inside
story
EarthBound: The Perpetual Adventures
Scene Commentary by Michael DePalma
A Hero's Work...
"Please, I can�t think like a college student when I have a cold�"
"Why don�t you heal yourself?"
"Because I have a math test tomorrow and I�m not ready for it yet."
"Understandable, understandable,� said Buzz Buzz. The two sipped their coffee in silence for a moment until Buzz Buzz broke the silence. �Well, Ness, I�m afraid this isn�t all about pleasantries."
This joke was invented, literally, on the fly. I started out with Ness actually suffering with a cold, and halfway through writing this scene, I asked myself this question. "The common cold is hell. Why would I voluntarily put myself through this?" And the answer I came up with almost immediately: Because I don't want to go to school. If I'm not mistaken, I was a high school Junior when I wrote this, the year I had Ms. Gimmi, The Vindictive Math Teacher From Hell. She was every argument against the unionization of teachers and if I'm not mistaken, I actually get a little dig on her in Perpetual 7.
Anyway, the whole concept of Buzz Buzz coming back has been done by so many amateur fanfic writers ("amateur" being a loose term, of course) that I NEEDED the first meeting with him to be spot on in terms of characterization. He needed to come across as a real person and not just as Ploty McDevice, and while reading this over again it strikes me that I'm not too sure how well I did. But something that definitely helps is the fact that Buzz Buzz doesn't immediately get into the situation at hand, preferring to calmly socialize before posing the question that drives Episode 1: "What would you do if you had to choose between a full life of peace before dying from a combination of pneumonia and Apocalypse, and a never-ending mission that insures the futures of your children?" I think this helps to offset that amatuer hour feeling that is associated with "Buzz Buzz comes back from the grave and gives Ness a new mission."
Girlfriend?
"Thanks,� said Jeff, �You were carrying this much cash?"
"I was planning to go to the movies tonight with Michelle. You know, movies are just absurdly expensive here."
"�Michelle?"
"My girlfriend."
"Oh, yeah, I remember you telling me about her. Have a good time."
I said in an interview on this site that the show "Smallville" served as my primary inspiration for Perpetual. Well, Michelle Walker was born out of frustration over one of its main characters, Lana Lang.
I'll try to explain for those who have never seen the show. "Smallville" is about young Clark Kent as he grows up, discovers his powers, and develops a friendship with Smallville's wealthiest denizen, Lex Luthor. It's really quite neat for a show that essentially adds up to (as good ol' Giampi puts it) "Dawson's Creek" plus heat vision. More camp than an episode of "Salute Your Shorts" (ok, maybe not quite that much, but it's not like they hired future Academy Award winners onto this show), but oodles of fun regardless.
Anyway, Lana Lang is the cute former cheerleader whose parents were killed in the meteor shower that brought Clark to Earth. Naturally, Clark is very affectionate towards Lana. Unfortunately, if there's one thing that the geniuses who run The WB are good at, it's trying to force an affectionate, yet strong, yet also wounded love interest down your throat. The writers tried to make Lana everything to everybody, and God bless Kristen Kreuk who's trying her best, but she's still just a Neutrogena model working with mediocre scripts.
So out of my frustration, I made sure to create a love interest for Ness that was the exact opposite of Lana. Lana's the preppy cheerleader type? Michelle's the PvP playing, movie-quoting, fanfic-writing geek. Lana mopes over her dead parents? Michelle just lives with the fact that she has absentee parents, quietly and gratefully accepting the hospitality of the Polestars, and moping only when she's ticked off about how the situation has inconvenienced someone else. Lana hates it when people hold things back from her? Michelle is smart and confident enough to understand that along with the secrets friends keep from her are very, very good reasons for keeping them, and therefore doesn't take it personally (more on this later).
She is an ideal character, but here's the thing about ideal characters: by definition, an ideal character is a Mary Sue. Therefore, Michelle is constantly walking a really fine line between being a character and a bit of silly wish fulfillment, IF she hasn�t already fallen into the latter territory. Judging by the couple of reviews that want to see Michelle killed off and/or be the GIS 3 culprit, I don't think I'm alone in feeling this way. However, if I had a choice between writing a Mary Sue and writing a weak-willed, dim-witted character which gives readers fits in trying to figure out WHY the hero would fall for her, I'll take the Mary Sue. And it's not like I think there's no middle ground between the two, I'm just not sure if I'm a good enough writer to consistently find that middle ground.
But there's a trade-off to the trade off -- I really LIKE writing Michelle and Ness. There's a great chemistry between them and I'm not sure if I can convincingly break them up. I'm mulling around a few ideas, but we'll just have to wait and see. It could be possible that Paula's love will go unrequited.
The Matter At Hand
"I apologize for beating around the bush, Ness. The point is, they're busy committing other, more terrible crimes; they're not going to bother with you. So you have developed the talent to spot those influenced-we'll call the influence GIS. You saw a red glint-you'll see two others, blue and black. Each color indicates a stage of GIS. Stage 1 is indicated by a blue glint. They can be saved with PSI Flash, that is, if they're willing to be saved. The red glint indicates the most common stage, Stage 2, and has to be beaten until you see the glint go out, indicating that they have lost Giygas' influence.
OK, if anybody's starting to get any "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" vibes off of this, I certainly don't blame you. It is true that I'm Joss Whedon's female dog; however, I started my Whedon worship with "Firefly" in the Summer of 2005, and then moved on to waking up at 7 in the morning every weekday to episodes of "Buffy" and then "Angel." Before then, I had no clue I was borrowing my structure from the geekiest geek in all of Geekatonia.
So how did I create GIS? I simply needed a "Freak of the Week" device and this seemed like the best way to go about it. I even realized later that there was something like precedent in the game for this (the mummy in the Summers museum that attacks you even after you've defeated Giygas -- even if it was because he just had a slight bug).
The Film Fan
On the way to Michelle's house, the talking about the movie came to a standstill. Michelle brushed away her shoulder-length brown hair from her thin blue eyes with her hand, looked around, smiled, and said, "You know, I never realized Twoson was so beautiful at night. It will vanish one day, that's for sure."
Ness and Paula smiled at that one, but Jeff was stupid enough to say "That's an interesting observation."
Everybody stopped in their tracks. Ness and Paula looked at each other at that moment. Their mouths said nothing. Their faces said "Oh, crap."
Michelle looked at Jeff dumbfoundedly. "You've never seen A Better Tomorrow?"
"I, uh...no."
"The quintessential Hong Kong movie. My prerequiste for any friend of mine is that they must see this movie."
"Really?"
"Yeah, Jeff," said Ness, "It's an insane movie."
Michelle's film geekdom comes from my film geekdom, so I'm just going to ramble on here about where my love of movies started.
My parents amicably split in 1992. Literally, it was like a gentle unraveling of a knot rather then a violent chop apart. Without having to go to court, without making any legal arrangements whatsoever (they weren't even legally divorced until just a couple of years ago, when Dad finally remarried -- Mom was actually the one who hooked them up) my mother and father managed to agree on custody, child support, and who gets what in terms of property. Dad got an apartment in nearby Bethpage, and that was literally how it ended. No ugly battles, no court-appointed time with the kids. Mom was going to raise us and Dad was free to pick us up and take us wherever as long as Mom knew what was going on and approved (which she usually did). And he also left Mom a check every week -- again, without being legally compelled. He just did it. And in the end, my siblings and I actually got along better with my father as a result.
Every kid that has to go through a divorce should have one like this. Even if they went all War of the Roses on each other while we weren't around, we never heard a peep even though we all knew it was coming. My parents will always be heroes to me because of how cleanly they handled things.
Anyway, enough about my family life; if you haven't skipped ahead to the next part, you want to know about my love of movies. Well, the seed was planted very simply: as a person who lives with a rare disorder known as hyperlexia, I'm relatively smart but I lack social skills that would otherwise develop naturally. It's why I spend all my time in front of a computer. I'd LIKE more...I just don't know what else there is. So the only way I could really connect with my father is through movies, and he'd take me to one pretty much every weekend. He still does -- nowadays he commutes from New Jersey (where he lives with my stepmother) to Long Island, a one hour drive each way, whenever he can to see his mother and brothers and take me to a movie or dinner.
Now obviously, Michelle's family life is MUCH, MUCH different from mine. Her dad's a mean drunk, and her mom...if you were to ask about her mom, she'd probably quote Famke Janssen from The Faculty (a great, underrated movie -- the reason why I've always pulled for Josh Hartnett in whatever he shows up in):
ZEKE (Josh Hartnett)
What are you going to do? Are you going to call my mother?
MISS BURKE (Famke Janssen)
And how am I going to do that, little Zekey boy? Do you even
know where she is? Europe, Sri Lanka, Japan? I wonder what
remote location she went to this week to hide from her great,
big bastard mistake!
Of course, this thought doesn't hurt Michelle emotionally; perhaps maybe deep down it hurts, but she hasn't brought it up because she really doesn't see a point in doing so. Her mother's gone. The Polestars are raising her, and she's "raising" her father, and that's just how it is. But the point of all this rambling is that Michelle's passion for movies comes out of a desire to make SOME sort of connection with her life. That need for a connection drives her, as you'll learn in Episode 7 (that's 2).
Sweet Dreams
The soft pitter-patter of several thousand raindrops could not overpower the soft sound of Dave Matthews and his band playing those smooth sounds and crooning those soft words that warned the listener not to burn the day away. She waited anxiously in her best dress, excited for the night she had ahead of her. The candles were lit and placed on the table, as well as some special incense she bought just for tonight. She poured the champagne--scratch that, sparkling apple cider since they were underage--and then heard the knock on the door she had been waiting for. She rushed to the door and opened it to Ness, looking so beautiful in that suit and tie, despite how drenched he was in God's tears of joy. "I've been waiting for you," she said.
"I couldn't wait any longer," said Ness. He leaned in close and--Paula, wake up.
Paula flipped in her bed, awakened from her wonderful dream by Poo's voice.
Not really that much to say about this scene in particular. Here we can gleam that Paula loves Dave Matthews and doesn't believe in underage drinking.
Paula's attraction to Ness is based on pretty much any telling of "EB" with Ness and Paula as a couple. Paula sees Ness as a guardian angel, and really, that's the only connection she feels with Ness at the moment. She doesn't know true love, not really.
Hidden Feelings
"So you're still not comfortable with going on your own?"
"No," said Michelle, "Not yet, anyway."
"Well," said Poo, "How does he feel about it?"
"He doesn't. I keep telling him that it has to do with my Dad not being comfortable."
Again, this was born out of necessity due to a lack of planning. I wrote the concert ticket angle, suddenly remembered that Michelle's not allowed to go out alone, and then also remembered that I intended to write Michelle's father as a lazy, violent drunk. Hence, Michelle was lying. In fact, she usually tends to lie about her family life, curiously enough, because she doesn't want people to worry about her. Ask yourselves, why does she not want to look helpless?
Affection
"All right, then." Paula kissed Ness on the cheek and said, "Go have fun."
"Uh...yeah, sure. What was that about?"
"What was what about?" asked Paula as she went to take the nearest chair.
"The kiss?"
Paula stopped in her tracks. I kissed him? she asked herself before she realized, Oh my goodness, I kissed him! Not wanting to look like she had something to say, she spun around. "Oh," she said, "that was, I was just being friendly." Idiot! I'm an idiot!
Ness raised his eyebrow. He was buying it but he was confused. "Really?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"OK...I'm just gonna head out now. See you later."
"You got it." Ness left Paula to beat herself up.
Anything other than a kiss would seem awkward for Paula to do, and I didn't want to have Paula acting awkwardly because she's comfortable around Ness and Matt Norris. So I played that up, had her do what came natural to her, and therefore catch EVERYBODY off guard, including the reader. I love this scene simply because it's easy to miss that Paula kissed Ness when she really shouldn't have, and if you do miss it, and you read Ness's bit of dialogue, you suddenly go 'WHOA! HOLD ON! What the hell, did that happen? Holy crap, it did! She kissed her!" Which is pretty much Paula's state of mind the moment she realizes that she kissed her crush that's currently dating her best friend.
Extreme Measures
The music suddenly stopped, as did everyone else a half-second later. Was it a problem in the speakers? Or was easy listening about to get a hell of a lot more difficult?
Suddenly, they saw Jeff, on the stage, in nothing but his underwear and glasses. They heard piano, hard piano. And then they heard Jeff's cry.
"JUST TAKE THOSE OLD RECORDS OFF THE SHELF! I'LL SIT AND LISTEN TO THEM BY MYSELF! TODAY'S MUSIC AIN'T GOT THE SAME SOUL, I LIKE THAT OLD TIME ROCK 'N ROLL!"
He was singing something about discos when security tackled him and dragged him off the stage.
Without a doubt, this is maybe the most popular scene in the story. I came up with it simply because Jeff dancing in his underpants served three purposes.
1.) Jeff needed to show that he was willing to go to insane lengths to get done what needed to get done.
2.) The slightly stuck-up Jeff was gone and he had completely submitted to a "life is for living" philosophy.
3.) Having Jeff mimic the famous scene in Risky Business is just comedy gold.
So there.
Moment
"Oh my God," said Michelle as she walked onto the roof. She looked around her, and could see almost the whole city from where she stood. "This is so cool," she said.
"Yeah," said Ness, "I spent some of my summer here. Late at night, when everyone was asleep, I would come up here and think about how far I've come...that is, you know, I just graduated middle school and all, I was about to enter High School, it was...it just seemed like a great place to reflect on all that."
"Of course it was," noted Michelle, "It's a cinematic place to reflect on anything."
Ness looked at her. "Cinematic?"
"Cinematic. It's the kind of area you'd expect a character in a movie to go to to reflect on things because it's so picturesque and all."
"Nice. Did you make that up?"
"For that meaning, I think so, but, you know, six billion people in the world. Who's to say somebody didn't think of it first?"
"That's a good point."
They sat there, just admiring the view. Ness looked at Michelle and suddenly Paula's kiss became ancient history. He loved the way she looked in the light of the Fourside night. Michelle looked at him and smiled. Ness leaned in, and they kissed, brief but tender, and held each other close.
Here's the point where I figured out just how into each other Ness and Michelle were. There's a sort of connection that Ness and Michelle have that's really...I can't explain it. They just bounce off each other, not like a standard romantic relationship but like an intense friendship.
Now obviously, it's rare that a first date amongst teenagers ends this romantically, but it goes to show that Ness is a relatively worldy person, and that he wants to make Michelle feel special, especially considering how nervous she is about going out alone. What inspired the setting was a recent visit to New York City that I had to see something off-Broadway, and although I never got a rooftop view, even from ground level the city seemed to sparkle and glow phenominally. I needed a place where Ness and Michelle could be alone, and the answer was, nobody ever goes up on the rooftop. That view of a city like New York at night...that could inspire more than just a scene in a fanfic for an obscure RPG.
Before I move on, I just want to discuss a pitfall I have with Ness and Michelle's chemistry. I've never been in a relationship, so I've found that the biggest problem I've had with writing these two is to find the "valley"; that sour that makes the sweet even sweeter. I don't want to just throw in a fight for the sake of a fight. It needs to stem naturally, which is hard because Michelle's the type of girl who doesn't get angry if her boyfriend is caught staring at a stranger's ass or doesn't pay attention to her on a constant basis. She's EXTREMELY low-maitenence. (Yeah, argue all you want about how this crosses into "Mary Sue" territory; how often do fanfic writers sabatoge their charaters because they end up getting angry over ultimately petty crap?)
Right now I'm toying with the idea of sex (as in, second base) entering the picture, which is SCARY territory to go into. Despite the fact that there's a really good reason that people start getting sex-ed in middle school, and despite the fact that I'm kind of covering it with Lauren, the fact still remains that frank, serious discussions about sex between two 15-year-olds make people uncomfortable. And that, in turn, makes me uncomfortable. But this is an inevitable issue amongst teenagers, and this could also open up a lot of new challenges for the relationship. And I can't lie, I'm really interested in seeing how the couple could fare against them.
So I guess what I really want to know is...how many Perpetual fans live in the Bible Belt?
And Now...Lauren
He turned around to come face to face with Lauren Pierce.
Lauren was a striking, overdeveloped blonde freshman who had tormented Ness since middle school through various means, usually flirtation. These days, she was going out with a senior that played football--not that that stopped her advances toward Ness.
Ah yes. Lauren Pierce. You thought my previous commentaries were long and self-involved? Ho ho ho...get some coffee. And maybe parental permission.
The inspiration for Lauren Pierce came from a girl we'll call Valerie. She always wore skin-tight cotton and denim to make it easy to undress with her eyes, and she certainly knew what it did to all the boys around her. She knew real well what it did to me, because on a day where she had me cornered (I think -- I may have also done this voluntarily, but somehow I can't imagine how I had the guts to do so), I admitted that I wanted her. Bad.
Admit it right now. Every last one of you men knew a girl somewhat like this, whether it's a celebrity, centerfold, or a girl you know in school. I can't imagine how you complete puberty without one. But how many actually manage to sum up the generous courage, compelled or no, and say out loud, "I want some of that"?
Now the realities of sexual fantasies like Valerie come in many attitudes and relationships. A puritan would slap me and file a sexual harassment suit. A best friend would never talk to me again or explain how she didn't like me in that way. A good samaritan would probably have obliged me. A girl who had the hots for me back would have definitely obliged me. But Valerie? She was dangling a bone that she knew I was following like a lost puppy.
The verdict? The exact word on my mind can't be used here so I'll just say that the word is also used for a certain farming tool.
Her teasing knew no bounds. One day she'd draw circles on my back with her finger in English class, and since there are no words that are appropriate for this site that I can use to describe what this did to me, I'll just say that it made me look like this guy:
All this teasing went on for a couple of months until she "broke up" with me. That's when I ultimately wised up and realized that she just wanted to string me along -- now she was bored with our non-sexual sexual relationship and wanted to see how I'd react to her being angry at me for inexplicable reasons.
So the rest of senior year, we were in flat out war with each other, which was always fun. One time in P.E., we were playing Volleyball, and I was getting a little too into it in spite of my lack of skill. So Val would mercilessly mock me for it by doing a lot of overbaked cheerleading as opposed to, you know, hitting the volleyball when it came her way.
Of course, the team we were both on liked to play volleyball, wanted to have fun playing volleyball, and had no tolerance for idiots like her (although they were slightly entertained). So when she came out mockingly shouting "Good game! Good game! We played awesome today!", I struck back, deadpan, "It was a good game. I wish you were there."
Of the few times I really, truly, FACED somebody, that was the best of them. Which is pathetic, but I still got high fives all around as Valerie instantly shut down, beaten at her own game.
Anyway, when it came time to write Lauren, I drew from my memories of Val, as she's Ness's version of "teenage hormones come to life," and it surprises me that she's as popular as she is. (Or maybe James likes her enough to make it look like she's popular.)
A Little Slip
His arms flew up, grabbing onto Chester's suit jacket, but it didn't seem to do much. The darkness started to settle in. Ness was fading, fading, fading, the pain blinding his mind as much as it blinded his eyes.
And then he heard a small "Boom," and he felt Chester's weight launch off his back fast. He heard an "Oof" from Chester and the noise of body grinding pavement. And then his vision returned, and he looked behind him, and then he saw Chester, seated and slumped. And he heard Lauren scream in echoes, "WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO TO HIM?"
Ness stumbled over to Chester, who twitched once every few seconds. There were burn marks all over his torso, as if there was a small explosion there. Ness checked Chester's eyes; they looked normal now.
One of the many plot threads that never went anywhere. I actually tried to explore what happened with this when I experimented with an interactive episode of Perpetual entitled "Lawyers, Guns, and Money", the basic gist of which was that Chester was kidnapped and Lauren turned to Ness for help. Only one person posted, though, and truth be told, I lost motivation to continue the story. It wasn't the poster's (GoldTurkey) fault, he did really well. It was all me.
So I have to resolve this loose plot thread, but again, I don't want to do things just to do them. It's all about timing.
A Special Day
"Are you Ness?" asked the brunette.
"Yeah, you guys are friends of Paula's?"
"I'm a friend of Paula's," said the brunette, "The others are friends of mine I dragged along...my, uh, Dad doesn't like it when I'm alone. I'm sorry, I hope you don't mind."
"Not at all," said Ness, "It's just dinner." Ness extended his hand. "Your name is?"
"Michelle," she said, shaking his hand, "This is Dropkick Murphy and Lyssa."
"Hey," said Dropkick Murphy (the bald one) and Lyssa (the other girl).
"Have a seat," said Ness. Everyone sat down, Murphy next to Ness, Lyssa across from Murphy, and Michelle across from Ness.
"So," said Michelle, "What are you doing here?"
The inspiration for Episode 6 came from wanting to explore the beginning of Ness and Michelle's relationship. I always thought it would be really cool and interesting if Paula, the girl who's crushing on Ness, was the one who set Michelle up with him.
The original plan was that Ness, Michelle, and Poochyfud would be trapped inside the Twoson Multiplex due to a Cujo situation -- in this instance, a GIS-3 infected toy poodle, who would tear a rude theater patron to pieces right before their very eyes. Of course, it would all be played for laughs, especially the part where Paula and Jeff drop by to kill it. Because animal cruelty in reality is evil, sick, and wrong, but animal cruelty in a created reality -- especially written fiction -- can be hilarious if you play it right. Point is, while the couple was trapped in the theater, they'd reminisce about their relationship then.
But there was SO MUCH going on already; Jeff and Paula were having their date (more on that in a little bit), Matthew was dealing with a potential new love interest, and of course, there were the flashbacks, and they were being covered from multiple angles, not just Ness and Paula's. So I scrapped the lighthearted "kill the toy poodle" story and just concentrated on the dates of the night, with the main theme of the episode having to do with connections; be it making them, maintaining them, evolving them, or even losing them. A theme that was solidified when Michelle discussed Magnolia, because I'm so talented I can't make a point on my own; I need to depend on a better artist to do it for me. :P
It Had To Be Done
SHUT UP!
SHUT UP!
"SHUT UP!" Paula finally screamed before breaking down in tears.
She sobbed for what seemed like hours before reaffirming to herself, "I had to tell her."
The phone rang. Paula realized that there was no one home to get it for her; Mom was shopping for groceries and Dad was at the gym. She took a deep breath, and then went to the kitchen to get the receiver. "Hello?" she choked.
"Hey...it's Jeff...are you okay?"
"Uhm, yeah, I'm fine, Michelle and I got into a bit of a fight, said some rough words...uh, what do you need?"
"I just was wondering if you'd like to go out for dinner tonight?"
Paula's eyes widened. "Really? Uh, with who?"
I chose not to reveal the actual argument right away because I felt it was easy to figure out what Paula and Michelle were going to fight about the second Paula said "We need to talk." And it just made more sense to put the aftermath in while Michelle was thinking about it, due to the non-linear nature of that particular episode.
I keep talking about timing. Here, the timing was perfect. Paula felt that the time to tell Michelle about how was right then, and I felt that the time to throw that sort of drama in was that moment. This is why I like to wait for friction to create itself. You can totally see both points of view on this issue even though you don't necessarily side with both of them; nobody's character is assassinated. If I tried to force this and manufacture the drama, characters would be lost.
So what does this mean, that I can't have a hero/ine that's even a little jerkish? Probably true. I haven't really discovered the joys of writing villians. It's true that they have no rules to conform to, but I don't generally judge a character by their actions as I do by their motives. Killing a toy poodle in the name of saving three people makes you a hero in my eyes, I don't give a crap what the Humane Society has to say about it. Donating half your liver because you want the person you're donating to to be indebted to you (copyright "House")? You're an ass and you deserve to suffer complications arising from surgery. I have equal amounts of fun writing good guys and bad guys, because my characters have goals, they're going to do what they're going to do to reach those goals, and other characters are going to react however they react; probably by setting goals of their own and doing what they're going to do to reach those goals, causing still other characters to react and set even more goals. I could go all night long, but let's move on.
What Goes Around...
Michelle shook her head. "You're drunk. Leave me alone."
CRACK, Michelle staggered back from the fist that connected with her eye. "Answer the question, be-itch!" her father followed up.
Michelle rubbed her eye a bit, seething in pain, muttering "All right, okay," and--WHAP!--Michelle kicked out her father's kneecap, CRASH he went into the ocean of beer cans and in one fluid motion, Michelle brought her father onto his stomach and twisted his arm behind his back and the pain that Michelle was reeling from earlier was revisited onto Dad tenfold.
I knew one kid back in elementary school who was allegedly abused by his father. He showed us a nasty gash on his elbow once and claimed that his father put his arm in the microwave. Personally, I thought this kid was a turd sandwich -- even for a third grader -- and that he was probably lying. But I'm sure somebody at school looked into it and took the necessary steps, whether he was telling the truth about his dad or not.
Of course, a lot of kids hurt from abuse, and it's probably a degrading, hurtful thing to go through life being kicked around by your own family. But if kids learn what they live, then abused kids see violence as the answer to their problems. So when the abuser becomes the problem, then the abuser is met with more violence. God knows that I'm no child psychology expert, but that makes sense to me.
I think Michelle used to get beaten on a regular basis, but then -- sometime before she met Paula -- she learned to hit back and the beatings became much less frequent. Because of this, Michelle feels she has a handle on the situation. She flat-out refuses to get Social Services involved because they'll just move her to a foster care center far away, where she'll find a home that's probably worse off than the Polestars, who have hooked her up in every way possible. (It's not only possible, but extremely likely that should Michelle ever find herself up against a wall with Social Services, the Polestars would adopt her in not even a heartbeat. Michelle, however, has a wicked cynicism streak and will only truly put her faith in 100% certainties. The Polestars, for whatever reason, are not what she considers a 100% certainty.)
She's also got a problem insomuch as she feels sorry for her father and has a desire to take care of him. She'll drag him to bed when he passes out and will keep him as comfortable as possible. It raises questions, which I like. Questions such as "How can a 15-year-old girl love someone she hates so much?" Questions that are eventually going to have to be answered. Questions that probably have to do with Michelle's mother.
The Movie
"So, what are we seeing?" asked Ness, situated in a dark basement at Murphy's house.
"You'll see," smiled Michelle. Murphy and Lyssa had gone up to the kitchen to "pop some popcorn" (part of the popping process may have involved third base). For the moment, then, this left Ness and Michelle alone with a big TV, a 5.1 stereo system, a DVD player, and what would turn out to be Murphy's copy of The Rock.
On my list of my all-time favorite 5 American action films ever made, The Rock stands at number two, just behind Die Hard and just ahead of The Getaway (the original with McQueen), The Last Boy Scout, and Lethal Weapon.
When Hollywood executives ask several different writers to turn in drafts of a movie, this is the result they hope for. Aaron Sorkin (of the first four seasons of "The West Wing" and the upcoming "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" -- read the pilot script, it's flat out amazing) makes his influence known when the President's cabinet is meeting to receive Frank Hummel's demands. When the mutiny begins to bubble up, you feel Quentin Tarantino's voice behind that concept. This was a piecemeal script, notorious for resulting in garbage final products, and Michael Bay not only makes it work, he KNOCKS IT OUT OF THE PARK and reminds you what it's like to be genuinely THRILLED by a movie.
And it works because of the characters, despite a ridiculous-sounding concept. Shenanigans on anyone who started calling Nicolas Cage a sell-out because of this movie (even if I'm not quite using the word correctly). Here he crafts a geeky, entertaining character, and over the course of the story molds him into a fully functional badass. Sean Connery takes a hardened badass, and believably softens him over the course of the story without giving up his edge. Ed Harris plays one of the greatest movie villians ever, a man with a good cause who is going about it the wrong way, knows it, but is so haunted by the troubles of the past that he knows of no other way to get people to listen.
This is not an unpredictable movie. But as far as action movies go, it's an ingeniously directed film that refuses to let you leave it without a big grin on your face over how cool it all is. I think it was Roger Ebert who called it a slam-bang action thriller. Darn skippy.
Things To Come
Paula smiled. "Promise you'll get over me?"
"Sure."
"Seriously, promise."
"Why?"
"Because if you don't, then I can't really help you."
"Well...what if you fall for me once I'm over you?"
"Well," said Paula, "It would only figure...but it should at least be fun to watch."
Jeff chuckled. "OK...I promise, I'll get over you."
Paula smiled, her teeth gleaming in the moonlight with genuine warmth, as she pulled Jeff toward her and sucked in his upper lip, closing her eyes as Jeff closed his to get the full effect of his first kiss. Jeff could tell that Paula wasn't feeling anything except love and a little pity for a friend but dammit if he wasn't feeling anything more than that because it was as if electricity was coursing through his blood and charging his heart to beat faster and faster and faster and when Paula finally let go he exclaimed HOT DAMN! in his mind and knew that if this was what it was like to kiss a girl who wasn't interested in him in the romantic sense then it must be something and a half to kiss a girl who was.
"Feel better?" asked Paula.
You know, I wish at least one of my crushes (maybe not Valerie, I'd want a lot more from her) did this to me. I don't think it would resolve a whole lot, but I have a theory that I need to have some kind of release. I know that everywhere I go, whenever I meet a girl that's really nice to me, cute or otherwise, I instantly have stalker-ific romantic fantasies about them, considering possibilities and everything. It's got nothing to do with actual romantic love and everything to do with me being that hapless, every fantasy stemming from a natural curiosity about what it's like to have someone like you "in that way."
The idea for the Jeff and Paula romance came from Angela Miles, better known as Moonlit-Angel007. I read Mend My Heart during my two-year hiatus between Episodes 5 and 6 and was instantly struck by how nicely Jeff and Paula could fit together. Mostly, I feel that people stick Paula with somebody else in an effort to be different just for the sake of being different, and that was probably the case with Mend My Heart. But Angel had a couple of things going for her -- a PHENOMINAL sense of narrative and an honest-to-God reason why JeffxPaula could work that didn't seem like something out of bad Japanese anime.
So seeing that made me want to explore that idea, especially since the possibility loomed that Ness and Michelle were going to stay together for a while and I wanted Paula to consider other fish in the sea. Jeff's got a strong interest in Paula, even though he knows that it could never work out because she's attracted to Ness. And Paula does find Jeff charming.
But even though they share a passioniate kiss, they both know what this really is; there are no delusions on either side. For Paula, Jeff is just a substitute for Ness. For Jeff, his attraction to Paula is just hormonal rage. Could they work as a couple in the context of this fanfic? Probably, but they won't last more than a few months if the concept of Ness gets in the way.
Well, thanks a lot for reading this big long thing, I hope you learned a lot, and be sure to keep an eye out for Perpetual 7. And give the first episode of EarthBound: The Miniseries a shot, why don't ya?
EFR
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