#gldngrl7 binges

[gldngrl7]

Binge Rewatch: Numb3rs

Part of the reason I decided to binge rewatch Numb3ers is because I mentally checked out during its final, shortened season. Probably because I was watching something new and shinier.

Bingeing sometimes helps me see things I didn’t recognize on original week-by-week viewing. Here’s some thoughts:

Charlie & Amita: are probably one of the best portrayed romances I’ve seen on television . They give you just enough flirty-flirt, with a smidge of will-they-won’t-they and then put them together. Then they’re just together and the whole show doesn’t fall apart. Also she’s never just the love interest. Oftentimes she’s the lynchpin to solving the case, her own computer and combinatorics skills not just adding to Charlie’s skills but complementing them. Relationship drama comes from within not without. Will her Indian parents accept him? Should his father move out of Charlie’s house once she moves in? They NEVER broke up and there was NEVER a (serious) love triangle. Refreshing.

Larry Fleinhart: far and away my favorite character and the show was slightly lesser during those periods when Larry would get his wanderlust on. Larry was always so philosophical and conveniently insightful that I often wondered he wasn’t meant to be a deity-type character. God living life among mere mortals for the sheer fun of it all, occasionally throughout the generations needing reminding that’s there’s still some good down here — even amongst all the bad. He always had the right thing to say at the right time in a way that, on binge-watch, seems supernatural. And Peter MacNicol portrayed him with delightful nerd charm that made me want to protect him all costs. The ending of the romance between Larry and Meghan when actress Dianne Farr left the show broke my heart because it was beautiful.

I loved that they consistently showed that Agent Liz Warner recalled Charlie’s mathematical applications over time — even going so far as to suggest using a previous application to solve the current problem. She was his best student.

Fun fact: Dylan Bruno, who played math challenged Agent Colby Granger, graduated with a degree in engineering from MIT. David Krumholz, who played Charlie Eppes (boy genius) was notoriously bad at math in real life.

Some of Don Eppes’ character arcs felt a little flat because they hyper-focused on his career while simultaneously trying to make him seem like he was more than just his career. In the finale he asks his girlfriend robin to marry him. But they worked so hard to make sure his own romance take over the whole that it seemed downright deprioritized. Sonin the end it felt like two people getting engaged not because of any great passion , or even because they have so much in common (he’s religious, she’s not) but simply because they are always in each other’s circle. So...they’ll probably be together until death do them part. But meh.

The true love story in this show is obviously the relationship between Don and Charlie. Though five years apart in age, they graduated high school the same year. Don was an athletic baseball player somehow living in the shadow of his genius younger brother. Charlie hero-worshipped his brother who always seemed to be trying to get as far away from him as possible. Don purposely asked the girl Charlie had a crush on to prom. When we meet them years later, their mother had fairly recently passed away and they are barely on speaking terms and have a non-existent relationship. Charlie becomes a consultant to Don’s FBI team and over the years often sacrifices opportunities to continue working with Don. In one beautiful scene where they’re in a joint therapy session Charlie admits, “I love working with my brother”, which allows Don to admit the same. By the end, you know that these two are bonded for life by more than just blood.

I love that this show presents a genius who is emotionally and socially functional without sacrificing his nerdiness.

Hey! women can be smart too!

I love that they recognize Charlie’s limits by utilizing others when needed; like Charlie’s rival who specializes in deep set theory (Colin Hanks), a genetics specialist, Larry’s physics and cosmology knowledge and others

As expected with most shows set in LA, they play fast and loose with the nature of time versus traffic.

This is a show I would love to see revived for a season - just to see them all come together again and see where they all are now. Charlie & Amita and their four kids (one set of twins, obvi). Don and Robin with their one, carefully planned, totally adored child who is now exhibiting signs of mathematical genius (like her uncle Charlie). Allen happily living in the renovated garage and loving being a grandpa. Or maybe he remarried. Don is now the SAC and Liz is running his old unit with Nikki as her 2IC.

[kelbottumbles]

One of Those Things

RULES: ANSWER THE 20 QUESTIONS AND THEN TAG 20 AMAZING FOLLOWERS YOU’D LIKE TO GET TO KNOW BETTER!!

Thanks for tagging me @thoughtscascade , @fangirlintheforest and @reddragonlilly7 AKA three mutuals that I now can’t tag myself!!! lol But thanks guys these are fun :)

Name: Kelly

/Nickname: Kel, Kelbot, Kellz, Kel-Kel (depends on who!)

Zodiac Sign: Pisces

Height: 5'8

Ethnicity: White lol (Irish heritage)

Favorite Fruit: Cantaloupe

Favorite Season: Fall

Favorite Book: Dies the Fire, by S.M. Stirling (I pray someone reads this book as a result of this!!!)

Favorite Flower: Literally any kind of orchid

Favorite Color: Green

Favorite Animal: Cougar/Mountain Lion/Puma

Coffee, Tea, or Hot Cocoa: I drink tea every single day of my life but would drink hot chocolate just as much if it was socially acceptable as an adult lol

Average Sleep Hours: Pretty much a consistent 8-9 hours in my bed but how much sleep I get really depends on the sleep gods that night lol

Cats or Dogs: Dogs, but I love cats too! I have one of each.

Favorite Fictional characters: (Currently obsessed with Mon-El from Supergirl, and always Kara Danvers) Sarah Lance, Cisco Ramon, Mike Havel, Earth 2 Wells, Barry Goldberg, Harry Potter, Jake (and Oy) from Dark Tower, Raphael, Chandler Bing, Captain America, Spiderman, Rudi Mackenzie, Harry Potter, Arya Stark, Jon Snow, Hermione Granger, Ginny Baker, Mike Lawson (OMG I’LL STOP NOW THAT COULD BE NEVERENDING)

Number of blankets: I have a better furnace now so just 1, my comforter.

Dream trip: England: freeform trip to see museums and the countryside, the harry potter studio tour, and go to as many castles as possible.

Number of Followers: like 360something, my blog had been dormant for like 2 years before I hardcore joined the Karamel ship/fandom lol!

Blog created: Originally for the Big Brother 2014 season, then I didn’t use the account again to post until Jan 2017 so I could join the Supergirl/Karamel fandoms :)

OK! I’m going to tag:

@emarasmoak @highwaytothe7hells @icantloseyou @lostin-the-desert @baskingintheinsanity @straightouttanetflixx @spatialelementalworld @chrstnwrrn @headtotoefangirllikeduh @misfitwriter @karamelfrostedcake @myfangirlinghq @gldngrl7 @karamelblobber @rainyjelena @congratulationyouwin @pwettypwita @shadowjaysmith @scoobydoobydee @sammyjo16

[gldngrl7]

Binge Watch: Unbelievable (Part 1)

Wow. Okay. Where to begin....

I’ll just start with the spoilers and background.

The first episode is very difficult to watch and should come with a trigger warning. After that it feels a little more like a female-led “Mindhunter” where they’re actually hunting a serial rapist, hoping to catch him before he strikes again.

In episode 1 we meet Marie Adler, a teenage girl in the system who’s part of a program called Rise Up. It’s sort of a halfway house for fosters who are making efforts to transition out of the system. They are given a lot of independence, but must meet requirements such as holding a job, keeping their nose clean (legally) and what appears to be group counseling (unclear).

One night, while she’s asleep she awakes to find a masked man in her room who ties her up and rapes her, takes pictures of her naked and tied up, tells her if she says anything he’ll post them on the internet, and then disappears into the night. What follows is a violation of a different sort.

First, she’s asked to relive the experience for the patrol officer who arrives on scene and then again for the (male) detective. At the hospital, while enduring her rape kit examination, she’s asked to repeat the story a third time. Later at the police station Det. Parker asks her to go over it again and then again. Meanwhile, the police are able to collect little or no physical evidence on her body or at the scene.

Long story short, the detectives decide she must be lying (in part because her former foster mom mentions that something felt “off” and because Marie has a history of attention-seeking behavior) then proceed to bully her into recanting her story. I’m going to note here that Det Pruitt is played by Bill Fagerbakke, a former football player who stands 6’6” tall and probably weighs close to 240/260. His detective uses his physical prowess against Marie (who’s 5’3” and maybe 100 lbs soaking wet) like she’s a hardened criminal that needs to be subdued, at one point literally cowing her into a corner. All the while, completely oblivious to the clear signals of trauma she’s emitting, or that he’s just adding more trauma to the pile.

He threatens her by telling her she can be arrested for false reporting and lose her place in Rise Up, so of course she submits to his overwhelming physical presence and allows that maybe she dreamed it. This isn’t good enough, he rages, so she writes a statement that says she lied about the rape. Case Closed.

Except later, when the press finds out and it hits the news, her peers and friend’s desert her and turn her life into a living hell. And then, to add insult to injury, the police follow through on charging her with false reporting (something they usually only do when the defendent falsely accuses a specific person — not true in this case). Marie is forced to stand up in court and lie about lying...about lying. All the while trying to convince herself that none of it happened.

Three years later, in Golden, Colorado, Det. Karen Duvall is called to the scene of an assault where the victim, Amber, was force to dress up, raped for hours, had her pictures taken, and then made to shower afterwards. As the investigation begins, at every turn, Karen offers Amber back a little bit of the agency taken from her.

“Would it be okay if we sat in my car?”

“You don’t have to explain to me why you haven’t called a friend.”

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

“You’re going to be examined at the hospital, but would it be okay if I tried to collect DNA evidence from your face right now?”

It is in scathing counterpoint to Marie’s experience, illustrating perhaps the difference between a rape investigated by a woman and a rape investigated by men who are all too quick to assume the victim has ulterior motives. Or who are too quick to give up in the face of what will obviously be a time-consuming and exhaustive investigation so they seize on the first out offered to them.

Later, through happy accident (Karen’s husband is a police officer for another nearby district) Karen learns that there’s a similar rape in Westminster and meets with Grace Rasmussen to discuss the similarities of their cases. After finding another victim, they conclude that there’s a serial working the area and he’s smart. Smart enough to leave no physical evidence behind. He uses a condom, he makes them shower, he takes the bedding with him when he leaves, and each time he gets away unseen and he never hits more the once in the same jurisdiction, increasing the chances that no one will notice the pattern. He counts on the fact that cops are too lazy to fill out the details in ViCAP for rape cases with the same gusto that they muster for homicides.

The legwork and the minutiae Duvall and Rasmussen have to wade through to bring the cases to a close is truly staggering. But once they merge their investigations together they don’t hesitate to bring every resource to bear. They meet with the FBI, Karen even goes to Kansas to investagate an earlier series of rapes that could be their guy, and they even refuse to rule out the possibility that the perpetrator might be a cop. It’s in Kansas where Karen learns about the Rape Forensics textbook, written by cops but sold on the dark web to help rapists master their craft. It’s disturbing and essentially calls into question everything that made her think it might be one of their own committing these crimes.

I don’t want to spoil the outcome, but suffice it to say when they find the rapist’s trophies and the pictures, they find among them photos of Marie Adler. There’s an intensely satisfying scene where Grace emails Det. Parker the disturbing photos, thereby proving to him that he’s a shitty detective who shouldn’t wear a badge. Of course, he tries to make amends to Marie, but it’s too little, too late...and insulting to boot. He thinks that by reimbursing her the $500 for her court costs she can be mollified. And once upon a time she would have been, but this is the last straw and she’s fed up with taking what scraps she’s given and forcing herself to be glad it isn’t worse. For the first time in her life, he decides to demand more.

The story ends with the rapist pleading guilty to avoid the trial and “spare the women the pain of testifying”. The women (minus Marie) are allowed victim impact statements and never once does he look them in the eye. The judge throws the book at him, sentencing him to 300+ years in prison. But it doesn’t heal the damage he’s done. It doesn’t magically return their faith, their trust, or their innocence.

I’ll leave this here and save my other thoughts and comments for part two

[gldngrl7]

Binge Watch: Teen Wolf (Spoilers)

I haven’t completed this yet, but I have...opinions.

I’ve seen some TW on my dash, some of it spoilery and some of it...shall we say...pure headcanon. I decided to watch TW before I go too spoiled and to separate the canon from the fanon. After watching a few seasons here are some of my thoughts

I had a hard time with the horror music (aka screaming violins) of the first season. I get that they wanted to be more horror than sci-fi, but jeez! It was like playing Dead Space! Jump scares, foreboding silences at expectant moments that often times didn’t pan out — Despite liking the characters I wasn’t sure I was down for season 2. Thankfully, in season 2 the musical score became more cinematic and epic, carrying themes throughout, rather than just going for the cheap emotional reaction in the moment.

This show has a bad habit of writing out a character just as they get more interesting. Prime example: Derek Hale. He spends an entire season losing his abilities only to find in the finale that he’s actually evolving into a more powerful wolf. Cut to end credits. The next season Derek is gone with little to no explanation. What does this evolution mean? Is it only available to born-wolves? Can Scott evolve too? What caused it? We spent the entire previous season believing that Kate did something to cause him to lose his powers, but that no longer appears to be the case. Oh! You wanted answers to these questions? How sad for you! Moving on. On this topic see also: Jackson Whittemore, Cora Hale, Allison Argent, Isaac Lahey, Deucalion, Kira Yukimira, Morin Morrell, Alan Deaton. Some characters are written out because their character arc reaches completion. This is not true for any of the above, IMO.

This one burns me up a bit. Question; why is Melissa McCall a nurse and not a doctor? Answer: because she’s a woman. I mean, why does Noah Stilinski get to be the Sheriff and not just a deputy? Because single dads get to be the boss while single moms have to be worker bees. Everyday sexism right there on a “woke” tv show. I say the plots would have been better served if she had just been the Beacon Hills coroner. But she’s a single mom so we need to see her struggle with finances (a plot device made convenient by the bag of money hidden under Scott’s bed, and then never mentioned again) and romance, I guess. Scott’s PlotDeviceDad was an FBI agent, and he was one before Melissa kicked him out for drinking. Which means they both likely had careers going before they had their only child. Totally plausible that Melissa could have gone to med school and then chosen pathology because the schedule can be more family friendly.

TW works best in short season format. 10-12 episodes to tell a contained story. Any more than that and the writers start to tell more story than they seem to know how to: stretching it out with unnecessary plot twists and bringing in unnecessary characters which they just kill off when they outlive their usefulness. All of that extra story telling and yet somehow the most basic questions oftentimes never got answered. Why DID The Dread Doctors want to resurrect Sebastian Valet? What was their endgame? I got that Marcel was part of it, but why? Was he in love with Sebastian and for the love of all that’s holy...WHY? Sometimes I felt like the writers plotted long stories believing that if they peppered in enough character development for the MCs then the viewers wouldn’t ask the hard questions. It’s about the holes in the actual story they were telling.

I became inordinately concerned about the (fictional) teenage population of (fictional) Beacon Hills because just SO MANY PEOPLE DIED! Like... surely this would make the national news as a town in crisis! There was literally a sewer full of 24 bodies of missing people and a bus full of dead people! In less than a month. It’s like they had a never-ending supply of teenagers. If I live in Beacon Hills I’m packing my shit and moving to Sunnydale. Surely The Hellmouth is safer.

I reach a level of fatigue about 3/4 through each season. It’s because of this: every big bad is just too powerful to defeat. Our heroes are beaten, broken down, confidence shattered and sometimes their separated through machinations and manipulations. Whatever will they do? Find a way to win in the very last episode, obvi. Sometimes it’s because of the “Maguffin”, the magical object that exists just for the purpose of destroying the enemy, and sometimes it’s because Scott put some plan to double/triple cross the untrustworthy ally at some point unseen by the viewer (they used this one twice). I would much prefer a more even fight for once where The Pack and The Enemy trade wins and losses so that when the final battle occurrs the stakes are higher and it’s anyone’s (lacrosse) game.

Yes these are mostly negatives, but I don’t want you to get the impression that I’m not enjoying the show. There’s a lot to like too. I’ll be back to share some of those thoughts later.

[gldngrl7]

Binge Watch: Teen Wolf (part 2). More spoilers

Why is it at the start of almost every episode I have to spend the first 10 minutes figuring out how we got to the beginning?? What is that about?

Why do they blame Scott for everything? It was Peter that turned Kate, yet she insists on continually get vengeance against him. Like what? She must be completely crazy because there’s no logic there.

A single episode (Echo House) did more to terrify me about mental institutions than an entire season of American Horror Story.

There could have been no supernatural element to season 602 and it would have been no less terrifying. Fear is the ultimate enemy and the ultimate corruptor. Frank Herbert had it right. “Fear is the mind killer”.

I feel like I need more background on the rules of werewolves. Even after 6 seasons. Will Scott pass his traits down to his children? Will they be born-wolves?

I don’t want to make this about the hot guys because...dime a dozen on this show...amirite? But JR Bourne has been a fave of mine since the Stargate days and he just gets better with age. He is all kinds of daddy.

Also this show deftly utilizes one of my favorite tropes — Enemies to Allies. Argent starts out as an enemy but became one of Scott’s most powerful allies and it gives me the feels.

This show is the worst at romances. Just the worst. Mostly because they’re super rushed or made to feel like the tease is just a little too subtle. I like my teases to be more than once a season, thanks. Love is...ephemeral on this show. Unless the couple is mlm.

Why was Coach seemingly unaffected by that fear that gripped the entire town in season 602? He seemed completely oblivious. Is it just that he’s completely fearless?

I know a lot of people seemed unhappy with plot lines in later seasons, but I didn’t have any issues with them beyond the same weaknesses present in earlier seasons. The only way to explain is that I frequently felt like I was getting more information/exposition from some scenes and then I would be completely unsatisfied with others. Like the romances, parts of it felt hollow, like we were getting left out of moments and we were somehow supposed to trust that character development just...happened in the in-between moments we didn’t see.

Season 302 is probably considered the best, mostly due to the brilliant performance of Dylan O’Brian as Void Stiles, but I liked season 601 just as much because even without Dylan they managed to still make Stiles the central focus of the season, which was an inspired tactic since he’s such a favorite. So even though he wasn’t there, he still felt very present. But for funsies I loved season 4. The Dead Pool ftw!

TW was really good at getting you emotionally invested in a character just before revealing them to be the bad guy. Particularly with Jennifer Blake. I was all in with Derek/Jennifer and I had all the feels because they really sold it. Then in that scene where she runs into his arms and they’re all soft and gooey with each other, it struck me. “Awww damn! She’s the bad guy!” And they had me. They did the same thing later with Mason. Thank goodness they got to save him!

[gldngrl7]

I have a problem

If I peace out of a show during a final season it’s usually because I can’t bear to see it end. If I don’t see the ending then it didn’t end, right?

I still haven’t watched the final four episodes of Spartacus: War of the Damned because there’s no way that ends well, right? And the really dumb thing is that I know enough about history to know it couldn’t end well when I started it. So...more fool I.

Also I haven’t seen the last half of the third season of Veronica Mars. So that’s my next binge because I have to get ready for season 4 because it’s NOT OVER!!!

[gldngrl7]

Binge Watch: Teen Wolf (Thoughts on Character)

Note: have I mentioned I hate the title of the show? This is not unusual for shows that out of gate pigeon-hole themselves into a certain genre by being title something short-sighted. When your show is titled “Teen Wolf” how are you supposed to grow beyond that? Calling the show “True Alpha” might have allowed the show to extend outside of its initial premise.

I’m not going to talk about because I just don’t have a lot of strong opinions about everyone and probably because on some characters, like Stiles, I probably don’t have anything new to say.

SCOTT: I’m thankful that his “Alpha-ness didn’t translate into douche-bagness, as it often does with males in the real world. However, it can be seen in the rotating cast of women in his life (which makes sense from a sociological perspective). But I would have loved to see even more of it in his relationship to betas. It seems like a beta without their own alpha near would defer to whatever alpha made demands. Even though it wasn’t really Scott’s style of leadership on the whole, I would have liked to see him use that ability more often as a strategic measure.

DEREK: like all of them, he made mistakes as an Alpha. His first being (literally) biting off more than he could chew by creating more betas than he could control at one time. Rookie mistake. Perhaps if he’d been more discerning, he might have fallen under Deucalion’s radar long enough to grow stronger. I don’t understand why saving his sister’s life would take his Alpha power though. Seems like the kind of thing that a good alpha should do. Like so many of the characters in this show I kept waiting for him to reach his full potential and he kept falling short. Then, when he did, he disappeared from the show. Smh. Just based on social media buzz, I expected Tyler Hoechlin to be on the show until the end, not cut loose halfway through.

PETER: Here’s the thing. When I enjoy watching a villain, that means there’s still some (usually untapped) good left in them. And I got that sense from Peter. I feel like he grew up in situation that, by nature and construct, is inherently competitive. While In childhood Derek seemed fairly comfortable with his Status as a Beta as long as he was part of the pack, Peter wanted more (for reasons that could have been made more clear). Peter wanted revenge on Kate for killing his family, despite the fact that her actions essentially elevated him to Alpha, so he must have felt that deep connection his family. That need to protect, defend and avenge. One he tries to deny with Malia but never quite can. We see his redemption grow slowly (maybe too slowly?) until he does something extraordinary, cracking open that sheild of self preservation. He saves Stiles in the Wild Hunt. Twice. And the first time it appears he didn’t even realize it was Stiles (“It HAD to be you!). So think about that. He thought he was saving a rando. Not someone who might serve his ends or eventually get him out. Just a random person that he pulled out of harm’s way - for no self-serving reason at all. That was the true beginning, or at least showing us a part of him he hadn’t allowed others to see before.

STILES: I’m just going to say that his back story killed me. I’ve known someone with Frontal Temporal Dementia and it’s insidious. Arguably more than Alzheimer’s or Lewy Body, because it strikes so young and steals a life. Stiles giving away his Jeep to Scott, as if finally letting go of all of that his mother could have been to him, but never was — as if accepting the mother he got for the short period he had her, was both heartbreaking and empowering.

ALLISON: I’m not sure what inner politics of the show caused Allison to be written off the show (or it was Crystal’s choice to leave) but what a bunch of wasted potential. Again, just as her interesting quotient reached peak levels, they kill her off. WTF? As I’ve said before, this show is the worst at romance because just as people get together, shit either hits the fan or someone leaves the show. You see this here with Allison and Isaac. Just as you see that Derek’s leaving is preceded by a relationship with Braeden (where the fuck did that come from?) and Lydia and Stiles get together just as Stiles leaves Beacon Hills (they’re still together...but not in a way that’s satisfying for the audience in any way). And a happy relationship between Scott and Kira preceded Kira losing balance with the Fox within and she had to go stay with Skinwalkers to control it (is there a connection?), never to return apparently. But I digress. I really liked Allison and losing her was a blow. And let’s not forget, she loved Scott BEFORE he was an Alpha.

TBC

[gldngrl7]

Netflix’s Glitch: first impressions

Concept: the dead mysteriously rise in Yoorana, a small town in Australia. 1). Legit question: is it the custom in Australia to bury people in the nude? Because everyone crawled out of their graves in the buff and I call bullshit. Now you can argue that clothes rot along with the bodies, but the main returnee Kate has only been dead for two years and it would take longer than that for modern fabrics to disintegrate if the person was embalmed. 2). It feels like an honest reaction both to learning you’re back from the dead and learning that someone you love is back. 3) Kate’s husband James is already remarried and his wife is about to drop a kid. He waited about five minutes before moving on, and he’s keeping it a secret so...yeah...that ought to end well. Also, women mourn and men replace, so it seems like truth. 4) people have been dead for varying amounts of time — one for 150 years, but there doesn’t seem to be much of any real reaction to waking up in this new world with automobiles and mobile phones. At least not yet. 5) Kate died of breast cancer but when she is resurrected she gets her breasts back, which the show is only too happy to show us. But when her concerns about her cancer returning are expressed, the doctor examines them for lumps in the clinic, a scene in which her breasts are “strategically” covered. So...gratuitously showing her breasts is a-okay, but presenting them in a way that reveals a woman as a human being with a possible health issue (or even to demonstrate how a breast exam should be done) THAT’S too sensitive to show????

[gldngrl7]

Binge Watch: Teen Wolf (Thoughts on Character - Part 2)

LYDIA: I was fully prepared to dislike her because I have little patience for the vapid teenage girl stereotype. But then lo! She is not vapid but only pretending to be so! Glorious! A genius in mean-girl Prada. But she’s also more than just a genius, she also cares for people, maybe even as much as Scott. She takes people under her protective wing. Right from the start you see this with Allison, who’s the new girl in school. Then later with both Kira and Malia. In a way, she fills the leadership/counselor needs of the female pack members in a way that a male Alpha can’t necessarily do.

KIRA: I never fully understood the Kitsune and what exactly her abilities were, other than being long-lived and a bad-ass with a katana. But again, just as it looked like they might delve...she disappears. It almost seems like characters disappear when they start to get more interesting than Scott. Hmmmm. Apparently, for the show’s purposes, Kira was just an excellent rebound girl for Scott. Once he rebounded from Allison (and then her death), Kira was no longer needed. Thanks for playing.

LIAM: a true Scott-created Beta was always going to be required. Interesting that they chose (not that there was much choice) a kid with anger management issues. Not so interesting is that the writers made his arc all about how his anger made him a stronger beta, when they should have made it about his journey to absolute control. He was so worried that his parents would see him as a monster, and yet we only met his dad (a surgeon, because....male) who was never given a chance to see Liam’s truth.

MASON: I loved the parallels between Liam/Mason and Scott/Stiles.

MALIA: talk about having the worst parents ever! But at least it seems like she became the impetus for bringing Peter towards the light, giving him something fight for other than his own hide, even though he didn’t know how to show it at first. I like that she was set slightly apart as a were-coyote, occasionally leaning more towards Lone-Wolf behavior and sometimes chafing against the internal pack structure. Her blunt speak and dismissal of societal norms seems more a function of having spent several formative years as a full coyote (“Can you TRY to act human?”) but her hair-trigger attack mode is all coyote. That she ends up with Scott seemed to come more from the Alpha/Beta construct than out of any real chemistry there (IMO).

HAYDEN: Another character to disappear unceremoniously, and I can’t help but think that it was because the love story between Liam and Hayden had begun to overshadow Scott’s story and maybe even the Stiles/Lydia ship, which had become centerpoint just before Hayden “moved away”.

THEO RAEKEN: Another one of my favorite, but rarely used tropes, is the “quick route to redemption through the hell dimension” trope. For Theo, this was a miss, but a near one. Maybe when they started his redemption arc they expected or hoped that they would have more time to see it through than they did. As a child, Theo kills his sister for her heart (did he even need a heart?) at the behest/corruption of The Dread Doctors. He’s essentially a sociopath, but he wants to be the hero, to be worshipped and adored, not because he wants to take on any responsibility. The Skinwalkers sent him to a hell dimension where we later learn he was tormented by the sister he murdered. This would have been a good time for him to learn some contrition, and more importantly to learn that there is no escaping the consequences of his actions. But when he’s restored to the mortal plane it seems his self preservation instincts are more alive than ever, because he’d do and say anything to keep from going back there. To be fair, we don’t really see him maneuver again to supplant Scott’s place (smartly accepting that that’s a well one can only go to once), but instead watch as he rather painfully tries to wedge his way into the pack like a square peg into a round hole. No one wants him there, but they’re taking a “keep your enemies closer” tact with him the second time around. As Theo himself said, he doesn’t take rejection well. Against the Ghost Riders we see him fight the good fight, even saving Liam, though his motives are unclear and it’s much too early to believe that he’s just a good guy now. The final proof of his redemption, in the finale, is when he takes the pain of a dying boy who tried to kill him, perhaps for the first time empathizing with someone, as like himself the dying boy had been corrupted to murder by forces beyond his control. But it came too quickly and one is left to wonder, why now?

ARGENT/MELISSA: DAMN! That was the ship I didn’t know I needed. Why isn’t there more Fanfiction!?!???

DEREK/JENNIFER: not going lie. I’m never not going to be upset that that ship went the way it did. From the beginning I sensed that she felt “like an ugly duckling”. It was masterfully and subtly portrayed. Or maybe because as a plain woman, I identified with her immediately. So Derek and Jennifer were my personal fantasy of ending up with the guy you secretly think is way out of your league but is also incongruously soft with you. She brought a smile to his face, until they fucking ruined it. They brought her back for the finale where Anuk-Ite uses her image to taunt Derek into looking at him. His struggle is palpable. He’s afraid, knows it’s Anuk-Ite and that opening his eyes will turn him into stone. But in the end he can’t resist. He has to look and I think that’s very telling.

[kelbottumbles]

5 OTPs

Thanks for tagging me in this @gldngrl7​ lol this is brutal how do I even begin!?!?

Ok well the only way for me to begin is with my current obsession/writing muse:

1. KARAMEL

Do you have like 5 hours to sit with me and talk about raw chemistry and soulmate type shit? Like a real hardcore, made for each other, yin to their yang, complementary personality,deep, delving discussion? Then maybe we have time to talk about Karamel. I just can’t with these two. They’re cute and sweet and hot at the same time

2. BAWSON

I became obsessed with the show PItch this year. I’m currently trying not to think about it much because it hasn’t been officially picked up for another season yet and I’m pretty terrified. But LORD THEY BETTER!!!! Because GInny Baker and Mike Lawson are funny and hot and they need to be together!

3. Gerica (Geoff x Erica)

I binged all 4 seasons of this show over winter break. It was all I thought about. It was funny, sweet, hilarious, touching, drole… did I say funny? Lol sorry I love this show. ANd I totally loved Barry and Laney and then out of the blue Erica and Geoff hit me like a wrecking ball in season 3! I’m obsessed. These two are soulmates, just ask the Yentadex.

4. Nick x Jess (Ness?)

I watched this show because it was funny but mostly because I was obsessed with the will they/won’t they story of Jess and Nick. I still ship these two so hard, even with the shoddy writing the show has been getting recently.

OMG… I HAVE LIKE 5 MORE OTPS TO LIST!!!! But knowing I only have one more slot, I have to go with my *original* otp… the one that kept me up at night, that possibly put me through puberty lol I used to tape Buffy the Vapire Slayer live on VHS CASSETTES and wear out the tapes watchinng them so hard, and I shipped one couple harder than anyone… and they never got together lmao

5. Buffy x Xander

Don’t ask me. I was like 12. I just rooted for these two so hard because I knew Xander was so in love with her… but my hopes started waning by the time High school was over lol. I managed to let go of this ship but I will forever remember my obsession.

OK I made it! I left out Mindy and Danny, Jim and Pam, and about a hundred more but I’m happy with my list!

Now the fun part about who to torture next:

@emarasmoak @chrstnwrrn @icantloseyou @shadowjaysmith @reddragonlilly7