2nd stanzas

They send a message to the capitol by scoring twelves
The other competitors will surely want to put their heads on shelves
Katniss does a fiery twirl on stage
The mockingjay gets the audience to engage

The tributes rise and hold hands as the trumpet plays
It’s the first sign of unity since the dark days
Cinna goes to wish Katniss good luck
Only to be beaten like a schmuck

The tributes rise to the arena
The Cornucopia stands out in the water like a marina
Katniss finds an ally in Finnick
They grab their weapons and join the bloodshed gimmick

Peeta nearly dies from running into a force field
Katniss climbs a tree where the circular shape of the arena is revealed
Their need for water ends
When a spire descends

A poisonous fog mysteriously appears
Mags, no longer able to go on, runs into the fog and disappears
The monkey mutts attack from trees
The woman from district 6 stops the attack and falls to her knees




Tick tok, tick tok, tick tok is all Wiress can say
They figure the arena to be a clock, thats one mystery done away
The four careers strike
Wiress and two of them take a “hike”

The sand takes a spin
Finnick and Katniss go to the jungle and hear familiar screams from within
Beetee thinks of a brilliant idea
Katniss blows up the arena turning the force field into a tortilla

Katniss awakes with a killer intent
The only emotions she feels are of anger and repent
The only thing they can do is get her sedated
Peeta is gone and the others feel her hatred

Visiting 12, she relives the past
She knows she’s responsible for the bombs blast
Grabbing her things, she can’t forget the cat
The rose in her dresser that she can only look at

Ceaser and Peeta meet again
His words are full of pain
He pleads the rebels to cease fire
Theres no way they can please his desire

Change in Point of View and Fractured Timeline

Changing the point of view and using the technique of fractured timeline can greatly affect a piece of writing. When telling Fitcher’s Bird originally, it was obvious from the beginning of the fairytale that the sorcerer was evil. When my group used the fracturing timeline technique, we started at the end where the youngest daughter disguises herself as a bird, and when Fitcher returns, she locks Fitcher and the wedding guests in the house and sets it on fire. The technique makes it look like the daughter is evil, and it also raises questions, for example why is she disguised as a bird?, and why did she set the house with all the people on fire?. With the change from third person to first person, the audience can get a better feeling about who the character really is and how he/she act. Fracturing time hooks the audience by raising a daunting question and change of point of view lets the audience hear the story through the characters view.

Lessons learnes from Fitcher's Bird

Unlike, the Disney Fairy tales little children watch every day, Fitcher’s Bird is a much more violent adaptation of a children’s fantasy. The themes and lessons though, are still the same. Some common examples are looks can be deceiving and don’t trust strangers. The sorcerer dressed as a poor beggar who needed food, but in reality he was a cruel and evil and dismembered his victims if they didn’t obey his rules. A complex lesson would be protecting life. The egg, that Fitcher says to protect, represents life. If the egg is ruined then what’s inside cannot hatch and it will die. The younger sister protects her egg, and she survives and is ultimately able to revive her sisters and kill the sorcerer. Even with the violence, Fitcher’s Bird still has the same themes and lessons learned from the earlier fairy tales that appear on the Disney channel.

stanzas

Oh, how things have changed
Her life has been disarranged
No more hunting or visits to the hob
Gale and past memories make her heart throb

President Snow makes a threat
Katniss has to accept and shudders with cold sweat
When will this love game end
For Katniss hates to pretend

The victors move by train to district eleven
Compared to district twelve it looks like heaven
There on the stage are the families of the fallen
Rue and Thresh will never be forgotten

The visits through the districts go on and on
To stare upon all the faces takes more than just brawn
Into the Capitol the victors arrive
With marriage in the air, will Katniss and Gale ever survive

Head Gamekeeper Plutarch shows a watch
The Mockingjay is the main topic of talk
District eight has started to rebel
Katniss and Gale plan to escape before the Quarter Quell

A new Peacekeeper has been sent
Gale would have died if it weren’t for Katniss’ ascent
Days have grown weary
As the relationship with the Capitol gets eerie

The border fence buzzes to life
Bonnie and Twill give news that stabs like a knife
Could District thirteen really have survived
The news on the television seems that they may have been revived

The Quarter Quell card was read
Katniss could only drink herself to bed
The training began
And the victors started an elite like gameplan

The reaping repeats
Katniss and Peeta study film to learn of the other victors’ deceits
They sit and watch the Quarter Quell
As they learned that Haymitch cheated the games as well

The opening ceremonies in the capital start
The tributes dress and climb in their chariots ready to depart
Strategy is discussed at dinner
After training the field of allies grows thinner

dark fantasy assessment

Dark Fantasy is a genre that focuses on themes such as horror, fear, impending death, the unknown, etc…. “Duel”, by Richard Matheson, provides the themes through a modern day encounter between a regular person and a maniacal truck driver. “The Raft”, by Stephen King, uses the themes as an eerie lake monster devours a group of college students. “Nightcrawlers”, by Robert McCammon, incorporates the themes by giving a Vietnam vet the ability to make his nightmares come alive. All three stories include the main aspects of the dark fantasy genre, but in my opinion, Nightcrawlers incorporates them the best.
Dark fantasy doesn’t always have to include fantastical elements, like vampires and creepy creatures; sometimes it’s just a killer truck driver. In Duel Mann is trying to get to San Francisco, but on his way he encounters a truck. This truck though doesn’t like being passed though, and so when Mann does all hell breaks loose. The driver constantly follows, instills the fear of death in, and tries to kill Mann. The truck driver even went as far as waving him on when a car was in the other lane. “The car came under his control again. Mann was sucking breath in through his mouth. His heart was pounding almost painfully. My God! He thought. He wanted me to hit that car head on” (161 McCammon). The fear of dying is strong in this story, and Mann knows he may not live. Duel uses a modern example of a deadly car chase to show the fear of dying in Mann.
Scary and killer creatures are often used in dark fantasy to express fear, death, and the unknown. In The Raft the creature is some sort of compact liquid type of creature that sucks its victims up. The creature uses a trick that entrances the victims to looking into the spirals it creates before sucking them up to their doom. The four students don’t know what this creature is, thus the unknown part. The fear wasn’t that high until after Rachel was gruesomely murdered by the creature. The students knew they were going to die, it was inevitable. The story used most of the themes of dark fantasy to effectively show the fear, gruesome deaths, and unknowing.
Nightcrawlers is a great example of dark fantasy because not only does it involve fear of death, but also the magical ability to make nightmares come alive. Price had been through a lot while in Vietnam. Having to step on dying comrades for his use of escape has haunted him all of his life. Now whenever he sleeps, his dark memories come alive as the “Nightcrawlers” come to take him back. The ability to transform dreams is not normal and especially scary since they won’t go away until he dies or the Nightcrawlers get their revenge. When Price is on the floor unconscious, his comrades come out of the woods and open fire on the diner. Bob along with the others present fear for their life as bullets fly everywhere and destroy everything in the diner. The only way they can disappear is if Price wakes up or he dies. In the end, the Nightcrawlers get their revenge by killing Price (this also makes them disappear). His soul was then able to rest, as he joined his comrades. Nightcrawlers is the best example of dark fantasy because it combines both dark and fantasy elements.
All the stories bring something to the table, but it is Nightcrawlers that takes the cake in most effective showing dark fantasy. The other two provide either too few of the elements or only use themes from one of the two areas of dark fantasy. Nightcrawlers showed the dark side with the fear of death and the unknown. With the fantasy side the example is the ability to make dream come alive. The dark fantasy genre is all about death, fear, and the unknown, and out of the three stories Nightcrawlers is the most effective example the genre.

Narration, dialogue, and Characterization

Serena and her shopping cart screeched to a stop in front of aisle 15. The sign read Canned Foods. She scanned the shelves, frantically, looking for the familiar box that smells of cheesy delight. It’s the day of Thanksgiving and trying to find mashed potatoes at the time was like trying to find the leprechaun at the end of the rainbow. She saw it, mid way through the aisle, hiding behind the peas and carrots, there was only one box left. At the other end of the aisle Serena spotted another woman, whose face looked vaguely similar to a friend of the past, who too, seemed to have her eyes on the box of Hungry Jack Easy Mashed Potatoes, which she desperately needed. Serena, still in her jogging suit from her earlier run, made a dash for the potatoes. What both ladies didn’t notice was another woman had entered the aisle, and was casually strolling toward the last box of potatoes. Just as Serena was about grab the box this other lady snagged them, and ran off to the next aisle. Both ladies stopped and stared in disbelief, their Thanksgiving feast was now ruined. They made eye contact.


“Cree? Cree, is that you?” Serena asked curiously.
“Oh, hey Serena. It’s been a while.” Cree said with a smile as she forgot about having another mashed potato-less Thanksgiving.
“It’s been two or three years at least. I think the last time we talked was The Washburns’ Christmas party, and they’ve been divorced for two years by now.” Serena replied, trying to forget that horrible memory from that party oh, so long ago, where she had gotten so drunk that she ran right into the Christmas tree and burned all of the Washburn children’s gifts.
“You’re probably right, but I doubt it was a few years ago. You look like you haven’t aged a day.” Cree stated sullenly, as she knew that her own looks have been receding ever so slowly.
“Stop it. You don’t look too bad yourself.” Serena said. She could tell by Cree’s facial expression that the subject needed to be changed, so Serena quickly asked, “How are the kids?”
Relieved that the subject was changed, she replied “They’re doing very well. Sonny is playing soccer, and Faith is in high school now.”

As the two ladies talked, Meredith (one of Serena’s daughters) approached them and complained how she wanted her mother to hurry up, so they could hit up Macy’s before the Thanksgiving Morning Sale ended at 11:00. Serena scolded her and told her that Thanksgiving dinner is more important than some clothes. She then gave her a twenty dollar bill and shooed her off to the candy aisle.

Serena sighed and looked back to Cree, and said “Adolescence is so difficult when it comes to raising girls. Did you have any trouble when it came to raising Faith? Our little girls are growing up so fast, it seemed just yesterday that they were only babies.”
A look of relief flashed across Cree’s face, she thought maybe she wasn’t the only one with that problem. “I agree. I know what you mean. Even though Faith didn’t cause trouble growing up, she doesn’t seem to be getting along with any of her old friends.”
Serena with a concerned look on her face said, “Both of us know high school is a tough place, with all the problems students go through, especially for young girls. Just think back to our old high school days and all the problems we faced. But she’ll come around. She has your confidence.
Things are different now Cree thought to herself. The bad memories of high school are all behind her now. She never liked to think of those days when she would come home from school high, and getting scolded by her parents for making wrong choices and hanging out with the wrong crowd. Cree tried to force a smile as she replied, “You’re too kind. Thank you. How are William and the kids?”
Serena, who had been dreading the time that the question would come up, calmly answered “William has been busy, you know, being a doctor and all. The kids are doing fine. We just returned home from our trip from France.”
Cree, though very jealous at the time, did not show it. She had always wanted to go to Paris, but could never afford it. So she tried to sound happy, and started to pry as much information out of Serena as she could. “No way! Ted and I have always wanted to go there, but we’ve never had the money.”
Reluctant that her family matters weren’t brought up any further, Serena indulged on her trip. “You two should totally go, Meredith and Kristin had a blast and made a bunch of new friends. If you ever wanted to get away, maybe for a long vacation, I’d be happy to look after the kids.
Cree, taken back by what Serena had just offered, thought back to Sonny and Faith. “I don’t know, I think the kids, especially Faith, would like France. They don’t really like long tips though. Faith went to a camp in Vermont last summer, and really enjoyed it and made lots of friends.”
Serena, who was still ranting on about everything great about Paris stated, “I’m sure they would. France is the city of love and all.
With a curious look Cree asked, “What places did you guys visit?”
“Well obviously the Eiffel Tower, The Catacombs, and the Louvre. But we also visited little shops and….”
“Mom I think we should really go, it’s 9:30.” Meredith had suddenly appeared and interrupted Serena.

Serena saw that Meredith was holding a boatload of candy in her hands. She must’ve spent the whole twenty dollars. Not wanting to cause a ruckus in the store, the girls quickly made their goodbyes and exchanged numbers, and left the store.