#doyle might die? and faith will be on it
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My Buffy spoilers
Now that Iâm about right on the middle of Buffy the Vampire Slayer I thought it was time to summarize what spoilers I know of that havenât already come to pass. You know just for the sake of transparency and looking back on this when I actually know how it all turns out.
Spuffy: I had known about Spikeâs character and how he turned from villain into Buffyâs love interest for a long time. Right now in the show Spike is only just beginning to join the gang and I find the way in which the writing enables that clever but from the very beginning of Spuffyâs interactions I was wondering how on earth theyâre gonna sell this as romance later on. This isnât the first time I watched a show knowing that an unlikely couple will come to be so, you know, weâll see. I do have to admit that James Marstersâ performance is delightful and Spike is a fun character, I just think that he has a long way to go still. But I am only halfway through and thatâs not considering AtS, so.
Dawn: kind of a bummer that I know of Dawnâs existence because Iâve heard her being referred to as the biggest plot twist of the series. Mind, I donât know much, just that Dawn is Buffyâs little sister somehow and will shake up the status quo. Is it some wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff? Donât know and donât tell me, the less I know about Dawn Summers the better but I do know of her general existence.
Tara: I just watched Hush yesterday so Tara is officially part of my Buffy experience. Since I was not only around for the Gay Migration and the Bury Your Gays outcry but actively researching it for my dissertation, I am of course aware that Taraâs doomed and so is her relationship with Willow, which Iâm also aware of. Still, Iâm going to enjoy their journey for what it is and Iâve been anticipating Willowâs queer storyline so much so even though itâs bittersweet going into this that wonât diminish them and Taraâs ch for me. Iâm so ready to see how a lesbian love story is handled just at the turn of the millennium.
Dark Willow: thatâs pretty much all I know, that Willow will be tempted by the darkness at some point and temporarily (?) succumb to it. At first I thought itâd just be vampire Willow from the Wishverse but I guess not now that sheâs dead. So Iâm guessing it will be dark witch Willow? Given how she handled Oz leaving and knowing what I know about Taraâs eventual fate, that checks out.
Buffyâs second death and hospitalization: this is sort of just a vague plot point/two plot points but Iâve seen it said that Buffy will once again die, end of s5 maybe? But given that has happened already Iâm not that shook tbh, tho who knows maybe the episode itself will be more effective than Prophecy Girl. I also wonder if it will result in yet another Slayer coming into play but Iâd rather they just bring my girl Faith back. Faith :( Anyway, Iâm also vaguely aware that Buffy will be sent away to a mental institution (?) at one point, possibly due to people not believing her about demons and such. Or probably as some kind of conspiracy to remove her from the picture.
Faithâs redemption: not that itâs a major spoiler and I would hope for it anyway but Iâm pretty sure sheâll not only be back but get a chance to make things right and rejoin the good guys. Itâs painful but Iâm avoiding all things Faith to get to experience her journey for myself. Iâm shaking with anticipation after having had conflicted feelings about her s3 story.
Once More With Feeling: Buffyâs musical episode is iconic to the degree that Iâve been hearing so much about it the past couple of years and know itâs considered to be the OG in terms of random musical episodes. Except Iâve heard that itâs not random, itâs clever and works really well within the show so suffice to say I canât wait. Itâs in season 6, right? So a while away. The only other well-regarded specific episode Iâm aware of is The Body, ep code 5x16 if Iâm correct? But Iâm pretty sure thatâs an emotionally brutal one based on what Iâve inferred. My only guess is that Joyce dies or something similar. But then what about Dawn? Eh, idk how Dawn comes to be in general and she could just be Buffyâs half sister, or some timeline rewriting or whatever. Anyway this is pure speculation now.
I think thatâs about it. The main spoiler I was aware of that had already come to pass is there being another Slayer in Kendra and then Faith. Iâm sure there will be plenty of other twists and turns that Iâm not expecting whatsoever and I love that. Feel free to interact with this post or me, I only ask that you please please donât spoil anything for me that wasnât already mentioned here.
#just a full disclosure thing and mostly a post for myself#i know basically nothing about angel the series btw except that cordy doesn't stay on forever#doyle might die? and faith will be on it#but angel thoughts is a separate post#btvs#buffy the vampire slayer#PLEASE no spoilers i'm on 4x11 atm#feel free to ask for thoughts on any particular aspect of the show up to this point though#i wanna start talking more about buffy
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a comprehensive list of all the Implications (TM) of the WishVerse that were never explored. enjoy.
so in case you forgot: buffy never came to sunnydale in season 1. the master took over sunnydale and made xander and willow his deranged vampire sidekicks. buffy fights the master and her, cordelia, angel, willow and xander all die. almost all these points are going off the branching timeline where giles didnât destroy anyaâs pendant and the wishverse kept going.
larry is a âwhite hatâ working with giles, oz and nancy. he has dyed black hair. I think itâs safe to assume that larry is out in this universe, and apocalypse or no apocalypse I love the idea of these three being a found family friend group just like buffy and the scoobies. also love the idea that oz and larry were in love but thatâs just because I am insane lmao. anyway larry is out as gay and friends with oz with surrogate father figure giles⌠yeah that just makes me happy. I would love to see his season 1-3 growth in coming out and becoming a better person / not a bully similar to cordy. and shittily dying his hair black.
were spike and dru there during the season 2 period? did the master kill them? did the white hats kill them? did they leave? WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM????
the mayor, adam, glory and the first would likely still happen on top of all the vampire apocalypse stuff. the trio could be dead or vampires and dark willow obviously would not be able to happen. does giles fight these threats, collecting various child fighters over the years?? no idea. do they succeed?? no idea.
dawn doesnât exist because buffy is dead. I wonder who the key would have taken the form of, perhaps she would be faithâs sisterâŚ???
whatâs the status of jenny calendar?? joyce?? tara?? amy?? no one knows!! I just hope they didnât meet too grisly of ends. the idea of leather-clad apocalypse vampire versions of all these badass women intrigues me thoughâŚ
did anya remain a demon?? destroying her necklace would reset the timeline back to normal, so I guess she must have done. my anyiles heart says giles thought âI could fix herâ and fell in love with a vengeance demon who doomed reality but that might just be wishful thinking (no pun intended).
angel investigations simply doesnât exist. angel and cordy are both dead.
connor would not exist because darla would not be brought back (I wonder if jasmine would find some other way to bring about her birth??)
lindsey would have both hands intact and he and lilah would likely stay at wolfram and hart, and neither would die unless they were caught in the crossfire of vampire apocalypse stuff.
gunn would stick with his crew in LA and would likely fight the master at one point, not to mention even more vampires than usual, and without superpowers would likely die eventually.
angel investigations would never run wolfram and hart, meaning illyria would have to find a different host body. if it was lindsey or lilah that would be awesome.
pylea would stay the same and suck forever because cordy would never go there.
lorne is flourishing and loving life running caritos. heâs probably better off for it tbh. the wishverse says gay rights!!!!
in terms of wesley, faith and doyle, I recommend this amazing fic. it really speaks for itself, itâs awesome!!
its unclear as to who would be called after buffy. is it a person to person thing or simply a timing thing?? would it be kendra, faith, or someone else entirely? as I said this is explored in the fic I linked, but still interesting to discuss.
season 7 would be very different. we donât know what slayer is currently around and we donât know if that would change the firstâs plan or the ending with all the potentials becoming slayers. no idea. kennedy would not be important thank god.
fred is still in pylea.
if you can think of anything else, please do share in notes!!
#buffy the vampire slayer#btvs#angel the series#ats#buffyverse#wishverse#cordelia chase#buffy summers#btvs angel
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Just Your Team?
Part of Ameliaâs 200 follower celebration!
Request: Angst prompt 21 from this list!
Ship: Emily Prentiss x BAU! fem ! reader
Word count: .9k
Warnings: Set during the Doyle arc, canon-typical violence, break-up, threats, implication of threat, gun mention. Basically, just what youâd expect from a fic based on the Doyle arc.
A/N: Did i have too much fun writing this? Yeah
Emily sat across from him, clutching the long-cold coffee in her hands and trying to hide the horror on her face as he speaks.
âDoes the lovely Penelope know the truth about you? Or is she too busy watching movies with Derek to care? Here you are, all alone,â Doyle smiles, âWhile Aaron sits at home with his son. Why didnât Dave and Ashley invite you to their game night? Maybe they thought youâd be on the Metro with Dr. Reid. That one does have some quirks. They certainly canât have thought youâd be having dinner with ____ tonight though, could they? No, they donât know anything about you and her.â
Emily balls her hand into a fist, âYou go near my team and Iâll kill you.â
âJust your team? Is that all?â
âYes.â
He scoffs, âPathetic. Where does she think you are right now?â
Emily doesnât speak. She presses her lips together in a fine line, waiting.
âThatâs what I thought. Youâve always been good at lying to the people you love.â
âWhat do you want?â She spits.
âI donât want your team. I donât even want her, though I should. But my quarrel isnât with them. How long that remains the case depends entirely on you. Theyâre innocent. Sheâs innocent. Youâre not.â
âI was doing my job.â
âYou wonât even acknowledge her to me when Iâm offering to spare her life. Funny way of showing you care about her, Emily,â He chuckles, shaking his head.
Her knuckles are white from tensing them, the coffee cup splitting in her hand, tiny drips of it making her palm wet.
âIt doesnât matter anyway. You obviously donât care about her. You never cared about me, after all. I only care about taking something important to you. The most important thing to you. Your life.â
***
Youâre sat at home on the couch with Sergio when Emily comes through the door, shrugging off her scarf and heading straight into the kitchen.
âWhatâs wrong?â You ask, taking a step towards her as she starts vigorously washing her hands, âEmily whatâs wrong?â
âI think you should go home tonight.â
âEmily, what-?â
She cuts you off, âIâm just. Iâm not feeling good, I think you should go home tonight.â
You step towards her again, watching as she braces her hands against the counter behind her, âYouâre never feeling good lately. Something has to be going on here and you canât keep hiding it from me. Everyone has been talking about you. Worrying about you.â
âItâs very nice of you all to be concerned enough to gossip behind my back,â She snaps.
âEmily Iâm your girlfriend. Theyâre our friends.â
âWhy are they even asking you about it anyway? They donât know weâre together.â
That hurts. It burns, seers into your chest. You open your mouth to respond but flounder. She notices the shock in your eyes, wants to apologise. Then Doyleâs words reverberate in her head and her own die in her throat.
âI donât need you all to be talking about me.â
âAnd I donât need you to be lying to me.â
âIâm not lying to you.â
âThen tell me whatâs wrong.â
âI donât know what youâre talking about.â
âYou canât just act like nothings wrong when it is!â Youâre shouting now, the frustration of weeks of being patient and understanding finally flaming out. Her eyes remain defiant, and anger flares in your chest.
âNothing is wrong.â
âThen why are you being like this?â
âIâm not being like anything.â
âIâm your girlfriend, Emily.â
âWell maybe you shouldnât be.â
It crushes you. Hard and fast, like a cartoon boulder falling on your head. You swear youâre seeing stars, dizzy with confusion and hurt, but sheâs cold. Refuses to meet your eye.
âH-Have you been wanting to break up with me? Is that why?â You ask, your hand coming to rest over your mouth.
âYes. Thatâs why.â
She doesnât stop you leaving. Doesnât move from her spot in the kitchen, doesnât see you walk out in a complete daze. Forgetting your coat and umbrella, stumbling out into the pouring rain with no idea where youâre going. It was you. This whole time it was you.
You think of the nights spent, trying to fall asleep without her. Her side of the bed cold, while she sat in the kitchen frowning at the laptop screen she wouldnât show you. What had she been doing? Sheâd said old Interpol cases. But what was it really? All those times sheâd offered to stay with Morgan on cases, fobbing you off with excuses about how she found it easier to stay focused on work without you around. Trying to make out like it was a good thing. Like you were too much of a distraction.
Itâs dark on the street, all the lamp lights blearing through your tears. If you werenât so focused on the blindsighting pain in your chest, you might have been able to count on your FBI training, or basic common sense, and noticed the SUV trailing behind you.
***
Emily crumples into herself on the kitchen floor. All those nights sheâd left you to sleep alone, terrified that if she wasnât awake, someone would break in to hurt you. How sheâd sit staring out her laptop, trying to stump up something about Doyle that could put an end to all this. How sheâd tried her best to avoid you on cases because you knew. You always knew when something was wrong. Knew her tells better than Spencer.
How sheâd let your heart shatter in two, under the guise of protecting you.
***
Out on the street, you register the sound of a gun click.
---
Tagslist: @calm-and-doctor @sassiest-politician @takeyourleap-of-faith
(message me to be added or removed!)
#emily prentiss#criminal minds#emily prentiss x reader#emily prentiss x you#emily prentiss fanfic#emily prentiss imagine#imagine emily prentiss#criminal minds x you#prentiss x reader#prentiss x you#emily prentiss fanfictio#criminal minds fanfic#criminal minds imagines#emily prentiss angst
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Your life is not your own
tw: for suicide and depression
Iâve seen people attribute this line to the writers of Sherlock, but actually it came from Arthur Conan Doyle, who was inspired by a famous Bible verse, which makes sense given that he was a staunch Catholic for much of his life.
The Veiled Lodger sees Holmes investigating a local landladyâs mysterious lodger. The lodger in question is a  very depressed woman who wants to tell Holmes her tragic story.
When she comes to the end she hints that the case and her life is now over. Holmes picks up on the hint of suicide and tells her, âYour life is not your own, keep your hands off it!â
The Bible verse it was lifted from is often used as a gentle reminder to Christians in despair that their lives and body belong to God. I included the whole two verses, but highlighted the relevant bit.
1 Corinthians ch7 vs 19 and 20: Do you not know that your body is a temple for the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were brought at a price. Therefore honour God with your body.
The âyou were brought at a priceâ part is a reference to Jesusâ sacrifice, so itâs basically saying, âthis nice guy loved you enough to die so you could have salvation; donât waste his sacrifice, live a good life thatâll please God.â
So we go from, âyou are not your ownâ to âyour life is not your own, keep your hands off it.â
Thereâs a clear difference in attitude between the canon and BBC Sherlock. As well as telling the Veiled Lodger not to take her own life, Holmes suggests that her life has value as an example of patient suffering in a world full of impatient suffering, that itâs her reason for being alive.
However, in BBC Sherlock, the dialogue is written in a way to suggest that Sherlock is saying that itâs Faithâs friends and family would miss her and so her life and death belongs to them.âTaking your own life. Interesting expression. Taking it from who? Once itâs over itâs not you whoâll miss it.â In other words, Faith has value because others care about her.
As a Christian I find both versions very touching because they remind me of this important Bible verse. But, I also like the canon version because it says that we can use our suffering to help or give hope to others; I also like Sherlockâs take that we all have value simply because people might miss us when weâre gone.
However, I think itâs probably best to remember both versions have their flaws.
Not everyone can turn their suffering into something that can benefit others, nor should they feel pressured to. Sometimes there is no silver lining and sometimes itâs just overwhelming. Sometimes you just have to rest and heal and only focus on yourself. Sometimes suffering is just suffering.
Likewise with Sherlockâs take, not everyone has friends or relationships. No one should feel worthless just because they are alone. And, tbh, I think itâs not always good to use other people feelings as a reason for encouraging someone to stay alive. If youâre not careful then it can sound like youâre telling someone to stay in pain because their death would hurt others. A little unfair, perhaps.
[Edit: What I mean about the above is that a little care needs to be taken about how you make someone who is suicidal feel. If for example, Sherlock told Faith, âDonât kill yourself because Iâve enjoyed your company!â it makes it about him and invalidates Faithâs pain, it needs to be framed in terms of that Faith is loved and valued and there are people who care enough about her who want to help her. Be explicit and tell the person that you donât want them to die, but be sure to let them know that they are loved, show some compassion, and acknowledge their pain.]
But, whatâs really important, is that both Holmes and Sherlock were paying close enough attention to realise that the lodger and Faith were contemplating suicide. Neither lady explicitly said so, but Holmes and Sherlock still heard and saw the warning signs, and from there they offered comfort and encouragement.
The Veiled Lodger concludes with Holmes receiving a vial of Prussic acid from the lodger, which she would have taken had he not persuaded her against suicide.Â
A couple of articles about how to support/talk to someone who is feeling suicidal:
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-to-do-when-a-friend-is-suicidal-1065472
https://www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/how-to-help-a-suicidal-friend#takeaway
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Top 10 Characters in The Tudors
SarHello! I decided I would do a Top 10 characters in this show. I will call them characters, since they are very different from their historical counterparts.Â
Honorable Mentions
Henry Percy
Bessie Blount
Mary Boleyn
Mark Smeaton
10 THOMAS CROMWELL
Why is Thomas Cromwell so low? Heâs the dreamboat, heâs the Crumb Cakes. But for me, there are a lot of characters I like more than him. His acting is well done, however he does not give off Thomas Cromwell energy. At first, I kept mixing him up with Sir Thomas More, he was that bleh in Season 1. That really is not his fault though, since Season 1 is my least favorite season and many of the characters are portrayed horribly. looking at you, Henry VIII. However, he does get better in the later seasons. He was the character that help made the dryness of Season 3 a bit better, making it only my second least favorite season. James Frian played him very well and his execution scene was very difficult to watch since I started to grow some love for him. But now it has been a whole month since I watched The Tudors and I think more characters other than him. Also, I personally think Mark Rylance plays Cromwell much better than James Frian since he does have the vibe of the historical figure.Â
9 KATHERINE OF ARAGON
Again, not having that energy of the real historical figure. I really liked her, however as time went on, more characters were introduced and I started to forget about her character. Plus, she is most prevalent in Season 1, so I am very biased on that. However, this Katherine does have real traits of the real Katherine. She loves her daughter and is very determined to still win Henryâs heart from Anne. Overall, I do think Maria Doyle Kennedy played her very well. Itâs not the best Katherine that I have seen, however she is somewhat close.Â
8 KATERYN PARR
A surprise, actually. After going through my least favorite portrayal of all time, Tazmin Merchantâs Katheryn Howard, I thought I was going to get another terrible version of Kateryn Parr, she is only queen for three or four episodes even though the real Parr was queen consort for four years. However, she was actually very enjoyable. I liked how it showed her faith to her religion and how terrified she was to it. I really loved how she bonded with Henry VIII and his children, she seems such a wonderful mother and I definitely want to be at court when she is queen. I really like how Joely Richardson portrayed her. I always really do not bring my attention to Parr and focus more on the other wives, so I was stunned how much of an interesting life Parr had. Iâm putting her higher than I should since she was mostly a surprise after Katheryn Howard.
7 ANNA VON KLEVE
Anna von Kleve is my second favorite queen after Katheryn Howard, when thinking of the real historical figures. However, one grudge of her being higher on the list is that she sleeps with Henry VIII in Season 4. Nevertheless, she is portrayed very well, in my opinion. She is very anxious and shy just like the real Anna von Kleve when she met her husband. She has so much love for the children of Henry VIII, it is really exactly like her. She is not in the show that much, so it is a real shame, I wished they shown her more often in the later of Season 4, since she was friends with Henry VIII until his death. I like how they also explore her life after the annulment of their marriage how she is more confident and more at home without being the queen of England. One of the most accurate portrayals regarding personality in The Tudors. Props to Joss Stone.Â
6 SIR THOMAS MORE
OK OK OK. I AM VERY BIASED ON THIS ONE. Why is he in number 6? Well, heâs really fucking hot. Like, no joke, if I had to pick any of the characters from The Tudors to marry, this is the guy. However, he will burn me on the stake though :(. Looks aside, Sir Thomas More is a very well rounded character. There are pros and cons about him. He loves his family and he has good advice when you need it. He is willing to help out his friends, too. However, he is a fanatic of burning heretics and would not accept Anne as queen instead of signing it off and going back to his family. he was one of the only enjoyable characters from Season 1 and I thank him for that. Jermey Northam is a fantasic actor and I a very happy to learn who he is. However, he is mostly high on the list because I think Sir Thomas More is really fucking hot like no joke.Â
5 HENRY TUDOR, KING HENRY VIII
I have to admit. He was one of the worst characters in Season 1. He was annoying, he yelled like a child when he did not get his way, overall he was not an enjoyable character. However, time grew on, and he grew on me. He does not have King Henry VIII energy since they did make him more sympathetic, but I really honestly do not care. Jonathan Rhys Meyers started to get a hold of this character and started to make him a more interesting and amazing character around Season 3. You can really see how Meyers started to very terribly make this character a little piss cry baby and into a mad, terrible king that loves bloodshed but also still loves the people that he does not kill off or does. Henry VIII I feel like is best when he is in late Season 2 and Season 4. Season 2 he wants to take down Anne so bad and you can see the determination of it and it is so wonderful how they shown the ending of him eating a dead swan (Iâm guessing it is symbolism of Anne) happily. Season 4 he kills off all the characters I really fucking hate which makes me happy. The ending with him and Kateryn Parr with his children is the most beautiful endings I have seen and when he is gazing up at Heaven with the Grim Reaper behind him on his horse is such.... wow. The end of Season 4 almost made me cry for this man. He has done so wrong, yet he is starting to understand that he fucked up big time and there is no going back and changing it at all. Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Henry VIII I feel like had beautiful growth throughout this show.Â
4 JOAN BULMER
Sometimes when I read a long book series or watch a show that has multiple seasons, I sometimes love one background character that does not show up that much. This did happen in The Tudors with Joan Bulmer. When I was suffering from the nasty portrayal of Katheryn Howard, I always had an outlet of relief for her best friend, Joan. I really love her personally how she is a bit gossipy, but she is very sweet to her best friend. I lowkey thought she was kind of gay for Katheryn at one point, since she looks up to her in such a high manner. And since I am the straight friend TM of many LGBTQ+ groups, it reminded me of them and how I could not see them in the pandemic. She was a very homely character because of that. Joan is very overlooked sadly and I wish she got more hype, since her character is so rich. I would love to be her friend honestly. Catherine Steadman is very pretty and was a great actor for such a bouncy and lovable friend.Â
3 EUSATCE CHAPUYS
Chapuys grew on me. My first ever grip of the historical figure was in Allison Weirâs Katherine of Aragon in her Six Queens series, however I started to get that grip in the end. However, I finally understood Chapuys as a whole from The Tudors. When I think of the historical figure, I think of Anthony Brophyâs portrayal of him. He is Chapuys each time I read a book with him in it. He is an amazing father figure towards the Lady Mary when she is so lost without a father to care. Their friendship is extremely sweet and I really want to write about it. How they bond over Katherine of Aragon is amazing too. He is there for her no matter what and comforts her when she is upset. It is a shame that he died before the real Chapuys passes, however i totally understand why they made that decision. It made me really upset when he started to suffer from gout and died because of it. Overall, I wished they recognized him more in the series, even putting him the title card for one episode would be enough. Very underrated in my opinion, I wish The Tudor fandom would show their love for him much more.Â
2 LADY MARY TUDOR
No offense to Henry VIIIâs children portrayals, but I really do not like them. Itâs probably because I am not the biggest fan of children or I do not like the way Elizabeth is portrayed (I think she is very dull until when she leaves her dad to die). Lady Mary is an exception. She has so much drama in her that is so interesting and I am so glad they made her very complex and not the bloodshed Bloody Mary that everyone knows her from today. She seems very calm and collected in the inside, but however, when she is alone she breaks every time because she has struggles of marriage and the divorce of her parents. She has flaws, like how she wants to burn all these heretics and is quite nasty to Katheryn Howard (I excuse her from that though). But she still loves her siblings even though they are heretics and especially close to her sister Elizabeth. She is the best character when it comes to character growth and development from a happy little princess into a broken young woman. I love her so much, I wish to forget what happened to the real Lady Mary and how she becomes quite different, from begging to her husband to stay and wondering if she would kill her sister or not. Overall, Sarah Bolger is an amazing young actress and i cannot believed she tackled this very hard roll when she was still a teenager. I had a hard time to pick who was going to be my favorite character between her and number one, so they might change.Â
1 ANNE BOLEYNÂ
Really? How can I not? Out of all of the queens, she was the most developed and had the most screen time. Natalie Dormer does not have the Anne Boleyn aura, however she still keeps all the points of the womanâs personality. She is shown to be caring at times, she loves her daughter and her family, and it is very sad to see that her father manipulates her to become Queen. When people think of the show The Tudors, they think of Anne Boleyn. She has so much class in the show and how they do her execution episode is very respectable. I like how they do all the timeline and symbolism with the swans. I was really upset that she died because she was the main force that drove the show on. After she died, I started to not care about many of the characters that shown up later throughout the show. I wished she was more prevalent in Season 1 because she feels somewhat of a background character in the first half. She is strong, witty, and tries to make people follow her way in a nice way at first. She does have flaws, like how she can be very nasty and how she treats her enemies, especially Jane Seymour. She was such a wel rounded character and Natalie Dormer played her wonderfully, it was very obvious that she knew who she was playing and was acting. Would the real Anne Boleyn be happy with this portrayal? Most likely. And I am happy that I watched this show to recognize the amazing acting skills of Natalie Dormer and the other actors.Â
What are you favorite characters in The Tudors?
#the tudors#long post#anne boleyn#mary i#chapuys#joan bulmer#king henry viii#sir thomas more#anne of cleves#anna von kleve#kateryn parr#catherine parr#katherine of aragon#thomas cromwell#this took so long
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May 6, 2021: The Martian (2015) (Recap: Part One)
Weâre leaving lo-fi sci-fi, people. Kind of.
I mentioned before that films like Her are what I define as âlo-fi sci-fiâ, which is a category that Iâve kind of made up. Basically, itâs the science fiction version of low fantasy, meaning it contains science fiction themes contained within an otherwise contemporary setting. In the case of Her, Joaquin Phoenixâs character, along with many others, live in a world and setting basically like ours, but with technology advanced enough to generate AIs (like Siri) that are intelligent enough to actually ascend our reality. Because we live in a society.
You give me Joaquin Phoenix, Iâm gonna make a Joker reference; itâs in the contract of my existence. Anyway, that is admittedly kind of broad, right? I mean, that has the capability of crossing over with a BUNCH of sci-fi genres and themes. And, considering that weâve already seen magic, speculative technology, time travel, monsters, and artificial intelligence, weâve already touched on quite a bit.
And with science fiction, the skyâs the limit. Literally. So, I think it behooves us to re-examine lo-fi sci-fi a little bit. Specifically, we should note that it can also be defined as an extension of currently existing technologies and possibilities. Writers would call this âspeculative sci-fiâ, assuming in this case that itâs set within the present or a near and attainable future. Her definitely fits in this category, as does Westworld. But, letâs crossover to another genre by speculating upon another possibility. And it begins with this man. Probably.
Hey, Elon, whatâs up? Now, Mr. Musk here is a...controversial figure, for COMPLETELY understandable reasons. Instead of touch upon the man himself, I feel like touching upon one of his recent focuses: space travel. With SpaceX and the various upcoming space trips and journeys that theyâre planning, Musk has made it clear that he plans to shoot to the Moon. Again, literally.
In fact, this full plan is to go even further than that, and to fuel potential commercial space flights in the future, which is admittedly very cool. And of course, if youâre going to shoot for the Moon...
Guys...guys, thatâs Mars. THATâS FUCKING MARS
Is that not amazing? We have sound and pictures from FUCKING MARS! THATâS A DIFFERENT PLANET, GODDAMN IT! Itâs cooler than I have the ability to properly express, but it IS goddamn cool. And this means that, easily within my lifetime, we could (and likely will) land on Mars. Which is amazing. God, I really want to see that happen.
And so, landing on Mars is BARELY science fiction, but since we havenât yet done so...yeah, itâs fictional at the moment. And so, any film about landing on Mars falls within this category. Well...to an extent.
2000â˛s Mission to Mars, for example, was a Disney-funded film (to my IMMENSE surprise; and itâs based off of an old Disney World ride, WHAT), and a movie that I saw a LOT when I was a kid. I also barely remember it, to be honest. But that film is straight-up science fiction because of, well...aliens. The idea of Martians is, as far as we know it, fictional. And most fiction involving Mars includes these aliens somehow. Whether itâs DC Comicsâ entire civilization of Martians, as seen in Justice League, Supergirl, or Young Justice...
...Sir Arthur Conan Doyleâs heavily mythologized civilization, as seen in the Barsoom series of novels (and another Disney film)...
...Or one of the best Looney Tunes characters.
Mmm. Yes. Isnât that lovely?
But, yeah, Mars and aliens go hand-in-hand in our media. So, to properly look at lo-fi science and speculative science fiction in relation to the Red Planet, weâll need a movie that goes to the planet, and doesnât touch upon the concept of aliens AT ALL.
Enter...Ridley Scott?
Yeah, the director of Legend, Alien, Thelma and Louise, Blade Runner, Gladiator. Also the director of Kingdom of Heaven, Prometheus, Exodus: Gods and Kings, and...ugh, 1492: Conquest of Paradise. Iâve talked about his mixed record before, in my Recap of Legend right here.
In 2014, he was brought on to adapt a book by Andy Weir called The Martian, which is a great book! Iâve listened to the audio book, and I whole-heartedly recommend doing that. And because of that, I am VERY MUCH looking forward to watching this film, especially seeing as itâs often called one of the best science fiction films made during that year, and was critically acclaimed then and now. It got seven Oscar nominations (although it won none of them), amongst other awards. So, enough navel-gazing, huh? The Martian!
SPOILERS AHEAD!!!
Recap (1/2)
On Acidalia Plantitia, at the landing site of the Ares III mission, a group of scientists are gathering samples. These scientists are commander and geologist Melissa Lewis (Jessica Chastain), pilot Rick Martinez (Michael Pena), systems operator Beth Johanssen (Kate Mara), surgeon Chris Beck (Sebastian Stan), German chemist Alex Vogel (Aksel Hennie), and overly talkative botanist Mark Watney (Matt Damon).Â
The group seems to have a good dynamic, but that dynamic is interrupted by a massive dust storm, which is large enough to cause the entire crew to evacuate. However, in the chaos of the dust storm, Mark is hit by debris and lost in the shuffle. Although Lewis goes back to find him, she canât get to him before they need to leave, and Mark is believed dead. This is reported (pretty callously) by NASA Director Teddy Sanders (Jeff Daniels) to the press soon afterwards.
But of course, that wouldnât be much of a movie, now would it? Markâs alive! And Markâs alone. With his suit damaged, and low on oxygen, he trudges back to headquarters, which is intact and still contains breathable oxygen. He gets inside, and realizes that heâs been stabbed in the abdomen by some debris. He removes it, and stitches up his own wound. Which is...god, itâs fucking BRUTAL just to think about, nevertheless watch.
Once heâs finished, he records a log for the future, if he doesnât make it. Itâs day 19 of the 31-day mission at this point, and Markâs basically screwed. He needs lasting oxygen, water, and food, and he might need that for 4 years, when the next manned mission can come to the red planet. Additionally, he has absolutely no way to contact NASA, leaving him completely stranded. Another dust storm rolls in that night, and Mark looks over the belongings of his colleagues, packing them up for their eventual return. Itâs somber, to say the least. However, Mark affirms that heâs determined not to die on the planet.
After doing the math, Mark should have enough food to last him for about 300 days, especially if he rations it. Until then, heâll need to figure out how to grow his own food, on a planet where nothing grows. Which is, of course, going to be a difficult feat to accomplish. But Mark Watneyâs a botanist with botany powers, and heâs gonna do it.
Itâs day 31, and Markâs brought in dirt from the outside, and uses the bio-waste from the crewâs stay there for a form of compost. After 5 days, mostly full of him watching Happy Days on TV and trying to farm, he realizes that he needs water, both for himself and for the soil. To do that, he goes chemical and decides to use hydrogen-laden rocket fuel, wood from Martinezâs belongings, and good old-fashioned fire to make water! And since hydrogen + oxygen = water, it should work. With a minor side-effect.
So, yeah, he blew himself up. As as he records a video log, the sound mixing makes itself impressively known by subtly and realistically generating a tinnitus sound. Itâs VERY well-done, holy shit. Anyway, he makes a stable fire, and the place is soon covered in condensation, moistening the room and the soil successfully.
We get to day 54, and Markâs planted leftover potatoes from the crew in order to grow them. And while heâs being mourned at a funeral on Earth, and in NASA, heâs seeing the fruits (or shoots) of his efforts.
Back on Earth, Mars Mission Director Vincent Kapoor (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is trying to convince Director Teddy to let him lobby for another Ares mission, despite the risk of bad press for the callousness of the proximity to Watneyâs death. Meanwhile, satellite technician Mindy Park (Mackenzie Davis) looks down at the Ares III site, and realizes that the site has changed visually, meaning that Mark may actually be alive.
Shocked by this, she tells Kapoor, Teddy, and media director Annie Montrose (Kristen Wiig) about this, and they realize the absolute clusterfuck that this whole thing is. They canât tell the other members of the Ares III crew about it, because itâd devastate them for the 10 months they have to get back to Earth, at the VERY least. They canât tell the WORLD about this, because they just had a funeral for the guy, and theyâd reveal that they left him stranded on Mars accidentally, destroying faith in the Mars Missions Program. And they canât save Mark, who theyâre sure will starve eventually. Itâs a mess. And Kapoor also wonders whatâs happening to Mark psychologically through all of this.
And yet, they reveal this to the world regardless, causing the clusterfuck reaction that they think itâs going to cause. But Markâs busy on Mars, figuring out how to get to the site of the next Ares IV mission in 4 years, at the Schiaparelli crater about 50 days travel away. This is a struggle, as his Rover has only so much power and fuel, and he can only get more power by cutting out the heater is risking death by freezing. So, problems. However, he figures out a potential solution: radioactive isotopes! In a move that is, letâs face it, COMPLETELY INSANE, he digs up a radioactive generator from the ship in order to heat the ship.
On Earth, they try to figure out Markâs moves, as well as how to resupply Ares IV sooner for Markâs benefit. This is with the director of JPL, Bruce Ng (Benedict Wong), and the flight director of the ship Hermes, Mitch Henderson (Sean Bean), who insists that they tell the Ares II crew. They continue to monitor Mark, and note that heâs been travelling for 17 days in his Rover towards something. Kapoor figures it out, and flies to California.
See, Mark needs a way to contact NASA, and he believes that the way to do so is through Pathfinder, the first probe ever sent to Mars in 1997, lasting for 9 months since landing until they lost contact. Mark digs it up, and the people at JPL in California start their own efforts for contact. And despite communication being extremely rudimentary, initially limited to yes/no questions that use a still-frame camera, it fucking WORKS! WHOO!
To boost this communication hurdle, the two camps figure out a hexadecimal system for communication, allowing them to communicate using a circular table of numbers that represent an alphabet. That allows them to teach Mark to hack into the Rover, allowing it to piggyback off of its broadcast signal and send them messages via keyboard. Nice! Now that communication is reasonably possible, Markâs able to ask how the crew is handling his death. But upon learning that they havenât told him. Heâs understandably a little goddamn enraged. And so, they FINALLY tell the Ares III crew about this.
The news breaks the crew, even though Mark continues to stress that heâs all right, and that it wasnât their fault. Meanwhile, Markâs able to survive for 912 days with his potato plants, and things improve with the help of technicians on Earth. They plan to launch a supply rocket to him in the next year, and things are looking fine! Unless, of course...something goes horribly HORRIBLY wrong.
Well...fuck. Good place to pause for Part Two, then?
#the martian#ridley scott#matt damon#jessica chastain#kristen wiig#jeff daniels#sean bean#michael pena#chiwetel ejiofor#benedict wong#science fiction may#sci-fi may#user365#365 movie challenge#365 movies 365 days#365 Days 365 Movies#365 movies a year#bookstofilm#whatelsecanwedonow
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Chapter 10 â Oh No Love, Youâre Not Alone [TLD 2/2]
[A line from RockânâRoll Suicide, which titles the previous chapter â listen here! X Possibly Bowieâs best song.]
This chapter aims to break down the infamous hug scene step by step â I couldnât handle this scene for a long time, Mary and Irene seriously breaking with the otherwise reasonably coherent series, but I have a reading. This reading is complicated in that it relies â like this whole meta series â on every character in the scene being a part of Sherlock. This is obviously sad because it means that our boys donât come together in one of the only moments of physical affection theyâve been allowed in the last ten years, but bear with it. There are three important symbols we need to know going into this scene: our three main characters. The grounding of this meta series is that, within the EMP, Sherlock is our eyes, the part of his brain that is consciously navigating the subconscious and trying to make sense of it. John represents his heart, normally in antithesis with Mycroft as the brain, but in TLD really taking centre stage himself. To get a handle on Mary, I refer you back to my TST metas [XX]; TLDR, at the end of TST Sherlock stages Maryâs assassination attempt on himself via Norbury, only to replace himself with Mary at the last second because he cannot cope with the implication that it is the loss of him that has made John suicidal. To be colloquial, then, Mary is comphet â which is essentially her function in every Sherlock Holmes adaptation anyway, but you know. Thinking about Mary in terms of comphet is useful particularly in terms of her obsession with Sherlock wearing the hat which dogs the end of this episode, and which for many spoiled this scene the first time around (i.e. me). Wearing the hat is a euphemism in tjlc for masking oneâs sexuality, drawing on the Victorian phrase âa hat of someone elseâs choosingâ X â Sherlockâs throwing off of the hat was so momentous in TAB that many of us were reluctant to see it brought up again. However, this all makes sense.
Before we take this scene from the top, I feel the need to say that someone has brought me tea in a glass, by pure coincidence. I feel this is a good omen.
The scene opens talking about Eurus!Faith, and one of the first possibilities touted is that Sherlock made up a dream woman who gave him all the info he needed. Not subtle â although Eurus has other purposes in the narrative which become very important, she does also kick the narrative along quite nicely here. However, as mentioned in the previous chapter, sheâs not the only character who does â think of the random comments that allow Sherlock to piece together âeveryoneâ, despite having nothing to do with the case. So what our boys are saying about Eurus!Faith, if we think about it in the context of the episode, instead of just her, points to the artificiality that is casting such a massive shadow right now. Johnâs âmagic dream womanâ comment comes straight after Sherlock talking about being able to predict anything â undermining the entire basis of the episode as magic and dreamlike, so we know where we stand. Sherlock is only experiencing all of this semi-lucidly â kind of like TAB â so itâs up to his heart to try to get him to twig it I suppose.
Sherlock then suggests that Eurus!Faith was a hallucination brought on by drugs, in keeping with the theme of the episode, but also with our own themes. Drugs are used to cover up oneâs true sexuality, and Eurus up until this point has only been used in her various disguises to veil Sherlockâs desires as heterosexual, so in that sense she is linked to the mirage that drugs can cause. Heart!Johnâs response is to keep Sherlock off the âsweetiesâ, which is a good sign for us â the more we fixate on the sober region of Sherlockâs brain, the more weâre in the place where he canât hide from who he is, and his heart is pushing him there.
It seems that comphet!Mary is the one pushing Sherlock to talk to his heart here, which might raise questions, but as weâll see one of the first things she tells heart!John to do is to âmake him wear the hatâ â everything she says is fitting in with the paradigm of Sherlock Holmes that the heart cannot cope with and needs to leave behind. Mary also suggests that Sherlock should wear the hat to her as a tribute, because sheâs dead. I like to read this as the weird sense that we should be respectful of old classics, as though queering them is somehow disrespectful â this gets thrown up a lot in relation to Sherlock Holmes. One time it really got thrown up though was in the making of TPLoSH â the reason itâs not more explicit is because the Conan Doyle estate didnât want Wilder to damage ACDâs legacy. The necessity for comphet of the Victorian era is dead and gone, but we still consistently pay tribute to it in our culture.
Sherlock keeps mentioning Culvertonâs confessions, which weâve talked about in the last chapter â but in this world of mirrors, heâs unable to map them onto himself perfectly yet. Itâs the same thing as Eurus heterosexualising his interactions â weâre working in a world of mirrors and proxies, because the reality of queerness is so off limits in his mind.
Then we get the text alert. Irene Adler has long been established within the mind palace as a symbol of Sherlockâs sexual desire. So, at the end of this, as Sherlock is about to neglect his heart and let it descend out of Baker Street, we get this sudden cry of sexuality â and the heart turns back. Comphet!Mary, through the hat linked to conventional storytelling metatextually propelling Sherlockâs comphet well into the 21st century, immediately jumps to the conclusion that Sherlock loves Irene Adler. There are several reasons why this is absolutely wrong. Firstly, we are dealing entirely in symbolic people here, so why Irene would suddenly be a real person instead of a metaphor is tonally dubious. Secondly, Irene is a long established metaphor for sexuality anyway. But thirdly, and most importantly â this scene, which revolves around the Irene Adler text alert, is the beating heart of the episode and arguably the entire series. For Irene Adler to be referenced once more in the series, in a minor line, suggests that she is not the actual focus. Itâs about whatâs going on within Sherlock.
[A side note: Maryâs exposition in this scene makes me cringe â I hope Iâm not the only one? But if you will set up a complex network of metaphors and then leave several years between series, maybe you need that.]
John then deduces that itâs Sherlockâs birthday â again, reasonably unbelievable that he wouldnât know this, given that Mummy and Daddy Holmes would definitely have made a big deal of it. Itâs difficult to know for sure what the birthday symbolises, but John saying he has always wanted to know it might make us remember Sherlock actually seeking out Johnâs birth certificate to find the name Hamish on it. This meta [X] explains why this represents hiding a part of ourselves that is essential â i.e., from birth â which would fit the concept of the birthday. However, this may be tenuous.
Heart!Johnâs outburst at the discovery of Sherlockâs sexual desire â not necessarily how it is directed, but that it exists â is basically: well, what do you do about it? Why donât I know about this? It is incredible that Sherlock has managed to compartmentalise this from his heart for so long, but thatâs the pro of having an incredibly intricate mind palace I suppose. The Harvester in High Wycombe situation is sex without strings attached â I think the veiled suggestion here is masturbation, because Sherlock has refused the heart any involvement in it, but Sherlock denies the suggestion. The level at which heart!John is losing it is desperate, and the idea that âHigh Wycombe is better than you are currently equipped to understandâ suggests an affection starvation of epic proportions. I had problems with Johnâs claim that romantic entanglement would complete Sherlock as a human being (Sherlock being ace is a common reading, often touted by the writers themselves, and whilst I donât subscribe to the theory such a statement plays into a pretty harmful narrative about ace people). The line is still dubious when said by heart!John because of the wider narrative it plays into, but spoken by Sherlockâs heart to himself does suggest that Sherlockâs denial of his sexuality has been crippling him.
The idea that comphet!Mary sent heart!John back to Sherlock is a difficult one â there are two warring versions of Sherlockâs heart here, and comphet!Maryâs idea of heterosexuality (posh boy and dominatrix, even whilst metatextually acknowledging that itâs a boring clichĂŠ) does require the unity of Sherlock and his heart, just in a way that isnât possible. However, another possible reading about letting Sherlock die without comphet!Mary might take us back to TST â the hypothesis assassination when comphet!Mary took the bullet for Sherlock at the last second admittedly slowed down Sherlockâs analytical processes, but itâs quite possible that his heart wasnât ready for it, that the heart wouldnât have let him realise it and Sherlock would actually have died in the mind palace. His heart was too afraid to show up â which, true or not, is echoed in the idea that heart!John wasnât there when Sherlock/Mary were shot by Norbury, but attending to heteronormative domesticity (sorry Rosie). Itâs also devastating that the heart wants to be the Sherlock Holmes of the stories still â and weâre breaking through, but itâs TFP which will finally push through that, not this scene.
Heart!Johnâs admission of cheating here is vital. Eurus as mirror for John has long been discussed, and as weâve seen in a previous chapter (X) she takes on a female form to give Sherlockâs desires an acceptable outlet â but here we have an acknowledgement from heart!John that he betrayed comphet!Mary in his texting of Eurus. The texting is made to parallel Sherlockâs own engagement with his sexuality in terms of Irene â heâs later revealed to have texted her too. Whether that just suggests merely thoughts or masturbation (or something else?) I donât know, but the parallel suggests that such engagement with his sexuality is the same as heart!Johnâs covert engagement with gay trauma Eurus â in other word, both romantic and sexual illicit desires have been acknowledged, and have existed simultaneously though compartmentalised. We can see the paralleling of heart!Johnâs romantic desires with Sherlockâs sexual desires in moments like when heart!John admits that he still wants more â the camera focuses on Sherlock, who looks at heart!John like a moment of realisation (possibly because heâs recognising the form his heart has taken â thatâs the headcanon).
But this is not a happy scene. Heart!John declares that he has never been capable of comphet, but that he wants it, and comphet!Mary tells him to get the hell on with it â taking special emphasis to call him John Watson. Thereâs no Hamish here, which in a conversation begun on birthdays might make us worry, but crucially calling him John Watson rather than John is a link back to the original stories, when we know that using just first names is a big indicator of the modernity (read queerness) of the adaptation, not least in the EMP (see TAB). Comphet!Maryâs heterosexual compulsion is thus still going strong based on the historical stories. And whatâs sad here is that the impulses are acknowledged! Sherlock not only acknowledges his sexual desire but even that he acts on it (the texts), and heart!John acknowledges his romantic attraction, and where they had been compartmentalised the hug as a moment of unity tells us that Sherlock has joined those dots, acknowledges his existence as a romantic and sexual being. And then â he puts the hat on, he still needs a high of some description to cope with his birthday. I believe that Sherlockâs acknowledgement of Maryâs ghost at the end, previously visible only to John, is a new recognition of the compulsory heterosexuality that his heart has been grappling with â but he puts on that hat in order to capitulate to it. (Never fear, the hat is coming off later).
The hat wearing comes in a separate scene, in terms of framing, to the official hug scene, although logically they must happen within 20 minutes of each other in the same room. [I am resisting the urge to make a crack joke about what happened in the interim. Iâm sure thereâs something on AO3 about it.] Itâs a horrible addendum, because heart!John has just confessed his biggest secret, and Sherlock acknowledges it â but then immediately downplays it. Just texting. In superficial terms, this downplaying is personally not what I would want from a friend â in metaphorical terms, itâs deadly. Itâs a subtle undermining of the entire previous scene. We can see that the wall hasnât been broken through, that heâs still chickened at the last second (much like at the end of TST) in other ways â he still has the appearance of drugged Sherlock, in particular the facial hair, which is used to reference bearding typically in the show. I also maintain â though others may take issue with this â that Cumberbatchâs gait changes when he plays a high Sherlock, and although ostensibly not high here that slightly clumsy gait remains the same. It is not a good vibe. And then, the final shot of this scene isnât one of acceptance or closure. After Sherlock acknowledges Maryâs presence, the look on Martin Freemanâs face is one of quiet but terrible sadness, as well as anxiety.
A final thought before I leave this scene, having discussed what happens at the end of TLD in a different chapter â itâs worth noting that Sherlock has a mug of an unspecified hot drink throughout this scene, but itâs left ambiguous whether itâs coffee or tea. (Yes, it could be something else, but given the heavy focus on coffee and tea earlier in the episode, along with the pre-established drinks code, we can assume.) This ambiguity, I think, is deliberate â it allows Sherlock to acknowledge desire but still mask it through vagueness and ambiguity. Itâs a way of lying to himself â and goodness knows weâre all capable of that, and can probably see how such a fudge might apply to a mental analysis of such a situation. Iâd love to hear othersâ thoughts on this scene though â do let me know! Until next time.
#sherlock meta#emp theory#tjlc#tjlc is real#meta#my meta#mine#thewatsonbeekeepers#bbc sherlock#chapter ten: oh no love#you're not alone#david bowie ref#what a guy#mofftiss#johnlock
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150 Best Engagement Quotes By Famous Personalities and Celebrities
Source: Happy Wedding App
You might need engagement quotes to beautify your Facebook and Insta posts; here, I am sharing with you 150+ timeless Engagement quotes given by famous personalities and celebrities. Take a lookâŚâŚ
âControl leads to compliance; autonomy leads to engagement.â â Daniel H. Pink.
âI have an engagement ring, which is my favorite accessory.â â Jules Asner.
âI love you for all that you are, all that you have been, and all youâre yet to be.â ��� Unknown.
âWhen you have been just told that the girl you love is definitely betrothed to another, you begin to understand how Anarchists must feel when the bomb goes off too soon.â â P.G. Wodehouse.
âI couldnât have dreamed you into existence because I didnât even know I needed you. You must have been sent to me.â â Kamand Kojouri.
ââŚlearning always occurs in a context of taking action, and they value engagement and experience as the most effective strategies for deep learning.â â Richard DuFour.
To speak frankly, I am not in favor of long engagements. They give people the opportunity of finding out each otherâs character before marriage, which I think is never advisable.â â Oscar Wilde.
âI married a man who was as much a part of me as my own soul.â â C.J. English.
âBetween a man and his wife nothing ought to rule but love.â â William Penn
âMarriage is not kick-boxing, itâs salsa dancing.â â Amit Kalantri.
âThere are many blanks left in the weeks of courtship, which a loving faith fills with happy assurance.â â George Eliot.
âIt is wrong to think of marriage as hyped bondage. You can marry and still be happy. Everything rests on who you are married to. Marriage is a beautiful thing.â â Michael Bassey Johnson.
âStudent engagement is a product of motivation and active learning. It is a product rather than a sum because it will not occur if either element is missing.â â Elizabeth F. Barkley.
âAnd try not to make a habit of getting engaged in the first place, Vivie. It can lead to marriage if youâre not careful.â â Elizabeth Gilbert.
âAnyone can catch your eye, but it takes someone special to catch your heart.â â Unknown.
âThe success of love is in the loving; it is not in the result of loving.â â Mother Teresa.
âGive a man the finger; heâll put a wedding ring on it!â â Ljupka Cvetanova.
âMy acronym for full-on engagement: ROAR, Return on Attendee Relevanceâ â Andrea Driessen
âThe highest happiness on earth is marriage.â â William Lyon Phelps.
âThey had exchanged vows and tokens, sealed their rich compact, solemnized, so far as breathed words and murmured sounds and lighted eyes and clasped hands could do it, their agreement to belong only, and to belong tremendously, to each other.â â Henry James.
âLove is not in the ring. Love is in the heart.â â Michael Bassey Johnson.
âWhen you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.â â Nora Ephron.
âYou Need To Gauge, To Engage.â â Syed Sharukh
âDoubt thou the stars are fire; doubt that the sun doth move; doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt I love.â â William Shakespeare.
Related: Â List of ideas for your Engagement party
âWhen you found someone you really loved, everything fitted.â â Melissa Hill.
âIt is sometimes essential for a husband and a wife to quarrelâthey get to know each other better.â â Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
âIâve found someone who refuses to let me be anything but myself.â â Hayley Paige.
âWe start a relationship with someone not only because of how great they are but how great they make us feel. And because they have granted us this extraordinary giftâa chance to experience Love, joy, compassion, and security âit is our exclusive privilege to make them feel wonderful about themselves, especially during days when they, themselves, donât feel so wonderful.â â Kamand Kojouri.
âRemember tonight, for it is the beginning of always.â â Dante Alighieri.
âWeâre all a little weird. And life is a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness and call it Loveâtrue Love.â â Robert Fulghum.
âMany people spend more time in planning the wedding than they do in planning the marriage.â â Zig Ziglar.
âI wonât give my heart to another girl until God shows me itâs my wife.â â Eric Ludy
âThe reason why women think men should spend a lot of money on an engagement ring is because women are the ones who get to clean up all the poop (stains and toilet bowl swirls included) that is provided by every family member living in the house until they die.â â Heather Chapple.
âEngagement can be a commitment to love or a declaration of war. One must enter every battle without hesitation, willing to fully engage the enemy until death does you apart.â â Emily Thorne.
âMy forever.â â Unknown
âTo keep the fire burning brightly, thereâs one easy rule: Keep the two logs together, near enough to keep each other warm and far enough apartâabout a fingerâs breadthâfor breathing room. Good fire, good marriage, same rule.â â Marnie Reed Crowel
âOnce youâve found the right person, you just know.â â Sophie Turner.
âA perfect couple shares their failures, mistakes and their successes equally and deals with them all as a team.â â Ricardo Derose.
âHow could I say no?â â Unknown.
âSuccess in marriage does not come merely through finding the right mate, but through being the right mate.â â Barnett R. Brickner.
âCalm down, it isnât a ring,â I laughed, and he pushed the box across the table to me, and I blushed and opened it.â â Mercy Cortez.
âWeâre engaged to be engaged, arenât we?â â E.D. Baker
âYou donât marry someone you can live with-you marry the person you cannot live without.â â Unknown.
âMarriage is not the beginning of the journey, nor the end â it is the journey.â â Carew Papritz.
âHeâs just the best person Iâve ever met in my whole life.â â Jennifer Lawrence.
âHis proposal was dedicated to his love for me and the future he wanted to build together.â â Rachel Lindsay.
âMy Constant.â â Unknown
âHe got down on one knee, and heâs like, âI forgot everything Iâm supposed to say, but youâre my best friend.'â â Hilary Duff.
âIt was so sweet.â â Hilary Duff.
Also See: 110 Most Romantic Wedding Couple Quotes
âWell, he is the best man Iâve ever met. Heâs just everything to me.â â Unknown.
âHereâs to a lifetime of friendship, purpose & unconditional love.â â Bindi Irwin.
âI asked my best friend a question⌠and he said yes.â â Unknown.
âWe have the greatest pre-nuptial agreement in the world. Itâs called Love.â â Gene Perret.
âWherever you are, is my home, my only home.â â Jane Eyre.
âChains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years.â â Simone Signoret
âShe said yes. Locking it down.â â Alex Rodriguez.
âWhen he asked, I could not say NO.â â Unknown.
âEngagement marks the end of a whirlwind romance and beginning of an eternal love story.â â Unknown.
âTrue love stories never have endings.â â Richard Bach.
âGrow old with me! The best is yet to be.â â Robert Browning.
âLove doesnât make the world go âround. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.â â Franklin P. Jones.
âThe countdown begins.â â Unknown.
âWe are not perfect; we learn from our mistakes. And as long as it takes, I will prove my Love to you.ââ Sara Bareilles.
âItâs time to make things official.â â Unknown.
âThe best and most beautiful things in this world cannot be seen or even heard, but must be felt with the heart.â â Helen Keller.
âEvery love story is beautiful, but ours is my favorite.â â Unknown.
âIt is good to have an end to journey toward; But it is the journey that matters, in the end.â â Ernest Hemingway.
âEvery day is an engagement day for us.â â Unknown.
âThe secret of a happy marriage remains⌠a secret.â â Henny Youngman.
â25 days to go.â â Unknown.
âI wish you to know that you have been the last dream of my soul.â âCharles Dickens.
Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness.â â Oliver Wendell Holmes.
âIn all the world, there is no heart for me like yours. In all the world, there is no love for you like mine.â â Maya Angelou.
âYou are my heart, my life, my one and only thought.â â Arthur Conan Doyle.
âAnd Iâd choose you; in a hundred lifetimes, in a hundred worlds, in any version of reality, Iâd find you, and Iâd choose you.â âKiersten White.
âLove is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.â â Aristotle.
âLove one another, and you will be happy. Itâs as simple and as difficult as that.â â Micheal Leunig.
âItâs not your perfectness that I fell in Love with. It was your flaws that brought me in.â â Unknown.
âAll commands from your lips are sweet, I say, and now have you not said the sweetest of all? Marry you!â â Byron Caldwell Smith.
âMy whole heart for my whole life.â â French Proverb
âWhatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.â â Emily Bronte.
âGravitation cannot be held responsible for people falling in love.â â Albert Einstein.
âA marriage is like a long trip in a tiny rowboat; if one passenger starts to rock the boat, the other has to steady it; otherwise they will go to the bottom together.â â David Reuben.
âAnd Iâd choose you; in a hundred lifetimes, in a hundred worlds, in any version of reality, Iâd find you, and Iâd choose you.â â Kiersten White.
âA happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.â â Ruth Bell Graham.
Related: 65+ Beautiful Wedding Album Quotes
âLove is the expansion of two natures in such fashion that each includes the other, each is enriched by the other.â â Felix Adler.
âIt is sometimes essential for a husband and a wife to quarrelâthey get to know each other better.â â Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe.
âBefore you marry a person, you should first make them use a computer with slow Internet to see who they really are.â â Will Ferrell.
âLove is the longing for the half of ourselves we have lost.â â Milan Kundera.
âThe disgusting way an engagement is regarded public property; all these older women smirkingâŚbut my point is their whole attitude is wrongâ an engagement, horrid word in the first place, is a private affair and should be regarded as such.â â Daniel Day-Lewis.
âIf you want to sacrifice the admiration of many men for the criticism of one, go ahead, get married.â â Katharine Hepburn.
âItâs so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life.â â Rita Rudner
âWe may have started as individuals, but now we are as one.â â Bryon Pulsifer.
âIf you live to be a hundred, I want to live to be a hundred minus one day, so I never have to live without you.â â A.A. Milne.
âToday, engagement parties still allow both families to meet each other if they havenât done so before. Even if both sets of parents have met, itâs nice for siblings and other extended relatives to meet and mingle, so they are all acquainted with one another before the wedding.â â Gabrielle Kaplan-Mayer.
âThey say that marriages are made in heaven. But so is thunder and lightning.â â Clint Eastwood.
âSuccess in marriage does not come merely through finding the right mate, but through being the right mate.â â Barnett R. Brickner.
âFind the person who will love you because of your differences and not in spite of them, and you have found a lover for life.â â Leo Buscaglia.
âCourtship to marriage is a very witty prologue to a very dull play.â â William Congreve.
âIt is the duty of the brideâs father to give a party to announce the Engagement. Apparently, this is done only after everyone knows about it.â â Spencer Tracy.
âNever go to bed mad. Stay up and fight.â â Phyllis Diller.
âThe best thing that the diamond ring could do; was to amicably occupy a place on the engagement finger.â â Nikhil Parekh.
âLove is just a word until someone comes along and gives it meaning. Your Love paints a beautiful picture of what Love really means.â â Unknown.
âYou rose into my life like a promised sunrise, brightening my days with the light in your eyes. Iâve never been so strong. Now Iâm where I belong.â â Maya Angelou.
âEngagement can be a commitment to love or a declaration of war. One must enter every battle without hesitation, willing to fully engage the enemy until death do you apart.â â Emily Thorne.
âItâs never out of style to have good manners. If possible, make the engagement announcement to the brideâs parents in person.â â Joyce Scardina-Becker.
âLove would never be a promise of a rose garden unless it is showered with light of faith, the water of sincerity and air of passion.â â Unknown.
âA perfect couple shares their failures, mistakes and their successes equally and deals with them all as a team.â â Ricardo Derose.
âMarriages donât work when one partner is happy, and the other is miserable. Marriage is about both people being equally miserable.â â Forget Paris.
âIn the arithmetic of love, one plus one equals everything, and two minus one equals nothing.â â Mignon McLaughlin.
âI wonât give my heart to another girl until God shows me itâs my wife.â â Eric Ludy.
âLove does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking together in the same direction.â â Antoine.
âYou rose into my life like a promised sunrise, brightening my days with the light in your eyes. Iâve never been so strong. Now Iâm where I belong.â â Maya Angelou.
âAlthough somewhat outdated, the use of formal announcement cards is a beautiful and elegant way to spread the word of your engagement.â â Joyce Scardina-Becker.
âMany people spend more time in planning the wedding than they do in planning the marriage.â â Zig Ziglar.
âIf I were to live a thousand years, I would belong to you for all of them. If we were to live a thousand lives, I would want to make you mine in each one.â â Michelle Hodkin.
Also See: 111 Best Wedding Anniversary Wishes for Friends
âI would rather not be engaged. When people are engaged, they begin to think of being married soonâŚand I should like everything to go on for a long while just as it is.â â George Eliot.
âIf you tell me you love me, I might not believe you, but if you show me you do, then I will.â â Unknown
âAn engaged woman is always more agreeable than a disengaged. She is satisfied with herself. Her cares are over, and she feels that may exert all her powers of pleasing without suspicion. All is safe with a lady engaged; no harm can be done.â â Jane Austen.
âAn engagement should come upon a young girl as a surprise, pleasant or unpleasant as the case may be. It is hardly a matter she could be allowed to arrange for herself.â â Edith Evans.
âFor a marriage to be a success, every woman and every man should have her and his own bathroom. The end.â â Catherine Zeta-Jones.
âLet us be together for the rest of our lives; I will assure you that, starting from this engagement.â â Unknown.
âUltimately the bond of all companionship, whether in marriage or in friendship, is a conversation.â â Oscar Wilde.
âI choose you, and Iâll choose you. Over and over and over without pause, without a doubt, in a heartbeat, Iâll keep choosing you.â â Unknown.
âFor it was not into my ear, you whispered but into my heart.â â Judy Garland.
âThe only gift is a portion of thyself.â â Ralph Waldo Emerson.
âWe may have started as individuals, but now we are as one.â â Bryon Pulsifer.
âThe meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances; if there is any reaction, both are transformed.â â Carl Jung.
âHe felt now that he was not simply close to her, but that he did not know where he ended and she began.â â Leo Tolstoy.
âTo love and to be loved is to feel the sun from both sides.â â David Viscott.
âI promise to take care of you when you are old, but the first time you hit me with your cane, Iâll wash your dentures in toilet water.â â Unknown.
âNo engagement is worth anything unless it has been broken at least once.â â Dorothy Tutin.
âThere are many blanks left in the weeks of courtship, which a loving faith fills with happy assurance.â â George Eliot.
âEach time you happen to me all over again.â â Edith Wharton
âIt is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.â â Ernest Hemingway.
âLove is not blindâit sees more, not less. But because it sees more, it is willing to see less.â â Rabbi Julius Gordon.
âWithout you, Iâm nothing, with you Iâm something, but together we are everything.â â Unknown.
âThe best thing to hold onto in life is each other.â â Audrey Hepburn.
âI try to remember, as I hear about friends getting engaged, that itâs not about the ring and itâs not about the wedding. Itâs a grave thing, getting married. And itâs easy to get swept up in the wrong things.â â Gwyneth Paltrow.
âI feel like this is the beginning, though Iâve loved you for a million years.â â Stevie Wonder.
âWhat greater thing is there for human souls than to feel that they are joined for lifeâto be with each other in silent unspeakable memories!â â George Eliot
âA relationship is like a house when a light bulb burns out you do not go and buy a new house, but you fix the light bulb.â â Unknown.
âLove does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking together in the same direction.â â Antoine.
âMy instinct is to keep my engagement ring. After all, I wouldnât like to see it on the finger of a cheeky girl.â â Sian Lloyd.
âEngagement is the time when you have a clear view of how wonderful your coming life will be. So try to get the best vision of a great and wonderful future waiting for you.â â Unknown.
âLove doesnât make the world go round; love is what makes the ride worthwhile.â â Franklin P. Jones.
âIf I had a single flower for every time, I think of you, I could walk forever in my garden.â â Claudia Adrienne Grandi.
âAll commands from your lips are sweet, I say, and now have you not said the sweetest of all? Marry you!â â Byron Caldwell Smith.
âFor you see, each day I love you more, today more than yesterday and less than tomorrow.â â Rosemonde Gerard.
âI love you and thatâs the beginning and end of everything.â â F. Scott Fitzgerald.
âYou are my answered prayer because you are more than a giver in many aspectsâa giver of Love, hope, and happiness. You are a great giver in your own peerless ways.â â Unknown.
âI love youâ means that I accept you for the person that you are and that I do not wish to change you into someone else. It means that I will love you and stand by you even through the worst of times. It means loving you even when youâre in a bad mood or too tired to do the things I want to do. It means loving you when youâre down, not just when youâre fun to be with. âI love youâ means that I know your deepest secrets and do not judge you for them, asking in return that you do not judge me for mine. It means that I care enough to fight for what we have and that I love you enough not to let go. It means thinking of you, dreaming of you, wanting and needing you constantly, and hoping you feel the same way for me.â â Deanne Laura Gilbert.
Everyone has an addiction; mine just happens to be you.â â Unknown.
Use these beautiful Engagement quotes to write wonderful F.B. and Insta posts to announce the great news to the world.
#Engagement quotes#engagement#quotes#quote#best quotes#best engagement#best engagement quotes#Quotes for insta#quote for life#quotes for social media#quote of the day#quote by celebrity#Wedding quotes#romantic quotes#Romantic Quote
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More Quick Thoughts... quickly presented...
Moderator Ginger Zee, from Good Morning America â now a huge fan â watches the show with her husband. Sheâs counting: 137 days of Droughtlander to go.
Introductions⌠Sam as the King of Men⌠six years into being introduced as Jamie Fraser and welcomed onto a stage, and the man still looks as shy as he did the first time⌠Caitriona as the Queen of All Women... and with Balfe mispronounced. đ¤Śđťââď¸ Sigh.
Surprise guests⌠Sophie and Rik appeared via video to answer fan questions, with help from Adso. Sophie calls their North Carolina home in Scotland âFraserâs Fridge.â She and Rik appeared just fine together, no awkwardness, and Iâll fight you on that.
They presented a video âfirst look at Season 5,â which is on the Facebook page dated October 3, so hmm. (If I remember, Iâll post it on Tumblr. If I forget, you do it.)
About the sets⌠across the board, âthe big house is phenomenal.â I canât wait to see it!
Dianaâs thoughts⌠character from her book she is most excited to see on screen? âAdso.â Her favourite line/words in the show thatâs not in her book? âfucking bastard snakeâ đ
On Murtagh đ⌠How has Duncan developed Murtagh in Seasons 3, 4, and 5 when he canât use the books to guide him? Heâs âalways taken the scriptsâ as his source. (Oops⌠đŹ) He thinks Season 5 is the best work heâs done on the show.
Sam chimed in with, âWe all need a Murtagh in our lives.â Well, duh. đ Ace of Spades by Motorhead would be Murtaghâs theme song, according to Duncan. According to boyneriver-fraser, Murtaghâs theme song is When A Man Loves A Woman. đ
Penalty whisky⌠Because she knew sheâd never answer a question without spilling a spoiler and getting fired (her word), Mrs. Blooper (Maria) declined to answer and asked for a whisky. (I forget the question.)
Cait & Sam as producers⌠Caitriona said so far itâs mostly been about learning. Sam said itâs rewarding to be able to give input and to work with everyone.
On how Jamie & Claireâs love story has changed since Season 1⌠Cait said their love for one another keeps expanding. (Settle down, people). Sam recalled a scene they recently shot where Jamie and Claire âmade love without making love.â Rather than expand on that thought, he chose a penalty whisky.
"Hereâs to making love without making love.â đĽ
Sam on time travel⌠If Season 5 Jamie were able to travel through the stones, what would he tell Season 1 Jamie? âDonât go near her.â But seriously though, folks⌠âHeâd do anything. Heâd die for her.â
About bringing a book-dead character back to life⌠Diana said, âWhen I kill someone, they stay dead. No offence to Duncan, but you (Murtagh) should have stayed dead.â 𤯠I wish Iâd screenshot Marilâs face at that moment. đ
Maril said Rupert, Angus, and Dougal. Sam said Geillis. Cait said Faith⌠and I donât think anyone on stage or in the audience heard her, because there was no reaction AND THERE SHOULD HAVE BEEN HUGE REACTION! đ
About what 21st-century luxury the 18th-century characters would like to have⌠Gingerâs husband would want a shower. Cait would like a flushing toilet. Ron, a TV. Sam⌠wait for it⌠A PHONE! đ
Using New York accents to deliver Outlander lines⌠paraphrased because Iâm too lazy to consult the scripts/books right now. Do your best to imagine these Scottish, English, Australian, and Irish actorsâ voices in their best New YorkeseâŚ
Sam: âHey, you canât be the first lass Iâve kissed, but I swear youâll be the last.â
Duncan: âThe idea of grinding your corn does tickle me.â
Maria: âArses and armpits. Too many people. The whole place smells like frogs.â
David: âDo you know what itâs like to love somebody who will never love you back?â
AND CAITRIONA BALFE FOR THE WIN! âIf you ever lay a hand on me again, James Fraser, Iâll cut out your heart and serve it to you for breakfast!â
Seriously, her accent and line delivery were hilarious! đ
Good to know⌠Young Ian has the fartiest horse. đ¤ˇđťââď¸
Period you would choose if your character could live anytime⌠Maria: 1930s-59 to hear Billie Holiday sing live. David just wants to see a dinosaur. Duncan: âRight now because right now needs Murtagh.â Cait: right now. Sam: would leave Jamie where he is, where he belongs.
Fan question⌠which, depending on your perspective, could be very awkward⌠When Outlander is over, will you still live in Glasgow? Silence. Crickets. Finally, âitâs never going to end,â I forget who said it first, but Cait jumped on it quickly. Duncan finally said, âYou go where the work is,â and everyone agreed.
Hereâs to a great audience and to Season 5! đĽđĽđĽđĽđĽđĽđĽđĽđĽ
Editorial 1⌠Whatever your perspective, no matter how hardened your heart might have become, I triple dog dare you to deny Sam Heughan did not burst with pride when one fan gushed about her loving Caitriona and presented her with a birthday gift, and another fan told the story of her becoming a surgical nurse because of Caitâs portrayal of Claire. I triple dog dare you.
Editorial 1-A⌠A fan mentioned and congratulated Sam on his upcoming movie. Sam talked about Caitrionaâs upcoming movie. [He did express (mock) annoyance about her working with Matt Damon, who probably canât ride a horse.]
Editorial 2⌠There is absolutely no circumstance under which Lallybroch would be better than a cat.
About playing (much) older characters⌠Cait said Claire and Jamie donât really get older because their hearts and souls are ageless.
Two parter: 1. With Outlander and all his side projects, does Sam ever sleep? I canât remember if he answered? Hmm. 2. What is his favourite episode or scene? He chose the first episodes of Season 3 during which Jamie was a shell of himself without Claire and had to learn to make a life without her. #obviously Cait was (mock) annoyed and he changed his answer to The Wedding.
Editorial 3⌠Mathematical question: If Faith was (still)born in 1744, and Brianna was born in 1948, which would be 1746 in Outlander time, had Faith not died, how would she be 10 years older than Brianna? Diana? Anyone?Â
Again, about Outlanderâs ending⌠Who would take Adso home? Cait said Eddie would kill Adso so Sam would have to take Adso home with him. And I eyeroll-laughed and laughed⌠(Perhaps I should label this bit âEditorial 4?â)
__________
October 5, 2019
Screenshots: @boyneriver-fraser from outlander_starz Facebook Live
#Outlander #NYCC 2019 #Panel interview #Caitriona Balfe #Sam Heughan #Duncan Lacroix #David Berry #Maria Doyle Kennedy #Ronald D. Moore #Maril Davis #Diana Gabaldon #Ginger Zee #151 #100519
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@heartsings {Doyle}
Faith hasnât dreamed since the coma, and frankly, thatâs fine with her. Whether it was medications messing with her brain or more bullshit Slayer superpowers, her dreams were too vivid, too visceral, each one threatening to tear open her bleeding gut and bring her back to the edge of tortured existence. If she was going to sleep, sweet black oblivion was as close to dying as she would come tonight.
Her wet hair clung to her trembling form as she transitioned from a feral disposition to fetal position, wrapped in thick, unforgiving fabrics that Angel had given her to rest with. Shaking, scared, her eyes and cheeks were sunken, retreating into herself as she sought to become small and swallow herself inward. But she was the snake that eats its own tail, endlessly consuming her rage and fear until sheâs choking on it, unable to die, all at once nourished and starving on the emptiness sheâs filled with.
The morning came quickly and to her immediate disappointment, Faith was still alive. Even after all sheâd done, after sheâd begged Angel to end her torment. If she could help it, the Slayer (was that always going to be a part of her now?) wouldnât go upstairs, even if the California earth quaked and the building was going to come down on top of her. Not quite a prisoner, not quite a guest, she slowly slipped from the bed and paced. Like a caged animal, wounded and pitiable but rabid all the same.
The floor was cold against her bare feet, sending little jolts of feeling up through her legs. Faith crept quietly around the place- Angel lived here. Huh, not bad. Were she not so numb grappling with the ramifications of her still being alive, she might have been a bit jealous. After everything heâd done... Even a vampire with a soul had more redeeming qualities than Faith did.
As she pondered her fate, she caught movement from the corner of her eye. âAngel?â she said softly, weakly. The man would never hide himself or try to sneak up on her, not if he was genuine in his desire to help her in her fragile state. âIâm serious, is someone down here?â
After no response, Faith scrambled for the kitchenette, finding a block of knives. Her hand trembled to pick one up, her mind flashing memories behind her eyes, of jackal knives and bleeding stomachs. Still, she armed herself, holding the utensil low against her thigh as she stalked around the corner wall. As she rounded the edge, peering past, her breath caught in her throat at the sight of a man, a stranger, waiting there. Somehow making it past the elevator shaft to end up in Angelâs living room. Faith flexed her fingers around the knife handle, keeping the weapon just out of sight.
                 âW-who the hell are you?â
#heartsings doyle#heartsings doyle 01#v: seeking sanctuary#divergent;#//hope this is ok!!!#//don't feel the need to match length faith is a mess i just wanted to establish that#TW: blood#TW: knives
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Writing Romantic Chemistry: Pt 1
Recently, Becca who actually went to school for this stuff, wrote a good post about romance novels and how theyâre different than other novels. For the full gist, go ahead and read it for yourself. What I took away from it is that in romance novels, unlike most other novels, the main conflict is between the two main characters. There is something keeping them apart, poor communication, denial, secrets, or lies. At the same time, there has to be something pulling them together both personally and socially. An outside force is attracting these two people who normally wouldnât be together into each others orbit where they have to overcome their difficulties and âgive inâ to that personal attraction.
Romance is pretty popular as a genre and as a subgenre in books and shows and movies and some are better at it than others. (Most action movies are pretty bad at it.) There are procedural shows like Castle that were built around the entire idea that someday the two main leads would get together and have a happily something or something. There are procedural shows like Bones where they tried to push it, forgot about it and then fell back into it when they were running short on plot ideas for the main characters. Then there are procedural shows like Rizzoli and Isles where the love lives of the main two women are cliff notes in the overall friendship.
Iâve read a lot of urban fantasy where romance is a major subplot and Iâve mentioned some of the tropes Iâve seen in previous blog posts. Tropes like serial dating and love triangles and the type of drama that if two people actually had a conversation like grown adults everything bad could have been avoided. Or peril could have been avoided if the main characters were actually doing their jobs instead of trying to solve crime. A lot of the time, these romances don't feel successful.
And in order for a romance to feel successful the characters in question need to have and keep or maintain that âsparkâ or what we generally call chemistry. And letâs face it, there are a lot of characters out there that donât have a lot of chemistry with each other and weâre supposed to go on faith that theyâre good for each other. (Iâm looking at you Letty and Dom.) And as writers we have to know where that spark is at its brightest point and if the characters donât move to the next level then that spark is going to flicker and die. (cough, Castle and Beckett.)
The first thing Iâve discovered about creating chemistry is that you need to get the audience invested. In order to care about your couple, your readers or watchers need to care about them as people. There are a lot of books that I canât get invested in the main characters because the book is so focused on the plot, the mystery, the not so great adventure, that the writer has either not written about the character in the first place or has been encouraged by an editor to cut all of it out in the interest of word count. (Most highly recommended urban fantasy.) Leaving the characters to the reader to feel like card board cut outs that I just canât get invested in. In order to care about the character, I need to know about the character.
Problems with his female characters aside, Jim Butcher is actually fairly good at this. In the first book about Dresden I learned that he likes to open doors for women, he enjoys steak sandwiches and warm beer, his alarm clock has Mickey Mouse on it (because no one with a heart can hit Mickey Mouse), he is owned by a big cat and his place is a hodge podge of textures, old paperbacks and yeah, heâs a magic geek. It may not seem like a lot, but that is the type of information and the way it is presented that lets me get to know and get invested in the idea the Harry Dresden is not that bad of a guy and I could like him.
A lot of books that have romance as a subplot especially if they are going the serial dater or the love triangle route, only take the time to flesh out the main character. Sometimes they donât even do that. If the writer doesnât flesh out the main character or the other side of the love plot, then why do I care? (I donât.)
After you flesh out the characters and get the readers invested in their lives, then you can get the characters invested in each other. Sure, theyâve got outside forces working on them to get them into the same orbit. But once these outside forces are removed, what do the characters see in each other that will make them stick together. Yeah, people feel intense emotions under stress. They often feel attraction and investment in the other person just because of those high stress situations. But what about after that?
A good example I feel of this is Kent and Jane from Rizzoli and Isles. Sure, the show got canceled before they really did anything with Kent and Jane and in the last few episodes they threw an entirely out of left field FBI guy for Jane to 'feel attracted to.' (Note: This is bad. We didn't know this guy. We didn't care. It felt pushed and rushed because it was.) But Kent and Jane had chemistry. They had sparks. And the way it started is that first, given that Kent was such a late comer into the series, they let the watchers get to know Kent a bit first. As we already knew and are invested in Jane and her happiness. He's an odd ball, but professional, limited social skills with a sense of humor. They 'revealed' that Kent had a bit of a crush on Jane after some distraction hi-jinks with Maura (moral and ethical quandary there as a conflict) and started having Jane and Kent bounce sarcasm and jokes off each other. Jane tended to ignore him but his puppy dog eyes were adorable. The question was would Jane ever notice Kent as more than a colleague? (I think they were going for yes... I mean come on, the whole bit with the watermelons in that one case. "But Kent, what did the watermelons do to you?" And the kilt!)
And then the series got cancelled. And we lost this great romantic conflict which drives me crazy. (And I didn't like Kent at first. I swear. I despised the way they introduced him. Ugh and then he grew on me and yes, see, that is good writing and I fell for it!)
There are different types of attraction. There is physical attraction, usually the first thing a person notices about the other. There is mental attraction, appreciation of their brains and the way they think. Thereâs verbal attraction, a liking of the way they talk, how they talk and what they talk about. Â Thereâs emotional attraction. They like the way that person feels things. What makes these characters compatible that there is chemistry between them?
And what is keeping them apart? Things like other relationships, getting out of bad relationships, not being ready for a relationship, trust issues, moral quandaries (such as not being a person who does casual sex,) and the ever easy, DENIAL. Maybe there is a power imbalance or an age gap or job restrictions (can't date within the office or superior officers.)
Then as a writer, we have to fine tune the sense of ânow is the time.â A romance plot follows the same rules as every other plot. At the highest point of the conflict, the character has to act or the relationship will wither and die. And if the characters donât act, the opportunity is missed, the readers are disappointed and they start looking for the next two big relationships for those characters to get invested into. If those arenât presented in a convincing manner, then they might just stop caring about these characters all together.
It can be easy to try and drag a relationship out with them almost getting together and then last minute something interfering. All of this is for the sake of drama or trying to up the ante or push it off or make the tension that much greater. And a lot of times, this fails dramatically. (See Castle and Beckett.) The writers may still try to push the characters together even though they missed that natural point in the conflict where it was the right moment, the right time story wise to do so. And then, they have to find a new conflict to keep the series going.
Because, once that conflict is resolved a lot of writers and writing rooms donât know what to do next. They have to manufacture another conflict in the place of the âwill they, wonât they.â A lot of times it ends up being on the womanâs side of âam I really good enough for him?â (Men in fiction never are as insecure as they are in real life. Itâs not âmachoâ enough.) Even if that woman has been extremely self-confident before then and pushing the guy away because she doesnât think heâs good enough for her. There are a lot of other conflicts than that, money and child rearing and living arrangements and 'how do we tell our friends, do we tell our friends?' come to mind. (But maybe they are just too boring.)
There was a lot of outrage in the fandom of BBC Sherlock when Watson got married and had a baby with Mary. âHow is Watson going to go on adventures with Sherlock with a baby?!â Well, you do what normal and rational people do, you hire a sitter? You take the baby with you? (Doyle wasnât good with female characters to begin with, BBCâs interpretation didnât help matters.) But these are the adult problems. How do you juggle a job and a family and hobbies and friends and keep your romance alive? Everyone has to do it. But media just tries to ignore it because UST is so much more entertaining. (Supposedly.) Babies have a bad habit of ending up kidnapped or disappearing for the story entirely (Bones.) Women who may be rivals for the main characterâs romantic affections are killed.
Or there ends up having to be a conflict in the marriage that may mirror how they got together. Bad communication. Denial of self or the opposite, selfishness. The characters may get involved in a new danger. Maybe there is an affair and trust is lost and has to be regained. Hardships  like disease and accidents are all tests of character that really show what people are like on the inside.
There is a reason why most romance series focus on a bunch of couples one right after the other who were introduced in previous books rather than focusing on a single couple. Every time a reader gets a new book there is a new thrill of âwill they or wonât they?â And the possibility of a different couple conflict. (Of course most romance novels are happily ever after or happy for now, so itâs more of a how than a real question.)
So, romance is tricky to write because it so depends on the fleshed out personalities of the characters. And how the reader feels about the characters is really going to depend on their own biases and views of romance too. From my observations of fandom is that somewhere out there in the great wide internet, there are going to be people who are going to put the oddest people into relationships and can get behind almost anything. And it may not at all be what the creators intended. But the people who consume the media see chemistry or a spark and decide to view it as romantic rather than filial love.
Just goes to show you can't predict anything!
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Chorus Rewatch: Season 13: Because You Deserve To Win
Crossposted from dreamwidth. Back in the spring, I did a full rewatch of the Chorus Trilogy with the purpose of studying its worldbuilding more closely. This series of posts is from that rewatch.
It is really no secret nor ever has been that I am Team Kimball and Team New Republic all the way. I do not hate Doyle by any stretch but you put two characters in front of me, "competent woman doing her best in terrible circumstances" wins over "incompetent man who fails into success" every time; you put a revolution story in front of me and unless you give me a damn good reason not to side with the rebels trying to overthrow a corrupt governmentâwell.
That being said, I appreciate more and more that in this story, the two sides absolutely need each other to win.
Kimball is objectively better at tactics than Doyle, and it is definitely frustrating at times to see fans ignoring thisâ Doyleâs insistence that automatic weapons offer a âstatistical advantageâ is meant to make it obvious to us how little he understands about combat, in addition to his terror of guns in general as seen in season 12. Doyle isn't a good leader or a good soldier. I'm not saying that to be mean. I'm not saying he's a bad person. I'm saying he is objectively less knowledgeable and less experienced with these things than Kimball.
Kimball also needs him.
The New Republic cannot win against Charon without the Feds at their side. This is a theme throughout season 13. It is stated fairly explicitly by Price in his conversation with Locus: what the Reds and Blues had in their fight against the Meta, and what is needed for victory now, is teamwork and faith in one another.
The entire plot of season 13 bears this out. Every time someone splits the party in season 13, they fail.
If they'd thrown all of their combined forces at Crash Site Alpha, they might have succeeded in taking it despite Charon's reinforcements. If they'd sent a larger party to the Temple of Trials, they might not have gotten pinned down by Sharkface. If Doyle hadn't tried to go after the Key alone, it might not have ended up in Felix's hands. And if Carolina hadn't pursued Sharkface by herself, she and Church probably wouldn't have ended up going off a cliff.
And the thing is, Doyle's "divide and conquer" idea wasn't inherently bad, anymore than Kimball wanting to take Crash Site Alpha was inherently bad. Both strategies were based on incomplete intel. If the mercs hadn't jacked the Tartarus and brought in reinforcements, the whole plan might have worked.
Doyle going after the Key by himself was a pretty bad call, but it's easy to see why he made it because deep down, Doyle is terrified of the responsibility of leadership. It's why all of his strategies involve what he feels are safer plays. Lock down in the city and wait it out. Divide and conquer; hedge our bets. It's easy to call Doyle a coward, and he certainly does act out of fear, but he's not just afraid for himself. He's afraid for his people too, and of what will come of making the wrong decision. Not unlike Tucker's struggle with leadership in season 12.
So when the time comes for Doyle to make a tough callâwhere to send backup, to Carolina or to Kimballâhe just⌠doesn't choose. He splits the backup between them, and goes for the Key himself, despite Carolina explicitly telling him to send troops straight for the Key, and not to her team. Doyle sent them backup anyway. Probably because he didn't want Carolina and Tucker, two of their strongest assets, to die because he failed to send them help.
It was a bad call, but it's not difficult to see why he made it.
In the end, even with the Reds and Blues, even with the Freelancers on their side, Chorus doesn't stand a chance against Charon until they are united. The Freelancers are instrumental, yes. Without Carolina and Wash to hold off Locus and Felix at the Temple of the Purge, all would probably have been lost. But even with the Temple destroyed, Hargrove has a lot of resources at his disposal, and he is more than willing to keep throwing firepower at Chorus until the job is doneâhence the mantises. I'm pretty sure that even if the mercs had been killed at the Purge Temple, Hargrove would've stopped at nothing to finish the job. That's also why getting to the Communication Temple is so critical. Nothing short of exposing Hargrove and drawing outside intervention will stop him.
And Chorus has to unite to win.
I was less than impressed with Kimballâs speech the first time around, because it seemed to lack her characteristic grace. I feel differently about it now. I think Kimball speaks the way she does because she knows what both the Feds and the rebels need to hear. âFight because you deserve to fucking winâ means, You have fought too hard to lose it all now because we canât work together.
And it works.
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The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux
The Phantom of the Opera is a novel by French writer Gaston Leroux. It was first published as a serialization in Le Gaulois from 23 September 1909, to 8 January 1910. It was published in volume form in late March 1910 by Pierre Lafitte and directed by Aluel Malinao. The novel is partly inspired by historical events at the Paris Opera during the nineteenth century and an apocryphal tale concerning the use of a former ballet pupil's skeleton in Carl Maria von Weber's 1841 production of Der FreischĂźtz. It has been successfully adapted into various stage and film adaptations, most notable of which are the 1925 film depiction featuring Lon Chaney, and Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1986 musical.
Leroux first decided he would become a lawyer, but after he spent his inheritance gambling he became a reporter for LâEcho de Paris. At the paper he was asked to write about and critique dramas, as well as being a courtroom reporter. With his job, he was able to travel frequently, but he returned to Paris where he became a writer. Because of his fascination with both Edgar Allan Poe and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, he wrote a detective mystery entitled The Mystery of the Yellow Room in 1907, and four years later he published Le FantĂ´me de lâOpĂŠra The novel was first published within newspapers before finally being published as a novel in 1911
The setting of The Phantom of the Opera came from an actual Paris opera house that Leroux had heard the rumors about from the time the opera house was finished. The details about the Palais Garnier, and rumors surrounding it, are closely linked in Leroux's writing. The underground lake that he wrote about is accurate to this opera house, and it is still used for training firefighters to practice swimming in the dark. The event that was the infamous chandelier crash also rang to be true. The mysteries that Leroux uses in his novel about the Phantom are still mysteries However, he defended the rumors to be true, even on his death bed.
The Phantom of the Opera's origins came from Leroux's curiosity with the Phantom being real. In the prologue he tells the readers about the Phantom and the research that he did to prove the truth of the ghost. His findings connected the corpse from the opera house to the Persian phantom himself.
In Paris in the 1880s, the Palais Garnier opera house is believed to be haunted by an entity known as the Phantom of the Opera, or simply the Opera Ghost. A stagehand named Joseph Buquet is found hanged and the rope around his neck goes missing. At a gala performance for the retirement of the opera house's two managers, a young little-known Swedish soprano, Christine DaaĂŠ (based on the late singer Christina Nilsson), is called upon to sing in the place of the Opera's leading soprano, Carlotta, who is ill, and her performance is an astonishing success. The Vicomte Raoul de Chagny, who was present at the performance, recognizes her as his childhood playmate and recalls his love for her. He attempts to visit her backstage, where he hears a man complimenting her from inside her dressing room. He investigates the room once Christine leaves, only to find it empty.
At Perros-Guirec, Christine meets with Raoul, who confronts her about the voice he heard in her room. Christine tells him she has been tutored by the Angel of Music, whom her father used to tell them about. When Raoul suggests that she might be the victim of a prank, she storms off. Christine visits her father's grave one night, where a mysterious figure appears and plays the violin for her. Raoul attempts to confront it but is attacked and knocked out in the process.
Back at the Palais Garnier, the new managers receive a letter from the Phantom demanding that they allow Christine to perform the lead role of Marguerite in Faust, and that box 5 be left empty for his use, lest they perform in a house with a curse on it. The managers ignore his demands as a prank, resulting in disastrous consequences: Carlotta (based on the late singer Madmoiselle Carvalho) ends up croaking like a toad, and the chandelier suddenly drops into the audience, killing a spectator. The Phantom, having abducted Christine from her dressing room, reveals himself as a deformed man called Erik. Erik intends to hold her prisoner in his lair with him for a few days, but she causes him to change his plans when she unmasks him and, to the horror of both, beholds his noseless, lipless, sunken-eyed face, which resembles a skull dried up by the centuries, covered in yellowed dead flesh.
Fearing that she will leave him, he decides to kidnap her permanently, but when Christine requests release after two weeks, he agrees on the condition that she wear his ring and be faithful to him. On the roof of the opera house, Christine tells Raoul about her abduction and makes Raoul promise to take her away to a place where Erik can never find her, even if she resists. Raoul tells Christine he will act on his promise the next day, to which she agrees. However, Christine sympathizes with Erik and decides to sing for him one last time as a means of saying goodbye. Unbeknownst to Christine and Raoul, Erik has been watching them and overheard their whole conversation.
The following night, the enraged and jealous Erik abducts Christine during a production of Faust and tries to force her to marry him. Raoul is led by a mysterious opera regular known as "The Persian" into Erik's secret lair deep in the bowels of the opera house, but they end up trapped in a mirrored room by Erik, who threatens that unless Christine agrees to marry him, he will kill them and everyone in the Opera House by using explosives. Christine agrees to marry Erik. Erik initially tries to drown Raoul and the Persian, using the water which would have been used to douse the explosives, but Christine begs and offers to be his "living bride", promising him not to kill herself after becoming his bride, as she had both contemplated and attempted just prior. Erik eventually releases Raoul and the Persian from his torture chamber.
When Erik is alone with Christine, he lifts his mask to kiss her on her forehead and is given a kiss back. Erik reveals that he has never received a kiss, not even from his own mother, nor has he been allowed to give one, and is overcome with emotion. He and Christine then cry together and their tears "mingle". Erik later says that he has never felt so close to another human being. He allows the Persian and Raoul to escape, though not before making Christine promise that she will visit him on his death day, and return the gold ring he gave her. He also makes the Persian promise that afterward he will go to the newspaper and report his death, as he will die soon and will die "of love". Indeed, sometime later Christine returns to Erik's lair, buries him somewhere where he will never be found (by Erik's request) and returns the gold ring. Afterward, a local newspaper runs the simple note: "Erik is dead". Christine and Raoul (who finds out that Erik has killed his older brother) elope together, never to return.
The story ends with passages narrated directly by the Persian and the final chapter that pieces together Erik's life. It is revealed that Erik was the son of a construction business owner, deformed from birth. He ran away from his native Normandy to work in fairs and in caravans, schooling himself in the arts of the circus across Europe and Asia, and eventually building trick palaces in Persia and Turkey. Eventually, he returned to France and, wearing a mask, started his own construction business. After being subcontracted to work on the foundations of the Palais Garnier, Erik had discreetly built himself a lair to disappear in, complete with hidden passages and other tricks that allowed him to spy on the managers.
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Its Okay Quotes and Sayings and it will be Okay Quotes
I may not know you actually, but rather I needed to connect over the web and to certifiably hold your hand and let you realize it will approve of a major rundown of reasons why. A rundown of reasons why the world doesn't suck despite the fact that things feel extremely hard at the present time. A rundown of suggestions to enable you to review your very own inward quality and versatility. A rundown of statements and insights and reflections on how and why you'll likely get past this time.
âI was set free because my greatest fear had been realized, and I still had a daughter who I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.â â J. K. Rowling
Because there are families out there raising and championing kind, compassionate, loving, respectful little boys.
Because I wrote you a pep talk for those times when youâre struggling.
âOur wounds are often the openings into the best and most beautiful part of us.â â David Richo
Because there are families out there who are consciously allowing and deliberately supporting their childâs own natural gender and sexual identity to emerge of their own accord. How incredibly beautiful and powerful is that?
Its Okay Quotes Sayings
You are resilient. Perhaps more so than you know. And you can do really, really hard things.
âPeople are like stained â glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.â â Elisabeth KĂźbler-Ross, M.D.
Because while you may not know what the future holds, I trust you have the skills and capacity to meet it and to navigate it. However it unfolds. âOne of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it.â â Clarissa Pinkola EstĂŠs, Ph.D.
Because, if the average person lives 27,375 days and this one happens to be a particularly bad one for you, remember not all of the other days lived so far felt this bad and remember that not all of your remaining days will likely feel this bad. Itâs just one of many days in your life, even if it sucks right now.
âDiscovering the truth about ourselves is a lifetimeâs work, but itâs worth the effort.â â Fred Rogers
No matter how hard things seem right now, you always have some degree of choice and free will, somewhere, somehow, even itâs âjustâ in how you choose to think about a situation.
âIâm here. I love you. I donât care if you need to stay up crying all night long, I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take itâI will love you through that, as well. If you donât need the medication, I will love you, too. Thereâs nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and I am braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me.â â Elizabeth Gilbert
If youâre feeling scared and fearful because youâre experiencing or anticipating a loss and itâs bringing up your childhood fears around scarcity, grief, and loneliness, look around you and find reasons why youâre actually more secure than you feel. Just because past feelings are present does not mean the situation is real.
Okay Images
Because there are great and effective tools you can use to help manage your feelings.
Because, the smell of fresh baked bread.
Because there are enormously talented writers out there like J.K. Rowling, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Marion Zimmer Bradley, and others who have created whole worlds and universes for us to âescapeâ into if we need a little break from this one.
Because no feeling lasts forever. Even if it feels like it might always feel this way, it wonât. Itâs impossible for it to because change is inevitable for all of us.
When it feels like youâre the last of your college girlfriends to get engaged/get married/have a baby/buy a house and you feel sad and very alone, just remember⌠Adultingâs not easy. And humaning can be hard.
âOften when you think youâre at the end of something, youâre at the beginning of something else.â â Fred Rogers
Its all Okay Quotes
I mean, because of things like this video.
Because the world is filled with talented ASMR artists who are creating content to help soothe and support you.
âYou may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.â â Maya Angelou
Because even while it feels like the world (or your world) is ending, if you look around and notice the ground safely underneath your feet, the walls holding up the ceiling, your lungs breathing in and out, you have proof that it isnât. Proof that you are safe.
âWe must let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us.â â Joseph Campbell
When you have gone through tough times in the past you got through them, didnât you? You developed resources and skills or had gifts and opportunities brought to you at the time you needed them, right? Hereâs your proof that this may happen again while youâre going through a hard time.
âItâs good to do uncomfortable things. Itâs weight training for life.â â Anne Lamott
You have (at least) one person in your life you could likely turn to if you needed to. A friend. A parent. Your therapist. Your neighbor. Your doctor.
âWe cannot selectively numb emotions, when we numb the painful emotions, we also numb the positive emotions.â â BrenĂŠ Brown
If youâre feeling uncomfortable and scared because youâre stretching yourself and doing something youâve never done before, know that this is totally normal and natural! Itâs normal and natural to feel emotionally and physically uncomfortable when you up level and do new tasks or act from new ways of being. Your discomfort may not last and it may not be a sign that this is the wrong step.
âI think one of the keys to happiness is accepting that I am never going to be perfectly happy. Life is uncomfortable. So I might as well get busy loving the people around me. Iâm going to stop trying so hard to decide whether they are the âright peopleâ for me and just take deep breaths and love my neighbors. Iâm going to take care of my friends. Iâm going to find peace in the âburbs. Iâm going to quit chasing happiness long enough to notice it smiling right at me.â â Glennon Doyle
Because of the sweet, milky smell of little babiesâŚ
It will be Okay Quotes
Please remember, what youâre going through right now is temporary. It may not feel like that from inside the tough time youâre in, but this too shall pass and you will feel different again someday. If you canât have faith in that, let me hold the hope for you.
Right now, somewhere in the world, spiritual leaders are praying for you, meditating for you, crafting their work in the world for you.
âItâs funny: I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools â friendships, prayer, conscience, honesty â and said âdo the best you can with these, they will have to doâ. And mostly, against all odds, they do.â â Anne Lamott
Because, ice cream on a hot summer day.
You guys, there are libraries. Air-conditioned places where we can go to LEARN and to escape and to grow. Where you can find computers and free internet, audio books, dvdâs and thousands upon thousands of worlds waiting for you to explore them.
Because of everyday warriors like Senator Elizabeth Warren who are standing up for us and fighting the good fight.
âThis is an important lesson to remember when youâre having a bad day, a bad month, or a shitty year. Things will change: you wonât feel this way forever. And anyway, sometimes the hardest lessons to learn are the ones your soul needs most. I believe you canât feel real joy unless youâve felt heartache. You canât have a sense of victory unless you know what it means to fail. You canât know what itâs like to feel holy until you know what itâs like to feel really fucking evil. And you canât be birthed again until youâve died.â â Kelly Cutrone
While you cannot go back and change the past, the reality is that you now have choice about what you want to do moving forward. So get clear on what you want now, and do everything you can to go after it.
Because, giggling children, crazy cats, and lists of whatâs going right in the world.
You may not understand whatâs happening right now, but I invite you to TRUST THE PROCESS.
It may be that your soul needs to be going through this right now for a divine reason thatâs just not known to you right now.
#Okay Quotes#Its Okay Quotes#It will be Okay Quotes#Okay Images#Its Okay Quotes Sayings#Its all Okay Quotes
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What happened to Sherlock? Part IV â Heartbreak and coma (2)
This is the second post of the fourth installment of my meta series where I try to use Sherlockâs own methods to find out whatâs happened to him in the show; you can read the first one here. This is about my hypothesis #4: At some point in time between TSoT and HLV, Sherlock takes an overdose of drugs and ends up in coma. In the first post I tested a prediction to try to verify the coma part. Here are the remaining four predictions that Iâll test the same way, corresponding to the rest of my hypothesis. Since this post wonât make much sense unless youâve read the first one, and since this is also a monster-post, Iâll put the whole thing under the cut, except for this picture of a comatose hospitalized Sherlock in TLD:
Disclaimer: If you feel the subject matter upsetting, please donât read further - take care and stay safe! I also want to state that no matter what happens in S4 - like nurse Cornish said in TLD, Iâm fully convinced Sherlock will survive this. He will pull through and solve The Final Problem - staying alive.
Prediction #2: It will be possible to deduce from events in the show that Sherlock might have harmed himself, and even overdosed.
Observations: There are some scenes - mostly in TAB and TLD - which indicate that Sherlockâs state of health might indeed be self-inflicted (at least on the surface). The most obvious ones, in my opinion, are:
1. Sherlockâs OD in the airplane scenes in TAB is treated like a fact, but people arenât acting accordingly. The case is complete with backstory from Mycroft, Dr Watson saying this cocktail of drugs could kill Sherlock...Â
...and assassin nurse âMaryâ suggesting he should be in hospital. And we know from TBB that John has specialist skills in being âable to recognize and give immediate and appropriate treatment to a wide range of medical and surgical conditions including --- poisoning/overdoseâ (among other things), because this is explicitly stated in his CV. Itâs also obvious in this scene that Sherlock has administered the drugs on himself.Â
But the obviously logical procedure after his OD - taking Sherlock to hospital to try to restore his body functions and maybe save his life - does not happen; no-one disputes Sherlockâs decision to not receive medical treatment. So here we have a person who might just have tried to take his own life with a potentially lethal dose of drugs, but Dr Watson doesnât even examine him. Itâs glossed over as if nothing serious has happened, and no-one reacts properly to it; Sherlock himself acts as if heâs already miraculously recovered, and the others just let him carry on. This is not realistic, itâs not how an overdosed person possibly could behave. Which indicates that this is all taking place inside Sherlockâs brain; itâs Sherlock who wants to gloss over the serious consequences, even though he feels ashamed. Conclusion: the emphasis at Sherlocks OD as such might mean itâs true, but the timeline might be warped and the reactions following the OD twisted because of Sherlockâs drug-induced state.
2. In S4 there are references to self-harm marks on both Faithâs and Sherlockâs arms. The scenes in TLD where Sherlock talks to Faith about self-harm, deducing that her relationship had ended, that she wasnât âgetting anyâ, that she must have scars of self-harm on her left underarm and that her âboyfriendâ didnât notice, are very telling:Â
But if âFaithâ was actually Euros, what was her purpose of first making Sherlock think she was suicidal and then just disappear? I see it as more likely that this is all about Sherlock processing his own relationship with John. Sherlock might have been sexually frustrated for a long time, because nothing ever happened between them. But at the same time Sherlock wasnât really in touch with his feelings and basically horrified to ever talk about it with John (greenhouse scene in TAB is testimony). Itâs possible that Sherlock had started using again when John had decided to get married (like he did in canon) and had scars of the syringe on his left underarm, but John didnât notice this, because he wasnât there. âSelf-harmâ in this case equals drug use.
3. Nurse Cornish tells John in TLD that Sherlock has âmade a mess of himselfâ, when what we actually saw was John assaulting him.Â
But why would the nurse in charge blame the victim in front of the perpetrator? And why all this glossing over the fact that John Watson attacked and beat up his friend to the point of hospitalizing him? Sounds very much like Sherlockâs guilt to me, like heâs actually processing the consequences of what heâs done to himself (his OD) in his Extended Mind Palace.Â
It also seems like Sherlock is re-hashing things in his EMP, because we already have a scene from the very first episode, where someone accuses Sherlock of having âmade a messâ:
4. In TFP we learn that Euros cut herself when she was a kid âto see how my muscles workedâ. The parents thought it was a suicide attempt. But little Euros is standing here between them, as if the case was being analyzed in Sherlockâs Mind Palace.Â
So what if Euros is actually a part of Sherlock himself? If S4 all happens inside Sherlockâs head, this could very well be the case. Which means that Sherlock might have been the one to harm himself as a kid.
5. As Iâve tried to show in this meta, suicide is one of the major themes in this show. It has been referred to or implied so many times, rubbed in so thoroughly, that itâs rather upsetting. This is a very serious topic, and I doubt the show-makers intend to treat it lightly. Iâd rather believe they want to catch our attention with it, to contemplate the dire consequences to other people of Sherlockâs OD. Just like I think Sherlock himself does in TLD, when he warns âFaithâ...
...and throws her gun in the Thames...
...and argues the point:
6. And then thereâs ACD canon. Before Holmes âfallsâ with Moriarty in the Reichenbach Fall (The Final Problem) he leaves a note to Watson (= a classic reference to suicide). Itâs believed that Doyleâs intention was to let him die and end the story with Watson living an ordinary life with his wife and only nostalgic memories left from his time with Holmes. But the fans protested and insisted for years until ACD âresurrectedâ Holmes and published new stories. So if ACD almost âkilled offâ this great character in canon, wouldnât it be rather canon compliant of Mofftiss to almost do the same thing? One of the canon stories is also named âThe Dying Detectiveâ, but in BBC Sherlock theyâve changed the name to âThe Lying Detectiveâ - maybe in order to not make it too obvious?
7. On a meta level, would there be any reasons for the character of Sherlock Holmes to try to commit suicide? Well, yes; I think there are plenty of hints that there might be. And I believe @tjlcisthenewsexy puts the finger exactly on those reasons in this excellent meta (my bolding): âIf a person takes their own life due to depression directly caused by a heterocentric culture and institutionalized homophobia, then is it really suicide? Or is it murder?â I think this issue was raised by Sherlock already in the first episode, albeit in a slightly less obvious way; the victims of the serial killer were persuaded to take their own life when the killer put pressure on them.Â
Same thing basically happened in TRF, when Moriarty pressured Sherlock to jump. And in HLV when Lord Smallwood committed suicide after CAM (=Media as a villain) put pressure on him with blackmail. But the real culprit isnât the victim; itâs societyâs norms and attitudes that pressure them. The issue of homophobia isnât of course openly addressed in BBC Sherlock, but I think itâs heavily implied for us to read between the lines.
Prediction #3: There will be abundant references to Sherlockâs drugs use, since this is the proximate cause of his state and therefore constantly on his mind.Â
Why do we see an IV drip with morphine in HLV? Well, this is the episode where Sherlock gets shot in the chest, so naturally he needs morphine as painkiller⌠But wait a minute; wouldnât his brother have informed the hospital staff of the risks of giving Sherlock morphine, seeing as heâs a drug addict? And then thereâs Janineâs comment:
Observations: There are several drug-related things in HLV that donât really make sense.Â
Firstly, after knowing him for merely a month, Janine seems to be very much aware of Sherlockâs drug dependence. But if she is already this knowledgeable, why did he have to tell her that he had been âworkingâ when he had actually been sleeping in a drug den (and she seemed to buy it)? But if she didnât know about the drugs, who had suddenly told her now?Â
Secondly, for some odd reason, Sherlockâs drug use seems to be a far bigger issue than his shot wound. A gun is used three times in HLV (twice on a human). But thereâs a whole bunch of different drug use references, most of which have to do with Sherlock: a) Isaac Whitney, b) Sherlock found in a drug den, c) Sherlockâs blood tested for drugs at Barts, d) Mycroft gathering Sherlockâs âfansâ to search 221B for drugs, e) âDonât appall me when Iâm highâ, f) IV morphine drip, h) Janineâs comment about drugs being Sherlockâs dream, i) CAM âreadingâ opium and morphine as pressure points for Sherlock, j) Mrs Hudson ârunning a drug cartelâ and k) Sherlock having Billy drug his whole family. So there are far more references to drug use than to Sherlock almost dying from a gun shot, which is glossed over; no-one seems to really care about his shot wound or chest pain until he falls apart. Mrs Hudson doesnât seem overly worried when she learns Sherlock has escaped from the hospital. John - his doctor friend - even yells at him to shut up, and threatens to kill him, when heâs supposedly already dying for the second time:
And Sherlock himself starts to talk about âsurgeryâ and the murderer calling the ambulance and other pieces of absurd, illogical nonsense to gloss over the shot wound, which is now threatening his life again. While at the same time claiming that his drug abuse is actually real; he only solves crimes as a substitute for being high...
At Christmas in HLV Sherlockâs own parents are fussing more over pregnant âMaryâ than over their own shot-wounded son. Heâs fresh home from months in hospital but doesnât even move strangely. In hospital he had only a plaster over the shot wound, no bruising visible. This is not realistic in my opinion; if Sherlock was really shot wounded, he wouldnât have been able to escape by the hospital window in the first place. How did he manage to bring the wheelchair with him, by the way, complete with attached IV-drip of morphine?Â
The idea of Sherlock risking his life again; all this mystic, dangerous and elaborated scheme to track down âMaryâ and confront her with her crime - and for what? Only to then dismiss the shooting as âsurgeryâ that âsaved his lifeâ in order to persuade John to stay with her? Itâs just not credible; this is more reminiscent of an action movie (Bond?) derailing into absurdity. I think what all these signs tell us is that Sherlockâs real problem isnât the supposed shot wound; itâs a drug-related problem.
So, now that weâve established at least the possibility of Sherlock having OD:d on drugs and ended up in coma as a result, we arrive to the point of determining more precisely when it happened.
Prediction #4: If Sherlock falls into coma, there would be a credibility change/difference between âbeforeâ and âafterâ the OD.
Now this is a hard one, because in BBC Sherlock thereâs generally a very subtle line between ârealityâ and âimaginationâ. There are a series of weird events in the whole show that I find it hard to believe in, and many of them happen before HLVâŚ
Ireneâs mystic break-ins into 221B which no-one had noticed (ASiB)
Sherlock being visited by Moriarty at 221B after the trial in TRF, before even John got there
Sherlock having a conversation with Moriarty on the rooftop in TRF (how did Sherlock predict that Jim would have him jump off a rooftop in particular and therefore made his arrangement of faked death based on this?)Â
Andersonâs sudden metamorphosis into being Sherlockâs fan-club (MHR)
Torture scene in Serbia and Mycroftâs cruel behaviour there (TEH)
Soldiers who donât feel when theyâre being stabbed in the back in TSoT. (This is such a crazy idea, and the given explanation we have is hard to believe)
These things are weird and not very realistic, but at least they might contain a grain of truth somewhere, albeit dramatized. But in HLV and onwards it does get far worse, in my opinion, when people start acting way out of character or doing absurd or outright impossible things. These could be signs that the events from HLV and onwards are fabricated by Sherlockâs brain, rather than representing ârealâ things that have actually happened.
Out of character As for acting OOC, I think Johnâs behaviour has some ups and downs in the show, but in HLV he gets abominable to a point of no return; the idea that he would stay together with âMaryâ after she shot his best friend is highly unbelievable - pregnancy or not (in fact itâs even less believable that John would find an assassin, who should be in prison and who attempted to kill his friend, fit to raise their child). And the top of the mountain then comes in TLD, when John assaults Sherlock and acts as if itâs all Sherlockâs own fault. No credibility left.Â
But Iâd still say that itâs an even bigger OOC development to have the worldâs most famous detective stop solving crimes and start committing them instead.
Because as far as I can see, crime solving ends with TSoT; after that, Sherlock doesn't solve a single crime case that hasn't directly to do with his own private life: ⢠He fails to solve lady Smallwoodâs blackmail case, which instead ends with lord Smallwood's suicide.
⢠He fails to capture CAM, the criminal who caused this; instead he murders him. The famous crime solver is now a criminal instead. ⢠He fails to solve Emilia Ricolettis case in his own mind; the person he thought was guilty turns out to be Moriarty instead - who is supposed to be dead. ⢠He fails to solve the mystery of why Moriarty's âMiss me?â video is on every screen in the country, which was supposedly the reason for bringing him back to London. ⢠He fails to save a single one of the Thatcher busts from destruction and why would he want to do that anyway; he even smashes the last one himself! ⢠He fails to find the stolen Black pearl of the Borgias; instead he finds the AGRA stick from Mary's assassin gang. ⢠In a highly doubtable deduction sequence without any kind of evidence, Sherlock decides that Charlie Wellsborough's death is no crime at all; he just had an unfortunately badly timed âseizureâ in an extremely weird situation. ⢠He fails to solve the Norbury case, which would exonerate âMaryâ from accusations of treason; instead âMaryâ dies in a most incredible and over-dramatized way which is physically impossible. ⢠He tries to prove that Culverton Smith is a serial killer, but the only thing he manages to prove is that Smith can try to kill him, Sherlock, on his own request. Supposedly, Smith 'can't stop confessing' after that, but we never get to see or know any of these confessions. ⢠The rest of the show (TFP) is exclusively about Sherlock's own family problems. The only 'outsider' crime cases he tries to solve - his sister's death threats against Sherrinford's governor with wife and the three Garrideb brothers - are complete failures; they all die. He believes he saves Molly's life by forcing her to confess that she loves him, but Euros tells him there was never any danger. Failure again. This is rather far away from canon, where Holmes kept solving crimes even after retirement, isnât it?
But in this show, after TSoT, thereâs only one thing that the genius detective manages to do right: he saves John Watson from the bottom of a well. By solving a puzzle.
So yes - I think these things show a huge difference in credibility between 'before' and 'after' TSoT; the world's most famous detective has stopped solving crimes! (But what about all the cases that were supposedly solved by Sherlock 'spinning plates' in TST, you might ask? Not to worry, I'll get back to that later ;))
As for HLV, I think this is the episode where things start getting completely out of control for Sherlock, indicating that he is actually no longer conscious. Which would mean he doesnât experience new events in the showâs reality, but his brain keeps re-hashing memories, combining them in new ways to solve Sherlockâs personal problems. Apart from the OOC arguments explained above, I tried to point out a series of others in this meta, connected to Janineâs character. We havenât seen much of her, but in HLV she appears to be a person with less than average intelligence, which I think she didnât in TSoT: Â
Why would Janine risk her employment to let Sherlock sneak into her bossâ high security office at night when she knew he was there?Â
Why would Janine believe that Sherlock would propose to her after they had known each other for a month and he had just left her waiting for him the whole night in his flat without knowing where he was?
If Janine and Sherlock havenât had sex (because of his reluctance), how come she all confidently just gets into the shower with him?
How can Janine miss out on all the mayhem at 221B - a âdrugs bustâ with several people present, Mycroft being slammed into the wall, Sherlock talking about her boss as a monster, etc.?
Janine just doesnât behave in a logical manner in HLV. It. Doesnât. Make.Sense.
Impossible The first outright impossible thing I can spot, is âMaryâ getting into CAMâs office faster than Sherlock. Sherlock makes a whole lot of effort explaining to John that the only way to get into CAMâs office is by his private lift, and just how difficult that is.
Anyone who tried to climb up wouldnât just need the agility of a circus artist like the âspiderâ in TBB; they would have to climb the façade, break into the flat and knock two people down in basically no time. I think we can safely say that itâs physically impossible to climb a building of 32 floors and manage all that in less than 45 seconds (which is the time it takes for Sherlock and John to go up with the lift after Janine has let Sherlock in).
Some people may want to talk about âartistic licenseâ here, and claim that this is just entertainment, this is just the show makers twisting reality a bit to make their show more exciting. But donât forget the major weakness of this argument: if we excuse one clearly impossible thing with âartistic licenseâ, then we must be prepared to excuse all of them the same way. Which means that the whole rational basis of Sherlock Holmesâ own methods in this show becomes invalid, because then there are no deductions to be made, since nature laws and reality as we know it donât exist âin-showâ. Which could very well be the case, as I see it, if nothing in this show is meant to make sense - or if thereâs still a coherent plot-line somewhere, but the events we do see are mainly taking place inside Sherlockâs head. But my idea here was still to try to pinpoint a change, a difference in levels of weirdness, between âbeforeâ and âafterâ Sherlockâs presumed OD.
Prediction #5: There will be time- and place-references that coincide with a possible OD directly after TSoT
If Sherlock would take to kill himself, where would it happen, when and how?
Well, I think Sherlock already explains it to Lestrade in this âscriptâ from ASiP published on BBCâs website, where we get this (supposedly) cut out scene:
In other words: Sherlock would kill himself, but in a different time and place, presumably a) after leaving a note and b) after some âprior signâs. And c) heâd do it in a familiar place that means something to him. So, to track down the point in time when Sherlock might have done this, we need to determine a) when he has left some kind of note and b) what âprior signsâ that could have preceded this.
Observations
Point in time:Â As for a), in TAB, after realising that Sherlock has OD:d, we learn that he has made a list of all the drugs that heâs taken; a promise to his brother since years ago. Thatâs a kind of note â isnât it? A note that could help saving his life after an overdose.
But there are also hints that TAB isnât the real time of the OD event:
JOHN: He couldnât have taken all of that in the last five minutes. MYCROFT: He was high before he got on the plane. MARY: He didnât seem high. MYCROFT: Nobody deceives like an addict.
But wait; could Sherlock really have overdosed on drugs and after that performed the whole scene at the tarmac? Where he says goodbye to John, jokes with him and makes a whole little coherent speech about the Game and the East Wind? Not very likely for a person who has OD:d if you ask meâŚ
And then thereâs also the fact I pointed out in my last meta (X); that Mycroft talks about this OD coming after a âweek in solitary confinementâ when Sherlock was locked up with his worst enemy - himself. I think this week could well be the time John was on âsex holidayâ after the wedding. If the shooting of CAM wasnât real (which is supported by the easiness with which Sherlock gets away with murder without any kind of lasting consequence), neither has there been any imprisonment. I can rather imagine Sherlock isolating and locking himself in at 221B for a week, trying to alleviate his pain and heartbreak with drugs after Johnâs wedding.
Regarding the turn of events after a presumed OD which we donât  actually see, @sagestreet has made a whole reconstruction of how the things could possibly have happened in one of the additions to this meta (please scroll down to the subtitle âTIMELINE FOR A POSSIBLE OD-AFTER-THE-WEDDING SCENARIOâ.Â
Thereâs also a note playing a central role in TLD, and Iâve tried to elaborate on this in these two metas: (X, X). The episode TLD seems to take place long after Johnâs wedding, when he already has a daughter. But what if this is actually not the case? What if the whole of TLD just represents Sherlockâs brain going through events that actually happened immediately after the wedding? (Or even immediately after his faked suicide, in some cases)?Â
Geographic place: The whole sequence in TLD about Sherlock isolating himself in 221B, resorting to an intensive drug abuse that is basically killing him, could be showing what really happened with him directly after the wedding. John has (supposedly) abandoned him (honeymoon?) and heâs turning nuts, talking to himself (Billy Wiggins), shooting the walls and playing out a Shakespeare drama all by himself.Â
221B would also fit with c), âa familiar place that means somethingâ to Sherlock. The events might in fact be showing some kind of reality, perhaps itâs just the time of them that is twisted and misplaced. Which would seem likely, if this is Sherlock processing his distorted memories of those events inside his still drug-addled brain. On the other hand, the prison where he allegedly would have taken the drugs and got high, before meeting up at the tarmac to board the airplane; none of these places would have the slightest personal meaning to Sherlock, would they? So where exactly is he more likely to take an overdose according to the deleted scene manuscript; in prison or in 221B? I think the answer here is clear.
Prior signs: Regarding b), Iâve already talked about the signs of self-harm in TLD that John doesnât seem to either notice or acknowledge. The drug abuse is one clear sign of self-harm, but thereâs also more subtle things, like Sherlock basically abandoning his job (which he was supposedly âmarried toâ) to take over Johnâs wedding planning; something he would normally find mundane and probably despise. He even tells Johnâs and Maryâs wedding guests in his speech how utterly useless the âwedding traditionâ is. So why does Sherlock even do this? John and Mary would be fully capable of planning their own wedding, wouldnât they? I think itâs a form of self-harm, self-punishment or maybe even self-imposed martyrdom - âa cross I have to bearâ as he tells John, referring to his âordinaryâ parents.Â
The âdelayed backstabbingâ in TSoT also makes for a dramatic metaphor about what happens to Sherlock; if heâs the un-seen murder victim of this wedding, the effect of it doesnât play out until afterwards, when heâs left to his own gloomy thoughts and feelings of abandonment in 221B. Which would mean the delayed back-stabbing was a prior sign to Sherlockâs later âbleed-outâ.Â
Itâs also interesting to speculate about exactly when this actual back-stabbing took place. We never get to see the wedding act in TSoT, but we do see the moment when it dawns upon Sherlock that Mary is pregnant. I think Sherlockâs realization of her pregnancy is the last nail in the coffin; that's what ultimately breaks his heart. Itâs not until after this moment that Sherlock leaves the party; a marriage can be dissolved, but a child is a child and it will always be Johnâs responsibility. Which basically means the definite end of their crime-solving life together...
But I think the most important piece of evidence about the time of Sherlockâs possible suicide attempt taking place immediately after Johnâs wedding is this:
Johnâs blog stops updating at this point. The blog also took a pause after TRF, but the current gap is definitely the longest. All this time weâve had Johnâs blog as a more âsoberâ account of the events; a âsecond opinionâ, if you like, to what I believe the show is: Sherlockâs more colourful and dramatic tale of their life together. Sherlock hacks the blog and posts one last instalment before the blog dies completely. I believe this last post can be seen as Sherlockâs ânoteâ, which Iâve tried to explain in these two metas X , X.Â
But what about the blog cases of S4? In TST we see a lot of cases listed by Johnâs supposed blogging; so many in fact that John tells Sherlock that he canât go on âspinning platesâ. Yes, it sounds promising, but since a) John is typing on a jpg-file (which is technically impossible, unless you convert it to or integrate it in another format),
and b) there are no references on the real blog to these new âcasesâ, Iâd say that none of these cases are realistic. Which probably means they are fabricated by Sherlockâs brain - some of them are even rip-offs from old cases, like The Six Thatchers.
Last but not least: on a meta level, is there a certain significance to TSoT as an episode that makes it a good time reference for being the point after which Sherlock passes to a comatose state? This analysis isnât mainly intended to reflect a meta level of the show, it rather focuses on the textual level. That doesnât mean, however, that I find the meta level unimportant. There are quite a few tumblr analysts that have expanded on the form and shape of this show; its âmessagesâ, arguments and conclusions on a meta level. For example, @garkgatiss has published several very thorough analyses of the overall pattern of BBC Sherlock as a five-act drama. In the latest one, dedicated to analyzing Bond and Hannibal references, @garkgatiss points out this about the symmetry pattern of S3 (my bolding):
âS3 doesnât follow the same Bond/Hannibal triad structure as S2 and S4, and we shouldnât expect it to. Nevertheless, we still find Bond and Hannibal in TEH and HLVâââTEH ârevivesâ the myth of Sherlock Holmes that was destroyed in TRF when Sherlock returns from being dead and proves he was not a fraud after all, and HLV gives Sherlock the Clarice Starling creation myth, as befits the true hero of the story. TSOT, as the overall midpoint of the show, serves its own distinct function in the story that I plan to cover in full at some point, but not hereâ.
So, TSoT represents the midpoint of the story. Itâs also the point after which, I believe, Sherlock enters his comatose state and resorts to pure speculation about the future. Or, should I rather say, he resorts to modeling the emotionally devastating consequences of his own choices, in a series of worst-case scenarios, which are basically S4, but start already in HLV. Which would mean yet another indication of the story arc being symmetric, with the figurative âmurder caseâ in the middle; Sherlockâs heart breaks when John not only marries âMary Morstanâ, but even starts a family with her.  Because Sherlockâs discovery in TSoT of âMaryâs pregnancy will (in Sherlockâs mind) most certainly mean that Johnâs days as a companion to Sherlockâs crime solving are counted. A responsible father wouldnât run around risking his life on a daily basis, would he? So yes - to me TSoT undoubtedly marks a midpoint in this story.
So, to sum it up once again: my belief is that this show is totally happening within Sherlockâs head, from his PoV. But thereâs a distinction between what happens before TSoT and after; in the former case Sherlock voluntarily goes through his memories with John, based on reading his blog. In the latter, I think Sherlockâs body is in coma due to an OD, but his mind is racing, thus the extra weirdness.
Summary
In brief, I think Sherlock Holmes has some serious stuff that he needs to deal with, and so has John Watson, even if maybe Sherlockâs issues are the worst. And in S4 Shelock does; he goes from being someone who constantly tries to detach his brain from its inconvenient âtransportâ of a body, to someone who ultimately allows himself to care deeply and truly. And I believe thatâs basically what this show is about: the long and winding road to freedom, the mental journey home to 221B. And on this inner journey, he has to go through hell, which means pain, heartbreak and loss, but also insight and realization. But since this is also the story of a truly brilliant and remarkable human being and his only âfeature of interestâ; an extremely competent, brave and loyal person, thereâs good hope that they can actually help each other. They just need to overcome their worst adversaries first; their own internalized heteronormativity and homophobia, imposed on them by society.
I think one of the most interesting things with Sherlockâs process is to see that itâs actually his brain that saves him. While Sherlockâs intense emotions lead him to desperate actions that cause a comatose state in his body, his brain still refuses to give up, because it needs to understand. Which - seemingly paradoxically - leads him to seek contact with his own feelings and thereby solve the problem - the final problem. This character development is indeed extraordinary.
Phew! Iâm truly grateful for those of you who might have managed to read through these two monster posts. :) The next installment of this meta series - which will hopefully be a bit shorter - will handle Hypothesis #5: Almost everything we see happen in HLV, TAB and S4 is Sherlock ârunning scenariosâ in his mind, based on a mix of his earlier memories and movies he has watched.
Tagging some people who might be interested: @raggedyblue @ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @fellshish @sagestreet @tendergingergirl @loveismyrevolution @sherlockshadow @darlingtonsubstitution @tjlcisthenewsexy @devoursjohnlock  @kateis-cakeis @csi-baker-street-babes @sectoralheterochromiairidum @mrskolesouniverse
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TOP 75 ALBUMS OF 2021
75- Soshi Takada- Floating Mountains
74- Lionmilk- I Hope You Are Well
73- Elori Saxl- The Blue of Distance
72- Geneva Skeen- Turning of The Day
71- Ryley Walker- Course in Fable
70- Shirley Collins- Crowlink
69- Big Brave- Vital
68- Turnstile- Glow On
67- Yu Su- Yellow River Blue
66- Sarah Mary Chadwick- Me and Ennui are Friends Baby
65- Sons of Kemet- Black to The Future
64- Dr. Lonnie Smith- Breathe
63- Lost Girls- Menneskekollektivet
62- Darkside- Spiral
61- Daniel Aged- You are Protected by Silent Light
60- Little Simz- Sometimes I Might be Introvert
59- Eli Keszler- Icons+
58- Zenjungle & Valiska- Years From Now
57- Marianne Faithful & Warren Ellis- She Walks in Beauty
56- Moin- Moot!
55- Murcof- The Alias Sessions
54- Pino Palladino, Blake Mills- Notes With Attachments
53- Decoherence- System I
52- Gojira- Fortitude
51- Bill Orcutt, Chris Corsano- Made Out of Sound
50- Dry Cleaning- New Long Leg
49- Sloppy Jane- Madison
48- Mogwai- As The Love Continues
47- Madlib- Sound Ancestors
46- Paul McCartney- McCartney III Reimagined
45- Deafheaven- Infinite Granite
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42- Brian Wilson- At My Piano
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40- John McLaughlin- Liberation Time
39- Geese- Projector
38- Nadja- Luminous Rot
37- Full of Hell- Garden of Burning Apparitions
36- Cassandra Jenkins- An Overview on Phenomenal Nature
35- Shackleton- Departing Like Rivers
34- Parannoul- To See The Next Part of The Dream
33- Yasmin Williams- Urban Driftwood
32- Nala Sinephro- Space 1.8
31- Dylan Carlson, Lori Goldston- Feral Angel
30- Jessica Pavone- Lull
29- Portico Quartet- Monument
28- Foxing- Draw Down The Moon
27- Mira Calix- Absent Origin
26- Arca- Kick ii-iiiii
25- Matt Sweeney, Bonnie Prince Billy- Superwolves
24- Bo Burnham- Inside (The Songs)
23- Sven Wunder- Natura Morta
22- William Parker- Trencadis
21- Tyler The Creator - Call Me if You Get Lost
20- Elbow- Flying Dream I
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18- Lingua Ignota- Sinner Get Ready
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16- Lambchop- Showtunes
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14- Mdou Moctar- Afrique Victime
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12- Ches Smith and We All Break- Path of Seven Colors
11- Jaubi- Nafs at Peace
10- Real Loud- Real Loud
9- Lucy Dacus- Home Video
8- Julien Baker- Little Oblivions
7- Irreversible Entanglements- Open The Gates
6- The World is a Beautiful Place and I am No Longer Afraid to Die- Illusory Walls
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