#I have too many qualms with the storyline as a whole to probably get along very well

[fumbles-mcstupid]

It’s not that I’m not a fan of Babylon 5, it’s more that I’m MORE of a fan of what the show could have been if it had not diverged from the way the story was being set up through Season 1. I’m a fan of what the path not taken was trying to be.

[lavendersugarplum]

Why Ben’s Death Was Important.

These two TUA characters could've died earlier, and I would not care.

Now that The Umbrella Academy has come to an end with Season 4, I feel like it's the perfect time to share some of my thoughts on the characters, and one in particular—Jennifer. If Jennifer had been killed off at any point during the season, it honestly wouldn't have affected me in the slightest. I just couldn't bring myself to care about her character. Jennifer's presence throughout the series has been minimal at best; she's barely had any screen time or development, making it hard to connect with or invest in her story. In many ways, she felt like a character who was simply there to serve the needs of the plot, rather than someone we were meant to root for or even understand on a deeper level.

The show could have handled her just as they did with Harlan—abruptly writing her out without much of a send-off. Harlan, who was once an important character, was discarded with little fanfare when his role no longer fit into the narrative. But because Jennifer is more closely tied to the central plot and Sparrow Ben's storyline, the writers clearly felt she was too important to be cut off so easily. Despite her being integral to certain plot points, it felt like her character never truly got the attention or development needed to make her compelling. So, while her survival made sense for the overall narrative, it didn't do much to make her any more memorable or likable to me as a viewer. If they had killed her off from the start, then the show would basically be over. Happy Ending for everyone....except her.

Another character I would have had zero qualms about losing is Sparrow Ben. Especially him. I HATE this character with a passion. No one can ever replace Umbrella Ben in my eyes; he will always be the best Ben, the only valid Ben, and the one who truly mattered. Sparrow Ben, on the other hand, is an entirely different story. I wouldn't give two flying fucks if something terrible happened to him. 😭 From the moment he appeared on screen, it was clear that his character was meant to be unlikable—arrogant, self-centered, and constantly at odds with everyone around him. And while it seemed like the writers tried to soften him up in late end of Season 3, hoping to make him more sympathetic or relatable, it just didn't work for me. Any attempts to redeem Sparrow Ben fell flat, and he remained just as obnoxious as ever.

Frankly, I'm convinced that the only reason the Umbrellas kept him around was because he looked like their beloved Umbrella Ben. If it were up to me, I'd have left his ass somewhere along the way, probably "accidentally" letting him get swallowed up by the Kugelblitz or one of the many other apocalyptic threats they faced. The Umbrellas' insistence on keeping him around felt misguided; he's not their Ben, and he's made it painfully clear he doesn't want to be part of their found family. I kept thinking, "Just let him go! He's not your brother!" The whole dynamic was forced and uncomfortable, and it's hard not to blame him for a lot of what went wrong this season. The group's willingness to cling to this hollow version of their lost sibling only made things worse.

Because let's be real, most of the things in Season 4 can be traced back to Sparrow Ben's actions or his selfish decisions. If they had just left him behind earlier on, half the disasters they faced might never have happened. The Umbrellas should have cut their losses instead of trying to see something redeemable in a character who had no interest in being part of their story. To me, the only decent Sparrows were Sloane and Marcus—characters who, unlike Sparrow Ben, showed some sense of loyalty, vulnerability, and a willingness to grow. Sparrow Ben was just dead weight, a constant reminder of what the Umbrellas lost, without offering anything meaningful in return. He is a prime example to show how none of the Umbrella's are willing to just let go of some things and move on.

The entire series of The Umbrella Academy revolves around one central theme: the siblings' refusal to let go of the past and accept things as they are. They're constantly clinging to old traumas, memories, and regrets, unable to move forward. This is why Sparrow Ben's antagonistic personality is in a way important to the storyline. If he had been as loving, kind, and brotherly as Umbrella Ben, his role as the catalyst for the Umbrellas' downfall would have made no sense. Sparrow Ben's cold and selfish nature was a direct contrast to what the Umbrellas once had, highlighting just how much they were still trapped in the past, desperately trying to hold onto something that was long gone. So even though a lot of us might absolutely loathe this character, he role was a reminder that you can't recreate what you've lost, no matter how hard you try, and this refusal to accept that truth is what ultimately led the siblings down a destructive path.

Rewatching the series with this context makes Umbrella Ben's death feel even more important. On its own, his death is a heartbreaking and tragic moment, a sudden loss of a beloved character. But when viewed within the entire narrative arc of the series, it transforms from a purely sad event into something more complex—almost a bittersweet relief. I believe now that Ben's death was a subtle foreshadowing of how the story would ultimately end. It was a powerful hint at the series' overarching message about the necessity of letting go. Ben's journey was a microcosm of what every character needed to learn but often resisted—the painful but necessary act of moving on.

Ben was the first sibling to accept his fate, to realize that holding onto people, memories, and pain when it's time to let go is not only unhealthy but self-destructive. His decision to let go wasn't just about moving on from his own death; it was about ending his cycle of self-inflicted suffering. He recognized that by clinging to the past, he was only perpetuating his own misery. His final act of release allowed him to find peace, breaking the cycle and allowing his spirit to finally move forward. This stands in sharp contrast to the rest of the siblings, who repeatedly fall into the same patterns, unable to break free from their own personal demons.

To break the cycle, you must be willing to let go, just as Ben ultimately did.

[xxanimecoolgirlxx]

Warning, pretty dark content for this one! There may be themes like mentions of depression, death, abuse (physical and other kinds), and other things that might make some viewers uncomfortable, if so, move on for this post! Things mentioned may not be for the fate of heart. I also want to make it a point that i do not condone any behaviors mentioned in this story. This whole storyline for this is pretty dark so keep that in mind.

Anais watched on with soul sapped eyes from atop her ivory throne at she watched her 2 year old daughter bounce about the room, playing with her imaginary friends no doubt. Any other mother would probably be ecstatic at the prospect of playing around with their toddler daughter, establishing a strong bond between mother and child. Not just leave them alone most of the time to their own devices.

But then again, Anais hadn’t had the strength to do much of anything. Physically or mentally. Life just seemed so dull, so grey. What would be the point of doing.. anything? She barely had the headspace to take care of herself, let alone a small child. A child she never wanted to begin with.

She tried not to resent her daughter, Magenta. She swore that she loved her, she truly did. But she just was a constant reminder of him. Her pale skin, her dark eyes that seemed so innocent yet somehow so dark at the same time. She couldn’t describe it exactly. It was just.. there.

But she knew she couldn’t blame Magenta for the transgressions her father had committed, that would’ve made her just as much a monster as him.

She remembered before him, she was a practitioner in the art of magick. A member of a fairly large community that called themselves “The Whisperers of Fate.” specifically. Some called it a cult, with strict rules that bond its members with the threat of harsh punishment and banishment for disobedience.

Back then, she ignored those rumors. She had learned so much under the Tutorage of her superiors, becoming such a promising student amongst her peers. Sure, they had rules and oaths they were sworn by, but they were to make sure everyone was in check. So that no unwanted people tried entering this community, or no current members turned corrupted.

Sure some of them were a bit more questionable. But they were understandable if they were actually apart of the community. The vows of eternal chastity were make sure that they were truly dedicated to their studies and to their craft. Earthly pleasures were mere distractions. The vows of having no partners that aren’t strictly platonic, The vows of never leaving the land one was born to make sure that their ways wouldn’t be taken and twisted into something that would disgrace the group.

In retrospect, perhaps the rumors weren’t as bias and baseless as what she had been led to believe.

When the fall and the subsequent massacre of the reapers happened, the world was put into chaos. Reapers, entities who were responsible making sure people died when it was there time and were brought to the afterlife, were supposed to be immortal and moral beings. They did not hold grudges, they didn’t hold any qualms. They only did what their duty called them to do. Whatever happened amongst their ranks, it was unknown to the rest of the realms until the aftermath was felt across everywhere.

Nobody knew exactly what happened that caused it, but suddenly every reaper was dead, gone, some may even argue that they had been erased completely from being. All that they knew is that one of them toppled them all. An reaper only known as “Death.”. It took an even shorter period of time for him to take over the realms under his tyrannical rule. Amongst the chaos of the new world order, The Whisperers of Fate were virtually untouched. They simply complied with whatever demands that would make them swear loyalty to their new lord and moved on. No period of anarchy and destruction, no take over, none of the hardships that other places around them faced.

At the time, Anais felt it was proof that the community was, indeed, the correct path to follow. She watched as everyone and everything around her outside of the community was warped and twisted into something it wasn’t. She felt as though she was safe from all outside forces, that she’d just go about her life as if none of this had even happened.

That wasn’t until HE approached her community. She didn’t know to this day why he came to the place. Her best guess was to discuss with the community’s matriarch about political matters and such. Ever since the whole takeover, the community’s influenced spread rather fast across the land, to the point where they essentially controlled the land. Either way, she finally saw HIM, Death for the first time.

It wasn’t a conversation, rather her just stopping by to pick up scriptures and runes by her superior’s orders. Death was in the form he normally took. A skeletal like creature in dark ropes decorated in jewelry and an ominous Scythe by his side. She couldn’t help but notice how he stared at her for a spilt moment. Purple dots just gleaming into her, it sent chills down her spine. Then he went on about his business. Anais thought it would be the last she’d see of him.

Oh how she wished that was the case.

Death’s stay at the community was longer than what she knew it was, and in that time, her daily life would start to.. shift. It started with the occasional feeling of being watched. It was ignorable at first, as that was an usual feeling for anyone in the presence of Death and his entourage. But it started turning more persistent as the weeks moved on. To the point where it seemed to follow her no matter where she went or what time of day it was. Even in her room with the curtains drawn and the door locked she still felt something was watching over her.

Then the interactions happened. At first it was through anonymous letters. They were rather vague at times but were generally harmless. Quizzing her on her knowledge and such. Something in her told her she shouldn’t be doing this but she blew it off. She was starting to become a rather well known for her exceptionally dutiful role in the community and how gifted and talented she was proving to be In her crafts at her age, even starting to outshine her peers in the young adult ranks. This was probably just another test amongst many to her to prove herself.

Then she began seeing him face to face. His appearance was intimidating to say the least. She would always just try and meekly answer what is was he had to say in order to just get out of there. But overtime, the conversations began getting.. odd. He spoke of wanting to bring her along with him with his entourage across the lands. He said it would be a great opportunity for her community to gain recognition across the world.

But the way he spoke. The way he looked at her. She had a feeling that it was more than just wanting to do a good deed for her community. No, it was something much more selfish.. more sinister. She reminded him of the oath that forbad her from doing such a thing, from leaving her homeland. He relented. For the moment at least.

From that point, Anais did everything and anything to make sure she stayed away from him. Studying extra hours, helping her superiors out with more chores, taking care of the elders and the younger members of the community. Anything to make sure she wasn’t in the general area that he’d come to.

But that still didn’t work. It would seem that he’d just so coincidentally manage to bump into her no matter where she went. She’d try to make the conversations short but he’d always made sure that they lasted longer than what she was comfortable with. He was still trying to convince her to come with him, that surely her matriarch would make this one exception. She’d always turn it down. Eventually it came to a point where it was apparent it was less about the Whisperers of Fate itself and more about HER in particular.

Then when she was finally able to get away, able to excuse herself from her, she’d always find gifts left at her chambers. No matter how she tried turning them down, they just kept appearing. It was only until Death began making passive aggressive comments about it on passing that hinted towards the gifts was that she felt forced to reluctantly accept them.

It finally came to a head at the final week that Death would be there before he would head off. She had finally been approved to summon in her Familiar, a high honor that was usually reserved for the older adults. She ended summoning in a raven. It’s feathers were it’s usual black with it’s undertone being shades of dark purple and blue that seemed to shimmer in the moonlight. It’s eyes were a ocean blue, separating itself from its normal, less mystical brethren.

The raven followed her everywhere she went, usually from afar on a branch or from a window seal or sometimes simply flying above her or sitting on her shoulder. It almost never left her side. It didn’t help that it would chirp whenever it sensed Death around. It made avoiding him all the more easier. After all of that, it should’ve been easier to avoid what came next.

It was a dark night, she had been walking through the corridors of library she often visited. It was empty besides from her. So when the raven began chirping, she was led on alert. He wasn’t supposed to be here. Why was he here? She didn’t know where to go or where to hide, there weren’t any true hiding spaces.

That’s when the raven began leading her towards a statue the far end of the library, sensing her distress. She followed where the bird to where it flew above. The creature then began peaking at a certain area behind the statue. Confused, Anais didn’t know what it meant. The statue itself was too small to effectively hide behind. Even if she could, it was in the middle of the library. He’d only have to change his direction of moving to be able to see her from behind there.

Then she realized the place the raven was peaking at was looser than the other stone. She pressed on the loose piece of stone and below her, a staircase to a room below the floor was revealed. It didn’t surprise her too much, the library was known for having hidden rooms, but most of those were very well known and banned off or not in this section of the library. She quickly descended down the stairs when the raven nudged her, seemingly warning her to hurry before Death came.

The room was pitch dark, it took a moment for her eyes to adjust. Even then, it was still very difficult to see, especially when she got to the end of the room. Unlit candles surrounded them, which would’ve been useful had she brought a match. Hey, at least her raven’s bright purple eyes shine through-

Wait. Purple eyes?

Anais’s heart leapt from her chest as she stared at the raven that sat there on the ground next to her. It cawed at her before it began growing in height, it’s body began misshaping and manipulating itself to finally form a human like shape. Anais watched in horror as Death finally let up his disguise and appeared before her. The form he decided to take on was that of a young man, perhaps to try and convince her more easily? Whatever the reason, it didn’t work.

Death loomed Over her as he spoke. He declared his love for her. He spoke of how he was just so enamored by her, how he had decided that she had to be his. It was such a shame he had to go to these lengths but she simply kept fighting what was going to inevitably happen. He confessed that he had been interested in a queen before meeting her, that he had a few other candidates in mind before meeting her. But now that he had made up his mind, he declared that it had to be her. He would accept no other woman, he would accept no other answer than her giving herself over to him.

Anais begged for him to just let her leave, she once again reminded him of the several paths that wouldn’t allow her to do that. But this time, he didn’t relent. He wouldn’t let her escape. He seized her, ignoring her begs for him to just let her go and her cries for someone to help her. He knew that nobody would hear or disturb them in this hidden place. This time, she wouldn’t be able to run..

After that night, the moment she got back to her chambers, Anais shut herself in her room, locking it and curling up in her bed, shaking, and white with fear of what had just happened. She knew then, that she was doomed. She had broken.. no, he made her break her vows. She didn’t want to, but it still happened. She tried so desperately from not letting it happen, but it did. Anais broke down into tears. She couldn’t let anyone know. She just couldn’t. She broke one of the most sacred vows, there was no way there wouldn’t be any punishment for it. She took a moment to breathe. She decided that the best course of action was to just keep quiet about it. Make sure nobody knows about what happened. Make herself as scarce as possible and make sure Death couldn’t find her before he’d have to go. It was the best thing she could think of for the moment. Probably not the best plan, but it had to be better than nothing.

Though she didn’t even get the chance TO stick to a plan. Not even an hour afterwards, she found herself being dragged down to the public square by her superiors, all the while spitting venom at her, swearing at her for breaking her vows. She tried to explain what happened, that she didn’t want to do disobey the community, just to please, please spare her.

They either didn’t believe her or simply didn’t care as they threw her in the middle of the community’s public square, tying her to a pole. She never thought she’d ever been in this scenario. This was usually something she’d very occasionally heard about. A member doing something so horrid that just couldn’t be forgiven that they had to be punished in the worse way possible. It seemed almost unanimous that she would was guilty of the transgressions she had supposedly committed. Her superiors told her it was from an unquestionable source that informed her of how she seduced one of Death’s entourage members into her bed. How she had been doing so for almost the entirety of their stay here.

Anais tried to speak out, but her voice was drowned out from the crowd’s cries of disgust and anger. More venom was spat at her. Anais almost thought this was a mere nightmare, something she’d wake up from, with the reassurance that none of this ever happened. It felt surreal that the faces that look upon her with kindness, pride, admiration, gentleness a day before, now looked upon her like she was the worse sinner that had ever lived. In their eyes, she probably was.

Then, her former superiors announced to the crowd what her punishment exactly was going to be. Anais could only weep as she realized what her fate would be, words failing to be comprehensive at this point.

For days, she was beaten, for days she was starved and denied water. It became a daily spectacle, watching her be whipped 20 times a day, before being kicked around and given as much punishment as an individual would like to dish out, anything, as long as it didn’t kill her. They would use just enough magick on her to ensure that. They broke and twisted her hands beyond repair to ensure she couldn’t use any of the spells or incantations she’d learned. A poison elixir was forced down her throat that muted her from ever being able to utter a single word of any type of magick ever again. Her familiar was stoned to death in front of her eyes, with her bound and helplessly trying to struggle in her restraints to try and save her trusted companion. When the familiar died, it felt like a piece of herself died along with it. It just felt like the world just stopped for a moment. Maybe that was for the best, because she couldn’t remember the rest of the beatings and ridicule for the day.

But the worse was to come on the final day of her torment. This time, they didn’t just beat her and let it be done with, they began flaying her. Specifically a tattoo located on her lower back. It was a rite of passage in the community, something that one gains when they enter into the community as a new blooded magick user. It was a practitioners pride, particularly for Anais. And now it was stripped from her.

Afterwards, she finally was let down from her bindings and walked through town square with accompanied by two of what used to be her friends and peers. She had to endure one last round of harsh curses and swearing, of various rotten things thrown at her and insults hurled her way as they finally exited the community. Then they walked, and they walked, and they walked. Anais still tried to protest her innocence to the two people she had known since childhood. They didn’t even meet her glance besides from a disgusted glare or say anything back to her. She was already dead to them.

They eventually stopped in the middle of seemingly nowhere in this desolate wasteland, many miles from the community. By this point, the sun began to set as night came. They promptly left her there. She didn’t have the strength to call out to them as she collapsed on the ground, in nothing but the rags that barely covered her body and covered In her own blood.

She didn’t even move from the spot she was laying in, she didn’t even feel the need to. Her entire life had just crumbled into Dust in front of her. Everything she had ever held value in, anything that she ever had meaning in, no longer had any significance to her in this state. She could’ve been eaten alive by whatever critters and creatures that roamed the wastelands and she wouldn’t have stopped them. What did she even have to fight on for?

That was when she felt a presence looming over her. She didn’t even have to look up to know who was looming over her beaten and broken body. She had honestly wished that Death had just come to just get it over with and just end it all already, to just make her horrid existence forfeit. But the rational side of her knew that he wouldn’t give her such a luxury, no he didn’t come here to end her pain.

Death didn’t say a word, he crouched down to her level, a skeletal hand caressing her swollen and badly bruised face. Any earlier on in her life she would’ve screamed and tried to get away, but she just stared up at him, eyes reddened from crying, at least, the one eye she could open as the other one was swollen shut. She was just so done with fighting, she just couldn’t muster up the energy to do it anymore.

Death just carried her in his arms as they both disappeared into the wind, back to his domain, back to his castle where Anais found herself somehow the queen and yet the prisoner of the palace.

All of which brings her back to the present day. Besides from scarring, the damage sustained to her hands was permanent, muscle tremors and overall weakness didn’t allow her to do much with them anymore. It was difficult for her to hold a pen, let alone do something as delicate as writing incantations or other things that would require a steady hand. It didn’t matter anyways. It wasn’t like she could do anything with the constant supervision of the guards constantly posted around her, as well as the serpent like dragon kept around her like a guard dog.

She felt like a precious gem, guarded and protected fiercely but never meant to have any agency of her own. It was an hellish existence, never having time to herself without the overbearing of either her ‘Husband’ Death or the all seeing eyes of the guards meant to keep her safe, to do everything and anything for her, except give her any amount of freedom, of course.

She coughed a bit, resisting the urge to vomit. Maybe they were doing more harm than good. Did they really think leaving a normal human in their corrupting presence for long extended periods of time wouldn’t have any consequences? This sickness she has caught wasn’t getting any better, though she was sure Death remained willfully blind to that fact, for that would call into question if he was truly meant to have her all so completely. It didn’t matter, nothing really did anymore.

She glanced over to Magenta, who was now toying with the dragon assigned to guard them. Alright, maybe one thing did matter.

Magenta then waddled over to Anais

“Mother! The snake isn’t being nice.” Magenta said, crawling into Anais’s lap. Anais managed to form whatever she could try to pass as a smile.

“Well, I’ll just have to speak with him about his rudeness later then.” Anais said.

Magenta then snuggled up into her, her face pressed against her swollen stomach.

“When is he coming out, I wanna play with him already!” Magenta whined. Anais took in a shaky breath as she tried to form a smile once again.

“Just be patient for a bit more, it’ll take a few more months. He can’t come out right now, he’s still growing.” Anais explained softly. Magenta grumbled but let it go as she got off Anais, most likely to go harass the dragon again.

Anais sighed. She tried not to think of Death whenever she thought of the little ones, but deep down, she just couldn’t shake it. Though it didn’t really matter much to her anyone. Not much did. If things kept going like how she predicts, if her sickness gets worse, if her son’s birth weakens her even more than she already is, she most likely wouldn’t be alive long enough to truly care.

[centaurianthropology]

The Magnus Archives Season 4 Binge-a-thon (Contains spoilers through the finale)

I’m back!  Life and work have been crazy, but I really wanted to binge the half-season since I last listened in order to get in on the season finale.  It’s been quite the experience.  The last time I binged TMA was season 1, since I started listening at the beginning of season 2.  I had really wondered which way was better listening: twenty minutes every week, having things play out gradually, or in one huge go.

I have to say, things flow really well as one run-through binge.  I couldn’t say I hands-down prefer doing it this way, but that the structure really holds up as a binge.  Plus, the evolving storyline begins to run at a less gradual pace.  The build-up of tension is strong, and I really ended up enjoying my binge.  

I think part of the danger of listening to each week is that you get lost in the minutia.  It lets you pick over everything, which can be great, but it can also be frustrating.  The character choices are that much more maddening when you have to wait a week to see how things turn out (and one character in particular in this latter half of season 4 I found particularly frustrating, so I think that listening week by week to that would have been a challenge).  

I figured I’d go through some thoughts on the episodes, starting with where I left off at ‘Decrypted’ and going from there.  I’ll be talking about episodes in little chunks as I go, with random comments in each section:

Decrypted, Infectious Doubts, Threshold

It’s interesting how much the Lonely was infecting the whole Institute at this stage in the story, although during these episodes it seemed like everyone hadn’t quite noticed it.  Or they’d gotten so used to it during Jon’s coma that they stopped noticing how bad things were getting.  

Listening now, it seems like Basira got hit the hardest, and that combines with the fact that she also seems to notice it the least.  While in season 3 she was the level-headed one, here she’s trying to take that level-headedness too far.  She wants all the answers so she can make the best decisions, but she refuses to wait for answers, and she refuses to acknowledge that those answers might be complicated.

The Lonely may also be the explanation for her detachment.  As in the plot as she is, she’s desperate to not engage emotionally with any of it.  Even Daisy seems to be held at arms-length, and Jon is labeled a monster without any unpacking of that term or what it would mean.  She also seems to refuse to address how close Jon and Daisy’s behaviors have been, at their worst, and that Jon is in the throes of his hunger, while Daisy was starved of hers forcibly.  She chooses to remain calm and chooses to work to overcome the Hunt, but her initial detox program was very much not of her own choosing.  She has simply chosen to stick to it, to embrace the good thing that came out of her imprisonment in the Buried.  Jon is struggling because he’s not being forcibly weaned, and no amount of Basira calling him a monster is going to prompt him to stop.  

I think that Basira, at this point, is perhaps the most blinkered of the characters.  She’s so focused on results that she refuses to do any sort of self-inventory.  She’s so convinced of her own rationality that she misses the places where she’s irrational: Jon has always been a semi-threat to her, so she can much more easily slide into thinking of him as a monster.  Daisy, on the other hand, was her partner; someone she trusted and cared about.  It’s much harder to look at someone you love and call them a monster.  She can see the shades of gray in Daisy, but it’s easier to ignore them in Jon.

As much as I think Basira likes to think of herself as the rational one, I think Melanie and Daisy fit that better at this point.  Both have passed through their own marking by one of the powers, and both have had their own time as monsters.  And that gives them both an outsider’s perspective on the situation, and an insider’s perspective.  And both had to be forcibly wrenched away from their respective powers.  As much as Melanie resents being torn away against her will, without any say in how it happened, she now has the perspective to look at Jon’s monstrousness as both something very not good, but something complicated.  Her own feelings toward Jon are complicated.  He helped her, but he took away her free will to do it.  He’s a monster, but so was she.  

Daisy is even further along that path of understanding, having been given a LOT of time to think in the Buried about herself and her choices.  She understands far more than Melanie, and far far more than Basira how the lines between monster and personal choice blur until there is no hard line between them.  She has to own all her choices, because she may have been deep in the hunt, but being chosen by a power often happens because you love it as much as you fear it.  With perspective, she knows that her choices were awful.  That she was awful.  But in that moment, she chose the Hunt every time.

She wants to help Jon and Martin, but also knows that people need to want her help before it can really be given.  I think that’s why she left as soon as Martin told her to go.  If he wanted to reject her help, she couldn’t stop him.

Melanie is also embracing perspective, choosing to go to therapy.  Choosing to make herself better.  If she’s doing that, her demand that Jon also do better carries more weight.  He’s not yet wrenched free, but he like Daisy still has choices to make.  They’re just a lot harder when he’s inside looking out.

Jon, of course, is deep into his own monsterhood, his guilt, and his isolation.  The guilt is keeping him at least a little grounded, but the isolation is definitely not helping him not become a monster.  People overcoming addiction have to make the choice themselves, yes, but they also need support.  They need people to hold them accountable, but also know what they’ve been through so genuinely useful advice can be given.  Confronting Jon was necessary to prevent him descending further, but I feel like Daisy’s understanding and Melanie’s therapy probably helped more than Basira’s “You’re a monster; don’t eat people” statement.  

Martin wasn’t in any of these episodes, but he continues to reach out in ways that keep him at as much of an emotional arm’s length as Basira, simply without any of the confrontation.  He gave the tape to Daisy and the others after he found out about Jon feeding on people, but didn’t confront him himself.  He’s avoiding all contact with people, making it ‘easier’.  He may have a plan, but he’s also deeply infected by the Lonely.  Like Basira, I wonder if he has much perspective on himself.  They both think they’re playing things smart, but they both seem to be missing glaring parts of the world closing in around them.

Weaver, Extended Surveillance, Concrete Jungle

Jon’s addiction is tied into desire, and also into terror, and also it’s as much a choice as it is for people addicted to drugs to take their next hit.  They do know it’s not good for them, but they make the choice, because it feels good, because they love it as much as they hate it.  And that analogy, in spite of never being directly brought up in these  episodes, continues to be driven home by the statements he reads.  A relationship with an addiction is complicated, and is often used as a substitute for something else initially.  How much of Jon’s embracing of the Eye was originally driven by his terror of the Web, deep seated and still child-like?  I think he fears Annabel Caine more than any other avatar, because she strikes at his worst fear: to be manipulated, to be pushed back to his childhood helplessness, to be lured and consumed against his will.  Isn’t it better, from his perspective, to be consumed by his will, by a power he knows and in many ways loves?

One thing I’ve noticed is that the people who are servants of powers embrace those powers as much as they fear them.  It’s not a new revelation to say that Jude Perry loves the Desolation, or that Jane Prentiss both loved and feared the Corruption.  But seeing that in Jon is harder, because he has something that they seemed to lack: moral qualms about what he’s doing.  He can acknowledge that the Beholding is as bad as any of the others, but how much of that is an intellectual acknowledgement?  How much of him revels in the Knowing in a way in the same way Jane reveled in the song of the hive?

But of course, in his isolation, he’s struggling to hold onto those intellectual moral qualms, when the hunger is so strong.  He can recognize the justifications for harm in other monsters, and even in himself, but his recognition isn’t the visceral pull that the hunger is.  And with a very rickety support system, it feels almost inevitable that he’ll tip over and feed again.  His one saving grace right now seems to be that his skill at analysis is just as powerful when turned against himself as it is when it’s turned outside.  He knows he’s slipping.  He knows that he no longer cares as much about investigation, about the victims of statements, as he does getting his next story, his next hit.  And no amount of admonishment is going to stop that craving.  

The other thing that seems to keep him anchored is Martin, but that’s an anchor growing more and more distant, closer to his intellectual understanding and further away from the deep-seated emotional attachment that might be enough to overcome the hunger.  Jon is continually concerned about Martin, wondering how he is to anyone who will listen.  I think of Gertrude being Agnes’ anchor, both holding one another to the world.  That was done to them, but I have to wonder if Martin and Jon have started anchoring one another simply through affinity.  Martin is trying to cut off all ties, but he keeps looking out for Jon.  He can’t help but try to keep Jon good and as human as possible.

The conversation between Georgie and Martin was interesting.  Georgie has chosen to help Melanie because Melanie isn’t as deep in it as Jon, and because Melanie is actively seeking therapy and help.  Georgie seems firmly in the camp that she’s willing to help, but will only help those actively helping themselves.  And I get that.  She is an outsider reaching in.  And she needs to protect herself as well; she’s right that tying oneself to Jon is probably going to get one killed.  She’s not obliged to die for him, or for anyone.  And from her perspective, he isn’t even reaching for the ropes being thrown to him.  

Contrast that with Martin’s perspective, which is that Jon needs help, and that waiting until he helps himself could be disastrous.  This is also right, but the problem is that if Jon is drowning, Martin isn’t really getting in the water any more than Georgie is.  He’s avoiding Jon, but is offended that Georgie is doing the same.  I can only hope she held up a mirror to his own decisions.  He’s choosing to protect himself every bit as much as he’s ‘falling on the grenade’ in order to try and stop the Extinction.  And trying to protect Jon from afar is as much a defense of himself as what Georgie is doing.  Both are reasonable.  Jon is self-destructing.  But Martin was also right that he needs help.  And for someone to help Jon, they almost certainly have to wade into all the danger that being around him entail.  Georgie’s decision not to be that person is frankly the healthier decision.  No one owes anyone drowning with them.  But that’s a decision each person has to make: how much are they willing to help?  How much of a life-line do they throw?  Georgie has helped, but also protects herself and respects Melanie for doing the same.  Daisy is helping a decent amount because she’s been there, and with a few bad days she could end up right back where Jon is.  It’s why people with addictions are often the ones to help others with addiction.  You sort of have to understand it from the inside.

Martin doesn’t know he understands it from the inside, because he doesn’t realize how much he’s falling to the Lonely.  Disappearing whenever personal confrontation occurs isn’t healthy.  He was an open wound of caring and emotion before, so it’s understandable that he’s swinging the pendulum to be less vulnerable, but he’s swung it too hard, and he’s drifting away.  And as much as he wants to help Jon, he’s not.  If he really wants to be Jon’s anchor, he has to be willing to open up all his emotional wounds again.  And he has to make that hard decision knowing how much it could cost him.  Or he has to let go entirely.  He’s in limbo, Jon anchoring him, but the tie between them is frayed.

‘Cul-de-Sac’ offered up a way to take hold of that tie and make it strong again.  The Lonely very nearly claimed the narrator as a victim, but in the moment he was almost totally lost to it, a call from his husband and the words “I love you” brought him back.  It gave him a way out, and as much as he believes he has to trust Martin’s decisions regarding his work with the Lonely, he also knows that the Lonely is seductive, that it has you do its work for it, that Martin is plagued with self-doubt and self-esteem issues, and that the Lonely is feeding on that.  Jon is trying to trust, but Jon also needs to reach out and help, just as much as Martin needs to do the same, if they both choose to take that route.

Basira has also apparently not made any real choice regarding whether or not she’ll help Jon.  She continues to be around Jon, but isn’t helping.  She’s very intelligent, but increasingly … black-and-white, which makes her blinkered.  And Elias was right: it also is making her predictable.  It’s like she’s trying to be more like Daisy as Daisy becomes more like Basira used to be.  But her taking a harsh tone with Jon and telling him ‘just don’t do it’ is likely to go exactly as well as everyone who’s ever told a drug addict to just stop.  Stopping is usually the hardest thing an addict ever has to do, and increasingly, Basira seems to want things to just happen.  If Daisy has learned patience, Basira has lost hers.  And that means that she also seems like she’s lost perspective.

And then there’s Melanie.  I really like that Melanie is sort of taking the middle-road of Georgie’s approach and Daisy’s.  She’s stuck there, and she’s still interacting with Jon.  Hell, her reactions to him pulling facts out of the ether are more like frustrated rolling of eyes than genuine anger at this point.  But she’s also unapologetic that helping the Eye—whether it be passively or actively—is wrong.  For her own good, she’s opting out.  She knows she could get sick.  She knows she could die.  But she is making a choice.  And like Georgie, I can respect that choice.  

Elias continues to be an evil delight.  Seriously, what a fantastic villain.  He gloats, he’s gleeful, but also urbane and intelligent.  The little moments of vulnerability sometimes feel like manipulation, so it’s hard to tell exactly how much he could be damaged.  He, of all people, seems to have taken Annabel’s advice to heart.  He is always either under- or overestimated.  And that just makes him fun.

Big Picture, A Gravedigger’s Envy, Love Bombing

Simoooon!!!  My favorite wacky wizard is just as much a delight as I had expected.  He’s a ton of fun.  He’s old and he’s full of joy, and he’s horrible.  He’s my favorite.  I also managed to predict that he was centuries old!  So pleased to find that out.  

It’s interesting to find out that so much of the rituals are bound up in the feeling and the fear.  All the ways the powers manifest or work are based on those feelings.  So rituals are made up because they ‘feel’ right, and it seems like they all fail because none of them genuinely generate the fear necessary to bring one power into ascendance over the others.  It seems that the balance is not only something most are dedicated to, but that it’s harder to upset on a global scale than people thought.  Robert Smirke, for example, seemed to think that the world was balanced on a knife’s edge, one second away from falling to a power.  And every fear took a cue from him and generated a ton of rituals.  But none of them have worked.  Because the truth definitely seems to be that none of them know what they’re doing.  They’re groping around for greater meaning, when it’s all really based on feelings and impressions.  That may make Simon one of the most effective avatars, as well as one of the most sanguine with the way the world works.  He’s not trying too hard to make the Vast win because he’s realized how difficult and potentially pointless that might be.

The end of ‘Big Picture’ has another confrontation between Basira and someone, this time Martin.  She’s taking the same tack with him as she did with Jon: telling him she doesn’t trust him, that he’s an idiot for working with Peter, etc.  Again, acting as Daisy might once have done, and again, I don’t see that she accomplished much.  She let Martin know that Jon’s heard of the Extinction, that he trusts Martin, and that’s about it.  Beyond that, they’re much in the same position.  Whatever her goals are in this situation, they’re either escaping me, or she has no real goals aside from being angry at everyone around her for not being as useful to her as she wants them to be.

Helen, on the other hand, is as helpful and delightful as Simon, while being just as dangerous and malicious.  She’s becoming more and more the Distortion, less an less Helen as she lets go of her guilt and embraces the feeding and the hunger.  She’s Jon’s ally, but is also unpredictable and is clearly playing her own game, learning the maze under the Archives, but refusing to let him in on what lies at its heart.  Their discussion about Jane Prentiss, about choice, throws more light on Jon’s choices.  

And the thing that sets him apart from the other monsters: his guilt, his burning humanity.  And his connection to others.  She looks at this as temporary.  Not the feelings, which may well persist, but the effect those feelings have had on his actions.  And I think that’s the hard truth that Basira has failed to impart as an outsider: Helen, as an insider to being a monster, gets that there is no hard line between the one-you-were and the one-you-are.  She gets that being a monster is as subjective as the powers or the rituals are.  It’s about feeling.  And Jon clings to his feelings and his connections.  And because of this he’s been finding excuses for his behavior.  But he still chooses it.  He knows that he shouldn’t want the drugs, but he keeps giving in to the temptation before the guilt spiral starts over again.  They all choose, and their choices may be guided by having no good alternatives, but the choice has always been his.  Of course he gets to keep what makes him fundamentally Jon, because Jon is the perfect Archivist.  He didn’t need personality traits grafted onto him.  They came ready made for the Eye.  How long had it waited for someone just like him?

But the thing about choice is that it’s yours.  Accepting that he makes the choices and that they are his alone means that he can control them.  He can take whatever control he can muster, even in the face of danger and death.  He can make the choice Melanie did, or a different choice.  He can choose to act, knowing that his actions are owned only by himself.  There’s power in that, every bit as much as there is responsibility.

And Daisy is the perfect example of that.  She doesn’t want to go back to the Hunt.  She’d die first, but she also will let that Hunt slip back in just a bit to protect Jon from Trevor and Julia.  Hearing her and Jon work through her impulses to listen to the blood, to find her way back to calm with his help, was one of the first indications that he really does get that choice.  And I find myself hoping that if he can help Daisy, he can learn to make those same choices, and that she’ll be there to guide him back when he needs it.

Bloody Mary, Cost of Living, Reflection

Jon going looking for knowledge the Eye didn’t want him to know was encouraging, and the revelation of Eric Delano’s page was a hell of a thing.  First, of course, there was James Wright (watching everyone through pictures and any eye available) before there was Elias, and Elias ‘changed’ a lot.  Another point for the Elias-is-Jonah theory, perhaps.

There was also the confrontation of Gertrude with a former assistant, how emotionally distant she was from him and the others, and how hungry she was for knowledge.  She wants explanations, not stories though.  More practical and less lyrical than Jon.  And less emotional.  Jon feels thing deeply and desperately.  It might be his salvation, as I’ve mentioned, but also it makes him just as human as her, despite his more outward monstrousness.

Eric was definitely in an abusive relationship with Mary, but after the betrayal and what Gertrude put him through, she seemed preferable.  And that’s thing, isn’t it?  Betrayal and under-handedness hurt worse than straightforward evil in the TMA world.  And so Eric accepted Mary and blinded himself to get out of the Institute, and wasn’t even too hurt that Mary turned right around and killed him for his sacrifice.  He found the way out because he had someone he loved: his son.  Much as tearing the bullet out of Melanie broke her free of the Slaughter, Eric tearing his eyes out let him free of the Beholding.

Could Jon help but entertain that fantasy?  Running away, tearing out the part of himself that is a monster once and for all?  No more hunger, no more temptation.  

But Martin’s right.  He can’t do it.  Because Jon is still choosing the Beholding, he still loves to Know.  He’s turning away from freedom actively.  And for Jon, running away with Martin was just this perfect potential ideal, but would never become reality without some really fundamental commitment that both of them lack right now.  As much as Jon is sunk in his love for what he knows, Martin is sunk in denial about how much he might actually mean to Jon.  He can reject Jon’s proposal easily, because he can’t believe Jon would ever really give up power just for a chance to run away with Martin.  

Martin is sunk deep, and Jon, who could reach him if he tried, isn’t trying.  Just as he isn’t tearing his eyes out.  He’ll be passive, and he’ll look at Martin like an ideal, but the real issue is that neither of them is reaching out to one another as a PERSON.  As more than the ideal that they’ve both seen one another as.  Being an anchor is all well and good, but eventually you need to dig in and get to know one another to have a true reason to stay human.  And they’re both lacking that right now.

Martin is drifting hard.  Realizing that he might only think he misses Jon’s voice, that he cares about Jon, that even his love is getting lost to the Lonely is very hard to hear.  Because Martin threw himself into all this to save Jon, and he’s not even horrified that he’s losing the original motivation for giving himself to the Lonely.  He seems to be going through the motions, letting everything happen, taking the easiest and least ‘noisy’ way out.  And that’s the draw of the Lonely right there, isn’t it?  There’s no real pain to lose yourself, because by the time you’re lost, you just don’t care.  Martin is being eaten by apathy, and that’s the hardest thing to shake.  He just doesn’t care enough to do it.

I really appreciate Jon finally confronting Basira about her hypocrisy.  The fact that she’s willing to give Daisy over to the Hunt to keep her alive, but is demanding that Jon starve himself to death if he has to is the height of hypocrisy.  It’s also deeply disrespectful of Daisy’s very difficult choice.  I appreciate that Jon stood up for Daisy’s stand, and I hope that it causes Basira to reflect about how she’s gone about her approach to Jon and Daisy.  

Because honestly, they’re both questioning their natures.  Daisy understands better, but Jon is actively exploring his nature, and the nature of monstrousness.  ‘Cost of Living’ is the perfect example of the entitled nature of a monster’s survival.  Each time she was confronted with their death, she found someone to exchange a life with.  And what was at first a one-off quickly became a continuous vampirism, one ‘unworthy’ life after another.  At each step she blamed the victim, explained her actions by the good she was doing.  Jon feels the same pull, but also a revulsion for her self-justification.  

And some people would rather do anything other than serve that sort of monstrousness.  Melanie gouged her own eyes out, leaving the Archives as definitively as possible.  I’ll miss the hell out of her character, but I am so glad that she found a way out.  I’m glad that, of all of them, she was the one who seized Eric’s solution.  Jon would never do it.  Basira won’t do it.  Martin won’t.  But Melanie still could.  She tried so hard to leave for so long that it’s fantastic she gets to go on her own terms.  And I’m so glad Jon respected her decision; that she left as bravely and calmly as possible for leaving by ambulance.  

Rotten Core, Panopticon

So Martin or someone else left his final tape to Jon.  Peter might have left it, Annabel could have done, so many others could have.  But the simple question is, what will Jon do with the information that Martin is walking off to oblivion?

Dekker’s final statement was something I wasn’t expecting.  It makes sense with the Extinction storyline gearing up, but it’s still strange to hear the end of this remarkable and remarkably eventful life.  And to go out in such a horrific way is tragic.  He searched for the Extinction so long, only to get taken down by the Corruption.  Just accidentally stumbled on John Amhurst, and though it’s good to know that Dekker properly contained Amhurst, it leaves his work unfinished.  But then, I think the work of people like Dekker or Gertrude always have unfinished business when they’re finally killed.  

Jon is not nearly so sanguine with death.  Hearing that the Extinction may be slow or strange or not real at all, he can’t not follow Martin down into the tunnels.  He tried to get a second opinion from Melanie, who is with Georgie—in all senses of the word—but she’s out.  He tried to go to Helen, who is not interested in helping because it entertains her more if he finds out what’s in the tunnels on his own.  She may think he’d just go home and give into his hunger, but the one thing that anchors him is in those tunnels.  So Jon is definitely going in.

At least he waited for Daisy and Basira, as much as it must have killed him not to go charging in.  And he’s lucky he did.  Peter Lukas set the Not-Them loose again, and Trevor and Julia are also back to finish Jon off.  And of course, Elias has also made a jail break to be there for the final show of whatever it was that Peter planned.

And it directly affects him, of course, because we finally got that confirmation: Elias Bouchard and Jonah Magnus are one in the same.  Jonah left his body behind in the Panopticon that lies at the heart of the labyrinth, permanently jacked into the All-Seeing Eye.  That was the Watcher’s Crown, attempted first as himself, and again in other bodies.  Peter wants to overthrow Elias, to replace him with a willing puppet in Martin.  The temptation of having that sort of power must have been undeniable.  

But it all still hinged on Martin choosing to serve the Lonely, to give himself freely to the Panipticon and to Peter’s power.  And Martin has been playing this game well.  Telling Peter what he wants to hear, all to see what his end-game was.  Listening to Peter and Elias duke it out verbally over him, Martin clearly knew that this was never about the Extinction.  This was just a stupid bet about whether or not Peter could steal Martin away.

So Martin refuses.  As much as he wanted to kill Jonah, he refused the game (but in so doing handed the victory to Jonah).   

The reason he knew that Peter wasn’t being straight with him about the Extinction was more than a little heart-breaking, but very in keeping with why he couldn’t believe Jon would really run away with him: Martin cannot believe that he’s important enough to be made a priority, let alone to be made a hero.  And so, even though Elias won the round, Peter had one more game to play: he threw Martin into the Lonely, and both he and Elias waited for Jon to arrive.  Because consuming the Archivist would certainly wrench the ultimate victory from Elias’ hands.  

But Elias is far too calm, and far too pleased with this turn for it not to be just as much set up in his favor as Peter’s.  He might have verbally warned Jon against going into the Lonely, but he was all too eager to show him the way.  This is just more of his game, and I’ll be interested to see how it plays out.

The Last

Which leads us to the penultimate episode of the season, Jon plunging into the Lonely after Martin.  The end-game of whatever bet or game Peter and Elias have been playing with one another turns out to have hinged on first Martin giving into the Lonely, and then Jon following him down.  Elias’ biggest pawn is on the line, and Peter has put himself on the line, letting something like the Archivist into his world.  

At first, Peter clearly has the home advantage over Jon.  He confronts Jon with the fact that he and Martin have been chasing the ideal of one another for so long, but they don’t really know one another.  But Jon is pissed, and Jon is hungry, and when faced with dying for Martin, he didn’t even hesitate.   Peter doesn’t understand love, or any connection.  And so he can’t understand how deeply tied Jon and Martin are to one another.  Hell, I don’t know if they quite understand it, except that they’d walk through hell to find one another.

So instead of giving in, Jon fakes his own drift into the Lonely to draw Peter in close, and then goes after him hardHearing Peter’s story was interesting, but not particularly sympathetic.  He was created to be a Lukas, certainly, but he also relished it and wallowed in the upper-class life he was given.  He wallowed in his loneliness, and hated everyone around him.  Sure, his family messed him up, but he embraced it while other siblings didn’t.  

So hearing that Gertrude took down his ritual with a call to a newspaper?  Amazing.  Wonderful.  Perhaps my favorite takedown of hers ever.  I laughed out loud at Peter Lukas drowning in community outreach.

And hearing Jon tear him apart?  Also amazing.  Potentially terrible, because once you open that door, it’s hard to close it, and Jon’s “Stubborn fool” is as close to truly being lost to the monster as we’ve heard Jon on tape.  But if Jon had to feed, tearing Peter apart wasn’t a bad way to do it.  But of course, that means Jon doesn’t get an answer as to how Elias gets him.  

But Jon does get Martin.  And that reunion?  The “I see you”?  So beautiful.  They’ve built to that moment for so long that the quiet conversation, walking out of the Lonely hand-in-hand and so gentle, was utter perfection.

Which is why having this be the second-to-last episode of the season is so ominous.

The Eye Opens

Here we come to the end, and we begin with domesticity and a continuation of the gentle quietness started last episode.  It seems, from the date of the statement, that Martin and Jon did get at least some time together before this episode to settle in and be together, and it shows.  There’s a comfort and a familiarity between them I’ve never heard.  Whatever time they’ve spent getting to know one another, they clearly fit together exactly as well as they’d hoped.

They may be on the run, uncertain if Trevor or Julia or the Not-Them are still alive, but it has an almost honeymoon feel to it.  They’re in contact with Basira, but seem distant from all that, here in their coccoon in the woods with its crackling fire and poetic cows.

And it’s really lovely.  Hearing them together, quiet and gentle and happy, was wrenching if only because it came so early in the episode.  And then it hits.  Jonah, smuggled in as a disguised statement, slipping in and taking over Jon’s body and forcing him to read against his will.  You can hear Jon struggling not to read at first, perhaps knowing what was coming, but Jonah’s will was too strong.  He’s too good at control to let Jon slip his noose here at the end.

And the end, as it turns out, is the end of the world.  It’s discarding the Watcher’s Crown as a botched job, and instead embracing a new ritual: the Magnus Archives.  The transformation of Jonathan Sims not into the Archivist, but into the Archive.  

And Jonah will become king of the ashes of a ruined world.

Jonah, Rayner, Lukas, and likely Fairchild all came together to become not only the first to realize that the world was almost guaranteed to end, but to figure out how to handle it.  Only Smirke kept to his guns and refused to embrace the end.  He tried to use balance to prevent it, to keep it from ever tipping over, but one by one the others embraced one power and decided that if the world was going to end, then it should end to their benefit.

Jonah tried the Watcher’s Crown, sitting in the Panopticon, but failed except to become a mind freed of his body.  He built the Institute to help himself with the race, trying the Watcher’s Crown again and again, each new body dying and giving rise to another.

And then he realized that the Watcher’s Crown was a flawed ritual from the off.  All the rituals were flawed.  All the rituals were doomed to failure, because every ritual only involved a single fear.  And so there wasn’t enough fear to keep it going.  Every one, even the ones not stopped, failed under its own weight.  

The true ritual was the Archive itself.  Turning a person into an Archive, and through him, with every other power burned into him, tearing open reality.  Because the true ritual HAD to have all the fears involved, because all fears are one fear, each blending into each, each reliant on another.  And so all powers had to come through at the same time, with the Eye watching over all.  

And Jon has been marked by every single fear, chosen by Magnus after he survived Mr. Spider.  Stabbed by Michael, burned by Jude, thrown into freefall by Mike Crewe, cut by the Slaughter when he tried to save Melanie, went into the Buried bodily to rescue Daisy … more and more and more until he went into the Lonely to save Martin and took the final step.  He consumed stories, consumed lives.  He embraced his own power in destroying Peter.  He chose to be the Archive at every turn, built himself as a record, wove a tapestry of every fear to create something greater than each alone.  

And so Magnus used his Archive.  He used Jon’s body and his power, and then left Jonathan Sims, both tied to and gutted by the world he created, behind as the world cracked open.  We finish the season with Jon and Martin, clutched together in their cabin, Jon knowing that the whole world has been consumed by the powers and by his own embrace of the Archive.  

“Look at the sky, Martin.  Look at the sky!  It’s looking back.”  

The Future

And so we head toward the final season of ‘The Magnus Archives’.  Daisy and Basira may both be alive, or Basira isn’t sharing the fact that she’s already killed Daisy as she promised.  Melanie and Georgie got out, but there’s not a lot of getting out of an apocalyptic world.

And the world is apocalyptic.  Jonah intends to sit the throne of this world, but I’ll be interested to hear if things go to his plan, of if the powers are so much larger than him that he is swept aside as every other living being will be.  This seems like the sort of plan born of hubris, from a man so desperate not to die that he’ll burn the whole world to survive it.  And I just don’t see fully manifested fears giving much of a shit about Jonah Magnus.

And that leaves Jon and Martin.  Jon is having a well-deserved breakdown over his part in this, but I don’t think he’ll get to do so for long.  If the Archive was needed to rip the world open, it may be the only way to repair it.  Whether that requires Jon to die, or Jon to lose every bit of Archivist in himself to do it, or something else entirely remains to be seen.  But he at least has Martin this time, and I genuinely hope that whatever path they walk in the final season, they walk it together.  That they fall together or rise together.  One or the other being alone at the end would be the worst possible outcome for them at this point.  They anchored one another in the Lonely, and they might well be the thing that pulls one another through to saving the world.  Going down together might be a sort of bittersweet happy ending for an Archive and the man that keeps him human.   What will the world be like now that all the powers are here?  Would people like Simon and the other avatar glory in this new world, or does a complete manifestation of all the powers make moot all the appeal of their gods?  I’m interested to find out who might be interested in a return to a normal world, and who love their new reality.  

40 more episodes until the end.  It’s been a hell of a binge, and honestly?  I’m very interested to see how thing play out come April.

[lilopelckai]

|| Get to know LILO who’s TWENTY-ONE years old and a JUNIOR in college majoring in MECHANICS. She is from HAWAII and is often times mistaken for LULU ANTARIKSA while others say she reminds them of LILO from LILO AND STITCH. || 

hello all, it i, pepper coming at ya once again on that new muse juice (... that sounds so gross omg i’m sorry dkjsdkj). today i am HYPE to introduce you all with my bby lilo!! honestly lilo and stitch is one of my fave movies of all time so sdkjsdk NO PRESSURE YK but anyways down bellow will be a bit about ya girl!

BIO (ish, thing tjkfj)

Lilo is weird. She’s a weirdo. She doesn’t fit in, and she doesn’t WANT to fit in. Have you ever seen her without that stupid mumu? That’s WEIRD

dfkdjsdk sorry i had to, i put joke in my app and i had to make it again aNYWAYS FOR REAL NOW

tldr ; she’s lilo, just kinda sadder sdkjds saw her parents die, went to therapy, doesn’t really ever feel like she belongs, is afraid of loving anyone because she’s afraid of losing them, the Works Folks. also teaches hula now! kinda wants to be a photography major! has an instagram following! i think that’s it oof 

For the most part I don’t plan to deviate from Lilo’s cannon storyline too much seeing as you know, she’s a human and not a humanoid turtle that knows karate so I don’t feel like I need to change TOO much BUT i do want to flesh her out a bit.

First, I headcannon that Lilo was actually in the car during her parents car accident. She was in the backseat and came out of the whole thing relatively uninjured physically, but mentally, and emotionally, well, that was a different story. This is the biggest explanation for the darkness deep in Lilo’s psyche, the reason she had to sit through so much therapy with so many psychologists over the years., You see, Lilo was odd prior to the accident but that eccentricity only seemed to be amplified there after. That combined with the fact that all of her friends abruptly abandoned her after her parents death (literally cannon, can you believe it, screw mertle sdkjdsj) Lilo was kind of left in no mans land emotionally. Therapy never really helped her much unfortunately, and for long time Lilo simply tried to do anything she could to cope. Whether that was pretending she and Mertle were still friends, or praying to god for some sort of angel, or getting unfairly angry with her sister. Lilo spent a long time after her parents death just barely trying to keep afloat, until after a while she stopped having to try. She’s gotten so good at pretending she’s okay that she’s almost even convinced herself.

Like I said Lilo has also always been the type that people struggled to understand. She was a harmless girl, but she said odd things without hesitation, and she never quite got along with her peers, or even other adults because of it. Honestly outside of her family Lilo had few friends because no one could really understand her, and despite the pain of that, Lilo swallowed it down and continued on. Pretty soon, Lilo started to get into the habit of keeping people at arms length, of pushing people away before they could reject her. It was easier being the weird girl, being the one people pointed at and whispered about than being the girl who desperately just wanted a friend. So Lilo slowly buried that girl down deep over time. She tries not to let her out, she’s a real buzz kill.

That was until Stitch of course. She let Stitch in. It wasn’t honestly at the time, the part of Lilo that was so desperate for friendship was still open and bleeding then. She accepted Stitch into her life with open arms and little questions, and to this day he’s still her best friend and her brother. He’s one of the few people who have accepted her fully for who she is, weird shit and all, and Lilo couldn’t be more grateful for him.

I have a headcannon that the Pelekai’s kind of became maybe a bit of a group home? Just because of all the experiments who came in and out of their place. In my mind the experiments were children who Lilo, Nani, her uncle Jumba and Aunt Pleakley would do their best to find amazing homes for. This was Lilo’s idea, after meeting Stitch.

Honestly Lilo uses her weirdness as a bit of a shield. If she’s weird enough then it’s like people know who she is immediately, and the people who wouldn’t want to be around her because of it will leave. She wasn’t rejected, and it didn’t hurt because SHE was the one in control if that makes sense? Being as odd as possible is just a way to keep her heart safe sometimes, and when people stick around despite how odd she is Lilo doesn’t really know what to do honestly.

Despite this Lilo is still very friendly. She feels no qualms about talking to people or speaking her mind, honestly, it’s never been something she’s had an issue with. She’s just chosen not to care whether those people actually like her or not, or at least has numbed herself to caring about that if that makes sense.

A rebellious streak a mile wide tbh. Lilo never wants to hurt anybody of course and she never will unless pushed to the breaking point (ex. That one time she lashed out at Mertle) , but she never has been and never will be obedient. She’s known to get into mischief occasionally, and she doesn’t love being told what to do,

HEADCANNONS ;

Still loves photography and actually sometimes considers changing her major. She chose mechanics because the idea of helping Stitch get up into space was something that she was always excited about -- honestly the concept of them being together even in their adult lives was just too reassuring to her-- and she rationalized it all by telling herself that she wanted to take photos for herself and for money. But photography is her passion honestly and she genuinely has a bit of a talent for it. She’s done a few art galleries and won a couple of minor awards, and even in her spare time she tends to walk around Corona with a camera looking for things take pictures of. Her photos aren’t ever exactly… everyone’s cup of tea, but they’re thought provoking at the very least.

In my mind Lilo takes a lot of photos with body diverse models, honestly for the most part she will only take photos of body diverse models.

At this point I think she has photography as her minor.

A bisexual babe because none of my muses are ever straight.

Also a demigirl. Lilo was kind of inspired by her Aunt Pleakley to truly consider her gender (I headcannon that Pleakley is gender fluid or a trans woman but that’s just me) and it was through that careful consideration that Lilo realized she didn’t fully identify as a girl.

Very accepting. Very liberal. Has gotten arrested at a protest once. Very much will stand up for her beliefs and the rights of others dkdsdkjd is Not here for prejudice or toxic masculinity will fight you on sight !!!

Still loves dancing. One of her proudest accomplishments is winning the hula competition that her mother won back home in Kauai. She doesn’t dance professionally in any other styles, but she does love to dance and she will indulge in that from time to time. I think she might teach the occasional hula lesson at the local gym but it’s probably a specialty thing like once every two weeks or something. She does have some regularly who come though and that always makes her happy.

Still loves the ocean and surfing as well, and honestly will go to the ocean no matter the weather and put her wetsuit on to have a good time. You can find Lilo on the beach at anytime, especially when she’s homesick, just smelling the salt of the ocean and riding the waves.

Also still tries to feed Pudge the fish peanut butter sandwiches, because she maintains that he does control the weather (also the fact that there’s a theory that Lilo used to feed pudge the fish because it was raining the day of her parents car crash and she him to make the weather nice so that never happens to anyone again has me FUCKED UP it will always have me FUCKED UP and that is all).

lilo is also a big philiophobe tbh, like i said she has a lot of issues getting attached to people because she feels like they might just leave so love really scares her? and she tends to freak out at just the thought of it so sdksdk love this for her she gets crushes on people occasionally but the moment things start to get serious this bitch will DIP

loves to have fun though! she doesn’t tend to get asked out on a lot of dates tbh but your girl tens to have a few drunken hook ups here and there and she finds those fun. she also regularly likes to go on tinder and fuck with people. not even catfishing them or anything she just likes to message them weird shit and have a good time dkjdf

has a big ass heart tbh. she would give someone the shirt off her back without any hesitation. she’s just a really kind person despite being hurt so much before, and she honestly never intends to hurt anyone even if she does so accidentally or in anger yk? Like if you fucked with her, then she might lash out for a hot minute but after she’s cooled down it’ll be like damn,,, didn’t mean to do that. Honestly she just has a bit of a temper lowkey but she actually feels guilty after unlike some people *cough* local devil kronk turtle man *cough*

Can’t hold a grudge for the life of her. Forgives way too easily rip 

Has a photography instagram that’s actually pretty damn popular! She’s got a good amount of followers on there and while Lilo’s proud she doesn’t really know what to do with all the positive attention on her weird as shit photos?

WANTED CONNECTIONS ;

i have a wanted connection tag here! check it out and if anything in there catches your eye just lemme know!

GIRL SQUAD ; please. please. i’m out here,,, beggin fdkdfkfd i really want lilo to have some female friends okay just a cute little squad of buds, i’m picturing the skam girl squad, i’m picturing those girls from pretty little liars that i can’t remember the name of, i’m picturing idk the girls from that one movie with tiffany haddish jsut sds pLEASE Y’ALL vanellope & tink

EX-SOMETHING ; this could either be someone who like actually got close enough for lilo to freak the freak out and dip like someone she nearly fell in love with or fell in love with her and kind of triggered her GOTTA GO reflex lmao or someone she casually dated for the fun of it, maybe they even went on a few dates before they realized they were better as friends?

ENEMIES ; someone who doesn’t like lilo and lilo doesn’t like in return. Or maybe it’s one sided we can plot it out!

PARTNER IN CRIME ; this is the person who Lilo will end up in prison with. This is the person who she goes to when she just wants to go crazy aaah go stupid. Love this for her. caitlin !

PHOTOGRAPHY BUD OR MUSE ; exactly what it says on the tin. Someone who will let Lilo sit on their shoulders so she can Get That Shot. Somebody who will be like Tom Holland in this post and Do It For The Gram!!! phoenix

EX-TINDER DATE ; honestly this could align with the second ex something or even the first or be something different completely! but like i said lilo tends to go on tinder dates to mess around with people so she would just be as weird as possible during the date for shits and giggles tbh and it was probably a really fun time unless your muse was really serious about it! We can discuss what happened on the actual date and have a wild time

SOMEONE SHE TUTORS ; surprisingly engineering and other sciences comes really easy to Lilo so this goes out to science majors I suppose! 

A CRUSH ; self explanatory I think but if anyone is willing to let Lilo have a a bit of a crush on their muse hmu. buttercup!

SIBLING LIKE CONNECTION ; !!! love this omg if anyone wants to give Lilo a pseudo sibling i would love this.

FWB/CASUAL HOOKUP ; self explanatory i think

i think that’s all i can think of for now but !!! plot with me please! that is all thank you sdksdjk

[onwardintolight]

Have you had a chance to read Last Shot yet? If so what did you think?

Yes I have! I finished it the day before yesterday, and I really enjoyed it, despite a few qualms.

I especially liked Han’s emotional journey as he comes to terms with being a parent. I’m dumbfounded at how a lot of people (*cough* Reylos) have used this book to argue that Han was a terrible parent and even to insinuate that he abandoned Ben, when clearly that’s anything but the case in the book. (It’s also not the case in any canon book or source material. Le sigh.) I think a lot of people have already addressed this though, and I’ll reblog some good stuff about that later, so that’s all I’ll say on this ridiculous assertion for now. 

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed watching Han grow as he wrestles with his fear and insecurity, learns how to simultaneously be a dad and follow his passion, and starts to really find his place during this new time after the war. I’m sure I’ll struggle similarly if/when I become a mom someday; I can’t imagine how daunting it would be for Han, having never had a family of his own. I thought his struggles were really sympathetically and beautifully portrayed. 

It’s made abundantly clear that his love for Leia and his son knows no bounds — in fact, that’s exactly why he’s struggling so much in the first place. He wants to be what they need and is afraid that maybe he isn’t; maybe he’s not equipped to be the “perfect” dad, whatever that is. And he finds out that, no, he may not know everything there is to know about parenting, but that’s okay —he’s trying and learning, along with Leia, and he loves them deeply, and that’s what matters. Moreover, his passion for flying isn’t something that he has to give up in order to be a husband and dad. Both can exist at the same time. He can be true to himself and a family man.

I did find it irritating, however, that they show Han as struggling with all this, but Leia seems to automatically know everything there is to know about motherhood (@inelegantprose​ has said some good things about this). This to me reeks of sexism. Yes, Leia had a family growing up, but she had no Organa siblings and I can’t imagine she was ever surrounded by very many babies, lol. The birth of a child would raise a whole lot of fears and insecurities for her, as much or even more so than Han — particularly when taking into account the knowledge of who her real father was. 

The book says that Ben’s arrival “seemed to light up the whole world when he’d first arrived: this simple impossible sliver of hope amid so much death and destruction.” I like that idea, and I could imagine they both felt that, profoundly. All the same, I think it’s likely that while Ben was dearly loved and celebrated, he wasn’t planned, and if Leia had had the opportunity, she would not have chosen to get pregnant (at least not yet), fresh off the revelation of her bloodline. (Although I also think it’s entirely possible she was just pushing that information away during this time, denying it and not dealing with it because it was too hard to accept.) 

Anyway, I wish the book had showed some of Leia’s parenthood struggles, too, and not set her up to be such a natural supermom. However, I’ll concede these points: 1) This book is entirely centered on Han and Lando and their inner journeys, not Leia’s. 2) Leia admittedly has had a WHOLE lot of practice at looking poised and put together, no matter what’s she’s going through (something the book even mentions). 3) While I believe the author could have done a better job and portrayed it in a less sexist way, there’s still a lot of room to guess at what’s really going on in Leia’s mind. 4) At least this is less fodder for Kylo stans, I guess? Consequently, I’m not as upset as I might be otherwise.

My opinions of the characterizations in this book varied greatly. Most often, I felt like there was a remarkable sensitivity to the characters’ emotional worlds that rang true. And that, to me, is what matters most. Still, there were bits of dialogue and action that just didn’t feel right to me, and, like in some of the comics, the characters at times seemed rather like extreme caricatures of themselves. For instance, Han’s tendency to run things by the seat of his pants doesn’t mean he’s always spontaneous or unprepared. He came off as rather clueless at times, which I think does him a great disservice. He also came off  as overly gruff and terrible at communicating, which I think he is to an extent, but not nearly as much as this book makes him out to be. Also, just because Leia calls people names in ANH and ESB when she’s really upset doesn’t mean she calls everyone names all the time (as a sidenote, I found some of the names she called people in this book a little odd. Calling Han “you old lug” or “old man”?…I’m just not feeling it).

That being said, overall, I felt like Han and Leia’s interactions in this book were an absolute delight. There are several scenes and exchanges that I will treasure. I don’t want to spoil them, so I won’t go into too much detail here. I also appreciated that, while Leia’s motherhood struggles were not acknowledged, her trauma very much was. There were a few little hints and snapshots into that from both conversations and Han’s reflections that I thought were extremely well done (and left me with a whole ton of feelings).

Similar to how I felt about the characterizations, I’m kind of back and forth on the plot itself. Overall I enjoyed it, but there were three storylines going on in three separate timelines, and the fact that they were all mixed around throughout the book, while involving some of the same main characters, made it a little confusing for me. I felt like there were some leaps of logic, too, that were perplexing. However, this entire impression could be due to the fact that my brain was rather foggy the night I read most of it. Who knows, a second read-through might make it all fall into place! Moral of the story: don’t binge-read this book when you’re half-asleep. ;) 

I really loved the exploration of droid rights, and what that actually means, although I felt like there could have been a lot more said on the subject.

I’m thrilled we got a Latinx POC author for Star Wars. I’m sure there’s a lot I’m missing (do I have any Latinx followers who can tell me more?), but I appreciated the representation and perspective. Also certain little details, like the fact that there was an Alderaanian character who clearly speaks with a Spanish accent (putting an e- before a word starting with st-, for example) — more evidence for a Hispanic Alderaan! 

Speaking of representation, off the top of my head, I can think of a non-binary person, a gay person, and many people of color, including main characters (and not just Lando). On a much lesser note, I also appreciated the fact that a lot of aliens were represented too!

I loved Lando’s journey in regards to his relationship with Kaasha; exploring what it means to be his scoundrelly self and yet be committed to one person.

I really loved the look into Han and Lando’s pasts with the storylines set ten years before. There’s one element in particular that got me from the outset, which I’ll write briefly about under the cut so as not to spoil anyone.

All this continues to give me great hopes for the Solo movie, and that they’ll approach these characters with sensitivity and complexity (as well as fun).

TL;DR: This book was probably a 7 out of 10 for me — I enjoyed it quite a bit, though it doesn’t come near to replacing some of the other new canon SW books for me (of which Bloodline still tops the list). I had mixed feelings about certain things but overall I’m happy about this addition to canon! I strongly encourage you, if you have any interest at all in new canon, to ignore the ridiculous Kylo-apologist discourse and give this book a shot!

(warning: spoilers under the cut!)

The part I was talking about that really got to me was when we first meet Han 10 years prior. As the scene opens, we find Han nursing a hangover and a broken heart over a girl (he never says her name). While he eventually gets over it, we are given a poignant window into Han’s big heart and sensitive soul underneath the rough exterior. He can’t help but love people. He can’t help but be absolutely devastated at their loss. He’s lonely and constantly striving for human connection (we see this later in how he relates to Sana and develops a rather silly, sudden rebound crush on her). He tends to go all in, despite himself and the risk, and consequently, he ends up getting hurt a lot. THIS MAKES ME FEEL A LOT OF THINGS. Gaaaah I love Han Solo, okay? It hurts to see him hurting, but it also makes my heart so happy to know that someday, he’ll find the belonging he so desperately seeks.

[brilliantkey]

Coming Out On Top/Teen Wolf

I recently got into the computer game Coming Out On Top, which delves into the life of Mark Matthews as he comes out to his friends and enters the dating world of an openly gay man. As I was (repeatedly) playing the game, I couldn’t help but make similarities to Teen Wolf. Both canonically and in the world of fan-fiction, there are characters that closely resemble each other. 

Be forewarned, this may contain spoilers of Coming Out on Top and, to a lesser extent, Teen Wolf. If you want to learn more about either one, visit the COOT website and/or watch Teen Wolf. So, just to be clear: 

POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERTS AHEAD

I rated each pairing in terms of canonical relation to Teen Wolf and possible relation to fan-fiction since Teen Wolf, despite it’s goal to show as much male skin as possible, certainly wouldn’t show one guy fucking another in a toilet stall. However, when considering a character’s fan-fiction rating, I tried to maintain a stndard that wouldn’t be too out of character for the parties involved. But, uh, we all know how subjective fan-fiction can be. 

So, with that said, let’s start with the main character and the six love interests:  

Main Character: Stiles Stilinski as Mark Matthews Canon Rating: 3/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 4/5 stars

To me, Stiles has to be the main character. Otherwise, you just couldn’t make these comparisons work. Sure, you could make a case for Scott as Mark since they are both the protagonists, but deep down in your fan-fiction reading heart, you know that only Stiles is capable of the shenanigans that Mark gets into. Also, Mark has a tendency for word vomit which definitely reminds me of Stiles

Potential Love Interest: Scott McCall as Ian Manachevitz Canon Rating: 3.5/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 4/5 stars

Without a doubt, Scott is a lovable goofball. Like Mark and Ian, Stiles and Scott are best friends, even when Stiles has to put up with Scott’s oblivious nature (read: Scott going on and on about Allison or Ian’s crazy ideas). To that extent, we can even paint Allison or Kira (take your pick but I’m going with Allison) as on and off again ex-girlfriend Zoe. Conceivably, it wouldn’t be outside the realm of fan-fiction for Scott to be into dildos and a bit of bondage and harboring feelings for our lovable main character. 

Potential Love Interest: Peter Hale as Alex Davies Canon Rating: 3/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 3.5/5 stars

Peter certainly fits the bill canonically. He’s about the same age as Alex and I’m sure a fan-fiction author would have no qualms about Peter pulling his favorite student (*coughs Stiles*) to the front of the class to finger him in the name of education. I’m less inclined to imagine Peter as willing to take a step back from fucking Stiles in his office, but that may be the fan-fiction reader in me talking. 

Potential Love Interest: Derek Hale as Brad Melnick Canon Rating: 3.5/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 4/5 stars

It certainly is canon for Derek to be portrayed as a typical jock with hidden layers. It’s also common in fan-fiction for Derek to be portrayed as a jock. While Derek is older than Stiles in canon Teen Wolf, many fan-fiction writers like to portray Stiles and Derek as the same age. In this case though, Derek would be a couple of years younger than Stiles as Brad is likely a freshman while Mark is a senior. 

Brad and Mark, much like Derek and Stiles, do not immediately get along in their respective canons. But fan-fiction certainly has Stiles admiring Brad’s body much like Mark does with Brad. Additionally, thanks to fan-fiction, we could easily see Laura Hale as Beau Melnick, Brad’s protective older sibling. Brad is coasting along thanks to his athletic ability and wouldn’t it be just like Laura to make sure Derek gets back on track. 

Alternate Character Potential Love Interest: Derek Hale as Alex Davies Canon Rating: 3.5/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 4/5 stars

Thanks to fan-fiction, it isn’t too out of the realm of probability to see Derek as Professor Davies. Why? Well, imagine if the fire had never happened (which is a common trope in fan-fiction generally called Alive Hale Family or No Hale Fire). Even if we don’t see the other Hales, we know from canon that Derek is naturally flirty and would likely hit on Stiles if he were to see him in a bar. And, it also stands to his character (maybe more so than Peter) to want to take a step back from dating a student despite his obvious desire. (I mean, Derek’s internal struggles are practically legendary). Regardless, Derek would certainly make a great Alex. 

Potential Love Interest: Danny Mahealani as Jed Zhou Canon Rating: 1/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 1/5 stars

I won’t lie, this one’s a bit of a stretch. Aside from their stunning bodies, this stems from my farfetched desire to see Danny open the door completely naked and asking me to be his Cumslut97. Not much else beyond that. 

Potential Love Interest: Vernon Boyd as Philbert Healy Canon Rating: 4/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 3.5/5 stars

Phil and Boyd probably have the most in common of all their characters. To start off with, they both hate their given name, Boyd/Phil is not initially impressed with Stiles/Mark, they have a close relationship with a crazy female character, and they are constantly babysitting a younger girl (based on Boyd’s backstory of his little sister). Because of their relationship in Teen Wolf, I’m also likely to cast Erica as Phil’s cousin Penny. In fact, the only difference between Boyd and Phil is that we don’t really get to see Boyd develop a closer relationship with Stiles. 

I’ll admit, my fan-fiction rating was based on speculation as I haven’t really read any Boyd/Stiles pairings. But thanks to COOT and that scene with Phil fucking Mark, who is hidden under the covers when Ian walks in, I can now definitely imagine it. 

Potential Love Interest: Chris Argent as Amos Canon Rating: 1/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 1/5 stars

Like Jed and Danny, this is another stretch for me. Aside from Chris being older than Stiles and having a previous relationship mentioned (i.e. Victoria as a Victor), Chris and Amos don’t really have much in common. 

Brofinder App Dates: 

Potential Date: Jordan Parrish as Cesar Canon Rating: 1/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 2/5 stars

Originally, I considered making the Sheriff Cesar and switching Mark to another TW character. But the more I thought about it, the less I could see the Sheriff abusing the trust of the citizens of Beacon Hills. (Well, I could but I won’t get into that.) While it’s still pretty out of character for Jordan to display such abuse of power, it’s still pretty hot to imagine. 

Potential Date: Issac Lahey as Terrence/Terry Lovelock Canon Rating: 2/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 2/5 stars

Aside from the fact that they are both blonde, and have similar body proportions, I mostly base this on the fact that they are blonde and have similar body proportions. Besides, don’t tell me you wouldn’t love to see Issac bend over and suck his own cock. No? Just me? I’m sure I read that in fan-fiction somewhere. *blushes*

Potential Date: Liam and Mason as Pete and Oz Canon Rating: 1/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 2/5 stars

I’ll admit, I stopped watching Teen Wolf by the time these characters were introduced. I mostly know them through Tumblr postings, but they seem as inseparable as these two. Also, I wouldn’t put it past either of them to want to be cuckolded and watch their partner be fucked by another man (in fan-fiction, obviously). 

Potential Date: Theo Raeken as Frank Canon Rating: 2/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 2/5 stars

As I mentioned above, I didn’t really watch Theo’s storyline. However, a lot of people ship him with Stiles for some reason. But I know Theo is a sketchy character and Frank’s whole storyline is about lying to make himself appear more impressive. Also, with how hot he is, imagining Theo as a stripper is hot.

Potential Date: Ethan and Aiden as Jesse and Hugh Canon Rating: 2/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 2/5 stars

Come on! Come ON! They’re twins. Need I say more?!

Potential Date: Roscoe the Jeep as Slurpy the Fish Canon Rating: 3/5 stars Fan-fiction Rating: 3/5 stars

Roscoe and Slurpy both serve as a beacon of hope and form of support for their respective owners. While I don’t think we’d ever be able to get Roscoe fully inside Stiles’ anus, I did see this one video where a guy rode the gear shift like....you know what? Never mind. 

All that aside, I’m still pretty much enjoying Coming Out On Top. I might post pictures of the characters that most resemble each other between COOT and Teen Wolf in the future. 

I hope you enjoying my long ass post. 

[canaryatlaw]

alright, so today was all around pretty dang great. the plan was to go to the 9 am service and serve in the babies room at the 11 am, but they were doing a special 1 pm gathering today because it was the anniversary so they were expecting more people, so I figured I’d take advantage of a little more sleep and serve at the 11 then go to the 1 pm. So I woke up at 8:50 and got to church just about on time, we did our “huddle” in the volunteer lounge, then up to the kids room. I was with the little babies again as that seems to be my designation for the time being. we had 7 babies and 3 volunteers, so not a bad ratio. A few of them were crying on and off for a while, but then one of them fell asleep in the weird “MamaRoo” swing thing we have (it’s hard to describe, but some babies really love that thing) and the other went into the bouncer and decided he was having the time of his life there, so that solved that problem. I cuddled with the little 4 month old I’ve had a few times now for a while, he’s just the cutest, and he fell asleep eventually too. Then I had another little girl in my lap who wanted to play with my name tag and everything else haha but as long as she was happy I was good. Two of my friends who are also on the babies team came and helped for a little, because they were going to the 1 pm service and had some time to kill. I’ve probably mentioned them before, they’re the married couple who both graduated law school two years ago, so needless to say we have a lot in common lol. Pretty soon the service was over, and I went with my friends to the new auditorium for the 1 pm service, and the whole thing was just so incredibly awesome I don’t even know how to describe it. Like, I had so much fun, it rocked. They did this really cool thing with a mock scrim on the stage at first that then dropped and all the worship people rushed out, and it was like, so awesome lol. The service was mainly a look back at everything that happened to get the church to the place it’s at, and how much of it came back to trusting God to provide even when the circumstances seem impossible. The whole thing was just really, really great. During the last song they dropped a bunch of clear beach balls that were filled with gold confetti down from the balcony, which proceeded to be knocked like volleyballs around the auditorium for the rest of the song, and right before the end my friend gave one a toss and it ended up beaming the lady like two rows in front of right in the back of the head, and I was like, doubled over with laughter as the band played “The joy of the Lord is my strength” and like, I was just filled with this overwhelming joy about everything, it and was just a really great moment for me. I know I’ve said this approximately a million times on here, but I really, really love my church, and I’m so fortunate to have found one when so many people my age are leaving the church because they just can’t find that. but my church is literally packed with young people, because they say things like “’everyone is welcome and accepted here” from the stage in front of everybody (they said that today even), and they celebrate women pastors and just women, they praised the efforts of the Women’s March when the church I was raised in would be calling that borderline heresy. It just feels so good to be in a place where I can feel God so strongly and not be impeded by my personal issues with how the church presents itself. I’ve said it many times, I never drifted away from God, God and I were always cool, it was the church I drifted from because I didn't want to be associated with what I saw them doing (and this has grown infinitesimally since the whole Trump supporting situation happened). I just feel so lucky to have a place where I can meet with God and be surrounded by people who are truly wanting the best for me, not to judge me or make excuses as to why I can’t do certain things. Towards the beginning of the service I was thinking about job qualms a bit, but once again I felt God saying to trust Him, that He’s got this covered and I don’t need to worry, so of course that’s comforting. Anyway. Service was great, headed home after and made okay time. Had some food and started with some bus orgs reading, but then decided to move on to legal profession because I can do my bus orgs reading while I’m at school for like 5 hours in between my lunch hour meetings (as in more than one) and my night class. Finished that in fairly good time, tried to start my adoption reading but didn’t make it very far, I did write down the case cites so I can pull them up tomorrow and at least read those. I spent the rest of the time digging through Virginia statutes and case law trying to find my “research state law” homework on the certain subject we’re covering, and for my life I could not find any Virginia law regarding disrupted adoptions, so eventually I just had to say that. At that point I gave up on reading for the night and made some dinner, while starting my child defender fellowship lecture, which took a little over an hour to finish, filled with good stuff for sure. After that I FINALLY got to finish Stranger Things season 2, which was of course all kinds of awesome. Eleven is my baby and I just want to hug her always and I'm so glad she has Hopper to be her dad now. Just a great conclusion to an awesome season. The child actors really knocked it out of the park, especially Will, because we barely got to see him last season but this season he was front and center, and damn did he do a kickass job in the role. so much talent! lol. From there I decided to watch the second episode of the gifted I had on my dvr, which was pretty good. Then I moved on to Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, only getting through last week's episode since I was two weeks behind. I know they said they were going to be exploring mental illness this season, but I have to say, I’m somewhat less than enthused by the seeming implications of the end of this episode- that Rebecca is some dangerous psycho who’s been a freak all along and now nobody trusts her. Like that feels super stigmatizing and just inappropriate to me, but this writers have proved to be pretty good about these things, so I’m choosing to believe that’s not where they're going with this and they can have positive storylines about dealing with mental illness that don't contain throwing people in the “loony bin.” Anyway. After that I got ready for bed, and that’s all for now. Tomorrow got a PAD meeting at 12, and then after that I’m going to a talk given by my summer job friend’s mom, who’s a big deal lawyer back on LI, so I want to meet her. And yeah, should be fun. Okay, I’m done now. Goodnight darlings. Hope your Monday doesn’t suck. ❤️❤️