#but until it's actually confirmed on-screen (or in another canon source but something like this will probably be on-screen)

[nattikay]

gentle reminder that the A2 script pages that have been going around from the Blu-ray bonuses are from an old/outdated version of the script, and anything that isn't shown in the final film cannot automatically be considered canon, whether it's scene/dialogue changes, character details, lore details, etc.

Stuff gets changed and/or cut for a reason, be it because they didn't have time for it, decided to go in a different direction for the character/lore, decided the scene should be moved to a later movie, or anything else.

It's fun to see alternate versions of the story that could-have-been, and if you want to play with concepts based on the script in headcanon or fanfiction, feel free of course...but be very very cautious about considering any of it "canon" until/unless another source confirms it (such as how the Tsu'tey's Path comics confirm some of the A1 deleted scenes).

[jesssssah]

Just Like Love 3/5 (Werewolves of London)

Gif source

Fandom: Queer as Folk (US TV 2022)

Ship: Mingus/Brodie

Rating: M

Warnings: Angst. Canon HIV-Positive Character. Sexual Content.

Summary: For the MF Halloween Bingo. A year on from the teardown party, Mingus and Brodie encounter each other again. As they reacquaint during a kayaking tour, and then a Halloween-themed party at Babylon, they realise the only things that have changed much in a year are the ones they think they have control of. Everything else has stayed the same; Mingus is still besotted and Brodie still feels like a fuckup.

Update is below the cut.

Or you can start from Chapter 1 on AO3 here.

_________

Judy merges left, onto the I-10, and into traffic that’s moving comfortably on what feels to Mingus like a perfect Saturday morning in late August. From the front passenger side, as her sky blue Pontiac takes them both north towards the Twin Span bridge — where beyond is the boat launch site at Pearl River — Mingus smiles to themself as they look out the window and imagine, projected out into that bright, dream-filled void of possible things, what unforgettable thing Brodie’s wearing today. They really hope it’s something sleeveless.

They look down at their own choice of outfit and fiddle with a hem on their loose-fit swim trunks. On top is an oversized, V-neck hockey sweatshirt and on their feet are an old pair of black, pull-on Adidas Actives. In their backpack is a change of clothes except for shoes — way cuter stuff than their activewear — and they secretly hope they will need it so that in front of Brodie they can glow up in especially the red checkered shirt and cream vest combination they only just got at the Buffalo Exchange last weekend.

The song playing on the Pontiac’s stereo — one of many retro-fits by one of Judy’s many ex-boyfriends, Mingus forgets exactly which one — comes to an end and they lean back in their seat and find the bop as the first piano bars of Warren Zevon’s 1977 recording of ‘Werewolves of London’ start a lazy trip through the speakers. It’s a nice beat to roll out over a sparkling body of water to as the car’s dated motor swaps from a laboured whine to a big cat purr when the road flattens out, now Judy is guiding their ways across the bridge that spans it.

“You know,” Mingus thinks aloud, reaching for their phone, which is connected to the car’s auxiliary charger, another hack by another of Judy’s exes, “this could actually be a good song for drag if something else was added. But I dunno what yet.” They start a search in their iTunes library, scrolling through ‘Art Angels’ by Grimes, still a go-to album for mashing tunes with. Although at a quick glance, they’re not sure it fits as well as something else might with this, so they close the app and start a Google search instead. “Or maybe if somebody has covered it, or something…” 

“Oh?” From the corner of their eye they see Judy give them a quick glance, kind of askance, and in between checking for traffic as she changes lanes. “Well, honey…that would be great!”

“I’m not saying I’m thinking of doing it, Mom.”

“Oh, I know. I learned my lesson. I don’t rush you back into your drag anymore.”

“You never really did. It was fine.”

“Well…”

“It was fine,” Mingus assures her, chuckling. “Really.”

“Oka-ay…”

The song lyrics bubble up again to take the place of a conversation they might otherwise develop as Mingus takes the opportunity to give up the online search which they only really began half-heartedly anyway, and instead they slip back into something they’re a lot more full-body invested in, which is to find the confirmation from Brodie again that he is still coming kayaking today. 

They slide down in their seat, bare hairy knees cramming up against the glovebox, and pull their phone screen closer to their face, green eyes taking in every pixel of the ‘eyes’ emoji he posted below the message Mingus sent him a week ago to check. Which he finally replied to late last night because until then Mingus hadn’t actually heard a thing from Brodie since back in July.

Their lips part and their pupils blow out, and their toes inside their sneakers start a helpless curl at just the sight of his name on the screen. Distant memories of him in states of undress flash through Mingus’ head again, and the more recent reminder of how warm his arms are, namely how warm his shoulder was when Mingus closed the little gap between them as they’d sat outside the puppet theatre together on that waning afternoon, when Mingus had asked Brodie out. 

Even though, outwardly, Mingus had downplayed that angle, the date angle. Brodie’s never been their boyfriend as such. But they hope, only outwardly, that Brodie had downplayed that too. And that inwardly he had remembered it, as clearly as Mingus had then: that one time when Bussey had mistaken him for their boyfriend as such. 

After all, Brodie hadn’t reopened that little gap between their bodies that day, back in July. He’d sat there too, with his shoulder pressed back to Mingus’ on the curb for some perfect quantity of minutes after that, just talking to them again. Brodie with his big hand squeezed around theirs for some of it and stroking their fingertips for the rest. Surely remembering, just like they were, all the other things of Mingus’ that Brodie has ever squeezed and stroked. And that part about a boyfriend again.

Mingus sighs.

“Is, um… Is everything okay?” Judy asks them.

“Mm-hm.”

“He better not be standing you up.”

“He’s not, Mom.”

“But would you actually tell me if he was?”

“Hm…maybe?”

“Mingus…”

“Of course I would tell you if he stood me up. You’re my ride back, I’m not exactly gonna walk for forty-five miles.”

���Or hitch, okay?”

“Or hitch.”

“Do you promise?”

“I promise.”

“Alright… Well, thank you for making that promise, baby.”

“He’s definitely coming, I checked.” Mingus holds the phone up for Judy, showing her the message, and smiling. “See? He confirmed.”

“Well… Wait, what is that? An ‘eyes’ emoji? Mingus… That is not confirmation!”

“Mom, it’s Brodie. It doesn’t get much more confirmed than that. Trust me, it’s fine.”

“Listen, honey? Now, I know you know this already but I just want you to know it again… I never mean to interfere when it comes to you and cute boys, and I’m really glad you wanna use your present but baby, I do just worry that sometimes, when—”

“Mom, I know.” Mingus closes their message app and sets the phone down, screen down, on their thigh. “I appreciate this again, I really do. But you haven’t talked to Brodie lately. He’s different now. He got a year older too.”

If they thought she looked askance at them before, Judy definitely looks askance at them now. And Mingus laughs out loud, half in exasperation and most of the other half in excitement, but the tiny little bit left over is like a little mask for the tiny little part left inside themself that actually doesn’t feel like laughing at all. That actually fears she might be right. Again.

But half an hour later, when the Pontiac pulls up in the car park, there Brodie is. He looks hot as fuck, and his top is sleeveless. And Mingus can’t get out of the car soon enough, their big feet getting caught up in the straps of their backpack on the way. They gather their long legs quickly, and untangle, hoping Brodie didn’t notice a thing. Except, as Mingus straightens up to reach their full height proudly, the same height as Brodie when Mingus wears flats, for how fetching they know they look in sports sunglasses.

“Remember—” Judy starts, reminding Mingus she’s still there.

“Mom!” they hiss, bending back down and dipping their shades to glare at her through the open window. “I’ll be careful, okay? I promise that too. I’ll be with Brodie, I’ll be fine… But I gotta go, he’s already here! Why is he early too? I thought—”

“Mingus, breathe, for gosh sakes… I was gonna say have fun… And also, honey, don’t call me if you tip out and fall in and get taken off by a gator or something, okay? Because I’ll actually be in Lacombe until at least one o’clock and I won’t be able to do much about it until then.”

Mingus stares at her open-mouthed.

“I’m kidding!” Judy says, laughing. “We’re actually hooking up in Mandeville… Two person private day spa… Best part?” She wiggles her eyebrows suggestively. “He’s paying.” 

Mingus groans, unfolding again. “Mom, remember those things we used to call boundaries? Can we get those back? Because I really miss them.”

“Old people have sex too, you know. It’s not a big deal. I have sex, Mingus. It’s how you were conceived.”

“Mom… Leave. Please?”

“Remember I love you!”

“Love you too.”

They close the door without regret at that point but blow multitudinous kisses through the air at the back of the sight of her head through the rear windscreen, when Judy finally turns the car around and goes, waving wildly at them through the open, driver side window, and leaving a trail of dust in her wake. Through which, when it clears, the alluring figure of Brodie re-emerges.

“Hey,” he says, and Mingus’ knees go weak when his brown eyes sweep their body up and down, and the little gap between his front teeth is revealed by the extent of the full smile it brings to his face.

“Hi,” Mingus says back, flashing their wrist when their oversized sleeve slips down their forearm as they give him a little wave, and their cutest smile back. “Ready to get eaten by gators?”

Brodie snorts. “Oh my god… I swear to god, I’m gonna have a heart attack if we actually see any gators.”

“Well, we will. It’s a swamp. They’re, like, the drawcard. If we don’t see gators, I’m asking for my money back.”

Brodie laughs. “You didn’t even pay for this!”

“Hey!” Mingus chuckles back. “Are you implying I’m cheap?”

“Would I really do something like that?”

“Yes.”

Brodie bumps his muscled shoulder straight across into Mingus’ more lithe one playfully as they start to walk side by side, and Mingus’ stomach does a little somersault at how even a playful touch like that by Brodie is strong, like he’s indelible. And like he shares a little bit of that with Mingus with each touch, each time, and never by accident. Like he wants Mingus to have it. Like his strength is a gift he could never grow tired of giving to them. And Mingus could never grow tired of letting him do that.

“So, how have you been?” Brodie asks. “Alright?”

“Yeah, fine.”

When they reach the check-in shed, they collect their paddles, life vests, and a dry box for storing their dry clothes and phones in. Then they walk, led by their guide and accompanied by about a dozen others, down a worn path to the launching place on the edge of the river. As Mingus holds the paddles, the dry box on the ground by their feet, Brodie removes his tank top and pulls a stick of insect repellent from a pocket inside his cargo shorts. He starts to slather it over his arms and legs, and Mingus only tears his eyes away once he stops, straightens up and hands the stick of repellant over to them.

“Could you do my back?” he asks. “I can’t reach and I always get bitten.”

“Ah, sure,” Mingus says, laying the paddles and their life vest down on the ground, and taking up the repellant as Brodie turns around.

They roll it over the width of his back and down the length of his spine, smoothing it out with their hands over his thick traps, underneath the blades of his shoulders, and across his tight hips. Only stopping at the waistband of his shorts. His muscles feel perfect when Mingus presses into them and his skin feels soft and hot to the touch when Brodie leans back into theirs, countering the pressure of Mingus’ hands against him.

“Do you want some too?” Brodie asks, once they finish and pass the repellant back to him. “Or are you already covered?” 

Brodie stuffs his tank top into the dry box, then starts to put his life vest on.

“Um,” Mingus answers, watching his ripped chest and upper abs disappear behind the padded panels and buckles, and the sight catches them unprepared for just long enough to be brutally honest. “Well, I have my sweatshirt…”

“Legs though?” he asks while he bends to pick up Mingus’ life vest, and pass it to them.

They blink from behind their shades, brain suddenly jerking back into gear. “Oh, yeah…”

Brodie grins, crouches down, and then he starts swiping a series of quick, assured stripes of bright white repellent down Mingus’ long legs, while Mingus fits their vest around themself. Halfway through buckling up, Brodie taps their hip to indicate they need to turn around, so he can do the backs of their legs too, and while Brodie rubs the creamy balm into their calves and shins, Mingus smears it across their own thighs. Once the cream is all rubbed in, Brodie wipes his hands off across the back of his own neck, and Mingus does the same to theirs before they reach across to gently glide the tips of their fingers up and down one side of Brodie’s neck, just beneath his ear.

“Oh, did I miss a spot?” he asks.

“Um…yeah?” Mingus answers.

Still grinning, Brodie clicks his tongue and shakes his head. “Get in,” he says through a muffled groan, thrusting the stick of repellant at the kayak they’ll be sharing.

“You first.”

“Okay.” He bends down to throw the repellant into the dry box with everything else, then lifts it up and stows it down the nose of the kayak. He puts one foot in the back but before he plants his second, he reaches out for Mingus. “Here, take my hand. Let me help you?”

Mingus glances a few kayaks down the dock to where their guide is helping another pair of people board.

“I’ve got you.” His voice is deep and sure. “I promise.”

They reach out for Brodie, take his hand, and take a cautious step into the front of the kayak. When they wobble as they leave solid ground completely, taking their other foot off too, they feel his other hand firm against their hip, and hold them there until Mingus finds their balance on both feet inside the boat, as well as the awareness that this isn’t really all that different from skateboarding now. Even surfing, which they tried a couple of times one summer when they were ten. Judy was seeing a guy who lived at Holly Beach. 

But more than knowing they might know how to do this already is knowing that Brodie is there, just in case they don’t. Like they thought as they farewelled Judy, when Brodie is there, things may not go perfect but they end up okay. When Brodie is there, they are always alright. After all, he saved their life. Theirs. In a club full of people it was Mingus he held inside his arms, protected when shots rang out.

They shimmy their feet, rocking the kayak from side to side as they find their swamp legs and their confidence again. Brodie cusses from behind them, loud enough to draw the attention of their guide, who is still several yards up the bank. Mingus laughs and Brodie cusses some more before he pulls Mingus down by the hem of their sweatshirt, and their ass finds the front seat of the kayak.

“Do. Not. Tip. Us.” Brodie’s voice is as serious as Mingus thinks he’s ever heard it.

“I will protect you from the gators if we tip,” they swear in answer, leaning back in the flexible seat until they can rest their head against the front of Brodie’s life vest, and look up at him.

Mingus watches his face while they feel him, through the thick layers of their own life vest, place one spreadeagled hand across the centre of their chest as he steadies himself against them there, and leans over one side of the kayak. And when he leans back, he has the paddles in his hand. He lays them along the deck of the boat.

“With what exactly?” Brodie asks, pushing off from the bank with his arm when the guide calls out to let the whole group know it’s time to launch.

Cypress trees, silhouetted against the sky, move behind his head, and Mingus hears the sound of water lapping gently on the outside of the kayak as they glide out from the bank and onto the river proper. 

“Oh, you know, my charms,” Mingus answers, smiling up at Brodie who’s paddling solo, the second paddle stowed down the inside of the kayak beside Mingus by now. “No going to thy deathbeds here.”

“Deathbeds?”

“Yeah, you know, Ophelia? It’s Hamlet…” They contemplate telling Brodie how they know about Ophelia but they stop short of mentioning Ruthie. It was Miss O’Neill who’d taught them Shakespeare in high school. Or tried. “I mean, all I ever really read was the CliffsNotes.”

“All I know,” Brodie says, “is that you seem to have it in your head that somehow you leaning back like this and not paddling at all will somehow miraculously save us from elements that you would happily tip us out into. Because you somehow miraculously think reptiles are not immune to your charms.”

“Oh… So you are acknowledging that I have charms?”

Brodie frowns theatrically. “How am I letting you lay in my lap and talk to me like this? And also managing to call me a reptile…”

“Charms, Brodie! My! Charms!”

Brodie laughs so hard he drops his paddle. “Shit…”

Mingus closes their eyes in pleasure at the thoughts that are swimming through their head now, content to listen to Brodie deal with the paddle situation on his own. 

“So,” they say, feeling happy and unashamedly flirting with him now, “you are telling me, in your round-a-bout way, that you do think I’m charming. Aren't you.” 

Drops of water fall like rain across Mingus' bare legs as Brodie swings the recovered paddle over the boat, and they hear it clatter against the inside of the kayak as Brodie stows it there, with the other one, for the moments it takes him to place his hand palm-down on Mingus' forehead, which feels cool from being in the river water, still slightly wet. But Mingus doesn't mind.

Brodie sweeps their curls back from there, and then he does it again. “Would you like me to tell you that more clearly?” he asks. “If I do that, will it mean you'll sit up and paddle?”

Mingus stomach does another little somersault. “Yes.”

Suddenly his warm cheek is pressed against Mingus’ cheek. And they can smell his moisturiser, and the cologne he wears, mixed in with the insect repellent when his lips are against their ear.

“You’re charming, Mingus,” Brodie whispers. “And you're charming too, Chickie-Ophelia.”

_________

Thanks for reading. Archived here on AO3.

[tolkiens-middleearth]

Some thoughts on Amazon's LOTR series...

When the show was first announced, I was both excited and worried.

Excited, because Tolkien's Middle-earth is one of the fictional creations that is most dear to me.

Worried, because Tolkien's Middle-earth is one of the fictional creations that is most dear to me.

Any fan would be intrigued by the idea of seeing such a work on screen, be it on TV or in the cinema. But of course there is also always the risk of a show or series not matching one's own imagination.

It's not a bad thing if what's on screen does not match your own imagination. But it can be frustrating. Wanting to like something but not being able to is very, very frustrating.

So far not much is known about Amazon's LOTR series, it's too early to give a final verdict before the show has even aired. However, based on the recent Vanity Fair article and some leaks, I can at least say for sure that I don't have any hopes left for this show. There is of course the possibility of a miracle, I could actually end up liking the show against all odds.

But as it stands, it's quite unlikely, and so I want to analyse my disappointment and frustrations with all the news I've seen and read so far, starting with the confirmed information.

The Vanity Fair Article

For a long time, there was barely any information about this show available. The Vanity Fair article is now our first official source of information for this show.

Timline

In the novels, the aforementioned things take place over thousands of years, but Payne and McKay have compressed events into a single point in time. It is their biggest deviation from the text, and they know it’s a big swing. “We talked with the Tolkien estate,” says Payne. “If you are true to the exact letter of the law, you are going to be telling a story in which your human characters are dying off every season because you’re jumping 200 years in time, and then you’re not meeting really big, important canon characters until season four. Look, there might be some fans who want us to do a documentary of Middle-earth, but we’re going to tell one story that unites all these things." – Vanity Fair

The Second Age is a very long age. It is more than 3000 years long and contains various different events. The foundation of Númenor is at its beginning. The creation of the Rings of Power is in its middle. The downfall of Númenor is at its end.

The Vanity Fair article keeps pointing out that Elrond is young – but born at the end of the First Age, Elrond is only really young at the beginning of the Second Age. At the time of the creation of the Rings he would be already 1500 years old, and at the end of the Second Age over 3000 years. Considering that a young Elrond is around in the show at the same time when Isildur and Ar-Pharazôn are around means that the whole Second Age has been reduced to a very short timeline. Galadriel hunting down "the last remnants of [Morgoth's and Sauron's] collaborators" is another indicator that all these three major events are coming together.

Compressing these things into the short period of a human lifetime is a huge problem:

Númenor as it exists in Tolkien's Middle-earth cannot exist in Amazons LOTR series: the long history is missing, both the rise to the impressive kingdom that it came to be and its slow decline.

If Númenor actually has exitsted prior to the Second Age, it has a different history. It is no longer Andor, the Land of Gift, nor can its special characteristics come from the Valar.

The Elves barely had time to leave for Valinor, and a large part of their history will be lost: Elrond was over a thousand years old when he lead Gil-galad's troups into battle against Sauron. Gil-galad and Celebrimbor had time to found cities and realms in Lindon and Eregion. Elrond's brother Elros was King of Númenor for 500 years, is there now any room left for him?

Having the Fall of Númenor so close after the creation of the Rings of Power also means that there is no real threat coming from Sauron. There is no Dark Lord here, ruling the East and South of Middle-earth for half an age, there is just a couple of years left for Sauron between creating the One Ring and losing it in the War against the Last Alliance. It all happens in the lifetime of one man (that man being Isildur).

There is more to this of course, but these are the first major points to make here. The epic stories that Tolkien wrote were built on the centuries of history of that world. You can't cheat your way out of it.

Ridiculing fans by claiming that they want them "to do a documentary of Middle-earth" is unfair, because time matters in any story. Unfortunately series and film makers alike don't understand this anymore these days, and the stories shown on TV and in the cinema suffer because of it.

Middle-earth

“One of the very specific things the texts say is that hobbits never did anything historic or noteworthy before the Third Age,” says McKay. “But really, does it feel like Middle-earth if you don’t have hobbits or something like hobbits in it?”

– Vanity Fair

Here is a showrunner saying "I know this is not what Tolkien wrote but I'm going to ignore it" word for word. There are indeed no Hobbits during the Second Age in Tolkien's Middle-earth, nor any proto-Hobbits. Middle-earth was Middle-earth long before Tolkien invented Bilbo. Together with the quote that this material is "sometimes scary—and sometimes very intense, sometimes quite political, sometimes quite sophisticated—but it’s also heartwarming and life-affirming and optimistic" it makes me wonder if the showrunners understand the difference between the stories told in The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings and the stories told in the Quenta Silmarillion or the Akallabêth. The Quenta Silmarillion as published in 1977 ends with the following sentence:

"If it has passed from the high and the beautiful to darkness and ruin, that was of old the fate of Arda Marred; and if any change shall come and the Marring be amended, Manwë and Varda may know; but they have not revealed it, and it is not declared in the dooms of Mandos." – J.R.R. Tolkien. The Silmarillion.

That sounds like a very different tone to me – and the Akallabêth is the same. Galadriel spoke about fighting "the long defeat". Tolkien wrote that there is "little fun or earthiness but mostly grief and disaster".

The conflict of the high and the beautiful with the darkness and ruin was a central element of these stories. The optimistic part was based on hope and faith in Eru – and I have serious doubts that the series will even allude to that.

And then there are changes that have no foundation in Tolkien's lore at all. Some will be mentioned further down in the text, and here I just want to ask: what is this supposed to be and why do these people carry moose antlers on their backs?

And if it's not a weird look like this, it feels like a cheap look, at least going by the pictures. It's hard to imagine that Amazon has spent so much money on this production.

The Characters

I can't go as deep into the character and peoples analysis as I would like to, simply because it costs a lot of time and noone will read it. I want to discuss a few issues nontheless.

The Elves

Tolkien had described the Elves as the "fairest of all earthly creatures". Elves weren't just humans with pointy ears, but in a way the personification of human dreams and desires – completely unreachable. People so much like us but also so much unlike us.

Now it's impossible for any production to make us humans more beautiful than we actually are. But wouldn't it be possible to make them seem a bit more than they actually are? To make them appear a bit different, a bit other, a bit more?

Amazon's LOTR series certainly doesn't think so – instead it makes the Elves look as mundane as the friendly neighbore next door doing cosplay.

The first look on Elrond was disappointing for me, and probably the most frustrating part of that whole reveal. While Robert Aramayo certainly isn't ugly for human standards, for me there is no trace of Elvishness in his face. The fact that Elrond and Arondir (the only other male Elf with a picture) both have short hair makes them both look even more normal and human. They have pointy ears, that's it. Cover up the ears and you won't know the difference between Elves and Men. It's a very modern look for a story that is supposed to take place at least about 9000 years in the past.

Individually these characters come with their own problems in their designs and descriptions, too. I have mentioned Elrond's age and I'll do it again: he was an Half-Elf, aging slower than Men, but not as slow as Elves. When he was born, his father – a Half-Elf as well – was barely 30. And Elrond's brother Elros was old enough to become King of Númenor at the beginning of the Second Age. In addition, he is described as an "architect and politician" – and there is not really any trace of that in Tolkien's writings. Elrond was a healer, and Imladris was founded as a refuge, not as an architecture project. Elrond wasn't really a politican either, he was a subject of Gil-galad while he was alive, and and advisor later on.

Galadriel's character doesn't seem to fit Tolkien's idea of her either. While it is true that Galadriel was physically fit and did fight in her early years, her role in Middle-earth was a different one. As Melian's student she became calmer and wiser. In the show it seems she takes over the role of Elrond as "commander of the Northern Armies" (since there are no other armies in the north but Gil-galad's). There is also the little bit of her hunting down those who had killed her brother... more on that later.

The only other Elf we see is Arondir, and he is a made up Silvan Elf. As it was clear that Amazon would go for a more diverse cast, the most irritating thing about his design is the very short hair that I have already mentioned, and the fact that there is a bearded guy on his armour. Does that mean Elves get beards now, too? Another thing that made me role my eyes is the "forbidden love" between him and what appears to be a mortal woman. I guess I have to be content that it's at least not a romance plot between an Elf and a Dwarf, right? Right??

Dwarves

Speaking of beards: someone who should have a beard and doesn't is the dwarf princess Disa.

Appendix A of The Lord of the Rings clearly states that the dwarf-women "are in voice and appearance, and in garb if they must go on a journey, so like to the dwarf-men that the eyes and ears of other peoples cannot tell them apart".

Disa does not look at all like the male dwarf example that we were given (nor does the male dwarf look like her). Neither her face nor her clothes feel particulary dwarvish to me. The beard is missing, the gold jewerly looks cheap, and the clothes are... overall very undefined. Not the clothes I would imagine a princess living under the mountains to wear. Without the jewelery it would look more like the dress of an Elven maid on a warm summer day, and with the jewelery it looks more like someone living in the warm south, like a queen of Harad. Dwarvish it is not.

The Rings of Power

Funnily enough, one of the things that irritate me most is in the title of the series. The articles says about the Rings of Power in the series:

All this will center, eventually, around the incident that gives the trilogy its name. “The forging of the rings,” says McKay. “Rings for the elves, rings for dwarves, rings for men, and then the one ring Sauron used to deceive them all. It’s the story of the creation of all those powers, where they came from, and what they did to each of those races.” – Vanity Fair

Interestingly enough, the story of the Rings of Power is split between the Second and the Third Age. For the Elves, the Rings of Power were the cause of Sauron's invasion in Eriador, but aside from that the Rings didn't do anything to the Elves in the Second Age, because the Elves did not use them. They knew they could not use them while Sauron had the One Ring. So the story about the Three Rings of the Elves is, according to Tolkien's writings, not very exciting during the Second Age, once Celebrimbor is dead.

The Rings of the Dwarves are vague enough that more could be said about them in the show, and we pretty much know what happened to the Nine: they slowly but surely turned nine kings of Men into wraiths. Only that there is barely time for it in this condensed timeline now – prolonging their life would only come into effect if the story would take longer than a human lifetime, and it's basically confirmed that there is no time for that. It is doubtful if the nine kings of Men even come into play in this story – maybe in the end it won't really even be about the effects of the rings, and more of the threat that Sauron poses because of his desire for the rings?

Leaks

However, the Vanity Fair article is not our only source of information on Amazon's LOTR show. There have been quite a few leaks posted and collected by https://fellowshipoffans.com, and many have been proven right so far.

And in these leaks there are a couple of story points (not yet confirmed!) that I feel contradict Tolkien's writings heavily:

The are reports of an Orc leader, who is not an Orc, called "Adar" (Sindarin for father) – he is played by Joseph Mawle. There are also rumours that this Adar could indeed be one of Galadriel's brothers (but not Finrod). → If this is the case it means that either Angrod or Aegnor becomes corrupted and ends up as a leader of a group of Orcs, probably in the service of Sauron. Given that one of Galadriel's plotlines seems to be the hunt of those "who claimed the life of her brother" (fun Tolkien's lore fact: actually all her brothers are dead), it doesn't take much imagination to predict that the drama will come from realising that her brother is alive but corrupted.

There are reports on Galadriel coming to Númenor, most likely to ask for aid in the fight against Sauron. → With the condensed timeline, it becomes obvious that there is no space for the growing hositlity of Númenoreans towards Elves that would result in Elves no longer coming to Númenor. Galadriel's changed character also comes into play here, because Galadriel in Tolkien's writings wouldn't have had lots of reason to go to Númenor. Gil-galad and especially Elrond would have had better connections with the Númenoreans.

Speaking of Elves... Charles Edwards as Celebrimbor is all but officially confirmed. → Judging by the looks of the other Elves, make-up won't be of much help for this 52 old guy, so he will most likely look even less Elvish than Elrond or Arondir.

There are reports on a character arriving in Middle-earth as a meteor. And the leaks also say that this "meteor man", as he has been nicknamed by Fellowship of Fans, first appears nice but later on it will be revealed that this guy is in fact not nice. In addition, he apparently comes in contact with the Hobbits. There also have been rumours that Sauron has been seen at the Hobbit set. Furthermore, this character is associated with the poster of the guy holding an apple. → Everything points to this character indeed being Sauron, especially since it's unlikely that either Elf, Men or Dwarf would appear as a meteor. There is absolutely no reason for Sauron to be in the form of a meteor, or to come in contact with Hobbits prior to the business in the Third Age with Gollum, Bilbo and Frodo. This is a huge departure from Tolkien's writings.

There is probably more that I just can't remember right now. Vaguely I remember that Elves-being-turned-into-Orcs came up as a topic, Queen Miriel was mentioned, the actors of Isildur, Elendil and Ar-Pharazôn are known... as far as worrying leaks go, I think I've mentioned the main points.

Imagination

And then there is, of course, the now well know promotion picture of the series that shows Valinor and the Two Trees (the figure is rumoured to be Finrod):

Given all that I know about this show now, I hope we won't see too much of the First Age in this show (although it may seem like we get two whole episodes about it...). Series and movies have a way of overriding your own imagination of places and characters. Without a doubt images of this series will appear all over the internet, you'll see it whether you want to watch the show or not, especially if you discuss Middle-earth online in general. It's not like people know how to tag properly. So I'd rather keep most of the First Age to my own imagination.

I know that I'll try my best to not let these characters override my own imagination of the Tolkien's characters that I have loved for so long. And for me as someone who usually gets easily and quickly attached to characters this is the worst basis for any show to have.

The Vanity Fair article writes:

The driving question behind the production, he adds, was this: “Can we come up with the novel Tolkien never wrote and do it as the mega-event series that could only happen now?”

Unfortunately, everything I've heard about this show so far says that you can't. When they talk about "realizing [Tolkien's] vision of places and characters" it is now quite clear that they either have no idea what Tolkien's visions for these places and characters were, or they simply do not care.

It is no crime not to want to tell Tolkien's stories. But why would you then still try to pretend that you're telling Tolkien's stories? Be honest and do something else!

[multimetaverse]

HSMTMTS 2x12 Review

Second Chances was a lacklustre finale for an uneven season. Let’s dig in!

Earlier this week I re-watched S1 in preparation for the S2 finale and the contrast between the two seasons is jarring. In almost every way S2 has been worse and after seeing this finale I’m less optimistic that Tim will be able to fix the long list of things that have gone wrong. Tim has said in some of his interviews today that pretty much all of S2 was written before the pandemic and that they didn’t have to do as much re-writing as people might think due to the stringent safety measures Disney put in place. Of course, that removes an excuse for the bad writing we’ve seen so much of this season as according to Tim what we saw of S2 is largely what he envisioned minus big crowds and background dancers.

 Across his many interviews today, the one consistent point is that Tim does not have any real plans for future seasons; things like Ricky’s endgame he hasn’t decided on and he can’t even guarantee the summer season the finale sets up due to the weather in Salt Lake. I do think a S3 is an almost certainty given the show’s popularity but I’ll take Tim at his word that he truly doesn’t know if they’ll be renewed since it seems to be a new Disney tradition to wait until seasons are done airing before making a renewal decision (the same thing happened for the popular and well received Mighty Ducks: Game Changers which got a silent renewal only after all of S1 aired). That being said as poor of a season finale as Second Chances is it is also a terrible potential series finale. In large part it goes back to his lack of planning, he wants to keep all options open but in doing so Tim is crippling the show’s ability to deliver any pay offs or tie up loose ends.  

The one mostly well done plot line this season was Portwell which got a happy ending tonight as they canoned. The only good thing about the big brother angst was that it was so insane that it had to be addressed and sure enough it was and Gina got her first kiss with a guy she really liked. If Tim is to be believed the reason we didn’t get an on screen Portwell kiss was not because of their age difference or covid concerns but because he felt that everyone’s first kiss was different so he wanted it off screen so viewers could fill in the blanks themselves. Tim’s line of reasoning is profoundly stupid. Imagine if they had Jamie show up and he and Gina talked off screen and Tim tried to claim that because everyone has a different relationship with their own siblings that he wanted the audience to fill in the blanks as to how their conversation went!

Still we saw great character development on Gina and EJ’s part as both really grew from the people they were in S1. As Tim noted, EJ bringing Gina back in 1x10 was kind of the set up for this story line. The only thing missing was a brief Portwell scene sometime in eps 2x01-2x04 to set them up. The consistent development they got from 2x05-2x12 is unlike any other ship on the show; only Rini exceeds their development. 

Unfortunately I don’t think that will last in S3 because Tim will always favour Ricky over EJ and if he wants to do Rina he’ll dispose of Portwell before doing so. I was surprised that they never bothered to have Ricky and Gina have a conversation about Gina’s S1 confession. It was a huge mistake to have Gina pine over Ricky for half the season and it was no surprise that Gina’s story line got instantly better once she stopped interacting with Ricky. Tim has made clear in interviews that he’s still interested in the possibility of Rina which makes his poor writing of them even more bizarre. What conclusions are the audience supposed to draw from the Rina story line this season? That Ricky never cared that much about Gina? That it’s totally fine for the show if they don’t interact for 6 eps in a row? That Gina has moved on? I’ve said before that a wiser man than Tim would recognize that doing both Portwell and Rina will do tremendous damage to the show and he should pick one and not do the other. Of course he’s not that smart but it is wild how he’s accidentally written their story line to make for a perfect end to Rina. 

Second Chances was great and is the only part of the finale that would have been well suited to being part of a potential series finale. 

The Rini closure was a sad inverse of their S1 opening night confession. They’ve fallen so far from being the it couple of the series and I fear Tim doesn’t actually know what to do with them now. He really needs to decide if he’s tearing down that treehouse for real. 

The less said about the Valentine’s chocolates the better but at least Gina and Nini are cool again and Nini can explore her budding music career with Jamie’s help. Tim repeatedly said in interviews that the scripts about Nini’s music career were all written before Driver’s License came out and I think he understands that the audience is just going to see the show as copying from Olivia’s life. 

The wildcats just deciding to drop out of the Menkies was a lame cop out. Tim has said he always meant for that to happen though they were originally going to compete at the Menkies then drop out (presumably that’s where we would have heard Lily singing Home). Somebody should have mentioned the $50 000 prize money which the East High theatre department could surely use after Miss Jenn and Mr. Mazzara burned it down (remember that story line that had no consequences?). And that NYU scholarship could have been life changing for one of them and yet no one even brought  it up once this season. 

I did like the twist that it was EJ and his dad who got Mazzara into Caltech. He’d be a fool not to take it but I’m glad he confessed to Miss Jenn. She’s had a really rough season and I hope she redeems herself in S3.

Howie was acting so weird tonight and last ep that I have a hard time believing he was really so awed by Kourtney’s talent rather than feeling guilty for helping to steal the harness. The harness is another useless plot device; there are no consequences for Lily stealing it, she’s not caught, East High pulls off another version of the transformation off screen, and then East High withdraws from the Menkies anyways. Doubtless the harness will eventually come up to serve Rily angst. 

At least Lily was straightforward, I’ll give her that. She has such an odd way of speaking, almost child like. As awful as it is there is potential for a forbidden/secret romance story line with Rily. It really does not speak well to Ricky’s character that he’s so easily fallen for Lily’s act when he has no reason to trust her and she never apologized for making fun of Big Red during the auditions or making Ashlyn feel insecure during the dance off. 

The one way in which S2 was drastically better to S1 was in regards to the Seblos story line. Clearly Joe being bumped up to regular made a big difference. We got the first same-sex kiss between two boys and the first love song sung by one boy to another in Disney history and that is a legacy to be proud of. Of course, there was still some Disney censorship such as Carlos and Seblos being unable to use the word gay in the same ep that focused on Carlos singing In a Heartbeat to Seb. 

S1 of HSMTMTS had a clear direction, the wildcats would have to try and come together to stage High School Musical and Ricky and Nini would have to decide if they still had a future together while Gina and EJ had to work on being better versions of themselves. It was simple sure but it worked very well. There was a lot of heart but also a lot of humor and the show never took itself too seriously. What has S2 had? Beauty and the Beast was hardly the main focus of the cast or the writers and the central couple that S1 was built around is now broken up either for a long time or for good. There was a lot less of the meta moments that jokes that made S1 such a hit, for far too many eps this season the show took itself way too seriously. Hell even the lighting this season was darker than in S1. 

Olivia Rodrigo’s team had complained in a recent article that Olivia wouldn’t be able to potentially tour until fall 2022 due to her contractual commitments which is a sign that they think a S3 is very likely though I wonder how late S3 filming would have to start to keep her occupied until late 2022. There’s no confirmation of this but I thought it might be worth keeping an eye on; a post on r/hsmtmts by someone who claims to have a source working on production says that the plan is for S3 to be a summer theatre camp possibly with Camp Rock renditions and the plan for S4 is to jump 6 months ahead to the final semester of senior year and end with Ricky, Nini, Big Red, and Kourtney graduating from East High. They also say that part of the delay in the S3 announcement is a conflict between Tim and Disney executives. Tim wants to move production to LA and film on sets as it’s easier and cheaper while the Disney execs still want some on location shooting in Salt Lake. Again this is all unconfirmed but if it pans out it will represent a major shift in the series. 

Regardless if Tim wants the show to remain successful he needs start planning out what he wants to happen. He should not assume he’s getting more than 4 seasons. If the series gets a S3 but then is suddenly cancelled then how would he want all the main story lines to wrap up? And if they make it to S4 where does he see it ending? The graduation of the current juniors is a logical series ending point but if Tim wants to do something different he needs to start thinking of that now. I can’t say I’m excited anymore for S3 but I do really hope that Tim and his writers can turn things around and that will only happen if they recognize what they did wrong and learn from their mistakes. 

Until next season Wildcats

[fishoutofcamelot]

I saw your r recent contribution to the post about hard vs soft magic systems and I agree wholeheartedly. You also mentioned having a bunch of worldbuilding and stuff about the magic system, and I was wondering if you'd be willing to share some?

(For reference, this is the post in question)

Certainly! While the worldbuilding/magicbuilding hellscape i was describing in the notes is actually in regards to an original-content wip I've been working on, i also have a LOT of headcanons regarding the BBCM magic system too! (Do not ask about my wip's magic system, because i won't be able to shut up about it)

WARNING: long post ahead and mobile won't let me include a cutoff/read-more line. If you're not interested, get ready to scroll down like your life depends on it (and it does).

So! First things first. Here's what we know about the BBCM magic system:

Magic requires spells, most of the time. This seems like a no-brainer, but still an important distinction. There are a lot of magic systems that don't require vocalized spells - Avatar: the Last Airbender, Fullmetal Alchemist, and Ninjago, to name a few. Spells are rather common for wizard/witch/medieval fantasies, and are typically used to control and channel the intent of the magic. This suggests that the magic of BBCM is some kind of force or energy that needs spoken commands to control.

Spells are repurposed words from Old English, aka the language of the Old Religion. (Let's ignore the obvious anachronistic nightmare of the fact that Old English is exactly the same language they would've been speaking in this time period.)

The use of a spell causes someone's eyes to flare gold, plus that fancy wooshing sound effect that Arthur miraculously never hears. This suggests that magic somehow changes your physiology, although it could be also just be a side effect of channeling.

However, magic doesn't always require a spell. Though never fully explained, it appears to be something only innate magic users are capable of - Merlin, Morgana, Mordred. It is something less controllable than spellwork, typically governed by moments of strong emotion rather than logical intent.

The show consistently flip-flops between the idea that magic is something you're born with, and that Merlin is rare for being born with magic. It's never clarified just how someone acquires magic. Gaius asks Merlin where he studied, suggesting that it's something you can learn, while Balinor claims that you either have it or you don't. Though not confirmed fact, i suspect it's similar to how it works in the show Supernatural. There, some witches are natural-born, while others are taught (and some get their powers from spooky demon deals).

It has a life-for-a-life policy. Basically like the Law of Equivalent Exchange from Fullmetal Alchemist, a life cannot be created without another one being sacrificed first. This rule only canonically applies to creating life/the Cup of Life, and any other possible applications aren't addressed.

This rule apparently doesn't apply to animals, as Merlin brought a dog statue to life without killing anyone (that we know of), and Valiant's shield had three live snakes in it. However, it's possible that lives were taken as payment in the process of animation without Merlin's knowledge, but it never happens on screen so we don't know. So either a) animals don't have souls to exchange in the life-for-a-life policy, b) they do but it happens off-screen, or c) those animated animals aren't actually alive.

The Cup of Life infuriates me from a magicbuilding perspective. Ignoring the obvious question of how it came into the druids' possession, its existence isn't clearly defined. Does it require the fancy rain ritual that Nimueh gave it, or was she just extra? Why does drinking from it give you life, while bleeding into it makes you undead and also mindlessly obedient to the sorcerer who made you as such? Were there life-for-a-life consequences for creating an immortal army? Wtf happened on the Isle of the Blessed to allow Merlin to "master life and death", and what does that even mean? All valid questions that never get answered.

Spells sometimes need need a 'source'. Think the staff from "The Tears of Uther Pendragon" and Morgana from "The Fires of Idirsholas." It is unclear what makes these spells different/special.

There is a power hierarchy. Some spells are too powerful for some practitioners to cast, although the reason for this is unclear. Does it drain you of energy/life force? Do you exhaust/overwork your magic muscles? Do you get a little pop-up that says 404 Magic Not Found? Unclear.

Magic is something that can be trained and improved. For example, Morgana gradually became more powerful over time. Merlin naturally had a lot of power straight off the jump and just had to discipline it, but he's a ~special~ case so he doesn't count.

There are some subsets of magic that are definitively born traits. Morgana is a Seer, possessing this capability even before her magic manifested. Likewise, Merlin is a dragonlord, which he inherited from Balinor. Although Balinor did mention that it wasn't a sure thing he would have the ability until he faced a dragon, so there may be some variation in whether or not someone lucks out in the Magic Gene Pool. This may suggest that natural-born magic is hereditary, as both Morgana and her sister Morgause had it. Vivienne and Gorlois both probably didn't have it, otherwise you'd hear Uther bellyaching about it, which raises the question of where they got it? A grandparent, perhaps? Maybe they both carried a recessive magic gene or something...

Unless you're Merlin, magic can be taken away by the Gean Canagh. It's not explained how this is possible, though, as it's never explained how you acquire magic in the first place. But Merlin never lost his magic because he's "magic itself" which if you ask me is just a deus ex machina wrapped inside a headache wrapped inside a heaping load of chosen one bullcrap. But it's canonical lore, so we have to consider it.

Despite my previous complaints, i actually find the idea of Merlin being "magic itself" rather intriguing. Is he a creature of magic, like a dragon or a questing beast? Is his body made of magic, like how a statue might be made of clay? Does it run through his veins like blood? If this is the case, then why didn't he suffer more severe ramifications for losing his magic? Why didn't it kill him? How did it restrict his magic in the first place? Placebo effect? The fanon explanation is that he's "the living embodiment of magic" but that makes my bullcrap richter scale shoot off the charts because that makes NO sense whatsoever. "Son of the earth, sea, and sky?" What does that MEAN?

There is a vivid link between magic and the Old Religion, which has its own beliefs and rituals and deities. Primarily, the Triple Goddess. The Triple Goddess is actually an existing deity in Neopaganism and Wicca. This also suggests the existence of the Horned God, another entity from neopagan lore and her masculine consort/counterpart, but that is never confirmed.

WHO. OR. WHAT. IS. THE. FREAKING. DOCHRAID. She's described as a creature of magic, which suggests that humans/humanoids can be creatures of magic, fueling my theory that 'Emrys' isn't human.

Destiny exists. It is unclear who creates/writes destiny, who controls it, who or what is privy to knowing about it, and what that means for the concept of free will.

The crystal cave is a thing, i guess. It's the heart of magic, is haunted by Taliesin, and is filled with prophetic crystals. I actually skipped the episodes that involve this stuff because i disliked them, so i don't know much about the Crystal Cave. Apparently ghosts can manifest there tho???

The veil is a thing too. It is unclear how some spirits can retain their human figure and mentality, like Balinor and Uther, but others become dorocha. I imagine its also like Supernatural - being a ghost for long enough will drive you insane, and though it takes a while all spirits eventually turn into dorocha.

Creatures of magic exist. These are normal creatures who have magic imbued into them somehow.

Okay, i think that's everything we know. It seems like a lot, but keep in mind that all of those rules are VERY nebulous. But that at least gives us a jumping-off point!

So here's my working theory/headcanon.

Magic comes from a connection to the spiritual energies of the Triple Goddess. Kinda like a third eye, and for the sake of simplicity that's what we'll call it. The druids have adapted a way of life that revolves around faith and magic, likely in an attempt to cultivate and one day attain this Third Eye. Like Gaius, who trained with the High Priestesses, you can study and practice and discipline yourself into acquiring it.

Magic is a cosmic force owned by the Triple Goddess, accessible to anyone with the Third Eye link. Imagine the Triple Goddess as a milkshake and the so-called Third Eye as a straw. The studying and training that people dedicate their whole lives to is basically just looking for/building a straw.

However, some people are just naturally born with a straw in hand, but require practice and study to be able to properly use it. Or like Morgana, it takes a few years for them to even find it/activate it.

Spellcasting is essentially just sucking through the straw, and the vocalized spells gives that Magic Milkshake some purpose/intent/shape.

The bigger the spell, the more Magic Milkshake is required. Some people have bigger/wider straws than others, so magic comes easier for them. But with enough training and practice anyone can widen their straw/strengthen their straw-sucking muscles to cast with the big leagues.

The Gean Canagh devours your straw/Third Eye. Perhaps you have to rebuild a new spiritual connection from scratch, or perhaps it permanently severs any and all connection to the Triple Goddess. Like getting excommunicated from the Church, only worse.

The Crystal Cave was/is the Triple Goddess's home, but she's out of town on a business trip atm so she left the spirit of her most loyal follower, Taliesin, to look after the place. It's super powerful and has all those cool crystals because it's hella steeped in her magic juices.

While most magic users get a standard-issue straw, others get Fancy Premium Membership Straws. Normal joe shmoes like Gilli have plastic straws, while a Seer like Morgana has a metal one or something (can you tell this metaphor is starting to get out of hand?). Those Premium Straws are only hereditary in nature. So there's a Seer Straw, or a Dragonlord Straw, or a Disir Straw, but it's also not a sure thing you'll even inherit it at all. It's all luck of the straw draw.

Creatures of magic aren't just animals that possess straws, though. They've been made/produced using magic rituals and processes and spells. Like Nimueh's afanc, nathairs, wraiths, shades, etc. So probably like a thousand years ago, some especially powerful shmuck came by and invented dragons. Which leads me to an important question: WHO THE HELL THOUGHT THE DOCHRAID WAS A GOOD IDEA.

Im reluctant to say these creatures were invented by the Triple Goddess, though, for reasons I'll get to in a moment.

So this still leaves the whole Cup of Life, life-for-a-life policy thing to be explained. I do believe that the policy is universally applicable to the creation of souls, and i do believe that animals have souls too. But individuals get their souls exchanged for those of equal value. So every soul has a certain weight to it, and you need to exchange souls of equal weight to create one. So when Merlin brought the dog to life, some random dog somewhere dropped dead against his knowledge.

Creating undead armies involves killing them and then resurrecting them. That's what 'undead' means. Zombies. So yes, to raise an immortal zombie army, Morgause's spell probably caused a bunch of people around the world to mysteriously drop dead.

Which leaves two last things to explain: destiny and Merlin.

Destiny is, i think, a combined effort between human choice and supernatural predeterminism. That is, for the most part humans make their own choices, but there are occasions where the Triple Goddess has to step in and do some course correction. Uther starting the Purge was free will, but Arthur and Merlin's destiny was an act of divine damage control. The Triple Goddess sets destiny into motion and informs a chosen few about it.

Okay SO. That leaves Merlin. And this is the bit im kinda excited about.

The Triple Goddess is a reservoir of power, a cosmic force of spiritual energy intrinsicallu linked to the fabric of the universe. People can spiritually reach out and tune into/channel her supernatural frequencies. But as a milkshake cannot suck itself through a straw, the Triple Goddess likewise cannot cast a spell. She can influence destiny, but she can't physically cast any magic on her own. That's why she didn't create the creatures of magic.

So a few years ago, Uther hecked up big time. And people of magic, the Triple Goddess's followers and acolytes and straw connections, were dying in droves. I can imagine that all those Third Eye tethers snapping en masse was painful for her to go through. She relies on the tethers to remain connected to the real world, and if all the tethers snap then she will be cut off from Earth altogether. And Earth requires magic to continue existing/thriving, so that's kind of a no-no.

So, the Triple Goddess knew that the only way to save the world was through divine intervention. Thus began the destiny of the Once and Future King and Emrys. She knew humanity is bigoted so there was bound to eventually be a repeat of Uther, so she made OaFK resurrectable, so they could keep him on the bench in case anyone ever needs him again.

Where does Merlin/Emrys fall into things?

Well. The Triple Goddess knew that saving her people and the world would require an immense magical undertaking, something no ordinary magic user would be able to pull off. But she has the power, if only she could use it. But a human can. So the Triple Goddess decided to be reborn into the body of a dragonlord's son. Merlin. Emrys. Magic itself.

Of course, this whole Being Born As A Human Thing is tricky, and as anyone familiar with reincarnation knows, you don't usually recall your past lives. So she became Merlin, unaware that he was ever the Triple Goddess. (Although she did add a clause saying she'd be destined to remember her past life eventually, which got hecked up for reasons ill explain later)

That's why so many creatures of magic/magic users recognize Merlin by his presence, why thr druids carry such reverence for him. Whereas the sidhe and other individuals don't recognize him, because they are blinded by heresy. They may have a spiritual connection to the Triple Goddess, but do not use her magic as she intended, and she's too busy wearing jaunty scarves to excommunicate them herself.

Why get the Once and Future King involved when she could just save everyone herself? Well, the Triple Goddess prefers to let the humans keep their agency and save themselves, and would rather remain in the role of protector/helper. Its just her nature.

But if that's the case, then why did Arthur's destiny fail? It's simple: Kilgharrah.

Remember what i said about the Horned God, counterpart to the Triple Goddess? Yeah, that's Kilgharrah. Like the Triple Goddess, he's another power reservoir, but he's jealous because people worship her and not him. He is against everything she does and actively seeks the destruction of the Triple Goddess's magic/influence for Jealous Evil Reasons. To stop him, the Triple Goddess enlisted some of her followers to bind him into the body of a dragon (perhaps this is how dragons were created) so he would never be able to do that. Years later, the Purge happened and "Kilgharrah" got locked away, further cut off from his power.

When Merlin walked in, unaware that he used to be the Triple Goddess, Kilgharrah seized his chance at revenge and manipulated Merlin into setting him free. Then, once free, he decided to lay claim to the power vacuum left by the Triple Goddess's quasi-absence. He began controlling destiny in whatever limited capacities he could, using magic of his own to permanently bury Merlin's knowledge of his past life. Then he ensured that Arthur would die and the Triple Goddess's magic would never return. But since he doesn't have FULL control over destiny (his powers are still limited by his dragon form, after all), he couldn't rewrite the bit where Arthur gets benched in Avalon. He's probably conspiring with the sidhe to ensure Arthur stays trapped there forever, or else he would've come back a long time ago.

As for how the Gean Canagh took Merlin's magic...well, yes, it devoured his Third Eye straw, but those are created by a strong spiritual connection to the Triple Goddess. And since he's literally the big TG himself, all he had to do was find himself again (by returning to his old home, the Crystal Cave) to recreate a new one.

Over the last 1500 years, Kilgharrah/the Horned God has been steadily accruing followers and worshippers in the hopes that one will become strong enough to release TG's bonds on him. Then he can kill her once and for all and claim full dominion over the universe, with the sidhe to support him.

I imagine that's how Arthur's resurrection would happen - Arthur and the rest of the dead Round Table are in Avalon when they learn about the treachery and plot to kill Merlin/take over the world, and spend the next few hundred years fighting their way out of Avalon.

Okay, I think that just about covers it. God, that was long. Any questions?

[akindofmagictoo]

20 first lines tag game

this comes from @zmlorenz and also I think @amillionwips — thank you both!

rules: list the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20 stories just list them all). see if there are any patterns. choose your favourite opening line. then tag others. 

(I will tag @writingbyjillian @pamsdrabbles @sleepyowlwrites and anyone who wants to play!) 

Hurricane 

Tempest stilled her bouncing leg, eyeing her sleeping husband. Had she woken him? She took a careful breath and didn’t let it go until he snored and rolled over, pulling the covers tighter around himself. Still she waited. One breath. Two breaths. When he still didn’t move, she stood up and grabbed her coat and sword belt, not even bothering to put them on. Because she had to leave, and she had to leave today. 

Theo x Aella Little Mermaid AU

Water closed over his head, tugged at his clothes. Tugged him down… down… 

He wanted to cry out for help, but the water filled up his mouth before he could make a sound. Cold stole into his limbs, heavy and dark, weighing him down. 

His chest ached, searching for air. Deep, cold darkness wrapped around him. Dragging, pressing, pulling down.

Down… down… down… 

When he’d hit the water, he’d panicked. That was gone now. All he felt was the cold, the deep dark cold.

a random post-canon Theo x Aella oneshot 

Thunder rumbled overhead, blending into the drumming of the rain on the roof. Aella tucked her blanket more tightly around herself, but it did no good. She couldn’t sleep. She couldn’t keep her mind off the locked front door, Alanna’s instruction to stay inside. It felt too much like other locked doors. Every time she closed her eyes, she was back there again and—

No. Sitting in this bed alone with her thoughts would do no good.

a post-canon Theo x Aella oneshot (sort of the former version of the one above)

“Read the mermaid one again.” Aella snuggled against Theo, pressed up between him and the arm of the big old armchair. 

a Theo x Aella modern AU 

Even with a map on his phone, Theo was impressed he’d made it to the small cafe on the main street. True, it was the main street, but his new house wasn’t, and directions weren’t his forte. Given how recently he’d moved, it was at least understandable. 

The cafe was small, but its list of drink options was larger than he’d expected. But it included several types of tea, so he ordered a familiar English Breakfast and sat down at the nearest table.

post-canon oneshot of the Hurricane women play ‘theatre’ 

“So, who’s up next?” Aria stretched out in her hammock. “As much as I enjoyed being the defence lawyer, I think it’s someone else’s turn.” 

“I’ll play the accused. I want to try my daring escape again,” Aella volunteered, sitting up. 

Theo grinned. “Because you got caught last time?” 

a crossover royalty AU with another project (Labyrinth) 

(this isn’t the first line, but it’s the first lines where Theo appears. also, you would be correct if you assume that the Spanish princess is not Aella. that is the complication.) 

“Spain confirmed the marriage alliance,” said Jared. “We still have to confirm it one last time, though.” 

Theo glanced up at his dad. “Hardly surprising, really. They offered it, after all.” 

Jared nodded. “Are you still alright with this? We can turn them down now, if you want.” 

“My calendar is free,” said Theo, straight-faced. “I mean, it’s not like I’ve got my eye on someone else or whatever. Just as long as I’m not expected to actually have a romantic relationship with the Spanish princess.” 

the below are all fanfictions. [ps my AO3 is @/ sidebysidewithafriend go check it out if any of these fics interest you] 

Shadow and Cottontail (Harry Potter: Marauders (OC insert)) 

(this is co-written, I’m posting the first part that I wrote) 

“Is there mail today?” Kai Lupin jumped the last step down to the dining room. This was the same question she’d been asking for five days, but she asked anyway. 

Her mother Hope was about to answer when an owl swooped through the open window, a parchment envelope clutched in its beak. 

“I think the answer is yes,” said Remus, descending the stairs behind her with a little more care than she’d taken. Kai rolled her eyes and crossed the room to see what the envelope contained.

Hope was already taking it from the owl. “It’s from Hogwarts,” Hope said, and Kai’s heart leapt, only to be dashed by her mother’s next words. “But there’s only one envelope. It’s addressed to you, Kai.” 

Told You You’d Kill It (Harry Potter: Romione) 

“Ugh.” Ron shoved his books to one side and ran a hand through his hair, making it stick up in all different directions. Hermione hid a smile as Ron drew his hands inside his jumper sleeves.

Through a yawn, he continued, “I’m done. I’m so tired.” Probably from his basketball training, but schoolwork was also a struggle for him, she knew. And they’d been studying in the library for several hours now. No wonder he was exhausted.

Thank You For Saving My Cat (Harry Potter: Jily) 

Lily pushed herself up to a sitting position and breathed a small sigh of relief. At least she was out. She turned back to the house, watching the orange flames that danced over the structure with her heart in her throat. Was it her imagination, or were they growing smaller?

Most of her stuff could be replaced. But she hoped nonetheless that she wouldn’t have to.

Then she remembered the one thing she’d left behind and couldn’t replace. Crookshanks. She stumbled to her feet. Legs shaking under her, she ran to the nearest firefighter and grabbed their sleeve. The firefighter gear covered its occupant’s face, but the voice sounded male. “Are you alright?” He took her arm gently, steadying her.

3AM (Harry Potter: Wolfstar) 

The beeping of the fire alarm filtered into Sirius’s sleeping brain, burrowing in until he couldn’t help but wake up. At which point he groaned and wrapped his pillow around his head, trying to block out the noise.

But this was a fire alarm, so really he had to get up. Grudgingly, he removed the pillow from his head and fumbled for his phone to check the time. The light from the screen was blinding in the darkness of his dorm room, but after a moment his eyes adjusted to see that it was 3:07 AM.

Give Him Back to Me (The Great Library: Wolfe x Santi) 

Day 1

“Nic?” Wolfe half-rose from the bed at the sound of knocking, leaving his Codex open beside him. Something was off, though. Nic wouldn’t knock. He had a key. Besides, Nic was away in Belgium, training a new company. He wasn’t due back for another day or two, and that was assuming everything went to plan.

Nevertheless, when the knock came again he got to his feet and headed for the door.

Death Is Not Fair (Shadowhunters: (very angsty) Malec) 

It wasn’t fair. Then again, life wasn’t fair.

And neither was death.

It shouldn’t have happened. It should have been a simple mission. The scans and all the reports had said there was just one demon in the area. It was a larger, stronger demon, and would’ve put up a good fight, but it was still practically nothing to a Shadowhunter like Alec.

Untitled (Shadowhunters: Sizzy) (unfinished and un-posted) 

Izzy was swearing off dating. She’d kind of thought about it before, but hearing about the amount of drama in Jace’s love life right now cemented the idea firmly in her mind. No more dating. Between that and the mess Alec had gone through a couple of months ago, she wasn’t sure she wanted any part of that. Not to mention that of all the boys she’d dated, none of the relationships had really been right. Did she believe in The One? She wasn’t sure. But none of her boyfriends had been it, that was for sure. So no more dating for her. She was here to study forensic chemistry, after all, and surely it was better to concentrate on that.

Moving Day (Riordanverse: Blitzstone) 

Last? signed Hearth. 

Blitz brushed a speck of dust from the shoulder of his shirt, studying Hearth’s face. He knew exactly how many boxes were left to move, and it was more than zero, but the elf was looking paler than usual. If that was possible. As he watched, Hearth swayed a little and put a hand on the wall for support. “No. But I’ll get the rest. You need a break.”

Untitled quarantine AU (Riordanverse: Percabeth) (unfinished and un-posted)

“Thanks for letting me stay over to finish this project,” said Annabeth, setting the last piece on the model Coliseum she’d made. They’d done most of it last night, and she was just adding the finishing touches now. Although that had been before school had been shut down; they’d been notified the night before, but since she was here she’d been determined to finish it.  

Untitled (The Hobbit) (I have a “better version of Tauriel’s arc” thing in the works, and this is an accompanying oneshot of how the Durins died in this version) (un-posted) 

“Where is he? It looks empty. I think Azog has fled.” Fili glanced around nervously, his breath steaming in the icy air. 

“I don’t think so,” said Thorin. 

Footsteps sounded on the ice, echoing in all directions. It was impossible to know their source. 

“We’ve got company,” Thorin growled. 

Kili readied his sword. 

This was practically everyday for them at this point. Every motion of his sword, every footstep, every bit of it was familiar. Fili hardly had to think. His sword flashed in the faint light. Droplets of blood and crystals of ice spattered his exposed skin, hot and cold. He was at home here; he might not have been on the ice before, but with a sword in his hand and Kili and Thorin at his back, he was content.

this is VERY long. if you read to here, thank you! and maybe consider reading some of them in full on my AO3? 

[abanomath]

DC’s Tone Deafness

So I don’t really like ranting or being negative, but DC Universe recently released an article to celebrate pride month about the Top 5 canon and non-canon LGBTQA+ relationships in Young Justice.

And the tone deafness is just off the charts. Like most of the world, I’m not American so I needed someone to screen-cap the actual article for me. I’m going to organize my thoughts and go down below.

General

For one, its pretty obvious the writer didn’t look at the source material. This article sounds like it was written by someone filled in on the basics and told to write a good PR article for DC.

There are a lot of little details in the story, such as when the writer claims that they “showcased even more LGBTQA+ protagonists in season 3″ implying they had previously, which they hadn’t. One character was implied to be bisexual in the comics, never on screen, but more on that below. Season 3 was the first LGBTQA+ rep for the show.

Also its always a bit tone deaf when in an article celebrating LGBTQA+ and diversity in your show, that you have a list of 5 “ships”, of which only ONE is actually a couple in canon. Not only did they need to resort to non-canon ones, they included people that can’t be called a “ship” or couple.

1. Kaldur/Wyynde

This is the only actual LGBTQA+ couple on the list that is canon in the show, and I liked them. But I can’t deny that Kaldur who was a main cast member for the past two season’s had a vastly reduced role (compared to straight cis white characters like Dick and Conner). He was basically written out of the first half of the season, and then his relationship was really present for 1.5 - 2 episodes max. This in a season that was marked with excessive attention given to heterosexual relationships (like seriously, basically every character was in some form of relationship on-screen). The one healthy LGBTQA relationship got less attention than Black Lightning and Dr. Jace’s romance, something that ultimately went nowhere, Dick/Barbara, even Megan/Conner when Megan was also essentially written out of the season.

2. Marie Logan and Rita Farr

They really dug deep for this “ship”. Ironically, they start this by talking about the scene in Young Justice #25, when Queen B’s powers work on Garfield’s mother. This was the first implication her being bisexual. And of course, she also dies in this scene, so starting off with a “Bury your gays” trope where Marie’s queerness literally got her killed and orphaned her son.

There isn’t much more to say about this ship, because it literally doesn’t exist. The shipping community for this is so small you have to go digging deep into tags to find even hints of it. The article even basically says this, posing the ship as a question. As being interesting. (Does it count as Bury Your Gays when both woman are dead before their relationship is even hinted at?)

In other words this article about celebrating LGBTQA ships literally had to try and CREATE A SHIP to reach 5 ships. Despite the fact there are plenty of LGBTQ fanon ships (Birdflash being the most prominent one left off the list). It really hits at the thing I said above, this is a “write us a good PR article with the barest amount of effort put into it” situation.

3. Harper Row and Halo

Oh boy don’t get me started on this. There are so many problems with how they did Halo this season, she is basically tone deaf personified. (For the purpose of this rant, I’ll be using the “she” pronouns for Halo, because I have no choice but to assume they are her preference, unless the show purposely spent the entire season mis-gendering her, but I don’t think her characterization really supports that she prefers “her/she”).

I’ve had a problem with Halo from the start, because she is basically an attempt for the writers to shallowly include representation without having to actually deal with it. She is Muslim representation, but not actually Muslim (as she confirms on the show). She wears the Hijab because she feels like it. She is genderqueer, but they never once talk about her pronouns. She refers to herself as “not feeling like a boy or a girl” and constantly refers to herself in the third person, but everyone uses “she/her” pronouns without asking her. They even have a scene where she informs them she is genderqueer, and its never brought up again without asking any actual follow up questions or awareness. They also infantalize and treat her as a little girl.

Additionally, she falls into one of my greatest pet peeves - she is genderqueer but for fantasy-scifi reasons. For those that follow genderqueer or transgender characters in media, this is a very common trope. Essentially, the trope is when someones gender identity is caused by/determined from otherworldly experiences.

This trope bugs me because it completely undermines the point of representation. Representation in media is supposed to show the audience that these are natural human experiences and that people like this exist and are normal. But the trope ensures that the experiences are not normal human experiences.

(and don’t even get me started on the fact that this show has made New Genesis tech gendered before, with Sphere. And even gender the bioship in the same season they pull this for Halo).

Lastly, she also falls within the “promiscuous bisexual” trope, with the very kiss this article praises as THE FIRST LGBT KISS ON SCREEN for the show. This is a problematic trope that DC seems to love. Basically, this scene has Halo cheating on her boyfriend with another young classmate, engaging in two kisses with her.

Now I’m not going to say that all LGBTQA+ relationships need to be wholesome one true loves. Problematic behaviour like Halo and Harper’s is a story telling tool. But the fact that the LGBTQA+ was told going into the season there would be LGBT rep so they should watch, and this was the first rep we got 18 episodes into the season? It felt a bit like a slap in the face. They could’ve had her break up with Brion beforehand, or any number of different ways that would even keep the scene in tact.

And the relationship doesn’t really go anywhere anyways. Harper doesn’t really remain part of the season going forward, Halo and her boyfriend continue their relationship after it was revealed until the end of the season.

This is ultimately my problem with Halo. There are a few tropes that basically are summed up as “writers put all their diversity into one character” which is basically what Halo is. Each of these qualities, from faith to gender identity to sexual orientation could’ve been a fleshed out character arc (oh! I forgot to mention she also falls into the “My gender identity isn’t cis, so my sexual orientation is also bi/pan/gay” trope). Instead all the diverse qualities of Halo are addressed shallowly as the show-runners pat themselves on the back.

4. Bluepulse

I’ve ranted a lot so I’m not going to go crazy on this point. You can probably find tons of posts about the drama between Bluepulse Shippers and the show, which again makes their inclusion kind of tone-deaf. Bluepulse shippers have been called disgusting by the fandom for the three year age gap, an age gap that was never confirmed on screen and you had to go digging in Greg’s personal message board to know (resulting in many people shipping them not knowing their ages at all).

In addition, the showrunners made it clear they did not like this ship over the several years the show has been off the air. And in Season 3 they give Jaime a girlfriend….who is a lesbian in the comics. Now Traci and Jaime did date in the comics before she came out, and this is another Earth. But when the sole purpose of their relationship being on screen was to tell the audience that bluepulse wasn’t happening, choosing a lesbian character to play the cis straight girlfriend is a bit of a slap in the face. again.

5. Bart Allen and Eduardo

Queerbaiting, nuff said.

For those not in the know, Ed is a character introduced as a runaway in Season 2, but he doesn’t really interact with Bart until mid-season 3. There is an episode where a group of heroes go to a carnival, and Ed and Bart appear to be on a date. They are in a group with all couples, except for Virgil. Virgil laments being the only person there without a significant other, implying that Bart and Ed are together. Additionally, Bart and Ed do everything that the other couples do together. It was pretty heavy-handed that the couples were there on dates.

And fans liked this! Even if Bluepulse wasn’t happening, Bart may still be bisexual or gay. This was made worse by Greg retweeting and liking Ed/Bart content, and not giving a straight answer on whether they were dating.

Which obviously, creates the expectation among LGBTQA+ fans that they will get together. They don’t. And later at a convention, one of the main writers (not Greg) said something like “its funny how the fans see relationships between characters differently from our intent” when asked a question about them. Essentially confirming that yeah, they didn’t have any actual content for them planned anyway. Though they did have an addendum that they may build on the fan reception/view of the relationship in the future (basically saying, maybe they’ll be canon).

As much as I’d like to be optimistic that they actually will get together and we’ll get a LGBTQ relationship that is in the spotlight for once, I’m not. I’ll be happy to be proved wrong on this point.

And that was my TEDtalk about how tone-deaf DC patting themselves on the back for LGBTQA+ content in Young Justice is. Especially when other animated shows do so much better with fewer episodes and screen time.

[littlemisssquiggles]

I love rose garden 😍

I think oscar hasn't dated much at best maybe a girl or to in school or a girl is age is ant set him up with ,so he maybe knows how to date,

I don't think ruby dose,I don't think her date let her date,am after becane fail ,I don't think dating on her mind but I think at some point after,salem gone

Ruby and Oscar will start dating as the show ends I could maybe see them having an on screen kiss in the last volume

Do you think ,rose garden will kiss or date

Sorry if u been ask this be for

You and I share the same sentiments about this wholesome ship between these two budding smaller, more honest souls, anon-chan. Personally I agree with you on thinking that Oscar has probably never dated or been in a romantic relationship before. My assumption is that Oscar has lived a pretty sheltered life with his only source of human contact and companionship being his family back on the Pine Family farm.

Since Oscar stated that he never met huntsmen and huntresses before back in V5, my assumption was that he and his aunt probably lived in the middle of nowhere in Anima where the closest neighbours were probably towns away. Either that or many of their local neighbours moved to the kingdom for the protection of the huntsmen. That being said, my hunch was that Oscar didn’t interact much with kids, especially ones around his age growing up which would explain his social awkwardness when meting RNJR for the first time. At least he’s courteous to adults highlighting a good boi (best boi) who was raised right by his family.

I also liked the thought of Ruby being the first girl Oscar ever truly had a genuine crush leading to those feelings ultimately evolving into love. Looking at Oscar, I more saw him as being one of those types who didn’t really bother much about romance; so much so that I imagined Oscar would be so inexperienced to love that he wouldn’t even realize his own feelings until someone else had to help him make the realization for himself.

I saw Oscar as the type who only allows love to blossom if it’s with someone he trusts wholeheartedly since to him, trust is everything and he’s not one to open his heart to any and every one. But once he does and he’s found the one who has tamed his heart, he will be ever devoted to said person; loving and supporting them unconditionally with every bit of his being.

I pictured Ruby being the same as Oscar. For me, I think outside of admiring them in her favourite childhood fairy-tales and supporting the relationships between her friends in real life, Ruby is quite the little red novice to romance herself. I perceived her as not really being all that interested in romance too since the feeling has never really hit her before. Unlike other characters she might know, the little light of love has never sparked in Ruby before so much like Oscar, she strikes me as being another who probably wouldn’t realize she was in love with someone even if Cupid damn right thwacked her over the head.

That being said, this is what makes the potential of a Rosegarden romance so fascinating to me and why I like it so much. At the end of the day, Ruby and Oscar are just two kids fitted with roles of responsibility beyond their years. They are both often looked to as figures of guidance and wisdom or at least are expected to. All the more reason why I love how the show has highlighted the two showing support for one another since, within our main group of young heroes, they share the most in common (at least in my humble opinion) and can understand each other in ways unique to them; thus making their bond more meaningful than any others they might share.

At this point, I can’t really say whether or not romance is in the cards for the rosebuds. Don’t get me wrong. As I’ve voiced multiple times in the past, this squiggly Rosegardening Pinehead is all for Ruby and Oscar falling in love with each other (particularly if it parallels the Fairy-tale romance that happened between Ozma and Salem a long time ago only with a much happier ending and happily ever after). I’m down for a Rosegarden romance but whether that will be is up to the showrunners. I’m not sure if Ruby and Oscar will “date” but I do like the idea of them sharing an onscreen kiss.

As a matter of fact, once upon a time, long before it was revealed that Oscar will be kidnapped by Salem, I was one of the theorists who kept advocating for it. Therefore I had concocted this scene in my head where Salem gives Atlas an ultimatum to surrender Oscar over to her in exchange for sparing the kingdom from annihilation. And while his comrades were strongly against this, Oscar, on the other hand, had made up his mind that he was willing to trade his own life if it meant the protection of everyone.

I had this scene of Ruby and Oscar professing their true feelings for one another after Ruby desperately tried to convince Oscar not to give himself up to Salem. I had this idea of the Rosegarden first kiss mimicking the first on-screen kiss between Katara and Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender.

In that series, Aang kissed Katara after expressing his concerns of never returning from confronting Fire Lord Ozai. And as Katara goes in to object, Aang kisses her on the spot as his way of letting Katara know his true feelings for her just in case he never got the chance.

For me, I pictured something like this being done for Oscar with Ruby. With him kissing her as a means of letting her know right then and there how much he loved her; just in case he didn’t return to her in the event that Salem  killed him.

I even had this idea of “I love you” being the very last thing Oscar says tearfully to Ruby before he is taken prisoner  by Salem and she and the others are left to die in the destruction of Atlas Kingdom. Even if we never get a Rosegarden onscreen kiss, I personally would still like the show to confirm Oscar having feelings for Ruby.

The longstanding Pinehead headcanon is that Oscar has a crush on Ruby and has been in love with her since the moment he looked into his silver eyes; paralleling the young man who met the lone Silver Eyed Warrior in the Warrior in the Woods tale from Fairy Tales of Remnant.

That being said, I’m waiting (ever so patiently) to see if the show would…y’know…do something more to make the notion of Oscar being in love with Ruby more official since I feel like they’ve been more or less teasing that since V5. It’s obvious that Oscar cares a lot for Ruby. It’s clear that he admires her and looks to her as a symbol of hope. However at the same time, it is also clear that Oscar acknowledges Ruby’s vulnerability (the side that she rarely likes to show but is evident to certain characters like Oscar and even Maria Calavera and of course, us as the audience) and the huge burden of responsibility placed on her shoulders and does his best to support her when he can in his own way.

But does this mean that Oscar is in love with Ruby? I’d like to think he is but I’m waiting on the canon to confirm since I feel like they’ve building up to it since the very moment Oscar met Ruby. I don’t know whether or not romance is in the cards for the rosebuds but what I can say for sure is that something important has been building between these two kids since V5 and I’d like to think thatV8 is the time to actually prove this or not since Oscar is expected to be taken by Salem at some point.

Not to mention that he’s also supposed to be dead a la Ironwood and I’m still waiting to see if that will be mentioned at any point by Ironwood when RWBN_P go to confront him up in Amity.

But we’ll have to wait to see what happens anon-chan. But whether or not, Rosegarden is carded to be together or not, let me say this, fam. I’ve voiced this point possibly several times in the past but given the nature of this fandom and how certain-certain shippers are behaving these days, this squiggle meister is going to make this firm statement.

Just like you anon-chan, I love Rosegarden too (if it isn’t obvious already XD). As a RWBY ship, they are my OTP and I adore this ship very much for the potential it has. Despite my own personal gripes with the writing of the show, if there is one thing I will give to the CRWBY Writers is that thus far, I’ve enjoyed the progress they have made with the growing bond between Ruby and Oscar. It is thanks to them and the things they have done with these two why I like them so much and humbly look forward to whatever else they have in store for their growing bond.

That being said, while I might love Rosegarden and why I may even wish for the series to pursue a romance with them---at the end of the day, that is NOT my ONLY motive for supporting this pair. It’s not even my main motive.

I don’t love Rosegarden solely because I want the showrunners to make them endgame and should the showrunners not do so, I will hate them forever. That’s NOT it. That’s not how I am as a person. I have always, ALWAYS said that whatever the showrunners do with this pair---whether it becomes a romance or stays purely platonic, I will respect it.

And even now, as we’re entering a new season, I stand by that. Regardless of what the showrunners choose to do with Rosegarden, as a supporter of the pair, I will respect it and it will NOT deter me from giving the pair as much love and support as I’ve always done.

Basically---in a nutshell, if Rosegarden becomes canon, this squiggle meister will support it. But if Rosegarden doesn’t become canon, guess what? This squiggle meister will still love and support it. How about that, huh?

I feel the need to express this now because there honestly seems to be this weird vibe in the FNDM in respect to Rosegarden and its community. It always annoyed me how certain-certain shippers and their respective community would go around the place acting as if their favoured ship was better than others even going so far as to bully other shipping communities because of it. In my opinion, there is no need for that. Just like what you like. Enjoy it however you wish and be respectful enough to allow others to do the same. That’s how I’ve always looked at it and that’s how I move.  

And that’s one thing that made me appreciate the RG community. For the most part, all of us share that same sentiment. We love our ship but we respect other ships and their respective shippers. Probably because some RG shippers are multi-shippers. While I’m not a multi-shipper--- since I more tend to latch onto one favoured ship and stick with it till the end---this is one thing that I liked and respected a lot about the RG community.

…Which is why it honestly disgusts me when I see the things that certain-certain shippers say about us.

What’s even worse is that even when we attempt to defend ourselves, somehow that proves to make things worse than better because then other certain-certain shippers start implying that we’re fighting a war with certain-certain ships when in reality, we’re not fighting anything. We’re just shielding ourselves against the nonsense the other people are sparking.

We didn’t start the fire yet…we’re being held responsible for it by association and even when we try to out the fire, somehow we still get chastised both by the folks who hate us and the ones we hoped would understand. It is honestly a mess and if you’re unware of it then stay oblivious, fam.

For the longest while I have heard stories about the toxicity within the RWBY shipping communities. But back in those earlier times, the toxicity was mainly contained to a few certain-certain ships and their shippers. Now it may seem that the toxicity is starting to spread into the RG community. Not in the form of us becoming toxic ourselves in our own behaviour towards other ships but more in the sense of certain-certain shippers kicking up dirt and trying to start fights with the RG community by making arguments against us whether it be here on Tumblr or Twitter or the dreaded cesspool that is the RWBY Reddit community.

And…sadly to say, I’m seeing some of my fellow Rosegardeners taking the bait and…that honestly needs to stop.

That type of attitude is one of the reasons why I’ve started to slowly back out of the RWBY community. That doesn’t mean that I’m jumping ship. I’m still following the RWBY train---just picture it more as me following it alone from the comfort and sanctity of my own little squiggle mobile gently chugger-chugging down the tracks. This way I can enjoy the show the way how I want to only engaging when I feel like it and more importantly, staying very, very, VERY FAR away from all the chaos that I’ve seen stirring up for seasons.

I still like the show and I’m still very much invested in seeing where it goes, particular with Rosegarden but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t becoming increasingly difficult for me to just enjoy the things that I genuinely like about RWBY.

Rosegarden and the development of these two smaller, more honest souls (individually and as a pair) are two of the things I still really like about RWBY. However I’m honestly tired of going on the tags and seeing my fellow RG shippers sharing and responding to the discourse surrounding the ship sparked by certain-certain shippers.

I’m tired of seeing all the weak strawman arguments made by said certain-certain shippers against RG and why they believe their ship is superior and more likely to become canon and whatever. Like seriously? WHO CARES!

I’m tired of it all and I genuinely wish my fellow RG shippers would stop answering these types of people. When will you learn that you are fighting a losing battle? It doesn’t matter how many posts you make. How much good evidence you provide from the show or the showrunners. Even if you are in the right, it all doesn’t matter. These types of people don’t care. All that matters for them is stirring up nonsense and throwing hissy fits when they don’t get their way. It is childish behaviour at display and nothing anyone says will stop it. So why even bother to entertain it at all?  

This is not me trying to knock down my fellow Rosegardeners in the RG community or even me throwing shade at others to “start shit”---I’m just…tired!  Tired of seeing that shit, y’know what I mean?

Shipping is supposed to be fun. Happy fun times where you get to gush and nerd out about your favourite pairings, not really because them becoming canon was all that important but just because you like it. What happened to just liking something and having a perfect platform to like it and enjoy it with others who feel the same way about it with you…IN PEACE? No malice. No disrespect. No fighting over which ship is going to be canon endgame (as if the canon means jack-shit in the long-run because look at Zutara, Sheith and Klance for Pete’s sake). I dunno. Overall, I’m just tired of the RWBY shipping community as a whole and it’s becoming tough just to have fun being a Rosegarden shipper anymore. So I think stepping back is a good way to go. 

Sorry if this response went off course anon-chan. It’s just that your question motivated me to express things that’s been on my chest for some time. I hope you don’t mind and hopefully I was able to give you a decent answer in all of this. Feel free to let me know or not.

~LittleMissSquiggles (2020)

[bethgreeneishopeunseen]

Do you think Caryl might happen now that you think Beth won’t be back until the end of the series?

When I mentioned Beth returning at the end of the series, that wasn’t a prediction of any sort, it was a wish. I think that TPTB originally intended to bring Beth back, which included that missing footage from season 5, but something might have changed off screen that led them to nix the storyline. So Beth’s survival is possible, we just might never see it. In regards to Caryl, I don’t think it would happen for several reasons.

For one thing, Norman has opposed it as a romantic pairing for years. (The earliest source I could find dates back to March 2012.) He’s mentioned in interviews that he has spoken with producers and writers on this topic, steering them away from a Caryl-romance when it’s been brought up. He has described Caryl as a platonic bond, often like siblings, and that goes back to March 2013, months before Bethyl first hugged onscreen. Melissa McBride also has described them this way. Example quotes included below:

https://bethgreeneishopeunseen.tumblr.com/post/612432610793275392/robert-hurst-commented-on-the-video-of-car0l-and

Daryl saved Carol during the zombie attack on the farm in true superhero style, sweeping her away on his chopper. Will love finally bloom?

Not if Norman Reedus can help it! The fan fave who plays Daryl hopes things stay platonic, though he adores working with Melissa McBride. “I’ve fought against having C@rol and Daryl hook up because there’s already too many of us doing it on this show,” says Reedus. “It’s more interesting to see these two damaged people gravitating to each other, needing each other’s friendship. But I gotta admit it would be hysterical watching Daryl put on a bunch of deodorant before he goes in for his first kiss.”

—Norman Reedus; March 23rd, 2012; TV Insider (x)

-

ETonline: Fans obviously love Daryl and C@rol – will we see any developments in their relationship this week? Does she try to soften his facade?

Reedus: Is she like an emotional roofie? [laughs] It’s there, but I think their bond is so much deeper than “stick your tongue in my mouth.” I like playing that and am glad the writers agree because it’s so awkward when boys meet girls, girls meet boys or boys meet boys, and they want to hook up. But this is a whole different set of uncomfortable rules. They love each other on a different level – it’s not about wanting to get together, it’s more like a sibling relationship. “If you hurt my sister, there’s nowhere you’ll be able to hide.” It’s an impenetrable bond. I know people want them together, but if that happens, I think it’ll be more epic than, “They did it!”

—Norman Reedus; March 29th, 2013; ETonline (x)

-

“There is a part of me that sees them both when they are with another as sort of a wounded child,” McBride said. “It’s like sometimes I see them when they joke together, or they’re happy together, or they’re sharing smokes together, or arguing together, being nit-picky together. I just see like Daryl could have reverted to that wounded child on the porch at the reunion, and I sometimes I see C@rol the same way, like a little girl almost, younger. […] “I think it is they’re wounded children, really get one another,” McBride said. “I don’t see her becoming a mother to him at all. I see her becoming that wounded friend.”

—Melissa McBride; September 5th, 2017; comic book.com (x) (x)

Though I haven’t watched the show since the beginning of season 8, I’ve picked stuff up from osmosis and basic research. From what I’ve gathered, Carol is on the warpath after her son’s murder, and she also recently left Ezekiel. She’s not in the headspace for a romance.

In addition, Norman has said for years that once Daryl falls in love, that will be it. Daryl loves for life like a wolf or an eagle. And multiple people related to the show have said that Daryl and Beth fell in love, or at the very least were on the brink of a romance. There’s also all of the romantic imagery, tropes, and music related to Bethyl.

https://bethgreeneishopeunseen.tumblr.com/post/188834464866/i-like-all-the-awkward-things-in-between-that

“I like playing these awkward moments in between that build relationships. I don’t ever want to play that character that grabs the girl and has my way with her. That’s just not who that character is. If Daryl falls in love with you, he’s going to love you for the rest of his life.”

—Norman Reedus; October 10th, 2013 (X).

-

“I think if he’s going to zero in on one, it’s going to happen by accident, and he’s not going to be the one zeroing in first. Then he’ll just stay with her. I think he’s like an eagle — once they start flying together, they’ll always fly together.”

– Norman Reedus, Entertainment Weekly’s Sirius radio show; February 10th, 2015 (x) (x)

-

Thanks to Beth, Daryl closes the book on his past. How will this free him up emotionally now? He’s definitely moving in the right direction now. He’s interesting in that he’s very guarded and very loyal. Once he breaks that wall down with someone, he’s loyal forever. Especially with Beth in this episode: she means a lot to him and took time to get to know him and open up to him and that got him to open up. It created a stronger bond between these two. He still thinks everyone else is dead and has little hope for the future, but Beth gave him a little light at the end of the tunnel and that means a lot to him.

Norman Reedus: The Hollywood Reporter; March 2nd, 2014

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/walking-dead-spoilers-norman-reedus-685083

-

Greg Nicotero’s thoughts on Alone at SDCC 2014:

When they pitched Season 4, they were talking about when the prison goes down and having Daryl and Beth be bunkered together. And it’s interesting because I get to see all the cuts and I see all the edits from the director’s cuts onward. And I loved the scene in the kitchen when they’re talking, and I got the sense that Daryl was starting to kind of fall in love with Beth a little.”

-

Emily’s thoughts on Bethyl for Insider October 2014:

“Last year, I definitely felt like there was a really special connection between Daryl and Beth that happened. My take on it was that there was a very deep growing connection that could become something more romantic or could become just … you know that was my personal understanding of it. I do feel like Beth has opened up to Daryl in a way that she hasn’t with other people and I do feel like Beth has never been really in love even though you’ve seen her with the two different boyfriends. I don’t think she’s ever been like, ‘grownup in love’ in the way that you feel like someone actually understands you and in sort of that special intimate way. And I do feel like she’s been closer to that with Daryl then with anyone else.”

Emily wrote ‘Last Chance’, a love song about Still, from Beth’s POV. Norman listened to ‘Nervous and Love’ while filming Still. He even wanted it to be the closing song for the episode. Daryl carried Beth’s knife on his person for more than a season, and in a 2018 Q&A, Norman confirmed that Daryl still had it. Bethyl developed into a romantic bond, period, and unless the narrative addresses Daryl’s grief, maybe letting him actually say her name, I don’t think he could move on from her. Daryl loved Beth and always will. No other Daryl-related romantic pairing would feel satisfying and in-character without closure, and even then, any pairing would contradict his monogamous nature.

https://bethgreeneishopeunseen.tumblr.com/tagged/bethyl-is-more-canon-than-romeo-and-juliet

But again, all my speculation is predicated on the writers having common sense and following through on their established story arcs, character histories, and Easter eggs.

[kusunogatari]

[ Naruto OC x Canon Ship Week 2020 - Face to Face ] [ @naruto-ocxcanon-ship-week​ || @abyssaldespair​ ] [ Suigin Ryū, Uchiha Obito ] [ Alcohol ] [ Verse: Best Years of Your Life ] [ Trope: Online Dating ]

Nibbling her lip, Ryū stares at the slight reflection in her mobile screen. Thumbs flicker over the keys, not quite touching in indecision.

This is the closest she’s gotten.

The concept, admittedly, is just...not one she ever saw herself using. Online dating seems so, so...weird! Lining up your face, your name, a handful of facts, and calling it good. Is that really all it takes anymore? Sure, she...doesn’t exactly have mountains of experience beyond that. Maybe she’s just old-fashioned. But putting up something akin to a mugshot to try and find love seems very...strange.

“Whatcha doin’?”

Eeping in surprise, she claws the phone to her chest, face going pink and heart pounding. “N-nothing!”

Behind her, a coworker she knows mostly only in passing perks a brow. “Whoa, sorry! You looked kinda, uh...distressed.”

Ryū heaves a small breath. “...sorry, I didn’t mean to jump so bad. I just, uh...I’m trying one of those silly dating websites, and…”

The other woman quickly perks up. “Oh! Yeah they’re kinda scary at first but I met my boyfriend on one! I bet you’ll do just fine. Just be smart about it, and it usually all works out fine.”

“Smart…?”

“Y’know...meet in public places, tell someone where you’re going. About the same as a normal date for those like us, huh?”

At that, Ryū can’t help but deflate. “...yeah, good point.”

“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine. People gotta have their pictures on there. I take a pic of any license plates and send them to someone I trust just in case.”

Brow wilting, Ryū admits, “You’re...not exactly giving me votes of confidence here.”

“Hey, gotta be prepared for the worst, but the worst hardly ever happens. Besides, a bit of chatting online usually gives a pretty good indication of if something will even work. And you can always ask friends to go on doubles, too.”

At that, Ryū doesn’t answer. She...doesn’t really have many friends to ask, let alone any with dates she’d feel like asking along. “Yeah, good point. I’ll, uh...I’ll see how it goes.”

“Cool! Good luck!” Giving a wave as she passes by, her coworker heads around a corner and out of sight.

“...what am I doing…” Ryū mumbles to herself, looking back to her nearly-completed account. “I know this isn’t gonna work…” And now the less appealing sides are at the forefront of her mind. Maybe she should just keep her nose to the grindstone and pretend she never brought this up.

...but then again…

As much as she hates to admit it, she’s lonely. Being a pharmacist might be similar to her wish to be a doctor, but it’s not quite what she wanted. It just feels like something is...missing. And while Ryū isn’t the sort to assume all her problems can be solved by a guy (or gal), she’s still pretty able to realize that her social life isn’t the best. No real close friends, passing grades with her coworkers...not even any pets. Up until now, she’s lived life in a series of grinds. School, then work, and now...it feels lacking.

Hence the idea to try the app.

“...no harm in looking,” she eventually mumbles to herself, slowly going through the rest of her profile and hitting the confirm button. “You don’t have to go on with it, but...just look. See how it works. Maybe just...chat with someone. One step at a time, okay?”

Of course, by then her break is nearly over, so she mutes her phone and heads back to work. She...only ate half her lunch, but she’s not really all that hungry anyway. Only once her shift is over does she head back to her little apartment and...give this thing a real try.

At first, it throws nothing but male profiles at her. Which is all well and good, but...it’s not all she’s interested in. Looking over a few names and faces, she eventually bucks up the courage to pick one. He’s a few years older, lives a town over, and works as a physical therapist. Not bad, right?

...ugh, wrong.

As soon as they start chatting, she knows this...isn’t going to work. He’s all Mister Nice Guy, subtly bragging about himself and leaving only certain questions open for her in turn: the only things he wants to hear about, and...things she can easily see through as shallow. Eventually she manages to get him to shut up and quickly deletes him.

Okay...not a great first impression, but it’s not gonna be perfect the first time she tries. This isn’t a fairytale, after all. So, she tries another. And another.

After over two weeks of duds that don’t even get past initial chats, she’s about ready to give up.

Laying on her bed spread-eagle with a sigh, she stares up at the ceiling. What started as a vague inking is turning into nothing but a source of frustration. Not exactly what she signed up for. Weighing her options, Ryū eventually stirs when her phone gives an all-too-familiar notification sound.

Another match...wonderful.

Sitting up with a grunt, she opens the message and looks over yet another profile. At first glance, it’s just another guy. Ugh. The amount of lady-seeking ladies has been depressingly low, but...apparently those are usually on their own kind of sites. So, for now, she entertains herself with this one.

Obito Uchiha...huh. Vaguely sounds like her own Japanese roots. There’s a small spark of curiosity, adjusting her stance slightly. Short dark hair, dark eyes, and...well, his pics aren’t the clearest (he clearly knows his good side (or what he’s assuming is his good side since...it’s all she sees)). But she spies a cat. That’s a win. She likes cats. A glance at his actual profile shows a like of sweets, cats (aha!), and a dislike of...aubergines? Googling that, there’s a hum of understanding. It’s eggplant! She...didn’t know that...whoops. The rest of the summary (stuff about ‘being extreme’ and ‘having abs’) gets her to giggle.

Well...might as well give it a try.

Giving the okay, she opens up the chat window, nibbling her lip in thought. What should she say…?

Hello!

A bit surprised, Ryū jolts slightly, not expecting the quick response! ...hi!

I didn’t think you’d accept it so fast!

And I didn’t think you’d say hello so quickly either!

Oh, sorry...was that too fast?

The apology begets a subconscious smile. No, not at all! My phone is usually pretty quiet is all. Sorry if I’m awkward, I’m...still kinda new at this.

Ha, me too. I haven’t had too many matches yet, so I’m still practicing.

Guess we can practice together! Though I have to ask you…

...eh?

What’s your kitty’s name?

Oh! Her name is Tenebris.

Aww, I love that name!

She’s my lady, haha! Helps me reel in the girls ;D

Ryū can’t help a snort. Well it seems to be working. I don’t have any pets, sadly…

What? None at all?

No...I work a lot so I haven’t gotten around to it. And I don’t want them to be lonely!

Bah, cats are good at being alone. Feed them and clean their box and you’re fine.

I’ll have to think about it, haha~

After a few minutes, Ryū realizes...this is the longest she’s talked to someone on here yet. Sure, it was a little stiff to start, but by some grace they just sort of...fell into conversation. No posturing or anything. It’s rather...refreshing! Encouraged, she keeps texting as she starts working on her dinner.

So what kind of work do you do?

I’m a pharmacist! Not quite the doctor I planned on, but it works.

Ohhh, wow!

What about you?

There’s quiet for a few minutes, and Ryū can’t help but wonder if that was a bad question. But then Obito replies, Sorry, my cat got stuck behind the couch...I uh...am currently working on a garbage truck part time…

She blinks. That’s...very random. Nothing wrong with that. It’s an important job, after all!

Eh, yeah...not very charming though, is it?

Oh, pffft. I stand behind a counter all day and give people medicine over and over. It’s not exactly exciting most days. We all make our ends meet somehow.

I guess that’s true.

Smiling at her phone, Ryū keeps cooking and chatting, giving play-by-plays as he asks what she’s making.

Do you like cooking?

Mhm! Food’s one of those things that’s both a necessity, and yet can be fancy when you want it to be, so...I thought it would be good to learn. And it’s a lot of fun!

I’m...okay at it.

Maybe I can give you some lessons down the road, hm?

You would?

Sure! It’d be something fun to do.

Like a first date?

At that, Ryū pauses. Right...dating. That’s what this is all for. She almost forgot… Sure! If that’s something you’d like to do. I guess dinner and a movie is pretty common for that. We’ll just make our own!

I’d really like that!

Cheeks warming, Ryū beams at the screen. I guess...it’s a date! Eventually. Whenever we can make something work, and maybe talk a little more…?

Sure! I take a lot of random side jobs so I can be a little flaky…

That’s okay - we’ll just keep chatting until then. You’re actually the first person that’s been fun to talk to…

He sends a big smile emoji. Success!

You’ll have to think about what we should make! I have to warn you, I like making dessert, too…

Oh no...my biggest weakness…

And no eggplant, right?

Eugh, no.

Haha, noted!

The conversation runs well into the evening until Ryū admits she’d best get to bed. Guess I’ll talk to you some more later, okay?

Mhm!

Say hi to Tenebris for me!

Haha, I will! Goodnight Ryū.

Night, Obito.

Checking her other messages, Ryū plugs in her mobile to charge before mulling over the evening. As she does, a smile slowly pulls at her lips.

Well, she can’t make any assumptions yet, but...this is a good start.

Chatting with Obito quickly becomes a routine. Though not much of a texter before, she checks in and quips with him throughout the day. He tells her about his latest jobs, and she notes anything out of the ordinary at work. Days blend into a week, and then two.

“So…”

“Hm?”

Leaning against the counter, Ryū’s coworker smirks. “Seems to me you hooked one, huh?”

Her cheeks flush pink. “Um...maybe…”

“You haven’t put your phone down for more than fives minutes all day!”

The pink gets darker as the other woman laughs.

“I’m glad! So, you gonna see him?”

“Yeah, eventually...I think we’re both a little nervous.”

“That’s adorable. You’ll have to let me know how it goes! Been nice seeing you look so bright lately.”

Ryū blinks. “...really?”

“Yeah. No offense, but...ever since I’ve worked here, you’ve been so quiet and to yourself. But lately you’ve just seemed more upbeat and...I dunno, out there.”

The observation admittedly takes her a bit off-guard. “...oh…”

“It’s just nice to see you look happy, that’s all. I know a job like this one’s kinda drudgy. Glad you’ve got something to keep your chin up.” With a smile, the other pharmacist straightens and heads back to work.

Still a bit struck, Ryū mulls all that over. True, she’s always been one to keep her nose to the grindstone. Maybe having a bit of a social outlet just...got her going to opening up some more.

...huh.

So...any openings in your schedule coming up?

Uh...I haven’t really checked lately. One sec!

Waiting for Obito’s reply, Ryū nibbles her thumbnail. She’s going to do it. She’s going to ask him over. By now she’s gotten to know him pretty well. She’s always been able to trust her gut, and...she believes she can trust him.

Though just in case, she’ll be letting her neighbor know when he comes to visit.

Just to be safe.

So I think I actually have Sunday clear. Does that work with you?

Yeah! I’m always on a Monday through Friday schedule, so weekends are almost always good with me!

Okay...cool!

Any idea what you wanna make?

Make?

Yeah! Remember, we talked about cooking…?

Ohhh, yeah! Uh...honestly I don’t have any preference.

You sure?

Yeah, just no aubergines.

I remember, haha.

Should I bring anything?

Nah, I’ll handle it. Though I guess if you have a movie you’d like to watch?

Ooh, okay! Uh...any you don’t like?

Maybe nothing too gory…?

Aw, that’s no fun!

I saw enough in medical school, believe me...it’s not fun.

Okay, okay. I’ll pick something.

And with a few other details hashed out...they have a date scheduled.

Ryū’s stomach can’t stop fluttering: both in excitement, and in nerves. She hasn’t really dated since college...what if she does something stupid? Offends him somehow? Or something just goes...wrong?

Okay, no, stop it. It’s gonna be fine. You’ve talked a lot, so...no need to be nervous. Just do it!

By the time Sunday rolls around, she’s as ready as she’ll ever be.

Fiddling with her hair in the bathroom mirror (can she EVER get it to do what she wants?), she jumps as someone knocks on the door. Trying to manage her nerves, she peers through the little peephole, spying what indeed looks to be Obito.

Taking a moment to steady her breath, she pulls open the door and looks up just as he looks over.

...oh.

She always thought his photo gallery on his profile was a bit...empty. At first she hadn’t really noticed that all of Obito’s photos had been taken showing one side of his face.

So only now, with him looking straight at her, does she see what he’s been hiding.

The apprehension in his face clearly shows he’s awaiting her reaction, and at first she can only blink. Eyes naturally slide to the right side where a plethora of scars mar the skin from his brow to his chin. One even reaches up into his lip.

But though it’s a surprise by novelty, it otherwise does nothing to hinder the blush in her face.

...gosh he’s handsome.

Her gaze lingers on the scars for only a moment before lifting back to his eyes, cheeks rosy and giving a demure smile. “...hi.”

“...hey.”

There’s a few beats of awkward silence, the pair of them stuck staring at each other. “...s-sorry! Um...come on in!” Ryū steps aside, going hotter in the face. A nice button-up shirt and clean jeans make him look quite snazzy. Seems her blouse and skirt wasn’t too much or too little. They hadn’t really breached any ideas about how formal to be…

Stepping in, Obito glances around before clearing his throat. From behind his back he draws a little bouquet of flowers. “Er...for you.”

Ryū’s greys alight with delight. “Oh!” It’s cliché as all hell, but she loves them. Delicately accepting the blooms, she gives them a sniff before beaming at him. “Thank you! I, er...I don’t have anything for you…”

“That’s okay! I mean, food’s good with me, heh.”

Giving a giggle, Ryū retreats to the kitchen to put them in some water, setting the vase on her little table. “There…!”

“You...have a really nice apartment!”

“Thank you...I’m always either working or tired, so I don’t manage to mess it up much,” she laughs. “I tried to make it kinda...cute. I’m not exactly an interior designer.”

“No, it’s nice. It suits you.”

That makes her go pink all over again. “...s-so! Um...are you hungry…?”

Obito gives a grin. “Always!”

“Okay! Um...I thought we’d do something a bit...basic? Just in case? Do you like spaghetti…?”

“Yeah!”

“...okay! Cool. Um…” Awkwardness creeping back up, she claps her hands and giggles nervously. “Then, I...guess we’ll give it a try!”

The pair move back into the kitchen, where Ryū already has everything sorted out and ready to go. “Wow...looks professional.”

“Oh gosh, it’s just…” She gestures vaguely. “...I wanted to be ready so we wouldn’t waste any time…” Turning on the heat under the water, she thinks to ask, “...no food allergies, right?”

“No. At least...none I’ve found…? And I’ve had spaghetti before, it should be fine, hm?”

“Okay!”

A bit stuttery at first, she starts guiding him through her process, letting him take most of the reins and acting more as a guide. Obito listens attentively, looking exceedingly focused.

...it’s adorable.

“Okay, so with the grease drained off, we can add our sauce...and once it’s all combined, that’ll be that!” She, in the meantime, worked on a salad mix. “And the garlic bread should be about done, too!”

“You make this all seem so easy.”

She flushes pink. “It...just takes practice! And you did really well!”

“I had a good teacher.”

Once it’s all finished, the pair of them ferry things to the table. “Okay...you try it first.”

“Me?”

“Mhm! You made it, right?”

Glancing to his plate, Obito twirls some noodles onto his fork, lightly pink at Ryū’s watching as he takes the bite and chews. “...it’s good!”

Beaming again, she follows suit. And it’s perfect! Mouth still full, she gives a thumbs-up, making him laugh. Between spaghetti, salad, garlic bread, and a little wine, they get through dinner with hearty conversation and increasing laughter.

“I dunno why I was so nervous,” she admits once they’re done, a cheek leaning against a fist as she twirls the last few sips of her wine. “I mean...we’ve been talking so much already. Guess I just felt kinda...out of practice. Y’know?”

“Yeah, me too. Though I try to bravado my way through things.”

“Well, we got through it. Should we play the movie…?”

“Sure!” He holds up a thumbdrive, grinning. “From my collection.”

“Oho!”

With a refill of wine, they move into the little living room of the apartment, Obito hooking up the TV and starting the film.

“What is it?”

“You’ll see!”

“Not gory, right?”

“Nooo. But...maybe a little scary.”

“Scary is okay. I like spooks. Just not lotsa blood and flesh and…” Her nose wrinkles. “...y’know.”

“Ha, yeah.”

They settle on the one couch she has, and at first sit...a little ways apart. They’d had opposite sides of the table before, and...well, this is new. But like a couple of dumb teenagers, they slowly meander their way closer, testing the other’s boundaries as they go until Ryū finds herself snuggled up against Obito’s side, head on his shoulder.

Obito, just out of her line of sight, is clearly ecstatic.

The movie starts out tame, but true to his word, it quickly takes on a rather creepy tone. Transfixed, Ryū stares at the screen, slowly worming her way further and further into the dip of Obito’s side.

...if she weren’t so focused on the movie, she’d realize that was likely his plan.

Obito, on the other hand, has technically already seen this one, and instead mostly watches for her reactions. The closer they get to a big scare, the more often he looks, biting back a grin until it finally happens -!

Shrieking in terror, Ryū scrambles for someplace to hide, and...ends up burrowing into his chest with a string of garbled, frightened nonsense as Obito does his best not to laugh.

“You okay?”

“I -! That -!” Her head shakes with a whimper, still hiding. “Nope. Nope nope nope.”

“Want me to stop it?”

“...nooo…” One grey peeks out, finding the screen a bit more bearable now. “...that was fricken’ terrifying! Ohhh my gosh!”

He just snickers, ignoring her continuing whines of discomfort. “It’s almost over, don’t worry.”

To his delight, she remains half-perched on his lap for the rest of the film. Once the credits start to creep up the screen, she loses her tension and goes limp. “...I almost had a heart attack…”

“Aw…”

“I mean it was good! But cripes, I wasn’t ready...eugh…”

Obito rubs a hand along her back, still clearly amused. “Gonna be able to sleep tonight?”

“...I better, I have work in the morning…”

He apologizes, watching as she tears herself from the couch and disappears into the kitchen. “...Ryū?”

No answer.

Brow furrowing, he makes to follow just in time to see her pull a pan out of the refrigerator. “What’s that?”

“Peach cobbler,” she sniffs, setting it on the counter and then fetching vanilla ice cream. “This is my reward for surviving your movie.”

“You’re gonna eat the whole pan?”

She shoots him a pout. “...maybe.”

He mirrors the look. “...I want some…”

“You have to promise never to scare me like that again.”

“Okay, okay. But wasn’t it at least a little fun…?”

Scooping the food into bowls, she thinks back over how nice and warm it was in his arms...and she could smell his cologne… “...maybe a little.”

They stay standing in the kitchen, leaned against the counter as they eat their dessert. Though not as lively as before, they chat in the quiet.

“So...on a scale of one to ten, how was our date?”

Ryū sucks on her spoon with a thoughtful hum. “...a nine.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“Why not a ten?”

“Because you scared the bejesus out of me!” After a moment to pout, she asks, “...you?”

“A ten.”

“...really?”

“Good food, good movie...good company. What’s not to love?”

She...isn’t sure how to respond to that, so she takes another bite to excuse her silence.

“We’ll have to try cooking something else next time. Something spicy!”

“Not too spicy, it’ll make me sick!”

“Whaaat?”

“I have a delicate stomach...nothing too greasy, either.”

“That’s all the good food!” he laughs.

“It’s not my fault!”

“Fine, fine...we’ll figure something out. I’ll have to find some of my grandmother’s recipes. From Quebec.”

That earns a blink. She thought she heard traces of an accent in his voice, but didn’t want to assume. “...sure! I’d really like that.”

But eventually, the bowls and the wine glasses are empty. The movie is over. The hour is growing late.

It’s time to call it a night.

...but it’s clear neither of them really want to.

Obito offers to help tidy up, and that helps take a little more time. But once that’s done, there’s really no more excuses.

“...well…” Ryū fidgets a bit. “Guess I’ll...say goodnight?”

“Yeah, I better go. Don’t want to keep you up to late. And I’ve got my route in the morning.”

“Mm…”

She walks him to the front door, the pair of them lingering in the opening for a long moment. “...be safe on your way home. Text me to let me know you made it okay, all right?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“And to say goodnight.”

“...again.”

“...yeah, again.”

Another pause.

Indecision seeming to make her bones vibrate, Ryū eventually makes up her mind. Stepping up a bit closer, she lays a hand against Obito’s chest and - with a bit of posturing up on her toes - she gives him a feather-light press of her lips to his.

Flashing pink, he nonetheless reciprocates, both of them easing slowly back apart.

“...goodnight, Obito.”

“...night, Ryū. I’ll...talk to you later.”

Nodding with a shy smile, she watches him head down the hall before forcing herself to shut the door. For a moment, she stands and holds the knob...then turns and leans against it with a sigh.

...it seems so quiet in here now…

Eyes lift to her little dining room table, where the flowers he brought her are still sitting in their vase. The sight brings her a small smile. As much as she’s sad to see him go...well, that just means she’ll get to look forward to seeing him again next time.

Next time...what a lovely concept.

Heaving a more contented breath, she makes her way back into the apartment. Time to get ready for bed, and wait to hear he got home okay. Then she’ll sleep, and start all over again.

...but at least now there’s something to look forward to.

     All righty, another day, this one with Ryū’s ship with @abyssaldespair​‘s Obito, set in a modern verse! I had...several ideas for these two, and picking one was difficult and ended up costing me time BUT, it’s done xD      Hopefully I can get MORE done :’D      But yes! This was actually an idea Meg submitted to me, with the premise based largely on Obito hiding his appearance on his profile until the big reveal! Ryū, of course, doesn’t mind his scars no matter the verse. She still thinks he’s one cute cookie x3      Anywho, I guess that’s...really all there is to say for this one! Hope ya like it Meg, and I better get to work on more drabbles xD

[wak-after-dark]

Still not able to come up with an argument about the Epilogue treating Gamzee (the murderous corpse molester) better than Jade (sat around for 3 years with depression only to have a dog dick and then be abandoned by her friends) huh? Guess you're just an idiot and willingly sucking Hussie's dick for a job at Whatpumpkin down the line. Maybe write some incest porn like IPDG and you'll get hired.

Wow get a load of this guy.

Okay I should probably just delete your comments and not give you the time of day, but you’ve been periodically sending me this kind of ask, and I really have to ask, do you really, really believe you’re someone with some sort of Moral High Ground right now? Like I’m not even defending the Epilogues as masterpieces or trying to shove them down people’s throats. I am literally just enjoying the content the WP Team put out and talking about it, and you come to my Inbox, to spew this accusatory nonsense and flinging insults. If you can’t read the Epilogues in a positive manner, and think they’re dogshit, sure, go ahead, but you’re like, trying to act like I’m some sort of brainwashed sheep and you’re trying to make me see the light. Also “Still not able to come up with an argument“ very passive-aggressive there, I have talked about the Epilogues, my opinions and takes on them, and how I feel about the way they deal with characters at LARGE here, if you haven’t bothered to look for the info, and the several responses to some of your asks, then don’t blame me for it. But sure. Let me talk about every single point you JUST mentioned here like some sort of big Masterpost, and when you don’t agree with my point either way, stop fucking harassing me on Anon, seriously you alone have been making me consider turning anon off entirely, which all things considered may just be the healthiest option I could consider, but here I am!

Still not able to come up with an argument about the Epilogue treating Gamzee (the murderous corpse molester) better than Jade (sat around for 3 years with depression only to have a dog dick and then be abandoned by her friends) huh?

Okay let’s begin with Homestuck proper. Gamzee is a Villain. He’s framed as such, people have constantly shown backlash against his character because he’s got fans that would like to see him redeemed, since a good chunk of his story happens with him brainwashed or mind-altered in some sort, but every time he’s shown to go back to doing awful things and killing people. He abuses Terezi, kills Karkat, and gets killed by Kanaya in return in one Timeline, and in another he gets locked up in a fridge, ends up in Caliborn’s planet, and trying to serve his Lord just gets beaten up, shot, left half-dead, until his final appearance in which he gets cut in half and absorbed into Lord English. Then, the Epilogues happen, and he becomes the butt of a joke about undeserved redemption arcs. His very existence in Candy is a joke that he’s not worth redeeming, actually, but tries to force himself to ‘seem’ like he has, despite ruining Dirk’s funeral, making Jake and Tavros’ lives miserable, supporting a Fascist ruler, taking advantage of a potential minor, and it all ends up with him being choked, killed, and his corpse being used as a Weekend at Bernie’s joke. Like... Is that really what you consider ‘good treatment of a character’? He gets away with a lot of bullshit, but he’s like. Constantly, and consistently, shown to be unpleasant, gross and awful. Like. He’s an awful person, and a comic relief, that does fucked up shit for most of his appearance, and I am not sure how any of this can be read in any sort of positive light. I’ve seen Gamzee fans MAD at how much he gets shat on.

Meanwhile, let’s take Jade. A huge theme of her character, sadly, is loneliness and isolation. I dislike that, like many Jade fans. She’s forced into depressingly helpless situations where she lacks agency or control over her own body, or the situation she’s in, and it’s shown affecting her greatly. I want my girl to be happy as well. So when the Epilogues came, and had her getting Callie-possessed, that was bad, it was like, AGAIN she gets the shaft. I want her to be happy and do what she wants to do and be badass with her powers! But- Oh wait, none of that is what you’re complaining about!!! You keep insisting on the Dog Dick instead of any of the genuinely heartbreaking things that happen to her. Jade has a dog dick. It is mentioned once in the entire Epilogues. It mildly affects her desire to have a child with Dave, but she doesn’t even shown herself that broken up about it, and had been looking about potential alternatives, even having Rose as a surrogate. There’s not a single joke made in the Epilogues about her HAVING a dog dick, nor any sort of isolation that happens as a product of her genitalia. Is it a weird choice to canonize that headcanon? Yeah! It kind of is! But this is also a reality where Obama and Dirk make out. And if someone is uncomfortable about Jade having a dog dick, or doesn’t like her being more openly sexual, then that’s fine!!! If they have a transphobic read on Jade, that’s fine!!! You can dislike it, and Homestuck, and the Epilogues, and the writers! But I, as a trans woman myself, and one who’s horny on main a lot of the time, liked the freedom Jade expressed to just do whatever she wanted with new partners on Earth C, and her seeming acceptance and lack of conflict at just, having junk. She does fuck up with Dave and Karkat, because she pushes them a bit too hard, specially Karkat, trying to use the Quadrant System to insert herself in a Black relationship. In Candy, this culminates with political tensions breaking Karkat away from the triad, which is bad for everyone involved. But in Meat, Jade states that they can tell her to just stop and she will, because she genuinely likes both Karkat and Dave, but their feelings are too deeply bottled and complex to just come to light. Does this put some tension in her relationship with them? Yeah! Does this ISOLATE her from her friends? No! Karkat and Dave DO still wanna hang out with her even if she’s a bit too much. John and Jade apparently chat online a bunch, and Jake seemed to have a good relationship with Jade before the whole Jane thing. She is close enough with Rose and Kanaya that Rose considered the surrogate mother thing. She has friends and ties! The major things that happen to isolate her is, Karkat leaving- Caused by Jane’s rise to power- Dave dying- Caused by Ultimate Self Timeline Shenanigans- And being possessed by Callie- All things outside of her control. I want her to get her agency back, but beyond that, her, as a person on Earth C, was not abandoned by her friends, and your obsession over her dog dick as a root of her issues and the bad stuff that happens to her says more about you than about the Epilogues in my opinion.

Guess you're just an idiot and willingly sucking Hussie's dick for a job at Whatpumpkin down the line. Maybe write some incest porn like IPDG and you'll get hired.

You know what? Yeah I would love to have a role at WhatPumpkin. Because I’ve seen the people working at it do other things, and I’ve seen their passion for Homestuck. The people currently doing Homestuck love Homestuck, and this is not up for fucking debate. As for the incest porn thing? Fuck you. Fuck you, fuck you, and a thousand fucking times fuck you. Once again, trying to get some stupid moral high ground mentioning incest. “Oh look at me, I am criticizing someone for something they wrote years ago”, is how you actually sound, and that’s only on the surface. V from Homestuck was never confirmed to be ipgd. V got harassed, and ‘doxxed’ by dubious sources and, I believe, Kiwifarms shit was going on at that time, so that was extremely shady and shitty. And the result of them being equated ended with ipgd being told to kill themself because of old fic they’d written, which, GUESS WHAT, was actually a critic to the way Incest was extremely popular in Fanfic back then, written by ipgd themself, a god damn survivor of that same bullshit they wrote about!!! Congratulations! THAT is the kind of bullshit people like you pull. You just cling to some idea of what’s right and wrong, and end up hurting real people that’ve gone through real shit, instead of considering nuance to your actions and thinking that, HMM, PERHAPS I SHOULD NOT HARASS SOMEONE ON THE INTERNET BECAUSE THEY DID SOMETHING I DON’T LIKE OR HAVE AN OPINION I DON’T AGREE WITH! But nah, let’s go send death threats to people we don’t like, riiiiiiight????

My fandom wish for homestuck 2 is the characters are treated with respect but since every single one of the new authors hate women and only want dirk and jake as well as Dave and Karkat to fuck on screen while Vriska gets comphet child raped by gamzee why bother lol.

Like, I don’t even know what to say. Have you seen like... The rest of the work the WP Team is doing with Homestuck stuff? Addressing actual issues? Doing right by the characters? Acknowledging their fucked up stuff while also showing them in positive lights? A good chunk of the Team, too, is queer? Like if they were all cis straight dudes I could see your complaint but they just. Aren’t??? At all???? Even Taz, who’s probably the biggest Dirk-Jake fan around, absolutely wants the best for other characters, yes, Jade and Rose included, you are just too jaded and blinded by your perception of the Epilogues. Vriska and Gamzee... Yeah that’s iffy. I am not going to defend that, whether it was a mistake with the ages or it was just Gamzee being more awful, that was extremely nasty. There’s also like, suicide and abuse and dictatorship in the Epilogues though. All of this shit that happens is awful, but also it’s not PROMOTING it or saying it’s a good thing? It’s... Fucked up. Comphet though, I dooooooooo want to elaborate on that, because, while I do like the reading of Vriska as being more into women, she does show a near-consistent fascination for Nic Cage and, then, ARquius as someone with a similar aesthetic? Like don’t get me wrong, Vris-Rezi is absolutely the way to go and the healthy thing for Vriska, but also I am not 100% sure if you can gloss over every single one of her relationships with guys as Comphet? (Compbi? Since it’s Trolls) Not to say it justifies anything with Gamzee, that was just nasty. But I feel there’s nuance to talk about Vriska’s sexuality.

Hussie doesn't like his fans or care about Homestuck, how you can read the Epilogue and say the opposite it honestly insane and a complete bold faced lie. Any author that cares about their work would read someone demanding a character be given a dog dick and say no. Any author who cares about their work and their fans wouldn't have released such a purposely bad and painful epilogue and then demand payment for a resolution. Just give up. That's the moral of Homestuck. Give up. It's pointless.

Nah man, you’re just jaded and hurt and projecting. Hussie and the WP Team love Homestuck. It would’ve been so fucking easy to just stop doing Homestuck and move onto something, not even release an Epilogue. It’s like when Homestuck ended. People accused Hussie of a rushed ending with Act 7 back in the day, of disliking Homestuck and the Fans, of having just wrapped it up quickly, but like... If you want to wrap Homestuck up quickly... There were a million fan theories and endings out around that would’ve been so much simpler, easier and basic than what we got. The fact we got Act 7 and all it entailed, the shit the characters go through the Epilogues, of course a lot of awful shit happens, but like... Precisely? If you’re tired of doing something, you just wrap things up. You don’t set up new plot points and mess with the characters and push a new narrative outlook on something. This is the work of an experimental team that still do love the content and characters. Again, you return to the fucking Dog Cock like it’s the biggest sin the Epilogues commit. You haven’t even mentioned Jane’s fascism a single time, but you’ve mentioned Jade’s Dog Fucking Cock like fucking twenty times. Who the fuck cares about what sort of junk Jade has, the Epilogues themselves barely even care, it’s mentioned in the passing and it hardly affects a THING at all. You ask me how I can ‘read the Epilogues and see the opposite of what they say’, and I ask you the exact same thing, because despite all the awful things that happen, Rose and Kanaya keep fighting against tyranny in Candy. Kanaya realizes she’s been brainwashed and chases after Rose because she’s NOT giving up on her wife. Roxy explores their gender identity and finds new things about themself. Karkat gets to live his rebel leader dreams in one Timeline, although with a bitter split from Dave, but ends up together in a proper relationship in Meat. John’s arc in Candy about feeling isolated from a world that seems fake, before realizing his nihilism has hurt the people he cares about and wanting to fix it. Jake’s morale of ‘better late than never’, working up the courage to take Tavros away from Jane- And in HS^2, working as a double-agent trying to sabotage Jane from within? Jane’s been shown at her worst in candy, but in Meat she’s shown to still be redeemable, and that’s exactly what the team’s aiming to do, too.

Like... I can see all the bad stuff that happens. And I find the reactions of the characters to these awful situations are interesting, and the political conflict among friends and the pushing forward in such a dark situation, resonates with me, personally, and some of my own experiences? Not to say, the Epilogues are a Game Over scenario? They are a low point. HS^2 sets up to be the high point. Like... When Game Over happened, a lot of people were like “Welp, Hussie just killed everyone, lol, guess he just got tired of Homestuck”, despite the Retcon Powers being there as the obvious solution. Epilogues, lots of shit happen, and similarly there’s still like a hundred ways to build up from there to a satisfactory resolution? Storytelling can have low points you know. It hurts when it’s characters you care about, duh, specially when it plays into the weaknesses they already acknowledged but fell into again despite themselves. I see why so many people would dislike them and take a more negative vibe from them than they actually convey. But I am still baffled as to why people like you feel entitled to shit on the WP Team and send harassment and insults to people who do enjoy them. You’re not helping anything. You’re not doing anything good. You’re just being a dick.

As for the “demand a payment for a resolution”, they didn’t demand anything? I will be the first one to say that I don’t like the Extra Bonus for 5 bucks, and think it would be better if the Bonus got released like, a month or two after it has for Patrons, an ‘early access’ scenario like I do with my Patreon. And I hope they change this. But aside from that??? The Patreon is optional to support the creators because, it’s not just Hussie, it’s a big team, and they’re also using the Patreon to help them with other projects like Pesterquest and Hiveswap, because we live in a capitalistic hell world and need money to be able to pursue passion projects. The main updates every month- And twice a month starting February- Are completely free for people to read, still, the paywalled content still circulates around the community despite being paywalled, and other paid projects like, Pesterchum, for their scope and the amount of fun they’ve given me, they’re super cheap and worth it.

You ask me how I can ‘see the opposite the Epilogues say’, you tell me that I am an ‘idiot sucking Hussie’s dick for a job at WP’, you act like I am scum and brainwashed and there’s literally no reason why I should ever like something you don’t.

You know what I am though? I am happy and excited about the things I’ve been given! I am happy with the representation I’ve seen the Team push lately. I’m happy with the way the characters have been treated in Pesterquest and have high hopes for HS^2. And I am interested in the events of the Epilogues, while acknowledging that of course a lot of fucked up shit happened in them.

Back when the Epilogues happening and I was reading them, I was reading Candy at like 4 AM and was LOVING the fucked up-ness of the Timeline and wondering what may happen in Meat. I got a PM from a friend asking me to make a channel in a server I’m in, to quarantine Epilogues Discourse, and was genuinely confused as to why there was Discourse going on. I went through the rest of Candy and Meat with some dread waiting for some ball to drop and something to turn really controversial, and I finished them still enjoying them? Obviously there was a lot of awful shit. Obviously there was a lot of things people wouldn’t like. Obviously they were tales that likely alienated a chunk of the Fandom that was looking for a happy ending. But honestly, the unbridled fury and subsequent harassment of people over them is just plain embarrassing. It was confusing then, and it’s even more confusing now, well over half a year since their release, and still sending random Tumblr Blogs this kind of bullshit.

So there you go! All of your questions and your bullshit, answered! Now let’s get this out of the way: You’re not going to like my answer, you’re not going to agree with a majority of what I just said, you’re not going to CARE about any of what I just said. Spare me the fucking asks and anon hate. Just move on and do something productive with your time.

[olderthannetfic]

You’ve probably heard of that film version of The Magnificent Seven from a couple of years ago. Maybe you know it’s based on a film from 1960, which is itself a remake of Seven Samurai.

But if you’re like 99% of fandom or even that guy I know who worked on the 2016 version, you probably don’t know that there was also a TV series starring, among other people, Ron Perlman.

(This came up because said dude and I were working on another Western starring Ron Perlman. A sucky one though. Alas, I cannot pimp it.)

Mag7, as it is usually called in fandom, was quite the little slash fandom in its day, yet it is nearly forgotten by newer fans. The show aired for two seasons from 1998-2000.

It’s one of those shows I bought, sight unseen, so I could catch up on older fandoms. I ended up liking it more or less, but I don’t think canon has aged well. It’s too bloodless for the era it came out in while making a pretense at covering serious, dark shit. It has neither the standing sets of old Western TV nor the big budgets of the 2010s Western revival. It’s too white. The one black lead gets relegated to token status along with all Native characters. The treatment of women is laughable, from the Happy Hooker stuff (gah!) to the time they try to teach the tomboy to be more girly so she can get the young dude in the cast (ragescream!). It feels more in line with what I’d expect a Western to look like in 1988 than 1998, especially on the heels of the far more inventive The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. in 1993.

Fanlore says that Mag7 suffers because current fandom is not into Westerns, but my problem is that I am far too into Westerns, and this show is not a good one.

OTOH, there is a lot of material here to work with, and work with it fans did!

It’s a super interesting fandom for a fandom historian because of how intensely AU-infested it is. Maybe you’ve heard something about “ATF-verse”? That’s a Mag7 thing. It’s not just regular AUs: The fandom is full of these shared universes with established rules for writers who want to play in them.

The “Seven” are:

Chris Larabee: The black-clad, taciturn loner with... wait for it... a dead wife and child.

Vin Tanner: The soft-spoken woobie, sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit, who has spent time amongst the Indian tribes. (It is every bit as cringey as you think.) Fandom’s #1 fave, natch.

J.D. Dunne: Horrid little twerp with a terrible hat. I wanted to stab him every time he was on screen. x100 whenever he was interacting with a woman.

Buck Wilmington: Played by Dale Midkiff of Time Trax fame! (What? Everyone important, by which I mean me, loved Time Trax!) He is Chris’s old friend and polar opposite, a jolly, good-humored man raised by a prostitute mother. Ladies, including the working girls, love him. Also he gets fake dead more than once, so he’s clearly the BEST character, and fandom ought to have loved him the best too! >:( 

Josiah Sanchez: Ron Perlman plays a wacky preacher and ex-gunfighter. Is he haunted by his past? Does he make woo-woo philosophical proclamations about this? Does this show love its ubiquitous Western cliches? (Don’t answer that.)

Ezra Standish: If Vin is the quiet, soft-spoken woobie, Ezra is the woobie who hides his Tragic Pain under a mask of charm and cheer. He’s the one with the rapidfire con artist patter, the fancy suits, and the Southern accent. He has a complicated relationship with his con artist mother. His wardrobe is a thousand times prettier than anyone else’s, and he crossdresses at some point. Naturally, he is fandom’s other darling after Vin. Possibly the #1 darling in ATF-verse.

Nathan Jackson: Nathan is a former slave and a doctor. He has a girlfriend in the local Seminole village and not enough to do on the show.

Other characters include a sad widow for Chris to have sad dead partner angst at, the judge who sends them on missions, and, in the pilot, that guy who played Harper in Sharpe. The judge is played by Robert Vaughn, which I 100% did not realize until I was looking at wikipedia just now!

Anyway, standard Western hijinks happen. The mystery of Chris’s wife’s death is eventually solved as angstily as possible. Chris pretends to kill Buck as part of a ruse at one point, making them my ship of choice. (What?) J.D. and the local tomboy get set up by all the other characters, causing me to want to stab not only them but also myself in the eye.

COME AT ME BRO!

Oops. I’m supposed to be promoting Escapade, not starting fights about old tv shows. Anyway, I think the canon has some issues, but the fic... let me tell you, there are no words more likely to attract me to a fandom than “presumed dead”, and Mag7 fandom delivered, not only in the slash but in the gen. I have no idea, years later, where to find any of those fics or even which ones I read, but I remember there was self-indulgent melodrama and it was GREAT.

Sweet, sweet idfic, come to Mama!

I would link you to a vid, but as Fanlore hilariously confirms for me, there are like no good vids in this fandom. They did eventually release it on DVD, but the image quality is... uh... not great. Oh, wait, I did love this lulzy het vid about ladies being thirsty for Buck.

Actually, that’s a total lie. I have gone looking for Mag7 vids repeatedly for the Escapade dance party. Excavating my old spreadsheets, I see a bunch of interesting ones, like this slash vid of Nathan/Ezra. The Southern gentleman and the black guy are an obvious cliche teamup for Westerns, but the fandom rarely went there. This vid is great though! The only reason I’ve never played it is that no one at the con ships this.

Past Escapade panels include:

2001 - True pairings and permutations (Who are the "right" couples, and what other combinations are remotely possible? Video excerpts for newcomers.)

2003 - AUs! Crutch or creative lifeblood? (Are ATF stories a creative extension of the universe or a cop-out by folks too lazy to do their historical research?)

2004 - The Multiverse (Where canon is a formulaic retread of a remake of a classic, the critical mass of fan creativity has exploded in fascinating and bizarre ways. Often, richly textured parallel universes seem more attractive than stories based on the original source material. From conflict over "closed" AUs to creative in-breeding, what's really going on in the Mag 7 multiverse?) [HAH, EVEN YOU GUYS AGREE WITH ME.]

2005 - Where has the Old West gone? (Magnificent Seven has it all! Seven sexy men, horses, the old west, guns, adventure, right and wrong, you name it! So why isn't there more Old West fic? Why all the modem and future AUs? Where do we go from here?)

2006 - Cowboys- Real Life v. Fantasy (From Magnificent Seven to Brokeback Mountain, from John Wayne toughness to curtain fic. What's reel? What's fun? And how much reality do we want in our fun?)

2007 - Chris Larabee: Tragic Hero or Pig-Headed Bastard? (How worthy is Chris to lead the Seven? Does he lead them because he believes in protecting the weak an innocent, or because it strokes his ego? Does he truly value Buck's friendship and support? Vin's? Anyone's?)

2008 - M7: Need Topic! by Megan Kent [LOL]

2011 - Mag 7: Deader Than a Beaver Hat (They're gorgeous. They're archetypes. Lots of other fandoms have less to work with. So, what the hell?)

2012 - My Paring is OK. Your Pairing Sucks! (In a fandom famous for pairing wars, let's get it all out in the open and put it to bed. Come and defend your pairing of choice, and enjoy others doing the same. Inflatable lightsabers, laughter, and the ability not to take yourself seriously. All welcome.)

2013 - What holds the gang together? (The deal was simple: a dollar a day, plus room and board, for a month. And now they've been together *how* long? What holds these seven loners together over the long haul? All pairings, all points of view. Bring story recs to share.) [Duct tape. The answer is always duct tape.]

Mag7 on Fanlore (including links to many smaller archives)

Mag7 on AO3

Mag7 on FFN

[incarnateirony]

Let’s talk about subtext. Again.

This is a topic I've talked on before, but at that point, it was a fairly closed-in discussion about the (mis)use of the word "subtext" abroad, especially in regards to intentional undermining of discussion of canon. Lots of people use the word, but nobody really understands what the word means before they use it, even well-intended people, much less people arguing for the sake of argument.

So I'm going to start with this, then put it behind a cut.

I will warn due to the nature of examples, there’s some Megstiel-critical stuff included even if it’s not entirely the core-point of the post. Plenty of disclaimers about your right to fanfiction and your headcanons there but there’s a lot of stuff I’ve noticed Megstiel shippers just... don’t want to read, or something, so if you’re like super duper defensive of the ship, stop while you’re ahead. But for what it’s worth (though I absolutely SHOULD NOT have to disclaimer this, but it’s SPN fandom, so,) Rachel Miner is a doll and my reservation to her or her character does not reflect on her whatsoever. Actors are not their characters, and opinions of characters in no way represent opinions of actors.

But yeah. *points up* subtext.

(Edit: I’m gonna spare everybody a lot of time and say that if you’re a reactive Megstiel shipper that refuses to practice basic self-care or heed the warning, once you read this post in full, also read the notes in full, in order, to prevent any cyclic time wasting repeating yourselves, since you guys seem to have a very linear argument track that I’ve now watched across multiple people on multiple SM platforms. If you hit a redundant point, your only response will be *points at previous notes* or *points at post*, so let’s not waste kilobits. Somebody got there ahead of you and already ran full ouroboros in advance.)

Cool. Got it. So subtext is the underlying spirit of a story, especially if it is implicit and thematic to the piece; Canon I went into extensive detail in this previous post but the basic points to consider in fictional literary canon, since that was fairly single ship focused post; let’s just scrape out a few of the original sourced points on what fictional canon is:

Original works of a writer who created certain characters and/or setting

In fiction, canon is the material accepted as officially part of the story in the fictional universe of that story. The alternative terms mythology, timeline, universe and continuity are often used [...] to refer to a richly detailed fictional canon requiring a large degree of suspension of disbelief, while the latter two typically refer to a single arc where all events are directly connected chronologically.

Other times, the word can mean “to be acknowledged by the creator(s).

I think, in base premise, everyone agrees with the base line of this: Fanfiction is not canon; stuff made by the original creators is canon; elements like mythology, continuity, etc, especially elements directly acknowledged by the creators, are canon. I don't think anyone's going to argue this, and if you are, sit down, Carl.

Don't worry, this isn't going to be a "Destiel is/isn’t canon" post. I've beaten that literary field to death. It's just the continued misuse of the words that is pissing me off right now.

One thing you will notice, however, is that "subtext" is thematic and implicit; and at times, authors have commented on subtext and given approval, nods, or confirmation. In example, despite subtext, those areas are inherently canon, even if never-ever overtly textualized.

But we're gonna go deeper than this, because some people have wrapped and tied it up in their noggins that people have to literally continuously creator-nod at the canon, despite thematic and implicit elements of storytelling that are previously confirmed.

Schroedinger's Canon

If an idea is formerly established, but we don't take the explanation out of the box every time, is it really canon?

(Psst: The answer is actually yes, I’m just being a smartass.)

I'm going to give the simplest examples.

Demons have black eyes (unless of course, they're higher ranking.)

We are aware that this is an established premise.

Early on this was even textually explained.

However, it was never stated that only demons have black eyes.

There are many encounters where a creature flicks their eyes black and we recognize them as a threat. And what kind.

In some of these moments, they are not explicitly labeled as demons. They are just ambiguous bad things if we ignore the meaning to these thematics.

That said, if we don't have a "you're a demon!" or "I'm a demon!" revelation, is that character suddenly not, canonically, a demon?

The simple answer is no. They are still a demon.

The same goes for angels. We are aware of a variety of angelic reasonings and behaviors and elements that were established at some point.

However, there are cases that are not necessarily called out and explicitly labeled "I/they am/are an angel."

Let's take 9.03 "I'm No Angel."

We see a pharmacist attack Castiel. Castiel slays the pharmacist and the pharmacist collapses without any dialogue exchanged to clarify angel-ness, but a bright white flash of light.

In fact, despite only having seen the pharmacist prior jamming to music, the transcript goes so far as to include "He is obviously possessed by an angel."

Why though? Why do we consider this "obvious"? Because there are thematic, subtextual, enduring elements, that even when not spoken, they are implicit. This is the very meaning of canonical subtext.

Canonical subtext is not "A random line I can extrapolate into whatever the hell I want in a given moment removed entirely from scenario." That is just interpretation of a moment. If you're just pulling random lines out of your ass that don't have consistency, that is not subtext. The line is canon. The interpretation, if not built off of established thematic subtext, is just that: an interpretation.

A wild interpretation appears.

Logic is destroyed!

But the fact is, deep down, we all know this. There are thematic, subtextual, enduring elements to the show that we don't need ELI5'ed to us to understand. We may need them ELI5'ed to us to feel the need to win a digital argument with someone you feel is being thicker than Rocky's pectorals, but we don't need it to actually understand these events.

Previously established and enduring premises that are technically subtext to continue to adhere to include:

Demons are bad things, and generally possess people against their will. There have been a few exceptions to this rule, which canon made point to highlight vividly.

Vampires are monsters, and generally drink blood to survive. There have been a few exceptions to this, which canon made point to highlight vividly.

Despite these changes, we all understand the enduring subtextual mechanics involved. Just because Ruby got the medical certificate of her coma patient after Sam grilled her about eco-friendly recycled hosts doesn't mean all demons are choosing coma patients and walking around with their medical records now. Just because we've met a vampire clan that sucks on cows instead of people doesn't mean they all go vegan. Just because exceptional moments of these tennents exist do not mean we should assume this applies to every scenario moving forward, or pretty much the entire scenario of the show goes in the shitter.

Nobody disagrees with me here, right? Pretty sure we all agree here.

So the real point of where "subtext" arguments get obnoxious is when people choose to undermine thematics. It's one thing to not *notice* the thematics initially. Not everybody is a high-acuity meta viewer/reader/writer. Sometimes we don't consciously absorb them or we miss a detail. Sometimes a few years later the authors are bashing their heads off their desk because we're still arguing over a point they tried to make so they write it in neon letters on a character's forehead. But it's another thing entirely to willfully reject thematics.

Let me fall back to these previous examples. Angels, demons, empty vessels, etc.

Ruby recycled her body and made point to do so. In making a point, they evoked a coma patient who was considered braindead. This warranted a clean, empty vessel without a host.

In 5x21, Castiel wakes up in the hospital feeling a bunch of human elements after losing his grace, having been considered brain dead.

Now, we can banter headcanons on day on how exactly we went from (later quote of) exploded by an archangel (previous to this would be Raphael) to a season-gap and then clinically registering as braindead. Logic on my end would indicate Castiel hadn't been strapped up to machines to gauge his brain-dead-ness until then, ergo, nobody was there to gauge that he was brain dead. Unsurprisingly, doctors didn't fly out to test molecularly-recomposed Castiel immediately.

But that's a heck of a random element to include after them slapping it around as a unique item before. While subjecting him to itches, pain, hunger, and headaches suddenly and talking about his lack of mojo.

Well, that's because it's not random, and it's thematic, Carl. The same way it's thematic he acquires those as a human later (and technically previously-later in 5.4), and even Lucifer in season 13. That's because we understand these thematic elements of the story. This is subtext at this point, but this is canon.

(In this example, Castiel is confirmed an empty host in 5x21 in thematic fallback to Ruby's host braindeath, but also confirmed humanized/degraced in both forward and backward thematics.)

These things aren't not-canon simply because they didn't have Chuck step in to narrate it to you. They aren't not-canon. They're definite canon elements that quite definitely reached the screen.

So where is my issue with this?

Well, have an example: Recently, I've been having problems with possible-Megstiel shippers. (I say possible because there’s also been an insurgence of well-known-Castiel-haters brushing shoulders with the Megstiel crowd and rooting for her to come back to respark the ship FIVE YEARS LATER because, IDK, I guess they’re panicking about how gay it’s getting and realized spitting acid at TPTB for years isn’t working so I guess they figure they can try to side-write him off. And when they suddenly pop out being combative AF as below, I mark them as possible anti in Megskin.)

Now, you guys have followed my blog for a while, and you may notice I've never commented left or right about Megstiel, because generally, if people are leaving me and mine alone, I leave them alone. But the genuine fact is I fucking loathe it. It makes me furious to my core. And not "because Destiel shipper." I only went true dumpster season 13 and maybe started tipping towards it around S11. But I hated Megstiel since the concept of it.

So I want you to first imagine this set-up. Me, some friends, Destiel conversation thread. BOOM. Aggro Megstiel shipper kicks in mocking ship superiority. Gets shut down. They stop. Next day, repeat. BOOM, starts talking bullshit about more canon stuff to their ship. Gets mad when people counter. BOOM, kicks in another day, starts saying people only don't like Megstiel because it's a "threat" to Destiel (...I'm not sure how a ship that died 5 years ago is a threat to anything???) - so people start setting this person straight on the reasons they don't like it.

Now, if you're super-defensive of Megstiel, you may want to skip this section, but this boils down to:

Vividly painted consent issues

Lack of honesty in the character

Psychological abuse elements

Psychological is semi-relative but considering Cas' mental state over time, some of his stans aren't fans; Meg isn't the demon's name - it's the name of the girl she possessed, and we never learn more about this demon and who they actually were. But back to the girl she possessed: in 4.2 it was Meg - the real Meg - the human Meg that REALLY manifested the consent issues to light, almost in counter-highlight to Ruby expressly clearing herself of riding with a passenger. And yes, Meg* (asterisk because HONESTY, wtf is your name demon dude/chick/other?) acquired another vessel, but also talked about the girl's aspirations and suicidal attributes. The long and short of it is - some people have a legitimate visceral reaction to this because, especially and of all characters, Meg Masters (human) illustrated this as a problem and then people just sort of wandered off and acted like it was NBD, like, she probs did the same thing as Ruby, right?

Well... no. That's where things hit the line of headcanon. And you have the right to develop your own headcanon to build a little fanfiction corner to do what you want in it, but you don't just get to ram it down everyone's throats and act like "their interpretation of canon is wrong." Not if they’re the one following thematics.

Thematic elements are canon. Excuses around them are headcanon.

This bullshit of “all interpretations are equal regardless of who does or doesn’t have actual canon content and supporting quotes, references, or moments and it’s all just interpretation and nothing is true and there’s no true canon because it’s all an illusion and it’s all interpretation” needs to die.

Otherwise, just deadass admit that you think there is no spoon, there is no canon, and there is no consistency or theme to the writing going on whatsoever at any point.

Because entertainment is art. And yes, you can interpret things. But things do have genuine themes. Supernatural is not one big floating 3D image of floating cubes you squint at that is entirely relative to the viewer. There are in fact stories being told, elements had, and truths within the world setting. 

Otherwise, we can randomly choose to extrapolate that Sam’s hair isn’t hair, because it’s never molecularly analyzed, and we can clearly and reasonably argue and be totes-equal-canon if we state it’s actually a bunch of Leviathan Scales stripped into hair shape. And yell that my opinion is as valid as everyone else’s and just as canon as the people who thinks Sam’s hair is hair on a molecular level. Except we can’t. Because there’s common sense and base rules to reading things in context.

Points raised were

"well Meg fell down after exiting so the host is empty." Okay, and an entire fresh-black-cloud-possessed town fell down after a mass exorcism before, so that means what, exactly? Nothing. There is no implication or even premise to that, which is thematic and sound, and in fact, thematic evidence to the contrary.

"Well when Meg exited she got stabbed and she left her so the host died. THEN she came back." Okay first of all, the knife was pulled and she was never actually stabbed, but even if we add the argument she secretly got stabbed off screen (not canon) for her to have died to try to make this an okay argument - Okay, but... if demons could just possess actual corpses, wouldn't that kind of undermine the entire point of The Everything here in picking braindead hosts? Why aren't entire legions possessing graveyards themselves instead of just raising zombies (like Samhain did?) To be dead like that but not dead-dead and only-mostly-dead is a level of devil's advocate that hits the realm of absurdity. Like, they waited until she braindied, but not organ diedededead? What's the odds of it even working like that? ????  

THAT ISN’T EVEN HOW BIOLOGY WORKS. There is no implication or even premise to that, which is thematic and sound, and in fact, there is again thematic evidence to the contrary. And past even the thematic evidence to the contrary, you’re now basically going to, what, argue some bazillion to one order of operations where she experienced brain death BEFORE organ death somehow? Is it only interpretation that Sam and Dean probably have to use the bathroom every day cuz it’s only mentioned a few times and that’s the only time those body functions are canon? Common sense on basic body processes is just interpretation now?

And just to clarify for the argumentative shits out there:

It has been proven that demons can continue to occupy dead hosts, if the hosts died while they were in possession. Exorcism of the demon at that point double-deads the host (again, ironically, Meg 1), as they are no longer supernaturally animated. However, a demon has never possessed or repossessed a previously-dead host. (And as above, what would be the FUCKING point of Ruby then? Or ANY of these instances if we can just possess the dead? Of the entire show?)

See examples: Meg 1 was alive when possessed; Meg fell out the building and broke; but Meg was possessed and got back up; Meg died immediately on exorcism because she was no longer supernaturally animated. New vessel was found. Similarly, the boys will kill demons in existing-dead vessels from fatal wounds which they identify, meaning demons continue to animate a host.

There is no instance TO DATE of a demon going into a previously-fully-dead-body, or otherwise, you know, the entire premise goes to shit. Yeah sure Ruby would take care to leave her braindead body on the floor instead of, I don’t know, just swinging through and picking up the first 100% dead chick available. Or she wouldn’t have just done that to begin with and shown Sam the grave or death certificate. Because it’s totally easier to find completely braindead patients than dead people, right? Because again. Thematics guys. Brains. Use the cells in them.

BUT AGAIN, SHE NEVER ACTUALLY GOT STABBED, SHE LEFT CUZ SHE WAS ABOUT TO.

So it’s almost like there is zero reason to even believe canon is trying to make a she-dieded-here excuse because she didn’t get stabbed, and almost like that is all completely arbitrary fanon.

I just felt the need to address how there is no universe that excuse even works in canonically.

Now, if you want to use these headcanons in fanfiction land to write a fanfic where it isn't noncon, that's great. You do that.

But canon has been very, very vivid about clarifying these issues; sometimes bluntly (Ruby's exposition), sometimes subtly (Cas' braindeath post-Ruby's braindeath), sometimes recurring until everyone gets the goddamn point (No, dude, he's alone, and human, he doesn't have other voices; no, dude- that's his heartbeat- no, dude- okay, fine, we'll have Cas explain EXACTLY the period Jimmy died [available in the same bracket] AND show him in heaven to make SURE everybody knows Cas isn't lying because for SOME GOD AWFUL REASON THEY ARE STILL ARGUING WHY.); sometimes they paint it as a story for an episode (cow-vegan vampires), sometimes they paint it almost like someone's changing and have them regress (Benny.) But they paint these elements if they are meant to be painted within canon.

And no, choosing not to ELI-5 these things every single time isn't bad writing. It's them trying to put faith in an audience. At best, it's bad understanding of the volatility of their audience. Much of the art of writing is through subtlety and persuasion. There is nothing more annoying than a villain that monologues his every decision and nothing more condescending than bashing your viewers with kindergarten explanations EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

But apparently some people in this fandom need that, because otherwise they'll run circles yelling it's just subtext, but that it isn't canon, despite it being subtextual canon, and that maybe the bad thing with black eyes that came from a black cloud wasn't a demon because they never called it a demon maybe it was an ebonyoompaloompa and you can't tell me otherwise because they never said it's a demon and THATS JUST SUBTEXT.

...THAT ISNT HOW THIS WORKS. I don't care if it's about races, about powers, about story elements, or about ships. Thematic, implicit, enduring subtext is canon. I honestly don't give a shit if you like the canon implications, and if you don't like the canon implications, that's what fanfiction is *for*, but this is not some ambiguous void in which the universe doesn't have any true rules whatsoever just because they don't stop to explain literally every single event happening on screen at any given moment.

This fandom is one of THE. MOST. FRUSTRATING. PLACES. to even TRY to hold literary discussions in. Because people don't just move the canon goalpost, they just flail it around wildly while telling people nobody can hit or declare what a goalpost is and that everything is irrelevant and there is no goalpost, and there is no canon, only Zuul, and again, THAT ISNT HOW THIS WORKS.

But while we’re at it, why the HELL is the ship called Megstiel? We are fully aware that is the name of the human girl that was screaming about consent. Why aren’t more people bothered by the continued use of her name? Nonamestiel? Anonstiel? What even is this? She’s not only walking around with a (generously, at-best) questionable consent host, she’s freely using the name of her last dead, terrified, used and abused host and Megstiel fans seem to not understand why people have HUGE squick issues with this.

Regressively, they tried to take a potshot at Destiel and Jimmy with season 4-5. At which point they claimed, blindly, I was moving the goalpost with the following points:

Destiel launched 4.1, Meg addressed this 4.2.

Not everyone is a meta author deeply considering these things *IMMEDIATELY*

This is different from aggressively resisting the ideas years after the idea was entered into central fandom narrative

Generally speaking the Destiel fandom of that era adapted by writing fanfiction to alleviate the shared vessel issue, or OT3 fics that involved his consent, or ironically actually wrote fics premised exactly on what happened (Jimmy died at a splodey advent and was released) and was confirmed even hammer-on-head-blatantly in canon.

Trying to yell at or about people who literally didn’t know better because it wasn’t even a spark in the common mind at the time, versus aggressively refusing to accept it years after it became an accepted thematic canon establishment, are two wildly different things Carl. 

Blameshifting, gaslighting, goalpost moving; it’s all ridiculous. But we can cull goalpost moving. Again, about *any* part of narrative discussion. Because most importantly and essentially, subtext is actually a very important part of our everyday viewing experience and understanding of entire universes, as long as it is true, implicit, thematic subtext. 

I’ve also heard the comment “I’ve wished they clarified that more for Meg.” Well... no? Has it come to mind they never wanted to clarify it? They clarified Ruby at the same time (Human) Meg screamed about consent. They clarified Castiel. But Meg just jumped vessels and kept using the name of the girl that was screaming about consent. Talked about her host’s mental state. Did not redeem for years after the fact. Had no real compulsion to do so. Her redemption WAS her highlight of learning at least a *few* of her mistakes (though it failed to address many of them, respectively), and being different than Just Another Demon. *points at the various demon subtext above* If they wanted to clarify that... well... they would have. They did with the others. Unsurprisingly, they didn’t with her.

And people can say that’s just an interpretation, but son, that’s the canon. That is literally what is there, through and through, in the canon. Top down left and right from origin to sunset. Demons Are Bad Smoky Things That Turn People’s Eyes Black And Have Little Moral Compass And Possess People Without Consent Unless Given Active Resistance To Make Them Act To The Contrary is canon. “But passing out implies empty” is not canon; new hosts have done that too; “But she got stabbed so could be dead” is not canon, because if she died, well, how the hell was she possessed again beyond Magical Fairies Preventing Her From Organ Death In Spite Of Braindeath While She Bled Out? - these things are not remotely canon. They are not even subtext. They are not thematic. They are headcanon. And again, you are free to have a headcanon in your fic land, but you don’t get to act like the canon of other stuff isn’t there and just tell everyone else they’re being mean/wrong/whatever for... reading... the content... both textual... and thematic... that is there.

And this is tumblr. I fully expect one of the Megstiel fans to come crawling buttchapped out of the woodwork, but I do defer you to

Your friend crawling our asses for days and seeking us out just to argue

The lead in that wasn’t just purely about Megstiel, as much as inspired by a Megstiel conversation, and still addresses broader fandom narratives

Why you so mad, bro.

If you want to have a problem, send me an ask and we can make a new thread about it. This thread is for literary discussion only. You *will* be blocked if you try to start a troll-off over it in hyper-super-inflated-defensive-psycho-shipper-mindset running off of emotion rather than logic, especially after as many disclaimers and “enjoy your fanfiction” labels as are present.

But the bullshit claim I encountered today that these reservations are “just shipwar wank” rather than upset survivors and/or people with disassociative or similar episodes being terrified and horrified by the presented concept is so fucking trivializing I could vomit glass.

Or that it’s “most” people just using it for shipwar wank. You don’t get to decide who has abuse survivor history, or MHI history, that could be deeply and fundamentally bothered by this. Whether or not you have a survivor card of your own, you don’t get to decide that. If it doesn’t bother you, great. Yet again: Enjoy your fanfiction. And if reading these repeated drilldowns about the canon problematic nature of it bothers you when everything else is rando excuses, then consider why it bothers you to be given those excuses in fanon but not canon spaces, and consider how those of us who take issue with it for these issues feel every time you drop it into conversation like a nuke.

And the thing is, it’s not just Megstiel. Not by a long shot. Like I said, I’ve stayed quiet on Megstiel through the course of my time in digital fandom. Most of the time, I’m laughing out bullshit from bronlies that are completely revisionist. Sometimes, I butt heads with other Destiel shippers (generally wherein they read my “subtext can be valid canon” and think I’m saying “queer people should settle for subtext”, of which these statements are not connected nor implied. Not even in thematic subtext.)

And again, like in the previously mentioned, previous post about subtext, canon and literary discussion: Even applying any Death of the Author excuses is wildly abused. There’s a goddamn spoon, Neo, and I’m going to smack you with it. Because when they’ve managed to collaboratively manifest these details into fruition and they have in fact aired, you can’t just run around yelling NOOOOO at everything. You can’t just pitch random excuses like spitwads into conversation hoping they stick to the wall. Content needs to be reviewed in full context. Otherwise you are literally spit-balling. 

Even the most generous styles of literary analysis will tell you that, unless your interpretation is literally that it is a completely abstract piece with no intent, continuity, objective, moral, thematics or anything like a Wassily Kandinsky painting, and even then he had SOME sort of premise to his stuff. But hey, if you want to write a fully, top to bottom, consistent and thematic analysis where literally the entire show is made in an arbitrary and random nonlinear hodgepodge of non-events, by all means. It’ll be pretty hard to convince people, but go for it. You’ll probably be up against far more solid readings, though.

If we want to get into “full context analysis” while trying to diminish actual content in the series, then the time comes to argue if any content can be removed from the series, due to seeming non-canonical; getting everyone to adhere to this revised canon is its own feat, of course, and is instead a side branch of alternate canon which may or may not be widely accepted (just as in literary canon, there’s multiple canons for different genres, etc.)

An example of a premise for this would be:

I genuinely believe Megstiel only exists because all related episodes of initiation (notwithstanding her flirting with Cas like Demons Do in previous seasons, where he complied only long enough to THROW HER AS A BRIDGE TO WALK OVER FIRE, but instead to season six where it started tilting) were penned by rookie authors during a season that has been proven to have poor executive story editing and many plotholes. Initiating episodes were written by new authors on their first and second episodes, while the one writing the teleplay was simultaneously among the story editors that were failing in other areas, making double-checking their work even more dangerous. Failures to address issues like seeing her true face and more, which were previously established, can easily be considered as part of this.

(Before 6.10 Caged Heat Jenny Klein only wrote 5.07; she co-wrote with Brett Matthews, who previously only wrote 6.05 Live Free or Twihard. Brett Matthews was also credited exec story editor on this episode. So two newbies cowrote an episode and then story edited it themselves. In a season full of plot holes big enough to fly a Boeing 747 through so nobody upstairs was doing tighten-up work either.)

This would be an argument to try to strike it from canon considering standard elements of even non-direct non-Megstiel-ick, just why-didn’t-he-see-her-face wumbo sized oversights.

However, despite however logical this may seem to a large swathe of people, I am not snorting enough crack to think I can convince the entire fandom to consider this and revise the fandom wide canon acceptance. Ergo, I will not premise an authentic argument from it. 

But that’s about what your other options are if you want to, say, try to scrub out thematics of demonic possession/exorcism effects or whatever else.

Ironically, the antis that yell a bunch of long-disproven points about Destiel, who are grudgeshipping Megstiel, are stepping foot in the same things they falsely yell are problematic. Even if we argued huge devil’s advocates on Meg’s life state as... dead and her reanimating her post-full-death after exiting at some point... then that’s necro? Like they try to claim Destiel is necro, despite Cas being explicitly divine-revived and having his own heart beat on multiple occasions afterwards since then, thus not being dead? Or that it’s noncon, despite canon aggressively clarifying time and again since as far back as season 5 that it isn’t? Or the above-mentioned pulled survivor card trying to speak for all people with that survivor card; is it because they tried to pull the “angels trigger me because of church abuse” card and got told to watch another show? Because... like. SPN is literally about magical creatures and angels, that’s part of what you sign on for. We don’t sign on for central themes of rape, incest, pedophilia or any other wild shit. There’s other TV shows for that. That isn’t this show. If angels bother you, practice basic self care. Just like my self care involves avoiding Megstiel episodes, or any episodes with T.A.W. in them.

Do they think they’re gonna pull an “ah hah, gotcha” if they make someone argue it? Because... these... these things aren’t parallel. Not even close. And at the risk of sounding like “my ship is better than your ship,” they’ve made a point of removing these problems for one character, and with the other character, repeatedly narratively highlighted these issues directly as enduring issues. So whatup with the super ironic grudge shipping?

Oh, lemme guess. “Subtext.”

...*looks up at the wall of everything above* 

Myeah, no, that’s not gonna work.

[sometimesrosy]

I hate seeing things like this “Someone on reddit (a huge bellarke fan) has had infos on s6 regarding bellarke. She said it was someone she trusts and that unfortunately the person made it clear that bellarke wasn't happening this season, if not ever. She said she completely lost hope... so yeah, low your expectations” I know better than to believe fleakers on reddit or twitter from GOT but it still gets you down knowing you can’t completely disregard it until the season airs

Anonymous said:A reliable moderator on Reddit said she has an insider and so far Bellarke isn’t in Jason’s plans and she was told Bellarke isn’t happening in s6 if not ‘ever’. I really know i shouldn’t believe in things like this, that don’t have open source or sumn but I feel so down. I still have hope I can’t accept that they put all those scenes or dialogues for nothing

Okay. So that’s two on the same topic. So this is going around again…. Three different asks now. And one nagging ask declaring i won’t answer their first. And it’s all bugging me.

*sigh* fine.

honestly i wish y’all just wouldn’t read it. but i should get it out. and you should know why I don’t buy those rumors and understand that I have reasons, I did research when they first came out. I went back to the text. And I have been watching the source of that rumor for literal YEARS now, so I’ve made some analysis on the way she works. I think we all forget that this is the internet, and we know what you said last year, how many times your theories were wrong, and who you blamed when they turned out to be wrong. None of this I say here is being said lightly and I wish I didn’t have to say it, but I think more harm has come from letting these rumors stand without challenging them. So. I guess I should do it, even though I don’t want to. The other option is to just wash my hands of fandom all together. I guess I’m too stubborn. fine. This is going to be a mess because I wrote it all day long, trying to get it out, planning on deleting it, getting new asks, having conversations with people, taking things out, adding others. And I’m just gonna post it and let it go without editing anymore.

I am not delusional. I am not naive. I am not a blind bellarke shipper. I am JUST trying to stick to the text and watch the show. I AM critical, but that does not mean I am negative. I am looking to UNDERSTAND the show on screen. And when rumors or writer commentary doesn’t fit with what I see in the show, I put them aside and do not take them as confirmation of anything.

I have been sitting on this answer all day trying to figure out how to answer it, because it gets pretty negative about… well… about one particular person and I am trying to keep out of drama and mind my own business and stick to the text and my corner of fandom. But I’m so tired of this all the time. 

I just went to reddit to find out why it’s coming back and who this redditor is and what they said. So I couldn’t find it in the 100 reddit, but it was in bellarke reddit. I don’t know know WHO that moderator is, although it might be someone I know, who I know listens to the person who started the original rumor, and even if it isn’t him, it’s still pretty clear to me that’s where this new wave of negativity is coming from.

 I have been avoiding speaking out on this particular rumor because I did my research when it first showed up and tracked it back to a person I had a meta argument with YEARS ago. And because of that, I’ve been careful to not say too much about it because it ends up sounding like I have a grudge. But it’s too much now. It isn’t fair that this stuff goes around because someone decides they are all knowing and understand everything better than everyone else and they think it’s a good idea to spread bad feelings as “confirmation.”

First of all, I don’t do gossip. I do canon. I analyze canon and stories and film and visuals and symbolism. Whatever someone says outside of canon, I consider it and see how it reflects upon canon. The more official it is, the more I take it seriously. Someone having an unnamed source with no written confirmation of what they said? And then DECLARING their interpretation of undocumented source material to be ACTUAL CANON CONFIRMATION? No. That’s called gossip and rumor and innuendo and interpretation and speculation. NONE OF THAT IS CANON CONFIRMATION.

I am at about third hand here, one person told me what she said about what the inside source said, so I cannot confirm anything I say as truth. But I want to explain the stuff I heard, and why I have decided that, far from confirmation against Bellarke, it actually sounds to me like confirmation FOR bellarke. It’s about interpretation, confirmation bias, point of view, rumors, fears, and ego.

As far as I can tell, someone who is an insider, who is in the know about the writers room said something along the lines of, 

“The writer’s room used to argue all the time about whether or not to write romantic bellarke, and now they don’t argue about it anymore.”

The person to whom this was told interpreted that to mean that it was CONFIRMED that Bellarke was dead and JR was NOT GOING TO DO BELLARKE AT ALL. RIP. 

Even if the source who said this is a good, honest source, that’s not what was said. At all. That was an INTERPRETATION of the statement, which seems to be strongly influenced by prior assumptions. The statement is saying they decided. That means it could go EITHER one way or the other. EITHER they’re giving up on Bellarke OR they’re committing to it so no arguments needed.

And I don’t understand that interpretation. Because it means that this source of gossip believes that season 5 had absolutely no romance in it. That there was nothing romantic about bellarke to argue about NOT doing.

But in season 5 we had 2199 calls to Bellamy, She must be important to you/She is. Sexy hug. The hostage taker and his girlfriend. Clarke jealous of B/E kissing. TWICE. Another traitor who you love. I always cared about bellamy. Love is not a weakness. Don’t make the same mistake I made when I betrayed you.  Go save him. Do you know how much she cares about you? She called you every day. Bellamy inviting her to the bridge and then giving her the romantic “look back” before he leaves. Waking up ONLY Bellarke. Marper charging them with care of their child (that’s not romance that’s MARRIAGE) and facing the new world in each other’s arms, TOGETHER. 

I mean, maybe one of those things could be taken out of context and read as romantic when it’s not intended to be, but all of them, one after another? on and on? No. That’s evidence that supports a romantic storyline.

If they CHOSE to not do romantic Bellarke, then there would be NO explicitly romantic moments, Clarke would NOT be compared to Echo in Bellamy’s feelings. They would NOT have used the daily letter trope. The camera would not have closed in on his hand by so much skin and his lips brushing her shoulder. Clarke would NOT have been jealous– a shot that CLOSELY echoed when she saw finn and raven kissing, an explicitly romantic/jealous parallel to a canon love triangle.

 And if they had changed their minds about romantic bellarke, they would have wrapped up the 2199 calls as NOT romantic at that fireside. They would have had Bellamy tell Clarke he poisoned Octavia to save Clarke’s life, and it was no big deal. They would have had Clarke tell Echo that Bellamy was her best friend, like a brother to her. But instead, they leave all these things unsaid, unspoken, still to be discovered. There are ACTIVELY open romantic Bellarke plots, especially because Bellamy HAS to either choose Echo and NOT Clarke, or he has to break up with Echo and see what can happen with Clarke, because he loves them both, as stated by Octavia. Or he could keep them both like Finn did. WHICH takes us back to romantic storyline anyway. Not endgame, but romance definitely. Which, EVEN if they have decided to go with endgame B/E STILL makes Bellarke part of a romance. Bellarke was a canon romance in season 5. Love triangle. C/B/E.

The writers CHOSE to put that stuff in there. They CHOSE to announce Bellamy’s love for Clarke as a tipping point for a major MAJOR plot and character moment. If they were clear about NOT putting romance in, they wouldn’t have done that. They would certainly not leave the storylines OPEN and in need of resolution. LIke with Supergirl, where Kara and James kissed and then did a 180 and were like, “nah let’s just be friends, HEy do you think that bland white creep is cute?” They tanked karolsen for a new ship. THIS is not happening on The 100. They did not tank Bellarke. They brought it in tighter and made it more immediate and brought other people into the the story and are forcing the need to CONFRONT the feelings they have for each other, because Bellamy is not going to be able to pretend he doesn’t feel that, when his girlfriend is there, and he SHOULDN’T be feeling it at all.

 If they were in the middle and TEASING bellarke and not intending to make it GO romantic, or delaying it and intending to make it go there, they would still be arguing about it being too much or not enough or whatever. 

However, if they put all that in there WITHOUT arguing, that means the plan, for everyone, is to do romantic Bellarke. It means they’ve already started. 

They know how to do platonic. Raven and Bellamy are platonic. When THEY stood at that window looking into the future of a planet, they DID NOT TOUCH. Platonic. When Bellamy refused to leave Raven behind, it was the memory of CLARKE that made it painful, and Raven jollied him out of it by calling him names and lying to him. NOT romantic. If they had decided to NOT do Bellarke and NOT tease romance or foreshadow it, they know how not to make it romance. Which includes NOT comparing your love for her to your canon girlfriend. 

NOW TWO people have declared the source to be a good source. And this has been the problem with this rumor, because this person has a lot of authority within fandom, has been involved with production, has a broad audience and does indeed talk to people. SO she is seen as an authority that cannot be questioned.

There is no authority that cannot be questioned about their opinion. 

And I have had significant interaction with this person that calls into question her interpretations, her judgment, and her authority. I once called her a hypocrite because she said I could not possibly know authorial intent, because SHE knew authorial intent and I was wrong. Which, as a teacher, just pisses me the hell off, because she’s basically saying that only certain people are able to understand story, people with authority like hers. She was gatekeeping my interpretation. And, like, my JOB was to teach kids how to think for themselves and come up with interpretations. And that’s what I try to do here. Come up with my interpretations, show you how i got there, encourage you to come up with your own and back them up. I mean if you agree with me, great, but it’s fiction. We all get to interpret things. The better our analysis, the better we can defend it. To just flat out say that she was the authority and SHE knows and can tell everyone what to think? No.

So I guess that’s why I’m going all in on this. I wrote this this morning when I was ranting, but not sure I’d post the vague blog because I try not to be negative. But then I got the second ask so it’s all coming around again, and I already avoided speaking out about it the first time. And that didn’t make it go away. She’s still acting as an authority who knows everything and all she has to do is say it is confirmed, and other people take it as truth because she said it. It’s not like it will cause a rift in fandom. The fandom is in pieces anyway, and anyone who believes her thinks I’m delusional and an embarrassment, according to the anons I get, But I’m going to put this under the cut in the hopes that most people are too lazy to click more. But whatev, she’s not my friend, she doesn’t respect me I don’t respect her. And this whole gossip horror was the nail in my fandom coffin when it first came up a few months ago. I’m not naming names but if you know what’s happening or what happened the first time, you know the story. 

I hope this is too long and y’all won’t read it. This is why I have been sitting on this post all day, but I keep getting asks and I’m getting so angry.

I know who said that, and i never trust her interpretations, because she spent season 3 telling us all, definitively, that Lxa was the hero now, CLarke was the Love Interest, and CL was endgame because it was *pretty,* and we had no right to think CL was dark. First of all, pretty does not equal good, and hasn’t been assumed so for like idk a hundred years? But worse, that I had NO RIGHT, to look at it any other way but a beautiful love story. (incidentally silencing abuse victims.) That we COULD NOT understand authorial intent, did not have the ability to do so, but she did, and we were wrong. And not allowed to say anything else.

 When she doesn’t understand something in the show, she doesn’t bother trying to understand the story that JR is telling, she just says that he’s a bad writer. When she DOES understand something in the story, she says the writers are so bad that they didn’t do it on purpose, and it’s only because she’s so smart and clever that she figured out their underlying psychological misogyny that they didn’t know they were writing into the story. That’s the Finn as “Nice Guy” storyline. 

When the writers actually TELL her that they LITERALLY meant what she saw and they are surprised the fandom missed it, she again goes back to blaming the writers for not being clear enough. When she was TOLD that the CL story in polis was a dark story of Clarke’s psychology and she MISSED it, she AGAIN blamed the writers for not being clear and then. And THEN. Get this. Blamed the fandom for never looking critically at the CL story in POLIS, For only seeing it as pretty, unless they were screaming ABUSE.  Remember when I told you she told me I didn’t have a right to my interpretation and she was silencing abuse victims? So. Yeah. She’s referring to me, and those of us who were talking about that seriously, as abuse survivors or psychology students.

Anonymous said:She’s not the only one that claimed Bellarke is never happening. [XX] had some insider too as i remember and tweeted something along those lines of the moderator from Reddit publicly. {XX] is reliable enough and she said something like they aren’t planning canon but I don’t wanna put pressure on her I only saw her tweet she is not a part of fandom drama she’s a part of presskru.

Yeah. I’m not saying her name. That’s her. I’ve spent all morning trying to write my thoughts on this, and on what I’ve seen her do in this fandom for three years. And I found that reddit thread and I’m pretty sure that the mod’s “reliable source” is that woman who is NOT a reliable source. She’s a biased source who does not check her theories against the canon because she’s more interested in hearing herself talk and being right than in actually understanding the story. 

Being part of presskru does not mean she is right. The press writing about this show has OFTEN been wrong. DO you remember season 3 at ALL? Some of those people were still writing reviews in season 5 where Clarke and Bellamy did not exist almost. They were trying to rewrite the show as Octavia-Raven-Diyoza centered. She was part of the completely inaccurate interpretations of season 3. Just because someone tells you they are an authority that does not mean you should take what they say without questioning them. QUESTION EVERYTHING. 

She is not reliable. She has had consistently bad speculation and has interpreted this show ABSOLUTELY incorrectly MANY times. And when she’s wrong, she says the problem is with the story and the writers, not her meta. She refuses to question her own interpretations or even, really, to check it to the canon show. She believes Bellarke is dead so when someone said something, she IMMEDIATELY decided she had to tell EVERYONE that Bellarke was confirmed dead. This whole rumor comes from her.  From her unreliable interpretations and confirmation bias.

Please, don’t take my word for it. Go back over her meta and her speculation. See what she says when the writers tell her to her face that she was wrong, and how she is friends with them until she is facing fandom and then she calls them all bad writers and the show a bad show and the story making no sense. When really, she the show just WENT OVER HER HEAD AND SHE MISSED IT. Every time she calls a writer a bad writer, you can just assume that she did some lazy analysis, jumped to conclusions, and when the story didn’t do what she thought it should, decided the fault was with the writers, the story, the characters, or, well hell, why not just blame me. I did after all say CL was abusive. And that’s why she didn’t bother looking into the symbolism of Clarke’s character development in polis. 

Someone told her something, when she knows the whole cast and crew are on lockdown, and she ran to twitter and started telling everyone that she had insider information and she knew the truth. That is not reliable. That is HIGHLY suspect and arrogant and lacks any sort of honor. She needed to be the one who had insider knowledge, so she decided to hurt a whole fandom. She HURT people, because she HAD be the one to know the truth. She was NOT concerned with anyone else and did NOT allow them to be happy shipping their ship. 

As far as I can tell, her interpretation of what someone told her is par for the course for her, had nothing to do with the canon, and everything to do with fandom drama, ego, confirmation bias, and the desire to be the authority and have everyone think she’s the shit.

I do not think she’s the shit. Sorry. I think she is an irresponsible writer claiming authority and using it to control those around her. Worse, she’s a teacher. And as a writer and a teacher, that makes me ANGRY. She can’t bully me into following her, or convince me that she’s smarter than me and make me hang on her every word, and so she blocked me a long time ago. But I’ve tried to help people understand the story and come up with their own interpretations and she’s actively gone out of her way to claim her authority to kill a whole ship and fandom. Am I biased? YOU BET. But that bias means I pay very close attention to what she says. And what she says, is suspect.

Please don’t send me any more asks about gossip, rumors or drama. And definitely don’t send me any asks about her. 

I would prefer to talk about CANON, literature, film, science fiction, character development, symbolism, storytelling, and Bellarke.

[johannesviii]

The Adventuress of Henrietta Street

Some highlights of the last EDA I’ve read (The Adventuress of Henrietta Street).

I took these screens while reading, along with my reactions. As usual, this is full of spoilers.

“Let’s wish for something simpler next time. I need a break.” (me, right after reading Grimm Reality)

OH SHIT OH PLEASE NO NOT NOW. NOT. NOW.

This is not what I wanted.

I’m not going to make any friends here, first because I’m sure this book has a ton of fans, and second because I don’t dislike it for the reasons you might expect. Sure, it sidelines Fitz and Anji, sure, the ideas aren’t as numerous or groundbreaking as the ones in Alien Bodies and Interference, sure, the pace is extremely slow, sure, it does some debatable things with the internal logic of the series, and yes, sure, it mostly takes place in a brothel. But while these things can be considered problems, they’re not real problems to me. Some of the most creative things in this story are actually possible thanks to them.

No. I have a problem with the way this story is written and framed. And I can already hear someone saying something like "what, is the academic style too much for your small brain?", but I actually think it doesn’t go far enough with its fake academic style.

By all means, write a fake pseudo-academic paper! Invent a ton of fake sources and names! Write horribly long digressions in footnotes until they eat up the rest of the page! Analyse this story like a bad history student and put on paper some really weird conclusions about it- most of them probably wrong. Even if you don’t go all out and write House of Leaves lite, at least write Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell lite, please. Have. fun. with. it.

But it’s not written like a fake master thesis, because there’s no sources, no footnotes, no actual goal or real analysis (right or wrong), and in the end, it’s mostly written like a normal novel, except it has a very flat tone and often digresses to talk about historical events. Reading Henrietta Street is not like proof-reading a badly organised master thesis written by a dispassionate student: it’s like trying to read a novel buried under piles of gratuitous infodumps. And that’s a real shame, because there’s an interesting story somewhere in there. 4,5/10

Okay, this is interesting.

That’s VERY cool.

That part made me laugh pretty hard.

Apparently the biggest danger that sex workers face in their line of work is accidentally summoning demons, and that also made me laugh pretty hard.

I’m not sure this is supposed to be funny, but it sure is.

Aaaaaaand she actually summoned a demon by accident and that guy was killed. Okay.

That’s very nice but there’s a distressing lack of footnotes and fake references in that pseudo-academic book. Also if there’s no quote from the dream journal (or if there’s some, but boring), I will riot.

Okay, first, I have to say Scarlette sounds incredible.

Second, I immediately pictured her like Mylène Farmer’s 18th century libertine persona, except with black hair.

This is probably a bad thing.

Oh my god

Ah, I was starting to wonder where our main idiot was.

Please tell me Eight is fencing with Scarlette. PLEASE.

YESSSSS Oh my god what a wonderful mental picture.

SCARLETTE, NO.

WAIT WTF EIGHT HAS A BEARD NOW?!

Ooohhh, he has finally discovered where he was from and probably what happened to Gallifrey! Interesting!

We already kinda knew that was what made The City of the Dead and its magic possible, but it’s always nice to have a clear confirmation.

I’M HOWLING

"Hello I’m the Doctor, can I stay here" "Sure"

So he’s looking for magicians. And clearly doing some research. I have to ask, though: where are Anji, Fitz and the TARDIS?

Meanwhile, on "The Doctor Is Asexual", episode 75647

These books have recently acquired a strange taste for tarot reading.

Wait, the Doctor is sick?

That’s all very interesting but could you please hurry up a little bit?

Again, I wish this kind of fake document had fake sources and/or footnotes to accompany it.

Again, I wish there was a fake drawing and a fake source there.

Interesting.

Also... is it bad if I’d like to read that book instead of the one I’m currently reading?

So the demons actually look like apes. Uh.

How much do you want to bet these creatures were inspired by this painting?

I love this dialogue.

What is your plan and what the hell are you trying to do.

"When Scarlette asked reasonably what on Earth she thought she was doing"

I laughed out loud at this awful, awful typo in French. That should be "par les couilles" and the level of sheer incompetence on display here is worse than any misused French ever printed in these books (yes, even the non-sentences of The Turing Test).

If you don’t speak the language, don’t pretend you do & send it to an editor anyway. You already know I don’t speak English very well, but you don’t see me trying to get my English typos printed in a book costing actual money and bought by actual people.

What are you trying to achieve.

Well you’re not wrong.

FINALLY

This is a wonderful little scene.

"It’s worth stopping" YEAH YOU THINK

WAIT WHAT, THEY DIDN’T ARRIVE WITH THE TARDIS

WHAT’S GOING ON

Another wonderful mental image.

Okay so I think that’s an important character. I don’t think anyone spoiled me anything too important about this book, but I’m pretty sure this guy comes back later.

The fact I didn’t stop to consider how awkwardly Fitz would behave in a brothel is all you need to prove how innocent minded I tend to be

This would be so much better if it was either written completely like a fake academic work or completely like a novel, because this weird hybrid thing isn’t working.

CUTE

How much do you want to bet he did a James Bond impression.

Fitz no.

Also this is a pretty great scene.

Is that a compliment or an insult

Oh. So he was looking for magicians of sorts who could act as a replacement for the Time Lords?

Anji as a prophet and a force of nature is a marvellous thought.

"But they had a tendency to giggle every time [Fitz] walked past"

Okay, I guess Sabbath is bad news, then.

 Is Sabbath actually human? Because if he’s a Time Lord survivor, that would explain a lot of things.

Probably panic.

It’s not a real EDA until someone is coughing up blood

Or because this book is clumsily organised.

And here’s another typo in French (éventrés).

Also who is that random guy with a rosette and why is he, like, metaphorically eating popcorns in the background?

Is that battleship a TARDIS?

It’s completely anachronistic, so it could very well be.

A question you could be asking yourself in quite a lot of these books, Doctor.

Take a shot every time an adjective reminds you that Sabbath is fat.

I’M HOWLING

Ohhhh is it his fault because he destroyed Gallifrey? Is that it?

What the fuck are you two talking about.

So the wedding is some sort of ritual? What?

What inspired the author to sit down and write this book also remains unclear.

That still sounds wonderful and I’d gladly read that book if it existed. Although it’s easy to picture it like some sort of Codex Seraphinianus variant.

A strange way to talk about regeneration, but a pretty cool one.

Of course, Doctor, of course.

Why is the author so fucking terrified by this very mundane detail about women.

"Assassin" as a noun doesn’t have a feminine equivalent so this is yet another typo in French.

Ohhh, is he trying to rebuild a TARDIS? Where is the real TARDIS, anyway?

You really don’t want Anji to have any kind of major role in that story, do you?

So this is what the ‘horizon’ is like. I like the black sun thing. Well okay it’s a bit of a goth cliché, but still.

I SPAT OUT MY TEA

DON’T MAKE ME THINK OF BETTER STORIES

And I’m pretty sure this would be a lot more dramatic if this book was written like a novel OR like a cold academic piece, but it’s neither, so it just sounds disinterested.

At least we have excerpts from the dream journal mentioned at the beginning!

...we know. It’s a very, very mundane thing, dude. It happens when a lot of women are living together. It happens in nunneries too. There’s nothing magical or evil about it, and this is getting very ridiculous.

Recently, in one of these liveblogs, I was wondering how many stories had living planets in Doctor Who and particularly in the EDAs... so I’m glad somebody else thought it was a recurring theme as well.

No seriously who the fuck is this guy.

Okay okay I laughed pretty hard.

I seriously doubt that.

138 PDF pages, and next to nothing has happened yet, apart from a lot of exposition.

Yes okay but could you please do something with this idea instead of just exposing it layer after layer?

A bit too meta for my taste, but still enjoyable.

Again, more explanations for this very cool concept, but nothing new.

Okay. Now do something.

We knew this already. Now do something with it.

An interesting parallel but the book still refuses to do anything with its ideas at this point.

Meanwhile, nothing happens.

YOU DON’T SAY

OH. Okay. At least we know the purpose of that wedding thing now.

It’s… very weird, honestly. I mean, the Doctor never really had ‘roots’ with Gallifrey, he hated the place (in Classic Who, at least – and in New Who as soon at it existed again) and tried to get away from it as soon as he could. But hey, fluidity in canon and all that, so why not. Can’t say I like it, but yeah, why not.

Meanwhile the Doctor gets worse and worse and Fitz finds yet another girlfriend "out of boredom"- which is understandable at this point.

Usually I would be like "OH NO" but since something is happening at last, I’m like "OH MY GOD, FINALLY"

Wait wait wait.

You know I try to avoid spoilers for these books but I couldn’t avoid this one. So.

Is this the book where Eight loses a f█cking HEART

I WISH

And now the Babewyns have a leader, since you persisted to do nothing.

Again, I wish this book was full of fake sources for this kind of things.

Good description of the TARDIS’ sound!

Finally, someone’s doing something about the Babewyns! Go Scarlette!

I like this detail.

WAIT A F█CKING SECOND

IS THAT THE MASTER

IS THE MASTER JUST CHILLING IN THE BACKGROUND OF THIS STORY WITH POPCORNS WHILE WAITING FOR THE SHIT TO HIT THE FAN

Okay, so the wedding plans had to be changed and now the bride will be Scarlette.

And the Master is drinking in the background, like:

Eh eh, so Moffat wasn’t the first one to think about this!

Take a shot every time an adjective reminds you that Sabbath is fat.

Holy shit, Scarlette rules.

And this is very sweet.

Well you’re not wrong.

Eight you are literally dying, there is no shame in using a wheelchair, okay

This is a great mental picture.

I’m pretty sure "howl of laughter" wasn’t the intended reaction, but I’m sorry, he kissed Scarlette and instantly started the apocalypse, I can’t stop laughing

You know what, just for fun, I am going to pretend this is a post-apocalyptic version of the Library of the Serpent’s Hand from the SCP mythos.

Ooooooh boy.

YEP. YEP, YOU ARE THE MASTER. YOU LITTLE SHIT.

At least he’s being reasonable for once.

How very convenient for you.

Yes I was about to ask, could you please hurry up and die already?

OH SHIT JULIETTE HANGED HERSELF.

YEAH YOU THINK

ISN’T THAT OBVIOUS WTF

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

FDSDFGHFDSGHFDFH I KNEW IT

To be honest, this book is FINALLY getting intense and interesting.

WELP, FITZ ISN’T THE LEADER ANYMORE, BYE BYE FITZ

YOU DON’T SAY

Bye bye, Master.

You weren’t very useful, were you.

YOU DON’T SAY

This place looks terrifying in my head.

Finally, FINALLY, this book is gripping.

But it took the Doctor, literally dying on the floor, in a pool of black blood, in a post-apocalyptic dimension for it to become gripping.

Or just a self-insert.

OHHHH HERE IT COMES, FOLKS.

Ah yes, one last typo in French, just because.

YOU DON’T SAY

Hey, isn’t that the cover?

SFSDFGHGFDHHHH ONE OF YOUR HEARTS WAS LITERALLY TORN AWAY FROM YOUR DYING BODY FIVE MINUTES AGO, CAN YOU PLEASE SIT DOWN FOR A SECOND BEFORE CHALLENGING GIANT MONSTERS IN A FIGHT TO THE DEATH

Hi happy Eight, we missed you!

YES BUT SCARLETTE WITH A SWORD IS AMAZING

Holy shit, Eight.

Holy shit dude.

I hope Scarlette isn’t really dead.

Apparently she is. F█ck.

There’s hugs, though. Hugs are always good.

DOCTOR WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING

COME BACK HERE THIS INSTANT

OH SHIT SCARLETTE FAKED HER OWN DEATH

And she’s still pretty great, too.

How very convenient for you.

EXTREMELY OMINOUS.

Phew. I’m glad this book is over. It was just as exhausting as the previous one, although in completely different ways.

[ramajmedia]

Star Wars 9 Theory: Dark Rey IS Palpatine | Screen Rant

A trailer for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker unveiled a dark side version of Rey - and she could actually be possessed by Palpatine. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker's writer and director J.J. Abrams is well known for his so-called "Mystery Box" approach to marketing. Under Abrams' watch, each trailer is carefully designed to raise more questions than answers, to stir up debate among fans, and to leave viewers eager to see the mysteries resolved when the film finally comes out.

At this stage, the trailers for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker have raised two major questions. The first trailer confirmed that Emperor Palpatine is set to return; it's unclear whether he's survived death or is in fact a Force spirit of some kind, and there have been few hints about his role. The second trailer ended with a haunting shot of a dark side version of Rey, wielding a crackling red double-bladed lightsaber. Was it a Force vision, akin to Luke's experience in the Dagobah cave in The Empire Strikes Back, or will Rey turn to the dark side?

Related: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker D23 Trailer Breakdown: 18 Story Reveals & Secrets

On the face of it, these are two separate mysteries. But they could be tied together - because dark side Rey could really be the first glimpse of Palpatine returning to the fold, and in the flesh.

Star Wars canon has always been clear that Sith can somehow survive death - but not in the same "Force Ghost" sense as the Jedi. In order to become a Force Ghost, a light side adherent has to submit to the will of the Force, right down to accepting their death; dark siders are driven by an egotistical desire to impose their own will upon the Force, which means they're naturally unable to become Force Ghosts. Matt Stover's novelization of Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith made this explicit. Stover worked closely with George Lucas himself on the script, and was given permission to amplify many of the scenes. As a result, he extended the conversation between Qui-Gon's Force Ghost and Master Yoda to include a longer discussion of immortality. "The ultimate goal of the Sith, yet they can never achieve it," Qui-Gon explained. "It comes only by the release of self, not the exaltation of self. It comes through compassion, not greed. Love is the answer to the darkness."

There is, however, one canon way that a Sith spirit can endure after death. A Sith can transfer their very essence into some physical relic, or can bind itself to the geographical place where they died and essentially "haunt" it. Star Wars: The Clone Wars season 6 included arcs in which Sith spirits were seen inhabiting a specific site, while Charles Soule's recent Darth Vader comic introduced Lord Momin, a Sith heretic whose spirit had inhabited a mask. This power is referred to as an "Essence Transfer", and it's important to note that Palpatine probably knew it; he'd possessed Lord Momin's mask for years before he loaned it to Darth Vader.

It's quite possible that Palpatine survived death by using the Essence Transfer ability. Indeed, that would explain why Lucasfilm has so far avoided showing any footage of the Emperor at all; the only image so far as is a Star Wars 9 poster released at D23, and the cartoonish artwork has made many suspect the Emperor lacks a physical form. As noted, J.J. Abrams is secretive, and his reluctance to show the Emperor may mean that he's holding this revelation back for later in the marketing campaign - if not for the film itself.

Related: Why Does Star Wars 9’s Emperor Palpatine Look Like A Cartoon?

Lucasfilm dropped the first hints of Palpatine's eventual return back in 2017, in the novel Aftermath: Empire's End. Written by Chuck Wendig, this book explained the Empire's defeat at Jakku, and revealed that the last survivors fled to the Unknown Regions, where they presumably formed the First Order. It featured a Sith cultist called Yupe Tashu, who had served under Palpatine and was convinced his Master had somehow survived death. "Palpatine lives on," he insisted. Another aide - who didn't actually believe it, but was trying to placate Tashu - made a fascinating comment. "The mantle of the dark side is yours to wear, at least for a time," he told Tashu. "At least until we can find Palpatine and revivify him, bringing his soul back to flesh anew."

Back in 2017, readers assumed that Yupe Tashu was simply insane. Palpatine's impending return changes that, turning this into a fascinating and important clue. Tashu seemed to believe that Palpatine's spirit had been transferred to a relic or geographical place, and that his servants had to find him and bring a potential host to him. Charles Soule's Darth Vader run confirmed that a Sith spirit can possess anyone who comes into contact with the relic that it resides in; in that case, anyone who saw Lord Momin's mask was tempted to put it on, and doing so left them under the Emperor's thrall. That would fit with the idea of "bringing [the Emperor's] soul back to flesh anew."

Related: Star Wars Canon Already Explained How The Emperor Survived Return Of The Jedi

That naturally raises the question of just who Palpatine would consider to be a worthy host. The latest Star Wars trailer ended with a mysterious glimpse of a dark side version of Rey, wielding a crackling red double-bladed lightsaber. There was something strange about Rey in this shot; her body was held unnaturally straight, and her facial expression was fixed in a glare. All this seems particularly odd given that Star Wars: The Last Jedi ended with Rey seeming to commit to the Jedi and the light side of the Force. Perhaps the explanation is that Rey has been possessed by Palpatine. It's already been confirmed that Rey and Kylo Ren will both head to the wreckage of the Second Death Star, the place where the Emperor died. If his spirit is haunting that location, then he could possess her; if he has contained his essence within a relic, then Rey could stumble upon it.

A close look at that shot reveals that dark side Rey is wearing a mysterious ring with a black stone upon it. It's possible that is the relic the Emperor placed his spirit within, and he has compelled Rey to wear it, taking control of her body. Interestingly, the original working title for Star Wars: Episode IX was "Black Diamond", which may well hint that this dark stone is important somehow. If Rey has indeed been possessed by Palpatine, then ironically her salvation could be Kylo Ren. She and Kylo Ren possess an intimate Force bond, created by Snoke but still be there even after his death. That bond would mean Palpatine has chosen a host who can potentially draw upon the Force power of another being, and so resist his influence more than anyone else. The Emperor may well have made a big mistake if he does possess Rey in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.

More: Star Wars 9 Theory: Dark Side Rey Is A Clone (& So Is The Original)

source https://screenrant.com/star-wars-9-dark-rey-palpatine-possessed-theory/