#ben newton

[avoyagetoarcturus]

"Faith is a fine invention."

Emily Dickinson in the total eclipse 4/8/2024 🌘✨💀🪰🔭🔬

[homemade-ghosts]

I doubt anyone will answer this, but I’m throwing it out into the Tumblr void anyway. 

I just finished rewatching s1 of Dickinson (I still haven’t seen s2 or 3 at all) for the first time in years and it got me wondering: were Emily & Ben ever in love with each other?

In retrospect, I was kind of an idiot for assuming, after watching s1 back in early 2020, that the answer was an obvious “yes.” I think, because I loved them together so much, I was so willfully blind to the idea that their relationship wasn’t actually romantic at all. That, in all likelihood, Emily & Ben saw each other as kindred spirts, in both interests and sexuality. That they connected so deeply because they were both gay and that meant understanding a part of each other it seemed that no one else in their lives ever could. & that maybe they (or at least Emily) confused that for a kind of romantic love because they knew that, given their time period, wouldn’t it be so much easier if it was? Wouldn’t their lives be so much less complicated if they just loved each other instead of the people (in Emily’s case, Sue) they were truly in love with? After all, at least if they were together they could be more themselves than they could with anyone else of the opposite gender.

That all seems like a pretty obvious conclusion after my rewatch, but I still had moments where I genuinely felt like maybe some part of their relationship was romantic? They had chemistry. A spark. 

Is that dumb? Am I just seeing what I want to see? Was the entirety of their storyline meant to be wlw/mlm solidarity and I mistook it for something else?

[uncleasad]

This was written on or about January 20.

Emily, as expected, was destroyed by the loss of Ben, and it seems like she’s been spending significant amounts of time at his grave—including on the day of Sue and Austin’s wedding. I’m not sure I completely blame her; if your BFF/love-of-your-life/sometime-lover was getting married, wouldn’t you want to be somewhere else? In comes Lavinia, finally getting Emily to return by playing the Sue card; the looks exchanged between them then…how long has the seemingly-flighty, self-absorbed sister known?

In a sort of bookend to the reconciliation talk with Sue two episodes ago, Emily had a lovely talk with Sue again. After the loss of Ben, Emily has finally realized all the grief, the weight and the darkness, that Sue had been carrying for all these years, and that understanding brings them closer again. And we finally get an accurate comprehension of Emily’s feelings for Ben when she tells Sue she loved him “almost as much as you”—although the gap between those two degrees could still be substantial, see the marvelous poem! Then Sue reveals her secret to Emily, of course the first person she’d tell (aside from Betty, who guessed it), and it feels like old times again, despite Sue’s impending nuptials.

It was lovely to see George one more time, a fitting end to his arc (especially after the disastrous appearance last episode…I suspect the Grout left him 😂). He finally sees Emily (almost) for who she is when he asks her to come to California with him, not as a prize to be won, with Edward’s permission, but as two like-minded people, as equals. But Emily will never leave Sue, and even George has recognized this (making the second seemingly-formerly-in-the-dark person to reveal that knowledge this episode) when he asks her if a sister will be enough. It will have to be…

Suddenly, though, Austin reveals his true self? Male privilege and power—and, perhaps above all, his insecurity over his relationship with Sue, his fears that Emily will steal her from him—and he wields that power and privilege to confine Emily to her room, belittle and diminish her. (And his lack of perception: what Emily wrote made Sue feel safe in pursuing this marriage, made her sure that she’d never lose Emily’s love, but Austin instead interpreted as Emily hurting Sue or trying to ruin his marriage. How will he react when he finds out about the pregnancy and its father? 😳) All this season I have admired how their sibling bond never faltered despite their competition for Sue’s affections, but now I cannot imagine them recovering. And the way he lied (and again belittled Emily) to Sue and the family to cover up what he had done—I’ll never look at him the same, for he has become a monster. (I also can’t help but see his seeing Sue in her dress, and the disaster that he unleashes, as foreshadowing of their marriage.)

The pairing of the wedding and the funeral in some senses is quaint and predictable, but I think it cannot be avoided. It was the death of the old Emily—if she did not in fact die the prior episode when she heard the fly buzz for Ben—the happy and free daughter, and the beginning of the afterlife—the new life—of Emily the Poet (and the eccentric shut-in; thanks, Austin <vomit>)

Sue, indeed, is a vision in the dress, as the last-minute arrival Edward is nearly breathless to describe. Edward has made his peace with the world, it seems; he can’t save the Union, but perhaps he can save his family, or at least his beloved daughter. Emily stood up to him, and he accepted her declarations, perhaps even with a smile, dare I hope a sense of pride? And she will stay right there, in that house, in that room—the very same room, incidentally, where the second great love of her life died—and so she will never leave him, looping back to his (still unexplained) fear from the very first episode.

The juxtaposition of the about-faces of Austin and Edward towards Emily pairs well with the juxtaposition of the wedding and the funeral; the world has turned on its axis.

There’s something powerful about Betty being the unsung heroine of the day—less the “unsung” part, perhaps—and a reminder that those without power and privilege are critical to the functioning of society. (Henry’s comment about the way white people party—with Emily wailing in her room at being excluded, Mrs Dickinson drunk and blind, and Robert Picardo getting it on with Aunt Lavinia, what a crazy party, indeed 😂)

It was good to see Lavinia moving on and casting off Joseph Lyman after his antics this season—and especially last episode. She deserves better than him, and I hope she finds it.

Finally, we had one last look at Ben, in the afterlife, in Emily’s subconscious. Both times her subconscious revealed that he is/was gay…was that an acknowledgement, or a fear, on her part? Was it platonic love, or something more? From Emily’s perspective, based on what she said to Sue, I can’t imagine it was anything but romantic, but this series has reveled in living in the grey and inscrutable.

I’m quite accustomed by this point to perceiving and following non-canon ships, and the vicissitudes thereof, so it feels weird, 5 years down the road from the original release of this season, to have heard all of the fandom abuzz with EmiSue during the run of the series, to have understood that the series was designed to center Emily’s relationship with Sue—after Sue was very literally erased from Emily’s life for all these years at the hands of Austin’s illicit lover—but yet to have seen and felt so little of it in the first ⅓ of the series. There were moments, yes, and powerful ones, but so far between and separated by other events—including Emily’s seemingly-romantic, encompassing love for Ben—but it’s been a struggle for me to feel EmiSue (Episode 2 aside). I wonder if it becomes more prominent, or more powerful, in the remaining episodes?

[polinsated]

💀💀💀

[shesnake]

No world they create for us can ever compete with the real one... Because that which is real is irreplaceable.

Westworld season 2 episode 10 "The Passenger" (2018) dir. Frederick E.O. Toye

[tampire]

#Me browsing Tumblr during work

[babsi-and-stella]

Marianne Faithfull photographed by Helmut Newton, 1981.

[lukenewtonlove]

Lukey Newts as Ben in The Lodge

[undiscoverable-words]

Shonda really said Happy Pride

xoxo Gossip Girl 🏳️‍🌈

[mariailoveyou-guerin]

See Lady Danbury with her favourite Bridgerton boys holding hands all happy smily she’s just like me for real

Why do I have feeling lady Danbury garden bloomed and was seen to by Benedict? He’s just a himbo like that he would love to help any woman a true feminist it’s not like lady Danbury don’t have experience with Bridgerton man that why she’s looking specifically at our resident silly himbo boy? Is that why she was so up in ups about violet garden being bloomed too bc she of this her and Ben so she was trying to get mama some

​see how Colin knows something is up between them and Ben is hiding away trying so hard not to her eye contact in public oh my gif what if they bonded over him going to that fancy art school and having his pic hang at the national museum which she frequently went to even with Violet remember they met there!

The fact Luke is going on press with Golda before the part2 basically the queen and Benedict why would they be together if not for the fact Benedict is doing it with the queens confidant and friend all these years THINK!

[hollywocd]

misc icons like or reblog if you use them

[nofatclips]

Last Light by Bloodmoon (Converge with Stephen Brodsky, Chelsea Wolfe & Ben Chisholm) live at PBHF Berlin, 2016

[allhailthemightyquattro]

Bridgerton BTS: 1x06

[uncleasad]

This was written from notes jotted on or about January 17.

A brief set of thoughts on Dickinson 1x09:

The annular eclipse was especially cool, having just had one occur this past year. (Jealousy not a good look on George, though 😏)

The through-line of the fly, from the beginning to the coda, “I heard a fly buzz, when I died.”

The horror on Sue’s face when the dress didn’t fit, and the word game with Betty, confirming-not confirming the truth—and then, seeing Betty with her daughter, something changed for Sue…the once-curse became a hoped-for future?

Alas, Ben 😢 Perhaps the only man who understood Emily perfectly, who loved her enough not to pursue marriage—although the anti-marriage, just before he went to his deathbed, was sweet. She will be destroyed—and, perhaps as the line of the poem suggests, she—this version of her—has died?

Emily’s talk with Maggie was lovely, and so needed—a woman in her life Emily can look up to…and a Catholic who has to pray in the barn, at that! (In stark comparison to Mrs Dickinson, dead inside; indeed, may Maggie never leave her employment with the Dickinsons.) I can’t get over the horror of the implication that Emily’s education was terminated because she could not feel the presence of God in her soul and refused to lie about it, and was branded “hopeless” and no longer worthy of efforts at educating (or learning)… 

I hope Lavinia has finally seen the light about that lout Joseph Lyman. Her sketch—sketches!—were amazing, and the way she seized her power was triumphant—you go, girl!

[love-thy-acolyte]

Actors I'd love to see appear in Acolyte series 2 if that can happen. Justine directs and writes these days but I'd pay to see what she directs any day.

[shesnake]

You used to be so beautiful. When this place started, I opened one of you up once. Million little perfect pieces. And then they changed you. Made you this sad, real mess. Flesh and bone, just like us. They said it would improve the park experience. But you know why they really did it? It was cheaper. Your humanity is cost-effective. So was your suffering.

Westworld season 1 episode 5 "Contrapasso" (2016) dir. Jonny Campbell