#this post was mostly a response to a different post about Buck and Tommy having dinner with Bathena

[whineandcheese24]

my unpopular opinion for the day: i don't like the way the 911 fandom shoehorns the firefam into a nuclear family situation. Bobby may be a father-figure for Buck, but he is not really his father and Athena is definitely not his mother. neither of them raised Buck, or even knew him when he was a kid, and that's kind of a big part of being a parent

the thing that pisses me off is the mom!Athena thing, because it feels like the only reason people say that is because of Bobby and Athena's marriage. Buck and Athena never had that kind of relationship. she may affectionately scold him, but like Bobby she didn't raise him, and unlike Bobby, she doesn't feel any kind of responsibility towards him. she loves him and cares for him, and he's part of her family, but that doesn't make her his mom. in fact, Buck already has a mother figure, and it's MADDIE. frankly, Maddie is more of a parent to Buck than Bobby is

and this goes for Maddie, May and Harry too. Bathena are not parent-figures for Maddie. Athena is Maddie's friend, and Maddie's on-screen relationship with Bobby is almost non-existent, same with Buck and Maddie's on-screen relationship with May and Harry. they're not siblings, as far as we know they barely know each other.

I just hate the way people want to shove Buck and even Maddie into the Grant-Nash family like a little nuclear family cutout. Bobby will always feel responsible for Buck, more so than he does for the rest of the firefam, and Bobby is one of the most important people in Buck's life. but being a parent isn't just about a relationship dynamic, it's about child-raising, and money, and teaching.

[buckevantommy]

Bucktommy Fixit where they reconnect next year and become friends - albeit ones who mostly converse via text and only really see each other on calls or running into each other at a bar etc. They don’t actually make plans to hang out, they just keep in touch. But keeping in touch turns into daily text conversations about anything and everything which turns into post-shift phonecalls at least once a week.

Meanwhile: Buck is casually dating, maybe more than one person, because he’s not looking to settle down right now he’s just looking to have some fun and meet some interesting people. But he starts dating one guy a little more seriously, to the point he stops dating others.

Also: Tommy’s been seeing a therapist. And doing art therapy. And trying his damndest not to turn into a sad lonely old man. It was a new year’s resolution kind of thing. He’d dated casually but soon realised it was better to just meet his base needs and focus on platonic relationships - like new friends and old friends, acquaintances and coworkers, and what little family he still talks to. 

Someone asks how Buck’s new boyfriend feels about Buck texting his ex-boyfriend so much (and Buck has mixed feelings about all of that: having an ex-boyfriend and a second boyfriend makes him giddy and conflicted all at once). He starts to wonder if he shouldn’t be texting Tommy so much now that he’s dating someone properly. But he doesn’t get the same want to text his boyfriend about his work day or random things in his life, and when they do text it’s brief and he doesn’t respond to Buck’s rambling trains of thought the same way Tommy does. He thinks it’s fine. Not everyone is a texter. And Tommy is his friend and people text their friends all the time while dating or being married.

But it’s different when it’s an ex. And Buck hasn’t told his current boyfriend that the friend he’s always texting with is an ex. Not that current boyfriend is aware of how much they’re texting or how often they talk on the phone. And current boyfriend knows Buck’s ex is called Tommy. And Buck always just says ‘a friend’ whenever current boyfriend asks who pinged him. Never ‘just’ a friend; Tommy will never be that for Buck, despite everything.

Things come to a head late one night after/during a rough shift or after a fight with Buck’s current boyfriend. Buck calls Tommy and vents because Tommy always lets him vent and always listens to what he has to say, and then he broaches what they haven’t discussed since reconnecting months ago: does Tommy ever think about where they’d be right now if they were still together?Buck has taken responsibility for his part in moving too fast, but he wants to know more about Tommy’s headspace now compared to when things ended between them. It’s curiousity in that ‘what if’ sense, but he also wants to know how Tommy is really doing, if he’s opening himself up to people, letting himself be happy, be loved.

There’d been a closure type of conversation not long after they reconnected, with Tommy apologizing and being sincerely happy for Buck and mentioning how he’s been working on himself a lot in the time since. And buck was happy for him but Tommy held back on details about what exactly he was doing and what that meant for him and his future relationships. He wanted Tommy to want to tell him, so he didn’t pry, but he liked the idea of being a friend Tommy could be open and honest with.

“Evan..”

Tommy knows he hates when he calls him ‘Buck’, but he never actually switched back to ‘Evan’, instead just kind of omitted saying his name altogether. Buck wonders what he’s listed as on Tommy’s phone. On Buck’s phone Tommy is ‘TK’, and he’s told more than one white lie to more than one nosey person that it was a firefighter friend from Texas - gay but happily married. He does keep in touch with T.K., but there’s periods between his letters on Buck’s contact list.

Tommy already said he’s sorry. He’s already told Buck it wasn’t his fault, that he would’ve ended things eventually even if they took their time with every step and that’s on him, it’s his issues and his life, not Buck’s.

“I can’t think about that.”

“I think about it all the time.”

Buck has a boyfriend and he’s happy, but he thinks about his ex-boyfriend slash current friend and what they could’ve looked like today if Buck had found a way to make Tommy believe he wanted all of him. He tells himself it’s to know himself better, to be better prepared and try harder next time. But he’s kidding himself if he says it’s not because he still has feelings for Tommy.

“You have a boyfriend.”

“Yeah.”

“I just want you to be happy.”

And.. he is. He is happy with current boyfriend. But he was happy with Tommy. And he can’t help wondering if he was happier with Tommy than he is right now, or if Tommy was right and his excitement and wonder about being in a queer relationship got muddled up with how he felt about Tommy. He still doesn’t know. He wishes he knew. 

“I was happy with you.” Tommy sighs over the line but Buck doens’t let him cut things off. “I know you think it was puppy love, and that I didn’t know you well enough, but.” But. He knows Tommy better now. Tommy has opened up to him as a friend, sharing personal details about himself and his past - not everything Buck wants to know and he never could bring himself to ask, but he’s learned things about Tommy in these past few months that he wishes he’d known when they were dating. And he wants to know more. He wants to know it all. 

“But?”

“Sometimes, it works backwards.” Sometimes you get to know someone and fall for them, and then you learn dark things about their past or get a better look at their emotional baggage or they go through a rough time. And some people break up because it’s too much or not what they wanted. But some people simply care more, and become stronger together for it. Buck wanted the chance to know Tommy better, to be there with him through the bad times. He never got to find out how things would’ve gone but he thinks he knows his own heart well enough to know he wouldn’t have abandoned or rejected or hated or been fed up with Tommy because he has a past or he’s imperfect or life threw some crap at him.

Buck knows people are more than they seem. He wants to see them for everything they are, to be trusted with that, the same way he wants to be seen in return and wanted anyway.

“What does?”

“Love.”

Sometimes, you love someone more after you learn the bad stuff - or what they think is bad - not less.

Buck breathes in as Tommy remains quiet.

“I didn’t have to know all of you to love you, Tommy. And whatever you think about how I would’ve reacted to the things you didn’t share with me, you’re wrong. I know I would’ve loved you anyway. And not out of pity, or some misguided infatuation, but because knowing you better means getting to love more of you, it means loving you better.”

Tommy doesn’t respond, and when there’s a bleep from Buck’s phone he thinks Tommy hung up - except he didn’t: it’s a facetime request. They’ve done this a few times before but only for something on a call or because it was easier for Buck to show Tommy what he was talking about in realtime rather than try to send through photos and videos.

Tommy fills his screen looking soft around the edges, hair and clothes and face bed-rumpled. His face is drawn into something that threatens to break Buck’s heart again; it beats in aching memory and yearns in equal measure. You’re good, he wants to say, you don’t deserve what you put on yourself.

“Tommy..”

[ganxiously]

Do you think they’ll continue exploring BuckTommy next season?

Okay, this is a bit complicated to answer right now so bear with me on this - I think I am about 95% on the fact that Tommy will return next season. Why? Mostly because of two reasons, well two and a half really -

1. There's a shift in how they have approached the relationship with the media. Before, Tommy was barely a discussion unless a journalist specifically asked about the relationship and even then we only got a vague response. And I don't think we need an expert to see that things seem to have taken a full u-turn this recent press tour. Oliver Stark, the master of making non-committal statements, has been literally gushing over Tommy and the BuckTommy relationship. He said something along the lines of I am looking forward to seeing what happens with that relationship next season and it would be very weird for him to drop that statement and then not have Tommy show up anymore. Especially since suddenly bringing up Tommy when he hasn't even been seen with Buck for 3 episodes could have no purpose other than to remind the audience that they need to look out for him next season.

2. The story was again deliberately left unfinished. They could have put a stop to it at any point. All it would take is probably 10 seconds of screen time. They could have had Tommy say it was just a one-night stand in 8.11 or say he was only there for Chimney in 8.15 or have a brief scene of them in 8.16 acknowledging they did not have the right timing and agreeing to just be friends (this would have the added benefit of freeing up Buck's romantic arc and setting up Tommy as an independent recurring to be pulled in when they need an oompf factor). But they did none of those things and instead have almost stubbornly kept these two characters tied together. That has to amount to something.

The half - What was the point of spending so much money on Lou and on helicopters if they weren't going to bring him back. Remember they didn't use Lou in the beenado episodes despite there being a perfect opportunity to do so and that was probably because of the pending breakup. The fact that they have done so now should logically indicate the opposite.

So, yes on Tommy coming back next season and also to it being related to Buck's romantic arc. Now, what I am not so sure about is how the relationship will pan out. Tim usually doesn't drag stories over but he did that last season so we can presume he might do it again this time around. But even then, all of that was end-of-season stuff that was resolved in the first 3 episodes. What's different in this case is that instead of a last arc story, the relationship drama has lasted all season and I don't know if that means we should expect a faster resolution or a slower one. Or even if we should expect one in the first place. I had said this in one earlier post - "This is probably the only romance arc that has given them so much engagement, on both sides of the front. Resolving it would take out one side so they might want to milk it for at least half a season more.". This still holds true but with how the finale panned out, I can't say for sure if they want to resolve it/resolve it soon and take away the engagement it is giving them.

So there you go. I don't know if I made any sense, I had a very straining day at work and English is taking a lot of energy right now but I hope I was at least able to answer your question.

There's one last thing I'd like to add though, which is that all of this is at best conjecture and I have been wrong a lot before so take it with a grain of salt. Whether Tommy will turn up next season or not is dependent on a lot of external factors like actor schedules, contracts, the overall plot and the creative whimsy of one Tim Minear so don't stress too much about it. I'd suggest focusing more on fanworks instead of holding out for canon like I am trying to do. The fans are doing a much better job anyways.

[lover-of-mine]

Okay, I keep posting around what I actually wanna say about Buck, Eddie, and the parallel love lives, and, well, their love lives have been written as parallel but misaligned, but I don't think they are that misaligned anymore. Or at least they are the closest they have ever been. Abby and Shannon both serve as the first love who left and never gave them real closure, Abby left, forced Buck to leave her, came back and didn't admit to anything, just continued to force Buck to deal with it on his own, and Shannon left, only came back because Eddie asked her to, and she died right after asking for a divorce, so she never gave Eddie time to process the idea of permanently letting go of her before he was forced to do it on his own, and they are the love they keep reliving, because they were forced to find that closure on their own and they can't. Eddie because he is actively chasing Shannon and Buck because he is trapped in the same structure as his relationship with Abby, meeting because of work, the other person starts it, they leave at some point, at most times it feels like Buck is more in it than the other person. Buck gets a whole apartment because of Ali, Taylor was never as intense as we knew she could be about Buck, Natalia ran away because of who he is, Tommy doesn't seem to be putting in as much effort as he could. Ana, Marisol, and Kim and Ali, Taylor, Natalia, and Tommy, they get scrambled in the parallels between themselves though. I think mostly because where Buck needs time, Eddie needs intensity. Buck will realize stuff if you give him enough time, Eddie will only realize shit if it slaps him in the face. And Eddie's breakups tend to be Eddie's fault, where Buck breakups are usually because the other person does something. So one to one parallels are hard to draw, but they are there. Ana and Ali both are relationships that started because people keep telling them it was time to move on. Natalia and Marisol show up in their lives because of a call that wasn't about them, and they go out because they actually want to ask them out. Tommy and Kim both give the impression of it being about someone else, Kim is a carbon copy of Shannon, Tommy is presented to us as very similar to Eddie and he also parallels other Buck li, and there's also the way Eddie doesn't really want to date Kim and Buck and Tommy have the conversation about taking things slow. Taylor exists in a different situation because Eddie doesn't really have a multiseason love interest, Ana has a lot less episodes, so it's hard to compare the introductions, but Taylor and Ana parallel each other with the being introduced in an episode their family gets hurt, the whole thing with the brownies and Bobby and Chris and the skateboard, and the hurting Buck and Eddie part comes from their jobs, Taylor wants to capitalize on Bobby's addiction and Ana was the teacher responsible for making sure Chris stays safe, I think even the way Taylor's camera man teases them and the way Carla teases Eddie about Ana, structure wise Taylor and Ana are introduced in a similar way, and then coming back into their lives in unrelated circumstances, Taylor happens to be covering a scene Buck is working on and Eddie runs into Ana again during an unrelated call and later asking them out because of peer pressure. Ali, Ana, Taylor, and Marisol also parallel each other with being someone they meet while working and then start dating after a period of time has passed unlike Natalia. Taylor, Ana, and Natalia all get treated by them and that's interesting when they are not actually paramedics. There are a bunch of parallels between Natalia and Ana when it comes to conversations Buck and Eddie have with them too.

Kim parallels Taylor with the way both of them create chaos in their personal lives, Kim ends up making Chris want to leave and causes the breakup with Marisol, Taylor continues to try to capitalize on Buck's family even in a situation where their lives were actually at stake (and Chim is family in a more traditional way, now obviously because he's Buck's brother in law but at the time because he's the father of Buck's niece, and it is interesting that Chim leaves and actively wants to be as far away as possible from Buck and Chris is trying to get as far away as possible from Eddie, and I know the Chim's situation is not about Buck, but the person getting hurt the most over Taylor/Kim actions actually leaves the state while wanting to stay away from Buck/Eddie after finding out they were keeping something from them, which is something).

So the storyline parallels between all the love interests are there, but the things that's been getting me the most right now are the lines you can draw between Tommy and Kim. Because the thing is, while Eddie is actively chasing Shannon, I believe that Buck has let the Abby ship sail, but they are both looking in familiarity for something they already have with each other. With familiarity I mean the way Tommy parallels all of Buck's love interests, including Eddie, and the way Kim literally looks familiar. But also the way neither would have a chance of working long term because of that familiarity. Eddie can never bring Kim into his life, so that relationship would forever be surface level, and so far no real depth has been added to Buck and Tommy even though the show had opportunities to do so. Both Tommy and Kim presented Buck and Eddie with something they wanted but weren't fully aware of until they slammed into them, with Buck is the general concept of attraction to men he couldn't understand on his own and with Eddie, he didn't fully confront the way he still wants something from Shannon, that being more time, closure, or just the general feeling of grief that sometimes gets so unbearable you just want it to stop for a little bit and Kim was enough to trick his brain so it would stop for a second, I don't know, but she was offering something. But either way Eddie is finally at a point where he might actually look around to try and find out what he wants, because he was forced to confront the ghost of Shannon and Chris is not there, so he's at a point where he has enough puzzle pieces to realize that what he wants is the life he already has with Buck, the same way Buck can trip into the realization he already built his idea of love with someone, he just didn't understand Eddie is also an option. I think both of them work as a way to expand Buck and Eddie's dating pool, Eddie beyond what's expected from him, a mother for Chris, and Buck beyond women. So I think this is the closest they've ever been to actually being able to stumble into each other.

[harmonic-intervention]

You're killing me with chemistry - Chapter 3

Buck knows he’s bi. He knows what he wants. And what he wants, right now, is Tommy. Maybe his hand in marriage, because he’s getting desperate. Because, despite all of his attempts, and all of the positive responses from Tommy, for some reason, Tommy just … doesn’t act on anything.

Tommy knows Evan is straight. He asked both Howie and Hen about it, and he trusts their word on it. It doesn’t stop Evan from pulling him in, and making him fall head over heels for him anyway. Tommy knows better than to fall for a straight guy, he does, but … he can’t change it.

Everything would be easier if they just talked to each other, but where’s the fun in that?

Last chapter of my fic based off on this post by @disaster-j And what fun it was. I just wanted to thank everyone who was along for the ride, and of course, disaster-j for that wonderful prompt.

Word count: 21,834 - canon divergence, bi disaster!buck & oblivious!tommy, sexual content, fluff, some shenanigans

Excerpt:

Buck was in a hell of his own making.

Not that he could blame anyone but himself. He really should have backed off. Tommy had probably tried letting him down easy. And Buck should have read the room and accepted that friendship was all he’d get with Tommy. Only he’d wanted more, he’d wanted so much more, and now, he stood in front of a reality where he would have nothing.

But he couldn’t handle that. He didn’t think he could continue his life without Tommy in it. If nothing else, he would take friendship. If Tommy was still willing to offer Buck that after everything that had happened. 

Buck gave it a couple of days just so he could give Tommy space. It also gave him the opportunity to put his apology plan into motion. Whenever he had a moment free at home, he had his laptop open and tried his best to learn how to make baked Alaska.

Tommy had mentioned the dessert before when they were at a restaurant, and how much he loved it but rarely got to indulge in it. Buck hadn’t ever had it, and when he found out what it was, he felt a little in over his head, but he was determined to succeed. If nothing else, Tommy had a dessert he hadn’t had in a long time. 

Buck tried his best. He started off learning the sponge cake base, and if he did say so himself, he got that under control pretty quickly. He moved on to meringue and that was a whole lot harder. Mostly because there were so many different variants. French was apparently the easiest to make, but Italian was one that was apparently commonly used in baked Alaska. He tried his hand at several different variants.

The ice cream was almost the easiest part. When he started his attempts at assembling the different layers, he used store-bought ice cream, but he had an ice cream machine that he had used many times before. The hardest part was getting the layers right, it turned out.

In the end, after he had bombarded his friends with the results of his practice runs, he finally reached a point where he was happy with his creation. Where he felt like this was a worthy apology gift.

He had Eddie check in with Tommy to find out when he’d be home, and Eddie did the spy work with no complaints, seemingly guilty for what had transpired between Buck and Tommy as if any of that was his fault. He sent the answer to Buck via text, and wished him good luck, and so, Buck was off. 

[continue on ao3]

[apollabarnes]

⭐️ please talk about the time loop fic and/or tommy seeing ghosts

okay here we go! way to get me to go back and reread my stories

if i can live through this - the time loop fic

so when i first wanted to do a time loop, i had to decide very quickly who was getting stuck; tommy made the most sense because he was physically close and emotionally invested in the team but wouldn't negatively impact the rest of the day if he was suddenly missing. (it also became clear that i would have to write in present tense, so i was suffering right along with tommy. my preferred tense is past, but this story didn't work in past tense. damnit!)

i knew i wanted it to be a long time loop; if it was too short neither the emotional or physical resolution would feel like an ending that had been earned.

(this ask, like the loop, has gotten very long, so! more beneath the cut and i will do ghost tommy in a separate post)

in terms of what i wanted to show, because i wanted it to be long there needed to be multiple attempts at a fix that didn't work — tommy's list was my list of things that needed to be considered, and then they also became his timeline/basis for his attempts. they're also some of the things that he ends up bitching about to ghost bobby in my other fic (but they're recurring issues that i had with the plot as a writer, so it's not a crossover nor do i feel bad about it).

the hard line for tommy was anything that put a different firefighter in danger; there was the initial attempt with eddie and then realizing that changing the makeup inside the lab turned everything into a crap shoot. at least when it was everyone who was there originally he could be sure that they would all survive until athena arrived back at the lab. for instance, he knew that breaking bobby's leg would keep him out of trouble; but who would end up standing where bobby was and getting their air hose punctured? he didn't want to be responsible for someone's death — he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he played god.

(there is one reference that i don't think anyone caught where tommy has used his army skills to ah... ask moira questions in a very not nice sort of way. he feels mostly okay about this because he knew that by grabbing moira he wouldn't be able to be in a position to save bobby, so the loop would restart and it's one of those 'no consequences' things. but it's still not something that he's proud of doing.)

he does give up a few times, but. that doesn't stick either. he could go as far away from la as he could manage in twenty four hours, but he couldn't get away from the fact that it hurt everyone.

every attempt needed to have a section that explained and showed what tommy was up to, and what he'd been up to in the interim between the last section.

(he spends. months. telling buck that he loves him after buck asks him to. not because he thinks they're all parallel universes (god, he hopes not!) but as exposure therapy, so that when he finally gets out he can tell buck and not immediately curl up like a potato bug and wish for death, because the first time he told buck that he took an entire week off and drank so much he could have opened his own distillery. the man loves so much and is so unused to telling anyone that he feels that way.)

the nerds became a cornerstone because i wanted to keep the fic as close to canon as possible; there was a lot of staring at the character list and figuring out who was 'available' to help with solving this problem. (poor lucy was initially in a lot more of this fic, but the flow got tricky when he was having to convince multiple people every loop and chopping her made the most sense. at least she has the home reno fic!)

roz and allen were both out of the blast radius before the explosion and had the necessary knowledge and temperament to want to help tommy. i also leaned a little hard on the 'tommy's so cool' vibe that, let's face it, the entire 118 has about tommy to explain the initial fact that roz and allen didn't run away screaming from this big, tall guy asking them to help him do some illegal chemistry.

the numb3rs nerds were just for me (it's been really fun to see who knows them and likes them too!) but i knew that i always wanted to get the physics of time travel in there and who better to do that than a group of nerds that i didn't have to make up on my own ?? (i'd also been watching some numb3rs recently so!)

that the answer boils down to trusting roz and allen to help him is obvious and yet it's something that tommy would never have considered at the beginning of the loop; something about watching the love of your life lose his dad for months on end (by the end of the fic, it has been at least a year of loops, maybe more, tommy does sort of stop keeping track by the end of it) makes you bite that bullet of feeling fundamentally unworthy because if you have to watch it one more time you're going to crack.

when he gets out of the loop, the calsci team does get that email and they have a new grand theorem to work on (probably for the rest of their lives); they, and roz and allen, are the only ones that know that tommy was in a time loop. all five of them promise never to mention it again, but roz and allen also get themselves invited to trivia from now until eternity. (buck is so curious about how that happened, they all say that they bonded while buck and athena were getting everyone out of the lab.)

[azaharinflames]

What are your thoughts on the how Eddie situation? Do you think he could really be leaving?

I just answered an ask about the Eddie situation, so to not make this incredibly long, check it out for a longer response! In short, however, I will say that even I, someone who is very neutral about Eddie, felt like his character was a bit mistreated last night.

Perhaps that's not the right word here, and I do acknowledge it is a big cast and that the episode wasn't for Eddie. But they gave Gerard more than they gave Eddie. They could've had him there earlier. They essentially made him feel like a recurring character when he's still very much a main.

As for if I think he's leaving... dude (gn) I'm more and more indecisive about it as the days go by. I first theorised Eddie could be leaving back in October/November, mostly based on Ryan's SM activity. Since then I've been changing my opinion every two work days it seems lmao.

Lately I was thinking they would just do a Season 5 2.0 and have Eddie come back to the firehouse at the end of the season, that perhaps he'd move back to his old house with Chris and Buck would maybe move in with Tommy. Now? I'm not so sure.

Like, yes, it would make sense if he were to come back to LA after this. If he takes this tragedy as motivation to come back. I think 813 lowkey showing us Chris wants to be with Eddie and not his grandparents could perhaps lead to Chris telling Eddie he wants to move back to LA. The house thing makes things more complicated, but not impossible.

But it would also make sense if he does not come back. If (potentially) volunteering in the MCE motivates him to try again with the El Paso firehouse, and he gets a job there. If he fixes his house, and he has a better relationship with his parents, and Chris is happy where he is.

So, because both things make sense to me, I have started to look a bit more into promo and bts. Not that it actually determines anything, it's just to add to each side of the argument.

Because, as it is, it does feel like they're sidelining Eddie in promo as well. Yes, he was barely in the episode, but they couldn't have posted a still where he's talking with Ravi? We knew he'd be in the episode; it wasn't something to keep for surprise value. And yes, I am aware they posted Eddie and Chris in between 814 and 815, but that was damage control if I've ever seen it lmao.

Then you have Tim's interviews, where he diverts the question to not directly answer if Eddie is coming back or not. Where he mentions he'll be in the last couple of episodes instead of answering if he's coming back to LA.

And then you have Ryan's overall SM activity. Where he's been doing a lot of self-promo and networking (including premieres), which is a bit bizarre if you know you are a main in a procedural. On top of that, I still find weird he didn't post a tribute for Peter when the rest of the cast did. What he posted yesterday was funny and it make me laugh, but it differs so much from the rest we saw from the cast. And this is not me criticising RG. Just pointing out it is a bit weird.

LT;DR: I have no fucking clue. I can see him leaving, and I can see him staying, and I can see him stepping down from being a main and going into being recurring, or a guest star.

[sitron-sunni]

I watched the new episode of 9-1-1

a personal essay on queerbaiting (sorta)

I watched the new episode of 9-1-1, and immediately burst into tears as the credits started rolling.

Then I rewound the last six minutes, and watched the scene again, pausing to rewind the kiss. Again. And again. And again.

We got a kiss. I didn’t know we were getting a kiss. I sorta knew we were getting bi Buck, but I didn’t know we were getting a kiss. After last week’s episode, a lot of people were 100% convinced we were getting bi Buck. I saw their reactions before I watched that episode, too, and I was so confused once I finished it. Had we seen the same episode? That guy, Tommy, Buck’s so-called bisexual awakening-guy, was barely in there. He had about two memorable lines, and then he was in the background of a different shot, where he received a job-well-done slap on the shoulder from Buckley. That last one’s the one people were focusing on online. Look at the way this is framed, look at how he’s positioned, between Buck and Eddie. This is foreshadowing how he’s gonna get between them. Buck and Tommy is gonna be the gateway into buddie. They’re actually gonna do buddie, why else would they introduce a relationship between Buck and Tommy?

Reader, I’ll keep it straight with you. I did not believe them. After a while I gathered a lot of people already knew the name of the next episode; Buck, Bothered and Bewildered. They’d seen some stills, they knew there would be conflict and jealousy within that trio. They were putting it all together with comments and hints dropped by the actors. All those things added up, and it did paint a far more convincing picture. And I thought it was fun! I reblogged a few posts about it, I think, or at least I liked some. But the fact remains: I did not believe them. I thought, oh, imagine how cool it would be if they actually went there. I thought, yeah, realistically it would make sense to bring in a third person if they were actually gonna do it. That way they could test the waters, gauge audience response, and it could work as a catalyst for the relationship after so long. But mostly I thought Okay, so they’re gonna bring in Buck’s fear of not being enough for the people he loves again, this time through his friendship with Eddie, and we’re gonna get some sort of final resolution for that. Like, a big moment of catharsis. Or something along those lines, anyway. It just seemed to me like the most realistic thing that could happen. I mean, the idea of canon buddie was nice, of course it was! The queerbait is why I started watching the show in the first place: I wanted a good queerbait! But ultimately, a ship like that going canon was completely unrealistic. I speak from experience, after all.

Maybe it would’ve been different if I was younger. I remember being in fandoms when I was a teen. I remember reading theories, watching youtube-videos with “proof” that this or that was real, that it was gonna go canon. I remember getting my hopes up, thinking Oh my god what if they’re actually gonna do it!? for shows and pairings that, in hindsight, were completely unrealistic. Maybe that’s why I, even with fairly good evidence in front of me, didn’t actually get my hopes up this time. Because why be that stupid? Why invest emotionally like that? Why not just enjoy what we actually had instead, and then get anything extra from fanworks? Haven’t we learned by now?

I woke up this morning and opened tumblr, and I read half a sentence about how we actually have bisexual Buck confirmed canon now, before I quickly closed the app to avoid too detailed spoilers. Oh my god they were right! I can’t wait to watch the episode, I thought happily, and went on with my day. I opened the app again a few hours later, and scrolled for a few minutes, until I saw a brief glimpse of one, maybe one and a half gifs. Bucks face, Tommy’s face. Warm orange-y yellow lighting, Buck’s loft, you still owe me a beer. Close the app, move on. There were other posts throughout the day, more glimpses, all along the same lines as the first one. The last one came late in the evening, this time on twitter. Just the word in all caps; ANNOUNCEMENT, and then Bucks face and a bisexual pride flag.

And then finally, finally, after I’d brushed my teeth and gotten into bed, I was alone with my laptop, and I could watch the episode. The hype had built up, I was so excited to finally watch it. I was internally vibrating just a little bit. I was giggly, I was grinning widely, I was making comments to myself out loud, and laughing. I said oh my god, they’re really laying it on thick. I remember watching that scene for the first time and thinking how Tommy really looked so nervous at some points. That last one I found interesting. I really liked the actor’s portrayal; His facial expressions were quite subtle, and I thought he captured that nervous feeling so well. Maybe I took such notice of it because, well, I wasn’t quite expecting it.

I wasn’t expecting nervousness in an interaction between Buck and Tommy, because I still wasn’t actually expecting anything. At least I don’t think I was. Even with everything I’d seen online. Even as I was watching the show, I convinced myself. Those words, you still owe me a beer, they’ve misinterpreted them. They think it’s an invitation to a date because Buck’s jealousy in this episode is making it more plausible than ever before. Sure, the show’s leaning into it this time, but they’re gonna pull the rug out next episode. No, of course it wasn’t an invite to a date, what show were you watching, are you delusional? It’s just gonna be one week of people speculating and theorizing and building it up, and then the show’s gonna resolve it with some no-homo followed by a nice new buddie moment. The buzz will die down, and things will go back to normal.

And then the kiss happened. And then I burst into tears.

And now I think, oh my god isn’t it wild that they’re introducing a new romantic relationship for one of the main characters, and for the entire lead-up to the relationship, both Buck and Tommy are entirely focused on Eddie? Like, they’re just making everything about a third person! Imagine if they did this for anybody else! and, oh my god Tommy’s gonna break up with Buck because Buck’s basically already dating Eddie or something, isn’t he? and, oh my god it’s gonna be glorious! and, oh my god I can’t wait!

And I’m also thinking, I was wrong, and you were right. And I’m so happy I could cry.

TL;DR: If you and I share sterek, or destiel, or god knows what other similarly-shaped trauma, 9-1-1 might heal ya.

[decastde]

I totally agree with your buck/eddie post, I don’t think shipping them is wrong or anything but acting like they must be canon or it’s not a good story is just not a good way to look at it. The writers as well as Oliver and LFJ are telling a wonderful story about two queer men in their 30s/40s and we should celebrate that.

I also think destiel is a very different situation to buddie, for me dean was bi-coded from even season 1, but it became more overt (not explicit but overt) as the seasons went on, kind of similar to how buck was bicoded, but dean’s felt more intentional from the writers since it was over a long period of time and used a lot of queer references that would fly under the radar of a lot of audiences. I think buck’s bicoding was probably accidental at first but by s4 they’d decided to play into it, and obviously now it’s canon (which is great! love that!).

Destiel seemed like the accidental bit to me (at first), misha was initially a guest star but he was playing a great character and had a lot of chemistry with jensen (however you choose to interpret that chemistry). Overtime the writers started to play into that on purpose and I think the actors did as well, misha has confirmed this from his side but tbh I don’t think we’ll ever get a straight (ha) answer from jensen about it. Which is fine tbh, I’m okay with that, I don’t need actors to confirm anything really.

Anyways, I never really got that vibe from buddie? Like Oliver was playing into bi buck slightly, but I don’t think it was ever buddie specifically and I don’t think Ryan, as supportive as he is, ever played Eddie as anything but interested in women (or mostly shannon). I respect people’s head canons but I don’t think buddie is a given for the writers so if people could stop saying “when buddie goes canon”, because tbh i think they’re setting themselves up for disappointment a bit.

Holy fuck, that got long, sorry 😅. I kind of rambled a bit there but I hope you got my point. I would say don’t feel like you have to delete your buddie fics, I have plenty up of fandoms i’m not even interested in anymore (though obviously orphan/delete them if that’s what you feel is best). Anyways have a great day!

Yes, absolutely get your point.

I agree Dean is for sure bi-coded. My jaded heart will forever lament SPN couldn’t hang around just a few more years (despite how weird it had got) so that they could have had the kind of response Oliver and 911 got with the bi storyline. 😭😭 Ah well.

Yeahhh, back when Tommy appeared I feel like, sorry for making a sweeping generalisation, adults understood that was it for Buck and Eddie. If it were not a procedural general audience kind of show then 2 characters having bi/queer awakenings would be awesome. Sexuality is a spectrum etc, later in life realisations happen and all that jazz. But, as you say, they’ve never been intentionally played to be in love with eachother. Again, sure, storylines can change, but if realising you liked men and didn’t consider the man you are closest to then……it’s a shame perhaps, but no.

I don’t know. It’s got slightly better now since the initial finale aftermath and there is no problem with shipping anything you want. Go for it! It’s the threats and entitlement, the rudeness and mean spirited accusations that people who like Buck and Tommy are gross and blah blah blah. It just feels like a real ‘old man shakes fist at cloud’ moment as they (again, sweeping generalisation) don’t realise how amazing the Buck and Tommy atoryline is.

I could be a total bitch and rant on and on about how in general there are some hideous takes and just not understanding media (and the real world) but I know that in ten years most of them will look back on their behaviour and cringe themselves inside out.

I don’t know if I will delete the Buck/Eddie stuff I wrote, it already annoyed me that it went against canon anyway but that’s just me. Lesson (not) learned to not write during the hiatus. I looked into orphaning them but I feel bad.

Gah I went on and on. Sorry. Have a great day yourself! ☺️

[darkwinterchild]

Arrow: how season 1 set up the world

Originally posted on Reddit

Warning: a lot of words, as usual.

Worldbuilding is an important part of storytelling, so I wanted to talk a little about one of the most important pieces of worldbuilding in Arrow: Starling City itself. Because I think it has been neglected after the first seasons. The city used to be so full of life back in the days. It felt whole, it felt real and it felt grounded, and there are two major ways the writers managed to accomplish that: first, they introduced characters from all walks of life, both mains and minors; second, they set up a social background, the issue of class, and used that background to frame, color, compare and contrast their characters from the get-go - give them more depth and complexity.

So first, let’s look at season 1’s array of characters

The main character belonged to Starling City’s elite: that was our point of entry, our main point of view. On the one hand, we had Oliver, Thea, Thea’s friends, Tommy, Max Fuller and Carter Bowen to represent the privileged youths of the city. On the other, we had Walter, Moira, Malcolm, Frank Chen and the people on the List (Adam Hunt, Martin Somers, etc.) to introduce us to the older generation and their shenanigans.

Middle class? The Lance family used to be at the center: Laurel, Quentin, Dinah and Sara (dead but certainly not forgotten). From there, we had Laurel’s friends and colleagues at CNRI (Joanna in particular), and we had Quentin’s friends and colleagues at SCPD (Pike, Hilton, McKenna). We also had Diggle and Carly, poor Rob, and Felicity Smoak.

The people of the Glades were given a voice via Laurel’s storyline as a lawyer: Emily Nocenti, Peter Declan, and Eric and Nancy Moore with their son Taylor. Roy, our main boy, was introduced in episode 15. Raisa, the Queens’ Russian maid, left an impression in spite of only being featured in episode 1. Others were antagonists, but they were still given depth and motivations: the Restons and the Savior in particular.

Organized crime in Starling City used to operate at every level. At the very top, we had Malcolm Merlyn and his organisation. Then, among the lesser rich, we had the Bertinelli family (Frank and Helena). Ted Gaynor and his disgruntled veterans belonged more or less to the middle class. Finally, down at the bottom, we had the Triad, the Bratva, and Count Vertigo’s drug ring.

Throughout the first season, the main characters also mostly all had their own distinct narrative space. Just to cite some of the most important ones: Laurel shared separate storylines with Oliver, Lance and Tommy; Felicity shared separate storylines with Walter and Oliver; Tommy shared separate storylines with Laurel, Oliver and his father; Thea shared separate storylines with her mother, Oliver and Roy. There were so many different factions with different opinions and different agendas, doing completely different things - which made it all the more exciting whenever these storylines intersected (and they all came together in the big finale). This was a way to breath life into their world: Starling City used to be more than just a bunch of vigilante saving nameless faces. It used to be Laurel and the lawyers at CNRI fighting the city’s corrupt elite; it used to be Tommy trying to find his place; it used to be Quentin Lance and SCPD fighting crime and chasing after the Hood; it used to be Walter, a good man trying to solve a mystery; it used to be Moira, trying hard not to drown in her conspiracies; it used to be Roy and Thea figuring out who they wanted to be; etc.

So, this diversity of POV wasn’t a coincidence, but a consequence of the choice the writers made when they incorporated class as one of the thematic pillars of their show. Once they made that decision, it was obviously very important to have both main and minor characters at every social level through which we could explore life in the city. Note also the variety of professions/life styles within the same social class: in terms of worldbuilding, it is doubly important, because of course that leads to a variety of locations. The city didn’t just feel different in season 1 because of all the characters, it also looked different because of all the different sets associated with these characters.

How class was used to ground Starling City and bring it to life

The class issue was an integral part of the story. For a show based on a liberal superhero (from what I’ve heard), it is the one social justice issue they chose to tackle (racism, homophobia, sexism, etc. basically weren’t addressed at all), and they obviously put some effort into it.

Most characters and relationships during the first season explored class dynamics to some extend. When you look at romance, for example, class was the most essential element of Thea/Roy, a core element of both Oliver/Laurel and Tommy/Laurel (Quentin resenting these rich bad boys for what Oliver did to his daughters, Moira telling Laurel that her son loved being at her place because he didn’t feel like Robert’s son there, just himself; Tommy being cut off being an important part of the development of his story with Laurel; etc.), and definitely colored the way Moira/Walter as a high-end couple was written. Concerning characters, the fact that they were billionaires was a defining characteristic of both the Queens and the Merlyns, just like the fact that he was poor was a defining characteristic of Roy. Actually, we can’t just talk about a defining characteristic: their social standing was basically one of the driving character traits in their storylines, for all these characters.

Class used to be at the very core of show. Oliver’s story started when he realized his family’s fortune was built upon the suffering of others - when his father shot himself in the head and left him with the mission of righting the wrongs he committed toward the lower class. On the outside, the Hood was designed to be a champion of the people, an avenger going after the corrupt elite: he was the monster they created, karma in a way, consequences for all those who thought they could abuse their power and get away with it just because they had money. On the inside, the Hood is a deeply personal story about redemption and legacy, it is about an ex- billionaire playboy making amends for not only his father’s cruelty and indifference, but also his own mistakes - the entitlement that made him hurt his girlfriend horribly and irreparably, and left her sister dead at sea.

The Hood going after the List grounded the show in so many ways. First, it made his story different than all the other superheroes out there. Second (and particularly relevant to this post), it allowed the writers to explore the city in so many different angles: these people were not only businessmen but also accountants, investors, financial advisors, etc. By telling us their stories, the writers were also telling us how the city worked in all its complexities, who were the many different players. It made it more whole. Third, it meant the Hood had a justification for being a vigilante: he wasn’t there to replace the police back then, he was there to do what they couldn’t because they weren’t allowed to. Go after the guilty that eluded the law, that fancied themselves above it. His targets and his M.O. meant Oliver couldn’t do what he wanted to do by legal means. Each operation was carefully planned in advance, complete with detective work. This added a layer of believability to his story and the world they lived in that completely fell off in latter seasons.

The class issue wasn’t used to ground just the hero’s story into something real: it’s the same deal for the big bad’s plot. Everything about the Undertaking is a commentary on class, from Malcolm’s motivation (the crime-infested Glades that killed his wife), its execution (using his power as the most successful businessman in Starling to persuade or bully the other powerful players into joining his cause, take control of the corrupt first class via blackmail, infiltrate the law-enforcement, etc.: all of that to have a hand of command over every important chess piece in the city), to his end-goal (the annihilation of the poorest part of town). Actually, I’ve always found the diversity of Malcolm’s main group, the team that orchestrated the Undertaking, striking: he was the only white man, the others were two women, an Asian man, and a black man (Robert was killed right after they switched objectives so I’m not counting him). The only thing they had in common was their social standing, so you feel like it was deliberately constructed not to be a gender or race issue, but specifically a class one.

Even if you exclude the hero and villain’s plots, most storylines during season 1 had a relation to class in one way or another. The Savior? Fed up with the gangbangers in the Glades and the executives who let them run around free. The Huntress? Couldn’t stand her father oppressing the poor anymore. Ted Gaynor? Resentful over having to babysit rich kids. Firefly? He was created during the Nodell Tower fire, a tragedy that only occurred because the construction company that built it used substandard material to save a few bucks. Etc. Every single one of these storylines served to flesh out Starling City and its citizens a bit more.

Season 1’s most iconic quote is probably “You have failed this city” - the vigilante’s tagline. These words are directly related to the class issue, and what made them powerful was how thoroughly the writers set up the city’s social background, how full of life they made Starling feel.

The current situation

Since season 1 was, well, the first season, it was its responsibility to set up solid foundations for the show, notably a believable world. A city in which the show could grow into something more. I think it did a good job, but the seasons that followed didn’t really respect that work with the exception of season 2.

The class issue was dropped somewhere after the first third of season 2, which was busy trying to introduce more comic-booky elements. Season 3 and on didn’t pick it up again. I feel like season 3 was trying to do something worldbuilding-wise w/ the League of Assassins, but failed miserably (they succeeded in destroying one of DC’s most legendary mythos that’s all, and I’m very bitter about it).

So what does Star City look like today? IMHO: boring. You’d think Oliver being Mayor would mean it gets more development, but it’s more bland and empty and dead than ever.

In terms of point of views in season 5 and 6, mostly all we get is Team Arrow in the Arrow Cave and Team Arrow in the Mayor’s Office. They killed, wrote off the show, or forgot about most of the characters that added layers and diversity to the city. Apart from the masks and their allies, mostly all we have now are some villainous POV here and there, most of them not even originally from the city but just coming around to cause mayhem for some reason (I do think the character of Susan Williams was a welcome break for that reason, but she wasn’t particularly well-received). I don’t even know how the city looks like anymore, empty warehouses is all I can see in my head.

It’s actually a joke how the background of the characters, wrt the totally dropped class issue, simply doesn’t matter now. We were left wondering where Oliver, the main character, lived for an entire season. Most of Team Arrow doesn’t have a job, and it’s only recently been addressed. Curtis, well-off genius who used to hold a good job in a giant tech company, can say stuff like “as a black man I’m 80% more likely to get shot than you” (/paraphrased) to Rene, poor latino guy from the Glades who has actually been a victim of random gun violence and used to be a marine - because the history of these characters barely matters anymore, it’s just superficial.

In terms of believability, all the work season 1 put into making it all seem grounded has been thrown out the window. Revolutionary tech is invented on the fly in a matter of minutes. Felicity can hack into anything in a matter of seconds - her and Curtis basically have God-like powers, I swear. I still don’t understand how Oliver manages to be the Mayor and also moonlight as the Green Arrow. Also he’s good at being the Mayor and Thea was an awesome Chief of Staff despite them having zero credentials in politics because our heroes can now be absolutely anything they want if the plot demands it (or just if it pleases the writers). He can pass magical bills on controversial issues that everyone is happy with because Star City is now just a bland simple-minded mass. The Arrow cave is more technology advanced than the NASA and honestly, since they don’t kill and only go after common criminals, I don’t even know why they haven’t simply joined the law enforcement - as a special unit or something, Marvel style. The whole vigilante thing seem pointless at this point, just another hurdle.

(I mean, for real, last episode, Dinah, instead of confronting Vigilante in her capacity as a cop, had to go put on her costume first - that I have no idea where she hid since FBI lady was snooping around. Seems inconvenient and a giant loss of time when people’s lives are at stakes, yk?)

Tobias Church can just show up and take control of Star City’s organized crime (which, btw, I’m surprised to see is even still around) in a matter of… what was it? Two weeks? Which completely undermines these guys, in addition to being unrealistic. It’s another thing that makes the citizens of Star City look stupid or useless, just like the fact people haven’t figured out Oliver and his little gang are the vigilantes makes them look stupid. The writers destroyed any credibility the city had as a whole.

So, yeah, the world of Arrow’s latter seasons is a senseless one, and Star City feels like it has lost its soul.

This is all my humble opinion. Thoughts?

[rodrigohyde]

Hip-Hop Has Shaped Our Style More Than We Know

How Hip-Hop Influences Fashion

American hip-hop culture has influenced the way people around the world express themselves and identify with each other for decades. From all corners of the globe, fans are financially swayed by their rap icons, so much so, hip-hop itself is now serving as a major source of inspiration for the most elite fashion houses.

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At the 2018 MET Gala (dubbed the Oscars of the fashion world) hosts included not only the event’s annual chair, Vogue’s Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour, but also Rihanna. Noteworthy invitees included rappers 2 Chainz, Migos, Wiz Khalifa, Cardi B, Nicki Minaj, Jaden Smith and A$AP Ferg, who garnered a wealth of social media attention and photo coverage usually filled by fashion’s most elite.

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Continuing to buck traditional fashion protocol, Cardi B sat front row alongside Wintour during Alexander Wang’s Autumn/Winter 2018 runway show at the former Condé Nast offices above New York’s Times Square. This seat, next to the most powerful figure in fashion, is typically reserved for A-list friends of the designers, powerful editors, industry exes — even royalty. The placement of the one of the hottest, most talked about female rappers today is a strong example of how high fashion has largely been influenced by hip-hop, which, in December 2017, surpassed rock to become the most popular music genre in the U.S.

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Rappers have long used designer fashion as a symbol of status, both in person as well as in their lyrics, and those stories have a direct influence on high-end fashion. It is evident even from hip-hop’s very beginning.

The ‘80s

Kangol bucket hats, chunky street-tuff gold chains, and name-plated necklaces with “Tonya” and “Lisa” written in cursive were all the rage. New York style with Adidas shell-toe trainers with wide white laces and black tracksuits were created by Run-D.M.C, LL Cool J, Funk Master Flash, The Fat Boys, and Big Daddy Kane, who were trendsetters in making authentic fashion statements.

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LL Cool J wore his then signature Kangol hat when few Americans knew anything about the European hat maker, but its association with hip-hop quickly invigorated the brand.

When Run-DMC sang about “My Adidas,” it at once pioneered the use of rap as a fashion advertisement and paved the way for the first endorsement deal between rap and clothing designers. In the mid ‘80s, the Adidas Superstar was an old basketball shoe, originally handed to players in 1969. The way Run-DMC wore their Superstars was different: The combination of sneakers without laces (similar to in prison, where they were removed to prevent inmates hanging themselves), black Lee jeans, leather goose-down jackets, Cazal glasses, and gold rope chains had long been the look of New York hustlers. But as earlier popular artists such as Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five were pushed by their labels into wearing flamboyant, shiny, post-disco gear, Run-DMC would successfully take the street look mainstream.

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The ‘90s

The rise of female rappers such as Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, and Salt-N-Pepa all ushered in black pride wearing Afrocentric fabrics, headwraps, large gold earrings, and asymmetric haircuts, which all symbolized a movement that gave rise to social conscious hip-hop.

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The genre had became a powerful mix of influences — especially for clothing — allowing for the interaction of two theories of fashion diffusion. The upper class of fashion leadership proposes that new styles are adopted or started by groups in higher social classes, and they are later adopted in the lower social classes. This theory explains the early emergence of hip-hop fashion in the ‘80s and ‘90s, when consumers adopted aspirational labels not typically marketed to them, black poor teens, and young adults.

In contrast, however, hip-hop artists wore styles from Polo, Timberland, and Tommy Hilfiger, drawn to their all-American, elite, country club appeal. Yet, in 1994, Timberland’s chief operating officer issued a public statement reassuring customers that the brand wasn’t abandoning it’s so-called core base for the urban market.

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In 1991, designer Isaac Mizrahi incorporated hip-hop accessories such as African-inspired medallions into his New York Fashion Week runway show, while Anne Klein launched a clothing line especially based on rap music. Grand Puba name-dropped Hilfiger in his hit 1992 track “360° (What Goes Around)” and wore the designer’s clothes on various album covers. In 1994, Snoop Dogg donned a shirt emblazoned with the Tommy name on “Saturday Night Live,” gifted to him just hours before. The new yet immense popularity of the brand in the hip-hop community provided Hilfiger fueled growth and widespread brand resurgence since its founding 10 years prior.

In 1996, Tupac walked down the Versace runway during a fashion show in Milan. This might be one of the most spectacular visuals of just how intertwined hip-hop and high fashion were becoming.

The transformation of the hip-hop “look” to both a mass fashion and high fashion trend pushed hip-hop pioneer fashion labels such as Rocawear, Phat Farm, Karl Kani, and FUBU into iconic status.

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The ‘00s

The Courvoisier-guzzling, supermodel-dating, bling-bling decade of the 2000s became the next huge fashion influence derived from hip-hop culture. This evolution of the style suggested extreme wealth when hip-hop’s biggest stars began wearing more extravagant attire, while Snoop, Tupac, and Biggie were dressing like old-school mobsters in fedoras, bowler hats, large double-breasted suits, and expensive alligator shoes.

Coming off the bright and colorful ‘90s, the advancement of technology and travel brought a wide variety of influences to fashion, and it seemed like every rapper with a little bit of money and power attached his or her name to a clothing label. For every successful Sean Jean and Rocawear from the ‘90s, there was a failed Akoo, Nostic, Benjamin Bixby, and Outcast clothing from the aughts.

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Outside of full-blown fashion brands, some more obscure trends did make their way into the fashion mainstream. Sweatbands influenced by St. Louis rapper Nelly, which had a bizarre crossover appeal, became a sports accessory that young men — white and black — started wearing on completely non-athletic occasions.

One of the most universally known fashion trends of the aughts was the tall white tee. Mostly because an oversized white tee like a beeper signified drug dealer, tall tees were banned in bars and clubs, condemned in the media, and used by the police to profile assailants. Yet, when looking back at the era, the oversize tee of any color was status quo for high schoolers around the country.

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No hip-hop artist in recent memory has influenced high fashion more than Kanye West. When West released his first album “The College Dropout” in 2004, his prepped out style and popped collars was perfectly timed with the rise and dominance to then absurdly expensive teen retailer with uniquely Waspy appeal, Abercrombie & Fitch. It was a brand of prep Americana in every mall kids would save their money for just to have one of the brand’s ironic logo’d graphic tees.

The ‘10s to Today

Kanye's preppy, collegiate style stood out to begin with, but it was at the start of the 2010s that he came into his own with the creation of his profoundly popular collection Yeezy 1. Best known for his incredibly popular sneaker designs, West began designing footwear for Nike almost a decade ago. The Air Yeezy 1 and 2 collections gained instant popularity, setting new records for how much they demanded in resale prices. According to Business of Fashion, the collaboration had "the biggest impact on sneaker culture in the last decade."

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In 2015, West teamed up Adidas, Nike’s biggest competitor, on a line of apparel and footwear simply known as Yeezy, a project that has since reportedly transformed into a $10 million partnership. The Yeezy Boost 350s and 750s presented during the Yeezy Season 1 show sold out globally within 12 minutes and exceeded the resale records set by his collaborations with Nike, with some pairs selling for more than $6,000 on eBay.

West, who refers to himself as the first “hip-hop designer,” has also designed collaborations with Louis Vuitton, Balmain, Giuseppe Zanotti, and A.P.C., but it was his record-shattering collaboration with Adidas as the first deal of its kind with a non-athlete, set an industry precedent that paved the way for other similar hip-hop and sportswear collabos, including Rihanna’s cultlike brand FENTY, designed for Puma.

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West is also, according to GQ, directly responsible for the prospering partnership between rappers and high fashion: “Five years ago, no rapper (or rap fan, for that matter) considered buying Givenchy or Alexander Wang ... West's penchant for luxury brands and avant-garde designers paved the way for guys like A$AP Rocky." A$AP was most recently named the face of Dior Homme, and sat front row at Gucci’s Cruise show in Blenheim Palace.

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With hip-hops’ already immense impact on fashion in the past decades, future holds much promise for this marriage. To be involved with the hip-hop culture is to participate in the defining mood of the spirit of the time. Luckily, fashion and hip-hop aren’t inactive ideas. They’re constantly evolving in ways bold and barely perceptible — but always aiming to be in line with that ineffable quality of being cool.

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