#eloise is loud and bossy and phillip loves her so much

[sea-owl]

Some random titled lady: Gentlemen don't like loud women

Sir Phillip Crane, introvert botanist: Oh, like hell we don't. Somebody has to tell Cook I hate fish, and it sure as shit ain't gonna be me.

[thekatebridgerton]

In one of your older posts you described Eloise and phillip as a single dad x magic pixie dream girl.

I was wondering if you could expand on this concept?

I've always wondered what happened after end of the book.

Honestly I need to read the Bridgerton Epilogues too.

I don't remeber when I said this about Phillip and Eloise being an example of the single dad x manic pixie dream girl trope. But it does sound like me. Mostly because to me Julia Quinn averted falling into the trap of making Eloise relationship with Phillip entirely two dimensional.

So we all know about the MPDG she's the female version of the hallmark hero. She's fun, quirky, outside the mold and seems to have landed on our hero's doorstep to cure his depression and make him feel like life can be fun again (then Julia said 'hey, what if the manic pixie dream girl had trauma after seeing her dad die and also had a family of wacky, equally traumatized siblings). Then we have the single dad, he's often overworked, depressed and his dubious approach to parenting has turned his kids into unruly brats.

Wait a minute, what do you mean that the resident MPDG has trauma? And a life of her own? so here's where it gets fun. Because as the story progresses we learn that not only was Eloise not placed in the story to solve Phillip's problems, she is quite frankly going trough a existential crisis of her own, and he and his kids are invertedly helping her trough it. Because we come to learn that Eloise is a lot more than this talkative extrovert who likes to give orders. She is deeply concerned about life passing her by and everyone moving on with their lives except her and she just really wants to find out if falling inlove IS actually something she's been missing out all along.

And it turns out that our depressed single dad really never had anyone to teach him how to be a good person, other than his brother who died. But he's been muddling trough and all this time the depression was because he simply has been beating himself up most of his life, for not being good enough or 'man enough' to fix everything that's wrong in his life without help.

And this is where we reach the deconstruction of the trope, because at the end of the story, Phillip comes to terms with the fact that Eloise isn't this perfect idealized woman of his dreams, I mean she's certainly brilliant and wonderful but not perfect. And that's okay, he never wanted perfect, he just wanted someone who would smile and maybe love him. He never expected Eloise to change his life but she did and he doesn't know how to go back to living without that.

And then we see Eloise, who never thought anyone would need her or appreciate her for all the things everyone told her were flaws, like being loud, bossy and energetic. And tho Phillip is not perfect, he does try his best to be better every day and appreciate who she is as a person, not because of how she's good at fixing his life, but because she's herself, a kind, friendly no nonsense woman with a heart of gold who can and will stand up for herself even against someone she loves. He's not her perfect one dimensional hallmark hero, he has a life of his own, and hopes, dreams and fears, outside of just pleasing her and being her husband. But he would do anything to make her happy and that's all she needs to build a good marriage.

It's very much real, in TSPWL how sometimes we idealize the people we are writing to, when we have never met them in person and build them up to be these perfect paragons of virtue and then we meet them in person and it turns out the manic pixie dream girl has trauma and the hallmark one dimensional hero, is actually just a guy trying to figure out his life.

Maybe that's another thing i love so much about this couple.

[sea-owl]

Oh my gosh I love the sibling au! I feel like Felicity will be like Jo from Little Women in the way she dreads her siblings being taken away. Hyacinth slyly asking if Penelope has misplaced a glove recently and Felicity fuming when she hears that Colin has it and has kept it in his pocket all this time. Or how Philip's handkerchief ended up in Eloise's possession. Her sweet naive older siblings, who have no idea of the wolves waiting to devour them. For god's sake her sister explained how babies are made and yet is oblivious to the fact that every time Colin Bridgerton looks at her, he always looks like he is thinking about ways to get her sweet sister with child!

Felicity has never been so happy that her siblings can be so oblivious and so socially awkward. She has also have never been happier that everyone in London seems to think they are married rather than siblings. 

But given that thought, why the hell do these Bridgertons seem so hell bent to come between a married couple? That brat Hyacinth keeps purposefully asking questions to make Phillip and Penelope blush while they are in direct eyesight of Hyacinth’s rakeish siblings. Also are they breaking into their house? Felicity could see no other explaination as to how Colin and Eloise Bridgerton seem to have come in possession of so much of her siblings’ stuff. Felicity will have to devise some traps with the twins later. 

Gods Felicity could not imagine if her siblings did marry those infuriating Bridgertons. Eloise Bridgerton is too loud and too bossy; Phillip will not be able to handle that. He has the backbone of an eclair! No, best to just keep Penelope as the acting lady of Romney Hall. 

Speaking of eclairs, Felicity shuddered. Colin Bridgerton constantly looks at Penelope like she is one and he wants to eat her up or out. Felicity has heard the stories, the man is rarely home, and never contributing to what he spends. A fortune hunter if Felicity has ever seen one. No, Penelope must protect her earnings, if she is to be tied to a man through either marriage or relation Felicity rather it be their brother who would never take her well earned money from her. 

Now what Felicity doesn’t know is that after that first meeting Violet privately asked Portia if Phillip and Penelope were together Portia immediately denied it saying she is the one who married the previous Sir Crane. Phillip and Penelope were nothing more than siblings. The two mamas have been scheming together ever since.