Look at this Spec! Spec! Spectranet right there giving what I call a Yoruba Demon eye. ACTOR!!

Thou shall not blur the Spectranet!

One of the best and worst things about Lagos, is that it's so small that it's almost impossible to go a year without seeing anyone be they friends, enemies, or the  the unfortunate people that lurk somewhere in the middle. The last time I saw Adeolu Adefarasin, the new guy on the hugely successful Skinny Girl in Transit (60,000 youtube views per episode on average) was at Starmix' 25th. He was largely the same way, he was when I met him. The only difference was that he'd added.

When Nigerians say you've added it almost always means that you've gained weight, and while it's true that the dear chap has now got something that's closer to dad bod than lad bod, he's added much more than that. For one, he's not a student anymore, and for two, he's done a good job of racking up some professional experience.

Back in the day and by back in the day I mean a little over a year ago, I watched this show called Skinny Girl in Transit. At first I thought I liked it. It was hilarious. It seemed like one of the most realistic depictions of adulting in the Nigerian media space. Our parents are almost uniformly insane and bipolar, and it's surprising that more people aren't turning it to comedic gold. Skinny Girl in Transit does this very well, but after five episodes of the same old stuff, I was tired. When you see the gag coming from a kilometre away you can't laugh when it arrives. The show I liked slowly but surely became the show that wasn't worth watching.

All of that changed the moment Adeolu said, "Oh! I'm in the new season of Skinny Girl in Transit." I don't know about you, but I like to support my acquaintances and friends. If you're in something, I'll give it a blog. If not that you'll get a retweet, and failing that I'll give you a shout out. Creative people in Lagos work too hard to go unacknowledged. The moment he said it my intestines re-arranged themselves. They said, "We the suffer-head intestines of Afam who only knows how to eat rubbish declare that from this day till Adeolu Adefarasin is not in Skinny Girl in Transit, this body will watch the show." I attempted to rebel, but they stopped me dead. I didn't shit for three days. To understand what this means to me I'll have to tell you a little bit about my family.

My father, the dearest, the most troublesome, Papa Afam lives his life guided by a solitary principle. He believes that a man who does not shit once a day is unwell, and a man who does not shit for three days is on his death bed. He doesn't care about vomit or fevers or diarrhea but the moment you inform him that you're experiencing system back log prepare for a week in the hospital.

Lesson learned, I watched it the first episode of season 3 and the stuff flowed from me like a fountain.

When Adeolu told me that he'd be in the third season of Skinny Girl in Transit, he asked me what he thought, and I told him. I said, "The plot is a disaster. It moves as slowly as a Range Rover sport pushed by a singular area boy. The jokes are overwrought. The acting is painful. Quite frankly there's nothing about the show that isn't stressful." During my moment of brutal honesty, I didn't realise that he had his co-star with him, and she wasn't pleased with my criticism. The co-star was Sharon Oja and she was defensive. If you're a fan of the show, you'll know that she plays the sister of the main character on Skinny Girl in Transit.

She said something like you're unqualified to criticise the show since you haven't watched the show's second season. Adeolu agreed, and I did too. But there was another bit of me that thought, "This conversation is pointless because Skinny Girl in Transit isn't my jam. I'm never going to like it and I'm never going to follow it religiously. Deal with it." And that's when my bowels stepped in.

So in order to appease my bowels and keep Papa Afam from confining me to a hospital bed, I'll be recapping every episode of the third season of Skinny Girl in Transit, with my buddies, the troam team, who aren't me. I swear they aren't. For the most part, the troam team is Avenger 2 picking up my slack. This is what happens when your friends are literally God-sent.

Happy days,
Afam

When you hear of the film, Queen of Katwe, you think of Lupita Nyong'o. You think of what she wears, and how she carries herself and the lilt that she has to her voice. She sounds musical and exotic in the way that only those who are products of more than one country can be. You almost forget that an extraordinary woman lies at the films heart. A woman that is perhaps even more extraordinary than Lupita. Her name is Phiona Mutesi.

A short documentary about her begins like this.

"My father died of AIDS when I was 3 years old. My mother could no longer afford to pay my school fees. It was very hard to not be in school. I was in the slums alone. I did not have hope, then I discovered chess. My name is Phiona Mutesi. I am the junior chess champion of Africa."

It is a story that has the makings of a legend; that a girl with nothing in the slums of Katwe could make so much out of so little. Even better is that it's an inspirational film that is made for us by us, given reach by the sheer scope of Disney. It stars Lupita as Phiona's mother, Madina Nalwanga as Phiona, David Oyelowo (Selma), and Ntare Mwine (Heroes).

You may not understand what this means so I will explain.

Life wasn't hard growing up. We were more comfortable than many Nigerians or Africans could dream. It was its own form of magic. I did not know then that I had the best of both worlds. The heart of Nigeria with the comforts of the west. You could tell me about London and I'd smile and say that I had been there. You could tell me of snow, and I'd tell you that I had touched it. But I could also tell you of empty fields and tadpoles. I could sing songs of cholera and hustle. The only part of my childhood that I can fault is that nothing was made for me. I was an outsider.

When I watched Cinderella or Angels in the Outfield, I was somehow aware that I was not there, and that those stories were not for me. When I read Enid Blyton, I was a Gollywog, and when I read C.S Lewis, I was not Peter or Edmund or Lucy. I was not a faun or any other fantastical creature that we met in the Chronicles of Narnia. I simply wasn't there. There was no place for being young black and African.

I was however on CNN. I had AIDS in South Africa, I was starving in Somalia, I had Ebola in Congo, and I lived in a slum in Nairobi. My culture was corruption and death, and I looked up to General Sanni Abacha, one of Nigeria's more famous dictators by default.

You may ask about the things we made for us; of Nollywood. But all I remember is Nollywood was even more terrifying than Carrie or Scream. The fear of being turned into a goat, or sacrificed to a spirit for money ran deeper for me than the fear of a serial killer. Nigerian films were watched with one eye shut, for fear that some evil spirit would reach through the television and seize me. And between the polish of the West and the distinctly home video quality of Nollywood there was no competition.

I didn't articulate this until I saw Dope by Richard Famuyiwa. It was a coming of age story with mostly black characters. I was stunned. I wasn't completely in that one either, but it spoke to me more than Sixteen Candles, Mean Girls or The Girl Next Door could ever dream. In that I wasn't a token or a product of Affirmative Action. I was the protagonist.

Now, Disney has made Queen of Katwe. It is one of the rare black stories that isn't destroyed in production, at least not where the cast is concerned. It won't be like Captain America where they insist that Lagos is pronounced Lah-gos and not Leigos. The name of my city obliterated at the hands of Marvel. Now, I've got to be aware that people may not know where I'm from unless I pronounce it like them. The thought that I should ever call Lagos, Lah-gos leaves an odd taste in my mouth.

In Queen of Katwe, there'll be no Blackface or Blacker-face. There'll be no shelving. It will be there front and centre at the Cinema, and when it leaves there'll be DVDs. It is heartening that my younger cousins and my future nephews won't have to rely on Snow White or Mary Poppins for their entertainment needs.

The film will be released on the 23rd of September this year.

Happy Days,
Afam

There was a better than good response to my last post about the Game of Thrones, so here's another. One of the things that bloggers must learn is that you are a slave your audience. They tell you what they want, not in words or emails but in views. If you want something, and I am capable of giving it to you, then I will. You wanted more about the Game of Thrones? Here it is as quickly as I could deliver.

If you would rather binge on Game of Thrones spoiler free, this is your cue. In a poll that I carried out on twitter I learned that most of you don't actually mind spoilers, so I have no regrets about revealing everything about the latest game of thrones episode: Book of Stranger.

The episode is named The Book of Stranger. If you follow the series closely you'll learn that The Stranger is one of the seven gods in the faith of the Seven, the predominant religion in Westeros. It's one of the more bombastic episodes in the series. I would say that it's even better than the red wedding. Having read the books, I saw the red wedding coming from years away. In this one I was blind. I hung on to every bit of the dialogue, and loved almost every scene. It was so good that I almost missed Arya and Bran, who did not appear.

So what were the big moments?

First off we've got the Stark re-union. Jon Snow and Sansa saw each other again. It was the first time that they'd been in the same room since season one and it was glorious. Sansa was rightly ashamed of the way she'd treated him because of his bastard beginnings and Jon was gracious. It was amusing to watch him realise how much she'd changed. The Sansa we've got now is a far cry from the Knight loving romantic that we first met. She's been tempered by the Song of Ice and Fire, and she's come out the better for it. They plan to march on Winterfell, save Rickon, and kill the Bolton infection that has taken root there. All in a day's work if you ask me. Mr Bolton could do with a stabbing or a flaying.


 Over the Vale Littlefinger appeared. He's still the boss there, and he's driving an army to Winterfell to help the Stark's resolve their homeless situation. "It's time to join the fray" he said. He's right about that. We've only waited five seasons for the privilege.

Osha got the X this week. It was a good ending as far as endings on the show go. She could have been flayed, crushed or battered to the afterlife, but she got a knife to the neck instead. She went down fighting too, but her feminine wiles and her knife reaching ways weren't enough to defeat Ramsay Bolton. After he killed her, he took out the knife and went back to slicing what I assume was an apple. It was a little bit of a disgusting moment. I cannot imagine that anyone could care for blood flavoured apple slices. They should have had a cameo from Hannibal to really drive the point home.

Daenary's got the last scene this week. She proved once again that fire cannot burn a dragon. There was a wicked glint in her eyes as she roasted her Dothraki Khal captors. She walked out of the fire naked and unscathed to all the Dothraki in attendance bowing in submission. It was a powerful scene. This commentator is definitely excited for next week's offering.


Happy Days,
Afam

There is an urgency and a violence to parenthood that only Nigerians understand. Spurred on by the Bible verse that says, "spare the rod and spoil the child" and the truly astounding realisation that no successful man or woman in existence has two heads, Nigerian parents demand perfection from their children. It is a practice that defies location.From Lagos to Alaska, Nigerian Children all understand the meaning of Dr. Do Good, the agent of parental discipline.

All of this has been mined for the creation of a new television show called African Booty Scratcher that will be hilarious. How could it not be when it's created by Damilare Sonoiki who's most famous for his work on Blackish. The television show is about Nigerian family in America that struggles to balance giving their son a better life while ensuring he maintains their traditional values.


It's a story that I think needs to be told. If my Nigerian childhood is anything to go by it will be some of the funniest material you'll see when it's made. If I were to write a song about it,

"AFAM GO AND PLUCK THE CANE!"

Would be the beginning of the first verse.
And.

"AFAM! YOU WILL NOT KILL YOUR FATHER!"

Would be the beginning of the chorus.

However, there's a catch. To see it made, you'll have to support it with your hard earned cash. The producers need your help to get the pilot of the show made, and to raise the awareness they need to get the show on a major network.

They've got a kickstarter page that you need to support. If you don't support it, we'll continue to sit here and complain about how our Nigerianness has been South Africanised and Hollywoodised by Will Smith's portrayal of Dr Bennet Omalu in Concussion. So put your money where your mouth is, and use your increased Guarantee Trust Bank Limit for something other than your ASOS shopping needs.

Happy Days,
Afam

Click here for the kickstarter page.

And Click here for the show's website. There's some seriously cool merchandise there. I recommend the African Booty Scratcher hoodie.

I apolgise for this in advance. There is a spoiler ahead. If you're a fan of the Game of Thrones and you hate it when things are spoiled, then now is the time that you should leave. It may seem odd that I tell you to exit stage left, but I'd rather you thought well of me than ill. If you no longer like me, then you'll stop reading. And if you stop reading then I don't know what I'll do. 



Yesterday, the world was abuzz because a certain television character pulled a Lazarus on us. Yes! Jon Snow came back to life. To be honest I saw it coming. Kit Harrington, the actor that plays Jon Snow said time and time again that his character wasn't coming back to life, but if that was the case, I didn't see why he had to be on set all the time. It doesn't take that long to pretend to be dead. Lying motionless on a bed of stone does not take six months to film.

Some people said that he was filming flashbacks, but Game of Thrones isn't really all that flashback heavy. There is so much material to cover that there is simply no time for detailed examinations of the past, and if there is, the events that will be covered won't be anything from Jon Snow's time. Furthermore, there's the theory that he's the bastard child of Rhaegar Targaryan and Eddard (Ned) Stark's sister Lyanna.

The mysteries surrounding him are far too important for him to die.

Even though he's come back, we cannot expect that he'll be the same. In 2011 George R. Martin, the creator of the incredibly lucrative franchise said:

"I do think that if you're bringing a character back, that a character has gone through death, that's a transformative experience"

He then went on to say :

"My characters who come back from death are worse for wear. In some ways, they're not even the same characters anymore. The body may be moving, but some aspect of the spirit is changed or transformed, and they've lost something. One of the characters who has come back repeatedly from death is Beric Dondarrion, The Lightning Lord. Each time he's revived he loses a little more of himself. He was sent on a mission before his first death. He was sent on a mission to do something, and it's like, that's what he's clinging to. He's forgetting other things, he's forgetting who he is, or where he lived. He's forgotten the woman who he was once supposed to marry. Bits of his humanity are lost every time he comes back from death; he remembers that mission. His flesh is falling away from him, but this one thing, this purpose that he had is part of what's animating him and bringing him back to death. I think you see echoes of that with some of the other characters who have come back from death."

So what does this mean?

It means that even though Jon Snow is back and his curls remain intact he may not be the same character that we fell in love with over the course of 5 seasons. This makes things infinitely more interesting.

For the first time, there is no difference between those who've read the books and those who haven't. We're all wonderfully ignorant of what the world of Westeros holds for us. The GIf below is no longer true.


Now, for the most part, we all exist in a perpetual state of suspense. The cliffhangers are universal. We obviously can't wait for George R. Martin to finish what he started. I almost wish that he'd be like a Jeffrey Archer. That the books would come out every year, as surely as winter, summer and autumn do.

As we wait for the next episode, we can delight ourselves in Kit Harrington's very sincere apology for the lies that he told before the new season aired. "I'd like to say I'm sorry for lying to everyone." He said in an interview with Entertainment Weekly.

At this point I can almost say that I am glad that he lied. If he hadn't. This avid fan and twitter genius would probably not have made this.

jon snow is the new jesus pic.twitter.com/Nu0WJkBFr4

— plutao (@geraradway) May 2, 2016

Happy Days,
Afam