#but tbh find me a primetime long form tv showrunner whose interviews AREN'T. they're meant to drum up clout and drama

[harrowharkwife]

hm, interesting that the writers chose this episode, titled starting over, to literally write a character (toni) saying pretty much verbatim, "i'm sorry for not being supportive of this wonderful gay couple and their strong and healthy love from the get-go even though everyone else saw the beauty in them, i had reasons and excuses but the truth is that i was just wrong, and to atone for that i am going to pour love, time, energy, and resources into specifically celebrating this couple and the strength of their love... and it is going to be a SURPRISE." even to them.

interesting, isn't it?

(not to make everything about buddie- the vow renewal was about hen and karen and the family they've built, point blank, period. but in an episode written and directed by the showrunner and filled with other meta, tongue-in-cheek nods and moments (''that's how you looked when you got DOSED,'' ''the new dispatch center will be ready MID-SEPTEMBER,'' the amnesia couple's story mirroring madney's beginnings, multiple outfit repeats with symbolic significance in a show that typically never repeats outfits, ''you're the guy who likes to fix things,'' ''this is like our first fight all over again,'' eddieana bucktaylor breakup parallels that are quite literally intentional and on purpose considering KR wrote both 5.03 and 5.18, i could go on)... i feel like pointing out these kinds of meta narrative echoes is absolutely fair game.)

the beauty of long-form television is that i needed a lot of words to get this point across. KR, on the other hand, only needed thirteen of them:

I'm gonna tell you a story.

What kind of story?

A love story.

sounds like a promise to me.