#not to mention the idea that carmen would WANT to have a baby with a chronic alcoholic who shes been dating for less than a year

[robbyykeene]

My distaste with season 5, and this show as a whole, boils down to the fact that the writers have gone all in on the idea that the only true Character that is allowed to exist in this story is Johnny, and nearly all the others are just malleable dolls for the writers to move around and play with as they see fit to advance the story in a direction that will make Johnny the Ultimate Winner Of Everything.

And I hear the criticisms already of “but Johnny’s the protagonist! Obviously every other character is ultimately going to serve his story.” But Walter White is the protagonist of Breaking Bad and Jimmy McGill is the protagonist of Better Call Saul and Kendall Roy is arguably the protagonist of Succession. And obviously it’s unfair to compare shows of that caliber to Cobra Kai, but do you see my point? In all of the above, the characters that orbit the protagonist are fully fleshed out people, equally complex and just as motivated by their own desires and history and traumas as the protagonist is. And yet still, ultimately, their characters do end up serving the protagonist’s arc, and the story as a whole. Because that’s what good writing is.

But increasingly, all the other characters in Cobra Kai have stopped behaving like actual people—especially the ones that pose any challenge for Johnny. Their feelings get stamped down in favor of removing Johnny’s obstacles towards happiness, which only winds up reducing Johnny’s own character in complexity and likability.

I watch Cobra Kai now and I don’t find any of these characters believable, maybe Johnny most of all, because the writers steadfastly refuse to let him face any real serious consequence for his actions. Instead, they have everyone falling over themselves to forgive him, repeatedly giving him a do over—a chance to right his wrongs without ever ever fully acknowledging the hurt and pain he’s caused. This season, quite literally in the form of a new baby. And if that’s the story they want to tell, well fine. It’s their story to tell. But they can’t keep pretending like this is a redemption story, that there’s anything deeper beneath the surface of this show than just being about a guy who does karate and kicks ass and gets the girl and defeats the Big Bad of the week. This is not a story about trauma, Johnny’s or anyone else’s. It’s really not about anything at all anymore.

[mrscarmenbearzatto]

So glad you're back!! Would you ever consider writing for Carmy x Richie's younger sister again?? I had an idea (if you want to write it, please dont overwhelm yourself) where reader and Carmen are fighting while reader is pregnant with their first baby and Carmen says something kinda mean to her and then she goes into laboro unexpectedly?! And seeing how Richie would react to that and be so defensive of his little sister 🥹

hi love! hope this is okay :) | fem!reader, mentions of a hospital, nicu stay/labor

You know he didn't mean it. Calling you stupid for showing up to the Bear that day when there was tools laying about, too many unknown people being around. He was just a worried soon-to-be dad, but that didn't make it easier.

Carmen was always protective over you, and now that you two had a baby on the way, it heightened. He was already on edge with the amount of repairs being done that day in the Bear, and the hazardous scene the restaraunt was in. He was just stressed out and took it out on you, like an idiot.

You didn't stick around to hear his apology after the words slipped out of his mouth. "Why are you being so difficult about this!? Showing up here was fucking stupid of you!" Nat took you outside to get you both away from each other, give you both some space to breathe. You could hear Carmen leave the restaraunt, disappearing to who knows where.

You sigh as you lean against the fence outside, gripping it with one hand. "He didn't mean it, it's just- there's been a lot happening today. Like a lot. Our fridge guy couldn't come and then a health inspection." Nat tried to explain. You were barely listening as your eyes squeezed shut. The pain in your abdomen and back you'd been briefly experiencing for the past few minutes had subsided as you let out an exhale. Syd stepped out at the same time.

"Hey, woah, you alright?" She asks. "Yeah, yeah sorry. Just Braxton Hicks. They just haven't been this intense." You answer. Syd stares at you both before clearing her throat. "I think your water just broke." She says.

You stare at her for a second, almost laughing. "Funny, Syd, but this isn't the time-" You look down and realize she's right. Your water just broke. "No, no, no it's too soon. We don't.. Carmen has to be here. You say, your voice filled with panic.

"Honey, I don't think you have a choice. Let's go to the hospital, okay? Syd, call Richie and Carmen, tell them to meet us at Chicago West." Nat takes your hand, helping you walk around the corner to her car, where she proceeds to break more then a few traffic laws.

"Who the fuck are you to talk to my sister like that?" Richie demands. The two were going back and forth after Carmen got back to the restaraunt. "Richie, I'm not fucking doing this with you right now." Carmen argues.

Syd walks in, exhaling. "Do either of you check your phones?!" She asks. "I don't know, he's a dumbass." Richie comments as Carmen rolls his eyes.

"Mine's.." Carmen frantically searches his pockets. "It must be in my office. What's the matter?" He asks. Syd frowns. "Y/n went into labor outside, Nat took her to Chicago West. I've been trying to call you to get you there before you miss the birth."

Carmen's already out the door by the time she finishes talking.

────

"If Carmen misses this, I'm going to kill him." Nat comments as she puts a pillow under your back for support. You sigh, laying back. The room is mostly quiet, except for the beeping of equipment. Monitoring your heartrate, your baby's heartrate, your contractions. It feels surreal to watch them increase and decrease with spikes on the monitor.

"He won't miss this. He'll be here." You say, your voice laced with doubt. You knew if Sydney had gotten ahold of Carmen, he'd be speeding to the hospital. Your doctor had been trying to push back your labor as much as she can, but you knew you were about to start pushing soon.

"I really hope you're right. I'm gonna go get you more ice chips." She says, stepping out of the room. You stare at the heartbeat monitors before you hear a small knock on the door. You turn to find Carmen in the doorway. "Hi." He says softly.

You smile. "Hey. Nice of you to drop by." You say, waiting for him to come over to you. When he doesn't immediately, you hold your hand out for him. He practically runs, taking it. "I'm so sorry. For not being here and for what I said. I shouldn't have- you didn't deserve that."

You shake your head. "Carm, you're here now. I'm glad you are. I love your sister but she is not a good birthing coach." She comments as he laughs.

He presses a kiss to your head. "I'm here now." He says. You squeeze his hand lightly. "I know you are, Carmy." Nat smiles as she returns. "Good, you get to live. Here are your ice chips. Best of luck." She wishes, placing a kiss on your cheek.

You smile. "Thanks for being so helpful, Nat."

────

Within the next half hour, your baby boy was in the world. Laying on your chest, his tiny hand wrapped around Carmen's finger. "He's so perfect." Carmen whispers, his voice filled with such fondness.

You two decided on a name: Theodore "Teddy" Berzatto. He was perfect to you two. Your own little boy, your son.

Richie and the rest of the staff came by the hospital. You swooned over your big brother getting to hold your little boy. "He looks just like dad." Richie admits quietly. You nod. "He does. Looks like dad and Mikey." Carmen agrees.

Your son couldn't have been surrounded with more love.

[etherealising]

chapter nine | don’t say baby! [part one]

masterlist | ↢ previous chapter | next chapter ↣

pairing(s): carmen berzatto x fem!reader | male!oc x fem!reader

summary: the day of nat and pete’s baby shower has finally arrived.

warning(s): grief | angst | self-loathing | self-depreciating thoughts | guilt | implications of miscarriage | miscarriage not mentioned explicitly | slight fluff | HAYDEN | alcohol | mentions overdose | mentions substance abuse |

wc: 6.2k

skin tones used in mood boards do not represent “baby” imagine her however your heart desires!

You sat criss-cross applesauce atop your island, a cup of iced lavender crème earl gray tea grasped in your hands as you took in the lively decorations scattered around your house. You’d been at it since eight this morning, the clock above your stove now read 11 a.m. It probably wouldn’t have taken as long if you asked the extra set of hands still asleep in your guest room for help. But after waking up this morning, you realized you just wanted to set up alone while in the comfort of your own home, before inviting everyone into your space. From your vantage point where you sat everything was perfect, exactly how you imagined it; only the best for Natalie and Pete.

You weren’t sure what to do with yourself now, all the decorations had been set up and now you were just waiting for the last of the desserts to finish up. While Pete had taken Nat out for her first day off in a while she’d mentioned to him a slew of deserts your mom used to make for you all growing up that she’d been craving, and what kind of friend would be if you didn’t indulge her pregnancy cravings.

Pete was instructed to show up with Nat at one, your group chat invitation asked for everyone else to arrive anytime before then to ensure everyone arrived on time. As you glanced at the balloon arch in your foyer and the boxes spelling out the word ‘baby’ you were nervous you had gone overboard, that Nat and Pete would think it was all too much. But with Pete telling you about Nat’s ideas you couldn’t help but go a bit overboard.

You glanced around your house one more time, a small laugh escaping you at the theme you’d chosen. It would’ve been a missed opportunity if you did anything other than a bear theme, you hoped everyone else got a laugh out of it the way you did. The more you looked at each decoration the more you forced yourself to not entertain the dozens of “what if” scenarios bouncing around your head. Those thoughts would bring nothing but negativity and as easy as it was to feed into the jagged wound of what once was, what could’ve been; you weren’t sure you had the energy to juggle both past and present today.

“Could’ve asked me for help.” You flinched at the sudden gruff morning voice traveling down your hallway.

Feet padding against the hardwood floor now alerting you of their towering presence next to you. You felt your nose scrunch as the rough scrape of a mustache caressed your temple along with cold lips.

You watched as Hayden walked around you, maneuvering around your kitchen like it was second nature, wearing his now wrinkled clothes from the previous night as he poured himself a cup of coffee.

He stood across from you on the opposite side of the island, forearms leaning against it, eyes darting to the many decorations behind you.

“I gotta run to the office, finalize some things for the gala,” he paused, raising the mug to his lips and taking a long sip. “I shouldn’t be too long.”

You nodded eyes unfocused as you tugged your bottom lip between your teeth. Your eyes shot up as Hayden reached out thumb gently sliding your lip from its prison.

“You nervous or something? I remember you doing that before big exams.” You watched as he let his thumb linger in a soft caress.

“Something like that.” You muttered as he reluctantly pulled his hand away, eyes lingering a moment longer.

After the oddly intimate moment initiated by Hayden, the two of you sat in silence as the man drained his cup of coffee before moving to round up his belongings. It felt odd having Hayden in your house and you couldn’t exactly pinpoint why. You weren’t sure if it was because of the incident from the night before or if it was because deep down you were hoping another man would be the first to spend the night under the same roof as you.

Hayden approached from the hallway briefcase in hand, a small smile on his face as you got up to walk him to the door, neither of you saying a word as he slipped his shoes on before turning to look at you. “Uh…I guess I’ll see you later?”

You sent him a small smile nodding your head as you opened the door for him. You watched as his hand came up to cup the side of your cheek, thumb gently caressing the corner of your lips before he began leaning in. You froze, the moment reminiscent of the previous night.

His lips were hovering so close over yours that you could feel the tidy hairs of his mustache tickling your upper lip as he took your silence as an answer.

“No! hell no!” You flinched in Hayden’s hold as the loud Chicagoan accent rang from the steps of your porch through your ajar door. Hayden quickly removed himself from your space and straightened up like he’d just been caught doing something highly illegal.

You didn’t need to look to know who it was, that boisterous voice was a staple in your life for longer than you could remember. You felt flustered as Richie’s back came into view, his tall stature stepping through the door and between you and Hayden blocking you from each other’s view.

“I uh was just leaving?” The questioning tone of his voice proved he wasn’t sure who he was hoping to convince. “Good to see you Mr. Jerimovich.” A small chuckle left your lips at how uneasy Richie made Hayden.

You watched as Richie turned, handing you the dish he was holding before his free hand came down to cover the doorknob and wrench the door open even more, making it clear that Hayden had overstayed his welcome.

“Yeah mhm-hmm you too Hilary.” If the wrong name wasn’t enough, the tone of Richie’s voice sure was and it told you he did not share the same sentiment as Hayden.

Hayden furiously nodded his head taking a step over the threshold before searching for your eyes and sending you a strained smile. “Baby I’ll ca-,”

“Pack it up, Heather.” Richie’s last words were punctuated by the sound of your front door slamming in Hayden’s face. His tall figure could be seen through the mosaic window on your door, showing he was still standing on your porch in shock.

You watched as Richie quickly locked your door before moving past you to your kitchen, a small sigh left your lips as you could physically feel Richie’s ire radiating off of him.

“Good morning to you too Richie.” The sarcasm dripped from your voice as you took a seat at the barstool at your island, and set the dish down as Richie set your oven to preheat for the dish he brought.

He turned to you, arms crossed tightly against his chest, the disappointed frown on his face telling you all you needed to know as you prepared yourself for the lecture he was about to lay on you.

“You know Baby, I was okay with Carmen, not my favorite choice for you but I got over it. But that jagoff with his slicked back hair and carpet on his upper lip is where I draw the line.” It was taking every bit of control you had not to visibly roll your eyes.

“Richie I appreciate the concern, but need I remind you I am a grown woman capable of making my own decisions.” You shrugged, while you appreciated the love and care Richie had for you, this was not a topic you wanted to discuss on a day such as this one.

Richie’s lips rolled in as he nodded his head, a humorless laugh escaped him. “Are you though?” You frowned as he shrugged, holding his hands out in a placating manner. “I’m just sayin’ I learned you were a recovering addict 5 business days ago.”

“Says the 40-year-old divorcee still hung up on his ex-wife.” It was silent in the kitchen as the two of you just stared at each other. Richie’s jaw clenched in annoyance while you raised your eyebrow daring the older man to challenge you.

The stare-off was broken by the beeping of your oven, signifying it was ready. You watched as Richie took the tin foil off the top of the tray mumbling under his breath as he moved to place the tray in your oven.

Richie turned back around when he was done, eyes not meeting yours as he stood with his hands behind his back for a moment. “You’re really fucking mean sometimes you know that?” The pitch of his voice rose a bit as though he was whining.

A soft laugh rose in your throat before being dispelled into your kitchen at Richie’s childish antics, the noise causing Richie to laugh as well before the two of you settled on sharing matching grins. The moment was lost as you watched Richie’s eyebrows pinch together, his teeth beginning to worry his bottom lip as he leaned across the island, a position similar to the one Hayden was in not too long ago.

“Listen, Baby, I just don’t want you letting the emotions of today guide your judgment,” you listened intently as Richie held eye contact with you. “I mean I know I ain’t the best person to be taking advice from, but channeling your grief and feelings for Carmy into whatever the hell you’re doing with Hailey ain’t good for anybody.”

A small smile graced your lips at Richie’s innate need to constantly misname Hayden, but you knew there was some truth in his words. Honestly, you weren’t sure what the hell was going on between you and Hayden, in actuality, nothing was going on between the two of you until 24 hours ago. The small moment you shared was abruptly initiated by the man, and though the two of you worked together and rekindled your friendship, you weren’t sure it was a good idea for the two of you to try and relive your college years.

You let Richie’s words sink in a bit more as you realized how right he was. Hayden didn’t deserve to be used as another man’s replacement, and you didn’t deserve to fill the void his divorce left. And while there might always be some underlying lust between the two of you, you’d rather not lose a friendship you were just getting back and cherished more than the intimate times you shared.

“God we’re such losers Richie,” the man raised his eyebrows confused by your train of thought. “You’re still in love with your ex-wife, and I’m in love with a man I’ve never even been in a relationship with.”

Realization dawned on Richie’s face, head nodding up and down as he agreed with you. “How’s the Loveless Loser’s Club sound? I know a guy who can get us a deal on some shirts.”

The serious look on Richie’s face caused the both of you to laugh, coming to terms with how sad your lives were at the moment.

“You uh know Carmen’s coming today right?” Richie scratched the back of his head not sure where things were with you and the Berzatto boy.

You sighed nodding, grateful for Richie’s concern for you, “Would you believe it if I told you I invited him myself?”

“Is that why the kids been walking around the restaurant smiling like a fucking whack job?” Richie questioned eyebrows raising to his hairline like you’d just told him the juiciest piece of gossip ever. “No… wait a fucking minute, you were on the other line when I barged in on him on FaceTime in the walk-in!” If you didn’t know the context of this conversation you would’ve sworn Richie just cracked the biggest mystery of the century with how giddy he was.

“Little shit wouldn’t tell me who he was talking to, he was all smiles like he fuckin won the lottery or some shit!” You laughed at Richie's observations. “So the two of you cool again or somethin?”

You shrugged unsure as to how to explain the relative peace between you and Carmy at the moment. You couldn’t help the small smile itching to show itself as your mind went back to the myriad of text and phone calls the two you were exchanging since your confession. Half of the time the conversations the two of you shared were pointless.

“Or somethin'…we talked about the overdose but I wasn’t completely honest with him about certain things.” Your words became quieter towards the end of your sentence.

“You’ll tell him though.” It wasn’t a question and it wasn’t a demand either, just a simple statement of fact. “Baby I uh…it wasn’t my place to tell you to keep this from Carmy, and I’m sorry I made that decision for you. But I’ll be there by your side when you decide to tell him…I’ll support you through it.”

You nodded appreciating Richie’s words but feeling nauseous at the thought of telling Carmy such a horrible truth about yourself. “You didn’t make that decision for me Richie. As much as I hate to admit it, I…I think my mind was already made up.” Your shoulders raised in a slight shrug as the two of you shared sad smiles.

When the time was right you would be honest with Carmen, because if anyone deserved to know the truth it was him.

Hopping off the stool you walked around the island to wrap Richie in a hug, his tall frame embracing you in a hug you never knew you needed but always appreciated when given. You stood in each other’s arms for a moment longer letting the reality of life settle into you before stepping out of his embrace.

“Wanna help me frost the cupcakes?” You smiled as Richie rolled his eyes at your question before nodding his head, the both of you knew he wouldn’t turn you down.

Richie watched as you maneuvered to grab the cooling rack on the opposite counter. “I was serious about those losers' club shirts.”

A small huff of laughter escaped you as you shook your head back and forth at Richie’s antics before handing him a piping bag. The two of you engaged in quiet conversation as you worked around each other, a sense of ease falling over the kitchen as the pair of you worked like a well-oiled machine.

Richie shooed you out of the kitchen to go get ready after the two of you plated the various desserts you made. The man mocking you at times when you complained he hadn’t placed the sweets at the perfect angle, mumbling under his breath that you were no better than Carmy.

You finished getting ready a while ago letting Richie know you’d be in the backyard if he needed anything. And that’s exactly where you were now tucked into some lawn chair that’d been in the garage when you first bought the house. Your cardigan tucked tightly around you as your eyes focused on the small garden you’d started after moving in.

The pretty blue flowers that you’d grown to love had your sole attention as you watched the spring breeze blow through them. The solitude felt much needed before you prepared yourself to be a gracious host. Part of you wished you never agreed to throw this shower, the grief you never allowed yourself to feel, now painting your insides with resentment. Another part of you was grateful to have made it this far, to even have a chance to celebrate these milestones with the people you loved.

The longer you sat there staring at the flowers, the lonelier you felt. It felt a bit hypocritical, for you to have some sort of misguided resentment towards Natalie and Pete when you couldn’t even work up the courage to show Carmen all your cards, couldn’t let him in on a truth he deserved to know the moment you knew.

Blue flowers stared back at you mocking the emotional turmoil you were putting yourself through. You could be angry with no one but yourself, you were now reaping the consequences of the choices you made in the previous year. It was no one’s fault but your own.

A heavy hand resting upon your shoulder caused you to flinch, the gentle squeeze pressed into the fabric of your cardigan letting you know the person behind you wasn’t a threat, and the signature scent of the off-brand laundry detergent they used led to the conclusion that it was Richie.

He was so close you could feel the warmth radiating off of him onto your neck, you felt his hand begin to knead your shoulder, the soft touch easing the tension your body had been building up throughout the weeks of preparation.

“People are gonna start to arrivin’ soon Babes.” You nodded absentmindedly as your eyes stayed glued to the blue bulbs, forcing yourself to face the reality of the life you were leading; reminding you of what a shitty person you were for keeping this secret from Carmen. “I could say you’re not feelin’ hot let you waste away in that big ass fucking bed of yours.”

You let out a quiet hollow laugh at Richie’s words, wishing the world would swallow you whole at that moment. “We both know Nat wouldn’t buy that.” Richie made a hum of agreement before walking around to stand in front of you, a familiar cartridge in the hand he held out to you eyebrows raised in question.

Your eyes landed on the packet of cigarettes contemplating just how overwhelmed you were in that moment before your eyes flashed back to the flowers. You let out a small sigh before standing up, dusting the nonexistent dirt off your outfit, you gave Richie a small nod before walking around him following the path that led to the gate that separated your backyard from the front. At the lack of footsteps echoing behind you, you stopped before turning to look at Richie. “Not in front of the flowers.”

The confused expression once marring his features dissipated into understanding as he took the steps to follow you out of the gate. It was stupid really, they were just flowers, and depending on which way the wind blew they’d still feel the stinging caress of the nicotine you were about to indulge in.

But you couldn’t stand another second staring at those vibrantly sad flowers.

Carmen wasn’t sure he’d ever get used to the sight of you with a cigarette between your lips. His eyes traced you and Richie standing at the side of your house, the older man talking animatedly as you nodded along to whatever outrageous story he was telling. He sat there for a moment just staring at the two of you wondering how privy Richie was to the past year of your life, the sound of the car turning off not pulling him out of his analysis of you and Richie. He was almost positive Richie knew about your overdose and definitely was privy to whatever sickness you’d contracted upon returning to Chicago. It just made Carmy wonder if Richie knew about the tumultuous year you had, why didn’t he ever mention anything to him; why didn’t Nat?

“Carm?” He blinked eyes moving from the window to the wide green eyes staring at him from the driver's seat. “Lost you there for a minute, you okay?” Carmy watched as Claire’s brow furrowed in concern, eyes blinking rapidly as he nodded, sending a small awkward smile to the woman. “Well c’mon then Bear.” She laughed as she said his nickname sending a bright smile his way before she began exiting from the car.

A small huff of laughter escaped him as he followed suit, eyes catching yours as you watched the two of them move to the trunk of the car, face unreadable before you took one more drag of your cigarette before stomping it out, eyes leaving Carmy’s to dart back and forth between him and Claire obviously trying to piece that puzzle together.

Carmy reached into the trunk to grab his respective present and the dish he’d brought, patiently waiting for Claire to grab her share before he shut the trunk. The two of them made their way up the drive, Claire practically buzzing in excitement next to him.

“You know those things kill right?” Claire’s words echoed around the group as the two of you shared a hug.

“Not fast enough apparently.” Claire laughed at your statement as the two of you pulled away, Carmen gave you a blank stare finding your words less than amusing, as Richie raised his hand to swat the back of your head.

Claire and Carmy watched as you turned to glare at Richie, the man returning his own irritated gaze upon you. It was silent as the newcomers stood awkwardly watching you and Richie have some sort of unspoken conversation as the two of you stared each other down. The clearing of Claire’s throat pulled the two out of your moment but not before you sent your elbow into Richie’s rib cage and he flicked the tip of your ear.

“Claire Bear! It’s so great to see you, not sure why you came with this loser,” Richie offhandedly gestured to Carmy who stood there like a deer in headlights staring at you. “But nonetheless, welcome, let's get this inside.” Richie reached out to take the dish from Claire’s hand before gesturing for her to follow him.

Carmen watched as Claire and Richie fell into comfortable conversation, not letting himself turn his attention to you until the door shut firmly behind them. The small cough you let out finally drew his blue eyes back to your figure.

“So…” his eyes met yours a feeling of awkwardness floating between the two of you, while you may have been falling back into old habits through text and phone conversations being face to face like this reminded Carmy of when he was 16 and trying to force himself to ask you out.

“You and Claire look great together.” Your words caught Carmy by surprise considering to no fault of her own Claire was the exact reason the two of you fell out all those weeks ago.

Carmy nodded, eyes searching yours for anything other than the forced act he could tell you were putting on. “We’re uh not together, n-not like that. I mean we are together like we arrived together, b-but we aren’t…” Carmy found himself trailing off as you let out a soft laugh, eyes seeming to light up at his fumbling.

“Carm, you don’t have to explain anything to me,” he nodded watching as your eyes darted between his eyes before moving your focus somewhere past him. “If you’re happy I’m happy Carmen.” The smile on your face almost made it believable, but he knew you.

He knew that since your move back to Chicago this was the second time you lied directly to his face.

Carmy stood around pretending to listen to a debate between Marcus and Fak about something he didn’t have the mental capacity to care about. For the past 20 minutes, his eyes were focused on you, watching as you greeted the remaining guests which was mostly just the crew from work. The word subtle was not in Carmen’s vocabulary as he’d been caught by you too many times to make his starring a coincidence but apparently not enough times to shame him into stopping.

He found himself thankful that Claire was too preoccupied in her conversation with Syd and Tina to notice the way he’d been studying you since entering your house. He couldn’t help but wince as he thought of Claire, he wasn’t lying to you, the two of them weren’t together at least he didn’t think he was giving off those signs. It wasn’t like he knew how relationships worked, the only experience he had was 48 hours with you, and look how that ended.

Carmy wasn’t exactly sure what was transpiring between him and Claire. To him, it was just two old friends reconnecting, but sometimes he found himself noticing the way Claire’s fingers would ghost across his arm or the slight way she’d lean her head against his shoulder. All things he’d done with you and found comfort in, but with Claire, it felt like more than a friendly gesture. Not that he had much to say in that department considering he lost his virginity to his best friend a year ago, but he knew he didn’t want more with Claire in the way he wanted more with you; he just wasn’t sure Claire knew that.

Carmen watched as you answered the door, a small smile gracing your lips as you opened the door wider to let the guest in. He eyed the two of you, obviously, some type of familiarity between both of you as he wrapped you in his arms hugging you for longer than Carmy thought necessary. He felt his eyebrows crease as the man leaned down placing a delicate kiss into your hair before placing another one on your cheek. You stepped out of his embrace smiling up at him before removing the gift bag in his hands and gesturing him into the room.

Carmy couldn’t help but feel like he knew the man who seemed to walk into the room and gather attention, Carmy assessed the man feeling inadequate as he took in the fancy slacks and button-up he was wearing. The shirt almost looked purposely small accentuating the muscles through the sleeves, two buttons undone as though wearing the shirt properly would suffocate him.

The two men locked eyes, Carmy doing his best to appear neutral as the man made his way towards him smiling like he knew a secret Carmy didn’t.

“Carmen Berzatto man, it's been a long time.” Carmy watched the man laugh, clapping a solid hand onto his shoulder pearly whites almost blinding the chef.

Carmy nodded trying to place how this man knew his name, he didn’t want to be pretentious and assume it was through his culinary work or accolades, and even though the voice sounded familiar he couldn’t quite place the face.

The man laughed, dropping his hand from Carmy’s shoulder “Don’t hurt yourself. Hayden Ivanovski, from high school?”

It took every bit of control Carmy had not to outright frown in the man’s face, of course, Hayden fucking Ivanovski was standing in front of him. It was bad enough he was standing in his own way when it came to his chances with you, now he had to deal with his high school competition.

“Oh yeah, yeah, guess the stache threw me off.” Carmy forced a laugh

Hayden nodded as he made his way to the kitchen, something compelling Carmy to follow as the taller of the two produced two beers from your fridge handing one off to Carmy giving him no time to wonder why the beverage was in your fridge in the place.

“It threw Baby off too,” Carmy couldn’t help but bristle at Hayden’s use of your nickname, the two-syllable word didn’t sound right coming from his lips. “How’s the restaurant coming along?”

Carmy followed the bottle to Hayden’s lips, eyebrows furrowed as he watched the man take a swig, “Good yeah uh great…coming along great.” The underlying question in his words was obvious, confusion coursing through him at Hayden’s question.

“Don’t worry,” Hayden’s hands raised in a mock surrender. “Not stalking you or anything, I just okayed Baby’s article on the project.” Carmen’s confusion only worsened not following what Hayden was saying. “We work together at the Tribune.” Hayden shrugged like it was no big deal.

Because it was no big deal, at least to him. But Carmy felt his stomach sink at the information, the fact that Hayden had access to your attention far more than Carmy did to settle the bubble of irritation in his stomach.

It was quiet between the two men after that revelation was uncovered, neither of them eager to continue the conversation in any way. Carmy watched as Hayden finished the contents of his bottle before moving to place it in the recycling bin and making his way back to Carmy’s side.

“I actually wanted to thank you, man.” Hayden stood in front of Carmy arms crossed so tightly against his chest Carmy was sure his biceps would rip the sleeves of his shirt.

Carmy nodded unsure as to what he was being thanked for, his body’s fight or flight mode in overdrive as he offered Hayden one last curt nod before placing his unopened beer bottle down on the island prepared to leave the awkward confines of this conversation.

“Keep fuckin with Baby’s emotions the way you do and I won’t have to do much work to convince her I’m the better option.” Hayden’s words caused Carmy to stop in his tracks, the blank expression on his face finding the smug one painting Hayden’s.

“You see Carmen,” Hayden moved forward, stepping into Carmy’s space. “You keep pushing her away, and the more you push her away, the more I get to console her, dry her tears, make her feel better in ways you could only imagine.” Carmy felt his face flush at what the man in front of him was implying.

“Look at her,” Carmy reluctantly turned his head, your laugh jingling in his ears as he watched you converse with Tina. “You wouldn’t know what the fuck to do with a woman like that if she came with an instruction manual. Listen all I’m sayin' Boss, just quit while you’re ahead, let someone else give her the life she deserves.” Hayden shrugged, eyeing you from his spot next to Carmy hand moving in a small wave as you looked in their direction.

Carmy stiffened as Hayden gripped his hand pulling him into a hug and slapping his back harder than necessary. He tried to remove himself from the embrace as Hayden tightened his arms around the shorter man. “I don’t usually kiss and tell but…” Carmy could feel his blood boiling the longer he stood there locked in this conversation. “You wouldn’t believe how dirty she gets behind closed doors.”

Carmy stood frozen as Hayden finally let him go, what was a five-minute conversation felt like an eternity for him. He couldn’t help but feel like throwing up, the words Hayden had spoken with such confidence made him sick to his stomach. As disgusted as Hayden’s words made Carmen feel, he was sure there was some truth to them.

He wouldn’t give merit to the statements regarding whatever intimacy there was between you and Hayden, but he knew if he didn’t get his shit together you weren’t going to keep waiting around for him. A part of him knew the man was just trying to get under his skin, it was only a couple of nights ago when you asked for his friendship and he couldn’t let whatever misogynistic bullshit Hayden was trying to pull get to him.

As Carmy stood in your kitchen watching Hayden connect to you like a leech, he couldn’t help the images Hayden had procured from bouncing around in his head. Carmen didn’t think he was a jealous man, he didn’t seem to ever have anything in life to be jealous about; envious sure, but never jealous.

But as he let Hayden’s words play on repeat in his head, he couldn’t help but feed the little green monster growing inside him the longer he looked at you and Hayden. The tall man caught his eye from across the room as he smirked before leaning down to plant a kiss on your head before turning to greet Tina.

Carmy watched the moment with a blank stare trying to disregard the sour feeling settling in his stomach. His eyes glazed over the longer he focused on your small group and he couldn’t deny the fact that you and Hayden looked like the picture-perfect couple tucked next to each other. Carmy was broken out of his trance by the light touch to his bicep, eyes blinking rapidly as he found Claire now standing in his line of sight.

“Carm, hey,” He watched as Claire chuckled hand gently massaging his arm. “I’ve been trying to get your attention you know.”

He nodded distractedly eyes finding yours over Claire’s shoulder as you watched the two of them from your own corner of the room. Carmy held your gaze for a minute, neither of you daring to look away from the other, the emotions in your eyes conveying something Carmy couldn’t quite understand as he drank in the undivided attention you gave him. You broke the stare first, eyes trailing to Claire’s hand still latched onto him, he felt his heart clench watching as you sent him a small smile before turning to leave your conversation.

Carmen turned his attention back to Claire who sent another squeeze to his arm, eyebrow raised as she waited for an explanation. “My bad I uh I just zoned out.” He forced a small smile allowing her to take his hand and lead him towards the front door. She stopped them at a small table set up with various colorful pens, markers and stickers sprawled across it for anyone to use.

His eyes caught on a familiar Polaroid Camera that not only held memories for the two of you but printed out some of his favorite photos of you. He watched as Claire grasped it before handing it to him.

“It's to make scrapbook pages,” He nodded fingers clutching the camera like it held the secrets of the universe. “Baby’s gonna bind the pages we make here and gift them to Pete and Nat. Take my picture?”

Carmen’s head shot to Claire at the question, her smiling face encouraging him to do as she asked before he stared at the relic of a camera in his hands. He hesitated before nodding motioning Claire to pose as he stood in front of the balloon arch taking up most of your entryway. Carmy gave her a small nod before raising the camera to his eye readying himself to take the picture.

The gesture sent his mind reeling to the last time he’d used this camera the context of those memories sending a blush up his neck. He cleared his throat moving the camera to rest against his torso, “I uh…I think it needs more film.” His words went unanswered as Richie was distracting Claire with whatever he deemed necessary to bore her with.

Carmen felt a bit bad for lying to Claire about the camera needing film, but he just couldn’t get himself to snap a picture of another woman using the same camera the two of you used after such a vulnerable moment shared between you both.

Wandering away from the balloon arch, Carmen found himself looking at the camera in his hands mind racing with thoughts of you. The two of you didn’t have much time to converse since he’d arrived and for all the back and forth the two of you were doing over the phone, he was hoping for a warmer welcome in person. It would be naive of him to believe the two of you would fall back into your friendship from all those years and two things proved this to him.

The first was his ever-growing and constant feelings for you.

And the second; how easy it was for you to lie to his face.

a/n: suuurpriseeee! this update is so out of left field so please do not get your hopes up. if anything i hope this update can give you a silly goofy fic to indulge in for a bit 🤍

[gingergofastboatsmojito]

Things that I hope DO NOT happen on S3

As I writer, and I'm not just talking about FF, I was a formal editor once... etc, I can recognize a crumb when I see it. And especially now that I have a pretty good idea, as we all do I guess, of how Storer's mind works.

Nat's aching shoulder was a crumb that Storer may pick up and run with eventually or not. I'm hoping not because that would imply a health scare I don't wanna watch.

Connor getting in the way of my Sydcarmy goals. Actually, I didn't sense any tension or any of the sorts that here on Tumblr everyone pointed out, I didn't think Carmy was jelly or anything, but maybe I'm biassed as Carmy and I share several character traits I won't get into and that may very well jeopardize my full objectivity on him. That being said, I did pick up on the fact that Connor may have the looks of a younger version of Carmy, the untainted version he once was when he was still green and staging in different kitchens all around the world. Personally, for me, THAT was the crumb and I thought that that was the sole purpose of that character, to be Carmen's mirror that reflected a reflection from the past, which made Carm uncomfortable and eventually triggered a change in him because Carmy somehow realizes he misses that old unspoiled version of himself and Connor gives him the chance to NOT treat him in the same way his nightmare EC <AKA: Joel McHale's character> treated him. That was my bet when I first saw Connor and THAT is what I expect Storer to dive into next season. I don't want Connor to have anything to do with Syd, at all. As a matter of fact, a lot of fans have been requesting a gay character in that kitchen, so I'm thinking why not Connor?

Fak getting married to Kelly, because that crumb they planted of Fak's smitten (by Kelly) face at the soft opening, may enable a Carmy / Claire reunion I have 0 interest in. Fuck Kelly! And yes, I do think Claire deserves an apology but I wish a phone call would do, I don't even think it should be in person because it will break Carmy's heart to see Claire cry. And if it's in person, it shouldn't be at a wedding, just a quick face-to-face over a cuppa coffee would suffice, and moving on... Carmy has a restaurant to run with Syd and has already dedicated WAY TOO MUCH TIME TO CLAIRE, thank you very much. Luckily Carm rocks at not showing up, deflecting, and sucks at apologies, so yay!

Mr. Berzatto making a reappearance. The crumb they planted by raising the question of whether the man is still alive or not could fully lead to Mr. Berzatto showing up and wanting a piece of his restaurant or just wreaking havoc in any other way. That is a plot twist that is waiting to happen because otherwise the character would have been officially dead by now and I want nothing to do with that. A good way to neutralize that crumb would be that Mr. Berzatto does show up eventually, they reconcile and his redemption arc proves to be beneficial for the entire family, which I don't think will be the case. I'm betting my ass on Donna's redemption arc because what she did on the soft-opening night, as twisted as it was, was an act of love, so THAT is a crumb I want Storer to pick up and run with, but not Mr. Berzatto's.

I could go on, but those are the main ones.

If you have more, I'd love to know about them, please share. I'm not like those babies around here who totally freak out the moment you disagree with or question their theories, or just mention that you happen to have a different take on them. As I matter of fact I fully enjoy that and I joined this platform to exchange different POVs. I love it! I actually find it enriching and amusing. And I'm all about amusement and enjoyment. Bring it on!

[juey20000]

The Cub Chapter 1

Warning: Explicit Language, brief mentions of sex acts

AN: Hello, everyone; this is my first fanfic. I became OBSESSED with The Bear and Sydney and Carmey and had a little fanfic idea come up in my head and decided to write it. I'd rewatched both seasons and I hope I didn't make the characters too out of character. The story takes place 2yrs after season 2, and Nat has a 1yr old girl; criticism is welcome, but be nice, please. Also, I'm not going to write smut for this fanfic; all sex acts will be in past tense or implied; Im not that good at writing smut. So I've decided not to write any, but if I do change my mind I will put the proper warnings for the chapter.

Summary - It happened so fast, one minute they were trying out new recipes at Carm’s apartment and the next they were ripping each other’s clothes off. It’s been two years since the opening of The Bear, business has been doing good and they are still working on getting a star and Uncle Jimmy finally got his money back. Natalie had a little girl, Amy, who is one and a half and Sydney and Carmy had been secretly hooking up for a year. Everything was going great.. until Sydney’s period came late.

Sydney stared at the two pregnancy tests, one was negative and the other was positive; what the fuck is that supposed to mean?

She had been feeling off for a few weeks now, certain foods either tasted like shit or had her running to the bathroom, her breasts were sensitive and sore, and she’s been having this terrible mood swings which would cause her to snap at everyone from Tina, to Carmy, she even snapped at Natalie at one point.

And she’s been having these weird food cravings all week.

After she missed her period she finally decided to take a pregnancy test, her heart started racing all she can think about is how disappointed her father would be, and how is she going to take care of a fucking baby while working at the bear? How is she going to tell her dad?

How is she going to tell Carmy?

Her and Carm has been hooking up for a year and a half now, but they been careful they were using condoms and she was on birth control, how the fuck did this happen?

Three sharp knocks on the bathroom door snapped Sydney out of her thoughts. “Yo Syd, you good in there?” Carmy asked while trying to open the locked door. “And why is the door locked?”

She had spent the night at his apartment like she had done every other night since they started hooking up. Sydney quickly grabbed the tests and the box and bag it came from, “Um, yeah just let me, FUCK!” Sydney dropped one of the tests behind the toilet while she was trying to clean up.

Another knock on the door “Hey Sydney, you ok?” “Yeah” Sydney said while crouching down on the floor trying to reach the test, “I’ll be out in a minute I’m just not feeling well” Why the fuck did this fucking test had to fall behind the fucking toilet?  After a few good tries Sydney finally managed to get the test and put it and the second test and box in the bag.

She then grabbed the bathroom trash cans trash bag and stuffed the pregnancy tests inside, and walked out of the bathroom with the bag in hand. "Hey, everything ok?" Carmen said while eyeing the bag.

"Yeah, I'm- I'm just taking out the trash cause the trash was full so..." "OH yeah, you didn't have to I could take it" Carmen said while reaching for the bag. "No! " Sydney shouted while yanking the bag away from his grip.

"I mean, I'll take care of it; it's no problem," Sydney said nervously. "OH," Carmen said while recovering from shock, "So uh... give me a minute, and I'll drive us to work. Ok"

"NO, I mean, i-it's fine; I need to go to the store anyway." Carmen furrowed his brow and said to her in a confused tone, "The store?" "Yeah," Sydney said nervously, "I promised my dad I would get a few things for him before I went to work" "Oh, well, I can take you if you want." Carmen offered.

"No, it's fine." Sydney said, " I don't want to make you late, besides It shouldn't take me too long." "Syd, you sure? I don't mind driving you."

"No, it's fine, you go ahead." Carmen hesitated but left the bathroom. Sydney let out a sigh of relief and started to get ready.

It didn't take her that long to get ready; she quickly freshened up and left Carmen's apartment in a hurry, and arrived at the store. She brought a pack of Clearblue tests and took the train to the restaurant.

Her stomach was in knots the entire train ride, and she couldn't wait to get to the bear and take the tests. As soon as she got to the bear, she quickly bolted into the bathroom, barely saying a word to anyone.

She nervously opened the box and took out the test. She pulled down her pants, sat on the toilet, and peed on the stick.

BANG!

The door opened with a thud, and Sydney dropped the test in the toilet. "RICHIE!!!!!"

[deeseelovez]

cheerleader 4

part 1  2  3 5

aged up! mike wheeler  x cheerleader! reader. reader is feminine and girly. can be read with any race and body type. reader is bit of a cry baby!

summary:  y/n has to sit with Mike's friends and he realizes maybe he doesn't know her as much as he thinks. Also, Mike is going to first football game and after party! 

"I'm going to sit with Mike's friends on Monday and Fridays." Y/n tells Carmen and she frowns. 

"I'll miss you," Carmen tells her as they stand at the doors of the cafeteria. 

"Carmen, you'll see me in like 30 minutes." Y/n says and Carmen shrugs

"Too long without you." Y/n playfully rolls her eyes and she walks over to Mike's table. 

"Hey guys!" Y/n says with a big smile, Will looks up at her with a familiar smile. 

"Y/n!" He says, getting up and moving her chair back for her. 

"Such a gentlemen," Y/n says to Will and she sits down pushing herself up to the table. 

Max and Lucas also says hi while Dustin just looks dumbfounded, he didn't know exactly what to say. 

"What are you doing?" Dustin asks in a slightly mean tone and Mike gives him a glare. 

"Dude, don't talk to my girlfriend like that." Mike tells him. 

"About a month ago, we started talking." 

"About a month ago, we started talking." 

"About a month ago, we started talking." 

"Yeah, I added her on snapchat and we started talking," Mike tells them. 

"And last week he asked me on a date," 

"We had a picnic on Saturday and I asked her to be my girlfriend." Mike smiles, he grabs her hand and looks at with a smile. 

"And now we're official, so we thought it was time to let everyone know." Y/n says smiling back, taking her other hand putting it on top of his. 

"You two are a," Lucas stops, "Surprising couple."

"I'll say," Erica says. Erica and Y/n brother, Carson both sit down. 

"Yeah, I had no idea that my lovely sister. Got a new boy." Carson says. 

"What are you doing here, go to your own friends." Lucas says to the pair. 

"No. I wanted to know more about this match." Erica says sipping on a coke. 

"I agree with her." 

"Just leave them alone, guys. They're obviously happy." Will says and Y/n smiles at Will. 

"Thank you," She whispers to him and Mike raises an eyebrow towards her. 

"Are you hungry?" Mike asks, "I'm going to get some lunch." 

"I didn't bring any lunch money with me." Y/n says, her eyes went to Carson who just frowned. Y/n gave whatever money she had to the kids. 

"I'll pay for you, doll. Don't worry." Mike says and Y/n smiles getting up. 

"Thanks, Mikey. You're just the sweetest." She smiles at him, going on her tip toes to press a very light kiss on his cheek and they go to the cafeteria.  

"Doll?" Y/n asks whenever she is out of earshot from anyone. 

"Yeah? Don't you like it, doll?" Y/n shrugs her shoulders. 

"you don't have to get me lunch." 

"I just said I would, it'll look weird if I don't." Mike and Y/n both lunched which he paid for. 

"Thank you, Wheeler." 

"Don't mention it, Doll."

                                                       ~~~

"Okay? So what do I do at the football game?" Mike asks as they sat in his car outside the stadium. 

"Go to the student section and have fun?" Y/n says, "Cheer for me after half-time." 

"I will be having the opposite of fun." 

"You're so pessimistic, it's annoying." 

"I'm surprised you know that big of a word." Y/n stuck her tongue at him and got out the car. 

"Come on, lover boy." She says and he shoves his keys in his pocket and gets out of the car. 

"Don't call me that." 

"Don't call me doll." She fires back and a playful smirk crossed her face.  

"How much is it to get in?" 

"It's free for you, you can come with me." Y/n grabs Mike's hand leading him to an opening in the gate with a woman standing there. 

"Y/n, you were supposed to ride the cheer bus with the rest of the girls." 

"I know, I'm sorry, coach. I rode over with my boyfriend." Couch Melissa looks over at Mike. 

"Come on, go get your cheer uniform on." She lets the two kids and Y/n smirks over at Mike who looked shocked. 

"Thank you!" She smiles and walked through, "Do you need help finding the student section or with anything?" She asks. 

"I think I can figure it out." 

"Okay!" She smiles, "Jane will be here-"

"I know, she's the cheer team mangager."

"You're a stalker." Y/n says, "I have to go, um, try to be close to the field so Jane and I both can see you. Try to act like you're having fun, please and thank you." Y/n smiles at him as she ran towards where the cheerleaders were. 

Mike found the student section and stood on the second row. Nobody paid him any mind until Jane Hopper saw him in the crowd of people from the football field. 

"Mike?" Jane calls and Mike standing on the end of the row got down from it and walked over towards the fence. 

"Yeah."

"What are you doing here?" She asks, "I mean, you hate football?" 

"I do. I'm here because Y/n and I are going out and I thought I'd come support my girl." He says and the smile on Jane's face wavered for a second. 

"you and Y/n?" She asks, "She doesn't really seem like your type?"

"I don't know, we just started talking and it turns out, she is." He says. 

"Jane!" Coach Melissa yells. 

"Sorry, Mike. I've got to get back." He watches as she walks away, her hair half pulled back. He could feel his pupils turn into hearts as he walks back to his spot. 

                                                           ~~~

Y/n was practically chugging back the water bottle that Mike got for her at the game. 

"Thank you," She says out of breath and wiping some sweat off her forehead.

"Did you have fun out there?" Mike asks and Y/n nods. 

"Always do, okay. I'm going to get my party clothes on and we can go to Brett Chapman's house."

"Brett Chapman? That guy hates me, Y/n. I don't think it's a good idea-" Y/n put her hands on his upper arms and a sweet smile went across her face. 

"Don't freak out, okay? We won't be there very long. I have to make an appearance. I don't like those parties either so I promise, we won't be long. Take a deep breath." Mike does as she says and takes a deep breath. 

"Good," She says, rubbing one of her hands, "Now, stay here, lover boy." 

"Gross," He says, and Y/n giggles as she goes to the bathroom with her duffel bag on her shoulder. She came out a few minutes later with her hair down and jean and floral crop top. 

"Okay, I'm ready." She says and they go back to Mike's car. 

Mike followed Y/n's instruction and they were at his big house in a few minutes. They got out and started walking towards the house. 

The music was vibrating the whole house and the smell of cheap beer hit their noses. 

"Ready?" She asks, intertwining their hands as they walked through the door.  They walked into the house and there were people everywhere. 

some people were making out, other's were drinking, some were dancing, and some people were in small groups dancing. 

"Y/n! My favorite cheerleader!" Brett yells grabbing her other hand spinning her away from Mike, "And? She's with a nerd." 

"His name is Mike, Brett and he's my boyfriend." His eyes went between the two of them and Brett laughed. 

"Is he black mailing you?" Brett asks, "Blink Twice." Y/n looks at with wide eyes. 

"No, Brett. I actually like him."

"You have a great house." Mike says, "Very big." 

Brett looks at him and then a smile came on, "Thanks, bro. Enjoy!" 

"Nice try." Y/n whispers to him as they walk farther into the house. Y/n said hello to a few other people and chatted with them. Mike always on her arm, smiling, and telling people that he was happy they finally started dating. 

Then they went to Jane and he could feel his heart start to beat faster. 

"Hey, Janey!" Y/n says, letting go of Mike and going to her friend, they both smile at each other. 

"I feel like we haven't talked in forever." She tightened her grip. 

"I've been busy with trying to get a job and-"

"Daddy cut her off," Mike jokes and Jane gives me a look. 

"I'm sure that's not it." Jane snapped at it him, "Don't need to be so rude, Mike. She is your girlfriend after all." 

"Oh, Janey. Just a harmless joke."

"No,"Jane says, "He shouldn't joke about things like that." She sends a glare. Y/n tells her that's fine a few times and they all three talk for a few more minutes. 

"Janey, I have to get going. My mom is calling me, I've got to get home." 

"Be safe, honey." Jane says, they hug again kissing each other cheeks and Mike and Y/n went back to his car. 

"She hates me." Mike says. 

"She doesn't hate you." Y/n says, "But I wouldn't blame her." Mike turns to her giving her a look, "I'm just kidding!" 

"I hate you!" Mike says and Y/n giggles. 

"Take us to nearest burger place, and I'll get you something and then I'll show you my favorite place in the universe." Y/n says and Mike turns the car on. 

"Are you secretly taking me to my murder?" 

"Yes, now drive, Mikey." He just shakes his head and drives. 

[itsdappleagain]

Here we go- on time, for once- with The French Connections Caper! As I mentioned, this is one of my favorite episodes from season one, because I am a little angst whore.

Alrighty- as always, notes are under the cut!

Who in the world reference. GET IT

The rotating pack of mints is so funny. Did acme have that on file?? Did she hack into his bank account??

The picture of julia just looking exhausted with chase is so funny

SIX MONTHS AGO?? THIS SEASON HAPPENED IN SIX MONTHS???

Chase is literally That Stupid

Man can you imagine the episode if PAPER STAR had kidnapped chase???? She would have just killed him

The standing up and saying “I will go” is theater kid level blocking i love that

I’m going to be yammering on about the lens of shadowsan’s double betrayal thing for probably the whole episode but goddd its so good. Severus snape and harry potter’s terf ass wish they had what shadowsan and carmen have

Shadowsan’s motif <333

YOU JOINING A KPOP BAND

Julia in her suit <3333333 YES YES YES part of the reason I love this episode is because its the first time julia sort of gets to stand on her own a little bit…sets up for next season, when she SLAYS

Also, ever notice that in this “virtual tailor” chase has gloves, but in s3 when he finally gets his suit he doesn’t have them? Interesting that some agents get them and some don’t

Chase getting so pissed off about julia saying she didn’t do it alone is SO FUNNY because he’s RIGHT she is NOT talking about him

Your SILENT partner yessir

I LOVE WHEN SHE GETS MAD AND YELLS AT HIM GO JULIA GET HIS ASS

DEFEND YOUR WIFE 💪

Chase’s ego is so large that it blinds him- jackie made a post on it already so I’ll just reference that, but its brilliant characterization

You can make yourself look like a law enforcement imbecile jusst fine

I love the way julia storms off. She cn’t take very large steps so its just very angry and quick heel clatters

She WANTS to be planning something nefarious but unfortunately she must be on the beach

Poor baby she looks so uncomfortable dsghfjda. Also another instance of a stellar outfit that we never get to see again </3

Ivy is actually weirdly talented at making gigantic detailed sand castles. That wave was so poorly timed her poor vile central

Also. wicked wicked

IVY YELLING AT ZACK IN THE BACKGROUND WHILE CARMEN JUST DOES NOT ACKNOWLEDGE ANYTHING

Yeahhh well you say you’re never going back to vile island. And technically you are right

FIELD TRIP!

THE SHOCK WHEN BRUNT SAYS THAT DJHDSFD

PLS SHE BUMPED BELLUM ON THE WAY UP WHY DID SHE DO THAT

I love the role reversal that shadowsan and brunt do here. Shadowsan is expected to be The Worst and Brunt is carmen’s closest thing to a mother. But in actuality….brunt is a murderous spiteful little bitch and shadwsan is evolving into dadowsan

Jsdfads the look on shadowsan’s face. He knows that everything just got a looot more complicated for him

At least he’s kind of self aware right

Chase only being nice to her because he knows she’s smarter than he is is so funny. He drinks the most vaguely mysoginistic respect women juice on the planet

You have no idea how much the line “wow, foamy” has impacted my daily life. I literally say it every single time i brush my teeth. I can’t stop

NOT THE VILE BRAND LOGO ON THE TOOTHPASTE AND EVERYTHING 

Chase lying on the floor looking like he just died of rabies is the funniest fucking thing

American outlets in france 👍

Carmen did a whole costume change between noon and sunset

Mesmerized by the way that top tuft of hair she has blows in the wind. Wow. could watch that all day

I love how the message goes “SURRENDER WE HAVE CHASE DEVINEAUX” and carmen is just like. Wait. partner??? Travel partner??? 😌😌😌

She’s kind of chill about mentioning that vile is definetely going to kill devineaux and then capture her in this little plan of theirs

“Which is why I’ll need to be careful” she says, walking into a closed off basement with no preparation at all

Why the hell would they put where they were keeping him in the Evil Email they sent her wouldn’t that just set her up to try a rescue mission

Props to raf for making the most diverse array of clueless grunting noises I have ever heard in my life

I cANT HELP BUT LAUGH WHEN BRUNT SAYS “BONJOUR” LIKE THAT. SHES TRYING SO HARD TO BE SINISTER BUT SHE’S JUST TEXAN

Wheeze acme set the expectation for him to be kidnapped for employment reasons

ASK YOU WHAT he’s so stupid i love him

“I’ve seen your keycard” said with the exact same tone as. Someting. I don’t know i love how she says that she’s just like Yeah. I’ve seen it. Hah

Shadowsan and that damn sword for intimidation tactics

Oogh that twisted little smile when brunt goes to get the brain scrambler 

Alternate episode where chase gets the hard way and carmen just walks in to a sad sack of broken bones on the floor

I love the almost impressed look on shadowsan’s face when he tells her that he’s singing the french national anthem. Like. of course he is

Interesting little detail that chase leans over and spits out the gag while carmen and company are just kind of making quips about him being tortured

I love he some good drunk but not drunk character tropes in cartoons. Drunk adora. Laughing gassed up anne. Sick luz. We didn’t get drunk carmen but we did get drunk chase and you know what I’m fine with that

THE WAY HIS EYES FLICK TO THEM WHEN HE SAYS BILE IS ALWAYS SO FUNNY TO ME

Love how shadowsan doesn’t care at all what happens to chase. He cares about carmen, but he’s still a VILE operative. She’s pretty much the only one he cares about until he’s spent a little while with TR

Mmm the music is so good in this ep as well

Thinking abt how if ivy was controlling red drone and carmen was sneaking off to rescue chase…that was zack in carmen cosplay who was dramatically standing ontop of the roof

The weird little petnames brunt uses for chase are also so funny

I have wanted to edit that shot of shadowsan running and jumping over chimneys onto the dinosaur game for SO LONG

Its cool how different the body types of the carmen decoys are. Its pretty easy to tell who’s who even with their faces not showing

IVYYYY

You can rock red, zack. I mean. You pick a devil costume out by yourself in s3 so clearly you know it too

I am shocked that she didn’t check the dumpster because. THATS WHERE I WOULD HAVE LOOKED. I guess she knows carmen’s style well enough- in s3 when they’re talking about catching carmen sandiego 101 zuko and luz mention that part of it was knowing that she always takes the high ground, anakin. And while this is zack the two of them are pretty well trained on carmen’s movements, clearly. They jump across the rooftops and everything just like she does to be convincing

JSHDGDS HE JUST GETS SLAMMED

BAIT N SWITCH…alright here we go

I like the little setup she has there. She brought the electrocuter thing because she had to get the cuffs off, but she uses it in the fight later too

Another little detail in the animation of chase’s sweat dripping to the floor when he falls

That little interaction between the two of them is so cool. Carmen doesn’t know what to expect, or how she can see or anything. OR that she knows exactly who she is

Pls its 4:30 in the morning the carmen team really do have a messed up sleep schedule

Sleepy julia in pajamas <3333

Me watching a france based murder mystery show: haha. Gendairme. I know how to pronounce that

It is a little inconsistent how carmen has so much difficulty dragging him out here…when these three meet again in mexico carmen just shoves him off the wrestling ring and into a chair with very little effort, although that may be evidence of her training and getting stronger over time.

Anyway, I’m exTREMELY excited for this fight. It is SO BRUTAL 

THE BENDNG THE METAL IS. GOD

She’s so. Like. hulking??? Its so creepy how she moves, especially when she uses all these little petnames at the same time as she’s cracking her neck 

THE CATCH OF HER FOOT IS SO GOOD GOD. brunt KNOWS her and even if she didn’t maybe expect her to have a gun she can catch her move pretty easily. This entire fight is full of brunt catching what carmen is going to do as she does it- except for the time with the taser

GOD the crashing into the chair augh that must have hurt so bad wheeze

Brunt is terrifying. She doesn’t slink around or do any acrobatics. She’s just like a final video game boss that has a tracker on your location and does not stop coming

GOD YEAH SEE. SHE CATCHES CARMEN’S KICK AND THEN JUST S L A M S HER INTO THAT SHELF

Carmen is again so used to the athletic, fast-moving operatives who usually match her in everything but cleverness, or use long distance weapons like paper star does. But brunt….it doesnt matter how smart carmen is when brunt can overpower her and fling her into the concrete like a bug

Goddd you can see carmen thinking about what the hell she can do. She knows strength isn’t going to work, so she has to find something else to distract brunt while she gets her baby taser

It makes sense actually now that the taser doesnt knock brunt out like a crackle rod would. Its meant for disabling hadcuff electronics, not seizing up the muscles of full grown woman

THE DESPERATION ON CARMEN’S FACE AS SHE ELECTROCUTES BRUNT IS SO GOOD. she knows this is not a good situation. She does. This is not her usual fighting style, obviously. She just wants to get out

The SMOKE when carmen gets electrocuted fuck

UNGH i love how different this fight is. Carmen stumbles on the run to the door and THAT is how you know she’s really in trouble. She’s just yanking on it trying to get out at this point. Its more instinct than battle- she’s just clawing at ANYTHING that could help her 

And then her coat gets ripped. Every time her coat is off in this show she is not in a good spot. Becauseeee COLOR THEORY!! That red is her sign she’s got a chance, but when it comes off and gets destroyed everything. Is. green. Same thing happens in hot rocks of rio, so look out for that next week. It’s really interesting to notice once you find the patterns

MMGH WHEN SHE CLUTCHES HER SIDE AND THEN HER HAND GETS CRUSHED AND HER EYES WIDEN AND SHE JUST KNOWS

That gasp when she’s down on thr ground will be the death of me. And then the rattling on the grate just. Trying to get away and do ANYTHING to save herself from this person she once called a mother figure its SO angsty god i love it

There were NO breaks in that fight scene until carmen was on the ground with absolutely no choices left. It keeps the emotion UP and TENSE and it is FANTASTIC. We get a break once we cut back to shadowsan and the gang…player telling carmen she just needs to make it a little longer, because the cops are better than being dead

Also. zack just waking up with the banana peel on his head.

Why does player have the individual tracking locations of all the cops in the city

Seaosn one and season two were written and made pretty much at the same time, which was SUCH a strong choice. THIS FINALE sets up ALL OF SEASON TWO and SEASON TWO’S FINALE. AUGH. it is such a fantastic end to the season

I love that carmen gets to learn that it wasn’t this woman who rescued her from “the side of the road” here. She doesn’t have to live with that idea in her head….that she could be saved by the same woman who was trying to kill her

Instead she’s saved again by the one who really cared all along- since the moment he saved her from the fire

Please carmen looks so small on the ground there its so scary to watch

God that returning to vile island is for carmen a fate worse than death is so. Its so

Ive always been frustrated with carmen for not. I dont know. Lying?? Saying ok sure ill go back fine to buy herself some time, so that the cops could come in and help her. But i get it. Yknow?? Carmen isn’t that person. But boy would that have prevented a lot of the rib breakage that is about to go down 

God. how limp carmen is in that moment. She flinched away when brunt goes to touch her face, but she just looks. Kind of regretful. She doesn’t really, i think, expect what is about to happen. She just thinks brunt is going to bat her around some more..

Also. how limp carmen is when brunt pulls her into the “hug” is also so scary. GOD i don’t know if its because she’s trying to prepare herself or if she’s in so much pain or if its because some part of her still trusts brunt

That tragic look almost into the camera when she realizes what brunt is doing is HAUNTING i love that sm

This is so dark btw. The foreshadowing way back in episode two for this when brunt hugs her so hard that she feels something crack to now, when that motherly role has twisted into. This

That last gasping breath carmen takes is another one thats just so. Augh. she is really and truly about to die

God the knowledge that at some point carmen just closed her eyes and let it happen because there was nothing else she could do is. What the fuck. Or maybe she just couldn’t breathe enough anymore to keep them open

SHADOWSAN!!

THE WAY SHE SCRAMBLES BACK AS SOON AS BRUNT GOES LIMP IS. god i love that shot. She’s so. Worn down at that point she’s more like a wild animal than anything ig. Just trying to get away get away get away

And then the way she, still gasping for breath and her voice choked with pain, insults shadowsan because her voice is the only defense she has against him right now

Pls i love shadowsan he doesn’t know how to not be intimidating. Running at her with a sword. “I did not come here to take you back.” this moment scared me SO BAD when i was 13 watching this for the first time. I expected it to cut back to her lying on the floor with some grevious injury, maybe to be narrowly saved by her team but frantically rushed to the hospital or something. 

The shadowsan twist is one of the best I think I’ve seen. Its set up and foreshadowed, enough that you could maybe see it coming on first and have all those little “ohh” moments on later watches. When you really step back and say, “what is the consequence of shadowsan doing all of this?” its carmen being able to escape and not becoming a vile operative. Its. yeah. I dont know. Its so good

AUGH the fear on her face. He steps over coach’s pretty much lifeless body, draws his sword. All she has is a fucking wrench

Player gripping his monitor and screaming her name is SO,, UNGH HE THINKS SHE’S DEAD

And the way they cut back with just the limp bodies around them, as shadowsan sheathes his blade. They knew what they were doing obviously

MM AND THEN THE LITTLE CHIME OF CARMEN’S MOTIF WHEN WE SEE THAT SHE’S ALIVE AND SAFE

THAT IS A QUESTION pls i’ve made fun of shadowsan here before because like. Yes. please do follow me into the dark hole no questions asked. I Will Not Stab You once we are at a more convenient and private location that you have moved yourself to. Or transport you back to VILE. just trust me okay carmen follow me right now

LOCK US UP,,, YEAH. REACH US. i love that little…its so small. The us and the little admission of how VILE works (hey- also sets up season THREE’s finale. wild). Yes yes yes. 

I love how shadowsan doesn’t want to admit it. But they have been in it together

GOD YEAH AND THEN. SHE DROPS THE WRENCH and THATS how you know she trusts him, and understands. Thats her last line of defense gone

“It was you….you were the one who found me.”

“YOU ARE IN NO CONDITION TO LEAVE HERE ON YOUR OWN” i love how shouty he is in this season he doesn’t have a gentle voice. He doesnt really. Know how to be vulnerable

But he tries. He tries so hard. He just. He says please and reaches out to her

DOOGY

Girlie im sorry but opening that grate wider would not have made brunt fit any better

That mass of flashing lights in the city is such a good way to show how far they went. Also. why did shadowsan make carmen walk like three miles with her fucked up ribs wheeze. He made her climb some stairs and everything

But he’s soooo gentle with her when they’re walking its so sweet. He lets her lean on him and helps her down to the ground so she can rest…makes sure she is safe before he says anything else and tries to get her medical attention. He is the dadowsan

Ungh gina. Gina gina please. Please put any kind of emotion into “argentina tell me everything now” like thats KIND of an emotional line..,, urgh. The problem i have with gina i think is that she is a fine ACTOR but being a VOICE ACTOR is a LOT DIFFERENT THAN THAT. she doesnt have all her little nice facial expressions and stuff she has carmen who is already inexpressive as is. So when she says that line it just sounds so flat 

He’s only lying about it a little bit, really honestly

Shadowsan: a jerk

“You knew what they’d do to me when I said no” is such an underrated line i love that one

THE COAT WAS EMPTY!! 

Carmen sounds so much like black sheep when she says “i knew it” and I love that so much. I don’t know if that was a directing choice given to gina but it was a good one. Also carmen forgetting her ribs are fucked up lmaoo

FIRST SHADOWSAN SMILE WHEN HE SAYS HE KNWS CARMEN WOULD ENJOY PROVING THAT TO HERRR that is the moment i think when he really becomes human :)))

She got my posture fr

That shot of shadowsan walking away from her as the police lights flash between them and the architecture frames everything is soo pretty

I guess i scare easy when i see a drawn sword is such a good line its so funny. i would too! Maybe he didnt have to extend the ruse all the way until he was a mile away from the school and no one was in sight except carmen herself but alright

IT WAS HIMMM WITH THE HELICOPTER I LOVE THAT REVEAL

NO WAY!!!! I love that its kind of a black sheepism

Shadowsan is like yeah i was happy you escaped but GIRLIE I DIDNT THINK YOU WOULD START FIGHTING CRIME LMAO???

The lug jsdfhds

Julia’s like not chief. Not chief with the random carmen accusations too

Used it to bait him?? How would she have done that?? She’s like in the cheese and breath mints store and she goes over the intercom like “chase devineaux please report to the shadowy death basement! We have your keycard <3”

AND LEFT WITH AN EVIL VILE MASTERMIND KSHGDFJGDS player is so right for that

That shot of her sitting and talking to player as the sun rises behind her is also beautiful i love that shot

Ahhh the way she gets up so carefully because of her injuries its so good

“A present” okay its okay you can tell him carmen

I HAVE A FEELING WE’RE GOING TO HAVE MORE CAPERS TO PLOT WOOHOO SEASON TWO BABYYYYY

ONCE MORE the shot of her standing there and the camera zooming way out is ALSO gorgeous its my blog header actually

YEAHH AND THEN THE CREDITS MUSICCC

God i cant believe we’re already done with season one!! I am SO EXCITED for season two- its my favorite out of all of the seasons and its where things REALLY get juicy. We’ve got the setup and standard formula out and we can start playing around with dynamics, backstories, history, new cast, lore, character development…yes yes yes yes yes i am so excited!!!

Love this episode, solid and fantastic end to a seaosn, which cs finales usually are. Alright- with the feeling that I’m going to have more capers to react to, this is me signing off of season 1 for cs weekly!!

[iammistressofmyfate]

Rating: Explicit

Relationships: Ronan Lynch/Adam Parrish, Richard Gansey III/Blue Sargent, Jordan/Declan Lynch, Carmen Farooq-Lane/Hennessy, Matthew Lynch/OC

Tags:  Kid Fic, Magic, Parent-Child Relationship, Parenthood, Established Relationship, Adulthood, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Found Family, Family Love, Grief/Mourning, Adam Parrish Loves Ronan Lynch, Ronan Lynch Loves Adam Parrish, Greywaren Spoilers, Running Away, Piercings, Tattoos, Mentions of Death, Vomiting, Minor Injuries, Coming of Age, Anal Sex, Mentions of Depression

Summary: The sample size was small, but literally everyone Ronan knew, besides Hennessy and Carmen Farooq-Lane, were having babies. He didn’t necessarily consider himself the baby having type. Most people would look at him and think that he would be the one to drop said baby. He would be the first to say that his lifestyle was not necessarily accommodating to a baby. But nonetheless…Ronan Lynch wanted a baby 

OR 

The one in which Lindenmere manifests a baby and catapults Ronan and Adam into Parenthood

Excerpt:

“Ronan!” Adam called into Lindenmere. 

Adam felt surprisingly calm. 

He had no idea what to expect upon arriving, but Ronan’s phone call had not boded well. He’d left his partner in the terminal and taken his bag right to car rentals. He’d gotten whatever they had on hand, flashing his badge. 

Several scenarios had run through Adam’s mind and there were contingency plans for all of them. 

Ronan hadn’t dreamt anything unsavory or unwanted in years but that didn’t mean that it couldn’t still happen. Adam always liked being prepared. 

He wasn’t even really worried about what the situation in and of itself was. He was more worried about Ronan . His tenderhearted husband was also a badass, but he wasn’t a murderer. 

Adam had long ago made the decision that he would be more than willing to take on that burden if it ever came to it. He didn’t worry much about hell or damnation or anything like that. He would do whatever he had to to protect Ronan. 

Adam called out again. “Ronan!”

“I’m here.” 

[Chapter Five]

[The Beginning]

[angelamontoo]

Guess who decided to do a part 2 to her Peter Lorre characters in drag post?

First I drew Polo in a Carmen Miranda inspired outfit. I mentioned on the first post that I wanted to draw a Peter character dressed that way because of Slappy Lazslo dressing up as her and @soapkaars suggested Polo wearing the outfit and it distracting people while he pickpockets them. I decided to make the distracted fellow the guy that Fritz Feld played in IWAA who they scam at the beginning and added in Polo's beloved mouse Helping him out

Then Professor Fenninger and Co. From You'll find out. Having faked their deaths and gone on the run in disguise as a young married couple and their darling baby

Next I drew a picture based on an idea @stillwaitin76 shared with me about a 'some like it hot' inspired story starring Peter Lorre and Vincent Price. Although when I drew the picture I think I had a much different vision of how that story would go down in my head than they intended. This was a fun one because even though I love all of the team ups Pete and Vince did together in their older years, it's a shame they never did any films together when they were younger and it was fun having an excuse to imagine them in something together when they were around their late 20s-mid 30sish

And finally, ik I drew Cairo in the last post, but I reeeally wanted to draw him and o Shaughnessy in eachothers outfits

[carmensbroom]

I've once again had 6 hours to process everything I saw in season 4 so I'm just gonna say my thoughts on it (hold onto your fedoras again folks)

first off, WE FOUND OUT GRAY'S LAST NAME?? I was so shocked and happy at the same time I love how everyone asked for player's real name and we ended up with gray's surname for some reason shsjsj. NOBODY ASKED FOR THAT BUT THEY DELIVERED ANYWAY

ALSO GRAHAM IS AN ORPHAN?? my precious boy *throws mommy's boy headcanon out the window*

the second episode really had me shipping carmivy they're so cute we got a girl's trip and I'm all for it

I think I may now be a dash haber stan but let's not make a big thing of it

also ivy eating the chocolate in the middle of a mission deserves an honorable mention because of her cute little tongue (I'm weird okay djsjsjs)

zack trying to bond with shadowsan and him having none of it was delightful

that fucking robot god damn bellum really thought of everything didn't she every time I thought it was gone it made a come back I literally said out loud "carmen is so fucked"

I SWEAR TO GOD EVERY TIME GRAY TALKED ABOUT CARMEN I KEPT THINKING HE WAS GONNA SAY "BECAUSE I LOVE HER" IN WHICH CASE I WOULD HAVE DIED AND NOT IN A GOOD WAY

yall have no idea how relieved I was when I found out that photo of julia was her and her (presumably) mother and NOT a boyfriend sjsjsjs

catch me making a headcanon that julia has a single mom because her father disowned her for coming out as gay based on that picture alone 😭

I'M SORRY BUT THE AMOUNT OF FLIRTING BETWEEN CARMEN AND JULES?? PLEASE THEY'RE SECRET GIRLFRIENDS JUST ADMIT YOU CENSORED THEM AND GO

OKAY BUT WHEN THEY WERE IN JULIA'S OFFICE AND CARMEN SAID "WAY TO FOLLOW YOUR HEART JULES" AND SHE WAS LIKE "YOU REMEMBERED" I LOST IT WHAT DID CARMEN REMEMBER JULES?? DID THEY HAVE A CONVERSATION OFF SCREEN? MAYBE I'M JUST A BIG HUGE LESBIAN BUT THAT'S A BIT GAY LADIES

carmen getting all worried when julia wasn't answering her phone was the blessed gay content I signed up for PLEASE THEY CARE ABOUT EACH OTHER SO MUCH

never thought I'd say this but I loved devineaux this season he was funny, he improved his treatment towards julia (I don't recall him officially apologising I must have missed something djsjsjs)

the only thing I didn't like was it kinda seemed like they were trying to hint that chase and jules were into each other and I didn't really vibe with that

all that shit with dr bellum and the crown for cleo really had me thinking cleobellum was gonna be canon what a clown I am (seriously tho the way she lost it when the crown got stolen GIVE IT BACK IT BELONGS TO HER WIFE)

look all I'm saying is: tigress new outfit in the egypt episode was hot

HER FACE AT THE END AFTER SHE GOT TRAPPED WITH ALL THOSE BUGS

I wish julia and gray could have met there's so much friendship potential there 😭

is player... is he a bit 💅 I SEE THAT PRIDE STICKER ON YOUR LAPTOP YOUNG MAN YOU'RE NOT SUBTLE

ngl I nearly teared up when player finally met carmen in person

I'M SORRY BUT JULIA'S BLUSH IN EPISODE 7 PLEASE SHE'S SO SMITTEN WITH CARMEN IT'S BRILLIANT

EVIL CARMEN WAS REALLY SOMETHING ELSE I WAS SO SCARED SHE'D BE STUCK LIKE THAT FOREVER

I mentioned this in another post but when julia was like "don't you remember me? I'm your girlfriend friend, jules" I NEARLY FUCKING CRIED THEY WERE GETTING KINDA CLOSE AND THEN CARMEN GOT MIND WIPED

JULIA TOPS JULIA TOPS I SAID IT ALL ALONG AND IT'S TRUE SHE REALLY PINNED VILE CARMEN THAT'S TOP BEHAVIOR (also this now makes carmen a bottom I don't make the rules)

kinda shocked that paper star was hardly here I don't stan her so it didn't bother me much but still it was just strange they didn't use her this season

when shadowsan whipped out the last doll and carmen had all those flashbacks to when she was at vile I nearly started crying AGAIN

I LEGIT THOUGHT CARMEN HAD KILLED GRAY DJSJSJS AN ELECTRICIAN GETTING ELECTROCUTED THAT'S SOME IRONY RIGHT THERE

gray really confused me towards the end he kept switching sides every five minutes for the whole season I wasn't sure whether to trust him half the time dhshsjs

THE LOOK ON CARMEN'S FACE WHEN SHE THOUGHT SHE'D KILLED GRAY WAS SO HEARTBREAKING AND THEN SHE STARTED CRYING OH MY GOD I'M SORRY BABY

the way she's always been against hurting people/taking lives and then she ended up hurting all the people she loves (she nearly killed zack for god sake) really hit me hard

gray's ending was... kinda weird I understood the parallel of him not wanting to complicate carmen's life like she said about him in season 2 but it was still kinda strange that they didn't have one more conversation or get any closure

I'm obviously kinda upset that carulia wasn't canon they had so much potential imo and the show isn't about romance anyway BUT I'm happy with the content we got and THEY FLIRTED SO MUCH THEY'RE CANON IN MY HEART

THE TEAM RED GROUP HUG KILLED ME IT WAS SO CUTE

kinda annoyed that carmen just straight up left zack and ivy she really just left a note and said YEET

ivy's voice crack when she read the note got me all choked up

ngl I'm still not entirely sure how it ended I had to rewatch it a few times to understand what they were trying to imply sjsjsj

would have loved to know carmen's given name but at the same time she's literally THE carmen sandiego that's who she is, it would be silly to go by a name that she doesn't connect with just because her parents gave her it

her mom being a regular citizen was kinda bittersweet I mean a plot twist would have been good but at the same time it would make the story even more complicated

*dreams of a spinoff movie where we get better closure on everything*

ACME IVY ACME IVY I'M NOT AN IVY STAN BUT DAMN IF I AIN'T SIMPING FOR ACME IVY

I know carmen didn't want revenge but I feel like chief got let off with killing her father way too quickly if I'm honest sjsjsj

JULIA BEING IN CHARGE OF FINDING CARMEN'S MOM OH MY GOSH

I feel so bad for laughing when julia got knocked out the way the cloth fell on her head sent me but when the pole hit her head I was like "OKAY I TAKE IT BACK THIS ISN'T FUNNY ANYMORE"

was not expecting julia to physically fight anyone I mean she's always been so calm and collected and then this season she was like fuck it might as well hit a few people before we finish forever

wishing carmen and jules could have hugged or had a scene together where they talked about stockholm but I won't complain it wouldn't have really made sense anyway considering they were cool with each other at the university

so glad the trailer was misleading about the coach brunt situation I really didn't want her to get a last minute redemption

another honorable mention: cleo snapping at julia "DON'T YOU DARE IMPLY THAT I AM COMMON" sent me djdjs she was just stood there like "I am but a humble history lesbian leave me be"

I think that's everything I'll probably add to it later if I think of anything or I might make a part 2 djsjsjs (I've been writing this for almost an hour now 😭)

overall I enjoyed it from start to finish. I haven't really cried about it ending yet I'm still processing everything but I'll probably have a little sob when it finally hits me djsjsjs

CARULIA NATION WE BASICALLY WON NOW EXCUSE ME WHILE I REWATCH ALL THEIR SCENES TOGETHER AND MAKE IT MY ENTIRE PERSONALITY

[florrickandassociates]

TGF Thoughts: 5x06- And the two partners had a fight...

I’ve been waiting for this episode for nearly a decade, and I didn’t even realize it. More under the cut. 

(This is very long! Please fight me on stuff and disagree because I just wrote all these words about this episode and I STILL want to talk about it more, it was that interesting!) 

This is the second episode in a row to start off with a TikTok video. 5x02 and 5x03 both ended with elevators. Is there some sort of pattern they’re going for here?  

This case—which is, it’s important to note, in Wackner’s court—is about TikTok content creators and copyright laws. Probably not enough material for a full case, but definitely an interesting theme to explore.

Marissa doesn’t have her laptop volume off (which I suppose makes sense; she was just playing the TikTok videos) and a notification sounds. She shuts the laptop.

Wackner rules that the profits made from the TikTok dance must be split evenly between the guy who stole the dance for his video game and the creator. The thief does not like this, removes his moose costume (oh, yeah, did I mention they’re in costumes again?), and starts shouting that he’s going to sue and then moons the whole court. Okay!

He follows through on his threat, and next thing we know, Liz, Cord, Wackner, and Marissa are meeting to discuss strategy.

Liz’s computer makes the same noise Marissa’s did; she punches some keys.

Liz points out that Wackner’s biggest problem is that real judges are not going to like Wackner playacting as a judge. “I’m not playing a judge. I am a judge,” Wackner says. Liz notes that Wackner’s court lacks any way of forcing people to comply with his rulings, but real court can shut him down.

I guess whatever keys Liz punched did not silence the annoying notification sound.

She asks Wackner to try not to become the focus of the court case, since that’s how they’ll lose. “This is why I started a court,” Wackner says after Liz instructs him to only answer yes or no and to wear a suit.  

Liz asks Marissa to keep Wackner in line. She says she’ll try.

Now we are at the Black Lawyers Association, where there’s a panel with leaders from Chicago’s four top black law firms. For reasons passing understanding, DIANE is on this panel. This makes absolutely no sense (I mean, unless only white people were involved in this decision, and even then!) and I’ll only excuse it because they mention later that it makes no sense for Diane to have been on this panel.  

I wonder why everyone else’s firm gets named but not Diane’s.  

Diane also gets the first question, which is, pointedly, about opportunities for black lawyers. Her phone starts making the annoying notification sound. Ever heard of silent mode??  

The annoying sound happens every five seconds at the RL offices. According to David Lee, it happens twenty times an hour, but it seems like more than that! He, for some reason, goes to Carmen to ask how to stop the sound. He also wants to know what it is. Carmen explains that it is “Dawnk” which is a new messaging system within the company.  

On Dawnk, you can talk about anything you want and be anonymous. Who approved this?! In one frame, I can see there’s someone complaining about someone being promoted too fast because of “the future is female bs.” In another, someone is upset that they are anonymous and wants to use their real name (only Jay, who is otherwise absent from this episode, seems to have figured out how to turn this anon mode off).

Sorry, before I can get on board with this plot, I just need to note for the record how phenomenally stupid the idea of using anonymous messaging software within a company is. This was obviously not going to end well! It’s like workplace YikYak... (remember YikYak?!)  

David Lee hates the idea of a messaging software; Carmen says the associates prefer this.  

Jay is being very nice in the chat and defends the person who was promoted “too fast”.

“Who’s ‘Anonymous Crab’?” David Lee asks. Well, I think the fact they are “anonymous” should be a bit of a hint there, David.  

Anonymous Crab asks, “How the hell did this happen??! How did Diane end up at a Black Conference speaking for our firm?” Good question, Anonymous Crab.

Anon Crab also shares a video and David Lee doesn’t understand how to press play. Carmen plays it for him. Diane looks really awful on the panel. No shit! David Lee seems to enjoy Diane looking bad, even though he should be able to connect the dots between Diane looking bad and potential for bad things to come for the firm...  

Not only does Diane get quizzed about why she’s running a firm that is still insisting on calling itself a black firm, she also gets questions about her insurrectionist husband. “He was completely cleared of those charges,” Diane notes. Oh, hey!!!!! Remember how last week I said I’d be more surprised if that was the end of the FBI nonsense than if it continued? I am surprised!! And relieved. Mostly relieved. Dealing with the consequences of that high profile, relationship-straining ordeal is so much more interesting to me than any FBI machinations.  

Next Diane is asked if Kurt just took a job to revitalize the NRA. She hasn’t heard of this yet. I’m glad she’s getting grilled on this stuff... it is about time.  

There’s a hint that Carmen will be representing Mr. Rapey next week. I assume that’s why there’s a line where David checks in with Carmen on Mr. Rapey’s case?  

Anon Platypus says, “I heard she didn’t even have seniority. She just jumped past other black partners to become our name partner. It’s crazy!!!” Anon Platypus is correct—technically. Diane was a name partner at one of Chicago’s top firms before joining RL, so while she skipped the line... that doesn’t seem to me like the PRIMARY issue in bringing her on. The primary issue is that bringing on someone that senior from outside the company is more similar to a merger than a promotion, and Diane’s partnership meant changes for the firm.  

Other anonymous animals also don’t like Diane. One calls her clueless; another says that “Liz needs to do something about this.” Someone responds to that, “Liz will never do it on her own,” which is an interesting sentiment I want to come back to in a little bit.  

“What is Black Twitter?” David Lee asks Liz out of the blue. “People on Twitter who are black and talk to each other,” Liz responds. David Lee asks how he can find it. “I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you,” Liz jokes. And to think Jay said Liz wasn’t funny!  

The Dawnk conversation shifts and now everyone’s ragging on Julius for representing Kurt and just generally being a Trump voter. There’s a lot of heated and racial language I’m not going to type here, enough to make Julius spit out his coffee and storm down to the associate floor.

He goes to Devin, who I’m not sure if we’ve seen before but is high ranking enough to have Lucca’s old office, to get information on the anonymous posts.

Anonymous Bison says, “Unpopular opinion: I blame Adrian.” Hey, Anon Bison, let’s be friends! I am with you. Adrian is the one who brought Diane on, who encouraged them to lean into Julius’s Trump connections, and who pushed the firm to pursue profit over everything else. Diane and Julius aren’t blameless (though I don’t actually think defending Kurt is a bad thing) but if there’s someone who actively strategized to make RL what it is today? Adrian all the way.  

In what world does noting that Julius is pissed in an anonymous message do ANYTHING to stop people who are pissed at him? If they were that concerned about him being pissed they wouldn’t have said anything in the first place.  

Liz and opposing counsel talk over each other in court until the judge makes them stop. I think we’ve seen both the judge and opposing counsel this season, making me wonder if there’s a bit of a COVID bubble situation going on here with the guest stars.  

Judge Farley jokes about “contempt cards” that go up in value and Wackner, of course, is all, “Wow, I really love that.”  

Liz, whose entire strategy was to not let on that anyone calls Wackner a judge, refers to Wackner as “Judge Wackner.” Come on, Liz! (I buy that she’d slip up—there's no one in the world I wouldn’t believe slipping up—but ugh!)  

How did the opposition not realize that they could make this about Wackner’s “crazy court” by referring to him as Judge Wackner? You’d think they’d be all over that.  

Judge Farley looks SO unhappy that Wackner would refer to himself as a judge; it’s phenomenal.  

Now Marissa stumbles over stuff because she’s, for some reason, speaking in court. I bought Liz’s dumb moment more.  

The plaintiff’s strategy is to make it look like Wackner is of unsound mind, and they’ve got video evidence. Remember how Del, Cord, and Wackner all chatted in the RL elevator? Well, turns out that lead to a reality show about Wackner for Del’s streaming service. Sounds about right.  

I don’t really think Wackner cares about attention or anyone else’s motivations... I think he just likes the idea of budget and an audience and a platform.  

Liz meets Del for a romantic dinner and asks him when he was going to tell her about Wackner’s show. Del doesn’t understand why she’s upset. He doesn’t get why he would’ve needed her permission to go into business with Wackner. (I don’t think he’s wrong from a business POV, but from a relationship POV, he totally should’ve let her know!)  

Liz says he should’ve asked because they’re using it against her in court. “That is unfortunate, baby, but this streaming show could be really good for Wackner. It’ll draw attention to his court. And... as I say that...that sounds... okay, look I’m sorry,” Del realizes. I like that he sees that Liz has a point. He goes on to note that he would be totally open to Liz trying to go into business with any of his acquaintances, and I think he genuinely means it.  

Del notes that this is what “power couples” do. Oh? So they’re an official couple? Don’t power couples also associate in public and not hide their relationship from their colleagues?  

This is the place where I note, yet again, that it is always going to be more interesting to see a relationship that feels realistic than to see a relationship that feels like it takes place in a vacuum.  

Liz doesn’t want Wackner becoming popular. Del argues someone else would’ve made the show if he didn’t, and that “disrupters gotta disrupt.” Oh God.  

Are we going to remember that Liz has a child at any point this season?  

Diane is reading the Dawnk discussion at home. It’s still lively even after work hours. The associates appear to be discussing the vaccine before someone changes the topic to “the Diane situation.”

One associate notes that the partners probably aren’t happy about Diane either and just have to vote her out. Kurt arrives home as Diane reads this, reacts to the loud music Diane has playing, the open alcohol, and her general demeanor and asks if they’re getting drunk. “Are we getting a job with the NRA?” she counters.  

Turns out it’s not entirely untrue about Kurt and the NRA. They want him for a new role. It would pay $167,000. I can’t decide if I think that’s a lot (objectively that’s a high salary) or not very much at all (isn’t Kurt the top of his field?)  

Kurt notes he doesn’t have a job so he’s considering it. “Diane, our politics are very different,” he starts. “I know,” Diane says. “I’m, lately, struck by just how different they are.”

“I would just like one week when I don’t have to defend you,” Diane says in frustration. Kurt doesn’t even know what that means at the current moment.  

“You’ll tell me when they offer you the job?” Diane asks. “They may not offer it,” Kurt says. “No, they will,” Diane says, because she knows that it’s basically a done deal already.  

In the middle of the night, Diane turns to Kurt and tries to ask him a question. That wakes him up. She asks who he voted for in 2020 and he doesn’t answer. Uh oh.  

Dreaming now, Diane sits up and asks, “Hello? What do I do?” More on that later...

The HR nightmare known as Dawnk is still going wild the next day at the office. (Seriously, with HR that strict, the anon feature would’ve been disabled the second the first semi-controversial comment was posted.) Everyone’s obsessed.  

The partners, minus Diane, all gather in Liz’s office to discuss Dawnk (and the topics of conversation on Dawnk). Madeline says they should ignore it. I say they should make STR Laurie shut it down and be the bad guy. It is nonsensical that this workplace would continue to allow Dawnk to continue! In addition to being an HR nightmare, it’s also a drain on productivity if everyone’s constantly glued to it, and I imagine STR Laurie cares about profit more than anything else.  

But like I really don’t get why Madeline says they can’t censor their associates. Of course they can shut down the app if they want to! Someone put the app there in the first place, no? I do understand not wanting to look like you’re violating free speech (even though taking away anonymous commenting in the workplace would not be a violation of free speech) but I highly doubt it would be only the partners complaining. Tina, whose promotion was called into question, would be complaining too. Anyone trying to get work done, or anyone who didn’t like the toxic culture, or anyone who was uncomfortable with a joke made, would be complaining. There are more than enough reasons it would be perfectly acceptable to take the anon commenting away.

Now the partners are fighting about Kurt’s case too. “Diane is not responsible for her husband,” Liz says when Madeline says that Diane should’ve known better than to get involved. Um, Liz, Madeline is right. Diane isn’t responsible for Kurt’s actions but she’s sure as hell responsible for volunteering to represent him.  

“In the real world of this firm, Diane’s billable hours speak for themselves,” Liz notes when a partner tries to call Diane’s unsavory associations into question.  

“The rest of us put in the hours too, for the record,” notes another partner. I’m sure... but do you put in DIANE’S hours and have DIANE’S client list? My guess is no. If Diane weren’t the biggest earner at the firm we wouldn’t be having this debate. She’d just be gone. She’d never have been at the firm to begin with.  

“Liz, when I joined this firm, it was because of your father’s legacy. It was about Black civil rights, activism, justice. That’s what people talked about in meetings. Now, people talk about billable hours, million-dollar clients, corporate payouts. Now, I know it’s not your fault. That was Boseman’s vision and we were trying to survive the Trump years by bringing in white lawyers, but those days are gone. They’re done with. And I miss being a strong black firm,” Madeline says. Everyone but Liz (and probably Julius) seems to agree with that.

This is one of many interesting facets of this issue. When Madeline argues against Diane, she’s not just arguing that she wants a black person running the firm for optics. She’s not saying that Diane-but-black would be an acceptable choice. She is saying she wants RL to be the firm it was at the very very start of the show—a firm committed to social justice, not maximizing revenue. A firm that didn’t just accept every client that came their way because they love profit. A firm that stood for something. So my question is: Does Liz want that firm?  

Liz is hard to read throughout this whole plot, and I think that may be intentional. Liz isn’t a manager by training—she was an AUSA who suddenly became a name partner at a firm (if you want to talk about seniority and skipping the line, Liz is a way better example than Diane—you can even through some nepotism, twice over, in there). She doesn’t seem to have a clear goal for her firm other than maintaining the status quo and keeping power. Liz not taking a stronger stance from the start (either accepting that they are no longer going to be a social justice-oriented firm or pushing to get them back to that place) allows these kinds of questions to fester. It’s my hope that this becomes text instead of subtext pretty soon, ‘cause this is the kind of thing that if it’s subtext for too long will start to feel like bad writing/Liz being conveniently clueless. It’s way more interesting if Liz is just not yet good at being a manager... because she is learning on the job.  

Anyway. I think the ideal solution here is probably that Diane and Liz continue to run RL: A STR Laurie Company (the fact they’re owned by corporate overlords kind of makes any decision about RL’s mission moot) since Diane wants to do that and Liz seems to be content where she is. Madeline and the other partners, instead of trying to force STRL to let them pursue the cases they want, can accept pay cuts and go start their own firm. Maybe they can even team up with Barbara Kolstad!  

None of that’s to say that the dilemma here is easily solvable, nor is it to say that Diane shouldn’t consider stepping down. I’ll say more on that later. My point here is just that this issue is much deeper than just if Diane is on the letterhead or not. As long as they’re owned by STR Laurie and have clients like Rivi, Diane stepping aside would just be a band-aid.  

(And that, I think, is intentional... they’ve been building the “why are we even representing x?” tension pretty consistently this season, so I imagine it’s on the writers’ minds.)  

Diane stumbles across the secret partner’s meeting and knows something’s up.  

“You gotta handle this, Liz. You cannot have a white partner leading a black firm. We’ll lose clients with that kind of hypocrisy” Madeline insists after Diane heads back to her office. I’ve already said it, but just to say it in a less rambly way: Madeline is right, but she’s right IF AND ONLY IF the goal is to be a black firm. So, Liz, is it?  

(They’ll lose clients, sure, but which ones? They’ll lose the clients Madeline wants while Diane continues to keep bringing in business and Rivi and Cord and Wolfe-Colman and their elk* stay put.)  

*I know this is not the correct word; see 6x17 of TGW

David Lee has also noticed the meeting in Liz’s office and thinks this may be the “beginning of the end.” Diane glares at him and he says he was just joking.

Diane schedules a meeting with Liz. Liz’s assistant doesn’t know Diane by voice, adding to her frustration.

Credits! We are 22 minutes in! This might be a record if 5x01 hadn’t saved the credits til the very end!  

I’ve already written more than I did last week by a couple hundred words.  

Two interesting things about the credits. First, this episode was written by Aurin Squire. Forgive me if I’ve mentioned this in a prior recap (I know I thought about it but can’t remember if I deleted), but I think Aurin Squire and Davita Scarlett are key to why TGF and Evil are both always so good. They’re the two writers other than the Kings who are in both the TGF and Evil rooms, and they both REALLY seem to be on the same wavelength as the Kings. I imagine that having four people who are in both rooms helps with managing both at basically the same time.  

(This isn’t where I wanted to go with this bullet point, but I may as well shout out how great Evil is this season, too! It also just aired an episode by Aurin Squire about the lead white female character realizing her privilege!)  

Second, this episode was directed by Brooke Kennedy. I didn’t know that going in, but seconds before the director credit popped up, I was thinking to myself, “this episode feels like it’s going to be a very important one. I bet Brooke directed it.” I was very pleased to see her name appear.  

(For anyone who doesn’t know, Brooke is an EP who’s been involved in nearly every episode of both Wife and Fight and she tends to direct important episodes that require a lot of familiarity with the characters. She directed 5x15 of The Good Wife and she’s done a bunch of the premieres and finales that Robert King hasn’t claimed for himself.)  

Diane and Liz meet in a bar to catch up. Diane’s still staring at Dawnk. Liz takes her phone and silences the notifications. “Who thought that sound was pleasing?” Diane complains. “All day in court today,” Liz commiserates. Carmen had to teach her how to silence the notifications. Liz, you’re using an iPhone, there is a very easy to use switch that silences your phone, like you would need to for court. I know you know this.  

(I think Diane, despite her complaining about the sound, is captivated by Dawnk.)  

Liz orders soda water instead of a drink. I assume that’s intentional, perhaps because she knows this isn’t going to be an easy conversation or a long night of drinking? She has wine in an earlier scene.  

I love that Liz and Diane chat about Dawnk even though there’s no real plot reason for them to spend this much time discussing it. Little moments like this make me believe Liz and Diane are actually colleagues who get along well and make management decisions together.  

Diane asks if Liz thinks Dawnk actually increases productivity. Liz laughs—she does not. But she knows the associates would “riot” if they got rid of it. She’s right. I still think they can get rid of it without too much blowback. But at least they’re acknowledging this.  

“What do the partners think?” Diane asks, very intentionally shifting the subject. You can hear it in Christine’s voice and see it in her body language—Diane is looking for an opportunity to talk about what she wants to talk about.

“God, Madeline can’t even open it. She’s lost her password three times. She finally just gave up,” Liz says. This is concerning! Madeline should know how to open an app! Probably not unrealistic, though. When you’re that senior, you probably don’t need to know how to use a messaging app. And messaging apps can be confusing sometimes. Like, I still don’t understand how to use Discord.  

The captions have a line I can’t hear in this scene—Liz (I presume?) saying “You know, ‘cause it’s Madeline.” This makes it sound like Madeline is a little less than competent, no?  

“Thanks for sitting down with me, Liz,” Diane says in a quite serious tone. “Of course. So, you’re wondering about the meeting today?” Liz immediately understands. “I am.” “Yeah. Uh, it was about Julius. He’s being harassed on Dawnk,” Liz explains.

“Okay, and I couldn’t be a part of that?” Diane wants to know. “He’s being harassed because he’s defending your husband,” Liz explains. Diane doesn’t seem surprised (perhaps because she, too, would have read these messages?). “Well, that’s unfortunate. We’ve represented people far worse than Kurt, who, by the way, was found innocent,” Diane argues like they’re having a very different conversation. It’s one thing to represent rapists and murderers and drug lords—and I’d argue that the same people pissed about Kurt are also pissed about them!-- and another for your leadership to be married to/close friends with someone who you believe participated in the events of 1/6.  

“I’m not saying it wasn’t. But, January 6th. I mean, we watched the Confederate flag make its way into the Capitol building. You know, those people that Kurt didn’t want to turn over to the FBI, those people. They don’t even want us alive,” Liz says better than I ever could. I think it’s important that Liz mentions a POV that likely wouldn’t have ever crossed Diane’s mind here. This is a small glimpse of why it could be so important to have black leadership at a black firm. Would Diane be thinking about the implications of having the Confederate flag in the Capitol? Probably not in the same way that Liz instantly does.  

“Well, not all of them,” Diane Lockhart, who is suddenly an idiot, says. Liz looks at her drink and grimaces, and Diane realizes she’s said something wrong. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that. I’m certainly not defending those people. They’re all despicable traitors.”

“And now, that’s what people are saying about Julius,” Liz explains. “And me?” Diane asks, though she already knows the answer. Liz doesn’t want to answer that. Before she can say anything, Diane asks if she’s being pushed out.  

“No. Not pushed out. You’re a name partner. You can’t be pushed out,” Liz clarifies. Diane knows there’s a but. “The partners just think you should do the right thing,” Liz adds.

“And step aside?” Diane asks. “No. Stay in the firm. Stay as an equity partner, just step back from your managerial role,” Liz says. Diane pauses. “Liz, I... I pull in the big clients. I... I get the billable hours. But still, ‘maybe you should step aside.’ Weren’t we going to form a firm led by women?” Diane argues. Oh, wow, I have so much to say.

First, I completely understand why Diane doesn’t want to give up her title or her power. She's Diane Lockhart! She’s been one of the best in her field for decades. She’s not wrong about the clients and billable hours. It’s just that every time Diane decides to be at this firm, making arguments about how she should retain her role in power, she’s saying that she values her own career/appearance more than the values she claims to care about. And every time she refuses to take a back seat or threatens to walk rather than sacrifice, she’s saying she’ll only through her weight behind her colleagues and their mission if she gets credit for it. To be clear, I don’t think it would be the shittiest decision in the world if Diane decided to walk, to take her clients to a new firm and to let RL become the firm Madeline and the rest envision. It’s asking a lot of her to give up that power and prestige. The interesting part of this dilemma is, to me, that Diane claims to value working for RL and to be active in the fight against racism... but the second she’s forced to choose between that fight and her own power, we all know what Diane is going to choose. There was never really any doubt. Diane doesn’t have to be on the forefront of this fight if she doesn’t want to... but she can’t claim to be invested in the fight if she isn’t willing to sacrifice, at all.

Second, LMAO at this firm led by women idea. Every time Diane talks about her firm led by women idea it sounds sillier! Not because a firm led by women is silly, but because Diane has a habit of saying this like it is a shared goal and each time she references it, it sounds less and less intersectional. For example, when she says it here, she’s essentially saying a firm led by women only has meaning if one of those women is a white woman (specifically a white woman named Diane Lockhart). Who’s to say that Madeline wouldn’t be made partner in Diane’s absence? Or Barbara (haha) or someone else we haven’t met? There is a very real possibility that Liz and another woman could run the firm and Diane would still be unhappy about it. Diane doesn’t ask Liz for a commitment that if she does step aside, her replacement would be female (idk if it’s legal to make this commitment but you get my point). Diane acts like asking her to step aside is already a betrayal of the female led firm.  

“And I hope that it will be,” Liz says, basically hinting to Diane that there are women in the world besides her.  

“But black women?” Diane says, agitatedly. “Diane, I... am not voting against you. I promised you that I wouldn’t. But there is growing anger here. They want to address it at the next partners' meeting. So just think about it,” Liz responds.

I think Liz is totally fair and forthcoming in this scene and strikes pretty much the right tone for this initial conversation. She gives Diane a choice and is honest with her.  

“You’re a good person,” Liz adds. Diane does a double-take, understanding that Liz is actually telling her “You are a good person, so you know that you absolutely need to step aside.”  

“No, I’m not!” Diane responds. As I said: Diane already knows what she is going to do. She needs to do mental gymnastics to excuse her actions, but her mind was made up before the question was even raised. (She did warn Liz in 5x01 she was going to fight any attempt to push her out.)

“Yes, you are,” Liz says again. She may as well be saying, “No, don’t try this. Everyone will think you’re in the wrong if you push this.”

Later, at home, Diane is doing some stretches on the floor and groaning. I don’t know if this scene is meant to show her age, but it does remind me that Diane is nearly 70 and started off this show by planning to retire. Retirement doesn’t seem to be an option for her here. (That’s fine by me; she is a workaholic whose career is her life.)

Kurt asks Diane what she wants to do. She says she wants to keep her name on the letterhead and “keep what I fought for.” Heh, I was just re-reading something I wrote about Cary a while ago and I’d pointed out that when Alicia and Cary discuss merging with what’s left of LG, Cary is also concerned about his name on the letterhead because even though he wants to change the world, he also cares about having power. It’s almost like Diane and Cary are really similar characters! (They are! That’s why the Diane/Cary moment in Hitting the Fan is so good!)  

Diane calls her position as name partner a fight against “gender and then age discrimination.” She isn’t wrong, especially when you consider how meaningful it likely was when she and Stern went into business together. It’s very easy for me to forget that when Diane has such an attachment to fighting for white women’s rights, it’s not just because she’s out of touch and selfish: it’s because that was something she personally had to fight for. That doesn’t make it okay that she seems to forget the concept of intersectionality (which she’s definitely aware of) the second anything challenges her own power, but it does explain why a firm run by women is so important to her.

Diane is not wrong that she deserves name partnership and she’s not wrong to not want to step aside. Yet, starting a war to retain her position as name partner is a CHOICE. The best thing for Diane to do here (morally, I mean) would be for her to step aside and throw her resources behind the firm’s new leadership, using her experiences and stature to benefit the firm (this would also be a way for her to cement her legacy and mentor a new generation of leaders). The best compromise, I think, would be for someone to leave the current firm—either Diane or the dissenting partners, probably Diane since Liz seems to agree with Madeline—without any hard feelings. The worst possible choice is for Diane to insist that this firm is hers and force every single tension at the firm to come to a head, screwing over Liz in the process and potentially permanently ruining the firm’s status as a black firm. Sooo... yeah.  

(I say it could ruin the firm’s status as a black firm because if Diane’s a white partner who happens to be there and the firm is mostly black, that’s one thing. If Diane is a white partner who fought all of the black partners to assert her own dominance over their firm... that’s hard to come back from. She can’t really call herself an ally, can she?)  

“Diane, this is the first time I’ve ever heard you sound defeated,” Kurt says. “Because I can’t win this,” she says. She insists she can’t even after Kurt tries to cheer her on (of course he does, he probably thinks having an all black firm is just identity politics and therefore worthless).

“You just don’t want to,” Kurt says. He is not wrong. This is a winnable fight for Diane. Liz is smart but Diane has the experience, the clients, the power, and her own reputation to use in this fight. Liz has her dad’s name (and I don’t think it would come to this, but Diane knows how she can pretty easily destroy Liz’s dad’s reputation). (Liz is great, don’t get me wrong. Liz is also someone who happened into a name partnership because her dad was important.)  

“It’s bigger than that. To fight this would go against every fiber of my being,” Diane says. “Every fiber in your being is about winning,” Kurt counters. Oh, damn. That’s a succinct way of putting it. He is completely right. Diane would love to think that every fiber of her being is about her commitment to social justice and women’s rights. It is not. If that were the case, would she really be a lawyer with clients like ChumHum, Bishop, Sweeney, Rivi, and Wolfe-Colman? We all know the answer to this. We all know Diane likes social justice a lot but winning, wealth, and power far more.

When I first watched TGW, now nearly a decade ago, I was a high schooler and my media diet mostly consisted of Desperate Housewives and a bunch of procedurals like Bones and Castle. The thing that hooked me about TGW—more than Alicia’s journey, more than anything—was that TGW never had easy answers to anything. Will tells Diane in 1x07 that “nothing here is pure and nothing here is simple” and that basically blew my mind. TGW always made it obvious that Will was morally gray, which fascinated me. But I struggled with Diane. Here was this woman who looked like she should be someone so impressive and inspirational I could write a college admissions essay about her (I did not, but that was my frame of reference at the time)… but the decisions she made... never seemed all that great?? I couldn’t comprehend it.  

When Blue Ribbon Panel aired in March 2012, I wrote to a friend, “Diane confused me a little bit tonight. She didn’t approve of Alicia standing up to the panel, and yet, she’s supposed to care about people, the truth, morality, etc etc. I never understand Diane’s motivations– is her philosophy to help others whenever it wouldn’t hurt her, personally, to do so?”  

At that point, Diane compromising her values struck me as something confusing because I wanted to think of her as a powerful role model and icon, and I didn’t know what to do with someone who looked like and often was role model material who also sometimes betrayed her values for her own self-interest. I had my analysis of Diane down: she her motivations ARE to help others whenever it wouldn’t hurt her, personally, to do so. All I needed to do was remove my question mark from the end of that thought.  

I promise I’ll move on from quoting myself, but I also want to share a paragraph I wrote about Diane in March 2014 (during season five of Wife) because it says what I want to say now as well as anything I could write today:

Diane is driven and ambitious. Her initial actions can come as the result of intense emotions, but given enough time and space, Diane will always be strategic and pragmatic when it comes to business. She’s spent her entire life putting her career first, and she wouldn’t have it any other way. That she found love is just icing.  Kurt aside, the two most important things to Diane are advancing her own self-interest and doing good in the world. These objectives appear to be a contradiction, and often, they are. Nine times out of ten, when it comes down to it, she’ll choose herself. I mean no judgment here: another central aspect of Diane’s character is that she’s upfront about her choices and stands by them, and this sort of moral ambiguity makes for a great character.  

The reason I quote myself here is not to be like, ha ha, I was right. It's because I think this episode is even more powerful because I can copy/paste in stuff I wrote nine years ago or seven years ago (oh god, 2014 was seven years ago?) verbatim and it can hold up as analysis. Both Fight and Wife have always implied Diane’s selfish side and given more than enough evidence to make a convincing argument about it, but they’ve never really engaged with it directly (and if you ask the social media teams for either show, Diane is a #queen who can never do wrong). This episode interrogates something that’s always been an unpleasant part of Diane’s character, and I’m so fucking glad about it.  

(I don’t think anyone’s accusing Diane of not growing as a person but it crossed my mind that this could be seen as lack of growth. I don’t think it is. I wouldn’t expect Diane to change. Her life and career are so set that growth on this without a LOT of struggle on her part would feel like a cop out.)  

Another reason I quote myself is to highlight how friggin’ character driven this episode is. I’ve seen a lot of people saying this episode felt like old-school TGW—and it absolutely does; that’s also how I felt—and I think that’s because it’s so character focused and meaty.  

But back to this scene. Kurt tells Diane that if she doesn’t try to win she should just give up entirely. Seems like bad advice.  

“Kurt, I appreciate the pep talk, but I don’t think the way you think. I cannot put my interests above a whole group of people—black people—just so I can keep my position.” Sure you can, Diane. You just don’t like to believe that about yourself. You know how Diane says to Kurt earlier that she knows the NRA will offer him the job? That is how I feel about this scene. The writers go to great lengths to explain where Diane’s head is at when she decides to fight for her partnership, but they’d have needed to do ten times more to get me to believe Diane would step aside voluntarily.  

Kurt basically thinks that Diane should fight because if her competition is actually talented enough to deserve name partnership, they should fight her for it. He’s missing the point here.  

“But a black person’s talent has always been valued less than mine,” Diane counters. The fact she knows and understands this makes her decision even less forgivable.  

Kurt knows he’s going to lose this argument and tries the same strategy he did on 5x01: telling Diane she’s right and should just give up and leave the firm. Diane doesn’t like that answer either.  

Given how much I loathed Jay’s hallucinations, I was expecting that when Diane asks Kurt in the middle of the night if he believes the election was stolen and then sits down at her fireplace to have a chat with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, I’d loathe what happened next. I did not! I actually really liked it!  

I think this is more effective than Jay’s hallucinations, at least for me, because it's less gimmicky. It isn’t played for humor or quirk, and it gets to the character-driven point a LOT faster. This feels more similar to Alicia imagining Gloria Steinem is telling her she’s good enough to be on the Supreme Court in 6x03 than it does to Jay’s hallucinations.  

I LOVE that Diane would dream that RBG would advise her on her work dilemma. Dream!RBG tells Diane that “any law firm would be insane to let you go.” (I don’t wanna spend too much time fighting dream logic, but I feel like the operative phrase here is ‘let you go’. Are the RL partners seeing this as letting Diane go? Or are they just trying to get at a different goal and Diane is in the way, and they don’t really care if Diane has top connections or billable hours? It’s almost like the other RL partners want a firm that stands for something and all Diane has stood for thus far at the firm is profit...)  

Diane pushes back on RBG and RBG shares her “real” thoughts. This is where this sequence clicks into place for me, because it’s working on a LOT of levels. Obviously, Diane is going to imagine that her hero tells her to do exactly what she wants to do (the aforementioned mental gymnastics). But without losing the level on which this is dream!RBG and filtered through Diane’s POV, the writers are also... criticizing RBG for not stepping down herself!? It’s fascinating and pointed and makes her the exact right choice to play Diane’s conscience.  

Dream!RBG shares her life story and notes how she was always asked to step aside, but she didn’t and that’s how she got to be RBG. “Don’t step aside because someone wants you to. Don’t step aside for politics. Men are always asking women to step aside so a man can go first,” RBG advises Diane. Even Diane knows that this isn’t exactly equal to her current situation-- “Even though I’m being asked to step aside so that a black person can take my place?” she counters.  

So RBG asks if Diane can still do something “for women” if she says. Diane says yes, and RBG says Diane should do that instead of stepping aside—she should do whatever it takes. That’s the wrong takeaway, Diane! If you want to do something for women then a) you could do something for the black women at your firm lol or b) you could politely remove yourself from the firm, encourage your most profitable clients to stay on if they are wanted by the other partners or and/or c) you could choose to bring your talent and your stature to a non-profit. But, of course, these options aren’t on the table. There’s a reason the options are leave and lose everything or stay and fight for name partnership, and it’s that Diane cares about maintaining control of what she sees as hers and winning more than she cares about anything else, including or even especially her desire to help women.

And also what women is she even helping at RL? Herself? She’s certainly not helping Wolfe-Coleman's rape victim. The closest she’s recently come to helping women is when she told off Weinstein’s lawyer and tried to start #MeToo... in a DREAM.  

The score for the next sequence sounds so familiar and I can’t place it. At first, I thought it was Hitting the Fan, but I’m not sure if that’s the right reference (also, damn, the Hitting the Fan score is REALLY GOOD!). I think it might be similar to 5x14 when Alicia’s pacing back and forth in the hotel room.  

Anyway, Diane starts meeting with her (white, male) clients to tell them about how she’s stepping aside. She hasn’t run this past any of the other partners, of course. She’s doing exactly what they want, in the most malicious and calculated way possible.

One of her clients is a fracking client who wants to win over democrats by being a RL client.  

Diane is so sneaky here! No one said that if Diane steps aside as partner she can’t handle the day to day on her cases... yet that’s what Diane tells this client since she knows it’ll make him mad!  

Diane makes a point of showing her fracking client that his new representation will be Madeline. He doesn’t know anything about Madeline, and, as Diane was likely counting on, he isn’t confident in having a black woman he’s less “comfortable” with on his cases. I don’t know if Diane was going for the racial element here, but... if you’re really concerned about continuity, you don’t have this meeting without having Madeline ready to jump in and show she’s read up on the client. I’m sure it’s possible that Diane meant nothing in giving this client only Madeline’s name, title, gender, and race to go off of, but is that likely?  

She hands another (white, male) client off to Julius, whom she describes as a “very competent lawyer.” What an introduction. She says she’s not retiring and the firm “just wants to let some other people step forward into a name partner position.” Diane knows how to sell clients on changes they won’t like. She knows this isn’t how you do it.  

That phrase, “comfortable with you” is doing a lot of work, no? Both clients so far have said it, and while it might not be racially coded... it’s racially coded.  

“Who should we call about it?” the clients ask. Diane can barely keep herself from smiling.

They call David Lee, immediately. He takes the call in the middle of a meeting, while someone else is talking—he is David Lee, after all.

The information on the screen in David’s meeting is quite interesting. It’s about STRL’s plans for RL. Here’s how the firm is described: “RL is a high-end mid-sized Chicago law firm that can consolidate its specialized brand within the American POC community and expand its national and global brand with STR Laure.” Soooo... yeah. For the corporate overloards, RL needs it to be just black enough that it appears like a black firm, but they care more about appearances and branding than anything of substance. (Notice how it says “POC” and not black? Notice how there’s this mention of national and global presence that doesn’t seem to be on the RL partners’ mind?)  

There’s an area called room for growth, listing top clients—entertainment law, fracking, the DNC, and civil cases against CPD. Interestingly, two of these are Liz’s clients (entertainment and DNC), one is Adrian’s (civil cases against CPD), and only fracking is Diane’s... so maybe I didn’t give Liz enough credit earlier.  

There’s also a plan of action that includes partners working with STRL and the 15-20% layoffs we already know about. I don’t think this text is meant to include any new info, but I assume one of the writers had a hand in writing it and it’s a good way of confirming things that had been subtext.

Wackner’s reality show looks... well, like his court, because his court always looked like a reality show. Cutting together the most out-there moments (audience reaction cards, Wackner singing “Come on defense!”, Wackner renaming himself Judge Shmuley for a day) makes Wackner look pretty bad.

Hey Liz, I thought you figured out how to silence your notifications for Dawnk permanently. (It’s not all high-stakes controversy over on the “R&L General” channel—the anon animals are now discussing a broken coffee maker.) (Though even this discussion is a bit political! Anon Owl says they bet STR’s coffee machine works, and Anon Dolphin wants to know why they don’t have more coffee maters at RL.)  

There’s also a dance party—which Marissa participates in—in the footage of Wackner.  

Hey, wouldn’t Marissa have reported the cameras to Diane and Liz? I feel like she’d know they’d want to know.  

Wackner ends up on the stand to offer context for the strange-looking clips. In a smart move, Liz offers to just let Judge Farley ask questions—she knows that’s what Farley is really after.

Unsurprisingly, Wackner’s context makes his outrageous practices seem much more reasonable. There’s a scoreboard to keep lawyers aware of where they’re standing so they can gauge instead of guess at Wackner’s thought process. Shmuley is to honor a recently deceased relative. The costumes are to prevent bias and cut down entitlement.  

Plaintiff’s counsel argues that Wackner is biased and the case continues even though Wackner’s (mostly) won over Farley.  

The case next turns to something about copyright law that sounds downright silly—the point is to underline that Wackner’s court makes more sense than real court on some things. It makes more common sense and it’s less racist.  

Del gets called into court. It’s interesting how these scenes are blocked together rather than spread out. The same is true of Diane’s scenes—after credits, we have Diane and Liz at the bar, Diane at home, Diane talking to RBG, Diane making moves, and then David Lee becoming aware of the situation. Then we have several consecutive court scenes (all of which feel like they have natural break points) of Wackner stuff. If I had to guess, I would guess that it’s to keep the momentum going. The Diane stuff plays better when it feels like a continuous chain rather than a subplot.  

(The only thing that suffers is that I have no idea why there’s a court scene about copyright law right after the plaintiff argues they have evidence about Wackner’s bias? I probably wouldn’t have even noticed if the scenes had been spread out more.)  

Now Cord’s involvement with Wackner’s court becomes an issue. It’s funny they need a witness to bring up Cord when Cord is SITTING IN THE COURT ROOM.  

Apparently Cord is financing a company that would compete with the plaintiff’s company and this means Wackner is biased. As the next scene will explain, Cord wasn’t even aware of his investment in the rival company, and Wackner certainly wasn’t. But, regardless, it’s going to be challenging to prove that neither Wackner nor Cord knew about the investment, and the opposition is going to go after Cord’s financial records, which no one wants. Liz suggests a continuance, which would give Wackner about a year to keep working on his court before they have to come back to this issue.  

Wackner HATES the idea of delays and is all, THIS IS WHY I HAVE MY OWN COURT and again, he isn’t wrong.  

David Lee needs to see Liz, now. Liz and Diane meet in David Lee’s office and stare at their phones. Diane says she has no idea what the meeting is about, even though she basically set up the meeting herself.  

“What the fuck is going on?” David Lee says. Diane feigns surprise and asks for more specifics. David Lee reveals that four top clients have called with issues about their representation shifting.  

Liz knows what’s going on and aggressively says, “Diane, thoughts?” “Nothing from me. I met with my clients. I just told them of a restructuring that I was being told about,” Diane says like it’s no big deal. Liz and Diane both know that Diane forced this meeting.

“Is this a power play on your part?” Liz asks Diane. “No, it’s just updating my clients,” Diane says for David Lee’s benefit or commitment to the bit or something. It is definitely a power play, and a nearly unforgivable one done to an ally.  

“David, Diane was told about frustration at the partner level about a white woman being a name partner in a black firm. And apparently, this is her response,” Liz explains. “I just told our clients what was going on,” Diane defends. David Lee doesn’t really care about what happened: he cares about one thing, and that thing is money.  

“Diane’s a fucking name partner until STR Laurie says she’s not. No one decides until I decide. Now stick your race war back in its bottle,” David Lee says. I mean, basically, yeah, that’s what happens when you merge with a huge firm that only cares about profit.  

I like that this ends up coming back to STRL. You can’t really have a conversation about RL’s identity without also acknowledging that RL is not independently owned. Sure, STRL will care at some point if RL loses its clout with the black community—but like most companies, they care about guaranteed loss of profit and the short term more than long-term what-ifs. It may sound cynical, but if Madeline and all of the other partners quit, STRL would simply put all their effort into keeping Liz or even just the Reddick name and would then hire black lawyers who think more like Julius than Madeline to keep the reputation. STRL does not give a shit about helping anyone, and that’s what Diane counts on.  

I do not believe the version of RL that Madeline wants can exist when they’re under STRL’s control. I believe the version Diane wants (not really a black firm) can, and I believe the version Liz seems to want (one that’s mostly black and occasionally social justice focused) can, but this issue won’t go away until STRL does.  

Sure, Diane, keep telling yourself you’re fighting the good fight out here.  

(Perhaps “The Good Fight” is a more ironic and fraught title than it originally seemed.)  

“That was a mistake. I am on your side, and you don’t even realize it,” Liz tells Diane afterwards. Interesting that Liz says “I am” and not “I was.” I would love to know what Liz really thinks about this situation and hope we get more from her POV next week. I think Liz wants to run a black firm, but I also think she wants to run a successful firm and likes working with Diane. Liz is on Diane’s side about as much as she can be while still advocating for Diane to step down.  

Pissing off Liz is a very interesting move for Diane here, too. Diane wants to fight the one person who is on her side for control of a firm that doesn’t want her there, and she’s convinced herself this is the smart move! Kind of wild. What does Diane think the day to day will look like? I think I said this above, but in forcing this war, Diane is all but guaranteeing that if she wins, RL will only be a black firm in that STRL will say it’s one to make more money.

Julius and Diane chat next. Julius says he wants to start his own firm—with Diane. Her only reaction is laughter, but, like, this is probably happening. I’m not sure why she laughs. It’s not quite a case of unfortunate timing (Diane could’ve done this before she blew things up, and it’s not quite too late for Diane to commit to leaving and smooth things over with Liz), so maybe it’s just a “well, this sounds familiar!” laugh.  

(If you think of Previously On as 5x00 instead of 5x01, that would make this episode 5x05, which would make this a Hitting the Fan callback. I can also do mental gymnastics!)  

The episode could end there, but it doesn’t. We’ve still got a Wackner plot to resolve. Cord has some people beat up the plaintiff as a way of enforcing Wackner’s verdict and getting the real court case to go away. Marissa picks up on what’s happened faster than Wackner does, unless Wackner just doesn’t care.  

It’s subtle, but throughout this episode, there’s a little bit of a trend towards Marissa becoming more skeptical of Wackner. She tries to keep him under control in court, tries to reason with him about the continuance, and in this scene, she just looks entirely displeased and alarmed every time she’s on camera.  

We get another scene with RBG. “It’s different for me than it was for you,” Diane says. She notes that unlike RBG, she herself is up against another “dominated culture.” This other dominated culture is “black lawyers.” (I’m sorry, I just find the way she says “black lawyers” funny, partially because she says “lawyers” instead of people and partially because Diane seems insistent on only occasionally remembering that Liz is both black and female.)  

I can’t tell if this scene was originally intended to close the episode or not. The blocks of scenes, the way the episode seems like it should’ve ended with Julius’s laugh but instead has three more scenes (guy getting beat up, Wackner’s court, this one), and the fact the Kings said this episode had to be almost totally rethought because both Christine and Audra had concerns about the original script all suggest to me that maybe some of the scenes in this episode got shuffled around to keep momentum and hit the right notes at the right time.  

Diane acknowledges that RBG could’ve stepped down and we wouldn’t have a conservative majority on the court now if she had. RBG insists that she wouldn’t have stepped aside even if Obama had guaranteed that her replacement would be black. She says it’s because she only knows what she can do—not what others would do. And “what you know is always better than what might happen.”  

Even if this was originally supposed to happen earlier (Diane saying she doesn’t know what to do makes me feel like it way), I like that we get to see it’s still weighing on Diane after the fact.  

(Also, I have seen some comments about, for lack of a better phrase, the girl power energy of these Diane and RBG scenes. No! These scenes aren’t a tribute to RBG! She’s in these scenes because she didn’t step down and can thus help Diane excuse her own actions! These scenes aren’t exactly anti-RBG, but they are certainly critical of some of her choices!)  

The topic shifts to Diane and Kurt’s relationship (another reason to put this somewhere other than the main part of the episode; this would slow down the momentum of the middle part of the episode) and its similarity to RBG’s friendship with Scalia.  

Tbh, I don’t think a friendship and a marriage are all that similar on this front and I’d be curious to see Diane think about RBG/Scalia in the context of her potential partnership with Julius rather than her marriage.

RBG basically tells Diane to stay with Kurt. Diane thanks her, and then, back in reality, tells Kurt to take the NRA job so he’ll be happy—and then she’ll just sue him. Okay, that feels like an episode ending, so I am REALLY curious about all the re-writing and re-structuring that happened in this episode and what did/didn’t get touched. I can’t make up my mind about what feels out of place.

So we start out with Diane feeling like it might be the right thing to explore whether or not it still makes sense for her to be with Kurt, a suspected insurrectionist and future NRA employee, and Diane feeling like she wants to help her friends and partners at her mostly black firm do good in the world. And we end with Diane doubling down on her relationship with Kurt, giving her blessing for the NRA job, and fucking over her colleagues because she wants to keep her own power. Dark! I love it.  

This episode does this all without making Diane entirely unsympathetic, which is astounding. While I think Diane knowingly makes choices that further her self-interest over the values she (claims to?) hold and I am definitely NOT Team Diane on her decisions in this episode, this episode could easily have been less interesting and complex. It’s understandable that Diane would not want to step aside from a firm she’s helped build—who would? It’s understandable that Diane might not feel the passion for a black firm the way she does for a female firm. It’s understandable that Diane might not want to blow up her marriage, despite her political differences from Kurt. This episode allows Diane to be just sympathetic enough she never becomes a flat villain, but never sympathetic enough that someone could mistake this episode for one that shows Diane as a morally pure hero. Personally, I love that in a TV show. That’s the exact kind of writing that made me love Alicia Florrick enough that I still spend a considerable amount of time thinking about her character arc even though TGW ended half a decade ago. It’s what’s been missing from a lot of TGF episodes for me, and why I’ve said that TGF seems like a show more about theme than character. It’s why I’ve written—oh god, TEN THOUSAND words—about this episode.  

I have no clue what’s going to happen next, but I hope it includes more character-driven drama (ideally with a lot of good material for Liz) and not a lot of firm-jumping shenanigans.  

[mrscarmenbearzatto]

promise me? | carmen berzatto

rating: | cw: mentions of mikey’s death/funeral, a few timeskips, afab/fem!reader, angst/fluff content, unfinished ending i guess (i’m so down to write a part two if yall ask for it tbh)

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request: “a more angsty idea would be that reader was dating Michael and no one knew she was pregnant when he died… so in order to avoid making their family sad/starting conflict, carmy agrees to pretend that they’re dating and it’s his kid? “

Since the funeral four months ago, your world had felt.. emptier.

Michael Berzatto was your everything. He was the boy in high school who threw rocks at your window, who climbed inside to make out with you on your bed until he fell asleep holding you close, only sneaking out to avoid your parents learning about his visits.

He was the guy who would make a big deal out of every small accomplishment. He was the person who you planned on spending the rest of your life with.

That was until everything happened. One phone call from the Chicago Police Department, and your entire view of the future had been shifted. There was one less person in it.

You didn’t talk to his family much anymore. His younger brother, Carmen, was the only person you really kept in touch with. You called Sugar every so often, and you’d send Donna a check-in text every week or so.

You knew Carmy was in New York, and he hadn’t come to the funeral. You weren’t expecting to see him again until he showed up on your doorstep.

The one thing he wasn’t expecting? You to open the door, tears in your eyes and a pregnancy test in your clenched hand.

“Hey, are you okay?” is the first thing Carmen says. He wraps his arms around you, trying to soothe you in anyway he can. A slight head shake from you and you taking a step back, holding the test out for him to see.

“I’m pregnant. The one person I should be able to tell.. isn’t fucking here.” Your soft voice breaks his heart. It’s the rush of realization that comes first.

The fact that, you’re pregnant with Mikey’s baby.

And Mikey is dead.

“Y/N, we can.. we’ll figure this out.” He promises in a whisper, and you shake your head, more tears streaming. “How?! How am I supposed to do this by myself?” You ask, and you fall into Carmen’s arms, crying on his shoulder. He could care less about the tear stains on his white tee.

If Mikey were here, if there was a way to talk to his dead brother right now, he know what he’d say: “take care of her. Take care of my baby for me.”

“You aren’t alone. You have me.” He swears.

It’s what his brother would want.

“Promise me?” You request quietly. And he nods, rubbing your back in soothing circles.

“I promise.” He repeats.

──

You knew bringing up the pregnancy to Mikey’s family would be.. rough. Sugar and Donna would be upset, with Donna resenting every choice you make.

It would be chaos. So, you kept it a secret, which was harder than it seemed.

You and Carmen had it planned out. To start “dating” two months later, and lie about the timeline of your pregnancy. No one had to know other than you two.

You and Carmen announced your pregnancy to the Berzatto clan three months later, seven months after Mikey died. All of it felt rushed and you found yourself having to force yourself to slow down.

Thankfully, though, Carmen was by your side through it all. Moving in with you and helping set up the nursery, which you made sure to send photos of to Natalie and Donna.

You were there for him when he took over the Beef. It was a while before you found the strength to go back there again, reminiscing on the times you spent in there with Mikey. Him flirting with you as you volunteered your time behind the counter.

Once you had, you found yourself in the same spot you were nearly a year ago. Laughing with Tina and Marcus, threatning jerks with Richie. Even making friends with the new chef, Sydney.

Carmen thought it was good for you. He found himself smiling in the back office as he heard your familiar, light laughter and calming voice.

“You were deeply missed!” Marcus says as he hugs you while you laugh. “So, how’s pregnancy going?” Tina asks as you sigh. “It is a bitch sometimes. But this little one will be worth it.”

“Can I just say.. thank you for bringing a smile to my brother’s face. Seriously. He hasn’t been this happy in a while.” Natalie says as you nod. “It isn’t just me. You guys play a huge part in that.”

“Yeah kid but none of us are having his baby.” Marcus points out. “I should hope not.” You reply, and that’s when the kitchen fills with laughter.

It felt like you were at home again. Carmen wasn’t the only one smiling again.

──

You stood in the nursery, your bump larger. It felt surreal to believe how far you’d come.

You were in your third trimester, 38 weeks pregnant. The nursery looked gorgeous, with a shelf close to the door holding photos from the maternity photoshoot you and Carmen did as well as sonograms pictures.

You wanted to memorialize Mikey in the room as well. A frame sits on the shelf near the sonogram, containing a photo of Natalie, Carmen and Mikey as kids.

You run a hand over Mikey’s spot in the photo, shaking your head and setting it on the shelf. “I remember the day that photo was taken. Mike hated that shirt. That was the only good photo that our mom decided to keep.” Natalie says, entering the room with a glass of water for you.

You accept it, only to nearly drop the glass when a tightening in your stomach forms. It’s at that moment you realize - your water broke, you’re having contractions and.. you’re in labor.

It’s a frenzy from there. Everything feels like it’s moving in slow motion. You waddling-running out to the car, Natalie following behind with the bags while you begin calling Carmen’s phone repeatedly. Time feels like it’s slowed.

It isn’t until you’re at Chicago Medical and being wheeled down the hallway to your labor and delivery room that you realize two things:

1. You’re actually having this baby.

2. Mikey won’t be here to see it.

Some part of you, the part that hasn’t been hitten by the grief yet and the same part that won’t accept he’s gone, is now being hit with the grief. The realization he won’t just come into the room and come back into the room or your life again. It doesn’t rush over you, it drowns you instead.

Maybe it was just the pregnancy excitement and rush. Things hadn’t felt real since the funeral and now? Now they were forcing themselves to be accepted. Forcing you to realize that this is occuring.

It isn’t until you’re alone in the room that you allow the tears to break free. Your vision feels blurred as your heart aches for a man whose gone. One who isn’t here anymore and you can’t change that.

The sight that Carmy finds in the hospital room hurts his heart. It’s quiet, the beeping of monitors that are keeping an eye on your vitals, the baby’s vitals, contractions is the only noise filling the room. You’re seated upright, your eyes exhausted.

“Hi. How are you?” He asks softly as he walks over. He hesitantely puts a hand on your face to brush some of the hair away, and you allow it. You sigh, your face relaxing when he cradles your face like you’re the most precious thing.

“It hit me.” You say softly. “I let myself grieve for a week before his funeral, and then at least three afterward. And then I found out I was pregnant and I bottled it up because I couldn’t do it anymore. And now it hit me again. That I’m having his baby and he’s not going to get to meet him, or her.” Your fists clench at the anger of it.

There are five known stages of grief. Denial, anger, barganing, depression and acceptance. You were on the second stage: anger.

There’s nothing Carmen can say. No words to make it all better, he knows that from his own experience and people trying with him. So, instead, he stays quiet and he lets you get it out.

You exhale, laying back with his help as he props a pillow for you. “Thank you for being here.” You say softly as he takes your hand in his, entertwining your fingers. “I made a promise to be here with you through all of this.”

He intends to keep that promise.

──

‘Roan Michael Berzatto’. Eight pounds, six ounces. Born at 11:37 AM.

Most of the labor process felt like a blur. You remember crying, a lot, and Carmen holding your hand and letting you squeeze while you push, doctors and nurses overlapping each other as they speak to you. Sweat pooling on your forehead as a nurse wiped it away.

Roan looks like Mikey. He has his eyes, his nose, even the same small smile when he sleeps. It’s faint, but it’s there.

His entire hand wraps around Carmen’s pinky while he holds him. There’s a warm aura in the room, the sunlight filling the room perfectly.

You sit, watching them. Carmy walks over and sits beside you on the bed while he puts your son on his legs, as you look down at him. “He really does look like Mike.” You say softly, and Carmen laughs.

There’s a quiet in the air before he speaks again. “I love you.” He says softly. “I know maybe this isn’t the right time to tell you that, but I had to. We agreed to tell everyone this is our son and I want to keep that up, but I want more for us. I want you and I to.. be something more.”

You don’t say anything more, instead you lean over and press your lips against his, letting yourself embrace him. To take in what it feels like to kiss him, be this close to him.

Your world was suddenly full again.

[yuraimi-lee-bunny]

Gray’s Character Analysis Part II. Empathy vs Ambition

Hello! Sorry if it took me a while to show the next part of my Gray’s analysis, but this part was a bit difficult for me especially in what order I should give it. You'll see what I mean as soon as you read. This part is going to be a little longer than the previous one and will explain some issues not only about Gray, but also about Carmen and VILE in general.

Thank you very much for the support of the previous analysis and I hope you like this too! Here we go!

As we already know, Gray is an orphan. And yes, it’s important to understand certain behaviors and ways of thinking about him. First, I want to explain a small detail of Black Sheep/Carmen so that Gray's decisions are understood in greater depth once he’s in VILE and his ease of trying to go far (and even the position of almost all VILE agents would also be understood usually)

Why does Carmen think and feel different compared to all VILE and especially Gray?

Simple: Empathy.

Now, it doesn't mean that Carmen is the only one who has empathy and others don't. Rather, Carmen's level of empathy is greater, deeper and broader. What caused it? Living in VILE was the first.

Yes, surprisingly it was that, VILE created her own "enemy" since they decided to give her a home on the former Island of VILE when she was a pretty baby. From the first episode, Carmen relates how stealing was a game for her and VILE Faculty was like her family in some way, especially Coach Brunt because her relationship was "mother/daughter." The other members of the faculty treated her well, they taught her the culture of thier countries and around the world, they gave her food and clothing, a large home, basic education and also living with many VILE students. But Black Sheep only knew the "basics" about VILE, because she lived with the belief that they only taught to steal all over the world, just a "the game of cat and mouse" but it didn't harm anyone, or so she believed.

Another very important factor helped Black Sheep's empathy to expand: Player. That's right, our little favorite hacker was very influential on her. First, because he was the first person she met, empathized and talked about her life outside of VILE. Black Sheep always wanted to know the world outside the island, and Player was his first contact outside the world, and a white hat hacker, his abilities used for good. Black Sheep never saw that as something bad or like a "enemy". On the contrary, he was her friend and appreciated him very much.

Last important factor: The archaeologist's words:

Black Sheep, the one who didn’t know anything about her roots, about her family, thought about how she wouldn’t like someone or an entire country and it’s people to live the same as her: not to know a part of her life. These factors caused that Black Sheep's empathy was different from that of VILE and her agents.

The other agents, although we don’t know their lives completely, the fact that we know that they’re orphans is enough to give us a glimpse that their lives haven’t been easy. The reasons why one can be orphaned are many, which can lead to sad experiences, hard, full of pain, others not of course, but being an orphan is to carry a great mark on your life. And in the end one must survive and get what he needs by his own hands if you are alone. But maybe have a brother, have a life partner, in these cases a brother/sister, can change everything, because you no longer feel alone in life, and you can create a bond of empathy, like Zach and Ivy. Or maybe not, like Shadowsan and his brother.

Sorry if it seems that I'm moving away from Gray, but I need you to understand how the VILE agents don't have a great connection and their empathy is lower because they don't know (or perhaps they do and not having good consequences) about their roots. To experience rejection more than once and for years. Of not having had a "family" or person to help them connect with the world and thereby seek and understand other people. Perhaps most of them had to survive alone. Or they got together with people of bad influences as seen with Shadowsan. They didn't have or lived the points that I mentioned about Carmen, or maybe they did, and even so they wanted to steal for mere enjoyment and get money easily. Everything is possible.

The fact that the faculty recruits students over 16 (it seems that it's from the age of 20 or is an approximate) is a great plan because it's 20 years of a habit of only trusting you, seeing for you and stealing for you, there comes a point where you live it with more enjoyment/play than just "surviving". A "vocational school" will provide you with a home, food, appreciate you for your stealing skills, without being without any communication, living for a year on an island, with people who have in common being an orphan and stealing, feeding your enjoyment of theft , that the faculty helps you find and develop skills to achieve a successful robbery, continuing to see it as a game and now see it in a professional way, which will make you survive forever, generates the idea that “it's okay to do it ”And you do it together like a family.

Graham and Black Sheep understood each other very easily and enjoyed spending time together most of the time. Antonio, Jean Paul and Sheena also considered them his friends, but not as close as Black Sheep. They communicated just by looking at each other, they understood each other easily, and they covered their backs. How to forget when as long as they didn't expel Black Sheep, Graham lied to the Faculty. He reassured her as long as he trusted that he would pass the exam and graduate from her. He felt very bad to realized that they wouldn’t graduate together. Gray somehow began to develop an empathy for Black Sheep. In the book he mentions to Black Sheep in detention: 

“I know they say there is no loyalty between thieves, but we’re in this together right? I have always taken care of you”

Which shows that he appreciated her a lot, but being on the island and under their ideals, made him think that everything was to be in a “family”, everything was loyalty, he didn't realize it could be more than loyalty, but appreciation, the beginning of great empathy. He really knew her very well, her goals, her desire to be the best thief and always improve herself. He knew Black Sheep, but not the factors that would make her Carmen Sandiego.

The next thing I will say is more of a theory/assumption, not a fact: As I mentioned in the previous analysis, Gray is someone who wants to be successful, he's always going to prove it to himself and will give everything to achieve it. Being an orphan, perhaps he has affected him in some way, that at some point in his life he decided to just see for himself and show that he can be successful and that nothing would stop him. He's ambitious. But when he met Black Sheep, his empathy grew more, however, a “struggle” began within him between his ambition and his love for Black Sheep, a person outside his life, but who has lived with her so much that your appreciation is big. A fight, of which, throughout the whole series, Gray will never be aware, but with acts it is always demonstrated.

There is a sentence from him in the second episode that I always found very curious:

This is cute and talks about how much he appreciates Black Sheep to mention her well-being first.

"Criminal Career" Do you realize how much Crackle has thought about it? He doesn't see being in VILE as a game or something. He sees it as a "Career". Something tells me that if it were up to him, he would have set his sights on a position at the faculty. That he would be willing to do anything to achieve it.

At least as far as I'm concerned, Crackle wasn't going to kill the archaeologist because he's evil, or because he doesn't have absolute empathy, it's because he always tests himself to achieve his goals, for him, to start with his criminal career, was to abide by ALL the rules of VILE. He somehow affirms it:

Did he want to be successful? Did he want to have a great criminal career? He had to do EVERYTHING.

BUT!

His empathy reminder was there

and was still there

This, this expression says it all (This expression was the one that convinced me that Crackle wasn’t bad at all and from then on no one moved me from that belief). Deep down, Crackle wasn't so convinced of going that far either. Something in him, the empathy in him spoke and made him feel that such acts were too much for him. Carmen's words reached him. Deep down, he felt she was right. But what could he do? Although he listened to all of Carmen's story, even his ambition and all that year in VILE resonated more with him. Because he hasn’t lived experiences of strong empathy as Carmen already lived.

His goals are very big, he commits himself to them at any cost. But there is also still a place for her in his heart. Unfortunately, we don’t know in detail (or rather nothing) of how he reacted when Black Sheep managed to escape from VILE. But when he and Carmen Sandiego meet on the train, he asks so many questions because he doesn't understand what led her to do all this. As I said before: he didn’t know the factors that I mentioned at the beginning, and there was no time for them to talk about it. He no longer recognizes her, he only has his memories of Black Sheep and of course he misses her, but he doesn't understand that she is no longer Black Sheep, she is Carmen Sandiego:

He told her that because he believed that she was still thinking like Black Sheep, but no more.

I always liked this scene because it shows how Carmen is in the light and Gray is in the dark.

I can only say that he didn’t want to do it, he only did on VILE's orders, because of his ambition that he was almost going too far. But deep down he didn't want to, if only there was a proof… oh, yes there is, but this is not the time to move on to it ;D

In the end and as we know, Carmen defeats Crackle and she uses him to distract Devineaux. This is caught by the police, VILE saves him, and he "regrets" not having caught Carmen (he’s relieved that he had not killed her rather. Crackle NEVER wanted to.)

BUT

VILE can accept failures, but not be trapped by the Law.

So Crackle, since you've lived so many years for your goals and ambitions, let's see what happens to live as little as 18 months with just pure empathy.

It would be all with this part! Geez, I feel that I wrote a lot but it was necessary to tell all this! Believe me that doing this is making me better connect my ideas and understand better to Gray. I hope it’s also helping you, you like it and it makes you reflect. I want to know what they think and if they have any other points of view. I love talking about analysis with more people. The next part for sure will be shorter, but still very important, it’s the safest that if they have it in two days. Greetings!

Part. I Introdution

Part. II Empathy vs Ambition (HERE)

Part. III Amnesia and it’s Future Consequences

Part. III.5 Graham Calloway: The Walking Enigma

Part. IV Integrity At a high (and unfair) price

Part. V The final decision and a new beginning

Plus 1. Gray and his strange habit of explaining things

Plus 2. Crossover: Sabrina And Gray: New Beginning

Plus 3. Crossover: Hawk/Eli and Crackle/Gray: Redemption

[yespolkadotkitty]

Sunshine on a Cloudy Day

So at some point, @alwaysbethewest​ (thankyou for the beta read!) mentioned that our mutual friend @keeper0fthestars​  has a thing for wearing Marcus Pike’s shirt/people wearing his shirt. So, then after Mary and I screamed at each other for a bit, this happened. Marcus Pike/f!reader

lovely gif by @beccaplaying

Warnings: None. Well, shameless fluff, a tablespoon of angst.

Word count: 1700  

Your alarm sounded from the kitchen. T-minus two hours until Marcus came home.

Double-checking everything was still in place, you jumped in the shower, hoping that the love of your life wouldn’t be mad at you. Or worse, sad. Or even worse, disappointed.

You started to feel a bit sick.

But you’d started now. And you were reasonably confident of the outcome.

Two weeks ago, you’d come home early from a night out. Marcus and his old army buddy Zach were on the couch, finishing a pizza, ribbing each other. You‘d poked your head in to say hi, then started to brush your teeth in the bathroom, when you heard Zach and Marcus step into the hallway.

“I don’t know, man,” Marcus was saying, pitching his voice low. He didn’t realise you had the door ajar. “Can I do it a third time? I’d all but sworn off dating when I met her, and proposing… could seriously mess it up. I can’t risk it. She’s beyond. The best thing that ever happened to me.”

Zach replied with something unintelligible, then they exchanged pleasantries and you heard the door close, before Zach’s footfalls sounded on the stairs.

Now, you dried yourself off, thinking of that night.

No one should have to propose three times.

When you’d met Marcus, his eyes were so sad. That soulful brown didn’t warm when he smiled. His eyes didn’t quite crinkle at the edges. It wasn’t until you’d been dating a month that you saw him full-on smile when you arrived at his apartment, your arms full of flowers.

“What’s this?” he’d asked, perplexed.

You passed the bouquet of daisies to him, their sunny faces making you happier immediately. “I was thinking, what should I bring to dinner? Then I thought, women don’t buy men flowers. Why not? Everyone should have flowers.”

And he’d smiled. Full-on, gorgeous teeth, crinkly-eyed grin. And you’d already been falling in love with him, but at that moment you tumbled headlong over the cliff, without a single regret.

You hung your towel and moved to your wardrobe, then hesitated. Marcus loved seeing you in his clothes. In fact, he’d once said it was his favourite sight. He’d left a shirt at your apartment a couple months into your relationship and you’d forgotten to return it, wore it sometimes. You always ended up having fantastic sex when you wore it unbuttoned too low, tied at the waist.

You’d kept it because it smelled of him, and when you two finally moved in together, after many discussions, that white shirt with the faint blue-lined check still lived in your wardrobe.

You tugged it out now, slipped it on over your lace bra, buttoning it just enough that the edge of red lace could be seen. You pulled on low-slung jeans, knotted the shirt’s ends.

One hour to go.

You’d prepped dinner earlier - took the afternoon off so Marcus wouldn’t suspect. His favourite - pancakes with lashings of maple syrup and bacon. The pancakes sat in a stack on the stove ready to be warmed-up, the bacon ready to fry when the timer got closer to when he’d be coming through the door.

After fixing your make-up and spraying on your favourite perfume, you set some music playing - Marcus always said it’s impossible to go wrong with Otis Redding, and as usual, he was infuriatingly right - and just as you wondered if you’d forgotten something, his key sounded in the lock.

Shit, the ring!

You dove for the bedroom, snagged the box from the very, very bottom of your underwear drawer and stuffed it into one of your pockets.

“Hey, sweetheart, I-” Marcus stopped in the doorway, his brow furrowed. “I smell pancakes…?”

He looked good. He sometimes took his tie off on the way home, and this was one of those days, his collar popped two buttons, his jacket loose.

The beard he’d grown for undercover work shortly after the Teresa debacle still hugged his face, scruffy-neat. You’d convinced him to keep it. It made him sexier, emphasized his fantastic jawline and bone structure, and besides, you loved the feel of that scruff on your skin, under your hands.

You walked over to greet him, saw his gaze dip down to his shirt, watched his lips curve slowly, those chocolate eyes warming up. “Well. Seems like I might be in for a treat.”

He tugged you close, filling his hands with your ass, pressing into you, and you lifted your face for his kiss, opening when his tongue traced your smile. He made a low hmmm in his throat and you vowed not to get distracted.

“Sit, baby,” you encouraged.

“But… this shirt.” He nibbled at your pulse point, traced a finger down the open neck of his button-down.

“Sit. Let me spoil you.”

Narrowing his eyes, Marcus let you go, then tossed his keys in the pot by the kitchen door. “And Otis Redding? Is there… something I should know? Is it my birthday? ‘Cause I’m willing to change it to today for this.”

You smiled, chucked the bacon in the skillet. “There’re two beers in the fridge.”

He shrugged his jacket off, hung it on the kitchen chair as was his habit, then pulled the door open. “My favourite kind. Sweetheart…”

“Sit,” you dictated.

Marcus winged a brow up. “Mmmmm. I like a woman who knows what she wants.”

Otis crooned Try a Little Tenderness as the smell of bacon filled the kitchen, rich and pleasantly greasy.

“How was your day?” Marcus asked, cracking open both beers and placing one at your elbow. He rounded the counter, sat at the table. You were momentarily distracted by the sight of him tipping his head back slightly to drink, exposing the very biteable line of his neck, and the pan spat hot grease on to the curve of your breast, naked above the low lace bra.

“Shit!” You shut the heat off, crumpling to the floor, your hands on your inflamed skin. “Should’ve got an apron,” you groused, more to yourself than to him.

“Whoa!” Marcus rushed over, bending down to assess the damage, his whiskey-gold gaze roaming over you, cataloguing every detail. He stood to grab a cloth from the kitchen cupboard, ran it under cold water, pressed it to the curve of your breast. “Better, sweetheart?”

“Much better.”

His eyes roamed over your face. Always thinking of you, your Marcus. Always caring, never putting himself first. So you had to put him first.

When he stood, saying, “I’ll get a bandaid,” you had a sudden idea. As he turned, you snagged his hand, knelt up.

“Marcus Matthew Pike.”

He froze, then very slowly, turned to face you. The look on his face was deadly sombre, like he was waiting for the axe to fall. You squeezed his hand.

“I think I have loved you since the day we met. I love your smile. Your kindness. Your ability to see the good in everything. Some of that was taken from you, but you’re still the guy who sings in the shower-”

Marcus winced. “Off-key.”

“Don’t interrupt my proposal. You’re the guy who looks forward to a rainbow rather than complaining about the rain, the guy who saves stolen art and learns the story behind the piece, and tells it again and again, so the artists live forever. That’s a man I want in my life forever. Marcus, will you marry me?” You dug the box from your pocket and popped it one-handed, revealing a slim, simple platinum band nestling in soft leather.

“Sweetheart…”

You held your breath,

Marcus knelt to face you, cupping your cheek. “I was working up to it. I swear I was.”

You shook your head. “No one should have to propose three times.”

He bent and touched his forehead to yours, sighing, his eyes warm, soft, crinkled at the corners. “I love you. So much. I love waking up next to you. I love it when you fall asleep on me during old movies. I love that you’ve made me happier than I ever thought I’d be. So yeah. Yes, please, I would very much like to marry you.”

You held his hand, slipped the ring on. It fit perfectly. The way Marcus fit inside your heart, taking up all the available space, his edges lining up with yours.

“I know guys don’t usually have rings, but-”

“I love it. I love you. I love that you did this.” He tugged you in for a warm, soft kiss, then overbalanced, pulling you with him, and you sprawled together on the kitchen floor, laughing together.

Eventually you remembered the bacon, drizzling it with maple syrup in the pan and tearing off bits of pancake to dip in the sticky mixture, feeding each other as Otis Redding serenaded you, and it was perfection.

Much, much later, Marcus showed you how much he loved his shirt on you. But how much more he liked it on the bedroom floor.

Pedro Pals, assemble! @gamingaquarius​ @a-seeker-of-imagination​ @knittingqueen13​​ @alldatalost​ @dornish-queen​ @lackofhonor​ @songsformonkeys​ @pascalitomarcuspike @cryptkeepersoul​ @pedropascallion​ @seawhisperer​ @thegreenkid​ @pajamasecrets​ @starlight-starwrites​ @agirllovespasta​ @scarlettvonsass​ @mourningbirds1​ @oloreaa​ @mrschiltoncat​ @synystersilenceinblacknwhite​ @emmy-dandiliom918​​ @holographic-carmen​​ @heatherbel​ @nelba​ @abuttoncalledsmalls​ @winters-buck​ @buckstaposition​ @opheliaelysia​ @jaime1110​ Please ask to be added to, or dropped from, the tags!

[chrissyslittleartwork]

So...I might as well post all my Yu-Gi-Oh! OTPs. Not to mention it's to hopefully clear up like who I ship with who. I have had people think that just because Atem and Bast are together, that must mean Yugi and Catzi will be too. And let me just say, no. That's not the case. While Yugi and Catzi are the renicarnation of Atem and Bast, it doesn't mean they will end up together again. Yugi and Catzi are just good friends.

DestinyLoveshipping (Pharaoh Atem/Queen Bast) – This kinda speaks for itself. I always felt Atem deserved to have a good strong Queen by his side. (Not to mention I never shipped him with Tea…or Yugi for that matter. Seriously…why do people love Puzzle shipping so much? -_-; ) So, when making Bast, I tried to picture of what would be the girl he would fall for. And thus, Bast was born. She’s mature, quiet, strong-willed, and kind. She is also not afraid when facing off anyone she duels. Like her husband, she shows no mercy. I do feel like Atem would love her strong good heart. Her being beautiful is just a plus. Their relationship seriously makes me smile because omg the angst and feels. Ah! I love these two so much. CX

 

Loneshipping (Marik Ishtar/Catzi Kaioh) – I’m going to say this, over the years of me coming back to YGO every now and then, I feel like Catzi has gone through a few guys. First time I made her; she was with Yugi. Second time, with Ryou. And now coming back a third time, I loved Marik so much that I loved the idea of him and Catzi being together. I mean, I already did kinda ship them back then too. The thought of Marik falling for Catzi due to her feisty ways as well as the fact she is willing to forgive him despite what he did. This relationship just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. CX

 

Guardianshipping (Yugi Muto/Carrie Francess) – I have said it before but, this ship was kinda a crack ship. And this was before I decided to make Carrie a flexible character. Yup, she was still a DP character when I thought of this ship. But now, she is no longer tied to DP and now I am free to have her be any character I see fit. This relationship between the two has developed and thanks to my friend, she got me to love them very much. Just picturing Yugi being such a sweet boyfriend to Carrie just makes me heart melt.

 

Drawnshipping (Joey Wheeler/Yuki Fumiya) – As I have mentioned before, I am not the biggest fan of other people’s OCs. If they are well written and great characters, I am willing to make an exception. Luckily, someone I became friends with who helped me love ships like Guardianshipping created her own characters and she made some really good ones. Yuki is a nice character and I do like her relationship with Joey. Plus, it’s hilarious that she has a crush on him and he’s downright freaking clueless about it. XD Ah, Joey, I love you but man you are dense. I also like this pair way more than Polarshipping. I have never cared for Joey/Mai especially with their age gap.

 

Blissfulshipping (Ryou Bakura/Chrissy Major) – I don’t do a lot of self inserts. XD I have only done it once before and that was with SWAT Kats. But the fact I had loved Marik/Catzi, I felt so bad for Ryou. The poor boy is forgotten so much, I feel he deserves some love and attention. And by goodness, Chrissy would be sure to give him that love and attention. But she is respectful of his boundaries too due to his fangirls never leaving him alone.

 

Warmshipping (Chase Fumiya/Tea Gardner) Again, like with Yuki, Chase is an interesting character. Plus, the fact Tea being the only one to stand up to him besides his sister Yuki would make him start to crush on her. I like to think Tea would come to care for Chase and wishing to change him for the better. Not to mention, I never really shipped Tea with anyone (except with Kaiba honestly) like I certainly never liked her being with Yugi or Atem for that matter. With Chase, I can see this working out. ^-^ Not to mention she would keep him from getting in trouble.

 

Raidershipping (Thief King Bakura/Carmen Sandiego) – When I saw the Netflix’s Carmen Sandiego, I really loved the concept of it as well as Carmen herself. She is downright gorgeous, and I couldn’t help but like the idea of her being with Bakura. Her calm sassiness would go great with his sarcastic ego. Plus, she would probably be the only one to put up with him. XD I can picture the two going on missions and using their thieving skills to keep artifacts safe. Also, this would be after he has been redeemed.

 

Sideshipping (Tristan Taylor/Miho Nosaka) – Let me just say this…I don’t really care for Miho. So why is she in this? Because this Miho is different to what we saw in the season 0 anime. I never liked the fact she is just some gold-digging dense girl. She never seemed like the type to even hang out with Yugi and the others. I know they wanted to have it so that Tea is not the only girl, but seriously. There were barely any good things about her. So, for this, Miho is more like her manga self. She’s shy but caring and quiet. I feel like, if she wasn’t embarrassed by that mean teacher, I think Tristan would have had a shot with her. Plus, I don’t ship Tristan with Serenity. Why? The duel he, Serenity, and Duke had in the Noah’s Ark. Duke didn’t baby Serenity while Tristan did. He acted like she couldn’t do a thing for herself. True it was her first duel, but she could learn and I’m sure Duke could trust her to do that. Tristan didn’t and I feel like their relationship just wouldn’t last even if Joey were to let it happen. Plus, Serenity seems to like Tristan as another brother anyway. Like I said, I know Tristan can have a girl, and I rather be it Miho.

 

Honorable mentions since I didn’t include them here because I haven’t drawn them…yet:

 

Cheershipping (Duke Devlin/Serenity Wheeler) – As I said above, I ship Duke/Serenity way more than Tristan/Serenity. I just like how he is willing to believe in Serenity and the fact he says in the manga of how she helps him be stronger. I just…awe!

 

Empathyshipping (Seto Kaiba/Ayano Shibata) – Another friend of mine came up with this character after seeing DSOD. Like Kaiba needs some serious help, so she came up with a therapist for him and even ended up shipping her with him. It’s freaking hilarious XD and Ayano is great.

YGO characters (c) Kazuki Takahashi

Yuki and Chase (c) @shiroi-majo

Chris, Carrie, Catzi, Bast, and art (c) me

[freddieslater]

it’s time for the dreaded s6 finale emotions

*strong regret in projecting onto ryan as much as i do because this episode h u r t s*

tyler being the one to invite ryan along?? g a e

“can’t send a man to his doom without getting drunk first” he’s trying so hard to fit in. poor bastard. and not calling the others out for excluding him? you can just tell he’s trying so hard not to ruin it for everyone, and nobody even gives a shit. and then of course he eventually snaps, he’s just spent over an hour having to watch everyone have a great time and forget about him, and then alex suddenly expects him to have bought mike a gift, and they fucking tell him to stop being so selfish and god those fucking assholes

god the conversation where may-li tells charlie about her grandad. it’s so beautifully acted, emily burnett sells the denial perfectly, it just,, ow

this episode is hard to watch when you have really strong empathy and project onto both ryan and charlie. h e l p

wow charlie really just delivered a baby in a car in the middle of the woods huh. i keep forgetting how absolutely badass that is

you know what absolutely kills me is the vague suicide subtext to ryan running away. take that goddamn phone conversation out of context and that’s what it is and that’s the worst part of all of this. and chloe saying that he’s left a note and that “i think he’s really gone for good”. o u c h

the fact that NOBODY EVEN NOTICES RYAN’S GONE EXCEPT MIKE AND CHLOE. even tyler doesn’t fucking notice. and then everyone cares more that mike’s gone to find him than that ryan even left in the first place. but we’re not meant to think about that because tracy’s here and everything’s absolutely fine right. this episode is murdering me can you tell

lily complaining about men on that facebook post. bit fruity of her, i must say *‘a day in the past’ flashbacks*

i havent watched my mum tracy beaker yet but i really need answers on how it fits timeline-wise into the tsotb/tbr/tdg canon

the fact that chloe isn’t even wrong when she says everyone would hate ryan even more if they found out mike isn’t there ‘because of him’ (read: because he quite literally had a breakdown and ran away and mike, being the only decent person in this goddamn show, went after him)

ah yes tracy, care worker of the year, really just said ‘your problems don’t fucking matter, forget that anything’s wrong because mike is getting married’. i love tracy but wow that is not the thing you say in this circumstance and the only reason it worked was because he felt bad about the cake and whatnot

this episode has such an all over the place tone. they really just went from mike freaking out to fiona figuring out he’s gone to a damn slo-mo shot of tracy and mike on a bike while ryan sprints behind them.

oh my god i forgot bailey was in this episode!! i hate him (affectionate)

this goddamn episode is so full of emotions i almost threw up oops. anyway it absolutely kills me that ryan looks like he’s about to cry pretty much the entire time. that poor kid. and then chloe really just pulls a tee and apparently loses all empathy towards him huh. love chloe but wow

i don’t think we get a chance to read what ryan wrote in that note? but i kinda wish we did. could’ve given some extra insight into everything

i have no idea if any of this is coherent, or how much of it is an actual analysis and how much is me projecting but oh well, this episode(s) is a fucking emotional trainwreck, what can you do

Oh god. I'm not prepared.

*valid regret to have, that sad queer kid with anger issues and insecurities experience hurts real bad*

Yes!! Once again proving that Tyler is the only one in the DG who actually cared about Ryan and wanted to be around him. He was pissed at Alex for not inviting Ryan like he was initally supposed to, and then took it upon himself to make Ryan feel included anyway.

That scene really pisses me off, because Alex really is going after him. You can tell, he won't let Ryan make a single joke without trying to be snarky about it, and then he purposefully tries to humiliate Ryan because he knows that Ryan couldn't possibly have known to bring a gift.

Oh yeah, I can barely ever rewatch the first part of the wedding for all of these reasons, but especially for Charlie finding out about her grandad. Emily really is way too good of an actor, that's why it's so painful.

I relate way too much to the strong empathy and projection, that shit hurts so bad.

Yeah!! Charlie did that!! Honestly, credit to her because I would not have been as calm as she was on a normal day if I had to deliver a baby in a car in the middle of nowhere, never mind after everything she had been through that day.

Okay, so you found a way to make Ryan's whole storyline of those episodes hurt way more than it already did. Thanks for that. But you are right, it does have that vague subtext to it. If this wasn't a children's show, I would've actually been worried that's where they were going to go with his storyline.

It does suck that nobody really noticed or cared that Ryan wasn't there. I wish even Tyler had shown a bit more concern, but I suppose they've only got enough time in an episode for so much.

That was definitely one of Lily's fruitiest moments, and that's saying a lot because of the aforementioned "a day in the past" flashbacks. Honestly, all of her scenes with Carmen and some with Tee are always fruity, there's nothing else to it.

Okay, so, I can kind of answer that one. My Mum Tracy Beaker definitely carries on from The Story of Tracy Beaker since it involves clips of it when Tracy sees Justine. However, it's only really connected to tbr/tdg canon through vague hints. Like, Tracy has a published book called "Who Cares?" and there's a mention of her being an ex careworker, and she wears a "T" necklace but it's slightly different from the one that she wears in the wedding episode. So, we know there are subtle references to TBR through these background details that are really just glossed over. There is a weird little moment when Tracy's daughter tells Justine that Tracy wrote a book, but Justine should already know that considering it was a big part of their reunion in Tracy Beaker Returns. At best, we can at least assume that everything that happened in TBR is canon for My Mum Tracy Beaker. I feel like, if we want to be able to make the timeline for the wedding add up with My Mum Tracy Beaker, we'd have to assume that Tracy hadn't already had Jess during the wedding. Since the wedding takes place around 2018, and Jess is 10, My Mum Tracy Beaker would have to be set in 2028 at the very least, and that would have to mean that Tracy had Jess the same year as the wedding. Either that, or she did already have Jess but just... never mentioned her because she was staying with Cam.

It really does kill me that Chloe was right about that, because you'd think at least some of them would have some sort of sympathy for Ryan. I wish Tyler did. Honestly, he had a genuine breakdown and ran away, and no one cared except Mike. Great family they are.

Yeah, that was not Tracy's best moment, but... that's just Tracy. She doesn't think, she acts on what she believes to be the best solution in that very moment. She was never exactly an aware winning care worker in all fairness skjdashd but Ryan definitely needed to hear something other than that.

I could barely be sad or stress during that episode specifically because of how chaotic it was, and ESPECIALLY because of that slow-mo that had no right being so damn hilarious.

SHFKDASJDLK "I hate him (affectionate)" well at least I'm glad the (affectionate) is there lmao. But I was screaming when I realized Baily (and Liam) were there, I was so happy!!

Oh yeah, Ryan looked so upset, he was absolutely blaming himself so badly. There was no need for Chloe to come in there "wish you'd run away for real" like fuck off. I love her. But fuck off.

I don't recall actually seeing the contents of the note now that you mention it.

Yeah, don't worry, I'm not sure most of my reply to it is coherent either. But those are episodes are some of the most fun to analyse because Drama and Angst.