#and the ones i find very disappointing and their wrongs annoying or truly infuriating lol

[vegaseatsass]

Even though I have very strong feelings about who I support and who I find disappointing and/or unforgivable in the DFF ensemble, I get sooooo exhausted by arguments over who the narrative is "going" to punish or "should" punish. I'm really hoping this is going to be a story where the narrative chips fall where they may and the audience is allowed to decide for ourselves who we sympathize with, and for ourselves whether the ending is bleak or bittersweet or satisfying or hopeful. Kinnporsche did that so well and DFF shows every sign of heading in that direction.

[thefudge]

scattered thoughts on sanditon so far 

this is a fun romp from andrew davies and there’s a lot to like and be invested in

but i do have some observations/ gripes

obviously davies is going for a modern/sexed up adaptation of austen and i have mixed thoughts on that, cuz there’s a lot of interesting stuff you can do with that, but you can also botch it up big time (i’m glad he didn’t do this to p&p back in 1995...i wonder what that adaptation would’ve looked like today. probably full monty darcy, lol). so i think some elements verge on the ridiculous, for instance having almost every dude in this show strip naked in front of a crowded beach several times in a row. ditto for theo james. i don’t mind the view (hehe) but i think it’s inserted awkwardly at times. like okay, we get it, it’s a beach resort and we’re trying to make austen edgy in 2019.... just maybe indulge a little less and literally keep it in your pants. 

this being a more modern adaptation i don’t mind hair and make-up anachronisms, but i DO mind the fact that rose williams sports this really weird shade of fuchsia lipstick in almost every single scene. stop iiiit

speaking of which, rose williams is a cutie and i loved her on reign, but i don’t understand what she’s doing with her face in this series. don’t get me wrong, she does a good job of making charlotte very likable, but the only way she can express...anything, really, is by making these confused faces, like a child practicing frowning in the mirror. it’s...really awkward. and she does this all the time, whether she’s happy or sulky or nervous, she just always looks like she’s trying to figure out the fibonacci sequence.  i mean it’s hilarious when u have theo james going all gruff to her about his feelings and rose williams is that gif of the blond lady doing math in her head. her acting is pretty good otherwise, but those faceeeees.

esther denham is my goddamn FAVE, gosh i love a Disappointed Queen and i’m glad she’s getting away from that boring skeevy brother. for once the incestuous siblings didn’t do it for me at all (which is pretty much the point lol). there’s nary a dude more uninteresting than edward whatshisface, my gaaaawd (also, davies trying to ramp up the sexiness with those scenes of edward brushing her hair or doing her stays...lol, sir, this rly isn’t your strength i’m sorry)

but i have to say that i thought esther and clara would be a thing. because my gosh, the chemistry during their scenes! the way they’d glide past each other with utmost contempt, while being disquieted by each other @___@. i mean it’s an austen adaptation, so i guess they’d never go there but!!! i need fic (would’ve made clara more bearable at least. i appreciate her character objectively cuz she’s an interesting pseudo-antagonist and you don’t get many of those, but blerghh. she was insufferable)

i was kinda (actually very) disappointed that the relationship between sidney and his ward, georgiana, wasn’t really developed. like there’s one more episode to go (as far as i know?) and they’ve barely scratched the surface with them. i mean he’s halfway decent to her now.... but ehh. i feel like this was a missed opportunity. after all, this was austen’s unfinished novel, so andrew davies & co could have added more material between these two. this, to me, should have been the real heart of the series. 

i like otis as a character, but georgiana/otis was zzzzzz. i suppose that they’ll end up together? zzzzzzzzzz (i frankly ship her way more with arthur! she finds him infuriating! he’s a sweetheart! the shenanigans!)

that German doctor is the real MVP, i feel like he should be sanditon’s no. 1 bachelor. i mean the shower rod??? providing pleasure to all the ladies in town, what a hero 

the soundtrack is rly rad! and the cinematography

i love how the show captures austen’s growing interest in the industrialized modern world which was emerging in the twilight years of the regency and i feel like maybe the show should’ve invested more time in that modern aesthetic (steampunk!) rather the awkward sexual shenanigans 

so....i can’t delay the inevitable anymore, can i? sigghh okay here i go

sidney/charlotte...annoys me. 

HEAR ME OUT.

 u know that i love LOVE “enemies to lovers” and hate/love stories, i LIVE FOR THIS SHIT. 

and i was ready to gorge on this dynamic because it looked delish 

 but i felt like michael bluth finding the dead pigeon in the paper bag. 

from what i can gather, sidney is supposed to be a mixture of darcy and capt wentworth, “haughty” and proud, with a history of romantic disappointment, a brooding sexy hero with a heart of gold. but to me this dude just comes off as weird. 

there’s legit no reason for him to be THIS mean to this young girl he just met. he is not just an asshole, he is ridiculously over the top about it, to the point where he makes a fool of himself. i am FINE with a man telling a woman off, believe me, but it has to have some kind of motivation, some kind of reasoning behind it. here, it just feels like the plot needs him to be utterly shitty to charlotte so that “sparks will fly”. that first ep convo on the balcony??? wtf???? it was genuinely bizarre. i got weird incel vibes. and every time he lashes out at charlotte (at least in the first 4 episodes) it’s fucking silly, because it’s not like he lashes out because she’s scratching the surface of his innermost painful memories. no!!! many of their arguments revolve around basic things that he could easily clarify!!! which he does eventually, so like whyyyyyyyyyy. charlotte keeps telling him he’s being vague for no good reason and he still does it. it doesn’t make sense he’d be this guarded and outspoken at the same time. like, fine, keep that shit to yourself, don’t tell ppl, but don’t also get pissed at them when they don’t guess your mind. again, i love an antagonist dynamic when it’s done right, but here many times it’s just pointless bullying, it’s not sexy or fun or challenging. the writers keep making charlotte apologize to him about how “wrong” she got him and how he makes her doubt her judgement but it sounds fake to me. like a) this dude went out of his way to be a total assface to you from day one, b) none of that bullying was him trying to coax you into having a more complicated view of the world. when darcy rebukes elizabeth, he is hinting at her limited point of view. he’s not blatantly negging her or calling her stupid as this dude does. AND U KNO WHAT.

i’d be absolutely fine with him calling her stupid IF IT MADE SENSE WITHIN THE STORY 

like if charlotte had truly done smth stupid during the first episode, sure, fine, it’s somewhat warranted 

but for him to decide she’s an idiot for no other reason than her making some honestly super nice remarks about his brothers when he asked for her opinion is THE HEIGHT OF NONSENSE 

it’s even more nonsense when 2 episodes later he decides maybe she’s not that dumb after all FUCK U MR. EDGELORD

and it makes me pity charlotte cuz she’ll probably marry this dude and have to deal with him in his old age when he’ll be even more insufferable. 

and i totally get the appeal. i do! i mean their scenes are manufactured to make you want more of them, i see the chemistry, it’s there (and we’re already at a point in the series where he’s trying to make amends) but at the same time i’m put off by this dude’s intensity, cuz it’s not the hot kind of intensity...it’s more like he’s a giant dumb baby who breaks things. meh. theo james is very pretty tho, and he is doing the most with his character (that voice def helps!). but i wish this antagonistic relationship had been written better, because it could’ve been glorious

this is why i think sidney/georgiana should’ve been so much more present. just like darcy has his georgiana we need the humanizing element, we need to see more variety from this dude than just “guy who clearly needs anger management classes”. 

i’m pretty sure i’m in the minority or possibly one of two ppl not won over by this romance, and i can’t lie and say i don’t root for them. too much of this show is predicated on their clashes for them not to work it out and get together, but boyyyy do i wish they’d done it a bit better

i almost feel like a reylo anti lol, but at least kylo ren doesn’t neg rey every single time they talk 

also, i go back to rose williams’ faces because they just rly enhance how clumsy this dynamic is. theo james is doing byronic asshole 2.0 and charlotte looks at him like he’s developed a smell lmao. i mean the scene where she catches him naked? she turns around and FROWNS in this rly bizarre way, almost like she noticed a growth on his dick lmao it’s that bad 

anyway i totally get the appeal, but i also know what i want from this kind of dynamic and...this ain’t quite it 

honestly i think i prefer charlotte/cute architect guy whose name i don’t remember right now! 

that being said, my fave moments of this show are the most austen-esque, where ppl don’t take themselves so seriously. i mean the adventures of the perennially-ailing parker siblings (arthur & diana)? deeeelightful. the pineapple scene? glorious

also it makes me sad that sanditon was left unfinished because to see austen tackling georgiana’s character in depth would have been so, so interesting 

in conclusion, the show’s a lot of fun but also frustrating in many ways

i hope davies doesn’t set his eyes on re-adapting p&p or other austen classics because ermmm i know i’m trash but i am kind of tired of these sexed-up “look how scandalous we are behind closed doors” adaptations. you can make the regency era feel modern and relatable without “shocking hand job in the estate park” pls and thank u. sure, the regency era was the inheritor of the sexually relaxed 18th-century, but it wasn’t that relaxed yall. ppl still kept their wits and bonnets about them.

still, i’m glad this show exists and that it tries to take risks, i just wish it took different kinds of risks, if that makes sense. like i am SO bummed i didn’t get into sidney/charlotte, u have no idea 

[dustydreamsanddirtyscars]

“Do You Believe in Miracles?“

Short answer: No. Not in relation to “the Future”. Not when it comes to Supernatural. Not when it comes down to exactly this phrase, these words, this question and the “miracles” it entailed. But believing and belief played a huge part in this episode and after having re-watched it when not being just about to fall asleep I have to say I really have a couple of issues with the story and narrative of this episode. I may get wanky in the following, you have been warned!

I hadn’t exactly been excited about this episode yesterday during first watch, but rather indifferent. Today however, I see the flaws of the episode - and there were a few - in much more colour. It’s no secret that I have my fair share of issues with this season and that I am sad and disappointed about how little Dabb has used the potential of the general set up, but I don’t mean to go into that again. I do however feel the need to type out my frustration with the most recent episode anyway. So fair warning ahead, just skip the rest of this post and don’t continue reading past this, because it will be very critical and quite possibly may contain some slightly angry wordings on my part. You have been warned.

So with that out of the way, here goes nothing.

“Cas Ain’t Cas”

I think the main thing that really truly annoyed me even more on second watch than on first watch is how we are just watching a repeat of a repeat of a repeat when it comes to Castiel’s story and it is enraging, because essentially we are back in S6/7 with Cas making decisions on the Winchesters behalfs in order to keep them save and “going dark” in the process as Dean so expositionedly said in their conversation right before Cas betrays him again to steal the Colt. We have had this over and over and over again and it just keeps Cas from ever growing or even reaching some semblance of closure or healing, because he tries finding purgatory to keep the Winchesters save and unleashes leviathan into the world, he tries to save the world from Amara by saying yes to Lucifer and now once more Cas - just like Kelly - is losing his free will yet again (and yes, that is of course the reason why the writers absolutely needed to name drop the “Team Free Will”-phrase as the last 15 minutes of the episode see Cas reverting back, back to a time where he used to believe in destiny and a plan, all of which he abandoned and had grown out of, something he had overcome, which is why Cas’ almost drugged out smile and his lines about him now no longer feeling lost and having a mission and faith again is so upsetting) and is brainwashed by an unborn nephilim child. Essentially Cas once more isn’t really Cas and ends up hurting those who really care about him most: the Winchesters. To put it plainly: I am tired of this charade, of the same story over and over again. Especially as the rest of the season had made such a point about Cas finally seeming to truly move to a place where he’d chose to become human even maybe, which still to me will be the only arc to make sense for Cas.

“A Sad & Angry Dean!Girl”

But it wasn’t just Castiel’s story that was frustrating, something I am really majorly annoyed by at this point - and yes, I can admit that I am probably biased because I am a Dean!Girl - is how the entire season sees Dean making amends, being compassionate and understanding, showing all the time how empathic he is, how well he can read people and also proves that he doesn’t hold on to grudges all that long anymore even when he would have every freaking right to do so. Dean has been shown to be the one character to be screwed over by any other character the most this season. It’s people leaving him all over again. His mom (as the Woman in White)? Can’t wait to get away from her sons. His best friend? Leaving again and making the same mistake all of them have made before by doing something behind the others’ back to protect them and by not being honest and open with one another making it so much worse. Dean has  shown concern and worry and has talked openly about his issues, but he isn’t met with the same treatment by others, instead he gets walked all over. By virtually anyone he meets. In seasons prior I would have felt content knowing this pattern would be broken and pay off at the end of the season, but we no longer live in Carver Era (dear lord, do I miss him), but Dabb is doing his thing and I don’t think that there will be a pay off in this regard, that there will be a focus on how Dean’s feelings, doubts and words have been rendered “not important” throughout the narrative by various instances, but how exactly that in the end will be the crux of the entire thing. I dont think that will happen, I don’t think there’ll be resolution. And it pains me for Dean, who tries so hard, but ends up hurt all the time by his loved ones - and the fact that they do things out of love for him doesn’t change anything about the fact that some actions still are far from okay.

“The Boyking Reloaded”

And last but not least let’s talk about the elephant, well the nephilim, in the room. I disliked this storyline and everything to do with Lucifer all along, but I just really dread how this storyline will continue to unfold in S13. Sure, I would love it immensly if Lucifer’s kid ended up as I said during live watch yesterday as rebelious as his father and would in contrast to him actually truly be on humanity’s side - it would be the biggest fuck you and lesson learnt for Lucifer and would bring him full circle and to walk in his father’s shoes, but let’s be honest. What are the chances the kid’s future will truly be this “dreamy wonderland” Cas and Kelly seem to see? With hellish squeaky sounds strewn in? And most of all what kind of story would they build from a world where everything’s alright? That doesn’t make for very interesting storytelling, simply because it lacks urgency and imminent danger. So while I’d much rather prefer the child to be at the very least portrayed as innocent, which was one of the key themes of the season, that exactly no child is born evil, but that the way we are raised shape and form us, I don’t think that option is truly anything to count on.

To me the thing they want to do with the nephilim is basically re-telling the Winchester story (and with that loosely playing with allusions that one may read as Sam and Dean not truly being brothers or that Sam may be a nephilim too). We have a mother (said to die soon after the child is born - sounds familiar?), basically called Mary by Daegon and very decidely and not very subtly working in the parallel here between Mary and Sam and how Kripke thought of Sam as a christ figure, etc.

Other Eyeroll-Worthy Moments of the Episode imo

Daegon: Seriously, such wasted potential for what the show could have turned into an interesting character. But I find it deeply infuriating how they basically limited her down to a power hungry fan girl of Lucifer, who just wanted to be with him and rule alongside him. Like... where is the feminism and emancipation in that? She was just following orders and yeah, the fact that Lucifer could torture her with his mind of course should let all alrm bells ringing for what Lucifer’s child is doing to Cas and Kelly no matter if it is honest and well intention or not - it remains mind control.

The fucking Colt: I mean, SERIOUSLY?! Wouldn’t Azael have thought of snatching the Colt from Dean’s hands and melting it into nothing in S2 too? He only needed it for the Hell gates to be opened, after that he could have just... destroyed it too. Like... if they really brought back the Colt to get ridd of it again in this fashion. Just... I have no words for such stupid decisions, not going to lie.

Joshua: He actually reminded me of Michael for some reason, but oh well... whatever. He’s gone now, so... why even make a big deal of the character? That said, maybe the show could bring Michael into the mix finally to get rid off Luci and his offspring. It would be interesting in so far as they also emphasized the “righteous man” bit. Maybe Dean will play an integral role in regards to the kid after all? Who am I kidding lol, the writers wouldn’t ever go there, because they don’t give a flying fuck about Dean focus.

The Impala and the Truck: I know people will say that I am overreading this, but the Impala as a symbol for Dean’s soul is “kidnapped” - lol literally as Kelly’s decision is driven by her child. Dean isn’t in control of the Impala, he has to stand and see his car drive off - kind of like he’s been treated and invalidated by multiple sources the season. So yeah, one may read this as a further possible connection between the kid and Dean, but that’s reaching. In any case, Dean fixing Cas’ truck is also rather symbolic of Dean���s role throughout the series and how he always tried to shoulder others burdens and help fix what’s wrong (even though of course he has helped messing up enough stuff himself of course).

So yeah, my biggest sadness over this season is how hollow it feels, how little emotion it conveys, it feels like the core of the show went missing somehow and I am left here standing at the side of the road desperately trying and hoping that maybe the Impala will pick me up and take me back to the time where I didn’t feel like this, but actually was captured and captivated by the stories of the characters of this small show called Supernatural that I love - which is why this season is so painful, because god, it can do so much better than this. So yeah, basically I am waiting for a miracle, but if SPN taught me one thing, there’s no such thing as miracles...