#they wasted so much fucking time in seasons 1 and 2 when all the meat of the whole fucking series IS IN THE END

[deadlydelicious]

Kx's Supernatural favorites

Top 5 Seasons

Season 10

Season 12

Season 2

Season 4

Season 14

Least Favorite: Season 7

Top 5 Side Characters (Any Character who is not Dean, Sam, Cas, or Bobby)

Donna Hanscum

Mary Winchester

Eileen Leahy

Death

Jack

(Claire was so close in here, but I had to cut at five. 100% think Claire should be the focus of the inevitable revival)

Top 3 Story Arcs

Mark of Cain

Sam going through the trials/ sealing hell

The OG season 5 apocalypse

Top 5 Story Arcs/Characters with the most wasted potential (like to the point i'm angry)

The Leviathan (They should have been horrifying, not a joke)

Adam Milligan (Rescuing him from hell and bonding should have been a whole story)

Evil!Michael (All that build up and we only get like 3 episodes of evil!Michael Dean. I wanted a whole 0.5 of a season)

Mary Winchester (I actually love her characterization, but its clear the writers had no clue what to do with her so they kept sticking her on ice?)

Human!Cas (This would have been so much more interesting handled at close range in the bunker rather than a couple one-offs)

Top 3 Villains (lets all be clear, the best villains are sometimes our friends)

The Mark of Cain

Crowley

Godstiel

Least favorite villain: Metatron (season 9 deserved better)

Top 5 episodes of Supernatural (specifically thinking 'good episodes' not 'big plot' episodes, so finales and openers only earn a place if they earn it)

Red Meat

Executioners Song

The Man Who Would Be King

The Curious Case of Dean Winchester

As Time Goes By

Top 3 Episodes of each season

Season 1

Faith

Skin

Something Wicked

Season 2

Roadkill

What Is and What Should Never Be

All Hell Breaks Loose Part 2

Season 3

Bad Day at Black Rock

Mystery Spot

Jus In Bello

Season 4

Lazarus Rising

Jump The Shark

It's A Terrible Life

Season 5

Dark Side of the Moon

The Curious Case of Dean Winchester (Even back when I'd only seen a few seasons on and off, I think about the tragedy of the 'villains' from this episode so much, they were so fucking affecting)

Changing Channels

Season 6 (aka the second to worst season)

The Man Who Would Be King

The French Mistake

My Heart Will Go On

Season 7 (aka the worst season. I'm honestly picking the worst of crap here)

Death's Door (The only beautiful thing this season made)

Reading Is Fundamental

Time After Time

Season 8

Sacrifice (I know its the finale, but that confrontation in the church and the image of heaven falling was fucking chefs kiss)

As Time Goes By (I'm a slut for Henry Winchester, sue me)

Remember the Titans

Season 9

Bad Boys

Heaven Can't Wait

Alex Annie Alexis Ann

Season 10

Executioners Song

Soul Survivor

The Things They Carried

Season 11

Red Meat

Baby

Into The Mystic

Season 12

Keep Calm and Carry On

Celebrating the Life of Asa Fox

Ladies Drink Free

Season 13

The Big Empty

Breakdown

Wayward Sisters

Season 14

Damaged Goods

Mint Condition

Stranger in a Strange Land

Season 15

The Gamblers

The Trap

Our Father Who Aren't In Heaven (that final Adam line, OOOF)

#supernatural #spn #kx watches spn #dean winchester #sam winchester #castiel #adam milligan #mary winchester #donna hanscum

[alycremie]

OC Introductions #3: Lena

So Transgender Stoner won the poll, honestly wasn't a very fair match. And since I figured she'd probably win anyway, I've spent all day extending their lore.

Also, I haven't mentioned this before, but if you want ask anything about my OCs, feel free to use the ask box :3

As per usual, OC images are picrews unless stated otherwise. I'll link the picrews at the bottom of this post. It's not my art. Don't credit me with it.

Soléne Monique De La Riviere, or as her friend know her, Lena Riviere, is pretty tall. She's 6'0", or 183 cm. She has kobicha-toned skin, and is generally lean. She's skinny with long arms and especially long legs, having a petite build. She isn't particularly muscular or strong, and looks more like she'd shatter and make the dry bones noise. Her eye colour is...unknown. Lena's most defining feature is her hair. She has a massive blonde afro that extends out past her shoulders, with curly hair completely obscuring her face from the cheekbones-up. Almost no one has actually seen her eyes, and she puts a lot of effort and money into keeping her hair big. I've failed to mention face shapes before, but Lena's is rounded with soft cheeks and a defined nose. She wears lipstick in a lot of different colours, but her favourite is black. Lena is also COVERED in tattoos. She has so many and they cover almost every inch of her body. Some are good, some are bad, some are meaningful, some aren't. She dresses supremely gay, her most iconic outfit being an unbuttoned blue hawaiian shirt with a thick-strapped tank top underneath and high-waisted jeans.

Now, on to her personality.

Lena - ISFP, 7w8.

Lena fits quite poorly into personality archetypes. At her core, the best way to describe her is that she doesn't care. She's by far the most introverted of the group - not because she hates people, but because she's just ambivalent to them. She doesn't have much to say, and would rather observe and think about something than engage with it. She wholeheartedly believes most problems are caused by people caring too much about things that don't matter. And this is how she lives her life. Some accuse her of wasting her time and never trying, but she's perfectly content with getting Cs or Ds cuz "she didn't fail." While in many ways she's pretty relaxed and often tries to get others to join her - especially with how much she smokes 🍃  - she can often come off as emotionally detached and uncaring, and this can lead to issues when not caring isn't an option. Lena is the quiet one of the group. She eases the stronger personalities around her just by encouraging people to take basically everything less seriously, and serves as a foil to Roselyn's intense caring about *everything*.

Lena speaks English and French fluently, and her pronouns are She/They. She majored in Philosophy and was briefly in law school as a former gifted kid, but quit after realizing it wasn't she actually wanted to do. She's the lead vocalist and guitarist for the reggae fusion band Daughters of Sekhmet, which runs from 1987 to 1999, but for the first few years she also works as a grocery store manager. She loves music, watching TV, and hanging with her besties. Her favourite season is Winter, her birthday is January 17th, 1964, and her favourite food is soup. She's a vegetarian and refuses to eat meat. Lastly, she also doesn't label her sexuality. She pretty much just picks people at random and is like yeah, I want to date and/or fuck you. Those people are usually women but can be of any gender. Image 1 source: picrew.me/en/image_maker/1706331 Image 2 source: picrew.me/en/image_maker/1469769

#my ocs #my ocs stuff #my ocs tag #oc introductions #oc #creative writing #backstory #transgender stoner #character concept

[septemberrie]

(1) I found a tweet the other day (i'll send the link in another ask) from july 2020 from a brazilian fan acc that posted transcripts of audition tapes (sadly the videos have been deleted except for 1), most of them are almost word for word what was in the final script, but the one with farah and roz has more dialogue. I don't speak portuguese but it's similar enough to spanish, so i understand a few things without using a translator. I think the first part is roz basically saying she didn't

(2) didn't pair farah and saul because she thinks they'll sneak out? She says something like 'you can have sex with whoever you want, i'm not your mother' lol that reminded me of your roz in IWJR, referring to farah's office as her and saul's 'love nest', and how saul felt mocked by her comments, making him feel like a child. Then she mentions a first year student who died in battle and farah says he shouldn't have been fighting cause he's just a kid and wasn't ready. Roz says no one is ready, 

(3) and that farah is fierce on the battlefield but a student at heart. Farah argues that they're still people and it hurts when they lose someone, roz says that hurt is because of their failure, i think? Her soldiers don't waste time on tears, they have to keep fighting to protect the weak or something like that. I couldn't understand some words very well, but i liked the interaction, and roz really reminded me of how you write her. It's a pity we didn't see them interact a little bit more.

congrats anon, you sent me into a fucking SPIRAL

First of all, 😍😍😍 thank you for the compliments about Red!! I'm so glad you're liking how I portrayed the Saul & Roz relationship.

Second of all. Second. Of. All.

The transcript?? Of the season 1 audition??? Insane. INSANE. I'm making a separate post of it because there's SO MUCH MEAT IN THERE and I actually dislike some of it??? I think I can say that?

But it's so intriguing, I'm so so fucking grateful you brought it to my attention. You did your fucking detective work!!! amazing translations! I went over it with @skloomdumpster who's a native Portuguese speaker and she/we came to the same conclusions you did… we think this is legit, or as legit as you can get without coming from official channels. Which is INSANE, I can't believe they cut it; I loved every bit except the Silrah part because it goes against my hcs of them. But the repartee between Farah and Roz?? The implications??? Getting an actual wartime conversation between general and lieutenant?? Anon have I mentioned how grateful I am you found these!!! Even if this script is not canon, it's fascinating to pore over. WOWZA.

#fate the winx saga

[docholligay]

Clueless non-cooking American-raised answer: what even is a pot roast? Like, it's a phrase I saw in books sometimes, I think? But I don't really know what it means in terms of what it does to the meat and I have no idea if I've eaten it. (Basically this is me saying that I'm pretty sure plenty of your teenagers will have no idea.)

I need you to know, and I mean this in a very loving teasing sort of way, I legitimately laughed out loud at "What even is a pot roast?"

I'm using your ask to thank everyone for their VERY helpful comments, and yes, a lot of the appeal for me of doing the pot roast is that it's really easy, reasonably priced for a beef dish, but looks nice and the leftovers are FABULOUSLY reusable in a variety of ways, which for me is the big thing--I remember when I was experiencing food insecurity the thing I hated the MOST was eating leftovers for several days in a row, because it was cheaper to make a LOT of one thing. I think everyone who has experienced a rough go of things has certain things that remind them so powerfully of the experience that it sets them off in ways that are admittedly goofy, and mine is eating leftovers. HATE.

ANYWAY, pot roast! It's easy, sexy, and can be had very cheaply, especially if you manage to shop a sale!

POT ROAST

What you need is a cheap cut of meat--there's no "pot roast cut" but what you usually want to use are the tough cheap cuts that work really well for long cooking, so your rump roasts, your chuck roasts (usually what I buy), a 7 bone roast if you have a roaster big enough makes MARVELOUS pot roast and the bones make EXCEPTIONAL broth afterward. I used to recommend brisket, because brisket used to be cheap before every useless-ass barbecue dad decided that he wanted to be ~special and skilled~ but still just make MEAT instead of learning to cook pastry or something LIKE A LADY and so went and bought a Traeger to use to make subpar wastes of beef 3 times a year. SO brisket's expensive now.

Cheap cut of meat --no less than 3 pounds

beef broth (2 cups, save the other 2 cups for later in the week)

I can't tell the kids to use a heavy brown ale, but use a can of heavy brown ale. Alternatively, red wine is the classic choice, but I'm happiest with my brown ale.

Tomato paste (save the rest of the can for beef stroganoff later in the week)

seasoning: I'm going to have to figure out how to simplify, simplify for these kids without many resources, so I list these from contribute the most to contribute the least

- salt and pepper

-thyme

Worcestershire sauce

-bay leaf

-rosemary

-of course you can fuck around with whatever it is you like!

Sliced onions

potatoes cut into big chunks (Yukon golds do best)

Carrots cut into big chunks

Mushrooms are also very good in this

about 2 tbsp butter and 4 tbsp flour(ish)

Equipment: a dutch oven or deep roaster, depending on what you have and the size of your roast.

1. Heat your oven to 325. Low and slow is the way we're going here. This doesn't take a ton of ACTIVE time, but it takes a lot of cooking time.

2. Put salt and pepper all over your roast. Lightly dust it with about half of your flour. (When I do this for the teens, I will explain WHY we're doing all this to help teach them techniques they can hopefully crossapply) Then toss your dutch oven or roaster on the stovetop, and throw some olive oil or canola oil or whatever the fuck you have in that bad boy. Sear on all sides, with a nice deep golden crust. Take it out of the pan and toss it on a plate for a minute.

3. Put your onions in the pan and saute them, remembering to give them a little salt. Deglazing time! Throw your can of ale (or cup of red wine if you're a traditionalist) into the pan, making sure to scrape up the bits of detritus on the bottom of the pan, that's where the good stuff is.

4. Toss the beef broth and all of your flavorings in the pot. Set the roast back in the pot.

5. Cover with the lid, or tin foil, depending on what you've got. Toss it in the oven for about an hour and forty five minutes. Play video games! Read a book! Do chores! Whatever! The great thing about this is that so much of the cook time doesn't involve you at all.

6. After the time has passed, put the root vegetables into the pan with the roast, making sure to nestle them around and get good braising action in the liquid. Cover it back up and put it back into the oven for ROUGHLY one and a half to two hours. The great thing about this is YOU DON'T USE A THERMOMETER. (another reason I picked it) You cook it until it's fork tender! That is, easily flakes with a fork.

7. Take it out of the pot when its done and shred it with forks, knives, your hands. Put you pot back on the stovetop, we're going to make gravy.

8. Make a thickening paste--take your butter and flour and mash it into a paste, and then add that to the pot, cooking for a few minutes to thicken (You can also use cornstarch to thicken, if you prefer. Remember cornstarch CANNOT be added straight to hot liquids, and has to be mixed with a bit of water first)

9. Serve! Put some meat and vegetables on a plate and cover with gravy. Some people choose to put all the meat back into the pot and coat with gravy before serving--I don't like to do that because I feel it limits my leftover options.

#oh wow you can do sub-bullets anymore #what a crock of shit #my AU bullet point posts probably make ZERO SENSE NOW

[shirtlesssammy]

5x12: Swap Meat

At a bar, a woman sits alone, enjoying her margarita, when one Sam Fucking Winchester wanders over and asks the barkeep ---NOT at all awkwardly--for a banana daiquiri. He’s either deep undercover or something is seriously hinky. There’s a lot of sugar in banana daiquiris, Sam. Crystal introduces herself and Sam introduces himself as Gary! She then propositions him, much to his cluelessness. 

The poor dumb boy puts it together and “would love to have the sex with [her].” We then pan over to see Sam REALLY isn’t Sam at all.

Housatonic, Massachusetts

36 Hours Earlier

Sam and Dean visit Donna, an old babysitter --well, she was a maid at a motel they’d stay at while John went hunting. She looked out for them. It seems that her family house has a poltergeist problem. Bumps and broken items have led to the thing attacking their daughter, Katie. 

Katie lifts her shirt to reveal “Murderd Chylde” carved into her abdomen. I'd get some serious vaseline on those wounds if you don’t want scarring, Katie. Yeesh. Sam and Dean tell the family to skedaddle while they take care of things. 

They stop at a diner for food next. Dean picks up their order from the counter from Banana Daiquiri Gary! He’s not impressed with Sam’s salad shake, and neither is Dean (but when is he ever?) 

They talk about Donna and how she’s got a good thing going. Dean asks Sam if he’d want to settle down at all and have a family, and Sam answers, “no.” Dean looks contemplative about it. 

Sam finds lore on the house. A Samuel Pickett owned the house in the 1700s and hung a woman, Maggie Briggs, there for witchcraft. As the brothers talk, we watch Gary hyperfixate on Sam. 

Sam goes to check out the town’s archives for where Maggie Briggs was buried. As he’s walking back to the motel, he hears a noise and then gets shot in the neck with a dart. Lights out, Sammy. 

He comes to later, wearing Gary’s work uniform. He starts walking but the cops pick him up claiming his family is worried about him. “My brother called you?” Sam asks, incredulous. 

No. The cops take him to a suburban house where a worried couple pops out and hugs Sam in relief. He asks who they are and in return they want to know if he’s drunk. 

They keep calling him Gary. It’s then that Sam looks in the window of the cop car --and sees his reflection. He looks like Gary!

Meanwhile, Gary is checking out his hot new bod. Dean shows up and wonders where he’s been. Gary placates him with food. He also tells Dean that the maid saw all their weapons and they better get out of there. While Dean uses the restroom, Gary gets rid of all Dean’s phones. 

THEN he has the NERVE to ask to drive. He doesn’t get far. And quite frankly, Dean’s spidey sense should be spiking through the ceiling at this point. 

Sam keeps trying to reach his brother, with no luck. He calls the motel to learn that the two dudes in room 102 left in the middle of the night. So, Sam starts digging through Gary’s stuff and discovers items of witchcraft. Before he can dig too much further though, he’s called to the family breakfast. 

His “dad” starts grilling him about getting drunk the night before. Sam’s got better things to worry about than placating some dude he doesn’t know. He also needs to learn more about Gary, so he starts interviewing the family about what they've noticed in him lately. 

The dad wants to know if Sam’s “smoking drugs”. Sam then asks if they’ve ever seen him with a black book recently. His sister, Sydney, reacts to that question. The mom reacts to him eating toast --his allergy to wheat gluten!! 

Sydney later reveals to Sam that there IS a book.

Gary and Dean are still working the case. Dean informs Gary that they have to search graves for Maggie’s body. Nerd of Nerd’s Gary knows exactly where Maggie Briggs is buried: Isiah Pickett’s basement. He also reveals that he murdered her and her unborn child before burying them in the basement. Dean connects the ‘murderd chylde’ clue. 

Once in the car, Bob Seger starts blasting, and Gary tells Dean to turn it up. 

Sam continues to leave messages for Dean. He ALSO has to navigate the tortures of high school again. Sam meets two of Gary’s friends and asks where his locker is (he’s still drunk, after all). 

For This is a Look TM Science:

(And let’s pause for a moment to enjoy Sam’s striped hoodie. Definitely one of the top 5 wardrobe choices on this show.) 

He finds the book in the back of Gary’s locker. 

Gary and Dean find the grave in the basement of the Pickett house. Dean gets to digging while Gary aims his gun at Dean. Before he can shoot, the ghost comes out to play. It starts beating up the both of them but Gary’s able to burn the bones.

Gary’s extremely nosy friends follow Sam out of the school. While it looks like we’re gearing up for some good ol’ Ferris Bueller shenanigans, Trevor shoots Sam in the throat (GAH) with a sedative dart. 

Meanwhile, at a bar, Dean orders a burger with extra bacon and a fried egg on top. Excuse me...I need to go eat an entire branchbouquet of kale in retaliation. Mysteriously, Sam orders the same thing. “Who are you and what have you done with my brother?” Dean asks. But it’s just a lighthearted comment and they raise a toast to a successful hunt.

Gary’s over the moon overabout the day he just had. His joy makes Dean suspicious the way nothing else has. Oh, you sweet sad sunflowers. Gary lays out Sam Winchester’s happiness list: 1) gun 2) getting drunk 3) looks like Sam Winchester.

“You ever feel like your whole future is being decided for you?” Gary asks. OH YES, Dean tells him. I forget for a minute that I’m watching a season 5 episode as the Dean-Winchester-feels-trapped-in-the-narrative-sorrow threatens to overwhelm me. But there areis no time for FEELINGS when the narrative must go on! Cut to later in the night, when Gary gets picked up by the woman in the bar from the cold open. Dean puts his thinking face on while Gary ecstatically leaves the bar. 

Back at Kid Kidnapperz clubhouse, Sam’s tied up. Trevor calls Gary and asks him if he’s killed Dean yet. “I’m working up to it,” Gary replies while sitting shirtless under a leopard print bedspread in the cougar’s lair. (Just...no on SO MANY LEVELS.) Sam listens to this with great alarm.

Sam demands to know how these rando teenagers know Dean. “Everybody knows Dean. He’s Hell’s most wanted,” Trevor retorts. Sam puts two and two together and comes up with a coupla dumb kids who took a deep dive into witchcraft and started talking to demons. 

“You’re just kids,” Sam laments. Trevor and Nora fill in more blanks. They were messing around with a Moste Dark Booke of Witchcraftery, as one does, and suddenly Gary went into a trance and drew a fairly decent picture of Dean. Gary also heard a voice - it was setting a bounty on Dean’s head, and apparently broadcast through the witch trance network.

Gary heard a voice in his head - it was setting a bounty on Dean’s head, and apparently broadcast through the witch trance network. Nora now has second thoughts, so Trevor ups his stupidity game and starts to summon a demon. 

That night, Gary creeps into the motel room and grabs Dean’s gun up from a nearby chair. He cocks the pistol. . He aims it at the shape under the covers...and Dean grabs him from behind and demands to know who he really is. (Silly Gary, Dean stopped sleeping under covers after he got back from Hell.)

Back in Trevor’s basement, he finishes the demon summoning. Nora looks up with black eyes.

She’s very interested to learn that they’ve got Dean Winchester in their sights. Trevor tells her where Dean is immediately. She absorbs this and swings her attention to Sam. She realizes it’s Sam “Boy King of Hell” Winchester sitting there and is suddenly VERY interested. Trevor asks her where his reward is, and when he pushes for it she first taunts, then kills him. (All the while Sam is in the background GRINDING HIS TEETH.)

Gary weeps, tied up in the motel room while Dean listens to voicemail after voicemail from Sam. Gary babbles about Sam’s whereabouts but it’s too late. Demon!Nora saunters in and lobs Dean across the room. Wherps. She offers Gary a powerful future but first he’s got to meet “the boss.” All he has to do is say “Yes” and they can have a nice chat together! Very sneaky! Dean attacks her while she’s cooking up her big plan and then Gary and Dean tag team an exorcism, freeing Nora of the demon. Later, Gary performs the incantation to swap bodies with Sam again. (I shake my head yet again that THIS is the ONLY body swap episode we got in the whole fifteen season run. What a goddamn waste of comedy potential.

With Sam restored to normal (or as normal as a Winchester can get), Dean confronts Gary. He tells him that if he were just a little older, he’d be dead right now. With those comforting parting words, they bring Gary and Nora back to their lives. Sam tells Gary to quit his whining about his life. It’s possible to rebel in a “healthy, non-satanic way.” Furthermore, he tells Gary that he wishes he had his life. Once the kids are out of earshot, Dean comments on Sam’s kind words. “Totally lied. Kid’s life sucked ass.” The apple-pie family crap is stressful, Sam decides. 

Maybe they just don’t know what they’re missing, Dean rejoins, and I calmly tie an anvil around my ankle and drop it off a cliff into a dramatically large canyon. 

They head out into the rainy night...to fight another day!

Doppelquöter:

You ever think that you'd want something like that? Wife, rugrats, the whole nine?

No matter how much you fight it, you can't stop the plan. The stupid, stupid plan

Um, I wouldn't exactly call praying to our dark overlord “goofing around”

 Want to read more? Check out our Recap Archive!

#spn recap #dean winchester #sam winchester #spn 5x12 #swap meat #supernatural season 5

[popculturebuffet]

Of Moons, Millionares and Mothers Part 2: The Ballad of Duke Balloney or “I’m Flintheart Glomgold and I Always Will Be!” (Commission for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy people. I”m Jake, I review stuff and today continues my look at Ducktales season 2 story arcs, of Moons, Millionares and Mothers. And while this arc as a whole is paid for by WeirdKev27, due to the Arc’s length, 17 parts including 15 episodes and 6 comics (2 of which will be in the same review), this one’s special as he’s using his patreon review every month to do so. If you too want me to review something of your choice simply hit up my ask box or join my patreon at patreon.com/popculture buffet. You get access to my discord, to pick a short when I do a group of them for characters birthdays, help me hit neat stretch goals like my next which is reviewing a darkwing duck episode a month, and best of all EXCLUSIVE REVIEWS. And I just added one this saturday of a carl barks story centerting around wigs, legal battles and attempted murder, both by our villian.. and by our heroes...

I will never get tired of that panel nor the boys inexplicably finding a blowgun. Point is it’s there if you want it at THIS LINK, but enough plugging so I can help pay the streaming bills and keep doing this... let’s get to the meat of things shall we?

This episode begins the second arc of this retrospective, The Glomgold Arc. And this arc was inevitibly going to come to this blog for two reasons. The first is that I have made no secret, in fact i’ve shouted it as loud as I can the neighbors are concerned, that I fucking love the 2017 Version of Flintheart Glomgold. 

Glomgold is Keith Ferguson’s best role, tied with Lord Hater obviously, but it is indeed a tie. No one but Keith could’ve pulled off glomgold’s combination of ego, ham, and batshit insanity. He just makes the utterly stupid and wonderfully ludicrious things that come out of the mans mouth sound so damn natural with such an unearned confidence. It’s very clear that Frank had Keith in mind when putting this version of everyone’s faviorite South African Billionare pretending to be a Scottish Billionare and wisely built the characcter around him and his immense talent. I was not familiar with Keith at all, wasn’t even aware he voiced hater before this show but damn if that hasn’t fully changed. 

Glomgold was also just in general a brilliant update of the character: While I know a lot of duck fans weren’t happy with this version at least at first. As the action figure sitting on my shelf that once road in a car with my david hasslehoff baywatch funko pop I have entirley due to my love of baywatching,  this insane music video hoff did in the early 2000′s, and just in general how gloriously rediculous the man’s life is when you stop and think about it for a second from a pay per-view concert that ended up falling on the same night as The OJ Chase,  to his kung fury cameo , to his weird insetence they never had sex on baywatch desspite mounds of video evdience and the fact the show was buit around the bulk of it’s cast’s sex appeal, to the fact the model of his pecs used for the spongebob movie was sold in an auction and on and on... I was going somewhere with this...

Oh right as the action figure, and previous praise, shows I am not one of these fans: The original isn’t bad, in fact one of my faviorite life and times chapters that i’ll be covering this week and talking about later in the review has him as the main antagonist and a pitvitol figure in Scrooge’s life in the worst way possible. Rosa GETS what’s needed for Flinty to feel specail: to have him be an evil mirror to scrooge, what he could’ve been had he kept down the path he started down in Africa. A ruthless, amoral asshole who will do ANYTHING to get rich. 

It’s just often that isn’t emphasised enough and he’s instead just another one of the millions of generic assholes trying to get scrooges money sometimes with hired goons...

Not only that but Frank really COULDN’T have him at full effectivness. See an arch enemy in the Silver Age, which STARTED the same year Glomgold Debuted no less, wasn’t a big deal. They were still considered your deadliest foe but they’d often, much like Flinty be shuffled into the rogues gallery, show up for an issue to meance the hero, then either escape, get thrown in jail only to escape from that easily later, or be presumed dead. The last one I bring up because it happened to Magneto a LOTTTT pre-claremont. For Fuck’s Sake Charles have those teenagers train to look for a body once in a while!

Original Flinty was built for that, and brilliantly so as Barks had a talent for it , as seen by the fact The Beagle BOys, Flintheart and Magica have stuck around ever since and even in comics overseas where Flintehart is replaced.. it’s by Rockerduck who Barks ALSO created. The 87 Show followed the same formula, which was just as standard for 80′s cartoons. It’s why Megatron took until his toy was canceled the movie to shoot starscream in the face. 

The problem is villians evolved and the expecation became more that a true arch enemy had to be a true threat. While Frank and Matt COULD’VE made Flintheart a real and honest threat, he also would’ve had to make him a Big Bad. The probelm was those seats were clearly taken: while i’m pretty sure some ideas came as they went, the main story beats were clearly planned out well in advance: Webby being a clone was always the plan, as was FOWL, Darkwing being a fan of a fictional Darkwing who became the real thing, and Della being on the moon. So he presumibly carefully choose each season’s big bad... and thus Season’s 1-3 would be full up wise. Season 1 had Magica, who he made into a TRUE threat, yet left the door open for her to return as she did, Season 2 had Lunaris who even if they hadn’t fully thought him up, they probably had thought up the moonvasion, and Season 3 was what they’d built the series towards with FOWL. 

Details probably changed, it’s very clear to me they were likely going to have all three buzzards be important and ended up deicding to pivot to it just being Bradford over time. But given how well they though tout the general framework, I highly doubt Flinty was ever considered as a seirous big bad.. and I know i’m saying this in an arc that tried to set him up as one, but i’m getting there simmer. 

So they could wait for a season 4 that might not happen.. or make him a recurring villian. So Frank and Matt decided to do that and leaned into comedy. Centering him around keith who Frank worked with previously on Wonder and thus knew he could play a hammy manchild like no one else, they simply leaned into the goofier aspects of his personality. His being similar to scrooge became him being an intentional and blatant knockoff. As Scrooge himself perfectly summed up in episode 1 “The poor man’s version of me.. which to be fair still makes him insanely rich”. 

It’s another reason to really love this version as while yes, they did make him a bafoon.. he’s a wonderfully, redicuously layered bafoon: He still contrasts scrooge perfectly, manically hammy to Scrooge being calm, especially around flinty, blantatly crooked to Scrooge’s died in wool honesty, and wasting money on revenge instead of spending it on his actual company. There’s more obviously but some i’m saving for the review. 

Not only that but his insane schemery has a rhyme and reason to it: He attacks Scrooge every week like the saturday morning cartoon villian he is, but his schemes are always unwieldly and massively stupid, and he always goes with the first draft. It’s something the team enforced: the first version is what they role with because that’s how his sad brain works. He also is obssed with sharks and explosives, the former being given a suprisingly heartfelt and unsuprisingly insanne origin story towards the series end, and works them into every plot no matter how much itm akes no sense. He’s pure ego, pure stupid and pure fun. 

So yeah circling back to him being the big bad, I felt he was made one for this season for two reasons: the first is while a lot of fans (raises hand) enjoyed this version, some didn’t like how inept he was, so this would give them a breif bit of Flintheart being a genuine threat again. The other was frankly... they didn’t want to play their hand. Lunaris WAS the big bad... but fans would get supscious if there was seemingly no true threat on the horizon. Magica popped up in episode 4. We didn’t know her full plan yet true, but all we needed was lena SAYING HER NAME and fans of any other version of teh Disney Ducks would instantly go “Oh shit there she is”. So fans would now have the expectation of a main antagonist.. but would be instantly supscious of Lunaris and Penumbra if there wasn’t one for the first third of a season it took to them, and it’d leave a gap in the story to not have someone driving the plot on earth. 

So Flinty got an upgrade.. a slight one and we’ll talk about the eb and flow. And thus he got a proper origin. Now granted they could’ve planned this too, but this one’s harder to tell as the curse you me gag could’ve been a clever setup or could’ve just been a one off gag they somehow turned into an entire episode. So Flinty got an arc.. and a comedic foil, the other reason this was inevieble, and Kev’s faviorite character, Zan Owlson. So how did it work out for them? Well we’ll begin that journey under the cut. 

We begin our story a few months ago.... on every level really: the months ago shadow war aired when this episode originally good, the months ago I reviwed Shadow War (which via counting I found out was my 200th episode not counting Patreon. Nice), and most importantly for this story, the four months ago before the present day of Season 2. 

Glomgold saying curse you me as he fell into the bay during the Shadow War.... only for once in his life he dosen’t somehow get out of it unscathed and instead passes out, almost drowning. He’s found by Fisher and Mann, two fisherpersons... Mann is specific about that due to being a woman despite the obvious irony. It’s a good gag. Flinty acts like he normally would.. hostile, demanding that they know who he is.. and while they don’t.. neither does he. 

Cue credits and cue present day. Via a newscast with Roxanne we learn what I mentioned earlier: It’s been four month and Glomgold’s been missing. The general mood.. has been about what you’d expect. 

Yeah Roxanne turned on him real fast. I genuinely wouldn’t be surprised if it was because he later openly bragged about stealing scrooge’s money during the shark thing on live tv at some point, making Roxanne look terrible for enabling him and for blatantly supporting him earlier. I mean.. how else do you get a corrupt journalist to do anything decent. 

But with Glomgold gone SOMEONE’S gotta replace him.. and that someone is Zan Motherfucking Owlson. Top of her class at Mouseton Univesity, Owlson is the show once again updating things: previously they added Mark Beaks to the Rogue’s Gallery as he contrasts the 50′s (scrooge ) and 80′s (glomgold) idea of billionares from previous versions of the property being a modern tech weasel. Though instead of just one thing Owlson represents a few: The most obvious is she’s a woman of color: Having a black woman in such a high position of power is something disney would’ve outright vetoed in the 50′s and 80′s. Here it’s well accepted as it always should have been. It also feels like a delebrate move on Frank’s part: There weren't’ any major african or african american coded characters in season 1, despite the show being very open and accepting, so that needed to change. The other is frankly outside of Brigtaa MacBridge, whose also weirdly absent from this series for some reason and has taken Fethry and Rockerduck’s place as the most major overseas duck character to never get adapted, there are hardly ever any females on Scrooge and his richer foes level. He’s had the occasional female rival or suitor, but only Brigittta had staying power and while I love the idea of her, another person as rich as scrooge whose willing to spend more and has a crush on him, she badly needed an update as she’s essentially Adventure Era Amy Rose in a grown ass woman’s body. 

Owlson also provides a diffrent dynamic in that she portrays the ideal of what we’d want from a ceo: She’s honest, works hard, earned her way as square as scrooge did, gladly donates to charity and is extremely charismatic and intelligent. Granted most CEO”s are nothing like this but still, she’s what we WANT them to be. Using the money not for themselves or taking big paychecks but to help people. She also provides something Glomgold needed: a straight man. While he has one in Scrooge at times, Owlson unlike both of them is a fully functional resonable human being. Scrooge, while a good person deep down, can be reckless, impulsive and greedy, and Glomgold had a tarzan like experince with sharks, goes on to name his dummy son sharkbomb, and tried to murder Scrooge on live television twice that we know of. She’s the calm, snarky, put upon sane person trying to reign in the crazy shark explosion man. 

Owlson dosen’t get a ton to do here, but that will change and she does get a decent amout in the final scene. But what she does here establishes who she is and how sh’es FIXED Glomgold industries; She’s shut down the vast number of money sinking scheme related departments, set ups everal charities, and is even setting up a new one with Scrooge, Dimes for Ducklings. In short she knew exactly what was needed to fix the company and it’s image and did so in FOUR MONTHS. Probably even less given they had to be sure Glomgold wasn’t coming back right away. I guarantee he’s faked his death like 10 times just to try and kill scrooge. They have to make sure it’s real first.  As one last note before we move on, Owlson is played by Natasha Rothwell, a producer and writer who i’ve only seen outside of this in Love, Simon and Sonic the Hedgehog.. that is a weird combo of things that mean a LOT to me I haven’t been able to bring up here again. 

We find the tv this was all playing on on the docks with a non-anthro segull pecking it while a bunch of fisherpersons go about their day. We also get this guy. 

Add him to the list of spinoffs I want THE LIST OF SPINOFFS JAKE WANTS: 1. Darkwing Duck 2. Donald, Daisy and the Kids 3. The Sabrewings 4. Tailspin Reboot 5. The Flintheart Glomgold Show 6. A Sequel Movie 7. This Guy Punching A Fucking Fish 

So you might be wondering when any of our main cast are going to show up.. and why the fish puncher isn’t in said main cast. Well that’s about now as Webby and Louie are fishing. Well okay more acuratley webby is fishing because she genuinely enjoys it and Louie is tagging along so he can nap on a boat while Webby paddles him around. That plan is threatnned by her spear fishing and he suggests using rods instead, but they need bait for that. 

Naturally, given we need to get this plot going our heroes run into Duke Baloney, aka an amnesiac Glomgold. Understandably, both of htem think this is some sort of scheme at first because waiting for someone related to Scrooge to stroll by his fish stand for some sort of shark themed trap, especially since he’s right near the water so he dosen’t have to worry about keeping them hydrated like that time he dropped one from a plane onto scrooge’s board meeting with two chainsaws strapped to it. But .. it’s not. While we the audience saw him amnesiac, and at first I thought that spoiled the episode... it really dosen’t. He still ACTS like himself on instinct, so your not sure if he faked it as part of some elaborate scheme or is really gone till this scene shows that, no he really isn’t there. And the how is simply in knowing the guy: Glomgold is not good at subtley. He has disguises and such, but their never remotely convincing. He could NEVER pull off  actually being a humble fish monger nor have gone four fucking months without yelling at scrooge or remotely contacting him. There’s also the fact Fisher and Mann 100% belivie in duke and back up his very real story of being dredged out of the bay. There’s also his south african accent, which actors including David Tennant himself have admitted is one of the hardest to pull off but Keith does swimingly, which is a hint.. but only on rewatch or for those who know his comics origins. 

Louie isn’t convinced which is fair: even if Glomgold isn’t good at this sort of thing, he’s still tried it a lot. Webby however correctly figures he has amensia. So the two simply try talking to him. Fisher and Mann do get a bit dickish laughing off the idea he’s possibly Glomgold.. despite the fact you know you dredged him out of the fucking water 4 months ago.. and if you actually looked at the news, would see Glomgold disappeared around the exact same time you found Duke. It just annoys me because otherwise these two are great characters: Friendly loveable fisherpersons who love their job, have no comeptiviness and genuinely want to help their friend duke. The encounter does have them seeing a fancy money clip Duke has but with no other options they leave for now. 

But while Duke has forgotten who he was... bits of glomgold still stir within him. And that starts when Duke spots the McDuck Industries fishing boat, the best fishing boat on the sea, something his friends are okay with.. but Duke naturally isn’t. So while Duke was a calm sane fisherman before the true glomgold in him is on full display as he comes up with insane schemes involving fish and explosives, before presenting a rather insane scheme to his friends involving getting engineering degrees and other stuff.. it’s as poorly drawn and wonderful as you expect from him. But what’s telling is that he reigns it in when his friends show obvious concern with his actions... something Glomgold would NEVER do. For one he dosen’t have friends. For another, he doesn’t care about anyone else’s feelings or thoughts. 

By now Webby is also championing that Duke is a diffrente person.. which is true. Duke is Glomgold stripped of his hate and resitment towards scrooge. He’s who the man COULD’VE been had he not sworn eternal vengeance on Scrooge. Louie is doubtful that he’s amnesiac still.. but neither can quite figure out the full story so it’s time for research.. and for Webby to accidentally knock Louie into some lobster traps.. which given he’s spent the entire episode assuming an amnesiac man isn’t that despite all the evidence to the contrary, he earned that. That said these two were the perfect choice for it: All of the boys have a bit of skeptic in them, and we already had a plot with Huey being skeptical.. and even he would’ve given up by now as would dewey since he only has a pinch at best. Webby.. has none. She can question motives and stuff sure, but at her heart she’s a kind forgiving soul who belives the best in everyone. And.. its’  paid off fo rher. Look at the whole Lena situation, she believed in her, even while Lena was actively manipulating her,.. and it truly changed her, convinced Lena to do the right thing despite the cost, to choose love over the abusive monster who made her. It’s the only missed opportunity in the episode for me. Character wise it has exactly the 8 it needs to tell the story and focuses heavly on the five it truly is about. But not having Webby bring up Lena when we don’t hear her mentoined AT ALL during her absence (though to the shows credit they did a good job showing Webby still had never remotely given up), and it made the wait more agonizing and would’ve made her motivations hit even harder: that she belives in duke because she believed in lena and it was real. And while this thank christ isn’t remotely romantic, the point does stand: She wants to see the best. 

Louie is a conman by nature so he only sees the worst, the weakest in people, the things he can use to take htem down or take hteir money. He can’t fathom someone doing good because he can’t fathom HIMSELF being good. And that.. says a lot.. but he’s accepted himself as a shady conperson who cares only for himself.. even if that’s not the truth. His inclusion here enhances his own arc much like Huey’s role in quack pack enhanced his. It shows that deep down Louie dosen’t think much of anyone.. and probably not himself. That he has to be shady and greedy to survive when that’s not tru. Sharper than the sharpies yes but also square.

One last bit before we moved on  I just found out though: The Crew originally had this as a straight up origin story: no kids, none of the rest of the duck family, except presumably Scrooge’s parts here, just Glomgold’s struggle with amensia and his past leading to who hei s now. Honestly I think that version could’ve worked, but likely given disney seems TERRIFIED of making a show starring an adult without a chlid and had to be talked into the child light Golden Lagoon, that was a non starter but I think it still works fine. I also foudn this out via a twitter thread of Frank’s rewriting history that goes in deep on teh production of each episode. Had I known this existed before writing this one, I would’ve used it for the other two arcs and most dangerous game night, but I intend to read through it so I have everything on the table from here on out. 

For only the second time in her long career of researching stuff though, Webby has hit a dead end. Mostly because she couldn’t find anything on Duke.. and NOTHING on Glomgold’s past pre-Duckburg. The most she has is his visa...

I want to frame this on my wall.. and someone is actually seling id cards out there, so I want this one at some point. It’s not Disney because they don’t care about fan merch like this, but then that just means they don’t get the money because they didn’t think of it or put the work in then huh. 

But yeah with nothing else our heroes go to the only person they know who knows him well...  Scrooge. 

Meanwhile Duke has .. this... I just.....I can’t put words to this truly bizzare surreal dream sequence.. it involves Glomgold going insane, the kids dancing on a bagpipe, and owlson is there.. despite the fact that Glomgold should have zero idea whot hat is. I think the kids mentioned here but even then, he somehow knows exactly what she looks like.

Otherwise good stuff and it’s raining hard as Duke goes in. Fisher and Mann have formally added him to their sign, and warmly welcomed him in and Duke says “this is the nicest thing anyone's ever done for me I think” which is probably true. and makes what’s coming all the more heartbreaking. 

But before what’s coming Duke has another thing coming.. Scrooge who the kids brought to talk to him. The two talk casually, the kids watch not knowing.. and then Scrooge comes back to them. Turns out Webby was, unsurprisingly right on the money, Flinty does have amnesia, and unlike what Louie thought.. he isn’t inherently evil. Duke is just duke.. and Scrooge has no intention of fixing the amnesia. And while that SOUNDS bad.. his intentions are noble: Glomgold.. was a throughly miserable person. He was never happy and never would be till Scrooge was dead by his hand and that was never going to happen.  It isn’t even taking an enemy off the board: Flinty is only a threat on occasion. Scrooge clearly ENJOYS their conflict: it may annoy him from time to time, but he clearly enjoys upstaging the guy. And as he points out, it’s not a brain injury or anything: Glomgold is practically immortal as Louie put earlier, and Scrooge outright mentions Glomgold’s taken a LOT of explosions to the face. So he’s in no real danger physically or emotionally.. he’s happy. He has friends, a calling he truly enjoys. There’s another reason too but we’ll see that in the final scene. 

So Duke is finally happy... but it doesn’t last... the kids go out but a storms a coming, and Duke selfleslly heads out to save them.. only to get hit on the head and fall in the ocean again. 

It’s here we get the 2017 version of Glomgold’s origin story. We did kinda get one with life and times, as we saw his first meeting with scrooge and why he hated him, long story short with the long story coming later this week Glomgold left Scrooge for dead and Scrooge’s response was to come back, kick the fuckers ass, tar and feather him and utterly humilaite him, leading to Flinty swearing vengance. 

But while I love that version..t his one is just as awesome if not better. And it’s without having Scrooge ride a lion. Here we instead meet Flinty as a child Scrooge’s age... and as a shoeshine boy. Yup just like Scrooge Duke, Glomgold’s birth name, was an industrious young boy with big dreams. He also had unwieldy schemes from minute one, but Scrooge saw in this lad the same fire he had and tried replicating his own origin. 

The problem was... the different context ruined it. Scrooge was paid by an equally poor ditchdigger the us equilvent of his pay: still useless in scotland, but a good lesson in hard work and not being swindled. Scrooge tried that... as the richest duck in the world and without giving flinty the same amount of money. 

So Duke/Flinty took umbrage at this yelled at scrooge.. and pick pocketed his money clip. In the only bit taken from the rosa version of their first meeting, Scrooge never realized he’d met flinty already. There and then duke came up with his first true, and first insane scheme: Save the money and use it to mold himself into a richer, more scottish version of scrooge dedicating his life to one upping him and killing him. A “single white female” type thing as Frank put it. 

It’s.. utterly brilliant... taking Glomgold being a knockoff as mention and just running with that... making Glomgold a LITERAL knockoff. This was indeed the plan all along: A way to have him be both south african and scottish and it was brilliant. It also gives him more depth and more tragedy: He COULD’VE been the next scrooge.. but instead of being his own man or learning any of the hard lessons scrooge did he doubled down on never learning anything and getting vengeance on an old man’s well meant but accidently classist gesture. 

So Glomgold reawakens and while it first looks like he’s going to save the kids... he instead throws Webby into the raging sea, and steals their fish. Webby is heartbroken and Louie asks him “what about duke.” His response is heartbreaking as it is character defnting

“I”m Flintheart Glomgold and I always will be!” the lightning shot, the cackle..i t’s just such a damn good moment that underscores the tragedy of the episode as Glomgold’s new friends are horrified by what he is now and what he was always meant to be and Glomgold leaves to go stalk scrooge once again. He indeed is Flintheart Glomgold and always will be.. because he threw the decent person he could’ve been away. He’s miserable.. because he can’t let go of his rage or ego and just move on from something that happened to him when he was ten! He has to be in his 60′s now! Glomgold may think Scrooge is his worst enemy.. but it’s really Flintheart Glomgold.... and it always will be. 

So naturally his first actoin is to storm into his company and scream at scrooge. How he found him there... honestly not a huge suprise it’s his company and he likely knows how to find scrooge anywhere because he’s a creep like that. Scrooge and Owlson’s reactions are both worth a look at:

Given Glomgold bursts into an already annoying meeting of Scrooge trying to get the dimes part knocked down to nickles (and likely lower before that given he mentioned Pennies earlier), to accuse Scrooge of trying to trick him by appearing as a boat in his dreams her bafflement is both understandable and hilarious. Like she probably HEARD what Glomgold was like but gennuinely didn’t belivie it and her face is just now frozen in a look of “oh my god they were not exagearating what fresh hell is this”. 

She tries to be professional and introduce herself but he just brushes her off and yells at Scrooge blaming him for being forgotten (”You literally forgot yourself), with Owlson also considering calling security. She only dosen’t because Scrooge points out he’ll tire himself out eventually and as usual for their jousts, is not remotely threatened or worried. He’s just..sad. And getting back to his reaction.. that’s what’s telling about his plan. He probably KNEW this would happen. He in his heart knew Duke Balloney would be gone soon, and he’d have to deal with Glomgold again. It helps soften the implicatoins: it wouldn’t last and fraknly if it did Scrooge would probably have people check on him regualry to make sure he was okay. He’s not a monster.. he just wanted Flinty to be happy for five minutes and to not ruin that out of some misplaced sense of right and wrong.. when the right thing was to simply let the man be happy till it inevitably blew up. 

Glomgold however, furious at being forgotten and cast aside has decided to take a huge poorly thought through gamble and challenges scrooge to a classic Scrooge comics trope between the two, but with higher stakes: A contest to see who will be the richest duck in the world by the end of the year.. and given Christmas happens right after this i’m just assuming he means a year from now. Winner gets both companies and fortunes. Scrooge scoffs at this.. till Flinty pulls out the clip, taunting him with how he did it and “If I can beat you once scrooge i’ll beat you again”. And this, Flinty revealing he stole from him and he NEVER KNEW it or realize it, enrages scrooge enough to agree and to take him seriously... meanwhile Owlson.. just tries to get actual work shit done and just forges their signatures. Look she is a woman of color in the business world with genuinely good motives... she’s probably used to using white nonsense to get things past two idiots having a peeing race. 

Final Thoughts:

This episode is truly excellent and like Most Dangerous Game Night! i’d forgottne just HOW good it was. The pacing, the comedy, and the character work is all on full blast and i’ve gushed plenty enough about how great an origin story is. it’s a character piece that explains why this doofus is the way he is and that is what holds him back. 

Next time on MMM: Louie’s back as he pulls a ghostbusters to make quick money and Storkules starts rooming with Donald with predictable results. 

If you liked this review consider joining my patreon and i’ll see you at the next rainbow. 

#ducktales #flintheart glomgold #scrooge mcduck #the ballad of duke balloney #webby vanderquack #louie duck #fisher #mann #fishing #weblena #disney plus #disney xd #disney channel

[intrepidmare]

MARE'S RECAPS ~ THE MANDALORIAN: CHAPTER 9 "THE MARSHALL"

Oh wow! It's been a while since I've done something like this. Last year, I caught up with season 1 about 2 days before the finale, so I didn't have the opportunity to write reviews/recaps. This season, though, I'm going to 😀 so here it is the first one! 

For the folks that haven't seen the premiere and don't want spoilers, scroll past this, fast and furious, because it's full of them. If you want to blacklist tags to avoid spoilers from me, I suggest that you add #mando spoilers, #the mandalorian season 2 spoilers, and #mare's mando recaps to the list.

I've seen the episode a few times (yeah, I'm that obsessed with the show) so some of my reactions are more visceral than others since I was too excited the few first times I watched it and I missed a lot of details (another reason to rewatch the episode more than once). This recap is loooooong, which is an indication of how amazing it was.

So this my final warning to those avoiding spoilers. Stop reading, right now. The rest of you… enjoy and let me know if you share some of my opinions. I'm always open to chat 😊

Chapter 9 ~ The Marshall

So it begins! It's so exciting!

I knew that Mando and baby Yoda walking in the street at night was going to be the opening scene. I started to think about it after watching the second trailer, and I'm glad that I was right.

It turns out that the red-eyed creatures were not jawas as I saw some people saying.

Baby Yoda was not happy with the little excursion to the fighting arena. Not walking on the streets nor inside watching the fight. I still laughed when he locked himself up in the pram, even if I've watched the trailer like a gazillion times by now and I knew he was going to do it.

And talking about the baby, he's getting more vocal I think. He's making a few new noises, whimpering more, which I'm not sure if it's a good or bad thing. That he complains more means that he feels safe with his buir and isn't afraid of retaliation for it as he probably was with others in the past and the reason he didn't cry much in season 1. But it breaks my heart that he is stressed. And that child is anxious, I can tell you that much.

The fight with Gor Koresh's thugs was awesome! The gamorrean flying to squash Mando and failing had me cracking up. And omg! Din'd moves! Using his helmet as a weapon and throwing his vibroblade. And leaving Gor Koresh to be eaten! Man of his word, he didn't kill the guy.

On a side note, I would've never guessed it was John Leguizamo who gave voice to Koresh until I saw the credits. Of all the actors who could play the part, I never thought of him.

Umm, I'm curious about the time Mando has spent in Tatooine, which according to him it's been a lot and it makes sense since he knows so much about the Tuskens, their language and culture. I'm guessing he spent a while among them. He had to learn all that somehow. 

When I speculated that Mando was going back to Tatooine after watching the trailers, I said that I was going to riot if he didn't visit his favorite mechanic. Thankfully, I didn't need to worry. I loved Peli in episode 5 of season 1 and I loved her even more now remarking on Din's dislike of droids and trying to keep the baby for herself. Not to mention she complaining about not getting good help these days 🤣

And I ADORE the (improvised?) Birikad Din got for the baby. Of course, the baby is safer in the pram, right (guessing that's why he used it when he met Gor Koresh), but there's something sweet watching him carrying his son so close to him.

And I tell you, Mando has been spending credits lately in baby stuff. I mean, he got a new pram (which I initially thought it was the original that he had somehow retrieved from the garbage in Nevarro, but no, it's not the same, and neither it's the one that Kuiil made) and he also got the bag/birikad thing, which looks brand-new. I wonder what else he bought.

Watching the droids doing maintenance of the Razor Crest makes me think it's all for nothing, knowing that in a few episodes (it might be even in the next one) Mando is going to crash the ship. More than once perhaps.

😆 The baby still loves speed! I think riding on the speeder bike was the only moment that he truly enjoyed in this episode. Look at that happy face 

When they arrived at Mos Pelgo and Din went into the cantina, leaving the baby outside, I was like: Din! That's not responsible. How can you leave your son out in the inclement sun, alone! Then baby Yoda peeked in and I went: never mind. I take back what I said.

Oooh. Cobb Vanth! I love him! For a moment, I thought it could actually be Boba but it seemed illogical and that's what Mr. Feloni and Mr. Favreau wanted us to think. I was correct.

My gawd! Din's shock when Vanth took the helmet off. I just knew he would freak out the moment Cobb asked for drinks and I said to drink they need to remove their helmets and Mando is going to lose it when this guy does. And the standoff! Was so good! "Take it off or I will" is going to become a quite popular phrase in fics from now on, not in the same context, but yeah…

The krayt dragon… oh shit! Or rather Dank farrik! We can't see Mando's face or expression but I can imagine which one was when he saw the dragon eating the bantha the first time.

Oh my goodness. The baby hiding in the pot! Too adorable! 

I know every hardcore SW fan lost it watching Vanth modified speeder because is a callback to the Phantom Menace and Anakin but my first thought was: is he compensating for something? Sorry, I couldn't help it 

The dog-lizard creatures were kinda scary at first but then became adorable. Almost as much as baby Yoda getting out of hiding

Baby Yoda doesn't like dog-lizards things. He looked afraid to be eaten I think. Poor little guy.

And look at that! Din showing such growth! To think he was the one incensing others in negotiation 😆 this is a total callback to the jawas in Arvala-7. And I gotta tell you, Din freaking loves his flamethrower. He doesn't waste the opportunity to use it.

The krayt dragon eating the Tusken raider instead of the bantha was quite of a plot twist 😆

When they were planning the attack on the dragon, Cobb Vanth's face when Din told him that the bones and pebbles were to scale, and then when he had volunteered the villagers to help… priceless! 

I like the fact of banding together with others for a greater good, relying on others to accomplish something is going to continue being the theme of this season. It started last season but I think it's going to be stronger this time around along all of the episodes.

😳😲😳😲 this thing vomits acid?! What. The. FUCK?!!!

Cobb: I don't think it's dead

Mando: me neither

Me, at the same time as Din: yeah, nope it's not dead

Oh yeah! Teaming up with jetpacks!

When they showed the bantha with the remaining explosives my first thought was why didn't they use all those before?! That's why they didn't kill it!! Of course, it was just an excuse to grant Din a more grand win in the end, but you know, it's stupid not to use everything you have to kill the monster on the first try. Just saying

Wait, what? Din! What are you going to do? No! Taking care of the child is your responsibility, not Cobb Vanth's! I hate this plan of yours, Din Djarin!! Whichever it is!

Oh! Nice callback to the flaw on that jetpack. But makes me wonder, do all the rising Phoenixes have the same flaw? Cuz unless Din knows Boba in person and that it's his armor with that particular flaw, it means it's a common problem for all and I don't like it.

Get away, Din! Get away, Din!! FLY AWAY!! AAAAAAAHHHHHH! NOOOOOO! 

There he is! Damn, Mando! Don't scare me like that! Altho, it was a nice move.

Okay, but now I want someone to explain something to me. If the dragon's acid melted people at contact before, how the hell is Din so whole? I mean, sure for argument' sake let's say his beskar armor provides some protection, but he's not entirely covered in it. His cape and undersuit seem just fine, albeit sticky. Where's the logic in that?

The tuskens getting the pearl reminded me of the jawas and the mudhorn's egg, chanting zukka, zukka (or however egg is spelled in Jawa).

That's quite a piece of meat. The baby is going to be happy eating off it for days🤣

😮😮😳😳 BOBA FETT!!!!! Yesssssss!!

Okay, I've seen other people's thoughts and some think that Boba was after Cobb Vanth because he had the armor, but I don't know. If that was true then why he hadn't gone to Mos Pelgo and got it? It seems to me that it's more likely that Boba is following Din somehow because it's the second time in as many Mando's visits to the planet that they sort of cross paths. Could they know each other? Have some score to settle? It's possible. Din has spent much time on Tatooine -his words, not mine- so it wouldn't be so out of consideration that they actually know each other. That if Mando knows Boba is (fake?) Mando, I don't know. Probably not, but who knows?

Extra thoughts

I gotta say that Ludwig Göransson is killing it with the score music! Oh. My. God! So so so so good! I could tell from the trailers that it was going to be awesome this season but it astounded me in chapter 9. Gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous! My favorite piece is when they're going to the dragon's cave to kill it. The orchestral sound of the already familiar music blew my mind!

#mare's mando recaps #mando spoilers #the mandalorian #the mandalorian season 2 spoilers #the mandalorian season 2 #din djarin #baby yoda #cobb vanth

[endangered-liaison]

FFXIVWrite Prompt #11/13: Ultracrepidarian

[This is my fill for the Free Day, going back to Day 11 since I missed that one the first time around!]

A vaguely ominous but jaunty tune plays through your vox. After a moment, a voice, low and raspy, begins to speak.

"Hey. Today I have a Gridanian Emergency Ration, 7AE 2, cold-weather ready. It's pretty heavy, comes in two packs. The main pack weighs 2 ponze exactly, and the accessory pack weighs 1 ponze and 6 onze. Not a lightweight ration, yeah?

"The menu is number two type or whatever the fuck they call it in the Shroud: Peppered Popotoes. Prefer the number one type, that's a dehydrated stew as its main, but beggars can't be choosers or whatever I guess.

"Lemme open this up."

There's the sound of a knife being unsheathed, then a blade cutting through what sounds like a canvas bag or something similar.

"Alright. The main bag has the peppered popotoes main, uh. A bunch of jerky, dunno what meat and I dunno if they want us to know. Might be mutton? Somethin' to eat on the go, good salt content. Peppered popotoes is a no-protein meal so I'd guess the jerky is to compensate for that. The type one menu has dried fruit instead, so that might be an advantage to this menu. Fuckin' love jerky.

"Also got some chocolate, and some oat biscuits. Whole lot of filler. Makes sense, cold weather food's for either Coerthas or Ilsabard. Guerrilla fightin' the Empire or the Temple Knights, lots of food on the go. Just the one meal to sit down and eat.

"Accessory pack might be more interesting."

There's more ripping, cutting noises, then the girl on the vox makes a delighted noise.

"Fuck yeah! See, here's where it gets good. Standard issue Gridanian spoon; pewter. The Garlean ones are better, but, y'know, hard to beat them. These aren't bad though. Better than the Ishgardian ones. Fuckin' teaspoons to eat a meal with.

"And here's where all that weight comes in. Cold weather gear needs a lot of heaters. To melt snow for water, and to heat up their main, y'know? So they've got a fuckin' great fire shard heater unit, I love this design. This design's shared across the whole Alliance. The Ishgardians and the Mhigans have their own, and I dunno what the Domans have since I ain't tried a Doman ration yet, but the three core city-states all use this design. This one's got extra fire shards to replace the first set when they burn out, since you'll be usin' 'em for pretty much everything."

The sounds of something being pulled from the bag, and being pieced together.

"They've got a few light-tinged water shards too. Gives you water if you ain't got any other source, an' purifies snow water real good. I'll admit, these are better than the Garlean method. I fuckin' hate the taste of chlorine, an' these leave it all clean and fresh. Only thing is, if you leave the crystal in there and accidentally swallow it, it'll kill you or make you sick as fuck. So you gotta spoon it outta there, which is hard since it's the colour of water.

"Alright. Let's get this out on to a tray."

There's a cut distortion in the vox feed, before her voice returns.

"Nice. Okay, so. Got the popotoes heatin' up on the burner, an' I'd say it's time to try the jerky. Smells like mutton, looks kinda like it, so we'll see. It didn't have the type listed."

There's the sound of rough jerky being torn through, then chewing noises uncomfortably close to the vox.

Then there's a few seconds of silence.

"I can tell you one thing."

Her voice sounds vaguely pained.

"That definitely fuckin' weren't mutton."

She spits out whatever is left in her mouth, making discomforted noises. "I'll eat near fuckin' anythin', but that just...ugh. Is that diremite meat? Are they fuckin' feedin' their soldiers diremite meat? 'Cuz that's what it tastes like."

She takes another loud bite and chews on it anyway.

What the fuck.

Why.

"Okay." She speaks with her mouth still full. "Popotoes are smellin' pretty good. Actually smell pretty peppery, so that's a plus. Steaming real good, so...probably ready. Got my spoon, and..."

There's more chewing. A humming noise, so close to the vox it distorts over your feed. Ow.

"It...tastes of popotoes, and a little butter. The pepper was all smell. There's no fuckin' flavour to it, they're...bland. This was just a waste of pepper. Helps the smell, but...whatever they did to it to have it keep longer just drained all that flavour. I've had spicier food from Ishgardian menus. An' yeah, today's insult-Isghardian-food day apparently. It's a mess."

She chews on it for a few more seconds, then sighs.

"Yeah, this is useless. If I had this in the field, I'd be tempted to grind up a fire  shard as seasoning. Which, again, will kill you. Don't do that, even if it would be tasty."

Who is this woman? More accurately, what is this woman?

"Anyroad. The chocolates and the oat cakes actually won't be shite, so I'm gonna enjoy them while I go through my fanmail from the last moon."

She starts chewing on what you assume to be an oat cake, making happy little mm noises every few moments.

"Got a letter here from a Mister Calldew in Ishgard. He says I'm a tasteless heretic traitor, and a violent goon, and that Halone would be deeply shamed by me if she acknowledged my presence at all. Hah. Thanks! That's sweet.

"Next I've got...oh, one from Limsa. Sergeant Svalwhatever, I don't know Roegadyn names, that's my girlfriend's thing. Blah blah blah, stealing essential supplies from military warehouses, blah blah blah, serious criminal action, blah blah, if we find you we shall arrest you forthwith, blah, Llymlaen curses you. 

“To that I say: bitch, if you've got a direct line to Llymlaen, get that watery whore to buy you some better fuckin' locks."

There's a snap and chewing. She evidently just bit down on the chocolate.

"I'm Max1562. See you next moon, when I'll be coming back at you with something new. Or old."

The music fades in to the vague sounds of this strange girl loudly chewing on chocolate and oak cakes, and you begin to wonder if she actually knew anything about what she was talking about.

#ffxivwrite2020 #Max Sawyer #With apologies to Steve1989

[lizardphobia]

AND TO THINK S4 OF CABLE GIRLS WAS ACTUALLY PALATABLE COMPARED TO THE EPIC SUCKFEST OF EPICALLY DISASTROUS PROPORTIONS THAT IS FUCKING S5

1) Everytime Lidia screams "You're despicable" to Carlos (man of my heart) I hate her a little bit more. Because come on, woman. YOU left him. YOU took your baby girl and left him via a fucking LETTER and then refused to tell him where you were and you expect him to be okay??? For 7 years?! You were his entire world!

2) Everyone should stop saying "It's your fault" to Carlos because there is nothing I hate more than people who blame other people for the shittiness in their shitty lives. (Francisco you spineless little shit I'm looking at you)

3) Carlos is La Única Persona in the whole fucking series who gets fucking slapped all the time and yet stands there and takes it and ALSO accepts blame and admits faults (even where it wasn't his fault) without even trying to shift blame anywhere.

4) When Lidia cut off the phone line before Carlos could even say ONE FUCKING WORD to his daughter I just about lost all respect I had for her.

5) I'm so upset and bloody pissed with this whole shitfest of a fucking fuck season I feel like I've wasted years of my life that I will never get back and this is UNFORGIVABLE.

6) Did they have to stamp Carlos into the dirt anymore? Set him up to be the Villain to Rule All Villains, a turncoat spy for the Fascists, a rubbish father, and then the piece de resistance they fucking blew his brains out in the MOST inhumane way -- literally I cannot. I just jeezus fucking christ, cannot condone what they did to the sweetest, the kindest; one of the best written characters on the show who had such a complex well-developed arc and basically DUMPED his body in the most disrespectful way possible like a piece of meat for Carlos haters and Francisco stans to laugh at.

The Disrespect. I cannot.

I'm so done with this show and to think I was so hyped to watch it after the season aired is just laughable. And they released it on Valentine's Day???? What part of it is romantic?! Fuck you very much.

8) The aesthetics this season were my favourite and figures they had to go ruin everything by killing off the ONE thing they were supposed to protect goddamit all to hell

9) What they did to Oscar was heartbreaking and completely unnecessary

10) kudos to Marga and Pablo's storyline. See now THAT'S an example of good writing and reminded me of better times in S1 and S2 where everything was written to further plots and developed characters in a well thought out arc!

Whatever. Screw you you bastards. You took a good thing and made it shit. I won't be continuing with the stupid final part of the season and a pox on you for making me lose a night's beauty sleep angsting over Carlos's vicious, violent, cruel and unnecessary death.

Screw you for killing him in the most clumsy, dishonourable, ignoble way possible. And screw you for mucking up what was the best ship I've had in a really long time.

N.B. Special mention to Francisco's Charlie Chaplin moustache, like no hombre, that's not working for you lmao, but if you wanna go ahead and make Carlos look gorgeous in comparison then who am I to stop you.

#cablegirls #laschicasdelcable #carlos y lidia #lidia aguilar #carlos cifuentes

[celticheartedfangirl]

My OUAT Rewatch -- S4E22 and 23 -- Operation Mongoose, Parts 1 & 2

Link to Rewatch Review and Ranking archive

Bobby looks about as done with this season as I am.  I know Michael Socha was done with it -- literally -- but we’ll get to that later.

This is gonna be long.  So have a seat, pour yourself a drink or seven, and get ready.  I’m not holding back . . . . . . 

First of all, I debated about whether I should review this as one or two episodes.  I decided to go with one, and will do this going forward with any episodes that have the same title and are part 1,2, 8 million, whatever.  Trust me, at times it SEEMED like 8 million.

First thing I want to address is a bunch of fandom wank nonsense that came out of this episode -- namely the idea that RUMPLE wrote the story.  Let me make this perfectly clear:

Rumple DID NOT WRITE THIS STORY.  Isaac did.  Rumple told him what HE, personally, wanted.  Isaac took it from there.  Rumple didn’t write Isaac as a famous douchebag author, and he sure as hell wouldn’t have given fucking ZELENA a wedding in the story, he’d have killed her off in a painful but well-deserved death.  Ditto Hook.  So if you still actually think Rumple wrote this story, my recommendation to you is that you back out of this post now.  And you should probably stay off my blog in general.  Because frankly, I think you are wrong and stupid and we are not compatible in any way.  Got it?

Looking at YOU, some RUMBELLE FANS who actually did this shit:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/118193570842/i-am-stunned-to-see-some-rumbelle-fans-bitching

Okay, so there’s THAT.  Next . . . 

So this episode was A&E’s attempt at META.  And frankly, they SUCK at it.  It didn’t come off as funny, it came off as making fun of the fans.  No spoilers, ha ha ha .  . . . . . . for those not in the know, back when the show was airing, Adam’s go to answer to fans on Twitter was #nospoilers.  So the whole Isaac so thing was basically a dig at the FANS.  

So there’s THAT.

The entertainment media was shitting all over Rumbelle before the finale, which pissed me off enough to make this post:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/118484723732/when-and-why-exactly-did-rumbelle-become-the

And this comment:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/118467157702/ouat-finale-your-burning-relationship-questions

And then there’s THIS:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/118658755342/omg-ae-dig-the-knife-in-why-dont-you

Yes, in case you weren’t clear, dead is DEAD (we’ll revisit this thought in S5), Neal ain’t coming back, suck on it all of you who don’t like that!  Love, Adam and Eddy.  

Also, in other bullshit news, regarding who taught Henry to sail a ship:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/118655893997/henry-no-your-father-taught-you-that

And THIS:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/118660507567/what-the-fuck-they-left-rumple-on-the-floor-but

Revisiting May 2015 me is making current me stabby.  And I haven’t even mentioned the entire town of dumbasses herp-derping around and partying at Granny’s while Rumple is dying and could be a meat suit for the ultimate evil of all evils any second now.  Morons.  

Let’s talk about the stuff I DID enjoy . . . . 

Evil Snow was a riot!  

Bandit!Regina was fantastic.  

And this guy:

Gotta love Knight!Rumple!  

Also, I will admit . . . . . Hook was more useful in useless mode in the AU than he’s ever been in Hook mode outside of the AU.  Does that make sense?  

So there’s all of that.  Overall this 2-part thing was part good stuff, mostly hot mess, and a lot of middle fingers waved to the fans from the writers.  But tally comes later.  NOW is the time to address the Michael Socha issue:

Right about now, dearie.  Will Scarlett is gone.  You will never see him or hear about him again.

(Side note:  Made an error in my last review.  I honestly did not remember AT ALL that we saw Lily again in this episode, both in person form or in dragon form.  Which tells you how much of an impression that made on me.  Anyhoo, my bad.  I goofed.  NOW she’s gone for good.)

So what was the deal with Will Scarlett anyway?  

Well . . . . nobody knows.  We’ll probably NEVER know.  You see, Will Scarlett was one of the breakout characters from the spinoff Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, and when that got canceled, someone -- really not sure who -- thought it’d be an awesome idea to plunk him onto OUAT.  

There were many schools of thought on this, the primary one being that ABC wanted him for something and wanted to keep him on contract.  That was 2014.  I’m typing this in 2020, and there’s still no Michael Socha show on ABC.  So that was a load of horse shit -- or else Socha told ABC to fuck off and hightailed it back to England.  My money is on the latter.  

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/115784240042/honest-question-why-did-they-bring-will-onto

But the issue isn’t even that they didn’t do fuck-all with Socha -- it’s the LIES that these assholes (they being A&E) told.  So here’s where my receipts come in.  You ready?  Got your popcorn?

First of all there’s this lovely article -- Will is mentioned by all of it is just glorious in general:

https://oncecrazy.tumblr.com/post/118843079631/the-26-things-the-castwriters-promised-would

What is so HIGHlarious about all of this is that almost all of the articles that existed about the whole Will Scarlett thing -- no longer EXIST!

The highlight is Zap2it -- which is a now defunct fan site that A&E liked to go prattle to.  

So Frick and Frack promised us we’d find out how Belle & Will got together.  I have this:

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/424464333605771793/#

And I have this:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/113163777872/once-upon-a-time-belle-and-the-knave-are-a-new

I also have a bunch of people I KNOW can confirm they saw this interview full of bullshit before it got erased.  Please show yourselves!  

But fear not -- I have an ACTUAL receipt from Mr. Socha himself:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/140658788782/apparently-michael-socha-got-screwed-over-by-ouat

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/140624375357/hes-a-good-bloke-i-saw-him-at-the-comic-con

I’m grateful someone had the idea to type it out, because sadly the link to that article was DELETED, which makes me think Socha got in trouble for that interview.  Because shortly after that, a more watered down interview with him was posted in its place and THAT is still up:

https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/ustv/a785951/michael-socha-confirms-once-upon-a-time-exit/

Interesting, no?

Whatever the case -- Socha got royally fucked over by OUAT, for no good reason.  His character was a plot device.  What a waste and what an insult to the man who just wanted to work.  Fuck these assholes. ��

So anyhow, there are the receipts, and we are now at the end of the clusterfuck that was Season 4.  

Speaking of clusterfucks . . . . onward to Season 5.  

Lord, give me strength . . . . . 

Points tally:

40 points to start

10 points for Rumbelle kiss

10 points for Rumbelle hug

5 points for Swan Queen

3 points for Papafire, at least it got mentioned

5 points for Belle in character

5 points for Rumple in character

5 points deducted for Hook

5 points deducted for Zelena

I really can’t justify adding or deducting anything bonus.  Just get me out of this season, please and thank you.

Total points:  68

Follow #celtichearted OUAT ranking tag for more to come!

#celtichearted ouat ranking #operation mongoose #anti hook #anti zelena #anti ouat writers #ouat criticism

[holidayblindspot]

Season of Hate/Season of Love (part 2)

The second part of RAnsomedR0gue’s seasonal Reller fic - chapter 1 can be found HERE.

***

The place Weller has picked for dinner is perfect. An upscale but homey vegan restaurant with little private alcoves, hidden seating to shield from curious eyes. She can tell right away that Jane would love it.

Of course Remi tries to hate it, feels the need to be extra resentful after completely giving into his ridiculous spa day, failing to show any semblance of self control. But the whole thing had felt like a waking dream, all frosty and steamy. And in her dreams she lets herself love him, allows him to love her back.

She wishes it hadn’t felt just as good in real life, makes her eye Weller longingly even now. Luckily he’s not looking at her for once, is informing the hostess of their reservation, and she manages to snap herself out of it before he glances back at her.

Get it together, soldier, she tells herself. Orders herself to stop thinking about his thumbs running up her wet back, his mouth touching that sensitive spot behind her ear she hadn’t even known about.

Remi exhales a long breath, forces her mind onto something else, anything else. Even just the merry eco-warrior urbanites with their alternative diets, their pathetic notions that they’re making a real difference by eating chickpeas instead of chicken. If Remi gave a rat’s ass about small time shit like overly cooped up chickens, there would be a lot of poultry farms on fire. Now that would make change, she thinks. Not eating soy cheese.

Goddamned vegan food, she grumbles to herself for the millionth time. Even though she had stopped craving meat ages ago, hasn’t snuck a turkey club since Weller got out of the hospital and started cooking for her. He had even become proficient at making tofu taste good, just another thing to be equally impressed and irritated by.

Stop it, she reminds herself. Pushes to come up with other inconsequential mental snipes at the décor, the hipster staff. But of course all she can think about is how much it suits her with the dim privacy, the artsy noir style art. How Weller much have trekked all around the city searching for the right place to take her because it’s clear he did a thorough job, did not just look at internet photos and reviews.

Remi glances around the restaurant, again trying to shake her faux husband out of her head. It takes her a moment to realize she’s been idly scanning the crowd for danger, searching for the most secure locations, all possible entry and exit points. An old ingrained habit, residue from being blown up, left for dead. Though lately she hasn’t felt the need as strongly, isn’t nearly as tense anymore, so acutely aware of everything.

She still remembers too clearly what it was like after the drone attack that nearly killed her. That feeling that she could be ambushed at anytime, the only warning being a whine just before detonation. The need to protect herself in the most innocuous of circumstances, the fear of every possibility.

It’s the only thing she’s thankful for since she woke up in another life. That her PTSD symptoms aren’t nearly as pronounced, constantly plaguing her. She’s no longer hyper sensitive, too sharp and snappy. Which doesn’t make any sense to her, especially because she’s all alone in hostile territory all the time now, with no allies to help protect her.

Irritably, her mind flashes yet again to Weller at that moment, makes her glance up at him. Remi feels a sad smile touch her lips as she sees that he’s also scanning the restaurant, scrutinizing the patrons and the staff. He reflexively puts his arm around her back as he looks for danger, probably doesn’t even realize he’s doing it. Similarly, he shields her with his body, guarding her from the unknown perils of the other vegan diners, the neo-bohemian servers. Because of course Kurt’s traumatic stress revolves entirely around her, just like the rest of his existence.  

His latent anxiety is making her feel edgy again too. But the fear she faces isn’t equipped with AR-15s, 9 mms. She’s just not looking forward to such a private dinner with Kurt, still can’t stop fucking feeling his hands all over her in the hot tub. It makes her cringe yet again, remembering how she had confided in him, let her real self slip through.

The worst part is he had given her an out, a guiltless way to escape his romantic plans. He would have even blamed it all on himself, somehow found fault in everything he did. But she hadn’t been able to lie to him, which was completely out of character for her. Worse yet, had then doubled down by grabbing onto him fiercely, letting him drown her in love.

Remi chastises herself again for being weak, susceptible to his charm. Is just telling herself that she’s going to re-establish her front lines at dinner when Weller slips his hand into hers, squeezes reassuringly.

“Ready?” he murmurs into her ear, so close his breath tickles.

No, she thinks. She’s not ready at all. Hasn’t the willpower to even harm him, much less kill him.

Remi nods, lets him tug her through to their hidden booth, in a back nook with good sightlines and egress routes. It’s both incredibly secure and charming, she has to fight hard not to love it. Even when she notices the cozy layout of the side-by-side seating.

They settle in and order drinks from their server, then it’s quiet between them for a moment as Remi pretends to look at the menu and Kurt does another quick glance around the place

She thinks how he’s so clueless about the danger he’s in, that she could easily murder him anytime. Yet he spends his days worrying about everyone else, her especially.

Case in point, he’s just done observing the entire restaurant and still feels tense beside her despite the fact there’s nothing even remotely threatening about their environment.

“Do you think something’s going on with our server?” Kurt asks, wearing his investigative frown.

Their server hadn’t said anything other than the usual season’s greetings, told them about drink specials. Nor had she seemed anything other than an average artsy vegan waitress, probably just another overworked wannabe actress.

“No, Kurt,” Remi sighs. “I think you’re being paranoid.”

Weller grunts his dissatisfaction with her answer, shakes his head thoughtfully.

“She seems tense,” he mutters.

This coming from the tensest man in the world, she thinks wryly.

“I’m sure everything’s fine Kurt,” Remi replies. “It’s not up to you to protect everyone.”

Kurt exhales irritably, like he disapproves of the mere concept. But he lets it go for the moment, turns to her and looks at her, his brow furrowed.

“No, just you,” he states, his blue eyes suddenly sad. “And I’m not doing a very good job of it.”

Remi turns towards him and frowns, finds that she’s somehow taken his hand in hers, is grasping it reassuringly.

“Kurt,” she groans. “It’s Christmas and I’m right here. Cheer up. Everything’s going to be fine, remember? Or have you been lying to me this whole time?”

She wins a rueful grin for that, feels that warmth in her chest again. Can’t help but grip his fingers even tighter, rub the base of his thumb with hers. Sometimes it’s impossible to deny that she wants to protect him too. Which then makes her do mental gymnastics afterwards to sort out why  

Sitting there though, she suddenly intuits the truth, it all snaps together.

Weller makes her feel safe. The overbearing protectiveness, so tight that it chafes, has an effect other than irritating the shit out of her.

Remi freezes at her revelation, shudders as the icy cold truth drips down the back of her neck. It makes no goddamned sense that knowingly sleeping with the enemy has somehow resolved most of her PTSD. She tries to tell herself it was the ZIP, that the drug was used experimentally as a cure for the disorder. But she knows that ZIP’s effectiveness in treating PTSD was highly questionable. And she can’t deny that Weller’s presence makes her feel secure, reminds her that he is always looking out for her.

Kurt pulls his hand free from hers, runs it up her back until he gets to the base of her neck, pauses there to rub her bare skin gently, as if to prove the point.

“You’re right,” he agrees. “You are right here. I shouldn’t waste that.”

The tone of his voice tells her what’s coming next, yet she doesn’t resist in the slightest as he pulls her into a kiss that starts out wistful and sweet, then deepens with urgency until they’re awkwardly interrupted by the waitress returning with drinks.

Remi pulls back, glad the darkness of their table hides the flush she can feel on her face. Weller’s wearing a look of irritated amusement, the blue of his eyes twinkling vividly despite the dim lighting.

“Well, that never changes,” he comments with a wry laugh.

She finds herself smirking too, a wisp of another life breaking through the barrier. It’s the strangest feeling, to be smiling and not really know why. Like Jane’s memories are there, shimmering in her subconscious. Not clearly enough to see, just enough to make her feel.

Like right now, this shared moment of annoyed amusement with Weller. An in joke she’s not in on.

Usually Remi clamps down on these glimmers of Jane, but tonight she’s all out of resistance. She has to admit that Kurt has played it well, has sapped her of any fight. So she laughs with him easily for once, even finds herself initiating a little footsy action while they order.

While they wait for their food they continue their back booth make out session for awhile then talk about Bethany’s visit the next day, which Remi can’t help but be excited for. Unexpectedly she likes Weller’s daughter, finds her little toddler grumpy Weller-face hilariously cute. And it’s hard to hate a kid that fucking adores you the way Bee adores Jane. Especially when you missed out on the life of your own kid, still regret it to this day.

Weller himself looks beyond excited about actually having his daughter for Christmas day, his eyes beaming, his body language all joyful anticipation. Of course he’s an attentive committed father, full of patience and love.

Like you knew he’d be, she thinks to herself, another distant echo.

It’s as if the walls have thinned with a day of snow dust, fairy lights. She feels the line between her and Jane flexing, dissolving. Usually it would fill her with anxiety, self-questioning. But Remi’s starting to think she can let herself off for Christmas.

Dinner floats by, Weller making her laugh a ridiculous amount of times with his laments about having selected Rich as his post-Christmas Secret Santa recipient, his absurd present ideas for the abnormally grating reformed dark web hacker. Which then leads to Remi confessing that Patterson told her Rich had fixed the draw and selected Jane as his present recipient, of course.

“But we picked names from a hat!” Weller exclaims, shaking his head in exasperation. “How can he rig something like that?”

Remi shrugs in shared mystified annoyance.

“It’s Rich,” she replies. “Everything about him is impossible.”

When their server comes back to ask about dessert they’ve moved on groaning about what Rich might be planning on getting her, the way he always tries to get a rise out of her. Weller glances at the dessert menu for a nanosecond before ordering the double chocolate lava cake, looks disappointed in her when she chooses something much less extravagant.

The waitress leaves with their orders, Kurt’s eyes following her as she stops at the bar to enter it into the system. Remi wonders what he sees, why he’s been half-watching her all evening. If she was less sure of his absolute devotion she would think he was interested. But she knows him well enough to read the protectiveness in his body language. He intuits there’s something wrong, that she needs help. Which is Weller’s way usually, an instinct that is annoyingly right most of the time.

Remi mostly thinks he’s being paranoid, somehow wants to self-sabotage Christmas because he’s so anxious about getting it right. But then again Weller does have some sort of spidey sense for people that need of protection.

She sighs, hopes he will just let it go and eat his ridiculous dessert. Kisses him on the edge of his forehead and tells him to not worry so much as she gets up, finds her way to the restroom.

She’s on her way back to their table when Remi hears the unmistakable sound of a gun shot coming from just out back of the restaurant. When Weller doesn’t come running through to check on the situation she sprints for their table, fear leaping into her mind as she remembers he had taken his weapon off while they were making out earlier.

She’s not surprised that Weller isn’t at their booth but she does swear and panic at the sight of his holster and gun, still wedged into the seating. He never forgets to take his weapon anywhere.

Remi tucks the gun into her pants, draws her own and runs for the back door

***

Weller smiles to himself, the feeling of Jane’s lips still warm against his temple as he watches her walk off towards the restrooms. The spa had been a winning idea after all, she’d been loose and expressive throughout dinner. This time It’s him that has the problem, the inescapable curse of worrying about everything, always being on guard. Especially since Jane’s been sick, he’s hyper aware of any possible danger, feels the need to protect her at all times.

Which is rationally ridiculous, because she’s tougher and more capable than he is despite the ZIP poisoning. And she hates it, is always sighing at him, telling him not to worry so much.

He can’t help it though, needs to be sure. It’s why he cased vegan restaurants all around the city before finding this one, both secure and private. Good entry and exit points, no one to stare at Jane except for him.

But despite the prime setting Kurt’s still been on high alert all night, has the worst feeling creeping at his neck about their server’s tight body language, her distracted glances around. He’s been trying to tell himself that Jane’s right, that he’s just reading too much into things, his anxiety setting off false positives.

Still, Kurt watches as their waitress walks down the hallway towards the back door of the restaurant with a bag of garbage and doesn’t immediately return. Feels his spine tingle with nervous anticipation.

Probably just going for a smoke break too, Weller thinks to himself. Though she hadn’t smelled like a smoker and he hadn’t seen her go out back previously that night.

The gears whirr in his head, his well-honed gut instinct fitting things together. The layout of the restaurant, how he’d seen a couple kissing in the alley just outside the back door when he’d come to look at the place a few weeks ago, the similarities between their server and the woman he’d seen. Now that he thinks about it, he’s fairly certain it’s the same person, just much tighter in her shoulders, a different energy to her.

It is most likely that he’s being paranoid, working himself up about nothing. But when he waits five more minutes and the waitress still hasn’t come back down the hall, Kurt can’t help but get up and go investigate.

Weller heads towards the back exit, hopes he’s about to run into his quarry and have to make some awkward excuse for following her down a dark hallway. But he doesn’t see her anywhere, opens the back door and is peering out when he hears the unmistakable sound of a strangled scream from across the alleyway.

Kurt bolts out the door, sees their waitress being choked against a concrete wall by a huge man with a gun. There’s a utility van with its back doors open nearby as well and it’s clear that the man is trying to abduct her.

“Freeze, FBI!” Weller hollers, reaching for his service weapon.

He’s halfway through the action when he realizes his mistake. He’d taken it off because it kept getting in his way while he was kissing Jane.

He’s going to die because he couldn’t help being handsy with his wife.

The man turns slowly and Kurt is already halfway there, launching himself into a flying tackle.

The element of surprise saves his life and Weller manages to knock the other man’s gun hand aside as he fires a shot. The bullet somehow skims across his collarbone instead of penetrating his chest cavity. Burns a bloody line along his chest as they hit the ground and Kurt slams the gun out of his assailant’s hand.

By that time the other man has read the situation and starts to use his size advantage to turn and pin Weller to the ground, hammer at his head with a giant fist. Kurt takes two hard hits to the temple, feels his skull crushed between the man’s knuckles and the rough concrete. Blood starts to drip down his face as he struggles to get free, just manages to knee the other guy in the crotch and slip out from under his weight.

Weller stumbles two steps towards the abandoned gun before he’s tackled from behind and tumbles hard to the ground. His attacker manages to get up before he does and viciously kicks him in the ribs with a steel-toed boot, then again in the head so hard Kurt almost passes out. He struggles to remain conscious, feels the foot connect again with his torso, directly in the sternum. Weller struggles for breath, tries to roll away when he sees the sole of the boot coming down at him and braces himself for having his teeth smashed in.

Jane is going to be really upset with him for dying on Christmas Eve, his half conscious mind thinks as the foot approaches his head. But then just as the rubber is about to touch his face, Weller hears a gunshot, feels a spray of blood that isn’t his own, sees his assailant fall to the ground clutching at his side.

Jane runs over, secures the perp with zip ties before kneeling down beside him and looking him over frantically.

“Oh my god, Kurt!” Jane exclaims. “You’re hurt.”

“I’m okay,” he grunts, pushing himself into a sitting position.

“You don’t look okay,” she replies, her green eyes dark with concern. “Your head is bleeding pretty badly. And your chest too, it looks like.”

She puts her hand on his jaw, lifts his head so she can assess his pupils and frowns at what she sees. He can tell she’s about to say that he’s concussed, that he needs to go to the hospital.

“I’m fine, Jane,” Weller groans, attempting a pre-emptive strike. The last thing he wants to do is spend Christmas Eve in the ER. They were meant to spend the rest of the night playing tourist in their own city, walk around to all the holiday displays, admire the festive lights.

“You call it in and see if our waitress is okay,” he adds. “I just need to clean up a bit.”

She’s still looking at him worriedly, brushing her thumb against his cheekbone.

“An ambulance and NYPD are already on their way,” she says. “And the waitress is fine, she’s the one that called 911. She’s inside with the manager now, everything’s being dealt with.”

Weller breathes a sigh of relief, scrubs his sleeve over the blood dripping down his face then winces at the sting of the cut. He brings his hand up again to probe at the injury but Jane catches it and puts it back down at his side before reaching her own hand up to tenderly wipe away the blood with a napkin, examine the cut.

“You’re going to need stitches,” she comments as she applies pressure to the wound, tries to stop the bleeding.

Kurt sighs, thinks it’s unlikely he’s going to win this argument. Jane’s too stubborn and is probably right. His head is still bleeding profusely and the pain in his temple has steadily increased to the point of being debilitating. So he’s probably going to end up in the hospital despite his annoyance with the circumstances, knowing that he’s managed to screw up yet another Christmas for Jane.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters, looking at her sadly.

Jane tilts her head and looks at him, her eyes twinkling with exasperation.

“You’re sorry you saved our waitress’s life?” she asks. “I still can’t believe you were right. Or that you forgot your gun.”

“I was distracted,” Weller declares with a groan. “That was so stupid. This is all my fault.”

“Hmm. Yeah, your fault for caring too much about everyone,” she replies, shaking her head at him. “Although I think it’s at least half my fault you weren’t wearing your holster.”

Kurt grins sheepishly, tilts his head towards her and then grunts at the pain of the movement, the nausea that washes through him.

Jane’s eyes emit alarm as he scurries away to vomit, heaves over and over until his ribs are screaming with the same intensity as his head.

Shit, you really screwed this up, he tells himself. Great worry free Christmas you’re giving your sick wife.

As if to prove his point, he feels Jane’s arms encircle him from behind, one hand on his bloody collarbone, the other rubbing his back gently. It feels incredible despite all the pain and he lets her soothe his hurt away even though he feels pathetic about allowing it.

“How bad is it?” she asks, her tone sadly stern, her breath soft against his ear. “The truth.”

Weller closes his eyes to push away another wave of vertigo, feels each shaky breath brush harshly against his broken ribs. His headache intensifies as he tries to resist puking again and for a moment all he can do is hug himself and softly moan.

“That’s pretty bad,” Jane states, answering her own question.

She’s still draped lightly over his back, her breath warm against his neck. He can hear the worry in her voice, the slightly tearful inflection. Knows she’s trying to hold it back so he doesn’t feel bad about upsetting her, which just makes him feel worse about it all.

It helps a bit when their waitress comes out to tearfully thank him, tells them how she had just left her husband and he’d started threatening her a few days ago, saying how he couldn’t spend Christmas alone. But she’d never expected that things would go so far, that he would threaten to kill them both.

The woman is extremely grateful, apologizes over and over while Weller tries to deflect her gratitude, tell her that he was just doing his job. Because all he can think about is how incredibly idiotic it was to forget his weapon, that he deserves everything he got as a result of such a basic error.

Eventually she tells them that their meal is paid for, that the owner of the restaurant wants to invite them back for another free dinner so they get a chance to finish their date. Of course Weller tries to tell her it’s not necessary and then shakes his head too vigorously, feels his body fill with nausea yet again.

Jane lets go of him so he can scurry away far enough to dry heave and groan with some dignity. When he’s finally done retching a few minutes later, the seeping cold of shock is starting to set in between his shoulders and Kurt begins to tremble uncontrollably in his soggy and bloody clothes.

Thankfully Jane must have seen him shivering and realized what he needed because she comes rushing over with his jacket, some towels, and a blanket. She sits behind him again and cuts his soggy shirt off with a pair of scissors, then wipes him dry with a towel before gently dressing him in his jacket. Next, she drapes the blanket over his shoulders and around his shaking torso, wraps her arms around his chest and starts to rub her hands up and down his arm while breathing hot air against the nape of his neck.  

“So are you going to let me take you to the hospital?” she asks, as if he could really deny her anything. Even if he wasn’t in a world of hurt, definitely needs medical attention.

Weller nods ruefully, then gasps as the throbbing in his temple becomes even more unrelenting.

It’s like Jane can feel what’s going on in his body, leans him back and cradles his head against her chest, rubs soothingly at the pain with her thumbs.

“You’re unbelievable,” she mutters, her lips tickly against the back of his head. “And an idiot.”

“Mmmm,” he agrees. “Your idiot.”

“Yeah,” Jane replies. “My heroic idiot. That was pretty incredible, Kurt.”

He allows himself a half grin, despite still feeling like he’s messed things up yet again. Jane doesn’t seem to be annoyed at his stupidity, is just worried that he’s covered in blood and in a significant amount of pain. Which isn’t ideal, definitely not the perfect holiday he’d planned. But he can tell she’s proud of him as she nuzzles her nose into the nape of his neck, holds him to her as firmly as she can without hurting his sore chest.

“Well, I have a lot of catching up to do,” he declares. “You’re incredible all the time.”

He feels her smile against his skin, then kiss him on the top of his head.

“Shut up, Kurt,” she murmurs with a laugh. “You’re delirious.”

But he doesn’t follow orders, continues to lean against her and go on about all the ways in which he adores her. Because it makes her smile and sigh, makes him forget about the pounding in his head, the difficulty of breathing, until he finally hears multiple vehicles with sirens pull up in the alleyway.

The EMTs unload and ask him too many questions as Jane helps him lie down gently on the stretcher and they quickly load him into the back of the ambulance. The sudden movement of the gurney makes his vision swim again and he barely manages to keep from retching as they secure him for transport.

Thankfully Jane clambers in after him and sees that he’s struggling, grabs his hand and squeezes, then and skims her other palm over his chest lightly.

“It’s okay,” she says, leaning over to kiss his forehead. “They’re going to give you something for the pain, it should make you comfortable until we’re at the hospital. So try and rest, Kurt. I’m here, you’re safe.”

It’s what he’s meant to be doing for her, keeping her safe, protecting his wife.

But then again he married Jane, deadly compassionate, always more worried about everyone else than herself, even with a fatal illness. Capable of anything, including saving his life on Christmas Eve, soothing him to sleep in a sea of hurt.

#season of hate/season of love #blindspot #blindspot in a winter wonderland #reller #remi/kurt #blindspot fanfic

[storytime-hoe]

Tough Love Ch.15

Pairing: Daryl Dixon x O/C

Summary: Story picks up during season three as the group goes into Woodbury to rescue Glenn and Maggie from the Governor. However, they pick up another prisoner of Woodbury, Emma (O/C). She is a thief who fears friendships after her hard losses. She stays on the move, studying communities from afar and then robbing them blind. She has stayed alive this way for a while until the Governor catches her in the act. Now she finds herself with the group from the prison in a mission to kill the Governor for what he has done to her. She plans on stealing supplies from the prison group after the Governor is killed, but she might be growing a little too close to the groups members, especially one man in particular: Daryl Dixon.

Warnings: Slow burn, language, usual twd violence, mentions of abuse/rape

Authors Note: This seem short compared to some of the other chapters maybe, but I didn’t want to combine another with this just to make it longer because I feel that the next part deserves to be its own chapter.

Previously: Ch.1     Ch.2       Ch.3       Ch.4     Ch.5      Ch.6     Ch.7       Ch.8       Ch.9       Ch.10          Ch.11        Ch.12        Ch.13       Ch.14

The world was so quiet anymore. There was no traffic noise or airplanes flying overhead or construction workers jackhammering at sidewalks. It was nice for the most part, but the silence was louder than those old noises at times. 

Like right now, as I sat up in the guard tower overlooking the prison yard. My feet dangled off the ledge of the tower as I was sat on the ground leaned back on my hands. My mind wandered to all the sad event of my life from before, the events that started not only when the dead rose again. But I permanently had my shitty past life engraved in me. From all the dates with douchebags to working endless hours to provide for my shit mom and brother. However, all the memories weren’t bad, it was just the bad ones that always came back to me at times like this, times of quiet. 

That's one of many reasons that I loved that Daryl joined me on watch everyday. I didn't want to be alone with my thoughts for too long, it wasn’t good for me to get into my own head like that. But Daryl kept me at ease, even if he wasn't talking to me to fill the silence, his presence was enough for me to relax.

The sound of heavy steps coming up from behind me signaled that Daryl was finally here.

"About damn time," I teased without turning to make sure that it was actually him.

"Took forever to get this," he said as he plopped down beside of me with two plates of food.

I lit up at the smell of food, but my mouth dropped open at the sight of a familiar bottle of vodka that he sat down between us. It was the bottle that he had taken from my hands during the eventful run with Sasha and Glenn. I remembered dropping my bottle and wasting it all when the herd of Walkers came at us, but I never saw what he did with his.

"Put it in my pack 'fore we hightailed it outta there," he filled in for me with a shrug.

When I found the bottle, they had all wanted to take them back with us that night, but I wanted to enjoy them right then and there like a fucking idiot. I was glad that that didn't happen however, because now I only had to share with one other person this way.

"Should we be drinking while on watch though? What if something happens and we don't see it?"

He nodded and chewed at the skin by his thumb nail. "Ya can drink all ya want. I'll watch."

A grin slowly spread across my face. I hand  hand on the bottle, eager to get a taste of the strong liquid, something I hadn’t done since the world went to shit. At my hesitation Daryl looked at me and nodded for me to go on. I snatched up the bottle and opened it up to take a swig. "If you insist," I giggled out like a fucking school girl, downing another swig of the fiery liquid.

When I glanced over to him, I saw the grin that he was fighting, but it won the battle against his stubbornness and shown through in the end. I liked seeing him smile, it gave me pride when I was the cause of it, even if it was only because I was being stupid and messing up. I just liked seeing him happy, happy was a rare thing these days.

As we began digging into our dinner I kept a careful eye on the fence line, at least pretending to do the job of keeping watch,  even while I drank down half of the bottle.

"Were your fans glad to see you stop in?" I snickered with a playful nudge to his arm with my elbow. 

He knew that I was referring to all the people that lived in the prison that had come to obsess over him. They loved that he provided them with food and a sense of comfort. Who wouldn't love it? He was perfect and for some damn reason he was the only one to not think so.

He scoffed before taking a bite of the deer meat that was on his plate. "Pretty much. These people can't let me be for two fucking seconds without wantin' to chat me up."

 I could tell it was actually getting to him as he talked. He hated attention, the good or the bad attention. "They just look up to you. You're the reason most of them are alive, ya know."

"Well, I don't want to be no damn hero." He took a gulp out of the bottle of alcohol at that, despite that he planned on not drinking in order to keep watch, but I just let him take it from my hand and put it back on my leg when he was done.

 After a long pause of silence, he continued, his thoughts needing to be spoken to someone. "Sometimes I wish it was jus' us again, our small group, 'fore we started takin' in all these people."

I nodded understandingly. Most of them were dumb as hell sometimes because of their lack of experience out in the real world after being cooped up in Woodbury, and it was hard not to be angry about it. "It's not their fault. The Governor had them all thinking things would return to the way they were."

Daryl grunted in disgust, taking out a cigarette from his pocket, resorting to a smoke rather than the vodka this time.

"Do you think it ever will? Do you think things will go back eventually?" I really missed the world sometimes and I could imagine building up civilizations again and governments and starting back where we left off. I washed down that longing with the tang of my drink.

He thought about it for a long time, before his meaningful eyes flicked to mine with a sense of sadness pulling at them. "Nah. Think it's all too fucked to ever get back to any kind of normal."

I swallowed hard, not wanting to believe it, but he was right. God, he was fucking right, and I had to accept that. 

 "Is there anything you miss about the way the world used to be?"

He took a long drawly off his cigarette and for a moment I thought he was going to ignore the question and not answer. Then he finally shook his head, eyes trained on the fence still yet.  "Not really," he spoke, looking out at the world in front of him. "You?"

I debated whether answering him seriously, but if I was working on the opening up thing, so I decided to be honest. "I miss parties; staying up all night with a bottle of booze and laughing at nothing," I said, the memories tugging at my heart. It was weird to reminisce the good times and not the bad ones. I wasn’t used to that, and the alcohol in me making it harder to hold back the emotion in my voice. "I miss getting dressed up for things and dancing." I sad smile graced my lips. I had lived in a shitty trailer park and didn't have much, but I could remember the nights of drinking with friends until we passed out, and dancing the nights away and acting like kids again.

The silence that followed was heavy. I really ruined the mood didn't I? Why did I have to make everything so depressing all the time? My eyes stung with the need to cry it out. I missed having fun so fucking much, but it would never be the same. Daryl had said it himself, the world was far too fucked up to be any kind of normal ever again.

With a grunt of effort Daryl got to his feet. "Come on," he said with the cigarette still dangling on his lips.

"What are you doing?" I searched his face for an explanation, but as usual his intentions were hidden.

"Can't give ya no damn party," he began a little shyly at first, much to my surprise. He had never acted bashful around me. Rude– yes, brash– definitely, but not bashful. "But I'll give you one dance," he continued. Then more irritably, "Then I'm done."

I hadn't expected this. He was not the type to offer to do something so personal or intimate. I'd come accustom to him avoiding physical touch with anybody at all. He looked awkward in hugs and he always steered clear of most human interactions. He only let a few people get close to him.

My heart did a flip when he reached his hand out to me. "C'mon 'fore I change ma mind."

He didn't have to say it twice before I got to my feet a little too quickly and placed my hand into his, letting him slowly guide me to him. 

His hands timidly laid at my hips and I snaked mine up around his neck. He didn't say anything else and neither did I, afraid to ruin the moment. He slowly swayed me back and forth and I gradually pulled in closer to him until my head lay down against his chest, listening to his heart beating rather quickly.

Suddenly, I was so fucking grateful for all the dark times and suffering that I had gone through in my lifetime. It let me recognize moments like this as they were: moments of pure bliss and love. 

My ridiculous mind then started to wander what it would be like to be with Daryl like this all the time. I already did fall asleep holding onto him every night, listening to that heart beat and falling asleep to the rhythmic sound. But this was different somehow... more intimate. We weren’t going to sleep as soon as we got comfy, we were both painfully aware of how close we were and how our breaths were picking up. 

Then I let myself do the worst thing possible. I let myself wander what it would be like to kiss him. I had recently come to terms that I had a thing for Daryl, and I always admired him for how he looked, but I never let myself dwelled on doing anything with him before. Nothing more than a daydream, that is, knowing there as a possibility that I was reading everything wrong the entire time and that he wouldn't feel the same way about me. Now, however, with the alcohol coursing through me, it wasn't sounding like a bad idea.

I lifted my head ever so slightly towards him. The stubbled on his face scratched against my cheek and I looked up at him through my eyelashes. When he moved his head down farther against mine I felt butterflies in the pit of my stomach.

Our noses were hitched against each other, our hard paced breaths mixing together. His hand came up to rest at the back of my head, the forgotten cigarette pinched between two fingers.

Forget the butterflies, there was a whole damn zoo ramming around in my insides.

I wanted to kiss him so fucking bad. We were so close together, our lips almost ghosting each other, that one slight move would do the trick. But we were both stuck in place.

What the fuck was I doing? This wasn't me, it had to be the vodka acting for me. I could do this. He wasn't thinking straight and neither was I for a different reason. He just felt bad for me. Of course that was it. He felt bad because I was bitching about missing the old world. So here he was trying to make me feel better. He didn't really want this. He couldn't really want this. It was crazy.

So, I had to stop it before I doubled crazy.

I angled my head back from him so I could open my mouth to speak, but I had to take a moment to clear my throat in order to get my voice to actually work. "I- I should go sleep off this bottle I just downed. Another early day tomorrow.” I attempted a smile, but it wouldn’t surface like I wanted it to, my mind too distracted by the feelings that flowed through me. Every part of me betrayed the words I was saying, from the way my voice shook to my eyes flicking down at his lips every now and again. 

His eyes searched mine for a second before he put some distance between us, but still held me to him in his arms, like a cage of warmth that I never wanted to exit.

"Listen, I been meanin’ ta talk wit’ ya," he began, clearly struggling with how he wanted to phrase his next words.

Oh fuck. This better not be some love confession or some shit, I couldn't handle something like that right now.

"I think maybe we should stop goin' out there. He ain't coming back."

My breath hitched in my chest. He was talking about the Governor.

I pushed out of his arms and looked at him accusingly the moment I registered his words. "The fuck are you saying? I should give up? Let him roam the world a free man after what he did to all of us?"

He ran a hand over his face, letting out an exhausted sigh. "The trail went cold, Emma. We can't keep wanderin' 'round mindlessly. It's time to start doing other things. The group needs us doin' other shit."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. How could he expect me to drop it just like that? I couldn't forget what the Governor did and I knew he was alive out there. I wasn't going to rest until it was taken care of.

I shoved at his chest hard, not being able to find the right words to show him how upset I was. When he didn't react and just let me hit him again, I boiled over.

"Fuck you Dixon! You're wrong. He is out there, I know he is. Do you want him to keep hurting people? You know what he's done to me! You fucking–"

"Course I don't want him to–"

"Then I am not fucking giving up!"

I was going ballistic. I wanted to cry and slap him and scream until my lungs were out of air. I had never been so mad at him in my life. Not when he called me names or gave me shit or even when he I was pissed about him defending Merle when I had first met him. 

My head began to spin and I tilted off balance slightly. Daryl took a step towards me with his hands outstretch, ready to steady my swaying form.

"Don't fucking touch me," I breathed out unthreateningly, the breath feeling like it had been kicked out of my lungs.

I had to get away. Right now. Before I did things I would regret. I stormed towards the stairs, grabbing onto the railing for balance.

Daryl made the mistake of grabbing my arm to stop me. I didn't even think, I just wanted away from him, so I spun towards him and slapped him across the face with a loud smack.

He released my arm immediately, and step away from me, the shock evident on his face. I felt just as shocked as he was, and a little guilty at the red mark that spread across his cheek. 

I didn't say anything else as I looked him over one more time, the desperation and longing in his eyes. After staring into his eyes for a minute, I had to remind myself to stay mad. So, I turned around and started fumbling down the steps before I gave into him.

But not this time. I wasn’t running to him. I didn’t need him. I was going  to hide in the comfort of my own cell, not his, the tears already puddling and ready to fall.

For fucks sake, when was I going to stop letting him make me cry?

***

Taglist:

@daryldixonandfrogs @jodiereedus22 @xchrisxevansx @bvbwestfall @my-current-fandom-is

#daryl dixon #twd daryl #daryl dixon fanfiction #twd #twd fanfiction #the walking dead #the walking dead fanfiction #the walking dead imagine #daryl x reader #daryl x oc #daryl dixon imagine #norman reedus #norman reedus daryl #norman reedus daryl dixon #reader x daryl dixon #daryl dixon x reader #daryl dixon x oc #oc x daryl dixon #daryl dixon fan fic #the walking dead daryl #the walking dead daryl dixon #the walking dead norman reedus #the walking dead fan fic #twd fanfic #the walking dead fanfic #daryl dixon fanfic #daryl fanfic

[the-coconut-asado]

NUT MILK CITY LIMITS

This should have been my Boston blog. And I will write one, someday soon. 

But limited as we are to four walls, dodging pavement cyclists and the kindness of delivery folk, let’s settle for a tale of lockdown invention. 

That said, my story does start in Boston - or rather, leaving it. It was the real start of The Weird, around early-mid March, when I still took the tube into work and was looking forward to a visit to the hairdresser (lockdown was announced the day before my appointment in case you were wondering. So there will be no selfies here).  We managed to head off to the US the day that Trump banned the rest of Europe from flying and I won’t lie, we felt lucky. I sat next to a Canadian student on the flight who explained, as she coughed, that she had traded her study trip around  Europe for a £2,000 ticket-chance of getting home. 

We got to our faintly Psycho- throwback hotel that night, where we seemed to be the only guests. And for three days we toured the (mostly shut)  sites of Boston with the streets all but empty. 

At one stage, as we strolled past a CVS store, two young women emerged, insanely juggling 4x16 pack toilet roll bags. How we laughed. The way those pesky kids laugh as the Scooby-ghoul looms behind them. On the Sunday, any holiday vibe had been replaced with low level anxiety, counting down the hours to our flight leaving the US on time and as planned.

And since we landed back in London, that’s been it. Travel now means taking the car for a weekly local drive to keep the battery ticking over, and let’s not dwell on the cancelled trip to Vietnam. The Supermarket Sweep race as you grab random packs off shelves before the personal space invader twats sneak up behind you  is now replaced by the delivery time lotto of Amazon Fresh. Got a formula for that, Dale Winton? 

But there have been new things to smile about: neighbourhoods coming together every Thursday evening to Clap for Carers; the bravery of NHS workers and a whole army of people I hope we’ll never take for granted again; friends and family checking in on each other much more than ever usual. And the travel buzz achieved by changing our backgrounds on Zoom. Don’t knock it,  the endorphin kick is real. 

And dare I say there have been pleasures too: delicious meat, fish and vegetables delivered from local suppliers, and weekends full of invention possibilities. “ Are we all fucking bakers now??” Twitter ranted in week 2 of lockdown  as flour and eggs became the New Disappeared. Cashew milk, the one nut milk I enjoy, became similarly scarce for a short while, but I discovered the eye-wateringly expensive delights of Milkadamia until sanity returned. 

Faced with the random nature of vegetable boxes, half used packs of speciality flours otherwise doomed to outlive their sell by date and the excitement of what you can achieve with a carton of buttermilk and bicarb of soda - life in the kitchen is nothing short of a blast right now. Just like wartime? We have no rationing and plenty of Chipotle paste so, er, no. 

Breaking my veg box virginity has been liberating. There are the highs of high-sheen aubergines and those creamy new potatoes of the season, and the occasional low of celery on three consecutive weeks. But the thrill of anticipation when we open the door to a new box is palpable. And finding specialist suppliers for everything from sumac to burrata has made me realise that up until the pandemic I’d been shopping all wrong and wasting far too much money. With the simple elimination of impulse purchase I have hit my notional monthly food budget for the first time ever. 

So here are a bunch of recipes for what I consider my best lockdown experiments. Stock up on your store cupboard essentials and you can use whatever basics are available that week. And by store cupboard essentials I mean: Olive and coconut oils, smoked paprika, cumin, turmeric, chilli flakes, soy sauce, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda (you don’t need yeast for soda bread or flat breads). And whatever flour you can find, you’ll be able to do something with it. 

Bolli-cauli biryani with camargue rice

Forget boiling cauliflower ever again. Chop florets, toss them in spice and oil and roast to crispy, caramelised deliciousness every time. Serves 2-3. 

Ingredients

1 medium cauliflower, cut into florets, then cut each floret in half to create bite size pieces

The cauliflower leaves, pulled from the fibrous stalks

2 medium red onions, quartered

1-2 large red chillies, split from top to bottom but kept intact

2 tsp. Sumac

2 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp kosher salt

Generous grind of black pepper

1 tsp chilli flakes

3 tbsp. Olive oil

300g camargue red rice (1 small mug)

25g salted butter

Plan yoghurt to serve

How to make:

Heat the oven to 190C. 

In a large bowl, toss the cauliflower, cauliflower leaves, chillies and onion (and any other chunky vegetable you hav in the fridge eg.squash, aubergine or courgettes) with the spices and olive oil. Spread out onto a large roasting pan and pop into the oven for 40-45 mins, turning everything half way through. The edges of the vegetables will caramelise and the leaves will crisp up. 

Meanwhile, heat the butter in a saucepan until it bubbles then add the rice and toss until you get a toasty aroma. If you used a small cup, then now add a small cup and an extra quarter cup (or if you measured 300g then add 400ml water) and a generous pinch of salt. Bring to the boil, stirring once and then simmer on a medium heat until the water is all but absorbed (about 15-20  mins). At this point, cover with a lid, turn the heat to low and cook for a further 10-15 mins. Turn off the heat and leave covered for a further 10 minutes before fluffing the rice up. 

When the bolli-cauli is ready, remove from the oven and serve over a generous scoop of the toasty, chewy buttery camargue rice. Add a dollop of yoghurt on the side and some mango chutney to serve. And treat yourself to some poppadoms for the crunch factor. 

Beer and Buttermilk Soda Bread

My favourite bread of the lockdown - and no yeast required.  Based on a Paul Hollywood recipe, mine replaces stout with any old beer or lager you may have  in the fridge, and a range of ‘bin end flours: Wholemeal, basic brown, spelt and strong white. 

Ingredients: 

500g wholemeal flour (or a mix of any brown or grain flours you have)

250g strong white flour

280ml buttermilk

300ml bottle of beer or lager

2 tsp salt

2 Tbsp. bicarbonate of soda

How to make:

Mix the flours, bicarbonate of soda and salt in a large bowl. 

Make a well in the centre and add the buttermilk and beer. 

Mix until everything comes together then knead gently until you have a cohesive ball. 

Pop into a 2lb loaf tin and press slightly into the corners.

Leave to rest for 30 mins. 

Heat the oven to 210C. Bake the loaf for 10 minutes, then turn the oven down to 180C and bake for a further 25-30 minutes. Cool in the tin for 10 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack. The base should sound hollow when you tap it. 

Cool then slice and slather with butter. This bread is also excellent toasted. 

Spinach,  Ricotta and Feta  Pie

The superstar look of this pie as it emerges from the oven belies a super-easy method. If you can’t get hold of ricotta, just use cream cheese. Serves 4. 

Ingredients

7 sheets filo pastry

2 garlic cloves, chopped finely

1 medium onion, finely chopped

250g spinach

1 large egg

1 tsp. Grated nutmeg

250g ricotta, mascarpone or cream cheese. 

125g feta cheese, crumbled

Handful of fresh oregano leaves, chopped finely. 

100ml olive oil. 

1 tsp. Nigella seeds

How to make:

Heat the oven to 200C. 

Heat 1 tbsp. Olive oil in a frying pan then saute the onion and garlic on a low heat until soft. Add the spinach and cook gently until wilted - about 5 minutes. Turn into a sieve or colander and squeeze out as much liquid as you can. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper and put to one side. 

Beat the egg with the ricotta and nutmeg then season. Crumble in the feta, then add the spinach and onion mixture. 

Brush a 22cm loose bottomed cake tin with olive oil and lay a sheet of filo pastry along the bottom and the sides. Brush again with oil, then add a second sheet at an angle to the first. Keep brushing each sheet with oil, then adding the next layers at an angle until you have used six sheets and they are lining the tin in a flower petal formation. 

Tip the spinach and cheese mix into the tin then fold each ‘petal’ of filo on top to form a lid to the tart. Brush with more oil then scrunch up the seventh sheet of filo, perch it on top of the pie and brush with the remaining oil. Scatter over the nigella seeds. 

Pop into the oven for 25-30 minutes (watch the top so it doesn’t turn from golden to burnt). 

Remove from the oven, cool slightly, before releasing the sides of the tin and transferring the pie to a plate to serve. 

Carrot cake muffins with mandarin frosting

Not really the season for carrot-eating, but grated three carrots into this cake mix and you have a winner. And the frosting is a great way to use up mandarins. Makes 6 Large muffins. 

Ingredients

1.5 cups plain flour

1.5 tsp. Bicarb of soda

¾ cup demarara sugar

½ tsp. salt

½ tsp. Cinnamon

1 cup cashew nut milk

2 eggs, beaten

½ cup sunflower oil

1 tsp. Vanilla Extract

3 carrots, shredded

50g pecan nuts, roughly chopped. 

For the frosting: 

Juice of 1 mandarin

1.5 cups icing sugar

How to make

Heat the oven to 180C. 

In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, bicarb. Of soda, sugar, cinnamon and salt. Add the eggs, oil, vanilla and cashew nut milk and mix again until a smooth batter. Fold in the carrots and the pecans. 

In a muffin tin with 6 cases (or double the recipe and use 12). Fill each paper cup with the muffin batter until ¾ full then pop into the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, until they are fully risen. 

Remove from the oven and cool in the tin before removing each muffin and placing on a cooling rack to cool completely. 

When the muffins are cool, mix the mandarin juice with the icing sugar until you have a smooth and sluggish paste. Ice each muffin and serve. 

[someonefromseoul]

Fuck Me.

Hello. I don’t know who or what I’m directing this to but I’ll just pretend there’s someone actually reading this. Temptation is a strong fundamental desire that doesn’t always have our best interest. Like that time you look in the mirror wishing you haven't had that donut for lunch, or that other time when you turn and toss, only to find yourself not being able to sleep at 4am from the nap you had earlier that day.

I feel like shit right now. I had oily ass bacon for breakfast, cup noodles for brunch, pepperoni pizza for lunch, ice cream cone for dessert, almond soy bean milk as my “work drink”, only to transition my day into a nap.

I feel bloated as fuck and my pimples are having the time of their lives, meeting new friends and such. 

So this only leads me to my usual routine of self hatred and disgust for a solid hour, drotting down what the rest of my day will look like just to fool myself to thinking I’m productive, and get on Tumblr to waste more time complaining about my day!

Okay, but here’s the deal. I really do want to get better again. I stopped working out ever since my gym closed down from that fucking coronavirus (yes, I am that spoiled and self centered only to be complaining about my gym closing during this time of crisis) which has been a couple of months now. 

I had diet fillers on my chin area to get rid of my chin fat right before the quarantine. That was a fucking waste of money since my double chin is back.

Anyway, my point is that I want to be somewhat sane again. My mind is literally going crazy over being stuck at home and I clearly don’t love my body enough judging by how I’ve been treating it. 

I put a face mask earlier today. That’s a change. I’m going to work out starting NOW. In like a few hours. And I’m going to document the progress and process because I want to see the change and actually hold myself accountable if I don’t go through with this. 

So this is the plan.

1. I am 51.8kg (114.2 pounds) right now. My goal weight is 48kg (105 pounds). Okay, so basically my goal is to lose around 10 pounds.

2. I just started an art instagram. Try to post three times a week. I want to have 10 followers by the end of May. And NOT by asking my limited amount of friends to follow. I want to connect with real strangers who are really there for my art.

3. My fucked up skin. Let’s try to clear that out as soon as possible as well. I know I have oily skin and a huge part of that comes down to what I consume. Let’s fucking please stay away from oily and salty food. Drinks permitted is only water, tea, and sometimes alcohol. 

4. Speaking of alcohol, try to stay away from that. Which I’m doing a good job of these days because I’m “social distancing” (no friends). I’m going out tomorrow though but let’s really try to keep it like max 3 drinking nights per month. MAX. preferably once to none.

5. You can never single out alcohol when you’re a smoker. Hi, hello, I’m a smoker. I’ll write a post going more in depth about my smoking journey. Long story short, I’ve been smoking since August of 2013. So like 7 years already. I genuinely don’t know why I started it. Actually that’s a lie, I got into it because I thought it looked cool and I wanted to fit in. Sad, sad weakling I was. Anyway, I’m going to QUIT. I literally say this like merry Christmas to the point my friends just roll their eyes at me whenever I say this. Like, let’s really try to make this a reality instead of this having to be that time I cried wolf again. LIKE PLEASE. For yourself, man. You know you’re getting old and it’s not like you have any more health to spare.

6. Work on my art project. You know which one I mean. I want to keep it on the down low. To roughly plan, I want to work on my portfolio around June July and August. but by June, let’s focus on instagram, enhancing my drawing skills from proko, and this personal art project I’m not going to specifically go into because it’s confidential. Let’s call it Arty. So yeah, finish Arty.

7. My relationships. Mind you, I’ve never seen a therapist because I’m not financially independent and it’s a taboo subject to bring up in Asian culture. At least with my family. So no, I haven’t been professionally diagnosed, but who needs a doctor when we have google, right? So to preface, this is not a legitimate claim I’m making. But I strongly think and believe that I have anxiety; especially social anxiety and an avoidant personality disorder. I definitely deal with SOMETHING-I do plan on going to a therapist the moment I get the chance to, which is hopefully, soon. Anyway, getting back on topic. I want to work on my relationships with my friends and family because I’ve literally been in my shell for the past couple of months. Avoiding people at all costs. Not healthy at all.

8. My mental health. Probably the most important one. If this was a meat house and I could grade my health, I would give it a B+. Definitely not a S, not exactly an A either-but on the fence between A and B. Not quite A- but more of a B+. I don't have any serious health issues but I’m not great either. I feel slightly uncomfortable when breathing, my mind is foggy, and I think I might have hemorrhoids soon. Literally keeps me up at night because it frightens me-I constantly flex my butthole just in case things might peep out (sorry for the TMI but this is my fucking blog so deal) (me still pretending like someone’s actually still reading this shit post) I lose sleep over it, don’t even get me started. Anyway, if my body health is a B+, my mental health is probably around a B-. I don’t think it’s around the C level, but it’s definitely below average (average being a B). It’s at the verge of either becoming average or enter into the C level. A or S is obviously out of reach with my potential right now. But I want to get to an A; possibly to a S some day. Some day. A girl can dream. Anyway, how I want to go about this is to keep writing on this blog. Because I have a fake ass personality, I literally hide my real self to everybody. Kinda psycho like that. At least this little spot can be my safe space where I can get all my genuine shit out. To be serious for 2 seconds, I think I’m fake to people these days because I don’t feel comfortable being completely myself. My self esteem really plummeted after I graduated high school. I’ve been shushing myself internally too-shaming myself about how stupid and weird I sound. I’ve been trying to press down all my negative judgements and thoughts because I didn't want to spread that kind of energy to other people which made me be fake positive all the time. That can be really fucking suffocating, guys. Those of you who know what I mean say I. 

Anyway, I want to find my color again. I think I’ve been shushing and shaming myself for so long, I don't even know who I am anymore. Hopefully writing like this helps. And apparently physically working out does as well. Let’s try to aim everyday, maybe a lazy day per week.

Side note-Kakaotalk keeps spamming me about the sakura flowers and how beautiful it is, suggesting me to go see it. Um, hello. Can you stop harassing me with these insensitive messages? Some people don’t have friends to go with. And it’s quarantine season? Are you dumb?

9. My looks. which goes under self care as well. I’m not gonna lie, I think I’m a fairly okay looking girl. I’m going to change my makeup style because after not putting on makeup for so long and looking back at my old photos, I’ve seen my bare face for so long, I grew fresh pair of eyes to see how I REALLY looked prior to this quarantine. And I finally got what people meant by “your makeup looks obnoxious.” Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE makeup. I’ve loved makeup ever since I was a sophomore in high school. I follow many of the beauty gurus (how they used to call it back in the days. I think people call them beauty influencers or makeup artists now) from youtube and Sephora was my second home. My broke ass owns like majority of the urban decay naked palettes in exchange for eating kimchi and eggs for weeks with my poor college student self in exchange. Poor college student with a BEAT makeup look though.

Anyway, the point I want to get across is that I respect and love ANY form of self expression. There is no such thing as too much or too less (is that even a word) makeup as long as YOU feel good in it. I personally did and I enjoyed my extra caked face. But not anymore. Maybe on some occasions, but I just don’t feel like that’s me anymore. So I need a new make up look, and I literally want new clothes. I hate my freaking outfits. Going to invest in some soon.

I can’t really think of anything else. I want to go in further with some of the topics I’ve tackled today but I think that’s enough journal writing for today. If I think of anything else, I can always update later. I just fucking pray I don't get hemorrhoids. I don’t have it now but I’m just so paranoid because I literally sit down 25/8 and apparently sitting for an extended period of time continuously can cause hemorrhoids. And for some reason I keep feeling like I’m going to get it soon. Like my butthole low-key feels a little weird at times. Hopefully I’m okay.

#journal #selfcare #goingcrazy #self reflection #hate myself #thoughts #plans #life