unexpected Rocketman review

We saw Rocketman last night and it was FANTASTIC. It was INCREDIBLE. It was just - they did an amazing job. I am not a big fan of musicals, but given that it's about Elton John, making a musical and throwing themselves into it at 110 mph of sincerity was the only way to go, and boy, did they. It's very gay, very colorful, very unafraid to skim over 5 years or more via a transforming costume change in the middle of a musical number, full of recreated Elton John stage costumes that are wonderful and hilarious even if you've seen them before. Everyone is clearly having the time of their lives, including the score composer whose enviable task was making smooth thematic bridges between and variations on Elton John songs.

I wouldn't have thought you could make a story with such depressing 'nearly succumbing to depression and self-loathing' stuff so fun and funny and uplifting (ultimately - I did cry a bunch of times first), but they did a fantastic job. And even if you didn't like musicals I think you could still enjoy this movie solely on the basis of the visual design (although maybe not if you don't like sequins, or if you genuinely don't like Elton John's music; and definitely not if you're triggered by suicide attempts, or if you are a child who isn't cognitively and emotionally prepared for that much explicit drugs and alcohol). Some of the musical theater-style musical numbers were so witty that I was muffling shouts of glee in the theater.

Also, some interview/BTS/promo material featuring Taron Egerton and Elton John is well worth watching too. Also this review focusing on the wigs (and dressing gowns) by wigwurq is a great read that does a better job of selling it, unless you prefer to avoid potentially spoilery details.

(Yeah, I thought I'd be posting a longer review of Good Omens first, but I haven't finished rereading it. We should be signing the deed to the house Tuesday. Third time's the charm?)

it's ineffable FUTURE (insert partner/spouse/other queer significant other terms debate) now

People on Tumblr are now tagging Aziraphale/Crowley pairing-related material as "ineffable husbands" (and it's consequently floating around the AO3 tag fields along with all those other catchphrase tags that serve no informational purpose other than to signal that the author is a member of the fandom community who has learned these memes, like MCU's "Tony Stark Has A Heart" and "Steve Rogers Needs A Hug"). The main reason pairing names without slashes are required are as tags, and this is better than a portmanteau of course, but it's twee enough that I wince in revulsion every time I read it (which is a lot). (So that would probably please both Aziraphale - because it's earnest while being saccharine - and Crowley - because it's revolting plenty of people - and in that sense you could say it's appropriate.)

But the other thing about it is that it contains a suggestion that the relationship as depicted is of the "they're so married" established relationship type, which has some truth to it of course, and which you could argue is exactly the dynamic in the book... but the biggest Thing that this series did was foreground their relationship arc to provide a strong emotional plot graph with the little peaks and valleys (and, presumably, to give Tennant and Sheen a good path to follow aside from just orbiting each other). In adding these key points the show effectively makes it a first time* story: ( Read more... )

* There are people who use "first time story" to refer to a story about the first time the participants in question have a sexual encounter with each other (and, no doubt deriving from this, people who use it to refer to a story about the first time the participants have penetrative sex even if they've already had other sexual encounters). I am using it in the long-established sense, however, of a story about the participants getting together, which just requires emotional resolution (kissing, walking/dogsledding off into the sunset, getting married, going on a date), not sexual contact. The framing on the show is pretty romantic in terms of genre convention, but a queerplatonic reading could still meet the criteria.