#like this whole family legacy thing has been done to death and the self-meta about franchises

[ahaura]

scream 6 is not like. objectively a bad movie. that being said i hated it. im just so over the whole meta-film self-referential thing. like how many more movies are they going to eke out of this old raggedy dishrag. how many more ~surprises~ and ~twists~ are they going to *spring* on us before they give up and move on to something else. i just. ive had ENOUGH. it feels like a cardboard cutout of a movie rather than a real movie and i feel like in an original setting with the new cast it could have been something awesome. that might be my inner hater talking but this could have been sent in a email.

that being said. i adore the new cast. they bring fresh good energy to the set and even though the story felt uninspired and lackluster the cast made up for it. i think mindy and chad should have had at least a half hour more of screentime.

[backjustforberena]

Hi! I've been enjoying reading your insights regarding the Velaryons, especially Rhaenys. I don't know if this has been asked already but if it hasn't been yet, please do rant about 'the juxtaposition of Corlys and Rhaenys at their daughter's wake and how it perfectly represents and underlines the divergence they are having in respect to legacy which leads onto their opposing positions in regards to succession.'

Hello! I assume you mean from this gifset? I would love to talk about it. And thank you for your compliments on my "insights", I really like having a ramble about these characters. It's fun, and escapism, and they occupy far too much of my headspace.

So, yes, the wake. I've done a bit of a meta, HERE, about it, and then a more in-depth look at specifically Rhaenys's movements during both the funeral and the wake HERE.

And I think my thoughts, just generally, about them as a couple during this whole entire episode, is that they are diverging and that ebbs and flows throughout and then you get the break of that relationship being the most visceral and violent event at the end, with Laenor's death and Rhaenys screaming and Corlys yelling. And that's what leads us into this six-year gap. They are ripped apart by this. It's the only thing that could have done so because the love and the marriage is pretty solid otherwise.

At the wake, obviously, both Rhaenys and Corlys are reacting to the same incident. The same trauma. The death of their daughter. But they each react in different ways which means they can't understand the other or even make room to try. They're at opposite ends of the spectrum and that is really new for them. It doesn't happen.

As I touched on, in the first meta I've linked to, they grasp onto their grandchildren as some sort of remedy. As some sort of answer. Both characters are fierce in their ideas of family and propelled by the love of their family but, in cases such as this, what that love amounts to is different.

For Corlys, it's the idea of legacy. So, he looks to Luke, who is to be his legacy as Lord of the Tides after Laenor. He tries to take comfort that, despite a major pillar of his love and family (and legacy) having been taken (Laena and an unborn grandchild dying in childbirth), all is not lost. All is not despair. Luke represents a future and a way out of this pain and grief. A brighter day and one, dare I say, that will absolve Corlys of any regrets at yoking his family to the Targaryen royals. It's a way of not facing his demons and not facing his culpability (however you want to look at that whether as illogical guilt, support of a match that meant Laena was away from them, his ambitions driving the family) in the situation he's in now.

I don't think it's any coincidence that he goes into familiar territory rather than looking at his granddaughters, who are basically living copies of the daughter that just died and are the last piece of his daughter. He's not engaging with the fact that they've lost Laena. He doesn't even do it in the following scene when Rhaenys wants to talk about Maesters. He fobs her off. For a man obsessed with legacy, he doesn't consider the legacy of his daughter specifically.

Whereas, looking at Rhaenys, all she can do is face the fact that her daughter is dead. Rhaenys is, in my opinion, light-years ahead of her husband in terms of the consequences of ambition. It's why she's the cautious one of the pair and why we only have them really, truly, on the same page about the Iron Throne in Episode 10 - because he's now been humbled by all this war and deaths and the cost. For Rhaenys, that sort of lesson has been burnt into her since the Great Council. So, she's painfully self-aware of her sins and the cruelty of the world, as opposed to Corlys who is a very accomplished man. Who does what he wants and very rarely gets burnt. I think Rhaenys is all too ready and willing to blame herself. To blame them.

And Rhaenys's view on legacy and priority on legacy has to be different to Corlys's. In part, because Rhaenys's legacy has been set for decades. What will she be remembered for, if not as "The Queen Who Never Was"? But also due to her sex. Her children do not have her last name. She has no holdings or land. Her name has every chance of being in a long list of Meleys's riders. Any title she could have passed on was stripped from her: her children are not even Prince or Princess. She has nothing to give that she cannot give day-to-day, during her lifetime, whilst she lives: her love, her body, her protection.

Corlys can cement his line, be remembered as grandfather to Kings, and leave behind a prosperous Driftmark with a secure succession of Velaryon after Velaryon, at least in name. His voyages and discoveries will be legend, his accomplishments will become myth, he will have victories and claim territories etc etc. He will be in the history books. He lives for legacy because legacy can be something to him. It can't be, for her. Any legacy as she would have liked it (Queen of the Seven Kingdoms) was taken from her long ago.

But back to Rhaenys and the loss of Laena, specifically... she can't deal with anything else. It's all she thinks about. All that motivates her, in this episode. There was even some cut dialogue during the knife scene (which I do agree on being taken out but nevertheless gives us insight) where, as Rhaenys and Corlys enter, she berates the room at large: on the day we buried our daughter (I'm paraphrasing). It's all about Laena and being unable to prevent Laena's death. It's self-reflection on her own actions or inactions.

Of course she's going to prioritise blood because that is the only thing she has to care about. She's going to prioritise Laena's legacy. Not Corlys's. Not her own. Laena's. Because those girls are all that is left of her daughter. She's going to protect those girls with everything she has and give them all she can and atone. Giving those girls a happy life and keeping them close and keeping them safe is the only thing even remotely within her control. It's also a way of fulfilling her daughter's wishes.

But, as we see in the fireside scene, it becomes about choosing. To elevate Baela (which is a massive thing to do, like I cannot emphasise enough how out of line Rhaenys was with that suggestion), you cast a shadow on the boys. You just do, without meaning to. So it becomes an argument, rather than a conversation because that threatens what Corlys is trying to find solace in - the communication goes out of the window. And that whole conversation spirals because they are just grieving parents looking to different things to make them feel okay again.

But I'll stop rambling there. It's just layered.

[incorrect-ikevamp-quotes]

I mean in Leonardo's route he mentions Comte used to be a smoker! AND, it's heavily implied Comte used to be a wild child so!

Comte spoilers below, please don’t open if you’d prefer to wait to find out! I know I’m 100% feral for Comte but I don’t want to diminish anyone else’s experience~

Yes, there are indications that he once engaged in smoking, and was implied to be even worse than Leonardo (a chainsmoker of epic proportions, so to speak). As for whether or not Comte was a wild child, I have no way to confirm that with the current information that Cybird has provided, but there are heavy allusions to him going off the rails (at least for a vampire of noble blood). There are several mentions–if I recall correctly he states it himself–that he’s been running from his legacy for a very long time, and only recently settled down and took up the full weight of his aristocratic title. Unfortunately we don’t know much more than that. But I wouldn’t be surprised, he wandered quite a bit around Europe before turning the men of the mansion. In the few glimpses into his backstory we receive there is also plenty of fuel for a so-called teenage or adolescent vampire rebellious phase. Both he and Leonardo have a profound compassion for other people/creatures, and vehemently reject the social hierarchy/power dynamics that other purebloods seem to want to enforce. 

Among the few scenes I have seen that can testify to his more wild behavior is an event that is likely headed to the english app very soon. There was a story event that featured the suitors–as a pair–enjoying a drink and often reminiscing about the past. Comte and Leonardo are seated at a bar, and they’re drinking their own weight in alcohol and bewildering nearby patrons. Leonardo asks if Comte remembers when it was that they became good friends, and Comte is all “I have no idea what you’re talking abt MORE BOURBON.” Spoilers: he likely knows, or at least has an inkling, and doesn’t want to remember his own punk ass going feral. Anywho, Leonardo goes into it anyway, and describes a situation in which he and Comte attended some kind of social event. Upon exiting the venue, they see/hear a young woman being assaulted in an alley by several men. Now, Leonardo is already cracking his knuckles, excited to unleash a can of whoop ass–but Comte actually beats him to it. He goes stone cold and starts knocking out the people hurting her, asking them how they like being on the receiving end of violence. He then gingerly lifts the young lady and asks Leonardo to get the carriage, since it’s raining out and he would hate for her to catch a cold. This is the moment in which Leonardo learns that–for all of Comte’s adherence to his noble title’s customs–all of that ceases to matter when somebody is in need of his help. And that’s why they became friends; because all of Comte’s money, all of his prestige and social recognition doesn’t mean shit to him. He would give it up in seconds if it meant doing the right thing. His principles and his convictions outweigh any of his perceived materiality, no matter how he conducts himself or seems to others.

One of the greater issues Comte seems to struggle with–and could very possibly have been the reason he distanced himself from his own family–is the way that vampires drop humans like flies. Even if they aren’t engaging in a predatory relationship, in some ways humans are deemed expendable regardless. He had the privilege of being born into a family that treats human beings with respect and perhaps even affection, but every single one of his teachers, caretakers, and the servants in the house he grew up with were fired long before he became an adult. But he was just old enough to understand why they left, and it crushed him. Getting too close was deemed dangerous, for both parties; it would hurt the purebloods more to leave somebody they were attached too, and the humans in their employ would grow suspicious/fearful, perhaps even violent, if they noticed that they didn’t age. But like Leonardo, Comte loves the company of all kinds of people, and to be forced to cut ties for the sake of his own emotional and physical health was shattering for him (death is impossible as far as we know, but that doesn’t make vampires impervious to pain).

I think he spent a very long time rejecting that mindset, until he started to live life on his own and saw how difficult it was. To love people fully, and watch their lives end what felt like hours later. Over and over and over again. Four hundred years is a long time to love and lose people, and while it can be easy to believe that all grieving really requires is letting go, such a thing is much easier said than done. Leonardo wrestles with it just as much as Comte does; the only reason Comte fairs a little better is because he exercises considerable restraint. He’s been burned before, and he’s edging the flames more carefully now. Even so, we see several moments in which this self-control collapses; he will never stand in the way of MC’s happiness with someone else–but the attraction is always simmering beneath the surface, never fully realized. Literally the entire crux of his own route is that he’s trying, trying desperately not to just move where is heart is taking him, but failing anyway because MC has the courage to meet him halfway–wants to meet him halfway, despite their differences. 

One of the hardest things Comte is probably forced to contend with is that, no matter how vehemently he feels that his family was wrong, life proves that in some regards they were right. It is extremely difficult to engage in the kind of life they live without a modicum of self-restraint, or at the very some kind of healthy grieving process. Eternity isn’t going to wait for them to feel better, life isn’t going to stop taking the people they love just because they were born under different circumstances, or are another species altogether. Life doesn’t have any mercy, in that regard, and so they must be merciful and understanding with themselves. In the course of his lifetime he’s forgotten how to be gentle with himself, and he’s forgotten how to look forward to each day to come. For better or worse, his answer to the pain of forever was to shut himself down as swiftly and powerfully as he could to stop the growing whirpool of poorly resolved grief, or perhaps better described as melancholia. He was able to survive the first downspiral, but that doesn’t mean he’s confident he’ll survive another. And survival doesn’t necessarily entail living well, it means doing what you must to forge on–no matter how much it hurts.

(I will say that I can clarify what I mean by the specific term melancholia, because I don’t mean it in the colloquial sense. But I’ll give the disclaimer here for the sake of sparing everyone a technical argument they might not care about lol keep reading after the dashes for the conclusion)

—

Essentially, Freud contends that people process grief in two distinct ways, as I will loosely summarize. Mourning is the reaction to some kind of loss (whether a person, a concept, an opportunity, etc.) that inspires a short-term level of discomfort and unhappiness. Most people heal on their own over time, and it’s something that most people have experienced before. Melancholia, on the other hand, is more or less mourning that has never ended. It is described as a prolonged state of dejection in which all the color in life has dissolved and left, in which one’s self-regard often diminishes (not usually a side effect of mourning, but specific to melancholia) and they lose their will to go on slowly but surely.

In Comte’s route he literally says that MC eases the void in his heart, makes him look forward to every single day; that “his time” starts moving again. That the reason he reciprocated her feelings at all instead of stifling them was because he just fell into the comfort and joy of her presence, couldn’t help himself in wanting to see and talk to her. He describes her love as an irresistible “magic,” something with the capacity to transfigure the fragments of his experience into a de facto life.

Sound familiar?

—

And that’s the whole point, that’s what we as the player are here to do. We’re supposed to help him find the magic in the little things again, hope for better again. Make it so that when he does open his heart and lets himself feel freely again, anguish isn’t the only thing that finds him. We’re supposed to help him stop living in the hellscape of anxiety that he’s been forcing into silence, a depression so wide and deep it’s a wonder he never went mad. 

So uh, this kind of became ridiculously meta, but that’s why I love Comte? And that’s as much as I know about him, as of now. Hoping for more details in the jpn app in the future! I know I got a little sidetracked, do forgive me–I get really in it when I discuss Comte LOL

[blackasmidnightcats]

Continued discussion about Sophie's "redemption arc"

Original post from @agathasarmy

@agathasarmy I've moved this to a new post cause I have a lot of feelings and still want to continue this discussion and I hope you don't mind

So anyways...

(this wouldve been also a great way to introduce the concept of legacies, especially with the past vs. present. vs. future theme and it would also parallel tedros’ storyline as they’re both dealing with the fallout of carrying their predecessor’s glory)

YESSSS

All of them have big shoes to fill because of the people who've nurtured and believed in them

One thing I really hated in the camelot years was the lack of mourning that Agatha and Sophie did for Callis and Lady Lesso respectively.

That is the kind of anguish that I was looking for. Just them being children and missing their parent/parental figure and wishing that they could still be someone's child who could look out for them and motivate them when they needed.

Like Sophie remembering that Lady Lesso believed in her the way that Sophie could never do and Agatha remembering how her mother would have wanted her daughter to live out her life with with love and adventure.

Let's not even get with Tedros (that's a whole other meta in itself)

so far all i got was lesso and hester being the best examples of it, but what i also got from them was that Evil wasnt being cruel but serving as the balance to Good like ok???? what exactly does that entail??

Exactly, I'm really frustrated about this because as much as Soman has tried to make us understand that Good and Evil are equals, he has never actually shown us how equal they can be since all the Evil figures that we have are usually helping Good.

I'm really pissed that the Coven's quest involve them finding a new School Master when they have absolutely no need to do that. They should be doing their own stuff instead. It's the one thing I shame Prof Dovey for.

that was what I expected the series would be: Tedros and Agatha as Good because Good always stands stronger together, and Sophie as Evil because Evil is best alone, but not lonely

I stand behind your point about "Alone but not Lonely" quote because if that does not describe Sophie's biggest problem than I don't know what does. She can have all the fans that she wants and build the whole School for Evil in her tribute and pretend that she's a strong independent woman who doesn't need a man but she'll still feel the loneliness seep through if she doesn't have a closure with her insecurities and envy

instead Soman subverted our expectations in the worst way possible since GoT S8 (dont @ me)

I will stand by you with the hate for GoT s8. That was a trainwreck so badly done it imploded on itself. Recently, writers that have big productions have been having a hard time gracefully ending their stories

EXACTLY I JUST KNOW SOMAN’S GONNA BRUSH IT OFF OR BARELY MENTION IT WHEN THIS KIND OF DIALOGUE IS MORE IMPORTANT TO THE MESSAGE OF THE STORY THAN SOMAN RANDOMLY INSERTING DOVEY AS TEDROS’ GODMOTHER OR REAPER BEING KING FOR PLOT CONVENIENCE

I KNOW HOW YOU FEEL. I WILL NOT STOP BEING SO FREAKING BITTER ABOUT IT.

Soman was off with a good start on that one. I would have been more interested with Sophie trying to handle her narcissistic desires vs her need to actually be a decent Dean to all the new students just like how Lady Lesso was for her. Her understanding how to be Evil and be herself would have been a nice read.

if soman had to bring back a trope from the last era, it would be the discussion of dichotomies i.e. Good vs. Evil, instead of the evil lover trope cos aint nobody got the time for that

YESSS

It's still technically the school for GOOD AND EVIL SERIES even if we go to a new era I was hoping that Soman would still have these as the roots but NOOOO.

His obsession with Sophie obsessing over boys that obsess over her is a strong one apparently.

like at this point it’ just really blatantly obvious how much Soman favors Sophie and I wouldnt be that bothered if he didnt sacrifice the plot or the other characters’ brain cells to go along with it cos to this day I refuse to believe that people really would just accept Rhian like that after reading The Tale of Sophie and Agatha

EXCATLY. I HONESTLY COULD NOT UNDERSTAND SOME OF THE DECISIONS OF THE OTHER CHARACTERS ABOUT THIS.

Like did no one still understand that not everything is what it seems?!

I am baffled with how easy they trusted a comeplete stranger over Agatha who has proven over and over and over again that she fights for the good of EVERYONE and is perfecrly willing to sacrifice her happiness for theirs.

Like at this point I'm thinking that her fairy tale propably does not do justice for everything that she's been through cause if the other people of the Woods read her story the way we did, there would be no doubt that we would stand behind Agatha for a lifetime

like cmon people we went through this already?? a random hot stranger coming out of nowhere??? ITS THE RED FLAG

In defense with them, (and I am saying this very, very off handedly) Rhian did come around saving everyone's asses and was a pretty decent guy (NOT).

WHAT I AM REALLY SURPISED ABOUT IS THAT THEY WANT A PIECE OF HIM AND HOW EASILY THEY TRUSTED HIM WITH EVERYTHING

I THOUGHT THE POINT OF THIS SERIES WAS TO SHOW THAT ROMANCE WASN’T THE ONLY HIGHEST MANIFESTATION OF LOVE, BUT A LOVE BETWEEN FAMILY OR A LOVE FOR ONE’S SELF WAS JUST AS IMPORTANT????

One of my biggest beefs with Soman's writing. He highlights romance too much compared to platonic and self love. I want a moment with Sophie like the one in TLEA where Agatha was getting stressed about letting Sophie and Tedros grow closer and Soman managed to pretty realistically portray that; Agatha was being insecure and possessive and jealous but she let herself reflect on her actions. She made peace with it and faced it with bravery even though it really hurts her. Because she understood that she would never have closure for this if she didn't let it happen.

AGGIE IS THE BEST. I LOVE HER

Why the hell can't Soman write something similar like this for Sophie.

WHY SOMAN PUTTING THIS AMATONORMATIVE BS IN THIS STORY AGAIN LIKE WE ARE TIRED

In fairness, Sophie getting into ANOTHER romantic relationship I will PASS SO HARD.

But for everyone else that deserves some romantic love (TAGATHA PLS) I will accept crawling

also I like your ideas on what could’ve happened instead, with Rhian being more proactive towards Tedros and Agatha instead of Sophie - it would play well into the Camelot myths and themes that I was really expecting in the new era

I KNOW RIGHT?!?!?!

If Soman could only just get over his Sophie Obsession, then he would understand that Tedros was the perfect target for Rhian's manipulations and Sophie was the perfect target for the downfall.

I have no idea how the hell did Rhian think (but apparently it worked because soman plot) that seducing Sophie would win him the love of the Woods.

plus it wouldve been a chance for Sophie to actively help them instead of tearing them apart like in the last 3 books?? like she’s kinda doing that rn but it would’ve been nice if she didn’t have a hand in stealing their happiness like she’s always done too

Well...for me she doesn't seem like she's tearing them apart anymore but I stand with your point about her stealing their happiness.

This could have been good, good character development for her. Her realizing that she keeps making tagatha miserable and stealing what belongs to them and the complexity that comes with her inner struggle between her envy vs love for her best friends.

PLUS CHADDICK DESERVED TO LIVE INSTEAD OF BEING KILLED FOR PLOT CONVENIENCE LITERALLY IT’S THE WORST DEATH IN THE SERIES NOT COS IT’S SAD BUT COS IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE AND MAKES FOR TERRIBLE WRITING IMHO

"NOT COS IT'S SAD BUT BECAUSE IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE"

SCREAM IT A BIT LOUDER SO SOMAN CAN HEAR IT AT THE BACK!!!!

Soman, I will never forgive you for doing this to this boy.

You could have made Tedros and Chaddick have a falling out. I mean the last time that they interacted was during AWWP and Chaddick treated Tedros as crap. I know that all of us headcanon that these two are each other's best mates but they've barely had significant interactions for me to consider that a case.

They'd be so pressured about not followong the legacy of Arthur and Lance that a small problem could propably tear these two apart.

also, on another point, you would think Sophie would be more sympathetic to Tedros situation given that they’re both leading populations, essentially

plus Sophie learned to understand Tedros’ mind better in awwp??? where the hell did that relationship development went (even if she was Filip at the time)??

I am honestly more suprised at how viciously Tedros seems to treat her.

Like it wasn't that long after TLEA that Tedros was perfectly willing to let Sophie stay in Camelot and even asked her to visit but come his coronation (which was like less than a day after) he keeps on proclaiming about how happy he is with her out his life and in aCoT his distrust for her was off the roof.

Then there is the Handbook ordeal with Sophie just completely roasting Tedros like what happend to the two of you?

I don't even understand Soman's decision about this. It doesn't even affect the actual storyline in anyway. It's just Sophie and Tedros at each other's throats.

Tedros has been treated the crappiest out of the main trio (let’s be honest) as if the game was built to oppose him, meanwhile Sophie gets major Soman privilege and is given the role ONCE AGAIN that could change the game

THIS

It's the reason why I can't even read AWWP anymore. It hurts too much to have to read at how badly the other characters treat him. Just reading the first line of that book gets me anxious.

And PREACH THAT SOPHIE HAS MAJOR SOMAN PRIVILEGES.

This is why I was actually suprised that Soman shared that he planned on killing Sophie off at the end of TLEA but we'll never how that story went

like if the School Years was for Sophie to realize and accept her Evilness, couldnt Soman have decided to give Tedros and Agatha the deciding roles this time around given that, you know, it’s called the CAMELOT YEARS ERA???

Honestly, I just want Tedros to have the most agency out of all the characters. Like make his decisions actually matter to the plot. Make him the center of the plot and revolve Rhian's plans around him instead of being against him cause that's exactly how Agatha's role in the school years era was for Rafal.

The basic formula goes like this;

Sophie important to the Rafal's/Rhian's/Japeth's/hell even Evelyn Sader's plan

Agatha/Tedros are in the way of that plan so they have to go

Agatha/Tedros saves Sophie's ass

Sophie making the big decision

Like didn't Soman say that he didn't want to be that repetitive writer? That's why he changed the ending of AWWP because it was too similar to the first book?

WTF SOMAN?

she’s still out here wanting someone to look at her the tedros looks at agatha (honestly big mood right there) but I wish this didn’t have to be her main conflict

This is actually why I'm not that mad that Sophie fell for Rhian. Because at the end of the day Sophie will be Sophie.

But I agree I kinda hoped that she wouldn't be as guilible

the girl is smart and knows her worth so I can’t really understand why she decided to get ENGAGED to the next person (Hort obviously cant count cos plot) who tells her she looks pretty???

NOW THIS. THIS IS MY BEEF WITH SOPHIE.

I can understand why she'd date him but MARRIAGE?! That was going a little bit too far.

You'd think after her engagement with Rafal that she'd be TRAUMATIZE for the next one.

And honestly it would have been hella funny if she did feel this way. Imagine Rhian nearly getting all that he needed but Sophie just straight up leaves him on the stage cause she's still got issues with it.

Would have been my favorite scene

And Hort, poor boy, he needs character development of his own. I'm not his fan honestly and currently, he's not winning me over.

ALSO THE FACT THAT SHE ENDS UP BEING CONSIDERED FOR THE ROLE OF QUEEN OF CAMELOT INFURIATES ME SO MUCH COS WE WENT THROUGH THAT SHIT IN TLEA???? WHY ARE WE BRINGING THIS UP AGAIN????

THIS. THIS IS MY BEEF WITH SOMAN

Can he not understand that she would be crap as QUEEN?

A parallel I noticed with Rhian and Sophie is that they both completely remodeled their respective castles in their image. Not even considering anyone else. And they both treat their faculty as crap.

Kinda tells us that she really would be crap as queen.

At least the Camelot citizens had enough braincells not to fall for this crap

Every other kingdom in the Woods though. They better be budgeting gold to Tedros and Agatha once they're back on the throne.

(and im so so tired of Sophie stealing Agatha’s Ever After from her, indirectly or not, like cant she just be happy for her best friend and move the plot in some way other than this???)

I really do believe envy is only one of the things that Sophie needs to sort out. The fact that she admitted at the end of TLEA that she does, in fact, feel envious that Agatha gets to be a queen and her little episode in the Ever Never Roundtable about how she's the one with the official title of queen and that Agatha isn't even a princess says a lot.

I wouldn't have minded if Sophie had a slight blackout and just lost it and saying mean things about Agatha but instantly regreting it because no matter what, deep down in the foundations of her soul, she loves Agatha with everything that she has. And is she has the be in a constant battle with herself about this fact then she's willing to keep on fighting. That would have been satisfying to read.

I mean just imagine if Sophie was there when Agatha was leading her army and Hester mentions that Agatha is Queen in the School, in Camelot, or anywhere elsse in the Woods. They would follow her. Willingly.

Sophie would have had a panic attack.

This girl needs to learn that she can't force people to be loyal and follow her by making every physical reminder of how amazing she is but instead she needs to lead and make some sacrifices of her own because she's doing these sacrifices in the benefit of Evil and its future instead of herself.

Sophie appreciating people?? Not only remembering them when she needs something from them??? Like @ soman im not asking her to be the next Mother Theresa but I’ll take this character development pls and thank u

I am all in for Sophie appreciating everyone. If she can't do it for other people, then she better do it for Evil.

[elained1]

Skywalkers: and the lack of support for the Mother/child in the SW universe

So I guess I’m writing a meta? Is that what this is called?

Let’s think back to 2012 when Disney purchased Lucasfilm. If I were to put myself in the shoes of someone who had a say in how to continue the Skywalker saga, or to wrap it up, here’s my take on what I would do based on what has been done. And this is taking into account just one of the overarching themes we’ve been presented thus far in the Star Wars movies (and I’m kinda going from movies alone here because that is what I’m most familiar with); that is, the failure of the mother/child relationship.

Example 1: Anakin/Shmi.

The prequels were the tale of Anakins’ i.e. the Chosen Ones’ fall to the dark side. I love how this story was executed, if not all of the dialogue and plot points (insert cheesy/awful romantic dialogue here). His major turning point is the death of his mother (slaughter of the sand people including non-combatants) and I think most would agree in the saying that if Anakin had his mother around, or at least kept in touch with her, he probably would have been able to keep a better handle on his life. She encourages him, comforts him, wants the best for him, all that good mother stuff. Even to the point of relinquishing him to Qui-Gon, a dude she barely knows who ends up being killed like 3 days later, and a Jedi Order of which she probably knows little about save for the fact that they are the “good guys” who can give him a better life. So this was definitely a failing of the Jedi order I think. When thinking about the “chosen one” and how much importance Qui-Gon and later Obi-Wan seems to put on it, one would think that the “mother of the chosen one” would accord you at least some status. Or some impetus to rescue from a backwater planet, from the control a literal nobody slaver (Watto), himself who is a complete side note to the larger universe. Why leave here there, practically presumably to die, when she is the one with the most key insight into Anakin as a person and the one most invested in his future? I digress. Jedi Order/SW universe gets -100 points for this.

Example 2: Padme/Luke/Leia.

Here is our second example of how this universe fails mothers, and their children. Padme/Queen Amidala was my absolute FAVORITE character in Ep. 1. She is BADASS. She has AGENCY. She does shit, fools everyone, isn’t afraid to make waves, and goes against the advice of practically every male character in the movie in order to accomplish her goals. She humbles herself, self-sacrifices, and uses all the tools at her disposal to save her people. And she’s like supposedly 14 (eye roll but whatever I don’t know why they couldn’t have made Anakin and Padme both like 18 in this movie and it still would’ve worked) The people of Naboo wanted her to stay as queen for as many terms as possible and wanted to change the constitution to keep her in power, but she refused that and became a badass senator. Now AoTC rolls around, and yes she still has agency, and I wish someone had talked George into writing better dialogue for those two because all the elements of a good love story were in the plot, but she still kicks ass and takes charge, making her own decisions and entering into a “forbidden” marriage (at least from the jedi standpoint) of her own free will. Then RoTS rolls around, and she’s pregnant.

This is when everything falls apart. For practically the whole movie, she sits around and waits for Anakin, and is a literally plot device for his fall. SIGH. Why on earth would the current queen of Naboo care if Padme was pregnant out of wedlock (from their point of view)? Is this the pre-1950s? Why couldn’t she keep being a senator if she wanted? She can’t have a nursery built next to her senatorial office and some nannies if she wants? For heaven’s sake the lady liberated Naboo and is a heroine she should be able to have her cake and eat it too if she wants, and retire to Lake Country. And yet her pregnancy is viewed as such a negative thing for her career-wise/in general in that movie. Let’s not mention the fact that apparently sonography is also not around cause she somehow doesn’t know she’s carrying twins? Were any women/medical professionals consulted at all during the writing/directing of this film? Anyway. Then we reach her death due to a “broken heart” I guess even I think we all know this mama bear fierce lady would fight tooth and nail for her children, just as she did her planet. I really wish they would make it canon that Palpatine somehow transferred her life essence out of her with the force, because really that’s the only plausible reason I can accept for her death. So: SW Universe -1000 for this one.

Example 3: Leia/Ben

Third time is the charm right? Not. Man this poor family. So your dad is Darth Vader, and you’ve got the force yourself, you’re rebellion icon/leader, Princess, Huttslayer, basically all around Badass that is Princess Leia. Post fall of the Empire, which is accomplished in your, what? Twenties? You’re interested in a political career and the future of the galaxy. Your man is usually pretty reliable when it counts. And here again you have a brother indoctrinated into all those Jedi ways and you would think would be able to help you if you have a force sensitive kid and yet, the SW universe fails you again. I mean, obviously these movies wouldn’t exist if these relationships weren’t tragic.

But how freaking tragic is it that this badass powerful woman falls pregnant, and then has her poor baby is TARGETED in the womb (what I’ve gathered from tumblr since I haven’t read the books), and no one can figure this out/sufficiently protect this kid??? To be honest I never really thought the Han/Leia pairing would work out that well, and I wasn’t a huge fan of her being made Luke’s sister in ROTJ. I wanted Luke to get the princess when I was 6, shoot me. Anyway. Regardless. The SW Universe fails again to provide this mom what she needs to have a supportive relationship with her son. He was left with droids a lot. Didn’t one try to freaking murder him once? Wtf? He couldn’t come with her to senate meetings? He didn’t have a non-hackable non-human nanny to keep him close to his mom when she was embroiled in debates? Dad couldn’t have dialed in more via skype/hologram? You would think she’d have a freaking staff entourage that would travel with her all the time and keep him close like the royal she is. Han couldn’t take him out on the Falcon with Chewie when she had a particularly busy week? Sigh. Again. No balance between career/being a mother seems achievable, despite this being some super advanced technologically universe. I guess that’s why it’s a long time ago in a galaxy far far away? SW Universe -10000 for this failure.

So this brings me to how I would really love how this Skywalker family to end up. First off I want happiness for Leia. Familial happiness, which means either Ben redeems himself and comes home to her (good lord if this happens somehow I will be a sobbing mess). She could also practically adopt Rey, which I hope does happen. The best way for this to happen? As I have said, Ben redeems himself (hopefully not as a last ditch thing ala vader) and then LIVES, in order to atone and rebuild. I hope Leia knows this or witnesses this, and that she doesn’t die without knowing it which would reduce me to tears even more. Rey,is adopted as Leia’s daughter, and welcomed into the family BEFORE any whiff of relationship between her and Ben which I think has already happened. Anyway this becomes even more solidified due to her either implied will happen or does in the movie happen marriage to Ben. Honestly folks I know Rey is an amazing female character and a strong person but she is also flawed too and the one who has caused her to grow and face her flaws? Ben. The one who is her opposite but ideally suited for her future life as a force user? Ben. The one ideally placed to understand her and her trials? Ben. He is her helpmeet people. Through them, the legacy of a POSITIVE Jedi Order can continue. Ben knows the hypocrisy and flaws of the old ways, and Rey does too. They can make a new order/legacy. And you had better BET that the man who felt abandoned by his family as a youth, and the woman who was literally abandoned by hers, would be taking good care of their children and finding a balance between work/life. If Lucasfilm is really putting forward a strong female protagonist, which I have to believe they are, they can show her as flawed as well (they have), they can show her as being powerful and having agency in and of herself, they can show her choosing to have a romantic relationship (if she chooses) without weakening her character and for ONCE I would also like it if they could show that you can have your own life path and also blend that with motherhood/family if you so choose. C’mon Lucasfilm and Kathleen Kennedy!!! I’ll have been waiting 27 years for this!!!! Anyway that is all for my Sunday morning rambling.

[ragnarssons]

Okay I’m gonna need y’all to have a little faith in my man Bellamy Blake. > First, while the memory of that sentence might be true (is true, according to the script), it’s still one sentence from Bellamy, extracted after hours and hours of him literally wanting to erase the Primes from the surface of their own planet. That moment occured right after Bellamy tried to kill Russell (umm something Josephine didn’t care to mention to Clarke?) > We also know that Bellamy’s decision is driven as much by Clarke than by Monty. Both, in his mind, at that moment, friends he’s lost and both friends who asked him to do better and to be the better person. We have scenes making it canon; again 4x13 for Bellarke and 5x13 for Monty/Bellarke- and now only Bellamy. Bellamy was in his mind at that moment, the last one able to carry Monty’s legacy, and Clarke during all these episodes where they were “coming together” with the Primes, made it especially clear that she wanted to do things differently and that she wanted to turn a new leaf. > We also have to take into consideration all the people Bellamy also had to take into consideration- these conversations he had with Murphy aren’t there just to paint Murphy as a “selfless benevolent potential new leader”. Bellamy is the leader and will remain the leader- Murphy had a point tho, as selfish his motivation was. And guess who is among these people? Madi and Jordan. Literally Monty’s son and Clarke’s daughter. Bellamy HAD to do better, if not for himself, then for his friends’ children and to offer them a better future than what they’ve known, and what pushed Clarke and himself to take horrible decisions (not to mention, how it “killed” Octavia, in a moral standpoint). That’s the triangle of relation Monty, Bellamy and Clarke have: all three of them are parental figures. And who knows better than to wish for a better future for someone you consider as your kid, than Bellamy Blake, huh? He was the OG dad! That’s also why, for example, Jake let himself be floated without creating a whole mess inside the Ark. What would be good for his people and his own family, if the people on the Ark had turned against their government and a whole war would have blown out in the middle of a spaceship that was, at the time, seen as humanity’s last hope? (funny how Jake appears precisely on that episode, ya kno!) > From Clarke’s perspective, it can be interpretated that Bellamy accepted Clarke’s death to accept a deal. Which was NOT what happened. Bellamy accepted a deal DESPITE Clarke’s death. These aren’t the same thing, actually, they’re almost the opposite. He didn’t “give up” on Clarke to make a deal with the Primes. He had NOTHING to give up on since she was dead in his mind. But Clarke doesn’t know that. She doesn’t know what they learnt about the chips and the hosts, the videos and whatever Josephine and/or Russell told them. > Also, that’s me, uh, but I thought Clarke to be totally irationnal to expect Bellamy to want to fuck the Primes after all of this. But to me, it totally works with what she’s seen in her own mindspace: especially the scene with Blodreina. Clarke is so sure that she’s worthless to Bellamy and that he never forgave her, that of course, seeing an image, as brief and misleading it can be, of him “abandoning her” fucking HURTS. Basically, Josephine miraculously managed to show Clarke an image of someone “treating her” as she thinks people treat her. All that by capturing a 10 seconds scene after hours and hours and hours of Bellamy wanting to kill everyone on Sanctum because of what they did to Clarke. It’s manipulation 101 but at that moment, inside her own mindspace, after everything she’s been through, Clarke was too broken to see it. She had faced too much doubt and self-hatred to see how obvious of a manipulation it was. > I’d like also to point out that Bellamy is RIGHT when he says “it what she would have done”- literally, Clarke already DID something similar. Actually, she did what I talked about earlier ^^^^ Remember on s2? And she did it with the man she was in love with, literally, at the point. She accepted the idea of “giving up” on saving Finn, to secure an alliance with Lxa and the Grounders. Bellamy SAW it, Bellamy LIVED it. > And what do we know of that moment? Clarke sacrificed her own “soul”, and mind and peace and happiness (potential, with Finn) to do so. That’s also what Bellamy did. The thing is, Josephine talked to Clarke as if her people had chosen to LIVE with her death. But Bellamy said “now we SURVIVE”. There is a gifset going around showing Clarke’s reaction to Finn’s death and Bellamy’s reaction to Clarke’s death and him making the deal. BOTH of them are showing to survive after what had happened, because it was the thing to do. Not because they wanted it, but in order to make the other’s memory WORTH something (Clarke “if this fails, he died for nothing” and Bellamy’s “we do what Clarke would have wanted”). Thing is, contrary to what Josephine said, Clarke’s people - Bellamy especially - won’t live “happily ever after”. And that was SHOWN on episode 6. There is a meta also somewhere, that I think I reblogged about how the theme of the season is survival vs living. To me, that’s exactly it, and it was especially showed with Josephine’s flashbacks. Her “opposition” with Isaac was relying on that especially: how he wanted to live, and how the Primes are just SURVIVING. I mean... did Josephine marry? Did she have kids? Was she ever happy? Well no! She even lost the dude she was in love with! Their “thirst” of survival made her lose the man she was in love with, and created a whole war among these people! And Bellamy was NOT thinking about living without Clarke. He was thinking about the SURVIVAL of their people. He was making the sacrifice himself, to assure that Clarke’s death wouldn’t be in vain. He sacrificed his own want for revenge, to insure that their people would live; people that Clarke loved, people for whom Clarke “sacrificed” herself on 4x13 or several other times. But as “Monty” himself point out on this episode too, SURVIVING is not what he meant! He didn’t mean to survive despite other people’s crimes, he meant living, and that means, evolving, learning, trying, loving, etc. > Also let’s all remember that the moment, the moment Bellamy saw a whisper of life in Clarke, the deal was OFF. He doesn’t care about the compound anymore, proof being the fact that Russell’s explanations about it were muted from Bellamy’s perspective. He doesn’t care about surviving if he has a chance at LIVING. And damn isn’t it a very very strongly platonic new Bellarke theme huh? So... LIVING for Bellamy is only if Clarke is alive? In-te-rest-ing. He’s ready to throw it all away, be like “fuck sacrifice” just to get Clarke back! And that’s!!!! SO PLATONIC LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!!!!!

[countessrivers]

Kind of long, but...

I’ve brought it up briefly before, but I just really love the way Gotham frames the murder of Thomas and Martha as that first spark, that first little pebble in the pond that ripples outwards, changing the fabric of Gotham forever.

The murder of the Waynes doesn’t just change Bruce forever, it changes the city. The Waynes were all but the city’s royal family, and having them die the way they did, and the tragedy of having their young son witness it, does something to the city’s psyche itself. It also sets into motion a cascading chain of events that ultimately culminates in guys calling themselves The Riddler and The Penguin, running around killing people and trying to blow up mayors, while Bruce Wayne tries to stop them while dressed as a bat.

First off, the murder pulls Jim Gordon fully into the fray. He starts off new to the city, idealistic, wanting to do good, but his promise to Bruce pushes him into close contact with the most ingrained corruption in the city, which he rails against. Jim spends the show fighting against that corruption, trying to do good, trying to make Gotham better even as he struggles to make headway without giving in himself. Solving one murder case becomes something bigger. It becomes about saving the soul of the city, it becomes about bringing to justice those who keep escaping it, and that mission ultimately lands him in the Commissioner’s chair. 

The cover-up, the instability of Wayne Enterprises (with Thomas and Martha dead and Bruce only 12) and Jim’s refusal to play along also weakens Falcone. Perceived weaknesses encourages both Fish and Maroni to start making moves, and gives Oswald his first chance at playing the game. By the end of the season those weaknesses, helped along by Oswald’s involvement, lead to an all out mob war, and when the smoke clears Maroni and Fish are dead, Falcone is gone, and what’s left of the underworld is following Oswald. The lack of a proper, organised, and entrenched mob from this point forward is really what allows the weirder parts of Gotham to flourish. Organised crime for the most part loses its grip on Gotham, and the danger then starts coming from something else.

The beginning of season 2 is where one of the biggest flow-on consequences can be felt. Theo Galavan himself wouldn’t have come back had Thomas and Martha been alive - a grieving, traumatised 13/14 year old is a much easier target for revenge and manipulation than two adults. I also doubt he would have been able to gain as much of a foothold in the city had Falcone still been in control. Oswald was in charge of the mob at this point, but the underworld had been hit hard. He was new, he didn’t have the connections or the power or the loyalty or the experience to keep Galavan out, or to even stand up to him, which is what allowed Galavan to become Mayor, escape arrest, and get so close to taking WE/killing Bruce. What Galavan and Tabitha do also has far reaching consequences for Oswald’s relationships with a number of the other villains, and in how he approaches things from then on.

Galavan also, in a sense, makes Jerome. Up until that point, Jerome was just some kid in Arkham who had killed his mother. Galavan breaks him out and encourages that sadistic, showman side. He plays on his needs and issues and promises him fame and attention and a legacy. His name being remembered forever. He uses Jerome and kills him when his part is done, but he also brings something out in Jerome that changes how he sees himself, the city, and others. He didn’t make Jerome a killer (he’d already killed his mother and happily offed his father and the other Maniax members) but he gave Jerome the opportunity to indulge in his more dramatic side, he encouraged it, all  while coaching him on how to terrorise a city, how to hold it hostage, how to manipulate the other players, and those are things Jerome completely takes on board once he’s resurrected.

And it’s after Jerome that you really see an uptick in the theatrical nature of the villains. Before that you have serial killers, you have the occasional vigilante or mad scientist, and god knows the villains have always been dramatic af, but whether it’s directly because of what Jerome does, or just the way he shifts the city’s psyche once again, the villains of Gotham start changing. For example, while Ed looks to Oswald for guidance on finding his villainous self, the theatricality, the need for an audience and a foil, the riddles themselves, are on a whole new level from his own past crimes, or any of Oswald’s. People start using freeze guns, you have metas popping up all over the place, Jerome has an actual cult following, and a guy with mind control powers and a thing for hats and rhyming shows up looking for his sister. There is a new kind of villain in Gotham, one that fills the gaps left by the mob, encouraged by the very public examples of those that have come before, or influenced by the ways they have been changed. 

Thomas and Martha being dead also has other consequences. Without them the Arkham project is sold off the the mob, which means Arkham Asylum, rather than becoming an actual working mental health facility as Martha wanted, is reopened exactly as is - a run down, corrupt probably cursed institution that no matter how many resources are poured into, never seems to improve its security, staff or patient care. Thomas being dead means that Indian Hill is able to be reopened, and Hugo Strange is able to experiment on people as he likes. Strange actually creates a number of the Rogues directly because no one was around to stop him. (And even indirectly, as one of the escapees essentially creates the second version of Ivy). 

His habit of bringing people back to life also has a number of far reaching impacts - Galavan is killed off pretty quickly, but Fish coming back has major repercussions on Oswald and, though it’s not Strange directly, Jerome being brought back not only spurs a major turning point in Bruce, but he will then go on to “create” Jeremiah.

The Nolan movies framed the death of the Waynes as something that managed to pull the city together, but I like how the show uses it as an act that rattles the city, that shakes something uglier loose, and in a sense, starts an avalanche that culminates in the need for/creation of Batman.

[signoraviolettavalery]

strategist-scientia replied to your post “I know Carina is bringing Malex into the light and I am infinitely...”

Kinda scared now tbh because Carina said "Yes" when someone suggested that Michael is probably reminded of Jesse Manes's hand in causing the deaths of his people whenever he looks at Alex. ������

I hope it’s ok that I use your response as the jumping-off point for some meta, because I’ve been wanting to write this since i saw Carina’s tweets, and the inevitable Malex panicking that ensued. There’s a couple tweets about Michael’s headspace that she made that I want to get into, as I consider where Michael’s character will go next season and what that might mean for Malex. 

Now, my immediate response to this is: Yes?? Good?? Carina is saying Michael is going to have a character arc next season, and this is a good thing. Characters need arcs, and frankly, I’ve been frustrated that most of his “arc” this season has just been taking care of other people. Equally frankly, I’m glad that this will be the arc, because Michael is completely traumatized right now. He not only lost his family right after finding them, but he’s witnessed the genocide of his race. I’m glad the show is going to deal with that instead of sweep it under the rug. That’s what Michael s a character deserves. And I know it sucks to put queer characters through trauma and misery and suffering, because it seems like that’s the only thing they ever get to experience in narratives. But in a well-written story, you can’t shield your characters from the world and have nothing bad ever happen to them. There need to be low points in order for there to be development, as long as there are high points. 

The other tweet that people have been worrying about is this one, about how Michael will react to Alex and how their relationship will changed, based on the fact that Alex’s family is responsible for literally all of the suffering of Michael’s: 

This is where people start worrying that Malex will crash and burn, or that Michael will blame Alex for what happened even though it’s not actually Alex’s fault. 

So, first of all, I’m going to point out the obvious: it doesn’t sound like English is this person’s first language (which isn’t a dig at them, but just the observation that there may be a language/communication barrier here). Carina’s “yes” is vague af, and twitter is a really shitty medium to sort-of-but-not-really hint at character motivations and what’s coming. 

Moving on from that, my  thoughts are that Michael isn’t going to outright blame Alex - after all, Alex didn’t do anything. In fact, Alex has literally shut down project Shepard and blackmailed his father to protect Michael, and if Michael knows about project shepard he knows this. Logically, he understands this. But I do think that Michael will pull away from Alex - just as he’ll pull away from Max, Isobel, Maria, and even Liz. He’s going to need space, and he might get self-destructive in all his relationships, not just the one with Alex, because he’s going to blame himself for what happened. It’ll be difficult to watch, but I think that Alex, who himself has extensive experience sabotaging his own relationship as a result of fear and trauma, will understand where he’s coming from and try to help. 

I do also think Michael will have a hard time with Alex specifically. Again, it’s not that he’ll blame Alex, because he clearly didn’t blame Alex for his hand, if his desire to rekindle a relationship ten years later is any indication. But Alex will be a living, breathing reminder of the Manes legacy, which has taken literally everything from Michael, starting with his hand and ending with his family. It’s going to get complicated, because just last episode, Michael was telling Max that he believes that there’s no place for him here (on Earth) - something that Jesse made him believe, and something of which his hand serves as a reminder. And now he has even more proof, painful, heartrending, visceral proof, that there is no place for him on this planet, in the sense that humanity as a whole does not accept him for what he is. And the Manes legacy is largely responsible for this. 

But. The irony is that while the Manes family has destroyed his family, his life, his home, and his hope, Alex has been all of those things for him. Alex offered him a home when he had none. Alex told him “you’re my family.” Alex, as Michael said in 1x11, made him believe there’s is a place for him here on earth. Home can be a person, and Alex has been his. 

And I think Michael will realize that. If Liz can get over the fact that Max covered up her sister’s murder and was responsible for her family suffering hate crimes for ten years, then Michael can get over Alex having a legacy that he has completely and utterly rejected. But it will take time, because trauma isn’t rational, and because Alex did enlist in the military and become a “Manes man” before he ultimately chose Michael. So Michael will have to reconcile those two things - what Alex’s family took from him, and the fact that Alex himself gave back all those things to him. Honestly, I think it’s going to be the culmination of the arc that they’ve been planting the seeds of this season - that home can be a person. Michael Vlamis also hinted that Micheal probably won’t be deciding whether to leave the planet this season, so perhaps this will be a decision he’ll have to make next season. Alex will give him the spaceship piece and set him free, understanding that Michael has never felt like he belongs on Earth and that now he feels like he belongs even less, and that his family is responsible for it. And Michael will have to realize that despite Alex’s legacy, which he has outright rejected, Alex is his home. 

It’ll be a long journey, but I honestly think it’ll be fine in the end. Think of it this way: ships, just like characters, need arcs. I know we all say we’d happily watch an entire season of them just cuddling in bed, but come on. None of us actually would. We’d like an actual story. That’s why we tuned in. We want to see characters facing challenges and overcoming them. And yes, just like with queer characters, we don’t want queer pairings to just keep suffering endlessly. But we do want them to have actual, meaningful storylines. And what Carina is hinting at above sounds like an actual storyline. It’s Michael working through legitimate trauma instead of sweeping it under the rug, and Alex learning to live with the legacy of his family. If done well, this is a good storyline. The alternative is either no storyline, or contrived relationship drama, and no one wants that. Remember when, on The Vampire Diaries, Damon and Elena finally got together and the writers had to come up with a dozen reasons to break them up (the sire bond, Katherine possessing Elena, Damon temporarily dying and Elena erasing her memories of him and about a dozen other “plots’)? We really, really don’t want that. We want an actual arc. 

Of course, how much you believe Carina and the writers will do justice to this arc depends on how much you trust them to actually meaningfully write it, and that’s up to each viewer to decide on their own. Based on my own personal experience, I think it’ll be fine, because whatever the various flaws of season 1 of Roswell (and they definitely exist), the emotional beats have rung true to me. I understand why characters behave the way they do, their fears, their traumas, and their progress (with some exceptions). So, I think we’ll be fine. 

Part of the reason I’m so confident is because every other time we panicked because of a tweet, a promo, or a promo photo, we turned out to be pretty wrong to panic. Let’s recap: 

1x09 This is the OG throwback episode, and when Shiri leaked that photo of Michael and Maria naked in the desert, we panicked. We thought Michael and Maria would have a full-blown romance and Michael would leave behind Alex and forget about him, or that Maria would sleep with Michael while knowing about Alex, or any number of worst-case scenarios. 

What actually happened: Alex ended things, with finality. Previously, he’d walked away - and we’re led to believe he’s done this multiple times, which means that he’s also come back multiple times, because to walk away again, he had to come back first. But now, for the first time ever in ten years, probably, he said “we’re definitely over.” The love of Michael’s life broke his fucking heart by making him believe they could never have a future together, and Michael’s response was literal suicidal ideation. That line about “I’m just wishing a meteor would strike me down and end my suffering”? That’s suicidal ideation, y’all. 

So yeah, he hooked up with Maria because he needed comfort and a connection with someone - but one that he was 100% certain wouldn’t get romantically complicated and messy. He picked Maria because he had a connection with her but thought there wasn’t a chance in the world that she’d catch feelings. 

And then Alex came back to him and he took him back and bared his fucking soul and revealed every single one of his deepest secrets. 

1x11 This was the UFO emporium re-opening episode, and everybody panicked that Michael and Maria would talk and kiss and/or hook up in the place of Malex’s first kiss. Come on, guys. Like, I get panic, but this was a bit much. 

What happened instead: Michael misses Maria, who was pretty much his only friend, and tries to get back onto the same page they were (flirty banter that meant nothing), but which is pretty hard to do once you’ve slept together. Michael believes he and Alex are completely over, and....he skips the Emporium reopening (probably because it’s too painful). Then, Maria, the person he pretty much considers his only friend, gets roofied and possessed by an alien serial killer. So yeah, he’s concerned, and he watches over her, because Michael Guerin is, at heart, a protector who takes care of people, and frankly, if he wasn’t worried about Maria, I’d like him slightly less as a person. Maria drunkenly indicates potential feelings for him, which he shows absolutely no indication of actually reciprocating (he looks concerned and frustrated at best). 

1x12 We all thought Malex was going to break up in this episode, despite the fact that they were already broken up and Michael thought they were “over.” We knew there was a tear-inducing Malex moment and we listened to Tyler’s song and I saw no end of posts going around saying Malex was going to break up. 

What happened instead: Alex confessed his love for Michael, called Michael family, stayed by him in the face of literal certain death, and physically and emotionally supported him during a moment of devastating heartbreak. 

So yes, I get the worry. I especially get the worry because apparently The Magicians fucked over their queer viewers just last night. Believe me, I understand, and I’m not a person to have faith easily. I’ve been through Supernatural fandom and the great Destiel queerbait that was season 8. I’ve been through Sherlock fandom and The Johnlock Conspiracy of seasons 3/4. I am intimately familiar with the nonsense shows pull on queer viewers, and I understand the context in which queer viewers are wary of trusting and investing emotionally. I’m a queer viewer as well, and I get it. I really do. But my personal experience of Roswell has been one of the fandom panicking (because we’ve been burned so many times), followed by us getting literal fanfiction on our screens, with actual love confessions and words like “cosmic” and all the tropes. So in this particular case, I choose to trust, because thus far, I think the show has done well by Malex for the most part, and because so far, almost all of our worries have turned out to be for nothing. And I’m also excited for Malex to have meaningful storylines and things to work through. 

That’s my two cents. Thanks for letting me ramble. Feel free to reblog if you think we could stand to spread some positivity. 

[poorreputation]

14X12 Meta: Prophet and Loss

Or, Nick is gross but is also an important mirror to... everyone. 

Spoilers for 14X12 Prophet and Loss, and episodes prior.

A contribution to @metafest .

Thank you to @verobatto-angelxhunter for inviting me to be a guest this week! 

In 14X12,- 

-Nick goes back to the home his wife and child were murdered in, searching for something. A sudden chill fills the room, and he turns around, only to face the image of his wife, Sarah. But, he calls out Lucifer instead, convinced that the Archangel has returned to him in the same place they first met. Appalled he could say make this mistake, Sarah recoils, then begs Nick to reject Lucifer; only then can she be free.

Nick turns his back and leaves.

On its own, this scene, and Nick’s entire story-line, is just disturbing. The implication that Nick cares more for Lucifer than his own wife, that he just went on a bloody killing spree to get answers about, is gross. The fact that Buckleming don’t know how to pull off these scenes makes the whole side-plot feel tedious and unnecessarily cruel. But, I would argue that all of Nick’s actions so far have been to be a mirror for just about all the main characters on the show, but in the worst ways possible.

For example, in 7X15: Repo man- 

-we meet Jesse, a man formerly possessed by a Demon. Years after being freed, he tries to reunite with said Demon because he enjoyed killing, and felt that a part of him was gone without said Demon, and even went so far to call him the love of his life. When the Demon takes a new meat-suit, though, they reveal Jesse was ready to carry on their dark work on his own. Jesse refuses this, and is killed by Dean shortly after.

Fun fact, 7X15 was written by Ben Edlund, and directed by Thomas J. Wright, the same director for 14X12. Bonus fun fact is that Sam had a series of Lucifer hallucinations during Repo Man. Okay, maybe not-so-fun...

The point of Jesse, wanting to be reunited with this Demon, is that it was one-sided. He was molded into the killer he had the potential to be, and then left in the dust. Fast forward to Nick, who wants to be reunited with Lucifer, and cares more for him than his own wife. Right here, we can already get a glimpse as to where Nick’s story will end.

But, the mirrors don’t stop there.

In 1X09: Home, Sam and Dean return to the house Mary died in, and find out it’s been taken over by a poltergeist. They also find the spirit of Mary, who’s bound to the location by the malevolent spirit. She ends up banishing the poltergeist, freeing herself in the process. Before this, earlier in the episode, Dean tries to get in touch with John, begging for his help on the case. John is revealed to actually be in town with the boys, but purposely avoided them, including missing the chance to see/free his wife.

Fast forward to 14X12, where Nick returns home only to find it is haunted by his dead wife. She is trapped, and is unable to free herself. Nick refuses to let Lucifer go, and abandons her. All of this is similar to John’s actions in Home, but so much darker and twisted.

And in just the previous episode, 14X11, Nick serves as a dark John mirror, hell-bent on finding the Demon responsible for killing his family. What’s important to note though, with the events of 14X12 in mind, is that Nick wants info from Abraxas, first and foremost. The Demon replies by telling Nick he is not a part of some grand plan, he was picked as a vessel because he was just there. I think Nick cared more about finding out why Lucifer picked him, and not why his wife and child were murdered. This is starkly different from John, who still lost himself after Mary’s murder, but never slaughtered innocent people for pleasure or self-gain. 

From my own notes/meta for 14X11:

In the same episode Dean brings up a memory of John not handling Mary’s death well, Mary is confronted with a John mirror. (Nick)

(I swear I’m not implying Mary is gonna sock John in the face, this is just the only gif with Mary from this episode I could find. It is quite satisfying though, isn’t it?)

The clearest distinction between the two I can see is this: if given the option to prevent his wife’s death, John would agree in a heartbeat. Nick would hesitate and let things remain as they are, unable to imagine a life without Lucifer.

Now, let me grab my third mirror, and the first one we saw for S14, Sam.

Sam immediately connected with Nick in the premier; both had been possessed by Lucifer, and knew of his mind games and cruelty. Sam was also the one who was the most devastated to hear Nick had gone dark side. He says in 14X11 that Nick could’ve been him. Of course, in this moment, Nick is also serving as a Dean mirror, when Dean reminds Sam that they can’t save everyone, and sometimes you just need to let go of those who are beyond the brink. As he says this, Dean is planning to lock himself in a coffin and be buried at sea, all to prevent Michael from taking control.

This leads me to the unspoken Nick mirror of 14X01, Dean.

We start off the the premier with Dean gone for two weeks, possessed by Michael. We then meet Nick, who managed to survive being stabbed by the Archangel blade. He was clearly still very shaken after being freed, but his surviving Lucifer provided hope that the same might be done for Dean. Obviously not with the blade, as there were no other Archangels around, but that if Nick could come back in one piece mentally, so can Dean. However, if Nick should (and did) prove to be scrambled from his time as a vessel, then that would add a sense of dread to Dean’s own future. 

Sam wanting to help Nick is not only Sam needing to believe things will get better for himself, but that Dean can be brought back home.

Another fun fact! 14X01 was also directed by Thomas J. Wright.

The final mirror I have to discuss is none other than Jack Kline.

Jack is told by person after person that his being a Nephilim, and the son of Satan, means he’s destined to be evil. And, yet, over the course of S13, he learns to be good, even in the face of defeat and crushing mistakes. By the S13 finale, he chooses Sam, Dean and Cas over Lucifer and his legacy.

Time and again, Nick is told that becoming Lucifer’s vessel did not mean he was special, though he tried to convince himself otherwise. Nick is also personally touched and entwined with Lucifer, but embraces his darkness. He tells Sam in 14X11 he doesn’t wish to be fixed, and shows no remorse for the people he has hurt. He is the antithesis of Jack in his wants and in his relationship to Lucifer. He is the darkest versions of the Winchesters, whereas Jack is a positive TFW mirror, and represents hope.

Jack is a mirror for Sam, who thought his blood made him bad, but still kept to the path of being good. Jack is a mirror for Dean and Castiel, showing he is more than a tool for his birth father to use. He and Nick are opposites, and yet mirrors for everyone else.

Aaaaaaand I’m exhausted. I’ve been wanting to write up this meta since the previous episode, but I’m glad I waited, because Prophet and Loss gave me so much more to work with.

I’m also very, very, VERY tired. But, this also felt very rewarding. It’s a bit difficult to go back and forth between other people’s posts, and the tagging system doesn’t always notify me, and I had felt a bit of Impostor Syndrome yesterday, or Friday, whatever, but I’m happy with this post, and really happy with this week’s Metafest!

Hopefully I gave some useful or unique insight with this post, and people can find all the extra stuff I undoubtedly missed! Like, seriously, there’s 299 episodes worth of canon to sift through, fucking hell it’s a miracle I remembered the S7 stuff at all.

Thanks for reading, and let me know what you think!

[linkspooky]

Once More Without Feeling

So about 100 years ago when we were still in the middle of Rueshima, I published this meta. This was of course before our lives got flipped turned upside down, and Furuta told us all how he became the king of the Washuu

The point is of course now that 1,000 years have passed, a lot has changed since then in the narrative. Just recently in the last three chapters alone we have had references to characters overcoming impossible circumstances, and power gaps through the strength of feelings alone.

The obvious difference this time is that in my last post I said quite clearly that existing outside of the rigid structure of the CCG’s world is what allowed ghouls to feel things more freely, and therefore access the strength of their feelings whereas the CCG were fighting without feelings, and therefore unable to tap into their true power. Matsumae was fighting to protect her family, whereas Hairu was just fighting to slaughter, that sort of thing.

However this time, all three of the characters who are shown gaining access to their feelings for a source of strength are CCG members rather than ghouls (Urie, Furuta as a Joke, Mutsuki).

That can’t be right though, because Yomo has already made it clear and had his emotional flashbacks about how his purpose in life was to fight and protect the remaining family he had left.

Yomo already has it clearly figured out what he has been fighting for and the emotions he holds towards both of the Kirishia siblings, whereas what Mutsuki is fighting for is pure delusion over a romanticized past. 

However, there is a clear difference between Yomo at that time, and the current situation. Just as there has been a significant change in Mutsuki in response to the CCG. Simply put, the changing cultures of both the CCG under Furuta’s reign, and Goat under Kaneki’s reigns, have also changed the way their individual members deal with their emotions. 

It’s become flipped to the point where members of Furuta’s CCG are encouraged to overindulge in their emotions, whereas Kaneki’s Goat are shown repressing themselves greatly in order to work together. Which, seems to be the exact opposite of what you think it should be, especially with the way Furuta seems to treat emotion in general as nothing more than a joke. Whereas Goat most of their focus chapters are about characters going into long dialogues about what they are feeling with other characters. 

It’s as the narration says, because Goat is an alliance of more emotionally involved people they have their entire organization shaken by the awakening of one person, whereas the CCG which is used to repressing their emotions and carrying on business as normal is therefore not shaken up. Yet, of course we see the opposite happening actually. The CCG gets totally shook... shaked... shooked....

The investigators scream out to show their approval of what Furuta did. That’s hardly being emotionally reserved. The next scene even says so, Furuta is different than other chairman, he’s much more open to the public about the gory details of what he does.

This is Furuta’s CCG, this is what it encourages. Screaming, applauding, giving yourself away to your more baser emotions and let yourself  being slaves to them. There’s no repression involved, rather it’s almost an over expression. You can see this in the people Furuta specifically taps himself to be around too.

Mutsuki flips like a switch during the clown raid and gives into his one long time repressed desire. It’s also important to mention that Mutsuki was one of the most repressed characters in the series to begin with, there is of course his habit of lying but before that he also regarded his own expression of emotions such as anxiety and fear as weakness during the auction raid.

Mutsuki’s emotions, his anxiety towards blood, his fear towards hurting others and the untapped power of a ghoul all of those were considered weaknesses that Mutsuki had to overcome. 

Ui literally gets tempted to abandon all of his ethics to pursue his desire instead in the form of Hairu ala a faustian bargain, and he seems very much aware of what he’s choosing.

Aura goes from a quiet and unseeming kid, to one constantly holding back anger and obsessed with vengeance. 

Juuzou even too, who was specifically chosen to be Arima’s replacement is also finally hung up on his own feelings about Shinohara. Juuzou admitting this directly as the reason for his fighting is still a pretty big change because at the beginning of Re: it was mentioned Juuzou was too hurt by the idea of Shinohara in a coma he could not even visit Shinohara in the hospital.

Whereas when Juuzou is discussing what to do next with Iwao, it’s in Shinohara’s hospital room, the place he had not been able to visit beforehand.

Even though Urie also directly rebels against Furuta, the revelations that he comes to only happen because of the pressure created by Furuta’s regime and his own disgust in reaction to it.

It’s the environment that Furuta creates that leads in reaction to Urie realizing both his own emotional numbness, and also his ability to act on his feelings. If Bujin had not been targeted it’s likely that Urie would never have moved an inch in his grudge against Bujin and realized that he actually does not want to see the man suffer.

In making the CCG more brutal, effectively more ghoul like Furuta creates an unrestrained environment where emotions flow much more freely. At the same time he also creates an environment where people are enabled to entirely be controlled by those emotions, Mutsuki by his sense of abandonment, Ui by his grief, Juuzou by his pining for Shinohara.

On the flip side then, what has Kaneki’s environment which features long pondering of character’s own emotions encouraged.

It’s kind of amazing, how many of the long emotional debates just end with “You’re empty inside” as if that’s a fitting end point all on it’s own. Remember Kaneki made Goat on the legacy of both the one eyed king and Aogiri, but Kaneki himself is a former CCG investigator for three years.  

Kaneki’s own mission essentially requires everyone to forget about their own emotions of the past to cooperate in what is otherwise an unsteady alliance. Such as the way Tsukiyama forgives Kaneki in .01 seconds with no apology on Kaneki’s part.

Ayato and Take both make a good observation as to why this kind of thing is happening though. Rather than mutual understanding, it’s more like every single person in Goat has come to depend on Kaneki Ken in one way or another. It’s not any actual conversation about emotions that’s going on here, it’s all one sided.

So we have all of these intense emotional discussions coming up relatively empty. Amon says that his ideas in the past have not changed even after talking with Kaneki.

Akira and Amon leave both to “contemplate their own emptiness”, having left goat bereft of any meaning only having been drained of their hatred after the whole experience. 

Hinami speaks about how even seeing Akira reminds her of the tragedy of her parents, but none of those feelings get addressed. Hinami just suppresses them again, even though she specifically says that she does not want to become used to the feeling of being hurt about her mother and father’s deaths because that would be doing them wrong.

As I said a two way dialogue doesn’t actually happen. Hinami sucks it all up for Akira’s sake, and Akira walks away after that point now that she has the closure she needed. 

That is probably the key problem with Goat, the environment of repression is created because everybody is afraid to step on the toes of the other. Perhaps because the leader who they all depend on is also an unstable person who, if is pushed too much or given too much to worry about, might himself wander off and die on them.

Something of which the members of Goat close to Kaneki at least seem painfully aware of. Hinami even says that her tending of Akira to her bedside was done for the sake of her big brother’s happiness, even though she admits later just the sight of Akira unnerves her that much. 

So yes, Goat is constantly talking about feelings but it’s an almost always a one sided thing. We’re shown again and again people repressing their own feelings in an attempt to make the others around them happy. Amon gives up his search for meaning to help Akira find meaning, Touka seems terrified to tell Kaneki anything that might stress him out the smallest bit, Hinami quiets down and plays along with Touka and Kaneki’s attempts to rehabilitate Akira even though she’s the more hurt party.

Perhaps then it’s most embodied by this chapter, where even in deadly danger and helping refugees escape for their lives, Touka’s immediate thought goes to whether or not Kaneki will be saddened by this whole affair.

Because Touka’s first instinct is not to worry about her own feelings, but rather Kaneki’s. She drops her guard down and gets hit by a surprise attack. The manga goes at great length to establish that Kaneki is not going to show up this arc, and what’s discussed above is exactly the reason why.

It’s as Hajime said, Goat is useless without Kaneki. Not because most of the members cannot defend themselves, but thematically because almost the entire purpose and creation of Goat is just to give Kaneki a reason to live, and the organization’s cultivated dependency on Kaneki means  that the organizations motivations have shifted not from their own feelings of self liberation but rather Kaneki’s. 

Kaneki won goat’s loyalty with the promise that they could put all of their trust in him.

From the start though Kaneki’s priorities have been skewed, as he sees more humanity in the ccg officers he’s fighting, rather than the ghouls he’s meant to be protecting. 

So with these missteps, the culture of repression that Kaneki has created the ghouls of Goat are not people of overwhelming emotion threatening to break the cage of the world through self realization, but rather they are referred to as beleaguered, air headed pacifists. 

It’s quite obvious, the reason Amon, Akira, Hinami, these characters feel empty is because they are constantly repressing their own emotions. Akira immediately goes back to repressing whatever it was she felt about Seidou the moment she woke up, not even bothering to ask if he was around. Amon represses his guilt for what he’s done in the past. The two are constantly trying not to feel their own emotions, yet we’re meant to believe that they are rendered empty for other existentialist reasons?

So we finally get to the question of why Yomo’s emotions do not trump Mutsuki’s. Remember, Yomo’s last words.

The entire rebellion, in its refusal to directly confront the world and choice to hide away in the 24th ward and run from every major conflict, has come to embody the fatalism, the negative side of these words.

The obvious counterpoint is that ghouls do not have to live this way. Kaneki seems to grasp it a little bit, as he begins to imagine a future with Touka. One that is dependent on creating a world where ghouls can walk in the open and therefore their relationship will be allowed.

However it’s one that Yomo and Touka never have, both of them have simply gotten too used to the idea of losing things. Rather than react to it and try to protect things, as mad as Mutsuki, Kaneki, and Ui might seem when they get wrapped up with their emotions like this and try to do the impossible, Yomo and Touka go the opposite direction and lose all interest in fighting the world whatsoever only focusing on accepting each loss and being able to move on from it.

So that’s why Yomo’s emotions lose out to Mutsuki’s, because Yomo was never fighting to win to begin with. For him, everything is already squared as long as both of the living remnants of his sister live on with him.

He’s fine with it, he’s already made his peace. While it makes him more mature, it also makes him unwilling to grasp the obvious. That there does not have to be a future where either he or Touka dies.

It’s as Hide said, rather than dying so somebody else can live, isn’t the better ending where they both live on together. That’s clearly the ending Kaneki wants to fight for, so it’s odd we see such emotional repression for the sake of others,a and self sacrifice in the ranks of Goat.

Just this once, can’t everybody live?

[mittensmorgul]

I've got Pac Man Fever on in the background for the meta rewatch, and one of the first things we learn is that the bunker isn't trackable to within a 20 mile radius. And all I can think is that like Dean with the Colt, trusting too much in it because it's apparently invincible.

Sam and Dean continued trusting in the security of the bunker because it was so incredible this way. We know the Colt still had five things it couldn't kill (and not WHAT those things are), yet Dean trusted it to kill an at-the-time unidentified god in 12.18. And nearly got himself killed by a plain-old human, because there's still the factor of reliably being able to point it at the thing and shoot it.

Even after 12.17 and how they missed Dagon with it...

It's just a tool, but they'd put ALL their faith in it...

Overconfidence is... a form of hubris.

And all season I’ve been yelling about how hubris is bad.

It seems like they’d put way too much trust in the security and sanctity of the bunker. You’d think they’d have learned after pretty much EVERYONE invaded the place at one point or another in the last few years...

Yet they STILL trusted in the building they’d come to think of as “home.” Even after finding the MoL’s listening devices. They brought Toni back there, even after hearing her prattle on about how the MoL was responsible for all the hunter deaths, even knowing that they killed Mick for being “too sympathetic” to the Winchesters’ views, and even after Mary’s warning phone call that they had a problem followed by their complete inability to find or contact her since that warning. Even knowing that the bastards HAD KEYS TO THE BUNKER.

That’s hubris, and hubris is bad.

Despite the pileup of subtext pointing to Dean’s instinctive mistrust of these people, the fact that he’s been so on-the-nose RIGHT about so much this season, he certainly has a couple of blind spots big enough to drive the Impala through.

He never even questioned how the MoL came by the Colt? Possibly because he was simply too relieved or pleased to have it back at all.

That’s hubris, and hubris is bad.

They trusted in Mary, who they don’t even really know. And who definitely doesn’t really know them. She thinks she knows them via John’s journal, and since the beginning of the season we’ve seen Dean resisting telling her the worst of the truth about their lives. He hadn’t wanted to overwhelm her. He hadn’t wanted her to feel like he was blaming her for what happened after she died. It’s not like she knew all of that stuff would happen-- that John would be consumed by revenge for her death, that their entire lives would become devoted to the one thing she never wanted for them because of her death. It seemed unfair to Dean at the beginning of the season to burden her with that knowledge when she was still adjusting to suddenly being alive again at all...

12.18 invited us to ponder what Sam and Dean’s legacy would be. In an episode where a horrifying family legacy of murder and greed had been buried and ignored for 20 years resurfaced and doubled down on the horror and greed. The sheriff had tried to bury and ignore the root of his family’s evil deeds while fixing up all the “surface level” wrongs his family had inflicted on the town they essentially owned. He sold it off to the people who lived and worked there. He even gave his half-brother the company that had been the backbone of the town, and he himself took on the mantle of justice for the people by becoming the sheriff.

Yet even when faced with the evidence that his family’s long-buried legacy might be coming back to haunt him, he passively ignored the threat. Yes, he eventually experienced doubt and went to check to make sure Moloch was still safely locked away, but while he’d been busy trying to ignore the monster’s existence, the other surviving member of his family had uncovered the secret for himself. His brother was lured in by Moloch’s promises, and a desperate, selfish drive to have the life he felt he deserved but had always been denied.

In his fervor, he not only capitulated to the monster’s desire for blood, HE FREED IT from the prison where it had been contained for more than a hundred years. Suddenly it wasn’t one death a year to appease the god, it was a string of deaths. Like the god had extra leverage over him because he hadn’t seen the bigger picture.

This is Mary, who was so desperate to make the life she’d intended to for her family, the life she felt she’d been denied by circumstance. But she didn’t have all the facts-- either about her own family’s history OR the Men of Letters. Yet she signed up to work with them anyway. Despite her doubts, despite the fact she instinctively, on some level, knew it was wrong enough that she hid her mission from Sam and Dean in 12.12, and then STILL didn’t tell them the truth when she discovered how shady the whole operation was.

Mary’s hubris has led to the loss of her free will, now subsumed by the Men of Letters’ agenda. She realized too late that she’d put her faith in the wrong place. She’d pinned her personal hopes and desires to an evil force because on the surface they seemed to share her end goals, and was willing to turn a blind eye to their blatantly obvious faults. To the hubris of the underlying agenda itself.

This is also Crowley, whose motives for diverting Lucifer from the cage in the first place seem like pure hubris anyway, A hubris compounded by his willingness to deal with the Men of Letters and his repeated tormenting of Lucifer. And Crowley’s hubris has led to him seeking refuge from the fate he’d made for himself by literally becoming a rat and being tossed out with the trash. Not fucking subtle, bucklemming.

So Sam and Dean have ended up trapped within their own “legacy,” the bunker that they’d gradually made their own without knowing the full extent of the baggage that came along with it, that some portion of the Men of Letters survived Abaddon’s slaughter in 1958 to become even more secretive and radicalized in their isolation. Sam instinctively wanted to trust them, because nothing he’d found in the bunker had made him believe that the Men of Letters might have evil intentions. He desperately wanted to believe the best of these people despite the evidence of his own experiences at their hands. He didn’t trust HIMSELF over their self-proclaimed superior knowledge and goals. Now that’s all come back around to bite everyone in the ass.

Dean’s been ignoring or suppressing his own instincts all season, despite being confronted with confirmation that his instincts were right all along. But his lack of faith in himself has a lot of baggage attached to it and THAT is what I believe he’s been working through. In the past he’s tried to enforce his will over that of others (see: his instincts about Ruby and how he pushed Sam away by trying to enforce his will, his instincts about Cas in s6, his own poor choices in s8 and s9 that culminated in him practically destroying the universe because he tried to enforce his own will by thinking it was a good idea to slam the gates of Hell... which led to the COSMIC CONSEQUENCES (i.e. cavalcade of dominoes falling that ended up releasing the Darkness and nearly ending the universe), and then having God himself rest the burden of looking after the Earth in Dean’s hands in 11.23. But he blames himself for ALL of it.

I’m watching 8.22 right now (hello, Dabb), watching Sarah Blake die because of his choices.

I can’t honestly say this loud enough. EVERYTHING THAT HAS HAPPENED ON THE SHOW SINCE 12.09 IS THE COSMIC CONSEQUENCES. Really, everything that’s happened since Mary was resurrected at the end of 11.23 has been a cascade of increasingly dire consequences. Billie had tried to set the natural order to rights SEVERAL TIMES over the early part of the season, asking Mary to choose to go back to Heaven where she belonged, but it had still been her choice at that point, and she rejected the offer.

In 12.09, Mary was ready to accept her own death in the fulfillment of Dean’s deal with Billie, but Cas spared her from paying the price. Honestly, he didn’t do it for MARY, but for DEAN. What would it have done to Dean at that point to have Mary pay the price for his own failure? Because that’s how it would’ve felt to him. It would’ve broken him. Instead, Mary’s been given a free pass to continue existing, and to continue screwing with the Natural Order.

COSMIC CONSEQUENCES.

Dean still hasn’t found the balance in himself that he’d helped bring about in the universe. The balance between trusting in his own will versus forcing that will on anyone else. Trying to bend others to his will has a long, long history of failure attached to it. And yet standing all the way back like Chuck and just passively observing these consequences unfolding despite that itching instinct to intervene hasn’t actually resulted in anything good either.

COSMIC CONSEQUENCES.

Cas felt like he’d failed Sam and Dean in 12.09 by not being able to find and save them from prison. He doubted himself so much that he wasn’t even able to carry out a normal hunt on his own when we know he’d become a shockingly effective hunter in his own right over the last few years. Self-doubt, lack of self-worth, all over the loss of Sam and Dean... led directly to the events of 12.12 where he nearly paid the price with his own life (except for the interference of Crowley, he would have).

(Heck, I’m watching 8.23 right now. This isn’t a new theme for Cas...)

He’s still trying to atone from his decision to say yes to Lucifer in 11.10. That’s the genesis of an awful lot of the cosmic consequences we’re dealing with now, after all. His failure to protect Sam and Dean in 12.08, however, is a driving force behind his current spate of terrible choices in a misguided attempt to protect them from paying those cosmic consequences on his behalf.

The tricky thing about cosmic consequences is that you simply can’t walk past them and ignore the inciting incident that kicked them all off in the first place. Like the Barrett family’s buried secret-- the literal god buried under their basement floor, the foundations of their entire lives, or even Dean refusing to kill that little girl in 6.11, our original introduction to Cosmic Consequences-- you can push them down and try to ignore them and hope they’ll go away. You can run around trying to clean up the resulting chain reaction of terrible consequences as they erupt into flames all around you, but until the original imbalance is corrected and the truth is unearthed and dealt with directly, that’s all they’ve been able to do.

Cas’s self-doubt, like Dean said in 12.19, has blinded him to the danger he was in. He’d said yes to Lucifer in 11.10, voluntarily handing his free will over to Lucifer, and he’s never really had a chance to reclaim that agency. It seems that everything he’s tried to do since then has been a rather futile effort to reclaim that agency.

I’ve said it so many times this season, but Cas “wished” for faith, and he was slammed with it. And the wishes turn bad. The wishes turn very bad. I think one of the main reasons it was so easy for the nephilim to inflict its will on Cas was that he’d surrendered that will in 11.10 and never fully reclaimed it. He hasn’t asserted it for himself again, instead acting on his own, scrambling around blindly trying to put everything else right while the original act of surrender remains unrevoked.

COSMIC. CONSEQUENCES.

That’s all any of this is, really. That’s the whole story right there.

It’s not about who has to pay the price, it’s about going back and reversing the entire original story. It’s about getting a second chance to put right those original wrongs. It’s about realizing that we can’t just have what we want, because that’s not how life works. Back in 4.08 Sam and Dean were in a very different place to where they are now. Even back in 6.11 when Dean began learning this lesson on a cosmic scale. It’s not just about cleaning up their messes, it’s about finding balance between the natural order and free will. And remembering that no one person’s will should decide the fate of the entire universe at the expense of the natural order.

[shirtlesssammy]

Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes: The Wine Recap

Then:

Witch twins!

Now:

The eponymous Tasha Banes arrives at a quaint B&B.

One guest is less than welcoming. Tasha admires a ring the woman is wearing. (Hint: we should pay attention!) Tasha passive-aggressively offers to cleanse the old woman’s aura, but the woman just snickers. Tasha gets all checked in, and later that night it’s revealed why she’s at the charming B&B –witch hunting.

She casts a “reveal” spell, and follows her charm to an underground shed, so foul smelling we can smell it in our homes, and once inside, she’s met with the pointy end of a pointy thing. RIP Mama Banes.

Destiel is Real Alert

It’s only been one night since Cas was possessed/overwhelmed/hoodwinked by the nephilim and Dean is still reeling from those events. He’s convinced it wasn’t Cas. Sam is unusually silent. Natasha believes it’s because Sam thinks Cas was in complete control.

Dean doesn’t know what to do, so Sam distracts him with the melted carcass of the Colt. Sam hopes he can fix it.

Just then a phone rings. It’s one of techno-phobe Mary’s many burner phones! And Alicia Banes is on the other end! She was hoping for Mary’s help tracking her and her brother’s mother. Max is sceptical that there’s anything to be worried about. Sam tells them that they’ll help –much to Dean’s displeasure. Sam assures Dean that Jody put an APB out on Cas and Kelly and they can’t do anything more about it. And they should help the witch twins since “their mom’s on a hunting trip, and hasn’t been home in a week.” RIMSHOT.

Agreeing to help, Dean then calls Mary.

Mary’s a little too busy to take any calls, as she and Ketch are busy interrogating a shape shifter.  Dean asks if she can help with the witch twin case, and then requests “Even if you can’t swing by, can you call me back? Just some stuff going down. It’s kinda got me spun out. It’d be good to talk to you.” DEAN BEAN. To add pain to this pain, I’ll just say that he could really use a Charlie to talk to right now. (Natasha: ouch. I hurt more.)

Ketch is having too much fun hurting the shape shifter, and Mary’s getting a tad uncomfortable. Ketch don’t give a shit, and punches the shifter, who instantly changes into him.

The brothers meet up with Max and Alicia. Alicia informs them that their mother was on the hunt for a borrower witch– a witch that gets their power from a demon deal. They know where she was staying, and Max got the bartender’s phone number! Wins all around. Dean then shows Max his super rad car, complete with Chekhov’s gun grenade launcher. Alicia and Sam bond over sibling/parent rivalry. Alicia admits that Max and their mom share more of a bond. Sam says that Dean and their dad were the same. Alicia asks about Mary. AWKWARD.

They all arrive at the B&B and find Strange Man Mcstrangerson coming out of the underground shed.

And they find the Bane twins’ mom is inside the B&B. Alicia is beyond happy to find her mom okay. Tasha tells everyone that she has wine! Time to celebrate. Sam and Dean got to watch two siblings interact with their mother like normal children, and I’m pretty sure I saw both of them crying rivers of pain internally, but they wouldn’t be Winchesters otherwise, amirite? Unfortunately, everything isn’t right in Mom-ville if her whacked out finger means anything.

Sam offers to go pick up food, while the others enjoy the wine.

Meanwhile, at the BMoL bunker, Ketch and Mary are done with the shifter and Ketch suggests they “find some privacy and tire ourselves out.” Mary shuts him down cold. Lol. She’s one cold BAMF. Mary’s pissed that the torture session on the shifter didn’t get them anywhere. “Anyone that tells you that torture is never the answer, they haven’t been under the knife.” Send me all the meta on Dean Winchester and torture, please and thank you. Ketch insists that the BMoL believe the ends justify the means. He then taunts Mary by saying she can call Mick to write him up –and that she should return Dean’s call.  “Wouldn’t want him to think that mummy doesn’t love him.”

Don’t worry Ketch, Dean’s felt like she hasn’t loved him for almost a whole season now. He’s good at that self-hatred without your help. When he isn’t staring forlornly at his phone with no messages, he praises Tasha for the great job she did with her children. “Parents always seem smart and strong and perfect, but it’s only when you grow up that you realize that they’re just people.” Dean’s learning all about that this season.

Mary’s listening to Dean’s messages, but overhears Ketch on the phone and eavesdrops. Her cover is blown when Dean tries calling her again, so she asks Ketch to use Mick’s computer to check email. (Mary’s on the Biggerson’s email list too!) Also, Mick is still dead still in London.

Sam’s back with the food, and motions to talk with Dean alone in the hallway. It seems that Strange Man McStrangerson has been missing for a month. They head out to explore on their own, while the mean lady from the cold open builds something from a tulpa’s nightmare.

Sam and Dean pick the lock of the cellar and open it up. They both reel back from the stench of death and then descend into the cellar.

Max heads out for a night of fun with the hot bartender from the vegan restaurant. (Wow, the vegan restaurant has a bar? Where is this town again? I’m in my car, ready to go.) Alicia and Tasha are left alone for girl time.

Inside the cellar Dean and Sam locate the bodies of Strange Man McStrangerson, the B&B clerk, and Tasha Barnes. “Son of a bitch,” Dean says for us all. Their hearts have been ripped out (much like the audience’s at the confirmation of Tasha’s demise). Max interrupts them in the cellar. He saw the light on - what’s up, guys? Sam tries desperately to head him off and keep him from glimpsing his mother’s body but it’s too late. Dean and Sam stand awkwardly in the background as Max weeps over his mother.

At Moonbase, Mary enters the storage locker and locates the shipping container Ketch referenced in his phone call. She opens it, sighs exhaustedly at the sight of Mick’s body, and strides through the hallways with purpose. She’s going to…fuck some shit up? Escape? Regardless, Ketch is also prowling the hallways so Mary slips into a handprint-locked door as another BMoL leaves so she can avoid Ketch. She turns in the small room and sees monitors up with biographical and tracking information. The BMoL are tracking herself, her sons, Claire, Garth, and Eileen. While I’m so happy that Claire and Garth and Eileen are keeping in touch with the Winchesters…I’m currently preparing to stand between them and the BMoL with Charlie’s samurai sword. Do NOT kill them - for the love of Chuck, don’t kill them.

Mary gets ready to fuck some shit up. She calls Dean and, in the Winchester family tradition, fails to inform him of any actual details. She simply says, “We’ve got a problem,” and hangs up. Dun dun DUN.

Ketch waits for her outside the door and backs her into the room, door slamming behind them. Mary asks him about Mick’s demise and Ketch neither confirms nor denies that he had any part in Ketch’s death. “You’re a psychopath,” Mary spits out and Ketch all but admits he killed Mick (which is probably the LEAST of his crimes). Finally, FINALLY, Mary socks him in the face. Ketch sends her flying and then tries to pin her to the wall. Mary shoves him away, kicks him in the balls, wrenches his arm, and pounds into his face. “Don’t talk about my boys,” she growls.

(Me: Yes YES I have been waiting for sooooo many episodes for Mary to beat down Ketch! Mary! Mary! MARY!)

“I’ve been cleaning up after them for months,” Ketch says, getting into his evil villain speech. He’s killed Federal agents, Magda, etc. “They’re damn sloppy.”

“I think you mean decent,” Mary says. Ketch tells her that it’s the end of the American hunters, but Ketch’ll keep Mary safe if she plays nice. (Ew.) The look Mary gives him reads: “Nope, it’s the end of you.” She head butts him like a badass then slips on Enochian brass knuckles. He laughs at her. Foolish Mary, those brass knuckles only work on angels! Mary demonstrates the general utility of metal slipped around knuckles, regardless of magic. Alas, Mary still has compassion at her core and she leaves Ketch alive as she tries to leave the room. Ketch zaps her in the back with a taser and she goes down before she can escape.

I got so wrapped up in Mary’s storyline that the switch back to the B&B is jarring. Max bursts into Tasha’s room and demands an explanation of his mother’s death from the thing wearing Tasha’s face. He leans in close, his eyes glow purple, and then he magically orders her to “Reveal.” She seizes under his hands and drops the following clue: “room, end of the hall, top of the stairs.”

In the room at the end of the hall at the top of the stairs, Old Lady Witch’s ears burn and she scowls, then snaps her fingers. The clerk, Tasha, and Strange Man McStrangerson snap to attention like good little soldiers. Max magic-blasts Strange Man McStrangerson out the window where it twitches on the pavement below. Dean and Max burst into Old Lady Witch’s bedroom. She tries to fight them with old lady sourness, but when that fails to work she magically pins Dean to a chair. (Well, at least he’s comfortable.) She compliments Max’s abilities and offers him a deal he should definitely refuse.

The witch mind-whammies Dean and Max to give a nice multi-media dimension to her evil villain speech. They can see and feel her attack on Tasha. The witch sold her soul for magical powers and she’s nearing the end of her very long magical life. She’s really not interested in going to Hell so she’s looking for someone to take on her magical legacy. (Apparently she negotiated a magic-shifting clause into her demon deal? I admire the negotiating chops, even if she’s kind of a dick. But wouldn’t all that murder send you to Hell anyway?) When Tasha found her, Old Lady Witch offered to teach her all her super magic. Tasha turned down her offer and the witch “made her into one of her creatures,” which is a roundabout way of saying she cut out Tasha’s still-beating heart and placed it inside of a wicker man. 

The doll has all of her mother’s memories. “It’s her, mostly.” Max attacks with magic.

Max can’t put a dent in her, though. She offers him her power instead and slips off her giant ring. If Max takes on her burden, Tasha will “live.”

In Tasha’s room, Sam fights the twiggy B&B clerk as Alicia worries over her mother’s own twitching form. Sam’s not doing so well with the fight so Alicia joins the fray. Alicia is also a badass, and she knocks the B&B clerk across the room where he crackles against the wall. Alicia turns to find her mother standing and the Tasha doll smoothly, without fanfare, slides a knife into Alicia’s gut.

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

Somebody call goddamn 911 or something? Augh. Anyway, back in the witch’s room Max slowly reaches out to accept the witch’s ring when Dean pulls out of her control just enough to aim his gun and shoot her. The twig dolls - including Tasha - crumble into ash. Dean reminds Max that touching that magic equates signing his soul away. Down the hallway, Sam yells for Dean, anguish in his voice.

Alicia dies just before Max arrives. Max wails over her body. Ugh, I’m so sad.

Later, Dean and Sam approach Max outside. “You’re probably in shock right now,” Sam tells him, wearing his Captain Obvious cape. Dean and Sam, who have seen each other die and resurrect more times than anybody but @supernaturalwiki can count, warn him that it’s going to hurt like hell. Max agonizes over his choices. He could have saved his whole family – his mom, his sister – but instead he laughed at Alicia’s concerns. And while that’s not true about his mom, at least, we are all familiar with the logically unsound Winchester-style guilt spiral. Dean and Sam offer to get cremation supplies but Max begs them to leave. The Winchesters, because they’re idiots when the plot calls for it, head out.

Cut to Baby out on the open road. It’s time for a BM scene!

Dean expresses his regrets over Max. He had everything Dean wished for - a happy family - and in an instant it was ripped away. The next bit of Winchester dialogue is overlaid with scenes of Max back at the B&B.

Sam: You couldn’t let Max make a deal for his soul.

Dean: We do terrible things all the time to save each other. Who am I to stop him?

Points to Dean for the parallel. Pretty sure Dean suspected Max was going to cut some kind of deal, but left anyway. Should I high five him for that? I’m so torn.

(Boris: I took this moment as a deconstruction of season 2. Max and Alicia are a direct parallel to Dean making his demon deal for Sam’s life. What will a sibling do for the other? Is this another step towards the breaking down of Sam and Dean’s dependency on each other? Or just creating complicated characters for the Wayward Daughters spin-off? :D)

Max picks up the witch’s ring, lays his sister’s body on the bed, and stands over her with the knife. Purple light flashes and the scene cuts to Alicia waking up as Max ties her last shoelace. She’s groggy but otherwise seems like herself.

He tells her it’s time to go and she readily agrees, walking out of the room with her body left behind on the bed. Max, heartbroken, takes the witch’s book of magic and immolates his sister’s body before leaving the B&B.

In the car, Sam’s tuckered out and snoozing so Dean takes the time to listen to his mom’s voicemails. When the second voicemail hits, Dean shouts at Sam to wake him.

The scene cuts to Mary waking as Ketch douses her with water. Mary’s trussed to the interrogation chair. “A taser?” Mary spits. “Not really a fair fight.” Mary knows where to hit him where it hurts (the balls amirite?). But the BMoL aren’t going to kill her (just yet). Ooooh no. Because Toni “Creeper” Bevel has arrived in her trim pantsuit to interrogate her first.

Natasha: Whew. This episode hurt. We see Sam and Dean die and do horrible stuff for each other all the time and roll with it. But part of how we roll with it is that we get to see their salvation arcs. It hurts to see such delightful characters die. Sure, Max and Alicia’s close sibling relationship was a tempting parallel to Sam and Dean (except they had way less angst). But we’ve already learned this lesson, right? And Alicia’s resurrection barely feels halfway there at this point since she’s under Max’s control. (Yuck face.) Hopefully we’ll get to see a redemption story in a later episode that DOESN’T result in Alicia or Max’s death. On the plus side, this kind of dark fairy tale horror vibe is MY JAM so I’m also really happy? Anyway, if you think I’m not going to write some fanfiction bringing Alicia back to life (her soul must surely be tied to the doll) and saving Max’s soul from Hell, you don’t know me at all.

Boris: I think we (and Sam and Dean) have learned lessons –ones that Max hasn’t yet (Dean did tell him not to take the deal, with personal experience to back his wish.) I have a lot more questions than answers after this episode, but the whole sibling parallel/sell your soul for your sibling bit was meant to highlight that it wasn’t a good choice that Dean made all those years ago. In a seemingly unrelated part of this episode Ketch talks about torture –something we all know that Dean will struggle with remembering for the rest of his life. And where to begin with Mary? She kicks ass. I really like her. And yet, Dean is still yearning for something more. He has her back, but what he really wants back was a life with her in it. (And in hopes that it will help Dean reconcile the fact he’s never getting his past back, I really liked his conversation with Tasha.)

Magical Quotes of Doom:

What the hell, man? What about Cas?

She doesn’t seem like much of a hugger.

I’m sad to say that you won’t become the Jiminy Cricket of the British Men of Letters.

“A slight werewolf mishap.” “A werewolf shot him in the head?”

I don’t play nice.

[cupidsbower]

You're living in the past, it's a new generation

Supernatural 12x16, “Ladies Drink Free.”

So you might have noticed I haven’t been around much lately, or posted any reviews. That’s because I’ve been too busy to watch any TV for about a month. I’m just starting to catch up on Supernatural again now.

This was an interesting episode because it had two narratives in conflict, one of which ended up working much more strongly than the other. The title pretty much encapsulates the problem here -- the reason “ladies drink free” is to attract male patrons by implying they’ll get access to the (potentially drunk) ladies. Everything about the notion is sexist and gross. Here’s a blackly humorous breakdown of the implied economic transaction taking place.

Anyway, the first narrative in the ep is Claire’s, which the writer, Meredith Glynn, seems to have done their very best to infuse with a feminist theme. The other narrative, however, is Mick’s teachable moment, which is at the expense of one dead young woman and one tortured young woman -- the “ladies” of the title who drank “for free,” so men would have access to them. Manpain, in other words; the second plot is all about the manpain. There’s really no successful way to merge these two different narratives, I think, but Glynn does give it their best shot.

Let’s start with the attempt at a feminist narrative, as that’s the bit that’s least successful.

The plot of this episode is very much by-the-numbers. We have two  potential male predators offered up to us, two  young, pretty female victims, and several male protectors. Glynn even points out how typical this is very early on, with the “Haven’t you ever seen a horror movie?” line. Yes, we all have, and so this plot unfolds exactly as expected when women are sacrificed so men can learn a lesson.

Glynn attempts to subvert this sexist old-school narrative by trying to make the episode a coming-of-age moment for Claire as well as the manpain-teachable-moment for Mick. The arc ends with Claire alive, and affirming her place as Jodie’s daughter and as a woman with her own needs as she goes off to be a hunter. These are good things. And there are some genuinely nice touches in this part of the ep too, like this:

(from @itsokaysammy)

You go Claire!

But these moments sit uneasily inside the frame of the typical women-as-sexualised-victims storyline, and there isn’t really a true climax for Claire’s arc in the ep, where she gets to kick-ass and take names, or even engineer her own moment of freedom.

We can see this thematically in the two musical tracks that top and tail Claire’s journey, without a proper bridge in between (the other obvious track in the ep is for Dean and Mick and it’s Save Me Tonight -- ugh). The first of Claire’s tracks is Make Me Wanna Die, as she’s walking into the teeth of the werewolf...

Make Me Wanna Die, by The Pretty Reckless

Take me I'm alive Never was a girl with a wicked mind But everything looks better when the sun goes down

I had everything Opportunities for eternity And I could belong to the night

Then your eyes Your eyes I can see in your eyes Your eyes

You make me wanna die I'll never be good enough You make me wanna die And everything you love will burn up in the light And every time I look inside your eyes You make me wanna die

Taste me drink my soul Show me all the things that I shouldn't know When there's a blue moon on the rise

I had everything Opportunities for eternity And I could belong to the night

Then your eyes Your eyes I can see in your eyes Your eyes Everything in your eyes Your eyes

You make me wanna die I'll never be good enough You make me wanna die And everything…

A very listenable song, but also one that’s very much about female victimhood. There’s something so icky about this being associated with Claire and Hayden, just because they’re young women who want to be able to spread their wings a little and are punished for it (by men). But I think this dissonance is made worse by being contrasted with the song Claire gets as she drives away at the end.

Real Wild Child, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts 

Joan Jett is the real deal, you know; she’s who Dean Winchester wants to be. Look at that car, and her hair, and her everything. She gave us a glimpse of what female rock really looked like: kindness, feminism, no-apologies rock, and all-around awesomeness -- just look at this interview with Roseanne Barr. Tell me you don’t have a crush now!?!

Don’t get me wrong, This could have been such a great journey for Claire, if she’d had a proper moment of agency near the end. It’s just she doesn’t really get to legitimately have this journey into becoming the Wild Child -- this is no Lily Sunder story arc. Glynn tries to give it to her, but the real teachable moment is all for Mick, and Claire’s is a tack-on to try and reduce the otherwise choking amounts of sexism that would be in this episode.

I have really mixed feelings about this, because some of the stuff related to Mick’s lesson is interesting myth-arc development, but this treatment of Claire is so superficial, and I want more from the show when it comes to the way they use female characters.

And has Mick even really learned his lesson, or was it another fake-out? I think maybe he did, because it’s implied this was his first hands-on murder, and it shocked him, but the whole MoL is so slimy I won’t be surprised if he backslides or just lied. So Claire and Hayden may have gone through all that for nothing.

UGH.

Okay, moving on to the good.  There’s three main things I want to talk about.

First, Dean pretty much explicitly confirms my reading of the Winchester style of hunting, as they’ve come to perform it, is supernatural police work. I’m pleased by this, as it indicates we really are heading into an exploration of what it means to be hunters, and what hunters are not. I’ve wanted this narrative for a long, long time. And the reason I want is so much is...

Second, back when I was a fan of Teen Wolf, one of the things that had me excited to find out what happened was the back story which showed that the genocide being carried out by hunters was actually the main cause of the very werewolf violence they purported to want to stop. Every werewolf we saw attack someone had a traumatic history with at least one hunter in their past, and no stable pack.

I adored this implication that the hunters were mired in hypocrisy, and I desperately wanted to see this arc unfold and resolve. Unfortunately, whatever it was that happened behind the scenes in season 3 that ruined so much of Teen Wolf’s potential, also seemed to destroy any chance of this arc paying off. *still bitter*

But now, here is is again! Our typical selfish white boy, Justin, it turns out, would probably only ever have been an everyday sort of prick if the Men of Letters’ genocide hadn’t wiped out his pack and launched him into his serial murderer and biter-without-consent spree.

In other words, the MoL’s actions are the first link in a causal chain that’s leading to the kinds of deaths and suffering they claim to want to stop. This is not to say Justin has no agency -- he’s still responsible for his own actions and the effects they cause. But the trigger that set him on the path he otherwise probably wouldn’t have chosen was the MoL’s attack on his pack.

I’m super keen that we’re treading this ground, and cannot wait to see where Dabb takes it. SUPER EXCITED. (But it better not be taking us to Mary’s refridging, is the proviso.)

Third, I am beginning to think we are seriously going to get Three Men-Shaped-Beings and a Little Nephilim as the plot for season 13 (how apropos), because this episode was aaallllllllllll about Sam and Dean as dads. Like, Sam is officially a skeevy old dude, and Dean is one breath away from grounding everyone, and they both have explicitly dad-coded moments. Dean with the shotgun speech (which just plays into the sexism of the Claire plot, so I’m not a fan, but it’s still definitely dad-coded), and Sam with his conversation with Claire that helps her decide to own her choices and talk to Jodie about them.

I’m actually pretty keen about this development too. With a kid in the mix, there is so much ground that could be explored in terms of the legacy of John and how Sam and Dean (and Mary) are recovering from that and learning healthier ways to be family, especially with a supernatural kid in the mix. It opens up an interesting role for Castiel as well, given he’s likely to be the kid’s uncle.

So, as I said, a very mixed episode. The sexism means I won’t be rushing to re-watch, but the good things do have me looking forward to the next ep.

Previously:

The Ministry of Information vs Wayward Sons Carrying On (12x01)

My, my, how can I resist you? (12x02) and follow-up about Bohemian Raphsody

So what am I so afraid of? (I think I love you) (12x03)

I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy Down in my heart (Where?) (12x04) and a follow-up about the codependency and about Dean’s self-flagellation and issues with space

There can be only one! (12x05), and a follow-up conversation with elizabethrobertajones on Freud vs Schwartz.

They shall fall by the sword: they shall be a portion for foxes (12x06)  

Presenting the Immaculate Heart Reunion Tour (12x07)    

I’m still living the life where you get home and open the fridge and there’s half a pot of yogurt and a half a can of flat Coca-Cola. ~Alan Rickman (12x08, 12x09)

When the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men (12x10)    

in re (12x11)

Making the most of teachable moments (12x12) and an added thought, In-and-out-laws

Don’t fuck with the branches on my family tree (12x13)

To Protect and to Serve (12x14) and some more thoughts

Hiding in the shadow of love (12x15) and some further thoughts in response to @elizabethrobertajones‘ meta.