#becoming elizabeth memes

[period-dramallama]

Let's see:

-intelligent

-confident

-sassy

-Protestant

-likes Edward

-ruthless

-slaps people

-swears

-difficult relationship with Mary Tudor

-knows when to be silent

Did.... did Robert Dudley fall in love with the teenage girl version of his dad?

[period-dramallama]

Becoming Elizabeth

Another silly six the kids thing

Orignal from taskmaster

[keewu]

More memes for the people

[historyartthings]

- John Dudley, 1552

[bethanydelleman]

what your thoughts on impact on Pride & Prejudice (2005)

So on the one hand, it probably brought a lot of new fans to Austen, something I assume because I was one of them. Always nice to see a new generation appreciating an excellent female writer, so that's a nice impact.

On the other hand, I blame 2005 for Darcy Shyboi (he ain't shy) and Bingley the Himbo (he's not stupid). This was a change from 1995 which had a very broody Darcy and an everyman Bingley. It's definitely had an impact on how people view those characters, even after reading the novel, and it has influenced depictions in fan fiction. I personally see this as negative, because it's not consistent with canon. Also, I feel like it's maligned my boy Bingles.

I don't know if this is an "impact" but it's certainly become a meme:

Neutral impact for that. Appreciate the hand flex all you want (though Elizabeth should have been wearing gloves...)

As an aside, the cinematography is very good and I appreciate the attempt to humanize some of the characters, specifically Mr. Collins, Mary Bennet, Mr. and Mrs. Bennet. I love how everyone stands around as if they are in a tableau. But, the costumes are a mess, the characterization is wrong (especially Darcy, Georgiana, and Mr. Collins), and the movie format probably isn't long enough to do the story justice.

[firawren]

you know what's fucked up? you know what's SICK and TWISTED?? you know what's the clearest proof that we live in a world made for CRUELTY and TORMENT??? the fact that persuasion is so obviously austen's horniest novel and anne/frederick wentworth are so clearly austen's horniest couple (sorry tilney/catherine, you're a distant 2nd i'm afraid, and sorry marianne dashwood, colonel brandon can't keep up with you) and yet we've got barely any smut fic on ao3. where's the 100k words of cunnilingus we deserve? anne did not say "but when pain is over, the remembrance of it often becomes a pleasure" for people to not write her enjoying it rough for 7 chapters straight. for god's sake, captain wentworth is a god damned SAILOR who ties KNOTS for a living and people can't write some good, honest bondage? am i going to have to do all the work myself in this wretched fandom??

I feel your pain and I like you, anon 😄 Even if this might be an indirect condemnation of me for writing plenty of Elizabeth/Darcy smut and never writing Anne/Wentworth smut. I don't even have a defense for that, because I too think there should be way more of it! I want it! And I ranked Wentworth as the best in bed, and made a meme about their sex life, so I agree with you that they have an awesome time together in bed.

I've never ranked the heroines in bed, but I'm sure Anne is great. She's got 8 pent-up years behind her, so you know she's enthusiastic, and she's a romantic so you know she's passionate, and she's kind-hearted so you know she cares deeply about her partner's pleasure too. Plus I think just life experience in general is gonna make her better than the younger women who might be more self-conscious about their sexual identities and kinky shit compared to someone slightly older. But maybe that's just my bias because I'm older.

Anyway, I do have a WIP that includes a short and sweet sex scene between Anne and Wentworth, and this ask motivates me to finish it sooner. And maybe even write a filthier, longer smut fic between them too? 🤔

Regardless, I hope you write the seven chapters of Anne enjoying it rough, because I will read and enjoy the fuck out of it.

[bernadettebraun]

I feel like this meme "how ya doin fellow kids", but here's my old Prometheus art with pathetic Gustav Klimt references.

It was made before Alien: Covenant, so I just thought that Elizabeth would become a mutant that will finally repeat the circle: destroy her creator, David.

[nanshe-of-nina]

Women’s History Meme || Empresses (2/5) ↬ Catherine de Valois-Courtenay (before 15 April 1303 – October 1346)

The official Neapolitan investigation into Andrew of Hungary’s murder targeted Johanna’s closest supporters and left her isolated and vulnerable. Her aunt, Catherine of Valois, took advantage of that vulnerability to become the queen’s confidant in order to make certain that one of her sons would be Naples’s next king. At first, it appeared that this son would be Robert, the eldest of the Tarantini, who for a time seemed to be winning the competition between the Angevin princes for power and whom Johanna requested a papal dispensation to marry. Soon, however, Louis gained the upper hand, and Johanna’s requests for dispensations began to identify him as her intended. — From She-Wolf to Martyr: The Reign and Disputed Reputation of Johanna I of Naples by Elizabeth Casteen Of the many relatives who chose to avail themselves of the glittering social whirl of the capital, one stood out: Joanna’s aunt, Catherine of Valois, widow of Robert the Wise’s younger brother Philip, prince of Taranto. Catherine was Joanna’s mother’s older half-sister (both were fathered by Charles of Valois). Catherine had married Philip in 1313, when Philip was thirty-five and she just ten. Catherine was Philip’s second wife. He had divorced his first on a trumped-up charge of adultery after fifteen years of marriage and six children in order to wed Catherine, who had something he wanted. She was the sole heir to the title of empress of Constantinople. … Catherine was twenty-eight years old, recently widowed, and a force to be reckoned with when the newly orphaned Joanna and her sister, Maria, first knew her at the Castel Nuovo in 1331. Shrewd, highly intelligent, and vital, Catherine was supremely conscious of her exalted ancestry and wore her title of empress of Constantinople as though it were a rare gem of mythic origin. Even the death of her husband, Philip, in 1331 had not dissuaded her from persisting in her efforts to reclaim the Latin Empire for herself and her three young sons: Robert, Louis, and Philip. A series of shockingly inept leaders had left the Byzantine Empire vulnerable to attack from the west, and this state of affairs was well known in Italy. Moreover, Catherine was used to getting her way. — The Lady Queen: The Notorious Reign of Joanna I, Queen of Naples, Jerusalem, and Sicily by Nancy Goldstone

[joeyclaire]

sorry about the election, here’s a fnaf politics au

republican president william afton is trying to win reelection against democratic utah governor michael afton

his approval rating is plummeting, mostly due to the swarm of child murderer allegations he keeps receiving

secretary of state emily, press secretary crying child, chief of staff elizabeth afton, secretary of defense vanessa

michael furiously bats back nepotism allegations, insisting his father spent much of michael’s life discouraging him from politics

first lady firstname afton stands by her husband no matter what. when michael wins she calls him and informs him she’s never been proud of him a day in her life

william’s policies include support of abortion because he wants more child murder

anti gay marriage UNTIL someone (michael) leaks screenshots of him and henry borderline sexting in the work group chat

as in writing wildly intense and passionate overly long messages in front of god and everyone which other people (michael) screenshot and make fun of behind their backs

michael’s policies include raising minimum wage, has a whole big deal about working a shitty job at fazbear’s and being a working class hero

the fnaf 4 bullies are michael’s advisors, they just talk shit all day

cc releases an autobiography with a notably short chapter on the nightmare gassing. he says it made him a stronger person.

(william reading over his shoulder as he types) “and then add that story about the time you were twelve and michael and his friends peer pressured you into smoking weed with them”

michael releases a book that’s a counter to cc’s. free me i only did some of that.

“okay yeah i DID peer pressure cc into smoking weed once but what he DIDN’T tell you is how he threw up on my lap and locked himself in the guest bathroom to cry for an hour straight”

cc’s account of the weed story appeals to conservatives because they care about weed. michael’s account appeals to conservatives because they care about elected officials sounding like a pussy

many years down the line elizabeth releases a tell-all interview detailing her side of the story. also all lies. she wasn’t even there for the weed incident.

cc cries reading michael’s book, including the parts that aren't even about him

elizabeth is obsessed with becoming a meme. very active on social media in an AOC kind of way. something of a miss piggy figure to a certain kind of leftist that enjoys pretending to support a republican politician.

against all odds, michael wins the presidency. william immediately gets to work on his assassination plan.

researching the most successful assassinations making a list of his most successful murders and what went wrong from his failed attempts.

all in on this until an advisor gently reminds him that if michael is killed then vice president bonnie bully will take over and william immediately blurts out “that faggot???” because he's already had to deal with bonnie bully being at his house all the damn time gaying up the place when michael was a teenager and now he's the vice president. of the united states. of america

vice president henry emily is current under a lot of fire for the fact that he doesn’t believe in the separation of church and state

[traegorn]

Is it true that gingerbread cookies were originally created for saturnalia? My friend just sent me this meme

Literally answered this last month, but I know Tumblr's search is absolute shit (even though it was tagged) so it's easy to miss.

Here's what I said then:

I feel like every year there's a new "did you know..." that inevitably turns out to be false. This seems to be one of them. First off, while ginger was a spice available to the Romans, there's no real link between them what we now know as gingerbread -- which is a much later invention. But that aside, the only sources I can find about a "man shaped cookie" connected to Saturnalia seem to go back to unsourced nonsense. Even the ones who cite something, if you follow the path to the source they do cite... it's one with no citations. Written by a mystery writer. And we fucking know exactly when gingerbread men were invented. They were created for Queen Elizabeth I, who had the cookies cut to resemble visiting foreign dignitaries. And then they caught on. So, if a person-shaped cookie existed in connection to Saturnalia (which I don't think it did but I will admit I wasn't exhaustive in my research), it is unrelated to the gingerbread man. (Honestly this feels like yet another one of those things that got started with anti-Catholic propaganda 100-200 years ago and has become another ahistorical talking point -- but I'm just going off of vibes on that one)

So yeah. The romans didn't make gingerbread or man shaped cookies -- so "gingerbread men" are not a Saturnalia thing.

This is the new hill I'm going to have to die on, huh.

[period-dramallama]

[cellarspider]

2/30: Prometheus attempts to establish themes

(Previous) | (Index) | (Next)

⛬

Several minutes into Prometheus, we have had no dialog, and we are going to wish that it stayed that way.

This is by little fault of the actors themselves. They all put in solid work. Many of the problems come from the writing, and others from the mismatch between their characterization what we’d call “informed traits”: What the movie tells us we should know about these characters. 

Elizabeth Shaw and Charlie Holloway are archaeologists. We see them with a dig team on the Isle of Skye, where they have just discovered their latest piece of evidence towards a radical theory. They have noticed something astounding that nobody else has dared to consider: evidence of alien contact with Earth, recorded in the art of disparate cultures from around the world. We, the audience, already know that they’re right. 

And we, the audience, know that the History Channel has had kooks on it for ages, ranting about Ancient Aliens. We’ve all seen the meme guy.

Okay. Let's try to meet this movie where it wants to be, thematically. These are its first two scenes, it's still establishing its direction, and nothing openly egregious has happened yet. We will ignore nitpicky stuff, like the fact that this previously undiscovered dig site is right next to a well-known tourist spot on Skye with 400 reviews on Google Maps.

This movie is establishing an existential premise for its themes. It implies aliens had some hand in shaping not just our culture, but our evolution. The questions it invites at this time are equally existential: why would they do that? What was their purpose here? What was their purpose for us? Why did they stop contacting Earth?

Whether life has a purpose is one of the core debates of philosophy and religion. This movie is beginning with the premise that terrestrial life does have a purpose, implied by the deliberate sacrifice of a thinking being to shape it. This supposition could create a more focused exploration of one possibility, within its narrative space.

I think it fails to deliver on this. The writing specifically fails to deliver on this, which will become apparent once we have more dialog. But there is also an issue with the framing of this premise, which the movie ultimately does not manage to avoid. An issue of cultural context.

Because this is where I, as somebody with a background in history, start to brace. The idea of extraterrestrials visiting ancient peoples is a discredited mid-20th century theory, which stems from ignorance of the historical record, and assumption of ignorance and incapability of ancient peoples to achieve great things, particularly outside of the cultures placed in the prized pedigree of European civilization. 

Such theorists look at the Great Pyramid of Giza and scoff at the idea that it could have been made without outside help, completely unaware of the century of more experimental pyramid-building that had preceded it, and the fact that we have written records that help us chart the progress of Egyptian mathematics for six hundred years prior to its construction.

They point to the Ramayana–likely written down around the same time that the Ancient Greeks were getting along just fine without aliens–and they say that the flying castles and chariots described in the text must’ve been aliens, who were mistaken for gods, and technological achievements such as rust-resistant iron must have been alien-made. Never mind that the period had a lively scholarly culture that was incorporating ideas from their Greek and Egyptian counterparts, and the people of the Indus Valley built well-planned metropolises with the world’s first known urban sanitation systems three thousand years before that.

They think the Moai of Rapanui, some of which were being erected while Shakespeare was writing his plays, were erected with the help of aliens. The actual answer, as usual, seems to be much more interesting: the Moai walked there:.

This is what ideas of ancient aliens are culturally tied to. You throw this into a movie, and even with the foreknowledge that they’re going to be proven right, I start out skeptical of these people from moment one. I was less likely to give them the benefit of the doubt, and less able to suspend my disbelief around them specifically. This will not get easier as we go.

Which is unfortunate, because most of the next scene is back to being phenomenal, and managed to bounce me back into going along with their premise.

...A side note as we close this out: Getting way too deep into the weeds here, but the art style of the cave paintings is worth mentioning. It appears to be a mashup of two famous cave’s painting styles: The animals are near-replicas of those famously seen in Chauvet (35,000 years old), and the humans and attendant dots are somewhat similar to Lascaux (17,000 years old), both caves in France. Here's an excellent little video from Tom Scott about the former, and the way that you can go see the cave paintings without endangering the site itself. There's a similar museum for Lascaux, shown below!

I say the human figures are somewhat similar to Lascaux, but I can’t find a match for the style anywhere. The closest I can find is from Tassili n’Ajjer in Algeria (6000 BC) or the Cave of Beasts in the Gilf Kebir mountains in Egypt (5000+ BC). This is because depictions of humanoid figures in european cave art are rare–ranging from a single bird-head figure in Lascaux, to the possible hoax at La Marche. 

This produces an interesting implication, if we take the movie’s premise at face value. If humanoid figures were avoided as subjects for cave art for thousands of years, their inclusion here is especially significant. Perhaps indicating that the alien visitors instructed that some visual representation of this scene to be made, or did so themselves. Thus, it is slotted in amongst the pre-existing animal art, creating a culture clash.

…However, cave lions never made it as far north as Skye. Their known northern range tapped out at about London. While it’s certainly possible that people could’ve traveled that far during this period, local animals tend to be the focus of cave paintings. So we’re getting the visual sense that a French stone age painter was doing a residency at Skye. Amusing, but odd.

⛬

(Previous) | (Index) | (Next)

⛬

Citations for alt text ramblings:

1. https://www.isleofskye.com/skye-guide/top-ten-skye-walks/old-man-of-storr

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chariots_of_the_Gods%3F

3. https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

4. https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/royalty-calculator

5. https://search.worldcat.org/title/7625265

[flo-nelja]

Arranged marriage for the meme!

Yay! I don't have a vivid imagination for this trope, so more than half are cases where the arranged marriage is totally canon.

Thorn/Ophélie (La passe-miroir/The Mirror Visitor)

It's very classic arranged marriage (for supernatural reasons) turns into resentment that stops them from realizing the good things about the other turns into alliance turns into unspoken love (painful for the reader) and maybe more? It fully worked on me. I especially loved how the description of Thorn (the book is Ophélie PoV) turn from uncharitable descriptions of an average looking man to very horny descriptions of an average looking man.

If you don't know the series, I can advertise it more. It's good French fantasy.

2. Louis/Caesar (Kimi o Shinasenai tame no Monogatari)

Yeah I have at least one m/m canon arranged marriage, is a dystopian future where romantic partners and reproduction partners are totally disconnected. It's a painful case of arranged marriage with love only on one side, it's a mess and they don't make it work. I enjoyed it though. ^^

3. Xavin/Karolina (Runaways)

In the category: arranged marriage to end a war. This one starts with love only one one side (it helps that one of them was raised to see this marriage as a positive thing and the other never heard about it), but they make it work. For a while. Because they're separated because you can't get peace that easily. Not the main romance for Karolina, but my fave.

4. David/Josiane (L'homme qui rit)

This one has a creepy age difference, but the relationship is fun despite it. They're capricious nobility of the kind "we could have loved each other so much, but the fact that our parents decided this for us is totally ruining the concept". I have hope for them in the future.

5. MIlly/Lloyd (Code Geass)

They are a case who absolutely don't fall in love with each other and break the engagement. I think their personalities go well together, though, and that they could have been good friends if not for the "ugh" reaction of being arranged engaged.

6. Khonnen/Leah (The Dybbuk)

Tragic version! Their parents engaged them to each other before they were born, and because of this they feel drawn to each other (it's a world with magic) and fall in love. Leah's uncle has forgotten about the promise and wants his niece to marry a rich man. The boy dabbles in dark magic to get her anyway and dies, but his ghost is possessing her. It's absolutely not healthy. Still shipping it.

7. Philip/Elizabeth (The Americans)

Communist spies in the eighties who are technically work colleagues but have a marriage licence and actual children. It's a slow burn romance and I love it.

8. Eponine/Marius (Les Misérables)

This one is absolutely not canon! I don't know why, I came across the idea of Marius thinking he has to marry Eponine out of gratefulness for Thénardier saving his father, either because he's naive, or because Thénardier is manipulating him, and I thought it had potential for being absolutely awful (complimentary)!

9. Ciel/Elizabeth (Black Butler)

You know, they're cute (they're cousins but I don't care). As of recently in the manga it's more complicated than this, but if anything it made me ship it even more.

10. Twilight/Yor (Spy x Family)

Both got married to have a cover for their (opposite sides) spy activities. Neither knows about it. It's written as cute anyway, on the arranged marriage that becomes real side, with their common affection for their (arranged) daughter a big part of the feelings. It works for me.

[keewu]

I made this meme because I've become addicted

And I started thinking about something. Is it only me that really fucking badly wants a fic of Elizabeth and Meliodas adopting all these weird mfs. Like a modern au type fic maybe, just something where all the sins are children and then Mel and Ellie just collect. And it's super wholesome, basically two traumatised parents taking care of traumatised children. Just me? Okay.

[gravesung-moving]

🌵🌵🌵

positivity meme! / accepting.

send 🌵 and i'll recommend a canon rp blog (x3)

@vsagis — how can i not recommend alex's izuku. he's become inextricably linked to my other blog's muse, to the point where they exist in each other's lore regardless of universe. if youuuuuu want to experience a version of villain izuku you've never seen before, whose ruthlessness is chilling as hell and whose deeper softness is incredibly rewarding to find underneath the unraveled thorns and grab onto. i could literally go on forever about alex's izuku so i'm going to shut myself up but trust me when i say you won't regret following. (AND WE MIGHT GET TO MEET IN PERSON NEXT YEAR IF I GET THIS JOBBBBBB IM SO EXCITED <3)

@shishitoren-vc — i've said this a million times already but jess is one of my first mutuals ever from my other blog, and i AM ride-or-die for them i'm afraid <3 their togame portrayal is so so so lovely, they bring him to life in a way that feels super authentic to the character (like i can literally hear his VA in the dialogue they write it's amazing) and the way they've expanded on his characteristics that we don't have explanations for is so well-thought out. i love to read their threads on the dash and it's always so fun to develop new plots together :D about to hurl chiaki at him alongside the dynamic we have going with geto, which is super exciting!

@sanctamater — speaking of my oldest mutuals. i think claire actually takes the #1 spot on this. we've been following each other since i very first started my elizabeth bioshock blog in 2014(???) isn't it wild that it's been literally Ten Years? god damn. (to be fair, much of that time was spent with me fuckign Absent but STILL) it's been so nice to reconnect and slowly start writing amelia and elizabeth again, there's a vibe to it that feels very much like coming back to a nostalgic time. their portrayal of lady comstock takes her so far beyond the crumbs we got in canon and turns her into such an otherworldly, tragic, human character that fascinates me at every turn. appreciate you lots, claire. i'm also Greatly enjoying your descent into the dragon age hole, bc it means i can live vicariously through you til i get a pc/console that can run it LMFAO. waving at you from my anime boy rot zone o7

[robsheridan]

When I was melting Barbie dolls as a kid, my Mom never imagined they’d be writing about it in The New York Times one day (except maybe if I ended up becoming a serial killer). I cannot express to you just how much I was (and apparently still am) exactly Sid from Toy Story, right down to the skull t-shirt. I spoke with Elizabeth Spiers for her great piece on the morbid joy of Barbenheimer memes.

I sent it to my proud mother:

I’ve made a special Barbenheimer variant of our popular Bar-B-Q apparel (as seen in The New York Times!), and it is out now on tees, tanks, hoodies, and more.