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my favourite thing about Havers as a character is how little we know about him! we don’t get the chance to learn anything about him, because Cap didn’t get the chance to learn anything about him. and that’s the tragedy of it!

we don’t know if Havers felt the same about Cap, because Cap doesn’t know. we don’t know if Havers was even gay / bi / etc at all, because Cap doesn’t know. because Cap couldn’t know these things because they couldn’t discuss them because of the environment in which they were living and operating. it was homophobic. which is, you know, sort of the point of Cap’s flashbacks, really.

we have no idea whether they were the right people for each other because they didn’t get the chance to explore that, due to the homophobia that surrounded them! (imagine I’m screaming that bit because I feel very strongly about how beautifully that story was crafted and executed.)

additionally, of course, there’s the other reason that Havers as a character having very little detail works, which is that he can represent the non-homophobic Everyman of the time. the Joe Bloggs (or maybe Tommy Atkins works better). he represents every conversation that couldn’t be had, every sentiment of support or community or attraction / affection that couldn’t be expressed, every person who was unable to help a gay man like Cap feel that little bit less alone.

I’m a firm believer that ambiguity in story-telling can be just as powerful as giving the answers, and it’s one of my favourite examples! I’ve not done a very good job of articulating it, but there you go I suppose.

hate it when i’m reading an actually very good post about how havers is left as a shell character for a reason because of what he represents for the captain. like yes thank you. and then they end the post with a. ‘and he definitely loved the captain in return thank you for coming to my ted talk’ like. you were SO close to the point and lost it in the last second. i can’t even comprehend how someone can be so close that they literally explain exactly havers’ role as a character and still manage to fumble the ball.

#bbc ghosts #bbc ghosts spoilers #ben willbond #peter sandys-clarke #analysis #bbc ghosts series 5 #the captain #havers

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I’ve been reading from The Teares of Ireland by James Cranford, which is a 1642 English comic about the 1641 rebellion in Ireland. obviously it’s complete propaganda and I sincerely doubt the veracity of most stories told in it, but there’s some absolute gems in here. I mean, really.

At one Mʳ Atkins houſe 7 Papiſtas brake in & beate out his braines, then riped upe his wife with Childe after they had rauiſhed her & Nero like vewed natures bed of conception then tooke they the Childe & ſacrificed it in the fire.

this is gruesome… if you believe they did it.

English Proteſtantas, ſtriped naked & turned into the mountaines, in the froſt, & ſnowe, whe:reof many hundreds are periſhed to death. & many liyinge dead in ditches & Savages upbraided them ſayinge now are ye wilde Iriſch as well as wee.

likewise. they perished to death, guys [/s]! and the worst thing the Irish could think of to say was… that these English Protestants were also Irish now? really, Cranford?

Drivinge Men Women & Children by hundreds vpon Briges & caſting them into Rivers, who drowned not were killed with poles & ſhot with muſkets

at this point I’d like to remind you that it was only in 1609 — not very long previously — that these same Catholics had been forced out of their homes and off their land in Ulster so that English Anglicans and Scottish Presbyterians could be moved in, in an effort to Anglicise and de-Gaelicise the nation of Ireland.

Mʳ FFordes houſe rifled; and to make her confeſſe where her mony lay, they tooke hot tonges clappinge them to the Soules of her feete & to the Palmes of her handes ſo tormented her that with the paine thereof ſhee died.

okay, so this one is also utterly ridiculous. but I am making a point here.

when I was reading these pieces — as well as the testimony of Elizabeth Price, an English woman, in June 1643 about the same rebellion — what really struck me was the similarity to Israeli propaganda about Palestinians. from Elizabeth Price:

shee often heard the Common sort of Rebells say, that when they had distroyed all the English in Ireland they would goe with an Army into England and destroy the English there

sounds a lot like Israeli claims that Palestine doesn’t want Israelis to exist. she also talks about how brutal the Catholics are in regard to religion:

hearing in Irish words answered and said Cuir do anim in diouall, which in English is Give or bequeath thy soule to the Divell, And at other tymes would say to the protestants (vpon their knees, begging with teares, that they might pray before their deaths) Why should yow pray for your soule is with the Divell already, And therevpon and with those words in their mowthes would slaughter and put them to death

firstly, what she means is “cuir d’anam i ndiabhal”. secondly, this once again reminds me of the propaganda of Israel as concerns the Palestinian people.

my point here, really, is that it was extremely clear to me upon reading these 1640s texts that the horrific details of the Irish rebels were made up. please have the same doubt about claims regarding Palestinians, things you hear from Israel. especially things that sound like they don’t have any evidence.

#irish #irish history #history #historical analysis #palestine #free palestine

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well, this is disappointing.

I know Gaiman’s probably trying to be neutral, but the situation doesn’t allow for neutrality.

“if you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. if an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.” — Desmond Tutu

this is one of my favourite quotations, and the man who said it campaigned strongly against apartheid.

I can see the desire to say that everybody should stop fighting and calm down and get along, but I don’t think that works when the so-called state of Israel displaced the state and people of Palestine. thinking that “Palestine should be recognised as a state” is all well and good, and I agree, but how could that happen if some of its land is still assigned to Israel?

the existence of Israel is inherently violent against Palestinians, as it necessitates the stealing and colonising of land that was already Palestinian land in the first place.

Mr Gaiman, I know you’re probably doing your best to not insult anybody and probably had good intentions in saying this, but we can’t just go back to when there was no bombs and no creation of refugees in the area that is rightfully Palestine, because that state of affairs is still violent against Palestine. I hope you learn and come to understand this.

·—·

(side note to pre-empt any misunderstandings: I asked a Jewish friend of mine to read this post over and confirm it did not unintentionally promote any anti-Jewish sentiment or prejudice, as I’m aware some people are using their anti-Israel opinions as an excuse to be violent towards Jewish people, which is unacceptable. my friend does confirm this.)

Hello, Mr. Gaiman.

Recently, an old tweet of yours from 2015 resurfaced, in which you show support for Israel in the ongoing conflict. Is that still where you stand, or have you changed your mind in the past 6 years since that tweet was written?

The one where I say that Israel has the right to exist and that Palestine should be recognized as a state? I haven't changed my mind about either of those statements, or about any of the ones about people not killing other people and standing with the refugees and the children.

#free palestine #israel is an apartheid state #palestine will be free

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I know I’m very late to the whole thing, but here’s my take on ’60s fem Aziraphale and Crowley in the States. more details after the cut!

decided to make Crowley a hippie because obviously. lust, substances, free love, questioning authority: all of these things that Hell probably think are a great way to win people over to their side. Crowley would insert themself into that crowd quickly as an easy way to get points with Hell: hang out, enjoy a bit of music, and let the humans come up with the supposedly immoral things themselves.

Aziraphale is just in a gentle, cute version of the “cleaner”, more mainstream fashion of the time. I didn’t know what Aziraphale would wear if presenting fem, given the general lack of change in their outfits, so I sort of went with what I could. I thought they’d look lovely in this style. a good outfit for going around and not doing much other than eating and having a nice time.

#good omens #ineffable husbands #ineffable wives #fem crowley #fem aziraphale #digital drawing #neil gaiman

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my Watson:

buff — 6/10. he is decently strong and muscular, a large fellow, although he has multiple physical disabilities so he’s not always able to use his physical prowess.

fluff — 8/10. both kind and handsome, and very gentle whenever needed.

gruff — 8/10. do not piss this Watson off. also I have him vent his frustrations to the reader because it’s fun. has a slightly bitchy internal monologue, and also genuine outrage sometimes.

stuff — 9/10. competent doctor, knowledgeable about things he finds interesting, very calm and capable in an emergency.

bluff — 6/10. can lie, to the reader and others, but doesn’t too often. only when needed and / or funny.

chuffed — 10/10. absolutely adores spending time with his Holmes. would spend his life doing it. and he quite likes being a mystery writer.

·—·

my Holmes:

deductive — 9/10. an excellent detective most of the time, but has been known to fuck up (see SCAN, YELL). I keep this in.

seductive — 3/10. has appeal to some people (mostly to Watson), but also is fairly sex-averse most of the time.

destructive — 7/10. will not hesitate to destroy things if needed, but won’t unless it is needed.

productive — 10/10. loves to help people, and is motivated far more by this than by “queen and country” nonsense (because I am Irish). also good at it.

obstructive — 10/10. absolutely lying to the police, refusing to cooperate with them even a little more than in the originals maybe, depending on the case. loves getting in the way of rich and / or powerful people.

instructive — 8/10. encourages Watson to learn and observe, as well as any others who don’t treat them like shit.

Presenting: The Six-Point System For Rating Your Watson

(Developed in collaboration with the Letters From Watson server, thanks folks)

On a scale of 1-10, rate your Dr Watson for the following qualities:

Buff - strength and build

Fluff - handsomeness and kindness

Gruff - sternness and anger potential

Stuff - can he do things besides just watching Holmes

Bluff - how unreliable a narrator is he/can he lie

Chuffed - is he happy to be there? Does he like hanging out with Holmes?

Go forth!

#sherlock holmes #queer #john watson #autistic sherlock holmes #disabled john watson #gay #holmes pastiche

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oh fear not. my Watson (whenever I finally get to start writing my Holmes stories) is utterly pathetic [/pos] for his lover.

Nothing but love and respect to the recent batch of grumpy, self assured Dr Watsons who rolls their eyes at Holmes, but we are due for a truly down bad hype-man/wife-guy Watson

#queer #watson #holmes #sherlock holmes #john watson #holmes pastiche

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this is the funniest joke I’ve seen in a long time @readingtheentrails the footnote I cannot

na rudaí is tábhachtaí i ngaeilge

clapsholas: twilight

gealach úr: new moon

urú: eclipse

éirí na gréine: breaking dawn

grian mheán oíche: midnight sun

#langblr #memes na Gaeilge #Gaeilge #Irish

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warning: Good Omens series / season 2 spoilers

you have been warned

final warning okay thank you

(also Pride and Prejudice spoilers I guess if anyone still cares about that 210 years on)

·—·

they’re Pride and Prejudice, people! I’m telling you!

Aziraphale still holds onto his anti-Hell, pro-Heaven, anti-demon, pro-angel bias, his prejudice telling him that there is no “institutional problem”, that Crowley fell because he asked questions rather than because Heaven didn’t want questions asked.

Crowley refuses to let go of his pride in his identity (whether that be as one of the fallen, or as part of a side that is neither Heaven nor Hell), and go back to the Heaven that betrayed him, which he doesn’t trust not to ruin everything.

Aziraphale is Lizzy, Crowley is Darcy.

and, come on, we all know what happens in Chapter 34.

Darcy proposes to her. he talks about having tried to pretend the love is not real (“in vain I have struggled”), and asks Lizzy to marry him despite the fact that they come from two different factions who traditionally wouldn’t marry, and despite the fact that he knows she does not possess the same identity he is proud of in himself.

and Lizzy turns him down, because she’s prejudiced against Darcy’s type and this has influenced how and what she thinks about him specifically.

Darcy leaves this proposal feeling hurt, betrayed, and upset, while Lizzy is too confident that she is right in the core beliefs that influenced her decision. and they go away needing to work on themselves.

(is all of this sounding familiar?)

and then they meet again and fall in love and there’s a successful proposal etc etc.

Crowley’s pride in what he is won’t let him take Aziraphale at half quality, still part of Heaven; Aziraphale must be so exceptional as to transcend that restrictive category. an angel who would buy into that nonsense is not what Crowley stands for. he cares about people in his own, very small category: their side, which he thought included Aziraphale. those outside Crowley’s side are not to be ruining Crowley’s “precious, peaceful, fragile existence”.

meanwhile, Aziraphale’s prejudice presents him two options. either Crowley remains a demon which means he is bad, or Crowley becomes an angel again, which means he can be properly good. in the second case, Aziraphale can have him. Aziraphale can’t have Crowley if he’s bad, which he must be if he’s a demon.

there’s a subtle difference between the two.

Crowley’s tactic is more about self-preservation for his group (which would have included Aziraphale if Aziraphale’d agreed to dump Heaven for their side, just as Darcy’s remaining pride extends to protecting Lizzy when they are married (“Darcy could never receive him [Wickham] at Pemberley”)).

Aziraphale is being self-righteous for the good in the world (which he would have done for Crowley too if Crowley’d agreed to be an angel, just as Lizzy loses her shit at Darcy for not helping Wickham and all of his myriad other moral failings and then turns around and defends him once she’s convinced he’s good (“that [her dislike of him] is all to be forgot”)).

of course, this all might be an accident on the part of the writers, but then again….

Crowley and Aziraphale’s ideas to get Nina and Maggie together were sheltering from the rain, one fabulous kiss, and Pride and Prejudice.

Crowley and Aziraphale have already had their sheltering from the rain — twice, actually (at the end of the creation scene, and the end of the Eden scene). they have also had their kiss — no explanation needed.

this is their Pride and Prejudice, right down to Crowley (Darcy) protesting when a dance with Aziraphale (Lizzy) is suggested.

I could go into how Pride and Prejudice is in and of itself a Much Ado About Nothing retelling, but honestly that’s not particularly relevant, just cool. (do watch the David Tennant and Catherine Tate Much Ado, though.)

so, my hypothesis for the conclusion of a potential series 3 is as follows.

it will involve Crowley’s equivalent of “one word from you will silence me forever”: Aziraphale’s last chance to answer in the affirmative and be with him. Aziraphale will learn that Crowley is not bad simply for being a demon (I hope), and Crowley will realise Aziraphale should be let into his heart even if he wasn’t always on Crowley’s side (I hope).

Darcy / Crowley stops refusing to interact positively with anybody not in the little clique, and Lizzy / Aziraphale stops believing an entire group to be awful.

I don’t know if I have anything else coherent to say on this. something about how they have to accept the things they cannot change about the other and change the things the other cannot accept about them?

(also Gabriel could arguably be Wickham, given that Crowley tries to convince Aziraphale that Gabriel did a nasty thing and should be kept away from those he wants to keep safe but Aziraphale won’t believe Gabriel is a bad person because Gabriel isn’t one of the group he considers to be bad… I mean, it’s just their pride and their prejudice again isn’t it. whether we’re talking about Darcy, Lizzy, and Wickham, or Crowley, Aziraphale, and Gabriel.

I’m not going to follow that extension of the comparison too far, though, because I don’t think I can reasonably claim that Beelzebub is Lydia.)

concluision: I don’t care whether it’s Benedick and Beatrice, or Darcy and Lizzy, or Crowley and Aziraphale. I love all of their dynamics.

and we have amazing things to look forward to if we can convince the company to make series 3.

#Good Omens #Crowley #Aziraphale #Neil Gaiman #Pride and Prejudice #Fitzwilliam Darcy #Elizabeth Bennet #Good Omens spoilers #Good Omens 2 #Good Omens 2 spoilers #Good Omens series 2 #Good Omens series 2 spoilers #Good Omens season 2 #Good Omens season 2 spoilers #it has been about a year since I read P & P so like #be gentle with me please #but Much Ado was the focus of my Shakespeare special interest recently so #Much Ado About Nothing #Much Ado #David Tennant #Michael Sheen #I have so many thoughts #Mr Darcy #Lizzy Bennet #Jane Austen #good omens analysis

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presented without comment.

#james connolly #coronation #king charles iii #irish #irish nationalism #socialism #marxism #irish republicanism #anti-monarchy #1916 rising #easter rising #irish republic

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so, the press release for series (we don’t call them seasons my side of the Atlantic) sixteen of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia says Dee “fights for […] women’s athletics”, and FX have said this series is going to “rip into the headlines” and that “a few figures from the past rear their heads”.

so. theory time. prediction time.

Carmen’s back?

what is constantly in the news at the minute (especially in the States), supposedly threatening women’s athletics? trans athletes! I can’t think of anything else, except for the occasional claim that athletes are, ahem, artificially improving their performances, but that’s hardly specific to women’s athletics. the only thing I can think of for this to mean is that Dee wants trans women out of women’s sports. (there might be other things. I just can’t think of them.)

Carmen, of course, is the trans woman whom Mac on-and-off dates for a while early in the show and is generally super rude to, and for whom Dee carries a surrogate pregnancy. (figure from the past.)

my prediction is that Dee and Carmen (or just, you know, some generic trans woman, but it’s way better if it’s Carmen, for reasons I’ll touch on later) are competing in the same athletic event, and Carmen does better than Dee. Dee subsequently wants Carmen eliminated from said event because she’s convinced she, Dee, deserved Carmen’s spot.

of course, we the audience know Carmen’s just… a good sportsperson (series six episode one, Mac Fights Gay Marriage: she is multiple times found working out very hard at the gym), and Dee isn’t particularly, and Dee doing worse than Carmen in a sporting event would be far more down to this than at all to do with Dee being cis and Carmen being trans.

but Dee really, really strikes me as the sort of pseudo-feminist to support trans people (series thirteen episode six, The Gang Solves the Bathroom Problem: she says she’d have no problem sharing a bathroom with a trans woman)… until certain things happen. like doing worse in a sports competition than one. conditional support, right? conditional acceptance? she’d be a really, really good character to represent people who only support the trans rights that are totally and completely convenient to them already.

Dee is repeatedly shown as the type of supposed feminist who actually is only in favour of women like her (White, rich, yadda yadda yadda) and not intersectional rights (series six episode five, Mac and Charlie: White Trash: her support of marginalised people does not extend to working-class people in the cheaper pool; series thirteen episode six, The Gang Solves the Bathroom Problem: she thinks she’s a trans ally but still refers to intersex people as hermaphrodites; series eleven episode nine, The Gang Goes to Hell: Part 1: she’s so non-compassionate to female survivors of assault that she’s willing to pretend to be this in order to coerce consent from men, which is assault; series thirteen episode four, Time’s Up for the Gang: it’s revealed that she assaulted a member of the Gang; series seven episode one, Frank’s Pretty Woman: she’s rude about sex workers).

I expect this type of behaviour includes trans people too.

I have good faith that, if they did do this plot, the show would take Carmen’s side. this is not least because they’ve taken her side literally every time she’s appeared in an episode before, but also because Sunny likes to subvert expectations and I think taking the side of the transphobes would be too obvious for them. they’d want to go against what all of the headlines are saying. they’re pretty good (in general) at not punching down.

I hope this is what that plotline turns out to be, because there are so many things I’d love to see in it. Mac interacting with Carmen again, post-coming-out? could be so fascinating! so many ways that conversation could go! I also think Mac would be pretty likely to try and take the other side to Dee on this and be trans-supportive as he likes to be the righteous one on matters where he can play the gay card (series thirteen episode six, The Gang Solves the Bathroom Problem: he insists he as a gay man deserves a special bathroom, as well as correcting the Gang on terminology for intersex people), despite the clear hypocrisy here because in previous encounters with Carmen he’s been pretty nasty about her being trans. (however, in The Gang Solves the Bathroom Problem, I really love the detail that he talks about trans people while Dennis and Dee talk about transgender people. such a tiny thing that shows Mac has been spending time in the queer community.) I’d also be very interested to see where Dennis, Charlie, and Frank stand on it. (my guesses are that Dennis would probably go against Dee just because, Frank would be very antiquated about the whole thing leading to Mac having to exasperatedly explain it to him, and Charlie honestly wouldn’t give a shit.) I also just miss my girl Carmen! give Mac some queer friends!

as a side note, I (a trans person) actually really love Carmen’s portrayal throughout the show. Mac Fights Gay Marriage is often misinterpreted as calling Mac gay for being with Carmen, but in reality the Gang say this because it’s so completely not true that this would make him gay (he wasn’t being implied as such yet really), in order to point out how nonsensical it is for Mac to call Carmen’s husband gay. it’s a sort of “well, by your absolute bullshit logic, that would make you gay too, dumbass” thing. the only two minor gripes I have are Carmen being played by a cis actor (I totally forgive them; it wasn’t widely known in 2005 that you should use trans performers for trans roles, plus it’s a cis woman rather than a cis man) and her total lack of reaction to being called a certain slur so often (not that I think the Gang wouldn’t use it, more that this pulls me out of the reality, but McElhenney, Day, and Howerton have said they didn’t know this was a slur, so that explains that). Carmen is consistently defended by the plot and writing, and people like Mac are made to look horrific in the way they treat her. I’ll write a whole thing about it one day, probably. I love her. I just love how nice she is.

anyway. this got so long and rambly, but I hadn’t seen anyone else with this theory so I thought I’d post it!

edits: fixed something I mistyped. also, someone pointed out this could be the bowling pictures we’ve seen, which would make total sense!

#iasip #mac mcdonald #dee reynolds #carmen iasip #trans #iasip season 16 #sunny sweet 16 #iasip theories #always sunny #it’s always sunny in philadelphia #transgender #trans rights #queer #mac iasip #dee iasip

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oh, hello! thank you aoibhe!

my main wip is Canary Logic, a quasi-mystery set in 1940s Wales that’s really about capitalist exploitation of autistic workers, the delight of having queer and neurodivergent friends, and the bullshit of the idea that fitting in should be an autistic’s goal. it’s full of little bits of Irish and Welsh culture and little nods to the history of the time (hi, massive history nerd here). I like to think of it as A Kind of Spark × Goodnight Mister Tom × One For All × The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester. (a lot of comp titles, I know.)

I’m also tentatively planning a Frankenstein reimagining in the vein of what I’ve decided to call “autistic academia”, with 1850s Bavaria as the setting and a heavy emphasis on the way the system turns us against each other. It’s going to be Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children × Babel × The Degenerates.

I don’t have anyone to tag, but… anyone who wants to!

Files/Wip Ask Meme

Thanks @iamscoby ml for the tag ♡

@airlocksandaviaries has been begging me to post something like this so...

I have a huge amount of Wips, but sure I'll maybe post about the main ones (although it'll be a while before any are written as I'll be focusing on BBB)

So... if anyone would like to hehe 👉👈

Blood, Blindfolds and Butterflies — DinLuke, Vampire!Luke AU

Actually, these are all DinLuke cos it's a hyperfixation and I'm just enjoying it atm.

The Naberrie House — modern AU ghost hunters

Pride And Diligence — my take on the Seven Deadly Sins / Heavenly Virtues AUs

None in our hearts but beskar — I love the idea of this one sm, Mando!Luke, Jedi!Din, plus Leia and Han (this is Han x Luke, Luke x Din, Din x Leia, Leia x Han,)

~ ty if u consider <3

Tagging @deviltownresident @athelstan-anglecyning @airlocksandaviaries (I wanna hear about that nitearmour fic) @positivityjediprince hey bro♡

And @mari-wrongway cos you were sweet and I wanted to say hi again cos I think you're cool

#wip #writer #writeblr #author #writers of tumblr #historical fiction #frankenstein #autistic representation

[visorforavisor]

as an Irish (we don’t call it “Gaelic”, ever) speaker and a Sunny fan, I thought it would be fun to do a bit of a post about the Irish-language scene in The Gang’s Still in Ireland, because it’s not a scene I see widely discussed but I adore it.

some background. I am not a native Gaeilgeoir (Irish speaker) — my first language is English — but I started learning it age five and have always had very high grades in it and a huge love for it. I was hugely excited about Charlie Kelly being able to read Irish in the previous episode, and even more so when he turned out to be able to speak it.

Colm Meaney, the actor who plays Shelley Kelly, grew up in Ireland and as such would have learned Irish throughout his time in school. (this has been required by law more or less since Irish independence, and it was already quite common before that. nowadays, you can get exemptions for things like dyslexia but otherwise you have to do it.) this is clear in his ease with the language. (I will do a post about where in Ireland Shelley lives at some point, because there aren’t many areas where Irish is the principal language, but that is for another day!) both the actor and the character have easy and good Irish.

Charlie Day, as an Italian-American, obviously does not actually speak the language and presumably learned the lines as a bunch of gibberish sounds. (nonetheless, some of his pronunciations do suggest he had the words written down non-phonetically too.) his delivery of the lines is god damn amazing. Charlie Kelly’s Irish is not remotely American-accented. if I heard someone speaking Irish like that, I’d assume they sounded Irish when speaking English. he doesn’t even sound neutral in Irish; he does actively have an accent (the word choices are more non-regional, not pointing to any of the three distinct dialects, but this makes sense as the same is true of Shelley’s Irish). his pronunciation is so on point and his accent is seriously just a delight to listen to. that’s serious effort to have been put in by an American in a show that routinely makes fun of Irish-Americans! I cannot stress enough how cool it is to see my national language like this and how good a job he does.

as a side note, Charlie Kelly finding Irish much easier to read than English makes total sense! he clearly has dyslexia, as well as intellectual disabilities and autism, so literacy being tricky is totally fair, but is probably being made worse in English by how much of a god damn ridiculous illogical irregular mess the language is. English has around two hundred irregular verbs, and that’s before we even begin to consider the irregularity of its spelling. Irish has eleven irregular verbs, multiple of which are only irregular in one tense. its spelling is entirely consistent and, once the rules are known, any word (pretty much) can be flawlessly pronounced from reading it or flawlessly spelled from hearing it. (I promise Irish names make sense. just not if you try to use English rules on them. the languages are very different!) Irish is one of the most regular languages out there.

so, I thought I’d go through the actual scene. I’m going to put each line, the direct translation, the subtitle provided, and a comment. hopefully this will be interesting to someone other than me!

·—·

“is mise do pheannchara, a Charlie.” (Shelley)

direct translation: “I’m your pen pal, Charlie.”

subtitle provided: “I’m your pen pal, Charlie.”

okay, so they translate “pen pal” two different ways in this scene. the first, used here, is “peannchara”. this is a compound word, much like all those long words you get in German. it’s a perfectly good choice given there is no one standard choice for translating that concept.

“tá brón orm, ach ní thuigim cad atá ráite agat. is féidir liom gibberish a léamh, ach ní féidir liom í a labhairt.” (Charlie)

direct translation: “I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what you’ve said. I’m able to read gibberish, but I’m not able to speak it.”

subtitle provided: “I’m sorry. I don’t understand what you just said. I read gibberish, but I don’t speak it.”

I would slightly disagree with the subtitles here. the “just” bit isn’t expressed at all. in fact, there is no Irish equivalent to that word, and we often just use the English one in the middle of an Irish sentence because of this. however, I expect that RCG (Rob McElhenney, Charlie Day, Glenn Howerton) wrote the subtitles and then handed them to an Irish translator, in which case the translator did a perfectly good job. a couple of notes about the use of “gibberish” here. I love it. firstly, we totally do drop English words into sentences like that. secondly, I really like the choice to use the feminine form of “it” here (that is, to make “gibberish” a feminine noun). all languages except English are feminine nouns in Irish as a rule, so it’s just a lovely detail calling back to the fact that Charlie thinks of it as the gibberish language. also, Charlie Day really does absolutely nail that voiceless velar fricative (the consonant sound in “ach”, as in Scottish “loch” or any number of German words), a sound even many natively English-speaking Irish people are lazy about. good on him.

“níl aon ciall le sin. sé á labhairt anois!” (Shelley)

direct translation: “there’s no sense to that. it’s being spoken now!”

subtitle provided: “that doesn’t make any sense. you’re speaking it now!”

I adore the phrasing of the first sentence here. thoroughly authentic. there are much more obvious ways to phrase it, but this is absolutely what a native speaker might go with. same goes for the second, actually. Colm Meaney says the second line in a sort of shortened way (same idea as how we might turn “do not” into “don’t”) so I’ve struggled slightly with how to directly translate it. interestingly, Shelley categorises “gibberish” as a masculine noun here, but this isn’t really wrong since it doesn’t have an official grammatical gender due to not being an actual Irish word. just a little odd. also, to fit better to the subtitle of the second sentence, I personally would’ve gone with “tá sé á labhairt agat anois” rather than “tá sé á labhairt anois” (the full version of what Shelley says), as this includes the information of by whom it is being spoken.

“’s é mo dheartháir mo chara pinn.” (Charlie)

direct translation: “it’s my brother that’s my pen pal.”

subtitle provided: “but my pen pal is my brother.”

firstly, to be clear, the nuance of the sentence structure here is not captured in either of the above translations because there simply is not an English equivalent to it. secondly, Charlie uses a contraction here by shortening “is é mo dheartháir mo chara pinn”. super cool. also, there’s that other translation of “pen pal”! this one is “cara pinn”, which uses the Irish genitive case (the word mutates instead of using an equivalent of the English word “of”; this case also exists in other languages including Swedish, German, Latin, and Greek). I like this translation very much too. both work! Charlie Day again delivers this line really nicely, even stressing the word for “brother” (and pronouncing its initial consonant mutation absolutely gorgeously)! I am truly very impressed.

“níl aon fhírinne le sin, a mhic. ’s é do chara pinn… d’athair.” (Shelley)

direct translation: “there’s no truth to that, son. it’s your pen pal who is… your father.”

subtitle given: “no son. your pen pal is your… father.”

so, I really disagree with the first sentence of the subtitles here. it works, but also misses a lot of the beautiful nuance that could have been got. I would have gone with “that’s not true, son” or, more likely, “that’s not right, son”. I also disagree with the placement of the ellipsis in the second sentence, as you see (and my frustrations in translating this sentence structure to English continue, as well). however I like the use of “a mhic” (“son”) here, very much. this is a mutated form of “mac”, meaning “son” (yes, as in all of those Irish surnames; they all just basically say who the person is the son of). it carries both meanings that exist in English: an actual son, but also the use of the word as an affectionate way to refer to any man younger than the (usually male) speaker. this is a really nice choice.

·—·

so, yeah! those are my thoughts. feel free to ask any questions you like. I love this scene so much. as well as the reasons above about how good the translation and delivery is, I also love two other main things about this.

firstly, the level of dignity given to the language. Sunny makes fun of Irish-Americans all the time, but doesn’t really do the same to Irish people from Ireland, which I like (I do also wanna talk about Mac and Charlie as members of the Irish diaspora because it is so so interesting, but that is for another day). Irish as a language is not often given dignity, especially in American or English media, so I really love that it isn’t the butt of the joke here.

secondly, that such a significant scene is delivered through this language. just wonderful. after fourteen and a half series, we finally discover the biological father, and the scene cannot be separated from this beautiful language. it just is so perfect.

RCG, and of course Charlie Day in particular, we Gaeilgeoirí (Irish speakers) thank you! our little language made it to the screens of so many people around the world.

I hope this was interesting haha.

·—·

edits: fixed some things I mistyped.

#always sunny #iasip #sunny #it’s always sunny in philadelphia #irish #gaeilge #irish language #charlie kelly #charlie day #colm meaney #rob mcelhenney #glenn howerton #megan ganz #rcg #ireland #irish diaspora

[visorforavisor]

i see a lot of posts about how devastating it would be if ghosts ended with all of the ghosts moving on, and i agree, but i’d just like it noted that there is a sadder option.

all of them move on, except robin.

#bbc ghosts #ghosts #ghosts bbc #six idiots #martha howe-douglas #ben willbond #jim howick #mat baynton #simon farnaby #larry rickard #lolly adefope #katy wix #kiell smith-bynoe #charlotte ritchie

[visorforavisor]

shatter your nose against a table until the bone shards lobotomize you you slur-dropping waste of a life

content note: violent language in ask

i said benoit blanc is queer. the writer of the benoit blanc stories said benoit blanc is queer. this word is sometimes a slur, and i have received it as such before. it cannot be used in all situations. but it is sometimes a happy word, and its sad, hurtful history and present do not change that it can be used in a happy way.

it makes me sad that you find such anger in my queer joy. i’m sorry that you do. but i’m not sorry for using the word to describe benoit blanc.

i’m also not sorry for saying that we lost queer people to aids. we did. not everybody lost then was a gay man, and i wanted an identity-neutral word to cover the variety of non-normative experiences of the community back then, not all of which can be neatly defined by modern terms.

good day to you.

#benoit blanc #knives out #glass onion #rian johnson #queer #gay #queer is beautiful #queer joy

[visorforavisor]

considering a certain show he was working on at that point and its stance on gayness, he can go away very far please.

It’s taken me a few weeks to remember who said it and where, but

“I think when the day comes that you have a big detective show where the first half hour was this man at work and he’s a maverick and all the usual things and then we went home and his boyfriend says, ‘Are you alright?’ it was just a thing, then something would have genuinely changed.”

- Mark Gatiss for Gay Magazine, February 2012 (x)

#knives out #glass onion #benoit blanc #knives out glass onion #bbc sherlock #bbc sherlock can fuck off #bbc sherlock is a piece of shit #bbc sherlock is ableist #bbc sherlock queerbaited #mark gatiss

[visorforavisor]

(author of the original post here.)

thanks for this [/gen]!

wasn’t trying to say blanc is from that generation (because, as you say, a bit too young), but more that his visibility is a sign of healing from the damage of a lack of visibility in general, which was caused in no small part by a small number of people who could be visible.

i made a bit of an unclear hames of what i was saying, though, and it could easily be read as me saying blanc is in that generation. apologies for that.

yes, you’re right. blanc would have seen all the shit from the aids crisis, but probably not experienced much of it himself. (as a side point, i love his ability to be happy when that was the queer adulthood he probably saw when growing up.)

i really appreciate someone doing the maths and giving good examples of people who were young adults during this generation; i was unsure of details around when the crisis truly started and so on. people like elton john are absolutely those we should be talking about in these discussions. i was unclear in my original post, but yes, blanc is not part of that decimated generation, he is a little younger than it. thank you so much for your really good analysis and explanation of the impact on today’s world of the events of the aids crisis. reblogging for the sake of other people seeing this too because it is a really brilliant point i initially left out for the sake of, i don’t know, brevity or something (and perhaps should not have left out).

thanks again!

i would like a moment to briefly note how important it is that benoit blanc is an older queer character. an older, happy queer character.

we are missing a good chunk of an entire generation of queer people due to the aids crisis. blanc living his cute happy little life, probably in his fifties, with his lovely partner, is such a beacon of hope. for me, at least.

#benoit blanc #gay #knives out #knives out glass onion #queer #daniel craig #glass onion #hugh grant #aids crisis #queer history #gay history

[visorforavisor]

people in my “bbc sherlock did us dirty” post: i knoooow right! season 4 was soo bad, it used to be really good, they should’ve just stopped earlier. what a waste of a good cast!

me, thinking about how all the major characters were white dudes while the only black female character was an asshole and an antagonist that brought the protagonist to ruin but wasn’t redeemed and just disappeared from the show while the other white guy asshole-antagonist had a redemption arc, how a minor chinese character was introduced just because the episode talked about mafia and then was killed off, how its “autistic representation” looked like sheldon from tbbt, how they made sherlock holmes into the umpteenth rude manipulative mysterious detective when they promised something new, how they took john watson, stripped him of all his morals of kindness, chivalry and loyalty and turned him into an aggressive, violent, cheating guy and erased his disability, irene adler (no need to add anything else you already got my point), how they constantly treated the idea of a relationship between the two protagonists as a gag throughout the show while still making sure to keep the romantic tension up enough not to lose hopeful fans and made fun of the fandom when it suggested asexuality as a possible identity for the protagonist even tho it was more compliant with the acd canon character than whatever shit they were trying to pull in the show, how the scriptwriters were too busy trying to make clever references from the books that didn’t work in a modern setting instead of, you know, actually writing a fucking coherent and good plot: no.

#just all this #autistic #actuallyautistic #actually autistic #autistic representation #sherlock holmes is autistic #autistic sherlock holmes #sherlock holmes