#'ask doverstar' | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

artist-issues · 2 months

Note

Raya and the Last Dragon popped into my head today and I kept thinking about how the incredibly unsubtle and poorly executed message of trusting others felt like a first draft.

What do you think about it? Would a revised script with the same story premise fix that film? Or was it doomed from the get go in what it was trying to say?

Good question! I go back and forth. I think the movie's biggest weak point was its writing, so I guess I'd say, "a revised script with the same story premise would fix it!"

There's nothing wrong at all with a message like "Without trust, we can't stand together." Because it's very true. Everyone has priorities, and there's always a chance they'll choose themselves over you, or over the "greater good." But if you keep trying to take control of the situation by believing the worst about them before it happens, you'll be exhausted & jaded, they'll be exhausted & jaded, and all your time and energy will be spent on competing with each other for the grand prize of "who can look out for their own interests better."

I think Raya and the Last Dragon's premise works for a truth like that. It makes total sense to have a girl who's competitive become jaded and control-freaky when her father, the symbol of the virtue of trust & good faith, is murdered by betrayal. And not just any betrayal, but betrayal from someone she directly tried to befriend and trust as a sort of "first experience" with that good faith her dad was always talking about. Makes total sense. And it's impactful; something that traumatic and personal would cause a relatable character flaw that the heroine needs drastic measures to overcome.

I actually love the concept of Sisu too. I like the idea that she's this pure, selfless soul who's got childlike faith—but, all the jaded people in a post-apocalyptic world respect and consider her worldview because she's a revered dragon. So she really does change minds just by being around them, just by coming back and existing in the first place. I mean, if she had been just a sheltered girl from, say, a different country, who came into the broken Kumandra with stars in her eyes, the bad guys wouldn't have thought twice about whatever she exemplified. But she's a dragon.

And step back and think about it: having a group of characters from every walk of life come together as a mini-experiment in trust and unity during the course of the adventure is a great idea. It's not flashy or original, but it's classic and true. Avatar the Last Airbender has a crew of characters from each tribe combining to defeat evil. When Kenai has a prejudice against bears in Brother Bear, how is that character flaw solved? Not just by him turning into one, but by him having to travel with and get to know one.

What they get to know is that they all have something in common: they've all lost people to the great evil in the world. And, they all want the same things, despite cultural differences. They all want their families back, they all want safety and success.

So yeah, the pieces are all there. The problem is, the writing was just super clunky. Theres a lot of telling, when it comes to the story, instead of showing. There's not no showing. There's just not enough.

I know this is already a long post, but I'll just point out: Aladdin's message had a lot to do with trust, too. But no character ever said out loud, "you have trust issues and you need to work through them." Certainly not more than once. The closest you get is Genie telling Aladdin to be himself.

Instead, you're just shown that Jasmine is the type of girl to give an apple to a hungry kid without even thinking about whether or not the shopkeeper wouldn't want her to do it. She's the type of girl who plays along with a scrubby boy from the marketplace trying to help her. She's the kind of girl who goes out with a Prince even though she has reason to believe he's already lying to her. She just does those things, and never says, "hey, why did you lie to me--you have trust issues!"

Meanwhile Aladdin's whole story is him bending over backwards to control what everyone thinks of him, because he can't trust them to accept him as he is. But he never says, "Trust gets me hurt." He just says, "if Jasmine knew I was really some crummy street-rat, she'd laugh at me."

Those sentences that the characters say are well-written because they are realistic. Only in our modern psycho-babble Instagram-influencer culture, where everyone thinks they're an expert on the human psyche, are teenagers starting to say things like "My trauma causes me to struggle with trust."

What Aladdin says is much more immediate, much more down-to-earth than that. It shows where his brain is in that moment. He's not thinking about the general philosophy of truth and trust. He's just thinking about what he should or shouldn't say on his date, and how scary the idea of getting laughed at is. We, the audience, are smart enough to infer that it's all rooted in trust issues. We don't need Genie to deliver a speech six times to make it abundantly clear.

I'm capable of identifying that as the problem, but I'm not great at doing it, myself. I know the language, I'm not great at speaking it. But actually I'm going to punt this part of the question over to @doverstar , who is very skilled at "show, don't tell," especially in dialogue. How would you re-write that scene where Sisu is trying to convince Raya of the importance of trust?

One final thing that I think handicaps Raya and the Last Dragon is that, because of the way they're written, the characters lose likability. Theres a way to have a traumatized, defensive girl who thinks she knows everything still be likable. Just like there was a way to have a selfish, insecure liar be likable in Aladdin.

I think there are other issues—I'd have completely written out the baby and the monkeys, and I'd have cut the fight sequences between two teenage girls way shorter because nobody cares about them. But that can be for another post.

18 notes · View notes

stitchandani · 7 months

Note

Hey Stitch, ever tried cutting the Turkey with a laser?

Doverstar

No, he has a cousin for that!

Well, for cooking it anyway.

#asked #answered #doverstar answers #art #fanart #stitch #627 #experiment 627 #evil #doodle #doodles

18 notes · View notes

pftones3482 · 1 year

Note

Thoughts on Ferbnessa? Negative, positive? Obsess over PnF with me!

I think Ferb's crush is cute and realistic, but I don't ship them. Vanessa is canonically about a year older than Candace, which puts her and Ferb at roughly a six year age gap. She'd be 18 when he's 12. That's gross. Plus, anyone who has followed me long enough knows I prefer Montnessa and Ferbella lol

I do however love the idea of Vanessa just adopting Phineas and Ferb as her little brothers and showing up to hang out with all of them randomly.

#pnf #phineas and ferb #asks #doverstar

15 notes · View notes

way-too-addicted-to-anime · 1 year

Note

For the Disney ask game ( one good turn deserves another! <3 ) Aladdin and Peter Pan?

Aladdin - A sacrifice you made for someone:

Hmmm I suppose the biggest one was switching rooms with my brother. He'd previously had the one next to my parent's room, but when he turned 18, he wanted more side from them. So I have up the nice, spacious room with good heating and a big almost walk-in closet for the bedroom that has unfinished walls (difficult to explain, basically walls on the outside of the room, but not the inside? Like the newly installed insulation is exposed. Don't worry I'm safe). But I'm only there during holidays and breaks, and it's still enough room for just one person, so it's not that bad.

Peter Pan - Something from your childhood you still love:

A lot of things, but one of the toys I remember playing with often (and had/have a large collection of) was the Littlest Pet Shop pets and sets. They're just so cute. I like getting the special edition series where they'd release animals from parts of the world other than the U.S. Some of my favorite are a koala, a giraffe, and a panda. I also have a lot of lizards. They're fun to use as decoration, especially in gardens and flower pots🥰

#thanks for asking!#doverstar #asked and answered #ask game #disney ask game #the list is on my other blog!

0 notes

way-too-addicted-to-fandoms · 1 year

Note

29 and 23 for the ask game, friend!

23. Do you wear jewelry?

Yes! Though normally just a pair of earrings, sometimes a necklace. I only wear bracelets and the one "adult" ring I own for special occasions.

To clarify the "adult" ring is my class ring, and the others are ones you get off of store bought cupcakes😂

29. Preferred pasta noodle?

This one is tough... Probably bow tie? I think they're neat, and at least in our house, my favorite pasta dishes always use them.

#thanks for asking!!#asked and answered #about me #doverstar

0 notes

kylejsugarman · 3 years

Note

This isn't really an ask but I'd like to say your thoughts on AATC and headcanons and all that jazz really give me life. I always want people to think about the characters and plots in-depth the way they do for other fandoms but AATC has a severe lack (maybe I'm wrong? hopefully?) and I appreciate you.

aww thank u!! sometimes posts pop up with people doing great analysis, but it’s a pretty small fandom tbh. i just really like to think about the nuances of media i like, especially one that ive loved since i was a little kid!! it makes me happy to talk about the chipmunks and think about the sweet details of their family and friendships

#syd squeaks #ask #doverstar #thank u!! im so glad u like my posts

3 notes · View notes

purpleyin · 4 years

Text

last line meme

I was tagged to post the last line I’ve written by @sophiainspace. This is a line for an angsty pre-ship fic I’m writing for lockdownfest.

“How long?” Hartley asks, not bothering with formality, certain Barry will understand his concern for Cisco.

Tagging (without obligation as always): @ttinycourageous, @chasingblue57, @doverstar, @agentmarymargaretskitz, @asexual-fandom-queen and anyone else who sees and wants to do it.

#last line written #last line meme #fanfic meme #fic writing #hartmon #memetime

20 notes · View notes

adora721 · 7 years

Text

“Curioser and curioser!“

This post is a response to @doverstar asking me the following:

“I didn't say they weren't, @adora721 :) If you could direct me to the spot in my answer where I said anything negative about Iris West, I'll apologize, I promise. I think she's great and her relationship with Barry is fine.”

@doverstar: No need to apologize. I did not say you said anything negative about Iris West. I said, “I just don't understand how you don't see exactly the same with Barry and Iris.” Basically, almost everything you said about Barry and Caitlin (except that Barry is in love with Iris) could be said about Iris and Barry (except the physician aspect). See my examples below in response to your post:

“He always has her back, she always has his (this was me watching S1, remember) and they can relate to one another through loss right from the get-go. Barry lost his mom and Caitlin lost sweet Ronnie.”

Iris has done even more for Barry since they were children; Iris also related to Barry because she, too, lost her mom. Iris had Barry’s back when psychiatrists and even Joe didn’t believe what Barry saw when Nora was murdered. You know how hard it is for a child to defend against adults with PhDs and a cop father to take the word of another child instead? Iris believed Barry’s word above all others, and I can tell you that in itself helped save Barry’s soul when Eobard Thawne wanted to utterly crush him. That’s a special friendship that we saw in S1.

“Barry is the Flash. He has super speed and he wants to help everyone and his smile is infectious and he loves saving the day. Imagine having that for a best friend! I saw scenes like the one in The Sound And The Fury, after Hartley hits Caitlin in the Cortex and Barry speeds in and helps her up, and I thought, okay, she’s safe now. Because there’s CareBare, the Flash, her friend, and if she’s ever in trouble she has the fastest man alive on speed dial. How cool is that? I thought that alone was sweet and very enviable.“

Iris doesn’t have to imagine being the best friend of the Flash because Barry, the Flash, is her best friend. Even though she didn’t know Barry and the Flash were the same in S1, she called the Flash her “guardian angel.” The Flash saved Iris just like he saved Caitlin. The only difference is that Caitlin knew the secret first. And remember that even though Iris wasn’t into science, she totally supported Barry’s love of science (bought him the state of the art microscope, went with him to the particle accelerator event; there were probably other science events she went to over the years to support her best friend).

“She makes him feel safe–not just physically, but when he’s having some kind of emotional breakdown, Caitlin talks him through it. (Okay, I know basically everybody in the show has emotional breakdowns and everybody talks through it, everybody talks Barry through it, but I’m not wrong here.) She understands how he feels about losing his mother, about not being him (hey-hey, Killer Frost) when he loses his speed, about being afraid, all his insecurities about Iris, she gets it all and she’s there to listen.”

Once again, there were many scenes in S1 where we see Barry and Iris helping each other emotionally, some in flashbacks and some in the present. For example, when Iris is worried about Eddie cheating, Barry is there for her just like she’s there for Barry. When Grodd was controlling Barry with fear, Iris talked him through it when no one else could.

“And who does Barry have, to make him feel secure, to save the day? ... I mean feeling guarded and protected, and basket-case bioengineer Caitlin Snow pretty much sums that up for him in the show, in all the little ways”

I must remind you of what Barry told Iris, not Caitlin, in Grodd Lives. “You know why I wasn’t afraid? Because you were there. Even though I really was scared, having you there is how I could stand up to Grodd. Every time I falter or make a mistake, the thought of you is what picks me up and keeps me going. Even though you didn’t know about everything in my life this past year, it doesn’t mean you weren’t a part of it. You were. Every single day. Without you, there wouldn’t be the Flash.” And it isn’t Caitlin that makes Barry feel secure; that would be Joe, Iris, and his dad, Henry. Re-watch season 1 to see that this is true. When Caitlin doubts Barry, Iris and Henry don’t ever doubt him.

“(She has lots of flaws, even gets annoying if you look at it like that, but I adore a realistic, flawed female character. Girls can be annoying [said the girl] and Caitlin’s great.)”

Lots of SB fans don’t allow Iris to have flaws and they hate her for having them. Some even use her flaws as reasons why she doesn’t deserve Barry’s love. Well, Caitlin has flaws, too, and yet they don’t think she’s undeserving of Barry’s love. I’m glad that you’re not one that thinks like that.

“And when I looked at it from that angle, it was hard for me not to ship it. I’m the sort of person who sees all that and ships it.“

Everything you see in Caitlin and Barry was already there with Barry and Iris (minus the physician aspect and Barry being in love with Iris). So, using your own words it should be, “hard for me not to ship it.” It seems like some people just couldn’t imagine themselves as Iris, and so chose Caitlin’s journey of getting to know Barry to represent themselves. They then ignored all evidence of Iris already living the experience you’re describing for Caitlin. Was Iris’ experience just invisible?

It’s no wonder that some SB fans believe, erroneously, that Iris was stealing Caitlin’s lines and parts in Barry’s life because they literally ignored or blanked out all of the evidence I’m mentioning. It’s like selective memory or selective TV watching. I feel like there’s a whole season of Iris and Barry’s interactions that some people completely missed or ignored simply because they already preferred Caitlin.

You can ship whomever you want. However, your evidence for shipping Caitlin and Barry is very similar to evidence for shipping Iris and Barry. Like Alice said, “curioser and curioser!”

#westallen #The Flash #iris west #Caitlin Snow #Barry Allen #doverstar

28 notes · View notes

doverstar · 2 months

Note

THERE WAS NO OTHER ENDING FOR ROSE and ya know what, I like to think the doctor thinks so too

I think he does too! I’m gonna talk about it, are you ready for me to talk about it? Are you ready for an essay-

I think the Doctor would agree that the ending Rose got—the one with Tentoo on Pete’s World—was the best possible fate for her. I’ll explain why, because I feel like it. First I’ll break down Rose’s most popular alternative-endings. Let’s start with Rose-stays-with-him-until-she-dies. That’s the one Rose decided on long before Canary Wharf. She planned on staying with the Time Lord until she physically couldn’t anymore. Forever.

First of all, that would be painful for the Doctor. He already said it. Watching Rose get shot, drowned, stabbed, sucked into a black hole, sacrificed for a remote planet’s civilization, poisoned, pulled into a void, atomized, eaten, possessed, run over, diseased, or ripped apart would be traumatic and terrible for the Doctor.

Watching Rose grow old and tired and then die would also be incredibly painful. He might try to prolong her life in alien ways, even in medical ways, but then she’s subjected to an unnatural, un-human existence until death claims her. Making a naturally-decaying body stick around and eke out another year, another hour, another century while he watches, exactly the same as ever. Yikes. Not fun for either of them. No thank you. He was against that ending with good reason.

Now, this ending where Rose stays with him until she dies? It is no less an emotional commitment to make than the one every married couple on Earth, every affectionate relationship on Earth, makes. Friends, family, spouses. You will lose them. You have to decide to love them knowing that.

The Doctor does love Rose, but he can’t tell her or admit it aloud because to do that would be facing a reality he’s not willing to face: he loves something he will inevitably lose. The old coward will not do it.

I believe that if Rose wanted to stay with him until she died, knowing she has a shorter lifespan but committing to holding his hand until she could not hold it anymore because he needs that and she can give it to him, and she knows he loves her back—100% yes girl, go for it. That is good and right and fine and she should be allowed to make that commitment. That’s love. That’s literal marriage vows. That’s unconditional, unwavering, and Rose is the first companion in 60 years of TARDIS passengers to love him like that. And he knows it. And it’s scary. But. Even in marriage, that is a commitment that has to be agreed upon by both parties. And the Doctor did not agree. The Doctor, selfish old man, is too afraid. He doesn’t want to watch Rose die, and he tried to explain that to her without confessing anything, and she heard him and tried to explain to him that she decided he would always have her if she had anything to say about it, not for her sake, but for his. (“Who’s gonna hold his hand now?” “I made my choice a long time ago and I’m never gonna leave you.” “Forever.”)

Now. That’s the first option for an alternate ending for Rose. She stays with him as a mortal and he has to watch her die, and they either dance around expressing their love in an unspoken, inexplicit way until he loses her and it’s agony, or they jump in with both feet and enjoy the time they have left, however many days Rose has before death, with the knowledge and understanding that he will outlive her, which is agony but with kissing. Still not 100% happy because one of them is, well, in agony. With a significantly long life stretched out ahead of him to spend as a widower. And it would fundamentally change the nature of a 60-year-old television show, but that’s another Ask for another time. Next is the Immortal!Rose AU, or the Bad Wolf AU. Personally, I don’t care for this AU (though I get the appeal and I do sometimes wish it could be that way). I used to think it was a good idea, and sometimes it's still sweet and I can see it, but the older I got, the more I disagreed with it. Because really, it doesn’t work. The AU’s idea—or its most popular explanation—is that Rose, by absorbing the Time Vortex and looking into the heart of the TARDIS in The Parting of the Ways, retained one slice of her godlike powers: she became immortal. Even after the Doctor kissed her and took the Vortex away to save her. The most-used version of this is that neither Rose nor the Doctor are aware that Rose was left with immortality until Tentoo ages and she doesn’t, or her family ages and she doesn’t.

The reason why I don’t think the Doctor would ultimately want this ending for Rose? The Doctor himself would not recommend immortality. He knows it’s ultimately a devastating existence. He himself has a ridiculously-long lifespan. Time Lords are supposed to only have a certain number of regenerations, but each regeneration, if left to age naturally, lives a long freaking time. (With the new Timeless Child nonsense, who knows, apparently the Doctor exclusively is immortal? I pretend I do not see it.) And then if they should die of old age, they regenerate and another chapter of life begins. So the Doctor knows what it’s like to essentially be immortal. And he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like watching his friends die around him. He doesn’t like knowing he will outlive the people and places he cares about. He hates it. “Immortality is everybody else dying.” “In the end you just get tired. Tired of the struggle. Tired of losing everyone that matters to you, tired of watching everything turn to dust.” That last line, the Lazarus speech, sounds familiar because it’s something similar, interestingly, to what Rose said when she was the Bad Wolf. “Everything comes to dust.” Immortality is not a blessing. Immortality is absolutely a curse, and the show treats it like a curse. It’s not just never dying. Immortality is being alone and being unnatural. It’s bad. It’s not a good thing. If you were a 100% perfect person with a 100% perfect memory, it might be doable, but it’s not an easy existence. It sounds awful actually. We saw it with Ashildr (terrible idea). She’s miserable. She never really stops being miserable. Think about this: the Doctor is (kind of) immortal. He never stays in one place for too long, and he is careful to bring along far more mortal traveling companions wherever he goes. The Doctor once told Amy that he brought her with him because he can’t “see it” anymore (meaning the universe and its value), but he brings Amy and others with him because they can see it. “And when you see it, I see it.” What is everyone always telling him? Don’t travel alone. Not because he’s lonely—even though he totally is. It’s because when he is alone, the Doctor becomes a hazard, not a help. He starts to feel like he can do whatever he wants. I mean, think about it. He starts to feel like his judgement is infallible, because he’s basically a god, isn’t he? But no one should have that much power. It takes a lot to kill him, he’s a genius, and he has a time-and-space machine. What can’t he do? After a long, long, long time of living and being alone, essentially in an echo chamber with himself, the Doctor would lose empathy and compassion and humility just like anyone else. Because he’s not perfect. But he brings friends along to remind him he can stop now. To remind him we don’t walk away. To remind him that the universe has life in it that is worth saving, and that there is such a thing as right and wrong, and that he is not God, and that there is no such thing as little people. 900 years of time and space and he’s never met anybody who wasn’t important before. He needs his friends to hold him to the mark.

So—the Doctor knows that being immortal basically means that in the end you’ll see everything come to dust. If you’re not careful, you won’t be you anymore. And nothing and no one else will be themselves to you, either. You will lose the people/places you care about, and you will be alone, and you will stop caring. And then not only will you be wretched, you’ll be dangerous. Someone who doesn’t care is dangerous. It’s Ted Bundy. It’s evil. But it’s okay, I hear you saying. If they had each other, he would always have someone to hold him to the mark! Well - yes and then no - Think about Rose. Rose Tyler is a young human woman with so much empathy and sympathy. She is “so human”, in the Doctor’s own words. She is imperfect, and selfish, and petty, and easily angry and easily jealous. She is also impossibly compassionate, even towards the most ruthless murderous species. She’s kind and generous and brave and has a strong sense of justice. She’s often very selfless and very loving. Especially toward the Doctor. She values doing the right thing. A lot of those traits are found in the Doctor’s other friends (he chooses them with great care). But Rose is different. The Doctor is in love with Rose. And Rose is a lot of ‘firsts’ for Doctor Who. She’s the first companion to inspire change in a Dalek. She’s the first companion to tell him she’s in love with him. (Jo loved him, Sarah Jane loved him, Grace loved him, yes I know there were others.) She’s the first companion to be a real, proper onscreen equal to the Doctor, and not in a She’s Basically the Doctor But A Girl way, like Clara Oswald tried to be. She is not his assistant, his carer, his associate, his sidekick, his adoptive daughter, adoptive little sister, biological granddaughter, or his partner. Not to be Emily Bronte, but these two characters have the same heart. Like recognized like and fell in love. Perfect complementation. That is also another Ask for another time –

RTD said that Rose “humans [the Doctor] and he Time Lords her”. He brings out the courage and confidence in her that makes her so exceptional as a human, things that turn her into a hero, things she already had in her that the Doctor pulled forward. In turn, she brings out the compassion and humility in him that makes him a hero instead of a villain, things he always had in him that she pulled forward, adding humanity which would otherwise be easy for him to cast off.

But she can’t human him if she isn’t human anymore.

The things that make Rose an exceptional mortal would no longer be exceptional if she were immortal. The good traits would be a duty to retain, and the bad traits would be a poison to keep at bay. Because Rose is on a different level when it comes to her relationship with the Doctor, she could, for a time, help hold him to the mark. They would be exactly as we saw them in the show—passing by, helping out, saving the day, loving one another, making one another better. And then after eons go by, they would be each other’s echo chamber. Rose is the Doctor’s equal? Given eternity to stagnate in, what was once a strength would quickly become a weakness. Rose is not perfect and the Doctor is not perfect. Rose would not always be able to “see it” anymore either, even with the Doctor there. Same goes for him. They might be together forever, but Rose would be watching her mother, father, brother, friends, and family all age and die. She would hate that. But it would be okay because she has the Doctor, right? I agree with that. They have one another. So they’re never alone. That’s good. But Rose would not be a Time Lord. She’d be an immortal human. Ashildr 2.0, finite memory in an infinite body. She’d become detached, unable to appreciate the universe, and she’d stop investing in mortal relationships because they all end eventually. All she’d have would be the Doctor—and that’s wonderful, but after a while it would stop being a special thing that they have one another. Don’t look at me like that; it would. Okay, no – no - even if the Bad Wolf powers allowed Rose to have an infinite memory to go with her infinite body, fine, let’s say they did, she and the Doctor would still end up with “a backyard” as Eleven called it.

And eventually they would both think that the two of them, together, have the best judgement in the universe and should be treated as gods, and they will stop caring (except about each other, which doesn’t sound good for all the little people who are not part of that relationship, can you say unhealthy?). Or else they will become enemies, the way the Master and the Doctor became enemies. Or they won’t be able to travel with one another indefinitely, the way Ashildr, the Rani, River, Clara, and Romana can’t travel with the Doctor indefinitely. Because it would become toxic for everyone. And they would be back to being miserable, wouldn’t they?

(And – again - let me finish beating this tiny horse here: if you think Rose Tyler would heal fairly quickly - say, ten centuries in - and warm up to the reality that she has outlived other humans because she is really no longer human, we aren’t thinking of the same Rose Tyler.)

The Doctor would not wish the curse of the Time Lords on anybody, especially not the woman he loves. He would not agree that immortality is the happiest ending for Rose, or even for himself and Rose. There’s a very real chance that immortality would ruin Rose. He wouldn’t do that to her. He loves her.

And here we go, here’s my freaking point - The Doctor loves Rose. So he would give her what she wants, even if it means sacrificing what he wants. Putting her needs before his own. That’s love. She knows that; she was trying to do that for him the whole time!

But what does Rose want? Adventure in the great wide somewhere? No. Rose wants love. Rose wants the assurance of real, true love. Rose wants to love and be loved. And when she finds that, she is darn good at it, and she will do her best to keep it. AND THAT IS ANOTHER ASK FOR ANOTHER TIME, HOOOO BOY DON’T POKE ME- The Doctor cannot give Rose what she wants using himself, or even the thing that will make him happy too, for a time—because to outlive her would be absolutely terrible, and they both know it, and because he will not put her through the curse of immortality. (She doesn’t want to live forever anyway.)

But he can give her what she wants in the form of Tentoo. Are you kidding me? A 100% exact copy of the Doctor? The same face, same mannerisms, same hair? All the memories of loving her and longing for her in his head? And he only has one heart? He’ll grow old at the same time as Rose does? Plus, hi, he actually was born in mini wartime and needs the very influence Rose provided for his ninth self? Come on. What else was he going to do? Of course the Doctor and Tentoo gave her this chance. When Rose asks him “What was the last thing you said to me?” The Doctor could have said “I love you”. He was going to say it. It is canon that he was going to say that he loved her if the connection hadn’t been severed the first time. And for him to say it then, they both knew, would have been all Rose needed to hear. She would have gone with him and Donna and died. Or gone with him and Donna and become immortal somehow, hey I hear there are these random Mire repair kits kicking around out there in the universe, they make people immortal, funny we never saw them before now, I hate you Moffat- But he didn’t say it. He said “I said ‘Rose Tyler’.” And she gives him one more chance to say it. “How was that sentence gonna end?” “Does it need saying?” Well, no, it doesn’t. We’re not asking you to confirm it. She’s not asking you to confirm it. It never needed saying. You both knew it was love. We knew it was love. A hundred times over, it was love on display.

But she is asking him to make a choice—and he chooses to let her go because he loves her.

It’s not a question of love. They give each other a chance, both of them. Don’t make the mistake of thinking Rose had no choice. She asked both of those Doctors to tell her they loved her, and she chose the one that said it out loud, after learning her options. She learned one of them would grow old and was offering to spend forever with her if she wanted. She learned that one of them was genuinely choosing not to say he loved her on purpose. She made an informed decision. (Yes, she ran after the TARDIS when it left. Wouldn’t you?) The Doctor would agree that Tentoo is the best ending for Rose. Tentoo would agree (because he is the Doctor, and bonus, he gets to have Rose Tyler). Because this, this ending where she gets Tentoo, which is our fancy term for differentiating between two versions of exactly the same man, don’t go there with me-

This ending where she gets Tentoo is genuinely what she always wanted. She didn’t want to live forever. She didn’t want a boring life, but she didn’t desperately want adventure over all else. She wanted love. That’s an adventure anyway. Love. And she loved the Doctor. And she got to have the Doctor, and not lose him, or watch him lose her. And the Doctor, our full Time Lord Doctor, had the assurance of knowing that he did the best he could do for the woman he loved.

(Plus, because yes please, in an official deleted scene which has been confirmed to be intended as canon, Tentoo and Rose have a chunk of TARDIS coral and are growing their own, so they get to see the universe too, so you can’t even complain that all is not as it should be in that sense.) It is sad, because the full Time Lord has to carry on without her (that’s how the story always goes for him, and it should be because without loving and losing, an immortal alien will not have the periodic wake-up call he needs to remember that there is value in people and in relationships and in caring), and it’s sad because Rose won’t see him again, and it’s sad because we won’t really see Rose again. But for her, it is the best ending. It is the kindest, fairest ending. And I think the Doctor would agree.

65 notes · View notes

doverstar · 6 months

Note

abed/annie is my community otp, so I would love to hear your essay if you’re willing to share ♥️

girl it would be my pleasure

this is going to be an absolutely enormous word-vomit, please prepare-

I want to start off by saying I actually think Abed is genuinely a little bit crazy. Yes, he might be on the spectrum or have some disorder but the show is so loose with that it never really confirms it, so I’m not going to confirm it either, I just think there’s something-something-spectrum there but I’m not educated enough to understand exactly what they’re communicating he has or is dealing with. I think the safest thing to assume is indeed that he’s insane (he said it himself; he saw literal lava when Troy was leaving) but in a small, functional, unique way that doesn’t make him dangerous except when he wants to cut people’s arms off because “Evil Abed has taken over” hello someone do something about that –

Anyway. It’s super difficult for me to understand what goes on in his head episode-to-episode, but with Annie it’s actually easier? Abed has such a specific set of needs when it comes to relationships that it’s a miracle he found the study group at all. He’s so smart and creative and he’s actually very empathetic and sweet but he doesn’t always seem to know how to express things.

Annie is clearly Abed’s second-best friend in the show (it helps that the actor/actress are best friends too). When he can’t turn to Troy, he can always turn to Annie. She understands him and there’s never been a point where we see that start or end—it just naturally happened and they’re both used to it. Abed is always touching her, always sitting by her, always making eye contact with her, and if you pay close attention to even background scenes, he’s measuring her reactions to things more often than anyone else’s. If I had to guess, I think she’s the group member he understood faster than any of the others. Abed (this is, from what I’m told, part of being on the spectrum? but like I said I am uneducated and don’t want to definitively say something the show decided not to be clear about) needs certain things to be a certain way, or he can’t operate normally. He panics, or gets angry, or tries to mutilate Jeff Wingers. He genuinely thinks he is crazy, and he genuinely thinks no one he meets will be able to deal with him for an extended amount of time. (Let’s begin at the beginning from his POV.) Abed meets Annie (and the group), and she seems like the typical Molly Ringwald girl-next-door; pretty, smart, wants popularity, ambitious. That’s why he chose her when he created the study group. Annie is all of these cliched things, but hey, quickly it’s pretty clear Annie needs things to be a certain way. Annie needs structure and lists and good grades. So she gets it when Abed needs that, what a pleasant surprise! And part of that is that Annie empathizes with everyone around her, without even trying, so much so that she’s depicted often as the heart of the whole study group. She gets Abed, both because they’re the same in lots of ways and they’re the opposite. She can crush easily, explode easily, cry easily, laugh easily. Everything Abed has no idea how to emote. Annie is a volcano of emotions, and they’re triggered most when she’s feeling because of or on behalf of other people.

So here’s this girl near his own age who is orderly and structured, and knows how other people feel and can enter in with them emotionally, including Abed. She’s so nice, and tries so hard. She’s even good at playing pretend (Mixology Certification, party of one?). What a perfect leading lady for the life-movie Abed sees everywhere he goes (because that’s how he makes sense of the world). Annie is the ideal female star he’d want in any story: the girl full of passion and drive.

But then there’s Jeff—the study group’s Judd Nelson—presumably the perfect leading man. When Abed first handpicks the group in the pilot and first season, Jeff wants Britta. Hey, that makes sense, Britta seems to be the leading lady type, actually! She’s nice, she’s strong, she’s beautiful. Works perfectly. And look, Annie wants Troy—the brainy bubbly girl wants the dumb jock, that makes sense too. Everything works. Then things start changing within the dynamic. Troy is actually not that dumb, and not that sports-obsessed—he’s fun, and he’s the ideal bro for Abed, but he doesn’t work with Annie. Britta is not that nice, and not that strong—she’s bad at everything, and she doesn’t understand people, she just wants to and is constantly trying to portray (and then hopefully become) the kind of person that does. And Jeff is a stunted jerk who needs reformation.

Oh, Annie is Abed’s friend now too. She said it herself, and that’s rare in Abed’s life. She called them really good friends, and that’s so important to him that he’ll sit in a room for 26 straight hours with nothing to do because Annie asked him to do it. Troy is not the only character Abed would give up control for. There’s one other from the start, because the moment she told him with all her earnest doe-eyedness they were friends, she had him hook line and sinker.

Season 1 progresses. Jeff and Britta might still work, and Abed seems mildly interested in that if only for the cliches—maybe Britta can make him better. No, wait, Britta is bad at that too. Actually, they’re not good for each other. Actually, they’re bad for each other—they’re bad for everyone. But they have similar terrible flaws and habits, so maybe they do make a good pair. Still fine leads. Still works. And besides, Annie has filled in the place of Troy with hippie Vaughn, which is also fine. Doesn’t really work long-term, but Jeff and Britta drive the plot forward more anyway, so the focus should be on them, right? The group is working. The group is thriving. The TV of life moves along.

(Except Jeff kissed Annie to win the Man Is Good/Evil debate. And Abed predicted it. Which means he was thinking about that as a possibility, because he operates on variables and tries to understand outcomes so that he’s not surprised by anything and can keep his friends for longer by relating to and reacting to them better. Jeff has leading man vibes, Annie has leading lady vibes, that’s one potential outcome. And though he insists he’s just making hypotheses based on what he’s learned about his friends so far, when it does happen right in front of them in real life, they kiss, Abed is just as shocked as the others—he literally can’t take his eyes off them until the debate is won. Then afterward, he tells Shirley he can’t predict the future and uses his plans for Pierce being discovered as a genius next in his home-movies as an example, which he believes would never happen—then Britta calls Pierce a genius right in front of him and Abed looks visibly concerned. Maybe what he predicts about his friends will keep happening, even the things he thinks are the least likely of the potential outcomes. Maybe even Jeff and Annie as the two leads. But that doesn’t make sense, does it? Jeff and Britta are endgame, aren’t they? Annie is too young for a leading man like Jeff. Annie is too nice; Jeff is too selfish. Annie is gorgeous and driven, Jeff is handsome and needs fixing, that would work, no, it would change things too much, it’s too unlikely, back to Jeff and Britta, back to playing with Troy and studying film, don’t give it a second thought—)

Transfer dance happens. Annie is going away for the summer with Vaughn. Classic Annie, has his back, always doing the better thing for the plot, bringing a good end-of-Season twist, but it’s okay, as far as he knows she’ll be back in the fall and besides, Abed’s got to-roomie-or-not-roomie with Troy issues to deal with.

And then the new semester starts after the transfer dance. And Anthropology 101 happens (again, one of my favorite episodes for the group fight at the end when it comes to my lil ships). I’M GONNA TALK ABOUT ANTHROPOLOGY 101 NOW. For A CHUNK of time. Jeff and Britta are doing relationship-drama stuff Abed doesn’t quite care about, until Shirley suggests he’s being selfish and that a real friend would enter into Jeff and Britta’s [incredibly fake and nasty] “happiness” and Abed thinks that could work. Actually, progressing Jeff and Britta’s relationship is a goal he can definitely work with. In fact, if you pay attention to the show, whenever there is an opportunity to advance or out Jeff/Britta, Abed takes that opportunity. And whenever there is an opportunity to put JeffAnnie in an uncomfortable or inevitable, c’est la vie light (which two independence-heavy freaks like Jeff and Annie would consider negatively) he takes that too.

Abed urges Jeff/Britta to get married right there in the library before the fight, gives them the ring, because he thinks that’s the next logical step in their grossness. Special episode, all about Jeff/Britta, endgame endgame endgame! He can work with that. In fact, he’s happy to control that. He leaves the room to inexplicably get an Irish singer, dead-ringer Clooney, and a transportable wedding set.

When he comes back and tries to prep the group for the special wedding episode, everyone is tense and Jeff is bleeding from the nose, and Abed does not notice; he’s intent on advancing the plot and the endgame. Then Troy says, “Abed. Jeff made out with Annie.” And Abed’s immediate reaction is “What? Where? When?” And he looks unhappy, like the rest of them. Jeff made out with Annie, and that means everything Abed thought he understood is incorrect. (And I think it bothers the crap out of him and he doesn’t have the ability to unpack why that is the way most people do because he’s different. Surely he’s just angry for the same reasons the rest of the group is? That must be it. That must be why he’s angry specifically with Jeff, not Britta in any tangible way, or even Annie in a tangible way—until later, which I’ll talk about eventually.) Annie tells him they kissed after the transfer dance in a guilty voice, which is a sheepishness she does not respond with to any of the other members of the group. It’s almost like she’s picking up on Abed’s emotion specifically this time. And while everyone else in the group explodes, and Jeff reduces his kiss with Annie to something he should be ashamed of (accurate) because men are monsters who crave young flesh and Annie looks absolutely crushed like a deer in the headlights, Abed starts packing up to leave. And we only see how angry he is right then—he doesn’t enter into anyone else’s problems. We see him react to “Jeff made out with Annie”, and then this is the next time we see him react. Jeff asks where he’s going and Abed throws out a quippy “I now pronounce you cancelled” with a bounce of his eyebrows in an angry way, at Jeff, and when he tries to leave Jeff hurls insults at his back and Abed stops in the doorway, in a normal-person—again, angry—way and turns around and drops one of the sickest burns of the whole show, that TV makes sense and has “likeable leading men”, and says “In life, we have this. We have you.” And walks out. His anger is not directed at anybody else. He doesn’t help Troy with the Pierce situation. He doesn’t try to fix any of it. It’s like he heard “Jeff made out with Annie”, learned the specifics, and was standing there reeling until eventually he decided he couldn’t deal and went to leave, and wouldn’t have shown just how angry he was with Jeff unless Jeff had provoked him, which he did.

IT'S ALMOST LIKE HE’S MAD JEFF KISSED ANNIE, JUSSAYIN’-

let me pretend I’m a 14-year-old shippy fangirl in my reasoning, okay-

Abed likes logic, and as Season 2 continues, Jeff/Annie gets more and more logical. In fact, even though he has noticed that Jeff and Britta are secretly hooking up in the background of the Season, he is not surprised in Paradigms of Human Memory when Annie calls Jeff out for the will-they-won’t-they he’s been enacting with her, and even says there is something between the two of them, matter-of-factly, which Jeff refuses to own up to. But Abed and Annie are getting closer and closer, too. It’s subtle, but it’s clear they’re 100% comfortable around each other. That becomes super clear by Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas, when, besides Troy, Annie is the only other character to enter into Abed’s way of thinking and play with him, because it’s genuinely important to him and she recognizes that this is what he needs, when everyone else kind of drops off. She helps Abed and Troy stop Duncan from dealing with Abed in a practical, normal way, because she sees that Abed is dealing with something and can only deal with it his way to get through it. That’s incredibly rare for Abed, we see. He’s very attached to her—like I said, often touching her, often sitting by her, often reacting to her.

(I mean hi, in English As A Second Language, Abed thinks he won’t be affected by Annie’s Disney Face; when everyone else obeys Jeff in closing their eyes to it, Abed doesn’t. “Oh don’t worry about me, I can only connect to people through...movies...” literally stops in his tracks when he sees her Disney Face with the cutest wistful twitch of a smile. Jeff has to Indiana-Jones-reference him to make him look away. He doesn’t only connect to people through movies—at least, Annie can get through to him without the need of movies; he’s not a quirky lil robot, he can have normal feelings, but boy does it seem like Annie is the one bringing them out of him more often than most. she gets under his skin ajhzsdkejdb-)

Abed definitely has a crush on Annie. But he doesn’t know how to deal with that or portray it. To his mind, Annie should be with a leading man. Any time he flirts with her, he is pretending to be a leading man from a movie or show. (For a Few Paintballs More, anyone?) Because that’s who she should be paired off with. And that’s what she wants, right? She loooves Jeff Winger now. Britta’s not the leading lady, she never was, that role was always Annie’s, and it makes sense she wants Jeff, and it makes even more sense that Abed is observing the love story, not part of it. Abed is not the leading man, he’s the computer. He watches, analyzes, does not get involved or get the girl.

But he still wants her around, and he can have that much—in fact, when he moves in with Troy and Annie tells him she loves their place, Abed instantly suggests she move in. Not Abed and Troy. Just Abed, and he does not discuss it with his roommate. And Troy seems confused and surprised and gives Abed such an interesting look right after. Annie moves in, Abed agrees to sacrifice some of his routine for her (blanket fort for he and Troy, full bedroom for Annie), things are happy. Things are fine. She puts away his buttered noodles when he’s not finished with them, but she adapts to his needs when he expresses he doesn’t want her to do that; she breaks his Batman DVD but he adapts by forgiving her in a role he can express that in—Batman himself, plus, bonus, he gets to flirt with her as that leading man—and things are better. But then Annie starts trying to control things. Annie starts trying to make life go according to the movie in her head. She tries to get Britta and Troy together, which not only robs Abed of his best friend for a day and disrupts his routine, it makes him angry with Annie. And not just because she tampered with the group’s dynamic, which he doesn’t want anyone else but him to do. okay we’re caught up NOW I get to talk about Virtual Systems Analysis, which is my FAVORITE COMMUNITY EPISODE-

Throughout that episode, Annie is trying to speak in Abed’s language in the Dreamatorium in order to teach him empathy. In the past, she’s had success in communicating with him on his level, but this seems extra hard for some reason. She sees somehow through his expressionless face right away and sees he is angry with her, and though he tries to deflect by saying she’s going to ruin the group by meddling, she eventually does recognize what the problem is. At first she’s convinced Abed just wants Abed’s way and that he needs to be taught how to think of others first (she’s right), but he hears her say that to Troy and it spirals him right into the worry he always has—that he’s crazy, that he’s a problem, that he’ll never fit in because of that, and that when Annie (and anyone else) tries to deal with or fix him, they will get sick of it, give up, and toss him aside. He was already angry with her for a different reason, not just wanting his way again—but now he’s sure she’s done with Abed, too. So he becomes someone else, everyone else, to make his point: that she’s just messing with Britta and Troy so that nothing will stand in the way of her and Jeff.

DO YOU KNOW WHAT HE SAYS WHEN HE IS PRETENDING TO BE JEFF TO HER? He says, “With Abed gone, and Troy and Britta together, there’s nothing standing in the way of us.” With Abed gone. Why did he say that? Because with Abed gone, Annie gets to be in control of everyone? Obviously not. Or is it because out of everyone, every variable, the only other match that makes sense for Britta is Troy and the only other match that makes sense for Annie is-

Oops, Freudian slip. Oh, she’s not falling for it. And Abed is mad at her because he thinks she set up Britta and Troy so she could be with Jeff. Abed is mad that that’s what she wants. And when she tries to argue it’s not, he literally pretends he is her, logicking it out at her, trying to convince her that that is what she wants, because that’s what he thinks she wants, and her controlling things to cause JeffAnnie makes him mad. But c’est la vie, it’s inevitable anyway, right? Why isn’t she seeing that? Why is she trying to talk about him, he doesn’t want to talk about him, especially not after what she said about him— Then she fights back and tells him that she does not love Jeff, she loves the idea of being loved and if she can teach a guy like Jeff to love her, she’ll never be alone. And then she finds out that’s what Abed is afraid of, too. No—that’s what Abed is used to. “I’ve run the simulations, Annie. I don’t get married. [Why is that the first thing he said?] I don’t etc. etc.”

He’s afraid he’ll be alone, and people will always be getting tired of him and throwing him away. Didn’t Annie get tired of him? But she doesn’t, she’s not—in fact, she understands him. She shows him other members of the group understand that feeling, too. She uses his language to explain to him that he’s wrong, and that neither of them should be trying to make life go according to a script in their heads. Abed sees that she does understand, and if she can get into his head and understand him, she really can do it with anyone, and if she can do it, maybe he can too. Annie helps him and makes him a better person, because she reminds him to empathize, which is something Abed didn’t think he could do. Okay I just spent a long time talking about Abed’s perspective. A tiny bit of Annie now, because this is going on too long. As for Annie, she is afraid of being alone and unloved. She’s “psycho”, she’s crazy too, because someone who empathizes that much and can exude that much emotion does seem crazy to other people. She’s a different crazy than Abed, but her brand of psycho lends itself well to getting and communicating with him, because his crazy is escapism and her crazy is confrontation. His crazy is emotionless, her crazy is emotional. His crazy is control, her crazy is compassion. Her parents cut her off, her high school shunned her, Troy never noticed her, of course she’s scared of being ditched. Of being unimportant. Annie’s need to be perfect comes from the need to feel valued. And doesn’t Abed understand the need to not feel left alone? Doesn’t he understand everything needing to be just so, doesn’t he understand wanting to feel important but never expecting it? Just the computer. Just the observer. Wait. Didn’t he invite her to live with him, voluntarily? Doesn’t he always seem to be choosing her to sit by, don’t they always seem to be reassuring one another with a look or a touch? He gets how she feels about Jeff and Britta and their monopolization (hi Basic Sandwich), he gets when she’s feeling insecure, he gets when she needs to escape, just for a second, to pretend to be someone else in any given scenario so that she can take a risk or get out of her comfort zone, and he excels at that so they often do it together. They don’t have to be alone, they have each other. Annie doesn’t have to be perfect, Abed doesn’t have to be normal, and neither of them have to be in control. But nobody listens to me and instead we have Jeff kissing Annie and Brie Larson in a sweater. And don’t get me started on VCR Maintenance and Educational Publishing and why Abed and Annie are individually trying so hard to fight each other’s third-roommate preferences-

51 notes · View notes

doverstar · 2 months

Note

reading your posts about your time watching doctor who reminded me of the first time i discovered doctor who, mainly, the eleventh doctor. i was going through such a tough time, and one day i just decided to watch doctor who to see what all of the fuss was about and started 'the eleventh hour.' it was pure magic to me. everyone has their doctor, and matt smith will always be mine. he was great! i loved how eccentric and warm he could be. i loved how he was just so sweet and kind to all of his companions, and i loved that undercurrent of darkness that was always bubbling under the surface of his character. matt smith was brilliant and i really, really wish they'd bring him back as the doctor in some way. i miss him so.

I so enjoy your blog and I was delighted to get this in my inbox. I loved reading this and picturing how you discovered the show; if anyone else wants to share their own DW experience with me, please take this as a sign! Commiserating over loving and missing the Doctor, feeling like he really is your friend (silly but true), is very cathartic to me. Nine was my first, and so was Rose. I didn't know anything about the show at all when I started in that basement bedroom, went in completely blind. I know what you mean by pure magic! I thought Christopher Eccleston would be the Doctor forever, and I was totally in love with him. I thought he was the reason everyone loved the show (I hadn't even seen Matt Smith's face yet, that's how in the dark I was at the time!). When he changed into David Tennant, I'll never forget how strong my feelings were. The revulsion and despair were huge. I was a lil teenager wrapped up in a zebra-patterned blanket downstairs, outraged that the 40-something with the big ears had transformed into hot young hair man. When Harriet Jones pleaded for the Doctor's help and Rose started crying in the kitchen, I was a mess. No television show that I can recall inspired in me such realistic emotions before Doctor Who, not like that! It took me so long to get used to Ten, and even now I still look at him and remember how hard it was to get used to him. Felt like someone had forced me to move homes or something. And when I finally got caught up to the show on live television, Matt Smith was finishing off his first season, and oh, he was so easy to love. Even as an adult now, his variation feels so safe. I love everything about him, the childish energy, the old man movement, the rhyming way he talks, and when he's angry, he reminds me of Eccleston. I'm like, That's him! That's the Doctor! I rewatch that era for Matt alone. When Clara looks at him regenerating and whispers "Please don't change," I cry every time. She's right. We were all saying it. Also reading your I miss him so totally made me stop and actually get emotional too - that says it all about the Doctor, about that time in my life (yours too, sounds like!) Eccleston to Smith. I miss him so.

21 notes · View notes

doverstar · 4 months

Note

Hey Doverstar. Fellow Christian here. :) What do you think about The Chosen? They just started releasing Season 4 eps in theaters this February in the United States. I really love this show. What about you? If you do...I think that would be groovy! If not...well. That would also be groovy too. ✌

Hi there! Woah, it's in theaters, that's crazy! Back in my day it was barely stream-able and we had to be in a specific person's living room to get it on the TV, how far we've come by matchbox twenty- I'm glad you asked, this will be long-ish!

I used to attend the church that the creator of the show had been attending at the time when we lived in IL (his name is Dallas, I think we had dinner with him? don't remember). That was before The Chosen was a thing. He had great ideas about what Christian media could be, but The Chosen in particular went downhill fast for me. I think it's an excellent show, but I also think that when you're using historical, real people in the content, you have to be very careful. Especially when it's biblical figures in history. Then you have to be insanely careful, and Dallas is not being as careful as one would hope. Because you don't want people who know nothing about Jesus to watch that show and have that expectation in their minds when they go to read the Bible. Jesus probably didn't talk like that, may not have looked like that, and may not have even smiled like that during His ministry here. But I've literally spoken with people who say things like if Jesus doesn't smile like Jonathan Roumie when they get to Heaven, "what's the point". That's dangerous. (And theologically the show is not sound.) I get taking creative liberties in order to make a television show more engaging for a modern audience, but not with the Bible. I get trying to make it easier to understand and follow for people who are just not brought up in the church and don't know the language. But I've decided for me, personally, not to continue watching The Chosen. For one thing, I don't want those actors/actresses in my head when I'm reading the Bible, and for another, I don't want to start being in a "fandom" for a show that's supposed to be portraying the events in the Bible. I don't want to start treating the Bible like it's fiction, like Peter's my blorbo (as the kids say), like it's just entertainment. It's not. It's real. It's all real, and I know me, and I know I have a tendency to over-romanticize the media I consume. I'm not going near that show with a 39-and-a-half foot pole anymore. It would be too easy to start thinking the wrong way about what I believe based on the way the show makes me feel. That, and I think the show is disrespectful and wrong. Great idea, good execution, went off the rails. And yeah, The Chosen is so good at making you feel things! I saw that first Season. I loved that first Season! Little ideas like having the Jesus-character laugh in bed while knowing exactly what the family of the lame man he cured is waking up to, literally able to see them rejoicing miles away? That's beautiful. When the Jesus-character cries with the woman at the well, and he tells her from now on it will all be about the heart, not about works? And she says "You promise?" And he cries and smiles and promises and she's so happy? That's beautiful. I cried too. And my favorite was the line when Mary says that before she met Jesus, "I was one way. And now I am completely different. And the thing that happened in between was Him." That's perfect. That's so good. That's what it's like, in three sentences. Excellent. Well done. Oh, and the music swelling at the end of each episode? Fantastic. Emotions everywhere. But like I said, I don't trust it. I got through about four episodes of Season 2 before I was like, okay, that's enough. This isn't good for me. Does that make sense? I could go into the discrepancies and how they often treat Jesus in the show as though He wasn't fully man and fully God (He was), and how they often make it seem like you can believe He was or He wasn't and it's all fine, when it's not all fine. But that would take a while! In a nutshell: I'm glad the creators had the right heart to start out with, and I'm pleased to see it proven that Christians can make excellent media, but not if it's like this, and I don't think the show should continue. If it does, I think they need to get their heads on straight and be super clear about the Truth, otherwise there's no point. I won't be watching it. Doesn't make you evil if you watch it! This is just what I think. Since you asked. Glad to hear from you! <3

#asked #answered #ask doverstar #doverstar's thoughts #the chosen #the chosen tv series #christianity #jesus #jesus christ #faith #dashdotdashdotdashdot #christian #jonathan roumie #dallas jenkins #christian tumblr #bible

20 notes · View notes

doverstar · 2 months

Note

You said earlier that if anyone else wanted to share something about their doctor who watching experience now would be a good time, so I might as well...

Doctor Who for me has been such a safe space as I grew up. It's the show I watch when I'm exhausted from college and social interaction, it's the show I talk about whenever I'm anxious about something because honestly just thinking about it is enough to distract me and make me smile, and it's just the comfort show that I could literally watch every single day and never get bored of

The first time I watched doctor who it was with the Twelfth doctor and Bill, and I recently went back and watched Twelve and Clara as well (after watching 9, 10, 11 and 13)

This is very specific, but there's just something about how the doctor is so unapologetically themself, and weird, and excited about all of the little things that really makes me love both myself a little more and see the joy in the world, because if a silly alien in a box keeps falling in love with earth then maybe I can as well. It's just a show, but it really means everything to me and I don't know what I would do without it

Anyway thanks for listening, I hope you're having a nice day :]

Twelve and Bill were your first?! Lucky, lucky duck! Peter Capaldi is a treasure (plus gives excellent hugs) and his love for the Doctor is in every step of his performance, and oh, how I love Bill. She is constantly saying and asking the things I'd be saying and asking. And her professor/student friendship with the Doctor warms my heart. I'm so glad you were able to get pleasure and a break from some of the harder moments in life out of Doctor Who. Made me nod a lot in solidarity. Good stories are a gift! I too love the way the show strives to point out the value and joy we can get from the planet we live on, even the most seemingly-ordinary things in creation! Maybe that's why In the Forest of the Night is one of my top Doctor Who episodes? There's something about trees, amiright? Thank you for this, it made me smile! I hope you're having a nice day too!

#asked #answered #ask doverstar #two-aliens-in-a-suit #doctor who #twelfth doctor #twelve #bill potts #bill #peter capaldi #pearl mackie #twelfth doctor era #moffat era #nuwho

14 notes · View notes

doverstar · 6 months

Note

Please talk more about Jeff x Shirley please please

AND I WILL-

Shirley is comfortable around Jeff not only because she doesn’t have to feel responsible for his decisions all the time, but because she can be herself around him. In the foosball episode he tells her the few times she’s “been a little bad” have been the times he likes her the most, which makes her laugh and feel touched as he expounds on that. And my point with that is not that promoting someone’s flaws or wrong decisions is a good thing, but that Jeff enjoys Shirley as person both when she is trying hard to do the right thing and when she slips up, because when she slips up, he relates to her more. She’s not angelic, but she’s always trying to be as good as she can be, and that’s more inspiring to him than Annie’s pedestal and Britta’s ideals. So she can breathe a little easier around him because he's not going anywhere.

OH. And Jeff feels exactly as pressured into Shirley’s way as the rest of the group does when she’s being manipulative, but the difference between the others and Jeff is that he doesn’t melt or bend backward as easily because he’s a lawyer, so he knows what being manipulative is really about—control. He knows Shirley has control issues because he has control issues, and he has control issues because he’s scared all the time, and he knows Shirley has control issues because she is scared all the time, so he can stand up to her and talk to her like an equal when she tries to control him. He calls her out for being manipulative more often than anyone else, and when he does, she wakes up and has to think about what she’s doing and why, and that’s improvement. AND IT’S THE SAME THING SHE DOES FOR HIM. He changes his behavior for Annie because he cares what she thinks about him, because his ego can’t look at a person like Annie and allow her to think ill of him. Being part of her fantasies of a male lead is a boost to his self-esteem, and he’s very insecure. He changes his behavior for Britta because he A. wants to sleep with Britta, and B. because again, he’s very insecure, and if he can’t get the blonde to want him, or speak highly of him, what is he? It’s all about him him him him. And it rarely lasts more than an episode. The two other leading women have to literally whine and bully him into changing his behavior. All Shirley ever has to do is ask. And sometimes not even talk, just be herself. Have you noticed that? When Pierce tries to sue her over ownership of their small sandwich business, Annie urges Jeff to get involved, Jeff refuses, and Britta nods when Annie reprimands him. But later, all Shirley has to do is sit next to him while he’s reading, say hi, and he knows exactly what she wants. And he knows the way she usually starts manipulating: singsong sweet-talking, and he teases her for it, and when he calls her out and gives her a very cute gotcha look, she immediately drops the act, talks normal. He doesn’t say no, he at first maturely tries to help her with some peacemaking advice he knows she’ll understand (where was this suggestion when Annie told him to get involved?), but then Pierce is Pierce and it’s obvious he’s going to cause problems for Shirley regardless. Jeff hides behind his book and immediately takes the case for Shirley and she just giggles at him, it’s adorable.

When Shirley wanted Jeff to stop fighting a guy on December 10th, he did not let her tell him what to do (which is a rejection she needed to experience), and when he started talking to her like an equal, she talked back like an equal. She was mad at him, she kicked him out of her party, he went to the fight and the second he saw the bracelet she made for him on his wrist he decided Shirley was more important than what he wanted and threw the fight. Then Shirley (with the help of the group) decides to go and watch his fight, sees he is throwing it, and decides Jeff is more important than having her way and decides to back him (not my favorite episode message-wise, but super fun and the first time I think we see this ship flourish). When Jeff is representing Shirley in that case against Pierce, he’s given the opportunity to back out of her corner to protect his future career, and before he can make any decisions, Shirley considers Jeff and the potential consequences for him of helping her without any hint from him, and she tells him straightforwardly that she wants him to have what he wants, and she genuinely does. And he sees that. And Jeff does not have to be ordered to do the right thing or want the right thing or think the right thing, because Shirley already is, and she is there for him, and he chooses to do the right thing because Shirley did the right thing, and he cares more about Shirley than about himself. Without hope of anything in return, which is not how we are shown that he thinks of that kind of transaction when Britta or Annie are on the other side of it. When he insults Shirley by implying she never has anything he needs in Foosball and Nocturnal Vigilantism, all she does is look at him and he immediately backtracks and apologizes and realizes where he's wrong. Shirley doesn’t have to do anything or say anything to bring out the best in Jeff. She doesn’t have to intentionally try to fix him or flirt with him. She’s just herself, and she cares about him unconditionally, and who she is as a person inspires the best in him. Jeff cares about Shirley for Shirley, not for anything she can give him. It’s a choice, and it comes naturally to him. That’s closer to love than anything he ever does with any other romantic interest.

One of my favorite episodes is Anthropology 101 (specifically because of the implications for all my lil ships in the show) within the last big fighting scene for the group. Jeff doesn’t lose his cool until Shirley says “What is wrong with you, Jeffery?” and then he loses his temper. Britta has been playing with him, Annie literally punched him in the face (deserved it), and he does not rise to either, but when Shirley’s opinion of him is loudly expressed, then he starts yelling at people. It’s almost like the person whose opinion matters to him most publicly lowering is what makes him snap. Or something.

More: In Social Psychology, we see that they have the same sense of humor and they find it just as hard to enter into small talk as the other person does. In Origins of Vampire Mythology, Jeff expressly describes Shirley as someone he invites to do things with him that he is afraid to tell anyone else about (also says she’s the only one who really understands him). In Foosball and Nocturnal Vigilantism, not only is it revealed that they briefly knew each other as children, but they recognize that they both admire the other person exactly as they are now and that they can, as ever, be 100% safe with one another. In App Development and Condiments, Jeff calls Shirley out on being manipulative again, and she calls him out over his need to be the center of attention, and they both recognize aloud that they want the same thing for the same reasons: control, because they’re scared, and again they see that the other person gets them and can be a safe place. I could go on (about Abedison or TroyBritta or more of Jeff/Shirley or blahhhhh) but Tumblr legit will not let me write a lot in Asks for some reason, sorry! THANK YOU for the platform-

33 notes · View notes