#i feel like the word puzzle adds so much more context to this post that is lacking from the description

[wsdalt]

a "little" post on rubens and self-preservation. quick disclaimer that as much as i've rewatched calamidade, there's always things i could be missing or misremembering, but i definitely hope everything i'm saying is accurate pfft. (and there are things i didn't go into detail about because it will add another few hundred words to this post). it will go under the cut, but here's the first few paragraphs:

One of my favourite things about rubens is how much he isn’t a self-sacrificial character. And that stands out very much because in the season he’s in every other PC is a self-sacrificial character (just look at the scene where they were trying to figure out the puzzle with the masks—everyone was attempting to take the potential pain of failure, but rubens didn’t)

This isn’t to say he won’t put his life on the line to help others (you have to, in this line of work—and I would say he does it more the longer the season goes on (I mean… you saw what happened with kian)), but he is certainly more reserved than the others—to the point where you can pick up on it and note it. In fact, clarissa did in canon, too. He has run from at least one fight even though he was drawn back to it, and his preference against close quarters fighting despite having a weapon for that is also noticeable

And at first it seems kind of selfish, even if it’s an understandable fear. and maybe it's mostly just selfish because you’re looking at it in the context of a self-sacrificial group in a usually self-sacrificial series

But i love the way felps plays it because it’s not that he’s an asshole about it or partially self-serving (as mentioned, he still tries to help with fights and for most of it he could leave whenever he wanted) it’s just that he’s scared. And that’s understandable because it’s a scary world they live in, and he didn’t seem too confident with fighting in opd either

But the further along you go (/the more you think about it) the more it starts to take on a more specific shape. In the end, it mostly ties back to johnny one way or another—and expanding on that thought under the cut:

So here’s the first layer: He’s just recently experienced a major shake up regarding how safe he actually is because his partner and best friend just got badly injured and he’s trying to play it safe. A brutal, traumatic reminder of just how dangerous this line of work is and that anything can go wrong at any moment no matter how experienced you are

Then there’s the second layer: Johnny and Rubens’ dynamic was very much brawn + brain. In their one opd episode together Johnny had pretty much double Rubens’ health, and in episode one of calamidade it’s mentioned Rubens has only ever worked in a duo before. which suggests that it is, in fact, usually just him and johnny

Rubens is… uncomfortable with close quarters fighting suggesting he’s not used to it, but despite that he isn’t afraid to jump in and attack. however at the start of the fight johnny pushes rubens behind him, and rubens doesn’t complain about it or try to stop him. Rubens is also established to know some medicine so:

It feels like: “johnny taking the brunt of the hits while rubens acts as support” could be a logical, pre-existing move of theirs. After all it does make sense, and rubens plays support a lot during late game calamidade too. If rubens (with much less health than johnny, meaning he will go down quicker) goes down and johnny doesn’t know medicine well, it’s going to be a lot harder for him to keep rubens alive than it would be for rubens to keep johnny alive if the situation is reversed. It’s… rough. But it is a tactical move

So: suddenly, rubens is thrown into a group of people who he doesn’t have that arrangement with after just experiencing a major (kind of) loss and a full shattering of whatever illusions he might’ve had about his safety. It makes sense that he seems a lot more jumpy, and a lot more hesitant to join a battle front on (and again: he does fight regardless of this fear. He’s just also very visibly less reckless/self-sacrificing than the others) 

And it really is easy to attribute that to just… being in active battle and finding it hard to fight his instincts. That is certainly part of it, as he mentions to clarissa that he isn’t sure why he ran from a battle—it was just instinct, and he knows he needs to fight it

But what about the above mentioned scene with the mask puzzle? Everyone else was trying to take damage for the others, but he’s the only one who doesn’t volunteer. In his rational mind, he’s already decided to put himself in harm’s way with this job. But he still doesn’t volunteer here. i think if he was asked to, he would take the damage (like when they were trying to open the door in opd). but he wasn't asked to, so he doesn't offer 

Here’s layer three:

This doesn’t come up until closer to the end of the series, but rubens talks to johnny through audio recordings + at his bedside at the hospital. One of the main things he repeats throughout all of that is that he’s “coming back” to johnny. (it’s mentioned like… six separate times at least) When he records the messages he says he’ll be back soon, and when he’s at the hospital he keeps saying that he has to do something dangerous and that the mission isn’t over yet, but he’ll come back. He’ll try to come back. He’ll always come back 

I would say part of his hesitation isn’t entirely trauma-driven self-preservation combined with a technically outdated mindset to his role in his team since he’s now part of a new team with different dynamics—I would say a good part of it is just a need to be there for johnny when he wakes up again

Rubens goes against his team occasionally for johnny. The situation doesn’t come up often, but it is very much there. Rubens kills two Host cultists without waiting for his team’s input, despite there being somewhat of a consensus on keeping them alive, at least briefly

(the first one i don’t think they had decided on what to do with her yet when they found out she was lying, and the second one— despite team argument—they decided on keeping him alive because he might not be bad.

Rubens of course only kills both of them when he’s certain they’re bad, but there’s a distinct lack of communication about it which is emphasised by—after killing the first one—he ignores the rest of his team for a bit so he can search for information by himself. this includes ignoring balu's attempts to get a heal from him—which i would say he only did because dante can also heal and it wasn't serious, but it's still interesting to note)

Johnny is very much intertwined in the things he does. He has johnny’s shirt around his waist, and carries around johnny’s knife to kill Host cultists specifically because it was the Host who hurt johnny, (if i’m translating it correctly) when he ascended johnny was pretty much directly mentioned + rubens said he wished he got out of this life with johnny at the start, and—most importantly to this particular post—he will value self-preservation so he can get back to johnny

(Sidenote: but it’s also interesting how this directly impacts the wider plot, too. Both Carina and Balu (if i’m remembering correctly) mention that they picked the Masks over the Host because of rubens’ experiences with—and (understandable) hatred of—the Host)

And i have to finish this off by saying that despite all this—despite the various layers that feed into his aversion to being self-sacrificial—he let joui kill him at the end of the games. He let Joui win because Joui asked him to let that happen even though he had no idea what would happen to himself

They all hoped that the people who lost before would wake up and be okay of course, but they had no confirmation that that would happen. As far as rubens was aware, he was allowing himself to be put into a magical coma with no cure or potential for recovery.

This death has so much meaning to me. even though it doesn’t stick, and there’s no consequences, and rubens wakes up pretty much straight away, anyway. It’s arguably the safest self-sacrificial death in the entire series and he wasn’t even the first one to do it in the games. But it’s a major change from everything rubens has done before, and must’ve been extremely difficult for him to accept

(it’s also interesting that rubens—if i’m remembering correctly—never rolls to attempt to take over from Amalia despite everyone else trying at least once so they could sacrifice themselves for someone else on the team, even if they failed. The only time he does is when Joui directly talks to him and even then he fails the rolls enough that cellbit has to word of god let him succeed. I think rubens was… somewhat glad that he didn’t have to take control in this. He didn’t have to choose between his friends and his survival. He could just let amalia keep them both alive) 

But yes, anyway… not really sure how to end this oops, but rubens’ lack of self-sacrificial nature in a group of self-sacrificial people is very very interesting to me—especially because of how much goes into it + the moment i mentioned above where he does essentially let himself be killed*

+ the fact that despite his prioritisation of Johnny and his self-preservation he still continues to put himself in harm’s way even after mentioning that he felt he got closure from the fight with the Host—and he almost died to Kian because of this. And when he talks to Johnny again it sounds like he’s going to continue to help them—because as much as the mission became about the Host for a bit, he wasn't put in that team for that to begin with

he doesn't want to be here, and he's scared, and he's not inherently self-sacrificial like the others in his team, but he will try his best to help—and i love that \o/!! i think it's such an interesting character choice \o/!! okay post over congrats if you got to the end, this is like 1700 words

*(and i do find it very sweet that joui returned this emotional step of his by focusing entirely on him when everyone woke up despite the fact arthur and dante’s losses were the ones that were freaking him out the most because of how close he is to them. Of course it’s because joui felt extremely guilty for killing him, but i don’t think rubens (or anyone watching) would necessarily blame him if he got caught up in the relief of arthur and dante being okay. So it’s sweet that all his focus was on rubens \o/)

[animehouse-moe]

Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2 Episode 21: I Am You

I think it's pretty funny that I haven't been active at all this week due to life, but my first post since the question about my activity regarding JJK, is a post about JJK. Just a bit of irony.

Anyways, this was originally just going to be a short complaint about narrative flops in this episode (that I thought I might not even write about), but I have a feeling it's going to end up a pretty long winded complaint about the handling of key characters at the end of this season. So here we go.

I'll just get right into it with the egregious ending of Itadori vs Mahito here.

I think that if for a minute you've understood who Itadori is, what he is, that this scene will immediately rub you the wrong way.

Why, on god's green earth, would you pull Sukuna into this conversation? Why would you make a reference to Sukuna with the words coming from Yuji's mouth in this context.

Better yet, why would you paint Yuji as a looming shadow above Mahito in this moment?

It's just an egregious and wasteful depiction of Yuji that takes his character in the complete opposite direction.

Our boy Yuji here isn't some grand hero, he is not some otherworldly threat to Mahito. He is, quite literally, the antithesis to Mahito. These are words that Yuji himself states, within this very episode.

Yuji is a cog in the machine of the Jujutsu world, he is a single piece of the puzzle that creates a bigger picture. He is the wolf hunting the rabbit on sheer instinct. There is no greater goal, there is no lofty ideal. It is clear cut and simple, that this is Itadori accepting his fate, accepting his life. Using the hole in his mouth to show him carrying the carnage of Sukuna on his back? Great idea. Using that imagery at the completely wrong time though? I can't imagine why they would choose to do that.

His entire character arc through Shibuya is to own his life at this stage, to say that everything he's done is his own actions, and that he'll keep pushing until he has nothing left. Not that he'll get stronger, not that he'll save his friends or the world, but that he'll keep. killing. curses.

It just sort of blows my mind to see how they would handle something so expertly clear cut from the manga. Gege's vision was so incredibly well defined and expressed in these finals moments of the pair. It was pure art, and absolutely earned its status and popularity within the fandom.

I won't lie, it hurts. Not physically, but it hurts. And then there's just a bunch of odd animation work with the sequence, like Mahito's mouth and eyes shaking at a million miles per hour. There's obviously some really great animation and work throughout the episode, and it's not so much that it's poorly animated, but just incorrectly animated. These characters can feel insanely different just from cut to cut alone, and when the smallest details can make the biggest differences, those variances can really add turbulence to their character arcs.

Anyways, onto the next topic of discussion: Todo. I love this man. Hands down, my favorite side character through all his time on the page and screen. Incredible character to put beside Yuji for balance.

But.

The production ran away with him a little too much. I get it, it's hard to not go crazy when you have the potential to, and in a vacuum I adore the two big sequences he's gotten in the last two episodes. However, I think you have to be pretty crazy to think that Todo's Takada Tandem (patent pending) is a good fit for the episode.

Todo and Takada are an... interesting pair. Todo doesn't "use" Takada too much, so it makes it hard to really define a proper line with it, so let me put it another way.

Before Yuji was in the picture, Takada was Todo's #1 by a mile. With Yuji in the picture though? Sorry Takada, a brother's more important than an idol.

So, you could imagine my surprise when Todo tries to steal Yuji's thunder with a Takada powered delusion. I mean, he's fighting side by side with his brother, the person closest to him in the world.

Todo went to Takada to ask a question in his season 1 dilemma with Hanami because Yuji was out of the equation. Yuji was not at risk, it was not "Yuji's fight". Where Todo was leading Yuji with Hanami, it is absolutely the other way around with Mahito. And I mean, the most obvious thing to explain that with is the fact that Mahito basically shoves Todo to the side to start.

Regardless, the idea is that Yuji's in the pilot's seat, he's the one that knows the most about Mahito, he knows how to fight him. Todo is there to support his brother. Bringing out Takada, stealing Yuji's thunder, and weakening the balance and chemistry between our brothers just confuses me to no end.

Like, just simple things like Todo's hand. Dude has 3-5 business days to chop it off in the anime, and realizes on his own to do so. Kudos to Todo and his insane IQ, but the entire idea presented in the manga is that Yuji is faster at warning Todo than Todo is at grasping what's going on. It's just things like these that undermine the significance and value of this fight, and consistently appear in the episode.

Completely baffles me why it happens, but it's just a further extension of the narrative trend of stirring the pot where no stirring is needed. And it really hurts. Powerscaling is nonexistent, fights have ended up vastly different in tone and execution, and core narrative elements have just all sorts of these little inexplicable changes that undermine that masterful work of Gege through this arc. We're almost across the finish line, and all I'm hoping for is for it to be over at this point, which is flat out depressing.

[ratlesshonret]

FAIR WARNING: THIS POST IS LONG! I HAVE MANY THOUGHTS ON THESE GAMES

You can find the positive version of this post Here

EDIT: AS OF 12/15/2023, A PATCH HAS RELEASED THAT HAS FIXED MANY OF MY ISSUES WITH THE GAME. I WILL KEEP THIS POST UP, BUT KNOW THAT MANY OF THESE ISSUES NO LONGER EXIST.

This post is some more random Little Goody Two Shoes thoughts because... to be frank, I have many thoughts about this game. Please do note, however, that I have still only finished two endings (for context, the two Rozenmarine endings.)

This post will probably trend more negative than the last few I've made about this game, where I was giving heavy benefit of the doubt to avoid sounding too negative. As much as I love LGTS, just like with my "Things I Didn't Like About GoldenerTraum" post, I think its important to criticize things you like.

And I mean, I'm also hoping maybe there's a 1% chance a developer at Astral Shift has seen the sentiments I'm about to echo and is maybe going to push a patch for the game to improve some stuff. Who knows.

This post will also cover GoldenerTraum again, as some things have changed since my last post about it.

I want to preface this with one last thing: Just to stress, I am a fan of Pocket Mirror. I love this series. I was there only months after the original Pocket Mirror came out all those years ago, and I've been in love with the game ever since. And that may potentially be part of the reason I'm so critical of both GoldenerTraum and LGTS. I'm not sharing this post out of a desire to bash these games, but out of a slim hope that my words may affect something.

Proper rant below the cut.

PART 1 - LITTLE GOODY TWO SHOES

(The following issues, regarding many scenes being unskippable, have been fixed in a patch)

To be very blunt, I really don't like how annoying it is to replay this game. Due to the way heart events work, unless I specifically set up a file where I date everyone at once (which is hard due to the whole "you will have no money" thing) I need to play the entire game three times, which is what I've chosen to do (due to the aforementioned "you will have no money" thing.)

Once you've seen every scene, the days are just "mash dialogue (a decent chunk of which you cant skip with the skip button,) do minigames, mash more dialogue, and do the Witching Hour that you've already solved all the puzzles for."

And like, the game is fun. I like the minigames. I can't say the same about the Witching Hours but honestly who cares, I don't necessarily have to enjoy them. That's not something I'm going to complain about (yet.)

it just gets repetitive doing it so many times.

For an example, I tried playing earlier to do Freya's route and couldn't even make it through one day. I just got so bored. I know this genre of game doesn't necessarily lend itself to replaying due to the whole appeal being the story/cutscenes and the puzzles, but I actually do have an actionable idea that, while it won't fix the issue, would make it a lot less annoying. Its also something that I've seen many people suggest before.

Add. A. Fucking. Skip. Button.

To. EVERY. Cutscene.

Not just some of them.

I had this complaint with Pocket Mirror as well, but its more lowkey there because as long as you either know the route or just separate your saves often, you only need to replay the entirety of the game twice. Which I feel like is actually good for a narrative game, because you get to pick up on things you missed the first time.

However, even in that game I disliked how slow mashing was in certain sections. My biggest and most commonly-cited example is Enjel's Theater, where my fastest time getting through the entire scene (not including the cutscene and with the fastest mashing technique I know, involving four buttons) was somewhere between 4-5 minutes.

It doesn't sound like much, but because every route needs you to go through it due to Enjel's area being after every ending choice is passed, you need to do it at least three times. Four if you're going for the secret ending in GoldenerTraum.

However, this is the LGTS section. And I have to say, this issue is worse in LGTS. Even just with the one playthrough I did to get the two endings I have, there were so many times where, either through loading saves or the ending divergences right at the end that happen after the last save point, I needed to rewatch very long scenes.

This wouldn't be very insulting if there wasn't a skip button already in the game, but there is, they just chose not to let you use it in many of the longest and most narratively-important scenes. Which I get why that was done, but I don't agree with it.

I feel like the most sensible course of action would be to do what many other games of this genre do, and simply have a persisting flag that permanently goes up for every save file once you've seen a cutscene. And once this flag is raised, let the player hold shift to skip the dialogue very quickly if they enter that scene again. This way, replaying the game or loading saves due to fails wouldn't be quite as annoying.

Also, I wish to whoever is listening that the first half of the credits was counted as an animated cutscene so it could be skipped with ESC. Again, they could even have a flag that raises as soon as you have one ending that only lets you skip the credits once you've raised it if its that important, that way the player still has to watch it once.

Overall, it makes the player (or at least me) feel like it isn't worth it to get every ending. In my eyes, I already got the canon ending. Everything else is just bonus. And while I normally love bonus (and will still hunt every ending) this is bonus that takes potential hours of mashing through scenes and repeating puzzles to see any reward from.

Oh yeah. Speaking of the puzzles...

PART 2 - LGTS: THE WITCHING HOUR

Now onto my more minor gripes. I really don't like most of the Witching Hour segments in the game. And honestly, feel free to skip this entire section (after the next paragraph) because this is less "here are some actionable ideas the developers could potentially roll out a patch to implement" and more "here's what frustrated me about the game."

(However, when possible, I will add a "solution" section to each individual Witching Hour breakdown to give a suggestion on how to mitigate the annoyance)

Because I've already invited you to skip this section, I'll just sum it up here with a nice TL;DR that explains my thesis: While you do know most of the puzzle solutions, a combination of game jank and general weirdness in the way certain things are implemented means you still aren't guaranteed to get by without damage or annoyance, which exacerbates the whole "lack of replay value" issue that is already very massive in a game with ten endings and a lot of dialogue that isn't easily skippable. A game's biggest killer of replay value is "that section" that makes the player decide they don't wanna replay after all, and I think most Witching Hours are "that section."

With this in mind, as if this post wasn't convoluted enough, let's break this down by section.

WITCHING HOUR 1

"Wouldn't it be funny if we made the puzzle answer "examine some random bookshelf" for no reason?"

This Witching Hour took me thirty real life minutes to get past. The candles are annoying to dodge unless you play really slow, and the "hint" is so laughably vague that it took the combined brain powers of three people (I was screensharing to others at the time) to figure out what it might mean.

Solution: Make the bookshelf more obvious. Or alternatively, add another hint, so that you have two things subtly nudging the player towards "a bookshelf is the answer" and not one.

WITCHING HOUR 2

(This Witching Hour has been fixed in a patch, and these complaints may no longer apply)

I hate the moths.

Honestly, while "moths are attracted to light" is obvious, it took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out that I had to turn my lantern off for them to be attracted to the light/corpse I was leading them to instead of my own body.

Solution: Honestly, I don't have any real answer. I think this was just my own human error. My best idea is just to make the moth hitboxes more lenient and increase the I-frames so you don't have to face-tank as much damage, because I had to tank a lot even after knowing how the puzzle worked.

WITCHING HOUR 3

(This Witching Hour has been fixed in a patch, and these complaints may no longer apply)

I hate birds.

Let me get this out of the way: I would've struggled a lot less had I talked to Rozenmarine and gotten the hint that I've since learned she gives you about how the big bird works. However, as many others have pointed out, the "puzzle" is still janky as hell even when you know the answer.

I did eventually figure out the whole "the bird is less likely to attack when you're near unshaking trees" thing, but even then I still was tanking a lot of damage. Why "less likely" and not "won't?" Hitboxes and timing.

Because of how the hitboxes are coded, Elise gets hit seemingly at random sometimes, even if you're directly next to a tree that was not shaking even the tiniest bit for minutes before you got there. I think the hitbox that detects "you're close to a 'bird gets mad' spot" might be too big or something, but I'm not a programmer, nor do I know if hitboxes are even the issue.

Solution: This one is twofold. The lesser one is to have Rozenmarine give you more useful dialogue when you talk to her as a party member beforehand, that way the player is incentivized to actually speak with her. The greater one is to re-examine the hitboxes in the area to make sure they're fair, and also maybe make the time that a tree is safe last longer so you don't just get jumpscared by random damage.

WITCHING HOUR 4

I hate children.

Honestly though, this is one of the least offensive Witching Hour sections in the game. The only real struggle point is the collapsing tile part right at the start, which luckily is the only part that isn't timed. Still, it can be improved, because I had to reload a save several times to figure out the whole "shaking tiles will fall" thing.

Solution: Make the shake more obvious. That's it. Just increase the range of their shiver by a few pixels. The rest of the area is fine.

WITCHING HOUR 5

Honestly? No major notes. Tense, genuinely scary, and requires some actual skill without being overly punishing. Maybe the water chasers could be slowed a bit, but that's just a personal balancing idea and not something I feel is necessary.

Though if I had to complain, I don't like the "guide the spirit to its other half" part. I thought by now game designers knew that "following partner who is way slower than the player and who returns to the beginning if you stray away for too long and also there's chasers" was universally despised. Especially when, depending on where in the movement cycles you are, you'll have to run away from the spirit and onto land.

Solution: Make the spirit faster. And give a bit more leniency to how far you can stray and for how long before they return. Or even don't make them return at all.

WITCHING HOUR 6

Ah, the boss fight. How I loathe you.

Most of this Witching Hour isn't very bad. I don't really like the plot setup for how it occurs, but I'm willing to overlook it.

But the boss. Oh the boss.

Such minimal windup on its attacks that you can't easily dodge.

Random cycles so you can't just predict what's coming next.

Timed questions (on a tight timer!) between each phase that instantly kill you if you answer wrong or run out of time, forcing you to redo the whole fight.

A screen flipping effect that is infinitely worse than anything in Lisette's chases in Pocket Mirror in terms of how unfair it is.

I want to be honest. Everything about this fight feels so poorly thought out and designed that I am astonished it got past testing. In fact, my only explanation is that the people who tested this fight were all people who were so familiar with the game due to development that they knew the attacks and the question answers.

I needed to spam healing items. And I'm lucky that I grinded out the best possible amount of money you could have so I could afford lots of them. But if you don't have healing, you need to play this insanely unfair fight close to perfectly.

Solution: Honestly, I don't think there's an easy solution. The entire fight is so badly designed that it'd require a full rework. But here are some ideas.

Add longer windup to the attacks, with a more obvious indicator of which one it is. As it is now, you have maybe one second to both recover from the last onslaught and figure out what the boss is doing now before you are being attacked again.

Remove the entire screen-flipping and control-reversing gimmick. It worked in Lisette's chases due to how it was done there, but it does NOT work here.

Finally, lessen the penalty for an incorrect guess. Maybe make it 1-2 hearts of damage + redoing the phase. It may sound too generous, but I personally hate this idea of "haha instant-death you gotta do it again" that seems to exist in both games. I thought we left that in 2016.

WITCHING HOUR 7

No notes.

CONCLUSION

I have to imagine that the main people who play-tested this game were those who worked on it. Some of the decisions are incredibly hostile to the player, both due to non-conveyed information on puzzle gimmicks as well as the occasional bit of odd coding/implementation. The Witching Hours on Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday are the only ones I don't have major issues with.

I really say this with a heavy heart, but I just feel like the puzzle design has regressed since Pocket Mirror.

PART 3 - MISPLACED EXPECTATIONS

I want to quickly address a point I briefly brought up at the start of this post. This part won't drag on very long, don't worry.

"I was there only months after the original Pocket Mirror came out all those years ago, and I've been in love with the game ever since. And that may potentially be part of the reason I'm so critical of both GoldenerTraum and LGTS."

Elaborating on what I mean by this: My expectations may simply be too high. And I think its important that I acknowledge my complete and utter bias. I try to be as fair as possible and push off most of the weight of my expectations on my rankings, but its impossible to not have it somewhat matter.

When I heard "Pocket Mirror is getting a remaster," there was a lot of things I hoped. Most of which didn't come true. I'll get into those later, that is its own section.

And I've been waiting for LGTS for basically seven years. From what I remember, it was announced that there would be a sequel very soon after the game's release, with concepts and everything. And while I know the game was only in proper development for like, 1/3 of that time, it still sat dormant in my mind for all that time.

Maybe that's why I'm so harsh on the game's problems. In my mind, this has been years upon years in the making, and its hard not to be let down by even the tiniest little things when you've been building excitement for that long.

Finally, I want to re-iterate: I like LGTS. I think it is a good game, both as a Pocket Mirror prequel and as a standalone. However, I will add the caveat that it is mainly for the plot and characters, not for the gameplay. I think Pocket Mirror is far superior in that regard.

PART 4 - MY (FEW) COMPLAINTS WITH GOLDENERTRAUM (2)

If you remember, I made a post almost five months ago, which was right after the game's release, about my issues with Pocket Mirror ~ GoldenerTraum.

Just as in that post, I want to state first and foremost: I think GoldenerTraum is superior to the original Pocket Mirror in basically every way. The graphics, extra lore and ending, and general quality of life features more than make up for my complaints.

This will basically be a rehashing of that post. This post is to the original what GoldenerTraum was to Pocket Mirror: an update. It will include the original points, with me adding in my changed opinions and anything that has been fixed about the game since I made that post.

"There’s a major audio syncing bug during the “chalk” scene before Harpae’s theater. My theory as to why this issue exists is because they changed the scene slightly, but did not update the music. I understand if the devs either were unwilling or unable to redo the music for this scene, but it’s majorly immersion breaking to have the sound of glass shattering be separated by an entire several seconds from the associated visual."

As far as I know, this has not been fixed. And from the looks of it, the game is no longer receiving patches or fixes. This is by far the most immersion-breaking point in the entire game.

"Mashing through text is SLOW. For a game that expects you to play several times to see every ending, there sure is no fast text option that I could find. Even mashing four buttons at once for frame-perfect dialogue skipping, it’s still slow. Scenes like Enjel’s Theater especially suffer from this, with it basically being a full six minutes even when mashing as fast as possible."

Already discussed, see above.

"This one is more of a personal thing, but I was hoping at least some scenes would be slightly rewritten. Some of the dialogue is very stilted and odd, with some questionable punctuation choices as well. Harpae’s area is especially bad. I get that the conversations being cyclical and neither of them wanting the other to take blame for anything is thematic, but it is a bit annoying to sit through basically the same conversation over and over again."

I've sort of reversed this opinion since I stated it. While I was hoping for some dialogue rewrites, I understand that the game was a "remaster" and not a "remake," with the main goal being to put it visually and gameplay-wise on par with the upcoming LGTS.

"Finally, the game is still kinda buggy. I know the team has worked super hard to patch the game several times, and I’m really thankful. I know it’s difficult to fix bugs, I really do. But encountering a softlock even after the “softlock fix” update, and other random issues, makes the game discouraging to play sometimes."

Quite a few of the bugs I was thinking about still exist in modern versions. They basically all have to do with issues related to fast text-mashing, which as I've stated, is required if you want to keep your sanity playing the game several times.

"Sprites. My biggest example of this is the scene where Harpae slaps Goldia. The handprint on Goldia’s face that was present in the original immediately after is completely missing. Also, in Enjel’s Theater, there’s no longer a unique “mouth zipped” sprite for Enjel, DESPITE THAT SPRITE EXISTING ON GOLDIA IN THE WITCHING HOUR ENDING. This one genuinely makes the scene less coherent, as Enjel’s mouth getting sewn up is the focal point of the scene."

ACCORDING TO A PATCH NOTE, THE LATTER COMPLAINT HAS BEEN FIXED, AND ENJEL WAS GIVEN HER PROPER SPRITE

I can't say it was because of me, but I will continue to privately think that.

The former complaint still exists. They couldn't have added a slap png to Goldia's face?

"Less impactful choices. The two I can think of here are both in Lisette’s area, with the “Accept or Protect” choice, and the “Help Me?” choice. In the former, it used to be a screen-wide filter was applied, and the text that you were choosing between was large and stylized to cover most of the screen. In the latter, you had to physically stand over your dialogue option. I understand if the engine doesn’t support these “special” dialogue choices, but replacing them with just normal choice boxes is a bit disappointing."

This is what I meant in that post. A few of the choices feel less impactful. In the latter especially, it was changed from standing on your option to just choosing it in the menu like every other choice.

That's the bulk of my complaints on GoldenerTraum. A lot of this probably sounds like "old person yells at cloud about minor changes to game" but I think its important to recognize that the original Pocket Mirror was superior in a few places.

I hope GoldenerTraum gets one last patch to fix some of my issues.

PART 5 - CONCLUSION

I love this series. I want it to be the best it can be. That's my only motivation behind making this. I'm nothing if not nostalgic and petty, so I feel like I'm an okay person to point out minor things that could be improved in both GoldenerTraum and Little Goody Two Shoes.

Again, and I know I've worn out this point by now, but I love these games. GoldenerTraum is a superior game to the original Pocket Mirror in 99% of cases, and LGTS is an amazing sequel. I just see a lot of tiny issues in the former (which to be fair, do add up) and a lot of missed potential combined with odd decisions in the latter.

If anybody from Astral Shift happens to be reading this, I have nothing but respect and admiration for the work you have done over the years. I don't want anybody, team member or random person reading this, to think I intend to disrespect or show disdain for anyone on any of these projects, or to think I won't be happy without perfection. These are all simply minor-to-moderate complaints I have, and I'd be fine if none of them are changed. I simply wish they would be.

I have high hopes for future projects, and I definitely don't think I'll be let down. I believe in this team, and have full confidence that whatever they make, Pocket Mirror related or otherwise, will be, if not perfect, of incredibly high quality.

If you read all of this, thank you, and goodnight.

(it is three in the morning and i have been writing this for like an hour)

[lavynrose]

Artem and his S/O confessing at the same time pt. 2

Title: Dedicated

Pairing/s: Artem Wing X Reader

Pronouns: Gender Neutral

Genre: FLUFF FLUFF FLUFF TOOTH ROTTING FLUFF

Warning/s: grammatical errors

Notes: ok so!!! thank you so much for waiting <3 one thing i'd like to say is that i recommend reading part 1 before this bc it creates a build-up for the story's conclusion. There are some parts here that needed context from part 1. Enjoy!

part 1 here

He couldn't ask for more.

The sunset spilled all around the theme park, the golden intricates of the the railings sparkled than ever before. The orange radiance of the solemn sun gives the park an even more golden glow.

Artem looked around, taking in the seemingly perfect view of what can be only described as serene. The laughter of groups of friends, families walking hand-in-hand, couples giving their significant other loving looks, people enjoying themselves left and right, the quaint smell of hotdogs and popcorn.

You spending your time with him.

The sunset made this picturesque scenery even more breathtaking, and he could come here everyday if only allowed.

Right now, right in this very moment, everything is glowing.

Especially you.

"That was really fun!" the enthusiasm in your voice never fails to make him feel the same. He loves seeing you have fun, without a care in the world. He admits, he also enjoyed getting splashed by water on the raft ride.

He unconsciously offered his arm to link with yours and when you took it as you gazed at him, he's more than satisfied.

You fit so perfectly in his arms, it feels as if you're the missing puzzle piece he never knew his being had. Even having dried after getting soaked from the raft, the warmth that your touch radiated fills his senses with comfort.

This moment of getting to spend time with the person he profoundly longed for was enough for him. Enough for now. You don't need to know his affections for now.

Does he really need to let you know?

His feelings?

It'll probably make your relationship awkward. He's not ready to risk the sweet smiles and playful looks you direct towards him just for his own selfishness.

It doesn't matter. He'll love you even if you won't, anyway.

He then stopped in his tracks, you followed suit. Not caring about the people around you. Lost in the little world the two of you shared. He looked down at your form, "Yes it was. I enjoyed it very much." because you're with me, he wanted to add but instead of saying those words, an amiable look in his cerulean eyes twinkled, and an adoring smile latched upon his features instead.

Almost as if he's telling you an unspoken confession.

His expression however, turned into mild surprise when he noticed how your gaze was filled with enchantment. With a soft glint in your lidded eyes, your brows are knitted together. You were silent.

It baffled him.

Why.

'Why are you looking at me like that?' Artem wanted to blurt out. His mouth opened to say something.

It was unclear to him as to why you looked like you were staring at his very soul.

'Why are you looking at me like,' he can't help but ask himself as he continued to scrutinize your tranced gaze, 'like you want to say the same words I desperately wanted to tell you?'

Are his feelings reciprocated?

You blinked and suddenly looked away, "Uhh, Artem, I-"

"Everyone! One more hour to go for the fireworks! Please look forward to it!" The both of you landed your eyes on the speaker, then on each other.

Artem cleared his throat, pulling the collar of his turtleneck, "You were saying?" he inquired, voice and features laced with curiosity.

You cleared your throat and pulled on your collar, mirroring him, "I..." you started as your eyes darted as if you were looking for excuses, then your orbs glinted with realization and faced Artem, "I just wanted to say that we should take pictures! This is a memorable night after all."

His eyes begin to scan the theme park and his gaze found a small photobooth just beside the merry-go-round.

"Good idea. We haven't had anything to commemorate today's fun." He brushed off your weird behavior earlier as you dragged him towards your destination.

There weren't too many people in the waiting line, there were multiple photobooths, plenty enough to not create a line of more than five costumers per booth.

As soon as it was your turn, you excitedly rummaged through the cute costumes the guests can wear in the photos.

"Look Artem," you snapped your fingers to get his attention, "This would look cute on you!" You squealed as you waved the headband with cat ears in front of his face.

This kind of trend has been circling around lately. No matter how much of a busy man Artem is, he still has seen some posts about this on the internet...

Catboy culture, wasn't it? He wondered.

"You should wear one, too." He suggested. He gingerly took the headband from you and after a few moments of hesitation, he finally gave in to the anticipation in your eyes.

Your eyes were practically sparkling taking in the sight of catboy Artem in the flesh.

"Oh my gosh." You breathed, gaping at him.

Artem blinked. "Is there something on my face?" He then turned to the mirror to check what's wrong, nothing seems to be out of the ordinary though.

"It's nothing!" You frantically waved your hand and gestured towards the camera, "Let's take a photo!" you grinned, wearing cat ears identical to Artem's.

You guys started the photoshoot with your hands making peace signs.

Ah, the classic.

The few shots after just consisted of you putting on different faces while Artem just wore different headbands each shot, with the same pose.

"You guys, please act cuter for the camera! " The photographer suddenly commented.

Isn't Y/N cute enough? Artem internally recoiled.

"Young man, put your arms around your date or something, or do a heart pose together! " Mr. Photographer added.

Artem looked back at you, his eyes meeting yours, both were wide with surprise.

He cleared his throat for what seemed like the nth time today and looked at you for approval, "Do you want to?" he asked as his hands formed half a heart.

Your cheeks lighted aflame as you raised your hand, forming half a heart to connect it with his, "I don't mind."

As your fingers touched, Artem cannot control the pink flushing his cheeks as he smiled at the camera.

The photographer continued to instruct the both of you with how you should pose. He deserves a raise for doing his job really well, Artem thinks.

After of what it seemed like endless snaps of sappy pictures, the two of you decided to print all of them.

"Now we have lots of souvenirs!" you scanned each one of the photos and Artem can't help but think how good you two look together.

He thanked the photographer for putting his all into the shoot, then you both headed for the exit.

"How was it, Artem?" You turned towards him with a profound smile.

You have lots of photos together now. He can already see himself wide awake at night, staring at your couple-like pictures.

It was more than okay.

"It was a fun experience. The cat ears aren't bad." He said as he recalled how astonished you looked when he wore the headband.

"We spent almost 20 minutes there..." You sighed as you looked at your watch.

Artem unconsciously checked his wrist watch as well, "There are 40 minutes left before the fireworks. Do you want to check out more rides before then?"

You surveyed the theme park to look for more booths, "Look at that, Artem." you pointed toward the large and loud crowd at the park's quadrangle.

"Perharps it's someone performing." Artem guessed, hearing the strums of a guitar from the speakers.

"Let's check it out!" Curious, you and Artem shuffled yourselves into the crowd. The faint singing voice grew more and more audible as you got closer to the center of the attraction.

You headed to the front for the best audience experience and the singer came into view, "Isn't that?" Artem's eyes were as wide as saucers when he recognized the person singing.

Funny how you weren't surprised, and he wondered why.

There at the center, sitting at a stool with a guitar in hand, singing with a gold microphone in front of him, was the new employee at the firm, William.

Artem frowned.

That's the guy. The guy who was getting too cozy with you, the guy causing the unpleasant pangs inside his chest.

The guy who was one of the reasons why he got the courage to ask you out on this date in the first place.

The feeling of delight earlier was now replaced by uneasiness.

"I didn't know he was a performer." Artem murmured, and he kept glancing at you.

When he saw that you were clapping your hands and a proud smile has decorated your lips - one that's not aimed him, a sudden bitter feeling overwhelmed his whole being.

You looked very happy, and he hung his head low.

He vividly remembered your smiling faces in the office yesterday, and how William seem to always hang around you.

Artem realized he wasn't special. The warm look that he witnessed from you earlier in the sunset, the look that made him think that you reciprocated his feelings, you probably do that to everyone.

He felt so stupid.

While everyone was watching William hit the notes and strum the strings, Artem was watching your every reactions, only for him to get hurt on the inside.

His heart hurts, the clenching feeling in his chest tightening with every cheer that you voiced.

He's glad it was you who were causing this pain, though.

The crowd boomed with claps and shouts as the last note finished the song, and Artem wasn't in the mood to join them.

6:30pm

"Aren't you going to greet him?" Artem's voice made you look up to him, his brows furrowed and he wasn't making eye contact.

You just brushed his behaviour off and said, "Nope. I wouldn't want to disturb him on this special day!" you felt giddy, knowing that you helped William to set this all up.

As soon as his first day in the office, which was around a month ago, he had overheard you and Kiki talking about the big opening of PAX's amusement park, and kept asking questions about the event. He then learned you were friends with the heir, Marius.

You've never seen a face as shocked as William's when he learned that.

He even made Kiki contact her insiders about the soon to be opened theme park.

Kiki asked why he was so curious, and he said he performs on gigs as a hobby, balancing it with his law career, and that he loves performing ever since he was a kid.

"Performing on the theme park's opening would definitely give me more opportunities!" He sounded so passionate that you can't help but support him.

He became bashful though, as he said, "Besides, I've been looking for an opportunity to surprise my girlfriend next month," you and Kiki beamed at him, "This would make her happy, as I made a new song that I specifically made as a gift for her birthday. I'll sing it on the opening if I'm allowed."

That's why ever since, you became close with William. Whenever you talk though, he almost always talk about her girlfriend.

"30 minutes remaining for the fireworks display!!!" The speakers announced.

You were excited for the fireworks, and an idea popped out of your mind.

"Artem," you called him out "Let's ride on the ferries wheel, that way we're up in the sky as the fireworks erupt," you dragged him to the ferris wheel's ticketing booth, "I heard that it takes 20-30 minutes for a capsule to be on top of the wheel, the time is perfect for us!"

"Can we be alone in the capsule?" Artem suddenly requested, his eyes filled with a look you can't fathom. He looked so vulnerable.

"Yes, that's actually normal. We can request that for the youngest senior attorney with 99% win rate!" You grinned and you expected him to send you one of his gentle smiles, but he just turned his head away, and looked at the distance.

You take a good look at him again once you got the tickets, he's still looking away, a solemn demeanor in his face.

You can't help but wonder what he's thinking. He's been acting a little weird, you thought.

Does he not want to hang out with you anymore?

"Artem, if you don't want to, you can tell me. I won't be mad." You eyed him with concern, "We can just sit on the bench or something." you suggested.

Just like that, his expression changed quickly, regret clouding his face, "Y/N," he sighed, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply that with my actions," he stared at you for a few seconds, then you noticed that light was back in his eyes, the fond smile you liksd seeing is back again, "The ferris wheel is perfect." He then grabbed yoir waist and guided you both to the capsule.

You grinned, "I requested a capsule for only the two of us!" you waved the tickets at him, he chuckled and grabbed it from you to give to the person managing the capsules.

The capsule was air-condition inside, with big windows to get a good view of the outside. You expected nothing from a device created by PAX.

Across from you, Artem sits, his mood is a little better now, but you can't help but notice the silent sadness his cerulean eyes hold still.

You don't like seeing him like this.

"Hey, Artem?" you half-whispered, not wanting to surprise him from his reverie.

His eyes met yours, "Yes?" he responded gently.

"You know you can trust me with your problems, right?" You started, you don't let his surprised expression distract you from what you want to say, "I will listen intently to your troubles, and we'll find a way to solve them together! " You declared with the brightest smile you could ever muster, "So please, share your burdens with me. I'll carry them with you." You finished with a toothy grin.

He blinked a few times before finally shaking his head with fondness, "Thank you, Y/N. I want you to know that you are special to me." His face is suddenly filled with so much endearment you quickly looked away, "Uhh, Of course!" your face flushed red and you raised your hide in an attempt to hide it.

Artem chuckled, the sound giving you a sense of comfort and security. You looked up to him again and saw his features get illuminated by the lights flickering in the theme park, his adoring eyes lingering on you.

Like yours was lingering on him.

You smiled at each other, letting the other feel that they're not alone in the battles they're facing.

What are you to each other, anyway? You pondered when you decided to avert your eyes away from him first.

As far as you can recall, friends don't do this kind of thing with each other. The staring, the blushing. Oh, especially the blushing.

You can't help but long for the possibility of having your feelings reciprocated, but oh boy were you afraid.

"Can I sit beside you?" His question brought you to your senses, and you happily obliged, "Of course! This capsule isn't shaky, we'll be okay being on the same side." You made space for him as you patted the empty space. There he sat, his scent enveloping your senses.

It was silent for the whole ride up, but you were comfortable with it. You were with the person you love, being with them is enough.

7:00pm

Your capsule was right on top when suddenly, a boom was heard and splashes of color was seen through the window.

"Artem!" you pointed at the big, colorful patch of explosion that's a little bit below the capsule you were in.

The ferries wheel was so high that you were higher than the fireworks!

The fireworks was on your side of the window, you can see the view to it's fullest glory.

"Whoa!" you exclaimed, your eyes astonished by the scene before you. Your hands flat against the window, when you suddenly felt a body pressed against your back, and a hot breath against your ear, "It's amazing" you heard Artem mutter, as his breaths fanned the hairs on your neck, before resting his chin on your shoulder.

You yelped, you forgot Artem was just beside you!

Your heart pounded against your ribcage when you realized that in order for Artem to see the fireworks, he needs to look at your side of the window.

Heck, your thighs were touching, and you can feel every ounce of heat that his muscular body radiated. He's practically caging you and this small, suffocating space of a capsule isn't helping!

Despite the unbelievable heat that your whole body is feeling right now, you badly wanted him to wrap his arms around you.

Something was pooling in your stomach, something weird. All you can think about right now is Artem kissing you against the window while you sit on his lap.

Warmth filled your already heated cheeks upon realization of what you just imagined, and you mentally slapped yourself. What were you thinking?

The smell of his vanilla cologne isn't helping!

Nobody has ever made you feel this way before. No other person has affected you like this. You think about the things that this man had done for you, he was selfless, hardworking, and most of all, kind.

Especially the smiles he had always shown you. Those smiles filled with comfort and fondness that makes you weak in the knees. Whenever you see that smile, you find yourself looking forward in seeing it again.

To you, Artem Wing was unobtainable.

Yet you wanted to make him yours.

7:01pm

"Artem!" you pointed below with an enthusiastic grin as the fireworks boomed and splashed the sky above the theme park.

His body scooted over to you without realizing, eyes widening with glee and he muttered, "It's amazing" Artem leaned towards you, placing his chin on your shoulder for him to get better view of the fireworks display below.

It's taking every ounce of his control to not face you towards him and claim your lips then and there.

What you said earlier only fueled his raging feelings for you. You were willing to carry his burdens with him? He never had someone say that to him before, and he was happy it's from you.

The evening is flawless. The two of you were alone, having you near him like this, your decleration of support earlier, and a beautiful scenery before him that he won't get to see everyday...

A perfect evening to pour his heart out to you.

He decided that if there was a best time to confess his love for you, that time would be now. He didn't care about your answer right now, he just wanted to let it all out before this passionate feelings can drive him to insanity.

These feelings were driving him crazy, he wanted to let you know how you make him happy, that he thinks about you eveey second of every day, that you ground him and his lonely heart.

He noticed you were silent and unmoving, so he decided to take the chance. He took a deep breath.

"I'm in l-" "Can I ki-"

You turned your body to face him, surprised. Your face only a few centimeters away from his. One wrong move and you'll kiss.

The both of you blinked.

"You... go first." you said, biting your lip.

He stared deep into your eyes, none of you dared to move from this intimate position, your breaths fanning each other's faces.

"Y/N, I," he rested his forehead against yours and breathed with the most vulnerable voice you've ever heard from him, "I'm in love with you..."

You gaped, but he didn't mind.

He closed his eyes for a few seconds, "It's okay if you don't feel the same. I..." he opened his eyes to give you a loving gaze "I will keep loving you anyway."

He looked so vulnerable right now, but it didn't scare him. If anything, he feels relief in finally voicing out the feelings he's hidden for so long.

"I was in a bad mood today because I think you were interested in William," you just blinked and he continued, "I mean, you always look happy when you're with him. It crushed my heart." He finished as he waited for your response.

He waited, and waited.

The silence that you were giving him didn't give him any clue to what you were thinking, it's unnerving.

After of what seemed like an eternity you finally let out, "He has a girlfriend, silly." you see Artem's eyes widened and you continued, "It's a long story, but I'm not interested in him. We're just friends."

You felt the heat creep up his face.

"So... what were you going to tell me?" He said hesitantly as he gulped, the embarrasment from earlier evident in his voice.

Your cheeks flushed pink as you darted your eyes, it was now your turn to get really embarassed, "Can I..." your face looks conflicted. That if you say whatever you wanted to say, It'd be the death of you.

You took a deep breath, Artem told you his feelings, so it's only fair you tell him yours, you told yourself and mustered the courage to look up to his ocean eyes, a vast ocean so blue, you could drown in them, "Can I kiss you, Artem?"

It took a moment before he could fully process your words. His brain short-circuit.

"What?" He blurted out as he scanned your face for any signs that maybe, you have made a mistake.

but you replied, "I want to kiss you Artem," you put your hands on his shoulder to steady yourself, "I'm in love with you too."

His body tingled with so much joy, you being in love with him was just a distant dream before.

Not willing to wait anymore, he licked his lips as he slowly dipped his head to meet your already parted mouth, welcoming him.

You may or may not have kissed the entire way down the ride.

Artem Wing is a dedicated man.

Now, he's willing to dedicate himself to you for the rest of his life.

do not repost © lavynrose 08/16/21.

[probably-haven]

A bit ago, I saw a reblog(wasnt sure if u were comfortable with me tagging you or not) of my first Archon War Era Venti post that asked how I came up with the phrases, so I figure I could explain those two and maybe construct a few more sayings or language things from the archon war as another example.

So for the first one "a riptide of mortal blood". I started out with an intention, wanting to display the violent nature of the archon war so I knew I wanted the saying to have something to do with blood. And since a lot of Venti's character tends to blue the lines between mortality I wanted to stress the fact that he is very much immortal. This is where the distinction between ichor and mortal blood was formed. And because apples are a simple thing, after a few tries I decided the meaning of the phrase would have to do with insignificance.

So I had a few components at my disposal- ichor, mortal blood, violent origins, and insignificance. So to stress insignificance by distinguishing mortality from immortality I looked at a few options. An event, a technique, a saying, a misunderstanding, an object, a person, a simplification, and just general morbidity that could have occurred, since these are where idioms and sayings often come from. And I came up with the idea of slaughtering mortal followers(inspired by the idea of burning and salting crops during invasions).

So then I played around with the order of the words for a bit, dwelling on "outweighed" and "balance" and "spiralling" before eventually my mind focused on the modern phrase "the tides of war" and other variations. And since blood is liquid and all, I decided to use a water metaphore. Then It just came down to refinement and expansion

Ichor washed out by mortal blood/the finest ichor (erosion synonym)/ the thickest ichor/strongest/purest(I did like this one cuz of the simultaneous blood purity connotations)/ and eventually settled on "most potent ichor"

And then I brought up power thesaurus and looked up a bunch of synonyms for tide- like current, waves(waves of battle made this one tempting), dam(breaking dam and similar metaphors), leak, and eventually settled on riptide for the more dangerous vibes it gives off.

Then came the joiner- again, I sorted through a lot of things like outweighed, imbalanced, overcome, drowned, squandered, hidden, but then I remembered a thing about sharks smelling blood diffused into an Olympic swimming pool or something like that so I latched onto the word and there you have it

"Even the most potent of ichor diffuses amongst the riptide of mortal blood"

-

"Storm of many clouds" was on the spot because I was like 'oh I should get something from Decarabian's era. Oh storm god! Wow team work! Sounds like a song lyric or something so hard could have said it, lmao clouds go brrrrrrr. And threw that one together so I'm not all that proud of it, especially since I used the same "noun of adjective noun" structure as the first one which was kind of repetitive on my part but oh well! Onto the next one!

-

So examining our options we have: An event, a technique, a saying, a misunderstanding, a simplification, an object, a person, and just general morbidity that could have occurred. And keep in mind that a lot of sayings come from either metaphors, or from literal sayings losing their meanings.

So what we do then is put yourself in the context of the archon war and start listing the things mentioned before, brainstorming different things that could fit into our option categories. And while you're at it and thinking of imagery, brainstorm associated words.

Event: Sal Vindagnir, Fall of Decarabian, A specific alliance, A specific betrayal, salt goddess's fall, guizhong's death

Technique: (I could brainstorm for hours don't tempt me)

Saying: (hard to brainstorm if you don't actually know any- sayings that can be shortened)

Misunderstanding: a God's powers, who did certain things, intentions behind an action, false evidence, divine manipulation

Objects: temples, altars, sacrifices, divine weapons, specific powers

Person: Guizhong, Salt Goddess, Xiao's God person, the Yakshas, adepti, Decarabian, Andrius, Barbatos, Celestia

Morbidity: God's revived through karma, executions

Words: Fire, steel, heavenly principles,

So I could probably keep brainstorming but let's look at what we have and pull out some favorites. For now I'm going to focus on "a betrayal"

now I'm not sure if we know any specific instances of betrayal during the archon war, but if there were, there could be a saying or phrase in which people would refer to someone who seemed shady or untrustworthy with a phrase like "they could be a [insert name of whoever the betrayer was]" which many idioms are actually oddly short like "loophole" which came from holes in walls that archers would use but that were big enough for small people to sneak into place through.

-

That's simple though so let's make another

This time we'll focus on gods revived through karma

so Xiao’s story describes these as “countless manifestations of their vengeful remnant souls, but in doing so, he caused these souls to become increasingly fractured”

so we can latch onto a few things from this: “souls” and the idea of broken things persisting

now- there will be an initial phrase or idea and then a simplified version

so as the origin: dead god’s who after being slayed had a vengeance that continued burning so brightly that their soul continually returned to the material plane only to be fractured time and time again. 

now how can we painfully over simplify this to make it apply to normal life. 

replace a few terms and frame them as concepts:

[people] [defeat/offended/minor inconvenience] [a reoccurring thing] [annoyance] [persistence] 

so whatever this phrase ends up being- it can end up referring to a minor inconvenience that just refuses to go away. 

and now to pick out words and make the actual phrase

so we already have some strong words in the previous description: soul, fractured, dead gods, vengence/vengeful. but lets add some more descriptive terms to stress the violent nature of the saying’s origins: slaughtered, divinity, revived, vestigous, wrath

and lets puzzle piece these words together- (wheeze- this is so much easier if i let myself use the word “of”

“vengeance-sworn soul”/ “divity’s shattered/fragmented will”/ “lingering vestige of slaughter”

and now to use filler words because these dont really make sense

“divity’s fragmented souls shall carry on through unending slaughter”

which i could probably go back and make it sound better, but it seems very human to refer to that fly thats been in your room for the past week as an “unending slaughter” or a “fractured divinity” or something so- yeah- 

its not my best work but thats the gist of how i come up with them. 

-

if anyone who happens to see this wants to try their hand at archon war sayings then feel free because i just think this kind of thing is fascinating

[saby-chan]

Fire Lord Ozai: A blood thirsty monster or the less fortunate “Zuko” of his generation?

Hello again and thank you as always for clicking and allotting some of your time to read my humble post! Since I’ve happened to notice quite an increase in posts lately regarding the controversial character and nature of the former Fire Lord, the now imprisoned fallen prince Ozai, and I’ve personally promised in my previous post that I will share my own analysis on him if people asked me to do so (which actually happened), I am here to deliver my own take on this very intriguing man’s character, while also building a potential past for him based on stuff gathered from the show’s cannon.

I would like to start this essay with what I find to be my favorite quote ever: ”Monster’s aren’t born, they are created.” ~ Naruto Uzumaki (Naruto) What I like about this quote soo much and find very inspirational is the truth it holds within its short, yet powerful message. We are often fast to judge a “book by the cover”, to reduce others to what we assume of them by their appearance or latest actions that we’ve seen them do, but never actually take a moment and wonder where they come from, if this person we soo harshly look down upon really has been this way since their very beginning?

I’ve come across many comments on social media related to ATLA, especially on YouTube videos on which people would throw with harsh comments such as “Aang being a coward for choosing to spare the villain just because they saw a dumb baby pic of them” or “Ozai is the essence of evil and even as a baby he’d been a monster”. I can’t help but wonder who hurt these people to make them be so cruel? Like, how messed up must you actually be to say that a baby, a friggin baby, is the embodiment of all evils? Or that a child was a coward for choosing to see his opponent’s last bits of humanity and opted to spare them?

Aang was soo morally conflicted about the idea of killing Ozai not only because it contradicted the morals of his people, but because he himself understood that this man hadn’t always been the cruel beast he came to met in their first and final showdown. It’s important to note here the fact that upon finding that picture, Aang was actually convinced it had to be Zuko as a baby since it looked so innocent and cute and was actually surprised to learn it was Zuko’s father. And that’s the thing, Ozai was born like us all as an innocent and sweet baby. Babies aren’t in any way evil or twisted, they don’t even have the notion of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ defined in their small, still developing minds. In fact, the very choice of the creators to add this picture in the show is meant to tell us this very thing: this man wasn’t always like this. But if he wasn’t always like this, then what happened to make him become this way?

Well, in order to find out the reason, we must go back in time to the very beginning: Ozai’s childhood and upbringing. For this next part I am going to solely focus on the show cannon, as the comics aren’t the products of BryKe and have a lot of inconsistencies to the source’s cannon (you can go and read my other post on why they fail when it comes to Zuko’s character and his family).

 From what we know and can easily deduce by ourselves just from their appearances, Ozai and his brother Iroh have a huge age gap between them (somewhere between 10 and 15 years). This has to be our first red flag: isn’t it soo odd that this family opted to have their children at such a long distance between pregnancies? It almost feels as if Ozai hadn’t actually been part of his father’s actual family planning... In other words, he was a ‘mistake’ child (I actually hate having to use this terminology, but it will become relevant to when we expand on Azulon’s relationship with his sons). Sure, some may argue that Azulon actually decided to have two sons in case something were to happen to his first born, but wouldn’t it have been more logical to have his second born at 2-3 years max distance from his first? Why choose to have your second child when you are much older and thus risk having a baby with issues, if your sole purpose of this child is to serve as an insurance that you don’t ‘run out’ of heirs? It just doesn’t make much sense, so let’s go for the moment with the possibility that Ozai was an unplanned pregnancy.

This perspective actually gives way to another very interesting aspect: remember the infamous “Born lucky...Lucky to be born” quote? What if I tell you that there is a possibility that this quote wasn’t Ozai’s personal wicked invention, but actually something he himself heard from his very own father? It had been puzzling me for a long time why he choose to say “You were lucky to be born” to Zuko, which implies that Zuko wasn’t supposed to exist. I mean, it’s soo odd that Ozai went with something implying that Zuko was an unplanned pregnancy, since Zuko was the first born. So my theory is that maybe Ozai wanted to convey a different message to Zuko when he said that quote, but due to his anger he ended up replicating the same line he received from Azulon at some point in his childhood. We never got the exact flashback when the line was delivered from Ozai to Zuko, so we don’t have the exact context that lead to it (remember, we are excluding Yang’s take on the matter from the comics).

I mean, this feels like something that wicked old Azulon would have said to his least favorite child. Okay, so let’s go with the scenario that Ozai was an unwanted child, to which we could also add the possibility that Ilah’s health deteriorated after the first birth, which makes plausible the family’s initial decision of stopping at 1 kid.

Moving on, we know from the old ATLA character wiki’s that Ozai’s character design was made with Zuko in mind, being meant to be a grown up version of Zuzu, without the scar. An interesting choice indeed and even Iroh’s letter to Zuko on Ozai from one of the ATLA books describes Ozzy in a similar way to teenage Zuko in book 1: stubborn, feisty, determined and with a volcanic personality (easy to anger and competitive), so it means that these were intentional choices to imply that Zuko and his father are more similar than we were led to believe at first glance. Maybe Ozai was the “Zuko” of his generation. Also, in one of the interviews on the royal family, BryKe stated that Ozai worked very hard to get where he is in book 3, referring to his firebending specifically (we all know how Ozzy got the throne, so clearly, he didn’t “work hard” for that), so maybe he wasn’t always the strongest man alive, with the most exceptional firebending skills out there, like Azula who showed ease in her learning, but rather someone closer to Zuko’s weaker performance as a child, building his way to success through endless hard work until he became the prodigy we know today.

Continuing with our theoretical scenario, after his birth, the second child show’s lesser skills compared to his brother Iroh (by that I don’t mean that he wasn’t gifted at all, but that maybe Ozai wasn’t as fast and great of a learner like his big bro), so Azulon opts to just ignore him and continue focusing solely on his golden child. In my headcannon I actually think that Ilah survived the birth and so she was left in charge of the younger child’s education and upbringing. At this point Iroh is already 10 or older, so he is forced to focus on his development, which prevents him from spending time with his lil brother, but just for the sake of being positive, let’s assume that Ozai still had both his mother and his big brother to keep him sheltered from Azulon’s darkness for a small portion of his childhood.

I choose to believe that Ozai had his mother’s love for a small bit of his childhood due to his willingness in the show to allow Ursa (who mind you, as the granddaughter of Roku was considered a treacherous individual) to spend a ton of time with both Zuko and Azula and share her philosophy with the children, as seeing his wife playing with their children probably reminded him of his own bitter-sweet memories he had with Ilah. They also probably spent a lot of their time near the turtle-duck pond since that pond’s existence prolly dates long before Ozai and Ursa married and had their own children.

Unfortunately, Ilah dies and little Ozai remains all alone, to be influenced negatively by his father (and even by his grandpa Sozin, we don’t really know for certain when the old man died, so he prolly was there for a short time when Ozzy was still a child). Azulon most likely blames Ozai for his wife’s death as the second birth might’ve really had a huge toll on Ilah’s already fragile body, bringing her closer to death, so he still neglects and ignores the child, if not straight out bullies and abuses him for not being on par with Iroh. This prolly leads to Ozai becoming jealous of his brother since Iroh has their father’s love, pushing them further apart. I headcannon that this jealousy between the siblings led to Ozai complaining to his dad when he finally had too much of their father’s discrimination (at a similar age to when Zuko prolly did and got the infamous line, if not younger) only to get the “Iroh was born lucky, you were lucky to be born!” line with the sole purpose of hurting him since now the child knows that he was never wanted.

When Azulon scolds very furiously adult Ozai in Zuko’s memories for daring to ask to be named crown prince, he literally says something like “What, you dare ask me to betray MY own son?!” (this is like red flag number two), line that pretty much testifies how Azulon chose to pretty much treat Ozai as if he wasn’t his son too, showcasing how much he despised his second born and favored the first child over him. Since we are on the topic of their last conversation, the punishment Azulon gave to his son alone proves this man’s level of sadism, which leads me to be believe that Ozai’s childhood was full of this type of punishments for bad behaviors that could be easily corrected trough a long serious lecture or a lesser punishment focused more on teaching him an actual lesson. 

The old wikis also mention on the page about the hall with portraits of the previous Fire Lords that it was the place where Ozai chose to spend most of his time in his youth, seeking advice from his ancestors. I mean, seriously now, if he had a good and supportive father and a present brother in his life, would Ozai had chosen to seek guidance from the dead instead of his living family? That piece of information that was easily overlooked by many proves how lonely this man was in his youth.

So for the most part of his life, Ozai grew up under the toxic influence and abuse of his tyrant father who refused to acknowledge him. Yet he managed to grow up still full of determination to one day prove his worth to Azulon and gain his acceptance (just like we saw with Zuko in book 1, who was desperate to regain his honor and be accepted by his father). But unfortunately, no matter how strong he became or how good of a firebender he was, Azulon was unmoved and unphased by his second son’s performance.

From what we could gather from the little info we received in the show, it seems that Ozai was never sent to the battle field to aid his older brother, being kept as a stay home prince, with the only occasion he actually left home being to search for the Avatar (I don’t think Iroh was sent to do his part on searching the Avatar since he strongly believed that there wasn’t going to ever be one, so it’s safe to assume Azulon assigned Ozai with this mission just to get rid of him for a few years) and the only purpose he ever served to his father was to become part of the old man’s genetics experiment in order to create strong unparalleled firebending offspring (which I am pretty sure were meant to be ‘biological war machines’ used by Azulon in the war, as he didn’t really seem to give a shit about Ozai’s children compared to Lu Ten). So just imagine the level of disappointment and dishonor Ozai must’ve felt as a man and young aspiring soldier to find out that he was going to be used like a ‘non-bending daughter’ in a strategical marriage and never get to serve his country in what he’d been taught was the greatest and most important war for their Nation.

All in all, this marriage didn’t really end up that badly because it seems he and Ursa were actually very compatible. The old wiki for Ursa states that she was a noble woman and the perfect match for Ozai, which leads me to believe that show Ursa was intended to be a very strong willed and determined woman who earned his respect. The show never stated that Ozai never wanted his first born or that he was disappointed with Zuko from birth like the comics say, so it’s safe to assume that Ursa and Ozai actually ended up falling in love at some point since they had not one, but two kids with relatively a short time in between pregnancies. 

There are actually many signs in the show that actually prove that these two loved each other and Ozai didn’t abuse his wife: from the fact that they went every year to see Ursa’s favorite play despite Ozai hating the poor performance of the Ember Island Players (I mean, what man would do such a sacrifice as to endure the same torture every single year just to make his wife happy if he never loved her?), Ursa’s undeniable and sincere love for their children (in the show it was never stated that Ursa saw Zuko and Azula as someone else’s children, so if she were indeed an abused woman who was forced to have these children, she wouldn’t have ever loved them to such an extent, especially Zuko who resembled his father the most physically), the fact that Ursa had equal rights in their marriage and raising of their children (her even scolding and grounding Ozai’s favorite child without hesitation), to the most significant scene to the Urzai ship in Zuko’s flashbacks: Ozai sitting troubled all alone in Ursa’s favorite spot by the pond, in a sad and brooding atmosphere, after he lost her, instead of celebrating what had to be the happiest day of his life since he was finally crowned Fire Lord (it’s clear who had more importance in his heart: Ursa meant more to him than the throne, so losing her outshined his achievement). In fact, Ursa must’ve been the only thing that still kept him outside of the darkness that threatened to swallow his heart and once he lost her, Ozai had nothing else to keep him on the right path.

And even as a father, it seems that Ozai wasn’t always cold and distant to his children, as his true self depicted in Zuko’s memories on Ember Island shows him caring for both of his children, even holding Zuko close to him with a protective arm on the boy’s shoulder. Except the Agni Kai, there don’t seem to be any instances in which he was physically violent towards his son before the banishment (Iroh literally let Zuko in to join that faithful war meeting willingly. Would’ve he done that if he knew his brother to be very violent towards his children in case they disobeyed? If yes, then it would make Iroh actually very questionable on a moral standpoint) and even on an emotional level, I don’t really think that he was actually abusive to him (at least while Ursa was there) because from Zuko’s conversation with Zhao, he’s adamant that his father will take him back and even states "You don't know how my father feels about me. You don't know anything!", meaning that the father he used to know showed him a level of respect and genuine affection (if Ozai were to bully Zuko since the boy’s very early childhood, do you think this kid would grow up to be so sure that his father wants him around and would he defend this bully when someone badmouths them in front of him?).

Even with Azula, despite people demonizing her from early childhood and saying that she was manipulated since birth by Ozai to become a war machine, I do believe that she shows genuine love and affection towards her father. I do choose to believe that back in the good times when the family was happy, Ozai spent quality time with his daughter, filling in the gap left by Ursa’s neglect. I theorize that the reason why kid Azula badmouthed her grandpa and uncle was because she was being very protective of her father: since she used to like spying and eavesdropping, it’s safe to assume that she prolly witnessed many instances in which the old man bullied or insulted Ozai, favoring Iroh over him. It’s a bit harder to see it that way since her snarky comments involve dark topics, but since they live in a society governed by power and war, I see them as something similar to if Azula would’ve said “Uncle sucks and he will surely be fired from his job!” or “Grandpa is old and weak, he should leave the family business to dad!”. Even the fact that the only thing capable of shattering her to pieces was her father leaving her proves how much she cared for him. Ty Lee and Mai’s betrayal was a big blow on Azula’s control and sanity, but she didn’t breakdown until Ozai discarded her after his coronation as Phoenix King. There’s nothing more painful in this world than to be left behind by the person you loved the most and was there by your side your whole life, whom you wanted to follow to world’s end and back. That was the moment Azula finally realized that the father she used to know and love was actually gone and had been in fact, long gone for years at this point.

But if Ozai cared for his family what made him change? Easy, it all comes back to the fact that his father never acknowledged him. The throne doesn’t seem to be his ultimate goal in life since Ozai discarded of the Fire Lord title very easily, tossing it to Azula without any remorse or hesitation. It was more about the meaning behind getting the crown: replacing Iroh in the line of succession was the ultimate proof of his father’s acceptance, that he wasn’t only a “mistake” and “failure” in his father’s eyes, but since Azulon ended up saying and doing what he did, backfired Ozai and made him understand that no matter how hard he tried, the old man will never see him for what he is. So yeah, for a proud man like Ozai this was a hard defeat to swallow, which in turn sparked his strong desire of winning the war and becoming the king of the world: if Azulon wouldn’t accept him even in death, then Ozai will prove to the whole world that he was above his father and his “perfect” brother by accomplishing what they never could and even better and no one was going to stop him, not even his own family.

This is what differentiates Ozai from Zuko: while both had similar upbringings, Ozai never broke away from his obsession of gaining his father’s admiration, allowing himself to fall prey to the darkness left by Azulon in his heart and abandon his true self, only to become the copy of his abuser, while Zuko stood up to his dad and chose his own destiny. If Aang were to come back around 20 or 30 years earlier, then he might’ve actually been able to save Ozai just like he saved Zuko, but unfortunately it wasn’t this way.

Do I think that Ozai could still be saved and redeemed even after the events of book 3? Definitely! Since he’s actually a broken man and still has a tiny bit of humanity left within, I think he still has a chance to change his heart. The only thing is that it’d be a long lasting process: first off he needs to spend a long time in solitude and reflect on his life’s choices and his past, understand where he went wrong and that what happened to him in his childhood is called abuse, which he ended up replicating on his own children. After he understands his wrongdoings and becomes willing to rediscover his true self, he needs to understand the truth about the war, that everything he’d known was fake propaganda and that there was nothing glorious in what he, his father and Sozin did under the excuse of “sharing their Nation’s greatness with the rest of the world!”. But most importantly of all, the only remedy that could possibly save him is love. It sound cliche, but by responding to hatred with more hate like Zuko did in the comics would never change the world “for the better” or bring it “to reality”. The only way to save both Azula and Ozai would be trough showing them the power of love, hope and empathy, how they don’t have to struggle alone and push everyone away. And especially by redeeming Azula, she would be a very important piece in Ozai’s redemption: since he had a closer parent-child relationship with Azula and cared for her the most when he did care, realizing how much he made her suffer through his actions, that would probably break Ozai enough to make him admit that he was wrong all along.

So yeah, this is my analysis on Ozai’s character using the cannon information from the show and old wikis and why I think he is just the product of a very bad environment and an abusive parent who never showed him love (if there’s a reason for why Ozai might be uncapable of showing a healthy parental love to his children is because you can’t show what you’ve never learnt yourself), being the Zuko of his generation who never got to experience the positive influence of an “Uncle Iroh” to guide him on the right path. 

You can agree with me or not on this one, but this is what I choose to believe. Maybe I am way too good by choosing to see any potential good in anyone, but I feel it’s a better way than to counter hate with more hate like Yang did in his monstrous portrayal of Ozai in The Search.

Let me know your thoughts in the comments and if you agree with anything I’ve said, feel free to leave a like and to reblog this post.

See you next time and stay safe! Bye-Bye!

Saby out.

[likehandlingroses]

“Realistic” Tom/Thomas Relationship Timeline

The S3/S4 Tom/Thomas affair is a theory that has been making its way around lately, and it is centered around the contrast in the interactions between Thomas and Tom during the Season 3 Christmas Special and their interactions in the Season 4 Christmas Special. 

This means that usually the start of the relationship is viewed as coinciding with the immediate aftermath of Matthew’s death, which occurs in the Christmas Special of Season 3 (September 1921). Due to the interactions between Tom and Thomas in the Christmas Special of Season 4, the relationship can almost certainly be considered over by that time (May-ish of 1923). But what happened in between, and how long were they actually together? There’s one view that the affair occurs in between Seasons 3 and 4, which means that at the very longest they lasted just under six months (generally I think this view cuts it even shorter than that)...but this leaves some unanswered questions and some peculiarities, so I took another look at the canon to determine when, in fact, Thomas and Tom broke up.

(Note: I definitely know that Julian Fellowes did not intend for them to be having an affair, but also Julian if I’m right just DM me)

Let’s start with what we know about September 1921 and May 1923—the definite before and after points—for reference:

Christmas Special Season 3—September, 1921

In this Christmas special, we see Tom left behind while the rest of the family goes to Duneagle, and we see Thomas still dealing with the Jimmy situation a year after its apparent resolution. On its face, this episode features Tom being challenged in his new role in the house—and being encouraged to step up and face that role—and Thomas finding a way to resolve things with Jimmy.

Except there’s a whole lot of other stuff going on in the periphery of those stories: Tom knows that Jimmy is bothering Thomas and appears to want to intervene at the fair, but he is stopped by Edna, who at one point uses Thomas’s injuries as an excuse to visit Tom and assure him that Thomas is “feeling much better.” And—of course—there’s the fact that Tom and Thomas hug at the fair (and lest you think this was a RJC/Allen Leech moment not caught by editing, it was in multiple takes! Someone—multiple someones actually—included it on purpose). They are friendly, aware of each other, and to be honest it isn’t impossible to argue that maybe the relationship predates Matthew’s death! I’m going to argue otherwise, however, based on how Tom breaks down when Edna kisses him—I think Edna is the first time he’s even really thought of himself in romantic terms for a long time! But Thomas is right there in the wings, and he just finally made some progress on the emotional problem that’s been plaguing him for over a year!

It’s a big difference from what we see in the next Christmas special, big enough to start the theory of the affair in the first place...

Season 4 Christmas Special—Summer 1923

Once again, Tom is left alone at Downton while the rest of the family goes to London...and the difference in how Thomas responds is striking. He’s furious at having to wait on Tom, for reasons both we and the characters cannot quite understand. The excuses don’t add up—at this point, Tom has been living at Downton for three YEARS, and this has never been a problem before. Now all of a sudden Thomas is slamming trays and clenching his fists and provoking Tom into admitting that he sees himself as Above sitting next to him...what?

Then there’s Sarah Bunting, a Miss Sarah Bunting...whose presence infuriates Thomas while also making him eager to use her as a way to embarrass Tom. And Tom knows it, immediately. He’s embarrassed, he’s uncomfortable, but still he’s quick to pull rank with Thomas when challenged. Something has fundamentally altered the way they interact with and perceive each other while sharing the same space.

All of this speaks to a breakup, and a messy one at that...so with the knowledge we have, WHAT exactly happened between September of 1921 and May of 1923? Let’s look at what Season 4 has to say:

4.1/4.2–February, 1922

“That’s right: it’s Valentine’s Day.” 

This is an important piece of the puzzle, because Thomas—Nanny West drama aside—is in a pretty good mood for the Valentine’s Day episode! He engages with Daisy and Jimmy’s Valentine’s card drama with good humor and even some genuine interest...something I do not believe he’d do if he’d only recently been broken up with, and by someone who lived in the house! The big one here, though, is the dialogue Thomas has with Nanny West in which she calls him “Thomas” and he says, “that’s Mr. Barrow to you...”

Now, where did Nanny West hear him referred to as Thomas? The episode makes a point of the fact that nannies do not as a rule spend much time with the downstairs staff—and even if they did, not many of the downstairs crew call Thomas “Thomas” on a regular basis. Nor do the upstairs folks...with one notable exception. Tom, who has to be reminded by Thomas in 4.3 to address him as “Barrow” (more on that later), routinely messes up names and titles.

To me, this suggests that Tom and Thomas are still talking, and it’s pretty clear from Thomas’s attentions to Sybbie in the episode that it would have been easy for Nanny West to overhear it in that context. Now, this doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re still seeing each romantically, but the “Mr. Barrow TO YOU” element implies that the correction was NOT made to whoever Nanny West heard using the name (we presume it’s Tom)...and the distinction is that Nanny West does not *get* to call him that! It definitely seems like whoever she grabbed the name from has been granted permission to do that, and she Has Not. And if it’s Tom...well.

So does that mean that Thomas and Tom were done by 4.3, when Thomas DOES correct Tom on his title? Not exactly...

4.3/4.4–The House Party (pre July 1922)

(tw on this section for discussions involving sexual assault)

The party features Edna’s schemes and assault on Tom in order to extract a promise of marriage from him. It also features a Tom who is incredibly vulnerable and entirely out of his element with the introduction of the Crawley’s friends. This is somewhat of a contrast from the Tom of the first two episodes, who stands up to Robert several times to intervene on Mary’s behalf, and even ropes Carson into the mission. It feels, for a moment, that despite Matthew’s death Tom has taken up the challenge presented to him at the end of Season 3 and begun seeing himself as a valuable, contributing member of the household and family.

But here, Tom speaks of himself as a fool, as walking a tightrope, and of not being understood. He relies on alcohol to get through the event, which Edna takes advantage of—and which gives us a Tom/Thomas interaction that speaks to, in my opinion, a continuing relationship (although perhaps an altering one):

Now, if I had to guess, I would say that Tom might be less *keen* than usual, given his overall demeanor and the new scrutiny placed on him by Edna coming back to the house (not to mention the house party itself). It’s very possible there’s been a lull between the two of them as of late. I do not believe, however, that there is evidence of a clear break between Tom and Thomas as of the house party.

For one, Tom doesn’t just say the wrong thing when addressing Thomas in the drawing room—he says, “Thomas, would you get me a drink for God’s sake?” That is Not how he talks to him in the Christmas Special, where he is stilted and uncomfortable and concerned about how the words will be taken. He isn’t worried about any of that, and while Thomas corrects him, he doesn’t seem all that bothered by it. Tom’s look of irritation at the correction isn’t overdone either.

“It’s Barrow now,” also has flexible meanings. Of course it literally is what Tom is supposed to call him now...but “now” seems like a weird word to use when it’s been what Thomas is meant to be called for several years. It could be a post-breakup smackdown, but we’ve seen what those look like in the Christmas Special, and this doesn’t feel like that! I believe, rather, that Thomas is making reference to the fact that it is incorrect at that moment, something Tom should know and has been discussed!!!

The house party has both of them overworked and tense (this is also the time where Thomas has to fill in for Jimmy because Jimmy hurt his hand...which is SO ridiculous if you think about it for more than two seconds), but Edna’s transgression still draws Thomas’s attention

And that’s important! Thomas had been friends with Edna until this point, largely for convenience it seems—she is a new lady’s maid, and she can feed him information. Thomas even worked with her to mess with Anna, who had earlier made a comment to Edna about his intentions in befriending her. There’s a bond forming there, and while I don’t believe Thomas would genuinely support the literal details of Edna’s plot, I don’t think it’s a foregone conclusion that he would be Opposed to Edna taking advantage of what she would frame as an indiscretion on Tom’s part. Not if he disliked Tom or was predisposed to believe Tom was at fault (ie: someone who expects to be “waited on Hand and Foot while he decides what Might Please Him Next”).

But right away, Thomas is suspicious the morning after. We see Thomas spying on Edna as she corners Tom, and he specifically brings it up to her later to catch her out. Already his tone is soured where she’s concerned. He’s sensed she’s up to something and he can probably guess the vague idea if not the particulars...and it turns him against her almost instinctively.

So what’s that about? Could it just be jealousy? The thing is, we know what Thomas would do if he believed that Edna and Tom were simply having an affair—we see what happens in the S4 Christmas Special with Sarah Bunting. This isn’t like that at all. 

Thomas immediately blames Edna for what’s happened, calling her a manipulative little witch and declaring that he’s delighted her plans didn’t work. There’s no question of Thomas’s loyalties, even though Edna assumes he’ll want to “keep in with” her. Not for one second does he appear to consider this, and that seems to distinguish this incident from later ones.

4.5/4.6–What Are These Episodes (pre-July 1922)

There isn’t a lot to remember about these episodes for Tom or Thomas, and so what people may not remember is that these are the episodes Tom starts floating the idea of leaving for America—a full season before he tries starting that conversation again, and over two years before he actually DOES temporarily move to Boston. Now, that kind of decision takes time, but it’s kind of...strange that he begins making it here in the spring of 1922 and will not seriously consider it again until well into 1924!

Whether this has anything at all to do with Thomas can’t be determined, but I do enjoy hearing Tom say it will be impossible for him to marry anyone at Downton because an upper class woman won’t have him, and would an “nice Irish working class girl” make everyone “comfy?”...and Thomas is standing Right There! What does it mean...

Thomas is also getting more paranoid, he’s got Baxter in the house feeding him information...and he’s generally giving off a different vibe than he has all season. 

Here is where I think the connection is starting to see some serious cracks—Tom is realizing he doesn’t belong and is making moves to change that. Meanwhile, Thomas is making moves to ensure Nothing Ever changes without him knowing about it ahead of time! Tension abounds, though we don’t see any evidence of it being directed at each other just yet...

4.7/4.8–Interesting and Modern (July 1922)

Thomas goes to America and Tom meets Miss Bunting...weird how that just happened like that!

Thomas is excited to go to New York, and it seems...pretty clear he fucked while he was there. I think if you’re gay and you go to New York in the 1920s and you come back and all you can tell your coworkers is that it was “interesting and modern” you definitely were not doing anything you can actually talk about

Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean that he and Tom are Done (they may not have ever been exclusive on paper), but the overall feeling from Tom is a dejected man in limbo...he can’t even say he’s a Socialist anymore. It’s not going well. So my inclination is to say that Tom hit pause (maybe not for the first time), and Thomas is dealing with it by getting some in New York (great!) and bullying his coworkers (bad!) So why do I think they weren’t totally done at that time? Because these episodes happen in the summer of 1922...the Christmas Special for S4 takes place in May of 1923. That’s a long time to have passed! A long time for Tom to keep Miss Bunting at arm’s length, a long time for Thomas to be fuming over something...I believe that in the Christmas Special what we are seeing is the last stand of two people who are grappling with finally cutting a fraying thread.

Another Look At The S4 Christmas Special

These scenes are truly some of the most incomprehensible things Downton Abbey ever presented to us with virtually no explanation.  So let’s take another look at what’s happening here.  

First of all, we have the scene with Tom and Thomas entering the house after sending Edith off and leaving Tom offically on his own--they don’t appear openly hostile, though there’s some tense looking when the other person isn’t and looking back down again when they are energy...but nothing egregious. 

Not until we see Thomas slam down a tray, that is. In fact, this whole thing seems to be coming from Thomas’s anger, while Tom appears eager to just smooth it over by not causing trouble and following the rules set forth by the household norms. This seems in line with Tom’s general dispositon--with both Edna and Miss Bunting he tries to ease out rather than break things off. 

 But Thomas interprets this as dismissive, and while he says to Ivy it’s about their positions in the house...as discussed above this really doesn’t logically check out. I do think it irritates him that Tom is essentially avoiding Thomas because it’s what “pleases him,” but it runs deeper than “he used to be the chauffeur.” Because that was always the case. 

And then Tom brings Miss Bunting back without telling anyone, and he takes her upstairs. And this makes Thomas INSANE, and Tom knows IMMEDIATELY that it will! And Tom is eager to assure “Mr. Barrow” that nothing happened (actually, what he’s really eager to do is have Thomas not stand there while he eats, but Thomas is not budging). 

Thomas is furious. He’s said to Ivy that he is SICK of this man, he’s tired of dealing with him...and then he tries to get Tom to sit next to him the car? 

Thomas stole a dog one time, and I still think this might be his wildest attempt at controlling a situation we see on the show. What is going on? If Tom HAD let him sit in the back, would Thomas have still gone to Lord Grantham about Miss Bunting? If Thomas hadn’t been such a jerk about Miss Bunting, would Tom have LET him? What is poor Ivy even processing this as? Am I the only one hearing Taylor Swift’s Better Than Revenge playing? 

Thomas acts immediately on coming to London, dropping the line of “Mr. Branson is stil a young man, and he can’t be expected to stay single forever”...he’s Angry Angry!! If they were on a break before, I don’t think it had fully set in for Thomas that it might be Permanent until now. And I think Tom’s newly avoidant personality we see in other scenarios gave him the wrong impression in this respect.

In Summary

I think that the relationship was relatively “on” from the period of September 1921 through whenever the house party took place. The house party caused some huge issues, mostly for Tom (understandably)—he may have unfairly blamed himself for what happened and drew wrongful parallels to what’s happening with Thomas. I think that after that it was very “off,” but I believe that neither Thomas nor Tom really committed to ending it either...and when we see them in 1923 they are in the peak stages of finally facing the end of things.

So what caused the final shift? Perhaps Thomas came back from New York with expectations, expectations Tom found himself intimidated by. Perhaps Thomas’s increasing paranoia and Tom’s growing agnosticism towards his own beliefs and identity are related and fed off of each other until they both just did not like the person they were seeing! Maybe it’s just that Downton Abbey is a really bad place for both of them, and even though they started off trying to protect each other from that, they got sucked in and turned on each other!

In any case, by Season 5 the romantic relationship appears over for good, though there is some evidence in later episodes that Tom and Thomas settled down a bit over time (Thomas defending Tom in S5 at Brancaster, and Tom saying he hates goodbyes in reference to Thomas). 

We will just have to see what happens when they realize they both are dating someone new, and they work together too :) 

[zet-sway]

@the-wip-project day 35:

I don't know what today's question is but I gotta write a wall of text about what happened last night because holy shit

I was on the verge of falling asleep and, like I usually do, I decided to hunt for some spicy fanfics to read on my phone. I found one.

All my posts are long but this one is real fucking long. CW for touching on dub-con and injury mentioned in the type of context it probably shouldn't be.

It's time for me to admit that not only am I a oneshot writer, I'm also a oneshot reader. I am drawn to short fanfics. If I click on a chaptered fic, it's (usually) because it's rated E for smut and I'll go in with every intention of skimming it for the spicy bits. I'm not proud of this. I've avoided saying this for years because I don't want to disappoint people who work hard on their very long and well thought out chaptered stories. I have a short attention span, and I know what I want.

But anyway, last night I clicked on a fic with 5 chapters and some amount of words, around 30k? Long, by my standards, but I was tired and I just wanted something to read while I dozed off.

This particular fic hooked me in, though. I still skimmed it, but the writing was so unique in a way that made me writhe with writer's envy and admiration. Whoever wrote this had their own language - nothing borrowed - their own vision.

I guess I should tell the good people who read my posts (ya'll, seriously, thank you) that the fic in topic is called Fault Lines by Recidiva on AO3. I would link to it but uhhhh I may be using my work PC for "extracurricular purposes" right this moment ^^; so maybe when I get home I'll remember to add it.

I skimmed it - like I said above - for the spicy parts. It generally follows the plot of Bioware's canon. Thane begins as possessive and manipulative, likely uncomfortably close to dub-con for a lot of people. He kisses her and knows full well that his kiss will make her willing but intoxicated, and how he will use that to fulfil himself. But as the story progresses, he falls in love. Their relationship is what I'll call "edgy." Both of them are renegades. There's a scene where they get down in the shuttle after a fight and they're both still injured and it borders on downright unrealistic but fuck it, it's fanfic and I bought it. However their relationship develops a certain heart-wrenching tenderness. She asks him what Siha means over and over again, and eventually tells him she thinks "bitch" when he says it. But in that moment they have a playful banter, he knows full well she's probably already looked it up on the extranet, and they fall into bed together. The smut is mind-boggling.

By the time it gets to Shepard's arrest, he's taken up a place on Earth and visits her, breaks into her house arrest. There's a scene where they see each other for the first time in a while, she tells him how much she's missed his mouth and how it's not right how bad she wants him, and wants him bad enough to smother him with affection. She says something to the effect of "if you're looking to die, I'd volunteer to be the cause," implying that her lust is powerful enough to endanger his life. And it was at this moment I realized I fucked up.

It's established that I live in my own headcanon and I'm not burdened with considering the end of Thane's life as part of my fics. And the suspension of disbelief was such that I forgot he doesn't make it. So at this moment in the fic, chapter 4 out of 5, I realized "Oh shit this isn't going to have a happy ending." I skipped to the end right away, I wanted to confirm my fears.

In their final exchange, she asks him to lie to her - something that's repeated in other chapters of the story. I forget what he says, I was reading desperately, but he asks her in return to tell him something true. She kisses him and tells him she loves him, and he breathes his last breath with the lingering tingle of their kiss to carry him to the other side.

I was so entrenched in the depth of their relationship up to that point. The level of fathomless love the author conveyed, unlike anything I've ever managed to write before, but more realistic to my own understanding of love as I've experienced it. Not because they're renegades, but just the selflessness with which they feel, communicate, banter, and make love.

When I read that last paragraph, something inside me broke. That sounds dramatic but that's honestly how I would describe it. It felt like waking up from a night terror, when you bolt up in bed from a dream so bad you immediately get up even if it's 4am because nothing feels real and you're so terrified you have to get up and do something - literally anything to take your mind off it, to ease you back into reality. I put my phone down and stared into the darkness of my bedroom and told myself "it's just a fanfic, no need to get upset." And then I started to cry and I didn't stop for 30 minutes.

My husband was downstairs watching Bohemian Rhapsody and I went down there and wrapped myself around him so tight and cried. Bless this man, from the bottom of my heart - bless him - for his unfathomable kindness. I felt like a fucking fool because I was crying over fanfiction but he paused his movie and just listened while I tried to articulate how it wasn't exactly about the character death, or the characters at all, it was just the writing and how it wormed into my brain so convincingly. I felt the loss like it was my own loss. I am terrified of losing my husband. So many feelings coalesced and I realized one day I may be in that situation, kissing the man I love goodbye for the last time, never to hold him again. I'm at work right now and I'm tearing up because it's so hard.

I tip my hat to the author, but I genuinely wished I hadn't read that fanfic. And isn't it kind of funny after that grandstand I took yesterday about not wanting to write the pain of loss and grief, that I ended up reading it instead and probably fucking myself up just as badly, if not worse, than if I had tried to write it myself?

It gets worse, too. Because it got me thinking about my own writing, and how I could never hope to achieve what that author did. So I sat there crying out my painfeelings while simultaneously feeling like a shit writer and like nothing I put out matters. I got up from the couch, sat down at my PC and picked up where I left off in the Omega DLC in ME3 because video games are great for taking the mind off things. It didn't exactly help with the intensity I'd hoped for, but I managed to fall asleep, by 3am.

Fast forward to this morning. I dragged my sorry ass out of bed 4 hours later and drove to work. By some fucking miracle, no one is here right now except our field director. And I'm stewing in how this one fic really fucked me up bad, reconsidering everything. I feel like I've been put in my place.

So what changed?

Yesterday I posted about how I'm struggling to write a plotline. I know what happens, but I'm not interested in the little bits that tie it together. I want to write the romance. I think there's a way to write the plot and the romance at the same time, but it's damn hard.

I started doing this because I wanted to grow my skills as a writer, and I knew it might be more than I could chew. I'm at that moment now where I'm about ready to give up.

Even if I felt like a shit writer last night (and still kinda do this morning), I know that the stuff I've put out has value. We can't all write these epically tragic smut-romance-renegades-to-lovers tales, we'd all be sad all the damn time. There's a time and a place and - I would argue - even a need for lighterhearted fic out there. There are really no rules. I'm confident in what I know how to do.

But the plot. Fuck it, man. I think maybe I'm trying too hard to be something I'm not. I'm trying really hard to write like other people. I may have mentioned before that I saw a post about how many artists spend their time pining for the skills of others, thinking "wow, when I can draw like that, I'll have made it as an artist." That same post cautioned against this, basically saying you already have your own unique style, it's just harder to see through the lens of your own eyeballs. It's fine to challenge yourself but try to acknowledge what you do that sets you apart already. I feel like I have that something - maybe not to the extent that I wish, but I have something.

So what's the point of the plot? Why do I need to tell my readers how I cured Keprals? I'm asking myself important questions here. I like to think I've come up with ideas that no one else has, but as I said above, I don't read a lot of chaptered fics. I very well may have come to the same ideas as other writers and I'm not even aware of it. I don't know if my ideas are unique but I still arrived at them all by myself.

The challenge here - the thing I'm struggling so much with - is how to put them together with the same elegance of my fellow writers. I'm looking at you, shrios fam (yeah I'm calling you that, yall know who you are). I know I can write words, but it's like I have a bunch of pieces from completely different jigsaw puzzles and I'm struggling to make a new picture out of them. I struggle with the transitions between them.

The point here is I have to find my own way. And I have to stop taking myself so seriously. In fact this level of "seriousness" is one of the things that got me into so much angst over World of Warcraft over the last two years. At least I know how to recognize it.

I have to find my own way. I have my own things that are worth sharing. The author I read last night had a language all their own, and I have a language all my own too. Their wordplay was actually more choppy than I would ever write. I've talked before about how I'm scared of starting too many sentences with pronouns, how I maybe write too many run-on sentences, whatever. This author did that with reckless abandon. It worked for them. So if they can make that shit work, I can make my own shit work.

I have to find my own way.

My most current WIP is Thane and Shepard's first time. I've been working on it pretty nonchalantly because I hadn't intended to publish it until I built up to it. It takes place further into my timeline, and it would probably ruin the point of a slow burn if I put it out there now. There are some really memorably moments in this WIP, and there are other moments that need to be smoothed over as well. I never knew what I'd really imagined for their first time but I think I've mostly developed something that's unique in its own right, and I think will be fun for people to read.

I'm just so fucking torn over what to do with it. I feel guilty for working on it. I should be writing "other shit" leading up to it but I don't fucking want to. I actually wrote probably 2-3k words this weekend, which is a pretty staggering amount by my standards. Some of it was for this smutty WIP and some was for something I just threw together, Thane observing Shepard on Horizon and the emotional toll it takes on her. He's seeing her humanity. I don't know if it's worth it to continue but I wrote a lot of it and the words are more precise than usual for a draft, I don't know. I have so much fucking insecurity. Fuck dude. I want to write this longfic, but I don't want to write it. I want to skim to the spicy bits like I always do.

I am wracked with insecurity, of my own making. I know what I can do but I feel compelled to see this idea through. Somehow I have to find my own way.

TLDR I feel like if I don't publish something soon I'm going to burst and I don't even know what the fuck to work on first and fjslfjsojoiejrj

I would be really down for, like, a bunch of hugs and a bowl of ice cream shared over memes and fanservice.

[bedlamsbard]

So, I get the distaste for Rebels and The Bad Batch (definitely that last one), and I can certainly suggest @agoddamn's series of watching Clone Wars (because wow, I'd forgotten how poor that series could be), but with The Mandalorian, the most I can understand of your dislike of it is how it handles previous characters. Which, yeah, Filoni and his Precious OCs, but other than that, what about it? I mean, the plot/theme seemed simple to me: focusing on the relationship between Din and Grogu.

Ack, I didn't realize that out of context of my past ten years of fannishness and fannish engagement the takeaway from recent critical posts would be "Bedlam hates Star Wars," let alone "Bedlam hates Rebels"!

Look, I love Star Wars -- I genuinely do love Rebels and TCW, I'm very fond of Resistance and most of the films, and there are other parts of the ancillaries (books, comics, games) that I love, like, and/or enjoy. There are other parts of the saga that I dislike, a lot of it that I'm pretty neutral on because I just don't care; there's very little that I outright hate. (There are things that I avoid because I know I would hate them; I won't read Dark Disciple because the old EU Republic/Clone Wars comics from Dark Horse were formative for me and I'm not really over how Quinlan Vos's story line got retconned for TCW and thus the novel, so I don't feel the need to rub my face in it.)

I think, especially with Star Wars, there's a tendency to think that people only complain because they dislike or hate whatever it is they're complaining about it. I don't talk about the parts of Star Wars I actually hate because I frankly don't see the point in talking about the stuff I have no emotional investment in, or where my emotional investment only is distaste -- that's why I'll almost never talk about the ST. (And why I've only talked about the back half of Rebels S4, which I do genuinely hate, a handful of times over the years: I don't want to think about the thing I actually hate.) I talk about Rebels and TCW because those are the parts of Star Wars that I love and because I occasionally want to dig into why there are parts of them that just don't work for me. (And I do realize that if anyone pays attention to what I reblog and don't it may come off as me not liking them particularly; 99% of the time I only reblog TCW or Rebels gifsets immediately after I've rewatched episodes, and I haven't been doing rewatches lately for various reasons.) Critique doesn't mean "I hate it," it means "I want to think about this more on a critical level." It means "I love the puzzle pieces, why does the way they were put together not work for me? How could they have been done differently so that it would have worked for me?" Like I said a few weeks ago, while I don't want to actively add negativity to the fandom, I also don't really want to sit down and shut up if something isn't doing it for me if otherwise I love the thing; I want to figure out why it doesn't work. This is the flip side of "if you can't say anything positive, don't say anything at all" -- I'm not talking to Dave Filoni or the other showrunners (and I would never say any of this to the face of anyone at Lucasfilm), I'm sitting here talking to myself and to my friends about why the puzzle pieces don't quite come together for me. (And the bonus of me putting it on Tumblr is that I can actually find it again, because sometimes I do want to go back and see what I said about XYZ.)

If I'm not actively talking about all the things I love about Rebels or TCW it's because I don't particularly feel the need to justify why Thing works for me, because I already know it works for me. Or because I spent the first two years or so of Rebels and big chunks of TCW doing episode liveblogs, which are on the back end of my "Bedlam watches Rebels" and "Bedlam watches TCW" tags, and I don't feel the need to come back and say "I love the way XYZ happened" six or seven times. Or because I think it would be obvious because I've written something around a million words of fanfic about the two of them. Or because I have three Rebels tattoos and am a Rebels cosplayer, which obviously I don't really talk about on Tumblr but is something that I personally know. I mostly have not talked about The Bad Batch publicly (and only a little privately) because mostly it's not doing much that triggers strong feelings in me one way or another, though I do have the whole "why are these puzzle pieces not working for me, how would I have put them together differently" feel about parts of it.

As for Mando specifically -- look, Mando's fine. I understand why it appeals to a lot of people, even if I am not one of those people. I don't particularly find Grogu appealing either on a character or an aesthetic level. I find that for me personally the show varies wildly in quality from episode to episode; I find it to be a little too clever about itself in how it deals with both the world, its plot, its place in the saga, and its characters in a way drives me up the wall. It hits a couple of really specific things that are huge do not wants for me and some of that is on a shallow note of "I don't like how they do their Twi'lek prosthetics" and some of it is "I don't particularly like the aesthetics" and some of it is a weightier "I'm confused about what the thematic points of the show are because they're all over the map" and yes, some of it is, "I don't like how Mando intersects or does not intersect with other parts of the saga." Or the way that it gets valorized for being live action rather than animated by a lot of the fandom and then gets elevated over the other parts of the saga that I care about the most (TCW and Rebels). I've talked in the past about how Mando genuinely made me feel gaslit, even if that was no one's intention and thus was not actually gaslighting; it just managed to hit on my specific issues. I don't talk about Mando that much because mostly I just don't care and when I do talk about it it's because it managed to trip into something I do care about.

And if I sound particularly cranky right now, it's because every time I say something critical and it starts making tracks out of my usual circles, someone comes in to go "wow! you must hate Star Wars!" or "wow! you care a lot about [aesthetic choice]! why would you care about that!" or "wow! you're an idiot for thinking XYZ would happen/not happen!" or variations thereof. I've been in fandom for twenty years. I've been in this fandom since George W. Bush was president. I know how it goes. I'm going to reiterate the post I made after the Mando finale:

in any expanded canon, people are going to have different deal-breakers on where they can suspend their disbelief and it’s not a judgment on you and yours if theirs is different than yours. nor does it automatically say something bad about them! it just means y’all have different priorities and that’s fine! neither one of you should be jumping down each other’s throat because their line in the sand is “this contradicts something in previous canon” and yours is “the CGI is unconvincing.”

I feel like I’ve been seeing a lot of condescension (rather than hostility, which tbh is par for the course in SW so I just tune it out) recently and like…people can have different priorities. it’s fine. they’re not stupid for having their priority be “I don’t like the prosthetics” when your priority is “character A was mean to character B.” don’t worry, Lucasfilm isn’t listening to any of us.

[addictedtostorytelling]

Hey! I’m a HUGE fan of your CSI analyses!!! I’m only catching up to them now as this is the first time I’ve rewatched CSI since 2015. I’m not sure if you already made a post about this but I guess I just want to hear your opinion on it: do you think Sara knew that Gil was going on a sabbatical? I’m not sure as to what the general consensus is when this episode aired as I didn’t watch it live but from what little I’ve read on old forums and reviews, they think she first heard it along with the lab. I personally didn’t think that’s the case - I think he would’ve told her. When she told him “so you’re going”, it wasn’t really a question. Do you think they had a talk about it? Would Sara have encouraged him or would she be - well, not opposed - but not a fan of it? I mean at this point they’ve been dating for around more than a year, right? the only reason I could think of as to why the “goodbye” felt so impersonal is that they already said their goodbyes in private. But also: wouldn’t she have driven him to the airport? Or is it just to keep their cover? But friends drive friends places right? Ah sorry I’m just rambling now, I’m having a lot of feels - Sara looks so sad, my heart is breaking

hi, anon!

thank you so much for your kind words. i’m glad you enjoy my analyses. ❤

i do have a couple of old metas about the scene in question posted in this tag, but my understanding has changed somewhat since i initially wrote them, so i’ll add my current take here under the “keep reading,” if you’re interested.

long response below.

__________

before we dive in, an acknowledgement:

you know how with icebergs, only 10% of the thing is visible, and the other 90% is underwater?

gsr is like an iceberg in that at any given time we (as the viewing audience) are only seeing and/or hearing about the barest fraction of what’s going on between them, while the majority of their relationship is unfolding off screen, completely inaccessible to us.

any discussions that grissom and sara have regarding his sabbatical prior to his departure in episode 07x11 “leaving las vegas” are, unfortunately, part of that “underwater” portion of the ol’ gsr iceberg.

since we don’t actually get to see said discussions take place or even hear about them after the fact (if indeed they happen at all), everything that follows here will essentially be conjecture.

i’ve got a lot of gut feelings based on my read of these characters and this arc, but i can’t really do much to substantiate them because i don’t know enough about what is going on between grissom and sara off-screen during this time.

with that admission in mind, let’s start by recapping what happens around the scene in question just to give ourselves some context for this discussion:

the beginning of s7 between episodes 07x01 “built to kill,” pt. i and 07x10 “loco motives” sees the usually indefatigable workaholic grissom perhaps for the first time in his career showing signs of professional burnout. the depravity he encounters on a nightly basis is starting to weigh him down, and especially with cases involving children and innocent victims. the puzzles which once invigorated and intrigued him now just give him a headache—sometimes rather literally. he appears distracted, disappointed, and exhausted both at the lab and in the field.

in the meanwhile, completely separate from his discontentedness at work, grissom continues to have a romantic relationship with sara, whom he has been secretly dating for almost two years now. despite his malaise otherwise, he is very happy with her, and she with him. she is one of the few things during this period that makes him smile.

through these first ten episodes, grissom, sara, and the team work the first leg of what will be the season-spanning miniature killer serial case. after exploring many false leads and dead ends, they eventually identify one ernie dell as their prime suspect; however, before they can have him arrested, he kills himself while livestreaming (see episode 07x10 “loco motives”). since the killings stop immediately in the wake of his death (and don’t start up again until after grissom’s sabbatical much later in the season), the team incorrectly assumes that dell was indeed to blame; they remain as of yet unaware that his adult foster daughter natalie davis is actually the culprit. they therefore consider the case closed.

having previously been invited to teach a four-week graduate seminar at prestigious williams college in williamstown, massachusetts as a visiting lecturer (see episode 07x08 “happenstance”), grissom now takes the opportunity to do so, feeling at liberty to leave vegas for a while since the miniature case has been wrapped.

he does not inform the majority of the team of his decision to go on this sabbatical until the day that he is set to depart for massachusetts.

the circumstances surrounding grissom’s decision to go to williams and sara’s role in said decision are unknown to us. while episode 07x11 “leaving las vegas” suggests that there is some tension between the couple surrounding grissom’s departure, we’re not told what the nature or source of this tension is.

grissom departs vegas at the end of episode 07x11 “leaving las vegas,” which takes place on 01.04.07 within the universe of the show. he remains in massachusetts teaching at williams between episodes 07x12 “sweet jane” and 07x14 “meet market.” he then returns to vegas during the events of episode 07x15 “law of gravity,” which takes place on 02.08.07 within the universe of the show. his seminar runs for a little over four weeks, and he is absent from vegas for five weeks in total, accounting for travel time. during this time, sara is shown to experience anxiety regarding his absence, and he himself is shown to miss her.

in episode 07x13 “redrum,” sara receives a package containing a cocoon on a twig from grissom. sara places the cocoon in a vivarium in grissom’s office and intermittently visits it there for the duration of his sabbatical.

in episode 07x14 “meet market,” grissom writes sara a love letter which notes their awkward parting, explains how difficult it is for him to put his feelings for her into words, and quotes from shakespeare’s sonnet #47 in an attempt to better express what those feelings are. however, he ultimately does not send sara the letter while he is away and instead brings it home to vegas with him at the end of his sabbatical. sara later discovers and reads the letter at their condo in episode 07x22 “leapin’ lizards.”  

while grissom is gone, team graveyard experiences friction under catherine’s leadership, particularly after she and new-to-the-lab csi level iii michael keppler dupe the team into unknowingly participating in a “reverse forensics” operation in order to bait a suspect in another homicide case (see episode 07x13 “redrum”).

when grissom returns to las vegas in episode 07x15 “law of gravity,” his reunion with sara is a happy one, with no hint of underlying tension. however, sara’s nervousness regarding whether or not grissom fully reciprocates her feelings and/or considers their relationship as permanent as she does continues until much later in the season, when grissom finally provides her with some unmistakable proofs that he deeply loves her and wants to be with her in the long term (see episodes 07x21 “ending happy,” 07x22 “leapin’ lizards,” and 07x24 “living doll”).       

now, let’s take your questions one at a time, okay?

first off, does sara know that grissom is going on sabbatical prior to the day of his departure?

when answering this question, i used to say “no” or at least “if so, she doesn’t know he’s leaving much in advance beyond when the rest of the team finds out.”

however, now i think differently.

here’s why:

by s7, grissom and sara are almost certainly living together, and because they are, i think that unless he were being very purposefully duplicitous and going out of his way to deceive her, it would be very difficult for him to accept an out-of-state teaching position, generate a course curriculum, and ready himself to travel to the other side of the country without sara ever becoming aware of what he was doing.

the kind of work that grissom has to put in in order to get his williams seminar up and off the ground is not unsubstantial.

he is going to be elbow-deep in prep, and hiding what he is doing from the person he lives with would be immensely difficult given not only the volume of tasks he has to do but also his time constraints for doing them.

when one starts teaching at a new university (whether as permanent faculty, adjunct, or visiting), there is a lot of administrative back-and-forth that goes along with taking on that new appointment. 

baby boy has a syllabus to craft, course materials to procure, a schedule to work out, and readings to decide upon—and since his class also includes an online component, he also has to set up his online learning space and upload all of the necessary items to the web.

in addition to having to pass background checks, complete training modules, and submit all sorts of identification (which he might have to do via fax or email given that he is not yet on campus), he also has to engage in lots of remote communication with the department he is joining just to work out the specs and logistics for his course.

in the weeks leading up to the start of the semester, he likely receives and has to reply to dozens of emails. he is undoubtedly on the phone with the department secretary multiple times and also attending multiple virtual meetings and training sessions (which were a thing even back in 2007).

he has to place his textbook order with the campus bookstore, talk to liaisons from various campus agencies, and make sure his course is listed correctly with the registrar.

prospective students are very likely reaching out to him, asking about the work requirements for his class and trying to see if they can add or drop, as needed.

there’s a lot of administrivia—and grissom must attend to all of it while sara is at home with him.   

i mean, they work nights together, and then they come home, have a few precious waking hours between the morning and early afternoon to share each other’s company, go to sleep during the late afternoon and evening, rise, and return to work again at night. 

at least when they’re not working double and triple consecutive shifts.

their shared waking time at home just so happens to coincide with regular business hours, so if grissom has a phone call scheduled with the dean, department head, and/or department secretary at williams ahead of his arrival, then he’s making it while sara is in the next room, able to overhear him.

he’s also emailing the campus bookstore from his laptop while she’s sitting on the couch beside him watching tv.

he’s got pages and pages of mosquito palp diagrams spread out over their bed as he searches for the right one to match the lecture he has planned for day #3 of the seminar, and in the meanwhile she’s getting ready to turn down the covers so that they can go to sleep as soon as he’s done.

he’s asking her, “honey? have you seen my copy of deborror and delong’s introduction to the study of insects? i could have sworn i had it on this shelf, and i need to check it for the reading list—,” and she’s reminding him, “you mean the seventh edition? you left it on your desk.”  

and then on top of all of the academic prep, she’s also watching as he packs clothing and amenities enough to get him through five weeks of new england winter, books himself airplane tickets, and says goodbye to the dog.

of whom, by the way, she will be the sole caretaker while he’s gone.

so she knows he’s going before he goes.

she absolutely does.

there’s just no way to hide all of that readying from your spouse when the two of you live together and share a very restricted schedule for getting things done during daylight hours.

the show might insist—however unrealistically—that the other members of team graveyard don’t learn about grissom’s sabbatical until the day he ships off to mccarran, but sara’s well-aware of what’s happening prior to that point.

she has to be.

so.

next question:

wherein lies the tension we sense in grissom and sara’s goodbye scene in episode 07x11 “leaving las vegas”? if sara already knows that grissom is going, then why does she seem so upset to see him leave? doesn’t she support his decision?

the short answers to these questions are:

the tension lies in grissom and sara’s different understandings of the significance of his decision to temporarily leave vegas and in many unspoken feelings between them.

even though sara does know about grissom’s sabbatical in advance, she still appears upset when he leaves because she worries that his decision to go reflects a lack of investment in her and their relationship on his part.

she does support grissom’s decision to go, but she also worries immensely about its implications for her and their relationship.

to elaborate:

as you mention, sara’s “so you’re leaving” isn’t a question but rather a statement.

however, it’s not exactly one that makes her sound pleased with or even fully reconciled to the idea of grissom heading off on his own.

sara’s body language in the scene further suggests displeasure and guardedness on her part; she’s got her arms crossed over her body like a protective barrier, her voice sounds choked up, and when grissom finally exits the locker room, her expression appears distressed, as if she were on the verge of tears.

for grissom’s part, he looks and sounds awkward, like he doesn’t exactly know how to comport himself, given the situation. 

of course, even if sara fully supports grissom going to williams, it makes sense that she still might be sad to have to say goodbye to the man she loves, knowing that she’s not going to see him again for over a month. 

it also makes sense that she would be guarded, given that they are at work and they have to be careful not to reveal their romantic relationship through either their words or their actions toward each other.

because, after all, anyone could walk into the locker room at any time and see her and grissom together.

that said, there’s more to sara’s behavior here than just her sadness to part from grissom and her carefulness not to get them caught.

“sadness” and “carefulness” are, after all, not necessarily equivalent to “tension,” and there is some palpable tension in this scene.

to get an idea of where this tension comes from, i think we have to take a step back and look at sara’s larger story arc for the season, beyond just this scene.

by this point, grissom and sara have been together since mid-s5 or early-s6. they’re living together and sharing a life but still keeping their involvement with each other on the d.l. while at work. on the one hand, they’re very happy together, but on the other hand, their situation is not without its complications.

in addition to having to keep their relationship a secret from the world, another stressor for them is that they happen to have different love languages from each other, with grissom primarily expressing his love through acts of service and gift-giving, while sara primarily recognizes love through words of affirmation.

this difference between how grissom expresses love and sara recognizes when she has received it lies at the root of sara’s s7 arc, which sees her questioning the extent to which grissom reciprocates her feelings and envisions a long-term future for them as a couple. that he seldom verbalizes what’s in his heart causes her concern. ditto for the fact that he seems (from her perspective) very comfortable with keeping their relationship a secret.     

as i talk about in this post,

sara’s main storylines in s7 revolve around her 1) concealing her relationship with grissom from their coworkers, and, 2) “wondering if grissom views their relationship in the same way she does and if he feels as deeply for her as she does for him.”

by this point in her and grissom’s relationship, she is 100% in—“grissom or no one,” “we’re sharing our lives,” “if he popped the question, i’d say yes,” “till death do us part” in.

and about 90% of the time, she believes that grissom feels the same way as she does.

but then there are still those few lingering doubts.

most days, she is highly aware that many of the insecurities she has are a her thing—that she has trust and self-esteem issues rooted in her childhood trauma, and they’ve got nothing to do with grissom, per se; they’re just byproducts of growing up under the circumstances she did (i.e., living in an abusive household for the first nine or ten years of her life and never being adopted out of foster care thereafter).

armed with knowledge of her own tendencies, sara is typically able to talk herself out of these kind of “oh my god, but what if he really doesn’t love me as much as i love him? what if he leaves me?” spirals—and especially when grissom is present and able to prove to her through his demonstrably affectionate and devoted behavior that he loves her deeply and isn’t going anywhere.

but then there are occasions—few and far between though they are—when something in grissom’s behavior—something outside of sara’s head—actually serves to stoke her doubts.

maybe he says or does something insensitive.

maybe he is uncommunicative about his feelings when she really, truly needs him to be otherwise.

maybe there are moments when she perceives that he fails to match her intensity—that she feels like she loves him so much she can hardly breathe, but he doesn’t seem to reciprocate, or at least she can’t be sure if he does or if he feels to the same degree that she does, and the uncertainty kills her...

still.

as long as these occasions when something in grissom’s comportment toward her or their relationship throws her off happen at intervals with lots of solid, faith-building, “we’re on the same page” moments in-between, sara is good; she can talk herself down off of whatever ledges she gets on, contented in her knowledge that grissom loves her, and she loves him, and their relationship is built to last.

she only ever truly gets tripped up when for long periods of time, those solid, faith-building, “we’re on the same page” moments don’t happen—like, say, when grissom goes on a five-week sabbatical on the other side of the country from her...

in this case, him leaving her behind on such awkward terms + her tendency to doubt her own lovability = a recipe for disaster, which comes to a head in episode 07x14 “meet market,” when her conversation with jesse at the host club causes her to wonder if she’s going to have to keep waiting her whole life for grissom to truly “sweep her off her feet” (i.e., to invest in their relationship to the extent that she has).

she doesn’t altogether doubt that grissom loves her, but she does worry that maybe he doesn’t see their relationship as a life partnership in the same way that she does—or that perhaps he is somehow cooler in his affections toward her than she toward him.

one of her biggest fears is that she has somehow come on “too much, too quickly”—that while she’s already thinking wedding bells, he’s still back in the “we’ll see where this goes” phase and will freak the fuck out once he realizes that she’s been so far gone for him from day #1.

she probably can’t help but think back on the times before they were dating when she would “come on strong” and he would spook and emotionally retreat, which is what happened when she first moved to vegas and then later when she asked him out after the lab explosion (see episode 03x22 “play with fire”); she does not want a repeat of those experiences now that they’re actually in a relationship.

grissom choosing to go away on sabbatical for a month stabs at the heart of all of sara’s insecurities, and therein lies the tension and upset that we see in the scene in question. 

in addition to the facts that she’ll miss him while he’s gone and that she can’t even properly say goodbye to him given that they are at work, sara is standing there wondering if the very fact that grissom is leaving bodes ill for their relationship and what his decision says about his feelings for her overall. 

she’s feeling incredibly vulnerable and not getting any of the reassurances she might need in order to talk herself out of her fears. she’s tense because she is in emotional freefall and bracing for the worst.

—and that brings us to the matter of whether or not she actually supports grissom going on sabbatical in the first place.

i’m not sure when exactly in his decision-making process grissom first talks to sara about his plans to go on sabbatical. 

she knows about them at least by the time he starts prepping for his course and getting ready to leave town, of course, but what about before then? is there a chance that he consults with her as he’s still deliberating whether or not to go or does he make the decision unilaterally only to then tell her about it after the fact?  

in any case—and, honestly, i can see him going either way on this one; either asking her because he needs some encouragement to do something that’s out of his comfort zone or neglecting to do so because he is only thinking in terms of the professional and doesn’t really consider that his decision has any bearing on his personal life—i think that sara’s reaction would be the same.

her m.o. would be to outwardly support him—to say, “yeah, absolutely! that’s a great opportunity. it sounds awesome. you should go.”

she would be the supportive girlfriend, because that’s just how she rolls.

and, honestly, her expressed sentiments here would largely be genuine.

she knows: williams college is a great school, and the gig they’re offering grissom is a good one. being paid to travel out east and talk about something he’s passionate about for a few weeks is a sweet deal.

particularly if she is aware of the professional frustration he has been experiencing at the lab as of late, then she probably does support him going and knows that his doing so will benefit him.

because she loves him, she wants him to experience good things.

—it’s just that she also supposes that for as much as him going will be good for him, it will also be bad for her.

remember: sara often doubts her own lovability (much as grissom does his), and she’s had experiences with grissom in the past where she feels she’s come on too strong and “spooked him off.”

she is absolutely ready to commit to him forever, but she’s worried he isn’t on the same page—and the fact that he’s “running away” to the other side of the country for five weeks does nothing to assuage that concern.

she considers that if he is willing to leave her (even just for a month), it may be a sign that he’s tiring of her altogether. she also considers that he may be ready to overhaul his life top to bottom and that taking this appointment at williams is his means of “testing the waters” before he does so.

his going touches on some already exposed nerves for her.

one of them is the secret status of their relationship.

not only can sara not say a proper goodbye to grissom in the locker room, but she also can’t publicly acknowledge how much she misses him while he’s gone.

since she and grissom live together, she can’t very well invite warrick, catherine, nick, and greg over after shift to hang out and keep her company in his absence. she also is unlikely to go out on the town with anyone on the team, just because, by this point, she’s been with grissom for a couple of years already, and her social life has evolved in such a way that she’s not really in the habit of spending time with any of her coworkers besides him outside of work; frankly, it would be strange for her to call up any of the other team members out of the blue and invite them out to the bar or to accompany her to a museum or what have you.

so there’s an isolation and a loneliness factor in play.

but there’s also just the whole weirdness of not being able to acknowledge the biggest, most important part of her life to anyone besides grissom himself.

in some other, better world where their relationship status were public, she could maybe go with him to or at least visit him in williamstown for a weekend or two during the time he planned to be away. she could keep a countdown to his return running at work, undoubtedly earning some ribbings from the boys about how pathetic she was but also their support and encouragement. “just two more days until the bug man is back. you’ll make it.” maybe catherine would take pity and take her out for drinks after shift some day. maybe she could walk into and out of the building on the phone with him and not have anybody say boo.

but that’s not her reality.   

her reality is that grissom has packed up and left her for a month, and because no one can know about their relationship, she has no choice but to sally forth, pretending that nothing is wrong in her life, even though she is anxious, lonely, and missing him so much her arms actually ache.

having to feign unaffectedness in his absence just highlights how bizarre and untenable their living circumstances are.

the whole situation probably causes her to question how long they can keep doing things in the way that they are and if there’s ever going to be a finish line to this “secret dating” race that they’re running.

it also likely causes her to question if grissom is at all as uncomfortable as she is with their current status quo.

does he ever feel trapped like she does? guilty? isolated? like their whole life is some kind of surreal tragicomedy?

is he ever going to want to come clean at work that they’re together?

for how long are they going to keep up the pretense?

for as long as they do, their relationship will always in some ways remain in a state of suspended animation.

it’s not like they can get married if they’re living a double-life like this, right?

of course, this line of questioning undoubtedly plays into what (i think) is perhaps the biggest source of anxiety for sara regarding grissom’s departure overall.

namely, her concerns about how his feelings compare to hers.

as discussed above, she knows for herself that grissom is the love of her life and that she wants to be with him forever, but if he can abruptly decide to just up and leave her for a month without seemingly having a second thought about doing so, she’s got to wonder if he feels the same.

when he comes to her either floating the proposition of the sabbatical or else having already made the decision to go, she probably questions why he feels the need to leave at all—if perhaps she’s done something to drive him off or if there’s something lacking in her to where she’s not fulfilling his needs. 

at this point in her life*, she can’t imagine ever willingly leaving him for an extended period of time, so the seeming ease with which he makes the decision to leave her for over a month causes her to feel very insecure indeed.

* that she does eventually depart vegas in s8 and s9 speaks to just how dire her situation is at that point—that she literally feels as if she has no other viable choice but to go or else do irreparable damage to herself, grissom, and their relationship.

we don’t know to what extent sara is aware of grissom’s professional burnout at this point, though there are some indications throughout s7 that she has noticed that he’s not exactly been his usual workaholic self as of late (see, for example, her reaction to his behavior in episode 07x10 “loco motives”).

if she is aware that he’s been struggling, then she may worry that she seemingly hasn’t either been or done enough to uplift him. she may also worry that if his malaise gets bad enough, he will be tempted to simply walk away from everything in vegas—herself and their life together included.

her fears about being unlovable certainly loom large, to the point where when he approaches her about the sabbatical (either early or late in the game), she likely asks herself, “is this the beginning of the end?”

his leaving trips all of the alarm bells in her head—and she has no way to silence them, given that

a) she doesn’t dare to voice her fears or concerns to him lest in doing so she somehow makes things worse, 

and

b) she doesn’t dare to voice her fears or concerns to anyone else, as their relationship must still be kept a secret.

it’s not like she’d ever go to grissom in the days before his departure and ask to sit down and talk through her apprehensions. she could never bring herself to ask him for reassurance—she needs him to reassure her without her having to ask or otherwise it defeats the purpose—or to request any specific course of action from him (such as daily skype calls) while he’s gone. since all of her experiences and anxiety are telling her that one wrong move will scare him off forever, she can do nothing but suffer in silence and hope that eventually he’ll come back to her someday of his own volition.

of course, in the meanwhile, it’s not like while she’s sitting there fretting, she can turn to catherine and say, “hey, i’m really worried that grissom is getting ready to leave me, and this sabbatical is basically his ‘practice run.’ can you please tell me if i’m blowing things out of proportion or not? my gauge on issues like this one is kind of broken because i’m an abuse survivor with intense attachment issues, and everyone i’ve ever cared about before has at some point abandoned me, so—”

i mean, those are just not actions sara has the emotional skillset to undertake, even if she were to feel at liberty to take them from a logistical perspective (which, of course, she doesn’t, because, you know, “secret dating”).

so.

next question.

why doesn’t sara drive grissom to the airport?

this one comes down to logistics, pure and simple. 

the events of episode 07x11 “leaving las vegas” take place (per a date we see on catherine’s phone when adam novack calls her) throughout the day on 01.04.07.

when grissom is first seen at the lab opening his present from hodges, the hour appears to be sometime in the mid-morning. presumably, he has either come in for an early shift or is working a double carried over from the night before. 

he remains at the lab throughout the day. 

sara is not present at the lab or in the field for the majority of the episode.

in fact, we don’t see her until that penultimate scene in the locker room, when she’s just come on to work, shortly prior to the official start of the graveyard shift at 11pm.

at this same time, grissom is departing for the airport.

considering that she is on her way in as he’s on his way out, sara can’t be the one to drive grissom to the airport. she’s got a whole shift ahead of her, and he has to leave long before she’ll punch out.

like he says to sara, once they say goodbye, he’s got a cab to catch.

maybe if he had had time to go home between his early shift and the start of graveyard, she could have been the one to see him off, and they could have had a proper goodbye. 

but the way things are, they’re two ships passing in the night, and they can’t be open about what they’re feeling because anyone could walk in on them at any moment and uncover their secret.

so.

what do we get when we tie all of these factors together?

we’ve got two idiot geniuses in love.

one of them is burning out on their shared work and feels he needs to go away to get his head straight. eventually, an opportunity to do so presents itself to him, and he takes it. for him, this decision is solely professional in nature. it has everything to do with “recharging his batteries” for work and nothing to do with him wanting to get away from his girlfriend.

in fact, because he’s the king of compartmentalization, the idea that his going away could in any way really affect his relationship with his girlfriend doesn’t even truly occur to him.

the problem is, the delineation isn’t so clear where his girlfriend herself is concerned.

to her, his decision to leave town for a month does indeed reflect on their relationship and does have implications with regards to the way he feels about both her and them as a couple. whereas he sees the matter as wholly a professional one, she reads personal notes into the situation.

in her view, his decision to leave at least potentially casts doubt on the depth of his feelings and calls into question the very nature of their arrangement. though she supports him pursuing such a fine opportunity for himself, she worries that his doing so may eventually result in him leaving her behind in the dust. if he could just say in an unequivocal, straightforward way what was in his heart for her, then she would be reassured. but the uncertainty kills her. it leaves her anxious and heartsick.

she feels as if she is waiting for the whole rest of her life to be decided, and she isn’t sure what kind of decision he is going to make.

of course, eventually, he realizes the error in his thinking—not before their awkward parting from each other takes place but seemingly in the moment itself, as he finds himself missing her before they’ve even fully said goodbye. 

suddenly, it occurs to him: he’s not just heading off to get his professional groove back; he is also leaving his girlfriend whom he loves more than anything else in the world behind him, and there will be consequences for him doing so—not just in terms of how she reacts to his absence but also in terms of how he reacts to it himself.

there is an emotional toll he didn’t anticipate.

in their moment of parting, he perceives for the first time how, despite the outward support she has expressed for his decision to leave, inwardly, she has trepidations. he also realizes that he is asking her to do something huge for him—to wait for him while he goes off to get his head straight—without having adequately acknowledged the enormity of what he’s asked. it finally occurs to him how much they’re going to miss each other and that every action he takes (regardless of his motivations) has an effect on her and their relationship; that there is no clear separation between “work” and “home” where she is concerned; that there is no part of his life that doesn’t include her because they are together in every sense of the word.

the trouble is, once he leaves her behind, he doesn’t know what to do to make up for his previous obliviousness or to improve the situation at present. because his communication skills are lacking (and particularly in terms of how he finds expressing his deepest feelings in words almost overwhelmingly difficult), he can’t figure out how to let her know where he’s standing emotionally. he tries writing her a letter but ultimately never sends it because he feels that what he has written is inadequate.

of course, because he doesn’t communicate with words where he’s at—and especially not how very much he’s missing her!—she has nothing to go on when she tries to gauge the state of their relationship and his feelings for her while he is away. she is thus left to imagine the worst.

—which, of course, full of self-doubts as she is, she does.

now.

to step back from this narrative for just a second, while i know that it perhaps appears in canon and also that popular fandom consensus agrees that grissom and sara have zero contact for the whole five weeks that he’s gone—and i actually used to myself believe that they didn’t have contact, as well—i don’t suppose that such is in fact the case.

people mostly base the assumption that grissom and sara go 100% radio silent during grissom’s sabbatical on four main pieces of evidence, as they see things:

first, that we’re never shown any phone calls or letter exchanges between grissom and sara on screen between episodes 07x12 “sweet jane” and 07x14 “meet market” while grissom is away;

second, that sara seems so starved for contact from grissom, as is depicted in the cocoon scene in episode 07x13 “redrum,” when she is thrilled to receive the package he sends her but then disappointed to find that said package contains no message from him or personal touches;

third, that grissom is seemingly unaware of the whole “reverse forensics” fiasco from episode 07x13 “redrum” and its subsequent fallout upon his return to the lab in episode 07x15 “law of gravity;”

and finally, that grissom’s unsent letter to sara (which we are only able to hear read in its entirety come episode 07x22 “leapin’ lizards”) talks about their parting from each other as if the parting were fresh, even though grissom writes it several weeks into his sabbatical (during the events of episode 07x14 “meet market”).   

however, i find that these “evidences” are more open to interpretation than perhaps they might initially appear.

certainly, we don’t see grissom and sara calling or sending letters to each other* at all on screen during the five weeks when grissom is away from las vegas—but with gsr, not seeing something take place on screen doesn’t mean that it isn’t happening at all; it just means that tptb aren’t showing us that it is.

* notice that i say “sending,” because, of course, grissom does write sara a letter that he then chooses not to send.

even when grissom and sara are living under the same roof, we don’t get to see much in the way of their interactions outside of work, so that we wouldn’t be privy to their phone calls and emails while they’re located 2,500 miles away from each other isn’t necessarily anything unusual, in terms of how the show typically depicts them and their relationship.

also, regardless of what we do and do not “see,” i think we do get some hints that they are in fact in contact with each other, beyond just grissom sending sara the package.

(more on those hints in a minute.)

as for said package, while some may view the cocoon scene in episode 07x13 “redrum” as proof that sara hasn’t heard from grissom at all until he sends her this gift through the mail, i’d argue that this assumption is never actually confirmed in canon. 

sara is eager to receive the package, yes, and she’s also disappointed to find that it contains nothing but the cocoon, yes, but those points in and of themselves aren’t proof positive that she hasn’t heard from grissom at all over the last several weeks.

they just show that sara is excited that grissom has sent her a surprise and then disappointed to find that said surprise doesn’t contain any kind of personal message from him.

there’s no reason to think that she isn’t also sometimes talking on the phone with him during the period when the package arrives.

that grissom seems to learn that sara has housed the cocoon in his office only upon his return to the lab in episode 07x15 “law of gravity” also doesn’t mean that they haven’t talked about the package since he sent it; she may have just been cryptic about what she did with her gift when he asked her about it over the phone or via email while he was still at williams.

i mean, that’s exactly their style of flirting: “i sent you something. i trust you’ll find the right place to put it.” “i found the right place, all right. you’ll see.”

as for grissom’s seeming ignorance about the reverse forensics debacle from episode 07x13 “redrum” when he returns to the lab in episode 07x15 “law of gravity,” the key word here is seeming, because i actually think this is where we get a hint that grissom and sara have had some contact while he’s been away after all.

hodges is the one who approaches grissom wanting to talk about the operation’s fallout.

grissom does not, of course, typically enjoy talking to hodges—and especially not when hodges is grandstanding, which he definitely is in this scene.    

hodges says, “the lab almost went to hell in a handbag while you were sabbaticalling. i'm sure you talked to catherine, but just in case you didn't, lot of hurt feelings, so in case you talk to nick—”

grissom then cuts him off. “i’d rather hear it from catherine, thanks.”

note that hodges is the one who assumes that grissom has heard about the debacle from catherine, and grissom never either confirms or denies that such is the case. also note that when grissom shuts hodges down, all that he says is that he would rather hear catherine’s take on the situation from catherine herself, as opposed to hearing about it from hodges as a third party.

nowhere does he claim to be ignorant of the situation altogether.

so then cut to the next scene in which we see grissom, when he runs into new csi level iii michael keppler in the hall and briefly stops to speak with him.

in this scene, grissom approaches keppler, whom he has never met before, and calls him by name. he asks if ecklie has still slotted keppler to work days. he also inquires about the case keppler is currently working, showing familiarity with its details. in the process, he makes reference to keppler’s “hometown,” seeming to know that keppler is from trenton, nj originally.

now.

to the best of our knowledge, grissom has so far only talked to hodges and keppler since returning to the lab.

that he knows about the case keppler is currently working perhaps suggests that since he first arrived to work, he has also checked in with judy the secretary to be briefed on his team members’ current activities; it makes sense that she might tell him that keppler was presently working with nick on a homicide case.  

while it’s possible that judy may have also told grissom details about who keppler was and what ecklie’s intentions for him were, it seems unlikely that she would mention that he was from trenton or that she would describe him in enough detail that grissom could recognize him on sight, despite never having seen the man before.

so where did grissom hear so much about keppler before ever meeting him?

that grissom would need to talk to catherine in order to learn her perspective on the reverse forensics debacle (as per what he tells hodges) suggests that he has not spoken to her since the whole mess happened. it is therefore unlikely that she is his keppler “source.”

he seemingly also hasn’t spoken with warrick since the fiasco took place.

ditto for nick and greg, likely.

maybe ecklie might have filled him in on the fact that keppler would be temporarily working with the team while he was away and even mentioned that keppler was originally from jersey, were he and grissom to have been in contact during grissom’s sabbatical.

still.

for my money, the most likely candidate to have told grissom anything is sara.

she couldn’t have been the one to fill him in on the case keppler is currently working with nick, of course, as she’s off at a garbage dump working a case of her own when keppler and nick first pick up the callout. 

but everything else that grissom knows about the man could have easily come from her—and particularly since he very much seems to be “already in the know” the minute he arrives at the lab.

to me, his already established knowledge of keppler suggests that he’s been hearing about the guy all along—which further suggests that he and sara have indeed been talking all along.   

so if grissom and sara have indeed been talking, then why is sara still anxious while grissom is gone and how come grissom’s letter references their parting as if it were a fresh wound?

well, because this is gsr, and with them “talking” and “communicating” are often two different things.

there is conversation happening between them; it’s just not emotionally expressive—just not about anything important; not what’s really on their minds or in their hearts. they’re both suffering for being separated from each other, but they’re relegated to chatting about the weather and day-to-day activities, never delving in to the matter of their deeper emotions.

sara is gritting her teeth and pretending it’s a grin for the sake of seeming like a “cool girlfriend.” she’s downplaying how much she misses grissom and how anxious she is about what his absence means in terms of their relationship. she’s never letting on how scared she is to lose him.

when they call or write, she asks him about his teaching and voices nothing but support and enthusiasm for what he’s doing. if he asks her how she’s doing, she deflects (“well, hank and i watched a hepburn and tracy marathon on cable over the weekend. your blanket now smells like dog, by the way. i’ll be sure to wash it before you get home”), never actually expressing her true feelings, or at least none of the negative ones. she’ll talk about what’s happening at work, certainly. mention how this or that case is going. fill him in on the new guy, keppler (“it’s like he stepped out of a noir film. very off-putting”). but that’s about it.

on grissom’s end of things, he’s doing much the same—talking about his teaching (because that’s what sara mainly asks about), trying to figure out if the edge he hears in her voice is because she’s mad at him or because maybe, possibly she misses him as much as he does her, though of course he wouldn’t ever dare to ask. for as heartsick as he is for missing her and for as worried as he is that they parted on a sour note, he won’t complain because he knows he brought this situation on himself. so he voices enthusiasm for his teaching. and he accepts sara’s half-answers and dodges without prodding. and he writes her a letter but never sends it because he’s not sure if even the bard of avon himself is a good enough wordsmith to express the depths of his love for this girl.

in the letter, he talks about their parting as though it were still fresh because, in some ways, for them, it is.

though weeks have passed and they’ve spoken fairly regularly in the interim, the specter of that awkward goodbye and all of the fears and trepidations underlying it still looms large. it’s colored all of their interactions since. it’s unresolved. still affecting them.

he wants to address it so that they can finally move past it, though he doesn’t quite know how.

so.

to hop back into our narrative: 

our two idiot geniuses in love spend five weeks apart. 

five anxious weeks.

during that time, they are in contact, though they’re not truly communicating about anything of substance. 

he’s worrying that he’s fucked things up by making the decision to leave without considering the personal implications of him doing so. he can sense that she is upset but he doesn’t know how to really broach the subject or do anything to fix the problem remotely—and especially not when she seems so thoroughly committed to withholding her true feelings from him, regardless of anything he might say or do.

on her side of things, she’s worried about the meaning of everything. he left, and she doesn’t know what his leaving indicates, in terms of their relationship. he seldom voices his feelings, and so she’s not sure what they are. she’s feeling the strain of keeping their shared life a secret more strongly than ever, but at the same time she doesn’t dare to complain because she doesn’t want to upset their delicate balance. so as not to do anything to spook him, she elects to suffer in silence, holding her breath as she waits for some kind of confirmation that he loves her in the same bone-deep, forever kind of way that she does him.

but for as anxious as they both are, somehow they’re able to weather the storm.

and when his time away is up and he finally returns and they’re physically sharing the same space once more—able to show their love for each other, even if they can’t adequately verbalize it as of yet—whatever tension that had been present since their parting very suddenly dissipates.

or at least it does so for the moment.

of course, as the rest of the season plays out, we see that she still longs for reassurance from him as to the depth of his feelings, and he still struggles to find a way to prove to her once and for all that he is just as much committed to her as she is to him. both of them chafe under the restrictions necessary to keep their relationship a secret from the world. as they start to look toward their future, they more and more want to be open both to each other and in general, until finally the events of the season finale take place, and everything comes to a head for them.

anyway.

that’s my take on the whole situation.

like i said at the top, it’s more conjecture than analysis, so take it for what you will.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.          

[paulinedorchester]

Garrett, Leah. X Troop: The Secret Jewish Commandos of World War II. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021; London: Vintage Publishing, 2021.

(The American cover is on the left, the British on the right.)

Every so often, gifs from something called X Company cross my dashboard. When I came across Leah Garrett’s book X Troop, my first thought was that it must treat the same subject, but it seems that that can’t be the case: Garrett maintains that none of this story has ever been told before, because most of the documentation remained classified until very recently. (She claims to have single-handedly declassified many sealed British military records.) X Troop is about No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando, 3 Troop, commonly referred to as X Troop, comprising 87 German, Austrian, and (in a few cases) Hungarian refugees, all but five of them Jewish (at least under Nazi racial laws — I’ll get to that). It is indeed an extraordinary story, and occasionally an infuriating one. Garrett has done a tremendous public service in relating this tale, but the book itself has some puzzling — no, let's be honest, irritating — aspects.

The men who would make up X Troop left their native countries in their mid to late ’teens during the late 1930s, most of them without their parents as passengers on the Kindertransport. They occupied themselves in various ways until the middle of 1940 when, apparently without exception, they were interned on the Isle of Man, in Canada, or in Australia, to which more than 2,500 of them were transported on the H.M.T. Dunera, a dangerously over-crowded liner on which they endured conditions so horrific that the officer in charge — Major William Patrick Scott, a gleeful sadist and anti-Semite — ended up being court-martialed.

It is heartening to be able to report that British public opinion appears to have turned strongly against wholesale internment by mid-1941, but it wasn’t until that December that the internees were released from confinement. Those who had been transported overseas were offered immediate permission to return to the U.K. — if they volunteered for the Pioneer Corps, and I’m grateful to Garrett for providing the first detailed explanation that I’ve seen of what that meant. It wasn’t a good situation: they did menial labor and were bored out of their minds.

In the summer of 1942, they were finally offered an opportunity to join in the fight against the Nazis. This appears to be an instance in which the “great man” theory of history is perfectly valid, Lord Mountbatten being the great man in question. Garrett explains:

Mountbatten made a bold suggestion [to Winston Churchill]: they should create a new special unit of commandos, different from anything used before. Rather than coming from the ranks of the army or the navy, No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando would be composed of soldiers made up of displaced nationals such as Poles, Norwegians, and Frenchmen. Each of the units . . . would be used for different missions depending on their native languages. They would be unified by the shared desire to drive the Nazis out of their home countries. These commandos, highly trained and highly motivated, would lead the way when the time came for the Allies’ invasion of Europe.

And that’s exactly what happened. There were French, Dutch, Belgian, Norwegian, Polish, and Yugoslavian troops within No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando. There was also a troop known as the “British” troop, made up of Germanophones. That was X Troop (a nickname Churchill gave them). “X Troop would be Britain’s secret shock troop in the war against Germany,” Garrett relates:

They would kill and capture Nazis on the battlefield. But that would not be all. They would also immediately interrogate captured Germans, be it in the heat of the battle or right afterward. The men’s fluency in German would enable them to get essential intelligence that would guide the next moment’s choices rather than having to wait to interview prisoners until they were back at headquarters. ... They would have to be in peak form both physically and mentally. And because they were nearly all Jewish refugees from the Third Reich, they also would need to be diligently protected.

The situation was particularly dire because most were stateless — stripped of their citizenship in Germany or Austria, but refused naturalization by the Home Office. As one officer later recalled, “If any of them were captured in battle and their true identity had been revealed, their fate would have been almost impossible to contemplate.” (Those who chose to remain in the U.K. after the war faced an uphill battle in gaining British citizenship, as Garrett relates. She tells us nothing, incidentally, about Jewish personnel in the other No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando Troops.)

The first step was to have them adopt pseudonyms. When they arrived in Aberdovey (now Aberdyfi), Wales, for training they were each given 30 minutes to come up with a nom de guerre. They also had to concoct false backgrounds to explain why they spoke English with foreign accents. One man told the couple with whom he was billeted “that his accent was somewhat peculiar because his father had traveled a lot on business,” an unlikely story that they apparently accepted without question.

X Troop personnel were involved in the Dieppe raid — which may have been a mistake, as the troop was just past its infancy and several of the men were killed — and the Sicily landings and their aftermath, but of course all of that was really just a warm-up for the invasion of Normandy and, beyond that, Germany. More than half of the book is devoted to this. Assigned to various units, nearly all of the commandos landed at Sword Beach on June 6th, 1944, and proceeded into Central Europe, achieving victory after victory. Garrett places great emphasis on anger as their motivator: anger at the disruption of their lives and at their uncertainly over the fate of their parents and other relatives.

Leah Garrett is American; she is also Jewish. Like the overwhelming majority of my fellow Jews in this country, she is incapable of acknowledging the possibility of viable Jewish life outside of the U.S. or Israel. Her main piece of evidence for this view, which she hammers home repeatedly, is the fact that all but three of the surviving X-Troopers (22 were killed in action) chose to continue using their noms-de-guerre after the war — and, as she is at pains to point out, all of those who resumed their original names ended up emigrating to the United States! (The book’s excellent index helps the reader keep track of who was whom.) It’s true that names hold an important place in Jewish culture, but coming from someone using Garrett as a surname, her attitude comes across as either oblivious or chutzpadik, I’m not quite sure which. She also seems not to know that, historically at least, Jewish immigrants to Britain have changed their names with an assiduousness that makes the same phenomenon in the U.S. look like a mere blip.

Garrett also informs us, in the written equivalent of hushed tones, that some of the men who settled in the U.K. after the war married gentile women and brought up their children as at least nominal members of various Christian bodies. I share her discomfort with this, to be sure, but in order to maintain her shocked, shocked, stance she has to ignore something that she has in fact explained at some length in the book’s early chapters: a significant percentage of the future X-Troopers had only one or two Jewish grand-parents apiece, were brought up as Lutherans or Roman Catholics, and had absolutely no idea that they had any Jewish forebears until Nazi racial laws forced the issue into view. While I’ve known quite a few converts to Judaism whose initial impetus was the discovery of Jewish ancestry, it’s a bit much to expect that everyone will react that way. On the other hand, it’s dispiriting to learn that the inscription on the monument to X Troop that was raised in Aberdyfi in 1999 does not include the words Jews or Jewish.

Garrett is Professor of Jewish Studies and Director of the Jewish Studies Center at Hunter College, part of the City University of New York (CUNY), a post she has held since 2018; she previously taught at the University of Denver and Monash University. As a former CUNY faculty member myself, I’m in a position to tell you that (a) even as a full professor, she won’t have been hired with tenure, and (b) this book probably won’t help her to achieve it. It’s a great read on an important topic and represents prodigious research, but as a work of scholarship it has several marks against it. It doesn’t come from an academic publisher. It has only a partial scholarly apparatus — end notes, but no bibliography, or even a list of the many abbreviations used in the notes. Those notes aren’t always as useful as one would like, I might add: after relating that some of the men interned in Australia chose to remain there permanently, Garrett announces that they “would forever change the landscape of Australia. They would be known as the Dunera boys and would become leaders in the arts, sciences, culinary arts, and industry during the twentieth century,” but fails to give us any clue as to where we can go to find out more.

She also adopts an informal writing style that alternates between the faintly slangy (“All the evidence I’ve found points to ... ”) and the unnecessarily dramatic: two key chapters are written entirely in the present tense, a strategy that would normally be after my own heart, but which feels contrived in this context. It also seems not to be the case that none of this has ever been written about previously, as Garrett asserts. (Last but not least, Garrett recently resigned from CUNY’s faculty union, which may end up affecting her status there, as tenure recommendations are made by union members.)

Mixed feelings, then; but the book is worth reading, and I can recommend it.

[fantasticwolfpenguin]

Short and Sweet: An Introduction/Letter

Getty/Kevin Mazur. Sag awards 2018

This is a letter I wrote and posted on LinkedIn (on October 21, 2020) of all things just to see if anything happened. Nothing much happened so I'm reposting it here. I am techinically working on two papers related to this, one on his stage plays and the other one which this is suppose to be an intro to.

A short letter putting into context my thoughts about Chadwick Boseman. This is also a sample introduction to a larger paper I am working on. (~5 min read)

On September 1st, 2020, Michael B. Jordan’s Instagram posted some messages as well as photos about Chadwick Boseman’s death. One of the quotes that was repeated was “I wish I had more time”. Prompting to remember these lines in the Disney’s “Hamilton”, in “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story” and I also distinctly remember one of the important lines of the musical: “Legacy. What is legacy? It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see” from “The World Was Wide Enough”. Other than being devout Christians, I think the similarities between Hamilton and Chadwick Boseman ends in this musical written by Lin Manuel Miranda or does it? I do have some nice pictures in my mind of Black Panther standing on the rotating stage and Killmonger reading those lines though.

As my last year of undergraduate courses, I have spent the beginning of the semester planning to write more. I decided to write this in an attempt to dodge the heavy responsibilities of knowing I have a Physics discussion worksheet due in a couple hours. I am an entomology undergraduate student, writing biographies is not my forte. I just wanted to see how long I could go with research about a Christian man I don’t even know. That’s enough about me.

It’s only been about a week and a half since his shocking death on August 28th, 2020 and I have been up some nights just trying to figure out how to start this. Do we start from when he was a major success and became a household name? Or do we start from his first role which subsequently got replaced because he was a teenager that complained about the lack of diversity in Hollywood? I thought about late 2019 to the beginning of 2020, where the cancer became visual. The posts and videos of people mocking him for his looks.

“The internet is forever” (as is Wakanda) as they say especially for a celebrity who is not entitled to let you know everything in their private lives. I did not have an Instagram, but I remember some snippets of news, and maybe I did agree back then he did look unfamiliar and thinner. What people don’t often remember was the context of the video, which has since been reuploaded onto YouTube. It was a message about supporting frontline workers, but ultimately. His second to last public appearance was after the death of Kobe Bryant as a guest star of The Shop presumably filmed some time in February 2020. What happens between those appearances is too striking. It makes me wonder further those following months that led to the end of August must have been heartbreaking. Yet instead of focusing on his message, the internet decided to talk about how frail he looked and presumably how he would continue his role as a Marvel superhero. This resulted in some cyberbullying and which leads me to my next point because of these reactions, what happens between April - August are a direct result of this. Barely anything is known and cutting a man’s pride resulted in people like me wondering things.

As nobody except a few people on this planet could even answer my questions, my curiosity continues to grow. What essentially, I want to answer is things the dear reader cannot like, what or if he ever wrote before his passing. I think we do not deserve those parting words and maybe that’s why I am writing this. It haunts me deeply that the actions of others lead to a selfless man to close off. I would say this is more of a work of faith wondering more about and what this journey would take me. It seems like his Instagram was the main source of things showing strong support of BLM and frontline workers. This makes the impact of the post made August 28th more shocking. If I am lucky, I want to actually ask questions and record answers to those who knew him, but this is truly a blind pursuit. Though when it is now socially acceptable to conduct everything through technology, who knows what happens.

I will try to summarize some main points known about Chadwick’s life and career. The other parts of this biographical essay will be about choices he made in characters seem more death oriented after assumed diagnosis in 2016. This paper was to look deeper into some feelings I had about the importance of a select number of his roles. In my hopes that there would be more aspiring young people who could look further past the check and into the impact they give to others.

-Sept. 7th, 2020

As someone that countless people look up to, his death came as a shock to millions. This is because Chadwick Boseman tried to give as much as himself to others every day. What you have just read were my feelings put into words, about a week after his death. I am currently planning to put something larger together, but it is akin to having a puzzle dipped in hues of purple, gold, and black, but the backing is missing in a sense. Although some of the backing may be missing, but I understand that the people who have it need it at the moment. They should keep it as long as they like, but if I had the backing it would certainly satiate my curiosity. I imagine the backing is not made of cheap cardboard, but careful layers of silk, warming the minds and hearts on whoever gleams upon it. I would say the backing is in less pieces than I initially thought and is held by the few people. This is mostly because in life, he kept to his tight knit circle. My hope in writing this is that one day, I could see the other things he was capable of: the writing, the singing, and the art more profound than we already have. In a way, my start is having to stay with what others have written such as the recent articles written after his death.

Afterall, he was an important part of the black community whether or not people knew him personally. Even if unable to see it in his lifetime, the dream of a society where spirituality, diversity, and technology fulfilled the needs of disenfranchised people. That dream is important to me as well and adds to the reasoning of me writing other than catharsis. The choices in roles he made, and career were also a direct result of this worldview that connects to the possible goals of this country. This hypothetical paper will be the big shiny puzzle put together as well as I could. The reader is to find some pieces missing, it may be entirely of my fault, yet there is so much, maybe it is worth searching for.  If anyone would like to help me with this endeavor or would like to talk to me about this, let me know, I still am collecting my thoughts and have many notes and thank you for taking your time to read this.

Sources

Jordan, Michael B. “I’ve been trying to find the words…” Sept. 1st. 2020. Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/p/CEkpoYcgi43/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link Accessed Oct. 17th. 2020.

[theonetheycallhannah]

The Treatment of Captain Syverson- Chapter 7: Non-Productive Time

Pairing: Captain “Sy” Syverson x OFC (Shane Benton)

Summary: On a slow afternoon, Shane remembers a couple of fun evenings with Sy, and can’t help but start texting him…he turns out to be a bad influence.

Don’t want spoilers? Click me first to catch up!

Word Count: 2.3k

Warnings:  Language, mature themes, a steamy scene that bumps up against the line of smut/not smut…it looks like smuttish is, in fact, a thing, (see what I did there? Toss a high five to your fic writer for the paraphrased Witcher quote in these here notes! lol! Sorry, i’m tired...and in a weird mood tonight...) so, anyway, using that. I love it. 

Author’s Note: This chapter was about half done before I even started SI1 and SI2! So that’s why it’s come along so quickly in the wake of them. It could also mean that there are some continuity issues…I found a couple during the re-write of the first part, and more when I was proofing, so it should be good, but…fair warning, one or more could have escaped me! Also, let me know if the text convo is hard to follow. I’ll try to reconfigure it to be more clear. It seemed to me like context was enough, and they’d had text convos before, and no one said anything…this one’s longer by about 300%, though, so…feedback and constructive criticism is always welcome and appreciated!

Disclaimer: Unfortunately for me, Henry is not mine, le sigh, and all mention of him, his characters, any characters from his films, or his precious doggy, Kal, are strictly for transformative and recreational use. I neither ask for, nor accept payment for the work I post on Tumblr or AO3. Unbeta’d because this is for fun and escapism.

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Hope I’m not forgetting anyone! If you want to be notified when I post a new chapter or work, I’ll be happy to add you to my tag list! Stricken blogs are getting personal messages from me when a new chapter is uploaded because Tumblr’s faulty tagging system will not stand in the way of me delivering what the people want!(?) lol! (Although…their lackadaisical notification system might…sorry for that. I have no control. lol!)

Time seemed to pass slowly when Shane wasn’t with Sy. When they weren’t having dinner together, or doing their typical date thing. She thought about their second date. One of the bars in town, chosen for its above average bar food but mostly, it’s pool tables. The warning he’d given her via text had made her laugh:

We’re goin’ to Cade’s for apps and pool, if that's okay. As gorgeous as you looked in that blue dress you wore last night, I recommend jeans and a T-shirt for tonight, okay?

She took his suggestion. A simple black tee, because she was a food klutz from hell, layered over a red camisole, and her favorite jeans. It showed off her dainty arrow necklace well.

While they played, they drank beer and talked about life, getting deeper into things than they could at therapy sessions.

“Dad split when I was about ten, I guess. Mom did her best with her only son, but she sent me to my grandpa’s a lot when she was working or just…needing her own time. He’d been an army man. Fought in Korea. His dad was in World War II. It felt like…I don’t know, this pull, like I was meant to join up.”

“Destiny?” She asked. A dreamy tone overtook him when he talked about his family and his now former career.

“I guess. Never though too much of all that before.”

They smiled at one another. Knowing.

“What was he like? Your grandpa?”

“Oh, Pap was the best. He was a mechanic in the service and so he could get anything hummin, ya know? We fixed up and built motors for all kinds a’ shit. My first car was a ‘67 Shelby Mustang with the fast back all because when I was about 14, he found most of one at a salvage yard and basically rescued it from the crusher. Got it for about nothin’. For two years we collected parts and did body work on that thing. And by the time I turned sixteen, it was the most beautiful, show-ready Kerry green machine you ever seen.”

“One of my favorite cars! I’d love to see pictures!”

“I’ve still got ‘er.” He grinned. “When Pap died, it got…hard for me to drive her, ya know? So…special occasions only now. And he left me his truck, which he’d just bought brand new while I was on my first tour. That F150 crew cab we came here in, with all the bells 'n whistles. I couldn’t let such a fine automobile go to waste.” He grinned.

“You’re such a gear head.” She chuckled.

“Hey, you may be glad about that when you need somebody to get your own motor humming.” He teased back at her, bending over the table to take his shot and sinking it deftly. He said they would only play for fun, but he was still winning this round…which she didn’t think was that fun.

“Okay, I deserved that.”

“The shot, or the innuendo?” He asked to clarify.

“Yes.” They laughed. He eventually did miss, making it her turn.

"Ya know, I'm disappointed in this date, Shane." He baited.

"How come?" she asked, a bit hurt.

"A guy only asks a girl to play pool with him so he can show her how to shoot…and you already know."

It was true. She'd played a lot growing up and even a bit as she got older. She and her siblings loved billiards. Her whole family, really. And although she was no professional, she wasn't half bad for an amateur.

"What do you mean?" she asked innocently, sizing up the table for her next shot, but knowing with a fair amount of certainty what he was implying.

"You know. I wanted to get all close to ya. Show ya how to grip that cue in your hand. How to stand, bent at the hip, where to eyeball your shot from." he smiled. "All that shit ya see in movies that makes the girl all nervous and excited that the guy's touchin' on her. Pressed up against her."

Shane grinned, picked up the small, blue cube of chalk and rolled the concave side over the tip of her cue…she had no need to do so, most people didn't, really…but she made herself look really sexy doing it and asked Sy, "Is that right? Well, I guess you'll have to find another way to get your cheap thrills, because this girl has been known to run a table." She bent over the green felt seductively, the angle at which she did so displaying her décolletage in his direction just enough to tantalize him into licking his lips. She took her shot at the 10 ball, but sunk the 8 instead, losing her the game…damn. She shouldn't have gotten cocky.

"Run it where, sunshine? Into the ground? Off a cliff?" he laughed as she stomped over and began to poke him mercilessly in the ribs.

"Come on, Minnesota Fats. Let's pay the tab and find something a little cozier to do."

"Oka--wait, did you just call me fat?" he was incredulous. She laughed.

"Oh my God, you thought YOU were gonna teach ME about billiards…Minnesota Fats is like the most famous pool player of ever. I am not calling you fat."

"You messin' with me?" he squinted.

"Sy, google it. I promise. I would never call you fat. You're… my sexy man bear."

"Technically a bear is a fat animal." he sulked.

"Why don't you tell that to one when it's chasing you down to make a meal of ya!" Shane laughed. "Come on. Remember? I think I mentioned something about… finding another way for you to get cheap thrills. Lets explore that, shall we?" she whispered into his ear. He dropped some bills on their table nearby to more than cover their food and beer, and they hauled ass into the night.

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

They had definitely been exploring. In the two weeks since they'd been given the green light to see each other outside of therapy--the day Sy basically handed Shane's boss her own ass--they'd spent most evenings with each other, unless Shane had a particularly late evening at work or an early day the next day. A few nights, they had been together so late, that just staying over seemed the most reasonable option. But they had both agreed to take things slowly with the physical stuff. It had been a long time since either of them had been in a relationship, and given their patient/therapist situation, waiting a while for the sex had seemed like a good idea…on paper. On the sofa had been a different story.

One day last week, she'd had to make an early night of things, and stood up from his couch, but was pulled back down to straddle his lap.

"Hold on a minute, sunshine. Why don't you gimme a proper goodbye before ya go, hmm?" he held her so close to him at every curve of their bodies, like the pieces of a puzzle snapping flush together. His kisses were deep and agonizing, his beard gently brushing her mouth, teasing her with its uncommon softness. She returned the ardor, squeezing him in every way she could.

She couldn't contain the desire pooling at her center, especially when he clearly couldn't contain his, either, straining against his shorts, pressing against her so deliciously, right where she needed him. She didn't hold back. And he was nothing if not encouraging to her endeavor.

"That feels so good, baby. You're so warm. Mmm." he whispered as he nipped at her ear and bit at her neck. She hadn't intended to, but she felt herself slipping over the edge, into pure euphoria and gripped at his hair, still rather short, though growing out from the mandated buzz. The length made him even more sensitive and when she ran her hands up his neck and over the back of his head, the result was like an electric current straight to his manhood. His body tensed as his release followed hers seconds later.

"Fuck." he said. "I'm sorry."

"What for?" she was truly confused.

"For losin' it like a teenager." he sighed and laid his head against the back of his couch in surrender…an unfamiliar sight, Shane was certain.

"Don't worry about it. I mean…it's not quite how I pictured our first time, but--"

"Oh, hell no. This doesn't count as a TIME, sunshine. This is batting practice. A warm up.”

"Ooh, you and your baseball references again. I told you, I need to leave, Sy. You can't get me worked up with that kinda dirty talk." she kissed his cheek, and stood. "Walk me out?"

He did. And they stood holding one another in the dark, leaned up against her Explorer, Sy's back against the door, Shane's cheek on his bare, hairy chest, and the turning of the earth all but forgotten.

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

She had to stop thinking about him. About their dates and the time they'd spent together. But her schedule had fallen apart for the day due to a nasty storm that had blown in, she had no more education to work on for now, and she could only clean and organize her treatment room and desk so thoroughly.

She guessed…the secretaries knew she was available if need be…and she was salaried…what was the harm in texting Sy? She'd stayed late and came in early and overworked herself in general so much for this clinic. She could justify a bit of downtime.

Hey! Whatcha doin?

Just did some exercises that my super hot PT gave me! *winky face emoji*

Uh-Oh, should I be jealous?

Mmm, hard to say, sunshine. I guess it'll depend on which one of you sleeps with me first. *devil emoji*

Smart money is on the one who’s already let you get to second base…and basically third, even though…does it count if it’s basically because of a dare. Induced by Jack Daniels?

I think it counts if you came…*smirk emoji*

Damn those skilled fingers and Tennessee whiskey.

What can I say. I told ya I knew how to get a motor humming. *cool guy emoji*

You certainly do. No doubt about that.

So how's your day goin', sunshine?

Eh, everyone's cancelled on me. I have no one until 4:00, and I have nothing to do until then. I've decided to see it as a blessing and text my favorite fella.

And when he didn't respond, you resorted to me? *smirk emoji*

Hey you know that you have no competition for my affection other than like, my dad…and Chris Evans. Lol

Your dad, I'm sure I couldn't compete with if I tried, from what you've told me. Chris…well, I'm a REAL captain, not some guy jumpin' around in tights.

Mmmm, shame. I bet you'd look good in a getup like that. *heart eyes emoji*

You think so?

Yup! *American flag emoji*

You wanna be my Black Widow?

I mean…I've already basically got a costume…*embarrassed monkey emoji*

*several lines of big eye emojis*

Yeah, a few Halloweens ago…I was Romanoff. Now you know. I'm a total nerd.

I'm a nerd, too, sunshine. Serious nerd.

How am I just finding out about this? There's next to no merch at your place, and you never wear typical nerd shirts…*skeptical face emoji*

You haven't seen my whole place…*wink emoji*

What, are you telling me you have Batman bedsheets? *lol emoji*

Oh, it's much…much worse than that. The bedroom is pretty neutral, but…I have a…kind of rec room in the basement that is basically nerd central.

Oh. Em. Gee. I can't WAIT to see that, Sy!!! And how dare you hold out on me!!!

Well, I mean, I didn't wanna lay out all my cards right off the bat. I'm playing the long game.

Ah, so, when do I get to see this nerd trap?

Come on over, sunshine. *smiley face*

I said, I've got a patient at 4:00.

Everyone's cancelled on you. Can't you cancel on them for once?

Not unless I'm violently ill do I ever have any patients cancelled on my behalf.

So…say you're violently ill and come see me. *shrugging man emoji*

I dunno, Sy…

I got stuff to make that soup you like…

She had made it clear to him how much she loved soup, especially a good creamy potato soup, and on one of their dates, he'd had her over and there was a big pot of the stuff on his stove, made from scratch. She'd never had better, and he almost got lucky that night…and I mean…he still got a little lucky. He cooked for her AND cleaned up, AND let her pick the movie that night. She still picked an action movie, because she wasn't really a romance movie type, overall. Even so. Could she leave him hanging?

She opened her thread with Heather in her messenger app on her laptop.

Heather, is there anyone who could take my last patient, Mr. Lopez?

Looks like Cheri has a cancel around that time. Need me to move him?

If you could. I'm not feeling well.

Are you pregnant?

Omg, every fucking time. Why when anything is amiss in a woman's life must it be pregnancy?! And why is it okay to ask that question?! Ugh! She loved Heather like a sister, and it probably was just a joke, but uuuuuugh!

Yes…yes I am. *eye roll emoji* I've got a killer headache that's making me queasy. I'll email Susan. Thanks.

You bet. Tell Sy I said hi. *wink emoji*

Shut up.

After a quick and concise email to her boss, she picked her phone back up. One unread message.

You there, sunshine?

She simply replied,

Get that soup ready, Captain, I'm on my way.

Up Next: Chapter Eight: Heat/Ice

[allsassnoclass]

I would like a director's cut for Puzzle Pieces OR the lashton christmas present one you wrote for my prompt about what other gifts you had they do

well for the Christmas one (that was teacher!lashton, yeah?) I can tell you that I did not have a good time picking out the presents lol. I low-key hate choosing gifts for fics (I have a prompt from November that includes gift-giving that I still haven’t done yet for this reason).  I don’t consider myself a very good gift-giver, so figuring out what characters would give each other stresses me out.  In the end I couldn’t come up with a singular gift that would be expensive or meaningful for this Luke for a secret Santa, so instead I gave Ashton too much inspiration and let him choose multiple gifts.  I found half of them by googling good/meaningful gifts and picking what I thought Ashton could/would feasibly get.

I’ve already talked about Puzzle Pieces a while ago here but I will say more things under the cut (spoiler warning, obviously lol). some day I will combine these two asks into one director’s cut master post

so puzzle pieces. my baby. my pride and joy.  this idea started forming back in May (I know because I was looking through my asks to Helen on her blog recently and I mentioned it).  It took a while to get to though, because I needed to let it simmer in the back and wanted to work on too close to see first.  I love soulmate aus that include platonic soulmates without specifying what soulmate is which type, and I really like the idea of soulmate aus where first physical contact produces a color, so you don’t necessarily know if you’re soulmates right away.  two things somewhat bother me about soulmate aus and one of them is that once two people discover that they’re soulmates it’s easy smooth sailing with no buffer period.  like whenever two soulmates meet for the first time and then kiss after five minutes it’s very ???? to me because you don’t know that person!!! you don’t know them!!!!! part of what I wanted to show in this one was the development of a relationship between everyone, and one way to do that was to make First Touches a big deal so the boys didn’t necessarily know they were soulmates right away with the exception of malum, but they were babies and little kids sometimes become bffs within 2 minutes anyway so I figured that was okay.  how our society would change if soulmates existed in a distinguishable way is something I've thought of a lot, and that manifested as it being a Big Deal to touch someone for the first time in this fic.

originally, way back in the day, I was going to have a different color for each pairing, but that was going to get really messy really fast, so instead I gave each person their own color that they leave on everyone else.  I talk about why I chose each color in the other ask.

two of my favorite scenes to write were the scene right after the recording studio where Ashton tells Michael about his dad and the scene where Ashton touches everyone else for the first time.  I just really like Ashton/mashton lol but I also felt like the scene in the car fixed another thing about soulmates that bothers me: love takes work!!! I really wonder how many soulmate relationships would be happy ones if we had marks to designate soulmates in the real world. I wanted to ensure that our soulmate relationships in this fic were not friends/partners because they’re soulmates, but because they genuinely enjoy each other and put work into the relationship.  revealing that soulmarks could theoretically disappear like Ashton’s dad’s did was one way to put that in context of the greater universe.  earlier in the fic I mention also that soulmarks show how easy it should theoretically be to love someone, not that you love them.  they are not a guarantee.  giving Ashton abandonment issues made his acceptance of the boys as his soulmates that much sweeter in my opinion, because accepting their marks was his way of saying that he trusts them to put in the work to love him.

I know I've mentioned this before but Michael wasn’t ace until about 4 days before I posted.  I’m pretty sure there was a conversation about ace rep in fics that I witnessed in the early early days of the club and then I looked at the (almost finished) doc and was like. hang on a sec. I could add two sentences and as its written right now this guy would be ace. so that’s what I did! because it turns out a lot of Michael’s “is this platonic or romantic” dilemma/crisis fits really well with my ace experience.  write what you know, amiright lads?

also an underrated line in this is Calum is an old, comfortable sweater, but Luke is like a favorite pair of shoes.  They both fit him perfectly.  He feels more at home when either of them are around, and although the love he has for Calum is different, he thinks he could love Luke just as much.  He thinks he might, by now. like bruh that’s the point of the whole fic! loving people differently, not less/more!!!!! also I just really like that comparison of the clothing items.  feels good feels authentic.

the first time this was referred to as an ot4 fic it threw me off because it’s not romantic between the four of them but I like that people say it’s an ot4 fic because the mashton and muke friendships are just as important as malum in my eyes, although I love malum in this dearly and think they’re super super cute.

also initially I thought it was going to be around 8k.  whenever I give myself a word count limit I think a fic will be, I exceed it.  that’s fine though I'm okay with that. it’s a lot more important to tell the story in the amount of words it needs than to either rush it or elongate it.

anyway those are the puzzle pieces thoughts for the night, tune back next time for more that I'll inevitably be able to dig up because I will never get tired of talking about this fic

[incognito-insomniac]

1, 6 and 10 for the meta asks?

Yay! Ask! Thank you! ^_^ I'm gonna answer #1 last because the other two add a tad bit of context to me talking about my WIPs.

6) What character do you have the most fun writing? Oooh this is tough. I kind of love all the characters i write in different ways. Otherwise why would i write about them?

But looking over my WIPs I think I have a real soft spot for big sad dudes in need of some TLC. So the Arthur Morgan's and Robert Small's of the world (Red Dead Redemption 2 and Dream Daddy). I do also love the snarky assholes like Lambert (Witcher) and Sera (Dragon Age Inquisistion) or chaotic messes such as Nyoka (Outerworlds) and Sophie Borg (Fallet).

I don't think that actually answered the question. But I tend toward imperfect characters with good hearts I guess.

10) How would you describe your writing process? Manic. Very on again off again. Whatever sparks the fancy when I have energy to work. Everything I write starts off with straight scripted dialogue and generic scene direction, possibly mention of character's feelings/expressions, and ever so rarely some descriptive text if it strikes me.

Then the torture begins. I add prose. And more prose. And then some more prose. If it was all just dialogue and people could magically just see what I see then it would be great. But sadly I must describe what's in my mind's eye using words that often feel inadequate.

Dramatics aside, I basically fill in prose around my dialogue much like a putting a puzzle together. I figure out different sections at different times and eventually have an entirely non-script format work....or really chapter because by the time I painstakingly finish one chapter I get too excited about it to wait and finish more before I post it, often with only two maybe three legitimate attempts at editing and almost never any beta readers.

1) Tell us about your current project(s) – what’s it about, how’s progress, what do you love most about it? TOO MANY WIPS T_T I will pick three.... no four... five..... aaaaarrgggghhhh

My big active WIPs posted on ao3 which have been glaring at me since 2019 are: Siren's Call (Endeavour) - Jakes catching the feels hard for an unsuspectin Morse. It's been at a dead stand still for about a year. I'm so sorry. I'm on a big chapter and I just can't wrap my head around it. But after that all the chapters are scripted and planned so, this hurdle then hopefully smooth sailing. Fav thing is half the inspiration for this piece came from one line of description in the second-to-last chapter which is "Peter Jakes running like the most beautiful anime boy to save his man." Seven Night's in Rose Creek (The Magnificent 7) - Faraday and Vasquez spend the seven nights they have before the showdown in Rose Creek falling in love with each other. I have the last chapters written! Yay! I have been procrastinating. I want to rewatch the movie because the last few chapters feel a touch out of character. But I'm so close! Fav thing, is the first chapter. I really got into Faraday's head and the feel of the character and the setting. I don't think I carried it through the other chapters as well. But that first chapter to me is just *chef's kiss*

Other WIPs I consider big current projects I have yet to post to ao3 and have yet to give good titles are: Two Idiots (Red Dead Redemption 2) - Arthur Morgan does some real soul searching and realizes his feelings for Albert Mason.....and then they bone....a lot....and then maybe if I'm so inclined after however many fucking chapters that fucking ;) turns into some more plot might happen where I assassinate Dutch's character because he's a big ol' poopy pants. Who knows. I have three chapters like 80% finished and then a disjointed mess of snippets that are just cute domesticity or porn. I hope to post first chapters some time this Fall. Fav thing, my dude, the whole thing just makes my heart happy. But how about how I researched skipping rocks for like three hours for this shit.....because I had to... I had to. Look at me. I had to. Stenvar (Skyrim) - Oh look it's me writing about strong sad men again >_> So Stenvar is about Stenvar....and my Dragonborn, Anla, as they go on adventures and slowly fall into each other. I adore Stenvar as a companion. He is just so excited by the world but also like...brutally honest. Anyway. First chapter is complete. Second chapter is >_> half finished....and then I have most of the script put together for the rest of the chapters. Fav thing, I completely rewrote the love confession a few weeks ago and I absolutely adore it now. Cannot wait to finish out those chapters.

And I'm gonna stop there because I could honestly talk about my WIPs forever and it's obscenely late now and I have to be at work early holy shit why did I stay up so late????? >_<

But if anyone else wants to hear about any of the other larger projects I'm working, they are for the following fandoms: Greedfall, Fallout 4, Dream Daddy, Witcher 3, Triple Frontier, and then I've got a bunch of Dragon Age and Endeavour stuff that I poke with a stick every so often but wouldn't call active WIPs at the moment. Oh and Fallet, my own little fandom that's got no one else in it :P

[lookbluesoup]

Hey Wyn! I Just read all of your Blue Soup series! I love it all!!! Every word of it is fantastic! I've been wanting to start writing Fanfiction for Fallout for a long time, but I've always been intimidated by the prospect of writing already-established characters and "ruining them" (especially characters like Piper, Preston and Nick, who I plan to make main characters in my story). Do you have any advice on dealing with this?

Hi Anon! Thanks so much for your kind words! ;w; I’m certainly no expert and know this fear personally, but I’ll ramble here about my process and how I try to think about things. Hopefully it can encourage you, too! :D I’ll add the disclaimer that this is what works for me, and what works for me might not work for others, that’s ok! 

First off - writing is for fun. Wanting to do justice to the characters and capture their essence is a great goal, and also a learning process. You don’t have to do it perfectly, nor should you try. Perfection implies there’s nothing more to learn or grow over, which is one, unachievable, and two, the death of innovation. Just do the best you can with what you know, and let your passion for the characters guide the process. And be gentle with yourself. 

Our own experiences and preferences will effect how we write these characters, what traits of theirs stand out to us, how we define their shape, at least in small ways, and that’s not inherently bad. Just like many different artists can draw a character in 100 different styles and that character is still recognizable and familiar (and enjoyable!), writers can emphasize 100 different facets of that character, too. If you’re putting your heart into it, you won’t ruin them. Saw a beautiful LotR post the other day about that, talking about how the movies are different from the books, but the love for the story and characters shows because the people who made those movies were passionate about it, and they’re worthy adaptations of the stories’ spirit. It’s the same for fanfiction.

It’s personally more fun for me to think about the writing process like I’m exploring a character rather than making a statement about a character, which are two very distinct mindsets for me. Exploring is fun, engaging, its ok to change your mind and edit or alter your story as you get new information. It’s like a puzzle, thinking through a character’s motivation, finding ways to incorporate that into a story. Making a statement is more 'fixed’, and implies pushing a narrative as the correct one, which adds a lot of pressure. Personally? I don’t like pressure hahaha 

Still - it’s hard not to feel obligated to do something to a certain standard for one reason or another. My anxiety likes to tell me lots of little lies, and it can be very convincing. When it strikes, working through my nerves is often harder than actually writing LOL

When I first started writing Fallout fanfic, I didn’t post it anywhere. That took a LOT of the pressure off, knowing that none of this needed to, or was even intended to be, shared with others who might judge. These stories were just between me and the characters. It was safe. I could work at my own pace and enjoy the process in my little tide pool. Since deciding to share them, I’ve been really grateful for the support readers have given! It feels good, I’m glad I found the courage to post them.

As for working out that puzzle of what seems most likely for a character, how to capture the heart of them, I love voice lines! Codex entries! Compilations! The best way to get to know a character is to spend time with them. I take Piper everywhere with me, I want to know what she thinks about everything, her character really struck a chord with me and, well, cue hyperfixation hahaha I use the Windows 10 Game Bar to record audio clips and have a massive archive of her voice lines. Flipping through these is a useful tool for me to get back into her “pattern” of speaking. All the Companions have distinct voices and tendencies, which is another neat aspect to writing them. I feel more confident knowing I had access to the source material. Also I just. Like listening to her voice sometimes. Shhh

Other great resources for this are the wiki (which has text files of most, if not all, each character’s dialogue lines and conversation trees) and youtube companion reaction comps - this SOUNDS like a lot of work. But for me at least I love it, it doesn’t feel like work because I’ll be excited looking for specific lines a la “how does she talk when she’s angry”, “what does she have to say about mirelurks”, you don’t have to keep everything about each character in your head memorized - these audio and text files are great archives to find what’s relevant to a scene quickly.

When I got into Fallout, I also got interested in 1950s movies, music, and even radio shows like Johnny Dollar and Green Hornet. This gave me context around the characters, too. For example, Piper’s kickass reporter vibes throw back to a lot of old sleuthing reporter tropes, and interpreting her actions through some of those filters felt more authentic to me than applying her behavior to a modern day setting or my own inclinations. I guess along with that I’d also say, take notes! Have an observation? Write it down in a notes file, or a google doc, somewhere you can sync between your devices and add to whenever you think about it. What stuff sticks out to you as important or defining for these characters, what trends do you notice? If you have bullet points written down, these also make great quick references. Here’s a few screenshots from the terror that is my notes docs:

You can see they’re just short notes or scribbled down thoughts that I can quickly reference if I’m wondering how she might act in a certain scene at a certain time! For me getting into a character’s headspace is often more of a feeling than any kind of scientific research, having easy access to these pointers helps put me in the right state of mind to jump into the creative pool and swim around and get soaked in - character goo - okay bad metaphor. Anyway,

None of these are rules that you have to follow or things that you have to do to get the characters “right”, they’re just potential tools that can help you find information to build off of, and hopefully feel more confident. Maybe something else is more useful to you with organizing or keeping your head clear for writing, it’s cool to experiment and find out what works for you!