#witness beatrice

[emotinalsupportturtle]

you've heard of the Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn as Benedick and Beatrice hc (or you should have)

Now, let me present to you David Tennant and Catherine Tate in the Philadelphia Story

[pochapal]

the premise is Evil and Fake but there is some incredibly fascinating Romantic theorywork going on here

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Thou and I are too wise to woo peaceably.

- William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing (Act 5 S2)

[flowerwreaththings]

royal fashion appreciation outfits of the female members of the british royal family at the coronation of king charles iii (may 6, 2023)

[mxmeiyun]

We got to Beatrice's coming out scene, and afterwards my mum says very slowly, "Wait... she hates herself because she's gay?" Internalized homophobia is not really something I want to discuss with my parents, so I said, "Very simply put, yes."

[vox-fantasma]

now the squall’s upon us: a warrior nun hades au

By the time Ava reaches the gates of Tartarus, she feels about ready to kill a god. 

In the past ninety-six lives, she’s been slashed, stabbed, shot at, bitten, and body-slammed by various and sundry denizens of the dead, shades that have seemingly been entered into the service of the Mother for the sole purpose of annoying the living shit out of the Princess of the Underworld. She has died - being crushed into a wall by a particularly enthusiastic Lunger - and died again - burnt alive by the combined hatred of millions of souls trapped within a garishly purple crystal - and again - a lucky shot by a witch who had cackled meanly as Ava fell to her knees - and again, over and over until all her deaths had blurred into one endless, fucked-up showreel in her memory. 

Each time, she had emerged in a shock of red from the blood pool at the entrance of the House of Hell, and each time, she had shaken the blood off, picked up her sword, and forged her way back out again. It had taken an incredible amount of strength, luck, and the mysterious help of some strange, glowing, boon-granting orbs scattered amongst the endless halls of this dreaded domain to have even gotten this far.

Each failure was met by the savage, and, frankly, uncalled-for derision by the Master of the House of Hell - and, more unfortunately, Ava’s aunt - Mother Superion. 

If Ava was being honest, there were many times she thought she’d never make it out of Tartarus alive; had come close to giving up more than a few times. But the Princess of Hell is nothing if not stubborn, and so, one fine, dark evening (for eternal darkness reigned supreme in the dank halls of the Underworld), Ava stood before the doors of Hell, facing her final barrier to the real, living world; a world she has only heard about in tales and song, a world filled with trees and birds and the sun and other such very cool shit that she’d very much like to see now. 

The Princess feels her mouth stretch into a triumphant grin, the metal of her divine sword humming with excess energy as she prepares herself to see the mortal world for the first time. 

She pushes the door open. 

Her smile grows. 

“Beatrice!” Ava cries, flinging out her arms joyfully. 

“Ava,” greets Beatrice, crossing hers.

“Boy, am I glad to see you,” Ava takes a step forward, grip loosening on her sword, “you would not believe the number of shades I had to fight through to get here, I swear Superion must’ve drafted the entire fucking Underworld to stop me from reaching the surface.”

“Hm,” says Beatrice, noncommittal, and it’s only then that Ava notices her fully extended bo staff; takes in her stance, the dangerous glint in her eyes, and the relaxed but lethal slant to her shoulders that Ava usually only sees before Bea proceeds to beat the shit out of someone. 

Her heart falls. 

“Oh.”

[sylhea-raemi]

i'm going to cry this hits so hard

[debtsunpaid]

tag drop for BENEDICK OF PADUA from a modernized version of shakespeare's much ado about nothing, a soldier, party animal and love-denier (secret romantic) in the messiest situationship you've ever seen! his song is either "what is love" by haddaway or "bite the hand" by boygenius if i want to break my own heart, but i am using quotes from much ado about nothing for the tags instead because it is my favorite shakespeare play.

[missrandomdreamer]

Had the sudden inspo of Smoker dancing to a good bop when he's by himself (or he thinks he's by himself)

and Beatrice just sneaks in and is like

Smoker just would be so damn embarrassed and just

Smoker: you tell no one 😡

[beansoup3000]

You know what's so devastating to me about "God that I were a man"? It's the way that in this situation, Beatrice is not exceptional. In the first acts, she appears to be exempt from the gender roles that everyone around her complies with: she has avoided marriage so far, and she has license to playfully criticize and reject being "over-master'd with a piece of valiant dust" (2.2.55-56). She even suggests to Hero that she claim some agency over her engagement: "it is my cousin's duty to make curtsy, and say, 'father, as it please you.' But yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another curtsy and say, 'father, as it please me'" (2.1.48-51). Beatrice has carved out an existence for herself that everyone else tolerates; her wit allows her to live outside of people's expectations of womanhood.

But Beatrice is not exempt from being a woman. When it actually matters, when Hero is disgraced by powerful men with no regard for her wellbeing or humanity, Beatrice can't do anything about it. And "God that I were a man" is so painful because it reminds us--and Benedick--that no matter how transcendent Beatrice appears to be, she is still constrained by her role in Messina's society. Back in act one and act two, the reason that she was allowed to poke fun at men wasn't that she couldn't be stopped; it was that it didn't matter. She has no actual power to change the order of things, and so her verbal sparring is not a threat.

(An aside: I think that Benedick is taken aback by "God that I were a man" because this has never really occurred to him. He sees Beatrice as his intellectual equal, and he has watched her carve out space for herself effectively (they know each other of old). In the 2011 production with David Tennant, the costuming and acting choices show how Benedick starts actively performing masculinity only when he accepts Beatrice's request to kill Claudio--when he has to "be a man for [Beatrice's] sake" (4.1.314). In the first acts, he wears tight clothes, a crop top, and a miniskirt. From the wedding on, he wears his military uniform and then a suit. His body language also changes; he abandons physical comedy, stands tall, and emotes less when he speaks to Claudio and Don Pedro. He wields his masculinity as a weapon because he now realizes it's a weapon that Beatrice cannot wield herself.)

The crashing realization of Beatrice's limits is so devastating to me because it's so familiar. I can only speak from experiences I've had, but as a queer woman I know that tolerance is different than empowerment. That having grown up evading dating and romance with made-up excuses to hide my queerness, having realized the extent of the misogyny in an organization I cared about and having grappled with how that misogyny prevented me from effecting change, being allowed to exist is not the same as being able to participate, to make things different. God, that I were a man. I would eat his heart in the marketplace.

[maybe-boys-do-love]

Mix Sahaphap gets to perform (and has the performance chops to perform) in a style that I’ve never seen any other male actor get to embody. Mix gets to unironically play the #strongfemalecharacter. The Beatrice, the Elizabeth Bennett, the Jo March. Strong-willed, emotional, kind-hearted.

Not only do the plot points line up, but Mix, more than any BL actor I’ve seen, fully leans into the embodiment of this archetype. In his roles, he rolls his eyes, pouts, banters flirtatiously, softens his posture and expression at small details. He doesn’t over-exaggerate and imposition other characters but his face also doesn’t hold back his character’s thoughts and judgments. And when the moments arrive, he lets all the hurt and anguish pour out in shatters of tears and visible heartbreak—the star-counting scene, anyone????—in a way that harkens to the operatic emotionality of well-done melodramas, soap-operas, and their contemporary Thai equivalent of Lakorn. It’s only that these have never been men’s roles in those.

It’s no surprise that one of Mix’s roles—Cupid’s Last Wish—is explicitly a gender body-swap, and Tian in A Tale of Thousand Stars is (albeit explicitly denied within the show) heavily connected to gender body-swapping. What Mix specializes in as an actor, and does exceptionally well, has been defined as feminine. To depict a kind of queer expression in this style is novel because it’s not camp, it’s not okama, it’s not a soft or femboy, it’s not a BL twink (Mix has been mostly excluded from the schoolyards and quads of the BL universe except for a role as a senior crush in Fish Upon the Sky). It’s too sincere and too adult for any of that.

In Moonlight Chicken we get to see, without the pretense of gendered mysticism, this performance style’s seduction, warmth, wit, and explosiveness within the framework of a general gay form of expression. It says that this kind of femininity might just be a gay thing. Not all gay men exhibit it, obviously—queer men aren’t a monolith. Still, it gives us something to consider about how we observe performance of queerness on screen, especially in front of an audience that puts so much more emphasis on ships, heat, and pairing chemistry to assess how well they perform a BL role. Could we look for other features to judge performance of queerness instead of how well they kiss?

Seme and uke roles would be the major performance style categories loyal BL fans assess actors with, yet even within the archetype his character’s fill within BL narratives, Mix’s performances differ from the typical uke depiction in BL because he really doesn’t perform them as passive. Rather, Mix’s characters and his portrayal of them are dynamic and demanding. It certainly fits certain stereotypes of ukes (Gilbert!) and their gay stereotype equivalent of bottoms as pillow princesses and brats. Mix’s characters, though, have more drive, agency, and compassion than that, and he plays them with all of those currents running underneath.

We certainly have openly gay writer/director Aof Noppharnach to thank for writing this kind of queer character for Mix to play in Tian and Wen. But for Mix’s specific commitment to the performance starting off with his (debut!?) role in ATOTS, we first have Earth to thank for believing in Mix’s ability and recommending him to portray the role of Tian, and then Aof’s acceptance despite his differing initial expectations for the character. Mix, Earth, and Aof have all been open about how Mix in his personal life and nature holds a lot of similarities to both his role as Tian in ATOTS and Wen in Moonlight Chicken. Some people might knock points off his performances because he’s like them. But his relationship to the characters, rather than dampening my enthusiasm for Mix’s performances, helps me appreciate his willingness to give an authentic performance in a style that hasn’t been encouraged on screens previously. It’s made more impactful that he chose to risk vulnerability to bring something personal that had previously been excluded from screens because of its gender deviance (and in broader society explicitly condemned). This doesn’t make a claim on Mix’s actual identity, but simply shows his willingness to understand and perform the expressions of his queer characters with an effort at empathy that many other actors would feel challenged to bring.

Some actors are chameleons, but some actors have a gift of a type within which they can explore depths and range that no one else can best. For me, that’s what Mix does in his work when directors and casting understands his talent. There’s a BTS video of Mix actually fainting during a scene while in Earth/Phupa’s embrace on the mountain that immediately brought to mind the wildly famous final scene in the film Camille where Greta Garbo as Marguerite dies in her lover’s arms.

For Mix, it was a serious incident due to regrettably extreme conditions and requiring the on-set paramedics, but these levels of theatrics, for me, are emblematic of what Mix is capable of as a performer, as well. After all, he had to faint in Phupa’s arms multiple times on purpose. It’s the kinds of Old Hollywood and heightened sentimental romance realms Mix takes his performances to! Then he can turn around and make it look easy to take that same character into grounded quips or dedicated everyday tasks. It only takes writers, directors, and audiences willing to see that men can feel this way and act this way. Mix has paved the way.

[pochapal]

so kanon also saw it, you say. huh. isn't that interesting.

[allthehiddlethings]

'I do love nothing in the world so well as you: is not that strange?'

Tom Hiddleston is Benedick

Hayley Atwell is Beatrice

Two of their generation’s finest actors collaborate with director Jamie Lloyd again in this savagely funny and beautifully tender battle of wits.

[flowerwreaththings]

Warm moments between royals: 925/∞

May 7, 2023 | Sisters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie share a moment as they attened a Coronation Big Lunch in Chalfont St Giles, UK.

[eyesxxyou]

Since drabble requests are open I'm begging for the dilf Hobie breeding and imperganting kink with ftm reader

Like he sees you with his daughter and starts tweaking immediately need to put baby in reader 🙏🏼🙏🏼

-🤡

❝ babyfever ❞ hobie brown x ftm!reader

❝ content ❞ breeding kink, talk of getting pregnant, DILF!Hobie, Hobie has a daughter already, graphic descriptions of sex, creampies, cockwarming

You had just picked her up. Beatrice, Bee, Hobie's daughter. You had picked her up and carried her on your hip, twirling her around until she giggled and you grew dizzy. You had just kissed her nose, her cheeks, her forehead with gentle pecks that anyone would offer to the girl upon knowing her. She was sweet, a controlled chaos, looked just as beautiful as her father. She was easy to love, just like her father as well.

All you had done was tuck her into bed and read her a bedtime story while Hobie sat watching the way she fell asleep with her head in your lap. You didn't even mind that she drooled on you.

All you had done was be a good boyfriend and accepted Hobie’s daughter wholeheartedly for him to get this way. All over you, muttering about how great of a dad you’d be between licks into your mouth.

“‘m gonna make ya a daddy.” His hands grip your hips as you lay on your back and take his cock into your soaked pussy. Your back arched off the bed, hands grasping his wrists as he sinks into you balls deep.

He’s already cum twice, his seed leaking from your abused, puffy cunt that takes as much of him as it can hold. You’re filled to the brink with cum and cock, determined to fill you up as much as possible and make you swollen with child.

Hobie pounded into you, each pull of his hips leaving sticky strings of cum connecting your hips to his. His eyes were alight with concentration, his gaze greedily feasting upon the way your pussy sucked in his length with open acceptance, like you wanted him to cum again, wanted him to give you a baby, wanted him to impregnate you.

“So good wit’ Bee-Bee. Yer gonna be such a good daddy when I put this baby in ya. Say I’. ‘’m gonna be such a good dad’.” He quickened his pace, the sharp clap of skin meeting skin filling the room. You wet his cock to the hilt, cum dripping down his balls and down the round of your ass.

You were so fucked out, trembling to your toes with each brutal thrust to your swollen pussy. Your t-dick was hard, aching, desperate. Hobie pinched it, rolled it between his fingers. He spat on it and slapped it a little. “I said, say. It.” He punctuated each word with a eye-fluttering stroke of his hips, angled and sharp.

“‘m gonna- fuck~ God, Hobie. ‘m gonna be such a good dad.” You choked, legs bowing. Your hole body rattled with each thrust, each stroke of his hips stealing any sort of cohesion or rational thought from your mind.

Maybe you did want to get pregnant. If it were to be by anyone, you’d want it to be Hobie, no one else. You want to have a family to him, want to take care of his daughter, want to give him another child because you know how much he loves being a dad, even if the position was thrusted upon him so unexpectedly.

He was making you lose any form of reserve against such an idea. God, you’d give him as many children as he wanted if he kept fucking you like this.

“Gimme a baby, Hobes.” You plead with him, even if it’s just in the moment. There are things in place to keep you from getting pregnant. “Fuck- I wan’ it so bad.” You spread your legs wider before him, let him pound out your pussy so thoroughly you were throbbing

Hobie leaned over you and pressed his lips to yours in a hot, open-mouthed kiss. His hips slowed into softer, slower ruts of his hips into you.

“We’ll be such a happy lil’ family.” You coo into his open mouth only for him to groan with pleasant satisfaction at the idea. “I’ll be there for Bee. You’ll be such a good father to our baby like you are to Bee.” Hobie simply purred. His hands grasp at your hips to keep you still so you can take his third load.

You rolled your hips into his and whispered on his sweet lips about how beautiful your family with him would be. You, Him, Bee, and your second child. You claimed Bee as your own, she was yours, your child your baby and Hobie was eating up every second of it.

“Shit- dove, ‘m gonna cum.” His tongue was against yours, lapping, his hips shuddering into you. “Gonna give ya wha’cha wan’.” Hobie filled you up, a warm flooding of your body in white to the brim as he slowly pulled out to make more room for his last load of cum.

Your body accepted it happily, accepted him. Hobie didn't pull out, wanted to keep the cum inside just a little longer. He laid on top of you, held you close, his lips peppering kisses to the side of your neck. “How long do ya think ‘til it takes?”

You giggled softly. “Whenever I stop my birth control.”

Hobie looked up at you, his eyes all big and pleading, begging for you to “at least consider it”. He so badly wanted another child and wanted one with no one other than you. He’d butter you up with kisses and sweet words into the shell of your ear. You know what he wants, knows he loves you and wants nothing more than to fully complete your family by having another child.

But you think Bee is perfectly enough. You don't need a child “of your own”, as far as you care, she is your child. But you understand, Hobie’s just having baby fever. He loves being a father.

You kissed him softly, fingers tracing the angle of his jaw. “I’ll consider it.”

“Jus’ consider it.”

taglist: @hobie-y-ellie @hoe-bie

[bethanydelleman]

Both Pride & Prejudice and Much Ado About Nothing work so well as enemies to lovers because despite surface animosity, it's clear that both end couples really respect each other and for good reasons. I think you could even argue that with Beatrice, she spars with Benedick because she considers him a worthy opponent.

When Hero and Ursuala plot to make Beatrice fall in love, Hero instructs her to speak of Benedick and "praise him more than ever man did merit" and yet when Beatrice finally speaks, she doesn't disagree with their high praise, she says of Benedick:

For others say thou dost deserve, and I Believe it better than reportingly.

Benedick likewise after his eavesdropping on Don Pedro, Leonato, and Claudio's praise Beatrice says:

They say the lady is fair; 'tis a truth, I can bear them witness; and virtuous; 'tis so, I cannot reprove it; and wise, but for loving me; by my troth, it is no addition to her wit, nor no great argument of her folly, for I will be horribly in love with her.

Similarly in Pride & Prejudice, once the misunderstanding about Wickham is cleared away, Elizabeth is able to acknowledge to herself how much she respects and likes Darcy:

She began now to comprehend that he was exactly the man who, in disposition and talents, would most suit her. His understanding and temper, though unlike her own, would have answered all her wishes. It was an union that must have been to the advantage of both: by her ease and liveliness, his mind might have been softened, his manners improved; and from his judgment, information, and knowledge of the world, she must have received benefit of greater importance.

Darcy also finds that he admires Elizabeth, after initially dismissing her:

But no sooner had he made it clear to himself and his friends that she had hardly a good feature in her face, than he began to find it was rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes. To this discovery succeeded some others equally mortifying. Though he had detected with a critical eye more than one failure of perfect symmetry in her form, he was forced to acknowledge her figure to be light and pleasing; and in spite of his asserting that her manners were not those of the fashionable world, he was caught by their easy playfulness.

All of these characters also hear and accept criticism of themselves. Both Benedick and Beatrice hear they are too proud to accept love, which they both overcome. Elizabeth learns that she judged Darcy without sufficient information and Darcy that his behaviour was not that of a gentleman. Their mutual acceptance of this criticism and their growth as people leads to their ultimate happiness.

Unfortunately, those who reproduce this trope often forget to build this foundation of respect and the acknowledgement, either personally or publically, that the characters have been wrong. Instead we get characters who mid argument begin ripping each other's clothes off. No growth, no understanding how they have been wrong, it just becomes "thin line between hatred and love" instead of "we grew towards each other".