#Rewatched the two last episodes of s3 last night i was trying to feel a specific feeling and well. It was fun to watch so shortly after not

[what-does-the-moose-say]

Really into the idea of just rewatching aos again. Did i finish 2 days ago? Sure. Lets go again. Right now.

[twdmusicboxmystery]

8-Ball Symbolism and Daryl's Characterization

@galadrieljones

I was rewatching the fight scene from Still last night to try and grab some drawing references and I was reminded of Daryl’s pool references (left corner, eightball). Other than Spencer and Negan in season 7, are there any other pool references in the series you can remember off the top of your head?

@wdway

Nothing immediately has come to mind other than what you mentioned regarding pool. I'll keep it in the back of my mind in case something pops up. Refresh my memory would you, when in Still does Daryl say, left corner, eightball? In the game of pool isn't the 8 ball the last ball that goes in, it ends the game. If it goes in accidentally during the game then that's the game, it's ended. I'm just thinking that Beth was shot in episode 8, her game was ended and in many ways so had Daryl's. And if Daryl actually said left corner, well you know me, I'm always talking about left=Beth.

@galadrieljones

I think he says “Top Left, eight ball.” I’m pretty sure but I should go back and check. I know it was left, just not sure if it’s left corner or top left or too left corner.

And yeah sinking the eight ball ends the game.

Magic eight balls are also a thing, like telling the future

@twdmusicboxmystery

I remember doing a post forever ago about 8 ball symbolism. I believe Eugene makes an 8 ball reference in 6x01. It’s one of the black and white flashbacks and he’s talking about Operation Lead the Walkers Away, but I don’t remember his exact wording

Found it:

Eugene: “It’d help disperse the force of impact and direct the walkers clean. Like a pool table. Eight ball, corner pocket.”

@galadrieljones

Thanks, @twdmusicboxmystery, I’m gonna check this out asap!!

@wdway

Thanks for the link to your post on Eugene's 8 Ball reference. I always enjoy re-reading your posts. I also read bethgreeneprevails post that you gave a link to. I know you guys will be shocked at this, but I fell into a rabbit hole while reading her side tunnel rant about Beth's and Carol's conversation about Daryl in s3e9 The Suicide King. Over the years we've discussed this conversation between Carol and Beth many, many times. The general thought among TD'er is that it indicates that Beth might have had a crush on Daryl. I'm not saying anything new here.

What I want to talk about is that this time in reviewing the conversation it gave me major Deja Vu feelings about the conversation between Leah and Daryl in Find Me. In TSK Beth is upset at Daryl for choosing his brother over her/them/TF. In the next episode, s3e8 Home, Daryl realizes that he had made a mistake in going off with Merle and in the end, he realizes that he needs to go home, back to where he belongs, back to TF.

This is roughly what happened in Find Me. Leah is upset because Daryl is going to leave her and go search for his brother, she wants him to stay with her, she tells him he belongs with her. He leaves. At the end of the episode, he's rethinking what he has done, and he returns to the cabin, but she's just gone.

In Home, he returns to where he belongs with the people he belongs with. In Find Me, he returns but the person that he believes he should be with is gone. Is this a foreshadowing of him returning to the person who he truly belongs with, and that person will be there when he finds her, or she finds him? Is this what I call back shadowing, to remind us of where he does belong. The other thing about these two episodes from s3, TSK and Home, is that Rick is having hallucinations about Lori. He was seeing Lori, but he didn't see the true Lori, what he saw was a made-up version of Lori dressed in white. It wasn’t true to who Lori really was. We could say the same thing about Daryl not seeing Leah for who she really was.

@galadrieljones

Okay great catch on the parallels with TSK/Home and Find Me. I love that!

@wdway

The other thing that ties this all together with Beth is that this is the first episode that we see the same license tag number on the white and black jeep with the pink, yes, I'm Sirius, I said pink, dog carrier, strap to the top of the vehicle. The same license tag number that we saw on the black car, white cross that took Beth in Alone.

@galadrieljones

Also I read both posts as well and found them really interesting. The red cue ball being #3 was very interesting. I was also interested in the inverse red stripe cue ball being #11. I really love your analysis of the 8ball as being “endgame,” and all the 8s around Beth at Grady.

The ouroboros is also often depicted as an 8 in the series—re: Alpha’s belt buckle and the symbol on Teddy’s box—indicating the mantra “The end is the beginning” which is a thematic parallel to the notion of a coda. We see the ouroboros in the episode of Fear which revolves around John Dorie Sr. being unable to rest until he finds the body of a dead girl from many years ago which turns out to be essentially hidden in the walls.

When Daryl calls the 8ball in Still, he misses. He’s drunk and screwing around but still. Beth then immediately goes and kills the walker. Daryl is bummed out because “we was having fun,” and Beth calls him a jackass who’s running from his feelings and this is how the fight takes off. Because killing them isn’t supposed to be fun. If you call the 8ball, you better sink it. Idk what I’m saying other than that Daryl, despite calling the endgame, can’t finish the game by himself. Beth finishes it for him because he is for whatever reason blinded.

@wdway

The car was on the Yellow Jacket Creek Bridge.

@galadrieljones

So this is the first time we see it?

@wdway:

Yes, that is the first time we see that tag. On the Jeep with the pink dog/Sirius carrier. We saw the tag number in s3e10 Home, s4e13 Alone, s4e15 Us, s5e5 Self-Help (white school bus) and s5e7 Crossed.

In the post by Bethgreeneprevails she talks a lot about the numbers 8 and 3. She then gave a link to other people's thoughts on the 8 ball and the number 3. One of them, I can't remember which had talked about how they hoped that it was foreshadowing that Daryl and Beth would be reunited in s8e3. We know that didn't happen. I'm because I'm so excited to tell you about s8e3, I think you guys are going to love this I know I did. S8e2 Mercy and S8e3 Monsters were both written by Matthew Negrete and Channing Powell. At the end of the episode Mercy, we saw in the background the same painting with Rick in the frame as seen in the episode Still. We also saw a character that had gone missing/left in s1 return. He was also in a scene at the beginning of e3, just before Daryl killed him. By the way guess who wrote s7e8 Hearts Still Beating, that's right, Matthew Negrete and Channing Powell. The same writers that wrote Inmates and Slabtown. I'm sure it's all a coincidence and not related in any way. Not.

@galadrieljones

I remember the 8.3 revelation for sure, mostly via frangi and the painting with the cranes and how they communicate with the one/one t-shirt that Noah wore. To me that is a lot of intricate connection that cannot be coincidence alone. I love that Powell wrote Hearts Still Beating. She wrote it also with our guy Matthew Negrete. I actually love that episode even tho it’s a horrible turn for Daryl. It just seems like it’s embedded with a lot of important global imagery. We see the chess pieces and references that tie Dwight to the crusades and the Seventh Seal, a reference that comes back in Alaska when he is stricken with bubonic plague (and finds his true love). The peanut butter, too. Hearts still beating reminds me of Carol telling Daryl in Them “You’re not dead.” It also reminds me of Beth telling Daryl that he has to let it go “or it kills you…here” and touches her hand to her heart.

@twdmusicboxmystery

Wow! This is so great! I knew if I sent you guys that link, you'd find new stuff! I've been so tired the past few days (work has been crazy) my brain just hasn't been firing on all cylinders.

I had never thought to connect the events of Home (my fav episode of S3) to Find Me. That's genius. And it just goes to show that we're right about the writers revisitng earlier story lines and making them new and continuous for the characters. Gimple WAS working on the show in S3, but as mostly a junior writer, still. Even though I'm sure the show runner had some idea where he THOUGHT he was going with things, he was ultimately fired for cutting back and forth, killing off characters for no reason other than shock value, and basically giving everyone whip lash.

And it's interesting, because it just feels like fate. Merle was supposed to survive S3, originally. He was Daryl's brother. That's why they did this storyline. The actors, the network, and even the fans were way disappointed when he died, because he was just starting to finally get his redemption, and people were loving his character by that point. Both for himself, and for Daryl, I'm sure. But with Merle gone, they made the very conscious choice to make Rick "his brother" in S4. Ever since then, every time we see Daryl searching for his brother and changing his mind about something, it's always about Rick.

But throwing Leah into the mix shows that Beth will ultimately be in there somewhere, too. I think it's VERY possible that Daryl goes to France searching for Rick. As we've discussed, he has a specific mission, and maybe it's that he hears some hint of Rick and is following information to where he might be. But along the way, he runs into Beth. As someone pointed out above, that's exactly what happens in Find Me, which was clearly one huge foreshadow. He was searching, along a body of water no less, for Rick, and he found Leah. Via Dog (Sirius).

Anyway, I'm rambling. You both know all this. I just really love the connections here. Just working them out in my own mind. ;D Can't wait for October!!!

@galadrieljones

I read something about 18miles Out as being Gimple’s first real showing as a writer on TWD. The entire fight with Rick and Shane opposing the quiet action with Beth back at the farm was his idea. Homecomes just before Clear, which is all Gimple’s and definitely an early symbolism hotbed as well as the episode that establishes Morgan as Gimple’s “prophet.” Clear is also the episode when Michonne and Rick bring back Daryl’s new crossbow which I think has major meaning for his development.

Home I think shows that the writers had bigger plans for Daryl. He became a real lead. I definitely think it’s safe to say that Gimple was at least present enough at this point to have some ideas for what he wanted the future of his beats and of the show to look like. I am assuming that’s how you get made into a showrunner. You have a vision.

I really do like the idea that he’s looking for Rick and finds something else, which takes him on an unexpected journey to learn more about Beth and even find her.

We already have an indication that he’ll find another Beth lookalike, only this time instead of a mercenary psychopath who works for a “pope,” he will meet a nun. I can’t imagine that not being purposeful. Leah led Daryl down a winding path away from his family and his true mission.

Will Isabelle lead him on the path back to them? Will he finally learn his true mission? Many ppl in the GA do assume he is looking for Rick and they seem to view a reunion with Rick as Daryl’s ultimate endgame. But I don’t see that. Ricks endgame isn’t Daryl, it’s Michonne. Why would Daryl’s be Rick? That does a disservice to Daryl.

I think finding Rick would be important to Daryl but “he deserves his own happy ending.” I have to believe that doesn’t just mean finding Rick again. Rick is Judith’s happy ending, and I think Judith recognizes this when she says, “Thanks for looking for my parents but you need to find your endgame, too.” Daryl and Rick went their separate ways long ago. Finding Rick will only allow Daryl to bring him back to Judith. It won’t solve Daryl’s emptiness or unhappiness. He was empty well before he lost Rick. This discussion makes me start to understand the purpose of 10c much more and to see just how far out ahead of things they really were.

@wdway

Both Scott Gimple and Glenn Mazzara are listed as writers for 18 Miles Out. I know this is probably silly but it occurred to me last night that 18 Miles Out, was such a huge episode for Beth in her importance in the story going forward. 30 Days Without An Accident (another Gimple episode) was another beginning of a major arc for Beth. I'm thinking we need more episodes with numbers in the titles, haha.

@galadrieljones

(As I was typing endgame above I started thinking of the 8ball again. Getting to that 8ball.)

@wdway

Guys, I was excited to make the connection between Carol, Beth's conversation and the ties with the storyline of Leah. It definitely helped me with more understanding why Leah even existed. I can't believe we didn't see this earlier. You never know what's going to spark a thought, a connection, that's why going back and reading older post is important. I want to speak to both of y'all thoughts about Daryl initially searching for Rick in the spin-off. I am open to it although I don't have any strong feeling either way, to tell you the truth.

What I came away with after connecting Carol/Beth's conversation with Leah's and Daryl in both s3 Home and s10 Find Me, in both episodes it was about Daryl searching for his brother, his biological one and then his chosen one. He walked away from his family in order to do that. At the end of episode Home, Daryl comes to realize that he deserves his own life, that it is time to pursue his own happiness, his own destiny and by doing so he's not abandoning his brother's, he is simply putting himself first. That is how I perceive the storyline going in the spin-off. Daryl will finally realize he needs to put his own desires before that of finding Rick. I can also see Carol helping Daryl as a bit of payback for all the times that he had had Carol's back when she was trying to escape from her problems or situations.

@galadrieljones

It’s a perfect analysis of a Daryl’s character and I agree 100%. I think that if Daryl does go off in search of Rick it will end up like you said, which is very close to what I said I think, ie: he can’t make finding his brother be his entire life’s purpose and mission. He needs his own purpose and his own mission. The idea of searching is essential to who Daryl is and all of his struggles. It may even be that he needs to resist this time. And that it’s the moment he finally chooses to stop searching altogether that he finally finds what he’s looking for (love). In the teaser he says, “I went out looking for something, and all I found was trouble.” This is ALWAYS true. It’s true in Chupacabra, in Consumed, in Find Me, and now. Daryl’s story about how no one came to search for him in the woods when he was a kid is proving to be his most defining moment.

I wanted to quickly add to that I think a big part of Daryl’s characterization, that he is a compulsive provider, always worried about others and never himself, has in some ways colored the GA’s perception of him. They still see him as existing only in service to Rick. They can’t imagine him on an independent mission that revolves around finding something that’s just for him.

@wdway

Well put. I think we're all on the same page. I just wanted to point out that I believe a lot of the purpose of the episode Find Me was as a call back (which we totally did not get until now) to season 3 TSK/Home. That those episodes were not only foreshadowing to Find Me, but also to the spin-off.

@wdway

Daryl has always been the better friend, not only to Carol but to Rick than they have been to him. And they have come to really take him for granted that their needs and desires were more important than his. This is always been a pet peeve for me because Beth is the only one that we ever saw asking Daryl about himself, about comparing dreams, no one else has done that. That's why I hope with Carol joining him that the whole purpose would be for Daryl's goals and his happiness.

@galadrieljones

Well said. I couldn’t agree more.

[amtrak12]

Lucifer Rewatch Liveblog: 1.02

We’re doing it again! And again I am so nervous about it. And also trying to stop myself out of embarrassment -- not the liveblogging part. No, just watching the episode in general. Who are you embarrassed by, Amber? Who’s going to judge you for what you’re watching in your own home? NO ONE! GET OVER YOURSELF!

Anyway. Ep 2. The paparazzi ep, which I only know because I’ve already rewatched it once. But after this, I don’t remember anything about S1 so we’ll get to be surprised together about what plot pops up next. :P

And.... *plays*

All evangelical street preachers are terrible. But I hate this faker just as much as the real ones. I'm on Lucifer's side here. He deserves the Devil face.

It's so cute when Linda thinks this Devil stuff is all a metaphor. Simpler times, right, Linda? ;)

Healed from feelings of humanity -- *Marcia Brady face* Sure, Lucifer.

OMG that was a Crazy Ex-Girlfriend billboard in the background! CRAZY EX-GIRLFRIEND SIGHTING!!! :D :D :D

Chloe is the absolute worst at being sneaky ROTFL

Aw. Give it a year and Maze and Chloe will be roomies :) Tell them that here and they'll both threaten to punch you lol

Lucifer once again completely fails to register that Chloe is playing him. Such a dumb-dumb (affectionately mocking)

(Chloe is just as ridiculous, though, thinking Lucifer would be wearing a bullet proof vest as part of his everyday wear. Granted, I’m sure she’s down to the dregs as far as plausible explanations go for how Lucifer could walk away unharmed after being shot multiple times. But also we saw Chloe get shot while wearing a bullet proof vest in S3 and she still got knocked back and knocked out for several minutes, which, through internet osmosis, I’m fairly certain is realistic with how bullet proof vests work in real life? So are you even still in the dregs, there, Chloe or are you now pulling straws out of your butt just to grasp at them?)

I was curious about who on the force would still call Chloe with a tip, but then I realized it was Dan lol. That makes sense.

Chloe easily follows Lucifer's lead even after telling him no. She only pretends to have self control. :P

*snorts* That look from Dan is 20% annoyed Lucifer is hanging out with Chloe and 80% pissed because he had to listen to Trixie talk for hours the other night about a two minute run-in with Lucifer where she gushed on and on about how awesome Lucifer is. ROTFL

"Is this the fight you want to pick?" -- It'll be nice when Dan gets a new refrain cause repeating himself two eps in a row is both annoying and very 'in case you missed the pilot, here's a quick recap' which is equally annoying.

Hi Amenadiel! (said with Trixie cheer) It will be nice when you get a new refrain too. Which happens sooner than I remembered because I rewatched the finale too last month for fic research and he was pretty much regular Amenadiel already which was... shocking. I could’ve sworn that took longer.

(Speaking of shocking, let me tell you, my first time through the early eps, I was FLOORED to realize Chloe and Dan were only separated in S1. I was under the assumption they were divorced the entire run of the show! I didn’t realize they were still married in the beginning. Fucking wild.)

The hilarious part is God probably isn't saying shit about any of this. This is all Amenadiel thinking he knows what Absentee Dad wants just like Uriel did in S2. (and look where that got Uriel....)

I know it hasn't come up yet, but they really didn't do the praying thing to contact angels after S1, did they? I mean they showed angels answering human prayers (very badly lol) in S5, but never prayers to contact another angel. Probably because Amenadiel and Lucifer had cell phones and no other angels were on earth. But still, I wish they had kept it. I like it.

Ninja chemist by night -- damn this girl is both imaginative and smart. And obsessed with ninjas even before befriending Maze. Excellent. No wonder they became instant besties.

CHLOE YOU ASKED ABOUT THE EIFFEL TOWER WHEN YOUR DAUGHTER WAS IN EARSHOT! THAT'S ON YOU! lmao

This whole conversation with the paparazzo is just Lucifer being all 'I came out to have a good time and I'm honestly feeling so attacked (by pesky human empathy) :(' I like it. Good shit.

Back to ‘just S1 things’, I'm fine with this weird Hell coin being a pilot season one-off though. It doesn't make any kind of world-building sense to me but if it's just for a season, I can roll with it.

'Are you coming or what?' -- :D Let the partnership begin!!!

Man, being a kid in LA must suck being right on top of Hollywood. The gossip mill must be out of control! And the brutal bullying about which parent has the more famous job. Or do the kids in LA bully each other about other things and consciously roll their eyes and shove the Hollywood stuff away because it’s so mundane and boring? I don’t know how school cliques work outside of the small ass Illinois town I grew up in.

How do these people always remember license plate numbers after seeing them for two seconds? Can't relate.

Maze just glaring and slicing an apple in the corner is perfection. Love my girl <3

But Dan, if Chloe isn't following him and you (allegedly *side eyes*) aren't following him, then how do you know the perp is missing? o_O

It's also cute when Lucifer was so convinced humans couldn't change cause he had spent too many eons in Hell where no one managed to stop running from their guilt. They're all so naive and innocent in S1, aren't they? :)

Leverage did this gun showdown better. But Leverage is as close to a perfect show as I've ever seen and this is Lucifer’s second episode ever so that's not really a fair comparison.

'Luci... you should've taken the offer.' -- Amenadiel... you shouldn't bring dead humans back to life so they can kill your brother for you. (See? Two can play the blame game :P)

Trixie already knowing about Hot Tub High School is reason #3 that I accept the fan theory that Trixie has always believed Lucifer is really the Devil. The girl understands things like reality and the truth.

(Trixie already knowing about the movie is also evidence #8 that Chloe and Dan are :S as parents. How does a 7/8 year old have that kind of unfettered access to the internet? What is happening with my niblings' generation??? MONITOR YOUR CHILDREN'S INTERNET SO YOU CAN TEACH THEM HOW TO PROPERLY USE IT! ffs)

No comment on the Jimmy scene. His freakout and Lucifer disappearing and popping back up somewhere else in the blink of an eye only weigh on Chloe's mind enough for her to shoot Lucifer later in the season, but not enough for her to believe he's really the Devil until S4. I’ve also seen it a few too many times in fan vids. Oops!

IT’S OVER! \0/ I’ve successfully liveblogged two whole episodes!! WHOO!! It definitely worked better to let the episode roll and take quick notes on the side that I went back and fleshed out after the episode finished. I’m going to stick with that method of liveblogging.

Catch you in the next one!

[itssoinevitable]

Completely understand your frustrations, Mel @owlsie-hoot. I’ve rewatched Series 3′s key scenes a few times now (including the PBS version with some extra scenes) and I am hoping I can help. I think you’re right to say that it seemed like Audrey and Gerald were only good friends, and that despite his obvious interest in her, on the surface she did not seem to reciprocate those feelings. I think that is how it started off in Season 2, because the entire point of Gerald in was to fill the gap that Dorothy left when the actress didn’t return - to give Audrey a friend and a place to exist outside Skeldale imo.

But somewhere along the way, she does seem to have developed feelings for him in return. (I’m not sure if that’s not shown as clearly as the writers intended, if their chemistry isn’t right or if we’re all just too partial to Siegfried x Audrey to see it? LOL) She even takes Diana’s advice in the S2 CS and dresses up for the occasion, in that beautiful black dress and she wears lipstick. But she gets scared and changes before Gerald arrives (but not before Siegfried has to mop his drool off the floor). My understanding is that AxG get even closer this season and she already likes him a lot when she agrees to go to the Elgar recital, but is trying to convince herself that they can just be friends. Siegfried tells her as much, that it is “what the young people call a date” but she is in denial up until she gets there and sees Gerald with the flowers. After this, they stop going on walks and they don’t see each other for a few months.

Then in Episode 6, when the war is announced, Helen encourages her to go talk to Gerald again, and they end up catching up but they’re not meeting regularly anymore. She’s in a different place as well because her relationship with Edward is now on the mend. But as far as Gerald is aware, nothing has changed for Audrey and she doesn’t feel that way about him. But she does, and she’s trying to tell herself not to because she’s technically married. He’s trying to get over his feelings for her, and lets her know he’s moving to Hull the next time he sees her (S3 CS). But when he gives her the news, Audrey suddenly seems to realise how much she’s going to miss him and invites him over for Christmas, clearly against her better judgement. She wants to use the opportunity to say goodbye to him, and is way more receptive to James’ and Tristan’s teasing this time imo. But she spends all night trapped between helping sort out Tristan and Siegfried’s relationship, and wanting to spend one last evening with Gerald. (And the episode makes it clear that she’s choosing between the two men in her life.) When she thinks Gerald already left and she missed her chance, she’s really upset. So when he comes back in, she impulsively kisses him.

All that said, please don’t mistake me for a AxG fan. He’s very sweet of course, but obviously she belongs with Siegfried. Imo the S3 CS confirms that, and I am not worried at all anymore because ACGAS is very good at creating escalated moments of romance and then simmering them down again. Siegfried x Dorothy seemed like they had something real, and that was dropped. Then Siegfried x Diana had a lot of screen time together, again only for them to not develop into anything further. Tristan x Maggie and then Tristan x Florence too. (Although I really hope Tris and Flo are endgame, I love them so much). So yes we get to see Audrey and Gerald have a special moment, but him moving to Hull was the writers’ way of ending this arc imo. She’s definitely not moving to Hull, maybe they will write letters or Gerald will visit for an episode, but I think it’s essentially over. And if anything, Siegfried seeing the second kiss confirms that he and Audrey are endgame. As you said, his reaction was absolute shock and hurt (if you increase the volume, you can hear him inhale). And like @olehistorian mentioned, it’s for him to see her that way, as a “real” woman who has feelings and desires. It’s definitely a catalyst, just as seeing her in the black dress was the year before.

But as much as we want them to progress to the next stage, I think they’re still very much in the slow burning era of their relationship. Season 3 put a lot of pressure on Siegfried to evolve imo, to become more emotionally vulnerable and available for Tristan and in general. At the very least, he’s becoming aware that he would not have gotten here without Audrey “he’s finally realised how much you care,” (he says this about Edward but imo he is 100% talking about himself) // “you always seem to know what’s best for me.” And he seems to know how much he likes holding hands with her <3 He’s finally becoming the man she needs him to be, and I think S4 will demonstrate that. 

Because I am still *uck*ng shadow banned by tumblr and cannot join discussions underneath posts (yay. thanks tumblr) but have so many things on my mind, here’s a very long meta about the CS, the things that happened after the kiss and what that did to my fangirl brain.

Keep reading

[starlyte-writes]

Been rewatching a bunch of Escape the Night and I can’t stop thinking about MCYT’s being in it, specifically SBI, so here’s some random stuff that no one asked for. 

Also, this is all just made up fun since I doubt any of them would join outside of maybe Techno since 1) they’d have to fly from the UK and 2) Tommy’s a minor and a good chunk of adult stuff (like explicit actors or drinking) happens so he probably shouldn’t be in it lol. Anyway, here’s my ramble

SBI in Escape the Night Part 1: TommyInnit

Part 2: Wilbur Soot

Part 3: Technoblade

Part 4: Philza Minecraft

Part 5: Tommy and Wilbur

Part 6: Wilbur and Techno

Part 7: Techno and Phil

Part 8: Tommy and Techno

Part 9: Wilbur and Phil

Part 10: Phil and Tommy

Part 11: Sleepy Bois Inc

Obviously Tommy would be funny as hell about it. From the get go screaming in terror with his high pitched scream, cursing at every jump scare. I feel like the first couple of episodes he’d really just be floundering about, arguing and panicking quite a bit. However, if he made it far enough, he’d start to get serious about it and really excel at puzzles and stuff.

Since Tommy’s persona is so obnoxious and brash, I feel like a lot of people would try to vote him out initially. Plus, he’d get really defensive at people who do try to vote him and call people out on their shit. (Think really big Nakita vibes, except he isn’t doing it on purpose lol) Underneath the loud though Tommy’s really mature and smart, so I think once he starts taking things seriously he becomes a really helpful member to the team. He’s really good athletically, pretty smart with puzzles, and I feel like he’d be willing to throw himself into a challenge literally just because someone called him a coward.

It’d be super entertaining to watch and Tommy would bring such a comedic factor to it as well. I always laugh at his jokes cause I have no idea wth he’s gonna say next, so there’d be plenty of good comedic moments. Not to mention with a lot of the monsters I feel like (outside of being scared for his life) he’d just find them really cool and interesting, and maybe even geek out with a few of them depending on what their based off of.

His character would really just be trying to prove himself, and maybe after getting thrown into a death challenge or two, he’d focus a lot on carrying his weight and being useful. Tommy’s also a killer actor, so I know he’d get super invested in the story and his acting, and depending on the allies he’d make I could see him acting super affected by someone’s death/maybe starting a rivalry like Alex in S2.

Tommy’s role in S1: The Hustler, just cause Tommy is a crime boy, always one to scam his way out of things, and he’s more tricky then he lets on.

Tommy’s role in S2: The Outlaw, for very similar reasons. Tommy plays by his own rules, and I feel liked he’d try to find a way around the “someone has to die” system, not wanting all these innocent people to lose their life. (Which in turn could lead to his own death like Liza)

Tommy’s role in S3: Absolutely the Daredevil. As I mentioned he’d be sticking his neck out and pulling his weight just to prove he’s a big man, and he’s always one to leap into action and try something new.

Tommy’s role in S4: The Con Man. Again, he’s a dirty crime boy and a known scammer, so it just fits lmao

How long he’d last: I’d say three, maybe four episodes. While Tommy can do a lot, being so blunt and defensive at the start is definitely gonna get him voted into challenges repeatedly. However, if he manages to make it past the first couple and start carrying his weight, I’d see Tommy making it to the final four.

[pluviophile-bookworm]

High School Musical: The Musical: The Series: The Rewatch pt. 4

I really need a pick-me-up after 2x11, and I feel like 1x7 might be what I'm looking for, so here I am again with another HSMTMTS rewatch. I'm genuinely so excited for both of these episodes, so without further ado, let's jump right into

1x6: She stands for... lies, pressure and very inappropriate suggestions (coming here after 2x11 might have been a mistake, actually)

I honestly don't get why Nini's reaction to seeing Ricky in full Troy costume was so big — he actually looked pretty ok to me. Sure, the wig is a bit too much, but so what, it's cute.

Ahhh my boy Reddy is so adorable in that talking head... 'click!' Gosh, I love seeing him so cheerful! Guess he's embracing his role as part of the crew. As he should.

'I'm home'. Yes, Sebby, and you look so good, too! Gosh, I love this scene so much. I can't believe I'd forgotten about it.

Gina looks beautiful, though — I mean, she looks beautiful in anything, but I really like the Taylor look on her.

Ok, I fully understand everyone's frustration about this picture — it's genuinely so hard to get a good picture of someone jumping up in the air, and I can only imagine what it would be like with six people. A bunch of my classmates tried to do something like that ages ago and, needless to say, it didn't go very well. No good pictures were taken that day.

Ah, Portwell: the early days. Ok, but wanting something and feeling like you have to get it is far from the same thing, EJ. Honestly, these two in their early days as accomplices... this is not the first time they've been like 'X is the same thing as Y' when it's obviously not. I mean, of course, that time they became accomplices because 'we want the same thing' — which, at that point, they didn't.

Ok, but they were in such unison with that 'Not now!'... couple goals! You know, even before either of them had considered the possibility of them being a couple for real.

That's a lot of pressure that Miss Jenn is putting on dear Carlito over there. I mean, he's one of the youngest at the drama club and he has to essentially do her job for her, all while she's not even sure if she'll be able to return to her job. I just... keep reminding myself that these kids are closer in age to my little brother than they are to me (except for EJ, who is precisely in the middle), and then the pressure they're under takes on completely new proportions in my mind. None of them should have to deal with all of this. And no amount of 'trust the process' is making it better.

'Should I just live vicariously through someone else?' Oh Reddy, you should just live for yourself. I mean, the truth is I don't practice what I preach most of the time, but I really do mean this. Just go out there and live your best life. You're not Ricky's therapy dog or anything (that being said, Ricky's getting a therapy dog when?).

What part of 'a forest of boys' does Nini not get? It's simple enough. Just help Carlos do his job, how about that? I mean, he shouldn't have to do everything himself anyway.

See? He cracked. That's what happens when you put all this responsibility on a teen's shoulders and be like 'deal with it'. He was just trying his best, you guys. He did not deserve all the clapback.

Ricky's forced optimism about Miss Jenn and the show is too much even for me. Sure, I know everything turns out mostly alright at the end, but this just sounds like Ricky's on the verge of a breakdown. You know, every time someone's been too unrealistically positive on this show, it has ended in a breakdown. And that's the last thing I want.

I do agree about the simple acoustic version of the song, though. Sometimes simple is the best option.

Major props to Carlos for going up to Mr. Mazzara like that. If someone had bullied me, and especially if that someone was a teacher, I'd never have dared to call them 'Benjamin Mazarra!' to their face. Even when he's on the verge of despair, this boy is still the boldest. And we love him for that.

Is this where the 'Carlos Surname' joke started, though? I had forgotten. It was funny while it lasted.

Ricky doesn't know it yet, but he's seriously playing with Gina's feelings there. And I don't blame him because, again, he doesn't know yet, but I still feel bad for her.

'Despite the 4.3 GPA, I'm actually an idiot.' — EJ is high intelligence, low wisdom, confirmed. Not that this is news, but I really don't remember much about this season, so I'm pointing this out now.

Now forgive me if I'm not feeling for Miss Jenn after 2x11... she did some really unforgivable things there. Still, as much as I want to say a real qualified teacher would not do any of that, my personal experience suggests otherwise, quite unfortunately. Miss Jenn might not be very emotionally mature, but not having legal teaching credentials is not her biggest issue, really. It is precisely her lack of emotional maturity.

OMG, Big Red accidentally invited the entire drama club over! And that, I guess, is half of how Redlyn established themselves as the hosts of every out-of-school drama club gathering. Thanksgiving is, of course, the other half. Gosh, those two were the parents of the drama club even before they were a couple. Guess they're soulmates in that way, too.

Ok, so I didn't comment on this after 2x8 when Big Red did it to Ricky, but now that I finally notice that Seb did it to Carlos, too (I took my time, thanks), I need to talk about the knee touch thing. See, this is exactly the amount of touch I used to be comfortable with (since I'm very touch-averse) — both on the giving and on the receiving end — and it can mean so much when you feel bad. It's a subtle 'hey, I'm here, it's going to be fine', a sort of hug-without-the-hugging... I feel like this is a gesture we don't see enough of in media and it can feel just as intimate as, say, holding hands or cuddling. I don't want to talk about kissing because I don't know anything about it. But I just love how we've got the knee touch depicted by both a romantic pairing and a platonic pairing in the show. Ok, rant over. But I just really wanted to talk about this because, well, I saw myself in it.

'Her past is a little bit sketchy'... I see, Ash has already started writing Truth, Justice and Songs in Our Key, even if she doesn't know it quite yet.

Miss Jenn finding out Mike is Ricky's dad is just as awkward as it should be. Whatever they had going on should have ended right then and there.

'... people in the dramatic arts are insane' — 'Thank you.' — Umm, Miss Jenn, you are not really helping your case there. Quite frankly, you're lucky you've got the allegiance of the entire drama club. I don't think they'd have your back as much after 2x11, though.

Ok, but... Big Red wearing a longcoat just to take it off for the dramatic flair of it all? An icon if I've ever seen one. Also, mad props to Larry for apparently learning this number in record time after Dara got injured.

Oh, and... mad props to all the kids in-universe for writing, rehearsing, and learning this entire number in one night.

So both Seb and Natalie have solo lines in the song... and Seb was promoted to main in s2. So does this mean Natalie will get the same treatment in s3? I mean, that will probably mean they'll try to stick her in some sort of romantic plot, and I really don't need that, but I really, really want her to be a main character.

Also, let's not forget we had our first Redlyn moment in this number... seeing them dance together makes my heart jump with joy!

I won't lie, though, the entire dance number and everything was just a little bit uncomfortable to watch after 2x11... these kids do so much for Miss Jenn, and what does she do? Put insane amounts of pressure on some of them, shuts others down at every attempt to put in a word, favours yet others despite their abysmal performance at the audition, and then has the audacity to tell that same person to jump off of something high, with all the implications attached? Not that I'm naming any names, of course. Ok, this has taken a sudden and uncalled for turn for the dark, so I guess I'll just move right along to the next episode now.

1x7: A world where 'That was terrible!' and 'I'm so happy!' can both be true at the same time

My girl Ash is doing the recap! And she's a pun queen, too. 'Miss Jenn was in hot water, Carlos was a hot mess...' — not pleasant, but so true. But wbk. Ashlyn is the best.

And... Ricky and Nini's on and off chemistry is back on. Good for them, because after season 2, I really needed to see a good rehearsal. But I'm thinking EJ's joy at the end-of-school bell had little to do with Thanksgiving...

That look Reddy gave Ashlyn as she was walking out... might be me digging for breadcrumbs, but I think I just saw the exact moment my boy fell, and he fell hard. Ok, I realise now after I've said this that 'fall' probably isn't the best choice of words, but you know what I mean. Fell for Ashlyn. Not like... oh, never mind.

'So meek, so mild, sword!' I can't really explain it, but I love this line. And I feel like it describes Ash so perfectly: like, she might be meek and mild, but if you cross her, she's armed. Gosh, I love her!

Not the Caswell parents leaving their children alone over two holiday breaks! No wonder these two are the way they are. But they're about to get a beautiful Thanksgiving celebration. [Fun personal fact: the year I was born, my birthday fell on Thanksgiving day. That doesn't mean much in Bulgaria, but my dad works with a lot of Americans so my parents knew about it and I've known this and that about this holiday I've never celebrated since I was very young. I have no idea why I'm telling you this, but Thanksgiving has always reminded me of my birthday for this reason, so... ok, moving on.]

So I know she kind of suggested it, but... why does Carlos think it's his place to invite people over to Ashlyn's? I mean, this was part 2 of Redlyn establishing themselves as the hosts for any out-of-school gathering, but... oh well, it led to a beautiful party with everyone, so... I'll allow it.

I really liked Nini's talk with her grandma. It was really nice, and a very fitting way to remind everyone what Thanksgiving is originally about. I feel like people often forget that when it comes to... literally every major commercialised holiday.

Wow, EJ really is that person where once the tap is open, it can't stop spilling. And I kind of like that look on him. It's a transitional stage between EJ 1.0 and EJ 2.0, and I appreciate it for what it is.

Ahhhh it's Redlyn's first proper 1-on-1 conversation! I mean, it got kind of really awkward really quickly because of — surprise, surprise — Nini and Ricky (and EJ), but those two are so adorable! No more breadcrumbs — we're about to get an entire five-course meal here! Which goes really well with the Thanksgiving setting, now that I think of it.

Gosh, they've never really talked and my boy whips out the 'the only thing I'd ever throw at your face is a brighter spotlight' line right off the bat? Boy is whipped! But like, he is the master of grand gestures where Ashlyn is concerned. Still, in this first moment they shared, he really was like, go big or go home, and home isn't really an option here. But I should have known, it's in his name after all. Gosh, I love both of those two so much! Especially when they're together.

Ok, so... this is a really bad way to meet your mother's new boyfriend. Poor Ricky. As if ringing his mum wasn't hard enough already.

See, when I rewatch season 1, I get where the Rina stans are coming from, but then again, remember when I used to say I wanted Gina and EJ to just be friends? Yeah, that's changed too. Not that I ever shipped Rina romantically — I rarely ever ship a pairing unless they're explicitly stated to have something going on, just because I can't see that sort of stuff very clearly — but I really, really want them (Ricky and Gina, I mean) to be really good friends. Once they get past the awkwardness of their sort of history, I mean.

I miss the good old days when Nini was a nice person... I mean, we kind of (really) had a glimpse of that in 2x11 (I'm guessing she was making up for Miss Jenn's very inappropriate slip-up), but I miss the days before she was this big internet-famous songwriter and actually had to be convinced by Ashlyn that she should write songs for herself... wait, now that I think of it... Ashlyn might have helped create a monster there. Oh well. Still love her so much!

You know, I love the Choosical, but it's all a bit sad, if you stop to think about it for a sec. Just picture little single-digit-aged Carlito making this whole thing up in an attempt to participate in his favourite thing... only to not have anyone to play with for the next ten years. Great, I just made myself cry. The thing is, I relate to that story a bit too much. I remember in preschool, when the rest of the children would play together, I'd sit in a corner by myself and read the only book that was there... over and over, day after day. I don't even remember a single thing about that little book right now, but back then I clung to it like it was everything. And I couldn't very much share the experience with any of my peers, seeing as I was the only kid there who could actually read (my grandma used to be a preschool teacher and she taught me to read when I was 4). So yeah. I went off on a rather personal tangent there. Thing is, I know how little Carlos felt and I'm so happy that he finally gets to share this thing he made with a loving and supportive group of friends. Everything has its time and place, I guess.

'Look, I'm not following Big Red just because he paid me a compliment' — of course not, dear, you know your own worth and we love that for you — but see, when he said that thing that you're referring to as a compliment, he did not lie! You really are the brightest star and deserve the brightest spotlight. See, the thing I love most about Redlyn's compliments to each other is that they're so sincere and state nothing but the absolute truth. Those two just see each other for what they are, and love each other as they are. And I think that is beautiful.

It's so funny to me every time someone gets something wrong and Carlos just walks past them out of nowhere and corrects them without missing a beat. I kind of relate to that side of him, too. Except it's usually about grammar and language in my case, not HSM trivia.

If I were Nini in this scene, and was suddenly put face to face with Emily on the spot like that, I would not have been able to handle it. So props to Nini for handling it.

Yeah, sorry to break it to you, Emily dear, but whatever you're doing is not a Cockney accent. I don't claim to be an accent expert, but I know first-hand what Cockney sounds like and... that's just not it. Even Dick Van Dyke was closer to a Cockney accent in Mary Poppins, and that's saying something. (See, I feel bad criticising any aspect of Emily because her actress is no longer with us, but... I have no idea who let them get away with passing this off as Cockney).

Is this the beginning of Jennzara there? I am loving this.

Of course Carlos was obsessed with Glee as a kid... but wasn't he a bit too young for it when it aired? I know I was, and I'm older than those kids. I mean, I waited until I was emotionally mature enough to watch Glee, and that wasn't until 3 years ago, when I was 18 going on 19. Ok, I'm thinking too much into this. Moving on.

Ahhhhh, Redlyn! Just... all of their moments. But screaming the lyrics of What I've Been Looking For on top of their lungs while looking right at each other... was so beautiful to watch. Give me more of that!

EJ: 'That was terrible.' Seb: 'I'm so happy!' — Moods, both of them. Those two are real-life emojis, aren't they? And we love them for that.

'... without laughing... or killing each other.' — I feel like that last specification was needed given that it's Ricky and EJ we're talking about, and especially what happened last time they had to do a one-on-one exercise during rehearsal. The ensuing scene, however, is the most hilarious thing!

Root beer, huh? Is that the HSMTMTS code for 'awkward' now? I mean, Nini and Gina had a nice talk there, all things considered. I really want the two of them to put the Ricky thing past them and be friends... but we'll see.

Gina is trying to make the sleepover thing look like 'it's not a big deal' despite how big of a deal it obviously is to her... to which I say, good for you, girl, but I wouldn't know. The only sleepovers I've ever had have been with my little cousin who is 9 years younger than me and also insists on sleeping with a very bright nightlight on, which means I can't sleep at all. So yeah, I wouldn't know. But I'm happy that Gina is feeling included.

So this is the exact moment when it becomes clear that Big Red is not telling us the complete truth when it comes to his HSM knowledge... '14 and 10'? Even I didn't know that. I knew 14, but... for someone who allegedly 'hates musicals', my boy has very detailed knowledge of one certain musical movie... I love how it got him a certain girl's attention, though. Not that she wasn't already paying attention to him, if you catch my drift.

Ok, but this hits even harder now than it did the first time — just when Gina has finally managed to make friends, to feel included in their group, her mum has to move her away again. This is straight-up tragic. I'll say it now, and I'll probably say it again when it comes up in the rewatch — Ashlyn is an absolute queen for taking Gina in for the next semester.

'That's sort of what you always do, huh? Take care of everyone else' — yeah, Ash, and you do the same. You two just need someone to do for you what you do for other people. See, guys, this is what I mean. This is why they're soulmates. Because in a world that has more or less forced both of them to put others first, they put each other first. They each get to be the most important person to each other after they've been stepping back for others all the time. And if that isn't beautiful, I don't know what is. I know I'm repeating myself over and over saying this, but... they own my heart and soul and I'm not for sale.

Ok, but Ashlyn's little run after Big Red left was so cute! Girl is... I don't know why I keep using that word, but... falling.

Unpopular opinion: Out of the Old is the best Nini solo to come out of this series to date. Maybe I feel that way just because I relate to it most, but hey, that is a valid reason to like something.

Oof, EJ's losing followers. Oh well, if they're unfollowing him for being too honest, they didn't like the real him to begin with. So good riddance to them.

Yikes... Jennzara fell asleep with flammable stuff left unattended... we all know how that ended, but just the fact that they felt comfortable enough to fall asleep in each other's presence... speaks volumes. So I guess... well, I don't know what exactly I'm saying regarding the fire they caused, but I loved this big little moment they had.

So this is it. That was 1x6 and 7 and, well, they were beautiful, but there are some parts I can't look at in the same way anymore after 2x11. Guess that's the risk of a rewatch. The Redlyn scenes, though — still the best part of both of these episodes. That and a couple of other things for which I don't need to pretend like I haven't seen season 2.

[hmgfanfic]

Talk about all the Fillory worldbuilding in LQoF, please :)

THIS IS INEXCUSABLY LATE. I’m so sorry!

And I wish I could say it was just my scatterbrainedness, which is definitely a constant factor, but it was also that when you sent this, I was deeeeeeeep into writing the final few chapters of Little Quirks of Fate and I was kind of... in my head about it. It took a lot longer to finish than I had planned (a cardinal sin to my particular combo of severe ADHD and Type-A personality) and I was spending excessive amounts of time making sure I figured out a satisfying ending by my own exacting standards, so I just didn’t have the headspace to think through my early process yet. Very sorry about that :( But now that I’m finally done, I’m excited to look back! So if you’ll indulge me a very late answer, I’d be tickled. 💗

Long ramblings and major fic spoilers under the cut.

The truth is a lot the world building came down to character stuff foremost, followed closely by my preferences as a writer. I adapted the world to the story I wanted to tell, while using the little bits of information we’re given in canon as a baseline, rather than building the story around the world. And that was a lot more fulfilling for me, since I only really love worldbuilding through the lens of character, rather than as an exercise unto itself (though it’s super fun once you get rolling.)

To explain what I mean by that, you need to know that Little Quirks of Fate was originally going to be a oneshot. My plan was about 25-30k (lol) of a pure S2 retelling, only with Quentin in the role of Fen. It was also going to take a much more traditional enemies-to-lovers’ path—with Quentin as an active member of the FU Fighters—and the whole thing was going to be in his POV. Also, they weren’t even going to kiss until after the bank heist (which, yes, was going to be a thing here), but that got abandoned the fastest in favor of trying my hand at smut. But two things made me realize I needed to significantly shift course:

1) I was struggling to make Quentin actually feel like Quentin. I wrote this very atmospheric early scene at the FU Fighters encampment, with lots of description of the bonfires and the way their shirts dyed in Fillorian red looked like blood (you get it.) It took place in the black of night, shrouded in secrecy, and when Bayler questioned Quentin about his new husband, Quentin said something like, “He’s a drunk idiot, we have the advantage.” It was all very lush and dramatic, but it really, really, really didn’t feel like Q in any recognizable way to me. Now, I’m not someone who thinks Q needs to be a precious sweetheart all the time, but what I was writing didn’t have his idiosyncrasies or a motivation that felt true to who I feel he is.

2) The draft was DEFINITELY missing Eliot’s story and his perspective. I certainly don’t think Eliot’s POV is always necessary (sometimes not having his direct thoughts heightens tension in romance especially), but it felt really necessary here, to fill in the gaps of what Quentin was assuming and also—more importantly—because the events were just as impactful on him, but in a very different way. So I knew I was missing half the narrative, but that meant I would need to deal more explicitly with the Beast (i.e., Mike, the most devastating storyline to me, personally) and I really, really didn’t want to do that.

My first step in making a more recognizable Quentin was figuring out a way he could more or less use the same syntax that he does on the show. Voice is the first way I connect with a character, so while many writers in this fandom thrive at modifying speech patterns and keeping the heart of a character alive, keeping close to Quentin’s canon speech was an easy fix for me in a story I was excited to get rolling. Sort of like the old adage of uplifting your strengths before putting outsize energy into things you struggle with.

The easiest way I could think to give him the same syntax was to figure out a way Quentin spent some significant time on Earth during his formative years. And once I rewatched 2x06 and was reminded that Ess went to Phillips Exeter Academy for high school, I lost my damn mind. I started sketching out ways that Quentin could get there too and that’s how I built out the idea of Umber brokering a marriage deal with the actual landmass of Coldwater Cove, which included an education opportunity for the boys (in a nod to Fillory’s patriarchal nature), and also the reason why Umber did that, which was to take advantage of his brother’s orgy mistake with the first Children of Earth to usher in a more productive and orderly Fillory. So that created a whole new set of rules and essentially a whole new world for me to play with... all for the sake of Quentin getting to say “fuck.” It was that important to me. :p

And as I worked through all that, I realized I also wanted to give Q magic, since Quentin’s relationship with magic is something I’m interested in. But I had read on ye olde Tumblr that the reason Illario uses a wand in 2x06 is a nod to the books, where Fillorians specifically aren’t Magicians and that’s the rationale for the Children of Earth royalty. And while I generally see the books as interesting supplemental material with zero bearing on the television show canon, I still said to myself, “Self, wouldn’t it be kind of funny if Quentin was the only native born Fillorian who had magic and so the FU Fighters believe he’s the chosen true High King, but instead of it being because he’s ~special~, it’s because Umber made a clerical error? Lol! Hilarious!”

So while all my questions for how to explain all THAT spun out into more and more detail, at the same time...

I caved to the idea that this story was going to be a No Beast AU, just like my last two stories, mostly because I really couldn’t bring myself to deal with the Mike of it all, even tangentially. I could have just changed that single element, but I’m not a half-measure gal! But I still wanted to stick with the vague background theme of Fillory = adulthood from a questing perspective and I wanted Julia leading the charge this time, but without the sexual assault that occurs in canon. So obviously, the answer was avenging all of the murdered and cannibalized “grown-ups,” i.e., master Magicians, by seeking out help from the gods in a balanced Fillory free from the devastation of the Beast. Duh! ;)

So then, like anyone would do, I rewatched every episode up to 4x11 that makes a mention of Fillory and took about twenty pages of notes on the canon worldbuilding, along with an analysis of how much a particular piece of information would be impacted or not by balance in the realm. For instance, the existence of geraniums (per The Fillorian Candidate and Tick’s misunderstanding of “power plants”) and the lack of diamonds as a precious stone (per the River Watcher not knowing the value of Margo’s earrings in Knight of Crowns) struck me as static facts unaffected by Ember’s reign of chaos. But I shifted the overall feel of Fillory to one that’s more functional and a lot more bureaucratic, leaning on things like the existence of socialized health/vision/dental insurance (the idea of which is canonical, per a petition from the beavers requesting dental coverage from acting High King Josh in Ramifications), strict taxation plans, and an overall sense of thriving Ceremony to show Umber’s influence.

Basically, I wanted Eliot to inherit a much, much easier Fillory to rule—especially with the highly educated Quentin as a built-in and passionate advisor—mostly so it wouldn’t completely strain credulity when a lot of his energy goes toward his love life rather than the intricacies of ruling (though Margo would say he still favored his personal life more than he should have, and she wasn’t... wrong. He wants to be a husband more than a king!) But I specifically made it so most of the chaotic elements were played as whimsical (sorry) quirky shit or smaller hints of greater injustice (see: Ember getting rid of STDs, but still letting magic-poor citizens die of sepsis because that’s too boring to deal with), all while a cataclysmic danger lurked under the surface.

After that, I just filled in details as they worked with character stuff and plot stuff, and I tried to make sure they didn’t contradict each other in a way that couldn’t be chalked up to “chaos.” I basically lived with the Fillory map open all the time and also took screenshots of Benedict’s map of Loria, which gave me alternate ideas for the overall feel of the landmass rather than just the kingdom. And pretty much that’s the basic process I used to create the world! It was extremely fun, and I learned a lot, though I’m *definitely* focusing on some pure relationship kind of stuff for a while because... oof, sometimes it was a lot.

Annnnnnnd if you’re still with me, here’s some stray observations, for funsies:

I wanted Quentin and Eliot’s starting points to be more mature than in the show. Quentin when we’re introduced to him as an adult in LQoF is a lot more jaded and cautious than S1 Q, which is because in this world, his S1 mentality happened while he was on Earth and came to a head during the throes of his fucked up relationship with Bayler. Similarly, Eliot had already gone through a lot of shit too, and was much more self-actualized by the time he agreed to be High King here than in the show. It was still out of desperation for purpose, but not coming out of a direct trauma spiral. I think if they had been younger, both in age and mentality, the story wouldn’t have worked because they would’ve blown it up day two. They’re both still disasters, as we like to say, which is why the... everything happens, but they’re not disasters in the exact same way as in early canon. I thought of them as closer to their S3 selves, pre-Mosaic.

While I mostly kept Quentin’s syntax the same as on the show, I did change it up in some ways to reflect his Fillorian upbringing. The most obvious was replacing “goddamn” with “godsdamned” and “Jesus” with “Hades,” but I also made him slow on the Earth idiomatic uptake and slightly more likely to use passive voice and less likely to use contractions, especially early on and especially when speaking with Fen. He also said slightly out of date things even for someone who last remembered 1999, since Earth was still overwhelming despite his immersion. E.g.: In the epilogue, he asks Eliot if he can spend some time “Googling the World Wide Web” instead of watching Gossip Girl together, even though by 1999 most people were saying “on-line” or “the internet” by a pretty wide margin. But in my mind, the first term he learned was World Wide Web and he stuck to it like glue.

I originally had a full-blown coronation scene, where Quentin helped Eliot with the answers to the 90s questions via subtle charades, such as flapping his hands at his sides to give him the answer “Wings” (and Eliot was eventually going to Eliot-Logically use that moment to argue to Quentin that maybe Q really is the true High King since he was the one who actually answered the Knight’s questions, etc.), but I cut it and only showed bits and pieces in flashbacks because it didn’t really matter. They had to treat it seriously because it was An Event in this version of balanced/un-Beasted Fillory, with a full audience bearing witness, but the whole thrust of the external plot was about dismantling that moment and the concept of monarchy in general, so giving it too much weight outside of the Eliot and Julia friendship felt disingenuous to the story I was telling.

This is also why it was important to me that Margo hated the title High King Eliot the Kind, even though I only brought it up textually once or twice. But in my view, she fucking hated it and never came around to it. Which isn’t because she doesn’t think Eliot is kind, it’s that it felt like a simplification of all that he is, and the coronation ceremony in general felt similarly shallow. It wasn’t just the four of them working out their shit on the beach; it was true ceremony after a year of questing toil and a lot lingering uncertainty/resentments (especially regarding Julia), so it was too Big Shiny Happy Bow to her.

Yet on the same theme, my greatest regret was not being able to work in the fact that Margo’s title for Penny (King Penny the Persistent) was supposed to be half-sincere and half-sex joke. She did genuinely admire that he stuck it out even through his initial heartbreak because he gives a shit about his people underneath it all, but—and this is a very important headcanon to me—she admired his dedication to the art of the female orgasm even more.

I was originally also going to include the One Day More sequence with way more details—such as Umber taking the Javert lines, Ember taking the Thenardier lines, Bayler taking the Enjolras lines, and Penny taking the Marius lines, but... uh... writing a musical number is apparently not in my skill set. Also, honestly, the weirdness of the original is its whole charm and so I didn’t want to improve upon perfection. See also, in a more serious way: Eliot bowing to High King Margo on the Muntjac, the events of Plan B, and Quentin & Penny in the Flying Forest. Would not touch it!

My favorite Fillorian detail was either the guy who sent a citizen petition requesting a “smidgen” of Eliot’s earwax for an undisclosed purpose, or the use of the verb “to peg” to describe a Pegasus flock greeting an outsider with honor. They encapsulate the obscene yet pristine feel I always tried to give Fillory.

My favorite subtle(-ish?) ironic moment is Ess, the heir to a hereditary monarchy, taking Quentin to task for not honoring the anarchy patch on his high school backpack. In general, I don’t like everything being neatly resolved, including on an overarching world level. And I very strongly felt they had ZERO business meddling in Loria, so it left some fun-to-me unanswered questions. Will Ess usher in democracy for Loria based on his experiences on Earth? Maybe! Maybe not, since tradition’s a hell of a drug and Loria has its own history and complexities. Who knows?

I misread the town name Sutton as Sultan on the map the first time I referenced Bayler’s hometown (Sultan’s Ridge), but instead of going back to fix it, I just made it a sister town. Whatever!

I do not know how Quentin got a full bookshelf of Earth literature back to Fillory with him. Magic, I guess. (That’s the answer to anything I didn’t totally think through.)

I occasionally get asked whether Quentin and Fen were physically related. The answer is no, though it doesn’t totally matter. But I intended heart-cousins to be more like close family friends. (Though I actually originally had a joke where Eliot still wasn’t sure by the epilogue, but it didn’t land/feel realistic so I cut it.)

The details of the magic frequency poisoning were DEFINITELY what I thought through the least. My main goal was to have something catastrophic happen to Fillory based in part from the historical actions of the Children of Earth and Ember, patently ridiculously but with lasting consequences. Hence, god orgy that took away Fillorian human magic and sent out a slow poisoning of the overall magic “frequency.” It sounds all well and good, but it’s definitely something that would fall apart with even the lightest bit of prodding. It serves it’s purpose though, so I figured the gaps could be filled in or politely ignored. ;)

This question was way too much fun and a helpful retrospective for me! Thank you so much for indulging me, many moons ago. 💗

[birdlord]

Everything I Watched in 2020

We’ll start with movies. The number in parentheses is the year of release, asterisks denote a re-watch, and titles in bold are my favourite watches of the year. Here’s 2019’s list. 

01 Little Women (19)

02 The Post (17) 

03 Molly’s Game (17)

04 * Doctor No (62)

05 Groundhog Day (93)

06 *Star Trek IV - The Voyage Home (86)

07 Knives Out (19) My last theatre experience (sob)

08 Professor Marston and his Wonder Women (17)

09 Les Miserables (98)

10 Midsommar (19) I’m not sure how *good* it is, but it does stick in the ol’ brain

11 *Manhattan Murder Mystery (93)

12 Marriage Story (19)

13 Kramer vs Kramer (79)

14 Jojo Rabbit (19)

15 J’ai perdu mon corps (19) a cute animated film about a hand detached from its body!

16 1917 (19)

17 Married to the Mob (88)

18 Klaus (19)

19 Portrait of a Lady on Fire (19) If Little Women made me want to wear a scarf criss-crossed around my torso, this one made me want to wear a cloak

20 The Last Black Man in San Francisco (19)

21 *Lawrence of Arabia (62)

22 Gone With the Wind (39)

23 Kiss Me Deadly (55)

24 Dredd (12)

25 Heartburn (86) heard a bunch about this one in the Blank Check series on Nora Ephron, sadly after I’d watched it

26 The Long Shot (19)

27 Out of Africa (85)

28 King Kong (46)

29 *Johnny Mnemonic (95)

30 Knocked Up (07)

31 Collateral (04)

32 Bird on a Wire (90)

33 The Black Dahlia (05)

34 Long Time Running (17)

35 *Magic Mike (12)

36 Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (07)

37 Cold War (18)

38 *Kramer Vs Kramer (79) yes I watched this a few months before! This was a pandemic friend group co-watch.

39 *Burn After Reading (08)

40 Last Holiday (50)

41 Fly Away Home (96)

42 *Moneyball (11) I’m sure I watch this every two years, at most??

43 Last Holiday (06) the Queen Latifah version of the 1950 movie above, lacking, of course, the brutal “poor people don’t deserve anything good” ending

44 *Safe (95)

45 Gimme Shelter (70)

46 The Daytrippers (96)

47 Experiment in Terror (62)

48 Tucker: The Man and His Dream (88)

49 My Brilliant Career (79) one of the salvations of 2020 was watching movies “with” friends. Our usual method was to video chat before the movie, sync our streaming services, and text-chat while the movie was on. 

50 Divorce Italian Style (61)

51 *Gosford Park (01) another classic comfort watch, fuck I love a G. Park

52 Hopscotch (80)

53 Brief Encounter (45)

54 Hud (63)

55 Ocean’s 8 (18)

56 *Beverly Hills Cop (84)

57 Blow the Man Down (19)

58 Constantine (05)

59 The Report (19) maddening!! How are people so consistently terrible to one another!

60 Everyday People (04)

61 Anatomy of a Murder (58)

62 Spiderman: Homecoming (17)

63 *To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar (95) Of the 90s drag road movies, Priscilla is more visually striking, but this has its moments.

64 Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (92)

65 *The Truman Show (98)

66 Mona Lisa (86)

67 The Blob (58)

68 The Guard (11)

69 *Waiting for Guffman (96) RIP Fred Willard

70 Rocketman (19)

71 Outside In (18)

72 The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (08) how strange to see a movie that you have known the premise for, but no details of, for over a decade

73 *Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country (91)

74 The Reader (08)

75 Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (19) This was fine until it VERY MUCH WAS NOT FINE

76 The End of the Affair (99) you try to watch a fun little romp about infidelity during the Blitz, and Graham Greene can’t help but shoehorn in a friggin crisis of religious faith

77 Must Love Dogs (05) barely any dog content, where are the dogs at

78 The Rainmaker (97)

79 *Batman & Robin (97)

80 National Lampoon’s Vacation (83) Never seen any of the non-xmas Vacations, didn’t realize the children are totally different, not just actors but ages! Also, this one is blatantly racist!

81 *Mystic Pizza (88)

82 Funny Girl (68)

83 The Sons of Katie Elder (65)

84 *Knives Out (19) another re-watch within the same year!! How does this keep happening??

85 *Scott Pilgrim Vs The World (10) a real I-just-moved-away-from-Toronto nostalgia watch

86 Canadian Bacon (92) vividly recall this VHS at the video store, but I never saw it til 2020

87 *Blood Simple (85)

88 Brittany Runs a Marathon (19)

89 The Accidental Tourist (88)

90 August Osage County (13) MELO-DRAMA!!

91 Appaloosa (08)

92 The Firm (93) Feeling good about how many iconic 80s/90s video store stalwarts I watched in 2020

93 *Almost Famous (00)

94 Whisper of the Heart (95)

95 Da 5 Bloods (20)

96 Rain Man (88)

97 True Stories (86)

98 *Risky Business (83) It’s not about what you think it’s about! It never was!

99 *The Big Chill (83)

100 The Way We Were (73)

101 Safety Last (23) It’s getting so that I might have to add the first two digits to my dates...not that I watch THAT many movies from the 1920s...

102 Phantasm (79)

103 The Burrowers (08)

104 New Jack City (91)

105 The Vanishing (88)

106 Sisters (72)

107 Puberty Blues (81) Little Aussie cinema theme, here

108 Elevator to the Gallows (58)

109 Les Diaboliques (55)

110 House (77) haha WHAT no really W H A T

111 Death Line (72)

112 Cranes are Flying (57)

113 Holes (03)

114 *Lady Vengeance (05)

115 Long Weekend (78)

116 Body Double (84)

117 The Crazies (73) I love that Romero shows the utter confusion that would no doubt reign in the case of any kind of disaster. Things fall apart.

118 Waterlilies (07)

119 *You’re Next (11)

120 Event Horizon (97)

121 Venom (18) I liked it, guys, way more than most superhero fare. Has a real sense of place and the place ISN’T New York!

122 Under the Silver Lake (18) RIP Night Call

123 *Blade Runner (82)

124 *The Birds (62) interesting to see now that I’ve read the story it came from

125 *28 Days Later (02) hits REAL FUCKIN’ DIFFERENT in a pandemic

126 Life is Sweet (90)

127 *So I Married an Axe Murderer (93) find me a more 90s movie, I dare you (it’s not possible)

128 Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (67)

129 The Pelican Brief (93) 90s thrillers continue!

130 Dick Johnston is Dead (20)

131 The Bridges of Madison County (95)

132 Earth Girls are Easy (88) Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum are so hot in this movie, no wonder they got married 

133 Better Watch Out (16)

134 Drowning Mona (00) trying for something like the Coen bros and not getting there

135 Au Revoir Les Enfants (87)

136 *Chasing Amy (97) Affleck is the least alluring movie lead...ever? I also think I gave Joey Lauren Adams’ character short shrift in my memory of the movie. It’s not good, but she’s more complicated than I recalled. 

137 Blackkklansman (18)

138 Being Frank (19)

139 Kiki’s Delivery Service (89)

140 Uncle Frank (20) why so many FRANKS

141 *National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (89) watching with pals (virtually) made it so much more fun than the usual yearly watch!

142 Half Baked (98) another, more secret Toronto nostalgia pic - RC Harris water filtration plant as a prison!

143 We’re the Millers (13)

144 All is Bright (13)

145 Defending Your Life (91)

146 Christmas Chronicles (18) I maintain that most new xmas movies are terrible, particularly now that Netflix churns them out like eggnog every year. 

147 Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse (18)

148 Reindeer Games (00) what did I say about Affleck??!? WHAT DID I SAY

149 Palm Springs (20)

150 Happiest Season (20)

151 *Metropolitan (90) it’s definitely a Christmas movie

152 Black Christmas (74)

THEATRE:HOME - 2:150 (thanks pandemic)

I usually separate out docs and fiction, but I watched almost no documentaries this year (with the exception of Dick Johnston). Reality is real enough. 

TV Series

01 - BoJack Horseman (final season) - Pretty damned poignant finish to the show, replete with actual consequences for our reformed bad boy protagonist (which is more than you can say for most antiheroes of Peak TV).

02 - *Hello Ladies - I enjoy the pure awkwardness of seeing Stephen Merchant try to perform being a Regular Person, but ultimately this show tips him too far towards a nasty, Ricky Gervais-lite sort of persona. Perhaps he was always best as a cameo appearance, or lip synching with wild eyes while Chrissy Teigen giggles?

03 - Olive Kittredge - a rough watch by times. I read the book as well, later in the year. Frances Mcdormand was the best, possibly the only, casting option for the flinty lead. One episode tips into thriller territory, which is a shock. 

04 - *The Wire S3, S4, S5 - lockdown culture! It was interesting to rewatch this, then a few months later go through an enormous, culture-level reappraisal of cop-centred narratives. 

05 - Forever - a Maya Rudolph/Fred Armisen joint that coasts on the charm of its leads. The premise is OK, but I wasn’t left wanting any more at the end. 

06 - *Catastrophe - a rewatch when my partner decided he wanted to see it, too!

07 - Red Oak - resolutely “OK” steaming dramedy, relied heavily on some pretty obvious cues to get across its 1980s setting. 

08 - Little Fires Everywhere - gulped this one down while in 14-day isolation, delicious! Every 90s suburban mom had that SUV, but not all of them had the requisite **secrets**

09 - The Great - fun historical comedy/drama! Costumes: lush. Actors: amusing. Race-blind casting: refreshing!

10 - The Crown S4 - this is the season everyone lost their everloving shit for, since it’s finally recent enough history that a fair chunk of the viewing audience is liable to recall it happening. 

11 - Ted Lasso - we resisted this one for a while (thought I did enjoy the ad campaign for NBC sports (!!) that it was based on). My view is that its best point was the comfort that the men on the show have (or develop, throughout the season) with the acknowledgement and sharing of their own feelings. Masculinity redux. 

12 - Moonbase 8 - Goodnatured in a way that makes you certain they will be crushed. 

13 - The Good Lord Bird - Ethan Hawke is really aging into the character actor we always hoped he would be! 

14 - Hollywood - frothy wish-fulfillment alternate history. I think the show would have been improved immeasurably by skipping the final episode.

[makeyourownmyth]

best seen in 2020.

My usual caveats from previous years are still applicable here: I don’t watch most of the major nominations the years they come out, and I’m usually not much for theaters and/or current TV. However, due to the pandemic, we watched a loooooooot of content. Here’s just a list of movies that I watched or rewatched this year, that were neither terrible, nor great, but I want to make note of:

Toy Story 4, The Brothers Bloom, Happiest Season, The Peanut Butter Falcon, Moana, Mr. Right, Moulin Rouge, Ocean’s Eleven, Spring Breakers, X-Men: Dark Phoenix (this might have been the worst movie I watched this year?), Widows, Gattaca, Black Klansman, Primer, It 2, Shazam (this maybe should have gone on the Honorable Mentions - it was fun), Training Day, Parasite (OK, now I have to update my Honorable Mentions), The Green Book, Strange Days, Elf, Love & Basketball, Above the Rim, Coach Carter.

That being said, there was some bad stuff, and I try not to shit on any artist’s creations too much, because I know no one sets out to make something bad, but these didn’t work for me. 

Anti

Uncut Gems - It’s not that it was BAD, it was just too stressful for me to enjoy.

Brick - It wasn’t even close to enjoyable on a rewatch that I encouraged my partner to take on for the first time. I felt bad. 

Hereditary - Neither a scary movie, nor a good movie.  

The Witch - Same, but maybe better made?

Under The Skin - Jesus, this was terrible. Maybe I’m not artsy enough to get it?

Now, however, let’s get to the good stuff. 

Honorable Mention TV

Avatar - I can’t legitimately put it on the Best Of list, because I’m not done yet, but I’m on Book 3, after finally actually getting started. I think I tried to start this in 2016, and i know all my nerd friends have been yelling at me for a long time because I haven’t gotten to it yet, and as someone who’s almost done, I can say: they were right! It’s great. 

Ozark - S1 was great. It fell off a fucking CLIFF after that. Ignore people who tell you that you HAVE to watch this. They’re wrong. It’s fine. 

The Last Dance - I know the world is obsessed with Michael Jordan, and I’m glad it came out when it did, but really, all it did for me was confirm that he’s an asshole who was very fortunate to play when he did. And also that the Bulls were fucking phenomenal. 

His Dark Materials - Neither as bad as some of my friends think, nor nearly as good as the books (obviously) but also not good enough that I’ve even started S2 yet, so....I guess it’s fine? 

The Mandalorian S2 - I think they know what they’re doing, and it’s super enjoyable, and I loved the ending, but I’m also curious as to where they’re going now. 

Fargo S3 - Given how good the rest of the series is (other than my distaste for S2, dealt with below, and out of step with pop culture) I thought this one was a misstep, 

Orphan Black - I cannot believe how late I was to this, and how good it still was. It really fell apart toward the end, but the acting was incredible, and the fact that they got to tell the story they wanted to was amazing. 

Best TV

7. All the Smoke with Kobe (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R3KIyEgCgc) - Maybe it was just his death, but it hits hard, and I miss him. Does this even count as TV? 

6. Looking for Alaska - It felt like gratuitous masochism to watch this and enjoy it, being 20 years older than when I fell for it, and feeling ashamed of the young person I was, but even knowing what was coming, I was weeping when it happened. Even knowing that they were ultimately going on a fruitless search and yelling at the TV while the Colonel and Pudge were searching for “signs” and hating them for it, I remember feeling like everything HAD to happen for a reason when I was this young... So yeah. It’s pure nostalgia for me. I’d be super interesting in hearing how kids responded to it. 

5. Locke and Key - I get that some people feel like they don’t need old shit in a new medium, but for me, I’m always up to try it out. If it’s fun, I’ll stick with it. And this is. It’s fun, it’s got some of the old shit, it’s got some new shit, and it’s a treat to see my favorite comic of the last decade in a new medium. Haters need a new bit. 

Fargo s1 and s4 (I didn’t love S3) - I know that I’m in the minority here, but I think 1 and 4 are the best and 2 was good, and 3 was fine. I literally watched all of this show this year, though, so I didn’t have the same time to digest as others. But I think that’s a benefit in some regards? 

4. Magicians s5 - One of the saddest conversations of the last year to two was when a nerd friend of mine said he didn’t like The Magicians because all of the characters were whiny and self-indulgent. For me, that was almost literally the point: they shoved Q into the corner and told the story of the others (at least one episode quite self-referentially so) and it was so much better for that. I wish it hadn’t ended, but I’m glad they left it where they did, because it was so good.  

3. Devs esp. The beginning of e5 - Jesus. The show of the year? Except for the fact that Watchmen came out at the tail end of last year, and I didn’t have it on my 2019 list? I mean, honestly, is there a show more tailored to me? I’m not gonna get into any spoilers, but it’s a quick watch, and it’s fucking fantastic. Watch it, have your mind blown by the concept, especially in the beginning sequence of E5, and then stick around for the subpar ending where basically all of the threads are resolved in the least good way. 

2. Watchmen - This deserves multiple re-watches and all the praise that people heaped upon it. 

1. The Good Place - I know, objectively, that Watchmen was a better show than The Good Place. But this is my list, and I’ll be damned if anything overtakes my favorite sitcom (maybe of all time?) for best of the year. I know it barely just ended this year, and there’s plenty of acclaim to go around for this show, but honestly, every time I talk to anyone about it, it feels like they kind of laugh it off. This show is not only worth your time, but should almost be considered must-watch material. If more people watched this show, we wouldn’t need the insult “sophomoric” to describe people who’ve just had their minds blown by Philosophy 101, and we’d be better off as a species. 

Honorable Mention Movies

In this order, and you can take the comedies and make them the only honorable mentions, if you’d like to make a nice, even top 10. (Until I saw Tenet the night before I posted this.( (And then I looked back at the playing cards that we use to randomly choose movies and I found that I needed to modify the Honorable Mentions and the Best Of lists.) 

21 and 22 Jump Street - In general, I’m not a fan of comedies. So I’m happy I watched these, thanks to Nathan Zed, and they’re funny. Good work guys. 

Palm Springs - Apparently there’s now backlash against Groundhog Day? I dunno, man, it was fun, and all the actors seemed like they were having a good time, and I was down for it. 

Parasite - I can’t add anything to this that hasn’t already been shouted from the rooftops, so let me just briefly say that I thought it was great, but it didn’t quite make the list of best. The combo of genres was great, the cast was fantastic, but what I loved the most about it was how quiet it was.

Best Movies

10. Blinded by the Light - Way more resonant than I thought it’d be from the previews, and I already thought it was gonna be stellar. I didn’t take into account TIME along with place, and that made a hell of a difference for this movie. 

9. Shoplifters - Yeesh. What a tough watch, but so good, and so necessary. For me, I think we watched it back to back to back with Parasite and I, Tonya, and this one just stood out so much more. The storyline was softer all the way through, but really had gravitas simultaneously. 

8. Tenet - It was fucking fun! I don’t get the hate! I liked it, I’ll like it more next time I see it, and I wish I’d seen it on the big screen, but I’m super glad I could see it on my TV! 

7. I, Tonya - Geez, what a powerhouse of acting. Not only did they get me to feel good about the villain of my childhood, they got me to feel good about Margot Robbie, who I’d only thought of as a hot lady before. Superb acting from everyone else, too, and what a great pick up to be like, yeah, this is the story we’re gonna tell. 

6. I Am Not Your Negro - I avoided watching it for so long because I was already depressed this year, and I didn’t think I needed any more of that, but it turns out I did, and I always do, from Baldwin. He’s a master for a reason. 

5. Hamilton - I know there was some backlash with the time difference, and I’m sure it was better to see it pre-2016 in the theater, where it’s meant to be seen, but I’m not a billionaire New Yorker, and I was plenty happy to see it when and where I could. 

4. Won’t You Be My Neighbor - I mean...what do you think? It’s so much exactly what you’re thinking it is, but then it’s even better, because it’s the real deal, and he was so good, and it’s so pure. Watch it. 

3. Her Smell - Elizabeth Moss has already gotten all the acclaim, but to play this different of a role, in a movie that felt as stressful as Uncut Gems, but pulled off an actual plot so much more successfully? I can’t believe this one didn’t get more pub, but then again, yes I can: it’s a movie about a girl band that rages against the machine, and she’s got severe issues. Small surprise that the people didn’t react well. Seek this one out! 

2. Arrival - Yes, I am going to totally cheat and put a movie that’s appeared on my list (sooooo long ago) as the #2 entry this year. You know why? Cuz fuck 2020, and this is a great movie, and it’s the movie that made me feel second best this year. It’s incredible, and I know people appreciated it in its time, but I feel like they should appreciate it even more. 

1. Moonlight - It’s not a shock, nor am I trying to appease anyone with anything. It’s just that I finally watched it, and it’s the best movie I saw this year. I don’t think I could possibly add anything to the authentic critics who have already heaped praise upon it, but I do have to say that it’s all due, and so much more. The acting obviously stands out, but the direction, from the color palettes, to the choice of when and where (and how) to break it up, are all masterful choices.  

[mego42]

1x08 discussion questions

blah blah blah clever intro, most importantly, thank you @pynkhues​!! I really appreciate rewatch nights. s3 was my first experience watching live/with people and that was obvs a more, erm, contentious experience so it’s been really nice to get to kind of mulligan that with the rewatch.

ANYHOO onward!

1. What was your favourite scene of the episode? Tell us why!

the spa robbery, I could talk a big game about the montage editing and beth’s dress (which are all worthy points) but at the end of the day? it’s the robes, they just do it for me. they’re so snuggly and they have hoods.

2. Was there any scene that missed the mark for you? And if so, how?

tbh while there was a lot of delightful elements about this ep, the whole thing is largely underwhelming to me and rewatching reminded me why I often forget about most of it.

3. This episode opens with Beth discovering that the money is gone – not just the fake cash that she’s washing for Rio, but the cut of what they’d already washed too. What do you think this tells us about Rio’s mentality and approach as an employer / boss?

maybe if he weren’t such a dick and the kind of boss that breaks into your house to take back your paycheck, beth wouldn’t be so inclined to shoot him.

4. This episode also features the start of a really pivotal arc for Ruby and Sara around crime, and Ruby’s worries about Sara somehow inheriting that part of her. Do you think Ruby was right to react the way she did in this episode? Was there a better way she could’ve handled it?

I mean what else was she gonna do? be cool with it? who is she, darren’s parents? I love the nuance retta and reno bring to that scene, both with their reactions and empathy for why sara did it and also the way stan backs ruby in front of sara to present a united front. It’s just excellent parenting all around imo.

5. What do you think this episode tells us about Annie and Nancy’s relationship prior to the series starting? Do you think Nancy feels threatened by Annie? Or vice versa? How do you think they’ve negotiated their respective places in Greg and Ben’s lives?

honestly the hair oils comment makes me holler bc I feel like that’s nancy’s version of I see you being a dick and I’m going to pretend I don’t to take the wind out of your sails but also you’re dirty and garbage and get off my fancy couch. the way both actresses play it, the conflict feels so lived in I can’t see how it isn’t a long standing thing, but then the way nancy opens up (both in this ep and then in s2 at the baby shower) makes me feel like annie’s been the driving force in them not getting along up to this point.

6. The spa heist! What did you think of it? Good? Bad? Tell us all your thoughts!

I mean it was a terrible idea that rested on being able to unload botox to a 17 boy who sells pot and hallucinogens in a grocery store parking lot. the execution was neat, but any scenario where dean is able to pick up the pieces and save the day is obviously flawed in some fundamental way.

7. In a lot of ways, Annie’s ‘slow boil’ comment to Beth feels like it’s been a long time coming. When do you think Ruby and Annie realised that Beth got something beyond just financial fulfilment from crime? And do you think they know the full extent of it at this point in the episode? Hell, do you think they know the full extent of it in s3?

I think ruby and annie know beth well enough to know she’s getting a happy little zip out of crime-ing no matter what she says about it. the part I think they don’t/may still not realize as of s3 and/or are starting to realize as of s3 is how far and how dark she’ll go

8. Let’s talk about Beth’s sales pitch to / second date with Rio! Do you think it was a good pitch and Rio missed an opportunity? Do you think Rio was genuinely there to hear her out, or was he just entertaining her? And this is the first time he brings up the idea of her being a boss (via, well, her not being one yet). Do you think he sees her as that yet? Or if, again, he’s just entertaining her?

It was a terrible pitch but hysterically depicted. I love christina, she did a note perfect rendition of every single software sales rep I’ve ever encountered. rio was, imo, 1000000000% humoring her on the specifics of the pitch once he realized what she was trying to sell him.

that said, I think the boss encouragement was an organic evolution of how he’s been watching her step up over the past few eps and recognizing her overall potential to think creatively and take charge. the you don’t need it comment, on the other hand, always feels a touch out of place to me

9. How do you think Annie felt about the news Nancy was trying to get pregnant? And do you think she would’ve broken up with Greg if Nancy wasn’t?

I think she felt absolutely wretched about it, though based on later eps (is that cheating?) I think she would’ve tried to give it a shot with greg if that hadn’t been a hurdle. the getting preggo situation was def a significant factor for her, probs at least in part because she is obvs intimately acquainted with the trials and tribulations of single motherhood and isn’t trying to force that upon nancy if she can help it.

10. Mary Pat has two pretty tight scenes in this episode where she has power plays with Ruby and then later Beth. What did you think of these scenes? And how do those exchanges compare with each other?

mary pat runs circles around them in her bumbling, oh shucks me gotcha way and I love it. I feel worse for ruby who’s basically like please oh please just let me live, but beth 100000% strolled into that house trying to pull her we’re just moms in this together schtick but with an alpha twist (shout out to @gild-and-fire‘s which gg character are you quiz you should absolutely take if you haven’t already) and mary pat looked her up and down like do not even try to pretend you don’t wrap a fake bill around your vibrator before you get off with it. classic.

11. Ruby finds out about Eddie’s arrest! We talked a little about Eddie’s loyalty last week, but how do you think the arrest went down between Stan and Eddie?

ooh like did it involve the handcuffs stan brings home to ruby? kinky.

[thethirdwheel404]

Med Rewatch Series (#10)

S3 E10: Down By Law.

Episode Description: Dr. Manning sustains an injury while helping a drive-by victim and Dr. Rhodes finds himself in uncomfortable waters.

Connor being in ‘uncomfortable waters’? I can hear Ava bullying him already.

(also i wrote a little thing abt maggie giving ava a red bull so enjoy that little bit of content)

Let’s get into it.

-barry just yeeted natalie against a car holy shit that’s fucking hilarious

-will needs to chill the fuck out

-YESSSSS

-THIS WHERE CONNOR BRINGS THE WOMAN HE WENT OUT WITH UP FOR MEDICAL TREATMENT. AND THEN AVA HARASSES HIM FOR IT.

-this is one of the most iconic ava moments. (it’s first thing that pops up under the tumblr tag)

-ava overhearing connor not knowing his date’s last name. and ava walking over, already getting ready to make fun of him. barely concealing her smile

-the confidence with which she set down the file. she was too prepared and too excited

-this could just turn into a list of ava quotes

-”It must be hard, remembering all their names.”

“You know I read Derek Jeter used to send his conquests home with a gift basket. But a full cardio work up is... It’s much classier.”

-ava bekker secret baseball fan?

-Connor: “Jeter? You a baseball fan?”

Ava: “Oh, no. It’s much too boring. But I love gossip.”

-interesting. very, interesting... is it weird to anyone else to think about ava liking gossip?

-like the idea is fun and all but i hate the idea of ava being suuuper obsessed with gossip. it makes her seem way too shallow in my book. that being said, one of my hcs about women gossiping about all the shit men do to ava bc they know she’ll call them on it now has a lot more precedence

-i know she explicitly says that baseball is boring but i can’t get the idea of ava being a secret baseball fan out of my head. its just so novel

-HER SHIT EATING GRIN

- Connor: “Well, we will get you in and out of here as quickly as possible.”

Ava: “That’s what Dr. Rhodes is renowned for around here. Quick in and outs.”

Connor: *turns to her condescendingly*

Ava: *two finger salute* “I’m Dr. Bekker, by the way.”

-the lesbian icon jumped out

-also the fact that in the previous episode Ava’s mentor did the exact same salute. idk what it means but it’s not that important

-ava trying to hide her smile when asking the woman if she wanted them to contact her husband

-ava overhearing again when latham tells connor the woman he was with was doing cocaine

-ava smirking when connor says that he thinks the heart attack was from his sex and not the cocaine

-connor thinking he’s so good at sex he’s going to give this woman a heart attack

-he really drives All the ladies wild in EveryWay (sex, suicide. he’s the whole package)

-latham asking connor point blank “did you partake in the cocaine?”

-the ct team gives connor so. much. shit. it’s so funny

-also. ava just chillin at her desk looking at scans? that’s the kind of content i want to see. just her just being there. doing her own thing. that’s what i want

-THE GUY WITH A TEENAGE WIFE IS A REVEREND HOLY SHIT

-counting down the minutes til natalie drops dead (passes out but yk a girl can dream lol)

-sarah. back at it again with her rayon jacket and button up and backpack. the coffee cup only adds to the aesthetic

-connor being surprised that latham isn’t gonna let him do surgery on the women he fucked (twice, he might add)

- whatever you do, don’t think of a brown bear. are you thinking about it?

-maggie dealing red bull to people who need it. that’s a very soft idea

- ex:

Dr. Bekker is sitting at the desk in the ED. Well, sleeping, more like it. Her head is resting on her fist, her elbow precariously close to slipping off the the chair armrest, and her eyes open by just a hair.

“Dr. Bekker.”

Ava jolts awake.

“Maggie,” Ava says, strong accent cutting through, acknowledging the person standing over her. Hastily, she adjusts her jacket and scrubs, smoothing them back into place.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this tired.”

Ava shrugs, seamlessly slipping back into easy confidence.

“Rough couple of cases. Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Uh huh,” Maggie says, unbelieving.

She sets a can of Red Bull on the desk with a knowing look.

“You need this more than anybody.”

Ava scoffs. “Those things? They are murder on your heart, come on.”

Maggie hums and walks away. Ava watches her leave, and when she’s out of sight, Ava darts forward, grabs the energy drink, immediately cracking it open and downing half of it.

- anyway.

- @punksarahreese that’s on you for making me believe ava loves energy drinks

- let’s continue

- sarah looking at charles telling her not to do something: I am not going to do a thing you said

- go off babe. it was the wrong decision but go off

- all the nurses watching this guy call nat a bitch:  👀 👀 👀 👀

- will being like: god that guy called you a bitch i fucking hate him

- and natalie being like: he is also refusing to let us treat the 14 yr olds cancer but you obviously have priorities

- sarah is so logical. she’s good at talking to people. can you FUCKING IMAGINE IF SHE HAD BETTER GUIDANCE (oh and less trauma)

- this is also the one with that hilarious screen cap of sarah holding a knife

- the way she is so calm about handing this patient a knife gives me anxiety

- THIS SCENE IS SO HARD TO WATCH IT SCARES ME SO MUCH

- sarah just in alone in a room with a man who keeps having visions of stabbing his wife. and her just handing him a fucking knife oh my god i have too much anxiety for this

- rewatching the series and getting completely confused bc norma is 5′7″ but she looks so short next to colin and the guy who plays latham

- AND RACHEL IS ALSO 5′ 7″ BUT THEY BOTH LOOK SO SHORT - WHY EVERYONE ON THIS SHOW SO TALL

- anyway. ignore that that’s not important

- I... the parallels btwn sarah offering this guy the ability to slit her throat (for therapy) and ava cutting her throat... i don’t know what to do with this information

- idk but sarah holding the knife got me feelin some type of way

- the way connor looks at ava with such contempt bc she... does her job (and his but yk) especially during the hug wtf dude honestly just stop looking at her

- this is also the episode where ava pawns off the patient’s hug onto connor. while yeah, it could ava just being annoying to connor by forcing him to hug his one night stand’s husband, but she did give connor due credit. (and something to be said about her being confused and a tad uncomfortable when the patient hugs her, which is why she pawns it off to rhodes)

- she also doesn’t hug the guy back, which is kind of funny, she never moves her arms and just shrugs out of it

- and like after the hug she takes a few steps away from the guy, really not wanting any more physical contact or attention

- there’s something interesting in ava’s expression when connor gets hugged by the guy, can’t quite explain it. i’m gonna go with it’s her trying to keep a straight face while connor hugs a man he just helped a woman cheat on, but that’s not all of it so

- or. okay, I think i got it. i think that that little expression when connor gets hugged is her rolling her eyes at him getting credit when ava did most of the heavy lifting. yes. final answer. i’m satisfied

- and her looking away from them is her stopping herself from laughing, bc connor is obviously not enjoying this

- and he’s so sad and angsty he can’t even play along with the jokes

- and ava smiling at him with pity as she walks in to talk to the patient, bc that’s really what it is. she feels bad for him bc connor is so obviously lonely

- and connor’s annoyed bc ‘dammit she does have a right to pity me i suck rn’

- med pushing the women are tough agenda LITERALLY SHUT THE FUCK UP

- you hate your women characters so much just fucking shut your mouth

- and will being like ‘ i have a lot to learn about women not being objects’

- and nat saying ‘you are way further along than most’ like no, he’s not. the bar is on the ground and he still can’t jump it

- i’m pretty sure this show doesn’t pass the bechdel test. holy fucking shit it doesn’t. you’ve gotta be kidding me. (at least this episode doesn’t)

I can’t believe this episode didn’t pass the bechdel test. The only convo btwn two women were like maggie and sharon and they talk about barry and oh my god this is infuriating god med the bar is so low. And I’m pretty sure most episodes don’t pass the test anyway. Will is literally the representation of med. He gets lots of credit for doing bare minimum things like giving women rights.

Anyway.

This was a good episode. We dissected a lot of unspoken Ava things, which is very good. Ava had a lot of moments where she was there, but didn’t say anything, and when your characters can do that, that’s when you know your characterization is very good.

The moments where Ava isn’t really doing anything to forward the plot of the episode but she’s still just there, doing her own thing, are hands down my favorite. Her sitting at the desk looking at a scan while connor tells latham he didn’t do cocaine could possibly my favorite ava moment in the series, just bc it shows how much of her own character should could’ve been.

I drew an interesting parallel btwn sarah offering the guy to slit her throat and ava’s death. i have nothing for that but go wild

This episode also showed us Ava pitying Connor, another new aspect. she gives him shit but she also pities him. very good ep for little ava moments

as always, thanks for sticking through it

-

read the rest here:

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 / Part 5 / Part 6 / Part 7 / Part 8 / Part 9 / Part 11 / Part 12 / Extra

[kiss-my-freckle]

8x9 Rewatch: The Cyranoid

“I can see it's not Keen. But what I can't figure out is why it's not Keen.” Couple this episode with The Wellstone Agency. Aram and Ressler have what they need to find Liz. They just need to put their heads together. 

This episode gives you everything you need for the rest of the series. If you want my summation, skip to the bottom because I included every pertinent dialogue. 

A parallel to Pete in 5x7.

Man on the phone: They know. I don't know how, but they know.

Pete: They knew I put in a request with CODIS. I don't know how, but they did.

A parallel to Aram in 7x1. The Seventh Seal, for those who don’t know. 

Red: You all look like you're in a Bergman film playing chess with Death.

Aram: Now we are both eating Polish sausage and playing chess with Death.

If you haven't noticed yet, they've got a coffee cup theme going on. This is like their 4th or 5th time with the coffee cups. To understand this, you have to go to the opening diner scene in 2x21. 

Tom: Alright, dream scenario. We finish our coffee...

Bremmer’s statement pushes back to 8x3 and 5x9, for a reason.

Bremmer: He'll never forgive you for this

Cooper: What you did to her, what you did to Katarina, I don't think Elizabeth will ever forgive you for it. Red: She might. Some day. But before then...

Liz: Can you forgive me? Red: Yes. Will you be able to forgive yourself?

Red: I fear she may do something that she can never recover from. And of all the tragedies that you and I have experienced together, that would be the most tragic. We have to do - do everything in our power to prevent that from happening.

Apparently, Neville is the reason Liz lost 30 years with her mother. 

Red: Make no mistake, Harold. By going after Townsend, Elizabeth is putting her life in grave danger.

I like the pest control van Ressler and Park use for their surveillance. The majority of Ressler's scenes push the idea of him turning to Red for help.

Gina: They say two things will survive a nuclear holocaust - cockroaches and twinkies.

A lot of their dialogues push back to Ressler's storyline with Prescott. Turning to Red now to help Liz ... it’s the kind of favor that wouldn't put Ressler in his debt because it's not for him, it's for Liz. if he ended up saving her by pulling her back in, Red would consider himself in Ressler’s debt just as he did with Aram. 

Aram: A war criminal and an international fugitive. Your parents must be proud.

This line of dialogue leads me to believe Neville is an international fugitive because Mary is the war criminal. Aram talks about her crimes later on in the episode. Everyone is led to believe Townsend got his hands on Liz. 

Cooper: You know Townsend. What hope does she have? Red: He's a very dangerous man. Elizabeth kidnapped his sister, and now he has Elizabeth. If I were her, I'd feel pretty hopeless.

Neville knows what Elizabeth looks like, which means he likely saw her in the news when she was on the run in S3. As you watch how Liz controls her Cyranoid, understand this is how much Tom and the woman from Paris have been controlling Liz. It's an emotional hostage-taking.

Liz: No, I know who I am. I am the puppet of some high-functioning sociopath.

Liz: A marionette with a high-functioning sociopath pulling my strings.

When you have someone who controls what Liz believes, and therefore, what she feels... you have someone who has taken Liz emotionally hostage. Period. That's why no one recognizes her. 

Red: I'm not worried about my hide. I worry about Elizabeth's. I strongly suggest you do the same.

Cooper automatically assumes Red killed Rakitin's patsy, and because of that, basically reveals he's the one who has Red's thumb drive. This gives Red his open to demand he return it.

Liz: You believe my mother was murdered by the Kazanjian Brothers. That never happened. They betrayed you, cut a deal with my mother to fake her death and buy her the time she needed to clear her name. Neville: I don't believe any of this.

William: Well, whoever I am is irrelevant. Katarina Rostova is dead.

Neville: Katarina Rostova is N-13.

William: Assuming, for the sake of discussion, you are who you claim to be, what proof could you possibly have? Woman: I have the identity of N-13. William: You're N-13.

Neville Townsend and William Heidegger shared the same belief. Katarina is N-13 and she's dead. By using “N-13″ as an unidentified codename, it allows them to drag out Red's identity reveal further and evens the war with Townsend. Both Katarina and Red are N-13 because Red is Katarina. Liz thinks she's avenging her mother when she's putting three generations at risk... her mother, herself, and her daughter. Using N-13 also makes it possible for Red to survive this war. If they didn’t do it this way, Red wouldn’t, that’s a guarantee. I told people this when they first brought up the idea of Neville being the big bad. If Red’s real identity got outed to the world, he wouldn’t survive it. He’d have to hide out on his island for the rest of his life. 

Neville: Are you saying Reddington killed her to hide the fact he's N-13? Liz: Yes. And I can prove it. That he's the reason your family's dead.

Ilya Koslov is the only person who can prove the identity of N-13 because Dom is dead. It's likely Sikorsky can prove it, but I don't think Liz will be able to push that far. 

Rakitin: The witch hunt is over and there's one less government knob sticking his nose into our business. You should be thanking me.

Red had his witch trial in S6. He’s a witch because he’s Katarina. Rakitin comes off a lot like Tom Keen, and I do think it’s purposeful. He's one of Red's assets.

Red: You tricked them. For a day. Maybe two. But they'll see past it, and when they do, they'll come looking for you.

Katarina: The news of my death would fool most. It won't fool Velov.

I believe his 30 year project is the Devry map and the blacklist, and it's a shared mission because Red is Katarina and Liz is Masha. A mythic battle that he and Liz are central to because they're mother and daughter Rostova. I think he's trying to remove the threats that separated them for 30 years. They've already cleared out the Cabal. Their affiliates likely went blue, so Red and Liz still have a massive blue player war to fight. 

Liz: I wouldn't have gone to the effort of taking your sister, luring you out, of making this pitch unless I was certain. Raymond Reddington killed my mother because she had uncovered the truth.

Most people don’t see it yet, but this war is on the opposite side of S5. 

Liz: You can trust me.

That’s why Liz is telling Neville he can trust her. For the same reason Tom told Red he can trust him. Because Red couldn’t trust Tom, and Neville can’t trust Liz. 

Tom: You can trust me. Red: No, I can't. I hired you to do a job. The rules were explicit, and you violated them. You're unreliable.

Red KNOWS Neville can’t trust Liz. 

Red: Elizabeth Keen is not to be trusted.

Neville is gonna find out she’s unreliable. She’s STILL Red’s daughter lol. This is where Liz's hopelessness will come in that Red spoke of earlier.

Red: He's a very dangerous man. Elizabeth kidnapped his sister, and now he has Elizabeth. If I were her, I'd feel pretty hopeless.

This Cyranoid changed everything when she surrendered herself. 

Cooper: We don't have to find her because she found us. She surrendered herself out front five minutes ago.

A quick gather of dialogues to show you what I mean.

Ressler: I can see it's not Keen, but what I can't figure out is why it's not Keen.

Cooper: Seven years ago - she was kind, enthusiastic, decent. Under your tutelage - she's become someone I fail to recognize.

Red: I'll tell you what she's not doing - behaving like you would.

Aram: Who are you? Liz: You know who I am and why I have to do this. Aram: You forged my signature to get 16 ounces of Semtex. You nearly killed Mr. Reddington and Ressler. I knew who you were, Liz. But I don't recognize who you've become.

Ressler: I'm just saying, if she did reach out to you, if you actually saw her, you might think differently. Aram: Did she reach out to you? Ressler: No, she didn't. But if she did... I'm just saying it might make a difference.

Aram: He didn't "say," he ordered. Ressler: Yeah, but I told you, if you saw her you'd think differently.

Aram: You were right. It is different.

THIS is exactly what the task force needed. To change Liz's face so they can know what they're seeing - a completely different person. Liz IS an imposter. She’s been an imposter since she stepped off Tom’s boat in 2x22. The task force still believes Red is Ilya, but this is where Liz parallels Rederina and both parallel the Deer Hunter. All that’s left for Liz is a gender change. 

She's becoming Tom Keen, but keeping her face. A Pinocchio wife and daughter because they’re holding her emotionally hostage. Tom, by making her believe he’s the father of Agnes. The woman from Paris, by making her believe she’s her mother. Tom and the woman from Paris are pulling Liz’s strings. She’s a fucking marionette. 

Cyranoid: I told you, it's me. Ressler: No.

Cyranoid: Why don't we start with what happened between you and me the night before I went on the run? Ressler: Who the hell are you?

Just like Reddington. “Who are you?” The entire fucking point. Imagine Liz changing her face to look like her Cyranoid. They'd never see Liz again. THIS is what Katarina did by permanently changing her face to become Raymond. You might as well Consider “Raymond” to be Katarina’s Cyranoid.

Dom: Last time I saw my daughter was in this rearview mirror nearly 30 years ago.

Put this entire Post Office playout in 2x22 context and you can see my memory wipe theory. You just have to consider Mary's death like Connolly's. That gif set is here. Liz is wrong. “Almost everything” has changed because she had her memory wiped. The only thing that hasn’t changed is her face. That’ll be left for Agnes. 

Cyranoid: You should let me go. Ressler: Those days are over. Cyranoid: Why? Nothing's changed. Ressler: No. You ordered your puppet to murder Bremmer. Now you're helping her escape. Cyranoid: I've missed you. Ressler: Well, how about we get together? Have a little chat.

I love how Panbaker says this when they haven’t even told her Red is Ilya. 

Panabaker: Which is why I give you a perilously long leash. But it's not so long that I'll approve granting immunity to someone whose identity I am unaware of. Cooper: Ressler, go over the forensics again. Facial recognition, prints. See what you can find. Panabaker: Be good if that included your dignity.

Ressler doesn't see that he has the power to make Liz surrender. They need to stop their physical search and start an emotional one. They lost her in S2. 

Red: She's the master of her own puppet. An avatar of herself.

Liz is a puppet controlling her own puppet. 

It makes her Grendel’s mother. Little Red Riding Hood. 

Liz: Before we had Agnes... I thought Tom and I were gonna adopt.

Tom: Tonight, you are finally gonna see what this little monster looks like.

A parallel to 3x17.

Neville: You need me on your team. This is my price. Are you willing to pay it?

Red: Do you really want your child to pay the price for that mistake for the rest of his or her life?

A parallel to 7x10.

Cyranoid: Your brother loves you very much.

Woman: But she asked me to give you a big hug and tell you how much she loves you.

I believe this will be the means of Agnes’ hit. Revenge for Mary Bremmer. 

Mary: I've done nothing wrong. Aram: Except use chemical weapons on men, women, and children.

Aram: Have you seen what she's done? Chemical Mary. The way her weapons have been used. Against civilians... children. The Agent Keen I know wouldn't use someone like this to get to Townsend or anyone else. She'd arrest her and make sure she couldn't hurt anyone again.

Aram: Whoever she is, she is not our problem. Now, this... this is our problem. Douma and Khan Shaykhun. Syrian children victimized by chlorine gas. We have a war criminal in custody. I am going to confront her with her war crimes.

For the same reason Victor Skovic took over Dr. Krilov’s business when he got arrested. Neville knows his sister. He’ll tailor his revenge to fit her.  

Separating this section. A parallel to 7x10.

Aram: She'd arrest her and make sure she couldn't hurt anyone again.

Ressler: You scrambled my brain, and I'm here to make sure that you never do that to anyone else.

Separating this section. A parallel to 3x15.

Aram: Whoever she is, she is not our problem. Now, this... this is our problem.

Red: Tom is your Tom problem. 

You basically have to put Agnes in Red’s place. She’s the one in danger.

A parallel to 5x8. 

Cyranoid: I don't expect you to understand, but I am doing what is necessary to end this. To stop Reddington.

Garvey: I like to think I'm the kind of man who'd politely ask you to stop this, to let this end here, but I can tell you're the kind of guy who won't get the message and stop.

These bits sell Liz’s surrender should Ressler turn to Red.

Cyranoid: That's why I have a Cyranoid. To eliminate your control.

Cyranoid: You really think you have power over me, don't you?

Cyranoid: I am not surrendering myself to you.

Red: When you love someone, you have no control. That's what love is. Being powerless.

A parallel to Dr. Fulton. 

Neville: Uh, it turns out that you're due for a reckoning.

Fulton: Closure requires a reckoning.

Because Red is Liz’s mother. So run this opposite. 

Fulton: A widow. A mom. A cop. Liz: And one more thing. Fulton: What's that? Liz: A daughter.

A parallel to Ruin. 

Blake: Try and get some sleep. Neville: I always try. And I never do.

Liz: What matters is that I did it and I was good at it. And I didn't lose any sleep over it. Red: You will. One of these nights you will. It's just a matter of when.

Summation.

They’ve covered most of my predictions for this season. Had I grouped these dialogues, you'd see it even more. With Neville, Liz pushes the danger to Agnes. With the task force, she pushes her second memory wipe and her possible surrender later on. A culmination of things for their first hit on my Tom Domino theory, and I do believe this very arc will lead to that reveal. Agnes’ hit is coming and everyone is falling in parallel with each other. They’ll have more coming, so expect a lot of parallel gif sets from me as they do. 

Liz: I want revenge. Alice: You have my full attention.

Liz is seeking revenge for the death of the woman she believes was her mother. That's it. She's not seeking truths, but feeling quite certain Dom framed her mother and set her up as a patsy. Don't confuse a woman willing to break the rules to seek revenge as a woman who's in control of her life. There's no control to have in seeking revenge, only a poisoned soul. The difference between 3a and 8a shows you where they're heading. The only way Liz can gain control of her life is by getting to the truth rather than seeking revenge for what she believes is the truth. Once those truths come to light, Liz will have the power she needs to take control. Because she’s seeking revenge for what she believes is the truth, Agnes will end up in parallel with Red. Liz and Agnes willl basically fall on the other side of The Djinn's episode. She's harming her own daughter by aligning with Neville, and she was stupid enough to take Agnes on the run with her. 

Consider Liz no different than Bahram because this is where they're heading.

Red: Look at that. Pinned like a swallowtail.

Red: I need an ambulance. A man's dying on a cross.

Ressler: So, you go ahead and you nail yourself to a cross...

You simply need to change Ressler's position from the Deer Hunter episode.

Ressler: Don't. Don't ask me to feel your pain, Liz. I got more than enough of my own.

Liz: But if she isn't who I thought she was, if she's a threat - Ressler: Then we'll deal with it.

Because Agnes is his daughter and he’s gonna feel that pain with her. 

Bahram: I wanted to protect you, Nasim.

Tom: We were trying to protect Agnes. Red: I guess that didn't work out.

I’m predicting Neville runs opposite William with the ducks. 

William: There's a park on the corner of Wabash and Grant. I take my granddaughter there to feed the ducks.

Duck, duck, roasted goose. Fire for Agnes. Burn scars like the makeup on the woman at the costume shop. Fire like Alina’s friend. Burns to the face like Mary Bremmer. I think that’s why they’re on the carousel with the unicorn. Unicorns are good luck. Washer necklaces are bad luck. I think he’s gonna drop a deadly weapon through Liz’s skylight on behalf of his sister. 

[panharmonium]

well, we started season 5 the other night.

[disclaimer again for anyone who doesn’t know me: i’m rewatching because I NEVER FINISHED SEASON 5.  i have never seen the last four episodes.  i don’t know how it ends.  please help me enjoy (or, you know, maybe not enjoy, given how things are going in the first two episodes, but...experience, at least) season 5 without spoilers.  thank you!]

i’m going to try to keep up with posting some things during season 5, but despite the fact that i don’t actually know how it ends, this season still kind of makes me feel like i’m being marched to my own execution, and sometimes i feel TOO emotionally invested in what’s going on to even want to write about it, but we’ll see how much i get done.  

anyway - the most important takeaway i want to put down about the opener is that merlin is a mess.

the writers/directors do a really great job of flipping the script between seasons 4 and 5.  in season 4, arthur was the disaster, and merlin was the one who had to take charge of everything.  but in season 5, arthur's gotten his life together, and merlin’s the one having a crisis.

the turnaround that arthur makes between S4 and S5 is amazing.  it’s like he’s a completely different person.  a better person.  i love seeing him like this - after spending all of season 4 so fed up with him, suddenly i get into season 5 and finally see the king i was looking for.  there’s no more agonizing over what people will think of his decisions or what his father would do - he just looks inside himself and does the right thing.  he’s confident.  comfortable in his leadership role.  and you can see that it’s changed his entire demeanor.  despite everything that’s happening, he never seems excessively worried about their situation.  he never seems overly stressed (in contrast to merlin, who is losing his mind) - he stays positive and just does what has to be done.  he seems happy.

it’s the kind of peace of mind that comes from being certain that you’re doing the right thing.  he almost never experiences that in season 4, but in season 5, he’s finally comfortable with who he is and what he’s doing.  even the tone of his confrontation with morgana is different than it was in S4 - he’s not second-guessing everything he did that could have made her hate him anymore.  he regrets the situation they’re in, but he’s not tearing himself up over it.  he’s not afraid of her.  

merlin, on the other hand - 

merlin is afraid of everything.

merlin in season 5 is a grade A disaster.  the - you remember how in this old piece i kept saying ‘merlin’s life does not revolve around arthur pendragon?’  

well, it didn’t, then.  but it sure as hell does now.

and not in a nice ‘you’re my best friend’ kind of way, either.  the fear of what’s coming - the idea that Something Bad is coming for arthur and that only merlin can stop it from happening, the fear that everything he’s worked for will come to nothing - it swallows merlin whole.  it changes him.  from the very first episode, his fear twists him into something unrecognizable.  like - even before mordred comes on the scene, after annis says that it’s likely gwaine and percival are still alive and being held captive - merlin tries to convince arthur not to rescue them.  he says “i’m not sure we should go to ismere.”

like - excuse me?  merlin’s advocating for NOT rescuing someone?  for just leaving his friends to die?  for abandoning GWAINE, of all people?

something’s wrong.  something’s big-time wrong.  

and it’s not like we’ve never seen hints of this...ruthlessness in him before.  merlin's worst moments have always tried to poke through when he gets too caught up in what kilgharrah tells him is “supposed” to happen, when he lets his fear of failing at his destiny override his natural compassionate instincts.  he almost leaves mordred to be captured in 1.08.  he almost allows uther to be assassinated in 1.11.  he does poison morgana in 2.11, though i’ll grant that that was in dire circumstances and under extreme duress.  for the most part, though, in moments like these, merlin’s better nature wins out, and he ends up defying the “demands of destiny” to do what he thinks is the right thing, the better thing, the kinder thing.  even when confronting morgana in the crypts in the S3 opener, he tells her “it doesn’t have to be like this.  we can find another way.”

but this season, merlin’s better nature is losing.  he’s losing himself.  and it’s noticeable, even to other characters.  arthur tells him “i’ve not seen you smile these past three days,” and gaius notices he’s not himself:

what happened to the young boy who came into my chambers just a few years ago?

he grew up.

which is, of course, exactly what morgana says to arthur in 5.2.  

watching this happen is the most devastating thing.  it’s TRAGIC.  for a character whose base personality has always been so sunny - how absolutely inconceivable is it to hear arthur advocating mercy in a situation where there was no need for further violence, and then to have merlin be the one shouting “you should have killed him!”

the juxtaposition of ‘he showed us kindness’ with ‘YOU SHOULD HAVE KILLED HIM!’ is horrifying.  like.  good god.  even arthur thinks it’s bizarre.  he literally turns to look at merlin and goes “what is WRONG with you?”

and then when they’re contemplating getting inside the fortress, merlin says again “i told you.  you should have killed him when you had the chance.”

and arthur gives him this look and the tiniest little shake of the head.

what is wrong with you.

last season, it was merlin telling arthur “this isn’t like you.”  this season, somebody desperately needs to tell merlin the same thing.  

it’s bad.  it’s bad, bad, bad.  that’s all i can say about it.  we’re only at the opener of the season and merlin’s entire life has already been consumed by this fear.  everything else falls by the wayside.  he does things that go completely against his nature.  it’s a far cry from the merlin of yesteryear, who fought the dragon every step of the way when kilgharrah tried to make him abandon morgana or let the druid boy die or even allow uther to be killed.  it’s a far cry from the merlin of 2.11, who shouted “where does it say my destiny includes murder?!”  it’s a far cry from the merlin of previous seasons, who said things like this:

you're telling me that little boy is going to kill arthur?

it seems that is up to you.

no.  you can't know that for certain.

you have it in your power to prevent a great evil.

there must be another way.  the future isn't set in stone.

does season 5 merlin not remember what happened the last time he acquired a little bit of foreknowledge and tried to actively stop the future from happening?  he ended up causing the exact events he was trying to prevent.  

i repeat - HE ENDED UP CAUSING THE EXACT EVENTS HE WAS TRYING TO PREVENT!

and obviously i haven’t finished this season, so i don’t know, but i just don’t think anything good can come of this constant ‘trying to get mordred killed’ thing merlin has going on.  so far, mordred hasn’t even done anything to hurt any of them.  i actually like mordred, in fact, from what we’ve seen of him.  and yeah, okay, probably i’m going to get burned for that later, but the merlin we knew before would always rather get burned for trusting someone and seeing the best in people instead of just advocating for cold-blooded murder.  

like - maybe mordred IS secretly evil!  maybe he is!  but merlin in previous seasons would never have just taken kilgharrah’s word for it.  he always used to say ‘we can find another way.  there must be another way.’

nowadays, it’s like he’s given up.  he is single-mindedly focused on the only purpose he can see for his life anymore, and that purpose is simple, stark, and cold: ‘make sure arthur doesn’t die.’  there is literally no room in his life for anything else.  

and you know - some people would see that as like...i don’t know.  romantic, or something.  beautiful.  but i don’t. 

arthur and merlin actually love each other in this season, and i think that’s beautiful.  arthur’s finally gotten out of ‘be a dick’ mode, and even in just the opener he displays genuine care and concern about merlin, and that’s beautiful.  the two of them are on more equal footing than they ever have been in the past - for the first time, it feels to me like they’re actually friends - and that’s beautiful, too.

but the utter collapse of merlin’s entire sense of self and the dissolution of any bit of his life and worth that doesn’t have to do with ‘make sure arthur doesn’t die?’  that’s not beautiful at all.  merlin is miserable in season 5.  he’s lost so much of what made him who he was.  he’s hidden himself away for so long that the lie has stuck; he hardly remembers who he used to be, and he’s stopped hoping for better, because people kept telling him ‘your time will come’ but it NEVER DID, and arthur is king now but NOTHING HAS CHANGED, and i don’t think merlin’s ever felt more alone than he is when we see him in S5.  

i don’t think he remembers what it was like to think things could be different.  it’s been three years since he had a friend to love him for who he was.  lancelot is dead.  ealdor feels like a dream.  he has gaius, and that’s all - the rest of his life is a lie.  and it’s like he’s resigned himself to it now.  he doesn’t talk about telling the truth anymore.  he doesn’t chafe at not being able to reveal himself.  this is the season where he literally hears arthur say ‘maybe my father was wrong, maybe not all sorcery is evil’ and then merlin declines an opportunity to free himself, just to make sure mordred will die.  

it visibly kills him to do it.  you can see the agony of that decision on his face.  the pain that he is in during this season is slowly destroying him.  but it’s like he doesn’t think he has other options.  he’s given up on his own life, he’s given up on his own liberation, he’s given up on anything that isn’t ‘make sure arthur doesn’t die.’  

i hate that this is all he thinks his life can be.  i hate that he thinks this is all he was fashioned for.  merlin at his core has always been such a happy, hopeful, sunny person.  he’s always looked at things and seen the good.  he’s always been so curious, and gregarious, and loving.  he’s always had a smile for everybody.  but so much of that has just been crushed, now, under fear and stress and isolation.  

i don’t know.  this is only the first two episodes and it puts such a feeling of grief - and dread - into my heart.  i worry for the future.

[rocinawanda]

the end of an era

game of thrones finale. spoilers of course

I loved the finale. I cried multiple times. The first half of the episode moved a little slowly but after Dany died it picked up and got to where I thought it would be.

I feel like this post needs to be really long to convey all my emotions regarding this show like how hearing the theme song at the end continued to bring me to tears. So i’ll just go character to character to make this easier.

Daenerys. I still love her. I loved her all the way through the series and that hasn’t changed. She needed to die and I was not surprised that it happened I started suspecting it two years ago. Because I saw it coming I didn’t feel much sadness when Jon initally killed her but when Drogon came up and started nudging her with its nose I started bawling. I’m still hurt I felt Drogon’s grief and him burning the iron throne was amazing and so poetic agh I cannot. I am so glad they didn’t kill him because I was wondering before the episode what would happen to him after she died. My theory was that they would “set him free” and I guess it pretty much came true he took her body and flew off east. Probably towards Valyria or something I don’t know but I’m glad he’s alive and away from Westeros.

Jon. I’m sad. I kept saying “it’s not fair!” but it is. Sending him to the wall, bringing it full circle. I’m sad for him that he’ll never marry or have children and ffs he gave his life for the nights watch once just to end up there again its bittersweet justice. However, seeing him reunite with Ghost I SQUEALED AND HIT EVERYTHING HE GOT HIS GOOD BOY PATS and riding off with Tormund and the Free Folk almost felt right for Jon like there was no other ending that would suffice. Like they could’ve made him king simply because he was the heir but this felt right for the end.

Sansa. or should i say QUEEN SANSA QUEEN IN THE NORTH LADY OF WINTERFELL OMG. I’m still yelling. I was wondering why she was hesistent to Aye Bran becoming king but yes I remembered she wants the north to be independent and I can agree with that. and HOLY FUCK IT FELT SO GOOD. DID YOU SEE HER MY QUEEN. Whenever I think about it I start yelling. She got the ending she deserved. She has been shown to be the best ruler the North could have like lets be serious. I’m so happy for her. Its also very funny like a Stark is King of the Six Kingdoms and the last kingdom is also ruled by a Stark aka HOUSE STARK FTW.

Arya. When she started the “what’s west of Westeros” line I started sobbing I knew instantly that she was going to go find it. I can see that is where she would want her life to be. Because honestly, I didn’t know what Arya would want to be I couldn’t come up with any theory because I had no idea, I know she didn’t want to be a lady, I was sure she didn’t want to be a killer/assassin anymore. But an explorer? I can fuck with that. Sad about Gendry I was hoping the shots around the boat would show him beside her but that would be pure fanservice he is Lord of Storms End now and I need to accept it lol.

Bran. All hail the king. UNEXPECTED. He was probably the last person I would expect to become king but damn they made it make sense. He will be a good king. I don’t know if he can be helpful strategically but hey the last king after a war was Robert Baratheon and he was only good at war and was a terrible king so I think Westeros could benefit from one that is very smart, wise and can recall all of the mistakes their ancestors have made in little time. Also his comment at the end that he may be able to find Drogon made me think he was gonna try to Warg him but like from how far away lol. Also when Tyrion said ‘Bran the Broken’ I did start crying because idk I felt it, like damn he really is the king and that is his title.

Tyrion. GLAD he didn’t die. Being hand of the king is his position lol that last small council scene was brilliant although I am still surprised they actually gave Lord of Highgarden to Bronn the whole scene was hilarious. Gold. But damn Tyrion, he’s been hand of the king twice now and hand of the queen. Also Glad Davos is a lord now and on the small council he deserves it.

Grey worm. I was worried what he would do in the end but I’m glad he accepted it and him and the unsullied are going to Naath.

Game of Thrones. I have loved this show. I have watched since season 4 aired so around 5 years now. I will miss this show so much. My blog name is literally thronesense for game of thrones and sense8, two shows which have now ended. I don’t know if i’ll eventually end up changing it, probably. Nevertheless, I have loved watching the world of this show grow and the characters grow with it. So many twists and turns that I have enjoyed SO MUCH. I will allow it to live on for me through me rewatching it over the years and the fanfiction i’m sure people are already writing lol.

Altogether I can say that my favourite seasons of game of thrones in order from my most to least favourite go S4, S3, S6, S8, S1, S7, S5, S2. I can say this now after rewatching and seeing all of season 8. Each season had parts I enjoyed and parts I didn’t it was just that some like season two had more parts that I didn’t find interesting than ones I did. Altogether they make up an incredible tv show that I won’t ever forget.

[lightsandlostbells]

Druck season 2, episode 7 reaction

Goddamn, Druck. I’ve been dragging my ass with the rest of the S2 reactions because honestly, the content is pretty rough and rewatching it requires a certain amount of emotional fortitude, lol. 

Anyway, here’s me putting myself through S2 hell so I can catch up to recap S3 hell!

Episode 7

Clip 1 - Interesting choice of entertainment

As I mentioned in the last reaction, I thought we might start with Mia calling off their relationship, as if last night was her way of saying goodbye to Alex, getting in just a little more time together because she did as Kiki asked. But obviously that wasn’t the case, because Mia and Alex are very much still in bed together.

They are sitting up and watching a movie on a laptop. In the movie, a woman kisses another woman. We cut away to Alex and Mia sitting there stiffly, sneaking glances at each other, as we hear the scene get sexy, with zippers unzipped, lots of panting and wet smacking sounds. Both of them clearly getting turned on by this video. Alex shifts and I think he covers his lap a little more, lol. He shifts closer to her and “subtly” puts his hand out for the taking. I love that Mia notices and smirks a little but doesn’t seem to take his hand. 

This whole part of the scene was so weirdly true to life, lmao, if you’ve ever ended up watching a film that was more explicit than expected with someone. I had a friend who ended up watching Y Tu Mamá También on like a first or second date, neither of them knowing what the movie was about, and it was apparently very awkward.

Finally he turns off the film and kisses her. She leans away eventually and starts asking him about the scene - whether he was turned on by her or the scene. He’s like … both? He asks whether Mia watches porn and she says yes.

There was some debate about like … whether it’s in-character for Mia to watch porn or whether it’s hypocritical of her to do so as a feminist, and I don’t want to even get into the larger debate about whether porn can be feminist because holy shit is that a can of worms, but whether or not you think it’s compatible for Mia to watch porn with her being a feminist, people do a lot of stuff that isn’t 100% in line with their ideals. A lot of feminist criticism also opposes makeup and believes it to be a product of patriarchy, but Mia wears lipstick anyway. So just on the level of whether this is consistent with her as a character, i don’t think it’s wildly OOC.

There was also a lot of (understandable) debate about them watching a lesbian sex scene while still dodging a clear answer about Mia’s sexuality, especially right after Kiki made that comment about Mia being bi in the previous night’s clip, which again went unanswered. By the end of the episode they did give us an answer, but watching in real time made it feel more like they were drawing out the answer. I guess I’m wondering just why they chose to do so? Was it to tease the audience, or were they trying to find a way to drop the answer in naturally (because I can think of places where they could have done so earlier), or was there intended to be a reason story-wise that Mia’s a little vague? Is it just because it’s related to her romantic history, and it’s difficult for her to mention? Because she could mention her bisexuality without talking about specific relationships, although it’s true people might ask whether she’d ever been with a girl.

I think the most likely reason is perhaps that the Druck team didn’t expect just how much people wanted from them about Mia’s bisexuality, and they wrote in more scenes mentioning it after they saw fan reaction.

About the video they’re watching - it’s called Wach and it’s apparently by Funk (the channel that does Druck). You can watch it on YouTube although it seemed kind of dreary so I confess I didn’t watch much of it, lol. If it’s really good and I’m missing out, let me know! Anyway, the movie’s about two girlfriends but in the scene Mia and Alex are watching, they’re having a threesome with a guy. Not sure if there’s any bigger significance other than the nod to something else from Funk, and nudging at the topic of Mia’s sexuality, or the sex topic between Mia and Alexander.

He suspects she has a bigger reason for asking and draws a question mark on her forehead. This dude needs to take improv classes already, that’s clearly where his heart lies. Also, I think Mia might be asking why he’s turned on to get his opinion about two women together? I mean, I guess that could be the in-universe explanation why the talk about her sexuality is a little vague is that she wants to see how he’ll react first.

They have a pillow fight and she shoves him out of bed, he runs back into the room and tackles her and they roll around. WATCH THE LAPTOP! Eh, I guess Alex can afford another one.

They’re playful and cute. Things get heated and he slips his hand to crotch level, which makes her shake her head and back off. He asks her what’s allowed. LOW BAR, I know, but at least he doesn’t pressure her to go father than she wants. It’s sad and I don’t want to praise him for showing basic human decency, but William’s comments when Noora didn’t want to sleep with him, saying it was a funny joke and such, or that he’d managed to sleep with her soon anyway, always bothered me, so I’m glad this wasn’t recreated in Alexander.

Mia gives him the finger, and then adds another, which is deeply fucking iconic, and we end as he slides his hand down her pants. Well, damn. A big departure from Noora, not so surprising because Mia has a lot of differences from her (such as drinking alcohol when Noora did not). Part of me is proud of Mia for being upfront about what she wants and setting boundaries for what she doesn’t, the other part is like ohhhhh nooooo, girl. You told Kiki you’d break up with him, you don’t want to go any deeper with him! (...pun intended.)

Clip 2 - Bubble bath

Mia and Alex are taking a bubble bath together, lying at opposite sides. That’s quite intimate. They are doing some types of The Sex at this point even if it is not The Whole Shebang so maybe not surprising, but certainly we’re seeing their physical relationship escalate as a faster pace than Noorhelm. They seem comfortable in there together. Alex says they should stay in there as long as they can. Like, days. Well, if you can tolerate pruning, cold water, and marinating in your own filth for that long, go for it.

Mia offhandedly mentions Alex’s grade retention and he looks tired and not ready to talk about it. That water just got a few degrees colder.

He asks why she’s so cautious, if it’s because of Kiki. Mia lies to him that she talked to Kiki and everything’s cool. MIA, NO. Really???? Not a good idea. You’re not only disrespecting Kiki with what you’re doing now, and lying to your friends, but now you’re lying to Alexander, too. I know that she probably just wants to stay in this bath and in this bubble of Alexander’s apartment where everything’s OK and she gets what she wants and no one is mad and her personal life isn’t messy, but this is not the way to go about it. 

OH SHIT he actually asked about negative experiences and whether that’s why she’s bi. Errrr, is he implying that she likes girls because she’s been burned by men? YIKES. Mia tells him that statement alone is reason enough to only date girls from now on. Okay, so is that confirmation of her bisexuality? (I guess if I have to ask, probably not the clearest it could be.) And she says that she could also ask why he only does one-night stands and moves fast. He says it’s complicated. So basically, despite becoming more intimate, literally lying here naked in this tub together, both of them still have some friction, both aren’t completely opening up to each other. 

She chides him for his so-called hard life, with his nice car and apartment, and he reminds her that this is his sister’s flat, and we finally get an answer of sorts that his sister is in Bali. (By now we know the truth, but when this aired I wrote in my notes: “Super dark theory: the sister is dead and he means they scattered her ashes in Bali or something like that.”)

He talks about it’s hard with his parents and then says he wants to get out of the tub as the water is getting cold, which is one hell of a turnaround from wanting to stay in there for days like a minute ago. Mia says things are difficult with her parents, too, and she’s sorry. That makes him lie back down in the tub. Tension averted for now. They fist-bump. I guess their couple thing is hand gestures? Like Jonas has Hanna’s nose, meanwhile Mia and Alex are just flipping each other the bird and knocking knuckles. I can get into that, they certainly have a lot of options.

Clip 3 - Truth or dare

Mia and Alex step outside and turn off airplane mode on their phones. So they’re really hiding from everyone, huh, not even letting text messages come through. This is shady as hell that Mia’s doing this when she told Kiki otherwise. She’s lucky because this is holiday break, but she can’t camp out in Alexander’s apartment away from the rest of the world forever

Mia told the girls she was ill. DUDE. All of them were worried and checking in on her. I wonder how many of them truly believed her and didn’t have any suspicion of what she was really doing? Kiki in particular seemed to wonder how she was doing, and I’m not sure she totally bought Mia’s excuse. But whether she did or not, that must make Mia feel a ton of guilt. (Though she still doesn’t break up with him...)

I love this shot of Mia and Alex looking so small and uncomfortable once they stepped outside, like it’s overwhelming and harsh to leave their bubble.

They go back inside because it’s cold, or because they don’t want to face the outside world, and Mia is pensive. She spins around the thermos like it’s spin the bottle (and lmao when it lands between them, fixes it to point toward Alex) and says truth or dare. I wonder why she chose that moment to get some truth between them? Because she feels guilty about the lies she told her friends? Because she wants to know this thing she’s lying to them about is worth it, and that means she has to open up?

He says truth. She asks, “Why me?” He says it’s because she knows who he is. Which true, if you assume he means all the way from when she told him off about Kiki back in season 1. She’s been pointing out his flaws all along. And I mean, maybe he has a shit opinion of himself, but she wasn’t wrong about him (at least not entirely) and she didn’t fall for an idealized version of him, Alexander the rich bad boy with the cool car who’s the most wanted guy in school. She saw through that and she saw him at much of his worst, and yet somehow she’s here anyway. And I don’t know if this is exactly what he meant, but she also knows him in the sense that they have some things in common, like dealing with difficult parents, being Christmas orphans, etc.

Mia directs the thermos at herself and says truth. Bold move considering she knows what he’s probably going to ask; she’s really just ready to talk to him about it, and this is maybe an easier way to do so, framing it as a game. Alex takes a moment to think about what to ask and then asks why she’s so cautious. She tells the story of when she was 13 and she had a crush on her friend’s older brother, who was 18. He paid her a lot of compliments and she thought he liked her. He pressured her into sleeping with him, she didn’t want to but did it anyway, and then he never texted her again. Some people are school knew about it. She felt bad about herself and couldn’t talk to anyone.

The age of consent in Germany is 14, making what happened to Mia statutory rape. This adds perhaps even more impact to Mia reporting Bjorn later in the season, because it doesn’t sound like the first guy faced any repercussions for what he did; with Bjorn there is hope that justice will be served.

I think this explains a lot about why Mia was cautious about Alexander in particular, because he’s the kind of guy who was feeding girls compliments, sleeping with them, and cutting them off. Didn’t Alexander compliment Kiki’s stomach or something? And then of course Mia had a front-row seat to him ghosting Kiki after sleeping with her, and then seeing it all happen again like a slow-motion car crash. I really, really hope this makes him think about what he was doing with girls before Mia. Remember how he tried to justify himself in episode 2 about what he did to Kiki, not making her promises and saying how he couldn’t have torn down her self-image all by himself? Here he sees the long-lasting effects of that behavior on someone. Just think, there are probably Mias out there who will end up telling their stories to someone else, and the guy they’re talking about will be Alexander.

Alex is about to turn the bottle back to himself, but Mia stops it and says she also had a thing with a girl that ended before she came to Germany. No details on why it ended, if it was something really bad or more of a mundane breakup. Since she’s not going into details, I’m assuming whatever happened wasn’t horrible, but I’d still like to know more details about it.

Could they have handled Mia’s sexuality better? Yes, of course. But at this point I was just glad they addressed it directly. It would be nice if they touched on it in the future: we haven’t yet had the build-up of Matteo living in the flat, or being rescued by Hans, but with both Hans and Mia being members of the LGBT community, it would be really nice if they were able to support Matteo, and then we could hear more about Mia’s sexuality, too, like her past relationship, how she realized she was bi, etc.

He says no pressure, they have all the time in the world. THANK GOD. Low bar, I know, but I also still think there’s value in showing men being respectful and not pressuring women into sex? If you consider that the target audience is teen girls, this is a message that they need to be hearing - that they are allowed to set sexual boundaries and that boys have to respect them. And for teenage boys, while Alex has done a lot of messed-up stuff regarding girls, this part can still be used as a model for respecting boundaries and getting consent.

Clip 4 - I bet Hans and Linn ate the soup later

Mia and Alexander are in Mia’s room, ostensibly trying to study but very clearly hot for each other and making this a kind of foreplay. However, they don’t get very far until Hans comes into the room. He asks whether Alexander made “grumpy cat” angry, lmao. I love that nickname for Mia. He flops on the bed as if checking out the view of Alexander. Hans, what about Michi??

UNFORTUNATELY the doorbell rings and Linn opens Mia’s door, saying there’s a girl with soup. We hear Kiki’s voice. UH OH. Damn, Mia didn’t even really have time to like, try to shove Alexander under the bed or anything, did she? 

Alexander says it’s totally OK with him. Um, I bet it is. Would be a great opportunity to be like, hey Kiki, sorry for dumping you on NYE? Although he doesn’t look totally OK with it, though that might just be because Mia is so visibly worried.

Lol, Hans thinks for a moment, clearly recognizing Mia’s distress, and then strips off his robe and throws it over Alexander, and hey, he was the only one doing anything smart in the moment? Maybe not honest, but smart? OK, not smart, but it was ... something. 

Well, Alexander ain’t up for hiding under a robe, he takes it off as Kiki walks in with a big pot. She eyes Alexander and Mia, saying she made soup. She looks stunned at first, but then gets pissed and says it’s one thing for her to fuck up and apologize, but this is the worst. I have to agree, honestly. Mia put the burden on Kiki to tell her what to do, and then she didn’t even respect Kiki’s wishes. And then she lied to everyone. After that whole performance with cooking Kiki a nice dinner to talk about how sorry she was? This makes it seem like Mia just doesn’t give a shit about Kiki’s feelings, her crying and apologizing was an act to make Mia feel better, not Kiki.

I wonder if Kiki was really thinking Mia broke it off, or if she wasn’t suspicious. Like she was definitely suspicious after Sam put it out there a few episodes ago, and some of her moves were kinda calculated toward figuring out the truth. The soup may have been genuine goodwill, but maybe she also wanted to see if Mia was really sick, or if she was hiding something. Kiki did look very shocked when she saw Alexander, but maybe she was telling herself that no, Mia wouldn’t lie, Mia meant what she said, Mia cares about her. So this moment was confirming her worst fears.

Kiki angrily puts down the bowl of soup and I have to give her some credit for not throwing it or dropping it, which is what I was expecting.

Alexander asked her why she lied, and Mia says she doesn’t know. Errr, not a great answer, Mia. I have an idea why she lied. She wanted the moral high ground of “making things right” but didn’t want to actually give anything up. She wanted to ignore or run from the problems instead of dealing with them.

Mia says she can’t do this to Kiki. Alexander is pissed. Honestly, I can’t blame him for that. He has his flaws, too, for sure, and has been a shit to Kiki, but he also asked Mia if things were OK with her and Kiki, and she said they were, and now he’s finding out they weren’t and she’s using that as a reason to break up. I’d feel pretty betrayed. She also gave them a few days where they were extremely open with each other, took their relationship to the next level physically, got vulnerable with each other, and after that, she’s calling it off. When she knew all along that it was a bad idea - like she could have nipped this in the bud at the benefit concert. Instead it’s like she dawdled and made their relationship more intense and meaningful before ending it for a reason that’s been there the whole time, which is so much worse. (For Alexander, a dude who doesn’t get close to people? Even worse.)

Mia has massively fucked up but from a story perspective, I don’t mind it? I mean … that’s good for the protagonist’s growth. I like how messy Mia has been. I think it takes her off the “perfect girl” pedestal. 

Clip 5 - Panic attack

Mia is lying in bed in the dark at 21:00, so you know, she’s called it an early night. I feel you, girl. She reads her texts from earlier, where she and Alex flirted and discussed him coming over to study. How nice things were just hours earlier. No new messages. 

By the way, I can see the tear streaks on her face when she’s in bed, nice detail.

However, after she puts it down and rolls over, her phone lights up. She checks it and Alex is telling her to come over. Typing in all caps so it seems extra urgent.

As she’s running to Alexander, you hear some heavy breathing and rewatching the scene, it definitely sounds masculine, but when I first watched this clip I was so surprised by this development and why Alexander needed Mia that I wasn’t paying super close attention (also not watching with headphones), and I thought it was Mia’s breathing as she’s worried and running out the door. The reveal that this is Alex’s heavy breathing during a panic attack really stunned me. It adds so much tension to the scene as Mia is running to his place, obviously heavy breathing is something that reminds you of dangerous or tense scenarios.

She runs up the stairs to his place and his door is open, the lights are dim. The way the camera follows her is really disorienting, it’s hurried, it’s shaky. The lights make everything eerier - it’s dark and the sign on the wall makes the room pink, it’s not unnatural. Watching Mia run through his apartment trying to find Alex feels like navigating a maze.

Mia calls out for Alexander and eventually finds him in his underwear in a corner, sobbing and hyperventilating. You can see him clearly in the light but there’s still something unfocused about it. Mia grabs a paper bag from the kitchen and has him breathe into it. He’s crying and saying he wasn’t there. Holy shit, this is a panic attack?

Mia holds him as he cries and gasps for breath. He asks her to stay, she says she’s not going anywhere. She makes a joke about it still being 50 euro with breakfast and he manages to laugh.

This pose at the end is definitely giving off Pietà vibes.

The camera goes from extreme closeups as Alex is gasping to pulling back once he lays in Mia’s arms and calms down a bit, once he’s able to breathe and laugh at her joke. Like we’re getting breathing room. The music also goes from really tense to something more gentle once he relaxes in her arms and she says she’ll stay.

Goddamn. So instead of Mia having panic attacks/trauma, it’s Alex??? It was Noora who was panicking in OG, but we’ve switched the roles, Mia is the one to calm down Alexander. 

Props to Druck for showing a dude having a full-blown attack like this, in a very non-glamorous and vulnerable way. Panic attacks in general can be pretty visceral and they’re not pretty, and I think some media shies away from showing male characters in really fragile states like this. And it’s definitely a reversal of a lot of media gender roles to have Mia the fully clothed one who’s “in control” helping out Alex, the half-naked, sobbing and shaking one. And for this not to be portrayed as something weak, but something healing. Also, big props to the actors. Chris Veres didn’t hold back in this scene.

This clip really got to me, especially as someone who has experienced panic attacks. The earlier scene with Kiki discovering Mia and Alexander together had ratcheted up the drama, but this was one of those clips where I couldn’t really do anything else after I watched it for a little while, it had gotten under my skin that much. It’s hard for me to unpack it. Even rewatching it unnerves me, though Mia’s gentleness and compassion, and the ending where she says she’s not going anywhere, make the experience more uplifting. Bravo, Druck. 

I think it helped that it was so surprising too, like we already got a very important clip earlier in the day, and it was the drama we were all expecting, the next step in the Kiki/Mia/Alex situation, but this definitely was not what I was expecting next, both in that it’s a divergence from the original storyline and that I figured the next clip would build on Mia dealing with estrangement from both Kiki and Alex.

Clip 6 - Giddy up

Mia wakes up in bed with Alex the next morning. I like the contrast here from the last scene, just what a difference the daylight can make, feeling so much less threatening, and I like Mia’s reaction, as if she’s taking in all that happened last night. She looks at a Polaroid picture at the side of the bed, of Alex and his sister. The fact that it’s beside the bed tells you how much Alex probably looks at it and misses his sister.

Alex stir and wakes up. Heh, the crinkles of their pillows and sheets are so damn loud? I kinda love it, though, it reminds me of how good it feels to slowly wake up after a good night’s sleep. He tells Mia that he had a dream where he was feeling bad and cried in front of Mia, weird right? Mia agrees. It’s very quiet and they’re whispering. Comforting, talking about it and acknowledging it without having to go into the ugly details right now. And Mia isn’t grilling him over why he was having a panic attack or anything, just being gentle. She strokes the hair behind his ear and kisses him. They kiss softly and it gets a little more intense until Mia reaches for the jar next to Alexander’s bed and grabs a condom. They smile and Mia sits up on him and takes off her shirt. The music helpfully proclaims, “I’m a cowboy” so I mean, we know what position they used. Not surprising Mia would be on top.

I have zero problems with Mia and Alexander having sex sooner than the season finale, as with Noorhelm, although I was kinda like … is this reeeeally the best time to take this step, kids? Not because of Alexander’s panic attack, but more about Kiki walking in on them and finding out, and Mia thinking she can’t do that to Kiki, and what the hell they were going to do. It felt like they had a lot to talk about. But even so, I can definitely see why Mia felt it was the right time to take this step. There was no way Mia was leaving Alexander after last night, and clearly they care about each other a ton. It must have felt not just like waking up in the morning, but that they survived the night. The panic attack made Mia realize the total depth of her feelings, I think, and so I can fully see why it led to increased tenderness and intimacy.

Comparing Mia and Noora, Mia has trust issues and a bad experience with sex like Noora, but William did more stuff that would’ve broken Noora’s trust and made her question her feelings for him before they had sex. Noora and William kissed, then William was cold to her in front of his brother, so Noora was upset, then they made up, then William smashed a bottle over a guy’s head, then Noora was upset at that and questioned whether she could be with William, then before they could get back together, Niko happened. Since they’ve kissed, Mia hasn’t really had so many reasons to be upset with Alexander himself - it’s all about the situation with Kiki putting stress on their relationship. So I can see why the sexual element of their relationship, and the relationship as a whole, escalated much faster; Mia had more time to build up trust with him without that getting interrupted.

Clip 7 - Crew love is true love

Hanna and Mia are in the bathroom and Mia’s been telling Hanna how fast everything has gone in the last few days. It sure did! By the way, Hanna’s looking very pretty.

I like how they went from the cowboy song in the previous clip being a non-diegetic song and transitioned into this one as a diegetic song, with it playing at the Abi party now. That kind of stuff is clever, and it’s smoother than just choppily switching songs between scenes.

Alex is going to therapy now, which I love. I love that we have the Bad Boy Rich Dreamboat character seeking professional help for his trauma, I love that Druck is mentioning therapy rather casually, normalizing it. It’s not something that’s considered shameful or embarrassing, just a potential avenue for help. Mia says she doesn’t think it was his first panic attack, but she doesn’t really know why. (I’d understand if people were ehhhh about Mia telling all this to Hanna if you want, like IDK if Alexander gave her permission to tell people about his panic attack. Mia and Hanna seem to be pretty trustworthy about stuff like Matteo’s sexuality and they’re not trading it as juicy gossip, but I would get it.)

Hanna says Jonas also won’t talk to anyone, not even Matteo. Ohhh no. That boy might need some professional help, too, if he’s that much of a mess.

Hanna’s totally hugging turtleneck guy/not Gereven when they enter the club. Mia looks around and sees Kiki with Carlos. KIKI, TREAT HIM RIGHT. CARLOS, TREAT HER RIGHT. Kiki glares at Mia. 

Carlos gets a drink the same time Mia does and says, “What’s up Judas?” Not gonna lie, that’s mean, but it made me laugh. He does the typical “ugh girl drama BITCH FIGHT” thing, and lmao, I can’t help but think of like Jonas/Toilet Sam tussling in the stairwell in S1. Yes, it’s all girl drama, boy fights just don’t exist, ever!

Carlos is like, it’s none of my business, he doesn’t want to get involved, but he’s getting involved (lmao) and tells her how Kiki was in a very bad state the last few days, and says it would be a good move to smooth everything out. He’s like, good talk, and walks off. Without paying either, lol. Mia pays for him. Well, I guess she has some groveling to do. God, that talk was ridiculous but benevolent of him? He’s looking out for Kiki’s well-being. 

"Two angry birds” aka Sam and Amira (and lmao I love that nickname) come up to Mia. Indeed, they look angry. Mia says she’ll make it up to Kiki. I mean, she should probably apologize to the other girls, too, for lying and putting them all in this awkward position where they’re torn between friends.

Heh, there’s some banter among the girls about Sam being the only one who’s single and when Amira is like helloooo, Sam says she has Allah. Although it’s played more as a joke, this follows the same pattern of people disregarding the Sana character as someone who can have romantic relationships and feelings. She doesn’t count in the conversations about who in their group is alone and who’s not.  

Mia follows Kiki to talk to her. She apologizes and Kiki just looks annoyed. I don’t blame her considering that Mia’s last apology with the dinner turned out to feel hollow, all words but not backed up with actions. Kiki points out she was a hypocrite. I love Mia and I feel sympathy for her, but Kiki is really really not wrong.

Maybe this is obvious, but I’m seriously just realizing how close this situation is to Eva/Jonas/Ingrid in S1 (or Hanna/Jonas/Leonie), even more than Vilde, Noora, and William were to that situation. Mia fucked it up with Kiki to a level Noora didn’t with Vilde. 

Kiki interrupts and tells Mia what’s what - that if she had been honest from the beginning, Kiki wouldn’t have stopped her. But instead, Mia went to her when Kiki was heartbroken and basically made Kiki tell her what to do and give her her blessing. That’s exactly what happened! Mia put the burden on Kiki and basically said her happiness was in Kiki’s hands, like either Kiki had to be the villain and tell Mia to break up with Alex, or put aside her own feelings and be OK with it, even when she was the person who was wronged. Kiki didn’t feel like doing giving her blessing when she felt like shit and had been betrayed by a friend. And she didn’t expect Mia to listen, but Mia should’ve cared about her from the beginning. Kiki calls Mia out on being honest not just with others, but with herself. Kki used to compare herself to Mia, Mia gives all these moral lectures that sound smart and clever, but it’s not about what you say, but what you do. Well, shit. She’s right. And Mia needs to hear this. I’ve said this before, but I think their relationship is really complex this season. Messy, but complex. And this dynamic between them, with Kiki feeling like Mia didn’t really care, or was judging her, goes beyond just Alexander’s involvement. It’s not just fighting because of a boy.

Mia is apologizing and Carlos comes in to ruin the moment and be like “You straightened it out?” Lmao dude, don’t interrupt. He gives them all a shot, which is his attempt to play mediator, I guess, so he’s dumb but he’s trying. Kiki clinks glasses with him, then walks out. When Mia calls after her, Kiki says you still want my blessing? But you need yours. Whoaaaa.

Carlos and Kiki walk off hand in hand talking about her breasts. Well, I guess it’s nice that they’re appreciated without the surgery. Though obviously it’s about how Kiki feels about her body, not Carlos.

Mia stays behind and has a Moment, I guess she’s thinking about how she needs to go all in with Alexander, get rid of her remaining doubts. Then she goes out to meet her girls, they smile and dance. Finally Kiki smiles at Mia and they dance together. I love their little glance of reconciliation. The girl squad has a group hug. Awww! 

Toilet Sam comes in and greets everyone! He’s talking to Hanna and OF FUCKING COURSE that’s when Jonas and Matteo roll in. Jonas sees Hanna and Sam and legit pulls a Granpa Smpson exit, lmao at Matteo’s exasperated exit after him. Poor Matteo.

Mia and Kiki dance together in the closing moments of the clip, and it’s a fitting ending. Yay, they’re happy again! Truly the next three episodes will only be good times and no more suffering!

Social Media/General Comments:

LMAO, I fucking lost it at all the passive-aggressive Instagram stories that Kiki posted after the dinner from last episode. She tagged only Amira, Hanna, and Sam, not Mia, posting pictures that didn’t include Mia, set to Little Mix’s “Shout Out to my Ex” for that extra bitter flair. Which you know, fits Kiki’s relationship with Alexander, but honestly feels more like Mia is her ex going by the pictures, lol. Then Amira, Hanna, and Sam respond by posting Kiki’s posts WITH Mia, like good lord, the dramaaaaa of it all. I mean, they’re all making a statement, that they’re not ditching Mia, but how must that make Kiki feel? But it’s all so teenage and petty and immature that I love it. 

Jonas flakes on Matteo, saying he needs to study, but it’s more like he’s staying home and getting wasted. Matteo is worried and says they barely see each other anymore. Jeez. This is a total reversal of what we’ll likely see in S3, unless they are BOTH total messes in that season. Then it’ll be up to wise men Carlos and Abdi to step up for their bros. We did see Carlos having some sage advice in this episode, so maybe it’s not such a wild idea?

Matteo and Hanna talk later and Matteo lets Hanna know that Jonas isn’t doing well and that he failed a math test. I don’t think it’s Hanna’s duty to fix Jonas’ problems at all, but it’s nice that Matteo and Hanna are talking together and trying to help Jonas.

The other girls were gossiping about Mia and Alex. Amira figured out that Mia probably wasn’t answering because Mia was at Alexander’s place. Sigh, Mia. How long did you think you could keep your relationship a secret? It always gets out, as you just learned last week!!

Kiki posts a LOT of stuff about fake friends on IG after she discovers Mia and Alex together, and it’s pretty juvenile, but you know, hashtag relatable. And understandable. Super teenage.

I like that Amira reached out to Kiki and said she was there if she needed to talk. Kiki has been a shit to Amira on multiple occasions, but Amira remains a true friend. And I hope Kiki keeps this in mind the next time she wants to say something racist or insensitive (not that she would recognize it as such, probably).

Druck gave out hotline information for teenagers after the panic attack clip, encouraging them to talk to someone, which is great. Again, I love how they’re encouraging teenagers not to go through their problems alone, whether it’s through therapy, hotlines, or talking to trusted friends and family.

Amira talked about religious discrimination on Instagram and how difficult it is to get into public service in Germany when you wear a hijab. She’s mentioned this before, when the girls were meeting with career counselors, and I really hope that we somehow get a S4 despite the girls’ graduation so we can get an Amira season. I would love to see her story talk specifically about her ambitions and how she tries to achieve them despite people constantly telling her she won’t be able to make it as a Muslim hijabi. Just send Amira to Australia and she can have a life-changing backpacking adventure. It would be amazing. (Skam never gave us the Evak + boy squad Morocco trip we deserved, so I am down for Druck providing that awesome travelogue content.)

I am not German so please feel free to correct me or clarify me on cultural and language matters.

If you got this far, thank you for reading!

[whoslaurapalmer]

⭐⭐⭐ , go off hun

SAM YOU’RE THE BEST

so would you believeI still have more to say about one day past the end of theworld, and also that I just regularly keep large sections ofcommentary on my laptop in the hopes that someone asks me about myfic (but I also hope it’s like???? things people want to hear….)(specific questions also make me very happy! people think of things Idon’t always think of and I appreciate that.) 

also this is long. this is so fucking long. 

OKAY, so this fic took, probably, theshortest amount of time to write – four days, one day to edit andpost, but notbecause I like, Knew what I wanted to say but because it got to apoint where I felt like if I added any more it was going to start tomess it up and I didn’t know what else I would add

IT WAS A TUESDAY, afternoon, it was areasonably sunny day. (thatdoesn’t really matter, but I am a detail-oriented person.)I almost constantly have my peaks fanfic document open – it’swhere I jam all the peaks fanfic I write, or I just, write it inthere in the first place, and it’s usually open because the laurafic is in there and that’s a constant presence in my mind until Ifinish it. anyway, at the end of the document, there’s thetranscript I made of the palmer interview from the between two worldsinterview, and I was reading sarah’s section and thinking aboutsarah palmer, for the first time in like, forever,practically.

at the same time, I had a sad lemon manfanfic open, where I have a long paragraph about grief, and I wasalso rereading that and then I just, got to thinking, about actuallythe amount of physical, sickening grief that sarah palmer has in herlife. and I immediately had a very specific line in my head about howI wanted the fanfic to start that I don’t think I wrote down,actually, because that meant COMMITMENT and do you KNOW how many wipsI have, at any given time?? toomany. butI know what it was.

grief was a sick sort of thing, sarahpalmer thought.

and one of my worries in not just fanfic,but particularly and especially in my original fic, is being tooon the nose. particularly indialogue. but like, people need to talk about things!! they do!! andI want to write that!!! but people are also vague and hide things andthey’re stupid, and that’s something that you have to contendwith when you write dialogue – andthe actual narration of the fic. I didn’t write the line down alsobecause I thought it was too onpoint, and it was something I wanted to show,instead. (overthinking about show don’t tell is a constant sourceof stress for, I think, everyone.) (I also tend to overuse the word‘thing’ so that’s also constantly on my mind and another reasonwhy I didn’t use it.)

my favorite part of the between two wordsinterview – the part that I wound up thinking about the most –was the line I used for the summary. I started thinking about howthat gelled with s3 (which is fun.that interview in terms of s3 is GREAT, especially laura’s part),and then, like I always do – i’m serious, everytime I start a new peaks fanfic I do this – I go through ren’smeta and character tags. and I found the interview grace zabriskiedid about sarah killing the man in the bar and hawk visiting her, andhow she mentioned that like, people will extend a hand to you whenyou’re grieving more to make themselves feel better than to helpyou yourself. and this is true. and it made sense, with what sarahsays in the between two worlds interview. “no one really knows whati’m thinking. or cares.”

so what was sarah supposed to do with hawk just saying, if you need anything, let meknow? why didn’t anyone do more? (and, well, also, it’s hard toknow what to do. it’s hard to know what you want people to do, too.I guess it’s really a situationwhere no one’s going to win and no one knows what the bare minimum of action should be. you don’t know what you want or what you’ll accept and sometimes you just never know, because that’s how grief works, but also especially when no one does anything at all.) (but i think what sarah wants or wanted was probably just someone to sit next to her.) 

and the more sarah was alone, theloneliershe was, the less she interacted with people who cared, because noone cared, and the more itstarted to stay with her. her hair dresser talks like nothing hashappened (in her own way, trying to help, and again only helpingherself) – but it has happened, and because it’s stuck with sarahso much, she is always, only, just onedayaway from it. every day is reliving it, and every day is knowing thatthis is what she has now and there’s no way she can move forward.(that’s also how the title came to be – I was hard-pressed for atitle this time.)

(also, speaking of the hairdresser, Imean, everyone in town from that point on knows that leland killedlaura and then….killed himself, I guess. and who wants to bringthat up to sarah? who wants to acknowledgethat themselves, that no oneknew, that no one sawthat, that it happened? people dodo things just forthemselves.)

the supernatural is, of course, a veryprevalent part of twin peaks. it’s there, it’s ingrained in theshow. it is! but a lot of people – and even me, when I firststarted watching it!! – see so much of the mystery and thesupernatural and don’t always realize, or understand, or maybe wantto understand, that there is so much grief and suffering and abuse atthe core of the show. sarah palmer loses her entirefamily in a matter of weeks.so, yes, there is so much constant, supernatural darkness in theshow, created by people – but you can’t let that overshadow thefact that sarah palmer has nothingnow. I don’t care about judy, she doesn’t factor into how I viewthe show at ALL, what mattered to me when I was thinking about sarah,what made SENSE to me when I thought about her, was that, ifanything, the thing inside her that was eating her alive and killedthat man in the bar was grief.

so I had sarah, alone and in this house,and I went back to reread your‘the house on the hill’ fic, because I had a couple paragraphsabout sarah and I was trying to figure out how to write her – thismix of sadness but also complete, abject BITTERNESS, abouteverything, this apathy, so that her lines would just, cut off beforeI got too deep into the emotions she was feeling (which is how iwrite laura, with a lot of, very prevalent emotion, laura doesn’tskimp, so it was hard to feel out where sarah was at first), and Iwas trying to balance all that with her scene with the turkey jerky,so I went to rereaditbecause it’s one of my favorites and I was looking for how otherpeople wrote sarah THAT WASN’T GOING TO PISS ME OFF. and dalethinks about sarah and his mother in that fic, and evacommented something about their similarities in the comments, and Ithought, huh. if there’s one person who would, maybe, understandsarah, or that sarah would maybe connect with – it’d be mamacoop, wouldn’t it?

we don’t get a lot of mama coop in mlmtbut I got the impression that she was like, sort of a quiet person,perceptive and calm but reasonably strong-willed and definitelysomebody who loves her son more than anything, more than anyone elsein her family, not the kind ofwoman who’s really cheery or bright but somebody who coop looks atand knows he’s safe and knows she’ll do anything she has to forhim. definitely an opposite personality than sarah but still someonewho can then look at sarah and say ‘i know exactly what you’re goingthrough’ and they have that fine line of understanding. Isawher with straighthair but I also think sort ofslightly wavy hair would work wellwith her too.

aswe got further into s3 when it was originally airing, I was like,half-worried, half-CONVINCED that there was going to be a scene wherelaura just, nonchalantly walked through the palmer house, especiallyin the last few episodes. like, that scene where gordon opens thedoor and there’s laura, in donna’s doorway, displaced in time????I gasped, out loud. the initial shock of seeing that scene for thefirst time has never left me. but it was also one of the things thatgot me thinking, well, there’s no way laura COULDN’T just sortof, show up places now, right? like, as of episode….2??? she’dalready been yoinked from the black lodge, so I figured, welp, girl’sout there, doing her best, no reason why she can’t relive the lastdays of her life in her own house (becausethat’s what I think it’s implied that she’s doing?? with the“she says something, music over the lull of the tv, andstalks out of the living room in all black, a way sarah never sawher.” that was supposed to be the scene in fwwm where laura’sabout to leave the house and donna shows up)–especially when s3 was leading up to the rewriting of that night.

what also got me thinking about laura inthe fic was, I was rewatching sarah’s s3 scenes, because I figured,the fic would have to follow them, or at least address them, and Iwas always struck by the theory after part 14 aired that the smileinside sarah looked like laura’s. so who was to say that, if sarahis consumed by grief, and grief aboutlaura, and laura is hangingaround the house, and killing the guy in the bar is a massivevindication, not letting scumbags get away with treating women,girls,like that – who’s to say laura wasn’t there too? who’s to saythat sarah wasn’t thinking about all the times she had failedlaura, and that sarah was acting in defense of her daughter (who shehas, as I said, always seen as little),the defense she SHOULD’VE done (because I was also worried thatlike, I mean, leland is drugging sarah – that’s pretty obvious,right? but was sarah complicit in this too? I mean sarah for sureloved laura but wasn’ta perfect parent but like, how far does it go? how far does sarahthink it went, now)

so, in rewatching that scene, and sarahsaying “do you really wanna fuck with this?” I was struck by howmuch it reminded me of the scene at the roadhouse in fire walk withme, where jacques renault sends the men over to see laura.particularly, I was thinking more of laura saying, “you willing togo all the way? huh? you gonna do it to me?” but when I went backto rewatch the whole scene (because what I also do when I write peaksfanfic is rewatch scenes….over and over) I realized that “so youwanna fuck the homecoming queen?” really stood out too and remindedme more, in terms of the content, of sarah’s line. (the one i’dinitially thought of matched it more in tone, though.) and if laurawasthere, then of course it made sense for me to think of that scene,and to try and layer the dialogue together. i’d layered notdialogue but emotions/locations before in writingbut i’d done it in poetry, not fanfic, so I wasn’t sure how to doit, or how it would read, or how people would react to it, or ifthey’d get what I was going for at all. but it became one of theparts that hit people the most!!! and i’m so happy it worked how Iwanted it to. (one of these daysI’ll go whole hog and just like, break out every crazy writingthing I learned in my experimental poetry class, and it’ll be agood day.)

additional specific notes –

-the turkey jerky scene did give me ahard time because I already had this very fixed image ofapathetic!sarah and then remembered about the turkey jerky and I waslike ‘mmmm. I do have to contend with that.’ (and I hate havingto change things…..) rewatching it so many times made me look ateverything and I thought, ‘fuck that cashier has blonde hair justlike laura.’ and sarah’s thinking the same thing too.-“somethinghappened, something keeps happening. it’s happening again.” sincesarah says that in the actual scene (and in that scene in the missing pieces Ireferenced later, which I talked about in my other post for this fic)I was thinking, it really is, isn’t it? I mean, sarah of coursealways feels that it’s happening again, but re: cycles of abuse,this blonde girl who looks like laura, BECKY, everybody, it’shappening again

-oh!in a related note! there was that longass thread on reddit atsome point about what was insarah’s kitchen when hawk was at the door (cause some people werelike, it’s judy! and other people were like, it’s the othercashier cause he said he’d deliver her groceries!) and in the termsof this fic, it’s mama coop. that’swhy I brought her up as being in the kitchen. “humming bythe stove, dusting the same spots over and over, locking the windowstight,” the dusting being a reference to coop’s asthma and thewindows to bob and mama coop’s death-speaking of those cashiersthough……...now I’m wondering if they hang out together and whathappened when he brought sarah her groceries. who are these lil teenagers. who are they 

-“aren’t there some things tooterrible to tell our children?” is about bob and is a direct quoteto what coop says to sarah in s2 and that’s why she closes her eyes  -sometimes, I need asecond opinion.me: hey mom can youlook at this bar sign and tell me if you think it’s elks point bar#9 or elks point #9 barmom: elks point bar#9.me, months later:….but what if it was #9 elks point bar………………..

-the end part wheremama coop looks older than she’s ever been to sarah was supposed to be a reference to TFD where mama coop lived a littlelonger in the redone timeline, because laura’s left the house to godie so from that point on the timeline for sure starts to fracture(she did, didn’t she????? live a little longer????? or am Imisremembering?????? this is the one time I do not have the energy tofact-check like four times)-sarah wrapping herhand around the bottle was as close as I wanted to get to part17!sarah slamming the bottle into laura’s picture but that’s whatshe was about to do with it, because she’s just seen laura leaveagain and knows she’s not coming back

-Ilistened to three songs while writing this – running up that hillby kate bush, the chromatics cover of running up that hill, and achoral version of the coventry carol (the lully, lulla, lullay). Iwas just thinking about running up that hill at the time and I wasstill entranced by lully lulla lullay from last december and wantedto listen to it too, and the songs just wound up vibing.