Some more honest entertainment opinions and some doom-saying in politics

     Lately, I've had trouble sleeping.  I keep thinking back to the Merle Haggard lyric "Sleep won't hardly come/when there's loneliness all around."  I don't know if I'm lonely in the apartment, because I don't know if loneliness is synonymous with a lack of trust in your neighbors.

 

    I think it is fair to say that fear has been well and truly cultivated at the top of the right wing between Trump and his Supreme Court.  Whether he is fully aware of it or not, whether his party is fully aware of it or not, they have constructed an American framework where Christian Republicans are now like members of the Gestapo and the SS to everyone else, especially atheists, LGBTQ+ people, Muslims and Democrat Christians.  By doing nothing about the pandemic and punishing the George Floyd protestors, by praising the Neo-Nazis in Virginia and by orchestrating January 6th, they have created a world where when someone talks about spiritual cleansing, or salvation of the masses, or Jesus without mentioning inclusion, we all get scared that they will break our doors down and beat us within an inch of our lives and possibly further.  And it is far from over.  This week, with the "can Trump be prosecuted" case on the Trump Court's desk, it is likely they will rule "January 6th's actions fall under special Republican First Amendment privileges to keep them safe from the Democrats who have taken over the mass media in Los Angeles."

 

    Speaking of, this will likely be one of the lowest "movie turnout" years for me, just above last year's 3 theatrical visits with 4; Godzilla x Kong; the New Empire, Ghostbusters; Frozen Empire, Garfield and Wicked.  The business has become grossly capitalist at any cost, and I see a likely short future for the MonsterVerse; they will think they will only make money with both Godzilla and Kong and Adam Wingard, leading to a stagnant formula that audiences will get sick with, leading them to kill Godzilla (because Wingard prefers Kong) and make Kong movies until that gets stale.  The franchise is in the disgustingly capitalist hands of Warner Brothers, who deleted "Coyote vs. Acme" for a tax write-off and killed the DCEU because Johnny Depp blamed Amber Heard for all his psychotic problems, James Gunn was hired and Gal Gadot is from Israel.  In all likelihood, everyone but Jason Momoa, Margot Robbie and John Cena is likely getting recast for the new DCU because that's the gamble they think will result in more money, rather than loyalty to a fanbase they built for ten years and is still willing to pay and demand better treatment of the actors than just meat they can cast aside when the powerful complain.  I know the preceding words will only state my insanity to most of you, but actors and directors are the people who make films (or make them stupid, admittedly), studios, CEOs and "can we make it cheaper/make more money" ruins it.  They killed the direction they were going with Transformers because of a whiny GEEWUN fanbase and they're going to do it again and again and again rather than invest in hard work, imagination and innovation.  Which is why they're investing in AI so they can just freeze everyone now and never hire any actors ever again!

Some honest gaming and nerd opinions

     Hi.

 

    This isn't going to be an easy one, because it's going to be revealing some stuff I've kept concealed for quite some time in an attempt for people to consider me cooler than I am.  However, I am too scared to search on YouTube for things like this because I know social media people are sinfully cruel.  In fact, let's start there.  Yesterday, I wanted to see if I could find this clip from Disney's Amphibia, but didn't because I felt if I typed "Sasha Anne Nintendo Reference Link" and "Edelgard" I'd just get a bunch saying "Edelgard is the woman equivalent of Hitler/Sephiroth, deserves no sympathy and we should plan the assassination of Tara Platt for playing her, Mitsuru and Elizabeth."

     My mind even comes up with those insults.  It notes that since Edelgard paints your portrait and has white hair while Dimitri is blonde, clearly Nintendo intended her to be the villain because Hitler was an artist and Sephiroth and Cloud have those hair colors, plus Cloud is crazy and succumbs to his demons and almost kills his friends.  It has taken every unsympathetic prosecuting attorney from every cartoon I've watched and aimed them full bore at various people and things I like.  We live in a world where too many people are the cartoonishly unsympathetic prosecuting attorney, or at least the one with blatant double-standards, condemning the women as sexual partners of the devil and finding excuses for every behavior of a wealthy, straight, conservative man.

 

    Honestly, I didn't get to say this to Tara herself, I wasn't sure how to, but the reason Edelgard became such a favorite character of mine wasn't just her will, it was her desire to end the idea of double standards and an elite class with special privileges.  I didn't want to be a political man, and I've never seen myself as a religious champion, but I've gotten deep in both subjects because many Christians in America support double standards and an elite class with special privileges, namely, themselves.  They praise God when their enemies suffer misfortune, and state that if America exterminates atheism and LGBTQ+ peoples and instates school prayer, it will never see a Category 4-5 Hurricane again and never lose another war.  These are not my priorities and I cannot find Biblical basis for them being God's priorities given the low level of violence Jesus enacted and when he did, who he did it to, namely, people who were asking Israelites to buy a better representation of themselves to present to God.  Conservative Churches can fall into placing similar pressure onto Left-Wing Christians, keeping them silent to avoid disrupting the flock. 

 

    I will also say if it wasn't for the DLC, I wouldn't have enjoyed Engage half as much as I did.  The presence of Edelgard, Chrom, Camilla and "Mirrorverse" versions of the villains really brought something extra to the game.  I also really liked Edelgard's conversations with Yunaka, Dimitri's with Merrin and Claude's with Citrinne, and the three girls from Engage have good conversations amongst each other, too.  Plus, "Mirrorverse" Marni, Madeline, has good conversations with Edelgard as well.  Without it, the game is mostly carried by Laura Post as Yunaka and Yuri Lowenthal as Marth, and Marth isn't in it too much.  I also feel Yuri, Tara and Laura Bailey deserve something special for their work on Fire Emblem Engage, Stray Gods and Spider-Man 2.

 

    I've been playing Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VII lately, and both are exciting, sometimes frustrating, but the victories over bosses are always satisfying.  I wasn't aware Sephiroth kills Aerith towards the end of disc 1, I thought it'd be towards the end of the game overall, so now I'm going through the second "disc" (I'm playing it on the Switch) with Cloud, Tifa and Yuffie with only a vague idea of what's going to happen, basically, that Sephiroth will reveal Cloud is a clone of Zach Fair or something and thus he possibly never existed because those might be Zach's memories with Tifa 5 years ago and that holdovers from Zach are the only reason he likes Aerith, so he'll start moping in the spinoffs, Tifa will say, "Dilly Dally Shilly Shally" i.e. "Quit moping, you're not the center of the universe and we, your friends NEED YOUR HELP."  If you hate that I referenced that line, the only other line I remember from Advent Children is "All Right, Who's been messing with my Materia?!" because it's Yuffie's only line and she was voiced by Christy Carlson Romano, who was also Kim Possible (and Ren Stevens, but I think only my sister-in-law remembers her).

 

     I am aware there are now remakes of Final Fantasy VII and Persona 3 out there, but they are on PlayStation and Xbox, so I can't play them unless I spend a lot of money.  I do know that Tara Platt reprises as Elizabeth in Persona 3 Reload and Dawn M. Bennett is Aigis, personally, I wanted Tara to reprise as Mitsuru, as well.  It was the role that made me take notice of her and the first quarter of Three Houses' Black Eagles route feels like an extension of Persona 3.  Tara made Persona 3 for me (in the Let's Play), just as Laura Bailey made Persona 4 (also in the Let's Play).  Dawn M. Bennett is very much enjoying the role of Aigis, it's one of the few things I still visit Twitter to check up on, others being Tara Platt and Abby Trott's accounts.  I might've missed out on talking to the new Yuffie voice actress at Anime Washington, I just remembered I might've tweeted a reply to her on Yuffie's birthday "She's living in a Materia World and she is a Materia Girl," which would've been fun to sing.  It's okay, though.

Women's History Month playlist and other things

 Well, it's March, which means it's Women's History Month.  I made a playlist for the month to play weekly or so.

Women’s History Month 2024:

1.)    Broken Horses-Brandi Carlile

2.)    FLOWERS-Miley Cyrus

3.)    This Is Why-Paramore

4.)    Dear Insecurity-Brandy Clark, Brandi Carlile

5.)    Dub Love-Big Lugg, Yuri Lowenthal, Tara Platt

6.)    The Long and Winding Road-Aretha Franklin

7.)    A Beautiful Noise-Alicia Keys, Brandi Carlile

8.)    Closer to Fine-Brandi and Catherine Carlile

9.)    Raise Hell-Brandi Carlile

10.) Heart of Glass (Live)-Miley Cyrus

11.) Jolene (Live)-Miley Cyrus

12.) Thousand Miles-Miley Cyrus, Brandi Carlile

13.) Edge of Midnight-Miley Cyrus, Stevie Nicks

14.) Yes, and?-Ariana Grande

15.) Landslide-Fleetwood Mac

16.) Over My Head (Live 1975)-Fleetwood Mac

17.) Rhiannon (Live 1975)-Fleetwood Mac

18.) Why (Live 1975)-Fleetwood Mac

19.) Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around-Stevie Nicks, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

20.) Rhiannon (Live 1977)-Fleetwood Mac

21.) Landslide (Live 1977)-Fleetwood Mac

22.) Over My Head (Live 1977)-Fleetwood Mac

23.) Gold Dust Woman (Live 1977)-Fleetwood Mac

24.) The Chain (Live 1977)-Fleetwood Mac

25.) Fireflies (Live)-Fleetwood Mac

26.) The Chain-Fleetwood Mac

27.) Into you (Live)-Ariana Grande

28.) My heart belongs to daddy (live)-Ariana Grande

29.) No tears left to cry (live)-Ariana Grande

30.) Don’t Call Me Angel-Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus, Lana del Rey

31.) Straight Through the Heart-Halestorm

32.) Noah (Stand Still)-Noah Cyrus, Billy Ray Cyrus

33.) Mad at You-Noah Cyrus, Gallant

34.) Every Beginning Ends-Noah Cyrus, Ben Gibbard

35.) Mama I’m Coming Home-Carrie Underwood

36.) Love Wins-Carrie Underwood

37.) Crazy Angels-Carrie Underwood

38.) Poor Everybody Else-Carrie Underwood

39.) How Great Thou Art-Carrie Underwood

40.) The Wonder of the Cross-Vicky Beeching

41.) The Story-Brandi Carlile

42.) Ignorance-Paramore

43.) Crazy Train-Liliac

44.) Rainbow in the Dark-Liliac

45.) Night In-Brittney Spencer

46.) Hey Bulldog (Live)-Fanny

47.) Magic Man-Dolly Parton, Ann Wilson, Howard Leese

48.) What Has Rock and Roll Ever Done For You-Dolly Parton, Stevie Nicks, Waddy Watchel

49.) Wrecking Ball-Dolly Parton-Miley Cyrus

50.) I Can’t Get No Satisfaction-Dolly Parton, Brandi Carlile, P!nk

51.) Bygones-Dolly Parton, Rob Halford, John 5, Nikki Sixx

52.) Let it Be-Dolly Parton, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Peter Frampton, Mick Fleetwood

53.) Free Bird-Dolly Parton, Ronnie Van Zant, Gary Rossington, Artimus Pyle

 

Outside of that, I must urge everyone to quit Twitter, it is becoming the next TruthSocial; just a NeoNazi playground, and we can recoup at BlueSky and donate to Biden's Presidential campaign and RedCrescent.  Otherwise, you shall be inundated with bad news and very little video games, sports and music as well fascists rejoicing at their chance to remold America and Jesus into their own twisted, antisemitic, Islamophobic, homophobic and transphobic image.  If they get that chance, I will pray that the nations of the world embargo the United States and declare war upon it, bombing it with conventional and nuclear weapons, leaving the country as barren and desolate as Germany and Japan post-World War II but with no Allies to rebuild it, forcing the once-proud populace to humble itself and eat rats, roaches, fecal matter and babies, forgetting about reconstruction and dwelling forever in ruins!

The deepest gash

     I've talked quite a bit today on social media about probably my deepest hurt in the last decade, and since it won't go away anytime soon realistically, I'm blogging about it.

    It is the failures, the poisoning of the wells and poisoning the roots of the tree of God by spiritual leaders.  Some say it started as soon as people misunderstood Paul and began using scripture as an excuse for homophobia, some say it started with the start of the marriage of Church and State and Televangelism in the 1970s.  I don't care when it started, all I know is it's probably never been as bad as it has been in the last 10 years in the United States, with the exception of Nazi Germany, with the American Church claiming those Christians were gay and pagan.

    10 years ago, a political party fed up with Obama, fed up with Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus and Ariana Grande and fed up with the existence of Muslims and the LGBTQ+ community created the movie "God's Not Dead," where an atheist professor torments a Christian college student and his Christian wife and a Christian child is tormented by her Muslim father.  That December, Kirk Cameron followed up with his pro-violence against people who didn't believe in Jesus the right way "Saving Christmas," where St. Nicholas beats two men brutally to cheers of admiration and it's all about buying big, fancy material things because we celebrate Jesus become material.  In the following year, Michael Sweet of Stryper condemned Miley Cyrus, a pansexual, gender fluid human trying to understand her self-expression, and would go on to make exceptions for a straight male with crude, racist, misogynist and homophobic tendencies to say "grab them by the [vagina]."  Violence skyrocketed with that man's campaign, and more films were released in even-numbered years to boost campaign funds.  In my apartment and on expanded basic cable, I was stunned to find still enough loyalty to Jimmy Swaggart, a crazed televangelist who, in the 80s, called rock and roll "the devil's music" and "the new pornography."  He also called Christian Rock Stars "as impossible as Christian Prostitutes" and demanded $1 million or God would strike him dead.  After seeing a prostitute in 1988, he lamented on TV and Ozzy Osbourne and Zakk Wylde struck back with the metal song "Miracle Man," calling him "a devil with a crucifix," and saying "Jimmy, he got busted, with his pants down," "self-righteous clown, MIRACLE MAN got busted." (the words "Miracle Man" were put through a distorted talkbox).  Wylde would later tackle a similar topic with "Counterfeit God," about preachers who claim to psychically know people's names and cure their cancer, filling theaters and stadiums.

    As a Christian, all of this is poison to our tree, poison to our body of Christ, poison to us.  We need to stop rejecting the outside world so brutally, some of it can be a necessary release from the dark clouds in our heads.  Rock and roll, video games, pop music, same-gender couples, they/them pronouns; they are not signs of a society partying in sulfur and flames.  You're just scaring them away from Church to the point that now less people go than those who do.  Even I tense up sometimes thinking about Casting Crowns lyrics, and I don't want to.  You are driving me crazy, I can't clean my apartment, I can't hear noise, I can't even look at anyone in my building without tensing up because all I can think of is who would beat me, lecture me and shove my head in a full sink like Carrie's mother.

Top 50 Love Songs

 Hi, Since it is Valentines' Day, I thought I'd share my Top 50 Love songs, some of which I've shared YouTube links to.

Top 50 Love Songs:

1.)    Heart of Gold-Neil Young*

2.)    Heart of Gold (Live 1972)-Neil Young*

3.)    Heart of Gold-Johnny Cash

4.)    Malibu-Miley Cyrus

5.)    Jet City Woman-Queensryche

6.)    Never Thought I’d fall in Love with you-Billy Ray Cyrus

7.)    Whole Lotta Love-Sammy Hagar and the Circle

8.)    Whole Lotta Love-Led Zeppelin

9.)    Something-The Beatles

10.) Whole Lotta Love-Zepparella

11.) Something (Live)-Paul McCartney

12.) Jealous Guy-John Lennon

13.) Bmblb-Casey Lee Williams

14.) I finally do-Erika Harlacher

15.) Without You (Southern Rain)-Billy Ray Cyrus

16.) Love Reign Down-Black Label Society

17.) Open Arms-Journey

18.) Faithfully-Journey

19.) Sweet Child O’Mine-Guns N Roses

20.) Is This Love-Whitesnake

21.) Treasure-Casey Lee Williams

22.) If She Ever Leaves Me-The Highwomen

23.) Whole Lotta Love-Santana and Chris Cornell

24.) Love Song-Tesla

25.) She’s Not Him-Miley Cyrus

26.) Her Body is Bible-FLETCHER

27.) Good-Hearted Woman-Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson

28.) Becky’s So Hot-FLETCHER

29.) Yesterday-The Beatles

30.) Oh! Darling-The Beatles

31.) Six O’Clock-Ringo Starr

32.) Photograph-Ringo Starr

33.) Stand By Me-John Lennon

34.) Fat Bottomed Girls-Queen

35.) Heaven-Warrant

36.) Why Can’t This Be Love-Sammy Hagar

37.) Mama, I’m Coming Home-Ozzy Osbourne

38.) BWU-Tegan and Sara

39.) U-Turn-Tegan and Sara

40.) Just Like Starting Over-John Lennon

41.) I’m Yours-Ringo Starr

42.) Woman-John Lennon

43.) Worthy (Bmblb Part II)-Casey Lee Williams

44.) Anastasia-Slash, Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators

45.) Give My Heart To You-Billy Ray Cyrus

46.) See You On The Other Side-Ozzy Osbourne

47.) Mama I’m Coming Home-Carrie Underwood*

48.) I’ll Be There for you-Bon Jovi

49.) Crimson and Clover-Joan Jett, Dave Grohl, Miley Cyrus

50.) After All-Whitesnake

 

II I am dealing with controlling my rage from the rage others release in social media about news, and also in the real world, last night someone was complaining about the quality of foods people share at the Apartment's free food area.  In both cases, there is limited things we can do, the social media complaints really suggest donating to ActBlue, MoveOn, Biden's Campaign and Red Crescent (you can't donate to UNRWA anymore because they helped finance Hamas and the US, UK and other countries cut them off), but I'm through my non-food budget for the week getting 1964 the Tribute tickets and MP3s.  Just be aware you'll get paranoid text messages on a regular basis afterward.