#shippers enjoy it to ;3 i certainly am enjoying it. so much in fact i overdid it with illustrations lol like i really didnt need a chapter

[drawnfamiliarfaces]

Dress to Impress Chapter 1: Open Invitations is out right now on AO3!!!

Illustrations for the fic under the [read more], but I do suggest to try and enjoy them in a fic for more fun experience. ;D

Thanks for checking it out. ;3

[totallyjustabunchofhocuspocus]

Hello! First I want to say I really like your fae story! The world building in it is insane and I'm so glad Buddie is finally together. Second, you don't have to answer but why have you been posting stuff with tommy? I don't understand why any Buddie shipper would like him, he's such a pos in the begins episodes...why write him with Buck? You don't have to answer, but there are lots of Buddie shippers switching sides and I don't see why.

Hiiiii.

So, first off thank you! I'm so glad you're enjoying Come Away, and I hope the ending coming up satisfies :) Second, ngl, I did consider not answering that question cause I really don't like wading into fandom drama...but that was a super respectful ask and I DO quite like the character so...fuck it, we ball.

This is probably gonna be long and rambly but the TL;DR is I think the fact that Tommy Kinard IS introduced as a piece of shit makes for really interesting nuance to the character and also I'm a multishipper...just cause bacon and pineapple is my favorite pizza flavor doesn't mean I DON'T like pepperoni or have decided never to eat it again (also, I have less than 10k words of BuckTommy on AO3 and, like, almost 300k of Buddie, so I don't think I've switched sides, lol)

As for why I can like Tommy and specifically Tommy and Buck together despite the aforementioned POS'ness, sure I'll cop to part of it being I am just so damn excited for bi!Buck, I'd have been happy with just about anyone awakening that in him. But also because Tommy, to me, is a fucking interesting character and DOES make a lot of sense as someone that Hen and Chim could forgive and be friends with, and that could be good for Buck.

First off there are some things I think we have to acknowledge about Tommy that are factual or can be inferred as factual from the show. 1. For his timeline to make ANY sense, he can generously be in his late thirties to early forties. For it to make sense without him being some kind of prodigy in a couple areas, he has to be in his mid-to-late forties. 2. He was at LEAST partially raised by someone who reminds him uncomfortably of Gerrard, a CARTOONISHLY boorish, evil, bigot. 3. He was closeted for a very long time.

All of those factors together make for someone who honestly, it would have been nearly IMPOSSIBLE for them NOT to be a piece of shit, and a textbook example of how patriarchal systems, toxic masculinity, and white supremacy are also harmful to the people who benefit from them.

Let me preface this by saying I don't think the harm Tommy suffered was anywhere near as great as what Hen and Chim (or any person of color) go through. And, of course, Hen and Chim don't owe him shit. Forgiving him or not is entirely up to them and the right choice whatever they choose.

My point is, Tommy almost certainly grew up in an environment where his worst flaws and character traits were just...normal. I think a lot of people don't understand how much LARGER the world has gotten with the modern day internet, how much easier it is to be exposed to things outside your own bubble. I'm either right around Tommy's age or a little younger, depending on the estimate you use and guys...I just don't have words for how INSULAR my worldview was growing up compared to now. How much everyone around you, even in larger cities, tended to be Just Like You. You had to live in true sprawling metropolises to be exposed to the kind of diversity that we take for granted now. It is a terrible thing, but when everyone around you, everyone you look up to, everyone you love and care about, and who is supposed to love and care about you thinks the same thing, you don't tend to question it. You don't even notice it. My own loving, wonderful, give-you-the-shirt-off-her-back grandmother, who was educated af in a time women really weren't as a rule, and spent her life as a teacher was racist as FUCK. And the really insidious kind...the "I don't hate them, but why can't they just stay on their side of town?" kind, the passive-aggressive comments that only sting the people they're aimed at so no one thinks to defend the victim kind. It's the weirdest cognitive dissonance to know someone as kind, loving, and moral and ALSO realize that the kindness, love, and morality only included certain people. If my parents had not moved around so much, exposing me to different environments (or if they'd been a little less lenient with my internet access when it started exploding) I honestly can't say whether or not I would have ended up just like my grandma. I like to think I wouldn't have, but that's the point...it's a frog in slowly boiling water situation. I think we can all safely say a parent like Gerrard was not creating an environment in which it was safe or even possible to question the hate.

And from that homelife Tommy had to have gone straight into the military during the heights of DADT, wherein hiding your true self from everyone around you was the acceptable compromise to just straight up having your life ruined (if not completely ended).

Now. Does any of this EXCUSE Tommy being a pretty racist, sexist piece of shit in the begins episodes? No. But it is an EXPLANATION and a true-to-life example of how those systems that everyone has to operate in are harmful no matter what. At the time, given what was almost certainly his background, Tommy would almost certainly have to have been INCREDIBLY self-aware and self-actualized (and honestly, really, REALLY fucking brave) not to have been molded into...precisely what he is. A pretty racist, pretty sexist piece of shit who is throwing anyone and everyone he has to under the bus (consciously or not) to divert attention from his own deviation from the "norm".

Okay, HocusPocus, you might say, so this still begs the question why the hell you think Tommy deserves to even breathe the same air as your favorite blorbo.

And let me again preface by saying I acknowledge the show leaves a lot to inference here. As 911 is wont to do, extremely important character moments are handled "off-screen."

That being said, we do get to see Tommy acknowledging he was wrong about Hen and Chim and getting to a place of mutual respect, if not friendship (personally, I think the going away party when Tommy leaves the 118 shows they've made it to friendship...I don't care how much you respect someone, cake, balloons, and a surprise party are strictly friend things). When Chim calls Tommy to take them out to the cruise ship like...Tommy's risking his life AND his career there, if not outright jail time. Just on Chim and Hen's say-so. Again...that's FRIEND level actions, not just "I respect you as a colleague". We see, either right there on screen or through deleted scenes, that everyone around Buck trusts Tommy with him. When have we ever seen the 118 be shy about expressing their displeasure over one of Buck's LI's? If Hen and Chim still harbored resentment towards Tommy, and didn't truly believe he'd changed and was good enough for Buck, do we REALLY think that wouldn't have been expressed?

Are there valid criticisms of the character? Sure. I think a lot of it can be explained by the rushed nature of season 7 with such a large ensemble cast, but yeah, Tommy's not super developed and a LOT of the issues between him, Hen , and Chim are left to inference. That's fair.

But I think the show MEANS us to make those inferences, that Hen and Chim's actions and interactions with him show that Tommy has done the work to change, and they accept that he's changed and it also says a lot about them that they can forgive him and be friends with him (which, again, he is NOT owed and they would have been perfectly valid in denying him).

So, yeah. I like him. I think he's interesting and while Buddie remains my OTP, I am very interested to see where Tevan goes this coming season.

Also, Lou is fucking pretty ;)

[delusinaldreamer19]

Sebaciel vs. Dadbastian, an analytical essay (not really)

Oh boy am I excited and terrified to start this discussion.

I’m just going to say right off the bat that I am absolutely biased towards one interpretation of Sebastian and Ciel’s relationship over the other, that being Dadbastian. However, my goal is not to criticize, but to analyze and point out the differences and, yes, correlations between the two versions of their relationship.

I’m going to start off by making a disgustingly blatant assumption about the reason why I believe both of these pairings exist in the form of a theory...Both the idea of Sebaciel and Dadbastian are coping mechanisms taken on by fans of the series to grapple with how dark the character’s canonical relationship truly is.

Now, I can’t speak for how much this really applies to Sebaciel shippers, as I am not one. But it certainly applies to me as someone who enjoys the idea of Dadbastian.

Let's start with the correlations that support this theory. Both of these concepts are versions of Sebastian and Ciel’s relationship that is more positive than it actually is. The plot of black Butler revolves around the fact that Ciel sold his soul to the demon he named Sebastian, and that upon their contract's completion Sebastian will kill Ciel and consume his soul as compensation. It’s a relationship that is predatory, manipulative, and just simply toxic for a plethora of reasons. While the manga is still ongoing so we have no definitive way of knowing exactly how their story will end, I don’t think it's controversial to say that it's very unlikely to have a happy ending.

Even so, black butler is a comfort series for many, including myself. But how is that possible?

By looking at the series as a whole and the characters through different lenses. A pro and con of black butler is that it’s very easy to interpret in many different ways, and the same applies to the relationship between Sebastian and Ciel.

I’d say there's 2 to 3 main ways that people have interpreted their relationship. In no particular order… - As it is in the series, where it’s strictly based on business and mutual benefit. They work together so that Ciel can get his revenge and Sebastian gets his soul. - Them being friends / frenemies - A ship, where they have romantic feelings for each other. (I’m not going to be discussing how people ship them for sexual reasons, as that's a topic for a different day.) - And Parental, where Sebastian serves as a father/mother (no I'm not specifying which) figure towards Ciel. I'm focusing on the latter two, obviously.

There’s one commonality between these two interpretations; Sebastian caring about Ciel (and vice-versa, but you'll see in a moment why that's not as relevant). There is loving nature to both, but romantic and parental love are not the same thing. So why, baseline, do both these versions exist?

My thought is that they both remove the main cause of distress in their canon relationship. Which is, you guessed it, Sebastian. More specifically his feelings/intentions towards Ciel. By creating scenarios where something changes his intentions of ultimately killing Ciel, it creates the illusion that there's a possibility that the series could have a happier outcome in the end, and a happy ending for Ciel.

Which brings in a new idea. Ciel, being the main character that we follow, despite having his own complex character, serves as the…how should I put this…automatic ‘self-insert’ for people. He goes through/has gone through trauma & struggles that people can relate to and see themselves in. That's why there is a strong desire to see him have a positive outcome through these two different relationships with Sebastian, because as a reader/viewer it will feel like we ourselves are experiencing that positive outcome.

See? Coping mechanism : )

Now here's where things get tricky…Discussing the differences between these two types of relationships. Ok, I could probably find a way to say this that's long and fancy, but I’m just going to be super straight forward. This is as an absolute read, I apologize :’) People ship Sebaciel because they want someone to love them, where they picture themselves as Ciel with Sebastian as the one loving him romantically. People like the idea of Dadbastian because they long for a parent's affection, where they picture themselves as Ciel being cared for by Sebastian.

Now, this is definitely just a theory, and absolutely not the only reasons why people come up with and enjoy each of these interpretations. But the Dadbastian one most definitely applies to me.

Here’s where my own opinion comes into play. Only one of these relationships is really ‘positive’ in nature. Both of these relationships when applied to the canon would be problematic in their own ways, but when looking at it outside of the context of the series and its plot, a parental relationship between Sebastian and Ciel, a thirteen year old boy and an adult figure, is more healthy than a romantic relationship between a thirteen year old boy and an adult figure. Please don’t make me explain why :’)

I’m really hoping this reaches the right audience. I’m not trying to start a war or offend anyone, just share my thoughts and an outlook that I haven’t really seen from the black butler fanbase before.

[raelle-writing]

DFF is such great show and I enjoy the portrayal of the characters and the plot. Although I am not much into JinPhee ship (even though their scene was hot) - meaning I won't actively search fics of them;-D. But I absolutely don't understand the hate this ship gets. Or Jin character gets? Like, did I miss something? Why there is so much hate towards this pairing? I don't get it. Or do they dislike Jin character so much?

So I think there are 3 main reasons that people hate PheeJin and specifically Jin as much as they do, and I'll see if I can explain it coherently below lmao

First is cultural differences.

I've noticed that by and large a lot of the hatred directed at Jin comes from international fans being extremely harsh, and I think it's partially because they don't understand some of the nuance of Thai culture. Which to be fair, why would they?

One aspect is that they get angry that Jin lied to the police without taking into account that the police are corrupt - both in the narrative and also in Thailand in general.

Another is they get mad at Jin for recording Non - which to be fair, really does suck lmao. But they make it about Jin recording Non instead of reporting the assault happening, without taking into consideration that the age of consent in Thailand is 15, which means that what happened with Non and Keng isn't technically statuatory rape. Still bad and awful and Non was coerced and assaulted, don't get me wrong - but that makes it slightly less clear cut IMO when it comes to the question of Jin seeing Non "cheating."

You can even see within the show that the reactions to that video are by and large slut-shaming and not "omg that kid was assaulted."

So to recap: Taking the video = bad. But I think people get a bit too self-righteous about the reasons why Jin took it.

Second is purity/cancel culture.

I'm sure it hasn't escaped your notice that in the internet age, if you make one mistake you're a terrible, irredeemable person and should be canceled forever. I think that's playing a part in this. All of the characters make mistakes, and because of that they're all irredeemable pieces of shit who deserve to die. Except for Non who is just a victim and has never done anything wrong (sarcasm).

In seriousness, I think that's part of it. And the fact that Non is SO sympathetic it kind of overrides people's sympathies for the other characters. I'm not 100% sure why people hate Jin the most out of everyone else considering he's the one who has tried to help Non the most out of the friend group... I guess they just have higher standards for people who try to help? Idk. Either way it seems to me that they expect Jin to be a perfectly-well-adjusted little hero who always does what's right and never makes mistakes. Instead of what he really is: a kid.

And last is fan favorites/shipping.

A big part of the reason that PheeJin shippers are getting so much hate is because TaCode shippers and PheeNon shippers have decided their ship is The Ship of the series, and think that Phee is just using Jin for revenge and anyone who genuinely ships PJ is fucked up, etc.

It's just ship war bullshit waged by largely Barcode stans, but it's certainly tiresome.

To be clear, I have nothing against PheeNon. I am of the opinion that Phee and Non were a cute high school romance that wouldn't have lasted because they had conflicting styles of showing affection and love (I'll write a post about it someday lol) but that doesn't mean I hate the ship. I thought they were very cute and it was fun to see TaCode on screen since I wrote MacauChay in my KPTS days ahahaha I just like the spice and fire of PheeJin better, and Jin is my favorite character.

I just wish that PheeNon shippers would live and let live instead of acting like they're waging some moral war. They were even crying in BOC's comment section on IG today after they posted the PheeJin poster for episode 9 saying "nooooo Phee is there for revenge he can't really have feelings for Jin!" It's exhausting... 🫠

General disclaimer: if you don't like Jin or like PheeNon better I'm not saying any of the above things applies to you. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, I'm just dissecting some of the over-the-top hate I've seen/experienced in fandom spaces lately.

[theunchainedmelody]

Shipping Super-post: Why Sorayla is a great ship

Time to talk about a ship that is special to me and needs more discussion. Before I get into it, I'm not trying to make anyone ship Sorayla. And before you think me a heathen, understand that Rayllum is my OTP. Just browse my Tumblr account if you need proof. But I am a multishipper and I think this little ship needs more love and attention. It DOES NOT mean I don't want Rayllum to stay together. I do. So here we go. Here's some reasons why Sorayla makes a great couple:

1. They're jock bros. Soren and Rayla are both physical fighters, using blades as their weapons of choice. They are both athletic and like to show it off. This is seen with Rayla showing off her acrobatics to the Dragang and Soren being proud of his bod. It's one of the many things that make them birds of a feather, and means they could totally spar and work out together as a couple. Also... They do spar! Rayla clearly enjoys facing him.

2. They have fun chemistry. Rayla and Soren have a lot of fun banter. Despite her annoyance with him early on, Rayla indulges Soren more than other opponents. While they get only her disgruntled scowls, Rayla exchanges jabs with Soren and is, generally, more playful around him. Even if they're both meatheads, Rayla is the more grounded of the two with her often playing the straight man to his funny man. It's pure bromance mixed with some potential for enemies to lovers.

3. They both want to impress their father but turned on him to do the right thing. One of the most compelling parts of a good pairing is shared experiences (often trauma). And these two both have daddy issues galore. They crave the approval of their father or father figure. Rayla wants Runaan to not hate her and to prove herself as an assassin. Soren wants his father to see him as capable and worthy. But Soren and Rayla have good hearts that override this desire. They choose to do what's right and so they both defy and fight their own fathers. Rayla and Soren are heroes with strong moral compasses. Also fun fact: They both tried to kill Viren to save someone.

4. Rayla really cares about Soren. Much of the fandom views Rayla as seeing Soren as a nuisance and she certainly expresses that a few times. However we also see Rayla has come to respect Soren by Season 3. And in Season 4, Rayla spends most of the season worrying about his well being, and is overjoyed that he's alive to the point she looks ready to kiss him when she finds him alive (see the header image).

5. Canon scenes that make them shippable:

Soren and Rayla bonding over not wanting Callum & Claudia to flirt. I feel like this was a bit of intentional shiptease by the writers (double juicy as Rayla may have been crushing on Callum as well).

Soren canonically liking the idea of Rayla being interested in him (the fandom pretends this scene doesn't exist):

Rayla realizing she likes and respects Soren and him being playful back:

Rayla casually touching Soren:

Rayla being really really happy he's alive:

Scandalous hand holding:

6. They look good together: Just look at that aesthetic. Think of the beautiful babies they'd have. Artwork by me:

Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed this Sorayla super post. To all my fellow Sorayla shippers, I'm down for all discussion and I'm eager to see your Sorayla fanart, fics, memes, and headcanons! ^-^

[sorcererinthestars]

For the AH asks!! 1, 3, 4, 6, 8, 17, 38, 44 and 51 (hope that's not too many to answer 😅)

Hahaha, love, no problem at all. It's like 2013 tumblr where I'm just doing all these ask games again.

How did you get into AH? I'm boring and got into AH through Rage Quit, like all of them! My current (kind of) partner had never really heard of AH and I was going back through with him last weekend, which made me remember the first ever AH video I ever watched was The Impossible Game Part Two. Swiss-fucking-cheese-god-damn-it was the phrase that hooked me lol. Went through all the rage quits and then into the minecrafts and then to the GTAs and now here we are.

Who was your favorite when you started? Immediately, Michael and Gavin as I was introduced to AH via Rage Quit and I loved their dynamic, like everyone!

Who’s your favorite now? Favorite is such a tricky word because I love them all for all sorts of different ways. My partner asked me the same question and I didn't really have an answer. Of course still Michael (and Gav, when he's around). I adore Matt. I really love Ky and BK and their interactions. I am obsessed with Dad Michael and Kid Joe dynamic. Last but certainly not least I love the Red Web boyos. I really do think Treh has the softest spot in my heart right now though.

Favorite ship? I am a ride or die OG OT5 girlie (Michael/Jack/Geoff/Gavin/Jeremy) even if it doesn't make sense with the current layout. FAHC isn't AH really, so it doesn't matter lol.

For new crew? I am a hardcore Alfreyo shipper and BK/Ky (what is their ship name...?)

Favorite AU?

I'm still such a slut for the FAHC, honestly. Although the new outlaw AU is super cute. I also have a huge thing for 7 Days, its one of my favorite games, and there's not a lot of 7 Days AU out there so a girlies gotta take what she can get.

Favorite experience meeting any of the crew?

This will be my 5th RTX, but one of the best experiences was meeting Michael after Theater Mode in like 2018. He was obviously stupidly tired and just wanted to go home but he stayed and chatted with everyone who lined up to take pictures with him. Me and my friend were one of the last ones and I was like "we don't have to get a photo, go home" and he was like "nah come here" and it was super sweet.

Also pulling Treh over for a photo and getting to say hi was awesome.

Poor Joe at RTX last year was just still so flabbergasted anyone ever wanted to meet him, he is such a sweet boy.

Double hugs from Ky and BK <3 <3 <3

Matt gives one of the best hugs I've ever had.

Jeremy was so happy I was shorter than him.

Not AH, but I met Greg Miller at PAX once and he came running over to ME to take a pic because I was in an AH hat and signed it huge so the real AH guys had to fight for the premium real estate lollllll

Favorite GTA mini-series?

Gotta say Criminal Masterminds despite the fact that I don't really feel comfy going back and rewatching it. Only series I've ever watched that I was literally on the edge of my seat. They gotta do something like that again.

Has AH ever inspired you?

AH inspired me to make the videos that I had on YouTube and because of them I have like 300 subs. I don't make them anymore but it was a really great time in my life. I haven't updated them though, so proceed with caution.

Any videos, series, podcasts, etc. You’d recommend to new fans?

My partner that I mentioned is just getting into AH so I'm trying my best to compile a good watch list for him. Survive Block Island is incredible. The 7 Days series is top notch. Weird Place. Haunter, if you don't mind a certain someone being in it. Red Web has my heart.

There's so much incredible content, even from 2021 onward. Binge. Enjoy. Smile. Laugh! <3

[characterdevelopmentmakesmenut]

I never see anyone talk about how Thorin has just accepted the fact that he'll never have an heir of his own, from the beginning of the movies (because I still haven't procured a copy of the book yet, and book canon must always be treated more or less separate from movie canon). He says stuff to Fili like, "When you become king..." as though he won't ever father a child to take over after him. Unless I missed some dwarven cultural thing where Fili would actually be the heir either way, I can't be the only one who thinks this is odd (and really sad), right? Okay, now I'm starting to doubt myself and wonder if I really did miss something. Whatever, I'm gonna keep explaining my thoughts on this.

There's almost no reason I can see that Thorin would be so sure he'd never father an heir. He's still rather young, and he's certainly attractive enough to find a lover. I can think of only four (potentially five) possibilities:

Thorin is gay (which I know would make many shippers happy)

Thorin is asexual

Thorin does not deem himself worthy of love or otherwise finds faults within himself that he believes would drive love away

Similar to the last one, Thorin doesn't believe in love, for lack of a better way to phrase it, or he just doesn't believe he'll ever personally find it

Now, #3 and #4 could combine to make: Thorin doesn't believe he could ever settle down and/or start/have a family. This could potentially be a fifth possibility, but seeing as it's more of a combination of two of the already listed possibilities, I wouldn't consider it to be a separate/additional one.

Now, time for me to explain some of my ruled out possibilities, which you are more than welcome to argue in favor of. I am, of course, not the end all, be all voice on this matter, and I may very well be mistaken about some of this.

One of my first thoughts had been that maybe Thorin is just a restless soul, wants to keep being out there, in the world, fighting. He wouldn't/couldn't slow down for love. But he was ready to take up a position as king. A lot more work is involved with being king than a surprising amount of people seem to realize. You sort of have to settle down for that kind of position, and he was already prepared to do so, more or less.

Speaking of being prepared to take up his position as king, you cannot convince me that Thorin believed he wouldn't survive the journey (though I welcome you to try). He wouldn't prepare himself for the eventuality of taking the throne if he didn't believe he'd get that far. And there was no way for him to know that he would die, anyway. He literally had no reason to believe this.

An extension of that, however, that I really did consider, is that maybe he believed he wouldn't survive very long after assuming the throne. This could actually hold a little weight. However, I have one issue with this: Why? Why would he believe this? Literally the most dangerous part of his life, dealing with a dragon, would have passed by that point. He's a capable fighter and fairly intelligent, so I don't believe he would be worried about assassination attempts. Not to mention, his grandfather went gold crazy, which probably made him an insufferable king for his subjects, but he was never assassinated. So, what would cause an abrupt end to his life after he assumed the throne? I did stop to consider that maybe he had a terminal illness or something, but I highly doubt that for multiple reasons that I believe to be evident, so I won't waste time elaborating.

One final consideration of mine is that Thorin knew (or believed) in the back of his mind, no matter how much he told himself and others, "I am not my (grand)father," that he would succumb to dragon sickness. This one is actually immensely believable, and I haven't entirely ruled it out. I don't think I even need to explain this one all that much. Part of why it isn't included in the four possibilities listed above is because I felt like it could be considered a/the cause of #3 and/or the second part of #4, both of which are basically my elaboration on this one. If he succumbed to the dragon sickness, it would be an understandable reason to find yourself unworthy of love (#3). And as a greedy, dragon sick king, you're unlikely to find real love, partially because you care more for gold than other people but also because, as harsh as it sounds, not very many people would enjoy your company that much as a result (second part of #4). I think it sort of goes without saying, anyway, that dragon sickness is, for one reason or another, not very conducive to love or lovers. I'm sure we can all agree on that.

That's about all I have for this topic at the moment. If I think of anything else, I might edit this or reblog it or something. Maybe I'm just overthinking this, and he's actually training Fili as a "just in case." Regardless, I'd love to see what you think, especially if you have something to add. Agree? Disagree? Let me know! (Especially if I really did just miss a dwarven cultural thing. Yeesh, would that be embarrassing after I already typed this all out.) With that, be safe, and have a great day/night/afternoon/evening!

[meetmeatthecoda]

Now that I’ve had some time to cry & mourn & actually think about that horrendous excuse for television... I have... some thoughts.

Firstly, the pace of that episode was insane. I mean, the season itself felt like we were slowly & tortuously hacking our way through a tangled rain forest, trying desperately to see the forest for the trees, but instead stuck cutting vines & branches down one by one... until we got to that finale, which felt comparatively like finally cutting away all the dense foliage only to immediately fall off a fucking cliff. You could just tell they were using the least amount of dialogue they could to move through so many weird emotions at fucking breakneck speed. I mean there was... the brief aftermath in Latvia, the 4 second plane ride to re-introduce Red’s illness after how many eps, Liz’s 3 second long recuperation, the awkward attempt at humor with the helium followed by a crash landing into solemnity at Red’s talk with Cooper, the abrupt & unsatisfying discussion with Red & Liz where he makes his rEqUESt, all the different “heartfelt” one-on-ones with Liz’s people, the fucking forced af “romance” with K**nler, the shoe-horned “chance meeting” with Beth Ryker, the most Agnes has ever talked in the history of ever, the weirdly morbid & fucking heartbreaking walk in the park, the choppy restaurant scene, to the unmentionable... end event. It went all over the place, which is very unlike TBL imo, which usually seems to stick to a theme or emotional center for an entire episode, whether blacklister or mythology driven. I think it was painfully clear how poor their planning was (when they have literally no excuse bc they knew this was coming the whole season???) & just how much shit they were trying to squeeze into one episode.

Secondly - & this may seem obvious, but I think it’s worth talking about anyway - Liz should have gotten her answers. And I’m not just saying this as a Lizzington shipper (I mean, mostly I am, but there are other reasons also!) Primarily, I think bc... literally everyone expected them. Not just bc they were advertised (it’s certainly not the first time they’ve delighted in false advertising in promos when it comes to the all-important AnSwErS) but bc THEY MADE SURE EVERYONE KNEW BEFOREHAND THAT IT WAS MEGAN’S LAST EP. It might have been mildly acceptable to play coy for yet another season finale IF she was coming back in some capacity later to eventually wrap things up, but - given that they fucking slammed the door on that possibility - THEY SHOULD HAVE GIVEN US ANSWERS. I don’t think anyone considered the possibility that they would KILL her & NOT give us answers bc it makes no fucking sense. Additionally, Liz should have gotten her answers simply bc SHE!! DESERVED!! THEM!! They’re literally the thing she’s been fighting for for eight seasons & she fucking died without them? WTF??? But, most importantly to us Lizzington shippers, Liz not getting her answers ruined the park fantasy. I think we all imagined (BC IT WAS MEGAN’S LAST EP) that Red & Liz would finally talk & Red would give her the answers she wanted. I think we all expected from the (misleading) promo that he would make some sense out of the potentially jumbled memories/visions (?) from 8.21 &, most importantly, there would be SOME KIND OF EMOTIONAL TURNING POINT, SOME CATHARSIS, AN UNDERSTANDING & RENEWED LOVE BETWEEN THEM DRIVEN BY THE AFOREMENTIONED REVELATIONS (& LOVE OF WHATEVER KIND, MIND YOU, WE WEREN’T PICKY, JUST SOMETHING FOUNDED ON RECONCILIATION & PEACE.) But - bc they denied us that - Liz was still in the dark & waiting on answers for the entire ep, unable to forgive or reconnect with her true feelings for Red (whatever you believe them to be) & this made her reaction to Red’s rEqUeSt ring very hollow & detached, the whole park bench conversation stilted & awkward (on Liz’s end) & - THE WORST PART - it made the whole park fantasy feel FALSE. It cheapened it. Like she was just indulging him, letting him walk with her & play with Agnes & enjoy one more day of life before she indifferently killed him. The one thing we expected to get, should have gotten, & THOUGHT WE WOULD HAVE NO MATTER WHAT ELSE HAPPENED IN THE FINALE was ruined. With the assisted suicide talk beforehand, the almost begrudging acceptance from Liz, the obvious morbid mindset from Red, the song in the background, the context of it all. It put an awful spin we completely didn’t expect on what should have been our beautiful Lizzington park fantasy. And I think that may be the part that hurts the most - the fact that I can only look at gifs of that scene - bc the music & dialogue & context completely undermine what Liz’s fantasy should have been, that she got for just one afternoon, when she was supposed to be happy & at peace with Red & Agnes.

Thirdly, (anyone still there? lolz) the whole “plot” of this episode was fucking nonsensical. Chiefly - & many other people have pointed this out before now - Red would never ask Liz to kill him. I simply call bullshit. No matter how hard they tried to justify it (& boyyyyy, did they try) Red has never wanted Liz to be a killer, criminal, or have to live a life like him. He has canonically said as much. I could maybe buy the whole “taking over his empire” thing as the seasons progressed, but asking Liz to live with the guilt (however slight or delayed) of killing him, after everything they’ve been through together, after she told him she loves him (seasons ago, but the feelings are still there, albeit buried deep)? And thereby launching her (& by extension Agnes) directly into harm’s way as the “new” Concierge of Crime (?), without him there to guide her from the shadows? No way. Bullshit. Also - & @iwouldlovetoeatyourtoast mentioned this first, I believe - the whole idea of it was stupid anyway bc Liz has spent the entire season chasing him, has repeatedly gotten opportunities to take the big shot, & has always been unable to kill him. It wasn’t even an engaging tWiSt to throw in at the very end bc - even when she agreed to do it - we all knew it wouldn’t happen, also bc Megan was the one leaving & not James. So, it wasn’t a surprise when she broke down at the end & said she couldn’t, so wtf was the point?

Fourthly (almost to the end, god this feels good) & this was a huge tell imo - everyone was OOC. Now you might say that’s the bitterness talking & you might be right... but you fucking try & tell me that 1) Red all of a sudden decides he’s ready for death after how long of not accepting it or mentioning it & absolutely must be killed by Liz & no one else within the next 24-48 hours 2) Liz would willingly go along with that for even a second 3) Dembe wouldn’t try his damnedest to talk Red out of assisted suicide in general & especially coercing Liz into doing it 4) Ressler would be the one to fucking figure it out & hightail it out of bed AFTER BEING ON DEATH’S DOOR WITH A BUSTED LUNG & SEPSIS FFS 5) Wolf Man Van Dyke would even know where to find Liz on a random fucking street corner outside a random fucking restaurant 6) Red wouldn’t see him behind Liz taking aim 7) THERE WOULDN’T BE A DECLARATION OF FEELINGS/LOVE CONFESSION BETWEEN RED & LIZ IN THE 14 MILLION OBVIOUS PLACES THERE COULD HAVE BEEN *PRIMARILY AFTER SHE SAYS “I CAN’T DO IT, I DON’T WANT TO” I MEAN, HELLO????? WTF, WHY WASN’T THERE AN “BC I LOVE YOU, I LOVE YOU TOO, LIZZIE” LIKE HOW HARD WOULD THAT HAVE BEEN, IT WAS THE PERFECT PLACE, THE LAST CHANCE, & WE FUCKING DESERVED ITTTTTTTTTTT *ahem* & lastly, & most importantly, & I’m definitely going to cry typing this... 8) if you fucking try to tell me that Red would allow himself to be pulled away from Lizzie’s dead body for a second time by Dembe or anyone else (especially when it was only the stupid task force arriving???) without simply crossing the street to load his gun with trembling fingers, pull the trigger, & join her... you’re fucking crazy.

In conclusion, bc this has gone on long enough, this was just... a hasty, sloppy, rushed, unprepared, careless ending on all fronts, no matter how hard they tried to convince us it was totally-100%-on-purpose-of-course-why-do-you-ask? (And I’m not even touching on the Redarina bait bc fuck that shit.) Like, did anyone else feel like when Red was telling Dembe that he was sure & this was what he wanted & really he’s positive so please stop asking, and when he was explaining things to Liz in almost too much detail, and when he was telling Harold this was absolutely necessary... that it was really the writers trying to convince us? It just felt so sudden & forced & heavy-handed & absurdly preventable & at the same time ridiculously unstoppable... I mean, look, whatever drama clearly went on behind the scenes? I think we can all agree that they did a terrible, awful, shit-tastic job on all fronts. And it’s just such a shame that that’s how it ended 💔

[televinita]

Earlier this month dollsome posted a poll of some favorite TV shows, and there was a space to write in your own favorite, and I had an immediate crisis of conscience upon realizing I do not know anymore.

(this got kinda long)

In high school and for a few years after that the obvious answer was X-Files, but lol no to that; even if the revival hadn’t tainted it, it’s been handily surpassed by way too many better shows at this point.

Up until the early 2010s it was definitely a CBS procedural, probably one of the CSIs or maybe NCIS. Now the only ones that have a chance at that title are Criminal Minds* and maybe Numb3rs; the rest are all uniformly like “you want me to watch cases? about strangers? when I could instead just make the episodes 10 minutes long by reducing them to the important parts, i.e. regular-character personal moments??” (...I actually do still have pretty good memories of the cases on CSI: NY and Cold Case, but I digress)

*which I joined up with in season 8; still haven’t seen huuuuge swaths of the entire first half of the series

I guess I could say The Office, which is a rare blend of strong character/shipper moments and episodes I genuinely enjoy watching again in their entirety, but also, how can a sitcom (even a smart one) be my favorite show*?? (even though sitcoms make up the vast majority of “shows I can watch over and over,” I’ve ruled most of them out because Office is honestly one of the only ones where I have beloved characters, let alone ships. And my favorite show of all time HAS to come with an OTP, it just has to.)

*especially when I hate Michael Gary Scott with every fiber of my being, or at least 96% of them!

So now I’m like - oh god. Is it Glee? Maybe it’s Glee?? Has anything after that so thoroughly eaten my brain and made me happy watching both as whole episodes (season 666 not withstanding) and as short scene clips years after the fact, complete with fanfic consumption? But I am certainly too old for Glee to be my all-time favorite show, aren’t I? And/or too straight? How could my favorite show be one in which the heterosexual rep is less than 90% of the ships, and also not the best one.

Part of me genuinely thinks it could be Revolution, something smartly done but also action-packed that I have now watched 4 times in its entirety, and on which I have a top tier OTP to boot. Seems an odd choice for favorite, given that I don’t actually think I watch a lot of shows in this genre, but maybe? Same goes for Pushing Daisies.

Another part of me is in such a fannish fugue state right now that I’m like “OBVIOUSLY Blood and Treasure. OBVIOUSLY nothing has ever been better than this beautiful couple on this glorious cracky treasure-hunting ride,” but I’m too close to it right now to make a judgment call, given that I once had this same feeling about Zoo. (which was fun, mostly, but also no. definitely not my #1 fave. I haven’t watched so much as a scene clip since like, 2018)

Then there are a lot of single-season shows I loved, but single shows simply cannot be my favorite. No one remembers most of them, for one.

Maybe I would feel better if I made a top 10? Or if I listed my top 10 rewatchable sitcoms, deliberately excluded them, and then tried to list a top 10??

Spiraling!!

tl;dr SUPER JEALOUS RIGHT NOW OF ANYONE WHO KNOWS THEIR FAVORITE SHOW, OR EVEN TOP 3-5 SHOWS, OF ALL TIME.

p.s. I came across this lovely book in the library, What to Watch When: 1000 TV Shows For Every Mood and Moment, which very much impressed me with its organization, comprehensiveness and ability to deliver on the subtitle while spanning decades all the way up to 2020 -- and I gotta tell you that as much as I cherish this one’s content, I am also very tempted to write my own personalized version. I think that might be the only way I feel okay. “what if I told you my thousand favorite shows? *hands you a Tome*” 

[phoneybeatlemania-bit-the-dust]

I’d disagree with the anon that Paul was “incapable” of love, but I do agree he was very distanced, and pretty cruel (to women) when he was younger. (It was unfortunate they bought into the love at first sight myth, but he was also a charmer, and dropped affection and got colder after fucking them.)

But I just can’t see romantic interest on Paul’s end. I’m sure he loved John, but a lot of the “sexual/Romantic evidence” really can just be as construed as platonic love. I feel there may be some confirmation bias looking for “clues”. (Not an attack on anyone, but some of the analysises seem to try too hard, really).

He does make references, with the whole “calling him babe during concerts”, and “in bed” but that could just mean he’s not uncomfortable with coming off “gay”. He has a quote about it somewhere I think. He’s supportive of the community at any rate.

This is kind of my own bias, but at times I think he…plays it up a little during the present day? Again, I’m positive he did love John a lot, but with how he is, a charmer, good at manipulating his image, he knows there is a benefit to building up the “magical” Lennon McCartney dynamic. John’s dead, and the old conflicts have faded, so he has no reason not to. I don’t think he’s anti-social, or a psycho or anything, but he certainly does put a lot of thought into his image, especially now, with how he wants to leave his legacy.

I’m less knowledgeable about John, and the speculation about his mental illnesses, but on his end, I can certainly see it. Maybe he’s just blind, but the looks are very much…yeah. He does seem to rely Paul a lot, and hold him in very high regard (REGARDLESS of what those old male biographers might make of him). You just know he was suffering over Paul, poor bastard.

Not sure if anything happened. I think Paul knew though, and either ignored it, or was kind, knowing John wouldn’t act on it. OR he didn’t notice! With the whole “we shared beds A LOT. you would think he’d make a pass at me, darling~”

I guess that’s how I see it. I don’t really have strong feelings on the nature of their relationship, or want them to be “confirmed”, so I try to be as objective as possible! Not a shipper, but not a male biographer. In fact, I was very put off learning the ship was a thing at first! With every fan base “having to” ship the main male leads, that’s what I thought this was. But after three years, reading actual books, primary stuff, I’ve began to change my mind on its legitimacy, and this was my conclusion. But new information can always change!

(Sorry for the long long analysis, god! I just took my adderall and I should go eat! Feel free to block me for spam/harassment.)

Yeah, this is basically my big mclennon dilemma: did Paul love John?

Of course he loved him, but I mean did he harbour any homosexual feelings towards John - and I just go back and fourth on that a lot.

In my last response to an anon I wasn’t necessarily trying to argue that Paul was romantically/sexually attached to John, because all in all, I don’t believe he did - but it probably came off that way because I didn’t particularly like the way the anon had phrased some stuff (like calling him “a master manipulator” and “incapable of love”) and so I just sort of wanted to show that the relationship was more nuanced then just “john was simping for paul”. My overall point with that response was more so that whilst I think Paul struggles in showing real affection and emotions, I don’t think he was incapable of love prior to Linda. I think he did really love John (in whichever form of love you want to take it: romantically, platonically etc.)

And so my point I guess wasnt so much that Paul was always capable of love (because I think he did at least love his family, his close-friends, probably Jane etc.), but maybe more so that he was always capable of intimacy with another person, though he struggled with it.

But yeah, he was quite cruel to a lot of the girls he slept with in the 60s, but I wouldn’t say that suggests he was incapable of love (i know thats not what you’re saying but other people might interpret it through that lens) I would just say he was young, dumb, ridiculously rich and famous and not emotionally mature enough yet to really empathise with most of those girls. Not trying to completely excuse him, but like, i dunno, i always just try to view people from the most human perspective. Everyones an twat sometimes yknow

I also really struggle to see romance on Pauls behalf towards John - the only times I think “wait but maybe he did fancy john back” is when I read some of his lyrics (like in ‘Coming Up’, ‘Yvonne’s The One’, and to some extent ‘Here Today’ - though I think interpreting Here Today as strictly platonic love is still a valid interpretation). I mentioned this in a different post though, that analysing his lyrics just isnt particularly convincing for me, because it feels more like speculation - and also as someone who does write songs, I know that a lot of lyrics just arent as deep as we wish they were. It is really difficult to be truly introspective and honest in a song, without exaggerating or hyperbolising or fictionalising any autobiographical aspects.

I do see your point with Paul possibly playing up the “Lennon/McCartney m a g i c” - im not entirely sure how much I agree, but I do agree to some extent. I think he’s always been very image conscious, and being in what is probably the all-time most famous pop band definitely wouldve heightened that. Even as a teenager I think he’s always just had this natural charm about him, and that tends to stem I guess from a need to be liked; I think you can see it in every interview he’s ever done to be honest. Its not necessarily a bad thing, (because id take a charmer over a rude knobhead any day) but I guess it sort of just shows that Paul is flawed like everybody else. Also, just read @mothernatures-sons tags and I agree with her - Paul just knows when to be a nice person! Nothing wrong with that! It isnt manipulative like the last anon suggested, its just how most people are: polite :) Ive heard a lot of anecdotes from people who have worked with or met Paul and the majority of them say he was a just a nice guy. Not saying he was never an arsehole (cause yeah he was pretty cruel to those girls in the 60s) but I think overall, hes a pretty good guy 👍

On the other hand though, you could also say that superficial journalists are looking for superficial answers - and Paul knows what the people want to hear. But occasionally ill hear an interview that does seem more intimate then most - I havent listened to it in awhile, but the interview he did with Sean I remember felt more honest to me then most. And when he said he’d like to spend the day “in bed” with John, to me that felt like a genuine and fitting response. Because, whilst it has sexual connotations, it also just feels like he’s saying he’d just like to sit around, chat, dont chat, just whatever with John for a day. Like he would just like another moment of intimacy with him.

I think we are pretty much in agreement on most of this though! At first I was also like “nah, mclennon isnt real, teenage girls just love shipping guys!” (I am a teenaged girl and I can confirm this lol) but then it just sort of became apparent to me through reading more and more about their relationship that there probably was something more on Johns behalf. If John wasnt in love with Paul, then it feels as though a lot of things he said and did just dont add up (the big one for me is him marrying Yoko so soon after Paul married Linda - like I really cannot come up with a heterosexual explanation for that!)

But when it comes to Paul, though ill have moments of doubt, I dont think he was in love with John (homosexually) and I do think a lot of the evidence on Pauls behalf seems like a stretch (but like you, im not having a go at anyone, because I understand that it is easy to carried away, plus its fun - but realistically, most of Pauls evidence just is not convincing to me). He’s comfortable with his sexuality, and I really do try to respect that and not force a gay interpretation of quotes or songs from him, unless it is genuinely making me question his sexuality and mclennon.

PS dont worry, I didn’t take this is spam at all!! And also, I would never block someone just for disagreeing with me! I enjoy discussion and I think its good to engage with people who disagree with you! To be honest, id only block someone if they were purposely being a real arsehole <3

[carol-effing-danvers]

Steve Rogers is a Monster

Yeah, that’s a hell of a title, isn’t it? Strap in, it only gets worse from here. 

(click here if you’d prefer to read this on AO3)

Forewarning, if you enjoyed the epilogue for Endgame, this particular essay is not for you - and no, I am not bashing the Steve/Peggy shippers, you are beautiful human beings who make the fandom brighter and I’m happy that at least someone in this fandom got the ending they wanted.

Additional warning: if you expect this to be another Civil War debate, you will also be disappointed. There has never been a measurement invented that can adequately describe how much I loathe the verbal dick measuring contest that seems to pass for human interaction between Tony Stark and Steve Rogers in this franchise. It’s not funny or entertaining - it’s exhausting, uncomfortable, and frankly it’s rather lazy writing.

This is about the very specific way that the epilogue in Endgame completely changed the way the character of Steve Rogers can be interpreted, and I don’t just mean the very illogical and contradictory way that time travel is explained, both in the movie itself and the fact that the writers and directors have two completely different views on how that worked out. 

I mean that the choice made by Steve Rogers in the very last minutes of that movie alters the way I view each and every one of his actions starting from The First Avenger and that alteration is exactly what I want to talk about, because whether you view it as deserving or not, what Steve does at the conclusion of Endgame was the most selfish thing humanly possible. Time is a thief, but somehow Steve managed to steal even more than Time.

Side note here: I understand that I am a completely biased Stucky shipper, a friend to Barnes and Noble, a Starbucks aficionado - sorry. Anyway, I’ve always believed that Steve and Bucky were destined blah blah blah, but I was never expecting a Stucky ending. Disney wasn’t going to do that, and I knew that, I wasn’t bothered that Steve and Bucky weren’t doing the smoochies by the end. But Bucky’s facial expression during those last minutes was gut-wrenching. Like...I have no idea what kind of cues the script and directors gave him, but in the future, please don’t ask Sebastian Stan to look sad unless you want soul-crushing devastation. It’s not Seb’s fault, his features are just arranged that way - but the fact that the editing staff allowed Sam to be sad though elated to be entrusted with the Shield and Bucky looked like his soul was being physically torn out of his body was an… interesting choice. 

Other side note: if you’re writing about time travel, I’m begging y’all to get your facts straight. Or just don’t write about time travel. It almost always sounds better on paper than it does on screen and it means that you’ve opened doors to more questions than you’ve probably got the answers for. I know this was about trying to set up the idea of the multiverse, I get that, but there were better and less messy ways to do that, and I know that because I’ve done it before. @Marvel: Let me write you a six-way orgy you fucking cowards~

By going back in time, Steve robbed Peggy of the future that would have been hers - not only that, he’s robbed her of even the chance of making the choice between those futures, because you honestly could not tell me with a straight face that Steve told her the complete truth of what he had done and she would be okay with him alternating the very course of the future. It doesn’t help his case that he has a history of not disclosing truths that he knows will be painful or inconvenient for other people in his life.

He robbed his loved ones - Sam, Bucky, Wanda - of the years they would have spent with him. Sure, he ‘came back’ after Peggy passed away, but they are adults in the prime of youth who knew him sixty years ago in his own time and he is an old, old man who has lived an entire life completely separated from them. He is practically a stranger with a name they know, but a history that no longer belongs to any of them - not even his oldest friend. They have him back, but judging from his age, they’ll be lucky to get even ten more years with him. Assuming of course, that any of them can stand to speak to him - I certainly couldn’t blame them if they tell him to go to hell and take his dad jokes with him. 

Steve has stolen away their friend and dropped off an elderly and dying near-stranger in his place, and this is treated by the writing (and the majority of the acting) as a wild and unexpected but not tragic event. 

Is it really that unexpected, though?

I recall seeing a Game of Thrones essay on Daenerys across my dash (I’m sorry, love, I don’t recall who you are since it’s not a fandom I’m in, but if someone knows who wrote that, please post the link!) which detailed how her ending in the series was foreshadowed many times by her penchant for bloody killings and her habit of surrounding herself with her own fawning friends.

Months after reading that, I had the thought: though Steve is never really shown thinking about Peggy after Civil War, except in a few scattered scenes in Endgame, was this foreshadowed? Whether you believe that his actions are justified or not, what Steve does is still, in the end, selfish at its very heart, and Steve Rogers is not a selfish person. 

Oh no, my dear friends and readers. Because taking this action has solidified and clarified Steve Rogers as the biggest and most selfish asshole in this whole universe.

Steve does not do the right thing, Steve does the thing that will most make him feel better. The fact that this often happens to be the right thing in the end is more the result of happy coincidence than any special sort of moral authority that the man holds. 

Rescuing Bucky Barnes and his fellow captives in a prisoner of war camp from being experimented on by an insane Nazi eugenicist? That was not a moral stand, that was endangering himself, Peggy Carter, and Howard Stark because he couldn’t handle the reality of his best friend being killed in war.

Sacrificing himself by putting the Valkyrie down in the Arctic Circle? That was not about sparing human lives, that was about Steve seeing his friend die right in front of him and not being able to deal with the grief. There were ways he could’ve prevented the plane from killing people without killing himself.

Trying to make Bucky remember who he was? And later on, saving him from the government agencies who wanted to hunt him down? Although, arguably, that last one is also just good common sense - Steve was already shown that government agencies could and were corrupted by HYDRA and he’d also seen how dangerous the Winter Soldier could be when unleashed. 

Steve did, I think, truly believe that this was the right thing to do, but it was also about keeping his connection - his very last, since Peggy had descended into dementia caused by Alzheimer’s before she ultimately died - to a past that for him, was only months or years ago, rather than decades. In some ways, this is completely understandable - Bucky might be the very last person left alive who truly knows who the real Steve Rogers is, because the rest of these people only know Captain America and we are consistently shown through multiple movies how uncomfortable this makes him.

This gets...considerably less and less understandable as we are shown Steve’s growing relationships with Natasha, Sam, Wanda - even Sharon, though she barely gets any screen time and they share the most awkward kiss I’ve ever seen - and indeed, what might be the most uncomfortable kiss in cinema history.

Side Note 3: This is made even more awkward by the director’s choice to have two of Steve’s friends watching them the whole time - seriously, who even does that? Why would you make them do that? Only sociopaths make out with their friends staring at them like that. It’s so fucking creepy - and don’t even get me fucking started on the fact that she’s also apparently his own niece. AHHHHH!

But we are shown, over and over again, that Steve is capable of building close meaningful relationships with people in the present. They don’t know his whole history, but they do know Steve Rogers rather than Captain America and they care about him deeply. 

Side Note 4: Notice that I don’t count Tony Stark among those people - despite this strangely persistent narrative that the various writers and directors tried to sell to the audience, Tony and Steve were not friends. They were never friends. They were colleagues at best, but these were two men who neither liked nor understood each other very well, but had to work together. And sometimes that’s okay, too. (Oh dear, I just gave the Stony fans a fit too, didn’t I? Sorry, guys. Enemies to Lovers is a great trope, I support you!)

But let’s set aside Steve’s gross betrayal of the people who loved him. We’ll also ignore the question of whether the motive for these good actions has tainted the actions themselves. Because even without questioning these, the conclusion of this story arc still transforms Steve into the biggest monster this franchise has. 

The very fundamental way that the writers and directors can’t agree on how the time travel mechanics in their own story work mean that Steve has just done one of two things and they range from shady and very questionable to absolutely fucking horrific. 

The first, that he’s created his own alternate universe to exist in, is morally dubious at best. Even the people who support this theory and liked the ending seem to feel that it wasn’t necessarily a ten out of ten on the moral goodness spectrum. They’ll say things like ‘he deserved to have his happy ending’. Even that phrasing seems to acknowledge that doing this was the opposite of the right thing. It just considers doing the wrong thing as being justified rather than horrifying. 

But let’s examine this first idea for a minute - even this, the more innocent of the two implications, means that rather than really processing his grief or dealing with the repeated tragedies and losses that have occured in his life, even as he was running group therapy sessions and grief counseling, Steve Rogers chose to escape his current life by creating an alternate universe that specifically allows he himself to live out his own fucking fantasies of the way his life should have turned out. 

That, in case you are not aware, is wildly fucked up. I thought I was playing pretty fast and loose with Steve’s characterization when I turned him into an extremely polite serial killer but as it turns out, I clearly just wasn’t setting the bar high enough, because that’s somehow even more fucked up than being an undercover child soldier with a small sadistic streak. 

Hm, and now I feel I should have been more creative there...

The second, and even more horrifying option, is that this older Steve Rogers has been in this world the whole time, watching as things unfolded just as we’ve seen over the past decade, taking ‘the slow way’ through time. 

Side Note 5: I do kind of understand why you would do it this way, because that’s really cool and shocking when you say that! Until you think about it for longer than three seconds and suddenly you realize…

Everything that has happened here, every tragedy and downfall these people experienced, happened because Steve Rogers lived his happily ever after with his beautiful wife and did absolutely nothing to stop it. He got to fuck Peggy Carter and watched as his wife built an empire of intelligence networks, knowing that her efforts were completely in vain because her agency was rotten to the core and he never told her.

Every horrifying act committed by HYDRA under the guise of SHIELD was permitted through Steve Rogers’ negligence. And that’s just the wider big-picture worldview, large and shocking, but not personal. 

What about the people that Steve claims to actually care about? 

This means that Steve lived his whole life in contentment with his wife and children while his best friend was physically and psychologically tortured for over seventy years and just...let that go. 

He allowed one friend to murder another in the nineties, when the Winter Soldier was sent after Howard and Maria Stark. Then their child was being advised by a greedy self-interested warmonger who paid terrorists to drag him off to be tortured and slaughtered, and Steve did nothing about that, either. 

Bruce Banner was exploited, experimented on, and made into a monster against his will in the failed pursuit of recreating what was done to Steve, resulting in billions of dollars in damage and dozens or even hundreds of lives lost, and Steve allowed that to happen, too. 

Like Bucky Barnes, Natasha Romanov was physically and psychologically tortured for others to use her as a living weapon - except that this was probably happening to her since early childhood, and a man her future self loved and trusted implicitly did nothing to save her from this upbringing. 

The Maximoff twins are shown to have not wealthy but loving parents who are murdered in front of them and they both endure days of laying in the rubble of their ruined apartment, wondering if the bomb in their living room would go off and kill them. Later, they are taken in by HYDRA, experimented on, and recruited as child soldiers to the cause when they show signs of having supernatural powers. They start a series of events that result in the destruction of a major city and the loss of what is probably thousands of lives. Pietro is murdered while trying to help the Avengers to stop this, and Wanda suffers the loss of the very last living person she loved. None of these things seem to have bothered Future Steve. 

Steve “I can’t sit on the sidelines when I see a situation go sideways” Rogers, planted himself on that fucking sideline and observed for nearly eighty years as friends, colleagues, and his own wife were lied to, brainwashed, tortured, vilified, and hunted down like animals.

And then there Steve Rogers himself - not the Endgame Steve Rogers, the Steve Rogers who brought down a Nazi plane and will lie beneath the ice for seventy years while everything he knows disappear (mostly) innocent of these horrors, the life he would’ve lived stolen from him by a stranger with his name and his face from another universe.

What I’m saying here is that if you consider this idea for any amount of time, it took Steve Rogers less than ten minutes to become the most evil and disturbing figure in the entire MCU, only (not really tho) contested by Thanos himself. 

Gross and poorly reasoned libertarian ethics aside, Thanos genuinely believes that he did what he did for the sake of the entire population. It’s made fairly explicitly clear that Steve didn’t do this for anyone but himself. 

Call me crazy, but if everyone you know needs to suffer and multiple planet-wide devestations have to happen in order for you to get your happy ending, you might be the bad guy. 

Maybe I’m just old-fashioned?

[starkfish]

Catelyn/Ned, Elliot/Olivia, and Olivia/Alex!

Catelyn/Ned

1. What made you ship it? Reading the books, Catelyn was my favorite character pretty soon into it, and I was pretty much like, "wow, I love Cat, I want her to have all the things she wants, which includes Ned." And then the glimpses of their relationship that we get, especially in her grief, just made me ship it harder. So many reasons, but definitely 'Team Give Cat What She Wants' was the catalyst.

2. What are your favorite things about the ship? I'm a sucker for 'arranged marriage that turns into a genuine love match' trope, I love the idea of the two of them both young and unsure in Winterfell and trying to figure out what the hell they're doing, both as lord/lady of the castle and husband and wife to each other. I love their tenderness, their trust/pride in the other, the way they're such a good compliment to the other, that NED BUILT HER A SEPT, that Catelyn had 'love enough for any woman once she found the good sweet heart beneath Ned's solemn face,' the fact that these two who are so perfectly suited were never supposed to be together in the first place.

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship? I remember when in the show, Cat told Roose that there wasn't a bedding at her wedding because 'Ned forbade it' and I remember haaating that even as some people swooned, hahaha. It was so out of character to me. Elliot/Olivia 1. What made you ship it? FIFTEEN YEARS OF TELEVISION, Mariska and Chris's perfect chemistry. 2. What are your favorite things about the ship? Oh god, it hits SO many of my trope buttons. Us against the world mentality, 'I'm your partner for better or worse', PARTERNSHIP AS A MARRIAGE, the way they spiraled into codependence, that they'd toe the line of legality for the other, cover for the other, lie for the other, the way they trusted the other more than anyone or anything, that 'I'd give you a kidney' 'Not if I gave you mine first' was 'I love you and I forgive you', I KNEW IF I HEARD YOUR VOICE I WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN ABLE TO LEAVE, the fact that we are getting NEW CANON!!! NEW THINGS!!! AFTER TEN!!!! YEARS!!! 3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship? I am fine with the slow slow burn they have going on right now and while I hope we get actual payoff this time, the fact that we have new content that is blatantly shippier than it was in 1.0 and has reawakened the EO shippers from their slumber and there is SO MUCH MORE FIC is more than I ever thought we'd get so really everything else is just gravy to me, and I'm not really anxious about anything because I feel like Chris and Mariska are taking it all very seriously and heavily and feel like the fans got cheated the first time around, and Mariska, at the very least, certainly has the clout to read a script and be like 'nah this is trash.' So I'm just enjoying the ride! Olivia/Alex 1. What made you ship it? God they're both just so pretty and smart and competent, they should probably just kiss. (Also Mariska and Stephanie have amazing chemistry as well!) 2. What are your favorite things about the ship? God they're both just so pretty and smart and competent, they should probably just kiss. (But really, that's basically the crux of it, I love the idea of these two warrior women finding refuge with each other! Like...they're both just so excellent, they deserve each other.) 3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship? I for sure like this ship but it is very much a secondary ship so I'm not really sure what the popular/unpopular opinions are!

[luna-tiel]

What Entrapdak Means to Me

On the eve of Entrapdak Positivity Month, I thought it was as good a time as any to share my rambling thoughts on a ship that’s affected me in a way I didn’t think was possible. 

Entrapdak is the first ship I have ever been invested in. It’s such a new experience for me that it’s taken me the last few months to wrap my head around the whole thing. I may relate to the characters in a show, but when they form romantic attachments I view it with a degree of passive distance. I don’t understand what it’s like to have those sorts of feelings for someone (I am aromantic and ace as a brick), and, well, I’m honestly not curious enough to give the subject a thorough study. My mind tends to fixate on other things. 

What does this have to do with Entrapdak, you ask? Long story short for people who don’t want to read my meandering essay -- I relate a lot to these characters, and the way they bonded together struck a deep chord in me that I can’t ignore. 

Let’s start with the characters. I knew going in that Entrapta was neurodivergent-coded, but I took it with a grain of salt. When I actually watched the show, however, I found myself relating to her so deeply it shocked me. Never have I felt such a kinship with a fictional character! We don’t share every trait, but it was still like seeing my brain put to life on screen. I related to her enthusiasm over her special interests, her struggles to fit in, her desire to make friends who accept and understand her for who she is. 

The fact Entrapta is completely herself is something I love about her. Over the years of growing up undiagnosed, I developed a lot of masking strategies. Human psychology is one of my special interests, and even with all that accumulated knowledge, masking isn’t easy. It’s extremely mentally taxing. Masking can certainly look easy -- I can, when I have the drive and energy, “pass” as neurotypical, and only people who know me extremely well can tell I’m dying inside. All that effort is taken for granted by a lot of NTs because that’s how people are “supposed to” act, and surely I can “do the bare minimum.” The accumulated stress of near constant masking has led me to the darkest moments I’ve had in my life.

Entrapta’s struggle with leaving Beast Island hit me hard. It threw me back to a time when my feelings of isolation and worthlessness got so bad that I lost the energy to do anything, even the creative pursuits that were the obsession of my life. I retreated so deeply into my inner world that I hardly interacted with anyone. That total apathy shocked my family into getting me professional help, which gave me my autism diagnosis, the coping skills to move forward, and a good start on the road to self-acceptance. It also opened a channel between my family and I, allowing me to feel heard and understood. (An important side note on mental health: if you or someone you love needs professional help, please seek it! Sometimes you have to try out several therapists -- it took me three to find a good fit -- but you are worth it!)

It took me longer to realize, but I also relate to Hordak in some ways. Mercifully I was not raised in an extremist cult environment. However, I know what it’s like to feel defective next to a sibling that seems perfect. I was constantly being compared to my younger brother, and in all areas but art, he was superior. He was smart, athletic, and above all, he fit in with everyone. I didn’t hate him for this -- I hated myself. Trying to measure up to his standard is what caused me to develop such strong masking strategies. Underneath it all, I felt the despair of knowing my peers would reject me as soon as the mask cracked. I also live with chronic joint pain, starting at around age seven. The jury is still out on what’s causing that (the worst of it was due to a previously unknown food allergy, but the pain still comes and goes, even though it’s a lot more manageable than it used to be). This cocktail of pain, stress, and sensory issues I had to deal with gave me a very short fuse at times. 

As an aside, just because I sympathize with Hordak does not mean I am excusing his actions. He is still going to have to face the consequences of his choices, and work to adjust to life post-Prime. The series end gave him a new beginning, the opportunity to be redeemed, and I prefer this to a rushed redemption arc. 

What I love most about Hordak and Entrapta’s relationship is how they accept each other as they are. Hordak gives Entrapta near free reign of his sanctum, he listens to her when she talks, and he respects her opinions. Even when he pushes her away, he still considers the logic of what she tells him, and sometimes ends up doing things her way despite his initial instincts. This is something I do in my own life; I am easily overwhelmed by new information, so my initial response to an idea/activity is almost always a firm (and sometimes rude) “no,” until I have time to properly process and think about it. Hordak is the first person in Entrapta’s life that truly listens to her. He still has things he needs to work on, but it’s a lot better than how most of the princesses are with Entrapta. The Alliance treats her as someone to be managed -- she is useful, but unreliable. Hordak, in contrast, trusts her to get things done in her own way. 

On the other side, Entrapta is the first person in Hordak’s life to accept him without judgment. Hordak spends so much of his energy putting up a front of strength and intimidation, and Entrapta cuts right through that. She’s not frightened by his appearance, and even his outbursts have little effect on her until the two of them start to bond. Entrapta doesn’t come into their interactions with any preconceived ideas of what Hordak is like, or more importantly, what he should be like. This lack of expectation leaves her completely open to accepting whatever Hordak does and says, and it also relieves Hordak of the burden of needing to put on a front around her. When Entrapta sees him at his most vulnerable, she reaches out to him with compassion, something he has never felt before. Entrapta also does this in a way that doesn’t belittle Hordak. His imperfections are not something to pity, they are a valuable part of who he is. 

I loved watching their friendship develop. Entrapta and Hordak’s shared time together evolved slowly into a bond that gave each of them a sense of belonging they had never experienced before with anyone else. It gave me the hope that, despite what an oddball mess I am, perhaps I could find someone who understands me too. 

When a romance subplot inserts itself into a story, I tend to gloss over and ignore it (if I pick up on it at all). I’m even less interested in sex. Way back when I was first getting into fandom I was so excited to go online and meet fellow fans of the books and shows I liked, only to discover the spaces being dominated by arguments over character pairings. I was baffled. This is what people are most interested in? Oh well… back to the hermit cave I go! 

I was late to the party with SPoP. I’d watched a few episodes, but the show didn’t really hook me. This was partially because all I ever heard people talk about online was Catradora, and if that was the main appeal of the show, I wasn’t sure I would enjoy it (sorry Catradora shippers, romance is not going to entice me to watch a show, even if it’s rep). Quarantine was the ultimate cause for me embracing my curiosity and diving headfirst into SPoP, binging the entire thing a few months before the release of season 5.

I vaguely knew about Entrapdak as a ship going into the show, and I admit, had I not been primed for it, I probably would have missed the romantic potential entirely. In no way did I expect to become invested. I was immediately intrigued by their dynamic, and as they got closer, I found myself thinking “oh, I see why people ship these two.” I didn’t understand this realization until months later. I was relating to the characters, and for the first time in my life, I was relating to their relationship.

I headcanon Entrapta and Hordak as an asexual couple. I’ll elaborate on this at a later time (asexuality is a spectrum with a lot of nuance, and this post is plenty long already), but at the core of it, I find joy in imagining these characters in a loving platonic relationship, something I hope to find myself one day. I hope this love comes across in my artwork and in my fanfictions <3

To those of you that read this far, wow, you must be patient! Have an imaginary cookie! I hope this ramble has provided a decent picture for why I, as an aro ace on the autism spectrum, have come to cherish Hordak and Entrapta’s relationship. It’s my first and only OTP… I’m still in shock thinking about that… I guess we’ll see where things go from here!

Take care of yourselves out there!

[btsandvmin]

Sorry, it's a long one. What do you think of the ARMY who doesn't recognize Vmin as a ship? I haven't seen that happen with english speakers, but I've seen it a LOT in spanish. As a spanish speaker, I commented this on a Facebook group and someone told me that Vmin are getting more attention because of their intimate interactions by other fandoms too. You think that's true? I mean, I respect their ships and all but... Vmin has a lot of important moments that doesn't seem like brotherly love.

Hi @litmusevidence and thank you for this ask. :) First of all I don’t think this was a long ask at all... and I am sorry for not answering sooner, as you sent this probably somewhere around when BV4 was being aired. Also, I don’t know how the spanish community might be different but I’ll just talk about my own views regarding shipping in general. (All of this can be applied to any fandom, not just with BTS.)

I think that people often seem to misunderstand what shipping is to begin with... I’ve talked about that before in my post  Shipping vs Believing.

I mean Vmin is a ship... Shipping doesn’t even have to have anything to do with reality. Then if others don’t recognize Vmin as beyond being platonic that’s their full right. They still can’t deny Vmin as a ship though.

I don’t mind ARMY who doesn’t ship Vmin at all as everyone is free to do what they want. I don’t appriciate it when they go after shippers in their own spaces though. I mean, using “shipping” was to begin with a way to separate shippers from general fans so we wouldn’t bother those not interested in romantic or sexual interpretations of those in the ship... But yeah, times have changed.

As for my own feelings I mostly don’t bother with other shippers or what general fans think about a ship as long as they aren’t aggressive or harmful in some way. But I do get a bit annoyed with shippers that say another ship can’t be shipped for whatever reason. I mean, I would never say “how can you ship ji/kook when they are just brothers”, because shipping is a fantasy and something you enjoy on your own premise. 

When a shipper says you can’t ship something else, they have missed the point of shipping if you ask me. Mixing fiction with reality when speaking about real people and using arguments for why you shouldn’t ship something while they ship something themselves is just being hypocritical. Mind you I am only talking about shipping here, taking it further with beliveing a ship is real is a whole other level. (In fact those that say “you shouldn’t ship x but rather y” are probably pretty close to believing in their ship as they see rival ships as “lesser” even in real life and not just as their own preference.)

Anyone is allowed to like and enjoy whatever ship they want. In fictional shipping communities there are “crack ships” that people enjoy despite the two characters perhaps never even having met. I personally see more fun in shipping things with potential to happen or where I get interactions I can enjoy, but really everyone has their own preference and reasons to ship. So basically let everyone ship whatever they want.

The way I interpret Vmin or any other ship will always be different to others, and even amongst Vminies we might not think or feel the same. Because there is no universal truth when it comes to interpretations. You and I think Vmin has moments that seems to go beyond brotherly love or being platonic friends. But, as every other shipper in the BTS fandom, we still don’t know. I think Vmin at the very least can be talked about as queerplatonic to some level, but honestly there is a lot that seems to go beyond that as well, in particular when looking at some of Taehyung’s gestures and actions towards Jimin.

Still, others not shipping Vmin or not understanding why we ship Vmin might be annoying depending on how they say it, but it doesn’t really matter. In fact if a ship is real not having a lot of shippers might even be a good thing in some ways. As long as people agree Vmin are soulmates and love each other and can be nice about people shipping something they don’t ship that’s what matters most. :)

So.

1. Let’s enjoy our ships in peace and let everyone think whatever they want.

2. If someone says “how can you ship x” while also shipping a ship themselves they are either a hypocrite or have misunderstood what shipping is.

3. Vmin having a lot or few shippers doesn’t change Vmin in any way and we can all keep enjoying them however we want as long as we stay respectful.

4. Vmin still makes the most sense to me if any ship in BTS would be real in some sense, but in the end that’s just my opinion and others will have clashing opinions and that’s totally ok.

Vmin are getting more attention as a ship for sure... Which makes sense when you sing about being soulmates and everything else they have done the last few years. I can tell you the Vmin community here on tumblr is very different and since BTS have grown so much I would say basically all BTS ships are big at this point. But yeah, Vmin has certainly gained more attention for many reasons, I just hope we can try to hold ourselves back and remain as peaceful as possible in the Vmin community even as we grow. :)

I hope my answers made sense to you, and would overall just suggest that you keep shipping Vmin and enjoy them with people who wants to enjoy them with you. :) Thanks again for the ask and I hope I understood your question correctly. <3

[drivingsideways]

Misaeng review

Ok, it's been almost a week, so I feel like I can get my thoughts (somewhat) in order. As usual, I'm late to the party, given that Misaeng aired 6 years ago, and is already considered a kdrama classic. Still: thoughts!

(under the cut)

I came to this drama with quite a lot of expectations, both because I'd seen it on a lot of rec lists, and also because I'd watched director Kim Won-seok's Signal and My Mister, which are justifiably as beloved as Misaeng. I'm happy to report that Misaeng mostly lived up to those expectations!

The writing & direction work together to make Misaeng a very immersive experience, which is good, considering the entire run time is over 20 hrs. The level of seemingly mundane detail of the operational aspects of running a trading firm that they delve into (and other dramas might have avoided for sake of pacing) seemed odd to me at first, but eventually result in a world building that's incredibly well fleshed out. The (formerly unlikely!) high stakes of a misplaced piece of paper or octopuses in a shipment of squid end up being parts of an emotionally wrenching narrative whole fairly seamlessly. Still, at 20+ hours, Misaeng also does get into the kind of pacing issues that most of the slice of life kdramas I've watched so far have. And it didn't need to! I think it had a wonderful ensemble of characters, and if they'd maybe given a little more time and space to characters other than Jang Geu-Rae (Im Si wan) and Oh Sang-sik (Lee Sung-min), the mid portions may not have felt quite so, well, stuck.

But more than the strong writing and direction, it was really the actors who delivered. They made what could have easily been a dull-ish office drama into a heart warming story about human connection and the joys and troubles of leading an "incomplete life". I'd never watched Lee Sung-min in anything before, and about half way through the series I was like, HOW IS HE MAKING A SHORT TEMPERED, ALCHOHOLIC MIDDLE MANAGER SO SEXY? Like, serious props, dude. Lee Sung-min is by turns annoying and brash and too shout-y and stubborn and funny and so incredibly vulnerable as a man trying his best to live by his principles in a world that thinks they are an impediment to "success", that you forget that he's playing a fictional character-- he's someone you know, he's someone you've seen in the mirror.

His performance as Oh Sang-sik is very ably matched by Im Si Wan's Jang Geu-Rae. This series would not have worked if these two actors didn't have the chemistry they do, and play off each other in every scene. I had watched Im Si Wan recently- in JTBC's "Run On", in which I liked his performance quite a lot, but I absolutely loved him as the naive and endearing Jang Geu-rae. Misaeng, is in part, a bildungsroman narrative centered around Jang Geu Rae. Im Si wan brought a kind of vulnerability to the role that might have felt cloying and emotionally manipulative in the hands of other actors, but Im Si-wan manages to do it with a light touch. I feel he's one of those actors that uses his whole body in a scene, not just relying on facial or verbal expression, and it's a joy to watch.

Each of the other actors in the ensemble also bring that dedication and talent to their roles, even if it's in a single scene. There are lots of one-off characters that we meet during the course of the series, and every single one of them leaves an impact.

But! I'm going to pick a fave from the supporting cast and that's Byun Yo-han, whom I'd last watched as the broody, troubled (and very sexy) swordsman Lee Bang-ji in Six Flying Dragons. I can't imagine a character more in opposition to that one than Han Seok-yul in Misaeng, but Byun Yo-han just knocks it out of the park as the scheming, cheerful and mostly inappropriate clown with a heart of gold; Han Seok-yul is the definition of Chaotic Good, and you're equal parts horrified by his antics- which include sexual harassment dont @ me -- and yet charmed by him. I wish they'd given him a few more scenes and a larger plotline to work with, but I also suspect that he might have just walked away with the entire series if they did that. (Am I plotting that series in my head as I write this? MAYBE.)

Alright, this is getting a bit too long, so I'm going to get to the bits that disappointed me. That's really one major thing: the gender politics. I don't know how different the show is from the web toon it's based on, so I can't tell whether they made significant changes to the basic plot and characters. As in- I have no idea if the webtoon was as male dominated in every way as the show is, so I'm not sure how much of the show's treatment of women as a class, and its female characters in particular, I should lay at the door of the original writer vs the screenwriter and director. I'm also lacking the Korean context in which this was written and made and aired, so you may take my criticism with a pinch of salt, if you please!

That the show features mainly male characters is perhaps unsurprising and realistic, since we know that the kind of corporate life it depicts is very male dominated, top to bottom. The show also portrays the very real and horrific overt and subtle misogyny that women face in the workplace and out of it; mainly in the character of Ahn Young-yi, played with steely determination and quiet suffering by the lovely Kang so-ra. There are only 3 other female characters that have any sort of real speaking role- Sun Ji Young (played by Shin Eun jung), a senior manager at the company, Jang Geu-rae's unnamed(!) mother (played by the amazing Sung Byoung-Sook) and Oh Sang-sik's unnamed (!) wife (played by Oh Yoon-Hong, who's a delight in every tiny scene she has). There are other women who appear but in very minor roles, and often in "comedy" moments that often rely on sexist tropes to start with.

Anyway, right there you can see one of the problems- 4 women characters that have any kind of real screen time, and only 2 of them are named. Aigoo! Screenwriter Jung Yoon-jung is a woman, and like, I don't like putting the burden on any one woman to y'know fix structural misogyny, but I can't also help feeling disappointed that she overlooked even this "small" thing among the larger things.

But that apart, the main issue for me was that while the show doesn't shy away from depicting egregious sexism in the form of sexual harrassment, verbal and physical and certainly emotional abuse, in a manner that's clear that we are meant to be horrified by it--it falls short of depicting how women deal and work with it. It just doesn't give enough space to women or their worldview.

It's very comfortable depicting victimhood, but doesn't put work into depicting the ways in which women survive by finding solidarity with other women. We have a scene or two where Ahn Young-yi who is this show's poster child for female victimhood interacts with the older women who offer sympathy and understanding, but no real strategy or support. And yes, we see men also being targeted by their seniors for the grossest verbal and physical abuse; and it's men who help Ahn Young-yi strategise on how to deal with her situation. Real life experience tells me that it's the women who do this work for other women. I have certainly been on both sides of this equation, for one, and so has every woman that I know in corporate life. And yes, one of the show's core philosophies is that those who endure, survive--but it is none the less extremely painful to watch Ahn Young yi "endure" the kind of abuse she does as a coping strategy and a survival strategy.

At the end of it, when she slowly manages to gain the support of her sexist team, it's shown as a victory-- though naturally imperfect, because this show takes its Realism very seriously (right until the end where it makes a tonal shift into quirky that I was a little ?? about)-- and y'know, sure, it is a victory. And I absolutely understand the choices she makes and why she does it-- I guess I just got annoyed by the fact that other antagonistic figures in the narrative get a more straightforward comeuppance for their egregious behavior, but Ahn Young-yi doesn't even get a goddamned apology from her abusers. Instead, we have a half humourous, half serious moment where she comments on how she's working at turning herself into "someone cute"- because she understands now that sometimes the right strategy is to "go with the flow". Be the water that slowly wears away at the rock. It's an interesting moment- the men she tells this to are taken aback by her bluntness, but also a little clueless about what she means. It's the kind of nuance that I would and do enjoy. Unfortunately, it also closely follows one of the show's most annoying scenes at the tail end of the series- where it tries to play off workplace sexism and misogyny as comedy- boys being boys-Reader, when I tell you that I had to WORK to unclench my jaw--!

I'm not saying we should have a single and obvious narrative of female emancipation. I'm not against realism in fiction, but god, sometimes, please do remember that when we look for escapism, we are actually imagining a better world. The first step toward liberation is allowing yourself to imagine it.

And the show does allow other characters its moments of unfettered fantasy- Im Si Wan parkour-ing all over the rooftops of Amman- and having a semi mystical + Indiana Jones moment in the deserts of Jordan--so why, I ask, are the women not given that gift?

*looks into the camera *

Tl;dr: I enjoyed it, it made me cry every episode, and I cared about all the characters, and if you haven't watched it yet, treat yourselves.

PS. Yes, Han Seok-yul is a disaster bi, sorry, I don't make the rules. Yes, hotties Oh Min Seok and Kang Ha-neul are canonically naked in a hot tub six feet apart because they are bros. Yes, I will be writing the fix it in which they fuck like angry bunnies. Yes, I am going to put my shipper cooties all over this gen slice of life show, deal with it.

[wheelfield]

Most shippable character? (Any fandom)

lucas sinclair!

he is the only party member who can be shipped with all the other party members and it actually works well each time.

him and max have this adorable couple thing going on. he listens to her and they crack jokes and she teases him. they just have this really nice connection and i think sadie and caleb have great chemistry. season 2 lumax was especially great (i’m still mad at the writers for season 3 but i digress).

lucas and el aren’t something i really delve into romantically (mostly bc i think of el as a lesbian and i am a big fan of their friendship). however, i don’t have a problem with the ship and it has the development and fondness between them that leads to a mutual trust. lucas and el are very protective of each other which is lovely.

i have mixed feelings about mike and lucas because of season 3 and am not a big shipper of them. i can certainly see the appeal though! they tease each other, and have known each other for a long time. their bond also has withstood strain, as shown in season 1 when they were arguing. they’re best friends which is a perfect basis for a relationship, and they have plenty of cute moments in the show. i also think they have similar feelings about growing up and can relate to each other a lot through this.

lucas and dustin are one of my favourite pairings. their bickering is endearing most of the time, and the fact that it is mutual is more of a testament to their friendship i guess; they can taunt each other and bicker while knowing that they both care about each other so much that it could never be taken too seriously. (also if you look past heteronormativity, the lucas/max/dustin love triangle can be seen from a different angle, which is that dustin was more jealous of max than lucas). they are just really neat. their shared interests, ability to be lighthearted AND serious depending on the situation and overall chemistry make them shippable despite them being a pretty rare pair in the fandom

and finally lucas with will is a pairing i really like! they shone in season 1 especially, with lucas so dedicated to finding will that he risked his safety multiple times. and there were lots of moments of fondness between them, such as the end scene of them playing dnd and when they reunited in the hospital with a hug. season 3 also had some nice moments which i enjoyed!

overall lucas is just very shippable. thanks for the ask :)