#but there's a fine line between finding a fictional character interesting/fascinating

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

I'm... kind of confused about this? Like Ignatz is basically saying the only way for people to move forward is by continuing to fight and destroy? That's a pretty awful message in general, but coming from Ignatz it just feels weird. It sounds like he's just accepted war and that it's just... something that happens so we should shrug it off and move on?

I know this game tends to have very strong pro-war/pro-invasion messages which is already really gross to me, but it went from being annoying and icky to just making me feel disgusted. Also, Ignatz of all people shouldn't just shrug his shoulders and be like well that's just the way of things, I guess! There's an active war going on so it makes sense that towns could be rebuilt and destroyed again. It doesn't mean just give up on it.

Also really doesn't feel like an Ignatz thing to say.

[thrandilf]

viren is my fav BECAUSE of the terrible horrible bad decisions he makes like sometimes when everyone is telling you to calm the fuck down it might be a good ideia to stop and listen idk

love to see your posts on my dash, reminds me that I'm not crazy cause like, there's people out there genuinely saying Viren Never Did Anything Wrong??? and missing like the glorious irony that is how in his effort to help humanity he killed and/or maimed its leaders, led 4 of 5 of their armies into Xadia WITHOUT A PLAN and then let the shady motherfucker he met 3 days ago turn all soldiers into brainless lava monsters like my man, my good sir, you wanted to help so bad, but the damage you caused was probably the worst thing that happened to humankind since what, the mage wars?

everyday eating sand over the fact you could make the tag Viren Tries His Best (it's really the worst for everyone involved) and it's the most canon thing one could say about him :)

Hi anon! Yeah I feel like. I keep seeing rly Extreme views of Viren when even though he is a villain, there's nuance there and a lot of people find him sympathetic, yet he is still a Villain. He planned a coup and tried to get the rightful heirs to the throne killed aka his best friend's children. I sfysuegfkwgfkugwefy

He's a great example of everyone thinking they're the hero of their own story. I think the novels especially let people see/confirm what's going on inside his mind. I don't agree with him on many things, but I understand how he got where he did and that's what makes him compelling to me. The way someone both so driven by a personal sense of justice and who has a calculating nature can still make so many mistakes is really interesting.

When Zubeia talks about Aaravos preying on human mages, "...people who had strong minds, and strong hearts, but who had an insatiable thirst, and fascination with magic" the camera panned to Callum but that was also word for word about Viren. Callum and Viren are so similar and the lines drawn between the positions they have had as high mage and as brother either literally or "like" a brother to their king is setting them up to have an even more prominent foil as the show goes on.

So I often find myself torn between the "Viren is an unsympathetic demon who also hates his family" crowd vs the "Viren should have been the show's protag and he's a better man than Harrow and the show has just done him Dirty by portraying his actions as wrong" crowd because I don't think either is correct LMAO.

Viren gets a full heroic cycle and he is a compelling character but like sergbeylgrfyeh it's fine to not have binary opinions, it's what the show is going for, I believe, to have things be complicated/hard to swallow given all of the trolley problems TDP poses, and it's not smth I see a lot of good faith engagement abt in general.

Like I think it's fine to not like Viren, but ppl don't have to throw canon out the window/make him worse to justify it. Feelings about fictional characters don't have to be justified or morally "correct" and idk, it's probably not specifically tdp as much as that is a Fandom struggle at large

[mediaevalmusereads]

Lincoln in the Bardo. By George Saunders. Random House, 2017.

Rating: 4/5 stars

Genre: literary fiction

Series: N/A

Summary: February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. "My poor boy, he was too good for this earth," the president says at the time. "God has called him home." Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returned to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy's body.

From that seed of historical truth, George Saunders spins an unforgettable story of familial love and loss that breaks free of its realistic, historical framework into a thrilling, supernatural realm both hilarious and terrifying. Willie Lincoln finds himself in a strange purgatory, where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel, and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state—called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo—a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie's soul.

Lincoln in the Bardo is an astonishing feat of imagination and a bold step forward from one of the most important and influential writers of his generation. Formally daring, generous in spirit, deeply concerned with matters of the heart, it is a testament to fiction's ability to speak honestly and powerfully to the things that really matter to us. Saunders has invented a thrilling new form that deploys a kaleidoscopic, theatrical panorama of voices—living and dead, historical and invented—to ask a timeless, profound question: How do we live and love when we know that everything we love must end?

***Full review below.***

CONTENT WARNINGS: self-harm (cutting)/suicide, child death, rape, slavery, use of the n-word, allusion to pedophilia

OVERVIEW: Friends and family have been telling me to read this book for ages. FINE. Now I've read it. And you know what? You were right - this book is interesting. It's not historical fiction in the strictest sense - it doesn't seek to narrate a moment in time the way one might expect. But as a work of literary fiction, I find it's construction deeply fascinating, so for that reason, this book gets 4 stars.

WRITING: This book is told using a "multi-vocalic" technique; some chapters are comprised entirely of excerpts from scholarship or first-hand accounts of Lincoln's presidency (some real, some fictional), while other chapters are narrated by different souls in the afterlife, each narrating for a word, sentence, or paragraph at time.

I very much enjoyed this technique as it made me think a lot about perspective and how characters related to one another. Sometimes, characters would narrate the speech or thoughts of another (especially in the afterlife), so there was a very thin line between where one soul ended and another began (at least, textually speaking). I also liked that the more straight-forward parts told through scholarship/eyewitness accounts conflicted with one another, producing an image of the Lincolns that was both imprecise yet shockingly real and human.

The downside to this narrative style is that sometimes it can feel like form overshadows function, and there were definitely moments when I felt that. But since this book moves so quickly, there isn't really a lot of time for things to drag, so if you find yourself lost, you'll probably find your way again quite easily.

PLOT: The plot of this book follows a number of souls in the "bardo" (the intermediate state between heaven and earth where souls go after death) as they try to get Willie Lincoln - son of President Abraham Lincoln - to move on.

The parts of this plot I liked the best were when characters would reflect on things like grief, connection, unity, and empathy. Souls had to work together at various points in time, and it's very clear that in the bardo, there is very little to motivate such cooperation. Willie's presence and President Lincoln's grief, however, seems to move a lot of them, and I liked seeing them come together to help a boy let go and move on.

That being said, I don't quite think this book hit as hard emotionally as I would have liked. I can't put my finger on why, but when I was finished, I was grateful for the experience, but not left feeling gut-punched. This is hardly Saunders' fault since books affect every reader differently, but I do think more could have been done to drive home the book's main themes, especially in the last pages when Lincoln himself reflects on death on the battlefield or when Willie decides to move on.

CHARACTERS: Rather than speak of individual characters, I'm going to speak more about how Saunders crafts them.

The souls in the bardo are fascinating to read because none of them realize they are dead and all are defined by something that they hold onto from the world of the living. Roger Bevins III, for example, is a gay man who killed himself but regretted it last minute, so his soul appears as a monstrosity with multiple eyes, noses, and hands, representing his attachment to the sensory pleasures of life. His companion, Hans Vollman, has an enormous erection because he died just before he was about to have sex with his wife for the first time.

The primary way these souls "develop" is to not only accept their deaths, but to show care and empathy to each other. While all of them have easy companionships with other souls in the bardo, it is only when they band together to try to help Willie that they truly come to know each other and try to help one another. It was deeply moving, and I loved the changes in Vollman and Bevins by the end.

TL;DR: Lincoln in the Bardo is a multi-vocalic novel that centers grief and empathy over recounting a historical moment in time. While I wish some aspects of the book had been pushed to create a heavier emotional impact, the style of narration is endlessly fascinating and humanizes one of America's most iconic leaders.

[demonmoonsupreme]

I’ve only seen 5 eps so far, but let’s just say that in those 5 eps…the line between good and bad, or Heavenly and Evil is so unclear and watered down. Idk, maybe the writer didn’t intend for it to be a deep dive into what makes actions one or the other; I’m not familiar with their previous work, so idk what their schtick is.

Charlie comes off as strangely kink-shamey, “ew porn��, oh bdsm! *charlie begins to chuckle off screen in discomfort*, not being saccharine and nice all the time is mean ;( , murder? cannibalism? that’s so weird why would someone do that haha! don’t do drugs kids ‘cause that won’t get you into heaven. Like….she’s the princess of Hell, yet she has all the charisma and compassion for the sinners in her realm as a Jesuit. (i have reason to hope that she does have a bit more of a devilish awakening) but, unfortunately for the first 5 eps I felt like she was a preachy white heterosexual teenaged christian girl who was afraid To Offend; telling anyone around her that they have the ability to become a good person *uwu* if they just learn how to say sorry, be vulnerable, and trust someone else.

I like how the little group at Hazbin is bonding and what not…but there’s nothing in the world building to imply that social groups and communal bonds weren’t already being formed outside of the hotel? Are we just saying that only the bonds formed inside of Hazbin are good and worthy?

Are we ever going to find what actually landed them in hell; like what exactly do they have to atone for before they can see the, um, pearly gates? Being a sex worker, enjoying sex, swearing, having drug or alcohol dependencies, being manipulative, etc. are not evil (though they are traditionally Hell-worthy! That is until you hear angel!Adam speak), like it doesn’t answer the question of what they did to really end up in hell. And so far the only character flaws that have been heavily focused on are or attacked are these ones that are just self destructive but not evil.

I just feel likes there’s an underlying fear to make a main character legitimately evil with no interest in salvation, to make a character so morally grey that it makes the viewer question their own morals. The fear of offending or pushing away an audience, it’s not enough to satiate those who love a villain or the chaos inhibition of hell (because for some of us, those characters are enjoyable because they’re fictional and can do things we find fascinating but could never actually do ourselves because of Morals), and not enough to completely turn off the more timid viewer, or those who need to be told how to feel about characters.

And, (i think) unfortunately, the first few episodes were full of sex jokes and profanity but were too afraid to really own them and use them positively. Like yeah! We’re gonna make tons of sex jokes and throw in vocab like ‘twink’ (and use it derisively) and ‘power bottom’ but then get weirdly preachy about sex when it’s convenient for the princess of hell.

But what do I know. I’m just your average little queer that’s sex positive, writing their own play about hell, loves villainy and hell in general, is into/supports the leather and bdsm communities, etc. What I do know is that everyone I know that loves “everything about this show!” is much more conservative about this stuff than I. And that’s fine, but I think that’s why it’s not much more than novel and cute for me. 🤷🏻‍♀️ I literally don’t even remember my original point anymore, but yeah…I just wanted to say that.

Hazbin Hotel criticism has been done so much by so many people about very real and serious things but I’m throwing my hat in the ring because this is something most people don’t talk about often.

Hazbin is boring and it misuses it’s setting and biblical characters/inspirations. Or rather it doesn’t use them in a way that’s actually interesting.

For a show about heaven and hell and blatant Christian setting it sure does seem to only take the aesthetics. And not even the visual aesthetics. It’s not even clear on which branch of Christianity it’s drawing from.

This is going to be done with a casual tone and it’s not very well structured because I am not being paid to write about my grievances.

Adam’s motivation as a villain is so shallow and flat. You’re telling me he’s doing this for funsies? For a laugh? Adam was made in God’s image. What does this say about the guy. For a show whose themes is about going “not everything is black and white!” It sure does make him (even visually) black and white. Which is just sooooooo. Boring. Here’s an actually interesting idea that also makes Lucifer more interesting. Adam was cast out of Eden, which was paradise on earth, all because of how Satan (aka Lucifer) tempted Eve (and thus Adam) into sin. So why not make Adam’s enthusiasm for rampaging through hell so that he’s wrecking a Lucifer’s hellish paradise in revenge? If Adam had to suffer then so too should Lucifer. It’s *Lucifer’s* fault after all.

Lets not even get into how Lucifer and Satan are technically two different people. It’s a common thing. But still if you went with Lucifer’s actual story where he’s being so jealous about humanity that he went out of his way to RUIN it all for them. it gives him more depth then him being Depressed. And loves his daughter.

It opens so much more that you can do with *both* characters. It also makes Charlie’s motivation to redeem sinners carry a more personal weight than just. Doing it because it’s right. Her dad was the catalyst! She’s taking on the sins of her father! Make her LEARN that as his child, she does not need to feel responsible for what he’s done. (And, hey, maybe have Vaggie be the one to teach her that! You know, the Angel? The one who would best be able to teach how to change from sin? And not just be “haha fuddy duddy no fun allowed” character.)

Saint Peter is in the show. Saint Peter is there. I am not going to get into Saint Peter because the implications and questions it poses is going to make me insane. And he’s probably only there because of how ingrained it is that *he’s* the one who greets you at those pearly gates. He’s pop culture Saint Peter and not the actual Saint Peter.

Now you might be wondering “what about Lilith she’s clearly going to be the antagonist in the second season.” Yeah she can still have that. We have no real basis on how much she’s done or doing. The only real motivation we have is that she wants to stay in heaven.

(My theory (aka what I think would make Lilith interesting) is that Lilith originally planned to try and outnumber and out power hell so then she could try and take paradise for herself. But obviously the yearly exterminations put a damper on the plan. I bet she was *happy* to be with Lucifer. I bet she loved her family. But she’s in hell. She’s in hell and the queen and her subjects do not respect her (if they do not respect charlie or lucifer, then they will not respect her) and when you have known what paradise on earth is, well you’d want it back. Originally you might’ve planned to take your entire family with you. But you just can’t manage it. Your husband is wallowing and tells stories but he takes no action. You start to resent him. Your daughter has heard his stories and has taken on his naïve hopefulness and maybe that’s what you loved about your husband when you fell into sin with him, but now it just reminds you of what you had and what you cannot reclaim and she looks *so much like her father* you start to resent her too. It’s Lucifer’s fault that you’re here. It’s Charlie’s fault that you stay. And then something changes. You strike a deal. You get to stay in heaven. The paradise you want.)

In a good world this is what Lilith’s motivations are. Which is a lot of words for saying Charlie should have this final “the child shall not bare the sins of the father.” Moment during her confrontation with Lilith. (This would have been something that was slowly built up during the show.)

Charlie shouldn’t be trying to redeem sinners in an attempt to apologize for her father’s actions. She should be doing it because it’s the right thing to do. (You know, for a main character, she sure does remain rather stagnant.)

What else did I want to point out the flaws for.

Ah right ass backwards way that Sinners apparently get redeemed. You are making a show about Catholicism you better get the absolute basics of it down. (We don’t know the breed unfortunately.)

Yeah so like. It should be remorse. You should be seeking out forgiveness for your sins. Not doing one selfless act and then getting killed immediately. And you can have! A very very interesting way of discovering this! You can have Charlie thinking that sinners need to become Good. (And you know, What Is Good.) She could confuse Goodness with Niceness. She could think that so long as they just Stop Being Bad, they get into heaven.

You can have Charlie lean into the whole Fire and Brimstone levels of Being Good. And then have to unlearn that! Angeldust (just using him as the example) Isn’t a sinner because he does sex work and drugs. He is a sinner because of whatever he did to get into hell. He needs to feel remorse for his *actual* sins, and seek out forgiveness before he gets redeemed. (from heaven, ig. Who the fuck is god anyways is god going to be a twink. is there a god? if not then wHY IS SAINT PETER-)

(TAKE NOTES. This is a great way to explore a character’s backstory beyond what’s told via Word of God (a la vizzie) and squinting at the aesthetics and motifs of a character and guessing what they did.)

Being redeemed through remorse can also carry a conflict! Let’s take one of the most morally reprehensible characters on the show. Valentino. Let’s say he has a sudden change of heart. Not a halfassed one. (It has to be REAL to make it an actual conflict). He realizes that what he’s done is vile, evil and reprehensible. He seeks out forgiveness. It is granted.

Because the only forgiveness you need (for Christians) is the forgiveness from god. (or heaven?? Ig?????)

Is there no sin that is beyond forgiveness? Is there no one beyond redemption? Is that whole all encompassing love from god schtick actually real, not clickbait?

I don’t know. Hazbin Hotel doesn’t want to get that deep into it. Because they just want to do a Heaven Bad????? Hell Good???? Or maybe???? Both are Bad and Good??????????? Story.

There is a lot more that I can nitpick and offer criticism to, or simply go “hey wouldn’t this be better?” To with this series. Because I think the concept can work really, *really* well. But it falls so flat on its face that it’s become concave.

[lacewing-if]

DEMO: TBD

Strange Case at Harbord is an urban fantasy interactive fiction, where you delve deeper into your family’s long-hidden legacy, as well as the paranormal world they have long been familiar with.

They say when you came into the world, mountains quaked, earth trembled. The sky shook itself with a never seen before force… for the most normal baby in the family to be born.

You’ve been kept in the dark for your whole life. Your relatives are abominations of half human half animal, and they are adamant to keep this secret from the outside. You were considered one of those outsiders, until one day, a pair of wings shoots out of your back. Suddenly, you’re tied to numerous responsibilities as a member of your bizarre family.

Now returning to your hometown, you have to deal with the residue from this new, supernatural revelation, all while trying to hide your giant wings. Will you abide to your paranoiac family’s rules, or become their source of headache like your mother? Or perhaps do you want to find out the mystery behind your relatives’ origin?

Whatever you do, though, be careful, because public uproar is the least of your family’s concern if words get out. There are people who hunt them (and you) in the purest of sense.

Customize your own MC, from gender to personality to responses.

Be part of a narrative where your choices can take an unexpected turn.

Build relationships with a variety of characters, platonic or otherwise. Five romance options with tropes including friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, slow burn, interspecies romance, and forbidden love.

Learn how to control your wings, or just screw it and walk like a normal person.

Get into heaps of supernatural shenanigans, intentional or not, giving your best friend an aneurysm.

Show your adversary you’re not as bad as they think, or give them exactly what they presume you would be.

Maybe join a cult?

Robin | The best friend

She/her, he/him, or they/them

Being your roommate, they had the misfortune of catching you with your wings, and now have to accompany you and your parents back to your hometown. They’re calm, cool, rational, with a fine reputation. Your town mates has always thought of them as a nice and friendly person, but only you know them for the little prick they are…

You guys have been doing questionable things that toe the line of friendship, but will you be the one to take that final step?

Nelly | A curious one

She/her

An unfamiliar face in town, who seems to appear out of nowhere. She’s sweet and enthusiastic, and has a special fascination regarding supernatural subjects. She also knows everything about anything. You wonder if she perhaps knows about your family as well.

She appears to have taken an interest in you, but will you be able to bring that interest into something further?

Loki | That damned spirit

He/him

Literally the embodiment of the hill your elders reside in, might as well say he’s your family’s landlord. It’s quite surprising that he’s not a popular figure amongst your family, despite his laidback and cheerful attitude. Not so surprising when you learn about his hobby to push people’s button.

He especially likes teasing you. Could this be a form of special treatment?

Keith | New guy

He/him

A friendly and refreshing face. Would be great if he wasn’t part of the faction that wants you and your family dead. Due to unforeseen circumstance, you guys become partners, and he’s been an uncuttable tail ever since. He doesn’t know about your wings, and it’s important you keep it that way.

He seems nice, very nice, but will he still be if he knows what you truly are?

Lana | New danger

She/her

She wants you. Or your head, same thing. You’re not sure what brought her into this town in the first place, but it’s ill-advised that you stay and find out. She’s stubborn, disciplined and determined, and she’s not generous enough to give you a head start on the chase.

There’s a tension between you two all right, but is it the tension of belligerent attraction, or just pure belligerence?

And many more!

[justaratswriting]

Batfam and Mental Health

orOkay so I love Batman and all the things surrounding it. Like the idea of a random rich man who happens to be an orphan just suddenly adopting a ton of children is ridiculous, and thoroughly entertaining.

But I am also a big fan of psychology, and learning about the mind. So mental illness and related things are fascinating to me. 

I notice that like strangely there is very little stuff about the batfam having mental illnesses or dealing with psychology or therapy. Don’t get me wrong there is still a lot addressing these things, but still with the things the family experiences you would think it would be a lot more prevalent in the writing about them, and especially fan fiction about them.

Like I think showing mental health through  beloved characters would be really cool and could be a tool to destigmatize them. Like showing hero's with them would make really great representation, people could see them and think Oh I can still be a good person and helpful even if my mental disorder makes it hard and for things like depression or ADHD showing which misconceptions are harmful and don’t work. 

I can also see this in the physical aspect, like I wish a hero would have something like chronic pain or one of the many invisible illnesses. To give representation and show how pushing through the pain can shut a person down for days. 

The specific disorders I think would be really interesting of the top of my head is, depression, Anxiety, POTS, Fibromyalgia, Chronic pain, eating disorders, nerve damage, ADHD, Bipolar, OCD, Chronic fatigue, PTSD, c-PTSD, Autism, Elhers Danlos syndrome, And the one I really think would be interesting DID. 

Like fore depression, showing how hard it is to get out of bed. Not showing constantly being sad but showing how it can be numbing. Acknowledging that in a disorder like this logic doesn’t always win even if you are the most logical person to live. 

For anxiety showing how debilitating it can be. Looking into their minds to show the thought process, the mind fight itself and logic. Knowing their fears are unreasonable but not being able to shake the feeling. Show how for different people different things cause anxiety. 

POTS or Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, (super simply put it is a circulation disorder where upon standing up blood rushes to extremities and can cause all sorts of problems like fainting, pain in your feet, Dizziness, poor temperature regulation, etc. Also I am assuming people know what depression and anxiety is.) would be fascinating to me. Like having a hero that is constantly sitting down or biting down and pushing through the pain even a hero that has to slowly stand up. So in the middle of a battle being shoved down having to slowly stand up or risk fainting or vision completely blacking out for a while. Showing a hero who has learned to fight with no sight because of that very thing. 

Or Fibromyalgia (This one I am a little less educated about but from what I understand, it is a disorder characterized by muscle pain and tenderness usually with no known cause, so from what I understand it usually is diagnosed after a ton of other disorders are eliminated and the pain is still occurring, often also has affect on sleep and memory/mood.) Like showing a hero having a particularly hard patrol and having to take a couple days off and constantly going places or trying things to help with the pain. 

Or Chronic pain ( from what I understand the main difference between Fibromyalgia and Chronic pain is chronic pain has to do with the nerves and Fibromyalgia has to do with muscles, also Fibromyalgia has other thins to go with it like energy levels and mental functions so memory/mood.) Like a hero having constant pain even if they didn’t have a big fight, maybe showing them icing, heating, or taking pain meds and the rest of the family or team being super confused as to why. Before they know showing them freak out and worry that they went on a mission without telling anyone. Showing how it is a constant battle, that sometimes treatments will work and other times, for seemingly no reason they won’t. 

I would also like to see eating disorders portrayed by the bat family. Showing how it’s not always a conscious choice, sometimes it is more along the lines of choosing something else over eating. Showing how people can use it for control or to punish themselves. Letting there be a male example, reminding people that they can happen to anyone. Allowing people to have representation. Show a recovery, how it is not impossible for anyone but not down playing how hard it is. It is a true and hard fight, and show how it can sneak up on you and drag you back. Not just one easy recovery, that recovery is a choice. You have to want it but you also need help, it is a long hard process and accessibility is everything. Show a family member making them food, show them sometimes eating it and others not. Also don’t only show under eating show how people can’t stop themselves from eating. Having cabinets locked to keep people out, for their own safety. 

Or nerve damage, showing how years of their work and fighting can really mess someone up. Show someone suddenly losing all feeling or sensation in certain parts of their body or constant pain or even pinched nerves. Show how confusing it can be to not know what you are feeling. Show how weird it can be when you realize you are fine or that nothing is touching you or taking it in the opposite direction and not realizing you are hurt or someone is trying to be your attention. I would also love to see the batfam explain any of these injuries to the hero community or to the public. Maybe show the hero community really starting to look into mental and general health services. 

ADHD or also ADD, showing how people can use it but also showing how hard it can be to control and fight. How much it can impede focusing and show situations it can put people in. Show a hero forgetting a huge part of their plan and falling but because of some random information from a hyper focus they still save the day. 

Bipolar, showing the wild swings and how confusing it can be. Feeling like a different person, struggling with identity and their own decisions. Show them accidently pushing people away but also how hard they work to maintain family and friends that despite how unpredictable they can be their friends still stick around. Or if their friends can’t handle it show them peacefully and respectfully stepping out of their life. Show how hard that can be to except but that the future can end up better than you could ever hope. 

OCD is really one I wish we saw in the hero's. Show their routines and things they do. Show the thought process, like if I don’t properly put the dishes away in fourteen seconds the joker will escape arkham. Show how terrifying the thoughts can be, but show how detail oriented it can make people and the beautiful art and amazing work that they can do. Show a person putting them selves at risk to comply with their routine. Like ignoring injuries to write a report. Show them and family or friends working to change the routine. Show how hard it is the moments they want to turn back and continue and how much they want to stop but show them not giving up and making the differences they want. Show them accomplishing things, show their compulsions actually keeping them safe.

Or even chronic fatigue, Show the fight each morning. Them saving energy, the disconnect between how exhausted you are mentally vs. physically. Show a hero that 50% of the time physically is too exhausted to be in the field so they offer technical support. Show a hero crashing, suddenly just not having enough energy to finish patrol or even get home. So someone has to come pick them up. Show them getting stuck in a fight and how hard it can be to do anything much less a fight. 

Let the characters have PTSD or c-PTSD, show flashbacks and being stuck in your head. All of the bat family has lived through horrors please show it affecting them. Show how they get help how they work through it show what can happen and how bad it can get if it is unaddressed.  

Show them having autism and how it is just a different way of life that there is nothing inherently wrong with it and how the ignorance that surrounds it and similar disorders can hurt and affect people. Show how it can be simple things that can show it or affect it. Try and look at it from their perspective and what things happen that should not just because they way someone is. 

Elhers Danlos syndrome, show the pain, the misdiagnosis, the process, the fight. Show how disabilities like this and several others including ones I have mentioned can cause a person to need medical equipment such as wheelchairs and braces. Show how not everyone using a wheelchair can’t walk. Show how limiting it can be and the precautions you have to take but don’t make everything about how hard it can be. Show how using a Wheelchair while not ideal can open up so many opportunities. Show them actually being able to go on family vacations and amusement parks because they have a wheelchair. Show how important it is to have ramps and accommodations for similar things so people can participate and so people can actually go places they want. Always show how hard people with disabilities and such work. Show them trying to get treatment and trying new treatments show how it isn’t as simple as getting a knee brace or two. 

And finally coming to one that absolutely fascinates me, DID or Dissociative Identity Disorder formerly known as multiple personality disorder. But don’t do this one completely uneducated, it is already a very stigmatized disorder. Show how Alters communicate. Show how they all work together and that they were made so the body and mind could survive. Make full characters just put them in one body. Show the confusion once they find out, show them slowly realizing and learning signs and what happened to them. Show each of the Alters having different friends and maybe understanding and knowing the family different. Show the different reasons and setups systems can have. Show system responsibility and each Alter working on themselves and to make a life for the system. Show the roles Alters will take. Show the horrible process of fragmenting and what things can cause it but also show healing and people supporting and accepting systems. 

Overall showing good parts of all the struggles people can have but not ignoring how hard they can be or glorifying them to people who don’t understand. Showing misconceptions and how support can affect these disorders. And most important in my mind, giving hope and a future to look forward to for the people with these disorders.

[leamy-world]

Some afterthoughts on The Devil Judge (spoilers for all the drama!)

Hello everyone! I hope you’re doing well!!

I wanted to write my thoughts after the finale aired because ep. 13-14 made me a mess and were too nerve-wracking! After these two episodes, i only wanted the week to go by fast to see how the finale unfolded (but at the same time, this drama entertained me sm i didn’t want it to end haha).

Watching this drama each week and reading your reactions and thoughts made me enjoy it even more, i’m glad i came back on tumblr! It was a really nice ride (more like an emotional rollercoaster haha)! It motivated me to write my thoughts and analyses on fictions i watched in the future, especially My Mister and Beyond Evil!! I forgot how much fun it was to do that and putting my thoughts into words gave me a little closure to my watch haha

These are just some afterthoughts & personal interpretations i had and were maybe probably already discussed, but i couldn’t get them out of my head haha

See you around and take care!!!

THE CAST. It left a strong impression on me and i can’t see other actors playing their respective roles!

—   Yohan portrayed by Ji Sung … i have no words, this devil judge left me speechless! His character, to his Devilish Smile (and hollow laugh in front of CKH and his son, or Gaon), his variating voice intonations (like damn, he’s a living ASMR like Lee Sung Kyung), his held back emotions and touch-starved and even desperate touches when it came to Elijah and Gaon, to his rage and unhinged moments! 

I winced seeing him contort in pain when Sunah revealed Elijah accidentally lit the church fire, and the two times he hugged Elijah totally destroyed me. His last scene with Gaon showed how gazes & micro-expressions alone could convey unspoken words as strongly. I’m weak for these kinds of scenes, My Mister for example did it and killed me haha

For this post, i rewatched some scenes and damn, Elijah and Yohan’s support of Gaon after Soohyun’s death was really emotional …

(They had no business in making Gaon have this kind of dream, those german scissors left a ... strong impression on him haha)

—   Kim Min Jung’s depiction of Sunah’s was hauntingly beautiful, a femme fatale who kept a broken child deep inside (and at the same time surfacing on her manners and personality) and a strong businesswoman. It’s a fascinating character i loved hating as a villain but still sympathized with. The scene where she murdered the former foundation’s president sent me chills down my spine (i still have her shot of her, sitting at his bureau and manipulating his speech video)! 

The melancholy slipping through her facade when she visited the mansion the first time in a while, as well as her devastation in front of the President’s scheme, by the young girl’s bed at the hospital were memorable. The tension between her and Yohan was incredible: they both managed to keep a very disturbing but enthralling aura, tangled with nostalgia at the same time each time they met.

(Looking at her reflection is a recurring pattern for Sunah’s character, i found this shot above interesting, divided in the two ends of the mirror, as if her self can’t be found on the other side anymore)  

—   This was the first time i saw a drama with Jin Young and i really loved his playing! Never thought I’d say one day i enjoyed someone’s tears and rage on screen, but his crying scenes stuck with me, especially in the prison yard and the last episode (he deserves therapy after all he went through, really) … And his letter to Elijah … (i’m glad nobody harshly revealed the truth to her, i’m really glad!)

I loved to see how his gaze evolved through this journey with Yohan. His endearment to Soohyun, Elijah and Yohan was very precious ;; Even though Yohan was the one who was first seen feeling lonely, Gaon’s loneliness since his parents’ death slipped through his seemingly fine world, i found that interesting! (And on a lighter note, i’ll always remember the truth behind Mrs. Ji’s cooking, Gaon’s epic reaction, and the pure comedy she gets to own a healthy food shop thanks to Yohan!!) 

I also enjoyed his supportive friendship with Jinjoo!!

—   Park Gyu Young’s acting was also on point! It’s really too bad she didn’t get more screen time because i wanted to know more about Soohyun!! I felt robbed haha, because when TDJ began airing, they introduced her as one of the ‘main’ characters of this story ;; The scene when she was on CKH’s suicide scene really left a mark on me + when she was confronting Yohan, especially after she took Elijah out!

—   Elijah. Just Elijah, our best girl!!! Apparently it’s one of Jeon Chae Eun’s first roles, she did so well!! Along with Ji Sung and Jin Young, she gave a whole new definition to the Domestic Scenes, i swear. These scenes will keep a special place in my heart for a long time! Her adorable smile and cheekiness were a refresher in this show!

(They could change TDJ’s concept in a second season and make us a domestic slice of life series, i wouldn’t mind AT ALL! Take my money!!)

Seeing her complicated relationship with her uncle unfold before us deeply moved me. The complete loneliness she silently depicted moving to her bed in the wheelchair, after Gaon left the mansion was heart-wrenching. And also the scenes after Soohyun’s death, hurting with Yohan seeing Gaon’s pain (the way she spoke her worry for the two of them, Yohan couldn’t let the words out properly to Gaon).

—   CKH’s character, played by Jang Young Nam, was amazing. Her acting already shattered me when i watched Nobody Knows! Her cold gaze, her harsh tone, she was badass i have to admit! 

The narcissistic rage was well depicted in her character, and even though i get where many’s opinions on her death come from (i share it too sometimes, but i feel it more for Sunah), i found this final decision fitting to the character, especially if you look how she treated her own son (each hold felt like a grip from rage eg. in ep. 3, as she maybe felt her son was the cause of her demise).

(HUGE SPOILERS FOR BEYOND EVIL BELOW!!!!) 

She reminded me of HKH’s ending: seeing his path to success was crushed with no way out of it except death on his own accord (in his eyes, because it was his absolute life aim, every single being, to his own wife and son, and means, even bending the justice independence, were his expendable ways to pave his path), HJW’s father was set on suicide before his son barged in. 

(Funnily enough, the filming spot for CKH’s house is the same for HKH’s house haha)

—   And also … Lawyer don’t-worry-i’ll-get-you-out-on-probation Ko deserves a round of applause for the best lawyer he is hahaha

THE STORY’S DEVELOPMENTS (AND SCRIPT). I feel like this story could very well have been developed on 20+ episodes! Even if i know some scenes in a script are sometimes (bound to be) cut in the drama, TDJ’s script leaks make me feel there was SO much more to be told, and so much more to explain some plot events in the airing drama!

Because the story was ambitious, both character and plot(twists which give you whiplash)-driven (and also the filming context with the pandemic), i feel like some choices were made.

The lines of thought about justice and the drama’s attempts at its ‘true’ definition are not lost on me. It was really interesting!

On a side note (there will be many, bear with me haha), the symbolic behind the app’s name, DIKE, which i’m pretty sure (correct me if i’m wrong, i only have some very rough basics in korean haha) is the korean romanization of Nikè, or in ancient greek Νίκη, the greek divinity of Victory ( ‘ㄴ’ in korean sounds like an ’n’ but its pronounciation is more abrupt/brisker, to the point of what could be sounding to ears like a ‘d’).

Nikè is most of the time represented as an attribute to other greek divinities who also embody the victory eg. Zeus or Athena, thus seen as a bestower of victory (in any domain, be it war, games = interestingly enough, the live court is set in a colosseum-like room, arts, …)  to the humanity on behalf of these gods (Nikè sometimes stands in her palm as an attribute of Athena, like the owl or the helmet). But sometimes Nikè was also revered an independent protective divinity.

Nikè is represented as a winged divinity in a long robe, flying above the victorious, assisting the humans in their works/challenges eg. handing them a laurel crown as a sign of victory, or a helmet, etc. Its mostly known representation is the Winged Victory of Samothrace (or The Nike of Samothrace) sculpture in the Louvre. The brand Nike also used it in its logo.

It calls back to Yohan’s line: « I make sure i win before the game starts », and in fact, since the beginning, unbeknownst to everybody witnessing the trials and participating to them, the app was his way to win. It foreshadows the ending of the story, Yohan finally taking down the foundation. It also adds to his god/devil image: he assumes the role of the intermediary/abyss of the « gods » (the Justice), taking in all the hubris of the society in order to bring the justice (well, guess we could say it put some hold to the cycle of the powerful culminating to chaos?) back, in some sort of catharsis through DIKE.

It might be a stretch, but Nikè’s winged representation could be found on Gaon’s tattoo (at first to me, it looked like a phoenix/winged angel, which symbolizes a ‘reincarnation’/new beginning for Yohan finding peace, a second chance to his past and Elijah thanks to Gaon & Gaon finding a new world even if his first crumbled ie. his parents and Soohyun’s death and professor Min’s betrayal).

(The whole virus plot by the end of the story made me feel a little uncomfortable given the actual context and the conspiracy theories that are spreading, but it wasn’t used carelessly and served the commentary of the powerful and how far they would go, i think? That said, a fiction, especially a dystopia like this, stays a fiction but when they used it, it gave me a forced laugh haha)

Now, if someone gets to translate some script bits, i’m really looking forward to:

K’s backstory!!!!!

Isaac and Yohan’s past!!!!

More about Elijah!!

Where’s the cat???

What was the script saying for Gaon and Yohan’s confrontation in ep. 12? When Yohan faced the window, waking up from a nightmare after Gaon left?

ABOUT SOOHYUN’S BACKSTORY. (Now, this will get long, i’m sorry but i needed to let my thoughts out haha) The drama introduced her as one of the four main characters with Gaon, Yohan and Sunah. I had so many expectations for her character! Especially from the three scenes we got of her:

➔ In the first episode, we see her save a young girl in the street from two men, looking up at the poster « A safe Korea will be realized from now on. »: it was a great introduction to the blatant lie of the ‘safe’ dystopian world that was being created in the story. It also showed how Soohyun felt in front of this insecure world. A side note, but seeing her hug the young girl like that reminded me the hugs she gave Gaon: she wanted to protect him from this unjust world with all her might (especially the scene in the restaurant where she hugs him). ➔ Her two confrontations with Juk Chang! ➔ Her dilemma and emotional turmoil when she erases Gaon’s presence in CKH’s office.

She was portrayed in the story as Gaon’s pillar since his parents’ tragic death and his moral compass. She’s the lawful citizen, despite feeling helpless to the world’s changes, who hopes it could be saved as long as the rule of law is preserved by everyone, and this begins by respecting it themselves. 

But she was not standing around and i kind of regret this was not shown more in the story: she kept doing her best in the « system », fighting from the inside the injustice hoping the little changes could make a difference someday. Because she couldn’t take Yohan’s path, in no way: the system/the law must be respected for it to be sustained. And i’m glad they addressed this point in the drama: Yohan chose to take on the role nobody wanted or even dared to assume, knowing fully well he became a criminal the second he began his plans (just as lawyer Ko said he was no longer a lawyer once he sided with him). 

This must not be glorified, nor vilified. As he said, it was a choice he decided to make. She mirrors his choices to some extent and i would have loved to see more of their interactions or her thoughts about that! And how she worked through the system to change things, her vision of the justice. They showed us the flashback of her career choice in high school, and it could have been interesting to learn more about her! 

A backstory about her saving the youth and meeting Sunah by accident would have been very interesting (given Sunah knew all about her since the beginning and ordered to kill her). Their meeting wouldn’t have foreshadowed Sunah’s plans, quite the opposite, and it would have given more ‘substance’ to her plans. We were robbed of this relationship haha! 

And of course, seeing her side with Yohan & Gaon for a short while (because seeing her team up with them all along the way could’ve been a little ooc) would have been dope. Her arresting Juk Chang while the two of them stop the gang was the closest thing we had to their teamwork ;;

Among the drama’s main focuses (the self-pity of the powerful and the never-ending cycle of their greed, the power displays it ensues which come in many forms in the system’s game), the conception of justice was developed all along the drama. It would have been really interesting to see whether Soohyun’s conception of justice could have changed in her own way!

And professor Min’s potential manipulation of Soohyun!!! Some scenes on their interactions could have been nice to see and explain why she focused solely on Yohan, the only side of the whole story she knew! Her reporting to the professor about her investigation (and him feeling she got too close to the truth) would have made sense because, as she saw Gaon growing apart from her as he was getting closer to the Kangs (especially since she saw him interact with Elijah when they invited her to the café, like Sunah saw how Gaon fit in their family at the dinner scene), she would’ve wanted to protect him without him knowing because she knew it’d have hurt him. It could have paralleled Gaon’s reports on Yohan to the professor at the beginning of the drama. And that could have explained (aside from the whole love triangle dynamics they had) her reluctance to tell Gaon Yohan was the one who told her his whereabouts when he was in danger in ep. 13 ; this scene also was one of the only moments addressing the lack of communication in their relationship. Seeing her feeling confused over Yohan could have been interesting!

(This also got me wondering whether in the script, Yohan’s injury was ever addressed.)

Also, i’m curious about her family, if the script mentions something about them: did they know Gaon?

About the loveline between Gaon and Soohyun: while the friendship could have stayed as is (it already felt pretty genuine in my opinion and strong friendships also deserve to be portrayed in stories), i’m convinced this drama wanted to set Gaon as the center of a subtext love & morality triangle between Soohyun and Yohan (and K and Sunah on Yohan’s part). I think i would’ve appreciated Gaon and Soohyun’s loveline so much more if they developed it more! And it had to develop in the very same episode she died: apart from the confession and kiss scene (i’m curious about the scene’s description in the script), the flashback of their moments, seen from Gaon’s pov, came just right in to ‘explain’ it! 

Of course it wasn’t the main focus of the story and there was already so much happening, but their new relationship development and her death almost had no impact on me even if it was set as a turning point for Gaon (and K for Yohan, as a cement to their respective decision to fight the system and how they would do it), and it made me really really sad! Of course it was a plot device (and i now wonder what would’ve happened if she or K wasn’t dead), but if it was bound to happen, the emotional impact was lessened!

Jinjoo’s character development and her relationship with Sunah happened really really fast, and i wonder how the script describes it!

Sunah’s involvement with the juvenile care center!!!  Her scene at the hospital left me really sad.

(Also, on the love plot, Gaon and Yohan jealousy bits weren’t used later as an expression of their envy towards the other’s status/life/etc. and were actually directed to people outside ie. Sunah/K/Soohyun in the plot, which makes me think they really wanted to set it as a love triangle!)

ABOUT SUNAH’S DEATH. I feel really really conflicted on this point. Her story was a parallel to CKH (and of course Yohan, i’ll talk about it below): two women — coming from totally opposite backgrounds — climbing their way up by their own means in this power circle. And despite all their accomplishments unnoticed (because they were the ones seeing through their plans while the others were mainly seen tearing each other into pieces), they could still be ruthlessly ejected from this world any day, part of it because they were belittled as women all the same, and chose to end her life on her own accord, still having agency over it. 

As someone else pointed it out, it also acts as a « poetic » retribution for her murder of Soohyun and K. BUT her exiting the scene in some other way staying alive could have contrasted with CKH’s suicide (especially since she overthrew the president who was the only one on her side getting in her way and even killed him in the end). Especially in a show that deals about how the justice can be carried out!

Of course, Yohan and Sunah were a foil to each other in their respective fights and traumatic past: the drama showed us how having someone to reach out to and protect (Elijah, Isaac and Gaon to Yohan ; Soohyun, Yohan and Elijah to Gaon) can become a driving force. Sunah, despite thinking this could be a weakness, also longed for companionship (from Yohan mainly, but also from Jaehee), and had no one to stop her crossing the line and preserve her from herself and the world. At least someone hearing her story, staying by her side and trying to understand her. 

Each time she said ‘can you be a little nicer to me?’ to Yohan made me feel for her (and also that one call with Jaehee), it was the only cries of loneliness she silently let out!

On a totally random note, i would have loved to see her interact more with Gaon (especially by the end of ep. 15, when Yohan was arrested)!

The story gladly didn’t end Yohan’s traumatic past and growth in death, but what about Sunah? In any case, Sunah was a really good and complex character, i enjoyed her character!

What about Jaehee? How did she react to Sunah’s death???

What about CKH’s family after her death???

I would have loved to hear more about Sunah’s plans as well! Scenes where she would play with Gaon for example (in Yohan’s presence or not, like at the photoshoot)! 

(This comment above foreshadowed, along with the dinner scene in ep. 11, she used him all along!)

Her involvement behind the scenes was only exposed in ep. 15 but i wanted to know more about her (motivations aside from her focus on Yohan, what did she plan to do before finding out a look-alike to Isaac, ...)! Given the elements in the plot, i get the idea she planned this whole business with the foundation first to reach the top and wanted to bring Yohan up with her (eg. leading the foundation or becoming the president) or down without her along the way, because she wanted his companionship. Maybe the script expands on it more? Did she really believe in the Dream Home project? Because as we saw her speech in the juvenile care center and her strong reaction to the youth being harmed in these schemes, i believe she kinda wanted to protect them as the best revenge on her past, because nobody could do it for her?  

THE ENDING SCENE. The ending was pretty good and didn’t give us an all-out tragedy, so i’m really glad! I still can’t believe Gaon was ready to blow his life away once he learnt Yohan’s death AND wanted to die with him (falsely) realizing Yohan wouldn’t change his mind, dead set on his decision (no pun intended!). And Yohan’s reaction to this ............... Now, their last scene is left to the viewers’ interpretation, but it felt to me like a new beginning to Yohan and Gaon’s relationship! As it was already said by many people on tumblr, Yohan wasn’t sure if Gaon would still be by his side despite it all, and he didn’t expect Gaon to feel this way. They’ll definitely meet again, it’s a promise of more in the future (especially Yohan’s nod, on the verge of tears and Gaon’s two relieved/endeared smiles, full of forgiveness). Gaon will join his new world once he’s done or they’ll come back to him once Elijah’s recovered.

And this game of hide and seek/hunt reflected their relationship development: Yohan felt unattainable at first, but he chased after him in the maze that was his devilish game, symbolized by the crowd, chasing him motivated by his suspicion, curiosity, anger and hate, disbelief and disappointment, empathy, worry, affection, desperation and love, until he finally reached him and they understood each other among all the crowd, living metaphorically in the same time, facing each other on the same (ground) level.

(A scene in the first episode, Gaon seeing a maze of Yohan’s reflections, maybe symbolizing he could not see through his facade in the beginning, being an enigma to him at first sight ; the choice of the reflections in the mirrors through the drama is interesting and reflects the story: depending on the angles, a story can hold as many meanings as there are points of view, the complete image surfacing once everybody’s story is told)

(Just like how, in ep. 4, Yohan shows Gaon the wicked system right under their noses, Gaon’s enraged and confused gaze directed right at Yohan after they all block his view by clinking glasses ; Yohan hoped he would understand what lies beneath but Gaon understands it fully through his own past in ep. 7-8)

(The crowd is cleared from their/our view in the final scene, leaving the two of them facing each other without any obstacle/reflection on their path)

Gaon kept Yohan’s watch all the time even in moments of doubt, sorrow and rage (the best PPL in drama history so far haha), Yohan finally got to Gaon and entered his world as Soohyun did, reaching out when he needed it the most, to stop him doing something he would regret deeply. It was symbolized by the scar he got on his left hand from preventing Gaon from stabbing him (that’s also why he caresses his scar in a bittersweet way, lost in thoughts, reminding him of their last meeting).

As @i-guess-it-rains said + according to the BTS’ editing (it passed off as a joke but i can’t erase it from my brain now haha),  the way the scene where Yohan defused Gaon’s bomb was framed looked at the same time like Yohan was also carefully handling Gaon’s heart (the bomb countdown clock radiating a red glow on his chest), on the verge of exploding. Now i have The Nights lyrics in my head haha (« My heart is going back to you, i just don’t know »)

On another note, i realized that in ep. 12, after Gaon left, he’s seen trying to call Soohyun in order to reach for her since their last confrontation, but right before, his finger glides over his contact, hesitating on Yohan’s contact before choosing to call Soohyun.

While in ep. 8, he only reaches out to Soohyun after his breakdown in the prison yard (without thinking to call Yohan because he was in the core of his doubts and pain at that time and needed space to reflect on all the events):

And it parallels to Sunah attempting to reach out to Jaehee in her loneliness at the top, hesitating before deciding to call her.

Now i hope TDJ will be on Netflix! It’d be very nice to get to watch the drama in high quality and have more people to see it!

I heard it got a webtoon adaptation so i also look forward to it once it will be translated!

A SECOND SEASON? When i first saw the ending, i thought it got wrapped up nicely and didn’t « need » another season, but it also left some parts open and laid out a new background for further developments (the system repeats itself but in another form, Yohan leaves the scene with his signature smile, maybe up to something else again, saying metaphorically or irl to Gaon he’ll come back if he doesn’t do well), kinda like Stranger/Forest of Secrets s1 or The Guest ending (the corruption doesn’t end there). I also heard it got high viewing rates in SK, so maybe it will be taken into account? And well, i’ll miss the cast so i would welcome the idea haha

THE SOUNDTRACK. The whole OST was stellar (and their titles are on point really!)! Getting to hear it without voices or noise over and with my headphones on made me realize it was even more beautiful! Because I Have You, Warmth That Melts Loneliness and If Only… are the end of me (especially If Only aaaaaaa)! Don’t get me started on Enemy of Truth’s title to the OST playing for the church fire because it’s devastating ;;;

If Only’s title … It leaves us filling in the blank space, the dots to Gaon’s thoughts when he learns about Yohan’s past and how it impacts him to this day.

The 4 songs were amazing (there’s also Different from the Outside but i still didn’t get its lyrics). Tempest was definitely etched in my mind as TDJ’s main theme haha And The Nights was my favorite!  

➔ Tempest was Yohan’s iconic theme and depicted his lonely path to revenge after the tragic events in his life, and his (fated) encounter with Gaon, how deeply it will change him in this journey in ways he didn’t expect. It perfectly introduces (with Chet Faker and Flume’s Drop the game) and concludes the drama!

➔ What you gonna do was THE revenge epic song making everyone revel in the ‘bad guys’ despair and Yohan’s badass moves! 

➔ The Nights felt like it was both Yohan and Gaon’s theme and Gaon’s sorrow after Soohyun’s death: at first i thought it was only Yohan’s, but his revenge and the last episodes proved me wrong! The song’s lyrics mirrored themselves (‘my/your night shines on you/me’), as if a complete understanding between Yohan and Gaon was found on their dark road. Yohan’s night shines on Gaon: Yohan’s broken past and all his misunderstood or hidden sides, his dedication to Elijah. Yohan’s rage (almost wrath since the biblical and god symbolism are there haha) and desire to take the inique system down waked Gaon’s own rage, buried deep inside, and made him move forward too. Gaon’s night shines on Yohan: all the time he spent with the Kangs, Gaon’s deep empathy and understanding, helping him reconnect with his niece, their dinners at night, his rage exploding when the truth about his parents was revealed, his desperation on the last two episodes (in ep. 15, seeing Gaon’s realization everything was a lie and Yohan was innocent, and in ep. 16, Gaon wanting to die by his side). Gaon’s night also shined on Soohyun, who wanted to protect him with all she got each time she saw him crumbling down.

There was still light on their dark road (which looks like a callback to Nightmare’s lyrics, « Save me from myself / Save me from this darkness that has lost its light »).

➔ Nightmare felt like it was Yohan and Sunah’s theme. When it last played when Sunah’s death happened on screen, it left me speechless (and if i remember correctly, the ‘save me from myself’ bit was played right when she shot herself … o u c h)!

[kingstylesdaily]

Harry Styles’ “Adore You” Is Everything a Music Video Should Be (Including Underappreciated by The VMAs)

KSD NOTE: there is a mention of suicide in regards to the beginning of Adore You.

On November 18, 2019, a website promoting a mysterious place called Eroda (“No Land Quite Like It”) arrived on the internet. Two days later, the official Twitter account for this fictional frown-shaped island began teasing local seaside attractions. You may have missed it, depending on which corners of the internet you choose to lurk, but not if you were a Harry Styles fan, a group that went into pure overdrive trying to figure out what it all meant.

I, for one, missed it at the time. I was unaware this account was cryptically quote tweeting fans as they tried to piece together what was happening, what it meant, and what it could be connected to (Greek Mythology and Lost were a couple of theories posed in comments, Twitter threads, and Reddit). Meanwhile, the Columbia Records marketing department had been hard at work for months, devising this specific and highly-detailed campaign around the music video for Styles’ second single, “Adore You” from his second solo album, Fine Line, ever since he shot the video in Scotland in August 2019 (Eroda = Adore backwards — clever!).

But it was all leading up to the morning of Friday, December 6 when the video was released, one week before the full-length album arrived. Up until that point, I had never seen an entire Harry Styles music video, but what happened next was inevitable. Somehow, as a self-proclaimed boy band scholar, I had never paid much attention to One Direction. I kept a distant eye on Styles since they disbanded, intrigued by the decisions he was making in his solo career. But I hadn’t yet realized I’d been in the ring all throughout the fall of 2019, fighting to resist the inevitable fascination that awaited. First came the jab of Rob Sheffield’s Rolling Stone profile, followed by the cross of “Lights Up”, a song that cracked my Top 20 most listened to songs of the year despite being released just two months before Spotify so thoughtfully compiled that personalized playlist. Then there was the hook of his SNL hosting stint in November (and bless you Bowen Yang for that Sara Lee sketch), which then leads us to the “Adore You” video, the uppercut and ultimate TKO. I surrendered in what felt like a near instant. I was now a Harry Styles fan. (If we’re following this analogy, I sat up to spit out some blood after seeing that cover of “Juice” before my head quickly hit the mat again with a loud thud).

Maybe it’s not quite remarkable that I took time out of a Friday morning to watch a music video, but that I sat at my desk, in an office, with other people around (back when we did those kinds of things) and proceeded to wipe away a few tiny tears from under my eyes by the end of it, was an experience I had not been through… maybe ever? In a world of lyric videos and TikToks, actual, thoughtful, impactful music videos with a full (and sweet!) story are about as rare as a glowing and growing fish these days.

Ultimately, “Adore You” does everything a music video should do. In nearly eight minutes, this video uses excellent visual effects in a cool and interesting way, tells a compelling and heartfelt story, is anchored by an irresistible leading man and an adorable sidekick, is backed up by the catchiest song you could ever dream of, and culminates with a touching and hopeful ending. It’s a treat for the eyes and the ears and the soul. It’s innovative and the kind of thing that begs you to watch it more than once to catch all the details (and yes, I do tear up every time).

So one would think that an award show with the specific purpose of celebrating this type of creativity would be extra sure to nominate such a charming and effective clip, but alas, “Adore You” was overlooked in the MTV Video Music Awards main categories this year. Of course, some could argue that that fact only adds to the video’s credibility but I’ll do my best to not be that petty as I’m still rooting for it to win in the three technical categories where it picked up nominations: Best Visual Effects by Mathematic, Best Art Direction by Laura Ellis Cricks, and Best Direction by Dave Meyers, who remains one of the most inventive and influential directors of all time and whose videos with artists such as Missy Elliot, Pink, and Kendrick Lamar have been racking up nominations for nearly 20 years now. He also saw four other videos he directed get recognized this year: Normani’s “Motivation” (Best Chorography), Travis Scott’s “Highest in the Room” (Best Hop Hop and Best Visual Effects), Anderson .Paak’s “Lockdown” (Video For Good), and Camila Cabello feat. DaBaby’s “My Oh My” (Best Cinematography).

But I reached out to Meyers to specifically ask about the intricate details of “Adore You” and how it all came to be; how he captured such a vibe with the overcast and dreary weather, mixed so wonderfully with the charming oddities of the people that make up this world of Eroda. In addition to directing the video, he also co-wrote the story with Chris Shafer and said, “It’s the first idea that popped to mind after the first listen to the song, and the first idea I pitched to Harry. It was a story that underscored my understanding of what Harry stood for and felt it was necessary to tell it as a narrative to convey his optimism.”

The extended version of the video starts with a two-and-a-half-minute introduction to the world of Eroda, narrated by Rosalia. This includes the “peculiar” people and their professions on the island, meeting The Boy (Styles) and his glowing smile that most people try to avoid, and the quirky superstitions these people continue to live by. “It all served a purpose,” Meyers said of the details. “The superstitions were a set up for how society generally reacts to different things. They fear change or oddity, even if it’s what’s best for them.”

Meyers, however, did not share in that fear, as much of this video provided for interesting and new opportunities he had yet to experience throughout his decades-long career, which he listed off: ”Compelling narrative, CG character, remote location, Scottish crew (nothing phased them),” also noting that all of the other characters in the video were locals as well. So perhaps they were less fazed by the atmosphere across the four-day shoot in Scotland, but as Meyers recalled, the “weather was nuts. It rained every 20 minutes, then the sun, then cloud over.”

However, it’s likely that Mother Nature is also a Styles fan, as Meyers recalled, “I seem to remember going up on the hill for Harry’s picnic with the fish and being worried that it was so gloomy. By the time we came to shoot, the sun came out. And then the sun went away as soon as the scene was over. Similarly, we had the worst storm when Harry was contemplating suicide at the start. Pouring rain, drenching him. So I guess in that sense it was fun watching how Scotland provided a backdrop for the emotions we were after.”

And hey, at least they had the weather on their side to add to the mood while shooting the video, as one of their main characters, well, didn’t exist. “It was very odd shooting with no fish,” Meyers admitted. “But was quite rewarding later seeing it dropped in and making empathic sense to the story we were after.”

Of course, the main character they did have on hand is an awfully useful and appealing one at that. Fans became enamored with the moment Styles uses the back of his hand to check the temperature of a coffee pot before dumping the fish inside the water so it could stay alive. I asked Meyers about this particular moment and he said, “The problem we had was apparent when Harry ran in and threw the fish in the pot. We all sorta felt — well, what if it was hot? So I believe Harry improvised that as a solution and we felt it was perfect for the character’s sensitivity and consideration for this poor fish.” And that’s not the only nice thing he does for his fish friend — he also serves him a tiny taco! “The taco was a whimsical way to express friendship between Harry and the fish,” Meyers offered. It looked pretty tasty, too.

The entire video serves as a showcase for what Styles does best and what makes him such a unique artist: his music, his acting, and his charisma, which Meyers knew would offer him a lot to work with. “Harry is a leading man. I felt that from my first meeting and wanted to play with his wonderful range of emotions. So finding a story with a real character arc was part of my focus in building this world.” Meyers described working on “Adore You” as an “all-around memorable shoot: awesome location, lovely Harry, compelling story, great effects, and… it worked.”

It did. And it was a risk: a video this complex and detailed (and one has to assume, costly), attached to a marketing campaign that proved to be even more involved, still came with no guarantee that the fans wouldn’t shrug it off. But as Manos Xanthogeorgis, SVP of Digital Marketing & Media at Columbia Records told Billboard last year, “When you have a video and a piece of art at such a level, it’s an incredible challenge for the rest of the team to build a campaign at that same level of artistry and creativity.” Oh, and that was only step one, as the marketing team engaged in “real-time marketing” with fans online, ensuring they would continue to remain engaged by dropping clues and clips in the lead-up to the video premiere and subsequently the album. “This whole campaign was around mystery and sometimes mystery is more powerful than knowledge,” Xanthogeorgis said. The Twitter handle has remained active throughout 2020, used as a continual marketing tool for Styles’ next videos including the Meyers-directed “Falling” and this summer’s hit, “Watermelon Sugar.”

With that kind of fan engagement, “Adore You” seemed like a no-brainer for the fan-voted categories of the VMAs this year, as they surely would’ve turned out to vote just as feverishly for this video as they did when searching for clues (about a made-up island, at that!). But hey, maybe MTV was just not interested in massive fan engagement this year — after all, it’s not like everything Styles does, including growing freakin’ facial hair, has the internet in a tizzy for weeks. Ultimately, as the impact of music videos (and certainly the ceremony celebrating them) continues to lose relevance, the disregard of this specific project simply feels like a missed opportunity to acknowledge a rare achievement in the art form.

While Meyers was sure to describe his inclusion in the VMA nominations this year as “lovely and flattering” (and he better have a moonperson in his possession this time next week, MTV!) it’s still puzzling why “Adore You” wouldn’t be included in the big categories, considering Styles is squarely within their demo, at the very least. That “Adore You” is also a technical and storytelling masterpiece, as well as a full moment that was used as inspiration both for the experience online and in-person at the Fine Line Spotify listening party last December, that also comes packed with one of the most enthusiastic groups of fans around, well, that should have had the entire network drooling.

Of course, some of this can simply be chalked up to a perfect storm. As far as his singles go, “Lights Up” was a nice appetizer, but “Adore You” remains the delicious entree (you already know what’s for dessert). “Adore You” is a perfect pop record if I’ve ever heard one (and I have) and deserved a special video. A Chris Isaak “Wicked Game” sexy vibe wasn’t going to work here. The song tells the story of such passionate, pure, and heartachingly naive and innocent love that it almost had to be directed toward a non-human being. Instead, Styles chose to inject those same carefree, sweaty, sticky, delicious, whimsical beach vibes into the “Watermelon Sugar” clip, which was the right choice, and not just for the summertime season (MTV has since added the Song of Summer category to the VMAs and included “Watermelon Sugar”).

But it’s “Adore You” that has melodies that bring a smile to the faces of babies, get your toes tapping even when you hear it in the dentist’s chair, and likely has my neighbors rolling their eyes when I sing along to it in the shower. The song is so simple it’s deep, a theme reflected in the video, as is the central reminder to help and care for others, a thoroughly 2020 message.

However, not all is lost. Both “Adore You” and “Watermelon Sugar” continue to rack up major spins at radio with the latter hitting number one on the Billboard charts earlier this month. Grammy voting kicks off at the end of September and Academy members should take note. Not only is Fine Line more than worthy of being acknowledged, but having Styles on hand to potentially collect trophies and perform is in your best interest when it comes to viewers and online chatter. Do not wait to take him seriously. This is the album, this is the time. Prove that you aren’t a bunch of stodgy old white men who think he’s just for teen (and um, thirty-something) girls, but that you understand the music he enjoys, is inspired by, and subsequently makes, is the same rock music you appreciate as well. An artist like Styles can be both of those things at the same time, and really, the best of both worlds. Give the album a listen, and then one more to let it all sink in. If you have not yet succumbed to the force that is Harry Styles fandom, I truly can’t recommend it enough — and please know that it will get you eventually.

Source: Decider.com

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

ok i know you said that reblog didn’t just refer to Rakepick (i’m assuming that’s who you meant by “her” but correct me if not) but i don’t really see how it could refer to her character in the first place?? if you could elaborate that’d be great cos i feel like it’s flying right over my head lmao

Happy to! As I might have predicted, I did get several messages about the post I reblogged so now I’ll try to clarify my feelings on this, as I know it’s been a touchy subject in the past. (This ended up being quite long, so...) @dat-silvers-girl and @heleneplays I thought you might find this interesting.

The original post was talking about shipping and the difference between enjoying character dynamics and actually projecting onto characters to see the relationship style you would want in your own life. I feel like both of these things can happen and that’s okay, but the point was that shipping two characters doesn’t mean you condone any implications that such a relationship would have in real life. Enemies to Lovers is a great example. 

In regards to fiction, I took that mindset a step further and talked about characters in general, notably villains. The same way we shouldn’t assume that people like a certain ship because they want a relationship like that in their own life, I don’t think it says anything about a person if a villain is their favorite character. Very often, villains are the most interesting or fleshed out. They have a unique relationship with the story itself as they are often the driving force or representative of its message. You could say that Harry Potter is a story about love and family...and Voldemort exists as someone who cannot comprehend either, to demonstrate their importance. Anyway, the point is that there’s nothing wrong with liking a villainous character. 

When I was growing up, it didn’t seem like this was a contested idea. It was actually common, particularly for villains who were seen as “cool” and many of them were. You’ll find few people who don’t agree that Darth Vader or Darth Maul look cool. However, in recent years, I’ve noticed that purity culture has spread to the point where liking a villain is considered questionable. It no longer seems to be enough, necessarily, that one is merely enjoying the villain as a character. Just like the idea of shipping two characters now means one must condone that kind of relationship in real life, sometimes it seems as though liking a villain is now tantamount to condoning their actions. 

Then again, there are people who feel sympathy for villains and attempt to justify their actions. Sometimes it’s due to a personal attraction. It’s a meme that people get horny for villains, and there’s probably some overlap there with folks who lean toward the “projection” style of shipping I talked about earlier, but never mind that. Other times, this sympathy can overlap with seeing potential in the character. There is a fine line, of course, between rooting for a redemption for the villain and arguing that they did nothing wrong in the first place, but these days it seems as though rooting for a redemption for the “wrong” kind of villain is something people take as an insult. (Severus Snape comes to mind.) Alternatively, people also seem to take it as an insult if you don’t believe the “right” kind of character deserves redemption. (This happens a lot with Princess Azula.)

Now all that being said, there is absolutely nothing wrong with hating a villain and just wanting them to go to hell and die. Like, that makes perfect sense. There are villains out there that we love to hate, characters who are so despicable that most people would agree they deserve a slow and painful death. Joffrey Baratheon is a great example. (Actually, a lot of Game of Thrones characters would apply here...) If a villain inspires true loathing from you, then paradoxically that also means they’re great, because they’ve been written in such a way that you as an audience can feel the evil. But this can become complicated if they overlap such despicable villains with the ones who have potential to be more interesting. It becomes complicated because of the aforementioned binary that now seems to be prevalent. The idea that everything one likes in fiction reflects what they believe should go on in real life.

Which brings us to Rakepick. 

Wow, we finally got here. I appreciate your patience. Rakepick is that character who has overlap. Whether we like it or not, she was presented as an ally for two years of the game’s story, before her betrayal. She spent a lot of quality time with MC and the other apprentices. We got to know her. It is not at all surprising, I don’t believe, that some of us see that “potential” to be more in Patricia Rakepick. But on the other hand, she sure has gone above and beyond in the effort to be one of those villains you just hate, given what she’s done. Having been part of this discourse, I think what’s going on is that the players who still feel a connection to Rakepick feel attacked by the players who ruthlessly condemn her. The players who condemn her feel insulted by the idea that players still like her after the terrible crimes she’s committed, after what she did to Rowan. No one is wrong here. Rakepick is a fascinating character who’s done unspeakable things. We do not need to fight about her. 

Everyone has different opinions about characters for different reasons. I have villains that I simply love because I see something more in them, or because I just think they’re cool. I also have villains for whom I feel the same contempt people have for Rakepick. Villains who I cannot stand and it makes me cringe to see their actions justified or considered - Cersei Lannister comes to mind. Likewise, there are just as many heroic characters that I love and adore, and some others that I find problematic. Others still that I flat out despise because of what they’ve done, villain or no villain, like Nozomi from SMT. Albus Dumbledore is probably the character I hate the most in fiction, even though he’s one of the good guys. I’m “Anti-Dumbledore” but when it comes to Rakepick, I don’t even like to use the term “Antis” because when a character is unquestionably a villain...isn’t it the default setting to hate them and root against them? 

Here’s the main thing. They’re fictional characters, first and foremost. They aren’t real, so it’s not like they know if we’re defending or condemning them. All of us are part of fandom to enjoy their story and share our enjoyment with each other. I feel like that should come before anything else. No matter if Rakepick is one of those villains you find “cool,” no matter if you love to hate her with how evil she is, no matter if you see more to her and wish she wasn’t considered a villain...or even if, like most of the HPHM fandom, you simply can’t stand her and root for a shallow grave...all of us have these opinions because we like HPHM. That matters more than our specific opinions about characters. Even villains. Even ones who have crossed as many lines as Rakepick.

[ellaofoakhill]

My Thoughts on Boxes

Something has kinda been bugging me the last little while, that I like to think a lot of people can relate to. We live in a society that, generally speaking, likes putting things into boxes; we like analyzing and sorting and organizing. And there’s nothing really wrong with that in and of itself--frankly, I could stand to do a lot more of it in the more practical aspects of my life--but such a system only really works with things that easily fit into discreet categories, and the things that aren’t or can’t be easily sorted are either forced into a box where they don’t fit, or left adrift without any real place to be.

In particular, I’m talking about fiction. You have numerous genres that multiply by the day, and the age categories that stories within those genres are deemed suitable for. And don’t get me wrong, there are lots of practical reasons for those categories; they make advertising and the organization of bookstores and libraries dramatically easier, and for most stories, this system works great, with each finding the audience most likely to derive benefit from reading it.

But--again, solely my opinion here--this may have produced stories that are a lot flatter than stories written in previous eras (which had their own problems, I will NOT get into that today). By flat, I don’t mean boring, or a failure of the story. I mean that the story feels like it was changed to fit into the category it most closely matched. In the most egregious examples, I feel like things were either added to a story that did nothing for it besides make it fit its box better, or taken out that were either integral to the story or added a depth and breadth to it that improved the work overall, even if that made it harder to sort.

This makes me think of the Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch quote, “Murder your darlings”, but completely opposite to what he was getting at. The general interpretation is “Even if you like a given piece of writing/painting/sculpture/etc., if it does more bad than good for your work, you need to remove it for the sake of the art.” What I feel is happening is “You need to change your story so it fits the target demographic, no matter what it looks like at the end.” The former serves the story and its spirit; the latter sacrifices the story for... I don’t know, ease of advertising, perhaps? Certainly financial gain is involved there.

So my first argument against this jaded, greedy way of thinking runs thus. Look at the stories that are now considered classics of Western literature: look at Wuthering Heights and Pride and Prejudice; look at White Fang and Call of the Wild; look at Dracula and Frankenstein; look at The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia (no, I couldn’t resist throwing in two classic fantasy titles, and no, I won’t apologize for it). If you haven’t read these stories, you probably should. Yes, they have problems that mark them as products of their time, but every last one of them has one thing in common: none of them were written with a box in mind. We’ve thought of lotr as a fantasy staple for so long that we’ve forgotten that, prior to its popularity, fantasy as a genre wasn’t really a thing. There were fairy-tales, yes, and stories with fantastical elements, but a genre of story with precise conventions? Not really.

Let’s zoom in on Tolkien’s work, for a moment. Look at his world and its origins, and it draws heavy inspiration from Old English and Scandinavian myths and legends. Look at his characters, in particular his four hobbits, and he drew from his love of the English countryside, his respect for the common working man (Sam, the gardener, literally carries Frodo, the wellbred young gentleman, on his shoulders in the final leg of their gruelling journey to the Cracks of Doom), and his horrific experiences in the First World War. Hilariously enough, a big part of the reason he wrote the stories was as a self-justification for his indulgence in and lifelong love affair with language invention (look at the huge appendices at the back of The Return of the King and tell me I’m lying!). Read his work and any and all interviews with him, and a “genre box” seems clearly to have never crossed his mind.

Putting aside the genre box for a moment, let’s talk age categories. The Hobbit was a story he invented for his children, and it does show. Look at the Lord of the Rings, and it is clearly at a higher level of reading comprehension, and written for a more mature audience; there’s less silliness, though he keeps the wonder at this wild, magical world. But where to put it? The hobbits run a spectrum from basically teenagers (Pippin) to almost middle age (Frodo is in his fifties when he embarks on his journey to Rivendell), yet they’re clearly his protagonists, though we also see some narration revolving around Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli, all of whom are adults, though the latter two are somewhat younger for their respective races, whereas Aragorn is in his eighties (this being offset somewhat by the fact that he lives to over two hundred, but I digress...). We’re told today (falsely; VERY falsely) that the main character(s) should match the age of their target audience. Where does lotr fit, then, in terms of age category?

The answer you’re looking for is: not really very well anywhere; at least, not according to modern convention. As for my personal experience, I could and did read both The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion at age thirteen. I consider myself a fairly intelligent young man, but I was varying degrees of lost when I read those. When I re-read them as an adult I was fine, but that isn’t to imply that teens shouldn’t be reading lotr, far from it. There’s nothing in them content-wise one wouldn’t reasonably expect a teenager to handle, and there’s a lot of good, powerful story and commentary in there that’s relevant to this day.

My point is, the age category doesn’t really matter. If I may shamelessly plug my own work for a moment, when I was first writing tftem, and even as I’m editing and publishing it now, I wondered and still wonder about this age category business. There is nothing in these stories I’d consider inappropriate for kids, and anyone above the age of about 8, with perhaps a slight stretch to their vocabulary, could comfortably read every story beginning to end. Further complicating matters, my beta readers ranged from 8 to almost 80, and most of the spectrum in between. They all liked it; whether they liked it for the same reasons is moot.

Which leads me into my second argument against boxing and categorizing stories. The boxes aren’t very reliable. If I may change media for a moment, cultural convention says, as an adult, there is only a narrow sleazy strip of cartoon entertainment I should be watching and enjoying. That tiny slice of the cartoon pie is the only slice I avoid like the plague. Yes, there are stories that don’t appeal to me because they’re too simplistic, or are problematic in ways that I find repellent, or just aren’t executed very well, but aside from things aimed at toddlers and the aforementioned “adult” cartoons, any cartoon is fair game. Give me an interesting concept, or a fascinating character, or hell just give me a good laugh or line of dialogue or beautiful fight scene, and I’ll give it a try.

My point is (yes I had one, and no, believe it or not I didn’t forget it), don’t write or draw or create with a box in mind. You will murder the spirit of your darlings. The box does not exist to define what you, the writer, are allowed to do, or what you should do. At best, the box exists in hindsight, once the work is done, to tell your prospective audience whether your story was written for them. And even then, lots of fantastic stories don’t sit well in boxes. Some of them actively rip the boxes to pieces. Lotr is a story that transcends boxes, and as a result has many layers and rabbit-holes and nuances that you can pick up when you’re ready to appreciate them, however old you are. In many ways, it’s ageless.

I didn’t write tftem to emulate Tolkien, nor even as an homage to him, or C.S. Lewis, or anyone else. But I did want to write a similarly ageless story, a story that could be read and appreciated a hundred years from now, by an audience of eight-year-olds or octogenarians. Why did we ever start moving away from stories like this? They were the foundation of stories for as long as stories have existed on Earth. People are still reading and marvelling at The Epic of Bloody Gilgamesh!

Tl;dr: don’t try to force your stories into boxes; they suffocate. Write what you enjoy writing; chances are it’ll live longer.

[bloody-wonder]

What are your favorite tropes?

thank you very much for being interested. here’s a post that’s ungodly long.

i love revenge stories. forget and forgive? how about no. i don’t believe in god or higher forces that distribute justice irl so even in stories where such forces actually exist i like when characters take matters into their own hands. will it make them happy or bring closure at least? i don’t care. for me it’s not so much about making the character who’s been wronged happy again as ensuring that the offending character isn’t happy. it’s all about bad karma. revenge stories are still done fairly often, so probably this would be the one popular trope that i like (idk if i can call it overdone though).

when a character does some favor for a stranger in the first half of the story to have it returned to them in the second half. i guess it comes from fairy tales: a hero rescues a person at the beginning of the story and later when the hero is in trouble and needs help it turns out that the person they rescued is very powerful and they just happen to ride by and help the hero out. it’s all about good karma. plus just generally i like when characters you thought were episodic turn out to be important later in the story.

when characters have to join forces with their antagonists to defeat a common enemy - both when it leads to them questioning why they are antagonists and becoming friends OR when they remain antagonists even after their enemy is defeated. the former situation is more common but it often isn’t executed very well in that the conflict between these characters isn’t resolved in a satisfying way - they just spend some time around each other and are like okay i forgive you we’re friends now which is frustrating. the latter scenario wouldn’t have such an issue but it’s very rare, i can’t even think of an example. a perfect situation ofc would be if after defeating the common enemy one side is ready to set their differences aside forever and the other one is not which leads to some delicious tragedy in the end (and to fandom discourse about whether person b should’ve forginen person a or whether they had every right not to).

forbidden romance. not of the montague / capulet kind, but of the actual “forbidden by society for valid reasons” kind. i don’t seek out books like this bcs all you will find is icky problematic romance books for people who have certain kinks, but i’m very intrigued when, for example, a literary fiction book will feature a forbidden romance. what will the author do with it? will they condemn it and remind everyone once again how harmful it is? will they have the nerve to make the ship endgame? how will they justify it? as the book leo has once put it, sometimes unhealthy relationships make for a more compelling story.

on a similar but very different note, when human characters have relationships with those who aren’t human. i guess paranormal romance is a subcategory of this trope but it’s not at all what i’m talking about. i like this inter-species dynamic bcs of how it makes different cultural norms clash and what it says about conditio humana and stuff. what if one character is a regular person and the other one is an unholy demon and they “fall in love” but for the human it means whatever it means but for the demon it means to devour their soul? in paranormal romance monsters learn to “love” like humans do but i think that’s cultural assimilation and also boring.

when a character is a prodigy at something and/or just very competent - like andrew at exy or toph beifong at earth- and metal-bending. many people like to see characters try and fail but i think it’s nice to have someone about whom you can’t be sure they won’t embarrass you. i have lots of first- and second-hand embarrassement in my life already, thank you very much. but admittedly there’s a fine line between such capable characters and mary sues.

when a character is obsessed with something or someone, often in an unhealthy Problematic way. i think it’s fascinating and i always root for such characters although they rarely come out on top (bcs turns out they’re “evil” or something) bcs they display the amount of enegry, drive and resourcefulness i can only aspire to. a subcategory of this type would be maniacs. yeah sometimes i root even for them bcs *looks at smudged writing on hand* i’m a bourgeois degenerate. plus, if you have a choice between the fbi and hannibal lecter and choose to root for the fbi it just means you’re boring and have no personality.

idk if the following ones are more character archetypes than tropes but i still decided to include them.

the first one i call “the douchebag ravenclaw” - it’s a character who’s very smart but also very mean which may or may not have something to do with how they’re Objectively Smarter than everybody else and their patience for other people’s stupidity and sensitivities is limited. yes, i’m a big fan of sherlock and dr house. tyrion and snape would also fit on this scale, although tyrion is not as mean as he is smart and snape is not as smart as he is mean. you know those tumblr posts that are like “it doesn’t matter how smart you are if you aren’t kind”? like yeah in real life certainly, but in fiction? big fat no. i have a lot of bottled up anger but avoid conflict at all costs so i need smart characters be mean at people to take the edge off it.

another character archetype i love is the lovable rascal - the morally grey and very sassy swashbuckler with a heart of gold. jack sparrow, locke lamora, seregil i korit are near and dear to my heart. it all comes from how when i was 12yo my favorite book was the three musketeers. much like douchebag ravenclaws give me a way of having (and winning) heated arguments i’d never start in real life, lovable rascals give me adventure which i’d never set off on bcs it sounds like too much trouble.

that’s all i could think of at the moment *says she as if this post isn’t too long already*

[montagnarde1793]

Ribbons of Scarlet: A predictably terrible novel on the French Revolution (part 1)

Parts 2, 3, 4 and 5.

Q: Why is this post in English? Isn’t this blog usually in French?

 A: Yes, but I can’t bypass the chance, however small, that someone in the book’s target audience might see and benefit from what I’m about to say.

 Q: Why did you even read this book? Don’t you usually avoid bad French Revolution media?

 A: My aunt left the book with me when she came for my defense last November. I could already tell it would be pretty awful and might not have read it except that I needed something that didn’t require too much concentration at the height of the Covid haze and I — like most people who insisted on finishing their doctorate despite the abysmal academic job market — have a problem with the sunk cost fallacy, so once I got started I figured I might as well find out just how bad it got.

 Q: Don’t you have papers to grade?

 A: … Next question.

 Q: Aren’t you stepping out of your lane as an historian by reviewing historical fiction? You understand that it wasn’t intended for you, right?

 A: First of all, this is my blog, such as it is, and I do what I want. Even to the point of self-indulgence. Why else have a blog? Also, I did receive encouragement. XD;

 Second, while a lot of historians I respect consider that anything goes as long as it’s fiction and some even seem to think it’s beneath their dignity to acknowledge its existence, given the influence fiction has on people’s worldview I think they’re mistaken. Besides, this is the internet and no one here has any dignity to lose.

 Finally, this is not so much a review in the classic sense as a case study and a critical analysis of what went wrong here that a specialist is uniquely qualified to make, not because historians are the target audience, but because the target audience might get the impression that it’s not very good without being able to articulate why. To quote an old Lindsay Ellis video, “It’s not bad because it’s wrong, it’s bad because it sucks. But it sucks because it’s wrong.” Or, if you prefer, relying on lazy clichés and adopting or embellishing every lurid anecdote you come across is bound to come across as artificial, amateurish and unconvincing.

 This is especially offensive when you make grandiose claims about your novel’s feminist message and the “time and care” you supposedly put into your research.

 I also admit to having something of a morbid fascination with liberals creating reactionary media without realizing it, which this is also a textbook example of (if someone were to write a textbook on the subject, which they probably should).

 With that out of the way, what even is this book?

 The Basics

 It’s a collaboration between six historical novelists attempting to recount the French Revolution from the point of view of seven of its female participants. One of these novelists is in fact an historian herself, which is a little bit distressing, given that like her co-authors, she seems to consider people like G. Lenotre reliable sources. But then, she’s an Americanist and I’ve seen Americanists publish all kinds of laughable things about the French Revolution in actual serious works of non-fiction without getting called out because their work is only ever reviewed by other Americanists. So.

 Anyway, if you’re familiar with Marge Piercy’s (far superior, though not without its flaws) City of Darkness, City of Light, you might think, “ok, so it’s that with more women.” And you might think that that’s not so bad of an idea; Marge Piercy maybe didn’t go all the way with her feminist concept by making half the point of view characters men (though I’d argue that the way she frames how they view women was part of the point). It’s even conceivable that if Piercy had wanted to make all the protagonists women her publisher would have said no on the grounds of there not being a general audience for that. It was the 1990s, after all.

 Except the conceit this time is they’re all by different authors, we have some counterrevolutionaries in the mix, and instead of the POV chapters interweaving, each character gets her own chunk of the novel, generally about 70-80 pages worth, although there are a couple of notable exceptions. We’ll get to those.

 It’s accordingly divided as follows:

·      Part I. The Philosopher, by Stephanie Dray, from the point of view of salonnière, translator, miniaturist and wife of Condorcet, Sophie de Grouchy, “Spring 1786” to “Spring 1789”; Sophie de Grouchy also gets an epilogue, set in 1804

·      Part II. The Revolutionary, by Heather Webb, from the point of view of Reine Audu, Parisian fruit seller who participated in the march on Versailles and the storming of the Tuileries, 27 June-5 October 1789

·      Part III. The Princess, by Sophie Perinot, from the point of view of Louis XVI’s sister Élisabeth, May 1791-20 June 1792

·      Part IV. The Politician, by Kate Quinn, from the point of view of Manon Roland, wife of the Brissotin Minister of the Interior known for writing her husband’s speeches and for her own memoirs, August 1792-(Fall 1793 — no date is given, but it ends with her still in prison)

·      Part V. The Assassin, by E. Knight, which is split between the POV of Charlotte Corday, the eponymous assassin of Marat, and that of Pauline Léon, chocolate seller and leader of the Société des Républicaines révolutionnaires, 7 July-8 November 1793

·      Part VI. The Beauty, by Laura Kamoie, from the point of view of Émilie de Sainte-Amaranthe, a young aristocrat who ran a gambling den and who got mixed up in the “red shirt” affair and was executed in Prarial Year II, “March 1794”-“17 June 1794”

An *Interesting* Choice of Characters…

 Now, there are some obvious red flags in the line-up. I’m not sure, if you were to ask me to come up with a list of women of the French Revolution I would come up with one where 4/7 of the characters are nobles/royals — a highly underrepresented POV, as I’m sure you’re all aware — but fine. Sophie de Grouchy is an interesting perspective to include and Mme Élisabeth at least makes a change from Antoinette? And though the execution is among the worst (no pun intended) Charlotte Corday’s inclusion makes sense as she is famous for doing one of the only things a lay audience has unfortunately heard of in association with the Revolution.

 Reine Audu is actually an excellent choice, both pertinent and original. Credit where credit is due. Manon Roland and Pauline Léon are not bad choices either in theory, but given the overlap with Marge Piercy’s book, if you’re going to do a worse job, why bother? The inclusion of Sophie de Grouchy, while, again, not a bad choice, also kind of makes this comparison inevitable, as another of Piercy’s POV characters was Condorcet.

 But Émilie de Sainte-Amaranthe? I’m not saying you couldn’t write an historically grounded and plausible text from her point of view, but her inclusion was an early tip-off that this was going to be a book that makes lurid and probably apocryphal anecdotes its bread and butter.

 The absolute worst choice was to make Pauline Léon only exist — at best — as a foil to Charlotte Corday. (It turns out to be worse than that, actually. She’s less of a foil than a faire-valoir.)

Still, why does no one write a novel about Simone and Catherine Évrard (poor Simone is reduced to “Marat’s mistress” here, not just by Charlotte Corday, which is understandable, but also by Pauline Léon) or Louise Kéralio or the Fernig sisters or Nanine Vallain or Rosalie Jullien or Jeanne Odo or hell, why not one of the dozens of less famous women who voted on the constitution of 1793 or joined the army or petitioned the Convention or taught in the new public schools. Many of them aren’t as well-documented, but isn’t that what fiction is for?

Let’s try to be nice for a minute

There are things that work about this book and while the result is pretty bad, I think the authors’ intentions were good. Like, who could object to the dedication, in the abstract?

This novel is dedicated to the women who fight, to the women who stand on principle. It is an homage to the women who refuse to back down even in the face of repression, slander, and death. History is replete with you, even if we are not taught that, and the present moment is full of you—brave, determined, and laudable.

It’s how they go about trying to illustrate it that’s the problem, and we’ll get to that.

For now, let me reiterate that while I’m not a fan of the “all perspectives are equally valid” school of history or fiction — or its variant, “all *women*’s perspectives are equally valid” — and there are other characters I would have chosen first, it absolutely would have been possible to write something good with this cast of characters (minus making Charlotte Corday and Pauline Léon share a section).

The parts where the characters deal with their interpersonal relationships and grapple with misogyny are mostly fine — I say mostly, because as we’ll see, the political slant given to that misogyny is not without its problems. These are the parts that are obviously based on the authors’ personal experience and as such they ring true, if not always to an 18th century mentality, at least to that lived experience.

Finally, there are occasionally notes that are hit just fine from an historical perspective as well. The author of the section on Mme Élisabeth doesn’t shy away from making her a persistent advocate of violently repressing the Revolution. Manon Roland corresponds pretty well to the picture that emerges from her memoirs even if the author of her section does seem to agree with her that she was the voice of reason to the point of giving her “reasonable” opinions she didn’t actually hold.

I should also note that while the literary quality is not great, it’s not trying to be great literature and in any case, on that point at least, I’m not sure I could do better.

Ok, that’s enough being nice. Tune in next time for all the things that don’t work.

[microsuedemouse]

hhhhhhhhhhhhhwoof I hate fandom/ship drama

anyway I’ve been thinking about how. there is nothing, inherently wrong,, with being interested in exploring ships (or even non-romantic/non-sexual character dynamics!) that are unhealthy in-universe.

here’s something: there is value in recognising that a ship is unhealthy or toxic or abusive or whichever other descriptor you feel fits best. (I am going to be using ‘unhealthy’ as my umbrella word in this post; obviously it’s an understatement to call an abusive relationship ‘unhealthy’ but it’s still accurate and it encompasses the variety of things I’m talking about.) there is value in taking that as fact and acknowledging such in whatever exploratory work you may choose to create or engage in.

I wanna take a second here to clarify part of what I mean: it is not inherently wrong to enjoy an unhealthy ship, and you are not required to defend a ship as healthy/‘not abusive’ in order to justify your interest in it. this is a very weird result, imo, of purity culture and virtue signalling. when you have a healthy understanding of the difference between fiction and reality, and a recognition of what’s acceptable in reality and what’s compelling in fiction, it’s actually very worth exploring what interests and engages you about Fictional Bad Things.

you know that phenomenon where people love villains? a lot of discourse around purity culture naturally leads to the conclusion: “it is wrong to like villains.” most of us are capable of recognising that this... doesn’t make sense. because obviously, we aren’t - or at least, the great majority of us aren’t - claiming that we would like and support this person in reality, or that we would be entirely comfortable with the deeds they commit if those deeds took place in reality. we’re saying that the character appeals to and compels us for some reason, within fiction. that’s a different thing - and it’s usually a sign of good writing! it’s very worth exploring that experience: what about this villain makes you like them so much? what about them makes them relatable to you, or sympathetic to you, or perhaps even cathartic to you? these kinds of questions can offer both entertainment value and, possibly, some new insights into yourself as a person. those insights might turn out to be interesting and meaningless, or they might provide you with new ways to express yourself, or they might even offer you a new avenue for growth.

(moral purity often also extends to the conclusion ‘you shouldn’t enjoy stories in which the main character suffers, because it’s wrong to enjoy someone’s pain.’ we all know this makes no sense, because that includes most stories. a major reason human beings tell stories is to share in the emotional journey of a protagonist ultimately overcoming great obstacles. but anyway, this is a whole other issue, really.)

what I’m getting at is - the same can apply to ships. there are a few approaches to unhealthy ships, and I wouldn’t go so far as to say they stand on equal moral ground, but there are a variety of ways you might be able to explore them without it making you an inherently evil person, or whatever. it’s also worth noting that while, obviously, I’m expressing here what aligns with my moral position and encouraging you to think similarly - but, I also encourage you to think critically about your own moral positions. decide what is comfortable for you, and what feels right to engage with. it’s fine and it’s normal to draw your own lines in the sand and say, this is where the range of acceptable ends for me. I won’t support or engage with what’s on the other side.

to give a quick overview of some approaches I’m not as comfortable with: sometimes you’ll find a writer/artist/other fan who likes to depict a ship as totally healthy in a way that can only be described as out-of-character. sometimes this seems to be a denial of the actuality of the ship; I don’t like that so much because it’s often a refusal to acknowledge that their canonical behaviour/dynamic is bad. other times this is depicted as a sort of AU; this doesn’t bother me quite as much personally (often depending on what the writer’s overall attitudes seem to be) but it’s also often less interesting to me. in my experience, this is usually very self-indulgent work and has a lot more to do with the writer’s own experiences than with canon itself. which is fair, honestly. sometimes that’s cathartic for the writer and that’s enough - I don’t have to be into it personally to respect it.

another thing that crops up that’s kind of worrisome, imo, is when a writer/artist/etc. depicts the ship as in-character but denies that it’s unhealthy. now, in fairness, if you’re simply reading a fic or looking at a piece of fanart or something, you cannot always tell exactly how the creator thinks the ship actually operates. not everyone is always going to include a disclaimer that says ‘hey I don’t think this is actually Good.’ so try not to immediately ascribe intent to the writer/etc. unless you’ve seen them state outright somewhere: this isn’t abuse, it’s just cute! (or whatever it is they’re seeing.) at that point it is worth being concerned about what this person thinks constitutes a healthy relationship, and if you don’t feel good about supporting their work that’s entirely fair.

HOWEVER. there are also other approaches. two in particular stand out to me that I think are worth discussing. one is simply exploring the possibilities of an unhealthy relationship, with total acknowledgement of its flaws. one unhealthy dynamic that I admittedly find really engaging a lot of the time? ‘these two characters are Very obsessed with each other, and it sure ain’t healthy psychologically, but it’s definitely mutual.’ I love that shit. gimme a couple of unhinged, incredibly codependent pieces of shit, and you have my full attention. particularly if they’re on equal footing - if they’re damaging one another, it’s reciprocal, or at very least they’re both getting exactly what they want out of the relationship. obviously this would not be a dynamic I could support in real life! that’s terrible and I don’t want anyone to go through it! but in fictional characters it can be fascinating to explore. and if the content is going to upset or trigger certain fans: that’s why we use tags and warnings. AO3, where many of us go for a huge amount of our fan content, literally has a whole system in place for precisely this purpose: so we can let each other know what’s inside, and make informed choices about what we want to consume.

the other common approach is the redemption arc. it’s always gonna be up to you which characters you consider redeemable and which ones you don’t - that’s okay. again, it’s your choice what content to engage and what to pass over. but as people we’re traditionally very fond of the redemption arc story, and as fans we love to create the redemption arcs our favourite characters don’t get to live out in canon. because we love something about the character and want to explore them further. like I said earlier, that in itself is worth giving some thought to. sometimes we’ll even end up writing partial redemptions: this character goes from totally reprehensible to kind of appealingly awful. the ship goes from abusive to a much more regular level of fucked up. that can definitely be an interesting story in itself, and it’s okay if you want to explore it.

the main thing is that you always exercise your ability to think critically about what you’re consuming and why you like it - which, honestly, you should be trying to do all of the time, anyway. be clear about what you do and don’t endorse, about what your actual values are, about where you draw the line. (as both an example and a disclaimer, since I know I still have followers from A Certain Fandom where this cropped up a lot before I mostly dipped: one line that I personally draw, and always will, is at ships involving an adult and a literal child. I am not comfortable with exploring this even in the hypothetical space of fan content. it is too objectionable to be compelling.)

go forth. explore your unhealthy ships and shitty favourite characters. experiment and learn why they compel you. write properly-labelled fanfic about them hurting each other and loving it. just remember that everyone has different boundaries, and that fiction and reality are very separate spaces. acknowledge that what you’re enjoying is not inherently right or acceptable in real life just because you enjoy it in a story, and it doesn’t have to be. if you’re a content creator, consider portraying these things in such a way that your audience is well aware of your position on the matter, in order to help them also understand what is and isn’t healthy. be a ruthless writer and a kind person, and you’ll do just fine.

[editingmadness]

Writing Tip: Characters

In writing, especially regarding any sort of fiction, characters are going to be one of the core elements in any story. They will be our guides through an unfamiliar world (or at least an unfamiliar adventure), and it is up to you as the author whether we are to root for or against them at any given point.

Thus, it is crucial that they be intriguing, dynamic, and well-fleshed out. No one likes a one-dimensional, half-assed character, especially if our setting is on Earth (lookin’ at you, Anastasia Steele). This is a trap that I see a lot of beginning writers, fanfiction authors in particular, falling into. Characters that are designed with the intent of being projected upon are fine for some stories (Again, especially fanfiction), but a lot of the time this results in people going overboard and making characters that are meant to carry a serious plot line out, nothing but, well... boring.

To combat this, I suggest creating a character profile for each character (or at least, the most important 5 or 6, if there are too many), that you can refer to throughout the story. My character profiles include this information:

- Physical Traits

- Postitive Personality Traits

- Negative Personality Traits (Extremely important and often overlooked)

- Information (Backstory, family, health info, etc.)

- Quirks/Habits (What sets them apart from the other characters?)

These five sections are pretty baseline for developing any character, but they are a great place to start. Of course, a characer’s personality (again, especially negative traits, as these are what creative conflict) is the most important thing, all of these are absolutely vital to flesh out BEFORE the writing process can begin.

The best reason for this to avoid another mistake that I see in a lot of amateur fiction, which is OVER-describing characters. Now, there’s nothing wrong with description, and it certainly can make a story more vibrant for the reader. Characters that act or dress strangely, have a certain sort of beauty to them, or have specific defining traits are fascinating to read about and these should absolutely be mentioned.

Problems arise when all the detail comes at once. Most people do not sit and admire every single feature of an acquaintance on their first meeting. Not only is this disruptive to the flow of a story and distracting to the reader (at BEST), but over-description typically leads to the story having this... feeling that it was only created with this one character in mind, most often the protagonist, who is usually the victim of overdescription. It gives a certain cheapness to the story and steals depth away from other characters/storylines.

The benefit of having all this information written down beforehand is to clear up what I like to call “Writer Brain”, which is a state of mind you go into as a writer where you feel you must write down every thought that comes to your head. That way, you won’t forget it. Because of Writer Brain, often a lot more content than is necessary finds its way into a story. Write everything down that you want to say about a character, and this frees up your mind to focus on what information is necessary to directly include in the story, and what the reader can reasonably deduce for themself.

In all of this, remember that a story is a story, not a character. No matter how interesting a character is, they should never overshadow the theme, plot, or message that you are trying to convey with whatever it is you are writing. The best example of avoiding this is bestselling author Neil Gaiman, who puts so much more emphasis on his plot than his characters in The Ocean at the End of the Lane that the main character is not given a name throughout the entire book. And guess what? You never notice. It’s not important. Because the story is what you’re invested in - THAT is what’s getting you to turn the pages.

Now, obviously everyone’s style is different and I know that I personally enjoy creating intriguing characters to love and describe. But just bear in mind that a story is a delicate balance between characters and their interactions and the situation at hand. Maintaining this balance takes practice, and little steps such as creating a character profile or understating the descriptions can make a massive difference.

That wraps up this Writer’s Tip. I will be doing a part 2 on this soon because I definitely have more to say, but until then... Go forth and write, my darlings!

[miss-m-calling]

Chocolate Box 2021 letter

Dear writer,

Hello and thank you for writing for me!

I’m Miss_M on AO3. For all requests, I am asking for fic.

My requests this year are: American Gods (TV), The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (TV), Starred Up (2013 movie), Witchblade (TV), and Бeсa ǀ Besa (TV)

General likes:

-pre-canon, canon, post-canon, canon-divergent, and missing-scene stories

-character-driven as well as plot-driven stories

-fics which mix humor and angst/serious business (when this fits the canon)

-characters at work and play

-group dynamics, family dynamics (including constructed families), professional partnerships, friendships, alliances, rivalries, intimate couples (new lovers/first times as well as long-term/established couples), UST-ridden couples who are not just UST-ridden but connected in other ways too

-irony, snark, humor, angst -- all arising from the characters rather than the plot crowbaring it in

-linear, non-linear, and 5+1 stories

-hopeful endings, happy endings, bittersweet endings, “everything is awful but you’re here and maybe I don’t entirely hate that” endings

-worldbuilding

-spiky characters who keep their jagged edges and spikiness in adversity as well as when their lives are going well, square-peg-in-round-hole characters, tough characters with (maybe not so well) hidden vulnerabilities, characters who are their own worst enemies, characters who manage to get over themselves when the occasion calls for it, characters with conflicting values which may or may not be reconciled/resolved, characters who treat each other with respect and as equals even if they hate/annoy/can’t stand/love to dislike each other, characters who may not be exactly friends and may well irritate one another but manage to rub along to get the job done and maybe even grow to care about one another (much to their surprise/reluctance/discomfort), characters who just cannot get along with each other or find common ground

-workplace stories (this can mean anything from an actual workplace/casefic/procedural setting to anything that revolves around the canon world in which the characters live) in which the characters get to be competent

Shippy and smutty likes:

-(where it fits the characters) banter

-competitiveness or antagonism shading into attraction (this tension need not be resolved)

-”oh god why did it have to be you what did I do to deserve this“

-”come here and say it to my face/do that again/kiss me, you motherfucker”

-bickering yet loving couples

-characters who are serious about their romantic interests

-characters who think they are much better at flirtation than they actually are

-characters forced to work together only to prove much more compatible than they initially assumed

-fics which mix an exploration of characters’ professional and everyday lives with shipping

-characters who are incompatible in some important way (they are ideological enemies, cop and criminal, spies from opposite sides, or there has been betrayal!!!), and while they love and/or want each other, they’re not willing to change sides or abandon/compromise their identity/beliefs for the other’s benefit

-I don’t know how better to phrase this than: smut which fits the characters; how does their canon dynamics spill over into hubba hubba stuff?

-sexual scenarios that subvert expectations a little and surprise the characters themselves

-sexual scenarios that contain an element of competition or antagonism

-"this is a bad idea but we’re going for it hammer and tongs”

-not wanting to admit feelings or show vulnerability except oops it happens anyway, whether the characters acknowledge it or not

-characters getting way more into the sex or being more affected by it than they thought they would

-quick and intense sex, slow and intense sex, rough yet willing sex (when it fits the characters), unexpectedly emotional and/or tender sex

-masturbation while thinking of the other half of the ship (or not wanting to think about them only oops there they are in the fantasy!)

-first time sex

-established relationship, we-know-each-other-so-well sex

-”we’ve both wanted this and now we both know it so here we go diving in headfirst” sex

-for het and/or slash, oral, vaginal, anal incl. pegging, manual (ifyouknowwhatImean) -- all is good. You can go as veiled or as explicit as you like, but please avoid excessive medical jargon – I don’t find a lot of mention of “penis” or “clit” sexy.

Ship/smut DNWs:

MPREG, A/B/O, knotting D/s, formalized BDSM, painful sex, hard kinks (holding someone down playfully, hair pulling and such like, the odd spank are a-OK) scat, watersports knife/gun/blood play incest deaging/infantilization, mommy/daddy kink under-16yos in sexual situations humiliation body distortion/horror (feeding/weight kink, come inflation, vore, etc.) unrequested ships/pairings soulmates and soul marks pregnancy and children (can be mentioned if canon, just don’t make the whole fic about them) wedding setting/theme secondary characters shipping the main pair like it’s their job xeno, tentacles, bestiality noncon/dubcon

Other DNWs:

torture and abuse (this and noncon/dubcon can be mentioned, but please don’t dwell on it in loving detail or subject any of my requested characters to it) descriptions of vomit, shit, and piss (”He pissed up against a tree” and the like is fine), toilet humor lots of gore/blood (mention it, yes; lovingly describe it, no), cannibalism, serious illness or injury character bashing genderswap/genderbent characters, characters as kids/young teens issuefic, gender/sexuality/race/ethnicity/religion/ability/identity headcanons death of requested characters hopeless, unrelenting gloom/angst/horror RL holiday setting/theme, RL religions as a major theme (invented fictional holidays and rituals are fine) reference to RL current events 1st and 2nd person POV unrequested crossovers or fusions AUs which have nothing to do with canon fic written in lapslock

FANDOMS:

American Gods (TV)

Laura Moon/Mad Sweeney

I ship it. Yes I do. They had me at “gimme-my-coin-dead-wife”-flicks-him-into-wall. The snarky road trip was the best thing I never knew I wanted until it happened, and I adored every second of it, not to mention the upped shippiness in S2. They’re both such assholes and so fascinating, even if they start to mellow toward each other a bit, and all the gods/magic/resurrection stuff swirling around them begs to be explored further. Also I love love love how their dynamic is about equal parts spikiness, pathos, and humor (they’re funny! and the canon doesn’t shy away from putting them in ludicrous situations), and it weaves seamlessly between those three. Plus she’s half his size yet can and does beat him up with literally one finger, and then there’s the angst of he having killed her, feeling really guilty about it, and then bringing her back. And the way that their New Orleans adventure makes clear they have feelings for each other but neither wants to admit it. And and and… yeah, I just love them.

Even if some of my prompts are about stuff that’s addressed or hinted at in canon, feel free to diverge – canon divergences and canon-adjacent stories are my jam, as are missing scenes and post-canon stories! Also, I’ve read the book, so feel free to riff on that if you want.

Canon-specific DNWs: Laura as Essie or Sweeney's wife's reincarnation/descendant or lots of comparing her to them, Sweeney staying dead, any S3 spoilers.

Exception to blanket DNW about blood/gore/bodily fluids: describing the physical decay of the living undead (undead? there but for the grace of magic coins dead?) is fine!

Prompts:

-Laura discovers (how? you decide!) that Sweeney gave her back the coin after their accident – whatever happens next, some punching may be involved.

-Wednesday’s big war finally comes, and “don’t you dare die on me [again], you asshole” is a line either Sweeney or Laura (or both) might say to each other.

-Laura asked “What does Wednesday have to lose?” and the answer is…? (Yes, give me that sweet poetic justice. One possibility, though not remotely the only one, but as of S2E3 Laura is technically a god-killer...) Or later when she straight-up says she’s going to kill Wednesday, but is warned to bring power with her when she does, how does that work? How else might she damage Wednesday or ruin his plans, just in case she can’t actually kill him?

-At the end of S2, Laura hoists Sweeney’s dead body over her shoulders and strides off, seemingly leaving Cairo, Shadow, and all of it behind. Tell me what happens then – does she use Baron Samedi’s potion to bring him back, and whose is the blood filled with love she uses (does she still bleed? You could get creative here, worldbuilding is also my jam)? Does her/his coin play a part – and how come the coin still “powers” Laura despite Sweeney’s death? Does she bring him back another way, maybe figuring out how to keep herself around and be able to give Sweeney back his coin? Does he come back like she did, more undead than alive, or does his godhead, however depleted, help with that? That still leaves Laura to be fully resurrected too… Or does something completely out of left field happen – surprise me!

-Possible divergences from “Treasure of the Sun”: Sweeney manages to kill Wednesday, and then Laura rolls up, and then…? Or Laura rolls up and makes like Mama-Ji told her – destroys some motherfuckers? Or Sweeney gets killed temporarily but Laura brings him back, or brings herself back, or does something else with the Baron’s potion, and is Sweeney’s blood the one filled with love, or can we interpret voodoo spells in a non-literal way? Or what happens with Gungnir hidden in Sweeney’s hoard? And definitely how do they deal with each other once they meet up in Cairo, given how they parted in New Orleans?

-Or how about a wild divergence from the last several episodes of S2? Sweeney and Laura manage to settle their differences (ahem, more fucking, on this plane of reality, might help) and don’t part ways before leaving NOLA. Or they roll up in Cairo separately but at the same time, and confront Wednesday together, and neither of them die (or die more, in her case). Or they’re there together when the police nearly raid the house. Or they have Wednesday (the ultimate cause of Laura’s death) and Ibis (a death deity) and Bilquis (a love/death/life deity) on hand, surely they can concoct some kind of resurrection thingamajig for Laura, and if they have to twist some divine arms then so be it. Or or or…?

-Wednesday told that luckless cop that Sweeney had been against the big gods’ war from the start, and while Wednesday lies, what if Sweeney decided much sooner to say to hell with Grimnir and his war and his having Sweeney kill random people? I’m guessing Sweeney too drank three glasses of mead so he can’t back out without dire consequence – but he does have a fierce, dead woman in his corner.

-They go to some as-yet-unnamed old god (feel free to bring in whatever mythology you want) in order to bring Laura back to life. Between Sweeney’s mouth and temper, and Laura’s mouth and temper, it doesn’t go well. Now one or both of them are in big magical trouble with a pissed-off deity and have to get themselves/each other out of it. Speaking of other deities, I really enjoyed their brief canon interactions with Ostara, Anansi, and Mama-Ji, and I’d like to see more of that, especially Ostara’s polite yet over-it attitude, Anansi very obvious over-it attitude and his dramatic flair, or Mama-Ji being one of the few capable of giving Laura pause.

-All the petty, ridiculous ways in which Sweeney’s bad luck manifests itself make me laugh (can’t help it, won’t even try), and I’m down for more variations on that theme.

-Sweeney and Laura fighting together, like they did on Mr. Town’s train of torture. Whether it’s a bar fight of their own making, or the big gods’ war they find themselves embroiled in, or something else entirely.

-Things happen and Laura finds herself in the position to throw Sweeney under the bus but also help/save him, and while he knows it’s only karma (he did kill her way back when), he can still be pissed off about it – how do they navigate this?

-Related to that, the Baron said: “In death is her true love, but she betrays him also.” If that meant Sweeney, or can mean Sweeney in the future (I don’t like destiny-wills-it stories, and they’re definitely not there yet, but they could maybe get there at some future point, and even then It Would Be Complicated), was the betrayal Laura rejecting him after the loa ‘fuck them,’ or is it something that hasn’t happened yet, and if so, what?

-Laura gets fully alive again, but traces of her (un)dead state remain – what are they, how does she cope, what price did she/he/they have to pay for her resurrection, and how does their relationship change? I’d especially be curious how it would work if they’re already a sorta-maybe-item and then she’s alive again and it’s weird in a new way.

-For reasons I’ll leave up to you, Sweeney and Laura have to stay put in a single place for a while and end up essentially cohabiting, regardless of what their relationship is at that point. Take “cohabiting” as literally or as creatively as you want – in any case, I’m sure it will be marvelously disastrous and amazing. If the place they have to stay happens to be NOLA, all the better, I find everything about that city fascinating. Or, if you wanted to use book canon, Laura and Sweeney (rather than Shadow) are the ones who have to spend time living in Lakeside and deal with its creepy Norman Rockwell-ness and with Hinzelmann.

-Slight or major AU from the opening of “The Ways of the Dead”: Laura has hitchhiked with Sweeney instead of going off in a huff with Wednesday, or she otherwise gets to New Orleans sooner, and she and Sweeney tear up the town together. Maybe they even cross the paths of some loa and it doesn’t get all angsty. They were actually getting along nicely in those first couple of scenes in NOLA, only ribbing each other a little while still being their grouchy selves, before they got to Le Coq Noir. I wouldn’t have minded seeing some more of that.

-AU from the end of “The Ways of the Dead”: they still have their big fight (which was amazing as well as painful) or some variation thereof, but they don’t split up. (Maybe the reason is as mundane as Sweeney refusing to get left behind or they have a shared ride out of town, or maybe the more time passes the less Sweeney can afford to be far from his coin – or maybe the coin needs him close by to work at full capacity.) And then what?

-All the old gods hide their true appearance to an extent. A situation arises in which Laura sees Sweeney’s true, or at least old, self. Or Wednesday’s war ends in victory, meaning the old gods again get belief, worship, and sacrifices. How does Laura, the ultimate skeptic even when she’s on the other side of the mirror, react? How does this new knowledge and new reality change her opinion of/attitude to Sweeney? Or to flip that around, if Sweeney were again relevant and believed-in, would that actually change his bad attitude and fix his issues (my guess is it would be complicated)? On that note, Sweeney’s decline from Lugh to king to leprechaun was more sketched in than really explored in canon, ditto I didn’t really get why he couldn’t seem to remember his own history except in snatches (the curse that made him a bird/madman of the woods?) – I’d love to see more about it and his (not) dealing with it, or with a reversal of that decline. Eorann told him long ago to adapt and change with the times – but what does that mean after humpteen centuries in a rut and becoming used to always feeling angry and unappreciated?

-The power of names, since they never use each other’s in canon: for all his “dead wifeing,” there comes a time when Sweeney (has to) call her by her actual name, and that’s a tricky moment for them to navigate. Or, Mad Sweeney is not his actual name, and true names have great magical power and so must be kept secret; Laura discovers or learns his name, from someone else or from himself; what does she do with that knowledge? Or, Sweeney gets to say “cunt” in a situation (sexual or otherwise) where, not only does Laura not peel his lips from his gums, but she finds that she can’t object, even though she knows that he knows that he’s getting away with it.

-They’re both so complicated and contradictory and spiky, but they also start to care and rely on each other - and react really badly when they (think the other one) betrayed them. I would like to see those nuances explored some more and/or to see Laura and Sweeney get to a point where they trust each other and rely on each other, and know it and accept it, however difficult the getting there and being there may be for them.

-Sweeney and Laura get drunk and wake up married. Or some sex and/or blood resurrection spell results in basically an unbreakable marriage bond, whether it also secures resurrection or not. Or marrying the dead keeps them (sorta) alive. Or being married makes it possible for them to share magical/supernatural abilities. They’re both pissed about it, but secretly having to make it work may not be the worst thing that’s ever happened...

-My perfect AG spinoff would basically be Sweeney and Laura tooling around America, looking to get her resurrected (whether they succeed or not is up to you), stealing ever more ridiculous vehicles, arguing/fighting and having those pesky moments where vulnerability and genuineness creep in – and fucking. So yessiree I’d be down for porn, including “it’s technically necrophilia/zombiesex” porn, including a canon-divergent first time, or their second time, or all the later times after they had their first time in NOLA in canon.

-If you wanted to throw in some worldbuilding, maybe something exploring living death. Magical bargains. What kind of favor did Sweeney do for Ostara that would be worth her bringing someone back to life as repayment? What other powers might Sweeney have – or have left from when he was Lugh? How long can a dead wife keep going before she’s “soup”? What other superhuman abilities might dead!Laura have? Can the dead do magic? What even are the rules governing and the limits of different beings’ magical abilities? For example, why can’t Sweeney just take his coin back, or why does Laura gain super-strength as part of her undead package deal? Is the hoard in the same space as the behind-the-scenes accessed through the merry-go-round, or it’s a different place? Why does the coin seem to start to “run down” the longer Laura has it? Why did Wednesday need Laura to kill Argus when he killed Vulcan himself just fine? What happens with Gungnir now it’s in the hoard – can only Sweeney get to it, has it been transformed somehow (it’s now the treasure of the sun), etc.?

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (TV)

Lenny Bruce/Miriam “Midge” Maisel/Susie Myerson

Lenny Bruce & Miriam “Midge” Maisel & Susie Myerson

Lenny Bruce/Miriam “Midge” Maisel & Miriam “Midge” Maisel/Susie Myerson

I’m here for Midge’s adventures in the intoxicating, foul-mouthed, and often-frustrating world of comedy, so her dynamic with Susie and Lenny is where it’s at. Shippy or platonic, I just love the interactions between these three, and between every pair combination among them: Midge and Susie bantering and swearing and tits-upping even when they irritate each other, Midge and Lenny bringing the pathos as well as the humor, and Lenny and Susie both being hardened old pros with still a little glimmer of starry eyes. I am good with L/M/S or L&M&S or L/M & M/S – so, if you go the shippy route, either a V-shaped triad or hey, Susie (whom I absolutely read as gay) might find a way to be good with a full-on triangle… If you want to keep it platonic, True Companions all the way, always there for each other, even when they want to strangle each other. And as much as I like the comedy inherent in the characters, I also love that they’re all three, each in their own way, messed up people and dysfunctional to various degrees. So yeah, I just want Midge to hand the kids over to her parents, ditch Joel once and for all, marry (interpret that as literally or as loosely as you want) both Susie and Lenny, and for the three of them to ride off into the sunset to make comedy history.

Canon-specific DNWs: explicit sex (so nothing above M rating for sex), pairing any two as a / couple with the third as a & hanger-on, Lenny can still be his RL messed-up, drugged-up self – albeit the gentler version the show gives us – but I don’t want him dying if your fic is set in 1966 or after.

Prompts (most of these are from before S3 dropped, feel free to work with canon or diverge however you see fit -- I am all caught up with S3):

-Does Susie manage them both? Does Midge open for Lenny on tour? Does he open for her??? Or they become equal stars on the comedy circuit?

-Maybe Lenny joins Shy Baldwin’s tour, or they run into him while touring Europe or the US, or after Shy fires Midge, Midge and Susie cobble together a Midge-only tour of America and keep crossing Lenny’s own touring path, and they all tool around, and yes I would love as much period detail and geography porn as you can throw at me. And while Lenny and Midge have seen the world, Susie hasn’t – her reaction to different foods, languages, customs, landscapes would be spectacular to witness. Especially if “different” is someplace as close to New York as Jersey or Connecticut, or someplace as far away and different as, say, Japan.

-If they do go to Europe, somehow or other they also tour the Soviet Bloc. Cue culture clashes, getting followed (or thinking they’re being followed) by the secret police, getting hammered on vodka and herring and pickles, and then when they get back to the States, the Feds grill them. It’s all dead serious, and Midge and Lenny refuse to take it as seriously as they should, while Susie is trying but the whole thing is really pissing her off…

-Lenny’s burned out, and Midge is just getting started. This dissonance may or may not find some sort of resolution. One thing’s for sure: Susie has limited patience for both Lenny’s depression and Midge’s need to make everything pretty.

-Instead of going to Joel for a no-way-is-that-closure fling after the Steve Allen Show taping, Midge goes to have a drink or seven with the two people who have, in their own ways, always been there for her and never let her down.

-Midge goes on TV again, this time as the star: longer set, prime time slot, dressing room, the works. She’s dying of nerves. Lenny and Susie coach her through it.

-More radio work to make ends meet in between gigs: hilaribad period ads, hilaribad radio drama, running all over town to be on time, getting paid in all kinds of dubious merch…

-Midge and Susie head out west to make it big and stay with Lenny once they’re in Los Angeles, and it’s marvelous (ha ha) and disastrous in equal measure.

-More of Susie being the hypercompetent manager we saw especially in S3! (And please don’t dwell on her gambling problem, I was not a fan.)

-They all three get drunk, maybe with a hint of sadness if it’s the holidays (you can ignore my DNW about holidays, but please let that be just the background, not the lynchpin of the story) or someone’s birthday, and there’s a bar fight, running from the cops, eating greasy food at ass o’clock, and possibly kissing, not necessarily in that order.

-One or two or all three of them get arrested/have court appearances all over America and have to bail each other out, or find someone to bail them all out, or secure legal counsel – you get the drift. Or all three of them are trying to explain to a single lawyer what happened, talking over each other, the two pros not being able to resist landing zingers and Susie not being far behind, and the lawyer just getting more and more confused.

-They get in trouble some other way – offended patrons, surly management, shitty hotels, tour bus breaks down in the middle of Wyoming – and have to have each other’s backs because no one else will.

-Three-person road trip or tour, and only Susie knows how to drive. So Midge decides to learn, right then and there. And Lenny… Lenny may or may not be too lazy/hungover/lying about not knowing how. There’s supposed to be a rotation so everyone gets to stretch out on the back seat for equal lengths of time, but you know the system doesn’t work too well in practice. Also, they play games in the car to while away the time, and they do it their own way of course: I spy, cows on my side, yellow car, never have I ever, 20 questions, or riffing on whatever’s playing on the radio…

-They sit down to watch the moon landing (you can move it up a bit so it’s not happening a whole decade after S2) – by which I mean, Midge is all gung-ho about the moon landing, and Lenny and Susie are like whatever – and things don’t quite go to plan, but a good time is eventually had by all.

-It’s Yom Kippur again, and Midge wants to do the whole production: synagogue, breaking fast, the lot. Lenny and Susie would rather eat glass. Midge gets her way, of course. Does she decide to bring Susie and Lenny home to meet – or meet properly – her parents??? I bet Abe and Rose’s reactions would be something to see. (This too is an exception to my DNW about holiday settings – I just want stuff to get as crazy as it did the two times we saw Yom Kippur celebrated on the show, and for everything to still somehow turn out relatively OK.)

-Midge and Lenny have cheered each other up when the going got extra rough. I want for Susie to be especially down in the dumps – maybe her boozehound of a mother died and Susie took it worse than she does in canon, maybe some asshole told her she’s a shit manager and got her right in her insecurities – and Midge to rope Lenny into trying to cheer her up. And for Susie to fight them every step of the way but still be glad they care enough to try.

-Inspired by Susie’s brother looking just like her, by which I mean she and he and their sister look nothing alike, and by Lenny’s “she’s my mother” quip about Midge at the TV studio and then his “let me introduce my wife or maybe my sister” in Miami – Midge, Susie, and Lenny pretend to all be blood relatives, or mafiosi, or spies, or something else they’re not, while out in public, say in a restaurant. Just to be assholes and see how long they can keep it going before they break character or people figure them out, or call the cops, or something. There’s totally a bet on who corpses and breaks character first. Or, nice hotels ca. 1960 weren’t very big on letting unmarried couples, let alone threesomes stay in rooms together – pretending to be family might make that easier; forgetting what they’re meant to be to each other, or mixing up their backstories might make it harder. This could also work platonically, if they’re trying to save money by only getting one room, there only being one free room in the hotel, or for any other screwball reason you can invent.

-Lenny and Midge do a (comeback) tour of the Borscht Belt, and all the Steiner Mountain Resort guests (especially the gossipy old hens from the beauty salon) and staff go to see them – and heckle.

-Stuff happens and they end up performing at some hole in the wall place where no one knows who they are (or no one believes it’s really those people they’ve seen on TV) – tough crowd, but a good workout for the two comics, and if Susie gets to threaten to rip off someone’s head, all the better.

-Lenny and Midge honing their routines – and maybe developing a double act – and Susie being all “oh my fucking god, what the fuck!!! … They’re actually good. I’m so proud.”

-Sharing a bed with two other people is an ongoing project: who sleeps (or refuses to sleep) in the middle? Who gets up during the night and why? Who starfishes across most of the bed? Who snores, and how does this get handled? If alcohol or pot have happened, how does that affect the sleeping arrangements? Also, Susie and Lenny witness and react to Midge’s beauty routine, ‘nuff said. Or, for various reasons one person after another ends up decamping to another room/bed/couch, but it doesn’t help them get much sleep or even stay there very long (this is inspired by my love of Shirley Jackson and her short story/humorous essay “The Night We All Had Grippe”). If you prefer to keep it platonic, most of this would work if they’re just sharing a double bedroom on tour (I leave the reason for why Lenny is bunking with the women up to you).

Starred Up (2013 movie)

Oliver Baumer/Eric Love

Yes I do ship it, I do, I do!

Ahem. Don’t get me wrong, I liked what the movie did with the father-son relationship and its influence on both men’s character development – but I really wish they hadn’t got Oliver out of the action before the story’s climax (not like that!). The final denouement with Love father and Love son was great, as was the hint at the end that Eric learned something in anger-management group and has a support network that will help him a lot. But. I would have wanted to see more of the intriguing dynamic between Eric the intelligent, semi-feral, yet not-incorrigible, young thug and Oliver the educated, dedicated, kind yet aware of his own potential for violence (what was he on about with “I need to be here”?), slightly older counselor. They had me at Oliver’s “I want him” and Eric later telling his father that Oliver’s a better man than Love Sr. Also the not-flirting and the push-pull in the scene when Oliver picks up Eric from his cell - yowza!

Exception to blanket DNW: dubcon is a-okay! If you decide to go there, my preferred flavors of dubcon for this canon are: power differential makes it a bad idea but they do it anyway; “I know you want this”; “if the answer’s no/you’re only doing this for a dare or to prove a point, then why are you enjoying this so much [as am I]?”; no no yes a.k.a. starts as dubcon (or one of them thinks they’re dubconning the other), becomes enthusiastic consent. 

Also, if this is relevant or makes you nervous about writing for me, Eric would be 18-19, and Oliver is maybe 10-12 years older – and I like it!!! (The actors were 22 and 31 when the movie was made, FWIW.)

Prompts:

-I would love to see Oliver return to holding his group in prison, so the two of them can interact more, either in the movie’s immediate aftermath or years down the line, as it’s implied that Eric will be serving a long sentence. Give me more scenes from anger management or the ribald, honest, free-flowing conversations in group, either with the other men present (I liked Hassan and Tyrone especially, among the group members) or a one-on-one session.

-An oblique or open-but-undramatic admission/declaration that they both know there’s something there, even if they don’t know what to do with it. Or, one or both of them knows exactly what to do with it, and the push-pull that would result from that.

-Dirty talk: used for arousal, as a defense mechanism, as a form of flirtation. Eric using slurs to assert dominance, and Oliver not letting him hide behind profanity, when he can use colorful language to express emotion and/or sexual interest. There could definitely be some verbal taunting/flirting about who wants/is eager to do what or is good at doing something. There may be some sniping comments about logistics and (lack of) condoms and barebacking and what men get up to in prison. There probably wouldn’t be deep discussions about sexual identity.

-An emergency in the prison requires a lock-down, so Oliver gets temporarily stuck in Eric’s cell or another room with only Eric for company. Things get porny and/or emotional.

-Eric is eventually released (you can handwave this so it happens soon after the movie or have it happen years later) and crashes with Oliver while he adjusts to the outside world. You guessed it: things get porny and/or emotional.

-How do they get to the point where both can cross that line from friends/whatever the hell they are and become, to lovers? (There’s Eric’s personal history and general discomfort with vulnerability, plus all the ways prison sex can be or make things complicated, and if it helps, I headcanon Oliver as either gay or bi and at least somewhat closeted, at work especially.) Who initiates and “directs traffic”? How does their always-contentious dynamic shift during and after sex? Is the sex an isolated (series of) occasion(s), or a progression/escalation over multiple encounters (how would I love especially an escalating series of encounters, let me count the ways)? Eric might seem like the logical initiator and/or dominant partner as well as using the possibility of sex to manipulate and exert control, but then Oliver might (or might not!) surprise him and is definitely the one more in touch with himself as well as aware of his custodial duty toward the men in the group.

-At some point in their intimate relationship (probably not right at the start, and probably not in prison, though if you can make it happen in prison, more power to you!), Oliver decides he’s going to take his sweet time and make Eric fall absolutely apart with pleasure, while using dirty talk to both arouse and empower Eric to own his desires – by that point, Eric is in a place where he can let that happen and enjoy it, even if he still talks tough.

-Or how about this: Eric gets out, relationship happens or is in the process of being negotiated, and while physical intimacy is a whooooole neeeeeew woooorld, you know what else would be cool? Phone sex. Yep. Or even, Eric gets himself one of those secret prison burner phones (preferably hidden somewhere that’s not someone’s arse), and… phone sex after lights-out and lock-down. Maybe nothing (much) has happened physically (yet), so phone sex can be a building block to that or one facet of that deepening intimacy.

Witchblade (TV) Sara Pezzini/Danny Woo

Sara Pezzini & Danny Woo

I used to love this show back in the day, and loved it again in all its hokey gloriousness when I rewatched it recently. Sara figuring things out and being a principled badass, but maybe out of her depth with the Witchblade, and her dynamic with Danny, whether he's a ghost or alive, it’s all catnip to me. Sara is not extremely quippy, she has a job to do dammit! and don’t look at her vulnerable side, just don’t look at it!, and I love that about her (she’s much harsher in S1, after Danny’s death, than in S2); ditto that Danny is somewhat softer than she is, but still can hold his own thanksverymuch (well, when the plot doesn’t require him to get nabbed by bad guys) and has a bit of a deadpan snarker side too. I’d love something that plays around with their canon dynamic from either season, or uses canon as just a starting point. Gen is good, shippy (incl. porny) is good. Some of my prompts lean dark or horror-y, so don’t be shy about going there; I’d also enjoy a story in which the Witchblade itself ends up not being very significant (say, they start to investigate a possibly mystical case and then nope, plain murder). BTW I really like Conchobar too, so if you want to include him (that means also Conchobar Lives AUs), his relationship (current or past) with Sara, or his canonical death somehow, go for it!

Canon-specific DNWs: Irons and any version of Nottingham appearing (you can mention them if you need to).

Exception to blanket DNW: dubcon is fine (see first prompt).

Prompts:

-The Witchblade is more parasitic than symbiotic, and instead of Sara learning to control it, its feeding on Sara affects her more and more over time. Or, the visions and dreams ramp up into full-blown paranoia and/or disassociation. The Witchblade's POV, maybe (it is sentient)? Asking for help is the hardest thing for someone like Sara, but what are (more than) friends for? I’d also enjoy a dubcon scenario where Sara really shouldn’t be having sex when her head is all messed up by the Witchblade’s influence, but… well… they do. The Witchblade canonically enjoys violence and bloodshed perpetrated by its wearers, so it stands to reason that it might lower other inhibitions too.

-Witchblade v. mythological monsters. In S1, even with everything else that's going on, Sara absolutely scoffs at the possibility of vampires. So of course I want: Witchblade v. vampires! The scarier and more feral, the better. Or, it's implied that the Witchblade was forged from a meteorite, so it's basically an eldritch artefact from outer space. Yes, please lean all the way into the Lovecraftian tropes! (The moon is turning red, the Old Ones are back, it’s the end of the world as we know it, but Sara’s got her partner by her side.) Or something from Chinese mythology, so Danny can kick extra ass. Or, for a silly take on Chinese culture: Sara and Danny in the world of Big Trouble in Little China (another old fave of mine, the entire plot of which revolves around… a woman with green eyes and an unwanted connection to the supernatural).

-The Witchblade has a reputation for abandoning its wearers just when they need it the most. True to form, it slips off of Sara’s fist, leaving her and Danny to save themselves with good old-fashioned guns, fisticuffs, martial arts, and of course having each other’s back.

-More of the psychedelic-ness in many of Sara’s fight scenes, where now she’s a woman in a leather jacket with a gauntlet on her arm, now she’s a knight in armor! Now her opponent is human, now he’s a wolf-shaped spirit of evil and hatred! Playing around with the characters’ senses and perceptions – yes!

-Instead of seeing only Danny and needing him to play intermediary for Sara to talk to other ghosts, the Witchblade makes Sara see ghosts all over the place, and it's getting to her. Ghost!Danny may or may not help with that. Or, ghost!Danny is basically always around, whether Sara can see him or not. He manifests when Sara is masturbating, and you can't really feel guilty if the ghost of your dead partner whom you’ve always had a thing for helps you out, and anyway you’re probably going crazy and none of this is real, so it doesn’t count anyway... right?

-Case fic/stakeouts and banter. Flirting/ribbing/joshing to pass the long and stressful days at work.

-Quick and guilty sex because Danny's married. Slow and intense sex if handwave he's not married but “oh noes we’re partners, we shouldn’t be doing this, but somehow we keep doing it anyway.” Hooking up in the car. I've always headcanoned that they had a thing pre-canon which ended for Reasons, but they both kinda wish it hadn't, hence the hand kissing, and the “I can’t even touch you,” and the coffee bringing/stealing, etc. So feel free to play around with that.

-Undercover as married, undercover as a gangster and his moll (LOL at Sara as a moll, or have Sara as the gangster and Danny as her arm candy), undercover as “they think we’re fucking, better fake it real good for the people listening in, oops shit got real fast, careful don’t say each other’s real name or you’ll blow your cover.”

-More timey-wimey shenanigans with the Witchblade. Maybe it allows Sara to manipulate time more than once. Maybe she starts doing it way too often, throwing the continuum out of whack (something non-linear would be very interesting). Maybe she and/or Danny remember some or all of what happened in S1. Something about all the multiverse versions of them, possibly splitting off from a dramatic moment. Time loops and feelings are a combustible mix.

-Apart from the pretty obvious shippiness, what I like about S1 especially is how Sara rolls with the weirdness the Witchblade has brought into her life, instead of reaching for rational explanations. More of that (I can't think of a better way to put it), and double extra brownie points if alive!Danny figures out at least some of what's going on with Sara's bracelet and somehow gets in on the action. Maybe a Danny saves the day divergence? Or how about a loophole that allows a man close to the Witchblade's wearer to wield it temporarily, but There Is a Price to Pay.

Бeсa ǀ Besa (TV)

Dardan Berisha/Petrit Koci

Skënder Berisha & Petrit Koci

Teuta Berisha/Petrit Koci

Divna Dukić/Petrit Koci

Petrit Koci/Marija Perić

Petrit Koci/Uroš Perić

My longest of long-shot requests! If you already know and like this canon, yeeees come sit with me. If you don’t know it, here’s a quick intro: this is a crime drama, one 12-episode season so far, produced in Serbia and created by Tony Jordan of “Hustle” fame. Set in (and with a cast including actors from) several ex-Yugoslav states, the story follows three main characters: a Serbian family man and regular joe who accidentally kills the daughter of a major Kosovar Albanian crime boss in a car accident; said Albanian crime boss who coerces his daughter’s unwitting killer to start working for him as an assassin; and a half-Albanian, half-Serbian Interpol agent (Petrit Koci) who’s after the crime boss but starts investigating the regular joe turned assassin as well.

The show has a twisty plot, gritty and handsome visuals, excellent performances, and a great through-line of deconstructing Balkan machismo and patriarchal culture. All three of the main characters have an image of themselves as MEN who Provide and/or Take Care of Business and Put Family First, each in their own way, and all three end up compromising on all their principles by season’s end. The women in the show’s ‘verse sometimes become collateral damage but also assert themselves in unexpected ways, which is great. The title refers to the Albanian (but more broadly, Balkan) cultural concept that one’s promise/vow/word of honor has to be kept and carried out no matter what, at peril of losing face, dishonoring both oneself and one’s family, even death. This gets deconstructed five ways from Sunday too, and it is awesome.

If you glance at the pairings I’m requesting, I think you can guess who my favorite character is. :-) Koci is so committed to being the “good sheriff” and carrying out his professional duty regardless of whom he has to piss off along the way, but is also often quite ineffectual because the local police forces with which he has to cooperate tend to resent both his attitude and his ethnic background – not to mention that when everyone’s corrupt and compromised, the man who refuses to play the game makes lots of enemies. He’s also a real hard-ass who made a conscious choice long ago to have nothing in his life but his work, is a bit of a bastard, has a huge blind spot about gender which comes back to bite him, and ultimately is driven by a desire for personal vendetta more than an abstract commitment to justice (I love a character who is super focused on their goal and presents themselves as invulnerable, yet whose insecurities and traumas are always just beneath the surface of what drives them). And yes, by the end of the season he’s presented with a Faustian bargain and gets a huge target on his back. There’s a lot to unpack there!

I will eat up any local color you want to throw in. Ditto, the canon is super intense, but if you find a way to bring in some vintage Balkan pitch-black humor, I’m here for it. If you wanted to include some dialogue or phrases or hey write the whole fic in any variation of what used to be called Serbo-Croatian, I’m here for that with bells on! (Unless you’re writing smut – I just can’t with E-rated prose in Slavic languages, sorry.) Alas, I do not read Albanian, but if you want to include dialogue/phrases in it, go for it, so long as you tell me (in parentheses, in footnotes, whatever works) what’s going on.

Canon-specific DNW: soapboxing about Balkan history/conflicts/ethnic relations (the characters can clash about this, use stereotypes, etc. – I just don’t want the fic to be an excuse for the writer’s hot takes, ‘kay?)

Exceptions to blanket DNWs: RL current events being mentioned + dubcon *but* for M/F ships I want both characters to be motivated by anger/revenge/general existential bleakness/whathaveyou instead of or as well as lust, so just no M/f dubcon, please!

Prompts:

-Any of my requested pairings in any kind of casefic, either a divergence, something pre- or post-canon, or a side investigation spinning off from the canon’s central plot. Anything that requires Koci to again traipse all over former Yugoslavia, butt heads with everyone, interrogate people, and do that soft-spoken “you don’t want to give me what I want but you’ll do it anyway” thing he does along the way. 

-Something that requires Koci to use his knowledge of Albanian language and culture even more than in canon. I love how the canon depicts the existential discomfort of never fully fitting into – or being accepted by – either of the cultures/communities to which one has a connection, and how a person can become antagonistic and volatile as a result. Leaning into that would be wonderful.

-Koci has devoted his whole life to bringing down the Berisha clan. With the help or hindrance of any of the other requested characters, he finally gets his wish. Now what?

-Maybe the other character has to turn to Interpol for help/becomes a material witness/gets arrested/enters witness protection, or otherwise has to do teeth-clenched teamwork with Koci. For / pairings, the shippiness doesn’t have to be overt -- antagonism, barely finding common ground, something that reads more like gen or shippy gen than explicit shippiness is fine! If the relationship turns porny, the antagonism (I keep using that word because it fits!) and complicated dynamics and maybe a reluctant recognition that they’re not so different would perpetuate themselves in the porn too, and I’m here for it.

-A few words about the other characters and how they (could) fit with Koci:

Uroš Perić – the regular joe turned assassin, who gets multiple chances in the course of the show to seek Koci’s help and doesn’t because he gets in deep and wants to be the guy that protects his family and takes care of everything himself. I keep thinking back to their very first scene, when Koci gives Perić his calling card and tells him to get in touch, and Perić could have done that before he committed his first murder but… didn’t. And then at the end, there’s that huge spoiler setting up S2. Despite becoming a murderer several times over, Perić is a much softer character than Koci, but he doesn’t like getting pushed around either. How would they work together, how would they clash?

Marija Perić – Uroš’s Croatian wife, who has the thankless role of being married to the guy who’s keeping her in the dark about major plot developments, but makes up for it with how she reacts to the hints she gets of Uroš’s continuing troubles as well as getting on Koci’s radar. She’s scared and out of her depth, but she’s also angry and, yep, antagonistic when she thinks Interpol is harassing her for no reason. I love the scene where Koci interrogates her and she lashes out and won’t give him an inch even when he blindsides her with evidence of her husband’s activities – more of that kind of thing, please! Or what if she decided to protect herself and her kids by cooperating with Interpol, or maybe thought she could help Uroš by turning on him?

Divna Dukić – Koci’s Interpol colleague and maybe the only character that likes him. Their dynamic is both very professionally respectful and yet… “flirtatious” may be too strong a word. They pretty obviously have a little thing for each other but choose not to act on it for a whole mess of reasons (he’s an emotional disaster area, she has enough on her plate as a single mom with a shitty ex, they work together). Also, I have a theory that Divna, while seeming loyal, may take her marching orders from one of the criminal elements or maybe from the more corrupt parts of Interpol or the Serbian police. I would love any or all of that to get explored more.

Dardan Berisha – the grieving crime boss and main target of Koci’s obsession (even though it was actually Dardan’s old uncle Skënder who had Koci’s father killed decades earlier). They’re both such hard, intense men, in part because they’ve had to be, and the narrative sets them up as mirror images of each other (while Uroš Perić is more a study in how someone becomes hard when circumstances push them to it). Yet while their conflict underpins the whole show, they rarely share a scene. Put them together more; let them fight or y’know *waggles eyebrows*.

Teuta Berisha – Dardan’s wife, who first loses her daughter, and by the end of the season her family is totally blown to smithereens, in part because of how she chooses to assert her agency within the super-patriarchal context in which she lives. She was ambivalent about her marriage before we meet her, and I love how canon events bring out her anger, grief, and quiet steeliness. Also, that moment at her daughter’s funeral when Koci gives her his condolences really hit me – they know they are enemies, but there’s that moment of standoffish respect between them. What if somehow they had to work together? Or what if she took over as the head of either the Berisha or the Sokoli clan (or both!)? A divergence from the end or any part of S1 would be very welcome.

Skënder Berisha -- Dardan’s uncle who still wields enormous influence in the Berisha clan and was behind the assassination of Koci’s father decades earlier. I only want this as a & pairing, but the character dynamic is still one of difficult shared history, knee-jerk antagonism, goading humor, not being at all intimidated by each other, and yet recognizing something familiar in each other. One of my favorite scenes from the whole show is their conversation at the hospital, in which they cover both present troubles and the past. Skënder is one of the few characters who can and does consistently run rings around Koci, and I want more of that as much as I want the tables turned.

[spaceorphan18]

The Pam Beesly Files: Pilot (1x01)

Welcome to the Pam Beesly Files! 

Tagging @ckerouac in every single one of these cause she convinced me to start doing this! :D 

I’ll be digging in and exploring one of my favorite fictional characters of all time - Pam Beesly(-Halpert).  Something I really enjoy about Pam is that, unlike a lot of sitcom characters, Pam grows and changes over the years.  She starts off meek and quiet - a bit of a pushover, but grows up and gains confidence and really blossoms into her own person, which is really quite cool.  

Kicking it off with the Pilot.  I don’t think it’s the strongest pilot -- the show, in trying to play it safe, nearly copied the British version of the episode, but in doing so lost a little in translation.  Despite the fact that the show takes a while to really get on its feet, there’s a lot to dig in her, so let’s get started! 

Introducing Dunder-Mifflin

When we first meet Pam, she’s sitting in her usual spot at reception, having to endure an overly out of control (because of the documentary crew) Michael.  (As an aside - I’m curious as to why this documentary wants to film a failing, mid-western paper company, but maybe it’s a life piece or something.)  Pam, as we’ll learn as we get to know her, is not an outgoing person.  In fact, here at the beginning, she’s down-right timid, constantly drawing in on herself.  I love Jenna Fischer’s acting choices here -- she physically closes in on herself to seem even more meek and withdrawn.  

This whole documentary crew is a rather disruptive thing, and I get the sense that Pam doesn’t really want or need to be filmed -- the opposite of Michael Scott, who is going overboard in his performance for the cameras.  Was Michael a good boss before putting on a show for the documentary? No, not at all, but he’s even worse when he has an audience.  

Pam mostly just endures Michael as he plays it up for the camera, just as she probably endures him every time he comes up to reception, which is probably more often than a normal amount.  If I had to guess - based on future interactions, any time Michael needs attention, she might be the first place he stops, though he gets frustrated with her, cause she’s not a good audience member.  Later - her relationship with Michael will change, but for now, she just waits in mostly awed silence until he’s gone.  

Since this is an introduction, we do learn a little about Pam’s life at Dunder-Mifflin.  She’s been with the company for a while (my headcanon is three-ish years putting her in her mid-ish twenties).  And that Michael used to think she was hot. 

About that second thought, when we meet Pam, she’s got somewhat of a frumpy look (and that’s intentional!).  The cardigans, button down shirts, and pencil skirts are business attire, but not anything more or less.  I have to wonder that when Pam first started working there (as someone who was freshly in her twenties) she did dress nicer -- but then after a lot of unwanted comments, purposely downplayed her looks.  But there’s more to that, too.  She’s settled in a relationship that she’s content but not necessarily happy in, and therefore it spills outward into her appearance as well.  

After the introduction - Pam attempts actual work, and Michael just kind of throws an important fax back into her face.  She’s bewildered and frustrated that he continues to act like a child and not an actual boss -- but the fascinating thing is how she keeps everything buried.  She is livid with Michael -- for laughing at her, for not taking anything seriously, for literally throwing actual work back at her face, but she contains it, and it doesn’t quite get to surface level but it’s most definitely there.  

One scene in - and we can already see how much Pam is restrained in her interactions -- there’s a lot waiting to leap out, but it’ll be awhile before anything can really be pulled out of her.  

Corporate Meeting 

Jan comes to the office to warn Michael about possible downsizing.  Pam’s in attendance at the meeting -- mostly because Michael probably enjoys the idea that she’ll be his assistant in such things.  She doesn’t have a whole lot to do here - except position herself out of the excruciatingly awkward conversation Jan and Michael are having.  She has a mild, horrific look on her face the entire way through -- knowing that everything Michael is saying is bad, but not feeling it her place to say anything at all.  

The only time she speaks is when Jan asks about the agenda, which Michael had thrown away earlier.  Interestingly, Pam is honest about what happened to it -- that Michael tossed it into the trash, and uses his own wording against him.  Pam won’t currently speak out against Michael, she’s too scared to rock the boat, but she can push back with actual honesty if nothing else.  

Downsizing

Our next Pam scene is our first Jim and Pam scene!! And we can already see there’s a stark difference between a Pam who is on camera having to deal with Michael, and Pam who doesn’t know the camera is on her, speaking to her bff.  

But first - I want to mention that before this, everyone else is discussing the possibility of downsizing.  Everyone else in the office is worried about their livelihood, and what steps they should be making for job security.  Pam (and Jim) don’t have such concerns.  Not only are both of them younger - and still of mind that they have time to ‘get out’ of such a meaningless life, but Pam (as we’ll later learn) doesn’t think downsizing is the worst thing that can happen to her. 

Instead - Pam asks Jim about going to Angela’s cat party, and the two both share a giggle over it.  It’s the first time we see Pam not only smile in the series, but also look like she’s got one genuine thing in her job that she cares about -- her friendship (relationship) with Jim.  

As an aside, I’d also like to note that Pam’s a touch sassy about the whole cat party thing.  The two of them are slightly judgy of the others, thinking they’re above the settled (and ridiculous) lives of the rest of the office.  

Talking Head

In her first talking head, Pam admits that she’s fine being let go.  In fact - you get the impression that she probably dreams about being let go or how she’d storm out if she just up and quit - but beyond the fantasy of that, she hasn’t thought about her future much.  She states that it’s not many little girls’ dream to be a receptionist, and that’s probably true.  But it also seems like she hasn’t put a lot of thought into what her own ambitions are.  What did Pam want to be when she grew up? Well, not a receptionist, but that’s as far as she’s gotten. 

She does have a hobby, however, as she says she likes doing illustrations and watercolors.  (It’s a nice touch by the filmmakers to include her carefully whiting something out during the monologue.)  She may or may not have other interests or hobbies but this is the one she holds onto.  She also feels the need to bring up that Jim thinks they’re worth something.  Because not only is Jim’s opinion incredibly important of her - his finding value in her creative side seems to validate her as well.  Pam doesn’t have much self-esteem, but Jim finding worth in her is something that she clings onto.  (Now she’s just got to discover it for herself! Because we’ll learn -- Jim can’t be her only source of positivity in her life.)  

I’d also like to mention that she not only doesn’t bring up Roy here, but his opinion doesn’t seem to matter much on the subject either.  Not to mention, he probably doesn’t give her much encouragement when it comes to such things. 

Six-Million Dollar Man

Michael’s still being obnoxious - doing impressions for the camera.  Pam really just wants him to go away and stop bothering her.  After doing the Six-Million Dollar Man, Michael claims that that’d be a good salary for him and suggests he get a raise.  Pam mutters that they all deserve a raise -- to which Michael grows serious and annoyed with her.  Pam isn’t one to push back very often, and having been pressed too often, I’m sure things like this spill out, which seem to spoil Michael’s mood, but are very truthful.  Pam’s a little stunned with herself for expressing an honest emotion, as well as Michael’s petulance, by the end of the scene.  

Conference Room Meeting

In an attempt to calm people’s fears, Michael calls a conference room meeting to talk about the possibility of downsizing (though he really just wants an audience for his supposedly good management skills).  A point of notice - as we go on in the series, Jim and Pam will usually be seated together for these things, but I believe this is just about logistics more so than anything related to the story -- Jenna Fischer had lines, John Krasinski did not, hence they were not seated together. 

Anyway -- Michael tries to lie about the possibility of downsizing.  In her most passive-aggressive move yet, Pam (still very meekly though) tells the rest of the office that since she was in the meeting, she can tell them what Corporate said, and thus undermine everything Michael is talking about.  It totally throws Michael under a bus, and she knows it, but once again, she’s hiding behind the guise of brutal honesty.  It’s the little things she can get away with that she’ll do.  She won’t outright confront him on his shenanigans, but there are still simple things she can do to get back at him. 

Also, another point of mention is that during this scene, she’s biting her nails.  Now, this really isn’t going to be a thing I see with her going forward -- apparently it’s a tick for this episode that Fischer (or the director) added just for this episode -- but it’s another physical reminder of how inward and insecure Pam is at the beginning of the show. 

Mixed-Berries and Jell-O

We get a talking head with Jim where he states that one of the useless things he knows is Pam’s favorite flavor of yogurt (which is Mixed-Berry btw) and when the doc crew asks Pam about it, she gets all happy flustered and giggly.  Why? Because it’s another sign that Jim notices her.  And really - no one else in her life, personal or professional, really notice her.  It’s one reason she’s drawn to Jim -- he seems to really (like actually really) care about her, what her interests are, what hobbies she has, etc, etc, and has used that to form a connection and a bond with her.  She doesn’t really have any other (seemingly) friendship or relationship with anyone else.  But (for reasons we’ll get to in a moment) she really tries to pretend it’s just a silly thing between the two of them, and not the emotional affair that it really is at this point. 

Meanwhile, we get a jump on Jim-pranks, a staple (ha pun intended) of the show, when it’s revealed that Jim put Dwight’s stapler in Jell-O (again).  Yes, Jim’s first and foremost reason for doing it is that he’s bored and Dwight bugs him and he gets a kick out of it.  But a nice side effect is that it entertains Pam.  She is the only one giggling as the whole thing unravels (the rest of the office really would just like to work without the shenanigans) but it’s another way Pam and Jim have bonded -- they share the same sense of humor. 

Roy

So, we have another spy shot of Jim and Pam up at reception. A little detail I love is that their hands are close to each other, not touching, but if you looked quickly, you’d think they were holding hands.  Anyway, Jim’s asking Pam to come with him for a drink with the rest of the office -- and Pam’s pretty cool with the thought at joining.   They’re super flirty and giggly with each other just as the scene opens, and you’re supposed to get the idea that they’re probably already some sort of couple until we get the twist of the scene in a moment.  

Here we get the introduction to Roy -- Pam’s fiance who works in the warehouse.  Fascinatingly, the moment Roy comes in, Jim jolts away from the desk, putting a lot more space in between them.  Pam is pretty oblivious to what her actions mean, but Jim is well aware that he’s treading on dangerous ground, to the point of possibly crossing the line by asking Pam out for a drink (though he probably already has in other ways).  

Roy, we learn, is kind of a brute, and uncompromising when it comes to putting his own feelings above Pam’s.  Pam would like to go out for a drink - does Roy want to go? Nope, okay then, and Pam is shut down.  Why? Well, for one - Roy is kind of /that/ asshole is blind to his own selfishness that he doesn’t realize he’s suppressing Pam.  (There’s also some hold over class stuff from the British version here that doesn’t necessarily translate as well with Roy being a blue-collar worker vs Jim being a white-collar worker.)  

Mostly though, Pam just isn’t her own person right now.  She let’s Roy kind of dictate her life because it’s easier than always fighting with him (and is slightly self-sabotage because if she pushed back she would have to wake up to the actual state of her life).   But also - she’s letting Jim dictate her happier emotions - letting his feelings for her dictate her own self-esteem.  Eventually, she’s going to learn to be her own person, but that’ll be awhile.  

Anyway - Pam gets a talking head where she explains a bit about Roy -- they’ve been engaged for three years, with no wedding date insight.  She’s happy to talk about Roy at first, until the camera lingers on her a little too long, and her face falls.  She’s trying to present that she’s happy in her life when, in fact, she’s really not.   I’d also like to point out that she does not light up when talking about Roy the way she does with Jim.  She likes Jim and has fun with Jim -- Roy is just another obligation in her life.  But she’s made a commitment, and she doesn’t take that lightly. 

I have some personal headcanon for the whole Pam and Roy thing -- in that they knew each other in high school, and Roy, probably a popular jock, took notice of her.  As I said earlier - people don’t notice Pam, and she somewhat clings on to those who do.  So, being young, they probably dated a little - and since he was popular and she wasn’t, she probably thought his coolness rubbed off on her.  And then they went through their college years (though I don’t think either of them went to college) and after nagging him about their future, he finally proposed and it’s been in this unmoved, content state since then.  

(As a personal aside - there’s a joke in there that if Pam had married Roy, she’d be Pam Anderson.  And I’m epicly rolling my eyes.  I kind of hate that, like, the only famous Pam anyone knows is Pam Anderson, so this joke seems to keep being made.)  

Prank

So, Michael, in an attempt to show off to Ryan the temp, decides to pull a Punk’d-esque prank on Pam and fake fire her.  It’s deeply uncomfortable -- especially since Pam has a breakdown right in Michael's office.  And we can learn a few things here!  For one, Pam’s a pretty decent worker.  Despite being bored all the time, she does take her job seriously, and does a pretty decent job of it.  And, she hasn’t so much as stolen a paperclip.  

On top of that, her job and life are in a very stable state right now.  Pam doesn’t do well with upheaval - it’s one reason why she hasn’t broken it off with Roy yet.  And Michael throwing her a curveball upsets the nice, little life she’s crafted for herself.  Remember earlier when she said she’d be fine if she was let go?  Well -- turns out that’s not so much the case.  What is her life without her job? Not a whole lot…  

But also, she’s endured Michael’s shit for years at this point, I’d be close to breaking down, too.  Interestingly, though, when she finds it’s a prank, she storms out and calls him a jerk.  It’s rather tame by comparison to what she could do -- such as be very cruel and/or angry, or be assertive and go to HR about Michael.  She doesn’t do either, she just leaves.  Michael is a terrible person to her - she has every right to complain and get angry, but eventually, like everything else that happens to her at the moment, she’ll let it slide off.  Just another day in the office. 

Heading Home

Jim was supposed to be going out with the rest of the employees out for drinks, but instead, he’s waited to walk out with Pam (which I assume they do nearly every night).  Pam’s happy to see him -- especially since she’s had her break down of Michael firing her.  It’s a relief to have a friend in such an awful working environment.  They’re both aware of the camera, however, so they’re both playing things a little cool.  Jim’s obviously concerned that Pam’s been crying, and Pam is grateful that someone, again, notices her -- but neither are going to present to a camera what they’re trying to hide from themselves.  

Jim offers to walk her downstairs, but Roy’s already down there, noisy honking his horn for her to hurry up.  Such a classy guy, that Roy.  And Pam takes off -- just another day at Dunder-Mifflin. 

Overall Thoughts

The first season, in general, I think is a little rough.  And the pilot is a direct copy of the British version -- which is grittier and more pathetic in a lot of ways.  I don’t think that much of this particular episode because I think it’s a softball of what the British version is.  (And, I’m not even a fan of the British version -- oops.)  That said, I think one thing it does have going for it is that it has some fully fleshed out, three-dimensional characters, which is a nice change from the zany sitcom character we often get on American television up to this point.  The Office will eventually fall to sitcom cliches, etc, etc, but one of the few things this first season has is that it does hold a lot of realism about it. 

Deleted Scenes and Extras

-There’s an alternate joke when Michael is introducing Pam where he states that every guy in the office has sprayed on Pam. 

-There’s a whole bit where Michael comes up to Pam, who’s sitting and eating her lunch, and discusses the health of his balls.  It’s gross on multiple levels. 

-There are two commentaries on the DVDs for this episode - and both are enjoyable to listen to, I recommend checking them out! 

-I’ll probably blug this once a season, but Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey started a podcast called The Office Ladies, which they discuss the episodes week after week.  It is an utter delight, and if you’re at all a fan of the show, an interested in a bunch of fun BTS stuff, it’s totally worth it!