#and the conclusion was 100% gay

[sarucane]

OFMD Spiral Parallels 32: Manipulative Pirate Buddies 3

Intro: What I love most about how season 2 builds on season 1 of OFMD is the spiral narrative structure. Ground is repeatedly and explicitly re-trod from season 1 to season 2, but in season 2 everything goes deeper than season 1. Symbols appear and reappear, transformed. Meanings are shuffled, emotions are stronger and truer, and transformation is showcased above everything. The first season plucks certain notes, then the second season plucks the same ones--but louder, and then it weaves them together to create a symphony.

---

In the middle of both episodes, private conversations about the nature of Ed’s and Stede’s relationship takes place between a manipulative pirate and one of our main characters. However, in the first episode, only Stede has a private conversation with Jack, but in the second both Stede and Ed have private conversations about with Anne and Mary. And while both the first episode and the second involve the new pirates manipulating our main characters, the outcomes of the scenes highlight how the meaning of the past has changed from one season to another, from destructiveness that must be avoided to chaos that invites transformation.

Anne and Jack both want to get information out of Stede, but they go about doing this in completely different ways.

Jack makes Stede defensive, provoking discomfort in Stede—and, crucially, denial about what’s happening between him and Ed. Stede obfuscates, pointing to an insecurity that Jack then exploits using repeated references to the past. Jack’s goal is to make Stede as uncomfortable as possible—use the shadows of Ed’s past and their connection to the present—to push Stede to isolate himself from Ed, and he entirely succeeds.

Anne, on the other hand, makes Stede comfortable. She is genuinely interested in what’s actually happened between Stede and Ed, because her goal is more open-ended than Jack’s. She wants to use the past to create drama, not destruction. And drama is actually what Ed and Stede need, because the only way to resolve the central conflict is for them to have a dramatic conversation.

Meanwhile, both Anne and Mary individually draw comparisons between themselves and the boys. Anne builds on what she learned about Stede’s personality—and its similarity to hers—in the antique shop, then tries to get Stede on board to make both their partners “so jealous,” to provoke drama in both their relationships.

Ed is actually the first one to draw a comparison between himself and Anne by bringing up how Stede stabbed him once. Anne then invokes the past, like Jack did, but not as a way to destroy the present—as a way to explain the present. Jack told Stede that he and Ed are “the same man,” but Mary tells Ed that both couples are involved in the same experience, are bound together by a chaotic “whirlpool.”

The scenes also illuminate important ways that Ed’s and Stede’s ideas of the past can shift.

Before, Stede was enjoying the “ideal past,” and to move forward with Ed he needs to accept that the past had negatives, too. He starts doing this with Anne, describing the problems of his past that arose when he went back to his wife.

Ed, on the other hand, was focusing on the negatives of the past, on the pain that resulted from Stede leaving. To move forward, he needs to think about the closeness that made the pain worth enduring. And he starts doing this with Mary, smiling and reminiscing about being stabbed by Stede. Before this, Ed rejected each attempt Stede made to suggest that their past relationship was a good place. But the bad ending didn’t define the whole relationship—the past influences the present but doesn’t determine it—and Ed starts to believe in that in this scene.

Other posts in this series:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 4

Part 5

[iceclew]

...sooo... As threatened mentioned beforehand, I did a thing that might be awefully specific ...? (☉౪ ⊙)

...

... Listen, I took our Kaiju blorbos and squished them onto Markiplier, like this is literally it, there was like one other guy that was like "Omg, Kafka is literally Markiplier" and I was like "YES!! THIS!!" and we were like "AARGH!!" And you should know me by now, that I am very unrational about my doings when there's someone else sharing my obsessions and/or stupid ideas about smth, so here is Markiverse...

And... I am very unsure about the way I pulled this off, like.. I feel...you need the original screenshots for context...? Or maybe not? ...but I mean I can always get rid of them later on..

Moreover better to link the videos as well, I guess?

Goat yoga and The Saddle - Unus Annus (best of compilation)

Family Friendly - Markiplier LP

[lloydfrontera]

in the unhinged tged that lives in my head at least in one (1) of the failed futures lloyd saw things go horribly wrong, realized what he had to do, did his usual monologue to warn his past self and then proceeded to violently kiss javier before killing himself. he just went "fuck it i may as well things can't get any worse anyhow" and decided that if he had to die he may as well test out that option and give his past self a heads up to see how that particular action was received. the answer was 'enthusiastically and with a lot more tongue than expected'. it is slightly ruined by the unfortunate fact that he had to kill himself immediately after to make sure it gets included during the time limit of the ending spoiler but like. overall great experience solid 9/10 totally would recommend 👍🏼

and present lloyd gets to experience all of that while barely starting to consider that maybe constantly staring at your best friend's perfect face is perhaps not the most platonic activity to indulge on. which on one hand, well, that is nifty he didn't know that about himself. but also w h a t t h e f u c k can't a guy get out of denial at his own pace???

[shigussy]

i don't think we talk enough about SFO explicitly telling Bakugo that he's targeting him because bk is Deku's closest person and since dk went insane over bk getting hurt before , he's going to brutalize & kill him and give his corpse to Deku as a present....

AFO said something very specific in Chapter 116... "People get angry when their true feelings are perceived!" ...

Combine that with Chapter 367, and yeah... That's a foreshadowing of Izuku's romantic feelings for Katsuki

[jinglefruit]

Those of you enjoying 100% Orange Juice's latest updates will be happy to know I've added everything new to the Animal Crossing mods for it. https://gamebanana.com/mods/383864 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2617764418

[aemiron-main]

going insane because the s5 mike death flags are aligning exactly with my gay mike analysis + his narrative as a character and what he represents and how we can use that to demonstrate whats going to happen to him in s5 and why gay mike is a core part of mike’s arc as a character and resolution of the narrative and metaphors of st +  then that’s also tying into my music analysis and oh my god i just need to finish this analysis but there’s So Much to say  its all coming together. though. the math is mathing. 

[mewvore]

Its crazy that you can see a CEO of a game publishing company make 100x the salary of the average developer, hear stories of game studio workers living in their cars, see endless layoffs, crunch, excessive monetization that breaks up games into piecemeal purchases so the price of a full game is well beyond $100 for no reason other than pleasing investors, beloved franchises morphed into live service recurrent revenue generators for that same reason, and yet a motherfucker on your timeline will hit you with the classic "wokeness is killing videogames" like how cooked does your brain have to be in online discourse butter to sidestep ALL OF THAT to reach the conclusion that its the black or gay characters added to the game thats causing people to abandon them and not the fact that shits expensive, broken, devs are too beaten into the dirt to fix things properly and nobody wants to support these companies that are abusing consumer trust with the worst monetization in decades and lackluster apologies when they step way too far.

[bugpill]

If I see any more misinformation about Kamala Harris to dissuade people from voting I will explode.

1. She did a lot of work as a prosecutor to dismantle the system. When she was DA in San Francisco she was labeled as being “soft on crime” which she in turn claimed was “smart on crime”. Harris made a program called Back on Track so that low-level nonviolent drug offenders could enroll in school rather than doing jail time. She has believe and continues to believe that supporting people prevents crime far better than criminalizing people.

Yes, she put people behind bars. I know she called herself the “Top Cop” and I fucking hate that. However, the number of people who served time in jail was significantly reduced due to her program. She’s not a saint, but she tried to reduce harm as much as she could in her position. Since then, she’s called for even more action in terms of legalizing marijuana and I believe recently fully endorsed it publicly.

2. She is not transphobic. Harris backed the state of California when it tried to deny gender-affirmation surgery to a trans prisoner, but as attorney general, she could not deny the state’s Department of Corrections as a client of hers. Essentially, she had no say in the denial of surgery herself, as she had to represent the department’s interests over her own. Once she realized what they were doing, Harris actually worked behind the scenes to get that very policy changed so that any inmate who needs that care could get it. Additionally, she has lead efforts to put an end to gay and transgender “panic” defenses in criminal trials.

3. Kamala Harris is Black. For some reason, people like to say that she isn’t, and that she’s Indian and pretending to be black… for what reason? Depends on who’s telling the lie to begin with. Kamala Harris is Black and South Asian. Her father, Donald Harris, is a Black man who was born in Jamaica. Her mother, Shyamala Gopalan, was born in India. Speculating about her race with so much evidence towards the contrary is so wrong. If anyone tells you shit about this, just send them her whitehouse.gov biography.

4. Harris (reportedly) has different opinions than Biden on Palestine. Whether or not she makes a clear stance against Israel, I don’t know. That hasn’t happened yet, but I’ll remain hopeful until further notice. She reportedly tried to push Biden towards “a policy on Gaza that was both more humane and in alignment with international law” but wasn’t listened to. The only reason why this is one of my points is that I’ve seen a lot of people stating that she is totally behind every decision and stance Biden made as president, which isn’t necessarily true. I don’t want to give her credit for being pro-Palestine if she isn’t, just to be clear. That is not what I’m trying to do here.

I desperately want her to stand for a free Palestine. I cannot make the promise that this will happen. All I can hope for is that her policy will be less harmful than Trump’s- who wants Israel to “finish the job” and promises to “throw (pro-Palestinian protestors) out of the country”.

Conclusion: the fact of the matter is that people make shit up all of the time. Sometimes it’s propaganda they accidentally absorb, sometimes it’s deliberate misinformation. People often take rumors as facts, and we need to be more vigilant about it. What I know is that some people will do anything for you to not vote tor Kamala Harris, when in reality she’s our only hope here.

Is Harris my favorite person ever? Absolutely not. Does she share my exact views and opinions? Nope. Would I rather vote for someone who more aligns with my personal views? Yes.

Is voting for Harris the only way to stop Donald Trump and Project 2025? Yes.

Disclaimer for the blog: To be 100% transparent, this is only my (Fanya’s) opinions. Although this is a shared blog, I cannot claim that my stance and my voice speaks for everybody involved in this blog. Some members are not American. Some may have different takes. All I know is that all of us are anti-Trump. Don’t go after my friends if you have beef with what I’m saying. I’m trying my best here.

[lilpomelito]

my favorite thing about Steve is that he’s actually a very confident guy, overconfident I would say sometimes, so in my head he has the shortest gay crisis ever like he realizes on a random Tuesday morning while slowly rotting on his costumer service job that his weird fixation with Eddie and how close he is with that punk dude from the Hideout is jealousy actually, so that means he has a crush on Eddie. Huh, that’s weird, has he had crushes on guys before? Maybe, his friendship with Tommy was intense and weirdly possessive actually, and their fight did feel like a breakup kind off and Tommy did behave like a bitter ex afterwards… also now that he thinks about it his obsession with the captain of the baseball team who was a senior when he was a junior was totally a crush in retrospective. And as he comes to this conclusion he also thinks damn what a waste, I could 100% have pulled him. So that same day he’s driving to Eddie’s place like “hi i’m taking you out” and Eddie doesn’t know if he’s about to be wine and dinned or murdered in the middle of the woods but he’s also a weak weak man for pretty boys so he just follows where Steve tells him to go. They have a lovely date at the dinner and then drive up to the quarry to see the sunset and then a very intense makeout sesh in the back of Steve’s car when Eddie remembers to ask him if he’s even into guys. Steve who already has his hands in Eddie’s pants looks him dead in the eye and says “yeah since this morning I think, but also since forever.” And Eddie who had to spend years slowly crawling his way out of Narnia to even admit to himself he was gay even less admitting it to others just blinks and accepts the fact that yeah, Steve Harrington has always had that vibe actually, and resumes kissing him.

[gunsandspaceships]

Proof that Tony Stark is bisexual in the MCU

It is known that 616 Tony is bisexual. If you didn’t know – here’s the page from “Tony Stark: Iron Man (2018) #4”.

But is MCU Tony also bisexual? Let’s find out.

The Avengers:

0:43:10 - seems that Tony watched Rogers' movements at the end of his fight with Loki and liked what he saw.

1:10:08 - “Back off”.

2:08:30 – Sleeping Beauty.

Age of Ultron:

1:52:35 – Rhodey and Tony being a “couple”.

2:10:30 – Nat’s remark.

Civil War:

0:59:50 – huh?

Infinity War:

0:14:35 - Tony didn't know that was Levi.

0:17:08 – Tony noticed Strange’s hair moving.

0:19:15 - Strange's flirting and Tony's reaction.

1:18:50 – Tony and Strange are gazing into each other’s eyes and holding hands.

1:23:45 – again.

Endgame:

0:09:25 – Rogers’ face btw. Is he jealous here?

1:16:30 - Tony is staring at the America’s ass.

1:17:30 – Tony flicks Scott's butt.

1:20:00 – Tony is 100% okay with having a man inside him. Literally.

So what do we have?

He is comfortable touching men and being touched, even if he barely knows them. Even if it’s very gay.

He openly jokes about “gay” things.

He gazes into the eyes of both Steves, and Steves gaze back. Like, pretty often. Even Nat noticed this little habit.

He looks at men. Body, hair, ass. And he doesn’t hide it. That’s not so straight, I’d say.

Conclusion: Tony is bi. He is not latent, not really hidden one, just already in an established relationship with a woman and is faithful to her. He seems to be attracted to some guys though (we can see this towards Rogers and Strange).

Marvel shows it to us, and that’s actually the best we could get here. Because, unfortunately, the real international movie business is not yet ready for Iron Man to have a boyfriend. At least we can say he is canonically bisexual.

[alleycatchitchat]

Just rewatched The Three Caballeros and wasn't expecting such a goldmine of cute little moments that specifically appealed to a certain, uh, subset of the fandom... anyway have some Three Gay Caballeros screenshots

Donald Duck, coming on strong

Lots of dancing together in this film but I specifically like that Donald and José are reflecting the couple behind them in this scene

If I had a nickel for every time Donald leaped onto José and clung to him tenderly I would have two nickels which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice

I call this one "Gay Panic"

José and Panchito's little cuddle here is really cute. Notice that Panchito pulls José closer; their heads are probably touching underneath the sombrero.

No thoughts head empty just thinking about Donald's head resting in José's lap

José is having the time of his life right now

Donald kisses him 6 times during this sequence btw. if you even care

LISTEN. LISTEN. I HAVE REWATCHED AND REWINDED THIS MOMENT SO MANY TIMES. Slowed it down, gone through screenshots one by one, nitpicked and analyzed and I CANNOT FOR THE LIFE OF ME DECIDE WHETHER PANCHITO IS SLAPPING DONALD'S BACK OR HIS ASS

I think my general conclusion is that Panchito slaps Donald's back and then lets his hand slide all the way down before he pulls away. But again, not 100% certain.

This one isn't shippy I just think Panchito looks really cute

I love this little dude look at his goofy rooster face

This one doesn't need a caption I don't think

bruh

I tried so, so hard to find a screenshot of this moment that wasn't cursed. So hard. This was too important to leave out

But still, look at José's horrible beak, that's going to haunt my nightmares

anyway shoutout to the polycule ever! three gay caballeros truthers were right all along

[thejellycat]

I have a lot of feelings about Edwin and his relationship with being gay.

in my head, Edwin knew that he was gay not long after he started attending an all boys school. he also knew that it didn't matter. there was no choice to be made, no decisions to agonize over. he knew what happened to people like him, and he knew that there were expectations of him. so he just kind of... ignored it.

he repressed and ignored and didn't bother to think about it, because what would be the point? why spend time wishing for something that could certainly never happen? why invite that kind of pain in the future when inevitably it came time for him to settle down with some nice girl? so he kept his head down and applied himself to his studies, and that was that.

it's not until Niko makes her comment, casually asking without any hint of judgement if he knew that it was okay to like boys, that he realized that it never occurred to him to stop ignoring it. he'd done such a good job of embedding the notion that it could never matter into himself that even 30-odd years after escaping from Hell he literally never thought to acknowledge this fundamental part of himself.

and then everything with the Cat King and Monty becomes that much more overwhelming because now he is thinking about it, thinking about Charles (wonderful beautiful loyal Charles, and oh those are thoughts he's been having for a while aren't they?) and everything is changing, and they nearly get destroyed several times over, and then Charles literally goes through Hell to save him. and he realizes he's done this whole thing quite backwards, gone and fallen in love with his best friend before he even knows what to make of his feelings. but in that moment that doesn't matter at all because Charles deserves to know just how special he is.

I think Edwin would flounder a bit after that, trying to figure out exactly what this all means for his own perception of himself. he spent all that time after escaping Hell the first time rebuilding his sense of identity only to realize he'd left out this massive piece. he's been clinging desperately to the way he was raised in order to have some kind of foundation so he could build himself back up, but this piece, these feelings don't fit there. how do you even begin to untangle 100 years of trauma and repression and loneliness on top of all the recent changes and losses?

I don't have any kind of conclusion here. I just think he's neat.

[ezra-editss]

Just watched X-men Apocalypse. What the hell.

Okay, so I kinda have a take on all this and idk if that's just how it feels to me, but that's what I wanna know. (I don't think this actually happened, but it's the vibes it is all giving)

So it started when I told my mom about First Class (keep reading I'm gonna get to apocalypse eventually) and we came to the conclusion that it feels like they wrote the script, looked at it again and thought:

"Hmm, this seems pretty gay.. Erik and Charles both have no female love interests and they have those lines that seem pretty romantic. Also, Erik seems almost obsessed with Charles at the end with how overprotective he is. Let's fix that!"

And then they gave both of them a kiss with a woman they weren't interested in and added the line "We're brothers, you and I" and then were proud of how well they "saved" it.

And then they made Days of Future Past and didn't even think of it, but when it came out they saw how people were shipping it and then they were like "oh shitt"

And in the first hour of the movie, I thought they were just doing all of this stuff to "erase" any potential gayness people thought there was and wanted to make sure nobody got the wrong idea about the recent movies. But it was more the reminder they like women, before the EXTREME GAYNESS in the second half.

(This is getting so much more unserious than initially intended💀)

Anyways, Apocalypse.

Either I missed something or Erik settling down and HIDING makes NO SENSE. In the last timeline it was 100% clear that he'd never stop believing in what he did, he would never stop fighting his war. So yes, this is a different timeline, but there is no reason given why he suddenly decides to try Charles way. He failed in Days of Future Past and Charles let him go, but there is no way that's enough. And they played this off like that isn't the thing they both wanted since forever and never seemed possible. Being on the same side. Erik switching to Charles side is insane, why wouldn't he talk to Charles in all those years then?

I can't believe they threw away everything that IS Erik, just so he had a reason to be angry enough to join the guy.

(They also died in such a weird/lame way)

And Charles and I still don't really know her name😭.. I have to admit the scenes where Charles was nervous were cute, but that's just because Charles is adorable. But in First Class she was obviously only there for the plot, in Days of Future Past, she wasn't even mentioned and in Apocalypse, she was, again, only there for the plot. She literally doesn't say anything the entire movie after the beginning. She has like two lines. And in the end fight, she's just standing there. And then Charles makes her remember and the flashbacks are soo bad, BC THEY HAD NO MOMENTS. (Especially bc you can compare it to Erik's flashbacks, we're gonna get to that)

(I don't think I have to say it, but to be sure. I have absolutely nothing against straight couples. I don't care if it's gay or not. But if one of them were a woman, I wouldn't be writing this. I just hate how often they prefer to write a heterosexual couple that has no chemistry at all instead of making the two guys/girls kiss.)

Let's talk about the ending. Sometimes when I talk about this stuff I'm a little worried that I interpret things wrong bc I want it to be like that and I'm not being objective anymore, but I was proven right so many times in this. When Mystique and Erik kissed in First Class, it felt really weird to me because Erik obviously had no interest in her. (I suppose it was to show her she's beautiful) And that was pretty much proven right when she talks to him and he barely reacts to what she's saying. I also thought that he probably didn't know Charles was dying, bc he wouldn't let that happen. Then Mystique says "Charles" and suddenly he does show a reaction and when she's gone, he has those god damn flashbacks. WHAT DO YOU MEAN THIS ISN'T A ROMANTIC PLOT?😭 and then the specific one of Charles turning away and leaving him. (Could be a metaphor for Charles giving up on him) THAT'S WHAT GOT HIM.

And they make it even more clear when Mystique is dying and Erik doesn't react, but when Charles is dying, is when he steps in.

Ending was cute, but damnn the "you can make me do anything" was crazy.

(This turned out soo long, I've never been so obsessed with something.)

[valenschmidt]

question cause i’m new to 911/buddie. i’ve seen people say buddie was supposed to go canon in an early season but higher ups shot it down. is there proof of that, or is it fans wishing they’d gone canon earlier? do you know?

Ok anon let's start from the beginning

There is this one twitter account (who we call Marvel account) that has been posting inside information since at least 2021. This account had legit info and would post things that ended up being canon with MONTHS in advance. We don't know who this person is or how they get this info but his source is 100% legit. This info will be useful later so we're leaving it for now

Back in s4 when the sho*ting/Will storyline was created, it was created with the purpose of establishing Buddie canon. Of course at the time we had no idea this was happening. The problem??? Fox didn't like that one bit, so they decided to shut it down. We still got that scene but after it happened we never got it mentioned again

This is the reason why I personally especulate Tim Minear decided to leave the show and go work in LoneStar full time (this is not confirmed but it would make sense since he probably had been building up buddie since at least s3)

Fast forward to 2024 Oliver confirms in a podcast inteview post 7x04 that he had been approached with the idea of Buck being bi a couple of years ago (he doesn't especify the time frame but we can guess) but then it was shut down from above (I'll leave the video below as proof)

ALSO! It was also confirmed thanks to Lou Ferrigno Jr. in an interview that the Tommy storyline (the kiss and relationship) was originally going to go to Eddie but then changed direction and went to Buck instead...

Ryan ALSO confirmed in a post S7 interview that he didn't know to whom the storyline was going to go in the very beginning (I'll post it below when I find it)

So going back to Marvel account... during pride month this year after getting mad because of certain shippers (bt) Marvel account posted this

It confirms that Eddie has always been a gay character and they tried to make that canon during 5A (the panic attacks and the whole EddieAna break up being HEAVILY repressed gay coded) and in s7 with the Tommy storyline which gave us bi Buck in the end...

SO! Putting the pieces together we come to the conclusion that Eddie was introduced as a heavy gay coded character and with the chemistry Ryan and Oliver had Tim decided for Buddie and was shut down by FOX

Now on ABC they gave us bi Buck in the first couple of episodes and intensified the repressed gay Eddie storyline

We ARE still missing gay Eddie but it's only a matter of time in my opinion until we get Gay Eddie and Buddie canon

Hope this helped Anon!!!

FOR ANY OTHER QUESTIONS YOU HAVE MY ASK IS OPEN

[canisalbus]

Hello! I hope I won't sour your mood with this ask but I have been thinking a lot about your gay dogs this month especially.

I'll just try to keep the context short but in general I'm someone that has accepted being romantically undesireable. It was hard but in the end I have built my life just around me, my humble family and at this point in time I don't even think I have the time for a partner. And considering that it's the love month and a lot of people are preparing to celebrate it with their SOs I assumed that, actually, this is a thing that I sort of have in common with Machete.

From the miscellaneous lore on your profile I see Machete as someone that also has kind of rejected love. That also has built his life around his job, possibly hobbies, his family or mentors (depending if we're talking about canon or modern au). Who kind of forgot that relationships are a thing and that people bond with others in that way. Well, at least he did until meeting Vasco.

I just love thinking about their awkward beginnings. Machete being 100% sure that Vasco is just joking, maybe even sometimes teasing him (in a friendly banter type way) or just explaining to himself that all that kindness and interest is just him being a very considerate friend. And then we have Vasco that just tries to be subtle, as if he was trying to pass a fawn without it noticing and running away, but also with time gains confidence and tries more risque moves. Vasco being all smug and Machete being flustered when their hands or shoulders or tails brush in passing. And then when both are sure of their feelings we have Machete who has to choose between God and his love. Who, at first, unwillingly accepts that divine wrath will be worth their brief love.

I just love your boys. I swear they are all the love supply one might possibly need

Thank you for such a long and thoughtful message! I don't know why you thought you might accidentally sour my mood, I'm utterly delighted whenever I hear that someone has been pondering my little guys (rotating them in their head, as they say), and when they go through the trouble of sharing their findings and conclusions I'm so happy I could crawl up a wall.

I think you deciphered Machete's inner workings very well, especially those of the original canon version. The concept of love is of course prominent in Christianity, so even as a kid being raised in a religious environment that discouraged overt displays of affection and close personal bonds, Machete wasn't completely alienated from it. But it has always been a nebulous, unperceivable and unattainable thing for him. When he was old enough to lock down his career choice he readily accepted he'd never have romantic relationships, spouse or a family, and I think he must've been too young and socially inexperienced to think of it as a significant loss. Either he consciously blocked out the need for companionship by studying and working like his life depended on it, or he didn't really consider that being genuinely befriended, appreciated and loved as a person instead of a respectable and competent authority figure was even an option for him, at least not until Vasco came along.

[bambi-kinos]

Hopefully, this ask is a fun one! I've noticed that a lot of times you mention Paul is a bottom, and honestly, I agree 1000% per cent, but I'm curious how you came to that conclusion

For me, I feel like it was a result of tons of reading up on him, body language + his lyrics, and I think the whole control freak (misleading in a way too) part makes some fans think he's a top. Meanwhile, I sit here and think, nope, he's totally a bottom lmao

A lot of it is just wish fulfillment as a result of Paul's bus-sized ass. We're not the only ones thinking about it:

Like it would be a crime if John didn't fuck Paul in the ass. Right??? So it's easy to think "yeah Paul is a bottom" rofl.

But more seriously, I view Paul as a bottom for a number of reasons.

The first is simply how long John and Paul knew each other and how they naturally shaped each other's interests and desires. Paul may not have been that 'swishy' (i.e. effeminate) if he had never met John in the first place. It's easy to see how John and Paul's understanding of homosexuality would have shaped their presentation and the roles they took with one another. Like, in modern times two gay guys can just be Guys Being Dudes. They can both take shirtless selfies of themselves holding up fish with the 🤙 going "shaka braaahhh." In the mid 20th century this idea was not terribly widespread so even among gay people there was an impression of "well someone has to be the woman and it's not going to be me."

So I think that's a big part of it. It's impossible to know how conscious a decision this was but IMO John and Paul reached a consensus of some sort that Paul would take up the feminine role in response to John's masculine one. It's a natural (for a given value of 'natural') position for the feminine half to be the one who is penetrated. Paul, who has demonstrated a number of times his sharp awareness of homosexual activity and how society perceives it, would know this. And he took up that position anyway and kept with it, voluntarily. (And to be clear I think Paul stimulated John's butch attitude and grew that to make John more overtly masculine as well. This goes both ways.)

It's not hard to see why this happened. John is a lot more naturally traditionally masculine than Paul is, no matter what John said about being "soft velvet" and "le Oscar Wilde!!11!!1!" He's the one who got into bar fights and hammered the shit out of other men. He's the subject of a rumor about kicking Stuart in the head, not Paul. Personally I think Paul is perfectly capable of violence, even extreme violence, but he simply isn't perceived that way due to his feminine appearance. Meanwhile John is overtly aggressive and in your face about it, even when going through his druggie periods, which is simply a more traditionally masculine trait no matter how you slice it.

I guess what I'm saying is, Paul responded to and was shaped by John's personality and preferences. John likes to fuck, Paul leans more towards feminine expression, feminine = 'the one who is fucked' not necessarily 'the one who fucks.'

I don't believe they were thinking about this as teenagers (and I don't think they did anything besides circlejerking before Hamburg.) And Paul likes using his dick! However it seems obvious to me that John woke something up in Paul that would have naturally lain dormant under other circumstances. John had a habit of doing this for people, he woke them up to their higher inclinations that got them out of their boxes and I 100% believe that he nudged Paul's 'swishiness' awake and that Paul quietly used this to get out of the box other people wanted to keep him in. He was able to embrace this more fully while with Linda. For Paul, that swishiness comes packaged with a certain set of implications and to me there's no reason why he wouldn't embrace that.

That's not to say that he was completely gung-ho from the start. People who write Paul going 'wtf I'm not doing that' in response to John wanting to fuck him are writing material that feels 'real' for lack of a better word. But I also don't think it would be that hard of a sell once he got used to the idea. Really look at this gif:

John's interest in Paul's backside is overt. Paul seems surprised and a little overwhelmed in the moment but he also smiles a little in response to John checking him out. It seems to me that there's interest there, albeit tentative. In other words Paul seems okay with being the one who is piped.

It's a lot to surmise from a single gif, I know, but otoh we don't have a lot of these moments where John's feelings are overt and Paul responds to them.

In addition to all this, Paul is a curious hedonist. I think John could prevail on him to at least try it. Then I think Paul would enjoy it greatly. Anal orgasms are somewhere between clitoral and vaginal for me but anal sex is satisfying in a way that PIV isn't, and I think Paul would actively seek it out once he tried it and realized how good it is. Anal sex is extremely intimate and John paid close attention to his lovers, Paul is guaranteed a good time once John takes him to bed. And John would want to make that special for Paul especially once Paul did 'break down' and go 'alright I'll do it' as part of their kinky power game. John did like to make things sweet for Paul.

Paul has this whole thing about wanting to be John's second and not necessarily the leader. He enjoys being lead and dominated by powerful men who are at the top of their industry. Check out this quote from McCartney Legacy Vol. 1 in Chapter 26:

Paul explicitly giving in to a "strong and demanding" male after putting up a perfunctory fight that he had no intention of sticking to? What does this remind us of?

And look, Paul invites this himself very deliberately:

Paul is doing this on purpose. He shows his ass off to entice us, the viewers, into imagining his hole and putting our dicks inside said hole and inside him. Women appreciate a nice ass but lack the equipment to fuck it properly. Men do have the equipment and by 1965 Paul knows his effect on heterosexual men. He's very much dangling the fuckability of his ass as a carrot in front of everyone who wants to look. No other Beatle displays this kind of overt neediness for this specific kind of attention. Paul knows what he is doing.

Paul is a bottom. A needy and bratty bottom who enjoys being put in his place and has a thick kinky streak to be sure, but a bottom nonetheless.

The insistence that Paul is a top has always smacked of contrarianism, to me anyway lmao. It's always packaged with making fun of McLennon fanart where Paul is yassified and John is butch or with complaints that Beatle fandom is making Paul "too feminine" and John "too masculine." There's a lot I could say about it but for now I'll just leave it at this: it's usually paired with bitching that McLennon fans are having too much fun. Many are guilty of it.

John and Paul themselves acknowledged this dynamic between them in oblique ways. John, Paul, and even Yoko always imagined Paul as being a woman as well as acknowledging that Paulina would have been romantically attached to John. Paul acknowledged it with the "if I were a woman maybe I could have...." thing, Yoko said that Paul would be a "great threat" if he was a woman in her audio diary that she recorded in 1968/1969, and John also has a quote floating around about the potential that lay in Paul being a woman though I'll be damned if I can't find the stupid thing. And then there's the insulting "Lennon's Princess" nickname from Apple staff. They perceived the dynamic as well.

John and Paul, consciously or not, actively pursued this dynamic with one another. They enjoyed it and Paul voluntarily stayed in that role even during a time period where he might have been justified in going "okay we've hit the big time, no more of that!"

Just look at Paul's posture here lmao. John is shoving his erection into Paul's shoulder. Yeah he's trying to hide it but Paul is fine with it, shoulders relaxed with no tension in him at all. Paul wasn't just John's princess, John was also Paul's knight, and that comes with certain responsibilities as well as privileges.

John was overtly more stable when he had sex on tap. John and Paul actively lived together for months at a time where few people could get to them. Seems to me that Paul not only did his job but took a lot of pleasure in doing it and John reaped the benefits. Notably John didn't start falling apart until they stopped touring and his sexual access to Paul was bottlenecked. Then 1967 rolls around and John just sorta, moved in with Paul and noticeably got back on an even keel.

Many thunks are to be had my friend! Many thunks indeed and one of them is that Paul is a bottom. Not just that, an enthusiastic one that likes courting powerful and even emotionally unstable males capable of overpowering him.

Much to consider!