things slide when the action is taking place somewhere that doesn’t seem real. This may be one of the reasons I enjoyed The Batman so much. Instead of grounding the action in reality, The Batman is set in a dark, stylized, rain-soaked noir city - the claustrophobic vibes reminded me a lot of David Fincher’s Seven. The action of the movie follows a young, obsessive caped crusader as he tries to solve a mysterious string of gruesome murders and learns that “vengeance” is not the best motivation. Robert Pattinson makes an enjoyably melancholy and messed up Batman who has a good character arc, and the supporting cast is great. I’m glad I saw it in the theatre and have enjoyed watching it again on streaming.
Heartstopper
Heartstopper is one of my favorite graphic novel/comic series so I figured going in to this Netflix adaptation that it probably wouldn’t live up to all my expectations. Yet somehow it exceeded them? I planned to watch one or two episodes before bed and ended up binging the entire season in a single sitting (and have watched it a few more times since then). Heartstopper is the story of two boys falling in love in high school: Charlie Spring is out and dealing with depression and bullying; Nick is the king of the rugby team and really confused about his growing crush on his friend. The two leads, Kit Conner and Joe Locke who play Nick and Charlie, are wonderful and so are the other young actors who round out their friend group. Heartstopper may not hit you the way it hit me, but this show was exactly what I needed at exactly the right time. It makes my heart happy. (Netflix)
BOOKS
So This Is Ever After by F.T. Lukens
Speaking of things that make my heart happy. So This Is Ever After follows a group of D&D-style adventurers who set out to fulfill a prophecy and defeat the evil ruler of their kingdom. The book starts immediately after they do the defeating, with our protagonist Arek unceremoniously removing the ruler’s head from his body. In need of a temporary ruler until a captured princess can be rescued, Arek briefly puts on the king’s crown and accidentally becomes the kingdom’s new ruler through magical shenanigans. With this royalty comes a caveat: the king must choose a partner by his 18th birthday, which for Arek is just a few months away, or he will literally fade out of existence. This mandate is extra complicated because Arek is hopelessly in love with Matt, his best friend and the group’s sorcerer, but they’re both teenagers who are awful about expressing their feelings. So the two end up ignoring what is right in front of them and instead work together to try and set up meet-cutes with their other friends so Arek can fall in love with someone. Of course, things don’t go as planned and each meet-cute just keeps putting Arek and Matt in closer proximity. F.T. Lukens lovingly plays with genre tropes and romance standards in ways that constantly made me giggle and smile throughout the book and the familiarity of the situations make things so much more entertaining when they are subverted. (fantasy/adventure/romance)
All The Feels by Olivia Dade
All The Feels is the second book in Olivia Dade’s charming Spoiler Alert romance series, following actors from Gods of the Gates (a very direct fictionalization of Game of Thrones) as they try to navigate the very bad final season of the show. ATF is about Alex, a charismatic chaos sunshine man who plays Cupid on the show and has a very hard time controlling impulsive behavior. After getting into a bar fight in the last few weeks of filming, the directors hire Lauren to be his 24-7 companion and keep him out of trouble until the final episode airs. Close proximity leads to begrudging friendship, begrudging friendship leads to romance. I really like both of the main characters in this one and really appreciate how well Dade writes confident, plus-size women. (romance)
The Forgotten Dead by Jordan L Hawk
While there is a little bit of a romance in this one, The Forgotten Dead is mostly a solid and entertaining ghost story that successfully creeped me the heck out. Haunted house stories always get me. Parapsychologist Nigel is desperately trying to get grant money so he can continue his research at a prestigious university, but when he finds a donor, the funds come with a catch: he has to investigate a haunted house with a ghost hunting group from the internet. Complications arise (of course) because Nigel has a personal connection to the house and Oscar, the host of Outfoxing the Paranormal, can actually see ghosts. A very entertaining story featuring a trans protagonist written by a trans author. (paranormal)
Real Hero Shit by Kendra Wells
Another fun D&D-esque adventure story, this time in graphic novel form, following a ridiculously pampered prince who decides on a whim to join an adventuring party and go on a quest. Said adventuring party isn’t thrilled to add the loud, constantly upbeat prince to their group, but he’s their only option. This is a short comic which focuses more on the characters than the quest itself, but that works since I liked all the characters so much and Kendra Wells’ art is wonderful and expressive. I really hope we get to join these characters on further adventures. (fantasy adventure/graphic novel)
The Heart Hunter by Mickey George and V. Gagnon
The Heart Hunter takes place on a cursed island where people’s hearts live outside their bodies and everyone is immortal until they meet their soul mate. Some have grown so afraid of meeting a partner and losing immortality that they hire special hunters to find and destroy the hearts of potential soul mates. This is situation for Psyche, a Heart Hunter, who is hired by the king who keeps sending hunters to destroy his soul mate but none have returned. The Heart Hunter is surreal and allegorical - people literally “wear their hearts on their sleeves” and “mend broken hearts” - but if you can get on board with that, I found the story and art really interesting and memorable. (fantasy adventure/graphic novel)
A Marvelous Light by Freya Marske
When Robin, a very minor baronet who inherited a worthless estate, is moved to a new office in his civil service job, he doesn’t realize there was a mix-up. Instead of being just another bureaucratic assignment, he has accidentally been set up as the liaison between the government and a secret society of magic. His counterpart in the magical world, Edwin, is anxious to get the problem fixed and have Robin replaced with someone who actually knows about magic, but before that can happen Robin is struck by an increasingly dangerous curse and the two set out on a journey to Edwin’s family estate to find out what happened to the previous liaison. A Marvelous Light is both a magical adventure story and a romance and has a neat take on magic. It was one of those books I was literally reading in every moment of free time I could find. (paranormal romance)
Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher
Nettle & Bone is fairy tale through and through - princes and princesses, witches, quests, magic, it’s all there - yet it feels distinctly original and very, very Kingfisher. When her older sister is married to the prince of a neighboring kingdom, princess Marra is sent to a convent to keep her from having children that could inherit power. This is fine with Marra because she has no interest in the machinations of royalty. But after the birth of her niece, Marra discovers that the prince is an abusive tyrant and no one is willing to help save her sister from violence because of the tenuous political situation between the kingdoms. So Marra seeks the help of a gravewitch, who sets her on a quest to complete three impossible tasks in order to gain the power to kill the prince. As this is a T. Kingfisher book, Marra is of course joined on this quest by a number of great characters, including a possessed chicken, a disgraced noble knight, a dog made from bones, and a flighty fairy godmother. A great combination of dark drama and light humor that I loved reading. (dark fiction)
MUSIC
Apparently what was needed to break me out of three months all-Orville-Peck-all-the-time was a bunch of upbeat synth-pop from the Heartstopper soundtrack. Every five minutes I was pausing the show to look up another song. In particular, “Colors of You” by Baby Queen and “Clearest Blue” by Chvrches have been on solid rotation. I made a whole playlist if you want some fun jams.
I’ve also had Florence + The Machine’s “Free” on a loop as well - it has a similar vibe to the Heartstopper music, so i’ve clearly been in a certain mood. 😂
ART
I got 13 new pieces done for my show at Gallery 9, which was hard but rewarding. It’s been a struggle to keep hold of creativity recently, with so much going on in the world and a bunch of new responsibilities at work.
