The incredible artist Jearum Castro did this wonderful art of myself, as well as the Peanuts cartoon of me that is now my profile pic on here! You should support him at https://ko-fi.com/jearum!! All his socials are there as well, if you'd also like to commission him for a beautiful commission!
(disclaimer: the writer of this article loves this show dearly and would like to point out that it is no longer on the streamer that produced multiple seasons of it, most likely due to David Zaslav personally pressing the delete key on the Warner Bros. server. While this review is full of passion for the work, it'll sound like a recommendation, to which I'll hint that you can find it if you're exceptionally wise at guiding through the World Wide Web. As a piece of work I love, I think its morally alright to 'find it' this way, seeing as its been removed from all avenues. I mean, they never even officially put this show on DVD.) [this is a spoiler heavy review, but if the show hasn't interested you before this moment, these spoilers are sorta your last chance] Search Party is a show created by (and partially written by Sarah-Violet Bliss, Charles Rogers, and Michael Showalter. Before we get ahead of ourselves, the conceit of the first season is about a millennial who unwittingly ruins her life by attempting to prove her own self-worth. The first domino fallen in this tragedy being when Dory Sief (Alia Shawkat) recognizes a missing person's poster of a woman she vaguely remembers passing by in college. She insists with her friends that she, Chantal Witherbottom (Clare McNulty), was always nice to her, an extrapolation of one awkward moment passing each other in a dorm room and vaguely smiling. Drew Gardner (John Reynolds) already finds this concerning, but the audience will soon notice how clingy he is as a romantic partner. Dory naturally pushes him away and seeks the guidance of an ex in the first episode because despite breaking up with her, she still continues to respect his opinion.
Dory's ex, Julian Marcus (Brandon Michael Hall), has an honest heart to heart with Dory about how he is naturally concerned that Dory is going out of her way to find difficult problems to solve, as she basically has nothing else going on. Dory sees this as a personal attack, as this heartfelt caring concern is coming from an ex, and she strives to prove him wrong, starting her journey down this rabbit hole of her own design.
Despite their presence in the moment of Dory voicing her initial concern, the other members of the ensemble, Portia Davenport (Meredith Hagner) and Eilliot Goss (John Early) brush off Dory's brunch topic by casually dismissing any possible remorse for anyone that they went to school with but didn't hang out with, commentating specifically they thought she was "awful". Dory ends up seeing Chantal as she is sitting in a Chinese restaurant and attempting her best to flee the country, only her slightly concerned boyfriend and barely caring friends hardly believe her.
Throughout the course of the first season, Dory takes every possible avenue to find any clue she can about where this missing girl went. She ends up harassing her family by saying that she personally knows she's alive, but doesn't know exactly where she could be, during a vigil. This upsets the family greatly as its not exactly helpful information at all. As Dory gets closer to this self absorbed mystery, she pushes her overly attached boyfriend gradually as Drew voices his concerns over him putting them all in increasingly unsafe situations (joining a cult, planning a double date with Chantal's mentally unwell abusive ex boyfriend, and more). While Dory makes a stereotypical string covered pinboard wall, Drew is naturally immensely concerned. While following this story obsessively, Dory attracts the eyes of a private investigator.
Keith Powell (Mark Duplass) is actually not a professional detective hired by the family to investigate Chantal's disappearance at all, but he lies to Dory that this is exactly what he's doing, to lower her natural guard of an older adult male following her around New York. Keith is actually following the case in an effort to make the reward money that the Witherbottom's have offered to whoever finds her, which both Dory and audience learn is happening in the climax of the finale of the season. Keith uses Dory both for easy help in the case and by taking advantage of her in this emotional state. Once her friends hear from Chantal's family, they understand that Keith "the detective" isn't know by them at all. With Dory's conflicting affair, she realizes how unsafe this situation has become for her personally, if only by fixating on this mysterious man. The gang together decides that Keith must be tied to Dory's fictionalization of the mystery, assuming he's part of the cult and was a secret ex of Chantal's. Once the gang find Chantal's whereabouts, Dory proves to have poorly handled her mislead of Keith. Keith appears at Chantal's current hiding place (in Montreal) While frightened, she tases Keith who approaches her with, albeit aggressive, misguided and hopeful teamwork, as well as a share of the profits for finding Chantal. The tase leads Keith to crack his skull on a marble counter-top and fall on the floor. Shocked and bleeding from the head, Keith attacks Dory, voicing his frustration from being hurt violently from the woman of his current affections. Reacting with little information, Drew protects Dory by finding a large trophy and completing the act of murdering Keith, unknowingly. Elliot and Drew quickly help Dory hide the body in the house while Portia returns from exploring the town and coincidentally finding Chantal.
Chantal feels inclined to share her story. Only, its not how Dory imagines it at all. It turns out, she was having an affair of her own, with a married man. Upon getting pregnant with this man, she insists that he must leave his wife and kids and marry her, to raise the child. This man leaves Chantal as he doesn't want to personally destroy his family over this. Chantal decides to react to this by running away from her entire life to escape her own problems, similar to how Dory treated the mystery. Dory learns of her naivety at her most vulnerable, after she helped murder an innocent man. Her awful situation is made entirely of her own conspiracies.
Search Party is clearly a show written about the average self-absorbed spoiled rich millennial.
Its about worrying about others problems so much to the point you are self-destructive. But, as an overthinker, I've always worried about any relation I could have with Dory's main struggle. Ruminating on thoughts that could help others in an unsafe situation but worrying to the point that I can't be confident I haven't just talked myself into being a Dory Sief. Naturally, these are equations where I should be the one making the call of safety, as it could only be me, but is the idea behind me being the sole person who can help giving myself a complex? In my last job, when I worked with kids, I always wanted to do my best, but there was the struggle of the burden of proof of the unhealthy environment, and it truly took a toll on me. I'd like to think I would never accidentally ruin a situation through self obligation like the main characters in Search Party. But the good news is that means I just have to be confident whenever I'm making the right call. Confidence helps.
Anyways, Search Party gets really wild, as every season is very different. It honestly goes off the rails in its final season, as Dory influences a group of the most popular influencers in America to accidentally cause a zombie apocalypse. There's also a direct parody of the Stephen King novel, It, which honestly adds way more abstraction to the story I'm not a fan of, despite it being an admittedly funny bit. Overall a show I still think about too often, though, if you couldn't tell.
if you enjoyed this piece at all, consider supporting me at ko-fi.com/eileenbrady! At the moment I'm unhoused and I can use all the help I can get :)
I used to have a simple, self-aware joke that I'd simply exhibit to show my love for the animated Disney film, "A Goofy Movie". I would simply say "I have a better relationship with 'A Goofy Movie' than I do with my own father". My personal connection with this joke meant I would often say it whenever the movie was a topic of discussion, which is frequent for the average twenty-something. Depending on how deep my connection was with my audience, depending on whether they were a close, dear friend or only a kind work acquaintance, the joke would have a mixed reaction. More often than not, the response would be a sad frown bundled with the classic "are you okay?" as a sign they did care about me but didn't fully grasp my self aware sense of humor yet.
This connection with "A Goofy Movie" (1995) had me immediately fall in love with the 2021 Sony Animated Pictures film "The Mitchells vs. The Machines" directed by Mike Rianda (Gravity Falls) and written by Mike Rianda and Jeff Rowe (Gravity Falls, also). The movie is essentially a modernized, more mature take on the basic conceit of "A Goofy Movie", directed by Kevin Lima (or Thomas Washington for my fellow Donald Glover fans out there). If you haven't seen the latter, it can be summarized with ease. Well, if you grew up on Disney Channel like I did, anyways. A father, Goofy has difficulties connecting with his teenage child, Maxwell Goof. Max Goof (Jason Marsden) wants to focus on his passion for music and his school crush, and finds his father's clingyness difficult to navigate. This becomes a core driving factor of the flick as Goofy (Bill Farmer) decides the only way he can connect with his son is by forcing him on a road trip to his personal favorite fishing spot, which inadvertently destroys Max's date with his crush from school, Roxanne (Kellie Martin). Over the course of the road trip, Goofy notices how Pete (Jim Cummings) essentially bullies his son, PJ (Rob Paulsen) into being a personal soldier that does everything he wants. He feels a clear disconnect with this idea, as the lack of freedom would keep Max from being himself, and comfortable being around his father.
Goofy spins this into inspiration by meeting Max halfway on the concept of the roadtrip, and giving him the position of "navigator" so that Max can choose every stop on the way to this preplanned destination, Lake Destiny in Idaho. Despite the growth between Max and Goofy over this new inspiration behind the roadtrip, Pete finds a simple way to throw a wrench in it, which leads to the climax of the picture.
On their last stop on this roadtrip, the Goof Troop runs into Pete and PJ again. Pete notices how much fun the Goofs are having and suggests he should take credit for their new enjoyment of the vacation. Goofy responds by explaining how he didn't feel comfortable with doing things Pete's way. This leads to an argument that ends on the note of Goofy saying "My son loves me" while Pete immediately responds with "hey!! My son RESPECTS me". In this mindset, Pete actually overhears a conversation between PJ and Max about how Max plans to navigate him and his father to his real desired destination, a concert with his favorite musician Powerline (in an effort to impress his crush, who was disappointed by the cancelation of their date). Pete immediately uses this information to snap at Goofy, and explain how the freedom gave Goofy a lack of control, meaning his way of doing things was the only Right Way. Back on the road, Goofy is noticeably upset with Max, despite Max's every attempt to connect with his father (using the same methods of classic roadtrip entertainment that Goofy has in the first act of the film).
The family is brought to a turn in the road, of which Goofy knows personally which way to go and trusts his son once again to make the right call of going to their planned destination, Lake Destiny. Confused by the situation, and stressed by Goofy's newfound passion fueled by concern, Max unconfidently sends them to the turn which goes to the Powerline concert. The climax of the movie features classic cartoon shenanigans of them losing their car down a canyon while arguing about their familial relationship. They personally realize how unfair to one another they are being, they hug and sing a song, and then they head to the Powerline concert.
Despite having more abstract ideas (an AI Robot apocalypse), "The Mitchells vs. The Machines" has quite a different analyzation of the familial struggle of a father/child relationship built on disconnection. Our main character here is Katie Mitchell (Abbi Jacobson), who we are introduced to by her being passionate about the members of her family she does have a connection with, her brother Aaron (voiced by director Mike Rianda) and her mother, Linda (Maya Rudolph), but also her love of making movies! Her major disconnect with her father, Mike (Danny McBride), is built upon the simplicity that he doesn't believe in her passion for art. We see him soon blame this disconnect on his family spending "too much time on their phones" while the film clearly shows us how the family is pretty connected despite their phones, just not to him, exactly.
Katie is ecstatic about leaving for college and making friends she can form deep connections with in an art oriented school. She plans on leaving by plane, and expresses her love through her family in a heartfelt goodbye through her methods, a silly video on the internet. Mike Mitchell initially feels put off by the heartfelt abstraction of Katie's feelings, and suggests that her career path could not work out. Katie jumps to defend herself before the video is finished, pointing out how these concerns can easily be read as her father not believing in her artistic ability. This conflict is concluded with the laptop playing the video being broken by the father accidentally throwing it against the wall in an effort of taking the laptop from his unwilling daughter in a short-sighted effort to show he DOES like the video. This broken laptop is an easy example for Katie to point to in her disconnect with her father, as the violent action made it more difficult to do her art, both functionally and emotionally.
This causes Linda to reason with her husband about the rift being caused in the family, with the justifiable evidence of the damage to her way of expression. This gives Mike a familiar idea.
Excited to move on from her messy family and connect with her fellow artists, Katie jumps with excitement as she exits the front door to her planned ride to the airport. Mike meets Katie face to face, explaining that they're actually going on a roadtrip as a family, his thinly veiled attempt to continue forcing a connection. Katie finds this difficult, as her father continues to struggle doing his best to find common ground. She does her best as her mother helps her see the events from a different perspective, and her brother is young enough to naturally find it upsetting when there is disruption in his family.
Soon, the family is met with an (incredibly unapologetic [positive]) AI Robot apocalypse, that is merely started because the tech dork running PAL Labs, Mark Bowman (Eric Andre), easily tosses his Pal (Olivia Colman) Phone away. Pal happily starts this conflict to teach humans a lesson about how phones can help the average person connect, rather than the other way around. She, of course, wants to teach this lesson by destroying the human race. The film is masterfully done in tackling this message, as the families reaction to this conflict leads to this demise. Mike, naturally, is happy to have an excuse to destroy the families' technology under the excuse of "safety from getting tracked by robots". Katie continues to find difficulty with her father as she sees this joy as a misdirection of their issues. Mike takes the opportunity to lead the charge with poor solutions to the films conflict, eating their family dog and living in a bunker. Katie, then is forced to go farther than the halfway point in her mother's plan and personally lead the charge. She masks to make her father feel better about their adventure, and give him the confidence in helping the family save the day. Katie's brother Aaron excitedly attempts to understand this newfound connection, but Katie never masks around Aaron, and explains to him that she is just telling their father what he needs to hear to continue attempting to stop Pal.
The roadtrip continues and the family all (mostly) happily connect now that Katie and Mike are getting along. They've simply never been a better team. Until Pal finds their specific, core conflict, and points out how it furthers her opinion of humans being rude, messy, and imperfect. Pal uses the security cam footage of Katie and Aaron's conversation while the family is imminent from failing her plans. It breaks Mike's heart and shocks him to the point that he crashes their stolen PAL transport to the core PAL Labs server. The Mitchell parents are soon captured, causing their kids to save the day. Only, Aaron is sad about the fact that this moment of pure honesty did cause Pal to win in that moment. The siblings watch home videos on Katie's hand me down Handycam (Sony movies are literally forced to have brand synergy lol). While watching these home videos, Katie recognizes that her father stopped being passionate about his art (the dad-coded hobby of wood working) once he focused on his family. This new realization inspires Katie to save her parents, and stop Pal, with Aaron and their family dogs help.
What is incredibly important to me, is where Mike is in this moment. While he's trapped in a cell, conveniently next to Mark, the lead tech fella behind PAL Labs, he notices the popularity and virality of his daughters work. Most importantly, he connects with it. He recognizes how he was not supporting of his daughter's creative passion. Thanks to a chekhov's gun, the parents get out and attempt to help save the day, with the family.
A Goofy Movie is wonderful, don't get me wrong. But the core conflict is very, well, childish. The main mistake Goofy makes is his clingyness to his son, which I think is understandable considering he's a single father raising a teenager. You can't exact connect with the film beyond "well obviously Pete is emotionally abusive and Goofy is a good dad." The Mitchells vs. The Machines takes that concept and finds a deeper meaning, connecting with your family.
In case its not apparent, I have a better relationship with The Mitchells vs. The Machines than I have with my father.
If you enjoyed this piece, please consider supporting me at Ko-fi.com/EileenBrady. I'm currently unhoused and it would really help a lot!
This video wasn't supposed to be so sad, when I was planning it earlier in the week. But at the same time, it wasnt so joyous and happy. I hope its clear that, while this is the beginning of my new venture, my brand is just gonna be being a dorky funny video game/movie/tv guy on the internet like so many of those people that have inspired me. 🫶
Abuse is a cathartic thing to realize you're facing after 28 years of your, albeit sometimes difficult, generally fulfilling life. I mean, and for the record this is all theoretical, you may have some sort of moral feeling obligation to the person that does the abuse to you. The abuser may have other enablers that cause the abuse to continue despite the fact that the average adult should learn from their actions and move on and grow. These enablers may do an improvisation riff with your abuser on how overweight you are to subtly attempt to get you to lose weight. Your abuser might randomly say you're one of their "weird looking kids" when you're out in public and they're talking to their friends. Your abuser could teach you the very concept of "walking on eggshells" to explain how you're being sensitive for hearing you drew something 'shitty' when you were 12 after you'd already decided you were proud of it. This concept of sensitivity was taught young enough by the abuser, who at one point could have been misconstrued as a prominent figure due to the aspect of familial unconditional love. You being this sensitive to criticism from loved ones at a young age and then being taught to avoid it might create difficulties in friendships with people that actually have real love in their heart for you. This one difficulty might give you attachment issues. Attachment issues you fixate on forever instead of providing yourself with self worth. Your abuser could not get you help with your neurodovergency at a young age besides showing signs, like struggling to get through anyday without reinforcement. Your abuser could still have a lack of responsibility for helping you with your mental health struggles due to this difficulty in understanding your own mind. Your attachment issues could cause you to continue feel sensitive on your own. Which in turn enables your abuser. You may also continue enabling your abuser by teaching them that there are no errors of their ways (ie: a "second chance"). A second chance could have been given seven too many times due to the unconditional love for the abuser in your heart. Your abuser could explain your sensitivity is how this means you're a deeply flawed individual and they'll get you therapeutic help that was the first time you'd ever felt heard in your life. The therapy sessions involving your abuser may, however, be repressed. If only to remind you that reinforcement of the fact that therapy is often supposed to be pleasant, and not a mediated argument where your abuser believes they have the right to scream at you when they are upset. Your abuser may blame you for them not currently being in therapy, as you're not the one helping them enough, now that you've grown up. You may go to therapy enough to recognize your personal struggles, and yet your abuser suggests that he never likes their therapists because they always have a disagreement with them. Your abuser may often have disagreements with these therapists after you personally tell these professionals about the struggles in the relationship with your abuser.
Your abuser could have a tendency to play the victim card despite them only owning a bootleg. Your abuser could have gotten these bootlegs from their enabler.
This enabler could often take it personally and blame others for healthy actions. Such as cutting her and the abuser out of her life. The enabler may be immensely upset at the idea of you standing up to defend this possible other person.
Your abuser might be the reason your mother feels safe several states away despite having all the kindness and love in her heart for her less than perfect but still easily lovable children.
Your abuser could not notice how often you've created a mask to walk on eggshells around them. The more confident you get, you realize that at the core fiber of your being you were never sensitive, you were hurt deeply by the abuser, and scared. The power of the metaphoric irony might make your personal creative writing essay have a great title.
Your abuser could say "you're so confused" when you're the most confident you've ever been in your life. Your abuser could shake their head and make a stupid face when you quit your job that was hurting you despite every colleague respecting you as an individual enough to help you figure out what you need for life to make sense. Your abuser might often say you don't understand how the world works as they, naturally, are older than you.
Despite your time spent in behavioral therapy, and your unconditional love for the abuser due to preconceived notions, your abuser may not have the ability to listen when they are being told objective facts.
Your abuser could find your new confidence confusing and take it personally, as they've done everything they can in their power to put you down. Your abuser could have started treating you even worse recently, now that he often compares you to your mother. The abuser could insist over and over that it's you who are the childish one in their equation they made poorly in their head, as they never even went to college. The abuser could take personal offense to your stance on generative AI despite the fact that its natural to be dismissive of it as an aspiring writer. The abuser could take your passionate defense of why they shouldn't use AI as you personally "having an active imagination" and "knowing very little about the real world".
Your abuser could pretend to be concerned about your lungs due to your smoking habits, despite being a core influence on that coping skill. Your abuser could possibly put you in a chokehold for having a constructive, witty comment about his unfairness, after you've finally realized that this has been a fool's errand for three decades. Your abuser could be simple minded enough to fail to see the irony.
Again, this is all merely theoretical. I have an active imagination, after all.
If you enjoyed this piece, please consider supporting me at ko-fi.com/eileenbrady. I'm currently unhoused and it would help me out a lot.
