#but my MAIN story barely has a plot it's just a wlw romance and like mostly friends to lovers fluff and shit

[strawberry-pretzels]

ugh i don't have ideas for like this whole thing i'm trying to write. literally insane.

[uweiy]

I'm intrigued by Love is Science? but know nothing about it. Can you give me a run down on what kind of thing to expect and who it might appeal to? Thank you!! 😁

Ooooo boi *gremlin smile* I'm glad you asked. You've entered the dragon's den, broken the dam and thus this post turned out to be a monster so I'm gonna link here another post from @accidentallyadramablog which imo gives a nice (and short) overview.

That said let's get into

Love is Science?

Summary :

Yan Fei is a the CEO of the Love is Science marriage agency, that matches people based on scientific data. Hsuan Yu, 8 years younger than her, is a promising young hairstylist who has been in love with her thoughout their entire childhood when she has only ever seen him like a little brother.

Unexpectedly they meet again. Between the way they've each built their lives and how Yong Yan Fei's ex husband still looms over Yan Fei's life, how will their relationship develop this time around ?

Now,

just reading that summary I know what you're thinking.

Indeed, if you have some experience with dramas, you might recognize some TYPICAL TYPICAL tropes – let's get them out of the way :

love triangle (though we all know who she is going to end up with don't we)

childhood friends

'noona romance'

And they are every bit as present and as trope-ey as you would expect.

However, as they say, the devil is in the details.

And particularly, in the side characters. Let me give you a quick rundown of the lot of them :

As such, we follow the stories of multiple relationships that develop parallel to one another.

The relationships

• Yan Fei/ Hsuan Yu : Not much needs to be added I think. Their storyline might be the most predictable but they are pretty sweet and heartwarming. pining for like 12 years though poor Hsuan Yu. Anyway you can enjoy it or find it boring or but you can't hate it.

• Mark/Ouwen : Noooow we're getting to it. Their dynamic is so... Refreshing and unique. Confident gay with a soft heart and dumb disaster bisexual I mean *chef kiss*👌delicious

After the disasters of their first meetings, it's a cat and dog relationship where Ouwen is the hsssssss don't touch me– cat and Mark is the golden retriever trailing after him not really realizing the rampage he's creating in Ouwen's heart. while Ouwen is like "Remind me why the FUCK I caught feelings again ?".

IDK it just has everything 'Enemies' to friends to lovers, (not actually) unrequited love, pining, sweet moments, jealousy, feelings realization, snarky banter... What more could one want.

• Cho Nai Hui / You Fu : they are. So. So sweet. Both are older and have experience, and as such they are not so naive or stupid as the youngsters. Them sharing their life experiences and going on dates like typically teenagers (in movies or TV shows anyway) would is refreshing to see and really really heartwarming.

• Liu Sheng Ying/ ??? Her ex ? : The show hinted at a wlw storyline and this arc seems to have JUST begun. Basically Sheng Ying's ex comes to Love is Science as a client and requests Sheng Ying as an advisor, while Sheng Ying still seems heartbroken over her. I can't WAIT to see how it develops.

The friendships :

Something I greatly appreciate is that both the romantic relationships AND the friendships have a great importance in the drama.

• Joanna and Yan Fei : Jo, queen Jo 👑. She's just here to gossip, get all the gossip and be the voice of reason and we love her for it. You can see how comfortable they are around each other and how they were there for each other during tough times and still are. Kudos to the actresses because I believed the characters were besties in a heartbeat.

• Hsuan Yu and Mark : they are honestly... Such polar opposites you kinda wonder how they became friends but they are and it works perfectly.

Hsuan Yu still hasn't gotten he maybe shouldn't take Mark's advice, and Mark still hasn't gotten that he, definitely should take Hsuan Yu's. It also enables to develop a more playful and mischievous side to Hsuan Yu, giving him more depth?

• Ouwen and Sheng Ying: rivalry to reluctant solidarity to friends-but-i-will-deny-it-if-asked to just friends. IT'S GREAT

I also ejoy the fact that these multiple storylines are allowed to coexist. The romantic ones, the friendships, older, younger, m/f m/m and f/f like take your pick !! And tbh a WLW storyline ?????? These are so scarce I will take anything.

The recurring themes :

The show more or less subtly touches on some topics/issues, to which the dating aspect contributes to.

A non exhaustive list would be

Divorce, and how divorced women can be viewed as failures for some reason

How successful men over 30 are sought after but successful women after 30 are somehow deemed undatable

Preconceived notions and homophobia

And beyond the topics, there's just things like... Joanna not being interested in long term relationships nor wanting to get married, reporting sexual harassment, older people going on dates.... I'm not saying it's a groundbreaking activist drama –which is not really what I was looking for– I just appreciate the fact that it is a pretty mainstream drama and that these things are there.

Mad respect if you've made it up to here ! but we're not quite done yet.

The cast and crew :

The other element that made this drama stand out for me besides the side characters is the cast.

It might be weird that such a meta thing impacts the appreciation of the show but it did, for me at least.

📣📣TMI WARNING 📣📣

For me what happened is I stumbled onto Mark and Ouwen cuts on YouTube, then somehow onto the behind the scenes. They weren't subbed at the time so I could barely understand a word of what they were saying, thus I'm not sure what but something about how the rest of the actors, the director and the crew were interacting just told me it was a show worth watching or at least checking out.

📣📣END OF TMI📣📣

The cast honestly seems to have a blast and to have, how to say it, come together really well. It seems like most of them have become genuinely friends, or despite differences in personality have truly enjoyed working with one another and with the rest of the crew, and it shows.

Where it's lacking

In my opinion the show does have some aspects where it underperforms.

As previously mentioned, the main plot is kinda tropey, furthermore, in a drama typical fashion when something is about to get resolved, immediately something else happens. Nothing unexpected from a drama though.

The pacing : Some moments of the main plot especially dragged on, so I admit I skipped through some parts.

Because I feel so strongly about all the characters though, I don't really mind the previously mentioned points. I just think it's a shame because I feel like if it had been crafted a little bit better it could have made the show go from an 8/10 good drama to an 11/10 friggin amazing drama easy.

Lastly, there is a pretty unequal time distribution so Yan Fei and Hsuan Yu do tend to occupy the most part of an episode. However some episodes are more centered on some pairings (like ep 11 that will probably have an important Mark/Ouwen part).

Overall

it's a drama that warms my heart, as simple as that. It's not that deep, it's pretty funny, the acting ranges from good to excellent and I have taken a liking to a lot of the characters, which is what I think fuels my interest for the drama.

And I feel like it managed to attract a wide range of audiences because the romances and relationships are so diverse. Whether you watch the show for its entirety or for one aspect/storyline/character is entirely up to you and I feel like the creators of the drama are aware of it as well : and you can easily find subbed compilations about each specific pairing on Settv's official YouTube channel.

Take that aspect that you like–if you find one of course–and enjoy it, that is all ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

What's left to say besides.... 🎉🎊 Congratulations for making it to the end of this lengthy post !

[insomniac-dot-ink]

Books I’ve Read in 2020

AHello! I’m trying to read as many books as I can during the quarantine, here’s what I’ve finished so far:

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong (literary fiction): a son writes a letter about his life to his illiterate mother. Breathtakingly beautiful with it’s way with words this book is lovely and real in the hardest and sweetest ways. The author’s combination of prose and poetry is dazzling and intricate, this book has stuck with me for days afterward. 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik (fantasy): a money-lender gets in trouble after bragging she can turn silver into gold and is kidnapped and ordered to do so by a fey creature. It may be that I am the perfect audience for this type of book, but it’s my favorite thing I’ve read all year. It’s a book that equally takes on the fantastical and real-world with compelling female characters at the center of the whole thing. A wonderful fantasy journey inspired by eastern-European Jewish folklore. 5 out of 5 stars.

Through the Woods by Emily Carroll (horror graphic novel): a series of short horror comics. Absolutely bone-chilling! This was a really fun type of scary story, especially the last one which made my skin absolutely crawl. Deliciously eerie, this was treat to read if not a little too short. 4 out of 5 stars.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender (magical realism): a young girl can taste other people’s emotions in their cooking and begins to understand her family in new ways. This was a weird book, but it has everything you’ve got to love about that combination of the surreal and mundane. It’s sense of character was electrifying and I had fun engaging with this type of off-kilter real world. I was a little frustrated in parts bc of some characters choices, but that too was true to life. 4 out of 5 stars.

Crier’s War by Nina Varela (steampunk fantasy wlw): about a Made automaton heir to a throne and her human hand-maiden that is trying to kill her. This was an easy read with a lot of tension between the two main characters that I liked, but the writing itself was very weak. There was waaay too much exposition in parts and the dialogue had some really hockey lines. I enjoyed the twists and turns in the middle of the book, but the beginning and end didn’t have much movement. 2.5 stars out of 5.

The Huntress by Kate Quinn (historical fiction): honestly, I’m a little disappointed. This book just did not hit my sweet spots, it wasn’t fast-paced enough for me to get immersed in the plot, and the characters weren’t real enough to be wholly invested in them. That said I adored Nina Markova and the Night Witches, so that did help. 3 starts out of 5.

The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten White (horror sci-fi retelling): HAND IN UNLOVABLE HAND. A retelling of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein from the perspective of Victor Frankenstein’s wife and my God! The characters! The plot was well-enough, but the characters took the whole show for being complex and compelling. The main character was breathtakingly layered and I was wholly invested in Elizabeth and her story and the triumph at the end of this story was tangible. 4 out of 5 stars! 

Uprooted by Naomi Novik (fantasy): A story of a young woman who lives in a valley where a girl must go live with a wizard for 10 years. She is certain she won’t be chosen, but ends up having to be “uprooted” herself. I enjoyed most of this book! However, I think I liked “Spinning Silver” a lot more just because the ending of this one somehow lost me. The characters were good and plot compelling, but (SPOILERS) the big battle at the end seemed to drag and didn’t interest me somehow. 3.8 out of 5 stars.

Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (fantasy): excellent read! A story of a young woman in Jazz Age Mexico who goes on an adventure with a Mayan death God who is trying to regain his throne. A romp across the country absolutely brimming with likable characters and fairy tale twists. My only complaint would be that most of it felt a little predictable due to the fact we knew where we were going throughout the whole story, However, it was still greatly enjoyable for the heroine herself, Casiopea. 4 out of 5 stars!

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (literary): a story of two families in a progressive “planned” community, how their lives intertwine, their secrets, and a central question surrounding motherhood. Deeply empathetic to its characters and introspective, this is an every-day story of people in suburbia that reads like a thriller. I could barely put it down and felt deeply for its characters and situations, 5 out of 5 stars!

Wilder Girls by Rory Power (YA sci-fi suspense): a story of a group of girls at a boarding school on an island affected by the “tox” which alters their bodies in strange ways like giving them scales or an extra spine. This was an eerie, interesting read with a wlw romance! Watch out for the body horror in this one, but it was very gripping and held my interest. Some of the pacing was off in places (like the romance), but had a very creepy atmosphere that did it for me. 3.8 out of 5 stars!

If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio (thriller-mystery): A thriller about a group of Shakespeare actors in their last year of college and one of their classmates who turns up dead. I enjoyed the murder mystery part of this novel more than I expected despite the fact I had guessed who had “done it” pretty early on. I really enjoyed the James-Oliver dynamic with its growing homoeroticism, but I didn’t like how the character of Meredith was handled at all. She felt like a one-note aside. I might have given this book four stars, but the ending was EXTREMELY frustrating for me and I did not like the “open-ended” conclusion. 3 out of 5 stars.

A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman (literary humor): a weird character-driven comedy about an old grumpy man and a new family that moves in next to him. Warning for themes of suicide. Anyway, I don’t normally indulge in cliches like “I laughed, I cried, I loved one Cat Annoyance.” However, that’s exactly what I did. I laughed out loud, I cried my eyes out (THE CAT’S HEAD WAS IN HIS PALM), I loved this book. It was sweet and compelling and thoroughly immersive. 5 out of 5 stars!

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow (historical fantasy): set in the early 1900s comes a story of a young girl and her experience with “Doors” that lead to different worlds. This book had a lot of great character development and really interesting descriptions, however, I didn’t like it as much as I wanted to. I found it hard to get myself to sit down a read it. There was just something missing with the push to “page-turn,” but it was still a really good book. 3.7 out of 5 stars!

Gideon the 9th by Tamsyn Muir (high fantasy, kinda gay): I AM FILLED WITH EMOTIONS. This was book was definitely a page-turner. I was very confused with it at the beginning, but the characters and their interactions were, forgive the expression, the life blood of the story and kept me wholly invested. The ending has CRUSHED my heart, but damn did I have a good time reading it. 4.5 out of 5 stars!

Harrow the 9th by Tamsyn Muir (sequel to Gideon the 9th): I really enjoyed this book. It was just as strange and twisting as the first book, though I think I enjoyed the first one a bit more since I love Gideon. It was fun ride overall, though the ending was kind of really confusing. So 4 out of 5 stars.

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo (historical fiction): Overall, I really enjoyed this book! The writing style was personable and grounded in reality. I found myself really liking the main characters and the exploration of the life of a bi main character was really well done I thought. A solid book with drama and glamor to boot. 4.6 out of 5 stars!

The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (historical fiction): A story of two sisters during WWII and their resistance to Nazi occupation. To be honest, this book wasn’t my cup of tea. It was compelling, but also wholly depressing and I felt like gloried in the pain of the two main characters too much. The history was wonderful and realistic, but it didn’t make me feel anything good afterward. It was just dark. 3 out of 5 stars.

Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston (mlm romance): I finally finished this after the heaviness of The Nightingale. This is a story of the First Son of the USA falling for the prince of England. And it turned out to be a very fun and light hearted read! Some of it was kinda generic and too political, and it coulda been shorter, but I thought the romance itself made up for it. It just made me feel so sweet and lovely inside. 4 out of 5 stars!

Anxious People by Fredrik Backman (literary humor): I’m searching out heartfelt books and this one ticked off all the marks on my “sweet” list. A lovely book that made me cry more times than I would like to admit. Compassionate beyond belief, funny and heartfelt. I think I enjoyed A Man Called Ove slightly more, but this book was also dear to me and something I hope to reread in the future. 4.2 out of 5 stars!

Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel (sci-fi): A post-apocalyptical story about a group of traveling Shakespeare actors and a symphony. Overall, an excellent read that somehow pictures a more realistic or even softer version of the apocalypse. At first, I wasn't happy with the jumping around of the story, but as I progressed I grew fonder and fonder of the interwoven characters and their journey. A very fascinating read about a world that hits a little too close to home. The appreciation of the arts and preserving humanity was somehow very hopeful and I was fully engaged with this story. 5 out of 5 Stars!

Up next: The Hidden Life of Trees by by Peter Wohlleben (nonfiction science), The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin (urban fantasy), The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (fantasy)

[lesbiradshaw]

not to completely derail your mlm ship parallels discussion but as we seem to have very similar taste in ships do you happen to have any wlw ships that you enjoy? they are a nightmare to find idk if i’m just consuming the wrong media or what but WHERE are the meaningful relationships between women/nonbinary people :/

the pickings are truly slim because female characters are RARELY fleshed out enough in popular media to ship while nonbinary ones struggle to even exist. in the mcu i feel like everyone should see it coming when i say carolmaria ... they ARE soulmates and if marvel does anything to mess that up in the marvels ... they’re meant for each other. they are wives. co-mothers. best friends. the perfect pair .. the way their story parallels stevebucky too makes me so :( and i know everyone on mcu stan twitter rags on the mcu tv shows from before disney+ was a thing (cloak and dagger, agents of shield, etc) BUT i actually kind of liked runaways? it’s on disney+ and hulu for streaming and it features a cast of majority bipoc main characters which includes a bisexual japanese american girl. she gets with another one of the female characters in season 2 i think? and they’re very cute. the representation isn’t perfect and the plot does get a little corny but it’s a cute ship with cute moments and it’s the first wlw relationship i saw in a superhero series off the cw- and this one is actually in the spotlight for more than five seconds! the ending of the last season they have up rn is a little unresolved but i think it’s worth watching because i view the ship as intended to be endgame. deanoru is also canon in the comics so you can read about it too! for books .... the first ship i thought of was piperbeth from percy jackson for some reason (isn’t piper canonically sapphic now?) LMFAO. but for actual suggestions: i haven’t personally read one last stop yet and i’m a little wary of it because the author is white with a reputation of kinda stumbling when writing bipoc but i think the general consensus has been that it’s good? i liked gideon the ninth and the mercies too. unfortunately it’s just really hard to find sapphic romances/ships that aren’t either toxic as hell, barely have any media together, or have 0 fandom content. like i love maria/nat and natsharon in theory but i’ve tried reading the fics and they always either bring up steve during sex or are just ... weird. i struggle finding good content myself. it’s rough out here for us 💔 but i hope some of my suggestions help and if anyone else has any feel free to hop in the replies.

[mariaaxescallop]

how black lightning is treating its wlw romance

(just for context's sake, i'm currently watching 3x04 of black lightning)

(SPOILERS FROM SEASON 2)

i love black lightning. it is a series about a black family of superheroes and that is the main reason why i started to watch it. the black representation is amazing, just like the way they address the struggles of black people in the usa. i also love seeing black girls (with dark skin!) on screen with different hairstyles. one of the things i love the most about black lightning is the main family. i'm so here for the family issues, not only metahuman related, but also the day to day stuff. the series addresses parental control, coming of age, leadership, the subversion of gender roles (lynn stewart? yes ma'am), dialogue, responsibility, respect, boundaries and, on top of that, the love the pierces have for each other.

besides, i can see myself on anissa and jennifer, not only because of their relationship with their parents but also in the way they interact with each other. every time they get to talk about anything, like school, race, gender, periods (!!!!), sex, clothes, their parents and, sure, even superpowers, i can't help but smile because it's so goddamn beautiful. their sisterhood is definitely one of the things that attached me to black lightning from the start. but i'm getting distracted here.

that said, i have to share one thing i do not like about the series. the way it handles its lgbt characters aka anissa and grace (mostly grace) (and i'm not even mentioning the other 3). just to point out, i didn't start watching the show because of them, if i did i probably would have already abandoned it by now. yeah, i'm mad about grace's almost nonexistent screen time. sis shows up one episode for one scene and a half and then vanishes for another three episodes. the majority of the interactions between her and anissa happen off-screen. how do i know that? i had to ASSUME that in order to make sense of their relationship. the first few times we get to see grace it seems like she and anissa are good friends. next season, when she comes back after a very long time, it looks like anissa ghosted her and is cheating on her???? and i didn't even know they were together or something??? every time i see them on screen it feels like they are on a completely different page comparing with how they were last time i saw them. at first, i thought i was missing something... until i realized it was the show that was LACKING content.

just to make it clear, i never expected the show to be about them. it is supposed to be focused on, well, black lightning. i was ok with that. i even ignored this feeling that something was wrong... and then i noticed how much screen time khalil has. i can't help but compare him with grace because both of them are romantically involved with our pierce girls and both of them have powers. even though they have those characteristics in common, it is pretty obvious that grace doesn't get as much attention as khalil does. and it pisses me off. there's also the fact that i'm not very fond of teen romance, but that's just a personal taste and i'm not going to elaborate on that while it seems like the writers keep forgetting about grace's existence, they do not forget about khalil. even after his death.

i like khalil. he is a well written, charismatic character. i find his interactions with jennifer very tender and it is very cute to see how much they care about each other. we get to know khalil's dreams, his pain, his confusion, his anger, his guilt and, finally, his redemption. his arc was so carefully done. i don't like the resurrection thing, though, but that's another story...

and then we have grace, whose life we barely know until she disappears without telling anissa a thing. while she is missing, the audience receives a lot of important information like: she was a foster kid, she was kidnapped by a prostitution ring at the age of 16 (???), grace choi is an alias and she is, in fact, a metahuman. a shapeshifter, to be more specific. and all that during her absence! i mean, she wasn’t given the opportunity to tell it by herself!!!! meanwhile, khalil manages to come back from dead before grace's return!!! and he has a lot of very long, graphic scenes!!! i mean, c'mon. i couldn't care less about the 23 martial arts he knows, and i definitely don't give a f*ck about his punch-on-the-heart thing.

not only grace is belittled as a character, her relationship with anissa has been almost insignificant to the story. jennifer and khalil had it all: cute scenes on the roof, khalil asking jennifer to be his girlfriend, sex talk, supportive moments, the drama, reconciliation, they run away together and then jen has a lot of scenes showing her coping with his loss. all we have from thunder grace is a few cute dialogues and other few kinda-arguments (which sound out of place if you watch them isolated because you have no clue regarding what happened off-screen), then we’re shown grace is hiding something, she leaves, anissa talks to gambi and jennifer about her and that’s it. WHERE IS MY DRAMA???? i don’t wanna see khalil’s muscles for the 8464th time, i just want anissa and grace to talk properly!

i love the representation in black lightning. i love watching a black family full of strong women being cute with each other and at the same time changing their community for the better. but then we have this asian bisexual woman who doesn't even have room to grow as a character, being constantly put aside. and this is not me saying that she should appear more just because she is a queer woman of color. my point is that she is a very interesting character, with a troubled past and a possibly nice personality. AND SHE IS A METAHUMAN, AN EFFING LEOPARD, what could be more related to the plot than that??? the way i see it, the story that is being told in the show would make more sense if she had more space, if she was actually part of it and not only an afterthought. she could add so much more to the plot. but it takes the writers being interested enough to put some effort on it, which they clearly don't have. by the time grace didn't even show up on season 2's finale, i felt disrespected by this lack of interest, as a bisexual woc myself and as a huge shipper of thundergrace. jennifer and khalil's teen heterosexual romance was at the center of the last episodes, meanwhile grace was mentioned a couple of times and that was it. why can't she get the same attention the other side characters do? some of them are so useless to the plot and yet there they are. am i talking about lala? idk.

grace could be so much more, she deserved more dialogues, an entire arc, actually being part of the plot. she deserved more complexity. i know grace has the potential. it is a shame that the show slept on her like that. i don’t want lgbt representation for representation’s sake, i want it for real.

[prongsmydeer]

Ayesha Liveblogs Oh My Ghost (2018) Ep. 1-8

As a precursor to the mildly harrowing journey I’m about to take you on, you should know that I initially liveblogged this in a Discord chat, so what I liveblogged is purposely not emphasizing some of the stranger elements of this show. Anyway, I thought, well why not have this fever dream live on my blog too. Spoilers ahead, but as I’ve said: it’s not that I recommend this show, but I did watch the whole thing

This woman is chanting at a rooftop altar in a lightning storm so I'm guessing she's responsible for the horny ghost

Just as I was pondering the fact that this is the only piece of Thai media I have consumed in which the main characters are not, to my knowledge, mlm or wlw, the next three characters to appear on screen were all gay (I do think they're just bit roles and not important characters but it was funny timing)

Update: God this is the second show premised upon Magical Virginity set in Asia I've seen in the past few months; r u ok Thailand and Japan

In an ironic twist of fate, she can't go to the afterlife unless she has sex with someone.... as a ghost????

I don't care for most of the chefs in this kitchen; both the sous-chef and executive chef seem to physically intimidate staff below them 

In more fun news Jiw, the shy main character, seems to see all sorts of dead people, since she is currently being haunted by spectres other than Horny Ghost, who has not yet met her

Grandma's explanation for why Jiw sees ghosts is that it's hereditary

UNBELIEVABLE SOMEONE HAS REFERRED TO HER AS A HORNY GHOST ON SCREEN

I'm oddly endeared by this sudden auto-rickshaw-chasing-a-taxi shenanigan, makes me miss India a little

“The onIy thing I can’t let go now is just that” It appears that the fact her virginity is relevant not because it's part of some greater Thai ghost lore, but because she specifically really wants to have sex but died before she could. The Horny Ghost Title prevails

It has been implied that Sun the Executive Chef may somehow be one of the 1-in-ten-million-men who could withstand having sex with a ghost, I now understand the trajectory of this show

“If one day you happen to possess someone who has exactly the same frequency as you, you will never be able to leave that body” The heavy-handed exposition is great

Reasons I Do Not Trust Sun the Executive Chef: 

1) He seems p harsh with his staff

2) He was rude to his mum

3) He doesn't like rice!!!! Who do u think u are!!! Gluten-intolerant???

Oh my goooood, I think Win the Handsome Restaurant Staff Who Studied Abroad (who I have been rooting for since he was introduced purely because he's handsome) might be Jiw's love interest hkjhgkjhgkhg

It might be a love square!!! Jiw and Win falling for each other while Horny Ghost tries to get with Sun the Executive Chef

“You know why I don’t like you?” SUN YOU ARE HER EMPLOYER!!!

He's right but he's rude 😔:

“A woman shouldn’t have scars on her hands” The context of this comment is that Jiw has just spilled hot soup on her hands kjhfkhfjhf sorry Sun, femininity isn't flame-retardant

Sun's tragic backstory is that he was also once a crybaby who apologized too much

Though in fairness to Jiw, if I were seeing ghosts and had this kind of work culture, I'd be stressed out too 

Jury's still out on Sun; I do like Sun's sister and her husband, they both seem very nice so far

I'm confused by the fact that Jiw's landlord seems to barge into her place anytime he wants??? Also he's threatening her to evict her for her Ghost-Be-Gone-Rituals   

The first actual hint of romance: Sun is commenting on Jiw's food blog, which he doesn't know belongs to her, bc he thinks her recipe and passion for cooking is nice

KUHHGDKJHGKJDHGKJHSJDKHG Horny Ghost has now possessed Jiw and has just THROWN SUN TO THE GROUND for trying to root through her purse for the storage room key

My guess is that the Horny Ghost will try to get with Sun the Executive Chef, while inhabiting Jiw’s body Greed-from-FMAB-style

Ep 2: Horny Ghost is attempting to figure out what Jiw's job is in this restaurant while still impersonating/possessing her

Barely ten minutes in and she has already challenged the sous-chef to a fight

Horny Ghost’s only priorities are fucking and fighting

God it's so hard get through this show it's too embarrassing

POOR JIWWWWWW SHE DOES NOT DESERVE TO HAVE THIS PERSON IN CHARGE OF HER BODY JGHKJHG

Jiw has been saved from further embarrassment because Sun has been taken into the police station. Bc he firmly escorted a food blogger out of his restaurant in ep 1 for yelling at his staff and now she's filing false charges against him. Whack

Why is there a shower in the back of this restaurant??? I was willing to accept the lockers for their stuff but the shower perplexes me. Was this building formerly a gym??

And yeah I don't know if I'll make it through this whole show bc I have to pause every minute or two to be embarrassed

TOOK 1 MINUTE FOR JIW TO SHOW UP IN THE SHOWER

I feel all of these emotions

Horny Ghost!Jiw is taking Handsome Study-Abroad Win on a date; I feel bad for both Jiw and Win bc I think they have a vibe going on hgkjhgjh

Executive Chef Sun is solving his B Plot problems by leaving fake positive reviews about his own restaurant

Sun is mad at his mom for settling his legal dispute bc she wasn't there when he was a Sad Little Rich Boy (Now he is simply a Mad Tall Rich Man)

I keep forgetting that the Sous Chef's name is Rain; hgkjhgkjhg I wonder if Sun hired him for the comedy of it

Oh with added context Sun and his mom had a rough go of it actually, she had him young and sent his sister to live with their aunt and kind of really did leave Sun to fend for himself

SUN MADE A FRIEND

Sun's mom and Horny Ghost's Nemesis (Auntie Pu) are hanging out bc Sun's mom is very superstitious

Also dear god these episodes are each an hour long???

An earlier sidenote: There was a scene where Auntie Pu seemed to be heckled by God for her inability to catch Horny Ghost

Executive Chef Sun is now shooting a cooking competition and Rain has been thrown out by security so I'm guessing that Sun and Horny Ghost will be ✨ live ✨ on ✨ television ✨

So the theme of the cooking competition is Mom's Home Cooking and they've mentioned like 3 times that Sun's mom never cooked anything for him

I know this is supposed to be a sad moment for Sun but I'm cracking up bc he reacted like he'd just been shot kghkjgh

Horny Ghost is helppppppppppppppppping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh noooooooo the sad old man restaurant owner having a hard time with his business who they occasionally cut to is Horny Ghost's dad, it seems!!

You know, ironically even though the other Thai media I've watched has been set mostly coming of age/university stories, this is the first thing aside from Love of Siam that has  put such emphasis on the parents. Most other media has been ‘1-2 parent scenes in the whole thing is enough’

HORNY GHOST HAS REGAINED SOME OF HER MEMORIES AND NOW HAS A NAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HER DAD CALLS HER 'KAOPOON'

Awww Dad's Restaurant used to be so bustling with life when Kaopoon was still alive 💔

Kaopoon's obnoxious personality really suited her old life!!

What an unexpected turn towards sincerity and emotional depth

In more light-hearted news, Sun is still vain as hell 

Also shout-out to Thailand for the adult orthodontics representation kjhkgjh I noticed this in 2gether as well, it seems a p common thing

Kaopoon has made the bold choice of hanging out of with her dad and snooping through her old room. I can only imagine this will lead to a fight with her brother, bc she has Jiw's face

OH MY GOD KAOPOON HAS BEEN STEALING FROM SUN'S RESTAURANT TO GIVE STUFF TO HER DAD'S RESTAURANT KJHFKHGK

Another ongoing subplot mildly stressing me out: Sun's sister Nam is married to a policeman and it turns out that Kaopoon used to have a crush on him when she was alive and I'm like DON'T FLIRT WITH HIM IN JIW'S BODY PLEASE DON'T NAM IS HER FRIEND

Sous Chef Rain is being a real bro to Horny Ghost Kaopoon and saying “We should all be held responsible so we don't lose our trust in each other” to which Executive Chef Sun says “that makes you a thief,” bc being rich makes u lose empathy I guess lmao

🎶 This is I why do not trust the Bourgeoisie 🎶

Executive Chef Sun is now expressing his regret for firing his Sous Chef to his dog, who, while doing nothing but eat, has stolen the scene and any of my sympathy

Whoops Horny Ghost's brother is about to reveal her Restaurant Crimes to her boss, I'm pretty sure

I hate that Horny Ghost's brother keeps insinuating that Horny Ghost/Jiw is seeking a “sugar d*ddy” or flirting like can't people just be nice jghjkg? I hope that Sun realizes now that family or not, she was being kind, not stealing for self-gain

This is so fucking funny Sun found out about Jiw/Horny Ghost's restaurant crimes, seemingly forgave her on the spot for no good reason, and hired Sous Chef Rain back only for the rest of the restaurant staff to immediately begin muttering about how much they hated Rain hahaha

I'm beginning to think Sous Chef Rain has a weird passive-aggressive crush on Executive Chef Sun. I would support it only bc I find them both exhausting and the comedy of two people named Sun and Rain falling in love is great

Rain: We have a strong bond. Stronger than friends, family or brothers. Sun, and also me: 👀🤔

“I helped you fix things with Rain,” said Horny Ghost Kaopoon, as if she had not also been one of several sources of conflict at her restaurant. (Also this dialogue is part of her drunkenly coming onto Sun.. which is quite something to watch)

Study-Aboard Win Who Probably Has Feelings for Real Jiw to the rescue

God, who has the mental strength to get through show all at once? Really and genuinely every time this show gives me a false sense of normalcy they do something embarrassing dhfjhfjk where is the pay-off? Where is the romance??

Sun's childhood friend Ida  who seems to have a crush on him tried to invite him up to her apartment [Tiktok voice "I wanna ruin our friendship"] but he said nah so now he's standing in the rain thinking about their history

First of all, sir, you are 30, so I don’t see the point of trying to pretend the same actor makes sense in a school uniform. Second of all, is wearing glasses and having bangs all that it takes to make you unpopular? What kinda She's All That nonsense??

Sun's argument for denying the booty call is that they should've dated in university but now they've missed their moment

Horny Ghost has just found out her Cop Crush is married (to Sun's sister) and Sun has just rejected himself from the Friendship Booty Call, so I wonder if they're going to have Sad Sex in the Rain

Update: No one is having sex in the rain but Horny Ghost Kaopoon has just been kicked out of her apartment and is now going to sleep in the restaurant I guess, this should end well

Sun definitely has a weird crush on Horny Ghost bc he keeps letting her get away with all kinds of shit kjhgkhgkgh she has punched him, stole from him, come onto him strongly, and snuck into the restaurant at night and she's just like “~~please chef 🥺” and he's like “FINE 😤😊 you can do whatever I guess”

That said despite taking it fine he did not let her stay the night at the restaurant so I guess that's the one thing she's not allowed to do jghkhgg 

Uhhhhhh it seems like the Cop Crush is reciprocated???????? Kaopoon/Jiw was like “You must love her a lot” and he was like “who” ABOUT HIS WIFE!!!

Sun has gotten caught up with Jealousy Antics towards Childhood Friend Ida and now Kaopoon is attempting to blackmail him to let her stay at the restaurant lmaooo

Okay Win his definitely in love with ONE of the two (Sun or Jiw/Kaopoon) bc Jiw/Kaopoon slept in the restaurant and everyone's like “Oooooh Chef and Jiw got lucky last night” and they had a lingering shot of Win looking longingly in their direction

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Sun just kissed Jiw/Kaopoon bc of a fever-induced hallucination I bet u $85 that Ida is about to walk in

Kaopoon has confirmed that Sun is Ghost-fucking Proof and now she's 100% Mission Sleep with My Possessee's Boss Before I Get Turned Into an Evil Spirit in Two Months

She just straight up asked him, “Will you do it with me? Just once?”

Sun, emotionally, at this particular moment: [Donkey Kong meme]

(As an aside I really wish Kaopoon were not up in everyone's grill romantic advance-wise this is straight up worse than an anime in that sense)

Oh my god is this how they actually become friends?????? By her chasing him around asking him to fuck and him going “NO” and then physically rolling her away from him

I DON'T UNDERSTAND YOUR DYNAMIC!!!!!!!! WHY IS THIS WEIRD FUCK-PROPOSITION MONTAGE SET TO SUCH PEPPY MUSIC

I have now pivoted and I think Cop Crush may have murdered Kaopoon???????? Auntie Pu (Horny Ghost Kaopoon's Nemesis) just said his identity was death and suspicious music played

OH MY GOD FOR SOME REASON SUN UNPLUGGING HIS PHONE CHARGER HAD THE COSMIC EFFECT OF REMOVING HORNY GHOST FROM JIW'S BODY???? WHAT!! WHAT!!!!!!!!

Every time I think "that's it, I'm done with this" they keep pulling me back in!!!

DGhfjdkjk?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They just made Cop Crush run over an unhoused man's recycling??? I guess to establish that we shouldn't trust him??? What is the writing on this show!!

Dkjhgsdkjhgkjh a Canadian character has appeared for some wonderfully stilted English dialogue:

Sun: How's Canada sir?

Canadian Ambassador: Canada was very cold, but it's good to be back

Sun: It sounds like fun anyway!

CA: It is! It's always fun!

Sun: Ok!

JIW HAS ACCIDENTALLY SET FIRE TO THE BACK OF THE RESTAURANT AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I figure if I power through the show the psychic damage will be shorter term

Also I think Sun has accosted Real Jiw for a psychiatric evaluation bc of her reasonably erratic behaviour

To add to the layers of this show, Jiw and Sun are back to interacting via her recipe blog and he's all like “wow this internet gal is my soulmate 😍“ like the dumbass he is 

Not to detract from internet relationships or anything, but they've exchanged ONE comment

They're having at least a minute long back and forth of cutting to these two staring stupidly into the distance thinking about each other

Kaopoon's father seems to have alcohol poisoning and Cop Crush just left him in the back storage closet on the ground????????????? Heavy-handed murder foreshadowing I think

Kaopoon saved her dad by possessing Jiw again; as much as I understand why she did it I really do feel bad for Jiw bc Kaopoon keeps living her life for her, you know? Seems unkind

Sun just offered to train Jiw/Kaopoon to be a chef (which Jiw really would want to do) but will Jiw be present for it? Hard to say!

SURE YOU WERE LIEUTENANT MURDER

It's been narratively established that Jiw does not remember what happens while she's been possessed so it makes the possessions that much sadder. Particularly since everyone but Win seems to like Kaopoon better

Bc this show needs at least four dramatic plots per episode, Sun has invited his childhood bullies to his restaurant to mock them passive-aggressively with his wealth

The bullies are like: Hey Sun, your childhood trauma's really harshing the vibe

Sun found out his Main Bully (Big) is really not doing well income-wise and now he feels slightly bad for mocking him with his wealth

Clearly Sun has not caught onto the Horny Ghost Situation

Oh my GOD “I spring up every time you talk horny because I’m scared of your words” Sun really said: ‘Well mark me down as a scared AND horny’

Auntie Pu whacked Horny Ghost out of Jiw on the way to their Spring Roll Not-Date so Jiw will finally get to experience some chef stuff with Sun

Sun, despite his reservations, seems to have a crush on all of Jiw's various personalities

He's playing guitar for Jiw through their shared apartment wall just bc she stopped on the street bc she saw a guitar player 🥺❤️

Real Jiw really likes him!! This is the Thai Jamie Oliver bullshit I signed up for

SCREAM he's trying to take Real Jiw on a bike ride kjhgkjhgkh what a quit pivot from his standoffishness to “I will be involved in every aspect of your life”

This biking day concluded in a way I could not have possibly predicted which was, as an interruption to their flirting, they had to high-speed foot chase a bicycle part thief, which they caught because Real Jiw BIT HIM on the leg

And Sun, because he is OUT OF HIS MIND, is just kinda like: “Love that for you babe 🥰”

OKAY SUN YOU MAY HAVE ONE (1) BOURGEOSIE PASS

The Jiw/Sun/Ida stuff finally comes to a head because Ida brought him a cake but Jiw and Sun are already sharing a cake (and restaurant-apartment building)

“Think of it as... helping a hungry policeman” EVERYTHING THIS MAN DOES IS SO FREAKING SUSPICIOUS

Somehow I don't think this is a reasonable request, Kaopoon

Things have escalated and now Auntie Pu, Kaopoon and Jiw are all on Team Sun Should Have Sex with Horny Ghost

I'm gonna power through as much of this show as I can at once so on it goes lol

I kind of understand Sun's "I'm not going to deal with this" way of approaching romance but man it sucks to be Ida who has tried to be pretty forthright with her feelings

So apparently Sun's sister Nam has not always had a wheelchair, she only had it starting three years ago, which is when Kaopoon died,,,,, did Cop Crush murder Kaopoon AND injure his wife,,,,, the stank vibes!!!

As weird as it is that Kaopoon and Jiw are working together to seduce Sun, it's exactly what I wanted and thought this show would be from the beginning

Win said all women are queens 😌❤️

Rain:  Why are you protecting [Jiw as Kaopoon]? Is she your girlfriend or something? 

 Win: Do I need to be her boyfriend to do that? Fine, I'll be her boyfriend then

Sun purposely did not give Win the prize in their Friendly Vacation Cooking Competition because he is jealous that Jiw and Win seem to be flirting; this man said my love language is Passive Aggression

They're going on yet another couple's bike ride (this time ft. Horny Ghost Jiw, which Sun simply canonically thinks is a product of mania, which is fair I guess)

Nam's friends are talking about the person who did a hit and run to Nam getting karmic justice while Lieutenant Murder sits there, probably the one that did it

Lieutenant Murder (formerly known as Cop Crush) just keyed his wife's friend's car because they need to establish that he is not only evil, but also a run-of-the-mill dick

Gsdkdhgkhgkh Kaopoon as Jiw has been trapped inside a storage crate by a tween girl who can see ghosts and u can this is set in Thailand (or Asia generally) bc they cut to this temp gauge like 10C is a really threatening temp. Girl it's chilly but you are fine!!

Sun said, "I am in love with all sides of Jiw, Aggressive Horny Ghost I Think Is Mania included"

[itsclydebitches]

3 topics this time!

1.) I was watching Sarcastic Chorus’ video on Star Vs The Forces of Evil, and near the end there was a comment that stuck with me. “These ideas are present, but not fully explored. I like to call them the window shopping of ideas.”

And that was just such a perfect way of describing it. When I first heard it, I immediately thought of My Hero Academia and RWBY. And while both have this problem in spades, RWBY is much more obvious about it. Every single time RWBY introduces a concept they’ll look at it, try it on for a bit, and then dump it on the floor for other people to deal with, and then leave without buying into anything.

Raven? Dumped. Beacon? Dumped. Has anyone seen Tai? Glynda? Sun? Are the grimm still roaming around? Are we sure that Salem hasn’t yet retrieved the relic from Beacon? Wasn’t Nora supposed to get development? Are she and Ren still having problems? Shouldn’t Jaune be learning how to control his semblance better? Especially since it’s something so helpful? Didn’t Robyn need immediate medical attention? But she somehow survived? And is perfectly okay? How? Wasn’t she in a serious medical condition? Is Haven still in chaos? Where is Watts? Is he locked up? Or did he escape while the mains were throwing their temper tantrums? Where’s Tyrian? Where are all of the other students? All dumped. Little to no explanation, and off to the next shop.

2.) I disappeared for a bit after your recap because I was so purely infuriated with the last two episodes. Ironwood shooting Oscar feels ignorable to me in a way because it’s such an out of left field, ooc moment, that my brain is just refusing to acknowledge it. It’s horrible, terrible writing. And it feels a lot like shark jumping.

But as someone who started writing fanfiction in middle school, I get where they were coming from. They wanted a fall from grace story. Cool. Got it. But that takes time. If they wanted to do this properly, it should have been given much more time. Hit the topic episode 1 of the season and devote little time to anything else. The election? Scrap it. Overall it was barely relevant. Robyn. Skip it. Again, barely relevant. Don’t have Ruby&Co hiding info. That takes up time and attention. Have them put all of their cards on the table immediately. (It also serves to not make them hypocrites.) Give the teams another solution to save everyone. (At least a reasonably feasible one.)

Have the kids argue it out. Have Ironwood refuse to budge because they’ve already put too much time into the plan before Ruby and friends came along. Have Weiss go to her mother ask her to set up a meeting with the council to protest what Ironwood is doing. And have her gain their trust by revealing what her father has been doing. If you really want to do this in such little time, it’s possible, but you have to dedicate the time that you do have to it. If you don’t want to do that, and you don’t want to pace it out for another season, then scrap it. In the overall story for the show Ironwood being evil is wholly unnecessary. It adds nothing  to the show. Especially since they’ve already done this twist.

You could also make it so that the Ace Ops were going behind Ironwood’s back to betray him to Salem. Have the ace ops getting along with the mains to gather information. You could also have had Ironwood going down a dark path since his reintroduction. Have him plant spyware on them. Have him in shadows. Have him looking menacing in scenes. Alluding to terrible things that he might be doing. Looking at secret files. Messing with the relic. But for the love of god, don’t do what you’ve done. It was messy and lazy. If you can’t (or don’t want to) devote the time and effort to make this work, then remove it from your story.

3.) There was an article about the fan backlash regarding Clover’s death. In it, it talked about how anyone upset was just a whiny woman who was upset that she can’t fantasize about two gay men. And that it wasn’t queerbaiting or burying your gays because Clover wasn’t officially canonized as such. And that the show has Bumblebee, so it can’t be doing either of those things. And I was so disgusted by it and the comments that followed that I had to get off the internet for awhile. There’s just so much wrong with that.

No, Clover was not said to be anything other than straight in canon. (He wasn’t said to be straight either, so…) However, if we are only going with what has explicitly been stated in the show; then I will not be accepting Bumblebee as a legitimate point for the show from the same people any longer.

Do they seem to be headed into a relationship? Sure. And I hope that it gets proper time and follow through. But if we’re only accepting relationships and sexualities by being told in universe, then you can’t use that as a shield. Because nothing has been said. The writers could change their minds, place them in relationships with male characters, say that they’re straight (you better not RT, do not take this as a legitimate idea to do) and act like nothing ever happened. But it wouldn’t matter, according to this logic, because they never technically canonized it. And I know that it’s a little different, given that we’re shown Blake and Yang having signs of romance feelings for each other, but by this argument, nothing matters unless we’re spoon fed information. And  that brings me to my next point.

In the history of media wlw pairings have always been more ‘acceptable’ than mlm ones. Because there’s a history of denial and fetishizing them. It it’s women, then of course they’re all over each other! They’re women! With all those emotions and need for physical contact! If they’re in a relationship with another woman? That’s fine! It’s not a real relationship! They’re just playing! They need a man! And just imagine! Two attractive women being attracted to you, good sir! And imagine being such a studly man that these women change their sexualities just for you! Women are fickle after all! They change their minds all the time! 

A man in a relationship with another man? Is seen as unnatural. Because straight men can’t fantasize about it. They can’t fetishize it. And therefore, there’s no need for it in media. They don’t want it there. And I don’t want to accuse the writers at RWBY of specifically thinking this way, but it is the way media tends to go. And while the lead characters are women, and a good amount of the fandom are women, there’s still room to question if this is what’s happening. The main leads are all young, thin, and conventionally attractive. Even when in a place that marked by how cold it is, the clothes are more for style and having the girls look attractive over function. The only one of them that looks even remotely clothed appropriately for the weather is Weiss. And when you get to the male characters, they’re either evil, dead, or given so little character that half the time they’re easy to forget. Because the story nor the writing is interested in men.

Also, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend of the writing suddenly getting rid of characters that fans pair with Qrow. First Ozpin, then Ironwood, then Clover. You could probably make an argument for Tai being shunted off once that started to gain traction in fandom as well. It’s creepy. 

(Sorry if anything is phrased badly. One of the problems I have with social things is that I never know if I’ve phrased something well enough to get my point across without being offensive. Still working on it, so let me know!)

***

Response under the cut! 

1. absolutely love that phrase: “Window shopping ideas.” I feel like I may have heard it before, but not enough for it to stick. It really is perfect though. The story looks at something, seems to consider it seriously, maybe even tries it on… but in the end doesn’t commit. We move onto the next piece of clothing—or even the next store—without, ultimately, having achieved anything other than introducing the possibility of buying a new outfit (telling a cohesive story). One of the most common compliments I hear RWBY get, and one I agree with, is that it has so many cool ideas. The problem is this isn’t a tumblr post going, “Here are all my fun headcanons, random concepts, and nifty details vaguely held together by a broad plot.” Cool ideas alone isn’t enough to carry a mainstream story a lot of people are paying for, certainly not one as long and complex as RWBY has become. Granted, every story has window shopping to a certain extent. We can acknowledge that there are different levels: 

Dropping Glynda is super understandable largely due to the issues surrounding her voice actress. Finding someone new for Qrow is one thing because he’s still actively a part of the plot, but if you’ve lost an actress for a character currently off screen, it’s tempting to just keep her off screen. I get that. It’s an arguably smart sacrifice. 

Dropping Jaune’s development is somewhat understandable because we acknowledge that change within a cast this size has to cycle. Jaune got to improve last volume through figuring out how to heal that guy’s arm and amplify Ren’s semblance. So his development takes a backseat the next volume to make room for others’. Problem is… 

Dropping something like Nora and Ren’s development is both Not Good and actively hurting the justification behind dropping other things (like Jaune). What did we learn about Ren and Nora this volume? Nothing. There was no insight into Nora like we were led to believe there would be. Ren obviously has a lot of stuff he’s trying to work through, but the story actively kept him from working through it by silencing him with a kiss. And the kiss itself? Great in regards to moving forward with their romantic relationship, but we already knew that relationship existed. We were clear about Ren and Nora being a couple up until Ren voiced hesitation… which, as said, was then ignored. The kiss achieved little in the grand scheme of things and, unlike something like Blake/Yang, doesn’t function to provide absolutely needed proof. Again, it’s good we got it, it just wasn’t done particularly well and was done in place of much more important development. I don’t need them to kiss this second because their moments in Volume 4-6 firmly established that they’re a couple. I do need to know more about who Nora is, whether Ren agrees with Ironwood, and why he’s so torn about this relationship that just the concept of hitting a fake version of Nora in battle makes him cry. (Because seriously, don’t they spar? That was clearly something much bigger than just not wanting to his his girlfriend.) 

So… yeah. A lot of window shopping. Which connects to: 

2. The fact that yeah, there was too much going on this volume which resulted in none of it getting the time it needed. We keep coming back to the question of “What is the point?” What was the point of resurrecting Penny if she wasn’t going to grow as a person, or help Ruby do the same? What’s the point of spending so much time on Robyn learning to trust Ironwood only for her to immediately reject him on the airship? What’s the point of devoting time to Qrow and Clover’s friendship if Qrow thinks so little of it he’ll team up with Tyrian instead? What was the point of framing Penny? What’s the point of spending SO much time showing justified and sympathetic scenes of Ironwood if you’re going to take a sharp right and randomly make him shoot a kid in the finale? What’s the point of the group being devastated by Ozpin lying to them if they’re just going to turn around and tell the same lies? Nothing amounted to anything. All the time we spent developing Thing A was dropped for Thing B. Continuing the analogy, the characters spent a whole volume admiring the red dress, checking the price, talking about reasons why this was the perfect purchase for them to make… only to turn around and buy a pair of pants instead, something we haven’t even seen them look at, let alone try on. The journey these characters took is entirely disconnected from where they ended up. 

3. Oof yeah. All of that is a complex af topic that deserves more than my quick response… but suffice to say, anyone who believes that “wasn’t queerbaiting or burying your gays because Clover wasn’t officially canonized as such” fundamentally doesn’t understand what queerbaiting is. The whole point is that it’s NOT canonized. Like Blake/Yang remain. I admit 100% that Clover and Qrow were not teased in the same way that other potential queer couples have been (such as Dean/Cas in Supernatural), but there were a lot of hints and coding that encouraged a queer reading regardless and fans are right to point that out, regardless of what RT’s intentions may have been. Even if you don’t want to go that route, this volume still—quite obviously—encouraged a close friendship, something that in and of itself is chock-full of implications given the history of the buddy duo/opposites attract trope. Whether you read Qrow and Clover as platonic or potentially romantic, the end result is the same: two men embodied an intimate and gentle relationship (something rare for two “straight” guys) and then one was horrifically murdered off in order to “justify” the destruction of the one other friendship Qrow still has going. There’s a lot in there for fans to be upset with, especially when it was all set up so poorly. And frankly, until RT actually canonizes Blake/Yang, I’m not going to make any blanket statements about how they would never queerbait, not matter how lightly. Because you’re right. We don’t know what we’ll get in the future and no matter how seemingly obvious it is that they will enter a relationship at some point…we can’t swear that it will actually make it on screen. In which case everything we’ve seen—romantic hand-holding, intense blushes, going out on presumed dates—would enter the realm of really intense queerbaiting, which in turn would drastically color how viewers read Clover and Qrow. You proved with one couple that you’re willing to string viewers along… so why would we claim you weren’t doing the same here, even though it was a lot more subtle? As an on-going series it’s hard to make any definite statements about RWBY’s representation, but given how long it’s taking for their presumed, primary queer couple to get together (no matter how little time has passed in-world the writers are still making the fanbase wait years) and the history surrounding Clover and Qrow’s character types as well as the ending they got… I’m more than a little uncomfortable. Just like I was uncomfortable with the decision to make the first queer character a villain who blames her crush for those feelings, her abusive relationship, all while trying to murder her parents. That stuff hurts in a world where queer media is still both rare and often badly done. Even if next volume Blake/Yang becomes canon and RT has A+ rep moving forward, we’re still left for the next year with one queer coded character denouncing all his male friendships, one close male friend dead, and two women dancing around each other. Volume 7 has a lot of things that on their own aren’t necessarily that bad, but pull them all together and it paints a far worse picture. 

(Also yeah, another anon mentioned how RWBY is popular because it’s not fanservice and I’m like, “Yes… but also no lol. I have things to say about how ‘We don’t do giant breasts or pantie shots!’ shouldn’t be the only bar we strive to meet.) 

[yeo-rims]

do you have some kdramas you could recommend? 😊

Ok, I’ll do this once again, as I did before, some of my favorite genres and my favorite dramas from it:

Slice of life

Can we get married: it’s not an easy watch, most of the characters are quite unlikeable, but there is a lot of great themes and discussions too. If you can get past the annoying mother-in-law dynamic, I highly recommend it because it’s worth it.

One spring night: finished it last week, and I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s slow-paced and the plot is mostly about this kinda engaged woman and this single father trying to make it work despite the societal pressure. It has one of the most realistic dialogues out there, and the characters are amazing. If you don’t like cheating or think emotional cheating is a thing I wouldn’t recommend it, but otherwise, it’s one of the best romantic dramas I’ve seen. 

Heard it through the grapevine: it’s from the same director, and it’s a satirical take on rich families, but with a really clever script and competent actors. Kinda like sky castle, but less makjang. It’s about a couple (a middle-class girl and a son from a traditional family) of teens that get pregnant and have to deal with this new dynamic and make it work with his terrible family. It’s so fun to watch, sometimes infuriating, but there’s a lot to unpack there and the cast is amazing.

Action

Healer: hands down the best of the best, it has romance, action, mystery, secret identities, and it’s just really fun to watch. You’re never bored, the romance is on point, and all the characters are likable/compelling. The villain is good, but the drama is actually great at making time for every story without making you feel lost/tired of watching it. It’s a favorite of a lot of people here, if you haven’t watched it yet, please do. 

My beautiful bride: this drama is the definition of love and devotion. The main lead will do whatever it takes to rescue his fiance, and it’s amazing to watch. The action is good, the fight scenes too, and the romance is just so well done. The villain is funny, and there are women doing stuff even though it’s an OCN drama, the concept!!! Really really good. A lot of blood and some disgusting scenes. 

Heartless city: the same writer, and oh god, this drama broke my heart. It’s mainly an action drama, the romance is not the main thing about it, but it’s there. The friendship between the trio of bad guys is the best thing about it alongside the friendship between the two women (one of them is part of the main romance, the other part of the main trio). The drama has some weird plots going on, but it’s great and full of plot twists and great characters to cheer on. Best bromance in years.  A lot of blood and some disgusting scenes.

School dramas:

School 2013: it’s slow-paced, there’s no romance, but the main leads friendship and the teachers make it work. It’s about trying to do better, how we impact others with our actions, mostly about second chances. The teens aren’t too dumb or too smart, they’re teens, the adults act like adults and there’s enough HS politics to make you engaged with, but not enough that will make you want to kill them. I’d advise it for some graphic scenes such as an attempt of suicide and violence. 

Sassy go go: not the best drama out there, but one of my favorite onscreen friendships. The characters are all difficult, complex, and they mostly need a hug. The antagonist is amazing and I love her to pieces, the main romance is good, and Ji Soo is going to suffer in it too. It also deals with heavy stuff such as self-harm, some graphic scenes, an attempt of suicide, and abusive parents. 

Seonam Girls High School Investigation: such a gem! probably one of the most unique dramas out there, although the script can be not that great. It deals with this group of girls that decide to investigate a lot of weird shit happening at their high school. It deals with a lot: sexual harassment, abortion, bullying and they actually showed the first wlw kiss in south korea television. It is really good. Even when you don’t agree with their view on some issues (me and the abortion, for example), you can see where they are coming from. It deserves some love and recognition. Jin Ji Hee is the best. 

Dramas that are all over the place:

The king 2 hearts: it hurt me. I had physical pain watching this. It was so good! They have a mostly respectful take on north korea (like crash landing on you) although the leading accent is the most annoying thing I’ve heard in my life. The main dude is horrible, it will take you a lot to like him, but the drama has action, drama, romance, some comedy, and a lot of insane things going on. The villain will make you want to kill him with your bare hands. It’s amazing. Also some graphic scenes, but not as heavy as the action ones, tho.

Hello monster: what even is this drama? It’s delightful and so charming. The last episode was kinda iffy, but overall it’s really good. The main trio is great, a perfect chance to see park bo gum and seo in guk together before all that fame. It’s my favorite character of jang na ra and I had the best time watching this drama. It’s about this boy whose father was killed by this dude and was never caught. Now they want to find him, maybe he’s closer than we think. The mystery is not the most important part, but all of the dynamics of the drama. Amazing! 

Sungkyunkwan scandal: a girl pretending to be a boy enters this university (it’s a sageuk!) and now she has to live with 3 other dudes and pretend she is a boy for real otherwise her family will probably die (so is she). There’s a mystery going on, but the charm is in its main leads. The three boys are amazing, the stoic lead that has some of the most unintentionally funny scenes, geol-oh as the kinda vigilante and always moody second lead (yoo ah in has the range to be the lead i will never forgive 2010 for this) and yeo-rim (yes, that’s my url, I’ve been geol-oh before too) as the flower boy rich dude totally in love with his best friend (he’s gay don’t @ me). 2010 gave you the song joong ki/yoo ah in bromance you didn’t think you needed before. park min young is incredible and her character is clever, nice, and so charming. I really love this dumb drama and I won’t ever forget the “I am the gay” scene. Perfection. 

[g0dblessthefandom]

The True Queen Review (1.5/5)

FYI: I only tag this so folks thinking about reading it can make an informed decision. If you like it, by all means, shout it from the rooftop, but it won’t do any good complaining to me. 

I didn’t read “Sorcerer to the Crown” by Zen Cho, and that is entirely on me. This year was supposed to be my year of reading-only-female-authors-writing-scifi-and-fantasy-about-their-female-protaganists year, and as I was well aware that the previous book in this series was about a male character, I skipped it. Big mistake. I can only imagine what I missed in the first book. Maybe the author had a more cohesive story, or maybe the long list of characters (that I couldn’t be bothered to care about) were explained in such a way that might have made me care about them. But, unfortunately, I didn’t read Sorcerer to the Crown, and this book has left such a bad taste in my mouth, that I doubt I ever will. Can’t recommend this one, unfortunately. 1.5/5

To give a small recap, The True Queen is the story of two sisters, Sakti and Muna who don’t have their memories and are sent to England to go to a magical school for girls. Then the book is about the Head of Sorcery in England. Then it’s about her friend (Henrietta). But now it’s about the Queen of the Jinn. Nope, it’s about her sister. Oh wait, now it’s about Henrietta’s sisters. Oh wait, now it’s about Sakti and Muna again. Wait, are Muna and Henrietta kissing? I haven’t read a less cohesive book in a long time. The plot is all over the place, and the threads that are supposed to tie it all together are barely there, so while I could follow along, I neither wanted or cared to know what happened in the book. I simply got caught up in a sunk cost fallacy by the end. 

This is normally where I’d put the things that I liked about this book, but I honestly cannot think of a single one. 

The cons were numerous and persistent. The world building felt only half done (maybe the other half is in the first book?), the characters (pretty much except for the main two) were interchangeable, and their motives were indiscernible. I spent half the book screaming “Why would you do that?!” and never getting a satisfactory answer. It takes about 150 pages (out of 367) to get to the ACTUAL PLOT OF THE BOOK, and then in the last third, the author was still introducing characters??? And expected me to care about them? Everything seemed to plod at this ~terrible~ pace, and then suddenly in the last few chapters, everything kind of sped up to a sprint. The chapters have different points of view, supposedly, but then halfway through a chapter the point of view would change, or the person that we were supposed to be seeing through the eyes of would no longer be in the room, but we’re still hearing what’s going on? It’s like, why even bother with the pov thing in the first place? It was so bad that I barely noticed until about half way through that the pov was changing. 

A huge problem I also had was that the sexism and racism were so persistent in this world that it was annoying and uncomfortable. It took away from the plot and served no purpose! Why had men be so dead set against women using magic and then in the end the father of Henrietta continues to let her study it and her parents both knew?! The lovely books I’ve read previously had allowed women to use magic, be in charge of their own affairs, and even be in same sex relationships, and they are still set in psuedo Earth histories. You can write it without having characters denigrate women and poc, and it can be just as good. You’re the author! You don’t have to make it “realistic”! It’s much more refreshing that way. 

One of the worst offenses of this book was the way that it portrayed Muna and Henrietta’s “romance”. They only hang out with each other for a few weeks (maybe less?), but by the end of the book (in exactly the last four pages), Henrietta tells Muna basically that she loves her. There has literally been no inkling of this before that moment, and believe me, I was looking for it. I was sure that Henrietta had been in love with her friend because she was hesitating to marry her fiance. The whole wlw relationship in this book is a mess, and the fact that it’s on so many lists about queer representation in the scifi/fantasy is beyond me. Muna never once expresses her sexuality at all or shows interest in another character romantically. This felt like something shoehorned in, and queer people deserve better. If you want to read something good to get the taste of this out of your mouth, I suggest Gideon the Ninth or The Priory of the Orange Tree. Don’t waste your time with this one.

[pickyperkypenguin]

Recently I remembered that Mabel podcast exists. As I had an upcoming journey, it seemed like a perfect occasion to renew my interest in it, and to get to know how the story of Anna Limon and Mabel unfolds.

(Disclaimer: I am writing all this after listening to twenty five episodes. I don’t exclude the possibility that I’d change my mind, had I listened to more, but for now this is what I think. Also, I had no idea I’ve had so much to say about Mabel podcast, so the length of this text is a surprise both for you and for me. tl;dr: I love the idea of this story, execution could be better.)

What I realised after listening to a couple of episodes after a long break (and the natural break in the narrative, at which point I initially finished), was that it’s, like, Really Bad. But, you know, sort of in a good way.

The general premise is something that a person ( I, the person. When I say we or a person I mean I, but it’s too late to care about my phrasing now) wishes badly to exist. Who doesn’t want a queered fairy tale, dramatic and tragic lesbian romance, the kind that somehow feels like in every single scene the heroes (heroines, in this case) are standing over the edge of a cliff, their ripped white shirts barely covering their chests, their bodies shivering from the wind, and somebody is about to kill or kiss the other person. You know, the romantic as in the historical period kind. Everything over the top, but better, because it’s not subtextually, but screamingly textually queer.

And it works at certain points, really – the queerness of the heroines queers the structure of the story, it plays on the archetypes and sort of fulfils the desire to appropriate them for the queer self for once. It’s a pleasant feeling.

The descriptions are flowy and opulent, the romance goes how certain type of straight romances would go – assuming that the listener will assume the same stuff about a queer couple, as about heterosexual one. And it provides the portrait of an unhinged, feral, burning and at times tender  love I see so rarely in queer narratives, because it often would be considered “problematic” (again, it would not, was it a straight romance, but we do tend to have higher expectations for queer romances) or simply botched (it often is in straight romances). It’s the love that’s not really supposed to be nice, and that’s based on imagining and idealisation of the other person more than the reality of the connection (and it goes both ways, as we see after finally getting Mabel’s POV). It is indeed for the most of time disconnected, here by literally a wall between the worlds, but not as the finishing scene, but by the duration. The sun and moon type of romance (and the podcast seems self-aware of all that, I think the creators are delighting in the fact that they can construct it like this).

And I think that till a certain point it all sort of works out more or less, minus the details I’ll be complaining about. When it comes to the luscious descriptions creating the atmosphere of a fairy tale in vivid detail, they are really over the top, bordering on purple prose (or sometimes just plunging right into it). The repetitions and flowery adjectives have their own charm and work in small amounts. I thought – maybe it was not made for binge listening? But no, on the other hand the structure of plot is slow to unfold and convoluted enough, that were I listening to it week-by-week, I’d get nothing from it, really, and would probably be discouraged by the fact that it’s not as much that I don’t understand anything, but I can’t see the larger plot that’s supposed to be unfolding. It’s a mystery-based podcast at first, and I would probably forget what would be considered as base-level unusual in-world, and it would not make an effective impression on me with the increase of oddity.

Another explanation of the purple language – maybe it’s Anna Limon’s character? Maybe she is that kind of girl – after all, for what we know she might as well be going crazy in an old lady’s house, fixating on mysteries and family history that’s not hers for the lack of anything to do? The voicemail “letters” (for a lack of better word, but it has that feel of XIXth century love letters, you know) charm at first. Well, at least me. (Same went with Alice Isn’t Dead, with the main character constantly addressing her wife that she misses – that was I think the first time I encountered a wlw affection showed like this, and I liked the idea very much).

Unfortunately, the formula starts breaking when the first arc of the story ends, and we get to know Mabel’s point of view and Mabel’s character. Here the similarities of that language start grating: Mabel is a not-really-a-girl-what-does-human-mean-at-this-point who has been isolated for a long time in the Kingdom Under the Hill, where concepts work in a slightly different way than in the real world, and she could be this over the top just from the isolation and existing for a long time among this non-euclidean post-death plant-gymnastics.

Both Anna and Mabel could have their own reasons to be speaking like this (speaking! That also changes the feeling of it, it read distinctively different in text form). But when those reasons are so different from one another, and yet the language stays about the same, it’s just obvious that it’s the writing of the show, and unfortunately, as I said, in larger quantities, in it not being a distinctive characteristic but how the script is written, and also because it’s all spoken, it starts charming and ends up jarring. It’s becomes too over the top, if I can say it like that, and it doesn’t work as it should, also because – and here we come with another thing – it takes itself so. damn. seriously.

The Mabel podcast does not joke, but it contains a lot of unhinged, wild and hysterical laughing, giggling and sobbing. Maybe it’s the fault of the voice acting (and sorry if it’s rude, but I’m afraid I think the voice acting is really not good overall), but at a point it just started getting on my nerves. The show never stops to give itself a breather, but rides the high C all the time, and there is no rest. That cheapens, I’m afraid, the moments that are supposed to be impactful and end up less so, because they have no chance of shining brighter than the others, as everything tries to shine at once.

I also think that the voice acting itself is annoying me more than it should. I don’t really find the cadence of the voices pleasant – especially Mabel, who is unfinishing her sentences a lot but in a way that sounds artificial. It’s like amateur actors who know they are supposed to not finish a sentence, because it has been written in the script that another character will interrupt them. So, they go off from their way to facilitate that, and there is the minuscule but noticeable pause that just sounds stupid for the spectator. It’s even worse when there is no other character to interrupt, just one person abandoning a sentence – but they have long ago known they will abandon it in the first place, oh my god, it doesn’t make sense. Sorry, I think I really didn’t like Mabel’s way of talking.

I mean, at first it was sort of incredible – I remember the impact it made on me when I finally heard Mabel’s voice! And she was so angry! She was angry at Anna for switching places without asking her if she even wants that, and she didn’t fit in the real world acutely, and she has had a lot of pretensions and grievances. She was yelling a lot and hitting things. It was awesome. And then, sadly, it all lost the impact, because I then started noticing everything that I listed above and all this became just a baseline communication for her, and nothing had the time to reverberate. Her appearance was the best and the worst that could happen, because it could be executed so well, but instead has basically destroyed the formula of the show that seduced me in the first place.

And the formula was this – one sided relation from events we don’t know if they are actually happening, or if it’s a portrait of a person losing herself and going insane. The distortions instead of voices when the worlds were colliding and the other world and its inhabitants were communicating was absolutely selling that ambiguity. It was providing a certain foundation to Anna’s self-doubt if she isn’t going insane, and at the same time giving us the structure of the narrative that we’re familiar with, because we’ve been (I was, in Central Eastern Europe) raised on it. It was (and is, I stand by it) an amazing choice for showing an encounter with the Other, with strangeness that the modern world (and its recording devices) is not equipped to handle, and the heroes are barely able to as well. I do believe the only way to scare us at all in the XXI century and the time of incredibly realistic special effects is to leave us guessing, because only then we’ll be able to scare ourselves. The theatricality will work out where the gore fails, and here it worked spectacularly. I still don’t know who exactly was speaking in which moments, if the house was speaking at all, if it was maybe Luna Thorn or the King. Who the fuck knows, and what a delight it is.

But the story started to fall apart, as I said, when we finally had both girls actually talking to each other, and then them speaking of the other as if she was not theoretically right next to her. In the exact manner as when they were apart, divided by the veil between the real world and the fairy kingdom. The distance disappeared, we got both points of view, and that should be the moment of losing the gravity, and I think it would kind of saved the show. Unfortunately, I say as a mantra here, even though the attempts were made – bravo for Anna, expressing her desire for Mabel to just fucking talk to her like a normal person and to co-exist, be in the same spacetime. To which we got a counterargument that oh, of bloody course Anna wants normalcy because that’s her fetish, and Mabel is not normal because she’s barely human and did even Anna love her all this time, can she love her after confronting that otherness of Mabel? Aaand there it went. I mean, it does make narrative sense a lot, but it also prevents from riding out the narrative high C, and so we are still listening to an equivalent of ten hour version of the last phrase from the Phantom of the Opera theme song.

The romance starts showing its imperfections, and normally it would be good, because it would lead us to the protagonists deepening the connection, going from the abstract, ideative one, to one forged in the fire of just being in near proximity, and in situations where they are supposed to work out compromises to rely on each other, instead of making decisions for the other and expecting gratitude. At the point which I listened to last, they confronted that issue, but didn’t seem like it was going anywhere (yet?). Which leads me to a point, that I will probably listen to at least a couple more episodes, both because I sort of want to give it a chance and to know how it will unfold, and also because I have another upcoming journey and what you expect me to be doing on a train?

Yeah, that’s about that. Gods, what the hell, I had no idea I would write this much. There might be several grammatical mistakes in this meta, because I am not a native speaker and there is no way I am going to go over 2k of words that nobody may even read, and I should seriously be going back to what I should be doing instead of this. Though I admit, right now I will try to go to the gym, because I am highly caffeinated (have you noticed???) and I, like, cannot really do caffeine. At all. Why did I do that? Oh yeah, I had to because I was working on some stuff before. Oh gods, how will I even fall asleep today.

[danyreads]

TITLE: The Rebels of Gold AUTHOR: Elise Kova RELEASE DATE: December 5th, 2017 READ DATE: February 3rd, 2018 PUBLISHING HOUSE: Keymaster Press RATING: ★★★☆☆

can i get an uuuuuuhhhhhhhhh i didn’t love this and i’m not sure how to feel about that!!!!!!!!! i did like it, i just didn’t love it?? this was a ~solid~ conclusion. i say ~solid~ because everything was wrapped up super nicely by the end of the book but it kind of left me feeling a little unsatisfied. truth be told, i feel like victory was obtained way too easily—considering the stakes the characters were up against, the nature of the villains, and the dangerous world they live in, in general. a lot happened in this book (and i mean, A LOT), which also leads me to think this might’ve been better as a quartet (or otherwise a trilogy, but taking out most of the useless material in book 2 and inserting the extra material from book 3 in there). this doesn’t mean the trilogy sucked, or that it was messy. it just means that there was a lot of world building stuff in book 3 that didn’t make it in book 2 or earlier, which maybe would have helped carry out the story and character arcs a little better. i adore elise kova and absolutely loved her previous series, air awakens, which was EXTREMELY different to the loom saga in all the ways you can think of. air awakens is also probably my favorite from the trashy high fantasy genre, which might’ve been why i was completely biased going into the loom saga and why it surprised me so much. about the loom saga in general, i have a few thoughts, both positive and negative!! ● diversity: ENDLESS amount of brownie points on this one for this series. when in this modern day and age can you pick up a steampunk high fantasy series and honestly say “hey this book has not one, not two, but three wlw MAIN characters.” that’s super rare. the word ‘pansexual’ is not explicitly stated but you can very confidently assume it since a whole society is based, basically, around pansexuality. sure, recently lots of books feature gay main characters, but they’re always male. having three (i can’t get over it, THREE!!!!) main female characters who had, currently have, or will have romantic relationships with women is an absolute, automatic win. i’ll mention again that a whole society in this book centers on pansexuality. just so it sinks in for y’all. i know diversity doesn’t stop at lgbt+ characters but considering the material we are constantly getting, this series feels like a long time coming. ● writing: elise improved immensely since air awakens and it’s pretty evident. as an aspiring writer i also really admire how she just thrusts out book after book after book with barely any breaks in between, and how they’re always fully fleshed out 300+ page novels. she published the entire loom saga in the same year and did the same with most of air awakens and i think that’s something that’s really praiseworthy skill for a writer to have. ● characters: a very conflicting point for me. some characters, like cvareh, i adored. some other characters, like florence, i felt were useless (despite the lgbt-ness). i can tell character development was tough in this one for elise, because there were very random jumps from plot points to plot points to help with character development, or to introduce new characters (again, some of them useless). i feel like she probably had a much longer draft with some very important character arc scenes that she eventually cut out for editing’s sake and proceeded to forget she had cut out, because there were things in the character’s behaviors or relationships that went virtually unexplained. not all is negative, though. as i said before, characters i adored didexist. ● gore: this was one of the things that surprised me the most. again, having read air awakens, i expected going into this series to find some fun loving romance with a cool plot, and instead i got cannibalistic dragons who enjoy eating pieces of each other’s bodies for fun, and who also take out organs from each other’s bodies and transplant them into their own bodies. you know, for funsies. if you don’t have a very strong stomach, i would personally skip on reading this series. there’s a lot of blood. ● world building: here’s where my opinion’s generally a little bit more conflicted. i’m not gonna lie, the world building was amazing. dare i say, i’ve never read a series like this one before. the science and magic systems are absolutely unique, genuinely like nothing out there. the worlds of loom and nova are also quite spectacular, as well as the complicated politics and societies in which the characters live. it really was amazing. however, i think it might have been a little toocomplicated to truly appreciate in such a short series, which i’m still baffled about. air awakens, (i know i keep comparing it to air awakens but i can’t help it), was a five book series. five longbooks, at that. this is why earlier i suggested this should’ve been a quartet, or at least a really long trilogy (i.e. mistborn). book 2′s world building and general development was a little on the short side, and suddenly you are thrown into book 3 with this intense, heavy political intrigue and then the characters are constantly traveling between territories and countries and it just... came in a little short. some pretty prominent plot points (perfect chimeras) ended up being not that important in the grand scheme of things. some of the characters also didn’t feel like they belonged in this heavily built world, but that’s a story for a different time. in general i did like this series. as i said before, though, i didn’t love it. and i was really expecting to love it, which i’m kind of disappointed about. something was off for me, but it might not be for everybody else. i just think it was a little bit ahead of its time for elise’s skills (i love you elise don’t hate me).

GOODREADS LINK

[badbookopinions]

The Once and Future Witches - Alix E. Harrow

A+: I thought Ten Thousand Doors of January was good, but this was stunning. I can’t wait to see what Harrow does next.

In 1893, there's no such thing as witches. There used to be, in the wild, dark days before the burnings began, but now witching is nothing but tidy charms and nursery rhymes. But when the Eastwood sisters join the suffragists of New Salem, they begin to pursue the forgotten words and ways that might turn the women's movement into the witch's movement, provided they can survive the shadows stalking them and repair the bond between themselves. (adapted from the Goodreads page)

I was a little wary about this book: witches, and the suffrage movement, and books advertised as feminist, generally tend to mean white feminist, to the point where it gets a bit annoying. But Harrow has tried her absolute hardest to make this a book about all women, so that every woman feels represented in this idea of witching, and it’s delightful.

Which makes it sound like I’m recommending this book for diversity points, but I’m not - none of it ever feels like tokenism, because Harrow has taken the time to beautifully think about how different magic would look to different cultures and different classes. This book shines as an alternate history/historical fantasy, with so many clever little changes. One of my favourites is the fact that the middle names of girls are called ‘mother-names’ because they’re given by mothers, but I also liked the fact that the Trail of Tears didn’t happen thanks to badass Native witches, and ‘the Grimm sisters’ instead of ‘the Grimm brothers.’

Speaking of the Grimm sisters: I love a good retold fairy tale, and this book is full of them. In a world where witches are real, and mostly just people, and the Maiden, Mother, and Crone are mythological figures akin to the Greek gods, fairy tales look a little different, too, and I loved reading it.

But hands down, my favourite part is the relationships between the three Eastwood sisters. So much of this book is about sisterhood, and connections between women, and solidarity. They start having been estranged and come together as they start fighting for women’s rights. Harrow explores the ways they’ve hurt each other and the path to trust each other again beautifully, and their interactions are fantastic. (I happen to be one of three sisters myself: so much of this book felt familiar.)

And the sisters themselves are perfect: Agnes (the middle sister) especially stands out. She’s strong, and selfish, and a mother, the sort of character you never see being given a spotlight or complexity, and I adore her. 

Plot: surprisingly well-paced. There were three or four times in this book where I was like, ‘oh, this is the climax,’ only to find out we were barely halfway through. It packs a surprising amount of plot into its 500-page run, without ever wrecking the pacing by the turns of the story. 

Characters: I love these. This is a story with a massive side cast (of all backgrounds - Black and Native and immigrants, working class women, queer and trans women, a disabled main character in Juniper - it’s fantastic), and Harrow does a decent job fleshing them out. The Eastwood sisters shine, with their own personalities, character arcs, and time in the spotlight. My favourite is Agnes, especially in regards to her relationship with her daughter, but Bella and Juniper are great, as well. Bella has a great romance with Miss Cleopatra Quinn, a Black journalist I’m in love with, and Agnes’ own romance is pretty great as well. (Juniper doesn’t have one, which works excellently for her character - see what I mean about Harrow trying to represent as wide a range of women and roles as possible?)

Setting: good. Harrow does a great job tying her story in with the suffrage and labour movements that were picking up steam at around this time, as well as the wider world. I’d recommend checking out her Goodreads page, where she’s annotated this book with a bunch of stories about the figures in feminist history characters are named after. 

Prose: good. I liked the tone-shifts into fairy tale language for the stories embedded inside, as well as Harrow’s talent for bringing up metaphors and expressions to show character growth, such as Agnes’ circle.

Diversity report: well-written women, background diversity, a wlw romance.

[spinnerprincess]

so i’m catching up on doctor who, after ditching the show at the end of s7 because i just couldn’t stand moffat’s bullshit anymore

i return to it with no less patience for his bullshit, but caring less makes me less angry about it, which is nice

and so, here is my doctor who series 8 review. 

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

I like clara and I like capaldi’s doctor and I hate most of the writing

the last four episodes are marginally better and just barely managed to drag the rating up to 3/5 instead of 2/5

here are some episode reviews if you care or if you just like hearing me complain (it is mostly complaining so don’t bother reading if that’s going to bother you) (no seriously don’t)

they are minorly spoilery but mostly just vague

episode 1: deep breath 

rating: 💜💜🖤🖤🖤 

the restaurant scene was the best part and the only scene really worth a shoutout. well built up to, suspense was grand. everything else was bland or confusing.

capaldi’s a fun doctor. clara is a good companion. the veil scene with clara and vastra was okay. the boyfriend thing was a little tiring since that whole gimmick always seems to have been based off moffat’s perception of all women finding the doctor attractive on some level, but sure. 

jenny and vastra continue to be delightful half the time and treated as if power imbalance in a relationship is a mere quirk and not serious concern the other half of the time (bonus points for this treatment in a wlw relationship). strax’s quirks have long worn thin. 

i already hate how “crazy” missy is. took two seconds. nice. 

episode 2: into the dalek

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

very entertaining premise. execution was acceptable. the twist at the ending does a good job of setting up for the doctor’s personal struggle of the season. however, I find that personal struggle very boring. lots of creativity was put into the structure of the dalek, very fun. 

cold open was very confusing. 

also already getting the impression that this series is going to gloss over the very real problems veterans have. when will people learn you can want to improve life for veterans while condemning the battles that forged them. 

might recommend.

episode 3: robot of sherwood

rating: 💜💜🖤🖤🖤

clara looked fantastic in that dress. the doctor’s pissing contest with robin hood was hilarious. the arrow shooting at the end was adorable.

entertaining, boppy. no real negatives, but no real positives either. kind of a snoozefest.

episode 4: listen

rating: 💜🖤🖤🖤🖤

an episode that might otherwise have been a promising 2/5 or maybe even 3/5 receives 1/5 for the last few minutes alone. 

as usual, moffat likes to break rules like “we can’t go to gallifrey’s history anymore it’s timelocked” on a whim, and by on a whim, I mean, because if he goes to gallifrey’s distant past, he can make it so his characters are somehow the most important people of all time, because they teach the doctor important life-long lessons, isn’t clara amazing, wow, the companion who knows the doctor the most, the one who told him not to fear monsters under the bed. 

it’s the smuggest bullshit i’ve ever seen and i’m so fucking done with this man’s insistence on his characters being the most important to the doctor. he consistently shows no respect to the companions and people that have come before his and it’s infinitely frustrating.

also the entire premise was apparently “the doctor is afraid of the dark” which is just an exhausting reveal for all the drama it puts us through to get there. especially since all the elements of horror are 100% recycled moffat bullshit: corner of your eye (cracks in time), monster under the bed (girl in the fireplace), don’t look at it (blink in reverse), like... so, so painfully rehashed

the date with danny itself was kind of cute but clara’s interactions with orson and rupert pink were awkward at best.

skip it. save yourself

episode 5: time heist

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

honestly with personal bias this one should be a 4/5, but again, that’s personal bias. I mean, come on. space bank heist. what’s not to love. i’m a sucker for a good ocean’s eleven.

good scary moments, good puzzles, interesting characters, fun times.

the architect reveal was obvious but it was a funny reveal the way they did it so who cares. the reason for the heist was a little cliche too but still very good. nothing outstanding, but good job.

would recommend. 

episode 6: the caretaker

rating: 💜💜🖤🖤🖤

I liked courtney. good kid.

the doctor was very in character and vain with the whole adrian thing but there was imo a slightly racist undertone of him presuming clara’s boyfriend was adrian, who looks like matt smith, over danny, a black dude, that made the whole thing kind of uncomfortable. 

the fact that disdain for pe teachers is never questioned was annoying too. even if i personally think so, it’s really irritating to see math elevated as somehow better than pe, inherently.

i spent most of this episode mildly annoyed. i do like clara though.

episode 7: kill the moon

rating: 💜💜🖤🖤🖤

an otherwise enjoyable episode, this one is brought down by the fact that all the main players towards the end are women, and as usual with moffat’s era, the doctor never seems to respect or listen to them when it really counts. 

this used to be a show I loved because the doctor picked up ordinary women and showed them extraordinary things, and more importantly, showed them that they could be extraordinary too. now it’s a show about extraordinary women trying to live ordinary lives while a man shows them extraordinary things but insists on treating them like mundane, ordinary beings. 

I really hope chibnall doesn’t continue this trend.

i suspect we’re meant to empathize with clara at the end, but disagree with her, but like honestly, tell him the fuck off clara. I mean, he won’t learn from it, because moffat’s doctor never does, but tell him the fuck off anyway.

episode 8: mummy on the orient express

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

pretty good. brought down, as usual, by the doctor’s personal struggle of the season, but pretty good. 

great build-up, good suspense, fun mystery. good atmosphere. unsatisfying to have no answers about the perpetrator. zero memorable characters, which is the biggest reason it rang dull, imo. 

clara wears the flapper look extremely well. it’s pretty sad when clara’s outfit is a highlight of an episode, though.

might recommend.

episode 9: flatline

rating: 💜💜💜💜🖤

I enjoyed an episode of doctor who!!!!!! will wonders never cease!!

the only bad part of this episode was the last minute or two where they touched upon the doctor’s "am I a good man” pity festival and gave us another glimpse at missy. 

everything else: fantastic. moral struggles! intense and frightening scenes! fascinating new ideas! neat special effects! the most thrilling new doctor who enemy I’ve seen in ages! clara being absolutely outstanding - moreover, finding out that she is outstanding! fantastic solution at the end! memorable characters who I rooted for!

that was a thrill from start to finish and the first time all season I’ve really, actually, truly remembered why I used to love the show. 

would recommend for sure!!

episode 10: in the forest of the night

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

pretty touching, and actually hit most of the emotional beats it was aiming for! that surprised me.

loved the concept behind the trees. appreciated maebh’s story for the most part. cute to have the kids from the school interacting with the doctor.

still not sure what the point of danny is? I like him and he and clara have their sweet moments but it’s hard not to feel like every writer writes him differently, and like him saying “I don’t care what the truth is I just don’t want to be lied to” rings false because every time she has told him the truth it’s been a problem.

also: so exhausted by the idea that danny, as clara’s boyfriend, has any say over how clara’s allowed to spend her time, or who she chooses to spend it with. 

that’s not danny’s fault I don’t think he’s intended to be read as controlling I think the writers are misogynistic little shits.

episode 11: dark water

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

I went into this one preparing to loathe it and as it turns out I was mostly wrong!

this would have been 4/5, except that only since missy’s a girl they have the gall to make her relationship with the doctor tread on explicitly romantic territory? uh-huh. seriously that kiss scene was awful and moffat’s “surprise kisses where one participant is extremely uncomfortable” strikes again. 

let the doctor kiss men, you fucking cowards.

but... masterful plan, pardon the bad joke. saw the twist when they went into the elevator, of course, and internally screamed. can’t believe I recognized the stinger, but I did. very well done, very well set up, very emotional. 

seriously if it weren’t for the fact that missy and her “romance” and her “craziness” represents everything I fucking despise about doctor who’s recent treatment of women, I’d say this was a damn good episode. what a shame.

episode 12: death in heaven 

rating: 💜💜💜🖤🖤

it was good but a large part of the reason I feel so good after watching it is just the fact that I probably won’t have to deal with so much irritating “blah blah soldiers suck” drivel and the whole “am I a good man?” pity fest from the doctor if I watch s9.

another large good part is the shoutout at the end to lethbridge-stewart, that was sorely needed tbh. about time. 

missy was well acted, but I’m still so fed up with the boring het treatment of it all. hey quick questions: why would time lords give a fuck about gender roles or gender orientation as more than weird, antiquated quirks? for that matter why do they even acknowledge the existence of a gender binary half the time? i’ll never know.

good choices include the plot and its resolution. laughing forever at doctor who’s insistence on upgrading their villains to make them somehow scarier all the time, but at least they had a plot reason for it too. also, clara’s bit about feeling special. that’s something I’ve thought was missing from doctor who for a long time, and to see it in a form I can almost believe was a breath of fresh air.

boring choices include setting up as if this episode is going to be all about clara being a total badass, only for it to last all of three seconds. which isn’t to say that clara wasn’t or isn’t a badass so much as, “boy do I love watching an episode where she spends nearly all of it upset and having no lines though.” hint: I do not.

mediocre choices include the characters chosen to be killed off. not like I expected better, of course. please, if you’re listening, let bill come out of her adventures with the doctor alright. people who don’t fit in moffat’s box of tricks so rarely do. 

i’ll watch the christmas special some other time. i sense another bad one coming on. 

s8 sucked but I liked some parts of it! wonder how s9 is.

[dykerightsmp3]

i recently really got into fantasy but it seems that every book is about a cishet white guy being super special?? do you have any recs of books that aren't like that?

So many!!

The Graceling Series by Kristin Cashore: Three different girl leads embark on different journeys in a fantasy world. REALLY feminist, with plotlines about consent and unfair power dynamics. Character development and romance writing of my dreams. Two of the leads and all three romantic interests are stated to be poc and one mc is bi and one of the love interests is bi too! And so many poc+lgbt side characters! 

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo: Fantasy mission impossible. Two bi characters (one of color!!), a really awesome woc. The biggest badass is physically disabled, and one of the smartest characters has dyslexia. This series is written so well!! There’s so much moral ambiguity, there’s some really well-written romance, I personally would die for every single character. 

The Scorpion Rules Duology by Erin Bow: The children of world leaders are imprisoned in preceptures to stop their parents from starting wars. Two bi girl mcs, one of whom is also asian. Well developed villain, the Best protagonist, gorgeous writing. It’s possibly the most sensical dystopia I’ve ever read and it subverts literally every trope ever. It’s a little hard to get through, but it’s so worth it in every way.  

The Young Elites Series by Marie Lu: This series is a villainess’ origin story where no character is entirely good or entirely bad. At least 90% characters of color and at least 70% lgbt characters. It’s entertaining and full of moral ambiguity, with central sibling relationships and a cast of interesting characters. 

Otherbound by Corrine Duyvis: Sense8 if every sensate lived in an entirely different world. Disabled mc and both main characters are nonwhite and one is a bi girl and she falls in love with a princess. It’s written very nicely and the author does character work so well. 

A Thousand Nights by E.K. Johnston: Retelling of Arabian nights. The strength of the main character in this is amazing, it’s absolutely a feminist retelling, there’s barely any romance, and it’s written… beautifully. I worship E.K. Johnston honestly

The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black: A brother and sister fight monsters together in a town inhabited by fae. Subversion of typical fantasy, very atmospheric, the romances are just so!!!, the sister is the warrior, the brother is gay and his romance plot is absolutely the best subversion of expectations and I just love this book so much

The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer: Four different girls take over the world and their stories are woven in with traditional fairytales. This series is… very straight. But it has good strong girl protagonists and lots of nonwhite characters!

And I Darken Series by Kiersten White: Genderswapped retelling of the childhood of Vlad the Impaler, which also tells the story of her brother Radu. They both grew up in the Ottoman Empire and had close relationships with the sultan (in the book, it’s played that they each had crushes on him). I love this book’s respectful portrayal of Islam and also the creativity and character work and the sequel is even BETTER than the first book. 

The Abyss Surrounds Us series by Emily Skrutskie: pirate x sea monster trainer in the future!! The wlw enemies to lovers we all needed!! Sequel coming soon, and I have faith that it will end happily. The author draws fanart of Swift and Cas kissing and posts it to her tumblr (again, not kidding, there’s some on my blog). Asian MC. otp: equal footing

Kissing The Witch by Emma Donoghue: Sometimes-gay versions of fairytales, really really interesting. Gorgeous writing and very fairy-tale esque!