#all the thinkiness

[destinationtoast]

On writing messiness, genre expectations, and satisfying endings

(AKA why did I mostly like the Ted Lasso finale?)

I found the Ted Lasso finale more satisfying than many people seem to have – which is not to say I found it perfect; it was an imperfect end to a messy season – but it made me feel a lot of big & enjoyable emotions while watching it, and it didn’t contain anything that left me feeling too frustrated afterward.  But I know a lot of people had a much more negative experience (and I feel empathy and compassion for that, as someone who has been deeply disappointed by past shows I was hugely invested in *cough* Sherlock and Game of Thrones *cough*).  This meta is me noodling about why I found the finale mostly satisfying, while not critiquing anyone else’s experience or expectations.  

It's been funny watching the Succession finale and the Ted Lasso finale in such close proximity, for a number of reasons (I loved both shows, in such different ways).  Maybe I'm just not tuned in enough to the Succession fandom to see it, but I didn’t see people saying things like, "I can't believe Succession set up X to stay in an abusive dynamic with Y," or “Z is in such a mentally unstable place and didn’t get help! So unhealthy.”   OTOH, I see a lot of people feeling unhappy that their favorite Ted Lasso characters weren’t given ideal/healthy/happy endings, which seems to be where a lot of the finale dissatisfaction arises.

A lot of this obviously comes down to tone expectations – people were presumably not expecting Succession to be kind to the characters in the end, because it's never been about kindness or healthy relationships, whereas Ted Lasso has often been.  But this got me thinking about how I nonetheless seem to have had different expectations for the Ted Lasso finale than some (many?) fans did.  Looking at some of the criticisms I’ve seen from people who were disappointed by the finale, I think I had different writing expectations from some fans, different genre expectations, and perhaps a different idea of what qualifies as a satisfying ending.  

Writing expectations. I didn’t think the finale could possibly fix most of what was wrong with S3, which was a mess.  S3 was often lovely, and I will enjoy rewatching it, but it was still a mess structurally – featuring weird pacing, odd choices of where to focus, and some unsatisfying storylines & character moments.  And because writers are only human – and also working with a lot of behind-the-scenes constraints & S4 negotiations & late rewrites – I didn’t think the finale would be able to do any last-minute miracle saves.   I didn’t expect any grand plan to become clear, or all/most of the loose threads to get tied up.  But I went in open to the idea that I would enjoy the finale for where it took the characters, given the messy journeys they’d already been on by the end of episode 3x11.  (This was tempered by my having hoped in vain for the writers to miraculously make sense of everything/tie together all the messy threads neatly in a finale before, and having never seen that happen!)

Genre expectations.   I think many fans watching Ted Lasso were expecting that the show was going to give an unambiguously happy ending to all the main characters for genre reasons.  Some saw it as a rom-com – a story leading to romance(s) and some form of happy ending for all the main cast – because the show featured a number of rom-com elements and references, as well as some romantic storylines.  And I think some (an overlapping set) saw it as a particular kind of hurt/comfort narrative – a story about triumphant personal growth, about overcoming adversity & trauma, and receiving only comfort & joy by the end of the story.  I can see the ending being disappointing with either of those genre expectations.  But the show I thought I was watching was about imperfect people trying to grow, to improve, to build better relationships, and to find ways to thrive – but doing so imperfectly.  I expected progress for most characters, but also backsliding – and for some characters to improve in some dimensions but not in others.  I thought the show was more about hope and effort than about success.  (And the show also wasn't about romance to me, even though I enjoyed Roy/Keeley in the show and want to read/write a ton of shippy fic about my OT3 and several other ships.)

Satisfying endings.  Given my genre expectations, what I wanted was not for the characters to all end up perfectly happy, nor for all the relationships to end up healthy or resolved.  I wanted characters to behave in ways where I could understand their motivations, and that were consistent with their behaviors through 3x11.  To me, the finale succeeded better at this than a number of episodes earlier in S3, where I was left scratching my head about why characters had made various choices.  And I wanted many of the characters that Ted had influenced to show some kind of growth/hope for the future, however imperfectly, because that fit my expectations for the kind of narrative it was (as described above – not complete happy endings, but messy and imperfect growth).  For me, the finale succeeded there, too.  To address a few endings that caused specific sore spots for other fans:

Beard/Jane: The one thing that seemed impossible to believe about Beard’s wedding was that Ted wasn’t there.  (That’s the main thing that makes me open to the “it was just a dream of Ted’s” theory – I think that theory has other difficulties, but it’s fun to consider, and I’m open to it.)  I know some people were upset that Beard & Jane ended up together because it’s a toxic relationship.  But while I don’t disagree, that doesn’t seem like a dealbreaker to me unless the show is a rom-com.  Beard has been on & off with Jane the whole show, and I didn’t see any signs that he was about to break that pattern.  It made sense to me that he would feel very conflicted about whether to follow Ted or stay with her, but also seemed believable to me that he would ultimately choose to stay.  I was very sad that he was leaving Ted, but it actually felt like personal growth to me, for him to feel like he could thrive without Ted.  (Lots of room still for personal growth in other dimensions.)  

Roy, Jamie, and Keeley: Roy and Jamie fighting about who should be allowed to try to date Keeley was stupid of them, but not unrealistically stupid, given that they're trying to figure out how to preserve their new relationship while also both loving her.  That’s backsliding, but they’ve also both grown a lot.  (Well, Jamie clearly has; Roy allegedly has, and I can see signs of that in a couple of episodes especially, but S3 has not served him that well overall imo, and I will require fic to fill in some blanks.)  I’m glad Keeley didn’t choose one of them – that shows growth on her part, I think.   I very much headcanon the three of them getting together eventually, but I feel like her choosing to focus on herself & KJPR for now (especially while they’re both being idiots) is a satisfying outcome.  

Jamie and his dad: As with Beard/Jane, a lot of the critiques I saw of the (dream?) montage reunion between Jamie and his dad were of the form “But that relationship has been toxic.” And I can understand wanting Jamie to be fully done dealing with the source of so much past trauma.  But I can easily imagine Jamie trying to cautiously have some limited form of relationship with his dad again.  I am not saying someone in Jamie’s position should do that, nor that it’s likely to lead to a healthy/easy dynamic.  But it does not seem inconsistent with where Jamie is as of the finale.  I think he’s grown a lot, and has more agency in his life now, but he clearly showed he was having trouble just ignoring his dad.  And many people revisit relationships that have caused them pain and have lacked resolution, for better or worse.  I hope and expect that with a strong set of friends/found family supporting him, Jamie will ultimately be okay.

Nate:  Okay, here I admit my headcanons are doing some heavy lifting, and I would have been happy if they’d clarified more of this onscreen.  But I cannot imagine that Nate was not offered a coach role when he returned – and I can easily imagine him refusing that offer and asking to be a kit man again for the short term, so that’s my headcanon.  He seemed to really be enjoying working at Taste of Athens as a waiter – for multiple reasons, not just because Jade was there – and this seems consistent with that.  I think part of what he learned from this season was that prioritizing fame & recognition doesn’t lead him to happiness, and that he has an unhealthy need to be admired/praised by the Twitterati, the press, etc.  I can easily believe that he’d want to step back from the limelight and prioritize working with a team that cares about him while figuring out what’s next.  (Especially as he has been pretty bimodal; overly humble and shy at first, and then overly recognition-seeking and angry about perceived slights – I can easily buy him backsliding into too-humble mode for a while).  I fully expect he’ll keep building more confidence again in a healthier way, and that he'll coach Richmond again shortly (even if the montage was just a Ted dream).  And if Roy was truly made head coach, I headcanon that it happened after a discussion about who should fill that role, and Nate turning it down.  I also would have liked a fuller resolution between him and Ted, but I bought the brief scene between them as consistent with where they both were emotionally at that point (I would not be shocked if Nate mailed Ted the full 60 pages later, though).

Rebecca:  Love that she’s truly over Rupert and figuring out whether she still wants Richmond in light of that – and I love the decision she arrives at.  Her running into the Dutch guy was the most rom-commy piece of the finale for me, but I didn’t mind it.  I’d been trying to figure out how on earth they could wrap up the whole messy psychic storyline (which I hated), and I had vaguely wondered whether – if she was indeed fated to be a mother – she might end up co-parenting with Bex, or whether she might end up with the Dutch guy.  I also started to think during the finale that she might go back to Kansas with Ted, but if she had done so, I wanted that to be the first step on a journey of world travel and self-exploration – not her getting together with Ted and co-parenting Henry. (I wasn’t ever opposed to T/R, but I personally felt it would have felt unearned if that relationship had only started up in the finale.  I personally really enjoyed the double trolling at the beginning of the episode, though, with Ted and then the bethonged Beard in Rebecca’s kitchen – amazing! XD )  Anyway, I’m fine with her ending up surrounded by her Richmond family and dating the Dutch guy.

Ted: I expected Ted to return to Kansas at the end, and I think that was the best choice, though a hard one. I think Ted adores Richmond and will be back visiting all the dang time, and I hope he may eventually move back.  But the “choice” Rebecca offered him to move Henry to Richmond now was an unrealistic one – Ted would have to negotiate that change with Michelle, and it’s a HUGE ask her (and possibly Dr. Jacob) to uproot like that and leave her family/friends/job behind.  So the right thing for Henry right now is for Ted to go back and be with him.   And I think that choice is very consistent with what we’ve seen of Ted’s struggles with anxiety last season and his more explicitly worrying about where he should be this season.  I think it’s a bittersweet choice for him, and he’s going to miss Richmond a lot, but I’m not worried about him being all alone.  With the way Ted makes friends, I am sure he already has a bunch of good ones back in Kansas, and that he’ll keep making more.  I very much look forward to a lot of reunion fic with everyone he’s left behind, though.  And I want AFC Richmond to come visit him, as well as the other way around!

I’ve read/been influenced by some good meta about some of the above points, and I’ll reblog some of it later.  But that’s the gist of where I’m at – the characters we love are growing and changing in some very good ways, but they are definitely still imperfect, and still themselves. And most things don't wrap up tidily with a full resolution, but that's okay.  For me, that all holds true whether or not the montage was Ted’s dream, and I am happy for that to be ambiguous (except for the part where Ted would totally be at Beard’s wedding).  But I’m very interested in hearing about the whole gamut of experiences people are having (and to hear alternate theories about genre expectations, etc)!  I can’t wait to read more meta, as well as so much fic, fix-it or otherwise. I continue to be delighted to be a part of the fandom for this show. <3

[twams]

[obsob]

despite, despite, despite!!

[tarysande]

The best part about coming back to the source material after a looooong time is you sorta get a fresh look at canon in comparison to whatever the dominant strains of fanon have become. Or, in fact, whatever your own dominant strains of headcanon have become.

I mean, yes, Garrus “I’m not a good turian” Vakarian gets infinitely cooler (and more competent!) by pretty much every metric as the storyline progresses. He does. But fresh out of ME1 and into ME2 through his recruitment, I find myself genuinely amused by how thin the veneer of badass is over a pretty dominant core of straight-up nerd sprinkled with idealism mixed with self-doubt.

When you have Garrus in the squad all the time (and thus get all his ambient dialogue and remarks), you really pick up on the number of times he calls out bad behavior, unethical actions, cruelty, and rule-breaking, especially in ME1.

He’s not actually a hothead who can’t abide rules of any kind. In fact, most of the time he’s pretty pro-law-and-order, and he gets amusingly hall-monitorish when people are breaking rules he considers important and worth following.

Fundamentally, Garrus chafes when his sense of what is just is at odds with what the authorities do about that injustice (or what they stop him from doing). And I would hazard a guess that the reason his actions seem so intense or harsh or "of course we should have shot down that ship in the middle of the Citadel" is indicative not of his impatience but of the degree to which he thinks the authorities have failed to uphold that justice. We know he can be patient. He's a sniper. His whole modus operandi on Omega is precision kills without civilian casualty. But when that long fuse finally burns down, he goes from zero to shooting down ships in the middle of the Citadel in what looks (from the outside) like a heartbeat.

And yes, injured pride hastens the burning of that fuse; he doesn’t like losing. Or admitting defeat. Or failing.

Having just replayed his recruitment mission, a few things really stood out to me this time.

The merc bands really hate him--and they also reluctantly admire him (he's described as smart, resourceful, dangerous, idealistic, brave, slippery; they all agree they only way they managed to get this far is by isolating him and employing dirty tactics). I mean, there's literally a station-wide announcement that Omega can return to "business as usual" once Archangel is out of the picture because he was disrupting things so completely.

The way Garrus blames himself for the deaths of his squad is so freaking turian. Failure reflects on the leader who places his people in danger they can't handle, not the individual who fails. Heavy is the head that wears the crown. Yes, Sidonis betrayed him, but the person Garrus blames the most? Is himself. For trusting Sidonis in the first place. For raising Sidonis to a position where he had the means and opportunity to harm others--and the weakness of character to turn coat, to save his own hide, instead of dying to protect the others.

Garrus mentions more than once that he was trying to emulate Shepard. And his tone always implies that he knows he failed because Shepard would never have let a Sidonis into the fold. Again, he's blaming himself. Like a good turian. Yes, he wanted to avoid the red tape and bureaucracy of C-Sec, but his code--Archangel's code--certainly aligns with Paragon Shepard's morality (with a Garrus Vakarian twist).

And since it wouldn't be meta without adding a Tara's Headcanon Twist ... I've always wondered why "Archangel" when it's such a ... human concept. But this time, when I noticed how he spoke about Shepard's influence, and how quickly he brushes aside the name when she asks him about it, I wondered if it wasn't actually his way of honoring the mythology of the dead woman whose example he was trying to follow. Not that Shepard is a God he's worshiping, but ... there is something about the way he talks about her. Garrus doesn't make himself over in the image of a God, though; he's the soldier, the right hand, the avenging angel responsible for carrying out divine punishments suited and proportional to the crimes committed, the rules broken, the selfishness or cruelty of the perpetrator.

[ao3commentoftheday]

While looking for something else, I found an old ask I answered about "ideal chapter length" in terms of word count.

I've been asked this probably a dozen or more times, and each time I need to take a moment and adjust my thinking to take the asker's point of view into account. Because the thing is? The only time I ever try to factor the word count into how I write a story is when I'm aiming for a true drabble.

For whatever reason, this difference in thinking stuck with me today and I actually considered why that might be. And I think it's because I'm in my 40s and the first 25-30 years of my life, any stories I was reading were printed on paper and bound into physical books.

When I imagine a novel, I still think of a mass market paperback on my bookshelf. An average one would be maybe an inch thick, probably in the neighbourhood of 300 pages. A long one would be maybe as much as two inches thick and 500 or more pages long. A short one was always nice to have because it filled in the gaps in the shelf because 200 page books were so much narrower. Or so it seemed.

When I started posting my fic online, I still thought in terms of pages. I'd type them out in whatever word processing software I was using at the time, and I'd usually get a chapter's worth of ideas into 3 or 4 pages. Turns out that's about 1000 words, which makes sense with the number of 1000 word essays I wrote in high school. I'd been trained to encapsulate an idea into approximately that length.

And that's what it comes down to. The thing that always made that question seem weird to me. A chapter isn't about how many words there are in it, just like a cake isn't about how many cups of flour exist in each slice. A chapter is a an idea that helps make up a bigger idea called a story, and it needs to be however many words that idea needs to be to get it out.

[isagrimorie]

One thing I want clarification on. Did Agatha use other witches' life forces to prolong Nicky's life?

Nicky's colicky and maybe sick, and they both haven't eaten for days. I don't think Agatha could produce a lot of breast milk because of that.

If Nicky had grown up, would he have inherited Agatha's siphon powers?

After that, Nicky's settled and even looks a little better.

Six years later, Agatha uses Nicky to lure unsuspecting witches to kill them, but they comment on how sickly and frail Nicky looks:

Then later, Nicky asked Agatha why she killed witches:

How does killing unsuspecting witches help you survive, Agatha? Or how does killing witches help Nicky survive?

And why does Agatha say that witches would kill them if they stayed long in their company?

The one time they don't kill witches when Nicky is sick... was the time Rio fetched Nicky from Agatha.

Nicky was not alarmed by Rio's presence and even went to her willingly without a fuss. This tells me, that when Agatha is not around, Rio and Nicky have met. Enough for Nicky to go to Rio without hesitation.

Rio reminds Nicky to say kiss Agatha goodbye.

Agatha loved Nicky so much.

Agatha can't heal, not for long. She can just stem the bleeding.

might have been right, if they stayed with a coven they could be safe and the coven could help Agatha with Nicky. But Agatha let her mistrust and fear of her fellow witch rule her.

Agatha and Nicky had six years. Really, though what is six years in the 350 years Agatha lived? A drop in a bucket. But it's a wound that's never healed because Agatha refuses to even process that grief.

Ghost!Agatha claimed that the Ballad she and Nicky created didn't mean anything.

The self-delusion and the lie. 'The song doesn't mean anything. It never did.'

The hugest of lies.

[sunlitlemonade]

what's better than making a suicidal idiot immortal

[thestarfishface]

tfw you have a loose collection of ideas for a new story but it's still really early on so most of it's really loose concepts and not anything solid enough to fully brainstorm, but you REALLY REALLY want to get to the point where you can DO something with it

I have essentially planted a mystery seed in the garden and am now staring at the little patch of soil waiting for something to happen and it's driving my CRAZYYYYYYY

[the-barefoot-hatter]

thinking about Billford again and besides the obvious toxic yaoi and doomed betrayal and mutual obsession appeal there's the like... soft hopefulness of it happening post-canon, post-book of bill

'cuz... no matter how much Bill wants to stay the exact same and never ever EVER change himself... he shouldn't. It's bad for everyone else of course- but it's ALSO clearly bad for Bill. He looks awful in Theraprism. And he should. Bad guy defeated and at his lowest point. But I don't want that to be the forever for him.

That's a mean ending.

Gravity Falls is all about growing up and forgiveness and letting go of things that hurt you. Changing your priorities. Rotting in eternal failed therapy or reincarnating into a completely different creature with no memories of everything is just death with extra steps. It's not satisfying.

But seeing Bill be genuinely sorry and want to get back in Ford's good graces but know how bad he messed everything up and definitely doesn't deserve any forgiveness- and the Pines extending a hand anyway? That's the good stuff!

idk it's just nice to think they COULD make it to a good place

[stagefoureddiediaz]

The Helena diaz of it all has me fascinated. I’ve said for a long while that Eddie’s real issues are his mommy issues and this episode just cemented for me that we’re gonna explore that and deal with it.

Because it’s Helena who forced Eddie to grow up to fast - because her husband wasn’t around much - so she pushed Eddie into de facto parent and husband role ls - selfishly filling her needs and ignoring the damage it was doing to her son (it is a form of abuse in my book).

Eddie then had the audacity to fall in love with and marry Shannon and get her pregnant. It’s why Helena was always so off with Shannon - she was punishing her. She is also punishing Eddie for all of this and his refusal to return to El Paso only cemented further her bitterness and resentment.

Now she does have Ramon back she doesn’t need Eddie any longer to fill that role so she is still punishing him and part of that is tied into her glee over now getting to parent Christopher - something she has always been intent on doing the doppelgänger just gave her the opportunity- as well as allowing her to further punish her son and his love of Shannon.

Her barbed comments about building a pool were all about showing what she can provide Christopher - how she is parenting him better than Eddie - it’s part of her mind games - making Eddie feel like more of a failure as a parent to his son.

The reality of course is that the reverse is true - Helena’s parenting is all superficial, flash and showy - it isn’t the hard day to day parenting when things get tough and you have to be the bad guy. While Eddie has made mistakes, there is nothing superficial, flash, or showy about his parenting. It’s why bucks comments about Eddie being a great dad are so important.

Eddie feel like a failure right now and that he is entirely to blame for everything. But in reality, while he does bear a bit of the responsibility, the truth of the matter is that he needs to learn and deal with the fact that all of it actually stems from Helena and her abuse of her young son - Shannon never stood a chance just like Eddie never has.

[zaacoy]

oh, to hold your whole world in your arms

[normalbrothers]

you know john's whole 'tommy i need a wife now because my kids are running around at night and i can't handle it bla bla ' is funny. because maybe if he got less drunk in pubs and spend some time at home, this wouldn't be an issue. and thinking of, on the topic of who's the most like arthur sr? you bet it's john.

[amagicbeyond]

okay confession time: I watched Good Omens when it first came out, and had a perfectly lovely time. It was fun and David and Michael are spectacular to watch and they were clearly having the time of their lives playing these characters together. I saw the love there and like, fully supported the ship in theory but could not for the life of me fathom how these two, who'd been dancing around each other for six thousand years or more, could possibly ever move out of the subtext and the dancing into something more explicitly romantic. I couldn't conceive of it, it didn't seem feasible. They seemed, to me, perfectly content to continue on as they always had, as the single most important person in each other's lives and the person each most enjoyed spending their time with, perhaps just a little more ready to stop pretending that wasn't the case. I didn't buy the holding-hands-on-the-bus thing. I couldn't read fic about them, no matter how brilliant or well-written! None of it seemed plausible to me. I couldn't see the pathway, the journey they still needed to take to get there. Not without another couple of thousand years to do it.

(I want you to know that I write this with full respect and admiration for those who've actively shipped it from the start - I'm just working through my own experiences as a viewer who wanted to ship it whole-heartedly but just couldn't manage it, and could never quite put my finger on why.)

When the heart shaped started popping up on all the promo materials for season 2, I thought oh no. He's gonna do it. How on earth is he gonna make me buy in?

Well.

I get it now. This is the angel and the demon who love humanity the most, who have made Earth their home, who have learned to revel in Earthly pleasures like food and drink and music and books and cars, not all at once but over time. It makes perfect sense for them, with the evident changes in their relationship in the years since we've last seen them, to finally endeavor into human touch, and to explore it together. Dancing. Human expressions of comfort, and love. Reaching out, a simple touch on the shoulder, or chest. A kiss, all wrong, for all the wrong reasons. A kiss, eventually, all right, made even more exquisite by the knowledge of the wrong one, and the journey they took to get there. Maybe someday more.

I know none of this is groundbreaking or new and everyone else saw it a long time ago. But I get it! I see the vision! I understand.

What was the point? The point is the best of humanity. They get to have it too, and to express it and wonder at it and learn it together. The point is love.

And I am fully on board.

[danganronpa96]

Oh, someone did a TvTropes page for Danganronpa96, if you want to know.

Yeah I did see it actually! There's even one for DR69 too

If anyone's interested in taking a look at them, here are the links:

DR69 -> https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Fanfic/Danganronpa69

DR96 -> https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Fanfic/Danganronpa96

I appreciate the people who made them, as going through both fics' story lines to pick out these details must take some time to do 🫡

[isagrimorie]

Adding to my collection of Agatha Notices something others haven't noticed:

The camera moved to Agatha noticing/eavesdropping for a reason.

This happens again in this scene:

Again, the camera cuts to Agatha who is watching and listening keenly about Billy's powers.

Very Detective Agnes of her (again, Rio's inquisitive look as she asked Agnes-Agatha: "Is this really how you see yourself?" the answer more and more becomes, 'yes'.)

Speaking of Rio-- I have a hunch that maybe, possibly, the endgame of this show is not just to convince Agatha she needs a Coven True and not just a Coven Two. It's also to convince RIO.

Because Three of Pentacles features not just Billy in place but also someone else wearing a green cloak:

The card shows the whole coven including RIO.

Sure, Rio is a cosmic being but in this show that emphasized Death is the Original Green Witch.

Rio is still called a witch, the witches claim Rio.

And as Lilia's Maestra said:

"A witch requires a coven."

Agatha and Rio might have been Coven Two-- but that's not enough. To quote About a Boy:

“Suddenly I realized - two people isn't enough. You need backup. If you're only two people, and someone drops off the edge, then you're on your own. Two isn't a large enough number. You need three at least.”

Agatha and Rio needed more than each other, they need a community.

They needed a True Coven.

[kiseichew]

Replication Error