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hyperfixated-fan · 7 months

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Here is some of those wonderfully nostalgic girly-girl shows in vague order in which I watched/discovered them that no one asked for but I’m giving to you anyways.

1. First up, we’ve got the Horseland

Back in the day, I was a major horse girl (a part of me still is), but this show was so awesome and adorable. It’s just a bunch of gals riding their horses and hanging out at the barn. And their horses and other animals talk amongst themselves. It is all an animal lover like me could want. It’s just so cute and gives sweet life lessons. And occasionally, I found it interesting that they do touch upon some serious topics such as eating disorders and loss. The episode “Mosey” always makes me cry. All the episodes are on YouTube.

Overall, I have to say my favorite character is Alma Rodriguez.

2. LEGO Friends

The first generation of LEGO Friends is nostalgic, but I also seriously love the LEGO Friends: Girls on a Mission. It’s just a bunch of teenage girls getting up to shenanigans and being besties (Oddly, though they are high school age, we barely see them in school XD). I particularly enjoy Girls on a Mission (the episodes are on YouTube) because the episodes were so well put together and it fleshes out each girl a bit more uniquely. It’s a genuinely fun show though I generally am partial to LEGO shows. I am personally not a fan of latest generation of LEGO Friends. I’ve watched a few episodes and it’s just blegh. It might be the nostalgia talking but I just can’t get into it.

My fave character has always been Emma (she’s so adorable) and my fave ship is Emma x Ethan in the Girls on a Mission iteration.

3. Barbie Movies

Not sure if all the movies are pictured above, but there’s a good portion of them. I admit, I haven’t seen all of the Barbie movies (especially the good old classics mainly due to animation that did not age well so sorry) and did not really become a fan until later than most little girls. However, I still find the movies to be very enjoyable and cute. I think a lot of my affinity comes from many familiar Canadian voice actors being in most of the movies and I find it fun trying to pick out familiar voices.

A few of my personal favorite movies are “Princess Charm School” (it’s the first Barbie movie I ever watched with one of my best friends), “The Twelve Dancing Princesses” (so many voices and characters to listen to and try and remember), and “Mariposa” (I am rather partial to the voice of Chiara Zanni and loved her playing Barbie).

4. Ever After High

It is so sad that Ever After High ended after Epic Winter. I really wish we got to see more. I loved the imaginative twist on fairytale characters and the whole “facing your destiny” storyline. The princesses, knights, dragons, and wonderland were all great components as a lover of fantasy. Disney Descendants ain’t got nothing on Ever After. It was a very creative show and it was interesting to see all the characters that would pop up.

A few of my favorite characters are Rosabella Beauty, Ginger Breadhouse, and Lizzie Hearts. Call me basic but I really do like the ship Darabella (obviously the execution of it could’ve been better but I still like it.)

5. Miraculous Ladybug

Simply put, this show is a mess. Miraculous Ladybug barely made the list only because I have fond memories of it. I’m not caught up on any recent events and admittedly quit watching it after season 3 or 4 (I don’t exactly remember). The show had potential and many amazing fanworks, but after a while, the episodes just get repetitive. I still like the earlier seasons before things got too messy. As a lover of side characters, I also wish they fleshed out the side characters a bit more instead of keeping on creating more and more side characters. I still occasionally pop in to see what is going on and apparently Nathalie is dead?! Idk what’s going on and I love looking at spoilers with no context because it makes the show all the more funny.

My fave character list includes Alya Césaire, Nathalie Sancoeur, and Juleka Couffaine and I’m partial to the ship DJWifi.

6. Monster High

Since I was a fan of Ever After High, it was only inevitable that I would eventually become a fan of Monster High. It took a while but I eventually did fall in love with the show. And I fell hard. All the characters are so unique and while I absolutely love all the generation 1 content, I do not completely hate the g3 series. I loved the message of standing out yet belonging at Monster High, freaky flaws and all. The animation is very dated yet endearingly nostalgic at the same time. I love all the different twists on various monster creatures.

My favorite characters list gets pretty extensive, as I love g1 and g3 Abbey Bominable (I always love an ice queen), along with g1/g3 Cleo De Nile (bc she’s your typical mean girl/diva but truly cares for her friends), Robecca Steam (her steampunk aesthetic and little accent are adorable), Deuce Gorgon (a kind yet popular jockish character is rare), Jinafire Long (Chinese dragon is always a win), and Rochelle Goyle (she’s just neat).

Fave ships = Cleuce (CleoxDeuce) and AbbeyxHeath. I just love them okay!

7. Lolirock

I believe I discovered this show coming off of Storm Hawks and Steven Universe so the crystal motif and everything was already an intriguing concept for me (plus familiar Canadian voice actors drew me in). I just love the trio of girls trying to “secretly” protect earth with sparkles and spells while putting up the front of being a girl band (the songs are very catchy by the way if you can get past an ungodly amount of auto tune). The episodes gave me vibes similar to Miraculous Ladybug but somewhat better with less convoluted characters. Overall, it’s a very bright energetic show and I wish they would’ve delved into the backstories of the other princesses a bit more instead of focusing on Iris all the time. Here’s to hoping they eventually do come out with season 3. All the current episodes are on YouTube.

My favorite characters are the sisters Izira and Talia. They have so much power and the show needs to actually do them justice.

8. Mysticons

This one is definitely lesser known than most on this list. I found it shortly after LoliRock since it has similar features and characters. It’s a very simple show with simple characters but I am fond of it still (and I’m pretty sure it made me cry at one point. I don’t remember when but I remember something about it made me emotional). The fantasy magic of the world was definitely a big win for me. I think the creators did a decent job at world building. It’s your typical prophesied heroes must save the world from certain destruction but I found the show overall enjoyable and cute with a nice dose of found family thrown in.

My top favorite characters are Zarya Moonwolf and Emerald Goldenbraid.

9. DC Super Hero Girls

I started out as a G1 fan when it was still coming out and became a fan of the reboot as well. It was interesting to all these wonderful kickbutt superheroes placed in a high school -esque setting. The original series was very average with their shorts but it was such fun to see what characters would pop up to help (I even will tolerate and enjoy the LEGO specials). The reboot had better design and animation. I am sad it didn’t get a chance to run longer. My only qualm was that some characters had such a drastic change from their backstory and original character development that it moved from being whimsical and imaginative to simply keeping the name and having an entirely different character. *cough* Jessica *cough* They don’t get that she was such a powerful Green Lantern because she was bold but because most of the time she was scared out of mind due to her past trauma but still acted and pushed through the fear to save people.

Rant aside, my fave character is Jessica Cruz despite the reboot overhauling her character and erasing her backstory.

10. She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

Not necessarily my favorite glittery girly series I’ve watched but definitely an enjoyable series. True to my usual form, I unfortunately did not end up caring for most of the main plot and characters. However, the idea of this show was fun nonetheless and it had its nice moments, so I’m glad it got a decent number of seasons. The magic, weaponry, and elemental powers drew me to this show. I wish they delved a bit deeper into the true effects and trauma that fighting a war would have on all of the characters as they are leaders of their respective kingdoms.

My favorite characters include Entrapta (little nerdy characters are almost always a win for me), Mermista (Vella Lovell was perfect for voicing her and her character design is nice), Netossa (another awesome blue character; if anyone’s seen Six: The Musical, does she vaguely remind you of Catherine Parr?)

Bonus: Rainbow High

An interesting premise though it ultimately falls flat for me because I am not a fashion-oriented person in the slightest. However, I still like the show and all the drama that comes with it. I just overall find it hilarious to watch the squabbles that happen because everyone is just so high strung. (Why do all the guy characters literally look the exact same with that same stupid little hairstyle?) XD

Fave characters are Ainsley Slater and Jade Hunter.

Bonus: God’s School

Greek mythology! Need I say more? This is such an imaginative show. It is even more amazing considering one guy does all the animation. The webisodes that are out are great and I definitely recommend watching them on YouTube. Zeus looks like Disney Hercules and I find that hilarious. All the character designs for the gods are so awesome and I love the details that help indicate who they are. Ignore the fact that over half of them are related in some form or another and everything is fine.

Fave definitely has to be Athena! (…bad*** in the arena. Unmatched witty and queen of the best strategies we’ve seen.)

Bonus: Tinkerbell

These are just cute adventures. I wish the series could’ve continued so we could’ve gotten movies highlighting each of the fairies.

My fave is Silvermist.

Bonus: Steven Universe

I personally enjoyed this show and know it had a large fan base so I don’t get why so many people are going back and hating on it so fervently. It’s a flawed show like any but it still has it fine points and I have a soft spot for it. I heavily debated on whether this qualified for a magical girl show but I think it does. It’s nice seeing Steven grow alongside the gems and it’s a good show to put on in the background.

My favorites have to be Garnet and Sapphire.

Honorable mentions that I never fully watched but seem nice:

My Little Pony - I’m disappointed in myself for never getting into this show because it has all the right points for me to like it, including great Canadian voice actors and magic and ponies. I have watched some episodes and enjoyed them but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to sit through and binge the entire show.

LEGO Elves - watched some but I never got truly immersed.

Totally Spies! - never really gave it a go but it seems okay.

Winx Club - I tried to like it but the characters just didn’t hit for me.

W.I.T.C.H. - watched the first few episodes but nothing made me want to continue.

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thatone-brightstar · 10 months

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Heyyyy, been loving your stuff recently! After binging season 2 of ‘the bear’ I’ve noticed I absolutely NEED some platonic fluff with the Reader/OC(fox) and Richie where they just comfort him and tell him he’s worth being alive and he amounts to something because episode one was absolutely heartbreaking😭 and I need something to make me feel better for him, especially after all his great character development this seasonnn!!

Hi! I'm glad you like it!

I also only watched ep1 especially to write this because you are so right- not even five minutes in and they had me in tears with the analogy.

So here you go, for you, for me and anyone else that wanted to hug sad Richie through the screen.

PS. I haven't finished S2 yet so don't fret if it's a bit inaccurate.

**********

Purpose (Richie Jerimovich X Platonic Fem!Reader)

Words: 1.4k

(Part of -but not exclusive to- TB&TF universe)

‘Richie emergency. Need help’

Carmy’s text was pretty ambiguous yet sort of straight forward nonetheless. You expected a second one with a bit more context, but you knew with the whole renovation conundrum it was a miracle he even had the head to write the simple sentences in the first place. Plus, knowing the two for almost close to a year didn’t grant you any solace, because a Richie emergency could be either something small like a disagreement or more serious like having to bail someone out of jail.

The memory doesn’t settle too well in your stomach and your strides grow quicker over the snow covered gravel that invades the space beside the restaurant.

The warmth engulfs you fully once you cross the back, scarf and beanie now unnecessary in the comfortable building. As you make your way to the office, you greet Manny and Angel with a soft pat on the back- so as to not distract them from their tasks- and unwrap the wool fabric from your neck, dropping it over the small bench by the lockers on your way in.

You can hear a soft conversation emanating from the small room, voices matching those of Carmy and Natalie once you’re close enough to the entrance to see them, and they you.

“Hey-” You greet with short breath, stepping into the room and planting a quick kiss on your boyfriend’s cheek, then leaning down to hug Natalie, who’s sitting on the squeaky old chair that just doesn’t seem to break yet. “I brought my mom’s first aid, what’s the emergency?”

“Why?” Carmy asks, confused.

“Well, you just said ‘emergency’ and I thought someone got stabbed again.” You respond confidently, raising the plastic case into view and shaking it lightly.

Carmy huffs out a small laugh while Nat’s expression is one of concern, mumbling a confused ‘again?’ under her breath.

“What? No- everyone’s limbs are good- I think-” He takes the kit from your hands and places it on the desk behind him. “Listen- Richie’s kinda not his usual self right now.”

“And that’s… bad.” You squint your eyes and tilt your head as you try to process his line of thought.

“I’m still debating it-” Nat kicks his foot softly at his answer, shooting him a look that you’d very much use with your younger brother too. “Okay- no but kinda. D’you think you can, like talk to him, maybe-please?”

A heavy sigh escapes as you cross your arms and lean back against the door frame, eyes flicking between the Berzattos. “What d’you even want me to say to him, it's Richie- he’s not the most open book here…”

“No, but you are pretty convincing-” Nat adds. “Something about the face…”

You scoff and shake your head.

“C’mon, babe please? He likes you… and you’re better at this sort of thing than us.”

You bite the inside of your lip in scrutiny for a few seconds, then uncross your arms and push yourself off. “Where is he?” In sync, their arms raise with a pointed finger in direction to the front of house and the slight smile playing over Nat’s face has you rolling your eyes. “There’s a hole on your wall- by the way.” You tell them, pointing loosely to your left, before disappearing again down the corridor.

Richie’s exactly where they said, behind the now empty counter, with small pieces of tape hanging from the tips of his fingers and eyes deeply concentrated on something on the bar. He looks up for a second when your shadow obscures his view and gives you a single nod. You place your forearms over the slightly dusty counter and rest your chin above your hands, trying to be as quiet as possible while he struggles to tape down the hole in the center of an old poster.

“It’s easier if you tape it from the back-”

“I know how to fix a fuckin’ poster, alright?”

“-Okay” You say defensively.

“I know how to do things- I’m not some fuckin’ useless moron…” He says under his breath and the wounded expression that slips from the veil furrows your brows.

“No one said you were, Rich.”

“Good, cause I’m not.” His eyes flicker up again, expecting a taunting look on your face that didn’t correlate to your words, but found nothing more than your undivided attention. “What’re you doing here anyway? Kindergarten let you out early?”

You’re shoulders shake with a short laugh and a thin smile pulls at his lip at your reaction.

“Just wanted to say hi, see how everyone’s doing…” You shrug, looking around the half packed room and to the newspaper covered windows that give the place a somber feel. “The place looks shitty...er.”

“Yeah- but your boyfriend’s got it all under control-” His tone is slightly irritated as he angrily pulls at the tape that’s beginning to stick to his skin. “Syd and Nat got it all under control- I don’t even know why I’m still here.”

“Cause we all need you here.” Richie’s eyes turn to you with a sheer hope that he tries to hide with a humorless scoff.

“For what? To be the butt of the joke?” He clears his throat and shakes his head, looking back down and picking mindlessly at the tape. “Nah, they don’t need me here. This is Carmy’s thing- like painting’s yours and all the gay- sorry, fruity- desserts are Marcus’ thing… I ain’t got a thing.”

“Course you do.” You answer like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “You know more about this place than any of us- Carmy included. Plus, who else is gonna keep him in check when he goes off on a tangent?”

“You.” He shrugs.

“But I’m not always gonna be here-”

“You’re breakin’ up again?”

“What? No-” You sigh and reach a hand to your hair, before remembering all the dust over your palm and putting it back down instead. “I meant… that these guys need someone to look out for them. Yeah, this-” You move your hand around the space. “is Carmy’s and Syd’s and Nat’s thing but, it’s also yours too.”

He keeps his gaze focused on his hands, but you can slightly see the tint starting to cover the edge of his baggy eyes. He’s quiet for a while, soaking up your words and letting them settle in his head beside the dark thoughts that you know a bit too well.

“Then what? What're they gonna do with me when they don’t need me anymore?” He speaks again with a hoarse voice, harshly sniffing back and raising his head to the ceiling. “They're the only family I got. Mickey’s gone- you took Carmy.” He points loosely to you and an amused blow leaves your nose. “This place… shithole n’ all, it’s all I got. And now it’s gonna be gone too. Where am I gonna fit in the new place?”

“It’s not gonna be gone if… you keep the memory with you.” You smile warmly up at the man and slowly reach out to press the tiny pieces of sticky plastic already popping off the poster. “And the guys are gonna be the talent, but the new place is still gonna need a soul.”

Richie nods slowly, brows creased as if not fully convinced. He opens his mouth but nothing comes out, doubting whether to ask.

“...I’m the soul, right?”

“You’re the soul.” You respond between laughs, with a shake of your head and Richie joins in timidly.

Your brows rise as your eyes land on the messy scribbling over an empty pizza box discarded beside you. You pull it closer in hopes that the writing will make more sense, but all you can make out is a few words and sums that are definitely not being added correctly.

“30k plus 50k equals 70k…who made these?” You ask Richie.

He leans down, eyes squinted and trying to read through. “I think those are Carmy’s chicken scratchings…”

You copy his stance and squint your own eyes in hopes to make out the words, then bite your lip to stop the small giggle when you read through the operations. Two or three sums are crossed out with another sitting beside it, underlined twice to confirm that it’s the correct one, though it’s just as wrong as the other two.

“Oh, my poor man…” You sigh in amusement and turn to his cousin. “See? Tangent.”

**********

#the bear & the fox #the bear fx #richie needs a hug #richie jerimovich #the bear tv #the bear hulu #the bear headcanon #carmy the bear #ask #carmy x reader #richie x platonic reader

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selfdestructivecat · 4 months

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I’ve seen quite a few posts in response to Thomas’ recent video, specifically his year in review. In this video, he discusses the setbacks he’s faced the past few years — such as the quarantine, Joan’s departure, and his own personal doubts and insecurities — and how they impacted the production of Sanders Sides.

And I truly sympathize with him. No, seriously! It’s already difficult to create something this big almost entirely on your own, but I’m sure this year only made things even more difficult. I know I’ve definitely felt insecure to the point of feeling sick when it came to things I created, so I can empathize with the enormous amount pressure he must be feeling.

However, many posts I’ve seen following this video are saying things along the lines of “If people still criticize Thomas after this video, then I’m going to lose it” or “Not that people who criticize Thomas even care, but Thomas really struggled this year. I’m with him all the way!”, or even “I bet SaSi critics will still demand the finale even after this. I doubt they’ll even watch the video!”

I want to clarify that this is obviously not everyone who doesn’t like ts criticism. People who block criticism blogs and/or the tag, who ignore criticism in general, or who feel upset when they see criticism of something they love: this is not about you. You are absolutely valid and entitled to feeling the way you do, and I hope you have a lovely day. Feel free to block me if that would be good for your mental health. Please take care of yourself. /gen

But to those vocally condemning ts critics, I want to make several things clear.

First of all, you are lumping everyone who criticizes the show in with people who demand the finale with no regard for Thomas’ well-being, for the well-being of his crew, and for basic common sense. While many people are upset that the finale isn’t out yet, we aren’t specifically mad that we don’t have a completed video to watch; rather, we are frustrated with what this says about the SaSi crew, their work ethic, and how they treat fans of the show.

We aren’t upset that we can’t watch the finale right now. We are upset that we’ve gotten very few updates about the show during this period between canon episodes. This video provided wonderful insight into why the finale has been delayed, and we would have loved something like this years ago. Obviously it didn’t have to be a 20 minute video, but maybe a Twitter thread? Something small that made us feel heard?

Hell, even announcing an official hiatus would have satisfied the vast majority of critics (myself included), instead of throwing SaSi into this limbo of “Oh it’s going to be finished this year, we promise- oh whoops, never mind! Next year for sure!” It’s been a constant chain of broken promises, and we were more than happy to give the crew some grace the first few times, but after a while, a repeated mistake becomes a pattern. And this pattern is not pretty.

We are upset that the crew seems incredibly disorganized (going back to the lack of updates, and of course taking into account how we haven’t gotten even a single part of the finale in five years), which could affect the quality of this series we all love so dearly. beauty-and-passion has spoken about this a lot (and is a lot more eloquent than me lmao, please go check out their stuff!) The most recent Christmas video seems to demonstrate that the series may be on the right track, and I will admit I was wrong in regards to this video, but the Inside Out video is a mess in so many ways. Even if this doesn’t prove a decline in quality, it certainly indicates a lack of consistency, which can be just as damning for a series.

We are upset that, while SaSi is in this limbo, Thomas seems to have been focusing on his other projects without telling us about this change in priority. He is welcome to pursue other projects, obviously. I’m thrilled that he is having fun with Roleslaying with Roman and My Roommate is Hades. But these new projects have come at the cost of Sanders Sides content, which also points towards a lack of organization. Some clarity towards which projects Thomas chooses to focus on would have been wonderful and greatly appreciated, so that we know not to expect something we won’t receive. And hey, maybe if we knew not to expect SaSi content until much later, maybe we wouldn’t have been constantly asking why we weren’t receiving SaSi content?

(And this is not an excuse for aggressively demanding content, obviously. But I feel like people who are confused and frustrated at not receiving something promised to them are justified in these feelings.)

And maybe we’re jumping to conclusions in many regards. I won’t pretend that we are prophets who can peer into Thomas’ mind and know what he’s thinking and feeling at all times. But it’s pretty damn difficult to say that NONE of the above could suggest that Sanders Sides isn’t held in the same regard as it once was. Hell, Thomas even admits in the video that he doesn’t feel as connected with these characters as he once did.

Second, many people attacking critics are also quick to drag their character. We are impatient, greedy, selfish, and cruel. We don’t care about Thomas; we only care about the end product! More Sanders Sides at any cost! We don’t like critical thinking, since we obviously didn’t watch the video; we only want to find mean things to say about Thomas and the show! We don’t like engaging in civil debate with our fellow Fanders who may disagree with our opinions; we only want to make other people feel bad, and to make others hate the show, too!

Well, guess what? You’re doing to us exactly what you think we’re doing to Thomas: you’re assuming the absolute worst of us and looking for any reason to drag us down.

We are critics. We analyze media (media that we love, mind you) and we acknowledge that it isn’t perfect, that the creators aren’t perfect, and we point it out. But we still love it anyway, because to truly love something is to love it with its flaws, to know that it could be better, to brainstorm how it could reach its true potential, and to keep doing so because you believe in this potential.

We aren’t trying to take away the joy you feel from Sanders Sides. So please don’t try to take away ours.

#ts criticism #ts critical #sanders sides criticism #my ramblings

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traxanaxanos · 10 months

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Re-watched the first 20 minutes of Caretaker to see Lieutenant Stadi and her minute and a half of screen-time, as you do, and I’m trying to contextualize her scene with Tom within the conversations I’ve been seeing on my dash recently about both Tom’s treatment of B’Elanna and the show’s treatment of B’Elanna as always angry and unjustifiably so, and that the anger is because she’s a Klingon, who can only ever be angry.

The first half of Tom’s conversation with Stadi is:

"Stadi, you're changing my mind about Betazoids." "Good." "Oh, that wasn't a compliment. Until today, I always considered your people warm and sensual."

So Tom here is using a base stereotype of Betazoids to inform his interactions, and specifically his sexual advances with a Betazoid woman, and then later repeats this pattern with a different set of stereotypes in his interactions and sexual advances with B’Elanna, where he continually reduces her to his (and the show’s) base stereotype of Klingons and Klingon women specifically. I’m not really sure that the writers knew they were making this a reoccurring trait of Tom’s, given that the Stadi interaction is basically nothing and was all the way back in episode 1, but it still is then a reoccurring trait of Tom’s in that he interacts with women with alien heritage by reducing them to whatever stereotype about their species is most convenient and sexually alluring to him.

Betazoids as a fictional species mainly suffer from the misogyny in their writing; they’re at the nexus of many of Roddenberry’s sexual interests. They can read your deepest desires, they become bonded to a partner, they don’t have cultural taboos around nudity, they have looser sexual mores than the average American viewer. I think they also tend to be exoticised, not so much with the few Betazoid men we’ve seen, but when they’re women. Specifically between Deanna (played by an British-American woman of Greek descent) and Stadi (played by an American woman of Italian descent), there are these occasional attempts at coding Betazoid women as vaguely Mediterranean, exotic and different, but not too exotic. Different in a way that is sexually alluring but “safe” to a White gaze.

Tom notes that Stadi is not performing his stereotyped version of a Betazoid correctly to try and bait her and shame her for not being receptive to his advances. He uses a similar tactic in many of his interactions with B’Elanna, only instead tells her that she is performing his stereotyped version of a Klingon correctly to shut her down, belittle her, and minimize any conversation she tries to have that may be a little uncomfy for him. B’Elanna is just being angry which is how all Klingons are. B’Elanna just has a violent personality, like all Klingons do. B’Elanna is flying off the handle over nothing, just like a Klingon would.

This stereotyped version of Klingons is rooted in the racism that is frequently present in depictions of Klingons, which is rooted in the creators racism towards people of color. B’Elanna is explicitly Latina, and the way the show and Tom positions her as being too angry pulls from the “fiery Latina” stereotype. Klingons are also either explicitly or implicitly Black, and the anger and hostility Tom reads onto B’Elanna maps onto a white racist stereotype of Black people being inherently violent or destructive.

I don’t think the show is aware that Tom has this racist essentializing tendency, and if it is, it doesn’t necessarily think its a bad thing. Trek is a series whose reach exceeds its grasp - Infinite diversity in infinite combinations has become a cornerstone of the show (or at least in the imagined truly utopian version of the show), but Trek so often uses broad stereotypes to talk about groups of people, and frequently seems unaware that this is reductive at best and outright racist at worst. At the end of the day most of the people in charge of Voyager had the most in common with Tom Paris.

#star trek #star trek voyager #B'Elanna Torres #lieutenant stadi

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akkrosu · 10 months

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Thank you, @recentadultburnout, for tagging me and asking for my nine favorite TV shows! I might have gone a little overboard because I haven’t been tagged a lot before, but please indulge me.

This is going to be limited to QLs, if only because I couldn’t think of a single piece of Western (or straight) media I love and/or remember well enough to be able to put on this list. The ones I have chosen are below, in no particular order.

1. The Untamed

This one belongs here both for being a fantastic story and for being the reason I even discovered any of the other series on this list. My entire “obsessed with Asian queer media” thing started all because a friend once told me, “Let me show you what I’ve been watching recently.” What can I say, drunk Lan Zhan got to me.

2. Moonlight Chicken

One of the most beautiful, thought-provoking and mature series I’ve ever seen, QL or otherwise. P’Aof is a genius and I would have to hide in shame if I didn’t have at least one of his works on this list. He created a narrative of six real people trying to figure out life and how to be happy and there is so much strength in every single one of them.

3. Not Me

With at least three watchthroughs one of my most-watched BLs. I mean, OffGun and the social commentary and political action and the queerness of it all and the characters. Ugh, I love this show. Plus, the music and musical editing were phenomenal.

4. Where Your Eyes Linger

Probably my favorite Korean BL ever? Also the KBL to really get me into KBLs, so it already deserves a medal for that (I was missing out on so much). I’m a sucker for good yearning and forbidden relationships, and this series gave me everything I wanted. And, again, the soundtrack. The instrumental of See U playing as Kang Gook storms Tae Joo’s dad’s house lives rent-free in my mind.

5. HIStory 3: Make Our Days Count

Yes, it’s the other HIStory 3, the one everyone ignores because ‘he went out to buy salt’. Look, don’t judge me, I own up to my love for this series. It’s not the show’s fault all anyone ever remembers is the tragic ending. It’s also such a beautiful story about a total dork falling in love with a lonely nerd and defying all odds to be with him. Plus, the best sibling relationship ever. And (spoiler) said dork dying doesn’t invalidate everything else the series tells us. Yes, it was sad, but I can deal with the sadness. And sometimes, the sadness is as much part of a show as it is of life.

6. The Eclipse

This series haunts me to this day. I was obsessed with it, and I still am. Akk is one of my favorite characters ever written, and First portrayed him beautifully. So did Khaotung with Ayan. The sheer existence of P’Golf baffles my mind to this day. These 12 episodes gave me everything I’ve ever wanted.

7. The Eighth Sense

I take back what I said about Where Your Eyes Linger. This is my favorite KBL. I’m not even sure I can explain why. It’s just so honest. And so, so queer. It made me cry so many times, and the storytelling was magnificent. Plus, it’s one of the few full-length KBLs we have.

8. We Best Love

The cups in my profile picture are the ones Yu Zhenxuan and Pei Shouyi drink out of in the flashbacks of the second season, so... yeah.

This was my very first QL that wasn’t a bromance, and so I’m very biased. I’m almost mad at myself for making this my first one, because sometimes it feels like nothing else could ever live up to it. I admit to having a special love for season 1, even though season 2 seems to be the one people talk about a lot more. It’s just perfect, everything about it. Especially Gao Shide’s mom.

9. My School President

What a phenomenal show. I remember how much I was looking forward to Fridays during the time this was airing, and each week it gave me everything I wanted. Gemini and Fourth are fantastic actors, the friend groups made me cry all the time, it’s one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen, and there are some absolute bangers in there, musically speaking. Gun and Tinn will always have a special place in my heart.

Some honorable mentions because it’s really hard to pin down exactly nine:

Never Let Me Go – I spent a lot of time debating whether to put this or MSP in this list because I love them both equally. And because they aired around the same time, they are sort of irrevocably tied together in my mind.

Big Dragon – I loved this significantly more than I ever expected to, and I can’t be impartial about Yai to this day, because I love him with all my heart. This was such a messy, weird, chaotic show, and yet it somehow gave us such beauty and sappy people in love.

Step by Step – It doesn’t get to be on the list because it hasn’t finished airing yet, and so it could still fuck up, but if it keeps going like this, it is definitely going to become one of my favorites. (Same with Be My Favorite, honestly.)

I don’t know many people around here, and certainly not many I wouldn’t feel awkward tagging, but I’ll just be awkward anyway and kindly ask @ellaspore and @biochemjess if they feel up for it. I wanna know! (No pressure, though.)

#the untamed #cql #moonlight chicken #not me the series #where your eyes linger #history 3: make our days count #history 3: modc #the eclipse #the eighth sense #we best love #my school president

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meraki-yao · 6 months

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RWRB Movie: Sequel Series?

Hear me out.

A while back I mentioned that although I desperately want more Firstprince and more of the RWRB universe, I don’t really straight up want a sequel movie because of how complete the movie’s “fairy-tale” ending is and because I can’t think of, and don’t really want a full-on dramatic plot for their future. I kind of just wanna see them live their lives. I said I didn’t really know what’s the compromise between my two thoughts.

It hit me recently:

a series/ mini-series

The thing is, a series doesn’t need to be a continuous storyline. It can and most of the time it is, but it doesn’t need to be. May not be the best comparison but the Disney Junior shows I watched as a kid, while having some sort of overall continuity, aren’t always continuous. Each episode can serve as an independent story: sometimes it’s a flashback episode, sometimes it’s an alternate universe episode etc.

So when it comes to RWRB sequel, the benefit of doing a series instead of a movie is that it doesn’t need to be strictly set in the future, and it doesn’t have to have a dramatic over-arching plot, which leads to two big things we can work with.

One, we can jump around with the timeline, and give enough time to explore events that could only be mentioned in passing in the movie due to time constraints and pacing

@pippin-katz wrote a post about seeing a flashback to their first meeting in the sequel, and yes, absolutely, but with a series, a whole episode can be dedicated to their first meeting, which would be enough time to explore the whole event (i.e. Alex’s nervousness and Henry’s discomfort being at the conference, what happened after) and both Henry and Alex’s perspective. We can see everything from that day.

We could also fill in the gaps, moments that occurred during the movie but wasn’t fully presented. I don’t know if Wimbleton still works with the difference in dynamic and character on Henry’s part, but if it does it would be fun to see. One of the things that was in the book that I wish could have been in the movie was a moment of Alex’s showing his vulnerability and Henry understanding him immediately when they were just friends, so the Christmas phone call in Chapter 3, that can be in the series. Maybe the thing with kid Alex and the magazine photo of 12-year-old Henry. Things like Henry’s meeting with the King during his 18th birthday. Henry’s perspective of the Alex POV events and vice versa.

And of course we could have moments of their future, living together or working out a long-distance relationship, celebrating anniversaries, going on dates, doing public events as a couple, maybe even proposal, engagements, wedding, adoption, all the good stuff.

Two, we can focus on characters and relationships that aren’t Firstprince

Now don’t get me wrong, I love my boys and could never get enough of them

But one critic I’ve heard and sort of agree with is that a lot of supporting characters, and subsequently their actors, were underused. While I completely understand that again, it’s due to the limitations of movie storytelling, it’s still a pity.

With a series though? We can have episodes focusing on certain relationships, past, present and future.

We can have Henry’s relationship with his father, how the whole family fell apart for a few years because of losing Arthur and how much Henry’s grief affected him. (I think Nick would absolutely kill it)

We can have Alex learning more about Henry from Bea and Percy, and forming some sort of unspoken “Henry protection squad” bond.

We can have Henry reconciling with his grandfather and mother, and him introducing Alex to his mother.

And while we’ve seen Henry bond with Oscar, it’d be nice to see more of that, as well as see Henry bond with Ellen.

Firstprince will always be present, but with a series, it doesn’t always need to be the focus, and we can explore other relationships as well! And it’d give the other character a bigger chance to shine

And it can even be independent character studies: we can get a closer look into Henry’s depression and Alex’s ADHD/imposter syndrome (I’m not sure if movie Alex still reads ADHD, someone help me out here please, but if he does it’d be nice to see)

I love the movie so much and I understand that not everything can be translated on screen for it, but if the next related project is something more like “fill in the gaps” instead of “start a new thing” we can adapt certain things in the book that couldn’t be in the movie. Like colouring and adding things in the blank space of a painting instead of starting a new painting. Think about it, even Henry’s bonus chapter is a collection of miscellaneous moments that happen after the events of the book: it doesn’t have a plot.

I literally don’t know if this is a practical idea, and I’m aware this literally sounds like a collection of cannon compilate one-shot fanfics but on screen, but this is the best way to extend the RWRB universe I can think of

It’s more domestic fun and maybe fan service than making a statement/sending a message like the movie did, but the movie already did that, and it would just be nice to watch smaller moments of their lives

(and well, I got myself excited writing this, so please please please please please)

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shiningshenanigans · 5 months

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When Sacrifice No Longer Feels Loving: Raw, Messy, Emotional Thoughts on Loki Season 2

It’s been a little over two weeks since the season 2 finale of Loki came out, and although it’s been pretty much all I’ve been able to think about lately, I haven’t really been able to put my thoughts into words. And I have a lot of thoughts. I need to get them out of my system, and I’ve tried to write them down on multiple occasions, but every time I do, they keep getting stuck on the way out.

So, I’ve decided to do something different. Rather than trying to analyze the series critically, I’m going to just start writing about how it made me feel, and see where it takes me. I’m not really sure what’s going on in my heart and mind as I reflect on this story, but I have a vague idea of the truth that it’s tapping into. Fair warning: these thoughts are going to get very Christian-y and preachy, so if the gospel is not your thing, I don’t know how much sense this post will make. But, if you’ve been having a similar experience with the season and care to read, I hope that you find some encouragement and truth in these messy, emotionally honest thoughts!

When I try to sum up how I feel about season 2 as a whole, the only word that really comes to mind is “upset.” I’m just upset about it. The morning after the finale aired, I woke up with a deep, hollow pit of sadness in my stomach. I broke down crying a couple of times over the next few days just thinking about certain scenes in episodes 5 and 6, and I couldn’t rewatch the finale for almost a week.

Is it weird to feel this kind of grief over something as simple as a TV show? Yeah, probably. But I think that’s kind of the point. I’d been looking forward to the release of this season for two years. Without getting too personal, I’ve recently been through one of the hardest years of my life. Just this year, I’ve gone to two funerals for people that I grew up with, been in a car crash, faced rejection in a relationship that I had grown emotionally attached to, and mourned with my community as we experienced one of the most tragic shootings in our country's history. The release of Loki season 2 had become a little bright spot in my 2023; something to look forward to in all the madness.

When the first season came out, I remember being overcome by how good it was. It was wacky, and sweet, and funny, and sad, and redemptive all at once. Even in its darkest moments, there seemed to be a thread of hope that ran through the series from beginning to end. Over the years it had become a comfort show, a beautiful piece of art that offered me encouragement when I needed a pick-me-up. Because if a comic book super villain with a long history of screwing his life up can change his ways, make new friends, fall in love, find meaningful work, stand up to his oppressors, and ultimately write his own destiny, then gosh darnit, so can I.

My roommate and I invited our friends over, every Thursday night for six weeks, to watch the new episodes as they premiered. Our watch parties started off full of excitement and anticipation. I even made key lime pie for us the first couple of times, which was a big hit. But as the weeks wore on, and the episodes started to spiral deeper into tragedy, our post-watch conversations became more full of questions and complaints than anything. When the credits rolled on the finale, we sat in an almost mournful silence, watching the screen, waiting with baited breath to see if there would be a post-credits scene. There wasn’t one. You could almost feel a sense of dread fall over the room. That’s it. That’s all they’re going to give us. That’s how they’ve decided to end the story.

I think the first words that were uttered when the Disney Plus screen finally popped up were, “I hate Marvel,” before we all began to voice how we felt.

I can honestly say this has been one of the weirdest, strongest emotional reactions to a piece of media that I’ve ever had. It’s genuinely felt like I’ve been going through the five stages of grief over this show, but the grief isn’t just stemming from the inherent sadness of the story. I’m also grieving the show itself; what it’s become, how it was handled by the people it was entrusted to, and the knowledge that there will likely not be another season to redeem it. I feel angry, unseen and unloved by the writers who set up everything over the course of six episodes to ensure that the finale was as heartbreaking as possible.

At the same time, however, I can’t say that I hated it. A part of me knows that the reason it’s affecting me so deeply is because it’s so well-made. Art doesn’t grip you this much unless it’s objectively good. There are legitimate critiques of the story/filmmaking that I could make and a lot of people already have. The temptation to scoff and say “Michael Waldron wouldn’t have done it this way” and turn all my excitement towards Secret Wars is very strong, but that just seems like misplacing my hope. Underneath all the sadness and the frustration, there’s also a layer of confusion. Am I supposed to be feeling this way? Is this what the writers of this show wanted me to feel all along? And if so, why? What are they trying to say through this story?

I don’t normally mind stories with tragic endings, so long as I can understand the purpose behind them. I remember feeling similarly unsettled when I finished the first season of Arcane, wondering what the point of it all was. But after a little bit of analysis and reflection, I could see how the tragedy was fitting; how the characters choices had led to the ending and the cautionary tale it was trying to tell me. Even in the tragedy, it was still good. I’ve also learned to love the grief that comes with watching a character make a heroic sacrifice for those he loves. I think of Tony Stark in Avengers: Endgame, Janner in The Wingfeather Saga, or Stoick in How To Train Your Dragon 2. All these deaths are heartbreaking and painful to watch, but there’s a certain beauty to them too, and you can feel the goodness and love in their sacrifices.

This one is different, though. Something about this one feels wrong. Something about this one feels deeply, inherently, not good. And analysis is only making it worse.

I’m having a really hard time seeing the beauty in the sacrifice that Loki makes at the end of season 2. This story wasn’t supposed to end in tragedy. It was supposed to be a reversal of tragedy. A second chance for a beloved character (one who has already sacrificed himself for love on multiple occasions) to finally receive some kind of reward instead of punishment.

To end the series the way the writers did feels almost like a stab in the back, a betrayal if you will, of all the hope and joy and restoration that the first season promised. I guess adopted children who are abandoned at birth really are destined to be alone forever, no matter how much love they have to give. I guess villains can’t find redemption, and even if they do, they will not escape eternal punishment for their sins. I guess quarrels between brothers (or lovers) can’t be resolved, and every relationship we cherish is doomed to fall apart eventually. I guess young women like me, who are strong and independent because we’ve had to be, are not worth pursuing, and we should be content with our middle-management jobs and casual friendships as if that is the peak of human existence. I guess we should embrace isolation and selfishness after all. I guess true love doesn’t really exist, and we should walk away from any semblance of it before it makes us bleed.

Bummer.

The night after we watched the finale, I drove a couple of my friends home. On the drive back, I could feel the sadness of the story aching in my gut. I thought specifically about Sylvie, and how unsatisfied I felt with where the story left her. I’ve always connected with her as a character, and I hated the way she had been sidelined throughout the season. Every week, I had tuned in hoping I would see some kind of reconciliation between her and Loki. I just wanted some kind assurance that she loved him back, that they would somehow end up together in the end. One kiss, one hug, just… one conversation, for heaven’s sake. One apology from either side. One confession of love. But six episodes and it never came. Their relationship wasn’t even addressed. It was reduced to subtext, as if it wasn’t the back bone that Michael Waldron built his original pitch off of back before 2021.

I thought about the way she shrugged and smiled when Mobius asked her what she was going to do next, and it just irked me. Why didn’t they tell us what her plans were? Why didn’t they give us some kind of clue? It seemed so obvious to me what she should do. She should make good use of her Tempad and go be with Loki. How could she just walk away, knowing everything he just sacrificed for her? Do people really think she could just… go back to her life after that, with so many things left unsaid between them? If she really does love him, how could she? How could she go through life, knowing that the truest love she’s ever experienced is lightyears away, always watching, always with her, but unable to be physically present with her in a mortal, tangible way? It sounded like such a sad, lonely fate and my heart broke for both Sylvie and Loki as I thought about it.

But then it dawned on me: wait a second… isn’t that what it’s like to be a Christian? Isn’t that the reality I’m living every day, as Christ’s bride? The weight of that realization was so heavy I almost had to pull over on the side of the road because I couldn’t breath. My savior loves me more than anything. He gave up everything for me, just like Loki did for Sylvie. I don’t even know how many rounds he went with the enemy on that cross, just to bargain for my soul. And what do I do about it? I shrug it off with a smile. I forget about it until it’s convenient. I go back to my job, my house, my car, my record store, as if every second of my life hasn’t been paid for by the blood, sweat, and tears of a God who just wants me to be ok. As if I could ever fool myself into believing a life without Him is enough for me.

As if I shouldn’t be fighting like hell to get back to Him. As if love so amazing, so divine, doesn’t demand my life, my soul, my all. Just so you know, I teared up again writing that last paragraph.

A lot of people have pointed out the parallels that can be made between Loki and Sylvie and Adam and Eve. The comparison really does work in a lot of ways. A perfect likeness, a counterpart created for a lonely man because “it is not good that the man should be alone” (Genesis 2:18). One flesh, two halves of a whole. Equals, balancing and complementing each other perfectly. A couple chosen by a higher power to rule the universe with authority. There’s something edenic about that scene where they snuggle in the grass under that blanket together: a man and a woman, wrapped up in a garden of green, completely unguarded and vulnerable with each other. The man promises the woman his protection, and the woman shyly offers him her trust and thanks in return.

When they make it to the Citadel at the End of Time, their parting echoes deeply of the fall. The serpent (He Who Remains) sows seeds of distrust between them, knowing full-well that they are stronger together and could easily overpower him if they remain united. The two halves are torn apart and turn on one another. The woman, in her thirst for freedom, takes control of the situation, and the man fails in his duty to stop her. Free will is unleashed into the world, and with it comes consequence and chaos and danger.

If season 1 can be read as the journey from the garden to the fall, season 2 reads more like the journey from the fall to the cross. Chaos and confusion, spiraling slowly towards death and destruction. Constant distrust between the man and the woman, between God and his bride. An inability to reconcile, to fix what’s been broken. The citadel goes from being Eden to being Gethsemane. When every other option has been tried and all hope is lost, Loki returns to the moment of the fall and pleads with his love, over and over again, to make a different choice. But she will not stop rebelling, even though it leads to her death every time.

Unable to reason with her, Loki confronts He Who Remains to bargain for her life. But there’s no option that doesn’t end in bloodshed. Loki must either kill Sylvie, the woman he loves, and go on committing genocide in HWR’s place. Or, he must break the temporal loom and let the chaos that ensues destroy all of reality. These, according to He Who Remains, are the only two choices. So Loki makes a third choice. Instead of sacrificing others for the multiverse, he makes a total sacrifice of himself. I think you can see where I’m going with this.

It’s not lost on me how weird it is to compare Loki, a marvel super villain based off of a pagan norse god, to Jesus. But the crucifixion/ascension parallels here aren’t exactly subtle. Loki puts on a heavy crown, carries a great burden up a hill, and “dies” on a tree of all things, to save both the woman he loves and the group of friends he’s grown close with during his time at the TVA. His last words to his loved ones before he ascends are, “I know what kind of God I need to be, for you, for all of us.” When I think about the story in these parabolic terms, I’m almost overwhelmed by how much truth is woven into this mythology. And yet, something about it still feels deeply unsettling to me. There’s still a piece missing that makes it feel more like a Greek tragedy than a Jewish parable.

As they are, Loki Seasons 1 and 2 show me a reflection of the fall, the cross, and in some ways, the ascension of Jesus Christ. What they don’t show me is a picture of the resurrection. And any christian will tell you that the resurrection is the most vital part of the story (1 Corinthians 15:16-20). The series shows me sin and what it costs. They show me what is lost in sacrifice, but they don’t show me what is gained. The hero meets a fate worse then death, and is forced to remain there, alone, for all eternity. There are no tearful reunions at the tomb, no assurance that death has been defeated, no eucatastrophe. No curse reversed. God and man are forever separated, and for some reason that’s supposed to be beautiful, according to Marvel. It’s not. It’s a question mark, a gaping wound at the end of the story that offers no comfort. To live in that tension, that separation, in those three days between Christ’s death and his resurrection, is literally the most painful, most hopeless place for the human heart to dwell. But, maybe it’s a tension that we should sit in more often, so that we can appreciate the weight of what Christ did for us.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that I don’t really hate season 2 of Loki. It’s a beautifully crafted piece of art, well-written (sort of) and well-acted, with gorgeous production design and a deep, meaningful story at its core. What I hate, with every fiber of my being, is the thought that that is where the story ends. That it’s supposed to end there. That this ending is good. As a Christian, I almost can’t accept it. Everything in me screams that there has to be more resolution beyond the credits of the finale.

That, I think, is where all the pain swirling in my heart around this story is really coming from. And whether they know it or not, I think that’s where a lot of the Loki fandom’s pain is coming from right now. The gospel is so written into our DNA that it pours itself out into every mythology we try to create. We are so desperate for the reassurance that the resurrection is true, that when we get even the slightest hint that it might not be, it triggers our deepest, darkest anxieties. Nothing scares me more than the thought of being alone, separated from God, for all eternity. Not even death is scarier, or more tragic, than that. It is, by definition, hell.

So yeah. Curse you, Marvel. Curse you for telling me a story that hurts like hell, and expecting me to just be ok with it. For giving me an ending that could never, in any reality, be satisfying or conclusive, and then trying to gaslight me into believing that it is. For ensuring that I will probably end up buying a ticket for both Secret Wars and Kang Dynasty (even though I’m really tired of superhero movies) just so that I can see if I’m right, that love really does win in the end. I don’t really have any kind of expectation that the next two Avengers movies are going to give me the closure I’m looking for. But I think I know where I can find it.

As grieved as I am by the way Marvel handled this story, I’m also kind of amazed by the way its incompleteness is revealing to me the total, satisfying completeness of the gospel. Marvel can’t promise me that, at the end of time, the God of Stories will be reunited with his warring bride and live happily ever after in the presence of his inner circle. But the gospel does. And the hope that I find there is immeasurable.

#loki #loki season 2 #loki series #geeking out gracefully #sylki #sylvie laufeydottir #christianity #when sacrifice no longer feels loving #eucatastrophe #ressurection

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that-nerd-who-writes-fanfiction · 27 days

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Hello....If you don't mind, can I ask, what are your top 10 (or top 7) favorite media (can be books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series)? Why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before......Thanks....

I can’t remember if I’ve done this before but it’s changed again recently. Most of these are gonna be books because I’ve had way too much time sitting around lately so I’ve had enough time to actually enjoy books without destroying my sleep schedule for it.

1. BBC Merlin is my all time favourite, I don’t feel like I need to elaborate, it’s pretty much all I post about on here.

2. Song of Achilles is still my all time favourite book and number 2 behind Merlin. I think I’m nearing 20 rereads total for it by now. It’s never boring and keeps me interested every time. Cannot recommend enough. I’d give anything to be able to read it again for the first time.

3. I’ve been reading quite a few classics recently, I had a lot of free time. I met another Greek mythology nerd so Iliad and Odyssey make my top ten again because they’ve been on my mind a lot more than I care to admit. (I know it’s technically two books but I always read them together)

4. And I finally got around to reading Iron Heart (sequel to Crier’s war) and it’s amazing. One of the best books I’ve read recently. I’m gonna leave it at that or I’ll start ranting but I can’t recommend it enough so definitely go read that if you get a chance.

5. BBC Musketeers is also really good, I started watching that recently. I’m only on episode 6 but it’s great so far. Santiago Cabrera’s hair is fucking gender. Also the show got me researching 17th century weapons and now I know a fair amount about capes so that’s fun. BBC is still shit at historical accuracy, but no surprise there.

6. The Great Gatsby because I’m that kind of nerd and I’ve been mostly rereading recently. Everyone is such an arsehole in that book but it’s so interesting to analyse and annotate. I read it in year 7 and hated it, then again in college and it wasn’t bad but 3rd times a charm I guess. I found it really interesting from an analytical perspective, but I wouldn’t read it for light reading or fun.

7. I’ve been avoiding anything new other than musketeers, just because I haven’t felt like getting to know a new set of characters and a new world. That being said, I rewatched the first season of Good Omens, Crowleys still one of my all time favourite characters and the show is great.

8. I rewatched Stars Align, always a fun one. It’s a great show and the art style is really cool.

9. Seraph of the end because I love vampire stories. The plot is really interesting, I still need to read the manga but the anime is brilliant so I want to read that soon. Also no romance (ignoring shipping) which my aroace self appreciates.

10. The Tempest because my cousin was studying it in school and asked for help so I reread it for her and got a little bit hyper-fixated for a few days, now it’s still just sort of in the back of my mind and I’m a Shakespeare nerd so might as well add it.

Thanks for the ask!

#asks #bbc merlin #the song of achilles #the iliad #the odyssey #iron heart #criers war #bbc musketeers #great gatsby #good omens #stars align #seraph of the end #the tempest #shakespeare #books #i’m bad at tagging

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makeitastrength · 25 days

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There are now 10 main characters on The Rookie — rank them! 😈

Oh my gosh, seriously? This is just evil, Sarah! Evil! Okay, let’s see…

1. Tim

Before anyone comes at me with pitchforks, let me just clarify that I love Lucy too. But Tim edges her out for the top spot here because (1) he’s had such incredible character growth and the most consistent character arc, and (2) I relate to him the most. From the moment we watched him encounter Isabel in the pilot, I knew he was going to be such a complex and compelling character, and I just love him so much.

2. Lucy

For as much as I relate to Tim, I relate to certain aspects of Lucy as well. While I’ll never be remotely as badass as she is, I definitely understand her on an emotional and psychological level. She’s come such a long way, and I’ve enjoyed watching her find herself and her confidence. I am forever in awe of her ability to maintain a positive outlook on people and on the world, despite what’s happened to her. And I’m absolutely loving her arc so far in season 6!

3. Nyla

Give me a tale of growth and redemption, and I’m there. It’s one of my favorite things, to watch someone battle their demons and become a better version of themselves. And despite seeing her softer side come out, she still has nerves of steel and is such a badass. I feel like things have calmed down for her a bit recently and I’d love to see them dig into her complexity more in the coming episodes.

4. Angela

Oh, Angela. She’s strong. She’s feisty. She’s such a good friend to Tim. She’s so relatable with her pregnancies and the challenges of motherhood (of course, I say this as someone who has been through neither of those things). Honestly, how can you not love her? The only thing keeping her a little further down the list is the lack of character development we’ve seen for her recently.

5. Aaron

Honestly, I liked him from the start. But it’s another tale of redemption, of sorts, so I guess that’s not too surprising. I’ve enjoyed watching him learn and grow and find justice for his friend. And I think there’s more in store for him this season. Plus, he has so many unexpectedly hilarious moments that always crack me up.

6. Celina

I didn’t like Celina at all at first, but she’s grown on me as they’ve calmed her down. And her storyline with her mom did a lot to humanize her and endear me to her. I think she has the potential to bring a lot of complexity to the show and I hope we see more and more of that.

7. Grey

How can you not love him? He’s such a papa bear. I always enjoy the episodes that feature him more heavily, and I wish we got to see more of him. He’s such a calm presence, with his own moments of humor thrown in as well.

8. Wesley

I don’t dislike Wesley. He’s adorable, and he and James as bffs are so much fun! I just don’t feel like I have a lot to go off of here. He had some great scenes early on, but lately it’s seemed like they don’t entirely know what to do with him so they just don’t do much of anything.

9. Bailey

I’m not a Bailey hater but I’ve also never been a Bailey fan, for reasons others have already pointed out. Mainly, it’s the fact that she was too unrealistically good at everything, at least at first. They’ve toned that down some, and I actually liked the abusive husband storyline she had. But now the main issue is that she has no real place in the show and therefore no depth. We see her with Nolan or we see her inexplicably popping up at crime scenes, and that’s it. She just doesn’t really fit the show but they’ve tried to wedge her in, and it’s made for a character that’s just difficult to invest in or relate to.

10. Nolan

Again, I don’t dislike Nolan. I actually liked him a lot initially. But now I just could not possibly be less invested in him. Seemingly no matter what he does or what situation he ends up in, he finds his way out with few to no consequences. And when you know that’s how it’s going to end, there are no stakes.

#okay actually this wasn’t quite as hard as I expected it to be #asked and answered #quesera #the rookie #chenford

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tellthemeerkatsitsfine · 26 days

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hi! I want to familiarise myself with John Robins's work, I was wondering if you could recommend a good starting point? the radio show? standup? just thought to ask you, my favourite comedy connoisseur! thanks :)

Oh wow, I thought you’d never ask! By which I mean, when you spend as much time as I do putting completely unsolicited screeds into the internet that I’m pretty sure are of interest only to me, it is rather fun to write one for someone who has specifically said they want to read it. Though I don’t know if you’ll feel the same way by the end of the post, given my penchant for detail and the multiple unnecessary caveats that I’m already planning for this. I will add a cut to spare everyone else the unnecessary detail.

Okay, so. Weird thing about me, given the current state of my blog, I actually disliked John Robins for the first few years that I knew who he was. That is because the first time I saw him was on Mock the Week, where he appeared alongside Sara Pascoe just as their relationship was about to collapse, and he was an absolute dick about it. So definitely don’t start with that. I mean, Sara Pascoe also wasn’t great in that episode, but I already knew and liked her, so I forgave her. I had no such goodwill toward John Robins, and it completely turned me off him for a long time. After that I saw him pop up on other shows once in a blue moon, but found him annoying because I’d already decided I didn’t like him based on Mock the Week. Definitely do not watch him on Mock the Week.

What turned me around was in November 2022, when I came across a copy of The Darkness of Robins, his 2017 stand-up show that won the big Edinburgh award and was made into a Netflix special. I really, really loved it. I remember making a post at the time when I said this is the fastest I’ve ever turned around on any famous person, the biggest swing from disliking them to thinking they’ve made one of my favourite stand-up shows ever.

After that, I did exactly what you’ve done here, which was ask around on Tumblr for where you can go if you’ve just decided you want more John Robins if your life. Because I knew he had a radio show on one station and then another station with that guy who’s (not) married to Isy Suttie, but I also knew those had about 150,000 hours (slightly exaggeration) worth of episodes and obviously no one has time to listen to all that, that would be absolutely ridiculous, what sort of fool would take that on? Obviously I could have just jumped in at the most recent episodes of their radio show, which is something you could do as well if you want, but my brain’s relentlessly completist nature wouldn’t let me do that. I needed something I could watch/hear all of, but have that be under 150,000 hours.

I asked Tumblr about this, and the best recommendation I got was to check out A Robins Amongst the Pigeons. This started as a feature on his radio show in which he read out loud from the autobiography of broadcaster Tony Blackburn, which was meant to be a serious book, but it’s so self-important and unintentionally hilarious that John got quite a few good weeks worth of content from reading out bits to make fun of them (if this seems mean, it helps to know that one of the passages he read said women working outside the home is bad for children, so I don’t feel bad for the guy). Later on, John Robins mentioned that he’d learned the writers of the Alan Partridge autobiography – I, Partridge – had based it partly on Tony Blackburn’s book.

After he finished reading the Blackburn autobiography, John Robins started to write his own autobiography, “in the style of Tony Blackburn”, and read out a chapter each week on the radio. Basically, John Robins is a huge Partridge fan and took the opportunity to write out his own life story the way Alan Partridge would tell that life story, and it’s really, really funny. It’s a good introduction to John because it goes through his life and lets you know what he’s like, and that gives you an idea of what sort of things he’ll say if you get into the rest of his work. And it’s also a good introduction to John because it’s really, really funny. If you listen to that and don’t find it funny, you probably won’t like the rest of his stuff.

Someone on YouTube compiled all the clips of John reading chapters from A Robins Amongst the Pigeons, and put them on YouTube so you can hear the all as one long string:

youtube

I downloaded that YouTube video, converted it to mp3, put it on my phone and listened to it like an audiobook. My biggest recommendation for someone who wants an introduction to John Robins would be that you do the same. He’s also released it as a paperback book, and did a few live performances where he read it out loud to an audience back when he first wrote it (2015), which is good because it’s too funny to have remained just a feature on a weekly radio show.

The next thing I did when getting into John Robins was go to his Bandcamp page, where he’s released three of his old stand-up shows:

They’re his 2013, 2014, and 2015 Edinburgh shows, with the dates listed on Bandcamp all being from a year later because they were recorded on tours the following years. I think they noticeably get better with each year, and his writing and delivery skills improve. Speakeasy is objectively the best one, Where Is My Mind not quite as good but still made me laugh more than a lot of stand-up hours do. This Tornado Loves You is, I think, not quite objectively as good as Speakeasy. But might edge Speakeasy out as my favourite of the three because it hits some things that I subjectively really love in stand-up.

He did a stand-up show in 2019 called Hot Shame, which I'd really really love to hear, but he's said he never recorded a version that was far enough along, with high enough audio quality to publish (though personally, I would happily take a version with shit audio quality and/or early WIP). In 2023, he did a stand-up show called Howl, which he's recently said he has on audio recording and is planning to publish on Bandcamp at some point, but it's not there yet. I am very much looking forward to hearing that one when it come out.

(Disclaimer: This Tornado Loves You has a routine about PMT/PMS where I see what he was trying to do, it’s not just an average “women be crazy on their periods” routine, he says it with an understanding that the victim here is the woman suffering from painful symptoms, and has said similar things at other times. However, I don’t think the stand-up routine does enough of that to make up for the inherent shitty-ness of a cis man making a joke about his girlfriend getting disproportionately emotional on her period, and I just want to clarify that, because I don’t want anyone to listen to that stand-up show, hear that routine, remember that I said that stand-up show is my favourite of all the Bandcamp releases by one of my favourite comedians, and therefore, I must think cis men telling jokes like that is a good idea. I don’t, I think that was a misstep in an otherwise great show.

The reason I add this caveat is because in the last months, I’ve had three different people watch The Darkness of Robins at my recommendation, and all of them came back with the comment… so this thing that you’ve been calling one of your favourite shows ever – did you mean to go so hard on endorsing a show that ends with a really inappropriate amount of sexual detail about Sara Pascoe, a woman whose name the audience knows, and it’s probably not cool for him to be saying that about her in public? Because this has happened before, I feel the need to say, again, in case anyone watching Darkness of Robins as a result of this post: I don’t love the part at the end where he describes sex with a person the audience can identify in an inappropriate amount of detail. When I endorse the show, I do not endorse that. I hope he asked her if it was cool to talk about that on stage before he did so, but I don’t know if he did, and I have a feeling he probably didn’t. Having said that, I recently watched a bunch of Sara Pascoe’s stand-up from across the years, and I hugely enjoyed it because she’s very funny, but I also learned more sexual details than I wanted to know about John Robins from her stand-up, so I would argue that they are, at best, even in terms of inappropriate talking about each other on stage. Also, for anyone who’s reading this but hasn’t seen the show, I’d like to clarify that it’s not like he goes on some misogynistic rant about her, he just describes sex with her in detail that gets a bit graphic for a couple of minutes.

While I’m caveating, I’ll just throw all my disclaimers in together, I did also have someone watch Darkness of Robins and say they were surprised I liked it so much because the stuff near the beginning, where he talks about how his relationship fell apart, feels a bit like the misogynistic stand-up trope of Man Complains About His Girlfriend For Being Less Logical And Rational Than Him. I’d like to say I actually stand by that routine, he’s built quite a bit of his comedy on talking about how he is compulsively and maladaptively meticulous about everything and is therefore more logical than everyone, he spends half his radio show complaining about how Elis James isn’t logical enough and doesn’t put enough thought into planning and organizing and getting everything right, that’s not a gender thing, that’s just his thing. A lot of his comedy is about his obsession with being precise about everything to the point of overthinking that ruins his life, and if you are reading this post in which I’ve just spent three paragraphs adding unnecessary caveats because I get paranoid about anything I say being misinterpreted, you might understand why that appeals to me so much.

Summary: I do not endorse the menstruation routine of 2014 or some of the sex details of 2017, but I do endorse the many parts of his comedy in which he comes off as an exhausting nightmare, that is very much part of the appeal, though it may not appeal to everyone.)

Besides his stand-up, he’s done some guest appearances on TV, radio, and podcasts. I was about to start listing the ones I’ve found, though it’s probably easier to just give you a screenshot of my folders of his audio guest spots:

and TV guest spots:

I've watched/listened to everything in those folders up to October 2018, since I'm currently working through the radio shows and going through all those other things chronologically alongside it, so I haven't seen the things past 2018 and can't speak to what's in them. Technically, it's possible that he became a flat Earther. So there's another disclaimer: any views expressed by John Robins after October 2018, I haven't heard and cannot endorse. But there's definitely some good stuff in the earlier years.

If any of the shows in the above screenshots are one you already like, then tracking down John Robins' episodes of them is probably a good intro to John Robins (or send me a message if you want a link). Except that second Mock the Week one - don't watch that no matter how much you normally like Mock the Week.

Of his guest spots on TV and audio, a lot of the best ones are better if you're already familiar with John from his radio show or at least from his stand-up, but some hold up pretty well even without that context. His Live From The BBC episode is a shortened (half an hour instead of an hour) version of his Speakeasy show, if you want to see a (shortened) video version of that instead of hearing the audio (and if you are a completist like me, it has a bit of material that's not in the Bandcamp version so it's worth watching). His other TV stand-up guest spots are mainly just little repeats of stuff that's in his longer published shows, except the Russell Howard's Good News extra, which has an older routine that's not in his Bandcamp shows.

I'd say his episodes of Alan Davies' show are particularly fun, though warning that there is a story in the episode he did with Russell Howard that's really weird. There's also another story that he either stole from Adam and Joe, or he was the person who sent that story into Adam and Joe, and I fear it was probably the former, but he wouldn't be the first to steal someone else's story on As Yet Untitled.

On the subject of people who steal other people's stories on As Yet Untitled, I found him very very funny on Isy Suttie's podcast, though he was quite drunk and I can imagine a person with less tolerance for drunken shoutiness could find it annoying. He's good value on Pappy's, a lot of fun and usually drunk (pre-2023, at least). He has a nice rapport with Richard Herring. He played a really weird song on Jon Richardson's old radio show. He told us about a sex dream he had on The Horne Section podcast. And he bickered with his girlfriend on Do the Right Thing. I also thought the Robins/James episode of Comedian's Comedian was excellent (Robins and James both did individual ones that were also both good, but the one they did together is one of my favourites out of the 76 episodes of that podcast that I've heard (I almost wrote ~75 there so I could pretend I don't have a spreadsheet to know the exact number, but why pretend that at this point?)), but it gets pretty deep into stuff from their radio show, so probably isn't worth a listen unless you've heard that show.

John Robins also released a book in 2018, called The Holy Vible, co-written with his radio buddy Elis James. I'm currently nearly done listening to the audiobook of that, and to be honest, there's a lot of filler that will be of interest only to someone who's already very, very interested in whatever John and Elis have to say. Which I am, so I'm enjoying the book, but I definitely don't recommend it to anyone who's not already very much into the radio show.

And that brings me to the 150,000 hours of their radio show, since that's pretty much the only place left to go. It was early 2023 when I listened to his Bandcamp stand-up shows, said I love these and I loved Darkness of Robins and I loved A Robins Amongst the Pigeons, I guess the next step would have to be the radio. But I don't have 150,000 hours to spare to listen to all that. So I guess that's as far as I'm going with the Robins fandom. I even made a post in which I said "John Robins is dangerous - not in general, but to me", because I like him so much that at any moment I could slip down the radio rabbit hole, and then I'd lose 150,000 hours of my life. I held out for nearly a year after I wrote that post, but here I am now.

The radio show with John Robins and Elis James started out in February 2014 on the indie music radio station XFM. XFM rebranded as Radio X in 2015, and they continued to make the same show on Radio X until they left in February 2019. In May 2019, they began broadcasting pretty much the same show (I think, haven't heard it yet, he might be a flat Earther) on BBC Five Live. They continued to do that until the end of 2023, and in 2024, they started doing some other thing that I don't understand. They record it as a podcast first (as opposed to live radio that gets edited and released as a podcast, which is what they did from 2014 to 2023), and then highlights from the podcast get broadcast on the radio, and it's released twice a week, also there are videos, I don't know, I haven't got that far in the chronology. I'm still on October 2018.

I can say that the XFM/Radio X episodes they did between February 2014 and October 2018 are fun, engaging, very funny, often interesting, and I think have been worth the several months of my life it's taken me to listen to them. They go up and down, like anything else that's produced that many hours - there have been a few times when I've thought the show was in a bit of a slump and hasn't been that funny for a couple of months, but just as I'm thinking that, they'll pick it up and do a run of like eight great episodes in a row. Overall, in my subjective opinion, they've had far more strong periods than weak ones. They have a great dynamic with each other and with the features. They spend too much time reading out emails but that's going to happen on a radio show. I'm not particularly into their food tasting segments but that's just because food shows don't generally appeal to me, I love their running quiz segments because competitive features do appeal to me. Your mileage may vary. Also, you don't have to do the relentless completist thing that I do. You could just jump in now at the latest episodes of whatever the hell their BBC show is now.

Oh, and he plays golf on YouTube with Alex Horne. I haven't watched that because I dislike golf and I haven't got there in the chronology yet, but I'll probably end up watching it at some point. A lot of people like it and I think it's probably funny, but I haven't seen it myself so I can't speak to that. It's called Bad Golf and you can find it on the internet.

To give a proper shot at answering the original question, which I now feel like was asked 100 years ago: I think the best introduction to John Robins is a Robins Amongst the Pigeons, linked above, that I recommend listening to like an audiobook. I did Darkness of Robins first, but I think the best order for a good introduction would be Robin Amongst the Pigeons first, to get a good overview of what he's like and what you're getting into with him, and you'll get that overview via 100 minutes that you'll either find very entertaining, or you won't and you'll know not to bother with the rest of his stuff.

After that, I'd say, if you have any completist tendencies, or tendencies like mine toward doing things in chronological order because I think everything is better if you have all the context for it first, then I would recommend listening to his Bandcamp shows in order (Where Is My Mind, then This Tornado Loves You, then Speakeasy), and then watching Darkness of Robins. If you're not bothered about that, just skip to Darkness of Robins because it's the best one. If you do all that and are still interested in finding more John Robins content, then I'm afraid you may have to set off on a journey to give up 150,000 hours of your life the way I have.

Well, there might be one other option. There are other clips and clip compilations from their radio shows, and while I personally have difficulty doing anything in clip form if I haven't gone through the full-length version first (Robins Amongst the Pigeons was an exception because that was its own thing, it was a collection of radio clips but they've also been released as their own book), some of those may be fun in isolation. You can flip through this playlist to find some of them (you can CTRL+F the word "complete" on that page to find compilations of their features and running topics):

One time, in a fairly early XFM episode, Elis informed the listeners that someone had written an email to the show that asked what their five favourite albums were, and John had written a reply that was an essay of several thousand words, and then apologized on the radio by saying there was no way this person wanted their inbox taken up by that much rambling. That may be what's happened here, the difference being that I don't have the status of a (then-future) Perrier-winning comedian to justify why anyone wants to read this many of my words. But still, I'm glad you asked.

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itzynabi · 4 months

Text

produce 48 episode 11

word count: 1.5k

warnings: mention of throwing up and zombies

an: words in bold are japanese. her outfits in appearance: one, two

eve’s masterlist // produce 48

Eve entered the auditorium, skipping until she reached the chairs. She sat down in the front row, next to Miho.

Eve hesitantly walked into the booth. “What is this?” She wondered, sitting down on the mattress. She wiggled her butt, trying to get comfortable.

She was startled when she heard someone’s footsteps. Wanting to know who the person was, she peeked around the wall between the two booths, so that when the person came in, she’d be able to see them.

“You scared me!” The person exclaimed when they had opened their door and seen Eve.

“Bora sunbaenim?” Eve asked, pushing herself back into her booth in shock.

“You’re the first person to be peeking,” she told Eve as she sat down.

“I’m an outside of the box thinker.”

“Do you have any worries on your mind?”

Eve puffed her cheeks with air as she thought. “Um… I don’t think I have anything.”

“Really?”

“I’m too tired to be stressed about anything,” Eve revealed. “I don’t have the energy to stress.”

Bora laughed. “Why are you so funny?”

“Am I supposed to be serious?” Eve asked, also laughing.

“I’m supposed to be your counsellor.”

“Ah, I’m sorry. I don’t like talking about my feelings and I can’t be serious for too long. I’m a nightmare, right?”

“Really,” Bora agreed. “Everybody else. told me their concerns, but you’re just making me laugh.”

“I’m more of the listening type,” Eve explained when they had both calmed down. “I listen to others when they tell me their concerns, I don’t like to be the one talking about my concerns.”

“You’re that style. You feel uncomfortable talking about your feelings to others.”

Eve nodded. “Yes! The fact that there’s a camera isn’t making it easier.”

Bora hummed in understanding. “Do you read comments about yourself? Under your fancams?”

“More than reading comments, I watch the fancam,” Eve said, her tone making Bora laugh. “I need to take notes on what I can improve on so I usually read about three comments and then focus on the fancam.”

“You’re really amazing!” Bora complimented, resting her arms on the table. “Since you’re so amazing, I’m going to give you a gift.”

“Oh, really?”

Bora passed Eve a small box. The young girl opened it, seeing small slips of paper. She read the writing on the first paper, sighing heavily.

“That was a heavy sigh,” Bora noted.

“I… I don’t want to talk about it,” Eve said, changing her mind about telling Bora how she was feeling.

“No! Tell me!” Bora whined. “Otherwise I’m here for nothing.”

Eve groaned for a few seconds before sighing. “Okay. I’ve… been afraid that I didn’t have any fans. Because I don’t think my recent performance was that good, so I think they got sick of me and just began voting for a different trainee. That was a stress for me, but seeing the letters made me feel better.”

“Didn’t you come in first place at the last ranking?” Bora asked.

“I did, but since it’s a survival show, the public opinion is what matters the most. If I don’t get a lot of screen time in an episode, I fear that they’ll forget about me. Or if I make a mistake, I’m scared they’ll decide I’m not ready to debut and they won’t vote for me.”

Bora nodded, beginning to understand where Eve’s head was at. “It must be hard for you. Whenever you’re scared, you can read those notes and gain confidence again.”

“Okay. Thank you!”

At the end, Bora came out of her booth and went to stand in front of Eve. Eve stood up so that she could give Bora a hug. “Continue to be amazing,” Bora encouraged.

“We will now reveal the four trainees ranking in fourth to first place, as chosen by National Producers,” Seunggi announced. “We will reveal them on stage.”

Eve sighed. She started singing 1 of 1 under her breath, using the song to calm herself down as she played with her fingers.

Miho wordlessly offered Eve her hand when she noticed the younger girl picking at her fingers. “You’re going to make it,” she said.

Eve looked to her left and grabbed Chaeyeon’s hand. “We’re going to make it.”

“Please reveal them now,” Seunggi said.

Miho, Eve, Chaeyeon and Sakura were revealed to be in the running for first place, causing Eve to sigh in relief, putting her head in her hands.

After Chaeyeon was announced in fourth place and Miho third, Eve stared blankly ahead of her.

“There are two trainees whose ranks still need to be announced. Miyawaki Sakura from HKT48 and Kim Nabi from JYP Entertainment,” Seunggi announced. “One of these two trainees will rank in first place during this ranking announcement. Please come up to the podium on stage.”

Eve stood up with a sigh, hugging trainees that she passed as she made her way to the stage.

“Kim Nabi from JYP Entertainment, it’s your second time on that podium. How does it feel?”

“I feel like I’m going to throw up.”

“Pardon?”

“Throw up. That’s what I feel like I’m going to do.”

“Ah, this must be stressful for you. You were first place last ranking so you must feel pressure to be first again.”

“Honestly, I don’t feel pressure to be in first place again because there’s nothing I can do to make myself be first. I don’t really know why I’m stressing so much, because I already know I’ve made it through to the last stage.”

He asked Sakura a similar question, getting her response before continuing. “I will now announce the trainee in first place. It’s Kim Nabi from JYP Entertainment!”

The trainees cheered for Eve as she gasped.

“Kim Nabi from JYP Entertainment received 373 783 votes in total. How does it feel to be in first place?”

“It feels nice,” Eve said, still a little bit in shock. “I didn’t think I’d be in first place, but National Producers voted a lot for me so I’m very thankful. I also want to thank all of the trainees for being really nice people, um… Even if we didn’t talk for a long time, I will treasure my memories with you. Once again, thank you to National Producers for letting me continue to walk on this path.”

“Kim Nabi-ssi, did you prepare anything in case you came in first?”

“Um, I didn’t think I would come in first, so I didn’t prepare a ceremony,” she admitted. “What should I do?”

“Ballet!” Yunjin shouted from the crowd of trainees that hadn’t made it, causing everyone to laugh.

Nabi jumped off of her box and did fouettes. After Sakura made her speech, they both walked up the stairs, stopping to hug trainees.

The trainees entered the room in order of their rank, gasping when Cheetah and Soyou entered after them. They explained the final evaluation to the trainees.

“Which part are you choosing, Nabi?” Soyou asked as Nabi stepped forwards.

“Um… I don’t know. I know which one I want, but there’s already a trainee there.”

“But since you’re first, you get to kick the other trainee out,” Cheetah reminded her.

“I don’t want to hurt her feelings.”

“You’re very nice and all, but you need to think about yourself.”

“I know, but I also have to think about how my actions affect others.”

Soyou sighed. “Which song do you want to do?”

“I’m In Your Care Now.” She groaned. “Okay, I’ve made my decision. I choose…”

“Are you still deciding?” Cheetah asked.

Eve nodded. “I just need to make sure it’s the right choice. Okay, I choose sub-vocal one,” she announced. She put her sticker in the block, moving Hitomi’s to the sub-vocal nine block as the other girl groaned. She stayed silent as she stared at the board. “I feel bad, can I swap with her?”

“No.” Soyou shut her down. “Once you put your sticker down, you can’t pick it up.”

“This is cruel. Hitomi, I’m sorry,” she apologised.

Team I’m In Your Care Now had their vocal class with the trainers. They were given feedback and told to consider changing the main vocal.

Eve, sensing the tense atmosphere in the room, shifted her eyes around. “Would you rather–”

“Oh my goodness!” Cheetah exclaimed softly, hanging her head with a chuckle. The rapper’s exasperation caused some of the trainees to loosen up.

“–give birth to a zombie or marry a zombie?”

Hoongki scratched his neck as he laughed. “How do you come up with these questions?”

“I just think of them,” Eve honestly said.

“This question is so… I don’t know which one I want,” Soyou admitted.

“But, just because you’re marrying a zombie, doesn’t mean you actually have to spend time with him,” Cheetah pointed out. “You can live in separate houses and only see each other every weekend.”

Soyou agreed, “That’s right.”

“Just sign the document and never see the zombie again,” Hoongki joked.

“What if you have to live with the zombie?” Eve asked.

“Separate rooms,” Cheetah answered.

“What if you have to be in the same room and same bed?”

Soyou sighed. “You, keep quiet,” she jokingly scolded.

Eve made a show of pursing her lips as she nodded.

tagging: @seolboba // @ateezivy // @ateezjuliet // @cafemilk-tea // @smh-anon // @alixnsuperstxr // @cosmicwintr // @girlzwfun // @txt-yaomi // @moongrlz

©️ kim nabi

#ficnetfairy #itzy 6th member #itzy sixth member #itzy oc #itzy addition #itzy added member #itzy extra member #itzy member au #itzy imagines #kpop oc #kpop addition #kpop added member #kpop extra member #kpop au #kpop imagines

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bibuddie · 19 days

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hiiieeee first and foremost…I love your blog! I just recently found/followed it and I can tell how invested and passionate you are about 9-1-1 and the fandom 🫶🏽 I just wanted to ask about something you answered in regard to your last ask— where you said “bucktommy isn't the intended end-goal” and that that’s pretty widely accepted within the fandom. which I can also see! I see that a lot of the fans are CONVINCED that this all leads to buddie in the end…

I guess I just wanna know…how are you SO confident that all of this is leading to buddie? I’ve read a few answers to asks on other blogs that briefly touch on this, and more than anything I want to believe it wholeheartedly (trust me!) but I feel like…idk part of me can’t help feeling they’re gonna pull the rug from under us and have it NOT lead to buddie. what has you so confident about this (and how can I be this confident lmao bc I really hate the doubt i’m feeling)?

hello!

first of all, i'm not sure if you're new to watching the show alltogether or just the tumblr fandom, but welcome! we're quite tight knit here but i'm sure you'll have a great time! <333

as to your question: there's a lot of reasons i'm confident that this is leading to buddie; honestly, there's been a lot of evidence over the years which tells us what's happening, and it could be an essay in and of itself. i'll try and summarise a few of the key points of evidence that, in my opinion, tell us where things are going (this will contain spoilers for any new fans of the show!!):

in eddie's very first episode (2x01), we see him for the first time on-screen through buck's pov. here, as we see eddie on screen, the son whatta man plays as eddie pulls his shirt on in slow-motion. to a lot of us, this is indicative of instant attraction/interest on buck's part, and gives us a major clue that something is happening here

in buck, actually (2x08), one of the main calls we see on the episode involves a gay couple, thomas and mitchell. when mitchell is pronounced dead, thomas and buck are sat on the ambulance and having a conversation, which goes as follows:

thomas: we only ever wanted to...to go together. that's love. buck: i'm sorry. i really am. i guess i can only hope to find something that good. thomas: you don't find it, son. you make it.

the idea that you don't find your love story, you have to put in the effort and make it becomes a recurring theme between buck and eddie. they manage to construct their own family unit consisting of themselves and chris over the years. the idea that they are a family already feeds into several different plot-lines over the years, perhaps most notably eddie's issues with ana and their eventual break up:

in episode 1 of season 5, eddie has a panic attack over a shop assistant thinking that ana was chris' mom. later, when he's talking to buck about it, he mentions how they became a ready made family...i'm not sure if i'm ready for that. when buck and eddie have been making their family for years now

eddie's entire breakup with ana was very queer-coded. honestly, watch the scene here, but ryan acted his absolute ass off and the entire thing reeks of eddie being a queer man at his core

honestly, one of the biggest bits of evidence we got in the first place was buck being confirmed as bisexual canonically. this allows us to thoroughly go back through and recontextualise a lot of interactions between buck and eddie over the years. two key scenes are the will scene (4x14 survivors) and the well scene (3x15 eddie begins). both of these scenes show buck and eddie in moments of vulnerability with one another, and show that their connection surpasses the connection which they have with anyone else

side note - i watched eddie begins yesterday, and the entire time eddie is drowning at the end of the episode, his life flashes before his eyes. all of this is chris, but a good chunk of the scenes also have buck in them.

again, there's a lot more i could point to, but these are the main things which stick out to me right now! i hope this answers your question!

#buddie #evan buckley #eddie diaz #i-love-tacoss #asks

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ravenya003 · 4 months

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Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Welcome to the Hellmouth, S01E01

My 2024 Buffy the Vampire Slayer rewatch starts NOW!

Before I jump in, here’s some quick housekeeping:

I’ll endeavour to do this on a weekly basis; watching an episode on Saturday night and writing up a post on Sunday.

I’m not going to worry about spoilers. This show was as good as it was because of how interconnected the themes and storylines were, so if something in season one reminds me of something in season seven, I’m going to mention it.

This is the first time I’ve watched this show (probably) since high school, and it’s almost certainly the first time I’ve watched it from start to finish. It’s actually rather dizzying in this age of eight episode shows that get cancelled after two seasons to consider there are one hundred and forty-four episodes of Buffy that span seven years.

Obviously I am not unaware of Joss Whedon’s mistreatment of others on the set of Buffy, and where it seems relevant I’ll bring it up. But I also don’t think it’s fair to the rest of the cast and crew to throw the entire show under the bus because of one person, especially when it had such a huge (positive) impact on so many lives.

For the record, my favourite ships are Willow/Oz, Giles/Jenny and Spike/Drusilla. My purpose in pointing this out is to make clear that I don’t watch this show to see what true love looks like, but to watch a close-knit band of social misfits fight the forces of evil together. To me, the heart of this show is the friendship between Buffy, Xander, Willow and Giles. The show is always at its strongest when it’s focusing on the four of them, and most of the love stories just don’t interest me that much.

Once season three is over, I’ll start alternating between Buffy and Angel episodes.

Okay, let’s get to it.

First of all, I was not prepared for how dated everything looks and sounds. Naturally my most recent memories of Buffy are watching the later seasons, when there’s cellphones and internet access and fashion choices that wouldn’t seem out of place today – but season one looks like a different era entirely.

There are some references that have dated amusingly (Cordelia and Buffy bond over their shared appreciation for James Spader), some that I didn’t get at all (who’s John Tesh? What’s Debarge?) and a few synthesized musical cues that are straight out of the nineties.

I had forgotten that the Cold Open involves Julie Benz as Darla, and that show-defining twist when it turns out that she’s the vampire and not her predatory date. Ah, Red Shirt #1 played by Carmine Giovinazzo – you have the distinction of being this show’s first victim. I salute you.

Also, it’s amusing to think that we had no idea just how important Darla would end up being to the franchise’s lore. She’s just a standard vampire minion at this early stage, though I do like the fact that she was presumably cast to look a bit like Buffy.

And of course, it all starts at good old Sunnydale High.

Our first glimpse of Buffy Summers begins with her in the middle of a nightmare, which... girl, get used to this plot device. This one is a bit more muddled than her later dreams, made up of a bunch of clips that’ll be used in later episodes that culminate in the Master, the season’s Big Bad.

I had to smile at the sight of those yellow school buses pulling up at the front of Sunnydale High. Buffy may not arrive at school in one of these things, but seven years later, she’s sure as hell going to leave in one.

Joyce – and later on, Angel – are both perfect examples of Characterization Marches On regarding the fact the writers’ room hasn’t quite settled on their personalities yet. In Joyce’s case, she comes across as a lot more flaky than in later appearances.

Oh, and here’s Xander, riding in on a skateboard that we’ll never see him use again across the entire run of the series. I get that he’s a very contentious character in the annals of the show, and though I’m certainly not going to let him off the hook for his occasional (frequent?) shitty behaviour, I also think I’m fonder of him than the average fan.

Honestly, I think Joss Whedon doomed him a little when he stated that Xander was the character most based on him in high school. Suddenly all his entitled, chauvinist behaviour was re-evaluated through the lens of knowing that Whedon was a pretty awful person – but I hope we can all agree that even at his worst, Xander is a MUCH better human being than Whedon.

We’ll see how we go.

Interesting that Willow’s history with Xander is established well before she meets Buffy. Not surprising, since they’ve known each other since early childhood, but interesting. Buffy is the protagonist, but Xander/Willow’s relationship with each other takes precedence when it comes to introducing the gang’s dynamics.

And hey, it’s Eric Balfour as Jesse! Oh man, they really dropped the ball on this character, didn’t they. It’s the one aspect of this two-part premiere that really doesn’t work... but I’ll get to that in good time.

Principle Flutie! Something else I’d totally forgotten; I honestly thought this show started with Snyder.

Also, that initial on his desk plaque is B. Does that mean his name is actually Bob (which is what he tells Buffy to call him)? Not Robert? Weird.

Buffy and Xander’s meetcute involves him helping her pick up some of the spilled contents of her bag, and accidentally saying: “can I have you?” instead of “can I help you?” Oof. Yeah, that’s not an auspicious start.

Buffy meets Cordelia before she meets Willow, and Cordelia comes across as surprisingly nice when she shares her textbook with Buffy and invites her into Sunnydale's popular clique. Then of course, the second relatively big twist of the episode occurs: Cordelia reverts into absolute bitchiness when they come across Willow at the drinking fountain.

Willow scarpers and Buffy looks deeply uncomfortable. There’s a nice subtext across this episode that suggests Buffy was once just like Cordelia, only for her calling to make her more sympathetic to social “losers” like Xander and Willow.

Cordelia also describes the Bronze as being in “the bad part of town”. Huh? I’m going to chalk that one down to more Early Instalment Weirdness, since I don’t think it ever comes up again. (Later Sunnydale is described as a “one Starbucks town”, which is also funny since it’s later revealed to contain a zoo, a shopping mall, several lakes and parks, a military base, and a university).

Buffy enters the library for the first time, and the first thing she sees is a newspaper with an article titled “local boys still missing” outlined in red. The plurality of “boys” means that this isn’t referring to Darla’s kill, which probably only happened the night before anyway. Instead, it’s an indication that there are ongoing problems of a supernatural nature in Sunnydale.

And here’s Giles! The most interesting thing about this interaction is that Giles has clearly been waiting for Buffy. As in, he knows that the Slayer is scheduled to appear in Sunnydale, and that she’s going to be enrolled in its local high school. As Willow says later on, he’s also a newcomer, having only recently taken the position of school librarian.

The show never goes into any more detail than this, but I have so many questions. Clearly Buffy was under surveillance from the Watchers Council, who knew she was coming and made sure Giles had a cover story and a position to fill at Sunnydale High so that he could more easily sidle himself into her life, but a part of me wonders they pulled similar strings for Joyce to get her that job at the art gallery in order to bring Buffy to Sunnydale in the first place.

Evidence for this is that Giles already knows it’s a hotbed for supernatural activity in his discussions with her, though I suppose his dialogue suggests it’s more fate (or the Powers That Be?) rather than the Watchers Council that had a hand in Buffy’s arrival at the Hellmouth (“there’s a reason you’re here and a reason why it’s now”). Still, it’s an interesting theory to ponder, and I always felt it was a shame that the show never delved too deeply into Buffy’s life after she became a Slayer but before she moved to Sunnydale.

(Though I suppose that had to do with the spectre of the 1992 Buffy movie, who’s relationship with this show is a bit tenuous. But now I’m getting off-track).

Buffy flees from Giles and strikes up a conversation with Willow instead. Willow’s eagerness and earnestness is very cute, and though she probably has the most profound development of any other character on this show, I’ll always miss this early dorky version of her.

In describing the library, Buffy says it gives her “the wiggins”. HAH! Remember that word? Remember how it didn’t exist anywhere except this show? Remember how it was essentially Whedon’s attempt to make fetch happen? Aw, man. What a delightful throwback.

On hearing that a body has been found stuffed in a locker, Buffy naturally cannot help but investigate – though I suppose we can chalk it down just as much to her wanting confirmation on whether or not vampires are in town than to any personal sense of responsibility.

Our first glimpse of her super strength comes when she busts through the locked door into the changing room, and she gives a weary “oh great” on seeing the bitemarks in the victim’s neck.

But then of course, she follows this up by sharing her discovery with Giles, who is quick to point out that she’s doing something about it. I have a soft spot for heroes who simply cannot walk away from danger and/or a situation that needs their intervention, regardless of how loudly they grumble about it.

Turns out Xander has heard their entire conversation about vampires and Watchers and Slayers from behind the stacks... which is an elegant not-coincidence since it was established earlier in the episode (in his conversation with Willow) that he was going to the library for a trigonometry book.

Giles is still jabbering about how Sunnydale is a centre of mystical energy that attracts all kinds of supernatural beings, and Buffy’s skepticism naturally gives way to a panning shot of an underground cave where a formidable-looking vampire is intoning “the Sleeper will wake” over a pool of blood.

As villains go, the Master is obviously not particularly inspired, especially since he spends most of this season as a quintessential Orcus on His Throne, but it was also way too early in the game to have a complex or personal Big Bad. You can’t come out the gate with a Glory or an Angelus, and I think he serves his purpose just fine as a Nosferatu-esque spectre that a sixteen-year-old girl would understandably be intimidated by.

Ditto Luke as the show’s Starter Villain: a physical threat to Buffy without being all that interesting.

On Buffy’s way to the Bronze we get our first Angel sighting, and much like Joyce, his characterization is a bit off. He’s way too smarmy and negging, but also... kind of upbeat? It’s amusing to reflect that the writers room knew very little about him at this point, including the fact that he was a vampire (making his “I don’t bite” comment deeply ironic) so it’s lucky that they never filmed any of his scenes in daylight before the truth comes out six episodes later.

In any case, his role in this episode is to namedrop things like “the Mouth of Hell” and “the Harvest” (which Giles will start researching as soon as Buffy passes them on to him) and give Buffy the silver crucifix which... becomes important at some stage? I remember the claddagh ring in season three, but have no recollection of this necklace.

Also intriguing is this dialogue between them: Angel – “I’m a friend.” Buffy – “Maybe I don’t want a friend.” Angel – “I didn’t say I was yours.”

I mean, I know it’s just meaningless banter, but Buffy assumes the “friend” he’s talking about is Giles, who soon confirms that he’s never met him before. So was Angel actually referring to The Powers That Be? Whistler, maybe? Again, I know that this was just filler dialogue with no established context, but I’d be interested to see if it fits in with season two’s flashbacks where he’s introduced to Buffy from a distance.

There’s a very sweet interaction between Buffy and Willow at the Bronze, in which the former gives the latter some advice (“seize the day, because tomorrow you might be dead”) and assures her she’s coming back – despite Willow’s expectation that she won’t – when she spots Giles on an overhead balcony.

The staging of the scene between her and Giles is a bit sus – did he really have to stand behind her and lean over her like that? – but at his insistence she spots a vampire in the crowd, though not because of her preternatural senses, but because of his dated fashion sense. And uh-oh, he’s chatting up Willow, who is unfortunately taking Buffy’s “seize the day” advice.

A throwaway line from Cordelia down on the dance floor is telling: apparently her mother never gets out of bed. Our resident Alpha Bitch clearly doesn’t have a great home life.

Poor Jesse gets the brush-off from Cordelia and runs straight into Darla instead. The reveal is wonderfully corny, in which she swivels around in her hanging basket chair with a smile that wouldn’t melt butter.

We’re heading into the third act cliff-hanger now: Willow is being ushered through a graveyard by her vampiric date, Jesse is clearly also in danger, the Master has risen and sent out his minions to bring him fresh blood, and Xander’s skepticism over Buffy’s Slayer status quickly turns to concern when he learns that Willow is in trouble.

They all converge in a graveyard crypt, and – bless her – Buffy is bantering right off the bat. It’s actually a pretty good tactic, as the vampires are caught off-guard by her confidence. Though... shouldn’t Darla clock the fact that she’s a Slayer? We learn later that she’s familiar with the concept, though this is obviously another case of not having figured out the character’s background at this early stage.

A point in Xander’s favour: Buffy tells him to “go” and instead he enters the crypt to help Jesse and Willow. You have to admit, that’s classic Xander.

And we end with Xander/Willow/Jesse being threatened by more vampires outside, as Luke lowers himself onto Buffy after he’s thrown her into an open tomb. To be continued...

Miscellaneous Observations:

Do we ever get an explanation for the force field that’s keeping the Master trapped underground? It’s obviously magic, so who put it in place?

How did Angel know about the Harvest? Who sent him? I know the answers are still to come, but the question is deliberately left dangling in this episode.

Giles mentions incubus and succubus in his litany of monsters that are attracted to Sunnydale, but I think they’re the only two creatures that never actually appear in the show.

I love the little glimpses of non-main characters going about their business in Sunnydale, namely Aphrodesia and Aura gossiping about Buffy before the dead guy falls out of the latter’s locker. I wonder if those girls made it to Graduation Day...

Watching this episode, the most eye-opening character is Cordelia, who has quite the epic journey ahead of her. It’s almost funny to see her in a role that requires her to be little more than Buffy’s antagonist and foil – essentially what Buffy would have been without her calling. I’m taking a moment to think about where all these characters end up, and it’s pretty dizzying.

Giles gives the famous Slayer mantra: “Into every generation a Slayer is born: one girl in all the world, a Chosen One. She alone will wield the strength and skill to fight the vampires, demons, and forces of darkness; to stop the spread of their evil and the swell of their number. She is the Slayer.” This is repeated in the show’s very final episode, and not only forms the crux of Buffy’s entire identity crisis, but also serves as the inspiration for her solution to it. Damn, I love this show.

But who the heck is the guy who speaks these lines in the opening introduction?? It’s later taken over by Anthony Stewart Head, but in season one at least we get a completely unfamiliar narrator.

As excited as I am to embark on this rewatch, I know that after the third season the show loses its centre a bit as the main trio form relationships that are ostensibly more important than the one they have with each other. I love these early seasons because their friendship is clearly the focus of the show – the thing not only protecting them against the forces of evil, but getting them through the hell that is high school.

The show loses its lustre when it loses sight of their bond, but I have three whole seasons to enjoy before that happens. Let’s do this.

Best Line: Cordelia (after Buffy has accidentally slammed her against a wall, thinking she’s a vampire): “Excuse me, I have to call EVERYONE I have EVER met, RIGHT NOW.”

Best Scene: The climatic fight in the crypt, not for the fight itself, but for the shock on Xander and Willow’s faces as the world (and their lives) irrevocably change.

Best Subversion: Obviously when the vulnerable and demure little blonde in the Cold Open reveals herself to be the real danger in the room.

Death Toll: Darla's date in the cold open. Thomas, the vampire that Buffy dusts in the crypt. Also, the newspaper in the library mentioned "local boys still missing" but since we never see them on-screen, the toll stands at TWO.

Grand Total: One civilian, one villain.

#buffy the vampire slayer #rav's watching log #welcome to the hellmouth #rav's buffy rewatch #buffy season one

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mahouknightdrabunwolfcat · 2 years

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Care Bears Unlock the Magic is very underrated!

It has so little traction on here and virtually anywhere online that I see, it makes me sad cause this is a truly hidden gem of a show and its been quite a long while that I’ve fallen in love with a cartoon like this.

The classic and Care Bears movie artstyle is really cute, and I love the UtM style just as much! (In case you haven’t seen the style its this!)

I’m honestly so surprised it doesn’t have a bigger following as it reminds me a ton of My Little Pony G4 aka Friendship is Magic, which is a show I would say is one of my favourites of all time.

It’s got a lot of the same genuinely really good stuff FiM has like likable and real feeling characters (Grumpy Bear is so good don’t get me started!!), and really sweet character moments and lessons that aren’t forced but very natural feeling. It is a kids show, so it will sometimes have a bit of cheese and sap, but I am not at all bothered by that and think it is very genuine with what it does.

Not to mention the very pretty backgrounds and art this show has!!

The animation is quite wonderful too, I can say every episode has such charming style and movement. This show is a must watch if you are an animation lover!

If you are able to watch this show, definitely consider doing so!! Its on HBO Max (but we all know how we feel about that streaming service), but its also -

🌈fully available on YouTube!!🌈 .. (almost)

- so it’s very easy to watch luckily! The only episodes missing are episodes 20, 25 and 40. You can also always arrg me matey if you know what I mean as well 🏴‍☠️ (if you have any questions about how to do that, even for other shows, feel free to ask for any resources and advice!)

The show in my opinion does not start the most amazing on the first episode, its a bit rushed feeling for the setup, but it rapidly gets better and more enjoyable. My partner and I got sucked in pretty quick after a few eps and we’ve been watching a few at night lately :3 we both agree that episode 3 is where is picks up and gains its stride, but it is important to see the first two eps still I’d say especially the first one.

If you ever have the time and curiosity, I’d totally recommend it! Again, if you like shows like My Little Pony FiM, or even the more recent MLP G5, you’ll have a nice time!

Happy watching!🌈

It would be cool if you reblog this I’d love to spread the word

#Care Bears #care bears unlock the magic #Care Bears utm #my little pony #friendship is magic #mlp fim #just tagging for visibility hehe #kidcore #I recently got into Care Bears so I haven’t seen the older stuff (I want to)#but unlock the Magic is my start and its super cute :3 #drabuncat ramblings

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isshebreathing · 1 year

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Work Acquaintances

I usually only work at night, there’s me and the head of our IT department, Ari, who tells everyone they work at night because it’s easier to update the IT at night, but I know it’s because they want to bring their dog Rocco in.

When I hired Ari I took a chance, they were a recently out of the military medic with a new IT degree and zero experience, they asked me to trust them, that that if I just allowed them to do their thing they will be the best employee I have ever had, and they were right.

It wasn’t just the dog that brought Ari in late, I could tell how uncomfortable in crowded meetings they were, or how they always watched the door. Occasionally we’d meet in the halls and I could feel their anxiety, we developed a sort of system that involved me only going one way through the office and always sending a “leaving” message when I left for the night.

I was pretty sure that Ari and my secretary Cate were the only people in the company who knew that my heart was failing. I had been working here for about four years before I started showing signs. I went from being a marathon runner to someone who can only take the elevator. I had an episode once at work that resulted in everyone knowing, and then I got really good at hiding it. Eventually I bought out the owner and the company was mine.

I tried to have a normal work schedule at first, but as we grew I faded more and more into the background, hiring people to do the daily things for me. At first I was in the office for a regular business day, then gradually I started coming in the afternoon and staying late, now I found it easier just to come in right before everyone leaves and work through the night. It made much less of a stir using supplemental oxygen while reviewing outreach data when it was just a few people there. And I could take calls while sitting with my swollen feet propped on the file cabinet next to my desk, deep purplish lines indented them from the heels I wore every day.

Which is exactly where I am right now. I’ve gotten gradually weaker over time but my heart was still remarkably well functioning and I had avoided. most major medical interventions. I wear very tight compression stockings and a compressing body suit under my button up shirt, suit jacket, and pencil skirt. Because I have so many layers I can wear. fun bright underwear since it won’t show.

Rocco the dog is visiting me for the baby carrots I keep in my office when I feel a tear in my chest. I sit up and am hit with a wave of nausea. I get out of my chair and try to yell for help but can only manage a loud groan.

Moments later Ari comes to my door and doesn’t waste a moment before kneeling beside me. They gently mutter words of comfort while holding my wrist and digging their fingers into my neck to find my pulses. I am trying unsuccessfully to suck in as much of the oxygen that I can but it is not enough, it’s never enough, I feel like I will never get enough air.

Ari leans down over me “I need to give you some rescue breaths okay?” I try to nod yes but my entire body has seized up at this point and can only try to bring in air. As I’m laying on my side Ari gently tilts my head back, pinches my nose shut, covers my mouth with theirs, and breaths two deep, hot air into my starving lungs. They put their hand on my chest and quietly say “that’s it, just breathe” before doing it again. I lose track of how many times we do this before my lungs are finally calm enough to breathe on my own.

Ari gets up and asks if I have a medical kit, I try to talk but Ari silences me, I can’t even move my hands to point, I weakly look at the cabinet under my bookshelf and Ari understands. They open it up and slide the large equipment box over towards my crumpled heap on the floor.

The first thing they pull out is a high-flow non-rebreather mask. They gently lift my head and slip it over my face. “There we go, just take some deep breaths okay?” After every command they sit with me, make sure I can do it, reassure me. They tell me everything they are going to do before they do it.

I imagine a life. before this, where Ari was a military medic who just wanted to help people, how empathy and compassion burned them out hard and fast, and I realize they must have been an excellent medic.

“I need to get this top off so I can listen to your heart okay? Do you think you can help me do that?”

I try to lift my arms up, to unfurl from this tight ball my body has gone into around my failing heart, but the moment i do a crushing pain goes through my chest forcing me into a tighter ball.

“Woah, okay, let’s take it easy okay? I’m going to cut it up the back okay?”

I feel scissors trace up my spine before the tight compression on my chest releases. It feels like it was the only thing keeping my ribs from splitting apart and the pain is unbearable. I lose all sense of vision, there’s a high pitched ringing in my ears, all I can smell is a metallic tinge.

I come to slightly and am aware of a cold stethoscope on my back and someone moaning. I realize the person moaning is me, it’s involuntary. I try to control my reactions and focus on Ari gently saying “I’m so sorry I know this must hurt I am going to help you okay?”

I notice Ari has connected the cardiac monitor that usually sits above my hip under my compression garments up to my computer screen and is watching the series of lines and numbers intensely but I can’t move my head to see them. I feel a warm, reassuring hand on my naked back.

Ari connects a small tube to the port in my chest and I feel a cold sensation rush through it as she flushes it out. “You have something in here for the pain, I’m going to give you that now okay.”

A warmth soon spreads through my body, but I can feel how slow and jagged it is, my heart is in arrhythmia I can feel it. The pain slowly ebbs gently down but not away, just less sharp.

“I need to put you on your back now okay, I’m going to do it really gently but I need you to let me because it’s very important that I can access your chest okay.”

The drugs take over and relax my body enough for Ari to gently roll me onto my back. They immediately wrap a blood pressure cuff around my arm and put a stethoscope to my chest.

“I need to cut off your nylons okay”

The pain from my chest now freely radiates all the way down to my toes but I’m too sedated to do anything other than quietly moan. Ari puts their hand on my chest. “It’s going to be okay, I’m going to take care of you”

I feel the blood pressure cuff squeeze my arm tightly and release as the unit beeps in alarm.

“Your blood pressure is really low and I think you need a procedure on your heart, I am going to call an ambulance.”

I can’t respond but I want to beg them not to leave me.

Ari leans over me again and gently says “I need to give you medicine to bring your blood pressure up but your heart is not beating efficiently enough to get it through your system. I need to do compressions on your chest, I cannot give you anything for pain I’m so so sorry.”

They kneel next to me and say “I need to cut your bra off, it is going to interfere with the compressions.”

I am paralyzed from drugs, pain, and anticipatory pain and don’t respond as a pair of scissors snip the blue piece of fabric between my breasts. Ari professionally snips the straps to allow the cups to cover my breasts for modestly.

As if modesty matters once Ari digs their palm into the valley between my breasts and starts one-handed compressions. firmly forcing my heart to be more efficient, the cups gently covering my breasts almost immediately fall off and I am completely exposed as Ari meticulously digs into my chest over and over again.

They stop to look at the monitors. “I’m going to give you something for pain, I am going to have to shock you okay, it is going to be very painful still but I have no other choice.

They push another round of something into my port and kneels over me, giving me compressions with both hands interlocked over my chest. I feel the violent thrust force my blood through me and eventually circulate the sedative enough for me to not feel the cold AED pads being placed over my right breast and on my side under my left breast.

Knowing that anticipatory pain is almost worst than actual pain Ari does not tell me that the shock is coming, they just shock.

Volts of energy shoot through my chest and I feel like I’ve been shot. The sound is like two cars crashing together, the light is blinding, and the pain is indescribable.

“I’m so sorry, you did it, that was great, I’m so so sorry”

Another jolt goes through me, I cannot open my eyes or take a breath. I feel Ari’s mouth over mine as I take in their hot breath again.

“Just stay with me okay”

Another jolt and everything goes black. my chest is being pounded on repeatedly and, despite my lack of consciousness they’re still talking to me.

“Just stay with me okay, we’re going to get you to a hospital.”

I start to hear the exhaustion in their voice as they give me two more breaths and start again.

“Yes, we’re back here” I hear Ari say “She’s asytolic, I need someone to take over compressions.”

#resus community #resus roleplay #resuscitation #cpr resus #cpr #resus

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