#Charles vane fan fiction

[midnightt-vice]

This is from my super old blog and it got about 5k notes. Oldie but a goldie.

[a-man-for-hire-and-his-archives]

Here’s Why Everyone Is Talking About A Pirate Drama That Ended In 2017

Black Sails has been described as Game of Thrones with pirates

If Black Sails kicked off in 2020 instead of 2014, it certainly would have thrown fuel on the raging fire that was TikTok’s sea shanty obsession. The reality is that this TV series aired on Starz from 2014 for four seasons, coming to a close in 2017. So why is everyone talking about it now, a decade after it began?

Black Sails is coming to Netflix very soon, triggering its fans to emerge from the woodwork and promote the show online. ‘I am SO excited for people who’ll be watching this show for the first time,’ one user wrote, with many others recommending the series to fans of Game of Thrones. With House of the Dragon still a few months away, here’s why you should tune into Black Sails this month.

New To Netflix: Black Sails

What Is Black Sails About?

Black Sails transports us back to 1715 – aka the Golden Age of Piracy. Set in New Providence, an island in the Bahamas, we meet the feared Captain Flint (Toby Stephens) who brings a new younger crew member into the fold (‘Long’ John Silver, played by Luke Arnold) as his crew continues to fight for survival and negotiate their space on the island.

Is Black Sails Based On A Book?

Black Sails was written as a prequel to Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel, Treasure Island (1883).

Is It Based On A True Story?

While Black Sails isn’t based on a true story, it does trace real events. The first season focuses on the hunt for the Spanish treasure galleon Urca de Lima, a real ship that sank in 1715 near Fort Pierce in Florida (where it still lies). Season two traces the fallout of Urca de Lima’s treasure being stranded in Florida, strictly guarded by Spanish soldiers while pirates prowl the shores. The subsequent third and fourth seasons then look at the war for the control of New Providence between the pirates and the British Empire – a la Pirates of the Caribbean.

Likewise, some of the characters are based on real people. Real pirates fictionalised in the show include:

Blackbeard (Ray Stevenson)

Anne Bonny (Clara Paget)

Benjamin Hornigold (Hakeem Kae-Kazim)

Jack Rackham (Toby Schmitz)

Charles Vane (Zach McGowan)

Ned Low (Tadhg Murphy)

Israel Hands (David Wilmot)

Meanwhile, Captain Woodes Rogers (Luke Roberts) – who represents the British Empire in seasons three and four – is based on a real English sea captain and slave trader, and subsequently the first Royal Governor of the Bahamas.

Was Captain Flint A Real Pirate?

Captain Flint is a fictional character who was first created by Robert Louis Stevenson in Treasure Island. He has since appeared in multiple works of fiction, including A. D. Howden Smith’s Porto Bello Gold (1924), John Drake’s Flint and Silver (2008), Pieces of Eight (2009) and Skull and Bones (2010), and J. M. Barrie’s Peter and Wendy (1904).

Where Was Black Sails Filmed?

Black Sails was filmed in Cape Town, South Africa, mainly inside at Cape Town Film Studio. Because the real city is so different today than it was in the 1700s, Nassau – the capital of the Bahamas, located on New Providence island – was built from scratch in a studio over a period of four months, as were two large water tanks to house the series’ two ships. Some scenes were filmed outside in and around Cape Town when new terrain was required, but most of the series was filmed on set.

The Cast

The cast of Black Sails is incredibly large, but key characters to know include:

Toby Stephens as James McGraw/Captain Flint

Hannah New as Eleanor Guthrie

Luke Arnold as ‘Long’ John Silver

Jessica Parker Kennedy as Max

Tom Hopper as William ‘Billy Bones’ Manderly

Zach McGowan as Charles Vane

Toby Schmitz as Jack Rackham

Clara Paget as Anne Bonny

Mark Ryan as Hal Gates

Hakeem Kae-Kazim as Mr. Scott

Sean Cameron Michael as Richard Guthrie

Louise Barnes as Miranda Hamilton/Barlow

Rupert Penry-Jones as Thomas Hamilton

Luke Roberts as Woodes Rogers

Ray Stevenson as Edward Teach

David Wilmot as Israel Hands

Harriet Walter as Marion Guthrie

The Trailer

Interested? Here’s the trailer for a taste of the action.

WATCH

All episodes of Black Sails are streaming on Netflix from 17 April 2024.

Source: Country & Town House

[meerawrites]

Introduction to writeblr

Hello I am Meera S (they/them), I am a speculative fiction writer, writer of historical fiction and more, all of it is queer centric and with person of global majority (colour) angle. Please interact with this post and I shall add you back to the best of my ability!

about my writing

I’ve been writing and fan fictioning since I was 10. I started my first novel a little over a year ago, I am editing it in a month. I gravitate towards the gothic and historical but I am not gonna limit myself to that. I also write short stories, fic and poetry. 

1. Vampires, witches, werewolves, ghosts, and more, oh my!: I love me some monsters and allegories that are multilayered, just not zombies. 

2. Fantasy and gothic, I write about the human through the inhuman, Anne Rice once said vampire was the most poignant allegory for outcast and other-ness. 

3. The historical. You have to know the past to understand the present and future. Ancient History through 1920s and all of South Asian history and mythology. 

4. Diversity: I am a queer south asian person but I do earnestly try for informed diverse world views that are nuanced and sympathetic even if not “moral” because vampire, etc. 

about me

read here. 

fandoms: read here. go here for fandom stuff. Here for history. Here for fic. Role-play masterlist. 

Influences: Anne Rice, Oscar Wilde, Octavia Butler, Indu Sundaresan, @writingvampires, @elisaintime, Silvia Moreno Garcia and @saintmachina.

what i'm looking for

1. Friends and cool people.

2. eventual beta readers/editors.

3. Other writers.

4. people who know people etc. 

genres i read

I gravitate towards the gothic and historical, but anything well written and I think worthwhile. 

Just finished: Good Omens, Lasher by Anne Rice, catching up with Dracula daily . also following @re-dracula.

Immediately going to read: Taltos by Anne Rice, The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice, Common Sense by Thomas Paine, and the memoir of Benjamin Tallmadge (the memoir is only 75 pages long so..)

WIPS

Presently unamed, editing in a month: What if Sibyl Vane was too haunt Dorian Gray? Heavily inspired by Wilde’s poetry, Emilie Autumn, steampunk, the allegory of ghosts as the inescapable past popularized by Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol. As well as the folklore of banshees, avenging angels & La Llorona. More here. Playlist. 

Pending: novella: les liaisons dangereuses x vampires. Playlist.

Pleasure to make your acquaintance!

[chocolatepot]

do you think the extend of good storytelling is by how gay it is, and how much shipping fanart can be produced from it? and yes bonnet was a massive racist and slave owner this isn't news

a1) I said nothing about good storytelling. Someone in the notes on that post complained about OFMD getting the fandom and hype that Black Sails didn't; I pointed out that fun + queer joy = fannish engagement. It sounds like you should go berate them for caring about not getting Hamilton/Flint fanart!

a2) As someone who actively likes reading, watching, and writing romances, yes, I do think that fiction with well-written and well-acted romance is more appealing than fiction where that's a super minor note.

b1) It seems like you don't understand historical fiction? The real Stede Bonnet was a slaveholder. The character named Stede Bonnet written by David Jenkins & co. isn't. Having an issue with that isn't exactly baseless, but for moral consistency you have a LOT of other fiction to object to as well, so you should get on with that to make it clear that this has nothing to do with being mad about one pirate show being more widely loved than another.

b2) You probably shouldn't rest your "down with OFMD, up with Black Sails" rhetoric on moral grounds, because all the characters in Black Sails are also pirates, and the real people many of them were based on (such as Charles Vane, Blackbeard, etc.) were rapists and murderers. Even on the show itself, one of these has his men gang-rape a main character.

If you just hate OFMD, that's mystifying to me but totally valid. If you hate OFMD and want to seize on an objective reason to declare the show to be Objectively Immoral and all its fans to be Bad People, that's childish behavior and you should really put your energy into creating the kind of fic or art you want to see for Black Sails instead.

[jaynovz]

What are you working on now that you're really excited about?

I am working on something that I had in concept doc for two years but finally feel like I have confidence to write--an alt canon action-adventure story, which starts to diverge after 2.9 Black Sails when, instead of Vane and his lumberjacks, Silver goes to Charles Town to rescue Flint.

I have been doing a fair amount of research for this including looking at maps of historical Charles Town, reading about the history of prisons, devouring action adventure plots/books, building a playlist lol.

I'm setting myself SEVERAL challenges with this--

Less words!

More communicated through action and dialogue! Less in the characters' heads!

More external pressures! Drama, tension, action-adventure, as stated.

The genre/style of this is a pretty different approach compared to most of the other things I've done, with the exception of The Silver backstory. It will be most similar to that, and fans of that story WILL see certain easter eggs. But yes, an attempt at a historical fiction type novel, but still fanfiction, still Silverflint, lmao. So basically, a lot of original events/plot, but within the bounds of canonverse this time instead of starting almost fully from scratch like Break Up AU.

There are surprises galore waiting within this one, I think it's gonna be a pretty crackerjack tale if I can pull it off.

Hope yall like it~ Thanks for the question~~

[phenomenal1500]

~Behind The Stories~

The Blood In My Veins [Charles Vane] 

This is my longest and very first fan fiction I ever wrote. Watching Black Sails instantly made me fall in love with the story and aesthetic and once I tried to search up stories and fan art, it was quickly noticable the writing and creative side of the fandom was very small and even partly dying. Since I’ve always wanted to write and share my creativity with people across the world, but never had the courage to do it, I finally began writing something. I think the most fun was that I wrote all 65 chapters without anything in mind. All I had created was an OC [Naida Jones] and I just went with what came up in my mind while I was typing it. 

Under The Influence  [Erik Killmonger]

If I had to choose one of my most passionate and sexual stories, this might just be the one. It’s one of the first fics where I started to experiment with new writing styles and the story was honestly more smut than actual plot at first, but along the way of coming up with the more detailed story I partly changed that. 

Iubirea Lui Pierdută  [Karl Heisenberg]

This is the only fan fiction I wrote with a solid story in mind from the beginning. I knew how it started and how it was going to end. This story also took me the most research and was the first story I wrote in third person. I had to figure out how to create Zuriñe’s abilities as real and believable as possible and also I wanted it to be able to fit with Heisenberg’s abilities so she could help him in his factory. The funny thing is is that even if it is one of my best stories, it’s one of my least popular once too.

[artemiseamoon-ficart]

Don’t Look Back

Black sails fic - revision in progress

Read on A03

Moodboards Pt 2

[shippingdragons]

Know no shame: queerness in the golden age of TV and piracy

Both Our Flag Means Death and Black Sails go all in on queer pirates — eventually

By Samantha Greer Jun 2, 2022

Our Flag Means Death has become a bit of a sensation, to put it mildly. The show skyrocketed in popularity for weeks after its debut, both in terms of streaming metrics and the outpouring of fan art. That’s in no small part thanks to its centering a romance between two men, Stede Bonnet and Edward “Blackbeard” Teach, which captured the hearts of many, especially among queer viewers starved of on-screen representation. Even as queer representation has improved over the decades, with several ongoing shows featuring queer characters and subplots, it’s still rare for a series to focus squarely on queer romance, especially in genre shows.

Perhaps some of the infatuation stems from how Our Flag Means Death marketed its romance story — namely, it didn’t. Those initial trailers, teasers, and handful of episodes focused on the comedy hijinks of Stede Bonnet and his inept band of pirates. Not so much as a longing glance between Stede and Ed. For an audience more often used to queerbaiting or sometimes no inclusion at all, the shock that this show really was going to commit to that romance seems to have come with much elation, not to mention a viewership which tripled somewhere between its debut and its finale. Even creator David Jenkins has commented on the matter; speaking to The Verge, he said, “I think I didn’t realize — because I see myself represented on camera, and I see myself falling in love in stories — I didn’t realize how deep the queer baiting thing goes. Being made to feel stupid by stories, I guess. […] [L]ooking at how people were kind of afraid to let themselves believe that we were doing that was a surprise to me, and it’s heartbreaking.”

Oddly enough, though, this isn’t the first time a queer pirate show has buried the lede. Though the shows don’t share channels, decades, or even sensibilities, the way they slowly revealed the queerness of their protagonists reveals how both of these shows reflect the different climates in which they were released.

Image: Starz

Black Sails, which premiered back in 2014, is a series that acts as both a prequel to the classic pirate novel Treasure Island and a mishmash of real history. Long John Silver brushes shoulders with real pirates like Charles Vane and Anne Bonny. In spite of any misgivings you might have about its gritty Treasure Island take, it’s a genuinely thoughtful exploration of history and fiction. To be sure, it has its fair share of bloody violence and sex; it was seen as Game of Thrones on the high seas among critics. What it absolutely does not do upfront is let the audience know that one of its central characters (arguably the story’s primary protagonist), Captain Flint, is in fact a gay man, and that his oppression and persecution under British society is the root of his entire violent quest.

In Black Sails this twist serves a purpose, held back until halfway through the second season. Flint, initially an enigma to audiences and his crew alike, is a larger-than-life character — an inscrutable, cunning, and ruthless pirate, much like the character first referenced in Treasure Island. He is allowed to embody a hypermasculinity, the archetypal bloodthirsty captain who will do anything for gold. The reveal that he’s gay and that his mission is to rebel against the British Empire, to create a nation free of its rule, complicates everything he has done and will do, turning him from a mercenary into a revolutionary.

The fact that Black Sails and Our Flag both smuggled queerness into their narratives is made all the more interesting when considering the real-life parallels of the characters. Both shows play with our conceptions of history and well-known figures. Stede Bonnet and Blackbeard really did hang out, and the show simply makes a leap as to why that could be; Jenkins has explicitly said he’s interested in treating recorded history as merely a jumping-off point. After all, it’s unclear how much he’s even reading into their relationship. To this day, there’s a lot of debate about how much queerness has been exorcised from records and accounts, either by omission or by individuals’ own necessary discretion.

Retelling well-known histories as queer tales is more about putting back into our past what has been erased from it. As Black Sails co-creator Jon Steinberg said to Den of Geek regarding the show’s historical figures, “There’s some freedom in the moment you realize that the historic record is severely compromised in terms of what these peoples’ lives were like. They had a motive to lie, and so did the people in London. [...] It gives us the room to try to tell a story that will hopefully feel real. It probably won’t necessarily match up to the textbook to what happened, but I think we would probably argue that the textbook is already a narrative that somebody with an agenda put together a long, long time ago.”

Image: Starz

Photo: Aaron Epstein/HBO Max

Not that it’s hard to read queerness into existing histories, even if the terminology and conception of the ideas differed at the time. Romanticized pirates have always been portrayed as camp, an image perhaps spurred on by historical figures like Jack Rackham, nicknamed Calico Jack on account of his colorful outfits (who also makes an appearance in OFMD). Mary Read spent a portion of their life under the name Mark Read, and whether it was simply a disguise or fluid gender expression or if they were even trans, it lends itself to storylines like that of Jim on Our Flag Means Death. Accounts of Blackbeard spending all of his time with Stede Bonnet can so easily be understood through a queer lens that it’s shocking no story put such a twist on these figures before Our Flag Means Death.

But the answer to why no one had might be captured somewhat in the response to Black Sails’ own voyage into queer storytelling.

To be fair, Black Sails does have queer characters from the outset — two women, Eleanor and Max — but the first season generally presents them under a leering male gaze, seemingly intended to titillate general audiences. The show’s interest in the revolutionary qualities of queerness didn’t take center stage until its second season. While it spawned a fervent following among some queer fans, it equally drew the ire of homophobes who felt betrayed by the reveal that half of the cast was queer. Reddit is littered with rants against the show’s “gay agenda” by lads who thought they were getting a show “just about pirates,” all part of an outcry that even got Flint’s actor, Toby Stephens, to comment. “Before the revelation I had this huge following from guys, but as soon as that happened it was like they had been betrayed. It was the sense of utter betrayal and I wasn’t surprised because I knew it was going to be a massive thing.” The degree of discomfort among men, that simply by being gay Flint no longer adhered to their rigid standard of a male icon, is hardly something that’s gone away.

In the present, though, the TV landscape has changed considerably since Black Sails aired. Streaming services have come to rule the roost and fracture the monoculture, and the pandemic has only further shaped that. Black Sails had to compete against The Wire, The Sopranos, and Game of Thrones to earn its place at the table. For Our Flag Means Death, which is much more a comedy than a drama (and not at all an epic genre TV series, though there are still plenty of old-fashioned stabbings), things are a little different.

Photo: Aaron Epstein/HBO Max

While the special effects (the revolutionary StageCraft developed for The Mandalorian) that allow Our Flag Means Death to seem like it’s taking place at sea would have been reserved for much higher-budget shows only a few years ago, they’re a flourish for a series that largely takes place on small sets. It could’ve been a tiny budget sitcom a decade ago. That smaller scale may be what allowed it to take risks that, sadly, still feel daring in 2022. It’s not just a romance between Stede and Edward but an entire cast full of queer characters — a queerness that in its own context largely feels unremarkable, with the crew quietly tolerant and respectful of each other throughout the series.

In the last few years things have moved along, but even still, both shows had to operate under the very conditions of which they’re critical. As America and the U.K. both ramp up in homophobia and transphobia, with legislation seeking to target those vulnerable groups, the stories of Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death don’t feel like purely historical stories. They’re tales of the here and now. Pirates are a way to recontextualize those who society “others,” who are made outcasts and fringe by the mainstream. The shows invite us to ask why someone would choose to live on the edge, to unpack their histories and motives until their popular image is vanquished. To take the most well-known of pirates and to reframe them as traumatized queer outcasts is not intended as a historical rewrite but as a rebuttal of the very idea of a history written by the conquerors.

The British Empire present in both stories is depicted as an entity that is, at its worst, all-consuming barbarism and, at its best, all-consuming barbarism propped up by a veneer of civility. It’s an entity that not only destroys but warps reality around itself, reshaping history in its likeness.

In our present, queer people are once again being miscast as villains and boogeymen. In a way, Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death always dance on the edge of tragedy. Either they meet the same ends as their historical counterparts or we see the bittersweet truth of stories that are written out of history, their actions twisted into something evil. By giving that other perspective, by suggesting another account, these shows are a rallying cry for queer folk looking for their place in a world that doesn’t want them to exist at all — and a reminder to everyone who stands against us which side of history they’re on.

Article source: Polygon

[deathnoting]

vane/rackham fic you say 👀

hi! yeah yeah yeah. i'm back directly on top of my bullshit. not sure why i am so obsessed with this ship beyond all other black sails ships. especially bc on my first watch i was sooo into silver/flint and max/anne/jack (and like, i still am) and didn't even think to ship vane/jack until after finishing the show a second time? but yeah it's taken over everything. i think probably bc their interactions canonically have, like, some of the strongest dom/sub energy i have ever seen outside of a fucking fan fiction and i am simple & weak

anyway idk if you ~know me~ anon (there's no way for me to write that without sounding like a self congratulatory asshole sorry i'm just leaning into it) but quite literally 5 years ago i wrote this jack/vane(/anne) fic and now i'm writing a sequel to it bc i'm a bitch who can't let go.

kinda fucky of me since it was intended to be a canon compliant prequel which explained why 1) all of their canon interactions have a like? highly sexualized energy? and 2) how the fuck charles "masculinity is a prison" vane even became best friends with the two most gender fucky people he has prob ever met. but now i'm writing a non canon compliant sequel to it set during s2 so whatever. it's literally just an excuse to write jack/vane and max/anne/jack at the same time & to have jack bottom for everyone. as i said, i'm so simple? so weak? don't judge me for my passions ok

[manabombs]

doing this meme for mr captain jack rackham because I think i’m finally ready to try to articulate my feelings, even if no one asked (i’m sorry this post is so long)

Why I like them:  So... here’s the thing... 

I’m kind of known for dressing like a fancy gay pirate. I’ve made a lot of cosplays over the years, but my pirate outfits are what I’m most infamous for. I met my partner over a decade ago while dressed like a fancy gay pirate. Many of my friends have seen me in pirate outfits more often then they’ve seen me in normal person clothing. Once upon a time I went to art school to study fashion design and I said “yes this is the aesthetic I’m going to cultivate” and now here we are. 

When I first heard that they were making a big budget period drama that was a prequel to Treasure Island, I knew that it was going to be My Next Hyperfixation, long before I had any notion of how much queer representation there would be or even how well-written the show would be. But it took me a couple years to finally feel like I was Emotionally Ready to delve into the series (Sometimes I’m bummed that I missed out on participating in the fandom while the show was actively airing, but I’m also glad that I was able to binge it all in its entirely, because the time waiting between seasons would have made me too crazy). 

And within those first two or three episodes, I saw that greasy rat man with his mullet and his avant garde facial hair choices and whatever the hell was going on with his wardrobe

and I said to myself “wait... Calico Jack... as in, the pirate known for his fashion sense...”

and I had one of those moments where I realized that this character was so much My Type that I was mad at myself for being so predictable. and I questioned some of the life choices that I made that led me to the point that this greasy rat man the sort of character that I immediately knew that I was going to fall in love with.

But that was only the beginning, because as I watched more of the series, I related to him more and more-- I think it was mannerisms at first, and things like “having to explain the vocabulary you just used to your coworkers” and “I would also like Anne Bonny to be my wife”, but gradually I began to relate to him for increasingly personal reasons. I first watched Black Sails after I had gone through a particularly rough couple years, and the catharsis of watching Jack go from “they pissed on me” to being the character who is ultimately victorious over the series’ main antagonist was an emotionally intense experience. I was already projecting on him by the time that he delivered the “great art has felled empires” monologue, which was the moment I knew that I was deeply invested in this character, and he hadn’t even started showing off his best looks yet. There are, of course, moments where his actions are... morally dubious, but even those instances just managed to make me more attached to him, because I respect the hell out of how well the writers succeeded in making him such a well-developed character. 

By the end of the series I realized that I related to this character on an intensely personal level, in a way that I haven’t connected with a fictional character in years, except it felt more profound than the times I’ve connected with fictional characters in the past because this time I was an Adult with a deeper understanding of the Self. I don’t want to sound like a soulbonder or a kinnie or whatever the kids are calling it these days but it really felt like this:

tl;dr I came for the wardrobe and stayed for the waxing about art philosophy and historiography

Why I don’t: ... undermining the revolution wasn’t great...

Favorite episode: I’m a big fan of 2.06 because... you know...

but also because we had to wait 14 episodes to see this pirate on a fuckin boat

Favorite season: Season three features so many of my favorite tropes it feels unreal... Jack and Charles as co-captains sharing authority and declaring their undying loyalty to each other... the way he goes full dandy the moment he has money to burn... Jack has to gain the approval of his judgmental father-in-law... his homoerotic rivalry with Rogers... getting arrested and then rescued by his significant others in the most dramatic way possible... I choose to believe that there was a brief, shining moment right before the beginning of season 3 where Jack was able to just chill and be optimistic about the future and bask in Charles Vane’s approval amidst his pile of gold and new wardrobe while Anne and Max were off doing lesbian stuff...

Favorite line: “It’s the art that leaves the mark, but to leave it, it must transcend, it must speak for itself, it must be true,” I mutter to myself as I draw vampire pirates at 1am

Favorite outfit: oof what a question...

This look is probably my overall favorite and there’s a good reason why it’s the outfit he’s wearing for the final climactic battle. He has so many amazing coats, but the details on this one make it my favorite, and I also love that gradient scarf and the pink embroidered shirt. The color and pattern mixing here is impeccable. It makes me appreciate his hot mess of a wardrobe in the first season more, seeing how his first outfit just looks like plain boring muslin and then more color & patterns gradually get introduced.

This is my runner-up just because I love the shade of blue and the prince charming vibes that are happening here, so I’m sad that we only saw this look for like 3 seconds.

OTP: I can’t remember the last time I cared about a ship as much as I care about VaneRackham.... sometimes I get mad that they succeeded in making me have these Feelings about fictional characters... I watched a show with multiple canon gay relationships and ended up fixating on the queerbait white man ship where one of the characters dies, because I have questionable taste and I love making myself suffer. 😩

Brotp: Jack and Max’s relationship means so much to me 💕

Head Canon: This might be me projecting, but because of his background in textiles I headcanon that Jack was more competent at sewing than anyone else on the Ranger and that skill came in incredibly useful on more than one occasion. The fancy coats that we see him wearing in seasons 3 & 4 most likely would have been custom tailored specifically for him, but I imagine that all of his earlier ones were acquired secondhand (one way or another) and he sometimes did patching/adjustments on them himself.

Unpopular opinion: I respect the artistic liberties that were taken with his character design, but he should have been allowed to wear some silk stockings and show off his calves at least once tbh

A wish: Obviously my #1 wish is that Jack and Charles had been permitted to kiss, but I also wish that we had been able to see them on a ship together clearly I have no choice but to assume that whenever they were on a ship together there was lots of kissing going on An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: man it would sure suck if Jack was executed for piracy within like three years of the series finale 5 words to best describe them: this adam ant looking motherfucker

My nickname for them: my guy/my dude

[denvilleneuve]

CREATOR TAG MEME

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. Tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

“I’ve been thinking about this meme as 2020 winds down (and what a year it’s fucking been) and thought that well maybe bringing this chain back around would be a good thing to kickstart a little reflection of our own creative work.”

It is! And a little self-love is more than appreciated!  💖  thank you sarah, @timothyolyphant​ for bringing this meme back, and thank you airam, @magnusedom for tagging me in!

going with the last one, charles vane set  i lost 2 braincells trying to match the spaces lol, it’s nothing particular but I really love how turned out the final whole piece.

the sinking razor crest (rip) mando you are a formidable pilot lemme tell you. this show is peak comedy and it’s my duty to gif every sigle scene.

descend into madness part 1 & part 2. I’m very fond of this two set, I always loved the complexity of this mental state portrayed in the movies or shows, watching how a character changes his ways or is driven in this direction always leaves me amazed. I love thrillers if you haven’t noticed.

avatar set. I don’t have any big reason beside colors!

so, another thing that I love are the parallels. Watching anything, my mind goes wild and I make 100 connections with other movies or songs or quotes, so yeah, parallels.  1. joker / taxi driver  2. the gentlemen / pulp fiction 3. sicario / zerozerozero 

tagging @schreiberpablo @helenspreference @vancssakirby @german-lauren @ewan-mcgregor @shoenaerts @emraanhashmi @john-seed @logan-delos @jackmans @solacelight @richardmaden @bjjorns @lucretiaborgia @oscarisaack @ssaoirse @pedrettii @maddiecline sorry if i tagged you already and feel free to ignore this! also to anyone that would like to do this!

[a-man-for-hire-and-his-archives]

Know no shame: queerness in the golden age of TV and piracy

Both Our Flag Means Death and Black Sails go all in on queer pirates — eventually

[Editor note: This post contains light spoilers for Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death]

Our Flag Means Death has become a bit of a sensation, to put it mildly. The show skyrocketed in popularity for weeks after its debut, both in terms of streaming metrics and the outpouring of fan art.

That’s in no small part thanks to its centering a romance between two men, Stede Bonnet and Edward “Blackbeard” Teach, which captured the hearts of many, especially among queer viewers starved of on-screen representation. Even as queer representation has improved over the decades, with several ongoing shows featuring queer characters and subplots, it’s still rare for a series to focus squarely on queer romance, especially in genre shows.

Perhaps some of the infatuation stems from how Our Flag Means Death marketed its romance story — namely, it didn’t. Those initial trailers, teasers, and handful of episodes focused on the comedy hijinks of Stede Bonnet and his inept band of pirates. Not so much as a longing glance between Stede and Ed. For an audience more often used to queerbaiting or sometimes no inclusion at all, the shock that this show really was going to commit to that romance seems to have come with much elation, not to mention a viewership which tripled somewhere between its debut and its finale. Even creator David Jenkins has commented on the matter; speaking to The Verge, he said, “I think I didn’t realize — because I see myself represented on camera, and I see myself falling in love in stories — I didn’t realize how deep the queer baiting thing goes. Being made to feel stupid by stories, I guess. […] [L]ooking at how people were kind of afraid to let themselves believe that we were doing that was a surprise to me, and it’s heartbreaking.”

Oddly enough, though, this isn’t the first time a queer pirate show has buried the lede. Though the shows don’t share channels, decades, or even sensibilities, the way they slowly revealed the queerness of their protagonists reveals how both of these shows reflect the different climates in which they were released.

Black Sails, which premiered back in 2014, is a series that acts as both a prequel to the classic pirate novel Treasure Island and a mishmash of real history. Long John Silver brushes shoulders with real pirates like Charles Vane and Anne Bonny. In spite of any misgivings you might have about its gritty Treasure Island take, it’s a genuinely thoughtful exploration of history and fiction. To be sure, it has its fair share of bloody violence and sex; it was seen as Game of Thrones on the high seas among critics.

What it absolutely does not do upfront is let the audience know that one of its central characters (arguably the story’s primary protagonist), Captain Flint, is in fact a gay man, and that his oppression and persecution under British society is the root of his entire violent quest.

In Black Sails this twist serves a purpose, held back until halfway through the second season. Flint, initially an enigma to audiences and his crew alike, is a larger-than-life character — an inscrutable, cunning, and ruthless pirate, much like the character first referenced in Treasure Island. He is allowed to embody a hypermasculinity, the archetypal bloodthirsty captain who will do anything for gold. The reveal that he’s gay and that his mission is to rebel against the British Empire, to create a nation free of its rule, complicates everything he has done and will do, turning him from a mercenary into a revolutionary.

The fact that Black Sails and Our Flag both smuggled queerness into their narratives is made all the more interesting when considering the real-life parallels of the characters. Both shows play with our conceptions of history and well-known figures. Stede Bonnet and Blackbeard really did hang out, and the show simply makes a leap as to why that could be; Jenkins has explicitly said he’s interested in treating recorded history as merely a jumping-off point. After all, it’s unclear how much he’s even reading into their relationship. To this day, there’s a lot of debate about how much queerness has been exorcised from records and accounts, either by omission or by individuals’ own necessary discretion.

Retelling well-known histories as queer tales is more about putting back into our past what has been erased from it. As Black Sails co-creator Jon Steinberg said to Den of Geek regarding the show’s historical figures, “There’s some freedom in the moment you realize that the historic record is severely compromised in terms of what these peoples’ lives were like. They had a motive to lie, and so did the people in London. […] It gives us the room to try to tell a story that will hopefully feel real. It probably won’t necessarily match up to the textbook to what happened, but I think we would probably argue that the textbook is already a narrative that somebody with an agenda put together a long, long time ago.”

Not that it’s hard to read queerness into existing histories, even if the terminology and conception of the ideas differed at the time. Romanticized pirates have always been portrayed as camp, an image perhaps spurred on by historical figures like Jack Rackham, nicknamed Calico Jack on account of his colorful outfits (who also makes an appearance in OFMD). Mary Read spent a portion of their life under the name Mark Read, and whether it was simply a disguise or fluid gender expression or if they were even trans, it lends itself to storylines like that of Jim on Our Flag Means Death. Accounts of Blackbeard spending all of his time with Stede Bonnet can so easily be understood through a queer lens that it’s shocking no story put such a twist on these figures before Our Flag Means Death.

But the answer to why no one had might be captured somewhat in the response to Black Sails’ own voyage into queer storytelling.

To be fair, Black Sails does have queer characters from the outset — two women, Eleanor and Max — but the first season generally presents them under a leering male gaze, seemingly intended to titillate general audiences. The show’s interest in the revolutionary qualities of queerness didn’t take center stage until its second season. While it spawned a fervent following among some queer fans, it equally drew the ire of homophobes who felt betrayed by the reveal that half of the cast was queer. Reddit is littered with rants against the show’s “gay agenda” by lads who thought they were getting a show “just about pirates,” all part of an outcry that even got Flint’s actor, Toby Stephens, to comment. “Before the revelation I had this huge following from guys, but as soon as that happened it was like they had been betrayed. It was the sense of utter betrayal and I wasn’t surprised because I knew it was going to be a massive thing.” The degree of discomfort among men, that simply by being gay Flint no longer adhered to their rigid standard of a male icon, is hardly something that’s gone away.

In the present, though, the TV landscape has changed considerably since Black Sails aired. Streaming services have come to rule the roost and fracture the monoculture, and the pandemic has only further shaped that. Black Sails had to compete against The Wire, The Sopranos, and Game of Thrones to earn its place at the table. For Our Flag Means Death, which is much more a comedy than a drama (and not at all an epic genre TV series, though there are still plenty of old-fashioned stabbings), things are a little different.

While the special effects (the revolutionary StageCraft developed for The Mandalorian) that allow Our Flag Means Death to seem like it’s taking place at sea would have been reserved for much higher-budget shows only a few years ago, they’re a flourish for a series that largely takes place on small sets. It could’ve been a tiny budget sitcom a decade ago. That smaller scale may be what allowed it to take risks that, sadly, still feel daring in 2022. It’s not just a romance between Stede and Edward but an entire cast full of queer characters — a queerness that in its own context largely feels unremarkable, with the crew quietly tolerant and respectful of each other throughout the series.

In the last few years things have moved along, but even still, both shows had to operate under the very conditions of which they’re critical. As America and the U.K. both ramp up in homophobia and transphobia, with legislation seeking to target those vulnerable groups, the stories of Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death don’t feel like purely historical stories. They’re tales of the here and now. Pirates are a way to recontextualize those who society “others,” who are made outcasts and fringe by the mainstream. The shows invite us to ask why someone would choose to live on the edge, to unpack their histories and motives until their popular image is vanquished. To take the most well-known of pirates and to reframe them as traumatized queer outcasts is not intended as a historical rewrite but as a rebuttal of the very idea of a history written by the conquerors.

The British Empire present in both stories is depicted as an entity that is, at its worst, all-consuming barbarism and, at its best, all-consuming barbarism propped up by a veneer of civility. It’s an entity that not only destroys but warps reality around itself, reshaping history in its likeness.

In our present, queer people are once again being miscast as villains and boogeymen. In a way, Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death always dance on the edge of tragedy. Either they meet the same ends as their historical counterparts or we see the bittersweet truth of stories that are written out of history, their actions twisted into something evil. By giving that other perspective, by suggesting another account, these shows are a rallying cry for queer folk looking for their place in a world that doesn’t want them to exist at all — and a reminder to everyone who stands against us which side of history they’re on.

Source: Polygon

[linmeiwei]

Can you recommend any other (historical) romance that comes close to Georgette Heyer in terms of banter, witty flirtation and delightfully absurd plots? I love how often her couples have a shared sense of humour.

I wish I could give you a long list of romances that manage to get the chemistry and the banter as perfectly as GH, but I really didn’t find anything to compare in the genre.

The few in the romance genre I can recommend:

Tessa Dare. Her books are full of sex, so be warned, but I remember that A Week to be Wicked had good banter and was very funny. This is set in Regency England, but it’s American-romance-writer’s-historical-England so if you are very much addicted to historical accuracy this might not be for you.

I’m also a big fan of KJ Charles. She writes M/M romances, they are usually full of actually dangerous feeling adventure or intrigue, and she does do thorough research (something I really appreciate about GH) and is, in addition, witty and clever. Think of England is a particular favourite, set in the Edwardian era.

In other genres:

The love story between Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane in Strong Poison, Have His Carcase, Gaudy Night and Busman’s Honeymoon by Dorothy L. Sayers is full of flirtation, humour, genuine emotion and chemistry. These are set in the 1920s.

To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis is a time-travel science fiction book which features a delightful romance full of pining. The action takes place predominantly in Victorian England. The whole book is a delight tbh. And if you like this then Connie Willis’ CrossTalk is also a great sci-fi rom-com (I re-read it about once a year), but it’s set in the future so it’s neither historical nor a straight up romance (but the romantic story line is very strong).

I love Howl’s Moving Castle and the banter between Sophie and Howl is very, very good.

In terms of romances written long ago, if you have a good tolerance for old books (and I presume you’ve already read Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters) there is Evelina by Fanny Burney. It’s very of its time but it is quite funny. As it is written by an 18th century person of the 18th century, though, the interactions between hero and heroine are limited, and extremely chaste. 

I hope this was helpful! If anybody else has any good suggestions, please let us know! :)

[captain-k-jones]

Tag Game

I was tagged by @myletternevercame, @heartonfirewrites, and @fortysevenswrites - thank you for the tag ladies!

Name: Miranda

Nickname: I went by Mandi when I was a kid and in high school. By the time I got to college I was to lazy to correct the professors when they asked that I ended up just going with Miranda, now almost everyone I know just says Miranda. 

Zodiac sign: Libra

Height: 5′2″

Languages spoken: English and a very very small bit of Spanish (my husband’s mother is from Honduras so I have been around it for almost 18 years).

Nationality: American

Favorite season: Winter

Favorite flower: Tulips

Favourite scent: I have really bad allergies and am allergic to most scents - I typically will go with a vanilla or suger cookie. Its simple and doesn’t make my allergies crazy. 

Favourite colour: Black

Favourite animal: Dogs 

Favourite fictional character: Yeah, I cannot pick just one. Females: Karen Page, Buffy Summers, Lagertha, Kate Fuller, and Emma Swan. Males: Frank Castle, Killian Jones, Gannicus, Charles Vane, and Seth Gecko.

Coffee, Tea or Hot Chocolate?: Hot chocolate - I cannot have caffeine. 

Average sleep hours: 10-12 hrs. I require a lot of sleep.

Dog or cat person?: Dogs - 100000x dogs

Number of blankets you sleep with: Sheet, fleece, comforter, and another fleece -- so 3ish

Dream trip?: Right now: Maldives ( I am ready to go on vacation) but also Ireland & Italy

Blog established: August 2013 but I really didn’t start posting until June 2014

Number of followers: 1,828 ( And I am surprised most are still here after switching from primarily Captain Swan to Kastle.)

Random fact: I am a HUGE fan of heavy metal music but you wouldn’t know by looking at me. 

Tagging: @bottled-bliss, @anna-hawk, @thevampirecat, @lightblindingme, and @timeless-love-story (but no pressure to complete)

Hope you all are staying safe and healthy!

[nikkiwriteswords]

1/2) hey, could you please write fan fiction or one shot about Charles Vane x Reader from black sails. were the reader finds out that charles vane cheated on her with eleanor in his tent (episode 1.3) and Charles after hears a rumor about the reader being pregnant with his child and after he wants her back and wants to know if it is true but she is on her way with the walrus to charlestown because she is also a pirate (Female Pirate Captain Legend) and that is actually the second reason why

2/2) Charles Vane came to Charlestown to take over the ship and demand her to tell him the truth with a little fight with ends with fluff and angst and after they become the most awesome couple ever. and could you pls tag me into it as well so i know when it is ready if you want to write it 

(Idea posted with permission.) I'm afraid I have never watched Black Sails but you have a great plot idea there! Can anyone help @havik2006​ out or give them some inspiration?

[phenomenal1500]

~The Voices In His Head (II)~

Masterlist

A/N: Continuation of chapter 1, requested by NinaNyara on AO3. 

Summary: After finally accepting he likes the new charming male captain that has arrived in Nassau, they start to work together. 

Timeline: 2 months after chapter 1.

Pairing: Captain Charles Vane x Male!Reader.

"CHARLES!" Y/N yelled enthusiastically and stormed into the sleeping man's tent, laying down beside him. "Wake up handsome." He lowered his voice just a little bit but kept his enthusiasm.

"What." The Captain grumbled and Y/N laughed a little, knowing after 2 months of knowing him he hated to be woken up like this.

"Open your eyes and look at me."

"I prefer not to." Charles turned to his side and buried his face into the comfortable pillow behind him.

"Look at me." Y/N demanded it this time and pulled the pillow from underneath him, Charles groaning in annoyance when his head hit the hard mattress. "We got an anonymous lead...."

"We do?" He instantly woke up completely and stared at the other man in disbelief.

It had been hard for them to get leads after Eleanor refused to give them any.

"Yeah, and we're leaving right now because we can't have anyone arriving there before we do now, can we?" The man shrugged sarcastically and got up, pulling the other Captain up with him.

"No we can't." Charles got dressed quickly, grabbing his weapons and wrapping their holders around his waist as well. "What is it about though?"

"The gold Flint was after.... he failed to get it and now it's lying, unprotected and without a crew to secure it, on a small island." Charles' exhausted eyes lit up just a little bit and he smirked at the man before him, suddenly kissing him roughly. "And what did I do to deserve that?"

"Being the smart ass you are. Let's go!" Charles left the tent and yelled back at the man, him rushing to the coast line with him. Once arrived there, both men said a simple goodbye to each other there and then climbed onto their own ships to set sail together. Apparently, Y/N had already packed everything in the middle of the night so everything was already arranged and they could leave quickly.

Weeks filled with sailing came to an end when they spotted the Urca gold laying on the white beach of the island they had been told it would be laying on, no Spanish soldiers anywhere to be seen. Charles had made his way onto the other captain's ship, walking into his cabin to talk to him.

"Y/N?" He opened the door slowly and quietly closed it again, secretly smiling when he saw the captain sitting behind his desk peacefully while staring out of the window next to his desk.

It had been a long while since they saw each other because they both had their own ships and so they sadly couldn't cross over to the other's and it made Charles' heart warm up to see him this close again.

He really seemed to love him....

"We fucking found it, Charles." Y/N got up from his chair slowly, still staring out of the huge window that had a perfect view on the Spanish gold.

"Thanks to you." The man grabbed a bottle of rum and pointed at him with it before taking a big sip.

"Captain Charles Vane praising someone else? That's new." Y/N chuckled and he rolled his eyes, putting down the liquor before walking to him.

"Only you because you've been a great partner." Charles positioned himself next to Y/N and stared at the gold as well, the gold that was now being taken into small sloops by their crews to bring it on board.

"Been? You're thinking about replacing me?" The man was joking of course and Charles smirked a little, keeping his eyes on the shiny gold while deciding to play along.

"Perhaps, because partners sounds so impersonal."

"Then if I'm not your partner anymore, what do you want me to be?" Y/N finally switched his attention to the man next to him and raised his brow in a cocky way, very curious to what the man would answer.

"For you to be mine." Charles growled and looked back at him too, Y/N's jaw dropping a little.

"As in-...." He couldn't find the right words and stumbled a bit until Charles interrupted him again.

"Lovers."

A short silence followed, a small moment where both men just stared into each other's eyes quietly, and then they both smiled.

"I would love that."

"Perfect, now come here." Charles ordered and Y/N got closer, feeling his arms sneak around his waist before Charles' lips found Y/N's lips, them smiling against each other's lips before they kissed deeply.

The kiss felt so different from the others.

The kiss felt passionate yet rough, lustful yet filled with love.

This is what Charles had wanted all along, this was the true him, and he figured it out all thanks to one simple man that had walked into Nassau one day. He honestly loved him more than he had loved anyone in his life and he would fight for him as Y/N would fight for Charles too.