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spudinacup · 5 years ago

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Spinels Character Analysis:

Now that the comic has caught up to this point I can go on a bit of a tangent here and rant about my logic behind Spinels progression through the first seven pages of the SU AU Gone Wrong comic.

Let's dive right in then, shall we?

Spinel’s Character Break Down and Emotional Complexity:

This is gonna be one hell of a long rant so putting Readmore here.

[This isn’t proofread so if there are grammar or spelling mistakes we’ll all have to live with them]

Spinel as a character is rather complex and predictably unpredictable in how she reacts to situations. In Pixar, they have a concept they like to refer to as the spine of the character. This is the basis of who they are and will drive all their decisions throughout the story. A prime example of this is Woody; his spine is to protect his kid and ultimately get back to him. This drives every one of Woody’s decisions. By being separated from Andy he feels that he will be hurt by his absence and as such seeks out a solution to this dilemma. As a whole, Spinel’s spine, so to speak, is rooted in her insecurity; more specifically her insecurity around rejection. It’s part of what made her so appealing to the fanbase and also to the viewers of the film. It almost seemingly justifies her murderous intent and ability to cause such havoc and devastation.

When looking at the concept of insecurity and abandonment you’ll find articles referring to child abandonment syndromes. TMI moment; but I was abandoned by my genetic parents and have an unfortunately extensive understanding of the sensations revolving around this kind of trauma. Spinel in many ways was a child for Pink, she was a playmate. This doesn’t imply that she had any maternal connection to Spinel but if you compare her situation to that of a child dealing with this kind of neglect it aligns very similarly. Spinel did not choose to be made, she was born into Pink’s service and felt that was her world. She revolved around Pink and was there to please her whims. She was immature yes, but so is a child.

In an article by Lynne Namka titled, “The Many Causes of Feelings of Insecurity and Abandonment,” she analyzes the impacts and results of this kind of abandonment.

“Some abandonment issues can be related to physical security and fears of survival of the physical body. Rejected children can fear annihilation if their emotional and physical needs are not met. The external rejection and lack of love are internalized by the child along with beliefs of being unworthy, undeserving and unlovable. These children can grow up to become jealous and insecure in their relationships.”

Everyone at some point in their lives has felt tossed aside or dejected by society or others and this drives home further that feeling of connection to this character. It as a rather smart choice for the Crewneverse to go ahead with such a character archetype considering the themes of forgiveness and friendship in Steven Universe.

The problem with a character that is based so heavily around the concept of rejection is their reactions upon being confronted by it. We see this demonstrated in the film through each of Spinel’s actions. This sensation of being left behind is strong enough that even while dealing with amnesia and being rejuvenated to an earlier state the emotional trauma still rears its ugly head in the form of aggression.

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Upon arriving at Earth in the film Spinel proclaims that she is there to kill Steven Universe and even continues to state in the concluding scene that:

“You know I came here to take my anger out on a bunch of strangers, but now that I know you... I want to kill you even more.”

This again coincides with the concept of Abandonment Rage. To quote another article of the same name from Lynne Namka:

“Blind rage often comes out of the anxiety and terror of being left behind. Domestic violence expert Donald Dutton defines abandonment rage by saying, “Rage often comes after fears of feeling abandoned and helplessness. A child is made furiously angry by a parent’s threats to desert him but on the other hand, he does not express that anger in case it makes the parent actually do so….the anger of a parent becomes repressed and directed at someone else later on.” Repressed anger then becomes displaced or put on someone else after frustration builds up to a boiling-over point.”

This is the progression of Spinel’s character arch prior to reaching Steven. She has had this melting pot of anger boiling inside of her festering and mixing into a whirlwind of hate and repressed frustrations. Spinel is experiencing a catathymic crisis, a term coined by the Forensic Psychologist J. Ried Meloy. To put it simply, its where the individual's anger becomes a catharsis for feelings of vulnerability. Its a moment of disconnect from one’s logic and instead allows their actions to be driven by this anger lacking any logical perceptions or thought behind it. Webster's definition is as such: an unexpected explosive outburst of impulsive often destructive behavior understandable only in terms of unconscious motivation

So now that we know where her head was at before confronting Steven, what happened after she killed him?

The Impact of Steven’s Death:

Spinel’s actions with the rejuvenator are rash, fast, and not well thought out. There’s been a few great analysis on Tumblr that follow this line of thought.

As a whole, Spinel is playing with the Crystal Gems but her aim is true with her weapon. When she strikes down Amethyst, Garnet, and Pearl its with a single slash straight through the middle, it's effective. What better place could you aim to cause immediate results? On the slim, and probably impossible but work with me here, chance that it didn’t work immediately or at the very least didn’t poof them, there’s no walking away from that impact. It effectively disrupts their physical form and forces them to retreat into their gems.

The intention of the injuries inflicted on Steven follows this same kind of logic. Spinel was attempting to cause as much damage as possible as quickly as possible.

Steven Universe is Pink Diamond, she knows this, or at least he has what’s left of her. Diamonds are difficult to kill as we learned during Steven’s trial.

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So why was she trying?

In my opinion, it was because she was attempting to remove the obstacles that were in her way to being Pink’s friend. She was envious. Under all the hurt and misdirected anger, she still feels abandonment. While it may enrage her she still longs to be accepted and craves that solace of belonging again. Pink Diamond was her world, she was all she had, that absence has left a void that little can fill. We ultimately see this envy and desire manifest in the climax of the film as she fights Steven and ultimately crumbles under her own emotional state before the injector combusts.

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After removing the obstacles that are the other gems she turns her focus upon Steven. The rejuvenator would revert him back to a prior state. If it brought Pink back, great she’d have the source of her anger. If it reverted his powers and Pink was really gone? Fine, she’d be done with him soon enough. It wasn’t a logical decision, it was an emotionally driven and rash conclusion of her abandonment.

When she attack’s Steven her first blow takes off Steven’s arm. I wanted this to stand out to the viewer upon their viewing of the comic. It's drastic, impactful and leaves one unsettled by the sensation of having some ripped violently from their person. The arm is in many ways if you look between the lines, an analogy of P!Steven’s situation. He has been lopped off what made him whole and is only half of a person in his current manifestation. There is no way to efficiently reattach that limb with the flesh expiring in his arms.

The second of her attacks follow suit almost immediately following the amputation of Steven’s arm. She attempts to recreate the action she did with the Crystal Gems and cut him in half. Again, this being an efficient and fast way to destabilize him and poof the gem. However, Steven is half-human. So worked up by her own feelings of entitlement to the violence and grief Spinel is blind to the blood that flies from his injuries and only realizes what has happened once she can no longer swing wildly. The second blow ultimately was the fatal one while also what forces his gem out of his body. Amputates his gem, if you will.

Unshown in the comic is Spinel realizing something isn’t right however it was actually the first image I did for this AU shown here:

The rejuvenator becomes stuck within Steven’s torso, it doesn’t go all the way through him. This isn’t normal and gives Spinel’s mind enough time for her actions is starting to sink into her. With this comprehension comes with it the confusion of what she is seeing.

[-credit @thelostmoongazer for this illustration.] Spinel has never met a human. Spinel has never been to Earth. Spinel has no concept of what an organic is asides from the small critters from the garden she presumably spent her entire life within. She has been isolated, abandoned, and now she’s thrust into the world blinded with rage that has left her unable to perceive the vulnerabilities of the individual she is facing.

In this instance Spinel panics and throws her weapon aside alarmed by the strange liquid she now finds her body splattered with. She attempts to distance herself from the collapsing Steven, the atrocity she has just committed, and the expanding substance that gushed from his body's fractures.

Gem’s poof, that is our understanding of their forms being disrupted. The Crystal Gem’s had poofed, Steven, however, Steven hadn’t.

This is when Pink appears:

As a direct result of her attack upon Steven, P!Steven is given space and room to reform himself. This immediately puts Spinel in the position of not only feeling confusion and shock of the situation she’d put herself into as her temper begins to subside and she watches the pink glow overtake the field they stood within. There is a sensation, we’ve all felt it before, its the same one you feel when you get caught with your hand in the cookie jar by your parents. It isn't that she regretted her actions, its that she regretted being caught.

Not only right after it dawns on her that something is wrong but, as she assumes, the very person she’d been driven to this near insanity by.

She reverts a bit here, tries to resolve some of the issues with the newly reformed Pink. She tries to connect with them and apologize for what they were seeing, for what she had done. Underneath her resentment, she doesn't want to be hated by Pink, asides from that she is almost uncertain what she desires. All she knows in this situation is that things have not happened as they should have and now she has been caught.

It’s when P!Steven speaks to her however that a switch gets flicked. As I explained earlier in the post, Spinel fits rather well within the box of abandonment rage. She is a character-based within insecurity that reacts with aggression when she feels threatened as a way of protecting herself.

In these few short panels, P!Steven not only displays disapproval of her, but his change instance implies aggression immediately making her revert to a more defensive state.

This is what causes her change in tone and ultimately the change in her behavior. She is no longer remorseful because she was caught, she’s being rejected again, by the same gem again.

Adding a cherry on top, upon realizing that it wasn’t even who she perceived to be she feels tricked and made a fool of. Somehow, he wasn’t Pink. He hadn’t reverted into his beginning state, no, that pest that kept her from obtaining what she selfishly desired was still present. Her resentment for that craving boils back into her insecurities and feeds the explosive desires beneath it. Rather than apologizing further she takes hold of these emotional shelters and dives into what she feels the most comfortable with, her anger.

Which brings us to today’s page, where we see that beginning to be acted upon. Surely she can fix this, at the very least resolve that judgmental stare that lingers on her. She can make things better for herself.

She won’t let herself be rejected again.

Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk.

Sources:

[Insecurity and Abandonment] [Abandonment Rage] [catathymic definition]

[SU AU Gone Wrong Comic Master Post]

#SU AU Gone Wrong #SU Gone Wrong #Steven Universe #character analysis #Spinel Character Break down #steven universe the movie #Spud speaks #long post #Spinel Abandonment #Trigger warning #TW: Character death #Tw: blood #Tw: stabbing #SU AU Gone Wrong Comic Analysis

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ollyarchive · 4 years ago

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Olly Alexander Is Done With Shame

Like the character he plays in “It’s a Sin,” the actor and singer struggled with being gay. Now, he tells the world everything.

By Anna Leszkiewicz

Feb. 19, 2021Updated 9:22 a.m. ET

LONDON — When Olly Alexander burst into tears shooting a scene of “It’s a Sin,” no one was very surprised.

Making the show, which came to HBO Max on Thursday and follows a group of friends embracing the gay culture of ’80s London under the shadow of AIDS, was emotional for many of the cast and crew — and Alexander is as comfortable showing his vulnerabilities as the character he plays, Ritchie, is at deflecting them.

“I was a complete mess after the first take,” Alexander, 30, said in a recent video interview. “I was sobbing.” Peter Hoar, the director of “It’s a Sin,” paused filming.

The scene in question, which comes after Ritchie and his friends are arrested protesting the British government’s inaction on AIDS, is one of many in the show that explore how the epidemic devastated gay men’s lives.

When we meet Ritchie, he is an impishly confident but naïve 18-year-old who has just moved to London, with dreams of becoming an actor. Alexander also moved to the capital from rural England at 18 and scored his first movie role, but today he is better known as the lead singer of the band Years & Years. “It’s a Sin” is his first acting gig in six years.

Years & Years’s music often explores the relationship between desire and shame, and is heavily influenced by ’80s bands like Pet Shop Boys. (“It’s a Sin” takes its title from that group’s song of the same name.) So when Alexander heard Russell T Davies, the show’s creator, was interested in him for the lead role, the opportunity “made poetic sense,” Alexander said.

In an interview, Davies said the show was “cast gay as gay, which is my policy.” For Ritchie, he added, he wanted an out actor who already had a big profile in Britain. “That almost narrows it down to a field of one,” he said. “It was the simplest audition of my life.”

Alexander’s arch performance as Ritchie suggests that the character’s ambition and bravado are reactions to fear and self-loathing. “I realized straight away, ‘Oh, I know who Ritchie is,’” Alexander said. “He’s trying to get onstage and shine and dazzle: I’ve done that.”

But whereas Ritchie masks his vulnerabilities, Alexander has spoken frankly in interviews and onstage with the band about his experiences of bulimia, anxiety, self-harm and depression.

“I’ve said just everything about myself,” he said. “My life is kind of out there now.”

Alexander grew up in Gloucestershire, in western England, where his mother founded a local music festival. His father, an aspiring musician, worked in amusement parks.

It was a creative household, Alexander said, but his father had mental health problems and substance abuse issues that led to a difficult atmosphere at home. When he was 14, his parents separated; he’d only seen his father a handful of times since, he said.

School was an even more fraught environment, and Alexander experienced homophobic bullying from age 9. “I had long blond hair, and I acted quite feminine,” he said. “That made me a target. And kids can be so cruel.”

As Alexander recalled his younger self, he started to cry. It took many years until he could look back at the child he was with compassion, he said. “But that’s the biggest thing I’ve tried to do,” he added. The impact of his childhood is something he’s still processing in weekly therapy, he said.

When Alexander’s high school classmates went to college, he moved to East London and became a jobbing actor while babysitting and waiting tables. A pale, skinny teenager with a nest of tight curls, he landed roles as the tuberculosis-ridden younger brother of Ben Whishaw’s Keats in the film “Bright Star,” and an anguished drug user in Gaspar Noé’s trippy art movie “Enter the Void.”

Alexander had been living in London for a couple of years when he met his Years & Years bandmates, Mikey Goldsworthy and Emre Türkmen. Though they started out making high-minded, Radiohead-inspired electronic music, Alexander pushed the band toward synth-pop, with big, melodramatic choruses full of longing.

In 2015, the band’s exhilarating but anguished song “King” — about the strange thrill of being treated badly in a relationship — reached No. 1 on the British singles chart, and its debut album, “Communion,” topped the album charts, too.

“His songs are his life,” said the producer Mark Ralph, who has worked with Years & Years from the band’s earliest days “If you want to know what’s gone on in Olly’s life, then you just read all his lyrics.”

“Love takes its toll on me,” Alexander sings in “Sanctify,” a song about a secret liaison with a straight man. “And I won’t, and I won’t, and I won’t be ashamed.”

When the band performed the song at the Glastonbury Festival in 2016, soon after the shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Fla., a rainbow-clad Alexander told the crowd, “I’m here, I’m queer, and, yes, sometimes I’m afraid.” But, he added, “I am never ashamed, because I am proud of who I am.”

The speech caught the interest of TV producers, and, in 2017, he fronted a BBC documentary called “Olly Alexander: Growing Up Gay.” In it, he returns to his family home and leafs through teenage diaries full of references to bulimia and self-harm. On camera, he tells his mother about the bullying at school for the first time: Through tears, they discuss how it led him to mental health problems in his teenage years.

“It’s a lot to ask someone to bare their soul on national television,” said Vicki Cooper, the TV movie’s director. “But those difficult conversations created the best moments in the film.”

That documentary, and Alexander’s openness about his own mental health, mean he gets a lot of messages on social media from fans who are struggling themselves. He used to try to respond to them, he said, but the quantity has become impossible to keep up with.

Through those messages, though, Alexander had “seen a really emotionally vulnerable side to a lot of people,” he said. “That’s a precious thing, actually.”

Alexander had also been humbled by the positive response to “It’s a Sin” in Britain, he said. The show broke records for the streaming service All4, where it aired, with 6.5 million streams.

“It’s a Sin” first appeared on All4 during National H.I.V. Testing Week; on social media, the show’s cast encouraged viewers to get tested. The Terrence Higgins Trust, an H.I.V. nonprofit, said that the number of people taking tests through their service had almost quadrupled in the weeks afterward.

“People living with H.I.V. now can live normal, healthy lives: It’s so important to get that message out,” Alexander said, adding that treatments for the virus had transformed since the ’80s. “I’m really grateful that these conversations are happening, because, honestly, lots of people really didn’t know what was going on in this period of history. They’re shocked to learn about it now.”

That era is also having an influence on Alexander’s music. He is currently recording new material with Years & Years, inspired by the ’80s dance anthems of the “It’s a Sin” soundtrack and beyond: Donna Summer, New Order, Pet Shop Boys.

“During the pandemic, I wanted to listen to super upbeat club music that made me dance around,” he said. “I found myself wanting to create the fantasy and the energy that I haven’t necessarily been experiencing.”

As well as working on new music, Alexander said he had spent the lockdowns in England watching “Real Housewives” episodes, and playing Animal Crossing. “I used to be so, so driven,” he said, but now he was putting less pressure on himself.

He was happy, he added, to think back on what he’d already achieved, and how much has changed since he was a little boy who wished he wasn’t gay.

“I’ve kept a diary since I was 13 years old,” he said. “Sometimes I look at it and think I can tell this kid: ‘You’re going to do amazing things. You’re going to get to where you are now. It’s OK. You got this.’”

Hugo Yangüela contributed additional camera operating for photographs.

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rpbetter · 3 years ago

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Urgh. Okay, full disclosure, I haven't been on tumblr much over the last week or so, because I was one of the people that Raven initially called out after the COAR mess, and it was in the interest of my own mental health to fuck off for a while so I didn't stress myself out into oblivion. So I'm scrolling through most of this stuff for the first time, and talking to other people who were targeted. And pardon my French here, but I'm fucking disgusted at the lengths Raven has gone to assert themselves as a victim, how many people they've affected, and the waving around of something as serious as suicide for brownie points.

I have sympathy for people who overinterpret things in a strictly emotional and mental sense (actual reactions aside) because they lack the maturity. There's always a reason for that, and it's not their fault. And I have sympathy for people if they legitimately feel suicidal. That, too, isn't their fault. If I hadn't been blocked, I would've reported Raven in case their claims were true as well, because yeah, I don't mess around with that stuff either. But what's unacceptable is how Raven acted on those sentiments and behaved towards others, even after people tried to provide perspective. How Raven claimed to be done with the drama, but continued inciting it; how they claimed to be suicidal and had left tumblr, but wrote what amounts to a "fuck you" in their header and were still putzing around on their blog, and were apparently still editing their posts until as late as today; how they claimed to have deleted but only changed the url; how they weaponized all of this stuff and used it as a tool for guilt-tripping. Like, come on. It's okay if you're down in the dumps, but it's not okay to treat innocent people like garbage, and carpet bomb half the RPC. To me, it really feels like there was an intent to weaponize all of their hurt, offense, anger, and suicidal ideations, despite the possibility it did come from somewhere genuine, and that's so harmful to anyone who is actually struggling with depression.

Every time someone weaponizes mental illness in this way, it just makes people more and more apathetic the next time someone is genuinely just hurting, and saying they feel like they're at the end of their rope. And it makes people suspicious of whether those words are being used maliciously, or legitimately. That suspicion and that association is now there, unconscious or not. And every time this kind of stuff happens, the association gets stronger. What happens if Raven does this again? Some people will still report, but some people might just scoff and walk away - people who might've actually acted before. So in a way, that kind of behaviour impacts Raven as much as it impacts other people.

And you know what? They're not the only one dealing with serious shit. I've been suffering from MDD for the last fifteen years, and I've been in the process of changing medications and having little success for months. I've been going through hell offline. I have a shit list of people I want to yell at because they're dragging their feet on really important things I need to function; I'm constantly running a deficit on spoons. Until a week or so ago, roleplay was one of the only ways I could unwind. So for Raven to bully me by sticking that stupid post in my tags, because they needed to make a scene on COAR, which I was obviously going to comment on (like many other people), then to "like" an unsubstantiated callout about me and other innocent people related to that mess, it's only worsened my own mental health. It sounds melodramatic, but really. Someone else mentioned this too, but the fear of being in another callout, and the fear of that first callout somehow exploding, was in the back of my mind all week, despite being away from tumblr. So that was a little anxiety-inducing, much as I tried not to think about it.

And I'm debating whether to return now, or take more time off, and I have no idea what to do. Because that callout post is still in my blog's tag. I'm freaking out because I was planning on approaching some people to roleplay, which is something I rarely ever do, but now I'm concerned that I'll contact someone, they'll look at my tag to get an idea of my writing/partners/who I am, and see the callout post, and immediately dismiss me because even seeing the word "callout" on its own will send up red flags, by unconscious association with more impactful drama. And as long as that callout is up, these fears are going to be there.

That's just not fair.

And Raven's "apology" is completely unacceptable. Like you and others said, it doesn't reach anyone who needs to hear it, because they've all been blocked. I would fucking love an apology if it came from a place of honesty, but am I going to receive one? Probably not. And even for the followers who can still see that apology, it doesn't address anything. It isn't directed to anyone in particular. It doesn't mention the specific behaviours that were wrong on their part. And miss me with the "my intentions were good" part. No, they weren't; going around blocks and sticking shit in peoples' tags is vindictive and entirely intentional in all the worst ways, and shame on them for pretending otherwise, and by leading with such a poor example for many roleplayers, some of whom are in their teens. One of the people who tried to message Raven (they, too, were called out on Raven's blog) was speaking to a nineteen-year old who was completely clueless about the extent of the manipulation Raven was pulling. They thought all of it was normal and acceptable behaviour. That genuinely terrifies me. And while I imagine if Raven was genuinely apologetic, they would've gone to the callout blog and ask them to delete the callout post (attempt it, at the very least), somehow, I don't think that would've happened given all of their prior actions. God forbid something else is going on there.

Phew. Yeah, I'm angry. Maybe I'm just biased and tired. But honestly, I have a right to be. Raven's apology is a handwave, and they know it. It's a slap in the face to me, to you, and to everyone else who was involved in this clusterfuck. They're not the center of the universe. They affected real people, with real problems of their own. Anyways, I am so sorry for this, argh. Really had to get this out, and I didn't want to dump it on discord or somewhere else; I sure as heck didn't want to go to COAR with it. But hey, maybe people here will feel less alone if I added my own account to the mix. The more, the merrier? In a sense, anyways. Sometimes if you feel like you've been singled out, it's nice to know you're not actually the only person it's happened to.

Sorry for saving your reply for last, Anon. It's such an important one, I wanted to be properly thoughtful!

I think that it is going to make some people feel less alone, and there is always some relief in sharing one's trials. That might be especially true when one has been unable to share them anywhere else. It's not like you can address this on your own blog right now, COAR is definitely not a safe place to do so, it's a very isolating feeling that is made worse for having done nothing.

Coming back and being required to wade through this shit was really damn disgusting to me as well, but at least in my case, I had neither been obliged to distance myself for the sake of mental health nor was I treated to the sickening display of drumming up ideas of victimization from someone who victimized me. What I experienced was just incredulity and disgust, I cannot imagine how incensing this must be for you, I am so very sorry. If it makes me angry having a degree of removal and watching in it real time? What you're experiencing...there really isn't a single word to adequately encapsulate that, I'm sure.

You've still expressed so many of the things I've thought and felt. I found all that initial behavior uncalled for, shameful, yet another display of what's actually wrong in the RPC, but it was increasingly upsetting to me the more I looked into it because it did feel a little (a lot) too reminiscent of the sort of bullying experienced in person. It's really something else to be viciously picked at by someone who keeps upping the game until such point as it begins to cause them trouble, then get to be painted the wrongdoer and punished in some way for it because they're presenting as a sympathetic victim. A more sympathetic victim than you, that's really what I mean, I'm just going to say it.

And that was already in swing by the time I got from the launch point to the smoking crater of then current events. I got to Raven's again after bouncing back and forth between their interactions with others, largely from COAR, yes, and the shit on the callout blog...to see...everyone else being blamed in increasingly drastic ways.

Because on tumblr, unlike reality, if you throw out enough times ahead of time that you have disorders people can get behind, you're more sympathetic, not less. So long as one has set that foundation and has others to broadcast it once convenient, any horrible action one undertakes is given a pass. Anyone disagreeing, anyone not tolerating the abuse, is in the wrong now. In the worst possible way, of course.

This whole thing began with incredibly unnecessary bullshit and every, I mean fucking every, further action taken was a new level of fucked up, but the trivializing of and damage done to the perception of mental health and differences is quite possibly the worst. Are those things that need any more of that? It's already such a problem! I already see suspicion and fatigue with this, every time it's given validation, it grows.

Even if I wasn't mentally ill, with one of the disorders that gets vilified even on tumblr, even if I were not autistic, even if I never knew a single person who suffered worse than I do from the the complications they won by way of being born, hadn't anyone I loved that took their lives, this would be extremely upsetting to me. Using the idea that "whatever I do, it's got to be acceptable because I am X" while not caring that anyone else is X, Y, and/or Z. Weaponizing it for bullying and sympathy simultaneously. Way too much. Incredibly gross and harmful, legitimately fucking problematic.

I want people to be taken seriously when they choose to speak of the boundaries their mental health requires, I want muns to be able to say that they are having a difficult time without it coming off (even to the rest of us with mental health conditions) as a ploy for attention/guilting for whatever action they desire be taken by partners, and I want people to take threats of oncoming, serious harm seriously. How are they to do this, when it is continually used as tool or weaponized against others? At very best, it becomes another thing to ignore and scroll by on the dash.

As we've all had the misfortune to experience or witness so recently, once it is weaponized, it's a problem of priority. I've said in damn near every message I've gotten that Raven isn't the only person involved here who has serious shit going on, but like the absurdity with trying to spin an accident as transphobia, or having the audacity to attempt speaking from a place of peace in a way that might benefit everyone, Raven included, resulting in a callout about being against ND people...it doesn't matter. Doesn't matter that any of us are neurodivergent, have serious chronic mental health complications, or are not cisgender. Raven was swinging that around like a flaming sword to drive off bigots real and imagined before we ever got their attention.

Attention they fucking asked for.

Reblogging that post from COAR was just like posting those rules. The intention was to get attention, and it was asked for with extreme hostility. I have no idea how that is coming off to anyone as simply them defending themselves. It was a great moment to either not out themselves as the person in the confession at all, not engage with it, quietly remove the post, or to reblog it and take responsibility in a meaningful way at that point. Can you imagine what a difference that would have made then? If Raven had chosen instead to reblog it and apologize for doing what they had. Just that. No shitty, snide little comments about how they're sorry, but still absolutely correct and here are five reasons why everything they've misconstrued won't be tolerated. Just an acknowledgment of wrongdoing, an apology for doing so, and awareness gained moving forward.

Their decision to interact with that post in the way they did wasn't just more of the same nonsense, it was actively upping the game. I don't really care if it was intentional bait or just continuing to let malicious impulse run free, it was used as bait. Everyone who interacted with that post was effectively consigning themselves to harassment, and if they happened to interact on literally any other topic that group held a passionately opposing opinion on, they were attacked for it. Curiously, it became necessary for them to be harassed by way of the callout blog, but that is getting a little close to off-topic, so, I'll leave it at that.

So, while I initially really wanted to have the appeal to Raven work because their expressions of regret that I was greatly on the fence about being genuine, I'd say those flags were accurate. I cannot believe that someone who took every opportunity to do the wrong thing is genuinely sorry. Sorry for themselves, absolutely, sorry for anything they did, not so much. This constant narrative I got of "they SAID they were sorry" and "they apologized again and again and took the posts down," including from Raven, is incredible. On that last one, they, yet again, couldn't actually address me.

Appropriate response: messaging me or reblogging that post (you know, the rules snippet I found right the hell there still, despite the claim of it being deleted and the final catalyst of me needing to say something after I saw that, nope, surely was not) with the acknowledgment of a single thing I said.

Extra appropriate response: ^ plus going to everyone who could still be located that they harmed with a genuine, individual, private apology.

Inappropriate response that was had: new post, shitty, childish tone like they at once wanted to argue with me and didn't want to drop the act, restating of this apology that had already been deleted and meant exactly shit while it existed, restating of how they deleted this post and couldn't control reblogs, ignoring that I literally reblogged the original copy from their blog.

Apology neither believed nor accepted. Just as it wouldn't be if my nephew came to my house, broke a bunch of my things, said he was sorry while throwing the pieces at my pet, then threw himself on the floor screaming that he said he was sorry when I told him to go have a time out.

(Yes, I absolutely did just make a comparison to a child, y'all can shit yourselves again. It's not my problem if you want to misconstrue "this person's actions are not befitting of an adult" as "Vespertine said autistic people are children!" Fucking miss me with that. I'm an autistic adult who pays my bills, apologizes, doesn't treat people like shit while trying to excuse it by being ND. You're offensive with that shit, and contributing to the negative perception people have of those on the spectrum. Be a good ally today! Don't valid that! Free ninety-nine offer!)

Again, sorry for yourself does not equal being sorry for what you've done. The former can contribute to the development of the latter, but as I said in a response yesterday, there has been no display of that beginning to transpire. I genuinely hope that will eventually be the case because that would be the best outcome, the only "best" outcome at this point. Even if it was two years from now, if it did happen, I certainly would not be kind to people refusing them any such growth in peace, and I hope that, by some distant chance, I get to prove that.

But...stating "my intentions were good" over any part of this is not remotely promising. When? Where? At what point? Oh, right, when you took it upon yourself to label a random mun you took issue with. That's when your intentions were good. Then, when you vehemently needed to defend that point by callouts and individual attacks under the guise of it definitely not being about your pride, no! It was the defense of everyone else! Defending the community by carpet-bombing it, yes. This is not a "the path to Hell is paved with good intentions" situation.

I am so disturbed about the nineteen-year-old mun, my god. I'm telling y'all, my anger and disgust almost reach what I think is a pinnacle, then there's something new like this.

I don't even subscribe to tumblr's ideology that anyone under twenty-five is an actual infant who needs be kept in a protective bubble and forgiven for all bad behavior with infinite kindness, nineteen-year-olds deserve the agency of the adultier adults they are becoming, but it is a transitional age. Especially today. Most socialization and formative ideas take place online, and by the time younger RPers are entering the adult sphere of RP here, they've already got some really unhealthy ideas. About themselves, about others. There is such a demand for rabidly performative action that gets internalized, it shouldn't be being heartily fed by people in the community they might look up to.

At that age, someone like Raven is going to be a person looked up to. They espouse all the right ideas, and it's an age in which aggressive interaction over those things is seen as amusing and correct, no matter how wrong the actions taken are or the basis upon which they are founded. When these people foster an environment of cruelty for questioning, of course, that is not going to be the natural response. The response is now going to be the requirement of being told otherwise with adequate proof.

I have suspected that many of the hateful anons I've gotten were from Raven's even younger followers who feel like it's normal, acceptable, and that everything they're being told by Raven's sales team over at the callout blog is absolutely true. Of course, they're now morally obligated to come harass me for the things they were told I did! I think it's likely that several of the anons people got were from actual minors, which is so many levels of scary and irresponsible. Really great example all around, yes!

Because whether it is one's intention or not, that is potentially exposing minors, or muns who are still close enough to be more negatively impacted, to who even knows what. As well as violating the rules of blogs who do not interact with minors for good reason, setting those blogs up for yet another callout for treating someone they didn't know was a minor the way they did or having "freak shit" on their blog. Setting up the other party to be treated with full hostility as an adult would be. Very cool, very responsible.

There is just so much here that is unacceptable, I don't think people who were not directly impacted or have never had a callout against them understand the results, and that is one more unacceptable thing you've been good enough to talk about.

Even while taking a break from the RPC, it affects you negatively. Wondering what you're coming back to, your blog is no longer a safe feeling space, and there's nothing you can do to "cultivate your blog" to change that. They've taken away the ability to simply block and avoid others, the thing that keeps all of us comfortable here as well as allowing that to be all of us no matter how disagreeable we might be to each other. Callouts negate adult behavior. Callouts mean that one doesn't know where more potential for harassment might be coming from, or how long we might have to be worried about that.

It would be a major concern for me as well about what putting myself out there to new writing partners might bring. What the success of that might be. It's incredibly unfair that they've made finding new people precarious and more unpleasant than it can be anyway. That puts all of the future of your RP here in question, and if you're like me, just dropping a muse, picking up another, and moving to a new URL isn't going to be a good choice for you. It isn't that simple if you dedicate time to a muse for a long period of time, when that's the case, that's the RP you want to do and have laid the groundwork for.

I don't know if it will help at all, but it has seemed to me, over the past several days, that there are fewer people in the RPC who are inclined to believe or support callouts than there once was. I was hoping that was the case, since there is always so much interaction on my posts against callout culture, but until this crap went down, I had no idea just how many people are not positive toward it. It has seemed to be that the people who are inclined to listen to callouts are just louder.

I've also noticed that those people have the same set of red flags, so maybe sharing that will help you or others?

They don't have simple, basic, reasonable Do Not Interacts. It isn't simply asking that minors don't interact because the mun is over eighteen, that muns writing a triggering topic not interact, or that sort of thing. No, it's URL dropping of specific muns, outright links to callouts or "receipts," and an accusatory tone about any topics or types of muns who shouldn't interact. Such as "nasty ass proshippers" or "pedo apologists shipping incest."

Their rules are reflective this as well. A statement cannot be made that they do not write, let's say, toxic ships and left at that. There will be some morality wank present about normalizing or romanticizing toxic/abusive relationships.

There are less assured flags, but literally, anything that stands out as an interest in RPC or fandom-based activism as opposed to an interest in writing, their muses, or even their friendships with a variety of muns. I don't mean a rounded-out interest in things, I really do mean a glaring predominance of buzzword-laden reblogs and PSA's while they've not written a reply, headcanon, or answered a meme in months.

I'm not saying any of that because I feel like you, or anyone else's, judgment is terrible or that you're oblivious to warning signs! It's just that when we've experienced bad situations, it can compromise our ability to see clearly. It becomes easy to see a potential threat everywhere, and maybe that seems contrary, but it's then easy to fail to see real threats from those we're blowing up. We question whether we're being just as judgmental as the people who wronged us, putting words in other muns' mouths and thoughts in place of their own as was done to us. While we still are afraid to be wrong in giving someone an in to ruining our time again.

So, please, don't feel like I'm questioning your intelligence or speaking from a place of ultimate knowledge, never making mistakes in such a choice! I just really hate that you, and many others, are going through this, and anything at all that I can think of that might help you move forward from this utter bullshit you've been through, I've got to try to grab it.

Because, Anon, like all those sharing their experiences these last few days, you sound like the kind of mun we need in the RPC.

You're someone willing to share with others for the benefit of others. You're being honest about your feelings of anger and even the hopeless sensation of whether it's even worth it to try to return, having your progress on and offline stomped on, while still maintaining a sort of fairness and calm that I know is not easy. Because that's the mature thing to do, it's the right thing, and unfortunately, those are usually the harder things to do as well.

You did the right thing in expressing your opinion and doing what people like Raven's group love to be on about, can only do through bullying: not tolerating it. I'd hate for the RPC to lose someone like you!

Just as your message matters to more people out there than myself, I have no doubt that your choice to not quietly allow this behavior mattered to more muns than you'll ever know. I'm sure that none of them would have wanted this result for you, but so many muns have experienced such toxic, bullying behavior over the years in which not a soul spoke up.

Many of you proved something very important with challenging Raven and the callouts blog, that unlike them, it isn't necessary for good people to even know each other to do the right thing. They have to dogpile and engage in cliquish behavior, what they do isn't coming from a place of inner ethics and strength, but what you all did? It's the opposite.

So, not only do I thank you again for sharing and providing the important support of simply not being alone to others, I thank you for being the example to the RPC that people dealing in callouts and generalized shaming cannot be, no matter their platform.

I hope that, whether you choose to remain, leave, or take a very long break, everything you've been dealing with starts to look up. I know it's easy to say things made hollow for their repetition and flippant use, like telling you not to let them win, or that their bullshit just isn't that important. So, I'm not going to say them.

It doesn't work that way when you're dealing with mental health concerns! You can logically know that this is just petty bullshit not worth being run out of something important to you, but that doesn't stop the worry, frustration, or depression. You can have all the determination in the world to hang in there, even the spite to back it up, but neither is a match for the things you cannot control coming from your brain. That is the cruelty of mental illness on the very best of days.

You have all of my respect, support, and genuine sympathy that this happened to you. No one should be allowed to continually and unapologetically go out of their way to throw a wrench into someone's hard-won progress. You did nothing to deserve this, and the people out there worth interacting with are going to be the same ones who will have no question of that.

Lastly, I also hope that some of the anons sharing their experiences have helped you feel less alone, or like you're not just irrationally upset. Please know that you're seen and supported as well! And that you are always welcome to talk more, vent, share successes here.

Thank you, Anon.

#vespertine #answered #anonymous #long post #drama cw #rp harassment #callout culture

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trainwreck-in-glitter · 5 years ago

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WHAT EUPHORIA GETS RIGHT ABOUT MENTAL ILLNESS:

the high fucking highs: EG (“when I feel good I think it’ll last forever, but it doesn’t” at the Halloween party when rues attempted to kiss jules who rejects her again) I can’t relate to rues manic episode, since I don’t have bipolar but her jittery display of chain-smoking, obsessive thoughts, sleep deprivation, numbing the pain with coffee and taking more steps than she needs to captured the obsessive side of OCD very well, as well as the: COUNTING. I’ve had to repeat numbers in my head over and over and watching rue just start hysterically crying as a child during trying to complete that compulsion fucken’ sent me because I’d never seen an accurate nuanced way of this shown on television. I loved that her OCD wasn’t reduced to cleaning obsessively (EX’ Emma from Glee) even though many people struggle with OCD compulsions of that kind it’s a bit of an overused trope almost like a laughing track in sitcoms, and usually doesn’t serve the characters development in any purpose having their OCD solely exist for neurotypical characters to make sarcastic jokes about.

the l-o-w fucking lows: EX’ rue being glued to her bed for two days unable to engage with anyone or even get up to fucking piss resulting in a painful difficult to watch ¿UTI¿ scene. At a time I experienced severe intrusive thoughts I neglected taking care of myself so much that my hair formed dreadlocks and took hours to brush knots all out.

pushing everyone away: EX’ (I mean just look at the first gif, as well as how rue loses it at Lexi when she tries to check in on her.) while people struggling with any kind of mental illness have a tendency to isolate (espesh in cases of severe depression/mood disorders) however it’s not always aggressive sometimes it’s quiet silence in your room for a week and a half feeling completely immobilised (like with Jules during rues own depressive, she unknowningky sinks into one herself to the extent where her dad is concerned).

feeling like a burden: whether it’s because of your mental illness, low self image or like rue your addiction issues impacting those around you, rue confesses this to Lexi who in true Howard fashion holds her and tries to affirm that she’s nothing like that. Often feeling like your own problems are too heavy for anyone to bear or understand adds to the hopelessness and potentially it could be one of the biggest roadblocks to anyone’s recovery particularly Rue’s

being heavily affected by external factors, more so than normal: like social aspects of your life EX’ (Rue’s codependency on Jules, and Jules’ search for affirmation in sexual relationships, Rue’s nerves upon returning to school particularly hit me (I had a three week hospitalisation and received treatment that kept me off school frequently, and the responses from peers was right on). when noticed again Maddy tells Rue herself she thought she was dead and another friend in her car shouts for rue to “get in Casper!”. Things like school, relationships, daily tasks and functioning can feel a million time harder when you’re battling your own head, the way Euphoria demonstrates this is so raw and realistic it really hit home for me. This becomes even more heightened when people are dealing with trauma/grief ex’ (rue still carrying the grief of her dad and wearing his hoodie frequently and maddy going on a bender taking molly at the carnival forgetting to eat for two days after nate assaults her resulting in her having to be rushed into emergency where they find the marks).

addiction and the feeling of needing to escape your own head: rue will take around about any drug just to temporarily forget her own anxieties, she’s willing to lie (in drug tests by using her sober friends pee), and fight tooth and nail even if it’s against the people she loves/cares about eg: her family, fezco, etc). her addictive personality is made apparent by her obsessive behaviours, codependency with Jules, hyperfixations (watching 22 hours of love island straight) and then again in her drug use. zendaya does an amazing job at selling this all, the way her face slowly sinks from the depths of depression into what looks like she’s gotten a relieving breath of air conveys what exactly she’s getting out of this. with any addiction whether it’s substance abuse, sex addiction, eating disorders, skin picking disorders, etc there’s a need to escape but there’s also a sense of safety/reprieve from what’s making you need that escape. for Rue who is heavily characterised by her own self-blame eg: being scared of people she loves being mad at her like in that scene with Jules, the way she cried when she saw her mother and sister sleeping beside her in hospital when she woke up from her overdose, and in one of earliest narrations where she states “if I could be a different person I would, not because I want it but because they want it” and even asks Jules after she admits to being in love with her if she wishes she was different and Jules responded in the negative. she seems to want to dissociate herself because she feels the weight of her as a whole is too much for anyone and will only be disappointing. it’s sordidly relatable for anyone with low self esteem and as a rue stan the candidness can make the scenes hard to watch.

to recover or sink: rue says herself in narration that after rehab she had no intention of staying clean and for the first few episodes or so she was using to the point where she almost had an overdose in front of very traumatised Jules who then sets an ultimatum that in order for them to maintain their “friendship” rue needs to stop using and rue agrees almost immediately. the look of guilt and shame on her face as she cuddles into Jules who is still shocked and upset saying to rue “I’ve had enough traumatic shit in my life, I’m not trying to be best friends with someone who’s trying to kill themselves”. rue remains sober but clings to Jules almost in replacement, most of rues innocent crush was well innocent and very high school realistic in the way that everything feels heightened. and for a while rue is at her happiest, her best friend since childhood even saying to Jules “it’s because of you” which fairly overwhelms her because being somebody’s sole reason for recovery isn’t long term manageable OR healthy for either party. expanding on this the blame Jules gets for Rue’s relapse is a way we’re perpetuating that their codependent dynamic wasn’t detrimental to either of them, which is wrong. Jules felt immense pressure which in turn tainted her relationship with Rue, and Rue was readily giving more to a relationship where the other person wasn’t ready to reciprocate. Jules and Rue ultimately have a beautiful dynamic together and I’d love to see more of them in season 2 but I’d like it to be in some time when they’ve both explored and identified what they’re both wanting. Because I refusE to settle for anything less than #Kethan after the finale. anywho this all meant Rues hinted relapse in the finale had an inevitable quality to it, because she wasn’t changing because she wanted it but because they did. I feel that one line perfectly captures exactly what would have led to that relapse, from personal experience I tried to actively recover from an eating disorder to please my family but quickly relapsed because ultimately challenging thoughts that have been in your head for so long JUST FOR other people stops being rewarding too quickly because as much as they may want to be an active support system they don’t have the access to rewire your brain. I challenged my meal plan but not the thoughts telling me I was disgusting. Rue still felt like a burden, she never challenged that only the drug use. it would be amazing to see Rue in therapy or even just actively attempting self care and explaining how and why that might feel so hard to someone struggling. I think Euphoria this season has set up a perfect segway for the second season, and so far they have managed to portray the complexities of being a teenager with a mental illness in glitter while keeping it relatable and not being exploitative. I think after seeing Rues chronic struggle it would be really cool to see a character representing what recovery actually looks like when it comes from the right place, having that positive representation of trying to be proactive while struggling and still having questions would be a new arc for Rue and it would really show her growth however after the city incident only time will tell 😪

#euphoria hbo #euphoria #mentally ill #ocd tw #substance use disorder #rue bennett icons #jules x rue #rue bennett #zendaya #hunter schafer #seratonin #fuckoffiknowtheresamillionspellingmistakesbutimonarant

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lionheart49er · 5 years ago

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My Take on the New Sanders Sides Video!

So like a lot of the fandom, I was excited about the new Sander Sides video. Especially after I found out from my brother that this video would introduce a new Dark Side. But I wasn’t expecting to get as emotionally involved with this video as I was. I’ve been rewatching this video so many times. And it gets better with every watch. This was definitely a powerful video for me and it came at a very appropriate time. Let me explain.

This video came out after I had just gone through a really painful bout of intrusive thoughts. I won’t go into detail over what they were. But I swear I went through a couple of weeks where they just kept bothering me. I remember walking up and having a panic attack. Then, spending most of the day under a blanket just having these thoughts run rampant in my mind. And then, having trouble falling asleep but I couldn’t get my mind to calm down. It would sometimes even appear in my dreams. I was desperate for an escape. I even considered buying pharmaceutical drugs that “might” have fixed my problems in the hopes of getting rid of them. (Fortunately, don’t worry nothing came out of that endeavor.) So when I was watching the video, a lot of what I experienced with my intrusive thoughts was conveyed in the video. I’m not sure how I would have reacted if I watched this video during my own bout of intrusive thoughts. But after having a bit of grace period from them (they still sometimes pop up but they aren’t as constantly dominating my thought space), I could appreciate the things this video offered.

It was almost distressing watching this video. Not for any of the things that warranted the trigger warning. (I have a sick sense of humor so I enjoyed some of those bits and could appreciate the darker humor of this episode) But rather because some of the ways Thomas tried to get rid of his intrusive thoughts were things I tried. And being reminded of that briefly brought back some of those intrusive thoughts while watching it. However, I was able to make it through. And when Logan was talking about how little effect intrusive thoughts actually have on a person. The more I was comforted by the advice. Like was mentioned in the video, you can never truly get rid of intrusive thoughts but you can definitely cope with them. And the less you take them seriously, the less bothersome they’ll be.

It was almost scary how much of this video I could relate. The scene where they tried to distract themselves from the thoughts by talking about “Just Like Heaven”. And then, unintentionally creating a connection between Just Like Heaven and those thoughts was a feeling I definitely experienced. Not with the movie, Just Like Heaven (never watched it), but I did make unintentional connections to things every time I tried not thinking about my thoughts. And those unintentional connections never helped. I definitely tried to repress those thoughts and realized that it only made those thoughts worse. I even struggled to talk about the issue with my college counselor and loved ones because I didn’t want to discuss my intrusive thoughts for fear of making it worse. Plus, that scene in the end where they “checked” to see if their intrusive thoughts were gone happened to me all the time. “Checking” to see if your intrusive thoughts are gone won’t help. The only progress I made in not being bothered by them was in accepting that thoughts had occurred and trying to move on from them. It wasn’t easy and took a while for things to get better. But they did eventually get better. Plus the reveal that it wasn’t Remus himself that was causing Thomas pain but rather Anxiety and Morality worrying about Remus. It definitely felt like the Anxiety around my intrusive thoughts was more bothersome than the thoughts themselves.

Overall, I really appreciate the effort they made in this video. As someone who actually experiences intrusive thoughts, I can say they nailed the topic on its head. It was almost scary how accurate the experience Thomas had was similar to my own. If my intrusive thoughts ever return to ruin my day and imagination, I could always look back at the advice in this video for help.

On a less personal note, I also just love the video in general. I commend the risks they took in this video for conveying the idea of intrusive thoughts in the character. While I can appreciate the darker humor, I understand others don’t and that’s ok. If you couldn’t watch the video because of its various triggers, I understand. Still I love the video, I love the characters in the video, I love the song (the song was so amazing on so many levels. It’ll be playing in my head for a long time). I loved how Logan was able to carefully break down what makes intrusive thoughts ineffective and how he was commended for it in the end. I love the reveal of Anxiety as a former dark side (I think a lot of us guessed that was the case but still the reveal was impactful). And I love Remus as a character. I definitely think/hope they bring him back again. Likely in a Remus vs. Roman video as I would like to see how these two “brothers” interact. (Similar to how Patton was mostly absent in Deceit’s first video only to get a later Patton vs. Deceit video) He was a great mix of hilarious ridiculousness and creepy disturbingness. The hammy, chaotic Dark Side in contrast to the colder, calculating Deceit (also love the little Deceit references in this video). Plus, they outright state that you can’t get rid of intrusive thoughts. So I could definitely see Remus literally popping out of nowhere to give us a bunch of “juicy” details of things we didn’t want to hear.

So yeah, here’s my hot take on the video. Hope you liked it. :)

#sanders sides #intrusive thoughts #remus sanders #remus #the duke #thomas sanders

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hiddlesgirl · 5 years ago

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SH 322: All Good Things...

This was a fantastic episode, I was crying from the moment the wedding started and I didn’t stop until long after the credits had rolled. As much as I want the show to continue with all my heart, this was a beautiful finale episode; it wrapped up the outstanding storylines and gave us a wonderfully bittersweet ending. I really don’t think we could have asked for anything better, the cast and crew did absolutely amazingly with the limited amount of air time they were given; I am seriously so grateful to them all that they were able to give us something so beautiful.

First thing to note is that this episode is 60 minutes long instead of 4o minutes; they gave us an extra 20 minutes air time to ensure that we got an amazing episode. Now, let me make sure you know that this was not Freeform or Netflix being generous; this was Todd and Darren not being able to cut the episode a minute shorter or else risk ruining it and going to the networks and begging for those extra minutes. So, in case you didn’t know this already, we owe those extra minutes (which enabled us to have some beautiful scenes) to Todd and Darren.

The first scene in which they defeated Lilith, cured Izzy and destroyed Edom therefore enabling Magnus to leave did seem rushed and extremely convenient fixes to the three problems; but this is completely understandable because they needed to wrap up these three loose ends before we could move forward in dealing with Jonathan and still have time for some scenes afterwards.

I really liked the morning montage of our three main couples; Sizzy’s first time, Clace getting to cuddle in bed after being separated for so long and Alec sleeping peacefully with Magnus by his side who is looking at Alec like he cannot believe his luck in finding him. I know that some people were disappointed that Malec weren’t cuddled up together too, I was a bit disappointed too but I also love what they did. Firstly because Magnus playing with Alec’s hair is so soft and adorable, plus I think that the moment spoke more about their feelings right now than cuddling would have.

For Alec he is finally able to sleep safe in the knowledge that Magnus will be there when he wakes up, we know that in the previous episode Alec fell asleep out of sheer exhaustion. Now he is able to sleep peacefully, also his body is facing Magnus even in sleep; we know from previous episodes that he doesn’t always wake up facing Magnus (for example in 2x15 Alec was facing the wall when he woke up). I may be reading a little too much into it, but hey that’s what I do.

For Magnus he can’t quite believe that this man literally walked into Hell for him; he had been trying to come to terms with the fact that he would never see his fiancé again and now he doesn’t have to face that dim future. He loves this man so much and is so excited to marry him that he can’t even bear to take his eyes off him long enough to oversleep. The stroking of Alec’s hair is a lovely display of soft affection from Magnus, especially because it is just for him; Alec isn’t aware of what he’s doing so Magnus touching Alec is just for his own comfort. I just love this little moment.

I really loved the conversation between Simon and Izzy, they were both surprised by how easy it felt to transition into an intimate romantic relationship; I think that this is just beautiful because it shows that sometimes having that established bond and closeness can really lend itself to the beginning of a beautiful romantic relationship. It’s almost the opposite of Simon and Clary because although their romantic relationship was sweet while it lasted you knew it would never last because they were too close in a way, like siblings; whereas with Izzy there was always this mutual interest that was ignored in favour of their friendship.

Considering how awkward first times can be for on screen couples it was amazing to see them so at ease with each other and their new relationship. I also loved that they discussed their insecurities a little concerning past relationships gone bad, and deciding to learn to be better together. I love that this made the point that each relationship should be looked at separately from your previous ones and that you shouldn’t expect it to play out a certain way just because that is what happened before. Plus, that this is a relationship they are building together and that it will become what they make it.

I love that Magnus literally could not wait another day to marry Alec; they have been pulled apart so many times and he is scared that it will happen again because they never know what threat lies around the corner. I also adore that Alec seems to have wanted to plan the wedding, to go through that entire process with Magnus; I love this contrast to Season 1 when he wanted nothing to do with planning his wedding to Lydia. Now that he is choosing to marry someone he loves he wants to be involved in the process of creating that ceremony.

Alec wants to have their wedding at the Institute which confuses Magnus at first but Alec goes onto explain the message that it would convey would be so important. Alec experienced so much anxiety, self repression and low self esteem when growing up because he felt like he couldn’t be open and honest about who he is. He doesn’t want that to be the future of other Shadowhunters; he wants to show everyone that it’s okay to love someone of the same gender, and that it’s okay to love a Downworlder; he wants to show the Clave and the entire Shadow World that it’s okay to love whoever you love.

Magnus’ face softens where he realises Alec’s intentions because he also knows how it feels to be rejected by people, by family; he also is a very compassionate person. He shares in Alec wish for the Shadow World to be more open to relationships like theirs; he wants to show them that no matter your differences it’s the strength of your love for each other that matters most.

I adore the little flirty moments about tuxedos, especially when you look back to Season 1 when Alec was afraid to even be near Magnus or smile at him. I will never stop marvelling over Alec’s journey and how far Malec’s relationship has come.

The scene between Clary and Jace is very sweet, I love seeing them smile but you can still see how much the situation with Jonathan is hanging over Clary. She knows that he isn’t just going to disappear and is scared of what he is going to do, especially now that she isn’t there as a grounding influence. She also doesn’t want the threat of him to overshadow Alec and Magnus’ wedding, she loves them both so much.

Jace understands why she is hurting but he makes the point that in their lives there will always be demons, there will always be a threat waiting around the corner but that’s life. You have to enjoy the good times and celebrate because that is what they fight for, to be able to live and love. I just really adored this line and moment because it rings true for everyone, it is important to enjoy life.

I have to say that I was very surprised when Jonathan killed the Seelie Queen, she has been a constant powerful thorn in our characters sides since 2B. She is a very intriguing character and was always interesting to watch, that said you love to hate her because she has caused a lot of upset for our favourites and she is always looking out for herself, you can never trust her. But given how powerful she has been built up to be I was extremely surprised that she died, although we know that Jonathan has become extremely powerful (compared to Lucifer and a God) it just didn’t cross my mind that he would kill her (as much of an annoyance as she is to him) until it literally happened. I am glad that we did get to see Lola again (albeit briefly) before the Queen’s demise.

I really enjoyed the scene between Alec and Jace; Jace has developed so much in allowing himself to show his emotions and that has positively impacted his bond with Alec so much, they seem much closer now than they did in Season 1. Their new found emotional openness has helped them both so much as individuals and made their bond so much healthier than it was before.

I love that Jace was able to exhibit both his excitement and happiness for Alec and Magnus, but also his apprehension at Alec moving out. They haven’t lived apart since they were children so Jace is naturally anxious about Alec moving out, he doesn’t want them to grow apart and is nervous about feeling left behind now that Alec is taking his romantic relationship to the next level. Alec reassures him that no matter what they will always be brothers, just because he is becoming closer to Magnus does not mean he is growing apart from Jace; they will always be a part of each other and nothing can change that. For those reasons, I think this might be one of my favourite scenes between these two of the entire series.

I cannot tell you how much I love the bond between Izzy and Clary, right from the moment they met they have been supporting and loving towards each other. Too many times in shows, especially young adult shows, they create animosity between female characters for no real reason and I am so happy that Shadowhunters went in completely the opposite direction. Their friendship is one of my favourite things in the show; the friendships, between so many different characters, is one of my favourite things about the entire show.

I actually did tear up during this scene because they have become like sisters and you can tell how much they mean to each other; but to also take that step into becoming Parabatai shows just how strong that connection is. Especially on Izzy’s side because she never even considered having a Parabatai, preferring to work alone, but now she wants to be tethered to Clary; to share that bond like no other with her. For Clary, to have a bond that is so similar to family ties is so important and there is no one she would rather be bonded with than Izzy. I get so emotional about this.

I love that we heard Clary call Luke ‘Dad’, I am pretty sure that she has never called him Dad before; she has said that he raised her and that he was like a Dad, but she has never called him ‘Dad’ to his face. I admit that I cried, because I just love their Dad-daughter relationship so much. This is another thing I adore about the show, how many familial relationships exist between people who aren’t related by blood.

I was so happy to see Clary with her mum again, especially considering the circumstances in which she lost her; again I teared up a little. It was such a wonderfully sweet moment between them. Then we found out the reason she was there.

I completely understand why Raziel was angry that Clary had been drawing runes that he did not give her, going against his will; but I don’t like that his last straw wasn’t raising the dead (defying the natural order of the world) but was uniting Shadowhunters and Downworlders. Although you almost understand Raziel not wanting Shadowhunters to be affected by demon blood, it was a temporary rune that only connected them for a short amount of time; and it ended up feeling so much like discrimination against Downworlders that it left a bit of a sour taste in your mouth, especially after we were all so happy when Raziel said he didn’t wish the death of Downworlders in 2x20. I understand why from both a character and storyline point of view, but it still rankles a little that the Alliance rune was the breaking factor, not the Necromancy rune.

I did like the scene between Magnus and Lorenzo, clearing up and putting away that animosity between them. Magnus really appreciated what Lorenzo did for Alec, Izzy and himself in Edom; he wanted to show Lorenzo that his actions meant a lot to him. I think that Lorenzo realised that what he believed about Magnus wasn’t necessarily true, especially because he has all these people willing to risk their lives for him, because they loved him. I adored Lorenzo’s lines about making a family of your own.

I will always firmly believe that Lorenzo’s animosity stemmed from jealousy, personally I cannot completely forgive how he treated Magnus and I don’t feel that he was fully redeemed by those few acts in 321 and 322 but I am willing to believe that he was making steps to become better and that if there had been s Season 4 we would have seen him develop into a better person.

I really loved the moment between Maryse and Alec when they talk about Robert; so many times children think that they need to choose between their parents when they split up. I adore that Maryse made the point that no matter what happened between her and Robert, it doesn’t change that fact that Robert is his dad and that he loves him.

We find out that Jonathan is destroying all the Shadowhunter Institutes one by one, leaving the New York Institute until last. He wants to destroy Clary’s world while she watches, to take everything she loves away from her because he feels like she abandoned him and he has nothing left that he loves. You can see how distraught Clary is, she now feels responsible for the deaths of all those people because Jonathan killed them to hurt her. She has to carry so much, she is so strong and I love her so much.

Clary insists on going after Jonathan alone, she knows that Jonathan will not kill her because he loves her, but he would not hesitate to kill the others. My heart is breaking throughout the entire scene because you can see that Clary truly loves him, despite everything he has done she can’t stop herself from loving him. She knows that he is a murderer, that he has done terrible things; but he loves her and he is her brother. She knows he has to be stopped but it is breaking her heart.

All she wanted was a family, she wanted so much to believe in Jonathan but in the end their family has caused them both nothing but pain. She knows that there is nothing she can do to change Jonathan now, he has gone through too much and done too much to come back from it. I cannot express enough sympathy for her that she has not only had to kill her own father but now she has to kill her brother to protect her found family, the people she loves.

As much as I dislike Jonathan for the hurt he has caused I cannot help but sympathise with him; he was experimented on as a child, felt abandoned by Jocelyn, he was pressured by his father, then he was abandoned by his father, tortured by his demonic mother, manipulated by his unloving father and now he feels like his sister has cast him aside too. All he has ever know is pain, no one has ever truly loved him; he has been warped by his experiences, twisted so much that he almost cannot function as a normal human being. He is such a tragic villain.

His death was beautifully painful; the image of Clary enveloping him, trying to convey her love for him, while gently suffocating him with angelic power was shattering. You could see how much it was hurting her, and her shushing him was like a knife to the chest. I really start crying when Jonathan says ‘Let me go’ and Clary replies ‘I am’; the double meaning of it is heartbreaking. It is such a beautiful scene visually and emotionally, but also soul shattering because you can see how much pain Clary is in.

She has lost her last blood relative and her heart crumbles even more when her Angelic Power rune disappears because now she realises she is going to lose her found family too. She is going to lose her powers, Jace and those she loves; she is about to lose everything.

The Malec wedding was everything I could ever have imagined and more, I cannot say how much I loved this scene and how much it made me cry. Firstly, the colour scheme; the warmth of the colours is beautiful, the yellows and oranges was wonderful. Especially in contrast with Alec’s first wedding which was blues and pale colours, the complete contrast of cool and warm sums up how not only Alec feels about the weddings but how they made us as a audience feel. We knew that he wasn’t happy about marrying Lydia and that he wouldn’t have a happy life, it felt more like a prison sentence; but with Magnus, he loves him with his entire being and he could not be happier. I love that the colours reflected this emotional change.

Secondly, the colour of dresses the women are wearing. Clary and Madzie are wearing the same shade of red; this so much reflects their connection to Magnus. He considers them both his family, they are like his little sisters (they are almost like children to him) and they mean so much to him. Whereas Catarina, Izzy and Maryse are wearing deep blue; they have become his family in a different way. Catarina is his best friend, the sister he found; Izzy has become such a close friend and will soon become a sister to him too; Maryse has become the mother he wished for. I just love that their clothes represent their connection to Magnus, especially for Izzy and Maryse; to show that they accept Magnus into their family as much as he considers them his is beautiful.

Thirdly, Maryse walked Magnus down the aisle. We know that Magnus felt rejected by his own mother and his father figures were awful; now Maryse has fully accepted him into her heart. She has become like a mother to him, which means so much to him especially considering her attitude towards him in Season 1. I cannot express how much I love Maryse’s development and her new relationship with Magnus.

Fourth, they used ‘I get to love you’; that song just screams Malec and it honestly was perfect, they could not have found a better song to use.

Fifth, the vows were beautiful. They encapsulate everything the Malec are to each other, and I love that they would say a line each which would complete the two lines which just sums them up because they really do complete each other. The vows were honestly so perfect, they weren’t cheesy or lacklustre; they managed to hit the exact balance that made them emotional and honest to the characters.

Those are just the main things that I love but the entire scene was just so stunning that you really can’t describe it in words and do it justice. It was perfect.

I really liked that we had a little moment between Izzy, Simon and Raphael; after everything that has happened between them it was nice to get that lovely little moment of them all being happy. Raphael is moving on with his life as a mundane, feeling more at peace with himself than he has in a very long time; he is happy that Izzy and Simon have found each other. He cares for them both and knows that they will make each other happy. I just thought this entire interaction was very sweet.

After the tears had just started to stop after the wedding I started crying again during Clary and Simon’s scene because you just knew that this was her saying goodbye to him. She cannot bear the thought of leaving without letting Simon know just how much he, and their friendship, means to her. All the party scenes feel slightly bittersweet because although we are so happy for Malec we are hurting because Clary is slowly losing her runes.

I love that Helen and Aline are discussing wedding attire, I love that their relationship has flourished but it also shows that Alec has accomplished his aim; couples like them are having the confidence to show their love openly.

I cried when Max said that he’ll call Magnus ‘brother’, we were all so disappointed with Max’s behaviour at the party Magnus threw for him in 208 and this moment more than makes up for it. It is another member of Alec’s family that is welcoming Magnus with open arms and you can see how much it means to the both of them.

I adore the scene between Clary and Maryse; Clary knows that Luke will be happy with Maryse and she is glad that Luke will have romance in his life. She also is thankful that Luke will have Maryse to support him after she is gone. I cried a bit more when she asked Maryse if the angels could forgive. In this moment you could see just how truly scared she is of losing the Shadow World, she doesn’t want to leave everything behind and is holding out the hope that Raziel will forgive her.

I think that the dance scene between Clace is one of my favourite scenes between them of the entire scenes, even as heartbreaking as it is. Jace loves Clary so much and has been able to grow as a person because of her influence; she is the first person that he has ever felt secure knowing she loves him unconditionally.

Clary’s heart is breaking, she loves Jace so much and knows how much he is going to hurt when she’s gone; and his words just make her more certain of that. She needs him to know that she loves him, and that no matter what happens she will always love him. She words what she is saying so carefully hoping that he will look back on this moment and be reassured that she loves him even when she doesn’t know him. I cried the entire way through this scene because it was so sweet, Clary was in so much pain and you knew that soon Jace would be in agony.

Honestly, the moment Clary walks out of the hall breaks my soul completely because we know that not only is it Clary crying over what she is losing but it is Kat crying because Shadowhunters is ending. She openly spoke about the fact that a lot of that was just her crying because these were going to be the last scenes of the show. Kat loves this show so much and it really shows. So not only am I crying for Clary but I am crying for and with Kat.

The entire sequence of Clary forgetting and Jace finding the letter was so soul crushing but beautiful at the same time; I was surprised I could still see the screen I was crying so much. It made me feel such a painful sense of loss and I cannot praise Kat’s performance in this scene enough because I was literally breaking with Clary, and that moment her last rune disappears you can see it all just vanish, her facial expression and body language just changes completely. I openly sobbed my heart out at this second. I did like that her runes seemed to disappear in reverse order (with the exception of the Angelic rune) and that the last rune to disappear was the first rune she got, the Iratze rune that Jace drew to heal her. I was a complete and utter mess.

I was a little surprised that we got a year long jump, but I am also happy that we were able to see how their lives have changed; and in many cases for the better. It shows us a little glimpse of how their lives have progressed and potentially where we were supposed to end up if the show had continued, that this was supposed to be the natural ending (with the exception of Clary still not remembering. )

I absolutely love the fact that Alec is now the Inquisitor, this was always his dream job and I am so happy that he has been able to achieve that dream and be happy about his situation. Luke talks about Maryse and it seems like they are very happy and stable in their relationship. We find out that Shadowhunters and Downworlders are now working hand in hand, with Downworlders now playing an active role as deputies; it shows us that the Clave has evolved so much and that there is now a much healthier relationship between Shadowhunters and Downworlders.

We find out that not only is Alec in Alicante but Magnus is there too, they have moved their apartment there. This is amazing because before Downworlders could even travel to Alicante. He is the High Warlock of Alicante too, I honestly cannot tell you how happy this makes me; not only has he regained a role he loved doing but he is now stationed inside the Shadowhunter home city, setting an example for warlock and Shadowhunter cooperation.

His phone conversation also tells us that Shadowhunter Institutes (we presume) are becoming much more open to Downworlders because a lot of people are now adjusting their wards to allow for Downworlders which is amazing. These two scenes show just how much the Shadow World has progressed considering Shadowhunters and Downworlder relations in just a year.

I also love Magnus’ outfit and makeup; it is very much reminiscent of Season 1 which implies that he is feeling more confident in himself and happy with his life than he has in a while. Plus he just looks stunning.

I adore the moment between him and Alec, it eludes to the very domestic and happy life they live together, how comfortable Alec is living with Magnus. I also love the little bit of flirty Alec, and I adore the ‘To us’ because it mirrors 106. It makes me so happy that in their last scene Malec are happily married and both have careers they love.

I know that ‘Taki’s’ is a reference to the book, so I am happy for the book fans who were waiting for it to appear. I love that it is Maia who is opening it as a place for all Downworlders to socialise together, further encouraging good relationships and camaraderie between all the factions. We also learn the Simon has written a graphic novel like he always dreamed of, I love that we are seeing so many characters realising their dreams.

My heart breaks when they reminisce about Clary, you can see the huge hole that has been ripped in Simon. I love that Maia added a burrata salad to the menu in Clary’s name; so many people cared about and miss her that it echoes through everyone she touched.

IZZY IS THE HEAD OF THE NEW YORK INSTITUTE! Sorry for the yelling but I was so excited and so happy for Izzy, she has got to be an amazing Head of the Institute because she has always been forward thinking when it concerns Downworlders, she is leader material and I would have loved to see more of her being amazing. Simon is a Downworld deputy which I love and their interaction is so sweet; I am so happy that we got to see their romance realised and they definitely seem to be very happy a year on.

I have to say that I love the Jimon training scene. It is very playful, especially with Jace’s ‘boop boop’, but it also shows just how comfortable Jace and Simon are with each other now. Their relationship has come so far from the animosity from Season 1. They have truly come to appreciate each other as individuals and create a friendship that seems to be beneficial to them both; they definitely seem to have become a touchstone for each in Clary’s absence.

Simon wants Jace to stop checking on Clary because he knows that it isn’t healthy for him, he wants Jace to be able to move on because clinging to Clary is hurting him. He understands because Clary is so important to him too, but he can’t stand to watch Jace continue to torture himself like this.

You can see Jace’s agony at being separated from the love of his life, he is desperate for her to remember and cannot let go of that possibility. He is sure that their love is stronger than the spite of the angels; he just wished that they saw that. The only thing that would have made this scene better would have been if Jace and Simon had hugged, but maybe that’s just me.

We see that Clary has realised her mundane dream of becoming an artist at the Brooklyn Academy of Art; on one hand I am happy for her but it also breaks your heart because it is evident that she feels something is missing (just like the first time she was mundane). A wonderful person on Twitter (I cannot remember who and I can’t find the tweet right now) pointed out that her two paintings resemble the two weddings in colour schemes, and that was both wonderful and painful to realise.

You can see how shocked Jace is that she sees him and he panics, I am sure that he had decided (thanks to Simon) that this should be the last time he checks up on her because it was just too painful; but now she sees him. He runs because he doesn’t know how to deal with the situation and is scared that it was a mistake, and that she actually doesn’t know him.

Clary chases him and calls him by his name, you can see the happiness radiate from Jace which just increases when she seems to recognise his runes. As heartbreaking as it is that we don’t end with Clace together I do love that their last scene mirrors their first and it brings the series full circle and feels right in a way. It was so beautifully done and I was crying so much.

I cannot put into words how much I love this episode and just how much it affected me emotionally; it was truly a beautiful episode. I honestly believe that they could not have given us a better ending (in the circumstances). It felt like it gave all the characters some happiness and closure, it didn’t feel so much like an open wound. They created it so that gave us a beautiful ending but also in a way that the series could be continued if the occasion ever arose. I cannot thank the entire cast and crew enough.

I love this show so much and it will forever hold a special place in my heart. I ache over the cancellation and I will always hope that one day we will be able to revisit the Shadow World with our wonderful cast. But I sincerely love this episode and I do feel that it was a beautiful and meaningful end to our wonderful story.

#Shadowhunters Review #All Good Things #Shadowhunters #SH 322 #SH3x22 #Shadowhunters 322 #SH 322 Review #SH322 #Shadowhunters 3x22 #SH 3x22 #SH 3x22 Review

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themyskira · 6 years ago

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The Life of Captain Marvel - issue #1

So here we are. Issue #1 of The Life of Captain Marvel, the miniseries that was touted as a bold new origin story that would change everything we thought we knew about Carol Danvers.

And it starts strong by exploiting family violence, trauma, mental illness and traumatic brain injury for melodramatic effect, with no intention of dealing with any of these complex themes in any depth or sensitivity.

For all that, infuriatingly little actually happens in this first issue. No exaggeration, the issue actually includes a stretch of nine months wherein Carol essentially does nothing except mope and grow her hair out. The dang plot doesn’t even arrive until the final seven pages.

Content warning: This issue begins with a flashback to Joe Danvers verbally abusing and hitting his kids. I haven’t included any images, but I talk at some length about Margaret Stohl’s abysmal handling of themes of abuse and family violence. Just a heads up.

The story opens on a flashback to an idyllic childhood holiday in Harpswell, Maine. There’s a montage of Carol and her brothers flying kites, wrestling each other, splashing in the water and stuffing their faces with candy, while adult Carol muses that she used to think her family was perfect.

Then the flashback takes a turn. One of Carol’s brothers rips the kite from her hand, tearing it. Their father, Joe, descends on the boys in a rage and begins verbally abusing and physically beating them as Carol looks on, because — surprise! — it’s Traumatic Past Retcon time!

Goodbye Joe Danvers, well-meaning but hard-headed dad who’s never understood his daughter and whose approval always seems to be out of reach. Hello Joe Danvers v. 2.0, scary unpredictable drunk who hit his kids and terrorised his entire family. Aren’t comics fun?

The flashbacks are interspersed with shots of Carol in the present day, where she’s battling supervillains Tanalth and Moonstone. As the flashback progresses, present-day Carol lashes out violently, alarming friends and foes alike.

“That’s why fighting’s easier than remembering. I tell myself that if I’m strong enough… I’ll beat the memories down so hard they’ll never come back.”

What’s strange to me about this page is the way it deliberately draws a parallel between Joe, snarling and raising his fist to strike his powerless young children, and Carol, snarling and raising her fist to strike down a powerful villain. By implication, it places Carol in the role of abuser, indicating an intergenerational cycle of violence.

Which of course is never explored or discussed beyond this, because Stohl doesn’t want to actually talk about the lasting impacts and terrible toll of family violence, she just wants to exploit it for THE DRAMAS.

As Joe whales on his sons, kid!Carol tries to run to their defence, only to be held back by mother Marie, who tells her, “You’ll just make it worse. Now’s not the time.”

We will be told numerous times over the course of this book what an incredible, loving mother Marie Danvers is, and how she’s prepared to sacrifice everything for Carol. Her actions, though? Her actions consistently portray a woman whose number one interest is in not creating more work or emotional angst for herself, even when it means hanging Carol out to dry.

This is not to say that Marie isn’t a victim as well in this scenario: though she never fears for her life or safety (she could pummel Joe into the ground without breaking a sweat), it could well be that constant gaslighting and emotional abuse have left her feeling unable to oppose her husband in anything.

It could well be, but that is nuance that Stohl is not interested in exploring, and all we get throughout this miniseries is Marie making excuses for Joe’s abusive behaviour and prioritising her own comfort over Carol’s emotional wellbeing and safety.

So anyway, flashback!Marie says “Now’s not the time”, and in the present day Carol shrieks “WHEN - IS - THE TIME?!” while damn near beating Moonstone into a pulp.

The other Avengers are disturbed by this.

Iron Man: Hey, Carol? Could you maybe leave a little something on the plate for… you know… bad guy jail? Black Panther: Would you call that rage… disproportionate?

hellooooo unfortunate paternalistic implications. A female superhero has a hysterical outburst on the battlefield, while her almost exclusively male colleagues look on in bewilderment. (‘This is why women can’t be superheroes, they’re too emotional!!!’)

Cap and T’Challa have to physically pull Carol off Moonstone, as Carol begins to hyperventilate.

Adding to our list of things that this series has zero interest in exploring:

What it’s like to experience a panic attack or traumatic flashback

What it’s like to live with an anxiety disorder

What it’s like to live with trauma

The Carol of this story is not a woman living with trauma and mental illness, she is a woman who swoons hysterically whenever the narrative starts drag a bit. Her panic attacks are purely a plot device used to ratchet up the dramatic tension at convenient moments, and it’s some of the most insensitive handling of mental illness I’ve seen in comics for a while.

Next comes the obligatory scene of Carol getting a full medical in Tony’s lab, only for Tony to throw his hands up and declare, ‘welp, there’s nothing physically wrong with you, are you sure there’s not something else going on????’. Because apparently neither Tony — who has personal experience with trauma — nor Steve — who lived through a FUCKING WAR — know PTSD when it’s punching them (well, Tanalth and Moonstone) in the face.

I mean REALLY.

Tony: Look, the breathing thing is probably some kinda nervous tic.

hi, hello, person with an anxiety disorder here, please do not tell somebody having a full-blown panic attack that it’s just a ‘nervous tic’, you absolute insensitive fuckstick.

Carol: [sigh] It’s… Father’s Day. Not my favourite day of the year, you know?

waitwaitwait, so CAROL recognised that she’d triggered and experienced a traumatic flashback, but for some reason decided to play dumb about it until she’d after she’d had a pointless medical examination??

Tony tells Carol she needs to get herself sorted out or else somebody is going to get hurt, so she goes to visit her mother and younger brother Joe Junior at the family’s holiday home in Maine.

Carol flies into town past a sign that reads, “Harpswell Sound / Summer Home of Captain Marvel” Carol: [narration] Oh, brother.

‘Oh, brother’ is right. I guess at least it isn’t as embarrassing as the time Stohl introduced a D-grade Captain Marvel TV series.

“Sugar’s Donuts / Official Donut of Captain Marvel”

hoookay yep that’s a bit much now.

At the donut shop, Carol runs into childhood friend Louis Lee, who’s grown into a Designated Love Interest with an obnoxious phonetically-spelled accent

“Better keep that to yah self, Ms. Danvers. Wouldn’t wantitah get out that yah cheatin’ on us…”

I despise him already.

Carol goes up to the house and hangs out with her mother and brother. Over dinner, Marie and JJ ask her why she’s dropped by so suddenly. Carol evades and JJ blows up at her because apparently he’s been holding in some anger about how he feels she abandoned the family and didn’t even bother to come home when their dad was terminally ill. (Which, hey, here’s another potentially rich thread to explore — PITY IT NEVER COMES UP BETWEEN THEM EVER AGAIN.)

Carol shoots back that he knows full well she was avoiding home because of their abusive father, only to be interrupted by the door slamming as their mother walks out.

…eeeeeexcept apparently that was an art mistake, because the very next page is Carol chasing after her brother, the one who actually stormed out. She finds him at their father’s grave, drinking booze.

He offers his recovering alcoholic sister the bottle, and when she lightly turns it down he gripes that she’d always thought she was better than everybody else and she should feel free to piss off any time now. Then he gets into his car and Carol lets him drive home drunk like the responsible person she is.

“Part of me knew I should go after Joe Jr. I mean, nobody in my family was any good with a bottle.”

WHAT IN THE HELL, CAROL.

But nah, see, she has more important things to do, like scream at her dead father and desecrate his headstone, because that’s sure not going to upset her family further, nope.

Her little tantrum is interrupted by the sound of tyres screeching and a car plunging off a bridge because YOU FUCKING MORON you stood there and watched your brother stagger drunk into his car and made the conscious decision that ‘nah, I’m gonna let this one play out’.

and ohohohohoho how ~poetic~! He crashed right through the ‘Summer Home of Captain Marvel’

god I hate everything in this comic.

JJ is rushed to hospital, where he is diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury, leaving him in a catatonic state.

And of course, Stohl’s Carol makes it all about her-fucking-self.

“In an instant, everything changes. You ruin someone’s life… it ruins yours right back. You’d give everything to have gone after him… and acted like the hero you’re supposed to be.”

Yes, JJ is in a coma with a traumatic brain injury, but let’s talk about how his near-fatal car accident ruined Carol’s life.

Anyway— NINE MONTHS LATER.

No, really.

We just skip over nine months.

Wherein apparently Carol has been doing nothing but poor-me-ing over her brother’s hospital bed.

Like.

She gave up her entire life and career.

Stopped saving the world.

Stopped interacting with everybody.

Just sat by JJ’s hospital bed looking melancholy and growing her hair out so that comic bros would stop complaining that she looked like a lesbian.

Tony tries texting her and she turns off her phone. So he appears beside her in an explosion of pixels.

which-- how?!?

There’s no visible technology at work here, nothing to indicate what’s projecting his image or enabling the two of them to communicate. Tony might as well be speaking to Carol via magic, for all we can tell.

Christ, it’s a superhero comic, it’s not like you have to work that hard to sell it to the reader. Two lines of dialogue: ‘What the actual hell, Tony?’ ‘Well, you wouldn’t return my calls, so I [insert technobabble here].’ That’s all you need. How lazy can you get?

Tony asks her to come back to the Avengers — we miss you, we need you, this isn’t good for you, etc. — and Carol’s like, ‘nah, I’m too busy wallowing in self-pity’.

And yes, like Carol’s PTSD and panic attacks, like the family violence, JJ’s brain injury exists solely here as a plot device. It’s not a disability he lives with or a trauma he survives, it’s a vehicle to bring melodrama to Carol’s story and a weakly-fabricated excuse for Carol to stay with the family and discover what she’s about to discover.

Because now it’s time to bring the still-catatonic JJ back home. And since the downstairs living room is more accessible than his upstairs bedroom, he’ll be taking the couch, where Carol has been crashing.

Yes, even though Carol has her own childhood bedroom in this house — we see it next issue — she has been couch-surfing for nine months. But now that somebody else has claimed her spot, she’s got to move into… JJ’s bedroom.

So she goes up the room and rather rudely starts going through her catatonic brother’s wardrobe and pulling his clothes out to make room for her own shit. Again, I cannot stress enough that she had her own bedroom in this house. She’s just… weirdly choosing to impose on everybody else.

In the wardrobe, Carol finds a box belonging to her dead father. The box contains a love letter, in Joe’s handwriting, addressed to a woman who is not his wife — along with what is obviously a piece of alien technology.

This is a comic with a goddamn identity crisis. It keeps tossing out plot hooks, only to abandon them pages later in favour of the next shiny idea.

It begins by announcing, ‘This is a story about Carol returning home and confronting her childhood trauma.’ Then it abruptly swerves: ‘wait, scratch that, this is a story about Carol struggling to hold her fractured family together after her brother is hurt in an accident she had the power to prevent’, and then, ‘hold up hold up what we meant to say was, this is a story about Carol discovering a hidden truth about her family and parentage’.

It’s like Stohl doesn’t know editing exists. Because spoiler alert: this story is not about either of those first two things. The first fifteen pages of this issue are a dead fucking weight. They do not need to be there, and in fact a lot of problems could have been solved by cutting them.

Carol decides to spend some time with her family because she’s working through some personal shit, and discovers a letter hinting that her late father was leading a double life. That’s it; that’s the story.

All these convoluted logistics around who gets the couch and who gets the bedroom? Not necessary. Again, Carol has a bedroom in this house. Since she’s not around much, it makes sense that Marie might be using it as a general storage space. So: Carol is staying in her old room and has to shift a few boxes to make space. In the process, her dad’s shoebox gets knocked loose from whatever nook it was stuffed into. THERE. EASY. DONE. PLOT UNLOCKED.

Like, the car accident actually makes it harder to get Carol to that point. The only reason I can see for it being there at all is to force the passage of time so that Carol can grow her hair out and dudebros can stop complaining that she’s unattractive. Because I guess it just never occurred to anybody that they could draw her with long hair to start with?

But ‘oh no, the aliens and the superpowers I can accept, but in the last comic I read Carol had short hair and I AM SORRY BUT there is NO WAY human hair grows that fast, this is BEYOND THE PALE’.

Oh, and can we talk about how Carol’s response to finding OBVIOUS ALIEN TECHNOLOGY is to go, ‘huh, I wonder what this is, let’s see if I can open it by smashing it repeatedly with a hammer’??

Carol: Huh. Let’s see if we can open it. [starts bashing the device wildly] Gah! Why — won’t — you— Marie: [off-panel] Carol! Can you help me with Joe’s tube? Carol: [wandering off as the device activates] Coming, Ma!

And then IMMEDIATELY GETS DISTRACTED AND WANDERS THE FUCK OFF, failing to notice that the OBVIOUS ALIEN DEVICE has suddenly activated and is now beeping ominously????

So while Carol blunders around obliviously, the obvious alien device sends a signal to a galaxy far far away, which in turn activates what is seriously and embarrassingly called a Kree Kleaner. A small spherical vessel orbiting a distant planet lights up and begin speeding towards Earth, while inside some kind of Kree cyborg gestates and grows to maturity at a rapid rate.

Meanwhile Carol sits by the sea with Digital Tony and mopes that “I knew my family wasn’t perfect… but I thought love was”.

you.

you fucking.

Look, I recognise that trauma is complicated and that family shit is even more so. I know people process and cope with things in different ways and at different speeds. And for Carol to suddenly discover that, on top of all the grief he was causing at home, her father was leading some kind of secret life with another women, must surely feel fucking horrible and bring up a lot of deeply painful memories.

But her reaction doesn’t gel with everything Stohl has told us about Carol’s relationship with her father.

We’ve been told that Joseph Danvers was a physically and verbally abusive alcoholic who terrorised his family to the point where, to this day, Carol struggles with PTSD and anxiety attacks. We’ve been told that Carol thinks of him as a mean, violent drunk who even in death haunts her family. She doesn’t understand why her mother stayed with him or why her brother still defends him, when all he ever did was make all of them feel small and powerless.

The idea that Carol would think all of this and yet still be totally blindsided to learn that Joe and Marie’s marriage was not a true-love-fairytale-romance is utterly, outrageously laughable.

Stohl presents the letter as bombshell that overturns everything Carol thought she knew about her family, indicating that Joe was leading a secret life she never knew about. It’s not. All it is is a confirmation of everything we’re told Carol already thinks about her father: that he was a cruel, self-absorbed bastard who treated his family like crap. You know what is a fucking bombshell?

The fact that Joe Danvers apparently had personal access to OBVIOUS ALIEN TECHNOLOGY.

AND AS FOR THIS LINE.

“And like they say, families were made to be broken.”

literally nobody says this.

I even checked, just to be fair to this comic, on the off-chance that it was in fact a thing.

One of the six search results is somebody on instagram quoting this comic. The other five are all related to the title of a single playlist on 8tracks.

But hey, like they say, Margaret Stohl is a fucking hack.

#comics talk #the days of our lives of captain marvel

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qandnoablog · 6 years ago

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Anomaly (Marvel Imagine)

Title: Discovered

Pairing: [In Progress]

Warnings: This part isn’t like my other ones since it doesn’t take place in any actual part of the Marvel movies. The scenes, however, are based on the movies - Thor Ragnarok Spider-Man: Homecoming

There will be some moments where a character will be experiencing a panic attack. Since this is based on my own experiences with panic attacks, I hope no one feels offended by how I describe it.

Part: 10, [9], [8], [7], [6], [5], [4], [3], [2], [1]

Key: Y/N - Your Name Y/L/N - Your Last Name

Word Count: 3,273

Summary: All seemed peaceful for [Y/N]. Everything had quieted down since her last adventure with Spider-Man. Little did she know, it was the calm before a storm.

Note From Author: Midterms are coming yet again and I wanted to post this before cramming like crazy! I’m sorry for making you all wait and I hope you enjoy this part!

Part 10 - Anomaly

It had been about a year since her encounter with Spider-Man.

[Y/N] had finally settled to life in New York, enjoying the lively atmosphere and often exploring around without too many worries. Her capture wasn’t exactly a priority, like Captain America or Wanda Maximoff would be, so she didn’t have to be wary of who could find her. In addition, Tony seemed to be helping behind the scenes, erasing any digital trail she may have left behind. She could never confirm his involvement, but she suspected it to be him nonetheless.

Spider-Man would visit frequently, the two sometimes just hanging out as he asked all kinds of questions about the Avengers. At first, he was so caught up with her new gloves that he sometimes forgot she even existed. He got so wrapped up, practically begging her to borrow it for closer examination, but it soon died down.

After that, he would go fight crime and she would sometimes tag along. Nothing too serious happened since then, so he could handle most of it alone. [Y/N] was just there for any damage control, helping him be more efficient during fights. Ned would sometimes also come over with Peter when the two needed a place to work on both actual school projects and other side “projects” without the watching eyes of their guardians. Overall, it was very peaceful.

Everything seemed to be going great until one day… Well, it was one of the worst days [Y/N] had experienced in her life.

The day started off normal. She had woken up early, a bit before her alarm, and was feeling energized to just go out and explore more of New York. Then, something completely unexpected happened.

While walking down the somewhat empty streets, the sun barely making its way up in the sky, a strange, orange glowing circle appeared on the ground around her. A bit panicked, the sparks of light dangerously close to her ankles, she jumped away from the center of the circle. Without someone in the middle of it, it quickle fizzled out and was gone.

What the hell?

She peered over at the empty sidewalk, examining it closely, but it showed no signs of charring from the odd occurance. Then, it happened again. The same circle appeared under her, but this time it was faster. [Y/N] felt gravity pull her down as the ground below her just vanished.

The sensation reminded her of the wormhole back on Sakaar, the flashes of memories jolting her with fear and adrenaline. Her breathing accelerated and her hair stood on end as power welled up inside her and exploded her upwards with incredible force, away from the portal. Just like before, the circle vanished when she no longer stood atop it.

No, no, no, no, no, [Y/N] chanted again and again.

Panic became hysteria as she trembled all over. The fact that she was completely exposing her abilities in public, regardless of the lack of people, didn’t even register in her mind. All she could think of was how she didn’t want to go back to that alien planet. There was no telling how long she’d be stuck in that wretched place again, if she was sent there at all. She might not even be able to return to Earth like last time. [Y/N] was lucky when Loki and Thor ended up there. If she got sent there again, it could possibly be forever. And, if the Grandmaster still ruled and remembered her, she wouldn’t be safe.

Take a breath. Panicking will get you nowhere. Breathe!

A few seconds passed by. Then a minute. After a couple of minutes of waiting the circle still did not reappear. Her breathing settled somewhat and her heartbeat returned to its normal pace. Though adrenaline still pulsed through her, making her uncomfortable with the excess energy, she was too scared to completely calm down.

It’s okay, she tried to tell herself, It could be nothing. Wormholes don’t usually appear in the middle of the ground, right?

But how was she supposed to know? That time on Sakaar, a wormhole just suddenly emerged and sucked her away from her friends and onto Earth. Thankfully, she ended up where she wanted to be, but that was a once-in-a-lifetime chance. Out of the infinite possibilities, it was highly unlikely that she would be that lucky again.

However, as she was carefully thinking about all her options while hovering in the air, those same sparks flew out to right beside her. The shock of it startled her so much that the hold on her powers faltered and she began to fall dangerously fast.

Shit!

It wasn’t a fatal height, but it was enough to do some serious damage. She braced for impact, her muscles tensing at the expected solid ground, but then the falling didn’t stop. [Y/N] could already surmise what had happened, the odd portal strangely targeting her, but she was too scared to open her eyes to confirm it. Still, the familiar feeling of nausea was enough for her to know what happened without seeing for herself.

I don’t want to go!

“Ah, you’re awake,” an unfamiliar voice called out as [Y/N] finally opened her eyes.

Everything was unfamiliar. The ceiling. The floor. The walls. The bed. Everything… They were all things she’d never seen before. Her heart raced as the events of what happened flooded back to her and her breathing became erratic. Tears filled her eyes and she couldn’t even focus on the person beside her. She couldn’t control her body as it trembled, her body feeling unnaturally cold as the blood drained from her. Reality was slipping from her and she began to hyperventilate, when something brushed against her hand.

“Shhh,” the stranger soothed, his gloved hand gently squeezing her own, “You’re alright. You’re okay. Just take a deep breath.”

[Y/N] finally turned to the speaker. Even he was unfamiliar. He had white streaks on both sides of his hair, contrasting with his normal full head of black. The lighting was dim, so it was hard to focus. Everything about him seemed elegant, but most importantly… Human. He appeared to be human. Though the thought should have reassured her, many people on Sakaar looked human. His clothes certainly didn’t resemble the fashion sense of Earth that she knew of. Still, not knowing was worse than knowing, since the imagination could be scarier than the truth. If she wanted to finally rid herself of this anxiety, she’d have to ask that dreaded, awful question.

“W-where…” She choked a bit, unable to form words as tears spilled from her eyes. Shuting them tight and taking in a breath, she tried again. “Where am I?”

“New York,” he answered, his stern features softening, “Earth, year 2017.”

It took her a moment for the words to sink in. New York. 2017. Earth.

[Y/N]’s body crumpled back in relief and the tears flooded like a broken dam. She covered her face in her hands, unable to stop herself from crying as the fear of being on another alien planet eased away from her. Sobs escaped from her as the sounds filled the near silent room. The man beside her just sat there, patiently waiting for her.

She wasn’t back on Sakaar. She wasn’t trapped on a foreign planet. She wasn’t sent to another place in time. She was still in New York. She was still on Earth.

It surprised [Y/N] how much the many years stranded on Sakaar had damaged her. Of course it was a scarring experience, but it never hindered her this much over the years she had returned to Earth. The memories resurfaced from time to time, often in the form of a nightmare, but they never bothered her to this extent.

“Who are you?” [Y/N] asked when she finally cooled down and recalled that she wasn’t alone in this strange room. Her eyes were still red and most likely puffy from all the crying, but he didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he was very calm, which helped her to feel a bit more at peace.

“My name is Doctor Stephen Strange.”

“You’re a what?”

Stephen had finished explaining where she was, why she was here, and how he had brought her there. He seemed to think that all of this was quite easy to comprehend, but a world of magic was just a bit difficult to believe. If he was categorized as a god or an alien, perhaps it would have been easier, but him being a normal human… Now that was hard to wrap her head around.

“I am the master of the mystic arts,” he repeated, “and I brought you here because I sensed an anomaly around you.”

“Look, Mister-”

“Doctor,” Strange interrupted her, adamant on getting that title across.

“Doctor,” she corrected, a bit drained from everything that went on, “I just experienced hell and now you want me to believe all this magic stuff?”

Honestly, she wanted to be mad. She wanted to be furious and throw a tantrum at the man who had caused her so much distress, but she was also tired. She was so exhausted due to all the change that went through her life, every bad experience just crashing back on her in that moment of hopelessness, that she just couldn’t muster up the energy to fight this man. He was a stranger to her. It was fine to leave it at that, wasn’t it?

“I just want to go home. Maybe take a nap. Can I go now?”

“Miss [Y/L/N],” the man replied, his expression serious and unchanging, “I keep tabs on everything that may be a threat to this world, but when you entered my city, there was just something off.”

“Off?” [Y/N] couldn’t even gather enough energy to feel offended.

“It’s as if the time around you is distorted,” Stephen clarified, trying to keep it simple so as to not confuse her. It didn’t really work.

Noticing her blank expression, he waved a hand in front of her, and a strange tingle prickled at her. She looked down at her own arms and noticed something rippling off her skin in almost transparent waves. It felt a bit odd, and she tried to touch whatever it was, but her hands just phased through them.

“W-what the-? What is this?” [Y/N] questioned, goosebumps forming at the intangibility of it.

“Thirty… No, twenty… Eight?” He muttered as he examined the ripples, his hand resting under his chin in thought, “Yes. Twenty-eight.”

“Excuse me?”

“You are off this timeline by twenty-eight years.”

It was then that it clicked. [Y/N] now knew exactly what he meant by off and anomaly. She didn’t know how he knew, but it seemed he was talking about her years on Sakaar. Still, she didn’t know this man. In fact, because of the stunt he just pulled, she didn’t trust him either. Why should she answer any of his questions?

“Ah, so that’s what happened,” Stephen nodded before she could even say a word. He leaned back in his chair, taking a sip of tea that seemed to appear out of thin air. “Well, nothing I can do about that. Strange, but harmless. I apologize for wasting your time.”

“Wait-”

But before she could finish, everything around her blurred. In the blink of an eye, a room full of old books, ancient artifacts, and elegant decor was replaced with the busy, bustling streets of New York. People walked around her, not even noticing that she had appeared out of nowhere.

She felt a bit queasy, the feeling of being transported from one location to another making her recall those wormholes and portals, but she swallowed back the nausea and blinked a couple more times. The sun was now high in the sky, showing how much time had passed. Its bright light made her eyes sting, since they had been adjusted to the dim lighting of that strange room. Shaking off the sick feeling, she gave up the idea of getting answers and simply let the matter drop.

“I really hate magic,” she grumbled, her mood fouled by the whole event as she finally arrived home and flopped onto her bed.

“Now that seems a bit harsh,” a coy voice whispered into her ear, making her jump back in alarm.

The man who stood before her was all too familiar. The years didn’t erase the memory of him, the image etched into her brain from all the rage she had felt for him that day. Without thinking on it for another second, her fist flew towards him, aimed directly at his face. However, her hand merely phased through the figure, his nose uninjured, as she stumbled forward from the lack of impact.

“Hello to you too, [Y/N].”

“Go to Hell, Loki.”

“Yes, the second-rate sorcerer,” Loki huffed, his brows furrowing slightly at the memory, “I must remember to pay him back someday.”

[Y/N] had given in once she realized he would not leave her alone.

He had sent a copy of himself onto Earth, admiring the “foolish actions of Midgardians” whenever he was bored, when he had happened upon her. Of course he was not looking for her, not even knowing that she was back on Earth and not with Thor, but he couldn’t pass up this opportunity to mess with her. Besides, he had some free time.

“You know Doctor Strange?”

She had known Loki for a few weeks back on Sakaar and though their relationship was far from friendship, it wasn’t as small as an acquaintanceship. They grew to tolerate one another, especially in the face of the Grandmaster, so of course they could hold a conversation. However, that became a bit awkward after Loki’s little mind tricks he had casted around the time of Thor’s arrival on the alien planet. Still, she hadn’t seen him in years. If she couldn’t forgive this god, then she could at least hold out so that she could find out how Thor was doing after all this time.

“We had a brief encounter,” he scowled at the memory and quickly pushed it aside before it could ruin his good mood, “but enough about me. I’m more curious on why you’re on Earth and not with my brother.”

“Wait, are you with him right now?” [Y/N] asked, sitting up on her bed and following Loki with her eyes as he wandered around her apartment.

“No, I am with a more… Rambunctious bunch,” he chuckled a bit dryly, clearly unamused by the company around him, wherever he may be. “Just some rebels rallied together to go help save Asgard from Ragnarok.”

That made her freeze. She had forgotten that she had been thrown back in time from that day on Sakaar. In Thor’s perspective, she must have been sucked up by that wormhole just mere minutes or hours ago. Not even a day must have passed by since then.

“Okay,” [Y/N] said, nodding as she took it all in. He was curious when he examined her reactions, but wasn’t too interested on what was buzzing through her head. As he was hundreds of years older than any Midgardian, he assumed her thoughts were just as insignificant. “So that means Thor made it off of Sakaar, right?”

“Of course,” the God of Mischief was a bit confused. Her question didn’t quite make sense to him and he didn’t like feeling left in the dark. With that, he decided return to his previous question. “Why are you on Earth?”

At first, [Y/N] was quiet. She wasn’t sure whether or not she should tell Loki about what had happened. First of all, she didn’t like him. Though her feelings towards him weren’t quite hatred, they weren’t very pleasant. Giving this god information was like arming him for battle. Secondly, [Y/N] enjoyed that slight bit of annoyance that shone on his face. It wasn’t a big win but she considered it one nonetheless.

After a while, [Y/N] finally gave in and decided to tell him everything. She took a gamble and prayed that he would pass on the information to Thor. He must have been worried about her since she was suddenly taken away. There wasn’t a day that went by that she wasn’t anxiously thinking back on what had happened after that day. Now that Loki was here, during the time where the battle against Hela was upon them, she desperately wanted Thor to know that she was alright and that he didn’t have to concern himself about her. His focus should go solely to his safety and his people. She didn’t want to hinder that.

“I see,” was all Loki said.

He looked bored, silently listening to her ramble on, but she had studied him enough to read him to a certain extent. Though his face portrayed indifference, his eyes sparked as calculations and thoughts raced through his mind. [Y/N] couldn’t decipher too much, she wasn’t a mind reader after all, but she knew he cared enough to hear her story out. Or at least he cared enough about the information she presented to listen carefully. Hopefully, he would pass on this message to Thor. That was all she could ask for.

Seconds turned to minutes as the silence continued. Surprisingly, the noiseless atmosphere wasn’t as awkward as one would have expected. The two of them were actually used to this, their days in Sakaar making any moment of quiet more blissful than stiff. Then, Loki looked up and glanced at what seemed to be an empty wall.

“Oh, looks like we’ve arrived,” Loki murmured, his image rippling as the main body stirred.

More and more of him started to disappear and for some reason, something within [Y/N] stirred.

“Loki!”

She called out without thinking. When he stopped fading, returning to a more solid image, and turned to her, more surprised than amused, she nervously bit her lower lip.

“Just…”

[Y/N] hesitated. She didn’t want him to know she was worried, given that she was still very mad at him, but she couldn’t let these words just be bottled up within her. Regret would consume her if something happen to him in this upcoming battle. They weren’t exactly friends, but how could she, in good conscience, let a man going off into a bloody battle go without settling debts?

If it wasn’t for him and his brother, she would have never escaped the confinements of Sakaar. Though she couldn’t forgive him completely for making her feel so humiliated that time he had forced her to spill her secrets, she still felt grateful to him for bringing a bit of Earth back to her. It must have been a small thing for him to share but to her… It granted her a sliver of hope.

“Just…” She took in a deep breath, steeling her nerves, and looked him in the eyes. Showing no weakness and only speaking the genuine truth, she finished her sentence. “Don’t die.”

His eyes widened, clearly not expecting those words to ever be directed at him.

“Well, not before I can kill you, anyways,” [Y/N] added with a grin.

A few seconds passed, something clearly happening where his true body was since his image kept flickering, and then, Loki smiled. Though it was that mischievous, signature smile of his, there was a glint that shone in his eyes before he faded away, leaving [Y/N] all alone in her little apartment.

Author’s Note: I’ll be taking a break from writing any more parts. Though a large part has to do with college and my daily life, I’ll mostly be on hiatus until after Avengers 4 is released so I can make the next few parts (which will be based on Infinity War) as accurate as possible. Thank you for sticking with me and enjoying my works! I hope you all will be patient and still want to read Discovered when I return!

[PART 11]

Tags: @themeanestlittlewitch @stressedandbandobessed7771 @moistpotatobear @fxckingfat

#marvel imagine #marvel #discovered #anomaly #mutant!reader #avenger!reader #spider-man #peter parker #doctor stephen strange #loki

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blazerina · 7 years ago

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A Lot to Live For (MC/Taylor’s POV - Sean x MC - Part 2)

Summary: Taylor spends her last night with Sean thinking about their time on the island, what going home might be like, and the life she has lived up to this point. Check out A Lot to Life For - Part 1 - for Sean’s POV from this night, here: https://blazerina.tumblr.com/post/165459359250/a-lot-to-live-for-sean-x-mc

Rating: Mature themes – nothing crazy; abandonment, dealing with no family, relationship issues, fear & anxiety – that’s about it.

–

“Maybe this is fast. But it might be my last chance to say it. I love you, Taylor.” Sean’s voice did not waver and his eyes locked on hers as he said those words to her.

“I love you too, Sean.” She swallowed hard, trying to keep the lump in her throat from escaping in an ugly sob. As she held Sean’s face in her hands, she closed her eyes and leaned in to kiss him. A single tear rolled down her cheek, despite her efforts to keep it from falling. Sean pulled back from her and smiled, wiping the tear away gently.

The scene from only a few hours earlier kept dancing in her mind. She knew it was a moment, a snapshot, in the history of her life, that she would never forget. Sean had been restless tonight and she knew he was still awake. The last thing she wanted was for him to be worried about her; even though she knew he was thinking about her and the others and how he could protect them. He was like that. It came naturally to him to think about everyone but himself. She truly meant it when she told him that he was the best man she’s ever known.

As Taylor kept her eyes closed and remained still, as not to startle Sean, she too began to think about tomorrow. Everything would be different. Sean had said himself that they would either be back home, or…

She couldn’t bring herself to even finish the thought.

If they actually did get to go home, what would she be returning to? Taylor had always struggled with her family life and her background being so unconventional. She didn’t have the same childhood memories that other people did. Sometimes she was thankful that she couldn’t really remember anything. She always told herself it was a defense mechanism, most likely, so that she didn’t have to live with unbearable pain or guilt. Memories had been subconsciously blocked by her own mind. She was sure of it.

Hartfeld had been the first place she really was able to be herself. Jumping from home to home as she grew up, she never felt stable, safe or secure. But at Hartfeld, she slept in the same place every night and came home to the same roommates every evening. Diego had been her saving grace more times than she could count and she couldn’t imagine life without her best friend. The college campus and the community she found there were her home. Like Taylor had told Sean earlier, this trip had changed everyone. What they had experienced together brought them closer to each other and made them different people than the ones who boarded the plane in June.

Taylor still had so many questions. The weird dreams and visions she had on the island; feeling connected to the Watchers and the way Rourke had spoken to her – it didn’t make sense to her at all but she knew it was real. She knew something was happening to her. It terrified her to think what life would be like away from the island, without answers. She didn’t know who she was anymore. The Taylor she thought she knew had been lost in the process of fighting the force of La Huerta. Trembling with fear, she rolled over and pressed herself further into Sean, realizing how scared she was of the future.

Sean gripped her tightly, letting out a heavy sigh. Taylor could swear she felt his pulse quicken and she was tempted to open her eyes and talk to him, but what would she say?

She couldn’t tell him that she was scared, because then he’d try to reassure her that everything would be okay. But what if it wasn’t?

She couldn’t tell him that she felt like the Taylor on La Huerta was more real than the Taylor that robotically lived her life at Hartfeld; repeating the same monotonous actions day in and day out. He would try to tell her that couldn’t be true and that sure, maybe she had “found herself” here on the island, but she could be whatever she wanted once they made it through the gate. What if she couldn’t?

She couldn’t tell him how afraid she was to lose him and how she knew if they had to be separated or if anything happened to him the next day, that she would not be able to live with herself. The pain she imagined feeling if tonight was really their last night together was excruciating. There would be no way she could express to him in words how much he meant to her and how much she had come to rely on him in just a few short weeks. If she did, she knew he would try to tell her that in the past few weeks they’d been together, she had made him the happiest he had ever been and that no matter what happened, he would always love her and he would be forever grateful for the ways she had impacted his life for the better. But what if he only felt this way about her because of the circumstances they found themselves in? What if none of his feelings for her were real?

She stopped herself there - realizing she was going down a dangerous path. Her mind was playing tricks on her. Sean didn’t “just do” things. He only did what he thought was right. He only fought for what he truly believed in.

He really was the best man she had ever known.

Taylor knew if she was going to try to get any rest, she needed to calm down and focus on happy thoughts.

Slowly drifting off to sleep, she re-imagined asking him to kiss her and Sean’s chivalrous response, “With pleasure…”

–

The next day, Taylor woke up early and could tell the sun was rising as the colors of the sky changed before her eyes. “Today’s the day.” She whispered.

As strong as she wanted to be for Sean and as much as she didn’t want him to know what she was really thinking or feeling, she knew she would break at some point. It had taken a lot of self-discipline to keep from waking him up in the middle of the night to talk, but she knew he was dealing with his own thoughts and struggles too. She was glad she had given him that alone time to think and reflect before today’s events.

As she rolled over and looked at him sleeping peacefully, her eyes welled with tears. How could she have lived so much of her life without him? He was her protector. Her rock. Her life. Her love. Her future.

She couldn’t let him down today because she knew he wouldn’t let her down; he would die trying to save her. She knew this without a doubt.

“Sean.” Taylor whispered, running her hand slowly across his chest. “We should probably get up. Today’s a big day.” She propped herself up on her elbow, looking at him and smiling wistfully.

His eyes fluttered open, smiling immediately upon seeing her face and somewhat surprised that he managed to fall asleep in the tent. “I like waking up like this.” He admitted, pulling her in for a deep kiss.

“We better get going.” He instructed, running his hand through her hair while she pulled away.

Taylor grabbed her clothes and sighed, watching Sean get dressed. “I don’t want it to end this way.” She suddenly blurted out. Here it was. The breakdown she knew was coming. All of a sudden her walls came tumbling down and she was sure she wasn’t strong enough to make it through.

Sean finished putting his shirt on, over his head and drew her in for a hug. “It’s not going to.” He assured her. “There’s too much to live for, Taylor. We’re going home.”

“But what if we don’t?” She questioned. “What if we don’t go home?” She sighed, searching Sean’s eyes for an answer.

“Then it ends. It is over. But we’ll be together.” He reassured her, hugging her, trying to calm her down.

Letting the tears fall, Taylor realized how alone she had been all of her life. Flashbacks to sitting on a bed, in an empty room that was cold and sterile, with only a few toys and some books, flooded her memory.

All too often she had been alone in her thoughts. Alone in realizing she had no memories, really – they were all locked away somewhere in a place that didn’t exist. Before La Huerta she didn’t have a purpose, or a reason to fight for anything. But now she did.

“I won’t be alone.” She said, reminding herself of this fact. She pulled away from Sean and wiped her face.

“That’s right.” Sean smiled, rubbing her arms and looking her over to make sure she was okay.

“No matter what happens, we’re in this together. And once we make it home…” Sean trailed off, sitting down to put his shoes on.

“You’ll never be alone again.” He gave Taylor a one-of-a-kind look that conveyed so much to her. If he believed they were going home, then she did too.

She watched Sean in silence as he finished tying his shoes. After putting on her jacket, she unzipped the entrance to the tent and looked over her shoulder as she climbed out. “I love you, Sean.” She whispered, before she turned to leave.

Stepping out into the cold winter air, she put on some gloves and took a deep breath, reminding herself to savor each moment before she embarked upon one of the most important days of her life.

#endless summer #sean x mc #sean marcus gayle #sean gayle #blazerina babbles

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ellenlucasonlinedatingblog · 5 years ago

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Porn Ed: What Happens When Porn Replaces Sex Education?

Adolescents today have greater access to a wider range of pornography than any previous generation. So how is it affecting them?

This question is the crux of a new episode of Lisa Ling’s CNN series This is Life titled “Porn Ed,” which premieres September 29. Ling wanted to better understand how accessibility to porn is changing the way adolescents and young adults think about sex and approach relationships.

Episode still from Lisa Ling’s “This is Life.” Image courtesy of CNN.

I had a chance to preview the episode and sit down with Ling to discuss it. While there’s much that we agree on, including the idea that porn is not an effective substitute for sex education, there are some aspects of the episode that I worry could potentially leave viewers with the wrong impression of how porn impacts people, especially the idea that it is “addictive.” The show focuses on people’s personal opinions about and experiences with porn and doesn’t explore the science—in fact, no researchers or doctors are interviewed on screen during the episode. So while it’s certainly a thought-provoking show, there were some missed opportunities for a data-driven discussion.

Below is a lightly edited transcript of my conversation with Ling that focuses on the areas where we agree, but also the areas where science and medicine diverge from some of the things claimed by those who were interviewed in the episode.

Justin Lehmiller: In this episode, you interview people who see porn as a source of danger and problems, but you also talk to people like Cindy Gallop who see potential value in adult videos that are capturing real-life sex. When you put those different conversations together, what's your take on whether porn itself is inherently good or bad, or is it neutral?

Lisa Ling: Our episode really isn't a condemnation of porn. I do think that for some people, there may be value to porn. And I would never begrudge sex workers because I actually think that there are sex workers out there who are performing a real service. My big concern is just the abundance of material that's out there—some of which is really extreme—and how easy kids can access it. You know, when you talk about what Cindy's trying to do with her website, Make Love Not Porn, they are defiant about the fact that they are not porn. They are providing people with an experience of what real sex should look like. It's not always clean and it's sometimes messy. It's sometimes funny. It sometimes doesn't really work very well. And I do think that there is value in that. I do think that we should be exposed to how beautiful and meaningful sex can be. It's part of who we are, right?

But at the same time, I do think that it's incumbent on parents to start having those conversations with kids sooner. I think that kids need to understand that sex is part of who we are, that it can be just a pleasurable experience, that communication is really essential, and that what they are accessing is not reality. It's entertainment for adults. There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes that kids are never aware of.

That's one of the reasons why we feature Tasha Reign, the adult film star, because she is on a mission to communicate to people that, before cameras even roll, they have a negotiation about consent and about what the men and women are willing to do. I think if we had a better sense of the fact that this is all artificial in many ways—it’s entertainment—kids may not think that's reality.

Justin Lehmiller: You and I are on the same page that porn should not be used to replace sex education. And you've already talked a bit about the different ways that parents need to start approaching sex education with their kids. But I'm curious as to the role of schools in all of this. What do you think schools need to be doing differently when it comes to sex ed, specifically as it relates to porn?

Lisa Ling. Photo courtesy of CNN.

Lisa Ling: I think it's ultimately a parent's responsibility, but we have to recognize that there are some parents who aren't able to have those kinds of conversations, don't want to have those conversations, may not have time to have those kinds of conversations…so we need to start having those conversations in schools. In California, for example, where I'm from, there is a very comprehensive sexual education curriculum. When I sat through one of the classes, I was even uneasy because I wasn't used to having those kinds of conversations. But for the kids, it was just sort of like they didn't even blink. They're learning that this is a natural part of who we are and that there shouldn't be any shame or humor around it—that it's meant to be enjoyed and pleasurable, but we have to make sure that we are safe at the same time.

Justin Lehmiller: I think you're absolutely right that kids do want to have these discussions, but it's usually the parents who don't feel comfortable initiating them. So where are they going to get that information? I think schools provide one potential avenue for that through, say, porn literacy programs.

Lisa Ling: I thought it was pretty impressive that in Boston public schools they have this sex ed curriculum that includes porn literacy. You know, some parents might go, "Why are my kids learning about porn in school?" Well, because your kids are probably watching porn in their bedrooms with the phone that you gave them. The moment your kid gets a phone or gets a mobile device, you got to start thinking about how to broach the subject with them because they've probably already seen things that they don't understand that they think depict real sex.

Justin Lehmiller: Something I noticed in watching your episode is that you interviewed a lot of people, but you didn't have any scientific or medical experts in the area of porn. I'm just curious—was there a reason or rationale behind not having one of them on to discuss it?

Lisa Ling: Our show is very much an experiential one and we have found that by immersing ourselves amongst people who are going through these things, I think we get a better sense of and we're more relatable to viewers who may be experiencing similar things. And if they do feel somehow like they connect with the information that we're giving them or the people that we're profiling, then they can seek out that more professional or clinical information.

Like Alex Rhodes who started the NoFap website. He's not a clinician or a therapist but he has half a million people on his website who say that they are suffering from pornography addiction. And pornography addiction hasn't even been classified as an addiction. But because he's experienced, he knows what has worked for him and what hasn't and it's become this forum for people to share exactly those things.

Justin Lehmiller: I'm glad that you brought up those points—that porn “addiction” is not a recognized medical or psychological diagnosis and that Alex Rhodes is not a clinician, but he is offering services sort of treating this as an addiction. This is one of those areas where when you look at the research, it’s not at all definitive in saying that porn is addictive, and so I worry a little that in highlighting what Rhodes is doing and the big following he has, that people might walk away thinking that it is an addiction when the actual medical community is not there based on the research.

When you look at a lot of the data in this area, what we often see is that porn is more the symptom rather the cause of a lot of the issues people are experiencing. For example, they might have generalized sexual anxiety or moral conflicts, and those might really be the underlying cause. So to put this in the form of a question, what's your take on the idea that we might be scapegoating porn because it's an easy target rather than dealing with the underlying issues that might be driving people to porn in the first place?

Lisa Ling: You know, I am also not a clinician or a therapist, but if you talk to any pediatrician or you talk to a lot of parents, the moment their kids become exposed to pornography and how easily it's accessible, whether they have underlying issues or not, it can cloud a young person's judgment about what real sex is supposed to be like. And, you know, studies have shown that young people are having less sex than ever before. And one has to ask, "Well, what's the reason for that?" Well, it's probably because they can experience the extremes using their mobile devices. They don't have to go through the anxiety of asking a girl out or dealing with rejection when they have everything that they need and more in their pocket, accessible at all times.

So for me to boldly assert that it's an addiction, that's not something that we do in our episode. But there's a reason why NoFap, that website, has a half a million people that are desperate. They're coming to this website desperate for help from what they believe is an addiction.

Justin Lehmiller: I get that they're perceiving porn as the cause of their problems, but it might not actually be the problem for them. So by going to these websites and resources that are not based in science and data, they might not actually be getting the help that they need to really deal with those issues.

[Sidebar: Research suggests that porn access probably isn’t why young adults today are having less sex. Read my take on this idea here.]

Lisa Ling: That's true. That's certainly true. And you know, I think NoFap, is very clear or it asserts that it's not a medically sanctioned website. But what it is is people sharing what has been working for them. I think one of the reasons why it hasn't been deemed a certified, bonafide addiction is because it's harder to get information about how to stop. Right? And so people have had to resort to seeking out information on their own and seeking support from people who are going through the same thing.

I mean, our second episode is about benzodiazepines—and these are some of the most widely prescribed medications on the planet, right? And doctors, in many cases, do not know how to taper people off of benzos. So what are people doing? They're going to these non-medically sanctioned websites and getting information and learning these very meticulous taper methods that are saving their lives. None of them are medically sanctioned.

So if it's working for people, and people are finding themselves in such a desperate situation, that they're seeking out help and guidance from people they don't even know because they're not being offered the right kind of information from doctors, I mean, that's kind of where we are with pornography. And also, let's say you do believe you have an addiction and your insurance doesn't pay for therapy. How are you ever going to get medical help when your insurance doesn't cover it? You're going to seek it out online amongst people who are dealing with the same things.

Justin Lehmiller: I think we're in agreement that we want people to be able to get help and to know that the help is going to work. But there's also a really big impediment for us to having the accurate medical knowledge we need about pornography, which is that there's really no federal funding available for people who want to do research on porn. And so there is sort of this roadblock if we want a design interventions or treatments or, you know, just really study porn. This is why I think our knowledge base is so limited and why a lot of these non-scientific, non-medical platforms are taking off. It's, in part, because they're filling this void that is not currently being addressed because there just isn't the funding to do the research we need.

Lisa Ling: There's the funding we need to do the research. And most of our insurance will not pay for the therapeutic services that people might need to even figure out what may have spurred someone to seek out porn.

Justin Lehmiller: I think that's a great point, that access to care is another big part of the issue that leads people to seek out these informal, non-medical platforms. With greater access to care, we could ensure that more people get the help they truly need, rather than feeling like their only option is to seek out information online that isn’t based in scientific research.

Now, given all of the people out there claiming that porn is “addictive” and fundamentally damaging, some are calling for bans on pornography and restrictions on porn access. Do you think that bans and restrictions are the answer to these problems or do you think it's really more about improving sex education and sexual communication?

Lisa Ling: I think that we could ameliorate a good part of it by educating kids about what sex is really like and what it's supposed to be like. I think that having those open conversations would do a lot for the issue—do a lot to alleviate some of the concerns. Porn is the only exposure some kids may be getting to sex. It's inevitable that would skew your perception, you know? So I think opening up the dialogue would at least get us one step closer to having a more sort of normal perception of what sex is and what relationships should be.

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Image Source: CNN