#every episode includes someone saying ‘but I love him/her father!!!’ and egg crying himself to sleep

[wodania]

House of The Egg 🥚

[msiopao]

Sera with the Members

a/n: mark is in this because dream is now a fixed unit and he’s part of the lineup!!!!!!

WATERMELON ADDICT

was the person who made Sera comfortable since he reminded her of home

always asks if canadian bacon is better than american bacon

‘i dONt kNoW, sERa! mEAT iS mEaT!’

she didnt actually cry on stage when he was leaving but she cried when it was just the two of them and he recorded for the last time

it was her idea for hyuck to buy him a big bottle of ketchup

CANNOT believe that mark was a churchboy and ends up acting up in music videos

the duality SCARES her

calls her finny since her name is serafina

sera has her own room but she has an extra bed so he sleeps in there when he spends the night

learned this watermelon shake to help mark’s hangover

english all the time

ever since they met, mark has always placed his elbow on her head due to her short height

sera learned this fried rice recipe from her mom and he goes over to their dorm for breakfast

‘mark bls dont touch anything. get out of the kitchen and go watch tv or something’

always brings up his messed up eggs

‘gordon spitting facts tho’

whenever he feels too overworked or too pressured, sera has always made it a point to come over to their dorm and have a movie night with just the 2 of them with his favorite snacks and drinks

LONJIN

omg these two

sera is typically not mean but when renjun starts, she becomes ruthless

always calling out his fake personality

‘everyone, don’t believe him! he’s 2 faced!’

‘what are you even saying! you act like you’re so quirky and giggly but you yeeted jisung into the wall last night!’

‘YAH!’

so yea, they fight a lot

but its very playful and they know where that line is drawn and not cross it

he talks to her about space and aliens and she listens to every word bc renjun sounds so confident and happy whenever he talks about that stuff

they’re actually 10 days apart but sera acts like she’s 10 years older than him

‘IS THAT HOW YOU TALK TO SOMEONE OLDER?!’

‘okay, granny’

always in awe whenever renjun draws and paints and she really likes seeing him in his element

unbeknowst to her, he actually draws her a lot

wants to frame all of his work 

they go out to the roof and stargaze

he steals her airpods just to watch her go crazy

once hid her phone in the fridge

lives for his vocals

cannot believe how much he’s grown from chewing gum era to now

her heart strings were tugged when he cried in dnyl

renjun always says that he wishes sera was born as his little sister bc they act like they’re siblings

EYESMILE PRINCE

hmm

so their is kinda complicated

sera’s closest to him than all the members bc 1, he was her first friend and 2, he has cats

before, when they still went to school, her and jeno always went together

yes, jaemin and jeno and her went together in the beginning

but jaemin was in the hospital and recovering so it just became them 2

also, she goes to visit his parents so she can see his cats

this results to his parents and older sister adoring her

‘bongsik, nal, and seol are my kids’ - lee sera, 00 line vlive

she always craves for attention and when it isnt given bc he’s too busy playing, she just walks into his room and sits on his lap while he plays

tries to get his attention by saying stuff but he teases her by acting like she aint there

‘fine, i’ll go to jaemin’

jeno wasnt supposed to be blonde for the comeback but they were just messing around and next thing they knew, jeno’s tips were bleach blonde

when shes on that,,,, time,,,,, hes the only one in the dorm she listens to

not even johnny, who’s practically her father

collabs with her mukbang show and jsmr

he mentions her like at least once whenever he has lives that she’s not in

steals his glasses all the time just to watch him wander around with this confused adorable face

hugs are so cute w these two and czennies see them hugging in videos and she can barely reach his shoulder 

forehead kisses and sweater paws for daysss

NANA

drop dead gorgeous boy

shes not safe from jaemin’s affections

*cue jeno glaring at him for stealing her*

we all know how much he loves the members and whenever sera breathes, he busts his uwus

takes so many pictures of her

sera buys him lots of lip balms and carmex but he always forgets to put them on

sera hates peaches but she buys him peach flavored sweets whenever she sees them

‘NANA!!’

sera is also an attention whore so she always runs to him and wraps her arms around him and he squeals by how cute she is

bought him an expensive camera for his birthday

has a polaroid picture of him in her clear phone case

actually, her phone background is an old picture of predebut sera, jeno, and jaemin

one of the rare moments where she cried was when she found out that jaemin wouldnt be in a few comebacks bc he was sick

kept visiting him and jaemin cannot repay her enough

the dorm is full of ryan and winnie plushies from the sofa, a tiny winnie plush on the corner of the island counter, and their bedrooms

sera is the one who always throws away the his satanic drink even though it’s still full

‘yah, you need to think about your health and if it your body is tired, dont fight it by trying to drink these to keep your energy’

sleepovers with them are often and sometimes found sleeping on the spare bed in her room

FULL SUN

our big babie

oh boi when he got hurt

sera called him twice a day, one in the morning and one at night, just to check if it’s still hurting and making sure he’s resting

forever remembers when he dressed up as a girl 

‘you see, i’m not the only girl member. dongsuk is just on hiatus right now’

his name on her phone is ‘man-child’

when he went on tour with 127, she really missed him

like she missed him so much that she kept posting on instagram for him to hurry back home

still mad that he moved dorms to be with the older members

when sera got sick, she made him sing ‘no longer’ to her like a lullaby

when he asks sera to do something for him, usually she says no because he asks her to do ridiculous things but his aegyo always convinces her

thinks his color amblyopia is so fascinating and adds more into the unique traits he has

another attention giver and she loves hugging him because he gives really warm hugs

one time, jeno and sera had a fight and it got so bad that hyuck had to be called and he was the only one who got to talk some sense in sera to talk to jeno

but the legendary markhyuck summer fight was resolved because sera yelled at them and cried since they are best friends and they shouldnt be like that to each other

they made up since ‘wow sera cried’ and ‘the members are ready to beat us up if we continue this’

and by members, like all members, including the older ones

sera knows how much being the moodmaker title burdens him so she tries to ease that burden by talking to him just the two of them

DOLPHIN CHILD

look how adorable he is UWU

he is 1/2 of sera’s sons

like she’s whipped for him and jisung and he knows it too

‘noona~’

‘yes, i will give you the world, the stars, and the moon’

thinks his laugh is endearing and is sad that it isnt that high-pitched anymore since his voice got a little deeper

cannot believe how much he’s grown too

when he speaks in chinese, sera thinks its the cutest thing 

‘can we give his scalp some rest? its not healthy for the boy’

trust fund babies

you know how chenle has 3 airpods?

sera went through 4 phones since she keeps losing or breaking it

dont ask how bc shes as clumsy as namjoon

had this phase where he wouldn’t stop back-hugging his noona and she just left it alone

always buys him snacks and cooks him a lot of food bc she thinks he’s too skinny and wants him to be healthy and gain some fat on those cheeks again

on their break, she went to china with jisung and her lock screen is a picture of her and chenle holding his nephew

triggered her baby fever

czennies ship them but he makes it clear she’s the older sister he’s never had

nct dream took a vacation to her hometown and she bought them basketball tickets so chenle could see his idol

his mom practically adopted her since she goes over to his apartment all the time whenever the others are getting too much for her

she misses him so much its not even funny

JISUNG PWARK

our maknae is growing up :(

sera had the whole family sit and watch the first episode of dancing high

so proud of her boy

she called him during the show and it was shown and heard about her telling him to take care of himself and to not be too hard on his body and that she’s waiting for him at home

as the youngest member overall, sera babies him the most

he obvs takes advantage of it and she used to cuddle him to sleep when he was younger bc he had a hard time sleeping

again, cooks for him a lot since he’s a growing boy and making sure he takes vitamins and drinks water and limit sugary things

she calls his mom to give him updates about her son

remember his phone that he used until it actually died?

sera actually bought him a new one before that happened and just casually gave it to him

‘i know this was going to happen so i just took care of it. i have to take care of you, jisung-ah’

hypes him up whenever he dances bc wow this boy is actually talented

doesnt really like skinship but he tolerates it when she holds his hands bc theyre so much bigger than hers

one day just woke up and she got so confused when jisung grew up

‘did you grow in your sleep?’

‘n-no?’

loves his awkward nature and she keeps saying how adorable he is and cute he is whenever he acts cool

god, she’s just so whipped for him

but tbh, who isn’t?

aaaahhhhhh i cannot believe our wish came true and they became a fixed unit and we really getting a comeback and an mv in the 29th!!!

[girlsgonemildblog]

So Much is Happening All the Time - The Bachelor, Season 25, Week 5 Recap

Image from abc.com

Buckle up. This one’s a doozy. We begin the morning of the cocktail party and rose ceremony, the day after Katie snitched to Matt. Victoria says to Kit that the new girls have nothing to complain about because she “hasn’t even begun the hazing process yet,” and Kit laughs nervously because she is genuinely afraid for her life. I have no idea what Victoria is talking about because “hazing” is definitely not part of the show. This is The Bachelor, not the fifth choice sorority at a state school.

Meanwhile, fellow mean girls MJ and Anna discuss the rumor about Brittany, and MJ tells Anna that she “did the right thing”. I have no idea in what context MJ could mean that. Did Anna do the right thing when she spread a lie about someone being a sex worker behind their back? Or when she then confronted the girl about the rumor in front of the whole group, ensuring that anyone who hadn’t heard it yet, did now? Or maybe when she continued to make fun of the girl even when she knew it was a lie? Or perhaps when she still didn’t apologize for all of her shitty behavior? While Anna and Victoria are the main villains so far, MJ is right behind them. She becomes more prominent later in the episode, so here’s her picture. Please pretend you’re not super jealous of how gorgeous her hair is.

Image from abc.com

The cocktail party begins with Matt addressing the bullying and the rumor spreading, and the producers blessed us with a zoom-in on Anna’s “oh shit” face.

Photo from Twitter

Matt then asks to speak to Brittany privately, and Victoria immediately turns on the group and asks who snitched. Anna realizes that this is obviously about her and repeatedly insists that starting the rumor was “one single comment” and “out of her character,” but I find that hard to believe as we saw her make the comment multiple times over several days.

During Matt and Brittany’s conversation, he does a great job of listening and comforting her. He says he wants to make this a safe space for the girls, and I genuinely believe him; I just don’t think that’s possible. This is The Bachelor, for God’s sake.

Matt then takes Anna aside and gives her a chance to explain, but ultimately sends her home before the rose ceremony even happens. If I were him, I would’ve walked up to her on the couch, in front of everyone, and sent her home right then and there. No excuses, no apologies. Just, “Bye bitch. You’re out.” She leaves (without ever apologizing to Brittany) and says she’s going to go cry in the shower. Honestly, relatable.

In an effort to save themselves, all of the girls who bullied (MJ, Victoria, Serena C.) start denying that any bullying went on, and all the girls who silently watched the bullying start apologizing and saying they had no idea any of this was going on. Do these girls not know that there are cameras, and we watched them sit there and do nothing?

Victoria does apologize to Catalina but laughs through it and insists that it was just playful and not malicious. She actually has the gall to say, “I don’t think you were treated fairly,” as if she wasn’t the one mistreating them. We all heard your hazing comment, Vicky!

Matt wants to check on the other new girls, and while speaking to Ryan, she names names, specifically Victoria’s. She tearfully tells Matt that because she is a dancer, Victoria called her a hoe. In my opinion, “hoe” is not that bad a word. Like the slut-shaming aspect is terrible, but I just don’t feel like “hoe” carries much weight. If someone called me a hoe, I’d be mildly angry. I definitely wouldn’t cry about it.

Victoria, wearing a visible bra as well as granny panties with her slit dress

goes to defend herself to Matt. Matt, like an idiot, tells Victoria that Katie is the one who snitched. He then brings up the “hoe” comment, which she claims was taken out of context. He asks her what the context was, and she has no answer.

After their conversation, she goes outside to complain to the producers, within earshot of the other girls, about how she is “literally the only girl who can be his wife,” she’s the only intelligent one, and the rest of them (specifically Katie) are idiots, and how she’s so nice and the rest of them are fake and toxic. Trashing them all where they can hear you is a wild move when trying to prove you’re not a bully. She starts listing what she thinks are positive traits about her and includes “spoiled” in the list multiple times. She also asks, “does he want a wife who is creating drama all the time, or does he want me?”

Photo from imgur.com 

The rose ceremony begins, and Matt gives the first roses to Ryan and Brittany, sending a clear message about the new girls vs. OG bullshit. The girls who get sent home are Lauren, Mari, Catalina, and (finally) Victoria. When it is her turn to say goodbye, she walks up to him and says she feels bad for him that he’s stuck with those girls instead of her for a wife. When he got home that night, Matt probably danced with joy.

The first date of the week is a one-on-one with Rachael, and he takes her shopping at a store in the resort. She gushes about him “getting” her all of these things. Before she goes all gold-digger, someone needs to tell her that he isn’t “getting” anything; the production company is definitely footing this bill. She returns to the house, arms piled over with shopping bags, and shows off everything she got, including Louboutins. Everyone is jealous. Everyone that is except socialite-Kit, who could not have looked less impressed. Girlie got her first Louboutins before she took her first step.

During their night-date, Rachael talks about having never been in love and says it’s because she struggles with confidence. Matt, who also doesn’t consider himself to have ever been in love, gives her the rose.

The next day brings a group date. After watching Rachael be gifted thousands of dollars worth of clothes, the rest of the girls get to spend their day shoveling animal shit on a farm. All of the girls complain about being not getting a one-on-one. I am so sick of people complaining about group dates every season. It’s part of the show that you signed up for. Shut the fuck up. Of course, maybe they had a point, proven by MJ trying to flirtily chase Matt with a broken egg, only to catch him full-on making out with Peiper. Yikes.

That night, Matt asks MJ what she thought about the bullying going on in the house. She tells him she was shocked even to learn that there was bullying going on. He responds by telling her that someone accused her of being a bully, and she gets real defensive real quick. She insists that she “leads by example,” which sounds like something a junior-high soccer coach said to her once. It also means absolutely nothing because you could also lead an angry mob to torch a house by being the first to light a match. When MJ rejoins the girls, she asks who said her name, and Jessenia, who looks 12 (as seen in the photo below), owns up to it. Thus begins the newest feud in the house.

Image from abc.com

Also during the group date, Abigail talks to Matt more about her hearing loss, and opens up about her father leaving after she got her hearing aid. Matt was also raised by a single mother, and relates to her in this way. Abigail gets the group date rose.

The final one-on-one date goes to Kit. When she gets a date card that implies they’ll be cooking on her date, she cries because she has spoken to Matt about how much cooking means to her. The date consists only of a night portion; Kit goes over to Matt’s house and they bake cookies together. Before she arrives, we see Matt cleaning his home so it’s nice for her, as well as checking his outfit because he knows she cares about fashion. Absolutely adorable.

When she arrives, he tells her that he believes in ordering dessert first, and I think I may be falling in love with Matt. She says how growing up with a famous and successful mom has put a lot of pressure on her, which is not something he, or most people, can relate to. They both talk about wanting to fast forward through the process and just be together outside of the show. They cuddle up on the couch and she gets the rose. Some people online think Kit seems braggy and pretentious, but I really like her. And I think you’d have to be an idiot to not realize that Matt really likes her as well.

The next morning as the women wait to get ready for the night, a date card arrives inviting MJ and Jessenia on a mini-two-on-one before the cocktail party. They ride over in complete silence, but when they arrive they break out in yelling. MJ insists she “preaches peace and harmony” or some bullshit, but the face she makes insists otherwise.

Photo from Twitter

The show leaves off on yet another cliff-hanger. My prediction is that Matt heard the yelling, sends MJ home on the spot and Jessenia home at a rose ceremony, if not that night then the next one.

[yesanotherimaneblog]

Being Dustins sister headcanons: Part 5

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Episode 5

You scream as the room goes down

o   Steve holds you close by the waist

o   You try to hold Dustin but he pulls away quickly to try and figure out the different buttons

o   You pull away from Steve and try to help your brother holding Erica steady

o   When the elevator stops you fall back with Erica on your chest so she doesn’t get hurt

“My groin! It fell on my groin”

o   “Dustin, help me save my future kids please.” You try to joke

o   “Ew, Y/N!”

o   “Your little shit head of a brother and his friends are all the kids I need”

o   You frown at that but know he doesn’t mean it

o   He’s so good with them you can just tell he’s going to be an amazing father

“…Your mom isn’t gonna to be able to find us if we’re dead in a Russian elevator!”

o   “Steve!” You say, touching his arm hoping it will relax him a bit

o   “Erica, your mom knows and likes me, I’m sure we’ll figure something out to say.”

You, Steve, and Robin stay up almost all night trying to figure out what to do

o   The only thing you can think of is wait until someone opens the door takes whatever the rest of the boxes contain and sends the elevator back

o   They have to send it back right

o   At some point you fall asleep on Steves’ chest

o   You wake up to your brother shouting, “Code red!”

o   You go to stand up but Robin stops you

o   “Steves’ got it, plus he needs to let out some steam”

o   You nod, knowing she’s right

“Steve, redirect your stream please!” You yell before turning back to Robin and the panel, “So do you think we can somehow hotwire it?”

o   You hear a loud bang behind you and turn to see Erica banging the green liquid

o   You take it away from her

o   “Erica I hate to break it to you but this is not water”

o   “But it’s a liquid”

o   “A lot of things are liquid, including acids that can burn through bones”

o   Robin puts her ear to the door and goes up to tell Steve that you have company

o   You help Erica climb up and then Steve helps you get up as well closing the door moments before the elevator opens

o   You mention to the kids to be quiet

You go under the door and pull Steve quickly before the tube breaks

o   You weren’t really serious when you mentioned acids before

o   Seeing the green liquid eat through the concrete is something else

o   “Come on, we have a lot of walking to do” you say, mentioning to the kids

o   ‘Why me?” Dustin asks and you smile at him softly

o   “He’s just kidding”

“Promethium. Prometheus is a Greek mythological figure, he gave fire to humans, promethium was actually named after him in a way because it symbolized both the brilliance and stupidity of the human mind or something like that.”

o   They all stop and look at you

o   “What I like mythology”

o   Steve smiles at you

o   Erica whispers “Nerd”

o   You start walking again

o   “All I’m saying is, it’s probably being used to make something.” Dustin continues

o   “... I mean Hawkins of all places…’

o   You stop and look at the boys who stay behind with you

o   “Do you think they know?”

o   “About the…”

o   “They could.”

o   “So it’s connected”

o   “Maybe.”

o   “But how?”

o   “I don’t know but it’s”

o   “Possible” the three of you say in one voice

While Steve is leading you to the comms room you stay behind making sure nothing happens to the kids

You step in front of the kids when you see the Russian

o   Robin tries to talk to him but you can see it’s not working

o   Steve attacks and at first you think you’re gonna have to watch him get his ass kicked but then he actually wins

o   You hug him tightly

o   “God I love you!”

o   You whisper and he stills for a second

o   You haven’t said ‘I love you’ yet

o   After Nancy you knew it would take him time

o   You’ve been holding it in for the last couple of weeks

o   And god damn it you don’t want to die without having told him that

o   “Dude!” Dustins’ voice breaks through the silence

o   “You did it! You won a fight!” He says and Steve smiles

While Dustin and Erica argue over the best plan of action you follow Robin up the stairs wanting to get away from Steve for a minute

o   It’s fine that he didn’t say it back

o   It is

You see the gate and immediately get worried about the rest of the kids

o   Especially Will and El

Episode 6

“I don’t understand you’ve seen this before?” Robin asks confused

o   “To be fair we never actually saw it” you say, hurrying Erica downstairs

o   You need to get out of here immediately and warn the others

The alarm starts ringing and you hurry the kids back upstairs

o   There has to be a way out from there

o   You push a few guards and scientists out of the way

o   You help Steve hold the door

o   “Dustin get out of here!”

o   The Russians keep pushing and Robin comes to help you and Steve hold the door

o   “Come on!” Dustin shouts but you know you can’t follow him

o   “Dustin get some help ok! Call Hopper!”

o   “Y/N I-“

o   “Dustin its ok just go”

The Russians break in and throw you to the floor with Steve and Robin

o   You raise your hands hoping they won’t shoot

They separate the three of you and ask questions

o   “Who do you work for?”

o   “No one. Thought to be fair Scoops Ahoy should hire me! I mean I’m there every day and I’m better with costumers than Robin”

o   One of the guards slaps you

o   “Let’s try again shall we, who do you work for?”

o   “Are you guys deaf or something? No one!”

o   “How did you find this place?”

o   “I told you my boyfriends delivery didn’t come, we went to the loading dock to find it but the room started going down”

They handcuff you and throw you in a room at the same time as Robin and Steve

o   Robin seams fine but Steve

o   You move as best you can to check on him

o   “Steve? Steve, wake up! Steve talk to me!”

o   The guy who you think is the general comes in and you stand up

o   “What the hell did you do to him you ass-“

o   You don’t get to finish the sentence as he slaps you so hard you fall back down

o   He says something and the guards pick you up and put you in a chair

o   “Don’t touch me!” You hear Robin say

o   “Steve! Stevie! Steve come on you have to wake up!”

o   You don’t even notice them tying you so concentrated on Steve

o   The general picks Steves head up by the hair and you start boiling with rage

o   “You touch him again and you will regret it!”

o   He ignores you and goes to stand in front of Robin

o   “Your friend needs a doctor. Good thing we have the very best.” He laughs

o   Robin spits on him and you’ve never wanted to hug her more

Robin starts shouting for help at some point and you consider joining in but you know it won’t help

o   Even if someone hears you, they won’t help

o   After a few moments you hear Steves voice

o   “Hey, would you stop yelling?”

o   “Steve, oh my god, are you ok?”

o   “My ears are ringing, and I can’t really breathe, my eye feels like it’s about to pop out of my skull, but, you know, apart from that, I’m doing pretty good.”

o   Robin lets out a laugh “Well, the good news is they’re calling you a doctor”

o   “Is this his place of work? I love the vibe.” He jokes and you’re about to start crying

You formulate a plan to move together and get the scissors

o   It works and then it doesn’t

o   You fall and you’re on your back looking at the ceiling

o   Robin starts laughing and if you weren’t worried about her mental health before you definitely are now

o   “I’m sorry. It’s just… I can’t believe… I’m gonna die in a secret Russian base with Steve “The Hair” Harrington and Y/N “Queen” Henderson.”

o   “We’re not gonna die. We’re gonna get out of here, okay? You just gotta let me think for a second.” Steve says

o   You stay silent for a second

o   “You know, they only started calling me that after Steve and I started dating. Until then I was invisible.”

o   She stops laughing for a second

o   “Do you guys remember Mrs. Clicks sophomore history class?”

o   You say yes, the same moment Steve says what

o   “Mrs. Clickity-Clackity. That’s what us band dweebs called her. It was first period, Tuesdays and Thursdays, Y/N was always the first one there and you were always late. And you always had the same breakfast. Bacon, egg, and cheese on a sesame bagel. I sat behind you and Y/N was on the same line but a row next. Then when you started dating, she took the seat next to you. I sat behind you two days for a year. Mister Funny. Mister Cool. The King of Hawkins high himself. And then his Queen. Do you even remember me from that class?”

o   Steve stays silent and you nod but say nothing, you know she isn’t really talking to you

o   “Of course, you don’t. You were a real asshole, you know that?”

o   “Yeah, I know.”

o   “But it didn’t even matter. It didn’t matter that you were an ass. I was still… obsessed with you.”

o   You suck in a breath suddenly worried again

o   What if what your suspicions were wrong

o   What if she liked Steve all along

o   What if the reason Steve didn’t say ‘I love you’ back was because he was falling for her

o   “Even though all of us losers pretend to be above it all, we still just want to be popular… accepted, normal.”

o   “If it makes you feel any better, having those things isn’t all that great. Seriously. It just baffles me. Everything that people tell you is important, everything that people say you should care about, it’s all just… bullshit. But I guess you gotta mess up to figure things out, right? I mean I’m pretty sure that’s how I got Y/N”

o   You smile a little at that

o   “I hope so. I feel like my whole life has been… one big error.”

o   “I feel the same way!” you finally say

o   “At least it can’t get any more messed up than this.”

o   The three of you start laughing

The door opens and the general comes in

o   The guard pick you up

o   The ‘doctor’ comes close to Steve holding a syringe and you start moving and screaming again

o   “Get away from him you asshole!”

o   “Don’t worry, you’ll get your turn as well”

o   After injecting Steve with whatever that blue liquid is you and Robin get a shot and then are left alone in the room

o   You stay silent for a while, wondering what the drug will do to you

o   You haven’t died yet so you count that as a win

o   Its Steve who finally speaks

o   “Honestly I don’t really feel anything. Do you?”

o   “I mean… I feel fine.” Robin says and you nod

o   “I feel normal.”

o   “I kinda feel good.” Steve confesses and the three of you start laughing

o   “They messed up the drug!”

o   “Morons!”

o   “They messed up!”

o   “There is definitely something wrong with us!”

o   “You’ve been working with Steve all summer did you just figure that out?” You ask and they start laughing again

o   The Russians come in again and you’re too busy laughing to really give a shit

o   But then the ‘doctor’ pulls out a big knife and your eyes widen

o   They start asking the same questions and Steve gives them the same answers

o   The doctor goes to pull out Steves nail and you and Robin reveals that you found the code

o   “Uh, well, Dustin knows.”

o   “Steve stop talking!” you warn but he continues

o   “Yeah, Dustin Henderson knows.”

o   “Steve!” Both Robin and you shout

o   “Is this your small, curly haired friend?”

o   “Oh, curly-haired. Great hair. Small. Yeah. He’s my girlfriends’ brother. Yeah, he’s Y/Ns brother.”

o   The guards look at you and you shake your head trying to deny it

o   “Where is he?”

o   “He’s long gone, you big asshole. And he’s probably calling Hopper. And Hopper is calling the US cavalry. They’re gonna come in here, commando style, guns a-blazin’, and kick your sorry asses back to Russia. You’re gonna be two pieces of toast.”

The sirens start ringing and they leave you with the doctor

o   Moments later your brother runs in and electrocutes him

o   “Dusty! Did you get help?”

o   “No get ready to run!” He says as he frees you

Episode 7

Dustin and Erica hurry you to the cart

o   “Are we going for a ride?” Robin asks

o   You frown, even drugged you know something isn’t right with your baby brother driving

o   “Dusty you don’t have a driver’s license”

o   “Y/N sit down and shut up!” he shouts

o   “Fine, jeez!”

o   He drives like crazy and you think you’re going to be sick

o   You laugh with Steve and Robin but then frown and scoot over closer to Steve

o   The cart comes to a stop and you fall back

o   Dustin pulls you out and you go inside the elevator

o   While it’s going up you sit in the corner frowning

o   You stand up and go to Steve and Robin who are pretending to surf

o   “Steve! Steve!”

o   He doesn’t pay attention to you

o   “Stevie!”

o   Nothing

o   You pull the cart from under him and he falls on some boxes

o   You go sit next to Erica playing with her hair

o   “Can we make a pit stop at the food court?”

o   You finally agree with something he said

o   “YES! Food!”

When you finally reach the top and the elevator doors open you skip outside

o   “Has the air always tasted this good?”

o   Dustin grabs you and Steve and shoves you inside the mall

o   Erica grabs Robin

o   You run thought the corridors until you reach the cinema

o   Steve grabs the popcorn from a trash can and you take it from him

o   He tries to take it back but you slap his hand

o   Dustin makes you sit with Robin and Steve

o   “These seats are too close!” Robin complains

o   “These seats blow.” Steve agrees and it makes you angry

o   “I don’t want to sit with them!”

o   Dustin tells you not to go anywhere and you roll your eyes but sit back

o   “You sound like dad.”

“I need water!”

o   You say and stand up

o   “Me too!” Steve says and starts following you

o   “Yeah, water.” Robin is the last to stand up

o   You drink from the water fountain and then let Steve take his turn

o   You go and sit a few steps ahead

o   “…I’m pretty sure that mom was trying to bang her son.”

o   “Oh yeah, for sure!”

o   “Wait, wait, wait the hot chick was Alex P. Keaton’s mom?”

o   “Yeah Steve you weren’t paying attention”

o   “But they’re the same age.”

o   “No, but he went back in time.”

o   “Then why is it called back to the future?”

o   You turn around to try and explain but the motion makes you dizzy

o   You hear Robin explain and then push Steve so she can drink water as well and you stand up

o   Steve is standing next to you looking up so you look to see what he’s seeing

o   The ceiling is moving and you start moving with it

o   Suddenly the dizziness turns to sickness and you run to the bathroom barely aware that Steve and Robin follow behind

You spend what feels like hours puking

o   It feels like you’ve puked your guts out when you’re finally done

o   You flush the toilet and crawl outside but don’t get too far

o   You were hoping you would be able to stand up and wash your face but you don’t have the energy

o   You lay on the floor looking into Steve’s and Robin’s stall

o   Robin is the one who speaks first

o   “The ceiling stopped spinning for me. Is it still spinning for you?”

o   You see Steve look up

o   “Holy shit. No.”

o   “Nope, but I feel like I should be dead.” You say weekly

o   “You think we puked it all up?” He asks

o   “Maybe.” You and Robin say

o   “Interrogate me.” Robin says in a Russian accent

o   “When was the last time you peed your pants?” Steve asks

o   “LAME!” You say

o   “Today!” Robin says and you look at her in disbelieve

o   “When the Russian doctor took out the bone saw.”

o   The three of you laugh

o   “Ok fair.”

o   “Steve’s turn!” Robin says

o   You act quickly knowing if you don’t ask now that you’re still a little drugged you never will

o   “Are you still in love with Nancy?”

o   “What? No!” He says surprised

o   “Robin then?” You ask

o   “No, Y/N why would you ask that?”

o   “Because I said I love you and you didn’t say it back. And you and Robin have a lot of fun together and you really seem to like her and she said it herself she was obsessed with you and honestly she’s a lot cooler than me so if you wanted to leave me for her I would totally get it!” You say in one breath

o   You can see Robin looking at you and look down

o   Steve slides closer to you and makes you look at him

o   “I love you! I didn’t say it back because you caught me by surprise and honestly it was an emotional moment so I wasn’t sure you meant it.”

o   “I meant it!”

o   “Good, and I mean it too! And Robin is cool and I do like her but only as a friend. No offence,” he says turning to her for a moment “and if we hadn’t just puked our guts out, I would totally kiss you”

o   You smile and hug him

o   A few moments later Robin speaks

o   “Y/N, what I said about Clicks class, about me being jealous and, like, obsessed? It isn’t because I had a crush on him. It’s because… she wouldn’t stop looking at him.”

o   “Mrs. Click?” Steve asks confused but you think you get it now

o   “Tammy Thompson. I wanted her to look at me. But… she couldn’t pull her eyes away from you and your stupid hair. Even when you got a girlfriend. And I didn’t understand because you would get bagel crumps all over the floor. And you asked dumb questions. And you were a douchebag. And- And you didn’t even like her and you had a girlfriend and… I would go home and just scream into my pillow.”

o   “But Tammy Thompsons a girl.”

o   You touch his arm lightly and whisper “Steve”

o   “Yeah?”

o   You and Robin both look at him

o   He finally gets it

o   You all stay quite for a while and you can see Robin getting worried

o   “You know, Tammy Thompson is cute and all but… you can do better!” You finally say

o   “No, I can’t”

o   “Come on she’s a total dud” Steve agrees with you

o   “She wants to be a singer! And she wants to move to Nashville of all places.”

o   “She has dreams.” Robin tries to argue

o   “She can’t even hold a tune. She’s practically tone deaf. Have you heard her?”

o   Steve starts singing and you join in

o   Robin tries to stop you

o   “She does not sound like that!”

o   “She sounds exactly like that” Steve says as you keep singing out of tune

o   Finally she joins in and the three of you start laughing

o   Then Dustin bursts through the door with Erica behind him

o   “Okay. What the hell?”

“Uh, Dustin we can’t go home!”

o   “What why not?”

o   “Cause someone,” you look at Steve, “told them your full name.”

o   “What is wrong with you Steve?”

o   “Dude, I was drugged.”

o   They keep arguing until Robin points out the guards

o   You see one of them looking at you and you grab the kids and run

o   You push Erica and Dustin on the ‘slide’ before going down yourself

o   You all hide behind one of the counters

o   You’re next to Erica and you pull her close looking at Steve and Dustin

o   You can tell they found you and you’re silently praying for a miracle

o   When the car starts honking you smile knowing your miracle has arrived

o   You hug all the kids tightly, especially El

o   You silently check up on Will while the others catch up

o   He sees what you’re doing and nods that he’s ok

o   You should have paid more attention to El

o   She falls down and everyone is immediately at her side

o   You check her leg and see something moving

Episode 8

“Jonathan!” You say knowing he’ll understand

o   The two of you have bandaged more wounds than you should have

o   He was always getting in trouble and you wanted to be a doctor

o   “I know, keep her talking, keep her awake!”

o   “Panda express is through there!” You point him to the right direction

o   You point Mike and the boys to position her correctly and hold her down

o   Jonathan comes back and he gives her a spoon to bite

o   You put on a pair of gloves and see him hesitate

o   “Jonathan, if you can’t do it…”

o   “No I got this.” He says and makes the cut

o   He goes to try and pull it out but you stop him

o   “Try squeezing it out a little, I’ll pull it out.”

o   You do just that but whatever is inside her just won’t stop moving so you can’t get a good grip

o   El stops you saying she can do it

o   You pull away taking the gloves off

You help Hopper pick El up and lay her on one of the benches

o   You quickly gather some stuff from Scoops and go back

o   You help clean her face up and bandage her leg as best you can

You go with the rest of the Scoops troop, back to Cerebro

o   You laugh a little at Steves reaction to the car

When you finally reach Cerebro you have nothing to do but wait so you pace back and forth

o   Steve is doing the same

o   “Remember the last time we were pacing back and forth?”

o   “I tried to teach you how to swing the nail bat.”

o   “You know we could have really used them today!”

o   “Yeah, we should carry those more often.”

o   You smile at each other and he pulls you in for a hug

o   He pulls away after a second and you look up at him

o   He’s looking at something in the distance and you look too

o   Something is very wrong at Starcourt

When the others don’t respond Steve starts running

o   You understand what he’s doing and turn to Robin

o   “Go with him! I gotta stay with the kids.”

o   “And Robin,” Dustin shouts, “stay in touch!” He says and throws her a walkie

“Y/N do you know it?”

o   “I only know 6,62, that’s all we use in school.”

o   “Shit!”

o   He starts changing up the stations

o   “Dustin this isn’t the time”

o   “Suzie, do you copy?”

o   You’re about to seriously murder your brother when…

o   “This is Suzie I copy”

o   You’re about to grab the walkie from your brother and give a piece of mind to Suzie but then he starts singing

o   You know no one will let him leave that down

You know the moment everything ends

Aftermath

Steve comes with a helicopter to get you

o   The medics check up on you and give you blankets

o   You ask him what happened in Starcourt and he tells you

o   Immediately you ask to be transported to Starcourt so you can help Max out as much as possible

o   You know everyone else has family there that they need to check up on

o   When you get there Will and Joyce and El and Hopper are hugging

o   Fight me

On Friday when Joyce and Hopper finally go on their date you plan a little something for the rest of the group

o   You know Will and El don’t need babysitting and neither do the rest of the kids so you get permission from your mom and turn the back yard into a movie theatre

o   You invite everyone

o   Jonathan, Nancy, Steve, Robin, Mike, Will, Lucas, Erica, Max and El

o   Steve is in charge of the barbeque

o   It goes surprisingly well

o   At first you thought about separating boys and girls but you know that wouldn’t be fair

o   In the end couples are just forbitten from sitting next to each other

o   Which is fine cause you get to sit with El and Max and they’re the coolest

o   Steve can’t stop smiling at you from where he sits next to Dustin and Robin

o   You know the date went well cause at the end of the night when Joyce and Hopper come pick up their kids they’re smiling like idiots

o   Joyce picks up Jonathan and Will while Hopper picks up El and Max

o   Nancy and Mike take Lucas and Erica with them

o   Steve and Robin are the last to go

o   You were hoping Steve would stay a bit longer but he has to drive Robin home

o   Robin being a good friend talks to Dustin while the two of you say goodnight

o   He promises to stop by the next day so the two of you can work on his resume

[aion-rsa]

7 Epistolary Time Travel Stories

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Here are some of our favorite TV shows, books, and movies that tell a time travel story through letters, radio, and DVDs.

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The epistolary novel—that is, a story told through letters—dates back all the way to the 1400s in the earliest versions of the form, counting Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice as famous examples.

But what about the first time travel narrative told through correspondence? Could it have begun with a short story in 1959—or might one theorize that the epistolary time travel story will exist, has always existed, throughout the timestream? That certainly feels like the case with Max Gladstone and Amal El-Mohtar’s new novella This Is How You Lose the Time War, featuring a pair of transdimensional pen pals.

At any rate, the form lends itself to a twisty story filled with predestination paradoxes created by the scratch of a pen or the typing of a key—literally writing the future, or the past, into being. And even as the method of delivery evolves from a traditional letter to more creative interpretations of communication, the connections forged on the metaphorical page remain as compelling. From a magical mailbox inspiring a meet-cute to rival time war agents leaving love notes across time, these seven stories prove that every time travel story has at least two sides.

“The Love Letter” by Jack Finney

Delivery method: writing desk with hidden compartments

What’s the story?

In 1959, bachelor Jake Belknap buys a seemingly simple desk from a secondhand store, it having been sold from a nearby Brooklyn brownstone. But when he happens to sit down at the desk on a particularly existential night of wondering if he’ll ever find someone to love, what does he discover but a secret hiding spot, and a note inside?

read more: 10 Ridiculous Time Machines in Fiction

It’s not so much a letter as a cry for help, from one Helen Elizabeth Worley in 1882. Charmed by her open-ended salutation (“Dearest!”) and moved by her own desperate longing, Jake impulsively writes back, validating Helen’s every forbidden thought. With the convenience of his vintage stamp collection and knowledge of a nearby post office that was still standing in the 1800s, Jake is able to reach Helen across seventy-odd years. After just a letter or two, they both believe themselves to like the other person enough to potentially fall in love… if only they could meet.

Pen pal paradox?

There are only so many hidden compartments in one desk, however; and once each is opened, Helen cannot place anything else within it. Jake doesn’t realize this until there is one compartment left, so he implores her to send something worthwhile. Instead of the long love letter he expected, however, he receives simply a photograph of her, with the inscription I will never forget. And when it finally occurs to him to track down her grave, he sees her true final missive to him, hidden in plain sight: I never forgot.

Successful delivery or return to sender?

Helen’s gravestone is a nice little touch, but that’s all we’re left with in Jake’s telling. Unlike other stories on this list, we don’t get a sense of how opening himself up to Helen’s love actually changed him for the better. Then again, there’s always the Hallmark movie version.

Frequency

Delivery method: ham radio broadcasts during the aurora borealis

What’s the story?

Over time, the definition of epistolary stories has broadened to include other forms of communication—from newspaper clippings to voicemails to, in this 2000 film’s case, hitting just the right radio frequency to reach across time and space. In 1999, cop John Sullivan (Jim Caviezel) finds that his dead father’s old ham radio starts broadcasting during a rare solar flare. On the other end? His dad, firefighter Frank Sullivan (Dennis Quaid), in 1969, the night before his death.

Pen pal paradox?

It’s easy enough for John to warn Frank of his impending fiery doom so that he makes it out alive. But then details in 1999 start changing: instead of John losing his father to fire, his mother is murdered by a serial killer, and Frank is still fated to die in 1989 from (irony of ironies) smoking. When his father’s old friend assigns John to investigate the cold case of serial killer “the Nightingale,” he uses his knowledge of the past and his father’s action in the past to try to save his mother.

Successful delivery or return to sender?

Like The Lake House, this epistolary time travel movie tends toward the cheesy (they get you with the ol’ “past injury influences present action” bit), but Caviezel and Quaid foster a tender father-son dynamic that makes it worthwhile. While the movie was adapted into a 2016 CW TV series of the same name, with a female lead no less, it only lasted one season.

The Lake House

Delivery method: magical mailbox

What’s the story?

The Lake House feels like the urtext of the epistolary time travel story, despite the fact that it came out only in 2006—likely because of how it so commits to the delightfully cheesy conceit of a time-traveling mailbox through which doctor Kate Forster (Sandra Bullock) and architect Alex Wyler (Keanu Reeves) exchange letters.

read more: Bill & Ted 3 — Everything We Know

Ostensibly both tenants of the same idyllic lake house—not to mention unintentionally sharing custody of an adorable dog—they soon discover that they exist exactly two years apart, with Kate in 2006 and Alex in 2004. Though it takes a few back-and-forth notes to be sure that neither is pranking the other, their status as time-crossed lovers becomes cemented once Kate predicts both the dog tracking pawprints through “their” house as well as a surprise cold snap. There’s also the nifty mechanic of watching the mailbox flag go up and down when the other receives a letter.

Pen pal paradox?

Aside from saving them a hell of a lot on postage, the TARDIS-like mailbox can transport more than just letters: a thoughtful scarf from Kate, an annotated map of Alex’s favorite Chicago spots that lets them share a walking tour, a copy of Alex’s father’s posthumous memoirs on the day of his death.

read more: Sandra Bullock Was Almost Cast as The Matrix's Neo

Their correspondence, in rambling letters and impatient quick-scribbled responses, both creates paradoxes and fulfills time loops; the movie seems to play fast-and-loose with time travel rules about how much you can change the past (like planting a surprise tree) versus fitting into the established fabric of time.

Despite the rom-com’s often overbearing earnestness, there are some clever moments, like when Alex charms his way into Kate’s birthday party in 2004 and even kisses her—a fond but vague memory for her that sharpens only after they’ve been writing each other for months. But if they’re so head-over-heels for each other, then why doesn’t Alex show up for their dinner date in Kate’s present?

Successful delivery or return to sender?

Watching this at a sleepover in 2006, the twist of “one of us is dead in the other’s timeline!” was still fairly unique in time travel stories, or at least what teenage me had been exposed to. Now you can see it coming a mile away. The Lake House’s big reveal comes on so suddenly, and gets resolved equally quickly, that it’s difficult to really key into the emotional roller coaster of the last ten minutes.

read more: Toy Story 4 — How Keanu Reeves Became Duke Kaboom

That said, on a rewatch the solution is deceptively simple: just wait. As a teen I was scratching my head thinking, “That’s it?” but, as an adult, I see how begging someone to go through linear time is the greatest request you can make in a time travel story. Still, this is a movie to be giggled at over wine, not to actually be taken seriously.

Doctor Who, “Blink”

Delivery method: DVD Easter egg extras courtesy of a transcript

What’s the story?

In one of the new Doctor Who’s most memorable (and quotable) episodes, Sally Sparrow (Carey Mulligan) encounters the Weeping Angels in then-contemporary 2007, after they trap her friend Kathy in the past. When Sally tracks down Kathy’s brother Larry to share her condolences, she instead discovers that he has been following a most peculiar phenomenon: odd Easter eggs of a man having a one-sided conversation, spread out over 17 DVDs… all of which Sally owns.

read more: Doctor Who Season 12 to Feature The Judoon

When Sally places the disc in a DVD player, she finds herself “talking” to the Doctor (David Tennant) despite the fact that he has recorded this video while trapped in 1969. In some cases, having seen the Easter eggs before, she can anticipate the Doctor’s next line; in the most baffling moments, he seems to respond to her exclamations as if they are actually conversing. In the Doctor’s case, he’s reading from a complete transcript, despite the fact that this exchange cannot happen until Sally plays her part in 2007.

Pen pal paradox?

“Look to your left,” the Doctor says—an ambiguous line that Larry, with all his rewatching, has not been able to decipher. Until Sally does so and sees Larry himself, who has printed out the Doctor’s lines and is writing in Sally’s half of the conversation. After defeating the Weeping Angels, Sally runs into the Doctor and hands him the completed transcript, telling him that he’ll need it.

Fittingly, this is the episode that coined the series’ description of time travel as “wibbly wobbly, timey wimey.”

Successful delivery or return to sender?

That sentence may have gotten away from the Doctor a bit, but this episode is a brilliant riff on the epistolary time travel story.

The Incarnations by Susan Barker

Delivery method: taxi cab

What’s the story?

In the lead-up to the 2008 Summer Olympics in China, Beijing taxi driver Wang Jun discovers an unsettling anonymous note in the visor of his cab: “I watch you most days.” The letter writer, calling themselves Wang’s soulmate, explains that, even though Wang may not know them in this life, the two of them have been intertwined in six reincarnated lives over the past one thousand years.

read more: Best New Young Adult Books

Concubines in the Forbidden City; classmates during the start of the Cultural Revolution; 19th-century prisoners of Chinese pirates; incestuous relations—the letter writer describes their gruesome, intimate pasts with Wang in a series of missives that increasingly threaten his current incarnation, including his wife and daughter.

Pen pal paradox?

The past lifetimesdescribed by the letter writer, whether they were cut violently short or proceeded until death, all seem to be self-contained experiences with no impact on the present—though clearly the letter writer remembers all of these incarnations well enough to influence their actions in reaching out to Wang.

While the timeline itself does not appear to be in danger of instability, Wang’s growing paranoia at his stalker’s identity—and how close they could be to his family—influence his movements in ways that they would not have had he not opened that first letter.

Successful delivery or return to sender?

It turns out epistolary does not necessarily mean the story must contain back-and-forth letters, only that it be told through letters (or some other communication). Barker writes so compellingly—and that often means brutally—that the book spins out a half-dozen narratives that make the reader feel as if they too were a bit player in each of China’s key eras. But what really makes The Incarnations work is the nagging suspicion that it isn’t a time travel story at all, that the letter writer could just be making it all up.

Time Was by Ian McDonald

Delivery method: World War II book of poetry

What’s the story?

Ian McDonald’s quiet, romantic novella is not the first epistolary story to bring in a third player—the well-meaning, if somewhat voyeuristic, reader of these love letters in another time—but the trope gains more resonance when time travel is involved.

In London, book dealer Emmett Leigh acquires and sells an odd little used book—Time Was, a poetry collection by one E.L.—but pockets the love letter he spots pressed into its pages. Posting the text of Tom’s missive to Ben to some online history groups, Emmett is presented with all sorts of historical artifacts: a photo, a diary entry, even a still from a documentary in which they are the wrong age. And, eventually, another copy of Time Was, this time at a bookstore in Paris, containing a letter from Ben to Tom.

read more: How Red, White, and Royal Blue Hopes For a Kinder America

Important as the letters are for touching base with one another as these two lovers jump in and out of time and across the globe, the real time travel is through the books themselves—each passed along with careful precision so that it and its contents can be recovered. It’s a clever play on the time travel trope of communicating via an object moving through linear time… so long as nobody puts it up on eBay, of course.

Pen pal paradox?

Tom and Ben are frequently separated for various reasons, some related to time travel and others concerning their respective jobs as Royal Engineer and Royal Air Force scientist. Yet their plan revolving around the Time Was editions is surprisingly straightforward. It’s only when Emmett inserts himself into the story, and chases down what he thinks was the precipitating event, that things start to get wobbly.

Successful delivery or return to sender?

Time Was is at its most clever when Emmett is deciphering the concrete evidence of photo, video, text, and oral tradition. While segments in which the readers (that’s us) actually meet Tom and Ben in their own original time provide some useful context, overall their story is left frustratingly unresolved. This novella feels like the beginning and end of a longer saga, with all the metaphorical pages ripped out of the middle.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

Delivery method: letters revealed by burning and boiling; letters whittled onto stolen bones and fossilized fish; letters seeded and tended and plucked at the utmost ripeness

What’s the story?

On a distant, bloody battlefield in one of thousands of strands of reality, Red claims victory for her Agency—the brutal, rigid foot-soldiers of one half of the eternal, ever-shifting time war. But then, in the rubble, she finds a letter that says burn before reading. Unable to resist the taunt, Red meets her match: Blue, deep-cover spy for Garden, whose own interferences with time are more subtle yet still choke out the Agency’s changes as viciously as weeds.

read more: Best New Science Fiction Books

A letter this clever, this audacious, deserves a response. And so Red and Blue begin leaving one another notes, dispatches, epistles, bulletins across strands—all while sabotaging the other’s mission in cheeky ways. But what begins as a relatively low-stakes bit of intellectual sparring soon turns emotional, because you can’t write this many increasingly creative letters without putting something of yourself into them. And so, as they begin to fall in love, these rival time agents begin to wonder how much they actually want to win the war for either side.

Pen pal paradox?

Red and Blue’s entire missions are based on undermining the other side, so very much yes. Empires raised by the Agency’s hand are undone by Garden; Garden’s intel is snatched by the Agency and used against them; multiple Genghis Khans coexist, some of them even peaceful. As Red and Blue chase one another up and down the braid of time, plaiting and yanking out strands, there is no one reality to maintain—only the drive to win one more time than the other side.

Successful delivery or return to sender?

Part of the story’s charm is in Gladstone and El-Mohtar having co-written the novella in person at a retreat and on other visits—ironic considering that Red and Blue are almost never in the same place at the same time.

The worldbuilding is superb, especially in the highly detailed snapshots of dozens of alternate realities, but the true star is the letters themselves, set off from the action like treasured artifacts stored for posterity—when, again ironically, their very existence threatens the fabric of reality. The kind of story that can be stretched (as it will be in the television adaptation, which has been optioned) or condensed as needed, This Is How You Lose the Time War wonderfully delivers on its premise.

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Natalie Zutter

Jul 8, 2019

Science Fiction Books

Keanu Reeves

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Doctor Who

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[bettercallselly-blog]

Hi everyone! The Leftovers Episode Three is finally out and here I am, trying to put things together as always. This episode was special and beautiful, completely different from all the others. It almost felt like I was watching a movie about the amazing character of Kevin Garvey Senior. We didn’t know much about him from Seasons One and Two: he is Kevin’s father, he’s a former police chief and he stopped working when he started hearing voices. He spent an indefinite number of years in a mental institution, and he finally got better when he stopped fighting the voices and started doing what they told him to do. The last thing we knew about him was that he decided to move to Australia as the voices recommended. I could not wait to know more about him and this episode is just what we needed to understand what kind of person he is and what’s the meaning of his journey. Apparently, he’s not hearing voices anymore and the last thing they told him was to move to Australia, without telling him exactly where to go or why. So he arrived in Sydney, bought a ticket for Verdi at the Opera House – that’s the second time we hear about Verdi in the serie, it’s impossibile to forget about the amazing episode International Assassin with Nabucco always in the background – and waited for some signs to come. The first signs he received was a hippie with a red headband who asked him if he wanted to talk to God.

“Son.. i’m fucked up on this s*it they call God’s tongue…”

“Then you’ve gotta talk in God’s tongue”, that’s what he told him. We already knew that “God’s tongue” is an high-end hallucinogen, used by K.G. Senior to communicate with Kevin through the Hotel’s television (International Assassin – s02e08). So… Do we have to take it for granted that Kevin is really God? Or that’s just a coincidence? But the odd part is yet to come, because K.G. Senior doesn’t remember a thing about that. He claimed he woke up two weeks later in a hotel room in Perth on the opposite coast of Australia and now he clearly has no memory of Kevin being in an identical hotel room. He doesn’t remember helping him with his situation, or telling him to take “his target” to the well. The only thing he remembers is his room with “a smoldering mattress and a bunch of white dudes lying around in war paint” and – and that’s the funny part – seeing a chicken in the television.

Apparently, on October 14th a small Australian town lost its entire population of 14 people, including the animals. The only living thing that didn’t depart was an egg, from which a few days later a chicken came out. Then people started talking about this chicken, claiming it could help people find what they were looking for. And that’s were K.G. Senior’s story really begins: he obviously went to see Tony, the chicken, and asked him to give him a purpose. Tony started pecking on an audio tape – the audio recorder was a present to Kevin from his mother, a month before she died – with a really weird and explanatory recording of Kevin and his father trying to stop the rain by singing a song. This moment brought two things to my mind:

 Kevin, trying to escape the Other Place by singing “Homeward Bound”, to prove his love for his family.

The National Geographic (may 1972) article about “The spider that lives underwater”. The song goes

“The itsy-bitsy spider climbed up the water spout – Down came the rain and washed the spider out – Out came the sun and dried up all the rain – And the itsy-bitsy spider climbed up the spout again”.

That’s an obvious reference to the National Geographic article and to something that Christine mumbled right before giving birth to Lily in Season One

“The are spiders underwater”

Anyway, according to the recording the song seems to work and we hear the rain stop.

“On the seventh-year anniversary of the Sudden Departure, I believe the rains will come, and with them a great flood. I have to sing to make it stop”

That’s probably what gave K.G. Senior the idea to use music to stop the Apocalypse: his plan is to go all along the Australian Songline, learn all the songs from every sacred site and sing them in order to stop the world from ending.

At this point in the story he needs one last song to complete his mission. He looks for an aboriginal man called Christopher Sunday, who owns the last song he needs. He tells him his whole story, about his journey to Australia, about young Kevin and his mother and he asks him to teach him his song. This is probably the longest (and weirdest and most beautiful) monologue of the entire serie – with Verdi again in the background: K.G. Senior cries for the first time, remembering how little Kevin coped with his mother’s death… At the end of it, Chris agrees to give his song to K.G. Senior, in exchange for his help in fixing some water leaks on the ceiling. While doing that, he falls from the roof and lands right on Chris, killing him.

He ends up wandering alone in the desert, where he gets bitten by a snake. This scene is very significant because once again we are in front of a spirit animal (he claims his totem is a bush snake). Also, he gets bitten by the snake on his left arm, in the exact same spot as the cave woman from Season Two opening scene was bitten (and that’s also the same spot of Nora’s tattoo).

Anyway, the snake poison makes him sick, he collapses next to a wooden cross and he wakes up in the same house we saw in Episode Two last scene. We discover someone has taken care of him, and has given him some medications. Right out of the house some people are building a big ark, so maybe they’re waiting for a great flood too. That’s where he finds out that Chris has died, and that therefore he won’t be able to teach him the last song he needs. He goes back inside, takes some random medications from a cabinet and finds a photo album in the refrigerator, showing the life of a young woman, her husband and their five adopted children. He falls asleep watching the pictures and he wakes up a few hours later. That’s where everything starts to make sense again: the four ladies from last episode are right outside his door and they’re drowning the “other Kevin”. They hit the poor K.G.Sr with a dart, and he wakes up next day. Grace, the blonde lady from last week’s episode, is looking at him waiting for him to wake up. She tells him her heartbreaking story, of how she assumed that her children had departed and found their bones two years later next to her house. She had a strong faith in God and strongly believed that the Departure was really the Rapture and her children had been chosen by God to ascend to heaven with him. She’s now devoured by guilt and she’s desperately trying to make sense of her tragic story. That’s why she thought K.G. Senior was an angel, sent by God to give her a message: he was standing on the exact same spot where her children died, with a page from “The Book Of Kevin” in his hands. She thought that God was asking her to find this police officer named Kevin, the only man on earth who couldn’t die and who was able to help her talk to her children for the last time. She didn’t expect her beliefs to cause someone’s death, again, and now she’s broken. That’s why the last scene is so beautifully powerful. Grace is crying because she thinks God has forsaken her and it takes just one sentence to fix her broken heart:

“You just got the wrong Kevin”.

The world is not over. God is still there with her, and she has a purpose again. It seems that these two people are going to help each other achieving their destinies..

I really loved this episode in a special way. Kevin Garvey Senior is an amazing and strong human being. He sacrificed everything he had in order to save the world and help his son, even though he seems to think that he himself, not Kevin, is the only man alive who can prevent the Apocalypse, and that Kevin is just a part in his own story.

Interesting facts:

– The National Geographic is back!! – “I don’t want him in Australia”. That’s what K.G.Sr says about Kevin. Why doesn’t he want him to go to Australia? I guess we’ll find out in the next episode! – We finally found out something about Kevin’s mother.. Apparently she died of cancer when he was 8. – K.G. started hearing voices five minutes after the Departure… Was he the very first man having a connection with dead people? – K.G. Senior leaning on Kevin’s old recorder to protect it from the rain reminded me of Nora bent over Lily on the bridge (s02e10) – In Season One K.G.Sr didn’t care about killing the deer. Now he apologizes to a snake, before killing him. His trip to Australia has changed him so much, now he even has a spirit animal, a totem. – Matt seems to be sick again. :( – Grace’s last name is Playford, which is also the last name of Thomas Playford, leader of the Millerite movement in Australia!! – Christoper Sunday is played by David Gulpilil, who was in a 1977 movie called “The Last Wave” where we meet a character named David Burton (just like our Leftovers character, who came back from the dead and found himself in a cave in Perth after being in the Hotel). The movie also talk about a flood that might end the world. – The man on fire says “They didn’t take me”. Is he talking about the LADR radiation “treatment”? This scene is also a reference from the movie “Walkabout”, also starring David Gulpilil. (Thanks Jim Kathan for finding this news)

– Australia is the beautiful new setting for the story, so full of magic because of the aboriginal rituals and traditions, their painted bodies, and the sacred paths called The Songline. The wide evocative landscapes are often forbidden to strangers because traditional Aboriginal people regard all land as sacred, and the songs must be continually sung in order to keep the land “alive”. We are even shown a picture of Uluru, the main sacred rock of Australian aboriginal people, in the photo album that K.G.Sr finds in Grace’s refrigerator.

  The Leftovers – RECENSIONE 03×03 “Crazy Whitefella Thinking” Hi everyone! The Leftovers Episode Three is finally out and here I am, trying to put things together as always.