Issue 1: Cold and Calculating

Calculating Villains, Cursive, and Crime Thrillers

Letter From the Editor

Dearest Reader,

I’ve been having a difficult time carving out what I want to publish on Substack.

I view it similarly to the way I viewed Wattpad back in 2019: a seemingly endless world of possibilities. And yet, I feel so utterly left out of it. Trends are the only thing present when I scroll on here, like the new “whimsical” 2026, the death of smartphones, and the eventual dissolution of social media. In the beginning, I tried to write like this. I wrote a piece about my failing attention span, wanting to relearn cursive, and trying to listen to the radio. Despite trying to mimic what has been done before, I learned nothing and I was left wholly unsatisfied with my writing. So why am I trying to write like other people? Do I want engagement? Do I want someone to finally look at something I’ve done and laud me on how impressive I am? I’m still not quite sure, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be. I think what I truly need to do is to be myself and try and make something of my own that is holistically me.

This is my promise to the readers of Substack. I promise to be diligent in representing myself to the world through one of the things I love most of all: writing.

This issue is called Cold and Calculating for January for obvious reasons: it’s cold outside. In this one, I talk about the calculating villains, an experiment that results in an inability to calculate anything, and a media list filled with some of the most vile villains known to mankind (not really.) Hope you enjoy this inaugural issue of 23.7 FM!

Overanalyzing Fiction

January’s fictional character to overanalyze is The Scarecrow from Batman.

If you look me in the eye and ask me who I think the greatest character in all of Batman is, I would immediately respond with the Scarecrow aka Jonathan Crane. There is some unspoken understanding between myself and Crane’s character. I understand him, why he does what he does, and that is what makes him so special to me personally. It’s hard to place exactly where this miniature obsession began, although it probably started when Christopher Nolan decided to cast Cillian Murphy as Crane and then give him the sexiest, sluttiest pair of glasses to ever exist. This infatuation with Murphy led me to do lots of research on Jonathan Crane, which has changed my life in a myriad of ways (one of them resulted in me being initially exposed to Gotham, another led to a flirtation with Psychology). Crane is cold, calculated, and focused on his work. He does what he does not for the enjoyment (although it can be inferred that that naturally bloomed over time), but to experiment. What lengths wouldn’t one driven scientist take to prove that he’s right? Crane assumes the identity of the Scarecrow for his crimes to get back at the people who tormented him, which directly interferes with any preconceptions of him not having emotions in his work. He is a walking enigma (pun sort of intended) and an oxymoron of himself. He’s a trauma victim who uses his stereotypical identity of a calculated strategist and scientist to make decisions that he tries to convince himself are for science, but are really a way that he’s fighting back at everyone who has wronged him in the past. He’s a brilliant character, and one that I cannot recommend researching enough.

Because there are so many versions of these characters, I also decided to tell you my favorite version of them. For Jonathan Crane, Vincent Kartheiser’s portrayal in Titans is my favorite. I feel like not many incarnations of Crane focus on how emotional he truly is, except for Titans. In the show, he is painfully aware of his own situation due to his previous work as a psychiatrist, and yet seeks out other people (his mother and Batman) to diagnose him in a feeble attempt to convince himself that he is not ultimately flawed himself. He is surprisingly charming, and is not treated like a joke when he walks into a room (cough, Arkham Asylum, cough, the Animated Series, cough, most Batman media) all while being ultimately likeable to the audience (sorry, that might be just me). I just think he is the star of the third season because of how unassumingly complex he is under the surface. Have you ever paused to look at his cell in Arkham? Probably not, but the guy has cat photos above his desk. What does that say about him? More importantly, what does that say about him that previous incarnations of his character have been unable to come close to saying about him? All in all, Kartheiser’s Jonathan Crane is spectacular and he’s my favorite version of Jonathan Crane because he actually feels like a person instead of a facsimile of some kind of calculated scientist.

Experiment

This month’s challenge was to write in cursive.

Supposedly it only takes (at a minimum) 18 days for a habit to form. Also supposedly, I think it’s funny to trick my brain into doing weird things. I was scrolling one day and I saw a video where a woman was trying to convince the viewer to write in cursive for a few reasons, but only one really stuck out to me: no one can read cursive anymore, so if you journal in cursive no one can read it. I, unlike most of the world, remember cursive and I write all of the time in my sketchbook. So I figured why not write in cursive for these 18 days and see how fast it takes root in my brain?

I started simple with writing just like I remembered from back in 2nd grade. Writing took me a million years and I kept itching to go back to writing like I normally do in print. My cursive was so utterly atrocious that I can barely read what I wrote the first day I started taking it seriously. I also wrote super big, something that we will see changes by the end of the experiment. If you are beginning to write in cursive again for funsies like I did, make sure you have big pages. My sketchbook is bigger than what I normally write on, so I had lots of room to remember the flourishes of cursive. Handwriting, in my mind, is like an accent. No matter what accent (cursive/”British”, print/”American”) you have, you still have the same voice. My handwriting style from print is starting to show up in my cursive a couple of days later. I still have to really think about how I’m going to write words and commonly have to go back and spell words correctly, but overall it’s not too shabby.

Well into week 2, I started writing much quicker than before, but don’t have any time to stop and think about how a word is spelled. When I normally write big words, I can stop mid-sentence and think about the letters that come next. With cursive, I feel rushed to finish the word because I cannot keep up with the speed of my mind or the speed of my hand. By the time a week and a half had passed, I completely stopped being able to write in print. I had started college back up again and was handed a sheet of paper to write on, to which I instinctively started writing cursive on. I tried to write in print several times, but I would have to exert the same effort it initially took me to write in cursive.

After my 18 days were up, I started to unnaturally flip back and forth between print and cursive. All of a sudden, I would write a cursive letter in the middle of a print word or I would have to actively decide which way I was going to write something. I started to freak out. Was I starting to think in cursive? Am I destined to forever write in cursive because I thought I could mess around with my brain? So, I started writing in print again. You know how people with non-American accents think that Americans talk super slowly? Yeah, that was me when I changed to print. All of a sudden, I was writing in slow motion, unable to keep up with how quickly I was thinking. I have a page of notes for a class written in print and I genuinely thought I was going to die while writing that page because it all felt so incredibly slow.

Even now after almost a month of recovering from this stupid experiment, I am still getting my sea legs back. I used to be able to write whole pages of notes with no problem, and now writing half of a page is exhausting.

Please never do this.

Issue 3: To Be Loved is To Be Loved

Break Ups, Futures, and Multidimensional Love

Letter From the Editor

Dearest Reader,

I’ve never actually been in a relationship before. I know, point your fingers and laugh at the poor unlucky girl. You’d probably think I’d hate Valentine’s Day and February, but I think there is so much more to Valentine’s Day than what meets the eye. For me, Valentine’s Day isn’t just about romantic love, but all kinds: platonic friendships, familial bonds, self-love, and obsession just to name a few. Those are the types of love we’re going to dive into for this month, we’re going to explore around and redefine what Valentine’s Day actually means.

In this issue, we’re going to discuss the “break up” scene in the Witcher Season 4, the future of the Walt Disney Company, and some media with complex relationships and themes.

Overanalyzing Fiction

February’s fictional overanalysis is of Jaskier and Radovid’s fight in the Witcher Season 4. Warning that this analysis is purely self-indulgent, and spoilers for the Witcher Season 4, Episode 4.

My most favorite trope of all time is when two people just hate each other, but what happens when two people start to hate each other after having a small fling? Enter my favorite scene from the Witcher Season 4: Jaskier and Radovid’s fight. Now, I’m literally going to go shot by shot and line by line for this because this scene is just a work of art. I will preface this by saying that I didn’t like Jaskier and Radovid’s relationship and that I am incredibly biased towards Jaskier in terms of this fight. For context, Radovid just rose to power against his will and is trying to deal with this role he never expected to have. Meanwhile, Jaskier is traveling with Geralt and finds himself torn between his loyalties to his dear friend and his past fling. Radovid’s advisor is trying to get him in the kingly spirit by engaging Jaskier.

The scene starts with Geralt crying out from being tortured. Jaskier immediately recognizes Geralt’s scream, a sign of how close they have become and how well Jaskier knows Geralt in particular. He asks Radovid what is happening and Radovid says “I don’t know,” a sign of how even in leading his own kingdom, he is blind to the corruption and terror going on around him. It also shows how innocent and naive Radovid is because of his lavish upbringing in the castle, which automatically parallels Jaskier’s similar upbringing as the Viscount de Lettenhove. Unlike Radovid, Jaskier knew the importance of being a part of the people and left behind his comfy spot to do the thing that he believes he was “put on the Continent to do.”

Jaskier implores Radovid to make them stop, mainly because Radovid is literally the King of one of the largest players in the Northern Continent right now (it’s also hinted that Redania is one of the only parts of the North still strong in fighting Nilfgaard at the time other than Rivia, I guess.) Jaskier then starts cornering Radovid while basically begging him to let Geralt go and Radovid lets him get closer, despite Radovid being taller and more imposing than Jaskier. Radovid then talks about his advisor having a plan and Jaskier implores that Radovid doesn’t have to listen to anyone. Radovid then uses this against Jaskier to convince him to stay. Jaskier is a bard. This means that freedom is something that means a lot to him. The ability to travel and tell his stories are the reason that he thinks he’s still alive. For Radovid to use his words, one of his most powerful tools, against him in this moment of weakness for Jaskier is the lowest blow one could possibly make to him. Jaskier slowly takes his hands off of Radovid and distances himself from him.

Then, the most amazing line ever happens, where Radovid says, “Or will you go back to searching for that little girl with your Witcher?” Literally I am clawing at the screen. Not only did Radovid offend Jaskier by asking him to exchange his freedom for HIM, but also now bringing in the fact that he undermines Jaskier’s found family. Also, the use of “your Witcher” instead of “the Witcher” is so incredibly amazing because Radovid doesn’t understand why Jaskier would want to be around someone like Geralt instead of him other than Jaskier showing some type of ownership over Geralt like a pet. Once again just this teeny piece of dialogue shows how Radovid is unable to understand Jaskier’s character in every way. He attempts to take his freedom, the most important thing to Jaskier, his friend in Geralt, and undermines his motivation for wanting to help his friend find the girl that Jaskier had an enormous hand in raising and helping. (On the side, Radovid does this thing with his head when he says “your Witcher” where he sticks his chin out in defiance and it’s so good and only pisses Jaskier off more with his blatant ignorance.)

Jaskier voices his outrage and Radovid meekly says, “You’re the only one left who knows who I am.” Basically, Radovid’s naivety from living in luxury made him believe that he was special in some way to Jaskier. It’s stated and shown that Jaskier can tell what a person is thinking or he can usually spot someone’s motivations. It’s usually hidden underneath plenty of comedic relief and jokes, but Jaskier is incredibly intuitive. Radovid takes this character trait of Jaskier and warps it into some kind of love that Jaskier has for him, despite them not knowing each other for very long.

Jaskier then destroys the man by absolutely dissecting him. At this point, Radovid isn’t trying to be prideful by sticking out his chin, but he is sitting on his throne with tears in his eyes. Once again, Radovid tries to reiterate his “love” for Jaskier, which is really just the ownership he feels (or wants to feel) over Jaskier the same way he believes that Jaskier feels about Geralt. He does not want him by his side so that they make each other better, but so he feels better. He does not show any care about what Jaskier thinks or feels, and takes his insight as a deep obsession. Finally, Jaskier says “you will die like [your brother] too” and you can tell on Joey Batey’s face that Jaskier regrets saying it as soon as it leaves his mouth. HOWEVER, he follows it up with “…alone” which shows that maybe he doesn’t regret it at all. Jaskier has been beaten down by Radovid throughout this entire exchange and now he’s finally broken down his charming facade and is just expressing his anger.

Radovid then stands up and asserts his dominance immediately over Jaskier. It’s like a switch has flipped in his head and he says, “you can’t talk to me like that.” Once again, we see Jaskier’s words bite him in the ass and we can see it on his face that he regrets telling Radovid that everyone has to listen to him. Radovid orders him away, and he’s standing upright with his shoulders all the way back (I forgot to mention it earlier, but I don’t think Radovid ever had stood up straight until this scene). Jaskier then follows it up with, “you know, I might escape my shackles one day. What about yours?” Which harps on the idea of Radovid being forever linked to the throne until the day he dies, destined to be a selfish tyrant.

Anyways, this is my favorite scene in the Witcher Season 4 (second is Leo Bonhart pickling the Rats) because of how nuanced it is. Their facial expressions, Radovid’s movements, and the biting dialogue all amount to an incredibly engaging fight between two men who had similar upbringings but different life experiences. Radovid displays a fundamental disconnect with Jaskier’s character, while Jaskier can see through Radovid clear as day. Despite the power imbalance, Jaskier will always have the upper hand with Radovid because of his intuition. That is until Jaskier crosses a line and Radovid starts to realize the amount of power he truly has and uses it to manipulate and hurt those around him.

Anyways, I hope we see Radovid go full-fledged tyrant in the next seasons because I want them to have another fight so badly.

Dining Room

February’s dining room obsession is of the future of the Walt Disney Company with the appointment of Josh D’Amaro as the new CEO. I know it doesn’t fit perfectly into the theme of the issue, but I will always love the Walt Disney Company for everything it has given me and other people around the world. I only want what’s best for it.

I hate to say it, but I am a Disney Adult. All my life I’ve wanted to work for Disney in Imagineering or Animation, so I take any structural changes of the company to heart. This dining room talk is going to be somewhat of an overview of how I believe the company is doing now and how I hope it changes under D’Amaro’s supervision.

Animation Studios: In my opinion, Walt Disney Animation Studios isn’t doing too great. We had Zootopia 2 (which I did not see in theaters, but I heard was decent) come out recently, and it’s just another view of how Disney is grossly underestimating the loyalty of their audience. To believe that a new movie has to be a sequel in order to triple its production budget is a generalization that dilutes creativity and stagnates leadership within the animation division. With the success of KPop Demon Hunters, I hope with all my heart that Disney takes notes and goes back to their musical animation roots.

Personally if I was D’Amaro or Jenn Lee, I would split Walt Disney Animation Studios into two pieces: 2D and 3D. I personally think sequels are fine to keep producing in order to keep stakeholders contributing to new movies, but I think defining a part of the studios for that would be beneficial to keeping creativity flowing. I think the 2D section of animation should focus on going back to the Disney roots and taking advantage of the rampant nostalgia that most Disney Adults yearn for. In my opinion, Disney Adults are where a majority of the money is to be made and making a division not only can focus on this large demographic and making money that way, but it also fulfills what a lot of the audience for these movies is yearning for: another renaissance.

Disney Parks: I am, personally, disgusted by Piston Peak in the Magic Kingdom. I am also equally as disgusted to see Pandora in California Adventure. Overall, I’m not feeling fantastic about the moves that Imagineering is making. I understand that rides and experiences based around IP give a reliability to stakeholders considering new attractions, but I think this money would be better if used elsewhere.

Firstly, new Tomorrowland at Disneyland has been something that guests have been asking for. To not allocate this money to revitalizing Tomorrowland, in my opinion, is a massive mistake in the long run. While I understand how big of a risk it is due to the long-term closure of a large part of the park, I think it is necessary to ensure the longevity of Tomorrowland as a whole. If nothing is done now, it will continue to get more and more outdated until it becomes an absolute necessity to revitalize it. Areas like Autopia and Nemo’s Submarine Voyage need some kind of revitalization, if not to be torn down. (Personally, I think both of these rides should be kept to keep the park open, but I do think they are outdated). Honestly, Tomorrowland is a whole can of worms in itself, but I hope that they start updating it and making it more cohesive little by little.

Next, Piston Peak. Look, I understand that Tom Sawyer’s Island wasn’t at the top of anyone’s list to visit, but Magic Kingdom desperately needed the wide open space of the river. I also understand that it was torn down partially to keep roads open on the way to Villains Land, especially over by Haunted Mansion. However, the tearing down of TSI signals to me and to a lot of other Disney Parks fans that nothing is sacred anymore. I firmly believe that with a little bit of marketing, TSI could have become a place that guests wanted to go to. There’s a restaurant on TSI that isn’t used anymore, but could have been a massive draw for crowds. Watching from TSI is also the best way I’ve ever seen Festival of Fantasy, and I think if the Parks marketed it as a premiere viewing spot and installed some speakers, it would have drummed up foot traffic. I even believe that getting rid of the Liberty Belle and extending TSI out to be a walkway to and from Villains Land like how Animal Kingdom is sort of set up with the wheel and spokes would have been a better use of space and drawn people into the island. All in all, we needed the river to break up the claustrophobia that Magic already drums up for a lot of people, including myself who worked there.

My last point is going to be about Pandora. Genuinely, I think the worst use of that space ever is for one big E-Ticket of an IP that doesn’t mesh into California Adventure at all. If anything, extend Avengers Campus. Let’s pay the actors who perform and put a longer version of Rogers the Musical in the Hyperion. Let’s put a facade on the side of that building across the way to look like New York and extend Avengers Campus up into the area where Monsters Inc is. If they’re going to get rid of a ride as near and dear to my heart as Monsters, I want it to be something actually good. We can even keep the taxi facade of the cars and make it a tour around the Avengers’ New York. Let’s come up with literally any other worthwhile ideas instead of destroying the Eastern Gateway into Disneyland and making it ONE E-TICKET. How is that a good use of our space, money, and time that could be better spent on improving outdated areas? Nothing can contain my anger at attempting to build a Pandora for little to no reason in Disney’s CALIFORNIA ADVENTURE. At least the Avengers can go to California.

Overall, I’m just upset with the direction that the Disney Parks are taking, and the worst part is that D’Amaro is the Director of Parks and Experiences. I think that the projects that Imagineering are working on all fundamentally misunderstand the types of people who go to their parks.

Disneyland will forever be a “local” park because of how the people of Southern California have taken it in. I even consider myself a local to Disneyland due to my close proximity, and I take pride in it. There is no reason to focus on drawing in crowds from outside of the Southwest when there are only a few Disney hotels to house those visitors. You’re just drawing in crowds to the hotels outside on Harbor. In addition, Magic Key holders would much rather see changes to Quality of Life rather than these flashy additions like Pandora. A revitalization of Tomorrowland would have a much heftier impact on reception to the park from the main source of visitors as well as set it up for many years to come.

Magic Kingdom is a park where people come from around the world to visit, and they most likely spend all of their day in the park. Why are we not emphasizing and updating shaded, secluded areas like TSI for park guests to go to when they need a break? The hustle of Magic Kingdom is why many Disney Parks fans don’t like going to it, and the destruction of TSI confirms that the company doesn’t care about the welfare of its visitors, only how much more capacity we can add onto an already overstimulating park.

I hope that Josh D’Amaro is different from Bob Iger. I hope that the Parks and the Animation Studios get the attention that they deserve for being the two most vital reasons as to why the Walt Disney Company has lasted this long. As a former Cast Member, I was delighted that D’Amaro was chosen as the next CEO. I do have a lot of optimism and hope that he will do his best to work on these two areas in particular. Before we absorb any other companies, we need to focus on improving ourselves first. Improve how the public views Disney, because it’s not a very good look right now. Time will tell, of course, whether D’Amaro is good for the role, but for right now I’m cautiously optimistic.

Issue 5: The Pursuit of Perfection

Batman: Hush, Fanfiction, and Society

Letter From the Editor

Dearest Reader,

I can’t help but feel pressure to make the perfect decision in everything that I do: the perfect haircut, the perfect website, the perfect photos, and the perfect issues for this magazine. Did you know that I almost deleted everything I’ve written for this magazine several times in just the span of a week? I’ve redone my website more times than I can count, hyperanalyzed every interaction I’ve ever had with my friends, and even scrutinized the way that I walk.

Logically, perfection is impossible and that’s the allure of it. It will always be a beacon to strive for, something attractively unattainable. Only the most ambitious and anxious aim to conquer perfection, which leads to failure almost every time. I’ve been thinking a lot about my personal pursuit of perfection and how I’ve let it take over almost every aspect of my life.

But I implore you to consider that perfection is a concept made to keep you paralyzed in fear, unable to make a single decision. I’ve reached this state before, being unable to leave the house because of an irrational fear that I was going to throw up and ruin my “perfect” encounter with society that day. The only way to cure perfection is to not give it the time of day, which I want to do for this latter half of March.

In this issue, we’re going to discuss the impossibility of perfection in regards to Thomas Elliot aka Hush from Batman, the courage of fanfiction, and some media where perfection goes to die.

Overanalyzing Fiction

March’s analysis is of Thomas Elliot aka Hush from Batman, the Impossibility of Perfection, and the Batman Part 2.

Thomas Elliot is a renowned surgeon who has based his entire existence off of the Waynes. He grew up alongside Bruce and they remained friends despite both of them losing parents. The only difference is that they both have starkly contrasting opinions of wealth, family, and themselves. Thomas Elliot is really awesome. He uses his training as a surgeon to physically change his appearance to match Bruce’s. I only wish that his face was slightly different from Bruce’s to show that no matter how talented an individual is, they can never replicate another human being. This is where Tommy’s real intrigue comes in: he can never be truly perfect.

In Batman: Hush, it’s revealed that Tommy tried to kill both of his parents in order to receive their money and failed. Meanwhile, Bruce’s parents get gunned down in an alleyway and Bruce is “lucky” to inherit his fortune at a very young age. Already, Tommy is flawed in comparison to Bruce. No matter how much he will try to reach Bruce’s level of influence, fortune, renown, he will always be upstaged. That is the terrifying aspect of Hush: the fact that he will stop at nothing to reach perfection. Unfortunately for Bruce, he is perfection in Tommy’s eyes and becomes this idol for Tommy to base his personality on. We can break this down through social psychology and the concept of human mimicry to increase their competence in the eyes of others. When you want to connect with someone, you can’t help but replicate speech patterns and body language. Tommy does this on an absurd level, focusing on becoming Bruce Wayne entirely.

It is said that Tommy’s anger towards Bruce is because of Thomas Wayne saving his mother after Tommy attempted to kill him, but I think there is so much more to him than that. I really dislike when comics attempt to squish down complex characters in order to make it more palatable to an audience in general. In my opinion, Tommy’s anger towards Bruce is because of this perfection that Bruce has so nonchalantly achieved. While Bruce and the reader see him as a flawed individual who fights the same criminals every single night in some vain attempt to redeem his parents, Tommy sees the pinnacle of perfection. That is what makes him so interesting, is his core belief that he is lesser than Bruce Wayne and therefore needs to kill him in order to assert some kind of dominance.

Now to get to the rumors of Thomas Elliot being the main villain of the Batman Part 2. I hope with every fiber of my being that they hold off on Tommy. In my opinion, Batman: Hush needs the other characters like Clayface, Nightwing, Oracle, Jason Todd, Tim Drake, and Poison Ivy to be central to the story. The reader is supposed to feel like this is an epic part of Bruce’s life that includes all kinds of people from his past, and I don’t think that Matt Reeves’s universe has been set up to be that vast yet. In addition, the Riddler is a huge part of the original Hush story, with his knowledge of Batman’s identity being the central twist of the story. Personally, I don’t see Dano’s Riddler being at the center of a scheme this vast. In the Riddler: Year One, Edward is depicted as a shy person who only became the Riddler out of necessity and anger towards the systematic oppression that affected people like himself. He does harbor resentment towards Bruce Wayne that could translate over towards a Hush storyline, but it’s a stretch.

In order to make it work in any sense, the entire movie would have to heavily focus on Bruce Wayne and his relationship with society now that he’s established his relationship with being Batman. To reduce the redundancy of the Riddler, simply eradicate him from the story and make Tommy the main villain. I personally think that the magic of Batman: Hush lies in the fact that Bruce is forced to confront this later in his life as Batman, but I do think that it could be a changing point for him in the earlier years. While Tommy Elliot is the main villain, I would personally partner him with the Scarecrow (shocker!) as the B villain. I hate when Jonathan is shelved and given the lesser treatment like he had in Batman Begins, but I think if we’re going to delve into the psyche of Bruce, let’s get in there. We can also hypothesize Harvey Dent being a massive part of Part 2 (as of writing this, Sebastian Stan is highly expected for the role). As a man who can do what Batman does in the light almost as successfully, Batman sort of becomes irrelevant. This could lead to the emphasis on Bruce Wayne throughout the movie and could set up Tommy as a formidable final villain. Obviously I’m rooting for a Hush-Harvey-Scarecrow trio for this hypothetical Part 2, but who knows where the road will lead us.

Tommy Elliot fails at every turn, and his perseverance and intensification of his methods are what make him so interesting. His fruitless pursuit of perfection can be seen through his common mimicry of Bruce Wayne and his rampant jealousy that affects him long after cut brakes and shattering pearl necklaces. While I think he would be an interesting addition to the Batman: Part 2, he needs to be partnered with other villains and characters that can reflect the original Batman: Hush storyline without all the necessary background characters. All in all, Tommy Elliot is awesome, and a great addition to Batman’s rogues gallery.

Dining Room

This month’s dining room talk is about another pursuit of perfection, this time in the world of writing fanfiction.

I just read fanfiction for the first time in seven years.

I had published my first work on May 5th, 2019 and set forth the motions that would seemingly change my life forever. I was about to start at a new high school in a completely new area and be forced to make new friends. I didn’t know anything about myself, other than the fact that I loved reading and writing. Now, seven years later, I’m trying to relearn that part of myself and I started by reading fanfiction. Despite being a voracious author on Wattpad, I never indulged in the act of reading. I was far too wrapped up in my own work to focus on anyone else’s. I deeply regret that about myself, that I was so wrapped up in myself that I didn’t even support my other fellow writers who were putting their souls on the Internet for all to see. I feel as if that mirrors my life now; that I am so self-centered that I forget to look up and see what other amazing writers and artists are doing.

I feel a deep sense of urgency to pay attention to others’ work now, especially in the precarious era of Artificial Intelligence. But more importantly, I feel a deep sense of urgency to reconnect with my thirteen year old self. I told my mother that I had finished a book the other day, and all she did was tell me how much she misses when I used to read. For clarification, I didn’t just used to read, I used to read as if my life depended on it. Every flip of a page was like a heart beat, every chapter a breath. Now, every scroll seems to be the replacement.

I can document the exact time when I stopped reading: 2020. A year after I published my first fanfiction. The rise of TikTok made me insatiable for the next short video, the next “legendary reel pull,” the next “sound” that I could quote at a get-together to demonstrate how integrated I was to the ever-changing digital world. Ever since then, I feel as if I’m climbing up a mountain every time I try to read for fun. I skim the books given to me in school, I use the writing skills I gained from years of Wattpad experience to hide the fact that I didn’t want to read, and I blatantly lie in my papers.

Thirteen year old me would be ashamed.

So, to make up for lost time, I started reading fanfiction. To me, publishing any form of fanfiction is the greatest job anyone can have. To toil endlessly learning about the intricacies of a world that doesn’t belong to you and to psychologically insert yourself into the position of a character within that world is a talent that not many possess. Not all fanfiction writers can do it either, but that doesn’t matter to me. What matters is that this world created by another individual was so strongly received by someone that they spend days of their own time trying to mimic that world. It’s hard to pick a passion when the only thing you dream about every night is creating something that inspires someone as much as a fanfiction writer is inspired.

Recently, I’ve been pondering this old dream of mine: to create something that inspires someone so much that fan art, cosplay, and fanfiction is spawned from. It still keeps me up at night, the thought that I’ve given up on it somehow. I stare at my ceiling and wonder whether I will ever achieve this goal. Whether I will inspire a work of art like fanfiction out of someone. All I can do is scroll through Ao3 and hope that my kudos will inspire a fanfiction writer to keep going, unlike I did.

I will never forget the embarrassment on my friend’s face when she told me she wrote fanfiction. I was never quite able to verbalize in that moment how unashamed she should be, until now. Fanfiction is the ultimate fight against Artificial Intelligence and corporations. It is made for free without any expectation of monetary gain or fame. Courageous people, like my friend, post every day hoping to make someone feel seen. And yes, I’m even talking about the people who write smut. Courage is the lifeline of fanfiction and the world. Without the courage to take the first step or put ourselves out there, you isolate yourself from so many possibilities. You turn into how I feel now, trapped by the anxiety that courage spawns. My mother will often butcher a quote that goes: the ones who care don’t matter, and the ones who matter don’t care. So please, do not feel embarrassed to write fanfiction, do not feel embarrassed to write that essay for Substack, and go out and read some damn fanfiction.

Issue 7: Repress to Impress

Nonchalance, Noir, and Whimsy

Letter from the Editor

Dearest Reader,

I got pseudo-rejected by a man this week and I actually felt pretty ambivalent about all of it. I’m trying to wrack my brain and think of a reason why I’m not as hurt as I thought I would be. This ambivalence really scares me, especially in the world of the nonchalant, ozempic, effortless productivity mindset we all live in.

I guess that’s why this issue is called Repress to Impress because I want to dissect that feeling of wanting to do things and what happens when we repress our innermost desires or warp them to match what others will be impressed by. In this one, I talk about Pete Campbell from Mad Men, the rise of the nonchalant and whimsical, and noir films. Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy!

Overanalyzing Fiction

This month’s dining room talk is about the world of impressing in advertising. Introducing: A Completely Unnecessary Deep Dive into Pete Campbell’s Hunting Analogy in Mad Men Season 1 Episode 7.

The title of this one is exactly as it sounds: another line for line analysis of an expertly written monologue. This one is from Mad Men Season 1 Episode 7 and is said by one of the most disliked characters in the whole series: Pete Campbell. I’m no stranger to a Vincent Kartheiser scene. In fact, if I had a nickel for every time I overanalyzed a scene he was in I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice. While I’m only in the first season, I have some kind of twisted intrigue in Pete’s character. He’s the ultimate misogynist, a relic of his time shaped by the endless privilege he is unaware of. He represents nepotism within the world of Sterling Cooper and is representing our fictional character who is repressing himself in some way in order to impress the top brass. Pete is brash, egotistical, selfish, and yet in this scene you see a different side to him and one that better represents who he is as an individual as opposed to who he is as an advertising executive.

Pete is sitting in his office with his hands held low, rubbing them constantly as if nervous about something. Standing over him is the kind Peggy, who is still (unfortunately) entranced by Pete after their initial rendezvous in the first episode. After engaging in some conversation about the gun that Pete bought in exchange for the infamous chip and dip bowl that his wife’s family got for them, he looks up at Peggy and asks her whether she’s been hunting. When Peggy tries her best to answer the question, Pete tries to make a joke of it and laughs it off. Peggy then follows up with trying to relate to him in some way by telling him about seeing her cousin hunt. Just through this first exchange, we see that Pete is anxious and unhappy about his marriage. He’s used to being swept aside by everyone he knows: his parents, Trudy (his wife), Don and everyone at Sterling Cooper. No one tries to relate to him or see him as a person. That is, until Peggy shows up. Immediately, she can sense that hunting means a lot to Pete and tries her best to relate to him. Peggy does not seem like she’s looking for anything in return (a contrast to how Pete operates), but is earnestly listening and trying to connect. She does smile slightly after Pete invites her to sit down as if she’s excited he wants to talk to her, but I do think that she starts the conversation just trying to earnestly create conversation.

Pete talks about having to take the animal out with the first shot or scare it away, but follows it up with but sometimes you have to go up and finish it off. This, in a lot of ways, relates to how Pete conducts himself within Sterling Cooper. In another episode, he attempts to go behind Don’s back and pitch to a client in hopes of getting a promotion. Or, in a sense, taking the animal out with the first shot. However, Don retaliates and demands that Pete be fired for insubordination (scaring the animal away). The problem lies in the fact that Pete ends up getting out of termination through his connections and nepotism. When the hunter has every weapon at his disposal, it is only a matter of time before the animal succumbs and gets finished off. If Don does not follow Pete’s wishes, he won’t hesitate to go up and finish him off.

Pete then regales Peggy with my personal nightmare, where he tells her what he really wants to do with the animal. The rest of the monologue is rather long, so I’m going to sum it up. He wants to carry the animal back to a little cabin, where he hangs it up, cuts it apart, goes into the cabin where there is a nameless woman waiting for him who cooks it for him while he sits, watches, and finally eats it in front of her. Now, the first time I watched this I physically recoiled, but it makes perfect sense for Pete’s character. He doesn’t just want to take out the animal “tie it to the bumper and go home,” he wants to make a show of it. He wants to hang it between two trees and have a woman sit and watch his success right in front of him. He doesn’t just want to take over, he wants to destroy absolutely anyone who defies him. We can see this with how he handles his relationship with Trudy. He doesn’t just want to punish her for yelling at him, he wants to destroy her emotionally until she is forced to leave him. Until this point, we have seen Pete be brash, egotistical, selfish, misogynistic, and rude, but this seems like a turning point for the audience’s opinion of his character. He’s all of those things, but he’s also cruel. He wants women to laud his successes while those who defy him get humiliated or “cut, drained, dressed.”

While this hunting daydream is truly my worst nightmare, Peggy says “that would be wonderful.” I don’t want to speak ill of Peggy, although she is an entirely fictional character, but this shows her complacency with the way Pete conducts himself. In the very next episode, she has sex with him while being acutely aware of his marital status. She doesn’t care how Pete sees other people as animals to hunt, because she automatically fills herself into the faceless woman role and becomes complicit in Pete’s wrongdoings. She thinks that she will be safe from Pete’s destruction because she is in that womanly role, but she doesn’t consider what a hunter does when they run out of prey: they start hunting down new ones.

You may think Pete Campbell is evil, you may think he’s terrible, or you may see the emotional abuse he endures from his parents as some kind of reason why he must be this way, but this scene proves who he really is. He’s cruel, conniving, and will do anything he can to humiliate his enemies while being surrounded by praise. He is a hunter equipped with so many advantages that none of his prey stand a chance, and he’s not afraid to take the shot.

Dining Room

This dining room was about the rise of nonchalant and its final boss in the whimsical.

Being nonchalant in the face of adversity is nothing new, and it is certainly not meant to be a trend. The definition of nonchalant is appearing casual and not displaying either stress or enthusiasm. In other words, it is the suppression of your innermost feelings. I don’t mean to go Freud, but there are many problems that can arise from suppression of any part of you. For me personally, the suppression of my creativity in favor of scrolling and living vicariously through others on the Internet who were being creative in my stead ended up sending me down an anxious spiral I’m still crawling out of. Nonchalance is not good for any part of you. So why do we seek it out?

I am no stranger to wanting to appear nonchalant, in fact, it usually rose from a place of anxiety about social situations. I would relax every muscle in my face and pretend that I was calm inside to match. One day, I was buying oil at a local car shop and I walked in with my relaxed nonchalant face. I quickly scanned my surroundings so I seemed to know where I was going and walked to the back of the store. Once I was back there, I was confronted with a wall of oil. I had no idea what kind I needed, and I was being too “nonchalant” to ask for help. So I stood there for about ten minutes scanning the shelves for some modicum of information about what oil to buy for my car. The only thing worse than my anxiety to appear stressed or helpless in a store is being in an aisle for too long (I am convinced they think I’m stealing despite never having or wanting to steal anything in my life) I walked to the counter and asked for help. Long story short, nonchalance got beaten by vulnerability.

Now with the rise of nonchalant culture also comes a rise in whimsy. Whimsy or the act of being whimsical is popular around women my age because it’s basically the act of being vulnerable and wanting to go back to doing things that make you happy. Similarly to analog, its rise can also be noted in conjunction with the rise of artificial intelligence and automation of creative human activities. I particularly wanted to talk about whimsy in regards to our relationships with others being whimsical instead of nonchalant and especially our romantic relationships.

Everyone craves human connection, no matter how nonchalant or ambivalent they appear to be. They repress their vulnerability in favor of making a good impression. What’s funny about this is that it’s paradoxical to literally everything we know about how human connections are formed. As flawed humans, we can’t help but find ourselves attracted –not to nonchalance– but to vulnerable individuals. When someone cries in front of you, confides in you, or trusts you implicitly, there is no better feeling. If everyone in the world was nonchalant, human connection would only exist at a superficial level if at all.

As I said in my letter to the editor, I just got rejected by someone which never feels good. When I felt apathy and nonchalant about the whole situation, I honestly got kind of scared. I don’t want to live in a way where I feel like I can’t be vulnerable with others or myself. I don’t want to live in a nonchalant world. This makes showing your vulnerable side even more important than ever before. Repressing your emotions in order to keep up appearances and impress others is only a recipe for disaster. Choosing nonchalance over whimsy and vulnerability is a disaster.

I currently work at a library and every time I walk in the kids section I look for the Fancy Nancy books. Where others see a trend of influencers hosting Fancy Nancy birthday parties in order to capitalize on the “whimsical” crowd, I can’t help but see a bunch of little kids reading Fancy Nancy and hoping that they can be vulnerable enough with the world and with themselves to stay true to the things that they love.

I think the world would be a lot better with more whimsy and Fancy Nancy.

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