#pSYCH!! the reason he's mysterious is that he's mARRIED

[francesderwent]

I figured it out. actually only the first two seasons of Greys are good.

[mary-fantg]

Что вы думаете о Лиззи, Татьяне и Мэй?

Hello) this is the first question on tumblr to me and I'm a little worried, thank you for your interest in my opinion and for the opportunity to speak out, this is very important to me. I will try to answer succinctly, describe the main qualities of the character and his key aspects in his relationship with Tommy.

I'll make a reservation right away, all of the following is just my purely personal opinion.

Лиззи.

Character: prostitute, poorly educated ("I did not graduate from school, went to work early" s5), prudent; understands that the only way to break out of her vicious circle is to successfully marry a man with money, candidates for selection are mainly men from criminal circles (Shelby, Changretta); loves children; is only sweet with those with whom it is profitable; knows how to keep secrets and not go where they don't ask; emotional; arrogant; jealous; short-tempered, but at the same time responsible, executive. It is still a big mystery to me how she worked as a secretary and conducted business in the Company, despite the fact that she could not write correctly (s5, when Tommy talks about her letter).

Lizzie/Tommy: initially, the prostitute-client relationship, which eventually developed into a confidential and friendly communication, "your man", thanks to which in s2 the relationship moves into a new direction employer-subordinate, "I need a person who looks through his fingers at everything."

I don't know, I didn't get the feeling that Lizzie loved Tommy, I saw in her only a financial interest and a desire to become a respectable woman. After Grace's death, Lizzie made every effort to become Tommy's constant lover, slowly and faithfully she went to her goal, trying to be there when he was completely broken and needed a woman's warmth. Being the mistress of the coolest gangster in Birmingham was very flattering for her. An accidental pregnancy became her "lucky ticket" to a luxurious life that she would not have dreamed of under any other circumstances. Which is exactly what Linda noticed in s4. In PB, every word has weight and meaning, so not once did Lizzie talk about her feelings for Thomas, neither before marriage, nor in marriage, nor in moments of his mental anguish, when he was weak in front of her and vulnerable, not once did she say that she loved him. All her speeches are only about money and what she will have left when he is gone, "I value my head for shilling more" is the main reason why she tolerates Tommy's indifferent attitude towards herself and their marriage. Only greed and calculation. Of course, it can be noted that she tried to be a normal wife, most importantly a mother for Charlie (I think this is the main reason for their marriage, Tommy saw that Charlie was lonely, he needed a mother). But due to the fact that they are completely different in intelligence and ambitions, there is no mutual attraction (chemistry) between them, their relationship does not add up. If it hadn't been for Ruby's death and Thomas's aggravated PTSD, I think they could have continued to live together in a "guest marriage" mode. But we see that by the end of s6, Tommy's psyche was exhausted and destroyed so much that he completely withdrew into himself, and Lizzie did not have the potential to help him recover, we see that she is completely unaware of how broken he is.

Татьяна.

Character: a runaway aristocrat from the Russian Empire, a princess, smart, educated, beautiful, has a position in society, rich, prudent, cynical, depraved, cruel, desperate, for the sake of her goals she will go over her heads, a devil woman, a fire woman. She is unhappy in her own way, since from a young age she was treated as a commodity, part of the deal, her aunt "sold" her niece repeatedly, as we see from the stories about Georgia and in the situation with Shelby. This experience killed everything "bright" in her, it seemed to me that she does not know how to love, to be compassionate, she absolutely does not understand Tommy's love and sorrow for his dead wife, and why he took her to the guest bedroom causes her perplexity. She liked to hurt him by breaking into his bedroom with Grace, his memory room, standing with her feet on his marital bed, using his wife's perfume. His love for his wife caused her inner envy and jealousy, so she tried to behave as subtly as possible in Thomas's house and trample on what was dear to him. Although why did he let her in there at all?!!

Relationship: exclusively business, with elements of sex and alcohol. No future was planned there.

To be honest, these s3 series, immediately after Grace's death, caused such a storm of emotions in me, I still can't understand why it was necessary to introduce such a plot with an abundance of debauchery, orgies so quickly, and most importantly, why it was necessary to bring it all to the house where a few months ago we played a wedding with a woman that Tommy will love for the rest of his life. I understand that this is all a movie, but I physically felt pain, bitterness and resentment for such an attitude to Grace's memory, it all looked like nothing terrible had happened, guys, moving on. I think it was rude to the fans of the T/G couple, who were already shocked by her murder. I am very angry at SK for this. Apparently, the author wanted to show the depth of Tommy's despair, the hell he found himself in, complete disorientation, and went all out. That's the only way I can explain it to myself.

Мэй.

Character: an attractive, educated, bored widow with good connections in high society, the owner of a stud farm, an excellent business partner for Tommy, opening up new horizons for his business. Ambitious, adventurous, suspicious, prudent, the mind prevails over the heart.

Relationship: Thomas is a pleasant exotic adventure for her, a curiosity, a "racketeer". A partner for sex, with him she feels like a woman again, "alive". Of course, this is a misalliance. It is unlikely that their relationship would end in marriage, I think they could only be lovers for a certain time, later the relationship would come to naught. In their communication, May's superiority over Thomas was felt, her tone always seemed to me imperious, she obviously tried to "bribe" him with her connections in high offices, thereby taking control of him. In her environment, Thomas would always be an outsider, from the lower society, even the groom in her stables allowed himself to be arrogant to Tommy, mockingly hinting at "gypsy stuff" when he gave good advice.

The whole essence of May's relationship to Thomas is shown in May's dialogue with Grace. For her, Shelby is primarily a lover, and she is a profitable connection for him. In her eyes, he is a man only about business: business, business and only business. She rules out the possibility that Thomas might love someone.

In conclusion (a little bit about Grace).

All the female characters who appeared in Thomas's life throughout all 6 seasons perceived him as an attractive, extraordinary, intelligent, very interesting man. But none of them loved him completely, with all his flaws and injuries. Only Grace. She was the one who sacrificed everything for him. In the first season of her career, she "betrayed all the principles given to her by birthright." In the second season - a quiet rich life, position in society, respect for his family. In the third season, with her life itself, though not consciously, but I'm sure if it were necessary, she would give her life for him voluntarily.

Grace was like Thomas, with her skeletons in the closet, with her injury, and her hands were "covered in blood." They were burned by circumstances and this made them "the same", they understood the motives of each other's behavior.

Other women in Tommy's life (excluding Tatiana, on the contrary, she was more "sick in the head", not controlled), were emotionally healthy, they did not cross the line, they were not broken, so they would never have been able to understand and accept Tommy to the end.

Thomas understood all this, felt and knew that there was no such Grace and never would be, which is why he never forgave himself for her loss. He died inwardly with her.

[jknerd]

PSYCHE

Name: Psyche Age: 21 -> Immortal Aliases: Anima Gender: Female Occupation(s): Princess (formerly), Goddess of Soul/Spirits and butterflies Relatives: King Minotlas (father), Queen Ganymedea (mother), Aglaura (older sister), Cippidae (older sister), King Argol (1st brother-in-law), King Ishmil (2nd brother-in-law), Eros (husband), Hedone (daughter), Aphrodite (mother-in-law), Ares (father-in-law), Hephaestus (uncle-in-law), Erotes (brothers-in-law), Phobos (brother-in-law), Deimos (brother-in-law), Zeus (grandfather-in-law), Hera (grandmother-in-law) Interests: Sewing, solving puzzles, tea time with Persephone, Aphrodite and other wives Character Psyche was a mortal princess who become a goddess of soul and spirits. She was youngest of three princesses in a kingdom and one of the most beautiful among them. People, including priests, compared her to Aphrodite and many even went to extent she was much fairer that the goddess. As Aphrodite’s temple was neglected and deserted in favor of Psyche, Aphrodite was even more outraged Psyche, the princess of her country, didn’t even bother to organize her temple, deeming it as sacrilege. As punishment, she sent her son Eros to make Psyche fall in love with a vile and hideous being. However, seeing Psyche’s beauty when asleep, Eros fell in love with her and decided to spare her from mother’s wrath. Concerned that while the entire nation praised her beauty yet no one asked for her hand in marriage, her parents asked for advice to the prophet of Delphi. Devastated that she had a fate of marrying “powerful, monstrous creature no god would dare go against”, they were forced to sent their youngest daughter away. Psyche didn’t even get to bid goodbye to her older sisters who were already married to then-princes of Assyria and Hittite. Arriving in palace, she was greeted by invisible servants and her husband who would visit her in the dark of night. One day, she begged her mysterious husband to see her sisters and he allowed. Horrified of her marriage life, her sisters’ concern goes overboard from believing their sister’s husband was gaslighting or abusing her, they told her to identity his face and if the husband is monster, she must kill him. Scared, Psyche obliged her sisters as she prepared the oil lamp and knife. Shocked in awe to see her husband was actually Eros, she dropped her knife waking him up. Psyche broke down as Eros left her. But, determined to reconcile, she searched for him and found Demeter’s temple to be barren and neglected. As Psyche cleaned the temple, she have discovered the reasons behind Aphrodite’s hatred towards her. With Demeter’s guide, she arrived to temple of Aphrodite. As the goddess angrily blamed her for misery of her son, Psyche asked for forgiveness and accepted four tasks. Despite the hardships and near death, she finally reunited with Eros and both officially got married. Later, they had a daughter named Hedone. Although she has become a goddess of souls and spirits, she was able to visit her family occasionally. Among the Olympian in-laws, she is very close to her father-in-law Ares as she learned he was the one who set Eros free during her near death experience. She was also one of the deities congratulating Ares’ rise to power in Ancient Rome as major god. She express joy and happiness with her wings fluttering golden dusts. In Fairly Odd Parents AU: Being one of the Olympian goddesses survived from the downfall, she lives with her husband Eros in the Fairy World. Her jobs were the measurer of godchildren’s souls and a teacher of Elementary school Poof and Foop attend; mostly on classes of flight and sports related. In Grimm Adventures of Billie & Manny AU: As a goddess of souls/spirits, her duty is the measure the dead’s souls, estimating amounts of good deeds and crimes through percentage. She is considered as reaper-in-training and a part-timer like Hermes. She was often seen calming her husband due to a stress from his business. She is also a friend of Grima as both interact in many occasions. In Disney Retelling - Heracles AU: Presented in Olympus to celebrate the birth of Heracles, she has given baby Heracles a gift of strong mind. Later, she watches Ares’ anger with her mother-in-law and husband in concern. When Ares and Hera attempted to use mind control to force Heracles to kill Megara and others, Psyche was the one who activated Heracles’ strong mentality, preventing the curse. Later, she was seen celebrating in Heracles’ wedding.

[adickaboutspoons]

📓

Once upon a time, there lived a maid. Not a maiden, mind you. She was married, thank you very much. Maid was merely her job title... Fairytale au in the vein of Hans My Hedgehog/East of the Sun, West of the Moon/The True Bride/Cupid & Psyche. Snipping because brevity? I don't know her.

When Ed's mum wished for a baby, she didn't expect her child would be a strange creature with a beard of black tentacles. She loves and protects him as best she can, but the world, and his father, especially, is cruel to the strange boy, and as soon as he can, he runs away (shortly after the mysterious disappearance of his asshole father), to make his way in the world. The world of piracy is also cruel, but with his prodigious aspect, and rapier-sharp mind, he quickly builds a reputation as the dreaded Kraken - the most fearsome pirate ever to rove the seas. In his travels, he encounters a land East of the sun, West of the Moon, North-by-northwest of the Pole, and around the corner from the Southern Cross, and in it an enchantress who promises that she can take away his tentacles and give him the face he was always meant to have, but in exchange, he must agree to return to her in a year and become her 20th husband. The enchantress Jackie is a reasonable woman, though, and will not require Ed to marry her if he finds someone to love him, and she'll even make the tentacle-reversal permanent as a wedding gift, BUT! he may not reveal to them his un-tentacled face , for if he does, he must return to her straight away. Ed has always yearned for someone to love him and believed that his cursed face has been an impediment to that. Barring that, he's fucking had it with pirate life and all its cruelty, and for all he knows, he may be dead in a year, and doesn't much mind the idea. so he takes the deal. But what the canny enchantress neglected to mention is that the tentacles would only go away in the dark of the night. Sailing away from the enchantress' kingdom, Ed sacks a merchant ship, but agrees to spare the merchant's life if he will surrender to Ed the first thing of his he lays his eyes on upon returning home. Which is how Mr. Bonnet not-quite-reluctantly turns over his worthless son, who was waiting at the docks, searching the horizon for his father's ship, and wishes the Kraken the best of luck. Stede is a bit worthless, in that he has no practical life skills, but he has boundless enthusiasm, insatiable curiosity about every aspect of Ed's life (which, of course, means learning about piracy), charming conversation, the most fascinatingly bonkers way of looking at things Ed has ever encountered, and most importantly, is the first person ever not to recoil in disgust, or fear from Ed's tentacled face. <insert falling-in-love sequence that I certainly haven't spent ages imagining and never actually committing to paper that eventually involves sneaking into one another's beds at night for (of course totally platonic, what else could it be, Stede tells himself) cuddles>. After some little time, Stede becomes curious about why the captain doesn't allow any lamps to be lit after sundown. And Izzy, who knows about the deal and would rather see Ed chained to an enchantress for the rest of his life than whatever is happening here with this fop, tells him that the Captain is under a spell, and nighttime reveals his true face, but it can only be looked upon by the eyes of true love, and it won't be long now before he can return to her in the land East of the sun, West of the Moon, North-by-northwest of the Pole, and around the corner from the Southern Cross, when the spell is done. And Stede (who is absolutely dippy for Ed, but can't imagine the greatest legend of piracy could ever be interested in a worthless wharf-rat like him, so won't let himself even think about being in love), with a curious pain in his chest, wishes Ed the every happiness. To be continued in part II because apparently Tumblr doesn't like how long this is or something.

[mxdam]

one of margarethe's most important traits is that she is a liar. there is a streak of dishonesty that runs through every layer of her psyche; on the conscious level, she will calmly and freely lie to any person at any time if it suits her purposes. on the unconscious level, margarethe spends a great deal of time lying to herself.

the reason i am discussing this is because of her first husband, francis tremaine. margarethe has a scene with ella, after her discovery of the glass slipper and the mystery princess' true identity, where she tells ella the story of her life:

"once upon a time, there was a beautiful young girl, who married for love, and she had two loving daughters. all was well. but one day, her husband, the light of her life, died. the next time, she married for the sake of her daughters. but that man, too, was taken from her. and she was doomed to look every day on his beloved child. she had hoped to marry off one of her beautiful, stupid daughters to the prince, but his head was turned by a girl with glass slippers. and so, i lived unhappily ever after. my story would appear to be ended."

there is a lot i can say here about the conscious and unconscious mythmaking margarethe is doing here. she has many telling omissions, and i may revisit them at a later time, but rn we are here to discuss francis, the man she "married for love," the one who was "the light of her life."

francis tremaine was 15 years her senior, and was 35 when they met, when margarethe was 20. he was an established merchant with a position in the mercer's guild. in addition to being older with the gains in brain development and life experience that came with it, he also had the benefit of male privilege in a society that disenfranchised women, and was able to be fully independent, a legal person under the law, and own property. he had power.

margarethe ten broek was, again, 20 years old. she was the dependent daughter of separated parents who had a strong whiff of scandal around her for that reason; the split between her mother and father was the stuff of gossip and there was widespread skepticism about helena and her children, which helena had been combating for 7-8 years at this time by demanding a pulverizing obedience from margarethe and absolute social perfection at every moment--margarethe suffered for every flaw, every moment she let her guard down.

yes, margarethe loved francis. could she possibly avoid loving francis? he was the first person to really look at her, to fix her with serious attention, and to not just offer her the world, but make her believe it was possible to get such a gift. from her position of vulnerability, dependence, and inexperience, she believed every word he said and fell desperately, passionately in love with him. her need and his pleasure in her need were the foundation of their marriage. as you can imagine, this did not go very well for them.

[wilderebellion]

Rip Van Winkle

-"Missing" one year

-Science teacher

-Many missing posters on drugstore bulletin board

Ichabod Crane (and family)

-Science teacher previously in Hartford

-"Absent Glory"

-'Wanted to see the world' (Refuted: seeking answers)

-Skeptic of supernatural phenomena (at first)

-Born in Sleepy Hollow

-Sent to live with grandmother when parents passed (cause unknown)

-Grandmother hated Sleepy Hollow (reasons unknown)

-Mystery heirloom left to Ichabod.

Location: Old Dutch House

Douffe Martling (pronounced Dufay)

-Wealthy landlord, incredible hair

-Insists on personal checks for payments

-Hacked Ichabod's Instagram

-Married to Dr. Geoffrey Crayon

Does not deny catfishing him

Claims he catfished her too, which he denies

Matilda

-Runs Colonial Drugs n' Stuff, saving to open her own occult shop

-A witch. Like, for real

-BFF to Kat? ("Bestie" inscription in yearbook)

-Mysterious whispers with Kat

-Ancestors were hanged for innate magical prowess

-"We've been through a lot" re: Kat

-Reluctant to Kat and Ichabod getting involved

-Last name Bishop (I only noticed due to episode 7 captions, but also stated in Kickstarter video)

-Family photograph looks old. Doesn't remember when it was taken, just that it was a really nice day

Kat Van Tassel

-Works at not-a-drugstore, Matilda got her the job

-Mayor's daughter ("That's what he tells me")

-Short for Katrina (German form of Katherine, "pure")

-"Not everything that happens here is the result of some curse."

-BFF/bestie of Matilda

-Went to college but "it wasn't for her"

-Dated Brom like, a decade ago in high school

-Brom once got her a job at the bowling alley but the hours sucked

-Seemingly a skeptic of the supernatural?

"Don't start with this horseman crap"

Dismissive of Rip's disappearance being mysterious

Refutations: Serious when speaking about Matilda's witch status, thrilled by the HH stories her mom told, psyched to discover HH is real and wants to help

-"We're running out of time and we need to be able to trust each other."

-Born 1995 (Reverse math!)

-Got sick from shrimp at last year's Autumn Gala (Brom held her hair back)

Judy Gardenier

-Current assistant to Mayor Van Tassel

-Ordained via internet

-Always cries at weddings

Eugene and Ramona Trousers

-Acting School for 'children'

-5'11 and 5'4 mezzo soprano, respectively

-Fired all the local children

-Obsessed with Trevor and stardom

-Theatre is definitely NOT A CULT as their flyer states

-"Trousers and Lee Strasburg [sic] Theatre (NOT A CULT) Camp"

Dr. Geoffrey Crayon

-Physician in chief

-Denies catfishing Douffe

-Was catfished BY Douffe with images of Bonnie Hunt

-Divorce = happy

-Present at Van Tassel house the night Anne Tarry died, checking on Kat (week after Autumn Gala last year)

-Wants to re-negotiate mysterious deal with Mayor

Trevor Trinkets

-Fifteen. Well, fifteen "next month"

-Fourteen

-Thirteen (claims he was eight 5 years ago)

-Flikpix audition

-Midwestern farm boy origins (alleged)

Mayor Baltus Van Tassel

-Rich white dude

-Watches Bosch and Safe House

-Believes "gents have to get a little bit crazy every once in a while"

-Checkbook with regular payments made out to Dr. Crayon

-Glass cabinet with half of map

-Phone calls with Dr. Crayon, refuses to re-negotiate their deal

-"We Van Tassels are extremely thorough"

Abraham "Brom Bones" Van Brunt

-Too much name

-Extra bones, genetic thing, pretty cool

-Gym teacher at middle school

-Substituted science class (poorly) after Rip's disappearance

-Well versed in local legends

-His 55 year old father with perfect bone structure is "on a cruise" (actually dead, fairly recently)

-Dated Kat in his youth

-Now accidentally married to Matilda (And LOVING it)

The Babes

-Cal, Tripp, and Blair

-Love shots and chanting

-Bro mentality but cognizant of toxic masculinity and misogyny (which are v.v. not cool)

-Enjoy helping community

-Burned an actual bridge once

-Former member Spike ostracized after an incident in forest by Raven Rock. Still haunted by high school events

-Blair was in Cirque du Soleil once, quotes Hamlet, and knows meaning of habeus corpus

-Trio would like to open a dispensary called Brom's Babes' Buds

-Cal's "real hair color" is blonde. He and the Babes often wear day-wigs.

-Tripp majored in archaeology at Cornell, now suffers PTSD from shark attack

-Blair has dated or hooked up with (at least) three of Tripp's siblings

The Headless Horseman

-"An aggro Hessian mercenary hired by the Brits to fight during Revolutionary War" (Refuted)

-COD: Decapitated on battlefield (Refuted), now wanders for his head (True)

-Longer without head = memory loss

-Same symbol on sword as mysterious Crane heirloom

Officer Baader Rhonda Meinhof

-Hair loss due to stress

-Frightened off by HH but says nothing about it

Captain Gravy Davy Crowbones

-His skull came with the drugstore

-Scourge of the Hudson Harbor

-Gravy Aloysious "Two Sleeve" Davy Crowbones

-Friend to animals

-Tyrant of eastern Copenhagen

-Architect of San Juan Swizzle

-Captain "Maybe Baby" Crowbones

-Lover of Juniper LaBouf

-Sea log shares a symbol in common with Elizabeth's manuscript (but NOT the same as Crane heirloom and HH sword?)

-Sought legendary treasure in Tarrytown, recorded sighting of HH in 1622

-Met Juniper in/near Tarrytown, later lost her

Juniper LaBouf

-Lady of a Thousand Sapphires

-Necklace in Davy's treasures, taken by Douffe

-"Met and lost on this shore"

Anneke Storms

-Teacher who established one of the first US girls' orphanages in Sleepy Hollow

-Disappeared one year later mysteriously

-Said to be a witch

Verla

-"So many men. I'm not even wearing my culling robes."

-Boyfriend Henri

-"You never understood our love!!"

-WHERE DID YOU COME FROM (recurring gag)

Crawled out of TV

From the orphanage

Doll came to life

A well

-Doesn't do plagues anymore (as a means of murder)

-"I remember my first murder trial."

-Always wears white

-Eats glass

Woman in White

-Depiction in play resembles Verla (if the black fabric is supposed to be hair)

-Haunts the woods to discourage tresspassers from harm

-Was caught in a deadly storm

-Sighted with "BLONDE hair, white dress, terrifying" by Max Lee between 2010 and 2015 (Babesteries ep 2)

Location: Raven Rock - Spike and Max Lee experiences

Elizabeth Van Tassel

-Astronomy nut

-Expert/obsessed with local legends and folklore

-Died when Kat was 10

-Author: The Legends of Sleepy Hollow Vol 1, Sleepy Hollow Herstory

-Believed the best in people

-Next book would've said Henry Hudson didn't found the town, was up in Nova Scotia exploiting natives

-Manuscript dated January 13, 2005. Anticipates meeting destiny that weekend. Died the following day.

-COD: Unknown. Official word was drowning, but Kat says her dad lied.

-Manuscript has a mysterious symbol

Max Lee

-Recognized by Matilda

-Died in 2015, Biannual reenactment of 1776 Battle at White Plains

-Marijuana delivery man

-Age 10 performed in History of Sleepy Hollow play

-Loves history

-Encounter with Woman: wanted to watch The Notebook (2004) on iphone 4 (2010) with buddies

Devlyn Versace

-Blogger, Youtuber, influencer, prankster

-COD: bungee jumping from a turbo blimp (also didn't wear flight suit?)

-Brand ambassador for many mobile apps

-Privileged, elite upbringing; online presence at age 10

-Casual abuse of substances (Quaaludes, Xanax, Adderall)

-2 years of Houdini Summer camp for magic

-Degree in Biochemistry from MIT

Anne Tarry

-Annafred Parygon Tarrysmith

-Former assistant to Mayor Van Tassel

-COD: Overdose, possibly poisoned drink

-Rumors of painkiller addiction after death

-Suspects Baltus of her murder

-Took improv class prior to death, didn't make it to show

-Big on caffeine

-Observed but didn't hear conversation between Baltus and Geoffrey Crayon the night she died

Lucretia Lazenby

-Also new in town

-"Before I came here I grew up in Kansas City and my hair has always been this color and length" - Super normal to say.

-Owns and runs Storms Inn

-On Brom's trivia team, knows a lot about foreign policy

-Knows many ways to kill a man, she's just super normal

Location: Storms Inn

Oldest building in town, former girls' orphanage. Unstable basement and historic mold in attic

Henry Hudson

-Captained the Half Moon in 1609, landed in Tarrytown (future Sleepy Hollow)

-Credited as town founder

-Left to discover new lands (allegedly) but named Ambrose Van Tassel as mayor

-Traveled north, faced mutiny, killed?

But somehow is not the Horseman....? Suspish.

-In Elizabeth's manuscript, he couldn't have founded S.H. as he was in Nova Scotia at the time

Henrietta Hudson

-Captained the Lichtgevend in 1609

-Married to Henry

-Included in the Herstory book by Elizabeth Van Tassel

-History play presumes death but evidence her ship made it

Frederick Storms

-Longtime friend of Henry Hudson

-Captained the Middernacht in 1609

-Fate unknown but presumed dead after failed voyage

Bruce McConnell

-Stand up comedian (bad)

-COD: Crippling tomato allergy

Major Andre

-Missing from the history play

-British spy in Revolutionary War

-"Hung" from church in town

Various Sleepy Hollow citizens:

Mrs. Van Ripper

Christa Pierson

Greta Bradley

Timmy and Edgar, Max's triplet buddies

Ambrose* Van Tassel (1600s? 1700s?)

Reginald Van Tassel (built family estate in 1888)

___

*Cotton Van Tassel = same or different from Ambrose?

-"The Trousers mentioned a Cotton in the play the other day"

-'Bad boy' of the family

-Survived Revolutionary War

-Mayor from 1777-1785

-Decapitated in drunken duel over soup that was too wet

-Wished for his remains to be burned in town square

Paulie Tahoe

-Family requested burial in S.H. due to enemies

-Smuggled a whole slot machine in broad daylight out of the Morongo Casino

-Refused to wear same suit twice

-Bennifer: is the reason for both the breakup of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez and their later reunion

-Has an ex-wife that thinks he's out of the business

Questions:

Kat knows her father lied because she found out something "last year". Did Rip Van Winkle discover something for her?

Where did the German soldier story come from?

Is "the deadly storm" literal or metaphorical for the Woman in White?

Did Kat and Matilda mess with magic in their youth and that's why they're "running out of time"?

Is there a curse on the Van Tassels binding them to Sleepy Hollow?

Has the history play always been so historically inaccurate, or was that a more recent development as a result of editing by Ramona and Eugene Trousers?

Who put up all those MISSING posters for Rip?

[luckycheesefoodie321]

FINALLY GOT SOME -degozaru UP IN THIS ONE PIECE

Our first samuraiiii. Idk which one this is but we’re in the land of big children and I officially have no real spoilers for this portion of OP.

I started watching OP officially when Whole Cake Island was all the rage and Sanji just defected. In the meantime I was hyped to get to the grand line (at which I think I knew nothing after Nami’s arc) and then stopped after Alabasta. (I mean I prolly took a big break somewhere in there but I tried to commit to a big slog up until just before Skypeia).

In the intervening couple of years I left OP (for uni reasons but also just a much needed anime cleanse) I got to peruse spoiler material. I knew about Usopp leaving, the flag getting shot down, Merry dying, getting the Thousand Sunny. I vaguely knew Sabaody was a thing. I knew Ace died and Sabo “died” but later returns. I knew the Straw Hats would get separated and I knew Jimbei would be the next crew member. And knew there was a giant mermaid at some point.

Got back into Skypeia all psyched to get past the time skip and committed to finishing all the way past Marineford and took a big break just after the straw hats reunited after 2 years and before they went to Fishman Island. It’s been another couple of years since then.

In those years I know Sanji leaves to get married but hijinks ensue with the bride and he and Luffy fight and Luffy starves for the first time in his life so Sanji comes back. I know Dressrosa is a thing like Doffy is a BIG and popular antagonist and he’s involved with Law and there’s the Coliseum and Straw Hat Grand Fleet. But ultimately that’s all in terms of spoilers for this portion. I know almost nothing about Punk Hazard.

And up to Whole Cake I know some dude with teeth dies (????) or is defeated by Luffy but Luffy covers his mouth and they escape rather than really defeat Big Mom bc Oda was saving that for Wano. The crew is split but Luffy finds Zoro and obvi the Nika thing made it’s way to my corner of the internet like an atom bomb so I know that happens. Now Luffy is a yonko. And we’re finally heading into the post-Wano era AND the final grand arc of the story.

So knowing ALL this it’s kinda refreshing going in mostly blind. But everything in the preceding time before Luffy actually fights Kaido and Big Mom with the other supernovas is a total mystery of over 100 episodes in Wano alone. So still should be fun and full of surprises.

[fractallogic]

Nausea/vomiting, loss of consciousness, incoherence means that there’s a limited set of likely things that could be happening

1) brain swelling (possibly she’s been mis-taking her decadron because bf is letting her be independent and the dosage/tapering is more complicated than “take one of these pills until they’re gone”; that’s the drug to keep her brain from swelling after the surgery and I think this is the most likely)

2) whatever was left of the tumor has regrown dramatically (this is apparently what was happening the first time he took her to the hospital a couple weeks ago; since no one fucking knows anything about the scans or biopsy, unclear how likely this is, but because of how tumors and cancer work, it’s definitely on the table)

3) some kind of bleed or block (stroke seems unlikely if they didn’t tell the bf right away that it was one, but possibly a bleed in the right place could cause this kind of thing to happen)

4) some other kind of damage (idk how fragile her head is with the stitches right now, but they’re not completely dissolved yet; she could have moved too suddenly or tripped or sth and wiggled her brain around too hard, causing other tissue to swell into the brain or, again, bleeding into the brain)

5) something else

I’m really hoping it’s option #1, in part because it should be easy to resolve if it’s a med thing, and also in part because option 2 feels the most likely after that and boy I really don’t feel great about a prognosis if that’s how quickly things are regrowing in there, and still! not really ready to deal with a parent’s death yet!

I think next week I need to call the counseling office where my psych is and inquire about their supposed sliding scale because my psych is also a therapist and at this point I absolutely need therapy like, now. I can’t do complicated mom feelings by myself (and friends) when maybe my mom is actively dying. I can’t wait another ?????? months and I also can’t afford something that is weekly and, I believe, $200 an hour. Like. Ffs.

Dad keeps telling me things that he’s planned for when he dies (in about 30 years, knock on wood, because he wants to live to see the middle of the 21st century) and prefaces this with “I know this might seem morbid, but you need to know this and I think you’re at the age where you can handle this information” and before I was like okay yeah it’s sad to think about you dying, but this is reasonable. Now I’m like thank god you have actually planned for this, you know how your medical bills and any caretaking or end-of-life stuff is going to be paid, I know that not only you have a will but that me and my aunts are going to be the executors of it, I know what you’re leaving to me, I know that you want to be cremated and where you want me to spread your ashes.

Do I know literally ANY of that for my mom? NO! It’s driving me insane. Maybe she has a will! Maybe she has insurance! Like just that basic info is a mystery. How has she been paying for anything on this big road trip, after they bought and renovated a house, and when she’s been working sporadically and mostly part-time for the last few years? Unclear. How the fuck am I supposed to know how to take care of her or what I need to do if she dies.

Stepdad has also been thinking about his own end-of-life stuff but obviously I’m less privy to that (because he has two grown children that he’s close with who are basically my mom’s age, so they’re presumably going to take care of all of his stuff). It’s going to be incredibly sad when he dies, but I feel less groping-into-the-unknown.

Crassly, morbidly, part of me is so frustrated that it’s the difficult parent who’s in this situation first. I don’t fucking know what to do and she’s still married to stepdad on paper; he and me and brother are her next of kin (is that how that works? ITS A FUCKING MYSTERY) (but I’m like 85% sure) AND WE DONT KNOW ANYTHING. With dad and stepdad it will be emotionally so much harder, but logistically so much less complicated. Mom has both complicated logistics AND complicated feelings.

I need to go to bed because it’s 1:30 and I would LIKE to enjoy the weekend I have with my dad here, and that means I need to actually wake up and like, exist, but. you know. what the fuck. goddammit. fuck. ugh. etc.

[pancakehouse]

respond whenever you can!!! i’m chillin plus i’m at work majority of the day anyways :( diff topic now i am going to be a witch!!!! i still have to find bottoms and a hat but the top is a lacy bit flowy long sleeve shirt!!! i love dressing up in costumes it’s so much fun! last year i was a hippie one night and a cowgirl the other!!!

but i’ve been reading so many diff fics i can’t even keep up w them bc majority of them are wips!!! but the main (and long) ones i’m reading rn are disintegration by moonymoment, crimson rivers by zeppazariel, and kill your darling by messermoon all on ao3!!! that last one is a hockey au and it just hits that sweet spot :)) and ofc ofas <3 also!!! i am always open to fic recs i will never ever turn them down heh

and he’s our remus lupin david thewlis!! i love that man w my whole heart he’s just so <3<3<3 even in his old age he looks good!!! the sandman is on my watchlist tho! ever since i found out he’s in it i’ve wanted to watch it!!! but from what i have watched of criminal minds it’s. so. good. i’ve only watched a handful of shows bc my bestie or my sister was watching it!! still so v good tho!!

i will most likely stay on anon bc i like the mysterious-ness of it all lmao it’s fun and hip!! but i am grateful that you’re so nice and friendly!! maybe one day i will come off nonnie!!! not today tho >:)

-tennis anon

A WITCH!! that is so spooky babe so edgy, a classic for a reason i LOVE a lacy flowy top!! also cowgirl oh em gee i need to know everything! you know i do think cowgirl is peak, my cousin's getting married next year and we're buying all sorts of shit for her bachelorette weekend n a pink sparkly cowgirl fit is number ONE on my agenda (think harry styles at coachella) bc it's really just such a slay!!!!

okay love moonymoment jude, can't go wrong with jude's writing they're a genius and a visionary! i have been super super tempted to start crim rivers bc im a slut for hunger games content so maybe i'll wait til it's done and binge it all in one go! (i did read the bonus alt ending MCD chapter and..like. sobbed. fetal positon, rocking back and forth, will never function the same way again. sobbed. it was painful.) (kinda fun to do with zero context too. gorgeous writing, but 0/10, will never be reading it ever again. i choose joy from now on!!! but now im dying to read the whole thing)

david thewlis is the best!!!! i need to watch some of his older stuff, i think he's got such a classic post-first war remus feel yknow, like that man has seen things he's been through it he's operating with some sexy damaged psyche energy. major hot girl trauma vibes !!!

you are the FUNNIEST and HIPPEST anon that has ever anon'd babe!!!! sooo mysterious so witchy so spooky so on theme for this month!!!! sending you so much love and good vibes my fave enigmatic stranger bestie!!!! mwah mwah xoxoxo

(p.s. since it seems like you're a jegulus stan might i recommend my bestie em's amazing fic. it's jegulus (/wolfstar) - fake dating, fake sex, copious pining, n the funniest thing your eyeballs will ever be blessed with <3)

[thejamiei]

Jamie’s♥️ Diary … 📕 26/03/2024

Last Night After I Was Here, I Thought That Maybe, Being The Most Intelligent Person Born To This Day In The World’s History, That Tays💋 Might Be Interested In What Is Actually Going Through My Mind For Once … 🙂

I Woke Up At 7:00pm To-Day To Watch One Of My Fav Shows Ever, MAFS Where I Observe In Total Real Life People’s Different Behaviours And How They Think And Process Different Challenges Being Married.

3am To 3pm Is Twelve Hrs, Plus 4 Equals 16 Hrs Sleep. Something Must Of Been On My Mind For It To Shut Down Like That. It’s Not Like I’m Not Human, My Brain Just Went Blank And I Had A Dream That I Owned The Biggest Train Set In The World. Strange.

Anyways After Watching A Doco On Domestic Violence, Me And My Mom Had A Discussion About Taylor❤️ And How Worried I Was That Taylor❤️ Could Be Involved In A Domestic Violence Situation With That Big Dumb Stupid Travis. My Mum Has Finally Accepted Our Relationship After Multiple Trips To Psych Ward Since 2016 Simply Because I Came Out And Said I Love Tays💋 And They Thought I Was Having Delusional Thoughts But They Soon Found Out I Know About Psychiatry And They Diagnosed Me With Above Average Intelligence And I Had To Let Them Believe That I’m A Huge Fan 🪭.

Jesus, I Didn’t Tell Them The Facts Otherwise I Would Be Given A Depot And That’s Why In 2017, I Was Silent Being Stuck Homeless With Nowhere To Go Until 2019.

However, The Vault Of Knowledge Got Broken Into Again And All The Top Secret Literature And Items Got Stolen, Including 3 IPhones And The Jamesi♥️ Coins. So, I Had To Rebuild It All. Then I Found Out That Joe Was Still On The Scene And It Was Like The Biggest Stab In The Back Yet.

I Pushed Through Because I Know I Am Right And Developed A Near Psychopathic Behaviour Because I Always Have Taylor’s❤️ Back And All My Emotions Nearly Became Cold, Having Dealt With Man After Man After Man. I Refuse To Let Them Destroy Me After What I Have Been Through, Not Too Many People Would Come Out On Top Or Recover From Such Extensive Traumas.

I’m Still Worried About Tays💋, The Only Reason A Person Would Choose Big Dumb Stupid Men Is Because They Are Insecure And Then They Feel Obligated To Make It Work When Most People Are Saying She’s The One Who’s Wrong, That Is Abuse And Unacceptable. I Said To My Mom She Has No-One To Turn To Except Me And She Agreed Because She Knows How Long My Relationship With Taylor❤️ Is Going On With And The Symptoms And Signs Of Domestic Violence Are Exhibited All Over This Travis Kelce Deceit.

So, I Go To Facebook And The Many Agencies In America Have Now Found Out About My High Level Of Intuition And Still Offer Some Degree Of Secrecy. However, All This Has Not Actually Been About Me And Until Taylor❤️ And Me Get Together, I Must Continue To Have Her Back. She Is Always My First Priority And Even Though, Mysteries Are Kept Secret For Very Good Reasons.

The Secret Is, She Has To Come See Me Which Is Virtually Impossible.

And This Is Something I Really Don’t Like Because The Best People In Life Are Free.

They Don’t Need Someone Else To Organise A Meeting. How Freakin Fake Can You Get. This Is Why I Never Want To Become Famous And Besides, I’m Not Scared Of Nothing.

Well, Maybe Water, Horses And Clowns.

he💋 he💋 he💋 … 🥹

All Her Big Docile Dumb Pathetic Men Have Nothing On Me. People Die For A Reason And The Jamesi Corporation’s Cybersecurity Is Second To None.

I Just Wanted Intelligent People To Know I Am Real And I’m Not Giving The Secrets To Mysteries Away Because Of The Huge Responsibly That Entails.

Alas, Because Of My Life Experience In Dealing With Mental Illnesses, I Will Help Anyone Who I Come Across.

Taylor❤️ Being Told She’s The Problem Is Unacceptable And Her Indications Toward Depressive Disorders Are Misdiagnosed And Unfounded. It’s Because Other People Lead Her To Believing These Things Which Results In Unwanted Verbal Abuse From Other People.

Now, That’s What Causes Real Depression And Once She Knows, She Can Do Something About It.

There Is Tremendous Strength With Dealing With Problems And Standing On Your’ Own Two Feet Coming Out On Top.

I Can’t Wait For Her To Wake Up And F_ck Off All These Pricks That Mislead Her.

It’s Not Being Mean Or Nasty, It Is Showing That You’re Not Taking Or Tolerating Anymore Deceit From Them Putting You Down.

It Is A Real Sign Of Strength.

I Know Because I Have/Do It Everyday.

I Must Stay Strong For Taylor❤️,

So She Can Be Mentally Strong For Herself … ✨

.

.

Love Jamie♥️

[goddamnwebcomics]

Krazy Noodle Massacre

It’s a psychological horror webcomic by a user named Lutzbug.

Rhodes and Dempsey are a young married couple who are too distracted with video games, late-night documentaries about serial killers, and spying on some weirdo buying generic brand noodles called “Krazy Noodles” rather than aiming to achieve their own careers and goals in life. That weirdo they’re spying on is Gideon Verner, a socially inept hermit who just wants to build his weird noodle sculptures in peace without being judged or followed. Unfortunately, he’s being haunted by a being posing as his only friend and wearing his face known as Gabriel, a mysterious incubus, vampire, brain-parasite that manipulates and feasts on the paranoid psyche of men such as Gideon and encourages their worse tendencies. It doesn’t help when Gideon’s worst fears are realized when he finds out he really is being stalked and followed by two strange guys at the same grocery store he frequents each night. As you can imagine, being treated like an exotic zoo animal doesn’t do this man’s severe anxiety any favors.

The art looks like it’s trying to be an amalgamation of Invader Zim and those weird psychedelic image posters. While it’s an interesting premise, it takes way too long to get off its feet, and it doesn’t help that it’s pretty sparsely updated as is. It’s definitely one of those comics for people with selective tastes from the looks to the setting and story.

Oh dear god. The noses. I hate the noses. I am torn. The art is disgusting but also the premise doesn’t sound half bad? If the only real flaw of the comic is that it takes forever to get to the main plot, I don’t really see a reason to riff it.

[flickeringart]

Planets in the 8th House

Like all the watery houses, the 8th house is mysterious and potent, yet it’s difficult to fully get a grasp of. The area of life that this house represents are usually summarized by worn out key words; death, transformation, regeneration, rebirth, sex, shared finances, the occult, hidden complexes, power struggles, trauma, crisis and the list goes on… from these words one gathers that the 8th is not a light-hearted sphere of life – it signifies struggle and emotional intensity. Having planets in the 8th, strong Pluto or Scorpio influence usually revolves around the same themes – paranoia, the striving for control and a tendency to keep things private and buried in order to sustain power.

I’m not going to discuss the difference of having strong Scorpio-Pluto placements vs. having planets in the 8th house in this post, but since the sign, planet and house are linked and are symbolic of the same themes, there’s a lot of overlap that is to be expected.

A person with planet(s) in the 8th will not act out the planetary principles consciously. Usually, the energy is felt through their aura, quiet but evident, as if the planet makes its presence known without revealing itself. For example, someone with Venus in the 8th might not openly declare affection and love, except in the most intimate of settings, but it’s unquestionably there. Picture the goddess of love living within a person as a body of water. She is there, but she is slippery and unable to manifest through conscious expression in daily life. The reason for planets in the 8th house “hiding” usually has something to do with fear of losing control, of exposing something taboo and risky that could have dire consequences.  We see this phenomenon in movies all the time – a person isn’t conscious of the fact the he or she is in love with a person but it’s obvious to everyone else – this would be typical of Venus in the 8th. One doesn’t dare to express it because it would alter the way of things, it would violate the sense of self-control and expose one’s vulnerability. Pain accompanies planets in the 8th, however benefic, because they impose themselves on the person and puts everything on the line. It’s a little bit like opening Pandora’s box – one can never go back to how things were before one fell in love, yet one resists the power with which one is pulled into a relationship. Even Venus and Jupiter, the most “positive” planets are operating in a way that makes the person feel out of control. Sure, it’s probably more positive to be invaded by love and abundance than anything else, but it can still be shocking and fearful to a person that doesn’t want to acknowledge the autonomy of the planet and has put up rigid defenses against it, only to have them be shattered. In the case of Venus in the 8th, personal love and affection is very private and usually has some kind of trauma or complex tied up with it. Looking at astrotheme’s database of people with Venus in the 8th , Miley Cyrus pops up at the top of the page with this placement. In some of her more personal songs, lyrics hint to her being afraid of love and intimacy. Even in her famous song “Wrecking Ball” she sings about falling under love’s spell and slowly seeing a relationship turn to “ashes on the ground”. If this isn’t typical symbolism of transformation through love I don’t know what is.

With the Moon in the 8th house, the person doesn’t openly express emotion – the emotions erupt volcanically from time to time, and it’s very uncomfortable for the person because there’s a feeling of being exposed and threatened that accompanies this release. Because of the fear that is tied up with emotion, the person might show dislike and defensiveness when faced with other people’s emotional expressions and needs. Sigmund Freud had his Moon in the 8th, which is very telling. He was obviously interested in uncovering the complexes behind certain reactions, presumably because he didn’t feel himself to be in control of his own emotions and inner life. He was certainly motivated to transform and free himself and his clients of the tight grip of the unconscious patterns of the 8th house. He explored the underlying mechanisms of repression, formulated the Oedipus complex and postulated the existence of libido – sexual energy with which the mental processes are invested. The Moon’s placement in the 8th would point to deeply rooted emotional and possibly sexual ties with the mother. The Oedipus complex is after all a desire for sexual involvement with the opposite sex and the presence of repressed incestuous instincts. Freud noted that he had wanted to marry his mother as a child to rival with the father and understood that it must be a universal principle among all boys in all cultures. This has not been thoroughly empirically proven, but it’s certainly reveals something about Freud’s own psychology. In any case with Moon in the 8th, the emotional and instinctual nature is accompanied with a sense of it being taboo and shameful. The emotional nature is experienced to be powerful beyond personal control.

Mercury in the 8th is a another story. Mercury is the planet of communication, thinking and deductive reasoning. When looking up people with this placement, it seems to me that it is common among people who speak up about uncomfortable topics, that which would be considered “risky business” to talk about. Prince Harry has this placement and he has been very open recently about his mental health struggles. Emma Watson has this placement and she has been an advocate for feminism and equality – preaching and advocating strongly with emotional investment when giving the famous UN speech in 2014. Lana Del Rey has this placement and she writes lyrics based on her own personal experiences, not shying away from dark topics like death, heartbreak, destructive and passionate relationships. It seems as if Mercury in this house gives the person a propensity for talking and thinking about that which in uncomfortable, for revealing difficult power-imbalances and dynamics taking place within the psyche. There’s usually a feeling of being cautious of what one reveals, of sitting on information that holds emotional power and that involves other people. With any planet in this house there’s a strong impulse to be aware of other people, in case of Mercury it’s what other people know and don’t know, what they say and don’t say. Mercury in the 8th might be indicative of a person who is controlled by what other people say and feels at the mercy of other people’s opinions – positively and negatively. The narratives and stories of other people might merge with the person on a deep level and fuel one’s own opinions. One might be exposed to challenging, discriminative and harmful opinions, even indoctrinated in them. When speaking one’s mind, one might have to summon a lot of bravery because more than likely there’s a bit of a chokehold that is being felt and effort that is required to break free from deeply instilled thought patterns. This placement could be indicative of a person that likes to think and communicate about deep and taboo topics, reveal and keep secrets.

With Mars in the 8th, one simple interpretation would be “someone who is prone to experience physical violence in intimate relationships”. Either one is the victim of it or the perpetrator, perhaps even a bystander or a protector. The violence, albeit linked to physical action, might just manifest in the form of acting without another’s best interest in mind. There’s usually a sense of being at the mercy of other people’s actions with this placement, but also of having no conscious control over one’s own motivations for doing things, one’s own drive to make things happen. Princess Diana had this placement, conjunct Pluto-Uranus, and she was far from feeling in absolute control of her direction in life. With Pluto-Mars the drive is buried and tied up with the primal survival instinct and latent rage. Her relationship with Prince Charles was anything but smooth and she felt like a victim to greater forces (Pluto-Uranus) making her act in a way that was, most certainly, driven by emotional complexes and not out of conscious will. She also behaved in a way with her compulsive eating and independent streak that was not favorably looked upon. J.F. Kennedy also had this placement, he too had difficulties on the relationship front, mostly because he had a compulsive sexual drive and had a lot of extramarital affairs. This is typical of Mars in the 8th being tied up with emotional complexes – he couldn’t stick to his wife; he had to prove himself and his masculinity through conquering women (he has Jupiter conjunct his Mars and we all know how faithful Jupiter was in mythology). His sexual appetite caused moral problems among the Secret Service agents who were employed to smuggle women in and out of the White House. His behavior was altogether inappropriate but somehow he survived politically as it was kept in the shadows. Diana certainly had her own extramarital affairs as well, perhaps to revenge Charles for his strong tie with Camilla and subsequent declining interest in their marriage. Mars in the 8th is undoubtedly indicative of action taken out of the need to retain emotional integrity, sometimes with unfavorable consequences. Notably, both Diana and J.F. Kennedy died suddenly, Diana in a car accident and J.F. Kennedy through assassination by a bullet. The 8th house is the house of death, and Mars here usually indicates a violent and sudden strike of “fate”.

Last but not least, let’s take a look at the Sun in the 8th house. The same people who shows up when searching for Mercury, Mars and even Venus, also have the Sun in this house; J.F. Kennedy, Lana Del Rey, Emma Watson and Prince Harry, which is not surprising considering that the inner planets never stray too far from the Sun. The Sun represents the ego, the sense of self-knowledge and self-awareness. The Sun is representative of the conscious center of the personality. This suggests that the people with this placement are painfully aware of death and violation, of the destructive nature of reality. While the Moon in the 8th might indicate that emotional reactions or lack thereof stem from deep seated autonomous complexes rooted in survival, the Sun might indicate a sense of self and self-expression that stems from the difficulties and hardships one has gone through. This placement can be understood in the sentiment “who am I without my trauma?”. There’s the tendency to identify with the ordeals of one’s life and how one overcame them (or didn’t). This dynamic is evident in all the people listed at the top of this paragraph. Prince Harry being a very obvious one that people make fun of nowadays – he’s coming out as a survivor of past down ancestral trauma, attempting to work through and shine a light on his personal struggles growing up within the Royal Family, attempting to separate himself from the curses of unconscious programming. Lana Del Rey certainly enjoys identifying and expressing the darker side of herself, illuminating the theme of death and emotional hardship in her songs. Emma Watson also seems to identify with the hurt and injustice present in the world and is a spokesperson for collective movements (Sun in the 8th, Leo in the 11th). J.F. Kennedy has the same Sun –Leo house setup as Emma, channeling his experience of personal hardships into his career and public life. In a sense, people who want to appeal to the masses and make a change on a large scale must be personally invested enough to fuel the movement. In the case of the 8th house being involved with Kennedy and Watson, they might feel as if their sense of self is dictated by other people’s values or that they would have to fight to remain in control of their sense of self. As the Sun relates to the father, the father figure might’ve been quite controlling, demanding and dominant. If the Moon in the 8thsays something about a mother complex, the Sun in the 8thdefinitely says something about a father complex.

[justalarryblog]

💓 Skipping Heartbeats by @1dfetusfics (3k) | Mature

Louis doesn’t talk much and for some reason he has a queasy feeling in his belly whenever he’s around boys now, especially around Harry.

💓 One day to believe in you by @mediaville (7k) | Explicit

A mysterious force compels Louis to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Even when it’s really inconvenient.

Harry blinks and has the nerve to look surprised. “You think about me when you get off?”

“Yes,” Louis says. He wonders how hard he’d need to punch himself in the face to knock himself out.

“Often?”

“Yes, Christ, Harry,” Louis groans. “Probably eight times a week for going on six years now. On average, you know. More when we were touring, less when I’ve been visiting family. Anything else you’d like to know?”

💓 keep me safe, keep me sane, keep me honest by @hilourry (8k) | Explicit

Louis is the Prince of England. All past omega princes and princesses have been married and pregnant at age 18, so his parents arrange him to be married to Harry Styles, the royal family’s PR guy.

💓 give you my fever by @beautlouis (10k) | Explicit

And he’s wanted it even more since he met Louis, it’s driven him insane, he spends 90% of his life turned on because of Louis and he’s had no relief at all. He’ll wake up at night too hot and itchy, with Louis warm and sweet smelling next to him, and unable to do anything but wank unsuccessfully, with no release. “I can try,” Louis says, close enough that Harry’s eyes cross a little trying to look at him. “I want to, I’ve never been with anybody, like, I’ve snogged people, lots of people, but I’ve never—touched anyone.” He clears his throat. “I’d touch you, Hazza.”

Harry’s breathing picks up. “Yes.” He doesn’t think there was a question but he’s a little overwhelmed. “Yes,” he repeats, dizzy.

*x-factor era. harry’s never had an orgasm before, louis gives him his first

💓 New Places, New Possibilities by orphan_account (12k) | Explicit

Harry has always longed for Louis from afar, never sure exactly what Louis wanted, or if they could even have what they wanted. Even though Louis would sneak into Harry’s bed every chance he could, they’d never gone further than cuddles and innocent kisses. But when the boys are finally away from home on their first visit to LA, things finally begin to change.

💓 An Irrationally Strong Bond Between Two People by @jishler (17k) | Explicit

Before The Advancement, most human lives and careers were plagued by irrationality and a lack of productivity. This was largely the symptom of what scientists refer to as “interpersonal passion,” which included two separate (though often conjointly occurring) phenomena: “love,” and “sex.” “Love” was a pre-Advancement word which referred to an irrationally strong bond between two people, which caused its sufferers to prioritise their fellow “lover,” as well as the integrity of the malignant bond itself, over vital things such as workplace productivity. Taken every two weeks in pill form, The Drug immediately removes interpersonal passion from the human psyche. Children’s friendships do not have the capacity to develop into full-fledged “love” since they are not yet adults. Every person over eighteen takes The Drug gladly, grateful that it allows them to be productive, clear-headed, and rational members of society.

A few weeks before Louis’ eighteenth birthday, Harry and Louis fall in love.

(Based on the book Louis writes in indiaalphawhiskey’s Our Lives, Non-Fiction.)

💓 now I’ll surrender up my heart and swap it for yours by @estrella30 (17k) | Mature

Louis can’t believe this. He just - he honestly, in all of the ideas he had in his head as to who Harry was, he never in a million years thought this was going to be the answer.

“You’re a prince?” Liam asks, for what is possibly the hundredth time in the past five minutes. It seems to be the only thing either of them can say. Harry’s sat primly in his chair, back a straight line and hands folded neatly on the kitchen table.

He nods once, and bows his head slightly. “Yes.”

“And you have to stay here,” Louis clarifies, “Because you were almost kidnapped?”

OR - a (kind of) Princess Protection Program AU

💓 Sail Across Me by @canonlarry / iwillpaintasongforlou (21k) | Explicit

Harry is a prince that is about to be forced into marriage against his will and running away to sea seems like a much better option. Louis is the captain of the infamous pirate ship The Rogue and he has a thing for helping defenseless creatures. Especially when they're as pretty as this one.

💓 Hiding Out in the Kitchen by @LittleMousling (28K) | Explicit

Harry’s in an internationally famous boyband with his three best mates, he gets laid on a pretty regular basis, and he’s headed to Australia in a week. He doesn’t need anything else, and he certainly doesn’t need a boyfriend. If this nice guy he met in a coffeeshop wants to date him, great—but that’s all it is. Right?

💓 Just for Tonight (I can be yours) by @sadaveniren (42k) | Explicit

Harry, prince of Cestrescir, has been betrothed to Ludvic, prince of Yorvik, since birth. He’d accepted a loveless marriage as his duty to his country, until an accident threw him in the path of a gentle alpha

💓 Faking It by @TheCellarDoor (46k) | Mature

A uni AU in which Louis has been Harry’s best friend since he offered him cubed fruit on the playground, and they spend more time cuddling in their dorm beds than they do apart, but it’s not like that. Or is it?

Aka Harry pretends to date his best friend to escape unwanted attention from a too insistent classmate and hopes it won’t blow up in his face. Featuring embarrassing dildo accidents, awkward boners, longing, first times, late night conversations, emotional discoveries and Niall as the exasperated friend with bad advice.

💓 No Hold to Hold Onto by @kingsofeverything (47k) | Explicit

Injured after being thrown from a bronc, Harry doesn’t know if he’ll ever compete again.

His only hope is a man called Tommo, a world champion rider who retired at the top of his game.

When Harry goes looking for help learning a new way to rope and ride, the last thing he expects to find is love.

💓 Gentle Autumn Rain by @creamcoffeelou (57k) | Explicit

Louis Tomlinson moved to London with a big heart and a big dream. Harry Styles moved to London, fresh out of the police academy, with the hopes of helping as many people as he could in his eyes. When a deranged alpha forces their paths to cross, their ideas of what is meant to be will never be the same.

💓 Gentle Autumn Rain by @creamcoffeelou (57k) | Explicit

Louis Tomlinson moved to London with a big heart and a big dream. Harry Styles moved to London, fresh out of the police academy, with the hopes of helping as many people as he could in his eyes. When a deranged alpha forces their paths to cross, their ideas of what is meant to be will never be the same.

💓 Can I lay by your side? by @tommosgun / Star_Henderson (59k) | Mature “Harry, tell me what you are going to do when you leave here.” “I’m going to drive to a hotel, drink some of that vodka, enough to give me dutch courage.“ Harry looks down at his feet, colour blooming in his cheeks. “I’m going to find a bar, find a man who wants to sleep with me, find some weed and lose myself for a few days.” “Look, do you even know your way around Manchester, do you know anyone here?” He shakes his head. “So you are just going to pick up a random man and sleep with him?” Louis huffs out incredulously. “There’s a first time for everything.” Or Fate brings Louis to Harry. Alone, Harry’s buying vodka in Louis’ local shop. He takes him home, this beautiful stranger, giving him his undivided attention and the weekend of his life. Together they tick off Harry’s ‘to do’ list and fall in love at the same time. Harry has secrets and despairingly, on Monday morning, he has to go back to his old life. Louis and Harry meet up six months later by accident in quite different circumstances.

💓 Into the wild by @Deidei (76k) | Mature Red is supposed to be the color of fate, right? Even if it’s annoying right now, it might connect to something good when you least expect it.

Louis Tomlinson, a mischievous and adventurous Omega ends up stranded onto an unknown and mysterious island, after a shipwreck, where he’ll be forced to learn to survive as a wild wolf. Here he’ll meet an Alpha that sparks an interest in him that no Alpha ever could. Not used to the new surroundings, the new social and cultural norms and the wolves will he be able to live in the wild?

💓 Want You More Than A by @TheCellarDoor (77k) | Mature Falling in love with your step-brother’s best friend is a disaster enough. When he happens to be the boy everyone loves and you’re a nerd who wears sweater vests and cries during rom-coms, it takes it to a whole new level.

💓 electing strange perfections by @scrunchyharry (84k) | Explicit Back for the summer from university, 19-year-old Louis is faced with a massive problem: their new gardener is quite possibly the most gorgeous man he's ever met. Over the course of the summer, Louis and a 25-year-old Harry will learn that love can be found where you least expect it.

💓 Both Showing Hearts by @kiwikero (113k) | Explicit

Louis Tomlinson is, in fact, not straight.

Harry Styles isn’t sure what he is.

Together, they figure it out, and maybe fall in love along the way.

Or, the Uni AU where Louis helps Harry figure out his sexuality, Niall crashes a bachelorette party, Liam works in a printing centre, and Zayn happens to need lots of printing done.

💓 Luscious blood by @Deidei (116k) | Mature

Louis Tomlinson, a human, has been living in poor living conditions together with his mother since he was born. Ever since he can remember he has loathed the stronger, faster, more developed kind that rule this world; Vampires. But will his opinion change after he meets his soul mate that is an arrogant, royal vampire named Harry Styles…

💓 Baby Heaven’s in your Eyes by @theboyfriendstagram (120k) | Explicit

They couldn’t be more different if they tried. Louis Tomlinson is 17 years old and in his last year of the most prestigious private school in Doncaster. Everyone who attends his school knows him thanks to his incredibly rich family, sassy attitude and gorgeous girlfriend, Eleanor Calder. If there’s one thing that completely annoys him, it’s that there is a poor community college right across the street.

Harry Styles is 19 years old, and (once again) in his last year of college. He goes to community college in Doncaster. He never shows up to classes and if he actually bothers to, he’s either high or drunk; sometimes both. His skin is littered with tattoos and if there’s one thing he absolutely hates, it’s the snobby students attending the private school right across from his.

Or a sixth form!AU where Harry is the fucked up bad boy with too many problems, Louis is the perfect rich boy with too much money and their schools are right across from each other. They meet at a party and that’s the last (and maybe the only) thing they need.

💓 Change My Mind by @larry_love13 (155k) | Teen And Up Audiences

Louis was a devout Christian family man with a wife and ten kids who lived a seemingly happy and idyllic life in Oklahoma. He always felt something was missing but he could never figure out what until he met Harry Styles, who made him question every single value he'd ever held dear, including his relationship to God AND his marriage. Harry, a devoutly religious young college student struggling with his own family and personal issues turned to Louis for guidance. They both end up learning a lot about themselves, each other, and their religion as they change a few minds-including their own-during their journey.

💓 Senses. by @kotabear24 (316k) | Explicit

💓 Silver Series by @Deidei (323k) | Mature

There are three prestigious Wolf clans: The Styles, The Payne’s and The Maliks. They are ancient clans of Pureblood Wolfs and they are respected and worshipped by other lower-class clans.

Louis is an Omega Fox spending his life mostly hiding because he’s not just an ordinary Fox. Louis decides to go to the most prestigious University in the country where he meets a blue eyed Omega he’ll forever keep in his heart and an Alpha with piercing green eyes. Hiding from his demons and living in a nightmare can he ever show his true self?

✨You can also check my fic tags for more fics! ✨

[notbecauseofvictories]

You know that Cupid and Psyche quote you just shared? To be eaten and to be married? What is up with that? Umm (SPOILERS ahead) if you've read The City We Became, one character thinks that exact same thought and like Harrow the Ninth, Gideon has that same thought. These characters wouldn't mind being quote unquote eaten by their love interests. And I get it and I also don't. Why is it soo horny? Since when did /that/ become an expression of desire? Is it an expression of desire?

“To be eaten and to be married to the god might not be so different.” from Till We Have Faces, by C.S. Lewis

....I mean, there’s literal vorarephillia, but I don’t think that’s what C.S. Lewis was gesturing towards and definitely not what I mean when I throw around that quote. 

In fairness to Clive and I, hunger is a very old and broadly common expression of desire. Desire-as-hunger shows up in poetry from Ancient Egypt and in Emily Dickinson; Plato doesn’t distinguish between the two, saying that all appetites came from the epithumetikon. Desire-as-hunger is used to mock in Catullus 21, demonstrate passion unfulfilled in Swinburne, and Dante’s Inferno tortures the lustful and the gluttonous next to one another, since they are victims of the same urge. Whole theses have been written about food and hunger as literary shorthand for the erotic; hunting down every novel, poem, and song that uses hunger to talk about desire would be an insurmountable task. (Just recently Natalie Diaz crossed my dash: “I confuse instinct for desire---isn’t bite also touch?”). According to legend, desire even served as inspiration for the tortellini and the champagne coupe, as though to turn to the otherwise untouchable object of desire into something that can literally can be consumed. 

(Even Clive himself recognized the parallel, arguing that human cravings like hunger, thirst, and sexual desire seem satiable, why not longing for God?)

However, the specific longing to be consumed---as opposed to general hunger-as-desire---is rarer. More poetic. Closer to what St. Teresa of Avila experienced, with the “pain and glory joined together” of her visions, or what John Donne meant when he begged the three-person’d God to o'erthrow him. What Nietzsche envisioned about artistic sublimation into the Ur-Eine; what Fleabag gestured to when she wanted Hot Priest to tell her how to live and dress and what to like. Hozier, singing about “deathless death” and the power of open flames, his raw and bloody heart at the feet of his angel of the codeine scene.

It’s less literal hunger and more a longing to be overwhelmed and subsumed, consumed---emotionally, spiritually and aesthetically---by the object of your devotion. It gets elided into and twisted up with hunger for the same reason that all other desires do: to call a longing hunger expresses just how immediate and visceral your wanting is.

I don’t think it’s solely or natively Catholic, that’s just the context I’ve encountered it most. And in my experience, Catholicism offers a lot to work with---our primary rite is consumption of a god, in a ceremony where that god is simultaneously ghost, bread, life, water, father, king, unknowable mystery, and bridegroom whose lust "many waters cannot quench." It’s dizzying, the number of longings tangled together in that concept of god. The relationship between gets even weirder you add in early Christianity’s flirtation with Neoplatonism and the whole ecstatic Christian tradition---Teresa, and Hildegard and Catherine of Siena and Bernard of Clairvaux and more adherents to the medieval cult of Mary than you could count, all trying to shed their earthly sins and unite with the divine.  It’s a long tradition of mortification, self-abnegation and transcendence---the struggle to crawl out of your body into something else, and yet the general inability to express that longing outside of our native tongues of hunger, thirst, and desire.

(Like I said, I don’t think longing to be consumed and subsumed is a uniquely Catholic phenomenon, but it might explain why so many of us are Like This.)

Anyway, the result of all this is a literary and philosophical tradition which uses hunger to talk about sex, and sex to talk about god, and the glad oblivion of surrender to talk about love. There’s also a lot of power dynamics involved, so yes, everyone is very horny about all of it.

I’ll end with this: 

in the 80s, South African philosopher Marthinus Versfeld wrote a cookbook. It has no recipes. Instead, it is a meditation on food---and in one particular chapter, the divinity of eating. (It’s not so far from the burnt offering to the hearth, after all.) Versfeld suggests that eating is another way of knowing: when we turn raw matter into food we give it definition and endow it with meaning, make it a sacrifice or a meal and therefore part of our explicable world. Then we take that piece of the world into ourselves, and are united with it.

By that definition, the desire to be eaten is not just longing to be consumed, but also the longing to be named and known, to join with the beloved in their world. And in that sense, it might not be so different from marriage after all.

[themountainsays]

pls write the isalores villain au i’m going thru actual withdrawals

lkewfnlefwnefm, fENJFEWNKL Anon SAME 😭😭😭 i just need.... some idea.... of where to start asjksadjaskjfkjf

I know I want Dolores to be the MAIN main character, with Isabela as a sort of... secondary main character. She still gets POV chapters and she’s super important but we know Dolores is the one in the spotlight this time around. And there are Dolores and Isabela chapters but that’s only the A side, because the B side is all told from Mirabel, Bruno and possibly Antonio’s perspectives. Mirabel is the main antagonist, even if she’s the “good guy”, because she’s actively trying to discover and stop Dolores and Isabela, and we get a bunch of chapters told from her perspective about her investigation and discoveries. For example, in this AU, Bruno is UTTERLY TERRIFIED of Dolores. She’s his sleep paralysis demon. She’s never done anything to him (yet) but just her power steals away his sleep - and yes, it’s how people used to react to him and his powers. It’s intentional. He’s being deeply unfair to her. And part of the reason she turned out Like That is because she didn’t receive the guidance and comfort she needed when she was younger and beginning to understand her Gift, which is where Antonio comes into place, because his Gift is SUPER similar to Dolores’ and it has a very similar effect on his psyche, but this time around he has Good Older Cousin Mirabel who does NOT ignore family traumas and mental health problems and is here to prevent history from repeating itself.

I still have so many blind spots tho.

Where do we even start? I want to establish Dolores’ everyday life before she witnesses Isabela killing her first victim, and I have a few ideas - maybe said victim is Mariano, and they were about to get married but she freaked out and reached her limit. But, okay, we got chapter one, we see a bit about Dolores’ life, and then at the end, she witnesses Isabela kill Mariano. I do know I want Dolores to be a bit stalkerish around Isabela but I have no idea what I want to do with her feelings for Mariano (are they still there?? has she deluded herself into thinking she loves him to cope with the pain of watching Isabela marry him??) or what exactly she’s doing until this big event. There are so many things I need to establish - her relationship with Isabela, with her parents and brothers, with the town - they think she’s super creepy and weird - and I do know that, after witnessing the crime, Isabela is horrified and apologizes profusely for letting Dolores see it, because she never wanted to scare her like that. She’s like, holding her face between her bloody hands and whispering to her and wiping away her tears, because Dolores is so precious to her and her biggest concern after killing her fiancé is traumatizing her. But I don’t want it to come out of nowhere TT_TT so I’m figuring out the little details of Chapter One and I can’t move on unti i have at least an idea for a first scene to work from.

Mirabel and Dolores’ relationship. Okay, Mirabel does her investigation, finds out the truth  etc etc. Dolores seems like only an accomplice, with Isabela as the main bad guy, seeing as she’s the one commiting murder, yet Dolores is still our main character and Mirabel is the main antagonist, an Bruno keeps insisting that Dolores is much more dangerous to Mirabel than Isabela. But... what is exactly the connection between Mirabel and Dolores here, other than one trying to stop the other? Is there, like, a clash of ideals? Morals? Philosophies? I’ve been talking a bit about how Mirabel and Dolores could be polar opposites, with Mirabel trying so hard to uncover secrets and mysteries and stir up old sorrows to heal them, while Dolores hides and hides and hides as much as she can. But how does that translate to a murder mystery plot? And how do I justify the big conflict being between Mirabel and Dolores and not Mirabel and Isabela, seeing as they already have such an antagonistic relationship in canon AND she’s the “main bad guy” and the supposed “final boss”? If Isabela is the physical “final boss”, then Dolores must be the thematic “final boss”, right? Isabela is the faux climax and Dolores is the real climax. We all thought we should have worried about Isabela but Dolores is the real thing. Now... what this “real thing” is, exactly... I got no idea :(

How does it end????? I feel like I should know that TT_TT after watching shows like Death Note and shit I suppose killing off Isabela and Dolores may be a fitting ending?? They could die together or something. Or have some thematically significant deaths. But I hate killing my main characters ;-; I don’t want them to die. I want them to be okay. Which takes me back to my previous point: what is Mirabel and Dolores’ relationship? Well, they’re family. Mirabel wouldn’t even think to use violence against Dolores or Isabela. I can see her trying to... idk pull a deku from bnha and try to “save them” somehow, though seeing as Isabela is a literal serial killer it may be a bit too late for her. That could be an interesting way to work out Mirabel and Dolores’ relationship - Dolores hasn’t killed anyone. She never pulled the trigger. You could maybe even see her as a hostage. She’s someone that can realistically be saved, while Isabela 100% needs to serve jail time. And maybe there’s something there, about Mirabel seeing Antonio in Dolores and Dolores in Antonio, and hearing Bruno’s horror stories, and knowing this is how they treated him, and coming to understand Dolores in a way that she never really does with Isabela, and try to approach her specifically. And Dolores may feel like she’s pulled into two different directions - betraying her cousin and partner, and accept a supposed “help” no one ever offered before, or to reject Mirabel’s help and further let herself be swallowed into Isabela’s darkness past the point of redemption. Buttttttt that still doesn’t give us an ending. It’s not like Isabela and Dolores have a goal other than not getting caught whenever Isabela kills someone - either because they gave her a gross look that day, because they talked shit about Dolores, because she heard Alma wants her to marry him... -, and Mirabel’s only goal is to find the murderer but it’s not like they have cops in the Encanto - crimes are prevented by using Dolores herself as a panopticon TT_TT and forcing Isabela to leave is almost too forgiving for... a literal serial killer. Do they kill their whole family? that’s horrible TT_TT do they run away??? i don’t know?? I kinda hate that ending too?? Does Mirabel join them? Then what the FUCK is her character arc???

Speaking of Mirabel’s character arc, yeah, no idea what to do with her. I kinda want her to search for the murderer because she wants to prove herself, and maybe she’s noticed things people refuse to see, so she decides that fuck it, if Abuela won’t listen to her, she’ll take the matters into her own hands. And maybe then she meets Bruno, and hears about Dolores, and she sees how badly Antonio is doing, and she figures out the whole truth, and she realizes her family she has bigger problems than her granny thinking she’s uncool. Namely: her older cousin is losing her head due to her powers, the same is happening to her younger cousin, it’s all because the family couldn’t take care of their mental health better - even though they say they were “cursed” with terrible powers and “destined” to lose themselves, and there was nothing they could do - and she sees Isabela break down and become a monster under the pressure they put her through. And she realizes all they ever needed was help and kindness and unconditional love, and the family failed and neglected them - though they can’t take all the blame, because Mirabel was treated even worse and she still didn’t turn out to be a serial killer, so you have that, too. She still tries to pull a deku from bnha and save Dolores and maybe Isabela?? I think??? Idk if it works?? Butttttttt I don’t like it :( I don’t want Mirabel’s arc to be a more violent and extreme version of what we see in the film. I want her to have something unique here, idk. A different reason to try and do this. Possibly something that reflects Dolores’ (and Isabela’s) motivations? But I can’t come up with anything other than “to prove herself” and “to save the Encanto.” Yes, okay, I can see Mirabel trying to save the Encanto, Casita and the family, but I want a different personal motive. Something like... idk redeeming herself. Redemption over what, you ask? I don’t know! Maybe she’s killed someone before too???? No! I don’t like that either. I don’t know. I don’t know what’s Mirabel deal in this AU. Because, okay, understanding what the family problems are is all cool and good, but I want something about her. What she thinks about herself. I feel like I have Dolores and Isabela a lot more figured out, which is why I’m not talking as much about them, but Mirabel here is a mystery to me. If anyone has an ideas please send them I can’t do this alone ;-;

So. Anyway Anon. I too want to see “Our Lady of Sorrows” written but as you can see TT_TT i am in pain

[mc-critical]

Hello, I just found your blog and I like it very much, it’s very interesting to read!!!. My question is : what is your opinion on Ahmed and Kosem’s relationship? Do you think he truly loves her? What do you think about him seeing other women? And what do you think about his relationship with these women (Mahfiruz, Katerina, Gulbahar and Yasemin).

Thank you for liking my stuff!

I think that, just like Süleiman, Ahmet loves Kösem in his own way. It's not as toxic or problematic or often questionable writing-wise as Süleiman's love for Hürrem, but it still has both its ups and downs that make it interesting to explore.

Ahmet and Kösem is perhaps the love story where the writers made the most effort to mask the possible worse aspects of. It could even be considered actually romantic at points, with their amazing first scenes in the gardens and the amazing chemistry of Ekin Koç and Anastasia Tsilimpou, the beginning sense of wonder and "mystery" it started out with.... when she first met him, Anastasia didn't know he was the sultan and put all her trust in him - a certainly good first impression. Ahmet himself is also very far from Süleiman's direct endeavors and tests of loyalty, he tries his best to be respectful in his own way, despite that he fails to do that a bunch of times. That's why it's easy to miss the darker aspects of the relationship at first and it could be perceived as probably the only thing in the franchise that is remotely close to a "fairytale" of sorts.

However, when the curtains start to fall slowly, but surely, we come to realize that while, say, Hürrem learns to want what Süleiman wants, to be fully loyal to him and to cave to his demands just like he often caves to her own, Ahmet and Kösem as characters have entirely different values and needs throughout their whole relationship. The fact that Ahmet wanted Anastasia because of a picture, without him having ever met her, is incredibly telling: he has created an ideal of her in his own head from the start and he wants to consistently maintain it. When he's with her, it's as if he's living his own dream, his own perfect world that has place only for him and that young girl. (that's why the garden is so symbolic: Ahmet calls it a place of solitude, only for himself almost immediately after the audience is introduced to it; also that line from him: "The world is on one side, Kösem - on the other." - quoting by memory again, but the meaning is the same) Their world views gained from their past and present environments begin to clash from the moment she finds out he's a Sultan - she wants to desperately go back to her family, both because all of them are still alive and her free spirit that cannot bear to live in this golden cage. Ahmet doesn't let her go also because he lacks the understanding of this desire: he has grown in the strict Ottoman system and having people like Anastasia stay in the harem forever is something he finds perfectly natural; for him it's unthinkable to stand against it. But despite of that "minor offense", Ahmet's idea of Anastasia's "purity" and "perfection" was working for awhile, with her seeming to meet his expectations and slowly warm up to him. But the real truth is way stronger than your own made-up lies. Anastasia's pleas to let her go only get stronger until they reach their climax with her attempt to escape. And you know what? If it weren't for her contrived, yet convenient excuse to come back to him, he would've lost her. Helplessly, in a blink of an eye, he would've lost her, due to what she sees as sheer ignorance from his part. And when she gains her own bit of agency later in the season and becomes Kösem, when she develops and realizes the actual stakes of the game, beginning to play it herself due to survival by default and the will for revenge, Ahmet's "perfect picture" breaks apart and that apparently hurt him so much, he stayed mad at her for quite some time. This wasn't the person he knew and loved anymore, this was an entirely new, reborn woman. He didn't seem to love and respect her for the virtues she actually possessed, but for those that he had imagined her to always have in his head. That is another, more "subtle" level of toxicity than with Hürrem and Süleiman, but it's still toxicity, that's why this relationship is far from healthy and the "beautiful, but quirky" dynamic it sets the impression of.

Kösem's view of Ahmet is very interesting and complex, writing-wise. I actually don't think she grew to love him as much. The place she forcibly got in made her feel very limited by him mostly, since he was the reason she was here in the first place and he was calling the shots in terms of her future (whether she would visit her family or not?). What made her become a bit affectionate wasn't fully him himself, but rather the oh-so-prominent theme of adaption in the harem. She wanted to escape so desperately, but there were so many happenings and situations during the time she was in the harem that just demanded for her to get used to everything. So when Iskender gave her the chance to escape, she as become used to the harem's environment so much, she felt unsure of herself outside of it. Her return was out of necessity rather than love and even her standing up to the people when Ahmet was sick was done out of necessity, too (like I elaborated in another ask about Kösem). I'm not saying that she didn't feel any affection whatsoever, but the affection she felt for him was easy to let go of (E25: "Today I didn't marry only Sultan Ahmet, I married the country!"), because I don't think Ahmet did his best efforts to understand her and I don't think Kösem felt completely comfortable around him, all that contrasted with Kemankeş in S02, who according to her, understands her better than anyone ever could.

Ahmet loves Kösem, because even after his perfect picture with her was broken and his anger and denial and refusal to accept it passed, he did try to make things better. What I loved most about his dynamic with Kösem, is his open honesty with her that continued till the end. There have been scenes where they seemed like true companions, especially their beginning one in E21 with all the kids gathered around them. I loved that despite of his mistakes, he did try to set things right. There was this sudden protectiveness that activated in him when Kösem told him the truth about the death of his father and why she acted the way she did and that could mean she now became something of a "cinnamon roll he just protect" and that is certainly a flawed mindset to have in many aspects, but that showed he could actually care for her beyond his idealistic perspective of her.

Am I okay with Ahmet having other women? Honestly, I'm glad that MCK lowered the concubine arcs to a minimum and with the way they did it, it doesn't offend me as much. I would even love some of them to be more developed for a change, because they did turn out to be solely drama tools, thanks to their lesser episodes and MCK's different themes as a whole, that basically did their purpose and left, instead of stretch out and outstay their welcome and that is just the other extreme in a bad disguise.

I won't talk about the relationship he had with his other women as much, because they just aren't fleshed out. I would've liked to see more of Ahmet and Mahfiruze: I believe he was way more decent with her than say, Süleiman was with Mahidevran, and their scenes weren't half bad. Too bad that would've demanded Mahfiruze herself to be fleshed out more as a character and the writers to give her more of a place in the narrative. Katerina was present only for an episode (or was it two episodes?) and we don't have as much conclusions to drive here. We only have his mild infatuation with her and... that's it? We have no idea what Katerina actually felt or how their dynamic would play out in the long run. We can only speculate. Gülbahar, by contrast, also had the least screentime of all his women who have comparatively minimal screentime, but her exploration in S02 helps us gain a better idea of how it went between them. I have the impression that she was the least favourite concubine of Ahmet's, ever. She did succeed to get pregnant and have a child, but it probably was a one and done thing and she didn't seem to get any other grasp of manly affection since then. Which is why, along with them taking away Bayezid from her by exiling her, she was so focused on scheming for one particular goal and this became what defined her. But then again, that is still a speculation in my part. Now, with Yasemin we have much more on-screen chemistry and interaction: that relationship felt very similar with what Süleiman thought of Firuze - infatuation, massive infatuation, but still not love, because just like Firuze, Yasemin also gave him poison and we don't know how much the poison affected his psyche, along with the sickness it brought upon him. These relationships have the opposite problem MC's concubine arcs had: these women were all unfavored or favored very temporarily in the span of an episode or two, which made them very stale and lacking in material.

Lastly, while MCK in its entirety, isn't very big on love stories, Kösem and Ahmet's relationship still had an evolution throughout S01, even if that evolution was more "condensed" than the others similar to it. It still remains the most fleshed out love story in the show, along with Kösem and Kemankeş's, and it was a very important part of the story that helped shape much of the narrative that succeeds it.