#also just generally a fun little episode i rly think it might b one of my faves

[majicmarker]

so i’ve had a lot on my mind lately — the good, the bad, the ugly, you know the drill. i’m used to the bad and the ugly, but i think (and ofc by my therapist’s rec) i need to give a little credit to the good, too. not to mention the good is largely comprised of people, and those people deserve a sports stadium wave, yk? idk shit abt sports, whatever, but i know what the wave is and it’s like the grandest gesture i can think of, SO

listen, y’all. to get real here, i hate fandom. my time spent therein has been hit-or-miss, but the misses got me hard and contributed to some major self-loathing, etc etc. we’re not gonna get into the specifics, i don’t owe that to anyone, but suffice it to say things got Rough.

but so much of it can be so, so good. and rn i want to keep on my rose-colored glasses, and the rosiest parts for me have always been @kitten1618x and @mygutsforgarters

(quite a few others, too, but i no longer have everyone’s info. and some ppl are newer friends, or relationships that have moved more slowly. i have mad love for u guys too, obvs, but ik melissa and gus irl so we know each other More and they’re who this post is rly about atm. pls know i don’t want to harsh on anyone’s feelings)

the tl;dr version of events is i met them both via fanfic. i happened upon theirs like “bitch!!!! **i** wanna do this, they’re bomb as hell” and then i made them be friends w me. they’ll tell you they wanted to be friends w me first, but that’s not important bc **i** am the one making this post, so they can both like,, suck it.

ANYWAY.

@ melissa : so bitch listen. here’s the thing abt melissa…… i found her while browsing jonsa fic back when i cared abt GOT, and she brought me back to what i loved so much abt romance when i first started, way back in junior high, what’s up. i bad a fascination w historial romantic epics for a loooooong time — those formative yrs, amirite ladies??? — but girl i could never write it so well as melissa. immediately she struck this balance between the drama you expect from historicals and the levity of a good romance, and i was just like, “hand to god this woman must be published already, surely???”

(she’s not, but that’s ridiculous so we’re gonna skip that)

(also she’s busy?? we’ve been friends for like six years and i will never know how many kids she actually has, but the point is she’s a goddamn superhero and i’m obsessed w her, MOVING ON)

i just Had to be her friend for two reasons: 1) she’s too talented, and b) i have said that abt 2 ppl my entire life and she was the first, so i was like, “AH YES MY HOLY GRAIL”

so ofc i slid into her DMs just as effectively as that one guy i had a crush on when i was sixteen and he’s still shooting me texts every valentine’s day bc of the societal pressures i guess (it is Far Less Effective these days, he’s my age and therefore too young for me, gross, but i digress), except me and melissa go way stronger.

she reminded me of why, half a lifetime ago, i started writing romance — bc it’s fun, bc i want to. bc i can do absolutely anything i want, bc who else is gonna read it but me and whoever i share it with? it was all up to me what i wanted to do with it, and i could do anything. nothing really mattered but what i wanted, and i hadn’t felt that way abt anything in such a long time — let alone abt something i used to love so much.

melissa’s writing is so beautiful, it’s everything i wanted to achieve when i was fifteen and never got around to perfecting. and i’m totally okay w that now, bc what do i need to do myself that she’s not already doing/wants to do in the future? when i found melissa’s writing i found a missing part of me — a part i’d maybe lost, maybe i gave it up, idk, but it was totally gone until i found her fics and they fucking clicked. i had to reach out bc there was a part of me that was a part of her, and she helped me find that again w/o even knowing it.

so i found melissa via GOT, and from the start she’d been trying to get me to write some bethyl. years and years, she dropped not-so-subtle hints — and by “hints,” i mean legit directives that i watch just enough TWD to write her some beth/daryl fic. real crafty, she is.

eventually the stars aligned: i was bored w the same dynamics i’d been writing for years, i wanted smthn new, i was restless, i was line editing a bethyl fic she’d written, and — again — this shit clicked. her fic made me want to explore this dynamic i’d never done before, so i watched the prerequisite episodes (no more than that tho, i super hate the show and i’m begging y’all to not @ me abt it anymore). i found smthn that i’d been missing, smthn that challenged and excited me and brought me back around to why i love romance and, more importantly, why i want to write it myself.

so as i was starting to write bethyl, i was poking around the ao3 tag to get a feel for what had been done, what hadn’t, anything i might be missing. and goddamn BAM —

@ gus : this is where u enter dramatically thru a red velvet curtain that i don’t wanna touch (Metaphorically bc you do romance better than me and i’m cool w that bc your talent simply Cannot be touched, and Literally bc i hate velvet) — i was like, “please for the love of god let her want to write contemporary romance, i need some good fckin food”

i happened upon “doo wah diddy diddy” first. ofc the summary hooked me, forget my usual hard no against pregnancy fics (i have issues w pregnancy and that’s all anybody Needs to know, back off), but This Bitch !!!!!!! has a way with words and i wanted to be friends w her straightaway. lmao too bad for her, now she’s stuck w me

gus’s fics gave me what i wanted without having to write it myself. her style is so distinctive, she hits the notes between porn and Actual Affection that is missing from uhhhh, every romance i’ve tried?? (why is everyone so intent on the sex part?? fckin chill. at best it’s unrelatable and at worst u sound like u’d rather wear someone than fuck them, check urself)

she writes w such care, she wants you to know what she’s doing here, and what she’s doing here is combining the physical and emotional needs of both characters w/o infringing on anyone’s comfortability. you root for these characters bc they simply want to be together, no strings (and if there are strings, damn, they talk abt it).

gus makes you believe in love in the modern age. like, not to sound like one of those ppl who post fckin “no one in this generation knows how to love!!!1!!11!!” memes on facebook, those are dumb, but gus’s writing made me think “yeah man, love ain’t dead, it’s just abt how we approach it.”

(if y’all haven’t guessed yet, i have some hang-ups abt relationships. i’ve goddamn earned those. but melissa and gus both brought me back to where i needed to be — in this place where, yeah, we’ve got some shit to deal with, but we all still deserve the things we want, and those things are achievable. i could not have gotten here without them, so jot that down.)

gus is Real, she’s funny, she’s unapologetic in the way she writes. ofc she has her personal hurdles, but who doesn’t?? and tbh nobody writes a sex scene like gus does. physical, realistic, but balanced w the emotional depth that makes you root for these characters bc you can Feel how much they want each other — not just sexually, but in the less-erotic aftermath of that passion. it continues to blow my mind, bc i’ve never seen anyone do what she does. i can’t even pinpoint the specifics, bc she just… Does It. and you’re reading it like “yeah bitch that’s it,” and That’s It.

it’s fckin wild.

these two — my best friends, the lights of my life, both of whom always make me crave chicken tenders at THE most inconvenient hours bc somehow we always talk abt chicken or ice cream or ultimately DQ, but they're both so hot idec — have something special.

i really, really want them both to know that: it’s not just in how they’ve treated me as a friend, but who they are as people, in their creative pursuits. i’ve never known support the way they’ve shown me; i’ve never known this much enthusiasm or investment or belief that i can do what i want with my talent. i want them to know that i feel the same way abt them and their works.

sometimes, when i look back at their writing that completely kicked my ass, i still can’t believe that they’ve become two of my best friends. it’s totally bonkers. they’re This Talented, and they wanna be friends w my spastic ass? GIRL. i’m out.

i’m not always the best at being present, at giving people what they need when they need it. but with everything that melissa and gus have given me in the past few years, i need them to know this — honey!!! i need all y’all to know this, bc i know fandom shit is hard, but you should know some of these friendships are so, so worth all that bullshit, so —

they have so much to give, so much to say, so much to offer. i could not have kept going without them. i couldn’t believe in myself without the faith they’ve given to me. i hope that i can always give that same faith right back.

and that, babes, is what real soulmates are all about.

[themanicgalaxy]

SPN 5X8 Changing Channels

oH FUCK YEAH it'S META TIME!!

I genuinely do think this is what helped popularize this shit oh HELL YEAH

it'S FUCKING G A B R I E L YA B O I

HE IS ALSO COMPLEX

JENSEN NARRATING BUT NOT WITH THE DEAN VOICE

CANNED LAUGHTER

THE COLOR BUT IT'S STILL THE OLD MOTEL LAYOUT

J U S T THE END OF THE WORLD

ALSO HIS HAIRCUT+color DOES NOT WORK IT'S GREAT

SON OF A BITCH AHAHA

HIS FUCKING VOICE CRACK

WHO WROTE THIS GODDAMN INTRO

tHIS INTRO IS SO FUNNY

also sidenote, it's so weird seeing them smile so much

DR SEXY

same pattern as the old time but you can SEE the color grading

huh like there's Something Wrong

and then business as usual

but like yeah they have to interview her

incredible hulk?

BANNER OR NORTON PFFT

Ah the TV version DEAN YOU NERD

a cartoon hole in the door the shape of the incredible hulk

oh it was HIM?

like he was a hothead, got killed by a hothead....

G A B RI E L

sam appealing to him is...interesting wait where is this going

facebook friends lmao Dean you Mom

he fucked with their radio didn't he

damn but he'S SMART

YOU'RE IN DOCTOR SEXY NOW LMAOOOO

THEY'RE SO FREAKED OUT

THEY'RE IN A MEDICAL TELENOVELA I'M CRYING

dammit I wish they let Dean grow his hair out the new lighting is making me sad

Dean's escapism is crashing down, it's great

Dean oh my GOD YOU FUCKING HYPERFIXATED NERD

DOCTOR SEXY

he does the...same lowered voice he does with Cas

ok listen there is a case to be made for hero worship, there IS but there's ALSO THE OTHER ONE

THE ABORTED HALF SMILE

the close ups work for him though?

oh the FREEZE! OH THAT'S NEAT!

HEY GABRIEL!

he morphs shorter lmaoooo

holy SHIT he's fun

the LIL GLITCH OUT OH MY GOD

THE EYEBROW WAG

GUYS HE HAS A POINT YALL WERE THE ONES THAT FUCKED UP

SAM IS SO TIRED OF THE MELODRAMA AHAHA

ah he gets killed again

dammit Gabe stop killing Dean

that's 100% not how surgery works

LMAO "figure it out"

what..the fuck did Sam do

THE FUCKING LADY

THAT WORKED??

and they switched to NUTCRACKER LMAOOO

THEY DON'T SPEAK JAPANESE

DEAN'S FACE!

SAM'S FACE

LMAOOOOO

commMERICALLL

CAS!

HE SOUNDS SO DISGRUNTLED!

NO IT WAS SO FUN TO SEE HIMMM

pretty boy angels?? WHAT?

whaT THE FUCK WAS THAT QUESTION

THE FUCKING JAPANESE?

oh my god the play along

that worked?

so they have to play along

boy they are both PANICKING

"I've got...genital herpes"

they're really going for the STD's with Sam for the last two episodes

thIS LOOKS LIKE IT'S PHYSICALLY PAINING HIM

I am CACKLING THIS IS

SO FUNNY

also...it's picking on Sam, maybe it's like...Gabe has a point to make with him?

also yeah he did kill Dean like a hundred times to make a point maybe he feels bad

"we might die in here" [canned laughter]

CAS!

no CAS!!

he looks genuinely shocked/scared oh my GOD!

the priorities tho!

Sam: u know him?

Dean: IS HE OK??

"play your roles out there" OHHH NEAT?

ah he just wants Chaos

he's not even happy? like "let's get it over with" is pretty neutral?

he's...not in league with anyone? he's kinda Weird about it?

ah so it's an actual ultimatum huh

they look good in this lighting at least?

"I am wearing sunglasses at night" LMAOOO

HE HATES PROCEDURAL COP SHOWSSS

THE STRUTTT

GRAVELLY VOICE

thE FUCKING POSES

THIS IS SO STUPID OH MY GOD

play along till stab stab?

ah they figured it was a fakeout

silent communication!

you can't telll if it's real or not..ever?

SAM'S IN A FUCKING RADIO

IT'S ANOTHER GENRE SHOWWWW

The vISUALS

HE'S THE CARRRR LMAO

ah he guesses, because of that field trip with cas

Car!Sam is so FUCKING FUNNY

GOTTEM! ANGEL!!!

Dean rly wanted to make that joke

"call it personal experience but no one gets that angry unless they're talking about their own family" O h M y gOD

oh shit I forgot technically we didn't know his name till now

hE JOINED THE PAGANS OH MY GOD

"watching them tear at each other" even though you love everyone involved...jesus

ah it's happening again

"I just want it to be over" :(

"It's about two brothers that loved each other and betrayed each other" uh OUCH

"you were born to this" oh JEEZ

ah yes the one kills the other

you have to at least admire their tenacity

"I wish this were a TV show, easy answers" oW

especially with Dean

"and it's gonna end bloody for all of us"

"hey, bro" aw

the bloody trench-coat oof

"you being too afraid to stand up to your family" oh my GOD and of COURSE Dean says it because he was oh my GOD

cas and gabe cas and gabe CAS AND GABe

"I think he believes it" oof

he lured them in didn't he? on purpose

1. escapism! Dean, Sam, and especially Gabriel. Like Gabriel is a very Evasive person(I feel like so is Sam) when confronted with problems, and he knows Dean at least uses TV to cope. It was a way to run away and try to get the others to understand him, I think. That whole "TV is escapism, this is the real world" and that Dean is the one that really likes it...ouch. Gabe and Sam would be cool to flesh out please Please

2. Cas and Gabe. No I have very little here, but I really like the little bits of their like "oh my god it's you fuck you" thing they have going, please give me more, it was so good. Like you get invested when they know each other and it's just...good. So good.

3. actually family in general. Like Gabriel is too scared to intervene, but doesn't want something to happen, Cas and Dean bonded over the fact that their dads are absent, Sam gets thrust into something when all he wants to do is figure out who he is outside of the context of his family. It was... a lot, and...actually compelling.

4. fucking THIS WAS FUN TOO! like fucking with color grading, actual gags, riffs on tv formulas. It felt so much like a precursor to WandaVision(the freezes, the glitches out, some amount of genre savviness, the "play along especially"(that whole thing about being trapped with a sitcom is so Important here), just...the concept and the baby TV show thing is...so fun.

5. but it's plot? I THOUGHT CHANGING CHANNELS WAS ALL FUN BUT THERE WAS PLOT! like we got Gabe's actual motivations, we got an actual reasoning, we got exposition but it was interesting cuz we were already invested in gabe's moral compass

holy shit that was good.