#young!blanche

[eeblouissant]

I’ll probs reblog with the whole page once I’ve finished but …. had a brainworm or two that I had to share first

[diioonysus]

reading + art

[the-eclectic-wonderer]

This is not prepared at all, so it's likely going to be messier than usual, but I was in the shower earlier thinking about the Golden Girls (as one does) and I drew a couple of conclusions on the topic of how many children does Blanche actually have? that I wanted to share with you all.

So, first of all, let me sum up the controversy. The issue lies with one of Blanche's statements in S3E3 Bringing Up Baby, when she's trying to convince Dorothy to keep the Mercedes she bought with the money they'll supposedly get after Baby's death:

"I want that car, Dorothy. I will give you anything. [...] I'll give you one of my sons. I have given this a lot of thought. I have had four kids, I have never had a Mercedes."

Ok, everything tracks so far. Blanche has had four kids, some of which are sons. We meet her two daughters, Janet and Rebecca, a few times during the series, so the natural conclusion is that Blanche has four kids, two sons and two daughters.

Which is great, except... her next line in S3E3 is this:

"What do you say? Which one do you want? Biff, Doug, Skippy? No, don't take Skippy, he's got asthma."

She names a Biff, a Doug, and a Skippy, so... three sons. Which, in addition to the two daughters we see in the show, makes for a grand total of five kids. Huh.

Alright, we know that Blanche wasn't the best mother ever, but I find it hard to believe that she forgot how many children she has, so: what's going on here? The obvious explanation is, as always, that this is a continuity error (although it's a really egregious one!), but you folks know I prefer to find a Watsonian explanation wherever I can, so let's see if we can figure out anything interesting.

One thing that struck me when I first realized this discrepancy is her use of the words 'I have had four kids'. Not I have, I have had. Why does she use the past tense here? The sentence flows better with it, but it doesn't make a lot of sense in-universe -- unless you think that she's using 'to have a child' to mean 'to bear a child'. If that's the case, then what she's saying translates to 'I have physically given birth to four kids, I have never had a Mercedes.'

I'm sure I don't have to point out the implications of this, do I? If the number of kids Blanche has given birth to is four, but her total number of kids is five, then that means that one of her kids is not hers in the strictly physical sense, i.e. one of Blanche's kids is adopted. This would solve the discrepancy without breaking the canon elsewhere (as far as I can tell, at least).

For a while, this idea remained in the back of my head to examine at a later date, because it still has a number of issues to work through. For one, why would Blanche (and supposedly George) adopt a child? They had kids of their own apparently without any issues -- why adopt another child, instead of, well... making another child, if they wanted one more? I guess it's possible that fertility issues might have arisen at some point, but that seems unlikely for a number of reasons; that kind of problem is generally genetic in nature, and it tends to be diagnosed upon first try, not after four successful pregnancies. So, then... why?

I was stuck on this point for a long while, until I suddenly remembered this conversation between Blanche and Virginia, her younger sister, during S5E11 Ebb Tide:

"I remember when you were 16 and didn't come home for Father's Day." "I was away at school!" "Oh, yes. The Good Samaritan Academy for the Knocked-Up. Two, four, six, eight, all us girls are three months late."

It seems Virginia got into a spot of trouble when she was 16, and was away 'at school' for a while to take care of it. While this might imply that she was sent away to have an abortion, there's also space to hypothesize that she was sent away to carry her pregnancy to term and actually have a baby to then give out to adoption. If this is the case... I wonder if this baby is the one that Blanche and George adopted?

While an adoption seems a bit out of character for young!Blanche (to me, at least: she wasn't interested in her kids, why would she agree to adopt another one?), I think there's some space to consider it. For one, George might have convinced her! We don't know enough about the man to draw clear conclusions, but he did send money to the one child he had out of matrimony (see S5E18 An Illegitimate Concern), so maybe he feels more responsible towards kids near him than Blanche did -- and, well, if he'd asked, Blanche would have agreed immediately, of course. I feel like Big Daddy might have also played a part in this scenario: he could have wanted to keep the child in the family (a Hollingsworth is still a Hollingsworth!), and asked the youngest married couple among his children to take on the responsibility, to shield Virginia from the shame.

Note that this theory has a few issues anyway. For one, while Virginia is Blanche's junior, according to Wikipedia she's only one year her junior, which would put Blanche at 17 when all this happened -- and we know she met and married George much later, when she was already a university student (see S6E9 Mrs George Devereaux). However, I can't find any confirmation for this difference in age in the show itself, so I feel like the hypothesis still deserves some consideration.

As for which of Blanche's children is adopted, well... we can for sure rule out the boys, since she mentions them all by name in S3E3. This leaves her two daughters, Janet and Rebecca. All throughout the series Blanche has a rocky and painful relationship with Janet, even more than she has with the rest of her children:

I would love to have a chance to raise David. I might make up for the mess I made with Janet. [S1E6 On Golden Girls]

Well, honey, I really do want to see you. I think we have a lot to talk about, Janet. I've been thinking a lot about you, lately. [S2E16 And Then There Was One]

"I just talked to my daughter, Janet, and she and my granddaughter, Sarah, are coming to visit in a couple of days. Oh, I've never been so happy!" "Janet? Isn't she the daughter who hates you?" "[...] She doesn't really hate me, Sophia. We just don't see eye to eye." [S7E23 Home Again, Rose: Part 1]

As for Rebecca, while we know they stopped talking for a few years due to a disagreement, she seems remarkably closer to her:

We were always so much alike, and so close, just like Siamese twins. [...] I have missed her. She's always been my favourite. [S3E14 Blanche's Little Girl]

Although Rebecca herself seems to have a different perception on their relationship:

You're not happy, Mama. You're doing it again, you're telling me how to live! [...] Nothing's ever enough for you. I had to be the prettiest, I had to be the most popular, I had to be the brightest... [S3E14 Blanche's Little Girl]

I think there's two possible theories here, neither of which paints Blanche in a good light (but hey, we love these characters because of their qualities as well as their faults, don't we?). If Janet is the child she adopted, I think it's possible she might have been especially neglectful towards her (especially in her first few years); she might have taken her frustration with being convinced to adopt her out on her, as a lack of affection when compared to her other kids. This would explain why the relationship between them is so fraught (certain wounds last a lifetime, I'm afraid).

If Rebecca is the child she adopted, on the other hand, she might have wanted to overcompensate for her abandonment and sort of one-up Virginia ('see, how well I can take care of your daughter? aren't I the better mom?'). She might have showered her with affection (and with expectations, judging from what Rebecca says!) to the detriment of her other kids, which would explain the issues in her relationship with Janet as well.

I don't know. It's obviously very clear that, for all her faults, Blanche adores her children and is deeply pained by her mistakes as a mother; she often expresses regret for her actions and wishes she'd been a better mother:

I realized, too late, that I'd put myself ahead of my children. I've never made up all the time I didn't spend with them. [...] deep down, I wish you were really mine. So I could try again with what I now know. [S2E16 And Then There Was One]

For all that might have happened in the past, it's evident that Blanche loves all her children equally and considers all of them her own, so she's clearly gotten over any issues she might have had -- but that doesn't excuse her past actions, of course.

There's a whole lot that could be said about Blanche's approach to motherhood, how it connects to the way her parents treated her as a child and to her own internal issues, but as for the question of how many children she has, I feel like this is a satisfying possible answer. It's not airtight by any means, and I'm sure there's other ways to explain the discrepancy (they might have adopted a child from George's side of the family, for one, which would change a lot of dynamics); this is just the one that occurred to me. As always, I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts, so do let me know your ideas about all this!

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

for the megumi and the world's most inconvenient custody battle, i just head canon geto and gojo screaming at each other in front of kfc (AGAIN) and the conversation goes something like:

Geto: I HAVE MORE EXPERIENCE I HAVE TWINS AT HOME ILL BE A BETTER PARENTAL FIGURE THAN U!

gojo: THATS MY BABY I CHANGED HIS DIAPERS! HE CAME OUTTA MY WOMB! GIVE HIM BACK!

megumi and the kfc workers are so so done someone get these gay men couple therapy pls

i have so normal feelings for ideas i totally dont think about them every single day.

The funny thing is that Megumi actually have no awareness of Gojo at all during the custody battle due to the intricacies of the binding vow (there's a clause where Megumi has to kill himself if Gojo intervenes at all during the span of the agreement. Geto wanted the clause to be that Megumi has to kill his sister, but Megumi threatened to kill Geto and then himself if he made that the clause. Geto doesn't actually want to make Megumi kill himself, it's just a dead man's switch to keep Gojo from swooping in and ending the entire thing prematurely. There's nothing Geto can do to actually stop Gojo, but he can deter Gojo with the consequences of a binding vow which even Gojo cannot break, and he knows Gojo won't actually risk his son, so he'll let the entire thing run it's course naturally). So it's just:

Megumi: *very grumpily going ice skating with Geto's twins because he's under binding vow to play nice and cooperate with the cult members during the terms of the vow*

Geto and Gojo, squatting behind a vendor's cart: *having the world's quietest and most hostile divorcee bitch fight*

[down-therabbit-hole]

Gillian Anderson wearing her milfiest glasses

[hecatesbroom]

By all accounts, I should've been working on one of my 5 ongoing wips. But when @the-eclectic-wonderer made this post (do yourself a favour and read the tags), and @eeblouissant posted Blanche in a leather jacket(!!) the next day, my hand slipped and I wrote a little Blanche/Rose Grease-inspired AU instead.

Summary

Rose Nylund has always been a good girl. That is, until she sees one Blanche Devereaux standing on the high school parking lot, leaning against a shiny new Ford, wearing a leather jacket. Blanche Devereaux has always been a rebel and a charmer -- but never has she loved someone before. That is, until Rose Nylund shows up and steals her heart.

[thestellaofdana]

line drawing of gillian anderson as blanche dubois.

[i don't want realism i want magic]

[this-geek]

I finally have something to post. It's another 5+1, which I had to split into chapters after it got too long but don't worry everything is ready to go, I just have to post over the next week.

A Dream is a Wish your Heart Makes - The Golden Girls- M (for now) - Dorothy/Blanche: 5 times Blanche dreams of Dorothy. +1 time Dorothy dreams of Blanche.

[gardenianoire]

also my local community theater is doing a streetcar named desire I'm going to audition just so I have an excuse to do my blanche

[lalaray]

Gillian Anderson as Blanche DuBois (A Streetcar Named Desire)

[eeblouissant]

hiii @this-geek !! one of your recent fics inspired some brainworms, so I hope you don’t mind a few doodles :)))

[diioonysus]

men's fashion + art

[perfectday1972]

NICOLA

[the-eclectic-wonderer]

I'm not sure how to put this exactly, but. In some episodes, we really get to see Stan show some qualities, we get to see why Dorothy still had some good times with him, and that makes the whole 38-year-marriage-turned-bitter-divorce worse to me. Because it means he had it in him to be a good person and a good husband all that time and he just didn't choose to be.

[thefisherqueen]

Then he turned upon me, gazing at me in the utmost amazement. “‘How in the world did you come here?’ he asked in amazement. ‘Wait a bit! I see that you are tired out and that wounded shoulder of yours wants looking after. I am a doctor, and I'll soon have you tied up. But, man alive! you are in far greater danger here than ever you were on the battlefield. You are in the Leper Hospital, and you have slept in a leper's bed.’

So it is a case of leprosy. Not suprised, but I'd thought it too obvious. But, then, this is an old story and sometimes plot points that are cliché by now were not so back then. Also worth to note: this doctor is literally saying that leprosy is a fate worse than death, which says so much about society's attitudes

[thestellaofdana]

gillian anderson - a streetcar named desire.

[blanche dubois quote]

this is part of a whole wall drawing i made of blanche.