#as much as the whole thing was very timey wimey

[zaruba-needslove]

Times I wish every rider show properly specify the location setting of where the specific rider works/operated/lived in, so when one wanted to write fics where different riders/characters crossovered and interacted with each other you can literally have a bare idea as to how to place ppl around - like there's the guys at Futo city or Zawame... or stuff.

Yet when the locations were left vague... you'd be like...how to decide if you want to have this person in certain parts of Tokyo... or should this person be based further away like Kyoto or Osaka... would that make sense? How to justify the reasons why their paths never crossed or why the monsters don't cross each other's paths 👀👀👀👀

[redrosebug]

Imagine if timey wimey shenanigans happened and Bruce got de-aged to before he lost Jason. He takes one look at his giant of a second child and goes "my🥰son🥰".

Damian is flabbergasted and also very jealous. Not only has he never met a version of his father that is so openly affectionate, but also, he can't believe Bruce is giving Jason so much attention. Damian is FIGHTING FOR HIS LIFE.

Dick and Tim take one look at Bruce and go on vacation to TT. That is a Bruce that a) has been fighting with Dick and b) does not know Tim. They do not have the emotional range to deal with him.

Jason is both soaking up the attention and running away from it. He has no idea how his brothers convinced him to stay at the Manor with Bruce, but now he can't leave. The one good thing about the whole situation is that he can brag to Damian that Bruce loves him more.

(Jason has been trying to contact Dick and Tim for a week. None of them have picked up their phones. They are playing air hockey in the Tower. Jason hates them.

Dick asks Tim whether they should return home. Tim gives him a look and Dick's all "You are right.")

[redtippedfox]

Miraculous Timey Wimey Lore: Kwamis

—————————————————————————————-

Kwami Headcanon: Tikki (Creation)

Kwamis are ancient eldritch Gods that ruled over the Heavens for years, Tikki is one of the very first Eldritch God to ever be born, created from the Big Bang of the Universe. Tikki is the other half of the God of Destruction, Plagg, her and Plagg have been together since the beginning of time. Though Tikki will not ever admit it she and Plagg are indeed in love but she won’t ever admit it since Plagg and her are always separated due to their holders. Tikki may look like a responsible Goddess but she is actually very irresponsible and while she loves following the rules she can appreciate a little chaos from here, she is actually very fond of Marinette’s clumsiness especially when it creates a little bit of chaos.

Tikki loves sweets, likes every types of sweets, from strawberry short cake to chocolate pudding, although she loves chocolate chip cookies more than anything, Tikki was very happy when she found out that Marinette lived in a bakery where delicious treats are served everyday. Tikki is very curious about the human world and enjoys learning about new things. She adores Marinette’s creativity when it comes to her fashion and her creations.

All of the seasons were created by Tikki

Spring is the season that belongs to Tikki, the season of Love was created by Tikki so her Ladybugs could find love and so humans could have a season of love. During Spring she is energetic, chatty, and an absolute matchmaker. She loves giving Marinette proper love advice and tries her best to help Marinette understand her feelings for Adrien and even help her realize her feelings for Chat Noir.

During winter she becomes slow, tired and less energetic, she is supposed to go into hibernation till the next spring but thanks to humans warm technology she is able to be kept warm and therefore does not have to go into hibernation. Even though winter is a bad season for her it is a time of warmth and love, the winter may be freezing but Tikki made sure it looked beautiful.

Fall is another season, while spring is Tikki’s favorite season fall is Tikki’s second favorite. As the leaves fade away and make way for winter Tikki it to show off the beauty of the falling of the leaves.

Summer is a time of fun and relaxation, it’s not Tikki’s favorite due to the heavy heat but she still cherishes the season

Tikki likes to use the word “Fuck”, its her favorite human curse word, “Shit” is her second favorite human curse word.

Tikki adores Alya and Nino, and dreams of being able to properly meet both of them

Tikki will come up with mischievous plans with Plagg to get Adrien and Marinette together

Tikki can get very jealous and possessive of Marinette especially when it comes to Marinette wearing or using other Miraculouses. Tikki punched Mullo after Kwamibuster when the mouse kwami kept teasing her.

Tikki can be very impulsive sometimes

Tikki has the ability to grant blessings on people but she can also create curses as well

Tikki will sometimes cry at night, hoping that one day her brothers and sisters would be safe and Nooroo and Dussu would return to them

Tikki is a little shit sometimes

Tikki has a whole wardrobe made by Marinette just for her, she doesn’t like sharing any of it.

————————————————————————————————-

Tikki’s old form was bland and didn’t have a lot of black, she didn’t look much like a Ladybug but that’s what Fu thought of her, after he became Guardian Tikki was stuck in that form for over 300 years, Fu only saw the kwamis as creatures that had to be locked away from the world so they didn’t have a lot of animalistic parts of the animals that they represented since they haven’t been free in 300 years and Fu didn’t see them as Gods with animal tendencies so they looked nothing like their animals.

When a new Guardian is chosen the kwamis change their forms to match how their Guardian sees them and to fit their Guardians soul. When Marinette became Guardian the kwamis forms changed and they got to have more animalistic parts. Tikki was given more black on her body to represent being a Ladybug, her tails even got bigger rather than smaller, she even had a pink glow around her, Marinette’s soul allowing them to be more free and God-like than trapped like Fu.

[tervaneula]

As a culmination of "some boys do lay eggs", "make your home in me", and the sneak peak you recently posted, I've been having some Thoughts.

Do you think maybe at some point late in the war, f!Leo stopped laying eggs (due to the stresses his body was under) and he assumed that he had hit the turtle equivalent of menopause a little early?

And maybe, after he had been back a while, and after he had started dating Yuichi and they had started having some *fun* together, his cycle starts up again.

And what if—hear me out—he has no idea until the events of "cracks never healed (they can heal now)" and his eggs show up on the X-rays they take of his shell?

Can you imagine the whirlwhind of panic (oh holy shit I was NOT planning on having any babies and now they might be well on their way), hope (maybe it would be nice to raise babies with Yuichi, and Yuichi seems really excited about the possibility), and disappointment (finding out the eggs are unfertilized, and he and Yuichi are genetically incompatible).

Just a thought! I love your NQK Romance Spinoff so much!

The way my jaw dropped when I saw the sheer length of this ask—

Oh gosh THIS IS SO GOOD. SO SO GOOD, ALL OF IT, AAAHHSGFHJ. It could 100% happen just like this if I hadn't planned and already written some of the storylines concerning this whole thing! I'm taking a different route but oh my gosh dang ahhhgg I'm so delighted by your thoughts on this, absolute mastermindery connecting all of the fics and bits in a way that didn't cross my mind even once.

Like in reality, Leonardo knows he stopped producing eggs because of the stress and malnourishment, and is expecting that his cycle will restart again at some point. In NQK canon he meets Yuichi two years after the timey wimey shenanigans so at that point he's already had at least a season or two.

But he also knows that he and Yuichi are not genetically compatible from the start. This comes up in two of my current WIPs and oh my gosh the first one is so funny...... though I promised myself that I wouldn't finish either of those until I've posted their first date cause they spicy lmao

Your version definitely would result in more drama and I'm LIVING for it, no kidding, and will probably use it for daydream fodder. Very tasty, delicious, 10/10 would wine and dine again.

Can you imagine the whirlwhind of panic (oh holy shit I was NOT planning on having any babies and now they might be well on their way), hope (maybe it would be nice to raise babies with Yuichi, and Yuichi seems really excited about the possibility), and disappointment (finding out the eggs are unfertilized, and he and Yuichi are genetically incompatible)

^ this is so goooood I absolutely can imagine it. I don't know how egg fertility is checked but for the question to even come up will imply to their families that Leonardo and Yuichi have had unprotected adult fun time, and I don't think either are very comfortable to suddenly be in that situation 😂

ANYWAY, thank you SO MUCH for thinking your thoughts and sharing them with me!!! I don't have the words to express how incredible it feels to receive an amazing ask like this!!!!!! Thank you for loving the romance spinoff, this means so much to me 😭💜💜💕

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

Doctor Who, but Chronologically: 46

Well. Tonal whiplash.

We advance three years, to 1986, and therefore we go from an almost aggressively mid Gatiss story on a Russian submarine to World Enough and Time, the Capaldi season finale that opens with the Doctor stepping out of the TARDIS mid-regeneration (which we've seen! It was a WW1 story with Mark Gatiss as an actor! He's a much better actor than writer), then cuts back in time to show us lovely companion Bill being horrifically cyber-converted on a Mondasian colony ship. I wish we were still on that submarine.

LOADS of plot though WOW. We get so many answers! Can't wait to update the list. The story proper starts with Bill, the ever-confusing Nardole ("I should go back to being blue" he muses at one point, because what the fuck is he), and of all people, Missy. They step out onto a 400 mile long colony ship stuck by a black hole which therefore has fun timey-wimey stuff going on whereby the top of the ship is moving much more slowly in time than the bottom. This is, to be clear, an absolutely fantastic concept to base a sci-fi horror story around, but only if you have a writer capable of spotting plot holes big enough to drive a bus through, which alas we do not have, so the whole thing is permeated with a constant urge to scream "JUST GET BACK IN THE ELEVATOR YOU FUCKING IDIOTS" at the screen.

So. They arrive, and Missy is pretending to be the Doctor while he listens in from the TARDIS. She describes Bill and Nardole as "Exposition and Comic Relief."

"Those aren't our names," Bill says.

"They aren't names, they're genders," Missy replies.

We are then treated to a flashback in which the Doctor says Time Lords don't care about genders and their associated stereotypes. This juxtaposition seems to be entirely unintentional.

BUT! So many answers. The Doctor explains that Missy is his oldest friend and a fellow Time Lord (our first Other Time Lord! Interesting, since we've been told repeatedly that the Doctor is the only one left.) They were friends together in the Academy, they've both changed gender since, and she's very like him so he wants her to be good.

"She's a murderer" says Bill, and the Doctor straight up compares sapient people to animals in an analogy I suspect Moffat thought was Really Clever, but I suppose it's a very Colin Baker response. In any case, this is presumably why Missy was living in a vault in the TARDIS, and could fly a TARDIS, and it confirms now that she is not, in fact, another regeneration of River. Origins for both! Huzzah. Let's see what's happening back on the ship.

A blue man immediately shoots Bill for being human.

Ah.

He does this because as soon as they arrive, the lifts start moving and rising to their current floor, and whatever is inside is specifically attracted to humans. The Doctor could in fact have prevented him shooting, but rather than actually stressing to the blue man that he will just put Bill back in the TARDIS to hide her, he instead chooses to go on an extensive self-aggrandising monologue about how great he is and is still mid-sentence when the lifts arrive so blue guy just fucking blasts a dinner plate sized hole right through her chest. Some patients in bandages step out, and take Bill's cooling corpse for 'repair'. They go down in the lift.

So at this point two things happen, to whit:

Bill wakes up in a hospital with a sort of coffee maker strapped to her chest, and spends the episode variously befriending a weird fake Russian (why so many fake Russians atm?) with a nakedly rubber face. His name is Mr Razor, and he does provide excellent comic relief. It turns out that the bottom of the ship has been here for generations and so is decaying - the air is engine fumes, the walls are rust, so some medical personnel are trying to upgrade everyone so they can move up in the lift and escape to a higher floor.

The Doctor realises the time difference as the lift with Bill is still going down. Rather than immediately following, he spends ten minutes explaining how black holes warp time to the blue guy who is not even going to be coming with him, and whom they ultimately abandon. This means Bill is down there for years.

Still, good to know the limitations of the TARDIS, eh? I mean, everything would have been solved if they'd simply been able to, I don't know, materialise outside the ship at a safe distance and then tow it away from the black hole. Clearly black holes must defeat the TARDIS. Got it. I shall remember this for future stories.

Anyway, here are several issues:

Of the 50 odd staff who were running this empty colony ship, many went down to the bottom floor when they first got stuck by the black hole. At this point, they did not bother going back up in the lift. Instead, for reasons that are entirely unexplained, they decided to stay down there and form a society, so the ship is now filled with their descendants. We literally know the lifts work; the people came for Bill immediately. There is no reason for the original staff to have done this.

The only difference it should make is that the blue guy would appear to the crew to have not moved in the ten minutes they were down there. They absolutely could still get back, though.

Like I have had days when I have felt 1000% done with my job but I have never decided to just build a house where I'm standing and start a colony so I don't have to go back to the office.

Perhaps, Tumblrs, you are wondering, like me, why the people on the bottom floor now can't just. You know. Get in the lift. Once again, in order to get Bill, several patients immediately got in the lift and came up for her, and then returned with her. So they do literally know it's possible. Bill asks this of Mr Razor. "We sent up an expedition to the higher floors once," he says. "But we never heard back from them."

Yes, that is blatantly the time difference, isn't it.

If there are still humans on those middle floors, why haven't they been retrieved by the patients? They came immediately for Bill, and she was on the top floor.

...and on, and on...

ANYWAY then Mr Razor BETRAYS Bill and has her cyber-converted. There is, fair play, an excellent reveal that these are Mondasian cybermen, which admittedly I did guess but still, credit where it's due. The conversion is shown to be more horrific than you can imagine, too. Semi-converted patients at one point are on a ward, repeatedly pressing speech buttons that say "Pain" and "Kill me", and the nurse who comes in just turns off the volume so they can't be heard. It is, imho, way too fucking dark for this show, actually, but that largely sums up Capaldi's era.

And that's the cliffhanger! The Doctor and Nardole staring in horror at crying Cyber-Bill (apparently she's still flesh inside the suit, though, that sure does imply it's reversible). BUT!

Also Mr Razor finds Missy and he peels off his rubber face.

"I had to wear this mask because I used to be Prime Minister on a different planet," he declares, which is baffling to us as we have not seen this, and also that doesn't make sense. "I'm a past incarnation of you and also the Master."

SO THAT'S THE MASTER! A character we have only heard named in passing. SO MANY answers in this episode.

I also still don't understand Nardole.

“She” (an unknown person) is returning (NEW INFO: perhaps River returned as Missy. River and Missy are separate! Could be either of them I suppose. Maybe Me? Maybe Clara???!)

There is something on Donna’s back

An entire planet, Pyrovilia, just… disappeared, somehow. (Maybe because the TARDIS is exploding??? Saturnine was also lost, and that WAS because of the TARDIS exploding. The lion man’s planet was also lost but he was a bit of a knob about it if I’m honest. The Thijarian planet was destroyed by some sort of impact). Is this the Flux?

Amy is maybe dead (she’s not)

The Doctor has been cubed (he’s out, but how?)

River is possibly blown up  (NEW INFO: unless she’s Missy. She's not Missy. Nope: she is definitely not blown up)

The TARDIS has blown up  (It’s fine now. Except it’s sort of melting now because it’s corrupted, but it’s fine again. NOPE, back to not working.)

The universe appears to have ended  (the universe is back again)

The Doctor has employed(?) Nardole

(And Nardole was “reassembled???” Nardole had glass nipples and invisible hair?? NEW INFO: he used to be blue, and could apparently go back to it??? WHAT THE FUCK IS HE)

NEW INFO: There’s a vault in the TARDIS and it contains Missy but we don’t know why (sometimes she knocks for the bants) She's a murderer and a fellow Time Lord and he's trying to rehabilitate her.

There’s an immortal Viking girl now. Her name is Me and she’s now looking after the people the Doctor abandons

Why was Rory entirely unconcerned by the entire world suddenly going silent when that is Not Normal and should have been, at the very least, extremely disconcerting?

What did the Doctor do to Queen Lizzie One?

Why is Amy seeing a one-eyed woman in a vanishing window? (She’s with the Silents, but we don’t know why Amy saw her)

Why is Amy’s pregnancy inconclusive? (Maybe because the baby had Time Lord DNA?) She’s deffo pregnant and the baby becomes River, but why inconclusive?

Who is Sarah-Jane Smith?

How is the Doctor Bill’s teacher and why/where does he have an office?

What is going on with the Cyber War and the Cyberium???

What happened with the Other Cyber War?

What happened with the Third War that deleted the void?

Why does Rose seem particularly important?

What order do these Doctors go in? (Eccleston, Tennant, uncertain, Smith, Capaldi, Whittaker)

Which companion just… forgot the Doctor, and how?

Yaz and Vinder are about to die as Mori/Mwri/Muuri (Not anymore, somehow)

There is a Lupari shield around Earth.

What’s a Time War?

What’s the Rift?

What’s Bad Wolf?

In which war did the Doctor become a war criminal, and how?

Who is the Master? NEW INFO: This is now resolved! The Doctor's oldest friend, a fellow Time Lord, but also a murderer.

Why has Amy forgotten Rory? How did she forget a Dalek invasion?

Is Rory plastic or not? Yeah, must be, he couldn’t possibly remember being plastic otherwise

Why is the Doctor sulking on a cloud?

How exactly does the Doctor have a cloud?

What exactly happened with Strax to, uh, tame him?

Which friend killed Strax?

Which friend brought Strax back?

Where did this lesbian lizard and human couple come from?

What happened with Clara as Souffle Girl and the Daleks?

How does Clara actually join?

Why so many Claras? A psychic midwife says she’s just normal human

Why is Missy apparently in robo-heaven?

Why is probably!Missy pushing Clara and the Doctor together?

What is Trensilor and what happened there?

Who is Handles?

The Doctor is about to be dissolved by a beautiful geode man

The universe is being crushed by the Flux

Will the Doctor open the fobwatch?

Sontarans are invading Earth again

Who is Kate?

Who is Osgood? Another name of Clara’s again?

The fuck is the deal with the Grand Serpent

Does Martha get to go to an ice cream planet with 12-fingered massage aliens?

How did the Doctor forget Clara?

Who is Bill’s puddle girlfriend Heather?

How did Nardole die?

When does Bill get Cyberman-ed and die? NEW INFO: Resolved! On a colony ship stuck by a black hole

When does the Doctor shrink and enter a Dalek called Rusty?

Whittaker is falling to her death rn

Was that ring relevant?

Does anyone know the Doctor’s name?

When did Yaz talk to Dan about fancying the Doctor?

When did Dan talk to the Doctor about fancying Yaz?

What’s happening with the bees?

What happened with Donna’s ex and a giant spider?

What war wiped out the Daleks, and is it one of the ones already mentioned?

What did the Doctor mean when he said “The (Daleks) always live, while I lose everything?”

If Dalek Caan is the last Dalek left why are there more now?

How did the rest of the Time Lords die?

How and why did Amy melt?

What’s the question that will make silence fall?

Why do the Silents… want silence to fall?

How and why are Silents at war with the Doctor when he… hasn’t even heard of them?

How does Hitler get out of the cupboard?

What’s the significance of fish fingers and custard?

Why does the Doctor feel guilt about Rose, Martha and Donna?

What happened with the space whale?

When does Rory defend Amy for 2000 years? Since Roman times, it seems

How does the Doctor survive River? He doesn’t, apparently

How does he erase himself from history

Did Captain Jack lose his memories to the same people as the Doctor? What did he lose?

When did the Doctor send the Daleks into a void to save the universe?

What’s with the weird crack in the wall and is it affecting memories?

Why do Amy and Rory think the Doctor is dead? Is it because of River as an astronaut?

Is Matt Smith’s Doctor a tree racist?

Why is the beautiful geode woman stealing people into a Passenger form?

River says she’ll die one day when the Doctor doesn’t remember her, let’s hope she doesn’t mean it

Why doesn’t the TARDIS like Clara?

When was the Master Prime Minister?

[it-hurts-because-it-mattered]

I'm not the biggest fan in the world of the whole trope of "people think this character is special for a reason but no, they're just ordinary, and they're special because anyone can be special". Like, I generally *do* enjoy thoughtful subversions, particularly ones that basically come down to "you're expecting this because it's a common structure in stories, but if you drop that expectation it's actually not the most sensible answer, this is a better one", but this particular trope usually isn't played that well, it's usually a let down.

But that isn't something I usually feel strongly about. In The Last Jedi, I wasn't a fan of that being the answer to Rey after a film and a half suggesting there was actually a story behind her parentage, but I could accept it, it was plausible and valid, especially because that's how Force sensitivity works in Star Wars, it "just happens" to a tiny minority of people, which creates a sizable but small population on the galactic stage.

But Doctor Who...

That was an absolutely atrocious application of what I already consider to be a weak trope. Even aside from the stupid anticlimax of making it a mystery all season, and making that mystery in itself the actual core plot point of the finale, then saying "yeah it was only ever a mystery because it was a mystery"... Like, damn, what the actual fuck? Hell, you could have played that better by making it a matter of fear and protectiveness; that the same way she kept the secret her whole life, she imparted so much emotion and intention to that secrecy that she made it a mystery. You could either do that on its own to fit with the new theme they were relying on, of things simply being magical, or you could say that the presence of the TARDIS or Sutekh or the Doctor left enough energy spinning around that her intent to keep Ruby a secret wove it into a fact of reality. That's playing nicely with the established rules of the world! There is precedent for that! And it's just a better story!

"It's a mystery because we believed it was a mystery" is the cheapest and shittiest answer imaginable. How does that belief in the mystery create the snow? How does it lead to the song Maestro found? If Sutekh's presence that night is important, why is it not important to everyone else the TARDIS has ever been around? If Sutekh is relevant, then why could he not see her, the very thing that you're telling us kicked off this entire thing?

Hell, if Sutekh kicked into action after that night, is it supposed to just be pure coincidence that the TARDIS got fucky at the start of Wild Blue Yonder in the exact same way it got fucky when Sutekh was exerting influence?

At the point Sutekh saw her on Ruby Road, there was no mystery. Nobody but her even knew there was a child, nobody wondered. I know Timey Wimey, but that's a stretch too far.

And all of that's before you even get into the more physical inconsistencies, like the absurd cloak, the signpost not being there, how was the name Ruby supposed to get from her pointing on an empty street to the baby being found however long later? The Doctor's memory being messed up, and reality itself changing. The coincidence of the range of the TARDIS's perception feature.

. This season was trading, so *so* heavily on the trust and goodwill of viewers that it would make sense later. I cannot fucking believe that they shit all over that trust the way they did.

[joju-but-trek]

Star Trek: Prodigy Season 2, Episode 2: Into the Breach, Part 2

People tend to think of Star Trek as a linear order of events, but in reality, it's a timey-wimey ball that you'd understand if you read the damn manual.

This episode is fun. I like the direction the series is going in, and I think I made the right call by spacing it out and doing an episode at a time. That being said, the premiere is a two-parter, and I probably should have treated it as one. The status quo changes a lot in part 2, and it lead to me making a significant number of statements I probably wouldn't have if I had known about that. But I did it to myself, and part of the experiment here is me intentionally watching the show as if it was a staggered release.

I think I like the premise more as it's presented here, but I would have gladly watched the show I thought I was watching during part 1. But as a whole intro to the series it definitely gets a 10/10.

I made the mistake of doing a bit more searching last night, so I know a few things are going to be much more significant than they'd seem from this episode. I'm trying hard not to spoil myself, though. That being said, Maj'el is cool. She's a good add to the cast, and I look forward to all the things that she will eventually do. In this episode, she was a fun counterpoint to the team, and I like that she's stuck with them now. The one spoiler I'll steal ahead of time is people calling Maj'el a Vulcan Sixth Ranger. I'm here for that title.

At the same time, I'm loving what they're doing with Rok and giving her space from the others. It's a great arc for her that she wants to go through the channels to join Starfleet to the point where she's at odds with the rest of the team. It's interesting that now her problem is too much conformity after spending last season proving that she didn't have to be typecast as the Big Guy. I'm excited for whatever she's going to do.

Gwyn's also back now, and doing some very cool things on Solum. I like that she tries to do first contact, but Ascencia already got there. Ascencia is a fun villain, and I'm glad she's back in a meaningful capacity. I also like that Gwyn still goes to the younger version of her father after everything. There are a few ways this storyline can go and all of them are extremely compelling.

And we have Dal, Zero, Jankum, and Maj'el going to the future together. This is a fun use of time travel, a fun storyline, and a great way of getting them into it. I like that it's an accident and that they weren't trying to do it. It'll be fun to watch them try to resolve that even after they get back. The timeline here is also incredibly twisty in a way that I like. It does make me think I should revisit season 1 to remind myself how it worked there, and I'll probably do that, but I'm on board.

I'm realizing how much I'm probably missing because I haven't seen season 1 since Paramount tried to memory hole it, so I'm going to go watch some of it and then maybe share some more opinions.

[dufrau]

Ronance Fic Master List - Titface/Dufrau

So originally I planned to just write one tiny little thing to clear the Ronance rot out of my brain but that turned into two things and so on and so forth and basically i have written a lot of ronance fics at this point and it makes sense to put them in a pinned post, so that’s what this is. Under the cut you will find much ronance.

Short Stuff

Exile - M - 3K -  A quiet little first kiss scene post s4.

Slowly, and The All At Once - T - 3.5k -  The next 10 years of Nancy Wheeler’s life, in brief.

I Wish I Was the Moon - M - 2.5k -  Nancy Wheeler always got what she wanted, and it was never what she really wanted.

Linens And Things - T - 2.5k - The color pink and first kisses.

If We Were Crocodiles - T - 4.5k - Valentine’s Day library flirting.

love minus zero/no limit - G - 1k - just a little love letter to nancy wheeler

if you look (and know what to look for) - T - 4k - prompt fill “water tower at midnight”

In Spite of Ourselves - E - 4.5k - soft domestic sort-of-smut

Retail Therapy - T - 3.5k - flirting at Family Video

Harpoon - G - 3k - vignettes about wanting things

Old Soldiers - T - 1.5k - Nancy character study. pstd and sports references.

A Goo Incident - T - 4k - patrol fic/proposal.

Turns - T - 2.5k - A game of Never Have I Ever. Sort of.

Medium to Longer Stuff But It’s Still Short Because That’s What I Do

Red & White & Blue & Gold - T - 9k - 3+1 times Ronance said “Hey. You wanna get out of here?”

Entirely On Purpose and According To Plan - E - 14k - A stakeout. But like, in a sexy way.

Oh Baby, It's All A Catastrophe - T - 6.5k - Halloween chaos.

Wanna Do Right, But Not Right Now - M - 8k -  Cozy campfire post-college makeouts.

Molotov - E - 10k - Apocalyptic fighting and fucking on a drug dealer’s couch.

tits out for annie oakley - E - 9k - Post s4 hurt/comfort smut.

you're covered in sun and I forgot my camera (wishing it was real) - E - 9k - timey wimey smut

high noon baby - E - 9.5k - pool party adjacent smut

Orange Crush - T - 7k - midnight phone call fic descending into chaos

Resolution - E - 10k - new years eve smut

Incredibly Wholesome, Actually - E - 7k - this is just smut there is no plot

All Things Go - M - 6.5k - jancy breakup, nancy finds independence, eventual ronance

hanging on the telephone - E - 7k - phonance smut

when you need a train it never comes - T - 11k - 4+1 ronance getting to know each other by the train tracks

Crimes Against Decency In A Family Establishment (The Power of Love) - E - 11k - Very silly family video smut

Nantasket - M - 7k - melancholy beach vacation

Robin Buckley and The Secret of the Yellow Polka Dot Bikini - E - 8k - silly bathing suit shopping and changing room smut

Scar Tissue - E - 10k - smut with hurt/comfort scar kissing

We Took That Holy Ride) Ourselves To Know Series aka Bigfootverse (complete)

Nothing But The Whole Wide World - M - 11k - "I want to find Bigfoot," Nancy said. 

One Too Many Mornings (and A Thousand Miles Behind) - M - 13k - Nine days before Nancy Wheeler said "I want to find Bigfoot," Robin screwed Vickie from the marching band in the back seat of her parents' Buick. 

What's One More Time - M - 4.5k - All of that, maybe, added together, the sum of it, was what had Robin picking up the phone next to her bed and dialing a number in the dark she had memorized but never used."

There's A Train Leaving Nightly Called When All Is Said And Done - T - 10k - They had met, really met each other, in the springtime. And they had only ever really known each other in the summer.Nancy had never really seen Robin in the winter.

You Are My Home  aka the TLOU Bill & Frank AU (complete)

My Piece of Land - M - 24k - Ronance TLOU Ep 3 Bill & Frank AU where they are middle aged apocalypse lesbians 

Into Dust - M - 6k - TLOU Nancy’s Barb origin story, the thing that made her who she is in the main fic. 

Different Days - M - 11k - TLOU Robin POV and backstory

Count Them - T - 1.5k - Fluffy vignette about chickens

Stuff I Posted Only On Tumblr

tenlark wedding night - t - 1.5k - just a little scene based on eskawrites erathia au within their fic this story that we found ourselves in

incredibly silly smut prompt - m - 600 words - this is just very stupid but i stand by it

[ghost-kitty-cat]

it's time for wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff! (Aka it's time for Roman Headcanons!)

First Headcanon, (I don't know if this really counts as a headcanon... but..) despite how mischievous he appears to be typically... i think Roman definitely has had moments where he is very sweet (and possibly romantic... though that just depends on how you picture Roman & Pip's "Friendship"/"Relationship"... ...personally i ship them...)

Second Headcanon, (It's not completely confirmed where Roman and possibly Pip are staying currently (since in the recent experiment log all we heard about the location was the word "Abandoned" I think...) soo...) I like to imagine they'll staying in a Abandoned warehouse of some kind (because come on.. you can't tell Roman and Pip aren't the type who would totally stay in Abandoned warehouse...)

Third Headcanon, (I've never really personally watched it... but..) I don't know why but I can totally picture Roman watching Doctor Who... (either he really likes it or he just watches it to make fun of it... that I will leave up to you...)

Fourth Headcanon, (more to do with my mental image of Roman... but..) I like to imagine Roman's hair has grown quite a bit longer since he hasn't been able to properly cut it... (then again... some do say hair carries memories soo maybe Roman is holding on to something from the past...)

Fifth Headcanon, (slightly inspired by the events of the first experiment log also slightly a Pip Headcanon... but..) I imagine Roman now gets slightly anxiety/panic attacks at times due to past events... and Pip does try to help him (though they aren't really good at these types of situations, they've definitely gotten better at helping...)

Sixth Headcanon, Roman definitely gives me the vibes of someone who can't choose if he likes cats or dogs.. (or even birds... he would rather just take the whole zoo then choose...)

Seventh Headcanon, (slightly also a Cyril Headcanon... but..) I definitely think Roman has at least once did the classic whoopee cushion or glitter bomb prank on Mr elfy boy...

Eighth Headcanon, (more of a funny one... but..) I like to imagine Roman really liked learning about history back when he was growing up... (which is ironic because of his name and how his life is now... XD)

Ninth Headcanon, I like to imagine Roman is the type of person where if you know him good enough he is very much a hug person/a cuddle bug (I just imagine there was a time where Roman tried to hug Cyril and learned the hard way of why not to do that again....never underestimate the elfy boy....)

Tenth Headcanon, Don't know why but Roman just gives the vibes of that kind of person who carries around gum with him... (I like to imagine that he occasionally chews some gum to help him either think or relax but besides that he just has gum...)

Bonus Headcanon, Roman definitely was the kind of kid growing up who would take a bunch of different things (for example, soap, shampoo and etc) and would mix it all up like they were making a potion of some kind...

[nebuvoid]

gonna be honest here.. i dont like bioshock infinite all that much. i know, very controversial statement.

i just replayed the whole series after almost 10 years and boy. bioshock 1 is perfect in itself. its like matrix 1, it slaps, it does what it sets out to do, it wraps up. bioshock 2 was still pretty good. infinite? im sure theres countless thinkpieces on it. its not that the player character has to have witty lines now, its not that its in the sky, or even the whole religious thing. i see that as just. thats what this game is. but the whole timey wimey alternate realities and how it "wraps up" at the end.. doesnt leave a player satisfied. it feels messy and stupid. oh and also that absolute distaster of writing that is the vox populi. like jesus how do you.. like how do you not see how this would be ill received by players.

i wasnt really aware of it back then but seems people were complaining so much they released a whole dlc playing in rapture. i just started it, vaguely remember having played it last time too. cant comment on that one yet but one thing i can say is that it gives the player that feeling of "hell yeah, back in rapture" that fans no doubt had wanted from bioshock 3 instead of... comstock and "um actually the oppressed are just as bad as the oppressor". christ.

[trashworldblog]

i think the "nice doing business with you" line from the s5 finale is definitely going to have significance to season 6. there are too many examples of innocuous lines that end up being foreshadowing to overlook it. it's also a general rule of genies that they can't bring things back from the dead, so i think that's going to end up playing into whatever the "deal" with ryan was. the genie could've said it was against the rules to bring prof back, so ryan made another deal to get him back (1/2)

[i think there's also going to be a conflict with time travel in season 6. it's such an integral part of the show, and ryan definitely screwed the timeline by bringing prof and his family back. if we hadn't seen the article with the photo of the prof and his parents' fossils, then i would be a little less convinced of this, but because its explicitly shown onscreen, its very likely that something will go wrong with the timeline (2/2)

oh i also think that the substitute survived defenestration, but i think he's going to be a minor antagonist next season. just a nuisance, if you will. like yeah he's still a problem, but there are much bigger fish to fry than a 1'2" puppet hologram with an obsession with murder (3/3)]

...

sorry for taking so long!! this has been sitting in my drafts and ive been slowly pulling my thoughts together on this so its taken me some time!! (plus ive been chillin with the holidays and such) i appreciate this ask so much!

!disclaimer! i may accidentally pull from shane's commentary on the season finale on pateron. im doing my best not to because i know some people dont have access to patreon content. (plus its fun to make it more challenging) all puppet history lore is like marbles in my brain and its hard to separate what ideas came from where. im doin my best tho!

ok lets jump into it!

i am So. Curious. on how ryan and the genies whole deal is gonna shake out. was that it? will there be consequences? i have a feeling we'll be seeing some kind of fallout from this wish. it feels like they cut their conversation very short for a very specific reason. theres gotta be something going on there.

I think that ryan didnt *technically* wish the professor back to life, he just wished the professor back to the present. i also like the idea used in @ask-the-substitute that ryan used his 3 wishes to bring the professor back and thats how the profs mom and dad got to the present. its so perfect, i love it. just the idea of ryan thinking the first wish didnt work so then he tried again, and again. incredible.

i am curious if there is gonna be any time travel conflict! im not sure what that would look like (my brain kinda melts when it comes to timey wimey bullshit). honestly this is the part im the most unsure of. like theyre probably is consequences, but i dont even know where to start for what that would look like. i still like to think that the article showing the professor's family's bones just faded away like how people in photos did in back to the future.

the substitute ABSOLUTELY survived the defenestration!! watcher hq is one story and im slightly convinced the substitute cant die (unless we go by hot daga hologram logic, in that case you would need a witch and a volcano to kill most holograms [and i dont have a volcano handy])

i hope the substitute turns into either

1) a minor villan thats more annoying/funny then anything.

2) character redemption arc. we really like this funky guy and it would be cool to see him chill out with the stabby stabby. (just a little, he can stabby stabby as a treat)

now it would be REALLY FUNNY if the substitute did ad reads for future seasons Especially for nord vpn and other online security stuff.

i think the bigger fish to fry is gonna be those puppets trapped in the wonderium arena!! we gotta get them outta there and back into their earthly bodies!! how is that gonna happen??? god is asleep, the devil isnt gonna help, and neither is the genie. how the hell do you even get to a purgatory like that? dorthy ruth has moved on even though her husband isnt really dead!!!

what im really curious about for next season is

1) who is gonna be the musical guest. if the professor cant time travel, where is he gonna get his musical talents? will he reuse the substitutes tech to make guests?

2) any new stuff to go with our new professor??

3) are dino mom and dad gonna be involved? casually mentioned? i really hope a guest asks if the professor has a family just so that he can excitedly say "yes!! i do :D"

those are most of my thoughts going into s6! pretty excited to see what next season is going to look like! not sure if its gonna be lore heavy. ill be keeping an eye peeled for any hints 👀 either way, im excited to learn :)

[variousqueerthings]

OKAY LAST FLUX EPISODE LET'S GOOOOOOOOO

I do like the doctor being torn into three timelines/dimensions, that's very spacey-wacey timey-wimey of her, and the way it seems to be increasingly exhausting to her

I feel like. while whatshisface and azure are well-designed and well-acted they're not well-drawn enough for me to enjoy their scenes as much as I do other parts of this story. they're constantly a little vague and like they're missing some core element that gives them a compelling edge, rather than just the sort of villain's posturing that one gets bored of

the doctor and yaz are the strongest parts for me, although I actually like dan more than I thought I would -- and while theirs isn't the best-paced/embedded story of the lot, I do technically like the two space-farers (vinder and bel) who're trying to find each other and slowly zero in on the main story, and I think karvanista is great, and I enjoy diane too, because she goes beyond just existing for dan's story

some of the other people are a bit lost on me, because it's so many across so many sprawling plots. on the whole I think there's a few too many pieces in this six-parter, and the division to me is the weakest one, which is what a lot of the other Stuff that's hard for me to get invested in revolves around

the idea of "all this happened while you were with the division, which you don't remember and you just need to trust is a massive plot that spans across all these people you used to know that is emotionally devastating. you're devastated right now," doesn't work for me

but there's enough here that does that it's not lost me. the doctor making fun of the title "grand serpent," the doctor getting frustrated and strung out as more and more stuff is hurled at her over the course of this story, the doctor figuring things out while split across three dimensions, just a fair bit of thirteen getting to do a lot of cool things

on the whole, it's very much about glass half empty or glass half full for me with chibs (with the occasional chibnall throwing the glass against the wall... this works as a metaphor I think....) and I'm currently quite positive about it. we'll see how it all ends! (and then the three thirteen episodes after that)

[booksandabeer]

Hi. First of all, you’re amazing and you’re doing God’s work for us. Second, could you please recommend me some time-travel fics? I think I already read a few well known ones, and was wondering if there’s more? Also, it’s usually both or Bucky who time-travels, is there fics where Steve goes alone instead?

Hello Stranger!

Thanks for the ask and your very kind words. I live to serve! 😉

Now. The first thing I need to do here, is to point you towards this excellent rec list by @voylitscope There are a lot of very good fics on it and I strongly recommend you check it out.

I also want to apologize again for the long wait. I had a busy week and when I finally sat down to put together this list, I realized fairly quickly that almost 90% of it was comprised of some sort of EG-Fix-It fics. Just the idea of writing up my thoughts on all of them felt exhausting and saddening to me, so I scrapped the whole thing and started over. So without further ado, here are 7 fics featuring timey-wimey stuff that I have read and very much enjoyed and 3 more that I've yet to read, but can't wait to get to because they look amazing:

sun peeking through the sky series by dontcallmebree | M, 16K (2 Parts)

Author's summary: Steve clears his throat, curling his hands into fists to hide them. “Alright, say I believe you. Hell, you’re here. So what?”

Scott pins him with an unshakable stare, alive and unyielding. He never realized Scott could be so intense. Sam was the one who knew Scott better, but then again, Sam was always the better one of the two of them. “Look, the place I was in—the quantum realm—it messes with time, it lets you go back.”

Steve wants to throw him out.

A post-IW, twice-over canon divergent series. In the first part, Scott and the Ant Fam (or what's left of it post-Snap) burst into a heavily depressed Steve's existence and slowly turn it into something resembling a life again, and together they hatch a plan to save the world. What that plan entails? I'm not going to spoil it here, but let's just say it's much more clever and original, not to mention more logical and emotionally satisfying than anything that happened in EG. It's a quietly humorous, suspenseful, heartbreaking, and at times brutally tender series about finding and accepting second chances when you least expect them.

To Live It Again Is Past All Endeavor by trinityofone | T, 21 K

Author's summary: Time travel bodyswap! Present-day Steve and Bucky wake up back in their old bodies in 1938, while past Steve and Bucky wake in a future where they're both built like comic book heroes and Bucky's got what he thinks is a swell future robot arm. Adventures are had, and the ethics of time travel are debated. Also, everyone trash talks Willem de Kooning.

A story that really drives home some hard emotional truths while never entirely losing its light touch. Accompany Steve and Bucky as they travel into the future AND the past, and discover their once and future selves. I call this fic "the clairvoyant one" because it features Steve and Bucky contemplating staying in the past and a subsequent discussion of the ethics and purpose of time travel that had me frantically scroll back up and check that, yes, this fic was indeed written all the way back in 2014. I then proceeded to lose my mind a little bit because it is such an eerily specific and accurate rebuttal to Steve's EG ending that I'm more than half convinced the author has clairvoyant abilities.

Where All Roads Lead by DrowningByDegrees | E, 46K

Author's summary: When Steve Rogers inadvertently touches a relic in the course of a mission gone sideways during WWII, he’s catapulted seventy years into the future. Before he's even sure where he's ended up, his search for help puts him in contact with Bucky Barnes, a historian and college professor who has built a career around studying Captain America. With Bucky's help, Steve means to find out how exactly he ended up in 2017, and solve the bigger mystery of how to get home. There's just one problem. The closer they get to their goal, the less certain Steve is that he wants to go home.

A Shrunkyclunks AU where Steve accidentally time travels straight from WW2 to the 21st Century. It's funny and heartbreaking, well-written and cleverly plotted. Also features beautiful art by alby_mangroves that not only beautifully augments the story, but actually is a part of it, too.

The Restoration Artist by superheroresin | E, 109K

Author's summary: As a conservator of rare oil paintings for The Met, Steve Rogers thinks of himself part scientist, part archaeologist, but hardly an artist in his own right. Only when he’s faced with the daunting task of restoring a frozen painting from a recently unearthed Nazi art hoard does he start to feel his passion for the craft return. Before he has a chance to understand what that means, Steve is transported to the 1940’s, where he meets both The Winter Soldier himself, and his own destiny.

A Shrinkyclinks AU in which art conservator Steve travels through time to save Bucky... who has been trapped in a painting...? Mystery! Romance! Art Talk! I practically inhaled this thing in one go, despite the length. This is a really lovely story, full of clever ideas and twist and turns that will keep you guessing. And on top of that you'll learn a whole lot about art restoration! What's not to love?

the world on fire by burlesquecomposer | M, 62K

Author’s summary: Steve loves old vinyl records, doodles on his files, and cannot remember a time that he didn't serve the TVA. And that suits him just fine—that is, until stray variant Bucky Barnes, fresh out of HYDRA's grasp, drops into his time theater and makes Steve question everything he believes in.

A really well written fic that has time travel and variants and alternate timelines and parallel universes and... you get it. A whole lot of timey wimey stuff, but the author keeps track of it all and ties up everything beautifully in the end. A super fun premise, clever plotting, wonderful characterizations, and a firm grasp on the SteveBucky dynamic in every incarnation/iteration/variation. It's a really lovely fic and I think it deserves a lot more love and attention.

On the Cover of Dawn by adeepeningdig | T, 6K

Author's summary: “Listen,” Bucky says again, and pads to Steve, book still in hand. “I’d sell my soul for that/fawn/of a boy night walker/to sound of the ‘ud & flute playing/who saw the glass in my hand said/“drink the wine from between my lips.” He kisses Steve then, insistent, tongue sweeping into his mouth, body to body. Steve buckles beneath it. Two stories. One poem.

I'm cheating a little with this one... maybe. To be perfectly honest, I don't really know what's going on here even after I read this several times. Is it time travel? An alternate universe? Reincarnation? None of it at all? The thing is, I'm not sure the reader is meant to definitively know or understand what exactly is happening, and ultimately, it doesn't really matter. What does matter is the poignancy, the beautiful, at times lyrical language, and the reassurance that Steve and Bucky will find and love each other in every possible universe and incarnation. Also features one of my favorite George Barnes scenes ever.

From Tralfamadore, With Love by newsbypostcard | E, 106K | Part 1 in From Tralfamadore series

Author's summary: In 2018, Steve, Sam, and Bucky embark on a mission to explore a Hydra-owned warehouse when a kid with mutant powers sends Steve 18 years into the future. Steve's just as in love with Bucky as he was when he left, but for Bucky it's been a long 18 years. As he gets used to life in 2036 and the flaws in Bucky's idyllic life expose themselves, Steve also has to manage a suspiciously ubiquitous security force, a Brotherhood of Mutants, and old competing loyalties among his aged friends. There's a Bucky in 2018 waiting for him to come home, but if he does that, it means leaving this Bucky behind for a third, unforgivable time. How can he choose?

Yes yes, I recced this not too long ago, I know. But there is simply no way in hell that I'm going to put together a time travel rec list and NOT include this fic. The summary is pretty self-explanatory, and I really don't want to reveal anymore than that. Much of the tension and emotional drama in this fic comes from not knowing what's going to happen, and from desperately guessing at how on earth the author is going to solve Steve's impossible dilemma. I loved the way the author explored the relationship of a Steve and a Bucky who have been separated for two seconds and 18 years, respectively. Also, possibly the best use of a Fleetwood Mac song in fanfic ever.

🕰 +3 To Reads:

Savage God by PottersPink | M, 36K

Author's summary: Past, present, future, Steve knows Bucky Barnes. It’s why he recognized him when he found him in that alley in April of 1942, even though Bucky was older, stronger, wearier; he called himself The Asset, and had a metal fucking arm. The Asset was only with Steve in 1942 for a few days, but it’s enough to change the course of Steve’s life forever.

Seventy years later, Steve wakes up in the twenty-first century, and he doesn’t know whether to be heartbroken or hopeful when some of the things Bucky revealed to him in 1942 start falling into place.

Every You, Every Me by Starshot | E, 48K

Author's summary: Desperate to follow when Bucky ships out to war in 1943, Steve volunteers for Project Rebirth, an experimental program meant to turn him into the world’s first super-soldier. Instead it fails, leaving him with a condition dubbed “Chrono-Impairment” which sees him travelling uncontrollably through time, to random points in both his and Bucky’s lives.

But with Bucky brainwashed into working for HYDRA, and Steve living life on the run, torn between his own time and Bucky’s, will they ever find the happy ending they so desperately desire? (AKA the Stucky AU based on the book, "The Time Traveler’s Wife" by Audrey Niffenegger)

a day in the life by powerfulowl (StuckyFlangst) E, 20K

Author's summary: Steve wakes to the sound of someone moving about in the kitchen below him. He lies for a few moments, trying to recall—a dream?

He looks over at the nightstand and there is a piece of card propped up there. He reaches out to take it.

You are Captain America. You are Steve Rogers. It is 1956. You are married to Peggy Rogers, nee Carter. You live in New Jersey. Sometimes you have trouble remembering.

Steve Rogers wakes up on Tuesday October 30 1956, and doesn't seem to remember his life that well. Why does every day feel so familiar? And why does he keep getting visited by tall, dark, handsome men who remind him of Bucky?

____________

You can always send more asks for fic recs if you want. I love inflicting my taste on everybody else!

[skayafair]

Names, Legends and Archetypes

Since it’s theories day, I’ll write another long-awaiting post.

So far names seem to be important/have meaning.

- Faroe - as was noted here, she’s named after the Isle of Sheep. This made me think about her role as ‘sacrificial lamb’: while she had to die, she still has an immense impact on Arthur and, thus, everything that’s goin on. The parellel with Addison only added to this impression.

- Kellin told about his name himself

- John Doe as a name speaks for itself and has so many connotations within the plot that I won’t even dig into this, there’s going to be a wall of text and this post isn’t about it. In short, I see it as a blank slate for the piece of entity to begin his journey to becoming someone of his own design. Plus, John seems to have a fixation on names.

- Someone here (forgive me I didn’t reblog and can’t find the post now) noticed Andrew Larson’s initials coincide with Arthur Lester’s - plot mirrors and parallels, we get it. I wonder if Jack Larson’s name has any meaning to it as well.

- There’s also Bella and I have a feeling it’s just the first name to hop into one’s mind to define some not-very-important female figure - she’s a woman, women are associated with beauty, let it be “Bella”. Maybe I’m wrong, it’s just a feeling.

And now we’re getting to the main star - Arthur.

First I’ll have to remind about one short episode 20 part when Kayne (who seems to be my main starting point for all the theories since he’s the only one who seems to actually know something) called Hastur “once and future king”.

This scratched my ears when I heard it because I never encountered the King in Yellow being referred this way before. This title exists, but it isn’t his.

Kayne MIGHT have been saying this just for the drama, this is always an option.

Except.

The actual “once and future king”’s name is Arthur Pendragon from british legends.

Soooooooo.

I like the idea that Lester and John form “jester” and those two are basically a Jester archetype in this story, mocking and challenging the King, being insightful and gaining wisdom, never bowing to the challenges they face, - but I get this is rather stretched. 

But I also know there are some interesting theories circulating.

For instance, I like the idea that the King in Yellow started as a human - this would explain why John’s called “Hastur’s heart” - I mean why an eldritch entity would need a “heart” in the first place? Besides, John seems to recall being human some time in his past, although this is unclear, but it ties well with the rest. Contrary to his own words, he didn’t learn everything from Arthur or their time together: e.g., it was John’s own initiative to stop by the car and go search for the child, and they’ve been together for less than a day by then. No one changes this fast, so I believe John has always had compassion in him - it’s another question of what to consider “humanity” and what not, but I guess within the podcast it would be considered as such, these words are often used there as synonims semantically.

So John may be Hastur’s human heart.

And the King might have been human some long time ago.

So there may either be timey-wimey and becoming the King is actually Arthur’s fate - time makes a full circle, seems fitting to “once and future king” title.

Or this is an indication of the rivalry, opposition of the two: the false King and the true future one, the Hero (which is another archetype and Arthur is striving to fit into it the whole series).

I like the 2nd option more, especially since the narration keeps mocking Arthur for his vanity time and again (reciting Invictus and giving up his principles a few episodes later, really now), so he’s never actually a Hero, he’s unfit for the title to begin with, but it’s exactly what makes this all interesting.

Or maybe there are other explanations (or I’m reading to much into things as usual).

The discussions are very welcome!

[xenon-demon]

💝: fave trope w/ rec

This isn’t from the list, just offering it up to give you the chance to talk about it if you’d like—no pressure!

HHHHHHHH IM VIBRATING EXCITEDLY THIS IS SUCH A CUTE IDEA, THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!

ok. so. It’s very hard to pick an ULTIMATE fave trope buuuuut a very strong contender for the title is time travel fics. More specifically, time LOOP fics. (What can I say, Doctor Who had some significant effects on my preteen brain chemistry.) I love a good time loop fic because it lets you hit a lot of my favourite things all in one: timey wimey nonsense, getting to Fix whatever canon bullshit you need to, having all these little character moments where you can explore different dynamics and do character studies - especially if people other than the looping character start to change/remember things as the loops go on??? MAN. I EAT THAT SHIT UP. Also the potential for calling back to previous events or repeating an event with a subtle twist to it each time, it’s suuuuuuch good shit. I also find stories about the importance of trying - even when it’s difficult, even when you don’t want to anymore, even when it may not actually change anything - really resonate with me. Which is major time loop vibes, yknow? I am a certified Time Loop Enjoyer™.

I know there’s a lot of good time loop fics out there in the ST fandom (especially steddie fandom), which, duh, Steve and Eddie and the events of season 4 are practically BUILT for a time loop. Because of that (and because the fic I really wanna rec for this trope is A Lot and Not For Everyone), I’m going to rec TWO time loop fics for you.

1: echo by CaptainHoney (~30k words, rated E)

Warning - READ THE GODDAMN TAGS. CHECK THE ARCHIVE WARNINGS. I AM NOT KIDDING. This fic starts out going full tilt balls-to-the-walls and it does not stop once. It’s emotionally intense (lots of angst), the events of the fic are intense, it’s a heavier take on time loops than a lot of other fics in this fandom, and you Will feel like you’ve been put through an emotional blender by the end. But there is a happy ending (I’m a sucker for happy endings, I can’t read anything more than ~5k without one), and like I mentioned above this is a story about Trying. Trying even when it’s hard, even when you don’t want to anymore, is such a powerful story theme for me and I really like the way it’s explored in echo. Plus, it’s a love story of course, and a damn fucking good one - both the love between Eddie & Steve, and the love their whole extended found family have for each other.

ALSO. I’m a feral creature for fun narrative choices and echo is told both non-linearly AND from multiple POVs (don’t let that scare you, it’s always really clear who and when we’re dealing with. You’ll see if you read the fic). It’s absolutely fucking delicious. I don’t see this fic talked about much (literally ever, actually) and I think that’s a SHAME. That being said, I do recognise this fic is Very intense and not for everyone, which is perfectly fine! Take care of yourselves, and don’t read something that you’re worried might put you in a bad spot mentally just because I’m hyping it up here. 💙

2: you are young and life is long (and there is time to kill today) by heartofwinterfell (~70k, rated M)

This is a fun one. This is technically a series, with the first fic being ~18k from Eddie’s POV as he goes through the loops, and the second is ~52k from Steve’s POV as he lives in the time loop without knowing it’s a time loop. Yeah. I really love that perspective, you don’t often see a time loop fic from the perspective of the other character, and it’s done really well here. PLUS the second chapter of Steve’s fic goes into time loop aftermath and recovery, which is one of my favourite things to explore that often doesn’t get addressed in great detail.

Thanks so much for the ask, anon, I really loved getting the chance to ramble a bit 💙

Ask me for a fic rec!

[timeagainreviews]

Moffat’s Great Gamble

Over its lifetime, Doctor Who has accumulated an ample and varied stable of villains, monsters, and baddies. Some are more successful than others. The Daleks were an overnight sensation spreading Dalek mania across the UK. The Cybermen were burned into every Whovian’s mind after proving too much for the Doctor, kickstarting the first regeneration. However, one of the more surprisingly successful baddies was the Weeping Angels. Having been introduced in one of the Doctor-light episodes most writers usually avoided, their overnight success must have been a pleasant surprise at the BBC. Overnight, the phrase “Don’t blink,” became as iconic as “Exterminate!” The next question, of course, was- can lightning strike twice?

It wouldn’t be until three years later that newly appointed showrunner Steven Moffat would put them to the test. A common practice within Doctor Who, when bringing back popular baddies, is to up the ante. Usually, this is done by establishing new abilities and/or technological advancements. Long gone are the days when Daleks were powered by static electricity. No longer can you escape their plunger’s grasp by ascending a flight of stairs. In a similar fashion, one of Moffat’s first steps was to address similar shortcomings of the angels. The next step was also a common one- going bigger.

Unlike the Doctor-light affair that was “Blink,” the return of the Weeping Angels demanded a bigger budget and lots more Doctor. So much so, that it actually required two whole episodes to tell the story. Adding to the grandeur was the exciting reappearance of River Song who had yet to return after her first story with the Tenth Doctor. It’s safe to assume that a lot was riding on the success of this story as it was the first they ever filmed with Matt Smith. An excerpt from the script was also used while auditioning for the role of Amy Pond. In many ways, this was the proof of concept for Moffat’s entire run on Doctor Who. Can the show continue outside the hulking shadow of Russell T Davies and David Tennant?

It’s important to me when revisiting older Doctor Who episodes to try and remember what we the audience knew at the time. When reviewing the First Doctor’s initial stories, I tried to imagine what it was like to walk into the TARDIS for the first time. We’re so used to that old phone box being bigger on the inside that we can forget its initial splendour. Knowing that River Song is Amy and Rory’s daughter and the Doctor’s wife can make us forget that at one point, she was a mystery. I find it important to remember these things because they can colour our memories with hindsight bias.

My initial reaction to River Song was one of frustration. In making the Doctor and her constantly meet in the opposite direction, much of the chemistry between River and the Doctor is merely implied. We’re told about these great adventures when being shown is far more interesting. It feels akin to falling out with a TV show only to jump back on two seasons later and discover a brand-new main character you know nothing about. There’s a sort of grudge against the new guy because they’re unfamiliar to you. In some ways, both Moffat and Alex Kingston lean into this frustration. This adds a bit of something to River as a character. She’s flirty, a bit of a mystery, and very possibly dangerous. It can also subtract from her character as it makes her feel less established and vague.

Something I have always admired about Steven Moffat’s era of Doctor Who is that he was one of the few writers to really play with the concept of time travel. It’s no wonder that “wibbly wobbly timey wimey,” is one of his lines. Even a Comic Relief short like “Time,” does more with the concept than a lot of other writers. It makes sense that Moffat would play with the concept of two time travellers always meeting out of sync. The problem is that while this gimmick is creative, it’s not incredibly interesting to hear about. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again- I don’t care about Jim the Fish. However, this time around, I found myself pleasantly surprised by River Song, and this is largely due to the fact that I know who she is now. If I were to think of her in the same vein as I did those initial First Doctor serials, I would probably still voice the same frustrations. But Alex Kingston is fun, and ultimately, so is River.

While I’m on the subject of River, I would like to mention one bit that still boils my blood, and those of you familiar with this story may already know what I am about to say. While watching River fly the TARDIS with her fuck me pumps hanging from the console is very cool, I can’t stand the joke about the parking brake. I’ve had people defend this joke as clearly being a gag, but I just can’t go there. My geek brain can’t divorce the joke from the history of the show. That would mean that every Time Lord in the history of the show is so bad at piloting a TARDIS that they too leave their parking brakes on. Furthermore, it’s shown to be more than a joke because as River lands the TARDIS, it doesn’t make that fantastic sound. I know this is incredibly pedantic, but I hate it. The only way forward is to ignore it like I would ignore the Doctor being half-human on his mother’s side or the majority of the Chibnall era.

After River’s iconic entrance, we’re given a glimpse into how this new era of Doctor Who will work. Much of this story functions in the same manner as a classic UNIT story. The Doctor is the difficult genius helping a team of soldiers and scientists, while Amy is the audience experiencing the danger on a human level. Much like Sally Sparrow, we experience the toll the Weeping Angels take through her dusty eyes. The fan reactions to the Weeping Angels are challenged here when Amy’s quick-witted idea of winking as opposed to blinking is undermined by an angel imprinting itself within Amy’s eye.

Writers don’t always make characters more dangerous when reintroducing them. Adding more rules isn’t always as effective as creating more dangerous conditions. Too many rules can bog a story down. After years of changing hands between writers, Superman’s powers became so numerous that he bordered on stupidly overpowered. I am happy then that Steven Moffat did a little bit of both. While he does indeed give the Weeping Angels more powers, he also ups the ante by placing our heroes in a more dangerous situation. Instead of an old house full of a few angels, why not an ancient ruin full of hundreds of them? That will do it.

When I first watched this story, I had originally been quite turned off by the idea of the image of an angel becoming an angel, but now I feel a bit differently. You can tell that Steven Moffat thought about the ways these deadly hunters might adapt. If you can stop them by looking at them, then they’ll compel you to look them in the eye thus imprinting themselves. Steven Moffat’s bread and butter are these little areas where he can turn the mundane into danger. Stay out of shadows because they’ll clean your bones dry. Forget a monster the moment you look away. And whatever you do, don’t blink. These are the thoughts of a writer who sat around as a child thinking about Doctor Who. Every one of Moffat’s wibbly wobbly proclivities is the product of growing up a geeky little boy reading Target novels and pondering the implications of time travel.

While Matt Smith is one of my favourite Doctors, I do feel like it’s obvious this is his first outing as the Doctor. There’s a bit toward the end where I feel his Doctor comes across as too angry. Though this is hard to gauge as much of this adventure would be incredibly stressful. You do get an implication, however, of the type of Doctor we would see more of in the Capaldi era. In this story, the Doctor comes off as more authoritative and bossy than usual. By the time they got around to filming “The Eleventh Hour,” he seems much more comfortable in the role. It’s not hard to see how I was instantly endeared to him as the Doctor. He was able to get any stumbles out of the way by the end of filming “Flesh and Stone.”

A stand-out of this story would have to be Iain Glen as Father Octavian. In the future, the Catholic Church becomes more of a military than a religion. It’s a bit muddled how any of it operates, but this doesn’t detract from Glen’s performance. It wasn’t until researching for this review that I realised this role pre-dates his role as Ser Jorah Mormont from Game of Thrones by about a year. I thought his role had been a cameo fresh off the buzz of his HBO fame. Mind you, I didn’t see this episode as it aired. It wasn’t until season six that I got to actually watch Doctor Who in real-time. I was still working my way through David Tennant at this point.

Another cameo I appreciated more than most was that of Mike Skinner as the soldier tripping balls on River’s psychedelic lipstick. In the early 2000’s I was a bit of a fan of the Streets, so it was cool to see him if even for a moment. He’s also a bit of perfect casting as seeing him whacked out like “darlings on Charlie,” was appropriate for his brand. It’s also a great reintroduction to River Song. It’s established that she goes around getting into danger and escaping it with relative ease. Whoever River Song is, she’s dangerous. However, I don’t exactly understand any of what I’m seeing on Byzantium leading up to her and the Doctor’s reunion. I love the idea that the Doctor keeps score by visiting museums. And I like the idea that this futuristic ship full of James Bond villains crashed 12,000 years ago. But I don’t understand why she’s there or much of anything else.

We know that the Byzantium is now crashlanded on Alfalva Metraxis, and its radioactive core is feeding a group of long-dormant Weeping Angels. And this is about as far as Steven Moffat wants us to think about it. River’s transition from spy thriller nightwear to military fatigues is about as fluid as the show’s shift in tone. A couple of throw-away lines of dialogue and suddenly River is GI Jane. It’s not a very elegant transition considering you might miss it altogether. But like I said, Moffat seems more interested in progressing the story. It’s less important how or why we’re in a giant ruin full of Weeping Angels. What’s important to know is that we’re in a giant ruin full of Weeping Angels.

The soldiers work much like they always do in UNIT-type stories- as fodder to be thrown into the gnashers of great evil. There’s some brilliant character work with the Doctor comforting Scared Bob. He also uses this opportunity to bring Father Octavian down a peg or two by implying that it would be stupid to underestimate the angels. This is driven home and amped up all the more by revealing the native species of Alfalva Metraxis had two heads, implying that every statue with only one head is actually a Weeping Angel, eroded by centuries of entropy. It’s nice to be reminded that all you need to do to illustrate the danger of a threat is to place the protagonists in a dangerous situation. I’m not exactly scared of a tiger at a zoo, but if it the jungle, that changes things a bit. You don’t need to give tigers lasers to make them scarier, you just need to place them in an environment advantageous to tigers. It also helps if there are a shitload of them.

With the new reality of their situation in mind, our protagonists are reasonably terrified. Soldiers begin shooting wildly. It would be easy to let the story fall away into action schlock, but ever present is the grounding role that is Amy. Karen Gillan should really be commended for nailing her character so early. There is a vulnerability to her performance here that feels thoughtful. As a person who experiences infrequent eye problems, I can attest to how they can completely occupy your awareness. Much like her performance in “The Girl Who Waited,” Gillan uses her physicality and posture to a great degree. You never forget that something is going wrong with Amy, which creates a persistent unease. The audience is unable to relax because Amy is in trouble.

It’s this sense of dread that carries a lot of this story in sections where it drags. Like a lot of multi-part Doctor Who stories, they feel too long for one episode, and too short for two. A big chunk of the story is given to the Doctor’s conversations with the hijacked consciousness of Bob after the angels snapped his neck. Angel Bob chimes in intermittently to demoralise the lads and establish exposition. It’s an okay device, but out of all of the angels’ new powers, this one is my least favourite. I’m not sure the angels ever needed voices, and in some ways, it makes them less terrifying. This isn’t a Davros moment where the angels have suddenly established their own dictator. It’s closer to learning the inner thoughts of an unknowable horror. Eldritch abominations lose a bit of their edge when you learn they’re not above schoolboy taunts.

Being generous though, I’m going to chalk it up to the fact that the Angels aren’t at full strength. They would need to conserve energy by employing cruder forms of warfare. I suppose my main gripe is that it feels like when Eric Cartman has the power to have every power. I’ve griped about this in previous reviews about the Moffat era’s tendency toward giving villains new and perplexing powers. Like the Zygons turning people into big balls of hair. Or the Ice Warriors and their guns that fold people like beach towels. If this episode is the overture for the grand opus that is the Moffat era, then you can see why problems began to form. Oneupsmanship can be exciting, but it can also be a crutch. It is a form of sensationalism and it can also deflate actual dramatic tension by either elucidating too much or pushing things too far.

Regardless of how I feel about the inclusion of “every power” the Angel Bob segments are still creepy. David Atkins gives a strong interpretation of a naïve soldier being twisted into something cruel. The fact that he’s able to get so much out of voiceover work is impressive. I’m surprised he’s not had a bigger career. Hell, not even Big Finish has used him. Much like Amy’s story arc, Angel Bob gives to the horror movie element of the story. When comparing this story to “Blink,” you could draw parallels to the Alien franchise. The first story is a smaller-scale budget horror while the next installment was more of an action blockbuster. Where the comparison breaks down, however, is that this isn’t an action story after all. It’s more like the story of “Predator,” where a group of soldiers fresh off the set of a Canon film walk directly into a slasher movie. Doctor Who has never told a straight military story. Even when the Doctor worked for UNIT it was usually beside them than with them.

The fact that the military in this story is the Catholic church is an interesting choice, thematically. Angels vs the Church, very big brain Steven, bravo. I do have to scratch my head imagining the sequence of events that would cause the Catholic Church to pivot from systematic abuse toward forming a military… oh wait, I answered my own question. It does muddy the waters a bit with regard to certain characters’ motivations. Father Octavian feels like a man of deep conviction, but if the Catholic Church has pivoted toward becoming a military, does he pray with bullets? Is the G-Man upstairs still part of the equation? Are these priests one with the holy spirit or is that all balderdash in their time? Maybe nobody else gives a shit about these questions, but they’re things that nibble at the back of my mind, distracting me. I can’t be the only one.

Moffat has said in interviews that when he pens a two-part story, he endeavours to begin the second half of the story in a different location or circumstance. He was frustrated by the way “The Doctor Dances,” simply picked up where “An Empty Child,” left off. You can see this in the way “Silence in the Library,” ends in the library, whereas “Forest of the Dead,” begins with Donna living in a house under the care of Dr Moon. I’m not really sure why this is such a big deal for Moffat. It’s like how Simpsons episodes start in one place and end up in a drastically different location. There’s no rule that the second part of a story can’t pick up where the first left off any more than the guarantee that the opposite will be interesting. What’s interesting then is that this story does a bit of both.

Having ended with Matt Smith’s rather cool speech about being the last thing you want to put into a trap, it was a bit of a mystery as to where we would end up in the second half. Having shot a set of gravity stabilisers on the Byzantium, the Doctor and company were able to fall upward to the gravity of the ship’s surface. But this is only a stopgap from the onslaught of Angels growing evermore powerful from the ship’s radiation. The slick interior of the Byzantium stands in stark contrast to the eroding temple below, giving us that Moffat point of difference. On a horror level going from a broken temple to a polished spaceship is a bit of a downgrade. It’s not like the Nostromo with its hanging chains and dark corridors. But don’t you worry, the Byzantium has a forest inside it!

There’s something very Moffat about going from a ruin to a ship, to a dark forest. The forest is arguably the first place we found ourselves naked and afraid. If you’ve ever walked through a dark forest on a moonless night, you know a bit of the animal terror that preys on your brain. Your eyes begin to trick you as you peer in vain to distinguish shadows of trees from shadows of predators. Imagine then that those shadows may be a group of hungry statues with the power to send you back in time to live under Thatcher. Terrifying. I know for a fact that this situation would be scary as it was the most effective part of the walk-through section of the Doctor Who Experience. Even at 30, I didn’t want the Weeping Angels statues to touch me. I think that speaks truth to the lasting terror of Moffat’s most infamous creations.

Things get worse for our heroes when the crack in time and space from young Amy’s bedroom wall makes a cameo. However, this time instead of having the giant eye of the Atraxi inside, we’re greeted by a hungry force of broken spacetime eager to heal itself by feeding on people’s lives. It does so by enticing the priests into its light like an angler fish. As the men go one by one to inspect this phenomenon, it erases them from existence, with the only one seeming to remember being Amy. The Doctor later explains this by telling her she remembers the men because she’s a time traveller now. This makes enough sense in the moment, but falls apart when Amy can’t seem to remember Rory, a fellow time traveller to whom she’s been engaged for some time.

The Doctor, River, and Octavian work their way through the Byzantium while leaving Amy behind. The need arises after Amy’s condition has progressed to the point that she is started to see things that aren’t real. After she begins to think her body is turning to stone, only the sting of the Doctor’s bite can convince her that she is still flesh and blood. Even more worrying is that Amy has begun slowly counting down from ten and doesn’t even notice herself doing it. It’s genius then that the one way for Amy to survive this encounter with the Weeping Angels is by doing the one thing you’re not supposed to do- closing her eyes. Once again, it’s the type of situational intensification that works so much more for me than tiger lasers. The pinnacle of this story arc comes in the form of Amy having to navigate past a group of angels as though she were still able to see. If the angels think she can see them, they might behave as though she can see them.

At the time, I remember murmurs in the fandom from people who were upset to see the angels move in this scene. I can see their argument a bit. It’s a bit like knowing their thoughts in that seeing them move makes them feel a bit less scary. The fact that we never see how fast they move or what moving may look like gives them a monstrous feeling. Personally, I don’t really mind. It worked for me the first time around and I still find it rather fun. The stone-against-stone sound they make as their heads look toward Amy is cute. Does it break the fundamental rules of the Weeping Angels? A bit yeah. The fact that they kind of move here says that maybe the angels aren’t quantum-locked at that moment. It implies that maybe they’re standing still because they expect they can’t actually move. It’s a case where the unknown leads to interesting questions as opposed to distracting ones. Moffat is transferring the way he experienced Doctor Who as a boy into his writing.

One element that really bothers me is the way in which Father Octavian dies. With so many variables to now worry about, the Doctor is really feeling the pressure. Amy is close to death. The angels are progressing. The crack is getting bigger. And there are lives at stake. What bothers me is that the Doctor gets lost in thought about the crack’s ability to erase people out of existence. I find it annoying that the most they can find for the Doctor to do in this moment is flap his hands about while piecing together that time can be rewritten- a fact that the Doctor has stated on numerous occasions in the past. He gets so involved with this train of thought that he completely misses that Father Octavian is about to be outflanked by a Weeping Angel. It’s nice that Father Octavian has a brave and dignified death, but I am offended that it was because the Doctor was busy figuring out the blatantly obvious. It’s one of the moments I felt was a bit of a misstep for this new Doctor. Sure, the Doctor is prone to get lost in thought, and the Doctor does occasionally get people killed. But this was possibly one of the dumbest reasons ever. Octavian’s death is played like a sacrifice, but it was a very unnecessary one.

The answer to all of the Doctor’s problems is of course right in front of him. I sort of like the way the angels try to goad the Doctor into dying for them. It’s as if in their own sick manner, they are attempting to use the Doctor’s ethos of self-sacrifice to save even their rotten existence. The Doctor is having none of this though, as a group of Weeping Angels would be just as satisfying a meal to a time anomaly as would a Time Lord with years of time travel under his belt. The fact that the angels even tried this tactic makes them feel alien. Like they misunderstand compassion so much that they think of self-sacrifice as an exploitable weakness. I like that even in giving the angels the ability to speak, they do still retain a bit of their esoteric inscrutability. 

Putting his big Time Lord brain to work, the Doctor comes to another obvious conclusion- if messing with gravity worked the first time, why not a second time? In the spirit of Indiana Jones chopping a rope bridge, the Doctor cuts the gravity long enough to feed the Weeping Angels to the crack in the wall, satiating its hunger enough to seal the crack once more. This moment is also a nice call back to the scene where the Doctor jumps down into the Byzantium which changes his centre of gravity. What seemed like a cute little moment of sci-fi fun with perspective and physics was actually the loaded gun ready to go off in the third act. I love it when Doctor Who does that. It’s like how throughout all of season four you hear about planets disappearing, a trope almost as old as the science fiction genre, and discovering that it’s actually a huge plot element in the finale.

While the Doctor still doesn’t trust River, it's interesting then that she returns to the Storm Cage. Whoever it is that she murdered, it was someone she respected enough to believe she belongs in prison. With nobody around to physically take River back to her cell, she still makes no attempt to escape the smokey teleportation beam. If they were ever trying to make us think River had murdered anyone other than the Doctor, I would be surprised. It seems pretty easy to imagine that it’s the Doctor. I think the only way they could have subverted expectations is for it to have not been the Doctor. You can even tell in the way the Doctor asks River who it was that she killed that he already knows the answer. There’s an interesting dichotomy set in motion where River knows she killed the Doctor, and the Doctor knows River died to save his life. It’s one aspect where the concept of two people meeting in two different directions can be very fulfilling.

As a proof of concept for the Moffat era goes, I would say this was a success. Steven Moffat wasn’t just working to establish his brand of Doctor Who, he was working to keep the show afloat. This was a Patrick Troughton moment in that much of the show’s future hinged on its success. I know I make it sound as though I am treating this like it was the actual first story that aired, but as I said before, it was the first story they filmed. They needed to nail this one in order to move forward. And it wasn’t just about whether stories about the Eleventh Doctor or River could replace the Tenth Doctor or Captain Jack. It was about whether the era could maintain the momentum of the Russell T Davies era. If everything were to all change from what came before, would it make or break the show? I think we can proclaim that yes, lightning can strike twice.