#i guess the real ones are everybody who saw season 9 episode 4

[me-beef]

@strangeravatar made a great point

i was gonna focus on the spike-hotboxing-celestia aspect but i got distracted somewhere along the way and i think i forgot what joke i was trying to make

but dont you think its interesting how many guards of the exact same color/body type she's managed to accrue?? i do

ooohh you want to go look at our stickers so bad

[marlborodean]

spn quotes: season one

i’m collecting a bunch of quotes from the show! favorite lines, good points of characterization, etc. all organized by episode and character, and with timestamps!

w/ncest shippers get lost

season two.

1. PILOT

Dean—

[Sam: So we kill everything we can find.] Save a lot of people doing it, too. (08:51)

I can’t do this alone. [Sam: Yes, you can.] Yeah. Well, I don’t want to. (09:30)

[Officer: So. Fake U.S. Marshal, fake credit cards. You got anything that’s real?] My boobs. (28:50)

Sam—

When I told Dad I was scared of the thing in my closet, he gave me a .45. [Dean: What was he supposed to do?] I was 9 years old. He was supposed to say, “Don’t be afraid of the dark.” (08:30)

You think Mom would’ve wanted this for us? (08:58)

We were raised like warriors. (09:06)

[Dean: Are you just gonna live some normal, apple-pie life? Is that it?] No, not normal. Safe. [And that’s why you ran away.] I was just going to college. It was Dad who said if I was gonna go, I should stay gone. (09:09)

[Dean: You’re really serious about this, aren’t you? You think you’re just gonna become some lawyer, marry your girl?] Maybe. Why not? [Does Jessica know the truth about you? I mean, does she know about the things you’ve done?] No, and she’s not ever going to know. [Well, that’s healthy. You can pretend all you want, Sammy, but sooner or later you’re gonna have to face up to who you really are.] And who is that? [One of us.] No. I’m not like you. This is not going to be my life. (22:45)

If it weren’t for pictures, I wouldn’t even know what Mom looks like. What difference would it make? Even if we do find the thing that killed her, Mom’s gone, and she isn’t coming back. (23:17)

2. W*ND*G* ( x )

Dean—

Her brother’s missing, Sam. She’s not just gonna sit this out. (14:55)

[Hailey: And you’re hiking out in biker boots and jeans?] Well, sweetheart, I don’t do shorts. (15:54)

I’m supposed to be the belligerent one, remember? (25:13)

The way I see it, Dad’s given us a job to do, and I intend to do it. (26:31)

All that anger, you can’t keep it burning over the long haul. It’s gonna kill you. You gotta have patience, man. [Sam: How do you do it? How does Dad do it?] Well, for one, them. I mean, I figure our family’s so screwed to hell, maybe we can help some others. It makes things a little bit more bearable. And I’ll tell you what else helps. Killing as many evil sons of bitches as I possibly can. (27:05)

Sam—

[Dean: No, you’re not fine. You’re like a powder keg, man. It’s not like you.] (25:06)

3. DEAD IN THE WATER

Dean—

You don’t think I want to find Dad as much as you do? [Sam: Yeah, I know you do, it’s just—] I’m the one that’s been with him every single day for the past two years while you’ve been off to college going to pep rallies. We will find Dad, but until then, we’re gonna kill everything bad between here and there, okay? (04:09)

Well, maybe you don’t think anyone will listen to you, or... or believe you. I want you to know that I will. (11:58)

You’re scared. It’s okay. I understand. See, when I was your age, I saw something real bad happen to my mom, and I was scared, too. I didn’t feel like talking, just like you. But see, my mom—I know she wanted me to be brave. I think about that everyday. And I do my best to be brave. (20:14)

What if we missed something? What if more people get hurt? [Sam: But why would you think that?] Because Lucas was really scared. [That’s what this is about?] I just don’t want to leave town until I know the kid’s okay. (29:48)

Sam—

People don’t just disappear, Dean. Other people just stop looking for them. (03:51)

4. PHANTOM TRAVELER

Dean—

It’s your job to keep my ass alive, so I need you sharp. (05:18)

Sam—

[Dean: It’s your job to keep my ass alive, so I need you sharp.] (05:18)

[Jerry: Well, he was real proud of you, I could tell. You know, he talked about you all the time.] He did? (07:09)

Hey, hey, it’s just a little turbulence. [Sam, this place is going to crash, okay? So quit treating me like I’m friggin’ 4.] You need to calm down. [Well, I’m sorry, I can’t!] Yes, you can. [Dude. Stow the touchy-feely, self-help yoga crap. It’s not helping.] Listen, if you’re panicked, you’re wide open to demonic possession, so you need to calm yourself down right now. (30:26)

5. BLOODY MARY

Dean—

Do I look like Paris Hilton? (18:08)

Her boyfriend killing himself, that’s not really Charlie’s fault. (29:54)

Now listen to me. It wasn’t your fault. It you want to blame something, then blame the thing that killed her. Or, hell, why don’t you take a swing at me? I’m the one that dragged you away from her. [Sam: I don’t blame you.] Well, you shouldn’t blame yourself, because there’s nothing you could’ve done. (31:24)

Sam—

[Dean: Hell, why don’t you take a swing at me? I’m the one that dragged you away from her.] I don’t blame you. (31:37)

Charlie. Your boyfriend’s death, you really should try to forgive yourself. No matter what you did, you probably couldn’t have stopped it. Sometimes bad things just happen. (40:37)

6. SKIN

Dean—

He’s sure got issues with you. You got to go to college. He had to stay home. I mean, I had to stay home with Dad. You don’t think I had dreams of my own? But Dad needed me. See, deep down, I’m just jealous. You got friends, you could have a life. Me? I know I’m a freak. And sooner or later, everybody’s gonna leave me. [Sam: What are you talking about?] You left. Hell, I did everything Dad asked me to, and he ditched me, too. (24:21)

Sam—

[Rebecca: It must be lonely.] Oh, no. No, it’s not so bad. Anyway, what can I do? It’s my family. (39:02)

Misc—

Shifter: Evolution is about mutation, right? So maybe this thing was born human, but was different. Hideous and hated. Until he learned to become someone else. (27:14)

7. HOOK MAN

Dean—

I told you, you don’t have to be a college graduate to be a genius. (14:59)

[Sam: Hey, be quiet.] Me be quiet? You be quiet! (19:48)

Sam—

[Dean: You’ve been holding out on me. This college thing is awesome!] This wasn’t really my experience. [Let me guess—library, studying, straight A’s. What a geek.] (21:30)

8. BUGS

Dean—

Growing up in a place like this would freak me out. [Sam: Why?] The manicured lawns, how-was-your-day-honey? I’d blow my brains out. [There’s nothing wrong with normal.] I’d take our family over normal any day. (08:21)

[Sam: You’ll be able to get out of that house and away from your dad.] What kind of advice is that? Kid should stick with his family. (20:26)

Hey, so with that kid back there, how could you tell him to just ditch his family like that? [Sam: Just, uh, I know what the kid’s going through.] How about telling him to respect his old man? How’s that for advice? (23:20)

Matt, under no circumstances are you to tell the truth. He’ll just think you’re nuts. Tell him you have a sharp pain in your right side and you gotta go to the hospital, okay? [Matt: Yeah, okay.] Make him listen? What are you thinking? (32:44)

Sam—

Remind you of somebody? Dad? [Dean: Dad never treated us like that.] Well, Dad never treated you like that. You were perfect. He was all over my case. ...You don’t remember. [Dean: Well, maybe he had to raise his voice but sometimes you were out of line.] Right. Right, like when I said I’d rather play soccer than learn bowhunting. (11:46)

[Matt: Larry doesn’t listen to me.] Why not? [Mostly? He’s too disappointed in his freak son.] I hear ya. [Dean: You do?] Matt, how old are you? [Matt: Sixteen.] Well, don’t sweat it, ‘cause in two years something great’s gonna happen. [What?] College. You’ll be able to get out of that house and away from your dad. (20:04)

[Dean: Hey, so with that kid back there, how could you tell him to just ditch his family like that?] Just, uh, I know what the kid’s going through. [How about telling him to respect his old man? How’s that for advice?] Dean, come on. This isn’t about his old man. You think I didn’t respect Dad, that’s what this is about. [Just forget it, alright? Sorry I brought it up.] I respected him. But no matter what I did, it was never good enough. [So what are you saying, that Dad was disappointed in you?] Was? Is! Always has been. [Why would you think that?] Because I didn’t wanna bowhunt or hustle pool, because I wanted to go to school and live my life, which to our whacked-out family, made me the freak. (23:20)

Dean, you know what most dads are when their kids score a full-ride? Proud. Most dads don’t toss their kids out of the house. [Dean: I remember that fight. In fact, I seem to recall a few choice phrases coming out of your mouth.] You know, truth is, when we finally do find Dad, I don’t know if he’s even gonna wanna see me. (24:05)

9. HOME

Dean—

And then you tell me that I’ve got to go back home, especially when... [Sam: When what?] When I swore to myself that I would never go back there. (07:56)

I remember the fire, the heat. Then I carried you out the front door. [Sam: You did?] Yeah, well, you never knew that? [No.] (12:38)

I don’t know what to do. So, whatever you’re doing. if you could get here... please. I need your help, Dad. (14:45)

Sam—

[Dean: I remember the fire, the heat. Then I carried you out the front door.] You did? [Yeah, well, you never knew that?] No. (12:38)

Misc—

Missouri: All those years ago, real evil came to you. It walked this house. That kind of evil leaves wounds, and sometimes wounds get infected. (27:15)

10. ASYLUM

Dean—

[Sam: This is a job. Dad wants us to work a job.] Yeah, well, maybe we’ll meet up with him. Maybe he’s there. [Maybe he’s not. I mean, he could be sending us there by ourselves to hunt this thing.] Who cares? If he wants us there, it’s good enough for me. [This doesn’t strike you as weird? The texting, the coordinates?] Sam. Dad’s telling us to go somewhere. We’re going. (07:05)

[Sam: We deserve some answers. I mean, this is our family we’re talking about.] I understand that, Sam, but he’s given us an order. [So what, we gotta always follow Dad’s order?] Of course we do. (12:17)

[Sam: I mean, why are we even here? ‘Cause you’re following Dad’s orders like a good little soldier? ‘Cause you always do what he says without question? Are you that desperate for his approval?] (36:52)

Sam—

[Dean: We’ve got to burn Ellicott’s bones, and all this will be over, and you’ll be back to normal.] I am normal. I’m just telling you the truth for the first time. I mean, why are we even here? ‘Cause you’re following Dad’s orders like a good little soldier? ‘Cause you always do what he says without question? Are you that desperate for his approval? [This isn’t you talking.] That’s the difference between you and me. I have a mind of my own. I’m not pathetic like you. [So what are you gonna do? You gonna kill me?] You know, I am sick of doing what you tell me to do. (36:43)

11. SCARECROW

Dean— 

[Sam: I don’t understand the blind faith you have in the man. I mean, it’s like you don’t even question him.] Yeah, it’s called being a good son. You’re a selfish bastard, you know that? You just do whatever you want. You don’t care what anyone thinks. (08:08)

[Sam: You know, if you’re hinting you need my help, just ask.] I’m not hinting anything. Actually, uh... I want you to know... I mean, don’t think... [Yeah. I’m sorry, too.] Sam.... You were right. You got to do your own thing. You got to live your own life. [You serious?] You’ve always known what you want, and you go after it. You stand up to Dad. I mean, you always have. Hell, I wish I.... Anyway. I admire that about you. I’m proud of you, Sammy. [I don’t even know what to say.] Say you’ll take care of yourself. (25:04)

Sam—

[Dean: Dad doesn’t want our help.] I don’t care. [He’s given us an order.] I don’t care. We don’t always have to do what he says. [Sam, Dad is asking us to work jobs, to save lives. It’s important.] Alright, I understand. Believe me, I understand. But I’m talking one week here, man, to get answers. To get revenge. [Alright, look, I know how you feel.] Do you? How old were you when Mom died, 4? Jess died six months ago. How the hell would you know how I feel? (07:25)

[Meg: I had to get away from my family.] Why? [I love my parents. And they wanted what’s best for me. They just didn’t care if I wanted it. I was supposed to be smart, but not smart enough to scare away a husband. Well, it’s just.... Because my family said so, I’m supposed to sit there and do what I was told. So I just went on my own way instead. ...I’m sorry. The things you say to people you hardly know.] No, no, it’s okay. I know how you feel. Remember that brother I mentioned before that I was road-tripping with? It’s kind of the same deal. [And that’s why you’re not riding with him anymore? ...Here’s to us. The food might be bad, and the beds might be hard, but at least we’re living our own lives and nobody else’s.] (21:11)

[Med: You’re running back to your brother? The guy you ran away from? Why, because he won’t pick up his phone? Sam, come with me to California.] I can’t. I’m sorry. [Why not?] He’s my family. (31:13)

12. FAITH

Dean—

Looks like you’re gonna leave town without me. [Sam: What are you talking about? I’m not gonna leave you here.] You better take care of that car. I swear I’ll haunt your ass. [I don’t think that’s funny.] Oh, come on, it’s a little funny. (04:44)

[Sam: Maybe it’s time to have a little faith, Dean.] You know what I got faith in? Reality—knowing what’s really going on. [How can you be a skeptic, with the things we see every day?] Exactly, we see them. We know they’re real. [But if you know evil’s out there, how can you not believe good’s out there too?] ‘Cause I’ve seen what evil does to good people. (08:10)

[Roy: I looked into your heart and you just...stood out from all the rest.] What did you see in my heart? [A young man with an important purpose. A job to do. And it isn’t finished.] (15:27)

You never should’ve brought me here. [Sam: Dean, I was just trying to save your life.] Sam, some guy is dead now because of me. (19:30)

The guy is playing God, deciding who lives and dies. That’s a monster in my book. (22:42)

[Layla: I wish you luck. I really do.] Same to you. You deserve it a lot more than me. (30:38)

[Sam: To cross a line like that, that preacher’s wife—black magic, murder. Evil.] Desperate. Her husband was dying. She would’ve done anything to save him. (31:35)

God save us from half the people who think they’re doing God’s work. (32:04)

[Sam: What’s happening to her is horrible. But what are you gonna do? Let somebody else die to save her? You said it yourself, Dean—you can’t play God.] (32:58)

Must be rough, to believe in something so much and have it disappoint you like that. (40:57)

You know, I’m not much of the praying type, but I’m gonna pray for you. [Layla: Well. There’s a miracle right there.] (42:00)

Sam—

[Dean: I’m gonna die. And you can’t stop it.] Watch me. (05:23)

[Dean: You’re not gonna let me die in peace, are you?] I’m not gonna let you die, period. (07:04)

How can you be a skeptic, with the things we see everyday? [Dean: Exactly, we see them. We know they’re real.] If you know evil’s out there, how can you not believe good’s out there too? (08:18)

[The guy is playing God, deciding who lives and dies. That’s a monster in my book.] No, we’re not gonna kill a human being, Dean. We do that, we’re no better than he is. (22:42)

Misc—

Layla: I guess if you’re gonna have faith, you can’t just have it when the miracles happen. You have to have it when they don’t. (41:19)

13. ROUTE 666

Dean—

[Sam: Look man, everybody’s got to open up to someone sometime.] Yeah, I don’t. It was stupid to get that close. (13:06)

[Cassie: Whenever we get—what’s the word?—close? Anywhere in the neighborhood of emotional vulnerability, you back off or make some joke or find any way to shut the door on me.] (15:19)

Sam—

You told her. You told her the secret. Our big family rule number one—we do what we do and we shut up about it. For a year and a half, I do nothing but lie to Jessica, and you go out with this chick in Ohio a couple of times, and you tell her everything? (04:18)

Oh, my life was so simple. Just school, exams, papers on polycentric cultural norms. [Dean: So I guess I saved you from a boring existence.] Occasionally I miss boring. [So, this killer truck—] I miss conversations that didn’t start with “this killer truck.” (29:31)

Ever make you wonder if it’s worth it? Putting everything on hold, doing what we do? (39:10)

14. NIGHTMARE

Dean—

[Sam: Well, with what he went through, the beatings, to want revenge on those people—I’m sorry, man. I hate to say it, but it’s not that insane.] Yeah, but it doesn’t justify murdering your entire family. [Dean—] He’s no different than anything else we’ve hunted. Alright? We gotta end him. [We’re not gonna kill Max.] Then what? Hand him over to the cops and say, “Lock him up, officer. He kills people with the power of his mind.” [Forget it. No way, man.] Sam— [Dean, he’s a person. We can talk to him. Hey, promise me you’ll follow my lead on this one.] Alright, fine. But I’m not letting him hurt anybody else. (25:01)

[Sam: We’re lucky we had Dad.] I never thought I’d hear you say that. [Well, it could have gone a whole ‘nother way after Mom. A little more tequila, a little less demon hunting, then we would have had Max’s childhood. All things considered, we turned out okay. Thanks to him.] All things considered. (38:27)

As long as I’m around, nothing bad’s gonna happen to you. (41:27)

Sam—

Well, I know one thing I have in common with these people. [Dean: What’s that?] Both our families are cursed. [Our family’s not cursed. We’ve just... had our dark spots.] Our dark spots are pretty dark. (19:13)

I was connecting to Max. The thing I don’t get it why, man. I guess because we’re so alike? [Dean: What are you talking about? Dude’s nothing like you.] Well, we both have psychic abilities. We’re both— [Both what? Sam, Max is a monster. He’s already killed two people, now he’s gunning for a third.] Well, with what he went through, the beatings, to want revenge on those people—I’m sorry, man. I hate to say it, but it’s not that insane. (24:43)

If I just said something else, gotten through to him somehow. [Dean: Don’t do that.] Do what? [Torture yourself. It wouldn’t have mattered what you said. Max was too far gone.] When I think about how he looked at me, man, right before.... I should have done something. [Come on, man, you risked your life. I mean, yeah, maybe if we’d have gotten there 20 years earlier.] Well, I’ll tell you one thing. We’re lucky we had Dad. [I never thought I’d hear you say that.] Well, it could have gone a whole ‘nother way after Mom. A little more tequila, a little less demon hunting, then we would have had Max’s childhood. All things considered, we turned out okay. Thanks to him. (38:03)

15. THE BENDERS

Dean—

Look... he’s family. And I kind of—I kind of look out for the kid. You gotta let me go with you. [Kathleen: I’m sorry, I can’t do that.] Well, tell me something. Your country has its fair share of missing persons. Any of ‘em come back? Sam’s my responsibility, and he’s coming back. I’m bringing him back. (08:56)

When we were young, I pretty much pulled him from a fire. And ever since then, I’ve felt responsible for him. You know, like it’s my job to keep him safe. I’m just afraid if we don’t find him fast.... Please. He’s my family. (15:04)

Demons, I get. People are crazy. (28:08)

If you hurt my brother, I’ll kill you, I swear. I’ll kill you all. I will kill you all! (35:54)

16. SHADOW

Dean— 

[Sam: What are you gonna do when it’s all over?] It’s never gonna be over. There’s gonna be others. There’s always gonna be something to hunt. [But there’s got to be something that you want for yourself.] Yeah, I don’t want you to leave the second this thing’s over, Sam. [Dude. What’s your problem?] Why do you think I drag you everywhere, huh? Why do you think I came and got you at Stanford in the first place? [’Cause Dad was in trouble. ‘Cause you wanted to find the thing that killed Mom.] Yes, that, but it’s more than that, man. You and me and Dad. I want us to be together again. I want us to be a family again. [Dean, we are a family. I’d do anything for you. But things will never be the way they were before.] They could be. (24:04)

Sam— 

What if this whole thing was over tonight? Man, I’d sleep for a month. Go back to school, just be a person again. (23:42)

Dean, we are a family. I’d do anything for you. But things will never be the way they were before. [Dean: They could be.] I don’t want them to be. I’m not gonna live this life forever. Dean, when this is all over, you’re gonna have to let me go my own way. (25:02)

Misc—

[Sam: Go to hell.] Meg: Baby, I’m already there. (30:22)

17. HELL HOUSE

Dean—

People believe in Santa Clause. How come I’m not getting hooked up every Christmas? [Sam: ‘Cause you’re a bad person.] (27:01)

Sam—

Man, we’re not kids anymore, Dean. We’re not gonna start that crap up again. [Dean: Start what up?] That prank stuff. It’s stupid, and it always escalates. (04:24)

Kind of makes you wonder—of all the things we hunted, how many existed just ‘cause people believed in them? (37:17)

18. SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES

Dean—

[Sam: What makes you so sure?] Well, because I’m the oldest, which means I’m always right. [No it doesn’t.] It totally does. (03:38)

Listen to me. I can promise you that this is not your fault, okay? [Michael: It’s my job to look after him.] (20:53)

I know how you feel, I’m a big brother, too. But you got to go easy on your mom right now, okay? (21:24)

Dad did not send me here to walk away. [Sam: Send you here? He didn’t send you here, he sent us here.] This isn’t about you, Sam, alright? I’m the one that screwed up. It’s my fault. There’s no telling how many kids have gotten hurt because of me. (25:35)

Dad never spoke about it again. I didn’t ask. But he, uh... he looked at me different, you know, which was worse. Not that I blame him. He gave me an order, and I didn’t listen, and I almost got you killed. [Sam: You were just a kid.] Don’t—don’t. Dad knew this was unfinished business for me. He sent me here to finish it. (29:26)

Are you sure you want to do this? You don’t have to. It’s okay, I won’t be mad. (33:57)

[Sam: Sometimes I wish that...] What? [I wish I could have that kind of innocence.] If it means anything, sometimes I wish you could, too. (40:05)

Sam—

Dean, I’m sorry. [Dean: For what?] You know. I’ve really given you a lot of crap for always following Dad’s orders, but I know why you do it. (34:39)

Sometimes I wish that... [Dean: What?] I wish I could have that kind of innocence. [If it means anything, sometimes I wish you could, too.] (40:05)

19. PROVENANCE

Dean— 

I’m sure that this is about Jessica, right? Now, I don’t know what it’s like to lose somebody like that, but... I would think that she would want you to be happy. God forbid have fun once in a while. (20:47)

Sam—

I had a girlfriend. And she died. And my mom died, too. I don’t know, it’s like... it’s like I’m cursed or something. Like death just follows me around. Look, I’m not scared of much, but if I let myself have feelings for anybody— [Sarah: You’re scared they get hurt, too.] (30:39)

Misc—

Sarah: I know, losing somebody you love—it’s terrible. You shut yourself off. Believe me, I know. But when you shut out pain, you shut out everything else, too. (31:27)

20. DEAD MAN’S BLOOD

Dean—

He does what he does for a reason. [Sam: What reason?] Our job. There’s no time to argue. There’s no margin for error, alright? It’s just the way the old man runs things. [Yeah, well, maybe that worked when we were kids, but not anymore, alright? Not after everything you and I have been through, Dean. I mean, are you telling me you’re cool with just falling into line and letting him run the whole show?] If that’s what it takes. (14:51)

Sam—

I’m happy he’s okay, alright? I’m happy that we’re all working together. [Dean: Good.] It’s just the way he treats us like children. [Oh, God.] He barks orders at us, Dean. He expects us to follow him without question. He keeps us on some crap need-to-know deal. [He does what he does for a reason.] What reason? [Our job. There’s no time to argue. There’s no margin for error, alright? It’s just the way the old man runs things.] Yeah, well, maybe that worked when we were kids, but not anymore, alright? Not after everything you and I have been through, Dean. I mean, are you telling me you’re cool with just falling into line and letting him run the whole show? (14:51)

[John: You left. Your brother and me, we needed you. You walked away, Sam. You walked away!] You’re the one who said “Don’t come back,” Dad. You’re the one who closed that door, not me! You were just pissed off that you couldn’t control me anymore! (19:27)

[John: Sammy, it never occurred to me what you wanted. I just couldn’t accept the fact that you and me, we’re just different.] We’re not different. Not anymore. With what happened to Mom and Jess, we probably have a lot more in common than just about anyone. (29:20)

Misc—

John: This is never the life that I wanted for you. [Sam: Then why’d you get so mad when I left?] You got to understand something. After your mother passed, all I saw was evil, everywhere. And all I cared about was keeping you boys alive. I wanted you prepared, ready. So somewhere along the line, I stopped being your father. I became your drill sergeant. So when you said that you wanted to go away to school, all I could think about, my only thought was that you were gonna be alone, vulnerable. (28:21)

21. SALVATION

Dean—

For the last time, what happened to them is not your fault. [Sam: Yeah, you’re right, it’s not my fault, but it’s my problem!] No, it’s not your problem, it’s our problem! (05:42)

You’re just willing to sacrifice yourself, is that it? [Sam: Yeah. Yeah, you’re damn right I am.] Yeah, well, that’s not gonna happen—not as long as I’m around. [What the hell are you talking about, Dean? We’ve been searching for this demon our whole lives. It’s the only thing we’ve ever cared abut.] Sam, I want to waste it, I do, okay? But it’s not worth dying over. [What?] I mean it. If hunting this demon means you getting yourself killed, then I hope we never find the damn thing. [That thing killed Jess. That thing killed Mom,] You said yourself once that no matter what we do, they’re gone. And they’re never coming back. [Don’t you say that! Don’t you—not after all this, don’t you say that.] Sam, look. The three of us, that’s all we have. And it’s all I have. Sometimes I feel like I’m barely holding it together, man. Without you or Dad.... (37:51)

Sam—

So Mom’s death, Jessica—it’s all because of me? [Dean: We don’t know that, Sam.] Oh really? ‘Cause I’d say we’re pretty damn sure, Dean! [For the last time, what happened to them is not your fault.] Yeah, you’re right, it’s not my fault, but it’s my problem! (05:34)

Misc—

John: I want to stop losing people we love. I want you to go to school. I want Dean to have a home. I want Mary alive. I just want this to be over. (21:10)

22. DEVIL’S TRAP

Dean—

You know that guy I shot? There was a person in there. [Sam: You didn’t have a choice, Dean.] I know. That’s not what bothers me. [Then what does?] Killing that guy, killing Meg... I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t even flinch. For you or Dad, the things I’m willing to do or kill, it’s just... it scares me sometimes. [Azazel!John: It shouldn’t. You did good.] You’re not mad? [For what?] Using a bullet. [Mad? I’m proud of you. You know, Sam and I, we can get pretty obsessed. But you, you watch out for this family. You always have.] (29:41)

Listen, you mind just getting this over with, huh? ‘Cause I really can’t stand the monologuing. [Azazel: Funny, but that’s all part of your M.O., isn’t it? Mask all that nasty pain, mask the truth.] Oh yeah? What’s that? [You know, you fight and you fight for this family, but the truth is, they don’t need you. Not like you need them. Sam—he’s clearly John’s favorite. Even when they fight, it’s more concern than he’s ever shown you.] (36:52)

Sam—

[Dean: Well, you and Dad are a lot more alike than I thought, you know that? You both can’t wait to sacrifice yourself for this thing. But you know what? I’m gonna be the one to bury you. You’re selfish, you know that? You don’t care about anything but revenge.] (19:24)

Misc—

Azazel: He’s gonna tear you apart. He’s gonna taste the iron in your blood. [Dean: Let him go, or I swear to God—] What? What are you and God gonna do? (35:09)

[peterstanslizzie]

Reacting To: The Hollow (Season 2 Episode 4)

Episode Title: Puzzled

Spoiler Warning: Kindly proceed if you’ve already seen the episode or are able to tolerate spoilers.

1. Continuing on from the cliffhanger in the previous episode, the gang tries to evade the green lasers being shot by the Stormtrooper-esque army and they manage to find safety in the building Mira is in. But the inside of that building isn’t so normal; They’ve actually entered a weird dimension of some sort with floating objects all around.

2. We get mini reunions between Mira and the rest of the guys. We also see Mira and Skeet having a cute little moment together with Skeet hugging and addressing her as “Meerkat”, just like her parents. And say what? Skeet is actually a nickname given to him by Mira; His real name is Bernard! Fascinating...

3. Mira wants their help to escape this dimension (in which gravity seems to work differently here) and go back to the real world. They follow her lead into a colorful building with loads of staircases that go in different directions. Adam fills Mira in on everything that’s happened since they got separated. 

4. Skeet is still confident in his theory that everything will go back to normal once his avatar dies in the game. So he foolishly jumps off the platform but drops right back onto it; It’s probably due to how the laws of Physics don’t apply to this place right now. Adam and now, Mira try to drill into his head that they’re most likely not in ‘The Hollow’ anymore and that he shouldn’t take such a risk. But judging from his facial expression afterwards, I’m pretty sure he will make another attempt. 

5. Mira takes them to a purple section with two wheels on its wall. She thinks it’s a puzzle that they should solve. Suddenly, this strange person in a suit with a multi-colored cube for his head pops up on a cloud (see picture above) and starts mocking Mira as she’s already been acquainted with him. 

6. They start investigating and experimenting with the two wheels on the purple wall, which if you turn them in different ways, they move portions of the floors and walls. They believe they are supposed to form the missing section of the path they’re on. The weird cube-head guy start messing with Mira and tries to trick her into thinking she’s doing the wrong thing. 

7. But after working on the puzzle some more, they are successfully able to create a path that leads them to an empty room. Ugh, great. More puzzles. The cube-head guy reappears and he gives them a riddle about them falling and sure you know it, the floor gives way and they all start to fall.  

8. As everybody else is focused on getting themselves onto a tower’s platform, Skeet still doesn’t give two effs and is just relaxing whilst falling to his death. He should be glad that Kai is able to fly because I’m starting to get annoyed with him trying to purposely die all the time. 

9. Just when I thought they’re all done with obstacles, the tiles of the platform they’re standing on start jumping up and down vigorously and they eventually form a huge cube with cube-guy’s face on it. It’s time for their final test. The cube then re-configures itself into a Rubik’s cube puzzle. Mira instantly knows that they’re supposed to form the logo of ‘The Hollow’. But they need to solve this puzzle quickly because the tower is about to collapse. 

10. With their combined effort, they manage to form the logo. But cube-head guy just has to rain on their and mine’s parade and says that they have one more game to play. OMG! Just stop! Can we please move on from these puzzles and games?

11. A portal opens and they all need to go in as quickly as they can. They are then taken to another world, where everything is empty and yellow? We find out that they’re now supposed to play a game show called ‘Find That Portal’ with Andy Kuma aka Akuma as it’s host. So Akuma’s back! The last time we saw him, he fell off the edge of the mountain after battling Adam for the Ishibo in season 1. 

12. However, he doesn’t seem like his old self. That’s pretty concerning. Anyways, he tells the group that they need to choose one of three doors that would lead them to freedom. And if they were to choose the incorrect one, well...I’m pretty sure it’s game over for them. Before they could discuss as a group, Kai blurted out, “Door No. 1″. *Face palms....Kai..

13. Akuma reveals what’s behind Door No. 2, which is just a donkey. So, the portal is behind one of the 2 remaining doors. He gives them the chance to switch their answer. The guys don’t think they should switch because to them, the odds of winning is still 50:50. But Mira, being the supposed probability genius tells them that they should switch because that would make their odds to now be 75:25. Isn’t this conditional probability or something? I kinda understand her frame of mind. 

14. Let’s see if she’s right....NOPE! Our girl is wrong. Ugh, how disappointing! The door reveals Katsuro, the beast that Adam had also beaten in Season 1. They try to forcibly open Door No.1 but it wouldn’t budge. It looks like it’s a rematch between the beast and Adam....and Adam wins again! And lucky for them, the beast accidentally breaks open the door and they are able to escape into the portal. 

15. They are pulled into a peaceful forest at night time. They want to keep moving but aren’t sure where to start. How about y’all use your map? And they do LOL. But wait, it has reset itself and it’s empty again! Adam thinks that the reason for this is because they’re not players in this game anymore. I’m so confused as to whether they’re in the game or not. I want to know what really happened to them after winning the game last season. They need to find Weirdy to make sense of all of this. 

16. Bernard, I mean Skeet spots a flashing light somewhere in the distance and they all make their way over there. Adam accidentally slips on a path of slime on the way. They think it’s left by a slime monster, which is probably true. Skeet randomly slides on the path of slime and I guess everyone else decides to do the same?

17. As they’ve stopped sliding, Skeet notices that the hill they saw a couple of minutes ago, changed positions. Is he sure that’s a hill? I’m pretty sure it’s a monster. How does a hill have spikes all around it?

18. And it turns out to be a giant snail, with razor sharp teeth! That explains all of that slime they just slid on. They battle the snail but it’s really strong and it takes out Adam and Kai in the process. It troubles me how they’re having such a hard time beating this dumb snail, especially after all the other enemies they’ve faced in the past. The snail then grabs hold of Mira and as it’s about to eat her, Skeet saves her and apparently sacrifices himself? What did the snail do to him? It was off camera. 

19. I love it when we see someone like Skeet do something heroic for the first time. But I hope he’s gonna be alright...even though it was always his intention to purposely lose the game.

20. Mira becomes very angry and emotional and starts yelling at the snail. Umm, do what you need to do girl. All of a sudden, a man somewhere in the distance calls out for the snail (his name is Louie?) and it leaves. Was that the snail’s owner or something?

21. They go over to Skeet, who’s lying unconscious on the ground. They try to give him the medicine that was left by the team who pixelated last episode but it isn’t working. OMG! I’m starting to get emotional just by watching this. I know he’s gonna be alright (I think) but it’s so sad watching Mira cry like that. And I say that because if he’s really dead, he would have pixelated by now. He’s probably just unconscious or really hurt. Basically, it’d better be a false alarm. If not, I don’t know what Mira would do; Would she take her revenge against the snail or the snail’s owner?

22. Let’s see what Skeet’s or Bernand’s fate would be in episode 5, which you can check out my review of it very soon. Thanks for reading. Bye!

[filthyjanuary]

7-12 and 16-20 for the asks!

7. What do you dislike about your favourite season?

i think season 2 is the best, but as i’ve said before, my favourite is 4 solely because the first few eps i watched were from s4. i think season 4 is very solid and even though it’s a season that HURTS BAD because of everything happening between sam and dean, i think the show earns the conflict for the most part. the literal only thing that still haunts me is that the STUPID VOICEMAIL THAT GETS ALTERED IS NEVER ADDRESSED. like i hate more than anything that sam still thinks dean said those things. like i know jared’s said that sam knows dean loves him but i don’t care!!! sam /and/ dean deserve to know the voicemail was changed.

OH also literally everything with anna milton. she deserved better <3 sorry the fridged you and gave part of your arc to a man, queen.

also sam and dean should’ve found out cas let sam out of the panic room.

8. Thoughts on Sam’s demon blood arc

i love sam’s demon blood arc. his hot girl summer! in all seriousness, it makes perfect sense. mystery spot sets it up that sam goes dark when he doesn’t have dean, and s4 is the natural progression of that. i love sam being hellbent on revenge, and the blood drinking was hot sorry not sorry. like obviously the end result wasn’t stellar and the handling of the demon blood as an addiction was handled rather shittily in the show, but overall this arc is near and dear to me and if i couldn’t have the boy king, i’m glad i got this instead. and it brings up some really interesting concepts that get explored really well in fic.

9. Thoughts on the Moc arc

i hate this arc mostly because like dean was terrible...which makes sense, but even after the mark was gone it’s like... he never /really/ pulls himself out of that place. it also just dragged on for FAR too long. like it didn’t need to be like 30 episodes or however long. i do like that it gave us demon!dean being like sexythreatening, and that scene of sam cradling dean’s face and begging him to tell him that he had to kill all those people and just the general sam is dean’s colette of it all. also the end of s10 with sam on his knees and dean telling him to close his eyes is deeply fucked up and i love it for that reason and obviously that happened bc of the MOC storyline.

10. Fave underrated ep

i am highkey obsessed with 1x04 phantom traveller, 2x07 the usual suspects and 4x19 jump the shark and i feel like most people don’t really care about those episodes or bring them up much. phantom traveller is just interesting bc i think the character moments are fun and i am obsessed with plane crashes for some reason. the usual suspects i just adore because it’s really a great exploration of HOW WELL sam and dean know each other and just how alike they are. and unfortunately i really like the cop lady in this one. jump the shark was the second episode of supernatural i ever saw and for some reason something in my brain latched onto adam and never let go. i love him so much (i know it’s not really him in the ep but ukno) and i love how much you learn about sam and dean through it too.

11. Thoughts on BMOL

boring. like...the actors were not good at their accents. they wanted what bela talbot had in s3. i just didn’t find ‘the british are evil’ a compelling storyline in a supernatural show.... like girl i live in real life you don’t need to preach to me about the british. also like they set up ketch to be evil like worse than toni who i already hate because she tortures/sexually assaults sam by having him kill magda i guess? but then they end up redeeming him and he survives longer than both mick (affectionate) and toni (derogatory), like seriously one of the worst Big Bads they’ve ever had.

12. Thoughts on Mary

to be honest, i think bringing her back was kind of a stupid idea in the sense that the ENTIRE SHOW starts because of her death. but i felt like HAVING DONE THAT, trying to deconstruct her image as like this nuclear housewife was compelling and the whole clash of sam and dean who just want their mom versus mary who left her kids as a an infant and a small child and now has these grown men who are older than her needing things she doesn’t know how to give was very interesting. and i wish they’d done more with that. 

16. Any criticisms of their world building/lore

well i think everyone’s said it better than me that they can’t seem to get their stance on monsters straight at all and the show suffers for it. i also hate how like the later seasons especially just blatantly retcon so much. the prime example is the garden of eden in s5 vs s15.... the s5 version was so much more interesting and i hate that they brought it back just to destroy their own lore. the whole concept of the abrahamic god being like the ‘real’ god vs other gods just being minor annoyances didn’t like...make sense or feel good either. i also would’ve loved more exploration of like what the fuck it means to be a vessel and also exploration of other monsters/urban legends. like ok we get it ghosts/demons/vampires/werewolves sure w/e but there’s so much to pull from. it got repetitive and there’s so many other things they could’ve tried. hell the SECOND EPISODE of the show mentions black dogs and we never actually encounter one. or like chimeras... like there’s just plenty to dig into and they just get lazy.

17. What did you like about s15?

15x20 <3 also just...jack....that’s my son! MICHAEL/ADAM IN 15X08!!!! i think there were a couple moments i liked in like...the gambler and last holiday, and i thought belphagor was funny. oh! also sam’s nightmare visions were kinda fun even tho they led back to lucifer :/

18. Thoughts on Lucifer

he was a really excellent and intimidating villain in s5.... and frankly i enjoyed hallucifer as well because sure he was presented comedically but he was a deeply dark presence hanging over sam as a reminder of what he suffered. everything after that...sucked!!! it sucked!!!!! overstayed his welcome, letting him out of the cage again totally nullifies sam’s sacrifice and frankly he lost every smidge of intimidation factor he ever had. he was just annoying and whiny and pointless and sam should’ve killed him <3 fuck that guy.

19. Most uncomfortable moments throughout the show for you?

answered here

20. Define the different eras in a few lines or words (s1-5, s6-7, s8-11, s12-15)

this was meant to be short... and then it wasnt... sorry.

kripke: PEAK SUPERNATURAL. racist AND sexist but like i frankly do not care because the actually storytelling is so GOOD. COHERENT. i long for what could’ve been had the strike not kneecapped s3 and we’d gotten boyking, but hell the arc we DID get... so good. so fulfilling. aesthetics go off the charts. character dynamics so good!!! conflicts are earned!!!! there was a fucking vision here and it was unique and interesting and the show was COMMITTED TO IT. literally iconic television i love her so much. eric kripke needs a therapist but i’m glad he wrote this show instead of going to see one. 

gamble: sera THEE gamble.... overarching storylines kinda weak, but SO FUN! i had fucking fun! soulless sam is a comedian, godstiel was the last time cas was remotely interesting, like!!!! she gave us everything!!!!! gets slandered way too much by this hell fandom like yes the leviathans were stupid but the were FUN and the character moments in s6-s7!!! so good!!!! lots of excellent MOTW eps as well, which... as we know...i love. when the show lost gamble, it lost something great, i’ll die on this hill. i love u #girlboss.

carver: there’s a lot of good here and a lot i despise. dean steadily grows darker throughout the show but there’s like a real VEER into being awful in s9 that the show never recovers from. it makes dean very unlikeable for the rest of its run, mostly by virtue of the show not realizing how unlikeable it’s made dean because it needs him to always be right so the fact that he’s basically turned into john is never like....addressed in any meaningful way. some storylines (MOC!!) dragged on for too long, while others were way too short (TRIALS!!!) but ultimately i think there were some good ideas here and moments i’m fond of. season 11 is Beautiful. i love her so much. there’s some really excellent eps in s11 and the character moments are good.

dabb: i literally hate it here (jack sweetie you are not included in this assessment you’re doing great). it was just stupid. the characterizations of EVERYBODY sucked and fell flat. way too obsessed with pandering to the loudest faction on twitter. took the wreckage of dean that carver left and full destroyed him. like straight up could’ve done something meaningful if they’d bothered to address it at all but they literally didn’t ever make dean be accountable for his actions??? can’t tell u what cas was doing it was so forgettable he obviously had no purpose literally the only scenes i remember were a couple where he’s being cute with jack and that one ep where he and sam go to that old-timey town and sam gets brainwashed. sam like... exists, and his character is intact but it’s only intact because the writers that were left didn’t want to bother giving him anything meaty to do to so the were like *spins wheel* leadership arc that goes nowhere, and he just exists being kind and compassionate and putting up with too much shit. BUT HE HAD REALLY FUCKING EXCELLENT MOMENTS WITH JACK and that alone is why i think it’s worth the slog. sam/jack is my favourite dynamic on the show following sam/dean so...unfortunately based on that.... i can’t just burn the whole dabb era but seriously... way to make every character a hollow, one-dimensional shell.

send me supernatural asks

[blodreina-noumou]

Final Season Spec Game

I’m out of tag games to speculate on season 7, so here we are! I wanted to keep these questions mostly upbeat (because we all know how this show can be sometimes lol we’re in for angst for sure 😉) and there’s 16 of them, one for each remaining ep! Feel free to play along everybody… Stay safe! 💙

I swiped this from @katersann​ - great questions!

1. Which character are you most excited to learn the endgame of: 

There’s only a handful of characters I truly care about anymore, and there will always be one that rises above the rest -

Obviously next season is going to feature the Anomaly in a big way, and since that whole thing seems deeply connected to Octavia, I think we can safely assume that this will be a big season for her. I hope she makes it out alive, but on some level, I won’t be surprised if she doesn’t. Going out in a blaze of glory was always more her style. I think that’s true even now.

2. Which character are you most excited to learn the backstory of: 

I’m definitely curious about Hope Diyoza. The fact that she and Octavia appeared to know each other in the s6 finale has huge implications. And I’m sure her life has been really fuckin’ interesting - with a mother like Charmaine, how couldn’t it be?

3. One character who deserves a new look: 

Madi!

She’s not a scrappy forest child anymore, nor is she a Baby Warlord. I’d love to see her in anything but leather (or a hospital gown, yikes.) I don’t know how central to the main plot she’ll be, since she no longer has The Flame, but I do hope we get to see something about her trying to become a semi-normal kid.

4. Two locations you want to revisit: 

If I had my druthers, I’d love to see the Dropship again. It was such a central location in the first two seasons, and one of the things that’s been tough for me since the second Praimfaya has been how we lost all those iconic locations. 

I also really loved the look of Shallow Valley aka Eden. A very cute, aesthetically pleasing location, gone too soon.

5. Three brotps you hope get more screentime: 

Octavia and Diyoza!

(Technically a Brot3 but just try and stop me!) Raven, Murphy, and Emori!

Raven and Echo!

6. Who will get the happiest ending: 

Honestly a tough call, because I don’t know if anyone will truly get a “happy” ending. If I had to guess, Raven and Echo are actually pretty high up there. As long as they both survive the season, I think they’ll finally find some peace on the other side.

7. Which minor or new characters you want to see more of: 

Given that Jordan was a series regular last season, we saw a LOT less of him than I expected. I think he’s going to be an unexpected antagonist in the final season, which should be a lot of fun.

8. Who will eventually snap Jordan out of the funk we see him in, at the end of 6x13: 

Agh, I don’t know. He didn’t really get a chance to connect with any of his parents’ old friends, did he? The deepest connection he made was with Delilah, and she’s dead and gone - but I don’t think he believes that, I think he’s fully swallowed the Sanctum juice at this point. I could maybe see Raven snapping him out of it, or Bellamy. If it’s not them, it’ll definitely be some message from Marper somehow. Or, tragically, he won’t make it out of the funk. I’ll be really mad if that happens, given who his namesake was. The Jordan curse.

9. Who will be the first to tell Bellamy he can’t immediately run into the Anomaly after Octavia: 

Oddly enough, my money is on Hope. And I think Bellamy will immediately distrust her and try to go anyway, but Echo will ultimately stop him.

10. To reference Monty’s ‘do better’ mantra: 

I’d like to hear it from Murphy, to be honest, or Emori. I don’t think it was necessarily Clarke’s right to take so much ownership of that one, last season.

11. To say 'go float yourself’: 

I hope I hear it from the mouth of every single (former) Delinquent, lmao. It’d actually be hilarious if someone like Emori or Echo said it, though. Show how it’s left the Ark as slang and entered the general parlance. 

12. Random object or prop you would bring back for Season 7 if you could: 

Lexa’s throne/Clarke’s walking stick. I really fuckin’ loved that little callback, y’all. Clarke leaning on a piece of Lexa to make it through her time in isolation - ugh, murder me. Even if it isn’t a major plot point, I’d like to see it in the background somewhere. I don’t think it made it off Earth, though.

13. Book One storyline/reference you want to see back for Season 7: 

We’ve got 16 episodes, right? Bring back my funny fillers! I know they weren’t common, and weren’t 100% funny, but I’d love to see an episode like “Day Trip” again.

14. Dead character you would like mentioned: 

Lincoln, Anya, and Nyko. Pay respect to the OG grounders. Even if it’s just in passing.

15. How do you think Hope and Octavia know each other (from season 6): 

There’s been a lot of speculation about what this face was meant to imply -

Personally, when I look at Octavia’s face, I see an entire goddamn story. It’s a story I might fully be projecting, but I’m going with my gut until proven otherwise. Octavia helped raise Hope. When she sees her, she looks at her the way one might a kid they haven’t seen in a long time - there’s surprise, tenderness, pride. A moment of almost not recognizing her, then realization that’s she’s the a kid she loves, all-grown-up now, and that’s what makes her emotional.

My other theory is that Octavia didn’t remember Hope at all until she saw her, which is why she looks confused, then surprised, then happy. She’s suddenly remembering a person who is very important to her, who she had forgotten (likely due to the timey-wimey/doorway weirdness of the Anomaly) and all of her memories coming back is what causes this reaction.

I’m reasonably certain that there won’t be any romantic attachment between them. As much as I’d love it, I just don’t see the show making Octavia explicitly sapphic so late in the game. One of the consequences of trying to create a world where sexual orientation doesn’t matter is that the writers tend to beat us over the head with what type of person each character is attracted to - that’s why we see Clarke and Niylah together multiple times, and why Clarke and Cillian got together. The writers want us to remember, always, without subtlety, that Clarke likes both men and women.

We just haven’t seen any real clues that Octavia is attracted to women. As much as I’m pulling for it, it’s clear that the writers intend her relationship with Niylah to be platonic. 

So, given all of that, I just don’t think Hope and Octavia will be a romantic couple.

That only leaves us with so many options - either they were friends or like family. Given the weirdness of Diyoza going into the Anomaly pregnant and her fully grown daughter stepping out of it three days later, my money is on like family. I think Octavia and Diyoza raised Hope together in the Anomaly, somehow, and that’s how they know each other.

16. How do you think it all will end?: 

I think it will have a lot to do with the backdoor pilot, how much that retcons, and how committed they are to giving this show a satisfying ending when they’ve already creatively moved on to a new world.

If I pretend I don’t know about the backdoor pilot, I’m even less sure. I’m hoping for a satisyfing ending. Not a happy one. I don’t think that would be true to the series.

I’m betting either Clarke or Bellamy dies, and my money has been on Bellamy for awhile. Call it a gut feeling. 

I think almost everyone else will survive. We’ve lost a lot of people along the way in this show, and I think they’ll give us one Big Death of the season, so that death has the greatest impact. And since I’m betting on it being Bellamy, well... that means I’m pretty sure everyone else will make it.

There’s been a lot of little background info dropped about how impossible life on Sanctum is without constant maintenance, and most if not all of that maintenance came from the more-or-less free labor of the people serving the Primes. It’s impossible to know how things will go in terms of Emori and Murphy being Primes now, and how long that will last. Because of that, and because of the “doorway” to another world that the Anomaly allegedly is, I’m betting Sanctum is not our final destination. I’m thinking we’ll end up on Earth again, somehow.

I hope it ends with everyone who survives together, and happy, and with a plan for a sustainable society that doesn’t murder each other every two months.

Tagging: @boomheda​ @awesomenell65​ @captainwilldameron​ @blodkru​ @dylanobrienisbatman​ @teeandsnowflakes​ and anyone else who I normally tag, I’m honestly drawing a blank rn. The usual “please steal this” rules apply!

[autisticmight]

how does someone who knows little-to-nothing about it get into sanders sides? i saw thomas' vines, and i've been sort of tangentially aware that the facets of his personality that he portrayed in the vines have since become characters, but there's a whole bunch of new ones??? what the fuck is a janus???? HELP. tldr where do i find The Lore? plz obi wan ur my only hope

it’s very simple!!! you hyperfixate on thomas sanders’s content in, like, 2016? and then he uploads a video called ‘my true identity’, which is a bit weird, but you love those vine characters. then he uploads more, and it becomes a trend. apparently people in the comments are shipping the prince guy and anxiety. you rewatch the new year’s video an embarrassing amount of times with your dog

i had a whole paragraph here about why i like the series, and why i dropped it and then picked it up again, but it was just a block of lowercase text and i guess it’s kind of hard to read

anyway, here’s the playlist of every episode, but i’m going to put a summary of the series and individual episodes under the readmore, while also ranking them, because i am Special Interesting and i like being useful. and i guess i’m gonna write using. like. actual grammar. if the readmore doesn’t work, then. have fun reading my infodump

here we go

Sanders Sides: A Summary

Fictional Version Of Thomas Sanders (known as Character!Thomas, and will be simply referred to as ‘Thomas’ henceforth) has ‘Sides’, which are parts of his personality that have been exaggerated and personified. It’s a nice little series set in some kind of semi-urban fantasy world, but mostly in Thomas’s living room. It mostly uses the idea of ‘Sides’ to represent the inner schemata of an individual. In simpler terms, you know when you’re conflicted, and you end up arguing with yourself? Yeah, it’s that.

Also, don’t read the comments, unless you want to disregard the care I’ve taken to not put spoilers in the Season 1 Summaries.

Season 1

I’d like to split this into parts, because there are a lot of things in earlier episodes that conflict with later characterisation. However, it’s also fun to watch them, and then rewatch them after some of the longer episodes, and feel your heart shatter!

This half of Season 1 was made solely by Thomas. It tends to be a bit more scattered, and can be watched out of chronological order, or completely skipped. Yes, I’m telling you that you can skip literally all of this section, if you want to. However, these are also the easiest videos to watch, and offer a taste of Silly Sanders Sides Hijinks without the emotional commitment.

My True Identity (6 min) - Thomas delves into the three aspects of his personality; his Logic (Teacher Guy), his Creativity (the Prince, also called Princey), and his Morality (Dad Guy who is Not Thomas’s Dad). At this point, the characters are far more similar to their Vine counterparts, and the characterisation clashes with later episodes. (3/5 - A nice way to see if you’ll enjoy the humour of this series)

Way Too Adult (5 min) - Thomas is asked by his family to help cook Thanksgiving dinner. Dad Guy pops up and discusses with Thomas how he can better learn to take care of himself. Features a talking stove, which is part of the reason why I classify this series as urban fantasy, and the start of a running joke. (2/5 - A fun, albeit rare, look into Dad Guy being responsible. I actually prefer this to My True Identity, but ranks lower due to conflicting with later S1 characterisation.)

Taking On Anxiety with Lilly Singh (6 min) - Thomas hopes and dreams to get rid of his Anxiety, who is a sassy, snide guy, sitting on the staircase. Princey, as the embodiment of Thomas’s hopes and dreams, is... Usurped by an imaginary version of Lilly Singh, who helps teach Thomas how to cope with feeling anxious. (3/5 - Introduces some secret tools that will help us later. The tools are Thomas being able to travel to various places in his head, and also Anxiety.)

A New Year of Lying to Myself... In Song!! (7 min) - The first video wherein you realise that this is A Thing. Thomas welcomes in the new year, hoping that 2017 will be better than 2016. Logic shows up to help him figure out some New Year’s Resolutions, accompanied by Dad Guy and Princey. Anxiety joins in to point out that Thomas has rarely, if ever, kept to his resolutions before. Through the first musical number of the series, the Core Sides and Thomas figure out simple, achievable resolutions that Thomas can use to improve his wellbeing. (4/5 - Unintentional foreshadowing in the form of a bop.)

The Dark Side of Disney (6 min) - Princey, not for the last time, enthuses about the wonders of Disney. However, Anxiety also appears, insisting that Disney is not as wholesome as it first appears. They argue and bond, despite the fact that Thomas still hasn’t redacted his statement regarding his hopes and dreams to get rid of his Anxiety. (2/5 - I have strong feelings on the meaning of ‘Beauty and the Beast’ and ‘The Little Mermaid’, both of which are shrugged off in favour of the tryhard-edgy ‘blegh stockholm syndrome’ and ‘blegh change yourself to get your man’. Still, it’s a fan-favourite for a reason, and the endcard always makes me smile.)

I’m in a Disney Show!! (6 min) - Princey enthuses about the wonders of Disney, because Thomas is in a Disney show. He talks about what happened, while the Sides (mostly Logic) suggest clickbait titles in order to entice people to watch the video. (2/5 - L*gan P*ul is mentioned, as he was also in the episode.)

The Mind vs. The Heart (6 min) - Thomas finds himself split between following his mind, Logic, or his heart, Morality. Features onesies, and looks further into the characters of Logic and Dad Guy. (3/5 - Pretty calm and peaceful, to be honest. It’s nice.)

Then we move onto the second part of Season 1. This is when Thomas’s friend, Joan, began to offer their input into scriptwriting and directing. They’re most of the reason why Sanders Sides is an actual series, instead of being silly skit characters in short vlogs. From here on in, episodes become more complex, and work on an actual timeline.

Alone on Valentines Day (9 min) - Thomas is rather upset that he will be, as the title says, alone on Valentine’s Day. The Sides try to help him figure out how to get a date with an imaginary version of his friend Valerie, but each of them has a weirder way of going about it than the last. (4/5 - Far more cohesive than previous videos, but Thomas still wasn’t fully out as gay, so his hypothetical date is a woman. Yes, I took points off because of that. Yes, I’m about to erase the 3/5 to make it 4/5 because Valerie is a delight.)

Losing My Motivation (9 min) - When Thomas finds himself procrastinating, Logic takes it upon himself to find out which side is causing it. In order to get into a deductive mindset, Logic dresses up as Sherlock, while Dad Guy joins in as Watson. Once the case is solved, an important piece of information is revealed: the Sides have names. (Logic’s name is revealed) (3/5 - It’s just a fun little video, and I can’t keep giving every video from here on in 4/5, or that’ll ruin the whole thingy.)

Sanders Sides Q&A (9 min) - Exactly what it sounds like. There’s not much else to say. (2/5 - I love it, but it’s not really necessary to understand the whole series. It’s just extra characterisation.)

Am I Original? (12 min) - Thomas finds himself in a creative rut, trying to think of a completely original idea. Princey requests full creative control - “full-on Daydream Mode” - in order to rapidly consider and enact many different concepts, all while trying to make something that has never been seen before. (Princey’s name is revealed) (4/5 - Important characterisation for Princey. I originally rated it lower due to Thomas’s inability to rap, but upon rewatching, i found that the ending dialogue between Princey and Thomas was worth two points, rather than the single one I gave it previously.)

My Negative Thinking (13 min) - When Thomas messes up in an audition, his ego - Princey - is out of commission and being cared for by Dad Guy. Therefore, the only Sides available to aid him in this situation are Logic and Anxiety, neither of whom can help Thomas in the way he wants to. Anxiety is worsening Thomas’s mental state, so Logan proposes a debate in order to combat those cognitive distortions. (4/5 - A fan-favourite episode which offers a lot of insight into Logic and Anxiety as characters. It is useful as a tool for identifying cognitive distortions in real life, which may help with the individual’s mental health. Even though it introduces another running joke, it’s educational and fun, and it develops their relationship in a positive manner, I just don’t particularly enjoy it.)

Growing Up (15 min) - It’s Thomas’s birthday! He’s in his late twenties, and he’s still a kid at heart. He hasn’t done his laundry, he's silly and immature, and he feels like he isn’t at the point that he needs to be in his life. Therefore, all the Sides, except for Dad Guy, who ironically embodies Thomas’s inner child, work on trying to make him more mature. (Morality’s name is revealed) (3/5 - Features the concept of Voltron Shirt. I love this episode, but there is a noticeable change in audio quality at the end which affects how enjoyable it is.)

Making Some Changes (15 min) - Back in Thomas’s living room, and in opposition to his view from the last episode, Anxiety is worried about how life changes in unpredictable ways, and especially about losing contact with Thomas’s friends. Therefore, in order to keep Thomas’s friends permanently by his side, Princey gets them all to shapeshift. (3/5 - It might be skippable, but it’s just really, really fun.)

Becoming A Cartoon (10 min) - Adding to the whole urban fantasy thing, it turns out that animators can literally, physically turn people into cartoons. Thomas wants to be a cartoon. Princey catches Anxiety in his arms and says “everybody loves the villain,” and I think that’s all you need to know. (1/5 - Co-stars B*tch H*rtman, known for Fairly Odd Parents, Danny Phantom, and Being A Bigot, who did the character designs for the Sides, if not the actual animation. And the designs are kind of. Eh. Just watch some fanmade animatics.)

Accepting Anxiety (23 min) - Part 1: Excepting Anxiety (10 min), and Part 2: Can Anxiety Be Good? (14 min) - HOO. If the musical number or the animation didn’t clue you in, this video confirms that Sanders Sides is A Thing. Remember how Thomas hoped and dreamt to get rid of his Anxiety? Remember how he never redacted that statement, or even expressed a bit of remorse? Well, here, his wishes come true, and he doesn’t feel bad about it at all! That’s because he has absolutely no shame, caution, or fear of death. Yeah, he’s a mess. Therefore, the Sides make him take them on a magical quest to Anxiety’s Room, in order to un-mess-ify Thomas. (Anxiety’s name is revealed) (5/5 - The team really went above and beyond with this one. Like. Hoo. That’s it. Just. Hoo. Hoo. I’m an owl.)

And that’s Season 1!!! I’m going to add Season 2 in a reblog, because this has taken roughly three hours and it’s been really difficult to not spoil their names!!! which i did anyway because their names are all easier to type from muscle memory!!!

[wallofweird]

This Is Us Q&A

Thanks @madsdefencesquad for tagging me. :)

1. The first character I first fell in love with:

Dr. Nathan Katowski. He just seemed to be such a charismatic, generous, wise and kind person and the way he comforted those two nervous young people (Jack and Rebecca) who were entering parenthood for the very first time was simply beautiful. Specially because nowadays some doctors are so arrogant and cold that make you feel so bad to the point of almost apologizing for needing their care (not most though, we have real life heroes out there on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic and I’m forever thankful for them!). Anyway, it was pleasant to see a character with so much heart. Now the first regular character I fell in love with was Randall. He was just so relatable and Sterling and the writers really managed to show all the affliction he kept inside from early on. All the things he had accumulated through the years, with the questions about his biological parents, his identity, finding out that William was dying the same day he met him and everything... Even before we got to dive into that story, you could see it in his eyes. And I empathized with him immediately.

2. The character I never expected to love as much as I do now:

Kevin. I used to find him very annoying and self-centered and now I’m eating my words, but I guess that’s always been the writers intention: to show a character that came off as really shallow and immature and slowly change our minds about him. It definitely worked. My opinion about him started to change on the ‘Number One’ episode. It broke my heart to see what he was going through, specially when he lost the only thing he had left from Jack. That was hard to watch. And now that I’m rewatching the show, I can get his actions a lot better now and see that a lot of the stuff I used to hate came from his insecurities. So I’ve changed my mind about his behavior on the first episodes and I’m enjoying seeing him back then as well. I can see the bigger picture now.

3. The character everyone else loves that I don’t:

Cassidy. I don’t really believe there’s a consensus about her, it looks like the opinions are pretty balanced, but I’m not a fan of her. I wouldn’t say I hate Cassidy, but I don’t really like her. Like, the other characters can get me to laugh and cry so easily, but she doesn’t make me feel anything? She looks kind of cold to me, which I can understand it probably has something to with being in the military and the things she had to experience and do, but even with the whole drama with her son and husband... It's just never given me the same emotion I use to get from the other characters. Also, I really wanted the first half of the season to be only about Kevin and his uncle, but they threw a stranger in it and played with the idea of putting Kevin and Cassidy together the whole time. I just wanted to see their dynamic without anybody’s interference, specially because I haven’t got the point of her presence yet. I believe Kevin and Nicky would’ve done just fine in their journey to sobriety without her and I don’t really think the woman will marry any of them. I hope there’s something bigger planned for her that will explain her addition to the show, because I don’t really get it. So far it just looks like she’s there to mislead us with the whole “who is Kevin’s wife?” mystery.

4. The character I love that everyone else hates:

Madison. I wouldn’t say everybody hates her, for me the public has mixed opinions about her? I’ve seen people who hate her, who are indifferent, who like her and think she’s funny and people who love her. However, I do believe she deserves more praise. I think she’s kind of in the same situation Kevin used to be a few years ago. A lot of people have a pre-fabricated idea of Madison and see her as someone shallow and immature. Madison has always been there for Kate, even when she was nothing but rude to her. When Kate hit her car (I know it was accidentally, but still), Madison got over it the second she learned Kate was pregnant. She immediately forgot about her car and was filled with nothing but joy after hearing the news. Madison also helped Kate to enjoy the process of finding her wedding dress, staying positive with her second pregnancy after the previous miscarriage... She’s been there through thick and thin. And she is so loving, selfless and strong that was willing to raise her twins and go through all of that by herself to avoid getting in the way of Kevin finding his great love story. How can somebody not admire that? Even if you don’t like her, because that’s understandable and sometimes a character just doesn’t resonate with us, there’s absolutely no reason to hate or criticize her personality and actions. Madison is very underrated, but she is an amazing person. I just don’t understand why people have changed their minds about Kevin after seeing his struggles and evolution, but won’t do the same with her. The only difference here is the amount of screentime they have and the gender, because they’re both great people. I really don’t get it.

5. The character I used to love but don’t any longer:

One of the great things about this show is that I’ve never stopped loving any of the characters. There are characters I don’t really like, there are characters that have grown on me, but the opposite has never happen. However, I am a little angry with Randall and Kevin after that fight. I won’t defend any of them. They were both terrible to each other. 

I get where they’re both coming from when it comes to how they deal with Rebecca’s health. It’s understandable wanting to save your mother. It’s understandable wanting her to enjoy the time she has left. There is no right or wrong decision in these situations. And a lot of how they deal with it comes from their personalities and traumas. They both have this hole in their lives because of losing Jack. Randall blames himself and thinks about what life would’ve been if he hadn’t died every single day. His anxiety also plays a role in how he process everything. It’s consuming. On the other hand, Kevin regrets not having spent as much time with his father as he could’ve had. He’s also already gone through therapy, is a year sober and attending the AA meetings regularly... He can see things more clearly than Randall right now. So I don’t judge either of them for how they approach to the situation. Still, Randall should’ve respected Rebecca’s decision. Period. He was selfish and I can’t defend what he did. I can understand why he did it and I didn’t really see it as him manipulating his mother, for me it was more of a desperate moment, when he was telling Rebecca he cannot handle losing her. Not that Kevin and Kate can handle losing their mother, but he’s clearly overwhelmed with the whole situation, while Kevin and Kate are at a better mental state and looking at things with more serenity.

However, regarding their fight, Kevin’s got some fault too. I’m sure they didn’t mean anything they said to one another, they just happened to know each other’s deepest wounds and wanted to rub them. It was painful to watch. Kevin knows Randall feels guilty for letting Jack walk back into the house. Randall knows Kevin feels guilty for not being there. Kevin knows Randall have never felt liked he completely fitted in, because he was abandoned by his biological father and adopted only after Rebecca and Jack lost a child. He’s always felt a little lost or as a replacement to Kyle. And Randall knows Kevin is self-conscious and feels like people don’t take him seriously or believe he can be responsible. It was heartbreaking and cruel. And I’m rewatching season 1 and recently saw the episode where they finally begin to grow closer and there is this scene where Randall says:

“[Mom] showered me with attention. Took my side more often than not. And I ate every bit of her love up. Ate it up like Pac-Man. You know why? Because the one person I wanted it from the mo..

[...]

You know, back there with those people, it's the first time in 36 years you've said the words, ‘he's my brother’, [as] claiming me.”

I’ve also just finished the episode where it shows young Randall having a nervous breakdown and Kevin ignoring him. Kevin and Randall did have some good moments growing up, but for most of it they weren’t close and Randall was the one who tried the harder to change that. It took them over 30 years to get to a place where they finally acted like brothers on a regular basis and now they have both ruined all of that progress. So I can’t really pick sides and blame one of them when it comes to that fight. They were both terrible. However, I’m just a little more disappointed with Randall because he interfered in Rebecca’s decision.

6. The character I would totally smooch:

Kevin. Justin Hartley just happens to be on my Male Celebrity Crush Top 2, so...

7. The character I’d want to be like:

Beth. She’s smart, successful, funny, wise and beautiful, I’d like to have at least 30% of that awesomeness. 

8. The character I’d slap:

Marc.

9. A pairing that I love:

Jack and Rebecca. Their love story, even with its ups and downs, remains epic. One for the ages, indeed. 

Still, I really miss a slowburn ship. We’ve had Jack and Rebecca, Kate and Toby, Randall and Beth since the very beginning. They were all love at first sight. They got together pretty quickly. I miss a ship that I can see go through all of those basic stages, like meeting, becoming friends and falling in love. I miss seeing a character pining for another and being a little bit jealous of them. I miss watching the scenes with the lingering looks, deep breaths, both staring at each other when the other isn’t noticing... All this tension building up until the moment it just explodes. Like, give me angst scenes! Give me a scene where they are hugging so tight and not wanting to let go and Character A can’t resist it anymore and kisses character B as if their his/her depended on it. Give me rain kisses. Give me character A pining for character B, but doubting that B feels the same way. Give me B being just as insanely in love as A and feeling frustrated whenever they’re around someone else. Give me character B being unconsciously jealous and fighting with character A. Give me A blurting out that he/she is in love with B and a passionate kiss. I know it’s cliché, but there is a reason why everyone loves scenes like these: they work. And This Is Us needs stuff like that. Hopefully Kevin and Madison can fill this gap, since I’m already in love with their potential. ;)

10. A pairing that I despise:

Kevin and Sophie. I genuinely have nothing against Sophie, she is a good person and she deserves happiness. If anything, Kevin was the one who wronged her. However, I can’t help sighing and rolling my eyes whenever she shows up or her name is mentioned on the show. I’m just tired at this point. I’ve never saw the appeal of it. I’m usually a slowburn kind of shipper, but I still have my ‘love at first sight’ otps. This one, however, never really convinced me. First, I don’t see the chemistry at all (in any timeline). Second, he’s cheated on her twice. Plus, the second time they were together, Kevin had fallen back into drinking and she didn’t even realize the seriousness of the situation. I’m not saying it was her fault or responsibility, because that’s a real problem and what Kevin needed was professional help. Also, he lied to her and broke Sophie’s heart again in the process, so I can empathize with her. Still, the fact that Sophie couldn’t see what was going on and they were never able to go through it together, whether it was his treatment, or the long distance or any real obstacle just proves to me they don’t work. They simply couldn’t work together. And Kevin has moved on. He moved on from her and genuinely fell in love with Zoe. They broke up because they wanted different things, but their relationship was real. So, the way I see it, the fact that he suddenly wants another ‘crack at it’ with Sophie, it’s just a result of his frustration. Kevin is so desperate to have his own great love story and children, that he is trying to get it from strangers on coffee shops or any ex-girlfriend that will reach out to him. He’s not thinking things through, but hopefully he will let life takes it course and find find them naturally, without forcing anything or insisting on relationships that have proved multiple times that weren’t the right fit for him. I also don’t really like when characters appear with the solely purpose to be someone’s love interest, I like seeing them in their own element and their dynamic with other characters. Like, even though each Pearson has their immediate family, we’ve seen bits of Beth and Rebecca, Toby and Kevin, Beth and Zoe, Kate and Madison (who at this point I’m pretty sure is Kevin’s fiancée)... Sophie wasn’t fully integrated into the family during their second attempt at a relationship, so that’s another reason for me not to like this ship.

I don’t wanna tag anyone specifically because I’m afraid I might forget someone, so anyone who wants to do this thing, just go for it. I’d love to see your answers. :)

[jan-uinely]

hot takes [pt. ii]

good[e] morning campers! we have more thoughts on \_ |_ | _/  RuPaul’s Drag Race episode 9... because i have nothing better to think about... lol. This is a novel, btw. 

SO... I have said it before and i will say it again... the in memorium segment gave me life. Robot Barbie Cheerleader. also RIP to jan’s clear drink in untucked. 

Let’s get into the gig, because why not. Unsure if readers are aware, but I am very politically minded. [do I use tumblr as a way to put politics aside for a little while? sure. but I have also worked on campaigns, did not take Elizabeth warren dropping out of the presidential race well... I mean she dropped at the beginning of march and now look at where we are.... anyWAYs.]

I did not like this episode. I did not like the challenge. From what I understand, the only other time this challenge was done was in season 4, but I stopped watching season 4 when sharon wore a conf*derate flag bodysuit for a mini challenge, prior to which she wore a mccain/palin shirt. I still don’t know if it was a joke, but #yeet. 

So this episode took the place of a “roast”/ stand up episode. Those are usually fine. They separate folks a little bit more. But, as someone who followed the recent primary with a VERY close eye, but was could also be humorous about it... Debates are hard to do. What makes a debate work is that everyone is well versed on everyone else’s platform, and knows how to attack them, because they have been the same person the whole time. For some reason, everyone “invented” a different character to play.... no one had a real platform... and it’s really hard to ~volley~ when people don’t really understand everyone’s characters. I also think, similar to the democratic primary- that there were too many people on stage. I also think snatch game happened too early... but that’s another story never mind anyway [did you catch that into the woods/bernadette peters joke???? @ JAN ]. 

So everyone has these “characters” which for the most part are not super consistent with who they’ve been portraying on the show... which makes it challenging. Then, it was moderated very poorly, and then edited together very poorly. There was no flow... it was very choppy. Again... not a fan. 

Season 8 also had a political challenge, but if i remember correctly, that was just a branding challenge kind of. It was better than this. Now, do I appreciate the fact that Drag Race is taking this election very seriously?? YES. But this challenge was just Not It. 

I thought Jaida was very consistent, I liked Jackie’s a lot [It seems like a running gag that she is too prepared in the same way that Jan was too energetic... which has its own election flashbacks....] I am really enjoying crystal... I thought she also had what was close to a fully formed character.. it just needed to bake a little more. 

So... next up... ms. goode. #cringe. tbh I don’t care about the performance. Were they just trying to redo snatch game? basically. were they the only person to try and do that? No. 

This mirror chat was the bomb dot com tho. best part of the episode.

We’re talking about the “oh i’m not political” We knew from episode one that Gigi grew up in a lot of privilege- and wasn’t the only one [@ jan] but jesus has it shown in gigi the most... I mean bob the drag queen said it best.. Gigi goode’s mom vs Jaida Essence Hall. 

But the nerve to openly say “i’m not political, and I don’t like it” when you KNOW at this point in time what the contestants have gone through... it’s just really insensitive. Also to be the open front runner knowing that the RPDR fans can be young and impressionable.. is really irresponsible TBH. 

Guess what? I don’t like to follow the news sometimes. I don’t watch tr*mp’s press conferences. Sometimes I log off twitter and go to tumblr. But I still stay INFORMED on the issues and am able to back up my positions. I VOTE. [cannot believe i’m saying this but i would not be surprised if gigi did not vote in 2016.]

[sidebar]

Maybe it’s bc I stan jan in a way that I have stanned no one else before [the only ru girl who even comes close to it while I was actively watching the show without prior knowledge is naomi] Maybe it’s combined with the quarantine that I have nothing else to do. And with that comes a [virtual] introduction to basically everybody who’s anybody in the NYC drag scene. [I will say the Bob-Monet-Cracker-Jan quad is just A+] So maybe I just have a better idea of what it is [have I gone down a Youtube rabbit hole on this subject? yes] 

Is new york also my personal favorite city? yes. Have I been to LA? no. Do I like the concept of LA? no. Have I been west of the mississippi river? no. So maybe it’s a combination of all of these things [including Jan saying on repeat that New York is the greatest city to do drag] but. The NYC girls are just so much more political. Brita, Bob, MOnet, tbh Jan is also on the record saying some A+ shiz. Marti Cummings is a non binary drag artist running for city council in manhattan. “Everybody black and aquaria.” 

Is NYC politics like any city, full of machines and garbage too? Sure. But NYC is just so much more powerful and political. LA is just the embodiment of privilege.

 I also think it’s interesting that some of the smaller town/city gals will move to LA [Trixie/Katya/Alaska? I’m looking @ you] after they get the drag race coin. Not that it’s a bad thing or anything, it’s just an interesting dynamic. [another aside: the non NY/LA girls deserve it all and i think it’s really powerful when the show directly addresses issues of wealth/privilege/access to drag on the show.] 

[end sidebar]

And Gigi came into the competition saying “I want to be on vogue” which is great. Their fashion sense is great. Most of their outfits are great. It’s great that they can do comedy [sometimes- like when they are not playing the role of Gigi] But something else I take issue with- and don’t get me wrong humility is great- is the whole “I’m not a dancer” that’s BS. they whole back handspring etc, madonna challenge. Maybe you weren’t a trained dancer, but ffs cut the crap. [if you haven’t look up gigi goode showgirls] 

And yet the judges continue to give Gigi [and SP] free passes. It’s like Ru is so afraid that if either of them end up in the bottom, they won’t turn it out and then there will be no frontrunner. Well guess what? In season 7, Max had 2 wins before anyone else and came in 9th. valentina going home was a total gag. Brooke and Yvie lip synced on the snatch game ep. But Apparently when the skinny white fashion queen from the big city [gigi, aquaria] does less than well, they don’t get put up for elimination??? [did aquaria deserve to lip sync for the makeover? idk.]

Gigi is getting a “winner” edit and it’s not really fair to anyone. People who should have won certain challenges were IGNORED, and instead the producers give all the credit to gigi, giving them almost a worse edit. Like we want to see humans, not robots. If we learned ANYTHING from last week is that the judges don’t like when you just “start on 100 and stay there THE WHOLE TIME”. Bc the truth is that [aside from the loads and loads and loads of privilege,] Gigi is really nice and very talented. But I, as a viewer of reality TV, live to see the perfect fail. I want everyone to shine [this is why I loved when Naomi sent manila home, oops] 

Also.. I would like to address the fact that Gigi basically used the same outfit twice... this runway and entrance look have almost the same pattern, with just a slightly different skirt type. I would like for this behavior to be called out bc it is such a memorable silhouette. 

Also- Shout out to Crystal for the most bomb ass runway... I want that whole outfit pls. 

but aside from that... TBH I just want a show with the real top 7 [ the heidi and widow have been cracking me up saying “we’re at top 5″ or “we’re at top 6″ before the ep aired on instagram and I’m loling.. and that VERY AWK moment when Jan is on the x change rate saying that they couldn’t justify putting anyone other that her and widow in the bottom bc gigi and 3 wins and trying to work around not saying SP’s name had 2. [also shout out to jan the real mvp for unfollowing SP on twitter]] doing competitions and having fun. And I’ve said this before. This is a really good season that did not need production’s handprints all over everything. But they chose to cast RuPaul’s Best Friend Race, so they shouldn’t be complaining or trying to manufacture drama.

I was cracking up when Jaida was [clearly prodded by producers] asking is there anything we need to talk about? and then Jackie goes to talk to widow right before they leave and they are just nice to each other. lol no drama here. It’s the season of the inner saboteur. 

So Jackie and widow are in the bottom and tbh I don’t know. I would have liked to see Gigi lip sync. I would have liked this challenge to not happen. but it did. The lip sync song.. I just didn’t love the cut... Katy perry’s voice is so over produced [trend alert] that the illusion of the lip sync didn’t work in the first chorus. Jackie’s plastic bag was just A+. These lip syncs, tbh starting w jan v widow have been very good. not good enough to make up for the garbage that was everything since ep. 3, but close. [and some of that was song choice, some of it was not. I will say brita killed her first one but rip to rock]

Jeff gold bloom. I just don’t know. Maybe it’s bc I never saw jurassic park. Maybe he was just a bad judge. maybe he too was being prodded by production. ugh. You can read the takes on his interactions with jackie somewhere else. 

[henrytheteddybear]

My 12 speculations for upcoming episodes of LiS2

         It's been about two months after releasing of the first episode. besides likes and reblogs, i tried to make my own posts about theories, speculations or fan arts of Life is Strange 2 but i needed more time to analyze and find inspiration until i decided to make this post and wait to see which speculations would be true or just ideas.

This list consists of my speculations and others' i found on websites. I don't know if here are somebody who still don't play or watch the prequel and the first episode. so you should skip this post if you don't want to see any spoilers.

#1. Mrs. Reynolds is actually the grandmother of Sean and Daniel.

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXE17l9SVM4

In Arcadia Bay Scene of LiS2, Brody asks Sean about his family and he says he only have grandparents who live in USA. in The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, if Chris can convince Mrs. Reynolds to leave, she'll talk about her grandchildren that she's never seen for a long time and they're at her house. these hints make me feel so sure that Dontnod try to tell us Granny Claire and the brothers are absolutely relatives. 

#2. We may see Lyla Park and Brody Holloway again.

Although I have no idea how she can find the brothers and why he should meet them again. maybe they will bump into each other with new issues after Sean and Daniel leave Claire's house. we may see the development of the relationship between Sean and Lyla or get a surprise from Brody, however they don't deserve to have small roles in this season.

#3 Is Brody's real surname Prescott?

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXE17... 

         During escaping with the car, Sean ask Brody about his occupation and he says he come from a wealthy family but no soul and he took off to travel after graduating high school and never go back to his home. now he does many jobs such as writes stories for magazines and websites, doing podcasts, and protest etc. 

         Since everything in LiS series are in the same universe, it would be awesome if we saw more connections between characters from both seasons. some say he's from Utah because his car displays Utah license plates but he never directly tell he's from Utah and he may be got the car when he visited there, however we still don't know his background well enough to tell who he is.

#4. Daniel does creepy breathing sound when Chris calls Mrs. Reynolds lately.

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJ4iO5jK9Xo

         In The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, when you do the awesome things or whatever until Charles falls asleep and call Mrs. Reynolds. you'll hear someone do creepy breathing sound during a call and in the post-credits scene of episode 1, you can see the forest covered with snow and hear Sean try to teach Daniel to control his power then he can float a stone in the air. this means the brothers may be somewhere in Beaver Creek in December and Daniel would have practiced for a month.

         I guess Daniel would control his power better and imagine himself as Darth Vader. he may monkey around in the house when Claire's not home until Chris call on the phone.

#5. If Dontnod need to show us the depth of friendship between two kids, they should let us play as Daniel.

         This speculation sounds like a wish and seems impossible but after the first episode, Daniel knows he has the powers and he can deal with it, i think it would be great if we had a chance to control his telekinesis via playing as him. besides, i don't know how big is Chris' part but if the friendship between Daniel and Chris is important to the main story, it should be told through the perspective of these kids instead of the third person because it's easier to see the depth in their relationship.

A teenager like Sean might not fit to do kids activities or follow them all day.

#6. The secret map may guide Chris and the brothers to the next awesome adventures.

         In Chris' room, you can find a hand-drawn map on the wall between the desk and the bed, it's called "secret map" and we use it with secret decoder to solve the puzzle and find the way in junk pile to get his treasure. (in fact, there's a short one way hole. ^ ^") besides, the details on the map based on Eriksen household's neighborhood but the locations were changed to his imaginary things and i'm curious what inspire them.

         So if an upcoming episode had the adventures of Chris and the brothers, i think every imaginary places and monsters in the secret map would be the destinations and let us know more about Chris' imaginary world and his background.

#7. Was Emily Eriksen killed by an influential person?

         Emily was killed in hit and run on December 16, 2014 in Beaver Creek. Charles had asked the officers about finding the culprit for two years but they said they couldn't find more evidence because the street surveillance data isn't available for the scene.

         It's possible the Emily case may be difficult for investigation like they said or the officers try not to investigate this case because they don't want to deal with influential people who would be revealed in upcoming episodes.

#8. Sean may plan to leave Daniel at Mrs. Reynolds's house and escape to Puerto Lobos alone.

source: https://youtu.be/eji0xlwH2-A 

         Besides mentioning her grandchildren, Claire also tells one of them is Chris' age and she bet him and Chris would get along like brothers. I think her words sounds really suspicious. why she compares Chris to Daniel's new brother instead of a best friend and Daniel still has Sean as his older brother. 

         I think Sean knows Daniel would never has a chance to be a suspect like him (if he never revealed his powers to everybody) and it seems to be hard to take a long trip with kid and a dog. so Sean may consult Claire without Daniel before she comes to see Chris but his plan wouldn't succeed for some reason.

#9. Derek, a proud member of a Church may has an important role.

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Chqug... 

         When Chris does something in the house for a while, Derek will call and say he is a proud member of the Universal Uprising Church and his church wants Chris and his loved ones to share the holy spirit. I guess Derek and his church may have interesting background and important roles in upcoming episodes. they may know something about super powers and have an ability to help Daniel or have mysterious backstory and be involved in murders.

#10. Chris may escape from the Eriksen Household to his grandparents's home.

         Near Charles' Laptop, you can find the letter to Charles from Peter Wyatt, the father of Emily reads Peter and his wife Kristen care so much about Charles and Chris. he heard Charles was in bar fight and he ask for permission to take care of Chris and want Charles to consider joining a support group.

         Although Chris doesn't want to leave Charles but in an upcoming episode, the domestic violence of Eriksen household may escalate and Chris would escape to Mr. and Mrs. Wyatt's home or Daniel may accidentally hurt Charles for protecting Chris. so the brothers and the only child would have to run away together.

#11. Sean and Daniel may not reach Mexico.

         Besides the journey of a thousand miles, they may have to face other racists, bump into officers or be chased by the antagonists who haven't revealed yet, however the brothers may find out the reason how and why Daniel got the powers and resolve all the conflicts before arrival to Puerto Lobos.

#12. It's possible that Sean or Daniel would pass away at the end of season.

sorce: www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwzNgdu5n8Y 

          I know it sounds terrible but if the second season still had a life/death ending like the first season and brotherly bonding is the main theme, their death could surely make us depressed for a month. this idea is inspired by Daniel lines that he talks with Sean about two raccoons they saw. he guesses the dead one may be the brother of the other one and Sean stops him from thinking of it, however this may be a hint from Dontnod or just random lines. 

         In my opinion, if Sean was the person who passed away by try to protect Daniel or whatever and left his sketchbook with all good memories of their journey to him, it would be a sad and beautiful ending. (I'm so sorry Lyla. T T)

         I'm a little bit disappointed that the second episode will release on January, 2019. i thought they would release in December but there's no any teaser trailer released in November and i was afraid that episode 2 will be released in Jan like somebody said and now it's true.

 but it's better than waiting without knowing for how long, right?

[galrakythel]

voltron s7 liveblogging

episode 1:

so?????? keith wasn’t raised by shiro? of course

keith is so adorable

did he say the emo kid’s doing it???!?!?

dalterion belt? so the older paladins were in the same area of space?

krolia knows keith loves shiro alsjdalksdja

coran is so ridiculous i love him

oh my god honey i shrunk the kids

and then altean linguistics omg

ooooooo so keith and shiro didn’t know each other OOOO so he didn’t raise him i see

holy shit keith and shiro are wonderful omg

but he made that jump to save shiro

but what’s kieth’s dad’s name???

omggggg shiro’s chronically ill this show is something else

yooooooooo adam you in the wrong man

keith never left you shiro, he loves you

romelle is so cute

episode 2:

yo matt is still in space where are you man

okay i’m gonna say it, but i’m wary of romelle

krolia is so annoyed right now i love her

yo is krolia gonna see kolivan???

cosmic wolf is the sweetest space dog ever

so someone got a hold of Lotor’s tech.... so haggar/honerva???

hmmmm pirates?? that stole galra tech and equipment

lance and keith’s teamwork is amazing

yooooo mama krolia protecting her boys

how did romelle take that guy out

you’ve got to be kidding me

these girls can’t work with anyone

episode 3:

coran is still in the black lion

yo this crew looks to be all made of galra hybrids yo

zethrid is so gay, ezor is so gay, and they are gay together

acxa whoa babeeeeeeeeeeee you look so good

acxa got cute ass horns

she’s always been sweet on the one with the flippity hair lmfao wowwwwww ezor

holy hell is this show going with acxa/keith now omfg i love it

acxa is so hot i’m dying

three years ago??!??!!?!?!?!

got damn

episode 4:

yoooo this season is all over the fucking place omg

omg it’s saw

keith is fucking adorable

this episode is cray 

zarkon is so cute

what the hell is going on omfg “the dumb one”

omg antok ANTOK YOU BUTT

LOTOR TOO CUTE

wt flying f

haggar snack pack omfg

aslkdjaslkcjoiasjlkdasjd

why does keith always have to do his model pose lmao

episode 5:

yooooo krolia taking care of her kids i love her

kolivan please let it be kolivan

let krolia be reunited with her people

askdjsalkdjasdkajdlasj where are the fucking BLADES?!?!?!?!

are you fucking saying that all these people are fucking ddead

kolivan is dead? are you fuck waittttttt

holy shittttttttttt no way holy fucking hell what the hell just happened

keith you gotta save your entire family again

yo thse druids are fucking scary

so haggar has exiled people what???

allura baby you are the best

let kolivan live please

krolia my sweet peach

episode 6:

what in the hell

these guys cant catch a fucking break yo

lemme say that no sleep keith looks hot as fuck so yeah

they hallucinating

hunk saving the day again

so this thing has been hunting them for ever, angler fish style

these kids need a vacation jfc

episode 7:

i can just feel from “part 1″ that this is gonna be intense

where the hell is matt????

damn sendak done fucked up 

let’s see what the hell happens with this garrison

colleen gonna kill these ppl

garrison being shady as usual

sam preach baby preach

but you literally just let the blue lion go, iverson

LMFAO these graduates lmfao

yo though, they all just went through all this resistance and then the galra just dropkicked them???!?!!

colleen is the real mvp

omg the family videos

admiral got her ass handed to her yo

episode 8:

is sendak behind it

yupppp

yoooo he’s got nothing else to do with his time, like just retire my man. get married to some dude, have som children and shut up

iverson yooooooooooooooooooo

is that adam doing what he does best, telling ppl what to do

wowwwwwwww listen to holt

world war 3

veronica??????? is that lance’s sister????

I KNEW ITTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

episode 9:

everybody be fitting into those things

keith is so pissed right now

omg this is so hearbreaking tbh

their whole planet is just like every other one that theyve liberated before

omg these ppl and they families

keith is such a good boy

this giffin kid is sooooo fucking annoying. he antagonizes everyone

keith and hunk omgggggggggg

these characters have all come such a long way

a royal galran?!?!?!?!!? lmao okay sendak

episode 10:

yo shiro’s knew fucking arm is boss

damn i love the way lance interacts with his sister

sendak has earth locked down holy shit

veronica lmfao

why the hell is he doing this, never mind keith answered

........

where the hell has romelle been these past few meetings and such

and didn’t kolivan say that the altean colony was empty?????

is the romelle theory correct?!??!?!?!?!

allura and lance yessssssssss

yo something weird is going on and i’m not really sure what is happening

they were ready for you bcause there is someone on the inside

ROMELLE

THE FUCKING ADMIRAL WTF

i dont understand your whole planet is going to be killed and you’re okay with that

wow what a fucking traitor

episode 11:

these kids gonna go through another fucking trial

lmfao the admiral thought

she thought yo, she thought

but seriously where the hell is romelle?

yo coran i love you, the castleship is going to power the atlas woot woot

shiro is all grown up, captain shirogane, i love you

shiro, fire when ready, yeah fire into my gay ass

but seriously, where the FUCK is ROMELLE?

remotely. they are remotely controlling them. i love it.

welp snitches get stitches 

episode 12:

another part one

i think sendak is just jelly he didint get a chance ot pilot the red lion for zarkon lmao

lmfao yes they will

sendak has already stated he doesnt give a shit about people

but like after this is all said and done theres still going to be a power vacuum within the galra society. this isn’t gonna be over

shiro is so bae when he’s dishing out orders omg

this boy better not die i cant lose him

stop making shiro suffer jfc

shiro better be okay, let shiro retire please

yo showdown since season one

keith saving his husband. AGAIN.

episode 13:

haggar or comet???

oh nooooooo its fucking lotor

or zarkon?

or? who?????!?!?

okay so my guesses: haggar, lotor, or zarkon.... or...

ROMELLE! lmao

part of me really feels like it may be haggar because she had spent her time in some kind of quintessence field but idk

it felt like the komar

it’s haggar omg

it’s fucking haggar who else uses magic like that

wow they cant catch a break

OMFG

omg shay came to visit

kolivan and krolia yooooooooo

acxa yooooooo

haggar took those alteans yo

now let these people rest

[peterstanslizzie]

Reacting To: Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (Season 3 Episode 1)

Episode Title: Everything Is Crabs

Spoiler Warning: Kindly proceed if you’ve already seen the episode or are able to handle spoilers

1. After finding out from Troy’s dad, Roberto about Dr. Emilia’s evil plan to turn mutes back into animals, Kipo’s new mission now is to find her and put a stop to her plan. However, they have been searching for her for months to no avail. During the search montage, we also see a bunch of new Mega Mute designs, including Mega Crabs and Mega Turtle Dinosaur-thingies. 

2. It’s also a treat to see Puck, the other members of the TheaOtters and Jamack (who joined them last season) working together to warn the mutes all over Las Vistas of Dr. Emilia. And they do that by staging a dramatic play and musical performance in front of the different mute groups. This time, we see them trying to convince the Umlaut Snakes to join their alliance, HMUFA (Human Mute Ultimate Friendship Alliance). I have to be honest; That’s not a very good alliance name lol. Sorry Kipo. But I find it amazing that Jamack is singing a song about Kipo, basically complimenting her. 

3. The snakes express their unwillingness to work together with other mutes but all of a sudden, we hear the sound of an explosion from what it seems to be nectar bomb dropped by the Humming Bombers. The scene then cuts off to the opening title. 

4. Back at Timbercat Village, we see the others (Benson, Wolf, Dave etc.)  also having difficulty tracking the doctor. The first HMUFA meeting is tonight but no one seems to take this alliance or at least the name seriously because Yumyan and the rest of the Timbercats would rather have their weekly Yarn Watching lol. Well, they are still cats after all. 

5. Even Benson has already set up a date with Troy tonight in case the meeting didn’t happen, which of course, he prefers to be with Troy. I thought it was their flapjacks date but I almost forgot that it’s been months since the season 2 finale. So, that date should’ve already happened. Darn it! I wish we could’ve see it though. Anyways, Benson reveals it’s another date altogether, where he’s going to watch “his close-up magic”. My nasty mind went somewhere with that....sorry.

6. Jamack, Puck and the others return, looking beat up due to the earlier explosion and reveal that Camille was kidnapped by the Humming Bombers. This sounds fishy to me. Why would they kidnap her? They said it’s probably because of a rivalry thingy between mute groups but I really don’t think that’s the real reason. 

7. Kipo and the others make their way to the Humming Bombers to confront them about kidnapping Camille as well as to convince them to be on their side but they all look really sad and out of it. They’re having a so-called “Sad Bomb Party”, which looks fun but real dangerous at the same time. Hopefully, there’s no one around the area they’re throwing nectar bombs at. 

8. The birds said that they didn’t kidnap Camille and put the blame on the Newton Wolves, whom they think they’re the ones who ate one of their own, Boom-Boom. This is definitely sounding even more suspicious. Kipo thinks all of this was Dr. Emilia’s doing; I agree. 

9. They then move on to question the Newton Wolves, who said that they didn’t eat anyone except a squirrel lol. They did mention about a stolen centrifuge, which triggers Kipo because she suspects that Dr. Emilia needs it to make her genetic cure. However, the wolves are confident that the Timbercats took it. So, Kipo convinces them to head back to Timbercat Village to ask them.

10. We shift things over to the first HMUFA meeting and it’s a hot mess because the Umlaut Snakes, the Humming Bombers and the Newton Wolves just can’t get along. 

11. Kipo is doing her best to keep everyone in check but it’s just too chaotic for her to handle. At least we find out that the Timbercats actually stole their centrifuge to use it to un-ravel and re-ravel their yarn. They’re so sneaky. 

11. Kipo feels helpless and she actually goes to Scarlemagne mainly to give him his dinner but he also noticed the chaos that’s happening and offers her his advice, which is to make them fear Kipo by turning into her Mega Jaguar form in order to intimidate them. I’m definitely picturing Scarlemagne being Kipo’s aid at some point during the season. I don’t think you can have two supervillains in a single season of Kipo. 

12. My favorite moment of the episode for sure: Kipo notices a bunch of mute children from each type of mute group playing together and getting along well with one another. This warms Kipo’s heart and it sure did warm mine too. She also brings her dad, Lio, Dave, Benson, Wolf and Mandu (who keeps on chewing on Dave’s arm throughout the episode for some reason but we eventually find out it’s because she’s teething and her tusks are coming in) to witness this precious moment. Side note: poor Benson was woken up from his dream of watching his bf, Troy sawing a woman in half lmao. I really need to watch one of their dates. 

13. All of a sudden, three Mega Crabs pop up and they start attacking the group. Kipo transforms to fend them off and Song assists her. The rest of the mutes notice the commotion outside but only the Timbercats and the Umlaut Snakes stay back to help. The Humming Bombers and the Newton Wolves simply just ran off because they don’t see this as their problem. I’m guessing they will come around within the next few episodes, hopefully. The cats and the snakes are working together to set traps for the Mega Crabs to get caught up in and they actually manage to kill the crabs. Wow...was that their intention all along? 

14. It seems like the mutes don’t have much regard for crab lives. They  also wonder why there were Mega Crabs suddenly appearing in the area recently and they theorize that it could be because Dr. Emilia was using her sonic emitter to drive them away from their homes at sea. That’s definitely plausible. But still, it’s kind of unfortunate that the crabs were chased away from their home just to end up becoming dinner to the other mutes. #crablivesmatter

15. Where’s Jamack? Well, he ends up becoming another victim to Dr. Emilia’ & co.’s kidnapping, along with Camille and Boom-Boom. How on Earth did she manage to kidnap them so easily and stealthily? Does she have secret agents working for her or something? Or maybe she can really turn herself invisible like everybody has been saying. 

16. Well, that’s the end of my review of episode 1. Stay tuned tomorrow for my review of episode 2. Thanks for reading everybody!

[apicturewithasmile]

LOST rewatch (season 2):

[follow the entire rewatch-tag here]

episode 1 – Man of Science, Man of Faith:

It’s Desmond tiiiiiime!!!! Maaaaake your own kind of muuuusiiiiiic!!!

>:

OH MY GOD Jack’s flashback hair is horrible.

Desmond’s accent alone is worth watching the show but honestly, his whole character is a total game changer. He’s the personified sci-fi element and I McFriggin love it!

 episode 2 – Adrift:

Big feels for Sawyer here

Does this count as the first on-island flashback when we see John climbing down the hatch? Because we already saw what happened after that in the previous episode… I guess it’s only a mini flashback but still… it is…

Awwww it’s the Dharma sharky

With every Michael flashback I hate his ex even more.

How did everything that’s happened so far only happen in 44 days?!?! It feels like they gone through enough drama for a whole year.

“box man”

episode 3 – Orientation:

Katey Sagal <3

Kate discovering the real important shit – first the chocolate, now the guns

“You needed a father figure and I needed a kidney.” Fuck you Anthony Cooper.

“Why do you find it so hard to believe?” – “Why do you find it so easy?” – “IT’S NEVER BEEN EASY!!!” --- you tell him, John!!!

episode 4 – Everybody Hates Hugo:

I missed Rose!

….Hurley’s boss at the fast food restaurant… ain’t that the same guy who bullied John at the box company? Did I ever notice that before?

episode 5 – …And Found:

Jin’s hair growing longer is all I ever needed for my inner peace.

That Sun + John scene in her garden :’)

I forgot how good the score of that show is. Suck me right up with the feels!

episode 6 – Abandoned:

Oh nooo… that the episode where Shannon dies? Please don’t!!!

I can never understand what it is Ghost Walt is saying to Shannon

John holding the baby *external screaming*

I’ll forever be bitter that they killed Shannon off – all the missed potential for character development

episode 7 – The Other 48 Days:

It’s Nathan Ingram looking like Indiana Jones.

Is it ever explained what the Arrow Station was for?

It’s so annoying that the place Ana killed Goodwin isn’t the same place where Jin finds his corpse in the jungle.

episode 8 – Collision:

Kate winning against Jack at golf is what I’m here for.

I wish Ana Lucia and Sayid had gotten more scenes together after that

“What good would it be to kill you if we’re both already dead?”

That reunion scene of Rose & Bernard and Sun & Jin is soooooo kitschy, I love it

episode 9 – What Kate Did:

Petition for Daniel Daw Kim to be topless more often

I… didn’t remember Sawyer fever-mumbles to Jack that he loves Kate

Ah yes, it’s the black horsey episode

Shannon’s funeral :’( whyyyyyy?????

“Boy, when you say beginning you mean… beginning.”

I’m trying to figure out who cut out part of the Orientation video… was it Kelvin?

Kate’s dad, who’s a very high ranking soldier: “I don’t have murder in my heart.” Me: …..sure, Jan.

“Don’t mistake coincidence for fate.” Mr. Eko and John could have had sooo many intriguing conversations; it’s a pity they had to write him out.

episode 10 – The 23rd Psalm:

I don’t like the whole drug plot but that’s probably because that means more plot for Charlie… like… don’t get me wrong: I like the backstory, but not the new found drama with Charlie

Smokey in his whole glory. That scene is so breath taking, I love it.

episode 11 – The Hunting Party:

 I had forgotten the whole “Michael locks John and Jack up in the armory”-bit

And Jack and Locke actually taking a button-shift together? That’s programmed trouble.

Fuck you Jack! Take Kate with you! You’ve known her for…. What? Over 50 days? You know she won’t stay behind. You’re really no good judge of character, are you?

funny how John is so curious about Sawyer’s name… kinds foreshadowing to the whole Anthony Cooper connection as if John already felt it somehow

Geronimo Jackson

episode 12 – Fire + Water:

 I find it interesting that they chose a + symbol for the title instead of “and” or an ampersand.

Charlie’s parents’ accents are… bad.

“Now Locke’s your friend, eh?” oh shut the fuck up Charlie!!!

Hurley as Jesus on Charlie’s dream is foreshadowing

The difference between Charlie and John is that John is protective over Claire and Aaron whereas Charlie is possessive.

 “[Kate’s] hot, [Jack’s] hot” – Ana Lucia, confirmed bisexual.

YAAAAS!!! Hit the bastard, John! You show him!!!!

episode 13 – The Long Con:

 “You wanna break seven virgin Marys? Be my guest! But I’m superstitious.”

Yunjin Kim is the only person on earth that can make the colour orange look good to me

Seriously… I didn’t remember why exactly I dislike Charlie so much but season 2 reminds me episode by episode.

episode 14 – One Of Them:

 IT’S HAPPENING! EVERYBODY STAY CALM!!!!

I’m so here for every scene between Sayid and Danielle

Amazing “arm waving through a tent” acting @Michael Emerson!!!

“My name is Henry Gale, I’m from Minnesota.” LIIIIIIAAAAAARRRR!!!

I think the first time I watched it I was so excited about Michael Emerson that I didn’t notice the guy who’s talking to Sayid in the next scene is Kelvin.

The first time John sees his future island husband… awwwww :’)

Funny how at first John doesn’t believe Ben’s act but later he’s like “tell me all the lies, I’ll believe you anything, my dear!”

“Why would you travel [in a hot air balloon]?” – “Because I was rich.” Has any line in the entire show ever been that real?

I have trouble believing that Jack is physically stronger than John.

The first time we see the hieroglyphs on the timer.

episode 15 – Maternity Leave:

Alex!!! My pretty little child!!!

Oh my sassy dear rat boy

And creepy Ethan is back.

Mr. Eko: *cuts his beard off* – Not Henry Gale: Okay, wtf?

“Are you the genius or are you the guy who’s feeling like he’s always living in the shadow of the genius?” Ben you little asshole!

episode 16 – The Whole Truth:

Daniel Dae Kim shirtless again – thanks for answering my prayers

Terry O’Quinn gets sexier the scruffier he is

Does Sun realise she’s pregnant this early?!?!?!

Okay John just totally took a glance at Jack’s dick after he was getting out of the shower.

“Jack and Locke are a little too busy worrying about Locke and Jack.”

Oh riiiight, Kate doesn’t know about Not Henry Gale

The fact that Ana Lucia and Sayid get along okayish fills my heart with so much joy but then I remember she’s gonna be dead in like… 2 episodes and I hate that.

“Men reject their prophets and slay them but they love their martyrs and honour those whom they have slain. So what’s the difference between a martyr and a prophet?”

episode 17 – Lockdown:

The first time Ben yells “Jaaawwwn!”

There’s also more and more Emerchesthair going on and I’m here for it!!!

“How about you put your mangos where your mouth is?”

Anthony Cooper you fucking asshole.

John just found the most inappropriate time to propose to someone

“You came back!” – “Did you think I was gonna leave you here?!”

episode 18 – Dave:

I wish Hurley’s story wasn’t focussing on his weight to much

John putting in a good word for Not Henry Gale is my vibe!

Never mind… bondage Ben is MY VIBE!!!

“God doesn’t know how long we’ve been here, John. He can’t see this island any better than the rest of the world can.” --- that’s one of the most underrated lines in the entire show I think.

episode 19 – S.O.S.:

Moooore chesthair action!!!

I love that Rose and Bernard just fairly recently met and haven’t been together for like 30 years already.

episode 20 – Two For The Road:

Ugh is that the Ana Lucia/Christian Shephard episode?? I’m always in for more daddy Shephard.

Strangulation really is Ben’s go to kill method, isn’t it?

“I was coming for you.” – you sure were, my guy. You sure were.

episode 21 - ? :

“the artist formerly known as Henry Gale”

Terry O’Quinn’s arms give me life

It’s the Pearl station

Oh riiiight there’s been cameras in the Swan station, totally forgot that

“every single second of my pathetic little life is as useless as that button” poor John

Sawyer comforting Kate… I’m here for it!

episode 22 – Three Minutes:

Oh Alex, my sweet angel

“we got caught in a net” – “why are you telling me this, Sawyer?” – “because you’re about the closet thing I got a friend on this island, Doctor.” I wish they had spent more time focussing on that broship rather than the love triangle

DESMOND’S BACK!!!!

episodes 23 and 24 – Live Together, Die Alone:

“we’re stuck in a bloody snow globe”

Charles fucking Widmore, my OTV – One True Villain

Aaah it’s the weird Hurley bird

John crying in the jungle breaks my heart (and fuck you Charlie for making fun of him)

“with enough money and determination you can find anyone”

Desmond realising John saved his life by hammering on that hatch door is one of the best moments in the whole show.

Not Henry Gale is back, my bebe, right there with the dramatic appearance on a boat

Desmond really big on competing against Sayid in the “who’s got the best island hair”-competition (Sayid still winning tho)

“I’m sorry for whatever happened that made you stop believing but it’s all real.”

“We’re the good guys, Michael!”

[babygirl06301]

13 Wishes for Season 13

So, I did this last year when I made a wishlist for Mary’s character in season 12 (find it here), and I thought it’d be fun to do the same for this season and see what I come up with!

P.S. There aren’t really any spoilers, so I didn’t tag it, but if you want to wait and read this after you’ve gotten the chance to watch 13x01, you can do so!

1. Jody to finally see the bunker and finally meet Castiel. 

Y’all, I have been waiting so long for this to happen, you don’t realize. From the chatter I’ve been hearing, the Wayward Daughters backdoor pilot is coming after Castiel returns from The Empty. I figured that the backdoor pilot would focus mainly on the ladies with Sam and Dean there mostly as background pieces to sort of pass the torch. But since Castiel is apparently counted as a lead character now, maybe he could be there too? How awesome would it be for Cas to meet Jody and the rest of that cast, huh? They already have a connection through Claire, so why not?   

2. A season-long arc between Sam and Jack

It’s about damn time we got a new dynamic on the show. I’m confident that this will come to pass, but I really would like to see Sam acting as a sort of mentor and friend to Jack. After all, both of these two were/are object of Lucifer’s desire, they both have powers they can’t always control, and they seem to be innately good. Sam could definitely offer advice or even comfort to Jack since he can easily empathize with his situation.

3. An Evil!Jack arc

(This is another one that I’m sure will happen in some form.) Of course I prefer the cinnamon roll of a character that we were introduced to in 13x01, but I feel like his character development would be severely lacking if he didn’t go dark side at some point. I don’t really care how it happens: he feels betrayed by Cas and/or the Winchesters, Lucifer somehow influences him to his side, he thinks he’s doing the right thing when really he’s not (just like his daddy). I don’t care. But I think seeing an evil Jack would be really awesome. 

4. Bobby, Bobby, Bobby

I mean, right? You cannot give us a glimpse of Earth 2 Bobby Singer in 12x23 and not give us more in S13. I know he isn’t the same Bobby that we’ve known this whole time, but honestly, I’m just jazzed to have some of him back. I’m just a little fearful that he’ll be in maybe three episodes tops? And that doesn’t suit me at all. Bring me all the Bobby, please.

5. Returning characters

We’ve all been talking about the possibilities that this other Earth could bring up. A parallel world that’s basically the same as the one we know but without Sam and Dean. So, that means you could bring back... well, anybody. I heard a rumor that Osric was set to come back this season, so maybe we’ll get to see Kevin? Or Charlie? Benny? All I’m saying is if they don’t bring somebody back, I’m gonna be mad. Earth 2 is a total loophole to revisit some fan favorites. And listen, it doesn’t all have to be the good guys. Bring back fuckin’ Abaddon or Azazel or Ruby. Take full advantage of the situation you’ve written yourselves into, writers. Don’t let me down.

6. A real, lasting solution to Castiel’s burdened soul

For the past six fucking seasons Castiel has been on a fucking journey of self-loathing and self-hatred. It’s been exceptionally highlighted in the past two seasons, and not enough has been done to fix it. I’m not trying to downsize all the goodness that came from the Winchesters in S12, but there was also a fair amount of belittling, especially from Dean. Shit, that’s all Cas’s arc has been for the past two seasons. This season, I’d like to see a change. I’d like to see a real, extended conversation with Castiel and Dean (because, let’s be honest, Dean’s opinion means the most to Cas) where Dean sits him down and says something to the effect of “You’ve got to stop trying to prove yourself, Cas. You don’t need to. You have always been the strongest player on the bench, and I need you to believe that. I do.” You know? I just need for someone to put their damn foot down and make Cas see how amazing he is so he stops getting stabbed in the damn chest trying to prove himself.

7. A Sam-centric storyline

I’m gathering that this season is going to be Cas-centric at its forefront, which is beautiful. He deserves that, he’s never had that, it’s his time to shine. However, Sam has been sidelined for too long. I don’t care if it’s a subplot, but I need for Sam to be a part of the actual plot for the first time in forever beyond him fighting alongside Dean. I get it; Sam’s the one who’s got his shit together, so why would he get into the kind of trouble that would warrant a solo story arc? Maybe he doesn’t have to get into any kind of trouble. Maybe he could just become a leader of some sort (like we saw in 12x22). Maybe something with his psychic abilities could be touched on again (which I heard might actually happen). Maybe you could stop painting him as a character to be sidelined and actually give him his own stories again. How ‘bout that, SPN?  

8. Explosions

I don’t really know why, maybe because of the grenade launcher last season, but I really wanna see something blow up. I mean, Jack can do so much, right? So, let’s blow some shit up!

9. Weird demonstrations of Jack’s powers

Like I said, Jack can do a ton of stuff with his powers, so I’d love to see an episode (which is probably the Scooby-Doo episode) where Jack’s powers just fuck something up so badly. He could accidentally turn the Impala pink. He could replace Sam’s fancy shampoo with toothpaste. He could be the reason Cas has highlights this season (but for real, have you noticed Misha’s hair lately?). I just want some funny shit to happen because there’s a juiced up spawn of Satan living in their house.

10. Chuck

I know he’s not going to bring Castiel back. Hell, I’m guessing Cas--and maybe Mary--are gonna save their own damn selves. But, even if it’s just for five minutes, it’d be cool for Chuck to come in like, “Dean, I heard your prayer, but there’s nothing I can do.” And then Dean would 100% try to kill God himself before Chuck poofs away.

11. Teleportation station

Honestly, if Cas is going to be back at full power, I want him to get lit about it. I just want to see him so damn happy to be back, ya know? He’d say, “I’ll drive” before a hunt and then boop Sam, Dean, and Jack to wherever they were going. He could flash his wings at random intervals. Shit, he could break Sam’s friggin’ leg and go, “Wait, watch!” and then heal him. Then Sam would go, “You could already do that, you marble!” And Cas wouldn’t even care because he’s so happy. Tell me that wouldn’t be cute.  

12. Crowley appreciation

Sadly, we all know Mark isn’t coming back to SPN, at least not any time soon. However, we can still give Crowley the respect he deserves this season. I understand that Crowley wasn’t TFW or family or anything, but he was something to Sam and Dean (as we saw in 13x01). I’d just like to see more comments made about wishing Crowley was there to help them with something or absentmindedly saying the kinda miss him. Ya know, just something to show everybody that they haven’t forgotten about him and that he meant something to the Winchesters. 

13. A new grieving process for Dean

I just made a post about this today, but I really want to see Dean grieve differently this season. For one, he’s lost so much at this point that I think it warrants more than the moody, drink the pain away, ignore the crushing feeling of loss, fight through it response that Dean normally has. For two, he made so many steps last season toward a more open and vulnerable expression of his feelings, and brooding doesn’t line up with that. Also, there’s a big difference this time around: Cas. He’s never lost Cas like this before. Not this completely, not for this long, not this far into their relationship. Say what you want, but Dean’s relationships are all different. From Sam to Mary to Crowley to whoever, Dean has a unique relationship with all of them. And losing Cas should result in a different kind of grieving. Especially considering the shit they’ve been through, especially because of all the shit Cas gave up for him. Dean’s lost plenty, but this time needs to be different.

Well, that’s all I got! Let me know if you agree or disagree or think some of these will happen. I’m excited for the season, for sure. Hopefully, it’s everything I’m wishing for! 

[desdemonafictional]

You Will Remember That

Telltale batjokes, slots into place during Season 1 Episode 4

Or, That Thing We Were All Thinking About

On AO3

When Leland says that she’s going to find you a room with fewer bloodstains, you don’t expect that room to be occupied. Leland stands at the door, signing off on some slip that she hands off to a passing orderly. “It’s unorthodox,” she says,“ but I promise you it’s only for one night. Two at the most.”

You glare at the bed they’ve dragged against the wall of this cell, slightly askew on the tile. “This can’t be ethical. This isn’t a state prison.”

“Truthfully, Bruce?” she says, with a grim eyebrow lift. “We weren’t supposed to be assigned any more patients this quarter. Your room was the last available one until we discharge our next ward.”

John, lying back on the opposite bed with his feet kicked up on the wall, adds, “Actually there’s two, but one of them has black mold and the other one has a chunk taken out of the wall.”

“John,” Leland says.

From underneath his hand, like it’s a secret, he adds, “Maxie took a disliking to the décor.”

Leland sighs. “Our biohazard maintenance is off the clock and the union won’t let us call him back in until tomorrow. I promise you, as soon as we have your room scrubbed properly, you’ll be back to your accustomed level of privacy.”

“My accustomed level of privacy doesn’t involve twenty-four hour surveillance,” you point out, eyeing the camera mounted in the corner of the room.

John laughs, a little harder and darker than you are entirely comfortable with. Quite a lot of things seem to be funny to him.

“More or less,” Leland amends. She scribbles something final looking on her clipboard, and then she says, “John, make sure that Bruce stays on the straight and narrow. No more riots. I’m trusting you to be a good influence.”

“You can count on me Doc,” he says.

“Lights out at ten,” Leland says to you. “Doors lock then. Group therapy is at 8 AM, but I think it’s better if we avoid introducing you to that kind of environment while things are still so tenuous. You’ve have one-on-one with me at 9.”

And then she leaves, the door open and taunting behind her. You guess you should be grateful that they’re still giving you open door privileges, after you threw yourself into the middle of a brawl, but you’re having a hard time being gracious about any of this. It’s taking all you have just to remain appropriately civil with Leland, who is genuinely innocent of your situation here. If only you had been able to make that call. Some distraction John made you.

As soon as the sound of her footsteps have disappeared, John leaps out of bed. He throws himself out of bed, lunges almost, throwing himself into orbit around you like a comet caught in the sun’s gravity. He circles you.

“We are gonna have so much fun, Brucie,” he says.

For the umpteenth time today, you force yourself not to track him as he circles you. He has this vulture-tiger-coyote fascination with your unprotected back, and you are pretty understandably prickled by it. You can feel him like a wave of electromagnetic interference over your skin.

“What’s your idea of fun?” you ask.

It has not escaped your attention the way he says certain things, the meaningful lowering of eyelids as he insinuates—what? Well, you can make a guess. This may not be a prison exactly, but in every way that matters, you haven’t detected much of a difference. Now, after everything he’d hinted in the rec room, you’re not as sure that you know what he wants, but you’re still waiting for the shoe to drop.

John throws himself back onto his bed (not yours, you notice). He crosses his legs. “Well, the rec room was pretty fun today, don’t you think?”

“I don’t generally categorize being shivved that way, actually,” you say.

“You don’t?” he says, tapping the corner of his mouth in a thoughtful way. “I was thoroughly entertained. Let me just say, it is a pleasure to watch you work. You really got right in there! And Zsasz, he’s no toddling bedwetter like some of these numbskulls. He’s a real piece of work!”

“Yeah,” you say. “Thank for that.”

He sits forward. “Tsk tsk, there’s no need to take that tone with your good buddy. It’s not my fault you missed your window of opportunity. Not that I’m not glad to have a little more quality time with you, don’t get me wrong, but you’ve got places to be, people to see.”

You say nothing. He’s right, it’s not his fault. That is to say, his plan would have worked if you had only chosen to go along with it. But you didn’t, and now you’re here, sharing a cell with him until your lawyers can manage to tie this place up in enough red tape to open up another fleeting window of opportunity. You’re confident that Alfred is out there working on it. He never lets you down. It’s just time, which you don’t have anywhere enough of.

“Anyways,” John says. “I think you do like it.”

“Like what?” you say.

He twists back and makes a motion like slamming a bat into something, throws his whole body into it. “The violence, Brucie. The action! I saw you out there, you’re a livewire,” he laughs. “I like that about you. You know just what to do with that body of yours.”

     I couldn’t just ignore it      No one could enjoy that      >it wasn’t that impressive

You cross your arms. “I’m hardly some kind of action hero. Recreational judo—some boxing, whatever’s new in town—I just do enough to keep fit.”

John plants his chin in his hand. “Come on now,” he says, “you can lie better than that.”

You find yourself speechless.

“You wanna give it another try?” he offers, helpfully.

“I’m-” you say, “I’m tired of talking about myself,” you say, which is not untrue.

John nods. “That’s fair,” he says.

And that’s it. He seems satisfied to leave it there, digging in his mattress to find a skein of red yarn which he twists around his fingers in a bizarre cat’s cradle, quietly manipulating the threads until they resemble a mandala.

You clear your throat, not sure that you like the silence any more than you liked the conversation. “Isn’t that banned?” you ask.

“Oh sure,” he says. He glances at you, eyes glittering like a window full of television displays. “But you won’t tell on me, will you?”

“…No,” you say.

He gives you a bright smile. “Don’t worry,” he says. “We’re gonna get you out of here. When one door closes—” he draws the cradle tight, with a twang, “—another one opens.”

 Wake up call at 7:00 finds you already up and pacing beneath the window of the room that everyone else is too polite to call a cell. John slides into his slippers and coaxes you out, leads the way to the kitchen full of undercooked hash and cold eggs. He doesn’t seem interested in the food, but he watches with a weirdly maternal zeal as you finally scoop up a serving for yourself, not quite moving out of your way until you fill the whole plate. He sits you down in a seat at a mostly empty table, across from a small nervous man pushing his eggs around and around.

“What’s the news, Tech,” he says. “Seen any rabbits lately?”

“No,” Tech says, without looking up. “What do you want?”

“I want you to meet the new guy!” John says. He slaps you on the back, nearly knocking you into your food. “Remind you of anybody?”

Tech glances up at you, watery blue eyes and a vagueness that seems to be looking right through you. “No one,” he says. “Nothing.”

“Come on now,” John cajoles, pushing the plate out from underneath Tech. “It’s good to confront your compulsions.”

Tech considers the table, for a long moment, and then he looks up at you again. This time he really seems to be looking. You don’t know what to say—the whole thing bewilders you. You can almost see him clicking on somehow, clear instead of cloudy.

 “White knight,” he says. “The white knight.”

“Really?” John says, with his eyebrow cocked. “I woulda said the opposite.”

 “With eyes, like cinders, all aglow,” Tech murmurs, “Who seemed distracted with his woe…”

“Oops,” John says. “There he goes. Looks like he’s not as far along in his therapy as I thought.”

You give John a look. It’s difficult to tell if he just likes setting people off, or if there’s some method to his madness. Zsaz was clearly a case of using what tools were available, but you remember the inmate in the hall too, and John thumping the locked door like a child tapping the glass of an aquarium.

“Come tell me how you live,” murmurs Tech, “and what it is you do…”

“Forget him,” John says, turning back to you. “He’ll get it together before group. Speaking of which, you get to skip don’t you, you lucky duck?”

“Dr. Leland was right,” you say. “It’s not a good idea, after everything yesterday.”

You look around the mess hall, counting the pairs of glaring eyes centered right on you. Security doesn’t seem to have been stepped up much. You spot some orderlies in the wings, but they’re only orderlies. Either they don’t have the resources to protect you, or they just don’t care. Or worse.

But it’s staying quiet isn’t it? You give the room a second look. Despite how many people are trying to drill your head open with their eyes, not a single one of them is making any moves. In fact, no one has made a move since that first brawl with the taser. With Zsasz, it was John who opened fire. Your gaze slides to him, to find him watching you back, and keenly.

“Nobody,” you say, “messes with you much, do they John?”

“Oh, I’m a model patient,” John says, casually. “Who would want to mess with little old me?”

There’s still blood splattered on the floor of the room that was meant to be yours. You don’t buy that misdirection for a moment.

“I was just thinking…” you say, “how everybody’s given me a pretty wide berth since Leland assigned you to me. Since you intercepted those guys, really.”

John drums the table with his fingers, not quite irritated but certainly not calm either. “They know better,” he says, no longer looking at you. “They know better. Hazing is the tool of a cult mentality.”

“I don’t think that was hazing,” you say.

John shrugs you off. He’s definitely agitated. “They’re lucky,” he mutters, “if you hadn’t needed checking up on, I would have—If I’d heard about it later, I’d have ripped their nails out.”

You kind of want to ask how he’d expect to manage that, but you are also a little bit afraid of the answer. He perks right up, anyways, before you can settle on whether to push it.

“But you’re fine!” he says, still watching you even as he pushes Tech’s plate back into his distracted hands. “And you’ll keep being fine, don’t you worry about a thing! Just leave it all to me.”

He’s smiling. His mouth is so wide you could count his perfect teeth. With every minute you spend in his company, you suspect more and more that he isn’t any ordinary patient here. You think of his cat’s cradle, the space at the center of the mandala that every twist of string orbits. But maybe you’re getting ahead of yourself.

There’s a distorted bell over the intercom. “Ah,” he says. “That’s group! Catch you later, buddy.”

When the orderly comes to escort you back to your cell, you follow him quietly. There’s a lot to unravel in this place, you’re quickly finding out.

 In your therapy session, Leland wants to know about your childhood. You are vague without being dishonest, disinterested without being rude—you tell her what she already knows. She wants to know about your relationship with Oswald. You’re candid enough. It feels good to tell someone what he’s done to you, although you obviously can’t tell her the whole story. She doesn’t stump you until, out of nowhere, she bring up John.

“And how are you getting along with him?” she asks you. “Any concerns?”

“Concerns?” you say. “Isn’t he your favorite patient?”

Leland frowns, as if she’s disappointed with you. “Bruce,” she says. “I’m a professional. If John has made you uncomfortable somehow, I need to know about it.”

     John is bad news      I can handle him      >I’m not sure what he wants

This is your chance to get out of the whole fraught affair. Or it would be, if you took it. But you don’t take it. Part of you thinks that you ought to; John is trouble, and you don’t at all like the way he talks about your father. But the other part of you, the part that wins out, is begrudgingly intrigued. You didn’t realize it until someone offered you an alternative, but—you’ve already been planning to see him again, you’re drawn back to him in some way that feels remarkably literal. As if you are physically being tugged at. You think again of the cat’s cradle.

“Is he like this with all the new patients?” you ask her.

She considers that for a moment. “He takes an interest, generally speaking. He’s been here the longest of any non-catatonic patient, so he sees himself as a sort of mentor. But no, to be quite frank, it isn’t usually like this.”

“How is it different?” you ask, leaning forward in your chair.

Leland regards you with her cool doctor’s eyes. “This is the most engaged I’ve seen you in nearly fifty minutes, Bruce. What are you thinking about?”

You flatten your features. “I just want to know that I’m safe with him, doctor. Sharing a cell with an inmate—”

“Patient,” Leland says. “Room. And judging from what I’ve seen, John is the one who ought to be worried for his safety, not you.”

You sigh. “I’m not dangerous,” you tell her. “You’re not… seeing me at my best. I promise you, once I’ve had a chance to get this stuff out of my system, you’ll see how stable I am.”

Leland flips through her copious notes. “Bruce, it’s not just the violence. Which, by the way, speaks for itself in my opinion. In less than half an hour you’ve told me so many unhealthy things about yourself that I’ve almost run out of paper, and I don’t think you even realize what they were.”

You pull back. “I haven’t told you anything,” you say.

“Yes, you’ve been less than forthcoming with the details of your day to day schedule, but that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s your attitude. Look, ten minutes ago you told me that you often go full days before actually sleeping. You do realize that’s a kind of self harm, don’t you?”

“I’m a busy man,” you tell her, helplessly. “I have to. Sometimes there’s just too much to do.”

“And you have to do all of it?” Leland remarks.

“Yes,” you say.

She shakes her head. “Why?” she says. “Why, when it’s clearly wearing you down to nothing?”

You’re still thinking about that as you make your way back to the room. Because nobody else can, you want to tell her. Because that’s what you’re for.

John looks up from a book as you pause at the door, feeling all at once like such an outsider that not even your body wants to go any further. John immediately sets his book off to the side, page unmarked. The cover of says House of Leaves. It’s a suspiciously heavy book for an environment like this.

“What’s the matter, buddy?” he says. “Therapy didn’t go so good?”

“It was fine,” you say automatically.

John gets to his feet and ushers you inside, toeing the door closed behind you. He leads you over to his bed and sets you down on the mattress, crawling up to sit beside you like a cat. “Hey, you can tell me about it,” he says, patting your knee. “Don’t be shy. Honesty is the backbone of a healthy relationship.”

You give him a sideways look. His hand is still on your knee, as if he’s forgotten it there.

“Dr. Leland and I just disagree about some basic underpinnings of my personality,” you tell him. “It’s fine. I don’t expect her to understand.”

“Ahh,” John says. “She started asking you about that nasty little dark thing inside you, huh?”

“I don’t have a nasty little dark thing,” you say, scowling. “I’m not my father, whatever you think he was. I don’t know how to make you people understand this.”

“Daddy issues,” John says, sympathetically. He squeezes your knee—definitely not forgotten, then. He ignores the way you’re glaring at him. “Okay,” he says, “you’re your own man, I understand.”

“Do you?” you mutter.

“Sure,” he says, bumping your shoulder companionably. “It’s always just you, at the end of the day. Nobody can live your life for you, Dr. Leland says.”

You look away. Sometimes that life feels like its sheering off bits of you with each choice. It seems like it’s always one bad option from a pile of worse.

You have a feeling he already knows what you’re thinking.

 Lunch passes without incident. You meet more inmates. You meet more staff. Most of them seem to be giving you the evil eye as they talk around you and over you. You certainly have a legacy here, in this forgotten old building, whether you want it or not. You think a lot about the Arkhams, and about your father—allegations, memories, a hesitance that is starting to feel cowardly in your own throat. In the afternoon they have optional crafts for people with recreational privileges. Someone tries to stab you with a magic maker in a fit of pique and ends up framed for worse by the time John is done with them. You feel like that was unnecessary. It was only a magic marker. But John is livid and already done with the deed by the time that you even realize there was a plot—he grabs your shoulder with a grip tight enough to leave bruises as they drag the inmate away. You don’t think he’s trying to hurt you. It almost feels like he’s afraid someone will rip you away from him.

During dinner, you get in a shouting match with someone who has opinions about your company and your life choices and your mother’s sexual history, and a couple orderlies swoop in to break it up just before it can spiral into an out-and-out altercation. Your vision is swimming by the time it’s all done, blue and red and nonsense like a 3D movie in the raw. You dig your nails into your scalp and try to calm down.

“Almost had it there,” John whispers, closer to your ear than you remember him being.

You grit your teeth. The fight broke up before it could start, there’s no one for you to take a swing at. You’ve got to hold it down, you’ve got to—

John is saying something to an orderly, and then he’s guiding you up from your chair, down through the hallway, back into the semi-privacy of your shared room. You feel a surge of gratefulness that froths and presses at your insides in the middle of all this rage, unable to find a release valve.

You spend a long time just breathing. God you hope this wears off soon. You’re angry enough without having Vicky’s chemical irritant making a mess out of your brain.

“Thank you,” you manage, eventually.

“What’re friends for?” John says brightly, unbothered by any of the episode. You realize he’s been absently rubbing small circles into your shoulder for a while now, as you lean against the wall. “We should really do something about that mouthy little toad,” he says, voice flickering dark for a breath. “If he thinks he can talk to a friend of mine that way—”

“It’s fine,” you say. You sound ragged in your own ears. “He’s got enough on his plate, living in this hellhole.”

John tuts. “That’s awfully negative,” he says. “You’re homesick, I bet.”

Maybe you are. You miss Alfred’s stolid support, his dry understanding. You miss the people at the office, the office itself, the freedom to get up and go wherever you want to. You’re homesick, you guess, but only in the sense that all of Gotham is your home. You miss the streetlights and the gargoyles and the sounds of traffic as much as you miss your own dusty house.

“Mm, I knew it,” John says. “Don’t worry, it’s normal. You’ve just got to ride it out. Eventually you’ll see Arkham is a kind of home too.”

“I’m not going to be here that long,” you remind him.

He pulls back his hand. “No,” he says, “no, of course not. I just meant that you would! If you stayed. Which you won’t.”

You give up and sit down on your bed. You can feel every single spring in the mattress, and you know that it doesn’t like your weight. Last night you half expected one of them to pop through the plastic sheeting and stab you through the heart, like the vampire that you are not. Tonight you’re tempted to just sleep on the tile.

John’s bed is just as bad, unsurprisingly. You could hear him toss and turn every time you surfaced from sleep, startled by an unfamiliar sound. There is something about hearing a springs squeak and murmur under another person’s body that feels uncomfortably intimate to you. It reminds you of college dormitories and one night stands.

“Cheer up!” John says, “I have big plans for tomorrow. I don’t want to give away the surprise, but think: hall phone.”

“Are you going to engineer another murder?” you ask him, startling yourself a little with the sharpness of it.

“It’s a surprise!” John laughs. “Jeeze, did you try to unwrap your Christmas presents early too?”

You sigh. You already know that if he tries something like that again, you’ll do the same damn thing. You can’t just let someone get stabbed in front of you, regardless of how lethal it might or might not turn out to be. Your mission is important, but it’s not important enough to change that fact.

John sidles over closer. “Do you mind if I…?” he says.

You stare blankly at him. Mind if he what? Murders someone tomorrow? Yes, you mind.

He gestures uncomfortably at the spot beside you on your bed. “I’m learning to respect boundaries,” he tells you, looking all at once more abashed than you’ve ever seen him. You marvel at the change in him, his lowered head, his hunched shoulders, his anxious expression.

“You want to sit down?” you ask him.

“If you don’t mind,” he says, clasping his hands together in front of him. “Your bed is your personal space, and I respect that. I wouldn’t want you to think I go in for that kind of,” his voice goes from urgent to pitch dark, “horseplay. Not me.”

You squint at him. You have no idea what he’s talking about.

“You can sit down,” you tell him, for some reason. Better not to ask yourself why.

Immediately he’s at your side, perched close enough to breathe in the air you breathe out. “Maybe when I’m out, you can show me around!”

It’s getting easier to know what to say to him. It doesn’t even hurt you, really, to say: “I know a couple good bars downtown, I guess.”

The way John lights up makes you feel like maybe you just passed a test. “I just knew,” he says, “the moment I saw you. Friends forever.”

Then he sighs. “Shame you’re going tomorrow. I still have so much to show you. You haven’t even met Crane!” He folds an arm over your shoulder, laying his cheek on his brightly colored sleeve. “What we need to do,” he says, “is go out with a bang.”

“A bang,” you say. You are imagining improvised explosives. Out of all the people you deeply and viciously want to hurt lately, the unnerving thing is that John doesn’t make your list. Not even at all. You are trying to figure out what the hell you’ll do if this man tries to blow up a building full of mental patients.

“A little something to remember me by,” he says. He looks up from underneath his pale lashes. His hand falls across your leg again, like an afterthought.

Oh.

Oh, so this is where the shoe drops. You really did not expect it to go anything like this. You take in the eagerness that practically oozes off him, the way he almost seems to vibrate with it as he leans forward, all but falling into your lap. What in the world do you do with this.

“John,” you say, carefully, “are you suggesting that you want to have sex with me?”

John pulls back a little, makes an offended little hmph. “That is strictly against Arkham policy, Bruce. I’m a model patient.”

“I’m… confused,” you admit. “What is this, then?”

“Wellll,” John says, opening up the hand that hangs between you, “this place is full of rules, rules, rules, but there are always… grey areas….”

Several things go through your head in that moment: one, you really don’t care at all about Arkham policy one way or another. You’re not a real inmate. Two, you’re not sure how much is actually riding on this moment. Three, what would John’s overwhelming enthusiasm look like underneath you, or over you, even?

“What if I say no?” you ask him.

Immediately he disengages, showing you his open palms in the universal sign language for I come in peace. “Hey,” he says, “no problem, buddy. I was kind of hoping, well, maybe you’d be excited about it, but if you want to do something else instead, no worries.”

Actually he seems kind of put out now. You regard him carefully, the way he’s rubbing anxiously at his palm with the ball of his thumb, the way he doesn’t seem to be looking at you anymore.

“What do you mean by grey areas?”

He perks right back up. “I could show you,” he says. “Arkham policy is no penetration, period, under any circumstances, but they’re not too specific about the rest of it!”

You give him a doubtful look. Just like handing a shivv to an inmate isn’t technically against the rules, huh? Just the part where you make it, or you use it.

“Sure, a couple of the other guys got yelled at for trying it, sure, but not me. So anyways, nobody’s ever told me it was against the rules. I’ve never tried anything in here.” John purses his lips. “Slim pickings,” he adds.

You decide to level with him, since he’s been nothing but helpful since you showed up. Even if his idea of help is sometimes worse than the alternative. “John,“ you say, "my head is pretty messed up right now. I don’t like what happens if I get my heart rate up while this poison is floating around inside of me, let alone a sudden surge of hormones—things could go very badly. I could wind up hurting you.”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” John says. “I’m tougher than I look, ya know.”

You eye his lean form, the rangy muscles down his arms. “Even if that was true,” you say. “No. I don’t want to risk it.”

John jumps up and paces the room, his bare feet skating over the tile. “That’s fine,” he says, “Okay. That’s fine. I’ll think of something else to do for you. I’ll just have to get creative!”

You frown. If he’s just trying to do something for you, to make you like him, the weird thing is that you kind of already do. There’s no point in all this. “Come here,” you say.

Instead of returning to the bed, though, he drops like a demolished building, landing on his knees at your feet. You wince. It doesn’t seem to bother him, but you know that would absolutely kill you. Maybe it’s the surge of sympathy, but what you do here is put out your hand and brush it over his swept-back hair. You watch him lean into it.

“How would you feel about it,” you say, surprising yourself, “if I were to just touch you. Just that?”

John laughs nervously. “Um,” he says, “why?”

“I don’t know,” you admit. “It just feels like something I might want to do.”

He’s quiet for a moment, and then he surges forward, hands pressing down into your thighs. “Well if you’re offering,” he says, “it’d be rude of me to say no.”

Last chance to back out. Who are you kidding? You’re not a passenger in this sinking ship, you’re the captain.

“I’m offering,” you say. “Please, get up off the floor?”

He does. He throws himself back onto your bed, in a protest of a hundred tiny shrieks. You swear, if he breaks your bed, you’re making him sleep in it. He starts wriggling out of his shirts, tossing them across the room in quick succession. He opens up his arms, as if he’s reaching for you. With a knot in your stomach, or maybe something worse, you climb up over him.

You’re starting to worry that you’re going to get yourself in trouble with Vale’s poison after all. Your heart beat—the way he hooks his arms over your neck, the way he looks up at you like you hung the moon, like you can do no wrong—

“What a view,” he says, with a quiet whistle.

What a view, you think, with an alarming mixture of apprehension and desire.

 As John comes, he clutches you to himself, all his needy whining noises quieted to a single reedy gasp. His nails buried in the back of your scalp seem ready to crack you open. If your vision is swimming, you know it’s just the poison, but you also know that the poison is triggered by arousal—deep inside your blood, part of you wants him to crack you open.

He slumps, but his grip barely flags. Against your ear, he murmurs: “I knew you would be fun.”

John will remember this

 What actually happens in the morning, which is not a bomb thank god, is that first thing John simply opens up the door that should have been locked and makes a sweeping gesture at the hall beyond. He winks at you, his hair still mussed. You don’t know how he did that, and when you press him he just shrugs mysteriously and returns to his strange book. The pages you catch a glance at have the helter skelter twisted formatting of something a patient might have written. You definitely get the feeling Dr. Leland wouldn’t like him to have it.

You make your phone call. Alfred picks up immediately, even though it’s five in the morning and you know he doesn’t get up for another hour. You reassure him, you lay out a solution, and then you resign yourself to a goodbye. Your heart aches for the stress you’re putting him under.

By the time evening rolls around, Leland has gotten word from the commissioner’s office that you are being released in order to testify in an upcoming investigation. If there is some way to make her understand that this isn’t just a rich man buying his way out of justice, you wish you knew what it was. She hands you your discharge papers with an air of disappointment so thick it nearly makes you choke. As frustrating as she’s been, she’s clearly one of the good ones. She’s trying. You respect that. It doesn’t change the situation.

Alfred seems to be focused on getting you out of the building as fast as possible. He doesn’t stop to look at anything or talk to anyone, staying cleanly out of range of any grabbing hands as he marches forward. It’s you who stops, just as you’re about to pass into the nurse’s office to drop off your uniform. The gate to the rec room is just a few feet away, and behind it, with his arms through the bars, John is watching you.

He winks.

You find yourself drawn his way. When you’re long gone from here, living your real life out there, and you think of this place, you suspect that you will think of him more than anything else. Already you can feel his presence swallowing all memory of halls or rooms or schedules, of the very building itself. John reaches up and pats your cheek, which is odd because you don’t remember walking all the way over here. 

"Parting is such sweet sorrow,” he says. “Still, can’t say we didn’t show you a good time!”

From beyond you, Alfred says, “Master Bruce, are you coming?”

John leans his head against the bars, smiling one of his knowing, dark smiles. You take a step back, and then another. You turn and catch up with Alfred, where he’s holding the door to the office open for you.

“Have fun out there, in the madhouse!” John calls after you. “Remember, they’re not all as nice as we are!”

As the door swings shut behind you, Alfred says, “Who was that fellow?”

But you don’t know where you would even begin, and so, ultimately you say nothing at all. 

[junker-town]

Fumble Dimension, episode 1: director’s commentary

Kofie Yeboah and Jon Bois recently debuted the premiere episode of Fumble Dimension, a show in which they simulated the death of the NBA over the course of several decades. They kept a diary. Here is that diary.

SB Nation Labs’ new series “Fumble Dimension” started with a new version of Jon Bois’ 2014 “Death of Basketball” article. During the six weeks it took to make the video, Jon and Kofie kept a diary of what the saw. Feel free to read along with the video, or enjoy it separately. Either way, here are the findings.

DAY 1

July 25th, 2019

-----

After months of discussion with my research partner Kofie Yeboah, we have elected to begin the NBA 2K experiment. In brief, we will attempt to create a portal to a cursed world.

Five years ago, I conducted an experiment. I created a 2K player who was as small, talentless, inept, and stupid as possible. Worse than any random person one would pull in from off the street.

And then I cloned this player until there was an entire NBA draft class full of him. And then I fed this draft class into the game’s franchise mode, year after year, decade after decade, until no real-life NBA players remained. The sport of basketball was destroyed.

I have long regretted my failure to keep proper statistics of this misadventure. Equipped with more time, endless spreadsheets, and the simulation expertise of Mr. Yeboah, the two of us intend to fully chronicle this horror.

I would like to believe I am a good person. But is this what good people do?

Jon, 5:59 p.m.

-----

DAY 2

July 26th, 2019

I am exploring the Create-a-Player mode. A wealth of options is at our disposal. Notably, the mode allows us to select a type of injury a player is most vulnerable to, and how many days it is likely to keep him out of action. For instance, if this is as it seems, a player might miss up to 480 days after sustaining a bloody nose or getting the wind knocked out of him.

Player attributes are all pulled down to 25, the lowest possible value. Tendencies -- as in, the player’s tendency toward a certain shot or behavior -- are another matter. In the experiment five years ago, I set every tendency at 0. I consulted with Kofie, who suggested we set them all at the maximum of 100, just to see what happens. Our reasoning is as follows: fuck it.

Jon, 2:04 p.m.

The Xbox keeps overheating while Kofie is attempting to create the draft class. It doesn’t want us to do this. Will take a shift of my own later.

Jon, 5:31 p.m.

DAY 3

July 29th, 2019

Two consoles and one weekend later, I have finally finished out the roster from hell that Jon started. I had to save early and often like this was a term paper that counted for 25% of my final grade. Whenever I tried to change too much data the Xbox One would shut down 2K and I’d have to start over from my last save point. This might be because this is an older version of the console, or this might be a game problem.

Luckily, now that the big building part is out of the way I don’t expect us to have anymore problems like this because our MyLeague will likely run on autosaving.

The draft class is here.

I wanted to test out the abilities of these players without compromising the NBA rosters so I decided to go to the classic teams.

For the sake of the article I’m not going to spoil how these characters play like so far, but boy oh boy you’re in for a treat.

Kofie 4:45 p.m.

DAY 4

July 30th, 2019

Before we start simulating I want to give some background on what exactly we’re doing here. We will be using the MyLeague mode and tracking as many seasons as it takes to completely jack up the league. Now NBA 2K tells us that we have to control one team, but they *didn’t say* that we had to be good at it. Sorry, Warriors.

We also will be automating everything we can except for the draft class, which we will import ourselves. Now apparently storylines can be added to the players in this draft class. I have no idea how that affects it so I’m going to say no.

Every season the sim will stop to ask us if we want to see the All-Star team captains. This will be obnoxious at first, but has the potential to be absolutely hilarious. A crazy thing that is in NBA 2K19 is “advanced stats,” which is something that seems mad unnecessary for this but I will welcome it with open arms.

We can also scout the shitty draft class that we put in the game. Now a weird thing I’m seeing is that the scouting report ALTERED the heights and weights of some of the players, so some players actually 5’2, which is BELOW the possible heights we made when we were making create a players. Is this because I put prospect scouting on Auto? There are so many settings in this one that I honestly can’t tell which one changes prospect height. One thing that didn’t change, however is that they all still suck.

At this point in time we are rejecting any rule changes that could potentially be made in the league.

So. During the Draft Combine we found out that damn near everybody had an eye injury and that is considered a serious draft concern. We are not making this up. This is real. In the combine the highest vertical leap was 26 inches. That’s it not ideal, but oddly enough it seems that everyone doesn’t completely suck at jump shots.

NBA 2K has also added Summer League, so we will get to see these players way earlier than expected.

After Season one we have one 40 Overall on the Warriors, He is currently reserve status, but don’t worry D.J. Gatling, Your time will come.

DAY 5

August 2nd, 2019

Season 2:

We are on season 2 of NBAY2K2 and our 40 overall for the Warriors, D.J. Gatling, has already played five games for a grand total of five minutes.

I just want to take the time to shout out Kurt Ryan, who made All-Rookie 1st Team without actually playing a game. We had some productive rookies this year, but they were from our draft class. They consisted of players that were already on two-way contracts. I think we’re going to see a decline of rookie production really soon. Congrats to Jacob Evans III for being named rookie of the year. Yes, that’s a real player, so shout out to him.

In addition to Vince Carter and Jamal Crawford, a lot of our 40 overall players are already retiring, which … fair. 29 teams voted to eliminate the shot clock, but we’re going to override this rule change … for now. Now usually after a season or two the players start to regress or progress. Our 40 overalls aren’t doing either. This is progression purgatory. No one improves, no one declines.

Season 3:

Despite the rookie class and summer league rosters running rampant with awful players, it seems like regular season players have been affected yet. When predicting when the first 40 overall would start/make a major impact, Jon said four years while Kofie went high with eight years. We’ll see who is right in the near future.

DAY 6

August 5th, 2019

Season 4: I’m not sure how long the takeover will take because we have a considerable number of 40 overalls retiring. I’m not sure how efficient the draft class infiltrations are. However, like Thanos, destruction is inevitable. After one month of simulating, the highest total number of minutes for a 40 overall is 2.

However, thanks to another Steph Curry injury, we finally have a 40 overall in the 12-man rotation. The little people are moving up in the league!

Season 5: Holy shit, LeBron James is a 95 overall at age 37.

The Rising Stars challenge seems to have disappeared. I didn’t sim through it and it was definitely in season 4. Maybe we have reached a point where there aren’t enough players to fill out a roster for it. Which means that we are getting closer and closer to the takeover.

Also LeBron retired. Damn. End of an era. He was so good that he got his jersey retired on three different teams! Take that, Kobe.

We are also extremely close to a summer league roster of all 40 overalls. Dammit Cody!

Season 6: After disappearing for one season, the Rising Stars challenge is BACK… wait never mind it disappeared again LOL. So what I’m guessing is happening is that there aren’t enough young international players to make a Rising Stars roster. Which is wild because we totally didn’t take the places hometowns into account at all when starting this. Maybe we can vote to bring the Rookie-Sophomore game back?

Season 7: After six seasons, it doesn’t look like we’re making any real progress right now. The main reason why is because all of these two-way players and G leaguers are coming up and getting in the way of everything.

Season 8: Now we’re getting into a nice simulation routine. Steph Curry is 37 years old and looking like the next star to retire. The 40 overalls are making a slow, but steady climb in the rosters. The team with the most 40 overalls on the roster is currently the Orlando Magic with four people.

It took eight seasons, but we finally have a summer league team with all 40 overall people. Let’s see how this goes.

Season 9: Devin Booker JUST turned 30. Damn.

DeAndre Ayton just won MVP for the Detroit Pistons. Ladies and gentlemen, we are officially in the simulation,

We’re also, one year away from a new CBA and a new TV deal and I don’t know what that means but it’s about to go DOWN.

Season 10:

So remember earlier when we had a player make the All-Rookie team without playing a game? Now we have a player on the All-Rookie 1st team that isn’t even technically on the team. Yes this guy has a contract with an overseas team and is ineligible to sign a contract for a year and STILL made 1st team all rookie. Wow.

Season 11:

Ladies and gentlemen, WE HAVE MINUTES!

DAY 7

August 6th, 2019

Season 11 continued:

So over the course of the season the 40s’ minutes would fluctuate due to injuries and stuff. Here’s an example of the Warriors roster when it’s full of injuries. This is crazy.

Side note: The Xbox One crashes are BACK, baby, making this simulation twice as complicated as it needs to be. Great. Help me.

DeAndre Ayton has won his third straight MVP award and I don’t know how to feel about this.

Season 12: It’s all going to shit. The Warriors team we’ve been keeping a close eye on has to start a 58 overall shooting guard because all of the 40 overall players are Centers. Curry, Harden and Cousins are gone and now the NBA is damn near unrecognizable. There are only three free agents in the 70s range. The rest are all 40 overalls, baby.

I’m sure this specific team wouldn’t be ass if we actually let them make awesome free agency moves. We however, have sat back and watched the fireworks.

Also. I’m sorry.

Season 13:

The 40s are starting to show promise as rotation players. No one knows how this happened or why it happened, but the end is near. We’re getting phases of play with multiple 40 overalls on the court at the same time. Their impact and footprint is growing ever so slowly.

Season 14.

The Warriors now have a 40 overall as the 6th. Guys, this shit is about to go nuclear. We are at the point where 2K is making up undrafted players that are better than the 40 overall rookies. Because this:

Is not a real person.

I had to make sure that the draft class wasn’t contaminated or that there wasn’t an error, but no. 2K is making up undrafted players to compensate for the fact that we made them all centers. Which is another thing that we weren’t expecting this time around. Well played, 2K. Well played. Also our Warriors team is 7-75 on the season. You love to see it.

I think all of the contracts except for two players ran out because in the offseason it looks like this now.

Season 15: As confirmed. NBA 2K is making up undrafted players, but no worries because we now have our first 40 overall in the STARTING LINEUP. HELL YEAH.

There is a new season fill roster option which will automatically sign players to fill roster to the NBA minimum. Jon thinks that the players are SO bad that the NBA teams refuse to sign them, so NBA 2K makes up players. Let’s put this to the test.

At the end of the season, there was a prompt for me to fill out the rest of the roster with players. I have 12 spaces to fill. I choose not to do it and the game crashes multiple times because I can’t sign anyone. They wouldn’t take my offers. Help us.

DAY 9

August 8th, 2019

With Kofie out of town, I’m reviewing his video files. In particular, I am recording the PER of every player over the years who has played enough to qualify for the stat. This requires hours of manual data entry. It is almost unbearably tedious. But it is worth it.

Thus far, I have recorded five seasons’ worth of PER data. I have plotted all five seasons, arranged from best to worst player.

There is no meaningful difference to be observed so far. This is my prediction: once it changes, it will change very quickly and dramatically. This will not be gradual.

We’ll continue to see key retirements in the coming years. But if a player can hang on for long enough to stand as one of the only giants left in the league, his PER will skyrocket. Perhaps to the 40s or above.

Jon, 7:42 p.m.

DAY 10

August 12th

I’m back from being out of town and I want to try to solve the undrafted player effect. My hypothesis is that this is because we made the draft class all centers. I’m making a second draft class and spreading out the positions to see if that fixes our 2K problem, but for season 16 we’re going to keep it as is and not change the overalls of anyone 2K added for us.

Our Golden State Warriors went 0-82, which has to be because we don’t have a single real NBA player on our roster. This is incredible. The All-Star rosters are giving us players we’ve never seen before.

It’s also of note that after nothing but centers for 15+ years, not a single center was drafted in this year’s class.

Season 18:

It seems like changing the positions helped stop the 2k created player influx because now the Warriors only have 1 non 40 overall on the roster. The 60 overall was a 2K-made-up player, but we seem to be getting closer to the apocalypse.

The All-Star teams look wonky, as a character named Ivan Radja is the All Star Captain now. I’ve also decided to watch the three-point contest and dunk contest this year. A 37-year-old DeAndre Ayton won MVP again. I predict that him retiring will be the true last domino to fall. He’s only a 75 overall now, but he’s dominating the league.

Season 19: At last, we have a team with all 40 overalls so we tried a game against a team that didn’t start any of them, and holy shit we got waxed.

It looks like we’re going to have to wait out the players 2K made up in our stead for this to be a fair fight. This also marks the first season where the MVP isn’t an actual real player. The MVP of the league was a 66 overall. For context, that’s the same overall rating as Kyle Collinsworth in today’s game.

Season 20: This is where it gets interesting, because there are teams with a lot of 70 overall players and teams with only 40 overall players. Jokic and Giannis are on our coaching staff and they’re easily better than anyone on the roster.

Day 10

August 12th

I just noticed that DeAndre Bembry is rated 92 overall in Season 8, making him one of the best players in the NBA. The prior seven seasons he barely played at all, or at least not enough to register in the PER column.

Reader, I will be honest with you: I could not remember who DeAndre Bembry was, and until I saw that he had an actual photo, I’d assumed the game had made him up.

Jon, 11:50 a.m.

Day 11

August 13th.

Season 21:

We are just waiting for the eventual cascade of phasing out the not good players. As one of the teams with all 40 overall players, we are on a steady diet of not only losing games, but getting destroyed in each game.

Now, I also discovered something. It seems after the free agent period is simmed every year no free agent deals were made. All of the team rosters only had 2-3 players on it. It seems like 2K then takes the first 12 players available *by rating* and gives it all to one team and then the next best overall goes to the next team and this happens in alphabetical order, so by the time the Warriors have a chance there are only 40 overalls.

This also happens every year as the people 2K made up have 1 year contracts while the draft classes that we made get rookie deals. This means that our Warriors team will be terrible until the playing field is level… so like a decade?

Season 23-26: We’re making progress on the simulation. As more and more players are retiring the playing field is evening out and the Warriors look like they are winning more games.

Season 26: the Golden State Warriors made the playoffs, winning only 28 games. This caught me so much by surprise that I didn’t realize it until the playoffs were over. Meanwhile the dominant Philadelphia 76ers went 79-3. In fact, FOUR teams won 70 games in the EASTERN CONFERENCE ALONE

Season 28:

The Golden State Warriors are third in the Western Conference with a grand total of 38 wins. Jesus, the Western Conference is atrocious.

Season 29: Holy shit, the Warriors finished .500. We’re getting closer.

Day 12

August 14th.

Season 30: The Warriors won 45 games this year and LeBron James has retired from the league again, this time as an assistant coach!

Season 31: The Most Valuable Player is a guy named Daniel Mills, who averaged 5 points and 35 rebounds a game. A 6’9 34-year-old who went undrafted. This is a 2K-made-up player who is still dominating the league because he’s just tall. In fact, there’s a huge spike of rebounds per game across the board.

Is this what the 1960s were like?

Season 32:

The Philadelphia 76ers went 82-0. YUP, 82-0. They also went 82-0 the season before. Jesus.

Want to see their roster?

Yeah. That’s all it takes now. They also went 16-0 in the playoffs.

With that being said, the total dominance of one team means that the 2K fill-ins are getting phased out. We’re so close. Hang in there, NBA. 5 of those 76ers players retired after this season. This might be the final straw for the good players of the league. Stay tuned.

Season 33:

Only three non-40-overalls remain in the entire league. Of course, they’re all on the 76ers. Sam Hinkie was a genius. Let’s see how a game between our Warriors and the 76ers plays out.

Meet Johnathan Bucker.

He’s the only 6’10 player left in the league, and he’s getting all the rebounds. He’s only 50 overall. After all of this, he didn’t even make the All-Star team because he suffered a right ankle sprain. Of course.

Well, there’s only one thing left we can do: try out the three point contest. Oh dear God.

The dunk contest isn’t better. It’s just a bunch of players glitching out and only getting 30s. Because they don’t even look like they’re dunking. Adam Silver needs to change that shit.

As expected, Johnathan Buckner wins the MVP as a 48 overall, averaging 43.8 rebounds a game because he’s tall as shit. He’s also 37.

Season 34: We have finished the job. The infiltration is complete.

Season 36: This is the year I’m going to start installing 0-tendency guys into the game to see just how shitty this can get.

Season... I don’t even know anymore. The year is 2055: It seems that the 0-tendency guys infiltrated our roster in no time at all.

All is... won? No that can’t be the saying.

Season I have no idea: This is the All-Star game. The funniest part about this is the NBA 2K broadcasting crew pretending that nothing is different.

All is lost.

Season 40:

The Warriors win the NBA Finals again, but at what cost?

All is lost.

All is lost.

[arcaneranger]

Final Thoughts - Fall 2018

This season dragged on me a lot, and I attribute that mostly to the fact that I moved right at the end and it put me way behind schedule, but also because a number of shows looked like they were going to really go the distance and wound up with one big disappointment or another.

That’s not to say that there weren’t gems - in fact there were a few - but this was yet another season where my “Hall of Fame” looked woefully light. That being said, I’d really like to get this over with since I have other shows to finish and three more lists to make for the year, so as usual, let’s start with the stuff I skipped entirely:

* Tokyo Ghoul re: Second Season & Gurazeni Season 2 because I didn’t watch either of their previous seasons.

* Senran Kagura Shinovi Master because Senran Kagura as a property is built entirely on half-naked girls with big boobs and that’s not going to jive with me.

Wow, that’s really it? Fall was the beginning of a lot of shows that won’t be finished until sometime in 2019, so the other shows I skipped will appear next year on the Multi-Cour list. So, moving right along, from bottom to top...

DROPPED

* WORST OF THE SEASON: TIE

UZAMAID!, My Sister My Writer (1/10)

We did have multiple entries into the Hall of Shame this season, with not one but two shows being offensive enough that they landed a 1/10 score from me, for an easily identifiable and familiar reason: actively glorifying pedophilia! That was pretty much UZAMAID!’s biggest problem, but My Sister My Writer aged up the target character in exchange for recycling the plots of OreImo and Eromanga Sensei, with all of the bullshit and none of the production values. Happy Sugar Life has even further convinced me that there is absolutely no excuse for this garbage anymore.

* Conception (2/10)

A video game adaptation that strips away the actual gameplay elements and focuses entirely on the main character figuratively fucking a lot of fantasy women to make world-saving babies, and it doesn’t even have the courtesy to look like it cost more than $5 to make.

* Ulysses: Jeanne D’arc and the Alchemist Knight (3/10)

I didn’t get far enough into this one to get to the real garbage (I’ve heard it’s another show I should probably throw in with the worst of the season) but the very first episode bored me to tears with its rote anime nonsense. I’m pretty well convinced that the only way I could ever find a Joan of Arc anime interesting is if it were an adaptation of the Level 5 PSP game.

* Between the Sky and Sea (3/10)

I can’t deconstruct this any better than Mother’s Basement did but it is just the most asinine thing I was subjected to for the whole season. Cute girls don’t fix a terminally stupid concept like “all the fish have moved into space and so now we train teenage girls to be astronaut fishers”.

* Bakumatsu (3/10)

I dropped this one an entire point from when I first reviewed it simply because I had entirely forgotten it even existed and cannot remember a single thing about it except that it was generic.

* As Miss Beelzebub Likes It (4/10)

I found this one’s first episode to be cute but entirely devoid of substance. Also, the poster still hurts my eyes to look at.

* DAKAICHI -I’m being harassed by the sexiest man of the year- (4/10) & Bloom Into You (4/10)

Proof that actual gay people just cannot have nice things, the most explicitly LGBT shows to be made in a while both suffer from the same problem: a supposedly sympathetic character having no ability to take “no” for an answer. True fact: not all gay relationships start with rape, and this is the kind of entertainment that fosters young people into not knowing how consent works.

* ReRideD: Derrida Who Leaps Through Time (4/10)

I guess everybody else saw this one coming before I did? It was the first post-premiere show I dropped because I thought the first episode showed an interesting setup, and the following episodes just completely abandoned the apocalyptic setting very quickly to show that society was pretty much fine, there were just robots roaming the earth like random D&D encounters. Man, sci-fi cannot catch a break these days.

* Ms. vampire who lives in my neighborhood. (5/10)

I can see why this might appeal to some but it’s basically just a low-rent Miss Kobayashi’s Maid Dragon and I wasn’t feeling especially charitable towards it.

* Double Decker! Doug & Kirill (5/10)

I really thought this one could get to be more interesting, but it failed to really commit to being either anime’s Brooklyn 99 (which, for the record, we have, it’s Blood Blockade Battlefront season 2) or being a serious tale about the dangers of Tide Po-I mean, drug usage, and wound up just being an uninteresting thud.

* The Girl in the Twilight (5/10)

This one really could have made it if only it had taken things a little more seriously and not made me wonder why the cast are even friends as they seem to have nothing in common. I can’t believe that the creator of this project was the guy who wrote the script for Punch Line, one of the greatest shows I’ve ever seen.

* Tsurune (6/10)

I literally just finished my write-up for this, but I do not understand why the same company would make both this and a continuation of Free! airing in back-to-back seasons, it just makes this one look like a copycat even if it’s not a bad show.

UNSCORED

* Gakuen Basara: Samurai High School because I’m not familiar with the source material and that seems to be the barrier for enjoyment here.

SPECIAL

* Anima Yell! (6/10)

If you need a reminder, I dropped Anima Yell after the first episode because even though I enjoyed it, I found it too similar to Comic Girls and didn’t particularly want to go through the effort of finishing a show I was already pretty ready to score, even if it was going to be a positive one. I simply didn’t have time.

FINISHED (Note that Tumblr has completely broken and I’ve had to re-edit this portion a dozen times because it keeps randomly bolding paragraphs and losing GIFs, so if anything got lost here, I’m very sorry but there’s nothing I can do about it.)

* Boarding School Juliet (7/10)

A pleasant little romantic comedy that wasn’t what I was expecting from the first episode but was charming nevertheless. Would have been better without the involvement of attempted rape on school grounds in the premiere though. * Release the Spyce (7/10)

A thrilling and surprisingly brutal little spy show that wound up being overshadowed by better shows with similar concepts but was a fun watch nonetheless, even if it dragged in the middle.

* Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai (8/10)

I stand by what I said before - this one would have easily scored higher with a better ending, but Bunny Girl Senpai is certainly the most approachable show of its genre and its strengths as a romance are not to be understated. 

* Zombieland Saga (8/10)

Another Very Good show that could have been better with one simple change - it’s hilarious and very well-written, but those performance sequences are just awful to look at and the heavier focus on them towards the end did not help.

* Iroduku: The World in Colors (8/10)

A stunning treasure that needed a little more character work for the writing to really impress me, but with a very satisfying ending and a ton of visual creativity.

* Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san (9/10)

A fucking hysterical show scientifically grown in a lab to appeal to me, Honda-san could have been the new INFERNO COP, SAVIOR OF ANIME if more people had given it a chance.

* BEST OF THE SEASON: SSSS.Gridman (9/10)

I don’t know what else to say other than that this is easily the most criminally underappreciated show of the year. A lot of people seemed to be turned off by giant robots fighting kaiju, and those people are dumb.

And that was Fall! I’ve got a few Netflix shows left and I have to finish Classicaloid 2, and then I’ll be all done with 2018, so get ready, I’ve got a few more lists on the way!