#SUBLIME (Ken’s scream in the Barbie movie)

[gatoburr0]

He just needs a better outfit

[glassrooibos]

I managed to avoid crying but I tell you it was fucking close

[wlntrsldler]

poisoned mercury | delicate

friend group shenanigans | set after pink skies | series masterlist

song: delicate by taylor swift

“good morning,” you yawned, rubbing your eyes as you exited your room. travis was taking up the entire couch, doubled over in pain. “woah, what happened to you?” 

“food poisoning,” he replied, wincing. he had a blanket draped over him, acting like he was on his deathbed. 

connor walked in with a bowl of chicken soup for his brother, rolling his eyes as he shoved travis’ feet off the couch to have somewhere to sit, “and whose fault is that?” 

clarisse was sitting next to chris on the love seat, shaking her head, “told you not to get a hot dog from the gas station.” 

“rookie mistake, babe,” chris chimed in, “whenever you tell trav not to do something, he does it. it’s in his dna.” 

“connor shares the same dna as him and he’s not like that,” you called out from the kitchen, making yourself a bowl of cereal. the dining hall was already closed for breakfast since you woke up so late, thanks to the boy who was still passed out on your bed.

you couldn’t remember the last time you slept so well. you felt bad for leaving him alone, sleep in your room but your stomach was growling and if you didn't get some food in your system soon, you were bound to catch an attitude.

“that’s because i got the brains between the two of us,” connor joked, scoffing, “i let him borrow some brain cells once in a while.” 

“fuck you guys,” travis complained, sitting up. “i’m dying here and you’re making fun of me?!” 

you walked out into the living room, pulling one of the bar stools to sit closer to the group. your eyes darted to the screen in front of you, internally cheering at the familiar scene. they were watching barbie. the five of you watched in silence, letting out little laughs at the jokes, until the door of your room opened. 

luke walked out, half-asleep, and made his way over to you. he kissed your lips, mumbling, “g’mornin, five star.” 

“mornin’, pretty boy,” you squeezed the arm he wrapped around your waist. he sent you a lazy smile, nuzzling his face in your neck before disappearing into his bedroom. you turned your attention back to the screen, shoving a spoonful of fruit loops in your mouth, “oh, i love this part!” 

when you were the only one who burst out laughing at ken’s “sublime!” you turned to look at your friends, wondering why none of them were laughing. they were staring at you with wide-eyes, jaws ajar. their eyes were bright, lips breaking out into teasing smiles. oh. oh. 

“castellan get your ass in here, now!” 

luke walked out of his room with his eyebrows furrowed, confused as to why chris was screaming his name like bloody fucking murder at 12 pm on a sunday. surely, he hadn’t done anything wrong yet– he just woke up! he put his glasses on, finally able to see the looks on everyone’s faces, including your red cheeks and sheepish smile. 

luke didn’t even realize what he did until that moment. it just felt natural for him to greet you good morning, like he always did anyway, but it’s just sweeter this time around because he’s allowed to kiss you now, at least he thinks he’s allowed to. he was a little butthurt that he woke up alone on your bed this morning so when he walked out and was only able to make out your silhouette, he didn’t think twice before placing a chaste kiss on your lips. he got a taste of what it was like to kiss you and he couldn’t help himself to do it again.

he thinks now, though, that perhaps he should’ve thought twice because there was no way your friends would let the two of you leave until you explained. luke’s face paled at the sight of his friends. were you mad at him for kissing you in front of people? if his head wasn't spinning with all the negative thoughts he was having, he would see your face and understand that you were happy your friends knew about the two of you.

clarisse clicked on the remote to pause the movie, “soooo… seems like we skipped a few chapters.” 

“more like we finally got to the next chapter,” travis snorted, earning a smack on the back of his head from connor. the older stoll hissed, “don’t act like y’all weren’t tired of their pining.” 

chris rolled his eyes, eyes darting between you and luke. he was trying to fight the smile threatening to show on his features, “so care to enlighten us, guys?”

"luke?"

luke's head snapped to the sound of your voice, pulling him out of his head. you had an arm outstretched, beckoning him over to where you stood. it made luke feel giddy inside as he trotted over to you, finding comfort in standing behind you and placing his chin on top of your head. he swung an arm around you, hoping that you wouldn't see the thumbs-up he sent to the boys.

"yeaaaaahhhh castellan's got the girl!"

"oh my god," you whispered, turning around to bury your head in luke's chest. you were blushing furiously at the cheers from your friends. you think you might've even heard travis complaining about losing a bet to connor. clarisse and chris were babbling about how double dates would be fun, though clar mentioned that luke and chris would end up third and fourth-wheeling the two of you more than anything. "our friends are crazy."

the arm he had wrapped around you pulled you in tighter. you felt the rumbling of his chest, "they are."

"you guys are so fucking cute," clarisse said, a hand over her heart. "y/n, he finally made a move!"

you turned back around to face clarisse and the group, "actually i made the move!"

luke scoffed, "you did not. i kissed you."

"i asked you to come in last night."

"yeah i believe, y/n," connor piped in, shrugging. "luke was not gonna make a move."

clarisse gasped, placing a hand on chris' bicep, "we should compare notes."

your eyes widened, "do not compare notes."

"wait, what do you mean notes?" luke asked quizzically. "was five star talking about me?"

"clarisse i will never forgive you if you tell him anything."

"i'm not gonna tell him directly," she hummed, lacing her fingers with chris', "but if i told my boyfriend who happens to be his best friend and he tells luke, then, technically, i haven't done anything wrong."

"y/n, i assure you, you should not be embarrassed," travis said, snickering. it was luke's turn to panic. "whatever you said to clarisse about lover boy here, i'm sure it can't be any worse than what he's said about you to us over the last two months."

chris cleared his throat, putting on his best luke impression, "five star is so pretty. i don't think i've ever seen anyone so beautiful."

"five star is so funny. i can listen to her talk about anything for hours." this was travis.

"oh, luke where were you today? we haven't seen you all day," connor said in his regular voice before deepening his voice a tad bit to match luke's, "oh, i was hanging out with five star and we accidentally fell asleep by the lake."

"not to mention the dozens of songs he wrote about you," chris teased, "thanks for inspiring the second album, but bro was like alexander hamilton writing those songs."

luke whined, tugging on his hood to cover his face, "guys, stoppp."

"oh my god, y/n, you should see his tweets."

"do not show her my tweets!"

you burst out in laughter, getting up from your seat. you wrapped your arms around luke and he took the opportunity to hide his face in the crook of your neck. you could feel the heat on his cheeks against your skin. you played with the hair on the nape of his neck, "all right, guys, enough."

"can we go back to your room?" luke whispered in your ear, lips grazing the shell of your ear.

"mhm," you couldn't deny him of anything if you tried, "come on, pretty boy."

you couldn't help but laugh and throw up the middle finger to your friends as they called out jokes and kissing noises as you and luke went off. it was funny, really, how they all knew there was something between you and luke before the two of you did. it was nice to know that your friends were supportive, regardless of how annoying they would be now that you and luke were together.

luke collapsed on his side of your bed, unable to wipe the dopey smile on his face. you sat on his lap, leaning over to press kisses on his cheeks, "just so we're clear, i wanna see the tweets. and hear the songs."

"well you can't ask me that while you're sitting on top of me because i'll fold."

you giggled, kissing his lips passionately. his hands gripped your waist as he sat up, getting in a more comfortable position, "that's the point, castellan."

luke pinched your side, chuckling when you squealed, "you're evil."

"uh huh," you mumbled, "you know we're never gonna catch a break with our friends now right?"

"honestly, i haven't caught a break from the boys since i met you," he admitted, "but at least i get to kiss you now, so it's really a win."

you couldn't agree more.

[ooklet]

I was thinking about how to articulate what I hate about the Barbie movie. Like, there are some fun moments (Ken stepping out of view to scream "SUBLIME!" has forever ingratiated itself in my lexicon) but by and large it left me with an increasing sense of frustration that ultimately culminated into a two-part hate.

The first is easy to cover, and it's Mattel's utter failure to put its money where its mouth is, in the form of the movie's portrayal of a fat Barbie vs. the proportions on the fattest actual Barbie that they sell*:

*For the pedants out there, this statement excludes specific, limited characters, like Disney licensed Ursulas. I'm talking about general Barbies for sale on a given day.

The second was harder. For a while I couldn't put it into words, just vague, angry hand gestures about how nothingburger the resolution was.

And then while I was reading A Glossary of Haunting by Eve Tuck and C. Ree, I saw this sentence:

"Listing terrors is not a form of social justice."

And it clicked not just what angered me about this movie, but about a lot of performative, faux woke (fauxke?) media these days. Acknowledgment alone is not the beginning and end of justice. Acknowledgment alone offers no solutions. Acknowledgement alone is how you get Riverdale's tonal whiplash of every second word out of Veronica's mouth ("Toxic masculinity!") vs. noted underage girl Betty Cooper's dead-eyed gang initiation striptease to Mad World.

(And yeah, I know Riverdale is a special case in that it exists in a mirror funhouse dimension of probably salvia-induced dumbassery, but my point stands.)

In the Barbie movie, Gloria lists terrors to the patriarchy-brainwashed Barbies, and that is all that it takes to restore them to their #feminist selves. But the thing is, we the audience already know that patriarchy sucks. This offers us, the people for whom this movie was made, nothing.

Related, second-and-a-half thing that I hated about this movie was the comparison between the Barbies having no defenses against patriarchal thinking and American Indians having no defenses against smallpox. Truly go fuck yourselves Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach. The genocide of my ancestors is not a punchline. (But don't even get me started on how often this sort of casual cruelty randomly pops up in media, or this is going to evolve into an essay on why Brendan Urie deserves to have his vocal cords repossessed for that "manifest destiny" line in High Hopes.)

Anyway, I guess my point is that there was never going to be a Barbie movie with anything of substance to say, because it exists to sell toys and facilitate Mattel's recovery from their Ever-After-High-Disney-License-Revoked-Monster-High-Destroyed-Revenue-Vacuum fiasco. And it did do that. That is, in fact, all that it did.