The Great Hunt (Book 2) – Chapter 18: “To the White Tower”

The Wheel of Time - Book 2 - The Great Hunt

The crew of Aes Sedai and their ships cruise down the river toward Tar Valon. Nynaeve is below the deck, seasick as all get-out. Seasick and belligerent. Egwene tells her that she keeps having dreams about Rand and impending Doom, but she doesn’t know the nature of the Doom in question. Unless it’s the computer game, which is still as fucking awesome today as it was 30 years ago! Play it next time you get a chance, it’s way better than The Great Hunt!

What? Where was I? Siuan the Amyrlin strolls on into the cabin to deliver their daily lesson. Perhaps its the seasickness, but Nynaeve is extra ornery and doesn’t want to waste her time doing piddling Aes Sedai magicks. She’d rather use a sword or maybe play basketball. Siuan tells her to sit down and shut the fuck up or else she’ll be mopping floors and washing dishes as a Novice in the White Tower. Cork it.

Siuan then proceeds to channel the One Power to hold Egwene and Nynaeve still, exemplifying that swords cannot counter such as THAT. Nynaeve continues to be obstinate, so Siuan lifts her up into the air and pisses Nynaeve off to the point where she causes Siuan to fly backwards into the cabin wall. Egwene is horrified. Siuan is impressed. Nynaeve thinks she has the upper hand now, but Siuan is able to cut off her One Power channeling. Siuan releases Nynaeve and they continue with their lesson (Aes Sedai fractions and decimals).

Since Nynaeve is a big ol’ butthead, Siuan exploits her tendency to get angry in order to goad her into channeling. Nyaneve’s mood does not improve when Siuan leaves, but at least they made it to Tar Valon, so now they can peruse the city’s exorbitant amount of black market human organs and cans of silly string. Shortly after disembarking the ship, Egwene and Nynaeve are approached by an Aes Sedai named Sheriam. The Master of Novices. She’s like a Master of Puppets except a little less thrashy, though she does have wild red hair.

Egwene is to meet the other novices in the tower. Sheriam tells Nynaeve that the first few weeks on the road to being Accepted really fucking sucks, so have fun with that. See you on the other side, bitch.


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Runaways (Vol. 1), Issue #4 – “Pride and Joy (Chapter 4)”

* Part 4 of 6 of the Pride and Joy storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Runaways (Vol. 1) Issue #4 – “Pride and Joy (Chapter 4)”! In the previous installment, Gert is able to tame the hidden dinosaur because it was genetically engineered to do so, having been lifted from the 87th dimension from her parents and whatnot. A hologram recording of Gert’s folks, designed to be watched upon their deaths, reveals to her the tome, known as the Abstract, hidden within the basement walls. It needs to be decoded, and the next lead is at Karolina’s house.

While at the Dean residence looking for the magic decoder ring, Karolina rips off a medical bracelet she has been wearing since she was four years old, and then learns she can fly! That’s exciting.

Also, the cops are in on all this. After an unsuccessful attempt by Alex to get the police involved on their side, one Lieutenant Flores calls Mr. Wilder to inform him that they have a problem on their hands. All hell of such as whoops.

Maybe they can get Karolina to fly over Mr. Wilder and dump a bucket of baked beans over his head like it’s Nickelodeon.

Runaways (Vol. 1), Issue #4 [October, 2003]
Written by: Brian K. Vaughan
“Pride and Joy (Chapter 4)”

Runaways (Vol. 1) Issue #4

THE WILDER RESIDENCE – 4:25am

Mr. Wilder holds an ornate knife behind his back as he enters Alex’s bedroom. “You asleep, pal?” Ha! Mr. Wilder’s name is Geoffrey. Like the Toys R Us giraffe! How simply adorable.

He’s not going to hurt his son, he just wants to convince him that the “sacrifice” that he witnessed was no more than an illusion! And—whoops, he’s not in his bed. He must be traipsing around L.A. with his snotty, rich friends. The bed, instead, has a male mannequin head. Something his mother finds discomforting.

“Alex is somewhere out there, and he knows the truth about us!” Geoffrey panics, but Mrs. Wilder assures him that Alex might not know anything! He might know his way around his own dick, but it seems unlikely that he knows everything about the two of them.

Pffft. Yeah right. “My minion inside the LAPD said that Alex reported a homicide. He mentioned our group by name.” Geoffrey’s getting upset! And if the rest of The Pride finds out about this, they’re going to wring Mr. Geoffrey Wilder’s fat neck with a belt.

THE DEAN RESIDENCE – 4:28am

Karolina flies around her backyard glowing like the alien that she is. “WHEEEEEEEE!” Huge smile on her face. I’m fucking jealous and I see people fly in comic books constantly. Must be the COMING-OF-AGE part of things.

“Stop messing around, Karolina!” Alex yells, clearly jealous. “Someone’s gonna see you!”

Don’t care! Dooonnn’t care! Flying is great! It’s like fuckin’, only with more orgasms! And–

Karolina, not paying attention, slams right into Chase’s butt, knocking him down. He hides his boner while Nico asks her how what flying feels like. I was pretty much right about the fuckin’.

Runaways (Vol. 1), Issue #4

Hang it up, freak. We’ve got police officers to start whacking.

Alex wants her to put the bracelet back on against her wishes. “That bracelet turns off your lightshow. And right now, we can’t have you floating around like an oversized Tinkerbell.”

Bitterly, Karolina puts her bracelet back on. Alex reminds her that she doesn’t know what her parents might be capable of, so they need to stay under the radar. Gert really wants to go get Molly and finally include her in all this. If nothing else, she’s probably safer with them than at her house right now. So who wants to fill her in on the evil parents thing? Not it!

“How are supposed to pretty much abduct Molly in the middle of the night without her freaking out?” Alex tries to think while Chase bugs him about going back to his place first. “I want to see what cool stuff is stashed at my house.”

Alex resists. Chase persists and plays the “we need more clues” card. “My place is on the way to Molly’s. We’ll just check my old man’s workshop for bloody gloves or whatever, and then be on our way… cool?”

Fine. Maybe they’ll find saltpeter to curb Chase’s boner for the flying girl. That’ll be worth it on its own.

Gert suddenly screams. She had this strange feeling that they were all being watched, but Karolina assures her that her parents are gone and that the mansion is paparazzi-proof. MAKE A NOTE OF THIS, IT’S OBVIOUSLY IMPORTANT. You can’t go through a mystery story without someone being watched.

The red herring here is that it’s Gert’s escaped velociraptor, who actually is watching them, but I bet there’s something else too. Like Gary Busey just running stark naked through the bushes.

THE STEIN RESIDENCE – 4:55am

Chase points to an old shed in their backyard. “They know I think their work is insanely boring, so it’s probably where they’d hide stuff from me.” While they all deliberate upon how to open the locked shed clandestinely, Chase grabs a shovel and cracks it the fuck open. “You guys think too much.”

The shed is full of mechanical equipment and metal artifacts. “What do your parents do, Chase?” Karolina asks, checking out what appear to be dismantled robot parts. They’re engineers that made a lot of money inventing “that thing that lets you open up new CDs without ripping your fingernails off”. So, what, a plastic wrapper?

The are machines that look like gas chambers. There are incubation tubes with body parts floating in liquid. There are fancy x-ray goggles that allow Chase to see the girls in their underwear.

Runaways (Vol. 1), Issue #4

They allow you access to the top of the National Sex Offender Registry list.

“Take those off this instant, young man. You are grounded until graduation.”

Chase’s parents, along with the Minorus, What are they doing here? Look, kids, they don’t have to explain themselves to shit… but they will anyway. The Wilders called everyone to see where his dipshit son went, and they all found out their own kids were missing too. “What are you doing in Mr. Stein’s workshop?” Mrs. Minoru asks, finger pointing at her goth daughter. “Are you making ecstasy?”

Ha! They wish! Some ecstasy sounds really refreshing right now. The Steins are all like FUN’S OVER, BEDWETTERS. Everyone out!

“Or what, Pop?” Chase taunts. “You’ll use some of our scary toys on us?” He holds up a couple of gun-type items that sure look like scary toys to me. “He has the Fistigons,” Mrs. Stein whispers to her husband. “If he figures out how to weaponize them…”

Nope, not today! Mr. Stein presses a couple of buttons on his fancy 2003 Apple Watch prototype thing and blasts his son with yellowish green rays of energy.

“Guys, get ready for Tinkerbell!” Alex rips off Karolina’s bracelet. She goes full-on Tinkerbell.

“Dammit!” Mr. Minoru grunts, shielding his eyes. “They know about the Dean girl!”

“We know about everything, Mr. Minoru,” Alex says like a complete doofus. “We… we know who you people really are.”

“Oh, I highly doubt that, child,” says Mrs. Minoru as all four adults get geared up.

Then they bust out the big guns.

Runaways (Vol. 1), Issue #4

Have a drink, children! BWAAHAHAHAHA!!!

Mr. Minoru hits Karolina with a geyser. Mr. Stein shoots some sort of sticky green Spider-Man goo at Alex to pin him against a chamber. Mrs. Minoru tries to keep her daughter at bay with a Donatello bō staff. The staff gets sucked into her body, which alarms her mother. The Staff of One! That’s not supposed to happen to the Staff of One! Oh god, the Staff of One! Nooooo!! The Staff of One!

Then Nico smashes the side of her face with a robot head. Mr. Minoru is understandably less than pleased at his daughter’s insolence! He’ll take care of her while Mr. Stein takes care of Gert. She’s huddled in the corner begging for help, and she gets in the form of a genetically engineered, telepathic velociraptor buddy! Hooray! Mr. Minoru tries to kill it, but Nico bats his book of spells out of his hand.

Karolina comes crashing back down from her geyser ride and forces her incandescent energy to one finger, zapping Minoru and incapacitating him. “It worked! Is… is he all right?” I hope not. That guy makes Nico eat her vegetables.

While Karolina fingers Alex off the wall, Gert instructs her dinosaur buddy to not kill the Steins. Only maul them for a bit.

Alex grabs the unconscious Chase while Nico sadly tears at her knocked-out parents. “I’m sorry, Nico, but we have to let them go. We need to take care of each other now, okay?” He holds her by the shoulders and maintains a nice erection buffer distance.

With Chase out of commission, it’s up to Karolina to try driving them to the hospital so that the doctors can try extracting the Staff of One from her body. I guess.

SAN BERNARDINO FREEWAY – 5:31am

Runaways (Vol. 1), Issue #4

Beep beep! Out of my way, I’m a motorist!

Chase slowly comes to in the backseat, which he’s sharing with Alex, Gert, and Gert’s bigger-than-a-van sized dinosaur buddy. “I don’t know what you remember, Chase, but your father assaulted you,” Alex tells him pointedly, like a he didn’t already get punched in the face 10 hours ago. “I probably had it coming,” he responds, clearly the product of abuse. Hilarious abuse! But seriously, if you are or a loved one is experiencing domestic abuse, then please call the hotline at–

Sorry! I got distracted! The issue ends with the Yorkes’ and the Hayes’ hovering over Molly’s bed while she sleeps soundly in a nightcap like she’s motherfuckin’ Geppetto. Gert’s phone rings…

“Gertrude? Your father and I are very disappointed in you. You have to stop playing these games… or I’m afraid we’ll have no choice but to do something terrible to your young friend Molly.”

Final Thoughts

ABLAHAB! BALHABAAB!! MOLLY, WAKE UP AND GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE!! BHLUHBALABAUH!! And so forth.


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Fray, Issue #8 – “Chapter Eight: All Hell”

* Part 8 of 8 of the Fray limited series *

Welcome to Buffyness and Nightlurkers Presents: Fray, Issue #8 – “Chapter Eight: All Hell”! We’ve reached the end of this fantastic miniseries! I hope everything works out well for all parties involved! In the previous installment, Melaka Frays gears up for battle and finds out there are many who are willing to fight the good fight alongside, including the folks from the warren AND the police! Even the police! Those guys hate doing anything, so that really must mean something.

Harth has awoken a whole army of vampires and demons from the dead, and they outnumber Fray’s people about 1,000 to 1. Not only that, but Harth himself swoops into town on a giant demon dinosaur. The all-knowing Urkonn realizes that the Gateway is in the dinosaur’s womb, and it’s ready to give birth to a dimension full of demons! The time for the evil ones to return to Earth is nigh!

Then Melaka gets eaten by the dinosaur. The end.

Fray, Issue #8 [August, 2002]
Written by: Joss Whedon
“Chapter Eight: All Hell”

Fray, Issue #8

“I’m just one girl. No big hero, no protector of justice, not even a bonafide one-hundred-percent Slayer.”

Fray catches us all up on the goings-on of the debacle that is the Rage Against the Lurks. She struggles to keep from being swallowed by the dinosaur, and its breath smells like Ed Sheeran’s hair so she’s struggling not to breathe in. Its saliva is burning her clothes. With effort, she grips her axe and plunges it hard through the roof of the creature’s mouth, up into the brain.

Erin looks on in horror while Broder radios in. He needs her to make a call quickly before the fire-breathing dinosaur fries the warren to a crispy crisp. Erin’s catatonic with fear. Harth rides the beast like he’s on a surfboard.

Urkonn is ripping Lurks to shreds while his mind reels. “The Slayer is gone,” he thinks. “The Gateway is opening. Hell’s own womb will disgorge the horde. And they will eat this Earth.”

Sounds pretty dramatic, Urkel. Chill. Smoke this blunt. Settle down.

Meanwhile, Harth and Erin have a little family reunion.

Fray, Issue #8

No, not the spiked cleats! Have mercy!

Harth stomps Erin’s face with so much force that I’m surprised she’s not fucking dead. “It’s so right that you’re here. That you should die here with Mel, the whole family together…”

Loo’s parents are becoming overwhelmed by the vampires. They’re planning on murder/suiciding their way out of this, which is exactly how I got out of jury duty last year! The suicide part, not the murder part.

“I loved the way you blamed Mel for my death. The way you shut her out. Was it rocketship, watching her bleed for your love…” Harth is now gripping her throat, tossing out tubular slang like “rocketship”. “How did watching her die feel? Big rush? Little rush? One to ten.”

I’m beginning to think this Harth guy ain’t no good at all! I was going to give him the benefit of the doubt, but he’s at two strikes now. He doesn’t want to know what happens when we get to Strike Three.

Suddenly, there’s a giant “HHHRRAAARGH!!” The dinosaur flails and slams its head into a few of the taller buildings. Then, like the alien bursting out of that guy’s chest, Fray bursts right out of this reptilian fucker’s eyeball. Splorch, etc. “Hey guys,” she says, covered in orange goo. The dinosaur crashes to the ground as people leap out of the way. Erin lands on her head and gets knocked out cold.

“Melaka… you think this is over?” Harth doesn’t look particularly happy that his dinosaur buddy just ate it. “You closed the Gateway. Saved the warren. Maybe even all of Haddyn. Maybe the world. You’ll never guess what’s coming next.

And yeah, neither did I.

Fray, Issue #8

Ahhh, good old fashioned twincest. Totally rocketship. Jaime and Cersei would be proud.

The baffled Melaka Fray watches as her brother dashes off into an alley, disappearing among the shadows. The dinosaur creature having been successfully subdued, Broder calls in for med teams to help the injured. Head trauma Erin gets whisked away in a flying ambulance. Loo’s parents didn’t kill themselves after all. Not at all an unsettling end to the battle, that’s for sure.

“He’ll not be able to draw force like this again,” Urkonn says of Harth. “Not for years at best. It’s over.”

“No it’s not,” Fray responds. There’s still some unfinished Gunther business to attend to. (with Gunther)

*intermission*

*Doublemint gum commercial where the twins kiss*

“Melahhhka, please, be sssensible,” Gunther hisses while Fray threatens the glass floor with her axe. He swears that he had no idea who Fray was grabbing for, honest to the sea monster god. “When I found out who they were buying for, and why they asked for you… I tried to warn you!”

Fray finds this funny. She doesn’t remember any warnings. “That’s why I paid you sssooo handsomely, so you would know something was wrong.” Again, flimsy. “You turned me into the Laws,” she spits back. “To keep you ssssafe!” Gunther responds. Flimsy, flimsy, flimsy.

This ain’t even about Harth. Ain’t about Erin. It ain’t even about Melaka. It’s about Loo. “Little girl. Friend of mine. She was killed. That’s gotta be answered for.”

And it’s not Gunther. It’s not even Ed Sheeran and his stinky hair. Someone else was responsible for this little girl’s death. Someone else caused this to happen.

“You did.” Fray turns her head, eyeballing the culprit. “Vampires can’t come in unless you ask ‘em. I sure as hell never did. And they didn’t feed.”

Urkonn looks shifty.

Fray surmises that training wasn’t going well. That Vrill and Boluz needed to be reassured that the Chosen One was going to be able to rise into action when the time came. “So you snapped a five-year-old’s neck ‘cause, hey, you’re a demon, right? What’s one small human life, we got a war coming! Am I right?”

Urkonn looks shifty.

…

“We would have lost,” he responds simply.

Well, that’s hunky dory! Thank you for explaining yourself, good sir, and – what in tarnation?! Wait a dagnabbed minute! That reason sucks!

Fray, Issue #8

There aren’t very good panels in this issue. Have this one.

This wasn’t the only thing Fray figured out. She also noticed that Urkonn never gave her a hand every time she was thrown into the river. He didn’t follow Icarus when he dove into the water. Hell, he didn’t even want to go through the sewers, a direct beeline to Harth’s Vampire HQ. “You’re a powerful demon, I know. A great warrior. Could snap me in two. Someone gave you orders to. Could pull apart any living man…”

“…but I don’t think you can swim.”

HOTCHA! With all her might, Fray breaks her axe through the glass under Urkonn’s hoofy feet. She drops in and drags him with her down through Gunther’s corridor to the other side of the glass case. They crash through into the next room, with Gunther following suit all flip-floppin’ and gasping for air.

“He was a good teacher. Even a friend. For a friend, I make it quick.”

SHHHNK. Pointy stick right through the head. Bye bye, Urkel. Then Fray picks Gunther up and throws him back into what’s left of the water in the tank. “Vixen,” he rasps. “Mammal. I hate you.” But he can’t do anything about it, can he? Fray’s the best grabber he’s got! Watch this grab! *grabs his junk*

Elsewhere, Urkonn’s bosses have a little pow-wow:

“She lives,” says Boluz. “She wins for us, closes the Gateway, but she lives.”

“As does her brother,” Vrill agrees, “danger to us in many configurations.”

“Urkonn will be unremembered. Stricken from our warrior’s books for his failure to end her.”

“As usual, you fixate on the unimportant. The girl. We have to watch the girl. For a while she will be busied… rebuilding.”

The folk of the warren clean up the mess.

Erin wakes up in the hospital next to a sleeping Melaka.

“She may even continue her old life. But she has found a new one. And as long as she heeds its call… they’ll be watching.”

“The demons, Harth… things I don’t even know about yet. They’ll all be waiting,” Fray thinks, closing up the story! “Waiting for me to fall.”

“So come on, guys. I’m just one girl. No big hero, no protector of justice, not even a bonafide one-hundred-percent Slayer. So what are you waiting for?”

“Take me on. Hurt my world.”

*burp*

“I dare you.”

Final Thoughts

Kind of anticlimactic, no? Melaka busts through the lizard’s eyeball, the beast dies, and Harth runs away into the shadows like a little bitch (after kissing his sister)? And the threat is neutralized for years to come?

Urkonn killing the girl was a surprise. I’m glad he got got, yo.

And so ends the beginning of my long, long Buffyverse project. Stay tuned, much more is on the way.


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Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1 – “Book I: Vader (Part 1)”

* Part 1 of 6 of the Book I: Vader storyline *

Welcome to Ghostliness & Nerfherders Presents: Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1 – “Book I: Vader (Part 1)”!

This is the companion series to Marvel’s Star Wars comic series! Both introduce the reader to the wonderful world of canon Star Wars comics. While the other one is about Star Wars, this one is about Darth Vader! Take notes, there will be a quiz.

As a quick recap of the first Star Wars comic series storyline, Luke Skywalker had blown up the Death Star recently. Han, Leia, Luke, Chewie, and the droids blow up the largest weapons factory in the galaxy, which puts the Empire hot on their heels. Luke fucks back off to Tatooine after getting some Jedi-related discouragement while Han and Leia outrun Imperial officers and attempt to find a new planet for their Rebel base.

In the end, Luke fights Boba Fett and wins, somehow. He discovers a journal of Ben Kenobi. Han and Leia end up on a pretty nice-ass planet, but Sana Solo, Han’s wife, shows up to give him the business.

Will any of this tie into this series? Probably not. But at least you’ve been thoroughly enriched with knowledge!

(no)

Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1 [April, 2015]
Written by: Kieron Gillen
“Book I: Vader (Part 1)”

Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1

Classic intimidating Vader pose! Lightsaber parallel to the floor. Left foot atop a makeshift stump. Consider me thoroughly awed.

ANYWAY, the introductory splash page informs me that the Death Star was destroyed by pesky members of the Rebel Alliance! The Death Star! The ultimate peacekeeping force! NOOOOOO!! Ha, that’s an Episode III reference! Anyway, Emperor Palpatine is Palpa-FURIOUS and Darth Vader must pay the price. And our story begins…

Vader is on Tatooine with the two suns and all. He approaches what looks like a smattering a ruins guarded by a couple of those guard pig-type piggy creatures. Vader slices them up with his big, red, glowing sword and keeps going.

He approaches one of those creatures with the pink, fleshy tail that curves from their heads to under their chinny chin chins. “I will speak with the Hutt,” Vader says in that booming James Earl Jones voice that we all know and love. Jabba awaits!

The Fat One is sleeping. He sleeps until he is informed that his new arrival “butchered the guards”. Jabba lifts this guy up and eats him. That’ll learn him to be the bearer of bad news. Keep this lesson in mind, kids.

“You arrive a day early, kill two of my guards and expect me to deal with you,” Mr. Slug says, drooling and snorfing. Vader stands there all puffed out and like “LOOK AT ME, I’M THE BOSS!” and states that if Jabba doesn’t grant him the audience he deserves, it’ll be more than just two he’ll be slaughtering today. Eep!

Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1

HUTT HUTT HUTT HUTT HUTT HUTT HIKE!

So Jabba dismisses the peons and asks Vader what he can do for the Empire today. Perhaps a pittance? A big smile and a hug? “Not the Empire. For me,” Vader states pointedly. So a hug it is! A nice, big, squelchy, stinky, Hutt Hug. The best kind.

Vader will return to Huttville on the morrow. He WILL get what he wants. Capisce? Vader tries one of those useless Jedi mind trick hand waves, but Jabba informs the ignorant one that such illusions are no match for the great Hutt slug brains!

How dare you mention Jedi in front of the Dark One? The Jedi are long dead. Fuck ‘em.

“Do you know the bounty the Rebels have for that head of yours?” Jabba asks, changing the subject gracefully. “If you disappeared, no one would ever know…” he continues, hand inching toward that button that sends cocksuckers to the pit-of-gettin’-eaten.

Vader steps back from the trap door.

The two of them continue to exchange lack-of-pleasantries until, finally, Jabba has had enough and commands him men to start shooting harmful lasers! They do. Vader blocks them all. This takes six pages.

Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1

Zip zoom zippity zap. Blam blam blam blam a-zip zoom bippity boom.

In the end, only Jabba and Vader are left standing. Well… Vader is standing. Jabba continues sitting in his own poop.

“You called me a Jedi,” Vader sulks in that trademark Anakin Skywalker whine. “You know nothing. Mind tricks are not of the dark side.”

Yeah yeah, dark side this, dark side that. The only dark side Jabba likes is the one of the moon. Pink Floyd, baby. “MONAAAYYY! IT’S A GAS!”

“You drive a hard bargain,” Jabba concedes, finally chuffed enough to keep this moving along. “It is difficult not to respect that.” And, finally Vader is satisfied.

THE END

But wait, there’s more!

ONE DAY EARLIER – THE IMPERIAL PALACE, CORUSCANT

Vader bows down before Emperor Shithead and tries to explain the whole thing about Rebels blowing up the Cymoon 1 weapons factory thing. “The Rebels were posing as the envoy, and used it to infiltrate the moon. They tortured the Overseer into revealing the base’s codes, they attempted destroying the core reactor.”

Attempted = Succeeded

Palpatine makes a dumb white-face kinda face. What of the Overseer, then? Abbadeen, is it? He’s strapped to a machine, unconscious and all fucked up! That’ll learn him to be the bearer of bad tidings.

Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1

The dictionary defines “failure” as “the failure to succeed”. The dictionary defines “success” as the “the successful subversion of the failure to succeed”. Write this down, it’s important.

OK, so the Overseer won’t fail again. That much is certain. But what about you, Darth Vader, you hapless little weasel you? Vader is speechless at this question. “We kept the skeleton of the Republic for nearly twenty years while the Death Star was constructed. Twenty years, my apprentice,” Palpatine scolds. “All that planning is now a layer of dust orbiting around Yavin…”

Yeah, but, uh, bu- bu- bu- bu- bu- bu- bu- bu-

Palpatine goes on and on about how fucked this whole situation is. All those years in the Galactic Toilet.

“You tagged the Rebel ship with a homing beacon then let the Rebels escape with the Death Star plans. DELIBERATELY.”

“I take responsibility for my actions,” Vader responds, pulling out an old chestnut from the Barely-Apologize Handbook. And then he tries to blame others too, but Palpatine ain’t having THAT. No sir. It’s Vader who will get the ol’ stake up the butthole for this one! “You, an isolated survivor of the greatest military disaster in all my Empire’s history? Oh, you are truly the chosen one, Vader. Chosen to be the one responsible.”

Oh snippity snap, dogg. Vader’s going to have to eat his own butt unless he redeems himself forthwith.

Vader offers to crush the Rebels. Palpatine counteroffers a shut-the-fuck-up. “You think yourself so clever, but have proved yourself a blunt instrument, far better to be wielded than to wield…”

Anyway, make another Death Star! Seacrest out.

Oh yeah, and you have to talk to Jabba the Hutt about something, too. Anything will do. He likes chatting. Make sure he sends an agent to the Core Worlds, otherwise they’ll need scope out the Outer Rim. For what? Who cares! I’m barely paying attention! You have two days. Or three, or whatever! Four? No, two. Two it is. And guess what? Palpatine doesn’t care if you “don’t wanna do it”. Sometimes you gotta talk to the Hutts, you know what I mean? “Besides, Lord Vader…” Palpatine says snakily, “a trip to Tatooine? I’m sure it will be sentimental…”

Some dude arrives looking like a Terminator T-1000 with the robot eye. “Who is this, Master?” Vader asks, feeling a strong case of FOMO. Vader doesn’t get to know, which pisses him off a tad.

Darth Vader (Vol. 1), Issue #1

Certainly not! Here are my dick and balls, at your service.

Palpatine is about ready to smack this twerp in the face. Do you really think you’re in a position to ask questions and expect answers??? Go fuck your whole self, sir. Now then, if there’s nothing else to report, kindly get your ruddy little ass to Tatooine before Palpatine grabs his ol’ hickory stick. Shoo.

Before Vader gets his ruddy little ass to Tatooine, he goes over all the details that he should report. Like, he killed Obi-Wan Kenobi. He knows who destroyed the Death Star. The kid who destroyed the Death Star happens to have his – Vader’s — Anakin’s — lightsaber. All this fun plot-forwarding stuff! But no, Vader keeps it to himself…

…and he leaves…

… *burp* …

Time to go to Tatooine, then. One day later, they arrive upon the shithole with the two really hot suns hanging in the sky. Vader stands, back turned to a man approaching.

“You’re the client,” says the mysterious man. Or woman. Let’s not be cunting sexist.

“I am. And you’re the best Jabba has. Are you bounty hunters up to the challenge,” Vader asks.

“Give us the mission. You’ll see.”

It’s Boba Fett and some really fucked-up looking Wookiee.

There’s this kid named Luke Skywalker, except he doesn’t know his name is Luke Skywalker yet. Go find him, please. He’s on some hunk of junk called the Millennium Falcon. He looks like this: *takes off black helmet to show a fatherly egg face* And please take him alive.

And that’s basically it. Who wants breakfast?

Final Thoughts

I’ll have eggs and bacon and toast with those little packets of jelly. And coffee and hash browns and pancakes and sausage.

Why do they give you so much goddamned breakfast at these restaurants? No wonder I’m morbidly obese.


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The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)

Tagline:
We accept the love we think we deserve.

Wide Release Date:
September 21, 2012

Directed by:
Stephen Chbosky
Screenplay by:
Stephen Chbosky
Based on the Novel by:
Stephen Chbosky
Produced by:
Lianne Halfon, Russell Smith, John Malkovich

Starring:
Logan Lerman
Emma Watson
Ezra Miller
Mae Whitman
Kate Walsh
Dylan McDermott
Joan Cusack
Paul Rudd

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

PREGAME THOUGHTS

I don’t know much about this movie. Based on a book from 1999, the film must have been pretty hyped when it came out because I remember hearing this name everywhere. I had assumed it was some feelgood piece of trash. It wasn’t until later that I realized that the hype was almost certainly around Emma Watson in a starring role separate from the Harry Potter franchise.

I’m going into this expecting a poignant coming-of-age story that will make me feel a slurry of emotions once I’m finished watching it, and I don’t find anything at all wrong with that. I’m also expecting a great performance by Emma Watson slightly tainted by a barely passable American accent. I’ll be keeping a close ear on that one.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Oi, guv’nor! Oi’m from Ameh-ica!

THE 450(ish)-WORD SYNOPSIS

Logan Lerman, who has one of the worst names I’ve ever heard, plays clinically depressed teenager Charlie Kelmeckis. The year is 1991, Charlie has just been discharged from a mental health facility, and, even though Lerman was 20 years old at this time, he’s playing a kid about to enter his freshman year of high school! He’s a little loser, getting picked on and making no friends except Paul Rudd, his Paul Rudd-like English teacher. He keeps having flashbacks of his Aunt Helen and her death on his 7th birthday.

After witnessing high school senior, and known social pariah, Patrick (Ezra Miller) hamming it up during shop class, Charlie decides that he might have a kindred spirit on his hands. He chats him up during a football, where he also meets Patrick’s half-sister Sam (Emma Watson). They get friendly, they go to homecoming, Charlie gets invited to a party where he eats weed brownies and his inhibitions melt away. Charlie officially joins Patrick and Sam’s social circle with welcome arms. There’s a part where the kids listen to David Bowie’s “Heroes” while driving and Sam stands up through the sunroof. There’s also a part where Charlie catches Patrick and the high school quarterback, Brad, making out. Charlie is cool with it and promises to keep it a secret.

Going forward, there are a lot of coming-of-age vignettes, both touching and sad. Charlie helps Sam study for the SATs. Charlie has never been kissed, so she kisses him. Charlie fills in for Sam’s boyfriend at the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Charlie enters a relationship with a member of the social circle, Mary Elizabeth (Mae Whitman), which is almost entirely one-sided. During a game of Truth or Dare, Charlie kisses Sam when dared to kiss the prettiest girl in the room, which alienates him from the group for a while. Brad gets his ass kicked by his dad after he was caught having sex with Patrick, which causes Brad and his friends to lash out at Patrick (and Charlie saves the day). Patrick is all fucked up from this and, in a moment of poor thinking, decides to kiss Charlie. Charlie doesn’t get upset at this, but Patrick feels awful about it and apologizes. Charlie is eventually forgiven for the Truth or Dare incident and everyone makes up. Sam and Charlie make out in her bedroom; they essentially fall in love.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

They probably had to redo this scene 100 times just to make sure there wasn’t a single hint of disgust on Charlie’s face.

Once the summer is over and Sam goes away to college, Charlie falls back into a deep depression. He calls his sister and says some very alarming things to her. She calls the police, he’s whisked away to the hospital. There he learns that his Aunt Helen had sexually abused him. That right there is a lot to parse.

Later, feeling better, Sam visits from college and they take another drive while playing David Bowie’s “Heroes”. Charlie has never felt more alive.

TOM’S DISCUSSION CORNER

TOPIC 1 — The Perks of Being Accepted

I’ll admit that back in my high school days when I actually wanted friends (I’m only kind of exaggerating), seeing this movie would’ve probably changed my life for what would be, in retrospect, unrealistic expectations of teenage friendship. At least unrealistic for what I actually want. On paper, I love the idea of all these nerdy, uninhibited high school kids having the time of their lives with little self-consciousness and fear of ridicule. In practice, I do not possess to the ability to be entirely confident and outgoing. That’s why I have this blog.

What this movie romanticizes, and what teenage me would have romanticized, is the idea of going all-in on literally anything. I would have killed or died or kill THEN die to be that way. I would have loved a group of new friends help me get out of my shell. While the Rocky Horror Picture Show was nowhere near my interests, I loved seeing this kid care enough about a friend to help out. I mean, what wouldn’t you do for love, I suppose? Hell, I wish I could say I would’ve handled the Patrick kiss situation with as much decency and poise as Charlie did. At 13, I would’ve flipped the fuck out for a laundry list of reasons.

However, upon review, Charlie goes GREAT LENGTHS to fit into his social circle. He’s clearly a people pleaser. This is the part the resonated with me so heavily, because this is exactly the way I am. Had I run into a similar situation, I probably would have done anything to be accepted. You don’t really get the sense that this had happened in the movie, since Charlie seemed legitimately interested in being involved, but I could be wrong. The kid was depressed and he was alienated, and even though his disposition wasn’t frantic or off-putting, I suspect that he did a lot of stuff that he wasn’t entirely into.

As an added factual statement, the kid was in love with Hermione Granger. Who, of a similar age, wasn’t in love with Hermione Granger? I certainly was. I would’ve dressed in drag too just to get a kiss from her.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Wingardium Leviosa, indeed!

TOPIC 2 — I Liked This Movie a Lot

The aforementioned part about how this movie would’ve changed my life as a teenager, that part is true. This is exactly what I want from my coming-of-age movies: realistic character interactions involving young kids palling around, bittersweet and not over-the-top humor, characters not always being complete dicks to one another, and a warm plot. I like feeling good at the end. I like feeling like something very important happened. And I’m willing to accept unrealistic sappiness (like standing up in a truck as you go through a tunnel while listening to “Heroes”) as long as I’m already invested.

I wonder if, among those who like The Perks of Being a Wallflower different people identify with different characters. Most people will identify with Charlie, a lot will identify with Patrick, but are there people who really identify with Sam? Does she have enough depth besides “trying to get into college” or “love interest”? What about Paul Rudd? Are there any major nerd teachers who get off on identifying with Paul Rudd?

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Right back at ya, Paul.

I definitely see myself as a Charlie, and I wouldn’t even mind going with the flow. That’s the kind of person I am anyway. I’m a people-pleaser to a fault, baby. You want to go the Rocky Horror Picture Show? I don’t give a shit. Let’s go. You want get decapitated standing up in a truck as you go through a tunnel? I’ll be your guest. You’re a dude who wants to kiss me? I’ll try not to make it awkward.

Anyway, I liked this movie a lot. I’ll have to rewatch in someday when I’m 50 years old and creepy.

IMDb TRIVIA FUNHOUSE!

In Entertainment Weekly, Emma Watson reported that she took the role because Stephen Chbosky told her that “Not only is this going to be one of the most important parts you play, you’re also going to have the summer of your life and meet some of your best friends.” She also reported that the claim came true.
This is obviously a complete fuck you to Harry Potter. Stephen Chbosky hates Harry Potter so much that he recruits Emma Watson for his movie, tells her it’s more important than Hermione, that it’s going to be more memorable than her role as Hermione, and that she’s going to meet better friends than Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint. And she’s like “of course that’s all correct”. Who could blame her?

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Finally, Christmas presents NOT from Harry and Ron.

Ezra Miller did their initial audition for the film over Skype, and they were so charismatic in the interview, that they were cast within five hours of the audition.
Right away, Ezra Miller seemed to me like an infinitely more interesting Adam Driver. That Adam Driver is more famous than Ezra Miller is an atrocity akin to when Pol Pot had thousands of babies smashed against a tree. Then again, their arrest record is pretty large, so, lmao, never mind.

In an interview with LAYouth.com, Stephen Chbosky said that he wrote the book for personal reasons, but reading the book’s customer reviews on Amazon.com made him realize that many people related to it.
You sometimes read about these writers who write a universal critically acclaimed story about anxiety, depression, coming-of-age, friendship, and love, and they’re like “I DIDN’T KNOW OTHER HUMAN BEINGS WOULD KNOW WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT!” Do these people live in the world?

John Hughes originally bought the film rights with the intention to write and direct. He intended to make the film as a dark comedy with Shia LaBeouf set to play Charlie, Kirsten Dunst slated to play Sam, and Patrick Fugit cast as Patrick. Hughes’s sudden death stalled the project, as he’d not completed a script before his passing. This allowed the film to be revived, as an independent movie, with Stephen Chbosky returning to write and direct.
Thank God. Can you imagine that disaster? When Shia LaBeouf wasn’t busy smacking Kirsten Dunst around, he would be drinking flagons of moonshine and pelting Patrick Fugit with food from craft services.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Happy birthday, Mr. President!

IS IT WORTH A WATCH?

While The Perks of Being a Wallflower checked all my boxes, I wouldn’t recommend it to everyone. It’s a little bit obnoxious and hipster-y if you’re not an obnoxious hipster like me, but if you’re reading this and are in high school (yeah right) then I would heartily recommend it. I was already 25 when this came out, so it’s unfortunately past my time. THERE’S STILL HOPE FOR YOU.


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