i have no everloving clue what’s goin’ on here

A Jumanji can be dangerous and high-stakes (to the characters), but it doesn't need to have a metaphor or lesson, it can easily just be a "Would this be fucked up or what?" situation (e.g. a lotta Goosebumps stories). If there IS a lesson/metaphor, it will be on a smaller scale like psychological issues (e.g. Magnus Archives), family/relationship issues (e.g. Zathura), or about a specific topic (e.g. Magic School Bus). Large-scale social issues may be present (after all, Everything Is Political), but they take a definite backseat.

saw

the cabin in the woods

labrynth (1986)

and

First: THIS RECALL IS NOT STATE SPECIFIC. IT IS NATIONWIDE.

here are the specific products and dates:

FDA page on this:

you wanna know why i call him that? well it's because we gotta do all kinds of recall when he's president. not many people know this.

this guy he just keeps doing things and doing things. he's gotta knock it out! gimme a break!

but with the recall president, you gotta recall with your mind, in your brain, and you gotta recall the products. you know?

so this guy, trump, that i'm talking about, he changed the rules, and because he changed the rules he got metal shavings in the baby formula. he got radioactive in the walmart shrimp

and you gotta recall all those products! it's not good for business, not one bit. and i know what i'm talking about, i'm a big business guy. i wrote the book, you know

not like this guy, the recall president.

you gotta recall, too, in your mind. in your mind you have to recall, you have to remember

because recall means to call something back, like the metal shavings they made the babies drink, they had to take it all off the shelves. very bad business

but it also means to remember, not a lot of people know that

so you also have to recall this man picked a dude who had too strong musk, you know, and he did nazi salutes in front of the white house. two of them! that's more than any speaker has ever done during any presidential inauguration! and then this guy put aaaaalllll these wet behind the ears college kids and college dropouts in charge of your social security number- i bet he didn't even vet any of them for crimes- i'm sure some are nice people

and they cut all kinds of piddly little budges just to be mean to people they didn't like

and i recall- not many people know this- but i recall the recall president didn't have that musky guy go after the one part of the US budget that hasn't passed an audit in eight whole years! and i recall this stretch started during his first term, you know, he started it

and the muskrat and his college dropouts didn't even look at that place and we spend beeelions on it. that's billions. with a b.

bobby is a childless parent and buck is a parentless child but you can get more specific than that and point out that they're missing the same period of time of those relationships. i'm not doing the full maths but Bobby jr. was around 11 or 12 when he died and Maddie tried her best (as a child herself) to nurture Buck until she left when he was again around 11 or 12. so when buck and bobby meet they jump into a father/teen dynamic. bobby literally teaches buck to tie a tie, did we miss him teaching him to shave off screen? i'd believe it.

so when i look at the lawsuit arc what i see is teenage rebellion. buck is pushing at the edges of bobby's love for him. he grew up with with parents who had one specific condition for their love and he failed that before he could talk. so now he does have an adult who does love him without conditions and truly wants the best for him he can't understand that there aren't edges this time, that bobby will love him regardless, because when there wasn't edges before it was because there wasn't love. but as an adult he has access to much more permanent and destructive means of rebellion than stomping to his room and slamming his door, even though that's essentially what he's doing.

as for bobby, there's obviously the guilt over being the cause of buck's harm (he wasn't) which gets all mixed up in his guilt over the apartment fire. then on top of that, he's a father trying to stop his child from making his mistakes. it's my understanding that most parents have a moment during their child's teen years where they realise they need to make their own mistakes because that's how you learn and grow. bobby is an amazing father but he didn't get the opportunity to get that far before now and he handles it clumsily.

This past month, Parks & Rec has been doing a lot of work on the field adjacent to my school. They have trucks with flatbeds, mowing/tree-cutting/postholing machinery, etc. And when they arrived, I (campus monitor) was told I would need to herd the kids away from the trucks/machinery and basically prevent them from creating a dangerous situation.

So when recess came around and the kids stampeded out the door I held them up and I said (being funny but at the same time serious, you know how it is, kids listen better if you're funny)

"Okay, I know that you're all smart AND mature, right? And talented and good looking? Definitely the smartest and most talented class in this school? (I say this to every class, they're all 'my favorites'.) And because you're SO intelligent and mature, I don't need to actually TELL you that these guys have vehicles and machinery that you need to stay clear of, right? Because I know you figured that out already, and I also know that YOU know how sad I would be if any of you were run over, or squashed, or had a pole fall on you. I would be SO SAD, like, I would probably have to lie down on the floor and cry. So you're not going to make me cry, right? I can trust you to stay away from the trucks and machines no matter where they are on the field? Because you're wonderful and amazing? My favorites? My inspiration?"

And they're laughing at me of course, because I'm being so dramatic. Some of them are "Yes, and-"ing my dramatics and inventing more involved mourning processes I should undertake if any of them get run over. Some of them are yelling at me that they are NOT mature yet and they are VERY STUPID and I should know this.

It's been three weeks. We had one conversation about it. None of them have gone anywhere near the trucks. This is actually in excess of the typical elementary-schooler's working memory and I'm very proud of them. I haven't had to blow the whistle at ONE person for getting too close even when the trucks were literally 40 feet from the actual playground.