#anti tgw

[pebblysand]

[on writing] the corruption of alicia florrick (or: 'show, don't tell' pushed to the brink)

i've touched on this really briefly already but i've recently engaged in a partial re-watch part of TGW (s1 to s5e2 - if you've also seen the show, you know why i stopped there) and i've been having a lot of thoughts about it, lately. this will probably be of interest to no one (apart from @tessiete, maybe, hello 👋 tess) but i still reckon it felt like something i wanted to write about, so here, this is my tumblr, and i can ramble on about whatever i want.

rewatching this show has led me to a lot of reflections about the portrayal of anti-heros in media. particularly: how to introduce one, and how to write one. and that's what i wanted to talk about here.

BACKGROUND:

for anyone who hasn't seen it, the good wife is a political and legal drama that ran on CBS between 2009 and 2015. it follows alicia florrick, wife of peter florrick, former US state's attorney for Chicago's Cook County. at the start of the show, she is presented as a housewife and a mother of two who, due to her husband's unconscionable behaviour (cheating on her with a sex worker and being accused of corruption in his office), is thrown into a sex scandal and turmoil that basically upends her life. she loses her house, her husband goes to prison, she has to go back to work as a lawyer - a profession she gave up to care for her family ten years ago - in an incredibly cutthroat and competitive environment, worsened by the 08 financial crisis.

now, as you may already know, a few years before the show aired, the early/mid-00s saw a resurgence of the anti-hero trope in american television. characters like gregory house or walter white became incredibly popular, as well as other main protagonists whose behaviour was portrayed to viewers as objectively immoral and objectionable, but for whom they were still encouraged to cheer (a more recent example of this would also be tommy shelby in peaky blinders). generally (though not always), these characters existed in a world of crime and/or drug trafficking, killed hundreds of people on a good day, but - deep down - kind of tried. had a good heart. or, at least, a moral code you could understand and relate to, or valid reasons for doing the things they do - even though the overall behaviour itself was criminal. even in the case of gregory house (who is not a criminal but still very much an anti-hero), he is someone whose impact on the world is at least partly positive because, well, he is a macho arsehole who treats people like absolute scum but, you know, he saves lives.

for a lot of viewers (and people who enjoy this trope - myself definitely included) the main appeal of these stories is this obvious tension between good and evil. no one is pretending these characters are good people - often, not even themselves. the interesting part is actually in whether you can (and should) root for a good person. and: this question as to whether good and/or evil exists, and this grey space in between. god knows i love reading (and writing) about that grey space. in the case of house or tommy shelby, there is something deeply fascinating about the knowledge that this person whose struggles you're coming to understand, and who you do empathise with, is objectively very problematic and questionable. these shows work because the viewer is constantly driven to question their own takes on the world, their own morals, the main protagonist's behaviour, and to try and understand their point of view. as a person, i'm generally pretty fond of this trope, because when done well, i find it very engaging.

MY POINT:

now, when it comes to the good wife, on the surface, alicia florrick is the complete opposite of the above. from the very beginning of the show, she is purported to be a Good Person™. she is dedicated to her marriage and to her children. she is intelligent and kind. she is a good lawyer and someone who exhibits a lot of empathy for her clients (in fact, the firm often assign her to "hand-hold" them). she is a bit of a relief. someone you can always root for, without having to check yourself and be like "omg, didn't she just kill three people in cold blood?"

and, of course, that is not to say she has no flaws. alicia is a fully-fledged person, and a very good character at that. she is a Good Person™ but also someone who is chronically incapable of making decisions. she can sometimes be cold and quite calculating. but, generally speaking, she is a Good Person™. she is trying to get her life back on track, to prove herself in her work, to raise her two teenage children as a single mother, and you end up rooting for her very easily. because her life is hard and even if you wouldn't necessarily react the way she does, or carry yourself the way she does (i - personally - probably wouldn't have tolerated peter's behaviour, etc.) you understand where she's coming from. the show tells you she is a good person, who is struggling and she is trying. it is mostly told from her perspective and really helps you see that she is always doing her best, and always having the best intentions (even though they don't always materialise). she's not some mass murderer, or sociopathic doctor who hates her patients, where you're constantly thinking: "omg, why am i rooting for this arsehole?" she is someone who tries so hard to be kind, and who tries so hard to always treat everyone with respect. because - again - she is flawed, but a Good Person™.

except, well, if you've seen the show, you know: she isn't.

and, if you have watched TGW, i'd be interested to know: think back. when exactly did you realise that? i don't mean: when did you start having doubts? i mean: when did you sit there and think "omg this woman is unbearable". for me, on first watch, it was probably somewhere between s5 and s6. on re-watch? probably as early as s2/3. i think everyone who was in the TGW fandom (and, to a larger extent, everyone who watched the show) had this thought once: when did this start? and where did Dark!Alicia (a characterisation i am stealing from @tessiete) come from?

and, honestly? looking back, i'm sorry to tell you this but: she was always there, you just didn't see it.

i only really realised this on rewatch but alicia is pretty much unbearable from the very start of the show. because, i mean, sure, she's a bit traumatised, but she's also: arrogant, self-centred, and incredibly hypocritical. she is (unlike peter, actually) a terrible parent. she is unforgiving of kalinda for Literally No Reason (other than archie and juliana not getting on, but that's a different conversation). she treats will appallingly, exploiting and toying with the fact that he's been in love with her for twenty years (which she very clearly knows), and after the event that must not be mentioned i am not over it romanticises their relationship like she ever gave a fuck about him. objectively speaking, and this throughout the show, alicia florrick isn't a Good Person™. she is a Fucking Bitch™.

and, as a writer myself, what i find very interesting about this show is that until the very end, you're never actually told alicia is a terrible person. you're shown it, and in hindsight, given Many Many opportunities to make that determination yourself, and yet, didn't it take us all So Long to stop excusing her behaviour? to stop being like "oh, but peter cheated on her," and "oh, but she loves them both." as an example, in s5, the show even almost succeeds in making you think will's reaction to her leaving the firm is an overreaction when omg if you look at the facts, it Really Isn't. think about it this way: if you were one of will's mates and he was telling you this story, you would be Out For Blood, wouldn't you?

rewatching this show has really made me realise that the "education of alicia florrick" (which the writers pitched was the overall arc of the show - or, also as you might see it, the "corruption of alicia florrick") is actually an example of how 'show, don't tell' can be pushed to the brink. because, this isn't even 'show, don't tell', it's 'show one thing, and tell another' and let the viewer come to their own conclusions. and, whilst i think that most people started out going with what the show was telling the viewers, there is a point where they stopped empathising with alicia and constantly excusing her behaviour, even though the show kept telling us she really was a Good Person™ and was #trying. there is a point where #trying becomes #pretending, and #pretending becomes fake and unforgivable.

and, this revelation arrived earlier for some than others but generally speaking, i think took a really long time to dawn on most of us. to realise that actually, alicia florrick is an anti-hero with very few redeeming qualities who is constantly and inexcusably toying with people's feelings and then excusing her repeated fuck-ups by the fact that she's #wounded and #trying, while still being presented like a hero. she is a Fucking Bitch™ because on top of this, unlike people like house or tommy shelby who are, in no way, shape or form, pretending to be good people[1], alicia and the show keep insisting that she is good, (really, trust her), and there comes a point where as a viewer, you have to look at it critically and say: nah, you're full of shit. and, i think that is what is most disconcerting about the show.

and, don't get me wrong, in hindsight, i believe this was one thousand per cent intentional. i don't believe this is an emily in paris type case where the writers wrote a character as a hero when she was in fact an awful person, and it took thousands of outraged comments for them to realise it. i think with TGW, it was definitely done by design. you see examples of alicia's terrible behaviour very early on in the way she parents her children (zach "watching" porn, for instance) but she always finds excuses for herself, and you initially lean into that as a viewer. like: oh, well, she's just a bit conservative. or: oh, well, it's hard being a single parent. the fact that this escalated into her appalling behaviour of going no contact with her own son because, oh my god, he got his girlfriend pregnant and dared hide it from his mother, shouldn't have come as a surprise. it's there from the get-go. and, it's not that the writers didn't know this, it's that they gradually made it more and more heavy-handed until it became unavoidable.

and, i think as writer, what's also interesting is: when alicia's true nature was revealed, it actually alienated a shit tonne of people. they truly lost a whole chunk of their audience because of it. i even stopped watching the show, and that's someone who wrote thousands of words of fanfiction for it. i remember telling a friend "ugh, she's just become too unbearable." and, i wasn't the only one. i know so many other people in fandom who dropped off around s6/7. whereas, there is a case to be made for the fact, as someone who actually loves rooting for Bad People™ and loves the anti-hero trope, i probably would have been able to stand her, had the show itself portrayed her as a problematic person to begin with.

but the fact that we had genuinely rooted for, and excused the behaviour of, someone who was objectively unconscionable for so long was so disconcerting and disgusting and disappointing that we... stopped caring? and so, whilst in hindsight, i do think the general idea of this was brilliant, objectively, the execution... wasn't much of a success, was it? it cost them a lot of their dedicated viewership. or: was it such a success that it rightfully alienated people? was this the objective all along?

because: is the main goal of a piece of art to cater to its audience or is it to make a point?

---

[1] small caveat with tommy who does sometimes seem to think he's a good person, but it never lasts very long.

[taylortruther]

I just noticed the lyric in the Great War about “somewhere in the haze got a sense I’d been betrayed” and then going back to anti hero music video where her alter ego teaches her “everyone will betray you.” Just hadn’t really thought about the consequences of that tendency within her and Joe’s relationship but of course it makes sense

yep! and in the midnights prologue, how she says she wants to save her relationship - from what? herself, of course

[jedi-enthusiast]

Ok, I just realized something kinda hilarious since I’m bouncing between writing TGW and writing my Fallout 4 fic ‘and still, we stand’

I love writing morally grey characters, but I absolutely refuse to write morally grey characters in Star Wars, because like-

Let’s use ASWS as an example:

Arryn- (MC) -has been through a lot of trauma, so she doesn’t trust people at all and- (because of the specific trauma she suffered) -her gut reaction to most situations is violent. She hurts people, she kills people, she lies, she cheats, she always expects the worst of people…all to protect herself from ever being hurt again.

Her emotions are completely understandable, given what she’s been through, but that doesn’t mean her reactions are right.

A big part of her character development is learning that she doesn’t have to follow the “hurt others before they hurt you" way of thinking and that, when they're given the chance, most people will choose to be good. Yeah there's still jackasses and cruel people out there, this is Fallout after all, but no one expects her to be particularly optimistic or even for her to change her way of thinking all that much.

What she learns is that she doesn't need to distance herself from the people she cares about to avoid pain, she can trust people and lean on them when she needs to, and that she doesn't always need to expect the worst from people---because, more often than not, they'll surprise her if they're given the chance.

By the end of the fic, I'll be honest, Arryn doesn't necessarily change all that much---she still doesn't trust easily, she's still pessimistic, she still has a lot of baggage and unhealthy coping mechanisms...but the point is that she's grown. She's trying to be better, whatever that would look like fore her.

...

I cannot do that with Star Wars.

Because with Star Wars so many people have this idea of- "oh, this morally grey/terrible person is correct because fuck emotional control and being a decent person" -for reasons I don't understand.

If I wrote a fic, like I wanted to, about a Sith who was being trained by Dooku---but who eventually flipped sides because she started to care about the clones and, through that, started to have her views called into question---and had the Jedi try to help her to which she, due to her trauma, lashed out at them...

...an unfortunate amount of people would say that she was in the right.

They would say that she shouldn't control her emotions, that her accusations against the Jedi and Republic are valid, that she did nothing wrong during the war and her apprenticeship with Dooku.

And, personally, I don't want to have to write a fic where I'll constantly be having to write a 4k meta in the author's note section about why she is in the wrong and it is bad that she's doing what she's doing.

Which fucking sucks because, personally, I think I could do a really fucking cool story with the whole- "Sith apprentice changing sides during the war and all the drama/emotions/etc. that comes with that" -and I think I could execute it better than a lot of the people actually making content for Star Wars.

(looking at you Felony and Headland)

But, due to the lack of media comprehension and the---frankly stupid as fuck---attempts of the anti-Jedi crowd to make the Jedi out to be the "bad guys" of Star Wars, I refuse to write the fic I want.

So yeah, there's my rant of the day.

Sorry if it didn't make sense.

It's 1 am.

[9w1ft]

In TGW Taylor describes how she navigated what she thought was a betrayal from her lover and how they found their way back to each other. Since you said you don't really believe they broke up back then, how do you view this song? I kinda think there must've been a conflict where Taylor thought K betrayed her with something to write it, even if it wasn't the masters.

i guess in a word i listen to it as taylor reflecting on a period of time spanning the 2016 election up until either 2020 or early 2021 when biden took office. i think that during this period of time where they had torn their banners down—the love blackout— the fog of war (the haze) preyed on taylor’s worst tendencies for paranoia and, hurt people hurt people.

i think the masters is so recent in the minds of the community at large, and a lot of people tend to forget Afterglow and how we have the line “put you in jail for something you didn’t do” on a song from the album Lover. so we have i-thought-you-betrayed-me-but-i-was-wrong-im-sorry theming before the masters sale ever occured. and taylor is very forthcoming, i think, with the anti-hero music video, where she admits that she has conditioned herself to be untrusting of everyone. in other words, we know there’s been conflict already, that taylor is aware of this part of her, and she is remorseful.

i also think that regardless of what the great war is about, it can still carry the utility of guiding swifties or gaylors to an understanding that taylor incorrectly vilified karlie in 2017 and again after the masters were sold and that she recognizes her bad behavior, and she feels bad about her actions (and hopefully it might have served as a point of reflection for her fans)

i also think that, like she described in her explanation of hoax on lpss, it’s possible she felt betrayed by and angered by several people for something or some related things and she was having a hard time pinning down her feelings of hurt and which belonged to who for what.

what i do know is that the song depicts (to me) a specific group of situations circumstances miscommunications and i …find parallels in the song to so many songs related to this group of meaning, and so i’ve just been letting the haze surrounding the correct interpretation recede of its own accord without fretting the details so so much, and just enjoying the connections that i find to similar songs.

[lovewithoutresin]

Here’s my take, if you don’t mind my sharing it. It’s not that I’m looking to strip TGW of its original meaning. It’s that when it came out, I was like, “okay. Another song where Taylor is entirely at fault.” That’s not to say it’s a bad song, but that the theme is everywhere - Afterglow, peace, TGW, even Anti-Hero if you think about it all depicted Joe as this perfect figure who had to put up with Taylor’s many problems. It bothered me then and it bothers me now. That’s not to say TGW isn’t telling the truth, but that I wonder if there’s more to the story. A war takes two people. And I do think “maybe it was her” is probably the only time in her discography pre-YLM that she’s ever been like “maybe you did something too” about Joe. The rest of the song is about how he wanted her to trust him, how he was broken and blue, looking at her with honor and truth, and how she nearly lost him because of her poison.

Idk, maybe it’s just because I was never particularly interested in Joe so I found it to be missing some part of the story from the beginning. And we won’t know anything for sure until TTPD. But I don’t think questioning its larger narrative, narrated by someone very much unreliable due to her bias against herself and toward him, especially after Joever, is necessarily rewriting it or an attempt to ruin it.

No this is fair. And I do get how it would be a bit difficult to swallow that Joe was never really considered the villain in any of these songs. Obviously it takes two for a relationship to have friction and she obviously rewrote things in her head to blame herself a lot.

I think my thing is that like. A lot of Taylor's writing abt that relationship has been about her struggle with paranoia. And for a LOT of people (I don't know if you posted abt TGW or anything recently but if so I promise my post wasn't an indirect just ftr) it seems like Joever negates this character trait of hers in some way, because oh! She was right! Something was wrong!

And maybe that is the case, and we won't know more until TTPD, but like... as someone w BPD (here's where the personal bias kicks in), Taylor's openness about her paranoia and flight risk tendencies has been one of the things I've connected to the most over the years. So I guess it's a bit off putting to see some of the suggestions that this is suddenly not something that's genuinely a flaw of hers that she grapples with, and that it was just her lying to herself all along, because it's sort of like... first off painting paranoia/jealousy issues that she portrayed herself as working on getting over as something to demonize, ig? That's a specific tone I've only seen in a couple of posts/other people's asks though, not a broad thing. But then it also feels like it negates the idea that she may have been honest about dealing with this in herself, and it feels like people are just too eager to jump on that train.

I do like what Jaime said sometime in the last 24 hours abt it being something she genuinely dealt with that was then weaponized against her, though. And I think it's possible a more nuanced take is in order where she does deal with this, but it was made to feel like this horrible aspect of her instead of a problem they could face together, or he used it against her to paint her as overreacting when she DID see problems for what they were, or... any number of things, honestly. We can't know for sure yet! I'm just not so quick to jump on the train that she's never been afraid and wrong before, which is the tone I do see a lot of.

[djkerr]

What's the matter? Don't you like our venison?

Uh, no, I'm, uh... I'm just not hungry...Reese?

I never really liked that name.

Aren't you going to pitch me?

Is there any reason to?

I am looking for a new law firm.

Mr. Dipple, we spent two hours arguing over abortion.

Very enjoyable hours. I like working with people I don't necessarily agree with.

We won't argue any anti-choice cases.

Pro-life cases?

Pro-life cases either. We won't.

Give me a call on Friday. We'll talk.

TGW 06x16 Red Meat

[warningsine]

Few queer arcs annoy me more than the "I'm straight with one (1) exception" one. Almost as insulting as the Pink Kryptonite type of shit.

I whined about this very thing back when I watched s3, but quickly let it go, because I didn't want to be a Debbie Downer for the fans who did like it.

But nobody cares now and I'm rewatching s1 so...

S3 was a drag and only watchable (to me) because of Paleta; how she sold a woman in love.

The show messed the fake dating thing up (HOW? Virgin teenagers have executed this concept better on AO3, damn it), failed Mariana by not giving us her POV (although the weak acting didn't help matters either) and failed Ana too.

They did the ensemble thing and wasted valuable time on inane subplots. Literally, who gave a fuck about Pablo's friends? Conrado was funny exactly one (1) time and that's when he sang in drag because he was drunk.

Know your audience. Predominantly queer people (nationally and internationally) were supporting your Netflix show. Conservative heterosexuals boycotted it because it had "feminist/LGBT propaganda" and "favored mothers over fathers."

The result was--that even though s3 was longer than s2--Ana, the lead, didn't have enough time to explore her sexuality.

But still, they could have taken advantage of the fact they had Alma, Ana's mean/gossipy childhood friend, say that Ana has had a vibe since they were teens. (There's no smoke without fire.) That was in 1.03 when we, the audience, still thought Ana was straight. (At least, she didn't ping to me until later.)

They could have gone for bi Ana--what I thought they were doing in late season 1. It was clear that even though Ana didn't give a fuck that Mariana was bi, she didn't quite understand bisexuality herself.

"Who wouldn't want you? If I were a guy, I'd fuck you." (to make her friend feel better about her postpartum body) "I'm not a lesbian." (multiple times) Sure, but your bestie isn't one either and yet she still wants you.

(Side note: "You'd be surprised how many gay women I've heard that from.")

They could have gone for latebloomer lesbian in denial Ana--what I thought they were doing in most of season 2, because, hey, they would not stop using the word "lesbian."

Then I realized they were doing the classic "We dare not name bisexuality" until finally, finally Tere defended her own daughter in s3.

"My daughter is gay. Or bi. Idk, I love her."

At least, they didn't say that Ana and Mariana were "flexible" (TGW, I'm side-eyeing you) because "post radical queerness."

Smh creative teams think they're being progressive when telling the community that not using a label is a virtue.

If you're a cis straight liberal/progressive and say, "Labels don't matter," then you're not being honest with yourself. Because your label is "normal" to the rest of society.

Without any labels, there would be no LGBTQ+ community. Whose rights would people be fighting for exactly?

We're nowhere near close to the point that people no longer need to identify their community. Even in relatively liberal societies where gay marriage is legal and anti-discrimination laws exist, queer people continue to be marginalized and oppressed.

And I know that queer people do the post-label thing too, but things there get more complicated. Why? Because many queer people are in the closet, many are busy figuring their shit out, dealing with comphet and internalized stuff.

And it's not like being queer absolves you of having regressive beliefs either, e.g., there are gay people who are biphobic and/or transphobic etc.

[firebrand-witch]

crows as midnight songs

Kaz: midnight rain

Inej: the great war

Jesper: anti hero

Nina: Bejeweled

Matthias: Labyrinth

Wylan: Question..?

Omg!! Yk when I first read the books and got tumblr I also made this post (I'll try to find it)

Jesper is so anti hero coded and nina is so bejeweled, it's insane

I see what you did there putting wylan as question🤭

I like how you put matthias as labyrinth instead of bttws!! It fits

I wouldn't have thought of kaz and inej as midnight rain and tgw but i am thinking of it now🤔

[joysmercer]

since there are 13 anubis residents and 13 midnights tracks…a sign a song to each kid?

this has been sitting here FOREVER i’m so sorry 💀

joy-would’ve could’ve should’ve

patricia- yoyok

nina- anti-hero

amber- bejeweled

kt- vigilante shit

mara- dear reader

willow- snow on the beach

fabian- mastermind

eddie- maroon

mick- …question?

jerome- high infidelity

alfie- sweet nothing

am i missing someone??? anyway here u go, as usual it’s all just based on Vibes and nothing else, also i used the 3am version bc lowkey idk the main album well enough lol

(bonus: all of the girls get tgw)

[g0rechan]

tgw most mature and respectful thing to do in that situation is to say yiu don't like it and tag your criticisms and dislikes about it but of course antis lash out at the slightest sign of happiness from proshippers.

Yeah, just say It's not for you and move on.

[kaylor]

I know tgw is about a rs, but for me it seems like its about depression and suicidal thoughts, and a period of time when one is at war with themself and after it ending, kinda looking back vowing not to do that again now that you survived it, and the one reaching for your hand was your younger self before they went through all that hell anyway thank you for listening to my ted talk.

ooooh yes, it really ties in with how it seems she views herself as her own worst enemy (anti hero mv!) and how she's trying to be a friend to herself more now ...

i love this interpretation so much.. the great war as a fight against yourself. "tore your banners down took the battle underground" you're no longer on your own side, you retreat from everyone and wage this war on yourself "spineless in [your] tomb of silence" - the memory loss that occurs "flashes of the battle come back to me in a blur" ouch. "my hand was the one you reached for" - the only one who can save you from depression is yourself. you're arguing with the monster in your brain, please fucking DO something, HELP me.

"maybe it was the past talking, screaming from a crypt telling me to punish you for things you never did" - your old self convincing you you deserved it, your trauma was your own fault, you talk yourself into believing you deserve to be this miserable, so you're justified in the mistreatment of yourself. how it culminates in one moment, your own finger on the trigger "somewhere in the haze, got a sense i'd been betrayed" - you're down at rock bottom but somehow you realize you got it all wrong, this isn't what you wanted, you don't want to be this way forever or have it end like this. the biggest betrayal is how you convinced yourself that treating yourself this way was justified.

there's no glory in beating depression, there's no triumphant music or festivities, there's no medals or awards. the battle is over but you don't feel like you've won anything. you just have to confront everything you lost (yourself) and learn how to live with the pieces that are left. the worst is over, you'll never be the same, but actually, in a way, it's for the better because now you know how to take care of yourself and love yourself, or at least you know what not to do. you'll never make the same mistakes your past self did, the self destruction the self sabotage. you vow to yourself that you'll always keep trying, you'll always be on your own side from now on.

[taylortruther]

I'm a 'TTPD is Red coded' truther, and seeing the "I'm the best thing at this party is based off a real party" discourse is altering my brain chemistry because Red also heavily focused around the detoriation of a relationship through the cycle of parties i.e. The party where he dropped her hand and ignored her infron of his friends (as seen in ATW mv) and then obviously THE bday party. Maybe there was also a real party this time where Joe made her feel insignificant. I mean yb and Jake do strike me as the same pretentious person in different fonts. So yk. Social validation obv means a lot to Taylor and if he was a jerk to her in public or "hid" her from everyone (again very ATW adjacent) then we might be hearing a lot about that.

i love that you pointed out the recurring party metaphor! i agree that there is a lot to be said about taylor wanting validation (who doesn't?) and the parties are certainly real (because we know taylor loves a party, but her life is full of them - from high school to the high school-esque scene of the industry)... the rejection and excitement is certainly real, as well. PLUS, as she's gotten older, taylor herself has recognized her own power to be the party, meaning, "the liquor in our cocktails," the figurative mirrorball, the person scheming to get everyone to have a good time.

tbh whether there was a specific party or just a metaphor is unimportant, imo, because it was always clear to me that taylor felt triggered more than once in this regard. we see this fear throughout her discography, preceding jake and joe. and she previously described it as more her problem to fix: "i should've known," or "you will never learn your lesson"... in lover and tgw, she describes how she would explode, "put you in jail for something you didn't do," and was begging for help through those difficult emotions. she believed "EVERYONE WILL BETRAY YOU" (anti-hero), and acted accordingly: running off to spare herself from hurt, or seeing things that weren't there and picking fights, sometimes to self-sabotage.

what was unclear is whether she was given a real reason to be suspicious. i think on april 19 we will find out, and we will also see taylor being even more honest or clear about what wasn't her fault/her responsibility.

[septembersghost]

This may be stupid/impossible but can you put the album in chronological order for me? I'm trying to figure out each story and where it should go 😵

in chronological order of when they happened in her life? 😅 maybe! i'll try to tie in other songs as touchstones too, though there are far more than just what i'll mention.

you're on your own, kid spans her entire career

2. midnight rain (this is a guess, but it sounds like someone she knew very young, and reminiscing about that small town feeling, the "normal" life she gave up, we could say debut-fearless, i've seen it connected to the way i loved you, and to the story of 'tis the damn season/dorothea from evermore)

3. would've, could've, should've (preceding speak now era, connected to dear john and the story of us, jm)

4. bigger than the whole sky (this is me taking a shot in the dark only because this and the previous song are linked lyrically - "what would've been, could've been, what should've been you," in my head is her mourning herself, because that's how it speaks to *me*, and how i grieve myself. there are dozens of different interpretations of this song and we're probably all wrong, but i like them as a devastatingly heartbreaking pair, so.)

5. maroon (red era, jg, it's literally just. it's all of the heartbreak and yearning and quiet anger that exist on red as a whole record, but darker.)

6. question...? (1989 era, hs, interpolates out of the woods, also very i wish you would and all you had to do was stay)

7. bejeweled (post 1989/pre-reputation era, ch, i'm smacking the next person who misinterprets this as anything having to do with her current life with a glove, he was stifling her and dimming her shine)

8. high infidelity (pre-reputation era, ch, possibly reflective of tolerate it, and ivy tbh, from this point all love songs are about joe, who is mentioned here, "he brought me back to life," which very briefly connects to gorgeous and paper rings)

9. glitch (pre-rep, connected imho to so it goes... and cruel summer and cowboy like me)

10. snow on the beach (pre-rep, but i'm not 100% sure of this placement, i'm only putting it here because of the feeling of delicate, and falling in love at the same time vibes seeming like early on, glimmers of long story short and cornelia street as well)

11. labyrinth (pre-rep but to me also spans time, she's initially afraid of losing him here, maybe linked to dancing with our hands tied, but he turns the plane around, which is very evermore)

12. hits different (pre-rep, i think? also some gold rush vibes. feels like it leads into the next)

13. the great war (i assume also pre-rep, possibly connected to lover's the archer and afterglow)

14. anti-hero (since this is taylor about herself and her insecurities, i'm just slotting it here due to what happened, and her snake hiss in, "everybody agreesssss," but it isn't specific to one moment)

15. paris (reputation, because they were somewhere else, and she wasn't bothered by any news)

16. lavender haze (lover, also spans time though, including the past - the haze is mentioned in TGW - and reaches the present, a little i think he knows, a little call it what you want, a little daylight)

17. vigilante shit (gonna say lover era when she decided to re-record, could also be more recent, see: mad woman)

18. mastermind (reputation-lover-present, invisible string on purpose)

19. karma (reputation-lover-present, u know we love a london boy)

20. sweet nothing (rep/lover-folklore-present, it's peace and it's daylight)

21. dear reader (as the closer, spans time to the present like yoyok)

and now looking at this tracklist, even though some of it is estimates, this looks like a fabulous album and i'm going to have to listen to it in this order 👀💖

[taylorrepdetective]

What's your favorite song on Midnights?

I’m bad at ranking things but I have a special place for Labyrinth. Also love Hits Different, Maroon, Anti Hero (obviously overplayed now, but a really great pop song,) WCS, TGW, Sweet Nothing, Glitch, and I find Dear Reader to be completely fascinating, but not like, as a song I want to bop along to. More like I would love a poem or an art piece that has deep meaning and speaks to me.

[preraphaeliteknight]

If there are rep vault tracks, it’s going to be the fuck you/fuck me variety. She’s not going darker than that. Lover is the honeymoon album - personal life was good and they were past TGW, career was going great, she was moving past some shit. The darker stuff definitely came out in Folklore & Evermore & Midnights as she was probably ready to start talking about it. I can’t imagine she was ready in 2017 to even get her brain to a song like This Is Me Trying or Evermore or Anti-Hero and I’m not sure that The Great War/Afterglow/Hits Different had happened yet or was very new.

Agreed! However big the rep vault is it’ll probably be mostly love songs