#and make them emotionally compelling pivotal plot pieces in the backstory of the world
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also sprach: roaring rain in may
#the alchemist code#for whom the alchemist exists#tagatame no alchemist#gale shitposting#ta ga tame no alchemist#look. i'm still mad at the also sprach events#how dare you take boring paste pointless characters#and make them emotionally compelling pivotal plot pieces in the backstory of the world#anger. hatred.
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THE BISEXUAL WYATT MANIFESTO: PART DEUX
The previous post simply got far too long for me to put it all in one place so here is part the second. Put below a cut and my apologies to mobile users!
Part one here.
PART THE SECOND: POURQOUI???
But why, Mads, you shout? Why decide to headcanon a character as bi? Is it just so you can write your dragon porn?
maybe
Ahem.
Listen. I love diversity as much as the next person. Yâall know I do. I mean, Iâm a huge fan of Rufus and Jiya, and Denise, queen of my heart. But⊠I mean we already have a het ship with Jiya and Rufus. And I feel like, yâknow, Wyatt being white AND cis AND male AND straight? Feels like a little much, yâknow? And thereâs no reason for him to be straight, he just IS, and that feelsâI mean whereâs the whole backstory about it, right? And it feels a little illogical to have⊠I mean I donât have any friends who are white and straight and cis male. It just feels unrealistic.
Okay, okay, extreme salt aside and mostly out of my systemâŠ
As a character, even in season one when I did like him, Wyatt is boring. Heâs the same white straight male soldier/law-and-order character that weâve seen in literally every single piece of science fiction since the dawn of time. You will find an exact copy of him in Stargate SG-1 (my apologies to Jack OâNeill), Stargate Atlantis (sorry JohnâŠ), 12 Monkeys, Sarah Connor Chronicles, Terra Nova, Battlestar Galactica, Andromeda, Star Trek Enterprise, Eureka⊠and thatâs not even touching all the mystery/crime shows (CSI, Bones, Criminal Minds, NCIS, Law & Order, Blue Bloods, Take Two) and military shows (SEAL Team, 24, etc). Heâs got a dead wife, fantastic, so does the Punisher, so does Sam Winchester (also created by Eric Kripke), so does GARCIA FLYNN, another character on the show, and Flynnâs wifeâs death actually ties into the bigger mystery of the show. By God, if youâre gonna fridge a wife at least make her fridging the entire reason the show exists.
Yes, you heard me. Think about it. If Lorena and Iris Flynn donât die, then Flynn never wants to go on a vengeful rampage, so Lucy never chooses to give him the journal, so he never steals the time machine⊠killing Lorena and Iris was the biggest mistake Rittenhouse ever made. If youâre gonna play the dead wife card then by golly at least do it like this and make avenging her death the entire reason for the show.
So not only is Wyatt the same cookie cutter character weâve seen in every TV show ever, heâs also a repeat of Flynn. Heâs not just boring, heâs redundant.
Wyatt is also the only character on the show that you could replace with someone else without changing any of the main plot. When I originally decided to do a fic where the team comes back to find one of them was erased from existence on the trip, I knew it had to be Wyattâerasing Lucy would change everything (which I explore in The Void is Open), erasing Flynn would take them to a world where Rittenhouse has won, erasing Rufus would mean potentially no pilot⊠you see what I mean. But Wyatt is very neatly replaced with Dave Baumgardner in 1.14 and shows us that Wyatt is, literally, replaceable. Of course he isnât to Lucy and Rufus at that point because they care about him but for writing reasons? For plot? Literally any soldier would do. Any. Denise could hop in there with them if she so chose.
Now, all this makes it sound like I dislike Wyatt. And I didnât in season one. I quite liked our puppy. I liked him for two reasons: 1. He had a lot of potential and 2. his character mirrored/paralleled Flynn and I saw a copious amount of opportunities with that.
Both Flynn and Wyatt have lost their spouse. Both Flynn and Wyatt are soldiers. Wyatt had an abusive father and given that Flynn goes on a potential suicide mission for his mother but we never once hear him mention his father (he might as well not have one for his importance to Flynnâs life), Iâm taking a guess that Flynnâs father wasnât all that great of a person either. Both Flynn and Wyatt risk everything to save the people they love and both pay heavy prices for it and become people theyâre ashamed of (Flynn all of season one, Wyatt in 1x13). Both Flynn and Wyatt care deeply for Lucy and look to her for guidance.
Wyatt and Flynn mirror each other. One is willing to break rules, and to forge his own path, while the other follows rules and is scared to strike out on his own. Both of them struggle with identityâWyatt has no idea who he is now that Jess is dead, and Flynn believes heâs turned into a monster and who he once was is lost. Taking advantage of that mirror makes for compelling storytelling, and the writers failed in that in season two after setting it up so beautifully in season one.
The fun thing is, these parallels become even more poignant if you make Wyatt bi and have him be attracted to Flynn (and is a convenient shortcut to bring those parallels back to the fore).
We touched in the previous section how itâs easy to see Wyatt as attracted to Flynn and thatâs why he lashes out so much, and indeed how that is the only rational explanation for why Wyatt is so goddamn against Flynn the whole time.
Letâs dive into that, shall we?
Of the original trio, Rufus and Lucy have ample reason to dislike Flynn. Wyatt? Has none. Flynn makes things personal with Lucy right out the gate, and Rufusâs family will be hurt if Flynn isnât stopped. But Wyatt is just supposed to see Flynn as an enemy soldier. No personal vendetta involved. And before you say rivalry over Lucyâmost of Lucyâs pivotal moments with Flynn in season one are without Wyatt present, and the ones she does have in front of Wyatt arenât automatically read as romantic. Wyatt himself doesnât even admit heâs got feelings for Lucy until season two, and as far as he knows, Lucyâs still dealing with Noah.
But Wyatt hates Flynn. As weâve seen in our examples, he reacts to Flynn with a violence that is missing from Rufus and Lucy. And there is no reason for that violent dislike to be there.
Unless Wyatt is attracted to Flynn and is scared of that from internalized homophobia.
If Wyatt finds Flynn attractive, and has internalized homophobia from, yâknow, growing up in Texas and having an abusive father and going into the army, then his anger towards Flynn, his stubbornness, his refusal to listen to Flynn (because if Flynn is right about things and Flynn is an okay guy that opens the door to other more âdangerousâ thoughts), and his tendency to react to Flynnâs time with Lucy with such angerâit all makes sense. The last one is partly about Wyattâs jealousy and possessiveness over Lucy but if itâs coupled with attraction to Flynn it makes even more sense.
Having Wyatt behave this way simply doesnât hold up. It relies far too much on the audience making leaps of logic about Flynn and Lucyâs relationship in season one and assuming that Wyatt and Lucy are meant to be together, without enough evidence for the latter and Wyatt not at all present for the former.
If Wyattâs bi, it all makes sense and is logical and again adds another dimension to his character and to his interactions with Flynn.
Monkey Brain: heh heh Wyatt and Flynn kissing is hot as fuck
Wyattâs toxic masculinity becomes even more interesting and important (and make more sense) if Wyatt is bi.
In this meta here (my first for the Timeless fandom!) I talk about Wyatt and his toxic masculinity so to avoid repeating myself howzabout you go read that and come back mmkay?
âŠ
You done? Perfect. So. Now that you understand where Wyattâs toxic masculinity comes from and how he displays it in canon, I can say this:
Wyatt being bi forces him to confront his toxic behavior in a unique and powerful way that he can no longer ignore.
Part of Wyattâs toxic behavior is that his behavior is specifically based in the masculine and the patriarchal. And so most of his bad behavior is rooted in how he treats his romantic interestâwhich has been Lucy and Jess.
Wyatt was, by his own admission, jealous and possessive towards Jess. He didnât know how to relate to Lucy when she was no longer a romantic option, so he keeps trying to be romantic with her instead, and his possessive behavior comes to the fore as he tries to control who she spends time with and tries to get her to be as emotionally intimate with him as she was before, despite his wife being back and that intimacy no longer possible.
Getting Wyatt to realize his toxic behavior is difficult, since so many people have bought into the lie that men are supposed to be territorial and possessive towards the women theyâre in relationships with. However, most heteronormative toxicity falls apart and is recognizable as harmful once we put it in a new light.
When a situation is bad, you often need an outside perspective, or to change one of the circumstances, in order to see how bad it is. Wyattâs been lectured at by Lucy, Rufus, Flynn, and Jess, and he didnât see his behavior was unhealthy. But if we change one of the circumstances i.e. the gender of the person heâs attracted to romantically/sexually, then suddenly he has to look at his behavior towards that person in a new light.
Letâs take Flynn for example. Wyatt canât treat Flynn the way heâs treated Jess or Lucy. If he tries to be possessive of Flynn, not only would he be unable to, but heâll realize that itâs wrong of him to even think of it. Wyatt wouldnât find it natural to try and be jealous when Flynn talked to another man, because Flynn is a man, and he wouldnât automatically assume another man was flirting with Flynn, or that Flynn was flirting with that man.
Because the thing is, our society is pretty heteronormative still. Itâs genuinely hard to tell when someone is just being friendly or actually flirting, but we tend to really assume that when a man is interacting with a woman, one or both of them are flirting. With people of the same gender (or of non-cis genders such as trans and nonbinary) it becomes harder to tell, and a lot of the time we assume that itâs just platonic. So for Wyatt to become jealous over Flynn talking to a manâthat goes against the norm because it means heâs assuming romantic rather than platonic interaction, the opposite of what we assume when we look at two people of the same gender.
It would force him to take a second look at all of his behavior and choices. It would force him to realize that his behavior was wrong towards Flynn, which means itâs wrong towards Lucy and Jess, etc. It changes an element and so it forces him to see everything in a new light.
On top of all thisâWyattâs character is pretty stagnant. I believe thatâs why they brought Jess back, honestly: because without Jess coming back to complicate things, thereâs nowhere for Wyatt to grow. Forcing him to confront his behavior towards Jess was, I think, what the writers ultimately intended for him (the smart ones, anyway). I donât think they intended for him to end up with Jess at the end, at least not originally. There are things said by Shawn Ryan in interviews that suggest to me that they realized Flynn/Lucy and Wyatt/Jess was a more interesting dynamic than the originally planned Wyatt/Lucy, so they switched gears and planned to have Jess end up with Wyatt. BUT, whether a romantic reunion endgame for them was the plan or not, given the alley scene in 2x10 and other scenes in season two, I fully believe that prior to the nuclear bomb of dog shit that was the Christmas finale, the plan was always to give Jess a redemption arc and that Wyatt would become a better person through convincing her to turn double agent (and through becoming a father).
If you donât bring Jess back, thereâs nowhere for Wyattâs character to go. Nothing for him to do. Rufus, Lucy, Flynn, Mason, Denise, Jiyaâthey all have hugely powerful arcs and tough situations. I could go into them but thatâll send me off into another tangent that we donât have time for. Suffice to say, I can off the top of my head think of two internal struggles and places for each character to grow that would last a couple seasons. And thatâs just off the top of my head.
But Wyatt? You canât. Heâs got nowhere to go.
Bringing back Jess is one way that you can force growth and give Wyatt a new arc, but you canât just give a character one single arc. You have to give them multiple. No real life person is struggling with just one thing, weâre struggling with multiple things. Take Lucy in season two. Sheâs struggling with Rittenhouse, with her relationship with her mother, with her realizations about herself and what sheâs willing to do, with losing Wyatt, with getting back Amy, and with her growing relationship with Flynn.
Thatâs a lot.
Rufus and Jiya have their relationship AND Jiyaâs visions that lead to an arc about destiny versus free will, AND both struggling with the âwhat are we willing to do to win/who am I becomingâ arc.
Give Wyatt JUST Jess, and thatâs not enough. Itâs also something that, to do right, you have to stretch over Iâd say two seasons, seasons three and four. So you need something else to fill in more gaps.
Having Wyatt be bisexual and having him struggle with his sexuality gives him dozens of more opportunities for interesting interactions with other characters, it gives him more ways to address his toxic behavior (as we discussed), it gives him more ways to grow. Because we donât just grow in a straight line. We grow like trees, with limbs stretching up all over the place and roots digging in deep and crisscrossing everywhere.
Wyatt is a stagnant character. Giving him bisexuality gives him a way to continue to grow that isnât dependent on another character (Jess) and can be shortened or drawn out depending on how his other arc (Jess, potentially Lucy as well) plays out.
Having Wyatt be bi takes away all of his redundancy, and stops him from being boring, and stops him from being so easily replaceable. If a character isnât intrinsically tied to the plot (Rufus is there because heâs the only pilot, Lucy is a history expert and tied to Rittenhouse, etc) then you need to think of other reasons for the viewers to really care about them and Iâm sorry, but having a dead wife and then being stuck in a heterosexual love triangle doesnât cut it in the year of our lord 2016 (or â17, or â18, or any other year that follows).
And no offense to anyone struggling with PTSD because it needs to be addressed, but the whole âsoldier with PTSDâ has been done before and, despite making it a main feature in 1.05 The Alamo, it hasnât been touched on since. Not once. So thatâs I guess been thrown out the window by the writers as a plot device (although again that could be brought back by having Wyatt bond with Flynn and Flynn talking with him about shared experiences could be a way that Wyatt further develops feelings for him YOU SEE WHAT I MEAN!?!?).
It also, as I outlined in part one, explains all of his behavior. It takes behavior that made no sense and was toxic alpha male bullshit and puts a whole new and interesting and understandable spin on it. Note I said understandable, not justifiable, this does not in any way excuse any of Wyattâs behavior. But boy howdy does it make it a lot more nuanced and layered. Having Wyatt be bi suddenly opens so many goddamn doors for his character I canât even keep track. His PTSD, his relationship with his father, his relationship with Jess, his relationship with Flynn and Lucy, his time in the army, all of those things have new and boundless opportunities in them. It gives opportunities and explains and gives depth to one-note, shallow, cliche male behavior.
Not to mention, um, making him a repressed bisexual gives so many more opportunities for angst and hurt/comfort and all that delicious, delicious character conflict that we all love. Mmmm yes the precious. And, BONUS, it gives us character angst that doesnât necessarily revolve around a romantic pairing! You can give a character a sexuality crisis without giving them a person to be paired off with! Wyatt can have his crisis over Ian Fleming or Wendell Scott or Rittenhouse Agent No. 5, and figure it all out with only platonic assistance from the team. OR he can be pining over Flynn without Flynn having a clue because Flynn needs his love interests to hit him over the head with a baseball bat to get him to notice and even then it doesnât always work. OR have him worry about confessing to Jess and/or Lucy and fearing theyâll see him differently given their past sexual/romantic entanglements! ALL. THE. CHARACTER. ANGST. BITCHEEEEEES.
Finally, last but not least, why should Wyatt be bi? Because representation matters, thatâs why.
Up until now Iâve highlighted why Wyatt, specifically, as an individual, should be bi. But stepping away from him individually⊠why the fuck not make your character bi?
Itâs the 2010s. The world is finally waking up to the fact that LGBT+ people are here, we exist, and also having us as characters makes your ratings soar. People were ecstatic over The Day Reagan Was Shot, which focused on Denise and her coming out. Timelessâs diversity was a huge point in its favor and was a huge part of why critics loved it. Making, of all people, the most rough and tumble masculine manâs man of the cast be bisexual is important because it reminds us that anyone can have any sexuality, that there are no stereotypes, and that not all LGBT+ people are fashion gurus.
Iâm sorry, Wyatt, but itâs true, you are no longer allowed to dress yourself, Iâve submitted you to Queer Eye.
What could be a more powerful storyline for today than a man who was abused as a kid, exhibited toxic masculinity, and was clearly unhappy with himself as a person and looking outside of himself to someone else to fix him, come to terms with himself, come to love himself, come to say âhey I love who I love and I am who I am and fuck anyone who says otherwiseâ? What could be a more wonderful representation of the diversity and family bonding themes of the show then to have Wyatt, the insecure difficult-with-feelings small town poster for typical masculinity come out, scared of rejection, scared of their reactions, only to have everyone show him love and acceptance and unwavering support? To have Denise hug him and tell him she understands how she feels? To have Lucy tell him she doesnât see him any differently? For Rufus to joke this is why Wyatt can never choose a cereal and then reaffirm their friendship?
Having Wyatt be bi isnât just good for him as a character, itâs good for the audience, and it continues the themes of the show and continues to break down stereotypes and honestly, thereâs no reason for any character to be straight, either. We just ask âbut whyâ because straight is still the default in our heads and all deviancy from the norm must be explained and rationalized. But thereâs no need for that. Wyatt has the most typically heterosexual traits out of all of them, and heâs from a small town in Texas, and he went into the army. How powerful for people to see him come out. How wonderful. But Wyatt can be bi just because you damn well feel like it, because there shouldnât be a big list of reasons (although I do have them, clearly). He can be bi just because, well, thereâs no big tragic backstory for why Iâm bi. I just am. And so is he.
In conclusion: Bi!Wyatt is ten times more interesting, nuanced, and unique than Straight!Wyatt, it adds depth and opportunities for growth, it gives layers to existing storylines and character relationships involving Wyatt, it explains his behavior and makes it more understandable, and it gives us needed representation.
My monkey brain adds that the opportunity for humor with this is also boundless and honestly I agree, good job monkey brain, you get a treat.
Thank you for coming to my TEDTalk.
#wyatt logan#timeless#timeless meta#wyatt meta#Wyatt Logan's Bisexuality Crisis#koortega#tagging her since she sent me the original ask
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3 and 4!!! gimme ur opinions on cliches!!!
3. What are your favorite clichés?
I am a big old sucker for found family. I am a major proponent of the belief that family does not have to come from blood. As someone from an admittedly complicated family tree, I understand that those related to you by blood can be either your most faithful supporters or your cruelest betrayers. To see someone who has experienced the loss of loved ones find a new place to call home amidst people of all different upbringings, religions, races, etc. is somehow sentimental to me.
Um, enemies to friends to lovers? Yes please! I eat that up for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and then go back for seconds. Iâm much more apt to ship two people who bicker like an old, married couple than the two shooting each other googly eyes. So long as the reason for their initial antagonization was not an innate, immutable opposition in their core values, I believe these types of people can be best suited to one another because they can challenge each other to grow whereas more like-minded couples instead stilt character development.Â
Weird one: widows working through grief. I am not a woman. My mother was not a widow. But there is something that I innately connect to when watching a mother and/or wife losing something so precious to them, mourning along with them, and then watching them find a new, redemptive life. TheÂ
And, as a surprise to absolutely no one: prophetic visions. When done correctly, this can add so much crypticness and intrigue to the plot because have a taste of what is to come without being able to discern the flavor. Reading peopleâs crazy conspiracy theories about the future of a series is my favorite pasttime, and nothing stirs up the insanity like a well-written prophecy.Â
Other favorites include: the resident flirt with the tragic backstory (Zelos Wilder, Iâm looking at you), small pure children trapped in a corrupt world (*cough*Quark*cough*), name changes (from Princess Garnet to Dagger), characters that cut their hair at pivotal moments (yes, thatâs you, Sakura), and a thousand others you have to stop me i could keep going forever
4. What clichés do you hate the most?
How much time do you have? Ugh, my friend, there are so many. Itâs sad, Iâm picky - I know...but I canât help it.
ALRIGHT, first on the chopping block: unnecessary deaths and resurrections. You didnât know what to do with that character? Guess theyâre dead! Aww wait, now the fans miss them. Guess Iâll bring them back to life with no canonical logic to justify it! Look. I am a big fan of resurrection and character death - but only when itâs done correctly. I find sooo many authors who have no idea how to utilize these weapons in their arsenal, and are instead just killing of their characters and their readers.Â
Awkward flirting. Good freaking gosh, does any author have any idea how to seduce someone? Or just, you know...talk to another human being? Attraction, be it physical or emotional or sexual, is not a simple switch you turn off and on. Not everyone is gonna be strutting around like theyâre hot stuff and everyoneâs fawning over them, begging to run off to bed with them. People have types. People can be attracted physically but not emotionally and vice versa. That, and incompatible partners. I see a loooot of forced, uncomfortable pairings in fictional works, regardless of whether theyâre movies or books or comics. What I want from a healthy, functional couple is for them to challenge and complement one another - not just look hot together.
And the last major one would be possession. Weird one, right? Itâs because I rarely see it done right. Suddenly, someone just starts laughing maniacally and having sadistic tendencies and everyoneâs just like âwow, theyâve changed...sigh.â UM NO! Your friend has a demon! Why is everyone okay with this!? But the real problem is that people use this as a cheap way to forgo addressing the real issues inside of people. They were an evil king? Itâs fine, they were possessed. They were selfish and ruined their friendsâ lives? Demonâs fault, not theirs! No. Not true. Itâs a much more compelling plot with a greater opportunity for quality character development when they canât just pull the possession card and call it a day. Make your characters address their issues. CALL THEM OUT ON THEIR CRAP! And if nothing else, if youâre going with the possession plotline, maybe, at some point, address the fact that the real problem is that they either: A.) willingly accepted a demon into their body or B.) put themselves in a position where demon possession could and likely would occur (such as attending rituals or cult meetings, trespassing into those forbidden woods no one ever returns from, or just straight up summoning a spirit for the lolz)
Other random ones include: neverending descriptions (I donât care how good you think that food tastes, George R.R. Martin, Iâve been reading about this brunch for eight pages and I never want to look at a piece of mutton again), repetitive/obvious/illogical betrayals for shock value, etc.
Thank you for participating in this weekâs Author Thursday ask game! If anyone else would like to participate, please take a look at these 20 questions and submit one to my inbox before the dayâs end :)
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