Artemis Crescent

Tuesday, 24 March 2026

100 Nights of Hero (2025) post

I hadn't heard of this film until a couple months ago, and the second I did I thought, "WTF?! There's a film adaptation of my favourite graphic novel of all time?! How did I not hear of this until now?! What cosmic force is trolling me?!" Worse, there was no way for me to see it. It's an indie film with LBGTQ+ themes, so of course it didn't receive a wide mainstream release. Fucking smallminded, cowardly conservatives.

It's criminal how so few people have heard of 100 Nights of Hero, and are not spreading the word, for it is important that it attract as much attention as possible.

But now I've bought a Blu-ray of it from eBay (imported from China), and I have finally seen it.

Yes, it is messy. But I liked it. I understand why they had to change some things, since graphic novels are not the same as the medium of film. It is still a fairy tale/storytelling/feminism/anti-dogma/moon/LBGTQ themed story put on celluloid. All the actors are very good. Nicholas Galitzine is ridiculously excellent at playing arseholes (with a heart of gold...?), yet he is so charming and smoldery that I like him in every role he's done (I refuse to watch Purple Hearts, though, and I need to stop getting him confused with Nick Robinson).

Overall, 100 Nights of Hero is a whimsical and cute little movie. It is definitely unique, and made by an almost-all female team of filmmakers. Anything to support LBGTQ+ films, as well.

I should watch it again. And again.

But you need to read the original graphic novel by Isabel Greenberg. Therein lies so much more substance, and feminist fairy tales told by Hero. I will never forget the day I stumbled across it in my local library in 2017, and going back again and again to read it there, before I bought my own copy. It's a truly magical and enriching experience.

Read my review of One Hundred Nights of Hero here.

I got back from surgery yesterday. I don't want to go into details at the moment, but it was a 100% success, and I feel I'm getting better, and hopefully things will turn out well and okay. 💖💖💖💗💗💗💝💝💝🩷🩷🩷💜💜💜💕💕💕💞💞💞🥰🥰🥰

Wednesday, 18 March 2026

Scribble #153

Lapis, Lepus, Lupin, Lupine

Lilies, snowdrops, dewdrops

Roses, rabbits, off they hop.

There is snow everywhere, on the ground and in the trees

I know there is so much more to the white than anyone sees

I crouch by the borrow, covered in cold, wet leaves

The air is freezing my lungs, twigs are digging into my knees.

But I kneel, paying my respects to the earth

My lynx's fur by my side as warm as a hearth

Her presence is a flame in my heart

Without her it is snuffed out, we cannot live apart

As with my horse, who stands respectfully behind me

Grazing the snowmelt grass, reminding us we are all free.

To go where we want

When we want

To defy Mother Nature

And her nurture.

Nothing is going to make me lose my focus

I bow my head, and blow hot, white breath on the crocus.

Rub hands, breathe in: sapphire

Open hands, breathe out: saffron

In: sapphire

Out: saffron

I get up, brush the leaves off my knees, and ride

Off through the woods, my lynx running by my side

My lungs are burning with cold, then warmth

Through snapping tree branches, I am not torn.

Is that more rabbits hopping and racing?

My horse goes all clopping, and they pursue in chasing.

We are living and fighting in Mother Nature's domain

Hark! We now fly across the snowy plain.

I and my animals are free as can be

Though I am not above a cup of tea.

A cup of fresh leaves

While sitting under the eaves

Drinking hot water, while surrounded by ice

Mother Nature's daughter, savouring a price.

Monday, 16 March 2026

Graphic Novel Review - 'Luna Express' by Campbell Whyte, Bre Manning (Assistant Colourist)

It's "magical girls" versus late stage capitalism, gentrification, monarchism, and worldwide systematic corruption, classism, cronyism, colonialism, and imperialism.

It's "magical girls" versus fascism.

It's "magical girls" as iconoclasts, fighting the status quo for survival.

All in the style of Mad magazine.

It definitely takes inspiration from anime and manga, as well, and not just 'Sailor Moon': 'Akira' and the like are a much stronger influence. As is 'Watchmen'.

It took me a while to get into it, and not be confused as to who was who and what and where and why, but once I got it, I got it.

'Luna Express' is the modern feminist comic mistresspiece of 2026. To say it is relevant to our current darkest timeline is an understatement. It is fucking vital. A punch-up. A wakeup call.

Plus it has magical girls and a celestial astronomy theme à la 'Sailor Moon' (the crescent moon reoccurs in the art, which is an astral extra for me), and a cute, tasty bakery goods motif.

Set in Australia, Perth, 'Luna Express' stars "magical girls" or "celestials" - young people who end up fighting political corruption everywhere (since everything is political) - capitalists, industrialists, white supremacists, and billionaires who want to take over the world just because they can. These magical, nocturnal blooming activists and rebels are sort-of reluctant heroes, but they have to try, and they want to prove themselves anyway. They are:

Celeste, a Black (or indigenous, her race is deliberately left ambiguous), queer, family bakery delivery girl, who is justifiably hot-tempered and snarky, and who under the starlight possesses super strength, speed and agility, plus she can manipulate gravity; Lucy, a white, queer, fat, bespectacled, heavily tattooed former foster child, who's very sensitive and high energy, has a very bad dating history, and who possesses the ability to transport anywhere via shadows, or "bloop"; Alex, the only male celestial child of the group, who is white, a femme boy, a graffiti artist, a skateboarder, and the mayor's kid, so no wonder he's depressed, and he can bring his art to life; and there's Lorelai, a former friend (and lover to Celeste) turned world famous K-pop star - initially overworked, and heavily coerced, controlled, abused, and brainwashed - who can make any of her wishes come true...as long as they're "some weird alien tech".

Celeste, Lucy and Lorelai tried to be a band at one point, and maybe they will be again...

None of these moonlit millennials will be made small. They will not be silenced. They will refuse to let themselves be threatened, abused and crushed by those on top of the privileged capitalism food chain/hierarchy...

'Luna Express' - how stellar! It's wild, weird, stellar punk and pop! It's like the safest drug trip! With likeable, down-to-earth, yet cosmic and queer heroes, and important, topical themes.

Not since 'A Magical Girl Retires' has a Magical GirlTM story been more subversive (there aren't even any transformation sequences, nor any outer transformations in the traditional sense) and relevant. It is also like 'Flavor Girls' and 'magnifiqueNOIR'.

Magical girls can change the world.

'My idiot friends are still idiots.' [] 'But we're idiots together.' [] 'Which is a whole lot better than being idiots alone.'

CELESTE SAYS:

'So-called Australia was built on the back of colonial violence that was inflicted without mercy to all who lived under it.' [] 'Erasing the truth of this history makes everyday living easier for some.' [] 'But it traps us in a collective land of make-believe, expected to unsee the reality in front of us.'

'The media you consume is ALWAYS political.' [] 'Those in charge of media empires have the ability to shape the political reality of entire populations.' [] 'They actively work to control our sense of what is "normal" and what is "other".' [] 'And then use their media platforms to prop up political actors who are then in debt to them.' [] 'Question everything. Accept nothing.'

'If you cut into the present, the past leaks out.' [] 'Even the slightest scratch reveals what lies under the surface.' [] 'And inside each of us resides the entire history of the cosmos.' [] 'When you lie on the grass at night, looking up at the stars, you can feel it churning inside you.' [] 'All the paperwork and bills and bad news stories and things do a pretty good job of distracting us from it though.'

'It's ok to relax.' [] 'It's important to rest.' [] 'It's necessary to sleep.' [] 'It's essential to dream.'

Recommended.

Final Score: 3.5/5 (three magical, celestial full moons, one halfmoon, and two crescent moons, and all the stars in the night sky)

Saturday, 14 March 2026

Forthwrite Women's Festival of Writing 2026 - My Showcase Piece

Learn from Great Women, Real and Fictional

Fear an Independent Woman - a haiku

Whore. Witch.

They call me names,

They sentence me to death.

They wanted to

For a long time before,

As I kept to myself.

I'm different.

Slut. Witch.

Alice Oseman - Rainbow Haikus

Alice Oseman's books

and comics I so relate,

They give love and hope.

Her works are sunshine,

Even through rain and thunder

There is a rainbow.

Always a rainbow

And it shines on everyone,

All flags included.

Representation

Inclusion and love and help,

That's Rainbow Alice.

A couple more haikus

Orchid Ness has phoned

She is never without mates

She is close with none.

Nisa No-nonsense

That is what she calls herself

In her noble voice.

Scoup!

My mother always schooled and scolded me about my use of language, and that I should never swear. So I'll say that I was too irate to scoup across the ballroom that fine afternoon. My dress was stiff and itchy - why did I need to wear the monstrous thing at rehearsals? - and the elderberry in my hair making me smell nice and juicy, barely covering up my sweat, was all that was keeping me from storming off, really swearing my head off.

So I thought to just tell mother that I had a fever - partly true thanks to the dress - and like the most honest party guest in the world, I voiced my ailment - also known as an innuendo for boredom - to my dance instructor, and did a leaver, my head not off but held high, all poised. With my gloved hands I pushed the heavy doors open and swanned out, and then pulled the elderberry out of my hair and ate it.

How's that for ladylike?

And who the fuck decided that should be one word?

I Love Being a Woman, No Matter How Much the World Doesn't Want Me To

Women are magic. Women are strong. Women are resilient. Women can survive anything.

Absolutely anything.

Women can know anything. Women can do whatever they want.

No one can survive anything without women.

We need each other. You need us.

You need us more than we need you. Deal with it.

We all - all genders - need each other - need to respect and love each other, to learn from each other, with no judgement and hate - to survive.

The more we learn from each others' differences, the more we realise that we are all, in fact, the same. The more we love each other, the more we love ourselves in the process.

Difference is good. Difference is a gateway to enlightenment and true, fulfilling happiness.

Empathy is realising that everybody is different, and it’s one of the keys to happiness. Difference is natural, it is what it is; it opens your mind and heart and makes you consider what it means to be human and alive in the world.

Difference is a path to freedom. Difference is love.

As usual, no one's existence should be up for BS, arbitrary political debate. And no one deserves violence and erasure. No one - and no history - deserves erasure and banning.

Listen to everyone and everything around you.

Listen to your brain and your heart. Do what's right.

Let empathy in. Learn that every woman, every gender, deserves love.

Sunday, 8 March 2026

Happy International Women's Day 2026

International Women's Day

Women should run the world.

End division.

End authoritarianism.

End war.

Be kind, caring and compassionate.

Friday, 6 March 2026

Graphic Novel Review - 'Absolute Wonder Woman Vol. 2: As My Mothers Made Me' by Kelly Thompson (Writer), Hayden Sherman (Artist), Matías Bergara (Artist), Jordie Bellaire (Colourist), Becca Carey (Letterer)

I loved 'Absolute Wonder Woman Vol. 1: The Last Amazon' that much to want to pick up the sequel less than a year later.

It is as full of fantastic, breathtakingly gorgeous artwork, and brutality, blood, and well written drama, as the first volume. It continues to be a gut-puncher of a character arc for, and study of, this unique take on Wonder Woman - a witch, and a lost warrior princess, on a quest find her gods-forbidden Amazon origins, and her Amazon sisters. And herself.

Saving man's mortal world unflinchingly in the process, she is constantly moving between worlds, not knowing which one she truly belongs. Yet no matter how much tragedy, horror and evil - manmade and god-spawned - seeps through and blights her journey, and she desperately tries to fight it all off, Diana remains kind, benevolent, compassionate, and merciful; as a writer who knows and respects her character should let her be.

Now more than ever. In a man's world that is woefully, shamefully, depressingly unbalanced in favour of evil over good.

No matter what is obfuscated from her, and how many times she will have to face her deepest, darkest fears - in the form of monsters both literal and emblematic - Diana, champion and hope of the Greek goddesses, will never give up. She will sacrifice anything for others, including herself...

I personally don't find 'Absolute Wonder Woman Vol. 2: As My Mothers Made Me' to be as great as the issues of its predecessor, mainly because it is still an incomplete story (it feels very much like middle book syndrome), and I don't quite understand the volume's subtitle, as neither of Diana's mothers, Circe and Hippolyta (wow wouldn't they make an iconic pair of two gay mums bringing up Wonder Woman?), appear much, and they don't make that effective an impact in this chapter of the Amazon princess/goddess's life (as an adult, anyway, and not in the flashbacks to her childhood). But in a sense, they do. Subtly. I won't reveal more due to spoilers, but I'll say that the witch of the Wild Isle seems to be doing very well on her own, without either mummy. She's busy finding her exiled and trapped Amazon sisters at the moment...

Once again, Steve Trevor is the only human male in the whole story, and he is staunchly not Diana's love interest. Brilliant.

In conclusion, continue to read 'Absolute Wonder Woman', and continue to love this variant version of the world's most famous superheroine. It is darkness - and dark, ethereal beauty and mystery - with heart.

Modern, mid-2020s DC might win me over yet.

For my review of: 'Absolute Wonder Woman Vol. 1: The Last Amazon'.

Final Score: 4/5