About once a year I revisit Event Horizon. I love this movie, but each time is for a different reason. Sometimes because it's a ridiculous horror. Sometimes because it's a great horror. Because I love the actors in it. Because the Lewis and Clark's bridge set was NOT designed with the approach to the Event Horizon in mind.
This last time when I watched it I noticed the cinematography. This movie was definitely written and budgeted to be a crappy summer film, yet there was a beautifully effective dolly zoom when Weir was in the tunnels. It helped demarcate the line between "this ship is old and malfunctioning" and "this ship is haunted". It set the tone for the rest of the visions the crew experienced. I've tried for years to recapture the terror in that scene.
I should start a blog called "How to Do Things Wrong". People can watch I do as much research as my attention span will let me do that day and then witness my anxiety foil all my preparations.
(Sponsored by the fact that it took me an hour to fill out a form that asked me to describe me and my work.)
I've been kicking an idea around in my head for ages and I keep running into roadblocks, so I hope that if I write stuff down it'll organize my thoughts. Or at least prevent me from losing them in a plethora of handwritten notes scattered around.
I love the relationships and characters in SW, but I've always thought that they were problematic. Plus, the dynamics and backgrounds didn't really fit the narrative I'd built up in my head prior to the prequels.
Since I don't really do fanfic (really bad experience in the late 90s), I thought I could fix it with by tweaking the characters and placing them in an OC setting.
Padme - Love this girl, but they really wasted her potential. First I'd get rid of her election and make her born royalty or a position of power. She's clearly trained for it from birth. I got the impression that she and her peers voluntarily pursued politics and I can't imagine the average kid being interested in administration or law from a young age. It just seems like an odd hyperfixation to have so many involved. She's also clearly a warrior and diplomacy is her weapon. I'd like to lean into the diplomatic Jedi archetype that the EU made for Leia, although Padme definitely isn't above getting her hands dirty and throwing a chair at someone when her words stop working.
I'd probably place her in a love triangle/throuple situation because I always thought that Obi-Wan suited her more. The romance in the prequels between her and Anakin seemed like it only happened because it had to happen rather than real chemistry, so I'd also try to do justice to their relationship.
Finally, Padme would disappear before anyone knew she was pregnant to protect the twins from their falling father. Darth Vader seemed genuinely surprised that he had a son, not that he was alive.
Anakin - The majority of my issues with Anakin is his behavior during his courtship of Padme. He was a walking red flag and while I know people ignore those all the time, he didn't come across as someone likeable...which he did in every other scene where he was allowed to be a Jedi warrior. His banter with Obi-Wan hinted at a deep friendship and his frustrations with the Jedi order/Council made sense even if they weren't articulated well. I think mostly I'd have to simply fix the execution of his flaws and insecurities.
I'd also close the age gap between him and the other two. Aside from the creepiness factor in his romance with Padme, the age discrepancy between Obi-wan and Anakin as apprentices/knights is kinda weird. Obi-Wan was supposed to be 25 in Phantom Menace. I get that he's going to be a mentor/old man later on in the series, but that seems really old to still be a padawan.
Obi-Wan - Nothing. You're perfect, baby. <3
(Except for the age thing.)
I've been using Microsoft Word for over twenty years and somehow it gets worse each year...
[Image Description: First image is a Microsoft Word screen shot where it suggested that the user change "mauled" to "mailed", changing the sentence to "The body had been mailed to the point that it was unidentifiable."]
I hate the culture of trying to be a "successful" self-published author. I'm a part of a lot of writers groups and so many want to over-stress marketing: Do you have a marketing plan? Do you have a blog? Do you have followers? Are you on booktok?
That's great and all, but have you finished your book? Have you gotten it edited? Is your book even worth reading? Like, how do you have time to actually write if you're spending all this time being a social media personality? I barely have enough time to come home from my day job to write, let alone try to market as an introvert who is used to the internet being a lovely anonymous space.
Too true, but I still think he's Padme's son and Leia is Anakin's daughter. She's more like him, despite being a diplomat.
I want to learn the ways of the Force and become a Jedi - like my father.
This year is the year that I'll finally accept that it's okay for me to act like a gremlin and I'll be one step closer to my final form!
Every time I have an idea for a fic, I overthink it and talk myself out of it. I don't know the characters well enough. This doesn't fit the setting/canon. Which is why in all the years I've been writing, I only ever wrote one Pokémon fanfic when I was like 14 and a fictionalization of a Slayers RPG I ran. OCs are easier because I make the canon!
I don't know what to do. I was going through old files on my computer and I found a bunch of stories from when I was still roleplaying. I've got documents that are 35K words or more, but I don't know what to do with them. There's a lot of context missing because I made a whole culture to go along with the characters and I'm not sure anyone else will find it interesting. But I just spent two hours today engrossed in a story I wrote over ten years ago and I kinda wish I could rewrite it.
But not yet, though.
This is so endearing that I'd write him some Scotty smut if he were still alive.
In case anyone wanted; James Doohan knew about all the Spirk porn, and in fact wanted a copy for himself. He also seemed rather bored by the fact he was only ever drawn with women. Someone draw him some Scotty yaoi asap!