#for so many reasons it could've not worked because of what the show is fundamentally trying to say

[variousqueerthings]

it did strike me that out of all the guys at mash (margaret included), the person i read as the most traditional heroic romantic lead is klinger, which is fun considering he spent over half of the show in mainly dresses, skirts, or other considered-feminine wear, that he (like the others) has zero interest in war and violence and the military, and that he’s the only lead who’s not white 

and also it feels good to see that the hope exists specifically in korea and it’s not just about the idea that one can only start healing once leaving a country that’s experiencing war, as if the people who still live there aren’t important. soon-lee is such a great character, after so many single-episode characters whose fates we’ll never know, she’s carrying a lot of previous stories as well as her own, so even though i do wish she’d arrived earlier, there are reflections of her story all through the show

[burst-of-iridescent]

i've written before about how fire lady katara isn't an inherently disempowering or racist trope, as have many others, but lately i've been thinking about how arguments against fire lady katara often tend to utilise a surface-level interpretation of colonial trauma.

[edit: this post will use the term "colonial trauma" because those who argue against fire lady katara usually use the same wording or are referring to that concept. but it's important to note that according to show canon, the fire nation did not colonize the southern water tribe and zuko and katara did not have a colonizer/colonized relationship.]

antis who present this argument usually posit that marrying zuko would be a form of re-traumatization for katara, while marrying aang would "protect" her. katara is supposedly more shielded from confronting the impact of colonization in the southern water tribe or on air temple island than she would be with zuko in the fire nation, which contextualizes colonial trauma purely through the lens of physical interaction with the colonial power (ie. living in the fire nation or looking after the people of the fire nation). whether intended or not, this argument inadvertently limits colonial trauma to the geographical boundaries of the colonizing country and implies that it can be reduced or averted solely by minimizing contact with said country.

even leaving aside that we have seen katara in the fire nation (and enjoying herself there), the implication here is that active engagement with a colonial power as a member of colonized peoples is an inherent form of re-traumatization... which i take issue with for multiple reasons.

firstly, katara lives in a world that has been permanently shaped and changed by imperialism, and that's going to affect her no matter where she goes. sequestering herself in the south pole her whole life and never seeing a glimpse of fire nation red again won't allow katara to escape the legacy of colonization or the trauma it has caused her, because its influence is rooted in everything from her family to her tribe to her own bending. believe me, i understand the appeal of a world where women of colour can avoid reckoning with the impact of colonization by simply never setting foot in the colonizing country again, and why people might be uncomfortable with zutara individually as a result - but i can't accept it as a valid argument against the ship, because that's just not how colonial trauma works.

secondly, the idea that this "protects" katara reeks of paternalism because katara is not a character who chooses her path simply based on how safe or comfortable it is. if that was the case, she would never have left the southern water tribe at all! she could've remained there her whole life and likely been safe, since the fire nation had no real interest in the south pole any longer. katara is fundamentally defined by how relentlessly revolutionary she is - over and over, she chooses to do what is right, what is hard, what is unexpected, even at cost to herself. she challenges injustice and discrimination and bigotry; she fights for the downtrodden and speaks for those who can't speak for themselves; she will never ever turn her back on the people who need her. does that truly sound like someone who needs to be hid away and protected from her own supposed re-traumatization?

thirdly - and i fully accept that there are those who might disagree with this - katara actively choosing to engage with her colonial trauma can be empowering just as it can be traumatizing. don't get me wrong: as a woc and a minority in my own country, i understand how tiring it is to do this. i understand the exhaustion of confronting what was done to you and your people, of facing down bigotry over and over. i understand the desire to run away from it all, and why it can be wish fulfilment for others to let katara do so. i really, really do.

but there is also wish fulfilment in letting katara fight, as a brown girl with power and resources that few brown girls in the real world hold. there is a power fantasy in seeing katara head into the belly of the beast and emerging triumphant. there is empowerment to be found in seeing katara struggle with racism and ignorance and mindless hate to enact change - and succeed. i love reading and writing about katara unpacking her trauma regarding the fire nation, about growing to love the place she once hated, about reconciling both her homes and healing from the wounds of her childhood.

and ultimately, i think that's what katara would want for herself. after throwing herself head first into the fight against the fire nation, after facing down her greatest trauma instead of letting it consume her, after helping and protecting the people of the fire nation, after refusing to let the fire nation take anything else from her - i firmly believe that the last thing katara would do is allow herself to be ruled by the fire nation instead of being the one ruling it.

personally, i find that a more hopeful and victorious narrative than one where she remains safe and sheltered away from the fire nation, but forever haunted and dictated by her trauma. would that be realistic? perhaps. but the entire point of foiling katara with characters like jet and hama is to show that she's not doomed to be mired in the pain of her past. that where their stories could only end in tragedy, hers can - and does - end in hope for something better, as she always believed it could.

[juney-blues]

ever since i made THIS POST a lot of people have been asking for a tutorial, even though in pretty much all of the screenshots i included the specific part of inspect element showing exactly what i edited.

so buckle the fuck up I guess because the tumblr userbase want to find out how to make html pages unusable and who am I to deny you.

get ready for Baby's First HTML and CSS tutorial lmao

ok so first things first we need to go over BASIC HTML

html is made up of these things called "tags" which specify certain parts of the web page, such as

HEADERS (<h1> through <h6> in terms of importance)

PARAGRAPHS (<p>paragraph here</p>)

LINKS (<a href="linkhere"></a>)

BOLDED SECTIONS OF TEXT(<b>bold here</b>)

and a bunch of other stuff,

by default however, specifying all of this just gives us a plain white page with plain black text of varying sizes

that's of course, no fucking good, and sucks shit, so the arbiters of html decided to let us STYLE certain elements, by adding a STYLE parameter to the tag

this can change any number of elements about how things are formatted.

text colour, page colour, font, size, spacing between elements, text alignment, you name it? you can change it!

you might've noticed that, certain elements are nested in other elements

and that any changes that apply to one element, apply to everything included under that element!

how convenient!

anyway this method of styling things by adding a style=" " to their tags is called "in-line style"

i think because the "style" goes "in" the "line"

it's generally ALSO a pain in the ass to style an entire website like this and should be exclusively reserved for small changes that you only want to apply to specific parts of the page.

for any real change in style you want to create a <style> section in your page's header!

this can be used to make changes to how all elements of a type in your page are displayed

or even add new elements with whatever wacky styling you want that can be used with the <div> tag!

wow! isn't css just dandy!

and hell you can even use External CSS™ if you're making multiple pages and want them all to have a consistent theme, by pointing to a .CSS file (which is basically just a <style> header without the <style> tags lmao

ok this is all well and good and very interesting if, say, you're making your own website

*cough*neocities*cough*itsreallycoolandfree*cough*

but you came here because you want to FUCK UP A WEBSITE and make it look STUPID!!

so this is where the transform css property comes in~

you can read up on it HERE if you want the details but basically it allows you to apply mathematical transformations to any html element you want,

all of these fun bastards,

they can be really useful if you're doing some complicated stupid bullshit like me

OR for having fun >:)

if you'll remember, earlier i said that css properties apply to literally everything nested in an element,

and you MIGHT notice, that literally everything in pretty much all html files, is nested in an <html> tag

you can use style=" " or regular css on pretty much ANY html tag,

INCLUDING HTML!

ok ok that was a lot of buildup for something that i could've explained in one or two lines, but i gave you all this fundamental knowledge for a reason,

well, two reasons, go make a neocities

CHAPTER 2: THIS POST HAS CHAPTERS NOW

CSS KEY FRAMES BABYYYY

THESE FUCKERS DON'T WORK AS INLINE STYLING

I HAD TO TEACH YOU HOW CSS WORKED, TO GIVE YOU THE KNOWLEDGE YOU NEED, TO ANIMATE PAGES. TO MAKE THE FUCKERY COMPLETE!!!!

OKAY SO AGAIN READ UP ON THIS IF YOU WANT THE FULLEST POSSIBLE UNDERSTANDING

BUT WHAT KEYFRAMES ALLOW YOU TO DO, IS ANIMATE CSS PROPERTIES

and then make a class, which calls that animation...

and then assign that class. to your html tag.

and then vomit forever

we can do it in 3d too,

the only limit is your imagination... (and how many parameters you want to look up on w3schools and mozilla mdn web docs)

CHAPTER 3: APPLYING IN PRACTICE

ok now the fun thing about all of this, is you can apply it to your blog theme, literally right now

like literally RIGHT now

like step one, make sure you have a custom blog theme enabled in your settings, because that's turned off by default for some reason

step 2: edit theme

step 3: edit html:

step 4: apply knowledge in practice >:)

[minthe-lover]

Chapter 233 Analysis

So don't worry I'm still alive. Life decided to just kick my ass and could actually get this done but doing it now!

So just to make this clear at the start, i don't inherently dislike stories of women using their sexuality to their advantage. Ie the sexy assassin type stories, I've said it before but I was a sex worker and that very much does effect the way I look at and analysis media.

Though stories like that often run a very thin line between just sexism and sexualization. I think the main way to tell the difference is the reason why the the person is using their sexuality is such a way. In lore olympus with hera.. it's a story about women using their sexuality as a form of power.. it's women being sexually abused to hopefully save themselves from more pain.

Hera has no power in this situation, and it's not an empowering story because it's just about a women being forced to let herself be raped and lastly rs just doesn't give the time and energy to actually respect the sexual assault of hera. It shows terribly in this chapter.

This episode starts.. alright. I don't fully mind hera being haunted by kronos, it's honestly sort of terrifying. The problem is that we aren't given enough time to actually sit and grow with this, Rs just can't spend the time she's given well enough to put it towards this event.

One of the first things we learn after the kronos fight is that he wants hera... it takes us another like 17 or so episodes to learn that kronos the main villain is fucking hunting hera. This is such a big and important event that just gets ignore and rushed in one chapter. We see her struggling with this, we even in like one panel how it is actively effecting her others relationships.. but we only get one panel. Like you can imagine a scene where hera gets uncharacteristically angry at echo and we aren't even a reason why till we get like a shot with kronos in a reflection with hera. There are ways this could've been set up and made it so much more impactful but then it's just ignored till it's needed.

Also again rs just has so many great points to make interesting drama that she just ignores... like the whole missing ten years thing is barely brought up. Most people just continue as normal. This line is a fucking insult cause like.. besides one panel of them hugging WE HAVEN'T SEEN HERA WITH HER DAUGHTER. like holy shit all this time could have been spent so much better.

Now I honestly don't think the child has been even mentioned since it was told to hera.. also having hera being the only one mentioning the child.. and when she is she's being literally raped... really makes persephone and hades look even worse. Also again.. this chapter didn't have a trigger warning.. and it really fucking should.

now I don't fully dislike this plot point... like the idea of it.. same way I don't dislike the idea of persephone sexual assault. My problem with it isn't the fact that sexual assault happened.. it's how it's dealt with. We have this dramatic build up and while it's not explicitly stated it's pretty clear that hera was just fucking raped.

now instead of giving this really upsetting and serious plot point time to breath.. rs decides to immediately go to a cut away joke? about how haha persephone and hades are engaged and dumb drama with that. It's just such a tonal shock that just fundamentally doesn't work. Rs you literally couldn't done the exact same thing you did with persephone rape. Give a few quite panels of reflection and just... let a chapter go by without Perspehone and Hades.

We barely even see heras own reaction to what happened to her.. the literal rape that just fucking happened is basically completely ignored for the rest of the chapter. We don't have a few panel of someone asking hera why she wasn't answering the phone. No one acknowledges what happened and instead it's time for dumb Hades and Persephone.

This chapter, which is mainly about hera being sexually and emotionally abused... ends on the happy note where the main characters are going to get married. It's just... feels so disrespectful. Rs you could make this chapter like 80% better by just removing all the stuff with the marriage and instead just having a few panels of hera actually being effected by her rape.

Now I've taked about how the whole rushing into marriage with Hades and Persephone is bad.. but it really shows the most in this chapter. A chapter that regardless if you are a fan or critic should objectively be focused solely on the rape of hera... instead is just made so much worse by adding this... It's been what.. an hour maybe two at most since hera was literally sexually assaulted and she's just completely fine and shows no effects of it.

Like it's so clear the bias towards hades and persephone that rs has.. literally every single story outside of theirs suffers because of them. Why are you making stories that and obviously more important then them getting married if you want the focus on them being married. Kronos should have just been fully defeated.. adding all this other shit just makes them look like terrible people and makes it clear that they don't actual care.

Despite season 3 not being finished yet... I'm pretty sure this is going to be by far the worse chapter.. just because rs decided that a rape should happen right before the main characters getting married.

[medicallymercury]

Take the Strain (03/02/24)

Melty brain week. Staying on top of my reading but at what cost?

This episode review ended up incredibly unbalanced with three paragraphs about the same topic and then I ran out of energy by the time I got to the rest of it. Normally, I'd try and give myself some time to try to balance it out but I really don't feel like for this episode.

I’m just going to unpack all of my Teddy Thoughts at the start.

An even more frustrating episode than I bargained for because there were actually some things I liked. Just, separated entirely from their context. Things I liked: Jan. Jan's so underrated. I am so desperate for them to actually continue from Switzerland that I will take anything at this point and I did really like that it felt like Teddy still wants/appreciates Jan’s approval, even now. Very Character of him. Extremely Character. In my head, Teddy has never and will never get over needing Jan’s approval and that’s just emblematic of the deeper issues going on with him. Those moments were good. I just don’t think Jan being upset at Teddy had to come from her noticing the Jodie stuff, he was already up to objectionable stuff without that. 

Similarly, I thought Teddy and Paige’s conversation in the lift had potential. The big problem I have with how this relationship has ended is that it feels like the writers are somehow convinced that they're breaking up because Teddy and Jodie happened, when Teddy and Paige would absolutely have broken up even if that didn't happen. They've been headed this way since Dog Days, at least. I just think the whole thing would've been better if they'd have leant into the fundamental issues the relationship has, instead of putting all the focus on this stuff with Jodie which is not the most interesting or even biggest problem they have. The Sah/Paige kiss created so many interesting routes they could've taken but they lost track of what they were doing with it very quickly and then kept losing track of every new opportunity they created. In my heart, they are to Casualty what tomshiv is to Succession. In reality, they're a mess.

I wish I could give a real, proper reason why I don’t like Teddy and Jodie together but I just don’t. It’s so bad that I can barely their scenes together. I guess we’re heading towards more of them, potentially even a proper romance plot? Ughhhhhhhhhhhhh. As I type, I am grimacing at the thought. Whenever I get a romance plot and I don’t like any of the potential outcomes I just start thinking of more unlikely outcomes. Anyway, Paige/Jodie when? When Jodie also figures out that Teddy is probably best left single right now, she and Paige can commiserate together and then get together. It wouldn't make sense but has any of this made sense?

Otherwise, it was a heavy one. Are they just making the most of always being on after the watershed or something?

My incredibly unpopular (at least, unpopular in other areas of the CAS fandom) opinion is that Iain is my least favourite paramedic. Don't dislike him at all, I like him but I just don't understand why the show chooses to only remember plot that has happened to him and often chooses to pretend things that happened to the other paramedics never happened. Maybe I associate him with Faith a bit right now, too.

The music sequence or whatever was so out of nowhere that it was more amusing than dramatic.

I’m glad Rash and Rida have worked it out for now.

The way Casualty has been dealing with disabilities lately has been uncharacteristically uncomfortable. I don’t really have the brain space to expand on that right now but certain choices sure have been made.

Nothing in next week’s spoilers that I feel like I need to comment on, except for Max finally agreeing to take Jodie’s kidney. I would really, really hope it’s mainly an episode of Jodie and Max stuff.

[chaoxfix]

i don't remember enough about cars to ask a specific question sorry but im dying to know your takes/questions on the cars lore

okay so i actually do have a weird amount of questions and theories about cars lore

was there an apocalypse that transferred human sentience into the cars they were driving somehow

why do they have door handles if sentient beings DIDNT used to live in this world

cars seem to have organs. why. how. where are they. is this picture canon. should it be?

why does lightning mcqueen have a tongue if the cars DONT have organs

the cars movies explore resource scarcity and career pathways that imply it's a larger capitalistic society. what does capitalism mean when individuals are technically commodities themselves, with supposedly organic parts and features that can be modified and replaced? how would they seize the means of production when fundamental parts of their bodies (tires, parts for tune-ups, equivalent to limbs and essential organs) are part of the production? if they were humans, this would be a cyberpunk disability capitalist hellscape. why is the worldbuilding the way that it is.

their minds seem to be largely human -- not just sentient, human. human references, human phrases, human range of emotions.

but despite the above point, their lives have such limited ranges of motion and freedom of movement beyond just - driving. psychologically, what would that do to otherwise largely human minds? imprisoned in car bodies -- the entire world would be locked into metal boxes that can only move forward, backwards, and make a few expressions with their faces. i am left remembering black mirror episodes with similar premises.

on the other hand, the entire world has to be automated, voice-activated, or based on scrolling selections in what must be infuriatingly precise tire-movements. because they simply do not possess the fine motor control of hands, or indeed limbs, to gesture, create, or carry out tasks. the worldbuilding shows that they've at least adapted to make the world functional, so. accommodation win?

what does it mean for earth's dominant species to be made solely of technology? do they care about earth's natural resources? if they aren't organic at all, do they have any love for organic creatures -- and if not, is that the reason there aren't even insects in this world? how do plants grow without pollenators like bugs and birds which possess important and irreplaceable fine motor control and skill sets to carry pollen from one plant species to another?

are there any environmentalist movements in the cars universe when they have no organic tie to the world around them?

anyways.

pixar didn't have to make them cars btw. the plot would've worked fine with literally anything. could've just been humans driving cars. i dont know why they decided to make them sentient cars. too many questions.

[lobautumny]

Reviving this intermittently-active blog yet again to make another post chronicling this toy's thoughts on Hot, Relevant Discourse:tm:, this time about Rivals 2.

For those not in the loop, we'll start with background info. Rivals of Aether is an indie platform fighter with very unique recovery mechanics, no shield or grab (instead having a parry mechanic), and a generally very fast pace. However, interestingly, they made the decision to give nearly every character some kind of persistent area control gimmick that's central to their gameplay. While this toy never really clicked too hard with Rivals, it appreciates how unique the game is.

A few years back, the dev team for the game stopped adding new content and announced a sequel, Rivals 2. Eventually, a Kickstarter was made to fund this sequel, and 16,408 backers would raise $1,076,198.

So why is everyone angry and yelling at each other? Well, basically, Rivals 2 is not going to be remotely similar to Rivals 1, outside of the general concept of being a platform fighter and having similar movesets. The entire mechanical landscape of the game is different. There's ledge grabs, there's shielding and grabs and no parry, there's a getup state... Even the DI works completely differently for seemingly-arbitrary reasons.

Now, this wouldn't necessarily be a problem, but it's left a very bad taste in a lot of people's mouths in the community because for many, many people, the game simply is not what they thought they were putting money into. And it's not like it was a matter of people just putting in money without reading anything. There simply wasn't that much information about just how different the game was going to be on a fundamental level at that point. Keep in mind, through all this, that the average backer spent ~$65.60 on the Kickstarter campaign.

In addition to feeling like they spent substantial amounts of money under false (or unclear) pretenses, many people in the community also feel burned by the fact that this game appears to be aiming to completely replace Rivals 1 while not being remotely similar to Rivals 1, meaning that if any given member of the Rivals community doesn't like the sequel (which many of them won't), then they simply won't have a game to play at all anymore unless they keep hosting official Rivals 1 tournaments, which seems very unlikely.

So, a lot of the core community for Rivals of Aether feels burned and lied to and disrespected, and this toy feels like most of this discourse could've been avoided if Aether Studios had simply been more up-front from the beginning that they had no intention of making a game remotely similar to Rivals 1, and that Rivals 2 is meant to be its own thing and not an outright replacement for its predecessor.

It's also not helping anything that Dan Fornace (the games' lead developer) has been spending a lot of time getting into Twitter arguments about the game and showing that he either genuinely has no clue why people are upset or understands and simply thinks that their reasons for being upset are stupid.

It's a really dumb, shitty situation and Dan's been handling it with all the grace of a crane fly that got stuck in someone's living room. And like, it sucks, because Rivals 2 looks like a perfectly fine game, and there's no reason they couldn't have just brought a team on to keep content updates and tournaments going for Rivals 1 indefinitely to keep the game alive so that both it and its sequel could co-exist. And if they did that alongside being more up-front about how different the sequel was going to be, this toy thinks nearly everyone would've been happy in the end.

[bellshazes]

do it again directors commentary part 2

He and Etho had shown up at her favorite diner for takeout midnight breakfast while she had been hanging out at the bar, chatting with Scott, and without even thinking about it she’d joined their argument, switching sides periodically to keep it going. Years enough have passed that she can’t remember now what it had even been about, but she remembers Bdubs’ instant adoption of her as an ally and the wounded look he gave her when she conceded Etho had some good points, too. Etho had smiled brightly with his eyes and given her the faintest nod of approval, opening up the takeout boxes and settling down on the seat next to her.

this is very explicitly inspired by all the times i've gone to waffle house and the encounters i've had meeting old friends there who i never expected to see again. it's about the familiarity but also the capacity to shift and surprise and change the dynamic if it's funny. so it goes

Bdubs smiles knowingly at her. He heard all the goings-on of her tabletop campaigns and knows exactly what happened to her old D&D group. He’d been an exceptionally good sport about it, showing up for many late-night dinners to let her vent, as if it were a recap of his favorite TV show.

this and other things allude to the cleo-big b breakup that i never found a good place to make more explicit. i like the idea of it being some nebulous D&D situation partially because i despise D&D and because i think it's fun that since cleo continues to care that big b betrayed them, it should show up in silly ways, because it's fundamentally a betrayal in the specific context of a game. but it matters, what we did or didn't do, etc.

Cleo pauses and holds eye contact. For half a second she imagines a red bandana around Bdubs’ head, but it’s only the force of Bdubs’ belief that snares her.

another thing i never quite made explicit but is true: cleo received an unusually high number of lives, as did bdubs, and it's that fact that makes her more susceptible to remembering. if i had got to make it more explicit, i could've got into the exchange of lives as memory and as permanency, as debts and owing and relationships built across lifetimes... but I didn't. so this is what you get.

“That is a lot to ask of a guy, Cleo,” he says, but he stands up when she does. “If I for some reason am prevented from talking to Etho by such things as him being asleep all day, or un-overcomeable anxiety -”

i hate this line? i think i nailed bdubs' voice in the first half but i've spent so long trying to come up with something better than "un-overcomeable anxiety" and never did. i think he says things in super fucking weird ways but that's not right. it was worth leaving because i do believe in the dynamic of cleo playing mediator insofar as it's funny to them, and in cleo chastising bdubs, and their back and forth.

“Bdubs,” he says. “Hey, Bdubs.” He squeezes his hand again. “I wanted you to know. I’m so glad you were my partner.”

this whole Death Coffee Incident is borrowed wholesale from opera25's mll au, but it was fun making something kind of fantastical work. etho never was given any lives, and only gave one up to tango for the you bet your life game; he remembers here solely due to the life-threatening duress of consuming wayyyyyy too much caffeine. it was fun to write but also the pivotal moment in bdubs becoming convinced etho always had remembered and thinking then that the only reason he'd behave the way he did if he remembered was out of bloodlust... not that bdubs had yet unlocked memories of enjoying that murderousness and play back and forth.

there's a level to which this misunderstanding is a satirization/playing with fandom conceptions of if you view LL in a vacuum you get some crazy interpretations. but as they both learn, the threats were fun BECAUSE they had history and both enjoyed it. four more chapters for that to sink in though.

The process of checking into the ER is as onerous as he expected – trying to fill out the paperwork for Etho, who is still more out of it than Bdubs was when he had a head injury, having to put his foot down that he’d like to stay with his partner as much as possible and yes he had the paperwork to back him up, because Etho had made him keep a copy of important things in his wallet after he fell of the roof in case of something like this.

this part is in spite of my severe medical phobia, but also because of me working in insurance-related fields for the last 4 years. this document is called an advance directive or living will and if you live in the USA you should complete one by searching "advance directive [your state]" and filling it out and filing it according to the directions on your attorney general's website or whatever. it's genuinely imporant esp if you're not married and queer in any way. this is my one genuine PSA of the fic. but also they would. etho requesting to dot Is and cross Ts bc he thinks bdubs will be the one who needs and and then needing it himself... well. anyway.

He remembers fragments from his last death: that he had made some promise that didn’t save him, that cost him his last life. That he died calling Etho’s name, calling out to an Etho who took great joy in menacing him and making him paranoid, who had attacked him in that long dark stairway. It does not comfort him to know Etho thinks he’s responsible for whatever happened.

this chapter ends with bdubs trying and sort of succeeeding in believing in etho, but that last sentence is the lynchpin of what comes after: etho feeling even a little responsible for bdubs permadying - esp when bdubs remembers being a ghost for session 7 but was not present for etho's permadeath in session 8 - makes him think etho knows more than he does, and holds him accordingly responsible. the metacommentary is there but it wasn't the point; it's true, but incidental. the reveal eventually is that the trust was there, and that bdubs' permadeath was stupid and willing because it's about the novelty and the endless beginnings. spoilers but whatever if you're reading this you must not care by now.

chapter 4

He can feel his heart beating in his chest, and he has a sense-memory of falling down with all the vivid, terrifying sensation of jumping from the height of a swing in the park as a child, down to the faint awareness that the intervening years meant it was no longer quite the same body, that something had been knocked out of alignment by time.

it's a little tonally dissonant, but i'm still proud of this. you can tell later on i floundered for plot in this chapter, but the image of being both in the past and in the present and the overlay is important to me. it's very poetic.

Etho snagged a nametag off the apron that had been draped over the drinks counter, presumably in a now-ruined hope of ending the shift quickly, and slipped it into his pocket before turning back to smile placidly over Bdubs’ shoulder.

etho stealing the nametags is another MLL AU concept i stole and can't take credit for, but again trying to find a plausible concrete explanation for it was really fun and was the impetus for this whole chapter. grateful for it, and he's an ass and also nosy like that. he would.

Etho punched the crosswalk button and tried to remember that conversation but couldn’t. He remembered getting coffee, and that he’d almost finished it off by the time he’d gotten home. [...] “No,” he said, sounding strangled. “That hadn’t come up, actually.”

the limited alternating third person POV is restricting at times, but i really enjoy the contrast between what we already know of bdubs' perception of the Death Coffee Incident re: etho's knowledge and etho's POV making clear he doesn't know jack shit, but he cares. bdubs is reacting this way because etho saying he took the crazy coffee to stay up to see bdubs sounds like a threat, but it's also an expression of caring and not knowing how to bridge a distance.

if theres anything i believe it's that these two motherfuckers don't capital-T talk. they exclusively communicate through threats and shenanigans and team-ups and every time they mention talking outside of Events it shocks me. and yet their friendship persists over more than a decade! what miracles.

“You can’t take dreams too seriously,” Etho said, cat purring loudly under his hands, a soothing anchor. “It’s just your brain picking up on whatever’s going in your life and making up stories about it. No good worrying too much about them.”

this is mine own opinion on dreams, despite my sincere involuntary belief in signs and omens, but more importantly it is another point at which bdubs is implicitly in his own POV goign oh my god this son of a bitch is manipulating me. miscommunication for ages.

 He spends a few nights on the couch, methodically trying to rule the variables out: the quality of moonlight through his bedroom window, some oppressive sense of confinement, embracing the possibility his roommate is testing him and trying to prove to his subconscious that fishing rods are nothing to be worried about.

etho being experimental and scientific about this all is important to me. almost as much as half-remembering bdubs misinterprets this exacting need to know as being meaningful and knowing when it's not, especially when he was trying to elicit some response. guy gets a response and thinks the worst even though he's causing his own problems? there's a thesis in that

Etho bites back a comment about Bdubs’ dedication to sleep schedules and waves the criticism off instead. “I’m trying to sleep right now,” he lies. “Not my problem if you want to haunt me.”

if i ever let myself revise this chapter (and this chapter is the one i want to revise most) i want to include the detail from beau's comic of this passage of etho having his glasses on when he says this. my dude was definitely not tryign to sleep AT ALL and i forever wish i'd thought of that indicator myself.

When he sits down to start his own work for the day, he thinks about the drawing and decides then and there what his plan is to fix all this.

i wrote this line bc i have such a sense that chapter endings, like the endings of short stories, should have a paritcular cadence and effect - but neither etho nor i knew how "to fix all this" and in fact the subsequent chapters indicate he definitely was not laying his final plans yet. i've let it stay because putting this line in let me move on to write the rest of the fic... but it's untrue and a red herring and i hate it. i will fix you eventually. but not yet because i still dont' know how to satisfyingly transition.

etho doesn't get his next POV chapter until the second half of chapter 6 at the diner with cleo, where he finally confronts that his dreams might be real enough to have to deal with, and even then he goes through great lengths to validate cleo's theories by messing with tango... so who knows. but it's fine. it's fine. i hate it. it's fine

[azeriairis]

I'm going to rant a bit about Trinity

Okay so Trinity is one of my favorite Stargate Atlantis Episodes, but I dislike the ending, specifically the apology McKay gives to Sheppard. Sheppard's reaction is fine, though I'm a little annoyed that it didn't carry on to later episodes, so it rings a little hollow. McKay's apology itself is more annoying because it fundamentally feels like he learned the wrong lesson for the mess.

There's a lot below the cut because I essentially just wrote a miniessay on the potential Trinity had for developing Rodney McKay's character that was completely wasted.

"I'm sorry for messing up and I promise to go back to getting everything right again" is a bad apology because him making a mistake was not the problem. The problem demonstrated in Trinity is that McKay, by refusing to consider the concerns of other Scientists and the possibility that he may be wrong effectively opted out of any system that may have prevented his mistakes from spiraling out of control, and this is not a problem McKay is ever shown to acknowledge nor solve. Mistakes aren't really a problem, so long as you learn from them, allowing your ego to get out of hand to the point where you neuter any system that could've helped prevent your mistakes from causing harm because you think that you are so much smarter than everyone else is one.

Doranda was the perfect example of what the consequences of McKay's opting out can be, McKay fucked up, yes, but his mistake would've been caught and prevented beforehand if he was literally anyone else, but because of his position as Head of the Science Department nobody can force him to actually consider the objections and concerns of other scientists*, so even though it was caught by Zelenka, McKay had free reign to completely ignore his advice, resulting in disaster.

Honestly a reasonable consequence to his actions would be McKay getting completely removed from his position. In Trinity he showed that he was completely willing to abuse his position as head of the science department to get out of what is essentially the peer review process by refusing to consider any objections others may have. And someone who will do that, isn't someone who you want in that position. Instead McKay essentially just got a stern talking to, and by the next episode pretty much everything is resolved and back to normal. He never really learned nor grew from this incident, and it didn't really impact his relationships with other characters.

It just feels like such a waste, this could've been used to develop Rodney's character in so many ways, but it just wasn't. He continues to shame and ridicule others for making mistakes, when this could've been used to get him to realize that everyone makes mistakes at some point, so it's more important to have systems in place to mitigate the harm of mistakes when they inevitably do show up. And He continues to discount and ignore other people's concerns even though taking the time to do so would've prevented the Doranda incident from happening altogether.

And even if he doesn't learn anything from this incident it still should've impacted his relationship with others. I mean for one there's Radek who he disrespected pretty openly while he was present, but he's not the only one. John nearly died because Rodney decided to be reckless and ignore the advice of someone he apparently trusts. Or what about the entire rest of the science department? Their boss essentially just made it known that he doesn't give a crap about their opinions when deciding which route to go down, once he's made a decision he's going to do it even if you confront him directly about the potential dangers he'll just lambast you, ignore your input and keep going anyways. That will most definitely impact how someone approaches their work and their interactions with said boss. Elizabeth just saw her Head Scientist completely opt-out of any critique of his idea, something he could only get away with because of his position, that should have an impact. But does any of these relationships change at all? No.

I could go on but I'll just stop here. Maybe I'll do a rewrite at some point, but not right now.

*technically John and Elizabeth could but as neither of them are scientists they lack the scientific knowledge to evaluate this stuff and make an educated decision, leading them to generally just trust Rodney implicitly, which isn't a very solid check.

[onewomancitadel]

Why is Jaune older now: a case for Jaune/Cinder

Anyway okay back to Knightfall, I just want to say that if I were writing Jaune/Weiss, I would've expected equal development between that ship, Ruby/Oscar (similarly and potentially a slow-burn), Ren/Nora and Blake/Yang. I mean anything from interrelated and mirrored ideological conflicts (I don't want to go into this too much, but again: BB: Adam; RN: backstories and Atlas/Mantle; RG: Ozma curse/Ironwood) to basic focus on couple reunions (you can see this in V5 and V8 in particular) to like literally anything else sorry.

Of course you might say that an about-turn can always be expected, but I want to qualify that you only can reason an about-turn based on what I'm once again laying out here. So I think it's worth thinking about anyway; it's not purposeless.

So then the question is that if the scene with Jaune's Semblance in V5 is sufficient enough reason for the ship, why no development until only now? More importantly, what I want to know is why they had to age Jaune up to make the Jaune/Weiss ship possible. It doesn't make sense. The character development from the Fall of Beacon put him into a reasonable enough position where their characters could've worked, even if you only wanted to start slowly stoking it in the background much alike to Ruby/Oscar. Then further to that, why is Penny not an actual stickling point for the pairing? It obviously is for him with Ruby, and it's something that will (and has) put some tension into the Ruby-Weiss relationship, but it absolutely should have given some ideological tension and weight to the Jaune/Weiss relationship like every other likely canon endgame romance. So then on this point, as Tower Anon pointed out, it's strangely mirroring Blake/Sun.

I'm not finished. Why would you need to age up Jaune to make the Weiss pairing work? Whether that eventuates as him actually staying this physically old or being transformed, it doesn't matter; he is fundamentally changed. There's no going back. But it's not something on paper that doesn't square out to me because realistically Jaune becoming hot and confident (in Weiss' eyes) and competent is not something which actually addresses the wound of his character; it's not actually a positive set-up for a romance (that isn't to say they're not dumb. I just don't think this tracks). The much more interesting point to develop the relationship from would have been the unconditional compassion and regard which Jaune showed with his Semblance which was not contingent upon his personal feelings for her, but his actual desire to save as many people as possible, which would then open up the door to her noticing him as being selfless, not selfish for the way he projected his own idea of her, onto her, tied up in who he thought he should've been.

So then what gives? Is it lazy storytelling? I don't know, it could be. Is it mirroring Blake/Sun?

I want to know why Jaune's been put in this position. Sure, fissure in his identity. Sure, mirroring Ozma in the Four Maidens fairytale. Sure, literal actual fairytale hero who is imperfect (rusted) but has the potential to be redemptive. Yes. That's all great. I don't know how that links to Weiss in any way (other than her being the Winter Maiden in this scenario. Otherwise I can kind of reason Weiss' role in the story right now in respect to Ruby based on Qrow's relationship to Summer). I don't know why you'd need to age him in order to make the romance work, when it conceivably should have been developed alongside the others for four volumes, even with some of the barest foreshadowing (I'm talking even like, scene transitions - which Blake/Yang does use).

I'm not trying to cope because it's obvious I'm a Jaune/Cinder shipper, but I can only make the case for Jaune/Cinder on the basis of the other canon romances. If I'm searching for Jaune/Weiss parallels to the other canon romances, I want to know why it is or isn't developing differently, and more importantly I want to specifically know why because yes, Jaune's my favourite and I'm invested in his character development, and what I want to know is if this development this volume is literally just accessory to make Weiss notice him being hot (which is superficial and gross, to me) or if it does actually have greater narrative consequences - which to me, from an economic perspective, I'd like it to, and because it's actually potentially interesting development. I know that Jaune is set-up right now to go save Ruby, and their character struggles/leadership struggles are being mirrored, so there is that at least.

The point I'm working toward is that I don't think that this ageing was necessary for the Jaune/Weiss romance and that the development crossvolumes has been insufficient.

I can't help but wonder that the experience of V9 for Jaune's character actually puts him in a much better position for a romance with Cinder. Sorry. It does. Being more psychologically mature and slightly divorced from his peers does alienate him and make him potentially relate more to Cinder, who other than her subordinates (whom she's also cut off from in some way, who are also evil!Renora) herself otherwise is and was psychologically divorced from her peers (who were all older men, other than her master). Like, she's young enough to enter Beacon and pose as a student, and she's definitely a character who tries to act older than she is (like Salem and Madame) and she's disguising who she really is. I do think there's a relationship here between Ruby, Oscar, Jaune, and Cinder and experience/age.

Even further to that is that putting him in a deeper position with Ozma in the exact way Cinder is with Salem just intensifies the reverse Ozlem element of the relationship (which is alike to all the other canon romances, but she has the actual Grimm curse, now he's actually lived the fairytale) and then you've got the element where redeeming Cinder's wounded idealism could perfectly involve what is effectively a rusted (imperfect) knight, and then you've got the fact she's responsible for the situation with Penny in the first place, and that's their shared wound.

But the point I'd been wondering is how you get (what is to my eyes) the only character who can function as the chainlink between Ruby (silver eyes, scary but necessary) and Cinder to actually notice Cinder in a deeper way, beyond the way he challenged her at Haven, and I feel like an option I had never considered has been put in front of me and I can't help but notice it. If you're going to write Jaune/Cinder, doing this to Jaune's character is actually kind of clever and it does signal that you're willing to push Jaune's character in particular in a direction that people aren't necessarily expecting (especially when it refutes a lot of the fandom's fantasies about him). If you want to make Cinder's redemption arc special (because it is), making the person involved in it go through special development makes sense.

It does feel like purposeful development then. It does feel like you'd push him in a particular way for this very reason. It does feel like something that has consequences beyond this volume, and it does explain why Jaune/Weiss feels like Blake/Sun, because Jaune/Cinder is like Blake/Yang in this set-up, and you know how Blake/Yang has gone.

So it's that or it's meaningless. But the question is why you'd bother, with what space you're given in respect to his character.

[numericalbridge]

"#(most likely imo him stopping being friends with odalia over whatever happened during the rats play)"

I'm sorry this may come out of nowhere but I just can't get over this tag because it makes it sound like the Darius & Alador/Odalia rift was over Raine of all people and is just sounds so fucking funny to me like holy shit.

Raine: I just ended a 5 year relationship.

Lilith: OMT are you ok?

Raine: I'm fine, it wasn't my relationship.

Absolutely not canon but funny as hell that image may forever live on my head now, you placed a curse upon me and I wanted you to know.

Haha, 😆

To be fair - since this is my theory only for the case where the old hexsquad was not one single friend group and instead people Eda had particular memories about - it would be not because of Raine specifically, but more like Darius standing up for what is right/realizing Odalia had crossed the line.

Longer explanation if you are curious:

Obviously this is based mostly on the vibes and there are way too many variables and i feel like even things that were initially planned since s1 can be changed/retconned, so, as i've said, i find it hard to speculate, but when i tried picturing what a raeda-focused old hexside spin off would've looked like as a mini-series or comic - and i don't think it would work as anything longer - it seemed like the Rats play was meant to be an important event, and, lets be honest, i don't think it would be very likely for Darius to get a lot of screentime judging by the way the main show handles its characters, so tying up development of several supporting characters to the Rats play could be a possibility, even if that wasn't the initial pre-shortening plan for the Darius, Odalia and Alador friendship break up. And in Eda's memory in Kings Tide: compared to Odalia, Darius seemed to be placed closer to Raine and Lilith and his expression seemed more open to me (although everyone was off-model in that image, lol), so i assume Eda had some positive memories of him.

So my speculation is that Odalia could've done something that crossed the line, Darius, who previously might have been somewhat 'antagonistic' towards Raine (like pestering them about their acting abilities etc), wouldn't support it and eventually stoped being friends with Odalia, while Alador for one reason or another wouldn't and that caused the rift that just continued to grow. Darius standing up for what is right/for other kids would also tie with ASIAS.

But the thing is, i don't actually want this speculation to be true, lol, because i would much prefer 1. Darius and Raine being some kind of actual friends in school and then drifting apart, even if doesn't fit Eda's Requiem and 2. i love the headcanon that Darius used to be much more open in his school years and more like s2 Willow - though still petty and somewhat bitchy - and became more closed off and cold with years, and that's something that he has to work on, post-canon. And the above scenario might not fit with this headcanon.

And my personal favourite headcanon for Darius and Alador friendship break up is either disagreement over some fundamentals of abomination magic and/or just petty teenaged drama that spiralled out of control (though i dread to imagine what fandom's reaction would've been).

[bellamyblake]

I love your blog title, it's what bellamy wanted to negotiate from Octavia in s5 right? The 80 acres?

that's it, yes! i love it because i think it also tells a lot about what bellamy really wanted, which was that he like the rest of the 100, even though he wasn't sent down there on pupose, only wanted the same thing they did-to have a home.

thinking about it, he never had one, not since O was born, things started taking a turn for the worse and his and his mom's once peaceful existance, turned their little place into hell instead of an actual place to live. they filled it with fear, he was bound by fear from the moment Aurora placed that little baby in his arms, so all the negative emotions were connected to this one place of sadness and the fear of being discovered.

their home wasn't really one, it was a hiding hole with a glimpse of hope that they wouldn't get caught and with a literal hole in the ground, something fundamental for every home if you think about it, the grounds of it, they were shaken and fileld with a hole where a kid hid hoping to get out and not be found out, so their foundations, of their family, their home were based on fear.

they lived above hell and in this hell they had a little girl, hiding away from the world, never truly living it. and he was the protector of that little girl and her small hole of hell.

and he failed.

so of course he always looked for a home and i believe that is one of the reasons why he gave his big motivational speech in season 1 episode 13 when he tried to convince the 100 not to leave camp. they had built it with their bare hands, they protected it, it was and had turned into their home.

he just didn't want to abandon it again.

but he lost that home again-i think arkadia never really was that, it reminded him of the ark and everything wrong with it and overtime his home became a person in the face of clarke, rather than a place.

then he lost it again with mount weather and he lost himself with failing gina who was the same glimpse of hope in the hell that was Arkadia after the mountain and after everything that happened with pike, i am not sure he was even looking for a place to call "home" anymore.

after leaving clarke behind and coming back on the ring well...i dont think that he considered the space station a real home. i think he always liked it better on the ground despite everything. he just had too many bad memories up there and never a happy existance, unlike monty or harper or even clarke for that matter who had whole lives up there and they were relatively happy ones. bellamy's also not one to be contained in one place for too long, i think that's partly his anxiety from the life he had as a child and on the other that he likes action and building and working with his hands more than living in a tin can and doing nothing.

that is why i think he was so eager to have those 80 acres and why he wanted to negotiate them from octavia. he could see them finally building that place, a small camp, a settlement just for him and his friends and actually living good lives there.

i think he could see himself building cabins step by step for them all, a wall to surround it, help monty with the crops, be close to the river so he could go fishing, have clarke and madi show him this new world and then inviting him into those 80 acres which he'd fill with live and love and hope.

i think that's what bellamy always wanted. i think that's what he was looking for at by the end too, despite the bad storyline. a home. with peace. nothing else. while others strived for power or wanted to fit in or were desperate to prove themselves, he just wanted a home. yes, he was a great soldier, he was also a good leader and he cared deeply but i think he could've let those things aside, like he did on the ring, and live a good and happy life like he should have.

and hopefully he'd have also been able to forgive himself for everything and turn on a new leaf. this doesn't necesarrily mean being with clarke which yes i would've love to, but it means just to live good and quiet life. in fact i think that it'd have taken him years to actually get together with clarke and once they did it'd have been fine because they'd both be where they needed to be and where they weren't at in those other points.

[number5theboy]

Please elaborate on how Five could've turned into the most insufferable character to watch

Thanks for asking me to elaborate on this text post:

@tessapercygranger​, @waywardd1​ and @margarita-umbrella​ also wanted to see a more detailed version of it, and I ended up writing an essay that’s longer than some of my actual academic essays. So buckle up.

WHY NUMBER FIVE SHOULD BE THE MOST OBNOXIOUS CHARACTER IN TV HISTORY, AND HOW HE MANAGES NOT TO BE

Number Five: The Concept That Could Go Horribly Wrong

Alright, let’s first look at Five in theory in an overarching way, without taking into account the execution of the show. The basic set-up of the character, of course, is being a 58-year-old consciousness in a teenager’s body, due to a miscalculation in time travel. Right off the bat, Five is bar none the most overpowered of the siblings; by the end of Season 2, no one has yet been able to defeat him in a fight. He is a master assassin – and not just any master assassin, but the best one there is – and a survival expert, able to do complex maths and physics without the aid of a calculator, shown to have knowledge of half a dozen languages, has very developed observational skills and, to top that all off, he can manipulate time and space to the point where he can literally erase events that happened and change the course of history. And Five knows how skilled he is; he is arrogant, self-assured and sarcastic, and his streak of goodness is buried deep inside. David Castañeda once described Five in an interview as 90% chocolate with a cherry in the middle, meaning that you have to get through a lot of darkness and bitterness before knowing there is a good core, and I think it’s an excellent metaphor. However, Five is also incredibly, fundamentally terrible at communicating with anyone, and, because he is the only one with time travel abilities, the character a lot of the actual plot - and the moving forward of it - centres around. Also he’s earnestly in love with a mannequin, who is pretty much a projection of his own consciousness that functions as a coping mechanism for all the trauma he has endured. All in all, this gives you a character who looks like a teenager, but with the smug superiority of a fifty-something, who a) is extremely skilled in many different things, b) has a superiority complex, is arrogant and vocal about it, and most of the superiority is expressed through cutting sarcasm, c) has one very hidden ounce of goodness that he is literally the worst at communicating to other human beings, d) is what moves the plot along but is also bad at talking to anyone else, meaning that the plot largely remains with him, and e) his love interest is essentially a projection of himself. Tell me that’s not a character who is destined to be just…obnoxious, annoying, egocentric, a necessary evil that one has to put up with to get through this show. There are so many elements of this characterisation that can and should easily make Five beyond insufferable, but the show manages to avoid it, and I’m putting this down to three aspects.

That Trick of Age and Appearance

Bluntly put, Five as a character would not work if he was anything else than an old man in a 13-year-old body. Imagine this character and all his skills and knowledge, but actually just…a teenager. Immediately insufferable. Same goes for him being around 30, like his siblings, all of which are stunted and traumatised by their father’s abuse. If Five, being comparatively unscathed by Reginald to the point where he explicitly does not want to be defined by his association with his father, were 30 like his siblings, it would just take the bite out of that plot point and also give him a lot less time in the apocalypse, reducing the impact it had on him as a person. And making Five his actual 58-year-old self would make him very similar to Reginald, at least on surface level, with the appearance and attitude. Five and Reginald are two fundamentally different people, but having one of the siblings being a senior citizen that’s dressed to the nines and bosses his siblings around in a relatively self-centred way does open up that parallel, and would take away from Five’s charm as a character. Because pairing the life experience of a 58-year-old with the appearance of a teenager gives you the best of both worlds. You get the other siblings (and a lot of the audience, from a glance in the tags of my gifsets) feeling protective and paternal about Five, but his age and experience also give the justifications for his many skills, his arrogance, in a way, and his ability to decimate a room full of people. It’s the very interesting and not new concept of someone dangerous with the appearance of something harmless, a child. This is also where Five’s singular outfit comes in. I know we like to clown on Five to get a new outfit, but I think what gets forgotten often is how effective this outfit is at making the viewer take him seriously. The preppy school uniform is the perfect encapsulation of the tension between old man in spirit and young teenager in appearance. The blazer, vest and especially the shirt and tie are quite formal, relatively grown up. They’re not something we, the audience, usually associate with a teenage boy wearing; it makes Five just a little bit more grown up. But there is also a reason characters in this show keep bringing up Five’s shorts and his socks, because those are not things that we associate with grown men wearing; they’re the unmistakably childish part of his school uniform. Take a moment and imagine Five wearing a hoodie or a t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers; would that outfit work for him as well as the uniform does? Would he be able to command the same kind of respect or seriousness as a character? I don’t think so; the outfit is a lot more pivotal in making Five believable than a lot of people give it credit for.

Writing Nuance

The other big building block in not making Five incredibly insufferable is the writing. Objectively speaking, I think Five is the most well-written, and, more importantly, most coherently written character on the show (which does have to do with the fact that the show’s events are all sequential for him), and his arc and personality remain relatively intact over the course of the two seasons. More to the point, a giant part of what makes Five bearable as a character is that he is allowed to fail. He is written to have high highs and low lows, big victories through his skills and his intelligence, but also catastrophic failures and the freedom to be wrong. His superior intellect and skillset are not the be-all end-all of the plot or his character, just something that influences both. His inability for communication has not (yet) been used to fabricate a contrived misunderstanding that derails the plot and left all of us seething; instead, it’s a characteristic that makes him fail to reconnect with the people he loves. This is a bit simplified, as he does find common ground with Luther, for example, but in general, a lot of the rift between Five and his siblings is that they can’t relate to his traumas and he does not understand the depth of Reginald’s abuse, which is an interesting conflict worth exploring. Another thing that really works in Five’s favour is that he is definitely written to be mean and sarcastic, but it is never driven to the point of complete unlikability, and a lot of the time, the context makes it understandable why he reacts the way he does. Most of the sarcastic lines he gets are actually funny, that certainly helps, but in general, Five is a good example of a bearable character whose default personality is sharp and relatively cold, because it is balanced out with many moments of vulnerability. Delores is incredibly important for this in the first season, she is the main focus of Five’s humanising moments, and well-written as she totes the line between clearly being a coping mechanism for an extremely traumatised man and still coming across to the viewer as the human contact Five needs her to be. In the second season, the vulnerability is about his guilt for his siblings, it’s about Five connecting a little bit better to them. There’s also his relationship with the Commission and the Handler specifically – which honestly could be an essay on its own – that deserves a mention, because the Handler is why Five became the man he is, and this dynamic between creator and creation is explored in a very interesting way – their scenes are some of the most well-written in the entire show. And TUA never falls into the trap of making Five a hero, he is always morally ambiguous at best, and it just makes for an interesting, multi-faceted character, well-written character, and none of the characteristics that should make him unlikeable are allowed to take centre-stage for long enough to be defining on their own. I know a lot of people especially champion the scenes where Five goes apeshit, but without his more nuanced characterisation, if he was like that all the time, those scenes would not hit as hard.

Aidan Gallagher’s Performance is Underrated

But honestly, none of the above would matter that much if the Umbrella Academy didn’t luck out hard with the casting of Aidan Gallagher. I think what he achieves as an actor in this show is genuinely underappreciated. Like, the first season set out to cast six adults having to deal with various ramifications of childhood trauma, and a literal child that had to be able to act smart and wise beyond his years, seamlessly integrate into a family of adults while seeming like an adult, traumatised by the literal end of the world, AND had to be able to create the romantic chemistry of a thirty-year-long marriage with a lifeless department store doll. The only role I could think of to compare is Kirsten Dunst in Interview with a Vampire, where she plays a vampire child who, because she is undead, doesn’t age physically, but does mentally, so she’s 400 in a child’s body. And Kirsten Dunst had to do that for a two-hour movie. Five is a main character in a show that spans 20 episodes now. That’s insane, and it’s a risk. Five is a character that can’t be allowed to go wrong; if you don’t buy Five as a character, the entire first season loses believability. And they found someone who could do that not only convincingly, but also likeably. As I said, he is incredibly helped by the costuming department and the script, but Aidan Gallager’s Five has so much personality, he’s threatening and funny and charming and arrogant and heartbreaking. He has the range to be convincing in the quiet moments where Five’s humanity comes to show and in the moments where Five goes completely off the rails. Most child actors act with other children, but he is the only child in the main cast, and holds his own in scenes with adults not as a child, but as an adult on equal footing with the other adult characters. That’s not something to be taken for granted. But even apart from the fact that it’s a child actor who carries a lot of the plot and the drama of a series for adults, Aidan Gallagher’s portrayal of Five is also just so much fun. The comedic timing is on point, he has the dramatic chops for the serious scenes, the mannerisms and visual ticks add to the character rather than distract from him, and his line deliveries, paired with his physical acting, make Five arrogant and smug but never outright malicious and unlikeable. It’s just some terrific acting that really does justice to the character as he is written, but the writing would not be as strong if it wasn’t delivered and acted out the way Aidan Gallagher does. He is an incredible asset for this show.

Alright, onto concluding this rambling. If you made it this far, I commend you, and thank you for it. The point of all of this is that Five, as a character, could have been an unmitigated disaster of a TV character. He is overpowered, arrogant, uncommunicative and could so easily have been either unconvincing or completely unlikeable, but he turned out to be neither. It’s a combination of choices in the costume department, decisions in the writing room, and Aidan Gallagher’s acting skills that make the things that should make him obnoxious and annoying incredibly entertaining, and I hope you liked my long-winded exploration of these. Some nuance was lost along the way, but if I had not stopped myself, this would’ve become a full-blown thesis.

[the-badger-mole]

It's kind of sad (and wholesome too) how Zutarians nowadays are like...- fine, Kataang. But let Katara be happy. Write their relationship decently. Make Aang support Katara, her family and her culture, make him respect her, make their feelings mutual. Make her not a damn prize and a constant caretaker. Show, not tell.

I think there isn't many Zutarians left who simply dislike Kataang because Aang is a bald young boy and hardly a shipping material. No, we just want a happy ending for Katara.

To see her truly happy and not worried where did her boyfriend run away to again. To see her laugh and smile and have her own interests. To see her gaining her own students or even a fan-club. To see her being attractive and young and maybe having boys (and girls) swooning over her while she already has a date with her SO and her SO totally doesn't just throw hissy fits at her but goes - "well, I'm not surprised you're poular because you're so amazing" and she just playfully kisses them.

That could've been Kataang, and I would've been okay with it. But it is totally not it and never will be.

The funny thing to me is that in order to make Kataang work, you'd have to fundamentally change who Aang is as a character. It could work if within the show, Aang had to actually face his problems and maybe even fail a few times to build some character; if he learned how to empathize with people and see from their perspective and appreciate opinions that differ from his own; if Aang had put in work to develop his understanding of his culture beyond what little he would have been taught or absorbed by the age of 12, I could maybe see that version of him ending up with Katara. I still wouldn't ship it, but it wouldn't fill me with visceral disdain. As it stands, I ship Zutara, but I'd rather see her end up with just about anyone else than with Aang.

Basically, the version of Aang that would work with Katara isn't a character that actually exists, so shipping Katara with that version of him may as well be a Katara/OC ship.

I don't care what people ship. As long as you're not a jerk about it, I hope you enjoy it in good health. But I hate Aang as a character for a lot of reasons, and a lot of it (but not all of it) does center on his treatment of Katara. I will never, ever, ever be positive about Kataang. If you see me post something supporting Kataang, call the cops because I'm being held hostage somewhere. The absolute best you will get out of me is support of shippers. I think everyone has the right to enjoy their ships, even the ones that piss me off to even think about.

[machinations-ii]

A Quote to Live by

"Every path is the right path, everything could have been anything else, and it would have just as much meaning"

Mr. Nobody (2009)

One of a lot of movies that scarred me for life. Nemo Nobody (Jared Leto) is 118 years old and reminiscing—on the time he had spent on this planet. His parents separated when he was 9-years-old and he went to live with his mother and her boyfriend, or did he? He might have stayed with his father and fallen in love with Elise. Although he remember falling madly in love with Anna (Diane Kruger), his step-sister and making love to her. His marriage with Elise was a nightmare with Elise suffering from clinical depression and Nemo might have died multiple times. Foreseeing this (Elise’s mental illness) Nemo might have settled with Joan, a girl he met at a party, and had two kids, whose names he can’t remember.

Perplexed, right? So is Nemo because he can’t decide upon the life he has led.

Oh and did I tell you that Nemo can see the future. Or can he?

You were unable to take a decision because you didn’t knew what would happen and now when you know what will happen you still unable to make a decision.

The problem with reviewing this epic fantasia by the Belgian director Jaco Van Dormael, is that you know you’ll fall short of words and ideas to write your understanding of the film, knowing still well that your understanding is probably a meager fraction of what the film is about. I’ve seen no other film, that drags for roughly 3 hours, challenges your mind thoroughly, makes you ponder about things you would've never thought of otherwise—and all these, throughout it’s playtime. Mr. Nobody is an ensemble of numerous mosaics from all the possible lives Nemo might have led, interwoven with just enough precision to not let you go: “Fuck this shit, I’m hitting the bed.” Not a single frame is a filler.

It is but the first of many decisions said above that cause Nemo’s history to fracture and diverge into multiple timelines; he gives a love letter, he doesn’t give a love letter, he becomes a photographer, and a TV personality, he marries Elise, Jean and Anne, he drowns in his car, is killed by a meteorite, and executed by mobsters. The result is a rather confusing collection of alternative realities that are even further complicated by being framed through the complex physics of time and space.

And yet, I believe that, at the center of it all, all this complexity serves one single purpose, one fundamental question; how do we make meaningful choices? To answer this question, we first have to answer several others.

We can immediately see how this one-directional movement places a burden on our decision-making; We cannot go back, that’s why it’s hard to choose. But what is the right choice? What makes one choice more meaningful over another? This question can only really be answered if there is such a thing as meaning, something to serve as an anchor against which to weigh our options and base our decisions. However, looking to the universe for such a guiding light is likely to leave you disappointed. Have you ever heard of the butterfly effect? The butterfly effect is a part of chaos theory, suggesting that a small change in one state can result in larger differences in a later state. And as we see in many of Nemo’s timelines, this causal reaction often undermines our own agency, although of course, we generally experience this phenomenon as random chance, bringing us either good fortune, or bad luck.

In the opening scene, we are also presented with an experiment in which a pigeon is given a treat every 20 seconds. The researchers discovered that if the pigeon happened to be flapping its wings when given the treat, it would continue to do so, convinced its actions are what caused it. This phenomenon, which is referred to as pigeon superstition, further emphasizes the dissonance between

how we perceive causality, and how the universe actually works. In other words, we may believe our choices and actions affect the world in a certain way, but in reality we know very little about what forces move our lives into certain directions. It is why, whenever something unexpected happens, be it good or bad, we are left wondering; what did I do to deserve this? Well, it's important for you to understand that in life, things don’t always turn out as we plan them. Life isn’t always what we think it will be.

So what does all this imply for our ability to make meaningful choices? How can we make informed decisions if we cannot even oversee all the variables? It is perhaps why we long for immortality,

for infinite time to figure out the right path and infinite chances to correct ourselves if we take a wrong turn. But I think this is where we have to consider Nemo gift, for Nemo is not like everyone else.

The point is that when faced with a difficult choice, knowing everything that will happen is just as paralyzing as not knowing what will happen. A philosopher Ruth Chang exposes a fundamental flaw in how we approach decision-making. Basically, she explains that we tend to make choices by weighing alternatives against each other, and judging whether one option is better than, equal to, or worse than another. And while this may be a reasonable approach for easier decisions, when it comes to the hard choices in our lives, where do we live? Who do we marry? what career do we pursue? This approach often falls short.

That's why the choice is hard. What distinguishes these kind of choices is that they do not become easier even if the outcomes are clearer. Nemo’s omniscience showed him every possible path,

but this couldn’t tell him if the love for his mother was more valuable than the love for his father, it couldn’t tell him if the heartbreak from Anna leaving was worse than that of Elise’s depression, in short; it couldn’t tell him which path was the right path, and here lies the crux of the problem; we are searching for meaning outside of ourselves, for external reasons to support these difficult decisions.

“Every path is the right path.

Everything could've been anything else.

And it would have just as much meaning”

And so instead of desperately searching the universe for guidance, for that one sign or reasonable argument telling us what we should do, it is we ourselves who have to make our choices meaningful. So the lesson of hard choices: reflect on what you can put your agency behind, on what you can be for, and through hard choices, become that person. This is no easy task, even if we believe we are on the right path, there will be mistakes, there will be sorrow.

We all experience moments of regret, moments where we feel life has passed us by, where we long for that reset button to give us another chance; another chance to say what we really meant, to show courage when we were afraid, to be the person we really wanted to be. But if we truly act from the heart, if we base our decisions on our innermost voices, we will also experience something else. We will find that if we want to, if we choose to, it is possible to love, to be loved, and to experience moments of genuine happiness, moments in which it becomes absolutely clear that, even if it is for a brief instance in an infinite universe, our lives can be profoundly meaningful. I'm not afraid of dying, I'm just scared that I haven't lived enough.

[dansenfans]

From Dansen fans admin.

This is a collaborative reaction to some (not all as we would be here forever and a day trying to write it down) of our problems with the current storylines on Supergirl. Before we get into that, a word on who helps run the account. We are a varied set of users, but all recognize the importance of Dansen, but also Brainia as representation that not only helps other LGBTQ people - it undoubtedly has saved a life somewhere simply because someone sees themselves represented onscreen. Do not think for a second this is an exaggeration or untrue. The representation is that important and needed. LGBTQ representation is far more than just having a character on TV. It gives those who are marginalized a voice. It gives that child growing up in a hostile environment simply for being LGBTQ hope that their life can be okay. That they aren't a freak. Or they have sinned.

We are from within the LGBTQ community, white, POC and from the heterosexual community (as an ally). So these comments are from a diverse set of people. We all love different characters and even multi-ship in some cases. What we all have in common is a love of Dansen.

What we all also have in common is our absolute horror in not only how the current LGBTQ characters are being used, but how relationships are suffering for it. 

Even away from Dansen we are finding the current overall arc of the story extremely difficult, because there is now such a disconnect from characters and friendships.

Let's tackle the LGBTQ and Dansen problem first. 

William has as much presence as a tree stump. There is something called the potted plant test, and that basically means, if a character can be replaced by a potted plant in scenes and not be missed, they don't need to be there. William is that plotted plant. So many of his scenes could easily have been done by Nia (who is a journalist after all) or Kelly (who we still don't know if she knows Kara is Supergirl, which under the circumstances is utterly laughable).

There is also something in the screenwriting industry that is writing 101, and by all accounts (according to a screenwriter a couple of us know, and no they aren't in the Supergirl fandom, SM or watch Supergirl), “Show us, don’t tell us why this relationship or friendship should work," is what you should have at the forefront of anything you write.

In other words, if fans are being told, or characters get continually told by those around them why they should be in a relationship, it isn't working.

The premise is pretty simple. You outline you want your character to have a love interest. You indicate who that LI might be. You get casting sorted, have chemistry reads. Consider the way in how they get together to fit the bigger narrative. What you don't do is tie it down that this is the way you have to go, regardless of what the story calls for. If after a few episodes, the chemistry onscreen between a character and someone completely different to the LI you had in mind is so obvious, so powerful, you adjust. You don't try to force the original LI into that scenario. If you then have to justify that LI (in Supergirl's case by having those around continually tell her she should go for a date with William, when she looks nothing but awkward and the chemistry is flat), then you fail on this basic writing point. If you ignore what a lot of fans, media and casual observers see elsewhere, you fail at the job of being a good storyteller. 

Supergirl has done both.

Ah but now we head into that territory of Supercorp. Look, we don't ask that people like Supercorp. This truly isn't about that. We aren't a Supercorp account. What it is about is the groundswell of fans who have increasingly seen a crackling connection between Kara and Lena, who had either of these characters been male, would've had them together by now. There are so many direct parallels to other couples, not just on Supergirl but elsewhere (particularly Clois, which fans have plenty of examples about if you look).

But this season, Supergirl took it a step further. The romantic coding that went on in 5a, that had direct parallels to the canon couple (Dansen) on the show to bait fans into watching (and yes it was queerbaiting if they didn't intend to make it romantic because that is exactly what queerbaiting is, and Supergirl has queerbaited now in the worst ways possible) is inexcusable. When you have media outlets, blogs, even non Supergirl fans see this and talk about it (each of us here has someone who isn't a Supergirl fan, but knowing there is a lesbian couple on the show assume Kara and Lena are that couple if they've caught sight of clips) then you have a problem, even if you don't acknowledge it. 

The latest hypocrisy of all this is how some fans have tripped over themselves to say how lovely, how romantic it was of William to remember Kara's coffee order, yet scream down other fans who said the same thing as Kara not only got Lena her favourite coffee and food - she flew across the world to achieve that, at a time Kara fully believed the friendship was fixed. To have fans called delusional for it is preposterous. You cannot do that. You simply can't, and this is a prime reason so many fans get angry and upset. 

Aside from that, the overtones of why William did the coffee run, it was actually more on the creepy side than friendship side. He even acknowledged his behaviour, with the coffee, the texts and the compliments was overstepping and not respecting Kara by his actions. Some say that's self awareness and bravo. We all argue it is borderline abusive.  If your self awareness is such you know your behavior is wrong, and you do nothing to stop or correct that behavior and carry on, then those are nothing more than platitudes. There are examples of people who have been triggered by 5.14 and Williams' actions, and citing why that has occurred as IPV survivors. Melissa is a IPV survivor and if others have been affected by this, we truly worry Melissa has been too, although we sincerely hope that isn't the case. Is that what you want as a fan, even if it is only a possibility with Melissa? Because we definitely don't. No fan should have been triggered from a character like that.

The 100th episode basically turned around and told Kara that she and Lena's destiny was so entwined, that they couldn't live without each other, or they would die for the other. Platonic or not, that is soulmate status. As for best friends? Those of us who are married are all married to our best friend. So many people, whether gay, straight, everywhere in between, say a spouse is their best friend. For anyone saying a best friend doesn't mean they're in love with that person is the worst take, as most of the time the best friend is the partner or spouse. William has barely been in the friend zone, let alone best friend zone. 

As for how William is impacting on the LGBTQ and current cast, there is no doubt he is in an extremely negative way. To the degree that Dansen has suffered significantly. Sure we had an emotional scene in 5.07, but we are now at 5.14, so a further 7 episodes in, and we barely have minutes worth of Dansen onscreen time. Last episode was less than a full minute total Dansen time and that's the best it's been in weeks.

Less than a minute! It was approximately 45 seconds for the first scene. 7 seconds (yes you read that correctly 7 seconds) on the second scene.

So this means that while we got nice character development beginning in S4, and to some degree early in 5a, we have had nothing on any note in regards Dansen all season, or Kelly throughout the entire season so far.

This means that we got invested in these characters, we were promised it would develop as S5 went on, to have this thrown at us as the best they can do? Any intimacy has been pretty much nonexistent, (we had more from Sanvers), and we get told that what they have given us we should be grateful for. No-one deserves that sort of disdain as fans. Yet we get told by others that Kara deserves a relationship with William? Save us the hypocrisy. 

No-one here is saying Kara doesn't deserve a relationship, but at the expense of others? Lead of the show or not, that is an awful take. Particularly when we have a fundamental relationship with her and Lena, even if it isn't romantic. 

If you cannot find balance as a writer to incorporate all of these things, then you aren't doing a good job of it at all. Azie in particular has been given the shittest end of the stick possible. Chyler hasn't faired much better. It is making Dansen now appear forced and lacking depth, and that's even allowing for the build up they gave us in S4. Kelly is a Black Lesbian, is highly educated, has (by all accounts) a loving solid relationship with another woman. All aspects we should be highlighting and applauding. Instead, here we are having to write at length some of what is so wrong for us.

Moving on to another area that was problematic. To have Alex discuss technical details as Kelly arrived in regard her work at Obsidian North, but to hear Kara say to Kelly, "She has never said words like that." 

Now this line could have been in jest, but it didn't feel like that, and considering Alex has a PhD in bioengineering, Alex is also an expert in alien physiology, and has used this knowledge in multiple D.E.O. operations. Alex was able to successfully create Blue Kryptonite to incapacitate Bizarro and working with Maxwell Lord, synthesized a cure for Red Kryptonite. She is also an accomplished neuroscientist and xenobiologist. Alex herself stated she could've had a promising medical career as a researcher had she not decided to work at the D.E.O. instead - and now you are saying Alex would never use that kind of language? Come on! That's so unrealistic it would be laughable if it wasn't so awful.

If you are a show who claims to be at the forefront of LGBTQ representation, who claim to be about female empowerment, you are giving us neither of those things. Someone else wrote this (taken with permission from Buddha in disguise on Tumblr).

"It seems we shouldn't ask for justification as to why William is on the show, but when we say the LGBTQ characters are being sidelined, that it doesn't matter one jot how diverse a cast can be; if said cast are not being given credible storylines or screentime, and if we say as much, we have to continually justify why that is the case. We get told to take what we are given. To insist on better, is oppressing the straight characters on the show, often said by CIS men (in some cases CIS women have argued the same). This isn't oppressing anyone, but asking that if we get given relationships, given characters we want to invest in, they get the storylines to accomplish that. Supergirl is failing the LGBTQ audience so badly at the moment. So many have the same complaints it is ludicrous to suggest this is just one section of a fandom or trolls."

The show is floundering. Winn got a more complete arc and closure in two episodes than anyone else so far on the show this season. We might have had 3 or 4 great episodes out of 14 of the 20 so far this season. The rest have been mediocre at best, with no obvious cohesive plot or storytelling. 

It is crazy that a Superhero show, that effectively has the freedom to pull in ideas from multiple sources with unique interesting takes that allows, has made it so boring, so full of drudgery that people are starting to turn off in droves. A fandom boycott isn't enough for such poor ratings on some episodes. Having moments in an episode that are good, possibly great, when the rest around it is so poor is destined to fail. 5.14 was another example of that. The moments that were good were enjoyable but the rest was so bad, it is harder to enjoy those good points. To even remember them.

Batwoman and Legends of Tomorrow have both done this far better of late (even if Legends have been a bit problematic with Zari), and the POC and the LGBTQ side of the stories have primarily been handled well. Batwoman in particular has just done an amazing storyline with Sophie Moore. The interesting thing is, a lot of people found Sophie hard to like to begin with. Many thought Kate Kane was better off without her. What changed all that was they gave Sophie an in depth, credible backstory and the chemistry between them grew organically. Fans could see the connection and increasingly yearned for it. They have also just tackled homophobia in families, particularly for POC. All without taking away from other essential elements of the storytelling. Supergirl take note; this is how you write a show that is integrated without hurting either the POC & LGBTQ characters or CIS straight characters. 

Now let's just broach the disconnect with characters and friendships. 

Because of the fracturing of friendships and relationships has been so extreme (virtually every one has lost all or most of what we had in previous seasons), we have lost core elements of the show. Of course the most obvious is Kara and Lena, but it extends far beyond that.

Alex and Brainy. Brainy and Lena. Brainy and Nia (Brainia is groundbreaking representation for transgender people to show they too can have relationships, but no, we can't even have that). Kelly and Kara (early S5 suggested Kara and Kelly were close enough friends now to talk about presents for Alex). Alex and Lena. 

Alex, Lena and Kara, which in the last two seasons have been the powerhouse behind them defeating whatever was going on around them as a team, but still allowing Kara to shine as the Superhero.

All these intricate relationships have gone. Instead we are faced with pairings that feel uncomfortable and awkward as a viewer, so the crux of what made Supergirl work has been lost. We are suddenly expected to be able to feel emphatic and understand completely unheard of pairings when we know nothing about them under those circumstances. Strangely enough, the one new pairing they have achieved this with is Andrea and Lena, because we got a fully fleshed out background, that also helped explain some of Lena's behavior today. The rest feels chaotic, and so far into the season that feeling of chaos should be going the other way. Instead it's increasing.

As we wrote this, the latest media outlet to highlight some of the problems the last episode faced came out.

It might not be a big article or have any real depth, but when The Radio Times wades in, you are beginning to lose serious credibility in media circles. The Radio Times is not some 2 bit media blog that you can laugh off or blame a fandom for.

5.15 promises to have better LGBTQ content, and is tackling a subject that Nicole herself became involved in with the writers. This gives us higher hope it is a better episode overall. We also know Kelly and Alex work together with J'onn, and while it would be great to see them partner up onscreen, we would actually really like just softer Dansen at home moments. We hope it incorporates both, but honestly the way this season has gone we aren't holding out much hope on that.

Last of all. We have seen several people tout that the plot twist is William in fact becomes a villain. None of us like the idea that another POC becomes a villain, but if by seasons end it occurred and so explained his presence (as a tool or high up member for Leviathan for example,) then at least that would give us something solid. But again, to do all this at the expense of all other characters is not what you want to see. Nor do any of us wish to see another POC get killed off if this happens as is being suggested. We would all rather William just disappears back to London to The Times. 

The last thing any of us wanted was to be writing this, but collectively our patience has run out. Our disappointment is acute. 

While we try to avoid mistakes and edit this, none of us are writers so please forgive any glaring errors you find.