#Enough drama in the world

[thexfridax]

A year before Raymond Burr first played Perry Mason, he was romantically linked to Natalie Wood. Dates to avoid scandal was a common tactic in Hollywood (and probably still is), and this gossip benefited Burr and Wood. The latter was trying to hide her relationship with Robert Wagner, and Burr would never star in Perry Mason if his sexuality were made public.

More than 60 years later, HBO’s gritty—and queer—reboot of the Erle Stanley Gardner stories features some art imitating life, using similar tactics to link Della Street (Juliet Rylance) and District Attorney Hamilton “Ham” Burger (Justin Kirk) in order to protect their reputations. Set in Los Angeles in the early 1930s, this mutually beneficial arrangement shields Della from prying comments about her lack of a husband—and Ham about his permanent bachelor status—allowing her to pursue a legal career alongside associate Perry Mason (Matthew Rhys).

For a show located so close to Hollywood, the glamorous movie-making biz had so far only existed on the seedy periphery when Perry, in his PI days, took snaps of stars in compromising positions. Tinseltown edges closer when successful and self-assured screenwriter Anita St. Pierre enters the series in a puff of Turkish cigarette smoke, offering Della respite from the dark cloud hanging over the office and the routine of her relationship with hand model Hazel (Molly Ephraim).

“This is my lesbian period piece fantasy,” Jen Tullock tells The Daily Beast’s Obsessed about the Palm Springs getaway in a recent episode of Perry Mason. It has been a busy 12-plus months for Tullock, who is currently shooting the highly anticipated second season of Severance—and cannot reveal anything other than saying it is “nothing short of mind-blowing.”

[...]

[waterghostype]

crusty kid

[starryluminary]

♪ Dirty Little Secret - The All-American Rejects

Do you remember when I said a while ago that a playlist with 6 songs didn’t sit well with me, so I had a way to add more? This is that way. I’ve put too much though into this universe where every kiss is Noco, so I’m making sketch pages for the comics respective episode, starting with Greeces Pieces!

No one even kisses in this episode, but the reveal plot point was WAY too important and WAY too interesting to ignore. The reveal comic will come eventually, but for now here’s the rest of the episode!!

For funsies here’s my notes about this portion, directly copy pasted from my notes app:

* Noah death glares Tyler, threatening him into silence. Alejandro notices.

* When Heather and Alejandro bicker before landing, Noah shoots Cody a look, saying “they’re crazy” with his eyes. Cody giggles back at him. Sierra notices.

* She questions him about it, not knowing Noah and Cody were friends. Cody awkwardly reaffirms yeah they’re just friends!! Sierra accepts this answer despite Cody stumbling through it. Oopsies I ended up changing this one. I’ll explain why later.

* Noah competes in the one on one turned 3v3 duel, Owen using him as a weapon. Well intentioned, of course. They end up winning, and they share the two medals Owen won in the original.

* Noah ends up flying across the arena, landing on Cody by accident. They pause for two seconds maximum, and stutter and stumble standing up. Alejandro notices and starts putting the pieces together of what might of happened.

* (By the end of the episode he’s positive he knows, so he’s not really shocked when Tyler actually says it.)

* The song of the episode is sung by Courtney and Duncan, about what don’t ask me. Courtney wins that challenge for the Amazons.

* Heather and Alejandro still compete in the hurdles challenge and Heather still wins, leading to the tiebreaker.

If anything is confusing or unclear, please feel free to ask about it! You wanna ask me about it soooo bad actually

[whetstonefires]

Oh yeah I recently had a moment of realization, which is that Lady Catherine's main underlying motive for pushing the Darcy/Anne marriage isn't actually her ideas about keeping property in the family etc, or her agreement with her late sister at all.

The number one reason she's so wedded to it is the same basic reason Mrs. Bennet is so eager to have Mr. Collins as a son-in-law.

Because while Rosings isn't entailed, which has allowed her to lady it over the demesne all this time on the strength of her daughter's status as heiress, property law is such that as soon as there's a man in the family--as soon as Anne weds--it will all belong to him.

And while she won't be forced to find other lodging or anything unless a truly dreadful groom winkles his way in, she'll no longer be the mistress of the place as she has been all this time, not even as much the mistress as she was before she was widowed, because that will be Anne's place now. She will be only the mother of the wife of the master of Rosings.

And there is not likely to be any great supply of fellows of sufficient distinction and lineage to meet her high standards, who will want Anne (whose main appeal is her property), who will also allow their mother-in-law to rule the roost.

Darcy is a known quantity, who doesn't especially want Rosings and can be relied upon to prioritize Pemberley. And he is very respectful of his honorable aunt. Lady Catherine makes it clear she believes her sway over him is considerably higher than it actually is, because he values his family so highly and hates a fuss, so she has always always gotten her way with him before.

If she could get Anne married to Darcy, then she could fulfill her maternal obligation to Anne, and her lineal obligations to the de Bourghs and the Fitzwilliams. Without having to give hardly anything up herself.

And it's really cool how it's set up like this! Because the fact that the system is rigged so a woman fulfilling her duties to family and society inherently obliterates any power base of her own is totally fucked up, and wanting to resist that is understandable and sympathetic.

But as is so often the case, the easiest way to resist or evade such compulsions and injustices is by finding a way to exploit other people, and gain your own security and independence by taking theirs away.

And so Lady Catherine, like Mrs. Bennet, is ultimately a tacky and appallingly selfish human being.

[nabasart]

I completely forgot to upload this here oops (please don't pay attention to how off time some of this is)

[misty-missdee]

can you even imagine.

Hey, being trans can be hard. be nice to a trans person :)

[kineticallyanywhere]

just

the way Normal sees a chance for kindness and someone to find solidarity with in the same creature that caused Hero's childhood to be irreparably marred by trauma and blood, but she doesn't even suggest Normal turn away from it and even offers to help if he really needs it lIKE

[rythyme]

the thing that gets me the most about the kinnporsche world tour is how impossible it is to categorize. like it's a concert. it's a musical. it's a burlesque performance. it's a cosplay contest. it's a comedy skit show. it's a martial arts demo. it's a kpop dance rehearsal. it's a striptease. it's a comic con panel where they do cast interviews and preview teaser trailers. also they make out on stage. BOC really threw in everything but the kitchen sink for this cash grab and i wouldn't have it any other way.

[deus-ex-mona]

real talk: lxl should continue to explore romance fantasy concepts in their songs. it’s clearly working for them~

[hollowed-theory-hall]

Do you think gay marriage is legalized in the WW (at least in Harry’s time in the 90s)? I lean towards no as I don’t really see the WW being that anymore progressive (most likely less) than we are when it comes to sexuality (Also I don’t think it helps that they are a culture that highly values continuing the magical bloodlines). What’s your take?

I agree with you here. I don't think it's likely that they legalized same-sex marriages.

In Hogwarts Legacy, there are Nora and Priya Tradwell who are two women who were married to each other in 1890. That being said, I don't really consider HL 100% canon since other aspects of it contradict the books (the castle is gorgeous but why is the potions classroom not in the dungeons?!). So, I'm kinda picking and choosing what's canon when it comes to the video games.

But in the books, we don't see any indication that it's legal or treated any differently than in the muggle world at the time.

The only real reference I could recall from the books to anything gay (explicitly) is Dudley taunting Harry about being gay (because this happened):

“What d’you mean, I’m not brave in bed?” said Harry, completely nonplussed. “What — am I supposed to be frightened of pillows or something?” “I heard you last night,” said Dudley breathlessly. “Talking in your sleep. Moaning.” “What d’you mean?” Harry said again, but there was a cold, plunging sensation in his stomach. He had revisited the graveyard last night in his dreams. Dudley gave a harsh bark of laughter then adopted a high-pitched, whimpering voice. “ ‘Don’t kill Cedric! Don’t kill Cedric!’ Who’s Cedric — your boyfriend?” “I — you’re lying —” said Harry automatically. But his mouth had gone dry. He knew Dudley wasn’t lying — how else would he know about Cedric? “ ‘Dad! Help me, Dad! He’s going to kill me, Dad! Boo-hoo!’ ” “Shut up,” said Harry quietly. “Shut up, Dudley, I’m warning you!” “ ‘Come and help me, Dad! Mum, come and help me! He’s killed Cedric! Dad, help me! He’s going to —’ Don’t you point that thing at me!” Dudley backed into the alley wall. Harry was pointing the wand directly at Dudley’s heart. Harry could feel fourteen years’ hatred of Dudley pounding in his veins — what wouldn’t he give to strike now, to jinx Dudley so thoroughly he’d have to crawl home like an insect, struck dumb, sprouting feelers — “Don’t ever talk about that again,” Harry snarled. “D’you understand me?”

(OotP, 15)

I can't say much more than Harry is bothered, whether it is about the assumption that Cedric is his boyfriend or that Dudley makes fun of Cedric's death is up to guesswork (I think it's probably a bit of both). But it doesn't appear other sexualities are any more accepted or openly talked about in the WW compared to the muggle one. I'd say even less in all likelihood.

I also agree with you on how important having children and continuing the family line is for pure-bloods (which is at least 50% of their population), I doubt they encourage gay marriage. Honestly, the more accepting pure-bloods probably treat it like: "Sleep with whoever you want in your free time, but get married and give us an heir", while other families are probably worse.

That being said, we do see on the family tapestry that both Alphard Black and Cassiopia Black didn't get married or have kids, so if you have enough siblings to carry the family line for you, you could get away with not getting married and having children. But with how Andromeda was disowned for marrying a muggleborn, it's likely anything less than the perfect pure-blood marriage would have had to stay fairly hidden for you to not get disowned.

I also agree that with how archaic many aspects of their culture are (from quills to their education standards, to candles, to the fact canning students was practiced at Hogwarts when Molly and Arthur Weasley were students, etc...), it's highly unlikely they're more progressive than muggles when it comes to, well, anything. Like, indoor plumbing supposedly came to Hogwarts in the 18th century alongside the muggle advancements in this field, but it was noted in Pottermore that wizards rarely copy from muggles to such a degree. So, I don't think wizards would be pioneering gay rights or anything like that.

So, yeah, I agree, I don't think same-sex couples could legally get married in the Wizarding World as there is no indication they can, but I don't think they're getting executed either (as was the case in the UK in the late 19th century), so, there's at least that. I think it's treated like a dirty secret that'll cause a scandal in some circles, but it's not illegal to be gay in the WW.

[total-drama-brainrot]

Just a question, who do think in the series (other than Bridgette of course) would be tricked into getting kissing the pole and getting their tongue stuck? For research purposes, obviously.

Well, the question there is if it's within the same parameters of canon.

If you're talking exclusively about Alejandro tricking people into kissing the pole, then I'd have to say that Leshawna is a pretty strong contender for pole-kissing. She's just as infatuated with Alejandro as Bridgette is at this point in the show, so if he had directed his manipulation attempts towards her instead of Bridgette I imagine a similar scenario would've played out.

Of course, Lindsay is also a solid choice here too- at this point in the show she's under the impression that her boyfriend Tyler is, if not just missing from the competition, entirely out of her life; and as much as I love Lindsay, we've seen in the previous seasons that she's not above flirting with other boys and/or showing interest in others when Tyler isn't around. Had Alejandro chosen to target her here, Lindsay probably would've fallen for his tricks- since she truly believed that Tyler just wasn't around. And since she did show signs of attraction towards Alejandro in the earlier portions of the season.

This is all following the guidelines of canon though. In my honest opinion, you could potentially spin the scenario to have near enough anyone stuck to that pole, should you so desire. Especially if you drop Alejandro's involvement in said scenario.

Want Tyler stuck to the pole? Owen dared him to lick it. Or vice versa, since the two of them are pretty evenly matched in terms of common sense.

Want Courtney stuck to the pole? She was too distracted by Heather's taunting (and whipping at one point?) to notice the pole in her pathway, and ended up running straight into it mis-yell, inadvertently getting her tongue stuck to it.

Want Alejandro stuck to the pole? Use the same pretences as canon, but have him misjudge the distance between himself and Bridgette (or whoever you want to substitute her with) and accidentally get himself stuck to the pole instead of his chosen target. Karma's a bitch. I should've known better.

It's fully dependant on who you, as the author/creator, want to stick to a pole.

[naffeclipse]

If you're still doing that author writing ask thingie, how about ✨?

✨What’s a fic you’ve posted you wish you could breathe life into again and have people talking about it? (or simply a fic you wish got more credit)

✨It's not a fic yet, but I do want to dive more into Devil Eyes and maybe take it a few steps away from Sleuth Jesters to make it a bit more original! It would be a thriller full of dark twists and relationships that make or break characters.

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

Question about Frank! What is his fighting style? I know you mentioned he does hand on hand, but does he do any specific form of martial arts?? Or is it just kind of the basic, punching, kicking, ect. Also, does he have some form of magic, or is he basically like Howdy? (I'm just imagining they all play like.. actual table top DnD and Frank is getting irritated because his rolls are garbage-)

i'm not nearly well versed enough in martial arts to name styles or blend them - though i feel a "i need to know everything i can about this" fixation creeping up... so i might be able to provide a better answer later!

but for now lets just say he's adapted his own stylized form, blended from his childhood training, what he learns on the streets, and what he picks up on his travels / figures out himself. i imagine it would be an efficient, ruthless, and elegant personal style of combat

Frank has no magic! if he rolled for it he'd somehow get a 0! he and Howdy are the only magicless maidens of the group

[starryluminary]

♪ Jump Then Fall ♪

Taylor Swift

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◃◃ II ▹▹

This was so impulsive. I only wanted to make one comic strip post for one kiss but my imagination went wild. So wild in fact I might start stitching the WT kisses into a cohesive narrative. You guys don’t mind that right

[boiledegghole]

new guy ive come up with

[marymekpop]

⟢ highlight of the hour: my perfect stranger [8/16] ⟣

home away from home