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FTVM Honors Program Cohorts

2023-2024 Honors Cohort

Adela Papież

Adela Papież is a senior Film, Television, and Film major with minors in Art and Design and Performing Arts Management and Entrepreneurship (PAME). Adela grew up in the Metro Detroit area and was always passionate about art in one form or another. When she was younger, she would film and edit short films and music videos with her sister, cousins, and neighbors using her dad's camera. As she got older, she became interested in photography and oil painting, leading her to apply to UM through Stamps. She quickly realized an art degree wasn't for her and transferred to LSA to pursue a film degree. At Michigan, Adela is involved with various film clubs, including being a secretary and producer for M-agination Films and an executive producer for Exposure Productions. She enjoys editing and directing. Outside of school, Adela is an intern at Paramount and is working on a project with an editor she met in Los Angeles. Adela is so excited to get started on her production and looks forward to working with such talented people.

Production Thesis - "Daffodil" 
Primary advisor: Carleen Hsu; Secondary advisor: Jim Burnstein

"Daffodil" is a 12-15 minute dramatic narrative that delves into the intricate emotions of grief and guilt experienced by Maja, an art major specializing in oil painting. Her world is shaken by the tragic overdose of her best friend, Charlotte. Amidst this turmoil, Oliver, another friend of Charlotte's, attempts to encourage Maja to confront and share her struggles. However, Maja's initial resistance only propels her deeper into the hardships of grief. As she continues to paint her feelings, the layers of her friendship with Charlotte and her contemplations on life and death gradually unravel.

Atticus Spicer

Atticus Spicer is a senior studying Film, Television, and Media with minors in Writing and Digital Studies. They have worked with queer advocacy groups for almost a decade, and now serve as the Graphic Design Editor for The Michigan Gayly newspaper, Graphic Artist for the Political Inqueery and PINQ Report podcasts, and contributes to and designs the Trans and Gender Nonconforming Arts Review. A lifelong horror fanatic, Atticus has spent years trying to– mostly successfully– turn every project he works on into something at least horror-adjacent. This past summer, they were delighted to serve as an Instructional Assistant for the Wolverine Pathways program, working alongside his thesis advisor with a class of thirteen high school seniors in Intro to Film and the Horror Genre. His passion for film studies, theory, writing, visual art, research, and increasing queer visibility have combined forces for this project, and they cannot wait to share their webcomic in April 2023.

Integrated Thesis Psycho at Large
Primary Advisor, Matthew Noble-Olson; Secondary Advisor, Sarah Murray

Psycho at Large is an integrated thesis split between examining current-day anxieties around sex and gender through the slasher subgenre, and the subsequent creation of a horror webcomic narrativizing those findings. Inspired by Carol J. Clover’s arguments concerning the Final Girl, this project will bring her ideas to the present day and ask what differences can be seen in our understanding of the gender and sexual Other. It will search for evidence of a cultural reckoning with these– particularly in the context of our current moral panic around “transgenderism” and our existence in a post-MeToo world– by recontextualizing the genre with queer and transgender perspectives. Psycho at Large’s webcomic will feature both a transmasculine and a cisgender female protagonist tasked with defeating a dangerous entity in a near-future dystopian nightmare world.