#but i think the monkeys also have major fear of defining their relationships

[crowboss-whore]

one thing i'm wondering about regarding your amazing fic is how you're gonna do the romantic relationships with both monkeys- like, will both monkeys and seer be in a single relationship or are there gonna be different endings for the story where the seer is with wukong and macaque?

I plan for all three to be in a relationship together. Wukong and Macaque are definitely on the more "Shit is kind of complicated" side since I'm unsure if I really want to do the whole Shadowpeach stuff.

The dynamic between the monkeys is going to depend on how the story goes. Their interactions are more... tense compared to interactions with Seer. But I do want them to reach a point where they lay their problems with one another bare to help them grow together.

It, honest to god, just depends on how the story flows and the dynamic between the three of them.

[powerbottomblake]

RWBY and Masculinity

I love RT’s, and specifically RWBY’s take on masculinity so much. The show subverts all expectations wrt their male characters and their development, which is why the male viewers experience major cognitive dissonance between what they expect and what story is actually being told (and then have the gall to call it bad writing). Under cut because this has gotten so long so fast.

The two main male characters - Sun and Jaune - are subvertions of genre/medium staples.

Jaune specifically hits all the beats of the typical male self-insert in a harem anime: he’s catapulted into a world he knows nothing of, instantly establishes 3 different dynamics with 3 different female characters/archetypes - Cheery, Ice Princess and Hot Tall and Earnest - one of whom he immediately sets his eyes on, he’s surrounded by women that are a whole lot more powerful than he is (and arguably THE most powerful one is instantly drawn to him), he’s essentially powerless and dealing with self-esteem issues and is nondescript enough to be a vehicle for any male viewer to project themselves onto. Which is why you have a good chunk of Jaune’s fandom from V1 being the embodiment of the Venn diagram intersection bewteen weebs and incels like That, and why there’s so much harem fanfic revolving around Jaune. 

CRWBY have heavily drawn from anime when making rwby so I don’t think this was coincidental; they laid out the groundworks to subvert a specific trope. Male fans, however, bought into the facade and kept waiting for Jaune to essentially steal the spotlight, be the focal point of several love interests and get a power up that’ll let him be their own power fantasy to boot, but CRWBY took his character in the very opposite direction. 

Jaune makes a lot of mistakes but what defines him is how earnestly he learns from them and redeems himself. He apologizes for lashing out at Pyrrha as a result of his own feelings of inadequacy and powerlessness when bullied by Cardin and then accepts her offer to teach him, sincerely taking instruction from her and then taking inspiration from her strength. Once he realizes his seduction skit with Weiss is not only ridiculous but wrong, he instantly changes his approach and prioritizes Weiss’s wants and needs over his, giving her space and knocking sense into Neptune so that Weiss can have her “ideal” date. Jaune doesn’t get embittered about being essentially rejected and most importantly he doesn’t let it affect his relationship with Weiss. Both of them become actual friends from that point on, and we get to see Jaune develop a certain measure of emotional intelligence starting that moment, which becomes part of his skillset and is shown to be part of what makes him a good leader. One of the best examples is how he and Ruby team up in V6E1 to get the hunter on the train to turn the turrets off. Jaune heals the hunter’s wounded arm and gently assuages his fear, in clear contrast with Qrow abrasively manhalding an injured and panicked man and expecting him to comply. The writing essentially puts down the show of arms and props up Ruby and Jaune’s approach; Jaune specifically is the example of masculine leadership the writing looks favorably on.  

And that’s the kicker here: Jaune’s strength comes from his set of soft skills as opposed to traditionally portrayed masculine strength, which usually careens into toxic power fantasy land. His whole arc in V1-3 is about learning to shed any distorted notions of chivalry and strength and knowing that his end goal shouldn’t be to become a hero for the sake of it or to live up to societal expectations, but to do what he can and as good as he can for the sake of everyone. Jaune is a good strategist and he knows how to make the best out of everyone’s powers. He’s there to enhance how people use their semblances together. His big power-up, his semblance reveal is basically him getting confirmed for a cross between a cleric and a paladdin (DnD players amongst us please correct me if I’m wrong): he is the ultimate support, acting as a healer and an amplifier to everyone around him, and that’s why he’s a good leader. His power on his own loses its entire meaning: Jaune takes strength from the people he loves and endlessly, earnestly gives back to them, never once stealing the spotlight in combat because that’s not his role and that’s okay.

And as for Jaune’s romantic prospects, think Forever Fall established once and for all that Jaune’s already found the One and I don’t think we’ll see him get any other love interest, especially now that arkos parallels oz/salem and with how vehement CRWBY are about lancaster being platonic. 

Now Sun. I want to tackle a specific expectation I’ve seen from male fans and that’s about him becoming more significant to the plot by coleading/leading the new White Fang movement...which would be hijacking Blake’s storyline. Blake is the one with drive and a cause, she was literally born inside the movement and has since seen it get derailed AND was the one to reclaim it from Adam and give it a new vision, as opposed to Sun who apparently wasn’t even aware of the systematic oppression Faunus had to deal with on a daily basis outside of Vacuo. So why is Sun, who has exactly 0 qualifications for this job and no interest in it, still expected to get it by a good chunk of his fans? Aside from the pervasive misogyny permeating fandom culture, there’s a specific trope media has served to us for decades now and that’s of a Semi-Competent Male Hero with his Hyper-Competent Female Side-kick (Vox published an article about it a few years ago and I really recommend checking it out), where a male character who’s semi good at best and not nearly as well-versed into whatever field he shares with his infinitely more competent female sidekick somehow walks in and saves the day and most of the time the female sidekick also, unsurprisingly doubles as a love interest. Time and again, male characters get rewarded for being half as good as their female counterpart at best AND they get the girl most often than not. 

But Sun’s whole character is, again, the very opposite of this. Sun never outweighs Blake on her own narrative (as is literal common sense) and shouldn’t be expected to. Sun actually gets schooled into the Faunus cause by his more competent female counterpart, Blake acting as his mentor and introducing him to the fight and why it matters. Blake and Sun basically reenact the plotline of Journey to the West (Sun quite literally references it by calling it a “Journey to the East”) a story whose main character is the legendary monkey king Sun Wukong, who’s the mythical figure Sun’s based on. Sun’s arc about finally knowing the cause and fighting for the right reasons happens thanks to Blake’s guidance - which Sun earnestly complies with and never questions because he knows she’s the expert and he doesn’t usurp that spot from her - and never overshadows her own narrative. Quite the opposite, it builds up to her own arc as a future leading figure of the WF and face of the Faunus cause by having her politicize someone who has no real stakes in this fight even though they should have.  

And then even his endeavor with Blake as a love interest falls through, with their relationship getting entirely recontextualized in V4-5 where their dynamic gets rebuilt as a friendship. Incidentally, that’s when it finally starts actually developing, instead of being stuck in the V1-3 limbo of mutual fleeting attraction where they’re constantly missing each other’s cues because they literally do not understand each other on a fundamental level. V4-5 is when Blake understands Sun isn’t what she needs in a romantic partner, but she does need him as a friend and ally. And Sun, whose premise falls in line with the Nice Guy trope, actually subverts it: he never makes Blake’s emotional journey about him, never expects anything in return and gracefully bows out of the narrative (for the time being) without ever pressuring Blake into acknowledging or returning his feelings. He doesn’t agonize over the initial attraction not going anywhere and doesn’t expect to be rewarded for being a decent person; again Blake’s feelings and well-being are his priority because that’s what good friends do. Their relationship developing into a steady friendship is never a point of conflict between them, and it’s actually lived as a positive event for both. 

And then, to top it off, CRWBY parsed together every bit of toxic masculinity and wrapped it into a power fantasy package and named the end result Adam Taurus, who’s the absolute worst abusive piece of shit. Adam is every single thing bad about men as a power structure: abrasive, entitled, controlling, takes violence as an indication of power and doesn’t take kindly to his leadership/vision being questionned. It’s not really coincidental that he steals the power seat from a woman and acts like he deserves it in any way. But male fans were so starved for their power fantasy fix and traditionally masculine cool calm collected and complicated male character that they were ready to minimize/outright ignore the abuse he’s put Blake through and just how awful a human being he was just to be able to hard project onto him. And CRWBY’s answer to that is basically this:

TL;DR: RT says if your masculinity isn’t humble, nurturing, supportive, compassionate, selfless and earnest then we don’t want it.

[hellzyeahwebwielingessays]

Super Heroes are a HUMAN power fantasy Part 1

Master Post

Super Heroes are a HUMAN power fantasy Part 2

Osvaldo Oyola , J. Lamb and Noah Berlatsky (who hates super heroes on principle btw), along with other dumbasses, have often said they are male/white supremacist power fantasies.

Nah fam. They are nothing more and nothing less than a HUMAN power fantasy.

Follow me along here for a while.

Human beings are animals.

We are. That’s a simple matter of scientific fact.

When push comes to shove we are really, really, really smart monkeys who share something like 50+% genes in common with chimpanzees.

As animals and all forms of life the overwhelming majority of us are biologically hardwired towards one ultimate goal: survival.

The desire to survive drives us innately in ways that go unnoticed most of the time. As we evolved into smarter creatures with higher brain functions capable of comprehending the world around us and constructing complex relationships and societies, that survival instinct was reinterpreted through various means.

The survival instinct in human beings and other mammals takes several forms but most commonly can boil down to two things:

a)      Survival through preservation of the individual

b)      Survival through procreation

Type a) involves getting food, shelter, rest, avoiding and recovering from injury and of course defending one’s self from threats, which can take the form of other living creatures, including members of our own species.

Type b) involves spawning offspring and at the same time looking after their wellbeing.

But the survival instinct goes deeper than that because we are biologically hardwired to work towards the protection of our very species. That is the very reason why type a) and b) even exist. By preserving ourselves and our offspring our species survives.

We are also communal animals. Much like chimpanzees and gorillas we live in groups for mutual benefit and protection. Thus, as part of survival of ourselves, our offspring and our species, we have a biological investment in protecting members of our group and of our species.

But seemingly paradoxically we are also hardwired to compete with and fight one another. This likely a by-product of how in the wild we’d have to compete for resources like food and shelter. Sometimes this involves two different groups from the same species competing with one another for survival.

Why am I telling you this? Well, because deep down all those things I have just talked about are innate to 99% of all human beings. It is little wonder that as we as a species evolved we expressed these biological driving forces in certain ways no other creatures could.

This is where the concept of our deities, Gods and figures from folklore and myth come from.

Jupiter, Vishnu, Thor, Hercules, Sun Wukong, Sampson, the Biblical version of Jesus Christ.

Whether they adopt the form of human beings or other entities, virtually every single culture on Earth, even those in isolation of one another, have conceived of beings greater than themselves. Beings with abilities beyond the average human being. And they’ve also conceived of those beings from time to time using their abilities to defy the laws of nature (such as averting natural disasters), combat dangerous or malevolent forces/creatures/individuals, and/or safeguarding the lives of others.

It is a form of explaining the world around us, and an act of wish fulfilment of the human experience.

We want to survive and since we are by our nature group animals we desire to be protected. Thus we conceive beings greater than ourselves who could potentially do that.

We want to survive by preserving our individual selves, so we imagined beings that are so powerful that they are not as reliant upon rest and sustenance like normal people. And who are powerful enough that they either cannot be easily harmed and are are capable of defending themselves from potential threats.

We have within us a vested biological interest in preserving our species, and so are hardwired to protect members of our family/group; our kin. Thus as part of our human wish fulfilment fantasies we imagine beings we’d like to be who could have the power to protect members of our species.

We then come to the modern superhero.

Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, etc. Fundamentally they are the exact same thing.

Individuals with powers beyond those of the average human being, who use those powers to help and protect people, typically from numerous threats (which most commonly take the form of individuals with malevolent intentions). This can include perceived social ills which plague society and by extension pose a threat to the survival or quality of life of ordinary citizens.

One can exchange Hercules fighting the mythological Hydra for Superman fighting Darkseid or Captain America fighting H.Y.D.R.A. terrorists and it is ultimately the same thing. Batman battling crime in Gotham city fundamentally is no different from Theseus defeating criminals and bandits on his travels. When Spider-Man swings into action to save Mary Jane from the Green Goblin, it is an expression of much the same thing the Indian deity Rama went through to save his bride Sita.

Many super heroes though are also vigilantes, someone who imposes their own sense of morality whilst working outside of the law. Vigilantes in the real world and in myths, folklore, fiction and so on can also be found throughout history. Perhaps the most notable example being Robin Hood, who denounced his noble status to steal from the rich and give what he took to the poor who were being over taxed and oppressed by a corrupt system. Other examples would be the Scarlet Pimpernel or Zorro.

What I am trying to say is that at their core, modern day super heroes are fundamentally modern riffs of the folkloric and mythic traditions and/or similar expressions of the universal human experience (which are informed by innate biological imperatives).

Ostensibly, in creating Superman (the first true superhero), Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were either:

a)      Consciously/subconsciously influenced by these older mythic stories when they created Superman (and thus birthed the entire genre), or

b)      basically tapped into the same kind of thinking which birthed Robin Hood, Hercules, Sun Wukong, etc. in the first place. Across the centuries great minds seemingly thought alike

Superman in particular was possibly heavily influenced by the figure of super strong Sampson or the Clay Golem of Prague, both of whom are part of Jewish religion and folklore (Siegel and Shuster being Jewish immigrants). He might even be seen as a kind of Moses figure. Someone sent away from his natural people to grow up elsewhere, but nevertheless destined for greatness. Or maybe he was just a messiah figure. Whether Siegel and Shuster had Jesus Christ in their minds at all or not, the Jewish religion does (I believe) talk about a saviour figure and Superman could very well be an expression of that.

Figuring into Superman’s creation was 1930s depression and the shadow of impending global war as Hitler was gathering power and invaded Poland the year after Superman was created. In his debut Superman is not only superhumanly powerful but uses these powers as a vigilante to do things like:

·         stop wife beaters

·         rescue someone framed for murder, whilst apprehending the real murderer

·         capture gangsters and rescue a kidnapped person (Lois Lane)

·         bring a corrupt politician to justice

This was an expression of 1930s fears and frustrations. Of Siegel and Shuster’s desires to right the wrongs of a system which was perceived to be broken…or at least envision someone who could do that seemingly impossible task.

The next year in 1939, Batman would come along and express many of these sentiments even more acutely, in particular when it came to crime.

As time went by and the superhero genre was consolidated and evolved, many heroes had their histories altered in order to make them more coherent. In Batman’s specific case his home of Gotham city was painted as so utterly corrupt from the lowest criminal to the most powerful political figures that Batman was literally the one and only effective deterrent to crime. Hope of legal or political reform was next to impossible, thus Batman’s brand of vigilantism was the only thing which could stand in the way of criminals from just doing whatever they wanted.

Bearing all this in mind the idea that the superhero genre is an inherent white construction (and therefore inherently racist, deliberately or otherwise) is, you know…fucking bullshit.

There is a difference between something defined by someone of one race or another and it being something which in indicative to them ONLY. There is also a difference between something having ‘white supremacist undertones’ and something simply being created at a certain point in time when cultural norms were (sadly) different to what they became later on.

As originally created Superman (and by extension the genre) was functionally the same kind of wish fulfilment expressesed by countless storytellers from countless cultures across human history, all informed by universal biological impulses to survive.

Yes, the superhero genre was created and constructed by white people and is therefore literally a ‘white construction’. Yes there weren’t many (if any) non-white characters outside of horrible racial stereotypes. Yes many of them took the law into their own hands.

But that doesn’t mean they are in support of white supremacist notions ala the Ku Klux Klan.

In fact given that Siegel and Shuster were of Jewish immigrant descent, one could argue that Superman was a reflection of how minorities need to be BETTER than the majority to be accepted and/or he was arguably an expression of their frustrations at being mistreated themselves an minorities.

On the other hand let’s say that ‘white supremacy’ strictly meant that superheroes operated with the belief in white people being the default, and as the majority, they were better than the non-whites. Superman was created at a time of segregation after all.

The problem is there is no evidence I know in support of Superman, by his mere existence, is consciously implying that white people are better than non-white people. I wouldn’t put it past Siegel and Shuster to believe that given the times they were from, but ALL media was like that. To an extent they honestly didn’t know any better. But just because they believed that and the social context of the time informed people of this, that doesn’t mean that those ideas are inherent to the superhero genre.

Because again, the superhero genre ultimately embodies beliefs and practices which date back throughout human history and can be found in many non-white cultures.

Yes. Their brand of heroism and the beliefs about heroism they embody were gifted to them by their white creators. And those creators were informed by white social norms (as in the white society they grew up in informed Siegel and Shuster that wife beating was bad). But that doesn’t mean that the superhero moral compass is inherently something that is itself white by design. Rather, it goes beyond that to form a mostly universal form of morality. And lest we forget American society and its laws were mostly informed by Jewish and Christian religious beliefs and practices, which themselves were not only innovated centuries before American society, but by people who were NOT white.

Yes, these superheroes are vigilantes, many of which wear masks and employ secret identities. But not only is that a matter of practicality within their work, as well as part of generating drama within the narrative, but this does not (as the above mentioned dumbasses believe) mean they are inheriting a legacy from the Ku Klux Klan.

Theseus and Robin Hood acted as vigilantes of a sort who again predate the KKK. The Scarlet Pimpernel is widely regarded as the originator of the secret identity trope, and he was created by a Hungarian born British woman!

Just because a superhero might act as a vigilante and impose their sense of morality outside of the law (maybe even using force to do it) doesn’t equate them with the KKK, because it completely and utterly ignores the specifics of the circumstances. It is like saying anyone who kills is a serial killer, when they might have killed for justifiable reasons. Superman and Batman might be operating as vigilantes with secret identities but we the readers can plainly see that they are genuinely justified in what they are doing.

But that’s because the writer has established that!

I hear you cry.

Yes that is true...so what though?

If the writer has set up circumstances which justify the superheroes actions then you can’t just IGNORE those. You can’t just choose the evidence you take under consideration to fit the conclusion you want. In this case that’d be the interpretation of superheroes are endorsements of white supremacist notions ala the KKK or police officers who abuse their powers.

That’s like desiring to interpret Star Wars as the story of white supremacy because the ‘black’ clad figures of the Empire are ultimately overthrown by the white Rebel Alliance and the ‘light side' of the force. It ignores the respective actions of the Empire and Alliance in-story.

It’s is presuming the Empire to represent black people and the Alliance white people in the first place and then working backwards from there. Equally it is presuming superheroes to be stand-ins for ACTUAL police officers or KKK style vigilantes in the first place.

And that cop analogy inherently doesn’t work because superheroes are only SIMILAR to cops. The analogy ultimately breaks down because they aren’t subject to ANY legal sanctions, many of them do not kill and their crime fighting efforts stereotypically takes the form of them intervening ONLY if they hear about a crime/crisis ahead of time or if they observe it in progress.

I mean one of the above morons conflated Spider-Man’s Spider-Sense to be a stand in for racial profiling which is an utterly inappropriate analogy. The Spider-Sense was originally constructed as a clumsy plot device that first and foremost operated as a personalised danger sense to Spider-Man of threats. Outside of contrived writing it categorically doesn’t alert him to ANY potential crime or criminal. And it doesn’t discriminate the way racial profiling does. It more often than not allows him to pinpoint precisely who might be a potential threat because they ARE a potential threat.

Spider-Man or Superman or Batman in the course of their work have these skills and it enables them to be ABOVE things like racial profiling. Again, taking their stalking of a potential criminal to be a tacit approval of police methods is an interpretation being overlaid ONTO   the superhero and then presumed to be factually what it is.

But it’s not.

It’s just an (mis)interpretation of what is going on informed by one person’s personal experiences and baggage through life. It is the same kind of logic which will take say a female character who has a male love interest as 100% definitely an enforcement of the idea that women ‘need a man’ to validate them when that isn’t necessarily the case of the story at all.

Building upon this is the oft-repeated interpretation that superheroes are fascists and are supportive of fascist values. That is an incredibly simplistic and literal reading of the superhero genre that ignores aspects plain as day on the page of the stories. It again is CHOOSES to see something in the concept which frankly misses the point but is nevertheless accepted as plain fact regardless.

An article in the Atlantic addresses this very eloquently:

This [fascist] reading of superheroes is common but wrong, a symptom of trying to impose political ideology on a universal, fictional myth. Superheroes do say something about the real world, but it’s something pretty uncontroversial: We want to see good triumph over evil, and “good” in this case means more than just defeating the bad guy—it means handling power responsibly.

The “fascism” metaphor breaks down pretty quickly when you think about it. Most superheroes defeat an evil power but do not retain any power for themselves. They ensure others’ freedom. They rarely deal with the government, and when they do it is with wariness, as in the Iron Man films, where Tony Stark refuses to hand over control of his inventions.

Indeed, superhero tales are full of subplots about how heroes limit their own power: hibernating once the big bad guy has been defeated, wearing disguises to live ordinary lives, choosing not to give into the temptation to ally with the villain or use their powers for profit or even civilizational progress. That’s because the creators of some of the most foundational superhero tales weren’t writing solely out of a power fantasy. They were writing out of a fantasy that a truly good people who find themselves with power might use that power only for good—and only in the face of extreme evil.

YES superheroes are a power fantasy.

But there is NOTHING wrong with power fantasies so long as one understands the distinction between the fiction and reality.

More than this...the hard truth is violence is part of being human. We are biologically hard wired to be violent and dominate others. That is innate to us like many, many, many animals. The flipside to that though is what also makes us human is the ability (and perhaps more importantly the DESIRE) to NOT be like that.

Most superhero fiction simultaneously offers us the opportunity to enforce those values whilst at the same time providing us with a safe outlet for our violent urges. We transfer those urges into the heroes and villains fighting one another. Kinda like how in Ancient Rome gladiator fights and other spectacles were used as a way of avoiding the populace of Rome from erupting into violence.

And don’t sit there and tell me that they ENCOURAGE violence.

If someone is going to be violent like that frankly there are almost ALWAYS further underlying factors often to do with their home life And

Human beings have been killing each other and acting in immoral ways LONG before the invention of popular media. Preventing ourselves from being like that is an act of learned control as we grow up. It is otherwise innate to our instincts.

Furthermore the concept of superheroes as being police officers who enforce the status quo and therefore help keep white people in power is incredibly flawed.

First of all Doc Ock nuking New York city hurts everyone regardless of race. Second of all Batman stopping a mugger in the middle of assaulting someone isn’t upholding white power, it’s just safeguarding life. Reading it as more than that is a projection these asshats are injecting INTO the stories themselves when they aren’t warranted.

Finally, the law might be stacked in favour of white power and minority suppression. But that not only has a lot to do with ABUSE of the law, but at the same time large chunks of the law are there legitimately for the well being of EVERYONE. It is illegal to murder someone, to mug them, to exploit them. None of that ensures white power, it ensures the well being of everyone. The problem is that those laws are often warped when being applied to minorities by the police force.

But superheroes don’t represent the police force. They represent something grander than the police force whilst at the same time representing what the police force SHOULD be like. The message isn’t ‘this is what the police are like’ or even ‘the police are heroes so anything they do is therefore a good thing’. It is providing a strong moral ideal and saying ‘You and everyone else should try to be like this’.

It is because of this that the superhero concept REVEALS the warts and shortcomings of the law and law enforcement as it really exists. Which was a part of 1930s frustrations Superman et al were giving vent to. Again, Action Comics #1 showed us corrupt politicians, commentating upon a flawed system.

Basically Superman being who he is doesn’t tell people that a police officer is justified when he racially profiles a black person as a criminal. Quite the opposite, he reveals us that they were WRONG in doing that because Superman would NEVER do that.

Ultimately, yeah these characters were created within a white context, but my point is fundamentally the same thing was created in non-white contexts as well throughout history.

Super Heroes are a HUMAN power fantasy Part 2

Master Post

[ninjagoat]

Notes on Supergirl 3x14

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

I've been annoyed with the show for a while now. Season three came out of the gate with four solid eps, and then draaaagged for another seven; before finally putting things back in order: slamming a season's worth of Lena's 'development' into reverse so she can actually have her own worldview and agenda once again; giving the Legion a hidden agenda so they actually have some narrative juice; giving Alex and Kara a genuine ideological conflict for the first time since... I can't remember, and actually having a plan for the World-killers because of it; and, important to me especially, the re-emergence of Winn as a recognised problem-solver.

Which brings us to 3x14, a MASSIVE episode for Winn, and, in terms of scale, a massive episode in general: the two major action sequences are of a kind you'd expect from a season finale; they've landed a *recent* Academy Award Nominee for a guest star; there's a frank discussion of later-life mental illness, and an insight into J'onn's specific attitude toward his adopted race; and a hilarious sequence of our heroes just... hanging out.

In short, in just a few episodes (which, by sheer coincidence, would all have finished being scripted *after* AK was suspended and fired for being a mediocre sex-pest)... they fixed the show.

THEY FIXED THE DAMN SHOW.

Notes below the cut (it’s a long post this week):

- "People being addressed as soldiers going into battle before actually just trying something fun and silly" is one of my favourite tropes, and that look Winn and Kara exchange is one of the best indicators of their long-standing friendship we've seen in a long time (Winn is, of course, Kara's best friend. You many have heard her give statements to the contrary. THESE ARE LIES).

- The choice to have the characters, all played by actors who can sing, do 'karaoke voice' instead of their actual voices is a good one. Having Kara do Beastie Boys side-steps the whole 'we've heard her sing' problem; J'onn and Mr. J are both wonderfully appalling; and Alex letting the lyrics of her ballad run on as she stops to drink is, as the kids say, a Mood (I'll come back to Mon-El and Winn at the end).

- THERE ARE *STILL* NO ALIENS AT THE ALIEN BAR. WHAT HAPPENED TO KEVIN? OR BRIAN?

- James's constant need for validation crashing against Lena's particular brand of emotional - and literal - unavailability is a good choice; we've not really seen James's interest in Lena manifest outside of her needs until now, and it's the first time he's had a relatable problem since 1x06. And pairing him up with Mon-El for this scene - who's having his own issues right now - is nice.

- Speaking of which, Imra's telepathy: is this the show telling us she definitely *doesn't* have mind-control powers, or that Mon-El - currently not the most reliable expert on the Legion - doesn't *know* she has mind-control powers?

- "FELLOW DRUNKS!"

- I'll admit, James was my least favourite option for who could be Winn's emotional support in this episode, given his long history of being really quite bad at it; but in this first scene, he's actually pretty good, providing Winn with the avenues he needs to avoid the old-school masculinity coping methods he's trying to use instead.

- Winn making ABSOLUTELY SURE that his Winslow's dead, even before they tried to put him in the ground, is on point.

- Mary. MARY. The writers knew they had Tony-award-winning Steppenwolf alum Laurie Metcalf on board, and it SHOWS. She's nervous and tentative, but she's also forthright; she takes over the space when she feels she ought to (a lot of her funnier asides could have been put in Cat Grant's mouth with no problem), and physically, tangibly awkward when she doesn't; and Metcalf runs through the gear changes as only a pro of her stature can. In her first scene, she's anxious, yes, and she's having difficulty separating Winn from the little boy she left behind; but it's also clear that THIS IS THE HAPPIEST DAY OF HER LIFE, even if it isn't her son's. Mary is a catalyst for Winn's pain, but has a whole existence outside of it. That's good writing, that is.

- Speaking of Winn's pain... DEAR. LORD. That story goes toe-to-toe with any crappy parent story you've ever heard (and blows all of Lena's solipsistic crap out of the water); and Jeremy Jordan, having done so much with so little every week, completely sells that this is a story he's been waiting two decades to tell, and how being left alone with no-one to be *except* his father's son absolutely broke him.

- The Flying Monkeys sequence is the best action scene this show's ever done. Better than Reign. Better than Crossfire. And again, Mary and Winn: every time they're not focused on the time they've spent apart, it's almost like they were never apart at all.

- Winn calling out James for suggesting he forgive Mary is absolutely on point; and James admitting that he was a selfish, sulky little brat after his Dad died as an argument of how it could have been just as bad if she'd stayed is interesting (James is making it up to her now, though, by... never going home for a single holiday. Ever. Still, baby steps). His argument will also end up applying, subtextually, to his relationship with Lena; stop being ungrateful for the time she's not there for you, and just be happy for the time that she is. It's what she needs you to do. She's got her own stuff going on.

- "He doesn't always get the credit, but he keeps us going around here." Kara's gentle tribute to her friend (her BEST friend) and the adaptive, outside-the-box thinking that's been keeping everyone alive for years is wonderful; not just for what she says, but for how comfortable a rapport she has with Mary, while never forgetting that being told how great her son is by *Supergirl* is as good, if not better, than hearing it from the President herself (and if Mary needs that... it could be arranged).

- On a downer note, anytime a show starts talking about a side character as the "heart of the team" or somesuch... it's usually not a good sign for that character.

- I'm not ready to go into Mr. J's illness yet. I have a personal relationship to stories like this, and I can't write about it in this format. But Carl Lumbly is still ABSOLUTELY the best.

- And I'm not the person to get into J'onn's opinion on his own blackness; except to say, in a week when David Harewood met with British MPs to discuss the 'accidental' deportations of the Windrush migrants, this is a BIG DEAL.

- Since I'm doing asides into side plots: Mon-El and Kara. His apology - agenda-free this time - is honest and heart-felt, and his full disclosure about *why* he's apologising now raises interesting questions: at what point is this honesty defined as over-sharing? Where is the line drawn between being 'open about your feelings' and 'demanding emotional labour from others'? Kara has a firm boundary - they are *not* going to talk about his marriage - and he respects that. But should he have told her about it in the first place, even if it does lead in to the new information about the World-killers? I've said before: Supergirl is the only show with a significant male audience that, whether you believe it should or not, actually tackles questions of what healthy masculinity *should* be (albeit with varying degrees of success), and it's good that they're keeping it up.

- Mary's story is not only an important reminder that the men who commit mass-murder often begin by terrorising the women in their own homes; but also, in the context of Childish Things, addresses Winn's misunderstanding of his own fears. Winn has always believed that his father was a good person, until one day, when he just wasn't; and Winn believed that any time he didn't keep a lid on his own anger, any time that he might use that part of himself to stand up and say 'no' against those that would hurt him, the same would happen to him. But Winslow Sr. wasn't a good person. It took a long time for his anger to consume him, a long time for his battles against perceived slights to affect anyone except Mary. Winn has little to worry about.

- And her decision to take the gun and take on Toywoman(?) alone is immediate, consistent, and believable. She's been without her son for twenty years to protect his life. He will NOT be taken from her now.

- Delightful stunt-casting for Toywoman, by the way (If you haven't watched The Silence Of The Lambs recently... go do that).

- The second action sequence: not as good as the flying monkeys, but still has some banging moments, as the 'heroes' drop out to handle various contraptions to leave Winn to rescue Mary.

- Speaking of contraptions: "Cloth Magic." Comics Mon-El fans, that's got to feel good.

- How many times did Mary have to sit through New Hope when Winn was a kid? I'm guessing 'more than ten'.

- Winn being offended at the idea that he's going to be killed with something as pedestrian as a *firearm* is the absolute business, and annoying because it's a beat I'd already gotten it noted down for my own fic series.

- "You haven't just survived, you have EXCELLED."

- Mon-El *butchering* a song now synonymous with a TV show that *LIVES* in the kind of masculinity he's been used to deconstruct (again, with varying degrees of success) is a solid piece of work. As is his apology.

- Okay, this episode isn't exactly what we all wanted for Winn. No-one has hugged him. No-one has told him they love him. Kara has not re-iterated that he is, in fact, her best friend (because he is). He's not designing the Valor suit. We didn't get to hear him sing. And his twenty-year-long trauma of being alone in the world is resolved a lot more speedily that it really ought to be. But that doesn't matter. Those are indulgences, and that's pretty much what fan-fiction and the Miscast performance videos are for.

    What this episode *does* do is reiterate the show's mission statement once again: We, as a people, are at our best when we depend on each other. Forgiving when we can. Understanding when we can't. And more than anything else, simply being there for each other. Whether it's supporting each other through a personal crisis, or through the decline of a loved one; teaching each other new skills, or helping to mend a beloved outfit; or even, sometimes, just having the courage or shamelessness to perform karaoke with your mum; the same truth remains:

    WE ARE STRONGER TOGETHER.

- Which is why it's perfect that the show end on Lena. Alone. Keeping the truth from the people she's closest to. She hasn't told James. She won't tell Kara. She's just there, trapped inside the box in which she's imprisoned her oldest friend, with no-one else there to help or to guide her. For all her claims that Kara Danvers is her hero... ultimately, the only person she will ever truly depend on is herself.

   And it's all going to go horribly, horribly wrong.

-LyraWatch: I'm bringing it to a close. It's now been eighteen episodes, and nary a mention of if they're still together or where she's gone. It's so very unlikely that she'll be brought up again.

-LenaWatch: 14 episodes (record high: 16). Most likely at this point, Winn and Lena will have a scene at some point after it's been revealed she's been working on Sam (and has probably made things worse); and Winn will, for the third time, have to help bail her out of the war-zone-like situation she'll have created through her own hubris.

[hirakdesherrani]

Break: A Svetlana/Gauri (SvetRi) story

*This is pile of trash. I’m no writer, this is just the result of some major frustration, because I made the mistake of reading the episode updates. Hopefully, after this I’ll get the monkey of IB off my back*

Tired. Yes, that’s what she was feeling. Weary, exhausted, worn-out. Not from physical work, though planning a wedding could be tiring. No, it was something else. Not some things, many things. Oh, so many things, so many thoughts, which she had been keeping at bay, just surrounded her this morning. So, once the morning drama was done, she surreptitiously made her way out of the Oberoi Mansion. Its not like someone would notice. And that was part of the problem.

She believed that her Shakarji was always with her, wherever she went. Still, the thought of visiting the temple always made her happy. After all, she practically grew up in the environs of the big temple in Bareilly. So, here she was leaning on the pillar in one corner of the Shiv temple, sitting down and contemplating her fate.

Why today of all days she felt the strong urge to commune with God she didn’t know. Maybe because two days hence it would be one year of her marriage to Omkaraji, the man Shankarji had chosen for her. Or maybe because yesterday, he disappeared for the whole night but he did not think it was important to inform his wife where he went or why.

Gauri was no fool; she knew this had something to do with Bade Bhaiyaa and Bhaujaai’s plan. Of course, Omkara ji and Rudy Bhaiyaa were part of it. Some part of Gauri’s mind was relieved that she wasn’t a part of this silly plan, which involved her Bhaujaai dressing up as a woman from the village. She told herself that its alright that they didn’t include her in their plans, Bade Bhaiyaa, Bhaujaai, Omkara ji and Rudy Bhaiyaa knew each other from way back and they had a much older, stronger bond.

But a stronger voice told her that it was wrong on Omkaraji’s part to hide things from her. To treat like she was till a stranger in his life. The other woman. Suddenly a memory flashed in front of her eyes: Omkaraji accusing her of having an affair with Ajay, because of those unexplained disappearances. Those periods when she used to attend English classes secretly. Yesterday, he disappeared for an entire night. What should she make of that? What should she make of all those times when he disappeared without telling her? Should she also suspect him of cheating on her?

She knew that he was planning with his brothers and sister-in-law, but he didn’t know that she knew. Wasn’t it his duty to tell her? Or did he expect her to understand him without telling her anything? She couldn’t believe this was happening to her again. Again the burden was on her to understand him, only this time she did understand him, she knew he was doing it for his family, but why couldn’t he tell her? Just for once talk to her.

Gauri was feeling miserable now. Not that she had been feeling anything else since she returned from Bareilly. One after the other, some new issue had been unfolding. She had lost count of what all happened since she returned. Not that there hadn’t been any moments of joy, but they were too far and few between. She longed to share her feelings with someone. With her Annika Bhaujaai. Bhaujaai would be able to understand her, and maybe help her out. After all, Bhaujaai had also faced rough patches in her relationship. But here again there was a problem; there was no escaping Bhavya. She almost felt guilty for thinking this, but if Gauri had to be honest with herself, she didn’t like Bhavya tagging along with her and Bhaujaai all the time. Bhavya was her friend, no doubt, but the almost-sisterly bond Gauri shared with her Bhaujaai, that was something different. Bhavya did not invite her confidence in relationship matters. And her presence meant that Gauri could not confide in Anika Bhaujaai.

Anyways, there was no point thinking about all this, because currently Bhaujaai was busy imitating someone from the North Indian hinterlands. And it was such a poor imitation, but Gauri was too sweet to discourage it. So, here she was, alone, reflecting the mess that her life had become. Its not that her life was wonderful before she met Omkaraji. No, it was difficult even then; standing up to the torture of her greedy chaacha-chaachi, taking care of her ill mother, struggling to keep their family afloat, none of it had been easy. But Gauri was a born fighter. She fought against all that, she fought against Kali Thakur, she fought against Svetlana, against Buamaa, and she fought against her Omkaraji too, in a way. All alone, always alone. But at least she knew what she was doing.

That’s exactly where the problem lay. Since she had returned from Bareilly, she felt like she was just an audience viewing everything happening around her from the outside. She felt like she was just a pawn in some pathetic game, in fact, she felt below than a pawn. She felt like she had no agency in what was happening to her.

********

Agency, that word seemed so alien to her. No one would think that she would come here. After all, why would Svetlana, the woman who could almost tweak science, come to a place of worship? But it seemed that she had no choice in the matter. For the first time in life, Svetlana was pulled against her will to enter the premises of a temple. Svetlana did not believe in god, or indeed, anything supernatural. But she just couldn’t resist the urge to come to this place. Like she had no agency.

But then again when had she had any agency? When was the last time that she did something just because she wished to? As far as she could remember, the foremost thing on her mind was taking revenge on the Oberois. That was her central mission, and everything other action in her life was dedicated to that. Its like she was a robot with only one agenda on mind and every other action of hers, were just ancillary actions, leading up to her mission.

As far back as she could remember her mother had instilled a feeling of revenge in their hearts. Svetlana being the eldest was almost fed on that revenge. Of course, being the eldest, the prime responsibility of taking revenge also fell on her. Svetlana had dedicated her life to this mission. While Tia was happily pondering about the universe, Svetlana devoted her time to science and business, as much as she could, to defeat the Oberois. She had come a long way in acquiring knowledge and learning through experience. Along the way, she would recollect some unsavory experiences as well, but Svetlana did what was necessary to survive, and she never reflected upon her actions.

She was recovering from another checkmate of the Oberois. It was almost humiliating now, how the Oberois managed to outsmart her, sometimes by sheer luck. The recent drama at the auction was still stinging her. Her temporary exit did not derail their plans however, because her cousin Veer was there to take care of the Oberois. Veer was probably the closest to Svetlana, when it came to their interests; both understood the value of science in their lives. However, Veer was boring, and not to mention had a certain streak of depravity, which made Svetlana privately grateful that he was dealing with the Oberois for now, because she needed a break from their stupidity. Her thoughts went back to how she would always come close ruining them, but get thwarted at the last moment. She remembered the time when she almost married Omkara, the second grandson of the family, and the stupidest of the three brothers. Sentimental fools are always the easiest to trap. But then his so-called wife entered the scene and ruined her plans. Gauri, oh how she made a fool out of Svetlana for months.

Maybe her imagination was too strong, but Svetlana was shocked for a moment to see that girl, Gauri, sitting on the temple floor. She took a closer look and realized that she wasn’t hallucinating; Gauri was actually sitting there.

********

Gauri was staring into space, when a familiar voice penetrated through the fog of her thoughts.

“Regretting our life decisions, are we?”

Gauri looked up to see Svetlana standing over her, smirking slightly.

“You better take off your heeled sandals in the temple. People might not like it.” Gauri said idly.

“And you may not save me like last time?” replied Svetlana. For a moment, Gauri was confused about what she was talking about, then she remembered the first time she and Svetlana met, and how Gauri had almost rescued Svetlana from the furious autowaalahs.

“I didn’t do it for your benefit. I overheard you while you were on the phone. You wanted a servant and I wanted a job. So, I thought this would work out well for me.” replied Gauri.

“I thought as much. You and I aren’t very different.” Svetlana smirked.

“What do you mean?” Gauri’s interest was piqued now.

“Well, its not like you are the Sati Savitri you portray yourself. You duped Omkara and his entire family into believing that you are boy for months. You played with their emotions by faking your pregnancy. And its not that your hands don’t have blood on them.” sneered Svetlana.

“What are you saying?” Gauri almost shouted, curiosity and a slight fear now mixed with her voice.

“Keep your voice down, you don’t want people to find out that you killed Kali Thakur, now do you?” asked Svetlana

“How do you know about that?” asked Gauri, now brimming with curiosity.

“After my history with Kali Thakur and his unexpected re-entry in my life, I would be a fool not keep tabs on him. I value my life.” said Svetlana

“Well, if you did keep tabs on him, then you would also know that I stabbed him in self-defense. And coming back to the Oberois, even if I did fool them, it was to save Omkara ji’s life, to save his family from the likes of you and Buamaa.” Gauri replied, with confidence now that her curiosity had been satisfied. “Its our intentions that define our actions, and not our actions alone. All I did, was always for Omkaraji’s good.”

“The same Omkara, who is so absorbed in his duty to his brothers, that he does not know his wife is here shedding tears?” chided Svetlana

The taunt hit too deep. “What are you doing here anyways? Shouldn’t you be in prison?” Gauri tried to deflect Svetlana’s taunts.

“I thought you knew me well by now, Gauri. No prison can keep Svetlana locked for long.” Svetlana laughed “Don’t try to avoid the question. So, Omkara indeed does not know that you are here lamenting your fate. This is hilarious. After all that you have done for him, put your life in jeopardy, even at my hands, he does not care to find out where his wife is?” sneered Svetlana even more.

“Shut up! Omkaraji trusts me, and I trust him. I have full vishwaas on him.” Gauri tried to fight back bravely.

“Oh really? Then lets test your vishwaas, shall we? Why don’t you stay here some time longer, and see if Omkara comes looking for you?” Svetlana asked

Gauri was struck by this question. Curiously what impacted her was not whether Omkara would come looking for her or not; but whether he knew where to look for her in the first place.

“What happened? No answer? Are you worried that he won’t look for you? Or are you worried that he wouldn’t even know where to start?” Svetlana chided further.

Gauri looked up at her; shocked that Svetlana of all people could guess what she was thinking.

Svetlana looked down at her, and the answer was clearly reflected in Gauri’s eyes. Curiously Svetlana did not feel like laughing at Gauri’s fate.

****** Dusk was approaching now, but no Omkara was in sight. Idly, Gauri thought that she was right, he didn’t know where to find her, and her mind went back to the time when they both were practicing for Dhurindhar’s questions, and Omkaraji did not remember her favorite dish was daal chaawal, even though she remembered his. Even though they had spent so much time together when she was in her Chulbul disguise, he knew nothing about her. Then again Omkaraji had promised that Chulbul was his best buddy, and yet he had left to die at Kali’s hand or worse, when the veil of Chulbul was lifted. And there, it happened again.

The entire day, wave after wave of unhappy thoughts and memories were crashing upon Gauri. She was plagued with negative thoughts, and she couldn’t run from the truth anymore. Omkaraji did not care for her, at least, not in the same way that she did.  Or not to the same extent that she did. It shouldn’t matter that he didn’t care for her the same way; after all, didn’t Gauri believe that love should be like Meera’s devotion to Krishn? She remembered how confidently she had told her future Bhaujaai on the phone, when they spoke for the first time. “Hum jise chaahe uska milna zaroori kaha hai? Hum toh chahne bhar se khush hai.”  But then she also learnt the hard way that a one-sided relationships don’t work.

“Abhi mohabbat karni hai, humein hamaare hisse ki.” Words, just empty words. What more to expect from a poet? Words are all that he could give, but his actions spoke otherwise. Its not like he didn’t care for her at all, but since they returned, there was one crisis or another that befell their family. But Bade Bhaiyaa had to face those crises too, yet Bade Bhaiyaa could manage to be an excellent elder brother, and an Ishqbaaaz’. Anika bhaujaai was so loved; it was evident in Bade Bhaiyaa’s eyes how much he wanted her.

Omkaraji just wasn’t like that. He just wasn’t an Ishqbaaaz like his elder brother.  Heck, he wasn’t even a normal husband. And not for the first time in her life, Gauri felt unwanted, unloved. Gauri was aware that she was beautiful in an objective kind of way. She didn’t think much of it though, because more often than not it was the root cause of unwelcome attention, the worst example of which was Kali Thakur. But it pinched her that her husband never noticed her. She was invisible to his eyes. Okay, maybe not invisible but she was definitely only a reactionary figure in his life. He did stand up for her, but only when something happened like when Papaji did her shraadh. That particular memory still hurt her. Not so much because of what Papaji did, but more so because Jahnvi Maaji, did nothing to stop him. The same woman, whose life Gauri saved twice, and not just her life, but her marriage too. Gauri shouldn’t be surprised at Omkaraji’s ungratefulness. It seems that he had inherited it from his mother.

Maybe Gauri was being unkind. Omkaraji must have done something for her willingly. Nothing came to Gauri’s mind. Desperately now, Gauri struggled to find one instance when Omkaraji had done something of his accord for her. Yes! He came to Bareilly as Dilpreet to make up to her. But another stronger voice nagged in her head that maybe that was out of guilt, to make up for his mistake. Gauri thought harder.

He was so sad when that painting of hers was auctioned. But maybe that was because the painting signified the rebirth of his art, and not because it was her painting. He did credit her for being his inspiration. Another thing, in the long list of things, that Gauri had done for Omkara. And here it was again. That feeling. That Gauri had given her everything to a man in the past one year, who did not even care for her enough to tell her the truth of what’s going on his life. To make her the part of his life. To come looking for her, when she’s been missing for an entire day.

She looked at Shankarji’s idol. She had always trusted her Shankarji to know the best for her, which is why she never questioned her marriage to Omkaraji. She never hesitated in performing her duties to that marriage because she believed that Shankarji joined their fates, so who was she to deny the responsibilities that came with it? She never expected of Omkara to upkeep his side of the marriage. Only wanted some trust from his side. He finally gave her the reason to trust him in Bareilly, he made promises to give her what was her due, as his wife. But he reneged on his word.

Did Shankarji make a mistake?

********

Svetlana did not know why she was sitting here. Like in her entire life, she could not have come up with a worse way to waste time, than sitting next to the wife of her enemy. She could be doing better things, like plotting her next scheme to ruin the Oberois. And there it was again, the same thought. The Oberois, always thinking about ruining the Oberois. Its like nothing else occupied her mind than the hundred and one ways to ruin that family of idiots. Her entire life, she could have achieved so much more, but no, it always ‘badla’ and ‘barbaadi’. But right now, nothing and no one could look more ‘barbaad’, more devastated then the girl sitting opposite her. Gauri took no notice of her, because it was as clear as day on her face that right now, the girl was going through an existential crisis, that her life was crashing around her.

Svetlana was feeling this strange emotion in her heart. She didn’t know what it was, mostly because she thought she didn’t possess a heart. She tried really hard to put a name to the contortions in her heart, which she was experiencing. Leading an almost mechanical existence her entire life, putting a name to her feelings was one of the most difficult tasks she’s ever come across. Finally she came up with a word to her emotions: Pity. Svetlana pitied the girl sitting before her. Yes, she pitied Gauri.

“Are you done moping?” said Svetlana, trying to sound irritated.

“Why are you still here? To enjoy the downfall of your enemy?” countered Gauri

“Are you my enemy? The Oberois are my enemy, but what is the cause for our feud? If I’ve done anything against you, its just collateral damage.” said Svetlana.

“Collateral damage? Right, like I was for your sister Tia?” asked Gauri, with a slight smile

Svetlana was stumped. “How did you know she was my sister?”

“I know that Tia is not blind. And the only way she could fool that doctor, was with chemicals, which no one but you could have provided her. And why would you help her? Why would she plot against the Oberois when she was so grateful to Bade Bhaiyaa and Bhaujaai? Only if you two were related.” guessed Gauri.

“Hmm, you are smart. Why are you wasting your time with that sentimental idiot, Omkara?” asked Svetlana

“Ek jhaap mein deewar pe sat jaaibe! Just because I’m disappointed with him, or sitting here talking to you, it doesn’t mean that I would listen to nonsense about him, least of all from you” replied Gauri angrily.

“Itna pyaar? And for that person who still hasn’t bothered to find out where you are?” sneered Gauri.

“Not love, devotion.” replied Gauri.

“Devotion to the person who doesn’t deserve it?” sneered Svetlana

And she hit the nail with it. Gauri had realized when she walked away from Omkara that day, after the fiasco at the hotel that Omkara wasn’t deserving of her devotion. And there she was learning English to impress him. How Gauri regretted that now. She, who was always proud about her origins, succumbed to her insecurities, which she never had before meeting him. That’s what he had reduced her to: an insecure shell of her former glorious self. After she walked away from him, she promised that she would never change herself for anyone like that again. But then why was she here in the temple today, cursing her fate? Because she tried to be every bit the supporting wife and bahu of the house. And what did she get in return for that? A father-in-law who performed her funeral rites and a husband who was out there gallivanting with his brothers and sister-in-law, forgetting that he had a wife too.

Svetlana saw Gauri’s form shrinking, and felt a little guilty for how her words pierced her.

“Oh c’mon. Get up. Do something about it if you are so upset. Fight him back, make him rue treating you like this.” said Svetlana.

“And what purpose will it serve? He hurts me I hurt him. I push back harder, causing no one more grief than myself, and everyone around me a lot of headache.” said Gauri.

“So, that’s what you think of Shivaay and Anika’s relationship?” taunted Svetlana, with a laugh.

Svetlana caught Gauri’s hand in time, because Omkara was one thing, but Gauri would not hear a word against her Bade Bhaiyaa and Bhaujaai, and hand her rose in reflex to reply to Svetlana’s words.

“Don’t even think about it.” Svetlana said with chill in her voice. She calmed herself, and continued, “Think harder, isn’t your Bade Bhaiyaa and Bhaujaai’s relationship exactly like this?”

Gauri was reminded of how both Shivaay and Anika got engaged to Ragini and Vikram only to show their famous ‘tadi’. And she was not totally unaware of their relationship’s origins. In the last three months, when Omkara was ignoring her (unintentionally of course), she ended spending a lot of time with the servants of the house. They were friendly with her, since they knew her from her Chulbul days. Svetlana was right. Yes, Bade Bhaiyaa and Bhaujaai’s ishqbaazi warmed her heart, but that kind of relationship was unhealthy in its own way, and involved a lot of understanding on her Bhaujaai’s part. Just like her own relationship where all the share of understanding fell on her shoulders while Omkaraji never fulfilled his side of the relationship.

Svetlana released Gauri’s hand, once she saw her shoulders drooping. Comprehension showed in Gauri’s eyes.

“If you are not going to do anything about your situation, then are going to go back to him?” asked Svetlana

“I don’t know what I want to do.” replied Gauri.

“How about doing something you like?” asked Svetlana, amazed at herself, for even asking this. “What do you like doing?”

Gauri answered immediately without thinking, “I’d love to watch a Salman Khan movie.”

“Then lets go catch one in the theatre.” Svetlana said that almost against her own volition.

Gauri was shocked too. Here she was fraternizing with the enemy? But wait, Svetlana was not her enemy, not anymore.

“Lets go then” Gauri replied, with a slight smile.

Svetlana was the enemy of the Oberois.

******* Svetlana knew beforehand that she would regret her decision. It was not happening to her for the first time. Svetlana pondered idly that why was she always hanging out with her sautans? There was that one time when she was hainging out with Jahnvi, when they had supposedly killed Tej. And now this.

Gauri was excited beyond belief. It had been so long since she watched a Salman Khan film. The last time was before she……no, she wouldn’t think about that now. She would enjoy the movie. There was the usual message on the screen to switch off one’s mobile phones. Which is when Gauri realized that she didn’t bring her phone with her at all. What if….? No, she wouldn’t think about that. She focused her attention back to Tiger Zinda Hai. Unlike many of her friends, Gauri loved the idea of sequels. She loved to see another half of the story. There was always more to tell, more to a character. There was always a second innings to be played.

Svetlana was distinctly embarrassed. She was trying her best to ignore Gauri’s overenthusiasm over the show. Failing that, she was pretending that she doesn’t know her. The movie was obviously not up to Svetlana’s taste. Then again, when was the last time she had seen a movie. The only video she remember playing again and again was the Kalyani Mills video, which turned out to be an error. She felt a headache coming on, but seeing Gauri so joyous, she shut her eyes and gave in. What was wrong with her? She, Svetlana, who had always manipulated people, was being manipulated by some unseen force.

The movie finished some three hours later, but Gauri’s antics did not. Her silly kampat trick was drawing a lot of attention, but Gauri didn’t seem to take notice of that. Svetlana was rolling her eyes continuously at this nonsense, but also, for some reason felt a strong urge to laugh. Something’s definitely wrong with her.

They returned to the temple. Svetlana faced Gauri.

“What are you planning to do now?”

Gauri thought for a moment. The corner stone of Gauri’s life had been vishwaas. But Omkaraji had let her down. He did not trust her with his life’s goings-on. He did not think Gauri was an important enough to share his life with her. She was still an outsider to his life. Did Gauri want to go back to him? And if she didn’t, would that mean abandoning her beliefs, and the person her Shankarji had chosen for her?

But her Shankarji had also pulled her to the temple today. He ensured that she met Svetlana, and undertook an honest evaluation of her life. Maybe this was a sign from her Shankarji, that the man he chose for his devotee was not good enough for her. Maybe this was a sign that Shankarji was showing her way out.

“I want a break.” Gauri replied. “I’m unsure what I want, but one thing I don’t want is to go back to man who is not ready to be honest with me, to trust me, and to reciprocate the vishwaas I have in him. I’m not ready to go back to the family, which still treats me like an outsider. I want to play my second innings.”

Curiously, Svetlana understood what she meant. She wanted a break too. A break from an endless pursuit of the Oberois. Let Veer deal with them, she needed a break.

“So, where do you want to go?” Svetlana asked casually.

“You coming?” Gauri asked, not really surprised.

“I could use a break too.” replied Svetlana with a slight smile. “So, how about Goa?” asked Svetlana.

Gauri remembered the past three months and all the drama that happened. Svetlana looked at Gauri’s horrified expression.

“Chill, I was just kidding.” Svetlana answered, amused by Gauri’s reaction.

And just like that, both the women broke into a genuine, peal of giggles.  

*************

[yellowfeaverpainting]

religious influence

Religious influence in utah

Is the religious influence a good thing? I have lived in Utah my whole life and was once a member of the predominant religion in Utah, The church of Jesus christ of latter day saints. I was raised in this religion and so were many of my friends. I remember not being able to play with my friends on Sundays, and always being at church every sunday. When I got a little older I wasn't allowed to drink coffee or dress a certain way. I was told specific guidelines to follow on dates. I was terrified to screw up or question anything. I remember when i would question the guidelines i was told to follow I would immediately get accusing looks, like I was doing something wrong. I never had a problem with these rules until they started to control who I was becoming. I wondered if this dominant influence in my life was really for the betterment of my life or was it just another social trap, another mold that my community was trying to stuff me into. I eventually left the religion when I began to wonder if this religious influence was really a good thing.

Religious influence has touched all over the world from establishing states and countries such as Utah or Israel. Religion also has an influence in politics. Some politicians let their religious views dictate what law should or shouldn't be made. Some countries run on the views of their predominant religion. Religious influence also stretches all the way back to prehistoric humans and how they lived and explained the world around them. Religion became a means of survival for some. Whole countries depend on religion to govern them and the people within. Religion starts wars and slaughters. It also influences us from a sociological standpoint and how we can or can not act around our social circles, but religion will also offer support and hope in people's time of need. Some religions send out volunteers in times of crisis or even just to volunteer at a local soup kitchen. Religious influence is more predominant in people's lives than they realize.

In 1847, Brigham Young led a company of Mormon pioneers into the Salt Lake Valley and said, “This is the place.” From that day on the area that would eventually become where the state of Utah was established. Young at the time was also the leader of the LDS religion. He had led that company of pioneers across the west in search of freedom from religious persecution. After being run out of other states the pioneers decided to look for and create their own settlement, which would eventually become modern day Utah. 

 At the time of the pioneer's arrival into the Salt Lake valley, the LDS religion had been established for around 25 years and was still establishing rules and guidelines for its members. Some of those rules included avoiding tobacco and alcohol use, as well as avoiding coffee and tea. Some beliefs continue to this day while others (i.e. plural marriage) were abandoned as they were a source of contention with the federal government. As these rules and beliefs were developed and established it begs the question, why? Why not allow the consumption of coffee or tea? Tobacco and alcohol use is understandable given the health risks associated with their use but, coffee? It doesn't have the same health risks that smoking tobacco does nor does it come with the social taboo that plural marriage has. Plus, it wasn’t until the religion had been established for years that these specific rules came about. 

Most rules within religion have been constant such as avoiding sexual relations outside of marriage or avoiding tobacco and alcohol while others have changed with the times such as allowing African American’s to hold the priesthood. These rules influence and dictate how the members are to make decisions and, in some ways, dictate how they live their lives. But is this type of extreme influence good in a person's life. Does it not take away their independence, their individuality, and their agency? All qualities the church encourages but sometimes appears to do its best to influence. 

Last year the lds church sent an email out to the members of its church urging them to vote no to the law legalizing medical marijuana. The Deseret new writes and explains the reasoning behind the church's decision. The question is though would this email be a breach of separation between church and state. No matter the reasoning behind the email it is blatantly telling its members how to vote. “As a member of the coalition, we urge voters of Utah to vote NO on Proposition 2, and join us in a call to state elected officials to promptly work with medical experts, patients, and community leaders to find a solution that will work for all Utahns, without the harmful effects that will come to pass if Proposition 2 becomes law”(Deseret News 2018). The quote I chose is taken directly from an email the lds sent to its members. It is a specific example of separation between church and state. The separation between church and state is the jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the nation state. Religions shouldn't tell people how to vote or what to vote for and politicians should not base their views or how the country should be run on their own personal religious values. Separation between church and state is a way to create balance between everyone's own personal views and morals.

The Scopes Monkey Trials is another example of separation between church and state. In which a teacher was arrested for teaching about evolution in a school in tennessee. Tennessee in 1925 passed a law which prohibits the teaching of darwinism in schools. It was the first law in the United states that banned the teaching of evolution. There are currently 14 states in the United States that use tax dollars to teach creationism within public schools. “The Butler bill, which had been passed in March 1925, made it a misdemeanor punishable by fine to “teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals.” (History.com Editors 2010). I wanted to use the scopes monkey trials as another historical example of religious influence and separation between church and state but the interesting twist about the scopes monkey trials is that the case was lost. The teacher who was convicted had to pay a fee in the end for breaking the law but the verdict was overturned due to a technicality. Even though the verdict was guilty the court recognized the scopes monkey trials raised the public's awareness of teaching theology and/or modoer science in public schools. The trail raises the distinct divide between urban and rural american life in the 1920’s. The scopes monkey trials is used as an emblem on the creationist v. elelutionist controversy.

In the 13th century the puritan church were slaughtering people on the premise that they were witches. The puritain church encouraged its members to condon their neighbors as witches. It was a moment where fear controlled a religion and anything they deemed different or going against their ways was evil and immoral and therefore put to death. The Salem witch trials are an example of religious influence and fear working together to slaughter innocent people. Some people at this time were so brainwashed into thinking that any little thing out of place was because of magic, anything they couldn’t explain through religion or the bible was therefore witchcraft and evil. “Puritan lifestyle was influenced heavily by the church and Christian beliefs. Church was the cornerstone of the mainly Puritan society of the 17th century.”(Blumberg 2007).  Puritan laws were extremely rigid and the members of society were expected to follow a strict moral code. Due to this fact, anything that was believed to go against this code was considered a sin and deserved to be punished. The Puritans also believed strongly in the wrath of God and did everything they could to prevent themselves from receiving it. This is why the witch scare was taken so seriously and the accused were punished harshly. The first women to be accused as witches were those who strayed from the Puritan lifestyle and were considered to be social outcasts. Religion can influence a mass group of people for the worse is what this quote and the entire Salem witch trials show. It's a religious group of people who teach to be different is a sin. The puritan s were scared of God’s wrath and had to quel anything they deemed evil and sin immediately or else god would punish them. They used their religious influence to keep people in line and to accuse neighbors, friends, even family. It is an historical example of fear and religious influence coming together to create the perfect storm to slaughter the falsely accused people.

Every major religion has some kind of crusade. Some kind of purification time period in which a religion tries to purge any other religion. Such is the case in the 13 century when the christian faith lead cursades to take back their holy lands such as jerusalem from other major religions such as muslim or jedaism through war and violence. In modern day Iran the christine population has dropped from 1.5 million to less than 120,000 because of the religious persecution in the middle east. “Throughout the remainder of the 13th century, a variety of Crusades aimed not so much to topple Muslim forces in the Holy Land but to combat any and all of those seen as enemies of the Christian faith. The Crusaders slaughtered hundreds of men, women, and children in their victorious entrance into Jerusalem.”(History.com Editors 2010) I used the crusades as an ancient example to show that religious influence is not a new concept. Religious influence has been around as long as religion has. The crusade are specifically a christion example of a extreme way of converting people to their religion. There are religions that still do this today, it has never gone away.

Why do people need religion in the first place? Why has religion always played a part in influencing people's decisions throughout history. There are as many different theories regarding why humans developed religion as there are religions. There is no definite answer, however. One theory is that religion is to enhance self-control. Another theory would be that religion was created to enhance a sense of cooperation. Another theory being explored by psychologists suggests the religion may be a byproduct of trying to find order in chaos. Humans anthropomorphized their environment to believe the world around them was created for their use; to answer the questions they have about the world around them. The american Psychology Association article entitled A reason to believe talks about the history of how religion was first developed by prehistoric humans. It goes on to explain how religion was first developed as a way to explain the natural phenomenons around them. Before science was able to explain the word around ancient civilizations used legends and stories, those legends and stories were their religion. These stories influenced how they saw the world around them. They created the wrath of gods to explain natural phenomenons. The world influenced their beliefs. They needed to understand the world around them and created religion to compensate for a lack of understanding. “Most researchers don’t believe that the cognitive tendencies that bias us toward religious belief evolved specifically for thinking about religion. Rather, they likely served other adaptive purposes. For example, because people are quick to believe that someone or something is behind even the most benign experiences, they may perceive the sound of the wind rustling leaves as a potential predator. In evolutionary terms it was probably better for us to mistakenly assume that the wind was a lion than to ignore the rustling and risk death.”(Azar 2010). This quote is used to show that there are also physiological reasons for religious influence. That before technology and we had the brain comprehension to understand the world around us, before we had complex thinking religious influence was there even before religion had a name. Religion was a sort of prehistoric thinking that kept us moving and aware of the world around us, it kept us alive before we had the understanding to do it ourselves.

Psychology Today writes an article entitled why do people believe in God. The article talks about how people use religion as a safety net in their everyday lives. How undeveloped countries have a higher religious rate than developed countries. This is because people use God and religion as a safety blanket for their cruel world. They believe in a higher power that will keep them or their family safe. The article talks about how affordable health care can also play a role in the religious rates because the United State has a high religious rate but the article argues that this is because we don’t have affordable health care. We don’t have that assurance that our government will come to our rescue when we are sick or injured so the idea of a higher power that will always be there for us looks more appealing. “There are societal factors that influence the degree of religious belief within societies. As a general rule, religious belief is considerably lower in developed countries compared with the underdeveloped world. The United States, with its high standard of living and high religiosity, is the glaring exception. However, as Mercier and his colleagues point out, Japan and Western European have universal health care and extensive social safety nets, as opposed to the U.S. The Japanese and the Europeans know their governments will come to their aid in their hour of need. But the laissez-faire attitudes of American society make people’s futures less certain and the belief in a benevolent God more attractive.” (Ludden 2018). This quote is to reflex that not only does religion influence the world but outside forces also influence a religion. People turn to God when the world has turned against them so it makes sense that underdeveloped countries have higher religious rates. It's the same when a dying atheist suddenly turns toward religion in his last moments, to have some sort of safety net. Religion is the escape, the light at the end of the tunnel for those who have nothing. Religion gives hope and peace, it brings people comfort in times or anxiety but if you're not worrying about where your next meal will come or if you have a safe place to sleep tonight or how you’ll get clean water then you don’t see God's guiding light as a necessity in your life.

Religion can promote people to be more aware of how others in their community view them. But it also leads to judging your neighbors and the way they live their life. It promotes a sense of community but also a sense of keeping up with the joneses. People have to make themselves look better than their neighbors. They convince themselves that the way they are living their life is more moral than another because they are living in a religious community that encourages this train of thought. This article by the Association for Psychological Science explains how religion influences  a person's self control. How growing up in a religion can influence how a person views themselves in a community. “It’s not entirely clear what cognitive mechanism is at work in religion’s influence on self-control. One possibility is that religion makes people mindful of an ever watchful God, and thus encourages more self-monitoring. Or religious priming may activate concerns of supernatural punishment. A more secular explanation is that religious priming makes people more concerned about their reputation in the community, leading to more careful self-monitoring.”(Ludden 2018). The quote I have chosen shows how religion influences how people act in their social groups. It is another example of how religion can have physiological effects on people. It influences how they see themselves, how they see their neighbors and how they act around their neighbors. Religion influences how people act the same way we would train a pet, through punishment and reward. You do something good and moral, you follow the rules we set for you, you go to Heaven, Nirvana, Paradise, Moksha, you get blessed. If you're bad and break the rules you go to Hell, Hades, Samsara, you get punished. It is the same idea of when people use cautionary tales to scare young children into following the rules and being good.

While religious influence can definitely have a negative effect on the masses it can also have a positive effect as well. The article by the heritage foundation talks about all of the positive things religion does for a person and community. Religion can influence people to become better by not smoking or drinking. It can encourage people to reach out and help those in need. It promotes the necessity of family and also gives young children a support system in case they can’t go to family. Religious influence has negative effects and positive effects just like anything else. Considerable evidence indicates that religious involvement reduces "such problems as sexual permissiveness, teen pregnancy, suicide, drug abuse, alcoholism, and to some extent deviant and delinquent acts, and increases self esteem, family cohesiveness and general well being. Some religious influences have a modest impact whereas another portion seem like the mental equivalent of nuclear energy. More generally, social scientists are discovering the continuing power of religion to protect the family from the forces that would tear it down." (Fagan). This quote is to show the positive effect religion can have on one's life. It can give people hope and provide a strong moral compass for people. It gives young children strong morals to grow up with and a support system they can go to outside of their parents. Religion can provide good life advice and hope to those living in troubling times. It helps people from dark physiological places and even out of dangerous situations. It offers support and love to those with nowhere else to turn.

Gretchen Ely is a proffessor and assosiate dean at the university of buffalo writes an artical about the abortion policies in other contries and what those countries predominant religion is. She writes about how strict laws are purposly put into effect to create it harder for a person to afford an abortion. She talks about how such laws and acts are advocated specifically by christian politicians in the United states. “Title X funds have never been used to pay for abortion services. But by eliminating funding for facilities that offer abortions in addition to other reproductive services, the Trump administration rule may leave millions of low-income Planned Parenthood patients without family planning care. The new rule is part of an old American effort, promoted by Christian activists and lawmakers, to make legal abortions as difficult as possible to obtain”(Ely 2020). The quote i have choosen supports my reasearch because it gives an example of how religouse influence can affect reproductive health, specifically abortion and how abortion can be a nessecity to women all over the world but due to some out dated laws influenced by certian belifs abortion are hard to get in certian areas of the world. 

Huffpost published an article entitled A Detrimental Influence: The Effect Religion has on Laws. The article goes on to explain the influence religion has on laws. It gives example such as how same-sex marrige used to be illegal in some states. It talks about certain forms of contraception are illegal because the predominant religion has placed a large importance on procreation. Not to long ago same-sex marrige was illegale until suprime court ruled against it. The laws against same-sex amrrige where all completly based on religion and personal befeifs. In no way was it causing any harm to anyone and yet it was still illegal. “Religion should remain what it truly is — a voluntary belief, not science and not law. One of the main issues in the world today is the fact that to some people, religion and the Bible or the Torah or the Qur’an is science and the law. This belief has, and still is, causing fatal problems throughout the world. In many places, forms of contraception are illegal. Even if these women are extremely impoverished, and cannot feed themselves (let alone a child), and have a large chance of dying due to unsafe birth conditions, they have no choice but to have the baby. Even more controversial is the issue of abortion. 52 of the world’s 196 countries only allow abortions to save the mother’s life. That is 26 percent of the world. This prevents family planning worldwide and can be extremely detrimental to a woman’s mental and physical health.”(Veselka 2012). The quote i chose from the huffpost article is important because it explains why religion should not be in lawmaking. It gives examples of how religion can influence people's personal lives by changing laws such as who they can or can not marry. Religion in many ways is a person's opinion. While it is important to have an opinion they shouldn’t be the determining factor in law making. If you decide to create a law based purely on your opinion you force everyone to follow something they don’t agree with. You're forcing your opinion on other people. Religion Is good to give people a moral compass. Don’t steal, don’t murder, don’t lie, all good advice from a moral stand point.

Religious influence has touched all across history, from ancient Greeks writing stories of gods on mountains to modern day religious persecution and wars. Religion has had influence in law making and reproductive health policies. Religion gives people a safety net and a place to fall back on in times of crisis. But religious influence has also caused great harm to others in extreme cases when fear and hate controls a religion. It helped ancient people explain the world around them and this does this for others today. People don’t realize how much religion influences everything around them and sometimes for the worse. In some cases religious influence does not belong in society, when it causes fear and hate, when it tries to control its members. But there is no denying that without religion the society and world we live in would be a much different place.

[365footballorg-blog]

Blackburn Rovers promoted: How Tony Mowbray turned club and his own career around

“I got a lot of texts when I took this job from a lot of very experienced people saying I was a glutton for punishment.”

Speaking to BBC One’s Football Focus before Blackburn Rovers’ last game of the 2016-17 Championship season, Tony Mowbray and his side were staring down the barrel of relegation to League One.

Rovers were an established Premier League club at the start of the decade, but the drop to the third tier rounded off a miserable few years containing countless managers, protests from fans against owners Venky’s, expensive transfer failures and spiralling debt.

It was an all-too familiar scenario for a manager who had started that season at another club, in Coventry, with well-publicised ownership and financial issues of their own.

Since his appointment in February 2017[1] as Rovers’ seventh boss in five seasons however, Mowbray has overseen a change in fortunes at Ewood Park.

He has led them back to the second tier at the first time of asking thanks to victory against Doncaster[2] on Tuesday, but how has he turned the club and his own career around?

Adapting to the third tier

Former West Bromwich Albion, Celtic and Middlesbrough boss Mowbray joined Blackburn five months after resigning as manager of the Sky Blues.[3]

Blackburn took 22 points from their final 15 Championship matches, more than any other team in the bottom seven, but even that was not enough to survive.

They beat Brentford 3-1[4] away from home on a frantic final day of the season, but Rovers were relegated to the third tier on goal difference after Nottingham Forest and Birmingham City also won.

An immediate promotion back to the second tier looked a long way away in October when Rovers lost 1-0 at Oldham,[5] leaving them 10th in the table and 12 points off leaders Wigan and second-placed Shrewsbury.

But it was season-defining. Since that defeat, they have lost just once in League One.

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“I think we’ve found different ways to win games. We talked early in the season about our defence and we’ve been playing a little bit deeper and on the counter attack to score in transition since,” Mowbray told BBC Radio Lancashire.

“The Oldham game changed the way we played. We had to be more positive in this league and stop letting teams that weren’t as good or had as good players as us have too much of the ball against us.

“After 12 games we were well behind Wigan and Shrewsbury so in the last 30-odd games we accrued a lot of points. It did take some time to acclimatise to the league and the new players needed time to settle in.

“We stepped higher up the pitch and started scoring a lot of goals and that’s given us confidence.”

Rebuilding a disconnect with the fans

Since buying the club in 2010, owners Venky’s have had a fractured relationship with Rovers’ fan base – heightened during the club’s slide from the Premier League to the third tier during their eight years at the helm.

Some Blackburn supporters have protested and organised boycotts[6] against the owners since their arrival and there were fears that the 1994-95 Premier League champions could slip into further financial trouble after their relegation last season.

Local businessmen Ian Battersby and Ian Currie, through their company Seneca Partners, contacted Venky’s with a joint-ownership proposal in May 2016 that was rejected,[7] while debts have also risen to more than £100m since the club lost their Premier League status in 2012.

After being given “full support”[8] by Venky’s after their relegation, Mowbray may have turned the club’s form around, but has he managed to win over the fans with his side’s consistent form leading them to promotion?

“He’s the first manager in this ownership who’s expressed empathy towards the supporters. No one has ever reached out to the extent that Mowbray has,” Oliver Jones, vice chairman of the Rovers Trust, told BBC Sport.

“Increasingly since relegation from the Premier League, we’ve heard less and less from the owners. We finally got lucky with a manager who’s taken us up but from a supporters’ trust point of view, we’ve hived off concentrating on the ownership.

“We can’t keep having that monkey around our neck and it hanging over us all the time. Promotion is the first major step forward in seven years of ownership but bizarrely it’s after 18 months of no noise from them.”

Mowbray, meanwhile, is happy that one of his teams have enjoyed a successful campaign, despite the club having a fan base that is hard to please.

“Football is difficult because fans generally expect you to win and (when you lose) the newspapers, the phone-ins and the shows are all negative, whether your budget’s the lowest or highest in the league,” Mowbray continued.

“But it’s actually been nice to be competitive in this division and they’ve had to step up to the mark.”

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Rebuilding his career

After the chaos of relegation last season, Mowbray has kept key players and shored up the beleaguered club with some astute signings.

Despite not spending much of the £20m brought in from the sales of Jordan Rhodes, Rudy Gestede, Tom Cairney, Grant Hanley and Shane Duffy in seasons gone by, Mowbray has brought in Gillingham’s Bradley Dack[9] for £750,000 as well as striker Dominic Samuel[10] and defender Amari’i Bell[11] to aid their push for promotion.

Dack, who has contributed 18 goals from midfield, was named League One Player of the Year at the English Football League Awards earlier this month.

Mowbray enjoyed success early in his managerial career with Hibernian, guiding the Edinburgh club to back-to-back top-four finishes for the first time in more than 30 years, before winning the Championship title with West Brom in 2008 with a brand of eye-catching football.

But relative failures followed at Celtic and Middlesbrough – both clubs where he had hero status as a player – as well as Coventry, where his side suffered a late-season slump to miss out on promotion from League One in his only full season in charge.

“I’ve enjoyed the fact that we’ve had a team with players that can win games. I’ve managed clubs where realistically it’s been very difficult to get into the top two or top six,” Mowbray continued.

“I’ve sat in offices after games and thought ‘I wish we had the budget’ or ‘I wish we had the players’ and I’ve been on the other end of it.”

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‘Fans can be proud of Mowbray’s team’

Analysis: BBC Radio Lancashire’s Andy Bayes

After taking a little while to settle in to life in League One, Rovers fully deserve the position that they find themselves in. One defeat since 14 October in the league is promotion form in anyone’s book.

The appointment of Mowbray has brought authority, leadership and a degree of calmness to a club that was crying out for it.

Mowbray oversaw the departures of 12 senior players and replaced them with ones he had either worked with before or been impressed by when he was in charge of Coventry.

He has found a position for Dack to flourish. Experienced players like Danny Graham and Charlie Mulgrew have been crucial to the cause, in Graham’s case particularly since the turn of the year.

Mulgrew’s 14 goals this season have been the most by a defender in one season in the club’s history and if Adam Armstrong scores once more, it would be the first time in 60 years that four players have reached double figures in the same season.

Rovers have had much publicised problems over recent years but Mowbray has created a team that the long-suffering fans can be proud of. Now they are over the line, he will not be settling for just making up the numbers in the second tier.

He has become a very popular manager in a relatively short space of time. Supporters feel that he is sensible and realistic about his objectives for the club and hope that moving back to the Championship is only the start.

References

^ his appointment in February 2017 (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ victory against Doncaster (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ resigning as manager of the Sky Blues. (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ beat Brentford 3-1 (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ lost 1-0 at Oldham, (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ organised boycotts (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ that was rejected, (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ “full support” (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ brought in Gillingham’s Bradley Dack (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ striker Dominic Samuel (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ defender Amari’i Bell (www.bbc.co.uk)

BBC Sport – Football

Blackburn Rovers promoted: How Tony Mowbray turned club and his own career around was originally published on 365 Football