It’s TIME to Talk About Superpowers!

Elon Musk's Laser Eyes

Pictured: Joe Rogan getting incinerated by Elon Musk on his own podcast.

I spend a lot of free time lately reading through comic books like one of those pasty middle school indoor kids who would rather count data bits and megabytes than get some fresh air and throw a ball or beat up the kid with sickle cell anemia by the swings. Longtime readers of TWAS aka TomWritesAboutStuff aka Tom Writes About Stuff aka Another Useless Website will know this hobby is brand new. I hated comic books and superheroes for decades because they were, and still are, dumb as shit! But I’m fascinated by them now, and much of my ENRAPTURED ENJOYMENT comes from the special skills and powers each caped crusader has! Captain America throws his shield around like a spaz. Spider-Man can crawl on walls and eat bugs. Iron Man gets drunk and eats bugs. Batman wears a giant belt with things in it. Superman can cook bugs with his eyeballs. Wolverine gets drunk and throws his claws around like a spaz. So many superheroes, so many specialties!

Naturally, like many of you who also read comic books (e.g. none of you, not a single one), I’m a man in my mid-30s who will still occasionally daydream about the kind of superpowers I would have if I were able to pick anything. They say that what you desire says a lot about you. For example, if you pick flying, that tells you that you desire the ability to travel and see exotic, faraway places in your own convenience. If you pick invisibility, that tells the world that you want to be a pervert who enters high school locker rooms so you can check out jailbait dicks and balls. And so on and so forth.

Alex Mack's Zappy Fingers

Alex Mack was a teenage girl who could strike fear into her enemies by threatening them with 40,000 volts of electricity from her fingertips!

If anyone has seen the Nickelodeon show The Secret World of Alex Mack, then you already know the premise! For the other eight billion of you, the show is about a teenage girl who gets nuclear waste dumped on her and she develops the power to zap things with her fingers, hover objects in the air, and turn into a glistening puddle of silver goo. These powers are pretty stupid, but I was seven years old at the time and I wanted nothing more than to be Alex Mack. I spent a lot of time daydreaming about waking up one day with the ability to fly, or eat pizza whenever I wanted, or play video games without my parents hollering at me to goddamned stop. These powers are pretty stupid too, but the point is that I wanted to do something cool besides juggle and/or split the atom on my kickass Yomega Raider yo-yo! I wanted to fuckin’ float around town or something.

I had given this a lot of thought over the years and have settled on one power and one power only. The power for me. The power that tells the world that I’m terrified to die, but I’m also terrified to live forever, and I want to find a happy medium.

I want the ability to stop time. It’s so simple and perfect, so very useful, but not without its cons. I’ve developed an extensive system of laws and rules around stopping time to prevent too much world-breaking manipulation, which I’m going to spend the remainder of this post nauseatingly picking apart in great detail. Feel free to skip all this and move onto Fox News or MassiveBeltBuckles.com or whatever else my typical reader base is into. I wouldn’t know! It’s your life, not mine!

Axiom #1 – Everything Reverts to Its Original State Once Time Starts Again

This is the single most important rule of stopping time. Nothing that physically happens during the time-stop remains in reality afterward. Do you want to gorge yourself on seventeen bags of French fries? Great! The French fries are out of your stomach and still in the bag once you start time up again. Want to smash your greatest enemy in the face with a tire iron, beating his head to an unrecognizable bloody pulp? Fantastic! He won’t have a scratch on him afterward. Are you tired and want to grab a time-stopped nap? Hell yeah! You’ll be exactly as tired as you were before you paused that clock. Heck, do you want to make some progress on Elden Ring? Sorry. All that time spent will amount to nothing once your save reverts back to the pre-time stopped state.

Woman Stopping Time

Godspeed, lady! Wrangle yourself a minute hand!

That doesn’t mean you can’t still have a little fun! Everything you do during your adventure will remain in your memories once you’re finished. You may not be able to write that book, or build any muscle, or knit that sweater, but you can binge on the entire 440+ episode run of NCIS! You can watch 45,000 horror movies! You can read an entire library of books! You can walk to Arizona and check out the Grand Canyon! You can master juggling! You can learn everything there is to know about calculus or string theory or Lou Diamond Phillips.

Unfortunately, if we have to stick to these rules, there are also naturally some extremely unseemly things you can also do if your personality aligns with chaotic evil. Let’s just say it has something to do with all the people frozen in time who are unable to defend themselves. With great power comes great responsibility, and if you want to be a supervillain about it then you are going to be a supervillain about it. You will face no consequences, your victims will never actually be hurt, your victims will never actually be aware, and you’ll get off scot free.

Maybe.

Axiom #2 – You Can Die

Think of it this way: the world becomes yours if you stop time. Any aging that occurs during the time-stop gets reverted. Any changes you make to your environment reverts to status quo. If you fall off a mountain, any injuries you sustain can be reversed if you have enough faculties to hit that off switch. If you fall off a mountain and you die during a time-stop, that’s it. You are dead. You yourself are unable to hit the off switch, and nobody can do it for you.

Scary stuff right? It depends on how you think about it. Once you’re dead, you won’t even know or care. If you die during a time-stop, the entire universe will be too time-stopped to even know or care. On the other hand, damn, you could be responsible for single-handedly destroying all of existence in the multiverse. But who will know? Certainly not you. So don’t worry about it!

Axiom #3 – Other People May Have This Power

Alex Mack's Zappy Fingers

Of course, Time Sickness is a topic for another day.

And you’ll never, ever even know for sure. Someone could tell you they just stopped time and beat your head into a bloody pulp with a tire iron! How would you believe them? You’d have to take their word for it? That would be preposterous!

Of course, you could get an inkling. Give a guy an 1100-page book and he could break it down for you in two seconds. He could tell you about every bulbous, misshapen skin defect on your penis. But maybe you showed him your penis a minute ago and you just forgot?? Hmm, this one isn’t thought through very well.

But the axiom stands. Other people may have this power, and you could be time-stopped every other nanosecond for the rest of your existence. It could be happening right now! Now there’s a thought experiment for ya.

I certainly don’t want to kill or rape people, but man do I want to burn through a Wheel of Time book without worrying about using up my precious life minutes. I want to be able to watch a season of The Shield without feeling like I’m wasting my time doing stupid shit.

In short, I want to live longer on my own terms! Don’t we all. This will be a reality for me some day, and I’d hit the science lab and read up on inter-dimensional wormhole manipulation and time dilation quantum physics…

…I just, uh…

…I just don’t have time.


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The Great Hunt (Book 2) – Chapter 2: “The Welcome”

The Wheel of Time - Book 2 - The Great Hunt

Rand spends a lot of time running around the Fal Dara keep, acting all sorts of “oh no” and “oh god” because he thinks the Aes Sedai are showing up to kill him or something. Perhaps because he’s possibly the first male Aes Sedai in millennia and the women are all “fuck that” and want to skewer Rand through the heart like a shish kebab.

Rand returns to the quarters he shares with Mat and Perrin and discovers a slew of female housekeepers rummaging through their clothes, throwing them out, and replacing them with new ones per Moiraine’s orders. Rand is ordered to strip down RIGHT THEN AND THERE in front of a roomful of boner-inducing ladies so that he can wear some crispy lord-like clothes. He begrudgingly does it, and even comments upon how nice it is to wear fresh clothes that he hasn’t sweated or pissed in constantly for weeks.

He packs up his soiled, gross clothes (as well as “Dead” Thom Merrilin Gleeman’s harp and flute and clown jacket with the clown patches) and heads to the stables where he intends to book it via horse. On his way, he catches a glimpse of the Big Cheese Aes Sedai, the Amyrlin, step out and address Lord Agelmar and thank him for the hospitality. The Aes Sedai are going to party down, start tearing Fal Dara up, chewing the shit out of it and spitting it out. L’chiam!

A servant at the stables treats Rand as a lord because of the “al” in “al’Thor”, which I surmise is a regal distinction. Rand doesn’t like it, but he can’t make the servants stop doing it. He is informed that, effective about fourteen microseconds ago, no one is to enter or leave the keep until further notice because the Aes Sedai are going to start tearing Fal Dara up. Rand is downtrodden that he can’t escape the keep like he wants to, so he’s going to take his lumps and get his lashes and whatever else he thinks is going to happen. But the opposite is going to happen. I already know that.


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Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1 – “Rules of Engagement (Part 1)”

* Part 1 of 6 of the Rules of Engagement storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1 – “Rules of Engagement (Part 1)”!

I’m doing a brief Batman detour from the immediate post-Crisis era to cover what seems like an interesting series from the mid-late 2000’s. Batman Confidential is purported to be a gritty crime noir series that focuses more on Batman/Bruce Wayne as a character study than a MAN OF ACTION. As in, what makes this guy tick? What were the more influential moments in his life? What made the man who he is today?

Or maybe not. Who knows? Seems like it might be my kind of thing, though, so here we go.

Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1 [February, 2007]
Written by: Andy Diggle
“Rules of Engagement (Part 1)”

Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1

See? Batman is literally frothing at the mouth on the cover! We’re off to a fantastic start! The world needs more rabid Batman.

“Wind. Traffic. Sirens. Music. From this height, the sounds of the city meld into a dull roar…”

The sounds of the city, all right. Horn honks and farts. A young prostitute is assuring her tiny little child that everything will be normal some day. They’ll head somewhere out west, and she’ll go to a real school and play with real toys and eat real pizza and sleep in a real bed and have real dreams and stare at the real sun. Then a fucking guy in a Jason Voorhees mask shows up in the apartment to be scary. “P–please tell him… Tell him he can’t have her.”

Well, sorry toots, but it looks like he can have her!

“Even before I reach the apartment window, I know I’m too late–” Batman thinks as he fails, yet again, to rescue someone in dire need of rescuing. “Another life I failed to save. How many more?”

Probably a million more! The young woman is splayed out on the floor all dead and stuff while the toddler plays in her crib. The door was triple-locked, so she obviously was anticipating someone coming by to rough her the hell up.

“He came in through the fire escape. Used newspaper to muffle the breaking glass.” He looks around the room, pointing out some very obvious clues like “a guy broke in” and “the woman is dead”. There are bloody boot prints on the floor, but none on the windowsill. Hmmm… perhaps he teleported out of there! Barring that, maybe he’s still in the apartment!

Then, from the closet, Jason Voorhes unloads two Uzis in Batman’s direction, three feet away, and completely misses.

Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1

Ugh. What’s with everyone trying to make me eat things? You can’t make me eat anything.

Batman batarangs one of the guns right out of Jason’s hand, but he’s still got the other one! Shit! “THAT’S RIGHT, FREAK! YOU BETTER HIDE!” he yells as he continues to completely miss every shot he takes. The kid, understandably, is now crying. Jason is about to kill the kid, but Batman pops out to roundhouse kick his throat, successfully knocking the second gun out of his hand. He yells “FUHH–!” about this, which is undignified.

As a last resort, Jason reaches back into the closet and pulls out a few grenades. Batman grabs the kid and leaps out of the apartment before everything goes kablooie. What a mess. Batman notices that Jason had escaped and is now running away like a little chicken wuss. Batman is in hot pursuit!

Isn’t this great, kids? ACTION!

“Alleyway ahead of him must be twenty feet wide at least. Thinks he can make it. Probably would have…” but Batman throws his grappling hook and successfully wraps it around Jason’s neck mid-jump, stopping his momentum and causing him to crash and dangle down the side of the building. “Scary, isn’t it?” Batman says from the roof above. “To have your life in another man’s hands. Feel it slipping away.” He taunts this mofo as he barely holds onto the rope. “Do you think that’s how she felt? Helpless?”

He pulls the guy up onto the roof and threatens to DO AWAY WITH HIS LIFE, which he is not a fan of! He pleads for his life. Batman assures him that he can do worse things to him than kill him, and demands to know who sent him. “Who bought the hit…? And why?”

Well, sir, it was Johnny Depp and he’ll thank you not to pry any further. Jason’s not going to fess up, and it doesn’t matter anyway. He gets sniped by an energy weapon, reducing him to a pile of ash and a stupid hockey mask. Batman looks beyond to a tall building where he sees the sniper leap down and start running off. Perhaps Jason wasn’t the target. Perhaps it was The Bat Man.

Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1

Well, stop waving that thing around before you put a bullet right through your Eggs Benedict, sir.

Back at Batman HQ, aka smelly Wayne Manor, Bruce is hanging out in the Batcave moping and brooding. The gun that his parents’ murderer used that fateful night, he stole it from the Gotham City Police Department evidence locker a year ago. “…there was nothing more they could learn from it.”

Sounds dandy, Mr. Wayne, sir. Stealing guns from the police evidence locker sounds a solid use of your ample free time. Perhaps tomorrow we can start stealing cop cars and driving them off of bridges. Alfred asks him straight-up why the fuck he thought stealing this gun was a good idea. Bruce goes into this whole thing about how cheap the ammo was. He can’t believe his parents died from fifty cents worth of ammunition! It’s like, couldn’t the killer have sprung for something a little more fancy? He owed his parents that much, at least. It’s diabolical!

Bruce goes on to talk about the murdered woman from tonight. He had silenced weapons, no one would have heard them, and yet he decided to kill her with his bare hands. “She wasn’t even worth a bullet,” he says, grunting and hefting himself out of his chair. Her daughter will never even know her. “I could have killed him,” he says, much to Alfred’s pure astonishment. “How can I I expect to make a difference in this city when all I do is mop up the bloodstains…?”

Don’t forget that Alfred is the one here mopping up bloodstains. Constantly. So many transmitted blood-borne pathogens.

Alfred reassures Bruce that his father did some good in the world. Bruce says shut up, he’s dead. Alfred pulls down his vest with a deliberate “fuck you” attitude and leaves the Batcave.

Later, at one of the Wayne Aerospace facilities, Bruce pops in for a friendly visit. Making sure his staff are on top of everything and not taking any bathroom breaks whatsoever or else they get a face full of Murder Weapon courtesy of Bullets McWayne! He gets the attention of some guy named Lucius, who calls Bruce’s presence a “pleasant surprise”. I would never consider my boss showing up a “pleasant surprise”, especially if he looks like he’s gunning to take away more than just the bathroom breaks.

Bruce is just checking to make sure the jet Lucius is working on is in tip-top shape before their bid with LexCorp the next day. Plus, he needs to ask Lucius about ENERGY WEAPONS. Yes, that’s right, ENERGY WEAPONS. As in, WEAPONS that shoot out ENERGY. Like lasers and magnets. “Man-portable energy weapons… with enough juice to say, flash-vaporize a human being at two kilometers in high humidity conditions. Hypothetically.” Looks like ol’ Brucey is looking going over to the dark side! It’s about time, too. You get black helmets with respirators, just one of the many perks. Lucius points out how specific this question is. Oddly specific. But Bruce is the billionaire here, and Lucius gets paid in TV dinners, so don’t ask any more fucking questions.

Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1

Why don’t you buy yourself a less craggy face.

Lucius has dabbled in such energy weapons. “Phase particle beam cannon. The power unit was so heavy, you needed a tank to carry the damn thing around. So we shelved it.” Bruce is intrigued! Not at all man-portable, it seems, but perhaps… if… maybe… hmm… uh… zzz….

Wake up! It’s the big day! The defense department remote warfighting contractor is between WayneTech and LexCorp, and let me tell you something, LexCorp smells. They smell like a fungus. Both companies gave their nifty GIF-laden powerpoint presentations and now the floor is open for more jibber-jabber. “Senator Crabtree, thank you,” Bruce says before launching into a monologue about belt buckles and Gilmore Girls. Soon enough, Lex Luthor smiles devilishly with skepticism about Bruce Wayne’s ability to give the defense department what they truly need. Then Lex starts launching into a monologue about Cap’n Crunch and holodecks.

Then Bruce and Lex bicker with each other like old women. Lex wants to put the money into artificial intelligence, but Bruce is skeptical about putting human lives in the hands of machines. Lex is like “don’t worry about it” and that’s the end of that.

Bruce leaves the meeting slightly dejected, but Lucius thinks the final decision will sway in their favor. As they head out, Lex gets their attention. “Lex Luthor,” Bruce says, sneering. “It’s been a pleasure to finally meet you. Shame it had to be under such adversarial circumstances.”

“You did well in there,” Lex sneers back. “It’s heartening to see you aren’t just the vacuous hedonist the media so love to portray.” Bruce admits that he’s also that too!

Batman Confidential (Vol. 1), Issue #1

You bet your butt, Bruce ol’ boy. I’m inventing a Death Star as we speak to rid the universe of that pesky Rebel Alliance…

Lex shares some lip service about it being their duty as leaders of industry to defend society from the outside. He doesn’t get so say much about it with his sunken eyes and his wormy lips before Bruce tackles him to the ground. A dump truck suddenly falls right where the two of them were standing. Alfred screeches by in the Buttfuck Bentley and yells for Bruce to jump in.

They all look above them to the robotic monstrosity that’s attacking downtown Gotham out of nowhere for some reason.

“I hate to be the one to say this, Wayne, but…” Lex looks legitimately astonished. “…isn’t that one of yours?”

Final Thoughts

Terrible artwork! Unengaging writing! A feeling that this is a rehash of Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight! I love it! See you next time!


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(500) Days of Summer (2009)

Tagline:
Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love.

Wide Release Date:
August 7, 2009

Directed by:
Marc Webb
Written by:
Scott Neustadter, Michael H. Weber
Produced by:
Mason Novick, Jessica Tuchinsky, Mark Waters, Steven J. Wolfe

Starring:
Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Zooey Deschanel

500 Days of Summer

PREGAME THOUGHTS

I saw this in college shortly after it was released to DVD. The hype around it was pretty high, and I was expecting a very poignant relationship story. And I got one, although I have the capacity to appreciate it way more now than I did then.

I remembered Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s character being a whiny crybaby through most of the family. I also had a huuuuge thing for Zooey Deschanel, because who didn’t, and this is the perfect role for her: the subverted Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Because we the people were tired of her actually being one again.

THE 400(ish)-WORD SYNOPSIS

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is Tom and, like all Toms, he’s a handsome go-getter! He works as a writer at a greeting card company, which sounds like the life. Here, I can do it too: “You are the wind beneath my wings.”

Zooey Deschanel is Summer (hey, that’s in the title!) and, like all Summers… uh… she’s hot? She works as Tom’s boss’ new assistant.

Tom catches Summer’s eye at work one day and tries to make some subtle moves, eventually getting her attention with their shared taste in music. They start talking and spending a little time together. During karaoke night at a bar, Tom’s stage presence illuminates something within Summer. She kisses Tom the next day the copy machine.

(500) Days of Summer

Tommy!… Tom-areeno!… Makin’ copies!… The Tomster!

Summer lays down the rules! Casual only! Tom agrees! They fuck! Guess who’s starting to fall in love?!

The story is told in a non-linear fashion, bouncing between the earlier days where things are great and the later days when things start turning to shit. A lot of the problem can be boiled down to this: Summer asked for something casual. Tom agreed. Tom starts reneging on the contract. Summer’s feelings day-to-day are mostly inconsistent. Eventually, Summer breaks it off congenially, but Tom is devastated for months. He spends a lot of effort trying to win her back and expecting the best at each turn, but she wants to remain friends.

Tom and Summer separately attend a wedding and have a good time with each other, which boosts Tom’s spirits yet again. Reality is crapped right onto Tom’s face when Summer invites him to a party and he sees Summer showing a friend an engagement ring. After another few days of crippling depression, Tom hoists himself up, quits his greeting card job, and starts to pursue his passion with architect work.

Tom and Summer meet up one last time. He’s starting to do better, she’s happy he’s starting to do better, he gets to ask his nagging questions, she answers them, he gets to tell her that he’s glad she’s happy.

(500) Days of Summer

Look Tom… I think we should see a bunch of other people.

Later, at a BIG ARCHITECTURAL FIRM job interview, Tom meets a woman who is vying for the same job. Grabbing life by the horns, he asks her out for some coffee after the interview is over. She is played by Minka Kelly. Her name is Autumn.

TOM’S DISCUSSION CORNER

TOPIC 1 — What the Fuck Is Summer’s Problem?

I’ll start with the male point of view. I am indeed a male, after all. Not me, of course, but A typical man will ask why Summer isn’t giving it up to a nice guy like Tom. After all, Tom’s a nice guy, right! He deserves to have Summer and she doesn’t get a say in it! There are even a few times where Tom says something to the effect of “it’s all about what you want, isn’t it?” or “I SAY WE’RE A COUPLE!”

From the male point of view, Summer is jerking Tom around. She’s cold and heartless to be playing with emotions like that. To an extent, maybe, but the real issue here is Tom projecting his ideal relationship onto her. You can find hundreds of similar opinions on the internet, so I’m not going to belabor this point.

(500) Days of Summer

Reality ain’t too shabby, honestly.

TOPIC 2 — What the Fuck Is Tom’s Problem?

But I’d like to go into more detail about that point, especially since I recall Tom being way more emotionally abusive, needy, and clingy during my first watch over ten years ago. I’m relieved that he wasn’t, but this movie still makes a good point: that movies aren’t real. Tom even makes this point during his quitting rant. Movies lead you to believe things that don’t happen in reality. That’s the perfect moral of this story. So believe this movie! Love stories set up unreal expectations of relationship dynamics. Absolute truth.

BUT, and holy hell people, Summer isn’t a saint at all in this either. She doesn’t get to come out of this scot free, because life doesn’t work that way. No black or white, no all or nothing, and the truth is that Summer did accidentally play with Tom’s feelings. She isn’t naïve and she isn’t stupid. Even though she sets the table at the beginning with “nothing serious”, Tom re-sets the table in the middle of the movie. The scene after Tom punches the douchebag out in the bar and Summer is upset with him, he now makes it crystal clear what he wants: he wants a serious relationship. He tells her this, and they continue in spite of this revelation. This is the point where Summer should have broken it off. Once it was out on the table, she had one thing to do.

I just wanted to throw that out there. Tom’s the bigger shithead, I’m not defending that. I’m just giving him credit where credit is due.

(500) Days of Summer

See what I mean? Look at this shithead.

IMDb TRIVIA FUNHOUSE!

According to the DVD commentary, one of the film’s writers estimates that 75% of the film actually happened to him.
THE TRUTH COMES OUT. This is all just one big “I’m a crybaby!” movie, then, isn’t it? Oh wait, there’s more…

Jenny Beckman, the girl who is mentioned at the beginning of the movie, was a real girl who dumped one of the screenwriters, Scott Neustadter. Summer is based on this girl, and the script of the movie on their relationship.
I had the pleasure of Googling this Scott Neustadter guy, and let me tell you, he looks exactly like one of those NICE GUYS who will fly off the handle if a lady doesn’t wethump his dick at the end of the night. Smug-face Joseph Gordon-Levitt was a perfect casting decision! Kudos, creep.

Around the time of the movie’s release, director Marc Webb shot a short video for the Internet, which featured Zooey Deschanel as Sid Vicious and Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Nancy Spungen, in reference to a conversation in this movie.
Now this Marc Webb guy, this guy gets it. I looked up the video, and they just pretty much threw a mop on top of Joseph Gorden-Levitt’s head. He didn’t even shave. Deschanel makes an attractive Sid Vicious!

In the original screenplay, Summer was depicted as having cropped blonde hair to construct a more summer-like persona.
Right? Nothing about Zooey Deschanel is very summery. She looks like dead-of-Winter with her pale skin, coming out into the sunlight twice a month to forage for snowberries. Snowberries are a thing, right?

(500) Days of Summer

“This art display exudes the late Baroque era of artistic expression. Namely, the ‘pile of shit’ movement.”

Ian Reed Kesler, who gets in a fight with Joseph Gordon-Levitt at the bar, is credited as “an actual douche.”
Gotta give it up for this one. The guy at the bar looked like David Boreanaz from SEAL Team and Summer was wrong for getting mad at Tom for punching him right in the face.

They say it took sixty casting calls to find the right person to look like more of a douche than Gordon-Levitt! Who these “they” are who said this, I’ll have to get back to you on that.

There is a fan theory that the final conversation between Tom and Summer on the park bench was all imagined by Tom and did not really happen. Even Joseph Gordon-Levitt has said he believes this is more a scene of Tom’s coming to inner peace than actual reality. If that is accurate, then Day 408 (at Summer’s house party when he learns of her engagement) is the last time Tom ever sees Summer.
This is a pretty good one, and deserves some extra commentary. The scene involves the two meeting up again at Tom’s “favorite spot”, which is a place that Summer says she now visits often. He gets the air some grievances at her, which she takes in stride. He gets to hear her admit that she might have been wrong about not believing in fate. He gets to tell her that he genuinely hopes she’s happy. They get to say goodbye.

The impact of all this would be much greater if it was all in Tom’s head, 100%. Having Summer showing her engagement ring to someone at a party be the literal last moment Tom ever sees her again is perfect and brilliant. I’m on board with this theory too, and I’m glad that while it may not have been an intentional choice on the part of the filmmakers, at least it left enough ambiguity to make it SEEM like it could’ve been intentional. That’s good enough for me.

(500) Days of Summer

Look, man. I’m sick of you. Aren’t you sick of you? I think French Stewart is looking for you.

IS IT WORTH A WATCH?

I think so. I wasn’t gaga over this movie in college, but it’s better than I remember. I mostly remembered Gordon-Levitt being a sniveling, emotionally abusive wanker about everything, and I’m pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t the case. I must be thinking about something else! Oh yeah, my own life!

*jubilant outro music*


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The Great Hunt (Book 2) – Chapter 1: “The Flame of Tar Valon”

The Wheel of Time - Book 2 - The Great Hunt

Rand and Co. are still hanging out near the Blight. Rand and Lan are swordfighting for training on the top of a tower, and during this planned skirmish you’ve got Lan dunking on Rand. Asking him what he’s still doing around the Blight. Asking him why he hasn’t hoisted his tall ass and made his way out yet, Rand claims that the heron-marked sword of his will draw too much attention. He refuses to sell it, of course, since it’s his only tie to ol’ whats-his-name. Maybe-Father. Tam. Lan advises him to sell it, since the rarity of such a sword will make him an easy target no matter where he goes.

Rand has the gall to ask Lan why these swords are so rare and precious in the first place. It’s because Aes Sedai were making these “power-marked” swords before the Breaking of the World. After the Breaking, they vowed to stop making more power swords. Any that are left are rare and precious. Like my love, or a good steak. Rand’s sword is possible 3,000 years old! Like a Jesus-and-a-half.

Rand admits it’s not just the sword training that’s holding him back. It’s his friends. And Moiraine is being weird and rude and ignoring him a lot lately, which doesn’t sound like a reason to me for anything, honestly.

Suddenly, Rand and Lan hear an approaching convoy of Aes Sedai flying a banner with the Flame of Tar Valon on it. The Amyrlin Seat herself is there with them, so this must be pretty much every Aes Sedai in the world.

The chapter ends, leaving my balls blue with anticipation! What are these Aes Sedai here for? Cockfighting and other debauchery? Matching tattoos? What happens in Fal Dara stays in Fal Dara, I always say.


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