#which is valid but also baffling at times

[lastoneout]

why do people on the internet know so much about the epic of gilgamesh

[secretwritingspot]

High Maintenance

Pairing: OPLA Sanji x Reader

COME GET Y'ALLS DINNER I'M BACKKK!!!

Rating/Content Warnings: like...pg-16ish? Idk there's nudity and a lot of suggestive shit and kinda a little bit of groping (consensual, obvs) heavy-petting I guess might be the right term? But there's no outright fucking so do with that what you will.

Summary: Okay but Sanji with a high-femme reader. Like...we know how much this man likes women so I feel like he'd be all over a super femme person. Basically he has a fascination with all their fancy bath products that borders on is pervy because what do all those even do??? Eventually reader just decides to let him watch and find out.

Disclaimer(s): Since it's directly related to the plot, reader is stated as a woman in this, so if that's uncomfy for you to read keep that in mind and keep yourself safe! This idea came to me because I just finished finals and got to properly do self care for the first time in ever and wash all the finals grime off lmfao. Also there's nothing REALLY sub!Sanji about this but also...there's vibes. Damn Taz Skylar for portraying a character so babygirl that even me, quite possibly the world's biggest sub, sees him and is like...yeah I could tell him what to do once or twice.

As much as he tried, Sanji just didn't understand.

Sure, he was far better then the others - leagues away from Luffy and Zoro in terms of hygiene - but he was still a man. And a pirate, at that.

It baffled him the sheer number of products you had- a brush, towel, some sort of sugar concoction, all for the same purpose. A more traditional shampoo, similar to the kind he used, for initially cleaning off all the (your words) "pirate grime". Another, "gentler" shampoo for your hair. Which only doubled his confusion, as he had been under the impression that all shampoo was for hair. 2 different razors, scented body wash, colorful soaps.

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His eyes bend to you when you walk into the galley to move through to the bathroom - towel, change of clothes, and multiple bottles in your arms.

It isn't uncommon for you and Sanji to meet this way. He's nearly always in the kitchen, and the hall to the bathroom cuts through the galley. Still, his heart warms every time you stop and set down all the numerous - he'll never understand what all those different products could possibly do - things in your arms on your side of the counter and take a stool, smiling at him.

Without fail, you stop for a few moments every time on your way to the bath just to talk with him, and every time it makes his heart race and his breath catch happily.

"Hey, Sanji."

"Evening, love." He answers, voice deceptively easy. He hopes you'd never know just how much effort goes in to that 'easy' temperament he has around you, but sometimes he thinks it's obvious. "What brings you down here at...2:30 in the morning?"

You laugh softly when he mentions the late hour, ever the type to worry over you getting enough sleep, shrugging sheepishly.

"I could ask you the same thing."

Your (valid) argument seems to phase right through him and he ignores the question, simply raising a brow at you. You shake your head fondly, but answer anyway.

"I was on my way to take a bath. It's nicer at night, since there's less people up. More time, and quiet."

He hums in acknowledgment and keeps cooking, turning to you with a shy look on his face.

"Um...love?"

"Hm?"

You fold your arms in front of you on the counter and lean on your hands, looking at him curiously as you wait for him to continue.

He pauses, face red.

"Well...I was wondering if I...if I could ask you a question?"

You squint in amused confusion at his nervousness, eyes soft and fond as you nod. He thinks he might die.

"Yeah, shoot."

He clears his throat and looks at all the various bath products you brought with you before looking away, gesturing at the bottles.

"What do they...do?"

You snort when you realize that was really what he was so nervous over, shaking your head with a fond giggle.

"Wow, you are such a man sometimes."

Your eyes flit to the products before looking back up at him.

"Wanna be a little more specific?"

"Oh, right." He chuckles, looking embarrassed. "There's so...many?" He looks back at you, the confusion obvious on his face. "I mean...why do you need so many? Do they really all do different things? And-" He gestures to all the various products, brow raised. "Why so many different kinds of shampoo?"

Your giggles turn to full-blown laughter at his confusion, though it's not at his expense.

Okay, mostly not at his expense. Maybe a little bit.

"Oh, honey. You're cute sometimes, y'know that?"

You shake your head, rolling your eyes softly and looking at him. It's sweet, really, how embarrassed and curious he is. A very, very bad (very amusing) idea comes to your mind, and before you can think any better of it, you hear your own voice speaking.

"...want me to show you?"

He blinks almost sleepily, eyes wide.

"I- pardon?"

There's a thick silence as you watch the gears turn in his head, trying to work out if you really just said that and what the hell it means.

"What- what are you suggesting?"

You shrug, teasing smirk unfurling across your face as you sit up, cocking your head at him. It's not exactly like you can un-say what you just said, so you figure you might as well go for it. In for a penny, right?

"Exactly what I just said. You wanna know what they do, I'll show you."

You look down with coy, faux-innocence and sigh, giving him a chance to back out that you know he won't take.

"But, y'know...only if you want to."

The heavy-handed mock disappointment seems to jump start His mind again and his eyes flash with realization, a red flush starting up his neck.

"O- Oh....oh! Yeah, alright. I'd like that. Yeah. Yeah, that would be very- very, uh...helpful. Thanks."

He clears his throat, trying to sound less flustered.

It doesn't work.

You stifle a laugh at his reaction, shrugging and picking up your things. You start to walk down the hallway to the bathroom and for a few moments, he feels like he's frozen solid right where he is. You pause at the door, turning over your shoulder to look back at him teasingly.

"Well, c'mon then. Don't make me wait up."

He blinks and then he's moving towards you, feet carrying him forward before he even truly thinks about what he's doing. He follows you into the bathroom, and he can hear his heartbeat in his ears.

"Uh...okay, so, how do I- do I sit somewhere? Or...or watch? I- I don't know what's, uh..."

You shake your head with a fond giggle when he struggles to put a sentence together in his nervousness, but you decide to take pity and give him a bit more guidance.

"Alright, sit down."

You move him over to a bench and push him lightly down by the shoulder to sit back. He goes without resistance, letting you push him by two fingers and minimal pressure on his shoulder, closing the door and locking it behind you.

He sits down on the bench, blushing intensely. He doesn't know much about healthcare, but he thinks he might be having heart palpitations.

You hum to yourself quietly as you turn on the hot water, letting the bath fill while you busy yourself setting up the number of bottles and containers and miscellaneous items of yours on the edge of the tub. He shifts in his seat as you open one of the bottles and empty a bit into the bath, which immediately starts foaming as you turn to him with a teasing smile.

"I'm assuming you already know what bubble bath is?"

He nods, looking at the bath as it starts to foam, feeling like a teenager in a high school health class.

"Yeah, I know about that part." He nods slightly in relief- at least he knows something. "Just uh...never actually experienced it before."

"Never?"

Your brows furrow in surprise and confusion before you make a conscious effort to raise them, trying not to make your concern too obvious as something softens in your eyes for a moment. Sympathy, maybe.

"...well, we'll just have to do this for you sometime, then. Once you know what all of it is."

Your voice is gentler then, soft. You don't linger on the moment, looking away to stop the water once the bath is full and holding up a spherical object for him to see.

"This is a bath bomb. It's got stuff in it that makes the water turn pretty colors and smell nice and helps with your skin."

He nods, shifting again in his seat as you place the sphere into the bath. Though he's nervous, his eyes drag to every little detail, desperate to take it all in.

"Right." He mumbles, watching you throw the bath bomb into the water before his curiosity gets the better of him.

"Do you always make it this nice? With all the different...products and stuff?"

You shrug and clip your hair up messily, and he tries not to get distracted by how domestic this whole thing feels.

"When I have the time, yeah. It's...nice. A good way to relax."

You find the zipper of the dress you'd been wearing, a simple sun dress to keep you from melting in the sun or freezing from the sea breeze, fingers halting at the top as you look back at him.

"Last chance to back out, Sanji."

He swallows, eyes trailing down your body as you give him one last out. If he were more in his right mind, he'd think you were sweet for continually checking up on him.

Right now, he just thinks it's tedious.

"No, uh...no, I'm good. I am very much interested in this lesson." He clears his throat. "I would appreciate the, uh...the help."

You huff a fond laugh at his enthusiasm as his blushing gaze meets yours, shaking your head at him softly.

"Alright then."

You reach for the pull of the zipper again and slowly drag it down, slipping the dress off the taper of your shoulders, your waist, your hips. Your panties follow quickly after and your clothes all pool at your feet. You step out of them gingerly before stepping into the bath with a satisfied sigh, sinking slowly into the water with a satisfied hiss.

His eyes follow you the entire time, his heart beating at a rapid clip in his chest. He's seen other people nude before, he's had sex, but watching someone in the bath seems so...it's just...jesus. He's never done something this intimate. And yet, his eyes are glued to you.

He swallows nervously, hands starting to tremble a little bit.

For a moment he gets to see you completely bare, then the cloudy, colored water and the bubbles slowly cover you inch by inch. He can still see from your shoulders up where the water doesn't cover you. Your eyes flick back to him with a knowing smirk.

"You're staring."

It's a simple observation, though there's an undeniably teasing tone to your voice when you point it out. It isn't cold, though, or unwelcoming- the exact opposite, in fact. It's an amused little poke at his more perverted tendencies, but one that makes no judgement on him for it.

It sounds suspiciously like approval.

His mouth is almost agape, mind replaying the scene of every inch of you disappearing behind the clouds of bubbles and soap over and over again. It's like a scene from a romance novel.

(Despite the others' teasing, he's never actually read a romance novel. He assumes this is what they're like.)

He flushes and his eyes flick away from you, resolutely staring at the wall to your right.

"I- I didn't mean to, uh...I- I'm-"

"It's alright."

You quiet his stammering immediately, sending him a quick wink. Again, your tone sounds suspiciously of approval.

"I don't mind."

You sigh in contentedness at the warmth of the bath, taking a moment to just relax into the warmth before grabbing a cloth.

"So, you still want that lesson?"

He looks back at you, his blush red and steadily getting darker He nods slowly, blinking dizzily at the sight of you.

"Yes please."

He whispers, voice hoarse and cracking with equal parts nervousness and excitement. "Please and thank you." He adds softly, biting his lips and nodding again, eyes wide.

You giggle at his obvious excitement, leaning over the edge of the tub to grab a cloth and looking at him coyly with the knowledge that it would give him a teasing glimpse of your chest.

"Right, well- this is an exfoliating towel."

You lift it up to show him on the word "this" as if to emphasize your words before dunking the rough cloth gently underwater to wet it, attempting to explain in terms he can understand- his cooking utensils.

"It's like...polishing a knife. You start with a rougher grit and work your way down."

His eyes widen at the teasing glimpse of your chest as you dunk the towel in. He's embarrassed to find himself a bit breathless, his mind definitely not in the proper place right now.

"Ah..." He nods in understanding, trying to calm his flustered nerves and look away from your body. "So, you'd use this...after you were in the bubble bath, I guess?"

"During."

You correct lightly, beginning to scrub your skin with the wet cloth. To Sanji, it's nothing but a massive tease- first scrubbing each of your arms, then across your shoulders, neck, collar-bones. Each second seems to stretch into hours and he seriously starts to doubt his sanity.

To his disappointment, you scrub down your chest, stomach, hips below the water where he can't see much other than the occasional flash of color from the hot pink cloth.

"It makes your skin smooth, makes it easier to shave, clears off gunk and dead skin. Keeps me..."

But then, you lift your leg out of the water and point it. His mind short-circuits completely as you give him far too good of a view, meticulously scrubbing down one leg before putting it back underwater and repeating the process with the other. Legs, legs - he's heard he has nice ones before and he's never quite understood it but this, you, now - he thinks he could die happy between yours.

You notice, of course, the way his eyes magnetize to your skin. Once finished, you continue the words you'd trailed off on, voice soft and teasing as you wink at him.

"...y'know, soft to the touch."

His eyes follow you, watching you scrub and reveal each body part with a slight flutter in his chest. He swallows, unable to move, his eyes glued to you. Said eyes go wide when you reveal your legs, your bare thighs something he never thought he'd get to see. He swallows, trying not to make it obvious he's staring.

"Yes, I, uh...I believe I understand. It helps make things...soft." He chuckles nervously, trying to play down how obviously flustered he is.

You put down the cloth once you're finished scrubbing down your whole body, thoroughly entertained by his nervousness. You pick up a small jar next, holding it up briefly to show it to him before opening it and gently scooping out a bit of thick paste and rubbing it onto your legs, again giving him a downright sinful view.

"Y'know how I mentioned working your way down to a lower grit? Well, this is that. It's a sugar scrub, pretty much the same purpose. Moisturizes and exfoliates to keep my skin soft."

He watches each moment of you scrubbing, and each bit you reveal of your body. He's got no clue where to look, if he's allowed to look. Even seeing your legs...oh god.

He must be allowed to look, right? Surely he must.

He bites his lip and nods, fingers nervously tapping on his knee as he tries to focus back on anything else, looking away in an attempt to look more respectful than he's feeling at the moment.

"That's, uh...that's a lot of work to put into your skin just for softness."

"Well, you should see how soft it is."

You shoot back with a wink, using another dollop of the paste to exfoliate your upper chest and shoulders.

He notices that you use it on fewer, more specific areas- which he supposes makes sense, since it's a much more finite resource than the cloth. The observation seems much more meaningful to a mind trying to focus on anything other than your body.

Not that it's easy.

Nothing about this is easy.

"Do you just...do this a lot? With your skin, I mean." He asks nervously, eyes wide in wonder that someone would put this much effort into something so baseline...or that someone like you would feel the need to do anything to your angelic appearance.

He clears his throat.

"Y'know...not that you should have to. You look beautiful either way."

"Not always. Or- not fully to this extent."

You smile softly with a shrug, steam swirling in the air around you. All of it seems so effortless. He can't seem to catch his breath. After scrubbing the mixture into your skin for a few moments, you rinse it off with the bath water, expression zen and almost bored like you haven't completely altered the rest of his natural life.

"This is usually what I do when I want to feel...extra nice. When I've got a date, or something else I want to look nice for."

You explain, rinsing yourself off thoroughly before picking up your razor, starting to shave your legs while you talk to him, teasing lightly-

"I take it I don't have to explain shaving to you?"

He blushes a little harder, his eyes going to your legs as you shave them. Oh god, this is making him so nervous. His body is buzzing with anticipation and nerves and...other things.

"Uh...well, no, I uh...I know how to shave. But I guess I'm- I've never been this close to a woman while she shaves, I suppose." He gulps, his words getting softer the further he talks, like he might run out of air. He bites his lip. "But I think I get the idea."

You hum in equal parts acknowledgment and amusement, finishing up shaving in comfortable silence- arms, under arms, legs. The process goes relatively quickly before you set the razor back down, picking up another bottle and a plush looking ball of tight-nit net fabric.

"This is a lufa. And the bottle is body wash."

You keep your explanations simple so as not to confuse him too much. You know he'll be having a tough time focusing on your words as is, especially considering that he has precisely 0 experience with this sort of thing, and you don't want to overwhelm the poor thing.

You hold up the ball for him to see for a moment before uncapping the bottle, pouring a bit of the soapy liquid onto the fabric and rubbing it across your skin. You trace along your neck, chest, shoulders, the sponge-like ball of fabric leaving trails of fluffy bubbles in its path. The sight only makes it harder for him to cope, the bubbles not leaving much of anything to the imagination.

Still, it only adds to the romance-novel story-book scene in his mind, leaving his thoughts alarmingly warm and fuzzy.

He blushes and sighs, eyes glued the entire time. His body is humming with anticipation, his mind is getting hazy. He doesn't know how to handle this, how to handle you- the way you look right now, the way you talk, the person you are. His chest is fluttering, and he's blushing up a storm. Oh god, you look so nice.

"What's that do?"

His voice is hoarse and breathless, the words barely escaping his lips.

"It's a bit like soap, but more...I don't know, luxurious feeling."

You close your eyes in contentedness and move the lufa across your body, much more thorough with this than anything else. As far as he can see, there's not a single spot you don't reach, leaving fluffy trails of bubbles that slowly dissolve when they sink back underwater.

"The lufa is also kinda an exfoliant, but a much more gentle one."

He watches every moment of it with complete fascination, not sure where to look with the lufa in front of you. It's basically impossible not to look at your curves and your body at this point. You're stunningly beautiful in this moment, and he's so close to you he can see her every little detail. His eyes can't move away, and he swallows, nodding.

"I...oh. It looks like it feels nice." He chuckles in his nervousness. "And, uh...it probably smells nice too, I'm guessing..?"

"It certainly does both of those things."

You confirm with a soft, gentle laugh, amused and teasing yes, but more fond and...almost intimate than before.

"I mean, there's not much point taking a bath if you don't come out smelling like a cupcake."

You joke lightly, holding the lufa underwater to let the bubbles fizzle out and then wringing it out and setting it aside to let it dry.

His eyes follow the motions of you wringing out the lufa and he watches your body intently. He's staring at you a little too much, he knows. He can almost see...everything. His breath is coming a little heavy, and he finds his mind is getting more and more hazy as you go.

"A cupcake...?" He swallows, his voice almost cracking. "That's an oddly specific smell. Like... like, vanilla?"

"It's just a figure of speech. Smelling like anything sweet, really. Vanilla, chocolate, fruit, flowers."

You wave a dismissive hand with a giggle, talking to him absentmindedly as you let your hair down from where you had it clipped up and out of the way, shaking it out once you let it down. Slowly, you slide down in the bath until your hair is wet, wiping the wet strands from your face.

"This one is vanilla, though."

You tease with a wink, holding up a bottle of shampoo before opening the lid and pouring a bit into your hand. It only takes you a moment of lathering it before it suds and you can start working the bubbles into your hair.

Sanji, meanwhile, is having a bit of a crisis.

He swallows, feeling his body go a little limp at the sight of you in the bathtub, wet strands of hair hanging over your face. His eyes are glued to you again, and he's getting...so distracted.

He manages to speak, though his words are slow and not quite as coherent as before.

"I- you look...so pretty. Your hair looks great like that." He mumbles quietly, voice hoarse and breathy.

"It's a cleansing shampoo. Probably close to the kind you and the boys use."

You huff a soft laugh at his mumbled praise, shaking your head fondly. He's always been sweet, but there's something particularly cute about him when he's flustered like this.

"That just means it's harsher. Better for getting everything off, since being a pirate isn't exactly the cleanest job. It isn't great for your hair, though."

You explain in a soft hum, leaning your head back again to rinse your hair off gently, running your fingers through it. And trying to shake the thoughts of the boys' 5-in-1 shampoo from your head.

You look like an angel, or a mermaid. He can't decide which.

He smiles, his eyes glancing over your body every once in a while, though mostly he finds himself focused on your face and your hair in particular. Your expression is so...so...ugh. You look like a goddess, hair dripping with water and skin wet from the bath.

"So, you...you want your hair to look nice then. Not just clean."

You nod your head and hum in confirmation, uncapping a different bottle with a smile and pouring some of the liquid inside into your hand.

"That's what this shampoo is for. Still cleans, but it's not as harsh or stripping as the other one."

"So it's not as good as getting all of the pirate grime out of your hair, but it keeps your hair soft, shiny, healthy. All that good stuff."

You lather the new liquid in your hair, massaging it into your scalp with a soft, contented sigh at the relaxing feeling as it quickly turns to white suds.

He swallows, his eyes locked onto you and your hair, watching it shimmer and gleam with the water and product soaking through it. God, you're so...your hair shines like glass, and he can't stop staring at it.

"Uh, do you...d'you want help with that?" He asks quickly, his breath catching in his throat. "I mean-" He mumbles, cutting himself off sheepishly. "Do you need any help?"

Your eyes widen slightly at his enthusiasm, an amused smile quickly growing on your face. You look off to the middle distance for a moment with a dramatic sigh in mock consideration before looking back at him, quirking a finger forward in permission.

"Well, go on then."

He swallows and then nods eagerly, leaning forward slowly. He leans close, his cheeks blushing a little bit as the scent of your hair tickles his nose. He reaches out gingerly, like he's not sure if he's allowed, before rubbing the shampoo into your hair.

His lungs stop working.

Really, his breath just hitches in his throat again, only a second as he blinks once. But he's convinced his body is giving out. Oh god, you want him to touch you. Oh, god, you're letting him touch you.

"Just..." He trails off quietly, his voice breaking a little breathily as he tilts your head back softly to give himself better access.

You practically purr at the touch when he massages the shampoo into your scalp, your neck, your hair, leaning into his touch as your eyes flutter shut with a sigh.

"You're good with your hands, aren't you?"

You observe softly, letting him continue to wash and rinse your hair. His passion for the task is palpable, though you could've guessed as much with the fixation he always had on your bath products, equal parts curious and perverted.

His blush deepens quickly, and his hands shake as his fingers brushing against you carefully.

"Uhm..." He chokes slightly, clearing his throat. "I- I guess I am. I like doing things with my hands." He swallows, words coming out a little hoarse. His fingers move back to your hair.

"I can tell."

You remark teasingly, voice soft as you shoot him a wink before closing your eyes again. Once the shampoo is all rinsed from your hair, you direct him softly, voice quiet in clear relaxation-

"Conditioner. Purple bottle by your hand."

He scrambles to uncap the bottle as soon as you speak, eager to have been given permission to continue, pouring a small amount into his hands before brushing his fingers through your hair.

"'s for making your hair smoother. Keeps it from breaking if you comb it too much."

You explain absentmindedly. This one is new- it doesn't fizz up in his hands or create bubbling foam in your hair, just absorbs into the strands, smooth and slick and shiny.

He rubs his hands together, spreading out the conditioner throughout your hair, working it to its core. His breathing is a little shaky as his fingers glide through your hair, but he does his best not to show it. His eyes are still focused on you, and his heart is beating too fast.

He swallows, the scent of your conditioner filling his nose and his mind.

"How do you...find the time for all this? That's a lot of bottles, and a lot of work to just...make your hair nice."

"It's worth it. It's...relaxing. Like meditation. Or cooking something familiar."

You add on second thought, relating back to him to help him understand. When the conditioner is worked into your hair, you toss him a towel to dry his hands on once he's rinsed them off.

"Now go sit back down. Lesson's almost over."

You instruct softly, voice gentle and fond. He doesn't think before moving back to the bench and sitting back down, though his brows furrow endearingly in confusion. You just laugh lightly.

"Not every bath product is something you use in the actual bath."

He nods, expression confused, but he doesn't ask for elaboration. His eyes are still glued to your body, the sight of you in the bath still stunning. It's almost hypnotic to just sit back and watch. He clears his throat, looking around the bath curiously with a hint of confusion on his face.

"So...what's left?"

"...you'll see."

Is the eventual, cryptic answer he gets after a pause, you still smirking slightly. Then you- oh. Oh. You stand up, pulling the plug in the bath and letting the water drain as you step out to stand on the bath mat, completely bare and wet and dripping and oh, god- you grab a medium sized towel and lightly dry your hair until it's no longer dripping, still damp but not actively in your way, clipping it up again as you pat the rest of your body dry softly, humming to yourself as you work.

You scoff lightly at the question, shaking your head in fond amusement without looking up, still focused on drying yourself off.

"Wait, are you...are you not going to wear anything else? I mean...I'm not complaining, I like looking at you, but...aren't you cold?" He asks, still staring at you excitedly. Your hair is up again, and every inch of your body is on display. He's practically drooling.

Oh, god, this is a blessing.

'I'm gonna put on clothes eventually, Sanji. Like I told you, I'm not done yet."

Once you deem your level of dryness acceptable enough, you pick up another jar and open the lid, scooping out a bit of a much thicker cream.

"Moisturizer."

You answer before he even has the will to ask, eyes meeting his for a moment with a fond smirk as you rub the cream onto your body.

"Smells nice, and keeps your skin soft."

He stares at you as you rub the moisturizer on your body, his eyes going everywhere as you move. Every inch of your body is incredible, and he keeps finding new places to look.

He swallows, his expression a mix of admiration, shock, and excitement.

"Do... do you want any help with that?" He asks nervously.

It would be a lie to say he's asking for innocent reasons. Seeing your hands - small, soft, yours - massage the moisturizer into every inch of your body, your legs, thighs, hips, arms, stomach, neck- Jesus, your tits- his mind is on fire.

"Aww, are you offering? Sure, Sanji. You can help."

You answer, voice teasing like you know exactly what he's thinking, and- wait. That's- he actually- you gave him permission? You actually said yes? It takes him a moment to process the words, mind tripping over itself in surprise and oh fuck yes, Jesus Christ.

That's exactly what he's offering, and he doesn't have the mind to hide it. He nods eagerly, his expression telling you everything you need to know.

He scoots over closer, his hand reaching for the moisturizer and his eyes glued on your breasts now. They look so good. He applies the cream directly there, the touch of his hands on your soft skin causing him a burst of electricity as he touches you gently. Oh god, you're letting him... he's touching you! It's like his mind is exploding, and he's doing his best to contain himself.

He's definitely not going to let you do this alone, anyway. It's too much of a blessing, and his hands are trembling, even as he works them into your skin. He's trying to focus on keeping himself from getting too excited, but seeing you like this is too much to handle. He licks his lips nervously as his hands flit all over your body. His mind screams at him to do something, do more, but the years of chivalry drilled into him stay his hands.

You almost laugh when he immediately decides to start at your breasts, rolling your eyes fondly at the predictable move.

You aren't really surprised but then again, you still let him.

Soon enough the moisturizer has sunken into your skin and you press him back lightly by the chest, using those same fingers to tilt his chin up softly. You angle his head up at you, voice soft with a gentle smirk on your face.

"Thanks for the help, Sanji."

He swallows, looking up at you. His lips are parted and his breath is heavy. He blinks slowly. He's...he can't believe just how lucky he is.

"Of-of course. It was nice to...it was nice to help someone...someone so beautiful." He says, his voice breathless and his cheeks flushed a bright, bright red.

You huff a fond little laugh, mussing up his hair with your hand.

It takes a moment for him to grow aware of his surroundings again. Aware of anything. The tile is cool beneath his knees and - when did he get there? - the air is thick with steam but slowly thinning. The scent of you still lingers, or the scent of your myriad of products, he's not sure. And...those.

You're gone in a flurry as quickly as you came, a sleep shirt and a pair of panties thrown on before he can even process that you're moving, a teasing pat on the cheek and a repetition of "well, thanks anyway!" And then...you're gone.

Like a mirage or a daydream, the kind he never lets himself have in public (not that any of his effort has stopped him, really).

That's an entirely separate problem for him to tackle. He groans.

His budget can't handle frivolous expenses, but now he can't get the thought out of his head of wrapping his fist around himself with some of that fancy moisturizer that smells like you as lube and...shit, he's gonna have to buy a bottle, before he goes insane.

Ah, fuck, who is he kidding? He's never going to be able to do so much as take a bath without jerking off again.

[detectivekirigirislays]

SOME MANGA SPOILERS!

i really do believe that damian and anya are somewhat similar to yor and loid in ways:

damian and yor are similar in the sense that they're the ones who quite literally fell first, they also seem to struggle with properly expressing how they feel and thus retort to violence and lashing out (violence for yor and lashing out for damian)

anya and loid, on the other hand, are obviously similar in the sense that anya and loid use these silly tactics to swoon over their specific target (or partner for loid), though in the end there's always a high percent that the tactic or plan backfires big time, which does give it a comedic sense.

but there's more.

anya and loid are similar in the sense that they start feeling comfortable around damian and yor respectively. not even realizing it, they slowly learn to open up to only these people, and it's baffling to them because they don't fully grasp the idea of feeling so secure and comfortable with another person, but it happens.

like in the latest chapter, where anya admits to damian (although he doesn't believe her) that she IS indeed an esper because at that moment SHE FELT COMFORTABLE WITH HIM. she felt that she could relate to him and felt secured enough that he was understanding of her.

loid, on the other hand, may still keep his secret well, but slowly and surely, before even realizing it, he literally drops to his knees with yor because he and his body are unconsciously already so comfortable with yor that he doesn't understand it at all.

loid and anya do things due to the fact that they feel comfortable with yor and damian WITHOUT EVEN REALIZING IT.

more parallels are that each pair can sympathize with one another because they have gone through the same thing or really remotely similar.

for instance, damian and anya; anya understands damian's loneliness and crave for validation and familial love because SHE IS THIS SAME. she craves validation and familial love because she's been lonely all her life hence her attachment to loid and yor. damian craves it in the sense that his family is not close with one another and is rather distant. with that, they can both sympathize with each other and realize things about one another that many others do not see.

yor and loid, on the other hand, share similar experiences as they have lost a lot from the war. losing family, becoming tools and weapons to their native countries and organization, somehow losing a part of themselves in the process of growing stronger, they find that lost part of themselves through EACH OTHER. when yor doubts herself, loid is there to support her and reassure her that she is doing great. even if loid somewhat dislikes asking for help, yor willingly offers to help him, she stands as a pillar and backbone for him. yor offers him advice and gives him another point of view he can work with, and loid lifts yor's spirits and supports her from behind.

in conclusion: damianya and twiyor supremacy🥰

[luckthebard]

So this is a very niche rant that is probably only something I've noticed or been annoyed by, but:

The longer Critical Role has gone on and the more changes they've made/content they've created, there's been an increase in weird people who are desperate and determined to prove that changes or content they don't like are "an objective failure" - but often lie or deliberately misunderstand viewership statistics to do so.

There are a few big "facts" I see repeated by people to argue that CR has "gone in the wrong direction" that are just plain wrong, and I think what annoys me most is seeing so many people engage with those "facts" without bothering to double-check them or push back against the certainty with which people state them. An example of one I keep seeing now is "twitch streaming numbers are down" and it's like, yeah, sure, in comparison to when they didn't simultaneously air on YouTube. If you add up the YT and Twitch numbers these days it's about the same as mid-late C2, but people love to act like YT streaming doesn't exist to make a point that "people don't like C3". And I tbh don't care if people like or dislike C3 but why this determination to falsely quantify and validate a personal preference?

The earliest I saw this was an intense agreement on reddit that Exandria Unlimited was a "failure" for CR, "unlike Undeadwood," because viewership numbers were lower. And it was tbh baffling to not see pushback against that narrative, because it's just objectively untrue. Original EXU's VOD streaming numbers are higher than every single episode of Undeadwood, and it premiered literally years later. It also has a lower "drop-off" in viewership (comparison of how many views episode 1 vs the finale has) than Undeadwood, despite frequent claims to the contrary. And don't mistake me here, I really enjoyed Undeadwood, but it actually was a viewership misstep for CR to the degree that they didn't try anything like it again for a while after and significantly changed how they approached marketing and airing miniseries. (A big one being: don't air a long miniseries simultaneously with the main series, it's too much content for most people to invest in during a week.)

(Sidebar, but another great miniseries CR did that didn't get a lot of viewership love is the Elder Scrolls Online trilogy, so I'm going to plug it here. It has some weirdly low viewership numbers on episodes 2 and 3 and I promise you they're both well worth it.)

The other one I keep seeing is "4 Sided Dive has lower numbers than Talks" which is also just not true. Most 4 Sided Dive VODs have nearly twice as many views as Talks VODs (and I'm using the ones that aired directly on the CR channel as a metric here, not the ones re-uploaded from G&S which lost numbers in the change-over). And I'll tbh chalk that up to the fact 4SD airs much less frequently - people are more likely to think it's necessary to watch whereas with Talks if you weren't interested in the guests you might skip a week. I'm not making any claims about the quality of either show, but the use of false viewership statistics to support "one of these sucks" is so rampant and so weird.

All this to say that yesterday I saw a weird viewer-hungry YouTube clickbait video titled "Midst a FAILURE for Critical Role!!" with a truly absurd confidence on what the VOD streaming numbers for the Midst YouTube videos mean for the series mere days after the premier and snapped.

tl;dr, people just make shit up and say whatever on the internet all the time and we hopefully all understand and expect that BUT (and here's the more annoying thing) 9 times out of 10 people just engage with that WITHOUT LOOKING INTO IT THEMSELVES

[anomalymon]

Addressing Anti-Endogenics in the Alterhuman Community

I keep seeing posts about being baffled by anti-endogenic alterhumans, but I haven't actually seen too many posts which address why being an anti-endogenic alterhuman doesn't make sense. Nor have I seen many which don't talk down to anti-endogenics or intentionally piss them off, which I think is counter-productive in this. I'm on an essay writing kick so I might as well.

This isn't to try to prove endogenic systems. There are already many who have done this. I'd recommend looking through Endogenic & Non-Traumagenic Plurality Resources by Guardians System. I don't agree with the use of sysmed, but for a link collection, it's very effective. Rather, this is to explain why there is an overlap and why some are concerned.

Because I feel this essay is important, I will be making a bulleted list first, and you can read further if you want the elaboration. I understand not everyone wants to read an over 1,500 word essay.

What is endogenic?: Endogenic for systems means being a system for a reason other than trauma - endogenic systems can still have trauma and dissociation, and the belief of cause can be literally anything including neurological, spirituality, or intentional creation. Many subcultures, some unrelated, exist under it.

System/Otherkin Historical Overlap: Plurality and kin have overlapped for over twenty years. Otherkin was used to mean nonhumans in systems, and fictive came from soulbonding which was/is a very fictionkin-dominant space.

Terminology: System is not DID only and has been used predominantly by endogenic systems since the early 90s. Most plural groups have historically shared terminology and the gatekeeping of such is very recent. This is concerningly close to paralleling what we're seeing with therianthropy gatekeeping.

Subjective Experiences: Trying to explain your subjective experiences to anti-endogenics and anti-kin are alike in being difficult and people not always being receptive to actual studies or arguments.

Similar Spirituality: Spiritual endogenic system origins are very similar to many spiritual alterhuman origins with the difference being level of separation and indiviudality between host/'type or different 'types.

Similar Experiences in Psych: Both alterhumans and endogenic systems have gaps in research and similarities with how we experience degradation from a psychological standpoint or being "insane". What is an endogenic system? This may be the most important thing to get out of the way - as I've noticed many people who are anti-endogenic don't actually know what endogenic means.

Endogenic just means a system that formed for a reason other than trauma. It doesn't say anything about having no trauma at all nor anything about dissociative experiences, and it can be anything from neurological, spiritual, intentionally created, or seemingly random odds. There are several subcultures under this umbrella - including some that don't even use endogenic or origin terminology, or ones that don't use system terminology.

Endogenic systems can have trauma later in life, they can also still have dissociative disorders from that trauma. Endogenic systems can still be diagnosed with DID.

It is a poor binary - but the reason it exists is most conversations surrounding systems have to do with trauma. Origin doesn't always matter when it comes to systems and that is a separate topic, however, it surrounds validation discussion and discourse.

The otherkin and plural communities have overlaped for over twenty years

For a long time there has been a huge overlap between otherkin and fictionkin with plurality in particular - at least for as long as both groups have been making websites and likely longer.

To highlight this the best, the overlap was to the point that "otherkin" was used for nonhuman system members in the past. Dark Personalities circa 2001 defined otherkin as "People in a multiple system who are not human. Often they are walk-ins, claiming to be older than the body in which they reside, and having physical traits very different from the body itself. Multiples are often hosts to otherkin." Source, Kinhost had an otherkin multiple FAQ since 2001 Source, and it even appeared in a list of DID terminology in 2013 Source.

On top of that, the term "fictive" originated within fictionkin-dominant soulbonding spaces. I'd recommend A Timeline of the Fictionkin Community by House of Chimeras for further reading on this.

The overlap exists in many ways in addition to what we have historically. What we deal with when it comes to certain types of discourse is simular, dealing with people against our subjective experiences has the same level of frustration, we have very similar spiritual beliefs in particular, and there are similarities with what we go through in the field of psychology.

Terminology out of the way: "but system is DID only!"

The simple answer is that it's not. I'd highly recommend reading A Brief History of the Use of "System" in Non-DID Spaces by LB-Lee on this subject, as they have been around for longer than my system has and this is a well-researched article. "System" is just a noun for a group of entities that exist in a body.

Terminology has historically been shared between both groups as they're needed. Fictive and headmate for example originated from endogenic groups while "host" seemingly cropped up multiple times independently - and terms like switching and fronting are needed because there isn't a better alternative. This didn't become an "issue" until about 2015 or so.

From a sociological standpoint however, something very similar has almost happened to the therianthropy and otherkin communities and arguably there is a similar problem already happening. There are those who claim that therian and otherkin are spiritual only and completely exclude and gatekeep psychological experiences - or cry someone with clinical lycanthropy using terms like shifting is appropriation. While they can normally be disproved, there are those who double down that this is spiritual-only. These communities are even developing their own binary - spiritual vs. psychological.

While this is a bit of a reverse to what happened with the plural community, that is a note of why these beliefs can be concerning within the alterhuman community. We are getting a bit too close for comfort to restricting and gatekeeping terminology based on a binary, and also teeter on the edge of expecting "proof" of an experience that's very hard to prove.

The nightmare of trying to explain your subjective experiences

As this is an essay for the alterhuman community, I am sure most of you reading this have encountered the scenario of trying to explain your subjective experience to some anti-kin or other group that is not having it. You can try to discuss your nonhuman experiences, cite historical and academic sources, insist with everything you have that what you're experiencing is real, but if someone is set in not believing you, it's ultimately a waste of time. The same thing applies here.

I could give you a long, detailed explanation about why we know we are a system. Many other systems would also be able to do the same thing - and many have tried. Ultimately it's up to you if you want to believe someone's subjective experiences or not - and if you don't believe it, it's up to you if you want to respect them or not.

To also claim that one is appropriating experiences is ridiculous. Are therianthropes appropriating from those with clinical lycanthropy, fictionkin appropriating from delusional misidentification, or otherlinkers appropriating from copinglinkers? There is a broad overlap and some shared terminology for convince over what can be subjectively a very similar experience - and you can't claim with certainty or in good faith that someone's experiences in and of themself are appropriating someone else.

Spiritually, you're likely very close to believing in endogenic systems

While not every otherkin, therian, or other identity inherently believes in spirituality, there is usually some coexistence or respect for others with beliefs different from you as spirituality can be a large element of the community. Most of these spiritual beliefs are already close to how spiritual endogenic systems might experience things.

Almost the exact same mechanisms which create spiritual alterhumanity is the same for spiritual systems. Various terms are already shared between spiritual alterhuman and spiritual system communities (and even non-spiritual system communities): walk-in for spiritual events and source vs. canon for fiction-based identities for example.

Additionally, several experiences are shared between these two groups. Existing in the astral plane or having experiences travelling through the astral for one. Communicating with spirits can also be a part of both - and that's where communities like soulbonding existed in tandum with fictionkin and even created the term fictive itself.

If someone believes in reincarnation and they can talk to and interact with their past selves - that is plural and can be considered an endogenic system. Same for if someone feels that their body at birth gave host to multiple souls. The difference between these experiences and polykin beliefs is just degree of individuality.

In the field of psychology, we are allies

Much of alterhumanity is arguably even less recognized by psychology. There are studies which showcase them of course, but there are also studies which showcase endogenic systems. Neither has many studies for similar reasons - we don't usually have a clinical need for help, and if we do, it can be extremely difficult to get it.

The potential for psych abuse or degradation in psychological settings exists for both of us - with how ridiculous it is to have abnormal other than human experiences, or how insane it is to be a system without fitting the DID model. The otherkin and therian communities in particular have a known saying along the lines of "If someone outside the community asks you for an interview: run" and it can be the same for endogenic systems.

Accusing others of faking their experiences only does harm to all of us. Giving our oppressors and ableists - in the sense of those who mock or degrade experiences for deeming them "insane" - an excuse to do so means they will take it and will use it to turn against others. If someone doesn't believe someone for something like being more than one entity in a physical body for any reason other than trauma, why should they believe you for identifying as nonhuman?

Conclusion

The endogenic and alterhuman communities are intertwined and respect of alterhumanity is in most of the steps the way to respecting all systems. The purpose of this essay is to get anti-endogenic alterhumans to reflect on their beliefs, and I hope that this was successful in doing that.

Others have made essays trying to argue for proof of their existence, and the sources are out there. I'd still implore you to get to know endogenic systems and remember that we are people and not just a discourse topic. Reflecting on our similarities in discourse, spirituality, ableism can help us move forward as communities.

[mari-monsta]

It honestly really baffles me when people say adrien is a boring or simple character, I don’t understand where that comes from at all. Because I think the main reason he’s so compelling are his complexities, but in the same vein those complexities I think make him someone very easy to relate to. Like it’s fine if he’s not likable or relatable to everyone but saying he’s not complex is really just ???? To me. Just looking at how DIFFERENTLY he acts around different people and situations is so fascinating to me. Of course everyone takes different personas and highlights different aspects of their personality around different people but adrien is the king of doing it around the same people to the extent of which having his two personalities be the same is laughable to those who know him personally in his everyday life.

But it’s not out of no where, seeing his home life and the kind of person he’s made out to be by his situation it’s not hard at all to understand that he’s a person who is immensely self conscious. He’s constantly gauging others perception of him and whether or not he is “safe”. What’s more fascinating is the entirely different way this comes out in chat noir. Because adriens personality as chat noir is also deliberate to a certain extent but it’s deliberate in the way that that’s how he wants others to see him. He wants to see self assured and larger than life because in his everyday life he feels small and self conscious. The fact that this dichotomy is so easy to follow in his character but creates such a black and white image in his two personalities is so interesting!

Another thing I find completely fascinating about him are his high empathy and how that actually fucks him up more often than not. He’s acutely aware of how other people might be feeling and can easily sympathize. At the same time though he has a hard time understanding certain social cues and situations and seems very out of his element. I don’t think these things conflict at all. Adrien is someone who easily puts himself in other peoples shoes and can imagine and have sympathy for their situation, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to pick up on the social complexities of every interaction every time. Emotions aren’t the same as communication and when it comes to the later adrien works best with simple and straight forward interactions.

In the same vein because of his aforementioned situations he’s also a character who has a lot of repressed anger and frustration that has been building up for a very long time. In his everyday life, he feels powerless, small, and insignificant. He doesn’t have faith that anyone would listen to his thoughts and feelings and actually take them into account, because by all of his experiences no one really has. This creates a defense mechanism where he shuts himself out before he even gets to the point of sharing how he really feels. We see this really easily in his relationship with Nino. He loves Nino DEARLY, but there is something that we have seen in him constantly putting up walls emotionally. He won’t tell him when he doesn’t find something funny, he won’t tell him if he’s unhappy to do something even when it greatly affects his life because he is at his core afraid Nino will not validate those emotions.

As a result, all the frustration he’s built up from feeling powerless in his everyday life we see just. Randomly bursting out of him in inopportune moments as chat noir. It’s not that adrien is such a violent or angry person normally. But he’s so used to repressing and modulating his emotions regularly that when he feels somewhat safe to express any frustration ALL of the anger he feels constantly bubbling under the surface all of the time just suddenly rushes out, like a dam holding back hundreds of gallons of water. This happens repeatedly, and then as soon as he’s realized he’s let himself get out of control he immediately feels immense guilt and he stops the dam up even tighter. This is obviously not a healthy feedback loop but it’s fucking FASCINATING!!!!

A common thing that I feel like I see fans often misinterpret about his character in my own opinion is just how PRIVATE of a person adrien is. Adrien loves sharing his love and appreciation for those around him because he knows how it feels not to know, not to be sure of that affection. But in the same token, Adrien rarely if ever actually shares his real feelings with those he’s close to. He doesn’t like people prying into his life or his feelings and he is very private about most things. We don’t see him talking about what he likes, we don’t see him sharing with his friends his anger or frustration. And in the end Adrien is the one character who has kept his secrets most closely held to his vest. This is all despite being so grandiose and loud mouthed as chat noir. Even as chat noir, adrien rarely is entirely open about things going on in his life.

To me Adrien as a character isn’t interesting or compelling because he is shy or cute or sweet, but because there are a number of different facets to his personality that I can easily see reasons for and understand where his feelings come from. He IS sweet, but not without misplaced anger, not without repression, not without mistakes and messy emotions. Not without pain that we can both easily see the roots of but also have a wide spread variety of consequences from. We see how his formative experiences affect every aspect of his life even in ways he audience wouldn’t necessarily expect, but make complete sense. That’s so fun and interesting to me!!!! Let characters be messy but try their best anyways!!! Let characters hurt each other and try to put the pieces back together one shard at a time. People have complicated emotions that come out in ways we can’t always foresee or help, people make mistakes because of that. But despite everything adrien is a character who cares deeply for those around him and tries to do right by them despite all the rest of it, and despite sometimes not really knowing how.

It’s things like that that keep miraculous being an extremely engaging and compelling story to me. Most of the general things about adriens character are also things that I find interesting about marinettes as well! Of course the intricacies of her character are completely different, but the general hows and whys and complex motivations for her actions while maintaining the best of intentions are what make them both so interesting to me. So this is just a little love letter to adriens character because I wanted to talk about that and why I find him so engaging!

[strongermonster]

little kids really love asking if i'm married.

i don't think it's just me specifically because i hear them ask basically any adult who's in range for more than 15 minutes. they LOVE knowing about that, i don't know why. usually they ask "miss j do you have a boyfriend?" and my answers have always been either 'no', 'yes', or 'no, i have a girlfriend'. and that's that. partly because this is my private life and we're not there to talk about that, partly because they're kids and strangers to me and don't really need to know more, and partly, unfortunately, because just that alone—just a simple "no, i have a girlfriend"—is enough to set some parents off.

even in the middle of a large city in ontario, parents will call to be like "ok so my child said that his female teacher today mentioned having a girlfriend? i'm lodging a complaint because that's so inappropriate." but thankfully the library has backed me up 100% of the time so far and just refused to accept that as a valid complaint. (also when you walk into the library there's a fucking enormous pride flag so like. how'd ya miss that mrs. mom)

but it sorta brings me to one of the biggest issues i have with being around kids is that i just won't lie to them. i'm a FIRM believer in that if a child is old enough to ask a question, they're old enough to get an answer. absolutely cannot stand that "oh when you're older" cop-out bullshit. yes they're going to ask some difficult questions, and yes the answer is going to be sometimes (or even a lot of the time) "i don't know", at which point, in my opinion, the follow up is "let's find out together".

and obviously you need to tailor the answers to be age appropriate. if a 6 year old asks where babies come from, that's going to be a different answer than if a 14 year old does.

but so many people are like "well my belief system doesn't account for that. my religion means we don't talk about that. i don't think my child is old enough for that. my child is a boy/girl and doesn't need to know about that." etc etc.

your child asked that though. which means they're already having thoughts about that. and if YOU aren't answering it, they're going to find out anyways. like no matter how tightly you hold those reins, they're going to ask a friend, or google it, and end up potentially getting a wrong answer. potentially getting a harmful answer. and in what world would you not want

a) the chance to bond and discuss things with your child b) the option to know EXACTLY what information they're getting on a topic because you are the one who gave it to them. c) just knowing that your child loves and trusts you enough to come to you about things d) getting that insight to what's on their mind, what they're going through in life, how they're feeling, what level they're at.

it just baffles me how SO many people underestimate, belittle, refuse to provide for, mistrust, etc their own kids. that the library has to be like "ok so if any of these 6,657 topics come up you just have to subtly change the topic and leave it unaddressed." it's heartbreaking to have a kid ask a valid question and have to basically ignore them.

i get that people are allowed to raise their own kids their own way, and that this is a ~controversial opinion~ i have, but like. it's FRUSTRATING and exhausting. if you're so intent on not letting a child ask questions AND getting mad when they get answers that you personally don't like, why have kids at all

[nipuni]

Some various lighthearted life updates 🏃‍♀️

It's been a very busy last few months! in a good way mostly. We had a friend visiting us from overseas so we showed him around the city and took him to all our favourite places. We also met new people and were invited to a bunch of events so it's been very fun! We are all out of social battery tho so now we are slowing down a bit and getting back to work. Nicolas is on a short work trip to Berlin and I'm back to painting. We also started running! aaand we are also back to watching a bunch of shows and to me talking about it here to like five people 😌

Under the cut cause it's a lot as usual!

We finished watching S13 of Doctor Who! (we still have the specials to go but after that we are all caught up!) I haven't updated in ages so here are lot of opinions!

We really did not enjoy S11 😞 I was aware it wasn't very popular but we were hoping it was for all the wrong reasons, sadly we found many to be valid. Some of the episodes were baffling, Rosa? Kerblam?! the writing of the whole season in general felt like a rushed school assignment. The first part of Spyfall was a strong start for the next season but that ending in the second part was really not it. We did love Sacha Dhawan's Master tho!! and we really love Jodie too, 13th is adorable and reminded us of Ten at times! Jodie is such a fantastic actress that it makes the quality of the writing and everything else around her even more frustrating 😫 S12 was an improvement in general. In the last few episodes It felt like the writing team suddenly remembered the companions could have a personality and agency lmao. Highlights for us were Spyfall one, Fugitive of the Judoon and Haunting of villa Diodati, tho we did also enjoy most other episodes of the season despite their issues.

The timeless child plot reveal felt a bit underwhelming? The idea on itself has potential but it felt mishandled (and it had a bit of a Moffat flavour to it? and not in a good way). I think it was meant to add more depth to the Doctor's lore but in a way it ends up having the opposite effect. Then the flux was just a complete mess. It read like a Marvel sort of plot, very comic book like which is alright I suppose if that is something you enjoy but it felt out of place. But mostly it was just way too much, it got out of hand. Anyway we still have the specials to watch! and I think the Master is in them so we are looking forward to it 🥰

We also watched Broadchurch!! and we LOVED it. We ended up binging all three seasons. Chibnall's writing on this is surprisingly great and Jodie's acting is spectacular she really shines here. Olivia and David are always brilliant!! honestly everyone's acting was amazing. This series had us both tearing up every five scenes. The direction and the music are outstanding. I could watch Hardy and Miller solve crimes forever I really love their chemistry and dynamic. We went into it expecting the usual detective fiction but it ended up being a whole study on grief with such a focus on family and community and trauma and a ton of touching interconnected character arcs, just really really good!!

Then we also watched Taking over the Asylum!! MAN we were not expecting to have our hearts wrung out like laundry by this!! We thought it was a lighthearted show!! GOD we are still not over it, what the fuck!! It was so good we loved it!! but we were not prepared lmao what do you mean 'the end'?? we'll be thinking of this for months, I was expecting an extra scene after the credits or something. Excellent characters, refreshing depictions of mental illness and trauma and so crushingly realistic. Every character is so loveable I really wish this was longer 😭

And our quest to watch everything with David Tennant on it continues. We watched Decoy Bride on Valentines day too and it was terrible but such a hilarious fever dream kind of bad that it was fun, it has David on it and he never disappoints. I feel so lucky that Nicolas and I are both in love with him, get yourself a man who shares your celebrity crushes lmao it's so fun!! We feel like teens again chatting about him and drawing little hearts next to his pictures haha 🥰 We watched the BAFTAs just for him and speaking of the baftas!! I was not expecting that last drawing of his outfits to get that much attention oh my god 😭 thank you!! you are all insane and I appreciate it so much!! and thank you for all the support in general, about my art and photos and just everything. I feel very lucky and grateful 😭 anyway I'll end this before I get sappy, that is all for now! I hope this week is kind to you all, I'll be sharing some more art soon 😊

[ineedtorantaboutjiangcheng]

Fuck, I'm here again. Goddammit. I've been doing well. I've been keeping Jiang Cheng off my mind (and my computer screen). Things have been peaceful.

And then today happened.

Again, a fic. Again, not naming names, both because that's rude and also because this issue is hardly specific to one fic alone. I've seen it many times.

But I've been pacing for half an hour, too agitated to keep reading, so I'm just gonna get this off my chest, and then skim through the fic 'til it stops talking about it.

I need to talk about the golden core reveal.

Specifically, I need to talk about an attitude I've seen cropping up recently in a lot of fics. (By recently, I don't mean it's only recent fics that do it, just that I've only noticed it recently.)

So it'll be a fic, usually canon divergent, but prior to the golden core reveal. Wen Ning or Wen Qing will often be involved (though I can think of a few times it was Lan Wangji). And the character, who knows the truth about the golden core transfer, will urge Wei Wuxian to tell Jiang Cheng.

They'll say "you have to tell him". They'll say "he'll find out eventually". They'll say "he deserves to know".

And... the fic will support this.

Will frame Wei Wuxian as irrational, paranoid even, to keep it secret.

Will sometimes even punish him, narratively, for his "failure" to disclose such a thing.

And I am... completely baffled.

Where the fuck is this coming from?

I suppose, if I'm being generous, I can kind of see why an individual sympathising with Jiang Cheng might have a knee-jerk reaction to this. If you see them as being essentially family, the idea that a family member that you love deeply, keeping what amounts to both a huge sacrifice and a massive disability from you would be extremely painful. You might feel hurt, that they didn't tell you. Angry, at the implied lack of trust.

I get it, as an emotional response you might have in the moment. I don't find it particularly relatable, but I can follow the thought process.

But like... that's an emotional response. Surely, at some point, logic has to kick in, right?

Because the thing is. Okay, there's two aspects to the secret, right? One, is that a medical procedure was done to Jiang Cheng, sort of like an organ transplant, I suppose, but he wasn't told that the organ was donated by Wei Wuxian. And the other is that Wei Wuxian made this huge sacrifice for Jiang Cheng, and didn't tell him.

But thinking about this for even five minutes should tell you that... neither of those things are actually Wei Wuxian's responsibility to deal with?

The first one is the by far the more common argument I've seen. I've read fics where Wen Ning and Wen Qing are tortured with guilt over having performed the procedure without telling Jiang Cheng all the details. I've even seen people have them blame Wei Wuxian, for demanding they keep it secret, had them secretly resent him for it. He's portrayed as deeply selfish, for keeping the truth of Jiang Cheng's operation from him.

But the thing is... if you're going to apply modern medical ethics to the situation... Wei Wuxian was in the right? They all were?

Under modern medical ethics, you have no right to know the identity of your organ donor. That can feel a little weird (it's probably why people often have a knee-jerk reaction that demands the opposite); after all, it's my body, shouldn't I have a right to know where the organ that goes in it comes from? What if it has cooties?

But according to medical ethics, the donor's right to medical privacy is more protected that the recipient's right to that information. Right to medical privacy is pretty highly valued; it kind of ties into body autonomy, which is kind of the keystone of... most modern ethics. You have a right to control what happens to your body, and that includes controlling whether or not people know about any medical conditions/procedures. So you might have an emotional response, thinking Jiang Cheng is valid for being upset that his golden core came from Wei Wuxian without him knowing, but... ethically, Wei Wuxian has the right to withhold that information.

But! some scarecrow says, If a person has the right to control what procedures happen to their body, surely that means Jiang Cheng has a right to control what happens to his own body! Therefore, the procedure was still unethical, because he didn't know everything!

And I say, well... not really. The reality is, we don't actually know how much Jiang Cheng was told. He was told to walk up a mountain, lie to the person he encountered about his identity, and ask for a golden core. And he left that mountain with said golden core... but we don't know how much Wen Qing told him when he reached the top. We know he believed Wen Qing was the Baoshan Sanren. We know he received a fully developed core, not just the ability to form a new one. Was he told that the core was from someone else? Were there signs of the transfer? Did he know the chance of success/failure? Did he not find any of the situation dubious?

(Did he really spend two and a half years fighting a war alongside, and then running a sect for a year with, someone and not realise they didn't use orthodox cultivation even once?)

The truth is, a doctor is required to inform a patient of risks, and answer any questions they ask. Wen Qing may well have disclosed the risk (if there was any to Jiang Cheng, other than potentially the transfer failing) prior to the surgery, we just don't know. We don't have any evidence that Jiang Cheng asked any questions, and from what we see in the novel, it seems likely that he simply didn't want to know. He got a core, his life was somewhat back on track; we never see any evidence of curiosity or confusion in him as to the specifics of how that happened.

The only lie we are sure that he was told was the identity of the person who he met on the mountain, who "gave" him the core. I could be petty and point out that as he was also lying about his identity, it kind of cancels out, but that would be a bit ridiculous, and unnecessary besides. The truth is, ethically, Wen Qing could have knocked him out and performed the surgery from the comfort of her own office. Because one of, if not the main reason you can ethically violate someone's body autonomy... is to save a life. And Jiang Cheng, after losing first his family and sect, and then his golden core, displayed clear suicidal ideation. He indicated, repeatedly, that he wanted to die. He refused food. Wei Wuxian even doubled checked, before giving him hope of getting a new core, that he was serious! (Rereading that scene is horrible; Wei Wuxian's dread, and eventual resignation/resolve becomes very apparent once you know what's happening).

The characters around him, including a trained doctor, believed that if he didn't get a new core, he would give up and die. Under those circumstances, a doctor has authority to make medical decisions, without a patients consent, if they believe it is a medical emergency. Wen Qing was an unquestionably brilliant doctor; if she believed doing the surgery was the right/necessary decision, who the hell are we to dispute her?

So, to be clear, under modern medical ethics (which seems to be what is being applied in these claims), Wen Qing has the right to do whatever surgery she feels necessary to save the life of her patient, no consent needed, and Wei Wuxian has the right to keep his identity as the donor a secret, since that's his own private medical history. Modern medical ethics (a bit ridiculous, when talking about magic powers, but I've seen the argument) supports our protagonist.

Now, onto the other thing. This is a lot less... ethics discussion and a lot more feels-bad-so-wrong type thing. Wei Wuxian kept the loss of his golden core a secret.

Jiang Cheng being upset by this is understandable. Like I said, I can follow the emotion/logic. Someone keeping a big secret from you can be hurtful.

But just because it's hurtful to you, doesn't mean they're in the wrong to do it!

If someone I cared about kept a massive secret from me, and I found out, I'd be upset! But my first thought would be 'Why did they feel they couldn't tell me?' And the answer here is obvious; Wei Wuxian didn't think he could tell Jiang Cheng because he knew he'd be horrible about it! Wei Wuxian admits, after the reveal, that the process of losing his core was distressing, and that he wasn't as okay with it as he pretended to be. If something like that happens to you (not... that it can, but, you know, equivalent), and you're struggling to hold it together, the last thing you want is someone you care about yelling at you about it, insulting you, making you feel bad for what happened!

Wei Wuxian didn't tell Jiang Cheng because he knew Jiang Cheng would be awful to him because of it. Jiang Cheng's jealousy when they were young was something Wei Wuxian felt he had to manage*, and he knew Jiang Cheng would feel inadequate if he realised his accomplishments were made with Wei Wuxian's core. And he would then lash out at Wei Wuxian for it, at a time when Wei Wuxian was already feeling emotionally fragile. Hell, nearly twenty years later, Jiang Cheng getting up in his face was enough to cause a Qi deviation; I can't imagine it would have been better any sooner!

No one wants to think of the people they love keeping secrets from them. And sometimes, people who keep secrets are doing it for their own sake, because they're scared, or unsure, or guilty, or whatever. But sometimes, when a person keeps a secret, the reason is not internal. If someone acts horribly to you when you tell them things, you're going to stop telling them things. And the person responsible for that gap in communication is them; all you're doing is protecting yourself.

And before anyone thinks that I'm assigning reasoning to Wei Wuxian that he doesn't have; he essentially admits it. After the reveal, Wei Wuxian states that he knew Jiang Cheng would react badly (though he didn't expect it to be quite so bad). Wei Wuxian is shown to have been managing Jiang Cheng's moods since they were young**, it's probably not the first secret he's kept. But that's kind of just... how that works; if a king kills every person who brings him bad news, eventually, all his advisors will only ever bring him good news. And he has no one to blame when his kingdom falls but himself.

SO. tl;dr. Modern medical ethics supports Wen Qing performing the golden core transfer, and Wei Wuxian keeping his identity as the donor a secret. Jiang Cheng can be upset at Wei Wuxian for not telling him that he no longer has a core, but it's not unethical, or selfish, and the nature of their relationship, with Jiang Cheng lashing out with impunity and Wei Wuxian trying to manage his moods, meant that secrets like that were pretty much inevitable. Unhealthy relationships are unhealthy. Truly, newsworthy take.

And one final note, on Wei Wuxian keeping secrets from Jiang Cheng and being portrayed as selfish for doing so; I have yet to see a. single. fic. that says Wei Wuxian keeping his sacrifice secret is wrong, but then goes on hold Jiang Cheng equally accountable for keeping his sacrifice secret. Not. One. Jiang Cheng often tells Wei Wuxian afterwards, that he deliberately got the Wens attention, but he's never framed as selfish for keeping that secret. Not. Once.

* see post-Xuanwu argument, when Wei Wuxian drags himself out of his sick bed, having just woken up from a coma, to reassure Jiang Cheng that he's no threat to his birthright. Because Jiang Cheng was jealous that his father acknowledged Wei Wuxian's skill in surviving, under horrendous circumstances. -_-

** childhood flashback; after arriving in a new place, having a massive change in lifestyle and meeting many new people (and, it seems, trying to make a good impression), Wei Wuxian took the blame for his broken leg, despite it being because Jiang Cheng locked him out of his room and threatened to sic dogs on him. Entirely because he knew one of them would get blamed, and he wanted to keep Jiang Cheng happy. People who grow up with aggressive/abusive family/people around often end up learning to juggle mood changes.

[charcubed]

Disneyland's Rogers: The Musical, propaganda that turns Steve Rogers into more myth than man, and revisionist history (possibly) to a purpose

Any of my thoughts in this post could just be me reading too far into things. I'm very aware of that, and please know that this post exists just because this sort of thing is fun for me! This is a thought exercise where we propose "What if we live in a world where the MCU is actually doing a cool and interesting thing as a longcon?" If you have anger at Marvel, that's valid and relatable, but please don't get angry at me or imply I'm an MCU stan who doesn't think critically about the mouse. Thanks!

Breaking news: I'm back on my bullshit!

A quick personal recap: I infamously hated Avengers: Endgame for a long list of reasons (and I even rewrote the movie). One of those reasons is that I've always taken issue with Steve's ending. But in the years since then, and as the MCU's phase 4 has evolved, my frustration at Steve's "ending" has turned into an ongoing and legitimate theory that the MCU could be slowly leading into a loosely adapted Secret Empire plot line. I know we've all been joking about Steve being trapped or about an imposter Steve since 2019, but uhhh, it's kind of not a joke to me anymore? It feels weirdly plausible at this point and so I enjoy discussing the potential.

You can find a full elaboration on that here, where I wrote out my "Steve was snatched by HYDRA" theory in 2021.

In that post, one of the things I mentioned at the time was Rogers: The Musical being in the Hawkeye trailer.

[The musical's] very existence is an example of how in-universe the stories of the lives of the heroes are being commodified, especially (in terms of how they’re framing it) for Steve’s. The heroes are no longer seen as people, if they ever were. They are, as Kate Bishop says to Clint in a recently released clip, more about “branding.” Sam Wilson will be redefining the shield moving forward in a Cap context, but simultaneously, the world is still enamored by Steve Rogers as a symbol in his own right. And that is ripe for manipulation as a Trojan horse to control public opinion… whether in the context of things like this by themselves (is the musical portraying Steve accurately, or is it painting an inaccurate picture of him the world accepts as fact?) or in future (is this propaganda that makes the public see Steve a certain way and continue to love him, to set up a fake or brainwashed Steve coming on the scene later?).

Now a form of the musical exists in full, at Disneyland and all over Youtube. Considering some of its baffling content – which I will break down below – this perspective seems even more strongly worth considering.

I have two main reasons for why I'm defending examining this musical so closely:

1. It is (arguably) an in-universe piece of media that has bearing on the MCU canon. It isn't like any other typical Disneyland attraction; its very existence is meta and it was in canon first. Obviously it's seen in Hawkeye, but there are also posters for it in several different phase 4 properties. It's lurking in the background indefinitely. So what can this musical tell us about what the wider public within the MCU is being told about the life story of Steve Rogers?

2. This Secret Empire graphic – which is animated in the center of the stage of a prolonged period of time – feels like a literal sign to pay attention.

Granted, this is obviously still ancillary material. 99% of the MCU audience will never see this musical, whether in person or on YouTube. But just because it isn't a vital piece doesn't mean it's automatically an entirely irrelevant piece.

They've given me an inch with that sign and I'm taking a mile.

So if you're interested, please join me on this journey :)

For the record, let me just say that I salute the creative team behind this show. It's pretty fun and the songs are catchy, the sets and costuming are cool, and the cast is overall very talented.

It's also fucking maddening. LMAO.

Why? Firstly, because of the seemingly deliberate ahistorical inaccuracies. We all know Ant-Man is wrongly shown in the Battle of New York, which originally "came from [the Hawkeye showrunner] and Marvel, as something to further aggravate Hawkeye as he watched the show, and also as a comment on how movies and articles and people always get something wrong." It seems like they expanded those meta nods, but most inaccuracies are now in service of glorifying Steve and Peggy's "love story." Yes, romance objectively makes for good theater; but again, I feel that this is worth examining considering the full context.

And secondly, Steve's ending is framed as an offer presented to him, convincing him it's the happy ending he deserves because he's tired. In my mind, these two big elements go together, and I'll walk you through the details of what happens in the musical before I tie the thought threads back around into some theorizing.

For your reference, here's a list of the main songs and story beats:

• "U-S-Opening Night" - the Starkettes (who are basically a Greek chorus) frame the show's story, and then it turns into an ensemble that loosely takes place at the Stark Expo. • "I Want You" – Steve's "I want" song about trying to enlist in the army. • "Star-Spangled Man With A Plan" – Steve performing on the USO tour obviously, and then there's a reprise with an added voiceover that (very briefly) covers the Howling Commandos' rescue + the war via comic book imagery. • "What You Missed" – Fury and the Starkettes tell Steve some pop culture things he missed while he was frozen, + they tell him about the Avengers. Then Fury goes down a list of other hero characters, including the Guardians? Doctor Strange? Wanda?? It plays loose and fast with time, because many non-2012 characters are bafflingly mentioned in this nonlinear Avengers list – including the Winter Soldier (???). • "Save the City" – this is the song seen in Hawkeye, with the civilians + the Avengers all involved, but it's slightly different here and expanded to also reference other battles. • "End of the Line" – Old Steve presents main Steve with the time stone as an opportunity for his happy ending, and they reflect on things together. (Yes, this is insane.) • "Just One Dance" – Steve and Peggy reunite and sing about their love. • And then there's basically a reprise of "Save the City," with the Starkettes and the whole cast closing the finale out.

Right out of the gate, let's address this: the main reason you're going to see some fans pissed about this musical is not only that Steve and Peggy's ~epic romance~ is made a pillar of the story... but also that Bucky's importance/involvement in Steve's life is minimized as much as possible.

And they took Bucky-related elements from canon and made them center more around Peggy instead.

• For some weird reason, Peggy is in the Stark Expo scene. When a soldier is hitting on the Starkettes ("hey sweetheart, I wanna dance!"), Steve tells the soldier to show the ladies some respect. The soldier grabs Steve and throws him down, and then Peggy swoops in to yell "Pick on someone your own size!" and punches the guy before walking away. So she's given Bucky's TFA line verbatim, and she is given the role he had of saving Steve from bullies. There is blatantly no reason they couldn't have had Bucky still serve that function and be truer to "history," because he briefly enters this scene in uniform less than a minute later to announce he's shipping out to the 107th – and then he spins off with a date on his arm. (We don't see Bucky on stage again until the full cast comes out for the finale!)

• After the Star-Spangled Man show, Peggy rushes in to talk to Steve. Steve is excited about his USO performance (???) but she urgently tells him to listen as she says that the 107th has been captured. Peggy apparently knows it's Bucky's division, and she knows Steve is going to go, so she tells him that she's already arranged transport for him. This is a subtle twist from the truth of how it went down in TFA, in which Steve recognized 107 as the number of Bucky's division, and his dogged determination inspired Peggy to relent and help his rescue mission. Here, Peggy is given a stronger role in the Cap origin story. And before Steve rushes off, Peggy sings a short untitled ballad hoping for their dance, so Steve pauses before he leaves to ask her to go on a date with her when he returns. • The most egregious Bucky-to-Peggy change of all is the song "End of the Line," in which the infamous Steve and Bucky line/promise (that broke Bucky's brainwashing...) is re-contextualized to be about ???? Peggy waiting for Steve in the past??? Old Man Steve and regular Steve sing it together. But we'll go back to that in a minute.

Again, I get it, yeah? It's for theater. Whatever. But in reality, the obvious logical truth is that Peggy is centered (to the point of taking elements from Bucky's story, and in turn Bucky is downplayed) because they needed to convince the audience that Steve going back in time to be with her makes sense. Steve's time travel ending had to be justified, so the Peggy and Steve "love story" had to be a pillar in this with everything else being given lesser weight.

And the inherent selfishness of him doing something as big as going back in time also had to be justified... which is why they do their best to convince you Steve fought so much he deserved it.

Let me elaborate on that by describing the lead-up to the "End of the Line" song.

So, right before "End of the Line" is "Save the City" – which includes Steve belting "I can do this all day!" repeatedly, of course. It's the 2012 Battle of New York as the Avengers come together to win.

As they begin to disperse, the song then transitions to a voiceover alert mentioning Sokovia being under attack by artificial intelligence (a.k.a. Age of Ultron). The Avengers group rushes back to center stage to say "Save the city! Help us win!" together for battle again.

And then things get fucking weird.

Because the next voiceover threat is "Washington DC. Attack: the Winter Soldier." This is not accurate to the order of events! The Winter Soldier events were before Age of Ultron; the public of the MCU would also know this.

And suddenly on stage Steve is now in the center while everyone else gestures to him. Instead of singing with him, they're telling him "Save the city! Help us win!"

Then, another voiceover: "Wakanda, under attack" (Infinity War) and again, Steve is centered while everyone else points to him. The ensemble says, "Save the city, help us win! Save us all from the state we're in! Got to hear you, got to hear you, got to hear you say..." as Steve is buckling to his knees under their pointing. And as the lights go down to one spotlight on him and everyone else leaves, he says "I can do this all day" one last time, but now it's subdued.

The implication is that Steve has been fighting and fighting, people leave him or he loses them, and he's tired.

And then fucking Old Man Steve arrives.

He says "On your left," because yes, they gave him Sam Wilson's line. BATSHIT.

So now there's two Steves on stage! There has been no mention of Thanos or infinity stones or anything up to this point! (I can only assume that's because in the MCU universe no one would want to be reminded of the trauma of "the Blip" – though it's pretty wild that they're allowed to know about magical time travel?)

Steve is baffled by Old Man Steve's arrival. I, too, was baffled by Old Man Steve's arrival.

As Steve questions how this is possible, Old Man Steve shows him the time stone from his pocket – and only the time stone – which Steve recognizes.

OLD MAN: "You've got to remember where you've been to know where you're going." STEVE: "Where am I going?" OLD MAN: "A date with destiny." STEVE: “Destiny. So we’re the hero till the end?” OLD MAN: “That’s the thing about endings, Steven. They can be rewritten.”

Lmao???????

Steve starts singing about how he hopes this means they "win" and calls himself a "tired hero."

STEVE: "But sometimes I wonder, who will save the savior? Can we really do this all day? So here I am, now and also then. Just a man, looking back at where he's been." OLD MAN: "The road is rough but wounds are healed by a thing called time. You can't forget what's waiting at the end of the line."

Me, watching this: the fact that he says this out of the blue makes absolutely no sense.

There's a bit more singing, including "end of the line" repetition, and then Old Man Steve pulls out the time stone to essentially show visions of... I don't fucking know. Past, present, and future?

That's pre-serum Steve, Steve with Mjolnir, and Sam Wilson as the new Cap. This is the only reference to Sam in the whole thing.

More singing, and then: Peggy's silhouette.

OLD MAN: "Can't forget who's waiting..." STEVE: "I can't forget who's waiting..." BOTH: "Don't forget who's waiting..." STEVE: "At the end of the line."

At this point I'm like, what in the hell?

Did Old Man Steve just brainwash normal Steve into thinking "end of the line" is now about Peggy? Because uhhhh, sorry, that's what it feels like!

Then Steve uses the stone to go back in time, reunites with Peggy, etc. etc. finale.

It's truly some crazy shit.

[drags hands down face]

Look... there's a lot to unpack here, and there's a lot that gets me about it. I know this is dramatized for the stage! I KNOW! But the fact that Old Man Steve shows up to convince Steve he should go back in time makes me want to gnaw on furniture.

Another person essentially uses the lure of a life with Peggy to tempt Steve into doing this, dramatized or not. That is how it's framed.

It's a hell of a way to frame it, and it makes Steve's ending stand in even starker contrast to so many other things in phase 4. Desperately trying to go backwards when you shouldn't or to bring back a lost lover is an evil temptation, and it results in a trap or negative cosmic consequences for basically all of the other characters in the MCU.

• In Shang-Chi, Wenwu is tempted by the Soul Eaters beyond the Dark Gate. They use the voice of his deceased wife to convince him to set them free. • In "What If" episode 4, Doctor Strange becomes evil in a desperate bid to save Christine and he destroys his universe. Along the way, he tries to tempt/trap the good Strange who's fighting him by using visions of Christine, but good Strange knows she isn't real. • Wanda's grief and desire to bring back Vision leads to – well, you know. • In No Way Home, Peter trying to undo things is what causes the multiverse problems.

And the fact that they frame it as Steve being tired, so basically the argument is he deserves that time travel ending (just like MCU fans who defend Endgame say in real life)... Well.

There's no way to make it hold up, especially because in "What If" they explicitly subverted that and had Captain Carter not go back in time despite how she felt she'd "earned" it.

Lastly, in this musical as Steve decides to pursue time travel as his course of action, he basically has the meaning or memory of "end of the line" rewritten for him. I refuse to not think that is some nefarious shit. Yes, it's not out of the realm of possibility that it's just some general Disney erasing Steve and Bucky nonsense.

But... this is on another level to me. I do think that it's a blatant choice that they had to be aware even general MCU fans would call bullshit on. Everyone knows it's inaccurate. "End of the line" is embedded in pop culture consciousness as being connected to Bucky. It just is! Surely that means it's not a stretch to theorize it could be deliberate meta commentary.

How, in the MCU world, would the in-universe playwrights even know the phrase "end of the line"? How the fuck would it be accidentally applied to Steve and Peggy? Not to sound like a crazy person, but who the fuck was rooting around in Steve and/or Bucky's personal business or their brains in order to obtain that knowledge and then remix it, and why? Neither of them would flippantly mention it in the public eye or interviews ever. So where did its inclusion come from?

And in the finale ensemble, this is Bucky's line when he comes out on stage and salutes + points to Steve: "Don't forget who's waiting..." And Old Man Steve completes it with "...at the end of the line."

What on God's green earth am I meant to do with THAT?

Smh.

The vibes are fucked, folks.

The MCU public wouldn't know enough to say the vibes are fucked. The MCU public wouldn't know the origin of "end of the line" as a phrase. But us? The ones who know the "true story" via the movies? We can call bullshit.

Whether the creative team behind this musical did every aspect of this consciously or not, in my opinion the fact that they had to tweak canon "history" to A) make Peggy's involvement in Steve's life more central and B) emphasize Steve as a tired hero all works as commentary on and almost a condemnation of Endgame's frustrating ending. In a way, it's also what Endgame did with the compass and 1973 moment with Peggy as well.

Steve's ending had to be convincing.

It's theater.

And so, maybe the same is true for the in-narrative perspective of this musical in the context of the MCU world. What purpose would it serve to tell the MCU public a feel-good narrative about how all Steve Rogers wanted was to no longer be a tragic man out of time and get to make a life with his best girl? To frame it as being about how he fought so hard for years and so he earned a happy ending? To minimize and nearly erase Bucky's importance in his life?

Who would want to do that sort of propaganda, and why?

The MCU civilians are given this happy explanation and maybe don't widely question it. Who cares about the details or logistics if it makes a good story, I guess. It's a stretch, but maybe they mostly applaud it. Maybe they're happy for "America's favorite son" (not unlike people who uncritically liked Endgame). In a way, it's even a rehabilitation of his image (after the Accords) like putting the shield on the Statue of Liberty. And maybe they'd even be ready and waiting to applaud if Steve ever made a dramatically selfless and de-aged return to the spotlight or a position of authority.

But mostly, the public is being conditioned to not know or to forget that anyone else like Bucky Barnes or Sam Wilson would possibly know Steve Rogers the person well enough in the modern day to call bullshit on any of this – or on his hypothetical miraculous future return.

So. Sure, it's probably nothing.

But what if it's not?

-------

UPDATE: @faeriecap added to this post with some incredible information and further behind-the-scenes context about the MCU/Marvel stuff at Disney parks! Check it out here :)

[orionsangel86]

I have been doing this meta analysis thing for a long time now and one thing that I have always tried to make clear in meta analysis is that for it to be taken seriously you must keep your personal biases out of it. You must come at it as objective as possible.

Rant under the cut

Its not always easy to do when you are dealing with difficult topics, or shining unfavourable lights on characters you love, or coming to conclusions that you werent expecting (recent meta discussions about Morpheus in the Sandman comics would fall into these categories).

What meta analysis should never be used for is to back up ship wars or specifically to shame fandoms for liking certain characters. If the meta isnt providing valid evidence to support the interpretations, and instead has fallen into name calling and mockery of fandom, its no longer valid meta.

I got this ALL the time in SPN fandom. Destiel was a huge fandom but as meta writers we stuck with what we were given by the source material and interpreted it with valid evidence. We understood that multiple interpretations were possible but we made sure that whatever we were analysing made sense and had some source backing. This wasnt always the case because meta writers are not a monolith, but the bigger blogs who wrote meta frequently at least understood this and would not be stretching to support their own claims if canon didnt back it up. Now no one is perfect of course, but the point is, proper meta writers understand that where they make a claim or interpretation of the source material, they have to site examples and evidence to back up their claims and also take into consideration any evidence to the contrary.

The people who hated destiel and made that their entire personalities didnt do that so much. I read a lot of their meta out of curiosity and every time I was baffled by where they were getting their claims. 'Destiel is necrophilia" was a big one which canon disproved almost straight away in season 5. "Destiel is rape" was another because Cas was using Jimmy as a vessel and yet canon confirmed Jimmy died at the end of season 4. Cas' body was remade by God in season 5 and has remained his own ever since. These are just two of the ridiculous examples supposed "meta writers" among the destiel hater communities would come up with and still use today.

I find it extremely infuriating when I see character/ship hate loosely disguised as meta analysis. I can give people the benefit of the doubt a lot of the time, as fandoms are usually highly emotional spaces, but when there is zero canon evidence to support the claims, when connections are being made on the absolute thinnest of threads, and when far more obvious interpretations are being clearly ignored to support certain viewpoints in such a stunningly obvious case of confirmation bias I have to throw in the towel and stop taking said meta seriously.

One thing I have loved about Sandman fandom so far is the meta. It's such a rich text to analyse, and the show adds an entirely new level to it which makes it all the more enjoyable. I've made no secret of my support for Dreamling and I wrote a very long meta series on Dreamling and how the show in particular uses certain tropes, symbolism, visual storytelling cues, and music, to name a few, to overload a 25 minute sequence with queer coding. It is completely understandable to me why anyone going into the show even without thinking about shipping, would feel like Dreamling hit them like a brick to the face. The creators weren't subtle with it.

Its also totally valid to find romantic interpretations of other pairings within the Sandman. I personally think Morpheus x Johanna was laid on pretty thickly. Morpheus x Lucienne is equally an interesting ship to analyse. But heres the thing, if you ship these other ships and are frustrated that Dreamling has "taken over" thats valid. I get it. I would like more focus on the other characters too. I would particularly like to talk about Lucienne x Gault and have a meta piece in progress about them.

Whats not okay however is for other shippers and people frustrated with Dreamling to go the way of the Destiel antis. Dont make shit up that has no basis in canon just because you need some moral high ground to shit all over the ship you hate. Don't call fans that see Dreamling "deluded" for seeing it. They aren't deluded. It's right there in the subtext. Dont resort to name calling and "gotchas" and use inflammatory language to bait people. And please, I'm begging you, stop claiming that people who ship Dreamling are somehow all overly fragile white racists. You're wrong.

The racism discussions about Hob's past have their place, but these things ARE being discussed, if anything I feel this fandom has done a far better job of handling the issues of slavery than another popular fandom has (looking at you OFMD). No one is forgiving Hob for his slaver past. But you have to acknowledge that the entire point of the story in The Sandman is about change, and growth, and how we can become better people. As another excellent short meta post stated recently "we are more than the sum of our transgressions". The Sandman is all about the shades of grey. No one is morally righteous, but most characters are not completely morally bankrupt either.

Hob Gadling is a controversial character who is often misunderstood by fandom but anyone with proper critical thinking skills and a decent understanding of what meta analysis is, should understand that Hob is a metaphor for humanity first and foremost. He is the average everyman from the perspective of an Englishman and therefore above all else to understand Hob you have to look to England, to Englands history, and to its current status in the world. A lot of blood on its hands yes, but also at least a century of trying to make up for it, a leader in the world in human rights and trying to do better. I have to believe that about this country, so I believe it about Hob too. Whilst I'm not interesting in getting into huge geopolitical debates about England, I hope that we can all agree that the average Englishman today is not a blood thirsty evil slaver/rapist/murderer or whatever else ive seen people accuse Hob of being even in his modern era.

We can argue the faults of the show downplaying slavery for sure. Its a valid criticsm. We can argue that not enough time was given in the show to show that Hob had changed and regretted his former actions. We can critique these things based on what the show has and has not told us, and also pepper in information provided in the comics and what we know about future Hob panels as well.

But when it comes to the blank spaces in between frames, in between cut screens, we can do whatever we like. Because that is where meta analysis ends and fanfiction begins. You wanna write about Hob joining the abolitionist movement and fighting hard to end slavery? You can. You wanna write about him ignoring Dreams advice and continuing to be a brutal slaver right up until slavery was ended in England sure, you go for it. But don't call either of these "headcanons" meta analysis.

Dont use meta analysis as a cover to shit on fandom. The minute you resort to name calling and mockery its no longer meta. No matter how frustrated or upset you are with the current fandom situation. There is always space to criticise fandom. But ask yourself what your end goal is here? What are you trying to achieve? Is it truly because you are on a righteous path to end fandom racism? Or do you just really hate a popular ship and want people to stop shipping it? If it's the former, then focus on that, ask what solutions we can put in place? Where we can truly tackle it on a larger scale, raising awareness of things that people may not realise are racist but are common tropes in fandom (like how making female characters all mothers or sassy gay best friends is misogynistic or how certain stereotypes in fantasy creatures are anti semitic) but if its the latter, then its disingenuous to use racism in fandom as a shield to hide your ship hate. It reduces an important topic to something shallow and irrelevant.

In ending this rant I will just say this. I'm not interested in engaging further on this topic. I'm legit gonna start blocking if anyone attempts to twist my words here. The civil discussions on this matter ended when people started name calling and flinging around accusations without basis. I am more than happy to engage separately in ways to improve fandom spaces for poc, because thats important, but ship hating has no place in that discussion. Drop that aspect, and there'll be less resistance in these topics.

[laguezze]

PAC: What's your ideal career path?

(This is for the career oriented people that got absolutely no idea what to do with their lives or have an idea but are so overwhelmed and lost with all the possibilities. I salute y'all bc same)

More piles this time because why not lol

Here are the piles:

Pile 1

Pile 2

Pile 3

Pile 4

Pile 5

Pile 6

Ready? Let's go!

Pile 1

I'm so into you, I can barely breathe ~

👩‍🍳🏖️🩴🍹🚣‍♀️🤝👩‍💼🕴️🧳

There are two subgroups within this pile so I will read them differently right now.

Seems like Group 1 is actually free spirited and out there and independent. You guys don't need anyone and you hate being restrained by boundaries or rules. Thus, I think a career that best suits you is one where no one rules over you but yourself. And of course not a high stress environment. I'm seeing you, group 1 fellows might thrive in a customer service position. Some of you might open your own bar or something, I'm seeing a lot of entrepreneurship here. Do it. Start that business and be happy.

And now onto group 2

For group 2, seems like you guys have some things to work on. You say your dream is to be a hippie by the beach that is free spirited and carefree but you are nothing like that. And that is ok. You're not less cool or more boring or ordinary. You being yourself is already unique, there is nothing to complete in you.

I'm seeing some of you guys are quiet and shy, but actually love people. Wouldn't be hurtful to try out some customer service as well! Weirdly enough I see the same career paths as group 1 for you guys. Entrepreneurship, having your own company, etc.

In general, for both groups I see these:

culinary arts (big on this one), Chef, waiter, bartender, owner of any place that serves food or drink, secretary, CEO, business management, HR worker, meeting mediator, etc

Pile 2

You like my hair? Gee, thanks! Just bought it ~

🎹👮‍♀️⚖️👩‍🔬🔭🔬💅

You guys seem like a bit of an airhead but in a wonderful way. I can't stress how positively I mean that. People seem baffled by the way you act and say things and you surprise them everyday. Seems like you really don't care about who you're talking to, there is no filter or personality switch. You're just you. And it's genuine. And it's enough. You seem to have some issues with people because of that, but also you attract wonderful opportunities as well. Think Elle Woods from Legally Blonde. Big Elle energy for real.

I think you guys might even be in a male dominated industry, which is tough considering your personality, but not impossible. And especially not impossible for you. Absolutely not customer service, though. Some people hate your personality (f them ngl) but your ideal career is probably one where your work speaks for itself and they can't deny your talent.

I see careers such as STEM, law, IT, music, biology, forensics, investigator, nail tech and criminal Justice.

Pile 3

Wrote some songs about Ricky, now I listen and laugh ~

🩰🪩🕺🏠👩‍💼🎭💵🤑😎

You guys are powerful. When you enter a room, people notice you. Which is why you could either do great in the performance arts or in a position of power within an organization. This is so short and straight forward, but so are you so...

Careers I see: dancer, CEO, event planner, actor, real estate agent.

Pile 4

She might've let you hold her hand in school but imma show you how to graduate ~

🏖️🤑🧳✈️🍹🍔🍕👨‍🍳🧥🚣

Ok you guys, this is gonna be a bit straightforward so beware.

A lot of you guys think you're hot s*-#, which you can be but you are not right now. What I mean by that is you seem like the type of person that says: yeah! I'm gonna have a private jet and a thousand cars and blah blah. Very materialistic. But you're not putting in the work at all, you probably don't even know what it is you're passionate about or want to do with your life (which is so valid). You just want to be rich, which honestly I get it, but you need some drive other than "i want a Maserati" you need to want something bigger. You need to be good at something and you don't even know what that something is. And something tells me that you are not even thinking about what that could be. You fantasize about being rich without wondering how to get there. Why do you want that? Status? Relationships? Reevaluate.

That said, I see two types of outcomes. If you put in the effort I'm seeing you can achieve that level of richness you're looking for. Some of you might start a company or climb up an existing one. Some of you might become travel vloggers or influencers.

If you keep doing what you're doing I see you're working at fast food chains (i literally channeled that I'm not gonna lie to y'all) as a manager maybe retail too, that type of jobs.

Careers I see: McDonald's worker, fast food manager, retail worker, makeup store worker (I'm seeing Sephora), mall business owner, souvenir store owner, business owner in general, travel vlogger, boat driver, tourist attraction worker, marketing specialist, hotel worker, hotel owner.

Hope it resonates and my apologies for the bluntness, seemed like the pile wanted to call you out. Maybe you needed it.

Lots of love 💕

Pile 5

I've been here all night, I've been here all day ~

🎤🩰🏡📚🧑‍🍳💐👨‍👩‍👦‍👦

You guys are actually going to be successful. I'm seeing some of you have bigger dreams, some of you have smaller ones (which is cool too!) But all of you will definitely achieve them in some way or another.

I see someone with a family and a big house. Some kids running around. Some of you want to be stay at home partners to a rich person (respect to you guys, every dream is a valid one) and I see you'll get that and be fulfilled. Vacation is a given. You don't struggle with money. None of you guys do.

Some common themes you all have is that your career will allow you to be calm and chill. There are no problems. Money comes easy and secure. And you're living the dream, whichever dream that may be.

A lot of you guys here are here for confirmation of an ideal life you have. Let me say, yes. It's happening. Maybe not in the way you think, maybe not in the amount of success you want it. Or maybe it does fully! But it's happening. I'm seeing some of you might want to act? You'll be an actor and have work but maybe you won't be a big Hollywood star. Or maybe you will!

Some of you may want to be singers. Again, you might not win a Grammy and become Beyonce, but you will work as a singer and it will pay your bills. Like singing at events, hotels, etc. (Or maybe you will win a Grammy! Don't let tarot discourage you from achieving anything! It's just a tool, not a strict rule to follow)

Anyways, you will be whatever it is you want to be.

I know this reading might be confusing but that's what I channelled.

Careers I see: actor/actress, stay at home partner, flight attendant, singer, dancer, librarian, real estate agent, restaurant owner, chef, coffee shop owner, flower shop owner, bakery owner.

Pile 6

A feeling that you can't fight, my one ~

🥖🇫🇷🌍✈️📸

You guys are travelers, no matter what you do you will be up in the air and onto a new place. Kinda chaotic, but you like that.

I'm seeing some of you might work in the fashion industry, models, designers, makeup artists, etc. You all are here gathered. I hear Milan, Paris, London, Fashion Week.

Some of you could just be a flight attendant and that's why you travel so much.

A couple of you might be touring for some reason, you might play in a band or you might sing backup for someone or you might sing yourself or play.

I'm seeing such chaos, though. Like a lot.

Some of you might do film! Or photography! And probably need to relocate for shoots a lot. So cool.

Careers I see: photographer, filmmaker, model, magazine editor, security guard, flight attendant, pilot, makeup artist, wardrobe assistant, set decorator.

The End

[germiyahu]

Similarly to the "Jesus was Palestinian!" crowd, I find this phrasing (and I've seen it in so many fandoms and other contexts about portraying Bibical characters I'm not just picking on the thing that it's popular to critique right now):

Kind of annoying? Like "Middle Eastern Jewish" is baffling to me. Is it because the average person thinks Jews are white Americans and they need to specify Middle Eastern = Brown which isn't even always the case, especially when we decenter American conceptualizations of race. But it also very cleanly lops of Middle Eastern-ness, and therefore this implicit Person of Color-ness from Jews as a class?

Some Jews can be Middle Eastern, and therefore brown/indigenous/poc/valid/worthy of protection, but it's not automatic and it's certainly not universal, so any time a Jew is granted this special status it must be verbalized so as not to confuse people. They might think the Jew you're talking about is a colonizer otherwise!

Or is it a way to imply (if not outright say) that there has never been a Jewish state in the region? Any Jews from Jesus' time were just denizens of the Middle East broadly? They had no country of their own, they just existed nebulously scattered throughout among other tribes and tongues and nations? Like if the Hasmonean Dynasty ruled over a polity called Israel I would see how the average Tumblerino would obviously want to avoid alluding to that when talking about New Testament characters/historical figures. But it was called Judea, well Iudaea in Latin. Some Israelis refer to the Hebron region as Judea now but this is not something that most anti-Israel people on Tumblr know about. So it has to be an aversion to admitting that there was a Jewish state in the Levant no matter what it's name was?

And less than 2 centuries later the land was renamed Palestine anyway. They don't even call Biblical characters "Palestinian Jews," at best some people used to call Jesus a Palestinian Jew, but I don't even see that anymore really. He's just "Palestinian" now. So you can be ahistorical when it's Jesus but not for anyone else in these books? Why? What's the point? What's the story what's the vision?

I'm definitely reading too much into this specific post, the worms in my brain sing so sweetly to me, but when these spaces are filled with so much casual disregard and disinterest in Jewish people, their culture, their history, their rights, their dignity, their lives... well maybe it's time to stop just slapping on "JOOISH!" to get sjw points while you're canceling the thing that is cringe.

[yourlocalrandombisexual]

alright so i’ve been seeing the watcher posts and gathering my thoughts so i’m gonna put all my watcher stuff in one big post under the cut cause it’s gonna get long and i need to get this out of my head.

i will say 99% of the fandom was expecting a fun, exciting, omg can’t wait for it type of announcement and seeing the title and thumb nail for the first time made me really nervous.

also, side note, why on earth would they choose a thumbnail of the three of them sitting on a couch like that with the title “goodbye youtube”?? just the imagery alone makes you think of the try guys and their now infamous video like why would you want that comparison right out the gate before you even say anything?? super weird choice.

then the video is all nostalgic and wistful, clips of steven’s, ryan’s, and shane’s, pre-buzzfeed youtube videos and i’m thinking “did someone die cause this feels like a video obit” none of this calmed my nerves and made me more anxious about what could be coming. and then we all know what happened next, they announce that they’re paywalling everything yada yada yada

and after seeing everyone else’s takes and the general vibe of the fandom being “fuck watcher” it continues to baffle me why they thought this was gonna go over well. because to me it feels like they went from “yay we have our own youtube channel” to “give us your cash we’re a media empire” and missed A LOT of steps in between.

and i dunno maybe watcher did try to change things and tweak their business model and things weren’t getting better but as a fan and someone who watches a lot of different youtubers you kinda see this one coming. like creators drop little crumbs beforehand to gauge how people will take it or they try weird series/shows that have like 3 episodes to see what their audience is more interested in. there are a signs as a fan you can see but i think one of the reasons this went so badly for watcher is because it was so far out of left field. there was never a hint that the youtube model wasn’t working for them.

but again maybe they did try x, y, and z without it working or being transparent about it and if they were trying things why not lean into that to garner compassion from fans? we all know the youtube algorithm sucks and if they had started the video talking about the things they tried and how nothing was working and how much it sucked to leave youtube i think people would’ve understood. then they could’ve had shane talk about how subscriptions suck and there are too many of them and they tried to find another solution but couldn’t. now not only do i have sympathy for what there going through i had my feelings validated. then they could’ve gone into why this is better and what i’m going to get out of it as a consumer.

like it’s not that hard. but instead the vibe i got from them was a real palpable relief that they were leaving youtube which felt like a slap in the face.

and while i don’t agree with the steven bashing at all i do think it’s a little bit funny that they kinda dug themselves into that hole with their end of the year behind the scenes video they put out last fall. they really painted steven as a genius ceo while ryan and shane are just on screen talent. so while i feel for what steven is going through they kinda put themselves in that position.

all of this to say that it doesn’t feel like they hired anyone to field this idea by or do any kind of market research at all and the vibe that i’ve always kinda gotten from watcher is one where they want to jump over the messiness and growing pains of being a new small business and be established. be this huge force a la dropout/college humor without putting in the time to get there. and i do think watcher showed it’s true colors here where they only think of fans as cash cows they can deposit whenever.

and just the arrogance of thinking their fans will follow them to a subscription and trying to spin it as it being the same thing as leaving buzzfeed drives me up the wall. it’s not the same.

anyway i think that’s it. if i think of anything else ill edit this post ✌️

[ccuniculusmolestus]

What do you think about Camilla/Charles? I don't know what to think, was Camilla forced to sleep with him prior to his deterioration/alcoholism or was it out of choice earlier? Because if she was indeed initially doing it consensually.....it would baffle me, considering how romanticised she is in this fandom, and apparently criticising her means you're a misogynist.

Oh boy.....

I agree w u sooooo much. Anyway, I do think it was consensual starting out (which must have been their teens probably). Now, not to imply that power dynamics don't exist even in siblings (you know older siblings have more of an influence on a younger sibling) and you know, especially in that time, a brother would have more influence/power over a sister.

THAT BEING SAID. Them being twins becomes very significant. Not only are twins a symbolism of mirror imagery (so then they are "equals") and the power dynamic might still exist but it wouldn't be as pronounced. Additionally, Camilla and Charles' similarities are focused on intensely in the book. Donna didn't just do this randomly (writers seldom do), and she didn't do it just to focus on Camilla's boyishness, at least not in my opinion.

It leads me to believe the relationship between them very much started out consensually, though the whys might remain murky. The loss of one's parents will cause trauma and everyone deals differently w it, idk, I don't want to say it was their way of coping bcs it just seems.....weirdly disrespectful.

I see people always bashing on Charles for what he became towards the end of the book, but Richard remains a well liked figure despite literally fantasising about r wording camilla. Curious.

I like Charles, perhaps even a bit more than I like camilla. (In the first part). He seemed more human and likable to me 🤷‍♀️ Not henry, not Francis, not Richard and not camilla possessed the reluctance or empathy when they, in a very cowardly manner, murdered someone who had thought of them as friends. Richard might have expressed grief and regret later on, but I take anything he says with a grain of salt, since he most likely only wants to paint himself in a better light. It was Charles who seemed truly broken after what they did, which makes me think he was better than all of them, which makes his corruption and deterioration even more sinister and tragic.

And I'm sorry you feel that way, but its so valid. To those people who bully others for their dislike of a fictional female character (yes. Very feminist of you to bully women (and others) for not liking the fictional character you can project on. Where would international feminism be without your tumblerina war on members of a niche fandom.) Camilla is not a feminist icon. She would not like you if you were another girl in her class because she thrived off the attention she got on being the sole girl in a pack of boys. Maybe its because Richard's hyper romanticised version of her is so vivid that most of you forget what camilla really was like, and even if you dont care for/congratulate her for being a "girlboss" man manipulator (for leading them on and playing a weird game of incestous jealousy with her incestous brother)-- i dont know, incest just makes me uncomfortable, and I kinda lose respect for characters who engage in it consensually. Even if its fiction it just gives me the ick.

That being said, I don't care if this fando, romanticises camilla or kin her or project on her-- bitch idgaf. Do whatever you want, write and interpret her as you wish- the fun part about having your mind is that ITS UR MIND!!! Whatever happens there is none of my damn biz 😘 and if this answer triggered anyone, I also dgaf abt that

[utilitycaster]

As someone who started with campaign 3 who isn’t too far into campaign 1 or 2 (and who just finished EXU Prime and hasn’t seen Kymal) I was a bit lost, which is genuinely a first for me in this campaign. Context and cast cues have really gone a long way with previous PCs and lore drops. But here I watched the first 20 minutes of the 2nd half or so before going “yeah, I should watch Kymal first” which is really not what you want a viewer to do. I get that they want to honor those established PCs and their choices and treat EXU as just as important to the lore, but I don't think Arabia didn’t do a great job of onboarding viewers to this group and what they’ve been up to - and I don’t think the answer here can be “well, you should’ve watched EXU!” You want viewers to be excited to go back and watch those sessions, not feel like they are obligated to watch them to understand what’s happening. Anyway, I was baffled as someone who is not fully caught up and would love to know the creative reasoning. It's only one episode essentially, but still!

This is also valid. I will note: I have seen both EXU Prime and EXU Kymal, and, criticisms aside, I enjoyed them well enough at the time. But also, EXU Kymal aired over two years ago and EXU Prime before that. I've forgotten a LOT. I don't think it's bad to do an in medias res thing and let people figure it out - honestly, I don't think you're missing too much info without Kymal other than "Morrighan was sent to Exandria by Morri, she worked at the casino they were doing a heist on and destroyed a bust that had the true name of the Raven Queen but they couldn't read it" but it's just. overwhelmingly, my criticism is "NOW'S NOT THE TIME." Even if this were something everyone was familiar with, or a totally new group that didn't require any background, and even if the episode was 100% flawless in every aspect, I want to see Bells Hells dealing with FCG's death. That is what I want to see. This isn't saying that's what you must or should do; it's just like. I want to see that. I think many people want to say that. I'd even say most people like to say that. I suppose given that I often say creators should be more hostile to their audiences I do not really have a leg to stand on here, but unfortunately wants are not terribly logical.