#I like anakin a lot but how people talk about his turn can be quite hypocritical in a way that's unacknowledged.

[drunk-on-starlight]

It's interesting how Anakin broke every rule the jedi had and yet people still say those rules are why he fell.

[varpusvaras]

"It seems that for once, we've managed to get ourselves into a happy ending of sorts", Obi-Wan said. "This situation could've gotten seriously out of hand."

Anakin sighed deeply.

"You don't need to tell me that", he said. He both looked and sounded tired, but he was still smiling as he watched Ahsoka across the plaza. Obi-Wan looked over to her as well. She looked just as tired as Anakin, but she was also smiling as she spoke with Rex. That was a good sign. Obi-Wan still wanted to make sure that she was going to talk about all that had happened with someone. He should tell Anakin to make sure she would.

He would, in just a moment. First, he had other things to say.

"I am very proud of you", he said. "Both of you, for not letting your emotions take over you in a difficult situation like this. Ahsoka decided to trust you, even when everything seemed to be going wrong. I'm glad your teachings have made her subdue her impulses."

He had been unsure about pairing Anakin and Ahsoka together. They were very similar in great many ways, and he had been worried that they would just end up amplifying the traits they needed to learn to control. Things had seemed to be heading to that exact scenario, but thankfully, it instead seemed like Obi-Wan had worried too much.

Anakin twisted his smile into a half grin.

"Thank you, Master", he said. "I'm proud of her as well."

Obi-Wan smiled back at him. Before he could say anything else, though, he noticed someone approaching them.

"Senator Organa." Obi-Wan turned towards the man. "Good evening."

Bail Organa smiled at him. It was a polite smile, but still genuine enough, Obi-Wan thought.

"Good evening to you too, Master Kenobi", he greeted him in turn. "No more responsibilities for the night?"

"Not too many, at the moment, though I assure you, they never truly end", Obi-Wan said. "I'm sure you can understand. Though, it seems that you have a free night for once as well? The Temple is not in the direction of either the Senate or your apartments."

Organa tilted his head slightly to the side. He was still smiling, though Obi-Wan thought that he could see a small change in it. It was tighter, now. Still polite, but clearly a lot less genuine than just a moment ago.

Curious. Obi-Wan reached out, ever so slightly, and he was met with a wall as tall as the man himself, and behind that wall, he sensed a storm.

That was concerning. Obi-Wan had learned to trust and even like Bail Organa over the years, despite him standing securily on the field of politics. Even if they didn't always see eye-to-eye in their approaches to different situations, Obi-Wan knew for certain that Bail Organa of Alderaan was a good man. His readiness to help people directly where the help was needed had truly confirmed that to Obi-Wan.

Feeling such a turmoil coming from him now was enough to raise the alarms in Obi-Wan's mind. Was there something they had missed? Was he here to deliver bad news to them, extending a small courtesy by coming and telling them himself, instead of letting them be summoned in front of the entire Senate again?

"Oh, I'm here on a more personal matter", Organa said. Then he turned away from Obi-Wan to look at Anakin instead.

All the politeness that had been left on his expression disappeared immediately, leaving behind just an empty gesture. No, not quite, Obi-Wan realised. It was a mask.

Obi-Wan was even more worried now of what he was about to say.

"Evening, General Skywalker", Organa said. "I heard that all the charges they were considering on giving Padawan Tano were dropped. Congratulations."

Anakin seemed to realise that something was going on as well. He stood more guarded now, his own smile long gone.

"Thank you", he said still. He was testing where the situation was heading.

The smile on Organa's face sharpened. The mask was starting to crack.

Obi-Wan had a bad feeling about all of this.

"The situation must've been difficult to you", Organa continued. "I can only imagine how it feels like, to have the power of the Force on your side, but then be stopped by a single panel of security glass. Though, as I have seen the feats the Force can do, it wouldn't have been able to stop you, wouldn't it?"

Anakin frowned.

"I don't understand what-" He started, but stopped when Organa suddenly stepped closer. Anakin was tall, but Organa was even taller, and had broadness to him that Anakin's body had not yet begun to fill.

The smile was gone, now. The mask had dropped.

"It was fortunate that there were others present, wasn't it?" He asked Anakin, his voice low. If it had been anyone else, Obi-Wan would've seen him as a danger. "I'm just wondering, what would've happened, if it had been just you and Commander Fox there, with the piece of glass between you two? Tell me. Would you have stopped yourself?"

Anakin's face was a mixture of multitude of things. Anger. Confusion. His presence in the Force was swirling with all of them as well.

Bail Organa had only one feeling on him at that moment. Tightly controlled, cold fury.

Obi-Wan had to step in.

"What is going on?" He asked, both of them, really.

Anakin opened his mouth, but Organa was quicker to answer.

"General Skywalker demanded to be let in to where Padawan Tano was kept after her arrest", he explained. "Commander Fox of the Coruscant Guard had to inform him that due to the nature of the suspected crime, the case was transferred over from the Jedi, by the orders of Admiral Tarkin. Who, if I may add, holds excecutive power over the Guard, instead of the Jedi. General Skywalker decided that this didn't matter. According to multiple witnesses, he turned rather aggressive towards Commander Fox."

Anakin bristled.

"I didn't even touch him!" He argued, his voice rising.

Organa wasn't phased at all by this.

"You had to be escorted out by armed Guards", he said, his voice still just as level. "Now, I think it's better you listen carefully, because I am not going to be telling this to you again in the future."

He leaned down, his mouth right at the level of Anakin's ear now.

"If I ever hear that you have even raised your voice at Commander Fox, or any of the Coruscant Guard, I can assure you, you will find that there will be consequences", he said. "Am I being clear? Stay away from him."

Obi-Wan looked at Anakin. Anakin was still scowling, but there was something else making its way onto his face as well. Dread.

"Are we clear?" Organa asked. "I'm sure there are a lot of people who see this all as a much graver mistake than you do. I'm also sure they would be interested in the other unconventional matters you have engaged in."

Anakin opened his mouth, but nothing came out, so he snapped it shut just as quick.

"Are we clear?" Organa asked, once more.

"Yes", Anakin spat out. "We are clear."

"Good. I'm glad that we could arrive to an agreement", Organa said, sounding just like all the politicians Obi-Wan had heard in his life sounding like when they had just done business. He straightened his back, and stepped away from Anakin, and turned to look at Obi-Wan once again. "I'm sorry for bothering you, Master Kenobi."

"What was all of tha about, Senator?" Obi-Wan asked. "I'm afraid I don't understand why you are taking it upon yourself to interrogate Anakin on the behalf the Guard?"

Not that he was at all pleased with what he had just heard, nor did he have to wonder what other matters Organa was talking about. There just seemed to be a rather large hole in the story, that Obi-Wan was not able to fill out. Neither could Anakin, it seemed, as the confusion Obi-Wan had felt on him at the start of the conversation still lingered, strong as ever.

Organa leveled Obi-Wan a look.

"We all have people who we love, and who we wish to protect from all harm", he said. "Any harm. On that, I think General Skywalker and I can both readily agree upon. It is most disheartening, when the harm comes from the one place that is supposed to be safe, on top of everything else."

He glanced at Anakin.

"I think we can all also agree on that the Chancellor does not need to hear about this", he said. "I imagine General Skywalker already wishes to go tell all about this to his good friend, in order to have all of his actions rationalised, no matter how hurtful they are."

He nodded his head.

"Have a good rest of your evening", Organa said, and then turned around and walked away, with his head held high and without turning to look back once.

Obi-Wan watched him go for a while, before he turned towards Anakin. Anakin, who was now all but ready to boil under the surface. There was one more feeling Obi-Wan could feel on him now, though. Fear.

Obi-Wan sighed, and reached his hand.

"Anakin-" Anakin sneered, and stepped away.

"I'm going to talk to Ahsoka and Rex", he said, and marched away across the plaza before Obi-Wan could say anything more.

Obi-Wan sighed again.

It seemed like there was so much more they needed to talk about than he had realised.

[tennessoui]

anyone remember the divorce lawyer au?

(first ficlet posted here, along with the explanation post) (1.5k)

“Of all the gin joints in the world, you walk into mine,” the very familiar and incredibly grating voice of Anakin Skywalker greets Obi-Wan mere moments after he settles into a seat at the end of the bar. 

“No,” Obi-Wan says automatically, though he isn’t quite sure what he’s protesting. It’s an instinctive sort of no. A plaintitive no. A for the love of all things holy, I cannot be expected to deal with this now as well sort of no. 

Even though, technically, Mr. Skywalker is right. Of all the damn gin joints in the world, he happened to walk into one already hosting Anakin.

“Well,” Anakin sounds considering now. He doesn’t particularly sound as if he’s planning on leaving. “I guess of all the dive bars in Vegas, you happened to walk into mine. But I’m pretty sure they sell gin here! Though I guess I don’t know how much gin needs to be sold at a bar before it’s classified as a gin joint.” Now his voice sounds even more considering. Closer too.

“What can I get you?” The bartender asks as she slides down closer to him. It’s not very loud in here, still relatively early and so not overly crowded, but she leans forward across the bartop as if having trouble hearing him.

Anakin sits down in the seat next to Obi-Wan rather aggressively, brushing their shoulders and thighs together. “You can put his drinks on my tab, thanks,” he announces. “We’re together.”

“We’re not together,” Obi-Wan tells her. “But yes, you can put my drinks under his tab. Much obliged. An old fashioned, thank you. A double. No cherry.”

“You got it,” the woman says, turning away to make his drink. 

Obi-Wan closes his eyes for a second to pray for patience before he turns to look at Anakin Skywalker.

He is just as beautiful as he was two weeks ago when he’d last stopped into Obi-Wan’s office, tearful, hungover bride in tow for a quick divorce before her plane ride back to Australia.

It isn’t fair.

“We could be together,” Anakin says. His eyes are dark, his head canted forward, his thigh still brushing Obi-Wan’s. “Just for the night.” “You know, I’ve always thought you were a lot less sober when you proposed to strangers,” Obi-Wan tells him drolly, accepting his drink from the bartender with a wave of his hand. “I’ve been picturing you absolutely sloshed stumbling down the aisle.”

“You’re not a stranger, Mr. Kenobi,” Anakin replies. “You’re my go-to divorce attorney.”

“Normal people do not have those,” Obi-Wan says, taking a sip of his drink. It’s strong at least, thank God.

“People get divorced all the time,” Anakin argues, leaning forward to rest his elbow on the bartop to look over at Obi-Wan. “You were the one that told me that divorce can be just as healthy as marriage.”

“Don’t remind me,” he mutters, taking another bigger sip. He really, really does not want to talk about marriage with Anakin Skywalker of all people. 

Yet somehow the words slip out of his mouth and off his tongue despite how much he does not want to talk about marriage with Anakin Skywalker. “How do you do it then?”

“Do what?” Guileless, innocent. Hell, he probably just has to blink wide blue eyes at his fuck of the night and they’d follow him down the aisle as quick as they can stumble.

“How do you—” he waves his hand and takes another sip of his drink. “Convince people to marry you. You’ve got a politician, a bride to be, who knows how many bridesmaids, a foreign dignitary, a man old enough to be your father, a veteran all under your belt. How are you dragging them all down the aisle? You can’t be—”

He cuts himself off. That good in bed, he’d been about to say. 

Anakin grins with his eyebrows raised like he knows it. “It depends,” he says. One finger traces over the countertop. The other hand falls to rest on Obi-Wan’s knee. “Sometimes we’re already in bed,” he murmurs, slow-like. “Sometimes we’re on our way there, in some dark corner booth and I’ve got my hands wrapped around her waist and she’s begging me to whisper dirty things into her ear, tell her what I’m gonna do to her. It’s sort of like marriage vows, you know? Dirty promises sound the same.”

He is far too handsome for his own good, Obi-Wan decides. If he were a little less attractive, he’d probably have a much harder time coaxing strangers down the aisle.

“I wouldn’t know,” Obi-Wan says stiffly, stopping Anakin’s hand from moving further up his leg. “I’ve never been married.”

The words are bitter; the wound is still bleeding. He downs his drink in one go and waves for another from the bartender. 

“You have a girlfriend though, don’t you?” Anakin’s nose wrinkles. “You’ll marry her probably. You’re the marrying type.”

Obi-Wan closes his eyes. “She’s not,” he says shortly. And then, to rip the bandage of the wound completely. “And she’s not my girlfriend anymore either.”

Anakin’s eyes go wide. “What?” “I asked. For her to marry me. And she said no.”

“She said no?” 

“While your disbelief is rather flattering, I’d like not to talk about it, thank you.”

“Why would she say no? To marrying you? Is she alright? Well, obviously not, but—I mean. I don’t understand. Or believe it.”

Obi-Wan’s lips thin, and he reaches into his pocket. “I assure you, if she’d said yes, she’d be wearing this right now and I would not be here.” 

He puts the ring box on the bar in between them and accepts a new drink from the bartender. Anakin looks down at the ring box silently.

“Well?” Obi-Wan asks. He doesn’t know what he wants Anakin to say. He’s sitting in the tatters of his longest relationship, ended because she did not want to marry him in the end and he could not live with that. And he is talking with a man who gets married and divorced more than  perhaps anyone else in the entire world. 

What could he possibly want to hear from Anakin Skywalker?

“‘M going to get you wasted,” Anakin says, and Obi-Wan figures that’s good enough.

—----------

“Marriage is important to me,” Obi-Wan slurs out countless hours later. They have migrated from the bar to a low-level booth, and Anakin has his arm curled around the top of it with his fingers playing with the ends of Obi-Wan’s hair. “I couldn’t com…pro…mise.” He sounds the word out carefully and deliberately. 

“You shouldn’t have to for something that’s important to you,” Anakin decides, and Obi-Wan nods. That’s what he thinks too. That’s why they’d broken up. That’s why Obi-Wan still has the ring.

“All sales final,” he quotes and rubs his hand over his beard. “What am I gonna do with it now?” 

“Give it to someone else,” Anakin suggests once Obi-Wan picks up the ring box again to look at it. “Someone who wants it.”

“Nobody wants it,” Obi-Wan says. That’s the problem.

The other problem is that his drink is gone. This is a very big problem and easy to solve because Anakin’s drink is right next to his empty glass, and Anakin will let him have his drink, Obi-Wan is sure of it. Anakin has been very lovely tonight.

“That’s my drink,” Anakin says. “Get your hands off it.”

“I’ll trade you for it,” Obi-Wan mumbles, gesturing to the ring box. Anakin stills completely.

“You…will?”

“Yes,” he decides. And then a thought occurs to him, terrible and mean and brutal. “Unless you don’t want to marry me either. But you want to marry everyone.” He scowls, though he thinks it may look more like a pout. “Don’t you want to marry me?”

Anakin’s hand carefully resumes its light stroking of Obi-Wan’s hair. “Yeah,” he says. His voice is rough. Obi-Wan likes the way it sounds. “Yeah, I do.”

“Good then,” Obi-Wan says and takes Anakin’s drink. After all, what’s Anakin’s is now his if they’re engaged to be married. “I’m sure you know where the closest chapel is. Though I’m quite disappointed so far.”

“Why?” Anakin’s face is awfully close to his. When did he move? “Aren’t I providing for you like a good husband should, baby? You’ve got my drink and everything.”

“I was told you’d put your hands on my waist and whisper dirty things into my ear,” Obi-Wan says. “And so far you’ve just been playing with my hair.” “I like your hair,” Anakin says. “And I don’t want to tell you what I’m thinking of doing to you. I think I just wanna show you.”

Obi-Wan blinks. His face is hot. Anakin is flushed all over too, eyes focused somehow despite the amount of drinks he’s had. His breath smells sweet, like the cocktail he’s been drinking for the last hour. Now Obi-Wan’s breath probably smells the same. “Well, I suppose tomorrow morning I won’t have to ask you if your latest marriage has been consummated.”

Anakin smirks. “No, you won’t,” he agrees. It’s a promise. 

[imagitory]

Review: Wish (2023) [SPOILERS]

Evening, everyone! Tonight my mother and I went to go see Disney's most recent film, Wish, which fortunately came to theaters in my area right before its formal American release date. I'd been very curious to see how this tribute to Disney's last 100 years of filmmaking would turn out, and now that I've seen it...well, I have to be honest, I was a little disappointed. I want to be very clear both that I was going into this with a rather sunny outlook and that there are things I really liked in this film...but overall, it felt like a lot of the good ideas it had were only half-baked, and I found myself -- forgive me -- "wishing for something more" than what we got.

For a more comprehensive deep-dive...a cut!

The Good!

+The single best element in this film for me was Chris Pine's performance as our villain, Magnifico. There are definitely some things I can critique about Magnifico's overall storyline and "character arc" further down, but Chris was clearly having a grand old time being an egotistical, sassy jerkwad, and it totally showed. Even in his villain song This is The Thanks I Get?, which just screamed "passive-aggressive abusive parent," you can hear how much fun Chris was having in the studio, recording it. I just about always enjoyed when Magnifico was on screen, and I actually did really like the idea that a lot of his villainy is rooted in him being obsessed with control over everyone and everything. In a weird way, Magnifico's turn to the Dark Side parallels Anakin Skywalker's in the sense that he lost so much in the past that he's determined to never lose anything important to him again -- especially the power he's accrued to make himself feel strong, after having felt so powerless. I find that very interesting, and I kind of wish that aspect was really highlighted more in the story, but we'll talk about that later.

+Asha was a likable enough heroine, even if I found her to be a lot like a two-way fusion of Mulan and Anna placed in a vaguely Snow-White-ish role in her clearly Seven-Dwarf-inspired friend group. Ariana DeBose portrayed her rather well, both acting and singing-wise. I also liked the "social justice" bent to Asha's character where she wants better things not just for herself and her family, but also Rosas overall -- in the French translation of her main song "This Wish," they even push this further by having Asha wish "to see the world happy again someday." We haven't seen a heroine really express this kind of desire for a positive change in the world since Esmeralda in The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and that's cool! Plus representation in mainstream media for previously underrepresented groups is always nice. ^.^

+As much as I don't think they all got enough focus as individuals, I liked Asha's friend group! Especially the fact that it is a friend group made up of people that are around the same age as our protagonist, which -- let's be honest -- isn't that common for Disney heroines. Often with "sidekick groups," you're more likely to have situations like Cinderella with the mice (who are more like cutesy sidekicks than equals) or Snow White with the Dwarfs (who are all quite a bit older than our heroine)...so a friend group made up of peers with their own personalities and motivations was kind of fun.

+The setting of Rosas itself could be pretty. I liked a lot of the Mediterranean-inspired architecture, especially inside Magnifico's tower.

+The combination of 3D and 2D-esque animation was also interesting! It really served to give the film its own distinctive visual style that sets it apart from other Disney projects, which I always appreciate.

+Star was...cute. Obviously just designed to sell plushies and definitely reminded me way too much of Kirby, but cute enough. I do think it's kind of cool that they're never gendered at all in the entire movie, because it'd be silly to think of a sweet little androgynous ball of stardust as being specifically male or female.

+I liked the idea of Simon "betraying" Asha, only to be turned into a pawn by Magnifico in the process, but not being treated unsympathetically by the story for it. Didn't love the full execution of the idea, but hey, that's what the negative section is for.

+The idea of everyone finding the power inside of themselves to stand up against Magnifico (because they're "all stars," and presumably all have the magic needed to make their wishes come true) was a little predictable, but still sweet. I have problems with how the film wrote it (which we'll get to), but the idea itself was wholesome and fitting.

+I like several of the songs, just on their own -- I added This Wish and Knowing What I Know Now on my ITunes as soon as I first heard them prior to the film's release, and now I've added At All Costs too: it's a really pretty duet! (Gorgeous work, Chris and Ariana!) I'll leave my praise here, though, because sadly the soundtrack is going to get a lot of discussion in the less positive section.

The Not-So-Good...

+This film being "Disney's 100th anniversary film" really got in the way of this movie telling a compelling and unique story sometimes. The whole movie really twisted itself into a pretzel trying to check off all the usual Disney tropes, and there were points that certain choices made the story seem incredibly stilted. For instance, one common Disney trope is a dead parent, so of course Asha has lost her father -- but we learn so little about him and he ends up playing such a small role in Asha's arc and story that it seems like an unnecessary detail. Asha's grandfather honestly plays more of a role in Asha's motivation throughout most of the film, so it would've made just as much sense to have Asha's grandfather be the one who believed in stars having power, rather than her father. Another example is the concept of the cute animal sidekick who's just there to make jokes -- as much as Valentino the goat didn't annoy me personally, he added just about nothing of value to the story whatsoever aside from comic relief, in contrast to other funny sidekicks like Sebastian from The Little Mermaid or Olaf from Frozen, who also serve a plot purpose and have a developed relationship with the protagonists. Then there's Asha being cut from the same "naive, awkward, wide-eyed idealist" cloth as many of our Disney Revival heroines like Anna, Rapunzel, and up to a certain point even Mirabel are; Star being in a similar vein to cutesy, innocent sidekicks like Pua, Crikee, and Baymax while Valentino is more akin to sassier, comic ones like Mushu and Sisu; her friends literally being based on the Seven Dwarfs from Snow White; our heroine getting a pretty standard "I Want" song and the villain getting his own solo number that doesn't really take any risks...oh yes, and we mustn't forget the trope of the Storybook opening, which (I'm sorry) I know was supposed to be a reference to Snow White, Cinderella, and Enchanted, but just gave me Shrek vibes the entire time. I was waiting for Shrek to rip out the page and use it for toilet paper any minute. It just felt a lot of the time like the movie was very paint-by-numbers, rather than throwing in much that was surprising or different.

+This isn't even touching all of the pointless meta references to other Disney movies. Asha wearing the Fairy Godmother's cloak and getting a wand like hers at the end -- the mushrooms crowing "we love crazy!" the way Hans did in Love is an Open Door -- Asha riding the reindeer the way Kristoff did in Frozen 2 -- Magnifico using green smoke hands a la Ursula -- the ending with those obvious Wendy and Peter Pan look-alikes, come on, really??? That was just painful.

+As much as Magnifico was an awesome idea for a character and Chris Pine's performance was beyond entertaining, the movie did not always write him as well as they could've. From the very start, we see this guy is an egotistical control freak -- obsessed with his own image, incredibly hard-to-please, arrogant, vain, desperate for attention and unwavering praise and adoration from all of his subjects, and determined to keep an iron grip on everyone else's wishes because of the power it gives him. He's ALREADY a terrible person, from the start -- and yet the film tries to introduce this dark magic book that gets no explanation or backstory whatsoever and has no real characterization or presence, so it leaves no real impact on the audience corrupting him and making him a bad person, when it didn't need to! Magnifico was already the villain this film needed! Just let him fall head-first into madness without the book prompting anything! Even if Magnifico "lost everything" in the past, that doesn't make him a good person, if he takes everyone's wishes away from them and hoards them all to himself, only to grant a few now and again when it would make him look good.

+This above point actually leads nicely into one change I really, really wish the film had been ballsy enough to make -- have Asha already be Magnifico's apprentice, not trying to become it at the start of the story. Give our villain and hero a real relationship, with history that started before the events of this film! Asha lost her father at the age of 12...how interesting would it have been -- whether to make Magnifico more of an anti-villain or show how manipulative he really is -- if he'd tried to fill that fatherly role for our main character and twist her to serve his ends? What if At All Costs was rewritten to be about Magnifico not just being determined to hold onto all of the kingdom's wishes, but also this apprentice he sees as an extension of him and his legacy, while Asha is determined to protect this Star she's accidentally summoned and the suppressed wish of hers it represents? This change would've made Asha's break with Magnifico so much more powerful for both of them -- it would've both justified Magnifico's descent into madness and given Asha more reason to feel like it was her responsibility to stop Magnifico. You even could've then played more with Asha's relationship with Queen Amaya too, in this kind of a scenario.

+Oh yeah, and on that note, Queen Amaya. OOH, this really annoyed me -- okay. So this woman is supposed to be a good guy, in this story. But as I touched on earlier, Magnifico was already a pretty awful person, hoarding people's wishes away in order to make himself powerful. Was Amaya truly so blind to that? Did she truly never question anything, ever? But no, really, she only turns on Magnifico after he starts using the dark magic book and actively threatens her. Only that makes her turn from him, and it's pretty damn immediate. Now okay, I hear you saying, it's like Amaya sings in Knowing What I Know Now, right? "The good in him, I've watched it melt // I was blinded by the love I felt"? Excuse me, lady -- but Magnifico wasn't a good person, before. He was just playing a part so as to stay powerful and adored by the masses. And if the story wants to claim otherwise, and act like that dark magic book was responsible for Magnifico going bad, then why would our Queen decide to keep him locked up in his staff's crystal forever? If the book was responsible, then Magnifico would be the Frodo or Golum to the book's One Ring -- he'd be a victim, in such a scenario: one in need of help and pity, not punishment. So either Amaya is a selfish person who only cared about her husband's mistreatment of others when it affected her, or she's a needlessly cruel person who decides to punish her husband for a vice that anyone could fall prey to. Either way, I don't want this woman ruling anyone! Make this woman a straight-up villain, same as her husband, and have the whole monarchy come crashing down after she and Magnifico both go down in flames! VIVE LA RESISTANCE! (Playing into my idea with Asha being Magnifico's apprentice all along, maybe there could even be a twist on the Evil Stepmother trope with Amaya, where she's jealous of how much Magnifico has tried to groom Asha as his apprentice, rather than spending time and/or starting a family with her or something.)

+As I touched on earlier, there wasn't even close to enough time to develop all of these characters properly. Since our heroine and friends are most similar to Snow White and her friends the Seven Dwarfs, let's compare cast size. Snow White is 83 minutes long and has a cast of ten (Snow, the Prince, the Queen, and the Dwarfs) -- Wish is 95 minutes long and has a cast of fourteen (Asha, Magnifico, Star, Valentino, Amaya, Asha's mum and grandpa, and our seven Friends). This results in us getting the vague idea that "Grumpy" role Gabo is sweet on our "Bashful" role Bazeema, but no time to develop their relationship or give it any kind of conclusion; the others saying "Sneezy" role Safi apparently loves the castle chickens with no sympathetic explanation why, to the point that he gets super excited about a chicken growing to a giant size for no real reason; "Doc" role Dahlia having a crush on Magnifico that is then dropped immediately after Asha turns against him; oldest kid and "Sleepy" role Simon feeling incomplete without the dream he gave Magnifico and "betraying" Asha as a result in an attempt to get it back, only to get stabbed in the back by Magnifico, and then have no time for a proper redemption after he's unhypnotized; Asha's grandfather turning on a dime about whether or not he wants to know what his wish was if Magnifico thought it was dangerous; Magnifico getting some justification in his backstory for his bad behavior, but Amaya's backstory being a complete black hole before she married Magnifico when you'd think it'd explain all the more why she stuck with him so long; and Asha's mum having her wish crushed to dust by Magnifico and then given back without us EVER LEARNING WHAT IT EVEN WAS IN THE FIRST PLACE, even after we see just about everyone else's wishes as soon as somebody picks it up and Asha's mum's wish gets picked up multiple times!! Come on, if you're going to set up NOT showing it, you may as well have a pay-off for it!! At least give us some moment where Asha's mum hugs her in relief and acknowledges that her daughter was her wish! That would've been a nice "aww" moment for everyone!

+Okay, I said I was going to talk about my problem with the songs, so here goes. As I said before, I listened to the soundtrack before watching the movie, and even when I did, I could immediately sense a problem: these songs did not tell me much of anything about the movie, just on their own. Welcome to Rosas, which is pretty much just an exposition dump about the kingdom and how Magnifico founded it, didn't really paint a picture of our setting or characters much at all, the way opening songs like Belle or The Family Madrigal do. This Wish, although pretty, was something I could hear just as easily on the radio -- it didn't feel as tied or necessary to understanding our heroine the way something like Part of That World does. I'm a Star, quite frankly, felt like a lot of inspirational word salad, rather than anything particularly memorable or revelatory -- why else wouldn't it even be worthy of a musical salute in the reprise, where Asha remembers that she and everyone else are stars during the climax? Even after reading summaries of the plot and spoilers from the storybook for this film, I could not figure out for the life of me how At All Costs would fit organically into such a story, being sung by our villain and hero. It wasn't until I saw the film that I saw how the filmmakers decided to fit it in and honestly...the song didn't help tell that particular scene at all. It's a really pretty song and I like it a lot -- but it lacked any of the irony or contrast that kind of a scene that introduces the difference in focus between our hero and villain required. If the scene itself is needed to understand what's supposed to be going on while the song is playing, then the song is not effectively telling the story and is therefore unnecessary. There wasn't even a particularly Spanish or Mediterranean flair to the soundtrack to help set the stage, aside from the occasional flourish of castanets -- instead it sounded very contemporary, which I guess is appropriate, since it was largely written by pop composers rather than any musical theater talent.

+There were also points where the songs felt the urge to shove in a bunch of extra words just because, rather than have the words flow well and really mean something. I'm a Star is most guilty of this, of course, but even in This is the Thanks I Get?, we hear Magnifico gripe that "I let you live here for free and I don't even charge you rent" -- mate, THAT MEANS THE SAME THING! If you live somewhere for free, then you are NOT paying rent!

+Knowing What I Know Now is a bop and I like it (aside from Amaya's stupidity), but I'm sorry, all I can think when I hear it is "This is clearly trying to be Ready as I'll Ever Be from Tangled the Animated Series, but that song blows this out of the water." However fun the song can be, it would've been so much stronger if it actually addressed the contrast between the characters and revved us up for a big final battle, instead of it just being our eight underdeveloped characters psyching each other up.

+The idea of everyone being stars was a lovely idea, but the execution of Asha remembering this fact and using it to defeat Magnifico was terribly handled. First off, there was no revelatory phrase or action that prompted Asha to remember this fact, so her suddenly saying that "they're all stars" came out of nowhere. Second, even putting aside that there'd be no way any of her friends could hear Asha from all the way up on the tower if they're stuck in the courtyard below, there's no reason I can see for Asha's friends or family to know what the hell she was even TALKING about. They weren't there when the I'm a Star number happened! And the way that number made it seem, just based on the visuals, it looked like the "star" power came from a person's dream, since it's the same glow that returns to Asha's grandfather when he gets his dream back, but most of the town's dreams have been already yanked out by Magnifico at this point! I think the idea is that since everyone is a star, even with that big piece of them and the power accompanying it taken out, they still have enough stardust inside of them to be powerful enough to chase their heart's desires...but yeah, I'm sorry, for all the word salad I'm a Star threw around, this world-building aspect was really not made clear, and because of that and the lack of a proper callback to this plot turn, the climax didn't hit as strong as it should've.

Overall, this film felt a lot like a batch of unbaked chocolate chip cookies that someone decided to throw a bunch of brightly colored sprinkles on top of, just because they could. A lot of ideas just don't feel like they were fully developed, and there was a lot tossed in that didn't contribute to the overall taste or bring the disparate elements together in a cohesive whole, instead feeling more like a distraction than anything of actual substance. That doesn't mean I couldn't eat it -- I like eating cookie dough as much as the next person -- but that doesn't mean it felt like a complete, finished product worthy of great praise. Instead I'm left looking at the wasted potential and wishing the movie had carved out its own path more, one distinctive to itself, rather than just be a mashup of previous Disney concepts and tropes. I won't act like there's nothing to like here, nor that it's completely lacking in heart: I actually would love to see fandom for this movie re-imagine it in ways that could've improved the story and characters, because there were SO many good ideas here...but for me personally, this movie left me colder than it should've and -- like Asha after meeting Magnifico -- a bit disappointed.

So I make this wish...to have Disney make a film better than this.

Overall Grade: C-

[antianakin]

And you know what pisses me off about Ahsoka Tano in the Siege of Mandalore arc? Is that she actually considered joining Maul’s crazy ass and that she actually bought into his inane anti-Jedi rant.

I actually kinda like that she considers it for a minute, because my most favorite version of Ahsoka is one who's also just teetering on the edge of darkness herself. Ahsoka listening to Maul talk about how the Republic is an Empire in everything but name and that it can't be saved, but that he alone can help her take out the Sith Lord anyway so long as she joins him, and she genuinely takes that very very seriously is arguably one of the most interesting things to happen to her since like season 4. I REALLY wish that the idea that she nearly joined a Sith Lord was something that was ever at any point followed up on, quite honestly.

Maul as Ahsoka's Palpatine just WORKS for me. Maul was the apprentice parallel back in TPM, both in opposition to Obi-Wan and foreshadowing what Anakin would eventually become. So for him to end up being sort-of Sith Master to Anakin's own apprentice just has a certain SYMMETRY to it.

I don't even hate that Ahsoka turns away from him specifically because he then mentions that they'd have to take out Anakin in the sense that Ahsoka is SUPER FUCKING ATTACHED to Anakin and this is something that's true within Rebels, as well. Ahsoka is RADICALLY attached to Anakin, to that relationship and the loyalty she feels she owes to him and his memory. And it's something that's absolutely THERE in TCW and Rebels, and it would've been a really interesting thing to explore in the Ahsoka show, the fact that she holds this attachment to him that's super unhealthy and that made it difficult for her to accept the truth about him. But they... didn't. And so instead of this kinda neat parallel where Ahsoka struggles with attachments just as much as Anakin did, we get this idea that her relationship to Anakin is what gives her the most strength, that it's the most positive thing to have ever happened to her, the only part of her life before the Empire she really remembers fondly at all (she does remember the Jedi more fondly in Rebels, but that's not there in the Ahsoka show where she explicitly calls them all failures).

And this is one of those things that frustrates me the MOST about Ahsoka's trajectory. There's so many times that they could've really explored Ahsoka's own darkness, her true struggles, and REALLY honed in on that to showcase not only the impact of things like the war and Order 66, but the impact of having had that relationship with Anakin at a foundational time in her life when Anakin was arguably at his WORST (before he became a literal nightmare genocide machine obviously). She's a gullible, malleable child put into a position where she has to have a lot of trust in Anakin and give him a lot of power over herself and Anakin is at a point in HIS life where he's giving into his darkness more and more. He's already someone who's massacred an entire village of innocent people, he's already a fascist who believes in MAKING people do what he wants, he's already a baby killer who feels no real remorse over it, he's already a massive racist who uses that prejudice to justify murdering people. He is selfish and he is greedy and he is losing his battle against his own darkness more and more to the point that he can be four bad days away from double genocide. I find it kind-of impossible to believe that that WOULDN'T have had an impact on how he trained Ahsoka and the way Ahsoka ultimately turned out.

But because the person writing Ahsoka is a fucking anti-Jedi Stanakin, what we get instead is a story that refuses to acknowledge Anakin was super dark at all and so refuses to really look at Ahsoka's OWN darkness at any point and mostly just justifies what Anakin did and the choices Ahsoka makes and her feelings about the Jedi as complete and utter failures because it helps fuel his agenda of making Ahsoka into The Greatest Jedi specifically because she was trained by The Greatest Jedi.

So, in a vacuum, I DO actually like that Ahsoka nearly joins Maul, and I even like that she ultimately refuses to do so specifically because of her attachment to Anakin causing her to be loyal to him over the possibility of getting more information about the Sith Lord. I think that that WORKS narratively and that it could've been a really interesting jumping off point for Ahsoka's character journey. But what I DON'T like is that this moment ended up turning into, as you mentioned, Ahsoka agreeing with the anti-Jedi sentiments and that her connection to Anakin is the better one because it's what allows her to reject darkness or whatever. I don't like that, I don't think it makes ANY sense, and it's boring. It makes her BORING and that's by far the worst criticism I can give any character.

[kanansdume]

I've seen a lot of discussion on why Andor DOESN'T feel like Star Wars up until this point, why that's good or bad or what have you, why it's unique and different and special, but I want to talk about why Andor DOES feel like Star Wars still to me.

Cassian wants to save everyone, he wants to just be able to find some small place he can lay low and live a normal life with his mother, wherever that may be and whatever it takes to achieve it. He doesn't truly want anything fundamental about his life to change (for example, he's willing to move off of Ferrix but he wants to take Maarva with him). But what he's not willing to accept that that life is no longer possible. The Empire is here already, it's not going away, and it'll never let him live a normal life. Even if he WEREN'T being actively hunted, the Empire won't let him live a normal life the way he wants. It doesn't matter how far he runs, what name he chooses, what clothes he wears, the life he wants isn't going to happen.

When he tries to get Maarva to run away with him, to ignore her failing health and dismiss her growing desires to fight the Imperial presence on Ferrix, Maarva tells him that his inability to stop worrying over her is just love, and nothing he can do about that. The love isn't the problem, it never was. She's not trying to get him to stop caring about her, just to convince him to accept her choice and let go, to accept that things are changing, including their relationship to each other.

And Cassian leaves. But when he does, he hasn't fully accepted Maarva's choice. He doesn't understand it until he lands in Narkina 5 and starts to feel what she's been feeling and then tries to talk to her and she's already gone. He goes back to Ferrix, hears her final words, and the last time we hear him speak about Maarva is when he sees Bix for the first time after she's been tortured.

Bix: Maarva was here. Cassian: Wasn't she great?

He's let go. He's accepted Maarva's fate, her choice, and made his peace with that loss, knowing there was nothing he could do about it, knowing that nothing he could've done would've changed this outcome. And only once Cassian has truly let go of Maarva and his past is he truly able to step into the role we all know he will take up. Only then can he go to Luthen and ask to be taken into the Rebellion. It's perhaps not the life he WANTS, but it is the life available to him. He either spends the rest of his life being hunted, or he turns around and becomes the hunter himself, even if it means sacrificing a life with the people he loves. He chooses to protect those he loves, to fight for their ability to live in peace, even when it requires giving up his own.

In The Phantom Menace, Anakin is offered a choice to follow his dream, but it requires leaving his planet and his mother behind. He ultimately makes the choice to leave, but we see throughout the rest of his storyline that he's never managed to let go of the desire to have the life he WANTS, a life with Shmi still in it, a life where he gets to have his cake and eat it too. He didn't want the fundamentals of his life to change, but he also wanted to be a Jedi and never quite accepted what that was going to mean.

This inability to let go of his past, to let go of the fantasy life he dreamt up for himself, ultimately has a cascading effect of instability and darkness on his life. Because he loses Shmi anyway, despite everything he has now learned, he loses the one thing he truly wants in his life. And that loss, that inability to keep change from happening, causes him to cling even more to what he has, it makes him incapable of letting go of anything or anyone that he has deemed fundamental to his life now.

Cassian's ultimate ability to recognize that he has to accept change, that his worry for the people he loves is part and parcel of loving people, allows him to rise.

Anakin's inability to recognize any of this forces him to fall, and he brings the entire galaxy down with him.

Much like Anakin, Cassian's major arc in this show was about LETTING GO. He had to learn to accept the world as it was, how to accept himself and the people he loved as they are, and only then could he move forward to become the revolutionary rebel we always knew him to be.

Cassian is morally gray, yes. He kills people pretty quickly, he's not always compassionate, he can be selfish and unkind. But he still lives by the rules that govern the Star Wars universe, and so he cannot become a hero until he learns these specific lessons

We're getting the same basic message about attachment, letting go, and accepting change as we've always gotten in Star Wars. This is the same message we got through Luke and Anakin, the same theme we saw explored in the recent Obi-Wan Kenobi show, the same concept we saw brought up a few times in places like Rebels and The Clone Wars.

Andor is looking at the world of Star Wars through a very specific lens that we haven't looked at it through before, and it brings a lot of wonderful new things to light about this world, but it also stays true to the ultimate message of Star Wars, and that's what made it feel so incredibly special to me.

[xstarkillerx]

Hey hey hey :)

I saw your post about wrestling Anakin into submission and I was just thinking...I'm 6'0 ft and a gym rat. I could literally take him in both ways. I dunno but wrestling for his cock, seeing the rush in his eyes at the challenge......

Omfg sorry

Original post referenced

NO don't be sorry because I legit think turning him on might be one of the only ways to avoid him being a sore loser. Because listen, he loves sparring, it's one of life's greatest past-times, but he can easily turn sour if he feels like he should be winning but isn't. * (Accidently went on a sfw, off topic tangent about Anakin and him being Shii-Cho critical because he's arrogant)

In the throws of it though, when it could be anyone's game, when you're both panting and sweating but your muscles still have some steam in there, that's when you see the rush in his eye. There's a subtle tell that a lot of Anakin's peers, people who don't quite know how to read him, overlook or attribute to his arrogance;

if Anakin manages to disarm you in combat, gains possession of your saber, has the undeniable upper hand– if he wins and yet he chooses to discard the sabers and taunt you to engage in hand-to-hand combat, oh boy that's how you know you've got him. Because listen, Anakin likes hand-to-hand combat as much as the next guy, but obviously saber fighting is where it's at for him, he also fights in Djem So, with foundational roots (via Obi-Wan) in Ataru, ending the battle quick is what's fun for him... unless it feels like it's leading to something else.

So that's what I'm picturing, right. You were sparring, he disarmed you but instead of ending the fight as he usually would and resetting back to square one, he tosses the Sabers aside and continues the fight hand-to hand. Maybe that's when he starts to realize he underestimated you. Anakin can fight, he's a swordsman but you, you've got brute athletic strength. He's having the time of his life as you both lose your breath together, trading blows, dodging kicks, bruising each other.

He'd never let you win, you know this, so it's a very genuine thing when you do. He isn't even upset when you get him on his back with his arms pinned under you, I think he'd laugh a pure laugh just from the joy of it, the kind of laugh he lets out on the rare moments he feels at home in his skin, when he's racing, or flying, or after a good fight. It would be infectious, ticking the skin of your face with how close you are to him. The moment would settle though, and all that would be left is the thick air between you two, hearts pumping, bodies close, and a solid warmth against his stiffening cock. Adrenaline fueled sex, two warriors, two athletes, two friends and sparring partners, solid strong bodies against each other. I think there would be something warm and bright about it, the kind of sex were you can't stop smiling at each other, as your tired body works to make him know he's been bested.

In the post where I talked about dominating Anakin as a person much shorter than him, I talked about having to be smart about it, having to know how to shift the balance of power in your favour because he can easily flip you over and take the reins back. In this situation though, the battle for dominance was the foreplay. He'd make some playful efforts to regain control, flipping over, trying to make you cum first, but he knows he's been beat and gladly accepts you taking what you want from him.

Sorry this isn't as erotic as the other one was, as I was writing it I kind of realized how much joy he would probably get out of being challenged this way, to the point where it would bring out a very bright and joyful side of him. Intellectual, mental, or hierarchical domination, anything that may actually make him feel disrespected or less than, is a definite no-go with him, but this stuff I think he absolutely loves. It's fair, it takes a considerable amount of effort that he can feel in his body, it makes sense to him.

[starlightandsunshine]

Alright 3rd and final Star Wars take of the day that is probably pretty lynchworthy:

Echo should have died/already been dead in the Bad Batch arc in s7. Sorry guys, I love Echo too, but the story would have worked better if he was already dead when they got there.

Like there's a lot of things that could have made this arc better in general that I'm not going to really get into here without touching on the character design or whitewashing and racism around the clones (which many much more qualified people have talked about way more eloquently than I ever could). Like the fact that this arc should have been a Cody&Rex arc rather than writing Cody out so early in or the weirdly dismissive way the writers treated the other characters in order to lift tbb up when they could have just. Not done that. Really very easily.

But specifically the Echo thing: as soon as Rex finds out the possibility that Echo might still be alive, he is immediately ready to jump in with both feet without looking, and Anakin cautions him that they might not find Echo alive and he needs to prepare himself for the possibility that they can't save him. This has huge overall narrative implications, because we, the viewers, know that in a few weeks time he is going to turn his back on the people who love and trust him and betray everything he's ever sworn to stand for bc he is worried about the possibility of not being able to save Padme.

Now Rex goes with tbb and Anakin on a rescue mission that might not be a rescue mission. Tbb are still being very dismissive of the "regs" and Rex, quite understandably, is not handling their attitudes very well.

They get there, it's a trap and so on and so forth, but here's the important part: they don't find Echo alive. The Techno Union found him after the Citadel arc and mined his brain for data through hand wavy star wars means and they had no need to preserve anything else or keep him alive after that.

The rescue mission is too late and they never had the chance to save Echo at all. And Rex breaks. He holds it together for long enough to complete the mission, they escape the Techno Union and protect the village, but once they get back on the ship and head back towards Anaxes, he just shatters. Full on sobbing on the floor devastated bc he was so sure he could save Echo. He was so hopeful that he could save this one person after everything. After Fives and Tup and Ahsoka walking away and Kadavo and Umbara he just wanted to be able to save one person that he cared about. And they were already way too late.

We can see Anakin faced with all of this and the shadow of his future actions that he will do so that he will not have to deal with his own potential grief. We can see the paralells between Rex doing everything in his power to have the possibility of saving his brother and Anakin taking extreme steps to have the possibility of saving his wife.

The shadow of RotS hangs over the entire arc and this then makes the scene with Admiral Trench hit so much harder. Because it's not just the warning of how far Anakin has already fallen, its the spectre of the future hanging over his shoulder in more ways than one, the way that throughout the arc you can see his resolve to never lose Padme hardening so he never has to face that grief.

On the other end of things, tbb are faced with Rex's very real and present grief for Echo and have to acknowledge the love and care that the other clones have for each other. They get to grow as characters and learn to respect the grief of the "regs" bc there is a shared kinship there, they do share more than they don't, and they are all horribly aware of just how easily it could have been them. The arc can end with them learning to respect the other clones and finding a closer kinship with them rather than returning to the status quo just with Echo as a member and they sort of like Rex now. Not only would that have made them more relatable as characters but could have set up a much better conflict for the future in their show rather than the weird thing with Crosshair that we did get and them still not really connecting with any of the other clones in a show centred on the clones.

Like, let the characters fail. Let them lose. Let them have succeeded in their mission without having it be a victory. Let it be bittersweet. S7 is already bittersweet. We know what is coming. We know how close it is. The shadow of it looms over every single interaction in this season. So don't shy away from it. Lean into the shadow of Anakin's choices, lean in to the paralells that you're writing in, let the events have meaning and impact and consequences like so much of the rest of the show.

[unmaskthewriter]

Haven’t I Given Enough? {Anakin Skywalker x GN! Reader}

A/N: Welcome back dearest readers! I apologize for the unannounced hiatus. I needed time to focus on my health and I finally feel like I have a moment to breathe and work through a lot of the writers block I had.

I do not give permission for any of my work to be copied, published and/or translated on any platform including Tumblr.

Summary: You say goodbye to a friend you once knew, and hello to a new threat. Inspired by Gilded Lily (Sped Up) by Cults

With that said, please enjoy this sequel to Ocean Eyes. If you have not read it, please read Ocean Eyes {Anakin Skywalker x GN! Reader} here!

Word count: 1310

Warnings: violence, angst

GIF CREDIT GOES TO ROSIETHESLAYER

Now it’s been long enough to talk about it

You were stationed on Jabiim, escorting civilians through the Path when you felt his presence. An old friend, someone who was very dear to you in the past during your time serving as a Jedi on Coruscant. You turned away from a family resting in the corner to face him.

“Master Kenobi?” You call out, approaching quickly.

“Master {Y/L/N},” He let out a breath he wasn’t aware of and enveloped you in his arms. You felt comfort in his presence. You pull away slowly, your hands resting on his shoulders, “I am quite relieved to see you are alright. Where have you been all these years?”

“Just outside of Mos Espa. Occasionally Tala asks for my help with the Path. She told me she needed me for some high priority passengers… I suppose that means you.”

“Yes, and someone else,” Obi Wan Kenobi ushers forward a small girl, “Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan.” He introduces her.

“It’s nice to meet you. Are you a Jedi too?” She asks, looking up to you. You take her hand with a smile. Obi-Wan can sense the overwhelming thoughts racing through your mind.

I’ve started not to doubt it, just wrap my head around it

“Why, yes I am. It is so nice to meet you.” You stand straight and look to Obi-Wan who nods.

“Tala, do you mind watching her? I must discuss something with {Y/N} here.” He explains to which Tala nods. You and Obi-wan walk off, waiting until Leia is out of earshot of the conversation.

“So, how did you of all people get involved in a rescue mission for the Princess of Alderaan?” You question with a mild smirk playing on your lips.

“{Y/N}, I never wanted you to find out this way… I understand you and Anakin shared a closeness that under normal circumstances would have had you both removed from the Jedi Order..” obi-Wan begins as you stop in your tracks. He turns to face you.

“She is Anakin’s child, isn’t she..?” You speak softly, looking down at the ground as you process this information.

“Well, yes, but… there is another as well. A young boy on Tatooine by the name of Luke. He is under the care of his aunt Beru and uncle Owen.” Obi-Wan explains gently, walking over and placing a hand on your arm, squeezing gently to comfort you.

“O-oh… Lars? The moisture farmer?” You question further, pressing your lips together for a moment.

“Yes, but Anakin is unaware of this and so it shall remain. Their safety is my highest priority.” Obi-Wan explained to you. You pause for a moment before nodding in understanding. Had you misunderstood his affections? Perhaps he was just being a friend and you mistook it for more than just friends. You had to put your feelings aside, and recognize that the past is the past.

“I will do what I must to protect them, just as you do, Obi-Wan. Thank you for bringing forward this information.” You force a small smile, taking his hand. He squeezes yours softly.

“Hey! You’re gonna want to see this.” Tala rushes over, beckoning for the two of you. As you followed, you realized the doors to the hangar had been sealed shut by an outside force.

“They are here… I can feel it.” You whisper, turning to Obi-Wan, “You must do everything to help these doors get open. I will make time.” You mention, pulling the hood of your cloak over your head and walking to the blast doors.

“W-wait, you can’t just give yourself up for us!” Obi-Wan argued, rushing after you.

“Vader thinks I am dead, Obi-Wan. He won’t see me coming. Force knows you would be doing the same.” You argue, pulling your arm back from his grasp. You navigate the tunnels to the blast doors.

“I wish to speak to someone on the other side.” You state.

“If this is your attempt at buying time, you have failed miserably. Anakin Skywalker isn’t here.” A female’s voice spits at you.

“How do you know his true name? Only.. you were there the night of Order 66. You saw him.” You begin putting the pieces together, your mind running frantic.

“Stop. Stop it!” She demands, breathing shakily as the stranger falls back into the memories of that night. The doors open and you are escorted to the outside.

You feel him, although it feels as though he is hidden deep down somewhere, and masked by someone else. You hear the clinking of his uniform as he approaches, stopping a mere ten or so feet before you.

“I had not wished to meet you under such circumstances.” You begin, remaining calm and poised as you stand before the Sith Lord.

“Yet, here you are, alive and breathing. The final piece to a mystery.” He responds, taking a few steps closer. You can feel him trying to probe your mind for information, something he never found himself capable of before.

“What's it supposed to mean?”

“He’s not the only Jedi I seek.” He states simply. Obi-Wan.

“I will not fight you, Anakin. I will not allow you to follow this anger and hatred in your heart. It is not the Jedi way-“

“Such blind faith in the Jedi who couldn’t protect you!” He raises his voice and for a moment, you can feel Anakin breaking through the surface, if only for a moment. You took a deep breath, your mind wandering for a moment.

You were standing alongside Tutso Mara, a fellow Jedi knight, supervising the work being done in the hangar.

“With a munitions expert such as Jackar, we will be properly-“ You began. Before you were able to finish your sentence, an explosion erupted just a few feet from you. The ground beneath you rumbled, as shrapnel from the nearby ship went flying in every direction like great balls of fire. Many were thrown back from the blast, including yourself. You felt your eyes burning from the small pieces of fiery shrapnel that had blasted in your direction. You cried out for help.

“Somebody, please..” you cough, trying to push yourself up, “I can’t see.”

“I do not blame the Jedi for that day.” You claim, remaining calm and steady with your emotions.

“I do.”

“So it’s our fault you turned to this? The Sith are elusive, you cannot tell me you found what you first sought after with them.” You argue, taking a step closer.

“It is no one’s fault but mine, {Y/N}…” Anakin draws his saber from his waist. “The time of the Jedi has come to an end. If you do not join me, you will die a blind and foolish person.”

I remember when you told me it’s an everyday decision

“It is not I who is truly blind, Darth.” You drew your lightsaber, the hum of its power almost bringing comfort to you. You waited for him to strike but he never did. You grounded yourself, feeling the Earth beneath your feet for his presence. You could feel his hesitance, his questioning. Just as you thought it was over, you heard the doors overhead open and the ship engines power up. You slowly turn back to face Darth, gripping your saber tightly.

But with my double vision, how was I supposed to see the way?

Darth sheathed his saber as the woman from earlier gave the command for the storm troopers to begin firing. You fought to the end, giving the ship just enough time to escape the Empire’s clutches for another day before falling to the ground, defeated.

“I won’t make the same mistake twice.” You hear Darth say before your world turns black and you feel all breath escape your body.

Haven’t I given enough, given enough?

Always the fool with the slowest heart

[ooops-i-arted]

Season 3 Episode 2 child development thoughts?????

Hey so you know how I've been beating the drum FOREVER of "won't it be so cool when Grogu feels more confident in himself and can be more proactive in the story?" WELL NOW WE DID IT!!!

Maybe not quite that level yet but HE SAVED DAD!! He did it!! Even when he felt afraid, probably overwhelmed, likely fighting the instinct to stay with Dad and use the Force, he did it! He conquered his own fears and kept his clarity of mind (like a Jedi) and used his Force powers and what he'd been taught by Din to quickly and readily get Din help. I AM SO PROUD OF MY BABY!!! Look at how far he's come from a little scared baby hiding in a pod!!

Scooting back to the beginning, I loved how he proudly showed Peli he could jump (and she praised him like the good aunt she is). And.... was that Grogu's first word? It did sound a bit like "Peli." This is one of a few instances we get over this episode and the next of Grogu "talking." Not stock baby sounds, but clearly trying to emulate the speech of adults in his life. We know the species can speak Basic (Yoda, Yaddle, Oteg, Vandar) so either Grogu has been strongly discouraged from trying to speak before he was taken in by Din (my personal theory) or he has a physical issue in his mouth structure that makes it difficult to speak (also a possibility but I'm not very knowledgeable, just what I've picked up from the wonderful speech pathologists at my job). I still think the real reason is a mute child is more marketable because most people don't actually like kids unless they're being cute props and not acting like actual kids. (Exhibit A: The reaction to young Anakin and Leia and being called brats for.....acting like normal kids. But let's move on from a personal pet peeve of mine.)

We've seen Din talk more and more to Grogu throughout the season as he grows more comfortable in a caretaker role, and he continues this by teaching Grogu about "their" culture. (Grogu is officially a Mandalorian now!) It's plot-relevant but it's also wonderful to see Din take an active role in Grogu's education. Din has seen the dangers of the galaxy and wants Grogu prepared, and I think he enjoys having someone to share his knowledge with and teach and parent. Grogu is clearly into it, facing Din, listening closely to him (and we KNOW when he chooses not to listen, he shows it).

Grogu showing empathy for R5 and being worried about it shows that he is developing social-emotional skills. Kids are pretty egocentric by design; they can't always meet their own needs and have to make sure they can direct an adult to get their physical, emotional, and mental needs met. Preschool is when we start teaching respect and compassion for others more purposefully (it should be modeled at all times - kids emulate what they see) because they're typically in a classroom setting and interacting with people more. While Din does do a lot of violence and killing for money, Grogu has also seen him speak politely to others, take care of people like Frog Lady when they need help, respect others' space by ducking in Kuiil and the Anzellans' dwellings, talk respectfully to others even when they disagree, so on. Din is actually a pretty good model, you know, minus the violence and the killing. I do my best to model at all times what I want my kids to act like, big moments (guiding them in using words when upset) and small (saying excuse me when I bump them, please and thank you when I ask them to do something, etc). It pays off because now my class sees and learns the expectations and by this time of the year, they aren't typically yelling across the room "Miss L he took my toy!" they're saying "I was using that, please give it back" and then coming over if needed to say "Miss L, can you help me? I was playing with that and [Friend] took it." Grogu has absorbed what Din is showing him. In turn, we see this again when Din takes Grogu's concerns seriously and reacts accordingly. To Din it's just a droid, but Grogu is worried, and Grogu can trust that Din will respond to that worry and reassure him either verbally, letting him watch on the scanner, or by fetching their poor droid friend. Grogu learns from Din because he trusts him and believes in him - just like my students learn from me and value what I say because I have demonstrated that I care about them, will treat them with respect, and can be a reliable person when they need me, and we have built a relationship off that.

We also once again see Grogu demonstrate a secure, healthy relationship with Din and the worth of Din's parenting by immediately going into his pod and sealing it when asked. A child who does not have consistent expectations or boundaries will test them to try and figure them out. Grogu knows that Dad means what he says and trusts that Din is telling him to get in the pod for a good reason, and will come get him when pod time is done. So he listens.

I loved seeing Grogu try to save Din. He's acting independently, but it's clear he's learned some skills from Din and Luke. He's able to successfully sneak right up to Din and would've probably gotten him out if the machinery hadn't clanged. He listens to Din when told to go, which had to be hard - it's scary to leave Dad even when Dad isn't in trouble! But he really shows off his cognitive skills. He's able to think through sneaking up to Dad. He's able to focus and use the Force well enough to leap several times. He shows memory skills by being able to track their path back to the N-1 and then show Bo the way back. He reacts quickly and adapts to any obstacles, even though he was scared. We see later when he's with Bo, he's much more scared and hesitant. He was definitely afraid of those dangers, but was able to push through it and not be ruled by emotion alone. That's a great show of maturity and I'm so proud of him!! His display of memory skills continues as he "communicates" to R5 to take him to Kalevala, remembering what Din has taught him. I also wonder if this will keep motivating him to keep trying to speak. Grogu wants to communicate so much! He knows it would be easier and I bet he's bursting with things to tell Din!

I was also wondering if he was able to control his pod, and yes, he finally can! This shows that not only he has matured enough to be more independent, he is trustworthy enough that Din knows he won't wander off and will be safe. The last three pods have all had controls via Din's gauntlet. Grogu could open and close the red-and-white one but we saw no ability to control it. But now he gets a big boy pod! This will really help him be more independent and proactive and safe and I think it will be good for him, so that he can keep developing his self-confidence in his own independence while still being safe. Din probably feels better knowing Grogu can escape dangers and isn't as totally reliant on him as he was in previous seasons.

Overall this was a really solid episode for Grogu. We've really seen how he's learned and matured. I hope this season gives him even more character development, and while I maintain my opinion that Disney would prefer a mute, cute-baby-noises character to better sell merch.... I hope I'm wrong and we're building up towards Grogu speaking!!

[mythical-illustrator]

hi!!! I’m sliding in with some ships for your OCs that I’d love to know your thoughts on 🥰

Helena x Fennec Shand

&

Grace x Jesse 👀

excited for your HCs 💙💙

A lot of these are how they get into a relationship rather than an established relationship because that's where my brain went.

Helena (human, spider-sona)and Fennec(human) Shand. This screams some enemies to lovers trope with potential doomed endings.

Very black cat + spider man energy .

Helena - spider woman of coruscant

fennec - bounty's hunter.

They definitely met when Helena saved one of Fennec's bounties and was running away.

Fennec, an excellent sniper wondering why she can't hit this damn woman in a stupid white gaudy suit

Helena keeps webbing her to walls.

Making quips and Fennec's very beautiful facial expressions.

Now its personal for Fennec.

Starts stalking spider-woman because she keeps getting in her way. Several more public chases have ended with spider- woman getting involved

No one escapes this woman

She will have to change her approach to more subtle works. Which starts making her an even better marksmen.

Helena looks up this known bounty hunter - despite several people's concerns over having met said bounty hunter.

Stars keeping a special eye out for her

One day Fennec shows up at Helena aunts gun range. Que Gay panic but also secret identify panic identify

Helena thinks Fennec's must know, and starts hanging around the sniper.

Helena - oh no she's hot!

Tries to flirt her way out of trouble when she gets caught 😵‍💫

Fennec thinks this pretty woman is just flirting. And she looks like a strong and capable fighter so she starts flirting back.

Flirting turns into talks, turns into showing off her gun skills.

The next thing Helena knows is she has a date. And then another and then another.

Helena - am I dating my enemy!

Before she realizes it she actually likes this quiet woman with her sass and strong silence and she doesn't know that she's spider-woman.

Fennec likes her cocky and quip filled new love interest and is setting out to seduce the fuck out of her.

Fennic screams the touching flirt- very physical. Dragging a hand up her arm, chucking the chin. Sharing air space. (Driving Helena to distraction). She's definitely brushed a few hot zones that are driving super senses wild.

fennec knows she's keeping secrets but who isn't so it doesn't bother the bounty hunter.

Now Fennec's isn't always on Coursant but when she is- she visits her new lovely almost girlfriend (she'll woo her don't you fret love. A few more make out sessions in the gun booth Should do the trick.)

Helena is so close to giving in. She loves Fennec's touches. They've definitely almost fucked in that booth. Some very very heavy petting.

Her other visits are ducking around spider-woman.

Eventually someone will take a hit out on spider-woman - and they will hire fennec Shand.

How it ends can either be really happy, or really sad.

My happy ass wants some angst that they get into a fight across the city and then dramatically Helena s mask either gets ripped off or Fennec actually lands a hit and Helena calls her a nick name or something that only her almost girlfriend would know.

Gods I'm gay 😵‍💫

Anyway!

Grace (half twi'lek former night sister turned Jedi healer)and Jesse (clone trooper of the 501st). (I'm not as familiar with Jesse but I'll try my best ) 😜

Now this one I had to think about.

Jesse takes his job very seriously but has a humorous streak to him.

I think they'd definitely start off as friends that accidentally stumbled their way into a relationship without noticing.

Grace is a Jedi healer on the move quite a bit during the war but would pay the 501 a visit often first because of Anakin, then to get to know the men he trusts the most.

She would spend a lot of time in the medic base with kix

Kix is the clone I think Jesse is the closest with in the close circle company.

At first hes super formal around the Jedi,

He calm reserved demeanor tries to reassure him that he can relax.

Jesse would make some sort of qip about her more non traditional Jedi look: "that's why they're called shadow people, where there's farm animals there is a farmer" boy is he lucky he's cute.

Something something - didn't know that Jedi knew what color was?

He starts hanging out around the med bay more to talk to the Jedi healer.

He says it's to help his best bro Kix but Kix isn't having any of that.

She stars showing him some basic first aid then answering questions about Jedi and then the force and their her background as a former night sister.

He starts telling her about missions, Rex, the Domino Twins. Ashoka. Training with ashoka.

Kix is like...I'm a third wheel in my own medical house?

Grace tries keeping a arms length distance but she loves hearing his opinion on things. Hearing his stories.

Jesse is a very passionate and animated story teller.

Sometimes their stories get sad, like the nature of the war, the loss of his brothers. The Senate.

Jesse is very honest even if it's a little silly sounding sometimes.

Grace starts spending more and more time with the 501st if she isn't ordered elsewhere.

She starts eating with Jesse and the other arc troopers.

Running and training with him, seeking him out to spar with.

Then shore leave happens and Grace is convinced to go to 79 by some other clones.

She isn't sure she- a jedi- would be welcome but she goes.

She feels awkward at first, sitting and drinking and watching the men be themselves.

Eventually he downs a shot(or 8) and asks her to dance with him.

It's all over the place, lots of twirling and spinning and she almost smacks several people with her lekku.

When their dancing and they have to get real close because of it, they almost kiss but grace pulls away at the last seconds

She pulls away because Jedi and emotions and she doesn't know what to do.

Jesse is freaking out because holy fuck he's in love with one of their Jedi commands.

Kix is phased and thinks they're both idiots.

He gets the entirety of the company to start setting them up in shenanigans.

I'm talking about locking them in storage closest. Making them sit next to each other. Other nonsense Rex pretends he doesn't see.

Then umbara happens.

Grace - who wasn't there comes rushing back. Mad and concerned and afraid and all the things a Jedi shouldn't be.

She's thing and ranting and Jesse is just watching her Pace the medical room- kix left a while ago to check on everyone.

And finally he tosses is helmet to the ground pulls her in and kisses her. Tells her he's sorry if that's against her code but he might die tomorrow and he's not going to die without knowing what she tasted like.

Idk secret secret relationship happens that everyone pretends they don't know about.

Thank you for the ask, they were fun and I hope you enjoyed them. 😊

Tag list

@anxiouspineapple99 @dangraccoon @clonemedickix @sev-on-kamino @523rdrebel @secondaryrealm

[undulinoted]

What are your Star Wars rare pairs?? (Very curious!!)

Hi anon, hope you're well!! This is a good question bc the more I thought about it the more I was like... ARE these rare?! lmao, I'm sure there are fans with much rarer pairs out there than these but my favourite rare pairs atm are:

- Darthfett (Vader/Boba)

- Satidala (Satine/Padmé)

- Windwalker (Mace/Anakin)

- Palpakin (Palpatine/Anakin) - here's the part where you run away screaming from my blog lmaooooo

- Droidcaptain (K-2SO/Cassian)

- Melshian (Melshi/Cassian)

also special shoutout to my fav Star Wars pair ever, ✨Thranto ✨, but I felt it wasn't quite rare enough to include, even though Eli is a novel character and not gonna be as recognisable to some fans, it's still Thrawn's most popular ship I'm pretty sure, so :') and i also rlly love Kalluzeb 🥺

I started writing some reasons for why I enjoy these pairs below but only got two done bc I'm currently sick and my brain is not working so well lol but yeah, if anyone ever wants to hear more ask away!

-----

Darthfett

lando knows what's up lol

Imagine trying to crack something, anything, the tiniest spark of affection, between these two bucket heads. Honestly just such a fun challenge lol. This pair kinda stems from how if Vader needs a bounty hunter? He hires Fett. This is obv meant to imply that Boba is the best at what he does ofc but I have a very active imagination and when you ALSO ship Rexwalker then it adds some lovely angst to the ship. Also. These two men are seriously closed off, lonely and harboring resentment. They get each other 💁‍♀️ Boba also has balls of titanium steel bc he's one of the only people in the galaxy not protected by Palpatine that can talk Like That to Vader and not get force choked to death on the spot, so. I think Vader likes that 😏

I've read some pretty good fics for these two! Quite a lot of the time Boba is very turned on by just the Look of Vader's suit and how ominously powerful he is and like... same?!? 💚🖤

boba is me 🫠

ALSO also, I just have to throw this in here

jsghxhdh it's so funny, Vader's just like ffs NO but there's no real heat behind it he just looks done lol

Satidala

Yknow that one Clone Wars ep where Satine and Padmé have to investigate a mysterious outbreak of illness at a school on Mandalore? I've watched that ep an unhealthy amount of times lmao - the way Satine greets Padmé and their little moments 🤭

👀👀

They also have dinner together!!! And they change their outfits so many times throughout the ep, which, according to my calculations backed up by zero proof, was done in the same room as each other which all points to the logical conclusion that they were having lots of lesbian sex. Anyway, I just think they look neat together, and imagine the Longing 🤌 They're both so busy but will always put their duties first so in true wlw fashion they would be writing in their diaries about the other and doing a lot of window gazing :')

queens 👑

to be continued maybe lol, thanks anon!

[ahsoka-in-a-hood]

We do like to cuddle-pile Obi Wan, lol. ….forgive me the urge to nitpick-

I would definitely say that Obi Wan probably blamed himself a lot in his exile and would wake up at 4am remembering the dumbest faux-pas, but I doubt he would turn that into a fault of everyone else the way fandom does- and possibly that's why fandom does it, but it still misses the mark for me.

…tbh I do object to the 'fact' that Obi Wan had less support, or that he seemed to handle it worse, or even that he was so much lower on self-confidence. All we are shown in TPM of the actual apprenticeship is him insisting on teaching Anakin with or without the Order's support, and the council deciding to keep them, and then him being quite gentle with Anakin for one or two scenes and smiling, the end. Timeskip 10 years. Anyone can headcanon that things were deeply difficult going forward, and idk what happend in the various novels and comics (except for the one I did read) but tbh….

I forget if it's a deleted scene or not, but aotc has him confiding in Mace and Yoda and taking counsel from them about his doubts surrounding Anakin. And then we get the clone wars- which, frankly, it seems strange to me to conclude from watching Anakin get support and communal teaching help that obviously that did not also apply to Obi Wan and Anakin- why? I took it the other way around. Anakin routinely cribs Obi Wan's words when talking to Ahsoka, and the way other jedi don't hesitate to have teaching moments with him and with Ahsoka, and the way they look out for them- I watched all that and I never once thought this was something Obi Wan and Anakin were deprived of. I concluded that this was most likely how it was for them, too. That we can learn the most about them from it.

Ultimately I understand the urge to choose angstier interpretations, so I get it. I don't think it's terribly well supported, but there's wriggle room when it happens off screen and anyway what's fun is fun. And I'm not really going to go to war with those books being formative for so many people. I'm not. (I'm not)

(oh, the self-confidence thing- again, it's funny, I don't quite see it! Obi Wan and Qui Gon have their tension, but Anakin's apparent arrogance reads much more brittle to me.)

I must admit I have this thing where when the portrayal goes a little too much into the concept that Anakin was this terrible burden that it was a great injustice for Obi Wan to undertake- there's a point where it hits a nope for me. Maybe it would have been, if Obi Wan had actually been an abandoned abused teenager with a child unexpectedly foisted upon him, but.. he wasn't.

I always find the melodrama around Obi Wan being Anakin's master a bit funny. Basically a teenage dad! Struggling single parent! Traumatized child in the care of a traumatized child! Eldest daughter syndrome etc..... Yes, he was grieving, and it must have taken courage on his part to present that ultimatum to the council, and had he had to leave the Order to train Anakin, I can see how that would have been deeply challenging, true. But like,

It's the clone wars cartoon that really renders it for me. Anakin was.... I think quite objectively less ready for knighthood at the end of aotc than Obi Wan was at the end of tpm, but the cartoon basically has it happen right away. He was an actual teenager. He, unlike Obi Wan, canonically did not really want a padawan at that time. Also, he had to raise a padawan in a warzone? Hey, he also had just lost a parent, wow, the parallels. The show also establishes quite thoroughly that jedi learn to look after children and teach... possibly even before becoming padawans themselves, judging by Ahsoka, and that there is also a good degree of communal teaching even with the apprentice system, judging by Ahsoka. But never mind all that

So we're cuddle-piling the 25 year old trained teacher with a solid support system who was applying for a position that he expected to include raising a padawan, i guess... truly the meowest of meows, the burdenest of burdens. No wonder Anakin fell!

[maysileeewrites]

something there - Padawan!Anakin x fem!reader

Summary: After not seeing each other for nearly two weeks, you and Anakin reunite …  This is Part II of my Anakin mini-series, you can read Part I here :) 

Warnings: fluff, some light angst, oblivious idiots in love

Word Count: 2.9k

AN: this and what is going to be Part III were originally supposed to be just one part, but I decided to split the two scenes up, to get this update faster to you. (Also, knowing me, this would’ve been another monster of a chapter if I hadn’t decided to split the two scenes up) 

I have a masterlist :)

Part II 

You looked out the window, sighing. The sun was starting to set and you were nowhere near to finish sorting through the books in front of you. 

You loved your job, you really did, but right now you felt as if you’d give anything to be outside, feel the refreshing air on your skin and enjoy a night out with your friends in the Uscru District. 

You shook your head, trying to focus on the task at hand again. Daydreaming about the things you’d rather be doing wouldn’t help you to sort through these books any faster. 

Suppressing a yawn, you put the book you’d finished skimming through to the stack on your right and grabbed the next book from the stack to your left. Chief Librarian Nu had tasked you with going through the books that had been handed back today, to check whether the books had been returned in the same condition they’d been in when they’d been lent. Sometimes, books were returned with dog-ears or scribbles inside the pages or even with missing pages, which always greatly infuriated the Chief Librarian. 

So far, only one of the books you’d been skimming through had spotted a dog-ear. 

You tried not to think about how you still had a huge stack of books to skim through before you could finally go home and reached for the next book. As you leafed through the book’s pages you found your thoughts - inevitably - turning to Anakin Skywalker. Again. (You’d never admit to it, but he’d been on your mind ever since you’d talked to him almost two weeks ago.) 

Shaking your head, you reached for the next book and tried to focus on the task at hand, but the pages in front of you started to blur together, until all you could see was the sky-blue color of Anakin Skywalker’s eyes and his wide, open smile. Kriff. What was it about that Skywalker guy that had him haunting your every thought ever since your conversation with him almost two weeks ago? (Not that you’d been counting the days since you’d talked to him.) 

Judging from your previous interactions with him, you’d never have thought that you’d actually enjoy talking to him. But he’d seemed genuinely interested in what you’d had to say, even though it was clear that books weren’t a topic he usually talked about with other people. 

You had to bite down on your lip to suppress a smile when you recalled the way he’d said that hearing the way you talked about books made him wish that he were more of a reader himself. None of your friends would have said something like that - or even engaged in a long conversation about books with you. They all knew that you were a huge bookworm, but none of them were readers themselves, which meant that they’d started to tune out whenever you started gushing about books once again. Which, to be fair, you did quite a lot - but it wasn’t like they never went on outrageously long monologues concerning the topics that interested them. 

After a while, the pages of the books in front of you all started to blur together as you leafed through the books, thinking about Anakin Skywalker, your friends, the books you were currently reading, Anakin Skywalker, the books you planned on reading and Anakin Skywalker as you did so. 

Once you were finally done with sorting through the books, you let out a tired yawn, before getting up from your seat. You chanced out a look the windows - it was dark outside, the sun having long since set. Though you loved watching the sun go up and down over Coruscant, nothing would ever compare to the look of Coruscant at night. The pale, silvery light of the moon and the stars illuminating the city, giving it an almost otherworldly glow - it certainly was a sight to behold. 

You allowed yourself to linger in front of the window a moment longer, drinking in the sight in front of you, before you turned around with a sigh, reaching for the books on the table. 

You nearly staggered under all of the books’ combined weight. (Normally, you’d have just used the Force to make the books float before you, but your mind was too focused on other things to think of that right now.) 

You gritted your teeth, tightening your grip on the books and took a tentative step forward. You really should’ve thought this through before grabbing the stack of books - not only was it relatively dark in the Archives, the lights dimmed because you never had too many visitors in the evening, but the stack of books was so big that you couldn’t see anything in front of you, apart from the book. Quite literally, you couldn’t see where you were going. 

Thankfully, you’d been working at the Archives so long, that you’d internalized their layout, your feet carrying you back to the Archives’ main hall through sheer muscle memory alone. Somehow, you managed to avoid bumping into any of the shelves along your way - until you collided with something, or rather someone, that wasn’t quite as solid as the shelves. 

You could feel the books sliding out for your grip and you’re sure that you and the person that you’d run into would have both fallen down to the ground - if it weren’t for Anakin Skywalker using the Force to make the books float gently to the side and reaching out his hand to stop you from falling. 

„Force - Anakin, I’m so sorry!“, you hastily said, looking into his sky-blue eyes. 

„We’ve really got to stop meeting like this, Y/N!“, was all Anakin said, laughing quietly, but the worried expression wouldn’t leave his eyes. 

„Wha- oh, yeah, you’re right … „, you mumbled, suddenly hyperaware of the fact that his hand was still lying on your shoulder. He was so close to you that you could’ve counted his ridiculously long and fluttery eyelashes. 

Force, where were all of these utterly ridiculous thoughts suddenly coming from? And why was Anakin still looking at you like that, his eyebrows drawn together, looking as if he was trying to figure out something very important? Oh Force - what if he’d picked up on your embarrassing thoughts and that was the reason he was looking at you all serious and intense? 

You could feel the blood rushing to your cheeks and quickly lowered your eyes. You knew that Anakin couldn’t really read your thoughts - but his Force perception was much, much better than yours and right now, he must be getting a whole lot of nervous excitement, mixed with confusion and embarrassment from you. 

„Hey, are you all right? You look - shaken“, Anakin said and as soon as he said the words, the memory of your conversation from two weeks prior started to play in your mind. Anakin was looking at you the same way he had back then - worried and concerned, but there was something else in his eyes, another emotion you couldn’t quite decipher. 

„I - I’m fine - I just - I hadn’t counted on seeing you tonight! Not that I’m not glad to be seeing you - I am, I just didn’t know when exactly you were coming back!“, you blurted out and you could feel your cheeks grow even hotter. Why was being this close to Anakin Skywalker and looking into his blue eyes suddenly rendering you unable of forming coherent sentences? 

„Oh, right! We, uh, actually just got back, but I - I wanted to see you again“, Anakin said, running a hand through his short hair, and suddenly he was the one glancing away and biting his lip, before looking at you again. „You know, make sure that you’re not having trouble with any books, uh … falling down … „, he added. 

„Well, it kind of comes with the field“, you said, making a vague gesture to all the shelves filled with thousands upon thousands of books surrounding you two. 

„Right … „, Anakin said, laughing nervously. 

„So, uh - how have you been?“ 

„How was your mission?“ 

You both asked your question at the same time. 

„Well, I - „, you both said, looking at each other. Anakin’s lips curled up into a grin and then he was laughing and you couldn’t help but laugh along with him. His soft and genuine laughter was like music to your ears and suddenly, the butterflies in your stomach were back in full force. 

„You first“, Anakin finally said, still smiling, his sky-blue eyes alive with joy. 

„Right - I - I’ve been good - you know, the usual, sorting through books, reorganizing shelves … „, you said, suddenly starting to feel extremely self-conscious. Anakin Skywalker had a way of looking at you like he was hanging on to your every word, making you feel as if you were the only thing that mattered to him in that moment. 

„So, no falling books?“, Anakin asked you, still smiling softly. 

„Wha - uh, no“ you said, distracted by his smile and the way he was looking at you - his azure blue eyes fixed on you, with a soft smile on his lips - was making you feel. 

„So, what about you? How was your mission?“, you said, trying to distract yourself from your heart beating frantically in your chest and your blood rushing through your veins, and your thoughts spinning around Anakin - his open smile, his blue, blue eyes, his long lashes, the way he was still standing so close to you that you could feel his warm breath ghosting over your skin, and his hand that was still lying on your shoulder. 

„Oh, it was - good … „, Anakin said, sounding just as distracted as you felt. „We got sent to the Outer Rim, because there was trouble with some separatists - again, but my Master and I took care of it“, he added, clearing his throat. 

„Oh, that’s great … „, you said a bit awkwardly, not quite knowing what else you could say to him. There were so many other things you wanted to ask him - like what kinds of books he’d think he’d read if he were more of a reader or if he’d ever consider reading some of Treama Hillshi’s works or how he’d managed to haunt your thoughts like that every day, even though you’d only had that one brief conversation two weeks ago. 

But you didn’t dare ask any of these questions out loud - either because they seemed too ridiculous or because they’d imply that you’d spent way too much time thinking about him during these past two weeks. 

Instead, you glanced out the window at the night sky behind Anakin, hoping that looking at the stars would somehow give you an idea of what you could say to him. 

Before you could say anything though, Anakin said quietly: „The stars - they’re beautiful, aren’t they?“ 

You nodded. „Whenever I’m working an evening shift, I just love looking out the windows“, you admitted, „I love watching the sun set over Coruscant. But there’s just something about the view of Coruscant at night … „ You trailed off, not quite knowing how to put the beauty of the sight before you - the stars, glistening in the night sky, the skyline of Coruscant dipped in silvery moonlight, the ethereal, almost otherworldly glow of the night sky - into words. 

„I know“, Anakin said, nodding, almost as if he’d read your thoughts. „I’ve always loved stargazing. My mother used to point out all the different constellations to me when I was younger … Though, on Tatooine you could never see much more than just the two suns … „, he paused, lost deep in thought. 

You didn’t know much about Anakin’s past - only that he’d grown up as a slave on Tatooine, until the Jedi had come and taken him to Coruscant, leaving his mother behind on Tatooine. It was clear from the irritated and slightly bitter tone his voice had taken on that he held no great love for his home planet. You debated whether to say something. You didn’t want to press Anakin on subjects he clearly didn’t like speaking about all that much, but you also didn’t want him to feel as if you didn’t care about what he’d just said to you. 

„I used to stargaze with my mother too when I was younger … „, you said slowly, waiting for his reaction. Anakin’s blue eyes found yours and though you could still see the pain from thinking about his past in them, they seemed to soften as he looked at you. 

So you continued speaking. „I’ve always had trouble falling asleep, but stargazing really helps me relax. My room at my parents’ house has a window with a view of Coruscant’s skyline, similar to the view you have here“, you nodded to the window behind you. „Every time I had trouble falling asleep when I was younger, my mother used to come to my room and then she’d just lie down next to me and we’d look at the night sky together. She always says that she’s grateful that she thought of that, because looking out at the night sky and gazing at the stars calmed me down in no time … „, you finished, smiling to yourself as you recalled all the nights you and your mother had lain next to each other on your bed, just gazing at the stars in the sky in companioble silence. 

Anakin nodded, still with a far-away look in his eyes. „It really does have a calming effect … „, he said, still lost deep in his memories. 

Without thinking about it, without even giving your hand the permission to move, you reached out with your hand and grasped Anakin’s free hand with yours. As Anakin’s blue eyes found yours once more, you squeezed his hand gently, silently letting him know that you were there for him. That you’d listen to him, if he wanted to tell you more about his mother and his past on Tatooine. 

Anakin smiled - not a smile where his whole face seemed to be lighting up, but a smile that seemed rather bittersweet and melancholy. 

„I - you probably shouldn’t tell Obi-Wan I said this … „, he said, voice thick with emotion. You squeezed his hand again. „About stargazing having a calming effect“, he continued and though his voice wasn’t laced with heavy emotion anymore, there was still the tiniest hint of sadness in his blue eyes. „Otherwise he’ll force me to stargaze all the time … „ 

„What - because you need so much calming down?“, you teased him. 

„Definitely, if you ask Obi-Wan“, Anakin said and you couldn’t help but laugh. His annoyed, yet fond tone and all the stories you’d heard about Anakin almost never following his Master’s direct orders - his words made perfect sense. 

„Well, I won’t tell him then“, you said, still smiling. 

„Thanks“, Anakin said, squeezing your hand. You’d almost forgotten about your hands still being intertwined. As it was, you felt a weird tingling sensation in your fingertips - just like when, during your previous conversation, your fingertips had brushed against his when Anakin had handed you the book that had fallen down. 

You were still racking your brain for something to say - should you say something else about his Master, ask him how it was to be trained under Obi-Wan? or should you say something else about stargazing? But no, you didn’t want to bring up any more bittersweet memories for Anakin - when Anakin suddenly said: „Hey, uh, are you up for a joyride?“ 

You were so taken aback by this abrupt change of topic that the only thing you could think of saying was: „What - now?“ 

„Yes … I mean, it would give us a better view of the stars … „, Anakin said, lowering his gaze, suddenly becoming very interested with the points of his shoes. 

You were about to tease him some more about the calming effect of stargazing, but then you noticed his cheeks turning pink and the way he was nervously biting his lip. So you stopped yourself from teasing him and said: „Okay, why not?“, instead. 

Anakin’s eyes found yours again. „Really?“, he said and you nodded. This new conversation with Anakin had only made you want to get to know him, really know him even more, and you’d been yearning to finally get out of the archives and feel the fresh night air on your skin for hours now. Besides, you didn’t feel like denying the fact that your heart skipped a beat when Anakin was standing this close to you, looking at you like that any longer. 

You wanted to get to know this boy with the sky-blue eyes that were always so expressive and full of emotion, and the warm and wide smile. You wanted to spend more time with him, wanted to continue talking with him. 

„Really“, you said, smiling at him. 

Anakin’s eyes lit up. „Great! Let’s go then“, he said, ready to go. 

„Just a moment“, you said, nodding to the stack of books on the ground. You were about to let go of Anakin’s hand to reach for the books, when they started float up from the ground. 

„Where do they need to be?“, Anakin asked you. 

„Uh, the front desk in the first hall … „, you said, watching as the books started to float in that direction. 

„Done“, Anakin told you with a grin. 

„Thanks“, you replied, smiling back at him. 

You didn’t want to let go of his hand anymore - and neither did he apparently, for he squeezed your hand again, before you started walking out of the archives, hands still linked together. 

Link to Part III (coming soon!)

divider credits: @delishlydelightfuldividers

Taglist: @ahqkas @zelzablues @khaleesihavilliard @stxrrielle

[tennessoui]

Prompt: "You're a terrible cook" (aka me wanting more kuwsk or recipe for disaster content ;D )

yes!!! ive been meaning to write more recipe for disaster content for soooo long so this is the perfect excuse. (obi-wan is his daughter, ahsoka's piano teacher, until ahsoka refuses to learn anymore. desperate to keep talking, obi-wan offers to teach anakin, chef, how to cook. obi-wan is a terrible cook.)

this is just fluff and bickering and them being married and ahsoka (nine now) being too long suffering for her age.

(1k)

“Obi-Wan,” Anakin coughs as he opens and closes the kitchen door rapidly, trying to fan out half the smoke. “You’re a terrible cook.”

“I’ve made a few mistakes,” Obi-Wan allows, coughing himself as he steps away from the stove. “You’re the one that keeps leaving me unsupervised.”

“Baby, I leave Ahsoka unsupervised in the kitchen and she’s nine years old.”

“Which I believe to be a parenting folly, as she is a child—”

“You know what she isn’t, Obi-Wan? On first name basis with all the firefighters in this city.”

“Careful, you almost sound jealous, love.”

“I’m not jealous, but I do think our taxes could be used for other things—”

“I agree, perhaps fixing the pothole you love to fly over out on 12th street, before you give me permanent neck and shoulder damage—”

“Who are you texting. We’re having a disagreement.”

“Cody. I’m telling him not to bring the troops out to the house. We’re fine.”

“You understand that it’s not normal to have the chief of the fire department as a contact on your phone, right?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Cody is deputy. Mace is the chief.”

Anakin opens and closes his mouth several times before he finally pulls himself together enough to shake his head with something that feels a lot like awe. “You’re the worst cook I’ve ever met in my life.”

Obi-Wan blinks imperiously at him from a scant foot away. Whenever they bicker, space seems to evaporate from between them, much like the boiling water Obi-Wan never remembers to cover on the stove. “Half your job is to teach terrible cooks how to cook. I am what you made me.”

Anakin lets out something close to a scream before he launches himself at his husband and kisses him roughly against the counter. Of all the people he could have ever fallen in love with, he chose Ahsoka’s piano teacher, who turned out to be the most stubborn and petty son of a bitch this side of Coruscant. He attacks his mouth with his own, pressing him hard against the edge. The fire alarm is still going off.

But that’s alright. Anakin has become quite adept at kissing people as the fire alarm goes off. Not people. Just this one man. 

They separate just as quickly as they came together, though Obi-Wan’s hands stay locked around Anakin’s waist.

“Forgive me, darling,” Obi-Wan murmurs, tilting his head to press a fleeting kiss against Anakin’s lips. He kisses him again half a second later. Anakin accepts each kiss as being from the love of his life and therefore what he deserves.

“Mm,” Anakin replies, as if he has to think about it. As if Obi-Wan has just destroyed his third saucepan and Anakin is actually mad. They’ll get another one. He’ll get Obi-Wan. It evens out. “I don’t know.”

“Now I can’t tell if you’re mad about dinner or about the fact that this marks the 20th recipe in your draft book that I cannot cook. How can you go forward with publishing a book called Recipes So Simple My Husband Can Cook Them if I cannot?”

“Maybe I have another husband,” Anakin replies, leaning forward to kiss him. He’s always been addicted to the sweetness of his husband’s kisses.

“Who also cannot cook to save his life?” Obi-Wan says. “Darling, you may just have the weirdest type I’ve ever seen.”

Anakin kisses him quiet and then pulls back. Almost all the smoke is gone, so he surveys the kitchen with interest. “What was it this time, baby? It was a recipe for a salad.”

“The instructions on how to cook the chicken were too vague,” Obi-Wan defends himself immediately. “And I…may have gotten a bit of flour in the fire. Which didn’t help.”

“No,” Anakin says, “I don’t think it would. Flour, Obi-Wan? The recipe doesn’t even call for much—”

“Dad? Obi-Wan?” The voice of his daughter calls from the entry hallway. “I’m home!”

Both adults rush out of the kitchen to the hall in order to greet her with a smile.

She looks between the both of them and sniffs the air. “Oh,” says Ahsoka. “Take-out for dinner again?”

Obi-Wan splutters and sets about defending himself, holding out his hand to guide Anakin’s daughter into the kitchen. He can make her her afternoon snack. There’s no way cheese and crackers can be fucked up. 

Anakin takes the free moment to go into his study, carefully locking the door behind him. A draft of his next cookbook is in a locked drawer in his desk, and he fishes it out to flip to the twentieth recipe. “Spell out steps for chicken?” He writes quickly before he forgets. He reads over what he already has skeptically. He doesn’t particularly know how he can be more straight-forward than what he already has typed.

“Add note: Remember everyone, flour is highly flammable. Best to not add any near an open flame.” He reads over the words before shrugging and closing the draft.

The dedication on the second page catches his eye, and he stops to read it with a quirk of his lips. 

To my husband, OWK.

I promise to cook our every meal for the rest of our lives, 

If you promise to set my place at the table and make sure that it’s always next to yours.

Also if you promise to never touch a anything more culinary complicated than an EZ-bake oven ever again.

Love,

Ani

His husband is going to feel like such a dick when he reads it. He’ll probably cry.

Anakin can’t wait to kiss away his tears. For that, and for every other part of their future together, two of those really long notes played in perfect melody. Harmony. Whatever.

It’s not like Anakin knows anything about music, after all. That’s Obi-Wan’s job.

[clonewarsarchives]

TALKING TARKIN (#125, MAY 2011)

In his varied career, actor Stephen Stanton has provided the voices of a vast array of characters, from Obi-wan Kenobi in Star Wars: Empire at War to Darth Maul in Star Wars: Battlefront II. His latest role is as the snide Captain Tarkin in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Words: Jonathan Wilkins

How did you become a voice actor?

I’ve been pestering people with my cartoon voices ever since I was a kid. I used to try to imitate the voices that actors like Daws Butler (Snagglepuss, Yogi Bear) did. I originally came out to California to go to film school, but even back then, if anybody needed a narration or something like that, I'd do it. Then I decided it was really taking up a lot of my time, so maybe I should think about it as a career. So I moved into acting full time.

Were you excited about playing such a well-known character as Tarkin?

Absolutely. I originally went to see Star Wars as a teenager. I was familiar with Peter Cushing's work from all the Hammer horror films, and one of my favorites was Island of Terror (1966). There was a scene where he gets his hand chopped off that really freaked me out as a kid. I went to see Star Wars and I was like, Wow! This movie is great and it's got Peter Cushing in it!

When the chance came to audition to play Tarkin in The Clone Wars, I thought, They're looking for a young Peter Cushing sound-alike, and so I immediately started doing my research and turned in my audition tape.

What was your audition piece?

It was a scene from "The Citadel." I think Tarkin might have been a sergeant in the script, but it was just a page of sample dialogue from the episode.

It was really straightforward, because there wasn't much else to do except Peter Cushing, only younger. So I re-watched Island of Terror and watched the BBC television series Sherlock Holmes. Dave Filoni suggested that I watch the 1960s movies where he played Doctor Who so I got the DVDs, only to find he was already playing an old man back then!

What sort of nuances and vocal characteristics did you pick up?

Well he definitely had a cadence that's very particular to him. When he rolls his 'r's, that's something that's very Peter Cushing. I listened to a lot of dialogue just trying to pick out when he rolls his 'r's, and when he doesn't, and that up-and-down style.

What made Tarkin so tricky is that there is no performance of him as a young man; there's only the Tarkin that we know on the Death Star. So I had to create that based on what I knew of the character in A New Hope and what I could hear from Peter Cushing as a younger man, and combine the two in order to come up with the young Captain.

He still has to sound like the cold-blooded, heartless Tarkin who kills everybody on Alderaan to prove a point, but now he has to be this vibrant, younger character, too. He's still proper, he's still distinguished, but he's not quite that cold-hearted murderer yet. We're not quite sure how it gets to be that he's one of the few people that gets to order Darth Vader around: "Enough of this, release him!" And Vader listens to him, no questions asked.

Anakin and Tarkin are fractious from the start. Did you have a back-story for their relationship?

Dave Filoni is very good at giving reasons why characters interact the way they do. He talked to myself and Matt (Lanter, Anakin Skywalker) before we started recording and explained that we were exploring the relationship, because, when were first introduced to Vader in A New Hope, you can tell that people who were around him in the Death Star think he's just this creepy guy that hangs around with Tarkin. No one thinks of him as the supreme villain that we all do.

Did you know how Tarkin would look when you recorded the voice?

No. There are a lot of things that are very confidential on The Clone Wars—scripts, images and so forth—so I didn't see what he was going to look like until I got there on the day of the session. When I went into the booth, they said, "Oh, we've got a picture for you of what he's going to look like." I saw a picture, and thought, That's incredible, that's great, it's him.

This is not only a much-loved character from Star Wars, but also a much-loved actor. Did you feel a sense of pressure playing the role?

Oh, you better believe it! I think that most of the pressure just came from myself, because I wanted to do it right. I'm such an admirer of Peter Cushing, and I realize that Peter Cushing is more than an icon. Tarkin is iconic, but Peter Cushing as an actor is so revered and he did so many great things.

Of course, Peter Cushing appeared alongside Christopher Lee (the live-action Count Dooku) in many classic Hammer horror films. So the big question for a lot of Hammer fans is: Do you think Tarkin and Dooku will ever meet?

That was the first thing that went through my mind! I was sitting right next to Corey Burton, and we were both wondering whether there was a scene in here somewhere where the two of us talk! I'm sure they've thought about it. It'd be great to see these two icons of cinema meet in animation; that would be wonderful, don't you think?

If you could play another character on the show, which would it be?

I did the voice of the older Obi-Wan Kenobi in the video games. I think everyone's love of Obi-Wan is really based on that original performance by Sir Alec Guinness—how can you not love that guy? That'd be fun to do again. Admiral Ackbar would be fun to do. There's a little bit of Winston Churchill in him I think. He's a great character.

Would you like to play Tarkin again?

Oh, absolutely. They've got a long way to go from the character we just saw in "The Citadel" to the guy commanding the Death Star in Episode IV. I'd love to see how that whole relationship develops between Anakin and Tarkin. What do those two guys have to go through to get to the point where, after everything that's happened, they are working together? I'm all for it.

REBEL FRIENDS

Stephen Stanton on his earlier career in special effects working with Phil Tippett on projects such as Alien 3 (1992) and Batman Returns (1991).

Very early in my career, I was doing both voiceover and visual effects. I was young, I wanted to do everything, so I tried and it kind of wore me out. Working with Phil Tippett was great. Phil has such a legacy with Star Wars and Lucasfilm. I also worked with Richard Edlund early in my effects career. He's another Star Wars alumnus and another incredibly talented guy. It was through Phil that I actually got to meet Ray Harryhausen, another person who inspired me as a young filmmaker. These are all guys that have done so much in the entertainment industry and to inspire me in my own career.