#fuck its so annoying how when i start to get into queer things outside of this site i have to fight to get to the less man centric side

[killuazedykeremade]

i just want a safe and quiet and fun space where i never have to hear people speak about men again

[raisedbythetv89]

I don’t understand how people can actually hate season 1 of Buffy unless they just hate fun and like jw has claimed “loves seeing buffy suffer” and be blamed and punished for everything???? It’s so nostalgic and camp and queer coded what do you mean you don’t like it????

The puppet show is comedic genius and I’ll say that shit with my whole chest - they’re dealing with an unknown demon killing children and Giles who is always chastising Buffy for focusing too much on things outside of slaying is like “THE SHOW! ITS ABOUT TO START!” 🏃🏻‍♂️💨

Buffy has beef with a puppet for 3/4ths of the episode that is so Spike of her and EXTREMELY FUNNY to me to have the slayer who decapitates vampires with tiny X-Acto knives and knowingly walks to her death majorly creeped out by a dummy 😹😹😹😭😭

Buffy whining in tandem with the tuba playing on the stage as a background sound track to her sinking mood after Synder forces the scoobies to participate in the talent show

The curtain opening to Buffy cradling the dead dummy and a dead demon on stage and Synder in the audience goes “I don’t get it - is it avant-garde?”

THAT SHIT IS SO FUCKING FUNNY TO ME

And Buffy is just in top form for me. Realizing Amy is in her mom’s body even on the verge of death. Seeing the way Cordy treats Willow and immediately finding a reason to align herself with Willow instead despite it being a new school and she is still struggling with not fitting into her old, pre-slayer life. Helping Billy face his fears in his nightmare while overcoming her own of becoming a vampire and really owning her slayerness in a way we haven’t seen before there’s a lot of scary things in the world “AND IM ONE OF THEM”

LIKE YES GIRL YOU ARE TINY AND SCARY I LOVE YOU SO MUCH OWN THAT SHIT. The whole bit where Angel is like BEWARE CLAW VAMP SO DANGEROUS WATCH OUT BE CAREFUL - and she’s like right…… I’m gonna use him as my own personal bloodhound to find the REAL monster. I EAT THAT SHIT RIGHT UP ITS AMAZING. It’s also when Buffy is blamed and suffering the least it’s such a nice break for the entire rest of the series that sometimes I just desperately need.

I LOVE that a show that gives us such deeply emotional moments and captures depression perfectly in season 6 can also be so silly and camp with genuine human emotion and connection underlying it because of the core of very talented and dedicated actors

AND THIS IS COMING FROM A DIEHARD SPUFFY. My man isn’t even there yet and Angel with his useless cryptic creepy bullshit is annoying me to no end AND I STILL LOVE IT

I know there’s tons of technical and quality stuff that gets better as the seasons go on but that’s part of the charm for me.

So anyway leave season 1 alone, she’s my girl and I love her.

[kamorth]

Just as an intro, yes this post reads VERY white. Unfortunately a lot of recent history is only accessible through white lenses and as I myself am about as white as it is possible to be, I don't have another viewpoint that I can write from with any kind of authority. My lack of experience does not negate anyone else's experiences or views.

In the 80s, being punk was how you showed disdain for conformity. NO, I DON'T Want to be Like You THE WOLRD IS SHITTY AND I AM ANGRY. They were the trash that you warned your kids to stay away from because they were dangerous and violent.

Grunge quickly followed suit with Yeah the world is shitty why do what the boring conformist bougies tell you when you can just do your own thing over here instead. They were the trash you hoped your kids got sick of but the worst parents ever suspected of them was maybe a bit of weed and some clumsy make outs, not that big a deal.

In the late 90s (my teens) it was goths. We are so sick of you and your church and shoving it down my throat with pushing for prayer in schools and Christian Pop Rock all over the billboard top 40. That kid is a witch now and You JUST Don't Get It. Depression is my baseline and the idea of being like you is the cause. We were the trash that were just indulging in a phase and would grow out of it, so we could be humored but mostly ignored (unless your parents were hard core Bible bashers, in which case you would get sent to something akin to conversion therapy - since you were also probably Queer it often was just outright conversion therapy).

Then the emos showed up and people started getting annoyed, partly because suddenly there were goths that you COULDN'T ignore for two reasons, they were LOUD about being sad and THERE WERE SO MANY OF THEM. Since they couldn't be ignored out of existence, the Western world decided to collectively bully them instead. They were the trash that was Just So Damn Cringe!

And now poverty is skyrocketing. Homelessness is a plague that has struck so many people who have committed no crime outside of bad luck. Actual fascists are in positions of power. Planned obsolescence and decades of lobbying by the oil industry in favour of petrol and plastics is destroying everything beautiful about this planet.

And Punk is back. Be ANGRY at your politicians who don't listen. Let your anger be heard so that they know you will not accept these ideas. Grunge is back. It doesn't have to be new, it just has to be functional. Work together to make a community you WANT to live in. Goth is back. Mourn for the world we were promised but never saw. Learn about belief systems that are different to the one you were raised in, ESPECIALLY if doing so pisses off your parents. Emo is back. Fuck haters. Cringe is dead. Being comfortable in your own skin means being allowed to do what YOU want, not having to exist for the benefit of someone else.

Before us it was hippies and beatniks and flappers and dadaists and before them there were the coffee shop philosophers and the point is there have ALWAYS been people who want the world to see its own flaws and fix them. I know other cultures had the same sorts of groups, like the Japanese Subekan gangs (who created the original lolita fashion trend as a way to take femininity back from being sexualized) and Islamic Sufism (an Islamic sect who practice things forbidden by stricter groups, such as singing and dancing) but I'm an armchair scholar, not an expert.

When society is broken, our numbers surge.

We are surging.

Society needs us.

[dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram]

I shared that link for you to have context in case you hadn't seen it, not to out him to the ones who read your blog.  But yes I will never share that video again. That podcast had zero traction outside of its regular viewers who took little or no notice of the statement made in passing. It wasn't until days later a popular larrie tweeted it to her thousands of followers that it spread out to the fandom.  If I had come across that podcast on my own I would never have shared it with the intention of being proven right or to create theories out of it.  And that's the part that truly made me feel shameful and sick to my stomach. Some people were upset with him he made the comment but others were ok with it because they unfortunately have an understanding of Harry's closet that's a decade old. They said harry needs our help to come out and that normally outing someone is wrong but not in this case because harry is closeted against his will.  it's the ones who justified it or took pleasure out of it that will absolutely change the way I interact with harry/larry online queer discussion. Because of the way others reacted to it and made this whole thing into a bigger deal than it needed to be, maybe that's the control you're referring to. I want to control how others are interacting in fandom and I can't.   What I do want is for Harry to have his own control over when and if he comes out and not for someone else to do it for him.  And while the guy saying it might have been joking, saying Ed Sheeran told him harry is gay is more than anyone else said before in all the years of harry sexuality discussion. This was a definitive statement. Harry is gay. And if even one person now thinks he is gay as a result of this video,  which I have seen,  then he's been outed. And that's what makes me so upset.

Oh anon - I'm sorry this is causing you so much distress. I wasn't as considerate of that as I could have been with my response yesterday - I'm sorry for that.

I do think part of the distress comes from catastrophising - and I'm sure that's deeply rooted in your own experience. So I want to send you some love.

Also a lot of this is about other fans - you're super aware that you can't control other people - which is good. But I don't think it helps that you're giving them so much attention. Fans are incredibly annoying, but they don't matter that much. If what fans say is causing you a lot of distress the best step to take is just to walk away.

To move onto the more substative question. I want to start with a subtle distinction that is quite important. The fact that someone thinks that a person is gay does not mean that person has been outted. Outting isn't just about saying someone is gay, but involves authority in quite complex ways.

I think it helps to use that framework of authority to understand this interaction. An ex-youtube comedian told a story on a podcast about getting incredibly drunk with Ed Sheeran and said that Ed Sheeran said that Harry Styles was gay and this conversation took place at a time when people routinely used 'gay' as an insult to have nothing to do with who you were fucking. I think for most people that's not something that has a lot of authority.

I think it would be really helpful to step back a bit from a worldview that says 'if even one person thinks someone is gay, then that person has been outted'. It's super scary, but we can't control what other people think of us - and people do wonder if closeted people are queer.

With Harry in particular, it's useful to understand that people are not receiving that story in a vacuum. This story comes into the picture that people have already built up about Harry. What people have seen will vary, but the picture may include him dressing up as Dorothy, performing Medicine, dancing with pride flags, singing 'I will survive' to the biggest audience he's ever had and given a range of ambiguous responses to questions that come near his sexuality.

If the story was slightly different and the comedian had gotten drunk with someone who was talking about Ed Sheeran - then the response might be different. Some people would think 'I wonder if Ed Sheeran fucks men' more would probably think 'fuck it was terrible when people routinely used 'gay' as an insult'.

Harry doesn't have control over whether or not people think he's queer. But if you look at what he does have control over and how he's decided to present himself, I don't think your anxiety reflects what's going on for him. I think Harry knows that some people think that he's gay and has made decisions about how to present himself in that context.

Harry doesn't get, none of us get, the ability to control how we're perceived. But it is a little absurd to treat one person thinking Harry is gay as a result of watching a video as something that is hugely distressing and catastrophic, when he's dressed up as Dorothy on stage.

[catgirledteach]

Things in the "Pine Barrens" ep I loved (spoilers obv):

- Laszlo telling Baby Colin to use Siri to prove him right in an argument with Nandor

- Baby Colin chilling with Sean during the day because Laszlo and Nandor are sleeping

- The girls night is fucking LIT they are having the time of their LIVES, and most importantly Marwa. I think Nadja even has a line about Marwa needing to experience other things outside of Nandor (I may be wrong though)

- Guillermos family is so cute but you can also start to get a picture of how he ended up as a perpetual familiar. He definitely has a somewhat subservient/perpetual little kid dynamic with his family and he struggles to speak up for himself, although not as much anymore

- Guillermo is wearing VERSACE. HELLO??? (he may also be wearing a Gucci tracksuit at the start of the ep)

- Guillermo is just SO SWEET with his family he's so proud to finally have them over for dinner im-

- NADJA PAINTING MARWAS NAILS NADJA PAINTING MARWAS NAILS

- The girls watching Mamma Mia and Nadja being so pumped about it. She's reliving Greece through Meryl Streep

- She also says Laszlo doesn't like to watch it because it reminds him of all the children he sired and then left when he was a human (which taking in his current parental role with Baby Colin is so interesting to me)

- Nandor and Laszlo are having tension pretty much from the very start of the ep but Nandor seems most taken aback when Laszlo says Sean is his best friend. And he keeps getting excluded from their interactions ��

- Nandor gets concerned about having firearms in the house with Baby Colin around 🥺 and when he tries to tell Laszlo he shouldn't be messing with them Laszlo brushes him off and that seems to be the final straw that leads into their fight

- My babygirl Guillermo was hiding so much over the years that he felt like he had to lie that Nadja was HIS WIFE. And when cornered, Nadja actually GOES ALONG WITH IT for seemingly no other reason than to help Guillermo??? She could have just slaughtered them all, hypnotized them into forgetting her, but no. She plays along!!!! Because they're friends!!!!!!

- PS. I think at one point she even lies to make him look better by saying he's actually her boss???

- de la Cruz family having natural slayer instincts theory CONFIRMED!

- I may be reading too much into this one but Guillermos abuela says when a de la Cruz gets near a vampire your heart burns and you get goosebumps and then it cuts straight to Nandor. I am connecting the dots on how Nandor and Guillermo met because there's no way Guillermo didn't feel something similar (he's probably just gotten used to the sensation after all this time and didn't think it was weird). Again I may be overthinking but that sure sounds like a sensation that could be mistaken for love at first sight and also its giving strong vibes of when Nandor said he had already found love and then it cut straight to Guillermo

- Nandor and Lazslo fighting in front of Baby Colin also gives big 'my parents are a week away from a divorce' energy

- Nadja actually really loves Guillermos family! She asks them how such lovely people raised such a boring person (im paraphrasing cause I couldn't really hear)

- Guillermos face after he comes out I will never recover

- Also the fact that as soon as everything about the vampires comes spilling out he also comes out - like I know we (sort of but not really) joke about vampirism/the monstrous being a metaphor for queerness but hoo boy. this one really got me

- His family was more annoyed that Guillermo wants to be a vampire than him being gay I love that for them

- Nandor is really going through it man. But he's also becoming so protective of Baby Colin. I just want to hug him 😞

- Nadja has another moment of real sympathy with Guillermo based on her own family that she can't see anymore. This was truly an episode delving much deeper into the individual characters' insecurities and histories of how they came to be the way they are

- I also think she has a line about how Guillermo has a puppy dog face when he wants something but it's more effective on Nandor and she thinks it's gross

- Nadja wants to have more girls nights and wants to watch Mamma Mia 2!!! I hope Guillermo joins their girls nights cause she only requested that Nandor Lazslo and Colin be out of the house

- This entire sequence between Guillermo and Nadja (in a talking heads confession TOGETHER! BESTIES!!! it's everything I wanted from them in London)

GUILLERMO: Now they know I'm gay, so...

NADJA: I mean, who isn't gay???

GUILLERMO: Lots of people.

NADJA: (sarcastically) Oh ok, woo-hoo. I'll get the confetti(?) out, sorry.

GUILLERMO: (rolling his eyes in the gayest, bitchiest way possible) Shady.

I love them so much it's insane.

- Baby Colin teaching Sean about Roblox - this can only lead good places

[a-shizno]

For @rubykgrant bc you put that little worm in my brain

~~~~~~~~~~~~

“OK so now that that shit show is over, will you now explain to me what the fuck we just had to watch?”

Lopez would’ve smirked if he had the muscles for it as the credits rolled on the forgotten tv. As he was he merely took a sip from his oil.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Oh that’s a load of bullshit and we both know it.”

Church shoved Lopez with his foot before taking a sip for himself.

“I know that we’ve watched some fucking bottom of the barrel dumb shit together but this is the first time we’ve watched something from a dvd.”

It was true, Lopez had to order a dvd playing relic to set up tonight. Over a month of searching, not that Church had to know.

“Oh?”

“An-and an another thing!”

Church slurred as he sat up.

“You can’t fucking tell that this is a stand alone film! There was like eight plots in this hour and a half film that were barley introduced before the climax! If it was anymore of a cash grab to pander to a specific audience of old grandmas and recently broken-hearted queers then they wou-*hic*- would’ve… fuck I lost my train of thought.”

“Lightweight.”

“Up yours man, some of us are still breaking in their robo-bodies.”

The body didn’t really do church justice in Lopez’s opinion. It was sleek and state of the art but it Lopez couldn’t explain how it felt like it wasn’t enough.

Maybe he had drank a little too much as well.

“So are you going to explain it to me or am I just supposed to forever question who the fuck Waylon is and why the bride ran to suck lip with him.”

“This was the original finale film of a telenovana by the same name. It ran on tv from 2006-2013. We unearthed the nine season box set and feature length film in a mystery box that Simmons bought off the internet.”

Church lifted an eyebrow,

“Ok but that doesn’t explain why we just subjected ourselves to this garbage.”

“This is also Red team’s go to tv show. They have watched the tv series at least five times since they bought they set and were currently in the middle of season eight last time I was there.”

Church muttered a “Jesus” as he took another swig.

“I am also the main reason they have watched the series five times. I stole film’s dvd when they were half way through the last season. They had forgotten to order me cooling fluid during the previous munitions I had to spend a week in this cannon without cooling fluid due to their obsession.”

“Oh my god,”

Lopez basked as the room filled with Church’s cackle

“If I couldn’t have my cooling fluid, they would have no conclusion. This show was not popular outside of a small demographic, there is no more copies of this film in existence due to its age and quality outside the one I own.”

The glee was worth Lopez letting church in on a secret he had kept to himself for three years. Church could just feel the smugness rolling off of Lopez as he continued.

“Simmons has tried to find a reputable replacement with no success. Every year on the anniversary, I drink and watch it with satisfaction.”

“Man how does it feel to have the biggest switch in this goddam canyon? Jesus I just- five times!? Like fucking five times.”

“They keep watching it in hopes of deciphering the ending through subtext. Unfortunately the writers were clearly on drugs while writing the story.”

Lopez’s felt his motor lurch as church gave him a brief hug as his laughter started to subside before getting up.

“Man, I haven’t laughed like that in months dude, thanks.”

“As long as you don’t tell Sarge, shotgun pellets are annoying to remove from armor.”

Church snorted as he made his way out of living room.

“Sure, as long as you don’t tell caboose. My hugs are limited edition and I would like to not have my spine snapped.”

[firelxdykatara]

gods, ok, apparently i’m not done.

atla fandom? we need to have a chat.

(....ok that made me sound pretentious as fuck. and maybe i am, but this needs to be said, cause i’m getting....real, real tired of a Certain Corner of this fandom and as a result, this is gonna be a discourse-heavy post so feel free to scroll past if that’s not your bag. as always, my salt posts all carry the catch-all #salt for ts tag, which you’re free to blacklist/filter at your leisure. i’m Very Annoyed at the moment, which will probably come through in the following post, so just. yknow. be prepared for that. or ignore it, that’s perfectly valid too.)

under a cut bc i do care for my followers and their sanity i swear lmao

there’s a real serious issue in this fandom with not understanding what queer terminology actually means or implies, especially when applied to a fictional narrative.

i’m specifically talking about ‘coding’, here. (if i were in a more meme-y mood, i might have said ‘the atla fandom found out about the term “gay-coding” and haven’t shut up since’.)

to the people who say ‘zuko is gay-coded’, i have this to say: you keep using that word. i do not think it means what you think it means. because he isn’t. i’m sorry, but he’s not! and the fact that this is such a prevalent claim in this fandom is distressing, bc it says to me that none of y’all know what gay-coding is or when and how to apply it! please, i’m begging you, go and look up these terms and what they mean and when they should be used before actually trying to plug them into your critical analysis, because when you misuse them and then call other people delusional for disagreeing with you it casts a pall over the entire fandom and is, i think, the root of some of the worst toxicity this fandom has to offer.

and the thing is, there are cases where gay-coding would apply--for instance, a couple series that are famous for queerbaiting their audience by coding their main characters as being attracted to one another (sometimes even despite their openly stated sexualities) come to mind, but those shows bare no similarities at all to atla and how zuko was written and portrayed! (and it would be funny, if it weren’t so obnoxious and infuriatingly wide-spread throughout the fandom, because the only queer couple we actually seen on-screen in either show wasn’t even queer-coded in any respect, and they’re canonically bi! [yes, i’m shading korrasami, or more accurately i’m shading bryke for refusing to give ka the build-up and development they deserved].)

this absolutely isn’t to say that headcanoning zuko as gay is a bad thing or invalid in any respect. (although the tendency for zukka shippers to do this specifically to keep zuko away from katara and/or invalidate his canon relationship/attraction to girls is more than a little eyebrow raising. especially since sokka is usually allowed to be bi, bc fans have no problem letting sukka stay in the background bc it’s no real threat, while jetko shippers are happy to have both boys be bi. [possibly bc katara is less a threat to jetko bc jetkotara is every bit as valid as any single ship between the three, but zukka can’t exactly let katara join in, and if the potential exists for zuko to be attracted to her then canon giving them the far deeper emotional bond becomes a threat to zukka’s existence? idk for sure--you be the judge.]) i prefer to hc zuko as bi (and always have, long before the atla renaissance), bc i don’t think zuko being attracted to boys is outside the realm of possibility, and it isn’t a threat to my ship since zuko&katara had a deep and emotional bond in canon that is very easy to develop further into something that becomes explicitly romantic--but the headcanon itself isn’t really the problem (although what it’s often in service to can be).

it’s the strange insistence that this is the only way to read his character, bc he was coded that way and so anyone who doesn’t see it must be too straight to understand--and i really shouldn’t have to say why and how that is so incredibly fucking insulting. (the ‘hetero lenses’ comment wasn’t cute when it came from bryke six years ago, and the same sentiment being repackaged and delivered by zukka shippers ain’t cute now.)

calling zuko gay-coded not only demonstrates ignorance as to what the term actually means, and how to usefully apply it in critical analysis, but also validates the frankly bullshit insertion of institutionalized homophobia in the world of atla where it was neither needed, nor wanted, nor ever hinted at in canon. as a queer woman i’m still infuriated by one fucking comic panel shoving institutionalized and systemic homophobia into a world where it was entirely unnecessary (and doing this in the first installment of the franchise showcasing a queer relationship??? making korra and asami worried about ‘coming out’ when they could have just gone on to have cute adventures together and tell people ‘hey we’re dating’ and have everyone else be ‘that’s awesome =DDD’ [because it is, in fact, possible to just have a world without homophobia i promise!!!!!] double yikes, i’m still pissed at bryke about it), and i doubly hate that ‘zuko is gay coded’ has become so widespread that ‘ozai hates him bc he’s gay’ has become a staple in that part of the fandom.

not only does making zuko gay and implying (or outright stating) that ozai hated and abused him because of it completely undermine zuko’s character arc by making his abuse about his sexuality rather than ozai’s toxic pride and anger at seeing himself reflected in his ‘weak’ son, but it comes very close to outright stating that abuse and trauma are inherently gay experiences, and they aren’t!!! they really aren’t, i promise!!!

abuse and trauma narratives exist outside of ‘my dad hates me because i’m gay’. and, quite frankly, there are MORE THAN ENOUGH queer trauma narratives out in the world. we do not need to start trying to retroactively make them canon in a series where they didn’t exist! if you’re gay and see yourself in zuko and project your own experiences on him, that’s understandable and valid. that does not make zuko gay-coded. and honestly, the insistence that he is makes very little sense to me, because you’re essentially trying to give the show credit for work you put into interpreting the characters! why would you want to do that? why not own your own headcanons and take credit for them, rather than insisting they are canon and everyone else is wrong for not seeing them??? like, i’ve said before that i’ve always headcanoned zuko (and katara) as bi, and even support it with my interpretations of evidence from the show, but the difference between ‘i think zuko is bi’ and ‘zuko is definitely gay-coded’ is that i know that bi zuko is my interpretation of canon, and that it is work i’m putting into the show that wasn’t actually intended by the creators/writers, no matter how much sexual tension i read into the jetko swordfight.

and like, zuko’s character arc doesn’t actually parallel a queer one all that well to begin with. it’s easy enough to do the work and twist it sideways just enough to make the general points fit, but the fact is, zuko’s arc is not one of self-discovery. it’s not one of coming to understand something fundamental about himself that he can’t change, that he was hated for, and coming out to his father in a dramatic confrontation where he shows that he understands himself and doesn’t need his father’s acceptance to be fulfilled.

zuko’s arc is actually one of trauma and healing. and those can (and often are--like i said, there are more than enough queer trauma narratives in the world, atla really doesn’t need to be one of them) be part of queer narratives, for sure! but they aren’t uniquely queer. and zuko’s confrontation with ozai during the eclipse doesn’t read like a ‘coming out’ at all. (yes, i’ve seen that post. yes, i rolled my eyes and moved on, bc unlike some people, i’m capable of not clowning on correctly tagged posts i disagree with.) zuko is specifically confronting ozai over his abuse, because his arc wasn’t about discovering anything fundamental about himself (and therefore realizing that ozai was hating him for something he couldn’t change)--it was about realizing that he was not at fault for the way his father treated him. it was also about realizing that the fire nation was broken and corrupt at its core, and that his father was an aspect of that he needed to break away from so that he could help the world begin to heal.

he says it himself:

Zuko: No, I've learned everything! And I've had to learn it on my own! Growing up, we were taught that the Fire Nation was the greatest civilization in history. And somehow, the War was our way of sharing our greatness with the rest of the world. What an amazing lie that was. The people of the world are terrified by the Fire Nation. They don't see our greatness. They hate us! And we deserve it! We've created an era of fear in the world. And if we don't want the world to destroy itself, we need to replace it with an era of peace and kindness.

making this about zuko being gay and rejecting ozai’s homophobia, rather than zuko learning fundamental truths about the world and about his home and about how there was something deeply wrong with his nation that needed to be fixed in order for the world to heal (and, no, ‘homophobia’ is not the answer to ‘what is wrong with the fire nation’, i’m still fucking pissed at bryke about that), misses the entire point of his character arc. this is the culmination of zuko realizing that he should never have had to earn his father’s love, because that should have been unconditional from the start. this is zuko realizing that he was not at fault for his father’s abuse--that speaking out of turn in a war meeting in no way justified fighting a duel with a child.

is that first realization (that a parent’s love should be unconditional, and if it isn’t, then that is the parent’s fault and not the child’s) something that queer kids in homophobic households/families can relate to? of course it is. but it’s also something that every other abused kid, straight kids and even queer kids who were abused for other reasons before they even knew they were anything other than cishet, can relate to as well. in that respect, it is not a uniquely queer experience, nor is it a uniquely queer story, and zuko not being attracted to girls (which is what a lot of it seems to boil down to, at the end of the day--cutting down zuko’s potential ships so that only zukka and a few far more niche ships are left standing) is not necessary to his character arc. nor does it particularly make sense.

(and before anyone brings up his date with jin--a) he enjoyed it when she kissed him, and b) he was a traumatized, abused child going out on a first date. of course he was fucking awkward. have you ever met a teenage boy????)

anyway, uh, that was a lot of words, so have a tl;dr: zuko is not gay-coded. there is nothing uniquely gay (or even uniquely queer) about his character arc or characterization, and he was certainly not coded gay in an attempt to sneak a queer character past the censors. if anyone involved with atla was gonna try that, it would’ve been in lok, and as established, they didn’t even manage to queer-code the actual queer relationship before the last few minutes of the final episode. headcanoning zuko as gay is absolutely fine (though if it’s only done to keep him away from female characters he may otherwise be attracted to, that smells more like misogyny than anything else), but insisting that this reading is the only one that makes sense, and anyone who doesn’t agree must be straight (hello, queer woman here making this insanely long thinkpiece) is very much not.

ship what you like, but stop trying to invalidate other ships and other interpretations of characters just to make your ship seem more plausible. it’s really not a good look.

[morepeachyogurt]

a sky full of stars (and she was looking at her)

Word Count- 2.8k

Pairing- Penemily

Summary- Penemily highschool au where they are paired up on a English assignment! Based on this post.

Part 1 of my, maybe we’re from the same star, series

Read it here on ao3

Tw’s- very small mentions of substances, minor swearing

A/N- this is the first installment of a series based on my yearning posts, and my first time writing romance/3rd pov, I’d love some feedback!

It’s hard to miss Penelope Garcia. With her bright clothes and brighter personally it seems like the sun shines a spotlight on her. Her golden hair is like a halo around her, she looks like an angel, and perhaps one of these days Emily will get the courage to talk to her beyond small talk and group presentations. She’s pulled out of her thoughts when the shrill bell rings, too loudly for her tastes but this whole building seems to scream at her, so perhaps it’s fitting.

Ms. Blake starts to talk about ancient poetry. The greats from the time periods before everything got so complicated. English is not Emily’s favorite class but somehow Blake’s class is more or less interesting, is it because she’s a milf? Maybe, who’s to say. As the class nears its end, she announces, “Alright, as we close out our poetry unit, we have one last assignment that hopefully at least one of you will enjoy, it’s a group project where-” immediately two hands go up ready to ask the question that always gets asked when a group project is announced. “Before you ask, no, you aren’t picking your partners, I am,” a collective groan comes out of about half the class. Emily isn’t too mad about it though, she doesn’t have many friends, especially in honors English. JJ barely passes English as it is. She’s all alone here, so she’s glad she doesn’t have to suffer through the awkwardness of trying to find a partner before everyone else does and ending up with the one kid who she’s pretty sure has been high the entire year and likes to leer at her in the hallway. “For this assignment, you’ll have to analyze one famous poem, from whatever time period you’d like, and write an essay about the poet’s intentions. If you’d like extra credit, which I know for a fact some of you need, you can do a reading of the poem in front of the class or do a drawing that represents it. Any questions?”

The classroom fills with questions of ‘when is this due?’ And ‘this sucks do we have to do this’. Emily however, is distracted by one very colorful girl in the upper left corner of the room, her spot in the back lets her admire the view without being caught, which tends to make it difficult to pay attention, but well, some things are just more fun than others. Her attention is drawn back to Blake when she hears her name followed by Penelope Garcia.

Oh shit.

On the one hand, this is exactly the opportunity she’d been looking for to ‘make her move’ so to speak, on the other, she’s terrified of making a fool of herself. Emily realizes that she’s been sitting for a bit too long when Blake stops talking and the rest of the class has already paired off. She catches Penelope’s eyes and tries to fight the blush of her cheeks. The sound of her docs hitting the linoleum is a bit too intense for this setting, she prefers their ‘clunk’ when it’s a crowded room, and she can walk like she owns the place. Emily sits down at the desk adjacent to Penelope and gets ready to ruin her chances with her.

“Okay! Hi! I’m Penelope! Which you already knew because Ms. Blake announced it, but it’s polite to introduce yourself to people so I thought I would do that now which I’ve done so I’ll stop talking now!”

Emily can’t help but giggle a little at her rambling, she doesn’t want her to stop talking quite yet, her voice melodic to her ears.

“So, I’m not big in poetry, I’m more of a comic book gal if you catch my drift, so I was hoping that you had some thoughts?” She drags the o in hoping and trails off waiting for Emily to fill in the blanks. It takes her a second too long because her brain is short-circuiting but she manages.

“Yeah okay, um, I’ve read some Sappho back when my mother was stationed in Greece? That could work?” she hopes bringing up Sappho wasn’t too obvious of her intentions, but it was all she could think of. Sappho had a point when she said ‘Sweet mother, I cannot weave – slender Aphrodite has overcome me with longing for a girl’

“Yeah okay! Cool! We’ve got like 3 minutes left of class, would you want to go to Bricks and Beans after school to work on it?”

“Uh yeah, yeah, that, um, that sounds great! I’ll meet you in front of the school?”

“Yep!” She pops the ‘p’ and Emily thinks she can’t possibly get cuter.

Emily’s walk to lunch has never been quite this mix of excitement and anxiety as it is now. Hopefully, JJ will be able to make sense of what’s happening because the wires in Emily’s brain are very much twisted.

“Okay, I’m telling you it’s not a date,”

“Yeah I know it’s not technically a date but come on. I personally have never asked my group project partner to a coffee shop before. She obviously likes you.”

Jennifer Jareau has been blessed with the right combination of looks that ensures she never had to wonder if her crushes liked her back. Emily wishes she had that special brand of confidence, but it’s simply not realistic, the number of openly queer girls at school is small, the number of them that would be interested in her? Even smaller.

“Look I’m not going to be the loser that gets my heart broken all right,” she steals a fry off of JJ’s tray before her hand gets smacked.

“Ugh I’m so bored here, promise me you’ll at least try. I need some new drama around here and you two would be so fucking cute.”

“Fine. On the condition that when* it goes south you’re buying me ice cream.”

Emily’s day goes by slowly and all at once. Hours turn into years turn into seconds and before she knows it she’s awkwardly standing outside the building waiting for Penelope to meet her.

When she does, Emily’s pulse quickens ever so slightly in her presence. It’s annoying as hell.

“I was worried you were standing me up,” a futile attempt on Emily’s behalf of trying to seem calm, cool, and collected.

“What! I would never, I’ve been looking forward to getting a macchiato and hanging out with you and Sappho all day! Coolest ladies from recent history,” she has to try and stop herself from getting too excited at Penelope’s words, they don’t mean anything, she’s just some loser that she has to work with to get a good final grade in the class. A means to an end, disposable.

“I don’t think Sappho counts as recent history but thank you, ma’am,” ma’am? God, what is she doing, this is going to go south faster than the time she tried to wear ripped jeans to one of her mother’s stupid dinner parties. To her surprise, her stupid comment is met with a giggle on Penelope’s part.

“Why thank you darling,” she replies in a phony southern accent that makes them both crack up, “Lead the way.”

Bricks and Beans is the staple coffee shop where all the high schoolers hang out after school or work during college. The owners are a sweet old couple in their 70’s who seem to be reliving the past with the vintage decorations. The pair settle into a table in the back, a window next to them showing off the highway. Emily is tasked with buying the coffees and Penelope rattles off her order filled with things Emily’s never even heard of.

“Okay, I’m pretty sure the barista is laughing at me now but here is your sugar coffee with whipped cream,” she says as she slides into her seat, placing down the coffees on the minimal free space left.

“My savior,” she says, fake swooning, “Okay so, Sappho? That’s the lesbian right?”

Emily answers with a snort before actually replying, “Yeah that’s the lesbian. I’m sure Blake will love it. I’m like, 90% sure she’s gay.”

“Single English teacher who loves Oscar Wilde? Yeah, I get it. My gaydar is spectacular by the way.”

“Oh yeah?”

She nods.

“Um, yeah, okay how about this poem:

‘and in your song most of all she rejoiced.

But now she is conspicuous among Lydian women

as sometimes at sunset

the rosyfingered moon

surpasses all the stars. And her light

stretches over salt sea

equally and flowerdeep fields.

And the beautiful dew is poured out

and roses bloom and frail

chervil and flowering sweetclover.

But she goes back and forth remembering

gentle Atthis and in longing

she bites her tender mind’”

“That’s gorgeous,” Penelope had a dreamy look in her eyes, like seeing a beautiful sunset for the first time. Except, instead of a sunset she was looking at Emily, seeing her, like for the first time, “I love when artists talk about the stars,” she leans back on her chair and looks up as if she’s looking at a constellation and not an off-white popcorn ceiling. Her collarbones are exposed and Emily feels like a 17th-century peasant pining over exposed ankles, “There’s just something about the stars ya know? They’re so far away, but sometimes it feels like we’re there with them. They twinkle at us and at each other,” she pauses to make eye contact, “maybe the greatest love story is in the sky,” there’s a beat too long, Emily doesn’t know how to respond to that comment, it’s hard to follow art without ruining it.

“Or maybe I’m just a sad sap for romance.”

“No!” She gets a of couple heads turned her way, the exclamation too loud for the environment, “I mean no, I get what you mean, they’re beautiful. Sometimes at night I go on my roof just to stargaze. It’s so peaceful there,” it’s now or never, “you should do it with me someday.”

“I’d love that,” it’s almost bashful, the two of them hoping the underlying meanings of their words are being shown, lest their hopes not be conveyed and come shattering down like a falling star.

The sun slowly sets as they work on interpreting the inter-workings of Sappho’s mind. The drinks run out so Emily buys them both hot chocolate, extra whipped cream and chocolate chips for Penelope. When she takes a sip, the whipped cream sticks to the side of her face.

“You got some whipped cream on your face,” she gestures to the offender in question. The blonde tries and fails, to get it off.

“Did I get it?”

“No, it’s more,” after some failed attempts, and the failure of Emily’s common sense, she decides to just get it off herself. It feels too intimate too quick, they both freeze, Emily’s hand inches away from Penelope’s face. Their eyes lock, scared brown eyes met soft blue ones and just for a second, there is peace in between their beating hearts and hands. Emily quickly brings her hand down and mumbles an apology.

After three hours they call it a night, Emily now the proud owner of Penelope’s phone number. On her drive home, she wonders if she’d done right, and she wonders if she’d done wrong. If she was clear about what stargazing meant to her. A branch into her world, her safe space. To share the dark night sky with something is to share your soul with them. Even JJ didn’t know about her nighttime viewings. Did Penelope feel the same way? The shared smiles and small laughs pointed yes. But Penelope was Penelope and Emily was Emily. How could an angel love a human? Why would it sacrifice its virtue for the danger of love? If Penelope was pink and Emily was dark green, could they mix and make something beautiful or would they both end up a ruined brown?

Dinner is tense as always, she does not share anything with her mother, she does not want to. They tiptoe around each other hoping that they won’t step on each other’s toes and crash. Emily retreats to her room the second dinner is over and opens a window. She loves that it gets dark earlier now. The fresh fall air trumps that tacky of scented candles that fill the house in a futile attempt to make it a home. She opens her laptop to finish the concluding paragraph of their essay. She allows herself to be lost in the words of another in order to avoid her own problems of love and belonging. Her phone rings. It’s her problems. They chat with careful conversation about their project and finally, it is finished. It looks good actually, or at least, to Emily it does. It’s not going to win them a Pulitzer, but they’ll get an A.

And then, “Hey.”

“Hey?” They’ve been on the phone for a half an hour, she’s not sure why she’s being greeted all of a sudden.

“Does your offer to stargaze still stand? It’s nice out tonight and, I don’t know, it sounded nice?”

“Yeah of course! Do you, um, do you need a ride or?”

“Nah I got my license and good old Esther. I do need your address though.”

“Oh yeah, I’ll text it to you. Who’s Esther?”

“My car! She’s a lovely thing thought she needed a name. I’ll be there in say, 15 minutes?”

“Sure. Bye Penelope.”

Holy shit.

Okay, she’s got 15 minutes to both have everything ready, but also seem completely casual about the fact that her crush is coming over to stargaze on her roof. The ambassador is long retreated either in bed or into her office, so she shouldn’t be a problem. Emily grabs a couple of blankets for them to sit on to avoid the chilly breeze and a bag of popcorn. She brushes her hair and touches up her eyeliner, not that it’s really visible in the dark, but it helps her feel confident which she’s desperate for at the moment. Her phone buzzes with a text, *im here!!!* It reads. She takes a deep breath before very slowly opening the door.

“Hi,” she whispers, the wind carrying her voice, but it’s just loud enough for its recipient. She closes the door

“Hi! So! Stargazing? That’s fun, I’m like, really excited it’s been a while since I’ve done something like this,” she somehow makes a whisper seem filled with enough energy to power a flashlight that Emily definitely should have brought. They make their way to the intersection where the hill meets the rooftop, and they only trip once, on a stick, but together they stay upright. Emily throws the blankets on the roof and climbs up on the chair before throwing her body on the roof. With her help, Penelope makes her way up after a couple of tries. By the time they lay the blankets out and are sitting down, they’re both practically crying from laughter, her nerves from earlier disappearing slowly.

The laughter fizzles out, and they’re both left staring at the stars. Penelope apparently is an expert of both astronomy and astrology so Emily’s ears are blessed with the sound of her voice. Like sunshine on a sweet summer day. She thinks that Penelope and her are like the sun and the moon, both beautiful, and complementary. Emily’s gaze shifts from the constellations to Penelope’s side profile. The stars shine almost as bright as her, and she can’t help but watch her instead. She can see the stars in her eyes, perhaps they were always there, but they’re more visible now looking in their reflection.

“God they’re beautiful,” Penelope says in awe. Like she can’t believe she’s blessed with the presence of the stars when really it is the stars who should have the honor.

“Yeah, yeah they are,” at this point she’s openly gazing at Penelope. When Penelope turns to meet her gaze she thinks she’s been caught, that it’s over and this night will be one for the ages in terms of beauty and heartbreak. Slowly, a hand makes its way to her cheek, cold like the air around them, but it somehow manages to set her skin on fire.

“May I?”

Emily nods and then they are lips on hers, it is sweet just like her. She’s being kissed under the starlight by a girl who deserves only beauty. Perhaps her dark green can be the field by the sunset of Penelope’s pink in the painting they make together. They do not have to mix, they can simply be combined to create something stunning. They can simply be. They pull apart slowly, and looking into her eyes, Emily thinks that the stars in comparison are simply dull. There is nothing as bright and beautiful in the world as the eyes of your lover.

Tag list- @royalpenelope @scandinavian-punk @kermitsaysgayrights

[ignitesthestxrs]

i apoligze for this in advance but idk who else to ask. so i’m attracted to women like 92% of the time but i’ve been dating a guy for a few months now. it’s not super serious yet but i still find myself feeling sad about never having had a gf/worrying i never will and just feeling like a bad queer. i KNOW that it’s terribly biphobic of me to think that if i a femme enby date a cis dude i’m not queer enough. but i also cant get past it no matter how many times i look at these ugly brain thoughts

first of all: you never have to apologise for sending me stuff like this. it is a known facet of my tumblr, and while i know i am hardly around at all, i do periodically check my inbox and am never angry or annoyed or any other negative emotion to see people reaching out for help/advice. i don’t always have the mental bandwidth to respond, but i am only ever glad that people still consider this a safe place to reach out to.

there are a couple of things i want to address here! in no particular order:

you are not a future teller or a psychic, no matter how much your worries and anxieties insist that they know what is coming. the fact that you are in a relationship with a man in this moment has no bearing on what relationships you may find yourself in, in the future. the fact that the person you are dating currently identifies as a man is no guarantee that they will always identify that way, even! you could be with them for the next couple of weeks or for the rest of your life and there are a million permutations in between and around those two options.

what i’m saying is - obsessing over things you might not do in the future because of things you are doing now is a game that nobody wins. you have no guarantees of what the future is going to hold - you can make decisions now based on what you want and/or expect the future to hold, but stressing about the path not taken means that you’re going to spend all your time straining to see that path and like, walk into a big boulder in the path you’re actually on or something. currently, you’re not even stressing about the fork in the road that you came across. you’re on a single path, and you’re worrying about a path you haven’t come across yet, which may or may not diverge from the path that you’re on, or might be in a different forest entirely and and and- at some point you gotta love the path you’re on and take in the scenery, my darling.

which, incidentally - this path? not incompatible with queerness. and i know you know this, but feeling it can be! so hard! so i am here to remind and reassure you that - queerness is not an action. the nature of identity is not things that you do, it is the person that you are. you do not cease to be non-binary because your outfit changes - your fashion choices are simply a way of expressing your non-binary-ness, and they are not the only way, and if you are not using fashion to express your enbyness then that doesn’t make you not enby. you don’t stop being enby when there is no one there to look at you and make external judgements about your gender, and you do not stop being queer because you are a femme-adjacent person dating a cis dude.

queerness is a thing that you are. you can take actions that express that queerness more clearly to outside observation, but outside observation does not change the fact of your queerness. i will not deny that it can make it easier to participate in community, because community is in part made up of particular signs that individuals recognise in each other and gravitate towards - but who you date is only one such sign. i’m a lesbian who hasn’t dated anyone for over half a decade - am i less queer because i have not hooked up with a chick in that time? i am not. if i fuck a dude am i less of a lesbian? idk man that depends on how i feel about fucking a dude. am i romantically and sexually attracted to the dude, or was his dick just inside me? what if he just uses his fingers? i feel like i could feasibly have sex with a cis man out of sheer curiosity and still be a lesbian, sure, but what if there’s a single man that just perfectly meets me where i am despite my overwhelming preference and interest in women? what if that man is trans? what does that mEAN? at which point do we stop dissecting identity and carving lines into each other?

queerness is a useful umbrella term to cover those people who exist out of heternormativity - cismen attracted to ciswomen, ciswomen attracted to cismen, exclusively. the second the spokes of that umbrella start poking you instead of protecting you from the rain, it has ceased to do its job. identity is useful in that it helps us understand ourselves and it helps us find community in other people, but there are no perfect words that encapsulate the whole of our individual experience, and there are no individual experiences that perfectly match up with another person’s individual experience, even if we use the same word/s to describe ourselves.

you can’t be biphobic at your own experiences. it’s not biphobic to look at the way you have identified previously/up to a certain point, to recognise a difference in your current behaviour, and feel weird or discomforted by this difference. it’s not biphobic to need some time to figure shit out - who you want to be, how you want to identify, what outfit fits you best. i think identity works best as a conversation with yourself - i think we should all be checking in on ourselves to make sure that the way are living is expressing the way we are being. this urge to build walls of definable identity is a protective instinct meant to save us and gather us together from the very real threats of a heteronormative society, but it can also mean we get trapped in a place that no longer suit us.

some practical advice - if the idea of never dating a girl stresses you out that much, i’d take a break from dating this dude, because it sounds like you have some work to do in terms of figuring out what experiences you want to have in life. but only you can decide where that stress line fractures, you know? but if you read this post and you sit with it for a bit and you find that the experience of dating this man is still making you miserable, it’s okay to take some time away from it. you don’t deserve misery.

that being said - like, you’ve only been dating him a few weeks? it’s cool to just envision this relationship in terms of weeks. you truly don’t have to stretch the current experience you are having out to cover the rest of your life in one daunting ‘what if’. so long as everyone involved in a relationship is clear with the terms of engagement, go forth and short term yourself some fuckin joy.

i stress, i beg, do not deny yourself the pleasure of a joyful experience with another human soul now because you are worried about what this means about other people’s perception of some amorphous identity. you are queer. you are a femme-enby person largely attracted to woman, but dating a man. you are queer, you are enough, you don’t need to question that anymore. i think that the last year, last four years, last lifetime has more than proven that life is, frankly, too fucking short. seize your joy and run with it. whether that means dating this man or take a pause to breathe and reflect, or whatever else! you’ll still be queer.

be kind to yourself my love i wish you well <3

[sapphicambitions]

hey! hey! why do you hate the television format??

Ah yes, thank you for reminding me

I would like to state for the record before we begin that this is my personal reasons for not enjoying the format of television and not “why television is bad'' because im sure there's many people whose reasoning for liking TV is the same as my reasons for disliking them. please dont get mad at me if you disagree lmao

I feel like the short answer could be: “I have a degree in theatre and i prefer books” 

But really i hate the fact that the story is subject to change via outside forces.

In a well written play or book, there is a beginning, middle and end. It is a complete story that has been well thought out and woven together. Every detail is important and makes sense dramaturgically. You have your characters and your plot and nothing about that changes. We’re taught in Theatre School (TM) that the playwright is the first artist, and everything goes back to the playwright’s words. The story cannot change because of outside forces and it will not change over time. Once a book has been published, it is done. And yeah in theatre, a play can be done by many people with multiple interpretations of the story but it always goes back to the playwright’s words as they are the first artist and it is about honoring those words. Yada yada. you get it.

TV is always subject to change. Actors leave because there was drama on set or because they have other projects to work on. Writers change and the tone of the show changes. Or they go to a different network and the show changes. You never know how long the show is actually going to go so it could be cancelled in the middle of an important plot they never got to wrap up or the show could extend past the original plot idea and the seasons get more and more ridiculous as they’re just trying to come up with shit to do so they can keep the show running.

Like supernatural, which went on for far too fucking long and just kept spitting out nonsense when they could have wrapped up in season five.

Like the Vampire Diaries, where the main fucking character Elena Gilbert left the show (which was ridiculous!!) or when her little brother Jeremy was just like written out of the show and then never talked about again like what the hell

Like Timeless, which got cancelled after two seasons and left so many loose ends (they had to like, beg for a movie to wrap everything up) 

Like the Magicians, which just, like, sigh. Y’all know. I don’t want to get into it. Y’all know. 

Hell, even Parks and Rec, with Ann and Chris leaving the show. If Parks and Rec had been a book Ann would have never left!!! Never!!! 

Characters get pregnant because the actors who play them get pregnant and suddenly THAT’s the plot line of the season. (Wynonna Earp, Brooklyn 99, The Office, How I Met Your Mother, Sex and The City, Bones, Friends, The Big Bang Theory, Once Upon A Time, Charmed, The Vampire Diaries, Parks and Rec, Grey’s Anatomy, The X-Files, Yes I Looked Up This List To Prove My Point)

If an actor breaks their foot then the writers have to change the plot. Everything about the story is subject to change due to outside forces and that might be a selling point for some people but i do not vibe with it!! 

And also, you’re watching the story unfold over the course of time and something could change halfway through the season and they abandon the really cool plot they were working on to suddenly set up a way for them to kill off the main character of the show. (okay apparently i do want to get into it with the magicians).

Like call me a snob but i like a concise arch! Something that the show is working towards, the story that they’re telling and the thesis of the show, and the end goal they’re working towards. I just honestly don’t like the “stories wrap up in one season and will we get another? Maybe? Okay yes we will so let’s come up with a new big bad for the characters to fight who’s got ideas” or like if you get seven seasons into a show and they’re like “And here’s my long lost sister that ive literally never mentioned before but we needed something exciting for the plot so here she is!” like i hate that shit. I know my old roommate loooooved when TV shows pulled twists like that so im not saying it’s bad writing im saying I personally hate this style of writing. 

I just keep throwing in these disclaimers so no one gets pissy at me lmao 

I think what caused me to realize and put a name to these feelings was watching the Schitt’s Creek Finale. I love Schitt’s Creek because it feels like one concise story. The characters all grow and develop and have an arch and at the natural conclusion of that arch, the story wrapped up. I loved that shit. It was a game changer for me. Any other show would have kept going and the tone of the show would have been totally different and frankly im glad they wrapped it up when they did and as they did. It was a perfect ending. 

I haven’t really watched the Good Place but I’m told similar things about it. 

Avatar the Last Airbender which we can all agree is the greatest show ever written had a clear plotline throughout the whole series and a goal they were working towards even if they did have side plots, it was all building up to one endgame. And it was stellar. 

I also recently rewatched parks and rec which is one of my favorite shows of all time and i do truly love it but like the whole point of the show originally was that they were gonna build a park and there were times in the show that they just totally forgot about that goal to work on other storylines until they were like ANN’S LEAVING WE GOTTA BREAK GROUND. That’s annoying! And once parks and rec started getting really popular and making more money they were able to be like “let’s send them to england! France! DC! Scotland! San Francisco! Let’s bring in Michelle Obama and Joe Biden and John McCain and Madeleine Albright! Which like all of that was really cool and some of the best parts of the series but also just another example of how the show changed over time as they got more name recognition and money. 

Also lmao i just had the thought that it doesn't really matter what community did because the point of that show was to be batshit and they succeeded spectacularly. What a good time. Just had to add that in there. 

So yeah that’s why i hate the television format because everything is subject to change from the plot to the tone to the writing to the characters and a lot of times there isn’t a clear narrative arch as they’re just coming up with nonsense to keep the show going and i just don’t vibe with that. 

So if i hate the television format why do i still watch it, you ask? You never shut about tv shows on your blog and yet here you are declaring that you hate them. What’s up with that. Well, the answer is simple. I have major FOMO. Also lmao quite honestly i just recently came to these conclusions and put words to these feelings during the quarantine so after 23 years of being pissy at tv shows all the time i honestly probably will watch less of it. I probably wont stop completely tho. Ive already said that im not gonna watch tv shows with queer characters until the show is over and its been confirmed for me that the show treats its queer characters and viewers with respect and dignity and i stand by that. (It’s the only reason why ive started to watch black sails.) im for sure never watching another cw show again. I have literally never finished a CW show because something has happened in it halfway through that pissed me off so much i never finished the series

So that’s my opinion does anyone also feel the same way? I feel like im crazy

[buckevantommy]

'(Un)Happiest Season' review

Simply put, it wasn't enjoyable as a romance or a comedy or a Christmas flick. It failed on many fronts, but this reviewer from Salon.com puts the thing into words for Happiest Season's main failings: 

What's bad: There were two main criticisms of "Happiest Season." The first being: Can't LGBTQ audiences have a holiday movie where the main plot isn't about mining the anxiety and trauma associated with coming out, being closeted and casual homophobia? Then there's the fact that Harper really is just kind of the worst. After pushing Abby back in the closet, Harper ditches her in a town where she doesn't know anyone to go drink with her ex-boyfriend until two in the morning, then proceeds to call Abby "suffocating" when called on it. It's a pattern of s**ty behavior that is pervasive and present throughout the movie, so her redemption arc doesn't feel super genuine. 

Why can't we have main queer characters in Christmas movies without their presence being all about their queerness? We want fluffy festiveness, dammit! They could've made Harper less selfish and more attentive while still playing into the *I'm not out yet Because Reasons so we need to hide our gay relationship* trope, but they didn't. Who knows why, but what a waste. 🎄👩‍❤️‍👩☃️

^ Look at that trailer and tell me you don't expect Misunderstandings with fun and tropey antics + Domestic Christmas Shenanigans + Comfort for Hurt! You will be sorely disappointed. 😞 

NOTE: The flick does have a few good moments. And it's probably worth the watch just to see what's missing/mishandled when it comes to queer characters and queer romances in mainstream movies. 

But it's not really fun or funny or heart-warming - where are the snowball fights? Insightful conversations? Christmas elements like eggnog/spiced wine, candycanes, mistletoe? Where are the many colourful side characters and the hungover brunches? We get one scene of ice-skating for a few minutes and it's wasted on sibling rivalry bs rather than, say.. Abby and Harper skating together but not being aloud to touch—omg the tension!! 😍 

There's just not enough comfort for the hurt Abby (Kstew) goes through; the film wholly lacks those warm-n-fuzzy Christmas vibes; there's just way more wrong with it than is right with it - which sucks, because this had the potential to be such a great movie if only Harper was written as less ignorant/selfish and we'd gotten more enjoyable family interactions and more festive fun - like a celebration in town. Instead we get a few limited shots of the adorable town, a crappy bar, and an OTT fancy Christmas party for performative rich white folk on a career path for power and "perfection" (ie. wholesome family values). 

The story they went with was definitely better suited for a dramatic film, so in a romcom setting it really didn't work. Plus the side-characters were flat; we needed more depth from the supporting characters, more meaningful interactions. 

^ Look at those intro credits!! Look at all the domestic happy moments and tell me you don't want to see a movie filled with such fluffy festive goodness!! Well, if you don't want to see such moments, don't worry because you won't. I naturally thought we were going to get this kind of romantic-and-non-romantic happiness dispersed throughout the entire film, but no. Not a one. There's 5 minutes of Happy Couple at the start, and that's it 📸☹️ (unless you count a photo collage of the happy ending and year that follows stuffed into the end credits). 

BTW: That intro song is the most Christmasy song in the whole movie. The soundtrack features modern pop songs which 1) don't help set the festive vibe and 2) are really fucking annoying; the song choices are grating, not pleasant, not enjoyable, and they overpower the scenes with a whole lotta noise. I really wish we'd gotten more tunes like the one above. 🎶 

About the image below—Abby is actually miserable the entire time, getting worse by the day, barely a smile seen on her.. while Harper is the one schmoozing her family and contacts with teeth bared, so.. this image isn't what you'll get, just fyi:

(also: the only POC actors they had were the perfectionist-stone-faced-bitch's husband and his girlfriend - wife + hubby being secretly separated.) 

The things that the Salon reviewer liked are the same things I did (see below), but imho even those elements weren't enough to save this film from being: 

an infuriating 102 minute-comedy of errors buoyed by a healthy dose of gaslighting 

More cons of the flick are pointed out by denofgeek.com: 

Some of its issues come from the structure of the film, which shoehorns very real queer struggles into wacky rom-com tropes too fluffy to contain the stakes at hand. Meanwhile the choice to have one half of the lead couple be so aggressively and repeatedly cruel—while her high school ex Riley, played by the ever-perfect Aubrey Plaza was standing right there having all the chemistry in the world with the other romantic lead—was a fatal one.

It really was a dramatic plot idea crammed into a fluffy narrative. You can see the conflicting genres fighting to stay alive and they both die a slow, agonisingly dull death throughout the film. The whole *Abby being converted to loving Christmas by Harper inviting her to spend the holidays with her family* thing, only to have Harper force their relationship + Abby into the closet. Straight conversion much? I'm 100% sick of heteronormative bs in my queer Christmas films. 

For the most part, when you're not feeling for Abby's harsh treatment by her would-be fiance and everyone but Riley ignoring her completely, you will be bored af from the lack of festive cheer - not just twinkle lights and boisterous seasonal music, but those good ol' homey family Christmas vibes. With the Harper house + family members, everything's a performance, so that lack of sincerity and warmth makes for a depressing viewing experience: 

^ Jane (one of Harper's 2 sisters) is the only character allowed to be consistently genuine in the narrative (aside from John, but he's restricted mostly to phonecalls, and Riley - but even she's keeping Harper's secrets). Jane is the only character who is naturally vibrant and reminds us of some of the reasons we get excited about Christmas movies: to feel joy and to enjoy the company around us during the holiday season! 🎄☃️🥳 But rather than give us a fun day out with Jane + Abby, we get Abby + the second sister (i don't even remember her name, just BitchFace) which leads to more bad treatment of Abby - this time by two spoiled af no-smile rich kids. *le sigh* Jane carries the spark of honest joy for the entire Harper clan and that is TOO MUCH to expect of one character, let alone a side-character. 😪 

There are so many ways the story could've been tweaked to make more sense and be somewhat enjoyable, including: 

The orphan!Abby thing is just bad. Rather than give Abby a voice, chances to let her personality shine, almost everyone interacts with her to merely briefly express their condolences for her long-dead parents 🙄 

Abby is a pet-minder, ie. she's an animal lover, yet at no point do we see her interact with animals! Not a dog or cat or hamster, no reindeer at the petting zoo, nothing. 🐕🐈🦎🦜🐠

Riley + Abby getting together (even just a kiss) 👄 

Abby + Harper separating so Harper can get her shit together - and then we get several flashforward shots of them separately living their lives (Harper especially), and then meeting back up again - maybe the next holiday season, after some much-needed time apart 🏃‍♀️🤸‍♀️ 

side characters who engage with Abby in a sincere, meaningful way instead of ignoring her (again, we got Riley, but she was outside of the family dynamic) 😊 

MORE FESTIVE CHEER! where were all the staple Christmassy passtimes, the smile-inducing season-specific experiences??? 🎉 

More from denofgeek: 

Where the script gets into trouble is that it doesn’t distinguish between Harper being closeted and her poor treatment of Abby. The two are separate issues and treating them as one does no favors to Harper, nor others struggling with the closet. As Dan Levy’s beautiful monologue late in the movie alludes to, the closet is a safety mechanism—but it’s not a free pass to treat people like garbage. [...] 😟🏳️‍🌈

Even a brief conversation teasing out that being in the closet doesn’t justify how Harper acted, and that plenty of people in the closet don’t treat others like trash, would have been important. Instead once Harper is out (which the movie takes pains to make clear only happened because Harper’s sister Sloane outed her), and a gesture so small it could never credibly be called grand is made, all bad behavior is washed away. [...] 😤🙅‍♀️ 

The jarring underlying issue is that 'Happiest Season' attempts to apply the standard rom-com and made-for-TV-holiday-movie tropes to queer life. So Abby having to go back into the closet isn’t framed as a painful regression or being forced to deny an essential part of herself, but rather a fun twist, in the vein of “but the guy she insulted on the plane is the owner of the ornament factory she has to impress to win the Christmas contest!”🚪😒 

All of Harper’s behavior adds up to making her feel like something the audience wants Abby to be free of, not someone Abby should be fighting for. Once Riley tells Abby about Harper’s cruelty in high school, where Harper outed Riley and mocked her rather than standing up for her or finding an excuse that protected them both, it becomes incredibly difficult to root for the lead couple to get back together, or for Harper at all. 👏💃 

With this information, Harper’s other transgressions go from frustrating to part of a larger pattern. Sadly, it’s a pattern Harper repeats when her sister outs her and she throws Abby under the (lesbian) bus. 🤬 

FAVE THINGS: 

all interactions between John (Dan Levy) + Abby (he's witty, honest, and 100% the most entertaining element of the entire film; i wish we'd gotten more of him) 😆 

Riley (Aubrey Plaza, Harper's ex) + Abby's scenes together because CHEMISTRY, both between the characters and the actors 👩‍❤️‍👩

Notable between Abby + Riley scenes include 3 instances of Riley comforting Abby's hurt: outside at the fancy party (Abby feeling excluded/ignored/not worth anyone's time due to the way they treat her even though they don't know she's gay), at a gay bar in town (sandwiched by scenes where Abby's made to feel like crap by Harper), and at the fancy home Christmas party where Riley gets Abby something stronger to drink after hearing Abby was going to propose to Harper (but it's been a helluva shitty week and those plans are dead) 👭 

Every scene with Riley was blessed relief from the hurt and discomfort and boredom of the rest of the time with Harper's family. 🤩 

Sister Jane, for being a genuinely fun character 🤗 who was written starkly different to her family and treated somewhat like an outcast 

Aubrey + Kstew killin it in various pantsuits 👀 

In contrast, Riley connects Abby to queerness, bringing her to an LGBTQ bar to decompress and enjoy a Christmas-themed drag performance. It’s the most relaxed and comfortable Abby is on screen since the opening scenes, a chance to glimpse Abby’s authentic self before Harper summons her back to heterosexuality, and where she once again ignores and disappoints her. Riley actually talks to Abby at the various holiday parties whereas Harper keeps leaving her to please her family, especially her father. It’s not hard for the natural chemistry between Plaza and Stewart to take over

I wouldn't watch this film again. For a hopeful Christmasy love story I'd just watch all Abby + Riley's scenes: 

In closing, here's a batshit article title from observer.com that just makes you go, huh? 🧐:

‘Happiest Season’ Isn’t Happy, But That Doesn’t Make It a Bad Rom-Com

Um.. yes, yes it does. 

Rom-Coms are supposed to be fun, light-hearted stories about love even when the plot deals with lying - The Proposal, Sweet Home Alabama - so a movie that leaves you hurting more than comforted in sympathy with one of the main characters because the (apparent) love of their life is treating them like shit, then it doesn't deserve to be in the genre of Rom-Com. 👩‍❤️‍💋‍👨💞🎬

In summary, Abby and Harper got 5 minutes of happiness in the beginning, and an eventual happy ending after a super rocky middle. The journey was painful and unenjoyable, and it made their happy ending unbelievable and, for Harper, undeserved because of her behaviour through 90% of the story. 

In short: it was not, in fact, the happiest season. 😕👎

[abigailnussbaum]

How to do Garak/Bashir in Canon DS9

Yesterday there was a fun tweet asking people how they would remake DS9 if they were given the option today.

Which led to some fun discussions (you can see my answers here). Obviously one thing that pretty much everyone said was “canon Garak/Bashir”. That’s generally considered one of the show’s big missed opportunities, with both Andrew J. Robinson and some of the show’s producers expressing regret over never having gone there. But it did get me thinking: how would you tell this sort of story? Because look, it’s one thing to write Garak/Bashir in fanfic, filling in gaps in the canon or changing the entire tone of the story to suit your ‘ship. But if you’re retelling DS9 along basically the same lines - the end of the Cardassian occupation, the discovery of the wormhole, the Jem’hadar, the Dominion, the war with Cardassia - and with the personalities of the characters and the tone of the show largely unchanged, how do you fit Garak/Bashir into that story?

There are some obvious issues with trying to work this ship into the show’s story and overall tone. For one thing, Bashir is a Starfleet officer. We like to make fun of his early, annoying incarnation, but even in that form he is clearly a decent, principled man with strong values. It’s one thing to flirt (literally or figuratively) with a mysterious, sexy spy, but getting into a relationship with him would not only be stupid, it would run counter to Bashir’s image of himself. You could go in a dark direction with this - Garak seduces Bashir purely as a way of gaining power over him (and perhaps out of force of habit); maybe they end up in a kind of Hannibal/Will relationship. But that doesn’t seem sustainable in the long-term, or congruent with the type of show DS9 was. Bashir can’t trust Garak, and Garak has done things that Bashir would consider disgusting. That’s something you have to take into consideration if you want to write them as a long-term couple.

It’s also worth considering that, as much as the Garak/Bashir pairing lingers over the fannish perception of the show, it’s not actually that prominent in the series itself. The last episode that I would call a Garak/Bashir story, “Our Man Bashir”, is an early S4 episode, well before the Dominion War happens. And Garak is absent for a lot of the later developments in Bashir’s life - “Doctor Bashir, I Presume” (you’d think Garak, with his complicated relationship with his father, would have something to say about Julian having been illegally genetically enhanced by his parents) or “Statistical Probabilities” (a troupe of savants who claim to be able to predict the course of the war would surely be of interest to Garak). In most of these stories, Bashir is accompanied by O’Brien, a much safer option as far as suppressed sexual tension is concerned (it should go without saying that this feels like a deliberate choice on the show’s part, to undermine any idea of a Garak/Bashir relationship). Meanwhile, Bashir is absent from most of Garak’s important Dominion War stories - his relationship with Ziyal and her death, his position in Damar’s rebellion, “In the Pale Moonlight”. So if you’re going to retell DS9 with Garak/Bashir as a real ship, you'd have to rewrite a lot of these stories to take that into account.

Finally, you’ve got the show’s ending, which is an extremely dark one for Garak, who gets everything he thought he wanted - his position restored, a place of honor in Cardassian society - just at the point where Cardassia is decimated and, in his words, left dead. Working a romance with Bashir into this ending would be tricky, and risks ending up with the final scenes of Man of Steel - two people making out atop a mass grave.

(Obviously, I’m taking it as a given that this hypothetical version of DS9 is much, much better at writing mature, complicated romantic relationships than the real one. Most actual DS9 romance was painfully juvenile, and the one exception, Sisko/Kasidy, was also an extremely low-drama ship - Sisko literally sent Kasidy to jail and the next time they met they were like “so, that was a bit of a bump in the road; dinner later?” It should go without saying that Garak/Bashir would not be a low-drama ship, so the writing would need to be there to support it.)

Anyway, complicated but obviously not impossible. This is what I’ve come up with for how I would rewrite the show with Garak/Bashir as an ongoing couple. I’m sure there’s plenty of fanfic with other, better ideas.

To start with, lose the claustrophobia business. Or, you know, keep it, but the reason Garak was expelled from the Obsidian Order and banished from Cardassia is that he’s gay. (To be fair, I feel like “claustrophobia” was pretty clearly code even in the original show.) A lot of people in the upper echelons of the Cardassian hierarchy know this - Dukat certainly knows - and miss no opportunity to harass him about it.

Obviously, in this version of the show Cardassia is deeply queerphobic. I don’t think this is a huge leap. Cardassian society is deeply conformist, and family-oriented in a fascist-adjacent sort of way that prioritizes the father as the master of the home. It’s hard to imagine a society like that tolerating deviations from gender norms, and it seems fair to assume that reprecussions for such deviations would be severe.

Garak doesn’t actually have a problem with this - or at least, not that he expresses. Garak’s defining trait is that he believes in, and loves, Cardassia deeply, and espouses its chauvinistic (in both senses of the word) values to anyone who will listen. But at the same time, he’s smart enough (and enough of an outsider) to know how hollow and destructive those values really are. So Garak will explain to anyone who challenges him on it that Cardassian homophobia is right and proper, while knowing that he has fallen victim to it himself.

Bashir is out. Though “out” might not be the right word because the Federation is so nonchalant about queerness that the notion of being closeted doesn’t really exist anymore (this is a version of Star Trek where we actually follow through on the promise of a more progressive future). But at any rate, to Bashir and the other Starfleet characters, him being gay is so unremarkable that it doesn’t even come up until his and Garak’s frienship is already established. This deeply shocks Garak - he knew humans were perverted, but the good Doctor, his friend? Bashir, meanwhile, wastes no opportunity to needle Garak about his society’s barbaric homophobia (Garak: “humans may be prone to such... urges, but Cardassians are made of finer stuff”; Bashir: *rolls eyes so hard he can see the back of his head*). But at the same time, and without being entirely willing to admit it to himself, Garak is intrigued.

And so we continue for about five seasons. Garak flirts with Bashir, partly because he thinks this is a way of unsettling the good Doctor, but really because he wants him. Bashir assumes that it’s all an act, and plays along with it a little because, hey, sexy spy. But he never imagines that it could go somewhere real, and probably wouldn’t follow through if it did.

And then Bashir gets replaced with a Changeling (this is a version of DS9 where that idea was seeded throughout the first half of the fifth season instead of being decided on five minutes before “In Purgatory’s Shadow” started shooting). And the changeling takes one look at Garak, sees an obvious in, and seduces him. Which clearly causes some awkwardness when Garak finds the real Bashir in a Dominion prison camp.

Bashir finds out. Worf tells him (this is a version of Worf who isn’t weirdly sexist and judgmental about other people’s sex lives). (Bashir: “why is Garak being so weird around me?”; Worf: “he and the fake you were doing it”; Bashir: “what”; Worf: “they were boning”; Bashir: “WHAT”; Worf: “they were engaging in sexual intercourse”; Bashir: “that's not possible. Garak only flirts with me to keep me on my toes”; Worf: *shrugs* “if that’s what you want to call it”.)

So now Bashir is upset because he’s spent the last five years bugging Garak about Cardassian homophobia and it turns out that Garak was a victim of it, plus he’s now been victimized by someone wearing Bashir’s face. And Garak is upset because he let his attraction to Bashir (Garak: “my base lust!”) blind him to the fact that his friend had been replaced by a changeling, leading to him being comromised as an agent (I will leave it as an exercise to the readers which one bothers him more). And, well, if you can’t get from there to romance on your own, you may not have read enough fanfic in your life.

Then you get the war, and honestly, I don’t know. You could do an on/off thing. You could make it a very casual relationship in between the two of them trying not to die and/or lose the Alpha Quadrant to the Dominion. You could have Bashir say “fuck it, I might die tomorrow and this guy makes me happy; who cares if my boyfriend is a liar and a murderer”. You could even go the Worf/Jadzia route and have them muse romantically about having a life together after the war. But either way, they spend more time around each other than they did in the original series.

But! When Garak goes back to Cardassia to help Damar’s rebellion, there’s a lot of tension between them, because Damar heard from Dukat that Garak is a pervert (you could still keep Ziyal’s death and Garak’s anger at Damar over it; those two always made more sense as friends anyway). And then it turns out that there’s an entire Cardassian queer underground, and in typical Cardassian fashion they’ve turned it into a whole spy network with operatives at every level of government. (Garak: “why did you never approach me?”; queer Cardassian underground: “dude, have you met you?”) And they’re willing to work with Damar if he promises that in the new Cardassia, they will no longer be persecuted (I think this dovetails pretty nicely with Garak’s observation that Damar needs to be disillusioned about the flaws of Cardassian society). So all of a sudden Garak is looking at a future where what he is doesn’t make him a pariah anymore.

And then you get to the destruction of Cardassia, and, again, I’m not sure how that combines with Garak/Bashir. The entire ending of DS9 is pretty rough on romantic pairings in general, but at least when Kira/Odo and Sisko/Kasidy break up, it’s bittersweet, and in service of other new beginnings. Garak’s ending is just bleak, and I’m not sure how you deal with a romance on top of that. The best I can come up with is Bashir saying “yes, this is horrible, but you can rebuild, and if you need my help with that, I’m not far”, leaving a door open for them to reconnect in the future.

Thoughts?

[grocerystoredean]

Hey bestie!! Yeah that was me the other day with the mangos, seriously I really shoulda looked it up or something cuz that was almost as bad as the time i accidentally used powdered sugar instead of flour. I hope whatever beings that look down at us like ants talk about me like posts about jensen ackles. Maybe i wanna be the pretty man with the fruity little boots! You ever been in onea those houses that look like hgtv? I Do Not Belong Here. Also i forgot my meds at home lmfaooo. Youve probably seen those oil pumps, the ones that look like birds pecking, yeah? (unrelated but onetime we found some frog eggs in the water tank of one and we took em home and raised em up into frogs!). And they have those out in the ocean, one exploded recently i think?? So we was watchin a video on em and apparently they build em close to each other and idk if the guys from one rig will boat to another to like play cards or something but i think it would be fun if they did. Also i think theyre kinda rad looking, like if they werent so bad for the enviroment and stuff i think ppl should just live on those. I guess itd be hard to make money there? Tho they can be fairly self sufficient too i think. But ok there was this scooby doo episode on onea these and velma was like gay for this mermaid?? Idk it was pretty much my fav one except ofc she turned out not actually being a mermaid which was lame cuz i think mermaids fuckin rock. Tho i think the idea of freshwater mermaids is much cooler. Like imagine getting pulled to ur death in a river not by the undertow but cuz u stepped too close to a mermaid hole. Fuckin awesome shit there. Ohh speaking of which I seen ur thing on japanesenatural, but like. Thats such a clever take on spn??? Everything i know about japanese ppl comes secondhand, friends, neighbors, social studies, etc. but i like reading about ur stuff on it. Every time someone takes spn and looks at it through a different lense, especially identity based, its always so good. Its about giving fictional characters ur lived experiences and processing things thru them ig. Also i saw yall was talking about poems earlier and while i dont know a lot of em i rlly like that one about the orange and idk if someone brought that one up already. “I love you im glad i exist” OK!!!!!! OK!!!!!!!!!!! I am feeling some things! Love how cas is very into bees like every time this bitch mentions insects im just!!!! Mmmm and i personally, being rhe person who has a ton of useless info on insects (not so much specifically bees but i know some. Mostly cuza castiel actually.) very much enjoy this. Yessssss lets talk about insects ily bestie!! I love being friends with other queer ppl…. Like omg same! I dont remember what i said to u last time also i feel like i just talked a lot so im gonna go before i start repeating myself also isnt it so frickin crazy its sunday??? And like the 4th of july. Here they only can have sponsored city approved firework shows so they already did those, but back home peoplell still be shootin off fireworks till next sunday lol. Im glad we arent doing anything this year. Learning from perspectives outside of the country has made patriotism taste much more rotten. How ru????????? I think its weird when ppl have cameras everywhere like in the house im in theres an ipad set up in the kitchen and u can see every angle of the outsidea the house. Some guy in my neighborhood has like floodlights and a buncha cameras all over their house that always comes on when im walkin the dogs at night and ik they got robbed a few times so /ig/ it makes sense but also theyre all really annoying and the dad is a cop and every person in my neighborhood who got robbed was a total asshole so like??? Is it rlly a crime if its funny?? Mbby if u stopped posting about qanon on facebook ppl would like u more smh. No but crime is bad ig. I wish ppl would garden with me cuz a lotta these people have nice manicured lawns (and seriously FUCK those. Biodiversity ftw babey!!) but dont rlly know how to garden which is different from me cuz i know how im just bad at it

DSFJJSDFJKL dba first off. powdered sugar instead of FLOUR????? also im so glad you like japanesenatural i think it's very fun as well! tasty treat just for me. as for the orange poem it's literally my favorite poem of all time i read it for the first time like sitting in class and fully tearing up it's so good. happy fourth of july to you too! i hope you have many people to talk insects with bestie. as for gardens i literally killed my little cactus i kept in a window sooooo. oops. i'll leave that to u guys.

[johnseedfanclub]

microscope, mixtape, ufo, and parachute for Angel please!!

okay....This one’s quiiiiite lengthy sorry about that 😅😅😅

Thanks for the ask! ♥️

Hope y’all like this one~

microscope: zoom in – describe the little, insignificant details about an OC.

Angel loves Thai iced tea and sweet drinks! He only drinks coffee for the caffeine but doesn’t actually like coffee (he prefers his with a lot of sugar/flavoring to cover up the bitter coffee taste)

Angel wishes he could have a pet but is scared he might hurt them with his bad mood swings

He secretly loves and wants plushies. He also has an attachment to them but never admits it because he’s “too old” for them.

His type is brunette, charming, suave, rich/wealthy men (not literally but is a nice add on yk~) , with light colored eyes (coincidentally it sounds like John but he can’t stand him)

Actually acts out/badly for a bit of attention he usually does it for shits and giggles but does it to receive a reaction out of someone whether it be from the person he’s talking to or the audience watching

He actually wishes people gave him more affection and reassurance. He never truly knows how much his friends appreciate him an a lot of times he feels like they don’t much. He doesn’t tell them the truth though because he doesn’t want to come off as jealous, needy or as an “attention seeker”

Likes dressing feminine more than masculine. He absolutely HATES men’s clothing Hawaiian shirts, turtlenecks, tuxedos/formal wear are the only exceptions (he would pretend to like the boxes of men’s clothing he would receive from friends as gifts. Would never even wear them. Maybe once if he doesn’t want to hurt their feelings)

Canonically he is “blonde” but he’s actually a brunette (light brown hair) but likes to dye his hair blonde instead

ufo: identity! what are some key identifying qualities or traits of your OC(s)? how to they identify in regards to gender/sexuality?

Special Qualities: his personality. Angel has a very unique personality compared to everyone he knows. He has this funny, mean/sarcastic, chill vibe to him. He always teases and plays around with his friends, not to mention he’s quite blunt and honest with anyone (even more harsh to people who annoy him). And though he seems like a small angry chihuahua at times, he’s a real sweetheart to everyone. He is never afraid to try anything new, no matter now fucking crazy or dangerous it may be he’s totally down to do it. That’s why both Eden’s Gate and the Resistance fear

Good Traits: He’s comedic (even at the worst times or when you need it), is the best at throwing house parties (even at 30 years old), he can help you with any favor it doesn’t even matter what it is (almost impossible to ask him of something he can’t do), he’ll take care of you when you’re sick/hungover/injured/depressed/having a panic attack, he’s a great cook and willing to share whatever he makes with anyone (if there’s enough), and he’s always generous (a big gift giver)

Bad Traits: He can a bit overly aggressive/rude (sometimes accidentally), he’s bad at remembering/keeping tract of things (he knows everyone’s favorite animal but totally forgets their birthdays and/or names), tends to crack under too much (bad) pressure and become extremely aggressive or violent, holds in his true feelings and emotions, has really bad mood swings, can be easy to piss off, can be too loud (mouthed) at times

Sexuality: Gay (attracted to men)

Gender identity: depends on the way he dresses/his mood normally he prefers he/him/they/them but if he dresses more feminine (wears makeup, tight dresses, feminine accessories) you could call him by she/him, or even they/them. (No pronoun preferences when he cross dresses)

#squad: who’s friends with who? what are the squad dynamics like?

Angel has few friends outside Hope County. The main people he’s friends with are Mary May, Jerome, Staci Pratt, Sharky Boshaw, Hurk Drubman Jr, Adelaide, Faith Seed, the Angel Twins (Jeremiah and Isaiah), the Whitetails, and a few of the peggies of Eden’s Gate

The only squads that Angel are apart of are

Sharky + Hurk = The Bomb Squad

Peggies = Eden’s “Gays”

Angel, Sharky, and Hurk are like the best and worst pairing. They’re all sweet, funny, and humble but can be obnoxious and destructive as FUCK. Anytime they go somewhere to find/finish some mission. It always ends in them leaving a trail of either, fire, gunpowder, or an explosion of some sort (either vehicle, silo, bliss tank, or outpost/building). Don’t even ask or mention what they do for leisure time. More crazy stunts and tricks that could put any normal person with a normal brain in the ER in critical condition. And at the bar? Jesus Christ. They order enough alcohol to kill 5 men but somehow make it through the night. And if they aren’t drinking, they’re sure as hell smoking weed or whatever the fuck Sharky has been brewing in his trailer (it’s most likely a 50/50 chance that you’ll pass out or die from it). They’re definitely one crazy ass group, nothing you would ever even expect, not even out of a crazy...Hollywood...Michael Bay movie. A feminine Latino city gay, an old cheery bomb-rocket enthusiast, and a insane pyromaniac that has a warrant. There definitely isn’t a dull moment with these three. But...you’re good as gone if you’re stuck with them for more than 11 minutes.

Angel and the Eden’s “Gays” are a pretty decent sized group of 6 men (plus the Twins some days) that are the few queer men of Eden’s Gate. Originally they seemed quite closeted because of the cult’s religion and some of its rules. But with Angel around they soon became another loud, obnoxious group of men. Before the whole group was “founded” the original 6 peggies (including John Seed himself) didn’t like Angel at all because of how loud and “out” he seemed (not to mention the carelessness). But as Angel visited the bunkers more often (after he was kidnapped by John) they slowly grew fond of him. Angel would always do kind gestures to learn more about Eden’s followers by helping them with chores, tasks, bringing them food and treats from outside the compound (though he wasn’t supposed to), and even help them find comfort in their own troubles. Though Angel liked a lot of the members he really favored 6 different followers in particular Connor, Michael, Anthony, Jace, and Jefferey (those who were the first followers he interacted with). Now they’re known as Eden’s Gays troublemakers. They sneak out to the Spread Eagle to drink, host secret parties in Hope County, and smoke as well. There isn’t a moment where they aren’t breaking the cult’s rules. They’re the only group of peggies some of the resistance members trust mostly because Angel made a rule of not attacking or harming them and actually enjoy being around. They’re definitely always getting into trouble with both sides too, much like Angel, starting small fights during church/sermons, fooling around on the job, or going around Hope County not to attack the locals but pester the living shit out of them. They almost stop being violent mean peggies and instead just become this goofy comedic group of young men. (Fun Fact: the “Eden’s Gays” were actually a thing before the cult became hostile *during its first few years in Hope County* and John was mostly the “leader” of the crazy group)

mixtape: 5 songs that describe your OC(s) or songs they themselves would like.

Ohohohooooo~

(The possibilities are endless for this one so I’m sticking to a Baddie playlist he would listen to)

May I ~ Flo Mili

Literal Legend ~ Ayesha Erotica

Yikes ~ Nicki Minaj

I like it ~ Cardi B

Sway With Me ~ Saweetie & GALAXARA

parachute: who does your OC(s) trust the most? who makes them feel safe? who would they do absolutely anything for?

Missy (my U.S. Marshal oc), is one of the few people he trusts the most. During the time from when he was arrested to when he was released out of jail (and transferring to Hope County Jail), she was always like a mother figure to him. And though she was supposed to investigate Angel’s murder and drug charges, she treated him kindly and respect, instead of a criminal. Without Missy, Angel might as well been as good as dead since she was the one that helped him move to a psychiatric ward instead of federal prison after discovering who he really was. Even after he was released, Missy still treated him as if he was her own son. She allowed him to stay at her penthouse apartment when Angel told her his father had disown him and he had no where to go. She always cared about him, made sure he ate, drank water, took care of himself, and even helped him get a better mindset. Though Angel still teases Missy by calling her “Mama Bear (Missy)” or “Mother Goose (or hen)” he’s forever grateful she was always there for him.

[katrinawritesthings]

jongtae/taekey; Taemin voice: hm.; nc-17

its Elle's birthday nd this is the most Elle energy fic I have ever written 

🐌 crop top jonghyun  

🐌 gremlin taemin  

🐌 queer Supreme key

🐌 horny giggly jongtae

🐌 grump/pest taekey

@taketaemtoyourleader here you go uwu

“Now, see, Kibs,” Jonghyun says. His arms come up heavy and snug on Taemin’s shoulders, hands playing with his hair. “You know I like you because you put up with this every day and you never come complain to me.”

“It’s ‘cause he’s got a crush on me,” Taemin says.

Taemin’s dick is in bliss, which means that he's in bliss, and he bites a lazy smile as he lifts his arms up to hold onto his headboard. He has soft fluffy pillows nestled under him, loud hard rock music playing around him, and Jonghyun above him, fucking himself perfectly up and down on his cock in time with the music. He’s hot and sweaty and his whole body feels fuzzy, blurry, floaty with the pleasure that thumps through his veins and tingles under his skin.

He rolls his hips up to meet Jonghyun each time he comes down, their skin slapping together almost loud enough to be heard over the music, their bodies perfectly in tune with each other. Jonghyun is all sweat and smiles as well. His grin is nice sharp teeth between nice plush lips, his nice soft light brown hair is wild and mussed on his forehead, his body is full of nice thick muscles flexing with each movement. The fuzzy lavender shoulderless crop top sweater that he showed up in is even more askew than before, so far down his right shoulder that Taemin can practically see half of his chest, but it still clings tight around his ribs so Taemin can see his pretty abs and each deep line between them.

Taemin lowers one hand back down to feel, to run his fingers over Jonghyun’s muscles before he just holds his waist tight to guide him even better on his cock. He wishes he could see Jonghyun’s cock, heavy and leaky, but it’s hiding underneath his cute pleated burgundy skirt. He feels like maybe if he fucked Jonghyun harder Jonghyun would want to jerk off, so he does just that, digging his heels into the mattress and driving his hips up to snap against Jonghyun’s, to fuck his cock in deeper and put more pressure on his prostate.

Almost immediately Jonghyun’s eyelids flutter, his breath catches, his fingernails dig into Taemin’s chest through his shirt. He licks his lips and looks back at Taemin again with a wide, lazy smirk, eyes little glimmers through his lashes.

“You’re so good, dude,” he says loud over the music. “You’re so--fucking good.” His breath caught again there because Taemin slipped his hand around to cop a feel of his booty under his skirt. Taemin grins back lazily, shaking his bangs out of his eyes.

“You too,” he pants. His confidence boosts a little, enough for him to want to flip them over and really show Jonghyun what he can do, to hold his legs up and fuck him wide open. That would probably let him see Jonghyun’s dick, too, so he makes the snap decision to do just that.

Well, try to, at least; as he props himself up on one arm and wraps the other snug around Jonghyun’s waist to prepare to roll them over, they’re interrupted by his dorm door opening.

“God, Taemin, what have I told you about the fucking music, you’re gonna--y’all.”

Kibum stops in the doorway, phone in one hand and backpack dangling out of the other, and just looks at the both of them, mouth an annoyed line. Taemin is suddenly grateful now that Jonghyun’s skirt is at least covering their sexy bits as Kibum closes the door behind him and finishes dumping his bag on the floor.

“Hi,” he says lazily, lifting a hand from Jonghyun’s waist to wave. On top of him, Jonghyun looks away from Kibum, grinning at the wall and very obviously fighting back giggles with slightly pinked cheeks. Cute.

“Okay,” Kibum says. “Ignoring, this,” he says, waving a vague hand at Jonghyun, “turn your fucking music down, you’re gonna get us in trouble with the RA again.”

“Ooh,” Jonghyun says, He pops back up brightly, smiling wide at Kibum and raising his hand high above his head. “That’s me!” he chirps. This time Taemin looks away to muffle his laugh as Kibum just looks at them and then closes his eyes to sigh loudly.

“That’s--what the fuck, Jonghyun,” Kibum says. Jonghyun’s hand comes back down to Taemin’s chest and he shrugs easily.

“Sex good,” he says. “But anyway--his music’s fine. I already had him turn it down. But I actually was gonna come over here anyway to talk to you.”

“Ha,” Taemin says loudly. Ha fucking ha. Finally Kibum’s getting in trouble for something. Up until now Taemin thought it was just him that Jonghyun came to reprimand, but apparently he was just a side note? Hell yeah. Oh how the turntables.

“What the fuck? Why, what did I do?” Kibum whines. Jonghyun holds up one finger and leans forward on top of Taemin to reach for his phone on the headboard. As he does so he pulls halfway off of Taemin’s cock, and then when he moves back he settles back down, sucking him in all the way, and Taemin closes his eyes and hums happily as he holds Jonghyun down in his lap and rolls his hips up just slightly. Nice. “Quit getting off right in front of me,” Kibum snaps. Taemin chooses to ignore him and start feeling up Jonghyun’s sweaty thighs where he can get at the soft patches of skin between his over-the-knee socks and skirt. Those also are nice.

“You,” Jonghyun says slowly, thumbing through his phone with one hand and drawing little lines on Taemin’s chest with the other. “Are bothering the girls in the all gender bathroom and making a mess with all of your makeup, apparently.” He looks up from his phone to Kibum, who’s scowling even more, a familiar expression of indignant fury on his face. Taemin lifts his brows blandly. Sounds fake to him.

“I--they’re--every fucking day, I’m just--and I never--but they always--”

“Now, now,” Jonghyun says, wiggling his finger in his best stern mother gesture. “I know you’re real clean in there and I know that this complaint is a thinly veiled sludge of queerphobia because they’re upset that you exist outside of the binary in what they think is their space even though it’s literally a gender neutral bathroom made for you and not for them and they can shove it up their asses,” he says. “But you know it’s still my job to come deliver the complaint and make them think I care.”

He tosses his phone into the sheets next to them and sits up a little straighter, rolls his hips just the tiniest amount on Taemin’s dick with a little wink, and looks back to Kibum, who looks significantly less angry and significantly more grumpy and pacified.

“And I mostly wanted to ask you if I could tell them off about the queerphobic thing or if you don’t want that kind of stress in your life and I should just lie and tell them that you promised to be a good enby and clean up more to get them off your back.” He shrugs simply. “I don’t wanna drag you into discourse if you don’t wanna be in it,” he says.

“Hey, that’s real thoughtful,” Taemin says. He reaches up to pinch Jonghyun’s soft cheek when Jonghyun smiles down at him with pleased crescent eyes.

“Thanks,” he says.

“I mean,” Kibum sighs. He runs his fingers through his hair and then sighs again, a big puff of air through his lips. “I’m guessing I can’t go yell at them myself?” he asks hopefully. Taemin snorts; Jonghyun grins apologetically and shakes his head.

“I’ve been doing so well at keeping this floor nice and calm and peaceful this semester,” he says. “I’m gonna get a raise if I keep it up.”

“Oh, well, we wouldn’t wanna interfere with that, would we,” Kibum mutters. Jonghyun pouts; Taemin sits up and wraps his arms around his waist protectively, frowning at his roommate.

“Be nice to him, he’s our mom,” he says. He’s their mom for the whole floor and he loves and supports them all so much.

“Do not,” Kibum says, one hand lifting only to chop back down through the air with each pause for emphasis. “Call him. Your mom. While. Your penis. Is. Inside of him.”

“Mommy,” Taemin grins, nuzzling into Jonghyun’s chest just to be a gremlin. He noses into the hem of Jonghyun’s sweater until he can push it down enough to reveal his nip and give it a tiny kiss. “Mommy, let me succ nourishment from your breast,” he murmurs into it.

“Now, see, Kibs,” Jonghyun says. His arms come up heavy and snug on Taemin’s shoulders, hands playing with his hair. “You know I like you because you put up with this every day and you never come complain to me.”

“It’s ‘cause he’s got a crush on me,” Taemin says.

“I do not,” Kibum snaps, and then, when Taemin opens his mouth to tell him that he does, cuts him off. “Whatever--I guess, just. I got a project to do this week. Tell them I said I’ll be cleaner and if they get whiny again later you can tell them to stop being queerphobes.”

“Got it,” Jonghyun chirps, giving him a sunny thumbs up. “Now, uh.” He looks down to Taemin, eyes hooded and mischievous as he slips one hand down to cup his chin for a tiny kiss before glancing back. “Do you want me to leave or can I finish up?” he asks Kibum. Taemin leans a little more forward to kiss softly against his jawline so in case Kibum does kick him out he can at least get a couple last smoochies in. He’ll be fine jerking himself off but this is his first interaction with Jonghyun that wasn’t just a quick doorway visit. He’ll be pouty to see him go.

“No, you two can.” Kibum waves a vague hand at them again. Taemin brightens up happily. Hell yeah. “I was gonna go get a smoothie anyway.”

“Ooh,” Taemin says, even brighter. Hell fucking yeah. He takes the hand from Jonghyun’s booty to grab the wallet on his headboard and then chuck it at Kibum.

“I didn’t offer, but, sure,” Kibum says, catching it. He opens it and pulls out a five. “What do you want?” he asks as he tosses it back. Taemin makes no move to catch it and it falls somewhere on the bed that he’ll find later maybe probably.

“You already know my usual because you have a crush on me,” he says.

“I don’t have a crush on you,” Kibum snaps. The glare he gives Taemin could melt ice, but Taemin just grins broadly back.

“Why are you blushing then?” he asks. His eyes flick down to the pink flush coming up Kibum’s neck just to make sure that Kibum sees that he sees. The pink rises even higher as Kibum’s scowl grows.

“I’m gonna go to the pet store and buy you a dog biscuit and tell you it’s human food when I get back,” he grumbles, and he turns around and walks out without a glance back, mumbling under his breath. Taemin smiles fondly at his back until the door closes behind him. He’s so cute. They’re gonna be good boyfriends when Kibum finally admits that he has a crush.

“Anyway,” he says, turning back to Jonghyun. Jonghyun cocks a brow at him, looking amused yet also like he doesn’t want to bother digging into their business. Taemin presses a soft kiss to his bottom lip and slides his hands up his thighs. “Where were we?” he asks. It’s a rhetorical question, because he knows full well that his dick is still inside of Jonghyun’s booty, hard and throbby and eager to get back to the fricking. Jonghyun still giggles and pushes his hair out of his eyes.

“I think it was somewhere around, ‘You’re so good Taemin, fuck, you’re so fucking good,” he says thoughtfully.

“Ahh, of course,” Taemin grins. So they're on the same page. “Then let’s--” He gets one arm around Jonghyun’s waist again, pushes off of the bed with the other, and flips them over quickly, setting Jonghyun down against his pillows and smiling at his surprised squeak and loud laugh. Miraculously, he kept his dick in there too, and he’s real proud of himself as he pushes Jonghyun’s legs apart while he laughs into his hands.

Flipping Jonghyun’s cute skirt up too, he bites his lip when he can finally get the full picture. Jonghyun’s ween has softened slightly, probably from that whole conversation they all just had, but Taemin’s not worried. He can fix that quick enough. It’s still real cute and real hot. He leans down when Jonghyun tugs at his shoulder and accepts his messy kiss, rolling his hips slowly against Jonghyun to get readjusted and back in the mood.

“Let’s keep going,” he finishes. Jonghyun smiles wide against his mouth, one leg hooking around his hips.

“Please do,” he says, so Taemin does.

[stina-is-a-punk-rocker]

becky albertalli’s ‘simon vs. the homo sapiens agenda’: a review, amongst other things

I walked into Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda fully prepared to hate it. I’d read it a grand total of one (01) time before, way back in December 2019, with very high expectations that were dashed to smithereens halfway through. On my first reading, I found it terribly cliché, vapid and utterly undeserving of the multitude of four- and five-star ratings on Goodreads.

I’m still iffy about those ratings (it’s a solid two-point-five, three at best for me), but I didn’t hate it as much the second time around. Maybe it was because my expectations were so low that the only way it could go from there was up. You could say that I almost… enjoyed it.

That didn’t stop me from scribbling a page of complaints, though.

I’ve seen many reviews hailing the book as a win for the LGBTQ+ community, for BIPOC, for YA fiction. And Albertalli’s certainly done a better job of writing the character of a homosexual male than certain others. Simon’s whole coming-out crisis is definitely relatable, and it’s definitely a relief to have a character who’s accepted their sexuality instead of one who spends roughly 200 pages whining, “bUt HoW cAn I LiKe BoY wHeN I aM bOy??”

And yet it can be so tone-deaf in other parts.

The most glaring example is at the start of the book (I doubt this constitutes as a spoiler), where Simon says (lmao), about lesbian and bisexual girls: “I think it’s different for girls. Maybe it’s easier. If there’s one thing the Tumblr has taught me, it’s that a lot of guys consider it hot when a girl is a lesbian.”

Yes, the really says ‘the Tumblr’. And it’s not the last time, either.

I find it hard to believe that Simon, a gen-Z if my calculations serve me correct, has a Tumblr account and doesn’t know about Phan, Drarry, Destiel (RIP), Larry Stylinson (yikes) and the other staple gay OTPs of gen-Z Tumblr culture. If there’s one thing the Tumblr has taught me, it’s that there are way too many gay male ships with a brunette and a blond, with predominantly female fans.

Granted, Simon’s talking about their school’s gossip blog in particular, but that can’t be the only blog he follows.

Because fetishization is so easy, am I right, ladies?

You might bring up the ‘death of the author’ paradigm; Simon’s views ≠ Becky Albertalli’s; Simon is a teenage boy and teenage boys are generally idiots- and yet it feels like this is something the author genuinely believes, because she’s also included Simon being A-okay and even flattered by his friend Leah’s gay fanart and fanfic obsession. Yeah… no. Fetishization of queer people is creepy and dehumanizing and I’ve yet to meet a single queer person who’s on board with the idea of cishets doing so.

Also, the fact that he warmed up to Martin even while he was being blackmailed is something no actual closeted queer would do, ever. I’m pretty sure I’m speaking for loads of queer people when I say that being out to someone you don’t trust is a literal nightmare- even worse when they use that against you. And this motherfucker’s all like, “Well yeah, he’s threatening to out me to everyone if I don’t set him up with my best friend, but he’s kinda funny :) I think we could be friends.”

Simon- fuck you, you smoothbrained numbskull.

Another thing I found cringey was how many pop culture references were thrown in. Why, on god’s green earth, would you name a dog Bieber? For one, that’s a godawful name; for another- Justin Bieber? Really?

I consider myself a pretty avid fan of Harry Potter (here I will insert the obligatory ‘fuck you, JKR’), and whenever I see a reference thrown in, I feel like that one Spider-Man meme. And yet there were way. too. many. in this damn book. Seriously. We get it. Simon’s a Potterhead. That’s enough.

Also, I’m obligated to cancel anyone who likes Reese’s cups. They’re fucking vile.

Other attempts at gen-Z-ing that made me want to fling myself into the nearest black hole: every time Simon said ‘I can’t even’; a pop-punk band called ‘Emoji’ (!!! the way I cringed !!!); ‘the’ Tumblr (yeah, I’m never letting that go); Nora unironically saying ‘OMG’ in a verbal conversation; the absolute LACK of One Direction references (see, this is why I love John Green); amongst others.

Simon’s got zero personality outside of his sexuality. In case you didn’t catch it the eight thousand times it was mentioned, Simon is gay. And… that’s about it.

Leah’s annoying and yet I’m ashamed to say I can sort of see where she’s coming from (I’ve had a long and illustrious history of being left out and ignored by my friends, but this is neither the time nor place to discuss my childhood trauma, so I’ll leave it at that). Her enmity with Abby was unnecessary and uncalled for. Nick’s… a Jewish guitarist? And that’s about it? Abby’s cute and quirky and lovable and I love her. Martin’s a bag of dicks plus more. It was pretty obvious to me who Blue was; if you’ve read a YA book, ever, it’s the easiest thing to guess.

The characters were painfully one-dimensional. I can imagine them existing in that particular story, but I couldn’t tell you a single thing about them outside of it. It’s like they don’t exist outside of those pages- they couldn’t be actual people, if that makes sense (it probably doesn’t, but humor me).

The family dynamic between the Spiers was believable and pretty well-written (says me, who has zero siblings). I liked how the diversity didn’t feel contrived- just enough information to tell you that Abby and Bram were black, Nick was Jewish, Blue was half-Jewish, amongst others (funnily enough, when I first read it, I thought the exact opposite). The dialogue between characters felt pretty natural, too.

In conclusion: was Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda a perfect LGBTQ+ novel? I’ve read objectively better works on Ao3 (seriously, those of you who look down on fanfiction are missing out on some quality stuff), but it’s a pretty standard Wattpad-worthy story. It has its issues, and it’s far from the best thing I’ve ever read, and it’s not going on my favorites list anytime soon. You’re not missing out on anything if you choose to not read it, I can guarantee you that. But it’s a decently fun read, and perfect if you want something to while away an afternoon- it’s hardly going to take up too many hours to get through.

And would you look at that- I finally managed to write a review without a single spoiler (admittedly, there’s nothing to spoil outside of Blue’s identity, but let me have this).