#i understand 'choosing to be evil is worse' but its so funny to say 'aw man we cant hate sheev he was just written that way' ????? HELLO?

[gayairbud]

truly fascinating to see someone say you cant blame palpatine for being evil because thats his narrative purpose but anakin is worse because he chose that path as if he just. woke up one day and said "hmmm i think today i will become evil" regardless of the 400 page essay in there somewhere about the nuance of his choice after years of textbook grooming and manipulation and trauma. like im obsessed with this idea that palpatine just blinked into existence one day old and fully 100% evil with zero events leading up to that and therefore gets a pass for being evil but if you get manipulated for 23 years WELL maybe you shouldve just been better at cognitive behavioral therapy have you considered that

[imagine-that-one-thing]

Her Majesty || 16

Letters patent.

Anastasia’s POV.

The papers fall from my hands, hitting the floor before I step over them, “Excuse me,” I mutter, hurrying past Harry and finding my way to the bathroom. My hands grapple with clutching the edge of the sink as I bow my head in defeat.

This can’t be happening.

One hand stays grasped to the edge, and the other holds my hair back, my stomach twisting at the realisation of everything.

The door creaks open, and Harry steps into the bathroom, thoughtfully pushing my hand away and holding my hair back for me.

“This is why you need a break.” Harry sighs, stroking my back while my stomach violently turns and the remainder of my afternoon tea makes an awful appearance.

I take a breath and press a hand to my stomach, straightening my back slightly, “Now isn’t the time for sly remarks,” I murmur, closing my eyes for a moment, another wave hitting me harshly.

I lift my head again, taking another breath and praying that it’s the last time I throw up.

Harry lets go of my hair as I lean back on him, my energy depleting extremely quickly.

We are stuck. Harry and I are bound to the monarchy with no way out. “He tied me to the monarch?” The words leave my mouth, and Harry nods his head as I gaze at him through the mirror, “We are stuck in it… Why’d he do this?” I softly question, tears falling down my blushed cheeks, “I can’t end it.”

Harry wraps his arm around me carefully, “Sweetheart, I think the point was so that the monarch can’t end at all. Your Dad issued letters patent.”

“The only person who can end this shitshow is my hypothetical child?”

“That’s how it seems.” Harry nods.

“The only way anyone can cause this monarch to end is if I have a baby? Not even Pippa can end it? Parliament can’t even end this fucking shit?”

Harry again shakes his head, “The monarch can only end with your kid.”

“Our,” I correct him, “Our hypothetical kid.”

“What do we do, Anna?”

I take a moment before I take a breath. I step away from his embrace, and I turn to face him, leaning against the counter, and I smile up at him softly, “We rule the monarch with an iron fist, Harry.”

“Excuse me?” Harry’s eyes grow big.

“We do what was intended, to rule the monarch and keep it thriving. But you’re going to call for a dissolution of Parliament. Every seat in the House of Commons will become vacant.”

“Why? Pippa said parliament seats couldn’t change.”

“She is wrong. Call for the dissolution, Harry. Then we can work on getting her disbanded as Primeinsiter.”

“We can’t get rid of her. We can’t vote; royals stay neutral in that branch.”

“Harry, I am aware of how this works. Please, listen to me, clear the seats, order new parliament officials. It’s a strategic dissolution.”

“So, now you want to end Parliament since we can’t end the monarch?”

I nod my head, “You and I both know some of the people who want me dead are currently members of parliament, call for re-election, so they lose their seats. If they are not voted in, you can figure out how to keep them at bay and away from us,” I respond.

“Isn’t there a rule about Parliament only being dissolved at a certain time?” Harry asks.

I shrug my shoulders, “Parliament can be dissolved at the beginning of the 25th working day before a general election… The Fixed-term Parliaments Act, which you are also going to sign and change today. Before the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, the government had the power to call elections at a time of its choosing, and I want that back.”

“I hate being the middle man,” Harry groans, “This is fucking ridiculous.”

“Then let me have the crown back.”

“Talk to your mother about it, Anna. I don’t have a say over having the fucking crown. I have tried to hand it back… Pippa and your mother have not allowed me.”

“The best thing about you being King is that you can sign whatever the fuck you want and not listen to them. You can hand me the crown; you just have to sign it on over or find a loophole as my father did.”

“I much prefer my daily job as security than as King.”

“Listen to me and do this, Harry. When Parliament is dissolved, all unfinished parliamentary business falls, including bills that have not received Royal Assent. Bills cannot be carried over. Whatever plans any of them have will fail. If I can’t abolish this circus, I will join them and end it for them and take back the monarch... You are either with me or against me, Harry.”

“I am with you, Anastasia,” Harry responds instantly, “I will start the process of everything, not that I know what the fuck I am doing,” Harry trails off, “Any other requests while I am here? Perhaps request my blood?”

“Oh, ha, ha, you’re funny,” I roll my eyes, “That’s all for now, I will keep thinking of Royal assents I want you to part take in… Until then, I have to make my first appearance as Queen, even though that is far from the truth. Are you attending?”

“I am,” Harry nods, “Matthew has Oliver and myself on your service.”

“Great… and if you don’t wish to participate in my plan to take back control of the monarch, we can always have a baby and abolish the monarchy.”

“Uhm…” Harry trails off, “No. All due respect, but if we have a kid, I’d rather we talk about it properly, and right now, I don’t want a baby in this mix, no, no— and no.” Harry shakes his head sternly.

“I’m sure parliament would love it.”

“I’m sure that would piss them off and make things worse, no.”

“Great, so you’ll be on my side?”

“Yes. Anna. I have always been on your side. Now I’m going to take a nap until your event. Please, for the love of God, don’t start shit, don’t make any plans, don’t do anything irrational like you did the night with Henry. I don’t need more blood on my hands, literally and metaphorically.”

“I will be the perfect princess everyone knows me to be.”

“You say that with an evil look to your eyes… I really don’t need to do a protocol.”

I shrug my shoulders and step closer to him, “You have my word, I won’t start shit,” I smile, drawing small circles on my stomach, feeling a bit more relaxed, oddly.

“I am confused as to what made you switch from hating the monarch to wanting to control it again?”

I take a breath and shrug my shoulders, “Sometimes you just have to play the cards you are dealt and hope that the hand you have is the winning hand.”

“But you suddenly flipped your switch, Anna… Do I need to be concerned? What happened to the Princess that wanted nothing more than to leave and have a normal life?”

“She realised that it would never happen. This is what I was born for, Harry. I have tried to get away so many times, and I can’t. I have no choice but to deal with it. You can still leave. You don’t have to be stuck in this, Harry. You have an out.”

Harry shakes his head and takes my left hand with his, “Anna,” Harry begins with a soft breath, his thumb rubbing over where my rings would rest if I were able to wear them. He reaches his other hand up to my neck where he follows the thin chain and pulls out my rings from under my shirt, “I gave you this ring and proposed for a reason, I put that wedding band on, for a reason, I wear my wedding band, for a reason. I love you, and I want to be with you. I don’t want an out. I don’t want to leave. I can deal with the monarch. It does not scare me.” Harry informs me sweetly and calmly, “I may not be able to tell the world I love you or act upon things right now, but I don’t want to not live life without being your partner, even if you do despise me for taking your damn crown,” Harry chuckles, breaking the slight tension in the space between us.

I do not despise him for taking the crown. I will admit that him having ownership of it is a better option. I am still in no headspace to hold such power, and I am still struggling with daily activities. Royal life isn’t easy, but it is much more challenging when you lose your father but gain a monarch to run that you are not ready for. My father may have prepared me in a royal status sort of way to run the place, but I was not mentally or emotionally prepared. I don’t think anyone can be emotionally prepared for the loss of a loved one.

“Are you sure?”

Harry nods his head, “I am more than sure, sweetheart. Are you okay? I still don’t understand how you changed your mind about the monarch.”

I shrug my shoulders, “I don’t know if I am truly okay. Today’s news physically made me sick,” I admit, “But this is my family legacy. I would be destroying what generations have built. My father did build a great monarch… It may have some evil people involved in it, but the people are thriving, and the country is doing well. I can sit here and wish to abolish and destroy it all because of my own bitterness, or I can figure out how to lead without being held back.”

Harry smiles softly and nods his head, “It is good to see you coming to your power as Queen, darling.

“I have a great husband and King to back me up.”

“No, baby. You don’t have a King. You have a husband. I am merely the husband to have your back.”

I shake my head, “No, Harry. If I am reigning Queen, you will be known as King. I will be changing that. You will have that title. I can be Queen and reign on my own, don’t get me wrong, but I want a King by my side.”

“We can cross that bridge when we get there… But I want to know when the staff will know about us, and I am tired of hiding us. Surely the staff have figured it out.”

I shake my head, “The staff do not know, but you are still the talk of the ladies,” I laugh, “A lot of the ladies keep their eyes on you. Rumour has it that there is a pool on how long it takes you to get a girlfriend.”

“What?”

“The staff, they make assumptions about you since you’re so private. Some think you have a secret girlfriend, and others think that you’re just a workaholic.”

Harry rolls his eyes, “Jokes on them, I have a secret wife, and I am a workaholic. Do they just sit and talk about me to you?”

I nod my head, “Yeah, I learn new things about you all the time.” I chuckle, unsure how he doesn’t know that many of the female staff swoons over him.

“And you don’t mind?”

“No, I find it amusing,” I respond, “I don’t know how they haven’t figured out we are together. You are always in my room.”

“I am security,” Harry shrugs, “I think a few of them know. They just keep quiet. I know Grace has an idea. She keeps smirking at my ring.”

“Oh well, I don’t care, I am unsure how the people will react, but I guess we will find out. I need to get ready for the event… I am giving a speech.”

“Mhm,” Harry hums, “So Pippa told me. How do you feel about that?”

“I think I am okay, considering I just threw up a handful of times,” I sarcastically respond. “I uh… I haven’t seen the speech. I am not allowed to write my own. They don’t trust me.” I roll my eyes, “I much prefer if I could write things myself. I don’t like being dictated to.”

Harry steps to the side and grabs one of the face towels that are folded neatly. He runs it under the cold water before touching it to my cheeks lightly, “I don’t think you’re okay at all. You don’t have to do this speech.” Harry taps the damp towel to my forehead, my eyes closing as it soothes me. “You look like you need to sit down for a few minutes,” Harry softly enlightens me, and I nod my head in agreement.

My body feels weak and exhausted.

Harry guides me back to the bedroom, being overly protective. I sit on the bed and rest against the soft pillows. Harry sits beside me on the edge and dabs my forehead, “Seriously, if you’re not up to it, you don’t have to do the speech.”

“Harry, I have to be a big girl and face the fear. One way or another. It’s all just a lot to handle,” I sigh, “Will you just ask my lady maids to come in an hour later than usual? So I can lay down.”

Harry nods, “Yes,” He leans over and kisses my forehead, “Try to relax.”

“It’s hard when the damn papers are on the floor and dictate my future.”

Harry shakes his head, “We will figure it out. One way or another, it’ll be okay.”

He is right; one way or another it’ll work out the way it’s meant to. What’s meant to be will always be. Right now, what’s meant to be is taking my world and turning it upside down.

♚ ♚ ♚

With heavy breaths, I try my best to compose myself and steadily speak, but with every word I am forced to utter, I feel a heaviness in my chest that’s threatening to break my walls of resistance and cause me to break. This speech is the first public speech that I have addressed, and it is turning out to be a lot harder than I had anticipated.

I hold back my tears, aware that cameras everywhere and several sets of eyes cast upon me. It was too soon for me to have to do this. Speaking about my father is still raw and cuts me like a knife. I shouldn’t have let Pippa coerce me into delivering a speech, and I should have taken my time with healing and working through things. The monarch and the expectations can wait. My mental and emotional health is more important than addressing the public and all the national leaders who acquire my attention.

I sense a hand to the small of my back, and I take my eyes away from the paper in front of me. I glance to my side and see Harry beside me, my other half, my shoulder to cry on and the person who holds me up when I’m down and praises the happiness with me. “I can’t,” I whisper, choking up with tears, finally allowing them to cascade down my cheeks. I attempt to turn into him so that I can’t be viewed grieving, but I can’t wholly hide, I can’t lean in for a hug and sob like I want to. I have to remember the boundaries between the royal and security guard as the people are viewing.

Harry doesn’t say anything. He naturally places an arm around me, leaving no gaps between us before moving the paper closer to him. Harry clears his throat and, without warning, begins to continue my speech for me. “He was an honorary member of society, a king that will be remembered for his devotion to the nation but most of all will be remembered as a loving father and doting husband.”

I subtly wipe a few of my tears away, doing my best to hold firm as a future Queen. Coronation day hasn’t arrived, so I’m technically not Queen until then, not that it matters considering it will be Harry’s coronation. I stand before my people, vulnerable and emotional, something that is frowned upon and has been for years. It is rare to see a royal display emotions other than pleasure and power, especially when broadcasted over news outlets and social media. A royal is to uphold a particular disposition. We aren’t meant to come across as weak. As I stand here, with tears, I’m aware that I may seem inadequate, but I’d rather appear weak and show the world I have emotions than hide them. Anyone in my shoes would still be mourning the loss of their father, no matter his status, for me to uphold the image that I’m absolutely fine and emotionless is not what I want to support. I do not want to be Queen and viewed as though I have no emotions. Raw emotions show character. It teaches people it’s okay to feel things, it’s okay to break, no matter who you are— it doesn’t make me any less of a Queen. For those who look up to me, I don’t want them to observe me as just another royal or another one who follows all protocols and traditions, and I will not sustain the image of perpetually being emotionless. I am Queen, and I am human.

The speech ends, and Harry guides me away from the small podium, escorting me to escape behind closed doors, where I find a place to sit and compose myself, “Thank you,” I breathe out, “It was too soon,” I whisper, wiping a few tears away from my eyes, doing my best to hold myself together. This is not how I wanted things to go. I didn’t want to break down and for Harry to have to save me from emotional wreckage.

Harry bends down to my level, placing a hand on my knee, “You did a grand job.”

“I started to stutter and cried. I balled my eyes out, Harry.” I don’t feel proud of myself because I couldn’t finish the speech and honour my father in the way he deserves.

“And? That shows that you’re human; you’re normal. Us normal people stutter and have emotions, baby,” Harry winks, managing to pull a chuckle from me, “Pippa did that on purpose, to have you break down in front of people...” Harry trails off.

I would love to say I’m surprised, but I’m not. I’m the centre of attention with the media spotlight, and it would make her night to have me breaking down. Anything in an attempt to continue to prove I’m unfit to take the crown. That’s probably her plan, prove I am incompetent and make sure I never have that royal power. Unlucky for her, Harry is on my side and not hers as she thinks.

“How kind,” I sigh, “Thanks for saving me.”

“Always,” Harry responds, “Wipe the tears away, put on a smile and show them the tough Queen I know you can be, don’t let that speech or Pippa bring you down, okay?”

“Are you giving me a pep talk?” I stifle a laugh as I wipe away a few more tears.

“Someone has to,” Harry responds, standing back to his feet and offering his hand to help me off the chair and to my own feet. He brings me in for a hug and holds me close, “Pippa wants you to fail. She’s watching,” Harry murmurs, “I love you.”

I draw away and nod my head, mouthing an ‘I love you, too’ before taking a step away from him, well aware that it’s only a matter of seconds before someone bursts through the door to summon me. I adjust my dress and posture, taking a deep breath and looking for Harry’s nod and gesture for me to head back to the same room that left me weeping. I stroll in, head held high, my heels hammering the marble flooring and keeping my composure as a strong-willed, calm and collected woman.

I make my rounds by talking to different people and allowing certain photographers at the event to take my photo. With everything that has happened, we need some excellent media coverage within the royals. I am sure Victoria’s death will continue to be in the headlines. I’m sure somewhere down the line, the issue that happened at the palace with Henry’s doppelgänger will arise and spark significant headlines. Royal scandals and murders seem to be the headlines everyone enjoys. I will not be the following headline or humiliation. The media will not predict my downfall or portray me as weak.

As I politely dismiss one of the diplomats, Pippa makes her presence known and offers me a smile, “May I hug you?” She questions and I shake my head.

“Security isn't allowing me to be touched,” I lie, not wanting Pippa’s hug nor anyone else’s. I’m not much in the mood to be touched.

Oliver nods his head, “Correct, strict orders, she isn’t to be touched.”

Pippa rolls her eyes, “Harry’s orders?”

“No,” Oliver instantly responds before I can, “Head of security, please respect the decisions,” Oliver narrows his eyes towards Pippa, not caring that she is a government official. Harry has trained him well, I see.

Pippa nods her head in agreement, “I just wanted to say that the speech was lovely.”

“You wrote it.”

“You’re very hostile, Anna,” Pippa sighs.

“You set me up.” I point out the obvious.

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” Pippas' voice is soft as she cocks her head to the side. “It was kind of Harry to step up, but now people will start to speculate,” she trails off into a whisper, making sure nobody can hear her. God forbid if the world knows I have a steady relationship with someone who isn’t royal.

“Perhaps if I weren’t forced to make the speech, he wouldn’t have had to step up and comfort me. I don’t appreciate the events of this evening.”

“Anna, it is not my fault,” she shakes her head, “I followed procedure. It was time you spoke.”

“And as it is time for me to walk away from this conversation, good evening, Pippa,” I dismiss the conversation, walking away before either of us can speak any further. I do not care for what she has to say right now or for the excuses. I’m sure she will blame my mother and say my mother was partly to blame for the speech. Which, I’m sure my mother agreed to the address and for me to speak tonight, and I believe they were both wrong for forcing it upon me and not letting me grieve, but my anger is towards Pippa for now.

♚ ♚ ♚

For the evening, I stood my ground; I didn’t let anything bother me or break me down— I didn’t run to Harry or have him, or Oliver devise an escape plan— I survived my first event without my father and as QUEEN… Just not officially. I know I can do this, it may be arduous, and it may take everything I have inside me, but I can do this. It does make it a little more manageable to know that I have Harry beside me if I need him. That alone gives me a little extra power and support. Sometimes, all someone needs is a bit of confidence and support to thrive.

I escort across the grounds with Oliver, my heels in my hand, while my other hand prevents the hem from dragging across the soft grass that smells of sweet saturnine with every step I take. For the first night in a while, there are no battering winds that howl until the early hours, there is no bitter chill, it finally feels bearable to be outside without the need of heavy coats and wraps, perhaps this is a short-lived moment, but I will take it and relish in it the best that I can. Oliver gently grabs me and pulls back on me, drawing me behind him. “Don’t come any further,” Oliver shouts, his hand reaching for his gun.

“What is it with the men always pulling a gun on me, geez,” Madeleine responds sarcastically.

“Announce yourself formally,” Oliver responds.

“Princess Madeleine Noelle Veil of Denmark. Anastasia, tell him who I am,” Madeleine huffs, holding her hands up as Oliver continues to stare her down.

“She’s fine, Oliver.” I chuckle.

“That’s not what Harry said,'' Oliver responds, causing me to laugh. I am not surprised that Harry and Madeleine don’t get along.

“It’s fine,” I assure Oliver, “Harry has already screened her. She was here for the funeral, remember?” I try to jog Oliver's memory.

Oliver nods his head and steps aside, allowing me to walk closer to Madeleine, “Why are you out here?” I softly ask, looking around, unsure why she is by herself and unaccompanied by a guard.

“Fresh air, Harry said I could come out; he is watching from the doors,” Madeleine gestures towards the Palace doors a little further from our position. “They burned down the Palace, though.”

“Who?” I softly question, walking beside Madeleine.

Madeleine lifts her shoulders into a shrug, “I don’t know. Louis seems to think it is the people who are causing everyone havoc.”

“Why would they target your Palace? I am sorry. Which one? Charlottenlund Palace?”

Madeleine shakes her head, “Amalienborg, lucky nobody was there. It was intentionally set. Mum and Dad were meant to be there.”

“Perhaps it was an accident, surely?” I suggest, unsure of who would purposely do such a thing to Amalienborg. Madeleine’s family have nothing to do with us British royals; they stay mutual and don’t cause issues— They’re the quiet royals that don’t mind being under the radar— They show up for special events and go on about their business.

Madeleine heavily sighs, and I push the Palace doors open, not allowing Oliver to open the door for me, “So, you and Louis have been talking?” I change the subject, not sure how to go about the issue with her Palace catching fire. I don’t fully believe that it was deliberate— there has to be some logical explanation.

Madeleine grows quiet, walking into the Palace behind me, “Madeleine?”

“He is lovely to talk to, a good man.”

“Stay away from him, Madeleine,” I warn her, not wanting to see either of them get hurt or drag me into their mess.

“What? Why?”

I raise a brow and shake my head, “He is my childhood best friend. I can’t choose between you both, so if you break up, I can’t choose.”

Madeleine laughs, “Who said anything about dating?”

“Whatever the two of you are doing, I am sure it is more than talking,” I mutter, knowing both of them too well. They’re stuck in a palace together on the same floor, and I highly doubt they’re talking about royal duties and discussing policies.

“I beg to differ,” Madeleine shakes her head, “He is good company.”

“Whatever you do, be nice to him.”

“You have little faith in me.”

“You tend to be intimidating, be nice. Do you need me, or are you just roaming the palace?” I softly question as we reach my floor. I’m not trying to dismiss her rudely or be a horrible friend, but I think she’d prefer to find comfort in Louis than me.

“Roaming,” she responds, walking off before I can say anything further.

I glance towards Oliver and raise a brow, “Do you think she and Louis are a thing?”

Oliver shrugs his shoulders, “I know nothing and see nothing.”

“Mhm,” I hum, not convinced, “I know that’s a lie, but for now, I’m going to leave it alone. I don’t know if I want to know,” I chuckle and shake my head, “Thank you for your service,” I respond, stepping into my room and closing the door behind me.

I smile over at Harry and walk towards him, “I did it, I survived, and I didn’t need you.”

“Ouch,” Harry laughs, and I sigh, realising how my words came out. “I know,” he shakes his head before I can say anything, “I’m proud of you.”

“Me too,” I grin, stepping closer to him and kissing him sweetly. He pulls me closer, and I wrap my arms around his neck, deepening the sweet kiss.

I have missed the taste of his lips and the burning energy that spreads like wildfire and ignites my soul. He sits on the edge of the bed and pulls me into his lap, where I straddle him at his hips, his hands roaming my body while mine eagerly moves to his button-down, flicking each button before he draws his honey lips from mine. He leans closer and presses his lips to my neck, causing me to go weak instantly. I tilt my head to the side and press my hands to his shoulders, the soft kisses down my slender column already causing my head to spin. I feel him bite down gently before pulling away with a devious smirk and bright, cunning eyes. He drops his hand to my thigh and glides his hand against my soft skin, ever so slowly and delicately, ignoring my dress and inching closer and closer to the material of my underwear. He dances along with the lace band, teasing me before I harshly kiss him, needing to feel him, one way or another. He caresses the lace, causing my breath to hitch when I feel it move slightly to the slide. I pull away from his lips and see him smirk, his eyes gleaming with delight at my eager anticipation and my yearning. “No foreplay, no teasing, let’s go,” I shake my head, my hand moving to his pants and unzipping them. Harry chuckles and disagrees.

He puts me at ease and slides a finger in, a breath exhaling from my lips as I move my hips slightly to his circular motions. His fingers slide upwards, relentlessly moving, dipping, swirling and circling around, adding pressure and attempting to obtain the one spot I have been craving to be touched.

“No, please,” I sigh, the sound of the door knocking echoing through the room, taking me away from the sensational feeling I have been deprived of, “Don’t stop,” I instruct, my hands pressed to his shoulders, my nails digging into the material of his shirt.

“Really want me, huh?”

“Tired of interruptions,” I whisper with all honesty. Every single time we get time alone, we are interrupted. It has been a few weeks, at least six since we had a moment to ourselves, and I’m pretty sure we were also interrupted that time too.

I tilt my head back, my mouth allowing a small groan to escape as I am enthralled with the circular touch and rhythm he’s presenting me with. “Harry,” I huff, “Keep going,” I instruct, feeling the aching desire through my body, the sensations radiating through every nerve possible. I feel my body begin to go weak as he holds me firmly closer to him, my legs starting to quiver, and my body squirming against him. “Harry—“ I breathe out, my chest rising rapidly.

Abruptly, without warning, Harry stops and slides his fingers out, causing my mouth to drop in utter disappointment.

You have to be fucking kidding me. He shakes his head and uses his free hand to adjust his pants, managing to do so without bothering to move me, “Ye’ all wet.”

“No shit, you got me all hot and bothered,” I mutter, my irritation washing away the moment he unzips my dress from the back and takes it off of me with ease.

He stands up, holding me against him, forcing his pants down his legs and leaving them on the floor before setting me down on the bed and wasting no time with moving the lace in his way and teasing me with the tip of his length at my entrance. I curl my fingers into his shirt and draw his chest closer, taking bold possession of his mouth, tasting the honeysuckle flavour and moving my hips to the motions of his. My body absorbs the intimate feel of him, blood humming in both our veins’ with every deep repetitive thrust that takes place. He moans into our kiss, and I tighten my grip on his shirt, the heat between us intensifying. Probing in a slow, repetitive rhythm, he perceives my every desire.

My head spins with the achy feeling of him inside of me, my legs quivering. He takes my hands and forces me to release his shirt, moving my arms over my head and holding them in place, “Hold it,” He instructs, my breath hitching in my throat as I’m getting closer and closer.

Tangy taste and male scent fill the air between us with every powerful thrust that drives us closer and closer to the barrier of resistance I am fighting. Our tongues dip and swirl between the soft groans of the two of us while entangled together in the heat of our bodies.

My breaths become shallow, and I can feel the tingly sensation in my toes that radiate around my body. My body closes tightly around him, and he squeezes my arm slightly, “Anna,” he breathes against my lips, my back beginning to arch, my body fighting the urge and squirming under him.

Our breaths quicken and the desire between us thickens to the point it's almost unbearable, and we can’t get any closer to each other or enough of each other.

He falls beside me, and we catch our breath with crooked grins. I tilt my head to look at him, “Was worth the bloody wait,” I chuckle.

Harry swallows hard, “Had been a while,” he agrees, propping up on his forearm and looking at me with his cheery grin, “Round 2?”

“We’d get interrupted,” I laugh, inching closer and pressing my lips to his just as his phone vibrates on the side table, “Fuckin’ hell, does everyone just have a bell that goes off every time we attempt to be intimate?” Harry pulls away and mutters, reaching over for his phone, “Fuck,” Harry sighs, forcing himself off the bed.

“What now?”

“I’m pretty sure a bell goes off when we try to make love, constantly interrupted,” Harry huffs, walking around the room and finding a clean pair of pants, “Always fucking something,” he shakes his head, his fingers quickly typing away on his screen, “I won’t be coming to bed any time soon, I’ll see you in the morning,” Harry informs me, looking at his shirt and noticing the creases, making the quick decision to change it.

I nod my head and pull the sheet to cover my exposed body, “Is there a problem?”

“I just have to watch the cameras until five in the morning to make sure there’s no suspicious activity from the staff who are currently being blamed for Henry’s murder,” Harry informs me, his eyes narrowing towards me. Whatever Victoria and my father managed to get themselves into has proven to be more than any of us can handle.

Harry claims he can handle it and figure things out, but I’m starting to wonder if it’s just a matter of time before it all catches up to us. He can protect me all he wants, but the plot continues to thicken. “That means you won’t be on my service,” I sigh, remembering my royal duties for tomorrow.

“Probably not. I need to sleep at some point. Matthew or Oliver will look after you. Guess I have to look into the palace fire for Madeleine, too.”

“What about Henry?”

“I don’t know about the arrangements.”

“No, how are you handling it? Sweeping it under the rug? Announcing it?”

“Baby, I do not know. I think they’re going to release that he passed peacefully in his sleep from an unknown cause… The palace doesn’t need any bad publicity, so I’m trying to hide it the best I can.” … “Just don’t talk to anyone about this, okay? Not even the lady’s in waiting or your assistant or publicist, nobody.”

I nod my head, “I know… Eleanor hasn’t mentioned it.” … “Good luck, King, I’m going to sleep now,” I half-smile, not thrilled that he has to handle this circus and not myself.

[oneweekoneband]

her Nebraska (1982)

In July I flew to Massachusetts with a plague on, and I felt that it was wrong, but my mother had begged and I’d been out of work for months. Mornings there I ran in long, uneven ovals on the same roads I’d memorized in high school. There’s no sidewalks, but the few feet of dirt between the craggy pavement and the open mouths of the fields serve all right for a single body in motion. When a truck comes up close from behind, the ground shakes, and I step away bouncingly from the street toward thigh-high yellow weeds and grass, and keep going. I was slowly picking my way back in that dirt, sweat-slick from only a plodding couple of miles in peak summer heat, and sucking the wet cotton of my mask in between my teeth on every inhale, when Taylor Swift announced she was releasing a surprise album produced by the guy from The National. Not the guy from The National, like, the voice, but the guy from The National whose photo was circulated on Twitter earlier this year as some kind of antifa super soldier, which isn’t the case, but would’ve been rad. First, I stopped dead to send some outraged, misspelled text messages, and then I ran home faster than I’d moved in years.

Tall, blonde, patrician pop star Taylor Swift is to me something like a cross-between a wife and a boogeyman. Bound we’ve been since we were really children. Time and its changes haven’t rid me of her, and what’s worse is I have never quite been able to wish they would, though I claim as much all the time. Countless hours of my one wild and precious life have been spent on endlessly analyzing the minutiae of Taylor Swift’s music, the mind that made it, the real world events which influenced it. And though all the while I have known she is only a person, and that people, while each strange and lovely in their own ways, are, in the end, mostly dull, needful in just the regular manner, the fantasy is better, the sick dream of a megalomaniac songstress, curious, thrilling, probably evil, and I choose that. I don’t know Taylor Alison Swift, born to this world in, I presume, the usual way. But my Taylor Swift? I’m a renowned expert. I’ve always eaten up stories—movies, music, celebrity news, the one my grandfather tells about falling off his bike once in Ireland as a boy and his face “cracking open like an egg”—like a starved dog. I’m obsessive about my interests, but not inclined to intense fandom, and certainly not fandom in the mode of the stan. For one, I’m too self-absorbed. But caring intensely for a famous person is falling in love with a ghost, and that’s all right—I mean, what the hell? We’re here together just dying... Let’s enjoy—but is an affair best undertaken with the knowledge that everyone alive has their own complex interiority, as unruly as your own, and that you, a stranger, are not in any real way connected to the lawless, blurry middle of that celebrity, and will never be. It’s freeing and fun to know this. I mean, these people are basically in your employ. Glamorous dollhouse dwellers. Acknowledging that uncrossable distance allows for a different, healthier closeness of pure imagination. My feelings, then, can comfortably be at once both fiercely intense and entirely silly. I am a foremost scholar in the art of the Taylor Swift who exists in my head. The real person raised in Pennsylvania I don’t know at all. I have some conjectures on the matter, and, as with all my conjectures, every hackneyed theory, each picky little opinion, I’m sure they’re perfect, brilliant, just absolutely right, but that’s still all they are. Taylor Swift, figure of the cultural imagination, is the Jodie Comer to my Sandra Oh in Killing Eve, annoying and pretty in frills, taunting me endlessly and holding us trapped together in a dance of most enchanting death. But the real Taylor Swift has favorite bed sheets and a social security number and a British boyfriend, none of which I have any desire to know about, and if I saw her at a restaurant I’d politely avert my eyes before, yes, dive-bombing the group text. There’s nobody on Earth I’d stand in line to speak to, but then I’ve been speaking to a certain figment of Taylor Swift for nearly half my life.

I went to a Taylor Swift concert the night before I moved into college in 2009. My father’s work friend, firefighter by day, near professional gambler by night, got comped tickets to the Fearless Tour stop taking place at the nearby casino, and he let me have them as a reward, mainly, for happening to be seventeen. Live in-person and performed acoustically, “Fifteen” made me cry. A few years after that, in the thick, sticky part of my first post-college summer, I wrote approximately twenty-three million words about her in these very pages.  (”Pages”) At that point, Taylor’s most recent release was 2012’s Red, and the work I produced that long ago July about Taylor and her career, writing I was fairly pleased with at the time, feels now, besides just being extremely clearly written by a twenty-one year old, strange to me for the way it favors the sweet over the sour almost uniformly. There is a wholesome kind of ardor in that writing which maybe I’ve outgrown the ability to hold. Or maybe Taylor just proceeded to spend the next half a decade plus releasing one bad single after another, and it was taste—and trespasses against taste—and not some shift in my nature which altered the tenor of our bond. I have real love for my particular image, gleaned from public statements and published art, of smart, bizarre famous woman Taylor Swift, and I admire the bulk of her output very much. I’m just no longer so inclined to fawn. This is not to say I am here to offer a Taylor Swift hate screed. I couldn’t swing it, and, anyway, I’m not a pop feminist-for-hire circa 2010. But we’re older now. Things are different. At twenty-eight, twenty-nine this month—Taylor will, also this December, turn thirty-one—I regard Taylor Swift warily, like an ex with whom you have a tentative friendship, perpetually on the brink of falling one way or the other into hatred or delight, only to wobble back the opposite direction again at the slightest provocation, but still, despite best efforts, even, I regard her all the time. 

folklore was released at midnight on July 24th 2020, but I was at a cabin in rural Vermont without Internet or cell service. I drank Bud Light seltzers with my mother while watching the eerie pandemic return of Major League Baseball, and when I got into a strange bed there I stewed, knowing there were people out in the world all over who were hearing Taylor Swift songs I never had, and that this was a fundamental wrong, a disruption in the balance of the universe. I listened to it the next morning in a Dunkin’ Donuts parking lot. 

And folklore is great. That’s the terrible thing. Slightly less great, maybe, than some people have insisted, tricked, I think, by just the pronounced shift in sound. But it’s great. A little gift I asked for a thousand times and was still surprised to get, like a wife who didn’t expect her henpecked husband to ever follow through and buy the paraffin wax hand bath as-see-on-TV. For years, I’ve been halfheartedly insisting that Taylor had a great album in her. I’d say it even, perhaps especially, while she stubbornly fed me gruel. Or worse, gruel with the occasional whiff of something better. With a ripe, little raspberry dropped into the slop. The bright, villainous thrill of “Getaway Car” made me believe Taylor, my Taylor, was in there somewhere under the lacquer of sequins and synth, which, while not objectionable by default, seemed a costume, and an ill-fitting one. The lived-in world of “Cornelia Street” made those old scars sting. That gay “Delicate” video. When she did “Call It What You Want” on SNL and played guitar while wearing an ugly sweater. If the abominable “ME!”, lead single off Lover, was the stick, 1989’s “Clean” was the carrot. I was Charlie Brown, and Taylor my Lucy, yanking the football back again and again. Over drinks I still yelled that Taylor Swift’s next album would be, “her Nebraska”, referring to my favorite Bruce Springsteen record, and learned to live with that egg on my face for good. I suppose I even came to like it. There was something inherently funny in taking up, like, “blind faith in the as of yet untapped greater artistic potential of massively wealthy and popular singer Taylor Swift” as my totally inane personal cause du jour, and eventually it was a bit, a gag I performed to be obstinate and didactic, but way down somewhere awful near my kidneys I meant it the whole while. And then she did it. A pandemic befell the world and amid a sea of human suffering Taylor Swift remembered she can write. She wrote, and with a massive, crucial assist from Aaron Dessner, whose music on this record is sometimes so beautiful it actually angers me, as the last thing I needed in already perilous times was to be made to try and marry my uniquely perverse emotional responses to beloved divorced dad band The National and fucking Taylor Swift,  she made an album which, if not her Nebraska, per se (I’ve come to realize that a major part of believing Taylor Swift will one day make an album I find as quietly devastating and gorgeous as Nebraska is knowing that no album will ever actually be Her Nebraska... That each will, rather, to me, be more and more evidence that it’s coming still, more proof that the limit is untouched, on and on ad infinitum, or at least until the seas take us into a place of salty peace.) is a shocking credit to all my hard-fought and deluded confidence. folklore is great. This fact has made me feel almost equally as disoriented from my understanding of the world as the time-melting COVID-19 lockdowns have, and it turned my Spotify year in review annual collective AI humiliation kink thing into a glaring indictment of my mental state, but still, I mean... It’s great.

In talking about folklore a bit this week, there are a number of specific topics I intend to cover—what a thrill it is to hear Taylor say “fuck”; Taylor’s terrifying birth chart; the astoundingly perfect bridge of “the last great american dynasty”; “because my ass is located at the back of my body”; the bit in last year’s “Lover” where deranged WASP Taylor Swift implies that to “leave the Christmas lights up til January” is some signifier of being a love-struck bohemian, when actually everyone who doesn’t employ domestic staff to take their lights down does this; how reputation is the best of the Taylor Swift records released in the latter half of the 2010s, actually, and the people who can’t see that are cowards—but intend mostly to let the muse move me where she will. Against the advice of my better angels, she—that tie-in marketing eldritch terror—always does.

[ordinaryschmuck]

What I Thought About the MCU (Phase Three Part One)

...I’m gonna have to split this one into two parts. Because Phase three is when these movies start getting good, and which in turn results in my have a LOT to talk about. So, here’s the first half of this phase.

10th place: Captian Marvel (6/10)

This is not the worst MCU movie. This isn't even close to the worst thing in the MCU. THAT honor goes to Inhumans, which might just be the most boring TV show that I ever had the displeasure of watching. And if you're a person who only counts the movies as part of the MCU, then there is no way you can look me in the eye and tell me that Captain Marvel is worse than Thor: The Dark World. Because this movie actually has better action, a handful of funny moments, a decent (albeit predictable) story, a fantastic tribute to Stan Lee, and Goose the Cat. Who is free from any criticism due to being equal parts adorable, hilarious, and awesome.

However, there is one major issue that this movie has, and that is Brie Larson's Captain Marvel. Before you say anything, no, it's not because she barely smiles (shut it, if you think that's actually the problem). The problem is that I just don't know what they want her character to be. Is she meant to be playful yet mysterious, like Marceline from Adventure Time? Is she meant to be a stoic badass with a deadpan sense of humor like Garnet from Steven Universe? Or is she supposed to be this perfect hero with witty remarks like Kim Possible from Kim Possible? Because at times, it feels like the people behind this movie are trying to do all three personalities at once, which makes the character feel disjointed. Plus, it's probably not a good thing that I listed three female characters in children's shows better than this character in this movie for teens and adults. Nor is it a good thing that every actor, including the males, act circles around Brie Larson, who is known for giving Oscar-worthy performances. Still, I'm willing to allow the benefit of the doubt that this issue will be solved in time for Captain Marvel 2, as it took both Captain America and Thor a while before they finally became fan favorites. For now, while Captain Marvel is nowhere near the worst, I wouldn't exactly jump the gun and call it the best, either.

9th place: Doctor Strange (6/10)

This movie is somehow both memorable and forgettable at the same time. The visuals alone help make Doctor Strange memorable, seeing the world bend and morph in a way that is best experienced on the most gigantic screen you can find. The visuals even lend to making the fight scenes unforgetable, resulting in action that's hard to forget. It's still just punching and kicking, but the way this movie uses punching and kicking that makes it fun to watch. Such as having Strange fight wizards as astral projections, or while the world is reversing in on itself, dodging debris as it puts itself back into place. Plus, that ending is not only the most unique defeat of a bad guy that any MCU movie has done, but it also proves how selfless Doctor Strange can be as a hero. So I won't be able to forget bits and pieces of this movie...but I can easily forget everything else. The jokes, plot, characters, and especially the villain are things I tend to lose track of on each rewatch. Which might honestly be worse than it sounds. Because while it's still a fun movie that I recommend, it's not a good thing that I constantly forget it, even as I'm writing this.

8th place: Ant-Man and the Wasp (7.5/10)

How is Ant-Man and the Wasp a dividing movie for MCU fans? People either really hate it or just think it's ok, and I don't get that. Because personally, I think this movie is really good. Yeah, there are leaps in logic, and the ending is a huge cop-out, especially since this movie came after Avengers: Infinity War. But I think Ant-Man and the Wasp incredibly improve upon the original with a tighter story and better-written characters, who all have great personalities and fantastic chemistry. Sure, these characters fall flat during certain dramatic moments, but really succeed when written for comedy. My personal favorite is Cassie, who might just be my favorite little girl character in fiction. She admires her father for everything he does, going so far as to smile with glee as he's wreaking shop in the finale. 

Speaking of her father, I really love how Ant-Man and the Wasp differentiate Scott Lang from the rest of the Avengers. In a world of gods and supersoldiers, you have Ant-Man, who's basically just a regular guy. The best example that shows how it that montage of him doing stuff while under house arrest. If any of our other heroes were in this situation, they would take advantage of the time to train, build cool s**t, and maybe even meditate. But for Scott? He wastes time singing karaoke, practicing close-up magic, and crying himself to sleep while reading The Fault in our Stars. It's a great way of showing how he's a little fish in the world's biggest pond. And I like that.

This movie may not be perfect, but every now and again, it's nice to get something small-scale (get it) and personal within the grand adventures in the MCU.

7th Place: Captain America: Civil War (8/10)

There are three camps of people who argue about this movie. The first camp is the people who fight about whether this is a Captain America movie or an Avengers movie. The second camp is the people who disagree on how Captain America: Civil War is the same as Batman v. Superman-Dawn of Justice. The third and final camp argues whether or not the movie is better than the comics. And I'm about to address each and every one of these camps.

First off, this is an Avengers movie. Captain America may take a more primary role, but consider that Thanos is easily the main character in Avengers: Infinity War, and how that movie isn't called Thanos: Infinity War. The fact that Cap barely takes center stage kind of ruins this being his movie, which is why it's arguably the worst Captain America movie by default, but that doesn't change how good this is. Mostly because it's easily a better Avengers movie than Age of Ultron.

As for how this movie is the same as Batman v. Superman, I can tell you right now that it isn't. They're similar in concept, I'll give you that, but their differences meet with the execution of said concepts. Yes, both movies have two people with different ideas fighting it out due to heroes causing collateral damage while inadvertently doing what an evil mastermind, with a tediously complicated plan, expects them to do. But you wanna know what Civil War has that BvS doesn't? Comedy. Marvel's ability to laugh at itself, to realize that what they're making shouldn't be taken too seriously, is what makes it worth the watch. Every. Time. Plus, I find it hilarious that a movie with four times the amount of superheroes manages to give each character a proper story and subplot than the film with just three.

This leads me to my third point: The movie is much better than the comics. Would it have been more awesome to see the number of characters we have now battle it out than seeing the relatively small one in this movie? Maybe. But look at Infinity War and Endgame. As good as those movies are, there were still many characters that got the short end of the stick. By keeping the cast small, Civil War gives each hero time to have an understandable motivation to pick one side or the other while giving each of their stories a proper conclusion. Even Black Panther and Spider-Man, introduced in this movie as sequel bait, still somehow manage to have clear motives and satisfying stories. Plus, where the comics make it hard to pick a side between Captain America and Iron Man because both made awful decisions after awful decisions, the movie makes it hard to pick and choose because both have to make hard decisions. Both Cap and Iron Man have clear reasons for their choices as well as hesitations. But they still see the point of view of the opposing side and try to talk things out. Which makes things all the more heartbreaking when they finally disagree. Something that never happened in the comics even once.

Overall, Captain America: Civil War is a great movie. It may not entirely be a Captain America movie, and the villain's plan is, again, tediously complicated. But it's still good because it understands the importance of characters and even a sense of humor. Which is something that I wish I could say about Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.

6th place: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 (9/10)

It's not every day that the sequel is better than the original, let alone being equally good. And yet, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 is just as fun as its predecessor, if not a smidge better. Everything that I love about the first movie is here in spades, with a few improvements added to the appeal. Like the visuals, which not only have the colors and gradient turned up to thousand, but there are also some spectacular shots that at times look like they could be panels in a comic book. Plus, Ego the Living Planet is a much better villain than Ronan ever could be. Ego's motivations are typical, but his charming personality creates a character that's fun to watch while also showing how dangerous a person like Ego could be when his true motivations are revealed. Although, despite improvements, there are still some elements that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 takes away. Because while most of the jokes are funny, there are some scenes where it's hard to tell if I'm supposed to be laughing or feeling emotional. Also, I just hate what they did to Drax in this movie. In the first one, he was a stoic badass with a deadpan sense of humor. Here, he's written as a dumb a**hole who gets one emotional scene. And it's a powerful one, sure, but it's not enough. Still, I love this movie. If I had to pick which one is better, I would probably say it's Vol 2, but even then, it's a close race, in my opinion.

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And that’s all for now. Here’s part two.

[helkiedustballs]

Mental Illness and the Horror Genre

An exploratory essay by Emma L. Gilbert

The relationship between horror media and mental illness is messy, and on many occasions outright screwed up. Today, I’m going to take you through various examples of horror films that utilize mental illnesses and disabilities, often as a central theme, and examine how exactly mental illness is used to benefit the tone of each film, and how some of them may or may not use it in a distasteful fashion.

Without further ado, here we go!

“Psycho” is the earliest film I know of at the moment that utilizes mental illness explicitly as a sort of evil or “villain”. The big reveal is that the character Norman Bates’s late mother developed as another personality inside his head which, very clearly, resembles Dissociative Identity Disorder (we will actually be talking about DID more than once today, as it appears to be the most common mental condition used in horror movies next to psychosis or schizophrenia).

I can only assume in the time of “Psycho’s” release, this portrayal was considered anything but realistic to general audiences (The term “psycho” is even considered a slur nowadays by a fair few mental health experts and activists). Mentally ill individuals were but a disturbed fantasy in the minds of the public, and in many ways they still are.

In more modern times, mental illnesses on the “scarier” side (like DID) are seldom understood or spoken about, and this makes them a very easy target to use as driving scare factors in horror films. We fear what we don’t understand, we know this, we’re talking about it a lot nowadays, but movies similar to “Psycho” that use such things as plot material for their stories still get made so carelessly.

Let’s dive into another example more thoroughly:

 “Midsommar” is a 2019 horror film directed by Ari Aster, the man behind “Hereditary” (which we will also be discussing). I know a lot of people love this movie, just like people love “Psycho”. It won just about every award from Fangoria’s 2020 “Chainsaw Awards”, which are completely fan influenced. But it completely missed the mark for me because of a couple instances involving disabilities. And while these instances are miniscule, it’s the fact that they are so miniscule, so “tossed in”, that bothers me.

My first problem begins at the start of the movie. We open with our lead fretting over an ominous email sent to her by her mentally ill sister, which is all well and good. But the ultimate result of this situation is that she was right to be worried, as her sister had hooked herself up to a car exhaust pipe which she used to poison herself and their parents, resulting in the death of all three.

This is… extreme. And while it’s absolutely okay to be extreme (I’m one of those horror fans that enjoys a little extremity), it’s peculiar, and yet not so peculiar, to have it alongside the aspect of the opening I’m about to explain.

The illness of the sister character is specifically labeled as bipolar disorder. Why is this specifically a problem for me? Mentally ill people can be dangerous, that’s an indisputable fact. But I’m gonna pause “Midsommar” here, because it’s a good time to shift over to a movie that I believe suffers the same problem.

 “Split”, both in the title movie and in the ensemble “Glass”, refers to anti-hero Kevin Crumb’s disorder as Dissociative Identity Disorder (there it is again!). This was a problem since the very conception of the first film, because it’s doing that thing where a mental disorder is used explicitly to make the villain of a horror film scarier. And while the character of Kevin isn’t ultimately seen as evil, the film still misconstrues many things about DID in order to keep its creep factor (like, people don’t wind up with evil alter egos who kidnap and kill people in a cult-like fashion, and people with DID do not go through extreme physical altercations when different personalities take the front).

This was many folks’ first introduction to the very concept of DID, just like back in the 60s with “Psycho”, and the movie does little to deter the audience from taking what they are seeing as factual. It really drives home the fact that Kevin has this disorder that is real, using that perceived realism to enforce the horror of its story. It uses a lot of typical “professional” imagery and dialogue, such as namedropping the disorder and having the character attend a therapist regularly on-screen. These things in film tend to equate in the general ignorant public’s mind to something bordering on or outright factual. While I choose to believe most people recognize the easy potential for illegitimacy in fictional movies, I still notice, even in myself, how further research is seldom enacted, and the information granted by that movie remains present in the back of our minds.

I’m not trying to say this is entirely the fault of the team behind “Split”, because I believe people should be responsible for recognizing that not everything they see is true, no matter how legit it looks. But the fact is that people are stupid and do take stuff like this as fact whether they realize it or not, and I think that filmmakers and storytellers should hold a little responsibility for making sure their highly fictionalized portrayals of real things (especially real people) don’t get taken as hard fact. Easy resources for understanding complex mental conditions are not popular enough or offered enough to garner the public’s attention; I’m sure someone would rather watch “Split” instead of reading a textbook on DID studies.

 All that being said, let’s go back to “Midsommar”. The mention of bipolar disorder is a one-time occurrence, but it still sticks out to me; both because I noticed a trend in Aster’s films of using mental illness explicitly (like I said, “Hereditary” comes later), and that this diagnosis is used at the ultimate expense of the sister.

Throughout the movie, Terri (the sister) is seen as a scary, taunting ghost through Dani (the lead)’s eyes. She is only ever depicted as that terrifying last picture of her, with tubes taped to her mouth and their parents beside her. She also seems to be looking right at Dani in these sequences, too, if I’m remembering correctly. It’s a fearful memory; her sister is a villain.

Using a disorder described as a “mental disorder that causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, concentration, and ability to carry out daily tasks” to tie to a character that was unhinged enough to plug herself into a car exhaust pipe to kill herself and her family seems… like a reach, to me, at least. She would’ve had to plan that out- it takes serious dedication, supplies, thought, and time to pull that off. Bipolar people can be prone to sudden outbursts, not necessarily to planning and executing an intricate double homicide/suicide.

What I’m trying to say is that there’s no way bipolar disorder was the sole cause here. There were clearly more “things” she had going on, but the only thing they say is that she’s bipolar, therefore suggesting that is the reason behind what she did, and then treat her like a vengeful ghost the rest of the movie.

There is perfectly good reason for Dani to see her sister as something sinister, though. Literally the only aspect of this plot point that messes it up for me is that we have a “diagnosis”. It doesn’t feel right to me to use such a common and non-extreme illness for the sake of being like “ooh check this out, this is a real mental illness and mentally ill people do bad stuff sometimes, look at that! Look!” It’s lame, and unkind, and, like “Split”, borders on irresponsible. It’s times like this where a character’s mental condition could use a little more ambiguity, especially when it’s literally never brought up again. It’s so nonchalant, so careless, and that’s what bothers me.

Now, I’m gonna move away from mental illness alone for a hot second and explore how “Midsommar” treats its other disabled character.

“Midsommar” depicts an explicitly inbred character with a facial deformity named Ruben who lives with the Swedish cult and is treated like a sort of “higher being”. They are clearly treated with care, but through the gaze of the American characters, we see them as off-putting. And, again, this framing makes sense, as Ruben was purposefully conceived through incest because of some misguided religious belief that disabled people are closer to clarity.

But, stop; what is this portrayal doing, again? It is doing that thing where it uses a disabled character to give us the creeps. And this is made worse when Ruben goes on to kill and skin one of the American characters, and then wear his face as a mask.

Okay, listen. It’s wrong of the cult to purposefully bring a very physically and mentally challenged individual into the world for religious reasons, but that’s not relevant to my point. Yeah, it’s weird, but people like that character are real- and, no matter how they came to be, they’re here now. Why are we always looking at these people with pity or fear, and normalizing that reaction? It can be jarring to see someone who looks like that, sure, but they’re a person, and should be treated like one.

Oh, and not to mention having Ruben wear the skinned face of a “normal” person is absolutely representative of wanting to “look like everybody else”, which is a screwed-up narrative especially when you’re using the disabled person as a straight-up monster. I get the whole “skin the fool” thing, that was funny, but did we have to do that? This is Ruben’s “normal”, and that’s not an awful thing.

Before we reach “Hereditary”, I’d like to say that the utilization of deformed people as killers and monsters in horror is, I think, arguably more prevalent and inescapable than the use of mental illness by itself. It’s present to a point where we just have to deal with it and the amount of irreplaceably iconic villains with facial deformities, but I’d like to believe that we can do better and move past that. Make a monster, not a person.

 Let’s get cracking on “Hereditary” now, which I think uses mental illness as a much more core aspect to its story than “Midsommar”. Again, Aster makes it clear out the gate that our evil character (the grandmother) was indeed mentally ill, and this is, again, used at the character’s expense.

Now, I wanna keep this short, because with how much I went off talking about “Split” and “Midsommar”, I think that what I find troublesome about a movie called “Hereditary” about a mentally ill cultist grandmother passing on her “lifestyle” to her family is rather obvious.

I mostly want to discuss the character of Charlie, because her portrayal is what bugs me the most. My gripe with her is that she is very obviously autistic, or something along those lines, which is framed as a creepy thing about her. She’s supposed to be some kind of “chosen one” that her grandmother wanted, and I guess this was grounds to have her be the “creepy one”. But this can be done without making the character blatantly mentally compromised (and before anyone comes for me, I’m autistic, and despite the many wonderful things about it, it also does hinder me from some basic things in life, so, yeah, it’s compromising). It’s just so tacky, uninspired, and tired.

In regards to other characters, we see Annie speak of how her grandmother suffered from mental conditions (I can’t recall whether or not one was specifically named), and then watch her exhibit various “scary” symptoms herself (trying to set her son on fire, etc.), which grow worse post-Charlie’s death as she is wracked with grief. Annie’s case isn’t quite as terrible as things such as “Split”, as she never actually does anything, only attempts and then snaps herself out of it (before the end of the movie where everything goes to hell, of course). My main problems, as mentioned, are with Charlie and the grandmother, mostly Charlie. I just wanted to attempt to cover all “Hereditary’s” portrayals at least briefly before moving on to my next subject.

 Now that I’m done being mad, let’s explore another recent horror film that uses mental illness as a core aspect.

“Daniel Isn’t Real” is a 2019 film by Adam Egypt Mortimer about a boy (Luke) who experiences a traumatic event as a young child, which he copes with by manifesting an imaginary friend named Daniel. Daniel doesn’t stick around, though, as he tricks Luke into poisoning his mother, almost killing her, and resulting in the two locking Daniel away.

It’s incredibly easy to decipher the, once again, use of DID symptoms. One could easily push this movie aside due to this fact, as clearly, the mental illness is used as the spooky horror thing again. But I’m of the belief that this film handles itself a little better than the likes of “Split”, and here’s why.

It’s a bad thing to use mental illness as your villain, unless you do it right, and there is a way to do that. Luke (the mentally ill person) isn’t the villain, Daniel (the mental illness symptom) is, just like Kevin isn’t “Split’s” villain, but the important difference is that, in “Daniel Isn’t Real”, the audience sympathizes realistically with Luke, doesn’t turn his illness into something extremely outlandish. In “Split”, the audience is following the heroine, who is terrified of the outside force that is Kevin and his personalities. “Split’s” DID is otherworldly and threatening. “Daniel Isn’t Real’s” DID is threatening, but something the audience and Luke hold hands through and fight together.

Aside from some muddy metaphorical aspects (assuming I’m reading it right) and the use of some racial stereotypes common in horror films, “Daniel Isn’t Real” is on the upper end of horror featuring mental illness.

It is also worth noting that there is actually a specific mental illness brought to attention in the film, schizophrenia, as Luke is seen reading a book about it once he starts realizing he’s losing control of Daniel. But this is merely a suggestion, as he doesn’t actually know what is going on in his head and we never get an official declaration of his condition. This brief clip pretty much only helped in solidifying my perception of the story as about mental illness first, and a demonic imaginary friend second. If you ask me, I think dissociative identity disorder fits more with the film than schizophrenia, but my knowledge on both of these disorders is relatively “bare basics”, so take that with a grain of salt. And besides, from this point on I’m going to be looking at the portrayal mainly as an undefined trauma induced condition.

I view Daniel as a visual representation of Luke’s mental condition. He is rude, and childish, and malicious, nothing like who Luke is, who wants nothing more than to get rid of him. Mental illness can feel like there is some evil thing in your brain telling you awful things and threatening your existence, and Daniel represents this feeling perfectly.

Going even deeper, the movie opens with a shooter entering a small café and massacring multiple patrons and themself. One of the things that causes Daniel to manifest is Luke, having left his home where his parents are shouting at one another non-stop, coming face to face with the dead shooter. It is later revealed that Daniel, an ancient demonic “imaginary friend”, was inhabiting the shooter at the time, thus making him the cause of the massacre. And he chose Luke as his next host on that fateful day.

Pause now. We’ve got a blatant mental illness metaphor, and it’s the direct cause of a murder. Why am I more lenient on this and hard on things like “Midsommar”? It’s because this detail plays into what I view as a very interesting interpretation of mental conditions and their preceding trauma.

Looking past Daniel being a demon, I see this as the shooter struggling with the same or a similar type of mental condition caused by a past trauma. This person was sick, as all terrorists of this breed are. Again, this narrative is helped by the fact that we are following Luke and not someone on the outside of his problem, and therefor understand the real lack of control had by anyone Daniel (A.K.A. mental illness) has touched, and, more importantly, the helplessness they feel.

Am I saying people who enact gun violence are partially innocent and have no free will? No, that’s stupid. The real point of me bringing this up is simply that I find it interesting how the film looks at trauma as sort of a contagion. Hurt people can hurt people, and traumatized people can traumatize people. Whatever “demons” that killer hosted were passed on to Luke- and, if the film wanted to go for a broader subject and ditch the singular evil imaginary friend concept, passed onto many others, too. But, it didn’t, and I think that works best, as symptoms like Daniel typically only manifest in young children, assuming you wanna go with the DID/schizophrenia reading, which is what the film offers to us.

We see experiences and fears felt by everyone who has mental illnesses portrayed visually in “Daniel Isn’t Real”, sometimes feeling like a mixed bag of different symptoms from different mental conditions. I see myself and my own experiences in Luke, and it feels good to see the mentally ill person as the hero, and the mental illness being at least mainly a threat to the mentally ill person rather than the outside world, which is how it is more often than not.

And while the movie ends on a sad note, actually quite similar to Kevin’s end in “Glass”, what it does with its runtime is, for the most part, what I want to see more of in terms of mental illness in horror.

 Like I said at the beginning, we’re an easy target. Autistic, obsessive compulsive, anxious, depressed people like me are scary when you have no idea what you’re looking at. Yes, we can be dangerous sometimes, but to nobody more than ourselves. But much more than dangerous, we’re scary to ourselves.

I’ve lived in terror for long periods of time before due to my mental illnesses, and I’ve had this thought; “why doesn’t someone make a horror movie where the mentally ill person is the protagonist, and the mental illness is the monster?” “Daniel Isn’t Real” executed this idea almost perfectly, if not for the fact that Daniel was out to hurt other people, because what’s scarier than a person with a realistic mental condition hurting other people? Ooooo.

Living with mental illness can feel like a horror movie all on its own. The horror is in my head, and I can’t kill it, only keep it at bay, control it. And I think that is scarier than any Norman Bates, than any Kevin Crumb, than any Ruben. To live with a force in your head that wants nothing more than you for to be in misery is a horrific reality worse than any killer.

And before I close, I want to comment on one more little detail. I’m much more critical on recent movies that work with this subject matter than I am on older movies; that’s why I had so much to say about the Aster films and “Split” and so little about “Psycho”. This is because I understand how invisible the very concept of mental illness was in everyday society in “Psycho’s” time. It wasn’t just an easy target, it was a given, and nobody writing these films had any idea of what they were doing or the seedling of thought to look into it. It was that alien.

Today, we are talking about mental illness so much, and yet we are still so careless with what we use it for in our media. It is blasphemous to me that directors and writers still insist on using mentally ill people as villains and creepy characters. Mental illness is such a complex experience that deserves to be explored from the viewpoint of those of us who live with it, not as a toy for the bigshot horror director of the hour to toss around like a hot potato.

There was an excuse in the 1960s. There is no excuse now. We can do better.

[shadowdianne]

Ok people. Time has come. Let’s be ominous and extra on main

So the order for me posting all my WIPS at once will probably be.... the order in where I finish doing all the editing. I’m currently in my last prompts. I’ll still answer the ones I recieve by the end of the week if there is anyone feeling like sending me some.

Aside from that ...

A few months ago I posted a really rambling text about me leaving the SQ fandom writer wise after the SuperNova was over. In the way it’s over once we all put the fics where they will, later on, be revealed. The full explanation of why I’m doing this is even more rambly than the one I gave and is full of nuances that I’ve talked about a little bit with a few of you.

However, I want to say something about it either way. Because words are the way I communicate the most with. And that’s something that I guess is obvious about myself in a myriad of different ways; not only with my fics.

As I’ve said a few times before, SwanQueen was not my first fandom. If I need to pin it to the moment when I actively began to search for fandom-related things, of how I first stumbled into fics and what that entailed…

Going really back in time my first fandom experience was with Sailor Moon and Card Captor Sakura. Yup, that. I was really into anime back in the day and, don’t ask me how, I stumbled into a website that no longer exists that had these pages upon pages on something people called “fics”.

It was around the same time I was building my own sexual identity so you can imagine the mess; I devoured those fics. Most of them were not even good. Most of them had some questionable themes thrown around. Most of them had language on them that I needed a few years until I realized that was hurtful. But some others taught me what “angst” meant, what “hurt/comfort” was, why “fluff” was about or why “smut” at my tender age of 12/13 was something I wasn’t entirely grasping.

Again, I devoured those fics, I searched for more, I found livejournal and ffnet. By the time I started fully diving into fanfiction livejournal was slightly abandoned so at the end I focused entirely on ffnet and from there… Pretty Cure (another anime) Strawberry Panic and the even more dubious Kannazuki no Miko followed. I found some amazing writers I still follow today and whose stuff I will forever adore on MaiHime/MaiOtome and, eventually, Kim Possible. I still didn’t write though. Probably because my English at the time wasn’t the best, my writing voice in Spanish was barely a murmur and while I had always been the “weird kid who likes to write poetry and if you ask her nicely she will write you a story on the spot” I had never truly considered… writing and posting on the internet.

Funny thing is that this kind of things are like that and those who are content creators will probably understand that: You NEED to create. So, eventually, slightly older, and full on the whole Twilight era, I wrote a very… cringey fic. And then another. And another. And another.

At first I didn’t know shit about editing. My actual first review told me I was horrible at writing, that I was a mess, that I should stop. But my second review told me: “Hey, if you do this and that on the editing process it will help you and this will be more readable.” And I followed that comment. I eventually became friends with that second reviewer but, as life tends to be, I lost contact with her years ago. I still hope she is doing ok though.

Eventually, I started working, if working is something that one can say about writing a chapter in 20 minutes and throw it every Wednesday while your mother is at work, not monitoring what you are doing and you have the internet for yourself back when the internet went through the phone, in a multichaptered story. It is in Spanish, it is awful, characterization is horrible… but it also made me meet the person that became a very important person. And still will be for that younger version of me. 

From twilight and the occasional writing on the HP fandom with the Hermione/Ginny pairing [Yeah, I wonder what younger me would think of my current main pairing on that fandom] I “graduated” to Glee. Lots and lots of Glee.

And then I stopped. Completely. Not a peep from me. Not a word, not a line. For over a year.

I was a fan and a shipper, however, of this little show called Once Upon a Time. I started watching in the pilot, in a very shoddy link a friend sent me over gmail. I fell in love with the characters but while I loved them I couldn’t… or wouldn’t really, put myself into writing. At the time my English was slightly better but my confidence levels were even lower than currently are. And the ones who have talked to me can safely say how horrible I am at taking compliments.

Yet, I had a very meaningful conversation, one I don’t know if she remembers still, in where I was told: Writing is you. If you want to write… like you did when we first met, why don’t you do it? I tried with a wip that is still there, buried beneath other stories now, that I never fully took off. And then I said fuck it and wrote several others, badly written, even worse characterized, but ones that helped me say… why not.

Disney World Family Business (in case there’s even someone here who read that mess) comes from there. Interview with the (Evil) Queen does too. Dancing Ring (who I’ve seen people roasting me over it and it’s fine because it was awful) was too. Texts on the cloud was there too, Coffee Black News… Eventually, I wrote a fic I’ve erased since then called The Holiday. Over 2k per chapter every day. I did it under a month.

It was… interesting. It was exhilarating. It was magical in many ways. And I had my favorite writers of course. Those who I followed religiously. Who I absolutely admired. And who I, to this day, still admire. And I even get to call them friends now which my younger self would probably be having a meltdown about now xD

I had opened my tumblr account way before that but I had never truly used it. I didn’t know how. Eventually, though, I dusted it off. I put some cringey theme there and I posted, after being sent a couple of random prompts here and there over ffnet pm’s the first “prompts anyone?” post I ever did.

It’s funny because now I’m a tease but the first time I asked for prompts I did it asking for words that I promised I’d make a smut ficlet out of them.

Words of Desire was born. Is, to this day, the one I feel cheekier about. Even if the writing is awful xd I even got my ffnet account in the line of “am I going to get deleted?” after I posted a story called “Lips”

Why I’m writing all of this you guys probably don’t care about? Because that post led to another. And another. And another.

Point is. I felt drunk on the sudden realization I could still tell stories. And so I kept doing it. At some point I opened my a03 account. Don’t remember exactly when in this story but I was crossposting some of my stuff at some point bother in ffnet and a03 so… who knows really. And then I kept asking for prompts. Or I got them asked. And so I did.

And I met other writers, and other content creators. And I loved it. I absolutely loved watching OUAT and then shit on the show and then create fix it fics at 3am on a Sunday. And I learnt about the narrative process outside class. How fanfiction truly is its own genre. I started developing my own ideas. I started looking at books, at people, at places around me with a critical eye I later on developed further to be able to specialize myself in literature. Because, at the end, that’s what I minored in.

I had roleplayed, I had written conjoined narratives. But fic writing at the scale SwanQueen was during the OUAT was still airing was something else. It still is in a way, but different now. And I think those who were around during the fucking show that basically did us a lot of bad in many ways was a different approach that currently is.

During those years not everything was good of course. I hit several walls, I didn’t have the ability to create the stories I wanted. It is not the reason why I’m leaving, I’ve spoken about the reasons -plural- with some of you. So I won’t bother you all more than I’m already doing.

 I still love these ladies. I still don’t know how I will open a doc and not write their names. Maybe I relapse from time to time, who knows. Yet, the constant feeling of not being enough, of not being good enough, has devoured pretty much all my creative juices.

I was talking a few months ago with a writer I absolutely adore and I can’t tell her this enough and we were talking about writer’s block. And she said something that is devastatingly true. “You don’t have a creative block now. You’ve had it for a long time now.”

And I didn’t even hesitate when I answered “Yes. I know.”

How do you have a block when you keep posting? Well. By choosing safer options, options you know you will do on autopilot, without emotion even if you know you should be feeling it. And while writing is part of who I am and a huge part of my own emotional stability the fact that I simply cried when I saw the numbers and the stats while being bombarded with anons that I deleted most of them the second I got them… well. It’s far too much I guess.

I love SwanQueen. And to those of you who I’ve created a friendship over the years with I’m not leaving tumblr and I’m not walking out on you. I’m remaining here. You guys are going to need to do more than this to get rid of me Xd

But I do need that. Otherwise I will keep picking safer options, options that I know will take me shorter and shorter time for me to write. And that’s not quality. And not what I want to write. Because while I love writing about them the pressure and the fear and the rejection and the many other little details have outweighed the good. 

Regina is a stubborn woman. No matter what fic you guys are reading or writing. I’m a little bit like her in that department Xd

I’ve finished my wips and I gave myself a few months after that first post so I could create closure and, you know, give you all the best I could do. I felt more relaxed at having a date set. I still feel dread at losing my ability to write now that, probably, the number of prompts will be smaller. But I hope I will still get news from you all. And don’t be mistaken. Me not writing doesn’t mean me not reading. I’ll be actually able to read more so expect lots and lots of fic recs on my side and comments on those fics. So hey, everyone wins.

To those anons, those gatekeepers.

I hope you all wake up one day and realize you are alone in the pit you’ve created for yourselves.

To fellow content creators: There’s always this game I play, on trying to find those headcanons that are truly yours, the ones that repeat themselves on every fic. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a headcanon per se. It can be a word, a special mannerism. I treasure those. I often link you to those in my mind when I’m thinking about you all. Thanks for creating. And thanks for being you.

To everyone really: It has been a few amazing years. Thank you all.

VIVA LA SWAN QUEEN

-Dianne out.

[ittybittywordsmith]

all truths that are kept silent become poisonous

A brief history of the romance between Rebecca Webber and Gilbert Prewett, 1982-1988

November 12th, 1982

The first time Gilbert Prewett knew himself to be a coward was on the day that he decided not to tell his fiancée that he was a wizard.

He'd had every intention of doing so, in all fairness. The past two years had been tricky, dating Rebecca Webber and deciding he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. Becca was a no-maj – but she had hair the very same color as burning coals and her eyes were the same hazel as tree moss and her smile was brighter than the sun. Gil loved her with all his heart, and when he asked her to marry him, Becca had only teased about how long it had taken him to ask. Gil had been thrilled – but he hadn't yet told her all of his secrets. He would, though. He didn't want anything to come between himself and his future wife, so he made plans to take Becca out to a picnic, and not only tell her about magic, but show her what it could do.

Gil laid out a picnic blanket on a grassy hill beneath the bare skeleton of an old oak tree that had long since lost its leaves to the winter chill. It didn't look like much, but he rather hoped the tree would be the catalyst for a nifty bit of magic he would perform later. He wanted to coax the tree into new growth, to shade them under a canopy of green leaves. Of course, the leaves would wither and die as soon as he ceased the spell, without magic to sustain them – but in the moment, at least, it would be a beautiful demonstration of what magic was capable of.

“Well, this seems like an odd place for a picnic.” 

Gil heard the smile in her voice before he saw it, and turned around to answer it with one of his own. “It serves its purpose, trust me,” he said with a laugh. Becca approached with a playfully skeptical look in her eye as she took in their surroundings. For a moment, Gil feared she would call off the whole thing and he'd have to come up with some kind of alternative plan, but eventually she shrugged. “Then, in that case, I look forward to being impressed,” she replied, greeting him with a warm kiss. Gil returned it enthusiastically, and thought reassuringly to himself, as she took a seat and began to divvy the food in the basket he had brought, that she would be impressed, one way or another.

They had spent almost an hour eating and chatting about other things before Gil found the courage to get to the reason they had come here. “Becca, sweetheart,” he started, as nonchalant as he could be while he nervously fingered the wand hidden in his coat pocket. “I was wondering . . . what do you think about magic?”

Becca blinked, and looked at him with a mixture of surprise and confusion. “Magic?” she echoed, like she didn't understand the word. “Like . . . pull a rabbit out of a hat, pick a card magician kind of magic, or like . . . sacrificing bunnies in a graveyard under a full moon, cackling over a bubbling cauldron witchy sort of magic?”

Gil frowned. He was sure she had meant it as a joke, but he didn't really like the dichotomy she had laid out. “Uh . . . well, neither, but closer to the second, I guess.”

Becca looked at him strangely, like she hadn’t expected a serious answer. “I . . . I don't know. I mean, I guess I never really thought about it,” she said as she laid back on the blanket, propping herself up on her elbows. She looked out at the view the hill provided. “It seems kind of silly, I suppose. Like those warty witches on Halloween decorations. Or from the Wizard of Oz.” She gave a laugh at the thought. “God, could you imagine? ‘I'll get you my pretty, eh he he he!’” Becca gave her best wicked witch cackle impression and wiggled her fingers towards her fiancé in an imitation of claws.

They both laughed, and Gil felt a bubble of confidence within him as he wrapped his fingers around his wand. “What, you don't think it might be cool if magic was real?” he asked teasingly, feeling like he already knew the answer.

He didn't already know the answer.

“Oh god no, that would be terrible,” Becca replied lightly, still laughing. 

The bubble of confidence inside Gil popped, and suddenly things didn't seem so funny anymore. “W-what?”

Becca didn't seem to notice the way he deflated. “It would be awful if magic were real, don't you think?” she said, like she was talking about a topping she didn't want on her pizza. “Like . . . make-believe is all well and good, but there's a reason the witches are always evil, you know? It's just – it's just unnatural. People are already terrible enough without magical powers – imagine how much worse it would be with them. And when something went wrong, I'd always wonder whether it was a hex or a curse or something. It'd drive me mad.” She shook her head as she thought about it. “No, I'll take my fantasy and my reality separately, thank you.”

Gil could feel a spot in his chest freezing over. He let go of the wand in his pocket and withdrew his hand, feeling suddenly ill. Becca looked at him with concern. “Are you alright, sweetheart?” Gil nodded. “Just – just a stomach ache, that's all.”

“Oh. We can leave, if you'd like? It's getting a little chilly anyways. Unless you still had something you wanted to show me.” She said the last bit with a teasing sort of expectation, like she was still waiting to be impressed, but Gil just shook his head and made up an excuse. He said weakly, “No, dear, I just . . . like the view from up here, that was all.” 

He should have told her, Gilbert knew. He felt the burden of his own cowardice even as they packed up the picnic and left for home. She might have understood, if he had told her then. At the very least, Becca deserved to know what kind of person she was marrying – but deep in his gut, Gil knew he wouldn't say anything. He loved Becca, and the idea of scaring her away – well, he just couldn't do it. So he didn't. And didn't, and didn't, for a very long time.

December 21st, 1985

The second time Gilbert Prewett knew himself to be a coward was on the day that his daughter first showed signs of having magic. 

He and Becca hadn't really been planning on children, at least not so soon after their marriage, but still they had been delighted when they found out Becca was pregnant. They wound up with a little girl – she had hair the very same color as phoenix fire and her eyes were the same blue as forget me not flowers and her smile rivaled even her mother’s. They named her Sawyer, after Gil’s favorite (no-maj) novel, and because Becca swore up and down that she could tell from the womb that their daughter was going to be a little troublemaker.

Gil wasn't sure he believed that – even early on, Sawyer had been an extremely easy baby, hardly prone to crying at all and quick to laugh. For a while, they were all very happy, father and mother and baby, all well-loved under the same roof, and entirely ignorant to the delicate foundation of their lives.

That foundation cracked a little after Sawyer’s first birthday.

Gil had always known there had been a chance that his daughter would inherit his magic – but he hadn't used magic at all since he'd gotten married, and wasn’t there also the chance that Sawyer would take after her mother? Gil choose to believe that the latter had come true, as if wanting it bad enough would make it a reality. Because if magic never manifested itself in his daughter, he would never have to tell Becca about the entire world he was hiding from her. They could have the simple, happy future he wanted for his family.

But of course, it didn't work like that. The Prewett line had been producing exceptional witches and wizards for generations, and Sawyer had magic flowing through her blood.

The first time her magic showed itself was just before Sawyer’s second Christmas. Gil and Becca sat on the floor that evening, their excited baby waddling back and forth between them as they called to her, and they laughed and caught her in their arms when she approached. The Prewett house was bedecked in holiday decorations, and the lights of the Christmas tree glowed merrily behind them. Gil had just stuck a large gift bow on his nose, and Sawyer squealed with delighted laughter as he blew raspberries onto her stomach. His fingers found her sides, and he tickled her mercilessly as her squeals grew louder, and – and then the lights flickered.

No, not flickered, not quite. The lights grew brighter, the louder the little girl laughed – all of the lights, from the lamps plugged into the wall to the colorful bulbs on the tree to the overhead lights in the ceiling. Everything grew painfully bright – and when Gil noticed, he ceased his tickling at once. The lights went out altogether as Sawyer’s laughter abated.

Becca looked around in the dark, confused. She didn't recognize the show of magic for what it was, not like her husband did. “Maybe it's just an outage from the weather,” she said uncertainly – and indeed, it was raining outside, although nowhere near hard enough to knock out the power. “Perhaps we should check the breaker or something?”

Gil didn't get the chance to answer one way or another. Sawyer gave a sudden, sharp sneeze, and all of the lights flickered back on.

His heart sank into his stomach. The first anomaly might have been some freak happenstance. Unlikely, but a man could hope. This, though . . . this couldn't be dismissed as easily.

Becca was still frowning, looking around as if something might explain their sudden electrical issues. “That was . . . weird,” she said, and Gil tried not to let his nerves show on his face. Becca shook her head uneasily and reached for her baby, calling for her to come to momma. Sawyer pushed herself clumsily to her feet and went to toddle towards her, but only made it a step or two before she fell, smacking her chin smartly on the floor. Gil knew what was going to happen seconds before it came to pass, and snatched Sawyer back into his arms.

Too late. The baby scrunched up her face and wailed, and the lights on the Christmas tree all exploded at once.

Gil shielded Sawyer from the shards with his body. The shards weren't exceedingly dangerous, really, but they certainly were sharp enough to cut. And indeed, when Gil looked up, he saw that one had managed to catch Becca on the side of the cheek before she covered her face, drawing a line of blood. But Becca paid it no mind. She only stared at her husband, and her baby in his arms. “W-what –”

Sawyer had calmed down quickly, with Gil bouncing her absentmindedly on his knee, but for all that she was calm, Gil felt panicked. Hastily, he blurted out the first excuse he could think of. “Faulty bulbs,” he said, trying not to sound as frantic as he felt. “Manufacturer’s error, must be. Those bastards, selling their products without notifying us of a risk like this. Don't worry, dear, I'll call first thing on Monday and give them a piece of my mind, and then I'll get some better lights. It'll all be okay.”

He had gotten up as he rambled, and put Sawyer down in her playpen, before going to help his wife to her feet. He wet his thumb and brushed away the blood beading on her cheek – it really was only a tiny cut – and then pressed a sweet kiss to her lips. “Why don't you go to bed, love? It's been a long day. I'll clean up here and bring you a cup of tea.”

Becca still looked dazed and confused, but she nodded after a moment. What else could she do? What other explanation could there be, besides that she was overly tired and imagining things? She pulled her robe tighter around her and walked toward the bedroom, only hesitating for a moment in the doorway to look back at her husband. Gil only gave his best encouraging smile and shooed her on, and when she was finally gone, he sighed and lifted Sawyer out of her playpen. She didn't seem to notice anything was wrong – she only beamed at him and reached for his glasses resting on the bridge of his nose. Her father pressed a kiss to her cheek and carried her with him as he went to go make a cup of tea, trying hard to ignore his own sense of foreboding.

He could have told her then, Gilbert knew. Becca would have been angry, but she might have tried to understand, at least for the sake of their daughter. But at this point he was too far into the lie to backtrack now, weighed down by his own shame and cowardice as he was. As a general rule, Gil had never been good at facing conflict – and the thought of Becca’s fury and sense of betrayal was too grand a conflict for him to even dare to approach. So he didn't. And didn't, and didn't, for a very long time.

July 8th, 1988

The third time Gilbert knew himself to be a coward was on the day that Becca finally found out.

Nearly three years, he made excuses. Nearly three years, he explained away the odd things that his daughter could do. Nearly three years, he dismissed the things that Becca insisted she saw as imagination, or exhaustion, or a trick of the light. Gil managed to put it off so long, he almost convinced himself that it was a sustainable way of life. That all he had to do was keep deflecting until Sawyer was at an age where she begin to control herself and understand – no magic around momma. He almost believed it could work. Almost.

And then he came home one night to Becca at the table in tears, and dozens of brochures for hospitals and laboratories spread out before her.

Gilbert froze in the doorway, staring at the scene in front of him, and for the first time he had a trickle of fear that wasn't for himself. He nearly dashed up the stairs to check Sawyer’s room, to assure himself that his daughter, sweet and innocent and full of laughter, was still safe and sound in her room, but he forced himself to stay rooted where he was. Becca would never hurt Sawyer, never, and would never take her away from her home – but then again, that she could just sit here and browse through lists of doctors and scientists like they were takeout menus made Gilbert question everything he thought he knew. “Becca, sweetheart,” he said cautiously, taking a few steps forward. “What are you doing?”

Becca looked up at him with eyes that had gone red from crying, and shook her head helplessly. “Something’s wrong, Gil,” she whispered, her voice sounding hoarse. “She can do things. Impossible things. I know – I know you think I'm crazy, and – and it sounds crazy, but I swear I'm not.” She shook her head frantically and glanced up the stairs to where Sawyer’s bedroom was, and Gil realized with a sickening jolt – there was some part of her that was afraid of their daughter. The fear crept into her voice as she went on. “I went into her room today and she was floating her toys. Floating them above her head. That's not – I don't know how she's doing it, but it's not right.”

Not right. Gil could only stare. He couldn't understand the fear Becca had of their daughter. Sawyer was pure sweetness, and her magic had never manifested itself violently. But magic – the realization of the supposed impossible – had always wrought fear when viewed without context, and Becca didn't have context. Gil had never given it to her. And now, they were here. Gil felt a renewed sense of shame, and took another step forward. “Becca . . .” he said gently.

But she wasn't listening to him. She had gone back to shifting through pamphlets. “But maybe it's not too late,” she whispered, sounding vaguely hysteric. “Maybe we can fix it. There are people – doctors – who say they work on – on things like this -”

“Becca . . .” Gil tried again, pleading this time, but again she ignored him.

“They could run tests,” she said, brushing tears from her eyes as she studied a particular brochure. “And then – and then when they figure out what's wrong with her, maybe they can fix it, and she can grow up like a normal –”

“Becca, there is nothing wrong with her,” Gil said loudly, his tone harsher than he meant. He winced at it, and Becca turned to stare at him. He hesitated a moment longer before he managed to force the words out. “This – this is normal . . . for people like us.” Blankness. There was no sign of comprehension in his wife’s face. Reluctantly, Gil reached for the wand he always kept in his work bag. Becca only looked more confused when she saw it, but he gave it a flick and all of the papers and brochures on the table gathered themselves into a neat pile. Becca was out of her seat so fast, she knocked the chair over, and backed away from him until she hit a wall.

“It's okay,” he said, trying to sound soothing but mostly coming off as desperate. “I’m a wizard, Becca, and Sawyer is a witch. She can't help it, she inherited it from me. There are lots of witches and wizards in the world. It's normal for the young ones to come into their magic like this.” Becca stared at him for a long time. Gil kept very still, like one does for around skittish animals, and waited for her reaction. Eventually, she took a few steps towards him, an unknowable look in her eye. Gil watched her hopefully, and when she raised her hand, he thought it might have been to lovingly caress his face.

She slapped him.

“You knew,” she accused venomously. “You knew and you just let me think I was losing my mind. You lying, vile son of a bitch–” Gil cringed at her words, and tried to take her in his arms, but she only pummeled her fists against his chest until she broke down into sobs and sagged against him. Even then, she still hurled accusations at him through her tears. “How could you? My baby – what is she because of you?”

Gil choked back tears of his own and tried to stroke his wife’s hair. “Shhh. It’s not the end of the world, you’ll see,” he tried to assure her, although he wasn’t even sure Becca could hear him over the sound of her own crying. “She’ll grow up with other kids like her, and make friends and go to school. It’ll still be normal. Everything will be fine, I promise.” He wanted so badly for that to be true. Becca’s sobbing had tapered off at his point, and he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Come to bed, love, it’s late. Everything will be better in the morning, and I’ll answer all of your questions then, okay?”

With what sounded like an indignant sniffle, Becca pushed away from him and stalked into the bedroom. Gil followed – but only after he had taken the pile of pamphlets and thrown them into the garbage.

As it turned out, everything was not better in the morning. Gilbert Prewett woke a little past the break of dawn when he reached out an arm and realized his wife’s warmth was missing. He sat up immediately and found the note left on Becca’s pillow. He stared at it a long time after he read it, trying to register the meaning. Then a flash of panic surged through him, and Gil launched himself out of bed, running down the hall. He stopped short in a bedroom door, and reassured himself with the sight of phoenix red hair splayed out over a pillow, and a thumb curled gently into a sucking mouth.

Gil leaned against the doorframe and slid slowly to the floor, feeling overwhelmed with his conflicting relief and dismay at finding his daughter, safe asleep. Relief, because at least he still Sawyer, despite it all. Dismay, because – Becca was gone. She had abandoned her daughter.

How was he ever going to explain that?

Simple. He wouldn’t. Gilbert Prewett was still, despite it all, a coward at heart, and the idea of having to tell Sawyer that her mother had left because of what – who – they were – he couldn’t face it. So when Sawyer found him still sitting there in the morning, he made up a silly reason about watching for monsters under her bed. And when she asked where her momma had gone, he only said that she had gone away. And when she asked – and asked and asked and asked, for weeks before she finally gave up – when she would be back, he only said “Not today.” and didn’t tell her why. And didn’t, and didn’t, for a very long time.

[nomoremetaphors]

How do you think the lex redemption arc would pan out further along in the dceu? I'm hoping that they will go in that direction too and I'm curious to hear your theories

All right, you asked me this, and I hope you remember that as this is liable to get long, involved, and more than a little bit fringe-theory in nature, because I’m definitively a Lex stan first and foremost when it comes to the DCEU.

So, first: Who is Lex Luthor?

Lex is, fundamentally, a representation of this line from Alfred in BVS: 

That’s how it starts.  The fever, the rage…the feeling of powerlessness that turns good men cruel.

Lex and Bruce are mirrors to each other in BVS – the difference and divergence between them is that while Bruce can be forced to see Clark’s humanity through the connection of “having a mother” and the idea that saving Martha can be a redemptive act for him, Lex is too isolated to find any commonality between himself and “Clark.  Joseph.  Kent.”  If anything, Lex shows more sympathy to Zod in the Genesis chamber than he does to anyone else.

It’s always been a little darkly funny to me that the very things that make Clark human – his restraint, his gentleness, his commitment to justice – are the very things that make him so alien to Lex.  Lex believes that power cannot be innocent; he uses that as a justification for his own evil and as a reason to believe that Superman has to be a fraud, and has to be secretly evil himself. 

This comes out of a need, I believe, to see himself as a necessary product of his childhood and the power that he now holds.

Lex spent his childhood under a man who had an impeccable public reputation, but was an abusive, religious monster in private (”No man from the sky intervened when I was a boy to save me from Daddy’s fist and abominations.”).  In believing that power generates evil, he also had to learn that the only way to be safe is to be powerful, more powerful than other people.  

He does what he does out of a need to survive in a world that he absolutely thinks conforms to his own childhood experiences of power and abuse.  It allows him to do terrible things, because he thinks that he has to be evil anyway.

And Lex does see himself as evil – he refers to himself as “the problem of evil in the world” when first speaking to Superman on top of the tower.  

If Superman is not ultimately evil – and by dying to save mankind, he proves he is not – then everything that Lex has ever done, all the evil he has become, wasn’t necessary.  It opens up a wide world of choices that Lex could have made differently, and I’m not sure Lex knows how to live with that.

Now, we have to take into account a second question: what does this mean, thematically speaking?

I think that this actually ties most heavily into Suicide Squad.  SS thematically focuses on the idea that good and evil are ongoing choices that people make.  Almost every member of the Squad has done something reprehensible – Killer Croc eats people, Harley helped kill Robin, Deadshot is a hitman, Boomerang is a thief, and Diablo killed his wife and children.

And, in some ways, the element of choice is taken from them by the chips implanted in their necks.  But that stops mattering when they get into direct conflict with Enchantress.  She shows them their deepest desires in an illusion to distract them, but all of them break the illusion.  Ultimately, Diablo sacrifices his life to help stop her.

So, good and evil are choices that people make from day to day.  This opens up the potential for redemption arcs across the villainy spectrum.

From a character perspective, Lex is in the perfect position to embark upon a redemption arc, to learn from watching Superman die that he could choose to be better himself.  From a thematic perspective, this would fold into the idea that good and evil are choices, and that bad people can do good things.

So, this brings us, once again, to the third question we can start to theorize about, the question I touched on in the last post: What will Lex do in Justice League?

Well, let’s start with the narrative context.  Lex is the person who knows the most about Steppenwolf and alien technology, barring Cyborg.  He has the capacity to use Kryptonian technology, and there is still Kryptonian tech on Earth.  

Additionally, Lex has only ever been wrong about one thing – Superman’s motivations.  Everything else he’s said has been true.  He manipulated Bruce and Clark masterfully, and is the first person to warn Bruce about the impending invasion of Steppenwolf/Darkseid.  It is, technically speaking, because of Lex that Bruce is so intent on pulling the Justice League together so quickly.

And Lex knows that demons don’t come from hell beneath us.  They come from the sky.

Lex would see Steppenwolf and Darkseid as the ultimate manifestation of every dark thing he thought Superman had to be.  He could very easily latch onto this as a chance for redemption.

This is why I foresee Lex building his warsuit.  I also believe that he, like in the N52 comics, may pattern it off of Superman’s colors.  No Lanterns, no Kryptonians – but a man wearing Kryptonian symbols, fighting in honor of a Kryptonian, that would be something.  

It would also provide a theoretical answer to the question asked in BVS, Should there even be a Superman?

June Finch answers that with There is.  And there must be – that’s the whole point of the Reign of the Supermen arc in the comics, and why Lex takes on Clark’s colors and cape in the N52 after he dies.

Zack Snyder favors complexity and moral quandaries in his superhero films.  We know this.  Having Lex embark on a redemption arc would be another chance for Zack to tackle this kind of story, because it would be a longer haul and much tougher sell than the way Batman finds his way back to the light in BVS.

And now, to really get to your question: How will that redemption arc look?

First of all, I don’t believe Lex will be trusted, and definitely not at first.  Any partnership between him and the League would be borne out of necessity and reluctance on the part of the Justice League.

Lex will likely resent this a little, because he is that kind of person.  Nevertheless, he will make a name for himself as a hero, an atoner for his past sins.  Eventually, he may even become friends with some of the members of the League.

Lois will never be okay with this – and frankly, I wouldn’t blame her.  Lex was particularly awful to her specifically, and, unlike Clark who died, she has had to deal with the lasting ramifications of Lex’s actions.  Bruce, also, will never, ever trust Lex, even a little bit, because he’s already sworn that he will be keeping an eye on Lex forever.

Now, this is the part where I start to wander into fringe theoretical territory, if I haven’t already, but I have to say it:

I believe that the “him” that Barry is referring to in Bruce’s vision is Lex, not Clark.  

This is the full text of what Barry tells Bruce in the vision:

Bruce! Listen to me now! It’s Lois! Lois Lane! She’s the key! Am I too soon? I’m too soon! You were right about him! You’ve always been right about him! Fear him! Find us, Bruce! You have to find us!

Now, most people took that as an implication that Superman is going to become the dark, monstrous, Injustice-flavored version.  Other people took it just as a dream, like the Knightmare sequence or the Man-bat dream.

But if you consider the idea of Lex as the ‘him,’ the quote still holds up.

It’s Lois!  Lois Lane!  She’s the key! – If Bruce had listened and sought out Lois Lane, she would have been able to tell him about what Lex had done to the compound in Nairomi, and the way he’s been manipulating him.  She’s also the key to understanding Clark’s humanity.  Additionally, if this does reference something in the future – which is likely – Lex is fairly likely to interact with Lois in the future; their enmity is a common part of most Lois-Lex dynamics, both in the comics and on TV.

Am I too soon?  I’m too soon! – In terms of time travel, this is a really ambiguous statement.  Does he mean “too early?”  That’s what most people took it to mean.  If so, why would the quote be about Superman?  If it was, then wouldn’t this be exactly the right time to tell Bruce he’s right to be doing what he’s doing – while he still has the capacity to kill Clark himself?  But if it’s Lex, it fits almost scarily well, especially if you consider the idea of a redemption arc.

You were right about him!  You’ve always been right about him!  Fear him! – People, including possibly Bruce himself, thought this has to do with Superman.  But Barry doesn’t meet Bruce until after Superman dies.  After Clark’s death, Bruce comes to understand that Clark is, in fact, just a man trying to do the right thing.  Bruce does say in the JL trailer that Superman showed people the best parts of themselves.  This doesn’t jive at all with the idea of a panicked You were right about him!  You’ve always been right about him!

If Lex becomes part of, or an ally to, the League, and then betrays them, Bruce will have always been right about him, and the “always” has to do with the whole time Barry has known Bruce.  Additionally, Bruce has never liked Lex, even before Lex’s true depths of evil were known – we can see that in the party scene.  His opinion of Lex hasn’t really changed, just gotten worse.

Now, what do I think happened in this future?

Well, it has to do with the Darkseid War in the comics.  After Darkseid is killed, Lex returns to Apokolips to lead a revolution and install himself as its ruler.  Subsequently, in the Men of Steel story arc, Super-Lex and Pre-N52 Superman encounter precognitive aliens who have seen a future where Lex has become a despot who is worse than Darkseid.

The Lex we have in the DCEU has shown himself to be unstable even in his most together moments.  It wouldn’t take much for him to return to his evil ways, especially if he feels betrayed by Superman for whatever reason.  If he takes control of Apokolips, that could be a precursor to a future that Barry warns against by traveling back in time.

So, in summation: I believe that Lex will try to redeem himself, but something will either prevent that, or some perceived betrayal will have him slide firmly back into villain territory, leading to Barry traveling back in time to try to warn Bruce about it.  

Thanks for asking!  It was nice to get this all out on paper, frankly.

[colonel-crapshot]

ISLAND Episode Two

Crunchyroll is determined to make me look at Maihime's cousin's ass 

Friend:  [Aliens.jpg] Fanservice

I mean, there are worse asses to stare at in this life. But there is more to it than just the booty.

Normally I'd say something demeaning about myself but I can't have an opinion of my own ass since I can't look at very well and even if I could it would probably be a resounding "Meh"

AH AT LAST WE PAN UPWARDS FROM THE BOOTY

Friend: My eyes are up here

Funny thing is we are facing her back and even when we get some of her face her eyes aren't in sight

Also, she's apparently a fucking vampire

A disease? You mean VAMPIRISM?!

"Soot blight syndrome" aight. I'll bite, THE FUCK ARE Y'ALL SMOKING HERE THAT THE SOOT MAKES VAMPIRISM?!

Aight lady you're fast balling a lot of things at us. And no, we're not going to contract vampirism to keep you company as a "Prince of the night"

Well that's an opener. Granted it follows neatly on from last episode so I can't complain

OH LOOK. A FLIER FOR THE MAID JOB. I WONDER WHAT SHE'S DOING AFTER SCHOOL TODAY

... you know thinking on it. I might be able to understand a slightly more territorial policy like the one Mayor Butthurt propogates if they have cases of FUCKING VAMPIRISM on the titular Island

OH COME ON SETSUNA. THIS IS LAUNDRY FOR A HOUSE OWNED BY A WOMAN (or at least with one woman known to be present) KNICKERS WERE ALWAYS GOING TO BE PART OF THE THINGS TO HANG ON THE LINE

It's not like you went into your own undergarments drawer and procured them

GROW UP

You were mopping anyways. A spill isn't the worst thing to happen

Half the usual and he's got at least one 10,000 yen bill present

I mean, failing all else they are making sure their maids get to fucking live off of working for them

Sweet christ they were a unified chorus

You should go to the shrine library to get them checked for evil spirits

Well no-one can say he isn't putting his back into it. Completed the days work AND it's still very sunny outside

Must be like early afternoon

Maybe ask your Vampire princess once she's roused from her slumber with a fresh bag of AB negative

Odd that the library would be closed at the end of a school day. You'd have thought that they'd have someone at least holding the fort for the inevitable bout of students who'd want to get some studying done

Granted I appreciate Setsuna trying to seek the information elsewhere. Though I do wonder if he'd even recognise the kanji for Soot Blight Syndrome if he just read it in the library and might misread it and be left scratching his head

The library on the Island might well have the resources to research their island specific vampirism

Oh shit an Oonusa. I’ve no idea what one DOES with an Oonusa. But dat be it

... Aight child. We need to have a talk about the abuse of the Gods powers for assassination attempts

"Let's go to my honey zone in the library." Assassination doesn't work so well when I know what you're up to you know?

Wonder what Mayor Butthurt's game is adopting a sodding shrine maiden

Granted this COULD be yet further hammering in the idea that this guy is a douche nozzle. But I'd like to think better of this. I've seen Visual novels with asshole characters actually having reasonable motives for acting in such dickish ways

Good grief. Who'd go to burn down a freaking shrine of all places?!

I suppose the Three Families in Urashima are something of the driving force behind the Barbatossian "NO! OUTSIDERS! EVEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEER!" which probably would make people a little miffed at them

OH BOY. STORY TIME

Okay. That's a nice dodge of the pendulum of bullshit. Well done Sara

I think Loli Maiden’s name is Sara anyways

OH BOY. INCEST LORE

Friend: WHA

THE ISLAND HAS INCEST LORE

Friend: https://i.imgur.com/GleCwqI.mp4

JESUS. I mean... to some degree I understand. BUT CURSING MONSTROSITY UPON THEM?!

Friend:  Hits red button and runs away

This is a long ago thing

They're not trying to champion it. But still, I respect the nope

Uh huh... interesting lore

Kinda counter to our boys instructions that "Setsuna must die"

Friend:  Oh I know you'd be going into convulsions if they had championed it. My nope comes from that sort of lore typically being used as edgy drama-bait rather than legitimate storytelling

Luckily this is lore and they were rather swift to go over it and the repercussions of it, or more so the repercussions of both it and jealous women

Friend:  Hand still hovering over the red button

The thrust of the lore is the idea that since Rinne topped herself the Shrine Maiden who cursed her said "Yo. She'll be reborn later in time, and if y'all can re-unite I'll undo the curse." Which seems to be good since it won't be incest at that point and they can let their love go about itself

RATHER than "INCEST" and hoping that we all press 800 nope buttons stacked atop one another and fire ourselves into an alternate dimension where we can keep watching it

That's convenient. I mean granted the library on the Island probably WOULD have books about their local vampirism disease

"I'm ready, so lets do this." Oh, you've finally finished setting up your honey trap? 

I don't have the heart to tell her that she REALLY should do this when her hopeful victim isn't present and aware

Oooh. Are we getting actual plot or is our Shrine Maiden ACTUALLY more cunning than an upturned cup of milk

"The reason why you exist." I could have given you that reason ages ago with Sex Ed 101

Tab A into Slot B, jostle as necessary until goop. Wait 9 months and hopefully a sentient potato falls out of Slot B

BECAUSE SHE HAS READ THE SCRIPT SETSUNA

OH SHIT SHE MIGHT HAVE ACTUALLY BEEN THAT CUNNING

That was your plot armour reacting to potential plot ending events

You're being awful rude, Setsuna. 

You know there can be more than one maid for a house. Whilst it may not necessarily NEED more than one maid since Setsuna pretty handily did everything before the sun was even close to setting

Oh look. Vampire princess

She set out incense when she was setting up a honey trap to murder me

Get with the program Rinne

Setsuna, you can't drag people in for an interview. Even if they're leaving in a huff

LOSING MEMORIES AND CAVING TO YOUR PARENTS BULLSHIT ARE TWO DIFFERENT THINGS! I CAN MAKE MORE MEMORIES. IF YOU GIVE IN TO YOUR PARENTS ISN'T THAT THE END OF YOUR FREEDOM?!

D'aw, that's nice Setsuna. You haven't put your best foot forward about it though

... GOD FUCKING DAMNIT SETSUNA.

At least you're reflecting upon your acted self importance

That's not a bad way of looking at it Rinne

"It's destiny." There's been a lot of that talk. I wonder if we're going to get a story I like where Destiny gets fucked and Setsuna forges himself a relationship of his own choosing. Or if Destiny in this is actually benign and just wants to help get lovers get into a healthy romance rather than one made of nope

"You'll remember soon enough." I thought you didn't have much in the way of memories from before you hurtled counter to time either?

Ah plot summer break

The ultimate hand wave to highschoolers gallivanting about at all hours

Why must you push Karen's buttons Setsuna?

I mean. YEAH, I DID. But 1,000,000 YEN?!... granted Setsuna did get a hefty paycheck even at half of the rate he would normally get it seemed

Yeah. I'd imagine your mom wouldn't take kindly to Mayor Butthurt's bullshit. Especially if she's anything like the basis for some of your personality

It may well have been 5 years ago honey but you don't sound exactly over it

He's been on Urashima for like 3 days Karen, how do you expect him to know the best places to be

I'm not even sure how far 1,000,000 yen will GET you. Assuming that you can even convince someone with a boat to take you there

HEY I WAS FUCKIN' RIGHT. HE COULDN'T READ IT ON HIS OWN

Still does put the idea of this vampirism and its things into check. Do wonder though why Rinne doesn't take the anti-vamp meds

"You went on a secret date with Karen?" If by "secret date" you mean doing the sodding shopping, then yes, secret date

Christ, you sound almost spurned for someone who was TRYING TO MURDER ME YESTERDAY

Ooooh. Cutting right to the thick of it. I like you Setsuna

CALLED IT

I'm unsure about how... wait. I think I get it. They were originally persecuted for cutting them off from the mainland and they put in those ideas to help assuage the peoples rightful ire

Aight I re-read it and it lost me again

Still I can see Karen's idea that Rinne contracting it is just an excuse. But by the same token IT'S FUCKING VAMPIRISM. YOU DON'T WANT THAT SHIT SPREADING

But by the same token. HOW HAVEN'T THEY DIALED UP THE MAINLAND AND ASKED FOR MEDICAL ASSISTANCE?!

"To protect the island" I can see how cutting themselves off protects the mainland. But not the island

Setsuna, come back to earth with us. YOU CAME FROM THE FUTURE! YOU TOOK THE NAME SETSUNA SINCE IT'S ALL YOU REMEMBERED THE REST WAS ALMOST WHIMSY

I mean... maybe? But on a different note, like 90% of that was twisty turvy nonsense

I'm gonna go back and listen again

Nope. Still don't get it

SHE ISN'T A VAMPIRE

Aight, that makes sense

D'aw that's sweet that she wants Setsuna to save Rinne

Nice. We're gently kicking the "Prophecied couple" routine in the head early

Less nice, Setsuna that's not a great way to approach it

... I mean granted I'D probably do it that way, But still, not good. I mean heck, Rinne may well have something more going on rather than just thinking "I'm the Rinne reincarnation."

Ooof! That looks like it hurt

Oh good. Mind palace. Not actual speech

Alrighty. He's handling this better than in his mind palace

You're awful hooked on this idea of Destiny, Rinne

... THAT'S NOT HOW THIS WORKS LADY! LETTING THINGS REMAIN AS THEY ARE WON'T KEEP SETSUNA AS "YOUR" SETSUNA

Good thing is. She's aware that she ISN'T actually a vampire. Bad thing is: She thinks that if things remain as is then everything is fine

Aight, this is proving interesting

Even if I don't get their idea of Island prosperity

Link: ISLAND Episode 2

[theliterateape]

Do You Want Nazis? Because That's How You Get Nazis.

By Kari Castor

Oh no. Polite society is being ruined. The left, according to POLITICO, is losing its cool. The PC bullies, says FOX News, were mean to poor Sarah Huckabee Sanders. WaPo wants us to just be civilized enough to let Trump’s toadies eat in peace.

Personally, I say fuck civility. Keep losing your cool, leftists. Lose all of it.

My own government has, among a long litany of awful things, broken international civil rights agreements and blamed their actions on a) their victims and b) their political opponents. There are frightened children sitting inside chain-link walls in an abandoned big box store whose parents have no idea where they are or if they’re ever going to see them again, so excuse me if I’m no longer fucking interested in civil discourse about this shit. Or don’t excuse me. I don’t care.

The next time some centrist idiot suggests that maybe I should just have some chill, I’m going to knock his fucking teeth in. I’m done. I have zero chill.

You want me to sit down and engage in a polite discussion about whether it is or is not OK to put brown children in internment camps? I will not.

You want me to engage in a good-natured debate about whether or not the appropriate solution to school shootings is to arm teachers and hand out bulletproof backpacks to kids? I will not.

You want me to speak respectfully about your vile, lying, misogynist, racist, narcissistic orange shitfuck of a president? I will not.

You want me to courteously leave you to your dinner when every day you choose to remain complicit with this shit? I will not.

You want me to cordially agree to disagree while you’re busy scapegoating entire religions and races of people for America’s problems? Do you want Nazis? Because that’s literally how you get Nazis.

The world doesn’t get better when someone nicely asks it to. The world gets better when people lose their cool and rise up demanding that it be better or else.

The world gets worse when decent people prize civility over what’s right and try to just be cool in the face of everyday pedestrian evil. They do it, perhaps, because they value tolerance and they think that means they ought to be tolerant even of people who hold abhorrent opinions and are complicit in hateful things. They do it because their parents taught them to always be kind and to give others the benefit of the doubt. They do it, sometimes, because it isn’t their bodies, their children, their rights at stake, and they don’t know how it is to be in danger of losing those things. They do it because they were taught diluted versions of history in which Martin Luther King Jr. was just a really chill black dude who got his way by being polite, unlike that uppity Malcolm X. (Funny how civility didn’t seem to matter to the people pulling the triggers on either of them.)

But Dr. King was not polite. He was well-spoken, yes. He was non-violent, yes. But he did not stand around courteously agreeing to disagree while his opponents declared blackness less worthy of respect and rights than whiteness. He did not preach the gospel of Play Nice with the Oppressors. Dr. King’s response to evil may have been non-violent, but make no mistake, it was not chill. It was radical, and it had no place for silence and placation and "Just let the bad guys eat in peace."

Sarah Huckabee Sanders has chosen her side. Kirstjen Nielsen and Stephen Miller have chosen theirs. They could make different choices. They could walk away from Trump and his noxious administration, renounce the policies they’ve defended and apologize for their complicity. And if they choose not to do so, by all means, liberals — keep fucking yelling at them and kicking them out of your places of business.

Fuck your conciliatory bullshit about civility. And fuck your false equivalencies about gay wedding cakes. “Trump employee” is not, and should not be, a protected class of citizen. “Trump employee” is a choice every one of those feckless cunts has willingly made, and I hope it bears them the rotten fruit they deserve. I hope they get run out of every fucking restaurant in America.

Do you think, when you are sitting quietly atop the ashes of America, that you will feel better for knowing you politely asked the arsonists to please not burn it down? Will you feel like you did your due diligence and no one could have asked more of you? Or will you look at the boot prints on your back and weep when you finally understand that your endless civility provided the foundation for evil to march across?

[recentanimenews]

FEATURE: Humanity's Worst, Front and Center on the Anime Stage

Humanity's Worst, Front and Center on the Anime Stage

By Ian Mertz

  There is a sadistic thrill that comes with watching people acting against our ingrained sense of morals, or better yet, against society's standards of good in favor of our secret rebellious desires. When Lupin the Third came on the anime scene in the early 70's, with its titular pragmatic thief, it was a huge shift from the model of protagonists who embodied the forces of absolute moral good. Even the punks who so often popped up as the stars in early sports classics brought a bit of that wild side out in the show, let alone more aggressively amoral characters like the swashbuckling interstellar Cobra or the hitman Golgo 13. Flash forward to 2017, and as if an old otaku made a poorly worded deal with the devil we got a season of protagonists who moonlight as terrible human beings, with both hilarious comic headliners and bone-chilling pragmatists coming to call. These are their stories.

  KONOSUBA -God's blessing on this wonderful world! 2

    Back in the 80's and 90's, prominent writers such as Rumiko Takahashi and Yoshihiro Togashi noticed that if they wanted to make their protagonist funny, one thing they could do is make their protagonist kind of a dick. Characters like Yu Yu Hakusho's Yusuke Urameshi, Ghost Sweeper Mikami's Tadao Yokoshima, and Urusei Yatsura's Ataru Moroboshi were all generally moral people, but had many of the failings one would expect of a teenage boy: perverted, insensitive, and just generally causing trouble. Again, they had a baseline morality usually shown through their devoted love interest, who indirectly acted as their anchor, someone who brought out the best in our hopeless hero.

  The first show on our list, KONOSUBA -God's blessing on this wonderful world!, tosses that morality out the window, and instead of a love interest just lets the whole harem get in on the amoral fun. Adventurer Kazuma Satou is just as lecherous and abrasive as any rom-com hero, but instead of a soft spoken heroine to bring out the non-existent goodness in his heart, he gets three companions at least as bad as him. It turns out having characters who are generally good on the inside is better for character development and storytelling, but when you take that away from them the result is plain hilarious, especially with the sense of comedic timing the show has honed over its last season.

    Of the three the show mostly centers on Aqua, the goddess Kazuma forcibly brought on his adventures. She is the only one in the show with a tongue as sharp as Kazuma's, and neither of them will let the other's failures go unnoticed, nor their own successes go without a good long stretch of gloating. When Aqua purifies a great spirit rooted to the world against his will, she spends the rest of the episode reveling in her almighty powers as a goddess right in front of Kazuma's face; when it turns out the purification also set a horde of monsters upon the city in the process, Kazuma's insults bring her to the verge of tears.

    The other two provide endless fuel for Kazuma's morally abhorrent personality too. While the masochistic holy crusader Darkness left the center stage for a while at the start of this season's KONOSUBA -God's blessing on this wonderful world! 2, she is back and in rare form, having gone so far into the realm of fetishizing her own pain and humiliation that Kazuma can no longer even insult her without feeding her complex further. The crowd favorite, the explosion junkie Megumin, has also been stepping up as perfect fodder for Kazuma this season. It's a mark of both great writing and the author's particular penchant for creating human trash when the show's greatest exposition thus far this season is that Megumin spent her younger years taking some kid's lunch money after class.

  Masamune-kun's Revenge

  And maybe it's a mark of a good anime season that she isn't the only character stealing people's lunch. One of the more popular romantic comedies this season, Masamune-kun's Revenge features a burgeoning couple who would be right at home with the KONOSUBA -God's blessing on this wonderful world! cast. I say burgeoning because they aren't a couple at the start of the story, nor do either of them like each other, and not in a simple Ranma ½ -style tsundere mismatch. Masamune Makabe wants nothing more than to be asked out by the school idol Aki Adagaki, who is notorious for hating men and rejecting them in cruel and mortifying ways. His motivation? To mortify her right back, the girl who teased him when they were kids. He completely reworked his appearance to the point where he's a heartthrob among the girls, but he passes up his chances at love for that one shot of sweet karmic justice.

    And despite how comically petty he is for even trying, Aki sells herself as such a terrible person that we can't even blame him. Besides sticking all the boys who ask her out with insulting, albeit meticulously researched, monikers, she also eats both her share of lunch and most of her best friend's bread on top. Good for her that she eats healthy, but the self-absorbed way she orders her friend to buy her more food, away from the prying eyes of the other girls who respect her so highly, makes us want Masamune to take her down a peg too.

    Or such is the premise. In reality while KONOSUBA -God's blessing on this wonderful world!'s cast is designed to be irredeemable, as we dive a bit deeper into Masamune and Aki we get to see a bit of their softer sides, on guard due to their past experiences (with each other), but prone to slipping up all the same. Masamune, focused on his revenge plot, learns through shoujo manga and botches his plans so often and so thoroughly that he ends up needing coaching from an insider in Aki's life. Meanwhile Aki is so clueless that she not only proudly wears cosplay to her first “date” with Masamune, but she derides him for thinking that that's wrong. As they both continue to hurdle towards ruining each other's lives again, the comedy and romance we're treated to is sometimes enough to hope they learn to be less petty and narcissistic, or it would be if it weren't so amusing to watch their misguided battle.

  Saga of Tanya the Evil

  But not all this season's terrible people are funny. Sometimes being registered as a terrible person implies something more akin to that title. Sometimes we are given a character who is genuinely morally repugnant, the kind of person who would get their family killed for a dollar and a pat on the back. These are the people outside the realm of 80's comedy; these are the people who would more likely show up on a police blotter, or worse, a thousand documentaries asking what went wrong. Thankfully in Saga of Tanya the Evil, it's easy to see what went wrong: someone gave that person a gun, a uniform, and an incentive to kill.

  When even the title registers Tanya, a girl who was given too much power in the army as a result of her abnormally developed magical powers, as “evil,” there's a pretty clear message being sent to us the viewers. There is little to no room for sympathizing with her, which is made worse by the fact that we understand her completely. She is vindictive, setting up a group of soldiers who disobeyed her to be killed by the enemy in the next attack. She chooses every word to better her chances at staying safe and away from the front line, whether it be to her superior officers or to her friends celebrating a new birth in their household. We see her pushed to the brink of death in a fight, and we see the unbridled joy she feels at letting her powers loose on anyone who bleeds red and looks at her the wrong way.

    But we also see her slip up, either tricked by those who are wise to her manipulative words or tripped up in her own ambitions. As Tanya is rising to power, the show is shaping up to be something we don't see to often in anime: a classic Greek fall from hubris. As we dive into her thought processes and motivations, we start to see all the fatal flaws that will inevitably come back to her, all the ways in which she won't learn from her mistakes while they're small. Besides the well-choreographed action and the detail put into Tanya's crazed facial expressions, the true gem of the show is watching Tanya's character, as a textbook case in greed, ambition, psychopathy, and if all goes well, in a fall from grace.

    Scum's Wish

  On that note, I would be remiss to not at least mention the crown jewel of this season's lineup of amoral characters. I read the manga for Scum's Wish a few years ago, and was thoroughly caught up in how shockingly awful—yet shockingly believable—the entire cast was. Each character sets out to outdo the last, while at the center lies a single doomed couple: Hanabi Yasuraoka and Mugi Awaya, the power couple of the school. To their friends and classmates both of them are perfect, and perfect for  each other. But they share no love between them; both are only out to soothe their loneliness over loving someone else. For Hanabi it's her brother, a schoolteacher who has a crush on Mugi's tutor from afar. For Mugi of course, it's that very tutor, who seems aloof to the whole situation save for being very attuned to Hanabi's moods.

    A love polygon develops with these four and a whole slew of their friends, each of whom is willing to use, bully, and manipulate one another to feel just a little less lonely in the world. Just as surprising as the explicit sexual encounters between the characters are the ways in which the script captures their thoughts, their disgusting and distasteful ways of getting one another to give up their other loves, their other friendships, even their mental state of being. It's not haphazard, nor is it solely a statement on the evil in people's hearts. It is perfectly balanced and calculated to show their desperation, and how they try to navigate love and friendship in the wrong way.

    This season's adaptation adds an additional layer to the manga, namely framing it as tragic. In particular Hanabi's character flaws are downplayed in comparison to the other characters, and she serves as the main focus through which we see the story, which develops her character so well that despite having seen her original manga personality I even started to feel bad for her at some point. Soft watercolor notes in the artwork, reordering events and changing up the pacing, and good use of soundtrack make her romance with Mugi into a fully fledged romantic tragedy, one from which there's no straight answer, with no clear line between bad people and misguided friends, as both bring her pain all the same.

  The following series are available for viewing NOW on Crunchyroll!

KONOSUBA -God's blessing on this wonderful world! 2

Masamune-kun's Revenge

Saga of Tanya the Evil

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  Ian Mertz is a graduate student in Toronto. He works in Computer Science though, so don't take his opinions on anime too seriously.

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com