#like on the. episode where they had the marathon for example

[seis-moved]

yk smth i rly appreciate abt cardcaptor sakura is that sakura doesn’t get a magical outfit w the weapon. n also that the messes that are formed from the cards own doing do not disappear after she captured them. i feel like the fact that the weapon doesn’t give her a costume that hides sakuras identity + doesn’t clean wtv mess the cards made gives her a bigger sense of. Responsibility. and like. Ownership towards her actions. if it makes sense?

[justsalpals]

I always knew about Stede's self-centeredness and lack of empathy (or more accurately: lack of thought/consideration) for those around him. It was a part of the character, often played for laughs, and always seemed born of a cheerful ignorance and inability to see outside himself originating from his life of privilege rather than any greed or selfishness.

I assumed a major part of the story would be him growing as a person and learning what it really meant to be a captain. How to care for and look out for the crew. It seemed so engrained into the show's concept, before Ed even showed up, that it never once occurred to me that he just. Wouldn't.

There are examples all over the show, but there's an example that cut me far deeper than the rest. That completely changes how much leeway I was willing to give the character, and made me genuinely so mad for the crew.

You guessed it. It's about Ed, the complete disregard of the crew's wishes and boundaries, and him proving his own hypocrisy and how he's completely willing to manipulate and disregard what I'd thought was a core tenant to his character (ie: "talking it through" meeting others with kindness and understanding, ect.)

It's about how the crew voted Ed to be banished, and Stede invited him back the very same night. It's about "one night" suddenly becoming an extended stay. It's about Stede actually fucking shushing people voicing their concerns and feelings during the apology. It's about what a big deal they made about the probation compromise, Ed in a sack and bell until the crew was comfortable with him again and (once again) Ed literally being back in his leathers 24 hours later. (I usually mentally insert at least a few days between episodes, but we know that wasn't the case here because of Lucius and Pete's engagement sex marathon.)

How many of you wanna bet that the crew genuinely got together and decided they were comfortable with Ed again, after he what? Caught one fish with Fang? Or would you rather bet that Ed got bored of humoring them? Because I know where I'd put my money.

And the crew's attitude breaks my heart, the general vibe summed up by Archie shortly after Ed's non-apology. This is just what happens. It's like when she had to fight Jim to death in the storm. This is just how it goes. The people in charge make the rules, and everyone else just has to deal with it.

So much for the new age of piracy, huh? Sounds like Stede fits right in with how it's always been, just dressed up in empty kind words and false promises.

[bakedbakermom]

can you tell use more stories of what it was like waiting/watching the x files when it was on air?>:)

i was late to the fandom - i stumbled across the episode Humbug during the hiatus between s6-s7 and was HOOKED. i was also, unfortunately, 13 at the time, and not allowed to use the internet nearly as much as i wanted. so i can't tell you about what the fandom was like before 1999.

HOWEVER i can tell you that the end of s7 was a nail biter, and the summer between 7 and 8 was filled with an unprecedented surge in fanfic as we all tried to imagine what season 8 would bring. (i wrote one that i may return to at some point, it was very apocalyptic.) there were a LOT of angry fans when robert patrick was announced as joining the cast, to the point where many of us felt like scully hitting him with water in Within was meant to be a catharsis for US.

what i miss most about those days, however, is how creative and connected the fandom was. there were web hosts out there like angelfire and geocities where anyone could make their own completely free website about whatever they wanted, with a simple wysiwyg interface (what you see is what you get, aka drag and drop) so even the most tech-illiterate among us could make something cool - and if you knew html (or had lissaexplains bookmarked) you could make something truly spectacular.

there would be surges of new fic and fanart after every episode (some more than others lol). you would find screencaps and videos on napster from those who had better tech than you. being 13 with a strict 10pm bedtime and no computer of my own, i couldn't hop on the forums after the episode like i wanted; instead i'd have to wait until monday afternoon after school to catch up on all the hot goss and new content, and i had NO irl friends who watched the show until high school (literally day one a girl named jenn spotted xf art on my binder and we were friends immediately). so you can imagine that by the time 3:00 rolled around i was positively VIBRATING with the need to talk about it.

there was one official forum and dozens of fan-made offshoots (walter's wenches, for example, started as a sub-board on the main forum and then became its own group) that felt like small towns. you could follow individuals or threads and get notifications for posts and updates. this was before social media, so it was all as anonymous as you wanted it to be.

i met several penpals on the official board that i stayed in touch with for years after the series ended and the board was shut down. one of them was a collector of xf memorabilia up in canada from whom i was able to buy several tapes of hard-to-find episodes (if you missed one, you had to hope for a rerun or a marathon) and merch (xf barbies my beloved) as well as extras like interviews and music videos and the celebrity deathmatch segment etc.

i miss late 90s/early 00s fandom so much.

also i was in catholic school and learned more about sex through fic than my school's pitiful sex ed would ever begin to touch on (did you know the penis goes in the vagina? because they never said that. did you know women can orgasm? because they never said that. etc)

[naoko-world]

Men aren't inherently bad

As a context I can sometimes see some people talk seriously about men as if them being men make them bad people. I could even see some people extending it to trans men!

But if you see, for example, more men being predatory than women, that's wrong to say every one of them are predators. They can even be strong allies!

To prove it to you I'll talk about some men who proved they were good people and far from predatory. Of course, I could talk about men I personally know but it will be better to concentrate on celebrities since talking about people I know won't make you that interested and will not prove anything to you.

But first, a bit of chauvinism

Still, I'll start by being a big chauvinist and talk about two french youtubers I see as feminists! (Even if none of them actually said they were.)

Le joueur du grenier (the gamer of the attic)

To introduce him a bit : He started his main emission by being inspired by the angry video game nerd and the nostalgia critic, and is one of the most popular youtuber in France. In his videos he's talking about bad old games, and sometimes talks about tv shows or other kinds of things that aren't games but are nostalgic (like old advertisements). He's also doing other things but I'll stop here since I'm not here to convince you to watch his videos.

In one video about Barbie games (this one in his second channel) he said as a joke "Pourquoi je joue à ça ? Parce que c'est marqué 'Software for girls', donc moi je veux prouver que même les mecs ils peuvent y arriver aussi." (Translation: "Why do I play it? Because it's written 'Software for girls' so I want to prove that the guys can do it too.") I don't know you but I always found it absolutely hilarious! And incredibly feminist!

Even better, in his most recent video he talked about Wii games for girls and, in it, he showed us a world where he's a woman (his role is played by an actress of course) and is playing the games with three other girls. The best is that it doesn't feel like a bad parody, you can really see him in this woman! It's not a stereotype!

Squeezie

OK now I'm talking about Squeezie, who's the Youtuber N°1 in France! He's basically the french Mr.Beast/Pewdiepie with a lot of concepts. His most popular is Who's the imposter, for which he added dubbing for one of the episodes.

To tell you about something pro-feminist he did, I could talk about his video about Kathrine Switzer, who's the first woman to run the marathon at a time where it was forbidden for women to run it. I could also mention his video where he invited one actress who was here to promote La maison des femmes (the house of women) which is a place where women can receive some care for various cases like when they're victims of violence.

Even better, in his emission Le pire date (the worst date), in the second episode, he was playing with 2 other men, but also one woman. Among the dates there was also one man. So we could see one woman trying to win some women's hearts (they're all actresses of course) and the men were seen trying to win a man's heart (also an actor).

Now for american celebrities!

It's time to talk about people you may know!

Keanu Reeves

This one surprised me a lot! Because I would never have thought about what he's praised for: not touching women when doing photos with them.

I personally did photos with celebrities and each time they were touching me because it's some kind of a automatism. It never bothered me because I never thought that I had the choice to refuse or accept being touched. So, hearing that Keanu Reeves don't touch women because, by default, he considers he doesn't have their consent... That makes me feel so happy! Also thinking about the possibility I could refuse to be touched during a photo.

Frederick Douglass

Here is an example of a man who escaped slavery to finally become a leader of the abolitionist movement in New York and Massachusetts. He was pretty famous for being a good orator and his writing against slavery but, according to a pdf from the secretary of the commonwealth of Massachussets, he was also fighting in favor of women's right to vote. I quote it: "Frederick Douglass’s lifelong commitment to women’s rights reflected a belief that rights should be universal, not limited by race or gender. He believed that disenfranchised groups should support each other."

Nice!

Fred Rogers

Well, this one I couldn't know them and I'm so happy I could learn about his existence!

For what I understood of it, he animated the children show Mr.Rogers's neighborhood, where he talked about many societal issues such as divorce or how to deal with issues of race. He also added in the show a recurring character who's an african-american police officer (played by François Clemmons), another character who is a mayor who is an african-american woman (played by Maggie Steward), and he showed his puppet Lady Elaine Fairchilde travel to Jupiter and discover a planet...

That man seemed to be a really good one who was embracing feminist values, as well as the anti-racism.

Danny DeVito

In an interview for The guardian, Danny DeVito has been asked if Hollywood is unfair to women. I love his answer, which is: ""I don't think it's only Hollywood, I think it's just generally speaking. Most men somewhere in their psyche are still dragging women around by their hair. It's terrible. I have two daughters, but even before my kids were born I always thought that it was terrible."

If we're asking about his actions, when Mara Wilson's mom got Breast cancer during the filming of Matilda he and his wife cared a lot for the girl, even inviting her at their home so she could forget a bit about her mother's illness. You can see more details on an article from Thelist.

Nonetheless that's so sweet of him!

Tom Hiddleston

Honestly when my friends suggested Tom Hiddleston because "he's a feminist" I was pretty skeptic. Especially since I heard men calling themselves "feminists" but being jerks outside of this.

But then, when looking for proof of it, I found this video showing many times where Tom Hiddleston was respectful toward women... Which convinced me he earned his place in my post... Especially with how many times in the video he's praising actresses he worked or is working with! Like OMG Tom I hope you really think that! Also... If I were them, I'd be touched by those words.

SquidTips

Back to YouTube with a man who made me question how I support trans people: Alex from the channel SquidTips.

Why is that? Because he's straight and cisgender but is showing the LGBT flag and trans flag in his logo and in his shorts where they're visible behind him (for example in this video). You can see in the screenshot that he even wears t-shirts with these flags.

He's also promoting LGBT rights in his longer videos, like in this one about why transgender women belong in women's sports.

What else do you want? He's awesome!

David Tennant

When thinking about good men one of the first people I thought about was David Tennant.

Like if I got fed up with him as The doctor since he returned in the role to be another incarnation of it, I still appreciate some things he has done and is probably still doing.

In the said things there's this t-shirt you can see him wearing during the promotion of Good Omens season 2, which is saying "Leave trans kids alone you freaks", and the trans and non-binary pins he sometimes put on.

In the same topic, he also said some things that are very pro-transgender and non-binary as the Media ThePinkNews reported.

And as a last one... My favorite...

Rick Riordan

Rick Riordan is, of course, Percy Jackson's author. He also wrote the sequels The heroes of Olympus and The trials of Apollo, as well as the spin-offs The Magnus chase and Kane Chronicles, and standalone books related to that universe.

Let's say that I admire this man... He included a lot of representations in his books after Percy Jackson ; which had been reproached to him by some parents who didn't want their children to learn about homosexuality, trans identity or other things he included ; but, in the first series, you can also see something awesome: strong and smart girls and women who aren't here only to please the male characters! I even think that Annabeth, Percy's soon-to-be-girlfriend, could have been the main character instead of Percy.

In the first series you can even see a daughter of Aphrodite and a daughter of Ares being besties and deeply loving each other (officially without them being in love with each other, especially since one of them has a boyfriend and the other one found her love interest at some point)... That's pretty touching! What is awesome is also how none of them are shamed for being either girly or not enough, they're only both two girls with different tastes.

I love these books, I love this man, I want to be a writer like him !

Adding that, outside of his books, he also created the imprint Rick Riordan presents, where he highlights books about other cultures or mythology written by other authors who asked to join the imprint. You can see a list of these books here!

Conclusion

As a conclusion I will only hope I could convince you that claiming that men are naturally predatory is a bad way to fight for women's rights but also incredibly wrong. Like I chose these examples but I was given many names ! No, being a man doesn't make anyone a bad person.

Also we can't fight for equality between the genders if we're stuck with the idea that the entirely male gender is an enemy of women. Furthermore, this idea brings some questions like "Do you consider that trans men are enemies too?" (Well, I saw some people who would reply "yes" to that question) and "What about non-binary people? Are they enemies or not?”

[clouseplayssims]

Get To Know Me

I was tagged by @esotheria-sims and @princesspiratecat, thank you!

Last Song: Basket Case by Green Day, I had my songs on shuffle but that’s pretty on point for my daily listening!

Last Movie: Soooo I’m currently doing a movie marathon this summer where I watch movies featuring a devil/Satan/Lucifer character. It started as a joke but it’s actually been pretty fun so far. Last night I watched All That Money Can Buy (1941) which had some great lines. It was a bit slow, but overall I’m rediscovering that I enjoy 30′s-70′s movies a lot more than modern films? They’re more structured, and character archetypes are much more rigid... but in a way that gave them so much more freedom to have specific character types without the need for exposition or explanations, which in turn makes it feel fresher and like there’s more variety to the characters? I dunno. It’s been an interesting experiment and I’m not even halfway through so far.

Currently Watching: Trixie Motel, The Orville New Horizons, and RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars. I tend to binge watch shows unless they are released in an episodic manner.

Currently Reading: Just started book 3 of the Temeraire series which is a fantastic history AU that is set during the Napoleonic wars and basically asks the question: what if dragons always existed and how would that impact history? Super good, highly recommend so far. I think there’s 9 total?

Current Obsession: Baking! I used to bake only when I was stressed, but with my newfound freetime I’ve been baking for fun and discovering I really like it. I’ve also been decorating and designing spaces in the house I now share with my partner and that’s been really fun since we’re both somewhat eccentric. The bedroom theme, for example, is Earth Science Lab in Space. My office is Metallic Witchy Library and my craft room/storage space is the Bitches & Stitches Room because between the two of us we have a lot of paintings/prints of historical women and they need to go somewhere!

I’m going to tag people I think haven’t been tagged yet, feel free to ignore if you’d rather not :) @ringa-starr, @niamh-sims, @simbury, and @berylliumsims

[permanentclawgrip]

okay this was originally part of my roommate rant post but imma do it separately because its more of a critique of a mindset:

I do not understand rapid completionist collecting culture

i know what youre saying, "eve, what the fuck are you talking about that makes no sense" let me explain

theres probably a proper term for it but I've noticed a worrying trend specifically in online spaces recently of rapid completionist collecting culture. basically a subculture of wider collectors which focuses on the attainment of a "complete collection" as fast as possible and often with a disregard for the actual content of what they are collecting. i have seen posts about this in comic collecting forums. ive seen similar kinds of posts on video game forums. my experience with it has been through my roommate though, who i will kind of vaguepost about (nothing new for this blog tho).

My roommate, who we'll call Adam (not his real name) for the sake of brevity, has a real strange relationship with these cultures. I first noticed it soon after i moved in with him, when he decided to watch every publicly available tv show and movie that marvel has made,,, ever,,, including every ,,, single ,,, saturday ,,, morning ,,, cartoon. this small feat took months. all catalogued in a nice tidy spreadsheet noting the runtime of them, the episode count of the shows, which storylines were adapted (iirc), and his overall rating (again iirc). this was not a months long project because oh he only watched an episode or two a day, no not at all. i would leave for work with some x-men cartoon playing in our living room and come home to fantastic 4 playing instead. every day. hours upon hours. it was not a simple, "oh one day ill watch them all eventually". it was a dedicated marathon of back to back to back marvel. it honestly completely burnt me out on all things superhero just being in proximity to it.

so what is there to take from this? "let people like stuff!" "its just a show why are you so mad?" well its hard to put my finger on it to be honest without sounding pretentious or hyperbolic. ill try my best...

in just a second...

first lets get pretentious!

i personally find this style of engaging with content to be very shallow. ive always kind of had a bone to pick with background watching, having a show on while doing some other task, but this is different. while background watching is annoying imo, most of the time people are doing so with shows that are kind of built for that (think sitcoms or light dramas) where you can kind of tune in and tune out on a whim and the point is more on the other activity that the show is the background stimulation for (i.e. homework, sewing, cooking, hanging with friends, etc.). in short, when background watching, the point is not to really watch the show. so that should be the polar opposite to what my friend was doing, right? nope! all these stats and all this time, just to usually be playing destiny or scrolling through DiscussingFilms' twitter posts for most of it. this is a recipe for not really getting anything from these shows.

secondly, the binge model is kind of horrible for story engagement or thematic understanding. there are very few stories in long form media which adapt well to binging. it has been discussed before, so im not going to re-litigate those arguments here, but suffice to say that binging is bad actually. pair that with these shows mostly being background fodder and it just strikes me as profoundly pointless.

Maybe I just have different wants from my media than others, but i usually like my media to have a point beyond just "it looks cool" or "it belongs to an ip i like". spin offs dont really excite me unless theres a reason for it to exist beyond just "hey look at this cool side character! guess what? theyre a main character now!" yes a lot of good stuff has come from "spin off" series (look at puss in boots: the last wish as just one example), but their mere existence will never excite me. i prefer to really watch movies or tv shows that im interested in: dim the lights, grab some popcorn, and set aside time to really engross myself in every detail. its not for every show and it is a little time consuming, but the depth in every piece of art that you learn to see is so worth it. but maybe thats not everyone priority.

okay now lets get hyperbolic!

im not going to sugar coat this and itll sound weird, but i see a lot of similarities between this kind of hyper obsessive yet shallow fixation and some very very disgusting subcultures online. and i dont mean that because i dont understand them. i mean that because i am sadly referencing many of the boys and young men who fall down the alt-right pipeline through porn fixation. if you do not know what i am talking about, youll have to trust me on this because i do not think that anyone should look these things up on their own because good god every trigger warning possible applies if you look at some of these peoples accounts. they make my stomach churn and i am pretty resilient to things. basically for those who dont know, what im referring to is a subculture of predominantly young men who become obsessed with porn and porn stars to the point that it is all they can think about. if this is giving hints of incels, it should because the venn diagram is actually just a smaller circle within a larger circle. their obsession and incel nature leads them to the expected political and social beliefs: misogyny, transphobia, grooming, forced marriage, etc. truly some of the worst humans.

now is this a leap? admittedly yes. but i dont think the comparison isnt without merit. the initial actions are the same and both lead to heavy levels of social isolation. sure you have your in group that understands every reference you make, but beyond them, you become stunted. that social isolation is the most dangerous fuel for a man to have.

overall thesis

i could write at length about this topic (and who knows i might one day) but ill keep it brief for now. in short, this trend of hyper obsessive binging that ive seen is extremely confusing to me at best and potentially dangerous at worst. i wish i had a way to break people's habits with this kind of thing but sadly i do not know how.

[inapat16]

To binge or not to binge...

This time we’ll stray a bit further from my previous endeavors, in which I focused on my own media consumption on Youtube, which is probably where I spend most time online. Because what I would like to consider here is not the what, but the how - how do we consume media nowadays, and more specifically why is binge-watching a thing? 

So, for those who may not know and have been sane enough to not get into a binging frenzy since covid, what is binge-watching? It consists in watching content, usually a tv show, during a large and somewhat continuous amount of time. For instance if you watch a whole season of a show in one sitting.

Researchers have traced this practice back to the mid-XXth century, but it was more about TV-shows that were long in themselves instead of viewers consuming content for a longer time. To me this isn’t binging, binging is first and foremost a viewer experience, like movie or TV buffs doing a marathon of their favorite show or movies, and this practice (not the word “binge”, which has been in use before as I said) seems to go back to the nineties.

It sprouted rhizomatically across the world, which interestingly coincides with globalization. Indeed, globalization allows for shared technologies around the world, and since content and the entertainment industry is always influenced by the technologies it relies on, it makes sense that even if the content is different, similar practice appears. In this case, binge-watching in the western world concerned mainly TV shows while in Japan it concerned animes, shonen especially, both due to the influence of the VHS and the dual formula of episodic releases on TV and VHS/DVD box set containing the whole season.

Also, I think it is worth noting that this dual formula may be more responsible for binging than what it seems at first glance. Binging isn’t just due to the boxset format, in which you can, and often do, watch more episodes than you would/could have when you caught your program on TV. Because TV releases induced a narrative constraint on writers in order to retain the audience, with the much known device of the cliffhanger. Therefore, when you have the opportunity to watch many episodes in a row, without being limited by the network programmation, but are still under the influence of cliffhangers, you tend to watch more episodes in a row than you would have if content wasn’t built like this. A Netflix study on binge-watching, showed that those kinds of suspenseful shows were more often binged than sitcoms with standalone episodes. Therefore the constraint still exists even if on Netflix the season release is common practice.

Showrunners haven’t been blind to this practice as well and have taken it into account in various ways. Some actors of the industry spoke against it, pleading for their work not to be released in bulk (see https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/05/tv-binge-vs-episode-by-episode-backlash). While others, while not advocating for it explicitly, have thought of their serial content as a tightly bonded sum of parts. The most striking example to me being the third season of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks. The show is cryptic enough as it is, but I remember (fondly) the time it came out and we had to wait a week or two to watch more episodes but did not understand much of it. While once we could binge it, the show changed before our eyes, the pace stopped seeming sluggish and turned into an eerie sleepy experience, coinciding quite well with the state of the main character Dale Cooper turned into a goofy oddball named Dougie. 

Anyway, while I certainly have not completely exhausted the subject, I hope I managed to show you what I thought were some key features of binge-watching. So “to binge or not to binge”, is that really the question? I don’t think it is morally wrong as you may read somewhere, nor that it is a must or even a practice that will keep going, but regardless, let us know in the comment what shows you have been binge-watching lately! William Renard

[des8pudels8kern]

I am at a point in my life where I take pride in taking care of my mental health.

I’ve had my first obvious depressive episode in my teens, and the first instance of anxiety negatively impacting my life that I remember was in kindergarten. There was little awareness of mental health when I was growing up, and my family in particular didn’t do feelings, so no one said or did anything. It wasn’t until my mid-twenties, when I got to a point where I realised that what I was doing wasn't working, I couldn't handle things I wanted/should be able to handle, and decided to get therapy to help me get better at, well, life. Reflecting on how I am and consciously actively taking care of myself is something I first had to learn while dismantling toxic and ultimately harmful coping mechanisms from my youth, and had to work on and continue to work on systematically and determinately

I have learned a lot about myself since then. I’ve learned about what I want, what I need, how I function, and how to take care of myself. The question I always ask myself is What do I need to be okay in the long run?

So far, I’ve worked out three main tenets that I use to manage and improve my life.

It's not your fault if you struggle, but it is both your responsibility to handle your issues and your right to demand help with them. There are people whose job it is, who are literally getting paid to help you! And if your government/health insurance covers this help, that means it's your due and you are entitled to it! You pay for it with your taxes and insurance fees. Others pay for it with their taxes and insurance fees. I today pay my taxes and insurance fees to pay for these services for other members of my community, and I am happy to do so because I am paying it forward. Personally, I’ve accepted that I’ll probably always be susceptible to certain issues, and that some outside factors and life changes will always be risk factors for me. (To put it plainly, I don’t handle unemployment well. The loss of structure in my daily life, the loss of social interaction and the positive reinforcement I draw from these interactions, the insecurity and restrictions that come with not having an income are the perfect storm of triggers for me.) It’s not that different from e.g. having an old leg injury. You’ve done your physio, it’s fine, you can go about your daily life with no problem, but adding a new strain on top or being forced to do extreme hiking or running a marathon will likely cause it to act up again and leave you with a limp, crutches, and another couple of months of physio where others without that same medical history would be okay once the muscle soreness eases. Learn which things are load-bearing for you and protect them. This one I got from @theunitofcaring on tumblr, actually, and you can read their post here.  For example, one of mine is scheduling a social activity on Saturday, but keeping Sunday free for me to be by myself, recharge, and also cook. I love my friends, and I do have enough people in my life that I could easily go meet up with someone/one group on Saturday and someone else on Sunday, but I'm introverted enough that a day of solitude is more important for my well-being that a second day of friends. Plus, I know I am drained after I come home from work and don't usually don't have the energy to cook dinner, so cooking a lot on Sunday and then having enough food in the fridge to last until Thursday or Friday is me making sure I can crash and decompress after work. As I said, taking care of myself. And my newest addition, decided on during the second pandemic lockdown when life had once again ground to a halt but I had already realised the first lockdown had pushed me into a depressive episode and was in the middle of systematically building myself back up: Do things, and try one new thing every year. I’ve always been great at wanting and planning, but less so at implementing. I get sluggish and lazy (my fellow Germans will know the power of the Schweinehund), or I overthink matters, and either way end up procrastinating more and more. This does save me from exertion and disappointment, but also from excitement, experiences, and discovering new things I like that will make my life richer and fuller. This summer, I tried stand-up paddling after years of wanting to give it a go but never going through with it because my closest friends don’t want to. I finally ended up asking a newer, less close acquaintance, who was all for it. We both loved it and have agreed to do a proper course next summer to learn the right moves. Bonus: making overtures like this or accepting them when they come your way is how acquaintances turn into friends. This fall, I'm going to take a painting class. Just booked it the other day. My grandmother painted, and I've always wanted to try but never dared because I can't even draw a decent stick figure. So now, I'm taking a course, just to give it a go and see if I enjoy it. Maybe I’ll love it. maybe I’ll be good at it. Maybe I’ll both suck at and hate it, but will still get the satisfaction of putting the regret of never have asked my grandmother to teach me to rest. Either way, I’ll be an experience richer afterwards.

I have little doubt that, at some point in the future, I’ll struggle again. But, all in all, I’m the happiest, healthiest today that I ever remember being, and with each depressive episode my toolbox to deal with mental health issues grows and the time it takes me to overcome depression and get better decreases. And this I am so, so proud of.

[outrunningthedark]

Think fandom as a whole has too many expectations regarding 5b and will be disappointed if some of our theories don’t happen but this is 9-1-1 some of the scenes will be better than what we imagined whereas others won’t be

I know I come across as the negative type who likes to ruin people's fun, but those posts are never directed at anyone who understands speculation cannot and should not be treated as 100% facts. It's the folks who express genuine anger or disappointment when an episode doesn't meet their expectations that need the reality check. We're not writing the show. We're not directing it. We're not making the decisions. Buck and Eddie's relationship is progressing at the pace that Tim, Kristen & co. feel is most appropriate given where they started. This isn't LS and Buddie isn't Tarlos. TPTB are not going to put our boys in a "romantic" moment before they've figured out how to deal with the whole "Lol, remember when we told you they were straight? We lied." part of the story. If it's taking too long and fans are running out of patience? The option to leave is always available. I want to specifically highlight this part of your ask - but this is 9-1-1 some of the scenes will be better than what we imagined - because it's SO TRUE and I wish people focused on the stuff we DIDN'T expect as opposed to the stuff that was expected and not given. Let's use 5A as an example just because it's still fresh in our minds: - Eddie had a panic attack alright. Over the idea of marrying Ana. - I don't remember anyone correctly predicting the doctor would be the one to tell Buck Eddie was hospitalized??? - FIRST hug between Buck and Chris where Buck LIFTS him into his arms!!! Hello!!! Still screaming about it!!! - "He takes Christopher [to the zoo] all the time. Has the place memorized." - "You need to tell me when something is wrong." & "Is that enough?" - WHO knew the EddieAna break up was gonna be LIKE THAT!!! "Maybe you should go home first." That was an "Oh. We're really doing this." moment for everyone!!! - B A L C O N Y S C E N E - Eddie having none of Buck's "I'm requesting a transfer" bullshit (those expressions!!! the attitude!!!) and saying "You're stuck with us." - Buck approaching Mitchell and that other guy when they threaten Christopher??? Eddie saying Buck's name ONE TIME and giving him *a look* in a silent plea to get him out of the ambulance??? Buck SAYING EDDIE'S NAME AS HE HEARS A GUNSHOT??? AND THEN SCREAMING FOR HIM AS HE RUNS OUTSIDE??? - Buck knowing he had to get Eddie out of his head when they think Parker and his sister died in the hospital fire - Buck calling Eddie out on the fact that he secretly enjoys telenovelas - Buck asking what the doctor said about Christopher's recent nightmare because he knew Eddie wouldn't hide that from him I have my grievances with 5A (piss poor planning/organization, the erasure of Chimney killed my spirit because I wanted the firefam helping with Jee, and I had no use for BT when Buddie is right there and MW's acting is not up to par), but you will never see me *seriously* complaining about the Buddie content we were blessed with. ALL of the details I listed took place while each one of the guys was in a relationship WITH SOMEONE ELSE. What do you *think* is gonna happen when we no longer have to deal with TKelly and Eddie is still single? Season three ringing any bells? What about early season four before Ana showed up? Marathon, not a sprint, y'all. Let's take it one week at a time.

[herorps]

shadow and bone and racism

shadow and bone just came out so i can now finally break my silence bc holy shit do they go ham on the racism and me being me, i just have to tell you all about it. possible spoilers and triggers for anti-asian racism and microaggressions.

to preface, i was very privileged to receive a screener for the entire first season last month and i was actually excited to watch it bc i have friends who love the books and the show piqued my interest since it was announced. and i also have to say that i never read the books and i probably never will ( tho i’ve been told i would like soc ) but i did like the show overall. 

i think sab is a good adaptation and that the fans will like this show. i thoroughly enjoyed it and as someone who had very little to almost no knowledge about the books, i didn’t have trouble keeping up with the fantastical world. 

however that doesn’t mean i can’t be critical of it. 

i think the show can actually benefit from people being critical about it because so far, it feels like they took a very tone deaf direction and ran a marathon with it. 

what i’m talking about, is alina starkov being half-shu. 

now, i said before that my interest was piqued for this show when it was announced and one of the major reasons is the casting of biracial actress, jessie mei li, in the role of alina starkov. i can’t tell you how happy i was to see that a half-chinese actress was cast as the lead in a series based on such a beloved ip, especially since the creators of the show consciously changed alina’s ethnicity to be half-shu before casting calls were even sent out. ( for those of you who are also non-book readers, shu is the race of people from the country, shu han, and is based off primarily mongolian and chinese cultures ) 

so i was endeared with the idea that this character, that is coded white, was deliberately changed to be coded asian ( and coded mixed race to boot ) because the producers wanted to include diversity into the show. i commend that, i love that, i support that. but i believe the way they handled it, shouldn’t have been the way they handled it. and it’s because alina’s race is constantly brought up. 

obviously of course race is going to be brought up at some point. alina in the show is surrounded by white people when we first see her, and her home country of ravka does have a hostile history with shu han----i get it. racism is going to play a part in alina’s story. but it doesn’t necessarily need to go so far as to constantly remind the audience that she is shu in almost every interaction she has with someone she meets. 

and that’s a big part of the issue, is that nearly everyone she meets will bring up the fact that she’s part-shu. and a lot of the time, it’s said with hostility. now i’m not exactly sure if i’m just being particularly sensitive because of certain recent events, but the anti-asian racism hits differently these days. idk. 

because that’s what it is, at the end of the day. it’s racism. alina is often the target of very hostile racism and it seems to mainly be directed at her character and her character only. 

and honestly, on a surface level it makes sense, i sort of understand what the producers are trying to do. ravka has a turbulent history with shu han and were involved in wars with them and they’re often seen as the enemy so obviously that would affect a shu-mixed person growing up in ravka, a very white country. but on a deeper level, it reminds me a lot of the anti-japanese sentiments during wwii. the production team even created a banner that i felt called back to those anti-japanese propaganda of that era. ( mind you it was shown multiple times, in main focus, and acknowledged by characters that were coded shu ) 

but on the other hand, they’ve done a considerable job to diversify at least the ethnic makeup of ravka. there are black and brown grisha at the school and there are people of different cultures ( noted by costuming, etc. ) in ketterdam and there’s even a shu-appearing trainer that teaches the grisha to fight. so my question is, why is this very hostile treatment primarily geared toward shu people and geared toward alina specifically? it just doesn’t make sense to me. 

and when i say it’s specifically geared toward alina, i mean that it’s very apparent that they’re targeting her specifically, because mal  ( played by a possibly mixed-race archie renaux ) is also coded to be of mixed shu blood. while it is not explicitly stated that mal is shu, it is heavily implied that he is mixed, but he is never subject to the treatment that alina is, and the only times he is subject to racism is when alina is also present. in scenes where we see alina and mal as kids, they are often both referred to as “mutts” or “half-breeds”. but when they are older, only alina is continuously called those things. 

this isn’t even touching the microaggressions she faces after she’s at grisha school and this one line that made my gut wrench so viscerally i had to pause the episode and replay the part so i could confirm what i heard. [ episode 3 spoiler warning ] i’m trying to avoid posting screenshots or from spoiling parts of the show but there’s a scene where alina is being cleaned up and made presentable by servants and one of them says “I’d start by making her eyes less Shu.” [ end episode 3 spoiler ] i don’t think i have to explain to anyone how offensive that is. and i understand that the intention was to show how racist this servant is, that the entire point of of this weird racism plot is to show how the people of ravka can be racist and ignorant, but to have that line be written by a white writer, approved by a white showrunner and said by a white character to the face of an asian actor/character feels very tactless. it feels like another antagonist alina has to go against is racism itself. 

what also turns me off about this scene is that jessie mei li revealed that this scene is what actresses had to audition with. “...the sides that they sent for the audition, like Alina is talking to Genya and they’re talking about her eyes and they’re talking about her Shu ancestry.” having actresses of mixed-asian ancestry come in and act out that scene for white producers doesn’t really sit right with me. and i know that there’s an argument to be had about how it’s important to show the minutia of what it’s like to be ethnic in a world ruled by white supremacy and that it’s important to show how alina’s race affects her story, but i don’t think that going this far is necessary to the development of plot or character. 

and i don’t personally know jml, i don’t know how she feels about the show apart from what she’s probably briefed to talk about in interviews, but it is perfectly valid for me to feel iffy about the microaggressions while she feels that it’s necessary for character development ( again, this is just an example, i have no clue what she thinks of the racism ). our experiences are different, our upbringings are different, but we’re both happy to see representation and i’m happy that she’s happy to see an actual mixed-chinese character on screen as the lead. 

i’m glad that the producers were open to diversity and were open to making the lead a person of color, but it’s things like the treatment of shu characters and exchanges like “Tell her...Oh, I don’t know...good morning.” “I don’t actually speak Shu.” and “I didn’t know the Zemeni had such talent.” “She’s Suli.”  ( zemeni is a race of “dark-skinned” people and suli are coded south asian/mena/wena so this exchange is just white people mixing the brown people up )  that remind me the majority of the writers and producers are white. 

now i’m not saying that you should boycott the show or that this show is the most problematic thing to ever grace my retinas, because i really enjoyed watching it and i want to see what season 2 has in store ( more crows content please ). but, i want you all to please keep all of this in mind when you watch the series and think critically of what kinds of unconscious biases these producers had. you’re allowed to have nuanced opinions, you’re allowed to be critical of the media you enjoy so long as you understand where some people’s criticisms are coming from---where my criticisms are coming from. i just hope in future seasons the treatment of alina gets better and that she actually learns to love her shu side because otherwise it’s just going to be problematic as the show continues. 

[monsoonblooms12]

The Butterfly Effect (Ethan Ramsey x f!MC)

Summary: The Journey from where it all began to where they are now. From a 2-minute power nap to a Miami kiss, Pooja and Ethan have come a long way. From Pooja's POV (Set in OH Bk 1 Ch 10 and contains flashbacks from OH Bk 1 Ch 1, Ch 4 and Ch 5)❤

The Butterfly Effect: Discovered by Edward Lorenz, this theory suggests that something small and insignificant, can alter situations in such a way that leads to utterly drastic changes. For example, a butterfly flaps its wings at an Amazonian Jungle and subsequently a storm ravages half of Europe. (This has to be one of my favorite theories ever🦋)

A/N: I got inspired from a dark Academia quote and here we are with 2.4K of mess. But I enjoyed providing all the fbs from Poo's POV and filling in the gaps of the unknown. And all the DbC peeps, I am trying to finish ch 8 believe me😭

Thank you so much to @jamespotterthefirst for Pre-reading! Love you🧡

If you enjoyed the story, please like it, leave a comment or reblog. Your feedback keeps me going🦋

Pairing: Ethan Ramsey X f!MC (Pooja Sharma)

Word Count: around 2.4K

Rating: General

Category: A messy mix of Fluff and Angst

Warnings: None that I found

A grain of sand, almost imperceptible to the human eye, 2 millimetres in diameter. Just a tiny little grain of sand, a single one. One would wonder how great of an effect that could produce?

A single grain of sand, eliminated from the base of a sand sculpture, can set on fire a cascade of events that result in something as drastic as the demolition of the entire sculpture. Just a trifling 2 mm sized grain of sand.

Tufts of hair gently swayed with the swooshing ocean breeze, the very grains of sand of which her mind was thinking about slip through gaps of her toes. It's a calming atmosphere, having a Zen-like effect on her racing heart and confused reasoning.

The echoing crash of ocean tides, the hushed ruffle of her shimmering purple dress, and the pattern of her footsteps of the white sand, now silver under the enchanting moonbeams.

She could not think about bad ideas and good ideas anymore. Nor could she obliterate the delicate touch of peach lips ingrained in her mind. Everything was a lock of tangled hair, a chaotic mess in her mind.

And when you can't disentangle a mess, you just tear it off.

That was what she was doing, tearing herself away before her mind got engulfed by a cocoon of ambiguity and concealed probabilities, restricting her to get out without getting transformed into someone else.

Legs exhausted after strolling for who knows how long, Pooja sits down, not bothering about the sheet of sand fragments that adhered begrudgingly to the purple satin.

A simple motion ensues, the florid hair tie holding her brown hair strands in a ponytail, now lay in her hand, giving them the liberty to enjoy the tranquillity of the idyllic scene they found themselves in.

Relaxation. That was what she anticipated. The soothing of her racing heart, the clearing of her muddled head, the easing of her bothering thoughts.

But it never came, the relaxation she desired.

Instead, her fingers, for a reason mysterious even to her, fidgeted the diamond imitation bracelet that embellished her left wrist. A twitch unveiled a vague scar, a remembrance of an old episode entirely cleared off from her mind.

Flashback

Pooja was a Potterhead. An extreme one indeed. Sometimes the thought made her chuckle. How she despised the books once, presuming they were overrated. And then, as if a magic trick had been performed on her, she became the Maven of the Harry Potter club.

But being a Potterhead and having to live in a niche under the stairs did not go hand in hand. The room under a staircase was still a room under a staircase. And every day, her mind replayed the poem of curses to her, as if to warn her to never search for an apartment on a Facebook Group ever again.

And now she stood, waiting for the century-old toaster's ping, as sleep struck like pin-pricks on her eyelids, threatening to close them off. It was a bad day today, the phone battery drained, and she, coffee drained. And the cherry on the top? Today was the first day of her residence at the most prestigious hospital in the entire States.

Uff!

She yawned the hundredth time, sleep playing a tiring game of chess with her mind, and giving it a Check! every now and then.

I don't even know a goddamn coffee shop around in here!

Displeased grunts accompanied the thought as she took the knife and began slicing the apple she had been floundering around for quite some time.

One Slice, and Another, and Ano-

Snorr!

What an ability it was to fall asleep anywhere, in any position! What harm would a "Power Nap" of a minute or two do? Right?

AAHHH!

The scream came out in bits, first when her eyes fluttered open with the sudden pain. A pause followed when she actually looked at the source of it and after her eyes and mind registered what was happening, came the second scream.

She was getting the taste of just how profitable the power nap was.

Hurrying away, she rummaged around for a first aid box, failed to find it, trotted to her Harry Potter adobe and took out the medical goodies she had brought with her. After ransacking through it, she found the antiseptic and the swabs she was looking for. Then a faint sound came from the blinking cellular and she picked it up, not waiting for breakfast. Just as she clicked the unlock button...

HOLY SHIT!

What? How? Her mind could not register. The only thing she understood was that she was notoriously late for her first day, and now she would have to do all the running that she had avoided for all the preceding years.

Letting out another pained groan, she kicked two flowerpots on her way to the kitchen, took the toasted slices of bread, switched off the stupid piece of machinery and ran.

She was sure she would have come first in any marathon if she had run in them with the speed she was racing right now.————————————————————————

Did she know about Dolores Hudson? No, she didn't. Had she planned on telling about her to Dr Ramsey? No, she hadn't.

The two words had inadvertently slipped off her tongue, not envisioning it as an indication. But as soon as they reached his ears, it felt as if a domino had been pushed. One pushed on to the other, leading to a chain of events that had given no hints, no warnings at all.

And now she was in the NICU, chatting with the man whom she considered an idol, a role model as if they were old companions. It was an enchanting experience to see the intern-terrorizing gentleman, so ... normal.

She questioned her mind's choice of word, but she did not completely disagree. To see Dr Ramsey, sitting here with an intern, talking with her, for no particular purpose other than the fact that she decided to stay back here in contrast to any other person, who would have valued their sleep than watching over a premature baby with whom she had no connection.

When sleep muddled her thoughts, she didn't realize what she was doing. Head lowered into his shoulder in a motion that felt like a reflex embedded in the nerve cords of her spine. She missed the gentle smile, decorating the handsome face of his, as he watched her from the corner of his eye, his eyes holding an emotion unrecognizable.

Was it affection? Pride? Adoration? Or something completely different? Who knew.

But if there was something she did know after that day, it was that she felt lucky, damn lucky, for that slip of the tongue.————————————————————————

How idiotic of her the decision was, she didn't want to talk about it.

Pooja had only found herself running the way she was running now on the first day of her residence, and she had only herself, and no one else to blame.

Why did she think that giving up on the most wanted position for every medicine intern in Edenbrook for friends when every one of them participated in it was a good idea?

If only her brain comprehended her priorities appropriately, she wouldn't have to rush through roads like a person who was missing their train.

Panting, grunting, and completely tensed, she arrives at Edenbrook. Steps don't slow down until she arrives before the light beige door, huffs and puffs, not pausing for a split second. She doubted if her legs still had the power to walk or if she would have to crawl into the office.

Nah, no more embarrassment, she would not be able to bear it. With the power that remained in overworked limbs, she knocked, entered and gave her reasons for the delay. And then, by a margin of a minute, she signed the sheet, absolutely normal but still holding the power to twist her entire life in an unforeseen way.

But did she regret it? She couldn't, and she wouldn't.————————————————————————

Miami. The city of gorgeous beaches, giving the aesthetic of peach and teal life. The expensive marble-floored hotel rooms in which she found herself was unreal. Definitely not made for some random intern.

Gorgeous decorated interior, delicately manicured lawns, elegantly made fountains, all standing majestically, giving a fight to each other. She glided through the vast space, joy overcoming job as she breathed the calming salty air coming from the oceanfront, which appeared like a picture frame in front of her. She had never seen anything so perfect in her life.

It was like Ataraxia.

She preferred Mountains over Beaches. She always had, and without a doubt, she always will. But when something looks so heavenly, it would be absolute stupidity to forego the chance of visiting it, even if it contrasted her preferences.

Forgetting the not-so-pleasant interaction with Declan Nash, which appeared like a stone in her perfect day, she let her sensations delve into the delicious culinary masterpieces that melted in her mouth like wax.

All the merrymaking and socializing drained her. But the gentle talks, soft giggles that she shared with him, an extraordinary, priceless moment, seemed to charge her, rejuvenate her. A corner of her heart did hope for something to happen. But she hushed it, not wanting to spoil the casualness, the beauty of the simplicity that blew in the air between them.

It felt like existing in the setting of one of those Michael Faudet quotes, one of them particularly being emphasized by her mind.

"As our eyes meet, all-time seizes to exist. The dying second frozen like petals of red roses kissed by autumn frost."

Pooja's mind still reeled, falling freely into the void as passion and some unnamed emotion overtook them. His heart steady under the touch of her palm and hers racing under the touch of his. She would not be able to remove the unreal image from her idiot of a heart, even if she wanted to.

Sleep refused to come to her, even after calling it repeatedly. She sat up, relieving the memory, playing in front of her like a sepia movie on the silver screen. Eyes travelling around, only to fall on a bouquet kept neatly at one of the antique corner tables.

It was white lilies and purple orchids.

Pooja Sharma didn't know the language of flowers when she received them, with a tag casually signed as E. A vague tag like that did not help to know the actual sender. The man whom she kissed had a name beginning with E, the hotel she was staying in had a name beginning with E.

Hell, even the hospital she worked in had a name with the letter E.

But if she had known the language of flowers, she would have pinpointed the symbolism hidden in it.

The White Lily carrying the meaning of Purity, Sweetness while Purple Orchids a clear cut indicator of admiration and elegance.

She would have been able to tell which E had sent the delicately wrapped piece that now lay uncared for in the corner of her room.

Feelings overcrowded reason, and she found herself suffocated in the very room that seemed heavenly to her in the morning.

Slowly and silently, she walked away to find the solace which he or she could not give her, in nature.

Flashback ends

As the amaranthine ocean glistens, waves crash and the foamy water rushes to engulf her feet as she stood, hands wrapped around herself, she felt she had truly found solace. There was a spiral, an unending coil of memories, a string which, when pulled, tugged in emotions hidden in darkest corners, forgotten but related, all tied together.

It was surprising, enigmatic, how much the little brain of hers, the soft heart of hers, holds in them. A constant battle of reason and emotions ravage the tired battlefields of her body. How casually, reminiscences of a bygone day appears, flicker like the reflection in the mirror of the calm pond water, but remain clear through the ripples that spread on the surface from time to time. That's how memories work, still clear, still dear, even after passing through chaotic ripples of time.

As she reaches the end of the spiral, the helix of her thoughts, she finds herself even more astonished than she was when she reverted to the first pages of the memoirs of her stay in Boston.

It was just a minute, or a word or two. Always so insignificant.

Every ignored act added one upon another and resulted in the catastrophic mess of heartbreak and affection she found herself today.

The 2-minute Power Nap of her first day? It led to the 2-degree shift of the knife and the scar that her finger was tracing now.

That 2-degree shift led to the delay in her reaching the hospital?

It resulted in her meeting her mentor, which gave her the chance to do the thoracotomy with him, to experience how it felt when his hand enveloped hers.

Those two words that slipped as a nonchalant thought off her tongue? It was why she could know how Ethan Ramsey was, behind the tough exteriors, the short-tempered demeanour, how it felt to place her head gently on his shoulder, to wake up to his glowing face.

And that one minute past midnight, when she signed up for the challenge that would change her life? That is why she is here, hair ruffling and eyes glistening, the Leucos Moon reflecting on the glistening water, the crepuscule spread mystically around her. That is why she knew how it felt to be touched by him, kissed by him, to get lost in him.

When Edward Lorenz discovered the butterfly event, he had correlated mathematics and meteorology. Had he thought that the same butterfly effect had turned an unassuming intern's life upside down, pushed her so back in the void of circumstances that it was impossible to come back?

Just a 2-degree shift of a knife, and now she was here in Miami. Just like the unassuming butterfly's flap of wing, which now ravaged a storm through her life.

Glassy droplets make a slow trail down the curve of her cheeks and drop on the scar as if trying to meet the origin which has brought her to the coordinates of the present.

And even though she did not know what would happen in the days to come, she was happy, truly happy, for that shift of her knife and for the 2 minutes of the power nap.

For the butterfly effect of love.

PS: Thank you so much for reading and I hope you have a great day ahead! Love, Manamee🧡.

Tags (Please let me know if you want to be added or removed or if I forgot you):

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@choicesficwriterscreations @openheartfanfics @choicesbookclub

[rachelbethhines]

Tangled Salt Marathon - Day of the Animals

While perhaps not my favorite episode this season, Day of the Animals is easily the best written story of season three. Even so, it still has problems due to the third season’s poor approach to characterization. 

Summary: Rapunzel, Varian, Angry and Red are returning stolen loot that the two girls had stolen years ago. They are accompanied by Max, Pascal, Ruddiger and Hamuel who all cannot stop quarreling with each other (or in Hamuel's case, just being useless). While messing with a sea shell pendant, it magically transports the humans into it, leaving the animals to fight over it. A minor thug named Dwayne, steals the pendant forcing the animals to work together to retrieve it. 

So Why is a Polynesian Inspired Kingdom Within Riding Distance of a Northern European Country? 

If you’ll remember my review of Beginnings, Neserdina’s princesses were wearing Polynesian garb and dancing the Hula when prepping for the competition. Now I’ve already went into length as to why that’s not good representation, but in addition to that it’s also just plain dumb. You can’t just transport one ethic group and dump them into another part of the world because it’s convenient for you. You don’t earn any brownie points for doing that. Especially when your fantasy world is still based off of our own historical earth. 

To make things even more confusing, we actually saw Neserdina way back in season one in Way of the Willow. It’s where Willow bought the gremlin knock-off. 

That is an island. How the heck do you get to a volcanic island riding in a horse and cart? And don't tell me they’re riding to a port, because Corona is a port city already. They could have gotten there by boat. It’s also can’t be too far away from Corona’s borders if Angry and Red were able to get there on foot during their year long travels. 

The only explanation is that the entirety of the Tangled crew doesn’t understand geography, and this won’t be the last example in the show to back up that statement. 

So Why Is Rapunzel Here?

We get explanations for why everyone is on this road trip, except for the main character herself. Red and Angry are trying to return some stolen loot. Varian is wanting to pick up rare alchemy supplies at the market and was invited along because Raps hopes it’ll be a chance for Ruddiger and Max to get know one another better. 

But why on earth does Rapunzel feel the need to come on this trip herself? Doesn’t she have a kingdom to run? While I’m sure Eugene is more than capable of handling things, this doesn’t reflect well upon the writers supposed plan of making Rapunzel appear more responsible. 

Literally any other adult could have come along on this trip. This wasn’t something Rapunzel needed to waste time on. Lance especially would have been more appropriate here as he’s the one who’s suppose to eventually adopt Angry and Red.  And the sad thing is, all they had to do was give Rapunzel a line about needing to attend some sort of diplomatic business in Neserdina. That’s it. 

In a show that’s supposed to be all about Rapunzel; Rapunzel sure doesn’t have a whole lot of reasons to exist in the majority of the episodes. 

Lack of Worldbuilding Strikes Again

At this point I’m kind of numb to the whole “magical thing just exists for no adequately explained reason” and so I’m not as upset as some people are about the shell necklace. But it’s still not good writing. 

Why does this thing exist? How did come to be cursed? How did it get mixed in with their stuff? What activated the magic and why did it only effect the human’s even though the animals were closer to it? 

Just something show. Anything. You bothered to give use rules for how this thing works and even stuck to them this time, but you can’t just make the last leg of the trip and give us some exposition? 

Yeah, okay. 

So Where Exactly Are We in Relation to Corona?

We can see Pittsford and Ivangarr on the road sign and we have to be in riding distance to Neserdina from Corona, but like are we in Corona still? Are we in Koto, which is Corona’s nearest neighbor to the east according to season three. Are we in some no-man’s-land where none of the kingdoms have control, or are we already in Neserdina itself? 

The series gives us no sense of direction nor any firm placement for Corona within it’s world. I only know it is a Northern European country because Corona itself is a peninsula with a north sea, uses French, English, and German fashion/customs, and Rapunzel is a Germanic fairy tale. But like those clues are thrown into a blender and contradicted several times over, on top of never being told where it’s closest kingdoms actually lie. 

All of this matters when traveling and exploring the wider world are big themes of your show. You need more solid and consistent world building than this. It also impacts how much authority and control your main character has within the episode itself if she range of political power is limited to one area. So like we need to know where the heroes stand here. 

(FYI I personally headcannon Corona as former Prussia which was once part of Germany and it’s alliance of smaller kingdoms. It’s also a peninsula next to the Curonian Spit) 

This Is Not Progress

Okay so the idea here, is that the show is implying that Rapunzel is trying to improve Corona’s justice system over Frederic’s previously inhumane crack down on crime. However, this is terribly executed. 

For starters the show has never called Frederic nor Rapunzel out for their previous misbehavior. You can not change any system for the better without acknowledging the flaws within said system first. Therefore this comes right out of nowhere and doesn’t stick around long enough to stay within the viewers minds for later. 

Secondly, Rapunzel is incredibly fickle about who she does and doesn’t set free. The Saporians were still in the dungeons last time we saw them, Caine was shipped off to the prison island and left to die there as far as we know, and the Stabbingtons are shown shackled together in the wedding short even though they supposedly changed their ways and befriended Eugene again. 

Meanwhile Dwayne and Stalyan are free to go their marry way and continue their life of crime, Varian is only released from his overly harsh punishment because he kissed Rapunzel’s ass not because it was wrong to imprison him in the first place, and later Cassandra gets away scot free because she’s Rapunzel’s bestie even though she committed the worst crimes out of everyone in the show and for very little reason. 

That’s not justice. That’s not compassion. That’s not progressive reform. It’s just nepotism, and it’s every bit as corrupt as Frederic’s classism and totalitarianism. 

Just because Rapunzel is “nice” it doesn’t mean that she is kind. Real reform has to treat everyone with equality and have a set of base standards that are beyond one person’s personal judgment. She is still a dictator and an abuser even if she lets the occasional person go free on a whim. 

Finally, Rapunzel’s methods are just downright ineffective. Dwyane may not be a threat to our heroes, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a threat to other people. He’s not actually sorry about trying to rob people at knife point and he fully plans on continuing being a thief after feeding Rapunzel the lines she wants to hear. 

Furthermore, we don’t know if this course of action is born out of malice or desperate need. He half heartily comments about finding ‘an honest job” but can he even do that? Is it even a realistic option for him? The series has been weaving this class inequality theme through out it’s past three seasons and directly connecting that to Corona’s crime rate. 

Eugene had a hard time finding a job during season one directly due to his past record, remember? A life of crime he was forced to lead in order to survive, and he’s the Prince Consort! What chance does Dwayne have? Did Rapunzel even try to help him find work or did she just wag her finger at him and told him “Now, now, stealing’s not nice.” 

The show wants to act like Rapunzel is this progressive reformer but then they turn her into a Republican instead. That’s not me being sarcastic either, this approach to criminal justice is the foundation of conservative belief and has been for centuries. The right are not interested in why people commit crime. They don’t care about addressing the fundamental problems in society that lead people to break the law. Let alone bother to analyze why those laws exist in the first place. Instead they resort to doublethink and survivor bias to either write off those that fall through the cracks or make excuses for why their policies repeatedly fail, often ignoring the fact that things aren’t actually working for whole swathes of people who aren’t themselves.  

Tangled the Series is far too simplistic and childish in it’s approach to deeper subjects like this to enforce the messages it supposedly wants to enforce. Rapunzel herself relies on magical thinking, double standards, and personal bias to see her through every and any problem and the show just rewards her for it rather than challenging her to grow and in doing so winds up supporting people like her in their authoritarian ideas, whether that was the writers’ intentions or not. 

In short, Rapunzel shows no interest in putting in the real work it would take to implement genuine restorative justice. She doesn't honestly care about Dwyane or his victims. She’s just posturing here for the sake of her self image.  

You’re Not In Any Position to Talk Rapunzel 

Speaking of Rapunzel being a hypocrite.... The entirety of season three’s main conflict is her having a petty bitch fight with her supposed best friend and needlessly dragging everyone else into it.

In fact that’s the whole show. Rapunzel repeatedly failing to get along with other people because she’s deep down a shitty person despite the veneer of ‘friendliness’ she slaps on to hide it. Having her just say she knows better does nothing to convince me that she’s actually learned anything. You have to show that she’s learned it first, and that requires acknowledging her own wrong doings.  

Varian’s face here just tells it all. Rapunzel is full of shit and no one in the show knows it better than him. Why are they even friends again? Why should we trust her with the three kids she neglected more than once? Why should any of these people take what she says seriously? 

Well This is Contradictory

Also, since we brought up double standards, here’s Varian undermining that whole “jail is bad” thing Rapunzel is trying to push with Dwayne and later with Cass. Not only is the show under cutting it’s themes for a joke, but it just reinforces the abuse Varian received. He’s now bought into Frederic’s stupid beliefs and winds up reinforcing to the audience that that his ‘reform’ was due to his past imprisonment.   

As an adult watching this series, Varian’s supposed redemption continues to increasingly look like a victim complying with their past abuser out of fear of further harm rather than anyone genuinely learning to be better.

Can We Please Stop Infantilizing the 16 Year Old

As if to deflect from Varian’s past mistreatment and continuing parentification, the show then goes on to showcase the opposite extreme whenever possible. I know it’s hard to tell just from these few screen shots alone, but over the course of season three Varian is spoken down too and treated condescendingly by the rest of the cast, and by Rapunzel in particular, even as he enters his later teens/early adulthood.  

Some of this is just to due to Rapunzel being her usual holier than thou self, but there’s also times, like here, where Varian is lumped together with the actual children of the show, even though he’s 6 to 8 years their senior. 

In fact out of everyone Rapunzel interacts with, Varian’s actually the closest to her in both age and development. Queen for a Day forced the two of them into a power imbalance due to a mixture of classism and society’s ongoing unhealthy (and often artificial) divide between younger and older teens, but as we get further and further away from that point in time and as Varian nears the same age Rapunzel started out as, that imbalance becomes less and less relevant. 

Look at how this scene is framed, He’s standing between Angry and Red and is placed lower than them to make it look like he’s one of them. He’s not. 

Varian may still look 12 with his big old eyes and short stature, but seeing as how we’re past Hearts Day, he’s actually close to being 17, if he isn’t already. The timeline gets even wonkier after The King and Queen of Hearts, but trust me, we’re close to being two years past Queen for a Day, if not more so. 

Varian, for all counts, should be Rapunzel’s equal by now in terms of story. Not only is he closest in age to her, but he’s also the only other person going through a coming of age arc. And of the two, Varian’s the one who has actually learned and grown as a person. He has more real world experience than Rapunzel ever will and knows how to implement that experience. (He’s also the more mature, but that’s more of a failure to write Rapunzel competently than a reflection of his capabilities.) 

No matter how you slice it, Varian shouldn’t be taking orders or advice from Rapunzel; no one should be, really; and he most certainly shouldn’t put up with her condescension. Rapunzel is not his nor anybody else’s mother. She’s not even a big sister like figure, and at no point should be treated as the leader of anything or anyone. 

Rapunzel is a Poor Man’s Rose Quartz 

I typically try not to draw too many comparisons between Tangled and other shows outside of the occasional parallel, as a show should be able to stand on it’s own for good or for bad, but it’s hard not to discuss the series without also discussing Steven Universe in some way. 

Steven Universe is this generation’s Batman the Animated Series or Scooby Doo. It’s the game changer that everybody else is trying to copy in some manner. Chris desperately wants Tangled the Series to be the next Steven Universe, right down to how the show is structured, paced, and what themes are presented. But unfortunately Chris has no idea why Steven Universe works the way it does. 

For starters SU adjusted it’s pacing as it went along, smoothing out its rougher edges while Tangled doubled down on its filler. SU had a planned arc from the get go and stuck to it, so that by the time the twists came they made sense. SU kept it’s focus on Steven purposefully so that the story unfolded from his view point while making to sure to acknowledge the importance of other characters around him and their conflicts. It didn’t make him infallible nor shove aside everyone else’s arcs.  

But most importantly, Steven Universe was written by a bisexual nonbinary person who set out to make a show for people in the queer community like themselves. Meanwhile, as a middle aged white man, Chis hasn’t a damn clue about his primary audience and has shown no interest in connecting with them. 

This isn’t to say that Steven Universe is a perfect show. No show is beyond criticism. Nor is this to say that straight white cis men can’t write; many of them do and can portray characters unlike themselves competently enough. But if you’re completely disinterested in other points of view than you can’t be a good writer of fictional stories, that’s just a fact. Because in order to understand proper characterization you need to acknowledge that not every character ever will be like you and that even you’re main heroes will hold beliefs and experiences different from yourself. Otherwise there is no genuine conflict to build off of. Either no one will disagree with each other or the conflict will come across as flat and forced, complete with lopsided bias. 

Therefore, in the end, Rapunzel winds up being less of a Steven and more of a Rose Quartz/Pink Dimond. Both are spoiled princesses/co-rulers of a kingdom that mistreats it’s people and anyone outside of it, who rebelled against their guardians, supposedly out of a sense of justice, but really for themselves and their own freedom, only to make things even worse for everyone. On top of that they both accidently harmed their friends, freindzone their best friend while also bossing them around, are condescending to their love interests, is controlling of people who trust them, and throws temper tantrums when they don’t get what they want, oh and neglected someone for an inhumane amount of time. 

Even then, Rapunzel winds up being the worst of the two. 

The whole point behind Rose was that she is someone whom the main characters place upon a pedestal and as the series went along slowly had the scales fall from their eyes and learned to view her for who she really was flaws and all. By the end, in Future, she is even metaphorically removed from her pedestal when Steven removes her picture from the wall.  

Rose also grows as a character, unlike Rapunzel. Her story is deliberately being told to us backwards. The awful person she was in the past was no longer who she was by the time of her death. True she was still flawed, and the consequences of her actions continued on even after her demise, but she actually tried to be a better person. She got called out for her behavior, she wasn’t excused for actions even when the show explained why she did what she did, and she stopped doing harmful actions whenever she realized that they hurt someone. 

Greg was allowed to stand up to her and show how she was wrong, and she respected him for it and later fell in love with him because of it. She tried to better control her temper when she wound up hurting her friend. Her failed revolution and her mistreatment of Spinel was actually born from a misguided desire to help, rather than outright selfishness. 

Rose Quratz/Pink Dimond is a brilliant fucking character. You may not like her, but you can’t deny that she is one of the most complex figures in children’s media to ever be created. She is real, nuanced, and multifaceted. He role within the story is complicated, messy, and intricate. She is the most well rounded female character I’ve ever seen and she is what I had hoped Rapunzel would be when I first watched season one, only even more so as the actual focus. 

I want women in cartoons to be people! 

But Rapunzel fails at every turn to follow through with this promise. She is not a deep complex character. She’s not a flawed and complicated heroine. She’s a blank canvas in which the creator can shove his creepy ass views upon. She is never taken off her pedestal, she’s never allowed to be wrong, and she is forced to spout the the creator’s personal bias against other characters. 

Rapunzel isn’t a person. She had the chance to be one, but then was reduced to .. to this. As a woman, the treatment of Rapunzel and Cassandra in this show is just flat out insulting. 

So What Is the Difference Between Angry and Red Now?

I’m all for character growth, but at this point Angry and Red are just interchangeable. Anything that made them uniquely them has been lost, and they’re now just fulfilling the generic rambunctious little kid trope. Red becoming more assertive shouldn’t mean she stops being an introvert altogether; that’s not how that works. While Angry shouldn’t lose her temper completely just because she’s wiling to open up more. 

So Why Dwayne?

I like Dwayne as a character and in truth I don’t mind his existence here, and unlike that werewolf hunter last time he at least was established in a pervious season. But this is still time that could have went to a more important antagonist. 

Also notice that Dwyane gets a villain song, but not Lady Caine or Zhan Tiri. Just saying. 

Rapunzel Has Not Earned the Role of the Wise Sage and Mentor 

Rapunzel has never learned to listen to others. Ever.

On it’s own this might have been a good speech, but when taken in context of the wider story it just makes Rapunzel look like an ass. 

A year traveling does not make Rapunzel suddenly all knowing. She is not wiser nor more experienced than anyone else in this scene. She’s also a crappy leader and big fat hypocrite.  

Even when she’s technically right, as seen here, she’s still in the wrong because she never follows through and acts upon her own advice; making this whole story pointless in the grand scheme of things. 

And that’s the core problem with season three. Rapunzel is shoved into a role she is not designed for and the whole premise of the series runs right off the rails. You’re main heroine in a coming of age story can not inhabit the mentor role. She can not simultaneously learn and grow and be always right while instructing everyone else. 

All through out season three Rapunzel is either rendered completely useless in her own damn series, or she utterly fails to fulfill any sort of narrative promise laid out for her while she infuriatingly hijacks the story from more interesting and dynamic characters. 

Behold The Only Reason Why Varian was Included in the Episode 

Speaking of hijacking things, Rapunzel of course has to get the idea to save everybody, even though what she thinks of isn’t anything special. It’s not derived from her character as an individual nor from all that experience she supposedly has. It’s literally an idea anyone could have come up  with and the show just hands it to her in order to justify her exitance. 

Meanwhile the character who actually is useful to the plot is sidelined and reduced to just a plot device. And not just here, Varian is rendered practically pointless in all but two episodes in season three, even in episodes that he actually should have more impact in, like the season opener and series finale. 

Good writing treats characters as equally contributing to the plot in ways that complements who these characters are.  

Ok I’ll Admit That This Line Is Funny

Look, I know this whole review series is about pointing out the negative, and I stand by my opinion that Tangled the Series is one of the worst written shows I’ve ever seen, but I want to make one thing clear.... I do not hate the show. If I hated the show I would not waste my time reviewing it. 

Yes the over all writing is shit, but there are a lot of good things to be found in the series beyond just the crap story arc. The humor is usually solid, the animation is gorgeous, the music is a delight, and the majority of the characters are likable even though they don’t develop in the ways that they should. There’s a lot of talent that went into this show and there’s a lot of potential to be had in it’s set up and lore. 

Being critical or negative about the aspects of something doesn’t mean you dislike it, or that you’re not a real fan, or that you’re just a ‘hater’, and I actually find TTS to be fascinating because it’s such a mess. I write reviews because they’re fun and because I genuinely think there is something to be learned from Tangled’s mistakes. 

So Why Do We Cut Back to Rapunzel Here and Not Varian? 

This is such an odd framing choice. Varian is the one who is talking and reacting to what’s happening. It’s his pet that’s in trouble and therefore he carries the emotional weight of the scene, and yet it’s Rapunzel’s shocked face we focus on? Why? What’s the point of that? She has no business being the center focus here. The action does not involve her. 

If you wanted to include her for a later set up then why not have both her and Varian present in this shot? Usually I can at least count on the story boarders to frame things better than this, but they really missed the mark here. Unless Chris is just that stupid and petty that he over ruled them and forced Varian out of the scene, but that seems like a pointless fight to pick, even for him. 

See This is How you Fulfill a Narrative Promise 

The conflict between Ruddiger and Max was set up in season one with What the Hair, then it was reiterated a few episodes ago during The Lost Treasure of Herz Der Sonne, and then it was reintroduced in this episode along with a stated lesson about working together that they needed to learn. By they end of the episode, guess what, they’ve learned to work together. That is how you properly set up and resolve a conflict. 

It’s clear from this that the writers of Tangled the Series know the basic tenants of writing and how to fulfill narrative promises. So the fact that they don’t follow through with this in the majority of the show’s episodes and ongoing story arcs just baffles me. 

Is it negligence? Is it hubris? Is it incompetent management and editorial mandates? Is it just one asshole ruining everything or is this a failure in the writers room as a whole? 

I just don’t understand what the fuck went wrong here. There’s no reason for why the show got as bad as it did. How does the most acclaimed animation company in the world put out such amateurish tripe? 

Just... wow. 

Now you know why I’m mesmerized by this show. It is a mystery to be solved, like trying to figure out how the crew on the Titanic fucked up so badly or why Hindenburg blew up. You just can’t look away. 

Conclusion 

Like I said at the start, structurally speaking this is the strongest episode of the season. I personally enjoy Lost Treasure a little more, just because Rapunzel annoys me less in that, but it’s not a bad story. However when you’re best episode in your final season is filler, then you know you’re in trouble. 

If you like my reviews and want to support my writing endeavors you can drop a tip in my kofi https://ko-fi.com/rachelbethhines

[imaginariaextraordinaire]

Episode 8 is one hella packed episode and it is an absolute joy to unpack it, beginning with this:

Clever, clever idea to have Ji-Woo repeat the line that Mi-Joo just said to indicate Ji-Woo is taking charge of things as far as Assemblyman Ki is concerned. It's also a good reminder of how tone and intent can change the meaning of a sentence even if the words are exactly the same (which is why we need good translators).

Seeing Mi-Joo stride across the screen with Seon-Gyeom behind her, it struck me that we've seen a variation of this many times before, beginning with the credit titles. While Seon-Gyeom is the sprinter, the one we see constantly trying to up the pace and charge ahead is Mi-Joo. She's always intent on moving ahead faster — perhaps to outrun the past that she finally makes peace with during the marathon? — while Seon-Gyeom moves at a slower pace, disentangling himself from the constraints of his troubled past and troubling father. The only one time we see him race ahead (in episode 2), we also see him come back and slow down.

What I particularly love about Park Shi-Hyun's writing is that in addition to all the layers and complexity she's written into the scenes and characters, she's also written a very, very funny show.

Both Shin Se-Kyung and Kang Tae-Oh do such a fantastic job with both the physical humour (without being over-the-top) and the timing that's needed to play up the wit in the dialogues. Not that Siwan and Soo-Young do a bad job — the scene in which Dan-Ah proposes to Seon-Gyeom is hilarious. My favourite is still May, who is very funny throughout this episode (the shot in which we learn she sleeps with her eyes open! GOLD).

The transitions in this episode are so well written. The insights from one scene ricochet off the next. For example, Dan-Ah in the scene at the bar — where she tells the bartender she can't risk keeping the book in her own study because she can't risk people guessing she has anxieties — gives us a look at the problems of the privileged. This is followed by a scene in which Yeong-Hwa and Mi-Joo discuss student debts, which is a relatable middle-class problem. This in turn is followed by Tae-Woong saying that he takes selfies because he's addicted to the validation he gets from the likes each of those photos gets him — a Gen Z problem. And so it is that we get a spectrum of problems that people face and hide behind performative façades.

The likes that Tae-Woong talks about pop up with manic frenzy at the end of the heartbreaking scene with Dan-Ah in the parking lot, presenting the viewer with a terrible contrast — driving away from him is the love and acceptance that he yearns for from a sister who (he hopes) knows him. All he has to hold on to is the superficial attention of the love professed by a fandom that doesn't really know him at all. Soo-Young's performance is fantastic in this scene, especially when she asks in a voice tinged with desperation why Tae-Woong keeps coming back to her despite her treating him so badly. For the first time, you realise how much it takes out of her to lash out at this desperately-sad boy. "It takes effort to hate someone," Tae-Woong tells her. My heart!

Another fantastic set of transitions comes later on in the episode, when Mi-Joo and May are unwinding at the end of a long day at the film shoot.

This is such a great example of writing inter-generational female friendships. When May remembers not being paid for working overtime, it's an acknowledgement that things are better for working women (especially in film) than it was before, but as Mi-Joo's experiences show, there's still a lot to be done because women are still driven by a certain insecurity and anxiety to push themselves way too hard (as we see a sick Mi-Joo do later in the episode).

Of course a man tries to break this gathering up — because he wants to go to bed. Superb excuse, particularly because these women are talking how much they have to work — and it is deeply satisfying to watch all three of them shut him down and establish their right to unwind.

This scene of female friendship is followed by one that shows the friendship between the three runners. Then we get to see a fight scene full of male actors. The machismo of that performance is a sharp contrast to the awkward tenderness of Woo-Sik and Yeong-Il's conversation.

While on the subject of toxic masculinity, this is the episode in which we find out Dan-Ah's father forged Myeong-Min's birth certificate to make him legally older than Dan-Ah even though he's actually 10 months younger than her. All to ensure he has a male heir. It's a nice detail that Myeong-Min's mother is the one laying out the memorial service for Dan-Ah's mother because it hints at a sense of solidarity.

Also dismantling traditional notions of masculinity is Seon-Gyeom, whom we see at his most domestic as he cooks and packs meals for May and Mi-Joo, and does chores around the house once they're gone. It's very much an inversion of the standard male-female gender roles with the woman going out to work and the man as the homemaker. To underscore this point, we see Seon-Gyeom consider the leopard-print shirt (that May and Mi-Joo hang to give strangers the impression they've got an alpha in the house) for a second before putting it away.

Speaking of alphas, Mi-Joo's really got a thing for wild cats. In addition to that shirt, her blanket is also a leopard-print and when we see her calling Seon-Gyeom, she's standing in front of a painting of a tiger. All these seem to be digs at her posturing that she's strong and invulnerable and I burst out laughing when Seon-Gyeom folds the leopard-print blanket while muttering, "I'd have guessed this is hers even if she hadn't told me."

As disinterested as Seon-Gyeom may be in films, they play a big role in sustaining him emotionally. In this episode, it's the film set that helps Mi-Joo and him come together after their stupid disagreement. Equally importantly, the film set is where he gets the time and space to reconnect with his mother.

Run On has so much fun being meta with the film bits. The film shoot within a drama is indeed an old fake.

There are two film sets we see in this episode — one with Ji-Woo and the other with Mi-Joo. While Ji-Woo's set feels relaxed, the one Mi-Joo's working in is chaotic and taxing. The two women are also at different ends of the professional spectrum. Ji-Woo is a star while Mi-Joo is not just working behind the scenes, but she's come to fill in for the person who was the juniormost member of the crew.

When pointing out the main players of their film crew to Mi-Joo and May, Hui-Jin describes the cinematographer as "a bit racist, but still a gentleman". (Mi-Joo's response is superb: "Weird.") It's an interesting choice to make the cinematographer racist because that's the crew member who decides how subjects and scenes will be framed. "Racist but a gentleman" feels like a precise summary of the orientalist perspective which (aside from being overwhelmingly masculine) shows the East through stereotypes that are often superficially beautiful, but also reductive and damaging. Not surprisingly, this cinematographer is the reason Mi-Joo flounders while translating on set.

The film set is also the first time that Seon-Gyeom sees Mi-Joo's vulnerable side when she falls ill. It's such a clever choice to have Mi-Joo stop performing in a setting that's all about performances. Not only does Mi-Joo give up the alpha act when she's sick, she admits to Seon-Gyeom that when she's feeling helpless, her instinct is to resort to a performative lie — calling out for mom because that's what she saw other kids do as a child in a sick ward (imagine how isolated and neglected she must have felt to do this. Also, she's felt this way so many times that this performance has become second nature to her).

The anecdote suggests Mi-Joo's mulish championing of her self has its roots in past incidents when she tried to fit and either failed or was rejected. And yet, for all her strength and confidence, she's chasing phantoms and has been doing so since she was a little girl. All because she was alone and didn't have anyone she could reach out to for help. Which is why what Seon-Gyeom tells her at the end of the episode is so relevant. He helps her to reorient.

To which Mi-Joo, bless her leopard-print-loving heart, responds with

But my favourite part of this episode is the conversation that Ji-Woo has with Seon-Gyeom when he visits her set. First of all, Ji-Woo is playing a "vegan murderer", which is brilliant as ideas go and it's adorable how delighted she is about her violent roles.

I love how Run On doesn't punish Ji-Woo for sacrificing her family life for her work. Instead, it holds out the possibility that it is ok if you have that imbalance. In this scene, we see Ji-Woo's family reforming at the film set with Eun-Bi sending the coffee truck and Seon-Gyeom showing up just because Ji-Woo asked him to be there.

The mother-son conversation gives us a glimpse of Seon-Gyeom's bleak childhood and we learn that everything Seon-Gyeom did for his father was actually him doing what his mother had asked him to do. It comes as a surprise to Seon-Gyeom that his mother has noticed what he's suffered and that she understands how he'd hoped silently suffering would keep the family together. It's almost as though he's feeling seen for the first time.

Much like Dan-Ah, Ji-Woo may seem self-centred because of her ambitiousness, but she does notice what's happening beyond the obvious, especially when it comes to people she cares about. Both women are up against the worst of patriarchy. Also, I love that when she's talking about motherhood, Ji-Woo is blood-spattered — after all, being a working woman and a mother in a patriarchal is nothing short of fighting a war.

In previous episodes, it seemed as though Ji-Woo was the 'bad' (or at least not ideal) mother while Director Dong was the ideal, modern mother. Yet in comparison to how Director Dong later reacts to her son coming out, you can't help but feel Ji-Woo, with her unconditional support for her kids, might just be the better parent. What is great about Run On though is that that the script doesn't pit the two older women against each other as competing examples of motherhood or femininity. The point is that everyone's struggling, making mistakes and trying to learn from them. Ji-Woo is doing that and so will Director Dong eventually.

Love that the scene ends with Seon-Gyeom effectively declaring himself his mother's son. Take that, patriarchy.

[firelxdykatara]

I really like hearing your thoughts on ships, so I was just wondering what you thought about the episode 'Seeing Red' from Buffy as a Spuffy shipper. I love the ship too and remember being so uncomfortable watching that episode. It felt like it came out of no where while I was marathoning the show

Ok so, I’ve been sitting with this for a while (my inbox is telling me it’s been 10 days......time plz stop moving without me noticing), mostly because it’s... a really Touchy topic, for a lot of (very obvious, to anyone familiar with the episode or the arc) reasons.

CW for discussion of attempted sexual assault and rape ahead. (I’m gonna talk a bit about Willow too.)

First of all, I wanna state that I understand why Seeing Red was a ‘point of no return’ for many people. There are a lot of people for whom sexual assault/rape is The Thing they simply cannot get past and they could never see Spike or Spuffy the same again, and that’s valid and understandable. For me, personally, I don’t consider it any more or less reprehensible than murder or anything else vampires and demons get up to in the show because they’re monsters and very specifically Not Human, but at the same time it felt gratuitous and unnecessary (like the writers were trying to remind us Spike was really evil right before he went to get his soul back of his own accord, and I’ll talk a bit more about that later), and the episode itself is difficult to watch. (Also because it includes Tara’s death, which wrecks me to this day.)

It’s also been a very long time since I’ve seen the episode in question, mostly because I haven’t done a full rewatch in years, and when I do watch Buffy it’s either starting from the beginning and then losing track of where i was and starting over again, or else jumping to random episodes throughout the show which I enjoy and watching those by themselves (and Seeing Red is very much not on that list lol). So I rewatched it just to refresh my memory and....god there are a lot of other reasons I don’t care for this episode. (Xander was exceptionally horrific to Buffy re: finding out she was sleeping with Spike. Gods I dislike him more and more the older I get.)

In general, it’s just a really hard episode to watch. (And I’ll never forgive Joss for finally putting Amber Benson in the opening credits, only to kill her that same episode.) There’s a lot of ugliness, and the Trio are among the worst villains in the show--not in terms of how they’re written (they feel kind of terrifyingly realistic, although they also seem kind of exceptionally meta in light of how much has come out in the last decade about Joss Whedon’s own attitudes and behavior and treatment of women), but because every other big bad with very few exceptions has the excuse of being a soulless vampire or a demon or a hellgod or some other monster that can’t really help the fact that they were made that way. The Trio are just normal dudes who think they’re entitled to women and money and power and are willing to do absolutely anything to get all three, proving that maybe it isn’t really the presence or absence of a soul that actually makes humans, like, humane.

But that’s me side-tracking. As far as Spuffy goes, yeah, this episode is pretty brutal. There’s no mincing words here--Spike attempted to rape Buffy, and he only stopped and had his ‘oh my god, what have I done’ realization after she managed to kick him off. If she hadn’t, he probably wouldn’t have stopped. And I can almost understand it, from a writing perspective--how do you make a soulless vampire realize that he’s truly a monster and, further, how do you finally get him to want to change that? Make him cross a line he never had before. Except... that really wasn’t necessary. Not for his character arc, nor for his relationship with Buffy, and a part of me thinks that it was really intennded to just drive home the message that Spike was a monster, and that Buffy could never really love him, and the easiest way to communicate that was sexual violence, something that the show never really had its vampires engage in previously. So it would be a shock to the audience, it would throw Spike’s motives into question when he went to get his soul back, and it would make his presence in season 7 a constant question, plus provide a reason for Buffy not to trust him.

I think all of this could have been achieved without the sexual violence. I think the scene was largely done for shock value--again, to douse the audience with ice water and remind them that Spike, no matter how chummy he’d seemed with the Scoobies since getting chipped and eventually working with them, was still a monster. But we really didn’t need that reminder, and I think it would’ve made more sense for him to simply attempt to kill her--still a betrayal, still shocking, still something that could spur him into the actions he would take afterwards (going to get his soul restored), but without the exceedingly uncomfortable attempted rape scene in a season where there had already been serious issues with consent.

I’m talking, specifically, about Willow.

There’s something interesting I’ve noticed in fandom, and it’s that people really don’t seem to want to talk about or acknowledge the fact that Willow raped Tara. Maybe because it was via magic, rather than violence--or because it was never really called what it actually was in the narrative, or because they’re The Gay Ship of btvs, I don’t know. But she did--when she spelled Tara to forget about their serious fight which had been building for weeks, and then went to bed with her. And then explicitly had sex with her the next day. It’s part of why I’ve always had a complicated relationship with “Under Your Spell”--I love the song, but it’s also literally spelling out the fact that Tara’s mind had been violated by the woman she loved and she could not consent to sex while under the spell.

So that moment was already toeing the line in terms of consent and at least Tara was able to talk about how Willow violated her mind and how that made her feel (in song, at that), but Seeing Red was like a slap in the face. Where Willow’s magic addiction and willingness to cross those lines had been building for more than a year, Spike attempting to rape Buffy came out of nowhere. This isn’t a show that explored any really complicated relationship between vampires and consent (in The Vampire Diaries, for example, vampires have an ability called compulsion and compelling humans that they then have sex with is pretty normal and no one really blinks about it, human or vampire; it’s definitely still rape, but it’s not treated as anything particularly beyond the pale, because they’re vampires who can control the minds of their prey and don’t tend to consider the feelings of their food sources to be of any real importance), and while the vampires are hot and have sex, there’s never been any indication that they sexually assault humans in addition to feeding on them.

I think that specific scene in Seeing Red is the hardest to watch in the entire show. There’s really nothing like it in any other episode or with any other villain, and it has a tendency to sit in the back of the mind and sour feelings about Spike and Spuffy because it’s genuinely difficult to forget. I’m not sure if the intention was really to turn people off Spuffy (especially since he got his soul and came back in season 7 and Buffy forgave him and fell in love with him), but that was certainly the effect it had on a lot of people.

For me, personally, like I’ve said I don’t like the scene and I don’t think it was necessary, which is why I tend to ignore it as much as possible when I’m thinking about Spike and Buffy and their relationship. It’s a thing I know that happened, but I also know that I don’t think it was particularly fitting from a character perspective, and that makes it easy for me to file it away as sloppy writing and generally OOC, and move on. Again, I can definitely understand why some people can’t or don’t want to do that, but I also know that a lot of people continue to love Spike and Spuffy and I don’t think I’m alone in considering that moment to be OOC for him and generally try to ignore it in my meta and other analysis of the show.

[honeypirate]

420 x follower event! Closed!!! 4/21/2021

I’ve hit 420 follows which I can’t even believe but I thought I’d do a little celebration! :)

Feel free to use these prompts for yourself or borrow this for your event just credit me! :)

Send in a prompt number from all the categories! The first two categories specifically, the last two categories are optional, and a character! I will write for any fandom I’ve already written for. Be sure to include that it’s for the 420 event! (Also If you don’t specify GN I will most likely write fem:))

(Organization station here)

This will be open for a month, 3/21/2021-4/21/2021

I will be writing them and posting them after this event closes.

Indica/Sativa

(choose a date idea)

Building a fort

Movie marathon

Baking while baked

Breakfast in bed

Star gazing

Theme park

Drive in movie

Sharing favorite music

Late night drive

Laser tag

Zoo fun

Art gallery

House hunting

Bonfire

Swimming together

Late night walk

(Your choice, send in your date idea)

Joints!

(Choose a Reality!)

Zombies au

Atlantis AU

Trapped in a different reality

Normal Universe

Soulmate AU

Royalty AU

Christmas time

Established relationship

Just meeting them

Friends to lovers

Supernatural AU (not the show) (include what kind of supernatural entities you would like. example: edible #5 with fairies)

Space AU

Pirates AU

Your choice! Send in your reality idea!

Edibles!

(Optional additions of flavor)

“Is that my shirt?”

“You watched the new episode without me?”

“I can’t believe that, out of all the people I was unfortunate to get stuck in a log cabin with, it had to be you.”

The fire crackled and the fairy lights twinkled, illuminating the room with a soft and intimate glow.

You could meet a stranger at a yule party and never see them again in your life - not telling anyone your name was the only rule.

Using a scarf to pull you in for a kiss

i did that annoying thing where i put loads of boxes inside one big box and you’re getting really mad but you don’t know what’s in the smallest box

Picture prompt! Include a picture with your request and I’ll include it in the fic somehow!

“Wait. You’re a stoner?” “...yes” *pulls out a joint with a smile*

“ i made you a mixtape” “I don’t have a tape player”

“Come with me if you want to live” *laughs* “no thanks”

The cool night air coming through the open window reminded her of one thing, the night she abandoned him.

If you hand things to people when they’re not paying attention, they will most likely always take what you’re holding. In this essay I will show my findings from testing this theory.

“Listen to this song I really like, it says exactly how I’m feeling”

Song prompt! Include in your request your favorite song for me to use!

Pack the Bowl!

(Optional additions of action)

Blind date

Shy flustered character

Taking them on a date to your favorite place

Trying and failing to make them laugh

The date is a disaster (good ending)

Disaster date (bad ending)

Running into an ex while on a date

Reader or character gets hurt (and comforted)

Training their fighting skills together

Character teaches reader something

The moment they realize they love you

The moment they see you across the battlefield, about to be struck down by a villain, and their world goes in slow motion

First kiss

[argumentl]

The Freedom of Expression, radio version - Ep 38, June 2016 - Subliminal messages, Japanese comedian takes on Cambodian citizenship to compete in Olympics, The appeal of Japanese women overseas.

Kaoru starts by saying at the time of this broadcast, the band will be mid-tour and will have just finished the show at Namba Hatch. Kaoru's voice sounds kinda husky, as if he has a cold. Joe says he will be dropping by the Tokyo shows, and then comments on the huskyness of Kaoru's voice. Kaoru jokes that he's been shouting too much at Namba Hatch.

Next Kaoru plays another entry in the show's new jingle campaign. He says he likes this one, which quite surprises Joe. Having said he likes it, he still won't give it a sticker. It would be unfair to the previous entrants who tried so hard if this entry were to get a sticker now.

Kaoru's first talking point is about the use of subliminal messaging. Joe points out that inserting subliminal messages is strictly banned in all Japanese public broadcasts, as it is in many countries. Kaoru says that talk of subliminal messaging is heard more often these days, and he asks Joe what he thinks about this. Joe says that secretly inserting subliminal messages into footage is quite a 20th century method. Technology has advanced a lot in the 21st century, so there might be new ways of delving into the subconscious going on right now, that we are not even aware of. Kaoru says he likes this type of thing. He wants to know all about it. Joe says he's not sure if this is the best way to describe it but, for example, with Nazi propaganda in Germany, despite being lies, after it was repeated ten thousand times it began to be believed. If the media is used to repeat something over and over again, it eventually becomes accepted. Now in the age of the internet, online restrictions are few, and there is a risk that hate speech will gain prominence if it is continuously repeated online. In this way, the human subconscious can be infiltrated without necessarily the use of old fashioned style subliminal messaging.

Kaoru says Dir are very aware of making sure they don't attract attention for subliminal messaging with the footage they use in thier MVs. Joe asks him if the band need to be aware of this with thier music too, and brings up the examples of Ozzy Osbourne's 'Sucide Solution', and Judas Priest's 'Better by you, Better than me', both of which were accused of and taken to court for use of subliminal messages resulting in suicide. Joe adds that these cases concern the use of negative subliminal messages, but conversely subliminal messages could also be used to produce positive effects. Kaoru says he has the feeling that Dir might have used reversed lyrics at some point during thier earlier years, due to the original lyrics being a no-go (*Is this refering to egnirys cimredopyh?*) , which he thinks might have a kind of subliminal effect, but they otherwise havn't given much thought to subliminal effects in thier music. They have been much more concerned about thier footage, and are keen to avoid anything resembling the 'Pokemon shock', where strobe lights in a scene of Pokemon caused seizures in some viewers in 1997. Joe asks Kaoru if this also applies to footage used during lives, or only to broadcasted material. Kaoru isn't quite sure about if it would apply to live footage too. He then says there is probably still a lot of dark, difficult to watch material being shown on tv. Joe says there probably is, but he doesnt know because he doesnt own a tv. He adds that as for making creative shows, a certain amount stimulation is needed, while at the same time keeping it safe to watch. Getting the right balance becomes harder and harder in the current era. Kaoru wonders whether new unexpected effects will be produced from all the different new technology that is being created these days. They wonder whether Hiranabe and Kami are using some kind of subliminal messaging in the way they both carry on, and especially with Kami's voice.

Next, they welcome Tasai for the Tokyo Sports corner. Joe mentions how Hiranabe appeared on the previous show, and asks Tasai if he sees Hiranabe a lot in the Tokyo Sports office. Tasai says due to his work schedule he doesn't, but he sometimes accompanies him to the night/entertainment districts. Joe asks Tasai what Hiranabe is like, and Tasai says 'He's an idiot'. He tells the story of how he recently went to a place in Ginza with Hiranabe in relation to work. It was Tasai's first time in this bar, but Hiranabe had been there before. A woman who knew him, kept flirting and calling out to him, 'Nabe-chaan!', and Tasai thought it sounded pretty stupid. He also tells of how Hiranabe got cheated by a woman into ordering a ¥300000 bottle without realising, and only had ¥40000 cash on him. There are so many episodes surrounding Hiranabe, like how he recently got his head smashed in etc, but thats a story for later, says Tasai.

Tasai's first news is that Japanese comedian Neko Hiroshi has taken on Cambodian citizenship in order to represent Cambodia in the men's marathon during the 2016 Rio de Janeiro summer Olympics. This has become quite controversial, with people questioning whether its ok to randomly take on Cambodian nationality just to represent in sport? Joe is pretty impressed that someone could be passionate enough about competing that they would change thier nationality, but he still isn't sure if he approves. He says Neko Hiroshi can do this easily coming from a rich country like Japan, so it seems as if some inequality is showing. Tasai comments that Neko Hiroshi did also try to enter the London Olympics in 2011, but was rejected because at that time he had been a Cambodian citizen for less than one year. He has spent the last four years training in Cambodia, and is considered one of the country's best runners. Kaoru is surprised to hear he is that good. Kaoru says he doesn't really understand why the Neko applied for London, knowing he would be rejected. Publicity? Joe also says it may be difficult for the Cambodian people to show much support for him, knowing he is not originally Cambodian. Tasai says he knows a Cambodian chef who is living in Japan, and he asked his opinion. It seems Neko Hiroshi is not that popular with the Cambodian people, but it will be interesting to see what kind of impact he will have.

Tasai's next story relates to the group Morning Musume. Tasai asks the others if they have heard of this group, and of course they both have, but Joe momentarily questions whether he's thinking of the right group. Tasai continues to say that Morning Musume member, Suzuki Kanon (also known as Zukki) is very popular with overseas fans, despite not having the same level of popularity in Japan. Tasai says that unlike a regular idol, Zukki has a plump figure, and she is apparently popular with Americans due to her cute smile. This prompts Tasai to ask Kaoru whether Dir en grey experience different reactions in Japan and overseas. Kaoru says that they personally don't see much difference, but he thinks Japanese women are viewed a lot differently by people overseas than they are by Japanese men. He mentions the idea of the 'Asian Beauty', and the fact that Americans etc find a woman with a bit of meat on her more sexy than a very thin woman. He then tells a story about how once when Dir were touring overseas with other bands (*Family Values?*), they took some of thier female staff with them, and the members of the other foreign bands were going crazy lusting after these Japanese women, which made Kaoru realise that Japanese women in general are seen as more attractive in some countries.

To finish, Kaoru pleads with listeners to send in more new jingle attempts, he'll feel a bit sad if none get sent in. He then plugs his DVD and new single Utafumi, stating the new single will be played in full for the first time on this show on the 2nd of July, 2016.

Songs - Dir en grey/New Age Culture, The Rasmus/In the Shadows.