#his fixation on the beatles and telling paul that he thought john was in love with him or wtv hahahah

[13eyond13]

I have a working theory that acclaimed director Peter Jackson has the exact same fave trope(s) of "besties to enemies when really they probably wanted to be gay lovers" / "besties to gay lovers but make it angsty and tragic" as I do tbh

[mydaroga]

what proof is there that john and paul were kind of obsessed/fixated on each other?

Hey nonny! I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get around to this. I keep getting distracted by other things and I want to do your question justice, so we'll see what I can do. I hope you're still around!

It's impossible for me to definitively "prove" that either or both was "obsessed" or "fixated," because I'm not them and there are lots of things we'll never know for sure. I don't think that they were the only thing either one ever thought about, or that other things/people weren't equally or more important at various times.

But I do think that, at times, they were extremely focused on one another, for better or worse. It's hard to define the type of relationship I personally feel they had, and I'm not sure THEY defined it, either. But I do think that there were points at which it tipped from what we might call a typical friendship/partnership into something that isn't quite covered by those words. My exactly feelings about what they were to each other changes depending on what I've been reading or thinking about, but for the sake of argument I'm going to be very dry here and not embellish. A few examples, in no particular order:

Deciding quite early in their career to merge their names and share songwriting credit. This is not something everyone who writes songs together does, and implies a deep faith and trust in one another. And longevity of the relationship.

Various friends and acquaintances report them being extremely close, to the point of cutting other people out and existing as a sort of unit--but this is also something John did repeatedly through his life.

All the Beatles, but especially John and Paul, would "mirror" each other's tastes and choices. Not in total, but say, if one bought an item of clothing, they all did. When Paul grew a mustache, John did. That sort of thing.

John wanting everyone to live on a Greek island together, reportedly feeling less himself if he didn't see them every few days, and Cynthia pointing out that he needed them more than they needed him. Again, that's John + all the Beatles but it builds to a point.

How do you distill the breakup? No one knows for sure exactly why it happened, and there were many factors. But I think it's undeniable that a big one was the breakdown of communication between John and Paul once they were no longer touring and in each other's pockets. To some degree, this was true of all four, but it's more pronounced in the two who, at one point, were singing with one voice and writing songs without differentiation. A relationship that is so heavy that its breakdown is a major factor in the breakup of the biggest band in the world is a pretty important relationship. And a band that can't withstand the breakdown of that relationship was pretty heavily invested in it.

And both of them acted in ways, after/during the breakup, that imply it was a really big deal to them emotionally. I think they both loved their wives, but it's certainly interesting that their marriages parallel one another and came about concurrent with their own partnership dissolving. The barbs traded in the press, and in songs, imply hurt, not indifference. Yoko supposedly telling Philip Norman that "no one ever hurt John the way Paul did" and Paul calling Norman up to demand what that meant involves some pretty hefty feelings. I don't think you get that kind of hurt without a pretty strong feeling in the other direction.

And related but slightly tangential, the way that John (especially) saw messages and barbs in Paul's songs is far from casual. It's the flipside of his conviction they used to be telepathic. Again, belief you can read each other's minds and that someone is sending you coded messages in their commercially released songs tells me John, at least, had moments of finding Paul's opinion very important.

And after John died, we've got decades now of watching Paul publicly wrestle with the complicated emotions that left behind. I can't entirely interpret that, either--I think it's very complicated and, what's more, at this point his connection to John is something the media expects. However, I do think that Paul thinks about John a lot, and still writes songs referencing him, and that's 60+ years now of a relationship, most of which, at this point, has been conducted on one side. And that's not not evidence John was pretty important.

As you can tell, I'm somewhat hesitant to use the same words you did, and I'm trying to keep to the things I feel I can say with certainty. I don't know if they were fixated on one another; to me that implies something maybe too overwhelming or all-encompassing. But I definitely believe that there were times when their feelings for one another, good and bad, were of pretty overriding importance.

I hope that helps, and I promise I'll be quicker if there are any other thoughts you (or anyone) wants to share!

[stewy]

stewy looks like youNre having many thoughts about india, care to share?

Okay so there are many sides to this, but I'm obviously only thinking of John's because, well, duh.

1. John and Yoko

So, much has been written about how John was already in love with Yoko, and how her letters were the one thing that kept him alive in India, and how I'm So Tired is about her, yadda yadda. I'd like to propose some basic fucking common sense questions:

Let's start with

John later said he wanted to take Yoko with him but didn't because of Cynthia. Well, he took Magic Alex instead, who was incredibly possessive of John and who Cynthia was actually jealous of, even though she dismissed Yoko til the very last second. Where are their affair rumors? I mean what the fuck is this: (I'm sure Yoko fascinated John like Alex, the Maharishi and many other objects of his fixations. Her difference, and her blessing, was, to be crude, her vagina lmao)

If he was so suicidal because he was away from The Woman like he sounds on I'm So Tired... why go? Even better, why not go back to India immediately with Ringo? Or even with Paul? Then he can run right back into her arms and tell her he had some kind of epiphany but... nope, John stayed for nearly 3 weeks after Paul and Jane left, and he needed Alex convincing him (and George) that the Maharishi was a pervert and a scam so he would have an official reason to leave. Why was he avoiding England if the love of his life was right there?

Again with I'm So Tired/Yer Blues: if he was suicidal 3 weeks in, why the fuck did he stay another 5?? What? He could easily go back home and go back to drugs (which he did, the second he landed in England) and yet, we have witnesses and footage of him looking joyful and healthy around February/March... so what's the truth?

It's actually crazy to me that John spent two weeks with his childhood best friend out of his mind with LSD and other drugs, blowing off a chance with Brigitte fucking Bardot, before even thinking of calling Yoko and taking a chance on her. I believe Pete Shotton's account of the Two Virgins night is by far the most accurate btw.

2. John and Cynthia (boring failmarriage)

These two already had marriage problems for over a year now, and I'm pretty sure John was already emotionally signed out for a long time, but he felt too much of a responsibility to Cyn and Jules + the fact he physically could not be without an official partner for any significant period. That's not to say he didn't love Cyn or never loved her, but there was nothing romantic, sexual or interesting about that relationship for him. They were college sweethearts who were forced to wed, there's love, but there's not much to it (though I sound dismissive, I'm willing to discuss their relationship in depth some other time).

LOTS to unpack here, but I'll try to ask some basic questions:

In the documentary (The Beatles and India) the Ashram coordinator clarifies that John was the only Beatle with a separate room, while the others slept with their wives. Now why would John so quickly feel the need to physically detach himself from Cyn? If, by most accounts, he was looking so joyful and healthy during this period...

"He found it quite difficult with me although obviously not with someone else." NOW HERE'S A GOLDEN QUOTE! You could take this at face value and assume Cyn is talking about Yoko (which she most likely was tbh), but for this to be in the same sentence she talks about India and apparently before Two Virgins... also I already mentioned John blew a chance with Brigitte fucking Bardot because he was high out of his mind, and yet he was healthy and mostly drug-free (for the first and probably only time in his life!). Am I supposed to suspend belief and assume someone with John's sex drive was not fucking anyone for two months (more, if you assume he didn't fuck anyone when he came back to England, which I do), locked away in his room thinking about a woman he didn't even truly want yet? lmao

Now a couple others to unpack:

"OF COURSE PEOPLE FEEL THE NEED TO EXPERIMENT" PLEASE SHARE YOUR EXPERIMENTS WITH THE CLASS JOHN LENNON

also not her with "I never dreamed that he had been unfaithful to me" girl, please lmao I know you can't possibly this dumb

"due to have stayed another two weeks" so, assuming the reason didn't go back earlier to England to stay with The Woman of his Life was his devotion to the program and meditation, why not finish the course when you already stayed two months? Sure, Alex gave him a palpable reason to return but idk, you believe what you will on this one. I'm sure the last few weeks were the period he wrote I'm So Tired/Yer Blues though.

3. John and Paul

(I think they deserve a post of their own tbh, and it's impossible to dissociate the India trip from the NYC trip so... )

Overall, I think we've been sold a narrative. Nothing wrong with it, it's easier to digest and all, but if you want to get into what really happened, it's time to start asking different questions.

[inspiteallthedanger]

What I meant is that fans and the media often act like deranged freaks about John and Paul's relationship. I'm not excluding myself, for the record.

John, Paul, George and Ringo couldn't even go for a cup of coffee with their families without being constantly pestered about the Beatles. I'd find it hard to move on if I was confronted with that on a daily basis too. People just felt oddly entitled to tell them how they should feel about each other or what to do with their lives. It was unique even on a celebrity level.

This is why George saying to a fan in India: "if your friends really love me, please tell them to leave me alone" struck me as really sad. I actually feel sorry for Paul to a certain extent too, because it's obvious he feels the need of saying the "right" things about his own life not to upset people he has never met. He's about to turn 80 years old.

I can understand that for boomers, The Beatles were symbols of their own fading youth but I find a little harder to understand extreme behavior from millennials and zoomers. You'll see those 400 page meta essays to prove the point that two total strangers loved or hated each other DECADES ago. You're like: ok, bestie, I get it, now just chill for a second.

I've done that myself in the past but at least I'm self aware enough to know this is *excessive* and part of the problem on a social perspective, to say the least. Besides, feelings evolve. I'm sure they both loved AND hated each other at different points.

I wasn't saying any of that to be antagonistic, I'm just curious to understand the motivations behind that. Since you're somebody who engages with parts of the fandom I don't, I thought maybe you'd have something to say about it. It's strange how people will sometimes complain about the fandom being too quiet or dead but won't actually make the effort of talking to each other off anon, you know.

P.S.: I quite enjoy how you write their relationship in fiction, by the way.

Hiya, I'm still not understanding that the problem is you're asking about. Is it that fame is hell? Hard agree, and it clearly messed them up a lot. But, I'm not sure what meta on Tumblr is doing to impact that now. I can see that it would form part of the overall soup of not letting them move on. But, that's just humans being human. We want more of the things we love. Or is it that you feel people are missing the wider story by fixating on the wrong thing? I guess that could be true, but I'm not sure if that's a huge problem, if that's what people are interested in.

The things you're describing seem to be very typical fannish behaviour. Fans often explore the themes they're interested in and look deeply at them. They want to pull things apart in detail and then see what it all means. It's for fun, it's enjoyable to look for patterns and to see if there's threads that can be found linking them all. This happens over and over because new people come into fandom and want to look at the thing again from new and the same angles.

I'm not sure that the aim is to convince Paul how he felt about John? I'm not sure that the aim is to tell anyone how they felt (at least I'm not sure that's it for many people). It's about trying to understand it. But, I suppose there might be elements of that in the tone of how they were treated and asked questions. And agreed, it must have been really annoying.

If you've done it yourself, what were you trying to achieve and how do you perceive that as different from the people you're talking about? What constitutes a 'deranged freak' from... a person that's interested in the Beatles histories. I mean, I would say that anyone who's written a book about the band could fall into the former category. So, we're back to 'fame is bad and not good for people' and I don't disagree with that. But again, fandom on Tumblr now isn't really the problem.

But, if you're asking why: it's fun, it's what has caught people's imaginations and humans generally like trying to solve things. We like picking apart the things other humans have done that don't seem to add up. The issue with John and Paul might well be that many people grew up thinking one thing about them but now find that isn't the whole story. I think it makes sense to then dive into that and want to look at it in more detail.

And I agree that people should definitely chat to each other and have discussions! That's all really good and should be part of a healthy fandom. I think there's a fear of getting called names or being judged for it, though. Which is probably why people stay on anon and why more popular blogs tend to fade.

p.s. thanks! Glad you liked it.

[kalypsichor]

five’s a crowd [ beatles x reader ] part seven

summary: You’re not jealous of the fact that girls on Tinder love George, you’re not. John may or may not be sexually attracted to metaphors. Paul may or may not have a professor kink. Ringo is just vibin’ like always. Gigi Hadid terrorizes your dreams. Oh, and y’all finally get the McLennon sandwhich you asked for.

warnings: 2k words of the usual bullshit, some english major bashing, actually it’s just john bashing ( sorry @spaceyantique​ ), i love english majors, and miscommunication babey!

masterlist and parts one | two | three | four | five | six

i’m writing this draft at 3 am. it’s a new low for me. oh, and the poem mentioned in geo’s tinder is lyrics from ‘for you blue’

“Well, it is a flattering picture.”

You have to agree with Ringo. The two of you are perched on the couch, peeking over George’s shoulder at the Tinder profile. John and Paul are sharing the armchair, snickering at something. Probably another scheme. Bastards…

The photo is the one John had snapped a few days ago of George in the kitchen. He’s got this brilliant smile on his face, just having taken his first warm shower in weeks, and he’s gloriously naked from the belly button up. It’s a little blurry, but it captures George’s happiness—though you privately think that no picture could ever really do the boy justice. Take that, stupid Tinder girls.

“‘George.’” Ringo reads the bio out loud. “‘Twenty-one. Majoring in horticultural science, looking for a girl to put the ‘ho’ into it.’ This is terrible,” he says rather gleefully. George turns around and gives his friend a betrayed look.

“You missed the best bit. ‘I’ve loved you from the moment I saw you. You looked at me, that’s all you had to do.’ What’s that?”

George goes stock still. Slowly, his head turns to John and you swear you can hear it creak like a door hinge.

“You.” The word shakes from his throat with a quiet rage. “You looked through mY DIARY???”

“YOU HAVE A DIARY?” Ringo screeches. Paul has the common sense to look a little frightened, but his boyfriend, who borrows a brain cell from Paul from time to time, does not.

“You write beautiful poetry, George,” John croons, and you have to physically hold George down to keep him from tackling the dumbass. Paul, getting flashbacks to the Shower Debacle, shudders.

You, on the other hand, are trying to wrap your head around the bio. Poetry? About who? That didn’t sound like it was about just anybody. Lucky girl, your mind hisses. Or boy. You immediately try recalling every single time George has brought up a classmate. Your brain sputters a bit and spits out an answer to one of the questions you’d skipped on your first midterm yesterday. Except now it’s fucking useless, isn’t it????

Ringo speaks, bringing you out of your downward spiral into insanity. “Hey, the app says you’ve got a match.”

Frowning, George taps on the notification. “But I haven’t even looked at anyone’s profile.”

“I did you a favor and swiped right a couple o’ times,” John says. George groans—no, the sound does not turn you on a little—and hangs his head forward. By ‘a couple,’ John must’ve meant a couple hundred, because George’s phone is blowing up. The only thing keeping George from hurtling the phone right into John’s smarmy little meerkat grin so hard that he shits pieces of it out for weeks is your hand on him. The warmth of it is radiating out from his shoulder to his chest and sweeping down to his toes. When you take your hand away a few seconds later, thinking it had overstayed its welcome, George has to try very hard not to sigh.

“This one is cute,” Ringo comments. The notification had read ‘Maureen Super Likes You!’ and the phone screen is now showing a pretty brunette, around your age, smiling up at George.

“Yeah, well, I’m not interested.”

He didn’t say she wasn’t cute.

“Wait, wait!” John scrambles out of his armchair, nearly pushing Paul off in the process. George’s thumb pauses where it’s hovering over the ‘delete’ button for the app. “Come on, Geo. You haven’t gone out in years. Like, since high school. Since… since…”

“Pattie,” Ringo says. You and Ringo hadn’t known the other three in high school, but, as always, he was good with names.

Pattie? George has never mentioned a Pattie...

“Yeah, Pattie!” John lights up. You wish people would stop saying her name. “Pattie Boyd. Man, she was a catch… I still remember her blonde hair. And those long legs. She looked like, uh… who’s that model?”

“Bridget Bardot.” Ringo, again.

Paul is mirroring the sour look on your face, though he obviously has a better reason for it.

“No, who the fuck is that? I meant Gigi Hadid. Isn’t that why you dated her?”

“She did not/” George protests. “And no, John, unlike some people, I care about more than just looks.”

At this point, Paul looks as though he’s about to cry. “What’s that supposed to mean? I’m more than looks, aren’t I?”

“I didn’t mean you, obviously.” But George’s words are lost under John, who leaps back into the armchair and coos at his boyfriend.

“Macca, you know I love you for more than your looks. You’ve got that big old brain, and you’re the best artist in this whole school… it’s just a bonus you’re so pretty too.”

Paul seems satisfied by this. Stupid fucking English major. John could get anything his way with just a few words.

“John’s right, y’know.” You and Ringo mouth ‘y’know’ at each other and erupt into giggles. “You’ve got to put yourself out there more. You’re in your third year of uni and you haven’t even dated a single person. There’s only one more year before you’re out in the real world! And the sea will be much, much bigger then.”

George scowls, unimpressed by Paul’s little speech. “People aren’t fish, Paul. And I’m vegetarian, so I don’t condone catching them.”

“It’s a metaphor!” Paul cries, throwing his hands in the air. John nods and makes eyes at him as if metaphors were the sexiest thing in the world. He’s probably into that. English majors.

“You tell ‘em, babe.”

The doorbell rings, banishing any homicidal thoughts from your mind.

“That’ll be the takeout,” you say. George flies so quickly to the door, desperate to get out of the situation, that you feel a little gust of wind. You hear him say something to the delivery person and then he’s coming back into the living room, take out boxes in tow and a big smile on his face. Nothing makes the boy happier than food. And maybe leggy blondes that look like Gigi Hadid, your brain suggests, and you sigh.

For a good ten minutes, the conversation is put on hold. You’re all broke college students, after all, and getting Chinese is like a luxury.

“What’d you get?” you ask through a mouthful of food, looking over George’s shoulder. He’s sat back down on the floor in front of the couch again and he lifts the box up so you can see it.

“Veggies with fried noodles. You?”

“Same.”

“Twinsies,” George says solemnly, and you high five over it.

Unbeknownst to the two of you, John and Paul share an eyeroll.

“I got shrimp fried rice if anyone cares,” Ringo pipes up from next to you. You bump your shoulder into his.

“Of course I care, Ritchie. Wanna trade a shrimp for my broccoli?”

He nods and you both chopstick over the terms of the trade. George’s grin drops a little. John and Paul roll their eyes even harder.

After a while, having devoured their food like it’s the Last Supper, you’ e all pulled out your phones. You scroll through Instagram and send a funny post to the flat’s group chat, and everyone laughs simultaneously. Everyone except George, who… has opened Tinder again. Christ, how does he have so many matches?

Well, why wouldn’t he? He’s cute… and funny… and gives the best advice when you’re down…

And you’ll be sharing all that with some other girl if you don’t do something about it.

“Why do these girls keep asking about my teeth?”

You scoff, trying to ignore the pit in your stomach. George’s sexy vampire teeth are yours and yours alone to appreciate, thankyouverymuch. “Probably have oral fixations, the lot of them.”

John does a whole body shudder and you all turn to stare at him. “Don’t fucking talk to me about Freud. That Psych course tore my GPA into shreds.”

“Right, like you care about your grades so much.” You lean back against the couch. “What was so bad about that class, anyway? I enjoyed it.”

“Professor Pang fucked me.”

“WHAT—”

“Fucked me over! Jesus, I dunno why my mouth just had a seizure there.” John cradles Paul’s face in his hands, trying to smooth away the frown on his face. “Paul, you know I didn’t mean it.”

“That’s a Freudian slip, that is,” you comment, sticking your tongue out when John turns to glare at you. Ringo starts humming Hot For Teacher under his breath. John leans over and smacks him.

“The only teacher I’ve got the hots for is you,” John says, turning back to Paul, and you and George make gagging noises. “Professor McCartney…”

“Professor?” Paul’s Pout (yes, with a capital P) turns into a grin. “I like the sound of that.”

“I think I’ve been bad… shall I serve detention for you?”

“Okay, just go!” You point towards their bedroom. “Please leave the immediate vicinity right fucking now.”

“I’m gonna hurl,” George says. The two horny bastards giggle and scurry off in the direction of your finger, door slamming behind them.

You go to bed that night with a belly full of noodles and a brain full of thoughts that keep you turning and tossing in bed. And when you finally do fall asleep, you dream about Gigi Hadid, cackling as she chases you around with George’s stupid little towel.

***

Your second exam the next day goes miserably.

Okay, maybe you’re being dramatic. It wasn’t that bad—you’d done a fair bit of studying that weekend, invigorated to overcome the Coffee Incident. Still, you couldn’t stop thinking about George the whole time, and him swiping through Tinder, and whoever the hell that Pattie girl is.

Okay, stop it. You can’t hate her for dating the boy you like. Us women have to support each other, the rational part of your brain tells you.

You grumble all the way back to the flat, fighting with the reasonable part of you. Eventually, you give in. Rational You is right. Hating on a chick you don’t know is what makes up eighty percent of Hollywood’s bullshit romcoms. Yes, you are going to be a good person and take the high route.

That all goes away when you open the door.

John and Paul are standing in the kitchen, whispering furiously to each other. You only catch the tail end of what they’re saying—

“-didn’t think he was actually going to do it!”

—before John sees you in the doorway and smacks Paul on the shoulder.

“Heyyy there,” John says. You immediately know something is wrong. You walk shut the door behind you and eye Paul’s smile warily.

“What are you two doing?”

“Erm, we were making a sandwich for you.” Paul gestures exaggeratedly at the plate on the counter, which John holds up at shoves in your direction.

“Yeah, we knew you’d need a little pick me up after the test.”

You look around the flat carefully. It’s awfully quiet. Ringo’s at his twelve o’clock lecture, but you should be able to hear…

“Where’s George?”

This slaps the smile right off of their faces and neither of the boys can put it back on quickly enough for you to not notice.

“He’s doing yoga,” Paul says at the same time John blurts out,

“He went to visit his mum!”

Paul glares at John and you feel something twist in your gut. “Yes, you see...” Paul looks frantically to the ceiling. God won’t help you out of this one. “George went to pick up his mum… and they’re at yoga together!”

You walk into the kitchen, crossing your arms. “Louise lives in Liverpool,” you say slowly.

“Yup,” John says.

“And the yoga studio is ten minutes away from our flat.”

“Yuuup.”

You can’t believe he’s still keeping this up. “And the drive from here to Liverpool is four hours. And George doesn’t have a car.”

“Yuuuuuuuuu—”

“Oh, I can’t take it anymore,” Paul cries, ignoring John’s frantic shushing. “George went on a date with that Maureen girl from Tinder. He’s at the coffee shop now.”

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

You must’ve said this out loud, because Paul gives you a sympathetic look. After a long moment of silence, John once again offers you the plate.

“Sandwich?” he asks, trying for a smile that comes across more as a grimace.

You take the sandwich and throw it right into the trash, plate and all.