mintrubbing

thefingerfuckingfemalefury: randomredux: hellionkitty: Jay...

Thu, 23 May 2013 23:23:23 -0400

randomredux:

hellionkitty:

Jay Tablante Photography

These are amazing.

I seriously thought that this was fan art at first…these cosplays are just SO good <3

"Superman. It’s always been Superman and it always will be. A good Superman story is hard to find...."

Thu, 23 May 2013 20:59:12 -0400

“Superman. It’s always been Superman and it always will be. A good Superman story is hard to find. They’re rare to the point that I can make a comprehensive list of them off the top of my head. But when one does come along… A good Batman story is entertaining and bad ass. And it makes you think “Batman is cool.” A good Green Lantern story is generally fraught with emotional peril but, at the end, you’ll wish you had a power ring. A good Superman story fills you with awe.
It’s the mythology of a sun god who wished he was a man because he saw something so great in us. It’s the story of a hero who could move whole worlds and see through stars and hear a whisper on the other side of the planet… who fell in love with a storyteller. It’s about a man and his dog.
Every single day, you can turn on the news and hear about something bad happening. People do terrible things to each other all the time. And, on the worst days, you might just sit down and get cynical, thinking thoughts like “maybe we are inherently evil. Maybe there’s just something wrong deep down in our hearts.”
And then there’s Superman. Looking down at the world with an unfathomable sadness. Waiting for us to join him in the sun. All the while, truly believing something only an impossible man could believe.
“If you knew how you are loved, not one of you would raise a hand in rage again.”
There’s a psychology to storytelling. It’s really quite simple. When presented with something light, we look for darkness. When presented with darkness, we look for the light. It gives a story depth. In a world without a Superman, we made one for our fiction. To guide us and make us feel brave. To let us hope.
You will believe a man can fly.”

- a redditor talking about his favourite superheroe (via burnedlogic)

The Adler Conundrum: How Elementary Solved The Problem of The Woman

Thu, 23 May 2013 20:37:45 -0400

lyrangalia:

By now, most of the Elementary fandom has probably already seen or been spoiled for the season finale double-whammy that was “The Woman/Heroine”. But just in case someone hasn’t, abandon ship now if you want to remain unspoiled, because this bit of rambling meta is going to lay out just how cleverly Elementary updated and made the one woman who bested Sherlock Holmes their own.

Short version: Warning, here there be spoilers.

So, just a quick refresher: In the original ACD canon, Irene Adler appears in one story, A “Scandal in Bohemia,” and is mentioned in others, as the woman who bested Sherlock Holmes and ran off to her own life and is never seen again. From Dr. Watson’s perspective, Holmes did not love Irene Adler, but that he did feel an immense respect for her.

In many of the adaptations since the original story was published, the role of Irene Adler as The Woman has been expanded, usually to that of criminal, and usually as a love interest for Holmes.

And for a while, it appeared Elementary not only went down the same path, but that she was also dead (which again, a nice nod to the original canon and ACD’s complete inability to remain internally consistent but that’s another point altogether), leading to cries of her being “fridged for Sherlock’s manpain”.

But lo and behold, not only do we find out in the season finale that Irene Adler is still alive, but that she isn’t in fact Irene Adler at all, but Moriarty herself. And this is a twist that, as far as I know, has not been played with in modern Holmes adaptations (though if it has happened in pastiches, someone please tell me).

And why not? It’s brilliant.

On Irene Adler as the Holmsian Love Interest… again.

One of the most problematic and most prevalent themes of the Adler-as-Love-Interest tropes is how despite she being the woman who beat him, that Holmes eventually returns to save her. The idea that Holmes has feelings for Adler because she’s beaten him is, I think, an acceptable read of canon. It’s clear that he has some strong regard for her, and whether it’s taking into account Watson as unreliable narrator or adaptation degeneration, the idea that Holmes felt something for Irene Norton nee Adler does not seem too much of a stretch.

(Why it always has to be love, well that’s another discussion entirely on the changing views of rationalism and love, one I’m nowhere near qualified to really expound on)

But the fact is that the return is always to the trope that Irene Adler, having beaten Sherlock Holmes, requires saving by him. And Elementary sidesteps this beautifully by having Irene Adler succeed in fooling Sherlock Holmes, and going on her merry way.

And this is the part where the idea gets a little complicated. Because by the end of the episode we realize Irene is and always has been Moriarty. So does Adler really beat Holmes? Or is it Moriarty who does. What does that mean for the Adler/Holmes narrative in the scope of A Scandal in Bohemia?

Trying to answer that question is where things get very interesting for me, and really brings to light for me how extremely clever the Elementary writers were. I think it’s very useful to distinguish between Moriarty and Irene Adler despite them being the same person, because the show itself takes such pains to set them apart. And for a good reason.

Things to note about Elementary’s Irene Adler: Much the same as “A Scandal In Bohemia“‘s Adler, she is content to have one encounter with Holmes and be gone on her merry way. Moriarty’s motivations for experimenting with Holmes, for observing him, are related to this fact, but the key is that the core of Irene Adler, the one who encounters Holmes, impresses him with her intellect (and in this case, intellect AND appreciation for art preservation), and then walks away from him with exactly what she wants, remains the same.

It gets a little more complicated, when we remember that Adler is, in fact, a construct of Moriarty’s. And how much could Moriarty be willing to walk away if the entire point of the exercise is to observe Holmes in his natural habitat?

But that too, is made clear in Moriarty’s reveal. Moriarty-as-Adler is still perfectly willing, perfectly capable of walking away from Holmes. Moriarty-as-Adler still wins by successfully fooling Holmes by faking her death.

It is Holmes who falls, who is deeply affected and deeply moved by his meeting with Adler. In the story, that deeply moved leads him to stop underestimating women, to give her the title of The Woman, the one that eclipses and predominates the entirety of her sex; in Elementary, Holmes ends up with a heroin addiction. But in both he is still deeply moved by having met her.

And Moriarty-as-Adler doesn’t need rescuing by Holmes. She isn’t saved, she doesn’t need to be. She walks away from Holmes with her agency and the very core of her being firmly intact.

Which is far truer to the text than would initially meets the eye with the red herrings of Dead Girlfriend and Bohemian Painter and The One that Got Away that had been thrown our way.

Some people might consider it a bit of erasure, for Irene Adler as a character to be revealed as Moriarty in disguise, I actually really like the twist, for a simple reason:

Irene Adler was The Woman to Sherlock Holmes, the one woman who eclipsed and predominated the whole of her sex, the only one to gain the honourific of The Woman from Sherlock Holmes.

And Irene Adler doesn’t exist. Irene Adler as The Woman is a construct, a fantasy, and Elementary very simply puts that out there. That the person Holmes considered The Woman, the single one, the woman who is representative of women. That person doesn’t exist. No perfect woman exists. Not for Sherlock Holmes, not for any one.

When stripped of artifice and the Sherlockian trappings of intelligence and meetings of the mind, the courtship of Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler, and the revelation of Moriarty-as-Adler, speaks to something incredibly basic:

Boy meets girl. Boy loves girl. Girl turns out to be not as perfect as boy thinks. Boy is distraught. Boy (with help of Friend) Gets Over It.

It’s simple and it’s powerful and it is poignant. And it flies in the face of every single romantic comedy in the media. By breaking Irene Adler down into a fabrication, Elementary shows us how hollow the idea of The Woman, The Man, The Perfect Ideal of Your Choice, is.

And, you know what, that’s awesome.

On Irene Adler Being Beaten By Sherlock Holmes… Again

Some people have said that by making Moriarty Irene, that it again takes away Irene’s agency that she is not the woman who beat Sherlock Holmes, but the woman beaten by Sherlock Holmes. And once again, this is the part where putting a distinction between Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes is helpful. Irene Adler is a construct of Moriarty’s, and it was Moriarty who was defeated.

But not by Sherlock.

Moriarty was beaten by Joan Watson.

Let’s repeat that. Sherlock’s overdose was a ruse. Sherlock being in the hospital was bait for Moriarty, and it was Joan Watson who beat Moriarty, who diagnosed Moriarty and beat her.

Joan was right. Moriarty remains (as both herself and in the Irene Adler guise) the woman who beat Sherlock Holmes. And who in turn was beaten by another woman, by Joan Watson.

How is that not absolutely beautiful and a clever way of keeping the core of what made Irene Adler so deserving of respect for Holmes while still remaining true to the Moriarty narrative of Moriarty being beaten. And in this case, even as Moriarty loses (in this case to Joan), Holmes loses too. Instead of losing his life (as the original intent of ACD’s Final Problem), Holmes loses a bit of his own history, a part of himself that was both painful and formative and something that was good that he obviously treasured.

But having addressed “The Final Problem,” let’s circle back to “A Scandal in Bohemia.” Holmes loses to Adler in “Scandal” because he underestimates her because she’s a woman, because he found himself believing the cultural myth of that period, that woman are inherently inferior to men, that they can’t be as clever. And he loses, to his detriment.

On Elementary, it’s not Holmes’ misogyny and buying into the cultural myth that is his downfall. This time it’s Moriarty’s. Moriarty buys into our cultural myth. Moriarty is a woman, Moriarty is the one who should know better than Holmes that women are a force to be reckoned with. And yet Moriarty buys into internalized misogyny and underestimates Joan Watson.

Think about it for a minute. Internalized misogyny is not being perpetuated by the hero who is then rewarded. Internalized misogyny is being practiced and perpetuated by the antagonist and her downfall is directly related to her internalized misogyny. Her dismissal of other women, as seeing them as competition, mascot, as lesser directly relates to her losing.

Just let that sink in for a moment.

In the current media landscape, we are still regularly reinforced by the idea that women should be seen as competition, where we all buy into (to varying degrees) a social expectation that women are lesser desirable, are expected to be less interesting, less well written then men. We all buy into that to varying degrees. But suddenly we have Elementary, we have a show that not only updated a classic canon to the modern age by the inclusion of peoples of colour, but one that proceeds to update the myths and shatter the idea of people as paragons of their gender, that manages to make internalized misogyny a trait that doesn’t just exist but is actively negative.

How cool is that?

Now, if only we can stop with the Microsoft product placements.

petit-bambi: Hilda is the god damn most precious pin up you’ll...

Thu, 23 May 2013 20:31:14 -0400

petit-bambi:

Hilda is the god damn most precious pin up you’ll ever find and it’s pretty hard to pick favorites when it comes to paintings of her :Tc

Richard Castle as Malcom Reynolds

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:44:19 -0400

Richard Castle as Malcom Reynolds

fuckyeah-nerdery: Oh my god, her face and hair are killing me....

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:42:38 -0400

fuckyeah-nerdery:

Oh my god, her face and hair are killing me. KILLING ME.

uastis: AC3: Liberation - Aveline Concept by Borislav Mitkov

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:13:44 -0400

uastis:

AC3: Liberation - Aveline Concept by Borislav Mitkov

Photo

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:04:15 -0400

superheroden: Fantastic 4 by Paolo Rivera

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:02:14 -0400

superheroden:

Fantastic 4 by Paolo Rivera

eschergirls: kidnotoriouswashere: arkhane: Lady Captain...

Thu, 23 May 2013 00:55:41 -0400

eschergirls:

kidnotoriouswashere:

arkhane:

Lady Captain America and Lady Thor

Art by Yasmine Putri

One of the few female versions I’ve seen that portray the strength of the characters instead of being a vehicle to show Cap with a midriff or Thor with tremendous cleavage.

These are very cool.

I finally got around to drawing Sailor Moon! Yay! Anyway, her...

Wed, 22 May 2013 01:24:53 -0400

I finally got around to drawing Sailor Moon! Yay!

Anyway, her redesign features a mix between the main senshi and the outer senshi look. Also, since she is a guardian after all, I figured she should be able to create a shield to protect the people she’s saving (and herself obviously). And as an offensive weapon I thought she should have these moon-shaped “bolts” that she can throw.

deviantart link

Tell me; who would you cast as me?

Tue, 21 May 2013 18:56:25 -0400

themikaelsluts:

Bonus: Tell me who you’d cast as my love interest.

Double Bonus: Tell me who you’d cast as my best friend.

thehappysorceress: Girl Talk by Gilbert Guillemot

Tue, 21 May 2013 18:56:05 -0400

thehappysorceress:

Girl Talk by Gilbert Guillemot

twentypercentcooler: the-hero-dies: Wonder Woman and sassy...

Tue, 21 May 2013 03:39:35 -0400

twentypercentcooler:

the-hero-dies:

Wonder Woman and sassy Batman. This image is based off of a series of tweets by Chris Sims that I included above. I thought it was funny, so I drew it.

Fan. Tastic.

"Painting isn’t an aesthetic operation; it’s a form of magic designed as mediator between this..."

Mon, 20 May 2013 14:33:27 -0400

“Painting isn’t an aesthetic operation; it’s a form of magic designed as mediator between this strange hostile world and us.”

- Pablo Picasso (via a-l-ancien-regime)

"I’m not going to make movies that tell children, ‘You should despair and run away’."

Mon, 20 May 2013 14:26:21 -0400

“I’m not going to make movies that tell children, ‘You should despair and run away’.”

- Hayao Miyazaki (via thefearsarepapertigers)

kristaferanka: Four Redesigns I did for She Has No Head’s new...

Mon, 20 May 2013 14:12:39 -0400

kristaferanka:

Four Redesigns I did for She Has No Head’s new article by Kelly Thompson

The theme were characters that need a redesign.

What do you aspire to be?

Sun, 19 May 2013 04:05:17 -0400

Wow…that’s a pretty big question.

Ummm…I think I want to be an accomplished artist. On my own terms. And by my current definition, being accomplished as an artist means finding that place in my mind that I can tap into and find creativity and originality very easily.

Anonymously message me one thing you want to know about me.

Sat, 18 May 2013 16:16:23 -0400

So I just finished watching the season finale of elementary. Do you know how long I’ve been...

Sat, 18 May 2013 15:49:06 -0400

So I just finished watching the season finale of elementary.

Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for a character like this version of Moriarty? All my life, that’s how long.

In conclusion, Elementary wins ALL the awards.