#but seriously its SO refreshing to see a lesbian couple get a happy ending

[qqueenofhades]

did you watch lucifer season six and what are your thoughts pls and ty

Ahaha. Yes. Yes I did watch it. Then I cried for a literal hour and attempted to compose myself, only to start crying again when I lay down and kept on thinking about it. Then I had more feelings. Then I slept like the dead due to emotional trauma. Then I reblogged gifsets and had More feelings. Then @buffaluff and @flynnanimal watched it and also required emotional support due to drowning in their own tears. So, uh... we're all fine here now. How are you?

My main takeaway from the final season was the sheer amount of love for the characters, story, and fans that you could feel shining through all the episodes, and which made SUCH a refreshing change. I had feelings in my tags the other day about how a show about the devil was constantly goofy, hopeful, loving, and uplifting, rather than all the grimdark nonsense they could have easily done with it. (As I said, just imagine it as written by the GOT idiots?? NO THANK YOU.) The writing really loved everyone and wanted to give them a proper ending and emotional journey, and it wanted to show the fans that they weren't stupid for having invested six seasons of effort and emotion into this, and just... that is so much rarer than it should be? Compare all the movies and TV shows that treat their fans like the enemy, that want to outsmart them at all costs even if it means changing major plot elements, that ferociously guard spoilers and think that "shock value" means good writing, by throwing hackneyed cliche upon cliche and making everything Depressing, and just... Lucifer had its hiccups and slow points and missteps, of course, but I am SO glad they didn't do that. The entire show consisted of Lucifer slowly but steadily progressing toward being a better man, despite mistakes and setbacks and sometimes a little too much will-they-won't-they. (Season 3 was the only one where I got bored and skipped over the filler episodes with Pierce/Lucifer/Chloe in order to get to the end).

That is an essentially simple premise, but they stuck to it, and they didn't try to create more drama by randomly wrecking what they had already established. I wrote a fic all the way back in mid-season 2 (In Nomine Patris) that ended up predicting quite a few of the future characters who had not yet appeared on the show at that time, including Eve, Michael, and Azrael, and several plot points, including the very major one of Lucifer returning to hell for the sake of his daughter with Chloe. And while this might mean that I am just that good at guessing TV shows (I would like to think this....) it also means that the writers set expectations, followed through on those expectations, and didn't suddenly derail everything or turn it totally on its head just for the sake of cheap shocks. As we can all attest, they certainly caused PLENTY of drama, anguish, pain, and suffering, but they did it in a way that remained faithful to the overall premises of the story and the characters, and wanted to see them become the best versions of themselves. I cried my eyes out at the end and then thought, "hey, I might want to watch the whole series again," which, if you ask me, is the mark of doing your job right. There have been so few TV endings recently where I didn't immediately swear off the whole thing or have to pretend that canon didn't exist, so yeah.

As I said, it was just refreshing to watch something that had that essential deep generosity at its core, where the message is that everyone is worthy of love if they make the hard and painful effort to change and become better, and that even if earthly things feel small next to all this messy celestial drama, they still matter, and that you are loved no matter what. I loved that Amenadiel became God and Lucifer returned to hell as a choice in order to help all the trapped souls be able to work through their guilt and go to heaven. There were obviously certain echoes of The Good Place in that ending; I don't know if it was something they had planned all along or if the success of TGP, another series asking deep questions about life, death, morality, and human nature within the framework of a goofy heaven-and-hell sitcom, influenced it, but either way, it worked so well. Even if it tore my heart out and stomped on it on the ground, it was fitting and oh so lovely to see Lucifer, once the most selfish being in the entire universe, following in Linda's footsteps and becoming selflessly dedicated to helping other people. Just. Chef's kiss.

And of course, Deckerstar. The Hades and Persephone vibes were IMMACULATE this season, and while it did take Lucifer and Chloe the best part of four seasons to get together, they never significantly backslid, never had third-party issues or cheap cheating storylines once they were officially a couple, and Tom Ellis and Lauren German REALLY killed it this season in particular. It was never easy for them and sometimes the drama went on a little too long over the course of said six seasons, but the love story was beautiful and incredibly meaningful and always true to the fact that the actors and characters and writers (not to mention the fans) all loved it so much. They were so much the emotional heart of this, and when they went to hell together in episode 6x03 (where they turned into cartoons because wHAT even IS this show), Joe Henderson said in an interview that this was to give the fans a view into Lucifer and Chloe's future (after) lives post-6x10, and to offer them a basis to write fanfiction. I mean... the showrunner saying to the fans "here, we love you, have something to write fic about!" is likewise pretty shockingly rare. It's again an example of how this show always audaciously poked fun at itself, never took itself TOO seriously, and was always welcoming its fans and the people who loved it to do so, rather than making them feel stupid or taking joy in wrecking beloved characters or plots.

Obviously, I loved Rory, the badass lesbian half-angel goth Deckerstar child straight out of My Immortal (seriously, she was SO edgy, it was amazing), because of the fact that Lucifer's entire arc was always about feeling abandoned by his father and that he was going to have to face it for himself. Dorky Devil Dad Lucifer trying his absolute HARDEST to bond with his daughter was simultaneously hilarious, adorable, and heart-wrenching, and yet again, the Growth. We all remember when he could barely tolerate Trixie touching him, and now we're here. Also, any variation whatsoever of "this is just a brief moment of time that we must be apart, love is eternal and stronger than death and we will never really leave each other" as a line is guaranteed to make me bawl my eyes out. So that was fun.

I got a big kick out of Ghost Dan running around and trying to get everyone to see him, and had feelings about seeing him in heaven with Charlotte and his beloved Pudding Pops at the end. I had feelings about how they handled Ella finding out the truth (or rather demanding to know why nobody had told her) and of course, I obviously loved Maze and Eve and their goth/femme wedding and the fact that they got a good three-season romantic arc (indeed, I wanted more of them). My god, Trixie is SO BIG, she used to be a tiny little nugget. I love that Linda was the moral and emotional rock all along, from the first episode to the very last, and that Amenadiel was Deeply Vindicated when Charlie's wings appeared at his first birthday party. I love how Lucifer in s6 is absolute thousands of light years from Lucifer in s1. And as ever, Chloe was Perfect. I am happy that I spent six seasons with these characters and saw them become better, and that I was never made to feel like an idiot for trusting the writers to end everything in a beautiful and emotional way. Because, well. They did. Sure, maybe I could go back and pick at a plotline here or a detail there, but I don't terribly feel the need to do so? It might not have been perfect, but it was perfect, and I am so grateful that it existed.

[genderless-consul]

Top 5 glee ships?

Straight to the live wire, huh?

Ok, so: 

1): Brittana - The fact that I really struggle to write them doesn’t change the fact that this is the one they got right, and I can still barely believe it to this day. The original joke in Season 1 was so obviously a throwaway lazy gag from a writing staff that consistently wrote women with absolute contempt, but Naya pushing them to take it seriously changed the course of the entire show. Their arc in Season Two is Glee at its absolute best (they even made Gwyneth Paltrow tolerable!), they have some really beautiful moments in Season 3 even if that whole season and Santana’s coming out arc in particular is kind of a disaster, and as much as we love to make fun of Santana’s gay panic in Season 4 (don’t act like it’s not highly relatable) even their break-up is legitimately beautiful - Naya turning Mine into a breakup song with nothing but her voice is the moment that cemented her as the GOAT Glee vocalist in my book (also Hand in My Pocket/I Feel the Earth Move is my second ranked mash-up of all time and I’m so angry the awful Santana/Kurt scene right after overshadowed it). And I have....complicated feelings about A Wedding as an episode (and we’ll get to that) but their part of it is absolutely everything it needed to be. “I would have suffered it all, just for the tiny chance to be standing up here marrying you.”

2): Faberry - No surprises here, except maybe that it’s not number one (canonicity was the tiebreaker, sadly). My favorite thing about Faberry is that there’s a million ways to ship them and all of them are great - obviously I’m more than onboard for an alt-version of Glee where theirs is the slow burn unlikely love story, but I also really love the tragedy you can read into them just from the canon, especially spinning out from the Quinntana one-night stand: that Quinn probably does have feelings for Rachel but either realizes it too late or just buries it out of self-loathing, and by the time she’s comfortable with herself the chance for storybook romance has already passed her by. Like seriously - if they had made that characterization explicit instead of retreating to the laziness of the Biff/Quick disasters in the anniversary episodes, I would have been just as happy with that as a Faberry endgame, both because the latter was always probably impossible given the centrality of Finchel to the show’s core structure and because Sad Flameout Lesbians deserve representation too, goddammit! And of course they’re a gold mine for fanworks, because there are so many “could have been” moments where their story has the chance the take a different direction, the best being their confrontation in Original Song: “you can’t hate me for helping to send you on your way” is the best use of Glee’s existential sadness since the Pilot. Oh, and their one and only duet is a fucking Red/Blue sequence and also one of the best songs on the entire show - enough said.

3): Finchel - My ultimate hot take, at least as someone from the Faberry side of the fandom, is that Finchel is Good, Actually. Keep in mind, I never watched Glee as it was airing, so I never experienced the frustration of Finchel’s inevitability; I knew from the very beginning that they weren’t going to get their happy ending. And as irritating as some of the on-again/off-again drama could be and as choppy as the pacing was at times, it really was one of the few relationships on Glee to be developed with consistent care and effort. I love that they have a genuine friendship and push each other to be the best versions of themselves (however inelegantly) even when they aren’t together, and the dynamic where the guy is the willing sidekick to the female protagonist and knows what they have might only be temporary was really refreshing to see, especially in a high school show. I’ll always be heartbroken that they couldn’t end it the way they were supposed to even if I wouldn’t have liked it, and they’re the reason the final scene of Season 3 makes me sob every time. 

4): Tike - The ultimate “THEY DESERVED BETTER” ship. And yes, I know it’s off-brand for me to put two m/f ships on the list, and yes, I know RBI basically had to make Tartie endgame as a courtesy to Kevin and Jenna for sticking it out until the absolute bitter end, but I’m still mad. Tina was always used as a joke, and Mike was never used at all, but when they were together they got the briefest taste of actual storylines, and they were so. goddamn. cute together. Sing! and L O V E aren’t the first Glee duets that most people think of, but they captured the magic of just being straight up in love with someone better than a lot of the more over-the-top numbers from other characters. And look, I don’t actually need my ships to stay together forever on a high school show (or any show), but given that they had the longest run as a continuous couple on the entire show I will never forgive RBI for using them as the one “no”in A Wedding in a disingenuous attempt to pretend they were at all interested in realism and weren’t just throwing bones to the fanbase. Like, I don’t know how to explain this to you, Ryan Murphy, but it’s not subverting expectations to kick the shit out of Tina one more time because THAT’S LITERALLY ALL YOU’VE EVER DONE WITH HER (Sorry, what was I talking about?)

5): Klaine - my ultimate love/hate ship, and the ultimate victim of Glee being consumed by its own hype machine. The initial arc - the staircase, Teenage Dream, Blackbird - was magical even at its corniest, and beats like the GAP Attack and Blame it on the Alcohol were desperately necessary moments of complication that kept Blaine’s character more interesting than “Kurt’s perfect boyfriend” (also, real quick, fuck Ryan Murphy’s biphobia). But the second Blaine transferred in Season 3 it became clear that they didn’t really have a plan for Klaine in the same way they did for Finchel - Blaine gets a different personality every single season, Kurt gets to a completely different place in his life that makes his inability to move on from Blaine really hard to buy, and Blaine as the New Rachel in 4/5 is every bit as insufferable as that conceit implies.  Even with all that, though, they kept winning me back, because Darren can sell the hell out of over the top cheese and Chris Colfer is the world’s greatest exasperated Straight Man (thinking especially of Teenage Dream Reprise and that absolutely batshit Beatles proposal, both of which worked for me way more than they should have).  I also weirdly like the messiness of late Season 5 Klaine - the episodes aren’t good, but I appreciate their willingness to confront how much of a terrible idea them living together at that stage of their life actually is, and they even managed to win me over to the idea that they would find a way to make it work anyway. But the Karofsky thing in Season 6 was just one reversal too far, and to get them back together again after that in the most contemptuous, smug, “nothing matters so just give the shippers what they want I guess” insincere way possible (I really hate The Hurt Locker, can you tell?) was the last straw for me, to say nothing of how disrespectful it was to Brittana and Klaine to have one couple’s  wedding coopted at the last moment by another so that it was no longer about them as characters but about how much Ryan Murphy has done for The Gays. So yeah, Klaine: My favorite canon ship that I wish didn’t actually end up together, at least not the way they did. But they were at their best when Glee was actually relevant and changed a lot of lives as a result, and that timing alone earns them a Top 5 spot.