#Amy would be so interesting if the writers were interested in letting her be interesting

[coraniaid]

Reverse Unpopular Opinion: Amy Madison

[Reverse unpopular opinion meme.]

This is an interesting one because I think there’s a solid argument to be made that the character of “Amy Madison” does not, in fact, actually exist on the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

By which I mean … look, okay, yes, obviously, there is a character in an early Season 1 episode called Amy Madison, played by Elizabeth Anne Allen.  And there’s a character with the same name in a Season 2 episode, and [in an admittedly weird coincidence] she’s also played by Elizabeth Anne Allen.  And there’s one in Season 3, and a one in a few episodes of Season 6, and one in an episode of Season 7, and all of them are played by the same actor.

But … I mean, come on.  There’s no way these can all be the same character, right?  They don’t have the same basic back story or the same relationship to magic or to Willow; they certainly don’t have anything resembling a definite personality or set of motivations or a consistent character arc.  No, surely what’s going on here is that there are several different “Amy Madisons” in Sunnydale – just like there are several different characters called Anne or Nancy on the show – and in a bizarre in-joke the writers simply decided to cast the same woman to play all of them.

Now, ordinarily, simply being written inconsistently over a handful of episodes and not having anything resembling the same personality from week to week would be no obstacle to having a few die-hard fans.  But – as far as I can tell, anyway? – there’s no “fandom Amy” either.  She never really gets mentioned when people want to talk about how all the Scooby Gang had awful mothers [even though Amy actually did, explicitly and inarguably, have a very, very awful and openly abusive mother!].  There’s very little in the way of Amy/Willow shipping going on here or on AO3 [even though witchcraft is heavily coded as a metaphor for being a lesbian and Amy, one of the first witches we meet on the show, is repeatedly linked to Willow throughout the show’s run].  There are no adorable drawings of Amy as a rat staring out of her cage at Willow and Tara (or if there are, they aren’t getting as many notes as they should be getting).  

No, it looks like most people who are still watching and talking about the show twenty-five years later have about as much interest in poor Amy Madison as the writers did.  She’s a plot device.  A punchline.  A cipher.  A blank slate.  She’s whatever the plot requires her to be to further the stories of the actual characters on the show, and she’ll never ever be anything else.  Which is a little sad, if you think about it.  I think Amy – or, well, most of the different Amys: The Killer In Me’s smirking evil-for-evil’s-sake Amy I’m not so sure about – deserved better.

[As I write this the thought occurs to me, belatedly, that I might be one of Amy Madison’s biggest fans.  Pretty grim news for her if so.]

OK. Enough stalling.  Five positive things about Amy Madison [with, as ever, the usual caveat about the comics, which I’ve still not read anything about and still don’t exist].

Witch, Amy’s debut appearance, is a solid episode!  One of that season’s best, I think (though not, of course, one of its very best).  And I think the duo of Elizabeth Anne Allen's Amy Madison (and Robin Riker as her mom Catherine) is a big part of why that episode works: no, they haven’t got a huge amount to work with, but I think they both do a pretty good job switching between evil witch Catherine and innocent victim Amy.  Catherine’s bodyswap spell foreshadows (albeit unintentionally) the bodyswap artifact that the Mayor gifts Faith in This Year’s Girl / Who Are You? and I’ll always have a soft sport for it because of that.  And I really like that the episode ends with Amy alive and hanging out with Buffy in a way that suggests that they are going to stay friends, even if we don’t see any evidence on screen that that happened.

Sarcasm aside, I’m really glad the writers brought Amy back in the second season.  To me, part of the appeal of the high school years are the recurring minor characters – I talked about Principal Snyder before, but also Jonathan and Devon and Percy and Harmony and … yes, Amy too.  The show obviously doesn’t care about her very much, and you have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to fill in the missing pieces of her story and make her arc make sense (why is she starting to do magic in Season 2?  When does she start hanging out with Willow?), but … well, I do care and I have done those gymnastics.  At least Amy didn’t end up like Marcie Ross or Buffy’s old flame Owen or any of those poor kids who must remember eating Principal Flutie. 

I’ve been reading a few old interviews Elizabeth Anne Allen gave recently (here and here, for example) which I think have some pretty interesting insights into how the character of Amy developed.  Had you ever heard there were persistent rumors at one point that Amy was going to be one of the starting regulars on Angel?  It’s mind-boggling to think about a world where that happened.  Allen seems to have put a huge amount of thought into her character, too, at least for her first few appearances, which … uh, I guess makes me feel a bit shitty about those opening paragraphs. [Not enough to delete them though…]  Also in one of the linked interviews she says that she “hopes she won’t be a rat much longer” – and that’s an interview she gave before the Season 3 finale had even made it to air, which made me pretty sad to read.  Forget appearing on Angel, imagine if Amy had been de-ratted in Season 4.  Imagine if Superstar was about Amy instead of Jonathan.

There is a second or two in Season 6’s Smashed – no more than that – when Buffy and Amy are catching up again (“How have you been?”  “Rat.  You?”  “Dead.”  “Oh.”) and you can, if you’re quick, delude yourself into thinking that the show is going to do something interesting with the obvious parallel it’s just set up. Willow has now not only brought Buffy back into the regular human world [and left her struggling to live and find meaning as a college drop out with a dead mother and an absent father last seen on screen about five years ago], she’s also brought Amy back into the regular human world [and left her struggling to live and find meaning as a de facto high school drop out with a presumed-dead mother and a presumably-now-absent father last mentioned about five years ago].  Surely this must be deliberate?  Well, no: the show doesn’t do anything with this idea ever again, because Marti Noxon had very different [worse] ideas for Amy’s character this season, but if you pretend it might be about do something like that it’s a pretty exciting couple of seconds.

The fact that “Amy Madison” exists as a (technically!) canon character means that I can write (or daydream about writing) fanfiction in which Willow has a friend in high school who is also a practising witch. One with a vague but miserable home life, who is secretly in love with Willow but too afraid to admit it (and so she keeps professing to be interested in men who she can’t possibly ever expect to date, either because they’re unpleasantly vile toward women or openly gay or both). And I can do that while, just about, pretending that I have not created the most embarrasingly psychologically revealing OC you ever heard about in your life.  Thanks Amy!

[shadamyheadcanons]

i love that you don’t put sonic as a jerk in your headcannons but rather supportive! this is so cool, because sonic really wants all of his friends to be happy and with amy wouldn’t be different, specially since they’ve known each other since they were children and sonic himself said that she is a special/dear person to him so i agree he would be happy if amy and shadow got together. as much as i love sonamy, i also love shadamy (sorry for the long ask it’s just that is not that common seeing sonic being portrayed like this in some ffs)

Thanks for the compliment! This one means a lot because I think I’m actually harsher toward Sonic sometimes than a lot of modern shadamy writers are. I say “modern” because new “Amy goes for Shadow because Sonic is a jerk” stories are actually few and far between. It’s easy to think they’re all over the place because there absolutely are a lot of them, but the ones I run into are usually from, like...2012. If you sort by Date Updated on AO3, it tells a different story, pun intended. I believe there are three main reasons for this:

1. Since half of shadamy fans started shipping them in SA2 two and a half decades ago, a ton of us are in our 30s now, writing more mature stories with more fine-tuned characterization. This is one of the advantages of having an ancient ship.

2. It’s a tired trope. We’ve all read a million of them. Most people don’t like how Sonic acts in them for his sake, but my biggest gripe is that they undersell what Shadow has to offer. He’s not just good for Amy because he’s Not Sonic, he’s good for her because of who he is.

3. Sonic treats Amy much better than he used to. The reason “Sonic is a jerk” fics were so common 10-20 years ago is because he was a jerk, almost exclusively to Amy.

These fics exist because no other character works better than Shadow as an arbiter of justice for something that bothered a lot of Amy fans at the time.

More on this under the cut. Lots more. I got kind of carried away.

It’s easy to forget how bad Sonic was when we have games like Frontiers and comics like IDW and Mega Drive now:

Between new fans who aren’t as familiar with older games, longtime fans who haven’t looked at their history in a while, and fans who love Sonic and just don’t want to see him in a bad light, tons of people sweep his old behavior under the rug without even realizing it.

I don’t think any of that is fair to Amy.

A brief reminder of their dynamic in the past:

1. Constant abandonment. He ran from her in Sonic Adventure...

...Sonic Heroes...

And four times in SA2 alone! More on that later.

2. Standing her up on dates. This mostly happened in Sonix X...

[Episode 42, episode 45]

...but there was also Sonic and the Black Knight, where he didn’t show up, didn’t apologize, never made it up to her, and made no attempt to reschedule.

3. Uh...literally hurting her, for some reason...?

At the end of Sonic Riders, when he didn’t feel like properly handling a hostage situation:

Oh, welcome back, episode 42! Didn’t expect to see you again:

The new version of Sonic Generations altered this cutscene, thank god, but back in 2011, players saw this:

4. And the worst part of this, to me, is that he lets her get her hopes up. It’s not just the almost-dates he skips. Knuckles teases Sonic in Heroes, saying, “Are you playing with that girl’s heart again, Sonic?” It’s intended as a joke, but then he does things like this:

Sonic X, episode 52. You know what roses are, Sonic, you know how she’ll interpret this, and you know you won’t follow through.

I know I’m picking on Sonic X a lot, but it was pretty popular at the time, even among fans who didn’t touch the games or comics. This was how they saw these characters growing up, and it made its way into countless fics.

But even after all these years, no matter which continuity you work with...he still won’t give her a solid “no.”

Not liking someone back is fine. Not being interested in a relationship is fine. But letting her believe she’ll win you over if she chases you long enough isn’t, and that’s what he’s doing to this day.

Fans throw around the same tired old “justifications” over and over for why he is/was like this to Amy, but they don’t hold water. People say he’s mean because he doesn’t know what to do with his feelings for her, but he liked Elise, too, and he was nothing but kind to her.

(Putting this here because although fans don’t like to admit it, Elise was indeed intended to be a love interest. She and Amy are presented on par here, so if you think he likes Amy, then he liked Elise, too. You get exactly the same result regardless of who you choose for this trial.)

The other frequent “justification” is that he ran and lashed out because he was afraid of her, often accompanied by awful Amy hate (“stalker,” “psycho,” etc.). This also doesn’t work because Sonic was always harsh to Amy no matter how gentle she was. Classic Amy is the sweetest, most adorable little munchkin in the world...

...and he still ran away.

^ These are from the same exact comic, by the way: IDW Sonic’s 30th anniversary. Five pages apart. How in the world could anyone not want her around?

Amy had more spunk in Adventure and Adventure 2, but she was just as sweet, and he still treated her like a pest to be swatted. The ending of her story in SA1 is this:

But...why should she have to? He treats everyone else with the same baseline of respect, at least until they give him a reason not to. Why is it just Amy? He wasn’t just mean to her, he was uniquely mean to her. She didn’t act out until Heroes in 2003, when she’d already been ignored for years. Standing on the sidelines wasn’t working, so she tried being more “proactive.” Was it the right way to do things? No...but I honestly can’t hold it against her. It makes sense in context. She was a kid, and kids act out when they’re neglected.

And this is where Sonic Adventure 2 comes in.

SA2 was pivotal for Amy. Nearly everyone tossed her aside; Sonic left her behind four separate times in this game alone. First was right after she broke him out of jail on Prison Island. He ran off the second her back was turned:

Second, he and Tails both walked away from her after Eggman blew up the moon. She easily could’ve gotten arrested here.

Third, Sonic and Tails made a plan to stop Eggman right in front of her, blatantly leaving her out of it as if she wasn’t even there:

...which, if you’ll recall, led to Eggman holding her at gunpoint:

...and when Sonic set out to rescue her, this was his recap:

This does not work as a joke given how they treat her. He pretends she doesn’t exist to her face, then says this behind her back.

And immediately after that, when it was time for them to save the world, they left her alone again.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I was furious by that point.

But then...something interesting happened.

A photoset or gifset can’t do this scene justice, but I think most shadamy fans have already seen it plenty of times. For the few who haven’t, you can watch it here.

The contrast between Shadow and Sonic is impossible to ignore. By building up this moment the way they did, the writers primed us to notice it.

Sonic runs from Amy’s hugs, while Shadow would like more of them, please and thank you.

Sonic pretends she doesn’t exist, while Shadow’s moved to tears and changes the course of his life because he values what she has to say.

Anytime they’ve interacted since then, he’s been uniquely respectful and gentle with her. It’s what she deserves, and for a long time, this was all we had. He was all we had.

The other half of the equation is that it is very, very easy to picture Shadow taking Sonic and the others to task for their mistreatment of her. As a blunt person who’s not afraid to confront Sonic, Shadow is the most believable candidate to this day. The only person to fully respect her from the start also happens to clash with the person who hurts her most often? Of course those fics exist. It’s a perfect storm.

And it’s no wonder that this attitude persists somewhat even now, because Sonic is still doing this, even if he’s “nicer” about it. That prison escape from SA2? The one he never thanked her for? He still gives all the credit to Tails for that, even up through Frontiers:

Amy. Amy broke you out of prison. Tails broke in, and then she snuck through a maximum-security prison, somehow stole a card key, and saved your life. We’re in the 2020s, but he’s still disrespecting her. And don’t get me started on the TailsTube Secret Santa episode.

It feels like Sega wants us to forget all of this ever happened, and it has some very confusing results. From that same Sonic 30th anniversary comic from above, the one where he and the others abandoned her:

Like...this? This is lying. He’s just lying to her. I can’t tell if they think we all collectively have amnesia or if it’s some weird, mean-spirited joke at her expense. I genuinely don’t know what they’re trying to say.

It’s not enough to pretend it never happened and move on, not to me. Sonic should be held responsible for what he canonically did. Him supposedly being bad with feelings didn’t make it hurt her any less, and he’s older than Amy, so he should’ve been the mature one.

The longer the writers keep this up, the worse Sonic looks, and I don’t think that’s what they’re aiming for. Ignoring the problem is not a solution. Amy might forgive, but I’ll never forget.

I just want to see a canon apology so I can reason out why she put up with it for so long. I want to at least be able to buy her having a crush on him. I can do that when he’s being selfless and heroic. I can’t do that when he treats her like the plague, and pretending he never did doesn’t match the Sonic I legitimately like. I bet a lot of s0namy fans would like to see a resolution like that, too.

Sorry to turn your thoughtful compliment into a rant. I really do appreciate it, and I’m glad you enjoy the stories!

[kexyyxx]

Posting this into my own post rather than just a reblog because I feel like it's important. (And I yapped too much, so hear me out😔) Original post by @randomthefox

I don't think that they don't have interest in Amy. I agree with some of the points made here, but, I'll be honest, as a hardcore Amy Rose fan, I'm GLAD that she is actually making an appearance later in a fourth movie. (Never thought I would say this tbh)

You see, we meet MANY Sonic fans in the fandom who have absolutely NO FUCKING IDEA about Amy and her personality. This pink hedgehog has a complex writing as of now, and she RIGHTFULLY deserves her own movie for that. Yes, it would have been good if she was in previous movies to discover her character a bit more throughout it, but honestly, I don't think that would have been good enough. Why? Because I feel like the writers wouldn't have really focused on her character itself, but rather than to just cramp another person into the films.

And butcher her? Skin her alive? Honestly, if they were able to make the infamous "idiot Knuckles who has muscle for a brain" into a well written character, why wouldn't they do that with Amy? Hell, if they were able to make the laughingstock of the old "Emo Shadow" some people made fun of into an absolute unit, to the point where even Non-Sonic fans are GUSHING over him, why can't they do that with Amy? Let's have a little faith people👏

And let's be honest, Paramount is STILL a company who wants MONEY. They are one of the more normal companies' due to them actually listening to their own fans, but come on. Ever since the second, and now the third movie's success, they see that they can get more cash from us, OF COURSE they are going to seperate other characters into other films and not cramp them up. That would be less profit if they already put other well known characters into the previous films. And yes, to the person who wrote in the question: "they can gain extra points from subsections of the fanbase for including her"

That's... kinda the point for companies? They try to find little exits on where they could get more money. But that doesn't mean that they are just going to completely fuck Amy up, because those subsections (like me🥰) would go absolutely berserk, and that would be a minus money-wise.

Also, we are forgetting one thing; video game movies are never Ctrl C and Ctrl V onto the canvas. Yes I'm also disappointed that they left MANY important things out of it which was important in SA2 (such as Rouge, Maria's final words, LITERALLY AMY, etc., what you mentioned), but we have to remember that this is a different universe from the sonic games with some of it's own rules.

Lastly, I don't think that they feel that women are unimportant. Remember Rachel? Maddie is right there too?? Jojo is also an amazing and kind soul. They are strong women characters with some yummy writing. Okay, yeah, they are human, and yeah, they don't have much screen time, but I don't think we can even say a single bad word about these ladies' stories. They brightened up the movies with their own moments, and I have faith that other future female characters are going to do just that.

Again, this isn't ATTACKING, I'm just stating my own opinion.

[underneathitalldeepdives]

Gwen's Lyrics: Late To Bloom & Sooner

A few weeks ago, Gwen's unreleased song "Sooner" was posted on YouTube for the first time. The song, written by Gwen, Shane McAnally, Busbee, and Amy Wadge, was added to BMI in 2019 and seemingly came out of sessions Gwen had with those writers in the spring of 2019. (Another song written during this time called "You Kissed Me Back To Life" was spotted on BMI the same day as "Sooner." We still have not heard that one.) 

Fans at the time immediately guessed what "Sooner" might be about - Gwen's wish that she had met Blake earlier in life. Gwen posted what would turn out to be a line from the chorus under a throwback photo of Blake in September 2019:

This was about a month after the song title was discovered on BMI by fans, but time passed and nothing ever came of it.

As we know, Gwen eventually released a new studio album, "Bouquet," which did not include "Sooner" but included another song with an extremely similar theme - "Late To Bloom."

Here are the lyrics to "Sooner" and "Late To Bloom" side by side:

When comparing the songs, the thing that sticks out to me is that "Sooner" seems a little more personal and raw. It has a sad tune, includes striking references to Blake's previous marriage and his late father, and is more reflecting on the time that was lost. It's interesting her honesty about wishing he wouldn't have loved anyone else before her.

If she'd released this song, the line about "all the years you had to fake it" would have definitely gotten people talking. My opinion of this line is that it means that Blake and Miranda, same as Gwen and Gavin, had a lot of ups and downs, but as a public couple they always had to put on the best face for people and not let anyone see the cracks that were there. They had to pretend things were great even when they weren't (which is why their divorce came as quite a shock to the public).

"She didn't even know she wasted you" seems like a sister line to "And only a stupid girl would let you go" in "Rare" — Gwen likely believes Miranda took him for granted and didn't appreciate him the way that she does. But she is envious of the time that Miranda got with him before they met, time that she believes was wasted with the wrong people who just hurt them.

In contrast, "Late To Bloom" has a peppy tune and is more optimistic. It has more generalized lyrics that don't reference anything too deep, but still has a personal touch, talking about them riding in Blake's truck and picking flowers. The lyrics show that she is enjoying the present and looking toward the future, rather than dwelling on the past with so much melancholy.

It's possible the difference in tone between the two songs is due to the fact that "Sooner" was written when Gwen and Blake had only been dating a little over 3 years (and thus were only 3.5 years past their divorces), while "Late To Bloom" was written when they'd been together more than 7 years and were now married. It could be that the more time Gwen has gotten with Blake, the less it stings that they met so late because they have continually filled their years together with valuable shared experiences.

Shane McAnally would say that working with Gwen during those spring 2019 sessions (which included writing "Sooner") and hearing about her relationship with Blake helped inspire him while writing "Nobody But You."

“I had worked with Gwen Stefani, just a few days before I went in to write this song,” McAnally said. “When I heard the melody, it made me think of Blake, and it sounded like a love song. I just said, ‘We should kind of write this with them in mind.’”

“One of the main things we talked about was her and Blake, and she just was telling me how happy they were and how glad they were they found each other at this part of their life and they're just truly in love,” he says.

I notice in the lyrics of "Nobody But You," there is again the similar theme to "Sooner" about wasted time:

"All the wasted days, all the wasted nights/I blame it all on being young/Got no regrets, 'cause they got me here/But I don't wanna waste another one"

The longing to have found each other earlier is also expressed in Blake's 2021 wedding song, "We Can Reach the Stars," in the line - "We always said we wished we'd met long before we finally did."

Gwen again touches on this theme in a line of "Empty Vase" - "Why, why did it take so much time? You've always been the one I've been trying to find"

It's obvious that this thought has loomed large in Gwen's head over the years, how different things might be if she had been able to meet Blake earlier in life.

I wish she had released "Sooner" because it is a very honest and touching song, but listening to it actually made me feel a little depressed, too. It's just rather sad! I'm grateful there is a more cheerful and hopeful iteration in "Late To Bloom," showing a sunnier view of the theme of meeting your great love later in life.

[bring-cringe-back]

Okay I might just be reading too much into this. But while I was watching the episode *cough cough* procrastinating *cough cough I realised that they don't show how the Doctor and Ruby got there.

And I know that it's probably just meant to be vaguely like 'they just went for fun'.

BUT this is the third episode in a row where we haven't seen them arrive. And for 73 yards it was clearly a doctor who episode when it started but it immediately gets rid of the doctor. ( I know that for 73 yards and for dot and bubble it was because Ncuti Gatwa was filming other stuff but let me cook) In Dot and Bubble you could effectively be forgiven for assuming that it was a random Black Mirror episode or something similar until the Doctor turns up, and tbh if you were just flicking through channels and haven't been watching Doctor Who you could probably basically not know for much longer. In Rogue they are just there, except for the title screen (the same for dot and bubble) you could basically watch it as a Bridgerton episode until the Chuldur turn up.

(And there's whole other rant about how the Chuldur fits into the theory about this basically being a TV show within a TV show, I don't know the name for this theory)

But anyway these episodes are increasingly separated from the Doctor and Ruby as plot points particularly in the beginning of episodes. They are more and more like an excuse to tell the story or explore the topic that the writers want to explore. Which isn't totally different from the occasional episode of previous series, but this is a lot more in my memory at least from previous series. So it feels a lot like they are skimming over the more sci-fi doctor who elements. Which fits in in my mind to the idea that the 'One who waits' is a representation of story telling. I've seen theories that it's Ruby but she doesn't know it which makes sense, I think it would also make sense for it to be her parent(s) who left her, or alternatively just it's own thing all together. But it feels very like that bit where Amy is living a life and starts to realise it's all fake.

The narrowing down of these episodes into not showing them arriving, and at least in Rogue - I can't remember in the others - not showing them leaving the story, feels very different.

It feels more and more like story telling. They have covered fairy tales, Period pieces/Romance, Dystopia, War/SciFi, Musicals, Political Drama. They are also showing the doctor playing his role, something that we see companions doing often enough but we seldom see the doctor doing it.

In Space Babies he is scared of a new creature. In the Devil's Code he sings a song that makes little sense in the story, he doesn't question the road making noise. In Boom he's more himself but it's also the closes to his 'normal' environment. In 73 Yards they just fully remove him from the story, which I realise was done for filming requirements but would have been so interesting to see the doctor in a Political drama. In Dot and Bubble he plays the role of the outsider bringing information to those living under a Dystopia, how is he UNABLE to access the inside, sure he plays a role that's fairly similar to himself but Doctor Who is really Dystopian.

In Rogue he is becoming more and more his role, he is playing the role of a sort of Elizabeth Bennet style character, a strong romantic interest for the brooding man. Which is great, he makes fun of the genre, but he is hyper aware of the genre and still ends up in its pitfalls. He trusts a man so quickly he ends up handing over his sonic, he gets proposed to and basically immediately accepts. Now I am really hoping that Rogue gets to stay around I really liked him as a character, regardless of which theory of his identity if any are true. But the Doctors reaction to him is still a little out of character, he is feeling what he is SUPPOSED to feel and he is acting how he is SUPPOSED to act.

It just feels to me like an increasing number of these episodes are more and more story like and more and more separated from the more Doctor Who elements. And the lack of an introduction of how they get there, and the lack of them leaving in the TARDIS is so unusual to me and stands out to my brain so much.

It feels like they are removing elements that don't fit the genre. Anyway not sure if that makes any sense but I'm vibing with it.

[cas-is-queer]

Nu!Who Doctors/Companions and my thoughts on their gender/sexuality ect. (I'm almost finished with season 10, so this will only cover up to Capaldi. I will be doing the small companions like Jack, and also the master/missy)

THIS IS MY PERSONAL OPINION, IF YOU DISAGREE PLZ DNI. HATE COMMENTS WILL MAKE ME CRY. Thank you.

If you have any questions on the terms used, either look it up or leave a comment and i'll respond.

9th Doctor: Demiaro/demiace. He doesn't seem super interested in romance n' stuff until later (once he knows Rose a bit better lol). I want to say he/they, but I'm not sure on that. Def pansexual (most doctor's will be lol) not giving polyamorous, not giving monogamous. he's down bad for rose and that's all he knows.

Rose Tyler: MY BISEXUAL QUEEN!! Billie Piper confirmed that Rose would've loved the doctor if they regenerated into Whittaker!Doctor instead of Tennant!Doctor. She slays so hard, I love her.

Mickey Smith: I want to say straight but we all saw him and that one guy so I'm gonna say heteroflexible, which is mostly straight but with the occasional homo interaction (that's a terrible explanation just look it up)

10th Doctor: My boy! I love 10 so very much. Demiace, slightly less demiaro but still there. (this is mostly inspired by that one clip of David Tennant saying that 'the doctor is a fairly asexual character') I want to say mostly into women, but we all saw him and Jack. I'm gonna say ominsexual, with a small/medium preference for women. giving ambiamorous, but more towards monagomous, you feel me?

Captain Jack Harkness: Most of the actors/writers/etc. say bisexual, but also admit to omnisexual, because he does get freaky with aliens. I feel like if you don´t think aliens are included in bisexual, then pansexual would be a better fit, but whatever. I'm not sure on this one, but he's def queer and also super freaky, so we stan. polyamorous if i've ever seen one

Martha Jones: I'm really unsure on this tbh. I think she doesn't really use labels, but def kisses men and women. kinda ambiguous on this, my bad.

Donna Noble: Bisexual. No evidence, gut feeling. I will not be explaining.

Simm!Master: that is a homosexual. he had a wife n shit ik, but that felt wrong. gay for the doctor. it's that simple. (i do want to clarify that he would still love fem!doctor, but like. hes gay. you feel me? timelords get that ambiguity.)

11th Doctor: hmm. hMM. he's silly. Giving pansexual. does not see gender. (danced with all the men and women equally at the Ponds wedding, was confused why the men were shy. an icon, truly) less on the demiaro, more on the demiace. (not super sexual except with River) I'd say monagomous but between River and Clara, he's most certainly not. ambiamorous.

Amy Pond: Pansexual. would kiss women, but loves Rory to death. She/they, we all know the scene i'm thinking about.

Rory Williams: bisexual. ik ik he had that whole 'im not gay' scene, but it was giving 'im not gay im bi' energy. I have no evidence for this claim, just trust me.

River Song: what a pansexual queen. canonically had at least two wives. in love with the doctor. an icon. Very much NOT asexual. Do NOT let her and Jack Harkness meet. They'd match each others freak and end up killing people.

Clara Oswald: canon bisexual, literally kissed Jane Austen. giving she/they. of all the people to fall for, fell for the doctor in his 'post-pond-depression-wet-cat-era', worst choice she ever made and i love that for her. she is babygirl, i will not explain.

12th Doctor: I'm currently on his last season right near the end, going to cry when he leaves. giving true pansexual, no preference. i have no evidence, i just think that all the doctors are pan, but some have preference, hence the omni. he/they, idfk. less on the demiaroace then all his previous regenerations, but i don't think any doctor is truly allosexual/romantic. you get the vision?

Bill Potts: !!!! My girl!! a lesbian queen!! basically the doctor's granddaughter!! queen!! her and heather are so flipping cute istg-

Nardole: literally cannot picture him with anybody. i hesitate on aroace, but also; he's def aroace.

Missy: a queen. love her so much. she/they pansexual. i feel like greyasexual/aromantic, but thats a bit hesitant. I feel like she's down for love and sex n shit, but unfortunately she fell hardcore for the doctor (and clara, to an extent), so she's just stuck. someone help her, she deserves so much better (currently on the vault era, if you couldn't tell.)

Alrighty!! that's all for now, I'll reblog and add my opinions on newer dw as I watch. lmk if I missed anyone (I don't think I did), and tell me your dw headcannons!!

Inspo:

[karbisworld]

I am bored af and I wanted to write since a WHILE so let's go! <3

✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓⟪SHIP⟫˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦ Jake Peralta x Reader

✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⟪CATEGORIES⟫˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦ Romance // Comedy // Little angst // Friends to Lovers

✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ⊹⟪SUMMARY⟫⊹ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦ Jake Peralta just got his heart broken by the two women's he liked the most, his formal girlfriend at the time Sophia Perez, who broke with him and his another romantic interest Amy after she told him that she didn't wanted a relationship inside work; now he's alone with only his friends.

✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁⟪NOTES⟫ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦˖ ݁ ˓⊹˖ ݁ ˓♡˖ ݁ ˓✦ Hello, new writer on tumblr here so have patience with me <3 I really hope you guys like my work, if you notice any grammatical error, well English is my second language so yeah. If you like my work you guys can ask me to write any idea you would like and I will be glad to! In this story, since I love Jake and Amy together too much, they never truly dated, let's say that Amy wasn't really interested on dating Jake... Anyways, enjoy!

-Man I told you, love is not for me- said Jake while taking a sip of his beer

-Oh don't say that Jakie, it's their lose!- said Charles trying to cheer Jake up

-I just can't understand my luck! Y/N you're a woman, tell me all women's secrets, I just can't understand why Amy said she liked me but then said she didn't wanted a relationship!-

Y/N just shakes her head -I don't know Jake, you know how is Amy, she's just afraid of breaking a rule maybe? I don't know dude, I am not her, every woman is it's own world but, if you say she told you she liked you at some point I don't think you have no chance- she says also taking some sips of her beer since the three were in Shaw's after work

Jake just keeps drinking frustrated -It's just a puzzle, I mean, I know Amy loves puzzles and all that but... MAN, NO FAIR!- he says laying his head on the table getting more wasted since he had a free day tomorrow, Charles looked worried and kept trying to cheer him up but didn't succeeded.

-Y/N please do something- Charles whisper to you

-What do you want me to do? The guy is heartbroken and getting wasted, I don't think I can do much here more than paying more beers- you whisper back, trying to show like you're not worrying much, even though you really don't like to see Jake like this

-Y/N please! It's your chance- he whispers. Charles discovered you had a crush on Jake a damn while ago, but you asked him to keep it a secret since you didn't wanted to cause any trouble in what Jake and Amy might had in between. Charles being Charles almost blew your secret a bunch of times since he knows, but you somehow made him learn how to keep the secret

-Shut up!- you say more louder than in a whisper making Jake lift his head from the table

-What happens?- Jake says confused, he is kinda drunk but still making sense

-Nothing- you quickly respond

-I was telling Y/N that I need to go- Charles said, you quickly looked at him with a little of a angry expression, he didn't even looked at you -Sorry Jake, Rosa just send me a text, one of our open cases just go a new lead so I need to leave-

Jake nods -It's okay Charles, can I help with the case?- he asked and his face light up

-Sorry Jake, this new lead is the last thing we needed so we basically just need to do paperwork about the case- he said strategically knowing that Jake hated paperwork

-Oh okay, I guess I won't be the only one being miserable tonight!- Jake said playfully lifting his beer as Charles get up from the table, you give him a look of "I will kill you later" - Come on Y/N don't let me drinking alone tonight! after all we both have a free day tomorrow!- Jake said, it was obvious that the beer was making more effect than before cause he was a little louder than before

-Sure- you said drinking a little more, you didn't do much since looking at the situation you would need to drive this man home

-Tell me Y/N do you have a partner?- Jake asks to you almost making you choke with the beer out of the unexpected question

-I do not- you answered

-Why not?- he asked

-Where does this questions come from?- you ask back

-Well I have been talking about my horrible love life all night, I wanna move on from that a little. I know everything about Charles but you're less open than him so, I want to know- he says drinking a little more

You sigh -I guess you and I have a messed up love life in common- you admit finishing your beer

-How so?- he asks curious

You shrug -I don't know, I just don't have luck in that area too-

-Cheers for that!- he says playfully taking a smile out of you and you two clink your beers and take a sip -But may I ask what do you mean by not having luck? Too much of heartaches?- he asks curious again

The beer was starting to affect you a little bit making you more honest so you nodded -Yeah, either people being assholes or not being into me so... Yeah- you admit taking another sip of your beer

-Not being into you?! How? I mean, don't take me wrong but... You're gorgeous dude-

Your eyes widen and you feel like you're blushing but you try to play it cool -Hahaha, sureeee- you say playfully

-No no, really! I mean it!-

-Shut up- you say while laughing -You're too drunk and saying bullshit-

-I might be drunk but not blind dude! Really you look nice-

-Okay okay, then, thank you- you chuckled -But still I don't know, people can say that but weirdly I don't have luck at dating- you admit

-Maybe people gets intimidated by you- Jake says drinking a little more

-Why would they?-

-Well, I don't know, you're a cop, and a badass one! And you're smart and all that-

-Would you get intimidated by me?-

-Maybe- he says playfully

-And not by Amy?-

-Amy too, I was extremely intimidated by her! I only confessed because I thought I would never had an opportunity later, you know since I went under cover and all that... But well at the end of the day it didn't helped or anything...- He says sadly

You put your hand on his -It's okay, it was very brave, and well, as Charles said before... Maybe is their loss? I mean I know it hurts to be heartbroken but, maybe it was for the best- you say trying to cheer him up

He nods -Thanks Y/N you're a great friend- He says making your heart break a little bit, you just smiled and nodded

-Aren't you drunk enough yet? It's getting late- You said looking that it was almost midnight

-Come on Y/N! The night is young! Don't be a Holt and let's drink more!- he says asking for more beers

-No, not more for me, I need to drive you home afterwards- you say rejecting his beer

-Come on! Just this one I swear! Do it for my little broken heart yeah?- He asks giving you the beer

You roll your eyes and take the beer -Just this one tho! No more- You say and he smiles

-Yeeesss!- he started drinking more quickly while you only drank one more he had like almost 3 making him more wasted than before, even needing help to walk properly

-God damn it Jake! I told you we should've left before- you say with a little annoyed tone of voice helping him walk out of the bar to your car

Jake just laughs while walking grabbed to you since he's tripping with himself -No! We should've stayed more more more! I am not sad anymore meaning that drinking is good good good hahaha!- he said at this point barely making sense

-It's not good for my freaking back!- you say helping him lean on your car as you unlock it -Get in, I will drive you home- you say helping him getting into the car

-Woah than-thank you! Y/N is a savior!- he says while laughing getting on the passenger sit. You get on the driver sit

-Put your seatbelt, I drank a little too so we better be careful- you say to him, he tries to but fails as he's too drunk letting the seatbelt get back to it's position

-Y/N your seatbelt doesn't like me!- he says putting a sad face making look in between extremely dumb and funny and extremely cute and kissable; you took the first option and just laugh softly helping him getting the seatbelt on

-There dummy- you said with a chuckle not noticing that you were really close to him, so you just backed down to your sit and tried to avoid thinking much about it -Okay let's go, and please tell me if you feel bad in the road okay? I really really REALLY don't feel like cleaning vomit from my car-

He nods -Don't worry Y/N! I have a strong stomach!- he said with a smile

-I hope so- you said and started driving to his apartment, you opened his window in the car just in case but thankfully, you guys arrived just fine to his place. He looked more sleepy than before so you had to wake him a little. -Okay Jake we're here- you say getting out of the car to help him getting out. You help him until you guys are at his apartment door. -Well, here we are, take care, sleep on your side and all that- you said about to leave but he grabbed you by your wrist

-Please stay- he said with some puppy eyes that could even fucking win a #1 prize in the most perfect ones that had ever existed -I don't want to be alone... Not anymore...- He said as some tears started forming on his eyes absolutely wrenching your heart

-But... But...- You tried to think on an excuse but looking at him in that state it would be a sin -Fine...- you said leaving out a sigh, he smiled and pulled you into a big hug without a warning

-Thank you, you're the best, you're the... BLEGH!...-

To be continued... (yes, he vomited on u)

[charlieconwayy]

Just curious what you don't like about Cory/Topanga if you feel like talking about it!

hey, i don't mind!

first off i think boy meets world in the context of just a purely heterosexual show makes it age pretty poorly, and that all stems from cory and topanga. i know one of the writers said a while back that the writers room was torn between shory and corpanga, and tbh, rewatching as an adult, that's extremely evident. i'm not gonna make this post all about shory bc that's reductive but i am first and formost a shory girl and a firm believer that cory matthews is a gay man

so let's get into it.

i really really love s1/2 corpanga. idk if it's just bc ben/danielle felt more natural back then or if it's bc they actually allowed cory to be wrong and topanga to be right, but it's just so sweet. one of my all time fav ship moments from the show is the frickin sock basketball scene where they touch hands and he giggles. so adorable! but i think what really makes them suffer after s1 (and kind of s2) is just that they clearly made topanga a normal, kelly kapowski girl-next-door type to make her more "desirable" for the male audience. that could be an entire separate post, but it's so fucking obvious that that's what the change was and it sucks because topanga was great the way she was.

they're not like hatable in season 3 exactly, but the "old married couple haha look how old gross and boring they are" trope when they were legitimately sophomores was just weird? and this is a retrospect thing but i hate how the show just kept retconning shit and pretended they never broke up in season 3, as if a HUGE storyline and one of the most iconic episodes (the happiest place on earth) wasn't about them getting back together? and for me just the concept of the ~universe wanting them to be together~ over and over again is just so fucking lame when they were so toxic. (great video on this here)

they really don't do anything wrong in season 4 either, but a long walk to pittsburgh is honestly so beyond ridiculous LMAO. i know everyone talks about how romantic it is, but i hate it because topanga literally runs away and moves back to philly just for cory. i know they claim it's to finish at john adams too, but i would find that much more believable if they had developed topanga AT ALL outside of cory. we know almost nothing about her home life and they wrote trini out so we never even see any friends of hers! the trend of them fighting and talking down to amy about their love is so fucking stupid too. like you are sixteen. it is fine to love someone and want to be with someone, but amy is right that it's not healthy for them to be as obsessed with each other as they are. like cory literally doesn't know who he is outside of topanga and that's NOT healthy.

oh lordy. s5. i'm not going to get into how much i hate that shawngela (a MUCH happier, more interesting relationship) was reduced to "wanting to be corpanga" in both their intro episode and then fucking gmw, but even the "old married couple" stuff in "chasing angela" at the restaurant is so annoying. "last tango in philly" is one of my fav episodes, but it's the perfect example of how cory can never accept he's wrong. shawn tries to tell him they should stop, and he just tells shawn he knows nothing about relationships and keeps being a dick about topanga and her (obviously gay) friend. but obviously, you're here to hear about how i feel about the cheating. yes, cory cheated and he genuinely liked lauren. for the show to act like he didn't is just gaslighting their audience. and tbh? i think ben and linda cardellini had excellent chemistry (certainly more than he and danielle did at that point . . .) and i think it's completely healthy to date more than one person! it was nice seeing cory be able to open up and bond with someone else, and yes, what he did was cheating. just bc he changed his mind and decided he "couldn't live without topanga" (bless u probably queer writer for what u did w that line :') ) doesn't mean that it didn't happen. topanga had EVERY right to break up with him. it does piss me off that we barely saw topanga's reaction to the breakup when there was a whole ep dedicated to shawn's reaction (and i say that as the #1 shawn stan), but that show hated women lbfr. AND WHY TF WAS IT BAD FOR HER TO KISS JONATHAN JACKSON WHEN SHE AND CORY WERE BROKEN UP????? bc cory can't accept things not going his way and not having control. the "we are a masterpiece" scene makes me so fucking angry omg i cannot

and i mean, bro, the yale shit has been talked about to death, but topanga lawrence going to the same college as straight d-student shawn hunter has got to be the dumbest, most woman-hating shit the show ever did. love can survive long distance if you put the effort in, trust me. (yes i am aware that the show prob didn't want to separate their main couple, but s6 was almost entirely about shawn anyway so????)

then in seasons 6 and 7 we get into the "cory yelling at and publicly humiliating topanga" trend. "undapants" is iconic so i'm not gonna go into that episode (fuck you "take her back to your tornado infested trailer park" line!), but i can name at least seven occasions where cory pressures her into sex. and rider strong is right. it was extremely holier than thou how they constantly made it seemed like corpanga was better than shawngela for not fucking before marriage. like isn't there a line where they call shawngela sluts in s7? the whole honesty bit in "the truth about honesty" (admittedly one of my fav eps) is also just ridiculous bc both of them always get pissed off at the other one for being honest, even in the past. i've seen people get mad at topanga for throwing yale in cory's face but lbr, who didn't see that coming? i guess maybe it's a little weird bc she'd never been resentful about it before, but that's a HUGE thing in their relationship. and yes, it is weird that she's using his razor without his permission but again just the pressuring her to show him her ass is also fucking weird (it's also weird imo that they've been together "their whole lives" but they've only ever kissed, but again, holier than thou bullshit)

one thing i can say about how weak and uninteresting their relationship actually is is that their ENTIRE wedding episode is about shory, bc they are the much more compelling dynamic in cory's life. weirdly enough, i do actually really like cory's vows though?? on a shawn hunter stan note, oblig "that best man speech was bullshit" comment. it's completely normal and healthy to have a best friend outside of your partner? especially when you can't be honest with your partner. god i fucking hate that bullshit. just like how i hate in "seven the hard way/the war" how they portray cory abandoning his best friend/true life partner for topanga AND THEN IN FUCKING GMW THE BAD FUTURE FOR EVERYONE LITERALLY CAME TRUE!!!!!!! omg i will go insane if i think about that for longer than a few seconds.

end of post, but leaving this here

[skull001]

Amy hot takes.

Amy's Sonic Advance gameplay is still THE superior 2-D gameplay for Amy, and the only reason it hasn't been revisited in newer games is because Sega are cowards still stuck with the "one-button" approach that only works for Sonic and Tails.

Even when games like Origins Plus and Sonic Superstars nerfed down Amy to just two moves, she is still more fun to play as than Sonic.

Amy's gameplay in Sonic Advance >> E-122 Psi Amy hacks >> Amy Mania by Troop Sushi/Codename Gamma >> Sonic Supertars >> Origins Plus.

Sonic X's Amy is the full package of how Amy should be like. Even with her flaws, she was one of the most fun characters to watch, and surprisingly got plenty of moments that humanized her and even explore a bit of how she saw her relation with Sonic, proving she isn't deluded about it like her detractors claim.

Giving Amy a toy hammer is one of the best things Sega did, and wish the full potential of what she can do with it was more explored in gameplay terms.

The tarot cards should be only a back-up weapon, never the main one. Story-wise, the can guide her in her quests, providing the player with hints that they have to interpretate.

IDW's characterization of Amy is alright. The issue if anything, is that she, like the game characters, are hardly the focus of the stories, nor are they allowed to be shown in a more personal manner. Don't care if it's because Sega is too strict, or if the writers only use them to get to the characters that THEY really want to write for. Either way, the situation sucks for the game cast.

I think Amy is better suited to be the franchise's co-protagonist alongside Sonic. She is very versatile as she isn't restricted to be by his side 24/7, and as long as she sees Sonic as her prince in shining armor, there really isn't any reason to keep her from growing into a stronger and more beautiful heroine.

I'd like to see a story where Amy tries to help a character find redemption, but is ultimately unable to, betrayed by them even. I think this would be an interesting change of pace because, even if let down by those Amy tries to help, that she still remain kind of heart would be proof of just how strong her heart is.

Superform. Of all characters not named Sonic, Amy's noble and compassionate heart should be more than worthy of awakening that miracle.

Morio Kishimoto really should go all out with exploring more of Sonic and Amy's relation. I think he is one of the few people capable of doing so and pushing the status quo to ot' limit whole keeping things fresh. After the let down of that last Tailstube where Amy's feelings were again the object of mockery from american writers ( especially HIM), I'd more than welcome the more respectful approach from Japanese writers towards the dynamic of these two characters.

Amy IS part of the main cast, and should be treated accordingly to her status as lead female character. That means, not giving away Amy's roles to less important ones. Wether it's things like her compassion (which Tyson Hesse mentions to be unique) or being the most adventure loving of the girls.

Don't make Amy be "mature" by becoming a party pooper who dislikes fun. This is a very outdated stereotype of women that honestly, doesn't apply to the real Amy. She would join the boys in doing dumb things, while still doing girly things with other girls too.

Enough of sad face Amy. Why the hell is Sega afraid to show an Amy that, no matter what, can be a beacon of hope for those who have lost their faith. Further more, why is she not expressing faith anymore on Sonic? I swear ever since Sonic Boom, only Tails is allowed to do this as an artificial means to push the bff thing, in contrast to previous games and even shows, where Amy did this. It saddens me how in Prime, she complains about Sonic not sticking to the plan, while Tails is the one who reminds that he has never let them down. Like, helloooooo? Amy also knows this, so why treat her like she doesn't?

Sonic, Tails, Amy & Knuckles >> Sonic, Tails and Amy >>>>>> Sonic, Tails & Knuckles.

Writers shouldn't be afraid to show/play out Amy's flaws. I like seeing characters make fools of themselves once in a while, as long as they are also allowed to get out of their mess by also playing out their strengths and positive traits.

[une-sanz-pluis]

Catherine of Valois wrote a very affectionate letter to Henry V? (Of course, members of the royal family during that period wrote letters to each other with great affection...)

I'm very sad to say this but this letter doesn't seem to exist. I talked about it briefly in this post but it's worthwhile going into more detail since I don't know of anybody who has discussed this letter and its existence in depth.

Anne Crawford in Letters of the Queens of England says that none of Catherine's letters are known to survive today, which was repeated by Katherine J. Lewis in probably the most academic biography of Catherine to date. There are a few blogposts that reference this letter, as does Amy Licence in Red Roses, but these all reference Agnes Strickland (Licence's text suggests she's quoting the letter but she's actually quoting Strickland's summary of the letter - and incorrectly at that. This mislead me for several years into thinking this letter actually existed.)

This is the entirety of what Strickland says about this letter:

Early in the same spring Katherine wrote her warlike lord a most loving letter, declaring that she earnestly longed to behold him once more. This epistle was answered by an invitation to join him in France.

There is no footnote for this paragraph and, as you can see, there is nothing in the text itself to indicate its source. This doesn't exactly inspire me with confidence since it makes it virtually impossible to track the letter back to a source. The fact that Strickland deals with the letter in such brevity - a single sentence! - and paraphrases, rather than quoting, the letter, adds more doubt.

Strickland's reputation adds even more doubt. She was a Victorian historical writer best known for her Lives of the Queens of England series, which has proved tremendously influential and tremendously unreliable. Strickland's speculations, suppositions and imaginings were often presented as fact despite being unsupported by the historical evidence and these speculations have entered into the accepted narrative about various queens. For instance, Strickland reported how Isabella of France was greatly upset by the fact that Edward II callously gave the wedding presents he received from her father to Piers Gaveston - but while we know Edward sent these gifts to Gaveston, it does not seem like he gifted them to Gaveston but rather had Gaveston take temporary custody of them in his capacity as Edward's regent. We know nothing about Isabella's reaction to this either. Additionally, Strickland popularised and possibly invented the story that Catherine was effectively imprisoned in Bermondsey Abbey when her marriage to Owen Tudor was discovered - we do not know why Catherine entered Bermondsey Abbey, much less whether it was against her will, though we know now that the council knew about her marriage to Owen much earlier than her retirement to Bermondsey. John Carmi Parsons's essay "Eleanor of Castile (1241-1290): Legend and Reality through Seven Centuries" also details the problems with her treatment of Eleanor of Castile and is an interesting commentary on Strickland's own politics that influenced how she wrote about these queens.

Now, in the two examples I mentioned, Strickland seems to have let her speculations/imagination outstrip the evidence rather than completely inventing these narratives out of nothing so it might be unfair to claim she completely invented the letter. However, without a source for the letter, there's no way to know that the letter even existed. It's impossible to tell what Strickland is referencing - I've made the assumption thus far that Strickland is referencing a letter that actually existed but she may have referring to an earlier historian's claim or a reference in a chronicle or a history to Catherine's letter. But Catherine of Valois has not, as far as I'm aware (I would love to be proved wrong!), been the subject of any in-depth historiographical studies which would help us locate an earlier source. It may be possible to locate the source by scouring older histories ourselves but it would no doubt be a huge and potentially fruitless task.

As to your question about the affectionate terms of the letter... assuming the letter did exist, Strickland's discussion of it is so brief and includes so little detail that it's hard to tell anything about it. It is true that most medieval individuals referred to each other in terms that indicated great affection (e.g. John of Gaunt referred to all three of his wives as his "dearest consort" in his will) so it might not actually mean very much beyond convention. If Catherine's phrasing was unusual, it might tell us something of she really felt about Henry - but without the text of the letter, it's impossible to make any assessment.

I want to end by saying that it is possible that the letter, or one like it, existed. Catherine must have written many letters, not just to Henry V, that are not known to survive in the present day and perhaps still exist in private or obscure collections and records. It may seem unlikely but it was only in 2022 that historians and archivists rediscovered new records about one of the most discussed aspects of Geoffrey Chaucer's life in the National Archives.

It also seems that Catherine's life has been the subject of scholarly neglect (that is not to to say that she has not been of interest, only that this interest has almost entirely been limited to her ability to be cast as a romantic heroine or in speculating about her sex life and the "true" paternity of her Tudor children or the treatment of her corpse). It is possible, then, that this scholarly neglect has led to some records of her life going unnoticed. I hope that the rise and growth of queenship studies will continue to allow her life and tenure as queen to be reassessed and new evidence looked for and found.

Sources:

Anne Crawford, ed. Letters of the Queens of England, 1100-1547 (Sutton Publishing 1997)

Katherine J. Lewis, “Katherine of Valois: The Vicissitudes of Reputation”, Later Plantagenet and the Wars of the Roses Consorts: Power, Influence, and Dynasty (eds. J. L. Laynesmith and Elena Woodacre, Palgrave 2023)    

Amy Licence, Red Roses: Blanche of Gaunt to Margaret Beaufort (The History Press, 2017)

John Carmi Parsons, "Eleanor of Castile (1241-1290): Legend and Reality through Seven Centuries", Eleanor of Castile 1290-1990: essays to commemorate the 700th anniversary of her death: 28 November 1290 (Stamford Paul Watkins 1991)

Agnes Strickland, Lives of the Queens of England from the Norman Conquest, vol. 3 (Lea & Blanchard, 1841)

[syrupsyche]

Chapter 1 of "Even If There Are Monsters" Director's Commentary

I wrote a Dracula AU for @/feathraly a few months ago, and for this spooky season I thought I'd do a lil behind-the-scenes look at what was going on in my head as I wrote the fic in the 2-ish months I had :D I'll be publishing a chapter or so a day until Halloween!

Feel free to read the fic here before/as you read the director's commentary :3

To start off: I knew I wanted the fic to read as close to Dracula as possible, and so I decided to stick with the epistolary format. Marius's entries were tough to write, simply because he and Jonathan are quite different tbh. Marius isn't as spontaneous as Jonathan; in the brick he's constantly paralysed at the idea of having to Make A Choice, and so instead I focused as much as I could on Marius's overwhelming desire for Cosette. I feel like he would have done ANYTHING for her, which is the one thing he has in common with Jonathan, and so hopefully that would have realistically spurred him on.

As I mentioned in the footnotes, I replaced the English Pitman shorthand with the French Duployan shorthand. It was made around the 1860s, so a little later than Pitman but still likely to have been picked up by Marius by 1890. As for changing Whitby, England to Cette, France, I mostly just searched for cities in the south of France, where Enjolras was canonically from, and specifically sea-side cities so that the Demeter would be able to wash up ashore later on. If I were a better writer and researcher, I might find somewhere more geographically similar to Whitby but um...I decided Cette would be fine 😭 apologies to any Sète residents for any incredibly inaccurate descriptions of its location.

Speaking of replacements, I had Enjolras as Lucy mostly for the lols :p. I mean sure they have their physical beauty that remains untouched even in death or wtv, but mostly I just liked whumping Enjolras. Though, a very lovely commentor did point out that both certainly had their own fire, and fought as best they could til their respective ends, so I'm glad their similarities were still present!

Prouvaire as the Van Helsing-figure was inspired by a prompt Feathraly had about him teasing Marius for being afraid of horror. Well, Marius certainly is going through The Horrors now, and Prouvaire is only spooking Cosette a little :') I think Prouvaire's canonical kookiness lends itself well to him being a vampire-expert in the story! He would have enjoyed Dracula the actual Book.

One of the main reasons why I had Grantaire be Enjolras's love interest in this fic (other than the fact Feathraly ships it :3) was because I couldn't fathom the thought of Enjolras dying without Grantaire (as per OFPD). So he was at least going to be the Quincey figure, but then I was like...well I hadn't written any proper romantic exR yet, maybe I should let them be happy in one universe (not for long but still), so I had Grantaire be the Arthur figure too! Maybe in a different Dracula AU, Enjolras would have a different Arthur figure...Courfeyrac maybe? He and Grantaire already share a lot of the suitor trio traits between them.

And speaking of sharing traits, it would have been easy to just pick a few of the Amis to feature and then substitute them in but idk....I didn't like the idea of just rewriting the entire novel with name differences. Though the general plot is still the same, I wanted it to feel like it was The Amis and Cosette having to face the horrors of Dracula, rather than just the OG plot of Dracula w/name changes, which is why there are so many "new" scenes written: to establish how most of them were already good friends, to build up the Enjolras/Grantaire relationship, and of course to infodump about vampires. Hope these changes were good!

Additionally, me not wanting to basically just repeat the entire novel unfortunately means I had to cut out a LOT of scenes and characters too. I basically squashed Jonathan's nightmares at Castle Dracula to just a few days, but hopefully it was still enough to make it terrifying for Marius 😭 I also sped up Enjolras's illness, and the Amis's fear re: Marius' silence, as well as cut out the character of Mrs Westenra. I feel bad for that, mostly bc she informs alot of Lucy's own character in the novel, but Enjolras is a whole other person who wouldn't fit into Lucy's dynamics with her mother, so I removed her completely.

Around the end of this chapter was when I knew I had to make this multi-chapt instead of a long one-shot 😔 otherwise /I/ would have lost track where everything was, and I was the author of it! And so I decided to split it where Marius makes his escape from Castle Dracula, and just before the introduction of a new narrator-figure: Combeferre! Now here's where I have to confess that my only reading of Dracula was via Dracula Daily, so I don't even know where the regular chapter splits are in the OG novel, hence my weird cuts for the rest of the fic. But hey, we got to a Shakespearean five-act structure, somehow!

And that's it for Chapter 1!! If anyone has any other stuff they wanna know, feel free to send an ask; I love talking about this fic!

Check back tomorrow for the director's commentary on Chapter 2 <3

[cringecompanionapologist]

Doctor Who Shipping Statistics: Because I'm Bored and I Like This Sort of Thing

So, I decided to see which Doctor Who ships were the most popular in the fandom, not because it matters, but because shipping is fun.

This probably isn't an accurate ranking of which ships are the most popular though, because it's just the amount of fics on Ao3. I'm only going off Ao3 because it's the only fic site where statistics are easy to find, because pairings are tagged and the number of fics with a tag can be counted.

If there's a really popular ship that people don't write fic for, for some reason, it won't show up on my radar, which is fine because this isn't exactly Science. It's fucking around with lists out of curiosity.

So, let's get started!

I started off with just finding the top 10 ships for Doctor Who in general. To no one's surprise, it was completely dominated by New Series pairings. The New Series tends to encourage more shipping and is ongoing, so more people are paying attention to it. Therefore, more fic.

10/Rose

13/Yaz

11/River

Metacrisis 10/Rose (That's the human clone of 10 btw)

9/Rose

12/Clara

Amy/Rory

Doctor (in general)/Rose

Doctor (in general)/River

Doctor (in general)/Master

Only Doctor/Master could be a pairing without any New Series characters, because that would include Classic!Doctor/Classic!Master.

Also, you might notice a lot of Rose. Get used to that. She's inescapable.

Anyway, I decided to filter the search to only E-Rated fics to see if there was a major difference when smut was involved. This didn't actually change very much:

10/Rose

13/Yaz

Doctor/Master (the Master comes up a lot more on the smut list lol)

12/Clara

Metacrisis 10/Rose

9/Rose

13/Dhawan!Master

10/Simm!Master

10/Jack (of course he'd show up more on the smut list)

11/River

What this reveals is that people are more interested in Doctor/Master smut than Doctor/Master romance, which honestly makes a lot of sense. The smut list is also slightly less het than the overall list. Slash fans appear to be the horniest of shippers. As a slash smut writer/enthusiast, I can't really protest.

But, what about Classic Who? I was more interested in Classic than New, so I looked at fics tagged Doctor Who (1963) specifically, instead of Doctor Who in general. Most Classic Who fics are tagged this way, so you'll find more Classic Who there. Here's the results:

Doctor/Master

2/Jamie

10/Rose (Yes, there's still new stuff in hear and of course it's Rose)

3/Delgado!Master

Tegan/Nyssa

4/Sarah Jane

7 and Ace (Notice the and. Platonic relationships get tagged too)

Ian/Barbara

6/Peri

5/Ainley!Master

And I did an E-Rated Only list for Doctor Who (1963) as well:

Doctor/Master

6/Peri (They seem to be more popular as smut than anything else)

3/Delgado!Master

5/Ainley!Master

2/Jamie

Tegan/Nyssa

5/Tegan (I see a lot of fics for this ship and feel strangely jealous...)

10/Simm!Master (A new series ship that isn't 10/Rose?!)

Mel/Ace

7/Ace (No and this time. They get shipped sometimes.)

Once again, Doctor/Master gets a lot of smut. Also, I think this is the first list to not include 10/Rose :)

Look, I don't hate 10/Rose. I'm pretty indifferent towards 10/Rose. Rose is nowhere near my favorite companion, but nowhere near my least favorite either. I just get a bit tired of seeing her absolutely everywhere.

I think decided to check for fics tagged with each Classic Doctor to see who they get paired with the most. I'll list every character who they're shipped with in the top 10.

First Doctor: Rose

There are at least 3 separate fics about Rose fucking every incarnation of the Doctor. If it was River or Jack, I probably wouldn't care, but Rose is not the Doctor's One True Love. And least River can claim dibs on having married an incarnation and Jack is Jack. This is what I mean about seeing her everywhere. Rose is often treated like the most important companion in the history of the show when she's just as important as any other companion. There's probably reason for this mindset that I could go into, but I'd like to finish my list first.

I did the E-Rated Only thing for each Doctor as well. Yes, for all of them. I'm curious and I fear no smut.

First Doctor (E): Rose, Barbara (there are at least 2 1/Barbara fics)

Second Doctor: Jamie

E-Rated Only doesn't change that. Fics tagged with the Second Doctor still contain a lot of Rose Ships, but 2 isn't emphasized quite as much. 2/Jamie is basically THE Second Doctor ship.

Third Doctor: Delgado!Master, Brigadier, Jo, Sarah Jane

E-Rated Only is the same characters in a different order

Third Doctor (E): Delgado!Master, Jo, Brigadier, Sarah Jane

Jo gets more smut than the Brig.

Fourth Doctor: Sarah Jane, Romana II, Sarah Jane/Harry, Rose, Ainley!Master

The Rose Fucks Everyone fics strike again! Also, we get our first OT3 with 4/Sarah Jane/Harry.

Fourth Doctor (E): Sarah Jane, Leela, Rose

Of course Leela would get more smut. I'm surprised with the lack of Romana though. Both Romanas are gorgeous and 4/Romana is the closest to a canon Doctor/Companion ship we get in Classic Who. Maybe it's a Time Lord Thing.

Okay, on to the Fifth.

Fifth Doctor: Ainley!Master, Tegan, Turlough, Nyssa, Rose

Yes, 5/Tegan is more popular than 5/Turlough right now. I'm fine really. 5/Master being at the top of the list is kind of what I'd expected though.

Fifth Doctor (E): Ainley!Master, Tegan, Turlough, Nyssa, Simm!Master, 6

Unlike most Classic Doctors, 5 is Young and Pretty, so he reminds people of 10 and gets porn with 10's Master. Also, Tegan is still ahead of Turlough.

Shipping wars are mostly bad, especially when people try to claim a moral high ground for their ship. I don't want to get involved in any hostilities just because my ship isn't as popular as another ship.

However, maybe encouraging some friendly competition by saying "more 5/Turlough fic should be written" wouldn't be going too far. If you ship 5/Turlough and write fanfiction, write a 5/Turlough fic because winning is fun.

Anyway, how about the Sixth Doctor?

Sixth Doctor: Peri, Ainley!Master, Rose

Sixth Doctor (E): Peri, Ainley!Master, Mel, 5, Charley, Rose

Our first Big Finish companion! Also, I was so distracted by shipping jealousy with 5 that I forgot to mention the selfcest. I think one person wrote a bunch of 5/6 smut fics.

Seventh Doctor: Ace, Ainley!Master

Ace was 7's definitive companion, so if people want to ship him with someone, I'm guessing she's the obvious choice. I personally see 7 as the one incarnation I just can't pair with anyone, but People Can Do Whatever They Want Forever.

That includes writing smut! The E-Rated Only round is the same two pairings in the same order.

Lastly, we get the Eighth Doctor. He's always interesting in terms of fandom because his televised run was one movie. Anyone who's familiar with him has had to see out audios and novels. The audios and the novels each of their own Definitive Eighth Doctor Companion.

But they somehow all lose to fucking Rose again!

Eighth Doctor: Rose, Charley, Fitz, Grace

The three Not Roses can all be explained. Charley is the Definitive BF Eighth Doctor Companion and the Big Finish audios are the most popular Eighth Doctor stories, especially since they're still ongoing in some form. The EDA novels ended around the time the new series began, so Fitz isn't as well-known as Charley. But, in the book version of the Eighth Doctor's adventures, Fitz is basically 8's Jamie. He's a guy who stays with him forever and is more prominent than the female companions of the era.

As for Grace, she's the only onscreen Eighth Doctor companion and they kiss.

The Eighth Doctor was the first Doctor to really be portrayed romantically. 1 got a one-shot love interest and the first four classic Doctors were allowed to flirt with someone from time to time. The Doctor wasn't a traditional male lead and he didn't have long-term love interests because no one writing him was really into that. It wasn't until the 1980s that Doctor romances were flat out banned. They made JNT nervous.

This led to a period of time where not only did the Doctor not get love interests, but it had to be emphasized that Doctor Who Has Never Fucked Ever. Not even for reproduction. The 20th anniversary came with a Radio Times short story establishing that Susan was adopted. Along with that, when filming The Five Doctors, Carol Ann Ford was told not to call the Doctor "grandfather", because that might make people think the Doctor had sex at some point. Ford laughed at the whole thing and was allowed, for continuity's sake, to call the Doctor "grandfather" anyway.

There's nothing inherently wrong with interpreting the Doctor as aroace, or Not Having Fucked Ever and Susan being adopted. It just shouldn't be something treated as Sacred Lore That the Americans Ruined With Their Stupid Movie. The rule against the Doctor having love interests was made by a producer that the same fans who claim that this rule is sacred usually fucking hate.

Doctor Who fucks however much you want him to.

But, because 8 was allowed to have love interests, 8/Charley, 8/Fitz, and 8/Grace are all varying levels of canon. I haven't listened to much of 8's BF stuff yet, but from what I can tell, 8/Charley was mostly one-sided, but might've not been. 8/Fitz wasn't as directly discussed in-universe and came across as Canon in All But Name.

We got sidetracked. Here's the E-Rated Only thing:

Eighth Doctor (E): Rose, Charley, Fitz, Roberts!Master, Jacobi!Master

Of course there's Master smut. This is an established pattern.

Since we've already gotten sidetracked, I'd also like to say a bit more about Rose.

I think that for fans that got into the show at any time other than right as the new series began, it's hard to see why Rose is not only super popular, but still dominant in fandom, appearing in more Ao3 fics than any incarnation of the Doctor. The thing is, Rose was the first companion for a lot of people and her introduction worked differently than similar first companions.

If you started watching the classic or new series at any point but the very beginning, someone had probably already told you that companions come and go. No individual companion is a vital component of the show. You might get really attached to Sarah Jane, but she leaves and the show continues without her. This will happen to every companion.

The only exceptions to this were people starting at the beginning of a series, before any companions had left yet. This makes Susan/Ian/Barbara as a team similar to Rose as existing before the show could exist without them. But, there's three of them and only one Rose.

There's also the way their introductions are set up. Both An Unearthly Child and Rose (the episode) start with the companions and introduce the Doctor through their eyes. They're normal people in present day London who walk into something strange. But, there's a certain even distribution between characters in An Unearthly Child. The entire show is named for the Doctor, the first episode is named for Susan, but Ian and Barbara are the real main characters.

But, though Doctor Who is still named after the Doctor, the first story is called Rose and is about Rose. To someone unfamiliar with the classic series, the show has established Rose as the main character of Doctor Who, the center of the show's universe. The idea that there could be Doctor Who without Rose doesn't seem to add up.

In Series 2, School Reunion is the point where Rose (and the new audience along with her) learns that the Doctor traveled with humans before her. She's traveled with Jack, so she knows that other companions can happen, but she thought she was the first, the special human the Doctor bonded with. She's special, but only because all of the Doctor's companions are special. She's part of a group of special people.

While the classic series audience would've recognized Sarah Jane and enjoyed seeing her again, the new audience would've learned that the Doctor had companions before Rose at all. You could swap Sarah Jane with a completely original character that the Doctor recognizes as a former companion, and the same point would be made.

So, School Reunion attempted to do some damage control. Rose was leaving at the end of the season and establishing that she wasn't the first companion would make it clear that this would be a normal part of the show. Doctor Who would go on without Rose.

But, the show was incapable of leaving it there. After a Big Dramatic Exit, Rose haunted the show longer than any companion had before, new series companions included. Until Jack returns in Utopia, the Doctor doesn't seem that upset over losing him. The show moved on. But, Series 3 has the Doctor still not over Rose, causing him to be a dick to Martha. Audience members that warmed up to Martha will be mad at the Doctor now and audience members still upset over Rose will turn on Martha because the Doctor does.

Series 4 brings Rose back and gives her a second send-off, once again establishing that the show can't let Rose go. It wasn't until the change of showrunner that Rose was allowed to be just another companion.

This was sort of the same thing that happened when 10 regenerated. The show wouldn't let the characters go, so audiences that'd grown attached refused to let go either, screwing over the next in line. Rose is treated as the Most Important Companion because the show wouldn't let her go, when the show normally lets companions go.

So, that's why Rose is shipped with every Doctor and is inescapable. Once again, I don't dislike Rose. I just find it annoying when she's given special treatment, though from everything I've just said, I know why. I started watching Doctor Who right before the 50th anniversary, almost exactly a decade ago, so when I starting watching the show on Netflix, I saw how many seasons there were and knew that things changed a lot. When my friends talked about the show, it was all 11th Doctor stuff, but I already knew that he was on his way out. I consider 12 to be My Doctor because he was the first Doctor I experienced live, basically. He showed up around the same time I did.

Watching the 1st Doctor's episodes for the first time while overhearing multiple hissy fits over the new Doctor being "too old" was an experience.

Okay, I've rambled this thing to death. Hope we all learned something.

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

AMY ROSE (SONIC THE HEDGEHOG)

1.) Amy’s characterisation has experienced several generations of misogyny, right from her genesis: She was designed as a girlfriend, but it eas then decided they didn’t want Sonic to have a girlfriend. First instance she’s a damsel in distress that he resents for being there and crushing on him, and this is echoed in the comics. She is then presented as pathetic, chasing and stalkerish, as well as sidelined in the games in favour of other characters despite being very strong. Her stories are often those with the most emotional weight, but the reading is coloured by other characters underestimating her importance there. She then enters a pushy and blind era where she becomes a mockery of her past self. A universe reset rebranded her as a feminist, but that often comes off as a bit pickme, and they frequently failed to hold her femininity and also combat capabilities in hand at once. She is finally getting a bit more stable characterisation and treated a bit better, but I still don’t trust the writers with her. Ultimately, it often felt like the creators didn’t like her, and only had her there because they were made to; and that sucked as a little girl sonic fan.

2.) She started out as the token Girl One in a 90’s property, and her first appearance was as a damsel in distress, which isn’t great to begin with, and she wasn’t playable for a long-ass time outside of spinoffs. The Sonic Adventure games redesigned her, made her playable, let her fight back against her would-be kidnappers, and gave her a major role in saving the world by letting Shadow talk to someone not game with destroying it. Then from Sonic Heroes to Sonic and the Black Knight, and the anime Sonic X, her character was reduced to ‘hehe funny obsessed fangirl is obsessed’ a lot of the time, losing her compassion and a good deal of her social awareness. In Sonic 06, she literally said that she’d sacrifice the rest of the world for Sonic, which, my girl would NEVER in SA2. The Archie comics weren’t kind to her either, as their explanation for the redesign was that Amy wished to become older, so they aged up her body, BUT NOT HER MIND EW EW EW. I’m sure there are other crimes the Archie comics did to her, but that’s not my knowledge base. THEN the writers tried to backpedal in the early 2010’s, but by attempting to undo all the 'crazy’, they took out Amy’s drive and convictions (Sonic Lost World just letting Amy sit and watch Sonic do all the work my beloathed). The Sonic Boom spinoff series tried to pivot and make their version of her a girlboss, but Rise of Lyric was SO BAD. Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice made an alternate version of her a damsel in distress, again, which while technically true to Amy’s roots, does not fit her Boom characterization AT ALL. The Sonic Boom cartoon was a screwball comedy, and they at least lampshaded a lot of Amy’s previous writing problems, but they didn’t give her much to do either, mainly making her 'the sensible one’ whenever Sonic wasn’t available for deadpan responses. They’ve been doing a bit better lately, with Amy usually involved in world-saving matters, and she was prominently featured in Sonic Frontiers, even if she was trapped in Cyberspace. The IDW comics are also treating her wonderfully, from what I’ve seen.

3.) when she was created as a character, she was made solely to be sonic’s love interest. in sonic adventure, they tried to rewrite her and flesh out her character more by making her realize she’s more than her crush on sonic and she finally realizes she’s strong enough to do things without him. sonic team IMMEDIATELY undid that in sonic heroes which came out soon after. they made her entire character in that game obsessed with sonic and based her entire story around him. she was obsessed with him unhealthily in that game because god forbid team sonic let’s a strong female character exist. many of the sonic games took away her quality of being strong without sonic by writing her to only be obsessed with him and not do anything without him. in many modern games, she’s improved more, but misogyny has really screwed her over as a character.

ABBIE MILLS (SLEEPY HOLLOW) (CW: Racism)

1.) Abbie starts out as one of the two protagonists of the show, only to get almost entirely sidelined as early as season 2, getting less and less screen time and allowed no relationships, either platonic or romantic, while the other lead Ichabod Crane has a seemingly infinite amount of them. It got bad enough that her actor wanted to leave the show, which they did by having her sacrifice her soul in the season 3 finale for the male lead to live, and then they ended the show after season 4 anyway, because guess what, it’s a bad idea to entirely sideline and eventually kill off one of your leads!

2.) She was killed by the narrative to advance her white male co-protagonist’s plotline and I’m still mad about it, Abbie deserved so much better. This is an example of racism in the narrative too and it extended to the production of the show, see news coverage:

3.) Look, I only watched the first season but they killed her off the show SHE was a co lead of!! Misogyny AND racism, all rolled into one. I remember seeing the fan reactions and I was so mad on their behalfs. They wrote her off her own show and from what I recall, gave her less and less screentime leading up to that. Truly, she deserved so much better and I will always be upset by this.

[ctrl-lupin]

OK let me rephrase that

Basically I wanted to know your opinions on the secondary characters that were big focuses from each show

Rebecca from Part 4

Ami From Part 5

And Sherlock Holmes from 6

Does that help clear things up?

Sorry for the time this took! I've had a lot of stuff going on lately.

Rebecca: I think she's a very fun and refreshing character, the fact that she's a thief and goes toe-to-toe with Lupin on some heists is really cool. It's nice to see a different method of thieving too. I like the fact that she's both an ally and an antagonist at the same time; she's friendly but she does pose challenges. Kind of like Fujiko but in a different way. On that topic, it's also refreshing to have another long-term female character other than Fujiko; because Fujiko's been The Woman of the series and this tends to be a restrictive role.

Ami: She deserved so much better from the writers. Her character had a lot of potential, even if she was very steeped in the emo hacker cliché; but that crush on Lupin was just... yikes. That was completely unnecessary and added literally nothing to the plot or to her character. She could have admired him like a big brother, or hell! like a father figure, that would have made a lot of sense with her character arc. Oh well. I guess it's up to fic writers to do her justice.

Sherlock Holmes: Eh. An interesting take on this character but he had way too much screentime. I really didn't like the first arc of Part 6 so I don't really have much to say on it or on Holmes himself.

Bonus that no one asked for:

Sebastian Moran: Do you have any idea how LOUD I yelled when he showed up? Sebastian Moran (BBC Sherlock MorMor fandom version) is the very reason I got into Lupin III in the first place. He's the reason I instantly imprinted on Jigen like a baby duckling. I told my best friend about it and her reaction was "Jigen and Moran in the same episode?? Your house is still standing? You didn't spontaneously combust?" Only good element of Part 6 arc 1 imo (that and Jigen Accidentally Adopts A Middle-Schooler).

[isobelleposts]

What I’ve Been Watching This Year

by Isobelle Cruz [April 13, 2023]

March has passed and I figure it’s too late to follow through with a post on the female directors I love, so instead, here’s a short list of the shows and films I’ve been watching this year in no specific order.

Beef (2023)

Directed by Lee Sung Jin

My most recent and favorite watch…lo and behold, Beef. A show about two extremely vulnerable and flawed people masking themselves through pride and borderline pettiness. Beef has it all from road rage, heist, and arson, to child abduction.

The Netflix Original starring Ali Wong and Steven Yeung features some of the most lonely characters I’ve seen on film. Danny Cho is a struggling self-proclaimed contractor that works every opportunity he’s given to keep him and his brother afloat while also standing by his promise to buy their parents a house in Los Angeles. With all of that weight at hand, Danny resorts to attempts at suicide and at the perfect time, meets Amy Lau—a woman just as lonely, struggling, and desperate at life as Danny.

But I promise you, it is not as touching as I made it out to be.

Danny and Amy take turns attacking each other after a road rage incident—pissing in Amy’s bathroom floor, vandalizing Danny’s truck, breaking into her house, fucking his brother, kidnapping her daughter—it never seems to end. … Until it does, in the middle of nowhere. The final episode of Danny and Amy in the Deserts reminded me of animals in the wild, a representation of what humans are in the grand scheme of it all. Beef is a must-watch for the hot-tempered, prideful Asians out there who are looking to see themselves on screen

Aftersun (2022)

Directed by Charlotte Wells

Aftersun was an experience. It was uneventful yet somehow spoke so much to me about the joys I’ve been holding myself back from and continue to do. I’d say that Aftersun is so well-loved because of how much it’s able to connect with its audience, despite their varying experiences in life.

It reminded me so much of a trip I had gone on with my father when I was about the same age as Sophie. It’s happened, it’s passed, and I can’t say it really made a drastic impact on my life. But it was there. It is now a memory—which is exactly what the film was. Instead of showing a major turning point in the protagonist’s life, it showed a memory, and it was enough for me to love.

Daisy Jones & the Six (2023)

Directed by James Ponsoldt, Nzingha Stewart, and Will Graham

Let me start off by saying how rich the production for Daisy Jones & the Six was, firstly through their music. I still remember when I first got my hands on the book and searched the band on Spotify, knowing very well that no results would come up, but now there they are—-with 3 million monthly listeners and 24 songs released.

Although the production and marketing went beyond my expectations, the writing seemed to lack, unable to show depth and establish the characters’ relationships with each other. The show went straight to the point, as though the writers had been scared of losing the audience’s attention by putting more focus on the little things, which I would doubt. It lacked the craziness that was found in the book. It lacked the drugs, women, fans, and the skyrocketing feel of their career that were always present in Reed’s works.

Nonetheless, these things never dragged down my rating of the show. It was interesting to finally see what Daisy and Billy’s chemistry looked like on screen and hear their lyrics come to life, which were, oh, so difficult to read on paper. Amazon Prime did its job to reach DJATS fans’ expectations and to entertain newcomers to the fictional band. — Let’s just hope Netflix does the same for Evelyn Hugo.

Suzume (2023)

Directed by Makoto Shinkai

My first anime experience in the cinema. Suzume’s soundtrack blasting from the speakers and Makoto Shinkai’s breathtaking art displayed before me brought this urge to jump through the screen. The atmosphere his art carried through the room was something I wish I could do with my own works.

Throughout the whole watch, it didn’t come to me that this was a love story between two people. There was that obvious crush Suzume had on Sōta, but it surprises me to hear a few people refer to this film as romance. It was moreover an emotional adventure, shining light on the lost souls that have made inches of the world alive.

My favorite scene, before Sōta is turned into a keystone, wherein Tokyo is shown in slow-motion with people going through their everyday lives—eating, shopping, and commuting–-while not knowing their world was on the brink of end, made me ponder of the unseen things that make life the way it is. Everything that has brought everyone to where they are.

There had been times when Suzume and Sōta would prepare to lock up a door once again and I’d think to myself, when will this end? It was as though listening to a song that would repeat the same line over and over again, but besides that, the pacing was captivating---had my eyes stuck to the screen the whole time.

Suzume is exactly what you would expect from Makoto Shinkai. Beautiful art, music, and an okay story.

Babylon (2023)

Directed by Damien Chazelle

Ask me if I’m tired of watching films set in Hollywood and I would likely say yes. But that doesn’t stop me from doing just so over and over again. It surprised me to see how negative the reviews on Babylon have been and almost allowed myself to be swayed by them, but thankfully, had chosen otherwise.

Although I do see where some of the negativity comes from.

The film has been branded as “ Chazelle’s attempt to pander to the Academy for another best pic nomination” by audiences, and as yet another film showing off the lavish and wild lives of Hollywood. Inequality, drugs, women, abuse, and everything. What’s new?

Well, I don’t really care about what’s new or what makes Babylon a poorly-made knockoff of Cinema Paradiso or Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Chazelle was able to keep me entertained and laughing throughout its 3-hour duration, and sometimes it gets really tiring trying to make cinema a technical experience. I can proudly say (shaking as I type this) that I loved Babylon.

[zahri-melitor]

Ok, I have now mopped up every extraneous storyline in my reread and I HAVE to start War Drums and War Games (and then I’ll do Identity Crisis afterwards, because goddamn is 2004 the start of the Grim Times)

Last thing I finished today was Nightwing #91-#95, so you know, I have been having some thoughts about Devin Grayson as a writer.

I’m very fond of Devin Grayson’s run on Gotham Knights, putting aside #16-17 and #20-21, the four issues focused on Dick Grayson only. I…don’t think that’s unusual; I think it shows the issue at hand.

I don’t think she’s a bad comics writer. She has objectively written clever, interesting comics that I have enjoyed reading. Most people would say GK Transference and 24/7 are great comic stories. After some thought, I think the issue for many DC fans is primarily that Dick Grayson is her all time fave but her headcanons about Dick long since departed from what other writers were doing with the character and she’s largely a fan of the secret Dick Grayson who lives in her head. And then she was handed the Dick Grayson book to write. It was a situation doomed to cause issues.

I’m not having a go at anyone for having “secret better version of a character who lives in your head”, we’ve all fallen foul to it on occasion. But the test case for whether letting someone who feels this way about a character write their comics is “are the fandom willing to go along with this”. Sometimes they are (please see Wally West’s backstory and supporting cast reappearing by sheer stubbornness of the fans and a handful of writers). Sometimes you’ve just pissed off your entire fandom while writing a whump storyline because you want to torture your favourite before getting to the catharsis (Devin Grayson).

Heck, if you look at what was the probable pitch for Grayson’s run up to #95, it’s…just a break the cutie whump run. Dick’s life falls apart, orchestrated by one of his nemeses, as his entire rogues gallery get the chance to attack him. We’ve all read this before. It’s the plot of Knightfall. The Maxine Michaels plot is supposed to be a Vicky Vale/Vesper Fairchild style story. We’ve seen these stories work and enjoyed them; the major difference is that they had resolutions. Devin Grayson never got to the redemption/catharsis bit of the story. I don’t know why.

The EXECUTION of the whump run however went far too hard in killing off supporting cast members and became egregious in parts (no really, why are we blowing up Haly’s Circus. And the apartment block. Why) and then, you know, #93-95 happened. But the starting idea wasn’t necessarily bad.

There’s even two issues in Grayson’s run up to #95 that I really like (#76 and #81) and I think that entirely comes down to the fact the storytelling picks up immediately when Devin Grayson is focusing on a character OTHER than Dick (Amy Rohrbach and Cass, respectively).

The issue isn’t so much “Devin Grayson is a bad writer”. The issue is that “Devin Grayson should not have been allowed to be Dick Grayson’s primary writer” and she should instead have been given books about characters she’s less obsessed with and worked out her desires to make her fave suffer by writing more fanfic.