itch.io

this was a beautifully brief look into a haunting with unknowable, yet intimately known depths. it feels like  i've  found a drowned animal in the pool, and all i can do is sit and absorb the image of a dead thing that won't stay still.

i have a hard time being objective when reviewing things, because, i mean, who doesn't, but i always feel there's a level of subjectivity that ends up being a little too personal and too revealing.  i don't know what i could say about Sunshine Backwards or how to put it into words that would really feel fair or do it justice, from an objective standpoint, and that wouldn't come across like i'm almost contemptuous of it, from the subjective.  i think i managed to avoid the latter, at least.

it's good, but it's the kind of thing you can have a bad time with, and that can be Good in its own way, but that can also be Bad.  beer, cigarettes, weed, junk food, too many energy drinks.  late night binges and staring at the pair of scissors on your desk and just, thinking.  it's the high you get from knowing you're hurting yourself and wanting a stronger hit.  it's looking into a mirror so hard you hope it explodes and the broken glass rips you to shreds.  sometimes you watch it happen to someone else;  sometimes you get to witness someone reaching into their own chest and pulling out their heart, and you wonder why it looks so much like your own, and what the fuck do you even do about it.  nothing, really.

my advice for best enjoying Sunshine Backwards is to drink a lot of water and go to bed immediately after.  as others have said and will say, it's an incredibly haunting piece of art.  it's the kind of thing you might need to cry/scream/manic laugh about, and definitely the kind of thing you need to sleep on to really think about and appreciate properly.  it's hard not to try and stay up, and ruminate on it, and rue its vulnerability, the way it cuts into itself and in its way, cuts into you, and the fact that if it cuts deep enough, you're going to have to acknowledge that there really are teeth all the way down.

thanks

it's always really comforting to me to play and read things like this where the author so deeply understands the mental gymnastics of shame you feel around stuff like this that you've felt since you were a kid. it's a thing that feels so earnest and i feel so empathetically towards it makes me  start psychically limbering up to do somersaults the moment i try to internalize the message. the truth is you can actually just say 'you know what, it's fine, whatever' and leave the gymnasium if you want.