#i get so irrationally angry if someone interprets one of my favourite characters just completely wrong

[aimseytv]

hey man you can totally sit down and enjoy this piece of media i enjoy with me. hey what do you mean you are misinterpreting my favourite characters motivations and you are analysing them completely wrong. what is wrong with you

[beth-march]

Can I rant about something that’s been annoying me? All the people who who keep saying that El has to die at the end of season 5 are really starting to get on my nerves, especially because I think that they wouldn’t do that for several reasons (mainly that she’s been through so much that it would be too depressing of an ending and that it would be too cruel of an ending for Hopper to go through all of that only to be faced with losing a second child in the end and have all that development thrown away) – and I just saw someone say that she’s their least favourite character and that she has to die at the end of season 5 because apparently it’s the only way that her character arc makes sense????????? …. What??? Are we watching the same show???

Yes, always! Please feel free to come and rant to me about things.

I understand your frustration here. There’s a strange animosity towards El in some circles of the fandom and this insistence on the need for her to die in the finale is definitely reflective of that. I really don’t like seeing people speculate about her death because it tends to be people who don’t like her and want her gone. Which, like, imagine being a Stranger Things fan and not liking El… She is the show, it belongs to her. She’s the only reason everyone is still alive and the world is still intact! It often feels like we’re watching different shows, there’s such a disparity in how people interpret things.

El dying is not the only way her character arc makes sense, that is a wildly untrue and completely subjective. I don’t think anyone other than that person would believe that. I also don’t think someone that biased against El is really worth taking seriously.

It’s so very annoying though. I never engage with antis because I don’t see the point, not even when they’re on my posts, but it makes me irrationally angry to see people being mean to El. It rubs me the wrong way, how harsh people are with her. Not just because El is one of my most beloved characters of all time but because of the misogynistic and ableist sentiments in their condemnations. I want to gatekeep El from those weirdos, they don’t deserve her!

[pinytree]

Umfb&mha meta : Notre-dame de Paris (part 2)

( link to part 1 )

   To complete our analysis (written in collaboration with the lovely @smutinator ) of the song “ Belle ” in the Rivals Serie by @kazliin we decided to take into account the other songs directly before and after Belle in the musical Notre-Dame de Paris to see if the lyrics/storyline match the fic as well.

   Belle is the 20th song of the musical I will talk about « A boire ! » (19th), « Ma maison, c’est ta maison » (21st), « Je sens ma vie qui bascule » (23rd) and « Tu vas me détruire » (24th). I ignored the songs sung by other characters than the three men of the song Belle ( Quasimodo, Frollo and Phoebus ) because I wanted to focus on the characters Viktor chose to express himself.

  Firstly « A boire ! » (It’s an interjection meaning “Give me something to drink!”), it is a song for which I thought the context was more important than the lyrics. In the musical this scene happens just before the song “Belle”. Quasimodo is tied to a wheel, hurt, and asks for help. Esmeralda comes to him and soothes him by giving him water, giving him hope that someone, especially her, can be kind to him. 

  I think we can link that to what happens in chapter 7, this chapter comes just before the “Belle chapter”. Viktor gets hurt, and, while we don’t have his point of view yet, he must feel tied out of the rink and frustrated to not be able to express himself through skating. As he was wandering, still injured an probably upset, he saw Yuuri skating to one of his old routines in the abandoned rink. I think it soothes him, gave him hope that there is more depth to Yuuri’s feeling towards him than plain hatred. By maintaining the mystery around him and suprising him once more, Yuuri gives him the water he needs to keep going.  

   Analysing the song coming right after “Belle” right now wouldn’t suit the UMFB storyline and would fit better if treated last so even if it doesn’t follow the order of the musical I’ll go first for the 23rd: “Je sens ma vie qui bascule” (I feel my life shifting). This one is very short it’s more of a transition for the next song and will be treated as such:

I feel my life shifting

Toward an unknown land

I see the crowd parting

as I walk the streets.

I am a man stripped bare

a man stripped bare.

  To me it shows a realisation, after chapter 8 he probably has no doubts left: Firstly he has a clear, irrevocable confirmation Yuuri hates him, secondly he’s already too far gone to care. By accepting to have sex with Yuuri in these conditions he embraces whatever relationship he can have and probably knows that by doing so his life will change to an emotional mess. 

    He feels lost and wonders how to cope with it and hence we come to my favourite of the four : “Tu vas me détruire” which comes right after and is a logical continuation of this one.

   I feel like the lyrics already speak a lot for themselves but I will copy/paste some of the lyrics to draw some attention on it. After the infamous « I hate you, now fuck me », Viktor’s love, because I do believe he loves him at this point, seems unrequited. I think Viktor felt very hurt, not only by the « I hate you » but also by the way Yuuri used him in chap 9 (as much as I love Yuuri, it’s impossible for Viktor to see Yuuri’s actions as something else than Yuuri using him without giving a damn about his feelings). He loves him but probably hates to feel like this because it hurts him and we have a glimpse of that in his dialogue with Chris « “You’re a masochist in the worst way. And not the fun sexy kind either.” “I know.” ». Now that I brought this up let’s have a look at the lyrics :

This ocean of passion

Breaking through my veins

Causing my irrationality

My disarray and my bad luck

[…]

I'll slowly drown myself into it

Without feeling any remorse

    That’s basically what I get from is conversation with Chris: He knows it’s wrong, he knows he’s hurt and acts not the way he should but he can’t bring himself to do anything else because of the passion, the way Yuuri makes him feel. As he puts it himself: “I understand how this works. But I can’t change what I want. If this is all I’m ever going to get, even if I can’t have anything else, then I’ll take it. That’s better than nothing after all.” He has accepted the love he feels for Yuuri and doesn’t feel remorse because he lives on whatever Yuuri accepts to give him.

You will destroy me

You will destroy me

    « "You’re practically begging for scraps as it is and you’re still getting almost nothing in return.” “I know.” Viktor snapped back and his voice was harsher than Yuuri had ever heard it before. He sounded almost angry but there was a crack in his voice that betrayed a very different emotion. » Here Viktor is obviously feeling terrible about whatever his relationship with Yuuri is which fits the « You will destroy me » lyrics, he knows that his situation isn’t sustainable, that he has no long-term perspective and that Yuuri could hurt him even more in the future but as said precedingly: he doesn’t care enough to stop.

Little illusions dealer

I live but in the expectation

Of seeing your slip getting blown up

And of you to dance and sing

   Honestly there is a lot of involuntary (well sometimes voluntary. Eros, I’m looking at you.) teasing from Yuuri in UMFB and these lyrics kind of speak for themselves. Yuuri makes him hope with his dancing alone in the rink, with his quad flip, with his teasing ( “Enjoying  the view?” uh) and glances. Seriously this kid is so oblivious he doesn’t know how his behaviour can be interpreted by Viktor. And since Yuuri contradicts his teasing with his words and his actions all the time (like hum idk leaving as soon as they’re done for example), he crushes the illusions and expectations he gave to Viktor.

   And then about the dance it’s pretty obvious Viktor loves with all of his heart watching Yuuri dance, no plot twist here.

I set myself on fire and torture myself

For the eyes of a foreigner

Concealing much more mystery

Than the light of the moon

   His love is unrequited and he suffers because he doesn’t even KNOW what fuels Yuuri’s hatred. Yuuri is a mystery, a beautiful one he can’t understand but he still wants so badly to know what he has done wrong and tortures himself because he’s not able to figure this out.

   And then comes the 21st song: « Ma maison, c’est ta maison » ( My home is your home ), Quasimodo tells Esmeralda she can stay at his place as long as she wants, it is obviously reminiscent of the 11th chapter with the week in Moscow:

You’ll come whenever you want

No matter the season

My house if you want

It will be your home

   Which is a blessing after all the angst of “Tu vas me détruire”.

 BONUS: I’ve also been reminded of the song “Beau comme le soleil” ( Beautiful like the sun ), and I’m glad I can finish this meta with a wink at Of Bright Stars and Burning Hearts . This song is sung by Esmeralda (well not only, Fleur-de-lys joins her afterwards but I’m focusing on Esmeralda here) talking about Phoebus.

He is beautiful like the sun

Is he a prince or the son of a king?

I feel love reveal itself

Deep inside me

Much stronger than me

He is beautiful like the sun

   Esmeralda compares Phoebus to a star, expressing her adoration and love for him. And Kaz confirmed the companion fic makes reference to a specific comparison Yuuri makes several times in UMFB:

"Yuuri was like a planet orbiting a brightly burning star, caught in Viktor’s gravity."

“Viktor was like a burning flame, a fiery star shining so brightly that he drowned out everything and everyone around him and for some reason, through all his hatred and all his resentment, Yuuri couldn’t seem to stay away.”

“Viktor pulled him close, their fingers still laced together and Yuuri could see the light in his eyes, bright and shining like the light of a star, drawing him into their orbit.”

I don’t know to which extent Kaz thought about the similarities with the rest of the musical but Belle was definitely a well chose song

Disclaimer: This meta is part of the #thankyouforsteppingonus project that started on a discord chat :sweat_drops: :pray: