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inheritorofmemories-archive · 3 years

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This is my gift for @lilolilyr for the Andromaquynh Secret Santa. You asked for a hurt/comfort fic, and I delivered. Hope you enjoy it, and happy holidays! Ich hoffe, dieses Geschenk findet dich gesund und glücklich <3

I’m putting it under a cut for length purpose and here is the link to the fic on AO3.

Lost and found again out there among the paths

The stars are bright, cold and unreachable, hung high in the firmament.

They haven’t changed in all of her centuries gone. The names are different but the same figures look down on her, the gaze of the Ursa and the Swan’s tail, the Crane hidden under the horizon in these parts of the world.

She isn’t ready to see her homelands yet, but this is enough. This is good. The Steppe hasn’t changed either, the same grass covering the earth everywhere she looks, the sun burning her skin as the winds surround her. It all feels so familiar, the sights, the animals, the long days of travel. Andromache, sitting by her side, walking by her side, sleeping by her side. Andromache, Andy, Andreas, Hadriana, Anath and so many other names forgotten by time. And still, she’s here, with her.

They are not riding horses but it doesn’t matter, Quỳnh would crawl to the end of the world with Andromache. They left their jeep three days ago at the entrance of those lands and they’ve been traveling by feet since then. The pace is slow but that’s what they both need. Peace, to be able to feel the grain of time slip through their fingers, not lost in the confusion of the modern world and its obsession with going so fast nothing matters anymore.

They talk as they walk, share memories and new stories, but mostly they walk, side by side, hand brushing and glances shared in the intimacy of the wide and open Steppe. Even the wind taste familiar in these moments. Quỳnh watches a lot, at night when the sun has gone down, she watches Andromache’s profile lightened only by the fire in front of her. Shadows dances in her temples and cheekbones and her pale eyes are drawn to the flames, mirrors bright with life. Quỳnh wishes she could bridge the distance between them as easily as they used to.

When the salt finally ate through her bound of iron, when the ocean took mercy on her, when Quỳnh broke out of her prison the first thing she felt after the burn of air in her lungs was an indescribable fury. A mad feeling seething in her heart that she mistook as anger, resentment. But it wasn’t that at all, she now recognizes it. She felt shame, because she knew then, crawling on the rocky beach away from the cold ocean that it happened. She had been broken, after millenniums of riding the world without a care, a handful of lunatics had done it.

She feared she had become nothing but a shell of the woman she was once. An’ always said she was like a sword, sharp edges and unforgiving. She used to joke that no one but her love’s skilled hands could handle her, that it was meant to be the two of them. It felt good, to know she would always have a resting place with Andromache.

She feared she lost herself in the ocean, that despite how hard she kept her faith in Andromache, how hard she clung to life, suffering over and over through the pain of drowning, of burning water suffocating her lungs, she feared she lost it all. That Andromache wouldn’t have that sacred place for her anymore, that she had become monstrous at the eternity spend in a cage. That despite how bright of a beacon it has been, her love somehow couldn’t be enough to save her. That their love wasn’t enough.

She was mad, furious at what happened to her, but more than anything she was scared. Scared of this new world, of what it had become and what she missed. Scared that she’d never find her family, that she would never have a home with them again.

And now, in a twisted play from fate, she is scared of losing Andromache.

She is so scared, like she has never been. Before seeing that damned iron coffin, nothing frightened her, for she had Andromache. Even the coffin didn’t fill her with as much dread as the sight of those bruises on Andromache’s cheek did when she finally found her again with the spy’s contacts the drunkard gave her. She wondered, has she lost her? Has she lost part of her soul? Did she cause this cruel fate?

They left the family a week ago. They needed time alone they said as they were packing their bags. Quỳnh needs time alone with Andromache, to be only with her, like they had been for so long before meeting Yusuf and Nicolò. She missed them, but looking at them doesn’t hurt like it does when she watches Andromache’s face. Andy said she had to leave, to be alone for a while, away from it all. It warmed Quỳnh’s cold chest that she was included in her idea of alone, that alone without Quỳnh means not whole, not complete, lacking.

They took a plane and flew all the way to the Great Steppe. At least it hasn't changed since she was gone, unlike her homelands. There’s still a bitter taste when she sees what happened to her mountains and her coastlines. Andromache says it gets easier after a few years, but she’s not sure she wants this to be more bearable, to get used to it.

They’ve been playing a game lately, “what hasn’t changed” she calls it. It started a few months ago when she finally grew tired of being reminded of everything new she missed the creation of. She looked at Yusuf who had been explaining to her some new gadget she had no interest in learning about that night and challenged him to find five things in the room that she knew of. It’s been easier talking with him since then, almost like before. The rules are simple, list everything that stayed the same through the centuries she wasn’t there for. Nicolò’s uncanny words, Yusuf’s bright eyes. The stars. An’s sweet tooth. The way Quỳnh still wields blades with the same grace; she can still spar with Yusuf in their shared Viet, Greek and Persian tongues.

Her love’s face hasn’t changed yet, despite her new mortality. She still has the same piercing eyes that look like home, that calls for her to come back home, please come back to me she heard Andromache cry out in her sleep.

She hides, hides it well in the day, in front of Yusuf and Nicolò and Nile. She smiles and laughs and moves the same. It’s only when they’re alone that she allows the walls to break down and for Quỳnh to see what’s going on in her head. The guilt in her eyes every time she looks at her, the way she touches her like she’s fragile, like she’s mist that would dissipate with the smallest gust of wind. She was so ready for Quỳnh to hate her when they found each other again, she doesn’t think Andromache’s really let go of this idea, that she doesn’t deserve Quỳnh, that she somehow failed by not letting her life rot by looking after an impossible task.

Quỳnh only needed one look at her pendant around Andromache’s neck, the pain etched in her eyes, the desperation in her voice for all doubt that she had been forgotten to leave her mind. The anger, the bitterness was still there, but how could she ever loathe Andromache, the other half of her soul, the one so unjustly ripped away from her?

At night, that’s when Andy confesses her fears. How scared she is too, of dying, of being gone after so long, of being without her family, without Quỳnh. Of losing that constant in her life, that she knew she would be there to see it happen, whatever was bound to happen.

She tells Quỳnh about her fear of aging, of her hands shaking, her hairs falling grey, her vision turning blurry, her feet uneasy and her mind crazy. Her fear of leaving them behind, the fear of the unknown. After all those years, the unanswered question still bears heavily on her. She wished she had answers like Nicolò and Yusuf do, like Nile does. That assurance that there’s something after for her.

She has nightmares too. When it’s not Quỳnh waking up cold and her chest squeezed by terror, it’s Andy who sweats through the sheet and mumbles names over and over. She dreams about Lykon, the hot blood on her hands. Quỳnh holds her through the night and they cry together, still bearing the grief for their lost brother. They share the burden, and that is all Quỳnh can ask for, wish for.

They share a lot of tears for the years lost to men’s madness, the one they won’t have, their mistakes and misdeeds. They share laughs too, when it’s late and the night is dark and the house quiet. Those real shards of joy that sounds like a thousand carillon, the sweet, soft laughter that heals and mends. They are rare, so, so precious. They talk about their first years together, learning to speak the same tongue, to move as one. They hold each other, close and dearly, with the desperation of a drowning man because Quỳnh refuses to let her go and Andy can’t seem to stop reaching out either, always seeking a touch.

It helps, feeling her hands in hers, her lips against hers, their body pressed together under the covers and standing hips to hips in the house, never apart, always locking eyes and sharing smiles.

They’ve set their camp in a nook of rocks just as the sun approached the horizon, near a small freshwater current and protected from the winds. They gathered wood together and Andromache used her metal lighter to start the fire. They unrolled their bedrolls and the thick plastic tarp and they filled their bottle with cool water, washed their hands in the stream like they so often did in time pasts.

They’re preparing their meal, Quỳnh’s cutting the few roots they have and boiling the barley and Andromache is gutting the two rabbits she killed earlier with her bow, her own labrys laid between them as the knives work. She’s wearing jeans and a woolen sweater and yet it still feels familiar, the sound of the blades and the crackling of the fire, the smell of wood and iron pot, the sight of the clear night sky, no clouds to cross the picture.

They chat idly in their own tongue as they work, no English, modern or what Quỳnh remembers, not even the so recent Italian language or the Sabir Yusuf spoke with them at first. No, it’s old, old enough that it’s forgotten by everyone, everything, papers and stones except for two being on this earth. They throw in the occasional olden Greek and Latin when they are in need of too new of a concept but it soothes Quỳnh’s heart to speak what she first learned, to build it again with Andromaque, keep its memory alive. It feels like saving a part of herself.

The comfortable silence is broken by a sudden shout from Andromache followed by a string of cuss and a number of blasphemies to at least three different cultures. Quỳnh turns her head in time to see her throw the half-skinned rabbit and the knife on the ground and clutch her hand to her chest. Her grip on her knife lessen and she wills her worries to quiet down.

“Fucking shit,” Andromache mutters under her breath and Quỳnh can see the blood flowing from the wound she inflicted on herself. She’s pressing on it but it doesn’t stop the blood from dripping down to her wrist. “Cut my hand.” She says and turns to shrug at Quỳnh, feigning carelessness. “Wasn’t paying attention.”

“You really should let me handle the knives, my love,” Quỳnh says as she sets her own knife down. Andromache has been hurt enough for her to know how to react in situations like this one, the sense of dread has quietened since the first wound she saw on her love’s body. “I would appreciate it if you could bring all your fingers to our couch tonight.” She tries to laugh; Andromache tries to smile. It still hurts too much but she knows it would somehow feel worse to not at least pretend that everything is okay. As wrong as it sounds, that hollow laugh of hers and the tight smile stretched over Andromache’s face feels like a breath of fresh air in the depth of their heavy hearts.

“We talked about this,” Andromache mutters. “I don’t want this to change anything.” This. This. This feels so unjust. How could the world punish them like that, taunt Andromache with eternity and take it all away just as Quỳnh finds her way back to her.

“Letting me use the knife won’t take away your skills my love. Or your honor.” She’s tiring of Andromache’s misplaced guilt, of her own heart betraying her and making her doubt. They have too few years to taint them with such futile thoughts and feelings. It’s at this instant, Andromache still holding on her hand and Quỳnh watching her hair falling in front of her eyes that she decides to push past what is outside of her control and move forward. She’ll keep the pain in her heart but she won’t let it define her, nor will she let Andromache be defined by it.

“Come,” She says and extends her arm toward her. “Give me your hand. Nile showed me how to care for wounds.” They’ll move on, gods help her they will find their path again, she swears it. Andromache holds her gaze for a moment, tilt her head, and it’s the first time since they reunited that Quỳnh gets that feeling. The one deep down that she knows, that they both know, that they are one. That they don’t need words, only a look, a touch to get it, to understand the other. Her throat lumps with relief as Andromache gives her her hand to hold. She’s holding her gaze with a peace she hadn’t see in so long, warm and confident despite the chaos surrounding them. Things will get better her guts murmur, and she believes it.

“It was time you pick up on this century’s medicine my heart, the way things are going I’ll have more scars than a crocodile has teeth before I get my first grey hair.” And this time the joke feels right. It feels like home, like the teasing and ribbing they shared so many times before a battle, on their couch, at a meal, in the busy streets, vast deserts and quiet forests. Quỳnh grins as she takes the small first aid kit in their bag and opens it in front of her, still holding Andromache’s wrist between her fingers.

“I might as well do it, seeing how determined you are at testing Nile’s and Nicolò’s knowledge of medicine. They need someone who isn’t afraid of telling you off before you run faster than modern science can follow.”

“It’s the hair,” Andromache says as if she hadn’t been intimidating kings and emperors with hair as long as a horse’s mane before Quỳnh even met her. Quỳnh smiles, the pain wavering in her heart as the warmth of feeling whole again gains her. Finally, she looks down at Andromache’s hand to judge the extent of the damage on the palm, only to have to double-take what she sees.

The blood isn’t flowing anymore and she knows that knife was sharp enough to dig deep in the flesh. The left hand, the one holding the meaty rabbit and the one victim to the blade’s enthusiasm, the one bearing the wound, doesn’t have any cut to show. Quỳnh’s breath locks as she stares at the hand, now cradled between her own.

“My love.” She says, and when she wipes the blood with her thumb, the skin appears undamaged, no cut, no scars, nothing but the smooth extend of her palm. She does it again, and a third time just to be sure. The flesh and muscles, tendons and bones underneath are unscathed, whole and perfect.

“What?” Andromache asks but keeps her eyes fixed on Quỳnh’s, a frown painting her face with worry. “Is it bad?”

“Your hand.” Quỳnh whispers. “Look at it.” There’s a moment of silence, maybe a minute, maybe an hour, Quỳnh herself isn’t sure. She just knows that she’s filling with euphoria and that Andromache’s right hand is touching the healed skin, slow strokes of wonder.

“It’s gone.” Her voice is hoarse, barely a whisper. She touches the skin, press on it, rub away the blood. It’s her hand that makes Quỳnh look up, and her eyes are filling with misty tears. “It’s gone. Quỳnh, I’ve healed.”

“Your immortality Andromache.” And the same shadow crosses Andromache’s eyes and her own mind.

“Wait.” Quỳnh lets go of her hand as she takes the knife again. They both watch as she brings the blade to the back of her forearm and slowly slices the skin, a hand long wound. It feels like one of those miracles Nicolò always talks about, the way the skin stitches itself close on its own, how the blood stop and the edges meet and the scar fades in a minute.

“It’s back, I’ve got it again.” The words are barely out of her mouth that Quỳnh wraps her arms around her neck and bring her close into an embrace, Andromache’s arms warm and heavy on her back. They’re shaking, laughing, whispering sweet nonsense into their shoulders, and Quỳnh knows tears are flowing from their eyes, she welcomes the liquid joy.

“Our love was enough then.” She can’t help but voice it out loud, needs to hear it to really understand the reality of what’s happening.

“Quỳnh?” Andromache pulls back, plunge her gaze into hers, it feels almost too much, too big.

“Our love was enough.” She feels herself laughing, nervous and bursting with relief, uncontrollable. “It is enough.” ‘I am enough’ she can’t help but think.

“What are you talking about Quỳnh? Of course it is. Always has been enough, more than enough. It has always been everything to me.” Both of her hands come to rest on the side of her face, cradling it with great gentleness.

“I was afraid my faith in you, in us had been wavering in my prison.” She confesses, lets herself feel it, feels the depth of the hurt now that she was proven wrong, that she knows it is untrue. “That you lost this gift of immortality because of me, because of my unreliable heart.”

“Oh Quỳnh.” Her voice breaks then, as does her face. “Have you been thinking this all this time?”

“Do you think me mad? To think that you losing your immortality coinciding with me finding you again broken, mad with fury, was nothing meaningless?” Quỳnh shakes her head then, covers Andromache’s hands with hers.

“Quỳnh, what are you talking about? I never doubted you.” Pain lines Andromache’s voice, desperation. “If you see yourself broken, then what am I? We are not as we were, will never be again. But that had nothing to do with you my heart.” She kisses her with urgency as if she couldn’t use her words to express everything in her heart. Quỳnh closes her eyes and feels the wind dry lips move against her, slides her hands behind her neck and bring her even closer. They part with a pant and Andromache smiles, a genuine, guilt-free smile, small but the seed of something bigger. “Our love was never tainted, in all of our millenniums together, it survived every hardship, every terror, every obstacle. We will survive this too.”

“I knew this, somehow, but you understand better than anyone how the mind is. It’s so easy to be tricked by sorrow when you’re grieving and hurting.”

“I’ll spend this eternity given to me reminding you Quỳnh. We never understood this gift, there’s no point reading meaning where there’s none. The only thing I am sure of is the love that courses through this world, through us.” Andromache fixes her gaze on her, strong, unwavering, and oh how Quỳnh missed seeing it. “I love you like the earth loves the sun, undeterred, constant, in the depth of my being because without I am not alive.”

“Can you believe that I do not hate you then?” Quỳnh prompts and she closes her mouth into a tight line. “That what happened was never your fault? That you couldn’t find me any more than you could save Lykon? My anger is not directed at you, never was, never will be.”

“I hate that I couldn’t save you,” Andromache says with shame in her voice. “I should have been there for you. You lost so much because of me.” This isn’t a new conversation, but it’s only today that Quỳnh realizes what she needs to hear, not a logical argument nor a dismissal of her feelings.

“I forgive you,” She says, and this time it’s Andromache who let go of a tight laugh, wet with tears. “I forgive you, Andromache, of any fault you gave yourself, I absolve any wrong you think you’ve done. You’ve saved me once in that desert where our path crossed for the first time, you saved me again in this century. I do not accuse you of anything, and neither will you. You are free of this burden.”

“Thank you.” Andromache whisper, tears in her eyes. “Thank you, my love.” Healing won’t be easy, but this is a start. They can forgive each other, forgive themselves, move on from there with a clear slate and shoulders relieved from their heavy loads of sorrow. They can do anything; they are not strained by time or Death anymore.

“We have time.” Quỳnh realizes, just as Andromache swipes her thumb along her jaw. “You will live, and we have time.” She pushes back Andromache’s hair, and she allows herself to feel the relief too. “You will live Andromache, spend time with the family, with Nile, Yusuf and Nicolò. You will see Sébastien again.”

“I don’t have to go yet.” She says, and the smile that carves itself on her face is radiant, shining with newfound light. “I don’t have to go.” Her hand slide at the back of her neck and slowly she kisses her, once, light and barely there, she rests her nose on her cheek “I am only grateful to have the gift back, to have the opportunity to spend it for as long as I’ll have it with you, together.”

“Just the two of us,” Quỳnh says through another laugh, press her forehead against Andromache’s, feel the warm skin and her hands over her shoulders. Let herself feels it all.

“Until the end.”

Quỳnh breathes the same air as Andromache, in, out, feel the same pulse as hers under her fingers, beating as one, like it always had. Like it was always meant to be.

The stars are bright, old and eternal, hung high in the firmament.

The fire is slowly dying, the last flames licking the wood and giving their valiant effort to burn for a bit longer. The moon lights their step, pale blue and cold on their warm skin. They are dancing together, waltzing under the milky way, hand pressed against hand, feet mirroring feet, circling each other as they did for the very first time ages ago, when the stars had different faces, when Andromache was still called a goddess’s name and Quỳnh’s was a whisper amongst her people’s legend.

Their gaze locked, lost in each other’s eyes, their nose touching and sharing the same breath, it feels like a dream.

“Do you remember my love,” Quỳnh pants as she shifts on her feet and pushes her hand against An’s, raising it high in the sky. “That night in Bābilim?” She grins and twists her hips just so as to press Andromache closer to her chest. She wishes she could crawl into her ribcage, be as close as possible, seize her heart from the inside and never let go again. She settles on sliding a leg between hers and let herself get lost in her scent, drunk from it like a young boy is from his first sip of ale.

“If I remember,” Andromache whispers in her ear. “You looked like wildfire. The most beautiful creature I had ever seen.” There had been music Quỳnh remembers, and wine flowing like rivers from the amphoras. She danced through the night, and Andromache’s gaze upon her was heavy and burning, she felt stripped from everything, baring her soul for the first time in her life. That’s the night their love became more than allyship, more than friend and necessity. That’s when it shifted to become more, to become everything.

“Do you remember what I said?” Andromache asks her, lays her left hand to her chest and she does the same, feel her heartbeat strong under her palm despite their clothing.

“More please!” Quỳnh moans like An’s does and pushes away with her hand only to crash together with the next steps. Andromache grins and indulges her change of rhythm. They had a room that night, a soft bed of feathers and fine silks like they had seldom seen with their own eyes.

“After that. On the balcony.” And Quỳnh remembers fondly that moment. Andromache had draped herself over her back, holding onto each other and murmuring in the quiet night. The moon had been full then too, albeit the desert looked warmer than the Steppe they are dancing in today. They circle each other again, Quỳnh savors the moment with her entire being.

“You will be my deathbed.” She meant it as a joke after the night filled with passion, but they both knew the deeper meaning. It hanged unsaid in the air between them. “Remember what I said?”

“And you mine.” Andromache presses her nose close to her cheek, her breath warm on her skin. They are silent after that, don’t need words anymore, not when they have each other.

They finish their dance when the last of the fire blow away in the night. They press their foreheads together and stand in the middle of the Steppe, alone, together. Whole and one. For the first time in over a year, in over five centuries, her heart finally feels at peace. She’s home, in the embrace of Andromache’s arms, of Andy’s, in the certainty that they won against fate, that they are truly immortal. That they’ll live together again.

The stars are bright and Andromache’s eyes are even brighter, Quỳnh is sure of that.

#andromaquynhsecretsanta #andromaquynh #andy x quynh #andromache the scythian #quynh #tog fanfic #tog #em writes

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nitrateglow · 3 years

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My bottom five new-to-me movies of 2020

2020 sucked. So did these movies. Before I do my customary top 20 favorite movie discoveries list, I wanted to share five very special new-to-me movies that were painful to watch. Forgive me if it all sounds like ranting. It probably is.

(And remember-- if you like any of these movies, that’s fine. I am not attacking YOU. I just didn’t like a movie. I know this is a stupid disclaimer to put on a list of opinions, but combing the venomous old IMDB message boards has me on edge a bit lol.)

Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker

Whether you love the sequel trilogy or hate it, everyone pretty much agrees this movie was a mess. I thought no movie could have a more structurally unsound screenplay than The Crimes of Grindelwald, but Rise of Skywalker gives it staunch competition. It creates a new artform from making things up as the plot requires: new powers for Rey, new Macguffins to pursue, new motivations and backstories for characters.

I admit I dislike The Last Jedi. I dislike it a lot, actually, and it appears JJ Abrams did too from the amount of retconning he does here (Rey isn’t nobody! Honest, guys!). But you can’t backtrack THAT much. Either plot out your entire trilogy before shooting the first film or play fairly with the cards you were dealt by the filmmakers of movie two.

If anything, these movies have become a cautionary tale about not having a plan when making a movie trilogy. Now, George Lucas didn’t really have one either when he was making the original trilogy, but in that case, he wasn’t even sure the first movie was going to be a modest hit, let alone the biggest movie of the 1970s. He had an excuse and did well enough finishing the trilogy. Here, Disney knew there would be sequels, they knew they had a hungry audience, but they chose to just wing it and the results are just-- so disappointing, especially given the talented young actors and lovely special effects they had at their disposal.

The more I think about it, the more poetic the image of Palpatine hooked up to a life support system/crane is. The best ROTS can do is riff on earlier, better movies and hope our affection will make us overlook the awfulness.

Artemis Fowl

Outside of Animal Crossing, Artemis Fowl might have been the only entity to benefit (if only slightly) from the pandemic. I cannot imagine it would have been anything but a box office bomb had the theaters been open.

Artemis Fowl feels like it should have come out in 2003-- not just because the books were more prominent then, but the whole style of this film in general. In 2020, it’s positively anachronistic. The whole thing is a joyless attempt at dipping from the old Harry Potter well, with a bit of Spy Kids thrown in for good measure. Beyond that, it’s so poorly done as a whole. I have never read the Artemis Fowl books, but I watched this with a friend who has and his head near caught on fire. Apparently, it cuts out everything that made the books cool, like the protagonist basically being a kid version of a Bond villain. Here, he’s anything but that: he’s the usual bland child protagonist surrounded by a cast of slightly more interesting characters. Josh Gad seems to be the only one really trying. Judi Dench shows up and somehow gives a worse performance than whatever the hell she was doing in Cats.

I was actually shocked Kenneth Branagh of all people directed this. I generally like his films, even the less successful ones like his musical adaptation of Love’s Labors Lost. Even the uninspiring live-action Cinderella remake he helmed is at least pretty to look at-- Artemis Fowl has neither brains nor beauty to recommend it.

Bloodline

This film was intended to jumpstart a career comeback for Audrey Hepburn. This decidedly did not happen. One has to wonder what she saw in this sordid material in the first place. Maybe she really just wanted to work with director Terence Young again? Or she thought this would be a good, more modern take on her screen persona? I have no clue. All I know is that Bloodline is one of the worst big-budget Hollywood movies I have ever seen.

No contest: this is Audrey Hepburn’s worst movie. Hate on Green Mansions and Paris When It Sizzles until the stars turn to ash-- at least there was some fun camp value in them. The plot in Bloodline makes no sense, going into unrelated digressions that lead nowhere (did we really need that extended flashback about the dead father? or the subplot with Omar Shariff’s two families?). Oh and then there’s the awful sleazy snuff film subplot that’s also poorly developed and goes nowhere. Hepburn is game, but she can’t save the sinking ship. The best she can do is be charming in a terrible 70s perm.

Luckily, she made the underrated They All Laughed two years after this cinematic fecal matter bombed, so at the very least, Hepburn’s big screen swan song was a film worthy of her presence. (Hint: there will be more about that movie on my top 20 of the year list!)

Halloween III: The Season of the Witch

You all have no idea how excited I was to see this. All the mentions of it on Red Letter Media made it sound like deliriously entertaining schlock. I mean, it’s a movie in which the villain sells cursed Halloween masks that turn children’s heads into bugs and snakes! That sounds awesome! Instead, the movie is badly paced and boring: the main characters are uninteresting and the plot takes an interesting premise then does.... nothing with it. Nothing whatsoever. The second act is the cinematic equivalent of treading water. In fact, so little happens, that the filmmakers squeeze in a pointless sex scene between two character who have all the chemistry of a lit match and a bag of M&M’s.

The thing that annoys me most about this film is that it killed off a great concept: that all of the future Halloween films would be standalone stories centered around the spookiest time of the year. Unfortunately, this movie botched itself so badly that people often think the absence of Michael Meyers was the problem. It wasn’t: it was the absence of a good story.

Blindsided

This is probably the most watchable movie on this list, but that’s not saying much. A bloodless ripoff of Wait Until Dark, Blindsided is an unimaginative thriller with no thrills, humor, or interesting characters whatsoever.

The whole film is just repetitive. The situation doesn’t slowly boil to something horrific, the threat presented by the villains doesn’t escalate, there are no interesting interactions between the characters: no, here the underdeveloped protagonist is interrogated, tortured and/or sexually harassed, tries to escape, is recaptured, rinse and repeat for ninety minutes. I admit there’s some clever resourcefulness on the part of the heroine in the last scene-- but it’s basically just Wait Until Dark’s climax (down to the twist with the villain finding an alternative source of illumination for crying out loud!) without the emotional payoff that comes from slow-burn pacing or the fantastic performances, so even that’s a letdown.

I thought the movie might at least be saved by Michael Keaton as the main criminal mastermind since he’s shown he can be a great villain in other movies (if they had remade Wait in the 80s, he would have been a perfect Harry Roat Jr.), but even he seems to be phoning it in here. Beyond a scene of attempted cat murder (I’m serious-- the bad guys are so incompetent they can’t even kill a cat), there’s not even anything so bad it’s good to enjoy. Blindsided is just dull and by-the-numbers.

#thoughts

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treatian · 3 years

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The Chronicles of the Dark One: Breaking the Curse

Chapter 41: Perfect Plans

He spent the night at the shop again. He would say that it was becoming a very bad habit, only this time there was no sleeping involved, and he was certain that meant there was no "habit" forming. Oh, he'd tried. At least half a dozen times, he'd grown weary enough to lay down on his cot and closed his eyes only to have his own curiosity and anxiety keep him awake. He spent his time trying to sleep, sitting on the edge of the cot, bouncing his cane up and down nervously, and taking time at his wheel to spin when he realized there would be no sleeping.

He hated this part. There was a lot about this process he disliked but this, leaving Jefferson to his own devices while his doves all took the afternoon off…this was like torture. He hated not having eyes, and he hated not having ears. At one point in the night, out of desperation, he'd retrieved his black bag and taken a look inside. He hadn't gone through the potions inside this bag since David had awakened him early. He'd gotten lucky then. He'd needed a potion that was strong enough to overcome the effects of the Curse weighing it down but weak enough that the Curse wouldn't want to absorb whatever magic it produced. He'd looked through all the potions he had, analyzed each of them. There was nothing that would work in this situation. To watch what was going on, he'd need his crystal ball, and he hadn't seen it since he'd left the Dark Castle. He hadn't any idea where it was in this world. He could use a mirror, but he didn't have the proper spells or options for that, and even if he did, he was certain the magic was too strong to make it work. The Curse would swallow whatever magic it generated up to help itself. He was trying to break the Curse, not provide more power for it. It could backfire too easily.

So he spun. And he paced. And he lay down. Then got up and paced some more. Today faded into Tomorrow. Late night became early morning. He received no calls. No messages. Nothing from any of his birds, not even the one watching Emma. Was that because he'd lost her and was too scared to tell him? Had Emma left town and her spy had followed and was now lying in a ditch somewhere? Was Jefferson just that good?

Finally!

He lunged for the phone on the table when it finally chimed. He uncharacteristically tripped over his own wheel and stubbed his toe but didn't think to care as he examined the unfamiliar number. Not Emma Swan, not Regina, not one of his employees, so then who-"

"It's done," Jefferson's voice spat before he could even utter a single word. He sighed in relief. Done. Jefferson had done his job. Now he just had to do his own. "Our deal?"

"Will be honored," he answered. "You'll not see my face at your door again."

"And my daughter?"

He tilted his head. A second request. A second favor. Jefferson had made damn sure the last time they'd talked that he hadn't wanted a second deal and yet…what was it the Seer always said. He'll do you a favor? He couldn't imagine what that favor might be, couldn't think of how he'd ever accomplish it without him being able to see him but…

If the Seer had said it, repeated it as she did over and over, then there was something to it. Who was he to resist?

"I'm working on it," he answered honestly. It was just as he'd said before. This was a long game, and it was going to take time. But he could do it. He could. He had to.

"Get it done," his old accomplice ordered. "I'm not going to wait forever, and the things I know about you, Mr. Gold…they could turn stomachs," he threatened before hanging up.

A threat. He didn't like threats. But considering the amount of curiosity he had regarding this issue and the amount of work he had to do to break the Curse, he was willing to let it slide. For now.

Like clockwork, almost as soon as he hung up with Jefferson, he received a message from the person watching after Emma. He reported that she'd spent the night at a strange house and was now leaving with Mary Margaret. They were going in the direction of the Sheriff's Station. Well…that answered one question. Why hadn't Emma's tail contacted him? Because it hadn't appeared that anything was wrong. Emma had left the station, she'd run into a man, she'd taken him home, and hadn't emerged until this morning. She'd gone into his house on her own, and she'd come out on her own. The only strange thing to him had been that she'd returned with Mary Margaret.

He beat the women back to the Sheriff's Station. He would have let himself in with his keys, but he knew that before she'd left, Emma had left the door open. He took a seat on the couch by the cell, the same seat Regina had used when she spoke to him. And then he waited. And waited. It was almost as bad as when he'd been in his shop. Almost. This time he knew all was well, that the women were well on their way, but he was getting tired of waiting. He was getting tired of being patient.

Finally, he heard the door open, and footsteps came down the hall. Mary Margaret appeared, and soon after, so did Emma. It was just after seven. Her arraignment was at eight. They'd need to leave soon, and he did not doubt that Regina would be here to see her off. He didn't want Regina to walk into this.

"Miss Swan-"

"Don't ask!" Emma snapped as Mary Margaret returned to her cell, and Emma locked her in again.

"Here!" Mary Margaret ran to her cot and pulled out a piece of metal. He had a feeling he knew what it was as she passed it to Emma.

The Sheriff looked it over. "Looks like one of Regina's skeleton keys."

"I'm sorry?" he questioned with false shock. In reality, he was pleased to hear her make the connection. It was exactly what he wanted her to conclude.

"Evidence to use against Regina. We'll worry about it later. Mary Margaret is back now. You can talk to her about what you wanted to now."

"Actually…I recommend we all leave."

"Excuse me?"

"Well, except for Miss Blanchard, of course. The best thing you can do is rest before your arraignment."

"We have…thirty minutes until we have to leave again!" Emma argued. "What's the point?"

"The point is not to make Regina suspicious that anything out of the ordinary happened. I haven't changed since yesterday, Miss Swan you smell as though you've been running about in a forest, and we're all here even earlier than Regina is. I think if she finds us in this state, then she'll suspect something. And correct me if I'm wrong Miss Swan, but it's you who wants to draw attention to Regina and not your friend, am I right?"

Emma's shoulders rose before dropping with her sigh. "Fine."

And then with a final, "Miss Blanchard, stay right where you are" the pair of them left the jailhouse. He understood Emma's frustration at his suggestion, because he felt it. Magic made life easier. It made life better. He couldn't wait for the day that he could simply snap his fingers and feel fresh and clean in a new perfectly pressed suit. Instead he found himself racing home, muddling through a quick shower, pulling on new clothes, and then racing right back to the station to find…

Exactly what he'd wanted to find.

Emma's car wasn't in the lot, but there was another one. It was Regina's. And it was empty, which could only mean one thing…Regina was here, just as Emma predicted, just as he wanted. She was inside, probably seeing by now that the plan hadn't worked, that Mary Margaret was right where she was supposed to be, that Emma couldn't be fired for "sleeping on the job". With any luck she'd be feeling a bit of her victory slip through her fingers. But he wasn't done playing with her, not yet. Right now, she'd be upset with Mary Margaret, either for not finding the key or not running. In a few moments, she'd likely me upset with him. Neither of those were the goal. He wanted her furious with Emma and that…that was another plan altogether.

Inside, when he turned the corner, he found Regina staring at Mary Margaret in her cell who, it seemed, hadn't moved since Emma had returned her. Perfect.

"Excuse me, but my client is not having any visitors," he informed Regina, stepping in front of her.

For a moment, fire ignited in her eyes as she looked him over and recognized betrayal. With that kind of anger, it was hard to believe this was the same girl who'd once struggled to make fire.

"Of course not," she muttered as her mind began to put it all together.

"I'll see you out," he said in a low tone, trying to convey comfort to her. This was where things were going to get tricky.

"What is she doing here?" the Mayor growled when they were away from Mary Margaret.

"She came back."

"You said this was going to work. That she'd take the key, that she'd go!"

"And she did," he explained. "But, it seems that Miss Swan is rather more resourceful than we thought. Fear not, Your Majesty. Miss Blanchard is still guilty of murder. You may yet get what you want."

"Oh, I better. The only reason I made a deal with you, Gold, is because I wanted results."

"And results you shall have. See you at the arraignment," he snapped. Regina glared at him before turning to leave. He took a breath.

Tricky, indeed…but perfect.

#Rumbelle #Rumple #Rumpelstiltskin #dark one #mr gold #Emma Swan #mary margaret blanchard #snow white #Regina Mills #evil queen #ouat #ouat fanfiction #fanfic

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thedeviltohisangel · 4 years

Text

He’s A God, He’s A Man: 8

It’s a delicate business.

masterlist is my url/writing

send me your thoughts!

Lydia could have basked in the new glow of love that surrounded her and Tommy for the rest of her life. Just the two of them standing nose placing gentle kisses to each others lips. It was soft and sweet and safe and so unlike the real world that they found themselves living in.

“I have a meeting soon,” he murmured as he tucked a piece of hair behind her ear and let his hand rest there.

“Do you need anything from me?” Lydia couldn’t help the bit of the thrill she got from being involved in the Blinder business. Not only did it show that she was capable of playing these games in a man’s world but it also showed she could fit in the Shelby’s world. She also thought that if Tommy would let her be involved then she could help to keep him safe. It didn’t take long to understand he didn’t have much of a regard for his own life.

“No, just work your shift like it’s a completely normal day,” he brought her hand to his mouth and placed a kiss to it, “afterwards we can go see a picture. Can probably get the room to ourselves if you’d like.” He grinned cheekily and she grinned right back. Tommy kissed her one last time on the forehead before dipping back into his private room. He wanted to show off the fact that he was happy and in love with the whole world but also keep her safe from those that would wish to use her in order to hurt him.

Lydia could clearly tell his business was with the Irish when she heard the thick accents of the men who walked into The Garrison. She knew Tommy was considering them for the guns he was still in possession of and also as allies against Campbell. The bruises on her wrist had healed but Tommy could still see them every time he looked. He would see them until Campbell paid for it. She pressed her ears to the thin wall that separated her from the meeting and listened, trying to understand as much as she could. Campbell had sent a messenger to her the night before. Telling her that if she didn’t start providing him information, he would terminate her. She believed him to be a man that followed through on his threats. She heard the man mention The Black Swan as a place where him and his men gathered. It wasn’t intelligence on guns or the Blinders but it was about the IRA. Perhaps that would be enough to satiate him.

Tommy came out shaking the man’s hand before turning to watch Lydia wiping down a glass. “Shall I tell Harry to give you the rest of the day off?”

“Let me bring the garbage out and I will tell him myself.”

“I can do it.” Tommy moved towards the bag of waste that sat at the end of the bar.

“I got it. Let me be somewhat useful and productive before I get stolen away,” she teased. Tommy smiled and pecked her quickly.

“Be fast. I’m not a patient man in general but knowing an empty theater with you awaits me does nothing to help the fact.” She laughed as she stepped out into the back alley where Harry had the waste collect before someone came to collect it.

“You enjoying spying on conversations, lass?” Lydia froze and looked to see one of the men Tommy had just been meeting with.

“I’m not sure what you mean, sir.”

“I know what pretty girls like you do in bars owned by men like him.” He produced a knife from the inside of his jacket. “Taking your tongue should keep you quiet.” Lydia ducked as he lunged at her, rolling away from the man but also farther from the door back into the pub. She grabbed the handle of a broom on the ground and blindly swung it at him as she continued to scramble backwards. One particularly hard swing to his wrist knocked the knife from his grasp.

“Tommy!” she screamed. Just as the man bent down with his hands poised to enclose around her throat, she felt the knife in her fingertips. Without even thinking about it her hand grabbed the knife and plunged into her attackers neck. He looked at her with absolute shock on his face. Tommy appeared in the doorway as the man stumbled backwards with a hand to his neck and blood trickling between his fingers.

Tommy was able to understand what had transpired within seconds and stalked over to the wounded man. He removed the knife from his neck and the bleeding increased. “I’ll make sure you bleed out slowly.” He dropped him before looking back at Lydia who had blood spattered across her face and blouse. She was breathing heavy and couldn’t look away from the man slumped against the wall.

“Did I kill him?” she whispered. She didn’t kill people. She helped them. As a nurse she had taken great pride in helping men who were wounded. In prolonging their life. Now she was responsible for ending one. Tommy crudely wiped his hand on his pants to get rid of the blood that had been on the knife when he grabbed it.

“Don’t look at him. Look at me. You protected yourself, yeah? Did what you had to do in order to keep yourself safe.” He shrugged off his coat and wrapped it around her shoulders, tucking her against her chest so she didn’t have to look at the dying man. “Let’s go home and get you cleaned up.”

Tommy brought Lydia to Watery Lane where he left her in the care of Polly before enlisting Arthur and John to help him dispose of the body. They didn’t even bother to bury it. The man didn’t deserve it. They threw him in The Cut instead.

“Where is she?” Tommy asked when he walked through the door and saw Polly drinking tea by the fire and Lydia nowhere in sight.

“Still having a good wash. She stopped shaking once all the blood was off. Asked me to burn her clothes.” Tommy looked to the fire and saw the pile of ash from her skirt and blouse.

“Thank you, Pol.” His aunt merely nodded as he took the stairs two at a time. He paused in front of the washroom. It would be wrong to just barge in like a bull in a china shop. She needed calm and support. Not a man on the edge with the gleam in his eye he got after a night of business. Tommy swallowed, rolled his shoulders and raised his hand to knock gently at the door.

“Who is it?”

“It’s me. Tommy.”

“Come in.” Lydia sat up straighter in the basin and took a deep breath as Tommy stepped into the room, shutting the door behind him.

“Is the water warm enough?” he asked. She nodded. “I’m sorry that happened to you today. He’s been dealt with.”

“You have some blood on your face,” she said with a wave of her hand. Tommy sat down next to the basin as she moved a dap cloth to his cheek, tenderly wiping away the blood. He closed his eyes as she dropped her forehead to rest against his. “It had nothing to do with you, Tommy. He didn’t try to hurt me because of your feelings. He thought I was spying on your conversation with him. Wanted to keep me quiet.” Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew Tommy had been beating himself up over the incident. She knew he was blaming himself. Blaming his love for her.

“It’s my job to keep you safe. I won’t let anything like that come close to happening ever again.” If it was the last thing he ever did, she would never feel hopeless like that ever again.

“Forever and ever?” she teased. She was absentmindedly scratched his scalp and it was making him feel sleepy.

“Forever and ever.”

----

“Lydia, can you help me make breakfast?” She looked up from where she had been reading the paper on the couch to see young Finn Shelby looking distraught in the doorway to the kitchen. “I can’t reach the milk.” Lydia smiled. After Finn had knocked over the last glass bottle, Polly had taken to storing it beyond his reach.

“Of course, Finny.” She ruffled his hair as they both went back into the kitchen. “What if we make ourselves a nice proper breakfast?” Finn nodded excitedly. Lydia had decided to take a couple of days off from The Garrison in order to relax after the ordeal she had just been through. Tommy had tried to convince her to quit altogether but she needed something to do besides lurking around Watery Lane.

“I like my toast with extra butter,” Finn informed her a little while later as the two of them sat down with their proper English breakfast of beans, toast, eggs, bangers and tomato.

“Here you, sir,” Lydia said handing him back his piece of bread. Finn smiled wide before digging into his food.

“Thank you, Lydia. You should stay here forever,” he mumbled around a bite of his breakfast.

“Would you like that?” Now that things with her and Tommy were official, she was doing her best to be on the top of her game around his family. Their acceptance was incredibly important to whatever future they hoped to have together.

“You could be like my sister!” he pointed out happily. Lydia beamed with pride.

“I would love that very much, Finn.” She reached across the table and Finn met with halfway, letting her grab his hand and give it a loving squeeze.

“Lydia! Finn!” The gentle moment was broken as Ada came running frantically into the kitchen. “Have you seen Tommy?” Lydia shook her head, swallowing the bite of food she had in her mouth and wiping the residue off her fingers with a napkin.

“Is something wrong?” Ada’s tone was concerning. And it was natural in this family to need something from Tommy if things were going horribly wrong.

“I think him and Freddie are going to kill each other,” she groaned. Lydia stood and led the Shelby girl out of the kitchen so Finn could continue to eat his meal peacefully.

“Tommy probably just wants to scare him a little bit. You’re his little sister and deep down Tommy knows how you and Freddie feel about each other.” Tommy had mumbled late at night when they were in bed together and his guard was down that he wasn’t necessarily upset that his sister was married or pregnant. He was upset that Freddie and his lifestyle would prevent his sister from being happy, always. “Why don’t you take a seat, Ada?” Lydia was also thinking about the impending addition to the Shelby-Thorne cadre. All this stress and anxiety couldn’t be good for the little bub.

“I have to find them,” Ada muttered weakly as Lydia gently stroked her hair and her eyes felt heavier.

“Have a rest, Ada, I’ll handle your brother.”

----

Tommy felt the weight of the world lifted from his shoulders when he entered Watery Lane to see Lydia minding the fire. Everyone else was off doing their own thing, Finn having been tucked in with chocolate on his face from the cookies they made, and she was enjoying the peace of the quiet and domesticity.

“This is a lovely sight to have at the end of the day.” After stumbling upon her in the alley yesterday, Tommy was just happy to see her sturdy and in one piece. The color on her cheeks was a good sign as was the pile of books on the center table.

“Did you have a good day?”

“Stressful but better now.” Tommy was warmed by the mundane comfort someone asking how is day was brought. Normally people jumped down his throat as soon as they saw him. Lydia was patient. Took her time. It was what he needed.

“Shall I poor us a drink?” She didn’t wait for his answer, taking two of the nice crystal glasses in the corner and filling them with an amber liquid, bringing them to him for a cheers. “I missed you today,” she mused after a sip.

“Did Finn behave?”

“Like an angel. I kept him fed and busy.”

“Well, we can’t be letting him get too used to it,” Tommy said, downing the rest of his drink and placing it on the mantle. He went behind Lydia and pulled her back to his chest, kissing the side of her neck.

“And why is that?”

“I’m going to get us out of here, one day. Buy us a beautifully big home in the country with lots of grass and fresh air.” Tommy began to sway the two of them from side to side. Lydia closed her eyes and relaxed into his touch and the soothing motions of his rocking.

“I like the sound of all that. Our own little castle,” she mused. It sounded like a dream. She could live there in her head forever. “For the sake of our happy little future, Thomas, would you be able to cut your sister some slack?” Tommy pulled back from her ever so slightly.

“So she’s gotten to you.” It wasn’t a question but a statement of fact. He pulled himself away and went to pour another drink.

“She was so worried you and Freddie were going to kill each other today. She loves both of you and it hurts so deeply to see you aren’t getting along.” Tommy scoffed.

“It’s because I love her that I won’t leave her be. Freddie has a target on his back and associating with him puts one on her as well.

“I just think, before the baby comes, everyone should try to work out their differences.” Lydia approached Tommy slowly and used her hand to direct his face so he was looking at her. “He loves her the same way you love me.”

“No. It’s very different. I would know when to walk away for your own safety.”

“And you know that I wouldn’t let you.”

“Because you’re stupidly stubborn,” he stated back, downing his drink all in one go.

“Because I love you. The same way she loves him. You’re just trying to delay the inevitable.” She softened her voice. Lydia knew Tommy loved his sister and was truly doing what he thought best. The thought warmed her heart.

“Perhaps I can consider loosening my ban on Freddie Thorne.” Lydia smiled.

“Tommy Shelby, going soft for love,” she teased.

“For the woman I love,” he clarified. Without a second thought, he reached forward and brought his fingertips to her waist, tickling in the same spot that made all of them laugh. Lydia squeaked and tried to push him away but it only spurred him further. Maybe Tommy was going soft. But only for her. Only around her. He thinks her love made him stronger. And he was going to need it.

@flecksphoenix @girl-w-a-quill @odetostep @itsilvermorny @shadow-of-wonder

#tommy shelby #thomas shelby #cillian murphy #peaky blinders #tommy shelby fanfiction #thomas shelby fanfiction #peaky blinders fanfiction

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ohhicas · 5 years

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I've only been into comics for a few years, but I've read enough of the old Flash stuff where I adore the classic incarnations of the Rogues. Honestly curious here: what's it like to be a fan of James Jesse back when he was retgonned around 10 years ago and see him brought back but now all mwahaha crazy evil? I'm way more used to Axel (and all that off-panel character development in Nu52, thanks DC) but even I find this kinda weird. Was James ever crazy evil in any arc?

^- me 90% of the time someone says James is coming back to recent media & it’s not a direct continuation of the comics prior to 2004

[ Warning: this is gonna get long and be full of a lot of assumptions. I can never form solid statements and things will get jumbled, because I suck at presenting things ]

[ this is my can of worms hill and you opened it so I’m dYING HERE ]

I mean, back in the earliest ages, no Rogue had a real personality to speak of? They were just “1960s Bad Guy in a different outfit” at the very start, with quirks! Like James having a thing for toys and nuclear powered flying tricycles. It wasn’t until that era ended that they started getting real distinct and into what a lot of ‘classic’ James fans loved and appreciated?

(I think at least, I’m just One Person here pretending like I even understand HALF of what the ‘classic’ fandom enjoyed. I’m wildly speculating just going off what fanworks I’ve seen produced.)

(I don’t have all my scans anymore but I’ll toss in scans when I have them)

But that’s when we started getting things like James actually having specified friendships with certain people

or clear distaste towards others, and when you could tell he was more of a wild card than the others. Or when he decided to fuck off and hang out in Hollywood with Blue Devil for a bit, even siding with Kid Devil to deck out Captain Boomerang.

Or when he decided to fuck off to Gotham, to mess with Catwoman by pretending he didn’t know who she was, but absolutely knew who she was because of how she walked and carried herself, but James being James was like “mmmmm long con, nope”

hey lil Cold, gimme all ur guns and don’t question why I’m in drag xoxo

Even then, he wasn’t shown to be vicious yet! He’d hopped around various places, was still considered A Rogue, A Criminal, and as far as any comic reader could tell by trying to count up how many civilians may have been crossfired at, he had no On Purpose deaths racked? Like, the only thing you could really argue was he may have made someone drive their car off a cliff once, but I’m like 98% sure they’re fine. He’s not a murderer, he’s just here for a laugh and a long-con for funsies because he know he can get away with it!

AND THEN WE GET A LITTLE OLDER, LITTLE DARKER

[ I’M PUTTING A CUT HERE CAUSE AFTER I THREW IT INTO DRAFTS, I REALIZED I GOT REALLY LONG, I’M SORRY IF MY LAYOUT SUCKS ASS FOR THIS. ]

little more 90s Hair. Little more 90s stereotypical “But what if EVERYONE WENT TO HELL” demon plots against Satanic Hockey Hair Neron. And James? still wasn’t evil? He was a little dismissive when everyone ELSE died sure but he still in the end turned around like “nghgng I’m THE ONLY ONE”, purposely got his ass down there, regretted it, and then beat Neron at his own game to save the entire fucking world. Because! He could! And he did it so well. STILL NOT EVIL, even when he had a chance right then and there to take over everything alongside Neron should he so desire. Like, two words, maybe some under the table BJs depending on how you feel about that pairing (I don’t), and bam. He would’ve bested nearly any other villain in the DCU save like, Satan himself. Or i guess one of those world destroyers. But we’ll get back around to those BOY HOWDY WE WILL GET AROUND TO THOSE.

So James! Saves! The world! Sorta! Later they fight Neron again and his kid he somehow had somewhere down the road (it sounds like I’m complaining, i’m not, I love Billy and Mindy both I just wish they showed up like… ever again?) and he sTILL SAVES EVERYONE.

Piper helps by their 90s ponytails combined.

Somewhere around here, because dates and timing aren’t my strong suit, he also goes and messes with Bart for a bit. It’s pretty much a Spy Vs Spy episode, but with less bloodshed.

ANYWAY IT’S AFTER THIS POINT THAT THINGS GET… where I think the majority of “James is a Low Rate Joker” comes from?

For some unknown goddamn reason, in between issues (James wasn’t a Super Frequent Rogue? He’d show up, sure, but in the huge run of the series he’d just kind of vanish for 20 issues at a time and you’d go “welp, guess he’s still alive”) James went super-cop? like, the FBI? For some reason? Hired James “I am a probably still wanted felon, a man who has escaped jail numerous times, probably never served a full sentence, known Trickster and liar” Jesse. to the FBI. And for so many issues it’s like he legit just. Did this. He threatens to shoot Piper who he was up until this very moment, considerably very close friends with (as far as comics would show Rogue/Rogue friendships), unwilling to help his friend clearly framed for murder of his parents and losing his mind by the day. Despite James talking Hart down a little on the whole ‘THE MAYOR IS ROSCOE ADN NOBODY BELIEVES MEEEEEEEE” thing.

Also he steals Digger’s dead ass corpse?

FBI James is a fucking enigma. Here he is standing up for Gay Rights even though Piper is like “mm maybe I should forgive my abuser??”

BUT. AFTER THIS? WE GET COUNTDOWN WHICH IS JUST. Countdown is. IT’s a problem. James’s personality is IMMEDIATELY HORRIBLY u-turned into “well we need SOMEONE to be the Bad Guy to Piper’s Good!” DESPITE. ALL THESE YEARS OF COMICS.This is the shit you’ll see people who don’t know better or just want a reason to hate the Trickster (despite being 100% okay for them to just say he’s annoying/they don’t like his tights/acrobats are stupid) reference. James is, suddenly, very abruptly, a homophobe. Like an “ew don’t touch me” level homophobe because I’m pretty sure DC snorts cocaine and threw a dart at a board for “how could they make these two fight” and landed on GAY RIGHTS IS TRENDING.

BUTSTILL IN THE FUCKING END OF ALL OF THIS?After so many issues of James being a complete fuckass prick?

springboards himself from his current job of being railroad face putty to catching bullets to make sure Piper wasn’t gonna die. Without knowing the proceedings of this entire plotline, James out of nowhere after so much gaybashing, still finds it in him to leap into the path of multiple bullets and save Piper. Because, yknow, he’s evil!

Later it’s shown he’s been working to take everyone down (y’know, like when he was in the FBI) and left Piper specific helpful notes to do it himself. Because Evil Bad Guy! Helping his gone-good friend! Take down bad guys!

DC I STILL HAVE SO MANY GODDMAN QUESTOINgsd

But yeah that’s. That’s where we last saw James. in 2007, dead, after saving Piper when he could have easily pulled a Joker and ripped HIM down to take hte bullets and etcetc, y’know. Something a Very Bad Person would’ve done, like the characterization we’ve seen now.

His ghost (easily argued as Piper’s own mental construction of James sassing him) sasses Hartley to even, in his mental state, saw off James’s hand so Piper doesn’t have to lug his weight around and has a fighting chance at living. And in the end, when Piper’s fighting the thing that can destroy the fucking world, it’s shown only Piper was the one who could save them? Because his flute, and his musical ability, and [enter DC comic science here]. You could argue this was James, once again, somehow knowing the long-con at play here, getting screwed over at EVERY turn, and sacrificing himself so they ‘good’ team had a fighting chance.You could also argue this is me losing my mind trying to make sense of the things they made James do. (my running argument is he was purposely a prick to push Piper away, so he could keep him safe)

Also Piper plays James a Swan Song of Queen as the final boss explodes and he’s fully prepared to die. So like. There’s that.

AND THATS BASICALLY THE COMICS? The main, ‘canon timeline’ comics. I’m missing a LOT of little things here and there, but I’m not missing anything like body counts, or murder attempts, beyond the old Silver Age “Bad guy of the week” things like trying to make Flash’s head explode, or you know. Other “nobody really has a personality, we just have quirks”.

MY NUMBER ONE GUESS TO WHERE THIS NEW PERSONALITY TREND COMES FROM?

Mark Hamil|’s OG run as him in the old live action show. That characterization was fun, for the time, and I even enjoyed it cause it was just that off the wall and you could tell it was what they used to decide he should be the Joker for the BATS Joker. Consider it a prototype (combined with all the previous comic jokers but that’s not for this long ass post)

And if it’d stayed there, that’d be it! That’s it! But then JLU came along, and they referenced the old show for their version of James with a sprinkling of early-era comics, and a lot of people loved and watched that show. That was their version of the Trickster, because it was their first meeting with him! And I can’t fault that! But that guy was clearly off his rocker and I’m sure if the JLU allowed a higher rating, it would’ve been even closer to the old TV show.

And both of THOSE were heavily, heavily referenced for the CW version, which as I’m at this point now means I need to slap my usual anti-CW tag onto things. I hate the CW James. There is so little comic in him it’s almost disgusting, and they ramped up so much of the Joker side of JLU & OGTV he might as well just be the Joker. It’s not a good representation of him at all. I have, also, only seen his first appearance episode, so maybe I’m wrong? But when you fuck up hard on the first run, why would I return for round 2?

So with ALL THIS–

REBOOT TIME. Whatever the newnew remake is calling itself.

At first! With how James was! In the first panel flash of him clearly behind the scenes tugging so many wires and lines, watching everything with a bucket of popcorn while pulling others to his side, sitting pretty in an old museum? warehouse? highlighted in purples and vintage toys, I was like “holy shit this it. This is My Boy, back from the goddamn limbo-dead. It’s him.” But then“taking over the city entirely” to do? What? Turn it into the world’s biggest Trickster themepark? Make everyone wear striped leggings and combat boots? Martial Law of murder if you don’t carry rubber chickens? This is already veering from anything major James has ever done. As it stands I can’t see the gag here. Its’ weirdly dark and edgy, and way too close to something we saw the 90s TV show Trickster do, in the episode where he basically took over the place. The previews show him being what I’m assuming a Judge, Jury, & Executioner joke– and unless this spins into a Clopin song and dance number and his little hand puppet crops up to slam the button on the guillotine, I’m not having it, DC.

They’re trying to tie him back into the CW, despite the writer saying he really enjoyed the Neron-era things with James (if I’m remembering the interview correctly). And it’s also why you may see me constantly saying “Well I sure as fuck hope Neron shows up” at anything new that’s released, to explain away all of… this.

This isn’t him. If they wanted a murderous Trickster, they should’ve just used Axel. The kid, canonly, tied explosives to stray dogs and homeless people. AXEL is the not-good Trickster, the murderous Trickster, the one you aren’t suppose to feel sorry for beyond being in way over his head due to his young age.

i think I somehow didn’t answer your question

TL;DR

it sucks? it’s also great because there’s a .5% chance that maybe they’ll do it right and won’t reference the fucking 90s noncomic media. But then they do. And all I can do is laugh and shrug like ‘welp I expected nothing’. But when they get it RIGHT it’s like christmas came early.

#anticwflash #james jesse #the trickster #god tumblr don't fuck this post up for me #Anonymous #remember when James made Mark and Digger BOTH run into a wall cause he looney tuned their asses with a black hole??

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mercurygray · 5 years

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Mercy Street? I'm a little one-track right now. Alternately, A Discovery of Witches - what's another major even in world history Matthew's been through?

So, I took this prompt and kind of squished it with another post - I think it was from @begins-with-an-absence-of-desire - about a Downton crossover and said, Interwar Oxford and vampires on shooting weekends. That’s a thing we need.

Sometimes his mother could be infuriating.

Matthew had finally settled into his new rooms at Oxford, one more pale, anxious face among all the other pale, anxious faces, and what had Ysabeau done but come barreling in fresh from Paris like some over-zealous society mother hen to drag him away to the country.

He knew she didn’t approve of his experiments, nor did his father - but if Baldwin could brood in Threadneedle Street buying and selling the world, and Verin swan through the backstreet cabarets of Berlin, and Stasia sit in state somewhere in Shanghai presiding like an empress over a string of gambling houses and opium dens, then he was entitled to something to call his own, and if it was too staid for his parents - well, that was just too bad.

This would be his…fourth? fifth? time at Oxford - a new degree, a new college, new people and new ideas to explore. This time would be easier, after a fashion - so many of the new men were already older, coming out of the army to finish degrees that the war had pushing into a waiting room. They came with a sense of comradeship already built, their proving under fire forging links far stronger than ties of school colors and cricket games ever had. And if they assumed that he had passed the war as they had, what was the harm in that? He had been a soldier, more than once, for England and for France; he knew something of mud, and blood, and death, and he knew what it was like to do things that terrified you, that you’d never thought yourself capable of doing.

It would have been simpler to move back into Woodstock, but there was something about being in the thick of the university that comforted him, grounded him to his work. At Woodstock, he remembered being a spy, a courtier, a poet. In Oxford, he was a scientist, an examiner of puzzles, a fellow sufferer on the wheel of academia.

Except, of course, for this weekend, when he would have to play the handsome, available son for whatever bored daughters of England’s aristocracy had come along for a shooting weekend.

Was his mother bored? Had she done this to spite him? Was this payback for abandoning her (her words, not his) during the war? Or simply one more effort to get him to abandon his research? Matthew didn’t truly know, but if several centuries had taught him nothing else, it was pointless to argue with Ysabeau de Clermont.

Whatever the reason, the matriarch of the Clermont clan was, at present, looking very pleased with herself in the backseat of the saloon car conveying them up to whatever country estate they were meant to be visiting this weekend.

“You haven’t asked where we’re going.” She sounded a little put out, but Matthew would be damned before he gave her the satisfaction.

“One English country house is much like another.”

“It’ll be fun,” his mother said with a smile, nudging his knee with her own. “You’re too serious these days, Matthew - you need a little color in your life.”

Ah, color. Cecelia had been colorful, and how had that ended? Debutante found dead in Seine; foul play suspected. Matthew hardly trusted himself any more where color was concerned. Let Stasia have her exiled White Russian princes to fuel the family gossip and let him have a quiet, uncomplicated, colorless life in Oxford.

Well, if this was the price for a few months’ peace, he’d pay it - a few days to shoot, and ride, and pay pretty compliments, and then he could go back to his lab and his books.

They drove for an hour or two down roads that had been set down around the time of the Conquest and only macadamed to suit current taste, making a turn into an old and well-maintained park, the road opening up for a moment on the long park in front, the house crowning a small hill.

Ysabeau smiled, their destination in sight. “Ah, Godwit.”

Godwit Park was not really what it claimed to be, its pedigree just as complicated as that of the family that lived within, built 17th century in the Jacobean, remodeled 18th century in Free Gothic, appended, added on, gardens redone, redecorated by the wife of the 14th holder of the title, until the thing being presented was as far from the original as its creator had intended. It was, for Matthew, a painful artistic exercise, coming back to a place that he had known and loved in its first incarnation only to see the things that gave him joy taken away, the ghosts of well-carved cornices and chimney pieces lingering only in his memory. Not to mention the actual ghosts - most homes in England had at least two or three - which naturally flocked to creatures like moths to candles.

It had not always been thus - he could remember a time when every self-respecting noble house in England had at least one witch on staff, a housekeeper or nursemaid who managed these things along with other small domestic concerns. Alas, those days were long gone, fallen prey to Victorian respectability and universal education. There was less magic left in England, now, and less creatures to remember it.

And Matthew was old enough to remember, at least, the days when the park had taken its name and the first Lord Belhurst had declared that he would only have people of ‘good wit’ at his table. There had been dancing in the hall, and great quantities of wine, and toasts had been drunk to Charles and his pretty, witty Nell. Yes, that had been a party -and this weekend would be very, very different.

Here was the drive, and here the front door, servants assembled in black and white, and here was the lady of the house to welcome them. “Isabelle!”

“Louisa!” They kissed in the continental manner, like two old schoolfriends, though that was hardly how they knew each other. (There was something about charity work for French refugees, and tea dances, and Claridges.) “You remember Matthew, I hope.”

Lady Belhurst looked him over with an assessing eye. “I feel like every time I see you, Mr. Clairmont, you get taller. Isabelle tells me you’re at Oxford, studying!”

Matthew silently remembered a time when no one sent to Oxford (including young Lord Belhurst, son of the house’s builder) had actually studied, and smiled. “One has to keep busy somehow.”

“Well, I am glad you’ve made time for us,” Louisa said. “We’re only a small party this weekend, just twelve, and I had such a time making up my numbers. None of Freddie’s friends could get away and when Isabelle said she would bring you it was such a blessing. I think Lydia’s through here.”

There was no time to see what changes the family had wrought in the intervening years - Matthew caught a glimpse of the young Lord Belhurst with his dogs at his feet in a heavy gilded frame, a flash of the young Lady Belhurst, his wife, in full court array down another corridor. (Her hair always smelled of chamomile, to keep its color; Charles had given her those pearls, and she’d gambled them away for - but it hardly mattered now.)

There were two women sitting in the drawing room enjoying their tea. Lydia Belhurst was built in the family pattern, with a generous face and a jolly smile that would have looked well under Cavalier curls, but the woman sitting with her was a different creature entirely, all fine lines and flashing eyes and cultivated coldness, her beauty of an older stamp, dark where Lydia’s was light. She did not seem the kind of woman who would greet a friend as Lydia did, rising quickly from her seat and coming to embrace him.

“Oh, Matthew! Mama said you might come. Has she told you you’ve saved the numbers?”

“I’m in danger of having that be how I’m introduced all weekend,” he quipped, and Lydia laughed. But was that anger he had seen on the other woman’s face? Disdain, perhaps?

“I’ll try hard not to say it again, then. Do you know Lady Mary Crawley? Her people are up in Yorkshire - the Earls of Grantham. Mary, this is Matthew Clairmont - one of Freddie’s friends.”

Again that flash of unease! “A pleasure.” A slim, elegant hand was offered, delivering a handshake that meant business. Power seemed to crackle around her shoulders, but Lady Mary Crawley was no witch - only a woman used to getting what she wanted. A dark dress and a wedding ring told him everything he needed to know - widowed, doubtless. Some well-meaning relative had dispatched her in the same way that Ysabeau had dragged him along. Well, there was a kinship to be had there.

What on earth was that damnable smile of Lydia’s? She looked like a cat who’d gotten into the cream. But there was no time to ask - her attention was quickly drawn out the window. “Good heavens, is that the Seatons? I thought they wouldn’t be here for ages! There’s tea here, Matthew, if you’d like some - must dash!”

And, just like that, she was gone, leaving the two of them alone. Mary watched Lydia leave and sighed. “I wish they wouldn’t be so damn obvious about it.” She turned to Matthew and gave a thin, belabored smile, the kind that is generally sick of playing games and having to give such smiles. “I’ll apologize now, Mr. Clairmont, and spare you the effort - I’m afraid Lady Belhurst’s romantic plotting won’t come to anything.” He tried to look politely confused. “I’ve been listening to Lydia extol your considerable virtues for the last half-hour and now she has - conveniently - left us alone.”

Ah. Yes, that rather explained it. “I appreciate the honesty - but Lady Belhurst’s plotting wouldn’t have come to anything from my end, either. At the moment I’m rather married to my work.”

“Oh?” She looked interested at that - a welcome changes from her usual round, then. Mary Crawley was used to being an object of universal desire. (As she would be, if she were beautiful, titled, and - were the Earls of Grantham rich? He couldn’t remember.)

“I’m down at Oxford. University College - Chemistry.”

She looked him over, making some small sound of amusement. “Funny, you don’t look at all like an academic.”

Was that a challenge? “Why, what should an academic look like?”

“Well, I don’t know…thinner and less …rigorous. And you’re missing a pair of glasses and a…a general air of derangement.”

There was something about the way she said rigorous that sparked something - this was a woman well-used to managing her desires, a common enough type for women of her class. A physical attraction was to mean little to her, the primary prize a man’s wealth and his station. But if she was a widow, she’d presumably made the first marriage that her family had so desired - which meant she was now free to do as she wished in the matter of her second. So you find me attractive, Mary Crawley, and you’d rather you didn’t - because that would make brushing me off just that much easier. Well.

“I’m so sorry, I seem to have left all of those in my other trunk. I can go and come back wearing something more suitable, if you’d rather.” A smile - genuine, this time. Why did that feel like victory? Why did he care? “So,” he asked, bending down to pour himself a cup of tea and settling into the sofa. “What shall we do to encourage their plots?”

Are Mary and Matthew going to re-invent fake dating for their shooting weekend? Probably, because…that would be entertaining to me. Why not set this at Downton? I liked the idea of being in a sort of ‘neutral’ territory.

I can’t remember right now the name of the other woman Matthew fell in love with, after Eleanor - was it Celine? Cecelia? It started with a C.

On a side note, I’m totally in love with the idea of Matthew having a kind of kinship with this generation of the shell-shocked officer class.

#all the crossovers #a discovery of witches #downton abbey #all the interwar dramas

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ashleybenlove · 7 years

Text

Hidden Talent

This episode is definitely one of my favorites. We get to hear Say The Word, Patton Oswalt shows up again, and Sherri Shepherd plays a character named MC Honey. Sherri hosted the Newlywed Game for a while and she also played Angie Jordan, Tracy’s wife, on 30 Rock. At the time of this episode’s airing she was on a show called Less Than Perfect (which apparently also starred Patrick Warburton, who also appears in this episode too). She would appear a total of 3 times on KP.

This episode literally begins with Kim trying out new gadgets at lunch. She calls the thermal sun glasses “flossy” Urbandictionary says that means extremely flashy/showy.

Kim has a laser ring. At school. It shoots Ron’s hair.

Wade has tech glitches on his end. This will cause problems later.

Bonnie’s older sibs won the talent contest in past 4 years. We meet Connie and Lonnie later in S3. Also Kim’s line: “And your talent is what? Singing... your own praises? Acting... obnoxious?” is amazing.

Bonnie has done 12 years of ballet training. That’s a lot.

Ron signed up Kim for the talent show WITHOUT ASKING. Not cool. And Kim gets mad at him for it. GOOD.

16 styles of kung fu.

Wade calls but it is not Wade.

MC Honey!

Dementors lair is really cool.

Ron’s like, you’re Kim Possible, you can do anything. Kim proceeds to jump around the red laser things which is pretty much how she started the save the world thing as we see in A Sitch In Time.

Kim did some singing as a young child. Silent Night. Probably one of the most overtly Christian religion references we get in the show (except perhaps, Christmas).

Kim going through all of Dementor’s henchman gives me so much life.

Kim is suspicious about the fact that Dementor named the invention they were asked to steal from his lair, and just in general but everyone’s like IT’S FINE.

Also Kim can’t hit the high notes. It’s funny because CCR is a great singer and was even Belle on Broadway. Also, Kim was wearing braces in the flashback so she was probably 12 or so. Also I guess they wanted to put more use to the model they made in A Sitch In Time of her as a preteen.

I feel like you can tell its not Wade because Wade is a little more chill than usual??? Also Kim definitely is like unsure of the legitness.

The disguised voice is actually Shego.

Drakken’s basically using mocap technology.

Kim, Ron, and Rufus are in the vents. To spy on Bonnie. Kim expresses disbelief that Bonnie would spend 12 hard years doing ballet. Which yeah, from what I understand ballet is super duper hard.

Bonnie’s wearing legwarmers. Did she miss the memo about legwarmers being passe like forever.

Serious suggestion or mocking. Ah Drakken and Shego, you’re the best.

We hear some of Say The Word.

Ron believes in her so much, aww.

Drakken as Wade contacts Kim and he definitely struggles with dealing with Kim. She tells Wade to chill.

Why is the adapter thing for the teleporter plugged into the phone line. Why would you trust landlines to be a matter transporter. Ron is like “It’s all fiber optics, Kim.” I mean, I guess.

Ron and Rufus head back to finish prepwork on the song and Kim stays behind to deal with the mission.

And then REAL Wade contacts her and apologizes for being out of contact.

Tahj Mowry proceeds to argue with himself.

Kim says “surprise me” in response to Drakken’s gloating about horrible fates. He’s all YOU TEENAGERS AND YOUR SASS.

Drakken shows exactly what’s gonna happen. A bottomless chasm that fills with water (that Shego calls out) and sharks and a squid are involved.

Kim’s like eh beats humiliation at the talent show I guess. Is this like that whole thing with millennial nihilism or whatever?

When the box starts filling with water, Kim’s face gets sad. Oh gods. She’s pretty much faced with the probability of drowning. Yikes. I do not wanna think about Dire Straits and Hiccup being like “I wouldn’t leave you either” to Toothless. *deep breath*

Bonnie is wearing the Björk Swan Dress. I love it. That was only like a couple of years before at the time.

Barkin gets up and he has that military music playing for him. That’s like his theme music.

Kim escaping from the box is incredible.

Kim has a funky little breathing apparatus that looks like the one from Phantom Menace that Obi Wan and Qui Gon use? I’m not sure what it is but she holds it in her mouth.

They play Jaws like music as Kim swims away from the shark. Y’all should have paid for the John Williams music. Probably would have been a distraction. And too scary. And also absurdly too much money.

Kim tries to use her body to break open the glacial ice. Um... you’re gonna hurt yourself.

She uses a high note to break the ice.

While Drakken uses the teleporter thing, it rings. His mother is calling. We’ll meet her later this season. More on her when she shows up.

KIM PATS DRAKKEN ON THE HEAD PATRONIZINGLY. I LOVE IT.

Kim uses the teleporter phone thing to get to the Talent Show just in time.

Ron misses out on Kim’s EXCELLENT PERFORMANCE OF SAY THE WORD because he’s knocked out. And it doesn’t look like anyone is videotaping it either.

We also see her family. Bros are bored, her parents are 😍.

Kim got an amazing response.

Ron won though, because quantity over quality. Snort. Sorry Bonnie and Kim. Kim claps for Ron though. So, like, good ending.

#ashleybenlove posts #ashleybenlove rewatches Kim Possible 2K17 #Kim Possible #season 2 #Hidden Talent

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