#a personification of her thing for competent older women too

[whetstonefires]

Im sorry, you had a character who had been raised in a place that hated magic users, been framed and lost faith in the government, became a fugitive whose ONLY FRIEND was a magic user..... And the dm did not lap that up on a plate???? You basically handed them a plot on a platter omg

On the one hand yes, and I was trying so hard, I was single-handedly carrying the ‘giving a shit about the story premise’ flag. She told me all about the setting (but not the plot) and what the party needed for balance ahead of time, and I built my girl to interface with all of that and then it...just didn’t work out at all.

On the other, she was trying hard too. She really didn’t know what she was doing, had never played under a competent DM who cared about story, and had gone into this with a ludicrously ambitious complex political machination plotline that collapsed the second we won our first encounter, and did not get kidnapped and coerced into working for the secret police as surprise agents the other factions didn’t know about.

And fell apart harder when she let the oracle be old friends with the head of the army, and suddenly we had ties to power in the opposite faction from the one she wanted us forced to serve, and even harder when (forced to make things up to replace the original plan) she had the place we went to hide besieged by an army of secret police trying to assassinate Army Boss Lady, her only developed PC who wasn’t a Super Annoying Dude, permanently exploding the ‘sneaky subtle machinations’ vibe.

But she just couldn’t let it go. She really wanted us to experience emotional conflict about what had shaped up into a really straightforward decision that I was the only member of the party who was emotionally invested in anyway.

Even when I tried to help I sometimes put extra strain on her, because I would get really into the worldbuilding and then for example be totally bewildered that the houses had roofs you could stand on, when we were four levels down in a city dug deep into a cliff face.

It had never occurred to her to look for plot in PC interactions, I think, and if it had I can see not attempting to lean into it, when dealing with a party composed mostly of asshole divas and characters specifically designed around not giving a shit. (We started out with two wizards who were different flavors of indifferent to the persecution except re: not getting caught.)

The sorceress princess didn’t care about anything currently in the story only her distant lost throne, and kept starting drama for lulz and ego, and the oracle just steadily escalated her attempts to get the desired power trip out of the game at the expense of everything else. Apparently she was DMing the DM violent revenge fantasies about an NPC who took her character down in an ambush that we’d been kind of manipulated into with misleading descriptions of the amount of cover available. Scary shit.

DM was overwhelmed. It happens. Although the more I describe the situations we got into the more I’m like ‘wow she really had problems with wanting us to wind up in specific positions so NPC dudes could monologue plot at us, huh.’

My roleplaying was specifically designed to interface with her stated plot, but it didn’t always yield the outcomes she wanted or relate directly to her opening story goals, so she often reacted to it as a distraction, which didn’t help.

That’s a learning curve thing, but I’m still annoyed with her for getting mad that my character wholeheartedly disliked her carefully crafted Morally Ambiguous Antagonist, who was super condescending and ran the secret police, and turned out to have been maintaining a constitutional crisis for fifty years so he could be the de facto ruler of the city-state and keep us locked in a state of infighting and witch-hunting so we didn’t have the energy to devote to serious border wars, as opposed to the low-key, defensive border wars I’d fought and my adored older sister had died in.

His sole good trait was being anti-war and my character was a very young, patriotic, dedicated member of the military elite! Why would she be conflicted? Because he’s an authority figure? Maybe then don’t give me alternate authorities who have better morals and more right to boss me and are telling me to do things that make sense for reasons they actually explain!

And she caught him in a lie in the very first thing he ever said to her, even before she knew who he was. Pulling off subsequent Bluff checks doesn’t obligate a PC to trust the NPC who they know lied to them for no apparent reason about something very basic, when they have every reason in the world to be paranoid?

But I got accused of godmoding. 😩 Because Dimsil didn’t trust this suspicious man to send us to go fight sewer zombies, after a week in a bunker hiding from her own government when she was supposed to be on sabbatical going home to meet her new nephew.

I was prepared to be the odd one out for being Lawful, but not fitting into the party because I was the only one who cared on an in-character level and I cared too much was hard.

...I’m always going to be salty about all the attempted railroading with that one NPC tbh. The dude had actually set up our framing on purpose, but he didn’t tell us this, so my girl was just really scornful that he thought he was the only one who could possibly be trusted to run the city when apparently he couldn’t even run his Inquisitors effectively enough to not have them running off trying to frame random citizens to meet quota. That’s not a sign of good management!

But yeah, tiefling wizard rogue dude with his thing for bombs and my paladin starting to be real friends in the middle of the bullshit storm could have developed into something really cool, I think, if the campaign hadn’t collapsed under the weight of entitlement and drama. As they do.

And in addition to the difficult party members, flexibility and being invested in the story on a character level rather than a major-themes or detailed-moment level are useful DM skills, which is something I knew but until this ask hadn’t isolated as a concept in quite this way. Thank you!

[justabrazilianwriter]

The Party (SHIKATEMAWEEK 2020 - Day 4).

Another day, another chance to write shikatema fics, another oneshot to contribute to the week of the best Naruto couple! This is also published on Ao3. Hope you guys enjoy it!

DAY 4: Roomates.  SUMMARY:  It was common knowledge that Shikamaru Nara was not a party person. Because of that, it's obvious that he is in a bad mood when he is forced to attend one made by a new friend of Kiba. He doesn't want to be there. Everything sucks. But when the host's older sister shows up, maybe going to that party wasn't such a bad idea. CONTENT NOTICE: use of alcoholic drinks and drugs. They are all adults.  (3987 WORDS). 

English is not my first language, so I translated this story through the google translator. If you find any grammatical or concordance errors, please let me know!

It was well known that Shikamaru Nara was not a party person.

Not that he hated parties with all his might, but he just didn't understand why everyone adored it. Shikamaru liked to drink here and there, but getting completely drunk only gave him the worst hangovers the next day. Weed left him dying from sleep and he was not a person who needed help with that. When the clock passed midnight he was ready to leave and sleep, but none of his friends allowed it and he had to stay, listening to Ino's terrible musical taste exploding on the speaker for long three hours.

Not to mention that parties usually never had a measly place to sit and Shikamaru had to spend hours leaning against the walls. What did people have against chairs or sofas? Some people needed a moment to rest for God's sake!

So, when Kiba invited him to a small party at the home of a new friend of his (some foreign kid who recently moved in to town and ended up saving him from an assault), Shikamaru's first thought is to deny. He does not want to go. Making new friends is a lot of work and he doesn't understand why he would need it. He already has enough friends, thank you very much.

But Naruto knows the younger brother of Kiba’s friend and Naruto, much to Shikamaru's despair, never gives up. He wants everyone to know each other, which means he doesn't leave Shikamaru alone. He sends messages, addresses him whenever he can, knocks on his damn door until he answers and, in the end, Shikamaru give up only so Naruto can leave him in peace.

Which brings him to that moment, when he stumbles down the sidewalk with Chouji by his side, sighing and moaning sadly.

"Why do we need to go?" he asked sadly to the heavens. Chouji laughed beside him, enjoying his mood.

"Look on the bright side," he said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "The sooner we arrive, the sooner you can leave."

Shikamaru laughed, wrapping his arm around Chouji's shoulders.

"That's why," he said, giving him a smile. "You are my best friend".

Chouji laughed with pleasure.

"Don't let Ino hear that," he joked. "She hasn't gotten over the last time she heard you say that and it's been years."

"Ino has no morals to say anything" replied Shikamaru as he put his arms behind his head. "Since she started dating Sai, she hardly spends time with us."

Chouji shrugged and smiled warmly.

“Who can blame her? She's in love". He looked at Shikamaru and raised an eyebrow. "Not that you know much about it."

An indignant exclamation came from his lips.

"What are you talking about?" He asked. "I dated Shiho for almost a year!".

"And look what happened".

Shikamaru didn't have an answer to that because he knew that Chouji was right. Shiho was a nice girl he met in an eccentric code-cracking class in college. She was cute, smart, kind and liked him, so Shikamaru asked her out. They dated for months and never fought, never fell out, never had any problems.

It was very boring.

There was no stimulus, there was no sparks, there were no emotions at all.

And when he realized he was absolutely bored in that relationship, he ended it all. And it should have hurt a lot more than it hurt, he should have suffered a lot more than he suffered. But in spite of everything, what hurt him most was seeing Shiho cry because she was a very nice girl and a good friend. Just it.

"You never fell in love either," he murmured to Chouji, seeing him roll his eyes. "You are not in the position of pointing fingers."

"I'm an incurable romantic, you know that" defended Chouji looking good-natured. “And I will find love someday. It's just that, unlike you, I don't go around denying the sadness of my love life and being all resentful about it”.

Shikamaru pouted and crossed his arms, listening to him laugh beside him. Feeling the words of his best friend entering his chest, he tried to change the subject.

"What's the name of this new Kiba friend, anyway?".

"Kankuro" said Chouji looking at his cell phone and checking the address. “And his younger brother, who knows Naruto, is called Gaara. I think they have an older sister, but nobody seems to know her ”.

The two finally arrived at the house, ringing the bell. From the inside, Shikamaru could already hear Lee's joyful screams and Ino's music bursting through the speakers. It would be a long night.

The door opened and a tall boy with brown hair and lots of makeup on his face appeared. He smiled at them, raising his eyebrows.

"Hello," he said. "And who are you guys?".

"I am Chouji" he said before pointing to Shikamaru. “And this is Shikamaru. We are friends with Kiba ”.

"Oh yeah! He commented that you would come. Friends of the blonde who speaks loudly and took over my sound, right? ” joked the boy. "I am Kankuro".

"It's a pleasure," muttered Shikamaru as he entered the house. "And I'm sorry for Ino."

Kankuro laughed and shrugged.

"Don’t be. I'm used to blonde women who like to yell at me. My sister got  me used well ”.

The rest of the group, who were scattered around the room, looked at Chouji and Shikamaru and shouted in celebration. Naruto left where he was sitting and pulled Shikamaru into a bear hug.

"I knew you would come," he said with a huge smile on his lips. "You say you don't like it, but I know you can't resist a party."

"What I can't resist is how insistent you can be" replied Shikamaru while rolling his eyes. "You literally started showing up in my nightmares."

Naruto laughed heartily and Chouji rolled his eyes fondly. Kankuro appeared behind them, pointing around.

“Beers can be left in the kitchen, over there. There's a bathroom up the stairs and please, cigarettes just near the windows or outside. Gaara hates the smell ”. He then pointed to a red-haired boy with eye makeup who was listening to something Lee was saying. “That's him, my little brother. I don't think you need me to introduce anyone else ”.

"I didn't want to be the person to warn you about this, but calling this group of people into your home was probably the biggest mistake of your life," muttered Shikamaru. Kankuro laughed before taking a sip of his beer.

“Kiba's friend, that quiet guy with the sunglasses, said the same thing, but we moved out a little while ago and haven't met anyone yet. Kiba said that we would get along with his friends, so why not? As long as no one pukes on the carpet, I think we'll be fine. Temari would make me clean the dirt with my own tongue”.

The party continued for the next hour. Shikamaru found a comfortable place to lean against the wall and drank a beer while watching his friends around. Ino and Sakura talked to each other non-stop, while Sai and Sasuke listened to them in silence as usual. Naruto tried his best to convince Neji to compete with him on ‘who could drink the most’, but Shikamaru knew it was a lost cause. Hinata watched them with a resigned look and Tenten laughed so hard that she looked like she was about to cry. Lee was talking non-stop, his cheeks slightly red, sitting on the sofa very close to Gaara, who was listening to him with all his attention. Shino, Kiba and Kankuro talked and laughed about something. Shikamaru also noticed that Kiba and Kankuro seemed to be leaning a little to close to each other.

Chouji tried to start conversations with him, but while he was drinking, Shikamaru couldn't help repeating the conversation they had in his mind.

He wasn't that bad when it came to love. He had his share of relationships here and there since puberty and he considered himself a handsome and intelligent guy, thank you very much. Okay, Ino was his first kiss and it was so absurdly weird that they just looked at each other afterwards and burst out laughing, agreeing never to do that again. He and Sakura also tried to date when they were younger, but Shikamaru was not in the mood to be with someone who was clearly in love with other guy.

They grew up, he had his dates, he lost his virginity, he dated Shiho. So, yes, maybe he never fell in love so deeply that he lost his mind and became as stupid as Naruto with Hinata, but that didn't mean he didn't understand anything about love or was hopeless.

Right?

And it was with these thoughts in mind that he heard her voice for the first time.

Key noises could be heard, but no one seemed to pay attention. The front door opened, someone entered, at the same moment that the music faded and, before anyone could do anything, a voice came up saying:

"Why is there a bunch of strangers in my house?".

Shikamaru's eyebrows furrowed and he turned his head, the beer can still on his lips, while he drank. His eyes sought the owner of that voice, going to his right, until he fell into...

Holy fucking shit.

The personification of his wet dreams was standing there, at the entrance to the room, looking at everyone with a raised eyebrow. Shikamaru almost let the beer can slip from his fingers, too impacted by the sight of her to be able to put strength in his own hand. His mouth was slightly open and he sure looked like an idiot, but at that moment, who cares?

His eyes followed beautiful tanned legs, covered with fishnet tights, to the smallest skirt in the universe. Then they head up, where he tried not to focus because he was educated to be a gentleman, but Shikamaru's brain melted. A  stomach line, tight T-shirt, a long and elegant neck that led him to a beautiful and dangerous face. Sand-blond hair tied in two ponytails, expressive eyebrows, delicious lips contorted in a grimace. Her eyes swept the room and fell on him for just a second. The world caught on fire.

He has never seen a woman like her in his life. He had never felt such an overwhelming urge to be trampled by someone like in that moment. He would let her step on him like a rug and then he would say thank you.

The music was paused. Everyone looked in her direction. And Shikamaru realized that she was clearly older than them, because all her energy screamed maturity. She seemed to dominate the entire room with just a look and he was certainly included in it, like an insect hypnotized by a light trap.

"Temari!" exclaimed Kankuro, looking slightly paler. "Shit. What are you doing here?".

She looked at him for long seconds without an expression on her face.

"I live here" replied simply and Shikamaru controlled himself not to laugh. She seemed to be a smartass like him.

"I know" replied Kankuro, looking indignant. "But I thought you were going to spend the night at your boyfriend's house."

"Oh, yes, me and Daimaru broke up" Temari replied, not looking shaken by it. Something in Shikamaru's chest hummed, happy that she was single.

"Are you alright?" asked Gaara, looking slightly concerned and speaking for the first time since Shikamaru arrived. She shrugged.

"Yes. He cried, but meh, it's okay” she replied. Then she put her hands on her waist and Shikamaru had a flashback from his own mother when his father was in trouble. "Now, can you tell me why there are a bunch of strangers in my house?".

"Well, you always say that we should make more friends, so I met some people and thought about making a social with them".

"In our house?".

"Yes".

"In the middle of the week?".

"Yes?".

"Without telling anyone?".

"I told Gaara!" exclaimed Kankuro, trying to defend himself. Temari's eyebrow went up even more and she looked so dangerous and powerful that Shikamaru lost his breath.

"Gaara is not the one who pays the bills" she countered and the silence followed for a few seconds. Everyone's eyes passed between them, as if watching a game of ping-pong. Shikamaru's chin was still slightly dropped.

"Kankuro...?" Temari started saying.

"Yes?" he asked.

"You are the worst roomate I have ever had in my life."

"I'm the only roomate you've ever had," he countered. Temari crossed her arms, indicating the sofa with her head.

"This is not true. I have Gaara”.

"Gaara is so quiet that sometimes I spend days without seeing him".

"And he couldn't be more perfect" she returned and a little smile appeared on her beautiful lips, because she knew she was winning the argument. The sight of that smile sent a delicious shiver down Shikamaru's spine. Suddenly, he was no longer tired. On the other way, he was full of energy.

In a quick movement, Temari took the beer can out of Kankuro's hands and drank.

"Hey!" he exclaimed. "That's mine!".

"Yours?" she asked.

"Yes, I paid with my money".

"Oh, so do you have money now?" Temari murmured, smiling in an almost feline way. Shikamaru's heart exploded in his chest at the thought of what it would be like to have that smile directed at him. "So how about you start helping with the rent then?".

She and Kankuro faced each other in a silent battle. He was the first to look away and she smiled victoriously.

"That's what I thought," she said, before taking a second sip. Then she pursed her lips, pretending to think and sighed. "Okay, I'm not going to ruin your party."

"Oh God, thank you" sighed Kankuro. "Tem, you are the best big sister in the world-".

"But I have some conditions."

Kankuro groaned. Gaara laughed, clearly enjoying the situation. He was not the only one. All the women present looked at Temari as if she were a powerful example to be followed. Shikamaru also couldn't take his eyes off her, but for other reasons.

“First, don’t break anything. Any mess or dirt has to be clean tomorrow morning”.

"Deal," said Kankuro automatically.

“Second,” continued Temari, looking amused by her brother's bad mood. She moved closer to him, with her long bare legs moving slowly and Shikamaru's hands were sweating so hard that he thought he would pass out from dehydration. “No weed in the back area. The neighbor will complain and I hate to deal with her”.

"There's no weed," lied Kankuro, making both Shikamaru and Temari roll their eyes. The smell was literally everywhere.

"Tell that to your friend who's eating mustard with pickles and peanuts," she argued, pointing at Chouji a few feet away, with his eyes a little red. Everyone turned to him and he flinched, his mouth still full of that culinary crime.

A loud laugh escaped Shikamaru's lips before he could stop himself. Temari turned, looking at him and her eyebrows rose slightly. Her eyes slowly studied him from top to bottom and the temperature in the room seemed to be so hot that everything would start to melt. Her lips lifted in a smile, still staring at Shikamaru and he can't stop himself from smiling back.

"You are not funny, Tem" groaned Kankuro.

"The cute one over there thinks I'm funny," she countered, indicating Shikamaru with her head and making him almost choke on his own saliva. “Well, rule number three: no loud music for the same reason as before. The neighbor is a bitch and she'll probably call the police. I am the eldest, everything will fall on my back and I swear to God, Kankuro, if I get arrested because of you, I will kill you”.

"Nobody's going to be arrested," he said in a groan. "Anything else?".

Temari took a long drink of beer, her eyes on her brother, just to torture him a little. Then she sighed and smiled.

"No” she said. “You can continue."

And the party continued.

Shikamaru's eyes seemed to be drawn to her figure like magnets. He tried not to look, but it seemed like a completely impossible task. He saw how Ino and Sakura approached Temari right after, monopolizing their attention for a long time. He saw her drink more, saw her smile, saw her laugh, saw her cross those damn legs together, thick thighs showing and making him shiver.

Worse, he saw her look at him. With her beautiful and mysterious eyes, Temari turned to him once in a while, sometimes without expression, sometimes evaluating him again, sometimes with that feline smile appearing on her lips and Shikamaru drank so much without realizing it, completely distracted by her, that his mind was completely blurred.

When she moved again, laughing at something Ino had said and her skirt went up a few more inches, Shikamaru stood up, desperate for a cigarette.

He went to the kitchen, opening a door to the back and stayed there, smoking, trying to distract his own head and ease his heartbeat.

Completely useless, because a few minutes later he heard footsteps and her voice haunted him again.

"Cigarettes are very bad for you, you know."

Shikamaru turned, seeing her leaning against the doorframe with her shoulder. His hands started to sweat again, but a mischievous smile appeared on his lips.

"Your brother is smoking weed less than ten meters away," he argued. Temari's eyebrow rose and she walked closer to him, looking amused.

"Kankuro is a hopeless case since I dropped his head on the ground when we were kids," she said. She leaned her elbows on the center counter of the kitchen, projecting her back slightly forward and making his mind go blank. "Are you a hopeless case?".

"I like to think not," he replied, taking a drag on his cigarette. "Some would say that I am very smart."

"Oh, so I heard" replied Temari with a raised eyebrow. “Your friends were telling me everything. A genius, huh? ”.

Shikamaru's cheeks burned.

"The title can be a bit over the top," he said, scratching the back of the neck. Temari laughed, raising her hand.

“Temari” introduced herself. He squeezed her hand and her skin was warm under his fingers.

"Shikamaru" replied.

"Well, it's a pleasure, Shikamaru," Temari said, letting go and leaning back against the counter. His name on her lips was music to his ears. "So, which one of my idiot little brothers brought you here today?".

Shikamaru laughed, finishing his cigarette.

"None" replied, throwing it in the trash and taking a few steps towards her. “I am friends with Kiba, the make-up boy who is not your brother. But I came because Naruto insisted”.

"The blond who doesn't know how to speak softly?" asked Temari and Shikamaru laughed.

"The one nd only" replied. Both she and he looked through the kitchen door, watching Naruto and Lee talking animatedly with Gaara, on the living room sofa.

"He and Gaara seem to get along," she murmured. Shikamaru smiled, finally standing next to her and realizing that he was taller by long centimeters. It was surprising, because her energy screamed that she would be able to put him on the floor in a few seconds.

"Naruto likes him," he said. "He convinced everyone to come so we could get to know him."

A loving smile broke out on her lips.

"I'm happy" she said and the tone of her voice was so gentle and soft that Shikamaru's heart beat again. He didn't know which Temari he liked best: the seductive and mysterious or the gentle and smooth. In the end, it didn't really matter. He would accept whatever she wanted to show. “Gaara is very shy. It is difficult for him to make friends. I'm glad that the blonde and the boy with the strange haircut adopted him “.

Shikamaru laughed again and she looked at him. The silence followed for a few seconds, before he tried to break it, not wanting their interaction to end there.

"So, difficult day?" He asked. Temari looked confused.

"No, why?". Shikamaru's cheeks burned and he was slightly lost.

"Well, you told about your breakup and these things are usually complicated ..."

"Oh, yes," said Temari before giving a dry chuckle and shrugging her shoulders. “I wouldn't say it was that difficult. My relationship was about to end for a long time, but it seems that only I saw it. I think I should be sadder than I really am, but I can't explain it”.

"Actually, I completely understand" Shikamaru said and she looked at him with surprised eyes. "I just broke up and was more sad to make her sad than the break up itself."

"Yes, exactly," muttered Temari and they continued to stare at each other with surprise. “It is difficult to explain, but it is as if Daimaru and I were just great friends. There was no...”.

“Spark” completed Shikamaru. Her eyes widened slightly.

"Yes! Chemistry, ” she said. "Everything was so normal, so monotonous, so ...".

"Boring".

And they looked at each other in even more surprise, with a strange and delicious energy pulsing between them. Temari's eyes assessed him again and a smile appeared on her lips. Suddenly, she looked like a predator ready to take a victim. And Shikamaru couldn't be happier to be her prey.

"... Yes" she murmured. "That's exactly it."

Shikamaru found himself completely lost in the deadly beauty of her face. He had, in five minutes of conversation, more chemistry with Temari than in his entire relationship with Shiho. She was beautiful and sharp, smart as hell, ready to give back in equal measure everything that anyone threw at her. Temari dominated the environment only with her presence, everyone around seemed to be under her command. She seemed to be someone who didn't bow her head at all. She looked like someone who would eat Shikamaru alive if he had the honor of being involved with her.

She looked like the most troublesome woman he had ever met.

And it was absolutely addictive.

The sound of an alarm broke their trance. Temari closed her eyes, cursing under her breath and took her cell phone out of her skirt pocket.

"I have to go" she said and Shikamaru's shoulders fell in disappointment.

"I thought you lived here," he said and she raised an eyebrow like he was an idiot.

"I meant to leave the party, genius" she countered with a smile in the corner of her mouth. "Some people work early in the morning."

She walked away from him, walking on her back, her eyes still on him. He saw her beautiful thighs move away, her beautiful silhouette move away, the idea that maybe he would never be able to see her again appear and Shikamaru tried to think of something to say, to prevent her from leaving, but his brilliant brain, for the first time time, didn't have a plan.

"Wait! Temari ”exclaimed on instinct. She stopped, looking expectantly at the doorframe.

Shikamaru swallowed, praying that he wouldn't ruin it.

"Why don't you give me your phone number?" he asked, scratching the back of his neck nervously. "You know, so I can let you know if your brother wants to throw a party behind your back again."

She looked at him for what seemed like hours, probably loving to see him sweat like she did with Kankuro earlier. In the end, her eyes sparkled and her smile became excitingly feline. Shikamaru felt an impulse to run and thank Naruto for being a stubborn idiot.

"I thought you would never ask."

[drinkthehalo]

Supernatural Season 12 - the Mary Winchester storyline

Of all the ridiculous things… I’ve fallen down the Supernatural rabbit hole.

Supernatural is the last fandom I’d have expected to sneak up on me. I stopped watching years ago and had been wishing that someone would put it out of its misery.

But then a few weeks ago, my friend mentioned that Sam and Dean’s mother was on the show as a regular character.  It piqued my curiosity.  A story that’s actually about the Winchester family, not the internal politics of Heaven or whatever random boring nonsense that caused me to stop watching?

So long story short - I was just in Shanghai (for the third time!) and when I wasn’t running around a dark hotel or drinking at a bar, I was waking up at 5am, jetlagged and half drunk, mainlining SPN. (Watching it in bed on my phone! Ha.)

To my complete shock, seasons 11 and 12 are GREAT. It's like the show took stock of everything it was doing wrong, remembered what had once made it awesome, and set about methodically fixing it.

If you are someone who also gave up on the show - watch 11x04 “Baby.” It made me laugh, made me cry, made me literally want to hug my television. It was such a gift to the audience, and a promise to do better. Proof that the show can still be absolutely wonderful when it puts in the effort.

Also, Dean Winchester. He’s one of the best fictional characters I’ve ever seen; he's so fucked up and he's also the most lovable thing ever. His combination of strength, fragility, competence, darkness, sweetness, silliness… His heroism and idealism and fatalism and self-abnegation… His joie de vivre, suicidal impulses, bitterness, weariness, ridiculousness and awkwardness… His badassery and heroism and codependence and tragedy.

Such a complex beautiful mess. Narratively, he is the gift that keeps on giving, the reason the show has lasted twelve years - you can just keep throwing stories at him and you get the most fascinating results.

I will be writing more about SPN. Sorry if you’re just here for the immersive theatre posts!

Here are my thoughts on the Mary Winchester storyline, which I LOVED -

It’s a complex, messy, fascinating story, where nobody is completely right and nobody is completely wrong, and you can sympathize with every character. It brings the show right back to the core of what made it good and interesting.

The three key things I loved about it:

I was pleasantly surprised at how it subverted my expectations

Mary herself was relatable, interesting, complex, and her choices raised intriguing ethical questions

Mary’s presence provided an opportunity to dive into the psychology and issues of Dean (especially) and Sam in a way we haven’t seen before

As soon as I heard that Mary was back, I was simultaneously afraid of the ways it could go wrong, and deeply intrigued by the possibilities it raised.

The most interesting thing the show had going on in its early days was the complexity of the boys’ relationship with their father. The success of Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s career was a tragedy for Supernatural - once he was gone it just never had the same emotional intensity, though they did interesting things with flashbacks and time travel and pseudo-father figures.

But Mary - Mary has that same intense emotional resonance. She was the first character we saw in the Pilot, Dean’s deepest wish (in arguably the best episode of the show, 2x20) and Dean’s Heaven (5x16), the key to Dean’s character.

"I know [my mother] wanted me to be brave. I think about that every day. And I do my best to be brave." - Dean from 1x03 - what an amazing through-line to a story still unfolding twelve years later!

But… Supernatural doesn’t have a great track record with female characters. The original sin of the show - the reason I’ve always been a bit ambivalent about loving it so much - is how it portrays women as symbols that matter only in relation to men. The Pilot is egregious. Mary and Jess, in their ridiculous frilly white nightgowns, dying as motivation for the men to embark on their quests. In Supernatural, men have journeys. Men are subjects, with destinies, and “work to do.”  Men are multi-dimensional characters. Women are objects (in the early seasons - it’s gotten way better recently). We barely know Mary and Jess as characters, and don’t need to. Their deaths are not even about them; they’re about what they do to Sam and Dean.

Usually when Mary reappears in the show, it’s as a symbol, the embodiment of the ideal of motherhood. The love, safety, and care that Dean longs for. (Sam, interestingly, does not long for Mary the same way, both because he doesn’t remember her and because he had Dean as his mother figure. I have always adored that parallel, that Dean is like Mary and Sam is like John, which so subverts our expectations of how they present their gender roles, tough guy Dean and sensitive Sam.)

So my fear of season twelve was that we’d still see Mary a symbol. And THANK GOD they were smart enough to completely subvert that expectation, and make the story ABOUT the fact that Mary is an individual human being, not an ideal personification of motherhood.

When we meet this version of Mary, her whole world has been taken from her. Her husband is dead, her small children are lost to her. Her friends are thirty years older, or dead. I love how the show handles Mary’s reaction to the ubiquity of smartphones. It’s not a joke about moms being bad at technology. It’s profoundly disconcerting. It’s sad and strange, especially for a person so smart and competent to suddenly be in a world where she lacks foundational knowledge - it’s almost like everyone else speaks another language.  She doesn’t fit.

So she tries to find her way. She’s a fully-realized person, just as conflicted and complex as Sam and Dean, with her own goals, flaws, fears, vulnerabilities. (And THANK GOD she’s tough, not in need of her childrens’ protection.) 

I imagine myself in her position - with these two well-meaning, overwhelming adult children tracking her every move - and I completely understand her need to break away and carve a space for herself. The pressure and weight of their expectation, on top of everything else she’s going through, would be overwhelming.

As with the best writing in Supernatural, Mary makes choices that are not entirely wrong and not entirely right. Her embrace of the British Men of Letters is driven by guilt that her deal with Azazel destroyed her childrens’ lives, and her own need create a purpose for her life in this strange new world, and a sincere belief that it really will make the world a better place. It’s the same kind of complex psychological motivations that would drive Sam or Dean. (I have a whole other post brewing about that storyline, and about the unique and brilliant way that Supernatural’s handles moral ambiguity.)

Mary’s reaction to her adult children was so unexpected, but so right. One of those character-deepening twists that make perfect sense in retrospect.

Mary struggles with Dean, and connects more with Sam. This is what I mean about Supernatural being great at subverting expectations - because we’ve spent the entire series knowing that Dean is the one most shaped by Mary - the one who remembers her, who dreams of her, who longs for her, who can’t even say her name without flinching. And Sam is the one who doesn’t remember her - who tells Dean in the Pilot “If it weren't for pictures I wouldn't even know what Mom looks like.”

But it makes perfect sense. Sam, without the weight of a lifetime of expectations, treats Mary as an individual and tries to understand her needs. Dean struggles to see beyond what Mary means to him, and what he needs from her. Dean’s love is overwhelming, and suffocating.

There’s this great line in season twelve - I can’t remember where, but it’s when Sam and Dean are talking about the British Men of Letters, not quite agreeing or disagreeing, and Sam says something like “I know you think [whatever]” and Dean interrupts and says “WE think.” (Sorry, I need to rewatch and dig up the quote.) It’s borderline abusive, and it must be exhausting for Sam, to live with someone so overbearing that you’re not even allowed to have a different opinion.

The whole season deals with Dean’s abandonment complex - going right back to the heart of the Pilot, “I can’t do this alone.” Dean is so afraid of being abandoned that he clutches his loved ones way too closely.  We understand and sympathize because we know where it came from -  the death of his mother at four, the neglect from his father, twelve seasons of everyone he loves dying - but that doesn’t mean he would be easy to live with.

The line that kept running through my head when watching Dean this season is from Marilyn Manson - “When all of your wishes are granted, many of your dreams will be destroyed.”

Mary’s return is an incredible opportunity for character exploration and character growth for Dean. In many ways Dean is emotionally stuck at the age of four, unable to move on from the loss of his mother. He’s finally forced to recognize that his perceptions from that time were a tiny sliver of the truth, a four year old’s limited view.  Maybe these dreams need to be destroyed. You can’t live your entire adult life longing for the cocoon you were in when you were four. (Or, I mean you can, you’d be Dean Winchester, but it’s not healthy.)

Dean needed his mother’s love AS A FOUR YEAR OLD, and it’s devastating that it was ripped away from him, but for his own sanity he needs to move on. I love that Mary flat out tells him that he’s not a child anymore. He needs to hear it.

The other side of the story is Dean’s perspective, which is incredibly sympathetic. Supernatural does a brilliant job telling a complex story where no one is entirely right or wrong. Dean tries so hard. He knows he’s weird and socially awkward. He doesn’t want to scare Mary away. He wants so desperately for their relationship to work. The scenes of him angsting over what to text her are some of my favorite moments ever in the show. It’s so surreal and yet so truthful.

And I have to admit - as much as I loved Mary NOT functioning as stereotypical mother figure - I also LOVED when she finally found out how tragic the boys’ childhood was. It was completely cathartic for me as an audience member. Those boys went through more than any child should have to bear. Dean is so scarred by it, and he’s this amazing person so full of love and compassion and this beautiful vibrant light that has been twisted by these awful experiences he’s been through, and the audience has been watching him suffer for twelve years, longing for the equivalent of his mom to give him a hug.  (Just look at the bazillions of hurt/comfort fanfics.) The emotional payoff of that validation finally happening from his actual mother is enormous. Intense, and it would be indulgent if it wasn’t so EARNED.

I love that in their big conversation at the end of the season, Dean phrases it as all about what SAM went through.  Of course the entire audience is watching that scene going BUT DEAN. It’s Dean that Mary saves. It’s actually all about him, but he’d never say it.  Brilliant writing.

[lextherandlxce]

Ellie Headcanons:

·         Ellie’s first name is actually Eleanor. She hates her name. To her it sounds like the name a much older woman has, so she can’t stand it. She doesn’t ever introduce herself as Eleanor, and she tries to avoid people finding out that it’s her full name. Though the people closest to her do eventually find out. She loves going by Ellie, and if someone she knows calls her Eleanor, she’ll ignore them until they Ellie instead.

·         Ellie needs glasses to look at screens. She needs them a little for reading, but any kind of light given off by a screen really bothers her eyes. She’d just squint and have her eyes water up if she was to look at a computer, tv, phone, or tablet without her glasses.

·         Her glasses are something she’s a little embarrassed of. In an academic setting, she doesn’t care. She’s there (on a dig site or in a lecture hall) to learn or teach. But in her personal life, she doesn’t like people to know she wears glasses, which is why she got the thinnest frames she could. She’s been made fun of too many times to really let people see them. But if she loves or trusts someone, she’ll wear them with no worries.

·         Ellie has loved plants ever since she was a little girl. She used to pick the flowers in her aunt’s garden and learned how to press them and make things out of them. She also loved dinosaurs growing up, but she never wanted to be a paleontologist. She always wanted to work with plants. She planned on either owning a nursery or trying to study current plant life in some way. One of her college friends invited her to sit in on a paleontology lecture, and Ellie went for the fun of it. Through that lecture, Ellie found out about paleobotany. And the rest, as they say, is history.

·         Ellie has always had her own garden throughout her life. Either in recycled glass jars or in little garden pots. She loves plants that are poisonous, but she doesn’t belittle their power and makes sure that they’re in an area no animal or child could get to. She takes safety very seriously. And when she leaves for extended periods of time, one of her neighbors always checks in on her plants for her.

·         Ellie is incredibly confident and competent in her academic life. She knows she’s one of the best in her field, and while she is proud of herself, she doesn’t boast. She’s very logical, organized, and can hold her own in any debate/argument about the prehistoric world. She’s very quick in general. She has fast and excellent come backs, and to get into an argument with her is often more than most people can handle. Ellie can fight with her words very well.

·         That said, Ellie is not good at pushing for what she wants outside of her academic life. She can strive for her goals and wants when it comes to her career but not with her personal relationships. She’s such a loving, dependable, and giving person that people tend to walk all over her. They take advantage, and most of them time, Ellie let’s them. Part of her is scared that they will leave her or hate her if she doesn’t bend. But she often bends so much that her personal wants and needs are placed on the back burner. Getting married and having children with Alan and not doing so are a perfect example of this. As unsatisfied as she is, she may often go along with things until she reaches her breaking point. Then she’s forced to evolve, shedding people from her life and moving on to people that she hopes will treat her better.

·         Ellie does have a very strong protective instinct. She has a very strong maternal instinct, but she’s so much fun to be around that people tend to look at her as an older sister.

·         Ellie had a complete nervous breakdown after the events at Jurassic Park. She wanted nothing more than to forget and move on. She wanted to live her life and not wait for other people to catch up to her. It was part of why she and Alan’s relationship could not survive the aftermath. He was obsessed with what had happened at the park and the raptors. Ellie was plagued with constant nightmares about them and couldn’t handle talking about them or remembering their calls. She would jump easily, sometimes scream, cry, or shut down if things startled her too badly once she came back from the park. She really can’t handle any metallic scraping sound, because it reminds her of the dinosaur’s claws against the doors. And sometimes she’d need to hole herself up, just stay away from people to feel safe and secure. But she’s too strong a person to let her fears stop her.

·         Ellie has distinct dualities about her. She does have a very strong and independent personality with those who know her. She can also be very shy around men she likes, and it can be difficult to get to know her. She’s incredibly confident when it comes to her work. She isn’t so confident outside of work. Since the park, she feels like life is moving to slow and she’s impatient for…anything to happen. Other times, she just needs to be stationary in her life to have a sense of security. She loves to be adventurous and go new places. But she also loves a quiet weekend at home, lounging around and not doing much. Others might think it’s Ellie being inconsistent or insincere. She’s completely genuine about who she is, and her actions are never dishonest. Ellie enjoys almost everything in life. She wants to experience everything in life. She is grateful for everything in life. She was this way before Jurassic Park, but almost dying reminded her to be in awe of the world around her every day.

·         Ellie loves springtime and summer. She loves them because she can enjoy her plants more thoroughly. She likes the light, the heat, the long summer days. She loves being able to go outside, walk, sweat, and enjoy nature. She embodies everything about those seasons. Despite her academic mindset, she can also be a bit of a free spirit. She likes the term and personification of ‘mother nature’ very much.

·         Ellie is actually very confident about her body. She certainly doesn’t think she’s the prettiest girl in the world, but that’s never mattered to her. She likes the way she looks, and she never worries about if she’s too tall, too skinny, if her breasts are too small, or if she doesn’t wear enough makeup. She thinks she’s fine just the way she is, and she knows that anyone who finds her attractive with no makeup while wearing hiking boots on is the right one for her.

·         Ellie certainly notices when other women are attractive, and she’s not ashamed to admit that. She thinks the female form is beautiful, and she’s thought about dating other women. She hasn’t though, simply because she does have a stronger desire for men.

·         Ellie really enjoys sex. She hasn’t had an opportunity to experiment too much, but she’s very open to different things. She’s not embarrassed about the fact that she watches porn. She’s not embarrassed to talk about sex or do something to please her partner. She does like a lot of tenderness and to know that she’s appreciated, but Ellie certainly doesn’t mind any rough stuff. In fact, it’s something that she often wants but doesn’t receive.

[wweismann-blog]

autumn

“Autumn is the season of the year that succeeds Summer and predates Winter. It is characterized by a drop in temperature, and by the yellowing of the leaves of the trees, which indicates the passage of seasons”

She was born in a cold morning of October. If she was able to have memories from that day, she would have seen her parents’ smile when they welcomed her to this world, the curiosity of her sister radiant as the summer - a four year old back then - and the Northern Lights painting the sky of Anchorage. She would have known that that night the termometers were setted in minus four celsius, that the snow was falling and that her first outfit was orange, just like the season she shared her name with.

She would also know that her youngest child days would last only for two years, but a baby’s memory is not exactly precise and this is another story.

She could definitely remember, though, of days and days in Anchorage with average temperatures between six and minus one that would allow her to enjoy the days spent out of the house and develope her passion for ice skating while everything was going on how it should be. School passed by with no memorable event and she would focus on training and everything else related to skating. She would dedicate herself to the sport with her body and soul, spending nights and more nights (re)watching and studying jumps and international competitions, trying to put everything in practice as soon as possible - and often being successfull in it. She had a bright future, everyone knew it - just like the medals of local competitions that would slowly fill her room could prove.

She was fourteen when that happened - and of it she remembers clearly. Her room had the walls full of posters of Oksana Kazakova, Artur Dmitrev and so many other russians and soviets that made history in the sport. The collant she was weating was red with orange bolts, her make-up in a variety of shades os orange and the automatic smile shaping her lips - and there was a good reason for it. Coach Carlton had told her that she got two proposals of training in Toronto or Moscow and keep what was supposed to be a promising career out of Alaska.

It was such a pity that when she got home ready to tell everything to her parents she was told that they were dead.

”Les sanglots longs des violons de l’automne Blessent mon cœur d’une langueur monotone.¹”

Autumn stopped practicing. She had lost her parents so abruptly and violently that the mere sight of the red suit made her think of the explosion that had taken their lifes. The house in Anchorage seemed cold and the nights where she could get some sleep - only possible after she stole her parents’ pillows to have with her in her bed - always turned out to be full of nightmares in violent colors: red, yellow and orange in a profusion of fall that had once made her so happy and now would leave her miserable.

She was forced to abandon her dreams because of grief, abandon the capital because of her sister searching for a new start in a place in the middle of nowhere that even if one day she was able to get back in the rink she would never be able to do so - and she made sure to remind Summer at every single opportunity how much she hated Homer, how much she hated the house they lived in, how much she hated how Summer was trying to pretend to be their mother when she clearly was not and would never be. Autumn was fifteen when she ran away for the first time and got her first tattoo, getting back home a few days later. When she was sixteen she was threatened to be expelled from her new school.

At seventeen she dropped out three months before graduating.

She remembers clearly of that October night, her eighteenth birthday’s eve. She had spent the summer cleaning tables, moving chairs and saving enough not to ask for a dime to her older sister, having that exact moment in mind in order to get over innapropriated comments, rude words and stupidity of costumers in the dine. She remembers that she knocked on her sister’s door twice before opening it carefully without even waiting for an invitation to get in. She anounced that she was leaving that goddamned city that has never brought a single good thing to her, that freezing state that could not bring her any remnant of happiness - which, she made sure to say, has been gone when she was forced to leave behing everything she knew and had in Anchorage just because Summer decided so.

She left her e-mail. For emergencies only.

With a luggage with no more than fifteen kilos and a backpack she went south without looking back not even once. She was not needed there and she was fully aware of this fact.

”Associated with the transition from heat to cold and with the seasonal status of the crop, Autumn has dominated the popular imaginary. In Western cultures, the personification of the season occurs through beautiful, curvaceous women - associating them with the season's abundance - with adornments of fruits, vegetables and grains harvested in the Autumn.”

Colin told her that the Big Apple was the solution to her problems.

The city was big, shining, full of new beginnings and people reinventing themselves. It allowed Autumn to get back in touch with that part of her that she still liked and made her able to recover all the time she had been wasting. When she was eighteen she was walking out of the bus in New Jersey, where she could afford rent. She would take the night shifts in a random diner and would go back to ice skating during the day. Life would slowly return to her body, the amount of possibilities increasing every moment. It was hard to become a professional after not practing for so long, it was true, but it was not impossible.

‘Nothing is impossible’, Colin would say.

Colin was her biggest fan. Her gay flatmate that introduced her to a Thomas Richardson that guaranteed that with hard work she could get what she wanted. At nineteen she got back to amateur competitions, amazing all the judges. At the age of twenty, she got a sponsorship of a team, making her able to leave her job and dedicate herself entirely to the sport.

She was twenty-three when she got her invitation to join the American National Team for the World Championship. Only a few weeks before getting in the plane to Turim, she got out the team. While training, she jumped as the coreography requested but landed poorly. The result? Two injuried ligaments, one ruptured, a broken knee. She went under surgery but alter re-running all the tests, the doctors were able to provide a simgle answer: she would not be able to compete again.

“Tout suffocant et blême,

quand sonne l’heure.²”

Frustration. Celebrating her twenty fourth birthday in a hospital bed, she had spent the year in a useless physiotherapy. She knew that she was able to walk without showing any physical damage but the cold brought her pain only controlled with medicine. She saw the national coach turn his back to her as soon as he could. She saw Mao Asada got the first place in the competition. She saw Colin finding herselv HIV positive and die slowly.

Then she saw nothing.

No, not nothing - fate would be too nice if it hidden everything from her. She saw death take Colin in less than an year, pneumonia. She saw herself being evicted due to lack of payment. She saw her skin being pierced so the paint could fill the void of her soul - and it would not, not for a long time. She moved to Brooklyn where she would share an apartment with four models from somewhere in Eastern Europe that introduced her to their agency and the possibility of making some money. She was tall enough, thin enough and young enough to get jobs that would pay enough.

Too bad that she was also desperate enough to submit herself to certain things.

”In poetry, Autumn is recurrently associated with melancholy: the possibility of Summer is gone and the coldness of Winter begins to appear. The heavens turn gray and people turn inward, both physically and psychologically”

Jerry Allen was his name. He was a good photographer that would repeat several times how Autumn was beautiful and how she would become his muse. She was twenty five, he was thirty eight. They fell in love. She saw herself leaving the apartment she shared with the slavic girls and heading to a beautiful place in East Village. She left behind photos, memories and the recently found profession that were now nothing but papers in a box. She was happy, she was loved. She would stay at home, cleaning it, preparing dinners, pouring smiles.

And after all she had nothing to complain about - it was her fault if there was dust above the table or dish on the sink. All Jerry did was only to disciplin her and he would not have to do so if she did not make mistakes. If she did not talk too much. If she did not looked too much for one of his guests. If she did not dressed like a fucking whore. If she did not keep in touch with those models that would sleep her way to a job.

It was not Jerry’s fault if she really needed slaps, punches and kicks to learn what was really right. The fault would be hers only, of not being able to meet the expectations, to keep the house clean, to please the one she loved. The fault was and would always be Autumn’s, with her skin tainted with permanent marks made in her youth, her skin showing trying to seduce other man and cheat on the only one that loved her and gave her a home.

This happened for two years.

”Je me souviens des jours anciens et je pleure³”

The upstairs neighbour was the one who took her away.

The old lady found her in the hallway in a November afternoon. She asked her where Autumn came from, she saw the purple bruises on her skin. She paid for a one way ticket to Anchorage, leaving from JFK in five hours with a connection in Seattle.

She tried to made Autumn go to a safe place, far from there, far from everything. She insisted that she would go to the police and report her boyfriend and heard from the girl that she had no reason to do so - at least not just because he was not guilty and only did that to her own good. The lady got a luggage with things necessary for a few days, gave her three hundred dollars in cash and took her to the airport herself.

She left her mobile back, a goodbye on a paper above the kitchen table and sent an email to her sister before heading back to Alaska. She hasn’t been happy there - she hate Homer with all her strenght - but now at twenty seven she believed that if her sister has gone there after the death of their parents, there should be a reason. There should be some wisdom on doing so, she would hold into the possibility of, onde againm have a new beginning.

In the night she got to the city, the snow was falling. You could also see the Northern Lights.

“Et je m’en vais au vent mauvais

qui m’emporte deçà, delà,

pareil à la feuille morte*”

__________________________________________________

¹ – The long sobs of autumn violins hurt my heart in a faint monotony.

² – All suffocating and pale when the time has come

³ – I remember the old days and I cry

*- And I leave in the mean wind that takes me back and forth like a dead leaf

(another original character for a RPG. Autumn is the second of four kids all named after the season they were born, Summer being the first and Winter, the only boy, being the third - their personalities are related to the seasons they were named after, one thing that we really enjoyed playing with. the quotations regarding the fall were taking from wikipedia, the ones in french are from a poem called Chanson d’Automne by Paul Verlaine. the temperatures are in celsius because it is just easier to work with for me and US has to get over farenheit and join the rest of the world soon. the idea is to see Autumn’s life as a circle; it starts and ends in the same state, with the same weather. that was the start point of when I started to roleplay with her - unfortunately not for too long)