Tommy Mood Board

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If you missed the cover reveal video post last Friday, due to the email mess up, you can go see it here!

I had fun looking for pictures that made me think of the main protagonist of Crushing It, Tommy Fairfield.

And I thought, why not share it with you?

Mood board of Tommy Fairfield. Pictures of a guitar, torn pieces of sheet music, STEM image, a rainbow heart, an icon reading ‘Best Leader’, and the interior of a bedroom surround a drawn image of a young blond boy. Art of the bedroom and boy are drawn by pinkpiggy93.

Tommy Fairfield

Age: 14

Date of Birth: May 11, 1988

Appearance: Short blond hair, green eyes, tall, white

Grade: 9

Favourite class: Math or Science or Music

Parents: Lilah and Gerard Fairfield live on a farm in Parry Sound, Ontario

Siblings: Older brother Phillip (who lives in Parry Sound), married and has one son (15 months old). Twin older sisters Eliza (who lives in Toronto) and MacKenzie (who lives in Ottawa). Older sister Kennedy, engaged to Jason Johnson and lives in Westmeath (seen here).

Cover art by @pinkpiggy93 on Tumblr and @flowerraven93 on Instagram

Pre-order Crushing It by Jen Desmarais now!

Physical version, electronic version (Coming Soon)

Prey – JenEric Movie Review

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How This Works – Read Other Reviews

Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2022 film Prey.

Story

The story is fairly simple and predictable but extremely satisfying. Everything is set up and everything pays off perfectly.

There are some excellent emotional moments and I am impressed with how tight the script was.

Score: 1

Characters

The main character is awesome. She is the perfect underdog in this sort of story and she kicks a lot of ass. I loved her brother. Their individual arcs and their sibling arc were wonderful.

I was impressed with how accurate the French was for the time period.

I’m a little sad I didn’t know there was a full Comanchi version before I watched.

Score: 1

Dialogue

The dialogue was well done. In the version I watched, they transitioned from Comanchi to English and it worked well. I liked the nods to previous Predator movies.

The main character’s body language helped with the intensity of the movie. She reacts realistically and viscerally to the horror.

Score: 1 

Visuals and Music

The great plains are a great backdrop for something so epic. The wild is just so big and the predator is so much more terrifying in comparison to the bears and mountain lions. They are also beautiful.

The camera work is clean and lets us see the impressive fighting.

The music was understated but effective.

Score: 1

Fun

The movie didn’t grab my attention right away and could have used a little more action right at the beginning but I think that’s because I was expecting an action movie not a horror.

Overall it was a lot of fun though.

Score: 1

Overall

An intense action horror with enough references to make Predator fans happy but not so much as to make it unwatchable on it’s own.

The action is amazing, the acting is fantastic, and I want a whole series of kick ass woman throughout history fighting off predators.

Final Score: 5 Stars out of 5*

*A 5 star review doesn’t mean the movie was perfect nor that it is perfect for everyone but it is a movie I believe is as close to perfect as possible.

Random Updates from Éric

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Hello family, friends, and fans,

Some weeks are hard. This was one of those weeks. I’ve been working through a lot of emotions. Among them is the fact that I’m still in pain. I know that a new physio for two weeks isn’t going to fix everything, but I was secretly hoping.

Let’s break this down into categories:

Writing

I’m currently finishing the longest running project I’ve ever had (started in 2016) and I’m really hoping to be done by summer. It’s going slowly, mostly because of pain, and I worry it’s crap but at least I’m having fun writing it.

Family Life

I’m trying my best to be a good father and a good husband. I know that I haven’t always been perfect; I’m a little whiny and I over explain and analyze everything but I’m trying. This week I’ve felt like I’m not enough and that’s really frustrating.

Work

I have a similar issue at work. I think it’s time for me to find something new. I’m fairly certain that within a year, my position will be cut and after 15 years, it’s time to do something new. The problem with that is because of my health issues and lack of return to full time work, it’s not easy for me to convince anyone to hire me. So I feel a little trapped.

Health

I’m seeing a team consisting of a physiotherapist, kinesiologist, and occupational therapist. They are trying to help me get back to work.

While they’re doing that, I have an MRI for my head, neck, and back set up for mid July.

Dad

My father’s birthday was earlier this month. He passed away at the age of 47 from brain cancer.

He was 40 when he was diagnosed. Considering my health issues, it’s hard for me not to worry about this year. (I’m turning 40 in July.)

It’s one of the reasons I’m really glad that I got that MRI. At the very least we’ll know something. The MRI should be able to detect brain lesions from MS or brain tumours. Hopefully there’s nothing to find.

Mental Health

With all of the above I’m struggling, but my occupational therapist is helping me find coping mechanisms and to rationalize instead of spiralling. That part is helping and I’m trying to be kind to myself.

How have you been?

Be kind and stay safe,

Éric

Crushing It cover reveal video

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OMG I CAN FINALLY SHARE THIS!

Seriously, the first time I saw this cover was in SEPTEMBER.

On to the cover reveal:

The actors in this film are Dragon and Dragon’s friend. Pegasus attempted to assist.

They were given the task of completing an obstacle course similar to the one in the book. (Simplified, obviously, as these are not 14-15 year olds.)

The music was written by me (with heavy assistance from Bruce Gordon for the chords! I was so lost as to how to put chords to the tune in my head!), sung by me, and recorded by Éric.

Cover art by @pinkpiggy93 on Tumblr and @flowerraven93 on Instagram

Pre-order Crushing It by Jen Desmarais now!

Physical version, electronic version (Coming Soon)

Hook

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Although Hook himself isn’t in this picture, these characters are all from that incredible movie. I wanted to shout out “Ru-Fi-Ohhhhh!” at the top of my lungs, but I controlled myself.

Barely.

l-r Tinkerbell, Rufio, Peter Pan

Peter Pan & Wendy – JenEric Movie Review

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How This Works – Read Other Reviews

Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2023 film Peter Pan & Wendy.

Story

I’ll be honest, I’ve never liked the Peter Pan movies. They always feel like growing up propaganda. I get that growing up is important, but this story is one of the biggest reasons that our society equates growing up with giving up childhood things. I think that’s a sad outcome.

All that being said, I liked the changes to the story from the traditional stage play and Disney movie. It’s exciting and fun. Lots of set up and some long monologues slow it down though.

Score: 0.5

Characters

It’s nice to see a Tinkerbell that is not jealous of Wendy and a Wendy that is a capable fighter. Tiger Lily was amazing and wise without being a stereotype. Great to see and hear the Cree language. (Although subtitles sometimes calling it a foreign language was silly.)

Hook and Pan have some great character moments and although there were a few monologues that went a little long, they both had a depth of character that is refreshing. Pan being a normal kid whose emotional maturity stalled was an interesting take.

Score: 1

Dialogue

As I mentioned, some monologues went a little too long. Some of the dialogue came off a little hammy like the actors were reading lines.

Overall it was a nice mixture of time appropriate dialogue and updated text.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

The scenery was beautiful. The action well choreographed. It was easy to believe that Pan was an extremely good fighter. The camera work and framing were superb. At times I found it a little dark and maybe a little desaturated.

The music was epic and perfectly timed. I liked the mixture of the Disney animated movie soundtrack with the new orchestration.

Score: 1

Fun

I enjoyed the film, but the longer monologues seemed to bore the 3yo. The 6yo loved it, but seemed confused at the Hook and Pan friendship.

The rest of the family seemed to love it and that’s saying something since my MIL and SIL are both big fans of the book.

Score: 1

Overall

A film that both respects it’s source material and updates it in interesting ways. Fun action with fun characters. If you like any Peter Pan stories, you’ll love this one. A Disney update that is definitely worth the watch.

Final Score: 4 Stars out of 5

Luka

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It’s no secret that I ADORE Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir. One of the characters is just so cool that you can’t help but adore him whether you like the show or not. That would be Luka, the super laid back, guitar playing, sage-advice giving big brother of one of the girls in the main group’s class.

I was really excited to see this cosplay, right down to the Jagged Stone tee.

I’m on Strike and it hurts

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*This post was written at 10pm Sunday night and we received word at 1am that the strike was over.*

Hello Friends, Family, and Fans,

We’ve now entered the third week of the strike. If you don’t know or don’t follow the news, my union PSAC (you say the letters and don’t read it. If you read it it sounds too much like a bag of urine) which represents over 150,000 public service employees, has been negotiating a new contract with the government since our last one expired in early 2021.

Members do everything from auditing, to web design, to ship inspection, etc. Lots of different jobs. The union wants our pay to be the same as inflation and several other things. (I think the original list was 500+ items)

What happens when you’re on strike is you don’t get paid. We can get $75 strike pay if we picket for 4 hours. That’s less than half of my usual. We’re doing fine financially thanks to some inheritance, but it’ll get tight if this goes on more than another week. (Not asking for help, Thank you)

Because of my health issues, I’ve gone twice and both times I walked around 18,000 steps (3x more than I normally do in a day.) Every time I sat down I caught whiffs of cigarette or cannabis smoke. There aren’t a lot of smokers but it only takes one to stink up the place and make me have trouble breathing.

So I walked, and both times it took me 2 days to recover from the physical exhaustion and pain. It’s hard to recover from, and hard to feel so useless. I know there are awesome and brave people out there walking 20,000 steps per day and really putting on the pressure and I appreciate them. Unfortunately, like many other parts of my life, I’m feeling a little mediocre.

Let’s hope this gets fixed soon so that we can all get back to work and I can get back to figuring out how to improve my health.

Be kind and stay safe,

Éric