at the risk of being cringe with everything going on — this week, the last six months, the past five years — i keep thinking about that one quote from the great gatsby
“they were careless people…they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”
not to be all “tw*light did nothing wrong” but misogyny honest to god killed the hunger games
it was no masterpiece sure but it also sure as hell wasnt the love triangle bullshit everyone made it out to be. seriously everyone blames this whole “YA fiction with the special One and teens overthrowing the oppressive government tropes” trend on the hunger games but the truth is that none of those books are anything like thg
god!!! im mad!! name one cliche YA novel where the government actually is BAD like not just “oh love is illegal” or “they barcode you!!uwu” instead of like. actual slavery and rampant poverty while the rich waste their money on dumb bullshit!! and name one main character who ACTUALLY suffers under the government’s regime!! who actually starves and works and suffers and has genuine REASON to rebel!! thg is the only YA book that had anything to say about wealth disparity and the dehumanization of the poor,, every other YA book uses it as a plot device to put some dumbass romance together or show how “badass” the MC is!! thg is genuinely emotional and the focus of the book isnt katniss’s archery and how cool she is and its NOT gale or fucking peeta bread. and then the marketing for the stupid fucking movies took the WHOLE POINT OF THE BOOK (which is to satirize and critique how women in entertainment have any serious things about them ignored in favor of whatever dress theyre wearing or who they’re dating) and turns that into……….. a fucking love triangle. and then the world forgets it because its just another dumb teen girl series. okay.
Me @ myself rn
oh also last thing. the fact that at the end katniss chose to kill Coin (the rebel leader/soon to be newest dictator) instead of just having a plain and simple boring happy ending shows just how different thg is from the YA fiction its compared to. no other book in this genre would have the guts (or even the idea) to put out such a blatant, obvious “the fight against oppression never ends, stay diligent” message and thg is iconic for it and it shows how much thought was actually put into its message. im sorry to susan collins for my 12 yo self for not understanding at the time and thinking it was just bad writing
thanks to everyone adding on about the representation! about finnick’s story and being trafficked! and about peeta and his disability!! and katniss and her indigenous coding and PTSD!! And about how it shows how war n dictatorships always prey on marginalized groups!! and a billion other things!!! that the movies just fucked off n forgot about!!!
Also, like…Katniss’ love triangle with Peeta and Gale was never about the love aspect. She was choosing between war and peace. It wasn’t “oh nooo i have too many boys :(” it was “one of these people represents war and violence and revolt, which is necessary in the world but unsustainable, and one of them represents peace and love and rebuilding, which can tolerate too much but ultimately is the goal.” and it had to be a romantic relationship because she had to be put into a position where choosing one cut her off from the other. katniss choosing peeta was NEVER about choosing the boy she loved most; it was about choosing a future where she counted up good things in the world, where she had children because she was no longer terrified of what their future would look like, where she grew primroses in her garden and started moving on from living her entire life steeped in trauma. gale was important to her because he was ferocious like her; but even he goes further than her, like when he refuses to run away with katniss because he wants to be part of the rebellion.
thg is a war story. peeta and gale both represent another aspect of what happens when the war is over - you can focus on it, enjoy it even, continue to bring it back every time something goes wrong; or you can slow down, rebuild, heal, refuse to glorify the effect it had on society and you personally. choosing one means you cannot have the other. you cannot hold hands and play in the grass with peace and war at the same time: you marry one of them. doing so erases your ability to commit to the other. and katniss’ choice of peeta is significant because she is choosing peace. she is choosing, despite how hard it is and how easy it would be to be bitter and broken and angry, to heal.
i just want to one day be loved like elle woods’ sorority sisters loved her
they all simply do not understand why elle wants to go to harvard so bad… yet they help her study, grade her tests, motivate her and all around fully support her from the moment she decides to go and never stop believing in elle not for a single second… like wow name me one sweeter moment in all of cinema, i’ll wait
sorry to be legally blonde blogging on main once again but i just wanted to talk about how easy it would’ve been to screw that movie up. the entire premise is based around a girl doing the most to get a guy, the main conflict of the film is the one between elle and viv, elle and her friends are stereotypical girly girls, etc - all that is just a perfect setup for a kind of passive aggressive lowkey misogynistic film that aims at actual feminist themes but falls short at #girlboss. but it doesn’t! while vivian is certainly catty to elle at first the insults aren’t sexist, vivian is just threatened but the confrontation is surprisingly and refreshingly… levelheaded? is the best way i can describe it. there is none of that one scene that a lot of 90’s movies seem to have where the two female protags have a fight where they insult each other’s appearance and then latch onto each other’s hair and yell bloody murder. ya know the one. there is none of that, none of the throwing around lowkey insults to women left and right, and in the end it works out quite beautifully because the only character we meet who is actually outright sexist is warner, which sets him up to be a gigantic asshole without having to have him like kill a kitten or something. it’s clever writing! and for a movie that came out in 2001 to toe that line between empowerment and sexism so well and come out the other side an enjoyable story with realistic women that does not fall under sexist tropes and stands the test of time is very admirable imo
It’s been said before, but I am all for the idea that, to Snow, Katniss Everdeen was Lucy Gray Baird rising up from the dead to haunt him.
This small, dark-haired Seam girl, making a scene at the reaping. Drawing the Capitol’s attention in the parade, and in the interviews, and with her training score. Haunted by tragic love as she enters the arena. Singing to Rue as she dies, and adorning her body with a rainbow of flowers. Cheating the Games to bring her and Peeta out alive.
And then - unwillingly - figureheading a revolution. Being hailed the mockingjay - the very thing that Snow so hated, that he so passionately wanted destroyed. Refusing to relinquish her own agency, refusing to play the Capitol’s game by its rules. Singing The Hanging Tree, by the lake. Dancing with Prim at Finnick and Annie’s wedding, spinning around the room to folk music.
It must have felt, to Snow, like Lucy Gray (and a little of Sejanus) reincarnated - Lucy Gray, coming to haunt him. Coming to destroy his empire from beyond the grave. Taking her revenge, after all those years.
every person can feel freddie’s presence in their souls when they sing MAMAAAAAA UUHHHH, I DONT WANNA DIE, I SOMETIMES I WISH I’VE NEVER BEEN BORN AT ALL with all the air in their lungs i’m not joking
it’s fucking crazy to think about the amount of people who have sung bohemian rhapsody? like it’s such a unifying song, by nature of the fact that so many people know it. it holds so many good memories for me and other people. it’s a song you scream in the car with your friends while you drive around your boring hometown, it’s a song you drunkenly sing with your arm around your best friend, or a song you sing along to with strangers when it’s on in public. it’s bittersweet to think about freddie’s legacy carrying on like that through his masterpiece. freddie carries on because he’s a part of so many people’s good memories and bohemian rhapsody is a huge part of that.
Reblog if you have sung bohemian rhapsody with your friends
every time i see this post i’m reminded of the video of 65,000 people singing bohemian rhapsody in near-perfect harmony
like, what other song can make that claim?
Some of the highlights of that video include:
The crowd cheering after the first stanza when they realize what they’re all doing
So many people audibly ‘doing the guitar parts’… like ya do
The sheer number of voices joining the rediculous falsetto (thanks, Roger)
How they all start jumping at the ramp-up “so you think you can stomp me”
Hands up, hundreds, thousands deep for the final “ooooo”s and the last line to close the song
I was the queue in a fabric store in Mexico and it came on the radio and me and several middle aged Mexican ladies were all singing along together.
