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iamnmbr3 · 3 years

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Another day. Another questionable interview from someone involved with the production. This time the Director (who to her credit at least is better than Mike Waldron in that she is able to say she likes Loki’s character whereas his interviews drip with open disdain and disrespect and he can’t even pretend otherwise). (x)

Kate Herron: But Loki doesn't have many friends, you know? He builds this friendship with Mobius across the second episode.

Here again we get out-of-universe confirmation that the narrative framing of Mobius in a positive light is intentional. Mobius is not Loki’s friend. He’s his captor and his torturer. Loki isn’t on equal footing with Mobius. They don’t even have a boss-employee relationship. LOKI WAS MOBIUS’S SLAVE until he escaped. He was being held against his will and coerced under threat of death to work for Mobius and his organization without compensation. That is slavery. And it’s not ok.

Mobius also berated him by telling him that he is inherently evil and monstrous - the very things that drove him to suicide. Mobius is complicit in acts of torture, genocide, murder, privacy violation, and police brutality and shows no signs of having any problem with it. He’s no more Loki’s friend than Thanos or the Black Order are.

When has he ever treated Loki with dignity or respect? Even if we ignore all the horrific stuff, he’s just plain not nice to Loki. He constantly mocks and belittles him and never takes his side. That’s not a how a friend behaves! That’s how a bully behaves! Where is the basis for this friendship??!!

Kate Herron: “And obviously, we're seeing it through Loki and Sylvie's POV. You know, neither of them are good or bad. A complete, pure good hero would probably join the queue and be like, "Well, hopefully we'll get on the train." But they're not those characters. They're going to try and get on it.”

They snuck onto a train??? That’s what she thinks a grey character is? That’s so dull! Loki was a complex and grey character. Larry (as I call the tv show character) and Sylvie...got on a train without a ticket. That’s laughable! That doesn’t make me think about complex morality or issues. And c’mon. All the heroic Avengers have done that level of rule breaking MANY times and they don’t lose their “pure good hero status.” Tony Stark constantly does things like that! I want Loki back. HE is a grey character. But I haven’t seen him in the show so far. Instead I get Larry the watered down clown.

Kate Herron: “When Loki and Mobius are at Pompeii, for example, that's shown through Loki's POV, right? He's joyous and he cracked the case. Pompeii was horrific, but we're seeing it through his perspective and he's in a completely different headspace.”

You know a scene can have more than one emotion right? Like he could be happy about solving the case but also horrified at the destruction of Pompeii? Instead he is laughing at the people who are about to die horrifically and seems to have no compassion for them whatsoever. Sure people can headcanon reasons why he behaved that way (and more power to them. Fixing dumb canon is what fandom is all about!) but the narrative framing is to me pretty clearly lighthearted and the director confirms that intent. There seems to be no awareness that by having Loki behave so callously it makes him come across as incredibly cruel. Far more than he ever was in canon.

In Thor 2011 Thor is laughing while slaughtering Jotnar (as is considered appropriate in his culture) but Loki isn’t. He kills when he has to but he doesn’t enjoy it, something that’s unusual for the culture he was raised in. This Pompeii scene could’ve been a great time to see Loki’s more compassionate side as he looks at the people who are going to die. We could’ve seen some real conflict from him. And it would’ve been a great moment to start introducing the concept that he’s more than just a simple villain to more casual viewers. Instead, although they think they’re “redeeming” Larry over the course of the show they’ve made him far worse and more villainous. I wish they had hired an experienced Director who also understands Loki - like Kenneth Brannaugh!!! - rather than a Director who has never headed up a major project before. Though even the best Director couldn’t fix the abysmal and ooc script and story Mike Waldron came up with.

Kate Herron: “I think that's the thing that's really key for her is that she's a completely original character, completely born out of our writers, and that, for me, was exciting.”

Remember when I said Sylvie is the favored OC? Called it.

Kate Herron: “The train scene I love because Loki doesn't get many wins and it's nice to see him having a nice sing-song. He's just enjoying himself. Because I think that's such a funny way, as well, to show the difference between him and Sylvie is that she's on a mission. She's like, "We're going to get off this moon." And when she's offered a drink, she's like, "No, thank you."

WOW. I hate this SO much. So suddenly Sylvie gets to act more like Loki and Loki suddenly doesn’t know how to be subtle and is just a dumb clown messing everything up. C’mon! This is absolutely ridiculous. This is not Loki silvertongue. This is not the Loki who tried to diffuse the situation on Jotunheim and almost succeeded. This is not the Loki who was always a restraining voice in Thor’s ear. They’ve turned Sylvie into discount Loki without any depth or complexity or vulnerability and they’ve turned Loki into discount Thor ft. dumb clown! Absolutely outrageous.

Kate Herron: “everything is not what it seems and even in our design, people have picked up on certain things. Like the way that they dress, or the posters and that there's something a bit more going on there.”

If the TVA actually turn out to be twist villains I will laugh SO hard; I’d say that twist is too dumb even for Marvel but...it’s really not! Like. Guys. If they’re gonna be TWIST villains you have to not have them do obviously villainous things on screen!!!! BECAUSE THEN IT’S NOT A TWIST!!!!

From the moment we meet them we see them commit acts of police brutality, murder, genocide, trial without due process, enslavement, privacy violation, and torture IN ORDER TO ELIMINATE FREE WILL. Like. They are literally the most evil organization in the MCU. Even Thanos can’t compare. So having them be revealed as villains will fall flat. Because the twist isn’t the audience learning new information or the main character learning it. It’s just the narrative suddenly acknowledging it and treating their atrocities seriously. So the twist is in the real world not the show. And it’ll make Larry look like an even bigger idiot than he already does if he’s suddenly like “Wait the people who tortured and enslaved me are evil?! What?!??!” (I stg if he has to fight miss minutes in the end like I joked about I will lose it).

Also. Why make it a twist?! When you treat the villains as a joke it robs the narrative of tension. Their acts of evil should’ve been acknowledged from the beginning in order to create sympathy for the protagonist and tension in the narrative as we watch him try to escape this situation! Smh. The only funny joke in this series is how badly the writing fails.

#Loki tv series #random musings #Marvel #MCU #loki show #loki series #loki 2021 #loki tv show #Loki Series critical #loki tv series interviews #my post

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love-archon · 3 years

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A Poem For You

Fleeting romances in the court of the Raiden Shogun, whose reign stands eternally still...

Spring - 春

"In Naniwa Bay, now the flowers are blossoming. After lying dormant all winter, now the spring has come..."

-Wani of Baekje

• The old tales warn of kitsune: yokai that take on forms of handsome men and beautiful women to play tricks on the unsuspecting humans. When they are careless, however, their disguises slip, and one can see a tail or two poking out from under their robes.

• Or, in the case of your soldiers' archery instructor, Gorou, a pair of large, fluffy ears emerging from his hair.

• There are whispers of a general in the rebel army far in the mountains, who has the features of a fox spirit and the slyness to match. Thankfully, the army lacks valuable intel to proceed, and cannot move forward without the use of spies.

• You blink and, in a shimmer like dust on sun-baked earth, the ears are gone. The gentle afternoon breeze rustles the leaves, and he nocks his arrow and lets it fly.

• Perhaps you were simply imagining things?

• Gorou, who guides his trainees with a strong, reliable hand, steady as stone,

• Gorou, who splits arrows in half as they fly, vowing to protect you always,

• Gorou, who smiles fondly at you as you walk through the gardens of your estate, holding your parasol to veil you from the sun, would never betray you or the great shogun. Would he?

• One warm spring night, where the dew still drips from the sakura flowers, he sits with you on the rooftops. His round lazuli eyes meet yours, and he tells you, truthfully, that he'll be leaving soon. Won't you join him?

• Your heart stirs to agree, but you respond that you cannot abandon your duties to your family, or to the shogun. He looks disappointed, but gets up from his seat, telling you that he accepts your decision. “If you ever change your mind,” he begins, but stops when the look in your eyes makes it clear you can’t.

• But you didn't know that "soon" meant now.

• Papers stolen from your family's most secret rooms are rolled up in his hands. His plain clothes melt away to reveal the uniform of the rebel army. The foxlike ears you thought were a dream now rest on his head, clear as day.

• Most striking of all, however, are the nine tails shimmering behind him- the mark of a fox spirit that’s accumulated centuries of magic.

• Your eyes can’t quite catch the way he leaves, and you’re not sure exactly when you became alone in the night with the flowers.

• Or if you’d imagined the saddened way he said goodbye.

Summer - 夏

"The spring has passed, and the summer comes again;

For the white robes are spread to dry on the Mount of Kaguyama."

-Empress Jitoh

• You do not know who keeps sending these letters, despite your best efforts. Only that they must be a refined noble of high status and excellent taste.

• Each cut of paper, beautifully bound, is dyed the right color to match the season. They are appropriately adorned with fresh sprigs of plants from the sender's garden, or tied with a luxurious ribbon of patterned silk. Lavish scents drift off the pages in a perfume that's sweet and light.

• Oh, and the words.

• The appearance of these gifts pale in comparison to the contents. The mysterious admirer has learned the alphabet borrowed from Liyue, and the complex brush strokes are applied with just the right deftness that each kanji character shines.

• Your beauty is eternal, they proclaim, like unmelting snow on summer mountains, and strikes the heart like a bolt of lightning. In your luminous eyes, the ideal of your god has been met- a thousand times over...

• As dizzyingly romantic as it is, one thing gives you pause, as you lift your own brush to write your reply.

• "Your god," it says. Not mine.

• Who would know the secret etiquette of the court so intimately, to the point that other suitors' letters paled in comparison... and not worship the immaculate Raiden Shogun, much less take an interest in you?

• Then you are sent in your clan head's place to deal with the troublesome Fatui that have slipped past your nation's defenses, and you find your answer then. Their leader wears the traditional attire of a traveling nobleman, and wields his weapon with aristocratic grace.

• His underlings fall rather quickly under your hand, but he himself is annoyingly persistent. He darts out of the way of your attacks, but it takes all your power to stop his from striking true.

• You do not get his name, only his face- fair and clean and luminous, with delicate features twisted in cruel amusement.

• It’s a shame that you must marr it with your blade, but what can be done?

• Then, he glides past you, close enough to whisper in your ear, and completes the poem no one has seen but you.

Autumn - 秋

"Even in the age of almighty gods unheard of;

The waters of Tatsuta are dyed in crimson red."

-Lord Ariwara-no-Narihira

• It is time for the great procession- an event of fanfare and decadence, where you and your family must travel from your ancestral home to the domain of the immortal shogun to display your wealth.

• Despite the excitement surrounding the occasion, you know quite well it is nothing more than a way to maintain control over the lords of Inazuma.

• But no expense must be spared if it means preserving your reputation. If it means that no other family dares question your wealth. Not in travel, not in housing arrangements, not in entertainment, not in the hired guards to protect you on your long and arduous journey.

• And so, after you pay the Kaedehara clan the exorbitant sum they demand, they give you twenty able-bodied samurai under their command... including Kazuha, their youngest son.

• The servant girls- and some of the boys- traveling with you blush when he passes, observing his lithe form and gentle eyes and striking, pale blond hair. One streak of red is visible there, calling to mind a sole maple leaf in autumn.

• Kazuha does not join in the other samurai's revelry. While they cheerfully indulge in the food and drink provided to them on the journey, and boast of their prowess when the time comes to fight bandits hiding on the path, he remains silent and alone, his eyes only on his collection of handwritten poems.

• (And, when you aren’t looking, they shyly flit to you before looking away.)

• In the end, however, Kazuha is the only one who actually bests a bandit in combat.

• Late at night, when the others are sleeping off the wine, large shadows flit past the trees. The bandit clans in the area thrive during this time, like hunters when beasts migrate in droves. They're confident that this traveling party will be easy prey.

• But one thief approaches too rashly, too quickly, and one crimson eye opens to meet him.

• Kazuha drifts from one opponent to another like a leaf falling from its branch, carried by strong winds. And yet, none of them can touch him. One after another, each man collapses with a sharp cry, only their silhouettes visible in the darkness.

• In the morning, the traveling party awakens to see fifty-some criminals tied up and piled up in a heap, and bursts into laughter. As the other samurai are still hung over, it’s clear who was responsible for this.

• Yes, Kaedehara-kun is a wonderful samurai. Skillful, composed, brave. And an excellent companion to have by one’s side, if one is lucky enough to have met him.

• It was quite the shock to learn that he would later flee the islands, sailing onward to the Land of Contracts aboard the ship of a pirate lord.

• But if anyone had the strength of mind to defy the gods- wouldn’t it be him?

Winter - 冬

"In winter, the early mornings. It is beautiful indeed when snow has fallen during the night, but splendid too when the ground is white with frost..."

-Sei Shonagon

• Lady Ayaka is one of your closest friends, with your families being in a partnership for centuries. You have fond memories of playing together in the snow, with cranes flying overhead in the white sky.

• You know her secrets, and she knows yours. Nothing is kept between you- this is how you survive in a court of treachery and lies.

• So when she passes by in a sunlit hallway, you hear a whisper that shocks you to the core. Smooth silver hair floats past your sight, quiet as snow, and just as fleeting. But you must collect yourself quickly, for spies may lurk behind any silken screen.

• You will be betrothed to Kamisato Ayato, your dear friend's older brother, in ten day's time.

• As close as you are to Ayaka, Ayato has always been a shadow flitting in the corner of your sight, being too busy with his duties to see you. So his visage- to you- is as featureless as a field of snow.

• After all the romance novels you've read, it's difficult to accept marrying a man you've never spoken with, but... what can be done? You can only hope that Lord Ayato is kind and treats you well.

• But... what if he isn’t?

• Lady Ayaka would never speak ill of her brother. In fact, no noblewoman would even consider such a notion, even if it were true. Good appearances, on every level, are more important to nobles than gold.

• But all the same, you’ve seen the ladies of the court who are trapped in loveless homes like birds in cages. How their smiles are painted on, how their laughs ring hollow and empty, how they glance longingly to the world outside, beyond the lavish court that hides them here.

• Your gaze drifts towards the harbor, where the water shimmers with light. You could run away, too. To the eastern mountains, where your former archery teacher hides with his fellow rebels- although to do that would invoke the shogun's wrath. Or, riskier still, follow Kazuha's path to the harbor, and chase him on to Liyue...

• “Young Lord Kamisato is waiting for you,” a servant says, breaking you from your thoughts, and bowing hastily before you can meet her eyes. The servant across from her does the same as the paper doors slide open, and they do not rise as you walk through.

• This room is airy and spacious, of course. Wind from opened windows seems to sigh as it passes over you and beyond, and you can smell flowers from the garden carried in from the breeze. How strange... even a garden that you played in countless times seems completely new and unfamiliar.

• Gracefully, soundlessly, Ayato emerges from behind his ornate screen. Power and elegance flows from his every movement. And at last, you dare to look at what you have never seen before.

• You look at his face, finally revealed before you, like translucent ice giving way to the land beneath the white...

• And gasp.

_______

Author's Notes

Wani of Baekje: Each opening quote is a poem by a famous Japanese author, but Wani was a scholar visiting from Ancient Korea!

Great procession: Known in Japan as sankin kotai. Powerful lords were forced to spend massive amounts of money to travel from their homes to the shogun's castle and back; in this way, the shogun was able to keep them on an efficiently tight leash.

#genshin impact x reader #kazuha kaedehara x reader #scaramouche x reader #gorou x reader #inazuma

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yurimother · 4 years

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LGBTQ Manga Review - Still Sick Vol. 2

Still Sick Vol. 1 was a highlight for me last year. I immediate fell in love with the complex characters and storytelling and, based on the first volume, I believe that Akashi has created one of the best shakaijin Yuri (Yuri works featuring romance between adult women, often in the workplace) out there. The series took a very typical office romance story and infused it with several unique elements, like a very meta understanding and portrayal of Yuri and Yurijin. On top of all that, Akashi demonstrated an apparent willingness to tell emotionally varied and impactful stories with subtlety, a trait often missing from more ham-handed Yuri melodramas. We, as an audience, could grow in our understanding of the characters, their backgrounds, and their neuroticism rather than have it all apparent for us. The second volume has done little but confirm to me that my initial reactions were right on the money. With Still Sick Vol. 2, Akashi delivers a stunning continuation to one of last year's best releases.

Still Sick Vol. 2 takes up directly where the first book left off, with Maekawa suddenly and somewhat cruelly kissing her friends and coworker Shimizu. The kiss was initially intended as a joke; however, it further confuses Shimizu as she struggles to comprehend her own sexuality and wishes to support Maekawa's efforts to reignite her former career in manga. Her conflicted feelings come to a head when, in a comfortable moment, she suddenly and accidentally reveals that she likes Maekawa. The following regret and discomfort are alarming human and relatable, as Akashi really captures the essence of a flustered lesbian. This confession acts as the catalyst for the dramatic transformation both characters begin to undergo as the story continues.

As in the first book, Maekawa is an irresistibly capricious and complex character. She acts exceptionally clingy around Shimizu in some moments, but in others, pushes her away. One of the best aspects of her character is that, just like the first book, each of her actions is not outright explained, nor are they random, but rather the appropriate reactions based on her somewhat twisted sense of self and the world. The more one reads into it, the more her varied, occasionally upsetting acts appear like those of a woman struggling to figure out what she wants out of life and out of her relationship with Shimizu. Early in the story, she and the reader have an epiphany that she wants to be loved. Still, throughout the story, her actions hammer home how alien and disconcerting the topic affection, romantic or otherwise, is for her.

One of the central conflicts revolves around Maekawa's manga, or rather, her writing the manga. Just as the first volume dived into the meta of the Yuri genre and its fanbase, this book details some of the struggles creators to feel when working on a project. For example, Maekawa makes multiple references to the balance artists, especially those working with publishers, must maintain between their inspiration and desires and their audience’s interests. She shows frustration with her work and sufferers from bouts of self-doubt and sadness when she hits blocks. It is all very realistic, and the reader gets a sense of the nuanced difficulties professional artists face.

The two plotlines, Maekawa's struggle to complete her manga and Shimizu navigating her feelings for her, are well integrated and support each other. If either element were absent, the other would have to be utterly changed, showing Akashi's storytelling ability. Shimizu's apparent greatest desire is to be there for Maekawa and support her work as a mangaka. However, through this support and want to be present, Shimizu has many of her more vulnerable moments, seeking to inspire her friend, which eventually leads to her confessing her feelings. On Maekawa's part, her work affects her character first and relationship second, the opposite of Shimizu, making for a nice contrast and more development for the often-flighty woman. The realization she has early in the story creates a conflict within her, expressed through her work and relation with Shimizu.

There is a constant push and pull between Shimizu and Maekawa, with each character taking it in turns to accept or reject the other. On Shimizu's part, this dynamic looks like her being there for Maekawa and enthusiastically supporting her artwork or avoiding her and using work as an excuse to back off. Maekawa, however, true to her character, is much more extreme in her actions, acting overly affectionate to Shimizu at times and openly hostile in others. The oscillating relationship continues as they both come to terms with their feelings, both romantically and around Maekawa's manga.

Akashi excels at justifying the varying actions of their characters while maintaining a sense of discovery and suspense for the reader. Only through deep and thoughtful readings can we hope to understand every action, but all the clues are there, making for an excellent repeat read and keeping the book in the audience's minds long after they put it down. However, sometimes, even having uncovered the reasons behind them, Maekawa can seem overly cruel and dramatic. It does not detract much from the overall work, but a few chapters hold a teetering balance just above falling into melodrama.

There is not much to say about the artwork that I did not mention in my review of the first volume. The character designs remain solid and consistent. However, the annoying lack of detail is even more apparent than in the first book. Panels often have a dull, empty feeling or fail to communicate the powerful writing's emotional tone. They are not bad, as previously said, they are consistent and keep the reader engrossed, but it is aggressively average.

One aspect of the art I will praise is its lack of service. Akashi treats their character and story with respect, and there is not even so much as a cleavage shot anywhere. The few moments which could contain sexual content, like when Maekawa embraces Shimizu and approaches for a kiss, are used much more for tension than service. It is perhaps the one area where the art begins to excel. The framing and expressions are all very carefully chosen to maintain the proper tone and avoid exploiting the characters. The best example of this is easily the onsen. At the height of their reluctant animosity at a company trip, Maekawa and Shimizu have to navigate being naked at the onsen together. The moment contains no sexual content but is excellently presented as an awkward experience to enhance tension, followed by some light comedy that brings the two women closer together.

Still Sick continues to amaze in its second volume. The tensions and stakes are much higher now, and the dramatic yet grounded relationship will enthrall readers as it develops. The Yuri romance integrates beautifully with a wonderful and incredibly meta plot about creating manga and all the turmoil the come with both. Akashi crafts a sophisticated and mature story that never lets up with twists and steadily progresses forward at a satisfying rate. This series is easily one the best shakaijin works out there and deserves hefty praise and enthusiastic investment from all its readers.

Ratings: Story – 10 Characters – 9 Art – 5 LGBTQ – 7 Sexual Content – 0 Final – 8

Purchase a copy of Still Sick Vol. 2 digitally or in print - https://amzn.to/2ZrErgn

Purchasing manga legally helps support artists and publishers

Review copy provided by Tokyopop

Support Yuri and LGBTQ news and review on the YuriMother Patreon

#reviews #lgbt #yuri #manga #lgbtq #still sick #lgbtq+#queer #gay #wlw #girls love #gl #lesbian #lesbians #romance #anime #art #comics

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star-ocean-peahen · 3 years

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p2 of old ML meta I wrote that I don’t necessarily agree 100% with any more. I know I’m really late to the party on these, but I thought I’d release them into the wild anyway.

Awright, here we go. (under a cut because holy shit this is long)

I think Chloe is a complex character whose failed redemption arc was actually in character, whether the writers intended it or not. I acknowledge that she's done some really awful things, bullied people, been hurtful and mean because she wants to, and has no illusions about hurting people. But she actually has a reason for doing this that goes beyond just enjoying bullying. Again, this does not excuse her actions, and a redemption arc would require her to accept that she has done bad things and apologize for them, which is not something she does in the show.

As we can see in the show, Chloe's mother does not care for her. At all. Even to the extent that she doesn't even remember Chloe's name. I don't know about you, but if my mom constantly chose not to remember my name, I would be devastated. She constantly tells Chloe ("The only thing exceptional about you is your mother") that she is worthless and has no skill, talent, or anything special about her at all. Chloe responds by mimicking the things she sees her mother does approve of, e.g. bullying, spitefulness, selfishness, etc. It's made painfully obvious that all of Chloe's iconic, unique snobbishness actually belongs to her mother, whom she is imitating in a desperate attempt to get her mother's approval. All Audrey cares about is herself, and Chloe knows that and tries to make herself a copy of her mother so her mother will want her. Audrey only accepts and begins to value her when Marinette tells Audrey straight up how mean and awful Chloe is, and Audrey reevaluates her daughter. She sees how much of herself Chloe has become, and decides that she wants a mini-her hanging around. I don't know why she does this, but it's clear that she only began valuing Chloe once she saw the appropriate traits in her. This means that Chloe has based her entire self-worth around her mother's opinion of her. It's actually compared to Adrien's opinion of her in Despair Bear, when he tells her that if she isn't nice, he won't be her friend anymore. She changes for a few hours because SHE ACTUALLY CARES ABOUT HIM AND HIS FRIENDSHIP MEANS A LOT TO HER, but reverts to her old ways because her mother's opinion matters to her more. This is probably how she acted for her whole childhood, but changed when Hawk Moth attacks. Why? Because of Ladybug. Chloe idolizes Ladybug, who gradually (unknowingly) gets more and more of an influence of her during the show. (Ladybug asking Chloe to stop causing akumatizations vs. Chloe giving up her miraculous) to the point where Ladybug is now a bigger idol than her mom. Example: Style Queen, where Chloe FAKES working with her mother-WHO APPROVES OF HER FOR THE FIRST TIME-to HELP LADYBUG. Ladybug is THAT important to her that she will give up the person she's been idolizing for her ENTIRE LIFE for her. (Side note: Chloe is not a wimp. She faked helping Style Queen-FOR ADRIEN-convincingly. Persuaded her to change her plans without getting punished. If that's not superhero material, then I don't know what is) So now Ladybug is the most important person in Chloe's life. What does this mean? Well, Queen Bee happened. When Chloe found her miraculous, she thought that she could be a superhero like Ladybug. Remember, Chloe imitates the people she idolizes. So she saw her miraculous as a way to get closer to the person she idolized-closer in character and closer relationship-wise. Chloe values Ladybug partly because she is a superhero, so she thinks, "if I can be a superhero too, then I will have value in the same way as Ladybug!", hence her stunt with the train. But this backfires on her when she only gets reprimanded and BOTH of her idols tear her self-esteem apart-Audrey purposefully, Ladybug unknowingly. She's been rejected by the two people whose opinions matter most to her. (Note: Chloe has a tendency to forget about Adrien, but if your heart wasn't destroyed enough, he technically rejected her too as Chat Noir.) She has no one to look up to now, so she clings to her miraculous-which is a symbol of worth-and guess what? Gets akumatized. Hawk Moth says that she'll be his queen. He'll value her when her world has come crashing down around her shoulders. Can you blame her for becoming Queen Wasp? She was akumatized after she displayed one of her first moments of vulnerability in the show, even showing it physically (nearly crying). That episode ends, and she begs for a second chance. Audrey again dismisses her as worthless (Note: both times she did this, she did it on LIVE TELEVISION.) Ladybug and Chat Noir tell her that she can be a hero (equated with value in her head) and gives it back. This is especially interesting. Bee Miraculous = Hero. But Ladybug says No Bee Miraculous = Hero. She amends her previous belief (GROWTH!) and trusts Ladybug, giving the Bee back. In Malediktator, Chloe has her mother on her side and thinks all is well. She continues to imitate her mother to keep her favor, taking it to the extreme with Audrey's encouragement and demanding the school shut down with an ultimatum: Do it or we leave. They leave. Marinette shows her humanity by celebrating Chloe's departure (which is FINE, she shouldn't be required to reconcile with everyone who's ever hurt her) and Adrien says this (BECAUSE HE CARES ABOUT CHLOE AND KNOWS WHAT A TOXIC ENVIRONMENT SHE'LL BE LIVING IN because he lives in a similar one): "Nobody's useless. Not even Chloe." We'll come back to the uselessness issue later. Chloe sneaks away from her akuma'd parents (again, quick and rational thinking in the face of danger, superheroine!!! Actually, it was probably learned from all the akumas she's been attacked by) and: "You're a hero! You....can....do....this!" When Ladybug grabs the Bee, she realizes that she needs someone tough who defies authority, and gives Chloe a second chance. (It wasn't just because she knew the powers, people!) Even Fu has misgivings, but Ladybug looks past her personal grievances and chooses Chloe. Meanwhile, Chloe is SUCCESSFULLY ESCAPING AND HIDING FROM AN AKUMA (must be all that practice, say what you want, but being attacked by so many akumas was some rigorous crisis training) and runs into Ladybug. When she meets LB, she isn't expecting to get her miraculous, unlike later. She knows Ladybug probably won't give it to her, and SHE'S FINE WITH THAT. SHE RESPECTS LADYBUG'S DECISION. ACCEPTS THAT SHE CAN'T BE A SUPERHERO, BECAUSE WHEN SHE GAVE UP THE BEE MIRACULOUS, SHE BECAME A HERO. Then, she opens up to Ladybug. She tells her what everyone else thinks she doesn't know, that she's a bully. And she's not targeting Marinette on purpose, Marinette just happens to be the most convenient target. She grows and understands that her documentary was ridiculous. She tells Ladybug how she knows that her bullying ways have just pushed her farther from her goal of being valued. She thinks that because she has no friends (girl, you have Adrien) she has no use, and notice she says "useless". Not "worthless", or "a horrible person". Useless. Because those things equal each other in Chloe's mind. Use = Value. She tells Ladybug how useless she feels because compared to Ladybug who is, notice, not "useful", but "serves a purpose". Chloe's purpose has been to satisfy her mom, but now she knows how empty that is and feels purposeless, useless, and worthless. Then Ladybug gives her the Bee Miraculous. Now, I don't think LB understands how much the Bee means to her. (Pollen calls Chloe her queen. Just thought I'd throw that in there) I'd be surprised if she did, because if she knew that the Bee was so intricately tied to Chloe's self-worth, then it was a cruel move she pulled keeping the Bee away from Chloe without any follow-up involvement, even with a good reason. Away from the tangent, Chloe gets the miraculous, transforms, and works one-on-one with Ladybug. And kills it. Like, Chloe makes an amazing superhero. She even says she's been practicing, which is played for comic relief, but shows just how much she idolizes Ladybug. She says, "I've always dreamed of doing this-with you!". She's achieved her dream. Ladybug thinks she's useful, and this is really important. She is now useful as Queen Bee. This is her use. This. Is. Her. Purpose. She's not empty anymore, she's full. She's doing good for people, being a superhero, Ladybug values her as a teammate, and friend. Ladybug (barring Adrien possibly) is now thought of as a close friend from Chloe, who looked past her personal annoyances and cares for Chloe regardless, a new experience for her. Let me reiterate: Queen Bee has become her purpose in life. (which is why she fails, incidentally, because she can't balance it with a civilian life, but more on that later.) After she and Ladybug defeat Malediktator (GIRL POWER!) she says this, which reveals how much more she's grown since the beginning of the episode: "Being a superhero isn't only about fixing messes." She became Queen Bee in this episode to fix her mess. Now she realizes that superheroing is not only a way to make up for the wrong she has done, it's also a way to make things better than they were. Being Queen Bee makes Chloe better. Marinette even says so, revealing why SHE is a better guardian than Fu, because she can see the potential in people. Chloe tries to be Queen Bee without her superhero costume immediately afterward, helping Jean with bags because she knows this is part of becoming a better person and a better superhero. Marinette then throws her a party to show her how useful and wanted she is, understanding how much Chloe needs that from their conversation. sniff....beautiful. This is Chloe's peak. The best she's ever been. She's reveling in her new-found identity of a superhero, doing good and resolving confict in her civilian life. In multiple episodes (Startrain, Heroes' Day) she is an everyday superhero by not getting akumatized (controlling her emotions and not letting fear take her over), and keeping others calm. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Chloe is incredible at crisis response. She doesn't panic, while the adults who have already experienced akuma attacks freak out. She takes charge when she sees akumas (Startrain) and does her best to fix the situation. She stopped an akumatization in that episode. (Seriously, if she hadn't done that, someone would have been akumatized.) She prioritized her response: First, eliminate the immediate threat. She did that when she evacuated the compartment. Second, eliminate the future threat. Find Ladybug and Chat Noir. (They need a hotline. Like, really badly.) It doesn't bother her that she doesn't have the Bee Miraculous, because she can be a hero in her normal life too. However, everyday heroics is still second to Miraculous heroics, and she expects Ladybug to still give her her Miraculous, because she still considers herself Queen Bee. She trusts Ladybug so much that she FRIGGIN' SUCCESSFULLY FIGHTS OFF AN AKUMA, THE ONLY PERSON TO HAVE DONE THAT TO DATE (yes, not even Marinette did, she took off her her earrings because she expected to be overtaken), deflecting her negative worry about the current lack of miraculous with her deep trust in Ladybug. When Miraculeur happened, she got the Bee because it was a last resort. It appears that LB and CN use Queen Bee only when there is no other option, revealing two things. One, they apparently didn't bother to tell Chloe that (or she didn't listen, although I'm inclined to believe that this new Chloe would have) and that they pick her despite having other, safer holders with miraculous experience, revealing that they know how well Chloe and the Bee fit together. She got the Bee (after defying Hawk Moth and Mayura without powers, this girl is INSANELY AWESOME) and went after Mayura, failing to capture her miraculous. She apologizes to Ladybug without making excuses for something that wasn't even her fault, showing how much Ladybug's approval matters to her. LB responds by telling her that there can be no more Queen Bee, not even as a reserve, because Hawk Moth knows her identity. Chloe accepts that without a fuss, showing how much she's grown so far. But if she's grown so much, you ask, why did she rip that picture of Ladybug? Well, this ties in to the position of use. Chloe was useful to Ladybug as Queen Bee and (so she thought) as a friend. But LB took the miraculous away. Chloe is probably getting the sneaky suspicion that Ladybug only wanted her because she was useful, which Chloe has now realized was not all she wanted out of her relationship with Ladybug. Chloe valued being useful to LB, but she also valued LB's friendship. Chloe continues in her superhero activities, but muted. So how did this go wrong? How did we go from this awesome superhero Chloe to Miracle Queen? The answer is in Battle Of The Miraculous. Marinette's narration reveals that Chloe lost hope, showing her turning off her Bee signal. I think Chloe still unconsiously thought she could still be Queen Bee. Ladybug went back on her withholding before, she could again, right? But then she finally gets it through her head that she's not going to be Queen Bee again, and abandons that hope in despair. Is that it? Is that why she turns to the dark side? Well, her fall was caused by a lot of things. One was the aforementioned despair. Another that contributed to her fragile emotional state is the fight between her parents. It feels awful to have your parents fight, and while Chloe is probably not a stranger to it, it's always painful. Then her parents get akumatized. That was what made her fall in Heroes' Day. She says to Heart Hunter: "I don't love anyone." Heart Hunter responds that Chloe loves herself (which, wow, you guys are the worst parents ever. You really don't pay attention.) Ladybug takes the dragon and goes to Kagami for help. She goes to Kagami, who also had her identity revealed, and gives her a miraculous, saying it's because of Kagami's "exceptional talent". Ryoko defeats Heart Hunter. Queen Bee does not. Dragon-Chloe does not. And Chloe feels this. First, Chloe wanted to save her parents herself, which is a completely normal thing to want. She loves her parents (despite their failings) and wants to help them. If if was me, I'd want the same thing. Second, she sees Ryoko active, whom she knows (somehow) was decomissioned for the same reason as her. This is where theseed of doubt planted in Miraculeur blooms. To Chloe, this confirms that Ladybug was only using her for her availablility and wasn't actually her friend. She thinks Ladybug was pretending that she was significant and still resented Chloe for getting in her way so many times. She thought her idol was her best friend, but now it seems like her idol was lying to her the whole time. With Ladybug's perceived rejection and broken promise, Chloe now feels useless and purposeless again. And Hawk Moth shows up at just the right time to sway her to his side with his impressive emotional manipulation by making essentially the same argument he made in Queen Wasp: Ladybug rejected you, but I still want you. You are useful and valued with me. Chloe, thinking Ladybug cares nothing for her, ("She couldn't care less about me!") accepts his offer and becomes Miracle Queen. (But not without asking for her parents' release first, because that is so important to her.) Miracle Queen's dialogue and actions line up with this. She exposes everyone's identities (so they can't be chosen over her again) and says to LB: "How many times have I asked to fight alongside you? [how many times have I asked to belong?] And how many times have you refused to give me my miraculous? [how many times have you denied me your friendship?]" She tries to take all the Miraculous and use their power to lash out at Ladybug, declaring that she'll be the most powerful miraculous wearer there ever was. This foolish action is a result of Chloe's fragile emotional state that has been controlled and manipulated by Hawk Moth to work as his pawn, and her raw pain and anger at Ladybug. She then takes only the Bee after Master Fu whiz-bang-pops the Miracle Box and says that she's going to New York to be a superhero, grasping at straws to regain her worth by clinging to the Bee, the miraculous that started it all. After Ladybug takes it, Chloe declares that she doesn't love Ladybug anymore, which could be taken as "I'm no longer your fan" but seems more like she did once love Ladybug as a friend, making her previous statement in Heart Hunter a lie. She finds her parents and demands to leave with her mother, who has reconciled with her father and refuses Chloe her demand, likely the first time they've done that (because they're too wrapped up in each other to even ask her why she's so upset). To sum it up, at the end of the current season, Chloe has hit rock bottom.

Okay, after this analysis of Chloe, let's take a look at the person mostly responsible for her fall: Hawk Moth. More than anywhere else in the show Hawk Moth is shown to be a master manipulator in Chloe's arc. He planned to weaken Chloe's trust in Ladybug, and succeeded. A lot of her actions in Miracle Queen can be attributed to Hawk Moth playing her like a queen on the chessboard, which is exactly what he compares her to and an excellent metaphor. He wasn't reactively trying to get the Bee in Miraculeur, he was proactively using it as a way to manipulate Chloe into losing trust in Ladybug through the Bee Miraculous. He understood Chloe's identity crisis (he was RIGHT THERE in Style Queen) and used it to his advantage. She surprised him with throwing off his akuma, but that just meant her love for Ladybug was more powerful than he thought. He akumatized Heart Hunter on purpose to affect her (an interesting change from the let's-throw-everything-and-see-what-works Hawk Moth of the earlier seasons) and carefully orchestrated the whole thing to sway Chloe to his side. He caused and took advantage of a child's distress coming from a bad home life and parental issues, giving us yet another example of how little he cares about what he has to do as long as he gets what he wants. (He beats his son in Chat Blanc. Fully knowing it's Adrien. Physically beats him up.) A lot of Chloe's mistakes can be put on Hawk Moth for manipulating her (seriously, this guy is a fucking asshole).

Yet another extra onto the end of this: Adrien. Both Chloe and Adrien are very iffy about their friendship, both saying that the other is their only friend and that they had/have no friends. And yet Adrien is probably the person who understands Chloe's conflict the most. Parent who thinks you're worthless unless you're doing what they approve of? He understands. He's probably seen how her mom treats her and understands why Chloe acts the way she does (gives a whole new perspective to all that standing up for her he was doing, hUh), but until his mother disappeared and his father went silent he wasn't able to personally understand just how painful it was for her and how hard it was to fill those expectations. And when that calamity happened he was grieving with no support system (I have no doubt Chloe tried to help in her own way, she does care about him even if she doesn't know how to express it) and was certainly not in a place to help her. Then he found new friends at school and increasingly chose them over her, adding more to her "everyone always chooses someone else over me" complex. To be clear, I'm not blaming Adrien for Chloe's problems. Her issues are her fault, her mother's fault, her father's fault and (later) Hawk Moth's fault. Adrien did the best he could as a child with no social skills. But if he ever catches up and realizes how much Chloe needs him, he would definitely feature in a prime spot in her redemption arc.

So a lot of this was my high hopes for Chloe and the show’s consistency, both of which have been disappointed. I was also caught up in a lot of Chloe love while writing this, which is why I didn’t focus on how nasty she is and has been or how she needed to make amends for it, because she very much does need to. This is just my analysis of her ‘arc’ in season 3. also sorry for the big block of text.

#miraculous ladybug #miraculous ladybug meta #chloe bourgeois #chloe sugar #technically?#just tagging that so people can block it if they want to #long post

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thebookbandwagon · 4 years

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Captive Prince trilogy review

Summary:

M/M adult high fantasy trilogy with a Gryffindor/Slytherin romance

politics

characters you go from despising to loving, and vice-versa

feels like a well-written fanfiction in terms of some of the tropes used i.e. enemies to friends to lovers, slow burn, lost princes, slavery

all the content warnings (well, okay, not all of them but I’ve put the appropriate ones under the cut)

elegant but concise writing style that reads very quickly

relatively short books in a trilogy (around 300 pages each or less)

Video review and illustration here [x].

The Captive Prince series by C.S. Pacat is a hybrid of a romance and a fast-paced political fantasy, set in a world where the societies feel inspired by Ancient Rome and Ancient France. The conflict begins with Damon, a prince in hiding, being ‘gifted’ to Prince Laurent of Vere for use as a pleasure slave. Laurent has no interest in using Damon in such a way, but they despise each other nonetheless.

I’m not a romance reader, but it turns out I’m definitely able to make some exceptions. This series absolutely being one of them.

This trilogy has brought about a bit of controversy because of some of the heavier plot elements that are featured most strongly in the first book and because one of the main characters is a PoC forced into slavery. It’s definitely not a story for the lighthearted and there’s a reason why the back covers state ‘MATURE’ in bold letters on them. There is torture. Violence. Explicit sex scenes. Rape is common in Vere, the main location of the first book. There are scenes involving consensual, non-consensual, and dubiously consensual sex. There is a side-character who is a paedophile. If you're not okay with reading through those things then this series is not for you, but readers should be aware that the more extreme graphic elements definitely lessen in later books in the series.

During the first book of the series, Laurent, the Prince of Vere, viciously hates Damon, our main protagonist, who then hates him in return. Laurent is cruel. He is arrogant. He punishes Damon when he sees fit. But it turns out that Laurent… does actually have a very good reason to hate Damon so much. Where Laurent is calculating and cunning and cold, Damon is brave and bold and brash. Despite the expectation of Damon being a pleasure slave, Laurent is not interested in using him in this way (or anyone else), but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t make Damon’s life miserable. The first book tells the story of Laurent and Damon going from antagonising each other to slowly coming to more a mutual understanding and maybe even beginning to have a little bit of respect for each other’s skills; Laurent the master of political schemes and subtle manipulation and Damon the fighter and battle strategist.

The second book in the series follows Damon and Laurent as they travel across the country with an army they need to train. They have many enemies and the odds are stacked against them but Laurent’s clever political manoeuvring and Damon’s experience with handling himself and others on the battlefield may help them pull through. Arguably the most fun book in the series, we get much more an adventure vibe with elements of humour and this is the book where Damon and Laurent’s relationship alters the most drastically as they start to learn that maybe the other person isn’t quite so bad. They are no longer enemies and are progressing from allies to friends, with wonderfully believable pacing and interactions between them that are engrossing and fascinating and touching all at the same time.

The third book continues from the aftermath at the end of Prince’s Gambit and has a plot centred around Damon and Laurent fighting for their lives and freedom and it has ramifications for both of their countries. Interwoven throughout are a combination of emotional scenes, action scenes, touching scenes, and, yes, smutty scenes.

The prose in C.S. Pacat’s writing is fantastic. It hooked me completely within the first chapter and it reads very very quickly, while still retaining some of that classic feel and elegance from fantasy inspired by history. Her writing is primarily focused on the characters rather than the world, and the characters are fantastically vivid. Their voices feel very distinctive and their personalities – Laurent, particularly – are wonderfully complex. Expect your opinions on certain characters to radically change the more you read.

There aren’t many flaws, but the flaws I can pick out are as follows: it often felt like Laurent couldn’t be mentioned without a description of his blue eyes or blond hair, which could just be because this is written from Damon’s perspective and he definitely has A Type™, but it was still excessive. Even though I definitely prefer the writing to be character-focused rather than plot or setting focused, I still would’ve preferred a little more description in places. We get a nice feeling for the difference between the societies Laurent and Damon are from, but little feeling for the rest of the world or what things that aren’t people look like or the history beyond the war that separated Vere and Akielos.

This series reads as quickly as contemporary romance often does, which I found to be a wonderful change of pace compared to what I am used to. I was able to read each book in less than 48 hours. I intended to reach each book while taking breaks to read other books in between but I was too far pulled in to stop reading. The only slight disadvantage to that is that I was reading so quickly because I just had to know what was going to happen that some of the finer details of the plot and politics I ended up glossing over. I’m definitely going to have to reread this series and make sure I do it slower next time so I can judge the political aspect of the plot better. The speed also meant that the final instalment felt like it could’ve done with being a bit longer, since there were still a couple of plot threads that didn’t feel 100% tied up and we didn’t get to see much of the aftermath of the climax of the plot. Saying that, I still found the ending to be extremely satisfying, but for me, these things would have only added to how satisfying the series was.

I am giving the series 4.5/5 stars. The strong character work and the believability of Laurent and Damon’s relationship and how it develops really made this series. If this author writes in the adult genre again, I’ll definitely be picking up their future works. My rating may change a little with a reread when I’m able to take it all in slower, and it may go up or down. But most likely up.

#captive prince #capri #c s pacat #book review #fantasy books #romance books #queer books #LGBT books #book #review #political fantasy #m/m fantasy #m/m #m/m romance #my book reviews

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littlestsnicket · 4 years

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the witcher: the end’s beginning

Whenever I hear the netflix noise, I automatically start singing Look Away. Doesn’t matter that I haven’t actually rewatched ASOUE that many times.

i very much appreciate how they make this first monster fight look difficult (it gives such scale to how dangerous these monsters are when you compare it to Geralt fighting Renfri’s posse later). And Geralt’s not at all human eyes. The spidering poison is super unnerving and feral looking. Great introduction to the character. (per my understanding of the video game, he absolutely ate that deer raw, when he tells Renfri he’s full later, he is FULL OF RAW MEAT.)

so that paper 100% says kikimora on it. important a scene or two later.

some of the costuming decisions aren’t 100% but I am a big fan of the set design. especially all of the candles.

i want to squish renfri’s cute little face! (her costuming is also on point, i really love the specific red color of her shirt. Although on further examination, the fit is actually a little strange? Or the pleating doesn’t read right on screen all the time.)

“more and more i find monsters wherever i go.” yup... early introduction of *theme*

“I killed a rat this morning with my breakfast fork.” Got to love Marilka!

“You don’t scary me”/“That’s too bad.”

(Geralt will be a good adopted father to Ciri, he’s good with violent, headstrong teenage girls.)

Marilka lied there, the flier was absolutely for a kikimora. She is very deliberately intercepting him to take Geralt to Stregobor. And Geralt is just like, fuck fine? You do sort of get the impression that people refusing to pay him as contracted is something he deals with ALL THE TIME!

“I think that makes you a hero.” (aww, Marilka!)

Marilka and Geralt are so cute together (I think he likes people who will talk at him)

Geralt’s little smile when she says “girls can’t be witchers that’s the stupidest thing i’ve ever heard”

Gratuitous nudity? Nah, we’re establishing something about Stregabor with this. Also, it’s just sort of there... in the background, like we should barely pay any attention to it. (So, per the timeline, Stregobor has already tried to prevent Yennefer from going to the court she wants for no apparent reason. Stregobor is a bastard.)

“I seem to remember that Witcher’s don’t feel anything”

Aw, Ciri dressed as a boy handing out with some rascals. She’s wearing normal pants here...

”Gross”, yes Ciri your horny grandparents are gross.

“Wizards are all the same. You talk nonsense while making wize and meaningful faces. Speak plainly.” Geralt is so done with everything. That’s how we meet him. I question the received fan wisdom that Geralt doesn’t talk very much. He’s just surrounded by people who talk A LOT.

How full of shit is Stregobor? It’s very difficult to tell. Does he actually believe his bullshit? What evidence did he actually have of these internal mutations? How did they die so he could autopsy them? Difficult to say. Also, there is something super weird about how Stregabor talks to Geralt, the way he’s moving and the tone of voice he’s using--like he’s trying to get in his head. Is it strictly psychological or is he attempting to do what he accuses Renfri of and manipulate him with magic? Make him kill Renfri?

“Pretty ballads hide bastard truths.” (Rewatching, this makes me think of episode 4, they’ve met Jaskier. I wonder if Jaskier wrote anything about Calanthe — there are so many references throughout the series of the power of song to change perception of the past, which changes the present.)

I can’t unsee how the bodice of Crir’s dress doesn’t lay quite right and the fabric is weirdly modern looking. (Her face when she is doing the kicky part of the dance--she’s so right, what the hell even is that.)

GERALT’S FINDING SHIT TO MAKE A POTION!

“Queen Calanthe of Cintra, she just won her first battle” — if you are paying attention, the timeline stuff is actually pretty clear, the clues are all there. I was explaining to a friend that i have trouble watching things that are of midrange complexity; i can follow this and i can follow a sitcom, but I often have trouble following things inbetween.

“Because then I am what they say I am” — Geralt is morally incapable of rehabilitating his own reputation, he’s too concerned he might deserve it

renfri says “no more princess” and then Geralt calls her a princess. He is SO DELIBERATE with words.

The violence in this battle is something. The visuals are weird; it’s not torture porn, it’s frantic and horrifying. There is this unbelievable level of squelching and bits flying around, but very little blood. And I don’t think i’ve seen a battle sequence that is washed out in that precise way--the overcast sky reflects the sun everywhere until you can hardly see. That’s got to be a horrible circumstance to fight under.

I hope we see Ciri comfortable enough to be this impetuous again.

Does Mousesack know Stregobor? Why does he choose to tell Ciri a story where a wizard systematically kills young girls? There’s no real moral relevance or connection to what they are talking about, unless it is the cruel callousness of fate.

Calanthe is so devastated when Eist dies :(

Ciri looks so scared and like the world is ending, talented actress, she’s wonderful!

Geralt’s giant monologue talking to his horse. Yeah, perceived fan wisdom isn’t quite right. He talks. He’s pretty verbal and good with words. He’s just so very careful around people and cultivating this very specific image.

“She took one look at me, screamed, vomited and then passed out. Yeah I thought the world needed me too.” I bet he is still thinking about Marilka calling him a hero.

Back in Cintra... the color has shifted so drastically from the glaring white to the orange burning.

Geralt is THERE, right NOW. escaping from the prison cell Calanthe put him in. DESTINY! But why?!?

The way Mousesack looks at Ciri when she does the magic yelling thing for the first time. He does not look surprised.

“Find Geralt of Rivia, he is your destiny.” I should have counted how many times the word Destiny is said. I’m sure it’s off the wall.

Note to self: Mousesack and Calanthe know that Nilfgard is here for Ciri. They say so. Were they too in denial about it to take appropriate action? Cause strategically, if they knew that, nothing they do makes any sense. And they could not have gotten new information since Calanthe went off to battle.

Cintra doesn’t have a court mage, and hasn’t for ages. Pretty sure Mousesack is a druid, but is it hard to convince Calanthe to let him stay? (should get back to this train of thought in episode 4)

This bit with the soldiers handing out the poison drives home how scary Nilfgard is so much more effectively than seeing them graphically torture people. (Not that what we see of the slaughtering people isn’t graphic enough.)

Calanthe just tipping out the window gets me every time. The soundtracking is great, the way is gets quiet and picks back up again.

Geralt is so fucking close to Ciri in this moment, but not close enough!

What is Renfi’s intent in sleeping with Geralt? Is it just because she wants to or does she have some ulterior motive? Does she think it will sway him? They both look at eachother so softly though. The way it is done in this weird prophesizing flashback is so strange.

“You have to choose the lesser evil.”

Geralt goes from resigned fuck to snarling so so fast when it becomes obvious that Renfri’s posse is not going to back down.

“They created me just as they created you, we’re not so different.” — what does she mean by that? Does she mean it philosophically that they have both been badly mistreated by society, or is she implying that her mutations are deliberate. And she was created, like a Witcher. Not a coincidence of being born during an eclipse. If that was the case, Stregobor would know, possibly even have been the one to do it, that creepy fucking bastard. I don’t have easily searchable transcripts handy, but I *think* Geralt mentions something in another episode about how he’s found mutations to be deliberate. Going to keep an eye out for that. I’m proposing that Stregobor was out to create an army of female witchers and it went... badly and he killed them all off. Maybe he was even doing it to replace Tissaia and Aretusa. This could be a *thing*.

I am 90% sure Geralt just grabbed the blade of the sword. Yup, he’s definitely holding the sword in his off hand by the blade when he kills Renfri. The fuck Geralt? Does that not hurt your hand?

Renfri’s giant eyes when she’s dying. God.

So Ciri legit causes a giant crevice to form in the earth. WHAT IS SHE CAPABLE OF?!?

The way Stregobor looks at Renfri’s corpse. So upsetting. He doesn’t look at her like a person. Stregobor is definitely using the idea of Renfri’s mutation manipulating people to turn the crowd against Geralt; make him seem more untrustworthy and shut down any attempt for him to defend himself. Protecting Renfri’s corpse from horrible wizard dude is 100% in character for him.

Shit. Geralt’s resigned but completely devastated face when Marilka tells him to leave and not come back. And she is so soft and quiet about it too, that must make it so much worse. And Marilka looks like she’s about to cry too--she’s lost something: her innocence, her chance to escape, both. What does she really, deep down, think of Geralt here? Will she lie awake at night wondering if she should have said something else? I wonder what becomes of her. What does she think about Stregobor after this? Her face though, she has to know something is wrong here. Does she leave Blaviken? Does she hear tales of Geralt the White Wolf as an adult? What does she think of them?

Close up shot of the pin he took from Renfri.

And then the clear visual cue that Ciri is the girl in the woods. If you just roll with it and assume things will get explained a little better later, this really isn’t confusing. You just need to let go a little.

#the witcher #mayo blogs the witcher #this was fun/easy--will totally do all eight episodes

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attemptingthoughtfulness · 4 years

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if you don’t want to talk about racism in media, you shouldn’t try teaching racism through media

(or: using minority exploitation and suffering to teach minority exploitation and suffering by appropriating a movie that appropriates minority exploitation and suffering.)

(CW: brief discussion of rape in the movie “Gran Torino”, also spoilers for said movie)

I’ve recently been having a lot of flashbacks to elementary school, kindergarden and I am still pretty much scarred from high school, so let’s talk about the usage of media in high school and the utter lack of care or competence on the side of some of my teachers.

We watched Clint Eastwood’s “Gran Torino” in English class and thinking back at it, there’s a lot of stuff that we didn’t talk about which would have been very fundamental to understanding media, so let’s start with that.

Who are hero and villain? The hero, Walt, is a old, white veteran played by Clint Eastwood. He starts off as a racist and “learns his ways” by interacting with a Hmong minority that moved in next doors. He helps the youngest son to “man up” and eventually dies in a crucifixion pose saving that family. If you wanted to be cynical you could say he’s the manifestation of a white saviour complex and toxic masculinity... The Hmong family next doors basically consists of a mother, a son and a daughter. The son is a little bit of a nerd and his cousin (named “Spider”) tries to force him into joining a gang but he refuses. That conflict culmulates in the gang shooting at the house and raping the sister.

So, as we go on to discuss several rather problematic aspects, keep in mind that we talked about none of this in class even as I asked the teacher about it. Before we even start off: Walt constantly refers to minorities with a racial slur and it is never addressed. Neither in the movie or in the classroom we watched the movie in. And maybe that makes sense within the movie’s internal logic but your main charachter, who you, the writer and teacher, chose to portray as a hero still uses a whole bunch of racial slurs and it’s frankly amazing that you don’t talk about that a lot. Like, the really stupid analysis would have been “Oh, he uses a lot of racial slurs in the beginning but then stops using it as he becomes less racist, it’s character development!”, but he never once apologizes for them, he never once gets corrected or gets told how hurtful those are. Why not talk about it?

And ultimately this is a lot about the choices you make when telling a story, who you decide to be a hero and frame in a fucking crucifixion pose, who gets to be the villain and what means become important.

Speaking of the villain: The villain is literally a part of a Hmong family, like the gang is framed in the most ridiculous light as they drive their pathetic car while listening to “fuck the police” but they get very cruel very fast as Spider shoots the house of his aunt and rapes his cousin with his friends which makes them quite abominable and barbaric. There is deep cutting sexual assault but it’s nothing but a means for Walt and his little apprentice to get upset and seek revence. You could probably substitute a literal gang rape for like burning a house down, or stealing some precious thing, it’s just weird that they chose to make it sexual assault. The sister, throughout the movie, takes a role in the background and kinda just naggs her brother, teases him and tries to banter in the most annoying way possible. And then she gets raped and if you think too hard about it, it seems a lot like her character was developed to serve that narrative purpose.

The movie also talks about the problems this Hmong community is facing, but it also kinda shows them as comically evil, there is no question who the good guy is - and who the bad guy is. What I am getting at is: why is the villain a Hmong gang and not.. I don’t know, the police? Gang violence is a huge problem for minorities - police violence is too and one kind of doesn’t frame an entire ethnic group as in need of help or barbaric. And yes, gang problems do exist in real life, but the active decision to depict it instead of the inherent flaws in the socio economic system that has enforced centuries of discrimination, is the important point. Interestingly, the movie does address the utter uselessness of the police briefly and kinda advertises the anarchist “taking things into your own hands” approach. As real as gang violence is, such is racial profiling or the fraud system - why not talk about it? Because that makes the black and white distinction of heroes and villains get a little fuzzy and who would want nuanced and complex themes?

Masculinity is used in connection to power tools, weapons and old but fancy cars. The son of the family (I forgot his name) is smart, he wants to go to university, he helps his mother, he is emotional but that doesn’t matter. And maybe that’s a very self aware take on “all of these qualities don’t matter but as soon as he has his own tool belt, he gets validated from society” but for that to be the take, they focus way too little on the validation or the previous value of his person - the validation becomes implicit and he is mostly validated through Walt. With that: there is not a single strong female character except for the sister in there and that would be generous considering what happens. Thinking of it, here are like three whole female characters in the entire movie.

Let’s get to the weapons. It’s no secret that Clint Eastwood is a conservative and it’s also a huge gimmik of the movie that “the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun” - no question asked about gun control. Guns are the cause for a lot of pain in the movie, but the hero is constantly glorified for his use and ownership of weapons, so there is absolutely not critical thought towards that one. Since Walt is a veteran too, there is a dash of at least value in military accomplishments too.

You could definitely argue that not all of these things are explicitly in there or that it probably wasn’t the intention of the screen play writer - but it still matters for media understanding to be aware of all of that. Of the fact that decisions are actively made and those are inherently political. Whose story you chose to tell is an observation that is incredibly crucial. You could also ask why I even bring these complex topics into English class? I mean, it’s high school. And I definitely agree that these questions cannot be talked about in a usual English class - but then tell my why my teachers wanted to talk about them soooo bad. The whole overarching theme of English finals was “belonging”, especially in contrast of its opposite of discrimination. They try so hard to make English skills about important social issues - they just fail doing so.

I am fully aware that the movie “Gran Torino” is just a means to teach the English skills necessary to pass English finals. They want you to learn about the history around the movie, cherry pick their way through topics they can get into 90 minute sessions, mostly avoiding debates about the movie tiself. I am fully aware that discussing racism in English class doesn’t aim to talk about these problems but to teach you the skills you need to pass finals. And that makes me cringe very hard because that means they’re quite literally using painful experiences to do that without having put a lot of thought into that.

One of my worst ethics teachers couldn’t tell me why I should care about Immanuel Kant’s work when he was this massive racist and sexist. He couldn’t tell me. And it is important to reailze that either he doesn’t have the capacity to think about that or he didn’t care enough to ask himself that question and I don’t know which one is worse. The same goes for chosing a movie that glorifies masculitiny and a white saviour to teach about belonging. Why not talk about the fact that nearly 50% of all homeless youth in the US is LGBTQ+? You need to be able to justify the decisions you make and the reasons why you don’t talk about certain things - and if that reason is called what the ministry of education tells you to do, they should have come equipped with an answer!

So. Why care? I love taking examples a ad hitlerum because that makes people realize the importance of the situation. If we were to read Mein Kampf in class, you would want the teachers to be a) able to understand the underlying problems of the material and talk about it to students and b) able to justify why the fuck they are reading Mein Kampf in class. I’m not saying Immanuel Kant’s ethics and Clint Eastwood’s “Gran Torino” are as bad as Mein Kampf, I’m saying that these are the kind of questions you have to ask yourself as an educational institution when teaching and chosing things worth teaching.

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lordeasriel · 4 years

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Hi! I saw that you read Alice Network and I was hoping you wouldn't mind if I asked you a question about it, cause I don't know many others who've read it. I was wondering what you thought of René's depiction. Quinn writes him so slimy and despicable, but then she really emphasizes his suaveness and idk sexiness - the way Eve remembers her nights with him, it's much more than Quinn gives to the actual VIABLE romantic interests in the book. Why is that? Or does this just say a lot about me haha

To get this first out of the way, I did some research on Kate Quinn before I read and a little after, to see if I could find her process while writing TAN, or anything like it, and I didn't find much, other than plenty of history fiction books. So, she's an author that does A LOT of research and she thinks her stories through - so mind you, I could be very wrong - but the vibes I get from Rene is that of a character who wasn't entirely planned the way he came out, from the start.

When we meet him, he's put right off the bat as the enemy, the antagonist, someone who sees past Eve's doe eyes and stutter, he doesn't underestimate her based on these things. Not that we can forget he's a devious, wicked man, but the narrator, going through Eve's perspective, shows us Rene as someone to loathe and fear, Eve is constantly terrified that he might see through her façade. However, Rene is also reasonable, logical, understanding even, he portions scraps of good food between his employees (mind, this is horrible yes, but considering he DIDN'T HAVE TO do that, it's quite something that he does so), he is even I daresay thoughtful in some ways He's very complex, as one expect from normal human characters, but we are introduced to him as someone terrible, slimy, loathsome. This is because it's how Eve shows us her first impressions of him, again he is The Enemy, so the text focus on showing us a stern man, sitting in a room full of luxury, purely ostentatious, after we see (through Eve) a city starving, sieged by the Germans who kill, steal and violate them at will. We're supposed to see the contrast of starvation and gluttony, luxury and poverty, and we're supposed to understand that man is someone who enables that.

As the story moves on, Eve began to add new layers to Rene: at first we have a scene where he is shown to appreciate art and poetry, he shows off by quoting Baudelaire (then he never stops LMAO); then we have him confronting her lie because he can tell different French accents apart, which is both a nod to him being a snob and petty, as well as a very well-travelled and educated man. This adds to him elegance, makes him appealing to the target audience as well as Eve, because the closer the story gets to the point where they engage in a sexual relationship, the more Eve perceives him as someone who would be desirable to the right people. She doesn't feel attracted to him because she sees him as a traitor, she's a spy in enemy territory, she's under stress a lot and he is living the easiest life on Earth by throwing everyone else under the bus. All of this conflicts with her personality, she's headstrong and righteous, so he's unappealing, but cut her disfavored perspective and you can see he's appealing from the start, she just doesn't let us see it because of course she hates him. But even Eve slowly began to notice these details, for example, when Violette suggests he might be interested in her, Eve says she's "not sophisticated enough" which shows us she considered that possibility, even if it was just for a moment. And after Violette suggests that, Eve began to avoid Rene at all costs, and when she talks to her she tries her best to keep the conversation as respectable as she can because she notices now his flirting/courting and it makes her uncomfortable, because suddenly he's very shave and cult (she even starts to remark on his scent). She of course, always end up in an obscene Baudelaire quote because that's Rene's game, so she's always trying to avoid that at all costs.

As he makes a move, Eve begins to notice him as someone appealing, and she's a wee prude so she's embarrassed, mortified with his presence. It's not that I don't think Quinn couldn't have planned this transition from the start, if she did, good for her, great storytelling, but this feels more like she realised the potential a sexual relationship between Eve and Rene, but she realised how he wasn't initially an attractive or suitable "partner", so she slowly begins to make him more palatable. As a first time reader, I didn't think him appealing at all, because like Eve, all I saw was the layer of luxury and lack of morals, that hindered the rest. He's a cultured man, educated, an art lover, there's a lot of appeal in him, that we take a long time to see because Eve resents him at first (righteously of course). Suave is the tip of the iceberg concerning Rene.

And it's easier to sexualise a relationship between a woman and a man if the man is appealing and handsome. Most female authors do that, because women already experience complicated sexual lives; we like the idea that a female character engages in a relationship with someone attractive, appealing. Eve having sex with an ugly, slimy, hideous man who is selfish and who collaborates with the enemy, just so she can have information to report? Distasteful, and this is why Rene checks all the boxes for an appropriate suitor. He's even described as "not un-handsome" which is English for "he's handsome but let us pretend he isn't too handsome cause otherwise I'm pushing my luck", and there's a whole section of the story that deals with Eve feeling horrible for taking pleasure in her time with Rene. Not only because she's a lil biased due to her upbringing, but also because he is a horrible man supporting the Germans while people die and starve. She doesn't understand how can she have any pleasure with someone like that, because she's very tormented by conservatives views as well as the conflict caused by the knowledge Rene is her Enemy.

So all of this contributes to Rene being, not likable, but perceived as attractive and sexy. Their relationship makes it hard not to perceive him like that; it's consented, and he's very thoughtful towards Eve and while she hates his guts, she enjoys the situation even though she feels guilty about it. We're just so used to associating villainy and evil with ugliness and disgust, that when we're presented evil characters we have to be explicitly told they're attractive cause otherwise we just imagine them as ugly and disgusting as possible. Such examples are Mrs. Coulter, who is beautiful and we know that from the start, while she does horrible things; or even Cersei Lannister; (there is also Count Olaf in ASOUE, who we are constantly reminded that he is unattractive, dirty, with poor hygiene habits and in contrast to him, we have Esme Squalor, who is described as attractive and fashionable, while she's just as cruel as Olaf).

Rene goes very easily from slimy to smooth as the story progresses. To us, compared to Eve, it's easier to feel lust for him (even if we question the morality of it) because we are not living that situation closely. We don't experience the same things as Eve does, we're merely observers, while Eve has to deal with starvation, poverty, fear and lack of freedom, and those are things she sees when she looks at Rene, which is why she feels such a shame. But personally I think there's nothing wrong in thinking he is a sexy character; I've seen much worse situations, and as long as you don't brush off the bad things he does to make him more likable, I suppose there's nothing wrong to feel attracted to him. (as I am, guilty as charged, Anon lmao)

I usually tend to stay away from sexualised female protagonists, but in this case I enjoy the whole dynamic because it's a powerful and very rare dynamic. They don't fall in love, or at least Eve doesn't, he fulfill his role as a "villain" by torturing her, but their dynamic is good because it puts under perspective lots of things. Especially considering it's a history fiction, so at that time women had very different views on sex, especially pre-marital sex, and we see Eve struggle with the idea of "how can I have pleasure with someone I don't love?", And it's interesting because, at least from my experience, sex and love are two very different points of relationship. And Eve spends a lot more time with Rene, especially because I think with her viable romantic options, there are no conflicts and that's fuel to the story. Her time with Rene doesn't change her experience someone else, but it changes a lot of her concepts and connects them through something frivolous, which is refreshing. Most situations like this end up with the woman falling in love, so this twist on the trope is very yummy.

#the alice network #literature #books #my*stuff #would bang rene I'm sorry friends i have no morals #but yall know that cause i love marcel delamare

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marvelvsmarvel · 5 years

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Bona Fide Superhero: Jessica Jones

So Far From Home was truly Amazing and Endgame was beyond words. But although the Netflix corner of the MCU has all be cancelled I can proudly say that Jessica Jones Season 3 was the best one yet and one of the better closing seasons of any show I’ve seen in a while. Obviously they knew this was their last run so there wasn’t a cliffhanger or anything at the end but it’s the way the summized the series and closed the chapter and shot it all that felt right and good.

I’m gonna start with supporting cast because hopefully you already know that I feel Krysten Ritter as JJ is such a perfect and natural casting on par with the likes of RDJ as Tony Stark. New squeeze Erik Gelden: 1. Having this incredible power to detect the good and evil in people (I bet Frank would give this guy a whiplash) though you have to admit it was an amalgam of good and evil since no one is perfect which leads to 2. Unlike Arturo from S2 this guy wasn’t an inherently good guy had a lot of shit he was working out including shit he kept going back on but he was just real and seemed like the most real character that’s been on the show (some might say he’s relatable) and then 3. It helps that he has this Pedro Pascal look and vibe to him.

Speaking of Jess’s squeezes the little surprise visit from Luke was seriously a love letter from those of Marvel Netflix and the Defender’s. Knowing where Luke’s character is in his own world but seeing him come back to help a friend. It just screamed to me that things change people change but you still got me and I am still me. Something small but big was her little wave goodbye to him because waving is out of pocket for Jess but instead it felt like a sincere goodbye to these characters who we’ve come to really dig into who showed us the blurred lines of heroics but who showed us that while being a hero isn’t easy doing good normally just takes doing something.

In spite of this I turn briefly to the true villain of the season and then the true antagonist of the series. Jeremy Bobb as Gregory Salinger is one of those things where you hope he didn’t have too much fun in this role. Turning out a whole serial killer was just bleh and I think appropriate. Every other villain from Kilgrave to Kingpin or Sasha or Mariah all were power thirsty individuals with some having the actual power to back it up. But with the tone and theme of Jessica Jones a smart and creepy and cliche loner middle aged white man serial killer is the type of villain you expect these street level heroes to go after and stop. Now if this were Punisher the guy wouldn’t have made it out his front door but the complexities that make up Jess told this right to her arc that killing isn’t easy but doing things the right way are often times even harder to accomplish. There couldn’t have been a better way to show her character development and the strength and will that she has that really is heroic.

In comparing her to the other Defenders it seemed like Jess wouldn’t naturally have an archenemy and would never get that stand-off of equals but boy were we wrong. Let me just say I love Trish Walker and even more Rachael Taylor since I first saw her of Transformers with her whole Australian accent but seeing her in her drug induced addict ways is really her peak performance. Her beautiful blue eyes get this crazed look of pain and desperation. Honestly she kicked a whole lotta ass in this one and I had wished we gotten a real Hellcat costume out of it like how her mom suggested cat ears and how her business is literally a fashion company just makes it a missed opportunity. But she’s been the true antagonist of the series keeping in mind not simply a villain she turned out to be but an antagonizing opposition to our hero. She’s been an addict since she was young and famous and grant it child fame claims that to most people but this antagonizes Jess to be her sister’s keeper which is a loving act but could also be a harmful burden. I don’t want to knock their sisterhood because their love is real but some people can’t help themselves and it does harm them and those around them more. But while Trish always saw her as her protector that came with perceptions and projections to get Jess to be a hero that she wanted her to be instead of the great loving hero she already was to her. This comes to a head with Trish getting powers and trying to realize that lifelong perception of a real hero only to be consumed by the power and turned by it until it was her heroics or nothing at all. It’s a sad storyline for her from beginning to end because even if that hero of hers were to have shown up in her past and saved her from her abusive dad her loving yet cruel mother is really the one that set her down this path through best intentions.

So lastly is Jess and if you’ve read this far just know this last part is me gushing over how much more I’ve come to love her and Krysten Ritter for her. She’s just the coolest one of these Defenders because she’s just badass without trying has all the best one liners and drinks bourbon. This season really showed off her real strength being her love and resolve. Jessica Jones was meant to be a shady personality with a heart of gold and nothing screamed that more that her destroying Sallinger’s evidence to save Trish. Like all she had to do was steal it not actually do what the serial killer asks! But that’s her. She’s a woman of her word. But two key standoffs with Trish the first after she destroyed the evidence in the hotel room where she tells Trish I choose you always. Her acting there really sold it a broken person trying to keep the pieces of her life together even though the thing she did to do it broke her heart. Then there was what was meant to be her hero showdown against the evil version of herself though the pain of going through with it rendered a heartbreaking performance. She wears her leather jacket like a cape her cocky attitude and strut her heroic calling card but she didn’t want any of it. Her sister literally tried to kill her and it pained her so much and pissed her off that she lifts and drops her with the most force she’s ever used on a person. It was the lashing back from Trish at her when she was taking drugs in the club it was Trish calling her a coward because she tried to prevent the surgery to give her powers. It was Jess’s greatest fear that one day she would lose the only family she had left no matter how hard she fought with all her powerful strength and even stronger love to defend and keep it because she knew it was inevitable. The ending was less of a teaser and more to reflect that even heroes have things they regret have people they’ve lossed have demons but they rise above them day after day after day. Thank you, Jess...

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ain-t-bovvered · 5 years

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Epiphany 2

read first ACT 1

EDIT: @waywardbaby

Summary: Less than two years later, you finally passed the men of letters’ initiation and, finally, you now set foot in America eager to be reunited with the Winchesters. But if Dean thought that you spent your days only with your nose in books and hands in monster’s guts, he was dead wrong. Your mission? Something that the British branch tried and failed miserably, or at least that’s what they told you anyway.

Pairing: Dean X Reader

Characters: Dean, Sam, Castiel and Jack

Warnings: slow burn guys…slow burn. Also, some fluff, humor, feels and angst.

Some laughs and some shuffling later Cas and Jack left you and Dean alone again. After a little moment of awkward silence, during which a particularly interesting drop of condense rolled down the neck of your beer bottle, Dean clicked his tongue annoyed.

“By the way, big fan of how you masterfully avoided any talks about that scar of yours.” he blurted out.

“Well, nobody asked.”

You stood up, the old stool protesting, slowly moving in front of him. He removed his legs from the table as you bent over, both your hands on the armrests of his chair. Leveling your eyes to his, you saw how he tried to hide how his breath caught in his throat and his own eyes flicked to your mouth. You smiled because, holy shit, and then leaned in, grabbing the coffee and the Moka beside him.

“Take me to the kitchen. I’ll show you how to use this.”

Dean blinked confused before registering what you had just told him, quickly scrambling to his feet as the chair legs scraped the floor.

“Don't use tap water, and fill it to the valve, not over and not under it. Just exactly in the middle.”

“Yeah yeah, how many rules are there?” he said, watching you from behind, bending over your shoulder. “I want to drink coffee, not defuse a bomb”

You shushed him, “Do as I say and you’ll thank me later”, you went on, opening the packet of grounded coffee. “Pass me a spoon, would ya?” you asked him without turning towards him, while you tied your hair up and out of the way. The spoon came hovering in front of your eyes, Dean’s breath was on your neck, and shivers spread down your spine.

“Y-you need to put the coffee in carefully, ok?” you faltered, “... however, there are two different opinions. We DO like to tear each other apart over that”

Dean was watching what you were doing, intensely but he was also distracted.

Dean’s thoughts, even if he was, barely, paying attention, were all over the place. She was talking nonstop, about this and that…

Jesus, whatever!

He actually did not care right now. She was here. How long had it been since he last saw her? Almost two years? It certainly felt a lot more than that, but she looked the same and completely different at the same time. There was something offbeat in the way she carried herself. However, when he saw her blushing again he knew she was still the girl who mumbled and hit her head under a table and spilled special whiskey on his hand.

She definitely looked like she could still eat his face if she didn’t like what came out of his mouth and he was pretty sure she could slap him silly if he gave her a good enough reason, and holy shit he got real close to that.

When he had first seen her, in his bedroom, he had thought he was hallucinating or something. Then she manhandled him and he knew right away that she was real.

Then came anger when he saw her tattoo and what the fuck. She said she was deep in books and guts not guns and also guts.

Oh, she’ll hear him alright he had thought before she came back with needles and anti-Vamp biotic or whatever that was. And she looked so proud, all twinkling eyes and pure confidence, his resolutions went flying right out the window.

She was doing well, she looked well. Maybe just a spank or two.

He gulped, suddenly feeling his mouth dry. No, okay maybe don’t go there Winchester.

When Sam had left to get dinner, he had a moment to let his eyes wander over her, taking her in. Fieldwork surely looked good on her. She looked strong even in her ridiculous height. Layers of clothes didn’t hide what all that training did. She looked sturdy, she was wearing jean shorts, her thighs tanned and full and-

“The fuck is that?” his eyes had widened at the sight of a long scar. He dropped between her knees without thinking, and only now did he realize how their position must have looked to Sam’s eyes.

He cleared his throat as her fingers brushed along his when he handed her the tablespoon.

“Actually that life found me, you found me ….”

He never had what she had and she was willingly diving into this life. They did encourage it when they had left, but she had made it clear that she would just help, not actively participate, or at least...be that involved that would justify a scar that big.

What else has she been lying about? Was she alone? How many times did he risk los- had she risked her life?

“OH SHUT UP! You want to know what I’d be if I hadn’t met you? I would be dead, in my car, that night. You saved my life and I’m proud of what I’m doing with it… Do not fucking spit your fucking contempt on it”

Her outburst caught him completely by surprise. There she was, standing proud, teary eyes, lips trembling, red-faced and she looked magnificent. His anger had melted into something else, pooling at the pit of his stomach. He had wanted nothing more than to take her there and then. He didn’t care that Sam was there. He had taken a moment before he followed her, but not before throwing Sam a glare to stay, the fuck out of that. His brother had lifted his arms in surrender and shaken his head, and fuck that, Dean saw the smirk on his face.

He had found her packing the few things she had brought in earlier.

Oh, hell no!! She wasn’t going anywhere. For once he had decided that he was going to swallow his pride just a bit. She smiled at him and his insides melted once again.

Her face at the sight of Jack had been priceless, and she had brought nougat for Satan’s baby. Yep, the kid had been so grateful for the gift, he kissed her and before he could stop himself he actually shouted at him in front of everyone.

Smooth Winchester! Real smooth!

The last night he had seen her replayed in his mind. Her skin, and scent, his fingers through her hair and how his name sounded, whispered and gasped from her lips when he had pressed her against the wall, her whole body opening for him and-

when Sam had told her she could stay, he saw her hesitation.

“…this is your home too, now” he blurted out without thinking, and it almost scared him how true that felt.

And now there they were, making coffee at the crack of the fricking dawn, probably trying to fight jet lag as he scooted closer, hands itching to touch her.

“So you have two choices here…” you continued trying not to think about Dean looming behind you and his warm breath on your neck, “... pack your coffee very tight and once you reach the edge smooth it down. Or you could gently let the coffee settle by itself and just let it breathe. In my opini-” you stuttered feeling his nose grazing your skin, his arms moving around you, hands resting on the counter.

“Dean?”

“Mmm, your opinion?” he murmured and you could be mistaken but you were almost certain he had buried his nose in your hair and maybe inhaled.

You cleared your throat, “I - in my opinion, the first method gives you a stronger and sharper taste. The second makes the taste smoother and gentler. So it depends on what are you in the mood for…”

“I can think of a few things,” he said low, and you swear you could hear the smirk on his stupid mug. Spinning around you faced him, hands bent behind you on the counter, looking up in his dark, hooded eyes gazing down at you. You just needed to stretch on your tippy toes to…

“OH.. " you cocked an eyebrow, “I’ll be happy to listen to those…” your hand lifted to his face, brushing his cheek lightly before gently grasping his ear. After all, two can play this cruel game and tugging him down to your level, added: “... after you make me the perfect coffee as I just explained it to you.”

Half an hour later, you were satisfied.

“Mmm yep! This is great. I can almost taste you” you said moaning, around escaping your lips that may not quite be appropriately fitting a coffee sampling.

Dean choked in his mug, “I’m sorry, what?”

“I-I m-mean ...I can tell this has been made by you”

“Oh, so you could tell who made you coffee?” the corners of his eyes crinkled.

“To some extent, yeah. Everybody can tell different people making coffee”.

He leaned back and crossed his arms, “Ok, close your eyes then and tell me which one is which.''

You felt him putting a cup in each of your hands. You slowly sipped from both. After a moment you held up the right one, opening your eyes.

“This is mine”

“How in the hell …”

“Because it tastes different. Here…” he took a sip from the cup you held to him and then one from the other.

“This is good,” he said, lifting yours. “Tastes soft in the beginning and then bam! All the flavor hits you at the end. That one though,” he said pointing at the one he had made, “That one just tastes bitter.”

“That’s not true. It’s rich and complex. You’d think you know what you are tasting, and end up with something totally different” you pointed at yours, “mine is just…bland”

“Let’s just agree to make each other’s coffee?” he offered.

“Yeah, I think it’s better” you chuckled.

“So how long you planning on staying?” he asked peeking from above his cup.

“I - I, uh, don’t know. For as long as I’m gonna be useful? Actually, I’m here because I sorta um …lied to my bosses...?”

“Lied?” he said, eyes twinkling with mischief.

“Well, I guess I told them I was going to…sort of ...train …you” your voice lowered almost to a whisper, and you blushed deeply.

“I - 'm sorry what?” he laughed, “Did I hear that right?”

You bumped your forehead on the hard cold table embarrassed. “I needed an excuse to leave my post and this was the best I could come up with!”

“…so you said” he had another fit of laughter, “that you were going to train American hunters?” His eyes gleamed as he continued, “And they believed you? Damn, Y/n!”

“Well…I… uh... volunteered to bring you some new equipment and knowledge. And before you say anything, they don’t know that I was talking about the Winchesters.”

“Why?”

You fidgeted with the handle of your cup, not looking at him in the eyes. “Well ...you two are pretty famous both as hunters and as legacies, and not in the best way. If I had told them you were my contacts they would have never let me leave-”

“Oh…?” he said smugly.

“-not that I think the same!” you quickly added, “I have the utmost respect in what you did and do. I've told you that already.” You looked down at your wringing hands “Don’t ever doubt that” you whispered trying to show him how truthful you were.

“I know you do,” he said softly. Your hands itched to grab his but you didn’t know where you stood.

Were you friends? More than that? Lots of time had passed and things were muddy and he was being his flirty, asshole self as always but-

“Um, I guess I’m gonna crash with you guys for a bit, if... that’s ok”

“I told ya, this is home, you can stay as long as you want”

“Thanks” you smiled. “I’m gonna start unloading my car, for my luggage at least. The rest, I can do tomorrow.”

Putting your empty cup in the sink you walked toward the exit.

“You can go to sleep, you know?” you looked over your shoulder when you saw Dean tailing you.

“I know. It’s fine. I’ll help”

“Your shoulder’s fucked”

“‘Tis but a scratch,” he replied with a British lilt, his stupid grin brightening up his eyes, and damn those eyes, and his smile, and his whole face.

You laughed climbing up the stairs “Don’t quote Monty Python to me”.

Once out, you walked to your rental car and grimaced even before you heard Dean’s whistle.

“Nice car” he taunted.

“Yeah, I know. Well, I just needed to drive here, and since you brought it up, how about you find me a nicer one? “

“We have a full garage here. Some cars need a little kick but nothing I can’t fix.” he proudly said.

You opened the trunk and dragged out a big trolley and another big backpack that you gave to Dean. Easier to carry on his good shoulder.

Walking in the sterile green corridor, you tried to be as silent as possible. The acoustic must be terrible here, and you didn’t want to wake up Sam.

“You can choose any room, Sam’s down there, mine’s number 11 from before.”

“…yeeeah ...I'll need one with a bathroom for myself. You know…one bunker, two guys, one angel, and the antichrist. A girl needs her space.”

“Oh…sure. Mmm, there should be a service bathroom, I think it’s mid corridor? Aaah, you’ll find it. But ..ah...showers are common. No luck there until you say otherwise, though” he said wiggling his eyebrows.

“Yeah, sure Dean,…just to be safe, if there is a towel on the handle, please knock “ You chose a room that was almost at the same distance from both of them. Opening the door, you grimaced.

“Spartan” you sighed entering and threw the suitcase on the bed. A cloud of dust rose and tickled your throat and you coughed waving your hand in front of you. “I guess I know what else I'll do tomorrow”

You turned to Dean who was waiting at the door. He handed you the backpack and put his hands in his pockets, shifting uncomfortably.

“Yes, Dean?” you asked while unpacking.

“You…you know that I’m happy… we… we are happy that-” he waved a hand towards you.

You stopped to look at him, “Of course” you smiled. "You just need to stick it into your head that I make my own choices. I’ll be fine. I need to finish unpacking and you should go to sleep”

“Yeah…ok. Uhm…goodnight then”

“Night”

You tossed and turned in your new bed, the jet lag hitting you hard and probably the dawn coffee hadn’t been a great idea. You had hoped that maybe listing all the things you were gonna do tomorrow would help, but nope, you were still wide awake. The phone said it was just past 5 am; you could explore the bunker and maybe make breakfast for everyone...?

Tossing your blanket aside you padded silently down the corridors, shivering as the cold tile floor hit your naked feet. Nobody had switched off the lights, thank god and now you were wondering if they ever switched them off?

Arriving in the main room, the one that looked like an old library, you lost yourself between the shelves. This room alone had so many rare things and so much knowledge that was thought to be lost back at home. Maybe you could ...no… what the hell? You put the book back in its place with a loud thud.

“Y/N, you are not gonna steal these books, you are not gonna steal these books, you are n-” you repeated to yourself in a mantra-like tone.

“You want to steal books?”

“Wh - Jack! Oh my god, you almost gave me a heart attack”

You jumped at the sudden voice behind you. His face suddenly grew worried, “You need a doctor? W - wait, I’ll call Castiel to-”

“No no, I’m joking! I was joking” you said quickly as you gripped his arm.

“Why would you joke about that? It’s a serious human, medical emergency,” he said confused and honestly, he looked offended. You put your hand on his shoulder.

“No, you are right. Sorry if I scared you. It’s just a figure of speech”

You saw his brain gears working to assimilate the new information. God, he really looked like a normal kid, a normal confused kid with so much power. Your hands itched. No, it’s - he’s not another monster to put on your table. He is…

“Jack …what are you doing awake anyway?”

“I don’t sleep much and I heard some noises. What are YOU doing up?”

“Ah, jet lag, can’t sleep; I was looking for something to pass the time before breakfast. Tell me, you know the bunker well?”

“Yes “

“Great, want to show me around?”

Jack showed you all the rooms and sections of the bunker. They even had an indoor shooting range. The garage made you giddy and you already eyed one of the bikes, the black Norton Commando. Your eyes were hooked on that when you felt Jack scooting to you. Looking at him, confused, you saw him eyeing the black Impala that was parked inside.

“It’s just a car, Jack”

“Dean said I can’t go near her. He calls her baby and treats her like she’s a person. I don’t think that’s normal”

“No, no, it’s not.”

Chuckling, you approached the car, Jack anxiously trying to stop you. You let your hand slowly caress the sleek, polished, black hood and you peeked inside. It really was a gorgeous car.

You went out of the bunker, enjoying the crisp morning air and you paused to watch the sun rising. You felt at home and you were so happy right now.

“Say Jack…?” you began, facing him as he squinted his eyes at the first sun rays of the new day, “... care for a quick drive?”

The phone buzzed a couple of times and you thought nothing of it. Probably your parents asking about minor stuff and that could easily wait.

“After last year Dean doesn’t like me going out without telling.” Jack was nervous but at the same time, he looked around the store excited even to be the one pushing the cart.

“Yeah well, I’m not Dean, am I? Just stay close ok?”

“I will “

Jack looked like an excited kid, pushing the cart between the aisles, eyes sparkling as you asked him to choose the cereal, while you looked for something that resembled what you knew about American breakfast. He came back with 4 different kinds, face falling as he told you he couldn’t decide. You just took all four and tossed them in the cart.

You let a fascinated Jack put the items on the rolling mat while you went to the other side to bag the groceries, getting confused looks from people because you refused help to do that. ‘I can bag my own, damn, groceries, thank you very much’ you thought.

After paying, you also let him park the cart with the others, laughing when he connected them and looked at you all proud, waving the coin. He picked the bags from you and walked to the car. Suddenly the screech of tires broke the silent morning in the mostly empty parking lot and you jumped, startled as Dean’s car stopped right in front of you.

The three jumped out, a scary look on Dean’s face, a worried one on Sam’s and you could not tell what was on Cass' face. Amusement and something that looked like he was gonna spank the two of you.

“Y/N, what the fuck ?”

“Wh-?” you didn’t have time to respond and Dean was in your face, Sam trying to get between you two.

“What happened? “ you asked, startled

“This! This is what happened,” Dean stated gesturing between you and Jack. “What the hell were you thinking?”

You and Jack shared a look “…pancakes?”

“Pancak-” Dean began and he had to stop himself from freaking out. “Ok…you can’t take Jack to buy groceries alone”

“Why? “

Dean threw his arms in the air, exasperated.

“Y/N…” Sam pushed his brother to the side, “... we woke up and you were gone and Jack was gone too. We were kinda worried”

“Oh...I’m sorry, next time I’ll leave a note “

“There is no ne-” Dean began.

“Dean, it’s fine. Nothing happened.” Cass’ calm voice interrupted him. You watched them, and suddenly it clicked, and you peered at Jack who looked guilty and kinda sad. Your heart broke but he was still the most powerful being in the known universe and you took him shopping for groceries.

“Oh ...I see, guys I’m sorry. In my defense…” you grabbed Jack and pushed him in front of you. “Look at him! Look at this face” you put your arms around him. “He would never hurt me, right?” you asked and he looked at you from above his shoulder, nodding shyly.

“I can’t believe this,” Dean said rubbing a hand on his face. He breathed out and looked at you. “Get in your car, we’re going home. Jack, jump in,” he said, opening the passenger door of Baby.

“He can ride with me” you challenged, lifting your chin “I promised to teach him how to drive later”.

“Okay Jack, now slowly pour the batter in the center. Try to keep it as round as possible.”

Leaning on the counter near the stove, you watched Lucifer’s kid, cooking pancakes, his tongue peeking out his lips in concentration. “When you see bubbles at the edges, flip it over quickly as I showed you.”

He looked at you panicked when the first bubbles started to appear, and carefully picked up the half-cooked pancake, flipping it over flawlessly. His head snapped up at you, mouth opened with amazement and your fists shot in the air triumphantly. “You did it! Nice job” you opened your palms waiting. He looked confused, “Dude, slap your hands on mine! Come on! Don’t leave me hanging “.

Dean‘s head popped in the kitchen right at that moment. “We hungry here”.

“Almost done. Jack, can you take those to the table? I’ll join in a moment.”

Dean started to follow him.

“Deeean…” you chanted, “... can you help me with something here” your tone glacial, now.

“S-sure. Um- whatcha need?”

“I need…” you turned to face him smiling sweetly, hands behind on the counter, “... to tell me, how did you manage to find us”.

You watched as he shifted awkwardly on his feet. “You put a tracking device somewhere in my shit, right?”

His shoulders sagged and you exhaled “It’s not my phone because it would have been neutralized, so what?” your face contorted in disbelief, “Is it my car? Did you bug my car?”

He did not say a thing but his expression told you everything. “Seriously?!.... Oh my God, don’t you trust me?”

“What? No, of course, I trust you, don’t be stupid!” he retorted and you blinked at him, “Uh...sorry...we all do. We had already tested if your GPS worked but it didn’t...”

“So, you bugged my car?”

You turned around to pick up the pitcher with the freshly squeezed orange juice and walked up to him, looking like you wanted to tell him something and he lowered himself.

On your tiptoes, you brought your lips near his ear and grazing it because you, too, are a little shit sometimes, and whispered, “Next time just ask me or I’ll smack you so hard that not even Castiel can raise your ass from where I’ll send you.

“Yes ma’am,” he stuttered.

Patting his injured shoulder a little bit harder than you should but believing that he deserved it, you joined the others.

The table in the library looked great. A huge pile of steamy pancakes in the middle, fresh bite-size cut fruit, greek yogurt, because Sam, Nutella and the juice alongside the still fuming family sized Moka. Sam was already piling fruits into his yogurt bowl, Dean hadn’t even sat yet that he already had his hands full of pancakes, bouncing the stack from hand to hand because they were still hot, the entire jar of Nutella under his arm.

“Leave some for us, would you?” you said to Dean who was spreading a nauseating quantity of chocolate cream between the layers.

“This jar is-” he said looking at the number on it “-500g…whatever that means. I think it’ll be enough” you snatched it from his hands and passed it to Jack who thanked you and did the exact same thing that Dean had.

“Jack…are you sure you can eat all of that? “

“Oh, don’t worry,” said Sam “he’s imprinted on Cass and Dean and has been imitating them since his birth “

“Oh, that’s why he kissed me yesterday,” you said just to be a bit mean to Dean who was currently choking. You poured him some coffee while turning to Jack, “I mean, you must have seen him kiss some girls. Please, tell me that’s all you saw”

“Do we need to talk about that?” Dean said, his voice still strained. “Now?!”

“Yes, that happens on cases. Sam always takes me to get ice-cream or at the movies… he says-” his forehead furrowed, “-he says that it’s best if we wait a bit before going back to the motel, but every time we come back Dean is sleeping drunk and clothed. I don’t understand”

“Dude! Come on!!” Dean groaned.

You snorted, and the coffee stuck in your nose.

“Is that everything?” Dean grunted, putting down the last case. Straightening up, he massaged his hurt shoulder. “What’s all this stuff, anyway?”

“Equipment.”

You crunched down and opened one of the crates, Dean and Sam peering down curious. At the sight of piles of books and manuals, Dean’s face scrunched up in disgust.

“You think I would have been able to go on a plane with all the weird shit without problems? They shipped all the toys in a container. They should arrive in a few days”

“Toys? What toys?” Suddenly Dean’s eyes sparkled.

“Most of it, you’ve already seen from the British. The rest is mostly prototypes I was helping with. Shouldn’t really have taken them out the lab but, what the hell? They don’t know what you have to face. They could be more useful to you than to them”. You passed the manuals to Sam’s eager hands. “Now, can you show me an empty room you don’t use so I can set up my stuff?”

The next 3 hours were spent setting up a makeshift lab with what little you were able to bring from HQ. Jack offered to help and he was now sitting on a chair while he checked the list. “Is that everything?” you asked, clapping your hands to get rid of some dust.

“I…think so “

“Let me see.” You walked behind him and scanned the list. “Yep, that’s everything. Thank you, Jack.”

He smiled proudly. You really couldn’t see evil in him. Your eyes fell on the exposed skin on his neck and your hand twitched. If you could just take a bit of his blood…

“what’s all this crap?” Dean’s voice snapped you out of your trance and you looked up at him.

“Your new lab!” you announced, gesturing around, proudly.

“The new what, now?” he walked in and looked around. “Not to be an asshole sweetheart, but we don’t need this stuff.”

Your smile fell, before frowning. “You say that now, but after I’ll show you how this works you’ll thank me. Besides …” you said walking up to him, “... this is just a little one. It only has the basics. You’ll learn in a flash, don’t worry and I translated all the procedures”

“Y/N, we are hunters…” he began.

“And I’m a lab nerd, I know. But…” you turned to watch the room, “... this could help you with the medical problems and… ” you faced him again, “...preventing nasties, ok?”

“Such as..?”

“…Mmm, like… not having to worry about vamp blood accidentally falling in your mouth or, even better, werewolves’ bites. You inject this-” you said pulling out a vial and shaking it in front of his eyes, “-and no worries. You are safe for up to 4h from doggie genes. Awesome right?” you said wiggling your eyebrows.

“…that’s…ok, yeah that’s actually pretty sweet, but ...why needles, Y/N? Aren't there any…vitamins, gummies?”

“….-then there’s this spray that can partially transform your scent to nonhuman or something. It confuses the nose,” you said waving a can to him. “Oh, oh and this! Oh, this is one of my favorites. Need blood to draw a sigil or some spells? Forget about cutting yourself and….” he and Jack watched as you went around the room grabbing things and dropping them in a pile in Dean’s arms.

Suddenly Cass appeared on the door, “I think Sam has a case”

“Really?!” you stopped with another one of your tools mid-air, throwing it to Dean, who barely caught it and followed Cass.

“She’s very energetic” Jack commented beaming to Dean, who stared down at his full arms and at the door where you disappeared.

“Yeah, …she is” he answered smiling softly, before almost dropping one of the vials. “Aaah, crap-”

When Dean, followed by Jack, arrived in the war room he came to a harsh halt making Jack almost crash into his back. As Sam was explaining the case, you had your elbows propped up on the light table, stretched to reach the laptop laying in the middle. Your hips swaying casually as you listened to what Sam was saying, unaware that the shorts had ridden up your thighs. His hand flew up to cover Jack's eyes, and he cleared his throat. You straighten up smiling at Sam and spun around.

“I’ll go grab my things. Sam’s gonna update you.” hopping past him you heard him yelling at your back:

“To the car in 20 …and change your pants!”

“…and change your pants” you mocked while shimmying out of your shorts. “Like, I don’t know any better”. Hopped to squeeze in your leggings, you felt your heart beating fast, excited for your first real hunt with them. A chance to prove your worth, finally! Maybe after this, Dean would stop being an asshole. Grabbing your medical kit and duffel bag, you stopped by the new lab and grabbed a few things. You were going to hunt what was probably rogue werewolves. Should you bring…

“Maybe I should ... yeah, ok.” You went back to your room and dragged out the soft case from under the bed, which you had hastily placed there, the night before.

“Hello beautiful “ you cooed, stroking the straps across your chest.

You found everyone in the garage. Jack and Castiel, you noticed, had no luggage.

“You not coming?” you asked, disappointed.

“No Y/N. I and Jack will stay here for this one”

“Why?”

“It’s probably a milk run, nothing fancy. They can rest this one out and focus on the search for mom” Sam told you, leaning out the passenger seat.

“We’ll stop along the way for a bit before going to Grantsburg” Dean called from the driver seat, “get in”

“Where are we stopping? “ you yelled over the music. Dean lowered the volume, looking over his shoulder to you.

“Sioux Falls “

“Oook, why?”

“It’s a 10h drive to Grantsburg. We’ll stop to rest and visit a friend.”

“Another hunter?”

“And a sheriff and a friend of ours,” Sam added.

You nodded and caressed the leather seats, Dean’s eyes watching from the rear-view mirror. “This car is gorgeous, by the way…” you mused and heard Sam scoffing and Dean, pleased, hummed gently as he patted the dashboard, “...and you have an unhealthy relationship with it,” you added, earning a laugh from Sam and glare from Dean.

The rest of the drive passed slowly, listening to the same 3 cassettes. By the look Sam gave you, you realized that suggesting something else was out of the question. Like, not even try to ask, it's out of the question, kinda look. Finally after a drop of temperature that made you put on your old ratty jacket, and the “Welcome to Sioux Falls” sign, Dean parked outside a simple, little house.

You slid out of the car slowly, groaning, stretching your legs painfully. “Man, I’m not used to these long drives “

“How do you travel long distances back home?” Dean asked retrieving your duffel bag and swinging it on his good shoulder.

“Humans have these amazing inventions called airplanes, you can cover great distances in 1⁄4 of the time”. He mumbled something while Sam simply shook his head. You followed them to the door and watched as a short-haired woman appeared before they could even knock.

“Hey, guys! Couldn’t mistake that car’s sound for anything else.” She hugged them both, warmly. “How are things?”

“Oh, you know Jody. No rest for the hunters. This…” Dean said moving aside, “... is Y/N. We told you about her, yes?”

Jody looked at you with a critic's eye. You smiled uncomfortably, her gaze quickly softening, as she offered her hand.

“Hi…I’m Y/N” you repeated as you took it, smiling.

“Jody Mills... they told me you are Men of Letters?” she asked you while inviting you in.

“More like Ladies of Letters, from the family that initiated me. Ladies run things where I come from”

“Love that!” She closed the door and pointed you to the couch where Dean was already slouched on, Sam occupying the armchair which although quite spacious, looked extremely small with that soft giant on it.

“Are you here for a case that I missed?” she asked from the kitchen.

“Nah, just visiting. Tomorrow we're driving to Grantsburg for a possible werewolf case… thanks” Sam said, grabbing one of the beers from Jody. Dean was next and she paused a moment, sizing you up.

“…I know I have a baby face but I’m past 26” you smiled bitterly. She blinked and smiled back, handing you the bottle.

“Don’t sound so salty. Give it 15 years and that baby face will be your best ally. Trust me”. Sitting down, she turned to Dean. “I’ll call Donna later to give her a heads up”

“I think this will be a milk run, but sure. Maybe she picked up something. Where are the girls?” Dean asked looking around.

“Alex’s at work, Patience’s gone home for finals and Claire she is ...well…you know” she sighed.

“Looking for trouble again, I assume” Sam chuckled.

“Yeah …” She confirmed while taking a large gulp of her beer. Looking at her watch she stood up slapping a hand on Dean’s knee. “Stay for dinner?”

“I thought you’d never ask” Dean answered, excited.

#Epiphany 2 #Epiphany #dean winchester #reader insert #reader fanfiction #dean x reader #dean x you #dean x y/n #dean winchester fanfiction

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heavenlypaper · 5 years

Note

I understand why people say that about Konan I agree but not fully I haven’t seen/read all of the series to form full opinion yet I do know She is complex human like character w/ Her own faults strengths struggles like any person who lives But w/ how everything ended I disagree with it Life isn’t always fair/cruel Can shape better/worse She died fighting I think was at peace to finally join those close once again Be at peace w/ hope still left when at times it was lost/hard to find

im not sure if this is part of the anon meme i was doing or if i made a post about Konan deserving better or something?? not sure

//Don’t worry you make sense for the most part. I mean you could of had unlimited characters and described things in detail and I would still have a chance of not understanding what you mean cause sometimes I can be a real air head.

But I swear. Konans character is portrayed SO fantastically if you ask me. But I believe the fandom (Not just the naruto fandom btw.) is sooooo absolutely quick to default to the claim that kishimoto is sexist and therefore is a bad writer. And a lot of these claims are made by people who actually rip apart characterizations of characters. I don’t know why “it’s bad writing” has become such a trend here on tumblr to be quite honest. It’s often another way of saying “the other didn’t do what I would have preferred therefore its bad.” or if it doesn’t fit into a certain socio-political opinion people have.

I also think it is absolutely beyond arogant when people claim that they could write the character better or give them justice. It’s okay to disagree with certain events pertaining to characters but its also such a dick move to claim you know THEIR own character better than they do.

All of Konan’s decisions are meaningful. They mean something to her and her own character. And I think alot of people get mad that Konan gets out shined by Nagato which I personally do not think that is the case. After all Konan’s personality is built around Nagato just as much as his personality is written around her. I think that alot of people just don’t understand the complexity of her. Or her own aspirations and beliefs. From beginning to end, Konan evolves, and not only does she evolve but she also sticks true to herself. There is absolutely nothing wrong with her making the choice to support the other two, to be the pillar that held them up. If you ask me I believe that makes her a stronger woman than someone who takes the spotlight, and gives off a very aggressive dominant attitude. Because Konan took so much bullshit from others (by that i mean obito. Hanzo. w.e) but never let it ruin her. I think it really shows how strong she is from a different angle rather than the one everyone recognizes as strength. Not to mention, emotional Konan is so powerful. I honestly could go all day but maybe it would be more appropriate for its own post.

Tldr: Konans character was very well written compared to some other characters and it doesn’t mean she was weak at all. And death taking her at the end is a better conclusion than her living and not meeting up with her friends. It’s the end to the Ame orphans story.

#Anonymous

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blackasteriia · 5 years

Text

Xion’s Opinions of Organization 13

I’ve seen a couple people do this so I’d thought I’d do the same. These are based off of general observations from the games, the secret reports, and manga. Several of the members Xion had little to no interaction with, so I extrapolated quite a bit. I included a brief summary as to how their relationship may proceed. These are just general headcanons and can be expanded, changed, or worked with as needed for interactions.

Note: I write Xion as a survivor of extreme, emotional, psychological, and physical abuse. Xion had no power, no rights, and no say in the Organization, she was the bottom rung. Regardless of how the character treated her, they are, in some way, complicit in her abuse. She will treat all organization members with the appropriate fear and rage.

Please don’t reblog.

13. Roxas

Xion adores Roxas, he is her first and closest friend. She would do anything for him and he’d do anything for her. While in the Organization, Xion’s primary concern was not herself but Roxas’ safety. Roxas always comes first. As good as friends as they were, the Organization was toxic for them. Xion was taught that she was inferior to Roxas, he deserved more than she did. Xion stole Roxas’ strength and memories, while she is his idealization of Kairi. Despite how much he cared for her, he remained oblivious to the depth of Xion’s situation until the end. They grow more distant, failing to communicate their complex emotions, and then at the end, they forget each other.

Outside of the Organization, Xion and Roxas have the chance to rebuild their friendship. A relationship that is built on genuine love and understanding of each other. One that is built without secrets. It would be key that they both recognize each other and themselves as unique, valuable individuals to avoid another imbalance.

12. Larxene

Larxene went to Castle Oblivion early in 358/2 Days. In the game she was dismissive and rude to Roxas. She likely was not kinder to Xion. That is if Larxene noticed her at all. Xion likely remembered Larxene as off-putting and cold. Larxene most likely saw Xion as a doll or puppet.

11. Marluxia

Marluxia was polite to Roxas and if they interacted, was likely cordial to Xion. Marluxia was a mysterious man with odd intentions who vanished before she ever knew him. A wild card with unknown abilities, she would treat him with weariness. Marluxia most likely saw Xion as Ventus.

10. Luxord

Luxord has two secret reports in 358/2 Days. The first report, from Day 173, Luxord admits that he envies ‘the children’ referring to Roxas and Xion. He believes that as children they have nothing to lose and can take impossible gambles without fear, unlike adults. He was likely aware that the Organization had some plan for her. He notes that the air has changed after Xion leaves in the Secret Report for Day 257 and then is surprised to find out she was a replica. He admits to frustration at being out of the loop. It’s odd but

9. Demyx

Axel and Roxas used to make fun of Demyx on the clock tower. Given Demyx’ usual lackadaisical attitude and obliviousness, I doubted Xion thought of him as anything more than a joke. She’d likely have a pretty neutral reaction to him. More likely, she’d be uncomfortable.

8. Axel

The secret reports reveal that Axel initially befriended Roxas not out of genuine concern, but for the sake of his mission. It wasn’t until he interacted with Repliku and felt remorse for him, that he reconsidered his friendship with Roxas. He returns, befriends Roxas but does not see Xion as more than a hooded figure. On Day 74, he saw her for the first time and notes she looks like Namine. After that they become closer friends, with him mentoring and helping her.

Axel was aware of the replica program and was wondering about Xion’s nature through-out the game. He learns a little bit before she does but decides that he doesn’t care. However, Xion goes to Castle Oblivion in attempt to learn about her past. She then confronts Axel and he not only lies to her, but gaslights her and grabs her. There is no illusion between them after this point and their relationship turns tense.

Both times Xion ran away, Axel brought her back against her will. Both times they fought. The second time lead to Xemnas’ preforming his experiment on her, which was incredibly painful, difficult, and traumatic for Xion. Ultimately, Axel was stuck between a rock and a hard place: protecting himself and protecting Roxas and Xion. They were all under threat of death for disobedience and he walked a thin line.

However, this shows how much Xion and Roxas affected Axel. He goes from a selfish, manipulative killer to a man willing to sacrifice himself to save Sora. There is great unresolved pain between Xion and Axel, they can make amends.

7. Saix

Saix was in charge of the day-to-day business and management of the organization for Xemnas. This was a position he earned by back-stabbing and behaving to expectation: cruel, callous, and cold, just like Xemnas. Of all the members, Xion interacted with Saix as an authority the most. He abused this authority and not only resented her, but was actively abusive. Saix only ever saw Xion as a puppet, he never saw her as a person and he acted like it. He misgendered her, he called her useless, broken, and threatened to kill her; In the manga Xion notes him as hostile and he calls her trash. At no point did he consider her less than a failure. Xion would be the most resentful, hateful, and furious at Saix over any other character.

Because the blog’s cannon is different, remember that Saix had no part in saving Xion in Kingdom Hearts 3. Other than her friendship with Lea, Xion would have no motivation to forgive Isa. She would be afraid of him and pissed at him. Isa must atone for his behavior, and only then can the work begin for Xion to trust him, forgive him, and maybe, possibly heal.

6. Zexion

As one of the members who went to Castle Oblivion, Xion has little original memory of him. Zexion was polite and patient with Roxas, and was probably decent to Xion, However, when Xion visited Destiny Islands she had a nightmare from Riku and Roxas’ perspectives. In it Zexion taunts Riku as he did in Chain of Memories. This nightmare was disturbing for her, forcing her through several form changes before turning into Sora. Zexion’s key role in it will factor into her thoughts of him.

5. Laxaeus

Laxaeus has no interaction with Xion before going to Castle Oblivion. He is big though so she probably would remember as the large, harsh one.

4. Vexen

Vexen’s relationship with Xion is unique. He is her creator however she did not learn this until after his death. She’d be curious about him, in a way that a child wonder about a missing parent. She wants to understand her origins and Vexen would be included in that curiosity. However, Xion would understand that Vexen created her as a tool and a weapon. She would be curious about him, but also weary.

3. Xaldin

Xion has no direct interaction with Xaldin in the games or the manga. He’s another one of those large guys she’d be nervous about.

2. Xigbar

Xigbar’s relationship to Xion is quite unique. He is more amused by Xion’s rebellion than frustrated, as Saix is. He calls her ‘poppet,’ this is either a condescending term of endearment while also making a jab at her origin. Xigbar admits in the Secret Reports that he sees Xion as Ventus. He was aware of her nature as a replica from the beginning and that she was made in Castle Oblivion. His behavior fits into Luxu’s chaotic nature, he’s more observer than participant.

There is one direct interaction between Xion and Xigbar. While on a mission with Axel, Xion and Xigbar fought. She defeats him and flees. Again, Xigbar at best seems annoyed and takes credit for her getting the jump on him. His enigmatic personality and position combined with her knowing she can beat him, would make a more confident Xion. She would not treat him politely.

1. Xemnas

Xion and Xemnas, actually, did not interact except in passing. Xemnas was hands off with the Organization and remained at a distant, the ever enigmatic superior. However, she recognized him as having the most power and the power he had over her specifically. Xion wanted Xemnas’ approval because she understood that hinged on her survival. She learned of and understood his plan with Kingdom Hearts, and how she played into it. By the end of 358/2 Days, Xion was acting specifically to spite and thwart Xemnas.

What she would remember him most for was his reprogramming. After Axel returns Xion for the last time, he takes her and implants the rest of Sora’s memories in her. This process is painful and torturous for Xion, leading her to having to fight Roxas. In this blog, Xion survives this process but is forgotten. She has reoccurring nightmares about becoming a weapon. Xemnas is next to Saix for the member Xion hates the most in the Organization. However, there is a key difference between Saix and canon. Xion, in her mind, has defeated Xemnas.

She broke his programming and escaped the organization. She overcame him and she survived despite how he attempted to crush her. She didn’t just defeat Xemnas’ physically, by surviving, but emotionally. She overcame him. Xemnas wanted to destroy Xion and create her into Sora. But she survived. Despite how knotted he is in her trauma, Xion will refuse to submit to Xemnas again. She beat him once, and she can, and will, do it again. He is an empty man who failed-- she has no fear of him.

#✰*✦ this is the idiot speaking ⎧ooc⎫#✰*✦more than a mannequin on the strings⎧headcanon⎫#✰*✦ 358/2 Days⎧VERSE⎫#✰*✦ reunion arc⎧verse⎫#✰*✦ do not go gentle⎧xion⎫#✰*✦the pale moon in the cold water⎧saix⎫#✰*✦an empty heart confesses its agony⎧xemnas⎫#✰*✦burning sunsets in the spectrum of red⎧axel⎫#✰*✦the golden twilight mirrors his soul⎧roxas⎫#i'm so sorry about laxaeus and xaldin there is literally nothing

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i-am-very-very-tired · 3 years

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Somewhere between Britney and Billie Eilish, liberated by social media and their direct relationship with fans, millennial and Gen Z women claimed the right to be complicated pop auteursRead all of the essays in the decade retrospective

📷 Laura Snapes Mon 25 Nov 2019 13.12 GMT 174

While Billie Eilish has reinvented pop with her hushed SoundCloud rap menace, creepy ASMR intimacy and chipper show tune melodies, there’s also something reassuringly comforting about her: as a teenage pop star, she has fulfilled her proper duty by confusing the hell out of adults. It’s largely down to her aesthetic: a funhouse Fred Durst; a one-woman model for the combined wares of Camden Market. Critics have tried to make sense of it, but when editorials praised Eilish’s “total lack of sexualisation”, she denounced them for “slut-shaming” her peers. “I don’t like that there’s this weird new world of supporting me by shaming people that may not want to dress like me.”To Gen Z’s Eilish, not yet 18, it is a weird new world. She and her millennial peers have grown up in a decade in which pop’s good girl/bad girl binary has collapsed into the moral void that once upheld it, resulting in a generation of young female stars savvy to how the expectation to be “respectable” and conform to adult ideas of how a role model for young fans should act – by an industry not known for its moral backbone – is a con. “It’s a lot harder to treat women the way they were treated in the 90s now, because you can get called out so easily on social media,” Fiona Apple – who knows about the simultaneous sexualisation and dismissal of young female musicians – said recently. “If somebody does something shitty nowadays, a 17-year-old singer can get on their social media and say, ‘Look what this fucker did! It’s fucked up.’”📷 Lunatics conquering the asylum ... the Spice Girls. Photograph: Tim Roney/Getty ImagesFemale musicians have been subject to conflicting moral standards for longer than Eilish has been alive. Madonna, Janet Jackson and TLC knew them well – but the concept of the pop “role model”, expected to set an example to kids, solidified when the Spice Girls became the first female act to be marketed at children. In the 70s and 80s, idols such as David Cassidy primed girls for a monogamous future. By comparison, the Spice Girls were lunatics conquering the asylum. But, given their fans’ youth – and the sponsors that used the band to reach them – they also had a duty of responsibility. Their real lives – the all-nighters and eating disorders – were hidden so effectively that Eilish, born in 2001, thought the band was made up, actors playing the roles of the group in Spiceworld: The Movie.In the late 90s, kid-pop became an industry unto itself: Smash Hits and Top of the Pops magazine pitched younger; CD:UK and America’s TRL aimed at Saturday-morning and after-school audiences; Simons Fuller and Cowell built empires. The scrappy Spice Girls preceded the cyborgian Britney, who was a far sleeker enterprise – until she wasn’t. She was pitched as a virgin: cruel branding that invited media prurience and set a time bomb counting down towards her inevitable downfall. Britney’s 2007 breakdown revealed the cost of living as a virtuous cypher and being expected to repress her womanhood to sell to American prudes. Her shaved head and aborted stints in rehab prompted industry handwringing, and so an illusion of the music business offering greater freedom and care for pop’s girls emerged in her wake. Advertisement Major labels abandoned the traditional two-albums-in bad-girl turn (a la Christina Aguilera’s Stripped). Social media-born artists such as Lily Allen and Kate Nash were swept into the system and framed as the gobby antithesis to their manicured pop peers – until their resistance to exactly the same kind of manipulation saw them cast aside. And if Kesha, Lady Gaga or Amy Winehouse burned out, their visible excesses would distract from any behind-the-scenes exploitation, inviting spectators to imagine that they brought it on themselves.📷 Reclaiming the hard-partying values of rock’s men ... Kesha. Photograph: PictureGroup / Rex FeaturesAt the dawn of the 2010s, social media surpassed its teen origins to become an adult concern, and an earnest fourth wave of activists brought feminism back to the mainstream. Like a rescued hatchling, it was in a

pathetic state to begin with – dominated by white voices that tediously wondered whether anything a woman did was automatically feminist. Is brushing your teeth with Jack Daniel’s feminist? Are meat dresses feminist? Is drunkenly stumbling through Camden feminist? Are butt implants feminist?Pop culture became the natural test site for these ideas – especially music, where a new wave of artists challenged this nascent, often misguided idealism. Kesha reclaimed the hard-partying values of rock’s men to embody a generation’s despair at seeing their futures obliterated by the recession. Lady Gaga questioned gender itself, as one writer in this paper put it, “re-queering a mainstream that had fallen back into heteronormative mundanity”. In a career-making verse on Kanye West’s Monster, Nicki Minaj annihilated her male peers and gloried in her sexualisation. MIA, infuriated by America’s hypocritical propriety, flipped off the Super Bowl and proved her point by incurring a $16.5m fine.📷 Infuriated by hypocritical propriety ... MIA gives America the middle finger during her Super Bowl performance in 2012. Photograph: Christopher Polk/Getty Images Advertisement As a former Disney star, Miley Cyrus stepped the furthest out of bounds. In 2008, aged 15, she had posed in a sheet for Vanity Fair. “MILEY’S SHAME,” screamed the New York Post. She apologised to her fans, “who I care so deeply about”. But in 2013, she torched her child-star image by writhing in her knickers on a wrecking ball, twerking against Robin Thicke, being flagrant about her drug use, appropriating African American culture while perpetuating racist stereotypes.Cyrus’s 2013 transformation bore the hallmarks of a breakdown – especially witnessed two years after the death of Amy Winehouse, who was then perceived as a victim of her own self-destruction. But Cyrus was largely intentional about her work (if, then, ignorant of her racism). She had waited until she was no longer employed by Disney to express herself. Earlier in her career, she said, she struggled to watch her peers. “I was so jealous of what everyone else got to do, because I didn’t get to truly be myself yet.” Despite apparently smoking massive amounts of weed herself, she didn’t want to tell kids to copy her. But she knew the power she offered her peers such as Ariana Grande, who that year left Nickelodeon to release her debut album. “I’m like, ‘Walk out with me right now and get this picture, and this will be the best thing that happens to you, because just you associating with me makes you a little less sweet.’”Pop did get a little less sweet. Sia and Tove Lo sang brazenly about using drugs to mask pain. Icona Pop’s I Love It reigned (“I crashed my car into a bridge / I watched and let it burn”) thanks to its inclusion on the soundtrack of Lena Dunham’s Girls. With its aimless characters and their ugly behaviour, the show mirrored pop’s retreat from aspirational sheen, and the culture’s growing obsession with “messy” women and “strong female characters”: flawed attempts to create new archetypes that rejected the expectation of girls behaving nicely.📷 An explicit rejection of role-model status ... Beyoncé performs at the Super Bowl in 2013. Photograph: Ezra Shaw/Getty ImagesA new cohort of young female and non-binary critics shifted the discussion around music: in 2015, when the documentary Amy was released, they questioned how Winehouse was perceived in death compared to Kurt Cobain. They also pushed aside the virgin/whore rivalries of old. In an earlier era, Beyoncé and Lana Del Rey might have been fashioned into nemeses, one sexualised and powerful, the other gothic and demure. Instead, their respective mid-decade self-mythologising showed that female musicians could be pop’s auteurs, not just the men in the wings. Advertisement Beyoncé’s self-titled 2013 album was an explicit rejection of her role-model status. She was 15 when Destiny’s Child released their debut album. “But now I’m in my 30s and those children that grew up listening to me have grown up,” she said in a behind-the-scenes video.

The responsibility she felt to them “stifled” her. “I felt like ... I could not express everything … I feel like I’ve earned the right to be me and express any and every side of myself.”It was the first of her albums to reveal the breadth of her inner life – the coexisting kinks, triumphs and insecurities, showing the complexity of black womanhood. The critic Soraya Nadia McDonald wrote: “Mixed in with songs about insecurity, grief, protest and the love she has for her child, Beyoncé manages to present her sexuality as a normal part of her life that deserves celebration.” “It doesn’t make you a bad mother. It doesn’t make black people look bad, and it doesn’t make you a bad feminist, either.” When Beyoncé emblazoned “FEMINIST” on stage at the 2014 MTV VMAs, she helped reclaim the word from middle-class white discourse.Like Beyoncé, Del Rey countered the idea that female pop stars were major-label puppets. She had struggled to make it as an indie artist but found a home at Polydor – a detail that caused detractors to question her authenticity. Her shaky debut SNL performance revealed the flaw in their thinking: if she was manufactured, wouldn’t she have been better drilled? Her project was potent, but startlingly unrefined. More intriguingly, she opposed fast-calcifying ideas about how feminist art should look: Del Rey’s lyrics revelled in submission and violence, in thrall to bad guys and glamour. It wasn’t feminist to want these things; but nor was it feminist to insist on the suppression of desire in the name of shiny empowerment.📷 Exposing industry machinations ... Azealia Banks at the Reading festival in 2013. Photograph: Simone Joyner/Getty Images Advertisement Del Rey’s lusts and designs were her own – pure female gaze – a hallmark of the defiant female pop stars to come. Rihanna said she was “completely not” a role model, a point driven home by the viscerally violent video for Bitch Better Have My Money. Lauren Mayberry of Scottish trio Chvrches refused to be singled out from her male bandmates and wrote searingly about the misogyny she faced online. Janelle Monáe and Solange rubbished the idea that R&B was the only lane open to young black women.They started revealing their business conflicts. In 2013, 21-year-old Sky Ferreira finally released her debut, six years after signing a $1m record deal. She was transparent about her paradoxical treatment: “They worked me to death, but when I wanted to input anything, it was like, ‘You’re a child, you don’t know what you’re talking about.’” When Capitol pulled funding for the album, she financed its completion: it was widely named an album of the year. Facing similar frustrations, rapper Angel Haze leaked her 2013 album, Dirty Gold, and Azealia Banks wasted no opportunity to expose industry machinations.The rise of Tumblr and SoundCloud put young artists in control of their own artistic identities, forging authentic fan relationships that labels couldn’t afford to mess with. Lorde was signed age 12, but her manager knew he had to follow her lead because she knew her audience better than he did. Halsey was already Tumblr-famous for her covers, hair colours and candour about her bisexuality and bipolar diagnosis when she posted her first original song in 2014. It received so much attention that the 19-year-old – who described herself as an “inconvenient woman” for everything she represented – signed to major label Astralwerks the following evening.A new type of fan arrived with them. The illusion of intimacy led to greater emotional investment – and with it, an expectation of accountability. Social media was being used to arbitrate social justice issues, giving long overdue platforms to marginalised voices, and establishing far more complex moral standards for pop stars than the executives who shilled Britney’s virginity could ever have imagined. In 2013, Your Fav Is Problematic began to highlight stars’ missteps: among Halsey’s 11 infractions were “sexualising Japanese culture” and allegedly falsifying her story about being “homeless”.Musicians, particularly of an

older guard, were unprepared. Lily Allen’s comeback single Hard Out Here, released in late 2013, satirised the impossible aesthetic standards expected of female musicians – a bold message undermined by the racist stereotypes she invoked to make her point: “Don’t need to shake my arse for you ’cause I’ve got a brain,” she sang, while black and Asian leotard-clad dancers twerked around her in the video. The backlash was swift. There was the sense of a balance tipping.📷 Refused to let terrorists suppress girls’ joy ... Ariana Grande at One Love Manchester, 4 June 2017. Photograph: Kevin Mazur/One Love Manchester/Getty Images Advertisement Over the decade, female pop stars steadily self-determined beyond the old limited archetypes. But the most dramatic identity shifts were still a product of adversity, women battling for control.In 2015, Ariana Grande provoked mild outcry when she got caught licking a doughnut she hadn’t paid for and declaring: “I hate America.” Two years later, a suicide bomber attacked her concert at Manchester Arena, leaving 22 dead. She went home to Florida in the aftermath, then returned to stage benefit concert One Love Manchester. A victim’s mother asked Grande to perform her raunchiest hits after the Daily Mail implied that the bomber had targeted the concert because of her sexualised aesthetic. So she did. By prioritising her mental health and refusing to let terrorists suppress girls’ joy and sexuality, she set a powerful example for fans that ran counter to the moralising of commentators such as Piers Morgan.Grande appeared to emerge from this tragedy – and the death of ex-boyfriend Mac Miller – with a renewed sense of what was important, and what really was not. Her next album, Sweetener, defiantly reclaimed happiness from trauma; she swiftly released another, Thank U, Next, abandoning traditional pop release patterns to work with a rapper’s spontaneity. “I just want to fucking talk to my fans and sing and write music and drop it the way these boys do,” she said.Kesha had helped instigate this decade of greater freedom for female musicians – or so it seemed until October 2014, when she sued producer Dr Luke, making allegations including sexual assault. (In spring 2016, a judge dismissed the case; Luke denies all allegations and is suing Kesha for defamation.) She claimed she was told she had to be “fun”, an image that Luke’s label intended to capitalise on, revealing how revelry could be just as confining as its prim counterpart. In 2017, she released Rainbow, her first album in five years. Addressing her trauma, it got the best reviews of her career – a response that also seemed to reveal something about the most digestible way for a female artist to exist. But her forthcoming album, High Road, pointedly returns to the recklessness of her first two records. “I don’t feel as if I’m beholden to be a tragedy just because I’ve gone through something that was tragic,” she said.Taylor Swift’s refusal to endorse a candidate in the 2016 election, and the fallout from a spat with Kanye West, saw her shred her image of nice-girl relatability with her 2017 heel-turn, Reputation. But she rebelled more meaningfully when she leveraged her profile to expose the music industry, alerting the public to otherwise opaque matters of ownership and compensation. She joined independent labels in the fight to make Apple Music pay artists for the free trial period it offered consumers. Earlier this year, she despaired at her former label, Big Machine, being bought – and the master recordings to her first six albums with it – by nemesis Scooter Braun, an option she claimed she was denied. Now signed to Universal, and the owner of her masters going forward, she hoped young musicians might learn from her “about how to better protect themselves in a negotiation”, she wrote. “You deserve to own the art you make.” Advertisement Swift’s formative politesse came from country music, an industry that emphasises deference to power and traditional gender roles. In 2015, consultant Keith Hill – using a bizarre metaphor about

salad – admitted that radio sidelined female musicians: they were then subject to endless questions about tomatogate, as if they had the power to fix it. But that blatant industry disregard freed female country artists to shuck off obligation and make whatever music they wanted. In recent years, Miranda Lambert, Ashley McBryde, Brandy Clark, Kacey Musgraves, Ashley Monroe, Maren Morris, Brandi Carlile and Margo Price have all creatively outstripped their male peers.📷 ‘Just me existing is revolutionary’ ... Lizzo. Photograph: Owen Sweeney/Invision/APTheir situation resonates beyond country: greater personal freedoms for female musicians haven’t equated to greater commercial success. Just because a wave of female pop acts have refused old industry ideals, that doesn’t mean control is consigned to the past. There will be young women enduring coercive music industry situations right now – whether manipulation or more serious abuse. Some may never meet those impossible standards, and fail to launch. Others may quietly endure years of repression before potentially finding their voice. There are high-profile female pop acts working today who control their work yet are still subject to grinding suggestions that they change to meet market demands, and noisy women from this decade who have been sidelined. The tropes of the self-actualised female pop star are so established that labels know how to reverse engineer “real” pop girls beholden to a script.But the emergence of a more holistic female star will make it harder for labels to shill substitutes. Their emotional openness has destroyed the stigma around mental health that was used to diminish female musicians as “mad” divas. Charli XCX said she would never have betrayed her vulnerabilities when she was starting out in her teens. “If I’m emotionally vulnerable,” she thought, “people won’t take me seriously … Now I just don’t care.” Robyn spent eight years following up her most successful record because she needed time to grieve and unpick the impact of her own teen stardom. Britney – who in 1999 told Rolling Stone, “I have no feelings at all” – this year cancelled her Las Vegas residency to prioritise her mental health. 📷 More to the floor: the decade the dancefloor was decolonised Read more Advertisement They’ve relentlessly countered the male gaze. Chris refused to simplify queerness for the mainstream; Kim Petras stood for “trans joy”; Rihanna challenged the idea of skinny as aspirational by creating inclusive fashion lines and candidly discussing her own shape. “Just me existing is revolutionary”, Lizzo has said, while Cardi B refused to let anyone use her past as a stripper undermine her legitimacy as a powerful political voice.Where unthinking messiness was valorised at the start of the decade, now imperfection only gets a pass as long as nobody else is getting hurt. This summer, Miley, now 26, apologised for the racial insensitivity of her Wrecking Ball era. Soon after, she posted striking tweets in response to rumours of her cheating on her husband. She admitted to having been hedonistic and unprofessional in her youth. But she swore she hadn’t cheated in her marriage. “I’ve grown up in front of you, but the bottom line is, I HAVE GROWN UP,” she wrote. (To a degree – not long after, she found herself called out again when she implied that queerness is a choice.)In their fallibility and resistance to commodification, the women who have defined this decade in pop look a lot more like role models than the corporate innocents sold to girls in the early millennium. They’re still learning, working with what they’ve got rather than submitting to what they’re told. “I don’t know what it feels like not to be a teenager,” Billie Eilish said recently. “But kids know more than adults.” … as you’re joining us today from South Africa, we have a small favour to ask. Tens of millions have placed their trust in the Guardian’s high-impact journalism since we started publishing 200 years ago, turning to us in moments of crisis, uncertainty, solidarity and hope. More than 1.5

million readers, from 180 countries, have recently taken the step to support us financially – keeping us open to all, and fiercely independent.With no shareholders or billionaire owner, we can set our own agenda and provide trustworthy journalism that’s free from commercial and political influence, offering a counterweight to the spread of misinformation. When it’s never mattered more, we can investigate and challenge without fear or favour.Unlike many others, Guardian journalism is available for everyone to read, regardless of what they can afford to pay. We do this because we believe in information equality. Greater numbers of people can keep track of global events, understand their impact on people and communities, and become inspired to take meaningful action.We aim to offer readers a comprehensive, international perspective on critical events shaping our world – from the Black Lives Matter movement, to the new American administration, Brexit, and the world's slow emergence from a global pandemic. We are committed to upholding our reputation for urgent, powerful reporting on the climate emergency, and made the decision to reject advertising from fossil fuel companies, divest from the oil and gas industries, and set a course to achieve net zero emissions by 2030.

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nonbinarysasquatch · 6 years

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Josh’s Ex-Girlfriend is Crazy.

“So, what I am hearing is, it’s not really about Josh per se. Josh is more a symbol of effortless normalcy from which you’ve always felt excluded.”

Rebecca can’t you seeeeeee, Josh Chan is a metaaaphooorr.

Since the beginning the title of this show has never really been the focus of the actual content of the show. Mostly, it’s been a feminist deconstruction of romantic comedy tropes. The relationship with the word crazy has largely been through the lens of Rebecca’s discomfort with others saying it but a willingness to describe herself as crazy with self-loathing.

Something I’ve been disturbed by since becoming involved with the CXGF fandom on Tumblr is that… in the #Crazy Ex Girlfriend tag, you’ll see literal men linking to videos of their (allegedly) crazy ex-girlfriends, or people variously ranting about their crazy ex-girlfriends.

And those people? They are why this show exists. Perhaps, more than anything else this show is about the exploitation, degradation and dismissal of women, particularly women with mental illnesses. Of course, that’s not all this show is about, because it’s a complex, layered show that you can’t just take a cursory glance at and decide that you understand it.

And for the record: I think there’s totally room for critiques of this show. Have I ever seen any good ones from that didn’t come from people who weren’t fans? Nope. It’s always the same old thing where you can tell they aren’t willing to intellectually engage with the show.

All of the good critiques of the seen of the show and it’s plot have all come from fans and people willing to intellectually engage with the show.

Even while watching and enjoying seasons 1 and 2 the first time I had some issues and concerns. But I trusted that all the feminists who loved the show knew what they were talking about. And season 3 almost unilaterally eliminated all of my concerns.

Let’s go back and look at the season 1 title theme: Rebecca is called “the Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” by her own opening theme. She rejects it as a being a sexist term then explains that there’s a lot more nuance than that. And you know? She wasn’t wrong. There always has been a lot more nuance than that.

She did move across the country for Josh… but she wasn’t really aware that was the case. And to just dismiss her as a stalker is to dehumanize her and disregard her mental health.

Throughout the show we have explored why she is the way she is. I’m someone who generally believes the world needs more empathy and to do a lot less demonizing of people. So to that end, I choose to understand Rebecca and I have a lot of sympathy for her.

And still, she does terrible things. She manipulates people and her actions have consequences. There is a question of how much we should see Rebecca as a person who really exists or if we should see her as a symbol for what childhood abuse and the patriarchy can do to a woman.

If we view the show as feminist satire it looks a lot different than if we choose to simply take everything at face value (though how you can ignore the innate feminism behind literally everything on this show is beyond me.)

This certainly isn’t a show for people who are only interested in a black and white view of the world. And it’s not a show for anyone who doesn’t want to ever see people with mental illnesses being portrayed in a negative light, even if to never show people with mental illnesses in a negative light is a complete and utter lie (which I can say as someone with mental illnesses who has definitely done shit I’m not proud of that was influenced by mental health problems.)

For me, as someone with mental illnesses, I’ve never felt like anything spoke to me the way this show does. I’ve never felt represented in this way before. I’ll have a lot more to say about that as this season goes on…

This show is from Rebecca’s POV and even when she’s doing terrible things, we are given her perspective. It’s a narrative that is traditionally been used to make men into sympathetic heroes, even when those stories all have men who are actual garbage with no consideration for the feelings of the women in the stories.

So, in this episode, we tackle the most egregious of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend tropes: the sort of films where the woman is spurned into murderous revenge.

Of course, Rebecca isn’t really a murderer. She doesn’t want to hurt anyone. She just wants to feel like her feelings matter. Her actions in this episode are terrible but the emotions behind them aren’t wrong. Josh hasn’t even approached making amends with what he did. He doesn’t seem to even think he did anything wrong. Last episode he was more interested in literally telling everyone that Rebecca was crazy and that was BEFORE he realised that Rebecca was spreading lies about him.

The opening scene of this episode is perfectly constructed and so realistic it hurts. I’ve been in that room. Not as Rebecca but as all of her friends. Rachel Bloom’s acting here is exquisite as perfectly uses her anger and fear as a mask for her pain. Her pain after she takes Darryl’s down is just so real and just… so accurate.

The grief that all of her friends feel is also very real, particularly Paula and Valencia who in many ways are the characters that Rebecca has hurt the most. Even Nathaniel looks aggrieved, despite having taken it less hard from her and having the least at stake. A solid sign that he isn’t the cold-hearted person he initially seemed.

Of course, then, he brags TO HER FRIENDS about having sex with her and says he knows her better. Which, no, Nathaniel, shut your mouth, man. To say this isn’t appropriate is putting it mildly. In some ways, this is the most mad I’ve been at Nathaniel thus far. He’s developing feelings for Rebecca but “she’s zany but in a cute way.” Nope, Nathaniel. Much like Josh Chan, I’m going to judge you for not being respectful of Rebecca’s mental health, though it is fair to say that he doesn’t know her as well as Josh (should.)

Rebecca’s friends all love her, even after the cruel things she has said. The world at large would just say she’s crazy. And no one could fault any of her friends for choosing to cut ties and take their own health and safety into account. But this isn’t real life. And Rebecca is a symbol, to a certain degree.

To readdress the point I was making above about the problem of people (particularly) men complaining about crazy ex-girlfriends, I think this show is making one point that I don’t necessarily see acknowledged all that often: that even when someone is acting in these sorts of ways, that it still isn’t OK to call them crazy. Which, it should be noted, is not the same thing as talking about abuse and mistreatment. But all this bullshit of dudes posting videos of their ex-girlfriends acting out and mocking them for crazy is gross bullshit.

If this show does have a failing, it’s that weaving the threads of being a deconstruction of romantic comedies, a deconstruction of the crazy ex-girlfriend trope and being a serious show about mental health means that engaging with it is complicated. And it’s a musical comedy to boot.

I’ve said before that I don’t think this show is for everyone. But it is for more people than currently watch it. And goddamn, I wish some of the people who dismiss their girlfriends, or any women as being crazy would watch it and absorb the message.

So, Rebecca goes to stay in a hostel. Fun fact: there are no hostels in West Covina. As far as I can tell, most hostels in Los Angeles County are in Los Angeles. But hey, there’s also nothing on East Cameron in reality too…

At the hostel she meets Danish tourist, Jarl, who might be my favourite one off character the show has ever done. Jarl happens to know a thing or two about movies like Swimfan, Basic Instinct and Fatal Attraction. The only one of those I’ve ever seen is Swimfan (which I don’t recall enjoying.)

Rebecca decides she needs to reenact those films in order to force Josh to feel what she feels, telling Jarl that she’s 7 feet tall angry.

Meanwhile, her friends are looking for her. It’s easy to miss that Valencia has never understood the full scope of the scheming against her that Rebecca and Paula were doing back in season one.

Easy to miss that Valencia doesn’t realise the full depth of the scheming against her that was going on, and that was largely driven by Paula. We also acknowledge for the first time that Paula and Valencia are friends, a far cry from season one when Paula just saw Valencia as an obstacle for Josh and Rebecca’s love story.

Darryl and White Josh are being forced to address the issue of whether WhiJo wants to have a baby together, forcing Hector to bounce out before the awkward gets too bad.

We also get a follow up here on a tiny thread seeded last season of Heather perhaps having an interest in Hector. I always love how the show does a good job of putting characters together who haven’t interacted much and doing something interesting with them.

Rebecca goes to Josh’s house, trying to spook him and get under his skin. It clearly works… for whatever that is worth.

After going back to the hostel, Jarl points out that if Rebecca continues on this path, she’ll end up murdered at the end of the movie. Rebecca, of course, doesn’t buy it. Because to her this isn’t about revenge. She simply wants Josh to feel her pain. Though she’s phrasing it unhealthily, really, what she wants is empathy. Something that Josh has… pretty much never given her.

Jarl points out that if Rebecca was unhappy before she met Josh that perhaps this isn’t all his fault. And he says the line that I quoted at the top about effortless normalcy.

Back at Rebecca and Heather’s house, it turns out that Nathaniel is sleeping there along with George and the girl he’s dating, Penny. And, for the record, it’s not true that a person needs to be missing X number of hours before you can report it. I did research for a fanfic!

You can immediately report a person as missing. This doesn’t mean that law enforcement will take it seriously of course, but legally there’s nothing stopping you. And they should (and that’s a big should, obviously) take into account like whether there’s reason to worry about that person’s safety or the safety of other people and act accordingly.

Now, whether Nathaniel would be taken seriously is another issue but in theory at a minimum, Heather or Paula (as her best friend and her roommate) should’ve been able to file a report.

Josh goes back to his job at Aloha Tech and is promptly suspended because Rebecca stuffed his work locker full of remotes. And as has been pointed out, yes, this means that Alex opened the locker, found all the remotes then stuffed them back inside so he could make the dramatic reveal to Josh. What a nerd. He must be bored.

Rebecca has left Josh a note, leading to him going to the carnival where Rebecca is with his mother. When Josh can’t find Lourdes, he confronts Rebecca, unwittingly allowing Rebecca to back herself up to a dangerous pit while he tells her she’s crazy.

Did Rebecca want Josh to push her into the pit? Maybe not consciously but I think perhaps part of her felt she deserved it. Maybe she thought Jarl was right. Maybe she just wanted to see if Josh really hated her. Whatever the case, Josh doesn’t allow her to fall, saving her at the last moment.

Josh leaves, warning Rebecca that if she comes near him or his family again he’ll call the cops. Rebecca tries to smooth him over, admitting that she just wanted to get his attention and she wants to talk to him. But it’s too late for that.

Paula’s dream is painful. We, as the audience, want that moment to happen but it’s not honest. Instead, Paula calls Naomi, deciding that maybe Rebecca needs her actual mother.

Rebecca, meanwhile, stumbles into a bar that Greg frequented in season 1, even talking about him with the bartender. And then, as if fate, Rebecca gets butt-dialed by Greg. But Greg doesn’t know and he can’t hear her. And even if they did talk… what would he say? Nothing he could say could fix what she’s feeling.

And then there’s Greg’s dad, Marco. Rebecca rightly observes that Marco has never had a favourable view of her. But Marco instead tries to compliment her, perhaps recognising that she’s vulnerable. And Marco is the sort of guy who inappropriately hits on his female doctors, so I don’t really see this above him.

And so Rebecca goes home with Marco, sleeping with him. Does Marco fully understand the lowness of the place Rebecca is in? Probably not. But I also think he doesn’t care. He knows she’s pretty and vulnerable. That’s why he flirts with her in the first place.

I’ve seen some fans critique this from the perspective of Marco being such a good dad that he would never do that but… I think that erases a lot of Marco’s previously displayed shitty traits in favour of focusing on his good ones. He’s a good dad to a certain degree but… also kind of a gross asshole. Those things aren’t mutually exclusive.

And honestly, I’ve simply known too many dudes who seemed like stand up moral dudes who it turned out had done appalling things and used women. It’s honestly never shocking to portray a man like this. And let’s be real, if last year didn’t show everyone that men culturally have issues with consent then I’m not sure what will.

Rebecca has hit rock bottom as her movie comes to an end, realizing that life doesn’t make narrative sense. When her mom calls her, demanding that she come home she doesn’t even fight it. What else can she do?

The Songs:

Scary Scary Sexy Lady: One of the few “not my favourites” this season. A version of this was apparently considered to be the season 3 main title sequence but given what happens in the next few episodes, they realised that it wouldn’t make sense for the full season.

The End of the Movie: One of the best songs the show has ever done, sung by Josh Groban. This song is why there still isn’t a full season 3 soundtrack. Hopefully they’ll get that worked out at some point. This is damn good song.

Episode Rating: 10.0 out of 10.0.

And this still isn’t even my favourite episode this season.

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ultralifehackerguru-blog · 6 years

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New Post has been published on http://www.lifehacker.guru/patrick-melrose-how-benedict-cumberbatch-climbed-inside-his-favorite-antihero/

Patrick Melrose: How Benedict Cumberbatch Climbed Inside His Favorite Antihero

To prepare for his harrowing role as an addict in the Showtime limited series, Cumberbatch had to ask the tough questions: “Injecting cocaine: what is that like? Why would you do that?”

Benedict Cumberbatch on the set of Patrick Melrose

Photo by Julian Broad

As Emmy nominations approach, Vanity Fair’s HWD team is once again diving deep into how some of this season’s greatest scenes and characters came together. You can read more of these close looks here.

PATRICK MELROSE, PATRICK MELROSE

When a fan asked Benedict Cumberbatch during a 2013 Reddit A.M.A. what literary character he’d most like to play, he offered a definitive answer: Patrick Melrose, the brilliant, damaged vortex around which Edward St. Aubyn’sdevastating quintet of autobiographical novels swirl. The books—and now Patrick Melrose, the gorgeously harrowing Showtime limited series based on them—trace the life of this charismatic upper-class Englishman as he tries to wrestle free from the damage imposed on him in childhood by his monstrous father and learn how to lead a meaningful adult life.

When Cumberbatch rhapsodized about the character on a recent phone call, he spoke so quickly that my ear could hardly take it all in. Which was appropriate enough, since Patrick Melrose wraps himself in language, using words as a both a shield and a life raft. “They are very, very funny novels,” Cumberbatch said, “and there are very funny bits which turn on a knife’s edge, 180 degrees, into tragedy.”

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As an example, Cumberbatch pointed to a scene in the first episode in which the drug-addled, twentysomething Patrick views his father’s corpse at a funeral parlor. He unwraps the body, which has been discreetly covered with tissue paper, turning a grim moment into an exaggeratedly comic scene. “He starts having this dialogue with somebody who’s not there, thanking them for the present of his dead dad—and then he’s fully triggered into this memory of the trauma of being raped by his father. . . . That happens in the space of about 20 seconds him on the page,” said Cumberbatch. “When you get prose as deep and rich and profoundly revealing of a character’s nature, you’re really spoiled as an actor. So much of your background research, your development of deeper psychology, and internal-thought processes and psychology—it’s there on the page. And this man’s salvation comes through a huge amount self-examination. So I just always, always went back to the book on pretty much every level.”

HOW HE CAME TO LIFE

St. Aubyn’s Patrick Melrose novels have been picking up fans since he published the first in the series, Never Mind, in 1992. (The fourth installment, 2005’s Mother’s Milk, was nominated for a Booker Prize). So much of their pleasure derives from St. Aubyn’s prose that adapting them for the screen seemed like a doomed undertaking. Yet screenwriter and novelist David Nicholls bravely took on the challenge—which wound up consuming more than half a decade. The resulting limited series covers Patrick’s life from sensitive child to middle-aged parent struggling to break the cycle of abuse, with his debauched, twentysomething years serving as fodder for the intense opening episode. Certain essential qualities run through Patrick’s entire life, Nicholls pointed out in a separate interview: “The desire to be better, to be less separate from the world, to be less ironic and sardonic, less disengaged.”

Nicholls said he always had Cumberbatch in his head as he wrote Patrick Melrose,even before the actor independently expressed interest in an adaptation. The two men had worked together on Starter for 10, the 2006 British film based on Nicholls’s novel, in which Cumberbatch played a supporting role as the prissy captain of a university quiz-show team—an amusing but two-dimensional character, the kind of work Cumberbatch was beginning to find frustrating and limiting. “Benedict was clearly something special, but everyone also had the sense that he is one of those clowns who could also play Hamlet,” Nicholls said.

As it happens, the tormented Danish prince is precisely who came to mind when Nicholls embarked on translating Patrick Melrose for the small screen. The two characters have a lot in common, not least father issues and a complex relationship with their mothers. There’s also “the potential for frighteningly cruel behavior coupled with a desire—I think it’s a sincere desire—to do the right thing. And certainly the soliloquizing, the playing with ideas, is so much a part of [the books].”

Cumberbatch spent a great deal of time getting to know the author, “Teddy” St. Aubyn, while immersing himself in the role of Patrick. “I asked him about things I won’t go into in an interview, of a very personal nature,” Cumberbatch said, as well as more specific questions about drug addiction. “For example, injecting cocaine: What the fuck is that like? I mean, why would you do that? Why would you do that, and how would you do that? What would happen when you did that? How longwould it happen?” He rattled off those queries at top speed, as if tapping into a sense memory.

“There’s a sort of ringing quality to the way Teddy speaks—everything is very carefully considered, and you’ll drive through until the end of the sentence,” Cumberbatch continued. “They are beautiful sentences. He speaks with the same language he writes with. It’s a joy to be in conversation with the man.”

Patrick Melrose is more than just a character study; it’s also a harsh dissection of British mores. “It captures so much of the hypocrisy and cynicism and sickness” of the upper class, which “hides its secrets and confesses to nothing,” Cumberbatch said. Patrick’s father, David (Hugo Weaving), is a sadistic aesthete who has taken up cruelty in place of a profession. (“What redeemed life from complete horror was the almost unlimited number of things to be nasty about,” David proposes in Never Mind, the first book in the sequence.) His mother, Eleanor (Jennifer Jason Leigh), is a crushed heiress who has seceded from reality.

They are surrounded by equally horrifying members of the aristocracy—most notably, Princess Margaret (Harriet Walker), who in one episode appears as the guest of honor at a fancy dinner party. Far from the chic figure we know from The Crown, the princess here humiliates the French dignitary sitting next to her and callously dismisses the hosts’ young daughter when the girl shyly approaches in hope of meeting a royal. It is Patrick who kindly comes to the little girl’s rescue, seeing in her traces of his old sweet self, ignored by the adults and neglected by his parents.

Cumberbatch said that he too had glimpsed the codes and rituals of high society, through the posh world of his grandmother (“not that she was like that—she was a deeply caring and loving person,” he hastened to add) and his time at Harrow, one of Britain’s most elite boarding schools. “That world was definitely around me, but I wasn’t ever really fully engaged in it.”

Making sure Cumberbatch looked the part was also crucial. According to costume designer Keith Madden, Patrick comes from a British upper class that doesn’t follow fashion, but favors traditional dress that might be embellished with a twist of eccentricity. Colored socks, he said, are “the seal of the aristocratic upper classes.” Patrick may look imperturbable, but Madden hoped to suggest a juxtaposition between his fancy dress and his sordid reality—meetings with drug dealers, descents into a speedball-induced state of madness.

Beyond that, Madden looked to St. Aubyn himself for guidance. “I was privy to some photographs that Benedict showed me of Edward St. Aubyn as a young boy, and then as a young man in the 80s. So, that’s where a lot of the inspiration came from—even the shape of the sunglasses, and the striped shirts, and the pale stone-wash jeans of the time,” he said. Sometimes the author himself would visit the set, “and it would be funny, because he would be wearing something very similar to what Benedict would be wearing in the scene,” Madden said. “I would say, ‘Yeah, we’ve got it right!’”

Cumberbatch confessed that it’s a great relief to have done justice to St. Aubyn’s creation. “I felt a sort of double responsibility,” he said—not just as an actor bringing the character to life, “but also as a reader to other readers of these novels. I do think he’s written some of the best prose of the 21st century, if not the best—and one of my desires is to bring these works to the widest audience.”

Photos: On the Set of Showtime’s Patrick Melrose

Benedict Cumberbatch stars as the title character in the forthcoming mini-series Patrick Melrose.

Photo: Photograph by Julian Broad.

(C)

#Benedict Cumberbatch #Lifestyle #Patrick Melrose #tv shows

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