#i feel strongly about the whole fact that he and cassian are literally here because the circumstances and their lives suck so bad

[rotzaprachim]

we all need some middle aged white guy to be a cringe apologist for. for me it’s davits draven from rogue one. bro that guy was trying to stop the death star from happening. bro like he knew billions of lives were at risk here he’s literally just assigning a hit on a guy who has been involved in building a weapon to commit genocide bro. like i very much appreciate when a villain is something just soooo dumb and boring in their evil in an au (shoutout to the empire being home depot in my favorite au) but draven isn’t a villain. he’s cassian’s mirror. he’s also a very good man in a very very fucked up situation. he’s his awkward boss who once accidentally called him son and they mutually agreed to commit a double murder before anyone found out. cassian is awkwardly in draven’s office whilst draven awkwardly tells him he should use more of his vacation days. they are eating the leftover cookies at the office christmas party so food doesn’t go to waste and stacking the chairs after everyone leaves despite being people who would have paid good money not to be there. 

[flowerflamestars]

Hey hey hey 😀 not sure if you've been getting my asks(could really be my WiFi too) or Tumblr has been up to no good again, but hey how was ACOSF? I gather from your updates and posts you're just disappointed by it. A lot of us are. Hope you've been doing well after reading Acosf 😅

Hey babe! I know I have at least one from you that I need to answer- entirely my bad, I’ve been going through my inbox in little chunks. Yall have been too lovely and the influx is great :)

Disappointment is very much the right word. 

The big thing- ignoring that Nesta as a character was meaningful, or that the baby plot line was big swing in every wrong way possible, the plotting is a MESS- is that I think the story resoundingly fails on both it’s goals.

It’s a recovery story, a healing story. And a romance.

BIG SPOILERS AHEAD

Nesta is stripped of her autonomy. And I want to be extremely clear on that- this is framed as an intervention and it is not an intervention. It is not, at any point, really about Nesta becoming healthy. It’s about control. Rhys says it, Feyre says it, Cassian says it: Nesta is a problem. Nesta affects their reputation. Nesta needs to be punished.

Morrigan, a fellow abuse/assault survivor, tells Cassian with absolute seriousness that they should just throw Nesta into the Court of Nightmares and leave her there. Because she’s just as bad.

WHAT

The entire structure is that Nesta needs to change- but it isn’t about her being safer, her finding her way- it’s about the fact that her being suicidally depressed makes her sister sad.

So yeah, Nesta gets stronger. Because one of her two-pronged punishments is army training with the man she once loved and has been trying to distance herself from for YEARS. Who proceeds to control what she wears, when she sleeps, WHAT SHE EATS. Who laughs, when she gets hurt. 

By the end of the story, the issue Nesta has confronted, from her laundry list of trauma is...that she’s bitchy to her sisters in instances of extreme distress/hardship. 

That she...blames herself for the death of her abusive, absent father, who in no way contributed to her life from the time of her mothers death into her adulthood until he showed up for...ten seconds in acowar, named a ship after her, and immediately died. Watching a parent die? traumatic as hell. Retconning an ENTIRE parent-child relationship to make a character have something more palatable to struggle with? Bad writing.

Rape hangs over Nesta like a cloud this whole novel, but she never talks about it. It never in any way comes up while her and Cassian are having rough sex on every available surface.

She never heals, and she never becomes comfortable as a faery. She gives up her power. 

Literally AND figuratively- Nesta is the same person at the end of the novel, but now she can punch really hard? has no magic, gave up a destiny the book STRONGLY IMPLIES was actually, really, always about Rhysand. All that changed is now she’s finally bent enough to play by the rules of the same people who condemned her for responding to the terrible things that happened it her...in ways exactly like they have and continue to do.

It makes me so sad, you know?

Which brings us to Cassian.

Who is supposed to be the emotionally intuitive one. The one who has survived so much, who understands trauma. Who more than that, understands Nesta, better than anyone else.

That is not the man in this book. 

He’ll make this earnest declarations that sound...almost right? and then ten seconds later he’s guilt-tripping her. Saying just, absolute bullshit to her. Sexualizing her in her lowest moments.

It’s not enemies to lovers- Cassian is ashamed of Nesta when the book begins. Takes active glee in physically punishing her when she’s having a breakdown 600 pages later, on what it supposed to be the great tipping point of their relationship.

At no point does this man seem to even LIKE Nesta. He wants to have sex with her. He want her to do what he wants and obey 1) him and 2) their High Lord and Lady. 

Nesta, who even toward the end of the book, as I said STILL IS NOT HEALING AT ALL, tells Cassian: “I don’t deserve you, and I never, ever will.”

Cassian’s response it to...kiss her?

Tell her: “You’re not going to marry Eris.” “There will be no one for else. For either of us.”

And then Nesta says yes, cries more, and they have sex again.

oh yeah, and then in the morning he runs off? To have a snowball fight? And then doesn’t speak to her or see her for three days.

I just. This dynamic never gets better. Proud, strong, intelligent, ferocious Nesta is always kind of like: will you look at me? you’re good and i am not. 

She’s not safe in this love. Not comfortable, not ever on even ground. The entire dynamic of this relationship has brought her low and keeps her there.

So like, in the end. They have this fight where Cassian fully starts yelling at her...in public...because she isn’t saying yes! we’re mates! I’m going to quote it here:

“I am your mate, for fucks sake!” Cassian shouted, loud enough for people across the river to hear. “You are my mate! Why are you still fighting it?”

She let the truth, voiced at last, wash over her.

“You promised me forever on Solstice,” he said, voice breaking, “Why is one word somehow throwing you off that?”

“Because with that one word, the last scrap of my humanity goes away!” She didn’t care who say them, who heard. “With that one stupid word, I am no longer human in any way. I’m one of you!”

He blinked. “I thought you wanted to be one of us.”

“I don’t know what I want. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Well, I didn’t have a choice in being shackled to you, either.”

GUYS. I hate this fight to unfathomable levels.

so yes, he immediately tries to recant it...but like, let’s follow the thread for a minute. They’re together, really together, ever since the stupid moment Nesta said she was trash and didn’t deserve Cassian and Cassian said...you and me! forever! let’s fuck about it!

I get that the matebond is a precious thing- but god, it could not be clearer Cassian just...doesn’t respect Nesta even a little bit? She won’t use the word, so he’s yelling at her.

a page before: “That word means nothing to me, Cassian,” she said, voice thick as she tried to keep people who strode past from overhearing. “It means something to all of you, but for most of my life husband and wife was as good as it got. Mate is just a word.”

BECAUSE SHE WAS HUMAN. Because, very validly... Nesta has been fae for, two years? Her baseline is human, that’s how she feels. And she’s not wrong??

Faeries get married too. It’s not mates or nothing. 

In my imaginary book, Cassian goes: why Archeron, is that a proposal? Because I’d love nothing more than to be your husband.

In THIS BOOK, he snaps: “That’s bullshit.”

Annnd cue fight.

Not only is Cassian so, so disrespectful of Nesta’s feelings...HE THOUGHT SHE WANTED TO BE A FAERY?

Are you kidding me, canon? Nesta was drowned against her will in the Cauldron! Cassian was there, unconscious in a pool of his own blood, still trying to reach her and save her. The ENTIRE pivot of her character that slides her into the dark place this book is meant to heal her from is her complete loss of autonomy at Hyberns hands.

and then the shackle line. I just...obviously, people say things in arguments they don’t mean, But Cassian never once stops going for what hurts the most where Nesta is concerned, and is yet baffled by her responses. He understands how to hurt her, but not how to comfort her when they’re fully clothed.

And then the end is...they’re mates. They’re going to have babies. They’re going to have a big faery mating ceremony. Nesta’s feelings aren’t not addressed, they magically cease to exist.

I’m sorry this turned into a FULL RANT- but yes, I’m disappointed. 

Its always the same story: the difficult woman has to soften. Learn to be nice. Power? she can’t have that. She’s going to have a mate and babies, that’s her journey, because that’s every woman's journey.

There is one bright spot, which I do have to mention. I love Nesta’s friends. 

They’re her real chance at recovery, that the IC have nothing to do with. And you know what? she makes them right off the bat. It’s crazy how if you treat someone like a person, they can function like one.

I just want them to have their own story far, far away from everyone else.