Feminism, Dark Crystal, travel plans

[flexagon]

For some reason I read a lot this week about the waves of American feminism. Seems like I'm third-wave... and quite on one side of the feminist sex wars, which aren't as fun as that name makes them sound. Sex-positivity seems to be on a downtrend among women these days -- I once asked why on Reddit and was told basically that the term's been used too often as a cover for bad behavior. Le sigh. At any rate, having done my reading, I feel I've learned my place in this slice of history; grown in the environment created by the first wave, employed in workplaces shaped (though clearly not enough yet) by the second, too pedantic to focus on women alone, too horny and curious to be anti-porn. So there it is.

The bug and I have started watching Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, a prequel series to The Dark Crystal, and I have questions. Also it's dark af. A review I read said "just as boldly inaccessible as the original film", and this time the body count will be sky-high (it has to be, to get from where it is to the world we saw in the film). Two episodes in and we've already had a torture scene, which was disturbing despite not being protracted.

Iceland is in a week -- no, Iceland is in four days -- and I need to finalize my packing list, but I do have the hiking boots required for one of our excursions, which survived a test walk nicely, and the right electrical outlet converters. I learned that the traditional wool sweaters are called Lopapeysas, and I might try to pick one up while there if I find a nice natural-grey one from a nice natural-grey sheep. Stress levels at my house lately are ridiculous, with both of us working every weekend, so a trip will probably be good for us even if there's jet-lag and rain.

Comments

[coraline]

we started watching it last night and... i don't know, I grew up with the original dark crystal and LOVED it, and didn't find it inaccessible. this one is stunningly gorgeous and i want to roll around in the world-art that they've created, but the writing is leaving me stone cold. i just don't care about any of the characters at all (the nerd princess a little, but... nothing's grabbing me the way i'd like).
I've heard that actually the series doesn't lead directly to the world we see in the movie, so it may not take the trajectory you expect in terms of body count, but I'm also not enjoying the grimdark aspects of it.

have an awesome time in iceland i want to hear all about it! i really want to go back, we had only a couple days there the one time we visited and it wasn't enough.

[islenskr]

When I was there many years ago, there was a shop in Reykjavik that sold mountains of sweaters and yarn. I bought a pullover there that I still wear today (even though it's really badly in need of cuff repair - and I repaired a hole in the elbow). It is my favourite sweater. It has no dyed yarn - it's a couple shades of grey, fawn, black and white, all natural sheep colors. Since Reykjavik is tiny, you'll have no problem finding the shop provided it's still there.

Eymunson is a nice cafe/bookshop in downtown Reyjkavik. They sell more English books there than I would have thought - the Icelanders are proud of their authors, too, so you can find English translations of mostly everything.

[flexagon]

The sweater/yarn shop is still there and we found it! I never found a sweater I loved, but I did buy a fleece-lined hat/mitten set from that shop and then wore them for the rest of my time in Iceland. :-)

[flexagon]

Are you still watching, and does it get better? We seem to have paused 3 episodes in -- mostly just due to schedule disruption but now Season 4 of The Good Place is coming out and that's also compelling.

[coraline]

(digging out my inbox) well, we haven't gotten back to it yet :}