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Last week we watched The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance and oh, oh...my Skesis-loving six-year-old fangirl self was transported. I honestly don't remember the movie itself that clearly; but this is the world that existed in my head for so long after it.
The uncanny valley of the puppets may definitely be too steep for some, but it gives it a feel unlike any CGI feature -- or anything else -- and if you can navigate that, it's a creative, compelling, breathtakingly beautiful high fantasy epic. With a thinly veiled sledgehammer of an environmental message, and so much to say about hope in the face of despair and love in the face of selfishness and evil. Also a bunch of great female characters (the Gelfing are casually matriarchal, and I love that it doesn't explain it -- it doesn't need explaining! -- but at the same time, the females do have a clear biological advantage, so yes, why not?) and incredible voice acting and the aesthetic is so gorgeous and spectacular and wild (we were sold when we saw the carriages with the bug-wheels in all their low-key horror).
And also the Skeksis. Who are a gold standard of villains, a class by themselves -- proof that evil doesn't have to be sympathetic to be understandable, or compelling...but it does help to have some of the most incredible character designs of anything ever. They're horrific and terrifying and laughable and tragic and you cannot look away (and Simon Pegg deserves some kind of award for voicing The Chamberlain, just. Damn.)
So yeah. Good stuff.
And squeaking in the Sunday Six -- well technically it's a bit past Sunday here, but it's actually six sentences (thank you semicolons!) Guardian, of course, a thing from a bit ago that I'm trying to get back to, because we can always use more angst...right? right?!
The uncanny valley of the puppets may definitely be too steep for some, but it gives it a feel unlike any CGI feature -- or anything else -- and if you can navigate that, it's a creative, compelling, breathtakingly beautiful high fantasy epic. With a thinly veiled sledgehammer of an environmental message, and so much to say about hope in the face of despair and love in the face of selfishness and evil. Also a bunch of great female characters (the Gelfing are casually matriarchal, and I love that it doesn't explain it -- it doesn't need explaining! -- but at the same time, the females do have a clear biological advantage, so yes, why not?) and incredible voice acting and the aesthetic is so gorgeous and spectacular and wild (we were sold when we saw the carriages with the bug-wheels in all their low-key horror).
And also the Skeksis. Who are a gold standard of villains, a class by themselves -- proof that evil doesn't have to be sympathetic to be understandable, or compelling...but it does help to have some of the most incredible character designs of anything ever. They're horrific and terrifying and laughable and tragic and you cannot look away (and Simon Pegg deserves some kind of award for voicing The Chamberlain, just. Damn.)
So yeah. Good stuff.
And squeaking in the Sunday Six -- well technically it's a bit past Sunday here, but it's actually six sentences (thank you semicolons!) Guardian, of course, a thing from a bit ago that I'm trying to get back to, because we can always use more angst...right? right?!
Zhao Yunlan sank to the floor--not quite falling, but not quite controlled, either. He ended up crouched on the balls of his feet amid the shards of the broken light bulb, knees bent, one arm dragged up by the cuff. He dropped his head into his other hand, knotted his fingers in his hair.
Da Qing squatted down beside him, mirroring his pose. "Lao Zhao?" he said, but when he didn't get an answer he didn't ask again, just leaned in, until his shoulder only just touched Zhao Yunlan's.
Zhao Yunlan twitched, but didn't sidle away; he sat there and endured that contact.
