sunrise, prepare for war

the really beautiful thing about the mulder-scully relationship is that they’re the perfect representation of what it’s like when social scientists hang out with natural scientists

I’m less than a season and a half into the x files and it’s really funny that they’ve already try to remake “ice” twice

world chess day is on Monday and as a celebration I get to show my roommates one production of Chess. my gut would just be to show them original London but I am inclined not to do that because the one friend I have exposed to Chess the most is already very put off by Murray Head. the next would be original Broadway but the only version I know of doesn't have Endgame-filmed, which makes it a no go! here we encounter the biggest issue: most Chess variants are Broadway based, which means they have Freddie as a competitor during the second match. this is fine, I really like og Broadway and I really like Sydney, but I think, in losing the reporter subplot, you lose part of what makes Chess special which, to me, is the non-conventional choice to not make the major conflict in the second act a conflict between Freddie and Anatoly. the next problem we have is productions that are not in English (Space Chess, Moscow) and thus, basically inaccessible to non-super Chess fans who can't intuit what's happening in dialogue scenes based on story structure. my go-to, despite what I said early about Broadway variants, would be Sydney, because I really like the staging in Sydney, but, again, I think Sydney is flawed in such a way that you can only appreciate what it's doing after you've grown attached to the characters and are familiar enough with how things are usually done to appreciate changes being made (such as the inclusion of Let's Work Together, Heaven Help My Heart, and the reprises of One Night in Bangkok... I also think the lack of a substantial time gap is a major problem, especially since I really like Anatoly and want my friends to like Anatoly, and I think they are already inclined to not do that). One thing I will give the current revival is that I hope it will spark some new appreciation for the reporter plot. I also thinks it cruel that we still talk about og Broadway as a flop, considering how influential it would be on the future of Chess as a whole.

Here to decree that I think Chess 2011 Bielefeld (Space Chess) understands Anatoly better than any other "professional" production despite the lack of budget and even the language barrier