#she writes succinctly and beautifully

[darlingpwease]

just wanted to make a warning that I've never actually read anything except svsss (not to the end) and 2ha (haven't even reached a hundred chapters) and everything I write is based on metas, spoilers, my and other people's analyses and fanons

[honeyhotteoks]

It’s the beginning of the comfort arc we’ve all been eagerly anticipating and it delivered more than I could have ever imagined fuck! I have so much to say BUT FIRST thank you for sharing your writing with the world it literally is amazing through and through - so carefully and beautifully crafted - and every update makes my day/night <3

Big thing for me in the last few chps is i appreciate so much how you tackle themes that mirror real life. It's in a way that’s nuanced and really makes me feel really :(( - but in a good way - in a way that makes me and i'm sure many others feel seen on so many levels. Like:

(1) Hwa in chp 10 mirroring the experience of not being accepted by family as a queer person - but also, tell me if im going too deep into this - but there’s an intersection of identities that you unpack - of class identity (i.e. Hwa’s need for career security which he was leaning on his family for) converging with his family’s expectation of heteronormativity - which meant that back then, Hwa’s relationship with San couldn’t coexist with him pursuing his passion. Like that’s a very real thing for so many people and a pretty complicated thing to explore but you expressed it in a natural way that feels very validating.

And then (2) in chp 12 Woo illuminating the experience of being a minority - when he says ‘fucking alphas’ when yunho is like ‘our girl’ - like as much as I love that possessive/intense caring vibe, woo is so fucking FAIR!!! Like that entitlement (altho obvs for yungi we know it's different) is such male behavior and I’ve KNOWN that rage woo feels, that ‘ugh alphas’ feeling is one I and I’m certain many others have felt in the context of living in an IRL patriarchy and idk… the fact that you can write that experience in a way that hits that hard, succinctly with subtlety AND clarity - damn you’re so good and I hope you know you’ve done these experiences so much justice in your writing.

But anyway on another less #deep note (lol): the ‘yeah baby?’, the ‘can I put you down sweetheart?’, the searching eyes, the cautious but caring touches, the tender kisses (p.s. I died when yunho started licking her neck omg why would you do this to us) - JESUS it’s too much for me to handle but I need it like I need air so THANK YOU. Now that yungi and mc are in the very same intimate space, that very same apartment, that very same bed that yungi/mc all began, I'm on my tippy toes patiently awaiting a new and ~soft~ dynamic.

So happy to hear you’re excited about writing again and once again, AMAZING JUICE!!

-Cloud ☁️ xxx

CLOUD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! your comment literally just hit me straight in the heart as always, thank you so much.

to answer/comment on some of what you said.... yes absolutely to your comments on chapter 10. i obviously don't know too much about the member's actual upbringings or family finances.... but i certainly see a particular type of small town/working class energy from san. he projects a bit of life confidence and surety that personally informs a lot of how i write him. to me it felt natural to contrast that with seonghwa here and add an extra layer of tension to their relationship. i think for san, being rejected because of money was a hard line in the sand for him..... but that's also his own prejudices and life experience at play. i'm excited to work more with them in future chapters and expand on this.

also chap 12 like..... YESSSSS - the thing that i always love about a/b/o is that you get to play with that possessiveness to the nth degree and when you fold in elements around claims and bonds it gets even crazier. yunho and mingi have this very sure feeling that reader is theirs ....and yes, that's somewhat true just like they are hers......... but that doesn't mean that she (and omegas by extension) are just property. i really wanted to write the arc with minseok so that later on when all the happy endings happen, reader's autonomy is obvious, it's clear that it's her agency and her choice. so thank you as always for catching those moments.

on your last comment.......................there is SO much more comfort yungi coming i can't even tell you. i'm a serious sucker for hurt/comfort arcs as a reader and writer, and i just seriously believe that people who go through hard things like this deserve a person who can be there and hold them like they need to be held. it's truly my favorite thing to write as a romantic bitch 😭 so yeah get ready..... yunho and mingi are shifting into patient, loving, kind, and tender mode before things get back to hot and heavy

thank you as always, your comments bring me so much joy 💗

[uwusillygirl]

Thanks for another wonderful answer. I just wanna come to my defence and say when I mentioned Chrissy's "we can just stay like this forever" I did realise it was more exaggeration than a literal suggestion, I just wondered if the practical side of Eddie's brain ever kicked in at that and did a but if you're here and I'm here who's flying the plane kind of thing but I get that it's more about reassuring him that it's not a worry, they'll figure it out and be fine no matter how long it lasts. The way you described it so beautifully and succinctly in the penultimate paragraph though just makes everything seem so natural and obvious that it feels silly that I even needed to ask about it.

As for my "fic", I'm not actually really a writer - I can count the number of fics I've finished on one hand and the number of ones that have taken me less than six months on one finger - so it probably won't make it past a rough draft on a Google doc that I add to every now and again for a bit of fun (and honestly if it did the idea of someone who writes as beautifully as you ever reading anything I'd written is so stressful and embarassing that I'd probably rather launch myself into the sun). Although if anyone out there has recs for similar fics pls make urself known, I feel like it's got such potential for a real fun time and I would for sure eat that shit up.

omg yes of course!!! i imagined you understood all that, i think i just got too meta in my thoughts when typing.

please never feel silly i love those questions, yours have been SO thoughtful!

i think you’re right that eventually he probably DOES worry about like “what will chrissy do if i can’t give her that specific support she needs”, but i like to imagine she really proves herself every time — totally calm and self-sufficient, knows he’ll come out of it even if he doesn’t.

also i think creating for yourself is the whole point of creating!!! that’s so lovely!!! (also anyone with similar fics to the pregnant chrissy vibe please let us know!!!)

[keyofjetwolf]

Hi would you like some rage about She-Ra season 5?

If the answer is no, please don’t click below. For real. Really for real. I’m not looking to piss in anyone’s Cheerios. I think if you were satisfied (or better!) with the show, that’s fantastic and I envy you. As I have always said, love what you love. My opinion is mine and means precisely nothing beyond that. If you think you may be even a little bummed reading about how someone didn’t like it, skip this post and go on with your day, I promise you’re not missing anything worthwhile.

IN A SIMILAR VEIN: If -- before, during, or after reading -- you feel inclined to argue with me, I am begging you to please not. I cannot begin to tell you how much I don’t want to be argued with on this right now. I’m still extremely disappointed and cranky, and I’m not much in the mood to have a measured, reasoned debate about my feelings. Much as my opinion has no bearing on you, your opinion has no bearing on me, and as I’m giving you the option to opt out, I’d appreciate the same courtesy. If you want to write your own post on your own blog, go nuts! Just please leave me out of it. I PREFER TO BE CRANKY AT TELEVISION SHOWS THAN PEOPLE.

The rest of you, come on down. I don’t promise coherency, but I DO promise a lot of stuff said in all-caps!

---

Hello! Thank you for joining me! We watched the remaining few episodes of She-Ra last night! I hated them! Yaaay!

What did I hate? OH HO HO MANY THINGS FRIENDS MANY THINGS. It’s not just stuff from the final couple of episodes either, I want to clarify. It’s the entire final season, settling on last few episodes like the freshly fallen snow on your front lawn that some frat boys decide to pee their names into. By the time we’d gotten to these last episodes, there was really nothing left for me but confirmation of all the shit I’d come to hate. SO THANKS I GUESS FOR PROVING ME RIGHT

Which isn’t to say there was nothing to enjoy in the final episodes! There was!

5. She-Ra’s Triceps. GET BUFF GIRL. I LOVE how Adora and She-Ra look similar, but very much not identical. Adora’s no slouch when it comes to physical stuff, but they go the extra mile to show us how She-Ra is that much more. HOW RARELY DO YOU GET TO SEE A WOMAN WITH MUSCLES. I’ve been nothing but impressed by the ways the show drew the line between Adora and She-Ra, and however I felt about its handling of other elements, it didn’t let me down here.

4. Sometimes A Family Is A Twink, A Lizard, And Their Imp Baby. I don’t have further commentary on this, and I need none.

3. Welcome Home, Daddy. THIS WAS SO SPECTACULAR. Glimmer had, I would argue, the most realized arc in the story. It was so gratifying to see this as a culmination, not just of her own struggle with her magical power and ability to harness it, but her willingness to do what needs doing, however personally difficult. That was a stumbling point Angelica could never overcome, continually trying to micromanage and protect Glimmer rather than trusting her and recognizing her for the asset she was. Also though, more succinctly: YESSSS BITCH

2. A Shanty! THIS WHOLE SCENE WAS PERFECT NO NOTES. Just the right blend of silly and sincere, a genuine delight as even brainwashed Mermista had had enough of Sea Hawk’s shit, AND so much more clever than it seemed at first glance. THIS IS THE ONLY VALID HETEROSEXUAL RELATIONSHIP IN SHE-RA I AM NOT TAKING QUESTIONS AT THIS TIME

1. Shadow Weaver. SHADOW FUCKING WEAVER. What a complicated, fascinating character, bar none the most interesting in the entire series. I do think they pulled their punch right at the very end with her, but I AM capable of remembering I’m watching a kid’s show, so I can only get so disappointed about it. Mostly, she remained a beautifully morally complex character, and she was one of my greatest personal delights from beginning to end*.

(*) Boy did this show have one single solution for mommy issues though.

THAT WAS ABOUT IT. So let’s get to why we’re all really here, and that is MY SCREAMING OH MY GOD WHERE DO I BEGIN

Nah, I know exactly where to begin.

GLIMMER AND BO JESUS MCTRISKET I AM GOING TO EXPLODE AND SHOWER THE UNIVERSE IN THE SHRAPNEL OF MY HATE

WHY IS THIS HAPPENING

WHERE DID IT COME FROM

HOW CAN I SHOVE IT BACK IN THE HATEFUL SPEWHOLE THAT SIRED THIS BULLSHIT

WHY WHY IS THIS HERE WHY IS THIS IN MY FACE WHERE MY EYES HAVE TO SEE IT FUCK ME SIDEWAYS THIS IS THE MOST UNNECESSARY SHOEHORNED IN HET ROMANCE FUCK A DOODLE NONSENSE I HAVE EVER HAD THE MISFORTUNE TO BEAR WITNESS WHAT IS IT DOING IN THIS OTHERWISE EXPONENTIALLY GAY CARTOON

WERE YOU PANDERING TO THE STRAIGHTS

WHY ARE YOU PANDERING TO THE STRAIGHTS I ASSURE YOU WE ARE COVERED BOTH HISTORICALLY AND FICTIONALLY

ALSO NEED I REMIND YOU THAT YOU HAVE ALREADY ACHIEVED HETEROSEXUAL PERFECTION

NO MERMISTA NO WE ARE NOT ALL JUST LIKE OKAY WITH THIS

Oh my FUCKSTICKS, I could’ve rolled with so much more that angers/disappoints me about She-Ra’s ending if every single thing I feared about this hadn’t proved true.

AND. IT. WAS. SO. UNNECESSARY.

What exactly did pairing off Glimmer and Bo do for the story? For their characters? THIS IS THE PART THAT’S STABBING ME IN THE DELICATE WEBBING OF MY TOES. Because -- COME WITH ME A MOMENT SWEET ANGELS -- because I was under the impression that, oohhhh, I dunno, FRIENDSHIP WAS A HUGE FUCKING IMPORTANT PART OF THIS PASTEL HELLSCAPE

Is it, She-Ra? IS IT REALLY???? When not one but BOTH of your childhood friendship pairings end in romance? When you close out your five seasons with romantic relationships so painfully and specifically sown across the character landscape like an overzealous gardener turned loose on the world?

You know what you have at the end? DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID

THIS ISN’T A BEST FRIENDS SQUAD IT’S A DOUBLE DATE THAT NEVER MERCIFULLY ENDS

And again I ask, Why?? What was it about Glimmer and Bo’s relationship that needed them to become romantic? What was LACKING that this was the solution?

THIS IS WHAT MAKES ME LOSE MY GODDAMN SHITTING MIND I AM SO FUCKING DONE WITH THIS INSIPID MYOPIC TRASHBAG OF A CONCEPT

I believed She-Ra’s entire premise about friendship, I believed it wholeheartedly, and I’m so PISSED that at the close of day, narratively, it swept it all the bin. AND YES, YES IT DID, otherwise, WHY IS IT THERE. It serves no story-based need, it serves no character-based need, it has no NEED at all. So is it meant to be a “reward” to Bo and Glimmer for winning the war, as if their lifelong friendship were not reward enough? Is it meant to show they’ve walked through the flames and emerged with stronger, deeper bonds, because of course a relationship can only go SO deep without fucking. There’s no avenue to Romantic Relationship that doesn’t simultaneously point to something lacking in Platonic Relationship, AND I AM FURY PERSONIFIED

I am so tired of this. I’m SO TIRED of this.

And it didn’t need to be there. They didn’t even TRY to give us a good reason. That may be the part that makes me the angriest. Of COURSE they hook up romantically, of COURSE their platonic love would grow into “more”.

Fuck YOU, She-Ra. I thought you were better than that. YOU WERE SO CLOSE TO BETTER THAN THAT

THEN THERE WAS CATRA

I get it, I guess. I mean, I think it’s shittily written, but I GUESS. Honestly, end of day, I just don’t care about Catra enough to really get too angry about it, particularly when as I’m so fucking incendiary over something much more important to me. But it’s also the show’s greatest creative failure, and even if I HADN’T gotten angrier at other choices, it would’ve still cut its own legs out from under it.

Catra’s “redemption” was weak and sad and did a disservice to her and everyone involved. She started self-centered and shitty, and she ended just as self-centered and shitty, only we’re fine with that now. She learned nothing and changed nothing, but also nobody ever demanded it of her, so I can only lay so much at the character’s feet. The problem is ultimately creative, where I think Noelle Stevenson got lost in her own love of the character, and somewhere along the way forgot that if you take them out that far, you have to be willing to walk them the long road back. Compare to poor Glimmer, for fuck’s sake, whose greatest sin was being desperate enough to be manipulated by the character whose entire fucking DEAL is being THE manipulator. How much shit did she get for that? How long was she punished? Meanwhile Catra becomes THE Big Bad for a while, nearly unravels all of reality in a fit of supreme lesbian angst and self-pity, directly leads to the death of the planet’s ruling monarch who also happens to be GLITTER’S MUM and DIRECT FRIEND TO THE SHOW’S HEROES, but that’s fine, you did one sorta good thing one time and even though it was also wrapped in a thick film of self-pity and a final fuck-you at Adora, all is forgiven!

Speaking of, Adora suffers just as much from stunted growth. From the beginning, her thing was control, unable to free herself from the responsibility of everything and everyone. What did we have at the end? Adora as the only one who could save everything and everyone. Yeah, they kept asking what it was SHE wanted, BUT THEN SHE NEVER ACTUALLY GOT TO CHOOSE. NOT activating the failsafe wasn’t an option for her, and while she wound up not having to die to do it, even that wasn’t her choice in the end, it was Catra’s. (Don’t even get me started on her nth hour “You love me?” fuckery when it wasn’t once for one single second shown to be a question of such life-turning importance.)

All of which could be interesting! That Catra and Adora went through all this, came so far to wind up right where they started? AWESOME. LOVE IT. FUND IT. But really all that happens is nobody minds now that Catra’s a self-involved little shit and tee-hee another Best Friends Squad Mission being bullrushed by Adora within five minutes of ending the last one isn’t that funny?

I can’t even dig much enjoyment out of Adora and Catra as a trope subversion (if one of them was a male, their romantic involvement wouldn’t have even been a QUESTION), because the show lost its fucking mind with romantically pairing everybody off in the final five minutes. WHICH BRINGS ME RIGHT BACK TO MY PREVIOUS SCREAMING SO I’LL STOP THERE.

There was other stuff, of course. I think it was a TERRIBLE decision to spend the last season with the focus split between the two groups of rebels, and writing half the cast into brainwashing. I think the Nettossa and Spinnerella stuff was wasted and lacked any punch at all because the show for some reason or another couldn’t be bothered to let us spend any time with them to care. The waste of Scorpia and Mermista especially (to people named Jet Wolf who are me) was fucking CRIMINAL. Speaking of Scorpia, wouldn’t her showdown with Bo have been so much more poignant if they’d had really any kind of interaction before that moment to build from? (Sure, it’s Scorpia, so if you’re going to sell the lack of context with anyone it’s her, BUT ALSO.) Hey, remember Huntara? No? NEITHER DID THE SHOW.

All my details aside though, MY MANY MANY MANY DETAILS, what kills/rages me most about She-Ra was how so much potential from the first four seasons was just flushed away. Whether it was the creative team shooting itself in the foot or corporate pressure and rushing from Netflix, I don’t know. I don’t CARE. This is the show I was given, so this is the show I have, and that kind of fall after that kind of potential doesn’t just irritate me, it makes me SAD. I wouldn’t be this disappointed if I didn’t think it could have been -- WAS -- so much more.

Time will tell if I can separate out the final season from how much I loved those that came before it. I like to hope so, because I did love it intensely and loved whenever I got the chance to really dig in and talk about it.

WHATEVER ELSE I SUPPOSE I WILL ALWAYS HAVE THIS

Again please remember that I am not at present looking to argue or debate my feelings and opinions. I get to just be angry and disappointed, as a treat!

[septembersghost]

for the reverse unpopular opinion meme ummm vanessa/ethan and elena gilbert in general <3

c r y ♥♥♥

Vanessa/Ethan, where do I begin? idk how to capture this well and succinctly! they’re a pairing that I didn’t EXPECT to captivate me so much, and then they quickly turned so many of their initial tropes inside out. you think she’s this mysterious, perhaps slightly aloof, determined Lady, and he’s the masculine, American, gunslinger with a troubled past - their first interaction, when he's sort of glib, calls her “darlin’,” and she just READS HIM, and then he asks, “You have a name?,” and she replies, “Yes,” with that enigmatic smile and walks away! then it’s like - actually, she is boundlessly empathetic and frighteningly perceptive, and she’s suffered horrific trauma, but it doesn’t define her, and she forges on through the dark, and he admires her for it. he is fascinated and impressed by her, and he’s wildly loving and surprisingly soft and not closed-minded (about her intellect, about the existence of the demimonde, about the tasks ahead of them). they’ve both suffered abuse, had their entire families stripped from them, both been beset by violence and darkness, some of their own making, and they’re drawn together electrically and yearningly. they both ache for a place to belong. (also, the Iconique bi aspect of the two of them, and never once do they judge each other for all that they know and uncover about their true selves. Dorian being infatuated by both of them? he’s ~problematic~, but you can’t say he doesn’t have taste). they both have monstrous aspects, yet in one another nearly find salvation. (that he says to her: “We are not like others. We have claws for a reason.” and she says to him: “Whatever you have done, whoever you have made yourself, I'm here to accept you. We're together for a reason.” I---!!!!) the fact that he manages to drive the demon back when she’s so terrifyingly possessed. when she asks if she can sleep in his room because she’s afraid, and you realize they give one another safe harbor. EVERYTHING in “Little Scorpion” when they go to the moors together. (has chopping down a tree ever been more symbolically loving? the discussion about their childhood fears! the fact that he teaches her to shoot, and she teaches him to dance! the way they fall into easy, comfortable patterns together, despite their terror and sadness. “Do you ever think what it would be like, to be like other people?” “Normal people? I try not to.” the score used for their waltz is one of my favorite pieces of music from the soundtrack.) the prompt said to not talk about missed potential which is HARD with them (the Wolf of God/protector thing was such a cool concept), but what we got on screen was so beautifully matched, they were like watching a dance, in and out of the shadows and light, magnetically drawn together, wishful and wistful. they both longed for connection and safety desperately, they were tender to one another in a world where they’d been brutalized (and it had “made us brutal in return”). that dream she’s forced to see at the end of S2 being suffused with warmth, and knowing how much she craves it, and seeing her turn it down for the sake of her own soul. the letter he writes to her tearing my heart out. (“your many kindnesses I will always carry with me. such generosity has not been a part of my life, and I thank you for your affection and understanding. in my most frightened and lonely moments, you were there, and such light you brought to me.” ARE YOU KIDDING, THIS IS MY WEAKNESS.) the IMPECCABLE Gothic Romance vibes of it all. it is very hard to effectively capture that and not lean too far into melodrama or to not feel like a facsimile of other Romantic couples, and especially since Penny Dreadful utilized characters and stories from preexisting media, they could’ve fallen into that, but never did for me. maybe because Vanessa and Ethan were both original characters? but the writing for them, the way they were more mirrors than they were opposites, the quiet and peace and understanding they found in one another, the way they became found family (the found family aspect of Penny Dreadful in general is a LOT) and never-quite-lovers, a missed breath away from their hearts being joined. I love them both so much and I’m sad about them forever.

***

ELENA, my best girl, my forever girl. I love Elena for a lot of the same reasons I love Dean, I can’t actually acknowledge her without saying that? they are closely related for me and have a lot of trait overlap. Dean was a part of my life for four years before Elena was, and Elena is actually another flickering flame that came into my world at the absolute lowest, ugliest point. seeing her as this young woman who is floating in grief, and yet still shines as a beacon of humanity with a recklessly brave and loving heart. her depression is really important to me and it gets dismissed or twisted a lot by people who unfairly decided to hate her, but it’s such an important aspect of her and about the way she’s moving though her life and coping. she is so compassionate, yet also able to be cruel and knife’s edge sharp. she suffers and is allowed to show that, to feel it. we see her begin to wake up out of the haze of loss and we see how many times she traverses the edges of it. she’s clever and tactical, but also makes impulsive decisions. she struggles and she’s self-sacrificing, to her detriment at times, and often despite others’ demands and even manipulations. she’s loyal, yet cunning. she’s radiant in a way that enthralls and draws in those around her, including the monsters (especially the monsters), and she herself is seduced by that other of the world. they say she’s a “special girl,” but it’s not because she’s a doppelgänger, she is NEVER a copy of a copy, she is fiercely her own. it isn’t her magical blood that makes her special, it’s her essence and the spark that makes her who she is. she got to be ruthless at times, she lashed out, she broke down (the scene where she burns the house down is inscribed in my brain, and it’s been years now since I rewatched TVD), but she also exuded joy and hope. she’s just so, so human and so made of love - its goodness and its darkness (again, the Dean parallels). and Elena has one of the most important lines from a show that has always stayed with me - her version of “I do my best to be brave” - “I’ll survive. Somehow I always do.” it isn’t valiant and it isn’t even remarkable, per se. it’s laced with sadness. yet she survives and withstands and keeps her heart open anyway. she always comes back to herself.

(Vanessa and Elena are without QUESTION two of my absolute favorite heroines of all-time, and there’s a whole other analysis I could do regarding the moments when they succumb and do become those beings with teeth themselves, and yet still how it’s their souls that persevere. through everything that befalls them, I just cherish them more and hold them closer.)

[residentlesbrarian]

The First Book I Read In the Dark: Queer Witches and a Whole Bunch of Redwood Trees

The Lost Coast by Amy Rose Capetta

Let me set the scene...we start Day 1 of this experience curled up next to the white painted fireplace desperate for warmth with two blankets, an extra hoodie, a stocking cap, and my trusty lazy husband for that much needed lumbar support. 

Now The Lost Coast was a book I had checked out multiple times over the past year of silence on this blog because every time I saw it on the shelf I would pick it up, flip to the blurb, read it and go, “Man, that sounds so good! I gotta read it!” Then I’d check it out and it would sit in my locker, or in my car, or on my desk for three weeks and I’d turn it in completely untouched. But this time...this time I swore I was reading this damn book! Even if I was reading 10 pages a day during my breaks at work I was gonna finally read this book, it wasn’t going unread sitting somewhere for three weeks again. Little did I know how right I would be! 

So as a bit of a precursor this is the only book of those I read in the dark that I had already started. I was 90 pages in when I started reading on Day 1 and I only get more incoherent from here so let’s do this!

Unicorn Rating:

Blurb: Our protagonist is pulled across the country to the yawning redwood forest of northern California and discovers more than she could ever imagine. Her mom  thought Danny kissing girls was the worst of her problems but now she has to deal with witches and magic and is that a dead body! This non-stop ride is just getting started!

Disclaimer: I will try my best to not spoil anything from the book, but my book loving rambles may give more away than a traditional review. Here we go! Ramble time!

Review: 

Okay so I would say this book pretty firmly falls in a middle ground of okay for me. It was some really great escapism for me in a time when I really needed it, but the way the book was structured and written just didn’t really jive with my usual reading tastes. It felt to me like it was trying so hard to be poetic and artistic that it got a little lost at times, no pun intended with the title of the book. 

Now for the plot, which I think was maybe the strongest element of this book. The driving plot of the book never changed and was always consistent and I really liked how the author wove the magic of the world and the unique structure of how she was telling the story while never losing the plot in that unique structure. It was always peeling away one layer at a time and showing us just a bit more without holding our hand. It was very well done and kept me guessing and trying to figure out what was going to happen and how it was all going to end. Next we have what is usually my favorite part of a review but this time...isn't. 

I have so many conflicted feelings about the characters in The Lost Coast. On one hand holy giant redwoods I haven’t read a book since Not Your Sidekick that had this many casually queer characters just strutting about doing their thing, but on the other hand I feel the way the story was written leaves so much to be desired. The characters feel so thin and lacking when they had the potential to be so rich and diverse. Don’t get me wrong they are diverse in the bare bones definition, but we know so little about them at the end of the day it feels like it doesn’t really matter. We have our protagonist, Danny, who we know has a strained relationship with her mother but is close enough with she was willing to move her across the country in an attempt to try and give her a fresh start. Now there are somethings that take place in the story that explain a lot of the odd things about Danny’s character and made me a lot less unhappy with her by the time the book ended but it was really hard to get behind her as a protagonist at the beginning not because I didn’t like her but because I wasn’t motivated to follow her into the story. She was just going along from one event to the next with no real drive of her own, which brings us to the Grays: Hawthorne, June, Lelia, and Rush. They at least have a consistent motivation, but they had such potential to be really interesting characters but each one fell just short for me. The closest one to a compelling for me was Rush, we learned the most about her and I think that was mostly because Danny paid the most attention to her for obvious gay reasons. Now I can’t really expand too much more without going into massive spoiler territory for the plot which I don’t want to do, because the book is good and is an experience I don’t want to take away from anyone it just fell flat for me.

So yeah, this book wasn’t what I expected and I think a huge part of that was because the blurb is so much different than what is in the book itself. And I know, as a lesbrarian I should know not to judge a book by its cover or its blurb...but that is your first exposure to the story you are going to be reading and in this case the tone was so much different. Now let me reiterate this book wasn’t bad. There were parts that were so beautifully written I had to reread them several times to take in the layers of imagery and sheer poetry of the prose, but I feel like at times that style took away from the story itself and most of all it took away from the characters so that by the end of it they just fall a bit flat for me. I do recommend you give it a shot though because you won’t find a book with a queerer cast out there and maybe it will speak to you more than it did to me. 

Queer Wrap-up: Alright lets look at the this stellar tally shall we. Even with my own lack luster feelings toward the characters from a story perspective you can’t over look the fact that all but one character we interact with on page regularly is queer. That is something I have never seen before, so it more than earned its five unicorns, even if the quality was a bit lacking on the tail end the quantity really pulled it out. So we have our protagonist who is unapologetically kissing girls from page one and doesn’t ever shut up about it but also doesn’t shy away from the fact she also finds boys undeniably adorable and cute. In a scene that makes this tally easier than most she defines herself as queer so we are gonna stick with that. Within the Grays we have Lelia who is a tiny nonbinary gray ace person who will get in your face and is not afraid to be called a weirdo, June is a “femme as fuck” lesbian who is also not white (I belive Danny describes her as vaguely pacific islander at one point. I swear it was more specifically stated what her ethnicity was somewhere later in the book but I didn’t write it down at the time and couldn’t find it in my quick flip threw the book when I grabbed it to jot down their stated sexualities, but she is definitely not white), Hawthorne is a bisexual black witch who states she has “a strong lean toward masculine folks” which is refreshing to see bisexual representation that isn’t just “gay but guys exist I guess”, then we have Rush who very succinctly sums herself up with “Fat. Queer. White. Cello Player.” She is also some add rep in the form of having synesthesia where she can taste words. We also have some disability rep as June has an injury to her leg from a fall out of a tree that never healed properly and it does cause problems for her throughout the book, not the greatest rep but it’s there and shouldn’t be forgotten or not included. Man, oh man, this is the longest wrap-up I think I’ve ever written but I am still not done yet. We have Imogen who is the missing Gray mentioned in the blurb and brought up pretty quickly in the story and without spoiling anything we do get confirmation she is also undeniably queer as well as another character that I can’t even begin to talk about without a giant redacted stamp for spoiler reasons, but just know this book does have queer rep coming out its ears. 

Links: 

Amy Rose Capetta’s Website

Goodreads

So yes here we come to the end of the first Book I Read In the Dark it was a whimsical journey through redwoods with witches and more queerness than you could shake a widowmaker at (if you don’t get that reference read the book). I finished this book on Day 1 and immediately dove right into Book 2 because well I didn’t have anything else to do and I was kinda reeling from the confusion of this book and wanted something to ground me. The next book was one I had wanted to read for a very long time. You’ll see whether it did the job or not. 

As always if you want to read this but don’t want to spend the money without knowing for sure you are going to like it, go to your local library. You’d be surprised what they have on their shelves just waiting to be discovered. Trust me, I’m a lesbrarian.

[apple-grass-and-smiles]

Anakin Skywalker and Gifts

Hi, welcome to another round of my Star Wars thoughts. Ever since the Phantom Apprentice aired I’ve been thinking a lot about Anakin and the gifts he’s given people. As a person who spends his entire life with relatively few possessions he can call his own, it is logical to assume that physical gifts are especially meaningful to Anakin. Over the past few months, I have also been thinking a lot about how Anakin is defined by the women in his life more so than the men (male characters often act as a foil to Anakin, which is a meta of its own about Anakin and his more stereotypically feminine characteristics). Then, because my brain does that, it felt logical to analyze Anakin’s gifts that he has given the women in his life and how those physical tokens represent his relationship with them. Below I’ll go over gifts Anakin gives Shmi, Padmé, Ahsoka, and Leia in roughly chronological order. (There’s also a TL;DR at the end if you want the short version.)

Shmi and C-3P0

The gift Anakin gives Shmi is a partially-finished C-3P0. He states in TPM that he is building Threepio to help Shmi and when Anakin leaves, Threepio acts as his stand-in (something that is a bit of a trend for Anakin). Anakin knows that his mother’s life is difficult and that the best thing he can give her is someone who will help to ease the burdens she carries. By leaving Threepio with Shmi he is doing his best to ensure that 1) someone will be there to take care of her the same way she always did for him and 2) that she won’t be alone. While we don’t see much interaction between Shmi and Threepio in Legends or canon, it is easy to assume that, especially in the early times after Anakin left, Threepio was Shmi’s main companion and tie to her son, so Anakin’s gift is more a surrogate son and constant companion than a protocol droid.

It is also worth noting that while Anakin clearly didn’t want Threepio sold (he says so in TPM), the droid could have been sold and brought Shmi money if that was what was needed. You could claim that Anakin also left some financial security and a better chance at Shmi buying her freedom by leaving Threepio; this just has less canon support.

Padmé and...

The Japor Snippet

Anakin gives Padmé tons of gifts over their time together. The first, and most frequently referenced, is the japor snippet. Anakin tells Padmé exactly what this gift is supposed to give/represent for her (good fortune and a reminder of him). From an out-of-universe point of view, the snippet also acts as a great visual symbol of Anakin and Padmé’s relationship. You see it a lot in ROTS as a marker for when Anakin and Padmé get to be themselves instead of their public personas. Ultimately, Lucas uses the snippet as a visual shortcut to remind us of the love between these two and Anakin’s intense infatuation/love/devotion for Padmé. For simplicity’s sake, and in hopes of keeping this from getting too long since the japor snippet’s symbolism can easily be an entire meta on its own, I’m saying that it represents good fortune and Anakin’s enduring devotion to Padmé.

C-3P0

This is a gift that is really only explicitly stated (to my knowledge) in Stover’s ROTS novelization. He writes a scene where Anakin passes Threepio onto Padmé very early on in their marriage as a “devotion-gift”. He explains that he can’t really keep Threepio because he’s a Jedi and that even if he could it wouldn’t make much sense for a Jedi to have a protocol droid. When “giving” Threepio to Padmé, Anakin explains that he “didn’t have many friends when [he] was a kid...so [he] built one”. In this case, Threepio once again acts as a stand-in for Anakin when he is away, but this time the droid is more of a friend than a helper or son like he was for Shmi. Anakin knows he can’t always be there for Padmé so he passes along his childhood friend and one of his greatest creations to her so that she can always have a friend with her. 

His Lightsaber

This scene is great because once again Anakin lays out exactly what this particular gift represents. He repeats Obi-Wan’s mantra that the lightsaber is a Jedi’s life before handing it over to Padmé. There’s really not much to explain here, but this does create a nice parallel once Anakin gives Ahsoka her lightsabers, which, partially, symbolize him giving her her life/ability survive. Here he puts his life in Padmé’s hands as a sign of trust and devotion and later he will hand Ahsoka her blades to get across a similar message. 

His Padawan Braid

Honorable mention to this *maybe*-kind-of-canon gift that features in the 2003 Clone Wars and the Stover ROTS novelization. In both pieces of media, Anakin gives Padmé his Padawan braid almost immediately after being Knighted. In Stover’s book, he says that the braid is a devotion-gift to Padmé and the “one thing that [Anakin] truly owned, that he had earned, that he was not required to renounce. One gift he could give to celebrate their love.” There are lots of things this gift could represent (I personally lean towards that it suggests that while he has devoted the past decade to the Jedi, he plans to give his future to Padmé), but since the braid really has no presence in things that are undeniably canon that I know of, we’re keeping this short and literal and saying the braid equals his devotion to Padmé. 

Ahsoka and Her Lightsabers-

At this point I think there have easily been thousands of words written about Anakin giving Ahsoka back her lightsabers and all of the ones I have seen are stunning. In particular I want to point out Dave Filoni’s interpretation of what the lightsabers, and the fact that Anakin modified them to be blue, represent:

“Him tinkering with her lightsabers while she is gone shows that he was always thinking of her. And the lightsabers are then a representation of her in the story, and his thoughtfulness regarding her.” -Dave Filoni (transcript taken from here and the quote is in this video)

So, for Filoni and I blue lightsabers equal a representation of Ahsoka’s role in Anakin’s life. If you want to read more about this idea, I’d strongly recommend these: meta by @soccialcreature​ and @novaewalker​, fic-like meta by @cross-d-a​, and meta by @meandmyechoes​. They all say what I’m thinking much more succinctly and clearly!

The other angle I want to point out is written about beautifully by @gffa​ here. Basically, the lightsabers come to represent not just Anakin’s role in Ahsoka’s life, but also the Jedi and the home and people Ahsoka desperately wants to return to. Lightsabers have always been the symbol of the Jedi both in- and out-of-universe. As has been mentioned and shown countless times in canon, lightsabers are also a symbol of a Jedi’s ability to survive (”This weapon is your life.”) and Anakin giving Ahsoka back her lightsabers is ultimately what keeps her alive throughout the Siege of Mandalore arc and her leaving one of them behind is what sells the story of her death, protecting her from being hunted by the Empire for a while. 

Ultimately, the lightsabers are full of symbolism, but it is most worth noting that they represent: 1) Anakin caring/thinking about Ahsoka, 2) the Jedi and Ahsoka’s chance to return to them and Anakin, and 3) Ahsoka’s ability to survive the events that will follow. 

Side note: I think it is also worth noting that Anakin tried to give Ahsoka back her silka beads at the end of the S5, but she turns them down. I’d argue that while the lightsabers stand for the Jedi as a group, the beads were a symbol of Anakin asking Ahsoka specifically to come back as his Padawan. When Anakin offered the silka beads he wanted Ahsoka to come back and to have nothing have changed, which is why she has to turn them down. The lightsabers are an open invitation to rejoin the Jedi when she is ready and a promise that he will accept her back whenever and however she chooses to return. 

Leia and Luke-

This one is a bit tricky. Leia obviously doesn’t have a great relationship with Anakin and Anakin doesn’t ever get a chance to develop a meaningful one with her. However, I think Leia is fundamental in understanding Anakin and that’s why I felt it was important to include her in this. She is probably the character who Anakin would say is the best representation of his legacy since she manages to symbolize so many parts of what makes Anakin Anakin. (She is a blood relative to Shmi and Padmé and therefore representative, at least in appearance and genetics, of them; she has a lot of Ahsoka’s personality; if you stick with Stover’s ROTS then she’s the child that Anakin sensed was focused on since he didn’t sense Luke...; she’s a great amalgamation of traits and people that defined Anakin.) While we never have an obvious moment where Vader hands over a gift to Leia the same way he does in all the examples above, I would argue that Anakin’s gift to Leia is the most meaningful one of all: he gives her Luke. 

People have pointed out over the years (I tried to find the posts about it but couldn’t; if you find one, please let me know) that Leia must have been thrilled to learn Luke was her brother because a twin meant she had family again. Luke is one of Leia’s best friends and a source of hope for her. Legends, and possibly canon that I don’t know about, has moments where Luke helps Leia to find the strength and peace to finally be able to forgive Vader for the horrible things he did to her and that helps her to be able to be happier and more fulfilled. This is definitely the most abstract of all the gifts, but I think it is important to recognize Luke and the love, forgiveness, and peace he brings into Leia’s life as the one gift that Anakin gave his daughter. He gave her so much pain, but also a person to help carry her through it, which is ultimately what all of his gifts have been about. Luke and Leia are the culmination of Anakin’s attempts to give companionship and love to the women he loves most in the galaxy. 

TL;DR-

All of Anakin’s gifts to the women he loves are meant to represent something  more abstract/deeper he wants to give them. Shmi gets Threepio who acts as a surrogate for her missing son and also provides much-needed help. Padmé gets multiple gifts from Anakin: the japor snippet (representing good fortune and her relationship with Anakin), C-3P0 (to be her friend when Anakin is away), his lightsaber (lightsabers equal the life of the Jedi they belong to), and his Padawan braid (open to interpretation, though I think, and Stover implies by calling it a devotion-gift, it’s a sign of him devoting his future to her). Ahsoka gets her lightsabers from Anakin, which represent that she will always have a place with the Jedi, the place she has in his life, and her ability to survive. The modification of the colors signify that he has continued to think about and care for her while she has been gone. Finally, Anakin gives Leia her twin brother, who helps to fill Leia’s need for family and brings additional peace, forgiveness, and joy into her life. All of these add together to tell a story of Anakin trying throughout his life to pass along love and his companionship to the women that mean the most to him.

[finalfantasyxivwritings]

Hi there! Hopefully this contact is welcome--I've really enjoyed reading your miqo'te content and headcanons, and finally wrote a heatfic of my own (FemKeeper!WoL). I'd be very interested in your opinion, if you've spare time/energy to give it a look? AO3 @ works/21699931

Interlude: Satisfaction on AO3

Rating: Explicit

Summary: 

If it had been any other time, any other place, her heat would have passed unnoticed. As is, being stranded on the First, the Warrior of Darkness finds herself in great need. A certain meddling Ascian can't resist prying, and a spying crystal cat is caught out.

I want you to know how truly hilarious getting this ask is anon, if only because I was literally reading your fic last night before I went to bed and I was fucking loving every word of it. Every conceivable ounce of love that I can feel for a fic is exactly what I was feeling while reading it--compiled with utter amusement when I open up my inbox and eventually do a double-take when I realized that said fic and the one you’re pointing me to are one in the same.

To give my most honest opinion, you’ve crafted an amazing piece of work for the fandom, and one I think--in regards to headcanons on miqo’te heats and the like--showcases beautifully a lot of what I like to think has become fairly intriguing ideas of miqo’te physiology. I mean, it’s one thing for someone like me to slap down a nice list of headcanons, especially more scientific-oriented takes on how the course of a heat makes sense in the first place.

But your work? It goes above and beyond, the next level, takes those headcanons and fucking runs with them off into the goddamn sunset. Because you wrote out some bomb-ass smut while also imparting a lot of really sweet takes about how keeper females would go into heat, but also (more importantly) why they would in the first place. Seekers are a little easier to work with given their structure of life, but keepers have always unfortunately missed out on the lore train and it’s always amazing to see creators like you filling that void.

"Dear hero," he drawls, pivoting on his heel to face you,"are you aware that your aether is, quite literally, glowing?"

Your stoic mask crumbles at the accusation. You've hidden your symptoms so well! How is it the Ascian of all people can tell? Y'shtola is your only companion who should be able to see you, and she will at least be circumspect if not outright sympathetic. Seeker heats differ from Keepers', though the discomfort of denying one is similarly stressful. In matriarchal Keeper societies, a females' heat is designed to draw the attention of compatible mates; their scent and aether headily alluring to those that matched. It seems, however improbable and inconvenient, that Emet-Selch is a potential partner.

I think this section really hits it off, and probably the point where I realized just how well-explained your concept is--and it makes so much sense!! Like, you got my brain all jazzed up about the new possibilities opened up with the concept of aether and how it plays a part in heat. You succinctly set up this set of information in a way that made sense and beautifully set-up the ensuing smut.

So case in point: it’s amazing! I think you have a lot of great ideas and you implemented them wonderfully (like I haven’t begun to go into detail on how good the writing itself is--you write Emet-Selch utterly perfect, I cannot stress that enough).

So just like. Anyone who reads this ask needs to go read this fic. If you want some Emet-Selch/Keeper!WoD/Exarch content, then this right here is exactly what you should be reading now. Like right now. Seriously.

[shipping-receiving]

Jaime x Brienne Slow Burn AU Fics

*cracks knuckles* Get ready because this is a long post. I had an anon who specifically requested “well written, well developed slow burn multi-chapter AU”. I’ve already included a few that fit those criteria in my Modern AU fic recs [ Part 1 / Part 2 ] so I thought I’d dig up a mixed bag of AUs for this list (Regency! Apocalypse! Fairy Tales!).

But just for ease of access, here are my Modern AU recs (so far) that fit this criteria, depending how slow of a burn you want. Some of them actually only happen over the course of a few days (e.g. On the Night’s Watch), but I think you still get That Slow Burn Satisfaction:

Clean hands by Gwen77

Fever by @ladyinredfics

It’s Like Weather by ssstrychnine aka @oneangryshot

Madonna of the Balcony by QuizzicalQuinnia

A Year in the Life by Coraleeveritas

On the Night’s Watch by @miss-m-calling

Beast and the Beast by SigilBroken aka @chickren

Now onward to some of that Enemies to Friends to Lovers action:

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All the Roads are Winding by ShirleyAnn66 AU: Modern / Historical / Post-Apocalyptic / +++++ rating: T (more like M in parts) | word count: 264695 | chapters: 29

Why not start with the AU fic to end all AU fics – ShirleyAnn66′s multiverse epic, featuring Jaime and Brienne as physicists who explore five alternate versions of themselves. There are six interwoven parallel slow burns. SIX. Physicists, Prince/Princess (Political Marriage), Singer/Farmer (Best Friends), Prisoner/Septa, Megastar/Private Investigator, and Mad “Jon” (Post-Apocalyptic). Note that there are only 29 chapters in the story, but 35 including the Author’s Notes, and compilations of the five universes so they can be read as single stories.

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Before Destruction by renaissance AU: Pride and Prejudice / Regency rating: T | word count: 102716 | chapters: 32

One of the best multi-chapter fics ever created for this pairing, this Pride and Prejudice AU has Brienne as a governess for the Starks and Jaime as Captain Lannister, but both of them still retain their original personalities (Jaime is still the snarky one where Brienne is reserved and insecure). Perfectly plotted, and I think it conveys more of the tension and antagonism so typical of J/B than even the original dynamic between Elizabeth and Darcy.  

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Shoot the Moon by @hardlyfatal AU: Modern rating: E | word count: 80250 | chapters: 33

corporate!Jaime and writer!Brienne meet on a ranch (with a host of other characters) and find themselves struggling between hostility and deep attraction. There’s also some very endearing domesticity in the second half, with Jaime’s kids Myrcy and Tommen. This probably isn’t that slow in terms of getting to the smut, but it’s really slow in terms of getting all those feelings out in the open. The author also has two other WIP slow burn fics that she is still updating regularly – Man of the Hour (Brienne is a vet, Jaime her mysterious neighbour) and the epic Western Desperado (this has three pairings: J x B, Sansa x Sandor, Dany x Jon).

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What is True, But Not Ideal by Vera AU: Modern rating: M | word count: 74868 | chapters: 19

I’m kicking myself that I didn’t think to rec this recently completed story in my first two Modern AU lists. Brienne meets Tyrion first, who hires her as a bartender in his pub, and they eventually become best friends. Jaime only appears from Chapter 4, but the Brienne/Tyrion friendship has really interesting implications for the J/B dynamic. I don’t want to spoil too much about the narrative because the direction of the story is so surprising, but it does take darker turns as the rest of the Lannisters and Starks are introduced.

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Bargains by Gwen77 AU: Regency rating: M | word count: 18171 | chapters: 11

Another Regency AU, this time with an arranged marriage between Jaime and Brienne. Jaime is still entangled with Cersei to some degree for most of this story, with painful consequences for J/B, but Jaime and Brienne’s growing feelings for each other are handled beautifully, and ultimately they get their happily ever after. This is the shortest fic in this list, but perhaps more so because Gwen77 writes heartbreaking prose so succinctly. No one writes repressed!JB like her, so it still feels like a slow burn despite its relative brevity.

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Scandal by Gwen77 AU: Victorian rating: T | word count: 21652 | chapters: 11

Look, I try not to rec more than one fic per author for each of my lists, but I would lay down my life for Gwen77′s four AUs. This one is set in a 19th Century version of Westeros, with Brienne as a journalist/writer and Jaime as a politician in a constitutional monarchy. This is one of the most unique versions of their dynamic that I’ve read, partly because this version of Jaime is more conflicted and elusive. Chapter 7 in particular leaves me breathless.

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The Dark, Dread Toyshop by @miss-m-calling AU: The Magic Toyshop / Modern-ish with a bit of magic rating: M | word count: 68755 | chapters: 25

Based on Angela Carter’s The Magic Toyshop, this underrated story is a mysterious coming-of-age tale that sees Brienne (and her siblings Pod and Sansa) sent to live with their uncle Tywin and his sons Jaime and Tyrion in his eerie toyshop. (This makes Jaime and Brienne cousins, just a warning for those who find that too incestuous.) This diverges quite a lot from the plot points of GoT/ASOIAF, but still remains enthralling.

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Everyone Has Secrets by ellaria AU: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo / Modern rating: E | word count: 113057 | chapters: 23

Another legendary, utterly seductive multi-chapter fic based on Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Jaime is a political journalist and Brienne is the hacker hired alongside him to investigate the disappearance of Sansa Stark ten years earlier. If you’re familiar with Larsson’s story, you’ll know to expect explicit sexual content and violence. (But don’t worry, all ends well, not the way Larsson left off his story with regard to his two main characters.)

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Tale As Old As Time by @brienneofthrace AU: Beauty and the Beast / Fairy Tale rating: T | word count: 56570 | chapters: 17

Jaime is the bitter lord of Casterly Rock (not an actual beast), and Brienne offers to become his hostage in exchange for the release of her captive father. This story plays fast and loose with both canons, which makes reading it really fun and unexpected. I was very lucky to have found this around the time the author chose to come back and complete it (I think there must have been a 4 year break somewhere)!

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Living Fiction by Archetype_Electraheart AU: Modern rating: M | word count: 72757 | chapters: 41

No-nonsense Brienne is assigned to be difficult Jaime’s new editor at Winterfell Publishing. This makes for some amazingly snarky interactions (and begrudging mutual respect) from the get-go, but perhaps one of the more unexpected elements of this story is the author’s decision to have Brienne be a longtime model/muse for photographer Loras Tyrell. Brienne’s relationship with her body thus manifest in a very different and refreshing way.

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+ BONUS: WIPs

I prefer not to rec incomplete fics on the off-chance they’ll never be completed (wow I wish season 8 was never completed) but these are two of my favourite WIPs that have been updated fairly recently:

With All Your Faults by @seaspiritwrites AU: A League of their Own / Baseball / 1940s rating: T | word count (so far): 91818 | chapters: 26/34

Well on its way to becoming a classic, this fic has been an absolute joy to read. Based very loosely on the movie A League of Their Own, and set in World War II-era America, Brienne is recruited to play in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, on a team coached by maimed former baseball star Jaime. As slow and as satisfying and as wholesome of a burn as you could possibly get.

for our world is cold and full of monsters by @trashy-greyjoy aka chancellor_valdez AU: Zombie Apocalypse rating: not rated | word count (so far): 32725 | chapters: 11/?

It’s the Jaime and Brienne road trip, except they have to fight zombies on the way. No prizes for guessing how Jaime loses his hand in this one. I genuinely love the way this fic is written – there’s a lot of great lines in this – and I don’t think it has gotten as much attention as it deserves. It seems to be on a bit of a hiatus (understandably after Season 8) but the author has promised to get back to it and I can’t wait.

[fight-surrender]

The 5 Stages of Wayward Son

 Word Count: 1283

This has been knocking around in my brain since September 24th, but others came along and shared their feelings and thoughts about this book far more eloquently and succinctly than I could. Plus it just hurt too fucking much to think about. I think I even have a draft somewhere on the topic that I started and stopped when this was all fresh.

But then Rainbow Rowell twisted the knife yesterday with her annotated playlist blog post. I started to read it but had to stop. My more emotionally mature fandom friends read it and messaged me weeping.

I know my tears are there, I can feel them under the surface. But through a confluence of life events and experiences, I’ve gotten really fucking good at locking them up. My therapist noted that they’re beyond locked up, I disassociate from my emotions completely. I’m working on it, slowly some feelings are percolating up. When Simon kissed Baz in Carry On, it was like an electric shock to me. I felt joy for the first time in years. That book made me so fucking happy. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why, but I joined up with this fandom, started writing fic, made some of the most incredible friends of my life and counted down to Wayward Son.

Shock, Denial, Isolation- when I googled the stages of grief, stage one was a hodgepodge of these. My heart stopped when I read “when I break up with Baz” in chapter 2 of WS. This was my worst nightmare, the thing I thought Rainbow would never actually do to us. I mean, she teased it, but I just thought…I almost put the book down. But I pressed on, convincing myself it will get better. I dug out an ancient emergency cigarette around chapter 11. My brain on repeat: “it will get better; they will be ok” like a drumbeat.  I was home alone, sitting in my leather club chair with my pets when I finished the book. I’m not sure I’ll forget that spot, that moment. Good God will it be emblazoned into my psyche like 9/11? But at that moment, I felt like the rug had been pulled out from under me and I was flat on my face in the dirt. Pure shock. All I could do was ugly cry in my bed while my pets looked on with concern. I isolated. I drank whiskey and ate cheese. I felt pretty insane— still do to be honest. Traumatized from a book? A work of fiction?

I’ve been thinking about it nearly constantly since then. Because I’m disturbed. Ask anyone. I know Rainbow has said that this is a very Baz-centric book, but for me it was all Simon. I needed Simon to be ok. I needed to know that you can go through trauma, where you lose everything you thought you were and that you can recover from that and be loved for what it made you. What you became. Simon’s trauma was my trauma. His worthlessness was my worthlessness. But this was fiction, this is where I get to escape from my humdrums and go to a world where at least someone gets a happy ending.

That’s what fiction is. An escape from reality. I get it, Rainbow, that’s not real life. Wayward Son is supposed to be like real life, but that’s not what I wanted, it’s not what I needed.

Instead, I got what I already have. Sinking dread. Uncertainty. Self-doubt. I wanted to rage, numb, distract. Anything to avoid looking down the barrel of my own sense of worthlessness and what got me there. In WS, Simon Snow gives voice to the troubled whispers of my own brain.  Carry On used to be my emotional support book. Whenever I was anxious or sad, it was like a drug. “And then he kissed me,” “because we match,” were like dopamine hits. Now it feels hollow. It feels like a lie.

This was obviously a case where my expectations were about a billion percent wrong. I was hoping for angst with a happy ending. I got angst with an uncertain ending. In hindsight, I kinda think I would have been ok if I knew ahead of time that it was a middle book. It wouldn’t have been such a shock. But here we are.

I’m legit afraid of Anywhere the Wind Blows. At this point I think Rainbow is capable of anything. I know she maintains that she loves Simon and Baz as much as we do. But does she love them together or apart? Maybe she decides they should just be friends. Maybe somebody dies. I mean, Elanor didn’t get Park. Rainbow said that she’s writing an epic love story: isn’t Romeo and Juliet an epic love story? I simply don’t know if my heart can take it.

I need to take a moment here. This whole piece is a moment—I actually have the house to myself—which is rare—because that’s where I have usually been: alone. I usually face my traumas and falls alone. I’ve been through some shit that would make your skin crawl. I’ve coped and muddled through by myself because I’ve never had any support. Simon has Penelope and Baz—I never had anyone, mostly due to my own habit of isolating and numbing. Until now. This fandom, the friends I’ve made. I don’t know where I would have gone, where I would be without them. I thank them from the bottom of my heart. I love them with my whole heart. Every chamber. (particularly “the moms group”, @penpanoply @vkelleyart and @carryonsimoncarryonbaz )

That’s the crux of it isn’t it? Simon has Baz. He has someone who loves him despite everything that’s happened to him, who loves him on purpose. He has Baz, his soulmate. He has Penny, his dread companion. If he can’t be ok, what hope is there for me?

So anyway, back to the stages of grief, I am currently stuck at stage 2- anger and stage 4- depression. I don’t think there’s any room for stage 3- bargaining. I mean, I’d sell my soul for Simon and Baz to live happily ever after as a couple, but Rainbow has made it abundantly clear that she’s a contrarian and will gleefully do the opposite of what readers wish. I just learned that the hard way with WS. So bargaining is out of the question. In the meantime, I’ll just read fanfiction of them being a happy couple.

I put WS in the place inside me where I put the things that hurt too much: the difficult euthanasias at my job as a veterinarian, when my dog died last year, when my marriage exploded six years ago (I’ve put it back together), a lifetime of miscellaneous hurts and traumas. I need to take these things out of their hiding place. @adamarks said it beautifully in their fic, Oh, Hello, I need to scrub out the inside of my heart with tears and elbow grease and anger and work. I want to put myself back together piece by piece until I resemble something presentable. So eventually I can get to stage 5-acceptance (and hope, but that’s scary as fuck).

I sure hope you haven’t read to this point, because this is all just me working through my feelings about this book and it’s probably mind-numbingly boring. If you did, I hope you found at least a shred of something relatable. If not, I apologize for the wasted time. I promise to go back to my regularly scheduled programming after this. I just needed to shit this log out of my brain so I can move on.

I love you all.

Viv

[fallinyourtidalwaves]

I feel so relieved and comforted to read Mary Ruefle discuss how her gender has no influence on her writing. As I’ve discovered myself more through art, and in Life, I have felt this exact sentiment deeply. In my life I of course experience my womanhood and all the historical cultural societal weight that comes with that, but with art - I find it impossible for anything I create to be reliant on or defined by my gender. These emotions and creations run much deeper than this, and, as Mary Ruefle writes so succinctly “I see the logic but I deny it.”

She later writes that while it has been shown that the minds of men and women are different, this is “simply circuitry (means) to the same end...My proof is that men and women die in the same way...The point of sameness in the different bodies.”

Of course this is very personal and subjective and with something as complex as Art this is not a truth for everyone. But I do think it’s beautifully worded and makes me feel much more liberated in creating. ❤️

[veliseraptor]

all right, it’s been a little while and I’ve got a whole bunch more to recommend, so it’s time for 

RAGNAROK FIC RECS, PART TWO

(part one is here)

from the mouths of babes by dannyboyy

The AU where Hela grew up with Thor and Loki. It’s very well done, I really like the Hela voice and the way it proposes Hela might interact with both Loki and Thor (but especially Loki). 

blóðflekkug by incandescent

I haven’t found much Hela fic so far, but this is one of the very best of those I’ve found. It’s beautifully written, jumping in time, exploring Hela’s past with Odin (and her present in the time of the movie); exploring her mindset and who she is.

and i’ve loved in shades of wrong by ginnyweasleys (Loki/Valkyrie)

I recommended this the other day in the Loki/Valkyrie recs list, but it’s delightful sparring-to-sex PWP so I’m recommending it again.

so much to learn (and no one left to fight) by TheOtherOdinson

Immediately post-Ragnarok, Thor and Loki sit down, get drunk, and talk. This is just the kind of quiet, dialogue-heavy, emotions-tugging fic that I love, and that I needed after the movie.

Laughing and Not Being Normal by etymologyplayground

As the summary says: “the Revengers bum around.” A light-hearted and delightful take on the post-movie roadtrip into space. 

Together the Light by Lizardbeth

Asgard’s survivors manage to land on Earth, and it’s time for a ceremony to mourn the dead. A touching and melancholy fic dealing with Loki’s grief and lingering feelings of being an outsider. 

In Aporia by mellish

I love this fic. It has a very Loki-feeling, not just in the dialogue but in the prose itself, and the opening line is fantastic. It’s more post-Ragnarok character study of Loki than anything, and it does that very, very well.

Survival Mode by thespectaclesofthor (Loki/Grandmaster, WIP, dub-con/non-con)

I’ve reread this fic like four times so far because it is maybe the single iddiest porn that I’ve found possibly ever and I’m so into it. Like. Really. If you are like me and in Frostmaster for all the power differentials and consent issues and fucked up madness... *gestures gleefully in this fic’s direction*

just in it for the game by grim_lupine (Thor/Loki)

I really don’t read a lot of Thor/Loki, but this fic was such delightful fake relationship with Thor and Loki fucking with each other that I really just couldn’t skip recommending it. Loki starts pretending that he and Thor are sleeping together to rehabilitate his image. Things escalate from there.

there’s no room to write it all by LuckyDiceKirby

Loki uses the memory trick he used on Valkyrie to take a trip through Thor’s head. Thor returns the favor. I’d love to see more fic playing with that little bit of new Loki power, and this scratched that itch very nicely - it’s tagged Thor/Loki but can be read as gen.

Legacy by gaslightgallows 

Valkyrie talks to Loki about Frigga. I love the idea of Val and Frigga having known each other and having a relationship, and this fic is a lovely one looking at the idea of - well - legacy.

through and through with fire by notbecauseofvictories

Instead of Hela dying, she gets dragged kicking and screaming onto the ship, power greatly reduced. Things go from there, because Thor can’t just let a sibling go.

Splinter in My Fingertips by gaslightgallows (Loki/Valkyrie)

I just recced this in my Loki/Valkyrie recs post too, but I figured I’d go ahead and mention it again (good fics are worth reccing multiple times!) - a short, porny fic where Valkyrie and Loki have sex in a closet, and there is no pun on their sexualities intended in that sentence.

the real banishment is the family we made along the way by scioscribe

I loooove this fic. 

Instead of imprisoning Loki after The Avengers, Odin does the economical thing and sends him to share a prison with Hela. They bond. Ish. (I desperately want more.)

Let No Witness to My Weakness by thelogicalghost

Goes into (speculative) Infinity War stuff, but I’m including it because it is of the genre of “Clint interacting with Loki in Infinity War and being hella uncomfortable” that I do not expect to get in canon and was startled to see fic about. And really, really enjoyed this one. 

saviors of all we (haven’t) seen by savage_starlight (character death)

Another one that actually spans from Thor through to speculative Infinity War, and it hurts. I’m just putting that out there. It really hurts. (But, like, in a good way.)

night for many miles by monsterq

One night in the kitchen on the ship, the Revengers join up in cooking dinner. That’s really the best way to describe this fic: it’s quietly emotional and describes the relationships between them succinctly and elegantly.

Ascension, From a Certain Angle by Tandirra (Loki/Grandmaster, dubcon)

Creepy slanted Frostmaster dubcon, also known as my favorite kind of Frostmaster. Doesn’t actually get into the porn, but it’s still hot and vaguely sinister and just what I want from this pairing.

[windwardrose]

My official post on Avengers: Infinity War

I was jittery heading to the theater on Saturday because I was so excited/nervous/curious/waiting. Because I was going to see a big finals-week release Marvel film without the people I had always gone to see them with before. Because - unrelatedly - I had had the second section of a big conversation that morning and was still running a little high-frequency because of it. And because I didn’t know what would happen, by the end of the evening, to these characters whom I’d known since my first year of college.

I think I knew from the first scene on that it wasn’t going to be like the other films. Maybe in a way I knew from the first moments, when we opened to a dark screen and a dark and desperate voiceover. Well. It wasn’t like the other films.

What was it exactly that Thanos says in the trailer?

In time, you will know what it’s like to lose.

[One of these days I’m going to write an essay: “My coming-of-age as summarized by the MCU.” That quote, initially encountered in the middle of what may have been the nastiest semester of my life so far, will definitely be featured.]

We never actually got that line in the film, unless I forgot it. Which is possible, considering everything else. But it’s perfect, because that’s what happens. The entire movie, the Avengers and the Guardians and their friends are trying every option they can think of to beat Thanos. They always think there’s a way out. They hand over the stones when their loved ones are on the line, because of course it won’t take that kind of sacrifice, they’ll think of something, they’ve always managed to win the fight before! Surely they can pull it off this time, too. Surely.

Loki alone tries three or four different plans in the first few minutes of the movie. One of them even involves handing over the Tesseract. And Loki says over his shoulder to Thor: I believe the sun will shine on us again, brother.

There’s a thought, Loki.

[Hold onto that thought.]

He’s dead a minute later.

*

I got a little mad at some of the characters while watching. Long-time follows may know that one of my favorite sequences in Fullmetal Alchemist (that’s Brotherhood if we’re talking anime) involves - well, a choice not entirely unlike the one that Loki and Wanda and Strange and Gamora and Peter all have to make.

Sometimes: sometimes you don’t need to heroically prove that you love someone. Sometimes the proof is looking them in the eye and doing the right thing, even if it doesn’t keep them safe. Sometimes you save the world first and hold your sorrows close if there isn’t time to circle back and save someone else.

This is not really the moral of Infinity War. T

There are, however, three characters who believe it:

- Doctor Strange, if you subscribe to the theory where he saw the future and knew that winning in the end only came if they lost that day.

- Wanda, during the final battle. It doesn’t help in the long run. [Pesky Time Stone.] It does no good at all.

- Thanos, our villain. But he takes it too far. If the other characters spend too long hunting for an alternative that doesn’t involve handing over someone else as a sacrifice, he doesn’t spend long enough. He wants to save the universe? One must kill half of it to save it. Obviously.

[This is a fellow who is not inventive enough.]

He believes it wholeheartedly: all things must bow before the greater goal. It’s just that he’s chosen a pretty cruddy goal.

But he’s still willing to throw Gamora off a cliff for it, under the silver-bright curl of Vormir’s moon and the watchful eyes of Red Skull.

[Red Skull, who is regretful and alone in a way that his greatest opponent will never be even on the worst days. Steve Rogers has the ultimate revenge in this case, more than he knows.]

*

Things I loved about this movie:

- The whole ragtag, well-intentioned, snarky, broken lot of MCU folk getting to be themselves in every line and action. I have never liked Tony Stark better than I did in this film. Thor finally clicked into focus for me as a character. Peter Parker is a delight - a heartbreaking delight, retrospectively. The Guardians are exactly as they should be. And Cap and Bucky get to meet again - I was up on the edge of my seat as they came to Wakanda, waiting for that reunion.

- The fights - which had me nervous in a way I don’t usually feel during Marvel fight sequences. I think the scale of the combatants made a big difference; they kept emphasizing how huge Thanos was, how powerful, and here are our bright story-folk up against him time and time again. Also, the aliens that attacked Wakanda somehow tripped some switches in my mind to actual oh no mode. Maybe there was just enough dog in their design to do it. Heh.

- Gamora. Her whole awful, awesome backstory, quite succinctly and beautifully summed up. Her first appearance in the movie, sitting front seat in the Guardians’ spaceship, singing to the music and very quietly swaying to the rhythm. Maybe she is “one of the ones that dances,” now. Her courage and her vulnerability and her tough choices.

- Wanda, who pries happiness out of the cracks and crevices of her tragic life, who loves and hopes and wants against the odds, who wields red unburning flame and holds off Thanos and is brave and crying at the same time.

Things I was not as sure about:

- I still don’t know what I think about the Snap. Am I ever supposed to? It’s odd because we know it has to be undone somehow - but we don’t know how, yet. And I don’t know how to feel about such devastation and impermanence at once. Would it have been worse if they’d all quietly collapsed instead of dissolving? Better? Who knows?

- I would not have minded Cap and Black Widow and some of the others having gotten a few more of the little “character moments” that so many of the characters did. There were definitely some “protagonists” for this film more than others. Which is partly a matter of practicality, and I’m definitely biased. But I think everyone does all right with what they have, when they have them.

- I wanted a little more hope at the end.

I am not sure who would have given it - I don’t think anyone felt very hopeful, and I don’t really blame them - but I wished the story could have channeled once more for a moment that flash of defiant optimism we got to see in the first five minutes.

I believe the sun will shine on us again...

[Never mind how much this looks like the end. Hold onto that thought. ]

So think about Infinity War like that, maybe, even though the characters didn’t get the chance to put it into words again. The dark before the dawn. Think how grand it will feel when we tie it together with the end of the story next May.

From now till then, it’s just waiting for the sunrise.

[Aren’t we all doing that, after all - both sides of the screen?]

[rise-above-the-grave]

I requested one of the prompts you did and OH MY GOSH. I'm just... wow, blown away. Somehow you manage to capture feelings and beliefs and truths so succinctly and beautifully, and I will forever be jealous of that. Also, one theme I see a lot in your writing (that I LOVE) with Leia especially is just overcoming what has happened and maybe never moving past it but still just getting through and finding love or striving to succeed and I don't know, it's just great. Basically, you&ur writing rock.

Oh gosh. I don’t know if I’ve ever received a better ask.

I’m about to get real candid with you here. 

I’ve been through a lot of shit. For a good chunk of my life I was raised by someone who wasn’t my parents. And bad shit happened to me. I was basically held as a sex slave for fifteen years. I’ve been tortured, and gang raped, and not-gang raped. 

It took me years and years and years to realize that I actually deserved to be happy, (in fact, that’s still kind of up in the air), and ages for me to understand that I deserved to heal and to have love. In fact, Leia was instrumental in me coming to understand that I deserved to heal. (Moving Target, and Leia realizing that she deserved to heal and have love, was what kind of finally convinced me. Even though I still struggle with it on almost a daily basis.)

Because of that, the theme of love and healing and hope, and maybe not ever going back to what you were before but dealing with and overcoming and finding love and striving to succeed, even through terrible circumstances, is incredibly important to me. It is something I’ve always tried to include in my stories. It’s my story. And so I want my writing to reflect that.

So basically, I’m so, so, so, so happy to hear that someone finds that in my writing. It is the best thing that someone could have told me.

[poorshadowspaintedqueens]

Thank you very much for so politely a.nd concisely replying. And no rest assured you never implied that elia can't have a right to her anger, or that she needs to be a martyr. It's just that I sort of ranted cause these days it's become almost a rule that if you so much as point out lyannas however small and unintentional responsibility then you're pitting women against women for the lulz. And that's so far from the truth. I don't even want lyanna to pay for her mistakes I only want it to be

Acknowledged that she did make mistakes. Martin is not writing Saints. Lyanna wasn’t. Elia shouldn’t be expected to be either. One more thing, I want elia to be show to be less angry at her for “stealing” her husband, and more on the behalf of the ten thousand Dornishman who died at trident. It’s something people ALWAYS ignore. That elia could feel pissed off at both r & l for inciting a war that took so many innocent Dornish lives. We see north nationalism let’s have some for dorne too, yes?

Also your reply was so beautifully put together that I can really tell you understand what I was getting at, that I don’t just want elia to hate lyanna for a cat fight over rhaegar - he wishes he were worth it. I’m so glad you recognise that elia owes no one shit - not Jon con, not rhaegar, not lyanna. Nobody. Plus I don’t want elia to call lyanna names like slut or homewreaker and such. I want an Elia who doesn’t have to stuff her hurt feelings inside who gets to vent them on those who hurt her

*************

Rant away, please! I’ll post and I hope it gets reblogged, because I do feel that this is a discussion that ought to happen in ASOIAF/GoT fandom and in fandom more generally. Pointing out that a character made a mistake is not an invitation to pile on someone, nor does it promote anything resembling an actual discussion of responsibility or the lack thereof. I am sorry that happened to you, and if I at any point have reblogged posts that suggested that pointing out flaws in Lyanna Stark is tantamount to “pitting women against women for the lulz,” that is on me and I apologise for it. (I suspect it has happened, and that while I might like to think of myself as the sort of person who would add a tag to the effect of “well, it’s not that simple BUT…,” that isn’t always the case.)

As you said, succinctly: Martin is not writing saints.

However, one of the tendencies I’ve noticed in fandom is this sense of all-or-nothing. Your character is either a Precious Cinnamon Roll™ or complete trash. And while I understand the impulse–you love a character and you want to protect that character from assholes on the Internet–it is too easy to go from that to a complete lack of nuance. Elia can be a wonderful, brilliant character and still have flaws, as you clearly know. The same is true for Lyanna. For what it’s worth, one of the interesting dynamics that I have been wrestling with in the Not So Dead Ladies Club AU is how Lyanna and Elia emotionally and psychologically deal with the aftermath of Robert’s Rebellion. Even though I am shipping them together in that AU, they are both grappling with the fact that thousands of people died in their names, and the many ramifications of that.

Goodness knows I’ve seen enough people try to argue that the Dornish revenge plots are somehow less valid or less important than the Northern ones, completely forgetting that ten thousand Dornishmen fought at the battle of the Trident under the command of a man who had publicly shamed and betrayed their princess. I have no doubt at all that Elia would have been enraged about that, and that her brothers are as well. Lewyn Martell was their uncle and he was killed in the thick of the fighting even before Elia and her children were brutally murdered. But because of the way the plot and POVs function in ASOIAF, it’s easy for (some) fans to assume that because the Starks and the North are more central to the plot, Northern nationalism is somehow more important than Dornish nationalism.

(And of course also racism. Not malicious on GRRM’s part, I am fairly certain, but there is so much latent, unexamined racism in ASOIAF. It’s fine when white people seek revenge; less so when brown people do, amirite, @lyannas?)

Again, thank you for starting this discussion. I hope it ends up going somewhere useful and maybe giving us all a chance to take a step back and think about how fandom could go back to being the safe space we all want it to be. One of the first steps toward that, in my opinion, is acknowledging that there are very few aspects of the world that exist in black and white, and that fandom is no different.

There’s nothing wrong with acknowledging–or wanting it acknowledged–that an otherwise good character did something wrong or, on the flip side, that a normally terrible character might have the potential to become better. (It feels silly having to point that out in ASOIAF/GoT fandom of all places, but it bears mentioning.)

[alexanderwrites]

Thoughts Roundup - Twin Peaks: The Return, Part 14

 “We Are Like the Dreamer”

David Lynch famously said that he can’t stand people talking after they see a movie. That the movie is the talking. Despite the fact that talking about movies is pretty much my passion, I get what he means. Up until recently, i’d be scouring the internet for hours after each new episode, reading about every talking point, every theory and attempting to unpick every moment. I would do this immediately after watching each episode which, really, makes no sense. Yes, I still like to read reviews and give the forums a quick peruse, but I find that to get the most out of the show, I have to sit with the episode for a while, and see how I feel about it after a good night’s sleep, hence why I write these reviews a day after I see each episode. There is such a thing as too much and too soon, and reading pieces immediately after watching an episode is sort of like seeing the opening act after you see the main show. There is so much to take in and enjoy with each given episode that afterwards I just need to process it in my own way without getting external input.

Talking and writing about the show does have merit and is great fun, I just am starting to realise that I need to separate the show from the writing about the show. I mean, how can it not mess with your expectations, for better or for worse? “We WILL see X character next episode”, “The next episode will be the ONE where everything changes”, “This character from this episode will be the key to the whole mystery”, and so on. How would I feel about The Return if i’d never read a word on it? Part of me wishes I had, but then again good, thoughtful writing about The Return is so complimentary to my enjoyment of the show, and has made me appreciate so much more about it. I suppose my point is: writing, whether good or bad, has affected the way I watch and view the show, and so for the reviews henceforward, I will try and keep my points as individual and unaffected by other writing as possible. Ideally, i’d like what I say about the show to express how I feel, rather than attempt to sway the readers (all 2 of you) a certain way. So, after a good night’s sleep, little to no reading on the episode and a big, fuck-off coffee, let’s talk about...

. The FBI. The episode kicks off and wastes no time in getting straight into things. It’s with openings like these - abrupt and un-establishing - that remind you that this is from one long, 18-hour Script. The endings often remind me of this fact too. Absent are cliff-hangers and buttons, and absent are ‘previously on’s at the beginning of each episode. Instead, here’s Gordon, calling Lucy. It’s strange to think that they haven’t interacted in The Return yet, and even stranger to remember that Gordon hasn’t even been back in town. It’s strange, because they’re two of the funniest characters in the show, and Gordon is one of the most Twin Peaks-y characters, despite not even being from the town. They feel linked, even if it’s by one event 25 years ago, and they are still linked today - they just don’t quite know how, yet. Gordon’s call to Lucy is laugh out loud funny; I have a simple comedy brain, and will always laugh at things that are too loud. Hearing Gordon’s tinny yell pummel its way out the end of her receiver really tickled me, as did his unexplained, confused pause when Lucy told him of her trip to Bora Bora. Not a beach boy, Gordon? So, for a scene that wastes no time, it certainly wastes time, but beautifully so. Their interaction is a miniature reunion that finally links Gordon back to Twin Peaks, which has always felt like his spiritual home.

The Return has had a really interesting way of dispensing information, wherein waiting for a character to discover something that we already know is as gripping as us discovering information in the first place. And so, Gordon finally finds out about Laura Palmer’s missing pages, and how it indicates “Two Coopers”. You have to admire Robert Forster’s straight-face matter-of-factness in handling these topics. He knows it sounds strange, but to him, these are just strange truths that it is his duty to notify his colleagues and superiors of. I guess, as a Bookhouse Boy, Frank Truman has seen enough odd things in those woods to not be particularly fazed by them anymore. 

. Tammy, God Bless you for saying “What’s the significance of the Blue Rose?” when asked by Albert which one question she should ask him about the first ever Blue Rose case. That is what we all want to know, and the last few episodes have given us more clarification of that than I ever expected. She could be seen as an audience surrogate, the newbie to whom everything is explained. But she is also smart, more proactive than the typical rookie, and she gives us the most perfect explanation of what a Blue Rose is: something which does not occur in nature. It’s exciting getting to hear glimpses into the history of the Blue Rose, but a bigger bombshell is dropped in this scene, one so inextricably connected to Dougie and Vegas that it’ll most likely have our FBI crew strolling down the strip by the next episode: Diane is Janey-E’s half sister. But, is she really? Whomever she is texting (which it seems is Doppelcoop), she tells them where the FBI are and that she’s getting them to Vegas. If this were her task, to get the FBI to Vegas, would it not be beneficial to her to speed up the process by claiming that she’s Janey-E’s sister? Who knows. Diane plays her cards very close to her chest, emotionally and informationally, and any time we get too close, we get a big fat Fuck You from her. For now, i’ll take her word for it, because I love the idea that Laura Dern and Naomi Watts are sisters. 

. Monica Belluci has the secrets to the universe, or at least in Gordon’s head. “Who is the dreamer?”. It’s a damn good question, and I think what it means is “whose chess board are they all pawns on?”. Is it Doppelcoop, or is it forces larger than him? Is it “Mother”, or something we saw born in the atomic explosion? The show has always felt like a dream, and while I don’t believe it’ll all turn out to be a literal dream, the feeling is there, and it makes us wonder what version of reality we are seeing. It’s a thoughtful philosophical quandary, and one that clearly disturbs poor old Gordon, the sensitive soul. And next we have our Bowie cameo which is not really a cameo like the clickbait headlines tell us, but a scene from Fire Walk With Me, which, at this point, you almost have to have seen to fully appreciate The Return. It’s interesting that both Gordon and Albert hadn’t remembered exactly what Jeffries had said, and his “Who do you think that is there?” question regarding Cooper is certainly creepy in retrospect. Did Jeffries slip in and out of time, and see who Cooper would become? It feels like he is, if not a key to unlocking the mystery, at least a very important figure in the overall story. I don’t think there is a clear mystery that will ever be solved at this stage, and I think in a sense, it would be disappointing if there was one overall answer to everything. It would be too easy. Instead, lets just take each scene and surprise we get, try and contextualise them as best we can, and figure out what they say rather than what they literally mean. It’s too vague and too abstract for everything to be neatly explained, and really, wouldn’t that ruin some of the fun?

. The boy scouts Bookhouse Boys are heading to Jackrabbit’s palace, and there is something intrinsically melancholy about their journey, because it makes Bobby fondly recall his father. The woods they walk through aren’t the scary, foreboding woods we see in Twin Peaks at night, they’re glowing with sunlight and the home of happier times in Bobby’s childhood. That is, until they find a vortex to the Black and White World and the woman from the Purple World who helped Cooper escape back in Part 3, naked and unable to speak, and with skin still over her eyes. The scene of them exploring gave me serious Lost flashbacks, and like Lost, what comes next is confusing as all hell, yet fairly answerable.........I think. Andy, of all people, disappears to the Black and White Room, which looks absolutely stunning again. The set design throughout The Return has been terrific but perhaps a bit more modern and less stylised than some of Lynch’s other projects, but the Black and White room is a hit of that old school, Eraserhead style set design. The Giant names himself as the “Fireman”, which ties again to fire and electricity being a source of evil, and the Fireman as a pretty decent bloke, really. A window above Andy transforms into a cinema screen which gives him the weirdest “Previously on” the world has ever seen. From the Atomic Blast and the releasing of Bob into our world, to Laura Palmer being taken by the Angels, it is a stirring and haunting mirror into the darkness that summarises succinctly the nature of good and bad in the show’s universe. And now Andy - yes, Andy - has the secret to it all. It’s a hypnotic scene, and i’m increasingly blown away by how well The Return is blending the more abstract, with the linear narrative, to the point where the two cannot exist without each other. Like a blend of a wanderlust through the netherworld, and a real-world sense of purpose and duty, Andy takes the woman to the police station to protect her. He knows more now, and understands that she is in danger. From who? Mother, it seems, is still hot on her tail. His job has never been more important, and keeping her safe was as important as arresting the policeman earlier, a funny scene, the buildup to which seems to have played out almost entirely offscreen. I like it though - it reminds you there’s an entire world going on that you don’t necessarily get to see. The woman chirps and squeaks in her cell, desperately trying to articulate some sort of message. We cannot decipher her message, no matter how hard she tries to speak. So close, yet so far away.

. James has his first non-singing dialogue of the season, and though he doesn’t give too many glimpses into his life, we know that it’s his birthday, and that he’s a security guard at the Great Northern. And that above all, he seems happy. It’s hard to tell from what we see of him, but he smiles so much more easily than he used to, and his brooding seems absent. We’re not really thinking about ol’ forehead, because we’re thinking about his Security Guard buddy, a ‘cockney’ (that accent is maybe the scariest thing in the return yet) who has lots of lines to tell you that he is, in fact, English (Pubs? Check! Football? Check! Antiquated cockney rhyming slang? Check!). It’s weird and a bit goofy, but damn is it a story that hooks you. I love the idea that there are portals to the Other Places all over the world (the book hints that there are many), including in an alley in the East End of London. Does that mean Ian Beale is to discover one next? It’s such an incongruous image but kind of brilliant, and now we have someone sent specifically to Twin Peaks by The Fireman and given one very powerful hand. Arms and hands, man. The references to arms and hands being signs of power, possession, weakness and evil are so numerous, but they seem to be perhaps an entry point for non-human spirits? Then, James goes to check out a creepy noise (never a good idea you dumdum) in the basement of the Great Northern, where that odd ringing noise seems to emit from. It feels like he could die down there; it feels like he is dead down there. It feels like hell, and there’s more excellent set and sound design to thank for that. There is something very bad under every building in Twin Peaks...

. In an episode that has so many talking points to choose from, I think the one that most people will be talking about is Sarah Palmer’s. Her scene is so filled with dread, malice, then satisfyingly gruesome terror that I needed to pause the episode afterwards. It’s an horrific yet celebratory moment: the disgusting harasser gets exactly what we’ve been waiting for the whole series, and gives a sense of power and authority right back in the hands of a tortured woman. Yet, it is pretty clear cut evidence that Sarah is either not a person, or is a person who is, for want of a better word, darksided. Was she the girl who got a bug in the mouth after all? Is she home to spirits as Leland was? It’s hard to tell, but i’m all for the spirits if they cause her to bite a gross dude’s throats out. When Laura took her face...off at the beginning of the Return, there was nothing but light. When her mother did the same, a darkness peered out, as did a cheshire cat grin that takes a pretty high place on the Nightmare Imagery Shitlist of The Return. 

. And we come to an end, with more ambiguous discussions at the Roadhouse. Billy gets a mention, and it is likely that he was the blood soaked creep from the jail cell scene earlier in the episode. “I can’t remember whether my uncle was there”, says one of the characters as she describes when she last saw Billy. She seems worried by this. It’s such a small and seemingly unimportant question, but it feels like the detail that makes her story not of this world. Having characters in more than one place at a time and having characters disappear and reappear has made us look out for any variation on this theme, and the Uncle’s both being there and not being there stands out. The talk of family members reminds me of the screaming car woman with the sick teenager from episodes back, who also listed members of her family, seemingly at random. What is going on in the families of this town? It feels so fucking nightmarish, and while I once didn’t enjoy these moments for their lack of direct connection to the narrative, I now appreciate them as miniature dramas, always unfolding under a shade of darkness, and expanding the universe of the show that you don’t really see. Tonight’s scene ties their drama to Audrey’s through the mention of Tina. How it’ll come together is to be seen, but the word I think most apt to describe it is Purgatory. It feels like these characters are stuck in a strange, haunted, endlessly unfolding narrative. Of abusive family members, of violence, lies and deceit, of nightmarish uncertainty and endless repetition. What would be really interesting would be to piece all these moments together to see what themes and motifs stand out, because like so much else, it feels like there is something pounding at us from beneath its surface.

That’s how I’d describe this episode. There is something underneath this episode, like the face beneath Sarah’s, or the language beneath the Blind Woman’s chirps, or the ringing sound underneath the Great Northern, that we get glimpses at but ultimately cannot decipher. They are brought out by fear, anger, necessity and desperation, and try as we all might, we may not discover what they all mean. Maybe it’s that we listen to the blind woman’s noises, that we venture into the basement, that we look into Sarah Palmer’s eyes, that is important. Perhaps the act of Andy listening to the fireman and watching those scenes unfold is what the purpose is. What matters most is not that the mystery is answered, but that we behold the mystery, and celebrate it. Isn’t that what all of life really is? One big, weird ass mystery that we’re endlessly trying to answer? We can watch the magician’s hands as closely as we like, but his hat will end up empty, and we’ll be left asking questions and wishing we’d just enjoyed the trick. Maybe we’re all in someone else’s dream, or maybe we are the dreamer - what matters most is that the question exists, and that we accept it. What more can you do than that? “What the fuck is going on in Twin Peaks”? We might never know, and that’s okay.