#Sera's Posts

[everyforkedroad]

Why Shine Might Be Set in 1969: A Story of Resistance, Silence, and Defiance

*sorry, folks, this is a long one, based on one humble inter fan's desire to understand

As we eagerly await the release of Shine, one intriguing detail stands out: its setting in Bangkok, 1969. 

Thailand in the late 1960s was not exactly a beacon of visible queer liberation. So why choose this year, this precise moment, to set this series? The answer may lie not in what was happening in the open, but what was burning just beneath the surface in Thailand and across the globe. That "light that lingers just beneath the shadows" that would turn a spark into the flames of social unrest.

1969 was a year of rupture and revolution. Across the world, young people were taking to the streets—angry, idealistic, determined to wrest power from corrupt systems. From the anti-war protests in the United States to student-led revolts in France, Japan, and Mexico, the air was electric with resistance. Music, fashion, and film reflected these seismic shifts, capturing the spirit of rebellion in psychedelic color.

In Southeast Asia, the Vietnam War raged just across the border. American troops passed through Thailand on their way to and from the front lines, and the Thai government, under military rule, maintained close ties with the United States. The social tensions of this geopolitical alignment were palpable between the rising tide of youth culture and a government suspicious of dissent. This tension was felt as well between imported modernity and deep-rooted tradition, agrarian poverty and Bangkok's concentration of wealth. All of these serve as a pressure cooker of tensions that was ready to explode.

In Thailand, student activism was gaining momentum. The seeds that would later blossom into the mass protests of the 1970s were already being planted in 1969. University campuses, especially Thammasat and Chulalongkorn, were becoming incubators for radical thought, as young intellectuals began to question military rule, wealth inequality, and the suppression of free speech.

Though the mass protests that would shake the monarchy and the junta had not yet occurred, the sense of unease was growing. Student publications, underground gatherings, and whispered debates signaled a generation preparing to stand up. It is into this world—a world tense with possibility—that Shine may drop its characters.

Half a world away, in June of 1969, a police raid on the Stonewall Inn in New York sparked several nights of defiant resistance led by trans women, drag queens, and queer people of color. It became a watershed moment in LGBTQ+ history, a symbolic ignition point for the modern gay rights movement. News of Stonewall may not have reached every queer person globally in that moment, but the reverberations would be felt by an entire generation.

For closeted individuals in Thailand, especially students and intellectuals already questioning other forms of repression, Stonewall represented something radical: the refusal to hide. Even if unspoken, it stirred something. It suggested that queerness and protest were not incompatible. That the same voices raised against political injustice would teach a future generation of queer people to fight for the right to love freely.

Thailand decriminalized homosexuality in 1956, over a decade before Stonewall. On paper, it was a progressive move. But legal tolerance did not equal cultural acceptance. The 1960s remained a deeply conservative era for queer Thais, especially in professional or public life. While kathoey ("ladyboys") had long been part of Thai cultural visibility, their presence did not signify broader acceptance of queer identities—particularly not of men who loved men or women who loved women outside of comedic or marginalized roles.

There were no pride marches. No activist networks. No formal advocacy groups pushing for LGBTQ+ rights in the way that began to unfold in the West. In fact, Thailand’s first gay rights organization, Anjaree, would not be founded until 1986—seventeen years after Stonewall, and almost two decades after the year Shine is set.

So why choose 1969 for a queer Thai story?

Because it is a liminal moment. 

A time before everything cracked open, when truth still had to live in shadows, but shined just as bright. A time when love, especially queer love, had to be coded through through music, poetry, unspoken gestures and looks. It’s a rich emotional landscape for drama, for longing and repression, desire and danger, all set against the backdrop of political awakening.

If Shine follows queer characters navigating this moment, their love story is not just personal, it’s political. Their very existence becomes resistance, not through protest signs or riots, but through every act of tenderness they dare to share in a world that tells them to stay invisible.

By choosing 1969, Be On Cloud may be offering a tribute to all the queer people in Thai history whose stories were never told. The ones who danced and sang behind closed doors. Who whispered their truths in journals and poems. Who watched the world begin to burn and wondered if there would ever be space for them in its new order, until they came into the awareness that they would have to build the world they wanted themselves. One love, one protest at a time.

So that future lives could Shine in the open as well.

[akaisenhatake]

last drink.

[203y]

drew a couple of OCs by @idolomantises for a sorta draw-this-in-your-style art meme over on blusky :3

[iliketoeatplastic]

ahhh

[redladydeath]

New information revealed by the Hazbin Playbill

Charlie went to college

Charlie won multiple musical theater awards in college

Alastor broadcasts every day at noon (or whenever he feels like it)

Angel Dust is a singer

Angel Dust made his first onscreen appearance in one of Valentino’s films (so in or after the 1970s)

Vaggie is trained in sychronized dance

Sir Pentious has made weapons for Carmine Industries and Voxtek

Sir Pentious created the Egg Bois with the help of someone (probably Baxter)

Lucifer performs alongside the other Deadly Sins (“perform” might be metaphorical though)

Carmilla discovered new ways to use Angelic technology to improve Hell’s weaponry

Carmilla is the host of the board of Pentagram City Overlords

Rosie does favors in exchange for people’s souls

Sera works directly under the Speaker of God

Sera is in charge of Heaven’s hierachy and laws

Emily is in charge of ensuring all citizens of Heaven are entertained and comfortable 

Mimzy owns a club called “Ragtime”

Mimzy once appeared in a radio special with Alastor called “Singa for ya Dinna!”

Vox acts in and directs his media projects

Valentino frequently goes on shooting sprees in the Entertainment District

Valentino describes the Entertainment District as ruled by himself, “Velvette, and I guess Vox”

Velvette has over 100 million subscribers

Velvette is the head of development for Love Potion (in collaboration with Valentino)

Velvette can do spells/magic

Saint Peter is the head singer in Heaven’s royal choir and founded the Angelic drama club

Saint Peter can play the harp and French horn

Zestial is the oldest living Overlord in power

Zestial is effectively retired

Zestial helps Carmilla with her business due to their friendship

[companionquest]

rogue on rogue violence

[stealingpotatoes]

inquisitor inq'isita part 6: @highladyofdusk and I don't know what we're doing but we're doing it very confidently

(commission info // tip jar!)

[tokoyamisstuff]

I could make these forever sorry

[loserifer]

structuring this page was kicking my ass, but i grabbed it by the neck and throttled it into submission with the power of hot women. you're welcome.

Page 4/?

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reblogs are appreciated!! thank you so much everyone for following along and supporting! when y'all reblog, comment, and leave nice tags it makes my day ;u;

[foonyeet]

I don't really celebrate pride month, but got a funny thought (from months ago) about making this so uhh.. here you go.. 🧍

(This is so stupid I swear to god—)

[trans-luis-serra-navarro]

Itty bitty Luis next to an even ittier bittier Rookie Leon!!! RE2 Serennedy is canon now everyone we can go home celebrate!!

Also!! Bonus little lighter and cigarette packet :D

[everyforkedroad]

What’s completely wild to me about Shine is how it explores deep ideological divides, each embodied by privileged men —hedonist, capitalist, journalist, military leader, and foreign-trained academic— who are also grappling with their queer identities during a time of political upheaval.

The voice we don’t hear? The people. Student activists stand in for them because institutions of that era didn’t give ordinary citizens a say in what happened to their lives. The same institutions that, directly or indirectly, each of these men benefit from.

Shine feels like it’s weaving a charged, emotional tapestry, where the personal and the political collide in the lives of queer men. I’m so excited to see how this series holds all those tensions together and manifests them on the screen.

[neves-trouble]

[mlobsters]

j2 okcon 2025 / supernatural s3e7 fresh blood (w. sera gamble) / s11e4 baby (w. robbie thompson)

-> scenes jared and jensen are most proud of, full answers here

[pin-poo]

residents (2024)

[fisherrprince]

Instead of writing a fanfic like a normal person this oneshot turned into two separate, contextless things,