#i want the british empire to break him i want him to break and then give up or become a cog in the machine and be miserable about it

[quatregats]

Hornblower as a character is like catnip to me but C.S. Forester is so so annoying <3

[the-90s-music-colosseum]

Quarterfinals, Match 2

expand to see all propaganda received! (wall of text warning oh my god this is a severe cautionary message)

Lauryn Hill:

"she paved the way and was hot as fuck the whole time"

"Girl c'mon. Look at her. You're gonna try and tell me that isn't the most beautiful and attractive person alive? Okay. You're lying but okay."

"if u freaks don't give ms. lauryn hill the respect she deserves..."

"actually one of the prettiest women ever I'm such a lesbian for her. like irl I'm already a lesbian but she is helping"

Damon Albarn:

"Don’t think Damon should be here? Why don’t you get your head checked by a jumbo jet? Maybe you’ll feel heavy metal and calm down."

"If Damon is in the “some guy” category, he’s the heavenly and heartbreaking version. Damon is the sort of significant stranger I’d see on the train out of Colchester but could never speak to, just a face seen in passing yet too radiant to be real. I’d fall in love for an hour and carry the ache for a month."

"Damon sets the standard for me. I think he’s the most fascinating man alive. What I find attractive in Damon is not just his gorgeous bone structure and boyish charm, but how wholly he’s committed himself to music. Damon is an artist who walked the walk: in one of his roughest years with some of his rawest songwriting, he said he was no longer excited by anything except the creative process. He was disillusioned with the celebrity of it all, with his relationships suffering for it, and only wanted to make art: nothing more, nothing less. He would go on to compose film scores, write operas and stage musicals, produce other artists’ records, form collectives to fulfill his passion for world music, and create some of the most globally successful music of his career in a completely innovative format that placed him as the phantom behind the characters. Whenever one band takes a break, he makes a solo record or puts together a supergroup to stay busy. He’s uniquely collaborative and still writes personal letters inviting artists to record with him, and yet can function as a one-man show, acting as a multi-instrumentalist, a singer-songwriter and a producer. He’s been a constant voice of bringing British music to the world *and* bringing world music into Britain. Sure, he’s won Brit Awards and a Grammy among others, but he also has a Guinness World Record and was named an Officer of the British Empire for his services to music; his long work with Africa Express earned him respect even from peers who’d previously dismissed him, and his commitment to support his Malian collaborators in the face of violence earned him the title of Local King in Mali. There is so much talent in the world, but there is truly no one else with a career that looks like Damon Albarn’s. Damon is far more than just a prettyboy to look nice on a magazine cover, but looks are the ultimate point of this tournament, so make no mistake: he was terribly, terribly pretty. You watch him performing in the 90s, you sift through photoshoots and interviews and documentaries, and it feels *cruel* how beautiful he was. If his talent was god-given, so was his face. To put a bow on this thesis: I don’t know if Gorillaz and Damon’s musical universe would be the experimental, globe-trotting, boundary-pushing community affair it is if Blur hadn’t become such a central figure in Britpop and if Damon had not been made such a media spectacle, and I don’t know if Damon would have been that spectacle if he wasn’t so ungodly pretty. The domino effect is that Damon’s cherubic face launched a thousand multimedia art school projects for decades to come."

"I wish I was basically any bloke in the 90s so I could tongue Damon Albarn down. Damon will see a man and ask “is anyone gonna kiss that?” and not wait for a response."

"I have a pillow with his face on it. I sleep with it every night 😊"

"“I’m more homosexual than Brett Anderson, always have been. As far as bisexuality goes, I’ve had a taste of that particular fruit, or have been tasted you might say…” is just the rawest most Shakespearean statement ever"

"he is the ultimate Pretty Boy ™. his glorious golden locks, his electric blue eyes. he is if Princess Diana was a Britpop Dude. he is the Regina George of Britpop. he is if Aphrodite took male form. Zeus would come down to earth to fuck him if he knew. he is a caffeinated orange cat let loose. he is deranged. he is unhinged. you never know what will come out of his mouth. he had sexual tension with every single man who knew him. he pulled justine fucking frischmann. his aura knows no bounds. he is a siren. he is a weird guy. but being so gorgeous stunning ethereal didn't stop him from also being one of the most prolific songwriters of his generation"

"THE MAIN BLUR"

"literally where do i even begin. i could write entire essays on this man. a good place to start would be the beetlebum music video, i suppose. i'll never forget the first time i watched that music video. something in me changed, my brain chemistry was altered, my life was never the same, i view the world a lot differently now. and a lot of the viewing i'm doing is of pictures of damon albarn's face because of boy do i have a lot of those saved. every time i try to look for a photo of something on my phone i can't find it because there's so much damon. okay that's maybe an exaggeration but this man has the most unfathomable beauty ever. his eyes? HIS EYES. god dammit i love his eyes i want to stare at them until the end of time like nothing else exists. i'm so normal about this man (lying) and while i'm usually very shameless about my interests i'm actually incredibly glad this propaganda is anonymous because otherwise. yeah. but the world deserves to see damon albarn's beauty and also hear his fantastic voice because what the fuck. his voice is literally the most gorgeous sound ever produced like bro sounds like that and expects me not to fall in love? i want this man to sing his silly songs and talk absolute nonsense to me until the sun eventually blows out and the world ends. cmon damon girlies let's demolish this tournament i know there are a lot of you."

"He’s beautiful. He’s a little rat. He’s a sweetheart. He’s a dickhead. He’s a musical genius. He’s a dumb bitch. He’s a jock. He’s a weirdo. He’s real. He’s an illusion. He’s everything. He’s just Damon."

"DAMON DAMON DAMON where do I begin oh jeez I've hyperfixated on this man for a solid 4 years and still going strong. Damon makes me wish that British people are real. That says A LOT. This man created a whole ass ANIMATED BAND WITH A SHIT TON OF LORE as a SIDE HUSTLE??? Not to mention, what other man has collaborated with Stevie Nicks, MF DOOM, Del the Funky Homosapien, Snoop Dogg, AND Beck?! People, we're literally in the presence of a god. And he's STILL GOING. Anyways, TL;DR, damon is so so so neat and cool and he should definitely win this competition. Thank you."

"Okay 90s Damon is The Perfect Boy yes yes, but the people who parrot the Daily Mail and say "he's ugly now" will never understand. I would still suck every drop from him on his deathbed."

"Vote for whoever you want to. But Damon is so pretty."

"i did not spend hours admiring this beautiful man's face on pinterest just to see him lose."

"Damon Albarn just brings me joy. When I'm watching him perform, following along as the camera lingers on and adores his pretty face, I get butterflies like I'm 15 again. It's nice to still feel that totally unguarded giddiness sometimes."

"God let the intrusive thoughts win making Damon. What if he's a beautiful blond twink with eyes like saucers and dick to his knees, he reads Herman Hesse and plays footie and is insufferable about both, he'll be the most prolific musician of his generation and write operas and seminal albums in 5 different genres and also he's gonna be the dumbest bitch alive? He'll also be kinda bi, but only kinda. And send."

"when i found out about his existence, my life was changed forever. i wish i could use him like the hannah montana boot milk pillow and chuck him at the wall so he makes a loud thud"

"Think of the drama and anon fights it'll cause if Damon wins it all! And think of how quiet it'll get after Damon's out. You'll miss him when he's gone, like memories of a noisy house years after it's grown silent. Choose Damon, and keep the messy train chugging."

"Even the Gallagher brothers have the hots for him."

"Kiss kiss I love him also you can't vote for any of the Seattle men they're literally copy and paste it's not fair. We need Brit representation"

"I want to take care of him, I want to provide for him. I need to gauge his baby blue puppy dog orbs out to I can clean them with wood varnish, paint shades of Pantone 320 C in his eyes, spray eau de parfume by dior in them and sew it back into his eyes like that scene in Toy Story 2."

"Seeing as simply filling the page with ‘Damon’ written 10000000 times isn’t going to cut it 😅 may I admit/submit: I DO have him tattooed on my being (no descriptive, is this anon?); he’s inspired somewhat unhinged late night/early morning fandom conversations in which I’ve served as ‘parish’ priest hearing confessions from all manner of folk about what they’d like to do to him/receive from him; sadly I lost an essay where I detailed why the letters that make up his name suit him so well, and described him as the hot caramel sauce to Graham’s cool vanilla ice cream. He’s a faerie princess with a nose that makes people weep and a voice that feels like the warmest home and he gives amazing hugs. He loves trains and chickens and his tuxedo cat. He’s annoying and sweet and somewhat unhinged and his music saves people and all this is on top of that fantastic dick. He’s a dream yet very real and we’re fucking blessed to be on earth at the same time as him, amen"

"Damon Albarn was a beautiful, beautiful boy. The world saw that, regardless of if every individual reading this has the same taste in men; it felt like a truth of the universe at the time. They don't make celebrities that angelic in face and erratic in personality anymore."

"I need to touch his eyebrows, nose and prostate just one time JUST ONE TIME COME ON"

[starkwlkr]

Hi Jen!!!❤️❤️❤️

I saw your requests were open so possibly, social media au or not, Cillian Murphy’s or Christopher Nolan’s daughter (either one would be fine, but I saw your imagine about Nolan!reader x Cillian so maybe Cillian would be better, either one is fine though) dating Charles Leclerc or lando Norris

(I don’t know if this has been done yet but it feels very random, but it I saw you wrote for F1 and Cillian so I just thought of that crossover. Couldn’t decide which driver I wanted to request for so I’ll leave it up to you between Charles and lando)

But if you do, then thank you!!!

my favorite nepo baby | lando norris

faceclaim saorsie ronan (don’t hate me, yes ik there’s more irish actresses but i love saoirse) also i love this request, mixing random fandoms is my favorite thing ever

liked by maxverstappen1, ynfans and 56,377 others

danielricciardo happy birthday, lady bird

mclarentears WHAT

dannyric333 does daniel know everyone??

bottaszz you don’t understand THIS IS IMPORTANT TO ME

landonorris my favorite nepo baby

danielricciardo the nepo baby says thank you

landonorris tell the nepo baby to make an account

danielricciardo no - the nepo baby

landonorris i tried

vettelsbees this is my roman empire

view all 23,477 comments

summer break

Y/n Murphy only knew Daniel Ricciardo because he had friends everywhere. It was only a matter of time before the Irish actress met the famous honey badger. Soon, his friends became her friends and the whole friend group was hanging out everywhere.

One of their hang out spots was the F1 paddock. Daniel insisted for Y/n to come to his favorite race, the Austin Grand Prix. It was no secret that Daniel is secretly a Texan so he wanted his new friend to experience the Texas atmosphere.

“We need to get you some boots and maybe a longhorns jersey. You’ll look so cool, trust me.” Daniel said as him, Heidi and Y/n walked into the AlphaTauri garage.

“He’s going to convert you into a Texan.” Heidi whispered to Y/n.

“Can you imagine me going home to my father speaking with a texas accent? He’ll have a stroke!” Y/n laughed.

“I bet that by the end of the day, you’ll love texas as much as I do.” Daniel smirked. “Maybe you’ll find a country boy you can take home to your old man.”

“Oh god, he’s going to have more strokes, die then come back and have more strokes.”

“Well then I can get you a British boy that won’t make your old man die.”

Y/n knew who Daniel was referring to. On the day of her birthday, which was a few days ago, Daniel showed her the comments that Lando had left on his post.

‘my favorite nepo baby’

While she told everyone she didn’t have an Instagram account, she had a secret one that only had about twenty followers which were close family and friends. She used that account to look at Lando’s account. She was going to lie, he was attractive.

“Just make an instagram! That boy keeps messaging me about you.” Daniel pleaded.

“I don’t use social media, I tried and I didn’t like it.” What a lie.

“Okay well can you at least talk to him? Wait, I should go with you, he might be the one having a stroke.”

So while Heidi stayed back in the garage, Daniel accompanied Y/n to the Mclaren garage so Lando could finally meet his favorite nepo baby. Y/n started to feel nervous, why? She didn’t know, she hardly knew Lando apart from his instagram posts.

“Hey Landoooooo!” Daniel dragged out the o.

“Is that Daniel Ric—” Lando’s voice stopped when he noticed who was standing beside Daniel.

“Is he having a stroke? I can’t tell.” Daniel whispered to Y/n.

“Hi . . . You’re y/n. Wow.” Lando tried to play it cool. “I’m Lando, but I’m guessing you already knew that because of the giant Australian yelling my name. Thank you Daniel.”

“Glad I could be of service. I have to go get ready, but you two go ahead and talk. Y/n, I’ve been told the Mclaren garage is the best spot to watch a race so . . bye!”

And all thanks to Daniel Ricciardo and his match making skills, your dad, Cillian, didn’t have a stroke when he finally met Lando.

[shini--chan]

Yandere Character Sheet II - 1p England / Arthur Kirkland

My depiction of Arthur here is harsh. I'll freely admit that it is due to a bias I have against the British due growing up in one of the Empire's late colonies and family history. Blazes, some of my relatives refuse to speak English because they regard it as "the language of the Antichrist".

Trigger warnings: colonialism, controlling behaviour, manipulation, mental break, trauma, physical torture, emotional/verbal abuse, victim blaming

Blend in - Are the red flags obvious? Are they even aware that their behaviour is wrong? Do they even care? 

Arthur is generally a cantankerous, cynical and proud man, so it would be more difficult to tell which of his actions are relationship red flags as opposed to personality red flags. Of course, this is also a gross oversimplification of the situation since he is complicated. When he wants to be, he can be genuinely kind, polite and caring. It is simply that the closer you are to him emotionally, the higher his expectations are of you. With you being the apple of his eye, you'd have the honour of finding out that being the subject of his affections is worse than having to bear his apathy or even ire. 

One of the reasons for this is that he'd have a fixed ideal of what constitutes as good and proper, and he would require you to conform to that image. Depending on your character and disposition, this could be painful for you. But surely you'll embrace your cruel fate, for isn't love the sweetest form of suffering. Pragmatic and cynical as he would be and would claim to be, Arthur would still be a romantic at heart. To him, meeting you would be fate, and you would do well to likewise recognise that your fate lies with him. Generally he wouldn't accept any words or actions that would go against this perceived destiny - he wouldn't take them seriously. 

Overall, he would see you as lesser than him, and therefore not as deserving of respect and regard. Much of the politeness and charm he would display to you wouldn't stem from seeing you as an equal or from thinking highly of your thoughts and emotions, but rather from the sort of charity given to the invalid and the naive. 

This flows nicely into the next red flag, in that he can be unbelievably paternalistic and conceited. You acting out, trying to defend your boundaries, or even just not fitting into what he deems appropriate would be deemed as you being unreasonable or having a phase. All in all, it would be very difficult to criticise him since he would first have to view you as a person worth listening to, and that wouldn't be a given. Even if your relationship has reached that level of respect, he would be quick to deliver some sharp retorts. Also, he would simply not care that some of the things he does are reprehensible. Either the end would justify the means, or the other people are inferior and conventional morals can't be applied to them. 

Additionally, he would be prone to making decisions for you, without your input. Mind you, he would allow you to place your orders by yourself when you go out to wine and dine. Though, he would decide what you wear, when you go to sleep, what you eat and drink at home, and the media you consume. This would start way before he would manage to fully isolate/kidnap you. Arthur regards himself as more apt when it comes to making choices about your life than you are. 

Related to that above, he would manage to make you go along with all that (at least in the beginning) by acclimating you to his controlling nature. He wouldn't dominate your life all at once and the more he'd enter your life, the more he'd determine how you'd live your own life. He'd demand that you tell him of all your movements and errands, make you let him look through your letters and bills and have you give him the passwords to all your accounts. On top of that, he would micromanage you at times. 

Another warning sign would be how unpredictable he would be. When it comes to social interactions, what happens is very dependent on Arthur's. He is far from emotionless, and is very passionate indeed. However, he isn't one to wear his heart on his sleeve or display his emotions openly, which would make it difficult to assess the situation at times. A bad time on the way home from work can decide if you receive affection or are pushed away with sharp remarks. Additionally, it would be the little things that would set him off the most, while he would remain stoic and calm in the face of large calamities.

Compatriot - Who aids them? Who condemns them? Are there ways you can convince their friends/colleges/underlings to help you? 

Part of Arthur's magic is convincing others of his superiority. There would be many that would aid him simply because they'd falsely believe he is all-powerful and that moving against him is futile. These sorts would be the worst - you'd have their sympathy and pity and they would likely believe you fully if you'd recount the lived horror and they'd still resolutely refuse to help you. On the contrary, they would even encourage you to give in to him, to simply weather the storm instead of fighting against it. These people would also be the hardest to persuade and the fastest to betray you, since they would fully buy into the illusion of Arthur's invulnerability and seek to gain small favours from their "Lord and Saviour". 

Then there would be those that would be on his side because they'd agree with his world views and morality. Best not to bank on their support, because Arthur would always be grander in their minds than you. Unless … there is nothing more feverant than a disillusioned devotee, eh? There, you could get their support, you would just have to teach them successfully that their angel is a demon. 

Naturally, England would also have many enemies. So some of them, all that would matter would be to land a blow on Arthur, so they would have no qualms or second thoughts of helping you. They might even "be on your side" before you'd catch on to Kirkland's true colours. Perhaps they would even be the ones to shine light on his less appealing traits. One thing that you should keep in mind though, that they wouldn't care about what would happen to you, as long as they could hurt Arthur. 

Aside from the obvious category of people that hate Arthur and who would also be sympathetic to your cause, there would also be the normal people that just want to go about their day-to-day lives. Those that might work for Arthur; they might trip you up if they like him, they might ignore your forged documents and stolen money if they hate him. Generally, many people downplay the power and the influence of the ordinary, working man. Arthur would be no exception to this rule, and could use this against him. 

Dominion - What actions are especially pleasing to them?

Above all else - you defer to him. He wants to be your guiding light in the darkness. He is supposed to be your teacher and protector and provider, and he wouldn't settle for anything less. For you to recognise and accept your role in the dynamic between the two of you would be a boon. It would be a relief that he wouldn't have to chastise and punish you like a wayward child. It would give him a bit of hope.

Interestingly enough, he would still desire for you to be resolute. Silk hiding steel comes to mind and if you're the sort to faint at the slightest sign of trouble, he would deem you a product of bad breeding. You are to be a rose, and your thorns should be sharp. Of course, this shouldn't come at his expense, for he doesn't want somebody that would constantly stand against him. You should be the sort that is a fun conquest, and a steadfast companion that doesn't cause more trouble than you solve. The deep irony here is that he wishes that you aren't a child, all while being continuously paternalistic. 

Appeal to his finer sensibilities - have etiquette down pat, be educated in that you know the classics and poetry and the BBC nature documentaries. Be easy on the eye and balm for the soul to him, make him feel respected and allow him to rant about god and the world without always throwing in your two cents. Be attentive to his needs, whether it be a shoulder massage, a bottle of port or tickets for the nearest rugby match. Communication without many words necessary would be prefered. On your side, such a skill would even be needed if you want to survive him. 

Tied into that - he would want the little things taken care of by you. Have a meal ready when he comes home, and the bathroom scrubbed and the washing done. Still he would require the dichotomy of a homebody and an adventurer, at least to some extent (and you thought he was going to leave you alone at home). Everywhere though, you'd be expected to put his well being above your own. After all, if he is out cold, then who will take care of you. No matter how strong and capable you are, he will forever regard himself as your superior. 

Conform to the values of the time. If there is something that irks Arthur beyond measure, it would be not understanding something. He wouldn't understand you if your mind runs on models of the world he is not familiar with. Of course, if you don't see things his way yet then it is no issue - diamonds commonly need polishing and cutting before they are perfect. It would be a re-edition of the white man's burden. 

Flight - What do you have to do in order to escape them?

It would be easier than you'd expect. Arthur's main spiel to make you stay by him would be to make you think that escape is futile, and that he is all-powerful and all-knowing when it comes to you. He would aim at "demonstrating" this by stalking you or also letting you escape only to capture you again. This wouldn't be his only failsafe. Perhaps he'll socially isolate you, so that you believe he is the only person in the world that you can trust, or he'll convince you that you're a horrible person, and he is only doing on to you what you deserve (he might even believe the latter himself). So what you have to do, is break the mental fetters, and then matters already become easier. 

Two pathways are recommended: Either do something completely haywire that he wouldn't expect. Send yourself abroad per post, join a travelling circus troupe or become a nun. There are only so many avenues of escape that he can close down, and the most obvious would be the first to go. Or you could elect to hide in plain sight and slip away. Lose him in a shopping mall or in a crowded street. A concert would be even better. Afterwards, it would be advisable to act normal - because he would be looking for a harried person. 

And have some tranquillisers/sleeping pills at hand. You'll need them to cope with the fallout. 

Hospitality - What is your life like with them? How much does it deviate from your former life?

You'd basically have to adopt an Arthur-approved lifestyle and discard everything that came for. He would dictate the tempo and direction, with you having precious little say in the matter. You'd only have your way if your interests coincide with England's or you plant the ideas in his head and let him think it was his idea in the first place. 

You'd become another fixture in his environment and thus everything that is his would become yours as well. The living space would be his and he would share it with you. Whether you like it or not, you would start orienting yourself around his routines and ideas. A side effect of this would be that he would control what you would read, watch and listen to. When locked up and subject to his tender mercies, you would be powerless to obtain any information other than what he allows. 

Aside from that, there are too many restrictions and rules to count, and you would only be able to have some comfort once you learn to navigate the minefield. In total, your life would be more akin to life in an old girls boarding school, or even a prison. The food would be just as bland, unless you'd take matters into your own hands. 

With him, your opinion would matter very little and his would be everything. Every criticism of your person would have to be acted on immediately, and every wish treated as an order. Of course, he would detest it if you'd simply allow him to walk all over you, but he would equally loath it if you would stubbornly resist it. It would be a balancing act that you would have to learn to master.

 In the beginning you might be inclined to point out how his treatment of you would contradict his own morals. Arthur wouldn't care - this is a point that can't be stressed enough. Conventional morals wouldn't apply to you, in his eyes. Besides, you would be his plaything, something with which he can engage in all his base desires and dark urges without any repercussions. Somebody at his station would have to punish him for him to genuinely become better towards you. 

There are few holds barred for him when it comes to you, and that makes him all the more dangerous. Should the mood strike him due to your bad behaviour, then he would bring out the thumb screws and the brands and the water torture. He probably wouldn't want to mar you, or at least not too much. You should still be prepared for burns of all sorts and being twisted into various uncomfortable positions and restrained. Here, the menu would be a lengthy one. 

Of course, there would be the social aspect. One of the first things Arthur would do would be to chip away at your social circle. This could be either through slander and manipulation, or more criminal methods like framing, drugging and murder. Eitherway, soon he'll be the only one you'll have, and since he is a jealous man, you would either only be able to interact with a carefully curated group of people, or not at all. 

Order - What are the rules you have to adhere to?

There are too many rules to count when it comes to Arthur Kirkland. He wouldn't spell out all of them for you anyway, since a lot of them are self-evident in his eyes. Besides, he'd want you to live according to the spirit of the rules, rather than him having to lay out an exact wording only for you to engage in loophole abuse. Regardless, here are some of mentioned rules:

If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all. Mind you, this is only towards him - other people are fair game. Although, you'd have to be smart about it and avoid causing second hand embarrassment. This would be easier said than done when you're in company, since your actions would automatically reflect on Arthur, once a certain point in your relationship has been reached. If you'd curse and chew out the world with him, he would be delighted. If you would turn your insults on him, he would burn with rage at the insolence and the impertinence. How dare you undermine his authority! Verbal sparring would be occasionally welcomed, though you'd have to have the sensitivity to tell when the ice is too thin to stand on. 

Behave yourself when we are in mixed company. Even when we are in company in general. To him, you are a pet project, living evidence that he can fashion perfection out of flesh and bone and a willful spirit. Totting you out to other people would come with the expectation that you be a living exhibit of his talents. As such, he wouldn't take it well if you misbehave. Mind you, he wouldn't be above humiliating you in mixed company just to save his own reputation. 

Keep up with the etiquette, will you? Belonging to him would mean you'd have to comply with a whole host of rules and rituals and mannerisms. This can vary depending on his social standing and the time period. The main point would be that you wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb. The irony here is that he would desire you to have the skills and aptitude to get along well with your peers all while wanting you all to himself.

Don't make me repeat myself, pet. There are some phrases Arthur would repeat around you over and over again, like an especially devout priest. He would want you to internalise some truths after all. On the flip side, he would loathe to have to repeat himself when he talks with you, or to have to lay out his instructions a second time. Should he be peeved, and then be forced to repeat himself just because you weren't paying attention, then you would have a punishment awaiting you. Above all, don't talk back when he orders or chastises you - he wouldn't hold back with the yelling and the insults and the condensation if you do. 

 Be honest with me, savvy? I can't smell what you are thinking, after all. For somebody as cunning and devious as Arthur Kirkland, he gets extraordinarily upset when he is given a taste of his own medicine. He would demand you be forthright and honest with him, something that would be very difficult if you don't want to be with him and don't want to anger him at the same time. The reason behind this would be that he would want to trust you, and he wouldn't be able to trust you if he'd have to cut through your lies and half truths and word games. Or if he would only receive your complaints from around five corners, or something of the sort. Asides, if you're the sort to voice your displeasure and be open about your thoughts and feelings (to him, it should be said) then he wouldn't be in for any nasty surprises. 

Rehabilitation - How much will they change you? Will they break you? How much therapy would you need in the event that you get rid of them? 

Arthur Kirkland is the sort of man that would leave scars. He'd want you to be unable to live without him and he'd strive to condition you to dissolve into hysterics should you be separated from him. In the case he should succeed, you'd be fine for a few days and then descend into such emotional turmoil. This would be because he'd have your behavioural structures tailored to him, and without him to act as your focal point, you would grow anxious. Be careful not to go crawling back to him then - each escape would be more mentally challenging then the one before. 

Even when you'd be away from him, his rules would be so ingrained in you that you'd follow them on a subconscious level. You'd find yourself fixing your posture all the time, and weighing each word up against gold before uttering it. Out of reflex you'd discreetly check your surroundings to see where Arthur is and no matter how much you'd police your thoughts, his cynical attitude towards other human beings would have rubbed off on you and infected your mental processes. Arthur would continue to accompany you as the devil on your shoulder, as the voice of your inner critic, as a demon that would haunt your dreams, even if he would no longer be physically present. You'd have to be self-aware and self-conscious to rid yourself of those fetters. 

Aside from that, he wouldn't hesitate to break you to achieve his goals. There would be regrets on his behalf, yes. However, he'd never regret breaking you to the point that he would strive to make amends and see the errors of his ways. Instead, he would blame you for being too rebellious, for having such a brittle character that you broke instead of bending to his will, for being of ill stock and bad breeding. Admitting wrongdoing would be akin to weakness for him, something he would never allow himself to display in front of you.

Perhaps you would retain enough sanity and energy even when broken to flee him, perhaps you would develop a secondary or even tertiary personality to deal with the trauma. Either way, a life without Arthur would be even more cumbersome and hard than when you'd have been whole. It would take years until you'd be able to function normally again, and that is only if the best case scenario of you having a stable life without Arthur hunting you, occurs. 

Zeal - Do they fall fast or slow? What is their reaction to their own feelings?

Ever the romantic at heart, passion would grip him quickly, yet he would be very slow to act on it. It wouldn't be the first case of limerence on his side, and he would want to be sure of his feelings and their longevity before committing to you. Ironically, the more he'd try to wrestle his emotions into control and bottle them, the more potent and out of control they would become. Finally, they would overwhelm him and he would find himself rationalising the most heinous actions. 

The same justifications he would use towards himself would be applied towards other people, maybe even towards you. As time passes, the self-justifications and such would come ever easier, and also more extreme. It would finally reach a point where morality would be flung out the window. Why should he heed boundaries, if there is no punishment for overstepping? Maybe you find some countermeasure within your power that you can exercise to keep him in line. Just don't harbour the illusion that it'll work forever. 

Art doesn't belong to me, nor does the character!

[follows-the-bees]

I saw complaining how Ed and Stede don't treat Zheng right in the finale. And I want to walk through that journey and counter that.

First, Stede and Zheng are by themselves after escaping the cannonball. Zheng gets visibly upset, though turned away from Stede to hide her emotions, and he offers the only physical touch we see outside Ed to Zheng; tries to comfort her about what happened, her fleets getting blown up and then death of many pirates. Yes, it may be misplaced at the moment (and his words), Zheng doesn't want it, but he is offering what he has learned throughout the journey of the show: physical comfort.

Next, Zheng and Stede fight side by side on the beach. And when Stede sees Ed, Zheng tells him to go to him. They fight to get to each other and spend just enough time to get two quick kisses and about twenty words in; all together it's only about 30 seconds of time.

Ed has no idea who Zheng is, who knows if he even saw her before the moment she yells out to them again. He thought Stede was dead and was fighting the British "for Stede!" His priority is getting to tell Stede how he actually feels, that he loves him, the words barely escaping his lips before theirs even separate. This is a romantic comedy, so of course there is going to be a big declaration of love amid a near-death incident.

When Zheng calls for help, Ed asks who is that? (reminding us that he has no idea who Zheng is.) Stede explains and then together they run to go join and help Zheng.

We cut to the aftermath of the battle on the beach. The entire time the three of them are getting along, giggling and complimenting each other. What's the phrase: the best/lasting bonds are formed in battle? But anyway, no hate is shown here, only the trio getting along.

The three of them then fight to get the crew back, joking that it's pretty much a death sentence. But Spanish Jackie is a badass and already had the situation handled.

They all once again do another fuckery to escape: together. And Zheng and Auntie ask Ed (and Stede) to come with them on their hunt for Ricky. Friends may be a stretch at this point, but they are allies, appreciate each other's strengths and recognize they have a common enemy as well as journey in piracy. Zheng and Auntie sail away on the Revenge.with the rest of the crew. They are now the crew.

To counter the points I've seen about why Zheng isn't captain at the end, we gotta remember that Ed and Zheng are parallels. They are strong pirate captains who are forced into the old way of piracy: the toxicity. Both of their journeys are about being able to be their true selves, to allow their inner softness to emerge while keeping that badassness that made them the pirate captains they are. She's just lost her fleet, and I think it's perfectly in line with her journey to take a minute, something she could never do before to be among the crew, with Auntie, and he love interest(s?). Just like Ed is currently doing with Stede, taking a break from piracy and being a captain.

Zheng losing her fleet is heartbreaking, and it is supposed to be. And it's also a commentary on how Zheng's armada is just the other side of the coin of the British Empire. Her fleet is a totalitarian armada with the philosophy the old way of piracy: join us or die. It is what made Zheng a great Pirate Queen, but her journey is more than that, it's also about being a human, and as the show shows us time and time again, the traditional ways of piracy do not allow captains that humanity; it stifles it.

The end of Act || of the show is the destruction of the Golden Age of Piracy, which we see through Izzy's death, and the state of piracy and more specifically The Republic of Pirates.

I think Zheng's story is beautiful and I would have loved to see how it continued in season three.

[valtsv]

im curious about your thoughts, would you talk a little about the theme of gender in the terror? i just enjoy your perspective!

okay i can't promise you the properly formatted essay with footnotes and citations i would love to write given the time and energy, but sure, i'd love to. because the theme of gender is central to the terror, particularly regarding the victorian ideal of masculinity, as a part of the greater overarching narrative theme of social constructions and structures being stripped away, and what and who remains after (crozier even explicitly remarks to fitzjames at the beginning of episode 7 that the remains of their civilization which they're clinging to for a sense of comfort and stability will begin to 'fall and drop away' as they travel further). we see this not just in the case of fitzjames, whose national identity and sense of selfhood we're given some insight into through the lens of gender, both with the iconic dress scene and his subsequent choice to dress as britannia, the feminine symbol of british imperial power, for carnivale - a juxtaposition which emphasizes the contrast between his private and public personas, and between the moment of vulnerability and honest self-expression in the scene where he holds up the dress and smiles at his reflection, and the ironic mask he dons for carnivale as a shield to conceal his doubts and insecurities, and any 'shameful' desires he might have - but also, for example, in the case of collins, who in the same episode seeks out goodsir, whose emotional availability and honesty have earned him the derision of his crewmates in the forms of scornful looks and derogatory comments denouncing his mannerisms as 'womanish' and thus shameful, but which only become increasingly necessary and shared amongst more of the men as they're forced to rely more and more on one another for support, and societal expectations of how they should conduct themselves become increasingly irrelevant, their fragility exposed and found wanting. collins is rebuffed and reprimanded by dr. stanley in episode 6, who dismisses his emotional distress, but in the following episode with goodsir he's encouraged to confide in him and, upon doing so, breaks down in tears and shares a desperate hug with him in full view of their camp; actions which would have been confined to privacy if they were allowed to be expressed at all earlier on. everywhere, cracks are beginning to show in this ideal construct of masculinity that the men were once expected and so proud to uphold.

silna's presence also highlights the themes of gender, and how they intersect with race and ethnicity; she is almost exclusively referred to as a 'girl' by the men of the expedition despite clearly being both a grown women and far more competent at surviving in the arctic than they are. the empire and its subjects' unwillingness to accept that someone who is both a native to the region and a woman could be more knowledgeable and better equipped than they are to deal with the situation leads them to assert their perceived superiority through how they address and refer to her, using the infantilizing language of 'girl', which although i believe the use of was more common in victorian england than it was today, nonetheless carries these implications, particularly when it's almost exclusively the only term they use to describe her. even those men who are more open to accepting the need to rely on the knowledge and support of the indigenous peoples of the region in order to survive there, such as crozier, don't begin to realize this until it's already too late. we also see the weaponization of femininity as a badge of shame of weakness with, as aforementioned, goodsir, and with hickey when he says to gibson that he "was such a good wife to me all these months" in order to get under his skin after gibson declares their relationship to be over.

we also see this victorian ideal of masculinity physically begin to 'fall away' as the men's bodies and minds deteriorate due to the extreme conditions they find themselves in. as sickness and despair set in, the men are no longer physically able to uphold this construction they've been told their whole lives it is vitally important that they strive to maintain in all their undertakings, further compounding the horror of their experience, but also liberating them. hickey again takes advantage of this, too, demonstrating his intelligence and quick, pragmatic thinking when he castrates irving's corpse after murdering him in order to threaten the remaining shreds of the men's masculinity and inflame them into rash, reactive action. and fitzjames comes full circle in his own gender-influenced narrative when he confesses his long-carried shame to crozier, finally unburdening himself of the idea of 'james fitzjames' that he built on the foundations of that masculine ideal the society he lived in values so highly and as a result is able to let himself lean on a fellow man for support and shed tears for the first time (that we see onscreen at least), and when he asks crozier to euthanize him to help him out of his suffering in his final moments - both poison and suicide have traditionally earned a reputation as means used by 'women and cowards' to escape the brutal reality of death, but they allow fitzjames to die with as much dignity and the least amount of suffering as the at that point truly desperate circumstances allow, and far more than the more ideally masculine, imperial british glory he once aspired to of death in combat or without any medical assistance to ease his passing would have.

[buddie911abc]

I have so much I want to post about, but I don't want to overload my own dashboard. I'm going to try and fit all of this into one post. I'm tagging this post as potential spoilers, but really these are part of fan theories. I'm throwing spoilers in there because if by some crazy thing, any of it happens to be right, I don't want to ruin it for others. However, a theory is just a theory, so let's suspend disbelief and dig into this one.

Most of you probably have heard or read some of these fan theories. One is that episode one or two is some sort of coma-induced alternate reality. There is a photo floating around somewhere that has the fire engine labeled 119 instead of 118. There is the mustache. etc. Someone pointed out, in the photo above, that the man on the magazine cover is Ryan Guzman but manipulated in some way. I would like to take it a step further. I looked at all the headlines and noticed that the one that likely matches with the manipulated photo says, "From a bedroom to an Empire." Is this a reference to a former porn star now running some sort of empire? (Bahahaha. if the manipulated photo is Ryan G. what a great play on the pornstache he is sporting.) I love it.

Anyway, if Eddie was stung by a bee and had a coma-induced alternate-reality dream, I love that he has reimagined himself in this way. It's a great nod. Another fan theory is that Eddie dreams he chose Chicago over LA. (but since it is not real, Buck, Chim, Hen, and the gang would all still be there, but they all live in Chicago instead.) I like the Chicago idea because it would allow them to do that crossover with Abbot Elementary (which is one of the shows that a cast member said they would love to do a crossover with.) It is a comedy show so it would lend itself to a comedic alternate reality episode.

The possibilities and directions they could take in this type of episode are broad, but I'm hoping for either an Eddie realization moment or for a planting of the seed in his head moment. (If I were writing it, I would do it like this.) In this reality, Buck and Eddie are already 'Buddie,' so after a day of work or whatever Buck could possibly drive Eddie home, but then not leave. Eddie isn't too concerned because Buck has practically wrapped himself around Eddie's neck since everything went down with Chris. However, later when Eddie is lying quietly in bed the covers shift and Buck gets in bed with him. Eddie jumps and flounders around for the light, and Buck just says, "Sorry. I was trying not to wake you." He finishes crawling under the covers and cuddles close to Eddie. Eddie is shocked and frozen to the spot. Buck doesn't notice. He just says, "Hit the light Papi... unless... you're not feeling tired." And gives Eddie that look that says, "Are you ready for it." AND it brings

THIS energy.

[Small break to apologize for the Papi line. I do not like the whole Daddy thing. I don't kink shame, but the Daddy thing is not for me. That said. Papi just HITS differently. I can't explain it forgive me.]

Also, here is a photo of Buck in the alternate reality. (Again, if I were writing it, I would let the tattoos stay. I would also let him speak with his real accent.) Bonus, if I were writing it, at the end of the episode when Eddie is back to himself, he may not admit to Buddie right away, but he would ask Buck to speak with an accent. Buck thinks it's a weird request, but he does it. However, he does it with the worst possible British accent you can imagine. Like Gandalf chewing marbles. Eddie stops him and tells him to never do it again, so we are back to Buck's American accent. lol

Oh, and here is that "if you aren't tired expression" I was referring to earlier when he asked if Papi was tired or not.

This post is so long, and I haven't even touched on the theory of Eddie having a hurt arm or hand... A few weeks ago, Ryan G. said something about, "when you have to fight one-handed." So he hurt his hand and is still so mad, that he's trying to fight with just one... Lawd, help me.

While I still maintain that I do not hate that Tommy guy, I am so down with a jealous Eddie fighting him because he thinks that Tommy has somehow hurt Buck. Equally okay, with Eddie punching Gerard and hurting his hand.

Edit and reblog because I have one more thing to add. If I were writing it, and if this is actually one of Oliver S.'s tattoos. I would 100% make sure this tattoo got screen time, and regardless of the real meaning of the tattoo. For an alternate reality Buck, THIS WAS his aha moment.

[madamealys]

Imagine you are Tom Glynn Carney’s closest friend. In fact… too close.

(21+)

***

You are having a relatively complicated day when he calls you.

“Hey, Y/N! Guess what? I’m gonna take the Empire State!”

Aware of his sudden escalating fame, you giggle at his excitement, happy for sharing it—you’ve always encouraged him to pursuit the path of acting, always stood there for him. What’s best of doing your part is that Tom not only acknowledges it, but is thankful for it.

Somehow this warms your heart and makes you forget the clouds that were forming above your head.

“No kidding!! Tell me all about it!”

“I will show you for I was allowed to take someone with me and this someone is you!”

Tom knows how you will react: a stunned silence will be followed by an overjoyed cry out before you are listing every reason why he should choose someone else. Of course there will be some small argument over it, and he could foresee how bright your smile will be when he wins you over it.

The sight itself of your blush and smile makes his heart skip a beat. A perception that rises an alert by his reason, but he doesn’t pay mind to it. Not now anyways.

And it occurs as predicted, which makes him smile.

I’m glad you’re still the same after all those years, Y/N.

“I don’t care. I’m picking you up tonight, pack your things already.”

Your day couldn’t get any better, could it?

***

“We are leaving early tomorrow”, says he when picking you up and driving you to his place. “To prevent you to get late, I’m kidnapping you.”

You laugh quietly at his teasing.

“I don’t get late this often.”

“For a British woman, you do get quite late in many places.”

“I am not late, people of my surroundings tend unfortunately to arrive too early”, you snap back, pleased to make him chuckle.

“Right. You keep telling yourself that, Y/Nickname.”

Tom smiles at you before finally parking his car. You gladly hear all that he has to say, genuinely listening—a trait that he always compared to his former girlfriends, who never seemed interested in catch up with him—until he stops talking.

“You are too quiet again”, Tom notices just as you two walk in his grand, magnificent house.

“I am not”, you try not to give in, but your tone—too high—breaks your intention.

Tom holds your wrist—and it’s here that this touch, former friendly, shows other colors, previously unknown to both of you—and makes you turn at him. You hate how his eyes, so deep and vivid, dive right into yours, drinking into your soul, denuding it crudely.

Most of all, what you hate about the intensity of his gaze is the incapacity of denying him anything. What he asks, you give. You know that.

Oh, you know that.

Fuck.

“What happened, Y/Nickname? I know how supportive you are, but I can tell you’ve been distant this time.”

Saying so, stroking his thumb around your wrist, you are pulled onto him, like the Earth when it’s forced to gravitate around the sun.

Tom knows by your body language that he has so much power over you—he maybe has always known this, but never intended to explore it, for fearful he was in discovering that he may not feel it back, in order to ruin the sacred friendship you two have.

But when gazing at you, he comes to know there is so much more than surface shows. When reading this unspoken pain behind your y/c eyes, he wants to grip your face and protect you at all costs, he wants to devour your lips, he wants to give you the world.

He wants to hear his name out of your holy mouth as he does unspeakable things to you.

Oh. Damned be I.

“Well?”, he swallows his unholy thoughts, burying them alive. “Do you not think I know not my dearest and closest friend after all these years?”

“I do not intend to trouble you, is all”, you say, detesting how weak and meek you sound when you are so easily against him. “You’re having such a great time.”

“I will not have a great time when you’re like this”, he protests with a smile on his lips, too acutely aware of the effects his presence has on you. “I’m all ears, Y/Nickname. Don’t hide away from me.”

You tilt your head, letting him pull a lock of your hair that stubbornly fell over your forehead behind your ear. And then… you tell him your frustrations at work, how little valued you feel by others—your family included.

Tom listens, and not only that but he prepares some tea for both of you. There is this intimacy you’ve never had with another… and when looking into his eyes, you realize that he’s your home.

But why admitting it to yourself when you’ve shielded it behind your pride all of those years?

“Feeling better now?”, he asks you at last. How suddenly you two are cuddling on the couch?

“I am, thank you. You’ve always been a great listener”, you smile at him, not minding the gravity drawing one to the other.

Fingers intertwine, playfully at first. But electric waves are inevitably felt.

“The same can be said of you”, he too smiles, pleased to spot a faint blush rising in your cheeks. He wants to stroke your face, but Tom lacks the bold moves.

One gazes to the other, an invitation is silently posed. But who is yet to give the first steps? So suddenly aware of this unspoken and unadmitted tension, you opt to break it by giving an excuse to retire.

Which cools the spark, you know. But for how long?

Tom sighs and opts to keep to himself, even if this uncertainty drives him mad on the inside.

How long, though? For how long?

A question he is yet to fear the answer.

***

“It’s a beautiful view!”, you tell him later that day, when he takes you back to the hotel with his cast friends.

This day you and Tom, alongside dearly Olivia, Phia and Ewan and other members of the crew of “House of the Dragon”, have climbed to Empire State. Though you tried to be discreet, to your embarrassment Tom ensured you not to be excluded and suddenly you and Olivia became good friends, with each exchanging the contact to the other.

You are still wearing a green—“how thought of you to dress accordingly”, so Tom teased you when seeing you ready, to which you teased him back: “all for my favourite king!, which in turn got him red much to your delight—long gown with reinforces your curves, with your hair loose and the emerald jewelry Tom gifted you on your last birthday, by the time you and him got to the hotel bedroom.

Aegon had insisted that you two shared it—with him sleeping on the couch against your protests—so here you two are.

“Indeed it is”, he agrees, sounding more tired than his bubbly countenance allows him to show. “Very remarkable indeed.”

“You look exhausted”, you say, removing your earrings and necklace before coming at him. “Should you get some rest, T.”

He gives you one kind of glance that makes you mewl.

“You are really gorgeous, Y/N.” And then he stands. For a moment you hope for it. But… “I need a shower, truly.”

As he goes to the bathroom, you know you cannot conceal the disappointment that Tom spots. But what then?

What then? You ask yourself, sad somewhat.

***

“Y/N”, you hear him call you.

It’s dark, lights are out, and after that awkward moment where delights turned to dust with each following to each side, everyone seems to content in silently agree to sleep under the pretense of exhaustion to disguise this unspoken tension.

“Are you awake?”

Part of you wishes to pretend to be asleep. You know you are tired, it really has been a long day, but…

“Yes.”

A brief moment of silence, interrupted by his footsteps. You don’t mind him joining your side—it’s something you’ve always insisted if you’d properly shared the bed with a cushion in between—but you know there’s an anxiety in how he moves to the bed you are that hasn’t been detected before.

Tom slides to your side, thinking the same, perceiving the growing climax of this unbearable tension. He turns the light of the lamp, which soon dissipates part of the darkness that involves you two.

Tension rises when you notice he’s shirtless, the way his short hair falls, his muscles. The proximity makes you warm… specially in between your legs, a feeling you haven’t felt for a long while.

“Y/N. I was rude to you, I’m sorry”, he says, sounding desperate.

You are on your elbow, not minding the nightgown that is nearly showing off unprotected nipples. Such a sight makes Tom sigh deeply, but he keeps sinful thoughts to himself.

Though you may have noticed a naughty glimpse behind his eyes that only makes you feel unthinkable things. And may as well make you incline so a nipple purpose is out.

Tom knows he should not look, but how can he ignore the pink, hardened nipple that is so easily out of the cloth that should keep it of his sight? How can he not admire the swell of your right breast under this light, making visible the object of his desire? Is it useful to struggle with the nights he slept with other women thinking of you?

Nevertheless he holds back his lust when you say:

“Rude? How so?”

Looking into your eyes, he says:

“I struggle in vain to hold back my sentiments for you. Over the years I’ve realized that friendship is not suffice to placate the yearnings of my heart. Your happiness is mine as is otherwise. I want to make you happy, I want to be the reason of your daily smiles. I know this isn’t the most appropriate form to say this, but fuck… I love you, Y/N Y/LN.”

You pale for a moment. Heart races, you forget how to breathe—this is far more girly like than you, as an adult woman, expect. Tom for a moment fears that he’s misinterpreted all of this, until you move forward and cup his face with both hands.

“I love you, Tom Glynn-Carney. I always have and I always will.”

His face brightens upon hearing these words. Three little words that impact a great deal his well being. There is little else to say other than doing what both of you wanted to have it done for a long while now.

In this poorly illuminated room he kisses you, and gladly give in. What it starts as a slow kiss soon evolves to a passionate one. It’s enough to spark that repressed fire.

As your tongue syncs with his, perfectly paired in the same rhythm, you pull Tom over you, welcoming him with your legs. It doesn’t really help your case that his skillful hands soon lift your nightgown, slowly to your waist, gripping your hips.

But you don’t stay too far behind, taking hold of his hair before sliding your hands to his shoulders, thanking the divine for the shirt he’s not wearing. As you dig your fingers against his skin, smirking as he hisses under his breath as a result, he parts the kiss to dive against your neck.

For every built tension is finally dissolved when his hands engulf your frame, slowly lifting higher your nightgown until he suddenly stops what he’s doing.

“Tom!”, you don’t hesitate in protest.

“What?”, he gives you a mischievous look before tilting his head with a completely innocent aura. “I was just wondering if you are comfortable with where this is going.”

“Well, yes I am”, you say as-a-matter-of-factly. “I appreciate your concerns, but you’d know by now if I wasn’t ok with this.”

To ensure you mean every word, you make sure to lock him with your legs and swipe positions.

Tom gives you the look of a devoted lover that not only makes you dripping wetter—if possible—but encourages you to be bolder.

“Even so…”

Whatever he is about to say dies in silence when you remove your nightgown and let him drink the view of your bare breasts pouncing lightly as you rub yourself over his hardened cock.

“This is better than in my wildest dreams”, he mumbles in between hot shortened breaths.

You lean to kiss his lips for a few moments before sliding your tongue to his neck. In the meantime, your eager hands play with his hair, gently moving to his neck and slowly going downwards.

Tom closes his eyes, letting you have the control this time, struggling to keep his arousal in check though his bone is making him burn inside.

It doesn’t help his case when your fingertips get it delicately only to wrap around it.

“Merciful be Heavens”, he groans, already pumping into your palm.

You take your time, running your painfully hard nipples against his skin, tasting his sweat with your tongue. Playing with his neck and jawline makes you hornier—if possible: hearing his ache for you brings such a naughty side of you unknown to any other men.

“Yes, my love”, you bite down his lip. And for a moment your eyes meet in a longing gaze. “Is it good?”

“Fuck yes. You do it so fucking well.”

He throws his head back, eyelashes barely closing as you keep doing what you’re doing. You love to have him moaning, responding so perfectly to your efforts in making him feel good.

You know you want more. In other circumstances you’d scowl at yourself for these impure thoughts, sinful desires, but this is hardly the time for doing so.

You feel so good in giving what he needs that you barely recall yours. And when you go down his belly, Tom gently holds your hair, playing with your locks.

“Babe, you don’t have to do this.”

When you look up, he sees a mischievous glint never before met in such pure eyes of yours.

“Oh honey, you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for this moment.”

When you finally replace your hands with your tongue, Tom is abruptly taken to Heaven. Every night he touched himself thinking of you is nothing compared to what you do, fulfilling his naughty dreams he often had about you.

As he pumps into your mouth, his mind goes into blank and brought into nothingness, he slips to an exquisite kind of joy. And you do your best, enjoying it to the point of touching yourself too in the process.

As he sees you enjoying doing it, eventually though… Tom knows that feeling too damn well. He’s about to…

“FUCK!”

You know he doesn’t plan to jerk in you, but you don’t flee from the task. You engulf it all, drinking it. As you sit over it, not minding the risks it may have by doing so, you lick your lips.

“You taste so good, Tom Glynn Carney.”

He eyes you like a hunter. And so suddenly you become his prey. For you are now under his desperate lips, his savage kiss destroying you all the whilst his hands cup your breasts, there staying for a while as you begin to moan.

“You will be rewarded for your devotion, my love”, he whispers against your ear, smirking pleasantly when spotting how shivering you are under his wording.

His lips burn you like fire, but you are yet to get burnt. Tom is patient, he wants to see every bit of you reacting to his command. He kisses you slowly, his tongue licking your skin in his own pace.

But when going to your chest, he says:

“I’ve always noticed your beautiful, rosy, round breasts. And often wondered what’d be like to take each nipple under my mouth”, the actor smirks when you blush. “I’ve always lusted after you, love. This shouldn’t be surprising.”

His eyes are locking with yours as he engulfs his tongue around your nipple, pleased to finding you moaning, louder each time he sucks it. Then his hand finds way to your feminine core only to be pleasantly surprised by how wet you are.

“I’ve always thought of you in the same way”, you say, messing with the sheets. “God, I’m in Heaven. Oh babe!”

Tom likes how you sing out his name, how loud you are, how wet his fingers are. He likes to taste your nipples under his tongue, aware of how much you want him taking his time there, which he does.

But to him, seeing you reaching your climax is a beautiful view his minds captures it in a mental photography. And he wants you so bad…

As he arches his back, this is the very moment he knows when to slide his cock in you, just as you are cumming he pumps in.

“OH LORD!”

Tom chuckles before letting a groan as he begins to fuck you nice and slow. Domineering you in a gentleman manner, he pins your hands above your head and hits your uterus intensely.

“Come, babe. Let us reach paradise together, shall we?”, he says quite breathless before wrapping a hand around your neck, sliding it then to your breast.

Two bodies lock as one. This is lust no more, but the consuming of long repressed flames. Sounds echo in the room as you and him find pleasure together.

When he slows down his pace, he cups your facd and says:

“I fucking love you, Y/N. You will be my wife one day, this I swear.”

Your reasonable self, experienced somehow by now, tells you not to buy this. But it’s not anyone you met. It’s Tom. Your sweet Tom.

Yours to behold and to love.

To care and cherish.

Yours alone.

“I love you, husband.”

And who knew in this night a solemn vow was made… only to be fulfilled in a few more months?

[goldfishgrahamcracker]

Obsessed with how, for as little as we see or hear from Thomas Armitage in The Terror, he still has a clear arc that is in part shaped by his use of violence.

From what we know for certain, Armitage commits three instances of violence and attempts a fourth. First he kidnaps Silna, then he kills two of the Netsilik party, and later gives Little a concussion. Finally, he tries to shoot Hickey only for Manson to shoot him first.

The first two acts are violence directly against Netsilik people, influenced by Hickey’s words if not under his explicit command in the case of the family. It is unclear if Hickey had given any instruction regarding Little, but this attack was clearly in coordination with Tozer, if not by his order, to incapacitate Little and protect Tozer. In the final case, Hickey orders Armitage to shoot Tuunbaq, and Tozer orders Armitage to give him the gun to shoot Tuunbaq instead.

Here, Armitage breaks the pattern. Instead of obeying Hickey or defending Tozer, both of which would effectively be efforts to harm Tuunbaq, he tries to kill Hickey, who has previously influenced him to commit violence against the Netsilik people. I doubt Armitage had a total change of heart about the Netsilik, but the exposure of Hickey’s lie that led to him, Hodgson, and Pocock killing the Netsilik family likely challenged his perception of them as a threat, and in any case proved Hickey untrustworthy. In any case, his defiance of Hickey, and to an extent Tozer, could be read as a symbolic refusal to commit violence against Tuunbaq, a part of the Netsilik culture or way of life. He does not perform the role of the private he has always wanted to be, a role Hickey grants him however fleetingly under his command as a mirror of the British Empire. On this level of symbolism, aiming at Hickey might even be seen as redemption, taking out the root factor that has led him to hurt the Netsilik.

Except it isn’t. The violence committed against the Netsilik doesn’t start and certainly doesn’t end with Hickey: it’s the Empire. And while Hickey, and for that matter most of the expedition men, didn’t have a specific desire to harm the Netsilik people, the will of Empire has sent them here, and individual actions have created this result.

In the end, Armitage never even shoots. And truly, what difference would it have made? But it strikes me that his one attempt at violence that could, albeit very generously, be read as a defiance of imperial violence he has thus far participated in, is the one that never came to fruition.

[ultraericthered]

Don't believe in what you can see (but I see you, Liam!)

Had some random thoughts to spare regarding Moriarty The Patriot following my viewing of the "Scandal In The British Empire" arc.

This is a series that lives or dies based on how it characterizes and handles the main protagonist, what he does, what he believes, and what he's striving for. And given that the protagonist in question is THE Professor James Moriarty, that had to be a tricky thing to figure out. So I guess it speaks to the writing quality that I am very engaged with how William James Moriarty and his brothers operate and am absolutely on board with the fundamental sentiments behind the motivation and support the revolutionary societal reforms they seek to bring about as their goal....but I also disagree with the angle Liam has settled on and what he believes has to be done to achieve it. Quite vehemently, in fact.

For starters, he wants to destabilize British society through a barrage of well planned, coordinated and directed crime waves throughout the empire, even reaching elsewhere in Europe. It'd be an extreme rarity that such crimes be victimless, and though done towards the end of crippling the power, wealth, and status-based influence of the nobility, there are plenty of non-noble class victims claimed. As part of these crimes, Liam will either commit murders, arrange murders, orchestrate suicides, or just look the other way as an aristocrat is placed in a life-ending situation by his machinations. Breaking laws, ethical norms, and common sense regulations of civil society in ways that harms more than helps is very, very seldom a good, righteous, justified thing no matter what rationalizations could be made for it. Now sometimes I can't fault Liam for what he does (the poisoning of the Viscount was aided by him but mainly required he simply not save the guy just as he himself hadn't save a terminally ill child, Dudley Bale fell off the bridge on his own, etc.), but most of the time his actions fall squarely under the category of "illegal felony".

Then there's the fact that the envisioned crescendo hinges upon the Lord of Crime coercing the masses into unity against a common threat to their homeland and collective well-being, prompting a need to re-asses and reconstruct things under dubious pretenses rather than allowing the people to seriously look at and examine the full reality of their fucked up society to come to a clear-headed, informed consensus on a decided course of action to fix things. It's the same thing Lelouch did in Code Geass R2 and I wasn't entirely okay with that either. I just think it's dickish and not even sustainable in the long term, and to think "I just need to make victims out of enough people to the point where they'll all rise up to want and demand social reforms and changes in their ruling class' leadership, and meritocracy will kick in!" is surprisingly naive for a genius like Liam.

Then there's his hypocrisy. The title "Moriarty the Patriot" is because Liam, in spite of being a criminal mastermind, also cares greatly about Great Britain and has sworn allegience to the crown, believing the nation needs a healthy government, honest law enforcement, non-abusive abiders of Noblesse Oblige in key roles of society's upper levels working alongside commoners, and the monarchy and military kept in-tact in order to thrive. It's that last part that seems like a problematic area, as monarchy by definition puts those of royal blood and status above all other people, and it's been known to allow anyone close to or in the favor of the royals to play parts in shaping how the country is run and how society is influenced. So if Liam wasn't keen on deposing the monarchy and reforming government in Britain altogether, who's to say that, no matter what reforms his plan may yield, the class system won't continue to prevail, aristocracy won't continue to abuse its power, and society won't remain as cruel, unfair, and inequal as it was before? ..... Oh wait, we CAN say that!

Lastly, the senseless martyrdom factor. Liam never valued himself as a priority in his life, never saw in himself any worth to society at large beyond what he could reshape it into, and due to turning to aiding crime and plotting murder even at a young age, he believes his heart is too blackened and his hands are too unclean. So naturally, he plans on the fulfillment of his revolutionary vision to come along with the end of his life. Beneath all the ideals and the honest assessment of what ails British society and does great harm to so many of its people, Liam is driven by a personal desire to leave behind this harsh and unjust world, to give his life to his cause and seal the realization of his envisioned future with his blood, and to validate the self-image he has of an accursed, dreadful, loathsome villain who can bring into reality necessary change only through necessary evil. It's wasteful, corruptive, insensitive, self-loathing, self-destructive, and wrong. (Thankfully I do know Sherlock's around to talk him out of this.)

So yeah, I find the James Moriarty Brothers to be quite the compelling Villain Protagonists/antiheroes, and Liam especially. So much I want to laud him for and just as much I want to kick him for.

[mental-about-you-too]

Why I believe the Will Darling Adventures were originally conceived as johnlock fanfiction

I will die on this hill.

The Will Darling Adventures (Slippery Creatures, Sugared Game, Subtle Blood) by KJ Charles are my favorite guilty pleasure comfort books. I have listened to the audiobooks an embarrassing number of times. I can play exchanges of dialogue in my head from memory, reader’s inflections and all. If you haven’t read them and you like a mix of adventure and gay smut (plus it’s a trilogy so there’s time for more complex characterization and more gradual relationship development than you usually get in books of the genre), then absolutely go do that, and don’t read below—because here be spoilers. Also, because the books are a delight.

So. Grand theory.

To be clear: I am not knocking these books AT ALL (if I’m honest, the Holmesian flavor is part of why I like them so much). As in many really good works of fanfiction, the characters have ceased to be mere copies, and have gained their own original and internally consistent characterization. Kim and Will are not Holmes and Watson, but I am completely convinced that the latter were the inspiration for the former. Here are some of the parallels/moments of homage:

Watson => Will

Returned to England from war with nowhere to go; ended up in London: “I had neither kith nor kin in England, and […] naturally gravitated to London, that great cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly drained.” (Study in Scarlet) => “…his mother had died from the Spanish ‘flu while he’d waited to be demobbed […] So, like everyone else, he’d come to London…” (Slippery Creatures)

Ran out of money as a recently-discharged veteran: “So alarming did the state of my finances become…” (Study in Scarlet) => “…his slide into poverty was unstoppable...” (Slippery Creatures)

War wound that nearly killed him: “For months my life was despaired of...” (Study in Scarlet) => “A month in hospital.” (Sugared Game)

Saved by an underling who never appears in the story: “…had it not been for the devotion and courage shown by Murray, my orderly, who threw me across a pack-horse and succeeded in bringing me safely to the British lines.” (Study in Scarlet) => “If it hadn’t been for the bravest stretcher-bearer in Flanders, I’d have died out there.” (Sugared Game)

Retained his favorite weapon from the war: “I have my old service revolver and a few cartridges.” (Study in Scarlet) => “…the Messer, his old trench knife...” (Sugared Game)

Is asked to bring the weapon on adventures: “Put your pistol in your pocket.” (Study in Scarlet) => “Got your knife?” (Sugared Game)

POV character

Holmes => Kim

Has a bunch of names but goes by a middle one: William Sherlock Scott Holmes => Arthur Aloysius Kimberley de Brabazon Secretan

Has pretty hands, which are something of a fixation for the POV character

Doesn’t eat much: “My friend had no breakfast himself, for it was one of his peculiarities that in his more intense moments he would permit himself no food…” (Norwood Builder) => “They ate breakfast, or at least Will did, while Kim chewed a single slice of toast with distaste.” (Subtle Blood)

Withholds information because he doesn’t trust his partner’s ability to deceive: “You won’t be offended, Watson? You will realize that among your many talents dissimulation finds no place.” (Dying Detective) => “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, but subterfuge isn’t your strong suit.” (Sugared Game)

Withholds information for dramatic effect: “It was too bad to spring it on you like this, but Watson here will tell you that I never can resist a touch of the dramatic.” (Naval Treaty) => “Of course Kim would turn up after two months with some bizarre story; of course he wouldn’t tell it like a normal person.” (Sugared Game)

Plays fast and loose with legality: “Doctor, I shall want your cooperation.” “I shall be delighted.” “You don’t mind breaking the law?” “Not in the least.” (Scandal in Bohemia) => “I am absolutely not empowered to break the laws of the land, so I try not to get caught at it.”

Has a brother seven years his senior, whom we meet (several adventures in) at a gentlemen’s club in Pall Mall, and who looks like him but bigger: “Mycroft Holmes was a much larger and stouter man than Sherlock.” (Greek Interpreter) => “He looked like someone had drawn a caricature of Kim as John Bull and not been kind about it. He was significantly bulkier…”

The club (The Diogenes => The Symposium) has a Strangers' Room, and in at least part of the club: "no talking is, under any circumstances, allowed" (Greek Interpreter) => "speech is strictly forbidden" (Subtle Blood)

Chases down the leader of a mysterious criminal organization who appears respectable in normal society, and who stays one step removed to leave no evidence of his involvement: “But the Professor was fenced round with safeguards so cunningly devised that, do what I would, it seemed impossible to get evidence which would convict in a court of law.” (Final Problem) => “[Arrest him] on what grounds? I’ve got a lot of nothing. Straws in the wind, and fears, and the words of the dead. The case needs to be iron-clad, and mine is wet tissue paper.” (Sugared Game)

Has a chat with this adversary before the action kicks off: “…I was seriously inconvenienced by you” (Final Problem) => “It has caused me enormous inconvenience” (Sugared Game)

Better at hand-to-hand combat than he looks like he should be: “I have some knowledge, however, of baritsu, or the Japanese system of wrestling…” (Empty House) => “Where did you learn knife fighting?” (Slippery Creatures)

Lounges around in a purple dressing gown (Blue Carbuncle; all three Will Darling books)

Tall, slender, pale, and dark-haired, with remarkable eyes (at least, the POV character sure remarks on them a lot)

Other parallels:

Inspector Lestrade (“lean and ferret-like as ever”) => Inspector Rennick (“He was a short, shrewd-looking man who sounded North London.”)

An aortic aneurism renders prosecution of a criminal moot: Jefferson Hope (Study in Scarlet) => Lord Waring (Sugared Game)

Will’s expectations upon meeting Waring line up with a description of Moriarty: “His face protrudes forward, and is forever slowly oscillating from side to side in a curiously reptilian fashion” (Final Problem) => “[Will] wasn’t sure what he expected. Something snakey, some reptilian air of cruelty…” (Sugared Game)

This rather iconic phrase: “He sits motionless, like a spider at the center of its web...” (Final Problem) => “…sits like a spider at the centre of a web of obligations...” (Sugared Game)

Alongside the parallels, Charles adds elements often found in the best works of fanfiction: in addition to the on-page romance, there's expansion of the characters' backgrounds, including an exploration of class and privilege, plus a fix-it-esque resolution of the issue of Holmes'/Kim’s dishonesty (I for one always wished Watson would confront Holmes about lying to him for cases).

There. Cataloguing all the parallels was taking up a ridiculous amount of space in my brain, so now you know & I can stop obsessing over it so much.

[charliethomascoxuniverse]

Charlie Cox: ‘I love being a superhero — I thought that ship had sailed’

Charlie Cox on the return of Daredevil, the joys of sea swimming in Dalkey and his rewarding character-driven work in RTÉ’s Kin

Kirsty Blake Knox   April 27, 2023 (X)

Charlie Cox is a busy man; he smiles widely from the back of a car as it ferries him from a physical therapy session to the set of Disney’s Daredevil.

“We’ve just kind of started, it’s really great. Pretty intense, hence the physical therapy,” he says.

Cox has returned to play Matt Murdock, the blind lawyer-slash-superhero.

The show started life on Netflix and ran for three seasons before it was cancelled in 2018.This resulted in an online #SaveDaredevil campaign which resulted in 400,000 signatures begging Marvel to bring him back.

It took a little time; a contractual clause prevented any characters from the Marvel-Netflix shows from appearing in any non-Netflix projects for two years after cancellation.

And now Cox is suiting up again in his Spandex costume, running around punching people in the face and fighting for justice. It’s a demanding shoot — the series is 18 episodes long. And he is a fan of doing as many of his stunts as possible.

“I kind of get involved as much as I’m allowed to and is appropriate. Obviously, the stunt team are professionals and there are things they can do that I can’t even get close to,” he says. “I feel like the name of the game is to get as involved as you can… it makes the scenes more realistic.”

Cox took on the role, which had once been played by Ben Affleck in 2015. At the time, landing the role came as a shock.

“I never thought of myself as being appropriate casting for an American superhero. That never really occurred to me,” he says. “And in my 20s, a lot of my friends, and a lot of British actors, had gone and done that already. So when I got to 30 I was pretty confident that ship had sailed. I was very fortunate to get a character that I’ve now been playing for almost 10 years. It’s unbelievable.”

Cox is a father to two young children (seven and three) but they are a little young to fully grasp the role their dad plays in the Marvel Universe.

“I’m not sure they quite understand… One of the books we read him (his three-year-old) is called Superbat. A bat who is a superhero. But that’s his only real understanding. And so he thinks that I’m Superbat,” he laughs.

Cox realised he wanted to be an actor while in school and studied at Bristol Old Vic drama school. His first big break came in 2007 when he starred in Stardust alongside Robert De Niro and Michele Pfeiffer.

He has performed on the West End and Donmar Warehouse, in dramas like Treason and took on the role of Owen Sleater in Martin Scorsese’s Boardwalk Empire. For Irish viewers, we can see Cox on our screens every Sunday night, as Michael Kinsella in gangland drama Kin.

It’s pretty unusual for Marvel Universe actors to appear in a homegrown Irish drama. But Cox’s wife is executive producing the series. When another project he was attached to fell through, he read the scripts and felt compelled to be part of it.

“I’ve been working probably 20-plus years, and there’s a handful of times where I’ve read a script and felt like I’m reading something written by a truly brilliant writer,” he says. “And that quality of scripts never ceased. Sometimes you can get a really good pilot episode. But then as you get deeper into the season, some of the writing starts to disintegrate a little bit, but with Peter (McKenna) that was never the case.”

Obviously, the scale of production is a lot smaller on Kin than other productions, but he says these productions can be just as, if not more, rewarding to work on.

“If you have a limited budget, the way you handle that is you write long character-driven scenes… So weirdly, the lower budget stuff often is more appealing. Because you get to really get deep into the character and the relationships and the dynamics… it’s sort of like theatre. So, from my point of view, sometimes that stuff is more appealing.”

He continues; “I’ve learned I’m not precious about my character’s involvement. I don’t care much if my character does cool stuff … what I care about is, ‘are they moving?’”

He says this is some of the appeal of playing Michael.

“This life that he’d come from…and now he’s trying to rekindle a relationship with his daughter. [The] vulnerability, and the desire, and the need to fundamentally change his nature. That was really exciting to me.”

Cox perfected his Irish accent by listening to the voice of former Dublin goalkeeper, Shane Supple. He got up to speed with Ireland’s gangland scene by listening to podcasts featuring award winning crime journalist Nicola Tallant.

“I was kind of blissfully ignorant of the whole thing,” he says. “When I actually read the first two scripts, I just thought it was all fiction and then I agreed to do the part and I started doing my research. I was like, ‘oh, shit, this stuff is happening. It’s current and it’s happening right now.’”

Despite the violent nature of the series, he found filming and living in Ireland to be idyllic.

He and his family were based in the seaside village of Dalkey — where Matt Damon was holed up during lockdown. Cox became a sea swimming fanatic while residing there.

“I absolutely loved being there… I had conversations with my wife about moving to Dublin because I loved it so much. It’s not really viable with my job… Season one, we’re in lockdown. We lived in Hanover Quay, which was delightful…

“Season two, we moved to Dalkey. I felt like it was one of the best kept secrets in Europe… I was swimming in Vico every day… I found it to be like a haven. And I would love an opportunity to go back at any stage.”

Cox is extremely polite and amenable. And modest — despite his success, Cox says he still suffers professional insecurities.

“I never think I’m going to be hired,” he laughs. “I read years ago that Christopher Walken always thinks his job he’s doing is going to be the last time he is hired. I don’t quite have that, but I certainly identify with it. I’ve never felt like ‘Oh, I’m always going to be hired.’”

He says this comes with some advantages, as it makes him more present.

“I’m filming in New York and I’m lucky enough that I’m still able to play a kind of a lead in a TV show,” he says. “You know, the time is ticking on that in a big way. And so I certainly don’t want to wish that away.

“It would be easy to kind of bemoan the amount of hours you have to work, and missing the family, but there’ll come a time where I would kill to be able to be the lead in the TV show. I think the trick is to really enjoy it while it lasts.”

As he makes his way out of his car and towards his makeup chair, I ask if he has any projects outside of Daredevil coming down the tracks.

“I’m going to be doing this until the end of the year. And then I’ll be back on the panic station wondering if I am ever going to work again,” he laughs.

~*~

[mistress-of-vos]

Okay so I'm about to explain very slowly the reason why I dislike when batfam fans talk sh*t about Lex: This image right here, yes. This.

Not only is this openly disgusting and rude, but it's also clear that there's no knowledge or comprehension about Lex Luthor as a character; and the comparison with Joker is simply and absolutely ridiculous. People are incapable of understanding that Lex is a villain on his methods, not because he - calls people slurs (which is a delusion of batfam fandom). And let's be real, Lex wouldn't have meetings with Bruce or Tim, they don't run WE, Lucius Fox does.

Making characters homophobic ain't funny. This "trend" of sh*tting on iconic DC characters that people know nothing about is gross. Not only are we living in a moment of rampant queer phobia and hate, which makes these kind of posts extremely nasty, but Lex Luthor is a character that has been used to transmit queer messages before (he has a comic where he's married to Superman, has a son with him, and Smallville *exists*). The hate that batfam fandom have for him shocks me, because it's pure mischaracterization done to prop up Bruce.

The jealousy towards Lex as a character is insane, because he has suffered enough due to creators needing to prop up Bruce. Lex is not the weird imitation of E*on M*sk that batfam fans want him to be, and I guess that must hurt, because I see posts like this one all the time, crying for someone to create content that does Lex dirty.

It reminds me of people arguing Jean-Paul Valley would be homophobic just because he happens to be Catholic, ignoring that he's a male character that breaks gender stereotypes and whose main plot is the vulnerability depressed people go through. Just because Lex is a villain doesn't mean he's s bigot (and for the record I also think all of this applies to Ra's except that Ra's' haters are usually just racists).

Lex is the child of a migrant family. He grew up poor and with a genius that made his life in school painful. He was abused by his father and had to take care of his sister. He made his own fortune. His intelligence allowed him to give life to science that no one had seen before. His charming with people was so large that he could get into politics. His empire is so strong that not even the al Ghuls could destroy it.

If you need to mistreat Lex Luthor to prop up Bruce Wayne, the only heir of a white family that comes from rich British people and whose company is kept alive thanks to Lucius Fox, then I think you should consider that Bruce is, simply, not that good of a character.

Oh, and read the comics before speaking up on a character. It's *so* obvious when people have only read the batfam silly webtoon. Can't relate!

[aiyanacatori]

The following is an expanded thought/rant on Nyo!America. I made a shorter version yesterday but wanted to expand it.

Warnings: mentions of neglect, abuse, period typical attitudes and behaviours, colonization, imperialization, civil war, Spain, WW1, Great Depression, WW2, Cold War, the '90s and early 2000s. Basically, if it was a major event I touch on it through the lens of the possibility of Nyo!America.

The fun idea about nyo!America existing in the same universe where it is basically the same but it’s Nyo!America is just how much would have changed for her. Personally her.

In general Alfred was able to do what he wanted, frolicking in the fields of the Midwest and avoid work? Yeah, he could do that. Go up and visit his brother for weeks at a time? Just leave a note. Start an international incident by punching Russia? That can be resolved. Have a sloppy public image? What are you going to do? Oppose him? Alfred can do more or less whatever he wants. Sure he struggles and I'm not invalidating those struggles, but it is a different font of struggle.

Nyo!America [whatever name you want to use because all names are cool and I have my own headcannon names.] Would have to work constantly to be taken seriously and to be seen as an equal. As a colony she was mostly neglected as a second thought by the English/British government. She would be constantly have been having to prove herself and be self sufficient. England would have not seen her as a threat. After all she was a small female nation. What could she possibly do against the British? When starting the revolution no one would believe in her. There were so few female nations to begin with in a high standing. The ones in Europe were under the flag of someone else. Everyone thought it was going to fail. Than the Americans started proving that they could do it, nations started supporting her. She got her freedom, but there was still the feeling that this would just be a shirt term thing. She would have to keep proving herself. After all she just proved them wrong already, they were going to be wrong about everything else.

The Articles of Confederation didn't work, and people thought this was going to be the end. This is just another point as to why female nations couldn't do all that much, and why, historically, many empires were better off with male representatives.

Nyo!America pushes on. Most of her bosses doubt her ability to some level. Even the ones who don't treat her poorly still doubt her. She can't take breaks, and she can't skip town for weeks because it will be held against her. She's doing paperwork, meeting and greeting officials, reading books and taking classes from paid tutors. She has to be because if she doesn't then they will find something wrong with her.

Her manners are top-notch, she learns the customs of other places, and learns greeting and pleasantries in other languages. She has to be the best at everything. So what if she skipped sleep here or there? She still has work to do.

Nyo!America would in a bit of spare time get to know her people. If she can find out where things within her country are lacking she can try to help. These are the people she represents and she wants to be the best place for all of them. She knows all of the flaws within her nation like the stories engraved in her skull, but she has to keep trying. Where she can try and help with things she does, but no one will take her seriously.

She learns early that most of these people won't take her skill and knowledge seriously unless she forces them. Everyone has something to keep and no one expects a lady like her to figure them out or use them against them. She does. So what if she has to blackmail a bit, so what if she had to threaten a couple of big-headed men who won't take her knowledge until given no other choice. So what if she has to use some underhanded ways that would make some weary. She is doing everything she can.

The Mexican-American war. She didn't want to fight Mexico. She was the only other female nation she knew. They had each other’s backs in the world of male nations. There was still a war and she had to prove herself. She didn't have the standing to oppose it all. She lost her friendship with Mexico. She hated the people in charge for a long while, but she couldn't say anything. How could she when they were waiting for a chance to throw her out? She writes essays of apologies to Mexico for years. For decades. They don't get along all the time, but they both understand the pain. They might not be buddy buddies, but they were still two female nations in the sea of male nations. If push came to shove they personally have each other’s backs.

The nation is divided and America was to kneel over in pain. She wants to lie in bed and scream, cry, and shut down. She can't. They won't take her pain seriously. She's just a woman. She stands up and fights. She fights for her people, the ones who can get their long-needed freedom. She's still in pain, but she will smile through it all if it means more of her people will be free.

There are still problems, still, people who deny rights, but she is doing the damn best she can to help.

She's a regional power, her wealth is growing and flocks of people are moving. She is proving them all wrong. The old world still scoffs at her and isn't taking her seriously. Some are mad at her for 'taking' their people. Not all of them. Some of them are starting to see the writing on the wall. Their respect for her is growing. She broke the glass ceiling just for it to be replaced by another. She will keep working at trying. She can't stop now. When she shows up for diplomatic meetings they still are looking for something to criticize her about. Maybe her clothes are a trend out of date, her accent is slightly off, she doesn't remember a custom. She keeps up. It's becoming harder to find something to hate about her with. She stays out of their buisness they stay out of hers.

Her country has 'territories' now. Hawai'i, Cuba, Philippines. She didn't really want them. She just wanted the Europeans out of the new world. She was done playing games with them. She was done sucking up all the time, she was in a position to demand them to leave. She went to war with Spain. One of the most feared nations in the new world. The one who burned it all to the ground. The one who had erased cultures and lives like the dust of a mantelpiece. ('Annoying and in the way) she won. But then instead of giving freedom her government took territories. Wasn't enough. The friends she made were now her colonies just with a more pleasant-sounding name.

She tries but nothing is being done.

Europe starts another war. She rolls her eyes and goes back to her stack of work. Europe I always at war. It was at war before she was around, has been at war before and will continue to be. She doesn't really have a side to pick. There are a lot of immigrants from all over so picking a side for yet another European conflict feels stupid.

Europe's war has been making her money. She has the biggest economy. People are being mowed down by machine guns. The telegram comes. The Germans were trying to start a new front in North America. A repeat of the Mexican-American war. Her country goes to war and she ships out with her soldiers to Europe.

The war is over and she hated every moment of it. She sent letters back to Mexico because she needed to talk to someone. They still don't get along all the time but she doesn't think she could ever fight a war against Mexico ever again.

Europe is being greedy again. They are creating a future problem with how they are handling this. Of course who would listen to her? Apparently not Europe who still thinks they are knowing wise for having a couple centuries of existence over her. She tries to help but there is only so much that they can do.

She allows herself a break. Finally, a chance to unwind. Of course, the government does something stupid. Banning alcohol is going to cause more problems than it fixes. She does participate in some underground activity because the government is stupid sometimes(a lot) and she just came back from trench war hell.

The economy crashes and the world seems to be going to hell. Her people are suffering and the news from Europe looks dark. Why are they ignoring it? She doesn't say anything. She has more problems than worrying about Europe.

War. Europe is at war again. She saw this coming. She wrote to England and France about it when she saw it. They disregard her again. Japan attacked and this war seems darker than before.

Hypocrites. All of them are hypocrites. Her government, England's, France's. All of them. She could list every time another government pulled some of this. It was in a different century, in a different time. It's what her brother said. She rolls her eyes but moves on, she has Russia to deal with now.

America will be less likely to admit this now, but she really only wanted to be left alone. Maybe not her government, but she wanted to be left alone. Going tor to toe with Russia was exhausting. She was paranoid and couldn't take any chances. If she failed no one would believe in her again. She worked hard for her spot in the world and she would be damned if that got taken away. Her officials don't like her new ideas, and don't like how she was siding either those who wanted to end the conflicts in the cold war. They saw that as weak. Just another womanly feature to belittle. She just rolls her eyes. She has power and the ability to speak back now.

Of course, every day is new paperwork, more issues, more help me here, stop helping me. Pay back money. She is trying. Trying. Trying. Trying.

She is the centre of it all and yet they still hold up their noses in their centuries-old bigotry of superiority. She's got this.

----

She mellows out. She calms down because she can afford to. Not all the time, but she can. Slowly some of them forget just how powerful she is. That's fine. They can forget. She knows how powerful she is. She knows where she Excels. She won't lord over anyone, because why should she? She worked hard for where she is, and she broke all expectations and then some.

-/\-/\-

Nyo!America at least in my eyes would be the perfect version of America. It was such a missed opportunity. Truly unfortunate that few others see it. Oh well, rather are missing out on a cool story.

[howlerbat]

I’m glad that you enjoyed my tags! I very much enjoyed yours as well. As far as the Breaking Point goes, I acknowledge what you’re saying about 3x05 and I agree with it, but also (from my recollection anyway, it’s been a while since I rewatched) 3x05 was more of Billy attempting to make a (for lack of a better term) professional connection with Flint. Going like “hey, can we talk strategy? because I’m not sure about this…” and obviously there’s not NOTHING personal in that request or in Flint shutting it down, and I think that was also a very pivotal moment, but Billy tried the professional connection thing again with Flint in 4x01, so he hadn’t completely lost hope in that department yet. What makes me view 3x03 as The Moment is that it was the last time that Billy tried to connect with Flint in a very personal and vulnerable way - attempting to check in on him emotionally - and to have THAT shut down, I think, destroyed the potential for true reconciliation irreparably.

Haven’t really looked at it that way but you’re right, after 3x03 Billy very much tries to maintain a professional distance through all their interactions (even if he does it through gritted teeth). I singled out 3x05 to myself as more of a ‘last opportunity for Flint to get Billy on his side’ because he starts promoting Silver pretty quickly after this. And even though Billy still wants to use Flint’s talents and reputation to their advantage and goes along with him, he starts to separate himself from his Goal aka the Fall of the British Empire. So if 3x03 is him giving up on understanding Flint as a person, 3x05 is him doubting him as a leader because there’s a fundamental difference in how they see this War (for Billy it ends with liberating Nassau, for Flint it STARTS with liberating Nassau).

It’s hard to point to a single moment as the breaking point of this relationship because it’s THEM and because it was never really that good to begin with. It was less of a break and more of a gradual tear of a rope that was sprung up too tight. Chances are Flint could still reach an agreement with him even in s4 but that would require him to be very… un-Flint.

[i-dont-know-how-this-site-works]

Tipping Point thoughts and commentary!

This episode gave me emotional whiplash, I was smiling, I was laughing, I was crying and concerned.

-HOWZER!!! It's been 84 years, buddy!

-Echo!!! It's been 84 years, my love!

-Damn, you can really see how superior clones are to normal recruits. A tiny bunch of them managed to infiltrate a ship full of regular troopers and didn't even break a sweat.

-Echo, Tech rubbed off on you too much. When the empire is showing up, you don't dilly dally with the data terminal, you dally your ass out of there.

-Crosshair! It's been like, 2 weeks.

-That music was eerie as hell

-You are a smart cookie, Cross.

-He's been a real asshole, but please, don't hurt him!

-"You know how they operate", bitch, the last time Cross saw them they were dead set on being soldiers, now they are chilling on a Mediterranean island and eating sushi, he doesn't know anything

-Why did they have to include that meaty sound when they stabbed Cross with the needle

-Coruscant! It's been 84 years, you beautiful, filthy thing!

-Ryo Chuchi! It's been 84 years, my queen!

-"I know someone who can crack it" Yeeees, the reunion!!!

-Why would you lay your weapon by the prisoner's hand. Why. God, you stormtroopers are so useless.

-Lay your ass down Cross, a shitface-drunk British tourist would outperform you

-Cross, no. Just no. Listen to her! You are walking straight into walls, how are you going to get out of there

-He is warning them, my heart T_T he wasn't trying to escape at all

-What it feels like to walk be a group of smokers

-Wrecker fishing! Forget what happened, I am happy now

-"Is that all you are? A soldier?" yeeess, Shep, you tell him!

-Ohh, Tech, my poor boy. Do you need a barf bag?

-"The collision alarms haven't gone off once" Omega, you pure, innocent thing

-Tech has really been stroking his ego lately, I love a confident king

-Tech screaming in terror

-I don't think the ship was designed to bear this much g-force

-Aww, she is so happy to hear him <3 I can't deal with it

-Echo definitely told Omega to race him just so he can mess with Tech

-dazed Tech stumbling off the ship

-Awww, she launched herself at Echo!!! She loves him so much <3

-Shit, we are back at Tantiss. Happy times with episode 14 are over

-"Hunter, look at them playing together! Your kid must be so happy here!"

"Yeah, Wrecker is really enjoying the island."

-Echo wants them to engage more, while Hunter is just concerned about his squadmates. The way Hunter asked what will be Echo's final line. He is worried about Echo, and rightfully so.

-Tech's face when he told them Cross was on the transport :(

-Hunter doesn't trust him. Not entirely unwarranted, considering what happened the last time they were all together, but knowing what's happening to Cross, that hurts.

-"How do we find out" Hunter looking at the pic of Dr.Hemlock with that look in his eyes...you are not suggesting actually going there, are you?

-"She means nothing to you." Knowing he saved her life last season and sent out a transmission to get them to hide Omega, I think he does care in some way.

Hooo boy, what a great episode! I just want all of them back together and feeling fine, is that too much to ask, Filoni and co??