#and this is why they canceled our show

[teeny-tiny-revenge]

What bugs me about the discussion is that so many people seem to think being gnc is only a matter of clothes (plus maybe hairstyle and/or makeup), entirely ignoring that behaviour is definitely also a big part of it, and that gender presentation is so much more diverse than masculine and feminine (seriously, a lot of people are reinventing the gender binary; there's two genders, and they're masc and femme - I hate it here).

When people from his old life treat Stede as being gnc, they aren't only mocking his clothes. The Badmintons mock him for crying a lot and picking flowers, aka for being emotionally expressive, aka for behaving not masculinely enough. Which is btw also one of the things that makes Izzy snap at Ed in episode ten: it's not just the silk robe, the final straw is the way Ed expresses his emotions openly with the crew, the way he's pining and crying. These are direct parallels. The homophobic peers in both Ed's and Stede's lives punish their gender-nonconformity, and they punish non-conforming behaviour at least as much as non-conforming fashion choices.

Talking fashion choices, not all of Stede's fashion choices in season two are entirely his own. He has only one shirt to begin his journey with. Then he's given a uniform on Zheng's ship. I feel like the cursed suit is a very important bit to look at when talking about Stede's clothes, because it's the first item of clothing he chooses to wear, and it's flashy, flamboyant, a real statement piece. And he shines in it! Look at him making his coat tails swish. Is the coat feminine? Whatever. Don't care; I'm not the gender police, but what it definitely is is very Stede. Because regardless of where on the gender spectrum he swings with a given outfit, Stede loves a showy look. Stede likes his clothes to stand out. Also the extremely piratey look he dreams up for himself for his dream reunion with dream Ed is showy and flashy, with the sash and all. The least Stede outfits we see him wear in the entire show are the bland and dull outfits he wears back in Barbados, trying to make himself fit back in.

Also Stede wearing more masculine looks in season two have a flavour of trying to fit in to them. He wants to become a part of pirate society, and he's bending himself out of shape to do so. We see it in his behaviour in episode seven, and it might be worth considering if some of his presentation isn't part of an attempt to conform, yeah, but that's not where he is at all times, and it's not where he ends up by the time the plot has concluded. (And the conclusion is important, because that's where he ends up after all.)

Stede is experimenting with his presentation, in a variety of ways. He tries to find his middle ground. The way I see it, his more flashy and colourful, and yes, gnc look in season one is him trying to be true to himself at least this one way. He has little control over his own life. He is married off to a woman he doesn't love. He is forced into a family life he didn't want. He follows a career he doesn't enjoy. None of the big things in his life are him, at all. Fashion is his one way to express his own personality in his restricted, repressed life. That's his one bit of freedom. Then he leaves this life behind, and doesn't need that anymore, because he's a pirate now, he's free, and that includes being free to live his queer identity outside of choosing his own clothes. He can now express other queer parts of himself openly. He's in love with Ed, and he can say that, and live that. And I think for a while he is so focused on the goal of reuniting with Ed that he doesn't really pay much thought to himself and his own identity and what he wants outside of Ed. He has other priorities! It's only when he and Ed are together again and they are beginning to mend things between them that Stede really starts exploring his identity again. I think it's no coincidence that the captain voice and pirate training with Izzy bits and the red suit of looking absolutely fabulous happen in the same episode.

An interesting thing about Stede (and Ed!) and gender expression in the entire show is that they lose when they try to conform. Things go bad for them when they try to conform to gender norms. The whole Kraken arc is Ed violently throwing himself back into conformity, and it makes him hurt everyone around him as well as himself and it nearly kills him. Stede tries to be the man that society wants him to be after returning to Bridgetown, and it makes him hurt everyone around him and it ends with him getting nearly stabbed. Then Stede tries to conform to pirate society gender standards, with the drinking and the setting people on fire, and it hurts Ed, the crew, Stede himself, and nearly makes Zheng kill him. Conformity is punished by the narrative.

Both Ed and Stede win when they find ways to be true to themselves and live their queer identities and find their own balance. Stede, after his attempt at being not gnc, goes back to talking about feelings (instead of drinking too much and setting people on fire). He goes back to being a captain in his original way - talking it through and offering kindness to the people around him (which are mockable traits if you think being a manly man who survives by stabbing all his enemies before they stab him is the way to be).

So, is Stede less gnc in season two? I don't think so. I think it just shows in different ways, and some of it is down to circumstance rather than choice, and he abandons his most extreme attempt at confirming to masculinity after it turns out to be harmful. I feel like if (when) we get season three, we'll see both Stede and Ed being gnc in their own ways, neither actually masculine or feminine, but just picking things that work for them as individuals, because that's clearly where both their arcs have been heading across both seasons IMO.

Throwing my hat into the "is Stede really gender-noncomforming" ring because I've seen some discussion around it recently.

I think it's true that we can see in the show that Stede's style of dress in s1 isn't that different from other men of his class. He likes to wear much brighter colors, though, and I'd argue that he wears these clothes differently. Stede likes clothes, he likes dressing up, and he's often noticably more showy and flamboyant with them than others who wear similar suits (his all-white suit is a nice example). But sure, I'll concede that his clothing style isn't especially gnc if we're just talking about the style of clothes he wears in s1.

However, I think we're still supposed to understand that Stede is gnc, and that's because other characters treat him like he is. Multiple times in s1, we get other characters pretending to mistake him for a woman to mock him. This happens first in the pilot, by someone on Nigel's ship saying he "appears to be a heavyset woman in a dressing gown," so it's not just people from outside Stede's social class saying these things.

Maybe it's because I'm also a feminine gay man, but the fact that Stede wears more "masculine" clothing in s2 doesn't stop me from seeing him as gnc, either. It's about the way he wears the clothes, in a way that's kind of difficult to explain. I don't think he stops being a gnc gay man just because he's not wearing frills anymore. I think he's a gnc gay man throughout the show because that's just who he is, and it's less about what he wears and more about how he wears it.

[javelinbk]

John Lennon escorts a sick Paul McCartney after postponing their show in Portsmouth, 12th November 1963 - part 3 (part 1, part 2)

[jacobglaser]

Also, I don't care if you hate the show or whatever, don't be a fucking cunt about it. Already seeing some embarrassing shit.

[sestrahulk]

Orphan Black: Echoes showrunner Anna Fishko on bringing back Tatiana Maslany:

Fishko reveals that Maslany was approached about returning, but because of scheduling conflicts she was unable to do so. But the showrunner says: "We tried and we thought about it, we had a little episode for her to return that we were sort of holding onto for a while, but in the end it just didn't work out, which was too bad." When asked if she'd like to see Maslany return as one of her Orphan Black characters in future, Fishko adamantly says: "I'd love to see her come back." The challenge now, then, will be on viewers to make that come to be.

Source (contains major spoilers for season 1 of Orphan Black: Echoes)

[naivety]

very weird to frame your abuse apologia as being aware that the writers intended to illustrate a mutually harmful dynamic and not an abusive one. when the writers in question also wrote the line 'once you put it out there, they [the audience] decide what it is' because nothing you ever create has any innate definition. when the writers in question decided to racebend major characters and then showcase them being harmed by white or nonblack characters in a repeatedly racialized pattern when they Did Not Have To Do That and then genuinely or disingenuously decide to dialogue about their directly or indirectly illustrated racialized dynamic of intimate partner violence within and outside the narrative. like to be quite honest it does not matter what they intended because this is what they made and this is how it Looks to a notably large amount of people. who just happen to be interpreting it wrong? according to what metric? the very metric they say Doesn't Work in their own fictional creation? ok

[kylosbreedingkink]

I find it really fascinating how cult like fandom spaces are. Ones I've been in such as kylux, or ones I've observed from the outside like Sherlock, reylo, Dr who, our flag means death, and so on.

Echo chambers hyping each other up, feeling like only they truly understand a show/film/whatever, blindly copying what someone with the most followers says. Having a complete disconnect from reality and how people actually behave towards one another in society. Throwing around accusations, often false, but heinous in nature to try and manipulate others into doing what they want, or ostracising people for not following the status quo of the fandom.

And then a complete lack of self awareness that they are in this echo chamber, that they might try say that they're open minded and all that but they truly aren't when someone with a different view on the show comes along. Very much you can have your thoughts but don't dare share them and upset the nature of the echo chamber.

I've seen it with my own eyes on a private kylux discord where a perceived slight, truly only perceived as the person being spoken about did fuck all honestly, but how the group just went in circles again and again adding more shit onto this persons supposed fandom crimes which there just wasn't any evidence for. But enough people said it that it was true, and pointing out otherwise was not a good idea.

And also the complete lack of self awareness a fandom echo chamber with a history of doxxing and harassment when they look down and claim to be better than a different fandom, also with a history of doxxing and harassment.

We know fandoms are toxic as fuck but when people are in a fandom, being like Thai, they just lose all sense of credibility and go full on into the cult like mentality. It's just like the right wing conspiracy theorists types of people overthinking things and hyping one another on the most bullshit thoughts until everything thinks they're true - as of course what they're saying is true, everyone else around them is saying it. The one saying otherwise is just a hater.

[fast-andthe-curious]

THEY PUT GOOD OMENS ON HOLD NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

UGH FRICK YOU NEIL GAIMAN

[cator99]

I always get detained at da border because PROFUNC never ended but basically I'm like if a targeted individual didn't even care

[aeolianblues]

do people like. Not realise that it is possible to be critical of two things at once or

[cowboy-robooty]

im so glad i live under a rock and never look at anybodys posts ever bc omfg me when gus shows me her feed and i keep getting mad like every 9 things i see because i go "thats from the dears outro. does anybody know thats from the dears outro. do they care" and keep seeing people use anime ops/eds or niconico douga meme songs thinking its a tiktok song and not from the source LIKE OMG. IM GOING TO KILL EVERYBODY AND THEN MYSELF.

[strawberryscorp]

albus comes home after having a bad day and collapses into scorpius's arms

scorpius could be doing anything but he'd pause and play with albus's hair while letting him rant about his day

[thenwethrowitonthefire]

Shout-out to everyone who survived a "fun" easter with the family

[void-of-unparalled-chaos]

Idk who needs to hear this, but if you think you are annoying and that no one likes you, just be glad you aren't my Earth Surface Processes professor who is so awful at his job and so hated by his students that we had an insult tally on the whiteboard during our 2 hour study session.

(Do not feel bad for this man. He absolutely deserves it.)

[writtenin-blood]

All these high ratings and extreme popularity and yet they cancelled it? I also checked several different sites that rate the shows on Max by popularity and OFMD was on nearly every single one.

Now isn't that INTERESTING

[harryforguccy]

idc what people say but I like Chappell Roan, I like her attitude and her approach to fame, if she doesnt like it or doesnt want to do it or be forced fed to say some things that other people with heavy media training have done then good for her like I love that she's like fuck that shit. If she doesnt want to mold herself to your idea of being famous or doesnt "deserve" fame then who cares but she is so refreshing.

[little-cereal-draws]

I am actually furious. There are tears in my eyes and I'm shaking with rage. what the ever loving fuck