#loki show discourse

[jimintomystery]

Wow

On Monday, Marvel put out a new Loki trailer, previewing the final two episodes of the season. The trailer briefly shows Mobius living out a normal life, presumably as he did before he was recruited into the Time Variance Authority.

Since then the Loki fandom, famed for its carefully considered reactions, has gone from debating whether Mobius is married/divorced/widowed to wondering if Mobius is secretly Thor. (Or Balder.) This is all based on approximately three seconds in a trailer for two episodes.

Apparently word got around that Mobius's real name is "Don," which could make him Don Blake. In the comics, Don Blake was the human alter ego of Thor. (Or Balder, in the other comics. This is confusing.) I have absolutely no idea how anyone decided Mobius is named "Don" in the first place. It's the same kind of logic that gave us "Someone said 'the devil' in WandaVision, so Mephisto is the next Thanos."

At issue here is, as usual, Lokius. If Mobius has a family life outside the TVA, you see, then he might not be willing or able to consummate his fanon romance with Loki. Or, if he's somehow a variant of Loki's adoptive brother, it would get real awkward for Lokius shippers who have insisted that it's wrong to pair Loki up with Sylvie because they ought to have more of a sibling dynamic. (Loki, who once fucked a horse, could not be reached for comment.)

Anyway, the next episode of Loki drops later tonight, and there's doom and gloom in the fandom about the possibility that Lokius has been Thorki all along. I've already seen someone denounce this "twist" as homophobia and queerbaiting. Because, you see, Disney deliberately designed this show to get fans to infer an mlm relationship, and now Disney is going to dick around with said relationship just to spite those fans, which wouldn't increase their profits by one cent, but for some reason they're bound and determined to do it anyway? I need to lie down.

[lokiusly]

extremely telling that people who don’t like Loki s2 are mostly people who didn’t get the sy*ki romance that they wanted

[worstloki]

oh god oh please not odin it's just a matter of time until frigga is here too

Upcoming discourse where people argue it’s more moral to bang a variant of your adoptee father than a girl version of yourself/your brother from another timeline

[lokiified]

listen man i understand the dislike for sylvie, i can get behind that. but i will forever defend loki’s character in the tv show. yes, he’s very very different and the change can feel drastic, but i think realizing that:

- the love and acceptance you always longed for from your family was there the whole time

- your own “glorious purpose” never existed

- you willingly die at the hands of your greatest fear

- the things you thought were the greatest powers in the universe (infinity stones) are being used as paperweights by a society that is in control of time as you know it

- your choices have never been your own,

would kind of change your perspective of yourself and those around you, and maybe make you act a little differently.

have whatever opinions you want, but that’s just my 2 cents on it

[lokidanger]

I will forever curse the MCU for calling their universe 616.

[nerdby]

If Loki knowing about the Infinity Stones in the television series has been tripping you up, please go back and rewatch the first Avengers movie--

In the first Avengers film, Loki had two Infinity Stones in his possession while battling the Avengers. One of them is the space stone which was encased in the tesseract and the other was the mind stone which was encased in Loki's staff. The mind stone was given to Loki by Thanos because Thanos knew it would aid him in making Loki betray Thor and try to take over Earth. This is because the mind stone acting as a drug that would allow Thanos to control Loki's thoughts and actions.

Because, like it or not, Loki is not stronger than an Infinity Stone.

So if you're confused about how TVA!Loki knows about the Infinity Stones, the answer is simple--

Thanos told Loki about the Infinity Stone in his staff and about the other Stones in the first Avengers movie, but also failed to mention the effect the stone would have on Loki himself. So TVA!Loki would NOT have needed to live through the events of any of the post-2012 MCU films to know of the Stones' existence.

[princesssarcastia]

you can absolutely make a character who was formerly a racist fuck-wit sympathetic and compelling, but ONLY if you (the narrative) and they (the character) own the wrong and the growth.

i mean, look, you tell that kind of story in the hopes that life will imitate art, right? there's gotta be a path out of the darkness. you can illuminate that path, but not if you lie about where the journey started. it's only compelling if you own it. don't shy away from the hurt and the sharp edges—cut yourself on them. bleed.

[jimintomystery]

@sunflowerdigs replied to your post “Wow”:

It wouldn't be to spite queer fans (though it would do that). It would reassure straight viewers that Lokius could never happen. It would be classic queerbaiting, really. Rope in queer viewers with subtext, but then appeal to the straight majority audience that Marvel actually wants once D+ has its subscription money. It's definitely not unheard of. The panic based on unsubstantiated rumors is silly but the distrust of a major franchise isn't.

For what it's worth, I'm willing to believe some media has intentionally queerbaited its audience. The problem is that all I've read about the topic relies on anecdotal evidence: "I expected this queer ship to be endgame, but then it wasn't, so those awful producers must have tricked me." If there's an interview or something, where somebody in the industry admitted to using queerbaiting as an actual strategy to increase viewership, then I'd be very interested in reading that. But even then, I'm skeptical that the strategy works at scale, or that Disney would bother employing it on Loki.

The motive for queerbaiting, as you've laid out, is to "rope in queer viewers" without alienating homophobic viewers, to maximize total viewership and therefore profits. That seems plausible for a show on the CW that's subsisting on a deeply hardcore audience. It makes less sense on a major streaming service that owns Star Wars, the Simpsons, and all the Marvel superheroes and all the Disney princesses. Disney+ doesn't have to do some intricate balancing act to play two opposing audiences against one another in a single show. For one thing, Loki is a spinoff of a billion-dollar movie. For another, if Disney just wanted to maximize profits, they would have used their Loki budget to make Iron Man vs. Darth Vader instead.

So I think it's fair to say Disney already has a stranglehold on "the straight majority audience that Marvel actually wants." That's not to say they wouldn't go the extra mile to string along queer subscribers as well. But if that was the play for Loki, they kinda gave away the game two years ago, when Sylvie kissed Loki, and the fandom denounced the show for queerbaiting. Why bait your queer viewers, and then chase them off before the second season? Granted, a lot of Lokius shippers weren't chased off, although a great many of them expect to be queerbaited some more. At this point the bait analogy falls apart--the fisherman crafts the perfect lure, but then tries to scare away all the fish, except the ones who would jump straight into the boat without any incentive at all.

Again, I'm willing to keep an open mind about this stuff. But from what I've seen so far, if the Loki showrunners are queerbaiting, they're doing a shit job of it, for an audience that sees right through the trick and pays to watch anyway, which makes the bait a complete waste of effort. It makes no sense. So it's easier to buy the alternative--nobody was trying to deceive the Lokius shippers, and they played themselves.

[verysium]

I’ve been seeing some discourse around twitter about the blue lock boys and whether they’d be a loyal bf or not 😭 Curious to know who do you think would be more inclined to cheat or who just wouldn’t at all!!!

I saw someone say sae would 100% cheat like whattt I feel like he wouldn’t even bother looking at anyone else if he already has someone (Cuz I mean dating him would likely mean you actually mean something to him) but I digress

ok anon you had me pulling up a whole argumentative essay here cus WHO TF SAID SAE WOULD 100% CHEAT??? 😔 that mischaracterization is so painfully inaccurate. twitter really took the whole emotionally unavailable itoshi archetype and ran with it. let me just clear the air here because my man deserves some explanation.

sae itoshi would not cheat. as in capital N and capital O. he took nearly an entire decade off his life just to work on his own issues and finally form a functional and healthy relationship with another human being. and you're telling me he's just going to let all that wash down the drain for someone else? 😒 twitter logic really be showing its illogical side here. apparently a man can be loyal to a professional sports career for eighteen years, but he can't be loyal to his significant other.

i think this misunderstanding probably happened cus of shidou. people read the manga and saw that sae dropped rin for a bug-eyed freak and automatically assumed he was disloyal. 😑 let me just say two things here:

(1) sae and shidou's relationship is strictly professional. imagine being stuck in an god awful corporate office with coworkers who bore you with their weaponized incompetence and a boss who annoys the living shit out of you. and then one day, the company hires a new recruit who is probably the most unhinged and debauched creature known to man. you're probably left wondering how he even got hired in the first place. but then you find out...he's useful. he takes risks and gets a high return on what he invests. it's impulsive and stupid, really. but at least it's unconventional and outside-the-box. he has your interest piqued. that's basically sae and shidou in a nutshell.

(2) just because sae gave shidou his number after the u-20 game does NOT mean he would do the same to any other person who would try to encroach on your relationship. and let's be real here. sae would get one text from shidou and block his contact.

anyways, here is my analysis on the bllk boys in general. introducing the anti-cheating to pro-cheating spectrum:

(A) cannot cheat under any circumstance (as in they already hate the fact that they live on a planet with 8.1 billion other people who are not you):

itoshi brothers (atp they don't even have the physical or mental capacity to entertain a third party), ness, reo

(B) cannot cheat due to physical incapability (literally cannot pull anyone within a five-meter radius to cheat with):

ego, igarashi, raichi, bachira (not that he's in any way unattractive...it's just...i feel like he would purposefully act weird to drive off people who aren't you)

(C) could not cheat (basically option A and B but less problematic version)

yukimiya, barou, kunigami, noa, loki, gagamaru, chigiri, niko, hiori, karasu (baby boy literally felt inferior cus his crush was the cutest in his class), kurona (head empty, just you)

(D) would not cheat (on you but everyone else is not included)

isagi (unintentionally a homewrecker to others but would never let anyone homewreck his relationship with you), leonardo (idk why but i just don't trust him entirely)

(E) could cheat (depends on what they get out of it):

kaiser, shidou (honestly what did you expect when you willingly dated a blonde man...)

(F) would cheat (either proven by canon or they accidentally fucked up somehow):

otoya, oliver, nagi

[catlady48]

Sometimes I feel like such a fake fan. This has mostly to do with the fact that I prefer Loki's characterisation in Thor 1 and 2 over Avengers!Loki. I also always heavily insist it was not actually his true desire to conquer Earth or rule anything, mostly because that's the way the first movie was written. I even think that plot idea is a left over from when they wanted Red Skull to be the villain of Avengers (2012). Because to me it just never made sense that all of a sudden he'd want to rule this planet he considers a backwater. I know some people argue that after having been on the throne for a bit during Thor 1 he grew to enjoy it too much or something, but I just can't see it considering his state of mind during that movie?

I especially hate that comparison during the Stuttgart scene, even if I agree you should always stand up to oppressors (especially these days). It's just created takes like "Loki is explicitly a fascist", which is factually wrong (even if he wanted to do as he stated, that'd be absolute monarchy not fascism. But also since I personally believe he wasn't doing all of it of his own will. It's also a bit weird since the movie heavily implies Loki was both tortured and to some degree influenced and this comparison contradicts it. So which is it? Did he want this and is he a despicable dictator or is he a somewhat sympathetic (even if his actions are of course still horrible) guy who was kind of forced into doing these horrible things in order to survive. It feels like the movie tries to forcibly frame him into "wait we've shown him as to sympathetic, now we must show him as the worst evil ever to compensate so that the audience will applaud at his defeat" and it doesn't match his own subtext. What doesn't help is that a lot of this was probably supposed to have been revealed during the original plans for Infinity War and that never happened so we'll never know what the true intention was. Furthermore, I think the Stuttgart scene was mostly intended to be at least partially an act and that makes that comparison even more unlogical to me.

I think I'd have preferred it that they wrote his villainy differently, without bringing the whole "he's powerhungry" stereotype into it. I know, part of that is because of what they wrote him into later, which wasn't explicitly the fault of Avengers as a movie and I also know it's a huge thing in the older comics, but mcu!Loki was explicitly not written like that before that and I think they should've stuck with that. I mean after his character arc in Thor 1, if they truly wanted him as the villain, "if I couldn't be your equal that way, I'll be your equal through being your archnemesis" was right there along with all the angst that could come with that. They wouldn't have needed to write in the torture and stuff to make it make sense with his character.

Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy most of Avengers and I do enjoy Loki throughout the movie. It's just some of the discourse that surrounds it that bugs me to no end. I'm afraid that I'm woobifying him too much by claiming he isn't as villainous as Marvel wants to paint him, even though this is genuinely how I interpret the movie. It feels like people are claiming that I need to embrace this (in particular the Stuttgart scene) as his true personality in order to not be woobifying him, while I think that is not the case at all based on textual evidence and I'm so tired of it. Does that make me a fake fan?

[mrsblackruby]

I used to be a really big fan of the MCU’s version of loki but I’m not a fan of the tv show at all but I understand that it resonates with some and want to respect that lolz. I just found this analysis really interesting and wanted to add to the discussion as someone who liked the version of Loki that was an agent of chaos and not the god of stories. Just want to respectfully add and engage my different perspective in this meta.

I think seeing Loki time slipping could’ve been an interesting plot device and I feel like even though i don’t really like how Sylvie’s character gets depicted overall in the show. I don’t think Loki had to betray her. And the scope showing that to be the outcome of the show feels narrow to me personally. I don’t feel like the TVA makes a good anchor for my understanding of Loki a god of mischief. Like going by the show’s cannon universe it is an anchor ( I would’ve liked to see an extremely different picture painted as an anchor for Loki) but I would’ve wanted loki to help it evolve into something else entirely like he said in one of the first trailers “he’d burn the place to the ground” instead he keeps theses timelines and the tva kicking against their own will (or maybe The better word autonomy independence) and he does it alone? The version of Loki’s story i was more familiar and interested in I probably would’ve resonated with more personally. But I agree that this story feels like there are actually a lot of plot holes and it doesn’t feel resolved yet but I think this end is a (predictable? Conclusive?) a pretty good match for the show overall.

the only thing that did feel “right” about the show was the end of the show to me. the spoilers I heard about the ending of Loki going tree mode and baby sitting every time line made some sense Because personally I don’t like the ending at all but because I recognize I don’t really like any of the other parts of the show it follows well with the direction the show went in to me.

and to reduce confusion I hate seeing loki feel like he has to sacrifice himself to seek repentance

but full disclosure I only watched season 1 and two episodes of season 2. So how I’m describing events might be ill judged and heavily biased.

Like Tom said, Loki tends to try and achieve repentance through self-sacrifice. So, I'm really glad that Mobius stepped up and made solving the time slipping a priority and didn't let Loki go chasing after Sylvie and Dox at the expense of his own health and wellbeing at the end of 2x01. It's one of my favorite little moments in the series. Mobius could see that Loki was upset that he'd had to betray Sylvie, and that he was already making the assumption that he was in the wrong in the situation and needed to make it up to her through self-sacrifice. And so Mobius called bullshit and didn't let him, reminding Loki that his needs (not capricious wants, but genuine human needs) were as important as everyone else's. B-15 backed this up when she volunteered to go looking for Dox and Sylvie in his stead.

It's this brief, wonderful contrast to the start of the episode, where Loki is wandering the TVA alone, unable to anchor himself to any point in time and completely unsure of what to do next. Mobius, then B15, become the anchors that he needs (and OB, too), and suddenly, even without Loki prioritizing himself, there's a solution to the problem that he was trying to ignore and white knuckle his way through.

And maybe it's because of this that I feel like there has to be another chapter to this story. Loki has done what he always does and has sacrificed his own happiness (and possibly health - we don't know what effect powering the whole timeline may have on him) for everyone else. So, imo, it's time for everyone else to call bullshit and work their damndest to get him out of there. Or, at least, it should be.

[ruibaozha]

I saw how some people use historical figures from Chinese mythology, folklore and religion for NSFW, literally, turning them into their own OC's, and I was wondering, what do you think of that? Because it seems like they just took them, and didn't do more research asking the question of "is that right?"

As per your second question for me I will leave that unaddressed and instead invite you to discuss those matters properly in private, especially if this answer is dissatisfying.

I personally do not care much if NSFW or suggestive content of such deities exist (except for the child Nezha, leave his child form out of this.) or that it’s being produced in the first place. The numerous Chinese social media sites like LOFTER, Douban (豆瓣) and Xiaohongshu (小红书) feature fan art of Daoist deities like Nezha and Er’lang in these kinds of situations. Fan fiction of these deities are similarly of the same attitude. It has nothing to do with if proper research has been conducted, especially in the case of Er’lang Shen who cannot act on romantic feelings even if he wanted to.

It feels to me that there’s an exception regarding Chinese deities and folk heroes when deities of other religions have been sexualized. This screams of not only hypocrisy but of ignorance in being offended on behalf of the Chinese. In the few months I was active in the LMK fandom I’ve come to realize a majority of the other Chinese in the fandom are either adopted or second generation immigrants with no real cultural background; and as a consequence have severely inaccurate biases on matters like this because they aren’t aware of how insignificant this is.

I’m admittedly not active within the LMK fandom anymore and as such I don’t know what’s happening there unless someone is compelled to talk about what is going on. But it feels to me that as per usual people are holding Journey to the West as the be all end all on numerous fronts when the books really cannot and should not be heralded as such. Moreover, it’s strange that the fandom is completely okay with sexualizing Sun Wukong, the Six Eared Macaque, and the Golden Winged Peng while any other character is unacceptable.

I assure you that numerous derivative works feature Chinese deities in relationships and sexual contexts, even Tang Sanzang is featured in movies or television shows with a romantic partner despite relationships of that nature betray his Buddhist faith.

I’ve been considering making a post about the cultural dissonance that’s happening here and various attitudes or opinions other people have because they lack the cultural context to realize how insignificant and misinformed a lot of this “discourse” actually is.

What is it about Chinese mythology that sets it apart from Nordic or Greco-Roman mythology in these ways? Why is it perfectly acceptable to sexualize Loki or Achilles, but not someone like Muzha (who was a very real person that became deified, in the same fashion as Guan Yu, as who he was studying under was seen as an incarnation of Guanyin)?

I don’t think this type of thinking will ever make sense to me as a true testament to how different the fandom (especially on Twitter) and myself feel about this matter.

[percheduphere]

people saying, oh it wasn't intended from the beginning so it wasn't intentional thus has to stay fanfiction bug me. like, shows can develop organically based on chemistry. they can surprise you and take you in a direction that wasn't planned but now just works. like, fucking, chandler and monica wasn't planned from the beginning! but the actors had chemistry and the writers tried it out and it became iconic. you don't throw something away just because it surprised you instead of being pre-planned; you cultivate whatever gold you find!

With Hollywood entertainment in particular, I think there is a lot of ignorance regarding how the creative process, production process, post-production process, and business all work. It is readily apparent that in Hollywood, there are many hands in the kitchen when it comes to creating a movie, documentary, or show. The "Original Intent" argument is weakest when it comes to Hollywood art, and in fact fails to be a viable argument in multiple areas. I will discuss how the "Original Intent" argument fails in Hollywood in more depth under the read more, using what I know from having worked in the industry myself as a writer. And to be honest, the fact I have to pull my private professional history out online, just to prove I'm not being delulu when it comes to the importance of queer subtext in film, pisses me the fuck off.

To be clear, since this whole discourse mess on my Tumblr is likely the result of someone thinking I'm an anti-sylki: I AM NOT AN ANTI. I have an extensive analysis on Sylvie as an integral character to the Loki series, Sylki in canon, and her relationship with Mobius here.

I agree with you: a lot of amazing art deviates from the original intention, especially writing. If deviating from original intent in the writing process did not exist, we would not have DRAFT REVISIONS, we would not have IMPROV, we would not have EDITORS (whose entire job hinges on giving the writer not only grammar corrections, but feedback on how to IMPROVE character, plot, and pacing, which inherently means making changes from the original intent!). This is to say nothing of the thousands, if not tens or hundreds of thousands, of media scholars--with actual PhDs--who spend years of their lives performing meta-analysis to write academic papers on subject matters like this. Papers that become formal publications and contribute to how queer history is taught in universities! This is no different than academic scholars analyzing women and race representation and resistance in film. Why should analyzing queer representation and resistance in film be treated any less?

LET'S TALK ABOUT ORIGINAL CREATIVE INTENT VS POWER HIEARCHY & POLITICS IN HOLLYWOOD

For context with respect to this ask, a different Tumblr user critiqued against queer subtext in one of my posts using the "original intent" argument for the Loki series and Lokius specifically. By this logic, if original intent is always honored, then the original script for Loki's S2E5 (written by Eric Martin) would not have been NUKED by the executive powers that be at Marvel. [source] But no, the original intent was not honored, it was rejected. So how does one square the primacy of original intent with original intent being rejected by people who are not the artist but the people who manage Disney's finances?

In television, "Executive Producer" (i.e. Tom Hiddleston, Michael Waldron, Eric Martin, etc.) is a title that can be given to a writer or actor who has more creative say in the execution of a story than a regular staff writer or actor on crew. It also indicates that the writer or actor is in a much higher salary range compared to their professional peers. It does NOT mean the same thing as a CORPORATE "Producer" of Kevin Feige's level, who ultimately has the FINAL SAY on what does NOT end up on the cutting room floor. The corporate Producer must take into account the wishes of corporate's shareholders and board of directors, who are often multi-million if not multi-billion global investors who need the distribution of the product to succeed internationally in countries like China, which is very anti-LGBTQAI+. This is how a script like Eric Martin's S2E5 can be nuked and the writer can be contractually gagged from talking about its specific contents by Disney, lest they be SUED TO HELL for breaking their non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).

This doesn't even take into account politics.

In 2020, Ike Perlmutter, Chair of Marvel, "gave $575,000 to Trump For Victory, $35,500 to the Republican National Committee in April, $5600 for Texans For Ronny Jackson in February. 2019 saw him donate $248,000 to the Republican National Committee, $466,100 to Trump For Victory, $5,600 to Donald Trump For President." His wife, Laura, mirrored those donations. "In late 2016, he also gave $5,000,000 to the Great America PAC." [source] Ike was only recently laid off from his position in March 2023 [source]. Perlmutter was in a power-struggle at Marvel with Kevin Feige for years. Feige was promoted to Chief Creative Officer in 2019, which brought the power struggle to a head, ultimately contributing to Perlmutter's departure.

There is also Bob Iger, CEO of Disney, who was famously quoted during the Writers Guild of America strike for saying, “It’s very disturbing to me. We’ve talked about disruptive forces on this business and all the challenges we’re facing, the recovery from COVID which is ongoing, it’s not completely back. This is the worst time in the world to add to that disruption”

This is the worst time in the world to negotiate to pay your writers, YOUR CREATIVE LABOR FORCE, who entertained millions of people while they were stuck in their homes for 2 years, fairly?

And these are just two men in executive power at Marvel and Disney. We're not even talking about all the other board members and shareholders. You think Tom Hiddleston, Michael Waldron, and Eric Martin have any real power compared to these guys? They do not. They are peons by comparison. And these artists (despite their "Executive Producer" title) are always at odds with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), who are ultimately not artists but FINANCIERS.

Here's another quote from a studio executive that occurred during the writer's strike:

"Receiving positive feedback from Wall Street since the WGA went on strike May 2, Warner Bros Discovery, Apple, Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Paramount and others have become determined to “break the WGA,” as one studio exec blatantly put it.  

To do so, the studios and the AMPTP believe that by October most writers will be running out of money after five months on the picket lines and no work.

“The endgame is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses,” a studio executive told Deadline. Acknowledging the cold-as-ice approach, several other sources reiterated the statement. One insider called it “a cruel but necessary evil.”" [source 1] [source 2]

Fortunately, this negative press and the WGA members' solidarity led to the WGA getting everything they demanded. I still have friends in the industry, specifically in the WGA and MPEG. A lot of them were indeed starved out. My friend who's a film editor is still unemployed because pre-production has only recently started to ramp up again and her profession is all in post. She has to wait for production to catch-up and finish in order to get work.

If the AMPTP is willing to use clearly unethical tactics to underpay their writers and actors (don't forget the SAG-AFTRA strike that joined later), do we really think members of the AMPTP (the studio execs) are willing to honor artists' original intent if the original intent may be "offensive to some viewers" and therefore can potentially cut into their financial bottom line?

We're not naive. We know the answer to this.

OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH, KILLING EVE, AND GOOD OMENS

But what about OFMD, KE, and GO? These shows are on MAX, BBC, and Amazon Prime respectively. These corporations have a different branding image than Disney. Disney touts itself as "family friendly"; (read: on-screen LGBTQAI+ affection between two lead characters is "not family friendly"). MAX and BBC's branding type also affords them the luxury of creating content for niche audiences. Disney, on the other hand, makes additional revenue through using their plethora of licenses to make toys, additions to their theme parks, and other merch. If a parent is offended that a canonically queer character like Loki has romantic love not just for Sylvie but also for Mobius (a same-sex relationship), what are the odds of parents like them not buying Disney's merchandise? We can apply this same question to Star Wars, Pixar, and any of Disney-branded animation or live action movies. How deeply can audience offense potentially cut into Disney's bottom line? If there were no discrimination taking place, we would have LGBTQAI+ representation through a lead character in any one of their licenses already. We do not, and that is a huge red flag.

In addition, these entertainment corporations (who do not tout themselves as "family friendly") generate other sources of revenue elsewhere. Netflix generates international revenue through the production of international programming like "Squid Game" and other K-dramas such as "The Glory" or Mexican shows including, "The Surrogacy" and "Haunted: Latin America". MAX is struggling. They were bought out for that reason. With AppleTV and Hulu, their target audiences are more diverse, they offer a variety of media product, and their business strategy is ultimately different from Disney. All of this grants them more freedom in what kind of characters they choose to represent, including LGBTQAI+ characters.

Remember House and Wilson from House M.D.? That show was on FOX. We know the political alignment of FOX. Dean and Castiel from Supernatural? WB Television. Both shows came out before streaming became dominant, and thus, these shows had to cater to anyone who might happen to land on their channels. When the market demands that you cater to the widest possible audience in order to generate the largest revenue, the creatives are forced to create relatively conservative artistic product. Hence, creative censorship and our long history of queer subtext.

At Nickelodeon, the artists actually had the support of corporate to move forward with Korrasami because the final season Legend of Korra was only available online. It did not air on their channel. If that had not been the case, corporate would not have approved Korrasami. However, that approval was contingent upon the artists being subtle subtle about Korra and Asami's relationship. Even in this canon ship, the animators relied on subtext for queer romance.

Not helping Disney's case is the cancellation of "The Owl House". Why was "The Owl House" canceled? It didn't fit Disney's "brand". [source]

THE FAILURES OF THE "ORIGINAL INTENT" ARGUMENT IN HOLLYWOOD

The "Original Intent" argument fails when it comes to art in Hollywood because:

Original Intent can change, and often does change, during the creative process. This applies to all forms of art, not just Hollywood.

Multiple artists are involved in pre-production, production, and post-production. At any point in this 3-part process of filmmaking, original intent can be changed for a variety of reasons.

Studio Executives, Boards of Directors, and Corporate Shareholders have more power than the artists in Hollywood. If they think a product will not make money, they will order changes accordingly.

Disney specifically touts itself as "family friendly". Its lack of a lead character (in ANY of its live-action licenses) being in an openly queer relationship with someone who presents as the same sex, is the direct result of not wanting to lose conservative audiences.

Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) are common in Hollywood and prevent artists from providing specifics regarding original intent. This is done not only to safeguard corporate's intellectual property (IP), but to also safeguard their public relations image.

THE ORIGINAL INTENT ARGUMENT WEAPONIZED

The "original intent" mindset can be either very naive or very cynical, depending on the thinker's motives for choosing this belief. Naive, in that thinking creative purity actually exists (it does not) or that oppression does not still occur in Hollywood (it does). Cynical, in that either the thinker doesn't believe in artists intentionally finding ways around mass produced arts' media censorship, which has in turn created our rich history of queer subtext in film, OR the thinker wants the "original intent" argument to invalidate a change they do not like.

The last motive is the same strategy used by fans who reject Miles Morales as being a real Spider-Man. The same strategy fans use to deny that Shuri is indeed the new Black Panther. Both are tactics used to mask racism and sexism beneath the veneer of "creative purity". Fans who have internalized racism, sexism, or queer-phobia may also use this tactic at a subconscious level to protect themselves emotionally from disappointment. Finally, there are fans who use this argument to invalidate another ship, usually a queer ship that cannot be formally canonized because of corporate studio power.

Regardless of the reasoning, using this argument is frequently insidious because it perpetuates straight white male dominance in media representation.

PERSONAL LIVED EXPERIENCE

I'm an old poc queer and have worked in Hollywood long enough to know that the writers' original vision rarely ever--IF EVER--pans out as originally intended. If you ever sit through a movie and wonder why the story feels so weird in certain parts, I can guarantee you that about 2/5ths of the time, a corporate producer stepped in and messed with the original story in post-production (usually in an poor, over-worked editor's dark editing bay) and ordered reshoots the director may not have agreed with.

I've also worked in the industry long enough to know that it is an absolutely toxic work environment in which women, people of color, and queer people still struggle to get a creative foothold anywhere. My first experience pitching a script to a prospective agent involved being asked to meet at a hotel for drinks. We didn't talk about my writing at all. What I thought would be a pitch meeting was actually the writer's version of the "Hollywood casting couch". Yes, I was propositioned. No, nothing happened to me. I walked out. This happened to me in June 2008. It was not my last experience. The "Me Too" movement that came years later in 2017 was in response to situations I have encountered like this.

Those of us who succeed are very rare, and 97% of the time, the executive staff is very, very white and male. There is absolutely oppression and exploitation of all sorts still happening in Hollywood. I fucking lived it and continue to have nightmares about it.

QUEER SUBTEXT STILL EXISTS

Thus, to deny queer subtext's validity as an art form and to only accept the words of those who are either in power or limited in what they can say because of those in power, undermines not only the artists' efforts to tell the story they want to tell but cannot tell explicitly, it also undermines queer joy and queer resistance in cinema. And yes, sometimes those artists are cis straight white male allies who want to tell these stories because they simply make sense for the characters. These people are the artists, not the financiers.

It's more mature to embrace, or at least leave alone, the loud joy others experience from shipping and performing meta-analysis instead of publicly pissing on them with the profoundly weak and ignorant argument of "original intent". Don't mess with me on this. The number of scripts I have worked on that completely warped from what I wanted, and then to have my writing credit removed or stolen, still makes me sick. Yes, I'm bitter, but I'm also glad I left.

[thealogie]

Thea, I spent Christmas chatting up a British actor (current family connection) so seeing as there are 11.5 actors on that island I tried to gather the dirt on everyone I could according to your old man agenda. He's small time, but works quite steadily in TV and theater, and HE WORKED WITH MICHAEL SHEEN. Nothing exciting to report, sad to say. Apparently he was quiet and private on set, very polite, that's about it 😒 Sorry about that. BUT HIS FRIENDS WORKED WITH DAVID TENNANT ON PLAYS. Again, no dirt or details 😕 But he was described in less general terms at least, as very witty, charming and ready to mingle as far as his family schedule allows. But family always comes first. He also made a point to say that DT commands the stage. He also briefly worked with Hiddleston if you're interested and says he's very genuine if a bit pretentious, like, he means well and it's all genuine for him but comes off a bit too public school to some. Idk anything about him, haven't even watched Loki yet. And he also had a job where he met Stephen Fry, but was too afraid of him and his treasure status to talk much, perfectly lovely though he said. No Hugh Laurie (whom I also love). So remembering your discourse about lack of awards for your favorite old men I asked him about that, and he looked at me strangely, like seriously? It was difficult for him to grasp that DT and MS might be treated unfairly 😁 Couldn't blame him. After several cocktailes he became more chatty and after a couple of hours I came away with basically this. An idea that someone has an agenda against DT was still laughable for him, and I couldn't interest him much in the fact that DT was never nominated for a Bafta 😏. But he said that there is a bit of an odd complex in the British biz about actors who tried to crack the US but didn't become huge stars like Cumbersome or Loki, like some do see them as a bit of second rate compared to the lucky ones. You should either not try at all, never go to H-wood, or you come back the winner, a proper intl star. If you tried and failed, or simply worked as a jobbing actor there, then even if you are liked better than Sherlock or Loki, you still have a whiff of something amateurish about you. Like, there are grumbles against big actors "selling out" to H-wood but at the same time it is seen as a stamp of approval from the big boys and it tickles the national pride organ. Hope it helps. 🙂

Dyyying laughing!! thank you for your valuable contribution to old British man deuxmoi. This is so consistent with their vibes, like Michael has always said he’s not fun on set (except if you’re David Tennant or Lizzy Caplan) and like of course David is nice and charming to everyone.

That’s a fair explanation of the awards thing but I actually don’t think the awards shows are out to get Michael but I do think they want to hunt David for sport due to his doctor who popularity

[platinumink]

I keep seeing this discourse and wish to settle things once and for all - Wanda Maximoff editon

soooo I've actually been comvinced to rewatch WandaVision and to watch Agatha All Along because I have been told that Disney finally aired a show that isn't Loki that is actually good. I still haven't decided if I like it or not but I think I do because I just watched the entire show except for the last 2 episodes in one go-

The thing I keep seeing though is people disagreeing on whether Wanda Maximoff is a good person or a terrorist.

Believe it or not, the arguments about this get pretty HEATED so please share your honest opinion. : )

Please also share your reasoning for whatever you picked, I am very interested. I've read some very good points for each characterization so far and want to see what the general consensus is. :D

[disguiseithypnotizeit]

I’m actually pretty content with the Loki ending, not because of the whole “loki is alone forever” thing but because NO SHIP WINS. I’m a hella big lokius shipper and all that but like the online discourse of the sylki vs lokius thing kinda ruined the show on me for awhile. At least now we can all hurt