#forever mad at these men for actually turning out to be the most basic writers after all

[clumsycapitolunicorn]

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[deans-haunted-baby]

Okay I see there are those who are confused as to why most of us are pissed about 15x19 I will gladly explain in depth:

Let’s start off with our boys Adam Milligan & Michael. These characters have not been seen for 10 fucking years. During that time there were Adam stans like myself campaigning like mad to have him and the infamous archangel return for some much needed closure. We had to content ourselves with headcanons, fanfictions and metas based on what we briefly knew of Adam and Michael as people while they unfairly sat in Hell. You might have seen the “Adam’s Still in Hell” memes that circulated. WE WAITED OVER A DECADE FOR THIS. And finally SPN answers our prayers and returns these boys back into the story for the final season. None of us anticipated what their arc and dynamic would look like. Before we could only imagine who these two characters were/are after having been trapped in a cage so long; what their personalities would be like and if they’d be antagonistic to TFW. 15x08 was a surprise because not only were Adam and Michael likable right out of the gate but the writing for them and their dynamic was damn near flawless! And Jake fucking stole the show he killed it as these two. It’s a crime they were not featured in more episodes because the chemistry between these characters is amazing and they’re played by the same dude.

We were given so much background into both Adam and Michael’s psyches in just a short period of time. Their motivations, interests and how they viewed those that wronged them (like the Winchesters); how Hell affected/changed them both and how they viewed their families. We got to see them banter, cooperate with one another and most importantly their different personalities. With Jake Abel appearing in only a handful of SPN episodes, he still fleshed out Michael and Adam beautifully; giving them layers and complexities that most side-characters (who’ve appeared more times than they have) didn’t. The way Jake played Adam’s anger and resentment towards his brothers was brilliant because it’s more under the surface compared to his angsty teenage self in 5x18. He’d become somewhat restrained, laid-back, gentler and wiser which works because Adam displays traits similar to Sam and Dean. He’s kinder and has a sense of humor but none of that distracts from rational thought as he’s quick to analyze and dissect situations. Man, he would’ve made a great hunter/Men of Letters recruit. We know right off the bat Adam’s pissed at his brothers for abandoning him in a thousand-year-prison-sentence and didn’t lift a finger BUT that ironically doesn’t compromise his willingness to help them unlike his past self in 5x18. Jake gets the point across with this character without saying much and that’s what made him so compelling to watch in this episode.

Now Michael was even more of a mystery onion since he wasn’t onscreen as much as Adam had been in past episodes so Jake got to really build on top of this character. Going from the uptight, cold-blooded merciless celestial warrior/dutiful son of God we saw in 5x22 to someone whom despite his arrogance and regal princely demeanor was very human, intelligent, fair, mindful and compassionate. He trusted Adam and respected his opinions even if he didn’t agree 100%. Whereas most angels take over the vessel completely from their original occupant; Michael chooses to share his vessel with Adam as a mutual agreement which says a lot about who he is. He’s fascinated with humanity and wanted to explore it instead of returning to his throne in the clouds. We know that Michael was created specifically to be Humanity’s protector and guardian of Heaven and Earth so these quirks he’d demonstrated in 15x08 aren’t too far off. He holds a lot of pain inside from his abandonment issues with his father whom he loves to a fault and grief over the death of his brothers. On the surface there’s very much an abused child syndrome thing going on with him though he masks it with a domineering presence. And above all this we saw that he was capable of forgiveness. Whether or not Michael always had these traits inside to begin with, its very evident that his friendship with Adam influenced the person he became post-Hell. And that was someone who, like Castiel, chose to rebel for the sake of free will by aligning himself with the Winchesters after witnessing the evil his father had committed. He actually cared about saving the world. This is what we call character development.

What does 15x19 do? It shits all over that. We don’t get to see Adam and Michael’s dynamic at all; and this was perhaps one of (if not the first) most healthy portrayal of a relationship between an angel and its original vessel occupant in the history of Supernatural. Adam is just killed off-screen Thanos style without so much as one last word and Michael barely reacts like he gives a crap. It was just established to us in 15x08 that he’d developed an emotional bond with Adam through years of inhabiting the same body. He protected Adam while they were trapped together in Hell. They were each other’s only friend and source of comfort. They’d developed a certain co-dependency on each other while respecting one another’s space. They’d both made peace with their joint situation. All they had was each other and the writing in 15x19 basically tells us their relationship meant absolutely NOTHING to Michael based on his OOC actions in this episode. He shows up much darker and shadier now that Adam is gone and its like all those years of friendship, things like that independence, newfound strength and humility he’d gained from living with a human for so long are erased. Michael just reverts back to Chuck’s 5x22 bitchboy persona in the most ridiculous 180 shift I’ve ever seen in my whole damn life. And all because his little brother called him mean names. Pitiful. Just when he lectures Lucifer about standing up for what’s right; he betrays his own words, his allies and the rest of humanity in T-minus 2 minutes. That is total character assassination. Nothing about this motivation makes any sense.

There’s no build up to it, no foreshadowing in 15x08 or throughout 15x19 until they get to the lake. He’s completely deconstructed as a character in this episode and rendered weak. It’s like 15x08 never happened. Stripped of all his development for lousy shock value. Instead utilizing all of what he’d learned through Adam and sticking it to Lucifer by proving he could be more than what Chuck tried to mold him into; Michael becomes just another NPC in the story forfeiting the hero he was. And his reasons for siding with Chuck are never specified. Was it about about saving Adam? Was it about proving something to Lucifer (whom he’d already killed in anti-climatic fashion)? Was it all an act that he was in on with the Winchesters; cause there’s absolutely NO FUCKING WAY they could’ve predicted he’d flip on them like that for their magical plan to work. Not after everything Chuck’s done, killing Adam and Jack and leaving Michael to rot in Hell for eternity. And why would he suddenly go along with destroying the Earth when defeating Chuck would probably get Adam back (if that was his goal) which IT DID not to mention its his sworn duty to freaking protect humanity, hello? So his betrayal meant jack shit in the end as it got him killed by his fucking dad!! He’s brought back into the show only to be ruined forever and killed off in the stupidest fashion.

Moving on.

Jack Kline & Castiel. This iron-clad relationship has been in development for 4 in 1/2 years since before Jack was even born. And next to Adam & Michael its the other most healthy relationship on the show. Castiel, a million year old celestial being, spent the first 9 years of his arc on Supernatural following around the Winchesters, being torn between his loyalty to them and to Heaven. He rebelled when he was supposed to be a straight-by-the-book warrior of God. And he defied every rule in the process even when the odds were stacked against him. There was an endless rinse and repeat cycle of love, loss, betrayal and redemption when it came to his relationship with Sam and Dean. It made his character complex, interesting and layered but it still didn’t give him an arc that was his own. Castiel started out moreso being written as just the Winchester’s angel BFF/side-kick. Until Lucifer got Kelly Kline pregnant in 12x08 then things really took off. Before this, Castiel was a lost soul. His faith was broken, he was depressed, lonely, battered and rundown from years of being conflicted over the other angels and Sam & Dean. He felt he’d lost a sense of self and meaning in his life. And didn’t have a mission. Once he turned on Heaven’s orders, Castiel was a rebel angel without a cause so to speak. But like I said this changes the moment he meets Kelly.

Originally Castiel was suppose to kill Kelly in 12x19 because she was carrying the child of the devil and Nephilim are considered forbidden abominations. Told that if Lucifer’s kid was born he could unleash even more evil into the world. But instead of doing what he thought he should, Castiel decides to runaway with her. Choosing to protect her from all threats (Lucifer, demons, other angels, princes of Hell); this especially included the Winchesters. During this short time-frame the angel develops a strong, emotional bond with Kelly and her unborn son that stretches all the way to the S12 finale; to the point where it actually gave him a power-boost. From the womb, Jack appoints Castiel to be his father and protector and he’s given a glimpse into the child’s destiny that he’ll bring paradise to the world. A prophecy that the writers establish head on. This is an unusual circumstance because right here is where Castiel’s solo arc apart from the Sam & Dean takes shape. The journey of becoming a first time parent and guardian. Its a new kind of independence that for the first time has nothing to do with his friends or his family members/colleagues in the sky. Its his own personal mission that he willingly accepts, the second he connects with Jack from inside Kelly. Castiel immediately falls in love with him, before they even see each other; and adopts the boy devoting himself to keeping him safe. Making a promise to Kelly that would later become a vital plot-point in the seasons to come.  

Castiel literally risks everything (Heaven and Earth) to ensure Jack’s birth and ends up dead by 12x23′s startling conclusion. Leaving the newborn infant Nephilim alone in the care of the Winchesters going into season 13; scared, confused and aged into a seemingly 18 year old boy for his own protection. And Alexander Calvert who is a fantastic addition to the cast really brings something wonderful to this role; he’s like a breath of fresh air and a bright light in the middle of a dark room. Jack’s naïve, innocent and curious about his surroundings but also as Castiel once put it “remarkably intuitive”. Right when he’s introduced his arc is intentionally paralleled with Castiel’s. Their alien-fish-out-of-water beginning is practically identical as is their adorable stoic facial expressions. Like father like son. And this helps because while the angel is currently dead in the beginning of season 13, there’s an empty void he’s left behind. So Jack is kind of his temporary stand-in. Odd enough this type of switcharoo would’ve been considered very controversial but it’s handled quite well. Alex is so likable and charming I almost wish Supernatural had introduced him sooner. I mean I really thought I was looking at Castiel’s actual mini-me and not the son of Satan. But I digress Jack’s story in the first half of this season is pretty much about discovery and reuniting with Castiel. He’s a baby so everything is new to him but he’s also one of the most powerful beings in the universe destined for greatness which makes the Winchesters very nervous.

Jack remembers choosing Castiel as his dad which is why he already feels strongly connected to him. Its a bond so powerful that it actually resurrects Castiel out of the Empty the first time. Something Chuck himself was unable to do (that was until the mess that is 15x19). When they’re finally reunited the payoff comes so naturally. Misha and Alex have such a phenomenal onscreen chemistry starting with that first hug; they really play off one another so well that it doesn’t feel like two angels interacting but a genuine father and son duo. So much of what makes Jack and Castiel’s relationship so relatable, deep and endearing is because of what the actors bring to it. But they’re not just a fascinating relationship, they’re compelling on their own too. Both trying to find their way in the world and within the Winchesters’ lives. Death is no stranger to either of them (tragic being that Jack is only a toddler). They’ve each experienced their own personal pain, traumas, life lessons, mistakes and decisions. The biggest for Castiel would be his deal with the Empty to save Jack in 14x08. While for Jack it was the consequences of said deal that would lose his soul causing him to accidently kill Sam and Dean’s mom in 14x18 as a result (something that Jack struggles with immensely to the brink of depression from so much guilt and regret that he’d rather die). Repercussions that would follow into the shows final season. What’s interesting about this deal though is that Castiel made it on parental instinct alone not as a promise to Kelly. He chose to sacrifice himself for the sake of his son as a selfless act of love and kept it a secret from Sam & Dean until his death in 15x18. That’s the extent how much this child meant to him. The other great thing about their family dynamic is that it parallels nicely with the Winchesters. Castiel and Jack share this unconditional love that can never be broken. its even greater than their ties to the Winchesters themselves just as Sam & Dean’s love for each other is greater than any of their other relationships. They would do anything for each other. Castiel would go to the ends of the earth for the little nougat baby because that’s his son.  

Each time these characters were faced with danger or died, Castiel and Jack were overcome with extreme devastation and distress. That said its not just pain that binds these two its happiness. Jack is the best thing that ever happened to Castiel. Literally becoming a father to that child saved him. It brought him back to life, restored his faith and gave him a sense of self-worth and hope he’d long since abandoned. And for Jack, Castiel is the best dad he’ll ever have! He gave this baby comfort, wisdom, nurturing, strength. Was always there when he needed him whether it was to talk or to have his back. No other person in Jack’s life has ever made such an important impact nor made him feel more safe and loved than Castiel. Even when Jack had done such a horrible thing to Mary alienating himself from his family; it was Castiel’s unyielding devotion to Jack that ended up being his salvation. This was huge because once again he’d chosen over the Winchesters proving that no matter what (whether it be the world ending) his son comes first. So when Castiel’s pact with the Empty finally comes due in 15x18 you’d think it’d have an earth-shattering affect on Jack in 15x19. I mean for the first bit it does...until he becomes God. Then its like to hell with that relationship. Castiel is a complete afterthought to Jack and the rest of TFW in this episode. JACK DOESN’T EVEN GET TO GRIEVE HIM PROPERLY. And he just lost his dad because of a deal he’d made a year ago for him. A DEAL JACK HAS BEEN FUCKING DREADING WHILE HE WAS SOULLESS MIND YOU. And when he finally has the power to bring him back, he doesn’t? Jack just walks around with a conceited smirk on his face, bids Sam and Dean adieu and fucks off. I mean who gives a shit right, its only your dad that you love more than anything. This was extremely OOC given that time in 14x14 Jack nearly lost his shit when Castiel got infected with gorgon poison; the anti-venom wasn’t working so Jack resorts to using his powers putting his soul at risk.

I mean if he was so limited to helping Castiel in the Empty AT LEAST FREAKING CLARIFIY THIS TO THE AUDIENCE. This is not about shipping a certain pairing btw. Jack becoming God is not the issue its his characterization after the fact. His first instinct would’ve been to save his dad above getting in touch with the Earth. Yes we knew this transformation was coming it was foreshowed way back in Season 12. Does that justify bad writing or character assassination?? HELL NO.

This is what I’m talking about, episode 15x19 deliberately butchers these characters and their relationships. It shat all over them. No one is behaving like themselves. The pacing is wonky and inconstant. The script feels like it underwent several rewrites and I swear there were scenes cut out. The acting is off too and maybe the pandemic could be blamed for these things but it ultimately falls on the writer. Buckleming screwed up by showing us they don’t know who the hell these characters are, their motivations nor do they give a rat’s ass. And its noticeable on screen. I’ve known better fanfiction writers for SPN than these guys. It’s like they all came back to work but just didn’t care to put the effort into it. That’s why people like me are upset and we have every freaking right to be. Some of us have been with this series for the entire 15 year run. I at least expect these characters to be handled better and for things to make sense. 15x19 doesn’t and its not satisfying its just a cruel joke. The writers and Dabb should be embarrassed to have put this out there thinking we’d just swallow it and shut up. But far as I’m concerned the only thing this episode serves is to disrespect and ruin everybody while angering long-time fans.

MICHAEL. ADAM MILLIGAN. JACK KLINE AND CASTIEL DESERVED BETTER. And that’s the tea.

[whitetrashjj]

“I love Pope for the most part but he is a very flawed character- which I think needs to be acknowledged by a lot more by his fans. I go back and forth on him because of these things but it’s also very evident to see when people hate on Pope because of his genuine character flaws and the people who just have internalised racism.”

what flaws? you keep saying pope has flaws, pope stans see through his flaws, the things he’s done wrong… what flaws? can you please list them for us? i’m not even trying to be rude i’m genuinely confused

Okay so I know you’ve been eagerly waiting on the edge of your seat to hear my thoughts on this so I’ve finally got to it. But thank you so for your patience and realising that I don’t actually owe you a response.

Before we start let me state once again, as you’ll chose to ignore this. I don’t hate Pope, I loved him for the first half of the series, that’s the Pope that I like to think of, that’s the Pope that I write in my fics. Then he did some stuff that did not sit right with me, I haven’t completely written him off but I do think that how he’s written in s2 will have a big impact on my opinion.

I’m gonna try and take this in chronological order. So well start with 2x7. This isn’t a big one for me but just something about it didn’t feel right.

So we all know JJ stealing that money wasn’t a great choice. I really wish the rest of the pogues tried to actually understand is reasons rather than jump down his throat and assume he was just being impulsive JJ. So when JJ appealed to Pope about it, points out that JJ had just confessed to a felony, took a beating and now owes $30, 000 and possibly could face time served, and is basically just saying I did that for you can you just try and be on my side here. Pope just goes ‘I’m gonna pay you back. I didn’t ask you to do that’ which I just did not vibe with. It felt like saying ‘well you chose to do that so if I pay back the money I don’t owe you anything’. It completely ignores all the other massive effects it’s had on his life and as if Pope eventually being able to pay JJ back doesn’t eliminate the fact that he owes that money now.

No, it’s not gonna make me hate Pope forever but I just didn’t like that reaction.

So then we have ep 8 and Kie and Pope’s fight on the HMS Pogue. The ‘why is it always about John B?’ which is just ridiculous. Why is it about John B? Because he’s just stormed off in a rage with a gun to confront his father's murderer? Like he could be either getting murdered himself or doing some murdering and while I understand Pope is under a lot of pressure about his scholarship those two situations just aren’t comparable. He also then goes on to call her a shitty friend that only cares about John B and wouldn’t care about him or JJ if they were in that situation but then justifies that by bringing up a situation where she wasn’t there for John B. Which makes no sense? It essentially proves that she’s in a different place now than she was then, in which she wasn’t there for John B - a reason why she is so active in wanting to be there for him now - so the fact that she is now proves that her actions then don’t speak to who she is now post-kook year.

That bring us to what really annoyed me about that fight. Pope throwing Kie’s kook year back in her face simply cause he was jealous and mad that Kie wasn’t giving him the same attention she was giving JB. Like, at a really low point she confided in Pope how bad the Kook Academy was for her, told him that she was suicidal and that Sarah was her only beacon of hope only to drop her without question and turning her into the pariah of the school. And what does he do, uses it to antagise her because he’s not happy. I don’t love that Kie pushed him her but damn can you blame her? She told her friend something she had struggled with alone for so long and he just uses it against her like that. I don’t understand how you can be that cruel to someone you supposedly love. 

Ah, yes the love confession scene. Now even if we ignore how bad the timing was - and act like being high was a justifiable excuse. Let’s talk about the fact that he wouldn’t take no for an answer. I’ve seen Kie get so much hate for how harsh she was but she tried to let him down easy but he just kept pushing and pushing. Insisting that her reasons weren’t good enough as if she needed a reason other than she just doesn’t see him that way.

Now, of course Pope is allowed to be upset by this, but there is a difference between being upset and the friendzone incel nice guys finish last bullshit that Pope pulled. The acting rude and cold and distant towards her like she wronged him. He was angry at her for not feeling the same way and acted like it was her fault and her problem. The revving of the bike scene will never not make my blood boil, she’s trying to approach him as a friend, talk to him and work things out. He could of told her that he needs some time, that he was upset and hurt but no he shows a complete lack of respect for her and literally silences her. It makes me think about that post that goes ‘men like to talk about how much it sucks to be friendzoned. But what about the hurt of thinking you had a friend only to find out they were only nice to you cause they wanted to fuck you.’ It’s understandable he would be upset but he dealt with that situation so poorly - almost in the way that a flawed character would. 

And then to end it all - now this isn’t Pope’s fault I know - our straight white men in the writers room reward him for treating Kie like that with getting the girl. I don’t know a single girl that would change her mind because of that. It was gross and I hated every second of it. 

I don’t hate Pope, but those we’re shitty things. And yes even if he had his reasons, even if he got mad and acted irrationally, they are still shitty things and that’s okay. He’s a flawed character who acted wrong in a situation, because he’s not perfect - and admitting that doesn’t mean you can’t still love him with your whole heart. 

[xlovelybeanx]

✭ I’m sorry, this gif is too precious for me NOT to put on here. I’m back at it again with Banana Fish, but this time it’s a request from the lovely @wertzunge !! Thank you so much for requesting and I hope you like it!! <3 P.S. I had a lot of fun writing this!! You can always send me more if you want !! <333

Btw, I tried to keep the original prompt true so if anything seems off, I’m sorry. (Not really an experienced writer yet, but one day! ..One day!)

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Title: “Ferocious Lynx.”

Pairing: EijiAsh ft. Skipper.

Summary: When Eiji hears a commotion coming from Ash’s room, the only thing to think is that something bad is happening - but when the poor boy walks on something else instead, he finds himself in a position where he can’t escape.

Warnings: Some swearing, I guess.. Other than that... It’s a wholesome tickle fic~!

Note: I’m gonna change the plot a little bit - instead of Skipper and Eiji getting kidnapped by Arthur and his men, let’s just pretend that Ash defeated them all with his mad skillz and got everyone safely back home. :)

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It happened roughly a week ago. The deal that changed the black-haired boy’s life forever, the deal that made him considering running back to Japan as fast as he could. Due to the recent events, the attack at the bar by Arthur’s men, the concerned photographer asked to make a “deal” with the gang leader - basically letting him own Eiji for a week or two in return for protection.

The sly lynx, of course he’d accept because he was just too lazy to do anything himself! What Eiji hated the most of this, however, was the fact that it was so boring and lonely. The only people who came by were gang members, and of course Eiji couldn’t really speak to them - what would they talk about? ..it just seemed a little too awkward for him to start, and when asking questions and things to Ash, the younger one would just tease him about it! It made life miserable, but as long as Ibe didn’t worry about him, he guessed it was alright for now.

“..ahh,” Eiji sighed, sitting down on the older, slightly uncomfortable couch as he finished with his “job”. He ended up cleaning the entire living room, by himself might he add, because he didn’t know really what else to do. He wasn’t allowed to go outside, he would be easily recognized by everyone - he wasn’t allowed to mess around with Ash’s things (like he had anything there anyways) and most of all, he basically was treated like a maid. “Eiji, go get this, go get that” sort of thing from Ash. And while he didn’t complain at all, it started to grind his gears. Of course, he couldn’t get too mad because he WAS protecting him - it was the least he could do, anyways. “Safe, huh? ...well, if it makes Ibe happy..” he murmured, closing his eyes as he leaned against the headrest of the couch.

Suddenly, a loud scream was erupted from Ash’s room which made the exhausted boy jump in fear. ...what was that, he wondered as he stood up, a concerned look on his face. “That didn’t sound like Ash... but... something could be going down.” He concluded, face pale from the shock of hearing such a loud noise in the quietest of rooms. Standing outside of his room, he almost wanted to leave it up to him - maybe Ash could take care of it on his own. But if there was any chance that he was in danger, Eiji had to see him. He took in a breath, grasped the doorknob tightly, and opened wide. I’m gonna...

“AHAHAHA- W-WAIHAHAT! ST-STOP! PLEHEHEHEASE!”

...save you? Eiji’s eyes widened at the scene he was witnessing - Skipper, the one who saved him at the bar incident was pinned down underneath the ferocious lynx of a gang leader, basically begging for mercy as Ash launched a tickle attack on the poor boy. Eiji didn’t know whether to stand there or walk away - the initial shock of hearing the scream made him stand completely still, as if he was frozen. He could feel his face heat up incredibly fast, but he couldn’t move fast enough to hide it.

“...oh,” Ash calmly said, as he noticed the photographer’s assistant walk into the room, slowing his attack down so that Skipper could catch his breath. The young boy’s face was red with tears pricked at the corner of his eyes, grasping his sides ever so tightly. Eiji raised an eyebrow, fists clenched as he looked down in sheer embarrassment. So he didn’t need saving?! Why was he even concerned..? But then again, it felt kinda nice seeing that scene take place - Ash never really let his guard down, but in the split second that he saw of him tickle torturing a kid, he was totally relaxed. ..felt kind of odd, as well.

“S-Sorry, I... heard a scream..and thought something.. bad was happening,” Eiji mumbled as he fiddled with his hands, earning a slight chuckle from the blonde. He sat up, along with Skipper who was still out of breath, and raised an eyebrow. What was that look for, he thought as he mustered up enough courage to look up for a moment. The jade green eyes scanned him up and down before looking at his “little brother” Skip. “..Hey, do me a favor, yeah? Go to Chinatown and get Shorter, we have to do something later.” He nudged the other in the side, getting a squeal out of the latter - “FINE! Fine.. I’ll be back... in a bit..” Skipper said, standing up and walking out of the room. Which now only left a flustered Eiji and a devious Ash in the same room together. Alone. ..this could only end well.

“What? Jealous?” Ash teased, standing up slowly - the words sent another level of embarrassment through him and he shook his head, his nervousness getting the better of him. No words could escape his mouth, much less process through his head. Fact is, he wasn’t really “hands-on” with his parents much as a kid, so naturally stuff like this didn’t happen. Akira, his little sister maybe did it once or twice but that was so long ago that he’s already forgotten about it. “...ahh, so you are jealous. Huh. Well, if that’s the case, it’ll be a while before Skipper comes back so do you want me to tickle you?” Eiji’s face seemed to turn a deep shade of red, eyes darting back and forth. “..I mean... I g-guess,” he mumbled quietly. There was no getting out of it anyways, so he might as well just take it.

“..alright,” Ash grabbed him, as gently as possible and threw him on to the bed, pinning his hands above his head - a sinister grin was on his face, and the other really didn’t like where this was headed. Sitting on his waist, he leaned forward to his ear and blew softly on the outer part, watching the boy shiver and hunch up softly. “...huh. Would you like to tell me where you’re ticklish, then~?” His whole face turned red, shaking his head - even if he wanted to tell him, what would he say? ...it’s not like he remembered where exactly he was most ticklish. If he was ticklish, even.

“Gonna play the silent type, eh?” Ash asked as he gently slid his fingers around his ear, watching the boy’s eyes widen immediately. “...what’s the matter? You seem... a little squeamish today, huh?” Eiji couldn’t function anymore. Any words that had even the 1% chance of wanting to come out have immediately been stuck back in his brain. He was going to die - of embarrassment? Quite possibly so. “...mmm..” he shook his head, squirming in his grasp. There was so much he wanted to say, and yet, while looking deep into those jade green eyes - there was nothing he couldn’t read at that point. His face said it all.

“...you don’t know? Or do you not want to tell me~? That’s okay, I’ll figure out eventually,” those were the last words uttered before the blonde moved down and trailed at his pant line, making him squeak out involuntarily. “..w-wait,” Eiji choked out, the only word he could muster up before giggles slipped out of him. “Wait? Wait for what? For me to find your worst spot.. and then abuse it? ...mmm.. trust me, I can’t wait for that. Also... consider it.. payback for making me take care of you..” Ash grinned as his fingers wiggled teasingly underneath his shirt, making him clench his hands into fists. “Waihihit, s-stahahahap ihihit..! Ash!” Before he knew it, laughter was pouring out of his mouth - he can’t ever recall being this ticklish but the situation he found himself in seemed to answer his question earlier.

“What is it, Eiji?” Ash asked, his nails scraping gently across his pale stomach, making him want to jump out of his own skin. “H-Hehehehey! Nahahaha- c-cut ihihihit ohohohout!! Hahahahahahaha!!” Eiji’s giggles rose in pitch, making his voice sound very squeaky - something that seemed to edge the blonde ler on more. The sparkle in his eyes seemed to brighten the more he got a reaction out of the Japanese boy. “...p-plehehehehehease! Hahahahahaha!”

“...please what? Tickle you more? Oh don’t worry, you’ve got a lot of that coming your way~.” Ash slowly traveled his fingers way up, resting right underneath his arms. His fingers had not even starting moving, but the poor boy had already been sent into hysterics. Even just the light touch was enough to drive him up the wall. His whole body now was shaking, his legs kicking against the sheets of the bed.

“Does it tickle that much? I couldn’t imagine being that ticklish. Aha.” And that’s when the actual tickling began - the nasty ler scratched his delicate fingers into the center of his armpits, grinning as his work just only started. Eiji jumped out of his skin, squirming desperately as he could do nothing but laugh hysterically. “Woah, maybe that’s why you didn’t want me to know where you’re ticklish...” Ash couldn’t help but laugh with the hypersensitive boy. “HAHAHA- ASH! STOHOHOHOP IHIHIHIT! PLEHEHEHEASE-!”

“...now why would I do that? I’m only getting started..” the more he picked up the speed, the more increasingly squeakier his voice sounded - and Ash wasn’t going to lie: it was ... pretty cute. At first he was just surprised at the fact he was there, considering that originally he was checking up on them to make sure everything was as okay, but now? He was just surprised at how someone could sound so cute and not be known to him. “...aww, is it too much for you?” The blonde let go of his wrists to use both hands, using one hand to softly pinch his sides while the other digged mercilessly under his arm. “AHAHAHAHAHASH! F-FUHUHCK! STOHOHOHOP IHIHIHIT, PLEHEHEHEASE...!” Ash flinched back - ... that was the first time he ever heard the boy cuss. He knew it was getting bad then, if he had no other choice but to swear. His fingers stopped where they were, although they never really moved from their spot.

Out of breath and panting with still a couple of giggles flowing out, the other laid his head back and sighed in relief. It was finally over - at least, for now - and he could take a moment to take in all of a precious resource called ‘air’. “..t-thahanks..” he said, covering both of his eyes with his hands. Jeez, Ash did a number on the poor boy. “..are you that ticklish everywhere?” Ash asked with a somewhat serious tone, playful wiggling his fingers at him. “No,” Eiji said softly. “Not that I remember anyways. I haven’t been tickled since my sister did many years ago. I just..haven’t really thought about it.. until I saw you tickling Skipper..” There was a brief moment of silence before Ash burst out laughing, unexpectedly.

“H-Huh..? What’s so funny?”

“That’s cute,” he said, pushing his hair back from his eyes. Cute? Huh? The red hue on his face came back as he puffed his cheeks out, crossing his arms. “Cute, huh? What do you mean by that?”

“Just sayin’, it’s cute.” Ash repeated, turning around so that he was facing Eiji’s legs and Ash’s back was visible to him. Eiji was visibly confused - weren’t they ... done? A terrified shiver went through him. If... he’s doing what he’s thinking of, Ash might literally kill him. Physically and mentally. “Hey, Eiji?”

“Y-Yeah?” He asked, his voice seemingly small in comparison. There was a moment of silence before he turned around, holding eye contact with the pitiful male. “Are your feet ticklish?” His stomach dropped - nonononono... this was what he wasn’t looking forward to. He darted his eyes away, looking for an excuse to get away. “...er, actually, I j-just remembered ... I forgot to clean the kitchen! I’ll just, uh, being going now...”

“Can it. You cleaned the kitchen yesterday, remember? Oh, well, I guess you don’t remember me being there. I am a master of stealth, after all.” That little... his cheeks puffed up as he realized there was no getting out of this. Covering his face as he wiggled his socked feet, he remained silent - and that was all he needed as an answer. Tracing a single finger up the sole of his foot, the reaction? ...interesting, to say the least. The smaller one squeaked loudly, covering his mouth - eyes widened in surprise that he was the one who made that noise. “Jackpot,” Ash murmured, mostly to himself as he scribbled at 10 fingers on both of his socked feet.

“AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA-! WAHAHAHAHAIT! YAHAHAHAHAHAMERU!” Eiji couldn’t help but cry out in his native language, seeing as this was probably the worst torture in his life - Ash merely chuckled. “‘Yameru?’ Does that mean stop in Japanese? Cause if so, you already know my answer.” Tears pricked at the edges of his eyes, threatening to spill out - man, could Eiji have walked in on ANYTHING else? It feels like he’s being murdered! “PLEHEHEHEHEHEASE!! I CAHAHAHAHANT TAHAHAHAKE IHIHIHIHIT!!”

“Oh, poor ticklish Eiji,” Ash fake whined, dragging his nails slowly up the poor boy’s feet. All the while he’s doing that with one hand, Eiji doesn’t even notice the fact that Ash is taking off one of his socks and throwing it to the side of the room. But when he feels all 5 of his fingers against his bare skin - you’d start to wonder if he’s the most ticklish person on the planet. Eiji screamed, pushing against the blonde’s back weakly - from how much he’s been laughing, it feels like his chest and face are on fire, and his laughs have begun to turn a little wheezy. Picking up on this sign, the younger stops, getting a little worried.

“...ah, whoops. Did I kill ya?” Ash asked as he turned around to find a tear-soaked, messy haired Japanese boy laying down on his back. The other couldn’t speak at the moment - he was still processing the fact that he stopped, since there was still tingly sensations all over his body. It made him jolt a couple of seconds but it didn’t seem to affect him that much. “...n-no,” he wheezed out, “...y-you almost did...” there came a sarcastic and light chuckle out of him but when that was done, he was lucky to have air.

“You guys finished with your one-sided fight?” There was a voice that everyone in the room recognized - Shorter, the purple haired Chinese boss was standing right inside the doorway, his arm resting against it. But somehow, even Ash didn’t even see him coming. Eiji was too embarrassed to speak and Ash immediately went back to being a boss for the day. “Yeah, we’re done,” he said as he jumped off the other male, letting him be alone for a minute. “Let’s go get him, yeah?” Shorter and Ash fist bumped before heading out the door, leaving Eiji alone in the room where he just got tickled to death.

What a day this had been...

[longitudinalwaveme]

Longitudinalwaveme Reviews More Old Comics (and One New One), Part 1

I’m going to be doing these reviews in chronological order, starting with the oldest of the bunch. 

Batman #292: “The Testimony of the Riddler” 

This issue is actually the second part of a four-part story, “Where Were You On the Night Batman Was Killed?” Basically, everyone thinks Batman is dead, and a bunch of his villains are coming forward to claim the honor of being his killer. Catwoman’s claim was dismissed last issue; now it’s Riddler’s turn. 

The mock trial that the villains have set up to determine the identity of the killer is amazing. Ra’s al Ghul is the judge, Two-Face is the prosecutor, and the jury is composed of the Mad Hatter, Poison Ivy, Mr. Freeze before B:TAS gave him a good costume, Scarecrow, the Signalman (*snicker*) and the Spook, who I only know as the D-Lister beheaded by Damian Wayne. 

The Riddler begins his testimony, regaling everyone with riddles (some of which seem more like jokes, but whatever), and telling them about a crazy criminal caper he launched, during which time he posed as Bruce Wayne in order to steal a ridiculous jeweled typewriter ( “made of gold, platinum, and ivory...its keys studded with diamonds and rubies...its ribbon made from a Ming Dynasty robe....and its case encrusted with emeralds!”). 

Amusingly, since Riddler doesn’t know Bruce Wayne is Batman, his Batman is not at all surprised to come across “Bruce Wayne” at the party. Batman ends up following the Riddler’s clues to find the Riddler and the ridiculously fancy typewriter in a quarry, whereupon the Riddler uses a knife he has to cut a rope that was holding some rock slabs. According to Riddler, the slabs fell on Batman, pinning him. Riddler then blew him up with dynamite (which he set off using a latern’s flames).

As soon as he finishes his testimony, Two-Face calls him a liar; gets permission to take the entire court outside, sets up a deathtrap using the dynamite Riddler claims he used to kill the Batman, and orders the bailiffs to tie Riddler to the trap and light it all on fire. 

They do, and the Riddler promptly passes out. Two-Face then walks onto the trap himself, and nothing happens. As Two-Face explains, “dynamite does not explode in fire! It can be lighted only by electric spark or percussion!” 

Riddler is eliminated as a potential candidate and escorted from the courtroom (with an apparent $25,000 fine for the dynamite display). 

Several other claimants retract their claims, and Ra’s adjourns the court for the day. 

Also, Bronze Age Riddler makes a surprisingly convincing Bruce Wayne, all things considered (this was back when he still had black hair; rather than red). 

Batman #293, “Luthor’s Testimony”

This issue takes up immediately where the last one left off, with Lex Luthor of all people taking the stand in the costume you can see in the picture above. It’s...certainly something, all right. 

Cluemaster, Killer Moth, the Cavalier, and some random gangsters are also at the trial. Most are impressed by Luthor’s amazing(ly hilarious) new outfit, which I’m pretty sure he only ever wore once (for this trial).

Luthor does his usual grandstanding before launching into the story of his latest plot to kill Superman. 

Said plot involved a fake robbery to lure Batman into a trap that would allow Luthor to put Superman’s mind into Batman’s body. 

Luthor then punched Superman-in-Batman’s-body to death and launched the body into space. Luthor says that now he’s leaving to go back to Metropolis, where he’ll put his own mind into Superman’s body so that he may become Super-Luthor. 

Two-Face proceeds to demolish Luthor’s story, first by calling in one of Luthor’s goons to reveal that Batman had infiltrated Luthor’s gang by posing as a henchman, and then calling in Superman himself to prove that, in fact, Superman’s mind is still in its body.  Superman just dressed up as Batman and pretended to be Superman-in-Batman’s-body to fool Luthor. 

Exposed as a liar, Luthor storms out of the room, but not before yelling at Two-Face for “colluding with Superman” and insulting the criminal pretensions of everyone in the room. 

Also, Two-Face somehow managed to convince Superman to grant every villain in the courtroom amnesty. (Although if I’m remembering the fourth part of the story properly, I think “Two-Face” is really Batman in disguise, explaining why he was so easily able to get into contact with Superman and probably making the amnesty fake.)

The comic ends with the Joker’s signature laughter; he’ll be the last villain to give testimony in front of the kangaroo court. Sadly, I don’t have that issue, so I won’t be reviewing it here. 

Batman #296, “The Sinister Straws of the Scarecrow” 

Scarecrow has henchmen he calls “Strawmen”. They have weird costumes and exist to give him someone to deliver all his lectures to and test his fear gas on. As usual, his speeches to his underlings sound...well...like simplified college psychology lectures. 

Otto the burly henchman’s deepest fear is Batman. What a surprise. 

Phobias namedropped by the Scarecrow (and narration boxes): phobophobia (the fear of fear), pyrophobia (fear of fire), algophobia (fear of pain), pathophobia (fear of illness), taphephobia (the fear of being buried alive), inutilophobia (the fear of not being able to carry on one’s work) and “chiropterhomopobia”. The last is especially interesting since it’s not actually a real word; it’s a fictional one that manages to effectively follow the formula used for naming phobias. “Chiropterophobia” is the fear of bats. “Homophobia”, in this case, is the fear of men (homo referring to our species name, homo sapiens); therefore chiropterhomophobia would be the fear of bat-men. Good work with conjugation there, writer! 

Anyway, the Scarecrow uses a crook named Skibo’s taphephobia to convince him to give them the location of the turnpike bond money he stole from Gotham City’s National Bank several months ago.

The next day at the bank, the money is returned, puzzling Bruce Wayne. Wayne goes to interrogate a crook who talks in confusing criminal slang, who tells him that Skibo was the one who fenced the stolen bonds. 

Batman tracks Skibo down...and finds him being assaulted by the Scarecrow, who believes that the bonds he returned to the bank were counterfeit. This is problematic for the Scarecrow because it suggests that Skibo was able to withstand his fear of the Scarecrow and disobey his orders, which would interefere with his ability to intercept criminals who are obeying his orders to return stolent money and take the money for himself. 

Batman, Skibo, Scarecrow, and his goons get into a free-for-all that ends up causing an explosion. In the chaos, Scarecrow and the goons escape and Batman gets information out of Skibo about the Scarecrow’s plans. 

Scarecrow and his goons then go after a thief who stole a valuable Gutenberg Bible, but before they can use the fear toxin on him, Batman shows up and they use it on him instead. It affects Batman, but he shakes it off and manages to defeat the Scarecrow and his goons as well as capture the thief who stole the Guetenberg Bible. 

The story ends with Batman telling Commissioner Gordon that he found the case exhilarating. 

All-in-all, a pretty standard Scarecrow story. 

Batman #308, “There’ll Be a Cold Time in the Old Town Tonight” 

Some guy named Jacob Riker has betrayed Mr. Freeze. The man in question is promptly murdered by Freeze and his henchmen. 

In this issue, Mr. Freeze is wearing an outfit that’s reminiscent of Captain Cold’s, but with a bubble-helmet and pink shades. 

Catwoman shows up in Bruce Wayne’s office to tell him that she’s reformed and wants to invest money in Wayne Enterprises. Bruce agrees, and also agrees to meet her for dinner at some point next week. She also brings a cat with her to this meeting, because of course she does. 

Lucius Fox introduces Bruce Wayne to his daughter, Tiffany, who works in a drug rehabilitation program sponsored by the Wayne Foundation. After exchanging pleasantries, Bruce tells Lucius to give him a complete rundown on what Selina’s been up to, presumably so that he can know if she’s on the level. 

He moons over Catwoman for a bit before getting called into action by the Batsignal, and he subsequently arrives at the scene of Riker’s murder. The guy is frozen solid and very dead. 

Some rich guy name Mr. McVee comes to Mr. Freeze; he’s exchanging all his wealth in exchange for the promise of immortality. 

Unfortunately, the process turns the man into a Popsicle zombie. His body is alive, but his brain is dead. 

Also, Mr. Freeze has a girlfriend named Hildy, whom he loves and is planning to make immortal (as he himself effectively is). Unfortunately for him, she does not reciprocate his feelings and is using him solely as a means of staying young forever. Interestingly, she’s blonde, just like Nora usually is (Nora, of course, didn’t exist at the time this was written). 

Meanwhile, at STAR labs, a medical treatment goes wrong and kills somebody. 

Batman finds and breaks into Mr. Freeze’s hideout...and is promptly attacked by Mr. Freeze and his Popsicle zombies. Mr. Freeze dubs them his “Ice Pack”. 

Mr. Freeze manages to take Batman out of the fight by freezing his legs, which causes him to fall to the floor. This allows him to be captured by the Popsicle Zombies and put inside Mr. Freeze’s immortality machine. 

Batman is apparently turned into another mindless Popsicle zombie as Mr. Freeze exposits about how lonely his life is and how much he loves Hindy. 

Mr. Freeze leaves Hildy in the room with the Popsicle zombies, at which point Hildy starts to talk to Batman about how she thinks he’s cute and she’d rather be immortal with him rather than with Freeze (who she’s planning to kill in any case).

Unfortunately for her, Mr. Freeze overhears her and is predictably furious, pointing his Freeze Ray directly at her face. 

Batman saves her from an icy fate by attacking Mr. Freeze, revealing as he does so that he had only pretended to be frozen by the machine (having disconnected several of the building’s extra power lines). Cue another fight with Freeze and the Popsicle Zombies. 

Batman uses a piece of ice to break Freeze’s bubble helmet; preventing him from giving any more orders to the Popsicle Zombies. He then fights Freeze some more. The Freeze Ray goes flying and gets grabbed by Hildy, who plans to kill both of them. Unfortunately, the gun backfires on her and she’s killed instead. Mr. Freeze is arrested. 

Meanwhile, we learn that the dead guy was the Blockbuster, Mark Desmond, and that he isn’t quite as dead as the people at STAR Labs think. 

Justice League of America #167, “The League That Defeated Itself!”

The splash page is of Superman punching Hal Jordan Green Lantern in the face.

The explanation is pretty quickly forthcoming: the Secret Society of Super-Villains has swapped bodies with the Justice League. The Wizard from Earth-2 is in Superman’s body, Professor Zoom the Reverse-Flash is in Green Lantern’s body, Plant-Master is in Wonder Woman’s body (ew), Star Sapphire is in Zatanna’s body, and Blockbuster is in Batman’s body.

The real Justice League are trapped in the bodies of the villains and locked in a cube-shaped cell. Superman guides Hal into using his new super-speed to help them break free of the cube.

The Joker stars in a Hostess Fruit pie ad!

The villains have left for Earth, leaving the heroes (who are trapped in their bodies) alone on the JLA Satellite, along with an unconscious Red Tornado, whom they promptly wake up.

Naturally unaware of the switch, the Tornado attacks them and they fight. Zatanna manages to bring the tornado down using Star Sapphire’s powers, and the JLA go off to find their bodies on Earth, with Batman telling Zatanna that she’ll have to reverse the spell as their only magician.

Green Lantern gets some information out of Hijack (who I think is a member of the Royal Flush Gang) by pretending to be Reverse-Flash. The information helps them locate the Society’s HQ.

As soon as they break into the building, however...they’re promptly incapacitated by Green Arrow (except for Zatanna, who remained outside). Green Arrow is suspicious of the way Superman is behaving and decides to keep an eye on him and the others who “located” the HQ of the Secret Society.

Justice League of America #168, “The Last Great Switcheroo”

This issue picks up where the last issue left off. Ollie and Hawkman are supsicous about the behavior of their allies, while Black Canary ad the Elongated Man don’t think anything unusual is going on.

Eobard traps the “villains” in a diamond cell, and then the Wizard chucks the diamond into another dimension!  

The Wizard covers for himself by claiming that the “villains” have been put into “time-stasis” by “Green Lantern”’s ring. “I just tossed the diamond into an orbit around the solar system! They’ll remain there until science perfects criminal rehabilitation.” For some reason, everyone except Green Arrow immediately accepts this excuse.

Red Tornado breaks free of the trap Zatanna-in-Star-Sapphire’s-Body had to put him in last issue and criticizes the decisions he made in the fight with them.

Zatanna then arrives on the satellite and convinces Red Tornado of the swap that’s taken place.

Meanwhile, in Mexico, the Secret Society and the remaining members of the Justice League are, at least allegedly, guarding some jewels for the Mexican government. Elongated Man, Hawkman, and the Flash are also becoming suspicious of their supposed allies.

And then Eobard ruins everything in the most Eobard way possible: forcing a kiss onto Black Canary!

The real Justice Leaguers fight and defeat the impostors (except for the Wizard, who left to “patrol the city”)...but before he can step in to salvage his plan, Superman uses the Wizard’s own magic to take his body down.

Zatanna reverses the mind-swap, and the day is saved.

Was it this story that later got retconned to include more mindwiping thanks Identity Crisis, or am I thinking of a different storyline?

Flash #275, “The Last Dance” 

In this issue, Iris Allen dies! 

The story starts with Barry in the grip of a teenaged girl with ESP powers (no, really. Cary Bates, the issue’s writer, really liked the paranormal). His marriage with his wife Iris has been struggling, and she fears that he might be cheating on her. 

She’s also spying on him by bugging his costume rings with “micro-mini homing signal devices”, which just goes to show that literally anyone in the DCU can invent amazing technology at the drop of a hat. 

Stalking the stalker is Clive Yorkin, a character from the plot thread that’s been building up to this issue. He’s kind of based off of the brainwashing scene in A Clockwork Orange and hates the Flash and Barry Allen. 

The teenager uses her mental powers to force the Flash to meet her at a motel and take off his mask, which he does. She’s apparently disappointed by the results, complaining that there’s nothing remarkable about him, and promptly storms out. 

Iris arrives in her car just as the girl storms out, and discovers that she’s coming from the room that her tracker has Barry in. She storms inside and accuses Barry of cheating on her, then runs out in tears.

Also, right before she storms out, Barry looks at himself in the mirror and thinks “ “Ordinary”? What in blazes is that supposed to mean? I may not be Robert Redford...but I always thought I was sort of sexy...at least, that’s what Iris told me.” It’s mildly hilarious. 

Iris promptly gets into a car wreck with a tanker truck. Barry manages to save both her and the two truck drivers from the massive explosion that this causes. 

Barry convinces Iris that he wasn’t cheating and the two promptly make  up. 

Meanwhile, Mysterious Shadowy Man on the Phone tells someone to kill Barry Allen at a philanthropist’s upcoming costume party for all of the employees of Central City’s government (e.g., police officers, firefighters, etc.) The Mysterious Shadowy Man on the Phone will eventually be revealed to be the corrupt police chief of Central City, Chief Paulson.  

Iris and Barry decide they want to have kids, then kiss. D’awww! 

Iris’ costume for the party arrives; she’s going as Batgirl. Barry was planning to rent a Batman outfit, but it was already rented, so Barry ends up going to the costume ball dressed as himself (that is, the Flash).

Clyde Yorkin is still stalking both of them. 

Barry’s friend from work, Frank Curtis, arrives to pick the couple up. Hilariously, he’s also dressed as the Flash. 

The theme of the party is “Dress as Your Favorite Super-Character”. Iris comments “it’ll be interesting to see whether we get more heroes or villains!”...which raises a question: Namely, why is everyone totally okay with people dressing up as people who are, in their world, real costumed criminals? That’s always seemed odd to me. 

Clive Yorkin sneaks into the trunk of Curtis’ car and slips out as the other three head for the party.

Inside the mansion, we see a huge number of people dressed up as famous DC characters, including Hawkgirl, the Calculator, Heat Wave, two Green Lanterns, Zatanna, Aquaman, Green Arrow, two Black Canaries, Abra Kadabra, Batman, Wonder Woman, Professor Zoom the Reverse-Flash, Star Sapphire, Supergirl, Pied Piper, Poison Ivy, Captain Cold, the Golden Glider, the Top, mustachioed Superman, some guy in a purple costume I can’t ID, Mirror Master, the Golden Age Sandman, and Captain Boomerang. 

The Golden Age Sandman is actually an assassin in disguise; he was hired by Chief Paulson to get rid of Barry Allen before he discovered his corruption; he drugs Barry by “shooting” him with his Sandman gun. One of the Green Lanterns is actually Hal Jordan, who pops up to say hi to Barry and Iris. A later story will reveal that the Captain Boomerang in this issue was the real Captain Boomerang, and that some of the other Rogues were also actually at the party so they could, quote, “party and pick pockets”. Yet another subsequent issue will reveal that the Reverse-Flash at the party was in fact the real Eobard. So...which of the other Rogues do we think were at the party? We know that the Captain Cold isn’t real; he’s “Phil from Vice”.  That means that the Golden Glider alongside him is probably not the real one either, and it seems unlikely that the Top here is the real one, since he was dead at this point. So that leaves the Pied Piper, Mirror Master, and Heat Wave as possible candidates. 

Chief Paulson calls Barry to meet him in his office at 9 AM the next day; Barry agrees but notes that the man seems oddly tense. 

Curtis, still dressed as the Flash, goes outside for a smoke break and gets jumped by Yorkin, who mistakenly believes him to be Barry (until he rips his mask off, at which point he just throws him off the balcony.)

Barry sees a Green Lantern making the moves on Iris and gets upset until Hal reveals that he’s the real Green Lantern and congratulates them on their plan to become parents. He then flies out the window, and somehow all the party goers are fully convinced that it’s just a really elaborate costume. Huh?

Iris tempts fate by saying that “this might be the happiest moment of my life!” The two go off together to get some privacy...but then Barry begins to feel dizzy, as though he’s been drugged. Iris goes into the bathroom to get him some water...and then Barry hears her screaming! He bursts into the bathroom to see Iris on the floor, with Yorkin standing over her. Yorkin then jumps out a window as Barry runs to his wife. 

A bunch of the guests, including Mustachioed Superman, burst into the room to see what the commotion is, and Barry passes out. Curtis bursts in a few seconds later to learn that one of his friends needs a hospital....and that the other is dead! It’s a very effective cliffhanger. 

[anileahvictoria]

Adam Kendall from My Little House on the Prairie.

Cutie Mark: Adam has always had a fascination with law and thought about becoming a lawyer many times, but ultimately decides he could do more good as a teacher for the blind. His cutie mark was inspired by the saying that justice is blind, so the scales of justice represent balancing his love for the study of law with his responsibilities as a teacher, and husband, and the cloth is Lady Justice’s eye covering that makes her blind, just like Adam is.

I accidentally referred to Little House on the Prairie as My Little House on the Prairie, and this fan art was born. More on that later, It's time for a rant. Adam is my favorite character from the series until I got mad and left the fandom cause they did this beautiful man dirty, so It’s time to rant about it.

#1. The Romance. The romance between Mary and adam was totally out of the blue. When Merry goes blind, she's shipped off to blind school, and her teacher is this capable, intelligent and hard-working young man named Adam Kendal. His teaching still is very much tough love, and he doesn't take crap from his students. Mary starts as a reluctant, uncooperative, self-pitying, closed-minded student doing things like throwing her things across the room. Adam handles all this brilliantly, saying stuff like: if you're gonna make a mess, your gonna clean it up. Doesn't baby her or pitty her AT ALL. Exactly what she needs. After a few months, Mary's attitude changes drastically, and she's thriving thanks to Adam. But when Adam sits her down to teach her some piano, she has a moment of self-doubt: 

Merry: I could never learn...

Adam: I wish you would forget about that. Some of the greatest writers and composers in the worl were blind.Have you ever heard of John Milton? 

Merry: Well of course. He- he wrote Paradise Lost, one of my favorite books.

Adam: Well, he was also blind. Now, do you want to play the piano or not?

Merry: There wouldn't be enough time. You know my family's coming to take me home. They'll be here in a few days.

Adam: It's been a long time, hasn't it, since you've seen your folks?

Merry: It seems like a lifetime. Adam, I'm so scared. I mean... I know I'm ready to go home... But here it's- it's easy, and I've always got you to help me.

Adam: Merry, you can't depend on me forever. And I'll be leaving too. 

Merry: Where are you going?

Adam: To Winoka, to start a new blind school.

Merry: Why didn't you tell me?

Adam: I don't know. It just never came up. 

Merry: Then I'm glad I'm going home.

Adam: Merry, it's not that much different out there. Not really.

And now it gets all angsty:

Merry: Yes, it is. I wouldn't expect you to understand. How could you? 

Adam: Mary...

Mary: The world isn't like the Burton school for the blind. It... It's a huge, dark place filled with... hidden obstacles and... strange sounds and voices coming from faceless people. Even you. I've never even seen you. 

Adam: Well then look at me. 

... And then they start feeling each other's faces and, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure blind people don't actually do that...

And then it gets randomly and weirdly romantic...

Mary: What color are your eyes?

Adam: Blue.

Mary: Your hair?

Adam: Brown.

Mary: Thank you Adam.

Adam: ...What do you look like, Mary? Ive never seen you either.

Aaaand more face touching.

So apparently, they're a thing now. I'd understand if Adam fell for her cause she looks like a literal angel (seriously, no girl has any business looking that gorgeous), but Adam's blind too. So he's going ultimately off of personality, I'm guessing. And when he first meets Mary, she is not a pleasant person. Yes, she does improve quite a lot, but what makes her any different than all the other students he's taught? It certainly isn't their age, cause Adam's 22 and Mary's 15 (back then, I guess it wasn't a big deal). Also, It creeps me way out that her teacher falls in love with her. The man who spends most hours of the day alone with a vulnerable teenage girl falls in love with said girl AND THEN asks said girl to work for him at his new school in a busy city away from her family where it would just be Adam, Mary, one old man who lives on the top floor, and a few students, not to mention Mary would also be spending the nights there... It's a good thing this isn't that kinda show cause there's a million different ways that could've gone... But because this is Little House on the Prairie, nothing happens, and Adam asks Mary to be his wife soon after she moves in.

#2. Regaining his Sight And Becoming a Lawyer.

This really makes me mad. When Adam gets his sight back and sees the faces of all his friends and, most importantly, his wife for the first time. It's beautiful and wonderful and heaven knows the man deserves a miracle like that, BUT his whole character changes. He goes from a responsible teacher and loving husband who knows who he is and where he's meant to be, to an ambitious young man who would rather chase his dreams of becoming a lawyer than take care of his responsibilities to the school he started, the children he teaches, and the wife he loves. I can understand wanting to go and see the world and do things you couldn't do before, but sighted or blind, he has responsibilities. Mary is kinda left in the dust when Adam makes all these new sighted friends and drags her along to all his fancy lawyer parties while he plays games, runs around laughing and talking, and leaves Mary sitting in a chair all by herself. Like, he doesn't even consider how she must be feeling! He doesn't try to include her in conversations or introduce her to his new friends; she's just a pretty thing that sits there to be cared for. And the thing is, this is exactly what Adam was afraid would happen to him when Mary thought her sight was returning a few episodes ago! Now Adam's new fancy friends get him an opportunity to take some fancy tests to become a lawyer and Adam, without a second thought for Mary, goes off to take the test, not evening considering who would run the school if he passed and became a lawyer. Then some bad stuff happens, and he can't make it to the test, and I'm all relieved cause we all know he belongs with his wife teaching at the school and now he'll see things clearly and get his head off the cloud and onto the here and now. But nooooo, this whole time Mary is hoping he'd fail (and so am I), but when she sees how heartbroken he is, she goes and has a talk with the professor and convinces him to let Adam take the test. He finally relents, and Adam passes and becomes a lawyer, giving the school away to a wonderful woman who teaches there. This whole thing is treated like he made the right choice when he obviously isn't! Not I blame this on the time period the show was made in. Back then, a man had to be ambitious and provide for the family and leave the teaching and such to the woman, so back then, it was a good thing he went off and became a lawyer, but still, I'm mad. Correct me if I'm wrong, but when Adam hands the school over to the lady, Mary no longer teaches there, which means that Adam has taken away Mary's dream of teaching on top of not spending nearly as much time as he used to with her and (though he doesn't realize it and I don't think anyone brings it to his attention cause men are supposed" to do all the work) doesn't let her do things for herself.

#3. He's Fictional.

This one makes me the madest. At first, I turned a blind eye to all these flaws cause I assumed Adam Kendall was based off an actual person, like most characters in the series, but noooo. They made him up just for the tv series. This means his romance with Mary WAS totally random, and Mary staying in the same building as he did BEFORE they were married WAS the writer's choice, and Adam regaining his sight and leaving his wife and school in the dust WAS ALSO THE WRITERS CHOICE! AND he was basically just made to me Mary's husband because Mary doesn't marry or have children in real life. So yeah, my favorite character's development went down the drain. But oh well, that's what we have fanfic and fanart for, am I right? Oh wait, this show is old. No one's made any good fanart/fanfic. K, I'm gonna go cry now. Bye

Also, if anyone has a different opinion or point of view, please tell me about it. I'd love to go back to loving this character, so please change my mind 🥺. 

[themidnightcircusshow]

ladyedwina asked, like a fool, so here’s a not at all quick run down of my fandoms. (You know, when I first went on a mini stress rant about this, because I’d rather do that than rant about my actual problems, one of my friends told me to just put my main fandoms in my bio. I asked what my main fandoms were. None of us could decide).

Dorian Gray: My favourite book, my favourite radio drama, the focus of my academic career. I have opinions, they are unpopular, I don’t care because my opinions are backed up by four years of literary analysis. I use the ‘Dorian Gray’ tag as a catch all.

Forever and all Ioan Gruffudd related properties: Forever is a fantasy crime drama from 2014 about an immortal medical examiner who helps the NYPD, in particular light of my life Jo Martinez, solve crimes. It is the sweetest, most life affirming show, and is what brought me back into fandom after a long break. There’s only one season, but it is a brilliantly written season with a perfect ending and I love it. It stars Ioan Gruffudd, who was also the star of my brother’s fave show when we were kids so I of course was morally obligated to love him and everything he is in (also I rewatched Hornblower when I saw Forever and that show is easy to love once you’re old enough to understand what is happening lol)

Dean Stockwell/Quantum Leap: Ah yes, the light of my life. I know the content has been light lately, but that’s because I am slow at doing things I’ve planned. Also I need to learn to do gifsets so I can contribute to the visuals side of things lol. Anyway. Quantum Leap is a time travel show from the 1989-1994 and it is also sweet and happy and also heartbreaking and just really loves humans while also unflinching showing the dark side. Dean Stockwell plays Al, the fun hologram. He also happens to be an absolute legend, who has been in movies with Frank Sinatra, Gene Kelly, Katherine Hepburn, Orson Welles, and Gregory Peck, and in a lot of cases stole the show from them. He is quite probably the most interesting celebrity ever. And also he was gorgeous.

Hannibal: *Hallelujah chorus plays* The other main thread of my academic career, lol. Everything I ever wanted and it’s glorious.

Idiots Assemble and all related properties: Idiots Assemble are a British comedy troupe that I have loved since high school. They currently have a new show called Ghosts. It is joy in a bottle. A millennial couple (one of the only well written straight couples around) inherit an old country manor from a long lost relative, and plan to turn it into a hotel. The ghosts living there don’t like that idea so one of them pushes Alison out the window, and her heart stops temporarily, giving her the ability to see ghosts. Wacky hijinks and unexpected feels all around.

CSI: The og crime show, and also the show responsible for pretty much all of my fandom likes. The Greg/Grissom side of the fandom is completely dead on tumblr (but still occasionally pop up a new fic on ao3 guys I just want to talk) but I love it. Like, imagine if Hotch/Reid and Gideon/Reid were combined and also a healthy mentorship based on mutual respect and support with a ton of character development and a ton of slow burn. Gah. 

TVXQ: An old school K-Pop group. Basically brought K-Pop out of Korea to the non-western world. They are the true definition of get men who can do both. Used to be five members, has been only two for a lot longer than they were five but people who want them to be five again are still mad even though [redacted for sake of blood pressure]. Their music is top notch.

CLAMP: Ok this is, if anything is, my main fandom. CLAMP are a group of manga writers. Series of theirs you will see here are: Cardcaptor Sakura (my very first fandom), Tsubasa Chronicle (how to absolutely ruin a series in one volume), xxxHolic (it’s horror, but fun!), Tokyo Babylon (it’s horror, but tragic!), and X (it’s the end of the world as we know it~).  Everything they write has queer and or disabled main characters. Usually both. 

Daredevil: Matt Murdock is the fictional love of my life. Especially when paired with Foggy Nelson or Elektra Natchios, the other loves of my life.

Skam: In particular the original and the Netherlands version, haven’t seen the Spanish or German remakes, France is pretty but rage inducing

Lucifer: Silent for now because I haven’t seen the new season, but the second I do...

Doom Patrol: Again, silent for now because I haven’t seen the new season. But it’s very sexy for them to have made a high concept queer acid trip horror in the guise of a superhero show

Doctor Who: Sometimes I will regain Nuwho feels but most commonly there will be content on the Eighth Doctor era and the Second Doctor era

Chuck: It just makes me happy

Harry Potter: This is at the bottom because I’m not confident calling myself a fan post-RowlingturningouttobeTHEWORST but Remus Lupin is the only chronically ill rep I had when I myself was chronically ill and he will always be my favourite character. Of course the version of him in my head is primarily made up of a gazillion fanfics and headcanons so JKR gets no brainspace from me thank you

[secret-diary-of-an-fa]

The End of Year Awards Are Back... and This Time, It’s Personal!

And so we approach the end of 2020, the year that never really began. On paper, at least, it looked incredibly promising. There were lots of great movies slated to come out; culture seemed slightly less paucity-riddled and pointless than usual; good things were in the air. Then COVID happened, and basically fucked everything. Actually, that’s not quite true: my personal year has been fucking spectacular. I’m in a long-term relationship with a gorgeous woman for the first time in forever- no more abrupt trysts and stolen moments for yer humble narrator: I’ve got a sumptuously plus-size lady-friend who actually wants to spend substantial amounts of time me (and has knockers you could sled down, were you so inclined). I also started a Youtube channel where I upload performances of magic tricks I’ve designed and a few people seem to quite like it. Oh, and I’ve written four novels, with a fifth well on its way to completion. Unfortunately, that’s my life, not the life of our civilisation and culture as a whole. The fact that bugger all happened in that makes this end-of-year round-up a little hard to write. With that in mind, I’m going to hand out the gongs for 2020, but I’m also going to do my usual dodge of giving end-of-year awards to things that I discovered in 2020, even if they came out the year, decade or century before. It’s not like any right-minded person gives a hoot about my opinion anyway. Right then, everyone clear on the rules? Then let’s roll up our sleeves and plunge elbow deep into the fetid trough of our decaying society to ferret out the best and worst of the Things That Humans Have Done Recently.

The ‘I Like It Because It Confused Thick People’ Award for Best High-Concept Sci-Fi Movie... … Goes to the sterling Tenet, a spy film that used entropy inversion and symmetric, opposite-direction timelines within the same physical space the way most spy films use hacking and guns. Christopher Nolan films are always intricately constructed and meticulously-executed, but this one must have had Japanese Master Puzzle-Box Makers crying into their breakfast cereal. Is breakfast cereal a thing in Japan? I honestly I have no idea. For some reason, all I can imagine is a sort of dry kedgeree where all the ingredients that aren’t rice have been removed. But I digress. For all its intricacy, Tenet is actually really easy to follow once you’ve grasped the basic premise that there’s a machine that lets people move backwards through time, and that this makes them appear to move in reverse to the rest of the world while they perceive the rest of the world as moving in reverse. Nolan maintains a mastery of cinematic visual language that makes even the most abstruse concept easy to wrap your head around. Nonetheless, following Tenet’s release, dumb people took to the Internet on mass to complain that the film was confusing and stupid, never once realising that their inability to conceptualise time in non-linear ways was their own failing, not Nolan’s. I find that refreshing. It’s nice to see a sci-fi film that’s actually made for smart-cookie sci-fi fans and doesn’t give a hoot if it alienate thickos.

The Award for Most Inexplicably Compelling Web Comic… … Goes to Questionable Content. I originally started reading Questionable Content because I’d heard that the female lead and love interest was a plus size lassie and that shit’s my jam. However, the art style makes everyone look like a skinny indie-type, regardless of their actual, in-universe size, so it doesn’t do much to titillate my Fat Admiring Titillation Centres. And yet, I’m over five hundred ‘episodes’ in and still reading. The thing is, I couldn’t tell you why for the life of me. Maybe it’s the hope that the art style will evolve to the point where the people look like actual human beings with different body types (but then, why would I care unless I was invested for some other reason). Maybe it’s the fact that when I get one of the many, many obscure band or pop culture references, I feel a little buzz of kinship with the writer. Maybe it’s the fact that it takes place in a universe where robots and superheroes are things that regularly happen, yet most of the strips are just normal people chatting shit in a coffee shop and the slice-of-life narrative/sci-fi setting appeals to my sense of juxtaposition. I don’t know, but I find it really compelling to the extent that I’ve pissed away entire days reading it. I have a horrible feeling that it’s a short step from this to really angsty hentai. If I start singing the praises of that, somebody please shoot me in the crotch.

The ‘Forest Gump Debating Peter Andre’ Award For Most Sustained or Elongated Instance of Stupidity… … Goes to Donald Trump. I was tempted just to award this gong to his entire presidency, but that wasn’t just stupid: it was also venal, corrupt, horrifying and punctuated by terrible moments of low cunning. So, instead, this award goes to his ‘soup’ rant. For those of you who missed it, the former President of the United States spent a really, really long time (in the run-up to the election) wittering on about protestors throwing cans of soup at police. What was dumb and weird about it was that he appeared to be extolling the virtues of soup as a siege weapon, going into really specific detail about how it was better than a brick because it could be thrown with more force, finishing with the utterance that protestors would just argue that “this is just soup for my family” if they were caught with the cans… which is phrased wrong in such a subtle and inhuman way it’s hard to imagine that anyone actually ever said it, at least in those words. I have no idea if protestors in America were throwing soup cans at police (which would be entirely justified considering how many innocent people American police have murdered in cold blood quite recently) or if this was a fantasy dreamed up by the former president in the cloudcuckooland that is his diseased little brain. Either way, the connected rant was balls deep in dumb.

The Most Disturbing Unintentional Impression of Vincent Price Award… … Goes to the narrator from One Step Beyond, a Twilight Zone-esque anthology of weirdness that purports to be based on true events and has to be seen to be believed. The stories are oft-disturbing instances of spooky-inflected human drama and can occasionally be quite disconcerting… until they’re book-ended by a dude who sounds like Vincent Price reading a children’s book in a really earnest voice. It’s weird and no, it didn’t hit our screens in Space Year 2020, it dates back to Ye Olden Times of the 1950s or 60s, when men were men, women were women and technincolour was a distant dream that could get you strung up for witchcraft. Nonetheless, I only encountered it this year, so it’s getting its prize. I warned you I was going to pull this shit, but you foolish fools didn’t listen.

The ‘It’s Not Gay If I Don’t Clench’ Award for Cognitive Dissonance… … Goes to Amazon Prime, the content-making branch of evil, tax-dodging, anti-monopoly-law-breaking megalith Amazon. You see, while Big Daddy Amazon is off being incredibly sinister and worrying, like a shifty vampire hanging off the economy’s throat, the creative people at Amazon Prime are busy making or acquiring some of the flat-out best TV ever committed to a streaming-service, from the extra-weird slice of fun-pie that is The Tick, to the entertainingly horrifying cultural dissection of The Boys to the utterly unique Carnival Row, to the superbly adapted American Gods. It’s a bit like discovering that Geoffrey Dahlmer single-handedly created a body of artistic work to rival Vincent Van Gogh’s when he wasn’t pouring acid onto the brains of emotionally vulnerable young adults. It gives me a headache.

The Clint Eastwood Award for Most Effective Older Gentlemen… … Goes to Joe Biden, for unseating dipshit in chief Donald Trump with the casual badassery of a Wild West gunslinger shooting a baddy (probably played by Leonardo Di Caprio) in the balls. I mean, he’s not the best Prez America could ask for but a) as a Brit I don’t have to care and b) anyone who ousts Trump gets mad props from me.

The ‘It’s a Pity Everything Else is Shit Now’ Award for Best New Ongoing Series… … Goes to my own Youtube series, Victor The Magician, in which I claim to be a reality-hopping, interdimensional wizard on an endless quest to… perform magic, basically. I’ll admit that the quality is super-variable (Youtube algorithms and their constant demand for fresh content be a harsh mistress, etc., etc.). However, when I’m good, I’m really good. If you’re looking for a punch-line other than the fact that this whole bit is a self-promoting plug, it’s this: my Youtube series really was the best thing to come out this year. Not because I’m great or anything, just by default. A promising year really did turn into a cultural wasteland the moment COVIDius Rex reared its scaly head.

The Zombie Ian Curtis Award for Most Crushing Disappointment… … Goes to Rick and Morty Series 4. As I think I’ve said before, it was still good, but it just didn’t reach the dizzy heights of nihilistic lunacy achieved in series 1-3. I think the problem is that the audience is meant to learn something from Rick’s poor choices, even if he doesn’t, because the creators saw the amazing success of Bojack Horseman and decided they wanted a slice of that sweet, tangy deconstructionist pie. It worked up to a point in the climax of Series 3, but having made their point, the showrunners probably should have moved onto a different point. They forgot that the appeal of Rick Sanchez is his combination of ‘entertaining car-crash of a human being’ and ‘unstoppable superbeing’. Push him through an arc and you risk breaking the thing that makes him and the show so endlessly watchable. Rick, unlike Bojack, just wasn’t built for heavy introspection. Also, the team hired on new writers who were less than familiar with the characters, setting and subtext, and that’s always an invitation to disaster.

The Special Sir Mixalot Award for Posteriority… ...Goes to… my girlfriend and glamorous assistant, Mystic Miss Terri, who’s arse is gorgeous and majestic.

The ‘Are They STILL Making That?’ Award for a Show You Forgot Existed And is Now Back… … Goes to Supernatural, which never technically went away and whose final series is apparently being broadcast on one of the 4 channels (though who knows which one, any more), It’s kind of nice to realise it’s still out there and be reminded that there are still people who care deeply about what happens to it. It’s like when you remember ‘oh yeah, [insert cute animal here] actually exists and isn’t just an internet meme. That’s nice’. Also, it’s good to see Jared Padelacki working steadily. It can’t be easy to find acting gigs when most producers just want to shoot you and mount your antlers over a fireplace.

The Irritating Magician Award for Something That Just Won’t Fuck Off… ...Goes to this blog entry, which is three pages long in Word. Good grief. Bye y’all! See you next year, assuming that the last few days of 2020 don’t culminate in a civilisation-destroying attack by giant space-ants. If that seems worryingly specific, let’s just say that- as Leonard Cohen would say “I’ve seen the future and, brother, it is murder”… by giant space-ants.

[amandaklwrites]

Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes (2009)

Genre: Action/Adventure, Mystery

Rating: 10/10

Movie Review:

*Some spoilers below, but’s been over 10 years, so I’m just going with it*

Let me begin by saying, I LOVE THESE MOVIES! I know not every Holmes fan loves these movies, but I am a diehard fan of these films. These were the ones that got me into Sherlock Holmes in the first place.

I love the Victorian era, which should be a dead giveaway. Every time I watch these films, I remember how much I love the dark, gritty, vibrantness of the era. My mom always says I’m weird because I say, “I love how dark Victorian England is.” There’s just something about it to me—maybe it’s the clothes, maybe it’s the world, maybe it’s England, maybe it’s the way mysteries feel so right set during the period. I can’t explain it. But this movie (and the second one) perfectly shows off everything I love about this period.

Robert Downey, Jr as Sherlock Holmes is just a fun mess. To me, he gets the basic of Holmes down, and then adds his own twist to it. Yes, Sherlock Holmes is a bit self-centered (to some degree, of course) and knows he’s brilliant, but hey, at least he’s comfortable in his own skin. This Holmes that RDJ portrays actually uses humor in such a fantastic way that I always find myself laughing at his quips. His madness is lighter, a bit more playful than other portrayals, I think. And this one is shown to be capable of love, when it comes to Irene Adler. I mean, obviously Holmes can love—i.e. he deeply cares for Watson as his comrade—but I meant in the romantical/sexual sense. Which I liked. It made him feel a little “human.” However, RDJ made him seem to be awkward in those situations, which I think felt like how a real person like Holmes would be.

Jude Law as John Watson is perfection. He has the personality down—the humor, the way he purposefully antagonizes Holmes, his utter annoyance and perplexion (wait, is that a word?) at Holmes is amazing. I’ve always loved this Watson the best (though I can’t choose a Holmes, I’m sorry), and not only is Jude Law a gorgeous man with the best voice on the planet, but he slips into this period so well. The dynamic between Holmes and Watson in these movies (as done by RDJ and Jude Law) is so incredible to watch, as they seem like best friends, brothers, lovers, and enemies all at once. I could watch these two forever, honestly.

Now, Rachel McAdams as Irene Adler is my favorite Irene. Forever and ever. She has a feistiness, while also a little scary in the scene when she attacks her attacker. She’s Holmes’ perfect equal and you see the attraction, the care, and the nervousness between the two of them perfectly. They attract to one another but repel the other at the same time. It is like they are constantly dancing around each other, and it seems like they would follow the other to the ends of the earth if they wanted. But they stay away. Plus, this Irene is brutal and her dresser in men’s clothing is one of the most attractive things I have ever seen.

Mark Strong as the bad guy, Lord Blackwood, is damn brilliant. I see Mark Strong in a few other movies and every time, I’m like “oh no, it’s Blackwood!” which often gets weird looks from my mother. He has the perfect acting and voice for a villain, and I like him that way. There’s something about him that is so dark and mysterious, especially in this movie, that seems to draw you in. He’s perplexing, he’s dangerous, and it’s like you kind of like it. At least I did. I also think Mark Strong is a fantastic actor because at the end, when he’s falling through the chains to his death, he looks like a frightened child. Which he technically is—Blackwood was just angry and turned to the dark. It was amazing, and I loved him as a villain.

The supernatural feel to the movie was fun. I liked it—though, I knew there would be scientific reasoning behind it—thanks Holmes! It gave the tone an even darker feel, and I love anything supernatural in Victorian England. It makes it more haunting to me.

I personally thought the plot and mystery was great. Someone coming back from the dead? Oh HELL YEAH! Though I know some people didn’t like it—I’ve heard others say that it was hard for them to keep up—but I think Guy Ritchie and the writers did a great job of having it reflect the period. Did you know that the Victorians were OBSESSED with death? I’m not kidding. This was when vampires were huge, the gothic genre came to life, they held seances on a regular basis, people saw creatures and ghosts all the time. Why do you think Dickens thought of ghosts as haunting Ebenezer Scrooge to help him become a better person on Christmas Eve? Mostly, however, the Victorians were intrigued with death and the afterlife, but they were terrified at the same time. There was a huge thing in the period where they developed different ways/mechanisms for people buried in caskets to tell people above that they were actually alive—yes, they accidentally buried people alive all the time. Let’s just say, doctors in that period were not great at reading pulses or understanding the body (sorry Watson!). At the beginning, when people “woke up” and climbed out of caskets and graves, people thought the dead had risen. So, to me, personally, I think this idea was PERFECT for this film. A man comes back from the dead and starts killing people—so they get Holmes on the case. And like in real life, there’s always an explanation (though, I personally believe anything is possible).

But also, this movie is about friendship. I think that’s the heart of these stories—two men that love each other and would die for one another. Yes, they both have romances—Watson is getting married, Holmes has Irene Adler whenever she’s around. But at the end of it, these stories aren’t about romance, they aren’t about death and mysteries. They are about two men who have seen so much, grown closer over the years, and have one another’s backs like no one else. It’s the type of friendship I have always liked in stories, one that I had long ago and lost, those deep personal connections that run deeper than any romance or familial relationship. We see their friendship tested, changes coming and threatening them, but they end up stronger and just as close as ever. These are two friends who love one another no matter what their virtues or flaws are. They care so deeply that those things don’t matter. They are just there with each other. And I think RDJ and Jude Law show this perfectly, making that the most important part of the film.

Now, I know this isn’t everyone, but Guy Ritchie is personally a favorite of mine, and I love how he films things. I know some people don’t like how he uses speed and CGI for certain affects, but I like it. I love that these movies just aren’t about solving mysteries, they have ACTION sequences. I mean, why not??? Holmes boxes and knows jujitsu. Ritchie played with that well and it made me think these movies were even cooler than anything. I just love them so much.

Everything about this movie is great to me—the main cast, the other character who round out the film (Lestrade’s hate of Holmes is the best), the humor, the action sequences. These movies are just downright fun and make me disappear from the real world for a little world. I get so sucked in that I can’t think of anything else. They make me feel warm and comfortable, and that I can do anything. That’s what they have done for me.

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson have existed in our pop culture for so long, and I loved that this movie introduced newer versions of them, and they are probably my personal favorites.

I will watch these movies forever.

[schraubd]

Jewish Representation on Television: A Random Review

I've been thinking about Jewish representation on television series over the past few days. The trigger was actually an antisemite who was complaining that there are too many Jewish characters on television -- we apparently have taken over his TV. That struck me, because my naive view was that Jewishness actually doesn't get a lot of attention on TV series (even Seinfeld, if I recall correctly, rather famously did not actually say its characters were Jewish). But I decided to actually think about it more, and look into how Jews are portrayed on the shows I watch. This is therefore not remotely scientific -- though I do watch a fair bit of TV -- and some obvious choices (Broad City!) thus aren't included. I'm most interested in shows that are not primarily about Jews, but nonetheless have Jewish characters whose Jewishness is fleshed out in a substantive way. I include shows that have no Jewish characters. This is not necessarily a critique -- not every show has to include Jews -- but it is worth including to get a sense if there is any pattern to what sorts of shows have Jews and what don't. That said, I'm not necessarily a superfan of all these shows, so it's possible that I could miss something (though it hardly counts if deep in Season 6 a show briefly mentions so-and-so is Jewish, only to never bring it up again before or since). * * * 30 Rock: On a show about New York City comedy writers, only Josh -- Josh! -- might be Jewish. This entire show is a case of "just say Jewish, this is taking forever!" C- Big Bang Theory: Of the major characters, only Howard (and his mother) are Jewish. Neither are exactly positive representations -- Howard, in particular, manages to be the most perverted, awkward and creepy of a cadre of young male scientists whose whole shtick is that they're kind of perverted, awkward, and creepy around women. Interestingly, Bernadette is portrayed as super-goyish even though Melissa Rauch is actually Jewish (Mayim Bialik is more famously Jewish, but to my knowledge Amy Farrah-Fowler is not depicted as a tribe member). D- Billions: At first I thought this show had no Jewish characters, a decision I chalked up to maybe wanting to step lightly around the whole "ruthless billionaires manipulating the financial system" thing. But then I remembered: Spyros is Jewish! Spyros! By far the worst character on the show along pretty much any metric you might consider, including that he's portrayed as a serial sexual predator. Literally every character is at least written in shades of grey, and we get Spyros. Ugh. D Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Jake Peralta is Jewish. It pretty much only comes up when he has flashbacks to his Bar Mitzvah (curse you Jenny Gildenhorn!), but at least it is acknowledged as a part of his character with substance. That said, it almost never is visible in his adult life -- most strikingly, there's no portrayal of it being discussed with Amy in terms of how their family will or won't be Jewish. B- Buffy the Vampire Slayer (and Angel): Willow is Jewish, but it gets almost no attention -- I think by the end of the series she's outright celebrating Christmas. C The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina: No Jewish characters. Community: Annie is Jewish, but it is almost entirely downplayed. Indeed, it basically never comes up outside the first season. Missed opportunity. C+ Crashing: This is a tough one to judge, since so many of the characters are playing themselves. I know Sarah Silverman is Jewish. I think Artie Lange is? I don't know if Ali Reissen is supposed to be Jewish, but the actress who plays her definitely is. I do know Pete Holmes is not Jewish. I can't give a rating here. Dollhouse: No Jewish characters. Elementary: No Jewish characters. Firefly: No real Jewish characters, though they do briefly show a postmaster wearing a yarmulke. It's actually a really neat moment of casual Jewish inclusion that I really appreciate. Fresh off the Boat: I don't think any of the regulars (including Eddie's friends) are Jewish, but Evan's arch-rival Phillip Goldstein is definitely Jewish -- and definitely portrayed as a massive asshole. C Game of Thrones: No Jewish characters (outrageous!). The Good Place: No Jewish characters (actual sad face here -- though I can see how incorporating actual religious faith into this show might be hard). I Feel Bad: Probably not worth including -- it was canceled after one season, and I'm not sure it even fully aired the one -- except to give one last plug to my headcanon where it is Sarayu Blue's side of the family that is Jewish. Brian George -- who plays her father -- is Jewish! He should get to play a Jewish character some time. Alas, the show goes down the more predictable route of making Paul Adelstein's side of the family the Jewish one. It does a good job with that. I guess. Still salty. B Insecure: I don't think any characters are Jewish. Frieda might be Jewish, which would be okay. Joanne also might be Jewish, which would be a less attractive proposition. iZombie: No Jewish characters. Mad Men: Rachel Mencken is great. She also stands pretty much alone. B+ Marvelous Mrs. Maisel: This is the only show that is explicitly Jewish in focus, and as I said that's not my main concern here. In any event, not everyone likes the portrayal of Jewishness, but I actually find it quite warm on the whole. A. Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: No Jewish characters. Mozart in the Jungle: No Jewish characters (really?). New Girl: Full disclosure: I did not watch this show all the way to the end. Anyway, Schmidt is one of the more famous Jewish portrayals of contemporary television. I'm not his greatest fan -- in particularly, that he's a proud Republican is, shall we say, statistically anomalous -- but once I started comparing him to the competition above he turns out pretty decent. Still, he, too -- especially in the early seasons -- doesn't exactly stand out on the "treats women with respect" metric. B Parks and Rec: The main Jewish characters are the Saperstein twins -- John-Ralphio and Mona Lisa. They are each, in their own way, "the worst person in the world." And with John-Ralphio, we get yet another creepy Jewish harasser. D The Orville: There are no Jews in space. The West Wing: This show actually comes out great. Toby and Josh are Jewish, visibly so, yet in very distinctive ways. It comes up, though it isn't obsessed over, in ways that feel authentic to their character. And the pilot includes one of my favorite "Jewish" scenes in all of television. A+ * * * In sum, I'd say that -- outside of shows where Judaism is a central focus (Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), there are a dearth of characters whose Jewishness is portrayed (a) positively and (b) as a substantive (not all-encompassing) presence in their lives. It seems that sci-fi and fantasy shows are the least likely to have Jewish characters, which is understandably, though it includes series set on Earth or otherwise "near-real world" conditions. This might reflect anxiety around how to portray Jews in juxtaposition with the occult and/or dystopian authoritarianism without reenacting antisemitic tropes. On the positive side, The West Wing, in my view, stands head-and-shoulders above the crowd; other solid performers include Brooklyn Nine Nine, New Girl, and (for what it's worth) I Feel Bad. But these are exceptional, for the most part, the Jewishness of characters either isn't established much beyond its mere mention. And the main exception is when Jewish male characters are portrayed as perverts, creeps, or sexual harassers -- indeed, this might be the most common way of "marking" a character as Jewish, which is worrisome. via The Debate Link http://bit.ly/2YP4sVe

[probably-not-star-lord]

Opposites Attract (Pre-Deadpool!Wade Wilson x Reader)

A/N: Wow! I feel so bad because I got this request literally over the summer. That makes me think about how long it has been since I’ve replied to a request so I sincerely apologize. Anyway, thank you for your compliments, anon, and I appreciate this awesome request!

Request: OH MY GOD you write wade so fuckin well!! if requests are open could we maybe get a pre-deadpool merc wade x reader where the reader is just super small and shy and soft and they're basically polar opposites but fall for each other anyway? you can do whatever you want for the plot honestly you're such a good writer adfklfkdf

Summary: You’ve always been Wade Wilson’s shy neighbor, but deep down you know you long to be something more.

Warnings: swearing, fluff, a little bit of angst

-

You’ve been Wade Wilson’s neighbor for three years now. He lives in the apartment right across from you and the thought that he is always so close to you sends shivers down your spine. The first day you moved in, you developed sort of a crush on him when he flirted with you as he helped you carry in some moving boxes. But, you were too shy to act upon how you felt. The result was only seeing Wade occasionally when you went out to get the mail and falling into a fit of giggles whenever he made a funny joke or flirtatious comment at you. Sometimes he would try and be serious and have a pleasant chat with you, but it was hard to continue conversations with him without blushing at his handsome smile. So, Wade Wilson has simply remained in your life as a friendly neighbor, nothing more and nothing less.

Occasionally, in the late hours of the night, you’d hear arguing coming from the hallway or bangs to the wall which made you wonder if there was fighting happening frequently. The idea of Wade being a criminal or hitman of some kind made you fear him slightly, but it also made him so much more mysterious.

Wade knows you don’t like to talk much. He knows how you spend most nights alone in your apartment watching reruns of old shows or rewatching your favorites movies. The fact that you are extremely introverted is something Wade never thought he’d like, but for some reason, it makes him more drawn to you. He loves talking and even making jokes to the point where it makes people uncomfortable, so the thought of you just listening and laughing to him ramble filled his heart with warmth. Yet, Wade already knows that a sweet, shy girl like you would never go after a violent mercenary, let alone a violent mercenary like him. He also likes to tell himself that opposites attract, and that’s what gives him the sliver of hope he has about the two of you going out sometime.

Wade is actually known by you more than he thinks, as he comes into your place of work a couple of times a day. You had been living in New York for a few weeks when you had decided to finally go out and search for a simple job to pay the bills. You looked for a waitressing job in a nice place, but those were a lot harder to come by in the city than you would have imagined. It felt like you had been walking forever as you turned every corner, peeking for “Help Wanted” signs. Eventually, you came across a quaint place named “Sister Margaret's Home for Wayward Girls” with a large poster in the window seeking bartenders.

As sketchy as the bar is, you found yourself enjoying your job at Sister Margaret’s more and more with each passing night. You and Weasel bonded easily and the regulars at the bar didn't end up being as intimidating as they seemed the first night you began working. You could even sense yourself stepping out of your comfort zone a little bit more, starting up conversations with the customers and being friendly with new people. Usually, you’d enjoy being at home alone by yourself, but now you genuinely have a good time at the loud bar you work at.

Tonight, the bar is particularly crowded and Weasel asked you to come in for an extra shift. You don’t mind coming in at all, and you’re excited to see the new wave of people that come in at a different hour of the night. You and Weasel chat behind the bar for a while, laughing and making fun of the men that come in. You have always found it easy to talk to Weasel, he’s a little awkward but makes funny jokes and that makes him someone you feel able to start conversations with comfortably.

A familiar figure struts into the bar and Weasel gets ready to serve him. You bend over and begin collecting clean glasses off of the bottom shelf, finally deciding to get to work on such a busy night.

“Well if it isn’t the one and only Wade Wilson!” Weasel exclaims as Wade takes a seat at the bar. “What the hell can I get for ya?”

Wade exhales deeply, his eyes searching around the room as he thinks of his drink order. His gaze lands on you and he turns to Weasel with a smirk. “Now, who might that be over there?”

“Don’t get any ideas, Wade,” Weasel instructs him. “She’s our best bartender.”

He grins before sliding over the bar and making his way over to you. He leans in close to your ear, his body practically on yours as his voice gets low and hoarse. “So what’s a girl like you doing working in a place like this?”

You can’t help but smile to yourself at the fact he can’t tell who you are. For one, you’re certainly dressed more provocatively for your job whereas Wade usually sees you in your pajamas and robe when you go out to get the mail in the morning. He also has no clue that you work here, even though you know Wade stumbles into Sister Margaret’s regularly. You turn on your heels abruptly to face him with a smirk. “Hello, Wade.”

Wade takes a step back, dumbfounded. “Wha-what? Y/N? What are you doing here?”

“She’s been working here for almost three years, dumbass,” Weasel chuckles.

“I see,” Wade says, giving you a once-over with his eyes. “I never pegged you for a girl who would be into the whole Coyote Ugly thing.”

“I’m not,” you defend. “We obviously don’t do that here.”

He takes a step closer to you, nearly backing you up against the wall. “Well, maybe now I wished we did.”

“All right!” Weasel yells, pulling Wade off of you and sitting him back down at his seat. “That’s enough out of you for the night. Stop hitting on my bartenders!”

Wade winks at you and you giggle, causing his stupid smile to grow more. You find yourself only working at the side of the bar he is sitting at as he talks to Weasel. Every few seconds he glances up and you, the two of you locking eyes for a few brief moments. This instills his confidence and makes him begin to wonder if maybe a girl like you would be into someone like him, so he decides to give it a shot.

“Y/N,” he calls you over with the wave of his hand. “I’d love a blowjob from you.”

“What?”

Weasel groans. “It’s a drink that he has me make.” He stirs the drink together and tops the shot off with some whipped cream. “Here you go, asshole.”

Wade smirks at you. “Now, be a dear and send this blowjob over to that table over there.”

“The one with the giant, scary men?” you ask, picking up the drink.

“Bingo.” He nods. “Tell fat Gandolf that Dusty over there is the one that bought it for him.”

You cringe. “Fuck, Wade. You know that they’re not gonna like that.”

“That’s exactly why I do it.”

You walk over to the table and drop the drink off for the man, informing him that Dusty ordered it for him. He looks at you like you’re kidding but you just shrug and waltz back over to the bat next to Wade. The two of you watch the madness unfold as a stool is broken over Dusty’s head as men everywhere begin fighting and attacking each other everywhere. Wade watches the bar go wild with a childish grin.

“So you don’t like to get involved in the fights?”

“Nope,” he shakes his head. “I just like to start them.”

The rest of the night you find yourself leaning over the bar and chatting with Wade. The drinks Weasel has let you sneak intoxicate you, making you feel tipsy and confident. Wade is surprised but how much you’re talking as he usually receives giggles or short statements from you. He is also surprised by how you genuinely find his inappropriate humor funny. Weasel jumps in on the conversation and asks Wade about his work today, causing him to stiffen up and become uncomfortable.

“It...uh...it was good.”

“Any good stories?” Weasel questions. “Usually you come sprinting in here with something legendary to tell me about whoever you fucked up.”

You raise an eyebrow. “Fucked up?”

“Yeah, fucked up.” He hesitates. “I’m a mercenary.”

“Retired!” Weasel corrects. “He’s a retired mercenary. He doesn’t really do the job anymore but he continues to help out people who pay him to fuck people up.”

“So, basically, you take down the bad guys?”

Weasel laughs proudly, patting Wade on the back. “That’s exactly what he does.”

You look into Wade’s concerned, brown eyes, reassuring him with a soft smile. “You’re like a superhero.”

“No,” he retorts. “All I am is a bad guy who fucks up worse guys for money.”

“That’s the understatement of the year!” Weasel exclaims. “He almost always lets the kids off easy and gives the girls back their pay.”

“Why are you trying to make me sound like I’m some decent guy? Huh?” Wade snaps at Weasel.

You take his hand in yours comfortingly. “That’s because you are a decent guy, Wade.”

“See? Even Y/N thinks so!”

“Yeah, I see that, Sherlock,” Wade says, turning to face Weasel. “Now get lost so we can have a moment.”

Weasel rolls his eyes and begins walking away. “I wouldn’t really call that a moment. She barely touched your hand but...whatever.”

“Get lost quietly!” Wade chuckles.

“We were having a moment?” you ask.

“I mean, I like to think so.”

Feeling bold from the flirtation and alcohol, you lean forward and plant a kiss on his lips. He immediately returns the kiss, deepening it by being a hand to the back of your neck and entangling his fingers in your hair. You didn’t fear Wade like he thought you did and he certainly didn’t mind how different and innocent you were from him. He also didn’t mind how you kiss like you’re not sweet, shy, innocent. You kiss like a badass who wants to get in Wade’s pants.

Before you knew it, Wade Wilson, your neighbor of three years, quickly turned into your boyfriend.

A/N: Sorry that the ending to this sucked I lowkey had no clue where I was going with this fic lmao

permanent taglist: @lolabean1998 @thisismysecrethappyplace @crazystarlady @gloomybisexualemo @yougottalovefandoms

marvel taglist: @verkyun

x-men taglist: @spacesuitsforemergency

[keeloves]

My Top 10 least favorite Celebrities

Now keep in mind this list is simply my opinion I don’t mean to offend people and I do my best to give good reasons on why I don’t respect or like any of these people.

#10 Danielle Panabaker

I haven’t always had a problem with Danielle. She is the reason I started watching the Flash. I was also familiar with her work on Disney channel. She starred in the movies “Stuck in the Suburbs” “Read it and Weep” alongside her sister Kay Panabaker and most of you know she was in the movie Sky High. I was excited to see Danielle move on to bigger and better things. However, my issues with her began after watching her interviews and how I heard she tried to steal Candice’s spot as leading female. I tried to let it go at first but the more interviews I watched of her the more I started to lose respect for her. There was this ‘Ship war” between West Allen & Snowbarry. The problem with that is that Snowbarry is nonexistent. That was made up shortly after Candice Patton a black woman was cast as the leading female. Danielle has baited her racist shippers into thinking Snowbarry could happen. She has boasted about her and Grant’s chemistry right in front of Candice and Carlos and she has disregarded canon for the sake of baiting her SB shippers. Candice Patton has always talked about including more females on the show and Danielle boasts about being the “Only girl in STAR Labs” She even implied that her character Caitlin was jealous of Candice’s character Iris simply because of attention Iris waEs getting from guys. Candice on the other hand says, “That Iris will be fighting over a guy.” Danielle never once mentions Candice or her character in an interview but completely gets excited over Emily Bett Rickard’s character Felicity because “It was great having another female on the show.” Even though she got done bragging about being “The only female in STAR Labs” The worst thing is she tried to pass off a moment of sexual assault/harassment as a cute Snowbarry moment just get her portion of the fan-base excited. Even worse than that she did that in front of Candice and Carlos. Carlos even had to remind her she had her own ship called SnowStorm. In a most recent she did, she was asked about a Snowest friendship (Iris & Caitlin) she didn’t even give a straight answer she said something along the lines of “Iris doesn’t really make a lot of sense in STAR Labs and I am excited to see her journalism arc” and I am like that had absolutely nothing to do with the question that was being asked. Her answer sounded a lot like Iris West Allen haters. I don’t know if Danielle is doing this on purpose because she is mad at the fact she was not cast as the lead or is it because she really is that oblivious to the kind of horrible stuff people say about her female costar? Either way I don’t have much respect for Danielle because she is willfully ignorant to her privilege she has a white woman. Honestly Candice deserves a better female costar than the one she has now.

#9 Alexandra Shipp

She is known for playing Storm and the singer Aaliyah. Storm in the comics is a dark skin full blooded black woman. Alexandra Shipp is a mixed woman. Once again, the casting directors were too lazy to hire someone like Lupita to play Storm. When people expressed how upset they were that Alexandra Shipp was cast as Storm she basically told people to get over it. Okay now on one hand Alexandra is an actress so she should be allowed to play a part without getting back lash. However, the problem is that Hollywood has a long history of casting racially ambiguous/mixed women as all out black female characters who are supposed to be dark skin. Hollywood is colorist as hell. Alexandra basically said she isn’t going to miss any opportunity to audition for a part or take a part even if it is meant for a dark skin woman. As an actress she has a right to do that but the downfall this prove she is unaware of the privilege she has a mixed woman. As a mixed woman myself I believe we should be using our privilege to help up lift dark skin women. Media shits on black women enough and it’s even worse when mixed women who are half black are helping this problem. Sadly, Alexandra Shipp isn’t the only woman guilty of this. Yara Shahidi and Amandla Stenberg will acknowledge their privilege as mixed women but then turn around take parts meant for full on dark skin black girls. That is so hypocritical and this trend Hollywood and in media in general really need to die. So, I hope that these women stop doing this and really do something to fight against the colorism in Hollywood.

#8 Julie Plec

I have only watched to season 1 episode 7 of The Vampire Diaries. I have watched clips online too. Three reasons I have trouble getting through that show. One Damon is an abusive asswipe, two Delena and three Bonnie Bennet’s piss poor treatment. I put Julie Plec on this list because she called Delena sexy and treats her one black character the worst out of all the characters on the show. She is entitled to her opinion on Delena. However, my question is what is exactly sexy about an abusive relationship? Damon has raped and abused Elena and her friends, has killed several people she has care about because she didn’t do what he wanted, the biggest example is that when Elena rejected Damon he murdered her brother by snapping his neck. Yet she calls that a sexy relationship? She sabotaged Stelena and Bamon actual healthy relationships to force an unhealthy couple. The only time Damon is likable is when he is around Bonnie. Bamon on the show didn’t happen because Bonnie is black. They happened in the books because Bonnie was white in the books. The fact that Julie Plec can tease ships like Delena and Stelena but is so quick to shut down Bamon shippers is part of the reason racism in fandoms exist. Behavior like that from people like Julie Plec and Danielle Panabaker are only helping fuel a racist fanbase. You can’t tell me Julie has never seen the nasty racist stuff that Kat Graham the actress and Bonnie Bennet the character gets. If she has seen it and said nothing, then shame on her for not saying anything. Anyways I don’t have too much else to say but when I complete the series of TVD I will make sure to give more thorough opinion on the show and Julie.

#7 Marc Guggenheim & Wendy Mericle (This picture felt right due to my feelings on them)

These two will forever be known as the two idiots who ruined Arrow. I have three big problems with these two. One, their treatment of female characters, two the vast amounts of white washing and three how unprofessional they are. Every female character that has been killed off died in a way where they  had no chance to defend themselves. Shado and Moria stabbed with their hands tied behind their backs and killed off for the sake of man pain. Sara Lance shot off a building with arrows while caught off guard. Dinah Laurel Lance Earth 1 the true Black Canary frozen by magic stabbed with an Arrow gets successful surgery only to have a random seizure and die. Really? However, the men on this show no matter how evil get to die as a hero. The worst thing about Laurel’s last moments is that she spent it with Oliver a man who treated her like shit and her last words were spent propping up his relationship with Felicity. Laurel was treated like trash all through out the show. Marc and Wendy didn’t know what character was going in the grave until episode 16. The death took place in episode 18. Katie Cassidy found out two episodes before that her character was going in the grave and she didn’t even find out in person she was told over the phone. So not only are Marc and Wendy unprofessional but they have proven themselves to be incompetent writers. Even John Barroman was dissatisfied at his departure from the show. They are also heavily misogynistic in their writing in the way they kill their female characters without giving them chance to defend themselves as I have mentioned earlier and in the way, they write Felicity. Felicity is written as a jealous bitch. She has been jealous of every single one of Oliver’s relationships. They had her refer to Lian Yu as fantasy Island a place that Oliver describes as his personal hell, just because there were two other women with him on the beach. Now on to the problem of white washing. Arrow has a bad habit of white washing characters. Here is a list of characters that Arrow has white washed https://thenerdsofcolor.org/2015/04/10/white-canary-and-arrows-habit-of-whitewashing/  Arrow also treats characters especially female characters like they are interchangeable.  The character Evelyn Sharp is Starling in the comics but because she was introduced the episode after they killed Laurel she got the name Artimis attached to her due to the popularity of the Young Justice character to simply gain them more views. Evelyn Sharp/Starling are characters that have never had a live adaptation so why not do that character instead of mix matching characters. The next character they messed up is Dinah Drake who was established as Laurel’s mom on the show and she is the first Black Canary in the comics. Yet the show introduces to a new Black Canary named Tina Boland whose real name happens to be Dinah Drake.  Arrow now has had four different Dinahs two of them being Laurel. Conner Hawk is now randomly John Diggle Junior and they have completely erased the Asian half. William and Samantha are supposed to be Blasian characters named Conner and Sandra Hawk only to be random white washed nobodies. .I hate how they treat their queer/lgbtq characters like trash. They forced a lesbian into a hetero marriage and have their one bi character sleep around. Marc even admitted two bi characters of the oppososite gender hooked up simply because they were both bi. I am sorry to all the LGBTQ people out there for being represented so terribly. Anyways thank god Marc and Wendy won’t be around for season 7 of Arrow. All though sadly their damage of the show will be left behind

#6 Marlene King

She is the writer for Pretty Little Liars and Famous in Love.  I put Marlene on this list because of “creative choices” she has made in her shows. In Pretty Little Liars and Famous in Love she had characters statutorily raped and did nothing about it. Toby was raped by two women, one being his step sister Jenna and the second woman being Alex, Spencer’s identical twin sister. For those going to Alex didn’t rape Toby yes, she did because she pretended to be Spencer to trick Toby into having sex with her. Tricking someone into having sex with you is rape. The fact that Toby’s rape from Jenna was played off as a secret love affair is disgusting and purpurates the stereotype that all guys are horny and want sex. This ignores male rape victims. Then I watched the scene where Alex and Toby are “having sex” and the people in the comments are calling it cute just because Alex looks like Spencer. That is so gross. There is nothing cute about watching someone get raped. Then on Famous in Love Nina who is the mother of Jordan’s best friend was having sex with Jordan when he was 16 and she was an adult. All though I am having trouble with that because people say she didn’t know because Jordan lied about his age. I am not sure if that is true but if she didn’t and found out it was her job as the adult to put to a stop to it but if she did know and didn’t care then shame on her and she needs to be in prison in a cell next to Ezra Fitz who I will talk about next. Ezra Fitz purposely stalked four underage girls and started a relationship with one of them knowing full well that she was underage and knew he was going to be her teacher all to write a book about their missing friend who is another underage girl that he had a relationship with.  This was never addressed in a nuanced way. Ezra never went to jail or prison. Instead people questioned his relationship with Aria, but not once did they call the police on him.  He stalked the four girls while he claimed to be away on business.  Then at the end of the series Aria and Ezra get married. Yes, that is right folks Marlene King had a victim marry their statutory rapist/stalker. Sadly, that is not the only abusive couple that ended up together. The one LGBTQ couple that ended up together was abusive and only ended together because of whiny ass fanbase and Emily’s eggs being implanted into Alison without either girl’s knowledge which is a violation of both girl’s bodies. I have gone on in the past on why I hate Emison so if you want to know more read my Top 10 worst couples list where you will find Emison and Ezria.  The next problem I have is how Marlene treats poc characters and her lgbtq/queer characters. She treated Paige badly even though Paige had the most common sense. She made a few mistakes but learned from them and she didn’t get the happy ending she deserved. The show Pailey lived together but we don’t get to see that instead we get flash backs of Emison where Alison is abusing Emily. Maya a woman of color who was also bisexual killed off for shock value. Yvonne woman of color Toby’s finance killed off just because of Spoby, Charlette a transgender character made into a villain and killed off, Shauna made into a villain and killed off. Ugh. Anyways Marlene is guilty of promoting abusive relationships by having two be endgame. She is basically saying if “Your abuser is nice to you sometimes then you should give them what they want.

#5 Adam Horowitz & Edward Kitsis

They are best known for making the show Once Upon A Time. I wrote a long post on deviant art that I will copy and paste here if you want a more thorough explanation but those of you wanting a brief explanation on what my problem with them are here you go. I have four main problems. One, they way the treat male rape victims on the show, two the fact it took them seven seasons to have people of color on the show because prior to that they have been killed off, three the vast amounts of queer baiting they do and four the fact that a woman needs to have a child and a man to have a happy ending. The first lgbtq/queer couple they had were rushed, forced and slapped together and then the two characters were never seen again. It just felt like they wanted brownie points from the lgbtq/queer community for representation. They have had three females on male rape which two out of three of them were done by deception and two out of the three rapes had babies born from this. Okay now here is the long-winded version from Deviant Art about my problems with Adam and Eddie. Its long because it is my review on Once Upon a Time. “There is a lot I am going to say here. These are my overall thoughts on Once Upon a Time and the writers. Not all of this is going to be positive so be prepared.  Once Upon A Time was a show I really enjoyed because of the many characters I grew up with got to be done differently and interpreted different ways. I thought the names characters had were quite clever. For example, Cora is the Queen of Hearts and Core means hearts, Regina Mills last named being Mills was because her mom was the Miller's daughter or how Rumpelstiltskin was called Mr. Gold or Detective Weaver because he weaved and spun gold. I loved all the clever names. My favorite story lines were Ruby being the wolf, and her boyfriend being named Peter as a nod to Peter and the wolf. I also enjoyed Ingrid as a character and I enjoyed the show for what it was. However, this show has many problems which I will now get into. The show's main problem is that villains’ actions are not called out properly. The two biggest examples are Regina and Rumple. Regina, has mass murdered three villages worth of people, separated children from their families, locked away Belle in a tower for 28 years and straight up raped Graham and yes folks I said it she RAPED Graham. Several people of asked Adam and Eddy about the Regina raping Graham argument and they have dismissed the argument by saying it Graham was Regina's sex slave. This isn't the only problem with Regina. She has committed so many heinous crimes and none of her main victims have called her out for it they just give her a free pass because "She's good now".  Once Upon A Time has a huge problem with rape in general. Adam and Eddy have written three female on rape cases and never once bothered to address any of them. Two out of three of the came a child and two out of three rape victims ended up dying by murder basically and it was never dealt with again. Zelena killed Marion a woman of color (We are getting to that soon) shape shifted into her then raped Robbin Hood who was dating Regina at the time. Then Zelena gets pregnant and names her daughter Robin? Why? I truly believe it was to spite Regina and rub it in her face that she can't bear children of her own. What the hell were Adam and Eddy thinking naming Zelena's baby Robin? Then Gothel raped Nook/Wish Hook and had Alice. Why won't they address this issue. What about Emma and Neal. Neal aka Bealfire is over 300 years old or 24 for safety and Emma was 16 or 17 years old. No one thought that relationship was weird? I feel conflicted about Swanfire. The most problematic relationship to me is Rumbelle, it’s so awful even the actress who plays Belle hates the relationship. Why did Adam and Eddy make that a relationship at all? Rumple did nothing but lie and deceive Belle. He murdered Milah twice and now he can't respect Belle. It is honestly the most emotionally abusive relationship I have seen. These writers tried to shove it off as a dysfunctional relationship. It was that all right but it was very emotionally abusive and just really creepy. Rumple went so far as stalking Belle by putting a tracker bracelet on her and showed up at the library when Belle clearly didn't want him there. Belle honestly should have ended up with Ruby, Graham or Adam who was never introduced. Moving on from Rumblle up next the show's problems are how they treat their characters of color. Up until season seven there were no main characters of color. The characters were either one offs, or they died too soon. Rapunzel who was black appeared once and never mentioned again despite being a popular story, Gus Gus dies, Ursula basically a one off never seen again, Sydney a black man brought on and used as a slave or indentured servant depending on how you look at it either way bad. Tamera Neal's girlfriend killed off by Rumple, Mulan an Asian bisexual woman never got a happy ending but was there to cape for the white characters. The Dragon guy killed off, Merlyn dead, and many others have died as well. The next problem is the queer baiting on this show. This show took five seasons to give us a lgbtq couple and it was rushed, and they weren't seen again. The two most popular couples are Sleeping Warrior and Swan Queen. Sleeping Warrior was the closest thing to a healthy lgbtq interracial relationship. We were so close but nope Aurea had to get pregnant with Prince Philip's baby and they won't even let Mulan say she was in love with Aurea which really pisses me off because the writers have established her as bisexual but won't allow her a happy ending or a chance at true love. The only main canon lgbtq couple we got were Robbin and Alice. I think if Mulan were a white woman and in season 7 she would have gotten a happy ending and a wonderful love interest. (All though Mulan is Asian and should stay Asian because, I hate white washing) Swan Queen all though I am not big on it I do see why people ship it. All though can people take a minute and realize that Emma and Regina are step granddaughter and step grandmother? Then again Emma married her almost step father in law so this show is close to having incestuous relationship so why shouldn't they give Regina and Emma a chance? My biggest problem with the show is how Emma got treated like shit by the fandom and the writers. Emma who tried to save Marion's life had to apologize to Regina for "ruining her chances with Robin or making her life more complicated?" Excuse me but Regina was going to murder Emma as a baby, Regina is the whole reason Emma didn't have a family for 28 years of her life. Regina can drink a tall glass of STFU. Seriously these writers coddle the hell out of Regina and it is annoying as hell. As I said before Regina has kidnapped an entire town by cursing them, she raped Graham for 28 years and she mass murdered thousands upon thousands of people. Here these videos are a summary of all the messed up things Regina have done.www.youtube.com/watch?v=9q8bNf…. Then the writers have retconned Henry. He told Regina "You were the first person to love me." Excuse me but this kid was going to build an armory against her and ran away to Emma. Yeah Regina isn't abusive. Adam and Eddy also think that happy endings mean children and other true love. Really characters like Regina and Rumple should work hard to improve themselves but nope corners were crossed for those two and they got happy endings meanwhile good characters such as Mulan, Facillar, Milah, and many other characters who were actual good people didn't get a happy ending. Yet mass murdering rapists got happy endings that is so messed up. In conclusion Adam and Eddy are misogynistic assholes and have proven to be racist in their writing. They have also don't care about lgbtq people, male rape victims and the people of color on their show. I also found it really insulting that they portrayed women as incomplete if they couldn't bear children of their own. All in all, Once Upon a Time could have been a great show but instead it was mediocre.”

#4 Kanye West

If there were a contest on being the most arrogant and most full of yourself person Kanye would either win first place or he would take second to his in laws/his wife. He is colorist, he is an attention whore and he said that slavery is a choice. I hope he meant the mind set of slavery is a choice but I highly doubt it but I highly doubt it. He put a confederate flag on his clothing line. I have seen the price of his clothing is way too expensive. $200 for a shirt all because it says Yeeze? Then again there are purses that cost more than that just because the purse has the word Coach on it. His wife who isn’t even black takes things from black culture but never pays respect to the culture she is borrowing from and Kanye just supports this. Kanye has bashes other types music just because it is not his own and he is just so full of himself. He even said he supports Donald Trump which his right, but he probably said that for attention too. Anyways I have never really cared for Kanye I can’t say too much else about him.

#3 James Gunn

He directed both Guardians of the Galaxy movies which are both great. However, I don’t think he will be directing the third since he was recently fired over some ten-year-old tweets. Now tweets shouldn’t get someone fired but if you are making several jokes about pedophilia then that is probable cause to be to be fired. James Gunn made these tweets in his forties and never deleted them. First off why is James Gunn making several jokes about pedophile at the age of 40? He is now 50 and he didn’t use his common sense back then to know those are not things you joke about?  Second why is that type of thing on his mind. He didn’t just make one joke about it he made several jokes about child molestation. If that is on his mind constantly then he needs to be psychologically evaluated. I honestly hope he hasn’t acted on the pedophilia because the fact that is something on his mind at age 40 is terrifying and he needs serious help.

#2 Robert Sylvester Kelly/R Kelly

He refers to himself as the Pied Piper of R&B. Which is ironically fitting since he the Pied Piper is known for kidnapping children. R Kelly is one of the most talented singers I have ever heard in my life. I listened to his music growing up. He “wrote” the song “I believe I can fly” and the song “Ignition” Now for those wondering why I put the word in qoutioans its because R Kelly is illiterate he can’t read or write. I am serious he is not dyslexic he has never learned to read or write according to his brother Carrey and Wendy William. Now as I said before R Kelly is one of the most talented singers but sadly he is also one of the most garbage human beings I have ever had the displeasure of hearing about. Where do I even start? There have been stories since the early 90’s of him being a predator. He would hang out at middle schools in Chicago as an adult picking up young girls, and promising[HK1]  them money, gift cards and McDonalds. The girls he did get to come to his house he kept him them in their rooms or the basement, forced the girls to call him daddy and made them perform sexual acts on him. He pissed on a fourteen girl and married the singer Aaliyah when she was 15 and he was 27 at the time. In fact, for more detail about R Kelly and his creepy behavior here is a documentary of all the fucked-up things he did. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p060m6qx  When R Kelly was 49 he dated a 19-year-old which wasn’t illegal but given his past history with girls that is just creepy. I also hate the fact he could afford to pay someone to teach him how to read and write but won’t because he used his money for lawyers and paid off the families of the girls he abused to keep them quiet. One day R Kelly will go to jail. I think the reason he stayed out of prison for so long are for two reasons. Number one he is famous and loads of money to pay people off and two he targets young black girls/women who are the least protected group in America. Anyways R Kelly needs to be in prison in solitary confinement until the day he dies. He is disgusting, and he is probably just as disgusting as my next choice for my number one pick.

#1 Gregory Daniel Jackson

He is better known by his YouTube alias Onision. He is a famous youtuber who tries to be like Shane Dawson in video style and in hair style. I put him on the list for the countless fucked-up things he has done to basically gain attention.  He has met all his wives and his current wife over the internet while they were either 16 or 17. He was an adult at the time. He flies these women out to his house and has isolated them from their families. He put his first wife on blast because she didn’t want to have sex with him and gave out the number of partners she had as revenge for not wanting to have sex with him. The number was pretty high, then after treating her like garbage he left her several voice mails. If you don’t believe me here is the video of the “voice mails he left for her” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPnC3n2fpYs&t=1s . His second wife Shiloh lost three years of her memory and posted a video of her having a break down but apparently she was faking I am not entirely sure. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cz_9s9SgQao and then filmed her having a meltdown https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7HcGsMb5PQ I am linking these videos as proof because Onision is just gross. He encouraged Lainey to get a girlfriend even though she/”they”  (Lainey is nonbinary but Onision calls her she all the time so I am not sure what pronoun to use for Lainey so I used both) was not into it. He only encouraged it to for his benefit. He killed his pet turtle/tortoise and to this day he will not admit that he did it. He put his turtle in on the grass put a plastic container upside down over the turtle and left it in the sun for two hours. He never owns up to what he did wrong and when he does he always makes himself out to be the victim. He has made jokes on self-harm, 9/11 and sexual abuse. He has made fun of people who struggle with their weight, eating disorders. He says things but later goes on to deny them. Anyways, he isn’t worth watching but if you plan on watching his videos I advise you to watch with caution. I almost forgot to mention people have had to call animal control on his ass. I pray he goes to prison soon. He even had to get a lawyer to find out if his marriage to his wife was legal or not. He lied about being honorably discharged from the military. Anyways, Onision is a narcissist, a sociopath and psychopath. He needs to go to prison and he doesn’t need to be making youtube videos. I forgot to mention if you are a meat eater Onion boy will hate on you wish death on you and get on his high horse on he is better than you because he doesn’t eat meat. He has done that in the past.

[afaimsarrowverse]

My 25 Favorite Arrowverse-Moments:

Scenes that emmideatly come to mind over all the six shows and that stuck with us – those are the moments found here. For the 25 Favorite Ones I mostly went with emotional scenes and scenes that started or ended amazing character developements. Many moments here are relationship based, however most of them are actually sad. So beware.

 Again as always, this list reflects my own taste, everyone loves what they love. So don’t commment or reblog just to tell me how wrong I am.

 25. Kate keeps the dying Alice company, but realizes that Beth had just died instead (Batwoman Episode 1.12 Take Your Choice)

 That one is tricky to explain, if you have not seen the episode, but basically Alice is dying because a doppelganger of her showed up on Earth Prime. Only one Beth Kane can survive, and Kate chooses to save the sane version of her sister from another Earth over her actual sister, whom she decides to keep company in her last moments. However the twist on this death scene is that Alice suddenly gets better, because Beth was assassinated, and the sisters have to move on from this incident afterwards, with the knowledge that Kate chose the other one over her „real“ sister, which of course changed their relationship on a fundamental level forever, or you know, would have, if the show would have actually gotten a real second season. Still it’s quite an unusal death scene with a twist we would have liked in any other death scene, but not so much here.

24. Oliver gets visited by Tommy‘s Ghost (Arrow Episode 2.9 Three Ghosts)

 It’s Christmas and Oliver is haunted by the ghosts of his past. After Shado and Slade in this scenes it’s Tommy‘s turn, who tells Oliver exactly what he needs to hear, and what he wished he would have heared from Tommy, when he was still alive:. „"I know I called you a murderer, but you are not. You are a hero. You beat the island. You beat my father. So fight, Oliver. Get up and fight back." And you know, it probably is exactly what Tommy would have said to him, if he would have had the chance. After all Ghost Tommy became kind of an interesting occurence later, so maybe he wasn’t so much a ghost as an projection from an Alternate Universe?

 23. Nate’s Resurrection (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 4.16 Hey World)

 Nate dies to get Ray his soul (and body) back and is reunited with his dead father, and we think that’s it, while Zari and Ray sob over his dead body, but now with a little bit of help from the Great Beyond, John and Nora magic him back to life with the power of song and love from humans, magical creatures, and the Legenda alike. And it’s beautiful. Boy, did I sob.

22. Oliver meets his Grown Up Children (Arrwo Episode 8.4 Present Tense)

 Brought to the Present by the Monitor, Mia and William get to meet their long dead father Oliver shortly before his death. „Present Tense“ started with this akward-moving reunion that we have been waiting for since that tireying Flashforwards started in Season 7, and starting with this scene they are finally paying of in a big way. „Arrow“ was seldom any better than this.

21. Mick gives Ray the Coldgun (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 2.4 Abnominations)

 After having lost his suit and saving Mick life earlier in this episode anyways, Mick offers Ray Snarts Coldgun to cheer the latter up and make him his new defacto partner. That scene is important because it’s the start of the peak of the Atomwave Bromance, which has been going on since Season 1, and it also shows us a softer side of Mick, who really wants to help the directionless Ray out here, even if he hides that under his scruff exterior. It’s the point where those two became acutal friends, so yeah, me heart.

20. Kahlil’s Death (Black Lightning Episode 2.11 The Book of Secrets: Chapter One: Prodigal Son)

 That one didn’t stick, but it turned the tide quite spectacular and was the starting point for one of „Black Lightnings“ best storylines, that may even lead right into a potential „Painkiller“ Spin-Off Show. And it definitifly was the saddest and most tragicial moment of the shows. After suriving more than any living person ever should, Kahlil finally dies here, leaving Jennifer heartbroken and the viewers more than a litte shocked.

 19. Thea thanks Oliver for everything he has dona after she learns that he is the Arrow (Arrow Episode 3.13 Canaries)

 Superheroes revealing their real identity to someone are always highlight moments of these shows, but that one parcticulary stands out because … well the scene did go quite different than we thought it would. After Oliver tells Thea that he is the Arrow, his sister … thanks him for everything he has done for Starling City. This shows how far Thea Queen as a character has come since we met her in the Pilot. After not being to supportive in the beginning of the show to Oliver, we now see how far her character development has brought her, as she says not a single unkind word to Oliver about him keeping his secret for over two years, instead she sees it from his perspective. Thea Queen had one of the most amazing character developments in all of „Arrow“ during the first half of the show, and this moment is the prime example for that.

  18. Mick refuses to leave Ray behind in the Gulag (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 1.5 Fail Safe)

 After Snart breaks into the Russian Gulgag to get his team mates out of it, he actually wants to leave Ray, who isn’t a great shape at this point, behind, but Mick refuses to. Not only is „Fail Safe“ the birth of Micks and Rays friendship, the episode and this scene in particular is the moment Mick Rory was given to us. After being portrayed as a rather one dimensional slighty crazed villain in „The Flash“ „Legends“ developed Heatwave in the loveable pyromanic bestseller author we love today, and all of that started exactlx in this moment, when Mick refused to leave someone behind, who stuck out his neck for him. Mick‘s Hero Journey begins exactly here, and, yes, Mister Rory, you are a hero. One can be a criminal and a hero at the same time, you know, and well a bestselling romance writer. That too.

17. The Mad Brainy is talked down from opening the Bottle (Supergirl Episode 5.10 The Bottle Episode)

 In Querl Dox‘s finest hour we meet quite a lot of different versions of him from all across the Multiverse, among them one, who bottled up his own Earth on order to safe it from the Anti-Matter Wave and is now guilt ridden to the point of madness. And wants to open up the bottle again to free his Earth but … well that would be very bad for Earth Prime as you can imagine. After learning a lot about Brainy‘s backround and the history of mental illness in this family, this moment hits all the right cords, showing that darkness, love, guilt and forgiveness all come in pairs, especially for Brainiac-5 in all corners of the Multiverse. It also forshadowed Brainy‘s Arc for the rest of the season: That he is capable of doing the wrong thing for the right reasons but not without suffering immensly because of his own actions.

16. Oliver reveals his real identity to Tommy (Arrow Episode 1.16 Dead to the Rights)

 Like I said before, Identity Reveals are always special, and this one is probaly the most important one out of all of those. Oliver reveals his real identity to Tommy in order to get him to trust him so that he can save him. But remember, at this point of the show the Hood is running around murdering people. So Tommy does not learn that his best friend is a hero, he learns that his best friend is a murderer, who still happens to save people at the same time. While Oliver is willing to do anyhting to save his friend, by revealing his real identity he might have done more harm than good to their relationship on the long run. Mostly though it’s a beautifiul written and acted scene.

 15. Nate tells Ray that he loves him and nothing will change that (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 4.11 Seance and Sensibility)

 Legends of Tomorrow did many great things, but its greatest achievement may be the friendship between Nate and Ray, that shows us a masculine friendship framed as a femine one. Steelatom are bros, who talk about their feelings, soft men who are nerds together, never fall victim to toxic masculinity and never fret over the L-Word or physical contact. They are just best friends and are unashamed of it. In this scene Nates father was killed, and everyone believes that Rays Love Interest Nora Darhk did it. And Ray is now worried that Nate might hold his feelings for Nora and his trust into her against him (which shows his own insecurity and his lack of meaningful relationships before he joined the Legends), however Nate tells him that he still loves Ray and always will, no matter whom he trusts or whom he fancies. Which honestly is how it is supposed to be between actual friends.

14. Barry kisses Iris before the Tidal Wave (The Flash Episode 1.15 Out of Time)

 In this alternate timeline, which Barry erased by travelling back in time for for the first time, Central City is hit by a massive tidal wave. Just before that circumstances lead to the first kiss between Barry and Iris, that is erased from existence only minutes after it happens, which is classic Flash-Stuff, really, and a an unforgetable epic moment.

13. Sara tells Ava that she can’t ever be normal (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 3.12 The Curse of the Earth Totem)

 After a Legends Emergency interupted Saras date with Ava, she splits on her date, who confronts her about that fact in this scene. In an emotional break down Sara admits that she is not normal, can never be normal, and should have never tried to be normal at all. Dating is not her thing, fighting is. In her mind Ava is the perfect daughter in law, while she is the opposite. And she does not think that someone like Ava would ever want someone like her. However Ava actually surprises her by admitting that she does not want someone normal, she does not want a Sara trying to be normal, she wants Sara just the way she is. Which leads to the couples first kiss of course. Which is then rudley interrupted by pirtates, but yeah, this is good stuff, classic romantic comedy with a Legends twist, just how we like it.

 12. Westallen Wedding Vows (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 3.8 Crisis on Earth X Part 4)

 Barry und Iris actually did not get married on „The Flash“, but during an episode of „Legends of Tomorrow“ right at the end of the „Crisis on Earth-X“ Crossover. After having actually given up on the big wedding idea, they are talked into marrying anyway, letting themselves be joined by John Diggle, who for some reason got the license to marry people. And so they do get married, with just the right vows, that reflect what they mean to each other. Sadly the wedding itself is still kind of a disaster, because someone has to interrupt it and make it into a double wedding, which the producers thought to be a nice idea, and it might have even been one, if they would have decided on it before and not during the ceremony, so the favorite moment is not the wedding itself, but the Wedding Vows, but boy, those are really beautiful.

11. Zari‘s Speech (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 3. 11 Here I go again)

 Stuck in time loop, not knowing that she is actually trapped in a Gideon run simulation in her own head, Zari here thinks that the only way to save everyone else is to sacrifice herself, but before she goes, she has some words for all of her team mates, moving beautiful words, that show how much she actually loves her team and make us love her all the more for it. This is the episode where both the writers and Tala discovered what makes Zari special and you can tell - never was any Zari Moment more magicial, and this moment led right to the end of Season 4 and everything that went on with Zari in Season 5, and that’s just one more reason to love it.

 10.  Nate and Ray so Goodbye to each other (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 5.7 Romeo V Juliet: Dawn of Justness)

 Parting is the hardest sorrow. No one wanted Brandon to leave Legends, Brandon did not want to leave Legends, no one wanted Ray gone, but he still left, left us and left his best friend Nate, whom he is saying goodbye to in this scene, after Nate initially refused to say goodbye, just like we would have wanted to. No one died in that scene, but it certainly felt like it. We all get that life is change, we just don’t want unnecessary change for financial reasons. This moment might have gotten us a Season 6, but we would have preferred for it to happen during the Series Finale or even better never. But it was still beautiful though.

 9. Oliver dies and tells Kara and Barry that they are the Best among them (Supergirl Episode 5.9 Crisis on Infinite Earths Part 1)

 We all knew Oliver Queen was going to die during Crisis on Infinite Earths, we just didn not expect him to die at the end of Episode 1! In a crazy plot twist he sacrificed his life to save additional millions of people from Karas Earth, hardly making it to Earth-1, where he had some important parting words for Barry and Kara and then left his friends and his daughter in tears when he left his body behind. Yes, he came back, kind of at least, for the rest of the Crossover, but this does not change the fact that this moment was a very hard hitting one, especially for the people on and off screen who love him.

8. Nora is written out of the Timeline (The Flash Episode 5.22 Legacy)

 Nora went back in time to change the timeline, but she kind of forgot to account for the fact that this might endanger her own life. As the timeline does change during the Finale of Season 5, the version of Nora we have come to know and love is written out of existence. Instead of hiding away in the Negative Speed Force, Nora accepts her fate, prefering to die over changing who she is deep inside, and she is erased out of existence while her distraught parents have to watch her go. A new version of her will likely be back at some point, but this version is gone for good in a way only Eobard Thawne deserves. Cruel but still a great moment.

7. Adrian blows up Lian Yu (Arrow Episode 5.23 Lian Yu)

 How can ever forget this Cliffhanger Ending? After not succeding in breaking Oliver Queen for good, Adrian changes tactics and abducted his loved ones and plans to kill them all, which is what he is doing in this scene. Having hidden explosives on Lian Yu which will detonate when he takes his own life, Adrian does exactly that – he blows away his brains in front of Oliver and his son William, while detonating the explosives at the same time, potentially killing of the whole Cast of „Arrow“ from Felicity to Thea, Quentin, Diggle, Dinah, Rene, Curtis, Black Siren, Evelyn and even Nyssa and Slade. Even though the only one that actually died was Samantha Clayton, the explosion did put Thea in a coma and gave Dig nerve damage. But in truth that scene is not about what actually happened after it, it is about what went on during it. Oh, Adrian, you win, you are the ultimate Foe of „Arrow“, we will give you that.

6.      Martin‘s Death (Legends of Tomorrow Episode 3.8 Crisis on Earth X Part 4)

 Death Scenes are always hard, but this one, was especially hard. It was mean, because Martin was in the middle of a storyline that would have taken him out of Legends anyways, but it also was especially heart breaking because it’s Martin Stein, damn it. We love him! Also there was something very authentic about this scene. Death scenes can feel very staged at times, but this one even thoug it had it all – speeches, goodbyes, the right person next to the dying one – this felt every thing else but staged, it felt real, in a way no other Death Scene on those shows ever did. And it’s maybe the saddest death scene out of all the shows. Because there is no win here, no lesson, no cool action, only a sad goodbye.

 5. Eddie‘s Death (The Flash Episode 1.23 Fast Enough)

 And speaking of mean deaths. This one … Eddie sacrificed himself to erase Eobard out of existence, but who has come back since then, like multiple times? Yes, exactly. Ralph was not wrong with the Vasectomie Idea. But nevertheless, this is one of the greates moment of „The Flash“. After telling Eddie he means nothing to History, Eddie is the one who beats Eobard in the end, by taking is own life in order to prevent him from ever existing. Iris loses Eddie, Barry loses Eddie, we lose Eddie, who died a hero, was never forgotten but is not given back to us, no matter how much we beg. It was an out of nothing twist, inceredible mean and sad, but a really great moment.

4. Kara‘s Hope Speech (Supergirl Episode 1.20 Better Angels)

 Kara‘s Hope Speeches have become kind of a running gag at this point, but they all date back to her first and greatest one. When needed Kara adresses the people of National City via Television, urges them to fight back, to not give up hope, and after we heard this incredible well written and delivered speech, even we thought for a single moment that maybe such a thing as hope does actually exist. Kara told us: „ When facing an attack like this, it's easy to feel hopeless. We retreat, we lose our strength, we lose ourselves. I know. I lost everything when I was young. When I first landed on this planet, I was sad and alone. But I found out that there is so much love in this world, out there for the taking. And you, the people of National City, you helped me. You let me be who I'm meant to be. You gave me back to myself. You made me stronger than I ever thought possible, and I love you for that. Now, in each and every one of you, there is a light, a spirit that cannot be snuffed out. That won't give up. I need your help again. I need you to hope. Hope... that you will remember that you can all be heroes. Hope... that when faced with an enemy determined to destroy your spirit, you will fight back and thrive. Hope... that those who once may have shunned you will, in a moment of crisis, come to your aid. Hope... that you will see again the faces of those you love. And perhaps even those you've lost." We hope so too, Kara, we really do, because after this year, we really need nothing more than hope.

3. Barry meets his dying Mother (The Flash Episode 1.23 Fast Enough)

 When presented with the opportunity to change the timeline and save his mother, Barry reculantly takes it and travels back to the night his mother died in the Season 1 Finale. However he does not save her, instead he ends up letting it happen, but saying goodbye to his mother instead, siting by her while she dies. Of all the sob-worthy moment of all the shows, this one is definitfy up there in Top 3, and will forever remain there, because this one is more than just a little bit hard, isn’t it?

2. Oliver dies as the Spectre (Arrow Episode 8.8 Crisis on Infinite Earths Part 4)

 And back to Oliver dying again. After becoming the Spectre, Oliver kills the Anti-Monitor (because he failed this Universe, remember?) and restarts the Multiverse with the help of the Paragons (no Lex, it wasn’t you that made a new one, you only helped!). However this has burned up all his energy, so he dies for the second and final time during this Crossover. Sara und Barry are sitting with him while he goes and reminds Barry of the final lesson his life had thaught him: „Dying is the easy part.“ Living is what’s hard, but it’s also worth it. Excuse me for a moment, I am over there sobbing quietly.

1.      Quentin‘s Last Speech about  Oliver (Arrow Episode 8.10 Fadeout)

 Wait, you say, how can that be Number 1? Well for a simple reason, apart from the fact that Oliver always fought for Quentins respect, that speech actually does sum up nicely what „Arrow“ was really all about. Forget Olivers messy love life, the bow and the arrow, the fight scenes and the villains. „Arrow“ was always about change, it was about character development, about how people can change. Not only Oliver‘s storyline, but mainly Oliver‘s, was about how you can always change for the better, how you can always dig yourself out of the hole you are in right now, out of all the pain, the depression, the darkness. „Fadeout“ was many things, but it succeeded on one simple level: It reminded us again what „Arrow“ was all about, and no moment incoperated that better than Quentin‘s Last Speech about Oliver: „Oliver Queen wasn't just a hero. He was a good man. He was an honorable person. The fact that he didn't start out that way makes him, in my book, even more honorable. He stands as a reminder to all of us that anyone can change.“ And that is ultimatley what a Hero‘s Journey is all about.

[amorningshadeofyellow-blog]

And He Tells Me I’m Grotesquely Obsessive

It had been some time since I had seen my shrink. I call him that because psychologist feels so sterile, and shrink makes me seem passive about my issues. Up until this month, I’d forgotten how relieving it is to hear someone tell me, “differences are not deficits.” So, today, I went in knowing we were to be reading the results of the test I had taken back in December. As for why we were just now reviewing the answers, I may never know. I sat in his room, talking about how my weeks had been. He had asked me about my mom, school, my jobs, how I felt overall. I told him, “I don’t know why I want to cry so badly when we’re just discussing my college English class,” and he told me that he’d cry too if he felt it was as pointless as I did. About 30 minutes into the session, things quieted down between us, and I mentioned the test. “Ah, yes, of course,” he said grabbing the giant yellow folder on the table next to him. 

He explained it to me- the test, how the results were read, what it all meant. Off the bat, he told me he very rarely saw tests that looked like mine, but that that wasn’t meant to alarm me. It was just to let me know that I was definitely as different as I thought I was. There were a few parts I recall specifically because I was taken aback, and one I recall for how relieving it felt. “These two, they represent depression and anxiety, so being above this line definitely shows me that you are most certainly in both of those categories. They usually go hand in hand. This,” he says as he points to a very noticeable “V” shape in my graph, “is what we called the ‘castrating V’ before we had to be politically correct. It basically means that you don’t trust men and that your relationships with men are often hard for you to remain confident in.” So, I thought to myself about how that probably stems from my dad and how I lost him. I never saw myself as somebody that had issues with trusting men. I’d never been cheated on. I’d only been in one relationship, but I still would like to think that I trusted him a majority of the time. It did sort of make me ponder for a moment about where the test could have possibly come up with this subconscious unease I had for men. 

“You’re also beyond extremely hard on yourself. Your ego is what my mother would call ‘as low as a snake’s hips’. You, as the test would put it, basically hate yourself and the way you are. Not so much physically as mentally. Would you consider yourself introverted or extroverted?” he asked as I without a doubt said so confidently- extrovert. All I do is talk. I love speaking to strangers; I love being the life of the party and the center of attention. He shook his head and said, “Far from.” He then proceeded to explain to me how I strayed away from this persistent party culture, this persistent going out. He told me that loving to talk means nothing in the sense that these are classified. “You’d be nowhere near the writer that you are if you were so extroverted. There is an air of keeping to yourself about you and you are obviously self aware. I believe you undermine just how much you like being alone and at your own pace because you want to think you’re more confident and sociable than you are.”

So, I learned that- halfway through my test results- I’m not necessarily exactly what I think I am. He continues with more results. “You’re a very angry person,” he states. I think suddenly that I am very far from violent. I’ve punched a wall once in my life and cried because of how badly it hurt. “Now, that doesn’t mean you’re violent or that you’re a hot head, just that your internal expressions tend to be a bit more pissed off and generally disdained by your surroundings,” he reassures me. “And you don’t like that about yourself,” he says- not asks. I begin to see that my road rage, my annoyance with people who walk slowly or talk too loudly, my irritability that comes from having to explain things that I find so easily comprehensible- I guess that that does make me a bit angry. “You’re also very cynical. Your view of the world is very cynical, and you don’t like that about yourself either.” And I think, why, of course, why would anyone boast about their test approved cynicism when positivity is far healthier and more attractive? Not that I consider it all to be cynicism; I would call some of it realism, but that my be a cynics point of view. 

Lastly, flipping over the page and lifting his eyebrows to widen his eyes as if he hadn’t looked over my test results already, he tells me, “You’re,” he pauses to tilt his head and find the adjective to place in front to make sure i grasp the sheer large-ness of the ordeal, “You’re... grotesquely obsessive.” I fold my hands together as tears that I never felt coming stream down and I nod my head smiling at something I’d known since I could give the definition of obsessed. It’s far more than anxiety, and it is far more than worry. It is complex fixation, and I cannot go back and unthink or unsee the things that have rotted in the corner of my mind because of how long they may sit there. He explains it to me like this- “Instead of all of my diplomas and degrees on this wall, I have an original Picasso painting. You’re in awe, staring and gawking because you’ve never been in the presence of an actual Picasso. While I’m talking, you realize that, somehow, some way, I have managed to scrape the painting and a piece of the dried paint has flecked off. For the rest of the session, you will not hear the things I say, and you will no longer feel so grand in the presence of Picasso- you may not even tell me who Picasso is if I asked while you were staring. You have become engulfed in the chip of missing paint. You will not stop thinking about it until you have worn yourself so thin with concern, worry, and wonder, that you just go blank.”

I’ve known for so long that how I think far surpasses how others think. I’ve never not been bothered by how I fixate on things, and I’ve never not felt contempt towards myself for it. You never want to be the crazy ex-girlfriend who asks 18 times in a day if they’re mad at you, but you can’t sleep thinking maybe something is wrong. You never want to be the person that lets the uncertainty of the future get in the way of actually pursuing one, but you can’t sit through a class feeling this way. Walking through the grocery store and forgetting half of the things you need because you’re worried about the way you walk and you’re thinking about it too much and over thinking something so minuscule and normal- it is hard. Having something such as bulimia that could only ever be intensified by these obsessive compulsions is so nightmarish. Learning that my route is one likely to struggle with substance abuse is never nice to hear. Remembering every detail of every important conversation- even unimportant- and having people roll their eyes at how overanalytical you are- it is simply horrifying. I cannot shut off how the wheel turns and turns and speeds up as things are processed in my head, and I cannot truly differentiate between anxiety and obsession in a handful of comprehensive ways, I just know that the fear of looking weird, the fear of forever turning people away because of how I act, the fear of never really being likable because of the way things are processed within me- it all is far surpassed by the insatiable obsession that follows thoughts around ever so often. 

Though it is one of- if not the- shittiest things I’ve had to come to an actualization about, it is nice to sort of set it in its own compartment and treat it accordingly. It’s a relief because my shrink told me that there are antidepressants that do work hand in hand with this sort of thing. He told me that, once I’m medicated and on something that isn’t Wellbutrin, I’ll be able to control the obsessions more and once I learn how to and feel the relief of letting things go, I’ll be more likely to stay on top of it and progress more than what I feel I am now. He told me to keep writing, to make sure that this is the only fixation I really keep to and with for some time. So, it is a relief. It is nice to think that this makes sense, and it’s real. However, now, I’m going to lie in bed and think about how this is cause for 90% of the situations I’ve ever come out losing in. The relief is quite temporary. 

[cyrano2021dirjoewright]

boy i’m about to do it... @pikeisaman asked me for a gobblepot outline of how they progress through the show and i have nothing better to do so here we go

season 1

literally from the pilot their fates are sealed and it's clear that they and this city will always be a part of each other’s lives. gordon is a babyfaced war hero cop determined to make this city better. oswald is a lowly umbrella boy  to a mafiosa (fish....my love) who snitches to the cops about the wayne murder case to further his own status. jim is ordered by mob boss falcone to take oswald to the end of the pier and shoot him for snitching. instead he lets him live, telling him to never come back to gotham. well...he definitely does come back with a master plan and shows up on jim’s doorstep (scaring the living shit out of him!!) explaining that he wants to help jim because he’s the last good man in gotham. part of oswald’s plan is telling his new employer maroni about what happened, the dude forces jim to come to his aid and corroborate the story and i tell you. the look in oswald’s eyes as he silently thanks jim for saving his life yet again...is what started my descent into this madness.

so eventually it’s revealed that oswald is alive and there’s all this mob bullshit but what’s important to this post is that when oswald waiting for his fate from falcone, he begged that the job of killing him be given to jim because he knew he’s the only good man in this city with a conscious who would spare his life. and he was right and in return he now secretly works for falcone and pleads for him to spare jim’s life when he gets out of line (which to THIS DAY jim does know about and it pisses me off!!!!)

anyways down the line jim finally comes to oswald for his first of many favors down the line because the city and the gcpd are corrupt and oswald is literally SO HAPPY like he’s been waiting for this moment and so have i because before this point this was the basis of so many fics for them. “FAVOR IS DONE..FRIENDS DON’T OWE FRIENDS, SILLY” this is actual dialogue that haunts me to this day

but then of course oswald’s promise of “no one gets hurt” doesn’t bode so well and jim is like [gob voice] i’ve made a huge mistake so the next time he sees oswald he’s a raging douche to him and from there on out. said interaction is what i call the first gobblepot breakup scene. oswald is opening his new club and comes to the gcpd to hand deliver an opening party invitation to jim with an earnest look in his eyes that parallels asking your crush to prom. jim says no and says he doesn’t want oswald coming to his work and THROWS THE INVITATION IN THE GARBAGE. Oswald urges that jim shouldn’t treat him this way because one day he’ll come back to him because THEY NEED EACH OTHER AND JIM IS A DUMBASS FOR NOT YET REALIZING THIS.

So literally like four episodes later jim DOES need oswald’s help and they road trip it up to this cabin and jim saves his life yet again but cuts Oswald off before he can thank him for it. A few eps later he comes AGAIN for a favor and when Oswald fucks with him he literally GRABS HIM by the shirt with empty threats. This boy just loves grabbing other men and pulling their faces within inches of each other while looking all macho. I tell you. But yeah Oswald still does the favor and says jim owes him this time (we’re past “friends don’t owe friends” since jim rejected jim)

Then somehow in the s1 finale jim’s idea of a favor is threatening to leave Oswald to be killed by mobsters in a hospital and Oswald has to wit his way out of things and have jim take him with him but like….this is the first time you see in oswald’s face that he was wrong to trust jim and it’s so goddamn heartbreaking.  

SEASON 2

Jim has been demoted because he told the mayor to kiss his ass among other unruly things and he goes to Oswald (who is now “king of gotham”) to get his job back. Oswald agrees if jim shakes down this dude who owes him money. Jim ends up killing the guy in self defense and feels shitty but Oswald keeps his word and gets jim his job back. Meanwhile gcpd has a new captain because the writers hate women of color and killed off Essen so now Michael chikilis is here and is the most aggressive by-the-book dude you’ve ever seen. He’s like “yo if anyone here is corrupt and idk likes to fuck with skinny gay emo criminals for favors I’ll fire you” so jim is like :o when chiklis announces they’re going after Oswald jim goes to warn him and ask him about shit going down because it doesn’t sound like something Oswald would do (he’s actually being forced to do it because his mom is being held hostage). Instead of telling jim what’s wrong he snaps at him and this is breakup scene 2.0 basically. These boys love the angst. 

So oswald’s poor mom gets murdered by this dude named galavan who’s taking over the city and he’s trying to make it seem like Oswald is doing all this shit and jim is like “Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm” and galavan is elected mayor and Oswald wants to crash his party to fuckin murder him him. Jim for some reason is protecting this asshole because I guess it’s his job or something. This turns into jim standing between Oswald and galavan, both with guns drawn on each other. Neither can pull the trigger on each other. If this were literally any other person Oswald would just gun down whoever was in between him and justice for his murdered mom. But it’s jim. So instead he pleads and cries for him to step aside and jim implies that he can’t even though he knows galavan is guilty but it’s this dumb cop code or something. The writers decided at this point that instead of us getting to see who would back down first, Oswald is shot in the shoulder by someone else and goes into hiding and recovery. 

Them boys meet up again because galavan goes to trial and accuses Oswald of all the shit he did and jim’s like “WHY THE FUCK YOU LYIN” in the middle of court so he’s taken away by galavan’s men and they gonna kill him but then OSWALD APPEARS because theses dudes are like addicted to saving each other’s lives at this point. Jim wakes up with Oswald being there like “hello please help me kill this douche” and jim agrees. Some bullshit happens in between but what’s important is that they…literally….kill a man together. Like if nothing else that they’ve done for each other so far didn’t seal this connection, this did. 

And then even jim is technically the one who pulled the trigger on the bullet that killed galavan, Oswald takes the full blame and goes to arkham asylum for it. He goes through the worst mental torture imaginable for jim. When he sees jim on site and pleads for him to get him out jim is a Dick and claims this therapy is for his own good and it’s honestly so painful to watch like this is the last shred of hope Oswald had for jim.

A lot of this later half of s2 they’re doing their own thing and jim goes to jail and Oswald finds his rich dad who gets murdered in front of him but later on Galavan comes back to life and Oswald kills him again just as the dude was about to kill jim so oswald’s just like “you’re welcome bye”

SEASON 3

Jim and Oswald greet each other like bitter exes at the gcpp when Oswald asks jim (who is now a bounty hunter) why he hasn’t caught fish mooney and jim says “you haven’t made it worth my while”. He does eventually help catch her by calling Oswald (guess they just still have each other’s numbers) and telling Oswald where she’ll be.

They don’t interact for a while this season but at one point when jim is put on a hallucinogenic trip he has a vision that he’s fighting a war with Oswald and Oswald saves his life in the dream and tells him “never leave your unit behind.” They literally never explain this on the show but I assume it’s about jim’s guilt for leaving him at arkham.

So then waaaay later on Oswald shows up on jim’s doorstep asking for information on Edward nygma and gives jim a phone with only his number on it, which becomes useful to jim when he’s held hostage and calls Oswald for help. Oswald like Bernie sanders runs to the place and saves jim yet again. Instead of thanking him jim is once again an asshole and says “took you long enough”

So then the s3 finale. I have never been more stressed in my life. Jim has been infected with this virus that makes you basically a violent douche with no inhibitions so he’s battling those demons and accidentally kills fish mooney in the process (Oswald actually likes her this time so he mad) and then is ready to offer Oswald up to save the city. Oswald ain’t happy about this, but only finds out at the last minute that jim is infected with the virus so idk how that affects his opinion on jim’s actions here 

SEASON 4

Oswald has time for NO ONE his emotions have already gotten him nearly killed multiple times. He runs gotham and jim doesn’t like it. They keep publicly arguing with reporters and photographers documenting this gay shit. Even though they apparently hate each other they can’t get through an interaction without grabbing the other and bringing their faces within inches of each other to make empty threats. I’m told they will team up again later in the season which Gives Me Hope because both actors have said from day one that their destinies are forever intertwined. These boys are never escaping each other. 

So yeah that’s as far as an outline goes, I can go even further if you want more meta and headcanons 

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior Home and Semi-Theater Edition 7/10/20 – GREYHOUND, PALM SPRINGS, THE OLD GUARD, RELIC and More!

I hope everyone had a good 4th of July weekend, even though movie theaters don’t seem any closer to opening, and I believe some in certain areas even closed! New York City just hit Phase 3 this week, and I’m not sure Phase 4 even includes movie theaters. Let’s not even talk about L.A. as it will just depress me. I literally have no idea what’s going on or if movies being back in theaters nationwide by the end of this month is even realistic.  There are a lot of available movies this week, and I did my best to see as many as possible, but honestly, I’m getting a little burnt out watching movies on my computer and even on my TV set (the few times I can), so we’ll see how far I get this week. Hold on tight, because this week is gonna be a doozy! (I actually wanted to write a defense of Quibi and its content, but I’ll have to save that for a quieter week.)

Believe it or not, Tom Hanks has a new movie out this week, too, but it’s only on Apple TV+, since Sony decided to sell Hanks’ fictitious submarine drama GREYHOUND to the relatively new streaming service. Surely, that can’t be a good sign, right? Directed by Aaron Schneider (Get Low), it has Hanks playing Commander Ernest Krause, who is put in charge of his first fleet of ships to sail across the Atlantic Ocean’s notorious “Black Pit,” bringing supplies and troops to Europe during America’s early days in World War II.  The area of the Atlantic got its name because the planes that normally escorted the fleet to keep an eye out for German UBoats would have to turn back. As Captain of the USS Keeling aka Greyhound, Krause is solely responsible for dozens of ships and men.

Greyhound is a classic case of “Well, it looked good on paper,” because when you have a piece of fiction by C.S. Forester and one of America’s most beloved actors wanting to make it into a movie, what could possibly go wrong? Well, I’ll tell you. As someone who generally loves submarine movies and movies with great sea battles, certainly this movie was made for me, but no, although there are a few decent CG battles, the majority of the movie involves Hanks calmly stating orders to his men from the control deck of the Greyhound, as they take evasive measures to protect the fleet from the UBoats. Really, it’s mostly about Hanks, because other than Stephen Graham in a small role, none of the other men on the Greyhound have much personality. The movie even has the audacity to waste a great actor like Rob Hunter on a nothing role as the ship’s cook who brings Krause food and coffee he never has time to eat or drink anyway, because fighting the Germans is very busy work indeed.

While some of the firefights do bring a much-needed level of excitement, there’s otherwise no real stakes or tension, because you always know that Hanks’ boat will never be sunk. Every once in a while, Hanks will ask for coffee or his slippers to change things up. That’s how boring this movie is. And then, despite all the “non-stop fighting,” they somehow have time to stage an elaborate burial at sea when the ship is hit by enemy fire. Maybe this would have been a better movie seen in theaters, but probably not. It’s absolutely astounding how boring this movie is, but if naval speak gets you hot then Greyhound might just be the movie for you!

Now that that’s taken care of, let’s try to get some of the other movies, hopefully some of them are better than Greyhound.

Andy Samberg stars in PALM SPRINGS (NEON/Hulu), the new romantic comedy and first feature from director Max Barbakow. Calling it a “romantic comedy” wouldn’t really be doing the movie justice, since it’s more of a quirky comedy that offers more than the simple Sundance rom-com formula of Samberg’s previous Sundance movie, Jesse and Celeste Forever. The movie begins with Samberg’s character, Nyles, waking up at a wedding with his horrid girlfriend Misty (a very funny Meredith Hagner). At the wedding, Nyles gives a rousing speech (despite no one knowing who he is) then connects with the bride’s sister, Sara (Cristin Milioti). But wait, maybe you think you know where this is going but when the two go off somewhere private to “hook up,” it’s rudely interrupted by someone trying to kill Nyles, and well, it just gets stranger from there.

I’m not sure how much of the plot and the early twist would be considered a spoiler, although maybe not if you’ve watched the trailer. Essentially, Sara follows Nyles into a cave where there’s some sort of dimensional thing that returns them back to the beginning of the same day over and over. They go to sleep or they die, and they’re right back at the start of the day, so yup, it’s basically a similar Groundhog’s Day premise that we’ve seen in movies like Happy Death Day, Natasha Lyonne’s Russian Doll, Before I Fall or others, but it’s all about what Barbakow, writer Andy Siara and the two leads do that make Palm Springs so much more entertaining and even deeper.

I have to be honest that I wasn’t familiar with Milioti at all before this film, so this ends up being an amazing spotlight for her talent, and similar to Rashinda Jones in Jesse/Celeste, she makes Samberg that much easier to palate. Not that I dislike Samberg, but I’ve never been the biggest fan when he’s given free reign like in movies such as Hot Rod. (But I did like Popstar: Never Stop Stopping, so maybe he’s grown on me.) I will admit that I’m a sucker for a good wedding-based romantic comedy—as seen by recent ones like Plus Oneand Destination Wedding -- and with its odd quantum physics twist, Palm Springs continually finds new ways of exploring the tenuous existence that is a new relationship. Oh, I should also mention that Roy, the guy trying to kill Nyles, is played by JK Simmons, and while it’s definitely a smaller part for one of my favorite actors, he also plays a significant role in the story.

You’ll probably know right away if Palm Springs is your kind of movie, but the mix of quirkiness and honest heart and emotion makes it one of Samberg’s better endeavor. It hope it allows us to see much more of Ms. Milioti, since I think she’s quite wonderful as well.  Palm Springs can be watched on Hulu or in select drive-ins starting this Friday, and since it is this week’s “Featured Flick*,” I hope you’ll check it out! (*I changed the name of this just to see if anyone is paying any attention… or even reading.)

Greg Rucka and Leandro Fernández’s comic, THE OLD GUARD, has been turned into a movie directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love and Basketball) that will hit Netflix this Friday. It stars Charlize Theron and is written by Rucka himself, and it’s a fairly high concept action movie involving a group of “immortals” – warriors who aren’t able to die, so they’ve lived for hundreds of years and are now hiring themselves out as hired mercenaries. When they learn there’s a new immortal awakening, they seek her out to recruit her.

I generally like Charlize Theron in action mode as seen in Mad Max: Fury Road and Atomic Blonde, and she’s pretty kick-ass as Andromache the Scythian aka Andy, the leader of the Old Guard. Kiki Layne from If Beale Street Could Talk offers a nice counterpoint as her trainee in the form of Nile, the newest immortal, who discovers that she can’t die while serving as a soldier in the Middle East. The rest of the cast includes Chiwetel Ejiofor, Matthias Schoenaerts and others, who are all okay, but I just wish there was more to the story than just watching them have to deal with a lame corporate villain named Merrick (Harry Melling), who wants to harvest their blood to create life-saving pharmaceuticals for others.

While I liked the flashbacks to historic times showing Theron’s Andromache in another light, the stuff in present day is rarely as interesting. I’m not sure I ever would have thought of Bythewood doing action, even though she was supposed to do a Silver Sable/Black Cat movie at one point, but her fight scenes pretty fairly impressive, but she doesn’t lose sight of losing the focus on characterization, at least in terms of the two women.

The Old Guard isn’t bad, and it really would have benefited from being seen on the big screen, but I’m not sure it really offers enough with its concept other than a few decent fight scenes. Personally, I felt it paled in comparison to Netflix’s other recent action film, Extraction, at least in terms of the story and characters.

A horror movie that got a lot of lavishing praise out of Sundance is Natalie Erika James’ RELIC (IFC Midnight), which you may remember me mentioning last week, because apparently, it opened in a few drive-in theaters last Friday.  I had been looking forward to this due to the amount of praise it got from Sundance, comparing it to the likes of The Babadook or Hereditary.

The story revolves around Emily Mortimer’s Kay and her daughter Sam (Bella Heatchote) travelling to their grandmother Edna’s country home in Australia after she’s reported missing. Edna (Robyn Nevin) soon returns and is behaving oddly, and with Gran clearly not herself, Kay has to figure out if she’s possessed by something or just suffering from advanced dementia.

I feel like I have a general idea what James was trying to accomplish with Relic, as it explores what it’s like being the caregiver for your elderly parent once they’ve become debilitated by something that makes them unrecognizable, put into the context of a horror film. I ended up watching the movie twice, mainly because I had no clue what was going on during my first viewing, but honestly, this movie just ended up annoying me, and it was only partially due to the fact that I had very little idea what was going on since most of the movie is so dark. More than that, I found a lot of the movie to be incredibly dull, and comparisons to The Babadook are inane, since the only thing is that it’s a horror movie (sort of) directed by an Australian woman.

The movie also involves some sort of “evil presence” and a creepy old house that was on the premises when Kay’s family moved in, but this information is revealed in such a dreary and confusing manner that makes it harder to figure out what you’re watching.  In fact, if not for a number of eerie random images, it would be hard to even consider the first half of Relic “horror” since it’s more of a family drama about these three women from different generations contending with each other in this house. As someone who has had many conversations with my sister about what to do about my own elderly mother, I could see why this might connect with viewers, but planting this idea haphazardly into a typical horror movie just never worked for me. Relic has some good things going for it, such as the performances by the three actors (particularly Nevin), plus the creepy imagery and sound design do a lot to create a mood even if it doesn’t necessarily help with the storytelling.

The problem is that this story is told at such a snail’s pace and by the time the horror elements start kicking in within the last 20 minutes of the movie, almost everything is in pitch blackness, making it almost impossible to tell what you’re watching. Any earlier qualities worthy of praise are lost with some of the bad choices in lighting and editing, as well as an ending that’s dragged on for so long and at such a drowsy pace that any good will towards the movie will likely be lost. Ultimately, Relic is a disappointing high concept but single-note thriller that fails to deliver on the scares, instead delivering a dull and slightly unsettling family drama about aging and dementia.

In fact, I actually much preferred Jeffrey A. Brown’s horror film, The Beach House, which comes to the streaming network sShudder this Thursday. It stars Liana Liberato and Noah Le Gross as Emily and Randall, a young couple who travel to his father’s beach house to reconnect. Once there, their vacation is broken up by Jake Weber’s Mitch and his wife Jane (Maryann Nagel), but as the two couples get to know each other, a freak environmental event unleashes an infection that leads to all sorts of freaky occurrences. While there was just as much weirdness and not knowing what was going on as in Relic, at least this movie mostly takes place in the sunlight, so you can actually see things that are equally or even more disturbing than anything in Relic.

Brown’s film starts out so simply with this young couple wanting to spend some time alone together, but there’s this constant menace looming that’s foreshadowed in the opening credits, and as Mitch and Jane show up and start behaving oddly, you’ll wonder what exactly is happening to them. Things get even more disturbing when Emily is on the beach and experiences even odder and grosser circumstances that lead into the film’s “body horror” portion that will make even those with the strongest constitutions slightly queasy.

Part of why the film works so well is the small cast Brown has put together.  I’ve been quite a fan of Liberato for many years, and she effectively becomes the film’s lead. Certainly, there are a few common horror tropes in place including ones that can be traced back to the likes of Eli Roth’s Cabin Fever, but there’s also enough new ideas that the film doesn’t seem like retread. While I’m not 100% sure exactly what was happening in The Beach House, Brown and his cast do a good job keeping the viewer uneasy and disturbed.  

Atom Egoyan’s new thriller GUEST OF HONOUR (Kino Lorber) will premiere this week as part of the Kino Marquee (and there’s lots of great stuff on there that will help support your local arthouse while you’re checking that out!)  It stars David Thewliss as Jim, a health inspector whose high school music teaching daughter Veronica (Lausla de Oliveira) has been jailed over an indiscretion with two teen students.

Egoyan has proven himself to be quite a master at the thriller genre, and Guest of Honour involves a complex family drama narrative that scuttles between timelines in order to keep you guessing where things might be going. I’ll freely admit that the non-linear storytelling was somewhat confusing at first, as the movie is framed by a conversation between Veronica and Luke Wilson after the death of her father. It also flashes back to an important moment from Veronica’s childhood before her mother died of cancer, which led to other things that would affect her years later.

I’m frequently amazed by Thewliss as one of England’s more underrated exports, but I was equally impressed by Ms. de Oliveira, whose work I was not familiar with before seeing her in Egoyan’s capable hands.

While we’ve heard plenty of true stories about the relationships between teachers with their students, Guest of Honour isn’t just about that, and it’s the way Egoyan reveals some of the story’s more interesting complexities, like Veronica’s relationship with an obsessed bus driver (Rossif Sutherland), that builds to some of the events that happen later. Honestly, I’m hesitant to reveal too much about the plot since there’s a way that Egoyan unveils various elements that makes Guest of Honour another compelling entry in the filmmaker’s constantly-evolving oeuvre.

A really interesting crime-thriller with a sci-fi twist hitting Apple TV, Prime Video and other digital platforms this Friday is South African filmmaker Tony Dean Smith’s own directorial debut, VOLITION (Giant Pictures), a film co-written and co-produced with his brother Ryan. It stars Adrian Glynn McMorran (Arrow) as James, a man constantly down on his luck who has clairvoyant powers that he uses to get himself involved in a scheme involving valuable diamonds. Just before this happens, he meets Angela (Magda Apanowicz), a young woman who gets pulled into the problems James gets into with others wanting the diamonds, and when he sees a murder, he has to do what he can to change the future.

I feel like this column’s running theme is that I’m being deliberately vague about the film’s plot, and in this case, it’s because halfway through the movie, there’s a pretty big twist that involves time travel. While that immediately makes the movie more interesting, it also makes things far more confusing.  Up until that point, Volition felt like a rather weakly-written indie crime-thriller from filmmakers who may have seen Memento a few too many times. In fact, it opens with such a pretentious bit of narration I was worried the movie wasn’t going to be very good, and there was very little in the first half to keep me invested. When that new element/twist is added, McMorran’s character ends up on a far more interesting journey, and that turns Volition into a far more inventive and original story. Sure, it isn’t Primer, but if you’re a fan of the twists that come with time travel, Volition does a good job keeping you wondering what might happen next, and it does this with a mostly no-name cast, which is always quite impressive. In that way, it reminds me of The Wretchedwhich opened earlier in the year, as that was also by two filmmaking brothers taking a DIY attitude towards independent film. Volition isn’t perfect but it’s far better than I was expecting, and it’s a testament to the filmmakers’ perseverance to bring their very specific vision to the screen.

I was pretty excited to learn out about the quirky Japanese coming-of-age musical comedy WE ARE LITTLE ZOMBIES (Oscilloscope) from Makoto Nagahisa, because it’s the type of movie that I would usually see at the New York Asian Film Festival that would have been going on right now if not for… well, you know what. But it did play Fantasia in Montreal last year, so I’m sure it would have been fun seeing it with that audience. It’s certainly cute and quirky, involving a group of kids who come together to deal with their parents. Honestly, I don’t have a ton to say about it, but if you like oddball Asian films like the ones that play those festivals, you’ll know whether the film is for you. You can watch a trailer and find out where you’ll be able to catch We Are Little Zombies at its Official Site.

At least that was more watchable than Gavin Rothery’s sci-fi directorial debut, ARCHIVE (Vertical Entertainment), starring Theo James from the Divergent movies as George Almore, a man in the year 2038 who is working on an AI that is as close to human as possible, one that will hopefully reunite him with his dead wife in this new form. If you watch this, you’ll immediately think that Rothery must have watched Moon quite a lot. In fact, he was the conceptual artist and visual FX artist on Duncan Jones’ movie, and the influences of that film are so obvious it’s hard to get past it. Then again, Theo James has so little personality and charisma, he’s almost constantly being overshadowed by his robotic companions. So yeah, not recommended, and I’m a little shocked this was accepted into this year’s cancelled SXSW. Honestly, I couldn’t even get through it.

Also premiering in the Kino Marquee is Nicholas Leytner’s Austrian drama The Tobacconist (Menemsha Films), starring Bruno Ganz (Downfall) as Sigmund Freud and based on the bestselling novel by Robert Seethaler, which I haven’t read (if that isn’t obvious). It deals with the friendship between a teenager named Franz (Simon Morzé) and Freud during the Nazi occupation of Vienna, when the former travels there to work as an apprentice at a tobacco shop where Freud is a regular customer. When Franz falls in love with a music hall dancer, he turns to Freud for advice.

Apparently “showing only in theaters” this Friday is Michael W. Bachochin’s sci-fi/”psychodrama” Parallax (The Primal Group) starring Naomi Prentice as a young artist who is haunted by nightmares and who wakes up to a life she doesn’t recognize. At this point, I might as well just post the actual synopsis: “As she begins to uncover the truths of the life that she's found herself in, the gravity of her failing reality weighs heavily on her psychological identity and the reliability of her sanity is called into question.”

Let’s get to some docs, and you can probably safely assume that Harry Mavromichalis’ Olympia(Abramorama) is about Oscar-winning actress Olympia Dukakis, because it is. Featuring interviews with Whoopi Goldberg, Laura Linney, Diane Ladd and more, that covers the Greece-born actress as she opens up about her struggles with depression, suicide and drug addiction, as well as stories from some of the actors she’s shared the stage and screen with over the years.

The next doc is about the Chinese artist who probably has had more docs made about him than…well, anyone else? Ai Wei Wei: Yours Truly (First Run Features), directed by Cheryl Haines and Gina Leibrecht, covers how the artist developed his 2014 exhibition, @Large: Ai Weiwei on Alcatraz, inspired by his 2011 detention by Chinese authorities (which has generally inspired all his recent work?) Hey, if you’re a fan of his artwork, then you’ll probably want to see this doc, too.

One doc that I really wanted to see was Brett Harvey’s Inmate #1: The Rise of Danny Trejo (Universal), which had a virtual world premiere and is now on ITunes and other VOD, but my attempts to get a screener was met with absolute silence. The film documents the amazing life and career of the 71-year-old character actor and action hero who went from a life of drugs and doing hard time in prison to becoming an easily recognized and respected star, mainly thanks to Robert Rodriguez. I would like to see this movie, and maybe someday I will.

Film Forum’s Virtual Cinema will be adding Jacques Becker’s 1947 film, Antoine and Antoinette, this Friday, as well as the 1927 filming of the original Broadway play, Chicago, long before it was turned into a musical, although it does have Ginger Rogers playing Roxie Hart. Reinhold Schünzel’s original 1933 film Victor and Victoria (which was later remade by Blake Edwards for wife Julie Andrews) also joins the fairly hefty list of repertory films available, being shown as part of the “Pioneers of Queer Cinema” series.

Other movies I just wasn’t able to get to this week include Tito (Factory 25), I, Pastafari (Gravitas Ventures), The Medicine (1091), Never Too Late (Blue Fox Entertainment), Deany Bean is Dead (Global Digital Releasing) and Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets (Utopia).

Also beginning on Apple TV+ this Friday is the new JJ Abrams series, Little Voice, starring Brittany O’Grady as Bess King, a 20-something singer trying to find her voice in the rat race that is New York City. I haven’t had a chance to watch this yet but apparently, Abrams got Sara Bareilles from Broadway’s Waitress to write some of the tunes, so it should be decent.

Next week, more movies—some in theaters, some not in theaters! But most of them watchable from home in case you don’t drive or your city is exploding with the COVID after the rest of us have been in quarantine for months. Thanks bunches.

By the way, if you read this week’s column and have bothered to read this far down, feel free to drop me some thoughts at Edward dot Douglas at Gmail dot Com or drop me a note or tweet on Twitter. I love hearing from readers … honest!