Life Post: Paper Towns and Finishing a Rough Draft

I just got home from seeing the Paper Towns movie with the siblings. I've only just had time to shower since we got back. A full review of the movie will come later, so for now, I'll just link you to the Tumblr post on my quicker initial thoughts on the movie. Basically, I thought it was amazing. Probably even better than The Fault in Our Stars, but that's partially just because I'll re-watch a comedic movie far more than a sad one.

The other big thing that happened since my last life post is that I finished a first draft of the sequel to my Twilight fanfiction. I've been incredibly focused on that for the past month or so. It's been taking up a lot of my time. The ride wasn't the smoothest. I went back and forth between hating and loving what I was writing. By the time I finished, I was somewhere in between. I'm not sure how the editing process is going to go, but since I finished on Friday, I'm giving myself the weekend before I start that up. Usually, I would switch to a different project between drafts, but I'm not doing that this time. I want to get it up before the end of summer break, so I'm doing all of the edits now. (With a brief break to possibly work on something else while it goes out to beta readers.)

I imagine I'll be working on it the rest of the summer. It'll take up most of the rest of my break at least.

As for what I've been doing elsewhere on the Internet, I wrote some flash fiction about writer's block and how writing and music don't mix well for me. Over on Youtube, I reviewed both movies we saw at the drive-in: Inside Out and Tomorrowland.

Speaking of the drive-in, I'm absolutely covered in bug bites from that trip, and after my shower, they're starting to really act up. I think it's time to go find the hydrocortisone cream so that I can hopefully sleep in peace tonight.

Naruto Shippuden Review: Episodes 256-260

Every single time I post a Naruto review, it starts off "Wow! It's been so long!" I don't know why I still feel the need to do it. It's been two months since I posted one here though, which isn't really long for me I'd say. My review for the last five episodes was over on Youtube if you're interested in it.

Of these five episodes, four of them are essentially nothing but flashbacks to past episodes. Only episode 256 isn't. It's actually been a while since I watched episode 256, so even looking at my notes, I can't come up with clear memories of what happened. Apparently, I got really excited about ShikaTema at some point during it. I made sure to include that in my notes, and now I'm amazed that I've apparently forgotten what that even was. I'm a pathetic excuse for a shipper right now apparently.

From what I do remember, I found the end of that episode to be really awesome and dramatic. Now that I've seen the following four episodes, that's been pretty muted. It's hard to keep up excitement like that when you suddenly are deluded with flashback episodes, although that's something Naruto loves doing.

The thing is, I actually don't have anything against flashback episodes. When a series is as long as Naruto is, it's helpful to bring show stuff again and remind the audience about certain important scenes. Flashback episodes obviously accomplish that, and I think that's okay some of the time. Plus, I'd rather filler composed of flashbacks to good episodes over stupid pointless fillers anytime.

That doesn't change that fact that tons of filler, even in flashback form, can be just a bit boring after a while. Still much better than most filler though. And, like I said, my excitement level isn't quite where it was after episode 256. I don't know how long this particular stretch of filler episodes is going to last, but I'm just going to keep trying to remind myself that this can't possibly be as bad as the span of filler episodes while they were on the boat. (Please, I am begging you, do not let it be that bad.)

As for what actually happens in the filler episodes, I don't feel like there's much of a point to comment on it since it's all older stuff. It was nice to see it though. I'm someone who can get a bit emotional during flashbacks, and that's especially true with the Naruto and Sasuke stuff. That will at least help me make it through this span of filler until I get to something new.

Life Post: Drive-In, Contacts, and Passports

I meant what I said yesterday about finally getting my to do list down to something that wasn't really intimidating to look at, but since stuff keeps getting added to it, I'm still keeping myself busy. Actually, it's a lot longer than I expected it to be today, and I was really hoping I would have more of it down by now than I do. Oh, well.

My family and I saw Inside Out and Tomorrowland at the drive-in last night. I'm going to review both of them, but there's no point not saying really quickly what I thought here. I adored Inside Out. It was such a good movie and one that I think everyone should go see. My entire family liked it. It might have won my spot as my favorite Pixar movie, but we'll see how that holds up over time.

As for Tomorrowland... Well, it held my interest, but not very well. I'll talk more about what I disliked in the review, but it was really easy to watch most of it while half asleep and not really care. I had my eyes closed for chunks of it even. I don't really feel like I missed anything...

Aside from the drive-in, I talked about trying contacts in my last post. Yeah, well. I've officially declared that a failure. I tried for a long time to get them in my eyes. I was working on it a lot, and my eyes have been in a perpetual state of soreness since I got the contacts. I can't get them in my eyes. I really can't, and I don't think I've been making any progress towards it since the first day. I tried to stay optimistic about it at the beginning, but it's become too frustrating. I went to try and do it today, and honestly, I looked at the contacts and kind of just wanted to cry in frustration. So, I went and told my mom that I'm giving up so she could cancel the follow up appointment with the eye doctor.

Maybe I'll try them again in the future, but I'm just too done with dealing with it right now. I don't want to look at contacts for a really long time. It's not worth it.

My last bit of news is much more exciting. Months ago I told my parents that the only thing I wanted for my birthday was a passport. I've asked for one for Christmas in the past, and my parents didn't do it because my mom said she didn't know how to go about it. I asked again, and I made it really clear that it is absolutely the only thing I wanted. Since my mom usually fishes for present ideas from us because she doesn't know what to buy otherwise, I figured I'd have a much better chance if I didn't hint at anything else I could possibly want. I also pointed out that I'm going to need one before it would expire anyway, and it's just easier to do it now instead of later.

Well, today my mom handed me a passport application to fill out! I was already pretty sure that she was going to go through with it and get me one based on the couple of conversations we'd had about it, but it's still awesome to know that it's definitely happening. I don't think I've ever been so excited to fill out paperwork. Yay!

I wrote a post over on my writing blog about how my story The Society came about if you're interested. I think it's cool how something can morph into something you never expected over time.

Life Post: Long To-Do Lists.

It's been almost a week since my last life post, and that week has been pretty crazy. It's been crazy in a very monotonous way that isn't at all interesting. I've been going to bed late and waking up early every day in order to get stuff done, and I've just been swamped. Right now, my to do list is the shortest it's been in a week, and I'm at twenty items on it.

That's really good actually, and I'm pretty sure I could finish it all up tonight. Except for the fact that my family's going to the drive-in tonight, so that's going to take up my entire night. I hope that doesn't get me further behind. I know I really need sleep at this point. I was struggling to put contacts in this morning, and I realized how bad my dark circles are when I could see them in a mirror even without my glasses or anything.

Speaking of contacts though, that's the most note-worthy bit of information I've got. I have contacts, but I have yet to successfully get them into my eyes. It's been a huge struggle, and I spend part of my day trying over and over again every single day. My eyes are a bit sensitive even right now because I'm messing with them so much. I'm almost reaching the point where I want to give up, but at the same time, I'm determined to get them in. Hopefully, I'll have a breakthrough soon.

I have managed to get some stuff up on my writing blog since my last post. I wrote about the meaning's of two characters from The Society's names: Devon and Emily. I also wrote a letter to J.K. Rowling, aka my idol. I posted my vlog about the Paper Towns fan event and also about throwing up in public. (Last week really was more exciting.) And I filmed a video on my phone that turned into me complaining about my keyboard. (Luckily, it's working at the moment.)

Book Review: The Beast Within by Serena Valentino

ISBN: 1423159128
Published: July 22nd, 2014
Publisher: Disney Press
Read from July 7th to 14th, 2015
Synopsis from Goodreads:

A cursed prince sits alone in a secluded castle. Few have seen him, but those who claim they have say his hair is wild and nails are sharp--like a beast's! But how did this prince, once jovial and beloved by the people, come to be a reclusive and bitter monster? And is it possible that he can ever find true love and break the curse that has been placed upon him?

Review:

I knew absolutely nothing going into this book except that it had something to do with Beauty and the Beast, and since it was published by Disney (and had the Disney version of the Beast on the cover) that meant the Disney movie, not the original fairy tale. I got the book as a gift, and the synopsis on the inside flap is short, so that was all the information I had. I love Beauty and the Beast though. The Disney version is my favorite movie of all time, and I also love reading all the different versions of it. It's always interesting seeing what people do with the story, even if it's not as good as other versions I've read before. So, I was really excited for this book.

This book is the Beast's side of the Disney movie. The book opens with the Beast's reaction to Belle being in the castle, so I assumed this was going to be the events of the movie in his point-of-view and nothing before or after that. I was wrong. The book goes into a flashback pretty early on, and the vast majority of the book is the Beast's story before becoming the Beast and is known as the Prince (The book sticks with the Disney movie of never actually sharing his name.) and after the curse but before Belle. The actual events of the movie are pretty condensed and make up just a short bit of the book at the very end.

That wasn't what I was expecting, but it was probably a good idea. Direct retellings of a story just from a different point-of-view are typically boring to me. They can occasionally be done well, but most of the time they don't add enough to the story to justify it in my opinion. This book could easily have just become a novelization of the movie if it had gone that route, and that's definitely not what this is.

And this book does add to the movie. I still can't really decide if I like what it adds to the movie. You get the entire story of how the curse came about, but I think I preferred having that be vague and somewhat mystical. The actual event of it in the book doesn't quite work for me. There's four witches instead of one. One of them is the stereotypical sort of good witch who is spurned by the Beast once he discovers that she is poor. She does the actual curse because she genuinely wants the Beast to become a better person, but her three sisters are "wicked" witches who want the Beast to suffer for hurting their sister. I put wicked in quotations because they never feel like all that much of a threat. They're more along the laughably stupid side of things. Even for Disney villains, they're not scary, and they come across more as annoying nuisances. They do interfere and make things worse for the Beast, but even if I had been unfamiliar with how the story ended, I never felt like they could successfully pull anything off.

I accepted that part of the story pretty early on though, and I was willing to go along with it. The only thing in the book that I'd really say I had a problem with was the characterization of both the Beast and Gaston. They're childhood friends in this book, and I found both of them to be too sympathetic. Yes, the Beast refuses to marry the witch because she's poor, but the actual builds him up as being absolutely terrible to everyone around him. That's not how he came across in the book.

In the book, the Beast has a pretty great relationship with all of the servants, and it's clear from the beginning that they're basically his family. We never really see him be rude to anyone all that much except for spurning the witch. He's definitely on the shallow side and a bit annoying in his vanity, but he wasn't horrible enough for the curse to feel like adequate punishment. The curse is supposed to be about him learning to love at all, but in the book he seems to clearly love already. Yes, he fails at romantic love by focusing more on wealth, but he has relationships with both his servants and Gaston that clearly come across as platonic love. He's not a hopeless sort of case that would have justified everything better.

Gaston, too, is presented sympathetically. He has a sob story past, and again, he's not seen as all that bad because he's close to the Beast. The curse making him forget his friend is the only reason presented in the book for why Gaston's willing to go after the Beast later on. Again, he's shallow like the Beast, but he's given more of a sympathetic view than the Beast in this book due to his friendship with the Beast and what you're told about his past. That makes his eventual death feel unjustified as well. He doesn't seem like he deserves it in this context, and I didn't like that. I think a huge point of the original movie is that someone who looks like a beast can learn to love while Gaston, stereotypically "beautiful" on the outside, can have no redeeming qualities. In this book, he has redeeming qualities.

Overall, I'd say I enjoyed the book, and I love the idea of having a story about the Beast's curse. On the surface level, it's enjoyable to read, and it does have a very fairytale-esque feeling to the writing style. The book's nothing amazing, but it's a quick and fun read. But in the context of the movie, the Beast and Gaston didn't work as characters to me in this book.

(I also just have to shout out the cover really quickly. The dust jacket is a picture of the Beast while the actual cover itself has the Prince in the exact same position. I really love that design.)