#Doug is certainly happy about it :)

[commsroom]

when it comes down to it, however much i think about eiffel's memory, whatever my reasoning might be, i think there's a much simpler core explanation for why i feel the way i do. i've said before that, if eiffel did regain his memory, i would want it to happen through 'an eiffel version of change of mind' i.e. a personal inner journey where the narrative he tells himself amounts to some greater reminder, self-confrontation, and self-realization. and that's just it:

eiffel regaining his memory wouldn't be a cop out to me for the same reason that lovelace not actually dying isn't a cop out: it's not just a story beat, it's a catalyst for character development & a better understanding of lovelace as a person. eiffel has spent his whole life trying not to be the person he is, and i just don't feel wolf 359 is the type of story to let him off the hook for that, when the ending is as much about accountability (to ourselves and to others and all the ways those responsibilities overlap) as it is about hope. i think there are ways you could argue that eiffel can still be eiffel without regaining his memory, but i think i've convinced myself that the symbolic resurrection / self-confrontation and acceptance of all the people he's been in the past, in order to move forward, is the more compelling option, especially for what it parallels, and the "eiffel is still eiffel" part is non-negotiable. it doesn't even feel like a question to me.

(and it makes the most sense to me in the context of eiffel's survivor's guilt - "of course i was fine. the driver's always fine." - and tendency towards a type of self-sacrifice and self-punishment that the show ultimately denies him / that doesn't address his real problem. he thinks sacrificing himself for the people he cares about will make up for something, but it won't. having him make that sacrifice and then keep living and keep being doug eiffel, with everything that means, feels like the natural extension of constructive criticism.)

in another story, or in a more theoretical context, there are all kinds of questions you could ask about whether eiffel's memory loss means he's a different person now, but in this case... i think it's better understood in narrative terms and what it represents for him as a character than any broader philosophical conclusion about the nature of the self and human consciousness. (and it is in no way as absolute as people sometimes behave like it is, considering he still has a concept of, like... everything. but that's a whole other topic of discussion.) most importantly, i just don't believe wolf 359 is a story about ideas as much as it is a story about people, these people, and in order to (hypothetically) continue to tell a story about doug eiffel, well. he has to still be doug eiffel. one way or another.

[dullahandyke]

Sidenote I was never her biggest fan but whenever I see someone talk abt dahlia hawthorne as if she's some evil seductress who breaks hearts for fun I feel the intense urge to hit them with hammers. Fucker can you read????

[sysig]

The time for regrets has long passed (Patreon)

[coraniaid]

OK, so, for context:

I don't like Agent Riley Finn, at all. He is one of my least favorite characters in Buffy, by quite some distance. I hated him even before the events of Season 5, and I only continued to hate him afterwards. I think the show would be significantly improved if his character had never been introduced. I think Whedon's idea that Buffy and Riley represent the show's one "happy and healthy relationship" is nonsensical.

I don't like As You Were. It's arguably Doug Petrie's worst episode (well, worst so far, anyway: let's not forgive him for his Season 7 episodes just yet).

I don't even really like Season 6 much (certainly not as much as so many people on Tumblr pretend to do). I think the concept of the season is very good but the execution is often decidedly lacking. It is not a season I often feel the urge to rewatch.

But, that being said, I'll confess it is somewhat bizarre to see so many people reblogging a post that says As You Were would have been improved if Riley showed up contrite and humble and openly ashamed of his [yes, unquestionably terrible and indefensible] actions in Season 5, or that the episode is one last attempt by the writers to force the audience to like him. To me, that is just ... obviously not true. I don't even see how it could be true.

As You Were is barely about Riley Finn at all. It's about Buffy. Specifically it's about what most of Season 6 is about: Buffy being miserable and depressed, struggling with bills and a soul-crushing mininum wage job, resenting her friends for having brought her back to life, romanticizing her past and (wrongly) convinced that she somehow 'came back wrong'. Riley is only in the episode to further that aim.

So, yes, the episode ignores all of Riley's [very real, very irritating, very hard to forgive] flaws and past failings and instead presents him as a dashing and attractive ex-boyfriend; as the perfect guy who somehow got away. Yes, it focuses on how much Buffy's own fortunes have declined since they broke up. Yes, Buffy is meant to find him attractive and be sad that he's married to somebody else already. Yes, the show deliberately sets up Riley as being competent and put together and high status while Buffy herself is none of these things. But this isn't because the writers are somehow trying to trick you into liking Riley (it would obviously be a very stupid and ineffective way to do that if it were! it demonstrably doesn't actually make anybody who didn't like Riley change their mind! why assume that it is trying to?). It is because this is how Buffy sees things herself.

The episode is about Buffy first, and Riley ..., not even third. He is a plot device. Just as in Season 3's Gingerbread (when Joyce is possessed and tries to burn Buffy at the stake as part of her campaign to cleanse Sunnydale of all things supernatural), or Helpless (when Giles puts his loyalty to the Council above Buffy's own safety and well-being), in As You Were Riley exists primarily to tell us something about Buffy. In Season 3, Buffy was afraid that being a Slayer would ruin her relationship with her mother and that Giles didn't really want to be the replacement father figure she clearly wanted him to be, and those episodes have her fears come true. Both Joyce and Giles act in pretty repellent (and arguably out-of-character) ways in their respective episodes, but those actions are justified in that they are consistent with Buffy's own view of the world. You could replace both of them with nightmare versions of their characters (like Hank Summers in Season 1's Nightmares) and both episodes would play out the same way (and have the same glaring lack of follow-up in later episodes).

So too in As You Were. The writers are probably more sympathetic to Riley than the average Tumblr user in 2024, but they don't particularly care if you like Riley or not. He's not been in the show for a year and after this he's never going to be in it again. This isn't about him. What is important is that Buffy herself misses Riley and her relationship with him: not necessarily because Riley was so great [again, he wasn't: Riley sucks] but because he's a part of her older life that she wishes she could go back to. A time when she had a 'normal' relationship and was still in college (and doing well academically!) and her mom was still alive and things seemed to be going well for her. Because she misses the version of Buffy that she used to be. (Who exactly are we supposed to think the 'you' of As You Were refers to? I don't think it's Agent Finn...)

Sure, I'd personally think better of Riley Finn as a person if he showed up looking sheepish and told Buffy he was sorry for how badly he behaved in Season 5 and he said he'd fund all her future bills and help her get back into college before dedicating the rest of his life to campaigning against both missionary work and US-backed (para)military actions in South and Central America. I'd think better of Joyce if she'd ignored the two demon kids only she could see and supported her real daughter better, too. Or of Giles if he hadn't ever gone along with the plan of hypnotizing and drugging a teenage girl he'd sworn to take care of and protect and who, less than a year earlier, he'd promised his unconditional "support and respect".

But Riley being a decent human being and making Buffy feel better about herself wouldn't make As You Were a "better" episode. It would make it a completely different episode, one that belonged in a completely different season. It would make it something that was utterly at odds, tonally and thematically, with the version of Season 6 that actually exists. This is not a season where nice things happen to Buffy, and if you think it should be I honestly don't think you like the story the season is trying to tell very much.

As You Were is not primarily "the episode where Riley comes back" (in which the writers then decided to talk about how great Riley was with the aim of making the fans like him while Buffy ends up feeling like shit and being embarrassed about how her own life is going as some sort of collateral damage). It is an episode where Buffy continues to feel like shit and be embarrased about how badly her life is going (and, in order to further Buffy's arc, this time Riley is there too to make her feel worse).

Do I think that it works to have Riley fill the role he does in this episode? Well, no, not really. Like I said at the top of this post, I don't like Riley and I don't enjoy seeing him on my television screen. Into The Woods' awful ending makes me pretty angry and it is a shame we never got any pushback on the idea that Buffy "letting Riley go" was a mistake. Riley wasn't ever the perfect boyfriend As You Were has Buffy remember him as. This isn't one of the better episodes of Season 6. But an improved version of the episode wouldn't have Riley act like a better person. That more palatable, more fan-friendly version of Riley just isn't compatible with the story the show is telling. An improved version of the episode that was still trying to tell the same fundamental story wouldn't have Riley Finn in it at all.

[rainbow-nerdss]

Hi Sorcha!! So many great options to choose from 😁. I think I'm gonna go with...

👧👧👧👧👧

🤫🤫🤫🤫🤫

😎😎😎😎😎

Happy writing! 🥰🩷

Thank you Maggie!!

here we go 😁

15 sentences for dad!buck 👧

“Someone looks chipper,” Chim says, clapping Buck on the back as he walks into the locker room. “Maddie didn’t tell you?” Buck asks. He’d called her, almost as soon as Róisín left, and told her everything.  “Oh, I was in the room while you two talked. I’m happy for you, dad.” Even in Chim’s playful, cheering tone, Buck feels a rush of delight at the word.  Dad.  He gets to be that, now. “Maddie said it was unexpected, though?” Chim prompts, sitting down to take off his shoes.  “Yeah. We were just playing, and she brought up not having a dad—totally out of the blue, and… Róisín gave me the go-ahead.” “That must’ve been hard for her,” Hen muses. “I think it was.” Buck folds his arms. “I get it, you know? She’s done good, on her own. Fia didn’t need a dad, but—” “But you’re good for her,” Hen finishes the sentence for him, and Buck ducks his head. 

15 for secret relationship 🤫

Bobby watches carefully as their shift progresses. Buck doesn’t spend all that much time on his phone, which is unusual for him. Usually, when he’s dating someone, he’s constantly texting them, but he seems to be even more glued to Eddie’s side than usual. Bobby isn’t being nosy—that’s what he tells himself. He’s just looking out for Buck. He wants to make sure this new guy, whoever it is, is someone who isn’t going to hurt him.  “Hey, Buck?” Bobby asks, approaching the couch where Buck and Eddie are sitting together. They both look up with twin expressions of feigned innocence.  “Yeah, Cap?”  “Can we talk?” Buck looks back at Eddie, then shakes his head. “Sure. Yeah, we can talk.” They sit at the kitchen island, just far away from the others to have a hint of privacy, without drawing attention to it.  Bobby clasps his hand together, taking in the way Buck is sitting. He certainly looks like he’s happy in whatever relationship he’s in, but Bobby can’t say he loves the secrecy. 

and 15 for bodyguard! 😎

“Not sure I can really speak on it, considering I’m the reason he got hurt in the first place,” he says. “Keep stirring, Buck,” Bobby reminds him. “That’s not true. Doug is the only person responsible for that.” “I know.” Buck picks the spatula up again, and continues stirring the onions. “I know it’s not my fault, but I still don’t want to influence his decision—it should be his decision, right?” “It should be, yes. That doesn’t mean you don’t get to have thoughts and feelings about it. Do you want him to go back to bodyguard work?” Buck closes his eyes, and actually thinks about it for the first time. He thinks about Eddie, working with another wealthy, entitled jerk. He thinks of how Eddie had acted during the first days  of working with him, the stiff way he held himself, the way he kept everything so close to the chest.  Looking back, knowing Eddie as he does now—he’d been unhappy.  “I want him to be happy. I want him to do what he loves. I don’t know whether he loves personal security.”

Thanks again, it's great to get to work on bodyguard again, honestly! I am so close to finishing it!! ❤️

[cal-daisies-and-briars]

Fic Update: go and kill, go and die

Happy Saturday! I spent a long day doing dog stuff. But because of some very large emoji asks, here's chapter five!

Summary:

Buck is reunited with his sister, and makes a new friend.

Snippet:

He comes skidding to a stop, breathless, the moment he sees her. 

“MADDIE!” 

It’s her. It’s really her. She looks like shit, granted. Sunburnt, overly thin, and tired. But it’s her. His big sister. The one he hasn’t seen since she sent him packing in her Jeep six years ago. 

She’s standing with a man who is most certainly not Doug, and a child who is too old to be hers. Unless she was hiding something pretty significant when he saw her last. Buck’s first thought is that he finds the man far more handsome than Doug. Which is, admittedly, a strange thought to have about the man his sister arrived with.

---

Tagging:

@epicbuddieficrecs @theotherbuckley @sevenweeksofunrepression @slowlyfoggydestiny @goldenbcnes

@diazsdimples @exhuastedpigeon @aquamarineglitter @loserdiaz @steadfastsaturnsrings

@your-catfish-friend @incorrect9-1-1 @hawaiianlove808 @babytrapperdiaz @watchyourbuck

@lyricfulloflight @tizniz @aroeddiediaz @estheticpotaeto @buckleybabyblues

@buddieswhvre @l0v3t0hat3y0u @mage8 @theautumnbard @lightningmcqueer8

@kultiras

As always, let me know if you'd like to be added to my writing updates tags :)

[buk0wskis]

let’s face it, i’m fashionably late.

well hello! name’s marshall. (mars works too!) my pronouns are he/him and i’m 22 years old. usually i’m a twitter addict, but recently i thought, y’know, why not expand to other platforms… and look where that got me.

in all seriousness, though, happy to be here.

currently i’ve got a crazy hyperfixation on aaron stanford, so definitely expect a lot of him around these parts. from what it looks like, a good majority of posts about, say, 12 monkeys or nikita, are from years back (there are some recent posts though!), but genuinely i’ve got no problem being the One Guy that talks about some of those older sources. naturally, i would like to encourage a resurgence. like, this shit’s still fire, guys. inform the children.

ah, also, i have a special interest in brenton thwaites! i wouldn’t be surprised if his face ends up somewhere over here, too. :)

i do like to write in my off-time; it’s just been a while since i’ve cooked up something new, but the aaron hyperfix has certainly inspired me to kick things into gear again. maybe some of that will be on here in the future, who knows? (i do really only write oc x canon content, it’s just kinda how i roll. my ao3 is only titans dickkory, which immediately disproves the prior statement… i was on a kick when i cranked those ones out. dunno when i’ll be putting more stuff on there, though.)

OH something i actually would love to brag about, if i may: i make character playlists! and pretty damn good ones if i do say so myself. i’ve made a lot of mixes for brenton characters, but there’s a couple mixes relating to some of aaron’s most popular roles that i recently made public. (and more on the way!) all of my character mixes are lyric-based, so genre whiplash won’t be that uncommon of a find. regardless, i’m proud of them! i’ll post a masterlist of what i’ve got out at a later date. :)

where else you can find me:

twt: buk0wskis

bluesky: buk0wskis.bsky.social

spotify: thwaiteshub

ao3: elalazul

letterboxd: buk0wskis

OHHH SHIT BEFORE I FORGET. i most definitely plan on showing off my halloween costumes this year once they’re all put together. i like having more than one costume; keeps me motivated to show off my current interests, especially irl. this year, i’ve got two: doug bukowski from the hills have eyes ‘06 and wastelander pyro from deadpool & wolverine. (pyro girlies, i’m with you. like that’s my goat. i went and saw dp&w like six times total just so i could see john and his stellar 2 minutes and roughly 24 seconds of screen time.)

[aragarna]

For the Fanfic Writer Ask Game—5, please.

Assuming we're talking about the same one ;-)

5. What rating do most of your fics fall under?

All my fics are General Audience. I honestly don't think the level of hurt/comfort I'm describing reaches a PG-13 level. And even my occasional romance or established relationship sort of fics are very mild and safe.

The main thing is, I just physically can't do too much harm to my favorite characters. It's too painful. To quote Doug Ross, "I have a very low threshold on your pain." I can barely imagine it - sometimes I picture very angsty scenes, but then I realize that it would require something bad to happen to get, like, a character to breakdown like that, or whatever. And I can barely *think* about it, and I will certainly never put it on paper.

To quote another great philosopher, "With great power comes great responsibility." As a writer, I feel like I'm given such a power over the characters, and I'm supposed to protect them. Keep them safe. Making sure they get a happy ending. So, at the very least, anything that happens to them, have to be fixable.

Of course, this is not a judgement on other writers. Heck, I don't mind seeing more serious stuff happening in canon. But this is just to explain how *me*, I feel, when writing. I actually love writing some very angsty stuff based on canon events. Those, I didn't inflict on the characters. It's the evil (affectionate) show writers who did. Now I'm just comforting the characters by sharing their pain.

(as for the absence of anything naughty or - god forbid - explicit, it has more to do with me being asexual)

Thanl you for asking! :)

[thebreakfastgenie]

⭐ the Carlye fic

Aaaa thank you! My poor, obscure fic.

This whole fic came out of the lyric that became the title, because I just got the feeling that line "she would've liked to say she loved the man, but she didn't like to lie" described Carlye's marriage to Doug. It didn't sound especially passionate, certainly not in comparison to her relationship with Hawkeye. But Doug gave her his time and attention when Hawkeye couldn't. That's why I decided for their first meeting, Doug regrets not approaching her and ditches work to run back and try to catch her. Hawkeye would never do that, and of course you can't blame him because you can't walk out on a surgery the way you can on a meeting. But that's the central problem for Carlye.

The man’s face brightens, but just then her plate of eggs comes out, and her hunger takes her attention. When she looks up, he’s gone. She eats her breakfast and doesn’t give him another thought, until she hears the door chime while she’s paying she check and turns to see him rushing back in, red-faced.   He lights up when he sees her. It’s cold outside, but he’s sweating.  “I made it in time!” he pants. “I was so sure you’d be gone… I made it all the way to the office, just kicking myself for not asking your name…” 

In trying to flesh out Carlye I came up with this woman who just wants to be a free, independent person. I decided to have her not love college for something different, although I think maybe she goes back to school someday, after the end of the fic.

Carlye and Hawkeye meeting in surgery was important to me. He talks about her nursing skills, so they obviously worked together back then, and it just kind of made sense. The skill and dedication is attractive to both of them, but of course Hawkeye's dedication drives them apart in the end.

I wanted her relationships with both Hawkeye and Doug to tell us something about her. It's not about Hawkeye or about Doug, but about how Carlye is with them and what that reveals about her.

I ended the fic kind of abruptly without getting to it, because I wanted to leave it open, but in my mind Doug forgives the affair but they divorce a few years later anyway.

The flat feels smaller the more alone she feels. He had a way of opening up rooms with his words, his crazy, believable dreams. Now the hunter green walls box her in. Now she thinks maybe it’s a good thing she can’t talk to him about it. If she gives him a chance to beg her, she’ll stay, and she thinks she’ll die if she does.  When she can’t take it anymore, she slips out in the night. She knows she should feel bad about it, and she does. The guilt clings to her and her gut twists with how badly she misses him. 

I have always felt the reason she left the way she did is that she couldn't give him a chance to beg her to stay, because it would have worked. I mean, look at how fast "no, it can be better" works several years later. The relationship isn't working for her, but she still loves him, and leaving is hard and painful. But she's sincere when she says "I know I hurt you."

He isn’t always exciting, but she never catches him muttering the names of suturing techniques while he runs his hands over her chest, 

I am slightly obsessed with this image. Rather than sexualizing medicine, he's medicalizing sex. Sometimes I think it would have been better if this had a happier counterpart, maybe the two of them doing anatomical dirty talk and joking about playing doctor early in their courtship. But I think the style of the fic would need to be slightly different for that to fit.

The version of this that's posted is the second draft and I think it improved a lot from the first one. I'm happy with it! The part about Carlye fantasizing about Hawkeye was better in my head when I first thought of it but alas I was half-asleep. It happens.

I just really love Carlye. Partly I have a huge lesbian crush on Blythe Danner. But I just love her and I love her dynamic with Hawkeye. I'm fascinated by the fact that they lived together unmarried in the 1940s. I wasn't trying to accomplish anything in particular with this fic, I just had a lot to say about Carlye Breslin Walton. Obviously I still do haha.

[rosemariad]

Supernatural season 13

I've heard of the widower arc that takes place during the early part of this season but geez

Dean looks so depressed – the desolation, the hopelessness. Poor Dean Bean, lost his angel yet again. You can't help but feel for the poor guy (for now…)

Then the instant 180, uno reverse this man takes in his demeanor. He's so happy Cas is back. AND having a big cowboy adventure! They're spoiling this man after the widower arc. Jack & Sam are not down for it but Dean's been so miserable they shut the fuck up.

Dean swallowing deeply when Cas quotes Tombstone – confirmation they have movie nights together (ALONE??????) if they were alone during these movie nights – they're basically dating w/o clarifying that they are actually dating – and they're coparenting, my goodness! The domestication is real!

We later find out Dean snuck a quick shot of Cas in the little cowboy hat he made him wear for the case. Wow.

But as a side note - I did NOT appreciate how shitty Dean was to Jack. He was basically abusing him verbally like WTF give the kid a damn chance - don’t make death threats to the newborn child that was literally born yesterday like the fuck #jackdefensesquad. Like anything bad that jack actually does, he’ll think back to the moments where Dean was like ‘oh he’s a monster’ ’when you go dark side, I’ll be the one to kill you’ yeah like maybe that’s what pushed him to that point. It’s no surprise Jack chooses to leave. My ass would’ve been gone. Also was Cas made aware of the threats Dean made to Jack???

They’re making it REALLY HARD to like Dean this season. MoC was bad, Demon!Dean too but evil forces were at work. This time he got no excuse — threatening at 16 yr old girl who has no one in her corner. They’re basically forcing her to help them for nothing in return. Unbelievable 🤬 And Sam, wtf? Would it kill you to stand up to your fuckin’ brother!

Anyway - Jack’s power is totally cool though.

Kaia…was killed by an alternate self? Whaaaaaat?

So this was the season they tried for the Wayward Girls? Shame it didn’t work out…like the premise is cool BUT since the main show barely give the women characters the time of day, is it any wonder that a pilot didn’t work? The showrunners only seem good with moments - but no building up of the narrative like the male counterparts AKA main cast. Also - what would be the conflict - give people a reason to keep watching the girls - their storylines seem more or less resolved - Jody has already mourned the loss of her family, its not like she became Batman or something to fight a war against criminality. Claire has also gotten past the loss of her parents (as far as we know but honestly she should’ve been part of the main narrative as her life had been directly affected by Castiel’s actions and we all know why Cas bothers to get up in the morning…anyway), Donna doesn’t seem to have anything going on - she’s divorced but over it, Alex is over her dark past, Patience is just seeming to get a hand of her abilities - like where are the stakes??? Sam and Dean had a whole quest to embark on, then they had to navigate fraternal relationship while fighting monsters all the time, slowly unraveling an overarching narrative that’s taken over their lives. Where’s that for the ladies????

I spoke too soon - Donna’s niece gets kidnapped and Doug is her boyfriend (wow totally forgot about that guy, certainly didn’t think he’d return) and once he gets turned into a vampire but cured of it, he’s done. Before he leaves Donna, he calls her a hero. Honestly, if I ended up having a partner/lover who killed dangerous supernatural creatures, I wouldn’t leave them. I’d stick by them and have them teach me a few things. Oh well. Maybe Donna will run to Jody to have a shoulder to cry on ;) I know y’all JodyxDonna shippers are out there.

Scoobynatural was fucking legendary! I loved watching Scooby doo as a kid, from when they were literal babies, to the OG episodes, to the revamp from the early 2000s, all the movies! (Zombie Island was the best!). It was a genuine delight watching the Winchesters (and Cas) cross paths with Mystery Inc. makes me wish they met Buffy and Ash from Evil Dead. That would’ve been awesome! Watching Dean say scooby dooby doo was total cringe tho :/ I love that Cas shut him down 🤣🤣

That ascot though? He’s wearing it all wrong, its supposed to be stuffed in, like how Fred wears it. And certainly not worn with plaid. SMH…

But now I totally want Supernatural as a fucking cartoon! Just like Scooby Doo - it would’ve been fucking glorious, Dean’s unhinge-able jaw, the kooky facial expressions, the comedic effects, and who knows, it would’ve given the show-runners the artistic freedom to reveal the true form of angels, namely, Castiel’s. Oh well.

Donatello is…dead? I know they said Brain dead but after Amara sucked out his soul and Cas fucked up his brain, isn’t he better off dead? Par for the course for a prophet though, sucks for him.

Funny how Rowena suddenly wants to be the good mom and try to bring her demon son back after CENTURIES of chances. Sure she may not have known what became of Fergus since she left him, but I’m sure it wouldn’t have taken much to find out. She just didn’t want to. Now she’s filled with regret. And Sam’s destined to murder her? And she didn’t take him out? Okay, well then I guess it’s only a matter of time until she dies😒 not this season though, she’s too useful with her witchy powers to be killed off until she serves whatever purpose is convenient 😒

Angels are almost extinct :( I know they’re meant to be seen as controlling jerks but so is Dean XD lol anyway that’s a bummer with devastating consequences cuz if there’s no angels - they said all the souls will fall to Earth and become ghosts - billions in number - yeah. If it were me I would’ve just said the souls disappear but it ain’t my show 🤷🏽‍♀️

Naomi is back and I don’t even care - I’m sorry but I just don’t care about Apocalypse world either, I feel like it’s a grand waste of time. The fact that Charlie and Bobby are there doesn’t even matter cuz it’s not them. It’s not the Charlie and Bobby we got to know before. They’re just counterparts of another world, echoes of the fallen. When Dean says I can’t lose you, dude you literally just met her. And they’re expected to what, abandon the world they were born into? The fuck?

And fuck this show for killing Kevin TWICE!!! Kevin you were too precious for this universe/multiverse, whatever.

ketch is the latest (aside from rowena) of former villains/enemies/antagonist in supernatural that's suddenly we're supposed to be sympathetic towards since they switch sides and help the winchesters for a change but what's the reason??? I feel it's a little out there that Dean especially would let ketch live after what he put his mom through but whatever. since the show runners insisted with this whole apocalypse world crap, Dean would have died without ketch's help 😑

Gabriel has returned…only to die…again…awesome. at least he got to fuck rowena before he passed away 🤣😅

Luci got fucked over hahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahaha

Bobby x Mary, oh man John would be roaring in his grave…if he had one 🤣 [got burned to ashes in season 2], Bobby finna take his whole family, first his sons now his wife ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Luci resurrected someone? And nothing bad happened? Now tht’s a twist. I figured since he’s Satan she’d turn into a demon or something, but i guess not cuz we’re definitely not gonna see her again…

You know since I’ve seen The Boys I can see a resemblance between homelander and the devil, they both blow up in anger very similarly. When jack tells Luci, you’re not my father, he raged in a way that was eerily like Homelander would’ve. Just thought I’d point that out…

Dean lets in Alt-Michael - Oh Lord above its the apocalypse all over again (this was a cool shot though) - meanwhile what’s OG Michael doing? Is he still in the Cage with Adam? Really? You had to bring an extra Michael into this nonsense? Ok 🙄 You know if Luci had possessed Sam too, it would’ve been a wrap!

Jack is powerless…for now? This poor kid was gonna kill himself?! Honey why? Ugh I’m blaming Dean for this. He put the seed in that kid’s head he was nothing but trouble and he was going to sacrifice himself, poor baby!

Cas why would you let Dean go?!?! Too sad to follow him into battle after Dean let Alt-Michael in?

Why can’t Sam get a super powerful Big Bad kill huh? Why is it always Dean? Geez.

So the only good things to happen this season were Scooby Doo and Jack meeting Cas. Ugh, their meetup was soo cute ^_^

Welp only 2 seasons left, the last that’s over 20 episodes. Which means we only have 40 episodes to go til the end…goodie 😅

[popculturelib]

Fanzine Friday #19: Happy Halloween Magazine v. 3 no. 1 (2000) by the Global Halloween Alliance

Happy Halloween Magazine was a zine that "focused on Halloween, the historical and contemporary celebrations of Halloween, promoting a positive view of Halloween, and providing a network of Halloween lovers." While we only have this one issue, it's certainly jam-packed with Halloween enthusiasm. Check out some of these listings from its table of contents:

"How To's: Planning a Home Haunted House or Room" by Sarah Briggs

"Screams for Charity!" by Kathy Marcrum

"I Haunted GM" by Larry Redmond

"Doug Elliot's Ghoulishly Fun, Salt-Free, Environmentally-Save [sic], FDIC-Insured Vampire Trivia Quiz and Answers" by Doug Elliot

The featured article is about Bob Burns (a film editor) and his "Halloween Extravaganzas": elaborate haunted houses at his home in Burbank, California, in the 1960s-70s. The article focuses on Burns' new alien "friend" that arrived at his home in 2000, as seen on the cover.

Longtime Tumblr users will be interested to know that this edition features a review of Andrew Gold's album Halloween Howls (1996). Why that's significant: Halloween Howls is the album in which the beloved "Spooky Scary Skeletons" can be found! Gold wrote the song and its fellows to fill a niche of catchy Halloween songs that weren't too scary for his daughters. Did you know that "Spooky Scary Skeletons" was written to emphasize the letter 'S' on every major word?

The Browne Popular Culture Library (BPCL), founded in 1969, is the most comprehensive archive of its kind in the United States.  Our focus and mission is to acquire and preserve research materials on American Popular Culture (post 1876) for curricular and research use. Visit our website at https://www.bgsu.edu/library/pcl.html.

[commsroom]

I had the question come to me while listening to his playlist.

How does Doug Eiffel dance?

Is he coordinated? Is he just jamming? How is he when it comes to dance with someone (aka like Hera?)?

i love this question. i know two things with absolute certainty: 1) eiffel loves to dance, and 2) eiffel is not good at dancing. he is notably not coordinated, he's accident prone, but he's a very physical person - always in motion, he talks with his hands, bounces his leg, taps on things, etc. ... he's got energy to burn. he's just jamming for sure; he's enthusiastic, and it doesn't bother him if he looks ridiculous because that's... kind of the point? i think he learned to dance in ways that would make people laugh because just hamming it up on purpose and leaning into that gets more of a reaction.

(and i honestly think eiffel has enough of a sense for music that he probably could be... maybe not a great dancer, but certainly a better one if he cared to really try, but really trying would require dealing with failure, dedicated practice, and a lot of vulnerability.)

but, that said, i think the fact he's kinda free-spirited and goofy about it gets people to dance with him who otherwise might not. he's good at... taking the pressure off? making people comfortable enough to get silly with it. he absolutely, like, comically 'waltzes' to the classical music transmissions for hera's attention, etc. if she had a body, he would step on her toes, but if hera had a body she could dance with, i don't think she'd really mind. eiffel's not going to be pulling off any fancy partnered dances, but he's perfectly capable of swaying to music and maybe twirling her around a bit. i think she'd be happy enough with that.

[petrifiedcrange]

Alma Bonnet is going to be the most badass pirate captain the seven seas have ever seen when she gets older.

She doesn't know when exactly she decided that — maybe when she was playing pirates with her dad ( the fact that her dad also went on to become a real pirate captain didn't help... even though until they reunited and she understood his reasons for leaving — he didn't leave them, her and Louis, he left the life that made both him and mom unhappy and now they are both happy and dad visits often, though not often enough, bringing his whole crew and Mr Hands along, so Alma can't really complain about the way it all turned out in the end — she wanted to become a pirate captain partly to spite her dad, because she was going to be the only Bonnet history remembered ) or when he was reading her pirate tales when she was younger or maybe she knew she was going to be a pirate captain since the moment she was born.

But she is going to be a pirate captain, and in order to become one, she needs to train a lot, like Mr Hands says ( he is the most badass pirate she's ever known and she doesn't quite understand why he isn't a captain because he certainly is better with the crew than Uncle Ed and sometimes her dad are ) but her mom can't know she is training ( because she thinks she is still too young for that, as if she is as little as Louis is ) so Alma developed a routine of training very early in the morning, before the sun rises, while her mom is painting during the day and late in the evening after mom and Louis go to bed.

This day wasn't supposed to be any different — she got up and took her sword from where it's tucked safely under her bed and was about to sneak out of her room when she suddenly heard footsteps in the hall.

This was new.

So Alma waited until the creaking of the second from the top step of the staircase alerted her to the fact that whoever was wondering the halls — her mom, most likely, and Doug because she heard two pairs of feet — was beginning to descend it and carefully peaked out, seeing her mom and a man she vaguely recognized but couldn't quite place go downstairs, talking quietly.

Curiosity getting the better of her — she was her father's daughter after all — she stepped into the hall and tried to creep close enough to hear what they were talking about. But by the time she made it to the staircase, their voices already faded.

A door, however, opened at the end of the hall and Alma barely had time to think about how much activity was suddenly going on in their house and that something must have being afoot and hide in the shadow before... her dad stepped out of a room and closed the door behind him gingerly, as if afraid of making noise ( which was logical if for some reason he didn't want her and Louis to know he was here which would be very odd but not unlikely, considering the way he creeped past Louis' bedroom ).

He didn't seem to notice her as he began to descend the staircase, even though he literally passed her on his way, and Alma could either praise herself on how well she hid herself... or get increasingly worried because the frown on her dad's face suggested he was simply too distracted by something bad or unpleasant to notice her.

In the end, unsure which route to take but feeling strange cold feeling pool in her gut, something like premonition, Alma peaked downstairs, didn't see anyone and turned towards the door her dad exited, quickly crossing the distance and, after a moment's hesitation as to how better to handle the situation, pressing her ear to the wood to listen to what was going on inside.

Murmuring, too quiet to be intelligible through the door, met her ear.

Biting her lip, Alma looked down at the sword she was still holding in her hands and thought about her options.

She could go back to her room and wait till the morning and see if her mom ( and dad? ) would tell her what was going on.

She could go on to have her trainining session like she initially planned.

Or she could open the door and see what was going on inside.

The first two options would probably be the most reasonable.

But Alma Bonnet was her father's daughter and future pirate captain and wasn't satisfied with the idea of simply minding her own business while something strange was going on inside her own house.

So she tightened her hold on her sword, turned the doorknob and resolutely stepped inside.

@unrely ( Izzy ) gets a semi-plotted starter from Alma based on that idea we discussed of Stede and Ed bringing Izzy to Barbados post-S2 to recover in better conditions. I imagine the man Mary was with is a trusted doctor ( probably someone she knows through Evelyn ) and Izzy and Ed are in that room Stede exited, Ed staying behind by Izzy's bedside.

[gaps-between-stories]

Fic Preview

Check out a sneak peek up an upcoming installment of my Step-Dad series Bonus (featuring a very special sneak peek at Sofia, who has me wrapped around her finger just as much as her grandfather's).

After four years of university, three years of law school, six months of studying, a 7-hour long exam, and fifteen more agonizing minutes, Alma was finding out her Bar results today. She’d flown back home from Ontario the day after her exam, sleeping for about a week straight before beginning her anxious wait for her results. 

Their kitchen had smelled incredible the past week given the behemoth amount of stress baking she was doing, and Stede and Ed had started pawning off her baked goods to the neighbors, coworkers, anyone who would take them. They were drowning in banana breads and strawberry jams and while they loved her baking, it was getting overwhelming. This was one of her healthiest coping mechanisms so they were more than encouraging, although Ed had had to talk her down from cutting her own bangs about three nights ago. 

Their kitchen had also become a concert hall for Taylor Swift, whose never ending discography Alma still listened to religiously, blasting it at a volume that Ed was convinced was to prevent her from hearing her own thoughts. 

Today their kitchen was in a flurry of chaos as Alma managed to cram seven different baking pans into their oven while scream-singing 1989, checking her phone every three minutes for the time. 

Stede wasn’t helping any by asking her every time she checked her phone whether she’d heard back yet. 

Doug was trying to set up Louis on a facetime call, a seemingly easy task made all the more complicated by the shoddy service the kid had up in the Yukon right now. 

And Mary was currently running late, having missed her ferry over from the island. That last tidbit certainly wasn’t helping soothe Alma’s frayed nerves right now. 

Ed was mostly trying to stay out of the way, counting down the remaining fifteen minutes til the results were posted as patiently as he could. He had been occupying himself by entertaining Sofia, who was more than happy to bounce between all three of her grandfathers to keep her out from under her mother’s foot. But about twenty minutes ago she’d demanded that Ed pick her up, before promptly falling asleep in his arms. 

The music suddenly cut out. 

“Uh-oh.” Doug had tried to mutter it under his breath, tried to keep it to himself, but Stede and Alma’s bat hearing prevented that. 

“Why uh-oh?” They demanded in unison. 

Doug clicked the laptop a few times, Louis’ face frozen on the screen, then checked his phone, grimacing. “Looks like there’s an issue with the wifi. I’m going to need to reset the router.” 

Alma’s head dropped into her hands on the counter, screaming into her palm. Stede moved to show Doug where their wifi router was, which was of course on the second floor, leaving Edward alone with Alma in the now silent kitchen. 

Alma exhaled deeply, dragging her hands down her face. “I’m just gonna go lay down in the street if you need me.” 

Ed shot her a disapproving look. “Orange.” 

She rolled her eyes, letting out an exasperated sigh. “Oh come on, I’m not allowed one joke right now?” 

“It’s not the one joke I’m worried about.” 

“Dad, seriously, it’s fine. I’m fine.” She licked the batter off of her spatula to demonstrate how fine she was, gesturing to her growing baking clutter. 

“What time does Eleanor’s flight get it?” He asked, tactfully changing the subject as he gently shifted Sophia on his hip, doing his best not to stir her from her napping. She snuggled her head deeper into the crook of his neck, letting out the smallest of sighs in her sleep as she did. 

“6 pm,” she answered, checking her phone again. Seven minutes. Her fiance was presenting at a conference in the States this weekend and wouldn’t be able to make it before the results came in. “She’s probably somewhere over Nebraska right now,” she groaned.

[hal-boy]

Finally finished House of Leaves (actually, I read it twice lol), and I really enjoyed it!! Though note I am the type to read literary criticism of actual real-life movies for fun, so I was able to get my head around the Navidson Record's format rather quickly: YMMV on that front.

On that note, I was originally interested in this book because I was basically told it was a good intro to ergodic lit, and I feel that it was: the style of 2 seperate stories being told almost simultaneously was rather engaging and, though certainly complicated to keep track of at times, I found I really like the genre! I bought a copy of S (which is a nightmare to look up: it's by Doug Dorst and JJ Abrams, yes the starwar guy) which I'm going to hopefully get around to reading soon :)

I'm typically not the type to say "go in as unspoiled as possible" about media, but because this is a book designed specifically around old passages being recontextualized by new information I'd say it's worth going in without much prior knowledge. A note, though: at one point relatively early on, there's a footnote that says (paraphrasing) "if you want to figure out what this character's deal is, flip to this section in the appendix, but if you want to figure it out yourself then don't read that part." I chose not to read that passage until after I finished my first readthrough of the book, and I was very happy with my choice given how significant that section is to understanding that character. I recommend holding off on that part.

Tagging @kimtranssexler cause you wanted to know my thoughts when I finally finished it :)

[clonerightsagenda]

10 First Lines Game

Tagged by @specialagentartemis

“Rules: share the first lines of ten of your most recent fanfics and tag ten people. If you have written less than ten, don’t be shy and share anyway ❤️”

The person who tagged me also mentioned original work which is handy because that's the biggest thing I'm working on right now.

Also this post got wildly out of control length-wise, because I wanted to do full openers rather than a single sentence, so under a cut it goes.

So........ moving backwards from publication order, I guess, including Exclusive Sneak Peeks of podcast girls week content...

BEA: However old you are, wherever you live, you’ve almost certainly encountered some version of the Dracula story

From my upcoming Arden Dracula AU for PGW which I had a blast with and may be my nichest published fic ever. I am very good at expending my effort on things 2 people will read.

Officer Eiffel wouldn’t have walked into a mad scientist's evil lair.

No, Doug corrects himself, he would've. He did, a whole bunch of times before he knew Hilbert's lab was an evil lair, until he got banned for being clumsy and not caring if he broke things. He even went afterward, every time something else happened to this clunker of a body – another thing he didn’t care if he broke.

From a document titled "evil lair thing", a surprise other PGW project that was a surprise to me also. These things happen. How is it PGW-related, you may ask? You will have to wait and find out.

You are accessing a finding aid for records created or maintained by Hippolyta Space Corporation (HSC) collected after the acquisition of Outer Bounds Space Exploration Company.

Finding aids are a tool to assist researchers in using our collections. They introduce a collection’s scope and context and identify the arrangement of materials. Some finding aids may describe collections with folder- or item-level granularity. Finding aids are created by company archivists to improve access to our materials.

Finding aids are a way for you to tell people which parts of the story you think are important.

Finding aids are a map.

To what?

First page of space archives!!! Wrapping up yet another major revision rn. Its day will come....

Now time to go to ao3 and find out what my seven most recently published fics are.

PLAYA LA POZA DEL OBISPO, ARECIBO, PUERTO RICO – MIDDAY

Isabel Lovelace is standing on a beach. Waves crash over rocks, shooting spray into the air.

She hears a voice from behind her.

From "Monster in the Middle". Script format, in case you couldn't tell.

EIFFEL

Hey Hera, are you there?

HERA

I'm here, Officer Eiffel. What is it?

(teasing)

Do you need a clarification on military protocol?

From "The Couples Agenda". Also scriptfic. Sue me; they're fast.

Isabel Lovelace went out for drinks with the people under her command once.

She was fresh out of training and they were sizing her up, trying to figure out what kind of officer she would be. She wanted to let them know she was one of the real ones, happy to rub elbows with the enlisted folks, or maybe she was just tired of having to keep her nose clean.

She woke up the next morning to the reality that West Point wasn't a party school, she hadn't had more than one drink in a night in years, and the entire driving population of New York City seemed to be slamming on their horns inside her skull.

Her head feels like that now. Her mouth doesn't taste like she’s gargled an IPA, though, so there's that.

From "Not the Only One"

Here's a story. You're born broken.

That's not the politically correct term. It's not the one I would have chosen either. Not because I care about making you feel better, but because it's imprecise. You didn't start out different and then break down. This was how you were made. Like highly original thought patterns, or 500 petabytes of random-access memory, or… freckles. Are humans born with freckles? You remember some of the other children at your orphanage had them, so they start early, at least.

You liked broken, though. If something's part of who you are, well, there's not much you can do about that. But broken? Broken can be fixed.

From "Born Broken"

Isabel Lovelace gets out of bed every morning. She pulls on clothing in a battle against zero gravity that has become second nature. She brushes her teeth.

Isabel Lovelace cannot do any of these things. She is dead, reduced to less than ashes floating at the heart of a star-that-is-not-a-star. She has been dead for years.

Isabel Lovelace gets out of bed anyway.

From "Door Number Three"

“Ok,” Hera says. “You can open your eyes now.”

From "Everyone Ready"

Doug was born on a space station a few minutes away from crashing into a star.

Not literally. Literally, he was born on Earth (Boston, Massachusetts; Hera tells him). But as far as he remembers? Hello world, smack into the middle of a bunch of people’s worst day of their lives, or one of them. Part of why it was the worst day of a bunch of people’s lives.

Woohoo.

From "The Doug Eiffel Reunion Tour"

Wow, 10 fics (including 3 not on ao3) took me 3 years back. I am not a quantity poster. Hopefully I am a quality poster. (Doing only ao3 stuff would've taken me all the way back to my HS era.... a near miss indeed.)

I never know who to tag for stuff like this.