#and also unrealistic plotlines

[philosophiessss]

Watching watson cbs is truly oh this show is bad actually.... oh wait actually this show is good actually...... oh no it isn't... oh yes it is

[ghostlycleric]

itd be so funny if mike had an arc where he was trying NOT to tell will he loves him in s5

like the irony of going from struggling aggressively to tell his gf he loved her and only saying it in the heat of the moment when hes not sure if she can hear

to a blushy geniuenly in love mike who is afraid to say ily because he doesnt want to put will in the position he was in. even though theyve been best friends for so long he feels like it has extra weight to it and doesnt know when “too soon” is so hes constantly tripping over his words.

(will definitely notices too but he doesnt say anything. hes afraid to be presumptious but also he thinks mike is adorable. everytime it happens will just gets all smilely, and when mike finally does say it will says it back almost immediately.)

[borealnyx]

And here's my dune: prophecy review.

Very starwars prequel coded(kind of positive but not really), but not toxic or gay enough

[zannolin]

(re-ish)watching ncis in 2023 is like came for the murder and crime solving, stayed for the absolutely unhinged tiva plotline

[sskk-manifesto]

:)

[paperconsumption]

stopped reading a book i was struggling to read its like a weight was lifted from my shoulders

[fix-me-sixteen]

this whole maybe-maybe-not department coup thingy is the weirdest plotline in this show istg

[edwin-paynes-bowtie]

Post because I just found out that my Cancellation vs No Payneland Endgame poll has caused a lot of drama on certain blogs and I never meant for that to happen.

I'm sorry to anyone who was hurt by it. It wasn't my intention.

But, just so people know:

My strong belief that I'd rather have the show stay canceled than Payneland not be endgame isn't exclusively because of the joy the ship brings me.

It's also not because I don't think people's friends are less important to them than romantic partners, and I'm shocked that people think I believe that.

It's definitely in part because I like imagining their future. They're my comfort ship, and I love that they will always be best friends over anything. I want to see that friendship take a new shape, and I want to see them love each other in every way.

I understand relationship anarchy and 'no hierarchy' stuff, but the show has been clear that Edwin and Charles are each other's most important person no matter what. Relationship anarchy is not true to their specific dynamic. Having someone come between them ruins the best thing about their relationship/friendship. They are each other's.

Also, expecting them to be exclusively platonic is unrealistic because Edwin already canonically has romantic feelings for Charles. There is currently a discrepancy in how they love each other (canonically - I would argue that Charles is extremely in love, but hey, to each their own.) I think it would be disingenuous to the characters and their development for them to not be together. I also think that the show did a good job of convincing me that falling in love with Charles helped Edwin overcome his repression - pulling back from this love feels like backtracking and quashing those feelings down.

Additionally - and this is just true - if Charles and Edwin were straight, no one would say they should be "just friends." Their getting together would be a given. The way that the story is set up would make this feel like adjacent to a massive DestielJohnlock queerbait, even if Edwin is canonically gay.

(Also, I find it extremely weird that some people think it's progressive - or anything other than extremely regressive - to keep them as "just friends." We have seen that story a million times on TV. QPR may not be an oft-used term, but it's an oft-depicted concept used in media with closely-bonded pairs of men.)

It's also in large part about the show's writing.

So far, the show has been very much about Payneland, about the power that loving Charles romantically has had on Edwin. It's about their bond. To de-center that bond in favour of another love story would be... bad writing. Plain and simple. A version of DBDA where Payneland isn't endgame is a version of DBDA with inconsistent writing, the world's longest game of gay chicken, and a very jumbled plotline.

"I'd rather the show stay canceled than have Payneland not be endgame" isn't a devaluation of their friendship. For Gods' sake, I ship them BECAUSE of their friendship's strength. It's a statement that "I would rather have this show remain canceled now than have the writers fuck it up with inconsistent plotting and a devaluation of the bond that makes the series special" and "I'm sick of being borderline queerbaited."

And, yes, for God's sake, I'd rather have my cute comforting post-canon headcanons. Sue me.

[lilacella]

Would you do a moodboard of the chaos amnesia au? 👀☺️ I'm waiting for the next part

Hello hello, we are finally at a point in the plot where making a moodboard makes sense! So here you go!

Also. Have

Part 8 of the Chaos Amnesia AU:

(Part 1) (Link to last part)

"Who are you?"

That's a tough question to answer.

The men that you lied to for the past 10 months? Your best friend and your loving boyfriend, that were horrified when they found out about what you have done in the past but still love you very much?

"Who am I ?"

An even harder question to answer. Because do James and Remus even know who Sirius is? Who he really is? And most importantly: Do they want him to know?

"You're Sirius," is what they settle on.

Sirius frowns. Weird name.

"What am I doing in your car?" He touches the bandages on his head. "What happened to me?"

"We were on a hike," Remus says quietly. "You fell. Knocked your head. Don't you remember?"

Sirius frowns deeper and he drops back into his seat.

"No."

James shoots Remus a look.

You lied.

So what?

They drive the rest of the way in silence. Except that one time Sirius asks if they shouldn't drive to a hospital.

"Lily will take care of that," James says. "It's easier, you won't have to wait in line."

[Little Jily background excursion at this point becaue this isn't a fic and basically just an elaborate plotline so I can do whatever the fuck I want 🥳:

James is, as stated before, a police detective inspector and Lily is a trauma surgeon at the local hospital. Since James is such a daring officer of course he gets injured a lot and Lily has to patch him up. James keeps flirting with her but she barely responds though you can tell she likes him ☺️

Patient doctor relationships are greatly discouraged and so she has to wait for James to get just a little bit more careful until she can herself show up at the police station and ask him out for lunch. James is of course overjoyed. The rest is history 🥰]

They arrive and lead Sirius' into the Potter's house. It is late at night, Harry is long asleep, Remus is hiding a gun in the inside pocket of his jacket and sweating profusely.

Lily is less than happy when her husband wakes her up, shirt torn and eyes wide, with the words: "I need you to check a headwound for me."

Her mood lightens a bit when it becomes apparent that the headwound is not on James but drops straight back down when he informs her in a worried whisper that it has been caused by a gun. And that Sirius doesn't remember anything. And that him and Remus want to keep it that way.

Lily isn't entirely onboard with that plan but her focus is on her patient right now. She sends James to fetch her bag and takes a look at the wound. After a short inspection she instructs Sirius to lie down, adminsters some local anesthesia and tells him to close his eyes.

Why that? Well, so he won't see the fucking bullet that has somehow managed to wedge itself into the cavity of his temple but by pure luck did not manage to break anything vital.

[Disclaimer: this is highly unrealistic and even a seasoned and talented trauma surgeon would not pull a fucking bullet out of your skull on their couch. There is so much that could go wrong. Bullets in the head are definitely a hospital thing!

But we are here for the chaos not for a sensible medical education so I will proceed]

Lily drops the bullet discreetly into Remus' palm (that poor guy really has to hold on to all the terrible stuff 😭 ) and he drops it into his pocket with trembling fingers. It clinks quietly against the two keychains that are resting in there.

"Is it bad?" Sirius asks.

"No."

He opens his eyes. "Really? Are you sure I shouldn't go to a hospital? I feel like we should go to a hospital..."

Lily presses a bandage on his head and shakes her head with a firm smile. "No need, I've got this. So... James said you were having some... memory issues?"

"Who's James?"

The three look at eachother.

Sirius sits up slowly and brushes his fingers over the gauze on his temple and eyes them with worry. "I really should go home. My father's going to kill me when he finds out that I have been hiking around with - " He frowns again - "Sorry I'm still not quite clear on who you are. Do you know my parents?"

tbc...

☺️ Look this is called chaos amnesia for a reason! So be prepared for chaos and amnesia!

[goodthingscomeinthrees]

these are my last two discoursey cents about the 911 of it all and then i'll go shut up and write a fic and be done with it. tim minear just provided a masterclass on how to break an unspoken (though, honestly, pretty clearly spoken) contract with your viewing audience.

you cannot set up a show to be wildly unrealistic in terms of plot storylines (shark on the highway; tsunami; beenado; cruise ship sinks due to a hurricane; civilian lands a passenger plane on the 110) and spend eight years guaranteeing that no matter what, your core cast of characters will live and then renege on it for the sake of "realism" that never existed in the first place. not to mention, the way he killed off bobby (airborne cchf) is deeply unrealistic because the virus isn't airborne.

the reason your audience will forgive all of the unrealistic plotlines is because everyone lives. that's the agreement. lightning strike? survivable. rebar through the head? gonna be recovering for a few months, but sure. throat slashed? it's fine, we spent a scene in the previous episode telling you how long someone can stay alive when that happens, so you know help is going to get there.

if you break that rule, you break your audience's trust right with it. and now you've bound yourself to your new standard of realism -- both in terms of characters potentially dying, but also your audience no longer being willing to go along with the crazy plotlines they accepted in the first place. they'll be mad (rightfully so) and you just wrote yourself into five different corners. let's see how nitpicky everyone gets with the next trademark 911 disaster episode.

good luck with that one, my guy!

[starrycassi]

I think a lot of young queers folks (like me. Not trying to be all elderly about this I'm literally a gen z) today need to watch the good oldies about our community.

⚠️: I don't mean, in any way shape or form to insult the newer queer shows/movies. I love SPOP. I love TOH. I read and loved Heart stopper. However, because of the restraint of mainstream media, they have a very... palatable?? way to portray the community. I am NOT blaming the creators (who I'm sure would love to go a bit further down on their portrayals if given the option)

SO! I have nice recommendations that I, personally, enjoy a lot. They're in no particular order.

A classic, for starters. But I'm a cheerleader!: Very campy, barbie-y, funny and free on YouTube. A cheerleader is sent to a conversation camp when her social circle realizes that she might be into girls. (It has a very unrealistic portrayal of conversation camps, though. Very cartoony) my comfort movie fr fr

Priscilla, queen of the desert: A trio of drag queens travel across the desert on a big, old bus. They fight, there's some falling in love. They talk a lot about gender identity, queer childhoods and similar topics. I've only been able to find this one (and most of the ones on this list, since I don't have any streaming devices) on illegal websites. There's very, very direct homophobia, SA, physical abuse, child neglect, yk, the American dream. The queens are the funnier thing ever, the romance plotlines are absolutely delightful and well-rounded. Focuses a bit more on the community itself and interpersonal relationships. All around, a solid 10/10.

Kinky boots: A very prude, engaged man inherits a shoe fabric. He's running out of ideas to stay in business, until he meets a drag queen. Same warnings (and themes!) as the last one. This one has a stronger focus on how the characters become more accepting and how our queen navigates being faced with them. I've rewatched it like a hundred times.

The birdcage (2000's) or le cauge aux folles (1970'): A gay couple runs a drag club. Their son brings home a conservative girlfriend and her family. This is more comedy lenient, but funny as fuck nonetheless.

Paris is burning: this one is a documentary, btw. Focuses on the life of drag queens in the 80's. Nothing I didn't already say on Priscilla tbh.

Saving face: A chinese-american girl that lives in a VERY conservatory and secluded community is trying (and failing) not to fall in love with a ballerina. At the same time, her mother (a widow, how scandalous!) gets mysteriously pregnant and gets kicked out of their family home. This one will hit close to home if you're from any ethnic, homophobic household. Cried a lot. Then cried some more. Happy ending, though!

D.E.B.S: THIS IS THE FUNNIEST, CUTEST MOVIE EVER. It's a full on romance comedy for when the mind is a bit too tired! The main plot is that, in a school of girls being trained to be top-notch spies (very totally spies type) a girl who's the top of her class falls in love with the biggest villainess they ever faced. More of a coming of age thing, that also explores the good old dilemma of choosing what the hell you're supposed to do with your life once you turn 18 (relatable tbh)

And now, for a book (in Spanish, though) we have "Las Malas": Narrated by a trans, poor prostitute. Extremely realistic in its narrative voice, cruel and very hurtful sometimes. This is actually one of my favorite books ever, it's so fucking underrated that I'm going to die if no one reads it. There's EVERYTHING. It genuinely drives me crazy to read this. We have queer moms, a child found in a freezing park, suicides, literally anything happens. I love it.

If anyone has any suggestions PLEASE drop them. I'm begging u

[frightfullytreeish]

tim has truly done something incredible by creating a situation where if bobby's dead I'm gonna be cross but if he's alive (as I suspect) I'm also going to be cross

I was sooo on board with what appeared from bts stuff and leaks to be a mistaken for dead plotline because I assumed tim would do what any sensible maker of big lowbrow network tv would do and SHOW BOBBY ALIVE IN THE VERY FINAL MOMENT OF THE EPISODE, so the viewers can go OH SHIT we know something the rest of the main characters don't know!! Athena come save your man!!! like for god's sake tim you're not making some prestige twisty turny psychological drama where the audience expects to be kept on their toes and still have the rug pulled out from under them, you're making daft unrealistic procedural drama with beenados etc

he's either broken the rule he's spent eight years establishing on the show, that the main characters will get through it, or he's broken a more general and pretty obvious rule: don't play tricks on your audience (when it's outside of the genre)

(and if I'm wrong and bobby really is dead dead and tim insisted on killing off the main character when peter krause by all accounts doesn't want to go.......... yikes)

[liminalmemories21]

Hi, I am fan of your 911 ls fics.

Now the show is ended, are there any fic ideas you want to work on other than Knave...?

Also have you thought about writing a crossover fic for 911 and 911 ls, as you seem to enjoy writing for both the shows.

Sorry it's taken me so long to respond to this, I've been thinking about it and about my reaction to the last two seasons of Lonestar, and I wanted to get what I feel in some kind of coherent order before I responded.

First of all. Thank you!

The short answer is, probably not. 

Maybe I'll do a Knave 5 if I can ever figure out a plot I like.  But, I don't think I'll do anything that is more canon-adjacent than that.

Longer answer is, for me a lot of the fandom discourse over this season was tense and uncomfortable and unpleasant.  That was true for S4 too, and two seasons in a row of discourse that made me feel slightly queasy every time I logged in is kind of too much for me.

I also just didn't like a lot of the choices that the writers made with Season 5 (and to a lesser extent Season 4).  I thought they were sloppy, and inconsistent, and done for the Drama, not to serve the characters (or, let's be honest, reality).

To be clear, I am not talking about Carlos's grief, or his focus on finding his father's murderers.  That was one of the only parts of S5 that really felt honest to me.

Even longer answer below the cut for anyone interested.

I am talking about - in no particular order (And, please, bear in mind - these are just my opinions and my reactions.  There's no gospel here).

The way they wrote Grace off the show.  There were more subtle ways to have her gone - one of her sisters was sick and needed help, for example.  The idea that Grace disappears and leaves her husband and daughter for an undefined period of time with little to no contact is ... frankly unbelievable.  The idea that she'd stay gone once Judd moved Charlie over to her parents because he couldn't take care of her?  Nope.  Does not track, even a little bit.

The entire Jonah plotline.  I'm okay with the idea that they take Jonah. The way they did it was stupid.  You can still have the same conversations about whether Carlos is ready to be a parent - about the ways it will change their lives - and still pay lip service to reality.  You don't actually need to manufacture additional drama for this.

As soon as Enzo was arrested someone should have approached TK about taking custody as Jonah's only living relative, one that is, hey is conveniently already in Austin.  They would not let Sophia take Jonah to Switzerland.  Being a paramedic and a Ranger would not be check marks in the negative column.  I know the show likes to pretend that Texas is apparently some kind of liberal bastion where the fact that they're gay doesn't matter - but honestly, that is a much more likely strike against them than being fully employed and owning their own home.  Or, alternatively, the fact that they do not have a private space for Jonah would actually probably count against them (although probably would not outweigh brother who wants to take him - especially if they had a throw away line about, this is temporary, we'll look for a bigger place where he can have his own room).

I also hate how much they did not talk to each other - that there was one semi-argument and we never saw anything else except that TK was ready to leave Carlos over it.  I hate that it felt like they leapt to adoption without discussing custody while Enzo was incarcerated.  I hated the way that felt like (to me) they were erasing or invalidating Enzo as Jonah's father.

I - personally - did not like the way that the show felt like it was pushing an agenda that a child needs to have one parent stay home.  It felt both unrealistic - I don't know anyone who can afford to do that; and also reductive - I don't know anyone who wants to do that.  All my friends love their kids, they also love their careers, and there is nothing wrong with that.  But, on the show - Tommy quits work to stay home with the twins.  She only goes back to work because Charles loses his restaurant.  The conversation with Marjan and Joe - Joe will stay home with the kids because he makes less than she does.  TK quits work to stay home with Jonah - which was a decision the show's unrealistic narrative forced.  Grace is the only parent who goes back to work, and is unapologetic about it because it is clear that she loves her job, and I really valued that.  But S5 has her disappearing and leaving her child behind.

I get that this is an ensemble show - but given how little we saw of most of the rest of the cast (whither Asha?) in comparison to how much we saw of TK and Carlos - either give us a more complete emotional arc of TK and Carlos, or give us less.  Halfway is a cheap cop out.  This was a lot of the season - too much tell, not enough show.

And, again, I get this is an ensemble procedural show.  But it's also an ensemble procedural show that gave us a pretty nuanced depiction of addiction, and gave us a pretty nuanced depiction of the different ways you can be queer and the different ways you can be out to yourself and to your community and to your family.  So, when they throw nuance out the window it feels like a deliberate choice more than a structural necessity.

Also, and this is actually a pretty minor thing in the scope of this answer.  But, the last two Lonestar stories I wrote - Knave 4 and S5 Interstitials I wrote for apparently five people.  And, don't get me wrong, I love those five people, and they loved those stories, and I appreciate every response they had to them, and I don't write for kudos or comments, I write for myself.  But, I kind of forced myself to write the S5 Interstitials because I'm a completist, not because I felt a real emotional response to the season.  And, if I'm doing that and only doing it for five people, it's not really worth my time or emotional investment.

This is not said to denigrate anyone else's response to the show or the season.  I am not here to dance on anyone's joy.  This is how I felt, nothing more.

Probably more of an answer than you were really looking for. Sorry.

[jessicas-pi]

Very interested in your take on the sequels, if you want to say?

I recently watched the whole trilogy for the first time in a long time and...oof.

OOOH i would be delighted to rant and rave about this thank you for asking! (and oh boy yeah i agree with that reaction so much lol, i still don't think I've recovered enough from watching TROS in theaters to give it another go yet 😂)

And a disclaimer right to start with---everything I say is an Opinion. and there are other Opinions out there and they're valid too! so no shade to anyone who disagrees with me or anything.

ANYWAY!

so. to start off. i saw a screenshot of a post about animation vs live action a while ago and i couldn't find the screenshot post again but i found the og post and screenshotted it myself so yeah my feelings are this-

-but, like, in reverse. i watched a live action film series and there were several moments where i thought "wow i wish i could watch this same film series but yes animated and better"

that is to say, my greatest controversial opinion is that the sequels would have worked SO much better as an animated series. (and i do mean a SERIES. none of this 8-episode-long nonsense. making 8 episodes per season is for cowards and boring people. i am neither.)

Because, IMO, the greatest failing of the sequel trilogy was they they were trying to do too much. i think that every single plotline they put together---yes, even the Palpatine one---might have worked, if they gave it the time and focus it deserved. But instead, they turned what could have been a fantastic series, had it been given a total runtime equivalent to TCW, into approximately seven hours of live-action confusion.

(The episodic storytelling method would have worked really well for it, too! There could have been serious episodes/episode arcs (retrieving the map on jakku, for example) and silly in-between episodes (the bit with the rathtars in TFA and the Canto Bight mission in TLJ could each be nicely reimagined into a friendship-building-through-chaos episode for Finn & Rey and Finn & Rose respectively. Well, maybe a two episode arc for Canto Bight? IDK.))

(sorry sorry i will stop ranting about My Own Ideas now and go back to your actual question)

So, I think the sequels had some really good ideas! and really mediocre ideas! and really bad ideas! and i think the heart of the problem lies, not in the varying quality of the ideas, but the quantity of ideas that they were trying to fit into a very short time.

And in general, I think the films are kinda fun, if I don't take them too seriously! But I must confess... there is one thing I absolutely HATE about these films.

It ruined the Happy Ever After.

Star Wars is a space fairytale. Now, I'm not saying that it should have been completely perfect no problems whatsoever, because that's just TOO unrealistic, and there wouldn't be Sequels anyway. What I'm saying is that maybe there's still metaphorical space dragons in this space fairytale, but the heroes should fight the metaphorical space dragons and come home again afterwards. And yes I KNOW there was no way in heck they were gonna be able to drag Harrison Ford back for another three films but MY POINT STANDS. (and yknow if it was an ANIMATED series they wouldn't even have had to drag him back at ALL they could have used voice actors like they did in TCW) They should have been able to live happily ever after. Their defeat of the Empire shouldn't have been in vain. Truth be told, I wouldn't mind the other issues half as much, if they hadn't undone everything the Rebellion fought for.

And I am well aware that there is some personal bias on my part. like, my 2nd most used tag on AO3 is "alternate universe - everyone lives/nobody dies". OBVIOUSLY my biggest beef is going to be with people not living and also dying. I thrive on fix-its, and the sequels were a break-it. But the fact remains that when the heroes save the day in a fairy tale, you don't write a sequel where everything they worked for gets destroyed and they all die. you write a sequel where they go on more adventures and it still ends in the same fairytale way! but that is Not how the star wars sequels went. and I just don't think that's very groovy of them.

SO!

In conclusion: it could have been great! but it was in the wrong media format, didn't have enough runtime, and---most critically---was not a Space Fairytale. so it wasn't great. it was, like... genereally tolerable. occasionally good. had awesome cinematography. but it does NOT hold up under a microscope. or a weak magnifying glass. tbh i'd have to take off my glasses and hold it ~10 feet away so it's a blurry blob before it could maybe start to hold up.

*deep sigh*

You were so close, Lucasfilm. So tragically close.

[enidsinclajr]

inspired by my recent travels i want a wenclair disneyland cast member au SO bad no matter how unrealistic it sounds. like i’ve been to disneyland a good amount of times but don’t know enough to be accurate on what it would look like from a cast member perspective but ugh it’s just so amusing in my head lmao. like i just imagine them having to work together and enid is like why tf does the grumpiest person work at the happiest place on earth? how? and enid is like #1 employee super cheerful and knowledgeable and all the guests love her and wednesday is annoyed out of her mind. imagine wednesday staring at enid during the fireworks show just in awe once she realizes her feelings about her. but also the most insane plotline could be wednesday being a character and enid is like shocked that wednesday out of all people is so good at what she does and is completely different out of costume ??? lmao either way a theme park summer job au in general just sounds so fun

[jesslovesboats]

Have you, like me, been personally victimized by the book The Women by Kristin Hannah?** Did you go into this book expecting to hear a story inspired by the struggles of nurses serving overseas during the Vietnam War? Were you instead subjected to a series of insipid and increasingly unrealistic romantic plotlines featuring a neverending carousel of terrible men? Do you want to learn more about the real women who served as nurses under fire in Vietnam? This post is for you!

Here are 3 books and one website that I recommend if The Women left you unsatisfied and/or wanting more:

Home Before Morning by Lynda Van Devanter. Originally published in 1983, this book is a classic for a reason, and Hannah drew heavily from it when writing The Women.

When I Die I'm Going to Heaven 'Cause I've Spent My Time in Hell by Barbara Kautz. Kautz was young- only 18!- when she joined the Army to finance her nursing education. Her book focuses less on the fighting and more on the day to day realities of life and the companionship she shared with her fellow nurses.

Healing Wounds by Diane Carlson Evans chronicles the author's time as a nurse in Vietnam, and later, her fight to establish the Vietnam Women's Memorial on the National Mall. I also highly recommend the Healing Wounds documentary and this bibliography from the VWM website.

Finally, if I can be a tiny bit self indulgent, I would not be a good reference librarian if I didn't point out that I have a local connection to Sharon Lane. Lane, who was mentioned several times in The Women, was a real nurse (from the same part of Ohio as me) who was killed in the line of duty in Vietnam. She attended the same nursing college as my mom (although a few years earlier) and was in Vietnam at the same time as my dad. You can learn about her here.

**DISCLAIMER- I did not care for this book, but taste in books is highly subjective and your mileage may vary! If you loved it, please put your energy into writing your own post instead of coming for me 🙃