#} is the most gay of all the brackets

[thepals]

:D

[kalicocoa]

I kind of wish so many people didn’t depict queerness through the lens of shipping. I think we’d fall less for the “queerbait” trap if we did this less.

[hotvintagepoll]

LAST POLL OF ROUND 6

Propaganda

Ingrid Bergman (Gaslight, Casablanca, Notorious)—A lot of the time hotness in a movie is just about words and framing. "You're the most beautiful person here" [vaseline lens] well I sure hope so because that's who you cast. But when, in Casablanca, they call Ingrid Bergman the most beautiful woman in the world... they were not fucking lying. And such a dynamite actor too!! I'd only seen Casablanca up until last year, and there she's confined to love interest. But in Gaslight she was maybe one of the most incredible actors I've ever seen!!!! Goddddd shes so fucking hot and cool.

Lauren Bacall (To Have and Have Not, The Big Sleep, Key Largo)—"Just put your lips together...and blow" excuse me ma'am i'm briefly going to turn into a kettle. She's the quintessential Femme Fatale who may betray me in the end but I'd let her it'd be worth it

This is round 6 of the tournament. All other polls in this bracket can be found here. Please reblog with further support of your beloved hot sexy vintage woman.

[additional propaganda submitted under the cut.]

Ingrid Bergman:

God, she's fantastic. She's both beautiful and a compelling actor who's more than capable of putting the whole movie on her shoulders if necessary. It's worth noting that while her beauty is conventional, she was seen as refreshingly "natural" with more eyebrows and less makeup than many other leading ladies of the time. She's well known for her role in Casablanca, but in Notorious, Spellbound, (both available on archive.org ) and Gaslight (1944) she shows how immensely capable she is.

I mean...she's Ingrid Bergman. I feel like that should be enough, you know? She's physically beautiful (her eyes!) but watching her is like a transcendent experience. Her voice, her expressions... beautiful woman, beautiful actor.

I'm a gay man but even I understand her appeal. I'll watch any movie she shows up in. Gorgeous woman.

Just try and watch her movies without sighing wistfully, then get back to me!

Choosing 1-3 movies where Bergman was at her hottest was agony because, of course, she was always at her hottest. Not just because she was beautiful but because she was absolutely willing to go up against the bs women in Hollywood were constantly dealing with. When exiled from Hollywood for having an affair with Roberto Rossellini, not only did she refuse to apologize at any point, but she went on to say that Hollywood's films had grown stagnant and boring to her. Though she said she appreciated her time working there, she wanted to try new, different techniques (hence starring in Italian neorealist films, working on stage, and acting under directors like Ingmar Bergman). She was not afraid to chase after her artistic ideals and go outside the box regardless of what society had to say about it. From her first movie to her last she killed it. There's so much more to say about Bergman's career and life, but I've already written five million words so I'll stop at that.

One of the most incredible actors I've ever seen on film. Her facial expressions are so intricate and poignant that I cannot look away. I'm either ace or straight, but damn she made me question that.

SEVEN TIME OSCAR NOMINEE QUEEN. Girl also PULLED, having affairs with famously hot men Gary Cooper and Gregory Peck IN ADDITION to her three marriages...sexy

She has a very natural beauty to her, and she's from Sweden!

She left Hollywood and only became more beautiful. You could drown in her eyes. She can look innocent AND like she's seen it all. She is effortlessly elegant. She's played Joan of Arc (automatically hot) AND was in the movie that coined gaslight as a term. And where would we be without that!

She was known for being a breath of fresh air on the movie scene at the time with her windswept hair, dreamy smile and soulful eyes. I have loved her in every movie I have seen her in - she was just magnetic!

Where do I even start. There's a neighborly quality to this beautiful, talented actress that makes her hotness one of a kind and her looks impossible to forget

With a career spanning five decades, Bergman is often regarded as one of the most influential screen figures in cinematic history. Known for her naturally luminous beauty, Bergman spoke five languages – Swedish, English, German, Italian and French – and acted in each.

She's hot, don't get me wrong, but I've always found her very approachable, like she could easily be a member of my friend group

Where do I even begin with Ingrid Bergman? I fell in love with her with her astounding performance in the 1956 version of Anastasia -- the best Anastasia movie in large part due to her wonderful and touching performance. She's got this amazing, fascinating intensity to her in whatever role she's in. She commits 100%, and she's got this light in whatever she's in that's stunning. She's utterly convincing no matter what she plays, from an amnesiac possible lost princess, from a nun, from a woman taking her revenge on the town that wronged her, to light romantic comedy. She's never missed in any role I've seen her in! Also she became quite the MILF.

Lauren Bacall:

"She is soooo neat. And hot. And everything. That one scene in To Have and Have Not where she says "you know how to whistle don't you? You just put your lips together and blow" altered my brain chemistry during media archaeology class and here we are."

"The VOICE, the SLINK, the EYES. Woof."

"Lauren Bacall was a major lesbian awakening for me. Every picture of her makes it look like she’s about to destroy you physically and emotionally (why is that so hot, I may need help). She had incredible long running chemistry with her husband, Humphrey Bogart, but was an absolute star in her own right. I’ll never be over my crush on her."

"She's got that confident, no-nonsense air about her. She's a boss babe who knows what she wants and gets it DONE. Staunch liberal Democrat her whole life. Campaigned for RFK. From Wikipedia: "In a 2005 interview with Larry King, Bacall described herself as "anti-Republican... A liberal. The L-word". She added that "being a liberal is the best thing on Earth you can be. You are welcoming to everyone when you're a liberal. You do not have a small mind."" Beautiful hair. Beautiful eyes. Beautiful lips. She's just beauty. LISTEN TO HER VOICE. TELL ME THAT'S NOT THE STUFF THAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF."

[llyfrenfys]

I'd like to preface this with that this is a screenshot of a post I saw a few days ago in the #welsh tag and that the OP has since deleted this post, but the sentiment is something I'd like to address since I see a lot of parallels with this kind of thinking in other contexts, such as in LGBTQIA+ rights conversations.

So, the most obvious elephant in the room is the idea that Welsh is super widely spoken in Wales now and that it isn't in as much danger as other Celtic languages. This idea is wishful thinking at best and erases the very real danger that Welsh is in and that it could be lost just as easily as Irish or Scottish Gaelic. Cornish (which is related to Welsh) actually did die out and has had to be revived. To make a metaphor out of this, we classify languages on a scale of non-threatened to endangered in a similar way to how we classify species.

Here are the statuses of Welsh and Irish as of 2010 (above) and the statuses of Lions and Tigers (below).

On paper tigers are more 'in danger' than lions. But that does not mean that lions are suddenly not in danger at all. The little bracket above CR, EN and VU labels all of these classifications as threatened. It isn't (and definitely shouldn't) be a competition of 'who is most in danger' because you do not want the thing you care about (whether it be a species or a language) to be in danger.

To come back to the original screenshot "they* [Welsh speakers] have always had the means and the ways because the English didn't beat or slaughter them for speaking it"- on the most basic of levels, this is just incorrect. The Welsh Not was a wooden token hung around schoolchildren's necks if they spoke Welsh in school. If someone else spoke Welsh the Not would be hung around their neck. At the end of the school day, whoever was wearing the Not would be beaten and caned by their teachers. I needn't go into much detail but there have been concerted efforts to beat Welsh out of schoolchildren. With the lions vs tigers metaphor, making the claim Welsh speakers have never been beaten for speaking Welsh because they always had the means and ways, while Irish speakers were beaten and never had the means or ways is like claiming poachers have never shot lions, only tigers. Bottom line is, lions and tigers are both victim to poaching and both species have suffered as a result. Similarly, Welsh and Irish have both suffered language loss and both need conservation efforts in order to survive.

(*sidenote- the consistent use of 'them' and 'they' in the original post is definitely indicative of a 'us vs them' sentiment which is a deeply unhelpful attitude to have when it comes to endangered languages and the Celtic languages in particular)

I see parallels with LGBTQIA+ rights in this situation. When equal marriage came in for gay and lesbian couples in the UK in 2014, many allies began to act like gay rights had now been achieved and that gay issues had been done, they're solved. Except, they really weren't (and aren't). Progress has been made in Wales and undeniably Welsh is doing the best out of the living Celtic languages. But that doesn't mean Welsh has been saved or that full equality for Welsh speakers has been achieved. It very much hasn't. The sentiment of the post in the screenshot is not conducive to helping Irish or Scottish Gaelic. Putting down Welsh speakers and erasing Welsh-language history will not save Irish or Scottish Gaelic. Pretending Welsh has had it easy in some kind of lap of luxury is a deeply harmful and bogus claim.

I'll address the tags under the cut as this post is getting long.

To address the tags, personal feelings ≠ an accurate reading of a situation. Nor is it praxis, for that matter. Why is pride in Welsh different/less good than pride in Irish? Is it the assumed proximity to England? If so, that's a terrible claim to make. Not only that, but Scotland is also next to England- does that make pride in Scottish Gaelic the same as pride in Welsh according to this metric? It's a ludicrous thing to say and deeply insensitive to the needs of Scottish Gaelic and Welsh speakers, who cannot help any current or former proximity to England.

Additionally, proximity to England ≠ worse. I know it's a popular internet joke to hate on England because of English attempts to eradicate the Celtic languages, but when the joke becomes praxis, it does not help. England ≠ a place devoid of Celtic languages either. Many English counties near the Welsh border actually have communities of Welsh speakers, such as Oswestry (Croesoswallt) in Shropshire. Cornwall is also home to many speakers of revived Cornish. It does a disservice to Celtic speakers in England to insinuate that proximity to England taints or corrupts them somehow. This is how ethnonationalism starts and we ain't about that.

And "#it feels a little.... blehhhhh you were seen as sophisticated and english enough and you assimilated however the Irish and the Scots? #brutish animals that need to be culled". So, this is arguably one of the worst things to say about a Celtic language- or any threatened language in general. First of all, the 'you were seen as' - 'you' is very telling. The switch from 'them', 'they' to 'you' indicates that this sentiment is aimed at Welsh speakers directly. This was likely a subconscious thing that OP wasn't thinking about when they wrote this. But it does indicate unhealthy feelings of jealousy and bitterness unfairly directed at Welsh speakers, who are also struggling. This righteous anger at the decline of Irish and Scottish Gaelic would be better directed at efforts to help promote those languages- some useful things to get involved with are LearnGaelic, similar to DysguCymraeg but for Scottish Gaelic or supporting channels such as Irish channel TG4 by watching their programmes.

The idea that Welsh speakers were or are 'sophisticated and english enough' is insulting and carries with it a lot of baggage of how any of these assumptions came about. Welsh speakers were definitely not seen as sophisticated. Where Welsh was 'tolerated', it was treated as a curiosity, a relic of a bygone age. Classic museification which all Celtic languages and cultures suffer from as well. Welsh was not tolerated in any legal sense since 1535- with English becoming the only valid administrative language and the language of Welsh courts after England annexed Wales into its Kingdom. Monolingual Welsh speakers suddenly had no access to any legal representation, unless they learned English. This is no voluntary assimilation- it is an act of survival for many speakers of minoritised languages to 'assimilate' into the dominant culture, or else risk losing access to legal security and other kinds of infrastructure. You need only ask any non-native English speaker living in an Anglophone country what that process is like. Welsh people did not see English incursion as an opportunity to become 'sophisticated and english enough', they had to assimilate in order to survive.

The "Irish and the Scots? #brutish animals that need to be culled" is also painfully misrepresenting a very complex social and political process that unfolded over the span of hundreds of years. The phrasing itself of 'brutish animals that need to be culled' speaks to righteous anger at the damage done to these languages and cultures, but it reinforces negative stereotypes about the Irish and Scots themselves. It also is more complicated than a simple English hatred of anything non-Anglo, since the English conception of particularly the Irish changed a lot over the centuries. It was (and still is) rarely consistent with itself. See: the enemy is both strong and weak. The very earliest Celticists were by and large, Anglos or French.

Ernest Renan (1823-1892) for example, was an early French Celticist who published La Poésie des races celtiques (Poetry of the Celtic Races- English translation) in which he says:

"... we must search for the explanation of the chief features of the Celtic character. It has all the failings, and all the good qualities, of the solitary man; at once proud and timid, strong in feeling and feeble in action, at home free and unreserved, to the outside world awkward and embarrassed. It distrusts the foreigner, because it sees in him a being more refined than itself, who abuses its simplicity. Indifferent to the admiration of others, it asks only one thing, that it should be left to itself. It is before all else a domestic race, fitted for family life and fireside joys. In no other race has the bond of blood been stronger, or has it created more duties, or attached man to his fellow with so much breadth and depth"

Yeah. This guy (unsurprisingly) was a white supremacist. Note that this sentiment is being applied to all people considered Celtic by Renan- Irish, Welsh, Breton, Scottish, Cornish, Manx etc. None unscathed by the celtophobia of the day. In this period, Celticity was romanticised (yet disparaged at the same time). It is less 'brutish animals' and more 'archaic, time-frozen peoples' in this period. Of course, 'brutish animals' attitudes towards Celticity did still exist, but it is disingenuous to act as if it was this attitude alone which drove English celtophobia. Like many things, it is always more complicated and never clear cut as it might seem.

I'll bring this to a close shortly, but returning to OP's suggestion that the Welsh assimilated and the Scots and Irish did not, is also incorrect in that some Scots did have to assimilate to survive as well. The Statutes of Iona (1609) required Scottish Gaelic speaking Highland chiefs to send their sons away to be educated in Scots and/or English in Protestant schools. Many did as the statutes required, which led to further language loss in the Highlands of Scottish Gaelic. These are acts of survival- and not ones always taken willingly.

This has been a long post but it's one which I felt I wanted to address. There's no need for infighting between speakers of Celtic languages over who has it worse. There isn't any answer to that question, nor is it a good use of time or energy. All in all, the Celtic languages have suffered greatly over the years and its only just now that some of them are turning a corner. If you care about these languages, put your energy into something good. Only through active work will these languages be saved for generations to come.

[bengiyo]

Knock Knock, Boys! is an Ideal First BL for New Viewers

I often talk on @the-conversation-pod about how I react to BL from the lens of a queer media critic actively trying to recruit queer media viewers to BL. I want those viewers to join us in BL, and so I value shows that have strong character writing and satisfying resolutions for their drama. New viewers don’t always understand or recognize romance or BL tropes right away, and sometimes things go over their heads. In that vein, Knock Knock, Boys! may be one of the most useful shows I’ve encountered in the last year for this exact purpose. 

Rating: 9, Highly Recommended

Runtime: 12 50+ minute episodes

Country: Thailand

Network: WeTV

Availability: WeTV, GagaOOlala

Knock Knock, Boys! places four young men at a transitional point in their lives. Split evenly between first-year college students and working adults, each character is running from something. Peak is running from a marriage to a woman, Thanwa is running from a bad relationship with his ex-boyfriend, Latte is running towards graduation, and Almond is running away from his sheltered existence. Over the course of the show, these two pair off based on their shared age brackets in one of the most sex-positive shows I’ve seen this year, with a common theme about how honesty and commitment to each other gives people the space they need to grow. More than anything, this show values patience and kindness in relationships in a way that I cannot overstate.

As the ice starts to break, they learn that Thanwa and Latte have had active sex lives (Thanwa exclusively with men, and Latte with all sorts of people) and establish a rhythm within their home. Thanwa makes most of their meals, and Almond has to wake Latte up every day because he ignores alarms. The original conceit that connects our quartet beyond their shared housing incident comes from Almond promising to pay the rent for a year for anyone who helps him lose his virginity to his high school crush, Jumper. Hijinks ensue as the boys try to befriend Jumper, and angle for him and Almond to grow closer. As with any story like this, Latte ends up developing feelings for Almond, while Peak and Thanwa grow closer. 

More spoilers ahead, I want to talk about each character, and what I liked so much about each. These boys became one of my favorite friend groups we’ve had in a while. I am a huge fan of age gaps in queer friendships, and this show has much of it.

Thanwa: Played by the talented Seng Wichai, Thanwa is a great answer to the question of “Where do the quiet gays go?” He clearly knows his way around cruising spots, or knows how to use the apps, and yet everything we know about his shows that he’s geared towards domestic life and his hobbies. He dresses like a normie all the time, he loves cooking, and he loves eating. He’s clearly a thoughtful and reliable friend, and it’s that commitment and reliability that eventually gets him a job he actually wants to do. More than anything, he gave far more grace to a closeted man he cared about than I ever expected AND HE WON. Seng remains one of my favorite BL performers because of his ability to play ugly and goofy. He’s so beautiful because he is capable of playing weirdos well. 

Peak: Played by BL veteran Best Vittawin, Peak is running from compulsory heteronormativity. He’s expected to marry the daughter of a family close to theirs, and he is letting this all happen to keep his stern father happy. Peak has been running away from himself ever since his mom died. He saw how much that hurt his dad, and he’s struggled to be a problem-free son for a long time as a result. The weight of expectation on him presses down on Peak so hard that he can’t even focus half the time, and literally zones out as he tries to cope. Best gives a wonderful performance as Peak, especially in the final episodes, as he finally unburdens himself and blossoms as a result. This is my favorite Best character of all time, and Peak is one of my favorite portrayals of what it means to love someone enough for them to leave the closet on their own terms. 

Almond: Played by Nokia Chinnawat, who appeared in Thank God It’s Friday (2019), Almond is such a fun view into what modern gay boys could be like. He’s young and horny, and he wants to get laid! He’s not embarrassed about this, but he is shy. I loved the way the show used his enthusiasm as a way to further its PSA agenda in such a fun way. Almond is also one of the few rich kids we’ve had in these dramas that isn’t inherently insufferable. I like how his wealth mostly comes up as a problem solving tool, and he doesn’t feel too much like a snob after the first few interactions. I also loved his arc of getting over his unrequited crush on Jumper into recognizing his feelings for Latte. Nokia himself shows a real knack for physical comedy and expressiveness that makes me genuinely want to follow his career beyond this show. 

Latte: Played by Jaonine Jiraphat, Latte fills the role of our sexually experienced queer in the group. Confidently pansexual, Latte was so much fun for me because he and Thanwa had no shame about the sex and relationships they’ve had before. I loved how consistently Latte was shown to be emotionally present and sincere in all of his relationships. It could have been so easy to present him as promiscuous or slutty, and instead they present him as beloved. Every one of his former lovers we encountered seemed happy to see him again, and also resolved about the time they’d spent together. More than anything, I deeply appreciated how patient he was with Almond without suddenly becoming a sexless being because his boyfriend was shy or nervous. Jaonine was incredibly charming in this role, and I hope casting directors take notice. 

The Supporting Cast: The supporting characters were perfectly calibrated for their roles in this show. Jumper (Pak Varayu) made total sense as Almond’s crush, and has a great arc of Almond falling out of love with him, and becoming briefly enemies with Almond before reconciling. Lookpeach (Guitar Tunthita) plays the role of the modern faghag in a way that feels like Thai BL doing corrective work on the role of fandom in BL, and I have deep love for this character. Jane (Naya Gorrawiya) is the friend that everyone deserves; I loved the reveal about how personal her understanding and support for Peak has been this whole time. This show even calibrated it’s villain well in Max (Tuss Thotsawat), who showed that there are far worse things than cheating in broken relationships. 

Final Thoughts: I am so excited to show this show to my friend Emily, who’s been watching BL with me since early covid lockdowns. While this show has a few small stumbles that keep it from getting a 10, I don’t want to downplay how refreshing it was to watch a show that had a clear vision of what it wanted to be, and executed it the whole time. I commented during episode 1 that it felt more like a romcom than a BL, and the show said that through Lookpeach in its final episode! It built believable queer friendships in front of us, and understood the emotional core of most of its angst and drama all the way through. This show avoided veering too far into melodrama, and remembered that it was a romantic comedy the entire time. It also managed to be consistently sex-positive without feeling exploitative of its talent, or by letting the audience down on the sex front (I will be thinking about Almond and Latte’s first time and the morning after for a long time). This show also has parents apologizing for the knots they tied their children into. I don’t know a better Thai show airing during this season. This show is a real delight, and one I urge you all to show your friends who might be looking for a gay romcom. 

[steddieas-shegoes]

Part 2 to this post

When gay marriage became legal, everyone expected Steve and Eddie to run to the courthouse and get it done.

They’d waited long enough.

But they were watching the news on a hospital room television instead of their home, keeping Wayne company while he received his last chemo treatment.

It had been a really rough six months, Eddie taking the brunt of caring for Wayne so Steve could work and pay the bills for all of them. But they wanted to.

Wayne had done so much for both of them, he deserved to be taken care of now.

The doctors had said he was getting to an age where the chemo would most likely only extend his life by a few years at most, that the cancer growing in his body would only be stopped temporarily by this drug that made him weaker than any cancer could.

At first, he didn’t want it. He told them both it wasn’t worth putting his body through it at his age, but Eddie convinced him through tears that he wasn’t ready to let him go yet.

And Wayne always did have a soft spot for Eddie’s tears.

Every other Friday, Wayne was brought to the hospital by Eddie, sometimes accompanied by Steve if his day off lined up right, hooked up to an IV of fluids and a harsh chemo mix, and kept for observation for 8 hours to ensure it didn’t cause any major issues on his frailer than he’d like to admit body.

The last treatment hadn’t gone well. Wayne ended up having low oxygen levels and high blood pressure, so they kept him overnight. Overnight turned into 3 nights, four days, which is sort of like a cruise to the Bahamas if you take out the fact they were in a hospital in Indiana.

Steve was holding Eddie’s hand as they all watched the tv, their silver wedding bands from a decade ago resting on their ring fingers.

It didn’t have to be legal to mean something to them.

Wayne had been much livelier over the last 24 hours, his blood pressure back at a normal for him level, though his oxygen level still fluctuated between too low and normal.

“Would ya look at that? They did it.”

Steve looked over at where he was sitting up in bed, smiling at the tv.

“They did.”

Eddie was wiping a tear from his cheek.

“Took them long enough.”

Everyone in the room huffed out an unamused laugh.

It did take way too long.

“Steve.”

Steve looked back over to Wayne and noticed he was looking tired again, like the news was the only reason he’d been forcing himself to be awake.

“You remember that bet?”

They’d made a lot of bets over the years, usually during March Madness. Wayne purposely bet against Steve because it was an easy win, even though they liked the same teams and often had similar brackets.

So no, he didn’t really remember whatever bet he was talking about now.

“Oh come on. I’m the old one here. You’re supposed to have great memory.”

“I’ve had like, eight concussions. My memory is like a goldfish.”

Eddie snorted next to him and nodded in agreement. Just this morning Eddie had to remind him that it was trash day despite it being the same day every week for the last 17 years they’d lived in their house.

“You owe me $5.”

“I’d remember that.”

“Eddie asked for you.”

Steve and Eddie looked at each other with concern. Was Wayne having a stroke? Was he slowly losing lucidity? He’d never shown any signs of memory problems, but sometimes being in the hospital had a lot of negative effects.

“When Eddie woke up in ‘86. I told you he’d ask for ya first and he did. Never collected on the bet because you two were too much.”

Steve suddenly remembered everything from that day, tears pooling in his eyes at how all of this started.

If he hadn’t stayed to hold Eddie’s hand then, would he be holding it now? Would they be husbands in every way but legally?

Steve looked at Eddie with a smile.

Then he turned to Wayne and smirked.

“Bet you $5 I propose right now.”

Wayne smirked back at him.

“Bet you won’t.”

Steve gave him the look that said ‘just watch me’ and stood up, dropping to one knee slowly.

“Eddie Munson. We already wear rings. We’ve lived together as husbands for so long, I can’t even believe we aren’t actually married. But I want to be. I want to fill out the stupid paperwork at the courthouse and maybe plan a little wedding with our kids and family. I want to have a honeymoon and be young and in love even though we aren’t young anymore. I want to be yours in every way starting right now. How does that sound?”

Eddie was crying. He was always more emotional than Steve, he just hid it better. Usually.

“You wanna be mine?”

“I’m already yours. I just want us to have everything.”

“Then I wanna be yours.”

“Good.”

Eddie leaned forward and kissed him, more passionately than they usually ever did in public or around Wayne. It was a special occasion, though, what choice did they really have?

After a minute, Steve pulled away and looked over to Wayne.

“Sorry about your $5.”

“I’m not.”

Wayne had never been more pleased to not be able to collect on a bet.

[badass-queer-couples-battle]

Gay wrongs tournament, round 2.5 of the major bracket

Propaganda:

For Eddie Brock and Venom:

I'm pretty sure its Canon in the comics and like, Canon adjacent in the 2nd movie??? Idk I just watched the first one sooo, anyways, this isn't propaganda i just couldn't remember if you said they needed to be Canon so I put what I rembered about that here, idk I'm proboboly just gonna send the propaganda in the ask box at a later date 

They eat people:) venom is an alien symbiote and Eddie is the host and they have melded together into one being. They care for and protect each other and are so intimately intwined they are only ever separated by force. Also they’re both absolute disasters and they periodically bite and eat the heads off their enemies. 

They eat people <3 

For Will and Hannibal:

Ive previously only heard the term "murder husbands" refer to hannigram so it feels flitting. The whole series culminated with a murder they did together bathing in blood. 

The show and ship that coined murder husbands. It’s in the text in s3 from a journalist side character. They do Many murders either together or as a message to each other. Usually this involves turning the dead body into an art piece. The show ends with them killing a guy together in a slo mo scene backed by porno music.

They're both batshit and manipulative.

ALRIGHT so they're not canonically together but it is HEAVILY implied and they have some sort of fucked up psychosexual obsession with each other. in the later parts of the show they start committing murder and cannibalism together and they're soooo unhinged but it's awesome

kill people for each other. maim each other. kill people together. most batshit insane metaphors. send each other to jail. ruin everyone’s lives. someone can probably say this better than me but these gay people are insane

Literally THE murder husbands. They kill for each other. They've tried to kill each other. They're canon in all but name, like the homoeroticism between these two is the driving force of the show.

one time hannibal folded a guy into an origami human heart

They are in love and they kill and eat people. They are called Murder Husbands in canon.

The original murder husbands (literally, that's not just their ship name, they get called that in canon)

The show begins with Will working for the FBI and trying to catch Hannibal, but because Hannibal is so intrigued by the way Will is able to see the world and the motives behind the killings so easily, it becomes a game of Hannibal isolating Will even more from the people around and seducing him to try and kill. By the time Will starts embracing the side of him that Hannibal sees, he starts oulling back and trying to distance himself so that when the time comes for Will to fully embrace himself and Hannibal, no one really suspects what they have planned. 

hannibal literally does murder as courtship and it works bc will is also a fucked up little guy

I'm actually quite offended they aren't included by default (joke). They are THE murder husbands!!!!!! (mod note: they should have been, but I wanted to see how many submissions they'd get. They got 19, making them a little more than 6% of total submission count).

do i have to say it. they literally get called murder husbands IN THE SHOW

There are 3201 works for Hannibal on ao3 tagged Murder Husbands. They are the ogs, they are the pioneers we owe it all to them.

THEE murder couple. You know it. I know it. They commit crimes at each other as courting and then commit crimes together and then fall off a cliff to wash up somewhere and live on to serve cunt. Get referred to as 'murder husbands' in canon. What more do you need

Hannigram were literally called Murder Husbands in canon, they are the og, they are THE blueprint. They were gay as hell and comitted so much murder so many crimes. THEY RAN OFF TO EUROPE TOGETHER.

[sexiestpodcastcharacter]

Sexiest Podcast Character — Night Vale Bracket — Round Ε

Propaganda

Cecil Gershwin Palmer:

Purple eye man <3

Hes like, THE eye narrator guy for podcasts imo.

THE tumblr sexyman

Not too short or tall, not fat or too thin. With hair, a nose and eyes.

Look, hes hot and sexy because he's an ambiguous gendered male pronoun character who's openly gay imminently. His hotness comes from his lack of description and his silly, whimsical nature. As a "The idea of having sex with my physical body is kinda yuck" ace, I would have sex with him irl if given the chance. He is the ONLY exception for my own minds rule. While that might not be real propaganda or whatever it should have weigh of how hot he is.

Dr. Carlos "the Scientist" Dave Robles

I would have said Cecil Palmer but I love Cecil Palmer too much to submit anyone other than his husband, who he loved from the moment he saw him

"That new scientist, we now know he’s named Carlos, called a town meeting. He has a square jaw, and teeth like a military cemetery. His hair is perfect, and we all hate and despair and love that perfect hair in equal measure. Old Woman Josie brought corn muffins, which were decent but lacked salt. She said the angels had taken her salt for a Godly Mission and she hadn’t yet gotten around to buying more. Carlos told us that we are, by far, the most scientifically interesting community in the US, and he had come to study just what is going on around here. He grinned, and everything about him was perfect, and I fell in love instantly."

huntokar never stood a chance

[hubrisbracket]

Hubris Bracket Side A Poll 3: Trixie Lulamoon (My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic) vs Erin Ruunaser (Aurora Comic)

Propaganda below (may contain spoilers)

Trixie Lulamoon

If any mlp character deserves to be in the hubris bracket it should be Trixie. Also she literally didn't even do anything wrong except entertain people (which is literally her job) and was punished just because the mane six couldn't take a fking joke. And, I might be wrong about this- but Trixie was originally only supposed to appear for like one episode but the fans loved her so much they brought her back and she became one of the biggest characters on the show. literal legend. Stream Magic Bitch by Vylet Pony and Magic by The Living Tombstone btw "sometimes you gotta let your ego slip for your own mental health" -Vylet Pony

egotistical magician my beloved... petty stage magician. she has a long standing rivalry with the princess of friendship (twilight sparkle ofc) who is incredibly powerful with actual magic. she tried to run twilight out of town once. it didn't go well. oh also she's besties (gay) with twilight's protege which annoys her to no end. also also she's sooooo trans the entire fandom agrees

Erin Ruunaser

This man walked directly into a primordial magic storm with an almost 100% death rate because he wanted to look at what's in the middle; he's the current Elemental Magus, and it has definitely gone to his head; he's outsmarted (or tried to outsmart) an eldritch evil that killed the oldest and most powerful gods of his world twice, which possessed him because of his aforementioned storm-walk; and his creator has called him Sicktats McHubris at least once. Also, he acts incredibly smug all the time.

He’s kinda like the avatar, so he thought that it would be a good idea to walk into a magical storm that no person had ever seen the center of. He ended up getting possessed by an ancient god-killing evil and now has to get rid of him. The fandom has nicknamed him Sicktats McHubris, on account of his very cool magical tattoos.

[relatableblorbopoll]

Round 1 of preliminaries, group 11

The first two places get a place on the bracket

Little reminder: there will be 2 more rounds of preliminaries, the losing blorbos of this poll still have 2 chances of getting in the official bracket

Propaganda under the cut

Mae Borowski (Night in the Woods)

"Spoilers! She's a college dropout in her early twenties, who suffers from untreated mental illness and dissociation and had a complete breakdown at college, causing her to come home. Now she's living with her parents again, but life in her dingy little hometown went on without her. Her friends are adults now - in a relationship and planning on moving to the big city, or having to waste away in a dead end job instead of following their dreams. Mae is the only one without a new adult role in life. She's not great with people either - she's blunt and often doesn't think things through, and in many ways just doesn't get the world of adults. She's also prone to petty crimes and general anarchy. She's kind of lost and purposeless, and trying to find meaning in life by desperately clinging to the past. Her decision to drop out of college probably saved her life, but it's also put her family in a tough financial situation and is viewed by most people as her just thoughtlessly doing whatever she wants. She's also kind of shamed a lot about not having a job or other productive role in life, despite the fact that her untreated mental issues are actually disabling for her. She also plays the bass real bad. Anyway, i love Mae a lot. Playing this game as a college dropout in my early twenties, sitting in my childhood bedroom in my mom's attic, back in my dingy little hometown, desperately missing my old friends who have all moved on to better, resposible things in life... yeah, it felt like the game was pointing dead at me. Given tumblr's general demographic, i figure i must not be completely alone in this"

Shigeo Kageyama / Mob (Mob Psycho 100)

"autistic. likes milk. if we reach a certain level of emotion we turn into a psychic bomb. cool brothers :)"

Barry the Quokka (The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog)

"Their only skill is working the microwave, they're non-binary, when seeing a trash bin their first instinct is to look through it, they're always the most normal person in the room, they can beatbox, and they were only hired due to being the only one who applied."

Kaveh (Genshin Impact)

"In a fantasy world, be a guy with a regular profession losing his goddamn mind. Poor guy has a guilt complex, (so true) and a lot of deep embarrassment regarding his life.(ehe) He just wants to do what he's passionate about but capitalism is evil and also he keeps getting scammed. Claims to not want anyone to know Things, goes into depth about these Things anyway. Is probably most definitely gay. Can be found face down on a table lamenting his fate. Terrible sleep schedule. (HA) He is such a guy. Wants to believe the world is a good place and people are inherently good. And wants to help people and do good himself. It's just hard. [And he has a roommate. Oh my god he has a roommate]"

"He was, and still is, regarded a genius. He aced his Akademiya days, he has the admiration and appreciation of so many people because he is oh-so remarkable. But what for, when reality is that he sits at home depressed and with guilt consuming him, faking the image people have of him, not only broke as fuck but actually in debt, drowning his sorrows in wine."

Yusuke Kitagawa (Persona 5)

"highschooler who wants to spend the rest of his life doing what he loves. is obsessed with art and beauty and it's on his mind 24/7 received help from his now friendgroup to break from his abusive foster father who he still have complicated feelings with had to move into school dorms and am struggling to live independantly since he'd rather spend money and time on his art but he's still surviving and enjoying the good times id say also ends up saying whatever is on his mind and is pretty eccentric. very passionate about what he loves. doesn't want to do anything else."

Nanami Kento (Jujutsu Kaisen)

"Ex-salaryman, now jujutsu sorcerer. During one life-and-death fight, kept talking about how it was almost six pm with is when he is getting off work at 6pm no matter what because he hates overtime. While his opponent repeatedly almost kills him. Normalest adult in this shonen anime. Teen MC: "Let's go all out!" Nanami: "No. Where moderate effort will suffice, use moderate effort." Some of his quotes from the anime: "I studied at Jujutsu Tech and one thing I learned is that Jujutsu Sorcerers are shit! Then I worked at your typical company and one thing I learned is that work is shit! If both are equally shit I'll take the one I'm more suited to." "You've faced several life-or-death situations, but that does not make you an adult. Finding more fallen-out hairs on your pillow, watching your favourite stuffed bread disappear from the convenience store... The accunulation of these little despairs is what makes a person an adult." "I don't praise or disparage anyone. I adhere to facts and judge on that basis. That's who I am. There was a time when I mistakenly believed society operated the same way." "

[morethanwonderful]

The Winner of the Which MXTX Character do You Most Want to Study Like a Little Bug Tournament Bracket:

Winning by 4.2% after an incredibly tense and uncertain race, Shen (Yuan) Qingqiu has officially beaten Nie Huaisang and been crowned the MXTX character that the fandom would most like to study like a little bug!!!

It is truly a marvel that just some millenial keyboard warrior managed to win out over so many uber-tragic xianxia characters in the fascinating weirdness race. Congratulations Sqq for your bafflingly unhinged brain and gay denial.

I hope you all enjoy putting him in your bug jars, and thank you once again to everyone who voted! This poll was a blast to run, and y'all have brought me much joy with your tags and replies this week.

[tomwambsgans]

the way that tom is literally a closeted gay man who is innately effeminate in many ways and due to this thrives among the metrosexual elite, but he can't actually earn that status without first struggling through the trials of a more traditional masculinity... but he's also compromising that masculinity specifically in order to be in a successful heterosexual relationship, which is part of the masculinity that he has to project. he's constantly having to ride the line between "masculine enough to survive the corporate environment" and "NOT so masculine that it makes him feel unsafe to shiv."

the rules of men and gender-hierarchy in the roys' socioeconomic bracket are further complicated: too much of a certain type of masculinity renders you lower class, which is sometimes worse than being a woman. and taking masculinity too seriously makes you look like you're overcompensating. (everyone can tell you're gay, which is worse than being a woman.) caring about being a man, or talking about it in frank terms, breaks the illusion for everyone and makes it clear you're an outsider. (you're lower class and masculinity doesn't come naturally to you, so, double whammy.)

there's no winning for an outsider, really, and that's why tom clearly feels the most masculine alongside greg in spite of how vulnerable he also feels around him - because greg expects nothing in particular from him. they're on equal footing. tom still postures but he has a whole, wide-open playing field rather than a tightrope to walk. he beats up on him not even to make greg out to be more feminine and himself more macho, but to put them both on that field. because greg can take it. in tom's moments with him, he gets to temporarily experience the masculinity of comradery. it's compounded with all sorts of other things, like the insecurity in his affection and desire (and it's notable that that makes tom feel both weak and villainous), but the comradery never leaves. it's always a haven - a place to be a man among men - while being threatened by both his job and his marriage.

it's that pressure from either end that ultimately pushes tom to the breaking point, to no longer try to achieve that impossible middle ground and instead conform exclusively to one: the side that promises him more success, yes, but also which only requires that he puff himself up rather than make himself smaller. it's also no coincidence that tom's success in the very end, as a ceo on the verge of divorce, is promising freedom from either obligation to perform. and that he gets to take greg with him.

[bl-bracket]

Mini-Bracket: Best Marriage Proposal in a QL

So, as many of y'all may have heard, as of June 18, 2024 the marriage equality bill just got passed in Thailand, making it the first Southeast Asian country to legalize same sex marriage and also only one of three countries in all of Asia to legalize it (Taiwan legalized it 2019 and Nepal legalized it in 2024 as well). While technically it won't fully go into effect for another 120 days, I've planning to do something to celebrate it for a while so with great pleasure I introduce the first mini-bracket: Best Marriage Proposal in a QL!!!

What's a mini-bracket? Well since we are currently still in the Most Unhinged Bracket (currently in the finals and about halfway through the loser bracket) and I have a planned hiatus coming up due to traveling, what it really means is that there will be a shorter submission time, no prelims, all one-day long polls, and will be running at the same time as everything else. This is just supposed to be a little fun thing to celebrate marriage equality!

Same base rules apply (which you can read in the form and in the pinned post) EXCEPT this time I'm going to open it up to all QLs! While GLs are still in the early stages of becoming an established industry compared to BLs (and thus it still feels kinda unfair to them if I were to say that that the brackets were for all qls but would still be like 90% bl at least), it didn't feel right to not include them in this one!

Also there's some extra rules this time!

For the purposes of this poll, the proposal MUST be for a queer couple (mlm or wlw)

While this is to celebrate gay marriage being legalized in Thailand, any East Asian live action bl is eligible

It must be a legitimate marriage proposal, not just an offhand comment about wanting to get married in the future or making some other type of serious commitment as a couple that isn't marriage (like moving in together). Those are all good, but not what I'm wanting to highlight here. 

Submissions Close on June, 22 @ 7 PM GMT

Submit your favorite marriage proposals in a QL Here!

@tournament-announcer

[hotvintagepoll]

Propaganda

Jane Fonda (Barbarella, Sunday in New York, Barefoot in the Park)—Feminist icon, LGBTQ+ rights activist since the 70s, Civil Rights and Native American rights advocate, environmentalist… she really is THE woman ever

Eartha Kitt (Anna Lucasta, St. Louis Blues)—My friend and I have a saying: NOBODY is Eartha Kitt. A thousand have tried, and they've all come up empty and will continue to do so. Everyone knows her for something: from "Santa Baby" to Yzma in Emperor's New Groove to Catwoman to making Lady Bird Johnson cry for the Vietnam War. She was a master of comedy and sex, an extremely vocal activist, and she aged like fine wine... I honestly don't know what I can say about her that hasn't already been said, so I'll stick to linking all my propaganda. Like what else do you want from me. She was iconic at everything she ever did. Literally name another. How can anyone even think of her and not want to absolutely drown?

This is round 6 of the tournament. All other polls in this bracket can be found here. Please reblog with further support of your beloved hot sexy vintage woman.

[additional propaganda submitted under the cut.]

Jane Fonda:

"I assume she's already been submitted but I gotta make sure. I think there's an element to movies like Barbarella or her segment of Spirit of the Dead of those having been directed by her husband, who famously made movies about her being hot, and the incredible costume design also helped, but good lord. Look at her"

"She was so pretty, dear lord! She was and still us stunning. She’s great at comedy and drama."

"Shes so hot im so gay for me i will let her hit me with hers car"

"Gorgeous and also still getting arrested at climate protests, which is sexy behavior"

"Watching her in Barefoot in the Park seriously made me, a straight woman, question things"

"PLEASE I LOVE HER SO MUCH"

"Her vibes in these movies are so interesting because she, the daughter of an Old Hollywood star, went on to make both poignant dramatic movies and the some of the silliest things you've ever seen but even in the silly space adventures and sexploitations there's always this undeniable gravitas to her. It's like she's able not to take herself very seriously but at the same time never stops having this grace and elegance and makes it all work together. And she's always been very politically active which is also sexy. Her famous mugshot is from 1970 so right at the cutoff mark but come on"

Eartha Kitt:

"A hot vintage woman who was not just known for her voice, beauty, poise, and presence, but also her unapologetic ways of speaking about how she was mistreated in the show business as a girl who grew up on cotton fields in South Carolina in the 1930s through the 1940s coming to Broadway first and then Hollywood."

"Have you watched her sing?? Have you seen her face?? Have you heard her talk?? How could you not fall instantly in love. She makes me incoherent with how hot she is."

"She can ACT she can SING she can speak FOUR LANGUAGES she is a GODDESS!!! Although she is (rightfully) remembered for her singing, TV appearances (Catwoman my beloved), and later film roles, her early appearances in film are no less impressive or noteworthy!! She’s an amazing actress with so much charisma in every role. She was also blacklisted from Hollywood for 10 years for criticizing the Johnson administration/Vietnam War, so. Iconic. Also Orson Welles apparently called her “the most exciting woman in the world.”

"She had such a stunning, remarkable appearance, like she could tear you to shreds with just a glance- but the most undeniable part of her hotness was her voice, and it makes sense that it's what most people nowadays know her for. Nothing encapsulates the sheer magnetism of her singing better than this clip of her and Nat King Cole in St. Louis Blues, she pops in at 2:49. Also I know it's post-1970 but her song that was cut from Emperor's New Groove is likely to make you feel Feelings."

"Even with as racist as Hollywood was in the 1950s and 60s, Eartha Kitt STILL managed to have a thriving career. She also once had a threesome with Paul Newman and James Dean, and called out LBJ over the Vietnam War so hard that it made First Lady Johnson cry. Eartha Kitt was talented, sexy, and a total badass activist."

[besttropeveershowdown]

The WORST Trope Ever Showdown

Hello again! After the success of the Best Trope Ever Showdown, from which Found Family emerged victorious (by, like... a lot), it is now time to find its corollary. Its parallel. Its foil, if you will.

What is the worst trope of all time?

This tournament, just like BTES, will be run on a bracket format. Each week, tropes will be matched up against each other, and the winner of each matchup will go on to the next round.

Here is the submission form. You can submit as many tropes as you want. Submissions will be open until Tuesday of next week (that's Tuesday the 5th, for those of us who do better with dates), though I may decide to leave them open longer depending on how many I get in the first week. As usual, I encourage adding a link to a TVTropes page, but if your trope doesn't have one or you don't feel the page accurately represents it, you can also leave a brief description of it! (And if you do both, it makes things a lot easier for me during the organization stage)

THE RULES:

Yet again, medium-specific tropes will not be accepted (i.e, tropes that are specific to video games, or fanfiction, or musicals, or any other medium). This is because I want all tropes to be on equal footing as they enter the tournament, and there are some mediums that certain people simply never consume (not everyone plays video games, not everyone listens to musicals, not everyone watches professional wrestling) and thus don't know anything about the tropes of.

Genre-specific tropes, however, are okay as long as they can apply to any or most media.

I'm going to change the rules around problematic and offensive tropes for this tournament, because a lot of Worst Tropes Ever are probably problematic or offensive in some way. However, I also don't want this to become a game of Which Real-Life Stereotype Is the Worst. So, the rule for this tournament is, tropes that are problematic or offensive to a certain group are allowed in if and only if they are about how the group is treated specifically in media. So, All Gays are Pedophiles is not a valid submission because that is a real-life harmful stereotype that many people believe, but Bury Your Gays is because that is specifically about how queer characters are treated in fiction.

Tropes about sex are allowed if they are about sex in general and the role it plays in a story, but NOT if they are about specific parts of the sex act.

TVTropes is very vague with its definition of a trope, and for good reason: it's a very hard word to define. However, for this tournament, genres are not considered tropes, and neither are settings. Anything else you can find on TVTropes listed as a trope is fair game, EXCEPT:

Writing pitfalls are also not tropes. Although TVTropes has entries such as "Plot Hole", "Mary Sue", or "Pacing Problems", those are mistakes, not intentional tropes, and should not be submitted.

Propaganda is encouraged and makes the tournament a lot more interesting! I will also accept propaganda in the ask box over the course of the tournament, but if you want to send some in with your submission, put it on the form!

Have fun and be civil!

@tournament-announcer @tournamentdirectory

[onepiece-polls]

One Piece Shipping War - Bonus Poll!

The winner of the poly ship bracket vs the most popular (and honestly, only) Buggy ship of the duo bracket!

Propaganda under the cut. [contains some spoilers]

Propaganda for Cross Guild:

Idk there's something about three people who hate each other that just works.

they don't need no propaganda. I could never make propaganda like buggy the clown does in canon

mr. pathetic (buggy) paired with two actual warlords who could (but haven't !) demolished him ? it has to be love

Crocodile and Mihawk are a fucked up rich ass couple and Buggy is the chihuahua in their purse

CROSSGUILDCROSSGUILD XXX

Its cross guild. you know why (mod: as an anime-only fan, I don't, but I'm looking forward to find out 😂)

Propaganda for Shanks x Buggy:

What if we were childhood friends who gave up our drama for each other then never saw each other again for years

What can I say, I'm a fellow shuggy truther too 🤝

Shanks obviously adores Buggy, and Buggy is so tsundure~! Mr 'I hate Shanks'-but-will-take-every-opportunity-to-talk-about-him-and-be-with-him.

Oden says in his journal that he can't tell if they're friends of enemies, and I just love that. Plus when you add in the revelation about Shanks and Buggy in the recent chapters.

They're childhood friends. They're exes. They've been married for 20 years. They're opposites. They're the same. They're silly goofy guys who make me want to cry my heart out. Red/Blue is always meant to be.

Buggy """""HATES""""" Shanks. This hate is so strong that he WILL yell at this red-haired bastard despite the fact that he is a coward, who is terrified of all the Emperors. Everyone thinks this is strange. However, when you grow up with said Emperor on the same boat, watching him stumble over his feet as he's trying to learn to use a sword, stuck scrubbing the whole deck because he was stupid enough to prank "Dark King" Rayleigh, and make that same stupid pouty face every time his Conqueror's Haki doesn't do anything because he is an itty bitty child, most of that fear gets pretty quelled. Also, that same fucker lost an arm because he's a DUMBASS and he deserves to be made fun of for it (not because Buggy is worried and missed him not at all no no Shanks is just DUMB and needs to be TOLD he is dumb more. But just by Buggy. Because Buggy has known his idiocy forever. He has earned the right to yell at this stupid, stupid Emperor for being a self-sacrificing fool and for giving away that stupid hat and... Wait, hang on, when did this bastard get hot!? WHAT THE FUC-) And Shanks just keeps smiling at Buggy and his antics because he has 100% been in love with him since they were children (his actions while they were on the Roger pirates are the DEFINITION of pigtail-pulling as flirting) and he is just happy to see that he's safe while being exactly the same larger-than-life clown he always knew. He would gladly give up his life of sluttery (that I am convinced this man has. Just look at how he exists) if Buggy would just agree to join his crew, but will not push him if he doesn't want to. He just loves his pretty clown from a distance and waits. TLDR: Buggy is mad that he's in love with Shanks and Shanks just likes existing with and/or annoying Buggy (they come as a pair). GOD I just love childhood friends to lovers bro. Just let the cabin boys kiss.

[Spoiler Warning] Red and Blue gays! Emperor husbands! Childhood friends to enemies to lovers!