KatCo Inaugural Post
Kat wants to write a blog. My review of Josh O'Connor in Challengers, an accidental magazine pic, and some Spotify recommendations
KatCo’s Inaugural Post
I deleted social media after graduating college in mid-May with a few moments in the past month of logging back into Instagram, Twitter, Tiktok to answer DMs before the apps are removed again. I deleted it all to confront online addiction and cleave myself away from over-connection, which was tearing more from my relationships than it was bonding them. Postop of my phone’s layout, I have gained more direction in making plans/goals for life after university, I am building a slow replenishment of the things I enjoyed growing up (aka WRITING!), and I have already seen discernible improvements in my work ethic AND attention span. I believed this planned detox, originally a 3-4 month timeline until I move in September, might even last beyond that time based on how good I’ve been. We’ll see about that BECAUSE…
I redownloaded Twitter last night (June 19th 2023) to be able to tweet about Garfield’s 44th birthday. But I did not delete the app, thinking I would have self-control after my month and a half of progress, only to find myself mindlessly clicking on it today. Which is where my first article and the building of this newsletter comes into fruition…
Challengers Trailer…
I was at a nondescript company, doing my nondescript work when I take my “smoke” break- 3 minutes in the bathroom once every vague hour and a half. It’s a mirage where I can choose whatever I want to do to fill the time away from my desk. Today, that meant I scrolled through Twitter without even realizing. Just because it was THERE! Of course there are blessings to everything because This is how I see the trailer for Challengers.
Luca Guadagnino’s Challengers follows Zendaya, a young tennis champ I’d call akin to real-life Naomi Osaka?, who gets involved in a love triangle with two slow brewing White Boys of the Month, Mike Faist and Josh O’Connor. Both of whom have been popular for the past 2 years in thirst fancams from straight 16 year old girls in the crosshairs of theatre and film twitter. Gay people might know Josh O’Connor from where I know him from: God’s Own Country, the bury-your-gays admonisher’s solution to Brokeback Mountain. Gay people might know Faist from Brokeback Mountain… at least the upcoming West End announcement of it. Or Dear Evan Hansen… But mainstream audiences who don’t follow theater award shows or the online archives burgeoning from the destruction of earnest gay tumblr will not recognize these guys outside of the 2021 adaptation of West Side Story (Mike Faist as Riff in the casting choice of the century) or The Crown (Josh O’Connor playing the most hated man in England- King Charles).
Here’s my deal. I have only seen the trailer once. I will not watch it again. It was peripheral to anything I’m interested in. Luca Guadagnino ain’t my cup of tea and this trailer is bizarre. I knew who everyone in this movie was but I could not make out who was who in the trailer. Despite the drastic hair color difference (my firm belief: you cannot have a love triangle between three brunettes!!!!!!), Mike Faist and Josh O’Connor were the twins from Big Little Lies or the guys from the remake of Funny Games. Total faceblindness. Who am I to say who they are?
That is until there’s the time jump. Zendaya cuts her hair. Mike Faist cuts his hair. Josh O’Connor has disgusting facial hair to distinguish him from looking like a “teen” (25 years old at youngest). Mike Faist is now apparently Zendaya’s husband. Her career was set back by an injury which means she now gets to be her husband’s manager (? feminism? idk). But now Josh is back again in their lives and he’s Mike’s rival. It does not matter.
What DOES matter is Josh O’Connor. I was struck. He’s literally looking disgusting- sweaty, patchy beard, weird American line delivery- but I am susceptible to all kinds of things apparently because that man is screaming “LET’S GO” on the court and I am craving him carnally.
All this to say! I will be seeing Challengers in theaters.
Kat’s Review of the Challengers Trailer
Fonts: ☆☆☆☆☆ BAD purple font reminiscent of angsty Wattpad fanfics
Josh O’Connor: ★★★★★
THROUPLE POTENTIAL: ★★★★★★★★★★+ Challengers has at least one threesome in it but if they aren’t pussies they’ll go for the whole thing. It’s what I want.
Kat in a Magazine!
I can’t tell you all about how this photo of me was chosen to be in my school’s magazine but I CAN say a guy banged on the door of the radio station I used to manage and when he came in, he told me he loved what I was doing and he was a freelance photographer that wanted to take some photos of me. Luckily it was for a tasteful magazine but I did NOT know it was for my school until I got a bunch of texts and emails from people who saw this inside the front cover of the official Denison Magazine. If you are a Denison student/alum- flip to the first page! There I am in a DJ check-in trying to talk to a mentee about intro Data Analytics classes.
Spotify Recs
Song: Suki Waterhouse and Belle and Sebastian’s "Every Day’s A Lesson In Humility”
I have a friend who told me she only knew Suki Waterhouse because of that photo where Bradley Cooper reads her Lolita. She should be known for that and this song! “Every Day’s A Lesson In Humility” was released as June 13, 2023. Good day. Best little couplet I’ve heard in a song in a loooonnnngggg time: “All my love letters sound like T. Rex songs//'To my dear old self, I'll ride a white, white swan’”- delivered so well. Suki’s most enjoyable song. Also somewhere in my head I forgot that Belle and Sebastian are Scottish and not Canadian.
Podcast: Financial Feminist
I really have been enjoying Financial Feminist- the third podcast I have ever listened to (fact!). I like Tori Dunlap a lot. She came into my life at a time (aka I followed her on Instagram) when I was facing my final years of university with a lot of debt while confronting a generational cycle of low income and unhealthy financial habits. I definitely would practice sorting out your own comfort with listening to anyone give advice about money. If you follow her blindly, then you are not discerning enough. But I like that she’s very millennial in an older sister way, just slightly generationally separated from Gen Z but not enough to make her social critiques outdated or seemingly out of touch. She applies 2021 trendy girlboss, Elizabeth Warren “Persisting” feminism to her podcast while also being very inclusive about camaraderie in the 2020s. She’ll occasionally say something cringey where you then find out she was a theater major in college and you’re like ‘oh my GOD it makes sense’. Like you’d meet her at a networking function and she’d ask your Hogwarts House but then she’s offering to look at your resume so it’s cool. She’s got some paid stuff available for more in-depth financial education- I don’t endorse anything you have to pay for but I would personally read her book (same title as the podcast- Financial Feminist) as an intro guide to becoming more financially literate and confident in your investments (money, time, situational occurrences) that shape both your current and future lifestyles.
Song: Split Enz’ “Six Months In A Leaky Boat”
Rated number 5 on APRA’s list of Top 100 New Zealand songs. The Australasian Performing Right Association is wrong because this song has an unintelligible replay ability which should shoot it to number 1 baby!!!!!. “Aotearoa//Rugged Individual”! I agree, having never been there. I love Neil Finn. I’m just now understanding just how much New Zealand loves him though- and his brother Tim, who is right behind Neil as the pair take up the number 2 and 3 spots of the most represented artists on the APRA list. Neil Finn replaced Lindsey Buckingham on Fleetwood Mac tours (I am Team Stevie as a person with a conscious) and I CRIED in 2018 when Neil played “Don’t Dream It’s Over” (Crowded House cover) and “Landslide” back to back. The encore was also a Tom Petty tribute. Once in a lifetime emotional exhaustion.
That’s ALL!
Thanks for reading this! More to come soon, I’m sure.
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