Rachel Does Stuff

It’s a family thing

Wait, what do you mean this never happened? Anyway, I’m glad Kristoff has a boyfriend now.

Kojima has a habit of declaring everybody he works with his friends but then they just kinda dump him afterwards, but Nicolas has stuck around for years and you can see how they inspire each other and have a real interest in each other’s lives.

Nicolas wasn’t a weaboo before he met Kojima but suddenly he has started incorporating Japanese things into his films, like the Yakuza in Too Old to Die Young and the (surprisingly non-sexual) kinbaku show in The Neon Demon. And Kojima was always all about America with a side of Japan, but after meeting Nicolas there’s suddenly a lot of Scandinavian and Nordic influences in Death Stranding.

But it gets better. When Sam first walks into Heartman’s house it’s dark and awash in blue and pink light, Nicolas’ favourite color scheme. Nicolas has said that his movies have bright, contrasting colors because he’s colorblind so colors just sort of blur together for him unless they’re contrasting and he cranks the saturation up. So of course Heartman has the most colorful character design in Death Stranding (along with Amalie). Kojima put him in a blue suit with an orange defibrillator, contrasting colors which are very uncharacteristic for Kojima’s designs, so Nicolas could see it better. How fucking sweet is that!

We joke about Kojima and Mads Mikkelsen, but Mads has been like “Sure Kojima is a fan of me, but him and Nicolas love each other” and it almost feels like Kojima made Nicolas the sweetest character because he wanted everyone to see him the way Kojima sees him, at least for a few hours.