#i just want to be her writer friend and have long conversations about craft

[tossawary]

When writing both original fiction and fanfiction, it's my personal preference and style to remind people who characters are in the narration when I feel it might be needed. It's especially handy when bringing OCs into a fanfiction. Example: "The person calling out to them was [Character's Name Here], the baker they had met earlier that morning." This quirk of narration often reads to me as the POV character internally reminding themselves who someone is.

Sometimes, a character is quite bad with names or wasn't given one, which is where it's handy to refer to this other character by a fixed epithet. Example: "The person calling out to them was the square-faced man from yesterday, who had given them those bad directions." OR: "The person calling out to them was the mayor's daughter." This reads to me as though the POV character is distinguishing people by a particular feature or remembers them by their relationship to someone else, which is a common way to remember people, until their own name becomes more fixed in your mind.

I also think it's important to keep an epithet / title the same across a scene. Epithets are best used, in my opinion, when that particular feature or quality is actually relevant. It's a little weird for a POV character to suddenly think of their own husband as "the tall man" unless his height is suddenly important in some way, and it might confuse the audience into thinking another person is in the room. If a character doesn't have a name, then "the square-faced man" or "the mayor's daughter" effectively becomes their name, and it's confusing to have a character's name change too much with every other paragraph. (It would be fine to also refer to "the mayor's daughter" as "the girl" or "the young woman" as long as there aren't any other nameless girls speaking in the scene.) Keeping the same title allows it to blend in in the same way that the word "said" does, rather than break up the flow of a scene.

Not every person or character is bad with names and remembering people, of course, or is inclined to give them funny little internal titles. There are people who are very good at names. There are tricks to use to get yourself to memorize names as you're introduced to someone. Narrative styles are going to be different by author and by the current POV character. (Sometimes, you might want the audience to be confused and disoriented!)

In fact, thinking about how different characters think about each other is one of my favorite starting places for crafting a perspective voice. A single character might be referred to in the narration as "His Majesty" by one character, "my husband" by another character, "the king" by a third character, "the usurper" by a fourth character, and "Dad" by a fifth. The name that a character calls someone else by will often say a lot about their relationship and their opinion of that other person. If the prince appears to think of his father as "the king" rather than "Father", that implies something about their relationship.

But back to introducing character names, you as an author, in my experience as a writer and reader, generally can't rely on the audience to easily recall very minor character names unless they're very distinct or the character was introduced in a particularly memorable way. Like, if you introduce a character as the protagonist's best friend, Mary, and immediately start refering to her as Mary because it's followed by a conversation between the protagonist and Mary, that's fair! It's reasonable to expect the audience to just learn Mary's name here! But then if Mary disappears after Chapter 1 and doesn't show up again until Chapter 10, I think it's reasonable to subtly reintroduce her to the audience again. Example: "It was Mary smiling at me from the doorway, and I jumped up to hug my best friend immediately."

Like, there's no one way that you have to refer to characters and introduce them and reintroduce them, of course. Characters have different levels of importance and sometimes we don't really need to know who they are. Sometimes, an author wants an audience to feel grounded, to recognize people, and sometimes they want their audience to feel lost and scared. It's all situational. Style is a thing.

But because it's all situational, this is something I like thinking about and I think it's something worth studying when you're reading original fiction. It's interesting to pay attention to how characters enter and exit scenes in different forms of media, and how the narrator introduces them and how other characters greet them aloud. (Shakespeare comes to mind as a neat thing to look at, to see how theatre does it. Comic books and films and visual media will do it differently to a text-only story.) The audience doesn't have the background that you, the author, carry around in your head all of the time, and you often need to give them a helping hand in keeping your cast of characters straight. Even in fanfiction, without including OCs, not everyone in the audience has the whole canonical cast perfectively memorized, and not every character in any given cast actually knows every other character! It's not just OCs who need introductions, whether those introductions happen subtly or a character enters the story with a bang.

Kind of another side note:

One of my favorite character introductions comes from the book "The Princess Bride", in which Princess Buttercup is kidnapped by three men who are referred to only as "the Spaniard", "the Turk", and "the Sicilian". You don't know their names for quite some time. Buttercup doesn't know these people.

You only learn the Spaniard's name when the Sicilian leaves him at the top of a cliff, tasking him the Spaniard fighting and killing "the Man in Black" who is pursuing their kidnapping. When the Spaniard is about to fight someone to the death, the book pauses to tell you that his name is Inigo Montoya, and then there is an ENTIRE CHAPTER dedicated to Inigo Montoya's long and tragic backstory, in which you learn about his decades-long quest to find the six-fingered man who murdered his father. And then the book abruptly dumps you the audience back out onto that cliff, where Inigo (no longer just "the Spaniard" and no longer just some random kidnapping thug) is about to fight for his life.

I think it's a terribly fun piece of whiplash that suits the comedic style of the book really well. (The book is a little different to the movie and there are things about it that I don't like, the movie gets across a level of a sincerity and love through the acting that the book misses in places, but there are lots of really funny elements to the book that the movie sadly couldn't cover.) The transformation from "the Spaniard" into "Inigo Montoya" is really neat to me.

[nerdieforpedro]

I love how you write and it makes me so glad you are here.

can I ask what inspired you to start?

signed - a maybe inspired future fic writer

This is such a wonderful ask! 🥰

I'm glad you enjoy my writing. I have ideas and I write them is my short answer and explains nothing I realize.

The long answer:

I've written fanfic before, off and on for maybe the last 10-15 years. Very different fandoms. Started out with anime, dabbled a bit in Yaoi then transitioned to Marvel and now I'm firmly planted in the Pedro Pascal, Oscar Issac, Benny Miller triangle of hotness.

Fanfic for me is an expression of a story, show, movie, video game or pice of media that I enjoyed so much, I just had to make something. I can't draw, no mixing of hot tracks or beats, I've just started dabbling in photo editing this year and am a beginner at that. It's all purely fun for me. I enjoy it and it's fun to share with other people who create and are like, "Hey! You like that? I like it too. Let me see yours and I'll show you mine. Where'd you get the idea for that?" And then hilarious conversations leap from there.

What inspired me to start specifically in the Pedro Pascal fanfic world was The Mandalorian. It was the first time I realized, "that's the man I've seen before!" And then realized I've seen Pedro Pascal in many of my favorite shows, (The Mentalist was watched for the sake of completion. After season 6 and the first episode of season 7, there wasn't a real reason to continue other than spending time with my mom. She's fine, when I tell people that they think she's passed on but the woman is still lifting 50 lbs mulch bags in her mid seventies. She more than fine.) I then became fixated on this man, reset the password on my AO3 account and found Pedro Pascal character fanfics. I was then led back to Tumblr which before I was on years ago for anime and read fics by @secretelephanttattoo ( I shall always sing about Headshots. It inspired the first fic I posted on Tumblr and is just so damn cute. El is also just a sweetheart.) and @morallyinept whose Tendrils fic only deepened my brain rot for that tall beskar bucket, she's also a dear friend who's made me laugh, cry in a good way, inspired me and very time I turn around she's crafting something new. Fics, banners, self-care, doodles, smut, databases, and all sorts of Pedro interviews and dialogue. Because I'm a fangirl of them both and many others actually, I keep 👀 on them.

What keeps me going is the fandom overall and that despite, recent tribulations let's say politely, we're all still here. Geeking out over a goofy, handsome, I know he gives the best hugs, actor who loves what he does and has been working at it for years and it's finally paying off.

I've met wonderful friends and moots who reach out, give me encouragement, tell me I do well (I'm starting to listen to them I swear. I'm not good at taking compliments in person so it's even worse online FYI.

So I hope this answers your ask and I do encourage you to write that weird, funny, smutty, cute, sweet, dark, twisty, angsty fic that you want to write. I do hope whoever you are, you tag me in it so I can read it. 🤭

Special love to the following and if I left anyone off, I'm sorry. It's after work, I rubbed my eyes, wipes my glasses because I got them wet while writing this and it was a lot:

@maggiemayhemnj @megamindsecretlair @soft-persephone @angelofsmalldeath-codeine @magpiepills

@mysterious-moonstruck-musings @for-a-longlongtime @i-own-loki @undercoverpena @connectioneverywhere

@soft-girl-musings @perotovar @julesonrecord @lotusbxtch @604to647

@yorksgirl @pedroshotwifey @fhatbhabiee @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin @bitchwitch1981

@jessthebaker @avastrasposts @inept-the-magnificent @lady-bess @grogusmum

@schnarfer @boliv-jenta @iamskyereads @iamasaddie @chaithetics

@tinytinymenace @yourcoolauntie @alltheglitterandtheroar @musings-of-a-rose @rhoorl

@trulybetty @laurfilijames @wannab-urs @legendary-pink-dot @din-cognito

@sin-djarin @beefrobeefcal @spacecowboyhotch

[drakeanddice]

On the Matter of “Lonely Fun”

I do not enjoy prep.

I had a conversation with Navi the other day and many things were discussed regarding Trad gameplay, OSR stuff, dungeon crawling, and the varying imbalance between the GM and player roles in those games. Navi explained that she views most of those older trad games as, to a greater or lesser extent, board-games in which you try to face greater and greater perils while expending the fewest resources possible. She misses a little bit of the granularity in the tactical plastic-pushing sense of dungeon-crawling.

I’ll admit I got a little caustic. “Of course you do. You weren’t the one doing the homework.” She showed up and got to passively consume. The AI had already set up all the situations and all that was left was to make interesting choices and see how the situations resolved.

I don’t want to put on that mantle of wounded pride, the one so common among the legions of “forever DMs.” No one’s forcing anyone into the service side of the weirdly-fraught master and servant relationship that is D&D. Plenty of power-bottoms in the scene, for sure; just absolutely over-the-moon to make sure everyone has a good time week after week, whose psychological reward is that their friends at the table were excited to experience the story they’d crafted.

Don’t @ me that you’re the big D at your table because you’re sitting behind the screen and deciding matters of life and death for your party, because the same has been said about healers in MMOs. You are in the service industry, friend. It’s why you’ve got homework before every game.

I do not enjoy that prep. Mostly, it rankles that only one person at a table of four, five, six functioning brains is the only one who gets saddled with the lonely fun in a lot of these games. Because, I’ll happily admit that it can indeed be lonely fun. Honestly, the problem is that I, being a writer, have a tendency to vanish over the edge of the deep end where prep and world building and scenario design and customized content and everything are concerned.

Navi, for all of her talk of occasionally missing the D&D-esque dungeoncrawling adventure days will be the first to tell me that she does not miss the days when I was running D&D for her. Because I put way too many hours in. Not because I had to. Not because the game was complex or difficult, not because the game required it of me, but because it didn’t fight me if I did. Honestly, the game was such a bag of blanks that I could spend as much time as I liked filling them in and if anything, the game only got better. And so I did. And the game was…y’know fine. Great. The table was awesome. So long as I didn’t expect anything of them.

The players would show up and play through the encounters, ooh and ahh at all the right places, and tell me they had a good time. And that was enough for a while. But man, the energy only goes one way in that kind of game. I spend my time daydreaming and writing and such, and they appreciate it. Then wonder what happens next week. No real agency or direction, just passive recipients.

I can’t do that anymore. So I tend to play games that treat prep with the same disdain I do. Or I write some World Anchors when I pitch an OSR game. I set the timer and spend no more than ten minutes on the steady state world and then go. I don’t prep, I play.

I prefer to get my board game-y combat bits from board games. They don’t require as much set-up. And typically the other players help.

[thecrystarium]

　　 · 　 * · ✦ about the blogger ✫ ✵ ·　　✵ 　　 ˚

b | 30+ | she/her | queer i've been playing ffxiv since 2/20/22! i played wow for 10+ years and then left for a long while, was missing mmos, so i decided to give ffxiv a chance after seeing someone play a bit of it. i fell in love immediately, absolutely loved the gameplay and story, and ended up finishing endwalker on 9/19/2022! i'm a decent gifmaker, a mediocre writer, and a bad gposer, but i'm having fun doing all of them! all likes and follows come from @pdwoozi~ :) update: very close to finishing dawntrail! i've just got the lvl 100 dungeon and the last trial left to do, and i'll get around to it soon! i'm so enraptured in crafting/gathering right now, i don't know what to do with myself. i've got culinarian and fishing @ 100 and i'm working hard on everything else!

　　 · 　 * · ✦ warrior of light ✫ ✵ ·　　✵ 　　 ˚

twinkle littlestar | 29 years old | pictomancer (main) twinkle littlestar (a chosen name rather than her given) is of the dunesfolk lalafell and is small in stature compared to others of her age. her nameday falls on the 29th sun of the first umbral moon and she very much loves to celebrate it with all of the people she's come to call friends. twinkle chose ul'dah her home, though she hails from somewhere else entirely. she loves the twists and turns of the city streets and the shadows the lamps cast when they flicker on at night. oftentimes, you'll find her just outside the city walls, looking straight up at the stars and marveling over the heavens. she doesn't remember much of her parents, who were taken away from her all too soon, but she does remember her mother singing her a little song every night as she snuggled up under her covers to fall asleep.

to say that twinkle loves the nighttime and stars (those from the source and those from other shards alike) is an understatement. if you ask her, the night sky is ever-changing, the heavens ever-moving. there's something exciting to see in it every time she glances back after having just looked away. (just ask her about the moment she saw the night sky return on the first!) the mere sight of something space-y sends her into an excited tizzy the likes of which you've never seen before. and for gods sakes, don't get her on the topic of constellations and their meanings because you'll never hear the end of it. see, here's where most people would figure she would have taken up with the astrology guild, but the people that know twinkle best know that her true talent lies in the arts. hand her a piece of paper and you won't get it back without doodles all over it. when she can't find the words to describe what she wants, she'll draw you a picture of it.

in twinkle's book, the less she has to speak, the better. she can go days, weeks without talking sometimes, and it brings her peace. so, when she has something to say, listen. it's usually important. her friends, at first, attempted to get her to speak more, but after an explanation to alisaie that she really didn't care much for idle chatter or feel a need to insert herself into conversations, everyone else got the memo. she's not trying to be rude or shut herself out: she does love to listen! to music, to the sound of her friend's voices, to the silence that surrounds her whenever she escapes to look at the night sky.

[amltdaily]

Before last weekend, I had no idea that Gary Mendez’s death and my mom’s had anything to do with each other.

(This is a TV story, I promise. Just stick with me.)

Last week, I had the honor of moderating some panels at ATX TV Festival in Austin, Texas. I love moderating, funneling a ton of preparation and research into what — if I do my job right — becomes a fun and illuminating conversation. One of my panels was titled “TV Screens for Cancer,” and it was sponsored by Hollywood, Health & Society. Despite what might at first glance seem like very grim subject matter, I was really looking forward to the opportunity to ask a bunch of TV writers about the cancer storylines they’d crafted over the years.  

I had a personal reason for wanting in on the discussion, too. My mother, Susan Roots, died in May 2021 from Stage IV breast cancer.

The fact of that sentence, by the way, is still as surreal to me as it was the week she passed. I don’t have much memory of when, in a fog of grief and distracted by funeral arrangements, I contacted ABC publicity to let them know I couldn’t make a prearranged phone interview with A Million Little Things creator/showrunner DJ Nash. I’d covered the show since its start; I vaguely recall being grateful, given the tight timelines related to broadcast finales, that our Season 3 finale call was moved to a time more convenient for me.

The conversation I eventually had with Nash, though, stands out in clear detail in my brain. I sat at my parents’ white kitchen table, wearing a shirt of my mother’s because I hadn’t brought enough clothes with me when I rushed home. I was about to launch into my questions when he gently interrupted.

“Tell me a story about your mom,” he said.

If you’ve had the experience of witnessing a loved one in the terminal phase of an illness, you know how tough it can be to think of any time when your shared lives didn’t revolve around the soul-grinding details, and how hard it is to think about anything else once the person has passed. When to administer morphine. Which hospice nurse is coming today. Which setting on the hospital bed brings the least discomfort. Nash’s kind, simple request delivered me from that for a moment.

I told him about a car ride I’d had as a kid with my mom, her mom and her aunt. The horn malfunctioned while we were on the highway, honking randomly, loudly and with abandon at the unsuspecting drivers all around us. My mom, grandmother and great aunt couldn’t stop laughing. My mom gasped for breath, wiping at her streaming eyes as she tried to hold it together so we didn’t run off the road. I cackled too, partly because the horn really was ridiculous, partly out of the novelty of seeing these three women lose themselves in such unhinged fashion.

Nash listened. He chuckled. When I was done, we went on with the interview as planned. I’ve been lucky to have a lot of great conversations with people who make TV over the years, but that one stands out — even more so now, for reasons I’ll get to in a minute.

For those unfamiliar with A Million Little Things, it was an hour-long drama that ran on ABC for five seasons. It followed a group of friends in Boston. At the end of the series, one of the friends — Gary Mendez (played by James Roday Rodriguez), whose experience as a breast cancer survivor was an integral part of the show — died of lung cancer.

As A Million Little Things’ boss and the arbiter of Gary’s fate, Nash was a great fit for the ATX panel last weekend. He was joined by fellow TV writers Erica Green Swafford (New Amsterdam), Adam Weissman (The Good Doctor) and Stephen Hootstein (Chicago Med), all of whom generously engaged with my questions about how to balance realistic portrayals of cancer and making good TV.

Remember how I said I like to be super-prepared for panels? Nash knocked all of that askew when, in front of the audience, he revealed something he hadn’t shared before.

“There’s a moment in the finale that was put in for you,” he said, referring to our conversation years before. “When Walter says to Rome, ‘Tell me a story about Gary.’”

ATX (which is owned by TVLine’s parent company, PMC) filmed the event, so you can see my surprise in the video at the top of this post. I was touched. I was flummoxed. I turned an even deeper shade of red than I normally do while public speaking. Reporters are taught to cover news, not make themselves the center of it. So while I was (and am!) flattered by Nash’s gesture, it was a little unsettling suddenly to find myself on the other side of things.

Most of all, though, I felt a deep gratitude that my mom’s existence was, in an indirect yet careful way, immortalized in a medium she adored.

When the panel was over, after making Nash swear to me yet again that he was telling the truth about the origin of Walter’s line, I confessed that I’d since stolen his story thing and used it when I didn’t know what to say to someone who was grieving. I recommend it.

So there you go: A brief moment of human connection in an industry that traffics in transactional conversations left us both with something meaningful. And somewhere, my primetime-drama-loving mom is absolutely overjoyed that she’s now a part — however far removed — of TV lore.

[narratingvoice]

How do you deal with writer’s block?

Ahhh, writer's block. The most relatable and universal of terrors. Is there anything more frightening than staring down at the white abyss of the empty page? Is there any pain more acute than being unable to wrest the words out of your head and into a story? No, surely not. (In fact, you'll never believe why I took several days to respond to this ask.) But I have been a writer for a long time, so by necessity I have devised a few methods of coping with the looming dread. Here are a couple of tips:

Write as if you're talking

One of the most common reasons for writer's block is that you want your writing to be perfect. Of course you do, why wouldn't you? But you keep going over the words in your mind over and over before you even write them down, and that's the problem. You need to think of it like you're having a conversation with a silent companion. When you chat with a friend, you don't look back at the sentence you just said and think "that was rubbish". You just let it be part of the conversation. And I for one am certainly known for my grandiloquence when speaking orally; in fact I'd say it's one of my best features. So just write down something, anything, that says the thing you want to say. Then once you've said it, you can rewrite it over and over again until it's perfect. Don't move on to the next section until you've polished it to a mirror sheen.

2. Have a punching bag

I don't mean a literal punching bag, although you certainly could use one if you so desire. I mean you need to have something harmless that you can unleash your built-up frustration on. One cannot craft a thrilling narrative when one's mind is clouded by self-doubt. My punching bag is a large plush tyrannosaurus I call Muriel. I like to take her to a nice dark out-of-bounds area where no one can see me, and hug her tightly to my chest while I let out an uninterrupted scream for as long as I possibly can. (This is usually several hours.) If I am feeling especially angry, I will punch her, bite her, and throw her at a wall until I calm down. And if that still doesn't work then I will drop Stanley into the void for a quick laugh.

3. Re-read your old stuff

If you ever have doubt about your ability to create believable dialogue and character, all you need to do is take a trip down memory lane. Simply read something you wrote in the past, and if you're anything like me, your heart will fill with a swell of pride and accomplishment. You can write! You've done it before and you'll do it again! I recommend making a binder, file folder, or shrine containing all your past works, so you can easily find them and remember them whenever you want. Oh, and if you published them in a place where you can get comments or reviews, save and print out all the good ones. That way you will know that it's not just your ego; other people enjoy your creative ability as well.

Do not save the bad ones. That will not lead to anything good. Trust me on this one.

If this is your first time writing anything, make up some imaginary good reviews that you think should exist once the work is finished, and look at them.

4. Use spite

It may seem counter-intuitive, but spite is actually a fantastic motivator for getting work done. What you need to do is find an author you really hate and read a bit of their work. In no time at all, you will be thinking to yourself, "I can definitely write something better than this dreck. If this can get published then so can I!" For me, all it takes is a couple of chapters of any Tom Clancy novel. Just be careful you don't read so much that it drives you into a murderous rage; if that happens, revert to tip #2 above.

And that's all I can think of for now! Good luck, and know that I believe in you! You have a story worth telling!

[just-4pple-pi3]

Silas Marner by George Eliot

Sep 1, 2024

[Spoilers ahead for Silas Marner by George Eliot]

I believe books require a particular atmosphere and mood to read in. Today was a cold cloudy day. Usually cloudy days are hot and humid here, but today was an exception. My mind has been at ease due to the weather. I was glad that I am not sick, and do not have flu and cough. Moreover, I did not have my morning class. The sleep knowing that there is no schedule the next day is comforting. Therefore, I finished Silas Marner. Yesterday, I was in the part where Silas complains about his robbery. It was sad that he lost his meaning in life for the second time. When this novel was in my syllabus i roughly read the summary only and had found it to be terribly boring. But after reading the whole of it, I'll say it is full of good vibes, this book was perfect for a day like this.

I felt that the first half was bland. I could feel that the writer perhaps first thought about the latter part of the story, which is so well-written in terms of humor, speech, thoughts. The first parts see Silas Marner from a third person perspective, but no one will be able to guess what they are getting into, whether reading this book is going to be good or bad. I found most of the detailed explanation regarding how we should feel or how the characters feel about something to be exhaustive in that the language was not understandable. I assume the purpose was to make the emotions understood as a whole, but that purpose failed in my opinion. Perhaps this purpose served during its contemporary times. In this aspect, the parts from where Silas is consoled by his neighbors for the theft and especially from the part where the 'un (baby) arrives is well-written in that, almost every aspect is understood fully. But i will say a part I found to be witty yet exhaustive is where Silas comes to put forth the charge in Rainbow after getting fully soaked in rain and we see the conversation of the people of that area. Perhaps why this part is so long and boring is exactly to bring that effect in that the neighbors are engaging in useless talks and affairs that goes on and on.

Another witty character portrayal is that of Godfrey Cass, his emotions, thoughts, and motives were well portrayed. The writing starts to get better and enough keep you hooked after Marner discovers the 'un. Overall, you can definitely trust this book to be a good read full of good vibes that will leave your heart fuller towards the end, I can assure you of that.

Did you know that George Eliot is actually female? Her actual name is Mary Ann Evans. In that era, in the 19th century, women authors were still not free from prejudice about their writings, deemed to be "too emotional". She wanted her publishes to be judged solely based on their literary merit and not with biasness, which is why she took up the pen name.

September the 1st is also world letter day. I was thinking of writing letters to the few friends of mine. I pondered abt what to write, how to make the envelop and the letter exceptional and creative, what gifts should i give. I might attempt to gift handmade bookmarks. I'll share here if I do. It has been a long time since I did arts and crafts.

~Just Apple Pie. Really gotta make some apple pie someday.

[adamwatchesmovies]

Jack (1996)

Anyone with a trained eye will see past the schmaltz and recognize 1998's Patch Adams as a manipulative, unfunny drama that cast Robin Williams in an attempt to be both hilarious and uplifting. For years, I kept a copy of it on DVD so that whenever I heard anyone sing its praises I could give them a reality check by sitting down and watching it with them. I don't know what I was thinking wasting my time like that. This brings us to Jack, which makes Patch Adams look like a finely crafted wine. Made two years earlier, Francis Ford Coppola tries to melt your heart. Instead, you'll want to die of embarrassment.

Jack Powell (Robin Williams) was born with a strange condition that makes him age four times as fast as normal. Home schooled for the first ten years of his life, Jack is finally allowed to go to school with students his own age when his doctor (played by Bill Cosby) convinces Mr. and Mrs. Powell (Brian PKerwin and Diane Lane) that it will be good for him.

This movie has a premise but it doesn’t have much of a plot. Jack is ten years old but looks forty. The kids at school think he’s a freak until they realize he’s a giant that can easily beat any of them at basketball and walk into any store to buy naughty magazines. Eventually they realize that’s not always a good thing. So what? The idea (I think) was that it would both tug at your heartstrings and make you laugh. Jack will look like the Crypt Keeper by the time he graduates from high school. His life will be cut short. How tragic. Meanwhile, Robin Williams, everyone!

Williams isn’t necessarily bad at playing a ten-year old. He does the best he can but the role is fundamentally unconvincing. You see a grown man jump into his parent’s bed and you can't help thinking about some SNL-type skit in which one of the cast members dresses like a kid for comedy's sake. The joke there was that they're not fooling anyone. This movie asks you to suspend your disbelief. It can't be done. A couple of scenes might make you chuckle but you can so easily see that these were not part of the script; they were lines Williams threw in and the editor decided to keep. The biggest hint is that no 10-year-old would say them.

It takes no time for Jack to reach maximum cringe. Bill Cosby plays Jack’s surprisingly non-comedic doctor (he’s being unfunny deliberately) and Jennifer Lopez, his teacher. All the scenes of Jack and his friends farting in cans convince you there won't be any romantic scenes between the 10-year-old and his sexy teacher but you’re nonetheless kept on edge. This movie could get THAT bad. It’s already pretty dreadful as-is, with Jack’s best friend’s mom (played by Fran Drescher) playing the stupidest adult you’ve seen in a long time. Her son, Louis (Adam Zolotin), hasn’t been doing his homework so she’s coming over to talk to the principal. Jack pretends to be him so the real conversation can't happen. That sounds like it could work but Jack stumbles over his words so badly it’s a wonder mom believes anything he says. Maybe she thinks the "principal" is just that hot for her that he can't speak properly. This scene embodies the entire film. We see where the movie could go horribly, horribly wrong, and where it might’ve actually been hysterical in a demented kind of way.

“No! Please! Stop!” Are words you better get used to if you plan on watching Jack. Writers James DeMoncao and Gary Nadeau aimed to make a bizarre tragedy, a pumped-up version of one of those “disease of the week” dramas fused with a coming-of-age story. Or maybe Francis Ford Coppola thought Robin Williams acting like a child while everyone around him pretends like that’s a perfectly normal thing would be hilarious. I don't think anyone expected it to be the low point in many talented people’s careers. It might've been interesting if it were absurdly bad or a little more tone-deaf. As is, "Jack" is a car crash you're more than happy to look away from. (February 18, 2022)

[tarysande]

I have so many things to do

And yet I cannot put down Leigh Bardugo’s new book, Ninth House. I’ve got a quarter of the book left and I am already mourning that it will end.

I just abso-fucking-lutely LOVE IT. It needs to be a tv series, like, yesterday. The lore! The world building! The characters! Ghosts! Magic! The pitch perfect dialogue! Prose I want to sink into like it’s a perfect-temperature bubble bath in a claw-foot tub!

Honestly, at this point Bardugo could write a phone book and I’d be there preordering, glassy-eyed and filled to the brim with anticipation. I know each one of those Smiths would be unique and alive and flawed and brilliant.

ETA: Thanks for the heads up @bellesletttres An Amazon-backed TV series has already been confirmed. Cue excited shrieking.

[positivexcellence]

Catching Up with Gen Padalecki

The run up to the holidays is packed with parties and festive events, gift buying, travel prepping and wrapping up all the loose ends of the year. Add to that running a business and a book club, acting, being a wife (to actor and entrepreneur Jared Padalecki) and mama of three (two boys and a girl), and things are busy for Genevieve Padalecki. We caught up with Gen, and talked about things from family and their new farm to two of her passions, books and towwn. Short for Take Only What You Need, towwn is a site she started with longtime friend Kelly Mickle to help people sustainably win the battle against burnout, both for themselves and the planet, with tips from eco-friendly kitchen swaps and sustainable sandals to self-care.

You’ve lived in Austin for more than 12 years, what advice would you give someone new to Austin? 

Embrace the weird, always say ‘hi’ to your neighbor, don’t judge opinions and views that might differ from yours, rather try to understand where others are coming from.  

What do you love about living in Austin? 

I love the eclectic collaborative community. I've always felt like I could be completely myself here.

What are you most looking forward to this holiday season? 

Family time.  

How are you and your family celebrating the holidays this year? 

We are doing things differently this year and giving our family an adventure.

What are some of your favorite holiday traditions? 

I love all the decorating, crafting, and meal making. I find it therapeutic and I love when my kids propose the activity.

Do you have a recipe you love to make around the holidays? 

We love cooking during the holidays and all the kiddos love to contribute. It can range from a great lasagna to a medium rare steak (cooked by our 10-year-old), to my husband's favorite, tomato soup with grilled cheese croutons.  The holidays are so fun and gathering with friends and family for a meal is the best part.

How long have you had your book club? 

I started my book club when we went into lockdown.  I wanted a way to connect with people and have an outlet.  I reached out asking for a “this or that” book pick for the month and Southern Book Clubs’ Guide to Slaying Vampires was a fan favorite.  Next thing I know Grady Hendrix and I are zooming and chatting about his book.  It’s been a wild couple of years and I am so inspired and feel so incredibly grateful for all the insightful, thoughtful and thought-provoking, stunning and beautiful writers I have been able to meet, converse and collaborate with because of it.

What are some you’d recommend for gifting this year?  

Pony, Red, White and Royal Blue, The Overstory, Tribe, Letters to a Young Athlete, Why We Sleep and Into Thin Air.

How do you consume books? Do you prefer real books, audiobooks, kindle? 

I prefer old-fashioned books I can hold in my hand. There’s something so wonderful about the sensory experience, the weight, the pages in between my fingers, turning a page, the smell of the binding. It just adds to the experience and for me is a delectable rush.  I also love a good audiobook, especially with all the driving I do, but it all depends on the narrator.

What’s new with towwn? 

towwn is growing so quickly and we’re incredibly proud of our community. We just launched our TikTok channel to help spread our anti-perfectionism message about the planet and ourselves to reach new audiences. We’re also building an informative and fun newsletter.

What do you hope to see in the evolution of TOWWN in 2023? 

Our main focus is reaching people who want to find solutions to burnout for themselves and the planet, regardless of background and politics. We’re looking at hosting more events where we can bring people together for these kinds of conversations, curating products to help people solve these challenges. You can learn more on our Instagram @towwn.

You and Jared recently bought a farm…

Yes, we love nature and I’m obsessed with soil health and regenerative farming. I’m hoping we slowly let the land speak to us and thoughtfully nurture biodiversity and tend to the soil as best we can. I’d like to have rotational cover crops as well as grazing animals to contribute to this beautiful symbiotic relationship. It’s also nice having a refuge for our family to get messy and breathe in and get lost in the woods so to speak.

What accomplishment are you most proud of in 2022?

I'm most proud of my family.  They are what I am so grateful for.

You went back to ‘Walker, Texas Ranger’ this season in flashbacks, any desire or plans on the horizon to return to more acting? 

Definitely, if it works for our family schedule.  

You and Jared have been married 12 years, any advice on having a marriage with longevity? 

Marriage is the best and most amazing adventure in the world. And like farming, there are some good seasons and not so great ones. Marriage takes a lot of love and nurturing. Throughout our lives we change and evolve into many different people. So, in a partnership, you’re both constantly growing and it’s impossible to always grow together, whether in parallel lines or intertwined at the same time. The best advice that’s been helpful for me is to take time and try and understand where your partner is coming from, and before reacting to anything that maybe feels a bit incendiary or frustrating, give it 24 hours.

What’s something one of your kids did lately that surprised you or made you laugh?  

Well, I'm currently watching my 8-year-old try and tell me U2 is the best band of all time I had no idea he knew U2!  My oldest sang a song in mandarin at a school talent show and my youngest gave her best ‘Hocus Pocus’ rendition dancing on our kitchen table - all in the last 24 hours! I don't know why I'm surprised by their theater bug, but clearly it's shining through.

Quick Fire Questions

Favorite book of 2022: Four Treasures of the Sky by Austin’s own Jenny Tinghui Zhang was outstanding - and it was her debut novel

Last show you binged: House of Dragons & The Bear with Jeremy Allen White

Favorite method of self-care:  Taking a time out for myself and remembering to be kind to myself and set that example.

Favorite restaurant to eat out: Emmer & Rye, Soto, WuChow

Favorite place to order in: Torchys

Go-to cocktail: Extra dirty martini or a good old fashioned beer is really my fav.

If you could have one superpower: To go back in time

[uomo-accattivante]

Excellent article about bringing a re-make of Ingmar Bergman’s Scenes from a Marriage to fruition, and the twenty-year friendship that Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain share:

There were days on the shoot for “Scenes From a Marriage,” a five-episode limited series that premieres Sept. 12 on HBO, when Oscar Isaac resented the crew.

The problem wasn’t the crew members themselves, he told me on a video call in March. But the work required of him and his co-star, Jessica Chastain, was so unsparingly intimate — “And difficult!” Chastain added from a neighboring Zoom window — that every time a camera operator or a makeup artist appeared, it felt like an intrusion.

On his other projects, Isaac had felt comfortably distant from the characters and their circumstances — interplanetary intrigue, rogue A.I. But “Scenes” surveys monogamy and parenthood, familiar territory. Sometimes Isaac would film a bedtime scene with his onscreen child (Lily Jane) and then go home and tuck his own child into the same model of bed as the one used onset, accessorized with the same bunny lamp, and not know exactly where art ended and life began.

“It was just a lot,” he said.

Chastain agreed, though she put it more strongly. “I mean, I cried every day for four months,” she said.

Isaac, 42, and Chastain, 44, have known each other since their days at the Juilliard School. And they have channeled two decades of friendship, admiration and a shared and obsessional devotion to craft into what Michael Ellenberg, one of the series’s executive producers, called “five hours of naked, raw performance.” (That nudity is metaphorical, mostly.)

“For me it definitely felt incredibly personal,” Chastain said on the call in the spring, about a month after filming had ended. “That’s why I don’t know if I have another one like this in me. Yeah, I can’t decide that. I can’t even talk about it without. …” She turned away from the screen. (It was one of several times during the call that I felt as if I were intruding, too.)

The original “Scenes From a Marriage,” created by Ingmar Bergman, debuted on Swedish television in 1973. Bergman’s first television series, its six episodes trace the dissolution of a middle-class marriage. Starring Liv Ullmann, Bergman’s ex, it drew on his own past relationships, though not always directly.

“When it comes to Bergman, the relationship between autobiography and fiction is extremely complicated,” said Jan Holmberg, the chief executive of the Ingmar Bergman Foundation.

A sensation in Sweden, it was seen by most of the adult population. And yes, sure, correlation does not imply causation, but after its debut, Swedish divorce were rumored to have doubled. Holmberg remembers watching a rerun as a 10-year-old.

“It was a rude awakening to adult life,” he said.

The writer and director Hagai Levi saw it as a teenager, on Israeli public television, during a stint on a kibbutz. “I was shocked,” he said. The series taught him that a television series could be radical, that it could be art. When he created “BeTipul,” the Israeli precursor to “In Treatment,” he used “Scenes” as proof of the concept “that two people can talk for an hour and it can work,” Levi said. (Strangely, “Scenes” also inspired the prime-time soap “Dallas.”)

So when Daniel Bergman, Ingmar Bergman’s youngest son, approached Levi about a remake, he was immediately interested.

But the project languished, in part because loving a show isn’t reason enough to adapt it. Divorce is common now — in Sweden, and elsewhere — and the relationship politics of the original series, in which the male character deserts his wife and young children for an academic post, haven’t aged particularly well.

Then about two years ago, Levi had a revelation. He would swap the gender roles. A woman who leaves her marriage and child in pursuit of freedom (with a very hot Israeli entrepreneur in place of a visiting professorship) might still provoke conversation and interest.

So the Marianne and Johan of the original became Mira and Jonathan, with a Boston suburb (re-created in a warehouse just north of New York City), stepping in for the Stockholm of the original. Jonathan remains an academic though Mira, a lawyer in the original, is now a businesswoman who out-earns him.

Casting began in early 2020. After Isaac met with Levi, he wrote to Chastain to tell her about the project. She wasn’t available. The producers cast Michelle Williams. But the pandemic reshuffled everyone’s schedules. When production was ready to resume, Williams was no longer free. Chastain was. “That was for me the most amazing miracle,” Levi said.

Isaac and Chastain met in the early 2000s at Juilliard. He was in his first year; she, in her third. He first saw her in a scene from a classical tragedy, slapping men in the face as Helen of Troy. He was friendly with her then-boyfriend, and they soon became friends themselves, bonding through the shared trauma of an acting curriculum designed to break its students down and then build them back up again. Isaac remembered her as “a real force of nature and solid, completely solid, with an incredible amount of integrity,” he said.

In the next window, Chastain blushed. “He was super talented,” she said. “But talented in a way that wasn’t expected, that’s challenging and pushing against constructs and ideas.” She introduced him to her manager, and they celebrated each other’s early successes and went to each other’s premieres. (A few of those photos are used in “Scenes From a Marriage” as set dressing.)

In 2013, Chastain was cast in J.C. Chandor’s “A Most Violent Year,”opposite Javier Bardem. When Bardem dropped out, Chastain campaigned for Isaac to have the role. Weeks before shooting, they began to meet, fleshing out the back story of their characters — a husband and wife trying to corner the heating oil market in 1981 New York — the details of the marriage, business, life.

It was their first time working together, and each felt a bond that went deeper than a parallel education and approach. “Something connects us that’s stronger than any ideas of character or story or any of that,” Isaac said. “There’s something else that’s more about like, a shared existence.”

Chandor noticed how they would support each other on set, and challenge each other, too, giving each other the freedom to take the characters’ relationship to dark and dangerous places. “They have this innate trust with each other,” Chandor said.

That trust eliminated the need for actorly tricks or shortcuts, in part because they know each other’s tricks too well. Their motto, Isaac said, was, “Let’s figure this [expletive] out together and see what’s the most honest thing we can do.”

Moni Yakim, Juilliard’s celebrated movement instructor, has followed their careers closely and he noted what he called the “magnetism and spiritual connection” that they suggested onscreen in the film.

“It’s a kind of chemistry,” Yakim said. “They can read each other’s mind and you as an audience, you can sense it.”

Telepathy takes work. When they knew that shooting “Scenes From a Marriage” could begin, Chastain bought a copy of “All About Us,” a guided journal for couples, and filled in her sections in character as Mira. Isaac brought it home and showed it to his wife, the filmmaker Elvira Lind.

“She was like, ‘You finally found your match,’” Isaac recalled. “’Someone that is as big of a nerd as you are.’”

The actors rehearsed, with Levi and on their own, talking their way through each long scene, helping each other through the anguished parts. When production had to halt for two weeks, they rehearsed then, too.

Watching these actors work reminded Amy Herzog, a writer and executive producer on the series, of race horses in full gallop. “These are two people who have so much training and skill,” she said. “Because it’s an athletic feat, what they were being asked to do.”

But training and skill and the “All About Us” book hadn’t really prepared them for the emotional impact of actually shooting “Scenes From a Marriage.” Both actors normally compartmentalize when they work, putting up psychic partitions between their roles and themselves. But this time, the partitions weren’t up to code.

“I knew I was in trouble the very first week,” Chastain said.

She couldn’t hide how the scripts affected her, especially from someone who knows her as well as Isaac does. “I just felt so exposed,” she said. “This to me, more than anything I’ve ever worked on, was definitely the most open I’ve ever been.”

“It felt so dangerous,” she said.

I visited the set in February (after multiple Covid-19 tests and health screenings) during a final day of filming. It was the quietest set I had ever seen: The atmosphere was subdued, reverent almost, a crew and a studio space stripped down to only what two actors would need to do the most passionate and demanding work of their careers.

Isaac didn’t know if he would watch the completed series. “It really is the first time ever, where I’ve done something where I’m totally fine never seeing this thing,” he said. “Because I’ve really lived through it. And in some ways I don’t want whatever they decide to put together to change my experience of it, which was just so intense.”

The cameras captured that intensity. Though Chastain isn’t Mira and Isaac isn’t Jonathan, each drew on personal experience — their parents’ marriages, past relationships — in ways they never had. Sometimes work on the show felt like acting, and sometimes the work wasn’t even conscious. There’s a scene in the harrowing fourth episode in which they both lie crumpled on the floor, an identical stress vein bulging in each forehead.

“It’s my go-to move, the throbbing forehead vein,” Isaac said on a follow-up video call last month. Chastain riffed on the joke: “That was our third year at Juilliard, the throb.”

By then, it had been five months since the shoot wrapped. Life had returned to something like normal. Jokes were possible again. Both of them seemed looser, more relaxed. (Isaac had already poured himself one tequila shot and was ready for another.) No one cried.

Chastain had watched the show with her husband. And Isaac, despite his initial reluctance, had watched it, too. It didn’t seem to have changed his experience.

“I’ve never done anything like it,” he said. “And I can’t imagine doing anything like it again.”

###

[thebtswritersclub]

Happy Birthday Rid!

Today we celebrate the exciting birthday to our lovely @taegularities! Through thick and thin, Rid is there for us, rooting for us and helping us with our many tasks. Her empathy and strong work ethic help us so much! BWC wouldn’t be the same without you!

 Also a special thanks to @missgeniality for making all of our graphics!

Happy birthday to my fellow kitten! I’ll keep the sap to our dms, b ut I hope you have an amazing year of growth and health. And hope you can create as much as you want because we all love to read it. Here to another year of cheating on Taehyung uwu

- Siya ( @missgeniality )

riid! my beloved, I wish you a truly great birthday. I can't believe how long it's been since we met, we've shared so much fun ever since then and it's a joy whenever we get to chat. thank you so much for being the wonderful friend you are and hyping me up in every aspect of my life, I'm so grateful to have met you and our bond goes further than being writers - though, of course, I will never miss a chance to simp over bts with you and brainstorm our work!! you always brighten up my day and I love you endlessly, wishing you the best day  ily 

- Ru ( @btsmosphere )

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RID YOU STUNNINGLY INCREDIBLE LAND MERMAID I wish you the happiest of birthdays, full of people you love and make you happy, no worries during this day. Since we're writing this in advance, I do hope Tae posts a thirst trap in honor of your day ILY and again have a happy bday

- Rose ( @biaswreckme )

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RID I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!! THANK YOU FOR BEING A PART OF MY LIFE AND ALWAYS LOOKING OUT FOR ME EVEN IN MIDST THE CRAZINESS OF LIFE AND CARING SO MUCH  I HOPE YOU GET ALL THE GIFTS YOU WANT AND AMAZING CAKES!!! HOPE YOU HAVE A BLAST I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU

- Melody ( @hoebii )

Happy birthday RID!!! I'm so glad we became friends! I hope this year is more kickass than any other year! I hope you accomplish all your goals and make the world your oyster! Thank you for being you and for existing

- Mars ( @joheunsaram )

Miss Riddle! I love you so so so much. I can’t believe that we have been friends for so long (almost 3 years)! Time flies so fast and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Our conversations and chats make my days and energize me, they give me great comfort, they get me curious about the world. You’re so hardworking and smart and I am so honored to be your friend and teammate at BWC. Your kindness, care, and focus on growth truly shines in just about everything that you do. I’ve had the honor of watching and growing with you over these past three years and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Happy birthday, bb! I love you so much!

- Lillia ( @moccahobi )

happy birthday rid! i feel like there’s so many things i could say and i don’t even know where to start. i guess i’ll start with the first thing i noticed about you: your writing. before i even had my blog, i would read your works on a little burner account. a teacher once told me that their are certain aspects of writing that can’t be taught. whatever that is, you have it. there’s a certain charm and rhythm to every word you type. the way you craft a scene, or characterize through subtle gestures, can’t be replicated. seriously, you have a gift. it’s something so raw and pure. i hope you cherish that forever. after making my blog and joining the net, i got to know you as a person a bit more. i felt like i knew you through your work, but you were even sweeter than anticipated. whenever i needed advice, you were there. the kindness you carry yourself with is felt. i mean it. the positive impact you’ve had on the net and community as a whole is bigger than you know. whenever i ask for recommendations, you’re mentioned. i know it can be tough sometimes, but please never lose sight of how loved and cared for you are. especially today. happy birthday!

- Kiki ( @chryblossomjjk )

Riiiidddd, I know we're rarely on discord at the same time, but I wish you all the best on your special day! You're an absolute delight to talk to, and you deserve all the best things in life

- Gina ( @chimknj )

Rid!

Hey Love! Happy birthday beautiful!

You know how much I love you already but again I freaking love you. You are so talented and tenacious and caring and funny and just such a ray of sunshine  every time we talk. A lot of people think they know you when they don’t and make assumptions that are not true but you sweep it all off so gracefully and just aah!! U r one of those people who always has my back when I am low and that friendship and love means so much to me. U are an amazing woman and I can’t wait to see how you grow this year. Happy birthday darling!

- Aditi ( @ditttiii​ )

Dear Rid, my darling Rid. You are such a light in the lives of everyone who knows you. I am so grateful for your friendship. You are an amazing human who deserves nothing but love and light. I hope this year is amazing for you

- Mom

[chainofclovers]

Ted Lasso 2x8 thoughts

I am so lucky that the creators of Ted Lasso decided to make this entire show specifically for me. #blessed

If last week felt like a bit of breathing room (albeit tense, poignant, character-progressing breathing room) with distinct narrative lines, this week’s episode was a chaotic yet tightly-written swirl of pain and hope and sadness! No neat subject headers for this one, y’all. Just my brain and heart in the inadequate form of a bulleted list. It is the medium available to me at this time.

I am going to remember the moment when Ted calls Sharon and tells her his father killed himself for the rest of my life.

(I could say a bunch of stuff about his face and what he says and how he tries to hide his tears from Beard right after and how insanely much I adore this character and ahhhhhhhh but I’m just going to leave that scene there in our collective memories.)

Jamie. JAMIE. Higgins has given some great advice about love on this show, but his musings about his up-and-down relationship with his own father were not helpful in the context of Jamie’s dad, who is an abusive piece of shit. I really adore that all of the main AFC Richmond staff members are realistically a bit hit-or-miss with their advice and life philosophies (some are mostly miss this season, of course).

And I am completely in awe of the moment when Jamie punches his father. The way he just stands there after Beard kicks his dad out of the locker room. The way you can hear a pin drop. And Roy—Roy who is learning in so many areas of his life about his influence on people, learning that the things he needs aren’t necessarily the same as the things other people need—is the one to cross the room and hug him. Hold him, really, with the tenderness Ted used when he hugged Rebecca outside the gala in 1x4. God.

I’ve thought a lot about how s1 was about giving people a soft place to land. There’s always an angel there when you need one. There’s always an opportunity to be kind. If you look for someone, you find them. If you look for the good in someone, you find the good. And as everyone works through their individual journeys in s2, that can’t always be the case anymore. But there are still so many moments of angels on this show, and it’s not about chance and serendipity and fate [not that it was about that in s1] but about the effort it takes to become someone who can be there for someone else. Or who can be there for yourself. I’m so proud of Jamie for physically fighting back against his father. I’m so proud of Roy for being the one who recognized what Jamie needed.

I have every feeling in the world about how Ted is almost totally frozen both times (s1 and s2) he witnesses Jamie’s father abusing him. In s1, he was still there for Jamie after, and I have every reason to believe he’ll be there for Jamie after this incident as well, but that frozen stance HURTS. He’s in so deep with his pain about his own father that it’s like he physically cannot snap out of it to act in the moment. It seems entirely outside of his control, and it breaks my heart, because Ted wants so badly to be a good father, a good coach, a good friend, a good partner, a good patient. He’s there for people in all kinds of ways, even in his current less-than-capable state. He takes care of Sharon post-concussion and even gets her a new bike! During the disastrous match at Wembley his coaching is ineffectual and everything is chaos but he’s the last one standing on the pitch! But this really awful thing keeps happening to Jamie and Ted is just…frozen in the face of it. Like one of those nightmares where you’re running in place.

The frozen-in-place nightmare also kind of applies to the way the total separation between Ted and Rebecca feels, too. I have never for a moment doubted the writers’ intentions in setting these characters up as soulmates on parallel journeys, and I’m actually really digging (on a story level) how disconnected they are right now. It is IMPRESSIVE that their absence in each other’s lives feels like such a glaring loss, one we cannot forget even as there are so many other things happening onscreen. It is 100% not just shipper goggles making me process information about Ted while thinking about Rebecca and information about Rebecca while thinking about Ted. I know there are a lot of really angry and frustrated people in the fandom right now (both T/R shippers and T/R antis and non-shipping fans who don’t get why s2 is different from s1) and while I understand being frustrated by choices characters make, and frustrated by the feelings the show makes us feel that we just want to feel more of or less of, I continue to agree with pretty much every narrative choice happening right now.

Agreeing with the narrative like this?! This is such a unique experience for me as a viewer—to feel like I’m on a ride that is at once absolutely wild and incredibly sensible and well-crafted, and to feel simultaneously completely invested and anticipatory and speculative but also totally willing to trust where it goes. I long for Ted and Beard to really talk. I long for Ted and Rebecca to stop missing each other. I long for Roy to have a serious conversation with Ted about what’s happening with him. I long for Keeley to find a vocation, something that drives her beyond her projects. I long for so many things! But I wouldn’t long for them if this show was less good. If the show was less good, I wouldn’t have a wish list a mile long because I wouldn’t be so attuned to the details and potential lurking in every scene. THIS IS SUCH A GOOD SHOW, I CANNOT HANDLE IT, I LOVE IT SO MUCH.

(To that end, a great deal of the Ted Lasso tag and so many Twitter reactions reactions to the show feel super stressful right now and I am kind of just trying not to look?! I love this fandom so much because of the amazing conversations that happen and because of brilliant fic and because there are some awesome people I never would have encountered were it not for this show. That little bubble is wonderful and I’d stay in this fandom no matter what in order to keep experiencing those things. But fans’ catastrophic reactions to every little thing that happens, every little choice a character makes that isn’t the “perfect” choice? The takeaway that the writers—on this show of all shows—wake up in the morning ready for another day of torturing shippers rather than another day of writing a beautiful story they genuinely want to write? I do not enjoy those parts at all. I would like to opt out of those parts. I’m having such a magical experience watching this show and talking about this show and listening about this show and writing about this show with a variety of people who feel all kinds of ways. I truly wish I could somehow transfer the energy of this experience onto all the people who are hating it right now. I don’t mind at all that people are having vastly different reactions to this show and are sharing their honest feelings, including the really angry ones (I can appreciate something and disagree with it!), and I get that sometimes the language of fannish reactions is intentionally, ironically hyperbolic. But there feels like this very serious trend of people legitimately thinking writers on this show are targeting shippers and have lost respect for their characters, and I just feel like an alien from another planet when I see that stuff. I guess I just feel like people make art because they want their art to be visible to other people and to themselves, but that doesn’t typically involve specifically catering to or torturing a subset of that audience?)

I am more fascinated by Sharon Fieldstone than ever before. I have been running through every single action with her and Ted so many times. The confirmation that she’s living in club-provided housing (that could not look more different from Ted’s club-provided flat). Ted clearly noticing the many bottles. Sharon’s face while she tries to casually recycle them. (Sharon could legitimately have a more problematic relationship with alcohol than Ted does, and I find that extremely interesting and am very curious to find out what happens there.) Sharon leaving him voice notes while she’s concussed, probably because she’d been thinking about him shortly before the accident. The way Ted calls her and does all the funny voices and it’s not frustrating like all the times he uses his silliness and allusions to deflect during their prior conversations because this time, those behaviors are just a part of him showing care for another person. The way they stretch each other, and Ted is still wrong about the things he’s been wrong about, but they both grow all the same.

While it is pretty much impossible for me to imagine that this show would include an actual romantic relationship between Ted and Sharon (it would be beyond unethical even if they could write it well, and Sharon in particular is so professional and committed to her work, and it would erase so much of the powerful message about the importance of seeking therapy from a professional who is not your friend or partner, and I would totally hate it), watching this episode was the first moment I had this queasy little feeling that it’s possible that Ted could end up developing really complicated feelings about Sharon since, at this point, he’s been honest with her about things he’s hardly spoken about before and you can really form an attachment to people you feel safe with in a new way. (I mean, I’m sure Michelle knows what happened with Ted’s father, but I’m not even certain if Beard does.) He’s so broken right now, and Sharon is such a great person and so different from anyone else in his life (even though Rebecca is also different, and Beard is also different, and Roy is also different, and so on), that I could see things getting really fuzzy for him. I continue to have faith in the way the storylines on this show are handled. I’m just. Putting this here.

(In saying that, though, I also wanna make it really clear that I don’t just automatically assume anytime a new female character is introduced that they’re going to end up becoming a romantic complication. Like, Phoebe is allowed to have a teacher who is an attractive woman and AFC Richmond is allowed to have a sports psychologist who is an attractive woman and Keeley is allowed to talk to Jamie Tartt without it threatening what she has with Roy and all these people can exist as human beings without the introduction of romantic drama.)

Isaac gives every player one haircut per season, OH MY GOD. The JOY during the haircut scene. YES.

KEELEY AND REBECCA. Their text thread. The affirming video call right before Rebecca goes into the restaurant. The way Keeley sits all snuggled up against Rebecca in her office.

I was pretty thoroughly spoiled for the Sam and Rebecca plot through 2x8, and I was bracing for something far more problematic and tortured than what happens in this episode. The words I would use to describe their scenes: awkward, cute, cringy, and understandable. There are a million reasons why this relationship isn’t sustainable, but I felt completely understanding of both their choices here. This show has a lot of thesis statements, but I keep going back to the idea from 2x1 that there are people who enter your life to help you get to the next point, and I think it’s entirely possible that Sam and Rebecca will mutually be that for each other.

I find comparisons between Rupert and Rebecca super upsetting. There are absolutely meaningful things to say about the irony of ending up in a situation with an uncomfortable resemblance to certain taboo elements of an ex’s situation. But that ex is abusive and manipulative and cruel and Rebecca has exhibited NONE of those behaviors, and it makes me really sad to think that people feel that the writers on this show have betrayed Rebecca in giving her this storyline.

As always, I reserve the right to keep blathering about this show. I’ve had a headache for a couple of days, but my head is also so full of 2x8 thoughts that I couldn’t keep them in even if the circumstances for writing this were not ideal. I kind of hate that I’ve included frustrated fandom thoughts within the analysis of what I felt was an absolutely gorgeous, complicated, heartbreaking, near-perfect episode of television, but if ya can’t be a little dramatic on your own tumblr while you’re feeling raw and under the weather, where can ya?

[monimolimnion]

I posted 11,344 times in 2022

That's 4,097 more posts than 2021!

35 posts created (0%)

11,309 posts reblogged (100%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@jollyfanasties

@itsrapsodia

@charmps-you-grickly

@freakinflipflop

@4ragon

I tagged 4,014 of my posts in 2022

#ofmd - 1,064 posts

#wwdits - 917 posts

#queue - 109 posts

#goncharov - 92 posts

#unreality - 74 posts

#seascape tag - 68 posts

#help - 48 posts

#lauren - 46 posts

#drawtectives - 35 posts

#oh my god - 28 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#the day after i saw this post for the first time i hung out with my friends and we had the most cursed conversations in ubers both there and

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Kindred [Chapter 12 + Epilogue]

name: Kindred fandom: Ace Attorney | Gyakuten Saiban pairing: Mitsurugi Reiji | Miles Edgeworth/Naruhodou Ryuuichi | Phoenix Wright wordcount/chapters: 13/13, 96k additional tags: miles adopting pess: the fic!, it'll take a while but we'll get to narumitsu eventually i promise, set during disbarment but no AJ spoilers bc i haven't played it yet, Plot Lite(TM), very mild disbarment-typical angst, Slow(ish) Burn, References to / characters from AAI 1&2 but no major spoilers, COMPLETE!

summary:

Her ears prick up at the sound of his voice, but she doesn’t move. "You'll have to forgive me, I'm afraid. I suspect that I am not very good at this." Miles would feel silly to an extreme for speaking to her like this, except for the way that Pess thaws, ever so slightly - her tail twitches, her head dips a little from its stiff posture, and she huffs out a long breath, heavier than her shallow meter from before. "I'm aware you don't understand me, but I am quite certain that I understand you, Pess, at least a little. And I want you to know you are safe with me in this house, and that this will be your home so long as you are happy here.”

Against his better judgement, Miles Edgeworth adopts a dog.

Read it on AO3!

74 notes - Posted August 8, 2022

#4

not to bang on about it, but i think the Goncharov Phenomenon and the new Defunctland video being released at the same time is kind of. apt?

in the documentary Kevin spends an hour and a half in agony about his existence as a youtuber/artist/documentarian, agony i recognise and deeply resonate with, and comes to the conclusion that work doesnt have to be "great" to be worth it. that seriousness and importance is not something worth trading off joy for. that it's not actually a bad thing necessarily that sketches and memes take off and stuff you worked hard on doesn't, even if it feels bad in the moment

his point being that creativity is worth it even in isolation, that even the "real" virtuosos have no regrets about producing work that is less important, and that it's about whoever you touch with the work, no matter how shallow or simple the work may seem, and no matter how shallow or simple the impact might be on whoever you touched.

you still touched them, didn't you?

i think it's obvious why this resonates with me quite so much - in a fandom context, as well as where that intersects with my work in games, my ideas for novels that might not get anywhere, and what i "should" be doing to be considered a proper writer

and that's why goncharov is such a fantastic fucking example.

the entire POINT of goncharov is that it doesn't mean anything. and because of that, it can mean everything at once. the outpouring of creativity in unison from seemingly all corners of tumblr is no less beautiful because it is couched in memery and an inside joke. the analysis speaks just as much about the context of our zeitgeist as it does the film that doesn't exist. the art, the writing, the music. everyone taking whatever craft they've built for themselves and using it to reach out to each other for no reason other than it's fun.

it is worthy of doing, in and of itself.

my god. humans just need an excuse to create beauty sometimes because we'll do it about fucking anything. and i think that's wonderful

90 notes - Posted November 23, 2022

#3

ok. hear me out. i have thoughts about nandor’s list of ideal wife traits.

ive seen posts that are like 'it's a list of traits guillermo has!' reading it as a nandermo hint, as well as posts that say 'guillermo has the exact opposite of those traits to show that nandor is in denial' and i really don’t think it’s a direct 1:1 of either of those at all

it's pretty clear to me that the list is first of all much more literal than that - the show isn't always trying to indicate something aside from literally what it's talking about (the traits of the wives he re-deaded during the montage) and while i love reading into things as much as the next guy i think this list really was just written to serve the joke more than anything

BUT. but. it's also something that is much more indicative of nandor's inner workings than it is a straight up list of things he likes about guillermo but won’t admit to because, well, let's list the traits -humble, an excellent listener, not petty or slovenly or vain or manipulative, never asked him to shave off his beard, not smarter than him, warm and wanted to be with him (🥺), kind, a good haggler, merciful, horny, and has a sense of spontaneity and fun

to me this reads almost as if it's a classic comphet 'oh i just have high standards' kind of bent thinking. half of the traits seem to actively contradict another item in the list! this is the exact kind of thought pattern that happens when you are so divorced from your actual Self that you don't actually even know what you want - if i just have a reason that every relationship isn't perfect, an excuse for it to never be right, then i don't have to face what is genuinely happening inside me. if i have a formula, then i am safe. 

i would argue that the list is actually three separate things: 1: things nandor genuinely does want in a relationship (which do tend to line up with guillermo's own traits, or the ones he has made most visible during his servitude) 2: things that would be good for nandor’s personal development and therefore he does not want to be challenged on them (especially by a near-stranger as his wives have become to him - the fight scene is the big example here, since his reaction to guillermo in the same context was so different, but also i’m including things like not being smarter than him, etc. these are largely Also traits guillermo has, and are the ones pointed out by the posts arguing that the whole list is about guillermo in negative).  3: the other things are just quibbles because he is a petty little bitch but we been knew that already

to me his total misread of marwa's personality at the end of the episode is so starkly obvious for those exact reasons - he doesn't know what he wants at all, and it's not as simple as his subconscious having all the answers in a direct negative for us to superimpose guillermo on, either. because divorcing yourself from your emotions and anything remotely difficult to process for 400 years is bound to have some sort of impact.

also i am deeply certain that nandor was largely the same (read: an asshole) even while he was still human, too, but that’s a topic for another time

118 notes - Posted July 16, 2022

#2

287 notes - Posted February 3, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

thinking about how nandor calling all his partners wives is a clever way to have him very explicitly handwave heteronormativity and establishes him as someone who doesn't even register the modern sexuality zeitgeist BUT still places him as the sole husband: still centers him as the man of the house, the one waited on hand and foot, the one in charge, and the one ultimately aloof from a relationship that is supposed to be a partnership (there being many wives notwithstanding).

and how if, in the end, guillermo refuses to be nandor's wife and insists on being his husband that it sings in total synergy with the entire storyline thus far - it would be guillermo learning to own himself, his sexuality, his self worth, and refusing to be a doormat, and nandor accepting that change is part of life even when you are undying, and that he cannot always be dominant in order to avoid being vulnerable, and in fact needs a partner that will challenge him

in this essay i won't

1,634 notes - Posted July 17, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[wizkiddx]

unusable faces

i have exams hence why i needed to write something exceptionally cringe :)

PSA: this is completely inspired from one of my fave writers own blurb @blissfulparker​ --> completely recommend u go read hers its much better than anything i could ever write!!!! (and just her whole account) = link

Summary: pure exhaustion and mutual pining, Tom Holland x actress!reader

^(just thought this was cute, doesn't really fit aha but full credit to op!!)

A scheduling nightmare would be putting it lightly. Perhaps almost unavoidable but that didn’t make it any less of a hellish form a torture. Harry had very helpfully said it actually was a form of torture, that is sleep deprivation. Y/n loved her job - it was all she’d ever really wanted - yet that thought was quickly becoming not enough to get her through the day. Not when it felt like an interrogation tactic used by the CIA. 

To give a quick timeline of the past few days may give a little context:

Thursday - filming the fight scene all day plus an evening-turned-half-the-night-shoot due to some technically difficulties delaying the process.

Friday - flying to New York while doing read throughs of scenes for the next few days; followed immediately by getting glammed and filming the tonight show with Fallon; then a dash across town to the late late show with James Corden; then straight back on a flight to Atlanta that landed at stupid o’clock in the morning

Saturday - a full day of shooting in a mock grand central station set

The press trip to NY had been unplanned… to say the least. But the star of their studios other new release had taken ill - meaning they had slots booked on some of the biggest talk shows in America that would just be abandoned (angering the shows bookers too). It was a waste of perfectly good promo time and since the studio had their two other stars together doing a block of reshoots - it wasn’t a conversation. Much more a call demanding the two of them to be on the plane.

Normally this wouldn’t be such an unmanageable ask either, except the reshoot block was really rather time pressured. You see, the promo tour wasn’t far from beginning meaning they really needed the final film in the can. So really it was a bit of a mess. Just to free up that single day the two were in New York the whole schedule had had to be rejigged - in doing so they’d lost a rare day off too. It was just typical.  

The joys of success hey?

Well, that’s at least what Y/n was making herself think whilst her incredibly talented SFX artist was in the process of crafting a deep wound onto her upper arm. The reason why she would be ‘dripping with blood’ whilst at a train station was beyond Y/n to be honest - she hadn’t been allowed to read a lot of the script so even now as filming was drawing to a close, the story arc of the movie she was headlining was still a little ‘fuzzy’.

“So I watched your ‘spill your guts’ thing on YouTube” Ellie giggled whilst reaching over for more prosthetic putty- a technical term apparently

“I’m glad one of us enjoyed the experience” Y/n replied with a sigh, rolling her eyes at the mischievous smirk on her face - no doubt Ellie took great joy out of seeing her suffer through eating a thousand year old egg. Which Y/n swore the taste of was still in her mouth… and it seemed as though it’d never leave. 

“Oh don’t worry darling I did too” Nelli called over from the next chair along, where she was doing Tom’s makeup for the day of shoots. “Between that and the animals on Fallon, you made a hell of a lot of people laugh last night” Tom’s artist was referencing the fact one of Jimmys other guests was a zookeeper, so at the end of the interview he had you and Tom join in trying not to scream at the snakes and spiders.

“You mean laugh at us?” 

“Well of course darling!” Nelli exclaimed back in an overdramatic bronx accent making all three of the women burst out laughing, Ellie’s unceremonious snorts echoing through the trailer only egged them all on more.

Tom in response, who had otherwise been absent from conversation for the majority of the morning, exclaimed a curse and jumped up in his chair. While you and Ellie collected yourself, Nelli apologised to him.

“Oh sorry love, I’m interrupting your snooze with my uncontrollable comedic gift” She spoke sweetly, even if still taking the moment to flaunt to the other women, as she squeezed his shoulder compassionately.

“No no” Tom waved off her apology, attempting to rub his eye before Nelli swatted his arm away - a stern look for the risk of ruining all her hard work she’d put into making his face look half presentable. 

“I’m impressed you can sleep while they poke you with all these er instruments” Y/n added in, having only just realised Tom had been in a light sleep for god knows how long they’d been in that chair. It did seem a bit unlikely, being able to fall asleep as you were dabbed, prodded and brushed. 

“Maybe you should try though Y/n… your purple eye bags are proving a struggle even for me” Ellie quipped back, now it was Y/n’s turn to give the stern look. Tom took the explain though, shutting her off from whatever kindly meant insult she was about to throw back at her friend. 

“No normally never, I just….” He was cut off by an ear splitting yawn, appearing almost powerful enough to crack his jaw - which would be a disaster, for no one should ruin such a beautiful and sharp jaw line. “…uh-sorry. I just think I ended up taking my NyQuil and DayQuil the wrong way round in the madness of yesterday.” Only Tom, the poor kid often seemed to lacking in any form of common sense - even if those closest to him knew just how intellectual and passionate he could be about the right topic. Affectionately, Nelli scalded his idiocy by jokingly swatting his head with a little tut.

“I can’t believe your still standing then! I’m barely alive and I don’t have any sedatives in my system.” It was true, Y/n was at that stage where every part of her body felt ridiculously heavy… eyes included … eyes especially. 

“But I did sleep on the jet back while your stupid self was studying the script!” Tom replied with a pretty inarguable point - at the time he knew her actions were stupid;  when their flight took off at 11 PM he was certain that the most valuable asset to his ability to act in the reshoots today would be sleep - rather than character development. And he’d tried to convince Y/n that briefly, but gave up. She was bloody stubborn when she wanted to be. 

“Stop competing about who has it worse cos I think it’s me and Nell”Ellie announced - making Nelli agree empathically with her coworker, nodding her head as she looked first to Y/n in her chair then back at Tom.

“Yeh because we have to deal with your unusable faces!!”

After much sarcasm thrown back and fourth, the trailer slowly ebbed it’s way back into serenity and peace as both artists focused on their work. Once Nelli was done she excused herself, Tom staying in the chair in favour of studying (more like staring blankly) at the dialogue for this mornings scenes. His pretence didn’t last long though and while Ellie was busy adding the final touches of fake blood to the now almost completely believable gash that she’d crafted on Y/n’s arm - Y/n had her attention focused the opposite way.

At poor little Tom. He looked so childlike, his slightly puffy eyes looked as if they had weights tied to them - they way he was having fight against gravity to flutter his eyes open, before loosing the next second only for the process to repeat as they dragged downwards. The broad muscles of his neck occasionally seemed to occasionally let up a little, letting his head tilt slowly at first until it gathered enough momentum to throw him off balance. The then sudden movement of his head unconsciously pulling itself back in line caused his eyes to bolt open prior to the whole cycle repeating again. All Y/n wanted to do was let him lay down someone, her heart feeling a tug in her chest just seeing him like that. 

Ellie proclaimed her completion of the wound, leaning back to admire her work before looking to get an affirming nod from Y/n. Yet instead, she was too preoccupied gazing at the boy slouched across from them. “Someone seems a little distracted.” Ellie smirked, finally garnering Y/n’s attention, only feeling more and more smug watching a light tint appear on the actors cheeks. 

“I-well-no… we need to go.” Y/n ignored her words as though nothing had happened, instead rushing off the chair to get Tom out the chair and onto the awaiting set. They had places to be.

|||||||||||||||||||||||||||| (bcos im lazy)

Honestly when the director, Ed, called for lunch break, it was pretty apparent to be purely as a compassionate gesture to Y/n and Tom. Both of them had tried so hard this morning to fully commit, even so they’d both been almost completely useless. Y/n kept missing cues whilst all Tom’s actions and lines where slow, dragged out and at times completely prompted from someone behind the cameras. 

So when the lunch break was called there was only one thing on Y/n’s mind and what sandwich was available in the mess tent was not it. Still standing on the set next to her fake holdall bag she looked toward Tom, who was pulling himself up to standing from the train station bench - the pace of his movement making him look more like an old man. 

“You good?” His answer was predictable. 

“I’m so fucking shattered”

Tom swore he’d never heard anything sweeter come out of Y/n’s pink lips than her next statement.

“C’mon I know somewhere we can lie down.”

Without any sort of thought Tom blindly agreed, nodding as he took her outstretched hand in his. The gesture in itself brought a fresh wave of comfort to his aching limbs and as his feet stumbled to catchup with her slight head start he leant the majority of his weight into their connected hands. 

Neither would admit it but they were ‘a thing’… whatever the hell that meant. It was clear as day to everyone and anyone that worked closely to the two but neither of them had ever broached the topic with each other. They’d worked on a few films together over the years; each time they got closer and closer to the point any job without the other simply wasn’t as good. It was scary though, especially for two actors in the prime of their careers. If they weren’t working the same film they’d likely be the opposite side of the world to each other most of the time - quality time together would be few and far between, Really their jobs didn’t suit dating at all, yet it would be perhaps easier if one half of it worked a ‘normal’ job. Something with consistency, a regular structure. A level of dependability that neither Y/n nor Tom could offer to the other. 

So it was terrifying, acknowledging the growth in their magnetic attraction to each other. Both were acutely aware that doing that, confronting their feelings, would most likely signal the beginning of the end. 

Although none of this stoped Y/n from returning the gesture, tilting her shoulder into Tom’s left side as they took slow steps through and then out the set building. She steered the two past the hair and makeup trailer and round into a store and extra equipment trailer. Tom tilted his head as she climbed the stairs whilst beckoning for him to follow - it didn’t seem like the most obvious choice. Rolling her eyes, Y/n explained.

“It’s where all the blankets and coats and kept for the raining scenes plusssss no one will disturb us in here.” Again Tom was not in a position to disagree, eyes drooping as his shoulders sagged to the floor. Right now he’d take anything. 

So he climbed up the stairs and shut the door behind him, just as Y/n flipped the light on. She was right, it was well equipped and with an almost mountainous supply of red blankets that normally the crew and extra would all be wrapped up in after the freezing rain scenes with all the ‘waterfall machines’ as Y/n called them. However it was also um…. It was cosy. “Oh I don’t think I realised how small it was” She chuckled lightly, since now the door was closed her back was pressed up against the far wall of cabinets and still her front was mere millimetres from Tom.

“I…I don’t mind… if-if you don’t?”

“I’m too tired to care” She giggled in response, and Tom , now with her seal of approval, immediately started ransacking the piled shelves for all their worth creating a floor carpeted in the pale red of the blankets, in an attempt to make it more cosy. Joining in, it was almost remarkable how quickly their bodies suddenly agreed to move, with the new promise of rest mere moments away. 

Once the trailer was fully drowned, Tom kicked off his costume shoes and threw his jacket off - it haphazardly landing by the doorway. Y/n copied him, leaving her stood up whilst he had the advantaged of already settling down on the floor, her standing and looking down at him.

The space between the two opposing shelving units was not close spacious enough for two people to lie down whilst keeping a respectable level of personal space. Suddenly feeling a wave of awkwardness, Y/n stayed standing, wringing her hands slightly - whilst fairly certain Tom could hear her heart running at 100 mph. 

“You er… gonna stay there or?” Tom, contrary to popular belief, wasn’t a complete idiot - he could see she was suddenly self conscious. He got it too - they’d never crossed this boundary of choosing to cuddle into each other. It had happened once of twice accidentally over there 2 years of knowing each other. Both of those times it was completely accidental, falling asleep watching a movie with a safe distance of space b between the two, only to find hours later their bodies almost completely intwined. Tom would be lying if he said that his heart didnt skip a beat when he had awoken to Y/n’s soft and gently breath fanning into his neck. He’d loved it, but understood that was unconsciously breaking down part of the wall they’d both been the constructors of.

For fear of getting hurt. 

So now, as Y/n awkwardly bent down and lay on her side, he thought it was imperative to make her feel comfortable. Naturally then, his arm slid round her shoulders and pulled her down toward his chest, releasing a little breath as he felt her relax, her legs slowly wrapping round one of his. 

“This okay?” He murmured, now into the crown of her head as she lay half on her side half on his chest. In reply she nodded into him and Tom couldn’t help but grin- unbeknownst to him but Y/n was doing the exact same thing. 

The peace lasted all of 3 seconds until she groaned again.

“What?” Tom enquired as she wriggled out his hold and stood up. Instead of replying though she just leant over and flicked the one harsh light bulb off making Tom chuckle as she fumbled her way back onto the padded floor in the darkness, earning a few grunts from both as she accidentally kicked Tom’s thighs or banged her head on one of the now empty shelves. Fumbling her way back into a comfortable position, occasionally cursing when she stubbed her toe- or Tom did when she accidentally elbowed him in the ribs. 

“Comfy?” Tom asked a little sarkily as he squeezed her a little more into his side.

“Mhmmmm… I’m gonna sleep for 100 years”

“Yeh me… me too”

And with that they both almost instantly and in complete unison sagged into each other and the blankets - the pent up stress and tension of the past few days ebbing away.

What the pair had neglected to remember was that sleeping for 100 years wasn’t really an option. The whole crew of 50 people, who wanted to restart filming after 45 minutes, had not been told about Y/n’s little hiding place. The pair were so completely safe in their own little cocoon of comfort they were completely oblivious to their teams calling there names more and more frantically. Completely oblivious to the game of hide and seek the situation had descended into, completely oblivious to Harrys natural annoyance as the director asked him for the whereabouts of the two stars - as though Harry was childminder to the pair of them.

It was Nelli who found them first. She’d and Ellie and Tom’s manager had all been recruited by Harry as part of the man hunt. Both girls, having seen first hand the state of the two this morning, were fairly certain they’d both crashed out somewhere. So Nelli, already with a sneaking suspicion, opened the door gently, her figure blocking the majority of the light from seeping through to the dimly lit inside. The sight she was met with had her actually pouting at the cuteness - and yes its a cringey word but also the only one appropriate.

Between bedding down and barely an hour later the two had managed to become impossibly tighter pressed to each other. Y/n’s face was pressed into the crook of Tom’s neck and his arms seemed to have pulled her on-top of him almost completely. Her left leg was hooked under his right, which was then sandwiched by his left too. They both looked so pure and innocent and god did Nelli know they both needed any extra time they could get.

Nelli cared a lot about Tom, she’d been working with him from the beginning, from the child star days to now. She cared about him like her very annoying surrogate son and she wanted to see him looked after. She also so completely wanted the two stars to stop pining after each other. Because frankly it was getting a little frustrating for everyone else. 

So she chose to tactically forget about her discovery, sneaking a photo on the sly before silently pulling the door closed and leaving them to their sleep. 

[fumingspice]

All The Things She Said

Part: One Two Three

Requests are open and I don’t have a life so knock yourself out with them xo

Pairing: Lana Winters x Reader 

lit the last update so that i cant put off seven wonders any longer. enjoy. mwah

Warnings: one (1) hot and sexy milf, implied smut

It made Lana Winters’ blood boil to the core seeing you, your friends and yourIt made Lana Winters’ blood boil to the core seeing you, your friends and your date discussing themes, co-ordinations, transport and the apartment you had all planned to book to stay overnight in. You could see it in her when she overheard Heather or Emmett making jokes that you were getting attention after your promposal.

You knew the idea of organised formal events gave her headaches unless she really wanted to go, so frankly you were pretty surprised when you found out she would be one of the teachers chaperoning the dance.

“You’re kidding me, right?” Emmett asked, smothing down a suit he was tryin on. Just a few more days to go until the prom. “I thought you said she broke it off.”

You unfolded your arms and straightened yourself up to read a few dress magazines which were sitting on a stool in the viewing room. “She did,” you replied, looking at different dresses on each page to try and get some sembelnce of what you wanted to wear. 

Emmett looked fantastic in his suit. “Be honest, Y/N. Is she bothering you?”

You shook your head and chuckled. “Gosh, no. Not at all,” you replied. That was true after all, you were keeping up with the prom thing because you knew that it trained Lana’s attention back on you.

“If you say so,” he said with a roll of his eyes. “Did you hear that her title got changed? She must have finally signed the divorce papers.”

You were frozen slightly for a moment. The news that Lana had actually signed for divorce after having put it off for years made the entire thing seem real.

And on God you loved the feeling.

“Are you ready to go dress shopping?”

You nodded, a wide grin showing on your face. The three of you strode out to the dress shop. Heather already had her heart set on a specific dress that she had seen months ago. You, on the other hand, had barely given it a second thought.

Manny was insistent on purple, claiming that it was your perfect colour.

It was also the colour of Lana’s bedsheets the first time you’d visited her home.

So, it was decided. A beautiful, vibrant purple dress with a slit that went up your thigh. Strapless. Just how Lana liked it.

The prom was taking place out of town in a hotel built around the ruins of an old castle. Your legs and jaw jittered out of every feeling swirling around your body and mind. The sea of your peers socialising, dancing, not-so discreetly drinking in the lit-up ruins was magical. It was like the essence of whatever parties must have taken place between the old walls of the ballroom came back to life every so often.

You noticed Lana through the corner of your eye wearing a red dress. Her eyes softened as she took you in, noticeably getting distracted from her conversation with another teacher as she raised her eyebrows at you.

You glanced away, making sure not to show her any emotion whatsoever.

When you had walked far enough through the lobby, Lana took your hand and walked slightly faster. There was an empty first-aid suite in the hall, lined with small beds incase guests ever got too drunk or took ill. Weird thing to have.

You danced and sang, drank, and laughed with your friends, swinging from Manny’s arms and pulling him in close. You certainly didn’t just look like friends tonight and it was driving Lana insane.

After what had been hours of stolen glances, longing stares and not so accidental brushes of contact, you finally worked up your nerve to go talk to her when she went behind one of the far-off stone pillars for a cigarette.

“I knew you weren’t going to be able to hold off those all night,” you said. Lana turned in surprise.

“I didn’t think you were going to speak to me tonight,” she replied, taking a deep inhale. “You seemed more than happy with your date.”

You smirked at her ill-attempt to sound irritated.

“Can I bum a cigarette?” You asked. You leant against the pillar on your back so that she couldn’t look away from you again.

Lana chuckled as she passed to you. “I thought you had no interest in smoking.”

You coughed heavily. “I don’t,” you wheezed. “But you look hot as shit when you do it and I wanted another way to keep your attention on me.”

The brunette shook her head. “Your wearing your necklace,” she admired, pulling at her own.

You nodded. “I had to have some symbol of the one I love on me.” Your words left your mouth before you even had time to process it. You muttered a profanity under your breath. “I’m sorry, Lana. I wasn’t thinking-”

Lana didn’t skip a beat in taking your hand and guiding you back into the main building of the hotel without explaining herself.

Your confusion almost continued until Lana opened the door and pulled you into the room. Before you had time to open your mouth and ask what on Earth was going on, she pressed you against the door and kissed you.

With that, it was like a magnet being held back was allowed to swing to its attraction. You clutched your arms over her neck, arching your back so that your bodies met. Lana's lips eloped yours as her hands stayed trained on your back and waist.

How on Earth did your French teacher manage to be the one who touched you and set your soul on fire.

Lana's tongue met with yours, her teeth biting down on your lips then going for your jawline. Tiny blotches appeared under her bites and nips as she guided you towards one of the beds and sat on it with you between your legs.

You tried to keep up with her pace, but in reality, you had never experienced something like this before with Lana. By now you felt like you had kissed her a hundred thousand times, but nothing came quite close to the feeling of having the room set on fire and watching from within the flames.

You felt one of Lana's hands trailing from your belly, over your breasts and resting on your throat in a light squeeze. You broke free from her kiss, your lips visibly swollen. Lana's mouth trailed your neck and jawline.

"I thought we were casual," you breathed, her actions driving into your abdomen.

Lana chuckled breathily. "Oh, baby girl. There's nothing casual about you and I.”

Her answer was satisfied you enough to let her get back to the kissing. For now, at least. You were going to absolutely milk the life out of Lana for having ever suggested that you anything less, but right now you just wanted her to work off her damn jealousy.

“God, Lana,” you spoke between her fiery kisses. “If I knew this is how you were when you were jealous then I would’ve acted up weeks ago.”

Lana chuckled into your skin. “Jesus H. Christ, you have quite the mouth, Y/N.”

Her eyes, dark and glossed, collided with your stare. She had the most beautiful brown eyes you had ever seen, and you were almost willing to get lost in her warm gaze. Lana pulled your body onto the bed and lent over you.

Lana’s nails scratched lines up your thigh, navigating themselves under your dress to the point that your eyes snapped open and your breath hitched.

“You put a lot of thought into getting this dress, didn’t you?” she asked. “You told me that you hated slit dresses and that you wouldn’t wear one unless you absolutely had to.”

You smirked. “Clever girl,” you whispered, feeling her hand scratch further up your thigh. Her fingers had almost reached between your legs when Lana pulled back.

“You aren’t wearing underwear?” You nodded and got met with Lana’s melodic laugh. “Y/N, you really are something.”

You could hear the music pounding from outside. t.A.T.u’s “All The Things She Said” had always been a song that you had made a mental note about getting railed to, and right now that somewhat looked like your wish was about to come true.

You took Lana’s hand and pushed it closer to your centre, moaning when you felt her fingers cold against you.

Whispers of, “are you sure?” were followed by slow moves being made for the first time as your lover delicately slipped her fingers to where you were desperate for.

She was slow and gentle, drawing low moans from your like a confession. You would’ve been more than happy to lay under Lana and allow her to watch you be completely undone by the delicate touch of her fingers and mouth, and you knew for a fact that there was no way you would be joining you friends in the rented apartment tonight. Eventually, your own hand slid up Lana’s dress and between her thighs. Your joint moans sparked up a weird melody of romance.

“I love you too,” she whispered into your lips as your arm tightened around her when you had both finished. 

“You know, if that’s what’s going to happen every time I say something like that then I’m going to have to say it more often.”

Even now, after the years. The loving, the learning, the fighting and the experience. Proving your sanity to your mom, who eventually approved of your relationship. It was always Lana, and it was always you.

taglist: @sarahp-stan @jumpoffabridge-t @sarahpaulsonsoftie @definitelynot-a-writer @bottom4delia @delias-bitch-craft @creepingwolfberry @thesapphictimelady @goodeday2u @that-fucking-error @saucy-sapphic​