#failmarriage tag

[morethanwonderful]

Now I'm normally a big defender of the "Tom really does love Shiv" argument, but god, that scene on Logan's stairs in the last episode might be the single most manipulative thing we've seen Tom do.

Like, his whole thing this episode is that he's trying to ingratiate himself to everyone he can. Logan was his support and Logan is dead, so Tom is hanging out with the suits and trying to throw his hat in the CEO ring. He's going on about "living to serve" them. He's sneaking off to suck up to Roman and Ken. And then there's his scene with Shiv.

And like I said, I'm usually a big defender of Tom's love for Shiv. I think he originally fell in legitimate love with her as much as he was social climbing, and I think that the story he told on the stairs was about something genuine. The past Tom that sent Shiv handwritten letters and asked her constantly to tell him "yes" sure wouldn't have minded getting close to the big boss's daughter, but he also did all that because he loved her.

But on the stairs? When he tells the story? He is still so deeply in "ingratiate myself" mode. He needs someone on his side in Waystar, and the best way to do that would be to make Shiv fall in love with or depend on him again. So he goes to her and pulls out the sweet romance and reminds her of the past. He says "hey, remember when you were going through a hard time and I made it good for you? remember when you fell for me and depended on me for support?" And the unspoken words behind the words are "hey, I see you're going through a hard time now, and I could be all that for you again. Don't you want that?"

He knows she wants the divorce and she's made it pretty clear that things are emotionally over, but he's trying to pull her back in while she's vulnerable.

I doubt Tom sat in a room somewhere and thought the words, "I will take advantage of my wife's emotional vulnerability," but when he went up to her and followed his instincts toward what might make her want to take him back again, that's exactly what he did.

[velaryoncoffee]

i love being delusional over helaegon

[sasukedivorce]

i understand why most sns shippers want to ignore sasusaku and naruhina and thats completely valid but i kinda love thinking of sns in that context. like. what if you have been in love with your best friend forever and your soul is intertwined with his but for various reasons (which could be its own essay) you could never be together so you have to marry a woman who you aren’t remotely in love with so you have to yearn for eachother from a distance or have an illicit affair knowing you will never get what you want. thats some fascinating stuff. prestige tv/critically acclaimed gay indie movie/award winning novel type shit. from a shitty shounen sequel series btw. i’m incredibly normal before you ask.

[toxicroyjamie]

I’m always thinking about an alternate s3 where roykeeley didn’t break up at the end of s2 but both cheat on each other with Jamie and Jack respectively. I just like when they’re messy idk 🤷‍♀️

YESSSS YOU SEE MY VISION. Messy petty heading-for-divorce Roykeeley is peak and I'm tired of pretending it's not !

[abnormalpsychology]

Hear me out. Brad and Janet, and Tom and Shiv— two failmarriages who may have more in common than you’d think:

inversion / parody of gender roles hetero romance

they are trying SOOOOOOO hard to be a normal married couple and it is just Not Working Out

very very hot sex symbol girlboss woman obsessed with another more powerful guy (Logan, Frank) and extremely unreliable but sometimes present sense of self-awareness and craves independence

dorky asshole malewife bottom trying desperately not to be a malewife as hard as he can for the entire media but yet the malewife genes overcome his efforts valiantly again and again and aGAIN

they cheat on each other a bunch of times (but they don't mean it guyssss 😩)

YES. they cheat on each other. BUT it's made known to the audience that they feel really bad abt it Imao

a premature WEIRD proposal done in a close-proximity-to-death situation yet they’re still like “okay 😊!” like would you rather I propose to you in the hospital while your dad is in intensive care from his brain hemorrhage OR in a graveyard after another person’s wedding while a funeral goes on right next to us featuring a suspiciously child-sized casket? romance central am I right

dedicated loving relationship struggling to survive in a crazy environment that is directly corrosive to dedicated loving relationships

horrible communication where the lack of communication in their marriage is kind of essential to the plot in and of itself

a threesome kinda happens in canon (more an orgy. this is abt rhps obviously) vs they almost had a threesome and then didnt... basically a threesome could've fixed all of them

"yes I cheated on you. Yes I still love you and would protect you as best I can in a traumatizing situation where a key extremely complex and kinda shitty person we both kinda love dies in front of us. We exist."

protection motif is a huge thing for both of them and in the end it's pretty clear that delusion is really what's actually been protecting them

most importantly: getting into marriage and being like "wow bitch!!! you are not who I thought you were"

they both end up in this really subjective completely destroyed irrevocably changed and entirely mortifyingly known position in their relationship like "who knows if we even love each other anymore"

"lol we both betrayed the other's trust beyond repair. does the love matter anymore lol Imao"

way too many people rightfully think there's no way to work their issues out but I am so delusional I don't give a shit <3

married couple that gets pitted against each other and have all these reasons to hate each other but you can tell that all of the love can’t be gone and like the evolution somehow emphasizes the love that was there before = PEAK ROMANCE. TO ME

[ardentpoop]

@ sam break up with him and marry me instead

[transsexualism]

divorce isnt enough at this point tom and shiv should make a suicide pact and cannibalise each other. its the only outcome

[nolanhollogay]

ship soundtrack for mikeyrafe for me. nr. 1 mikey warrior

ok well now that i know im playing the game wrong.. im still gonna play it wrong FUCK shuffle

opening credits: i know the end by phoebe bridgers meeting for the first time: dRuNk by zayn hey, i kinda like you: juicy fruit by sizzy rocket i’m going to kiss you now: chew on my heart by james bay falling in love: heart to break by kim petras your place or mine: why'd you only call me when your high? by the arctic monkeys naked in bed: shame by mitski first fight: get busy living or get busy dying by fall out boy maybe we should take a break: bags by clairo OR bite the hand by boygenius i want you back: relapse by boysworld will you marry me: love will tear us apart by joy division first child: buyer's remorse by daniel ceasar & omar apollo we’re getting older: cellophane by fka twigs if you die i’ll go with you: i'm not calling you a liar by florence and the machine end credits: supercut by lorde

[theinfinitedivides]

preaching to the choir here but i think. that for my own health and sanity i need to acknowledge that sometimes people i follow can have absolute mind-boggling takes on media that we both engage with and that in order not to go scorched earth on them for that i need to ignore said tag when they use it and move on. peace and love in the world girls and gays

[antiqua-lugar]

as a huge fan of the tomshiv failmarriage, I didn't see the speech from 4x04 as...romantic? Like outside from the pretty obvious manipulation attempt, the way Tom says "eventually, you said 'I like it all'"... like I always like to see tomshiv as two people who loved each other but love wasn't enough and maybe they both thought this was the best they can do but it's not, but the way tom says eventually ... like was this relationship truly doomed from the start in so many ways? did they never had a chance but they both desperately wished to?

[sonnendeathiccur]

will I watch the new hotd season? probably not, no.

Will I eat the rhaegon crumbs? well, yes!

[morethanwonderful]

Also feeling insane about how Tom and Shiv both want to go back to the points in their relationship where each of them had power over the other.

Tom goes to Shiv on the stairs of her dead father's home and reminds her of when she was vulnerable and fell in love with and relied on him. He hearkens back to a time in their relationship where she was going through a hard time and he supported her, because that's what he wants again. Being the rock supporting Shiv through a storm gives him irreplaceable power there, even if he's nothing but good to her in the process.

Meanwhile, when they had the divorce talk in 4x1, one of the reasons that Shiv cut things off so quickly was that she wanted Tom to reach out and ask for her. If she said "it's over" and Tom tried to fight for her, then it would have been him begging her and her making the decision. It would have given her power over him again.

But I think Shiv recognizes Tom's ploy at the wake, and she pushes him away rather than fall on him, and Tom doesn't let himself beg when she tells him it's over. Tom wants to be her rock again and Shiv wants to be in control of someone subservient, but Tom's sick of subservience and Shiv refuses to be weak or reliant on him. So they're both just grasping at what the other one won't let them have.

[tomwambsgans]

i could literally make a 20+ minute long compilation of shiv treating tom like utter shit, openly disregarding his feelings and opinions, outright cheating on him, etc all while tom just allows it to happen bc he's so terrified of starting a fight, and yall would all be like "fuck yessss 🤩🤩🥰 failmarriageeee 😁😁😁😍😍😍😍"

[thekaticorn]

intellectually i know these characters should divorce but spiritually i need them to keep doing what they’re doing so i can study them under a microscope like a failmarriage scientist

[abnormalpsychology]

Someone pointed out that “it’s not my fault you didn’t get his approval. I have given you endless approval” could be interpreted as Tom thinking his love should be equivalent to Logan’s, which is just… it’s not! Of course it’s not!!!! No matter what he does, there’s always going to be a part of Shiv yearning for that. No amount of a good man’s love can cure not getting that original parental love. Something something “you’re not Logan and I’m not Gil. and that’s a good thing.” Like I don’t think I would wish being cheated on or being in a relationship w/ Shiv on anyone, but I also wouldn’t wish what happened to her on any child. Even if she’s “broken”, I don’t think his love could ever “fix” her, even if he wanted to believe that. What makes it a tragedy is I think that both Shiv and Tom did the best they could 💔

[ardentpoop]