#i hope this makes sense oaksoaksaoksaok

[lover-of-mine]

"I do think the show kinda wrote themselves into a corner with them and I can go on a whole separate rant about that" can you elaborate on that?

tldr: the stakes are too high now so it's easier to keep playing with the tension than resolving it.

Okay, so, I do joke they had a plan when they casted Ryan, but I actually do think they were just playing with the chemistry between Oliver and Ryan up until the moment they decided to retcon the well to make the will a thing. I do think both Ryan and Oliver like to play with their chemistry too, I don't act but I'm guessing it is fun to play with what you can do with another actor you have the type of chemistry they have, but when you look at season 2 and most of season 3 as a whole, ignoring a few moments we like to hang on to, they are two friends who really trust each other. Season 3 does up the stakes, but it was early enough they could swing it either way even more with the way they are not as close as they could be during most of season 4, a lot of things about the 2 of them are left implied, and it makes sense considering both of them had explicit love interests that season.

But the shooting and consequences are a real turning point for the way they are being portrayed, its less unintentional, less reliant on the chemistry between the two of them, it's more on purpose, the way the shooting scene was filmed and framed, the choice of words, the slow-mo of them standing there, the impression they give you that they have their eyes locked across the pavement, Buck saving Eddie alone, having Eddie ask Buck is he's hurt, Buck saying "I need you to hang on", the way Buck steps up with Chris without knowing about the will, the way we find out about the will, the choice to have that be something Eddie has been hiding for over a year, creates something on purpose with the two of them that actually allows them to play with putting buddie in season 2 and 3 in a different light, it implies a level of planning when you look at the whole show. Season 5 we have them talking more on screen, we have Eddie basically asking for permission to break up with Ana, the wording in that scene also feels really on purpose to make you look for hidden meanings if it ever came to it. And there are things like Mitchell clocking that hurting Eddie is more effective in controlling Buck that's also something you can come back to and repurpose later. There's the choice to have Buck being the person who actually gets through to Eddie with making him feel comfortable in his own life again, and having Buck being the person Eddie opens up about his trauma to begin with. And then we have literally everything about season 6. Season 6 actually allows me to change the perception of the whole show and write a 4k words rant about how Eddie has been in love with Buck since season 3, because they make a very conscious effort to paint Buck, Eddie, and Christopher as a family unity, the dinner on the premier, Buck baking cookies for Chris to take to school, the 3 of them hanging out on the loft while Chris does his homework. And everything about Buck's death and the episodes following, Eddie mirroring Buck during the shooting after the lightning, Eddie acting like a grieving partner, Chris being the person who makes Eddie go and see Buck, Buck knowing he can run to Eddie's when he's overwhelmed, whatever the fuck was mixed feelings.

But since now they can very easily add context to previous seasons to make them seem planned even if they weren't, there's a whole new level of expectations about them together. Because it makes it look like the people who have been shipping them since season 2 are right, so right now the showrunners have the chance to make what could objectively be one of the best slowburns in television history and add the fact that it's a queer relationship and they have the chance to do something that will make the show go down in romance history in a way. But realistically speaking, it's hard for them to make that relationship a reality. We have 7 main characters, we see 4 of them get together, so we are invested in them, we have Karen being introduced to us when Hen screws up, which makes us sympathize with Karen so we are invested in henren even if Karen mostly exists to be Hen's wife, and we have the other two being heavily shipped together since the beginning. But the thing with Bobby and Athena and Chim and Maddie is that they don't work together, so they don't have to acknowledge bathena and madney every episode, because if we are not seeing them together there's no real expectation for the episode to do something to remind us they are together. That won't work with buddie. Considering the way they are partnered in the field most of the time and they are on the same shift and how high the expectations around them are because of the way their friendship was constructed, they would have to find a way to make the relationship known every episode. And let's face it, most television shows really struggle with keeping slowburns together after the buildup, and the buildup with buddie is high, because they get used to working the tension and once the tension is resolved they drop the ball so we end up with unnecessary conflicts and breakups that make no sense just to add tension back in so the relationship will be interesting for them to write. And we joke that Eddie baby trapped Buck and that they act like an old married couple, but they literally already have a canon legal document tying them together, they very explicitly co-parent Chris, they are very clearly comfortable in each other's spaces, so that makes the usual tricks to keep slowburns interesting won't work, because honestly, I think that even a friends to married thing with them isn't that farfetched. Raise the tension enough in the lead-up to getting them together and they could have them flying to vegas to get married and most people just accepting it. But that's not good for their storytelling because 911 is not the buddie show and there is all this expectation that could end up with them deciding that writing them as an established couple is more complicated to deal with than just leaving them simmering forever.

Because the thing is, one good push and you get them together, they can trip them into a relationship at any time, really, just sit them down and let them talk about their feelings and accidentally confess to something, or turn up the flirty banter they have while they're alone and let them trip into each other, put any of them in danger and have the other snapping, like literally any of the hundred contexts we have of getting together fics about them would work at this point, but the issue is not getting them together is keeping them together in a satisfying way.