infinitewrites

Thursday Thoughts!

Posted on January 8, 2016 by marcanthonyk

So its the first week of the 2016, the new year, and I’m thinking about the things left behind in 2015 and the things wanted to be accomplished this year. What did you feel was needed to be left (or was forced to leave) in 2015? What does this year hold for you?

I was forced to realize quite a few things in 2015 (specifically at the end). How much I truly appreciate my mom being in my life and how much closer we have gotten after years of her not accepting my sexual orientation. Siblings can be a blessing when you’re older. What friends will be there for you when you’re down and out. Despite knowing someone for YEARS and wanting to be with them, you don’t know them until you’ve dated them. Sometimes you should just stay friends. Everything happens for a reason.

“The Weight of Time” by Julie De Waroquier

My 2015 had “Ups” and way, way, way “Downs,” but I have truly grown from all the experiences and humbled myself and many aspects (after I came to terms with the whole “everything happens for a reason” thing). I had very low points in this year, some are still with me, but its the first week, so I just need a bit of time before I’m fully focused on what needs to be done this year.

I’m 25 and realizing that time is passing so fast and I keep seeing that number after the 2 increase (I’ll be 26 in 5 months and some change). This year I want to take more chances, really go for my dreams and accomplish something astounding. Hopefully I can get more people reading this blog.

It’s difficult at times, but you have to know what things are worth carrying and what things aren’t. If it’s dragging you down and not contributing to your life, it’s time to drop that unnecessary baggage.

My Thursday Thought!

Legends and Mercenaries

Posted on December 29, 2015 by marcanthonyk

I hope your Christmas was delightful and you got everything you wanted. Christmas weekend saw two new trailers that I’m excited to talk about.

Fox’s Deadpool

The first! Deadpool!!! I am so stoked for this movie. I am glad Fox is taking it from a different direction that X-Men Origins: Wolverine went, because that was garbage. I fell asleep, and I rarely fall asleep in movies. Wolverine rewrote the back story for Wade Wilson (Deadpool) on how exactly he got his powers and was mutated, even going so far as giving him the power of protruding blades from his wrist and Cyclops’ Optic Blast. HORRIBLE. Wade doesn’t posses any of these abilities (including the teleportation power procured from John Wraith), in fact the ONLY power Wade posses is Wolverine’s healing factor. He also knows he is a comic book character and continually breaks the “fourth wall,” but I’m not sure that can be considered a power.

The trailer showed us more of Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) and what led him to becoming the “Merc with the Mouth” (clearly seeing that before he became Deadpool, he was a wise-ass). We also saw more of Colossus (Andre Tricoteux) and Ellie Phimister aka Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand), who looks to be doing something that is not quite apart of her original powers (Ellie has Telepathy and Precognition abilities. In one version she can create illusions) but we’ll just have to wait to see what’s going on with that. I’m very interested in seeing how crazy and funny this movie is, how Deadpool breaks the “fourth wall”and how the X-men fit into his Universe. Come on Feb 12th!

CW’s Legends of Tomorrow

CW’s released a full trailer for is upcoming January 21st premiere of Legends of Tomorrow. I’m still on the fence about this show. I’m not particularly fond of any of the superheroes/villains being showcased in this show, except Firestorm (Franz Drameh as Jax Jackson and Victor Garber as Dr. Martin Stein). There’s also Black Canary’s resurrected sister Sara Lance as White Canary (Caity Lotz), Ray Palmer aka The Atom (Brandon Roth), Hawkman and Hawkgirl (Falk Hentschel and Ciara Renee) and I guess anti-heroes Captain Cold (the awesome Wentworth Miller) and Heatwave (Dominic Purcell). Apparently the point of this team being put together is to travel through time and take down the immortal Vandal Savage (Casper Crump). DC shows have been doing a pretty decent job the past couple of years (Arrow, The Flash, Gotham), so my hopes for this show aren’t to high (lest we forget Constatine), but I’m expecting something close to The Flash since they are on the same network. Oh, and for Firestorm to get his full powers. He does more that shoot flames, people!

Saturday Quote

Posted on December 26, 2015 by marcanthonyk

“The hardest thing in life is to know which bridge to cross and which to burn” -David Russell

This quote is so true, because I believe we often keep those in our lives who are toxic or unworthy of ourselves: whether it be a significant other, a friend, or even a family member. It’s hard to realize when your time is up with that person and it’s time for you or them to exit stage right. We allow love or lust and even being comfortable, to keep us from seeing the truth. But I believe that everyone comes into our lives for a reason, and often it’s to teach us a lesson and help us to grow, and it could very well be that a person is meant to be in our lives. It’s growing as an adult that you must learn and understand who is here for a short time and whom you are meant to build an everlasting bridge.

Saturday Quote

Posted on December 19, 2015 by marcanthonyk

H.M. Tomlinson

“We see things not as they are, but as we are” – H.M. Tomlinson

I think this quote is important because we often perceive things (and the world for that matter) the way our minds process it, but don’t think to take our googles off and step into another persons shoes and view it from how they see it.

Have a safe and awesome weekend.

Black superheroes?

Posted on December 17, 2015 by marcanthonyk

Black Panther in The Avengers

So it’s 2015, and Hollywood is JUST starting to add to the Black superhero roster. There were underrated (aka just plain awful) movies such as Steel starring Shaquille O’Neal (1997), which most people wouldn’t even realize is based on the DC Comic’s superhero John Henry Irons. Mainly because they removed the red cape and the “S” insignia from his chest so he could better represent a “blue collar Batman” rather than the Man of Steel Iron’s persona was modeled after. Weeks before Steel premiered in movie theaters, Michael Jai White played spooky demon Spawn. A year Later you had Wesly Snipes become a half-human, half-vampire Blade, which did better than O’Neal and White’s movies, and even spawned 2 sequels (which weren’t as good). A couple of years after, Halle Berry portrayed Storm in 2000’s X-Men (all I can remember is her trying so horrible hard to do an African accent. Ugh). But after that, no real black comic book characters were portrayed on the silver screen (Samuel L Jackson voiced Frozone in 2004’s Incredibles, but that’s not actually a comic book character). What happened?

Sam Wilson as the Falcon

Mainstream Black superheroes have been around since 1966 (in 1947, Atlas Comics [the name of the comic book publisher before it became Marvel Comics] distributed All-Negro Comics, an anthology of Jungle Tales, which premiered Black power[less] superheroes, but was barely sold), when warrior prince T’Challa of fictional Wakanda took the mantle of Black Panther after his father was murdered. Black Panther first appeared in Fantastic Four #52. After Black Panther’s appearance, Marvel created another future Avenger, Sam Wilson aka Falcon. Falcon appeared in Captain America #117 in 1969, followed by DC’s creation of the third Green Lantern, John Stewart in 1971 and Marvel’s Luke Cage in 1972 (who is the first out of the four to appear in his own comic book first). Many more appeared after (less known: Tyroc, more known: Black Lightning and Storm), but the question is why is that now, in the 21st Century, are these characters JUST starting to be portrayed on the big screen and receive their own titled comic books.

The clear answer is who Hollywood is targeting. Their targets are White Americans because they believe that they are the higher percentage that spends money on comic books and movie tickets. Because of this, its not important to add diversity into their cast, nor does it occur to the writers, directors and etc. But now, magically, black people are JUST showing interest in comics and movies, so it’s currently imperative that we add these Black and oh even a few Asian superheroes to our movies.

*Ultimate side eye*

Enter a caption

It has been a long time coming, but now we’re starting to see more diversity in superhero movies and even more in comics. The Spider-Man in the ultimate universe is Spanish and Black, the Ms. Marvel is Pakistanian, the Thor is a woman and Sam Wilson is the current Captain America. Many minority characters have their own solo comics and upcoming movies. I believe we have a long way to go, but it’s great to see the rise of these minorities and to watch how they play pivotal roles in shaping the current generation’s mind on the importantance of equality. There’s a long way to go, but it is looks promising.

Mutants: humans and turtles alike.

Posted on December 16, 2015 by marcanthonyk

20th Century Fox

By now, you must have seen the trailer for X-Men: Apocalypse, and if you haven’t [CLICK] and do yourself a favor. This movie has EPIC-NESS written all over it. Finally, the new franchise is introducing significant character such as Jean Grey (the beautiful and talented Sophie Turner), Ororo Munroe aka Storm (the amazing Alexandra Shipp), Scott Summers codename: Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), and Kurt Wagner aka Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), along with many more mutants to fill your heart’s content. If you have seen the last movie in this installment, Days of Futures Past, then you are aware that Wolverine caused a ripple in time erasing pretty much a lot of events. Basically, the previous trilogy committed a lot of poor decisions causing the movies to suck exponentially, especially the last one (I actually enjoyed X2: Mutants United, though), killing Cyclops and Jean Grey, and just messing up a whole slue of things.

Alexandra Shipp as Storm (20th Century Fox)

So like DC’s Flashpoint (Barry Allen, the Flash, travels back in time and saves his mother [unknowingly] and alters the future, inadvertently creating a timeline where the Justice League doesn’t exist and the Amazons and the Atlateans are fighting a war on Earth. He travels back in time and set things right, returning the timeline to its former state with significant changes; i.e. giving DC Comics a chance to reboot 52 of their comics) , DoFP erases all that and brings back dead characters, allowing a new story to be forged. I am interested in seeing how they will take this opportunity to make a better story. The movies have not followed the comics at all (First Class being a completely different roster than it’s comic version which debuted September 1963) but the First Class film was highly enjoyable. Now I am not a huge fan of Bryan Singer’s interpretation on the series (as I stated before I dislike the first trilogy and he directed the first two films. He also directed that horrible Superman Returns in 2006). But DoFP was decent, so I’m hoping this movie is as great as it’s trailer.

I’m also curious how they will convey the family relationship with bothers Scott and Alex Summers (Lucas Till appeared in the first two in this series) and Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) and Nightcrawler who are mother and son. I mean I realize that each movie has had about 10 years between them, but when did she have time to have a kid? Is this why she went insane last movie? And Scott is suppose to be the older brother, but if you remember First Class, when Hank and Xavier first get Cerebro working, they show Scott as a boy while already having recruited Alex. Discrepancies Fox!!! Seeing as they didn’t do well at exploring Quicksliver’s (Evan Peters) relationship with Magneto (Michael Fassbender) along with completely ignoring the fact that he has a twin, I’m not holding my breath.

Bebop and Rocksteady (Paramount Pictures)

Now….to Teenage Mutant Turtles: Out of the Shadows…..why is Megan Fox still acting?!?!? Riddle me this! She played a horrible April O’Neil in the first installment, she WILL play a horrible April O’Neil in this one. Joining her as hockey stick wielding badass Casey Jones is Arrow’s Stephen Amell, who I don’t think is quite a good actor either, but I still enjoy him playing Oliver Queen. I have faith in him for this roll. Don’t squander it Stephen. We will most likely have to count on the tough acting Alan Ritchson (Raphael), the hilarious Noel Fisher (Michelangelo), the gadget wiz Jeremy Howard (Donatello), and their fearless leader Leonardo (voiced by Johnny Knoxville) to save the movie. I’m not gonna lie, I liked the first one, so I’m excited for this sequel. Especially since their bringing two #throwbacks: Bebop (Gary Anthony Williams) and Rocksteady (Stephen Farrelly). And hey, at the end of the day, this is a Nickelodeon movie. Click it for the trailer if you haven’t gotten a chance to take a gander.

The 2016 movie year looks promising. Let’s hope it’s not a let down like this year.

Thursday Thoughts!

Posted on December 11, 2015 by marcanthonyk

I So let me paint a picture for you: it’s just after midnight, your audio chatting with your best friend through iMessage, making yourself some tea, and all of a sudden your notification bar pops up and “says some random person followed you on Twitter.” You don’t recognize the name or psude-name, so you open up your Twitter app. You click on your notification tab and viola, you current big/gf’s ex randomly has added you. What?

So your asking a million questions off the bat, right? Like how did you find me and why are you following me? What do you do?

Now I narrowed it down to three main reactions. First, The Messy: you DM said ex and ask the questions flooding your mind. How did you find me? What do you want? Do you want me to cut you? You get to the bottom for the clear messiness of the ex who had the audacity to add you in the first place. You call up your current and tell them to let that bitch know, “you don’t play!” There are clear motives, let’s lay everything on the table.

Or you could react the secon way, The Investigator: look through all the ex’s followers and followings to see who you all have in common that could have lead them to you. Find out this persons real name, if you don’t already know it, and go through their face book and compare friends. Look through their pictures, see who they know and connect the dots. The other name for the investigator is The Crazy.

Lastly, you can react calmly, almost flippant, The Yawn. Why did your current’s ex follow you/add you. *Yawn* Who knows, probably just wants to see what you’re like and what makes you different from them. It’s weird and creepy because you don’t know how they found you, but who cares. Laugh about it with your current and sip the tea you made and continue binging Pretty Little Liars on Netflix.

Nothing is saying you can’t be a combination of the three, either

I for one, am not a jealous person, I feel like it’s a useless emotion (but it is a human emotion, so everyone is entitled to use it), so I’m definitely The Yawn. Which would you be?

My Thursday thought!

Musicals, season finales and remakes

Posted on December 11, 2015 by marcanthonyk

There’s so many things that have happen in the past week and weekend to review and I am three days behind, so let’s get into it.

Now, unless you are living under a rock (like most American’s have apparently resided the past 40 years), you should know that last Thursday NBC put on a live version of the 1975 musical The Wiz, an adaption of the 1942 musical The Wizard of Oz, which is based on the 1939 film of the same name. The film is an adaptation of the 1902 original musical (of the same name) and the 1900 book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Now the two musicals and the book that The Wiz is adapted from, are all characters who are Caucasian. The cast for the musicals and movie, both, have an entire cast of white characters. The Wiz, which was originally performed in Baltimore in 1974, is a cast of all blacks just as the original plays and movie it drew inspiration from, had an all white cast. WHAT IS WRONG WITH AMERICA TO SAY BLACK PEOPLE WOULD BE OFFENDED IF WHITE PEOPLE HAD AN ALL WHITE CAST?! YOU ALL ALREADY HAVE TWO AND A MOVIE!!! It is ridiculous to me that people have forgotten about these; I actually love both the movie and play. Now, I know not everyone is a musical major and know all the musicals that are out there, but not knowing The Wiz is unacceptable, but I would let that pass if you knew the original The Wizard of Oz. Not cool, people who decided to take to twitter and post your ignorant comments. Beside from that, the production was phenomenal. Shanice Williams was a great Dorthy (no Diana or Stephanie but great in her own right.) NeYo stole the show for me though. He was outstanding. The stage is a great color on him. David Alan Grier also played the hell out of The Lion. Aside from the many commercials, I thoroughly enjoyed this adaptation. Oh, lest I forget the epic ‘Emerald City’ scene. I have never seen such fierceness on a musical stage, ever. So much life was given.

Speaking of television and epic-ness, many shows had their winter finales. [Spoilers Ahead] Once Upon A Time was a bit anticlimactic, I must confess. Not much happened in the show aside from Emma’s (Jennifer Morrison) redemption, until the end when (NOOOOOO!!) Poor gorgeous Killian (Colin O’Donoghue) met his end (or did he?) He made the ultimate sacrifice by taking in all the revived Dark Ones into Excalibur and had Emma drive it through his abdomen. Tragic. The twist, Rumpelstiltskin(Robert Carlyle) took in those Dark Ones as Killian thought they were going into Excalibur. I know, too much. Now they are traveling into the Under World to retrieve Killian’s soul. Part Two of season 5 should be promising, hopefully they bring back my Merlin (Elliot Knight).

Scream Queens ended its season with revealing that Hester (Lea Michelle) was the second tub baby, twin sister of Boone (the handsome Nick Jonas) and niece to Gigi (Nisam Pedrad). The Red Devil Killers were revealed (Diego Boneta’s Pete being one of them before meeting his end by a Red Devil dawned Hester) and all the Chanel’s ended up in an Asylum, with the very last scene being The Red Devil appearing over Chanel Oberlin as she lie in bed ready for bed. No news yet on the return of the show next fall.

The Flash was a great episode with Mark Mardon (Liam McIntyre) releasing Captain Cold (Wentworth Miller) and The Trickster (James Jesse) who plotted a great scheme to kill the titled character (Captain Cold decided to warn Barry and took no part in this inevitably failed attempt). Harry (Tom Cavanagh), Cisco (Carlos Valdes), and Jay (Teddy Sears) all worked together, foiling Weather Wizard and The Trickster’s vicious plan and allowing Barry (Grant Gustin) to quickly defeat both. Most surprising is the long awaited entrance of Wally West (Joe West’s son and Iris brother in this TV adaption and played by Keiynan Lonsdale. Wally is actually Iris’ nephew in the comics). Finally!!! The plot thickens and hopefully he has something to do with the Speed Force. The last show I’ll speak about is Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, which had a twist I foresaw, the “HYDRA God” had taken over Will’s body (played by Dillon Casey). Unfortunately, Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) notice too late and fought it out with Will Daniels corpse eventually setting him on fire, while former Director Coulson (Clark Gregg) battled with a bounded Grant Ward (Brett Dalton) who he killed with his mechanical hand (GASP!!!). Fitz and Coulson made it through the portal before it closed and the team returned to Coulson’s new “toy” plane where Fitz gave Simmons the look that said, “Will is dead.” They embraced and after the infamous S.H.I.E.L.D insignia at the end of the show, Ward was shown possessed by the Inhuman who possessed Will, and clearly had returned to Earth. How? Who knows. The winter finales this season were too intense.

Lastly, let’s briefly discuss two announcements I heard over the weekend. First, I am extremely bitter about this one, Sony announced that they are developing Final Fantasy VII Remake. I’m completely bitter about this for the simple fact, I’m a Microsoft guy and only own a Xbox One! Meaning, I’ll never see Aeritha die in 3D on the Unreal Engine 4. Woe is me. There is no set date for this release, but let’s hope Square-Enix has some sympathy and releases it on Xbox eventually. Finally, I’m not sure if anyone has seen Ang Lee’s 2000 hit Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, but you should. It’s totally epic and one of the first Japanese movies to open the door to other American Martial Arts movies such as Romeo Must Die, staring Aaliyah and Jet Li, and The One, also staring Jet Li. A sequel to CTHD will air on Netflix on February 26 (subtitled Sword of Destiny and not directed by Ang Lee), same day as it hits select theaters. I for one cannot wait. I watched the first one many times growing up and it help garnish my love for Japanese cinema.

The past week has brought us so much to look for in television, movies, and gaming. Stay tuned for more information as I receive it.

Thursday Thoughts!

Posted on December 3, 2015 by marcanthonyk

Photo courtesy of Marc-Anthony Kenney

I had a conversation with my significant other, possibly last week, and I asked him if he thought that in a relationship, at some point, do you think that one person loves the other more? He replied with something very philosophical that I currently can’t remember. I instantly cast the thought from my head and agreed (previously I thought the saying was accurate). More and more now, as the weeks have gone by, I’ve began to rethink my stance on the matter.

I have been in my share of relationships, most of them ending because the guy was either unable to meet my needs (which I promise, I don’t have many of), decided to not make our relationship a priority, or they were just plain moronic. To me, and I could be very wrong, all share a common factor: I gave more than they had given. I made sure their needs were attended to, I made our relationship a priority, and I made sure I was not a moron. But just because I gave more in my past relationships, does that mean that the past guys love me any less.

My current boyfriend asked how can you measure one’s love? He might be right to question this. How can you? In daylight? In Sunsets? In cups of coffee? (Sorry, RENT reference.) But do you measure in the things you do for the other, or how much you long for the other, or sex? I’m not sure exactly, but for me if I give you more of myself, I feel like I’m putting my heart more on the line than the other. To me, if I am willing to put my all into you/give you my heart, I’m showing you how much I love you and care about this relationship. How can you love someone if you don’t offer your entire self/your heart to the other. Is it really love , or just words that you have gotten comfortable and use to saying?

I am not saying I am an expert in love, its just how I see things. Love is a gamble and you have to put something in to get something back. I don’t feel like this is the case in my past relationships. The others decided to hold their chips to close to themselves, so they lost the game. Or rather they won, but didn’t win the main prize (not that I’m conceited enough to think of myself as a grand prize or anything. Just go with the analogy). So I feel like I loved them more than they loved me, I was willing to put it all out there.

But you tell me, how do you feel on the matter? I could very well be looking at it all wrong, so enlighten me. That was Thursday thought.

Infinite Writes

Posted on November 24, 2015 by marcanthonyk

This past summer I met a man who made me think. I had just turned 25, I had so much time to make my dreams come true, what was I doing to make this a reality? The answer was nothing. I wanted/want to become a writer (network television or a novelist preferably), so why wasn’t I writing? I think honestly (as most artist unfortunately do) I was so caught up in my head and felt my work wasn’t up to par. Consequentially, this kept me from doing the thing I loved. He gave me an opportunity to find this love again by writing for his magazine which was awe-inspiring. I was given the chance to meet people who were so passionate in their craft and were native to my District of Columbia/Maryland/Virginia area.

Ultimately, I learned the selfish ways of that business and that not everyone is out to help you further your career like they claim. Which is fine, that is how the story goes, as they say. But he gave me the courage to put myself and my work out there and because of that I have published work on the internet (I will list my articles on this post at the end, should you choose to take a gander.)

Because of this, and the support of the people I love, I decided to create this blog dedicated to the things I love and interest me, in hopes that it will interest you. I too, want to use this blog as a means to showcase my writing (somethings I am working on). Through my experiences this year, I have learned, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts” –Winston Churchill.

Infinite Writes is dedicated to write about anything and all things.

Please enjoy and stay update with me!

-Marc-Anthony Kenney

P.S.

Here is a link to my available published articles: http://rollingout.com/author/marc-anthony-kenney/