#EDITH!! SHE IS CANON NOW

[chempack]

i’m watching the chaos of some brotherhood knights fighting a group of super mutants, crashing the vertibird, getting mutant suicide bombed, somehow setting off like two unrelated car explosions. and then i turn around and see preston chilling and enjoying a drink

[hareofhrair]

Edith Finch Timeline

So I'm still organizing my theories (honestly they're more like a list of unanswered questions than a coherent theory right now) but I think my timeline is pretty much complete now that I've had a chance to go back through the pet cemetery and add all those in.

I do some wild speculating about Odin here that has no canon basis, just spinning ideas.

Things to notice- Just how many deaths happen on or very near birthdays. Not always the birthday of the person who dies and not every time, but suspiciously often.

The pets almost seem to fill in the years when no one human died? Like everything in this game it's nothing definitive enough to base a solid theory on, but it is odd.

TIMELINE

1439 - Earliest possible beginning of the Finch Family Curse based on the Odin viewmaster reel, as this is 500 years prior to the invention of the first viewmaster.

1445 - If the Odin viewmaster is the Model E made in 1955 (which I think it is), this is the start of the curse instead. Not much is happening in Norway during this period, but Vlad the Impaler was at the top of his game this year?

~About 7 generations of Finches dying horribly happens here.~

1880 - Odin is born. At some point between now and his death he writes "The Mysteries of Death and the Thereafter" and "Joining the Great Majority" which both appear to be books about the afterlife.

1896 - Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration begins with the Belgian Antarctic Expedition and won't end till after WWI. Expeditions are marked by depression, starvation, insanity and scurvy. Many famous expeditions are made by Norwegian teams. Odin is 16.

1911 - A Norwegian expedition is first to reach the South Pole. The British Scott expedition chasing the same goal are lost. Odin is 31.

28 July 1914 - WWI begins, Odin is 34. Norway, "The Neutral Ally", remains neutral on the war but due to economic pressure from Britain commits its merchant marine fleet (one of the largest in the world) to Britain's service. Half the fleet is sunk and 2000 seamen are killed. If Odin was a sailor, he likely served. Alternatively, he may have been one of the wealthy merchants who profited greatly during the war. He clearly has a great deal of money to burn by 1937.

June 17 1915 - Sven is born.

April 8, 1917 - Edie is born.

1935 - At some point between now and Dec 1937, Edie and Sven marry and Sven takes Edith's last name.

1936 - Ingeborg and her newborn Johann Finch die in an unknown manner. Odin is 56, Edie is 19, Sven is 17.

Jan 7 1937 - Odin sets sail for Washington.

Dec 1937 - Arrival on Orcas Island, death of Odin at 57. Molly is born, on the boat? In the Old House? Sven and Edie build the cemetery, and then the house.

1938 - Churpy the budgie joins the family.

1939 - Invention of the viewmaster, earliest point the Odin story could have been recorded.

Sep 1939 - Sep 1945 - WWII. Sven was 24, and may have served or been drafted.

1940 - Burpy the house finch joins the family.

1941 - Churpy dies.

1947 - Christopher the goldfish joins the family.

Oct 31 1947 - Halloween Baby Barbara

Sometime between 1937 and 1947 - Molly's unnamed gerbil joins the family.

Dec 13 1947 - Molly dies of apparent poisoning after eating mistletoe berries, on or very near her 10th bday. She relates hallucinating having become several animals, most notably a cat. Christopher the fish dies shortly after. The fate of her unnamed gerbil is unrecorded, as none of the unattributed headstones are of the right age, but presumably it dies eventually.

1948 - Burpy dies at 8.

April 25 1950 - Sam and Calvin are born.

Aug 26 1952 - Walter is born.

1952 - Lurpy the Cockatiel joins the family.

1955 - Viewmaster Model E released- If this is the one used for Odin's story, that puts the beginning of the curse at 1455.

1956 - Lucy the dog joins the family.

1959 - Bailey the (???) joins the family.

Oct 31 1960 - Barbara dies, allegedly murdered, on her 16th bday. Her boyfriend Rick disappears the same night. The version of her death shared in the game is notably extremely unreliable and raises numerous questions. Rick is seen in a leg cast using crutches. Walter is 8, Sam and Calvin are 10 and notably absent from reported events.

Sept 23 1961 - Calvin dies at 11 falling from a cliff. He is seen wearing a weathered and heavily autographed leg cast. His model shows him with a black eye and several cuts.

1962 - Zoe the (???) joins the family.

1963 - Lurpy dies at 11. (Cockatiels have a life expectancy of 20-25 years)

Aug 26 1964 - Sven dies on Walter's 12th bday, while making a dragon shaped slide. He's 49.

1968 - Walter enters the bunker. He's 16. Durpy the Dove joins the family.

May 7 1968 - Dawn is born.

1969 - Lucy the dog dies.

June 20 1969 - Gus is born.

1970 - Zoe dies

1971 - Purply the Budgie joins the family.

1974 - Coco the (???) joins the family.

Jan 12 1976 - Gregory is born

Dec 7 1977 - Kay files for divorce after arguing with Sam about the curse.

Dec 19 1977 - Gregory drowns in the bath a month before his 2nd bday

1978 - Shadow the cat joins the family.

1979 - Purply dies at 8.

1980 - Rob the Bearded Dragon joins the family. Bob the Snake joins the family.

1981 - Durpy dies at 13.

1982 - Oliver the rabbit joins the family.

Nov 8 1982 - Gus dies, crushed by debris from a storm during Sam's wedding to an unnamed woman.

July 16 1983 - Sam dies, kicked off a cliff by a deer. Dawn is 15.

1984 - Bob dies at 4.

1985 - Daisy the (???) joins the family.

1986-87 Dawn goes to India, meets Sanjay.

1988 - Shadow the cat dies.

Dec 27 1988 - Lewis is born. Furpy joins the family. Tucker the (???) joins the family

1989 - Oliver the rabbit dies.

1991 - Rob dies at 10. Furpy dies.

1992 - Zurpy the Owl joins the family.

May 19 1992 - Milton is born.

1993 - Charlie the cat joins the family. Daisy dies.

1994 - Durpy Jr the Dove joins the family.

1995 - Zurpy dies at 3. Schatzi the (???) joins the family.

Feb 14 1999 - Valentine's Baby Edith. Lowest tide in a thousand years allegedly allows Edie to access the Old House. At some point between now and Nov 2010, three unnamed gerbils join the family, and then die.

Feb 22 2002 - Sanjay dies in an earthquake, eight days after Edith's 3rd bday, Dawn and children return to Finch House. Dawn writes "To Teach and To Learn" at some point in the next few years. At some point between now and 2010, Dawn probably finds a stray cat and names it Molly.

Oct 23 2003 - Milton disappears.

Late 2003 to Early 2004 - Dawn searches for Milton, eventually gives up and seals the rooms for unknown reasons.

March 31 2005 - Walter leaves the bunker and dies, allegedly hit by a train. There are several strange inconsistencies surrounding the circumstances of his death.

2006 - Durpy Jr dies at 12.

2009 - Schatzi dies

Nov 21 2010 - Lewis dies of apparent suicide one month before his 22nd bday.

Nov 28 2010 - A week after Lewis's death, Dawn informs Edie they are leaving the house. After Edie attempts to give Edith a book containing a story about their family which Dawn violently rips away, Dawn flees the house with Edith immediately, leaving Edie and all her belongings behind.

(Molly the cat is not mentioned in regards to the move, so she may have died by this point, but she is not listed in the graveyard, so it's possible she was simply left behind. There is a taxidermy calico in Sam's room, but Sam was dead before Molly could reasonably have joined the family, so this is unlikely to be her. A cat is seen outside human Molly's room in 2016, which may prove she's still alive- but she'd be around 14 years old. An unlikely age for a cat abandoned outdoors for 7 years.)

Nov 29 2010 - Edie is found dead by nursing care workers, and may have killed herself by combining alcohol with her medication, intentionally or otherwise. She's 93, the only member of her family to live longer than her father, who died at 57.

Dec 5 2010 - The date on Edie's tombstone, a week after when she supposedly died.

May (around the 12-18th?) 2016 - Edith becomes pregnant.

Oct 12 2016 - Dawn dies of a chronic illness at 48. Edith is 16 and about 6 months pregnant.

Oct 13 - 19 2016 - Edith returns to the Finch House at 22 weeks pregnant.

Jan 18 2017 - Edith dies in childbirth a month before her 18th bday. Christopher is born (possibly named for Molly's goldfish?).

2027? - At some point in the future, a young Christopher returns to the house, which has changed since the last time it was seen. He is wearing a cast.

A note on unrecorded pets- There are additionally 5 (possibly 6?) unmarked pet graves in the cemetery. One of the blank stones presumably belongs to Rob the bearded dragon, who has a memorial in Edie's room but no gravestone. One is marked as a fish and another is a rabbit, with no names or dates. One is a knocked over and unreadable sign of the same kind used for the birds, indicating it may be an otherwise unrecorded bird. There is also a statue of a frog- the knocked over sign may instead refer to an unrecorded pet frog, or the frog statue might be a separate gravestone, or simply a decoration. This leaves one blank headstone with no indication of what might lie beneath it. Let's assume it's a mass grave for gerbils.

[floralcrematorium]

A band AU nobody asked for? COUNT ME IN!!!!

I've been tormenting my poor friends with this since the idea of Hetalia Band AU popped into my head -- I'm talking throwing my rapid-fire ideas at multiple people while actively trying to navigate the train station after a concert. Do not recommend.

ANYWAY! MISS SEYCHELLES!

I'm very very excited to design more outfits for her <3 She's very visually inspired by Meet Me @ The Altar's lead singer, Edith Victoria, whose fashion sense I've adored for a couple years now. With Sey, I want to mix the edgy and heavy rock aesthetic with the cute and flowy clothing she wears in canon

Michèle is still the bubbly girl we know and love. If Alfred's not hogging the spotlight, she's actually the one who talks the most during interviews. She has SO many ideas and has a hard time picking just one project to work on. Vocally, I imagine her voice to be similar to Ashrita Kumar's - the lead singer of Pinkshift. She mainly does backing vocals, but every now and then, she and Alfred duet

She grew up playing piano, but switched to drums sometime in middle school. She's closest with Matthew, as they've been best friends for a majority of their lives

If anyone's going to make it as a solo artist, it's Michèle. But... the band won't break up. Surely. They'll definitely remain a band and have a long and happy career. Deeefinitely

[marzipanandminutiae]

A Crimson Peak Timeline

(based on the art book, documents shown onscreen in the movie, and the character bios GDT wrote- where the bios don't contradict film canon. I've attempted to combine the two where contradicting elements are unavoidable.

Sometime during the reign of Charles II (1660-1685). Edward Sharpe created Baronet for services to the crown in providing clay for construction projects. Allerdale Hall built in the parish of Above Derwent, Cumberland, England.

1841. Carter Everett Cushing born the second son of six in an impoverished family that traveled the eastern US for his father's masonry business.

1863. Beatrice Alexandra Chetwynde, eldest daughter of a large, wealthy family, marries Baronet James William Sharpe. The marriage is contracted solely for the Chetwyndes' land, which adjoins the Sharpe estate.

April 1, 1865. Lucille Sharpe born.

Sometime between 1865 and ~1873. Carter marries 18-year-old socialite Eleanor Wyndham-Beckford, to the immense disapproval of her family. Though she is disowned and the couple struggles to make ends meet for years, Carter ultimately becomes a successful developer.

February 18, 1867. Thomas Sharpe born.

C. 1867-1872. The Sharpes employ a wet nurse- and later nanny -named Theresa, who would become the only adult to care about the children in their lives. She would ultimately be sacked after Beatrice caught young Lucille snuggling with her for warmth on a winter's night (on the grounds that a noble child should not be close with servants- a "crime" for which Lucille was beaten severely).

1876. 11-year-old Lucille murders her father with poison distilled from mine tailings, after he took Thomas on a hunting trip and left him in the woods to die of exposure.

Late 1876? A mining vein near Allerdale Hall collapses, killing several child mine-workers. I could have sworn I read somewhere that James foolishly dug a mining tunnel under the house shortly before his death, and that's what destabilized it, but I can't find it now.

October 9, 1877. Edith M. Cushing born, after Eleanor had suffered several miscarriages.

1878. Thomas and Lucille begin a secret sexual relationship.

Early August, 1879. Beatrice catches Lucille and Thomas together; Lucille murders her to keep their secret. The siblings try to run away together but are caught and brought back. Thomas is sent to live with an aunt and uncle in Whitehaven (who in turn send him to boarding school), while Lucille is forced into a mental institution.

Probably summer, 1885. Thomas finishes his schooling and rescues Lucille; they return to Allerdale.

1887. The Sharpe siblings travel to London seeking investors for Thomas' venture to reopen the mines. A wealthy, terminally ill gentleman, Major Richard Upton, takes a liking to Thomas and begs Thomas to marry his disabled daughter, Pamela. At Lucille's urging- since they're running out of both options and money -Thomas agrees. The two attempt to poison Pamela to death, but Lucille ends up strangling her instead.

Sometime between October 1887 and October 1888. Eleanor Cushing dies of cholera and appears to Edith as a ghost.

Early-mid 1890s. Carter and the recently widowed Mrs. McMichael have a brief flirtation that both Edith and Eunice oppose. Though it goes nowhere, the rift between the two girls is never healed.

Late October or November 1892. Edith (age 15) becomes infatuated with a 25-year-old poet who is having marital difficulties. After convincing Carter to hire him as a tutor, all unknowing, she confesses her feelings to him. He not only takes his leave of the Cushing family, but of Buffalo itself, quickly moving away with his wife and children.

1893. The Sharpes travel to Edinbrugh, where Thomas again finds no investors but does attract the attention of a 36-year-old widow of means, Margaret McDermott. Once again, he marries her and helps Lucille poison her, though she is ultimately killed via blunt force trauma.

Summer 1893. Edith asks her best friend, Alan McMichael, to kiss her so she can write about kisses more accurately. It means nothing to her, but sparks an unrequited passion in Alan

1896. Lucille falls pregnant by Thomas. He travels with her to Italy, which he loves and she despises. There he meets a wealthy woman named Enola Sciotti, widowed and bereaved of her only child, and decides of his own accord to marry and murder her in their usual fashion. The Sharpes and Enola return to Allerdale.

1897. Lucille is delivered of a son, who may or may not be sickly. Enola tries to care for her and the child, promising she can save him. The baby either dies of natural causes or Lucille smothers him under the conviction that his cries mean something is terribly wrong with him and he can't live- this is one contradiction in the bios vs. the movie that I prefer to leave vague, since it's possible not even Lucille remembers what happened. Either way, she blames Enola and dispatches her by unknown means. Thomas patents his excavating machine.

Late summer(?) 1901. Alan returns from studying medicine in London and sets up an ophthalmology practice in Buffalo. Edith's debut novel, Figures In The Mist, is rejected for publication by Oglivie and Sons. Thomas seeks investment in the mines from Cushing and Co., unsuccessfully. Edith and the Sharpes begin a friendship. Edith sees her mother's ghost for the second time.

September 14, 1901. President William McKinley dies after being shot at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo. I include this because the fact that the movie doesn't is hilarious to me.

October 21, 1901. At the Cushings' dinner party, Carter bribes the Sharpes to leave, instructing Thomas to break Edith's heart or he'll tell her about the marriage to Pamela. A deleted scene reveals that he was on the verge of relenting and investing in the mines when he read the private investigator's report.

October 22, 1901. Lucille murders Carter at his club, then departs to return to England. Thomas and Edith become engaged.

Late October-early November 1901. Thomas and Edith are married and travel to Allerdale.

November-December 1901 (possibly into early 1902?). The rest of the movie's plot.

[moo9395]

My Ghosts headcanons

I've had these sitting in a google doc for ages so I might as well hand them over.

I've split them into stuff that 'could take place in canon' and 'modern au' stuff

Robin:

Fluent in multiple languages (kind of canon but whatever)

He has a PhD in astrophysics 

Humphrey:

He gets migraines

He’s a teacher (this is quite popular), Headteacher humphrey is cool as well

Failed his driving test 4 times in a row

Coffee gives Humphrey headaches so he drinks more of it. 

Mary:

She was a girl guide (me coded) (Credit to @kingofthefrogs swapped au for inspo)

Welsh (me coded)

Dyslexic

Kitty:

Can be heard on a spirit box (Credit to kingofthefrogs)

Likes Call the Midwife.

She is a Nurse or Doctor, possibly a paediatrician. Haven’t seen this done yet but I think it could be fun given her fascination with Maddocks’ injury.

She loves iced coffee.

Thomas:

He is scared of dogs (channeling me right now) Dante is a weird exception to this that Fanny often complains about but secretly is proud of.

He can experience temperature as a ghost. (Credit to Ailendolin) He is susceptible to heat stroke and sometimes gets a cold, especially after going in the lake.

He's left handed

He is dyslexic and/or short sighted. Bonus if he refuses to wear glasses. Double bonus if this gives him constant headaches.

Studied abroad in Holland for 2 years and developed a weed addiction, he moved back to the UK to get over it

Coffee gives Thomas headaches so he doesn’t drink it. 

Fanny:

Hypochondriac. 

Incredible at Netball (she's such a netball girlie) she plays wing attack or centre

Captain:

He has reading glasses.

Scared of chickens (Alektorophobia) (Inspired by @upsetslingshot on ao3)

Cap was in army cadets (me coded) and loved it.

Pat:

He's claustrophobic, he was in life and the fact that he died while struggling to breathe has worsened that.

He’s basically blind without his glasses. (like Velma type blind)

Road rage.

Julian:

Has hemophobia (fear of blood)

Julian was in army cadets and hated it.

Multi Character (mostly modern au stuff):

Thomas, Fanny, and Mary love watching Downton Abbey. Thomas is a passionate fan of Edith, Mary likes Sybil, and Fanny is a big fan of Violet Crawley (as she should be).

All autistic (Julian and Robin AuDHD).

Cap, Thomas, Mary, and Julian are cat people

Pat, Robin, and Fanny are dog people

Humphrey and Kitty passionately refuse to pick a side.

Thomas, Cap, Pat, Fanny and Julian are tea people.

Humphrey, Kitty, Mary and Robin are coffee people.

Robin and Humphrey as siblings/ twins.

Thomas and Kitty met in school. Thomas was being picked on and Kitty defended him.

Julian and Robin met in Cambridge Uni, Robin was doing an astrophysics PhD, Julian was doing his classmates a masters in politics.

Cap and Fanny play badminton together.

They have a group football team (more on that later)

Mary and Robin hooked up once (I know its canon but I love when it also happens in modern au's)

Hogwarts houses:

Hufflepuff - Humphrey, Pat, Mary

Gryffindor - Robin, Julian

Ravenclaw - Fanny, Thomas, Kitty

Slytherin - Cap

I'm very willing to elaborate and hear other opinions on this.

Mario Kart mains:

Robin - Bowser

Humphrey - Shy Guy

Mary - Yoshi

Kitty - Daisy

Thomas - Peach

Fanny - Toadette

Captain - Luigi

Pat - Koopa Troopa

Julian - Donkey Kong

The football team (my pride and joy):

Robin - goalkeeper, he once scored from a goal kick

Humphrey - defence, very good at headers (lol) but is frequently injured mainly due to being clumsy

Kitty - defence, she gets very invested in the game and will break knees (while apologising) 

Cap - defence, it took him a while to pick up the sport but he’s thriving, works very well with Humphrey and Kitty

Thomas - surprisingly good left winger, other teams generally see him (being himself) before the game  and write him off as a weaker player - he loves proving them wrong

Fanny - right wing, her and thomas make a weirdly good duo, she's absolutely incredible at penalties 

Pat - central midfielder and the team captain (Cap conceded that maybe Pat was a little bit better than him at football and should take the lead ‘just this once’)

Mary - Striker, really strong with both feet, closes her eyes when she takes a shot but somehow is still usually on target 

Julian - Striker, solid player but is frequently sent off for inappropriate celebrations

I had way too much fun re-reading these.

PLEASE USE THEM AND SEND ME THE FICS IM OBSESSED.

[the-cu-genswap-au]

hey hey, welcome to the first official post on this blog!

First order of business: updated refs for the cast! Starting with what I've been calling the "Main Quintet," or just the core cast of kid characters. I'll be posting a couple more of these bios to tide everyone over while I plan out the next comic.

Massive dump of information incoming:

- Ben Krupp takes the main character spot for this AU. Like mainverse Krupp, he's kind of grouchy and impatient and likes to stick to the rules, but there's meant to be a feeling of.... performance to it in this AU. He's had to take on a lot of new responsibilities in the family after losing his dad a few months ago and it's resulted in him feeling like he has to give up his childhood and be Mature™ now. The kid's stressed.

- Despite this, though, he still secretly holds on to his love of the Captain Underpants comics. He sees the fictional hero as a role model of sorts, the kind of person he wants to aspire to be. His attempts to be that kind of person, though, usually tend to fall a little flat....

- Design note: Ben's main color motif is green, but the bits of red are there as a nod to Cap's color motif. Ben may not actually be Cap in this AU, but I still wanted there to be a physical link between the two.

- Jasper Krupp is Ben's younger brother, the middle child of the Krupp family, and the glue that holds this whole group together. Unlike his brother, Jasper is a lot more open and friendly, and a lot more trusting and empathetic. He's a sweet kid, but like his brother, there's a hint of performance to his behavior, too.....

- Design note: the majority of Jasper's character in this AU is based off of my personal headcanons for Jasper, since he's pretty much a blank slate of a character otherwise. Canon is but putty in my hands etc. etc.

- Toilette Ree and his younger brother Lavatore are the new kids in town, having moved from Quebec to Piqua over the summer. It's been.... hard adjusting to the move. The other kids at Jerome Horwitz haven't exactly been making it easy for them, either. But hey, that's why they've got each other!

- Toilette is the more rowdy and confrontational of the two, but mostly when it comes to defending his brother. When he cools off he likes to put on this snarky, cooler-than-you attitude to make himself seem more formidable than his tiny frame would suggest. It.... doesn't really work all that well.

- In his spare time, he has a budding interest in engineering

- Lavatore, by contrast, comes off as the more timid, less aggressive brother, but that's only because he has a tendency to fall back on Toilette whenever the two of them are in trouble. When he's not struggling to survive third grade, Lavatore's actually a pretty nice, chill kid, with a surprising rebellious streak to his personality that comes out whenever he's emboldened enough.

- Design note: Toilette and Lavatore have the same color motifs as Ben and Jasper (green/blue). This is only partially accidental on my part.

- Design note: Toilette's hair curl is essential

- Edith (they never caught her last name) rounds out the core cast as Ben and Jasper's closest (and only) friend. A quiet, painfully shy girl, Edith has a hard time fitting in with the other kids at Jerome Horwitz Elementary, not that she isn't trying. Sometimes she can't help but think that the other kids can just tell that she's different, somehow....

- In her free time, Edith has a huge passion for baking. She likes to share whatever she makes at home with Ben and Jasper, her self-proclaimed biggest fans.

- Design note: Edith's color palette is an inversion of her mainverse counterpart's colors—mainly yellow with red highlights instead of mainly red with yellow highlights

[dollarstoreartsupplies]

For the Drabble/doodle prompt:

Fem!Reddie But I’m a Cheerleader AU

ohhhh babey hell yeah

me and @haaawaiianshirt actually discussed this au like a million years ago but I genuinely can't remember who was who, so after like a full forty five minutes of staring at a wall, thinking about Them, I reengineered it to make eddie megan... except she still gets to be a little butch

ficlet below cut:

i haven't written these babies in so long so I sincerely apologize if im rusty but have some Eddie-specific, non-canon scene, but i'm a cheerleader vibes:

Eddie… didn’t quite see it working out like this.

Which to be perfectly fair, isn’t, like out of the picture. The past almost two months have been exclusively didn’t quite see it working out like this. 

Being accused of lesbianism, being sent to conversion therapy, and, goddamnit, especially not the accusation being right.

But when she’d been sitting outside the office, panic coursing through her nervous system, waiting, Eddie had genuinely thought that she was going to lie. She was fully prepared to pretend she was straight, to say that none of it had ever happened. That she’d never loved Richie Tozier and she was so, horribly, incredibly excited to graduate into a dull, mind-numbingly pink life of heterosexuality.

Richie was going to look at her with huge, betrayed eyes. Richie was going to get kicked out. She’d already carved out a place in her brain for the guilt.

Eddie was a good girl, Eddie was a catholic girl, Eddie was her mother’s perfect daughter, Eddie was a fucking cheerleader. Richie was the brave, snarky, proud-to-be-a-dyke one, not her.

But for some fucking reason, staring her mother down as tears and snot dripped down her face, demanding she reconsider, while Robert fucking Gray in neat little blue suit grinned at her and told her she could have a second chance, she couldn’t do it. Fuck that, she’d thought, considering a life of boyfriends and a raised ranch in the suburbs and two and a half kids, Fuck that.

Richie had said she was braver than she fucking thought that night, her hand slid under her skirt in the back of the Cocksucker, her voice all soft and smiley and genuine. She hadn’t really realized that she’d meant it comparatively. That Eddie was brave because Richie wasn’t.

Maybe that wasn’t fair. Eddie just… doesn’t know how to feel fair right now. 

She was supposed to leave with her and she hadn’t.

(The spot in her head she’d reserved for betraying-Richie guilt has been instead taken up with the image of Richie herself, pale and crying and more quiet than she’d ever seen her be, mouthing silent ‘I’m so sorry’s. With the words, ‘It’s been decided, then. Richie will do the simulation with Connor. Edith, you can go.’)

Adrien and Don had told her to take her time with the whole thing. Stan had rolled their eyes and told her that she’d get over it. She doesn’t think either of them are fucking right.

Not when she’s so fucking mad and confused, and every time she closes her eyes she pictures Conner fucking Bowers, sleazy, gay Conner Bowers, simulating sex that she knows Richie doesn’t want to have. 

She stares hard at the ceiling of her new bedroom. It’s smaller than her one at home, the walls painted a bright, angry red, and self-help books and dyke memoirs and magazines she knows you can’t buy in the grocery stores unsubtly sitting on the bedside table. 

It’s a weird, hands off sort of acceptance she’s not used to. And it’s better than her Mother’s cloying need to have control, but it almost makes her uncomfortable.

She doesn’t know what the fuck she’s doing, in general and as a fucking lesbian and… god, maybe it’s selfish but she almost wishes Richie were here just so she could tell her the steps. 

Richie was the same age as her, sure, but she had more experience with this whole thing. She’d kissed girls, she knew what fucking… scissoring meant, she was good at it, she had the fucking training hours and everything that Eddie specifically lacked. 

(Though, she realizes, maybe that's the difference.

Richie knew. Richie came into this whole thing well aware she was a lesbian. From what she’d whispered, hidden in the dark corners of New Horizons, when they’d stopped making out just long enough to talk, it’d been one of the openly apparent things everyone around her knew and hated since she was thirteen. 

All her sex talk and bold sexuality shit that Eddie’d been so intimidated by at first, that she kind of longs for now, was just a defense mechanism that could be easily broken down and manipulated. 

Eddie… had honestly just never considered the idea before her mom sent her away.

Having sex with Conner would have grossed her out before, probably. She’d never even wanted to kiss Myran when they were dating, and now that she knew why, she wasn’t about to back down.

Somehow, Richie having more time to figure everything out made it even more complicated.

Christ, it’s not like any of this shit feels simple for Eddie, though.)

Without thinking about it she kicks herself off her bed and slams into the bathroom. 

‘Sweetheart, don’t worry about being a perfect lesbian,’ Adrian had soothed when she’d shown up, crying with suitcases, ‘Just worry about being yourself.’

It’d probably been good advice. If she’d known who the fuck she was.

She knew she was a cheerleader, that one had just been a fact.

She knew she was a lesbian, she’d figured that one out fast and then let it sink it incredibly slowly. 

She knew she was angry and she knew she was sad, and she knew that Richie might have had a point about her being brave. And that one had been after doing something impulsive and maybe stupid. 

She doesn’t really have time to recreate the first two, slowly burned life changes, but she can probably do the impulsive stupid one again. 

The least she could do was try, she thinks, digging in one of the drawers under the sink until she finds what she’s looking for. 

Her hair falls in clumps as she hacks at it with dull, bathroom cabinet scissors, uneven and probably ugly and she’s gonna have to get someone to fix it. Suddenly, though, she doesn’t think she gives a shit. 

She wonders if it’s a cliche, a dyke with short hair. She’s not necessarily sure she cares any more. Her head feels lighter than it ever has. 

She wonders why the fuck she hadn’t done this earlier, short hair would be so much easier for cheer than a fucking hair-sprayed stiff blow out. 

She wonders if Richie would like it. 

Richie. 

Fuck.

(Mother fucker… well, impulsive and stupid worked twice, right?)

She slams into Stan’s bedroom, the sudden plan shaking its way out of her skin too hard to take anything slow. They blink up from their book and look her over, cocking an eyebrow, “Nice hair.”

“Thank you,” She grins, feeling hot all over and shaky and kind of like she’s gonna pass out. Just, in a good way, somehow, “Wanna go crash the graduation tomorrow?”

[fuckyeahdindjarin]

Hello, love! Congrats on the follower milestone! I’m sorry I’m so late. I’ve been super busy the past couple of days. If no one has sent in a request for Jack to see Shiv, I’d love to read how that interaction would go. If you want. Please and thank you. You’re the best. ☺️❤️

Sarah, my love! Thank you for sending Jack to Shiv's salon, the cowboy yearning is real ❤️ While this is not Palomino Jack, it's definitely a softer version of him compared to canon. I hope you like it babe!

Shiv's Salon: Jack Daniels

548 words | warnings: Jack is an outrageous flirt, which is an actual endangerment to life. He's also an unapologetic attention whore.

It's the first of the month, which means two things.

One, your favourite ladies - a trio of grandmothers who have been your regulars since you started up the salon - are here for their monthly blowout and tea session.

And two, Jack Daniels will be coming in for his monthly haircut.

You can't help that your eyes flicker to the clock on the wall. You don't know if it's a habit, or if somehow, you can actually sense him coming.

At exactly three on the dot, the door to the salon swings wide open.

You have no idea what he actually does for a living that allows him to stroll in for a leisurely haircut in the middle of the afternoon, but you'll bet those polished western boots have never touched stirrup irons, and the cowboy hat is more for show than for function.

One corner of his mouth tugged upwards in a roguish grin, and he all but purrs in his honeyed baritone. 'Howdy, ladies.'

You roll your eyes at the collective, feminine sigh that cuts through the salon. This man is a lady killer of the highest order and he never misses.

Jack sidles up to you first at the counter, not missing your reaction to his dramatic entrance, holding up your coffee order from your favourite place - he never comes empty-handed.

'No smile for ol' Jack today, honey?'

'Isn't it enough that you have the whole salon fawning over you?' you shoot back without any real sting, taking the paper cup from him and setting it on the counter.

'Don't be jealous, sweetheart,' he chides, leaning across the counter to pin you with his warm, playful eyes. 'You know I have a thing for women in charge, and you're very much the boss here.'

'Hey!' calls out Ashton from where he's adjusting the salon dryer for Prue. 'Don't play favourites now, mister, that's not fair!'

Jack winks at you, then turns to cross the salon with a swagger that is uniquely his, placating his captive audience. 'Ladies, ladies! There's no need to fight over me, there's plenty of this ol' cowboy to go 'round!'

He absolutely loves being the centre of attention and to his credit, he repays it threefold. He asks after Ashton's Grindr escapades, compliments Edith on her new lipstick and thanks Betty for the cobbler recipe she gave him last month.

By the time his adoring crowd lets him go, you're waiting for him by his usual chair, the coffee he bought you buzzing in your bloodstream.

He takes off his hat and tweed jacket, hangs them on the coat rack, then settles into the styling chair, meeting your eyes in the mirror. 'What about you, honey? Still going out with that boyfriend of yours?'

'It will be the same answer no matter how many times you ask - it's none of your business, cowboy,' you answer firmly, running your fingers through his hair to gauge the length.

Undeterred, he smiles, the corners of his eyes crinkling endearingly. 'You know being mean to me will only make me fall in love with you, don't you?'

You shake your head, and despite yourself, your lips twitch into a smile. 'Is it a threat or a challenge, Jack Daniels?'

He grins. 'Whatever you'd like it to be, sweetheart.'

Fuck Yeah 1.2k Sleepover

[more-than-tender-curiosity]

While we’re here. Here’s a canon hair/eye color chart. With evidence.

Nick: Blonde/Blue/Green the evidence is very marginal and I usually disregard it, but it does say: “This idea is that we’re Nordics. I am, and you are, and you are, and—” After an infinitesimal hesitation he included Daisy with a slight nod..." 'Nordic' was eventually coopted by the Nazis as a companion word to their Aryan bullshit, and in 1924 (when this part was likely written) there were even some measures to separate 'dark whites' (Italians, Jewish people, etc) from 'lighter' white people. All bullshit, but all this to say the implication at the time of writing would have meant light hair and light eyes. Also. Fitz had blonde hair and blue eyes and we know about this fucker and his self-insertion. Like I said I usually ignore this but it is kind of funny because I have never once seen a representation of nick with anything other than brown or black hair Jay: Blonde(?)/Blue This comes from the Princeton holograph. since fitz decided to deprive us in the final product. For his hair: "...his bright suit and hair..." (pg 139). jay's suit is caramel colored in this scene so the closest I can imagine is that his suit and hair are of a similar color, like perhaps a reddish blonde at most but certainly blonde at the very least, if the description lends to anything. Fitz wrote as follows in regards to Jay's eyes: "...at a table with a handsome blue-eyed man..." (pg 103); "...the blue-eyed man looked at me..." (pg 103); (he also calls them handsome eyes on page 105.......); "dark blue eyes opening out into lashes of shining jet" (pg 105); "...with such a wild look in his blue eyes..." (pg 115); "...his eyes, damp and shining like blue oil..." (pg 131); "...damp and shining like blue oil..." (again) (pg 137); and i think that's enough thank you scott Daisy: Dark(?)/?? There's two bits of evidence, mainly, for Daisy's dark hair. I'm assuming it's dark brown but that's just me. First is the whole 'Nordic' bullshit thing, where Tom is hesitant to include Daisy in the 'Nordic Race' or whatever, which would imply that she has darker hair. Also, Fitz directly confirms this with the line "...and once he kissed her dark shining hair." HOWEVER. Daisy does say that Pammy has her hair, and Pammy's hair is 'yellowy'. This is even weirder considering Tom is remarked as having 'straw hair', as in blonde. So. Maybe we CAN'T rely on the alcoholic for consistency. Daisy's eye color is not remarked on, just that they're bright. So maybe light. but who knows. One other note is that Ginevra King, the woman Daisy is based off of, had dark brown hair and eyes. Jordan: Blonde/Grey This one is easy, thank god. As for her hair, it's written "...autumn-leaf yellow of her hair..."; and again "...her hair the colour of an autumn leaf..." girl get a toner. and also the forementioned Nordic bullshit argument. Jordan was included with Tom and Nick. Her eyes: "Her grey sun-strained eyes..."; "Her grey, sun-strained eyes..." (again) Again, the direct inspiration for Jordan is Edith Cummings who had, shocker shocker, blonde hair and grey eyes if a period-appropriate painted color portrait is to be believed. Tom: Blonde/?? For his hair he's described as a "sturdy, straw-haired man of thirty". the argument could be made that that is more in regards to the texture but knowing fitz it probably means that tom is also. blonde. you'll start to notice a pattern. As for his eyes, all that's really mentioned is that they are shining and arrogant. no color Tom is based off a few people so I won't rely on any of them for hints or clues. George: Blonde/Blue

This one is pretty cut and dry. "He was a blond, spiritless man, anaemic, and faintly handsome...hope sprang into his light blue eyes." Myrtle: ??/?? If you can find written evidence for myrtle having red hair I'd love to see it because I've been searching for a while now and I can't find it in any draft. It's a movie thing, I guess, like switching jordan's and daisy's hair colors around in lazy deference to eurocentric beauty standards and a pitiful attempt at acknowledging fitz's penchant for color-based symbolism <3 The only clue for Myrtle having red hair is that her sister does. SO maybe she does, too. Her eyes are a mystery. Klipspringer is also blonde and balding, too. God's least favorite creature I guess. so it's safe to say that fitz just loved making everyone blonde. like, everyone. and considering that he himself said that all of his characters were just him, that makes an unfortunate amount of sense.

[snapdragonling]

sfw 7, 11, 13 & nsfw 1, 9, 14 for ozy/kallux + bran/sabine! (+ dummies if you wanna xoxo)

thank u!! 😊 | shipping headcanons

7. Would they go to the beach?

ozy/kallux — ozy does need to sit in salt water for a couple of hours for his mental health and honestly kallux hasn’t seen a large body of water (let alone the ocean) in decades so yeah, get these men to a beach. maybe if they survive the campaign they can explore the other continents and find a little seaside town to shack up in for a few weeks.

bran/sabine — YES. bran is an ocean girl and sabine would really love the seaside as well, even more so knowing how much bran loves it. in modern AU bran surfs and sabine would be amenable to learning (but also amenable to sitting on the sand and watching, or exploring the seaside cliffs and feeling the wind pull at her hair and clothes, meeting back up with bran looking a little wilder and more settled)

maeve/dietrich — picturing dietrich vibrating with anxiety at the beach because he's expecting hags to emerge from the water at any moment. he wouldn't be keen in modern AU either, but he would inevitably be dragged along because maeve (and edith) want a beach day and he simply must oblige them. he could’ve sworn maeve already put sunscreen on but now she needs him to apply more for some reason?

11. Baths or showers? Together or separate? Any bubbles or bubble fights?

ozy/kallux — baths were the only option until fairly recently and there’s certainly something to be said for marinating, but ozy personally loves a scalding hot shower. he’d like it even more if kallux was there too. (no bubbles, they're busy)

bran/sabine — either is good but sabine loves the luxury and leisure of a proper bath. there’s a perpetual open invitation for bran of course. sabine never asks or acknowledges it but she is rarely so relaxed as when bran takes it upon herself to shampoo her hair. if she could purr she would.

maeve/dietrich — in canon there's only baths, and maeve valiantly champions the idea of "using the hot water more efficiently" by sharing. it really depends on dietrich's mood whether or not he caves to that logic. in modern AU he'd be more of a shower guy, and more amenable to being interrupted (or letting maeve lead him into the bathroom to begin with)

13. Who stays up late? Who sleeps the most? Does the other have to force them to sleep/wake up?

ozy/kallux — ozy sleeps the most because he lost his elf privileges and needs to sleep like a regular person while kallux trances for 4 hours. great news for kallux who gets to see ozy completely out of it and clingy in his sleep. right now ozy is committed wholeheartedly to the party’s objectives so he doesn’t usually sleep in (apart from the morning after the tavern because he was. um. well) but i think he'd lose his morning-person tendencies if he ever has the luxury of doing so.

bran/sabine — both of them keep somewhat sporadic hours, bran because of her job and sabine because she doesn't sleep well, but in general i'd say sabine is more of a morning person and has to disentangle herself from a sighing bran fairly regularly. bran sleeps more (if only because she takes naps when she needs to. once sabine is awake she's awake for the rest of the day).

maeve/dietrich — dietrich stays up late, wakes up early, and sleeps sporadically. maeve definitely gets the most sleep, and probably has to drag dietrich to bed when he’s being particularly stubborn. (although i like the idea that the inverse has been true once or twice, when maeve had stayed up writing until the early hours of the morning, and dietrich had to grumble at her to go to bed or she'd be miserable the next day)

1. How often do they have sex, if at all?

ozy/kallux — answered!

bran/sabine — answered!

maeve/dietrich — highly depends on how flighty dietrich's being. sometimes there's months between their interactions. sometimes he's in town for a while and keeps swinging by the sommers estate because he's "in the area". when they're travelling together it's definitely more frequent, because dietrich has nowhere to go to escape maeve's flirting and unfortunately it's very effective. tldr: not as frequent as maeve would like but more frequently than dietrich plans for. (and of course later down the line when he stops running it becomes an even more regular occurrence)

9. Quickest turn ons? Immediate turn offs?

ozy/kallux — ozy thinks it's really hot when kallux uses his magic (mostly because it's inherently sexy but at least partially because that was the gift he gave back to kallux, and it feels good to see it in use), and (as of recently) when kallux brute forces his way through ozy's fumbling and takes charge of the situation. DM says kallux is immediately turned on every time ozy exhibits an emotion™, which is such a low bar but what can i say. don't think these two have many turn offs but ozy is immediately derailed by any mention of the traveller, so i guess that's a safe word option.

bran/sabine — unfortunately they are both so turned on seeing each other in a fight. there's an untold number of times where combat has been the foreplay. sabine loves seeing bran in captain mode, striding around the deck and playing her crew like a fine instrument. (she also loves when bran is clearly flirting with her but there's a Task At Hand, so the thought of what they might get up to later is hanging over her head). honestly not sure about turn offs. feel like there's been at least one occasion where the foreplay conversation accidentally got a little too serious/pointed and put a damper on the mood 💀

maeve/dietrich — not to out her on main but maeve seeing dietrich do something dextrous with his hands is a surefire way to get her interested. unfortunately for dietrich all the little touches and bits of contact that maeve bestows upon him without really thinking (or alternatively, with a lot of thinking) get under his guard and make him want more. he's a simple and very repressed man. as far as turn offs go, dietrich really doesn't like the idea of public sex or being seen/heard by strangers. if that potential emerges he's immediately turned off.

14. Lights on or off? Do they look at each other? Or is someone embarrassed?

ozy/kallux — answered!

bran/sabine — answered!

maeve/dietrich — lights off please for the love of god. candlelight at most. dietrich does not want to be perceived. it’s bad enough with maeve’s big ol’ eyes watching him in the dimness, he doesn’t need any more light shed on the situation. (it’s a little unfair of him, since he can see perfectly fine in the dark)

[infini-tree]

Captain Underpants and the Problematic Pandemonium of the Punishing Plungerina! (TETOCU23 Edition)

the episode concept hybridizes two episodes-- season 1′s TP Mummy with ree’s character reveal and the plungerina concept seen in season 2, except she was retooled to be erica’s monster of the week form instead. we imagined this coming around later in the season-- even to the point of having her be the final monster of the week kid in the first season.

the general idea was that, throughout the season erica has been built up as this kid who grew up too fast. whenever the big plot of the day happens, she’s usually off to the side doing her work. unlike melvin, she does this out of necessity because she wouldn’t have the time at home. 

during the dressy monster of the week episode (chronologically before this), this is actively challenged where she has a more active role in stopping her, as well as get a new friend in the process! this is also the part where erica realizes that, hey, acting like a kid her age and being friends with others feels pretty nice.

now, in this episode, the pressure reaches a boiling point for erica. there’s a few versions of what exactly made her go full monster of the week-- her parents not showing up for parent teachers conference, ree unintentionally exacerbating the issue through a series of circumstances left to be determined, erica being unable to juggle all of her responsibilities and her new social connection. 

as a result, the boys and captain have to fight erica as plungerina and ree’s secret comes to light. the omega toilet is probably involved in the climax (i mean, it didn’t flush properly... it’ll be a real Hoisted By Their Own Petard moment if erica unplugs it and that’s how she’s brought out of the monster of the week form)

post-episode, ree takes her as a protégée after seeing her skills in plunger-based combat. this was one part because their dynamic in the canon camoflush ep was fun and needs some lead up to the equivalent in this au, but also because the opportunity is so good. i mean, the both of them fight with bathroom supplies and tetocu23!erica is in need of a decent/solid adult figure in her life!

and some general notes:

prior to this episode, ree appears in the background after school-wide monster of the week fights to clean up to subtly set him up. he sometimes does weird stuff like collect samples, but with how weird the other staff is, it doesn’t seem as weird in comparison

since the legacy movie characters are going to be in this theoretical reboot (and lean a little closer to their movie selves), there’s no reason for a yewh-type character for krupp to pine over on account of edith being there (that isn’t to say that she may not come back)

this kind of makes erica, dressy, and ree a bit of a parallel to the george-harold-captain trio dynamic. this will be relevant later when the boys are properly expelled and the kids are left to fend for themselves against endenemys

[dissectedgrrl]

okay so a while ago i mentioned a the good place rtc au

n so i finally made one :D

keep in mind this is j kind of a rough idea thing so not every detail is there but here are my ideas !! this also includes some headcanons for the characters so dont mind certain parts

------------------------

so it kind of follows the same plot as the show

karnak is like michael and he tells the choir where they are, what happened, etc

he got their names right + the fact that they were the choir n referred to as "the six saints" in the news

but he got their personalities mixed up with other students

he thinks they volunteered, helped out a lot of people, etc.

he doesnt know about mischa stealing wine, ocean bullying literally everyone, etc

but the choir knows its all wrong n have to find out what went wrong, how to get out, etc (just everything eleanor went thru)

------------------------

cast of characters :

Ocean O'Connell Rosenburg

she/her , lesbiaB, learning 2 languages, can speak 5

Ocean is in COMPLETE denial that she doesnt belong in the good place. i mean why wouldn't she ? shes ocean o'connell rosenburg. shes perfect. shes supposed to be here.

she tries to remain as perfect as possible while in the good place

she keeps calling karnak "god" no matter how many times he tells her there is no god in the good place. sometimes she does it on accident

the soulmate she got matched up with is constance

^ when she was told that she blurted out "WHAT ? WE ONLY KISSED ONCE !!!!" and everyone just kind of . . . . stared at her

most likely says the "all neutral people should go to Cincinnati" joke

Constance Blackwood

she/her, bilingual and bisexual

Constance doesn't want to leave the good place but she knows it isnt right for her to stay

she loves ocean, but being her soulmate takes a lot of patience (that constance sometimes doesnt have)

she got SO excited about the free froyo flavors

"mmm . . . . warm laundry flavor 😍"

when ocean said the kissing thing constance was j kinda like "🧍"

Savannah

("jane doe")

she/they/it, pan demisexual demiromantic (i swear im not projecting 😭 /srs)

i have a lot to say abt her 💀

since she doesnt know who she really is she tries to learn as much as she can in the good place

^ she always has a "why" to ask n gets frustrated if she cant figure something out

^ it LOVES learning

^ whenever something interests them they get really excited

karnak gave them their doll n when they asked why all he said was "shes nice"

^ ever since then shes LOVED dolls n just toys in general

its favorite thing to learn about is toys

it has a lot of toys n keep all of them in a toy chest

when she learned she could eat food she just didnt stop 😭

^ they LOVE food but their cooking skills arent the best . . . .

^ its favorite savory food is pizza. dont ask why they just like it . . . . all kinds of pizza too

she really really likes music as well

^ favorite artists are frank sinatra and edith piaf !!

its soulmate is ricky

^ she LOVES him like theyre so close (i havent decided if theyre gonna be platonic, romantic, or both, but for now lets j say theyre best friends !!)

^ her and rickys relationship kind of confuses her bc all the other souldmates kiss n hold hands n what not but her n ricky just kind of . . . . watch star trek and talk about their interests together

they HATE being photographed and recorded, the smell of smoke, big rollercoasters, and anything people use to smoke (weed especially)

it hates being called creepy and having people afraid of her

shes really nice and smart but no one (expect ricky n the rest of the choir) rlly gives them a chance :/

Mischa Bachinski

he/him, bi, speaks same languages as he does in canon universe

soulmate is noel

he loves music (we all know this) and listens to any recommendation he gets

has to try and keep calm while in the good place so no one gets suspicious

his weakness is animals . . . . show him a rabbit n he will cry istg

^ hes a dog person but tries to hid it bc noel prefers cats

he doesnt rlly like sweets but hes okay w the free froyo (only SPECIFIC flavors tho)

he asked karnak if his mom was also in the good place, but didnt get a straight answer, but karnak hinted at a yes

^ his goal is to find his mom while he has time in the good place

^ hes doing everything he can to find her and is convinced he gets closer every day

Noel Gruber

he/she, gay (and maybe bigender or genderfluid ? idk yet), speaks english n french

he rlly likes black coffee like . . . . a lot

^ mischa says he hates coffee, but hes never tried it so noel is determined to make him drink it

noel sees the good place as a second chance at life

^ she hopes to get to live out her monique dreams here

secretly hates mischa's music taste 💀

noel introduced jane to edith piaf !

Ricky Potts

he/they, pan + trans demiboy, can speak english n pig latin (when jane asked why he just said "itsyay ustjay oremay unfay anthay englishyay !")

he loves living with jane because he gets to ramble n he gets to hear her ramble as well

^ him n jane have cats ! :D

^ every other saturday night ricky n jane watch spiderman movies while eating pizza. they look forward to that saturday every week !

he actually CAN cook

he claims he doesnt have a favorite cat but Captain Butterscotch is always with him . . . . suspicious

one of their favorite pastimes is looking out the telescope thats in their backyard at night

^ he likes to name stars (even if they already have names)

------------------------

okay thats all i got so far ! if you have any suggestions or anything feel free to tell me ! srry if there are any spelling errors i wrote this down so fast bc i had to get these idea out or else i would implode 💔

[smolvenger]

Some thoughts on Crimson Peak and the Thomas vrs Lucille who is bad and who is good debate and Why Thomas tends to be more "redeemable" than Lucile- DON'T LIKE DON'T READ/INTERACT, just some ramblings.

tw: spoilers for Crimson Peak, discussions of child abuse, murder, incest, death, and violence.

Warning, I will be more defensive of Thomas than Lucille so if you don't like that, don't interact

Okay, lately there has been a lot of Discourse (tm) on Crimson Peak and the whole thing about Lucille vrs. Thomas. A lot of people's consensus lately being Thomas has gotten way too off the hook- but it is Lucille who is more redeemable and more pitiful.

And I am not saying that both are not sympathetic in their backstories and for what abuse they faced...but with the whole thing about how justifiable either character is, it tends to hinge on one thing-

How consensual is the incest?

And that itself is iffy and left ambiguous, in typical Del Toro fashion (like in Pan's Labrinth, was it all a tragic dream or real? It depends on who you ask) because he doesn't give us answers and leave things open. The books say that it was "a mutual source of comfort" that began when Thomas was nine and Lucille eleven...however, given the fact that they were children when this began and those ages, that is what makes it iffy personally for me and the hardest to wrap my brain around.

Now, personal story time. I...was abused by my cousin when I was that age- I was eight/nine/ten and he was about a pre-teen and early teen. I said "yes" at the time...but I didn't understand what I was saying yes to. I was curious, and I wanted to feel "special"...and then I remember crying and asking him to stop- because, and I cannot emphasize this, though I said yes I didn't comprehend what I was saying yes to because I was *checks notes* a child.

Because children can't really give consent and given the psychological development between a nine-year-old and an eleven-year-old, I find it personally hard to justify the incest as anything but iffy considering their ages when it started. If it began when they were adults and was consensual a la The Borgias, then...uh, fine I guess. But...no, it began as children. So it makes consent iffy.

The other thing is that Lucille is a control freak. We understand WHY she is a control freak after how shitty her whole childhood was. This is a tendency in Del Toro with his antagonists. Captain Vidal in Pan's Labyrinth is a Control Freak and that ultimately leads to his downfall. Everyone loves to quote Lucille's monologue about how everything she did was out of love for her brother- "the horror was for love." And they use it to justify her actions and it is an eye opening monologue.

But no one remembers Edith's response to it:

"That's not true, you suffocate him."

And let me show you what TV Tropes says about their relationship. To paraphrase, she controls his time and actions, guilt trips him to try to kill Alan, and when he admits to loving Edith, she kills him, which tends to be a common pattern in abusive relationships.

Now, with Thomas, the most we can say that he canonically does is A) gaslight Edith by saying "There's no ghosts" when there definitely is, B) Seduce her into marriage knowing what was going to happen as he did with the three other women, C) Agree to poison her and deliver said poison.

And yes, though he DOES want his invention and all that funded, and that is his motivation and why he is implicit in the plot and murders...

He doesn't seem to actually enjoy it.

It is left open ended as to whose idea the giant plot and poisoning was, but it was stated in interviews that Thomas tends to be...bad at being a villain. He doesn't have it in him to directly kill the wives other than being the one to deliver them the poisoned tea (note, Thomas uses poison, which is considered traditionally as "a woman's weapon" versus Lucille actually butchering them with cleavers and whatnot). The novelization says he would leave the house whenever Lucille would kill the wives, showing not just implicitness but implying he doesn't enjoy it. And Rather than kill the dog he just...tosses it outside and maybe it will just...starve or something- and then it doesn't. Lucille actually kills the dog herself to spite Edith.

But the thing is that Thomas shows regret like Lucille...but he is the one to take action to make ammends.

He asks Alan where to hit him where it won't be fatal and delivers him to safety, since Edith is the first one to show him healthy love and kindness with no conditions, he decides he shouldn't go forward and kill her and should spare her, he burns the documents that would transfer the money to them- he shows the least amount of pleasure in being evil and tries to save Edith at the cost of his life, caring for her needs over his at the end. And THAT is why (not taking into effect that Tom Hiddleston being hot plays him) he tends to be more "redeemable" in fandom and fics than Lucille. He shows anger and regret over the crimes...and Lucille shows regret, but only after she sees Thomas's ghost, which implies she regrets killing Thomas.

Though, honestly...the Thomas fans and Lucille fans aren't that different at all. We are BOTH "my poor sweet meow meow is just a lil baby and it's the OTHER sibling who is the bad one *points fingers*" and it also is "look at how BEAUTIFUL my lil bb is and how attractive they are to me! So it's the OTHER sibling who is the bad one! Bc I don't want to boink them like I do this one," so...in the end, we're just the same in different fonts.

Ok, thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

[thebiscuiteternal]

(please full view, idk why tumblr keeps making my stuff look so fuzzy when compressed. i thought they'd fixed that.)

Anyway, when we're talking a canon that revolves around sheep, i can't not let my girl in.

A Witness willingly created by one of the old Old Faiths, before the Bishops even rose, Edith was sealed away to save her life when her god(dess? no one's particularly sure and she's not talking) realized they were going to lose. Lambert found her and shattered her prison (both entirely by accident, but neither of them is complaining).

She's very confused by this new world where there is only one sheep left and they are now the god the gods who killed her god have to answer to. Can you really blame her?

But she's still content, because Lambert is happy to let her chase down and eat heretics who threaten to harm the flock.

face closeup under cut so you can see how neat her eyes are.

[bacchanal-if]

Going around asking all my favourite IFs this-

My friend (who has written one and a half IFs so far) told me that she balances all the routes very carefully. If one choice reduces one stat and increases two others, then the other choice also does the same, though it might not be the same stats. She does this for most choices. She believes it's the only way to not have a route that's perfect or seems like the canon path.

I'm just starting writing an IF, but this does not seem to be working for me. Maybe I just need to add more stats?

Either way, do you agree with this? How do you balance your routes within the game?

How kind of you to include me!

YMMV, as everyone has their own preferences and story structures, but I will say what has been working for me.

I do keep close track of how the stat modifications are done in each branching path, namely because I don't want any one choice to have an advantage in sculpting the MC.

Let's say I have branching options at the end of the passage, and I've included ones for two different stats: meek/assertive and melancholic/joyful (as I have in the MC's reaction to being woken up.) Within the meek/assertive options you are also given the opportunity to affect the melancholic/joyful stats, and vice versa.

To make it easier for me to see all the stat change options within branching paths, instead of making a new passage for each option I make one general one for which point in the story it moves on to and use <<switch>> to display the different results of a choice. Then I am able to see all the stat changes within a single window. Here is a screenshot of the structure in twine (with spoilers removed for Chp 2)

This has worked for me so far because until you start dating the ROs, the story follows a linear path despite what you have the MC do within its confines.

Now that I'm working on Chp 2, tracking the RO's stats is a little trickier, because for the most part you will only be affecting one RO's stat in a single passage.

Slight Spoilers below for how I'm keeping track of the ROs

To easily keep up with the passages where you affect your relationship stat with the ROs, I am color-coding them with tags. The reason I mark this as spoilers is you can clearly see from my screenshot that I already have a few tagged in gold (though I am a bit behind on tagging posts so don't read too much into their placement or lack thereof.) With this method I can keep track of relationship stat changes throughout the story at a glance and even be able to tally their numbers for each RO. Just for clarity, because Tamsin/Thomas and Edith/Edward are interacted with before the masked ROs, there is a chance that though I will perfectly balance it out between them at this stage, they might end up having the advantage over the masked ROs simply because they come earlier in the story. But this is something I will take into account when I start writing that part, and a thought process not entirely relevant to the question.

If it isn't working for you, maybe you just don't need to worry about it yet. Perhaps focus on writing your story, then go back over it. When I did this, it turned out I needed to add a melancholic/joyful stat because in the text, I was defaulting to a cheery naïve MC and a morose world-wise one! I hope this all helps, and the very best to you as you venture forth!

[mrcowboytoyou]

The City on the Edge of Forever: The Original Teleplay (the comic)

The City on the Edge of Forever is arguably a pretty popular episode of TOS and with good reason. It's a pretty dramatic episode and it was influential in forming Kirk's character and inspiring future ST material, both in the beta canon and in fan works.

Fun fact (though a bit off-topic): Edith Keeler is brought up in the novelization for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. Bones mentions her and it results in a pretty emotional altercation with Jim. The scene isn't in the film but I think it adds an interesting level to the story especially where Gillian Taylor is concerned. Makes her parting in the end sting a little worse.

"She had a mission in her life, and she wouldn't have given it up to go with you."

A bit of foreshadowing aye? Anyway, this aside, I actually have something else entirely to talk about.

Recently, a trek artifact found its way into my lap. And that is the comic version of Harlan Ellison's original script for The City on the Edge of Forever. The comic isn't that old really, but I'd seen other people talking about it and was excited to of found it out in the wild myself.

For those unaware, the script underwent a lot of changes resulting in pretty different experiences between it and the episode that aired. I think even more than what's in this comic version, which came out in 2015. I've not actually read the original script though.

I did read some commentary from Ellison who's original script apparently ended with Kirk deciding he would save Keeler, because fuck it, he loves her, and Spock saves the day by physically holding him back from doing so.

The episode ended with Kirk stopping McCoy, and by extension himself, from saving Keeler; the comic ends with Kirk hanging back as Spock stops Beckwith (instead of McCoy) from saving Keeler. I do have my opinions on which ending I like best but I'll get to that a bit later.

Since I've not read the original script (except for one exchange which is in the comic and was wholly responsible for my excitement in finding this comic to begin with), I will avoid comparing it to this comic for the most part. While, I'm sure there are differences, at present time I don't know all of them besides what I've already said above.

Instead, I will compare this comic experience to the episode. Besides, there's going to be a lot more differences I think between this and the show rather than this and the script.

So first things first, let's actually talk about the conflict here. I mentioned that instead of McCoy we have an antagonist of the week type named Beckwith. Beckwith is a drug dealer in karkow, which is a drug that resembles comically big, colourful crystals. Seems an unfortunate thing to have to ingest, but it apparently sends you on quiet the whirlwind.

Beckwith has some larger agenda surrounding this drug and has gotten one of his shipmates hooked so that they might, in a drug induced daze, assist him. This other lieutenant references that Beckwith caused a slaughter on Harper V, but I don't know what the details of this are. Looking it up only brought up a dead ensign, may he rest in peace lol.

So, while I'm curious, I don't think that bit of info is important beyond just detailing Beckwith's track record. It's a bit of a strange setup to me in some regard. Like it feels too big of an issue all on its own to just be a component of a story. I mean there was a "slaughter" on a planet because of very expensive and illegal drugs.

Additionally, there is something else very interesting about an antagonist that we aren't attached to, like McCoy. For one, we do not care if he lives or dies. Really we only care that he sees justice, because we care about the motivations of Kirk and Spock.

But in keeping with the episode, the conundrum ultimately becomes about the life or death of Edith Keeler. Beckwith, like McCoy, saves her and now Spock and Kirk have to prevent that. That's interesting because, we are given information that paints Beckwith in no uncertain terms, as a very bad person. Additionally, his saving of Keeler is something one of our leads wants very much to do himself. So it's a interesting dichotomy.

I sorta like that aspect of it a lot. McCoy wants to save Keeler because he's a good person and a doctor. We know that his ignorance and desire to save others motivate him. With Beckwith, its a bit of a mystery, and as an audience we must now think about what it means that Kirk and him might share a want or an instinct to save.

The comic ends with Kirk and Spock discussing this very dilemma. Why might Beckwith of done that? This may be the only part of the comic you'd know at all because it is in the original script, and pictures of the text circulate ST tumblr every so often.

Following this bit of a dialogue Spock asks Kirk why Beckwith would try to save Keeler. An appropriate question given what we know. I think the answer is a bit cryptic but the long and short of it is- humans are capable of good and bad things.

Beckwith, a horrible man, was still capable of saving a woman's life. And Kirk, noble and level headed as he is, can still be selfish. At the end there they mention Keeler and a soldier whom Kirk paid for information. The soldier is homeless and legless but saves Kirk's life when Beckwith fires at him, dying in the process. When they go back to the Guardians Kirk asks if the soldier's life, just as Keeler's, might have affected reality but the answer is no, he was inconsequential.

This cruel uncertainty about the value of people weighs on Kirk. He wasn't inconsequential to him. That man saved his life, and was paramount in finding Beckwith.

I think the ending dialogue is a bit confusing and I don't know if that's just me, but at the end Spock assures Kirk that Keeler was not negligible. Kirk replies, "...but, I loved her".

I think there is a thought which remains unsaid here about the loss of these two. Part of Kirk's confusion and hurt comes from the fact that if Keeler was so important to the future, why couldn't she be saved in some manner? Why was her fate to also die like the soldier, whose loss was labeled as negligible by the Guardians?

In response to this, Spock says:

"No woman was ever loved as much, Jim. Because no woman was ever offered the universe for love."

It's very touching. The value of life isn't lost because someone dies, and your feelings for her aren't without purpose or meaning because you didn't save her. It's something he needs to hear. Shortly after, Spock leaves, and Kirk now alone in his quarters screams into the inky darkness of space as the Enterprise hurtles on to boldly go... Good ending.

There are a lot of parts of the story which hit similar beats to the episode. The plot largely is intact after all but even in the way of dialogue. There are cute moments where Spock doesn't understand the lingo of the time period in both, for instance.

Additionally, the tension that builds between them, and which has been the source of so much fanfic, is very much alive and well in this comic. Some of those scenes play out pretty similarly as they do in the episode. Even the panel designs are reminiscent of shots from the show at times. But there's also bits like this only in the comic that I couldn't stop rereading...

"Captain, fooling me is simple. Just give me the order, I will change my opinion."

WOOF WOOF. Just an absolutely great line. It's the sort of thing only Spock could and would say. There's something about it that is so rich with understated emotion, like the way a dam holds back a flood.

So would I recommend this? Oh, easily!

Is it better than the episode we got? This question is harder to answer so readily, but I think after much thought, I would say no.

So much change is taking place between these adaptions that they're different enough stories to both be fulfilling to experience. There are parts of this comic that I'd of loved to see acted out, for sure. Obviously there are some amazing bits of dialogue that did not make the final cut and that's disappointing; they'll always be in my heart, but I like the canon ending a lot more.

In the show, Kirk's choice to stop McCoy is really very significant. It's not just that he's stopping Bones, he's also stopping himself. He went back to save Bones and also the entire rest of the ship's crew after all. In my mind, Kirk was always going to make this choice no matter what. Yes, he loves Keeler, but it's not like he loves his ship, friends, or crew less. He just loves them in a different way. Ultimately though, he would always do what he needed to do when there proved to be no other option.

So I'd of hated an ending where Kirk defies the beliefs he's consistently maintained throughout the show to save Keeler. I also don't really like that Kirk hangs back in the comic's rendition and that Spock ends up stopping Beckwith. It's less significant for Spock to be the one doing it.

I don't mind Beckwith being there instead of Bones but I do think the drug dealing component to his character feels a bit out of place. As I said in the beginning, something about it feels too large to be just a mere component of an episode. It feels more deserving of its own episode entirely.

In any case, I really liked this comic. The art is beautiful and the back of the book included a bit of how J.K Woodward (the artist) went about creating panels and poses. Despite the fact that I ultimately like the episode we got, this comic is still a great story, so I think it's a nice addition to any Star Trek collection.