Right, random Happy Christmas message, though it does have some kind of point.

I managed to stop procrastinating an icon making session, which can be seen in my current userpic (whoo! I actually have another one!), because I needed a J. Marsden one and felt I'd found the perfect image. Bebo had a big thing going on with Enchanted; there's another screencap I can probably gank later to manipulate into some semblance of goodness.

It's there for the taking, if anyone wants it, which is highly unlikely.

Otherwise, happy holidays (as not everyone celebrates Christmas) and I'll hopefully get the Cyclops bear finished this holiday between Maths and IT work.

Nope, this is not a 'I've done all this (insert rubbish here)' moment. No, it is not. However, I have just returned from the cinema, and have worked out exactly what is wrong with 'Enchanted'.

Mind you, I didn't go and see the actual film, just watched clip after clip after clip of it, and stared at all the pretty posters of James Marsden festooned all over the walls... ahem.

The concept of Enchanted is good, and the animation looks sumptuous (really; cartoon!James looks just as good as his irl counterpart). I've realised the problem, and that's the media they're using compared to the script.

Animation has to be blown out of proportion: the voice acting has to be overdone to work, and the writing has to be exaggerated; all bells and whistles are attached because to make animation work, everything has to be slightly... well... larger in scale to look good. It's not a subtle medium; if you underplay it, whether traditional Disney work or CGI films, the product comes out flat and generally crap.

Now, the scriptwriters have managed that fairly well, from what I've seen. All well and good. However, the exaggeration has been carried across to the actual film section, and that's the problem. This was, of course, intentional; to carry of the film across the two medias, those from fairytale world need to be overly energetic and costumed in God-knows-what. That's not to say it works. There are scenes I've seen which are so overly acted they're painful to watch. If they had, maybe, been slightly more subtle with some of their contrasts, it might have been easier on the eye.

I might go and see the film anyway despite the complete cringiness, complete with animatronic squirrel and everything else they could throw in for the schmaltz-factor. Mind you, it's unlikely. Ah, well; we'll see what the critics say. I don't think it looks promising.

Yes, a squee post. This is not unusual for me, I know, as I am atrocious at such things, plus the whole fixation on a guy who's probably twice my age and is happily married with a son... I shouldn't know that, should I?

Never mind. Hairspray is the only film in around three months I haven't had to run from the sofa cringing in the middle, and that, for me, is saying something. I was expecting a lot, and I wasn't disappointed; the cast were all brilliant, newcomers or High School Musical... things (they don't count as people), and I believe it takes an awful lot of guts to shake your ass on camera when dressed up as a woman in a fat suit; go John Travolta!

The book was very good, too; amusing lyrics and script. Since I'm embroiled in the trollop that is The Boyfriend at the minute (a 20's musical which requires a French accent on my part), everything compares favourably, and though it wasn't jaw-crackingly funny like Avenue Q it had a good dose of laughs that brought up the mood of something that could have easily become very slushy and sentimental with an overbearing moral, which was just about avoided.

Mind you, didn't James Marsden look sexy in that purple suit? ^^ I didn't know what to expect with his character, but I was very pleasantly surprised. I loved the lyrics to 'Hairspray'; Corny Collins is an arrogant bastard indeed. In fact, I was only there for his part originally, but highly enjoyed the whole extravaganza, though I noticed how songs deviated from the soundtrack.

Other observations... oh, I did a double take when Tracy descended with her black and white number, but it wasn't her dress, it was her hair. I thought of Movie!Rogue straight away, and ended up in a fit of the giggles. Whoops.

I'd usually go looking for fanfiction at this point, but I've decided I'm not going to mash my brain either by reading or writing for the fandom. Well, I could write it and then leave it on my computer to rot, like 99% of everything I do, but we'll see.

I'll get RL stuffs over first, I think. Minor things like GCSE mock exams come first, sadly (why, oh why did they move them forward two weeks for all of three people? Why?)

Ook. I haven't updated in a while. Forgive me while I squee briefly...

I'm going to see Avenue Q again this Saturday! Yay for puppet sex, schadenfreude and general lulz!

...

Ahem.

Otherwise, I have become hooked on Jimmy Marsden's song on the back of the SJP perfume advert. Whoops. It got to the point where I've downloaded the actual video off Youtube and then proceeded to attempt to convert it without the picture into a music file, because I prefer the audio to the video (I agree wholeheartedly with Frankie Boyle when he described her as 'either a very ugly woman or a very beautiful seahorse', which is harsh but I can see his point, in a way).

I've so far failed, though I'm still working on the issue. If it works, then I'll upload it somewhere for anyone who wants it, because it might be of interest.

Oh, and NaNo WriMo word count: doing very well at 19K or so. Today, I should be at... 20K, but I've got the rest of the evening to work on that issue: only another 700 words or less. Plus, as of yet, no filler! Yay!

(Note that at this point last year I was writing X-Men fanfiction and slotting it in at opportune moments. I've got better at writing at length now, I think).

Oh dear. I've just had a fangirly moment. This cannot be good.

I'm still getting to grips with LJ, and was exploring communities and the like when I discovered one for Cyke. Glancing through, I clicked on a review of Jimmy Marsden (curiosity killed the cat, after all) and, at the top... I can't even think about it without spiralling off on a tangent. This is why I, unlike most of my friends at school, like Cyclops. It's the smarminess- and when he took off his glasses in X3, it affirmed everything I'd previously thought, but then you could count to ten before his screentime was up, dammit. Still, very cute picture which makes me feel horribly guilty about not having seen the new Superman movie yet. I shall have to get my grubby mitts on it, or wait until a TV channel gets hold of it.

However, that wasn't meant to be my reson for writing. I came to show the new short film Scorpi's just finished, bless her. I'm in there, in Sim and human form, but acting like a moron was not my idea of an afternoon. Not for those who don't like watching dying Sims (but stick with it, it's a satisfying ending.)

Click here to watch!