#at the same time. him being gay IS a significant part of his character. i liked that they didnt shy away from that

[tytoalbatross]

can people be normal about dorian pavus

[pippin-katz]

One Shots in Red, White & Royal Blue - Part 1: Alex's Room

Modern movies are fucking obsessed with jump cuts. Even scenes where it is completely unnecessary get cut to shreds. There's films I've seen where one, single sentence line got three jump cuts in it.

After watching Red, White, & Royal Blue over ten times now, I’ve noticed so many moments where they could’ve made jump cuts, but didn’t. There were moments where I was expecting it to cut because of how used I am to other movies cutting the shit out of scenes. They did not do that here, and believe me, it makes a difference.

Cuts temporarily remind the viewer that they're watching something scripted, professionally filmed, and edited. It's a subconscious feeling that most people probably don't even notice.

In case you're unfamiliar, a one shot in film is when a sequence happens without any cuts. One of the benefits of using them is the believability they add. Any amount of time could've progressed between cuts, like if they film a scene on two different days. When you see everything happening in real time, it just feels more real.

Red, White, & Royal Blue balanced their editing and camerawork incredibly well, and utilized one shots way more than I see a lot of other films doing nowadays. They use it for a variety of scenes, and it's done very well.

Example No. 1

From this moment, where Henry enters the room:

GIF by taylorz-nicholasg

To Henry pushing Alex onto the couch:

GIF by sheisraging

To when the sequence ends:

GIF by gay-bucky-barnes

is ALL ONE SHOT.

There are no camera cuts during that sequence, and there's a significant amount of movement and activity going on.

They are obviously aggressively making out, and crossing the room at the same time. Tracking this part might be common, but when they get to the couch, and Henry pushes him, I got this gut feeling that a jump cut was about to happen, but it didn't.

Instead, the camera rotates around to that side perspective, and lets Henry come back into frame and onto the couch in real time.

GIF by sheisraging

The camera doesn't change position until Henry moves down, which could've been a cut to Alex's face, but they opted to zoom in on him, keeping the shot connected.

GIF by sheisraging

This is not a small series of events to capture in one shot, and it means that Nicholas and Taylor had to memorize and perform the entire scene's blocking as a whole rather than in parts. If they mess up, they can't just say: "hey try that line again"

A one shot scene like this means that if you mess up at any point during the sequence, you can't use the take. You have to do it again from the beginning. That's the point of a one shot.

I think it's such a testament to Taylor and Nicholas' talent, skill, and dedication that they did such a long shot involving so much intimate, and difficult, choreography.

Breaking it down, they have to kiss for the first part, but it's not just kissing; it's aggressive kissing. Their eyes are closed, and they're grabbing at each other, while crossing the room. Taylor has to walk backwards. They need to have really good spatial awareness in order to move without hitting something or tripping.

Once they hit the couch, Nicholas has to undo the buttons on Taylor's shirt. If you've ever worn a button-down shirt, you know that sometimes you just struggle with those damn buttons; there's a moment in Paris where they joke about them. Nick has to undo them fast, and deliver his lines too. If he's too slow with the buttons, or they get stuck, take ruined.

Nick has to shove Taylor onto the couch. He has to be visibly forceful, but not knock him down so hard he falls off the couch, or land in a way that make it difficult for him to shift into where he's supposed to be. Nick also has to climb around onto the couch fast enough.

Obviously once they're on the couch, the difficulty comes in that they are being intimate, kissing and grabbing each other, and they need to remain in character. Then they have lines, and Nicholas has to get even more intimate by kissing his neck. He undoes another button or two and kisses his chest and down his stomach, all while delivering his lines correctly.

If either of them messes up a line, or breaks character for a second, or loses their balance, or anything, go back to the start, do it all again.

That is so much, and the two of them nailed every part of it. I still admire how they were able to trust each other and become confident in doing all that they do.

This being a one shot created a really incredible scene. It's fluid, and grounded in space and time. It's not the only scene that's drastically improved by the fact that it's a one shot, so I'll probably write more essays breaking down those scenes cause this movie has me in a choke hold.

Update: If you enjoyed this essay & would like to support me, you can give me a tip on my Ko-Fi! ☺️

[dingodad]

personally the vriska calling him a pedophile bit wasnt out of place for me. Canonically vriska doesnt shy away from saying that scratch is a sexual predator, she does state outright to his face that he gets off on manipulating little girls in the comic.

i think "would it be in character for vriska to say that" and "does it make sense in the context of the story for her to say that" are two subtly but crucially different questions, though.

like, on the one hand: it has always been textually clear that doc scratch is not LITERALLY a pedophile. he's a completely asexual organism. by using that word to describe him, you're making the subtextual textual. and this kind of "saying the quiet part out loud" is something the HICU have done very deliberately since they took the helm of hs2; they are intimately aware, i think, of the fact that they are fans in charge of deconstructing homestuck for the entertainment of other fans, and that in service of that aim sometimes you need to be willing to have mature discussions out in the open. a lot of the time this has worked for them quite well, especially in terms of getting old readers back on board with a story which has in the past been overly subtle to the point of excruciating boredom. but sometimes it teeters close to the edge of "characters talking like they're fully aware they're getting therapy", and i think this example leans somewhat toward the latter. like, is there really anyone reading hs2 at this point who doesn't already have some understanding that scratch is a predator? who exactly did it serve to make that already blatant comparison that much more overt?

on the other hand... i get the impression that vriska is actually aware of this distinction, on some level? like emphasising the fact that scratch is a child predator is almost a sort of shield for her. the name of vriska's game in this chapter is minimisation; while it's super cool and heroic to admit that part of your tragic backstory involves a sick spider monster and a badass lady pirate, by trying to paint scratch as nothing more than a pathetic kiddy fiddler what she's really saying is that because he never actually molested her then she was never really abused, that she was never really a victim and therefore he was never actually a significant presence in her life at all. that's how she lives with it, by role playing as the predator to forget the fact that she was ever prey.

i think what i question about this is possibly that vriska would even know to use that word at all? writing dialogue that actually feels authentically like stuff trolls would say is another thing i think hs2 has had a rough time with ("that is a completely normal human sentence"?). the gay joke in the tavros chapter was funny because it had been a long time since we heard caliborn and jake do the same gag but it feels like they tried to capture that same energy with vriska calling tavros a "pussy" in this chapter and it fell flat. and it felt just as unnatural for a troll to say the word "pussy" as it did for her to say the word "pedophile". i think what makes alternia and its traumatic knock-on effects so effective is that it's often more insidious than it is explicit; trolls barely have the language to describe all the institutionalised neglect and abuse that is happening around them all the time because to them it's just how the world works! yeah sollux has that line about sex offenders and schools, but i think that basically serves to illustrate my point, because for the most part we all seem to understand that trolls don't have what we would be able to identify as "school" either: sexual abuse and education are concepts that, in the world of homestuck, exist entirely in the abstract; tropes to be evoked but not things that ever actually happen.

that being said, alternia is designed to reflect the structure of homestuck as a whole, and the reason alternia doesn't have sex offenders or schools is because homestuck in general does not explicitly concern itself with these topics. we understand that escaping homestuck and settling down on Earth C means settling down in the "real world", replacing the threat of time-travelling demons with real struggles and real problems, and as a continuation of the homestuck epilogues hs2 naturally IS going to continue to touch on sex and politics and all the other stuff that was delegated mostly to the subtextual in the original comic. i think the structure of this chapter even kind of alludes to this; tavros and erisol beckon vriska to relax for a moment and play childish games with them like she used to do when she was a kid on alternia, but by choosing to forge on ahead with her personal growth vriska is immediately confronted with the fact that becoming an adult is NOT like a webcomic, it's NOT all allegories and RPG battles; it can be sick and it can be hurtful and it can stop you right in your tracks just as you thought you were "making progress" toward "winning".

i just feel that by having vriska apply Earth C vocabulary to an Alternian experience right off the bat, we've skipped over a key part of her transition from homestuck to the real world. would this chapter have been any easier to stomach if it had been about vriska coming to grips with the fact that scratch was a predator in the first place? no, of course not LOL. i think my gripe here might literally just be with the word choice. like i believe the writers have it in them to express what they were trying to express here in a much more interesting way than simply having vriska say "lol he's a pedophile". yes, addressing something literally that has only ever been mentioned before in symbols and whispers is part of the impact of this update, but i don't think that has to come at the expense of the dialogue actually feeling like it belongs in the mouths of these characters

[lemotmo]

Dear god in heaven I loathe these people. Go away! Also I desperately, desperately need that phone call thing to be canon. But I love both scenarios. They feel true to both characters.

Q. I need you to be so serious. The conversation that needs to take place that you all and the show don't want to acknowledge is that Tommy made Evan. Before he started dating Tommy he was a spoiled, immature, narcissistic brat. In other words he was Buck. Tommy made him more compassionate. More thoughtful. More mature and confident in his own skills and abilities. Buck was an insignificant little boy. Evan is an accomplished capable man. The show is trying to revert him back into Buck. You all should be disgusted.

Q. If you could write it, how would you write Buck and Eddie each having their recognition moment? Do you think they'll both have their moment at the same time or separately?

A. To the first anon, what the actual fuck? Tell me you haven't watched a single second of this show that didn't include your walking piece of shit without telling me you haven't bothered to watch any part of the actual show. At some point being this stupid has to be painful. I mean it cannot be possible to be this fucking stupid without some kind of physical pain. Is this Lou's latest take? Are these his new marching orders since the pathetic hashtag stunt went completely ignored? I'm not going to waste my time explaining all the ways you're wrong about Buck. But I will be happy to tell you that the only thing Tommy did was introduce him to dick. That's it. That was Tommy's purpose. To make Buck aware that he is also attracted to men. But do you really want to know who helped Buck grow up a bit? It was meeting Eddie and Christopher. Becoming a part of their lives, and having a relationship with Christopher that involves some level of parenting. Abby, Eddie, Christopher and the family Buck made at the 118. Those are the people that helped shape Buck into the man he is today. Tommy had nothing to do with making Buck the person he is. Being bisexual is not why Buck is the person he is. Your sexuality is not what makes you a good or bad person. Tommy introduced Buck to his attraction to men. And while that is significant in its own way it has nothing whatsoever to do with who Buck is as a person. Tommy is gay and a prick. But he's not a prick because he's gay. He's a prick because he scolded a grown man for having the audacity to be nervous while on his first date with a man. He's a prick for making a closet joke in front of that nervous man's best friend. He's a prick for leaving that same confused man alone on a curb. He's a prick for calling his boyfriend Evan, even though everyone knows he doesn't like to be associated with that name. He's a prick for not knowing after 6 months that his boyfriend doesn't like basketball. He's a prick because he's racist and sexist. He's a prick because he led a woman on for years and when he dumped her and broke her heart he made fun of the way she tried to help herself heal. None of that is because he's gay. It's because he's just not a good guy. He and Lou seem to have that in common. Great taste you've got there.

To the second anon, thank you for the ask and the opportunity to hijack the first anons ask to talk about Buddie. I actually really like that question and I know we all kind of wanted this big dramatic near death feelings realization, and while we still may get that in some way, it's looking more likely that it won't be quite that dramatic. I do think Eddie is the one we actually need to see have some kind of moment in the mid season finale though. If it's not going to be a nde then I like the idea of the episode ending with Eddie and Buck at Eddie's house. Maybe they had several close calls throughout the episode and Eddie has decided to go get Christopher so he and Buck are just relaxing and hanging out before Eddie leaves. They are clearly choosing to frame whatever realization Eddie needs to come to around him allowing himself joy and finding joy for himself so I think that would carry over into any kind of Buck feelings. I also don't think they will have him say he's gay. I think they will frame it as a Buck thing. So if he's decided to go get Christopher he's feeling hopeful and a little nervous in that moment. Maybe Buck is still feeling a little down and a little in his own head. I like the idea of another voice over at the end of the episode about choosing your people and the universe bringing you your person even if you aren't quite ready for them yet. Maybe in an effort to try to cheer Buck up Eddie says something along the lines of 'it really does help' and Buck kind of smiles and says something like 'you promise'? And we see them look at each other and Eddie turns music on and we see them get up and just dance around Eddie's living room. We see them carefree and laughing and just simply enjoying the company of one another. For Eddie it can be as simple as that. He can stop and ask Buck to come with him to get Christopher. Buck would ask him if he's sure and Eddie could simply say something like 'yeah I'm choosing my joy'. It doesn't have to be any kind of verbal declaration. It can be something that soft and just for them but the audience would know. That's all it would take.

Now if I was writing it for Buck I would still have them at Eddie's house at the end of the episode and I would still have Eddie decide to go get Christopher. They would still have had the close calls of the day so maybe Buck is just hyper aware of himself in that moment and he and Eddie are sitting close on the couch and Buck can comment on how much lighter Eddie looks than he has the last several months. And we see a flicker of something pass across Buck's face. I still want a voice over but maybe this one would be about choosing to get off the familiar path and deciding to take the path that is unknown but holds the possibility of something greater. I would want the camera to pan to Buck's phone and the audience to see that Tommy is calling him. I would want the voice over to say something like the familiar path is tempting because there are no unknowns that way. We know what happens on the familiar path that's why we usually take it. Then I want Buck to see that Tommy is calling him and the voice over to say something like so do we take the path we know or do we make the brave choice. Do we take the unknown path the path that can hurt us in unimaginable ways but the path that also holds the most amazing potential. And Eddie can ask him 'who is it'? And we see Buck take a deep breath, smile to himself, dismiss the call and say 'just a wrong number'. Again that tells the audience everything we need to know. Buck removing himself from the hamster wheel and choosing the new path. I love the idea of the wrong number analogy for Buck's realization.

Both ways are simple and fitting for them and would tell the audience exactly where the story is going. Their history has done all the groundwork for them. Their realizations don't have to be any bigger than that for the audience to know what's coming. 💗

Thank you Nonny!

For the sake of my sanity and patience I have decided to only focus on the second question and answer. I can't cope with these people and their delusional thinking anymore. I'm trying to ignore as much as a I can of their drivel.

So I'll go right to my positive place and tell you all that I have already mentally started manisfesting Ali's wonderful Buddie speculations two days ago when she shared one of them. I figured I would get a head start and then it actually might come true.

After all, it worked with the BT breakup. 😋

IMPORTANT! Please don't repost this ask and/or a link that leads straight to my Tumblr account on Twitter or any other social media. Thank you!

Heads up! For anyone who is giving me the shifty eyes for reposting Ali's updates instead of reblogging. Read this.

Remember, no hate in comments, reblogs or inboxes. Let's keep it civil and respectful. Thank you.

If you are interested in more of Ali’s posts, you can find all of her posts so far under the tag: anonymous blog I love.

[watchingblsnowandforever]

Hello!!

The crack post saga continues... =D

Warning: long, long post 😊😅

To be very honest though, for today's ep I will be getting serious more than usual, because it was quite significant in the flow of the plot, and also had moments of communication (this emotional constipation is what makes me yearn for Cherry Magic ah) that need to be studied a little closely.

HOWEVER, there will most definitely be crack because this group of friends is (unapologetically) batshit crazy and my brain refuses to not make comments at the most inappropriate times.

Peem: NO ONE SAW ME CUDDLING MY CRUSH TO SLEEP RIGHT?!

The sheer panic in his movements, oh my gods. It should not be as hilarious as it is 😭😂

To be very honest though, I would've panicked a bit in his place too, with friends like those, they'd never let him live it down

Peem is so cute 😭

Nothing to see here, just a guy getting shy over how his prince charming hom-ed him, and they kissed through his hand and cuddled all night hehe

Phum: here he comes again :) *eye twitch*

Peem's expression, how he's still holding his hands as if he has the cup, Kluen's disbelief, and Phum's smug af face-

I'm wheezing 😭🤣

Kluen, I'm kinda starting to like you, but no.

You don't stand half a chance against them and their situationship.

Hope you find another boyfriend to fall in love at first sight with (and leave my boys alone please, they don't need any more complications) <3

Oh, Fang knows too. Of course he does, that's his little brother right there

We all know how protective of his brother he is, there's no way he'd let anybody else take care of him... unless, he knew Phum liked that person

les voila

Poor Tan, his theerak just ignoring him T-T

*looks between them* yeah, pretty much the same pic 👀

And here it is. The root of all his fears.

See, in this camp, almost all of them are paired up in the sense that they usually stick to that person. Even Beer has MIck. But then comes wild card Kluen, who's hogging all of Peem's attention as much as he can and that leaves Phum. Alone.

I will be getting back to this running motif of Phum being alone and how it changes through the ep in later scenes as well

Also, after they went back, both Mick and Beer asked if he really was okay, which made me smile, because maybe, Phum isn't as alone as he thinks himself to be. There are people who care for him, who are concerned, who'll support him, and of course, he always has Fang, his beloved phi

My poor babie Tan 🥺🥺

Also, notice how the shot is taken in such a way that they're the only ones in the frame, and are also standing within one specific part of the wall? (Ignore Kluen's head and hands please). It reflects how they're in their own world with each other, especially Tan

The nosy peeps gang strikes again!

Jokes aside, the synchronised strides, the background music together set the perfect levels of suspense and comedy

Peem, smug: yes! that emotionally constipated dumbass is finally getting out of De Nile

Pun: wait... is my plan actually working? Ah, of course it is

Toey: head empty, no thoughts, but... DOES P'Q ACTUALLY LIKE ME OMG I'LL DIE

Oh gods, FINALLY. I wish them a happily ever after. Sadhu 😌🙏🏼

Pun forgetting all about being quiet when Toey finally confesses is so on character 😭👍🏼

Also... what's even the point of being quiet? Q and Chain have been friends with these idiots since high school, of course they know they're peeking

Toey: *shooketh*

Gays in thai bl and staring off into the distance 😭

This scene was so, so beautiful and also quite important for both Q and Toey

Q knew what was up, more or less, but his confusion stemmed from his knowledge of Toey

Would Toey really go to these lengths? For him?

"Why? Are you the only one who can tease me?" <- Q says this to tell Toey that he might have been angry, but now he understands that Toey didn't really have any bad intentions

Hugs always get bonus points from me, and this was pretty up there

Pun hiding behind Chain is so on point

His friends: you're an idiot so we had no choice but to intervene 😭😭

Matt's (JJ) comedic timing is >>>>>>

Toey and Matt's friendship is also given weight in the series, and I'm happier for it.

Also revenge is sweet ehehe *coughs*

Moving on.

If there's no live singing dedicated to your One True Love, is it even Thai BL??

We Are making generous use of MSP songs 😭👍🏼

This scene.

The apology. It is at this point that they're leaving all the past pain, grief and anger in the past

Q makes sure to tell Toey that yes, he may have loved Milk Frappe Boy, but now, in the present, all his love was for Toey, his lovable annoying mentee

This apology is not only to Toey, or Milk Frappe Boy, but to himself as well, because by causing pain to a person he loves twice, he'd caused himself pain too

The perfect sweet and romantic moment, but also with a teeny bit of teasing, because that's who they are

No joke, I gasped and nearly stopped breathing when he said this

Peem's reply, his soft but kind of hurt voice were just so painful to hear

But it's also this moment that Peem gives Phum a reality check – if he really didn't want to, he wouldn't be doing any of this, and Phum had no business trying to control his life

The conversation outside with Q was significant, but also a diluted reflection of Peem's earlier (in ep. 7) talk with Q

Even a few episodes earlier, Q would have gone ballistic on Phum for treating his bestie like this, but now, he asks Peem how he feels for Phum, tries to understand exactly what their relationship is

It was at this point that he knew, he fucked up

Beer is a godsent. I love him <3

I think Toey says "I asked hia Tan to blow it up for me."

Also, Tiw and his rubber duck floater from MSP anyone? 👀

And, we are back to square one where Phum is left alone again

As I'd said before, this a repeating motif throughout the series, but especially the last two episodes

This is how it has always been in Phum's life: he has been left behind. He does have Fang, but now even Fang has a boyfriend. And while this does not affect his brother's affection towards him in anyway, it does introduce a new strand of lonliness for Phum because 1. no matter what, he loves his brother a lot, and knows how much he loves Tan, so he definitely will try to stay out of their way at least sometimes and 2. he wants a boyfriend too. Further, he wants Peem, but there's a push and pull there, and after what he said, in his mind he had pretty much ruined his chances with his crush

This is the moment Phum starts to hope that maybe, just maybe, his feelings aren't as unrequited as he'd thought.

On the other hand, Peem is the one afraid here. What if the deal is all that's holding them together? What if without it, Phum will have no reason to be as close to him?

Peem, baby, for one, your groups are already merged, and secondly, this guy is head over heels for you, no way he'd stop following you like a lost puppy

(Apparently, it's not Peem's turn with the communal braincell this week 😭)

Here, Phum is technically alone, but he's surrounded with friends, and he's smiling

He isn't left behind here, for once, he's sitting there by choice (to shamelessly ogle his crush, but shh we don't talk about that) with the comforting knowledge that when/if he jumps in, he won't be left out, Kluen be damned

Once the floodgates of affection have been opened to Q, there's no going back <3

(Also, notice how Tan is already asleep on Fang's shoulder? 👀)

FINALLY

I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS MOMENT SINCE PEEM KICKED PHUM'S BALLS

Jokes apart, this moment is so, so beautiful. The kiss, the soft question "are you ready for my answer now?" (maybe Peem isn't, but hell if he denies this man his kissies).

Everything leading up to this point is also so very delightful

Phum helping them out in the cafe, despite probably having never worked a day in his life, discovering how Peem still kept the roses and finally, finally, the completed painting. This sight, above all, is what convinces Phum that Peem might have feelings for him after all; because which fool would lie about not having completed something that would free them from being a slave to someone? A fool in love, that's who

ALSO,

if they don't get together and have the fluffiest moments in the next ep, I swear to god, hands will be thrown *grumbles* they're already making me wait a whole damn week

Anyways, that's all for this week, see you next ep! (I cannot promise I won't be jumping around and screaming, but then again, this is supposed to be a crack post so-)

And if you made it this far, thank you so much for reading! 😊

Here, have a bubble tea and a sandwich 🧋🥪

[If you'd like, here are my previous posts: Ep 8 and Ep 9.]

[cat-in-a-mech-suit]

Transmasculinity Throughout Time: Dr James Barry

Part 2! Here we go. James Barry was the first European doctor to successfully perform a C section where both the mother and child survived, which is cool to me because I was born via C section. He was born in 1789, but lied that he was younger on documents in order to pass - people described him as young looking and soft featured with a boyish voice, but never questioned in his gender. Despite adamantly stating he was a man for his whole adult life and only being revealed as transgender after death, he is still referred to as a “a woman ahead of her time” in the Guardian in 2016 and argued to have only presented as a man to enter the male-dominated medical field. In his wikipedia page, he is only referred to by his last name, not he/him pronouns. This is another example of the transmasculine erasure done by cis feminist historians that I mentioned in my last post in this series. Instead of doing this, cis feminists, here is what you can do: accept and include transmasculine experiences as a part of feminist narratives, not in contradiction to them, and if you can’t do that, at least actually do some research on the women who were practicing medicine at the time, and acknowledge their accomplishments instead of stealing and erasing transmasculine history! To all students of history, and especially anyone who cares about queer/trans history: stop erasing trans men (and all trans and nonbinary people) and explaining us away. Come face to face with our existence. Can you do that?

Alright.

Barry was a British imperial surgeon. When he was 19, he expressed longing to be a soldier, and he later joined the British army. Eeh, I know. His official title quickly ascended to Colonel Medical Inspector. If it wasn’t for his privilege, his gender transgression would likely have not been so easily forgiven and explained away through infantilization and feminist narratives during and after his life. However, he still faced great challenges.

In his profession, he was unlike others because he spent time around and advocated for the most marginalized in society - prisoners, mentally ill, lepers, poor people, and enslaved people. He did this even though it made him vulnerable and eccentric to those around him. His bluntness and need to make change made him extremely challenged and unpopular among his fellow officers, and he survived on his professionalism and bravado alone, enduring an accusation of “conduct unbecoming of the character of an Officer and a Gentleman” for a clash with another surgeon, of which he was acquitted thereafter. He also got into a pistol duel and won against Captain Josias Cloete of the 21st Light Dragoons. Generally, he was described as both rude and unafraid to speak his mind, as well as sometimes overly polite, with a good bedside manner. People were confused by him because he didn’t fit into society, and they constantly speculated on his life and tried to diminish him and the advocacy that he did.

He was first appointed to his position and was able to keep it despite challenges to his authority because of his “close friendship” with the Governor, Lord Charles Somerset (we all know what close friendship means when historians say it). In 1824, he was slandered, put on trial, and investigated when someone said that they “detected Lord Charles buggering Dr Barry.” James Barry is an important historical example of transhomophobia. Unlike what TEHMs and their ilk believe, queer trans men in fact have been experiencing homophobia all this time. James Barry experienced the same homophobia as a cis gay man would at the time, with the additional pressure of being a trans man who had to pass as a cis man to live as himself: transhomophobia. As a queer trans man, thinking about what he must have gone through makes my stomach hurt.

In 1857, he was appointed to be the Inspector of Hospitals in Canada, and he made significant improvements to sanitation and care for prisoners and lepers during his short time in that position. He was forcibly resigned against his will after only two years, because of his supposed poor health.

Before he died of dysentery in 1865, he asked for his person to not be examined at all. His wishes were disobeyed. He was outed as trans and subsequently, his life was either erased or stolen from him and written as that of a woman. To avoid a scandal, all army records of him were locked for 100 years, until in 1958, a biography of him was written by a cis woman historian, who wrote about him as a woman pretending to be a man and erased his transness. Barry’s own doctor said after his death that “it was none of my business whether Dr. Barry was a male or a female” and suggested that he might have been intersex.

Interestingly, he was also known for an incident in which he scolded Florence Nightingale for poor sanitary practices, which she complained about after he died, saying he was “the most hardened creature I had ever met.”

[matan4il]

911 ep 706 first watch reactions

Buck and Eddie setting up the bachelor party are so funny. They're married to a degree that the bride and groom can only aspire to one day achieve. And Madney are raising a kid together! Then again, so are Buddie, and have been since day 2... (day 1 is forever Buck ogling Eddie at the station, and Eddie strutting his stuff for him, with Buck's now canonically jealou-traction being the, ummm, lubricant)

Oh, Tommy just arrived, Buck and him have done nothing but hug, and Eddie's already bringing on the jealousy jealou-traction. IDK what is the etiquette about bringing your date to a bachelor party, but what's the rule about bringing your hubby who's jealous of your bf?

Oh, and an extra jab at Buck bringing Tommy officially as his date to the wedding. I love me a jealous Eddie. My dude, your closet is shaking so hard, it's about to push you out of itself if you don't make the move already.

Okay, in all seriousness, Tommy not dressing like the 80's, Buck showing that he really cared about that silly party theme, Eddie rolling with it, the two of them being dressed more as a couple than the actual guys dating, Buddie seeing things so much in the same way (down to both seeing themselves as the same character from Miami Vice) while Buck and Tommy are totally out of sync... I love that Tommy is there to help Buck figure himself out, but also, this is the stuff that will forever keep me shipping Buddie.

I know the flashback is mainly to show that the bachelor party is Buck's idea, and goes against Chim's wishes, but Eddie suggests the couple costume? And Buck was so readily on board? Even when he knew Tommy would also be invited? This is my house catching fire, while I sit here, mumbling to myself how fine it all is...

Okay, everyone leaving the bachelor party, even the guy Buck is dating, while Eddie stays, sure is something. And by "something" I mean "a couple." That's a couple. That's Buck's partner in everything, even dumb ass 80's costumes and failed bachelor parties, he's the one who jumps in whatever stupid plan Buck comes up with, and stays to deal with the mess.

LOL And then we got some REAL mess. Again, dumb Buck idea, and Eddie just rolling with it. Making it worse even, by suggesting how to take the party (made up of people who don't even know the groom) to Chimney. These two deserve each other. XD

Buck was behind Eddie while his shirt was being torn? Presumably helping with the tearing? That's it, 911 does not want me to make it to the end of the season with my sanity intact. I guess it's good that I'm not even trying...

I'm glad there was a representation of Chim and Kevin, and a Korean tradition, I just hope it was a truthful one. (do we have Korean viewers in our midst to chime in on this?)

Maddie using her 911 skills to find and help Chim is pretty badass (and a nice gender reversal of the 'damsel in distress needing to be saved a sec before her wedding' tale). Love it!

Maddie and Chim looked so happy during their wedding. Honestly, at the end of the day, my little hopelessly romantic heart doesn't need more than that. <3

Awwww, the Buck and Tommy kiss was nice. I think the most important part of it is we got to see Buck for the first time daring to kiss another guy, rather than wait to be kissed. I may bbe a Buddie shipper, but I think this r/s is important to Buck as well, to his ability to find what he wants, to not be scared of it, to not wait for others to want him as was the case with all the women he'd dated, but rather figure out what he wants in a certain moment, and that it's okay for him to go get it.

(I still don't think Tommy is Buck's endgame, though. Much as his probably my fave Buck r/s so far other than Eddie. Tommy not being there for Buck when the bachelor party flunked, him not being there at the wedding itself, to share this significant moment with Buck, being almost incidental to Buck's coming out to his colleagues and parents, other than being a gay that was obviously kissed by Buck just a short while ago... Again, just not the stuff great love stories are made of)

Hen going, "Finally!" to Karen was funny and cute. Everyone (almost) just smiling at Buck's coming out was nice. But the way his mom reacted in particular felt more realistic, and made me wish that at least with his parents, who we know he has a strained r/s with, the should would have allowed this to be more explored. Hopefully in a future ep if not now.

Thank you for reading! If you're looking for more, you can find my s7 reactions tag here, and more of my Buddie meta and content in my pinned post. xoxox

[scarlet--wiccan]

Semi related to the "Mayomoff" thing, but I really dislike sometimes how cb twt tries to distance Billy from Wanda. I get it's a way to overcompensate because MCU stans usually have the misconception that Billy and Tommy were raised by Wanda, but the insistence feels icky. By the way these people write about these characters, it would make you believe that Wanda tried to steal baby Billy from Rebecca's arms (anti roma tropes are still super present even in "leftie" fandom spaces).

This has been a thing for years, and I've definitely noticed an uptick recently, from both sides, in response to Billy's imminent arrival in the M C U. I think a lot of comic fans, in particular, have a hard time accepting that characters can be more than one thing, or have more than one important storyline or relationship. Whether or not you find it interesting, Billy's relationship with Wanda is a major part of his story, and both characters care about each other a great deal. If you think you can have one without the other, you've lost the plot.

But if I'm being honest, I do think that racism is a part of the problem. People undervalue Wanda's relationship with her sons because they don't understand the significance and nuances of Romani heritage and identity. They undervalue how meaningful a story about family separation and reunion can be, because they have no investment in our history or generational trauma. I think a lot of folks are not willing to hold the space for those perspectives or learn from Roma voices. When we talk about representation and authenticity, a lot people think they need to understand the interiority of Romani culture, but I think these experiences and historical perspectives are much more important.

On top of that, a lot of people seem to think that acknowledging Wanda as Billy's mother or labeling him as a person of Roma heritage somehow erases other aspects of his identity. In some cases, this is well-intentioned-- Jewish identity can be just as nuanced and specific, and needs to be respected-- but a lot people clearly just feel threatened by the idea that he might not be white. And that's a real shame, because in my mind, Billy's Romani heritage only adds to the richness of the character. Mixed families with varied identities exist, and there several real-world experiences you can map Billy's identity onto without invalidating his Jewishness.

-----

Homophobia and gender anxiety are also important factors. I've been following this character for nearly two decades, and I find that Billy's depiction, and how fans respond to him, often reflect shifting attitudes about "positive" gay representation-- specifically, where femininity, diverse gender expression, and gay cultural semiotics fit into that narrative. [x] [x] The character has always been legible as a certain type of gay guy, and over the years, more writers and artists have taken license to explore that aspect of Billy's style and personality. All told, it's pretty subtle, and since most of those writers are gay/bi men, I usually find it quite authentic, but certain fans-- particularly the Young Avengers fanbase-- always respond negatively to any degree of femininity or androgyny.

Billy's proximity to Wanda-- as a legacy character based on a female hero, and as a man who identifies positively as a "witch," when that word is used with explicitly feminine connotations elsewhere in the Marvel canon-- evokes a lot of those same responses. Again, I think this is a perfectly authentic and frankly very common relationship for gay men to have with femininity. But characters like that are rarely represented as powerful, admirable, or desirable, and Billy is all of those things. To me, that is positive representation, and anyone who can't see that has an internalized bias they need to work on.

On the flip side-- homophobia and transphobia are on the rise in America, and I really think the pendulum has swung back around in terms of how comfortable people are expressing those views in public. I've been more plugged into the M C U fandom lately because of Agatha, and I've seen a lot of folks just saying mean, homophobic things about the actor and character. I don't want to defend Locke, because of the whitewashing, but that sort of hate okay is not okay.

[distant-screaming]

your top 5 nlmg moments <3

what the HELL archer............. worst sleepover ever I'm being made to choose? from nlmg????? >:( I had 22 scenes shortlisted, and I with great pain cut it down to 5 + 3 bonus ones. also this took me really long to answer because I can't shut up. anyway. I will try to keep this as short as possible and not go into full explanations because then we'd be here forever 🎀

so, my favorite nlmg scenes, in no particular order:

palm gets shot

is this surprising? at all? no I didn't think so. palmnueng are so insane about each other and this entire scene is such a good demonstration of that - palm, actively bleeding out from a gunshot wound, tells nueng not to sign anything over, and nueng does so anyway. and then palm gets shot and just - the acting is so wonderful from everyone in that scene and it's such a good demonstration of their characters! I also especially ADORE the next bit, where nueng is outside the operation room and he's just so grief stricken it makes my stomach hurt. and I just love this whole section a lot okay!! (fun fact: my first time watching the show, I wasn't able to watch the scene fully - I had to skim it and go ahead to the part where palm was Alive. once I realized he was, I went back to watch it properly djfkfj)

waltz scene(s)

I'm cheating a little but it's fine - all three of palmnueng's waltz scenes live in my head rent FREE. the first one (the dream sequence) is just so very 'I have a crush on this guy' core and it's so soft and sweet and yearn-y <3 I don't remember where I talked about this, but in the dream sequence nueng keeps track of the rhythm by tapping his finger on palm's shoulder - the same thing he did in real life. this means palm was so focused on him during the irl dance that he even noticed that. and that just. it makes me sick okay. second dance sequence is in the motel room after mam dies, and this one is so different from the first because it's much more centered in comfort and relief rather than romance. the whole scene is an absolute masterpiece - the way it's shot with the blurred backgrounds and close ups and the colors - and man I just. I love it so much. it's so intimate. and finally the waltz at the restaurant before nueng gets snatched by kit... literally no one does it like them they're so!! it's a very scary scene to watch because you can tell something's about to go really wrong really fast, but my GOD is it good. me and who literally........the tenderness, the trust, the way they look at each other with absolute stars in their eyes (and the way that the camera focuses on nueng more this time, and how in love he is because we've seen palm but nueng is just as insane). insane. deranged.

first kiss on the island

rooftop hug

while watching this, I had to pause the episode and physically stand up to do laps around the room. it's sooo good and pondphuwin are amazing at intimacy and it's just like, they really do kiss like they're desperate for each other which is exactly what palmnueng are. also the significance of it being after david + wu's wedding is a whole different rant I will spare you from but ajfkskfkdjfkdjfkfjfjfjv!!!! absolutely amazing first kiss, especially contrasted with their first kiss on the rooftop. no notes.

speaking of rooftops! man. the whole ben + coming out part really hurts me every time I watch it and this scene is no exception. nueng is so desperate and heartbroken and he keeps lashing out but palm just holds him close and doesn't say anything and eventually nueng hugs him back and just cries in his arms and he just. he just wanted a friend. he just wanted to be loved. that's all. GOD.

peng(2) you(3)

world's most insane guys flirt, leave me dead. like. this is episode 2. nueng still has some like vague pretend animosity towards palm. and yet. 'oh yeah let me just - here touch my neck and I'll gaze into your eyes and say peng you (friend)' HELLO?? I mean. sure why not. palm's clearly enjoying it (read: having a gay induced mental breakdown). generally I love scenes that have flirting with pining oblivious guys and this is the perfect fit. also, the fact that palm is slightly higher than nueng here the CONNOTATIONS guys the THEMES. the [I am shot and dragged away]

Bonus:

nueng barging into palm's room

sir...... just. all of this. no words. he's such a bratty teenager. I love him

palm opening shot

this one is on here solely because this is the exact moment I feel utterly and deeply in love with pond. hello there gorgeous standing there all by yourself??? why is he so <3

every time palm is annoyed by ben existing

I ADORE this dynamic. they're this 👌 close to killing each other in every frame they're together. the fingers are touching btw. hashtag gay on gay hostility. I love it.

[ranbling]

I feel like i’m definitely in the minority here but if eddie actually has some sort of affair with the priest in s8 it honestly would take away from buddie canon to me…

like I know their sexualities aren’t about each other, but I’ve waited so long for buddie canon that I don’t want their relationship to begin because “oh we both know we like men now, we should get together” which is what it would feel like if they BOTH have sexuality arc separate from each other… and like it feels like it would go so against eddie to have him just have a random fling with a symbol of the religion that has been repressing him for so long… it’s not a fleabag moment, it’s not a ‘gotcha’ to catholicism- it’s a priest fetish and sexualizing eddie’s queerness rather than having a meaningful discovery tied to someone he knows he can trust which is a huge part of eddie- that he finds it hard to trust that people won’t leave him.

and to have them both date/sleep around before getting together would just make it feel like they are any other couple but they aren’t they have been dancing around and building up this thing between them for six years and to throw it all away just to have eddie sleep with a priest simply bc the fans think he’s hot just destroys that buildup and makes the wait not worth it bc that catharsis isn’t there… bc then it’s just another relationship for both of them that, yeah, may be their endgame one but it doesn’t set them apart in any way bc then they’re just getting together bc they’re both single at that point- there’s no buildup, there’s both release.

at that point it’s just “oh hey, what if we dated” “yeah sure” and that’s not what ive been waiting this long to see and to see people actually begging for that makes me so upset

especially with how plausible it is bc this wouldn’t be the craziest case of ooc writing tim has done… like it’s very much a possibility and if he’s going to be around for multiple episodes that means he’s playing a significant role, whether it be eddie’s sexuality or eddie becoming hyper religious again… neither being a good sign for us (ik it seems weird to say that eddie’s sexuality arc isn’t a good sign but his sexuality arc being brought about through the priest is not promising at all)

I agree with you! Though I don't think the priest is even confirmed to come back (but yeah, why would multiple actors follow him at the same time).

Honestly, I think Buck and Eddie's sexualities a little bit about each other, in a way that many part of their queer-coding comes from how they interact with each other. Also, everything we know about Eddie would make him having a fling truly out of character.

Also, there is no guarantee that we'll have an 9th season. Giving Eddie (or Buck) one more meaningless relationship as a "groundwork" for Buddie is just taking away chances to actually get Buddie. And I don't want that.

I also have multiple things against this whole priest thing that stems from me being Hungarian and having attended a catholic high school. All priest I know are homophobic (which is fair given the religion thinks being gay is a sin) or think engaging in gay sex is a sin (if they're a little bit more open-minded). I know the US has more progressive churches. And even without the whole "being gay is a sin" thing they have going on, they're celibate. One of the biggest think when becoming a priest of swearing off any kind of relationship (let it be sexual or romantic) and I don't want Eddie's first relationship to be some kind of hidden thing, he deserves better

I hope this all makes sense

[hawkinsschoolcounselor]

whats your opinion on the UD being frozen as a metaphor for will's childhood and so when it's all released, he'll be free of it and therefore maybe his love for mike is still chaste and childish and that when it's all over he'll have released that love too?

with neither mike nor el or will ending up in a romantic pair at all.

That sounds rather ridiculous, in my opinion, like someone was trying to find a way to justify Will growing out of his love for Mike. If that's the case, then it's also homophobic, as it's very in line with the old standby of "it's just a phase" that gay kids had to grow up hearing.

The Upside Down being frozen in 1983 has been stated to be a significant plot point. While it may have connections to Will's feelings, since it seems to be connected to Will in general, its main purpose is in the central story.

We already know that the Upside Down does not naturally appear as the real world. When Henry was sent to what we are told was Dimension X, it was largely barren of any landmarks, looking much like a violent primordial world. The only signs of life were the small democreatures and the Mindflayer. Assuming Dimension X became the Upside Down, which seems likely since Henry, the Mindflayer, and the democreatures all are found there, then it stands to reason that it can be shaped.

The obvious source of this would be Henry. His first action when he got there was to bend the Mindflayer to his will. However, the problem with that is that he was in there for years before he had any (known) contact with the main world, apparently caused by El getting close to a demogorgon while in the Void. This causes a Gate to open, creating a physical connection between the two worlds on November 6, 1983. Will disappears into the Upside Down that night, and the dimension has appeared as a dark, twisted version of Hawkins forever stuck on that date.

The question we have is why hasn't the Upside Down changed since then? What is responsible for shaping it? If it is Henry, then why would he bother doing so? Why wouldn't he make it look more like the Hawkins he knew from before he ended up with Brenner?

The next suggestion is that Will is responsible. He wanted so badly to go home that the entire dimension shaped itself to be home. That would fit in with the idea that Will was more than just a random victim, that Henry wanted him for something. Unlike other victims of the demogorgon, Will was hunted, but not killed. We've seen enough of these beasts to know they are both mindless animals, but subject to control through the Mindflayer and, subsequently, Henry. We also know Henry can take the powers of his victims ("everything they will ever be"), so it's very possible he wanted to get this power for himself rather than let Will be food for his beasts.

The problem I see, especially with the Reddit community, is that they see Will as an artifact character. There's this idea that the writers just didn't know what to do with him after season 1, and that he's an unimportant character that they're giving side stories to in order to give him something to do. However, Will has always been important, only in a way that they've been saving for a big reveal, with only hints along the way. His love for Mike is part of his individual character arc, but it's not a weakness for him to overcome. Instead, it's being built up as his source of strength. Mike makes him feel like he's better for being different. It would be very bad storytelling to make this something he has to give up.

Will is central to the story in a way they haven't fully revealed. I'm banking on the Upside Down being stuck in time being a result of something he did, albeit unwittingly. Henry is going to want that power for himself, which is why he hasn't killed Will. I'm guessing that Henry will appeal to Will's repressed anger and resentment to recruit him in the same way he tried to recruit El (mirroring Palpatine tempting Luke in Return of the Jedi), but it's Mike and his love that will grant Will the strength to overcome this. At that point, we'll see the dark, twisted Upside Down either be destroyed, revert to its natural state, or become something beautiful as a reflection of Will's emotions.

[silverview]

alright i’m shifting back into tlw mode. i'm finally writing a fic from chas's POV and it's sticking a little bit. i know i can never actually do justice to him but the attempt is being made and i have a lot of thoughts, i'm just going to throw them all down in one place

chas might be my all-time favourite in9 character. reece has described the performance as being basically the same as he gives in sardines, which is a fair comparison honestly – the difference isn’t really in the performance or the character as much as in the circumstances. as in, stuart doesn’t do much relatively speaking and he never really has to shift gears onscreen. whereas chas is what you’d get if that character went through literally the full spectrum of human emotion onscreen in the space of half an hour, including an extended closeup on him experiencing the most extreme betrayal and mortal terror it’s possible to imagine, while covered in gunk and immobilised from the neck down. it's an extreme exercise in humanising/complicating a stock character, and it's an extraordinary performance. chas’s vulnerability and humour and courage carry the entire episode. and his little dancey dance. i love him for his defence mechanisms and the pain and heart that's underneath when he lets them drop. i love him for losing his dream, and coping with it terribly, and being forced to rebuild his life and his sense of self. i love him for being a bad person and a good person

and YES i love him for being camp!!!! i watched the original boys in the band recently and recognised so much of chas in some of those characters, especially emory, both as written + performed. crucially the humanising/complicating of a comedy stock character for pathos. tlw is only two seasons out from how do you plead and i think that contributed to some negative reactions about reece's camp performances being too exaggerated and/or too frequent. i don't think many people really noticed that urban explicitly, intentionally speaks & acts that way as part of his job. he is a man who is explicitly playing a character for most of his screentime. why exactly he does it in that particular way is not clear to me. i am desperate to understand that episode & character better, partly because i feel like unlocking it would also provide a key to better understanding their overall handling of gay characters & themes

i've talked before about chas and simon being linked by the experience of death by parasocial rejection. lately i've been thinking about how this strand of rejection (in a less fatal but still tragic form) also runs through reece's characters in merrily merrily and plodding on. "i never responded in kind" = *suffocates you with a pillow* = "move on" = "i don't even know if we are friends anymore." why is he always the one who loves too much, discovering that his feelings are not reciprocated? and why is this tendency punished so much more violently in episodes where it's figured as explicitly gay, hmm? if you read the end of plodding on as resolving the rift in that episode, then it's also resolving this long-running meta arc; if you read it as unresolved then it is also leaving the meta arc unresolved

anyway here's my tlw timeline. i have joe & chas being born in 1965 + 1975 respectively. that puts chas in his early 20s in the late 90s when atlantic 5 was active, 30 when olivia attempted suicide, 39 when he met joe, and 48 when he died. if you listen to the audio described version it literally does differentiate them as being "the younger one" / "the older one," even though that's not explicit in the episode. they do need a bit of an age gap to make the backstory work. idk, i know they have a small age gap irl – it's just funny to me that they managed to turn that into a more noticeable/significant age gap through sheer looks and vibes

and here is my tlw playlist and here is my dedicated chas playlist, which has some overlap and is still evolving and is a mix of songs about him + pure vibes. i get really emo thinking about him listening to eternal flame as a sad teenager and dreaming of finding love someday :/

[alexissara]

Gwitch and Minimum Viable Queerness

Trusting companies to make queer art is always asking for heart break even when it really and deeply seems like they made some queer art. However, despite my love for Gundam: The Witch From Mercury it must be said there is plenty of issues with the show that pointed towards the direction they have gone now that we've entered the post release era.

In the magazine Gundam Ace they edited our a writer stating that Sulleta and Mio were married. They apologized for that statement ever making it in to begin with on Twitter the X gonna give to you dot bomb with this.

This obviously lead to tons of angry fans and queer folks but it wasn't like this came out of nowhere. Despite some people saying it's just "western brained losers" or something that thought there was queer bait in the Witch From Mercury there is something that queer people forget which is that most straight cis people literally have no brain cells. They espically have an inability to see sapphic relationships as real or valid.

Gundam The Witch From Mercury was explicit, more explicit than a lot of media but they intentionally excluded the three universal signifiers of romantic or sexual love from the show despite it being centered for all 24 episodes around the Sulmio engagement. These three signifiers are an "I love you" "I Love You too", a kiss, or fucking. Gundam is a toy commercial for kids so while sex is probably not on the table it isn't actually even off the table for Gundam given the series history has had off scene sex and bad stuff too like adult women trying to seduce like a 10 year old boy. So like these shows aren't afraid to do some shit. Many say that Gundam doesn't do kisses that is a lie, Z, 00, Seed, and Iron Blooded Orphans's all have done kisses. I love yous also happen across the series, the end of G Gundam has a special love attack that blows up the last boss.

This is all to say Gundam: The Witch From Mercury activated a strategy corporate media called minimum viable queerness. In order to get the gay dollar, to seem progressive, whatever it may be a company will do as little gay as they can get away with to get the gays actively invested in their art. Ultimately, their aim is to have it be blaringly obvious to queer folks but invisible to the hets. The show also did the minimum viable amount of women making sure the men had utterly meaningless fights near the end just for women to be on screen less. These fights involve men who are not either of the main two girls getting mad at each other for some kind of connection or action towards one of the girls. These take up a significant amount of the second seasons run time not to mention one of these men got a full episode devoted to him. Meanwhile the main couple of the show was away from each other for the vast majority of episodes, almost never in the same room and almost exclusively on somewhat bad terms.

In the show Sulleta is the main character but in season one she is mostly piloting against men with one fight against a pair of girls near the end. Chuchu is given sidekick pilot status and lives to the end but she doesn't get her own highlighted battle ever unlike a side side character in Guel's brother who gets a major fight against his brother weighted against the fate of quite zero and Sulleta and Ariel fighting. Which comes after Guel fought Shadiq for no reason which came after Guel fighting Sulleta again for Ariel which came after Guel trying to survive in a mech when he was stuck on earth earlier. Guel was in a mech 1 more time than Sulleta was in season 2. The two other witch girls die in their first and second time respectively of being in a gundam in season 2 and the second of the pair gets maybe a word in with our main character her whole existence and never talks to our secondary main character at all. The action is still in large part being given to men even in the woman centric series.

And in this "queer centered" story we see very explicit delectations of feelings from Guel, Shadiq, Petra and Lauda which are all heterosexual ontop of all the adult characters being hetero, implied hetero E5 with Nora dying for considering being with a man and E5 sexually harassing Sulleta. The series overwhelming overcompensates for it's queerness by aggressively pushing straightness and in particular having other main characters want our lesbians heterosexually.

This does not mean that the writers or animations didn't want to be more explicit or that they did a bad job. they did a great job but we cannot know what is Namco Bandai and what is Sunrise. We just can't but it seems given recent statements that likely Bandai was very hands on in controlling the show. Not to mention giving it's first woman lead series a much shorter run time than most other Gundam series got and intentionally closing it off from an easy sequel series despite it being the most profitable series ever for them.

It appears to me as if Namco Bandai's intention was to convert a bunch of lesbians into gundam fan and throw mild gay bait at us to keep us coming now that we converted, far less explicit than Sulleta and Mio but attempting to ride it out in good faith and have us enjoy the men shows that appealed to boys to not break their delusion that they are making a boys toy for boys. Feeding us right into more Gundam Seed is like trying to choke out any potential life and I think we're gonna see a decline in Gundam sales following Gwitch representing the betrayal of these sapphic fans but more so simply the lack of interest in the bar being lowered.

As fans of Gwitch we need to demand better, it does work, we've seen companies fix statements about Sailor Uranus and Neptune before and other similar instances. We can also make them see if they want to reach the high highs again we need the great shit we get in Gwitch but then even more that the minimum we'll let them get away with is far more than the last time.

If you enjoyed this post consider throwing me some money on Patreon to help me make actually queer art without corporations controlling my voice. I'm hoping to write a bit more about minimum viable queerness in the future but I wanted to really just talk about this while I was mad about it and get it up there. Anyway, back to the writing mines with me, hope you have a great day and go out there and be gay.

[that-irishman-fan]

one piece characters that give off bisexual energy part one!

( GIF is not mine, it belongs to @snippychicke and neither is One Piece or its characters mine in any way! )

Kuro/Klahadore

Arc: Syrup Village, East Blue, Vols. 3-5, Chapters 23-44

Headcanon: Kuro is bisexual biromantic, but I can also see him being sapiosexual too.

Thie Machiavellian butler himself serves both tea and cunt as the first contender in this series! Kuro was always interesting to me as a twelve-year-old reading One Piece for the first time. He was definitely a highlight when I was uncertain about the story as a whole. ( Keep in mind One Piece was the first manga and anime I fell in love with, after my grandparents had bought me the first volume from a flea market when we were visiting them on summer vacation. ) I've seen lots of people put him down as an antagonist for being a walking trope, lazily written, or just plain boring. I don't get it myself and I'll always be a Kuro stan. You couldn't have had a layered baddie such as Doflamingo or Orochi in such an early part of the story. It wouldn't have fit the tone. While there are some irksome qualities to Kuro and his motivations, I won't hop on that hate train saying he is somehow a terrible villain. Kuro was classy, snobbish, wicked smart, a scheming bad boy who I always pictured as belonging in Buckingham Palace laying out silverware for the royal family. Can I just say how fucking mental I went when they made his actor in the Netflix series English? I've always had a thing for villains, and he was no exception to me as a middle-schooler. I've had a plot bunny for a small one-shot involving Kuro as the main character; before he betrayed Kaya, just about his daily routine as a butler. I find anything to do with butlers to be absolutely fascinating-- I'm showing my autism and ADHD here. In it I wanted to write Kuro as being explicitly bisexual. I can't really explain why I get a gay aura off of him. Perhaps it's queer coding, a subconscious recognition or gaydar, or just me being ridiculous. I really got it when I reread East Blue again recently, and after I saw the live-action. The latter had a HUGE part in forming my opinion on Kuro being bi. This is more me joking, but can we agree being a cat person is inherently queer? I think either he's really overkill with the whole black cat theme, or there's something else going on. I also want to add I'm firmly convinced he'd be sapiosexual too. This is a man who prioritizes intelligence as a both strength and virtue. You can't tell me he wouldn't be looking for smarts as the defining trait in a significant other; somebody to match his own wit. Some characters I've chosen for these headcanons won't fit into one easy box, which is true to life as we don't all think, love, or view things the same way. I want to make sure I'm showing representation and diversity to our beautiful community, no matter how we identify.

So yes, Kuro/Klahadore is bisexual biromantic and sapiosexual in my mind! I should quickly write as an aside that I won't be going in any particular order with these posts. So, we'll be jumping across arcs to all kinds of characters. With that, thank you all for reading this, please let me know what you think! I'd love to hear your thoughts. Have a fantastic rest of your weekend and take it easy!

[sleepy-moron]

Super messy kingdom hearts feelings

Riku is genuinely one of my favorite characters in any piece of media full stop, and it’s really hard for most people to understand why I love him so much. To a lot of people who only really played kh 1 and 2, Riku is just a kind of generic rival character, and for a lot of fans of the whole series he’s one of the best characters in the franchise but nothing particularly special in the grand scheme of all media ever.

I think understanding that Riku is deeply in love with Sora is essential to understanding what makes Riku such a wonderful character. There is so much more to him as a character, but his primary motivation has always been deeply intertwined with his love for Sora, and that’s not something you can ignore.

Riku speaks to a very specific experience that most people probably have not had, but if you do relate to it he becomes so special and important. So I’ve got to get a bit personal here to properly articulate what I mean.

When I was younger, I was best friends with one of my neighbors. We had been friends for years and spent a lot of time with each other. Then, a new kid our age moved into the neighborhood, and my best friend was suddenly spending all their time with another person. I had a lot of very strong feelings about this, to the point I would feel physically sick from it all. I didn’t understand what I was feeling or why I felt it so strongly, I just knew it hurt and I hated it.

What I didn’t realize at the time was that I am very much not straight and had a massive crush on my best friend when all this was happening. I was jealous, sad, angry, guilty, and legitimately disgusted with myself and my friend. Our friendship was never really the same after that. On top of all this I was also dealing with undiagnosed mental illness as a kid, so I was basically just an emotional wreck pretending everything was normal for a few years.

I also watched my dad and brother play a lot of kingdom hearts as a young kid. I didn’t really understand the games but I was entranced by them despite this. Flash forward quite a few years to right before kh3 came out, and I decided to start watching people play through all the games so I could actually understand what the story was. I had by this point mostly finished having a sexuality crisis and was starting to deal with the unaddressed feelings I still kept locked up.

And then I got to see Riku in all his messy emotional gay coded glory, and it just resonated with me in a way I didn’t know I wanted or needed. Watching this kid feel all these messy and ugly things that he couldn’t really understand and lashing out because of it, to get to see him atone for his mistakes and begin the long journey to not only forgive himself but also accept himself and all the things he felt, it was just so emotionally significant for me. I had never really thought about what it would be like to see this part of my life reflected by a character, but once I had it I was just overwhelmed with how strongly I connected to the Mickey Mouse anime games.

I finally had the time to watch the 6 hour Riku is gay and why it matters video the other day, and it emotionally destroyed me all over again. I don’t think I’ll ever really stop being emotional about Riku, sometimes you just consume a piece of media at the right time and it just stays with you forever. That’s really why he’s so special to me, I happened to get to fully see his character at the right time for him to be so important to me in a way very few characters are.

[astercontrol]

I've been thinking about at least one post I've seen, regarding a certain type of caricaturized villain in movies. A man who is portrayed as flamboyantly un-masculine, and yet instead of hinting that he's gay, the narrative makes him intensely, worshipfully devoted to his wife or other female love interest.

A lot has been said about why that is. But here's my take, based on how I perceived these tropes in my own experience of watching movies as I grew up in the 80's and 90's.

So, as I see it, the villain characters from old movies that we often see described as "queer-coded"-- the sissy, the fop, the dandy-- are usually there primarily to show weakness. To be physically, emotionally and morally weak, in the most conspicuous way possible, and thus throw into contrast the "strength" of the manly-man hero.

And homophobia is of course a very large part of why so much of that portrayal is associated with weakness. Gay men and trans women (who were at the time very much lumped together in popular culture, and often considered practically the same thing) represented the opposite of what the manly-man hero was supposed to be.

As a strong man, he was of course supposed to be attracted to women. But at the same time he was supposed to be very much at home in his own masculinity, and never show significant interest in any pastime or entertainment that was considered feminine.

His attraction to the heroine would be based on her looks, and on her virtuous character traits like kindness and loyalty. He could want to protect her, give her gifts, and of course be physically intimate with her. But there was a limit to how much he could have in common with her-- how much he could share her interests, how much he could respect her as a person-- before he would start to be perceived as a sissy caricature like the villain.

This extreme devotion to a woman, which we saw in villains sometimes, was a sort of heterosexual expression of "weakness," a different side of what was expressed in gay-coded villains. This devoted wifeguy-- hen-pecked, pussy-whipped or whatever he might have been called at the time-- was considered weak because he let a woman tell him what to do. His masculinity was undermined not by being attracted to men, but by being so attracted to a woman that he became "weaker" than her.

He had failed to walk that fine line of strong masculinity, where a hero could want a woman, but could never fully be in her world.

We also see a fair number of other male villains with the trappings of queer-coding-- in their clothing, interests, mannerisms and so on-- who are explicitly interested in women-- but come across as objects of ridicule because the women they pursue are not attracted to them. These men have the masculine desire for a woman, but they fail the other masculinity test of being able to get one.

And of course, again, this is deeply intertwined with the queer-coding tropes. The failed pursuer of women doesn't lack heterosexual experience by choice, but he still lacks it. And the trappings of queer-coding in his mannerisms, clothing, and interests are often implied to be part of the reason women don't want him.

I'd say it's not really possible to untangle all the different threads to what makes a stereotypically "weak" male villain. They're all too interwoven in the culture of filmmaking tropes. Gay-coding is absolutely a part of it-- not the only part, but still pretty much inseparable from the others.

Other parts-- also pretty much impossible to untangle from it all-- include such things as nerdiness, laziness, physical weakness, and pretty much anything that could be viewed as a character flaw in the culture contemporary with a film.

Childishness is another one-- as in Disney's Robin Hood, where Prince John "calls for his mum and sucks his thumb," or in Spaceballs, when Dark Helmet is caught "playing with dolls."

Interestingly, although the words "playing with your dolls" are used in that scene, the dolls are not stereotypical girls' toys; they are action figures closely resembling the Star Wars merchandise marketed to boys at the time. Furthermore, they all represent adult characters, and Helmet is using them to act out an adult scenario (seduction)-- which is also explicitly heterosexual (representing what he wants to do with Princess Vespa.)

So even though his activity, on the surface, is explicitly not something that would be expected of an actual child, woman, or gay man-- it still carries trappings of those identities, which evoke the same feelings of ridicule that those identities themselves would have evoked in many audience members at the time.

But, to end on the subject of childishness: That whole set of tropes, where a man can fail masculinity by liking a woman too much, reminds me very strongly of a certain phase I've seen before in the behavior of very young boys. The phase where all girls are gross and have cooties, and liking girls at all makes you a sissy.

Some filmmakers are still stuck there, and it shows.