#Feels like Something in relation to the show even if I can't really articulate what

[hephaestuscrew]

I just read this poem by Rick Barot and I want to make Wooden Overcoats fans read these lines:

I know the difference doesn’t matter, except in poetry, where a coffin is just another coffin until someone at a funeral calls it a wooden overcoat, an image so heavy and warm at the same time that you forget it’s about death.

[qqueenofhades]

as a woc (who is south asian, so i share that with harris), it's deeply upsetting to me that......nothing she could do would be right. i see people wondering why she isn't doing more, but then she does something, and then those same people pick that thing apart and tear her to pieces and it really does go to show that nothing we ever do will be "right".

i have yet to see criticism of her specifically that doesn't boil down to racism or misogyny (or a combination of both), and it's frustrating, especially in leftist spaces, because i do want to think critically and have conversations about what she's doing right and what she (and the administration as a whole) could improve upon, but i feel like i can't start or participate in those conversations without dealing with that same racism + misogyny. and this isn't even getting into the gop, this is about people who call themselves progressive/leftist/whatever. so much effort goes into maintaining the idea that they're better than the right, but i don't see nearly as much effort put into.....being better tbh

Unfortunately, among all their other problems, Online Leftists are a) often just as likely to be racist and misogynist as the GOP, and b) to strenuously deny that they are, weaponize that language in bad faith against people or candidates they dislike, and otherwise parrot abstract "social justice" talking points and Progressive Jargon while being absolutely noxious to the real, actual people that are involved. They do, as you say, assume they are Morally Righteous, and then don't actually interrogate that or question it in any way. So.... yeah. Yeah, pretty much. As I've said before and will say again, they are an absolute failure as any kind of practical or effective opposing force to right-wing fascism, and often inadvertently or even deliberately enable it in deeply disappointing ways.

It's funny that in all my posts/answers on the topic, I stated multiple times that if people could provide me an actual reason that made empirical sense as to why they didn't like Kamala, I was happy to have that discussion. Instead I got a lot of weird angry asks from people clearly still trying to justify their Hillary Clinton Derangement Syndrome (I only answered one of them because I have better things to do with my life), accusing me of being "emotional," "angry," "trauma-dumping" and God knows what else. And like. I'm sorry that pointing out a clearly verifiable fact (misogyny is what doomed HRC, anti-Obama backlash/racism was what enabled Trump) triggered y'all to that degree, but I think that fact is pretty illuminating on its own. And no, actually, I don't have to "get over" HRC's loss or "just accept" that people had "reasons" (conveniently never articulated, but they were real! They totally weren't misogyny! PEOPLE HAD REAL REASONS FOR NOT LIKING HER WHY WON'T YOU BELIEVE ME AND ACCEPT THAT!!!) for disliking her and/or not voting for her when her opponent was Donald F'n Trump. Like, I know they live in the magical realm of the Permanently Online where the real world suffers no consequences from their bullshit and the argument about why 2016 was not their fault changes daily, but that's not the case with us here on Earth. And yeah, we're pretty mad.

Kamala has, in my view, been doing a perfectly fine job as the vice president. She has been able to give a few powerful and relevant speeches about race relations, gun violence, abortion, and other topics. I occasionally see news articles from "anonymous sources" who "don't like her" or want to cause trouble for whatever reason, which I treat with the usual degree of skepticism that I employ when reading anything the mainstream media writes about Democrats (which is then repurposed and reused in the Online Leftists' "Democrats Terrible!" screeds in equally bad faith). Yet again, I repeat my offer for anyone who wants to complain about her for an actual and clearly articulated reason to explain what that reason is and why it's not a double standard, why it's not attributable to racism and misogyny (even and especially the unacknowledged sort), what they expect she should be doing differently, and why this is any kind of big deal for the actual mainstream electorate. But judging from previous experience, this will just trigger another round of anonymous WE HAVE GOOD REASONS FOR NOT LIKING HER!!! whines with cheese, and to that I say, yeah, don't even waste your time.

[stylinsoncity]

Caya discussions... I'm seated 👩‍🏫

I've always wondered about Louis' internal process when he came to ny after Harry. When did he decide he was gonna go for it? What would he do if Harry never showed up to the bookstore?

i feel like i won't explain this well, but by chp 19/20, louis is in a constant state of wanting to be with harry. like in his heart, he's already determined that's what he wants (even if in his head, he's also determined that he can't have him).

so, during the time that they spend apart, louis wants to be with him. there are several things that keep him from pursuing him. his grief, his trauma, even his writing. once he starts the work of processing all of that and begins to heal, i think as the sort of logical methodical person he is, the next and obvious step to him is to see harry and try talking things through again. it's not like he ever has like a change of heart or he sees the light. it's more so like his life is a puzzle he's slowly putting back together and harry is the final and most important missing piece. i feel like his thought process simply put would be "i feel better than i have in years and well enough to tell him how i feel."

this is just how i understand caya louis at least. and it's why i never wrote a eureka moment where louis perhaps has a conversation with someone who tells him to go after harry or something like that. i really just feel like it was always clear to louis that he wanted to be with harry and should be with harry but he had some work to do before that could ever feel possible.

i think if harry never showed up at the bookstore, louis would have just kept waiting and hoping for a opportunity to see him. he probably would have reached out to harry's mum again lol... it's like he wrote in his book: only harry's love would do. so whether he saw him at the bookstore or not, he definitely wouldn't have given up on having that love again.

edit: okay, just to quickly add to this, i think caya louis does see the light, but it's more so related to him realizing that he can heal and he can be better and that he's worthy of love. but not related to him wanting to be with harry vs not. i feel like there's a distinction there. again, this is so hard to articulate for some reason.

[death-himself]

ok episode 6 thoughts

decent episode, doesn't top episodes 4 or 5 for me but it was good

kronos being portrayed by his headmaster is an interesting choice

the iris message is so much blurrier than I always imagined i'm crying

144p iris message you would think it would be clearer but nope that's so funny to me

with how involved rick is with the show that means that's always what he imagined iris messaging looking like I can't iris messaging is ruined for me

we didn’t get percy talking to the zebra T-T it’s fine tho i forgot that even happened in the book until i checked after watching

their whole conversation while watching the animals escape i love them

their chemistry is perfect in this episode

THE LOTUS CASINO HAS A ROLLER COASTER WHAT

i get people wanted poker face, but the dua lipa song is perfect, it’s like a slightly more modern version

i don’t know fashion throughout the centuries so i can’t really say anything about the costume designs, but i kinda wish there were more obviously out of place outfits in the lotus

is augustus mentioned at all in the books? i don’t remember a satyr named augustus so i guess he was made just for the tv series?

luring grover in with pan is a cool change

grover slowly losing his memory was played pretty well

i keep getting impressed by how good these kids are as actors

i honestly don’t know why people hate on lin manuel miranda so much, i think he made for a pretty good hermes this episode

but also the way they’re portraying hermes feels a little bit off?? i don’t really know how but something didn’t feel right about his character

i do feel like he’s the most “human” out of the gods introduced so far, and i think that came through pretty well

“to be so close to someone you love, knowing neither of you has any choice but to keep hurting each other?” that line is just-

as someone with a really complicated relationship with my dad that line just hurt goddamn

the flashback percy had??? i feel like that line doesn’t 100% relate to percy and sally’s relationship, but i see how that’d be how percy would feel

unless i’m dumb and that was referencing his relationship with poseidon lol

ok the end of their talk with hermes i wanna talk about that a bit

parenting sometimes being watching your kid struggle and being powerless to stop it: completely true

“we’re all just doing the best we can” now that’s some godly bullshit

the difference between that first quote and gods being parents is that they’re literally capable of doing anything

they could be more present in their kids lives, they just CHOOSE not to, that’s how it works in the books

sure it’s coming from a place where he thinks interacting will only make things worse but???

i can’t articulate my thoughts, i liked this scene tho, my thoughts on hermes are mixed as they should be

ANNABETH STEALING HERMES’S KEYS

“i’m multi-talented” I LOVE HER

percy forgetting grover felt so unsettling to me

hermes driving a taxi so real

percy trying to drive, i’m not gonna lie, that scene went on a little too long for me, but i was laughing the whole time so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

ok percy getting 4 pearls instead of 3??? idk why but that change pissed me off

i paused to get out the book, and i guess it makes more sense then hades just deciding to return her

but at the same time there’s the line in the prophecy, he’s supposed to leave her in the underworld for that part of the prophecy

are they just going to end up accidentally breaking one of the pearls or trading it or something? that’s the only way i can see that still working out

i feel like these episode reviews always turn out sounding more negative than positive, but i swear i’m enjoying the hell out of this series, i just have trouble articulating joy lol

[bedlamsbard]

this whole thing about the Ahsoka show just makes me existentially sad in a way that's hard to articulate without sounding like a lunatic, and I think it's also the reason that I eventually had to leave Star Wars.

like, yeah, Star Wars had been making me angry for years and I hadn't been having a good time for a very long time by that point (June 2021), but NOTHING fucked me up like the way they were just aggressively rewriting canon while openly pretending they weren't. I could deal with it when it was just the films, because those teams weren't really related and that sort of thing is normal anyway, not to mention that I came out of the PT-era EU when TCW was just treading gleefully over the EU. that's fine. the books and comics doing things? not great, but like. the EU's always been that way. (though even before 2021 it was messing me up because Lucasfilm was swearing -- and is still swearing -- that everything is equal levels of canon. it is blatantly untrue.) Mando made me feel like I was being gaslit, made worse by the fact that it was a lot of the same team that had done TCW/Rebels, but there was still the live action/animation distinction. TCW S7 and then finally TBB was the thing that finally made me snap, because then that live action/animation distinction had collapsed and they were still doing it, and it was worse. it made me feel like I was going insane.

I'm aggressively avoiding everything about the Ahsoka show because it brings all of that up again, only worse and more hurtful, because it's just...this thing I really loved chopped up and made palatable for someone else because ~it wasn't good enough. look, I don't know what's going on in this show, I don't want to know, I won't watch it, I don't want to hear about it, but everything about it, the overwriting of everything that came before on every level, MESSES ME UP. it's wildly destabilizing. it's not a logical reaction, I'm well aware of that, I'm not having fun with it either.

(I have everything related to That Show blacklisted, but things about it sneak through on various socials, so I still know a fair amount and I've seen stills and such-like.)

there is something existentially horrifying and destabilizing, and downright cruel, about the canon itself, the cast and crew, telling you that the story they told, the thing you loved, isn't good enough as it is. I can't get over that.

(this is about Star Wars but the MCU isn't immune to it, it's just honestly better at handling it. it's one of the reasons I find the Time Heist in Endgame and portions of Phases 3-5 unbearably sloppy, but by and large it doesn't feel as abjectly cruel as Star Wars does. there are exceptions, of course.)

[outrunningthedark]

i hope i can articulate this properly but the problem (for me) with how they've written most of the love interests for buck & eddie so far is that they've never gotten them integrated with the other main cast much at all. so it feels a little like they're taking away screen time i'd rather see spent on other people with scenes that are just buck + LI at home or eddie + LI at home (although they can at least get chris in there with those too)

like in restrospect it's kind of hilarious actually that taylor was involved in way more scenes with the 118 before she and buck got together then after

I think your feelings are echoed by many in the fandom, and it's the main reason why I stopped pondering the future for Natalia and Marisol. I personally don't see what a DIY-er and a death doula are going to bring to the firefam dynamic when neither character has a history with them (TayKay) or is a parent to someone's kid (Karen, Shannon). I do have a couple #unpopularopinions in relation to this, though. o1. Difficulty integrating has not been limited to Buck and Eddie Lis. Michael was a main. He had his best friends, his kids. But did his love life get a lot of attention prior to the hospital explosion? And then why did the hospital explosion episode even happen? To give those characters a friendly sendoff. Had Rockmond never been let go over his actions, we can't say that part of his story would have gotten any better.

Maddie is a main. She has a child with a firefighter. They're getting married. Why does Maddie go missing in big moments? Why was she not around during the dispatch fire or Henren's vow renewal? Why is she not having "girl talk" with Hen and Karen, her soon-to-be-husband's best friends? Why is she so isolated that the fandom can't even agree on who would be her maid-of-honor? o2. Buck and Eddie can't both have first responder LIs, I'm sorry. Yes, it's the logical choice if the show wants to make new characters "fit", but that would leave only one of the mains with a LI as a background presence - Hen. I realize that the show isn't actually for us gays, but having the lesbian relationship be the one with intentionally less screen time is a path I'd prefer they not take. o3. Not directing at any specific person because I don't know the opinions of every single one of you, but I will repeat something I said the other day and apply it to future LIs. *I* think it's too little, too late not only to get the GA on board with Buddie, but also to get the fandom - the Buddie shippers - on board with other LIs. The excuse for not liking outside relationships has been that they don't feel like part of the family (agree there), but had Tim shut down the possibility of Buddie for good with Ana, or brought in a new LI for Buck in 4B that wasn't previously criticized...we wouldn't be having these conversations today. Lucy comes in as a first responder and people hate for the cheating angle, sure, but what really stung for most of them was the reminder that the fate of Buck and Eddie would never have been a debate were we watching a man and a woman as opposed to two men. Eddie could fall in love in season seven and the reaction would be "Why does Chris need a new mom when he already has Buck???" Um, because Eddie is supposed to be straight? The only way for Buddie to be co-parents without the confirmation would be if we were watching a queerplatonic relationship. Except...neither one is queer.

You know when you try to clean a stain and somehow make it look worse than it already was? That's what it feels like to watch this show and those characters post-s4.

[egipci]

what do you think it is exactly that's stopping the daemyra pairing from being more compelling? bc i feel the exact same way and i can't pinpoint it. is it just the show not hitting the right points and letting it kind of blur into the background... is it an acting problem, a chemistry problem? i think rhaenyra by herself is great and matt smith is really bizarrely ugly imo but a very good actor and from the beginning i had faith in him to play daemon (and i'm still enjoying him for the most part). also its not like one or both parties being ugly has stopped me from getting into a pairing before but i just for the life of me cannot bring myself to feel anything about them at all. i am kind of a lowkey viserys/daemon shipper but again that's not something that on paper would have stopped me from also caring about d/r? i feel like that's been the consensus amongst casual viewers too tbh, having read the book(s) i expected more outrage from my normie friends over the incest but more than one of them has complained about being bored with those two. it's gnawing at me. idk would be interested to hear your thoughts

Hello hello <3 I had to take a minute to think more about this beyond "the vibes are just not there anymore” lol, because I actually really did enjoy the ship in S1a, even though I vastly prefer Emma D'Arcy and older Rhaenyra to Milly Alcock (and she was great in her own right) and despite Matt Smith's... unconventional charm. And while I do think the actors still have plenty of chemistry, and I can be persuaded to care more, at this point I just find myself wondering 'what do these characters like about each other? what is this relationship like?’

The thing I have found particularly attractive about incest (and even more inter-generational incest) is that it's inherently a shorthand for deep history and affection and obligation (kinda like childhood best friends to lovers in that way) -- I don't need to see Daemon meet Rhaenyra for the first time as a new-born to like, imagine the feeling of meeting a very little person related to you for the first time and the parental feelings that inspires. And of course an uncle/niece relationship is per se about the nexus character, namely the brother/father, and so far the show has delivered on that front. Viserys is their third because he's the raison d'etre of the relationship, but I can't figure what else is going on there, I don't know what inspires the romantic turn. Daemon is a parental figure to her, but he's not just that, and that's the reason the relationship is permissible in their world in the first place, but what else is there? In ep 2x4 little Rhaenyra articulates what the initial draw was for her, and then again adult Rhaenyra does the same in ep 6, but what is it to Daemon? What does he like about her? Like, I know why I like watching her as a character, but what does he like about her?

Not to make everything about j/d but for the sake of illustration --- j/d is a parent/child relationship obviously, and whenever I write them the central motif is that deep paternal love but that's not enough to explain the sexual turn (whether consummated or un). There has to be some extra something there, which is in the case of J/D the 20+ years of history and partnership between them, which we only see glimpses of. But I factually know that in canon it existed, and I can still see its impacts on Dean all the way to the very last scene of the show. There's a reason I find J/D more plausible than J/S, even though John feels the same profound affection and devotion towards Sam.

I have no sense of that history with D/R. I can fill in the blanks when we first meet them in ep 1, but that can only go so far, because the adapted text leads me to believe there is no such history between them. There is no canon opportunity for that relationship to develop. We have a few scenes with them between s1 ep 1-2, then there's a three year time jump to ep. 4 during which they haven't seen each other, between 5 and 7 there are ten years where these characters do not interact, unlike in the book. Their reconciliation in ep. 7 feels more like a grief-fueled political alliance than a rekindling of a torrid affair, which is of course plenty interesting as a foundation for a relationship, but then we immediately jump six years into the future in ep8. Presumably any given relationship is different at year 20 from what it was at year 0, I just don't know much about how this particular relationship has evolved. I know they have had sex in the interim because I see they have kids, but that's about it. And it's unfortunate, because the show has been able to deliver real-feeling relationships in very limited scenes between Rhaenyra and Laenor, for example, or Aegon with his parents and Otto in S1. And to be sure the D/R relationship doesn't lack nuance, it just doesn't have the emotional resonance to me of a romance between soulmates like the show runners describe it. From a Rhaenyra-centric pov it simply feels like getting with your high school crush after many years in-between and it's just not working out as you would have hoped. From a Daemon-pov, Rhaenyra just feels like a consolation prize. And also both of them used to date the same guy. And ironically, I actually find that intriguing enough, I just feel like I'm being gaslighted by the show runners and its fans about what I'm actually watching.

Like I said before, incest aside, I think this is a very common problem in conveying romance in visual media, or at least a common experience for me as a viewer (which is why I consider myself a pretty non-shipper normie). Obviously there are many many people who ship it and spend a lot of time thinking about it out there, so it's not unpopular by any stretch, and I think fandom and transformative works are completely valid ways to deepen your investment in canon and the characters, but it takes a lot for me to reach that level of interest.

As to your impression of the normie consensus: that seems more or less accurate to me --- none of my normie friends have seen s2 yet, but I do watch a lot of reaction videos (lol) and people seem more invested in the dragons and the overall family drama and politics than in the romantic dimension to D/R. Though to be fair, I don't know that any of the romantic relationships on the show are particularly attractive. Corlys and Rhaenys were wonderful, and I'm intrigued by Cole/Alicent (and Alicent/Aegon in headcanon land), but it's a pretty sexless show on the whole. Like, even Baela and Jace have taken vows of chastity until marriage or something, it's very strange.

Re: Viserys/Daemon: <3 I think it's wonderful actually! I haven't finished F&B and I haven't read any of the other books so I don't know if there is some gay incest down the line, but I don't think there is? Which is bizarre of course because why wouldn't two siblings of the same gender develop a relationship in the fucking your siblings family? I think that conflict would have been tremendously intriguing to explore, and I can so easily see Daemon as a character attached to his vision of Targaryen godhood pushing that permission even further to fuck his brother. As it were it's completely consistent with the show and with Daemon's chemistry with male characters, and holds a lot of explanatory value for him as a character, but I do wish it were made more explicit. And this is coming from someone who generally finds sibling incest pretty meh to squicky. In a different world I would write about them, but all this canon is enough for me!

[halfmoth-halfman]

I didn’t know the new chapter has been out FOR A WEEK. Thanks Tumblr!

Anyways, lovely start to my morning, pretty sure my pup was enraptured cause he was snuggled with me looking at my screen as I scrolled faster than light to read.

Seeing the softer side of Ghost during the panic scene was really nice and I could almost hear his internal thoughts of “what the fuck did they do, what did WE do”. I feel as though that scene really revealed for them just how wrong they were about her and it was heartwarming to see them rally

Price was a t total DICK at first, but the love confession shocked him into his right mind. This man on his knees DID something to me, we love a man in the wrong on his knees “apologizing” (i’ll take murder as an apology along with a check sir). When Canary is healed she better make him kneel and beg.

Now on to your writing, i’m always impressed but WOW this is by far your best work, you articulated the inner thoughts of a panicked person so well I thought I was having an episode and that I WAS canary for a moment and had to take a breather. You perfectly put into a visual word form complete panic and shattered thoughts. This is a masterwork because everything was written both incomprehensible and sharp, written so that we knew how canary was thinking, with how fast events were happening and how quickly canary had to try and process it while psychologically shattered herself. I keep rereading because i’ve never read anyone write in such a way.

How dare you make me feel these emotions at 8 in the morning. I’m so impressed with your work and i’m excited to see you flourish from here. -🔥

i legitimately think hell will freeze over long before tumblr actually works like it's suppose to.

asldkajsdal not the dog reading along with you, and so early in the morning too omg i'm sorry 😭

ghost def went through a lot of realizations in that moment, the most important being that he was very very wrong about canary and regardless of how he feels about her, he needs to help her. we'll be seeing more sides to ghost in the next few chapters and maybe a few conversations with canary too!

i really like the love confession as a whole, just because it's so quick and so simple but so effective in getting price's attention. like he's just kinda laid into her, and is fully convinced canary's played him the entire time only for her to respond by telling him she loved him. it's the first time she's ever said it to him, and it throws him off enough that his anger is momentarily forgotten.

thank you so much, i usually try to draw from my own experiences with panic attacks and anxiety when i write those scenes for canary. given how quickly things happen for her, esp in the last chapter, i try my best to show how fast she has to process things while it all just keeps stacking onto the panic she's been pushing down until eventually it all boils over and she can't stop it. she's going through so many emotions, she's scared, angry, stressed, lonely, depressed, confused, just so many things that i don't even she realizes what she's feeling, all the while she's trying to keep herself together and figuring out how to save herself. i know it won't relate to everyone's experiences, but i do my best to portray her dealing with everything and the consequences of pushing it all down.

thank you so much again!!! i'm pretty impressed with myself making it this far, and i'm so eternally grateful for everyone coming on this ride with me!! 💜

[sapphosdickandballs]

Hiiii~ I'm here to yapp about Jennifer's Body 😈

I'm still gonna rant with Cramity BUT it's true that you kinda got me messed up (in a good way) in the first place when we were talking about dollification and the relationship between horror content and horny content, lmao.

I don't want to give you spoilers, tho. So I'm gonna try to articulate my thoughts on the movie without actually talking about the movie. I hope I can keep it spoiler free!

Brace yourself, ig.

I've been thinking long about the movie almost in a whim. I don't know why exactly it clicked in my head the way it did, but what I do know is that I felt related to the themes and the main characters in the movie, both Needy and Jennifer. It was a fun watch, indeed, and oh Lord Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfried. How I love these women.

The movie got some interesting themes, as I was saying, and I found myself smiling thinking about what could have been if, I don't know, if I got to watch the movie when I was 13 or something. You know, the peak of the angst. Probably I wouldn't care as much as I do now, but I can't shake the feeling that in some way this movie would have clicked, although slightly different, with that 13 years old me just as it is clicking now.

But why am I insisting on this ‘click’? Well, the keyword here is girlhood. In my opinion, the movie works with Needy as a character the viewer can relate to. It's a normal teenager girl, with a good boyfriend, and other people that care about her. But then we've got Jennifer. She is the dream, in some way. That stereotype of popular girl we all kind of tried to be at some point. And it got me caught up in the story, because Jennifer is quite messed up, you know? Besides what happens in the movie with all the succubus stuff, her life isn't completely perfect. Her popularity is wearing off, she feels lost, and she tries to keep it together, to keep the show going on. She starts to realize that she is not the It Girl, and she keeps on feeling more and more powerless till the things with the band I'm gonna skip because spoilers happen.

But all of this is girlhood. God, even her room felt like girlhood for me. That's what I wanted, you know? I don't know when I stopped desiring to be a girl, when it started to feel like a senseless dream... I got a phase in which I started to hate everything pink and femenine, and even after that phase was gone I found difficult to create a strong relationship with my femenine side. I didn't gave myself a chance to be girly, to enjoy that stuff, and now it's like I don't know “how to girl”. I don't know how to take care of my hair, or how to do my make up. I grew up tired and quite uncomfortable using skirts and dresses. Because in a way they felt wrong. They felt dangerous, even.

Girlhood felt like something I didn't want in my life. To grow up in my body, to have to play that fucked up hide and seek with my own identity, and to come to a sort of deal with the life I was supposed to live, based on what my parents wanted and what I felt like the goal at that time was (being perfect, basically).

I have been feeling powerless lately, I admit. Maybe because of that same girlhood that, in one hand, I denied myself and, in the other hand, was still mine in the eyes of everyone else (I don't know how to girl, but I'm still a girl, so there's that dichotomy. My girlhood has never been mine exactly, even when it's supposed to be a thing inherently mine). And this movie really got me thinking about this. About all this thing with my own identity and the sense of being powerless... When I watched it the first time I thought “this movie feels like a dream come true”, in the sense that the girl I'm projecting to, Needy, becomes someone powerful. And she fucked up everyone that messed with her. And that was cathartic.

I still feel like Jennifer's was both another teenager girl and also a metaphor of girlhood and it's problems, though. I can't stop thinking and ruminating her character... I haven't got a clear idea, so what I'm gonna say it's quite meh, but anyway. She is, in fact, just a girl like Needy, but she gets so caught up in this stereotype of what being a girl is that she ends up in such a position (mind you, this is the same stereotype I feared myself even subconsciously as I was growing up). She hides from the reality... She avoids it. Till the last minute, actually. And is almost a metaphor for that same stereotype and how dangerous it can be. It's quite tragic, and she is, in my opinion, a victim of that narrative she created (and the society created, too)...

Maybe I'm reaching, but I do find some power in her arc and I see in it all the things I already listed. She wasn't at her best before the conflict of the movie started. Then she got fucked up. And then she got powers that raised from that situation. Same powers that led to her doom. Man, it's so messed up...

The movie got me feeling so much about what I have lost, who I am and what I wanted to be when I was a kid. The movie really connected me with the girl I was. With what I wanted and dreamed about... while also connecting with present time me, and all the struggles I still have with being a girl and just exiting as a human being...

And I'm gonna leave this here for now, lmao. It's long and I'm sure I didn't say half the things I wanted to say, nor did I said what I said in a satisfactory way (I rambled too much, zero structure) neither. So yeah. Hope you enjoyed the brainrot.

Reading this with a bowl of popcorn

thank you for Brainroting in my inbox this was super interesting! It made me really wanna watch the movie I’ve only ever just watched clips of it (mostly Megan Fox covered in blood cause!!!)

But yeah this is a very interesting look into something I really don’t know much about, the concept of girlhood and being a girl in general and all the expectations. This is really fascinating. I feel like peoples brainrot/rants do more for me than like any promo. I’m gonna go do piracy try to obtain this in a super legal way 👍

[backtothedisaster]

Okay I can't stop thinking of the cat style courtship presents tdyfhvvj

Do either of them have a favorite 'gift' from the other?

What were the first 'gifts' they gave/received?

Do they contact one another like "hey I have something for u" or do they just....show up at random and go like "here" and hand over whatever loot and/or corpse/body part they have?

What's the loot to dead things gift ratio like?

Dear god I hope these are understandable there's a couple where I feel like I could articulate it better but for the life of me I can't figure out H O W

Also love the new art thank you for sharing it

their evil courtship is all that matters really

Do either of them have a favorite 'gift' from the other? - hmmm zer0 probably once got a really nice sniper rifle from fl4k that they really cherish. and for fl4k i don’t think they have a specific favorite but i think whenever zer0 finds a new trinket for them they add it to their bag

What were the first 'gifts' they gave/ received? - i think the first gift fl4k gave zer0 was a trophy from a target of opportunity kill they left in his room. and then the first gift zer0 gave fl4k was probably a decent quality pistol or a sniper (he has no idea what fl4k wants) (On a semi related note can we talk about how fuckig homosexual the targets of opportunity are. ok that might just be me)

Do they contact one another like "hey I have something for u" or do they just...show up at random and go like "here" and hand over whatever loot and/or corpse/body part they have? - i think it’s a lot of just handing it over without another word but sometimes they’ll just go to their respective rooms to find a gun/shield/piece of a guy they wanted dead and be like wow:)my beloved partner left me a gift

What's the loot to dead things gift ratio like? - probably an even split but i think it leaned more towards dead things when they first met. fl4k was trying sooooo hard to impress zer0 with the targets of opportunity

also THANK YOUUU for the compliment about my art … i got the idea to draw that days ago when i was out of town without my tablet and just lived with that idea for like a week…it felt so good to finally draw it

[woozapooza]

I had some thoughts while watching The Sopranos 4x04 "The Weight" last night that I'm going to try to wrangle into a moderately coherent post right now during my half-hour lunch break, so let's see how that goes:

I noticed an interesting parallel in this episode between the mob world and the non-mob world (is there a better term for that? the normie world?). The parallel is between two characters who are, like, the last characters I would expect to be thinking about in relation to each other: Johnny Sack and Jason LaPenna. Johnny spends this whole episode trying to avenge his wife's honor by having Ralphie killed, something that Ginny, who is not even aware of Ralphie's offensive joke, very much did not ask him to do. Meanwhile, Melfi tells Kupferberg that ever since she was raped, her son has become alienated from his father and seems to have generally lost his way in life, to which Kupferberg suggests that Jason feels "powerless to avenge [her] and resents his father for the same shortcomings." But Melfi, like Ginny, very much did not ask to be avenged. I don't doubt that Johnny truly loves his wife or that Jason truly loves his mother. But in both the mob world and the non-mob world, cruelty towards a woman is taken by the men who love her as a cause for vengeance—specifically violent vengeance, given that in 3x04 Jason declared he "want[ed] five minutes" with the rapist—regardless of her wishes. Now, obviously violent urges in response to literal violence are vastly more reasonable than violent urges in response to a mean joke that the target of the joke didn't even hear, but I think the parallel still stands: the mob world paternalism on display in this episode is just an amplification of the non-mob world paternalism on display. (Interestingly—and this isn't my observation but something I read on the internet after watching 4x04—Ginny is first mentioned [and joked about] [EDIT: and makes her first appearance] in "Employee of the Month.")

All right, so that's the parallel I saw within this episode, but I want to take my remaining ten minutes to try to begin to articulate how this ties in to some other stuff. The parallel I saw here ("parallel" may be too strong a word but I can't think of a better one so it'll have to do) between mob world masculinity and non-mob world masculinity reminded me of two other episodes where I've noticed similar things. First, in "Boca," the guys are all more or less horrified at the relationship between Meadow's classmate and the soccer coach, recognizing it (again, more or less) as predatory, but they also ruthlessly mock Junior for performing oral sex on a woman, not realizing that the coach's behavior and their own are part of the same bigger picture of patriarchal sexuality. Second, something I commented on from 3x13: Tony doesn't want AJ (or Meadow, but for simplicity's sake I'm focusing on men here) to follow in his footsteps in terms of a career, but otherwise imposes the same standards of strength/masculinity on AJ that he does on himself (rebuking him for crying, wanting him to become a "soldier," describing AJ's panic attacks as "that putrid, rotten fucking Soprano gene" as if that's the worst thing he's passed on to AJ). I'm out of time so I can't really wrap this up neatly, but I guess what I'm getting at is that the resonances between how both worlds conceive of masculinity show that Tony isn't really wrong to conceive of the distinction between his own life and the one he wants for AJ as one purely of legality rather than anything deeper. I don't want to overstate the case because, for example, obviously in the non-mob world it's not normal to kill someone for making a mean joke, but I have to get back to work so I don't have time to bring much nuance to this post.

[sylvaridreams]

1, 5, and 15 for whoever you want 👀

OH BOY (i did not forget this. forgetting is the post killer. forgetting is the little death that makes me not post.) ask game!

I'll do these for my little orange freak... Auru...

1-- Where did they grow up/spend their early years?

In the Grove for a short time, where he met Alba and Meisi. Auruim didn't stay there long before enlisting in the Vigil, and from there he was at Vigil Keep until the events in the Maguuma Wastes unfolded and Camp Resolve was build up. He felt from early on that he was too weak, incapable of keeping up with the other two, and after being attacked in the Vigil Keep, his confidence further tanked and he verged on being discharged from the Vigil entirely. Darlio is the only reason he managed to hang on and make it through the join the Pact in the wastes.

And then of course none of this really matters much, he was blighted within a few months of waking up from the dream anyway.

5-- How do they feel about their family? Chosen and/or biological?

I guess you could argue he's "biologically" related to all the other sylvari, with whom he feels a deep divide and a vast disconnect. He knows he's not one of them and can't return to that life. He knows that it doesn't matter whether or not he tries to be like them, that there will always be a cold, if polite rejection to his otherness. I think this contributes to him othering himself further; i.e., since he feels like he can't be one of them no matter what he does, he'll behave opposite to their behaviors and values to create a wider disconnect and a sharper contrast.

Alba, Meisi, Canach at this point, Bourbon at this point, Deidre, Venasis and Darlio-- those are the people he cares about. I think their bonds are complex -- Auruim is not nice by nature, he has trouble being kind even when he wants to be, he can't get words out unless they're cruel and hurtful, he can't communicate what he wants from people without lashing out at them. He loves each of these people but he's not good at showing it and might never be. But he does love them. They know he does.

I think things with him and Alba have been the absolute rockiest out of everyone, because he and Alba really do love one another and always have, but Auruim had no one else to blame for sending him into the jungle for four years and then leaving him suffering in a lab for six months after, and the two of them have directly conflicting communication styles and understandings of a lot of things. I think there will just always been tension and stress in their relationship which will probably never go away, if only because Auruim can't articulate what he means or how he feels without hurting Alba. I could just go into Auru's history with and feelings about people forever but. That's what Icebrood Saga rewrite is for isn't it....

15-- Are they more avoidant or confrontational?

Confrontational. But... Auruim is the type to get really angry about something, charge headfirst into confrontation completely unprepared, be unable to vocalize what his position is, get really really really upset, cry his eyes out and break things and blame the other person for everything, and then require a lot of cooldown time before he can get to the point of it all. (100% conflicts with super avoidant Alba for whom problems just don't exist as long as he doesn't look straight at them.) Basically, Auru is confrontational in a way that gets nothing resolved.

[sapnapstummy]

🔥🔥 sapnap

Finally wrote the sapnap treatment essay I've been thinking about for a while

Tw for fatphobia and homophobia under the cut

I feel like I with never be able to fully articulate what I'm trying to say but I gonna give it a go.

Sapnap in general has been treated really differently in this fandom than Dream and George, while they've all had their share of bad treatment, sapnaps is different for a few reasons. Fatphobia is the biggest one off the bat for me. I know there's a lot of new people who weren't around for Texas sapnap, so I'll try to summarize. Sapnaps always been a liked a little less just due to the fact that he doesn't feature in as many videos and has less videos up. But sapnap faced so much fatphobia in 2020 especially September/November if I remember correctly, this coincided with the huge burst of the dsmps popularity and the dsmp becoming a bit more mainstream, it was also the time when tubbo was getting a lot of bodyshaming and sexualization too.

Looking back at the fanart of this era, there was hardly any sapnap fanart that reflected what sapnap actually looked like in real life (the fandom still has a problem with drawing people skinnier than they are, which is prevalent in all fandoms and has been an issue for a really long time). After sapnap moved in with Dream he lost weight and during the karlnap meetups he was getting a lot more positive reactions, suddenly now that his cheeks were a little less round he's hot instead of cute (or "friend shaped" or "looks like he give nice hugs" or other back handed compliments, god forbid people who aren't skinny be called attractive) and there were a lot of "I'm proud of him" and "he's so much healthier now" posts going around that really showed how people really viewed his weight loss. But fatphobia is never just about someone's weight there's always other aspects aswell. The idea that sapnap was grosser than Dream or George continues even now. Sapnap does gross things sure but he's also clean too, it goes back into putting people into defined boxes. Dream multiple times talked about how clean sapnaps room is, and even just looking at the effort that sapnaps put into his stream room it's clear that sapnaps not this purely messy slob, also during George's birthday stream at Hannah's house sapnap was constantly washing/rinsing his hands. The idea that sapnap is soooo much grosser that the rest of the dteam was tied into the fatphobia, especially considering that multiple times is was said that George wouldn't shower for weeks (but if you called him gross for that then you're ableist)

As I've said before this fandom (and the general young online community) has the tendency to put people into character boxes and give them set traits, they fall into the trap of black and white thinking and can't entertain any grey areas. This is especially apparent with the biphobia dream, and other multispec people, face. There's a lot of "clocking" gay people and "tells" that young people use as a way to determine who is queer and who isn't. Saying that queer people look a certain way has always been a way to alienate people, and it's homophobic, full stop. Whether it's denying that someone is queer because of they way they look/act, or if it's insisting that people are queer, it never has been and never will be a fool proof way to "figure them out" (and it's speculating sexualities which is incredibly invasive).

I'm not going to get into a sexuality debate and I'm not speculating sapnaps sexuality, but sapnap has always read somewhat queer to me (as in relatable as a queer person) and at the very least he has always been very vocally supportive. He's never shied away from play flirting with his friends, he's an adamant homiesexual, and he's always been supportive of dnf. The notion of "sapnap is homophobic and hates dnf and he hates his queer fans" has always been unfounded.

Something that I've seen people say a lot is that karlnap/dreamnap/any sapnap ship with another man, is never going to happen because sapnap is so straight (as if shipping always has to be serious) and it usually comes off as somewhat defensive, I see it a lot after a lot of ship content happens, like the georgenap meetup or the karlnap meetups. People use "sapnap is straight" as sort of a shut down for ship content they don't like. I'll never forget the post seriously calling sapnap "the straightest man ever" and including a picture from the time sapnap was blushing while watching karl change. It comes off as "I don't see you as queer so clearly you aren't" which feeds from the putting people in boxes.

The young queer community has such a hard time viewing queer people as more than skinny attractive feminine white people from progressive areas. Being a queer person born and raised in the southern usa (in a red county in a red district in a red state with a homophobic governor with homophobic laws) I see so much dismissiveness towards the south and marginalized people in the south. Years ago I was in the group of queer people that didn't look queer because we couldn't look queer.

Sapnap is from Texas, he's a southern boy, he used to have a Texas flag hanging up in his room. He's also a sweaty gamer who yells and plays aggressively. He doesn't fit into the twinky gayboy that people try to put George and Dream into, he doesn't fit into the stupid boxes that define what's gay, so obviously he's so straight (especially because he like women and when you like women as a man you're only allowed to be straight because multispec isn't real it's just a middle point before people realize who they truly are, right)

Anyway, this is getting really long and I haven't even mention everything I could talk about, but I'm gonna end it here. To summarize, people mistreat sapnap because they can't fit him into predefined boxes and they don't have any nuance, and I think they should take some time to reevaluate people and the way they think about and treat others <3

[freaky-flawless]

So I Got Cleo's G3 Doll

Here's my thoughts under the cut. Just wanna put a disclaimer that I am someone who doesn't consider themself a fan of Gen 3, but is keeping an open mind. So just keep that in mind as you read, I am biased and do compare her to the G1 dolls, but I try to give credit where credit is due.

Like I said previously, I love the doll itself. Her face up is pretty (mine does have a slight imperfection, but its subtle enough that I'm not bothered by it), her hair is pretty, her skin tone and the shimmer they added to it are beautiful. I love her new body as well, though I do wish her torso and neck were a little longer. Specifically I love her big ears and hands. I do like G1 Cleo's hand pose a little bit more, but overall her new hands are great, and because they're bigger they're easier to remove. And finally, this will probably be an unpopular opinion, but I could do without the chest articulation in place of something else, like a doll stand.

I can't say much on the quality of her hair as it's not something I'm all that knowledgeable about. All I can say is that it feels more...plasticy? Compared to her G1 doll's hair. I'm having a hard time getting it to stay flat. I also think it's kinda odd that they seemingly made it a point to give all the dolls long brushable hair, but didn't provide brushes. Don't get me wrong, I have an abundance of Monster High brushes and don't need any more, but kids brand new to the series don't. And as someone with nieces, I can say for sure that they love brushing doll hair. I feel like doll stands and hair brushes are pretty standard things for dolls to come with nowadays, especially at that price range.

I'm very amused at how much she looks like Nefera, in the sense that the two of them look even more related than G1 Cleo and Nefera. It does look to me as though they took more inspiration from Nefera's G1 design more than Cleo's, which is interesting. I also discovered that Nefera's shoes, though they don't fit, match G3 Cleo's outfit pretty well, aside from the black in them.

Speaking of G3 Cleo's outfit...that's where my biggest disappointment lies.

I haven't exactly been subtle about my dislike for her boots. They don't go with the style of her dress, and overall I think giving a character who grew up in a hot desert climate boots is a super weird choice. On top of that I don't find them to be flattering on her new leg molds. Her calves are much thicker now, and adding thick boots to them really accentuates it and makes her look slightly awkward and disproportionate. However the actual quality of them is pretty good. There's a decent amount of detail, and I appreciate that the slit in the back of them doesn't go all the way up so they can't lose their shape, which is actually an issue I have with a couple G1 dolls. I would say the same for her accessories, they're well detailed and the paint job on them is really nice.

Her dress is where things take a nosedive. I think before I was so distracted by how much I disliked her boots that I didn't pay that much attention to her dress. But now that I have her and have felt the material I'm really disappointed by it. I don't know what material was used to make it, but I can assure it's plastic and pretty cheap feeling. Compared to G1 Cleo's clothes it feels like a cheap costume. I will say this material is probably more play proof, but I do have G1 Cleo's basic outfit, which is over ten years old by now, and her jumpsuit still looks brand new, and the material is so soft. It feels like real clothes. And compared to other modern doll lines the quality of her dress is kinda embarrassing. They couldn't have used a nicer material?? And aside from that, she has this new beautiful body mold, I would have really hoped that they'd have given her an outfit to accentuate it a bit more, like Draculaura's does.

Interestingly, I think her outfit in the show and on the box art would look better on her doll, and her doll's outfit would look better on her 3D model.

tldr; the doll is gorgeous, she should have come with a brush and a doll stand, her accessories are well detailed, and the quality of her dress is cheap.



[nounpolycule]

This thing for me is fine hate Rose people are entitled to their own opinion, but Dan is the hill to die on?? Dan is peak character writing and representation?? Dan??

Also, the "try liking a character that gets actual sexism and racism on the daily" is getting to me. What does that even mean?? This is talking about working class characters? The way they said it implies that Dan goes through racism and sexism everyday? Dan??

Yeah, honestly I couldn't give two shits about people hating Rose? People have been talking about how Rose is boring and a bitch and too stupid and so on for longer than I've known the show existed (a bit over a decade at this point), and they'll be saying the same shit until the end of the fandom's existence. I take issue, however, with acting like everyone who disagrees with you about a dumb (affectionate) little sci-fi show is stupid, especially when you're actively insulting them.

And yeah, there's like a lot to be said on the concept of "representation" in general. Other people have articulated this better than I ever will. If you focus too hard on a character being "representation", somewhere along the way, you lose the "character" part. Not every character that fits the same demographic(s) as you is going to feel like they match your experiences 100%, and they shouldn't! If no one person's experiences are universal, how can we expect a character to portray universal experiences without losing that piece that makes them feel more like a character than a plot device being used for diversity points? It's good to have diverse characters! I'm not joking when I say Jack Harkness was a stepping stone in realizing I'm a lesbian - would it have taken me less time to realize if I'd had Bill to look up to when I was 13? Would I have felt comfortable with myself at a younger age if I'd seen a lesbian character on my favorite show? I can only hope that that's what happened for people younger than me! But, at least to me, you lose something when you focus on "good representation" over diverse good characters.

The thing about looking at Rose through the lens of representation is that... that's not what she was designed to be? Her experiences inform her character, but her story isn't about that background. Sure, call her bad representation. She was never intended to be representation. It's not a fucking gotcha. She's a character first.

And with Dan... I can't see him as serious commentary. His house gets shrunk as a joke. His house stays shrunk as a joke. We do not see the ramifications of him losing his house, I don't really see that as commentary on poverty or homelessness when we don't actually see what happens to him afterwards. I won't tell anyone they can't see themselves in his character or situation, but to say that everyone should universally agree that he's more relatable is literally bringing us back to square one of "this character resonates more with me and therefore they are better universal representation and if you disagree you're just a basic bitch that needs to grow up." It's not productive. Besides, isn't the point of representation supposed to be that the more a particular marginalized experience is portrayed, the more likely it is that someone will find something that resonates with them?

And as for talking about Rose being a disservice to Dan... I haven't seen anyone comparing Dan and Rose aside from OP. I won't say it doesn't exist, clearly we do not run in the same circles, but it's not something I see at all. Though if we want to get down to it - yeah, I see my experiences (admittedly as an American) more in Rose than Dan. And that's okay. I'm a young adult who has barely left home whose experiences of being poor are colored by that - of course I'm going to see myself in the 19 year old still living with her mom than the 50-something year old who is living on his own. But that doesn't mean I can't respect people who feel differently.

As for "try liking a character that gets actual sexism and racism on the daily", I can only assume that they were talking about Yaz. But of course, as you said, the placement makes it sound like it's about Dan. It's a really weird place to start talking about Yaz, especially since they didn't actually mention her by name and she wasn't being discussed prior. And they did block my friend for pointing out that actually experiencing racism and such is worse than being a fan of a character that is treated that way by fans so... take that as you will.

Also no part of main tagging these posts (including one that begins "rose tyler is so fucking boring"), calling Rose fans "basic bitches" (again - whether or not you think calling Rose a bitch is misogynistic - calling real people, at least some of whom are women, bitches because they disagree with you is, in fact, misogynistic), and saying "#rose stans are so easy to wind up #just say you don't like her or she's bad rep #and they start crying and shitting themselves #it's so funny" reads as attempting to have a discussion about these characters in good faith. It's just so clearly deliberately trying to start shit. Like grow up, it's 2023, get a hobby less reminiscent of a middle school bully.

Also like. You didn't mention it at all but I will talk about Rose's ending (especially looking at Doomsday specifically) being 1. a punishment rather than a reward, and 2. really horrifying to me, actually (from a power imbalance perspective, not just a Rose fan perspective) until I'm blue in the face. And also I do find it funny that someone said that "Rose Tyler and Charlie Bucket are a fantasy, that if you work, behave and are good at heart, you will get the ultimate treasure in capitalist society, capital." Like first of all I know it was someone on the pro-Rose side that brought it up, but I don't think the Charlie comparison is worthwhile at all. Second of all, I love her but what part of Rose's story is her working and behaving and that's how she ends up rich? Babe didn't work for money (though she did work to be undercover for what, a week?) onscreen a single day after the Doctor blew up her job. Since when is Rose "jeopardy friendly" Tyler known for behaving? And if half of your point is that she's a bitch... well that kills "good at heart" a bit, doesn't it?

[tgtbata]

getting in b4 wednesday with a wincest ask because i know i'll forget in the chaos of the week -- what is at this very moment your heartfave most indulgent wincest au to draw?

it's wincest week all week every week <3

below the cut for incoherent musings. i prommy there’s an actual answer somewhere in there.

i love indulgent AUs and i love drawing them but i still feel like they have to fit into the idea of canon even if they're cracky (and if we’re talking about completely different lives and jobs etc. they’re best created by someone who knows what they’re talking about and appreciates canon imltho) so i can't get into any ol’ AU and most things that i am into would qualify more as canon divergence than actual AU - especially for wincest!

but one of the AUs i enjoy drawing is cowboys! it’s something i’ve only drawn once or twice but i love the idea of it and the aesthetic for art and i want to explore it more in the future! the AUs presented to us by the show (like lebanon or smith/wesson or rich!chesters) are very fun to play in but don’t really count since they’re almost just another shape of canon, miraculously. however, more AU in that sense: there’s some endverse!dean/laterseasons!sam art in my files i’ve already sketched that i’m excited to properly work on. oh and the AU where john was bujo-ing his journal with the best of the stationery girlies and spent sam’s college fund on washi tape.

i’m not really interested in transplanting sam and dean into random mundane settings and if they go there for a canon reason like a hunt that’s not an AU so. genderswaps are an interesting exercise to draw but not heartfaves, if that makes sense! sorry, i’m just going through AUs in my head here.

and as a non-answer to your question because it’s on my mind: football AUs (association football) are my id, my ego, my superego, my everything in fandom but they have to be done the way i (me, me, me!) selfishly want them and unfortch they are a little bit of a hard sell for supernatural. maybe it's the us-american setting, maybe it's the very confined cast of the show that doesn't lend itself to much except mercenary-style transfer careers or maybe it's that i can't believe these guys would want to fuck the metaphorical personification of their club before fucking the guy standing in the freekick wall next to them - the whole point of wincest is that they’d love to fuck the guy standing next to them! but i need my football AUs to feature the true faith in a greater thing (i.e. The Beautiful Game) in a relevant fashion and i’m not saying it's impossible to do for spn or to subvert it well but it's difficult, for me. so this is something i'm always turning over in my head and i will draw them/have sketched them in football jerseys because i love drawing football jerseys but it’s nothing articulated at all. so not a true AU, you know.

to actually answer the question after all these detours: there's a bigger project made up of multiple drawings i’ve been incubating related to dean surviving the rebar incident which is SO incredibly indulgent as a concept that it just makes me happy. again more canon divergence than true AU but that’s all i got. thank you for the question! and thanks of reading.