davetheanalyzer

As promised, here what had been my story interest this past year. Though I had many up till this point, I'll focus on my most recent obsessions: Lonelygirl15 and its spinoff, Katemodern.

For those who don't know, Lonelygirl15 is a character blog web series that, at first, disguised itself as a genuine blog. The fictional's blogger's real name was Bree Avery, a perky homeschooled girl with a love for learning. She is friends with Daniel, a quiet boy who was her classmate during her brief tenure in public school. At first, the series simply focused on their everyday lives until the case of Bree's religion was brought up.

Bree and her family are a part of called the Hymn of One, a cult about listening to one's "eternal song" and other suspiciously vague practices. Conflict arises between the two when Bree was chosen for a ceremony and Daniel investigated the matter. He witnessed a fake ceremony set up to draw him into the open and later broke into Bree's helper Lucy's apartment to discover photos of him on her computer. This led to Bree questioning her religion and deciding to resign from the ceremony. After this led to her parents being taken, Bree and Daniel flee.

After that, a lengthy adventure followed, where the pair had to learn about what was going on while avoiding being caught. They were soon joined by Jonas, an orphan rich kid, and, on their journeys, eventually learn the true purpose of the Hymn of One: It was a front for the Order, a large and complex organization whose sole purpose was apparently to take the blood of Trait Positive girls at the expense of their lives and give it to the Elders so they could live longer. Learning that, the growing cast tries to figure out a way to stop them.

After hearing about this series for so long, I decided to give it a watch, and found it enjoyable. Its TV Tropes entry says its greatest strength was its character development and I agree. I was quite interesting to see how the circumstances affected their personalities and what type of people they were by the time they left or were killed off. At the moment, it has spun off into Lonelygirl15: The Resistance, with only Jonas and Sarah left as main characters and a pair of new characters to share the spotlight. The season finale is on the twelfth and I'm anticipating what's going to happen then.

Now let's turn our attention to London, where the spinoff series Katemodern took place. Centuring around Kate, an art universities student in London, it followed how night terrors and a visit to a specialist eventually led to her waking up with no memory of the day of that appointment. Meanwhile, Tariq, Kate's boyfriend and his friend Gavin set up their business through a loan from a sinister loanshark. When Steve, an Hymn of One member obliviously following orders, approaches Kate and lied that he also losed memories, the events that follow lead to the discovery of the Order. Things really take a turn when Michelle Clore, an artist Kate admirers, was revealed to be an Elder.

The characters of this series weren't as keen with fighting the order like their American counterparts and try to live normal lives when things get more complicated. I also enjoyed this series, to an extent and the Les Yay chemistry between Kate and her Austrailian roommate, Charlie. The series had concluded now, but who knows, the cast might return in Lonelygirl15: The Resistance.

Next time, I'll talk about my own stories I'm working on. Until then, farewell!