#I’ve only played Code Veronica beforehand

[magic-can]

Finally played Resident Evil 4

So I beat RE4 for the first time recently and I kinda just wanna ramble incoherently about it because WOW what a game. It was absolutely fantastic and absolutely deserves its legacy.

The rest of what I wanna say is below the cut but just know that I do go into some spoilers and also there’s mentions of cults. That’s another thing - don’t play this game if cults are a genuine trigger for you. A cult plays a major role in the plot.

It’s a game I’ve had my eyes on for a while now. Years actually. I never got around to it for a multitude of reasons but now with the upcoming remake and it being only 5 bucks during the Steam winter sale, I decided to finally pick it up.

First off, the visuals have aged impressively well. I’m not one of those goofballs who thinks visuals make or break a game but I will absolutely give praise when devs go the extra mile to give a game a good art style. Yes, RE4 is very clearly a game from the mid 2000s, visually. But it has an art style that still stands out - to me at least.

Then there’s the story. I am very impressed with how this game balances goofy action movie shit with genuine horror without one taking away from the other. I know that’s a part of the magic of RE at this point - campiness combined with genuine horror - but still. This game manages to be both fucking hilarious and absolutely horrifying at the same time which is VERY impressive, even more so given that the game has almost been out for 2 decades.

By far the scariest thing to me about the game were the Los Illuminados. The Las Plagas itself didn’t really freak me out because at the end of the day parasites are just trying to survive. Yeah getting your head esploded and/or turning you into a horrible abomination as the Plaga completely overtook you would suck but you can’t get mad at it. It’s just trying to live. What is fucking horrifying to me is the idea of a cult weaponizing such creatures to indoctrinate people into their ideology and to commit international terrorism. It just made me think of the lengths that cults have historically gone to spread their fucked up ideologies. That felt very real despite some of the insane and at times goofy things that happen in this game.

The knife fight with Krauser was, as a scene itself, fantastic. The quick time events were annoying though. Actually that has to be my biggest complaint with the game, personally - the QTEs - I got used to them and sometimes they were fine that doesn’t mean they aren’t annoying as hell for the most part. I really hope the remake gets rid of at least some of them.

I do wanna say, though, is that I really do not understand the Ashley hate. I thought she was very likable and adorable. Any time I got annoyed during the escort missions with her it was more so at the game itself and not her yelling for help or getting injured. She really isn’t a bad character at all. Also she’s voiced by Carolyn Lawrence. There’s no way I could be annoyed by her.

I do, on the other hand, understand why everyone loves the merchant. He is absolutely wonderful and I adore him. <3

Finally, Leon. Leon himself is an absolute highlight of this game. He is a very likable and endearing guy who, while clearly hardened after the events in Raccoon City, is still very caring and kind. Also he says the dumbest things and I adore it. I knew about some of his goofy one-liners beforehand but I was still grinning ear to ear each time he said one of them. He is legit a great character though - just in general, not exclusive to RE4. He’s definitely my favorite RE character now. Also he’s an absolute babygirl. Ada is also great and I love the messy, complex dynamic between her and Leon.

These are far from my full thoughts and I AM going to yell about this game more on other posts but again this is just me. like. yelling. Anyway, I am VERY excited for the remake. I love the direction they’re taking it in and that it’s going to be very different from the original. Because the original is an amazing game that should not be “replaced”.

[bugheadotp]

a birthday to remember

so this is a really really late secret santa gift for @betts-and-jug​. i took your prompt and put my twist on it, i hope you enjoy!

ao3 link: archiveofourown.org/works/13381398

~~~~~

“I don’t understand how you can be so cheery so early in the morning, Betty,” FP yawned as opened to the trailer door wider to let her in.

“It’s an exciting day Mr. Jones, and thank you again for agreeing to help me. I know you’d probably rather be sleeping,” Betty said as she unpacked food from the brown grocery bag she’d been carrying. “It’s not every day your son turns eighteen.”

“God, where did the time go?” he sighed. “It seems like only yesterday you, Jughead and Archie would play in Fred’s backyard and piss Alice off with the mess you’d make in her kitchen.”

Betty smiled at the memories, “Yeah, much simpler times.” She reached into the cupboard above her to retrieve the carton of eggs and cracked all six eggs into a bowl. “Can you heat a pan up please Mr. Jones?”

“You know it’s FP, Betty.” She nodded bashfully and FP moved to the stove and turned the dial on the right to a medium heat. The blonde also handed him a frying pan from the clean dishes next to the sink, which he placed on the back burner of the stove..

Betty continued to whisk the eggs, then moved onto making a pancake mixture. FP made a pot of coffee before sitting at the small table, knowing that she’d rather not have him in the way. He smiled at the thought of his son. FP was always proud of him, even when he wasn’t around that much, knowing that Jughead wasn’t following in his footsteps had made him a better person already.

“Do you kids have plans today?”

“We’re going to Pop’s where Veronica, Archie and Kevin are meeting us. Then the Bijou this evening and then to my house. I told my mom that Jug doesn’t really like his birthday but she was insisting that he had to do something on his eighteenth, so she’s baked him a cake. You’re still  okay to come right?”

“Of course, Alice has been texting me all week. I think she thinks I’m going to forget or something,” FP sighed as he got up to refill his coffee cup.

“Yeah, she does that a lot. I’ve had three texts from her this morning already.”

FP watched Betty move around the kitchen like it was her own. It wasn’t an unusual sight. Ever since Jughead had first asked her out, Betty had slowly started to add her own touch to the trailer.

It started with her own body wash on the small shelf in the shower, and a very sleepy FP not realizing he used it until he was popping bread in the toaster and Jughead had asked why he smelled like strawberries.  

A month later he’d returned to his trailer, after a long day at a construction site, and was greeted by the smell of freshly baked cookies. FP knew that he didn’t have anything in his kitchen cupboards that would assist in the baking of said cookies and walked into the kitchen to see new mixing bowls stacked on the counter and Jughead who was washing up a bowl. Betty was using a smaller bowl to mix icing and insisted that he need not pay her for any of the newly bought things.

Betty had a printed chore chart for housework stuck on the fridge, color-coded and laminated, that had the three of them alternating between washing up, laundry and vacuuming. Jughead had started to learn to cook, basic things like rice and pasta, to accompany whatever feast Betty was making alongside him. They’d work together effortlessly every time.

FP smiled at all of the memories, his son was lucky to have Betty in his life.

He glanced around the living room, noting the wrapped box next to the TV stand. “Can I ask what you got him? Or is that something private?”

“Not at all.” Betty moved the pancake she’d just made onto the stack of others and, after turning the heat to low on the stove moved to sit opposite FP with a glass of orange juice. “It’s sort of like a memory box of us, from things I found when mom was cleaning out the garage. It has some pictures of us that I didn’t even know existed, the ticket stubs from our first date, the first article we co-wrote for the Blue and Gold, things like that.”

“Wow, and all I got him was a voucher for Pop’s.” The silence grew between them once again, neither knowing how to continue the conversation from there. Betty got up to resume making pancakes when FP two of the photos on the fridge caught his eye. They were taken simultaneously, on the first day of Pre-K. One of Betty and Jughead, the small blonde’s arms wrapped tightly around his son and the other of them smiling brightly at each other. “Did you know the first day he met you, he told me he wanted to marry you?”

Betty turned around, a shocked look on her face, “What?”

He indicated for her to sit back down, which she did, pouring them both another glass of orange juice (FP limited himself to two cups of coffee a day.) “The first day you met, your mom, Fred, and I had met up beforehand so that you’d all become acquainted with each other before school. We’d all arranged to meet in the park, Fred was running late but you and your mom were already there, sitting on one of the benches. As we were walking up to you, Jug tapped my leg and said you were the prettiest girl he’d ever seen.”

Betty’s face turned a light pink and she gulped down the remainder of juice in her glass. “How do you remember that?”

“It’s one of those things that stick, I guess. When your first day finished and he came out of school, he begged me to take him to your house to play. In the truck, all he talked about was you and for a four-year-old, he knew a lot of words to describe you. That night when I was tucking him into bed, he said ‘One day, I’m gonna marry her.’

“When he was seven, Gladys and I forgot his birthday, but you didn’t and had brought in a cupcake for him. He kept the candle too and before he went to bed, he came and told me that you wore your special dress when you brought it him, the one you only wore to Church at Easter and Christmas.”

“I remember that. I spent days convincing my mom to let me wear it even though it was about fifty degrees out. Juggie deserved me looking my best.”

“Betty, my boy’s been in love with you for as long as I can remember. You could have worn the worst thing you can think of and he’d still think the world of you,” FP explained with a laugh.

“For the record, I still want to marry you,” Jughead said, leaning on the short counter between the kitchen and the living room.

FP looked between them then got up, “I’ll leave you both to talk. Call me when you’re ready to eat?” He walked towards his room, pausing to give Jughead a hug, “Happy birthday, son.”

“Thanks, dad,” he responded then greeted Betty with a kiss to her forehead and sat where his father had just vacated.

Before Betty could say anything, Jughead opened his hand to reveal a ring. Her eyes widened as she gazed from his hand, back up to his face, “Juggie, I-”

“Betty, I do want to marry you someday. You told me that in your life plan, you wanted to get married by 25 and no sooner, so think of this as a promise ring. We’ll carry on with life, moving to New York, going to college, getting jobs, we’ll do all of that and this,” he held the ring between his thumb and index finger, “this means we’ll do it all together. Through everything that’ll inevitably happen, we will stick together. If you want to that is.”

“Of course I want to Juggie, I love you.” She closed the gap between them, kissing him.

Breaking the kiss he took Betty’s left hand and said, “I read that promise rings go on the ring finger of the left hand.”

Betty nodded and wiggled her finger slightly to help ease the ring past the knuckle. She wrapped her arms around Jughead’s neck and sat on his lap, hugging him tightly.

“Is it safe to come out kids?” FP yelled from his room.

The blonde pressed a kiss to her boyfriend’s lips before telling FP he could return. Betty resumed cooking, plating up what was ready to be consumed.

                                                              ~

After finishing breakfast,  FP gave Jughead his gift then left for work. Betty had finished drying the dishes, with Jughead’s help, when she remembered the present in the living room. She took his hand and led him to the couch and handed him the box.

“I hope you like it, Juggie,” she said pressing a kiss to his cheek then taking a seat next to him.

Jughead opened the box, “Betts, what?”

“It’s a box of our memories Juggie, everything from the plastic toy you gave me when we first met to the pictures you had developed of us yesterday.” Betty said as Jughead went through everything in the box, telling each other the stories associated.

                                                              ~

Later that night after the annual tradition of an ‘inner circle’ lunch at Pop’s, followed by Betty and Jughead’s date night at the Bijou, they arrived back at the Cooper’s house to Alice, Hal and Polly (as well as her twins - who were only just awake) in the kitchen, Alice holding a cake with an 18 candle lit. They all sang happy birthday and Polly’s twins, Junior and Emily, hugged their uncle before being taken to bed. Alice and Hal ate a slice with them before retiring to bed.

Whilst Betty was getting ready for bed, Jughead was sitting at her dressing table, and opened up his email on her laptop to watch a video he’d received from his sister and mom earlier in the day, blowing party horns and singing happy birthday. He typed back a reply about his day, using several exclamation points about his proposal/lifelong promise to Betty, and that the following week when JB’s in town, he’s going to spoil her rotten with the voucher for Pop’s.

Betty walked back into the room, wearing grey pajama shorts and a white tank top, kissed him on the cheek then settled into bed. He logged off and joined her, wrapping his arm around her waist and entangled their fingers, lying gently on her stomach. She turned her head back and glanced up at his blue eyes, kissing him again. “Love you, Juggie.”

“Love you too, Betts,” he replied bringing her closer to him.

[fuckyeahevanrwood]

Evan Rachel Wood Turns Her Trauma Into Good. On ‘Westworld’ and in Life.

When Evan Rachel Wood needs a jolt of confidence, she puts on a certain playlist, a compendium of feminist anthems and feisty classics — “I Will Survive,” “These Boots Are Made for Walking,” Tina Turner, Pat Benatar, some head-whipping grunge and hip-hop. It was piping through her house here one chilly afternoon last month. Ms. Wood, the actress and musician, had just put herself through an emotional wringer: She testified before Congress, in unflinching terms, about being a survivor of sexual violence, then jetted to Los Angeles to perform songs by David Bowie, her musical idol, with his bandmates.

It was a cross-country head-snap. Now she was welding herself back together.

“My life is definitely going places I did not foresee,” she said, leaning over her kitchen counter, as Sia’s “Unstoppable” played in the background. “But I’m going with it. It doesn’t feel like a choice at this point. This is just what I need to do.”

Her trajectory is even more remarkable when you consider how much it overlaps, thematically, with the story line of Dolores, her character on the HBO series “Westworld.” On that sci-fi drama, set in a Western theme park where visitors can act out their most depraved fantasies with humanlike robot “hosts,” Dolores is an innocent and much-abused host who slowly awakens to the darkness of what has befallen her, and then fights her way out.

A critical darling when it aired in 2016, “Westworld” had the most-watched debut season of any HBO series, and anticipation for its new season, which begins April 22, is high. In a starry ensemble that included Anthony Hopkins, Ed Harris and Jeffrey Wright, it was the women, like Ms. Wood and Thandie Newton, as a host madam who’s newly conscious of her reality, that were riveting, in part for how they endured — and inflicted — violence.

The show, Ms. Wood said, “completely transformed my entire life,” not because it catapulted her career — although it did — but because playing Dolores forced her to drill into her own struggles. “Her journey mirrored so much of what I had been through and what I was going through,” she said. “It gave me a strength that I did not know I had.”

For Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan, the married co-creators of “Westworld,” Ms. Wood was first an exceedingly “protean” actor, as Mr. Nolan said in a joint phone interview. Ms. Wood, 30, has been in front of the camera since childhood, graduating from volatile adolescents in movies like “Thirteen” to a vampire queen on “True Blood.” They cast her knowing she could pull off the lightning shifts that Dolores makes in Season 2, which finds her exacting sweet revenge even as she weighs its costs.

“With Evan’s character, I wanted to explore a hero who has flaws and had a history that was trauma and sadness, but who could overcome that,” said Ms. Joy, a writer, producer and director of the series with her husband. “To me, that’s an inspiring story, and a story that can teach. And Evan, because she is so strong and she is that person, was able to unleash even more of that strength than I imagined. Even the aspects of her performance where she’s vulnerable, or when she makes a mistake, you’re internalizing that even heroes falter. It’s the kind of hero I wish I had had growing up.”

Ms. Wood did not necessarily feel heroic when she traveled to Washington — her second time there, after the 2017 Women’s March — to testify before a House judiciary committee in February. “I shook for days” beforehand, she said. She feared she would be judged for what happened to her.

“I couldn’t even believe I was about to say these words aloud, that I probably have only said out loud to three people.”

That somebody with her background — “I’ve had practice baring my soul in intense, surreal situations; it’s like what I do for a living” — was still terrified made her even more determined to go, to represent those who couldn’t. She was invited to appear by Amanda Nguyen, the founder of Rise, an advocacy organization for rape survivors. They were endorsing the Survivor’s Bill of Rights, 2016 legislation which amended the federal criminal code to give survivors of sexual assault the right to a free medical exam and to have rape kits be preserved for as long as 20 years, among other changes. (The hearing examined the law; its supporters are hoping to get a version passed in each state, because most rape cases are tried on the state level.)

Ms. Wood called herself a survivor of domestic violence and sexual assault, and described being raped twice, about a decade ago, first by an abusive partner, then by a man in the storage closet of a bar. “Being abused and raped previously made it easier for me to raped again, not the other way around,” she said. She has aligned herself with these causes before, but never in such personal terms.

She spoke of suffering from “depression, addiction, agoraphobia, night terrors” and attempting suicide; eventually, she was given a diagnosis of long-term PTSD. The assaults left her with “a mental scar that I feel, every day,” she said. She delivered her testimony in a gripping voice and broke down in tears afterward.

Around her neck, in a locket on a long silver chain, she carried a picture of her character, Dolores.

She was still wearing it a week or so later, at her home in Nashville. “Whenever I had a moment of self-doubt, I remembered — this is a part of me,” she said, as her cat, a protective Devon Rex named Smokey, curled up beside us on the couch.

She moved to Nashville a few years ago, seeking a quieter place to raise her son, now 4½ years old, she had with her ex-husband, the actor Jamie Bell. Save for an old friend turned writing partner, she knew few people there, and gets around without much fanfare, helped by a pair of tortoiseshell glasses and a choppy bob. (Her long “Westworld” hair is a wig.)

Would she have been able to testify without the show?

“I hadn’t even cried about my experiences until after ‘Westworld,’” she said. Her defense mechanism was to go numb and power through. “And I didn’t even realize that until I’d done ‘Westworld.’”

When she finally gave herself permission to cry, “it was like the floodgates opened,” she added. “It just felt like an exorcism; it was so painful but so healing.”

Revealing her ordeal, she felt freer, she said, comparing it to coming out as bisexual in 2011. “Everyone was like, ‘Don’t do it!’” she mock-yelled. “And I was like, I have to, it’s me, and it’s unhealthy if I live in a way that’s not authentic.”

Ms. Wood’s testimony, coupled with the personal revelations and shifts of the #MeToo movement, made a difference, said Ms. Nguyen, who helped draft the original bill. “Storytelling is so important in convincing people about policy change,” she said. “I know that that hearing moved the needle for progress.”

Twenty-four hours later, Ms. Wood was in Los Angeles, about to perform at a touring Bowie tribute. She has a lightning bolt tattoo, from Bowie’s “Aladdin Sane” album cover, and songs like “Rock ’n’ Roll Suicide” were her beacon. “I used to just put that on when I was at my lowest points and just wait for him to scream, ‘You’re not alone!’ And that would get me through another night,” she said.

When she opened the lyric page for that song, onstage at the Wiltern in Los Angeles, her hand trembled. The words looked like symbols — “like I couldn’t even read,” she said. “Everything went white. And I thought, ‘Oh boy. Breathe, girl, breathe.’” In videos from the show, you can see her hesitate and back off, then regain her momentum. She finished the number with shattering intensity.

“Evan is a powerhouse,” said her friend Linda Perry (4 Non Blondes, Pink’s “Get the Party Started”), the vocalist, songwriter and producer, who recommended her for the Bowie gig. “What I like about her is, she’s not afraid to be vulnerable, and that to me is an extremely powerful position to be in. She stands right there with her feet on the ground and her arms open, saying, This is who I am, this is how I’m going to be, and this is how I’m going to walk through life. Take it or leave it.”

In Ms. Wood’s telling, that position is hard won. The daughter of two actors from Raleigh, N.C., where her father runs a community theater, she began performing early, and moved to Los Angeles with her mother, an acting coach, after her parents split when she was 9. A steady career followed, but looking back, she said: “I didn’t feel like I had proper training for the world. I lived my whole life asking, ‘What do you want me to do and who do you want me to be?’ I was so insecure and didn’t feel worthy of much.” As a teenager, she began a much-ogled relationship with Marilyn Manson, the older goth rocker, to whom she was briefly engaged.

Only later in her 20s, she said, and especially after she became a mother, did she find her voice. The 2016 election also impelled her to act, to set an example for her son.

In between Seasons 1 and 2 of “Westworld,” Ms. Wood filmed an indie drama, “Allure,” out now, in which she plays the gaslighting abuser of a teenage girl. It was not fun to play, she said, but a painful story she felt needed to be told. “If you’re going to be famous, for me it has to mean something, or be used for something, because otherwise it just freaks me out,” she said.

The playlist we’d been listening to all day — her soundtrack for the revolution — is called “Invincible,” she said. In a flannel shirt, dark jeans and cowboy boots embossed with stars, she was unguarded and casual, peppering the conversation with “Dude!” and the click, every now and then, of a fidget cube, to channel her energy. Her house is cozy but feels half-lived in — she’s still in Los Angeles often. “Westworld” shoots in the Utah desert; to lighten the mood on set, she and her co-star James Marsden, as a “host” gunfighter, run their lines as Veronica Corningstone and Ron Burgundy, from “Anchorman.” (She puts on her coaching voice; he’s dense. It works.)

But Dolores’s transformation, in Season 2, left Ms. Wood unnerved.

“I’ve worked for a very long time to not be angry and vengeful,” she said, “so it was hard to take pleasure in that, even though I knew that the character had definitely earned it.”

Ms. Wood’s mission is always to turn her trauma into some other force. Before she went to Congress, she had her aura read at a Nashville shop. It told her some of her energy was blocked, that she needed to get something out. Now, a week afterward, we went back, to see if anything had changed.

She was still glowing lavender — “wonderful storytellers, writers and artists,” the description said. “They have the talent to visualize and describe magical, mystical worlds.” But where before her emotional chart looked like a jagged mountain range, now it was flat, calm. “Speaking your truth!” she said.

Her hope was that — especially post #MeToo — “Westworld” would do for others what Dolores did for her: help them to feel powerful, and be heard.

“Everything you want is on the other side of fear,” she said.

[nooowestayandgetcaught]

i wanna preface this by saying: 

no, i don’t think you shouldn’t ship what you want. no, you shouldn’t be generalized for what you ship. this is just a critical analysis on the (admittedly, unsurprising) phenomena i witnessed for betty&jughead ship

it really is a “phenomena” to me because there was no telltale indication that they had romantic interest in each other that pre-dates the 1st kiss

(i’ll get back to that later on in this)

but... it’s canon? why are you picking on this one?

i’m genuinely not trying to

i was up for anything in this show tbh as long as it wasn’t the damn love triangle. i didn't come into this show with any preconceived expectations other than PRAYING for no love triangle bullshit

why? 

because i never encountered spoilers during this whole time

here’s the kicker: i think the leaks were on purpose. because what happened? it planted the idea (whether or not you were for or against betty&jughead) that the ship would be inevitable, and forced people to visualize it a certain way

ahead of time

doing this attempted to make up for the lack of romantic development

it’s shady and manipulative on the cw’s part, if that’s the case

but then again: what american television markets on is the safety net of heteronormativity. they pull in their lgbt+ audience with “baiting” (the beronica kiss in the first episode, the jarchie bathroom scene in the promos), but to ensure the homophobes won’t throw a fit, they put together a seemingly “straight” couple as the endgame or imply it to be it

this isn’t just the cw. this is a formula used in other american television programs as well. we are getting better, but it still exists

let’s try to as much as we can and look objectively at every betty&jughead scene before that 1st kiss (and by objectively, i mean this is coming from the perspective of someone who wasn’t spoiled beforehand) 

so what happens?

episode 2: 

- archie and jughead show up at pop’s while betty and veronica are together. archie stares at the girls, and he does this long enough and obviously enough, until jughead notices him staring. betty offers the invitation for them to the join the girls. archie does not respond and continues staring (arguably longingly) so jughead takes it upon himself to answer for archie and himself - since this outing with the boys includes the both of them. he introduces himself to veronica and bypasses her handshake, leaping over the back of the booth seat and sitting down beside her. all four of them enjoy hanging out, but seemingly nothing telltale about betty & jughead concerning interactions

pretty self-explanatory stuff 

episode 3:

- betty calls jughead over one of the classrooms and says he is doing a story about jason’s murder and makes a case by saying the whole thing started as a series of artciles. piecing that together, she asks if he would join the school newspaper. he refuses initially, and when she pushes for it, he asks if he’ll be given creative freedom. he’s not given the exact response he wants “i’ll help, and i’ll edit, and suggest” which jughead narrows his eyes and doesn’t look convinced, but he is eventually persuaded and does with both of them smiling

a lot of their interaction in this is playfully done, due to their already established friendship - jughead messing with the magnifying glass, his nose-wipe, betty’s use of ‘juggy’ and her body language being extremely loose and comfortable

but nothing inherently romantic is being shown. it appears to be a pleasant but platonic scene between them 

- the last scene of betty & jughead together includes dilton. exactly nothing is said between them and the focus is on primarily on dilton talking

episode 4:

- the pop’s scene with jughead ranting about losing his job/the twilight drive-in getting shut down. he’s clearly angry and looks to betty occasionally for a reaction, and she says nothing and looks uncomfortable/disinterested the whole time. they’re sitting very close to each other in the small booth. jug calls her ‘bets’ at one point. betty sees archie with ms. grundy and jughead tries to grab her sweater to prevent her from talking to archie, seeming to panic since he knows about archie & ms. grundy AND knows betty knows about ms. grundy’s car being a sweetriver on the 4th of july 

the only time they seem to warm up to each other is when betty suggests playing “rebel without a cause” (which is actually a q-coded movie itself) and jughead smiles at her while she smiles back, and they laugh quietly. 

an inside joke? maybe she just knows he likes the movie? he decides to play it that night after all. so as friends of course she would know what movies jughead would like. we can only assume this. 

again, no romantic indications of anything happening here

episode 5:

- jughead, kevin, and betty are discussing jason’s murder case. trev shows up, asking betty if they were still hanging out at pop’s tomorrow. betty tries (and fails) to explain what trev interrupted, and jughead says plainly it’s their murder board. betty calls her and trev’s meeting a “date” - it elicits a reaction from kevin and jughead with both of them looking surprised. they call her out on saying it was a “date” and jughead’s expressions are contemplative and his tone is blunt, but still somewhat surprised and processing what he heard.

i’ve heard people say “he’s jealous” in this scene but i’m no sure where they are picking that out? surprise is not jealousy. thinking out what you just heard is not jealousy. his body language hasn’t changed since the start of the scene.

- betty and jughead discuss the news of polly’s suicide attempt. he apologizes to her and calls that heavy. jughead suggests they go into jason’s room to figure out what the actual story is of why jason was running. 

pretty ordinary stuff. the focus is on their next plan in the investigation.

- betty’s bedroom scene where she finishes up dressing for the funeral. jughead comes into the scene dressed up fairly nicely for the funeral. betty looks at him and smiles, clearly approving but say nothing. jughead says it’s the best he can do but smiles and looks away.

it’s pretty soft and adorable of a moment with jughead looking embarrassed by betty smiling, but it’s still not romantically charged.

- they enter jason’s bedroom, looking for something to help their investigation and get scared by jason’s grandmother inside the room they never noticed. jughead stands behind betty and grabs her shoulder. he places a hand between himself and betty who is close the intimidating/scary figure of the old lady.

i’ve seen the argument done of “jughead was protecting her” in this scene and honestly that’s not the case if you are reading body language. protecting her would have meant putting himself between betty and the threat. grabbing her shoulder/standing behind her looks more like he’s using her for a block against the threat/using her as a human meat shield. it’s made even worse by the fact he uses his hand to ‘guide’ betty closer to the scary thing while he stays back.

- the last scene where betty and jughead discuss betty’s parents are lying. jughead thinks they’re lying more. he writes out ‘the coopers’ are possible suspects, glancing at betty and passing it to her to pin on the murder board. jughead says they need to talk to polly.

nothing out of the ordinary again. the focus is on the investigation.

episode 6:

- jughead is invited over her breakfast by betty. betty does this bc alice cooper would be interested in keeping an eye on jughead. betty uses that opportunity to have jughead as a distraction (going to the bathroom) so she can go through her mom’s things and take photos on her mobile. 

self-explanatory

- by looking at alice’s things, betty and jughead find the place polly is being kept at by looking it up on one of the school computers.

again, self-explanatory 

- during lunch, archie asks what they’re up to and if they need help. both of them shut him down - betty uses archie’s practice as a way to change the subject; jughead points out that it’s a stealth mission. at one point, jughead makes eye contact with betty, indicating he would like to take a piece of her food and she indicates it’s okay and he takes something we don’t see.

as a tactical move, it was smart to shut archie down. involving more people puts their investigation at risk. nothing romantic about that. 

- they get on a bus to visit the facility polly is at. they clearly appear intimidated by how it looks, and jughead attempts to make a joke about it. betty is near tears but she straightens her ponytail and walks towards it. betty gets checked in but jughead is asked to be left behind. betty eventually gets shut inside a room until alice shows up, grabbing her hand and intending to take her home. jughead follows. polly makes a scene about alice not telling her about jason. betty hugs her. jughead tries to move forward, because he sees betty move forward, and gets shoved back by one of the staff. 

focus is on the investigation, but also at one point, betty’s safety. jughead hasn’t been scared into a reaction - which would be to protect himself first - so he acts by wanting to get closer to his friend and protect her. 

-jughead gets a ladder, calls her juliet, climbs through betty’s window, makes a ‘the yellow wallpaper’ joking reference, she calls her parents crazy, jughead calls all parents crazy, betty suggests maybe polly was crazy, or that she is

-jughead uses a very soft voice and touches betty’s shoulder, tells her "we’re all crazy” and that they’re not their parents 

this is the point where something felt off. the dialogue here felt stilted and didn’t make sense? jughead is trying to reassure her shes not like her parents, because betty is in distress and doesn’t need to hear that and yet.... he says all parents are crazy and that they’re (parents+betty+jughead) all crazy

... but yet he says she’s not like her parents?

the logic doesnt come together.

“juliet” IS a clearly romantic reference, which if you have been following this analysis this long, should actually surprise you and make you think “how?”

-betty smiles and then jughead looks like he wants to say something, and betty repeatedly asks “what?” before he takes hold of her face and kisses her

from there, i was lost. i felt like i was missing something essential. and then it hit me later that i was. the romantic development is what i was missing

where was it? was it the lack of romantic indications this far in, or was i supposed to let heteronormativity decide for me that this was inevitable?

or were the leaks supposed to guide me to believably like it did other people?

either way that’s why i feel lost

i actually think it's a good thing i wasn’t spoiled bc i feel like i had a more objective standing on how relationships were gonna be developed 

bc watching what is happening on screen with no idea what to expect and forming conclusions based on real time events is what keeps the experience​ objective and that’s why, to me, when that kiss happened i had nothing to back up why - no indicators, no obvious romantic chemistry

(that wasn’t possibly heteronormativity being pushed at us)

of course you can love them and ship it - you’ve got show-canon now to back you up! the point of this whole thing is to explain that when someone goes “heteronormativity and possibly manipulated events created this” that thing explains why someone ends up saying this