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the-bau-quinjet · 4 years ago

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I don't give a damn

Steve x f!reader

Summary: Sometimes Steve's forgets how times have changed. You're there to sing him a song about it.

Warnings: swearing, drinking, kisses, themes of sexism, i guess spoilers for Annie Get Your Gun (although that's from the 50s so I don't really think it needs much warning lol)

Word Count: 3020

a/n: another karaoke fic (because I wasn't kidding when I said I love them). Most of the songs I've been listening to have come from a playlist aptly titled ffs. It stands for both "for fucks sake" and "feminist fight songs" in my mind, hence the similar theme of this fic and My Name Isn't. This one was inspired by Joan Jett's "Bad Reputation"!

Masterlist

You and Steve don't see eye to eye on most things. It's not that you don't get along. You respect each other too much to fight about everything, but you have differing opinions on most things.

Take movie night for example. Cap always wants to watch something from his list. He's always trying to pick a "classic".

Most of the time, you would rather watch something you haven't seen. Unless it's a comfort thing, you don't really like repeating movies.

You both understand the other's perspective, so rather than a screaming match you typically settle it with a game of rock, paper, scissors.

Unfortunately, that's how most of your interactions go.

Outside of missions and team building nights Tony forces upon the group, you don't spend much time with him. The two of you are just polar opposites.

The problem with that? You have a massive crush on Mr. America himself.

Not that anyone else would know that. You're highly trained in the art of covert operations. You know how to hide your feelings, although you are certain Natasha at least suspects something.

You've resigned yourself to taking this secret to your grave, that is until Cap says something one movie night that sets you on edge.

"Rock, Paper, Scissors, shoot!" You held out your fist, having chosen rock.

Steve smirks, covering your fist with his open palm. "Paper beats rock, time for another 'classic'." He squeezes your hand before letting go. He picks up his book, trailing the pencil down the page for the next movie.

The high you were currently riding from his touch quickly dissipated when he announced the movie he wanted to watch.

"Annie Get Your Gun is next on the list." He smiled, closing the book before returning it to his pocket.

You couldn't help but scoff, "who suggested that one?" Annoyed at the sexist themes of the 50s musical movie.

"Someone said to watch all of the best pictures/musicals from the Academy Awards to see how times have changed." Steve scrunched his face in thought. "I can't remember who though."

"What? Most of those movies are terrible if you ask me." You whined a bit, annoyed at the idea of watching your least favorite type of movies.

"Your just annoyed cause you lost rock, paper, scissors. Let the man cross it off his list and move on." Sam chimed in from across the room.

You huffed, making a face at Sam before turning to get more comfortable on the couch. "Fine, this one still sucks though." You frowned, nonplussed by the idea of watching another 'classic' with another sexist storyline.

Somehow, you sat through the musical without any interruptions, unless you counted aggressively rolling your eyes.

The second it was over, you were turning the TV off, excited to be done with it. You were three steps from the exit when Cap called out to you.

"I don't know why you hate that musical so much, Y/N. I thought it was sweet what Annie did for Frank."

You narrowed your eyes as you turned back to him. "Would you lose on purpose to 'get the girl'?" You couldn't help but roll your eyes at the phrase. "Would any of you?" You looked at all the men in the room.

"I don't think it'd be very fair. Wouldn't want her to think she was better than me if she's not. Besides, it depends on the girl." He may have been going for a flirty tone, but you just grew angrier at Steve's response.

"Right, because why should you have to pretend to be worse to appease someone else?" Everyone in the room could see where you were going with this. Everyone, that is, but Steve.

"Yeah, that's a good way of putting it." Steve nodded along, glad the two of you were finally agreeing on something.

"The why'd you think it was sweet when Annie did it?" You stepped closer, narrowing your eyes even farther. "The whole musical Frank was too stubborn, his ego too big, to deal with the fact that Annie was better than him. 'You can't get a man with a gun'? Bullshit, you could always shoot him." You let out a dry laugh at your own joke, completely fed up with sexism in movies being written off as love.

Steve was taken aback at how everything had shifted. He thought he was finally in agreement with you on something, so he clung to it. "But she did it for love... her reputation, all the medals, they still showed how good she was." Halfway through speaking, he realized he was only making it worse, but it was too late. The damage was done.

"For fuck's sake, she shouldn't have to pretend to be any less of a badass sharpshooter than she is to find love." With another roll of your eyes, you went to leave, stopping again at the sound of Steve's voice.

"Maybe she was just scared she wouldn't find anyone with that reputation." He nearly smacked himself for that one, why couldn't he just shut up? He just didn't want you to be mad at him.

With one hand on the doorway, you looked over your shoulder. "That reputation? I'd rather have that reputation than a relationship where I have to feed his ego." With that, you walked to the elevators, beyond ready to call it a night.

"I'm an idiot." Steve sighed, head in his hands, elbows on his knees while sitting on Bucky's bed.

"Yep. You just kept digging." Bucky agreed easily, not sure where to start with the advice.

Steve shot him a glare as he began pacing back and forth. "I mean, she clearly didn't like the movie. Why did I even start the conversation? I should have just let her walk away. She already barely tolerates my presence as it is. We disagree about everything, even if we rarely fight over it. I should've just cut my losses and enjoyed the time we spent together, even if it was with everyone."

"Punk, you need to relax. Just go apologize, then maybe you'll actually go to sleep at some point tonight." Bucky shoved Steve out the door, slamming it shut before he could object.

Mumbling about what a jerk Bucky is, Steve made his way to your door. He hesitated, turned around, walked a few steps, turned around again, and eventually knocked.

You opened the door with a yawn, having been close to sleep when the noise startled you. "What d'ya need, Cap?"

He couldn't help but smile at your sleepy state, never having seen you this unguarded before. "Uh, I just wanted to apologize for earlier. You're entitled to your opinion, and there was no reason for me to fight you on it."

A look of annoyance briefly flashed across your face at the mention of the movie, but you relaxed given his apology. "I'm glad we can agree then. It's a terrible movie."

"Oh, no, I still like the movie." He had never wanted the ground to swallow him whole more than he did in that moment. Floundering for a way to undo what he just said, he started rambling. "I mean, you're right. It is kind of sexist, but that was just the time period you know? Like in the 40s, dames had to constantly worry about how their actions would affect their reputations." Up to that point, he had been staring at the floor, rapidly spewing more words. "I mean, you wouldn't want a bad reputation, right?" He chose the wrong sentence to make eye contact.

The sleepy, slightly confused smile was gone, replaced by a look he had hoped to never have directed at him. You spoke with an eerie sort of calm when you replied. "I think you're a little stuck in the 40s, Cap. I shouldn't have to worry about my reputation anymore than any man does his. Goodnight."

For the second time that night, a door slammed in his face. Bucky was definitely wrong. He would not be getting any sleep after talking to you.

"Ladies and gentlemen, it's karaoke night. Yes, I've rented a bar. No, you may not stay home. We start at 8!" Tony walked in, made his announcement, and instantly walked right back out.

Everyone nodded, taking in the brief encounter with Tony. Well, everyone but you and Steve. The two of you were too stuck in your heads to listen to Tony's ramblings.

It had been three days since movie night, and Steve still hadn't worked up the courage to talk to you again.

What could he even say to explain why he was so flustered? "Sorry for the other night, I can't seem to form coherent thoughts when I'm around you, because even though we rarely talk outside of missions, I have a massive crush on you"? No, that was definitely coming on too strong.

He just needed to find the right words.

Meanwhile, you were confused. You never would have imagined Steve to be so stuck in the past. Of course, you understood things were different before he got stuck in the ice, but he's really made leaps and bounds in his understanding of feminism and equality since he first realized what year it was.

You wanted to ask him where the whole speech came from, but you were afraid of the answer.

"I guess that means it's time to get ready since it's already 6:30! I swear, he never gives us enough notice for these things." Wanda smiled at Vision, pressing a quick kiss to his cheek, before grabbing you and Nat to go change.

"What are we getting ready for?" You asked when Wanda finally let go of your arm, having entered the elevator.

"Karaoke! Didn't you her Tony?" She eyed you suspiciously, clearly debating whether or not to look into your mind.

"She was too stuck in her head to notice me throwing popcorn at her, she definitely didn't listen to Tony." Nat smirked at your startled expression, laughing when you reached up to brush the kernels out of your hair.

You glared at both of them, "I was just thinking about some stuff. That's all."

"Yeah, some stuff named Steve." Wanda cackled, having decided to peak into your head. It was for your own good after all.

"Wanda! You said you wouldn't read my mind unprovoked." You wanted to be angry, but part of you was relieved you wouldn't have to keep this secret anymore.

"It was provoked! You wouldn't tell me what you were thinking about." Wanda smiled, also knowing that you were happy to have shared the secret, even if not by choice.

"And don't try to change the subject. Steve, huh? Somebody's got a crush." She was taunting you like a child would on a playground, shaking her head back and forth for emphasis.

"Well, yeah, but that's not what I why I was thinking about him." They each gave you a pointed look, obviously not believing you. "Seriously! I was thinking about movie night." You frowned, upset at the memory.

You quickly filled them in on what Steve said when he came to talk to you as you made your way to Nat's room to get ready. (She has the biggest vanity, so it makes the most sense to go to her room).

"I can't picture Steve trying to defend himself like that. Normally if he's fallen back into his old ways, someone points it out and he apologizes." Nat made a face, trying to put two and two together. "Unless..." She looked at Wanda, gesturing for her to read her mind.

"Oh my god!" Wanda squealed, nearly knocking you over with her excitement. "Steve's got a crush, toooooo." She happily dragged it out, much to Nat's amusement.

"Please, the man barely talks to me as it is. Our most substantial conversation revolved around my 'bad reputation' or lack thereof." You couldn't help but roll your eyes at the memory. "I seriously doubt he's got a crush. I do want to fix this though. I don't like when people are avoiding me. I get all stressed about accidentally running into them."

"He totally has a crush." Wanda smiled again.

"It's the only reason he would turn into a rambling idiot in front of you." Nat added.

"What song should I sing tonight?" You desperately tried to change the subject.

Wanda smirked, already having a perfect song in mind. "I think I've got one that could solve both your problems..." She filled you and Nat in on her plan, and although you doubted the crush aspect of it all, it was a good way to break the ice in terms of Steve avoiding you.

Hopefully it would show him you were more confused than upset, and everything would work out.

You changed quickly, embracing 80s fashion to go with your song choice. You wore black leather pants and a matching jacket, slipping on a tight red shirt underneath. Although, you still did your hair like you normally would, not fully committing to the 80s vibes.

With the addition of some red lipstick, a rarity for you, you were ready. Wanda and Nat finished their looks as well, and the three of you left for the bar.

You were honestly a little surprised when Steve walked up to you immediately after you walked into the bar. He handed you your favorite drink, smiling as he took in your ensemble.

"I wanted to apologize. I didn't mean all that stuff I said, just sometimes I forget how much things have changed and I-" You cut him off, not wanting him to suffer (or ramble) too much.

"Steve, it's fine. I was honestly more confused than anything else." He smiled, taking a sip from the drink he provided you.

"Really? You definitely looked angry when you slammed the door in my face." He outwardly cringed at bringing it up again.

"Okay, I was angry at first, but then I was mostly confused." You nodded, trying to convey that you weren't upset with him anymore.

"Good. I'm glad because avoiding you was getting pretty difficult." He wanted to smack himself again. Why does he always say the stupidest things around you?

To his relief, you laughed at his 'joke'. "Plus, this makes my song choice even more fun." You winked before walking back over to Wanda and Nat, leaving Steve to wonder about your performance.

"Y/N! You're up next." Tony called from his seat near the stage. He really liked to enforce his 'everyone must participate in team building, that's how it becomes team building' philosophy when it comes to karaoke night.

You couldn't help but smirk at Steve as he whipped his head around to witness you walking onto the stage. He's been eagerly awaiting your performance.

Everyone who knew the song started laughing at the first sounds of the guitar. The two super soldiers though? They were confused.

"I don't give a damn 'bout my reputation."

Once you started singing, you couldn't take your eyes off of Steve. He was blushing at being called out, Bucky's hysterical laughter next to him not really helping the situation.

"Living in the past, it's a new generation."

Bucky nearly fell out of his chair laughing. Even Steve had a smile on his face. You bobbed your head to the music, relying on your previous drinks to really get into the performance.

"A girl can do what she wants to do, and that's what I'm gonna do. And I don't give a damn 'bout my bad reputation. Oh no, not me."

You put air quotes around bad, really playing it up since everyone was having so much fun with it. Tony, Nat, Wanda, and Sam were jumping around, dancing as you sang. Bucky was still trying to catch his breath from laughing so hard. Steve was full on grinning by the last chorus, slightly shaking his head at your antics.

"So, why should I care about a bad reputation, anyway?"

In typical Tony fashion, he saing along for the "oh no, not me" bit of the song, encouraging everyone to scream the words with him.

By the time the song was over, you were a little out of breath, sweating a bit from the lights.

"Now's your chance, punk. Go bring her another drink." Bucky shoved the glass in his hand and gave Steve a slight push in your direction as you walked off the small stage.

You hugged Nat and Wanda before making your way toward the bar. Steve intercepted you, handing you the freshly made drink.

You smiled, uttering a quick thanks before eagerly taking a sip. The cold liquid did wonders for your parched throat.

"That was quite the performance. Really called me out 'on my bullshit' as you would say." You couldn't help but laugh and tease him a bit more.

"Captain, language!" You placed your empty hand on his shoulder, sliding down to his chest with your next question. "Whatever will the world think of you?"

"Well, recently I've adopted a new motto." He whispered, leaning in closer so you could here. "I don't give a damn 'bout my reputation."

Caught off guard by his use of the lyric, you laughed, leaning into your hand on his chest for support.

"Something we agree on then." Your breath caught in your throat when you realized just how close he was.

"I think there's one more thing we agree on..." He trailed off, eyes quickly glancing down at your lips.

"What might that be, Cap?" Your eyes drifted down his face as well, giving him enough courage to lean in.

His lips caught yours in a passionate kiss. He pulled you closer as you wrapped your arms around his neck. The two of you moved in sync, as if you were made for each other.

You were so lost in each other, you paid no attention to the cheers from your teammates. You didn't even register Nat and Wanda screaming "I told you so" as Steve pulled you in for a second kiss.

#steve rogers x you #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x y/n #captain america x you #captain america x reader #captain america #marvel fic #marvel

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florrickandassociates · 4 years ago

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TGF Thoughts: 5x01- Previously on...

Welcome back!! I’m so excited to be writing one of these again. I think this hiatus has been the longest I’ve gone without new Diane Lockhart content in ten years, and it sure feels like it. A lot of important stuff has happened in the time since TGF season four ended (not concluded—ended). Most notably, CBS All Access became Paramount+ and suddenly started offering a lot of content I care about! I kid. 2020 was quite an eventful year, so I was curious how television’s most topical show was going to take it on. TGF is always forward-looking, but too much happened in 2020 to be ignored. And while I didn’t think TGF would have much to say about the pandemic, it seemed impossible to imagine a season five that pretended it never happened. Going into this premiere, I was expecting that they’d either skip COVID entirely or include very few references, but after seeing this episode, I feel like the writers took the only approach that made sense. And that is why they are the writers, and I'm just some girl on the internet who writes recaps.

Anyway, before I dive into the episode, I should also note that my pandemic boredom spurred me to actually pay $30 to watch this episode early as part of the virtual ATX Festival. Yes, I paid $30 on top of the money I spend every month on Paramount+ for this show. But I write tens of thousands of words about each TGF episode—are my priorities really that surprising? I note this not to brag or even to poke fun at myself, but because watching the episode before I knew a single thing about it (not even the title!) completely changed my viewing experience. I’ve never had an experience like this with TGW or TGF. I’m one to search for critics tweeting cryptically about screeners and refresh sites looking for background extras (haven’t done this in the TGF era, though) and read every single piece of press I can find. For any big episode, I usually know the outline of what to expect going in (I even knew about Will before the episode aired in the US!). Not this one! So, I got to be surprised, and I had to—gasp—formulate my own opinions before I knew what anyone else thought! It was really pleasant, actually. I think the structure of the episode worked extremely well for me because it caught me by surprise... and also because I’m the kind of person who somehow managed to write a college paper about Previously On sequences.

I see Tumblr has made it so that “keep reading” expands the post in your dash instead of opening a new tab. I absolutely hate this. Here is a link to the post you can click instead of the keep reading button!

The ATX stream started mid-sentence, meaning I missed the “Previously On... 2020...” title card and skipped right to Adrian saying “I’m retiring.” It was pretty easy to pick up on the device (the directness of the scenes at the start, their cadence, and their placement in the episode made it clear this was meant to mimic a Previously) but the second title card hit way harder because... well, I had no idea if this was meant to be 2020 or some moment outside of real time until a bit later in the episode.

Man, before I get any farther into this, two things that I don’t know where else to put. First, this episode had to cover so much ground. They had to write out both Adrian and Lucca—more on that later--, figure out how to deal with all of 2020, figure out how to either wrap up or continue all the truncated season 4 plotlines, and set the stage for a new season... in 50 minutes.

Second, just wanna shout out the Kings’ other Paramout+ show, Evil, which you should absolutely be watching even if you hate horror. Evil is a Kings show, so it is unsurprisingly topical (sometimes evil takes the form of racism or misogyny or Scott Rudin) and at times very, very funny. I would be recapping it if Paramount+ weren’t attacking me personally by airing it at the same time as TGF. Ever hear of too much of a good thing, people?! (On that note, I am VERY upset with myself for not having made a Good vs Evil joke about the Good shows and Evil. I didn’t even think about it until Robert King made the joke on Twitter, and it was right fucking there. How did I fail so miserably?!)

So STR Laurie, who wants a 20% downsizing, is still a thing. Noted.

This scene with Landau is the only one in this previously that is actually old footage, right?

Unexpected Margo Martindale! Yay! (Ruth Eastman is a character who is so much more effective on Fight than she was on Wife and I’m quite glad they’ve had her appear on Fight several times. It kind of redeems season seven. Kind of.)

I don’t think the writers intentionally chose for Adrian’s book deal to be with Simon & Schuster because it is the most politically fraught publisher (the number of stories about controversial memoirs they’ve picked up in 2021 alone...) but I kind of like that Adrian’s Road Not Taken involves S&S. My guess is they chose S&S because it is owned by ViacomCBS.

“Years ago, I wanted to create a law firm run entirely by women, but it never worked out. So, why not now?” Diane says to Liz. One of the advantages of having twelve (!!!) seasons of Diane Lockhart is that we’ve seen what she’s talking about. And we’ve seen her put this idea forward multiple times, too. I have my reservations about Diane’s brand of feminism, and I’ll say more about how fraught a Diane/Liz firm would be as the show explores the potential issues there, but on the surface I’m kind of excited about the prospect of a Diane/Liz led firm. Diane has wanted this for ages, Liz is a good partner, and this actually makes sense (unlike the nonsensical Diane/Alicia alliance of late season seven, where the only rationale was “well, Alicia needs to betray Diane in the finale, but they’re not on good terms. So maybe we make them business partners so then the betrayal stings more?”). Plus I fully love that Diane would end up running a firm with Alicia’s law school rival.

(Has TGF mentioned that Liz and Alicia were law school rivals? No. Am I still clinging on to that as a large part of Liz’s character? ABSOLUTELY.)

Julius is on trial for Memo 618 reasons; Diane is defending him. So this is still happening. (There’s more old footage here.)

Do they put these references to one/two party consent in these episodes as a wink at the fans? It has to be intentional. (Please do not ask me what the actual law is on this, this show has thoroughly confused me.)

I knew Cush was filming stuff for TGF, but I didn’t know it was for the premiere. She was just posting about it a few weeks ago, so either they shot a lot of it right before air or she posted a while after filming. Anyway, yay Lucca!

Bianca’s still around. And, TGF gets to shoot New York for New York, since Bianca is there. I do wish TGF could do more location shoots; there’s something about seeing an actual skyline that feels more real.

Bianca wants Lucca, who has never been outside of the country (except to St. Lucia, as Bianca reminds her) to go to London and buy her a resort. It’s supposed to be a three week stay and Bianca’s already arranged childcare. Speaking of children, because of COVID and filming constraints, that’s Cush’s real kid in this scene! You can’t really see him, but I recognized his curly hair from Cush’s Instagram, and the Kings confirmed in an interview.

Adrian wants to write a book about police brutality cases he’s worked on. Ruth very much does not want him to write that book. She wants him to write a book without substance about how white people and black people can work together. He, understandably, has no interest in writing this book. (Also, you can see in the background that Ruth doesn’t think Biden’s odds of winning the Democratic primary are good—there is a big down arrow next to his picture, which definitely dates this scene.)

Oh, David Lee is in this episode. He acts like an asshole towards Marissa when she’s trying to help him.

Marissa, not happy with the lack of respect, calls Lucca for advice “for a friend.” Lucca mentions she’s in London and Marissa does not believe her and keeps going on and on about her frustrations and her new desire to become a lawyer—quickly.

Marissa wanting to become a lawyer because she “hates being talked down to” is not a plot I would’ve expected but it’s also one that makes a lot of sense. I think Marissa’s used to being respected and praised even when she’s doing things that aren’t glamorous, so I see how she’d get very restless when she’s no longer outperforming expectations and is instead taken for granted.

Bells toll in the background on Lucca’s side and Marissa asks where she is. Lucca again notes she’s in London and Marissa still doesn’t believe her.

I’m going to miss Lucca so much, especially since we’ll also be losing a lot of the Millennial Friendship scenes with her. Cush is fantastic (even if she never really got enough to do here) and she plays so well off of the rest of the cast. I even sometimes liked the writing for Maia (who?) when she had scenes with Lucca, Lucca is that good.

Jay wakes up sweating and unable to breathe, so he deliriously calls his father-figure Adrian. This whole scene is shot like something out of Evil and (I’m getting ahead of myself here) this plot is the only thing about this episode I felt was a misstep.

“I think you’re my father,” Jay says to Adrian. Heh, I didn’t catch this line the first time around (maybe subliminally I did, since I just called Adrian his father figure lol) but I love that it is included here. Adrian and Jay’s relationship definitely deserves a goodbye.

Adrian calls an ambulance and also gets to Jay before the ambulance somehow. Adrian notes that Jay might have “this thing from China” and... we’re doing the pandemic, y’all. (Minor nitpick: on March 13th, 2020, when this scene is dated, COVID was not “this thing from China”-- we were all aware of it. March 11th was the day Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson announced they’d tested positive and the NBA shut down and travel was restricted and every single brand that had my email sent me a message about their plans and measures. March 12th was the last time I was in my office, and we’d been getting emails telling us to wash our hands and prepare to work remotely for weeks. I went to San Francisco in mid-late February and distinctly remember deciding to leave a burrito unattended on a table while I washed my hands because I was paranoid about COVID... and then I remember making a specific trip to Walgreens to buy hand sanitizer so that didn’t happen again. My point is, Adrian lives in the same world I do. On March 13th 2020, he would not be treating COVID like it was some new thing he’d vaguely heard of.)

(I am going to nitpick this timeline, but please know that I’m only doing it because I can, not because I think it’s necessarily a bad choice. Lines like this do feel a little forced, but I see the reason for introducing COVID as something new rather than going for the line that’s exactly historically accurate. I also am pretty sure there are references to dates in March/April in s4 of TGF that are now going to be contradicted by this episode, but I truly do not care. The writers get a pass on this one.)

We skip slightly back in time to the beginning of March after the MARCH 13TH title card, or maybe this is supposed to be after March 13th and my own memories are preventing me from believing these face-to-face interactions were happening. Who knows.

Michael Bloomberg is... here, again, I guess? He asks Diane to assist with a Supreme Court case about gun control. I guess it does add some weight to the plot and make the stakes feel higher.

Oh hey, this case is the 7x17 case!!!! Love that continuity.

Diane and Adrian are both at the office late, working, and there is an unnecessary split screen that feels even more unnecessary when you consider that the editing alone was enough to create the parallel.

Diane and Adrian have a nice convo (which I’ll really miss, their dynamic is great and this really feels like a successful partnership) as they wait for the elevator. When the elevator dings, they nearly tumble down into nothingness because... the elevator never came. Apparently this is a reference to an law old show I’ve never seen that killed off a character this way, and it’s meant to be a wink at how they are not going to kill off Adrian.

I do not know why I remember this, but I do: after they killed off Will, a critic (Noel Murray; I just googled to confirm my memory) who didn’t want to spoil things tweeted, “Exactly 23 years and 2 days ago, Rosalind Shays fell down an elevator shaft.” Please tell me why I remember this reference that I didn’t even understand well enough to have tracked down the original tweet in under a minute. (https://twitter.com/NoelMu/status/447942456827326464)

Back on this show, Diane and Adrian share a drink and talk about their wishes. Diane wants to argue in front of the Supreme Court, and Adrian encourages her to speak up. His own near-death experience motivates him to trash the book Ruth has him writing, and Diane trashes the (bad) legal strategy someone else prepared for the Supreme Court.

DIANE IS WEARING JEANS!!!!!! Tbh, I think my favorite part of this episode is how many slice-of-life scenes and settings we get. These are always my favorite moments. I love the satirical and political stuff too, but the character moments are what get me invested enough to write these. (Yes, Diane in jeans constitutes a character moment.)

Diane tells Bloomberg she wants to be involved and advocates for herself. Kurt gets a call on their landline (hahaha) from Adrian.

God, I love Diane and Kurt. Not only is their banter fun, you can just see a different, more relaxed side of Diane in these scenes. Diane tells Kurt she has good news for herself, but bad news for him since she’s arguing for gun control. She asks him to help her prep for court, too.

So this is before Jay is rushed to the hospital, because now we are back at the hospital with Julius, Diane, and Marissa. I do not believe any of these people would be setting foot in a hospital like it’s any other day on March 13th, 2020. But I'm trying not to nitpick.

I get why they chose to give Jay a rather severe case of COVID. I just don’t get literally anything else that follows from the initial shock of Jay having COVID.

I see why the writers chose March 20th (the actual Illinois stay at home order) as the next date for this timeline. I still do not believe that people were in this particular office on that date.

You know what else I don’t believe? That RBL just shut down for two weeks and was like, no work is being done. Did law firms really do this? I can believe it if it’s an excuse to cost-cut, and I know there were massive layoffs, but this seems... really weird???

Why are they setting up a teleconferencing infrastructure (didn’t they have one at LG? In season five?) if they are not planning to do work?

Lol Diane explains what Zoom is, very slowly. She asks everyone to “download a program called Zoom.com” which is one of the first Zoom jokes I’ve chuckled at in a while.

Marissa is not happy to hear that there’s no work for her in a work-remote world (this I believe 100%), so she calls Lucca again with more questions about law school.

Love these NYC and London location shots. Wish they could do that for Chicago.

Lucca asks Bianca to help get Marissa into a law school, fast, and Bianca tells Lucca to use her name... then offers her a job.

Marissa is at the office, alone, boxing up her things, when one of the office phones rings with some dude offering her a spot in a law school class. I guess we are really all-in on this! (Why would Lucca have given a firm phone number not specific to Marissa, though?)

Adrian and his corrupt girlfriend decide to shelter in place together. I still do not understand why he is okay with her being corrupt. I also don’t really understand why they’re going from talking about sheltering-in-place to George Floyd. How did we just skip from late March to late May? Are Adrian and corrupt gf having a conversation about sheltering-in-place two months into sheltering in place?

Okay, I am not doing so good at this no-nitpicking thing. Again, I understand why they need to merge several scenes into one to keep things moving. And I guess they could just be getting around to this conversation.

I’m going to nitpick again, I can’t help myself. How did we just go from a scene of Adrian specifically talking about sheltering in place to a scene of Adrian bursting into a bustling and maskless DNC headquarters room? How!? The only masks in this scene are on TV!! There are like ten people in this scene!

Anyway, more importantly, Adrian tells Ruth off and screams at her that she needs to listen to him instead of acting like she knows the way forward. He is completely right.

Why is travel from London closing down in May 2020? Is it because this scene is supposed to be at a different place in the episode? Liz is asking Lucca to come back home from her three week stay in London (which has now lasted three months but travel is just now closing down), and Lucca’s hesitant to come home.

This is all happening via Zoom, btw. Lucca’s in her hotel, Diane and Adrian are at their respective homes, and Liz is in the office. All of this feels right. There is a chat off to the side of the screen where you can see Adrian and the others discussing how to unmute on Zoom. Very real. Though probably not very real in late May 2020. Feels more like April. I am convinced this scene got spliced in later to help the episode flow because everything in this scene (except the TV footage that definitely was added later) feels like it should be happening in the March section.

Lucca mentions that Bianca offered her a job, and at this point we as viewers know how things are going to go—Lucca's going to end up taking it. Liz types in the Zoom chat that they don’t want to lose Lucca. When Lucca tells them how much Bianca’s offering ($500k/year, go Lucca!), Diane types “Shit.” into the chat. “Shit’s right,” Liz replies. “Yes... What should our counter be?” Diane replies. Lucca is kind enough to point out the messages are not private (again, this feels like March not May) but I think knowing that their reaction to topping $500k is “shit” tells her all she needs to know.

Diane’s background still says that RBL is a division of STR Laurie. Weird how little we are hearing about the overlords except the 20% staff cut.

Liz and Adrian chat and decide the only way to keep Lucca is to make her a partner. Which, yeah, if you’d just made her a partner years ago when you told her she was in the running for partner and then offered it to fucking MAIA, maybe she wouldn’t be considering Bianca’s offer. Lucca is definitely one of RBL’s stars, and I don’t think she’s wrong to feel like they don’t value her enough. They treat her well enough to be upset about losing her, but not well enough to have already made her partner and not well enough to actually give her authority (even though she runs a whole department). I’d be pretty unhappy too. It kind of feels sometimes like they take her for granted, and I don’t know that Lucca is one to feel like she owes a company anything. She’s more of an “I’m out for myself” type.

Madeline and the other partner we’ve seen a few times who isn’t Liz/Diane/Adrian, walk into the office (wearing masks! Which they take off as soon as they enter a room with Liz! Without asking her if she is okay with this! TV logic!) and ask who is replacing Adrian. They think this is a good time to reevaluate having a white name partner of an African American firm, and they are spot on. Liz tries to deflect, noting that Diane is already a name partner and was before Liz even joined, but Madeline and other partner (whose name I really wish they would say so I can stop calling him “other partner”) won’t let up. Their position is that Diane shouldn’t have been made a name partner then—all she did was bring in ChumHum, an account that quickly left the firm. Good point.

“What is this firm if it’s not African American? It’s just another midsized all-service Midwestern law firm, one of 50,” Madeline argues. The other partner says Liz needs to remove Diane and promote two African Americans to name partner. Liz laughs and asks if they mean themselves. Madeline does not—she's concerned about the number of black associates they’re letting go. Liz heads out, but this conversation is very much ongoing.

And I think it’s a very interesting dilemma! There’s a lot of mileage the writers can get out of this, because I don’t think there’s a right answer or a wrong one. It’s all about what Liz decides she wants the future of the firm to be. If Liz chooses Diane, she might be choosing something that works for her personally or that she thinks is a safer financial bet—but she’ll be choosing to work at a firm that can no longer be thought of as a black firm, and she’ll be choosing to move away from her father’s vision for the firm. And since the plot hinges on what Liz will decide rather than what’s objectively the right path forward, there’s a lot of interesting tension there I can’t wait to see.

(My favorite thing about Adrian leaving is that Liz will likely get more to do, especially when it comes to managing the firm. Adrian tends to speak up first, but Liz is more than capable of managing without him and I’m so excited to see what she does when her ex-husband isn’t constantly talking over her.)

Marissa and Lucca video chat with Jay. He’s still in the hospital. One thing that bugs me about how this episode handles COVID is that I never really get the sense that any of the characters are particularly afraid of the virus. Maybe none of them were. But you’d think you’d see a little of that fear, the weird dance of trying to assess others’ comfort levels with masking, etc., in an ep specifically about living through this time. ESPECIALLY since someone they all know and are close to has been hospitalized for MONTHS with this thing! It’s just so weird to go from a scene where people wear masks until they come in contact with other people (when masks matter the most) to a scene of someone in the hospital with COVID.

And now Jay’s weird hallucinations start as his battery dies on the video chat. I really, truly, hated these hallucinations. I was ready to be done with these from the second they started. They’re weirdly shot, they go on for too long, and they feel like the clunkiest parts of Mind’s Eye when Alicia starts having a debate in her mind about atheism mixed with the (far superior) hospital episode of Evil.

I don’t have much to say about these hallucinations except that I hated them a lot. When there’s the reveal that Jay is hallucinating a commerical, I almost came around on the hallucinations because that’s kind of funny and inspired. And then several more hallucinations popped up and they had a round table and Jesus got added to the mix and I was like, nope, this is bad in a very uninteresting way. I reject this.

I feel like the Kings didn’t have much to say about COVID, the actual virus. This episode is definitely more about what the characters’ lives were like during COVID and not the pandemic itself. I think they likely got a lot of their COVID commentary out of their system with their zombie COVID show The Bite (I have not seen The Bite due to it airing on Spectrum On Demand, which I have no way of accessing. Like, I would have to move and then decide to pay for cable in order to watch it.) I also suspect a lot of their commentary on COVID isn’t going to be specific to the virus and is instead going to be about things like mask-wearing and vaccinations becoming political. And, really, that’s just a new variation on talking about polarization... and they’ve been talking about polarization for years.

In fact, they even wrote a whole series about an outbreak of a (space-bug-spread) virus that caused political polarization before Trump was even elected. BrainDead is basically commentary on the pandemic before the pandemic even happened. Soooooo I get why they are more interested in recapping 2020 than in doing a Very Special Episode about themes they’ve been talking about for years. (I still think they would’ve benefitted from at least one character being afraid of getting sick or getting their family sick.)

There is likely some interesting content in these Jay hallucinations. I hate them so much I cannot find it. You know when you’re just on a completely different wavelength than the writers? This is an example of that.

Also I’m not a fan of the shadowy directing. I think this is meant to look cooler than it does.

Have I mentioned yet that I absolutely love the “Previously On” device for this episode? It’s such a fun, propulsive way to get through the slog of 2020. Scenes can be short and to the point, and each scene has to do a lot of lifting to fill in the gaps. I think that leads to scenes that are better constructed and telling on lots of levels—where are people when they’re quarantined? Who’s wearing casual clothes and when? What about this scene defines this character’s life at that moment in time?

Bizarrely, even though this episode is pretty much all plot (this happens! Then that!), I actually found this to be one of the most character-driven episodes TGF has ever done. There’s a lot of story, but most of that story is about how the characters reacted to 2020 rather than overarching plots that will weigh on the rest of the season. This episode covers a lot of ground, but it does it with character moments that resonate.

Now it’s July and Diane’s prepping to argue in front of the Supreme Court. Kurt’s helping her witness prep and it gets a little personal... and that ends up turning Diane on. Good to see McHart hasn’t lost its spark. (Remember how Kurt cheated on Diane in season 7 of Wife? No, me neither, because that never happened.)

Corrupt judge is back. Adrian playfully tries to distract her from work. Then he takes a video call from Liz, who updates him on the conversation she had with John (so that’s his name) and Madeline. I guess that part of May was close to July? Anyway, Adrian isn’t surprised to hear that people are upset at the prospect of Diane being one of two name partners.

Liz is at the office in workout clothes and I love it!

They’re losing 15 black associates (and Adrian and Lucca) and 4 white ones, Liz says. This sounds like a very big problem. (I’d be curious to know what that is as a percentage of the firm and how the racial composition shifts.)

Liz knows it’s not exactly up to her if Diane stays on as name partner (the other partners get a vote, but I think Liz knows she has a lot of sway here). She’s also wondering if Biden could win, and if so, would it be to the firm’s advantage to be black-owned? Interesting.

“Well. If you’re thinking it, then Diane’s thinking it, too,” Adrian says. He’s right. “White guilt. It runs verrrrry deep on that one, huh?” Ha. He is right about that, too. I actually can’t decide which of these interpretations is correct, because it could be either even though they seem contradictory. (1) Is Adrian saying it with a hint of mockery because he knows Diane will fight for her partnership even as she would say she’s a huge supporter of black businesses? (2) Is he saying it because he knows Diane would have enough white guilt to realize what her presence as a partner means and think through the implications? I think it is, somehow, a combination. I’m interested in this line because this whole dilemma (from Diane’s POV) is something that’s very familiar. Diane’s always been an idealist who will betray her ideals for personal gain. That sounds like an attack, but I mean that as neutrally as I possibly can. There are so many examples of this that this is kind of just a character trait of hers at this point. Usually those ideals are about feminism, but this situation seems closely related.

Adrian overhears Corrupt GF talking about Julius, Diane, and Memo 618. You would think she would wait to have this conversation until there is no chance of Adrian overhearing, because if Adrian overhears, he might...

... do exactly what he proceeds to do and hop into a car with Diane to give her a heads up. (I think I’m just going to have to accept that the mask usage rule on this episode is “we use masks to show that the characters would wear them, but we don’t want to have scenes where characters are fully masked because that’s annoying.” If that’s not the rule, then why else would Adrian be masked outside... and then take off his mask as soon as he gets into a confined indoor space with Diane?

Baranski looks ESPECIALLY like Taylor Swift in this scene.

Adrian tells Diane what he knows. He dug deeper after overhearing Charlotte, so he has even more info. “If you tell me, I will use it,” Diane warns. Adrian knows that, so he takes a moment to decide. And he decides that he cares more about Diane and Julius than about his relationship with a corrupt judge.

Diane and Julius are masked in court. Visitor and the judge are not. They use masking in a clever way in this scene: Diane uses being masked to her advantage because it means no one can possibly read her lips, so she can use the info Adrian fed her against Charlotte without any fear of spies. Charlotte, who is unmasked, guards her lips with a folder, as the Visitor watches interestedly.

Diane convinces Charlotte to recuse herself. Charlotte says she’s making a mistake; Diane does not care.

The new judge is, unfortunately, the idiot who doesn’t know anything about the law. Uh oh.

Charlotte decides she’s done sheltering in place with Adrian. He tries to talk through the conflict, but Charlotte says “You made your choice, Adrian. Julius Cain over me.”

“The choice was about right and wrong, Charlotte,” Adrian tries to explain. I mean, yeah, but if you’re dating a judge who has admitted she’s totally corrupt, didn’t right and wrong go out the window a while ago?

Adrian seems to think the other people involved in the events are bad and Charlotte is good. I am not convinced. I don’t think she’s the big bad, but I don’t think she’s good.

Charlotte points out that he invaded her privacy. She is right about that. “You said the choice was between right and wrong. Turning over my emails was the choice,” she said. I get her POV. But also, she is corrupt.

I do not like the way the part of the scene where Adrian physically restrains Charlotte to keep her from leaving is shot. I don’t think this is an abusive scene but I think it should’ve been shot from a little farther back so we could see it’s more like Adrian reaching out in desperation than trying to choke Charlotte. Because it very much looks like he is trying to choke Charlotte.

He tells Charlotte he loves her. She says it’s too late and leaves. “Maybe you won’t be with me. But you keep down this path... you’ll be done, I’m telling you, you’ll be done.”

I think something that I’ve been missing in these interactions is that I didn’t quite realize until this scene that the Adrian/Charlotte dynamic is more interesting than Adrian liking a corrupt judge. I think he truly believes Charlotte is a good person who got caught up in some bad stuff, and that she can bounce back from it. I’ve always seen Charlotte as someone who is corrupt for herself and then ended up going along with the corruption of others, too, so I’ve dismissed her and the relationship. This is the first scene that has felt real to me, and the first scene where she’s felt like more than a caricature. Kind of sad it’s the last she’ll get with Adrian—now I’m actually starting to find her interesting. Notice how in these last few sentences I’ve used her name instead of “Corrupt GF”!

Charlotte says she loved Adrian too, but that’s not enough. Awww.

He can’t really be surprised though, can he?

Now it is August and we get to see Diane and Liz react to the announcement of Kamala Harris as Biden’s VP pick, and I would like to thank the writers for giving me the opportunity to see Diane and Liz react to this. It’s kind of fan-service, but it’s also a nice tie-in to the girl-power theme of the Diane/Liz alliance.

Diane and Liz realize that Adrian’s probably not a good candidate for 2024 if the DNC only wants one black candidate and Harris is the clear front-runner. Liz suggests keeping him on as partner instead, in a way that very much implies this would be her ideal solution. Diane, being Diane, says she was liking the idea of an all-female firm. Liz hesitantly says she was too, and Diane senses the hesitation.

“Let’s look again at which associates to fire. I’m worried we’re losing too many African Americans,” Diane switches the subject. How have they still not made this decision? If any employees know downsizing is coming, and they’ve had months to act on it, assuming there are jobs elsewhere, people would’ve been jumping ship by now.

But that’s not the point of this scene. The point of this scene is that Liz corrects Diane: “Black. You can just say Black people.” Very nice moment underlining the tension. Diane means well, but she’s still acting like a white lady who doesn’t know how to act around black people... and she wants to (and, I guess, already does) run a black firm. Major yikes.

Marissa and Lucca are talking again. Marissa does not want to be in law school—she just wants to be a lawyer. Lucca won’t accept Marissa’s refusal to memorize meaningless rules: “Marissa. I know that you know how to play the game, but you have to pass the bar to get into a position to play the game.” Why does this line make me love Lucca? This line isn’t even anything amazing. It’s just a line that cuts through the bullshit and makes a good point.

Marissa keeps going, insulting all of her peers and teachers, and Lucca figures out how to cut through that, too: she tells Marissa that she’d hire her as a lawyer if she killed someone, but only if Marissa passes the bar. Marissa is instantly intrigued.

“Why are you leaving here? I’ll miss you,” Marissa says.

“Because they won’t pay me what I deserve,” Lucca says in a matter-of-fact tone. “Anyway, I thought they fired you.”

“But they didn’t mean it. It’s like the smoothie place—they kept trying to fire me and I just kept showing up,” Marissa replies. That checks out. (Love the callback!)

Lucca tries to get Marissa to come over to England. Marissa shuts that down as Lucca gets a news alert—and it’s not good news.

Our next date is September 18th, 2020 and I will get my nitpicks out of the way up front! I don’t really know why it is daytime for Lucca when she reads the news, considering it was already the evening in the States when the RBG news broke. And, also, it was Rosh Hashanah, so Marissa probably would not have been sitting in her bedroom studying... she most likely would’ve been with family or friends. OK I’M DONE. FOR NOW.

Diane is getting ready for her arguments in front of the Supreme Court. It’s almost time! She’s in casual clothes but has on a wonderful mask. She’s standing in front of Kurt’s guns to make a point (love that she’s using her video call background to her advantage) and there are several people in her bedroom getting the tech all set up. I have noted before that they only built one set for Diane’s apartment, and it’s just a massive bedroom. Diane choosing to be in front of the guns does a nice job of cutting off my question about why she’d be arguing in front of the Supreme Court from her bedroom rather than the home office she absolutely would have.

Kurt walks in and tries to shake hands... he’s clearly not very COVID paranoid, and Diane seems to be, and... that’s something I might have wanted to see? How was Diane okay with Kurt taking risks that also affected her?

Diane confirms she intentionally chose to stand in front of the guns. That’s when Kurt gets the push notification. He pulls Diane into the bathroom to show her the news. He hands her his phone and Diane’s face falls. She starts tearing up. “2020 just won’t let go,” she says, speaking for us all.

Normally I hate things that are like, we’re going to contrive this so the news hits at the worst possible moment! This works for me, because the Supreme Court plot for Diane feels more like something that exists to be a through line for the episode. It would also be a little hard to work in RBG’s death as a main plot point—and it is definitely important enough to be a main plotpoint—if it didn’t also affect something in the world of the show.

Also, another reason I like this contrivance is that it makes it all the more powerful when Diane says, “It’s over. He gets to nominate someone. Another Kavanaugh! We’ll have a conservative court for the next 20 years. My whole fucking life!” She’s not thinking about how this affects her case (and that case is basically a life-long dream for her). She is thinking about way bigger things, and knowing that her mind goes to the bigger things before the personal with news like this really underlines how big of a deal RBG’s death was.

Diane tells Kurt, “I don’t deserve you. You don’t agree with me.” “I can still feel bad for you,” he responds. He holds her while she cries.

Jay’s hallucination thing is back. Now Karl Marx is here. So is Jesus. I’m so done with this. It’s nice to get a break from writing.

Malcolm X is also on the roundtable and now they’re talking over each other in that way that everyone on this show always does. (RK gave an interview about Evil where he said he likes having the children on that show talk over each other because he grew up in a household like that. I did not need to read that interview to understand that RK likes scenes where people talk over each other.)

If anything happened in those hallucinations, I missed it, because I didn’t pause the episode. Because I do not care about the hallucinations. Because I hate them.

Now it’s November 2020... Diane’s watching election results and rocking back and forth. She tells Kurt he can go watch Fox News in the other room (so they do have more than one room!). He says he’s fine—he thinks Diane needs it more.

“Yes, but Kurt, if you stay, I know this isn’t sensible, but... Trump seems to get more votes whenever you’re sitting on this couch,” Diane tells him. Ha, I relate to this kind of superstition so hard. “Are you serious?” Kurt says. “I am so deathly serious,” Diane responds. “Whenever you’re sitting here, Arizona goes for Trump. Humor me, please. Just go in the other room.”

When Kurt tries to kiss her, she pulls away: “No, no, no. No kiss. If you kiss me, we’ll lose Georgia.” This scene feels so, so real and perfectly captures what it was like (at least for me, though I don’t have a Republican husband or anything) watching election results come in.

“Uh, if you lose, we’ll be fine, right?” Kurt asks. “Kurt, let me just say this. I’m only saying that we won’t be fine so that the universe will grant me a win,” Diane responds. This scene is so fun and so good! It simultaneously captures a relatable mood, adds some levity, gives us a window into Diane’s life, and shows some of the tensions in her marriage?! I want this all the time!

Kurt leaves the room. Diane pours more wine.

Later, with Diane still rocking back and forth with anxiety (just you wait for the several more days this will drag on!), Kurt brings in the champagne. “That was for when Hillary won. I can only drink it if Biden wins,” Diane protests. Did I also refuse to drink any celebratory alcohol until things were absolutely certain? No comment.

“It’s odd you progressives resisted religion. You seem to have a hundred religions to take its place,” Kurt says, speaking on behalf of the writers’ room. (This joke doesn’t get written if the writers don’t believe this and probably even see it in themselves.)

“Go away, Trump. I mean Kurt,” she shoos him away. Have I mentioned yet I love this scene?

“Love me even if you lose?” he jokes (though I do wonder if this isn’t that joking? I think it is, but he keeps saying it!) as Diane gestures at him to get out.

I could do without the joke about Diane’s heart on the TV for a couple reasons. One, it goes on too long. Two, I was very worried something would actually happen to Diane. You’d think that would make the scene feel more tense, but it does not, because it takes me out of the moment.

“Ok, God. You know I don’t believe in you. But I will believe in you if Joe Biden wins. I’m sorry. I know that that’s not what Jesus taught. There’s nothing in the New Testament that says, ‘Believe in me, and I’ll make sure your candidate wins,’ but I need Joe Biden to win. I’m sorry, God, but I just do. I need some faith.” This is a little much but... yeah. Also, is this the first time Diane’s flat out said she’s an atheist? I think it is, though I’ve assumed as much for quite a while.

The next day in court, masks are no longer required if you’re a series regular and votes are still being counted. I remember those days. Marissa thought Diane was checking in on Jay... Diane was not. She was checking on vote counts.

Apparently Jay’s finally being released from the hospital!

Bad news for Julius—the idiot judge finds him guilty of some nonsense charge and sentences him to seven years in prison.

Diane says not to worry, and Julius asks “Why not?” Good point.

Then we have election results! We skip, specifically, to December 14th and the electoral college vote. I’m a little sad we skipped over the huge party that was November 7th, but I get why they’d rather keep things moving along. I think showing November 7th in an uncomplicated way would’ve just been too close to fanservice. But, man, what a day.

Diane, in a red hoodie with leopard print that she somehow manages to still look classy in, is ready to pop champagne. Then she hears that on January 6th, a joint session of Congress will count the electoral votes and there might be a debate. “Nope. If I open it now, something bad will happen,” she reasons. “I’ve waited four years. I can wait another few weeks.”

It’s been almost a year and they’re still somehow negotiating with Lucca, but I understand why they’d space this out across the episode. Otherwise we’d have to say goodbye to Lucca in the first like, 15 mins of the episode and all those scenes would be in a row. I can forgive (and still nitpick) choices like this when the reasoning behind them seems sound.

Adrian says they don’t want to lose Lucca. He, Liz, and Diane are all in the conference room, and they ask Lucca for a yes or no on their latest offer by the end of the call. Diane offers Lucca partner—she'll be the youngest partner in the firm’s history—and she’ll get a $500,000/year salary. Adrian tries to sell her on being part of American history by being part of the firm.

“We are a black firm, Lucca, and we need you,” Liz says with a lot of passion for someone who knows she might very well partner with Diane. Diane looks at Liz with a bit of suspicion at this, wondering if Liz is showing her cards.

Lucca manages to make the wifi malfunction (or she gets very lucky) and uses the disconnection to call Bianca for a counteroffer, even though they said they needed a yes or no on the spot.

“They used George Floyd because they want you for less. They have never appreciated you as much as I do. All those scars, all that time being taken for granted and undervalued has made you a fighter. It’s made you someone I now want,” Bianca tells Lucca. She gives Lucca a counter offer of $1.3 million and the title of CFO. Lucca takes it. Is there really another choice? (If she were concerned about loyalty to the firm and the partnership was what she wanted, she probably would've just taken it.)

(Also, the partners can’t really act like Lucca is making history by being the youngest partner ever when they passed her over for partner two years earlier and offered it to Maia! To MAIA! Who had like three years of work experience! And yes I was fine with Alicia and Cary getting partnership offers with four years but, one, that was a scam, and two, Alicia and Cary actually worked. Oh, I see I still hate Maia with a passion. Back to THIS season...)

Lucca apologetically informs Marissa she’s leaving and the offer was just too good to turn down. I believe it. I also believe Lucca wants that job more. What has loyalty to RBL gotten her? She's someone so talented and good at her job that she just gets job offers from acquaintances all the time (starting with Alicia!). RBL appreciates her, but just enough to appease her while still undervaluing her. I don’t know that I would’ve believed a plot where Lucca actively job hunts, but I definitely believe this.

“Marissa, we don’t have to work together to be friends,” Lucca tells Marissa. I’m going to miss this so much. Why is this the best material Lucca’s gotten in ages?! I think one of the things that makes Lucca such a great character is that you can see why everyone instantly wants her on their team. She’s a fantastic friend (without giving too much of herself), she’s not a pushover, and she is incredibly sharp and able to get to the heart of any situation. I love her and I’m sad we won’t get to see more of her.

(On that bit about friendship—I can’t write about Lucca’s departure without writing about the moment I realized just how great of a character Lucca was. It was in 7x13, when Alicia has her breakdown that’s seven seasons in the making... and Lucca supports her. But the writing, and Cush’s performance, never make it feel like Lucca exists to be a part of Alicia’s story. Lucca seems like her own fully formed person who happens to be supporting Alicia at this moment. I don’t think I can overstate how tough of a task it is to get me to care about the other person in a pivotal Alicia scene, especially when that other person was added to the cast in the final season and many suspected she’d just be a replacement for a different beloved character! Anyway, Lucca’s been great for years, and I’ll miss her.)

Just when I thought I couldn’t hate the hallucinations more, we get a hint that they are going to continue: Jay sees one right after he learns that Marissa’s used her quarantine to start law school and he’s done nothing.

Jay says he carries a gun now and it’s “performative.” I have no idea what that means and Marissa and Lucca don’t seem to, either.

Another thing I like about Lucca’s final scene is that it isn’t rushed. We have time for all that, and also for Lucca to tell Marissa about the time she stole her breakfast sandwich, and for Marissa to react to it, and for Marissa to find Lucca’s Birkin bag, and for Lucca to tell Marissa to keep it, and for Marissa to react to that, and for Lucca to sappily say “think of me when you use it,” and for Marissa to nonsensically reply, “you think of me when I use it,” and there’s still a little bit more of the scene after that!

Marissa’s silly line makes Lucca tear up. “God, I’m gonna miss you guys,” she says. “I’m gonna miss this. You make me smile. I didn’t smile much before you guys.” Awwwwwww. This is also so true to character! Her friendship with Alicia aside, Lucca’s definitely said before she’s not one to have friends (which is hilarious because she is, as I've said like 100 times, a fantastic friend and also just like, the coolest person??? Who wouldn’t want to be HER friend?!).

She says she has to go because she’s getting too emotional and says goodbye. She’s also super sappy and when Marissa says, “you were the best,” she responds that they were the best TOGETHER! Awwwwwww.

What a nice, fitting goodbye for Lucca. There’s no bad blood or fireworks—she just makes a change like a lot of people do. I’d like to think she’ll still be friends with Marissa and Jay after this. I don’t want too many Lucca references in future episodes, but I would really like it if we see Marissa and Jay update each other on the latest from Lucca, or if a scene begins with Marissa closing out an Instagram post from Lucca of her kid, or something. I wouldn’t want clues about what Lucca’s up to, but I’d love to see that she’s still a part of Marissa and Jay’s lives.

Now it is January 6th. Liz, Adrian, and Diane sit on the floor of the mostly empty office, watching TV coverage and drinking. It’s so relaxed it’s almost surreal, and it, like many other moments in this episode, feels like a slice of life. Everyone’s dressed casually and no one is worried about appearances or looking like the boss.

“God, have you ever seen anything like it. It’s so fucked,” Diane says. Adrian’s more optimistic—the courts rejected most of the challenges to election results! “System worked,” he says. “Yay.” Liz says in response. She’s not as optimistic as he is.

“Liz. Liz. Sometimes when things work out, there is no parade. There’s no congratulations, but I’ll tell you this: We live to fight another day,” he explains to her even though she makes a good point that a system just barely hanging on doesn’t bode well for the future. (She doesn’t say all this, but that’s a very loaded, “Yay.”)

“Yeah? Then why are you leaving the law?” Liz asks. Diane seconds to the question.

Adrian announces he’s still retiring—and he’s moving to Atlanta. He wants to go to the south to help “create and consolidate political power.” He’s excited to start over and inspired by Georgia going blue. This is a very nice exit for Adrian. I fully believe that he’s interested in political organizing, that he’d be good at it, and that he’s ready for a change. I don’t think he’s always the most progressive person (of the three in this scene, Liz is absolutely the most progressive one, though Diane probably thinks she is!), but I absolutely think he thinks of himself as an activist and I believe that if he’s going to step away from the law, he’d do so to make a move like this.

Adrian—and Lucca, but especially Adrian—probably both got better exits thanks to the events of 2020. If Adrian had just left to be groomed by the DNC, that would’ve been a predictable and boring ending for him. His candidacy would, obviously, go nowhere, and the whole thing felt weird from the minute it was introduced. But this? Adrian being energized—like so many others were—by the ways the world changed in 2020 and using his already announced departure from the firm and recent breakup as a chance to start over and make change? This is great!

Adrian asks Liz and Diane what’s next for them. Liz says that she thinks the Biden admin will be better for black businesses. Adrian asks if they’re replacing him, and Diane says, “I think the big question is, are you replacing me?” She’s smart. I like how this scene goes from friendly to tense very fast, with everyone kind of testing the waters. Adrian tries to force the conversation, Liz opens with something vague yet pointed, and Diane speaks what’s previously been unspoken.

Liz says it’s not her intention to push Diane out. “I can’t change the color of my skin,” Diane replies. “I know,” Liz laughs. Audra’s delivery is fantastic on that line.

“Hey, I’m gonna fight for my partnership,” Diane says. “I know,” Liz says. The tone of this scene is so different from previous partnership drama on these shows and I’m excited about it. This is just a bunch of adults talking about business decisions with each other and treating each other as equals?? It's not backstabbing?? Or drama?? No one is hiding things?? It’s refreshing and I hope this plot stays like this. We’ve done so much partnership drama that I think drama that stems from a real, pressing question that has no easy answers and isn’t anyone’s fault is going to be much more fruitful for the show.

Adrian heads out—ah, I see now this scene is set in his empty office and this is why they are on the floor—and gets a nice last moment with Diane. And then they give him a last moment with Liz, which I knew they would but was still glad to see.

Liz asks if he knows what he’s doing—he says he’s not sure.

Adrian asks if Liz knows where she stands regarding Diane. “It’s going to be interesting,” Liz says. I don’t think she’s decided what she’s going to do yet.

It wouldn’t be an Adrian and Liz scene if Adrian didn’t have some unsolicited advice. “Diane’s a terrific lawyer, but this firm belongs to you. Your dad built it. He did, Liz. Despite all his faults. You got to run this place the way you want. This is a black firm. And after today, the world needs black firms. You got me?” He tells Liz. He makes it seem like Liz gets the choice and then tells her what to do. She says, “I got it,” signaling she understood him but not that she necessarily agrees.

I cannot wait to see what Liz does next!!!!!!! About this but just in general!!!!! Without Adrian there giving her constant advice I feel like she can grow so much and the show will have to give her more to do!!! I think Adrian, for all his many wonderful qualities and all he brought to the show, can suck all the air out of a room with his charisma, and Liz usually ends up suffering as a result. She’s such a capable lawyer in her own right, but Adrian has a way of making it always seem like he’s right—even in arguments she wins. I’m excited to see Liz lead (or stumble at leadership; she is fairly new to management) without Adrian’s direct influence.

Liz walks Adrian out and it’s cute. They run into Marissa and Jay. “Everybody fun is leaving,” Marissa notes. Liz is minorly offended, but playfully. Heh.

Adrian asks Jay how he’s doing; Jay says he’s a long-hauler but he’s doing okay. I like that they included that moment in Adrian’s goodbye sequence. It’s a very little thing, but it underlines that Adrian cares about Jay.

Then Liz interrupts to note that Trump pardoned a lot of convicted and corrupt Republican officials....... including Julius.

Everyone celebrates, but especially Diane and Marissa. Diane lets out her wonderful laugh and then we, finally, get to the credits. Because now that the previouslies are over, it’s time for the real show.

The credits are absolutely delightful, btw. I was a little worried some of the kittens would blow up, though! Once I relaxed and realized what they were up to—literal puppies and kittens because Biden won—I couldn’t get enough of these credits. They work so well because they accurately capture the way I (and all of these characters, except maybe Julius and Kurt) feel about the election results, but it’s so exaggerated that you know the kittens and puppies aren’t a realistic representation of our new reality. They’re just too good to be true, but you may as well enjoy them for a minute. I’m sure we’ll be back to exploding vases next week.

What a great episode! My timeline nitpicks and whatever they’re trying to do with Jay aside, I was blown away by how well the writers managed to move on from season 4, tie up loose ends, and write out two main characters. And they did it all while making me revisit the events of 2020, a year I don’t think many of us want to spend much time thinking about! This episode was enjoyable, fun, emotional, and clever. I don’t know what to expect from the rest of the season, but I’m definitely excited about the show in a way I haven’t really been in quite some time.

This season’s naming convention seems to be titles that end with ... and only have the first word capitalized. I want to see more.

Season FIVE? There have already been as many TGF seasons as there were TGW seasons prior to Hitting the Fan?! Time flies.

Please writers: No topical episodes this year-- no pee tape, no Melania divorce, no Epstein. None of that business.

Sorry if I repeated myself here. I never proofread these things, and I wrote half of this on Saturday and half of it today (Wednesday) and the days in between were an absolute blur so I cannot remember if I said the same things about this episode twice.

#the good fight #tgfthoughts

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technobladetimestamps · 4 years ago

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Nov 16 Stream Timestamps

Timestamps from Technoblade’s “THE REVOLUTION (dream SMP)”

Link to my youtube comment with all of the timestamps x

Timestamps with hyperlinks below

02:13 “This is a surprise tool which will help us later” / thumbnail isn’t foreshadowing / video thumbnails have to be big / stream thumbnails can be detailed 05:17 “The traitor is actually Jschlatt” / firework crafting 09:50 “The ratio is impeccable” 13:23 “Dream’s in the game! My audience retention rate” / vc with Tubbo & Quackity / traitor Jschlatt theory / “Are you high?” “A little” 14:47 “You’re a bit of a wildcard” “I am the most consistent character on the entire server” / “What’s this about getting into power” / “We’ll burn this bridge when we get to it” 15:54 “You really are such an English major” / “You’re an idiom” / malaphor / “I’m actually speaking twice as much English as you guys” 18:07 “I think Thunder is overcompensating in the chat” / “Where can you see me” “In my heart” (Karl & Quackity) / Karl not leaving vc 20:33 vc with Niki / “Did Tubbo just leave me? I spaced out for 2 seconds” / “You can’t call everyone the traitor” “I can & will” 22:45 “You know it’s an event when Skeppy’s here” / “You know it’s a big deal when Georgenotfound wakes up” / “Everyone leaves me” 23:31 explaining the traitor thing to Niki / “Maybe I’m a sleeper agent” / had to kill Tubbo 25:03 nothing happened with that creeper / Fundy interrogating Niki / “Why did I train her for MCC” 25:54 “Even YOU’RE leaving me” / sad music / “I’m sitting here with 203k viewers & it’s not enough for any of these streamers to bear talking to me for more than 60 seconds” / Skeppy joins vc to immediately leave 28:50 Karl has a gift for Techno / Karl is just here for the animatic 32:21 “At least the chat won’t leave me” / pays for his music 35:01 “I’m going to destroy the government so bad” / “I hate all of the farming updates on skyblock” 37:45 joining a vc / “I just got stood up in like 4...conversations in rapid succession” / “My new years resolution was to make friends & it’s november & I’ve made zero headway” / Eret switches sides 41:53 Ender chest setup / worried about hotbar management / potions > shields 43:13 vc with allies / “Karl you are literally the biggest third wheel I have ever seen” 45:03 angering the dogs / trident combo 47:13 “D!ck with one ball” (Tubbo) 50:25 “Let’s hope Wil overslept like [George]” 53:09 recruiting Eret / “If you fight on our side we’ll make you the King of Burger King” / “He’ll be an executive citizen” / “I’m surrounded by idiots” 54:58 putting Schlatt on the allies list / “Schlatt is an alcoholic high on protein power” (Fundy) 56:47 can’t trust Eret / “I hate it when you’re right” (Tubbo) / Wilbur joins vc 59:50 having a moment with Hubert / “Not even the mobs like me” / sad music / “I just gained 8k subscribers the sadness is gone” / cow pit exp farm 1:02:57 vc with Niki / “I’m going to join the other vc AHHHHH” 1:05:02 “Once everyone meets up...I have something prepared” / “Technoblade when are you not ready?” “When I joined the server” 1:09:38 “Who do you take me for? Of course I’ve read the Art of War. It’s written by Mozart” / battle planning 1:12:18 “This is the betrayal...happening very slowly” 1:13:35 Pan1 / “This revolution is so doomed” 1:15:29 Dream attack / Quackity dies 1:18:07 “Agree Retweet” / “Violence is the only universal language” / “i have a supply” / “Why do you talk in upwards inflections constantly?” 1:19:57 Techno not getting to talk / “He took it all by force didn’t he” / “Fear into Ear” 1:23:50 Techno telling everyone he has a stash twice / distributing blue / mushroom the fox 1:26:49 Tommy talking over Techno again / “Stop going off on your tangents” “We have food at home” 1:29:30 vault reveal / Tubbo stealing emeralds / secret chest 1:32:40 “Shut up bro you are green as shit” (Tommy) / “Everyone give me back my stuff you don’t deserve it” 1:34:41 no netherite swords / “Who’s the traitor” “Promise we won’t be mad” 1:36:31 battle / Technoblade trident maneuvering / giving rocket launchers to Tubbo & Tommy 1:40:27 killing Karl / Dream bringing out the end crystals / fighting invis Dream / purpled switches sides 1:43:57 Dream wants to talk / 309k / group photos 1:46:08 vc with Dream / “But only if my enemy insists” / in the van with Schlatt / “What are you doing in my drug van? It better not be drugs” / Tommy preparing to shoot Schlatt 1:54:42 “We won” / “We killed an old man with heart problems! It only took 20 of us!” / President Innit / subscribe to Technoblade sign 1:55:57 Dream & Techno talk in chat / Tommy speech / “It was meant to be” / “I don’t think anyone is bowing to Tommyinnit” / “Karl don’t be weird” / Skeppy has a disc 1:59:06 Techno being apprehensive on mute / Tommy makes Wilbur President / “I’ll be the president” “I’m gonna veto that” / “Techno...you’ve taught me that government is not the way to go” / Wilbur makes Tubbo president 2:03:20 “I’m not sure I like where this is going x2” / “I’m not sure this is a good ending” / “Team chaos” “Perhaps” 2:06:20 Techno shoots Tubbo / Philza joins / “You think Schlatt was the cause of your problems? No. It was government” / speech gets interrupted / “The government ends here, I’ll kill it myself!” 2:09:23 Phil kills Wilbur / techno yelling for silence / “Tommy you just did a coup...& instilled yourself as president” 2:12:11 “If you want to be a hero THAN DIE LIKE ONE” / wither spawning / killing his former allies 2:15:09 post fight talks / “There will be no new government today. It will be over my dead body” / “Techno was not the traitor” 2:18:50 “I need to increase the crater that is L’Manberg so that no country can rise in its place” / “Mom says it’s my turn on the flame bow” 2:23:51 “What I’m doing right now is small scale. This is the work of an individual. This is nothing compared to the cruelty governments all around the world [inflict]...systematically” / “Llamas are the primary victims of war” / “I just wanna be apart of the explosion” (George) 2:27:06 Techno joins vc / connor joins the server / “I hope you’re proud of yourself Techno” “I kinda am” / Jack Manifold (Thunder) being broke / netherite armor 2:32:30 “Beach episode” / Techno accidentally joins the L’Manberg vc 2:35:16 the base is compromised / “There’s no way Technoblade would put a clock there if it didn’t mean anything” / got robbed 2:37:37 “If you’re going to ask me how I got all these emerald & arrows that’s a story for another day” / explaining the bedrock / “I can give everyone stuff & it’ll be such a flex” 2:40:24 Greek mythology 2:41:45 The Golden Apple / “They didn’t use discord back then they used skype, so can’t invite Eris” / “Zeus the god of feminism” 2:46:02 Eret recruiting Techno to kill George / joining vc / “Let’s stop him before he gets land” / Awesamdude proposing a fight 2:49:08 “No one can kill me I’m invincible” (logs out) / Dream literally names the turtle potions Sam thinks he hasn’t heard of / “I’m at soup” / “It’s not smack talk he just has that many items” 2:53:06 “Stab him Dream, I’ll shout encouraging words” / Techno fighting Bad & Ant 2:56:23 Dream wins / “I think there was this Dream guy attacking you with some sort of weapon” 3:00:11 turtle potions / Dream hyping up Techno about fighting BBH / Badlands negotiating with George 3:04:34 vc with Philza 3:07:00 spider farm afk’ing / lagging Quackity’s computer 3:09:06 smp earth / Phil only logged on to back Techno up 3:10:32 killing George / “I’m gonna drop his armor off don’t jump me” / not fighting Dream 3:13:00 vc with Karl & Phil / Karl definitely not starting a government / “Chat that was the boring part, don’t leave” / 320k / “Why do we keep scheduling these on Monday?” 3:16:18 “I don’t even want to think about how famous Tommy will be in the future” / “I get a tad bitter” / covid is good for youtubers but obviously bad / “I’m so good at socially distancing” 3:19:51 “Aren’t you tired of being nice Philza? Don’t you just wanna go crazy” / “You should be wary of the old in a profession where people die young” / vc with Eret 3:21:47 “What if you built a slightly larger throne next to it?” / “How are they paranoid of a mole but the guy with a track record of being a traitor gets no questions asked” 3:25:47 “I’m gonna place a block at the bottom & kill you instantly” / reverse mlg / emerald rich even with Tubbo’s theft 3:27:57 “I’ll allow it” / upstairs chests robbed / Eret disconnects with the book 3:32:04 armor sabotage bc he thought it’d be 1v5 / crystals are mutually assured destruction / Wilbur afraid of tnt getting blown up early 3:34:11 the diary was actually Eret’s / “He’s gonna tell everyone who I have a crush on. Nooo” / reading the 100 page book / “Can I not win here?” “No” 3:40:14 “This stream has released more serotonin in my brain than the last 6 months combined” / revolution was overcrowded / could improve the crater 2:43:09 “Awkward ten minute period where I’m just sitting there watching them set up a new government but I can’t kill them yet” / Carl is missing 3:44:34 “The one time Technoblade is gonna roleplay & they talk over him” / “CARL” / “As long as Sapnap isn’t the one that took him there’ll still be hope” 3:46:10 “Once you start using end crystals it’s the only pvp that matters & end crystal pvp is so lame” / Webtoons 3:49:10 “What’s going to happen to you & WIlbur now?” “I don’t know, I think I’m chill with Wilbur” / “The only thing that changed is my voice. Zero personal growth” / lines from the first speech that got interrupted / “King George is trending booo” 3:52:00 1 million twitter followers / “O god it’s been four hours...I am not built for this” / did a 13 hour stream once / sub growth goals 3:56:30 “What the heck is Phil watching”

#technoblade #technoblade timestamps #THE REVOLUTION (dream SMP)#dream smp

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blogspersonal707 · 4 years ago

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fayewonglibrary · 5 years ago

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1994-2020: Faye Wong Advertisements (2020)

On August 19th, Faye Wong was officially announced as the newest global spokesperson for the underwear brand NEIWAI, which shocked the industry.

What’s interesting is that underwear advertisements are usually extremely sexy and show a lot of skin. But because it’s the heavenly queen, it became a high-class style of sexy. The heavenly queen’s image on the posters is quite covered up and her poses are elegant and comfortable as usual. It is rumored that Faye Wong's endorsement fee is sky high.

The former brand models Maizi and Du Juan gave the impression of coolness. Faye Wong is definitely the master of this temperament to the extreme.

The press release by NEIWAI said that they aim to "explore the freedom of body and mind in a more pioneering, profound and international way." Indeed, the endorsement of the heavenly queen suddenly added a touch of international style and high-class to this domestic brand that was founded on Taobao not long ago. It gives that feeling no matter what the cost is.

You must know that Faye Wong has always been very picky about advertising. Before NEIWAI, she accepted an offer to be the global spokesperson for Helena Rubenstein in 2019. Last December 7th, L'Oréal Group's top luxury beauty brand Helena Rubenstein announced that Faye Wong became the first global spokesperson for its brand.

I still remember the queen attended the promotional event in all white and wrapped her head in a golden scarf. Her skin looked smooth and firm. The most impressive thing was that her facial features were more beautiful than even when she was young. It was surprising. After all, the queen is over 50 years old.

I could see that she was in a very happy mood, chatting and laughing with the host on stage. She described this cooperation as proof that it was love at first sight. The flawless firm skin of the heavenly queen can help a beauty counter to sell thousands of bottles of expensive product.

For so many years, Faye Wong was sought after by advertisers for her image as a high-end, avant-garde, free spirited woman of a new generation. Her manager once proudly said that their main job was rejecting offers. Faye Wong’s advertisements are notoriously sparse and also notoriously expensive.

Today, let’s take a look at the advertisements by the Heavenly Queen since her endorsement debut from 1994 to the present day. It can be seen that her strategy is "less is more". The big brands she has cooperated with, of course, pay well. Ease is another important criteria for her to choose a job.

The advertisements that Faye Wong has received over the years reveal the changes in the status and mood of the queen. Of course, we can also see the changing of the times from her advertisements. Popular brands that are still ongoing, but some brands have completely ceased to exist. The changes and the rise and fall of a brand is really interesting.

1994-1997

Avant-garde idol, trend setter for the youth.

In 1994, Faye Wong released her iconic hit "Sky" making her the free spirited idol of the young generation. That year she received an advertisement for Just Gold.

At that time, the Hong Kong-based gold jewelry company was preparing to enter the Taiwan market. In order to abandon the old and outdated feel of the past style, this brand, hoping to find young customers, wisely found a budding singer who was also ready to enter the Taiwanese market. Back then she was called Wong Jing Man.

In the advertisement, Faye Wong read the narration in her beautiful languid voice. The whole concept seemed to be very trendy and forward-thinking, making women suddenly realize they do not need to wait for men to buy them gifts and gold jewelry. They can own it on their own initiative. It was the new idea of feminism that women rely on their financial strength to satisfy their inner desires.

Just Woman, Just Gold; Real Woman, Real Gold. Faye Wong's life attitude of being courageous to live her own life fits the brand's pursuit of "real woman" characteristics. The following year, the brand also specially designed the "Fei collection" with the theme of "true", "beauty" and "life".

Coincidentally, the Virgin Atlantic advertisement of the same year also took a fancy to Faye Wong's distinctive personality.

At that time, Faye Wong's performance in the movie "Chunking Express" left a deep impression on people, and in the advertisement, she also had a similar short haircut, various styles, and she even had airplane props. She swayed her body and narrated in Cantonese. This advertisement made the top ten of Asia TV in 1995 and won the most popular TV commercial female star award.

In the ad for Virgin Atlantic's direct flight from Hong Kong to London, she used her hearty laughter to inspire people to take off whenever they pleased.

Faye Wong became a big hit in 1996 and appeared on the cover of Time Magazine. She became the second Chinese artist and the first Chinese singer to appear on the cover. She was called one of "The Divas of Pop".

Faye Wong willingly lived in a Beijing hutong for love, married Dou Wei, and gave birth to her daughter Dou Jingtong in January of the following year. The old photos of the two riding horses in Yesanpo bared witness to years of love.

Marriage and childbirth did not affect Faye Wong’s status. In October 1997, Motorola hired Wong Kar-wai to direct and spent 60 million on a large production to shoot her StarTAC (Palm Treasure Series) commercial. Anyone who has experienced that era knows that Motorola had a monopoly on the mobile phone market.

But with the advent of smartphones, after 2013, Motorola long lost its momentum. Motorola’s headquarters in Beijing has been downsized repeatedly. The era of holding a Motorola in one hand is gone forever.

Although shooting only lasted for 5 days, it was a huge collaboration: big name stars, director Wong Kar Wai, cinematographer Christopher Doyle, and designer William Chang. It was a movie level production. And the actor was Asano Tadanobu who was popular in Japan at that time. Reportedly, the reason for seeking him back then was because his hair was messy enough to match with Faye Wong.

The whole commercial lasted less than 30 seconds, but it was full of Wong Kar-wai's individualism and uniqueness. It is considered the most unusual commercial advertisement. And Faye Wong, whose pay was as high as six figures per hour, had only two lines: "Moshi Moshi".

Photographer Wing Shya also shot a set of print advertisements. Ah Fei as seen through the lens was smart and playful. With brilliant colors, it is entirely worthy of blockbuster art.

1999—2003

The fast-moving market adores the unconventional idol

In 1999, Faye Wong divorced the talented Dou Wei, which caused a commotion in the entertainment industry.

Pepsi spent 8 million Hong Kong dollars to invite Faye Wong, making her the first Asian female singer to endorse Pepsi. You must know that Pepsi’s strategy for so many years was aimed at the youth market. The stars they have invited over the years were the most popular among young people.

At that time, the commercial "Wish" depicted Ah Fei returning to an elementary school and seeing a little girl who resembled herself when she was a child. She recalled the scenes from when she was a child, expressing the theme: as long as you work hard, your wish can come true. The commercial song "Spectacular" was co-written by Faye Wong and Zhang Yadong, and included on the album "Only Love Strangers".

The following year's "Starry Sky Infinite" was a collaboration with Aaron Kwok. One was the god of water and the other was the god of ice. In the hot summer, the collision of ice and water brought coolness and pleasure.

Everyone remembers this poster. The heavenly king and queen who were still youth idols back then sang the commercial song "Starry Sky Infinite" together.

Faye’s styling in the ad now seems very ahead of its time. It was bold and creative. Whether it was the mini skirt with fishnet stockings or exaggerated color eye shadows, it is fashionable and cool at any time.

Also at that time, the theme song "Eyes On Me" of the classic game "Final Fantasy VIII" became popular in Japan. The song made the top ten of Japan's Oricon charts and Faye Wong also became a Japanese J-Phone mobile phone spokesperson.

As we all know, Japanese brands prefer their own artists, so Faye Wong's ability to break through and occupy a space is enough to prove her strength.

The six commercials that J-Phone shot for her at that time were all very advanced and full of new ideas.

The following year, she starred in the Japanese TV series "Usokoi" on Fuji TV. She worked with Takaichi Nakai and became the first Chinese artist to star in a Japanese drama as the main heroine. Unfortunately, the ratings were lower than expected.

At the beginning of 2000, Faye Wong became the spokesperson for Head & Shoulders and it was rumored that the remuneration at that time was 32 million Taiwan dollars (about 8 million Hong Kong dollars).

The commercial contained 6 cool styles. The production cost was as high as 15 million. The jingle was her newly created song "Chanel", which was intoxicating and psychedelic.

What’s interesting is that she cut her hair super short when she attended the press conference. When asked by reporters whether this style would conflict with being the spokesperson, she replied in a way that is still so cool, "Don't you need to wash short hair?"

If the advertisements for the above high demand products were expected, Faye Wong's acceptance of the following brand is more interesting now.

In 2003, Baleno spent 5 million a year to invite Faye Wong to become a spokesperson. Baleno was first known as a Hong Kong brand. In 1996, it was sold to Guangzhou Deyongjia Group and then regarded as a mainland brand.

But it was willing to spend money to invite the most popular celebrities to endorse. At its peak, it had 4,000 stores in the Mainland. Andy Lau and Faye Wong were invited to be spokespersons.

The phrase "brand, Baleno" caused everyone to laugh.

Ah Fei shot the posters and could manage all kinds of exaggerated makeup as always. At that time, Li Jianhui once wrote about the influence of Faye Wong on Baleno - hiring her was an upgrade for the entire brand.

The following year Faye Wong became the spokesperson of Louis Vuitton in the Asia-Pacific region. A series of print advertisements shot that year now looks very advanced. She is lying sexily and lazily on a white sofa, and her poses exude a different charm with each different set of clothes. The Heavenly Queen had such magical powers and her cool expression enchanted people.

2004—2005

Getting older and moving towards the high-end market

Which brand was Faye Wong most responsible for helping to enter China? There is no doubt that it is Celine. It is Faye Wong who brought this French brand into the hearts of every Chinese woman who loves fashion.

In October 2004, at the age of 35, Faye Wong attended Celine's 2005 Spring/Summer Fashion Show in Paris as a close friend of the brand.

The queen’s photoshoot on the streets of Paris expressed her attitude towards life. She exuded self-confidence and self-reliance even when she was just standing.

In early 2005, Faye Wong appeared on the cover of the Hong Kong edition of "HARPERS BAZAAR" wearing Celine.

The magazine’s fashion spread was a blockbuster for Celine - just by simply sitting at a dining table, revealing her slender legs. The styles were both casual and fashionable. This photoshoot perfectly fits Celine's brand aesthetic with Faye Wong's own personality: cool and sassy.

She also wore Celine's 2005 spring and summer collection and participated in the opening ceremony of the new store in Hong Kong.

For the next ten years, Faye Wong’s favorite was simply only Celine. She took brand promotional photos. She went to fashion week to participate in brand events. She was photographed in major magazine editorials. Even in her private birthday celebration, she wore none other than Celine.

Celine's fashion style fits her own personality. She appreciates the brand's neutral, functional, and concise design concept, and its pursuit for a free and comfortable attitude of living.

Just as she always dared to love and hate, in the Spring of 2005, it was reported that she and Li Yapeng were about to marry.

It was also at that time that she had her first skin care product endorsement, Jovell. At the time, it was reported that Jovell paid tens of millions to invite her to become a spokesperson in Asia.

The Heavenly Queen was over thirty and her perfectly maintained face couldn’t not be used as a skincare platform.

This commercial was based on her daily work environment, with pure English narration. In April, she also attended the brand's launch event in Hong Kong. She maintained an awkward and polite smile, but she did not accept interviews during the whole process.

The endorsement was not satisfactory. Jovell, a brand used by so-called Hollywood stars, applied for liquidation after the defendant defaulted on a loan at the end of 2005. They were desperate to invite the queen to help out. They wanted to take advantage of this momentum to come back to life, but unfortunately could not in the end. Because of the company’s liquidation, there was no money for payment. Faye Wong's management company issued a lawyer's letter to claim 4 million Hong Kong dollars in remuneration, and it went to the High Court.

2005-2011

Coming back is not easy At the end of May 2005, Faye Wong’s manager, Katie Chan, confirmed to the media that the Queen had started an "indefinite rest".

On July 28th of the same year, Faye Wong and Li Yapeng married in a low-key banquet in Beijing. The wedding photos taken at Tianshan were only revealed many years later in a Smile Angel Foundation promotional video.

Faye Wong retired for four full years because of her marriage and newborn daughter, during which she only sang theme songs for a few movies. There was always news that she was going to make a comeback, but in the end it turned out to be nothing.

Until 2009, on the 20th anniversary of Faye Wong's debut, news confirmed that she was about to come back to endorse a shampoo brand. The sky-high price discussed was higher than Jackie Chan. It was also reported that it was because of Li Yapeng's failed businesses that the Queen had to return to make money.

The rich and powerful Bawang Group gave enough money and not much additional conditions. The two sides hit it off quickly, which also kicked off the first wave of Faye Wong's successful comeback. In 2010, the queen made a triumphant comeback. At the beginning of the year, she returned to the Spring Festival Gala stage after 12 years and sang "Legend". At the end of the year, she held 10 sold out concerts.

She became the brand ambassador for the newly launched Chasing series shampoo under Bawang. Shooting shampoo ads was already familiar to the heavenly queen.

Although the brand positioned itself as mid-to-high end, the commercials were not very flattering. Heavenly Queen wore a cheongsam with a huge lotus leaf hem and neckline, walked slowly like a scallop princess. The whole advertisement fell flat.

It can be said that this was a low period for the heavenly queen. Whether or not it was satisfactory, it was a means to make money. But I have to say that Faye Wong's role in the brand was still very obvious. The products turned out to be famous all over the country.

Although money is earned, the risk of advertisements is also high. First, in 2010, a Hong Kong weekly magazine slandered Bawang shampoo for containing carcinogens and the herbal line of shampoo endorsed by Faye Wong was also not spared from testing. The star’s credibility was questioned for a while.

It took Bawang six full years to sue for defamation. In the end, they won the lawsuit, but only received a compensation of 3 million. However, the accumulated losses caused by the damage to its reputation over the years reached 1.7 billion.

Then at the end of 2014, it was reported that the intermediary claimed the fee from Faye Wong. When the case came to an end, the intermediary who originally claimed 3.35 million received only 600,000 compensation. Although the queen was cautious, she was sometimes not 100% insured. It was inevitable that there would be disputes.

2012-2020

Safe and easy money is the priority In 2012, she endorsed a dairy brand with sky-high prices. Yili Jindian Organic Milk, which focuses on high-end dairy products, coincides with Faye Wong’s status as a queen. The brand used her super popularity and influence to broaden its appeal and greatly increase sales.

Faye Wong’s commercials could be seen everywhere on major TV stations and variety shows. The contents of these advertisements contained similar features of natural innocence and quality.

The beautiful grassland featured in the commercial is located in the Shin Kong Chao Feng Ranch and Resort in Hualien, Taiwan. It was also called "Faye Wong Prairie" after the commercial became popular.

She has been cooperating with Jindian for nearly ten years and each year's commercials are considered by fans as a new opportunity to see their idol again. This year's newest commercial was no longer limited to the grassland, but used light and shadow effects and it was just perfect.

In recent years, Faye Wong was really low-key.

The protection and mystery of her private life has deepened the public's desire and imagination of her, so that every public appearance of hers causes an uproar and there are always speculations about how big a bargaining chip is used to invite her to appear.

She has also been questioned a few times about making money. For example, the biggest public backlash came from her Fantasy Music concert at the end of 2016, which caused controversy because of the high ticket prices.

This was her return to the stage after her 2012 tour ended. The cheapest ticket was as high as 1800 and the most expensive ticket was 7800. This triggered an "anti” storm and she was accused of marketing and money-making. Although the organizer clarified afterwards that the production cost could not be reduced because of technical requirements such as global live streaming, the public did not buy it.

After 18 years, she participated in her first variety show, Hunan Satellite TV's "Phantacity", where she was rumored to have been paid hundreds of millions of dollars. The news at the time stated that "the investment of the program is more than 300 million, of which 150 million is used to invite a certain heavenly queen." Of course, they also say that the top price of super first-line talent like Faye Wong is worth it.

When the MC He Jiong questioned her on the show, "Why did you want to come here?", she still answered so bluntly, "Because it’s easy."

It really was easy. Just sitting and talking can make you money.

This was a highly anticipated show that invited a large number of stars. But since the post-production process is too boring and many technical highlights couldn’t be shown on the TV screen, the freshness of the first two episodes faded and the following episodes were weak. Even Faye Wong could not save the ratings from declining. However, her performance in the last episode fulfilled fans' dreams.

Every time someone asks: is Faye Wong short of money?

Nonsense! Who is not short of money? The heavenly queen is human. She also needs to make money to pay for living expenses, including children's tuition and so on. Children’s education, the monetary cost of maintaining her own high standard of living (nanny, maintenance, self-care, etc.), and preparations for retirement, these all cost money.

Therefore, it is not difficult to see that the advertisements taken by the Heavenly Queen ten or more years ago were lively, interesting and creative. But after her comeback in 2009, they have been more grounded in a sense of reality. The long-term ten-year contract like Jindian Organic Milk is more worry-free and comfortable.

There is no longer a need to tailor songs for advertisements. You can easily make money by showing your face and narrating. Why not do it? It’s safe, worry-free, and comfortable. These are the benefits of advertising.

Of course, some people ask, why does only Faye Wong have such an influence in the advertising industry? It seems that you can pay anyone to stand there. Why don’t her contemporaries have such influence?

This only further proves that Faye Wong's body of work is excellent. She had continuous creativity and was always fresh. As the goddess of the music industry, she has been influential several times. Faye Wong is the only super queen recognized by audiences on both sides of the strait. By gaining a big market, it is the simplest answer to this question.

Secondly, Faye Wong has an unparalleled personality. Her charm lead her to become an era’s rising female power and a new generation female legend. In layman's terms, she has lived the life that everyone wants, which is why she can bless the brand.

Her personality and charm is her brand premium. Her international style and her unconventional life are also her brand premium. This is why TV stations and merchants are willing to spend sky-high prices to invite her, because they can use their own efforts to upgrade the brand's profile.

As for making money, Faye Wong is also a human being, not a god. Like you and me, she has to work in life.

As for the so-called lowering herself to common mortals, as she herself once said, "I am not as perfect as you think and I admit that sometimes I can't tell the true from the false." And sometimes mistakes are inevitable.

For 26 years, Faye Wong chose her advertisements. When watching these advertisements, we clearly saw time fly past us at a fast speed. The light and shadows were dazzling, and I sighed.

What can we say? The era has chosen Faye Wong and Faye Wong has accompanied us in every era.

She can do whatever she wants, since she has already given us beautiful moments in music.

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SOURCE: NETEASE // TRANSLATION BY: FAYE WONG FUZAO

#2020

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alexsfictionaddiction · 5 years ago

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Alex Recommends: May and June Books

I must apologise for the late arrival of this post. It should have been up days ago but I’ve been struggling to read much for the last month or so. My head has been very foggy and dark with all of the confusion, anxiety and hate that has been filling my news feeds and I’ve been filled with a desire to combat it. Before this month, I’d have run in the opposite direction from any kind of confrontation but recent events have given me the kick up the butt to actively do better. I’ve been calling out bigotry when I come across it and I’ve noticed that some people, notably my older relatives, haven’t necessarily reacted favorably to the changed, more outspoken Alex. It has been pretty daunting and I’ve worked myself up into fits of rage and tears several times over the last couple of months.

A lot of things have changed for me since my last Alex Recommends post. I’m currently temporarily living in Staffordshire with my boyfriend because my depression got too bad for me to stay at home for much longer. I missed him unbelievably much and I knew that spending some prolonged time with him would help -and it has. Both him and I have spent 12 weeks religiously following all of the rules, so we’re both extremely low-risk for catching and spreading COVID-19 and being together was something that we simply really needed to do. Please don’t hate me for it! In other news, I have also started writing again, which feels amazing. I’m now a few thousand words into a queer Rapunzel retelling that I have lots of ideas for. Maybe I’ll even post an extract or two, when I feel it’s ready to show you.

In the centre of the renewed energy of Black Lives Matter and the undeniable exposure of the horrors that is police brutality, the book blogging and BookTube worlds vowed to uplift Black voices. I wrote a very long, in-depth blog post full of Black-written books and Black book influencers. Please check it out to diversify your TBR and educate yourself on Black issues, which is what every white person should be doing now and always.

June was Pride Month and I tried my best to compile a series of recommendation posts in honour of it. These included gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, non-binary, ace, pansexual and intersex lists. I’ve had some great feedback on this, so I hope you find some fantastic new reads. It felt especially poignant to put them together the same year that one of my childhood heroes came out as an ignorant trans-exclusive feminist. As a lifelong Harry Potter superfan and someone who has repeatedly publicly supported Rowling in the past, I feel the need to clarify where I now stand. I do not support or agree with a single thing that she has said in recent times with regard to transgender people. I’ve never felt my own status as a cisgender female threatened by trans people wanting more rights or believed that children or women were at risk due to their existence.

I read her words more than once and struggled to find any semblance of the woman who wrote the books that have most defined my life. I’m hesitant to say that we can always successfully separate the art from the artist but I will say that it makes sense to me that the Rowling of 2020 is not the same Rowling that wrote Harry Potter. She was a destitute single mother when Philosopher’s Stone was published in 1997 and of course, she is now a million worlds away from that lifestyle. It breaks my heart but it makes sense to me that she has changed beyond belief because her life has changed beyond belief. I’m not and never would make any excuses for her recent behaviour and I have stopped supporting her personally but I will not be getting rid of my Harry Potter books and I will undoubtedly re-read them several more times. However, I am now hugely reluctant to buy any more merchandise or special editions of the books, which saddens me but at the moment, it feels right. There is no coming back for her from this and I will make a conscious effort to keep Harry Potter and Rowling away from my future content. It can be really tough to admit that the people you once really admired aren’t great humans but it’s something that we all have to acknowledge in this case, in order to move forward with our own quests to become our best selves.

It didn’t feel right to post my May recommendations last month as I didn’t feel comfortable promoting my own content in the midst of boosting Black voices. So today I’m bringing you a bumper edition of Alex Recommends. Here are 10 books that I’ve enjoyed since the start of May that I’d love to share with you. Enjoy! -Love, Alex x

FICTION: Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng

Set in the affluent neighbourhood of Shaker Heights, Ohio in the 1990s, two families are brought together and pulled apart by the most intense, devastating circumstances. Dealing with issues of race, class, coming-of-age, motherhood and the dangers of perfection, Little Fires Everywhere is highly addictive and effecting. With characters who are so heartbreakingly real and a story that weaves its way to your very core, I couldn’t put it down and I’m still thinking about it over a month after finishing it.

FICTION: Get A Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibbert

When coding nerd Chloe Brown almost dies, she makes a list of goals and vows to finally Get A Life. So she enlists tattooed redhead handyman and biker Red to teach her how. Cute, funny and ultimately life-affirming, this enemies-to-lovers rom-com was exactly the brand of light relief that I needed this month. The follow-up Take A Hint, Dani Brown focuses on a fake-dating situation with Chloe’s over-achieving academic sister and I can’t wait to get my hands on that.

FICTION: The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart by Margarita Montimore

Just before her 19th birthday at midnight on New Year’s Eve 1983, Oona Lockhart finds herself inexplicably in 2015 inside her 51-year-old body. She soon learns that every year on New Year’s Day, she will now find herself inside a random year of her life and she has no control over it. Seeing her through relationships, friendships and extreme wealth, this strange novel has echoes of Back To The Future and 13 Going On 30 with a final revelation that I certainly never saw coming.

NON-FICTION: The Five by Hallie Rubenhold

Atmospheric and engaging, The Five details the previously untold stories of Polly, Annie, Elisabeth, Kate and Mary-Jane -the women who lost their lives at the hands of Jack the Ripper. Full of fascinating research and heartbreaking accounts of what these women’s lives may have been like, Rubenhold paints a dark immersive portrait of Victorian London and gives voice to these tragic silenced lives. Although we can’t know for certain if these accounts are entirely accurate, they feel very plausible and in some ways, The Five exposes how little time has moved on, when it comes to the public portrayal of single, troubled women.

NON-FICTION: Unicorn by Amrou Al-Kadhi

From a childhood crush on Macaulay Culkin to how a teenage obsession with marine biology helped them realise their non-binary identity, Unicorn tells the story of how the obsessive perfectionist son of a strict Muslim Iraqi family became the gorgeous drag queen Glamrou. Packed full of humour, honesty and heart, this book will give you the strength and inspiration to harness what you were born with and be who you were always meant to be.

MIDDLE-GRADE: The Super Miraculous Journey of Freddie Yates by Jenny Pearson

When fact-obsessed Freddie’s grandmother dies, he discovers that the father he has never met may actually be alive and living in Wales. So he has no choice but to grab his best friends Ben and Charlie, leave his home in Andover and go to find his dad! I laughed so many times during this madcap adventure and I know the slapstick crazy humour will hit the middle-grade target audience just right. It’s also a wonderful depiction of small town Britain with a focus on the true meaning of family.

MIDDLE-GRADE: A Kind Of Spark by Elle McNicoll

When Addie learns about her hometown’s history of witch trials, she campaigns tirelessly to get a memorial for the women who lost their lives through it. This wonderfully beautiful novel gives a unique insight into the mind of an 11-year-old autistic girl with a huge heart. Busting myths about neurodiversity while tackling typical pre-teen drama, you’ll laugh, you’ll cry but most of all, you’ll close the book with a huge smile on your face.

HISTORICAL FICTION: Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

In 16th century Warwickshire, Agnes is a woman with a unique gift whose relationship with a young Latin tutor produces three children and a legacy that lasts for centuries. This enchanting, all-consuming account of the tragic story of Shakespeare’s lost son, the effects that rippled through the family and the play that was born from their pain will send a bullet straight through your heart. Wonderfully researched and beautifully written, Hamnet is worth all of the hype.

HISTORICAL FICTION: The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

When a vicious storm kills most of the men of Vardø, Norway, it’s up to the women to keep things going but a man with a murderous past is about to come down with an iron fist. At the heart of this dark tale of witch trials, grief and feminism, two women find something they’ve each been searching for within each other. Gorgeously written with a fantastically slow-burning queer romance, Kiran Millwood Hargrave’s first adult novel is an addictive, atmospheric read with a poignant, tearjerker of an ending.

SCI-FI: Q by Christina Dalcher

When one of Elena’s daughters manages to drop below the country’s desired Q number, she is sent away to one of the new state schools and Elena is about to find out something she’d really rather not know about the new system. Packed full of real social commentary and critique of life as we know it while painting a picture of how things could be even worse (yes, really!), this pulse-racing, horrifying sci-fi dystopian gripped me from the first page and refused to let me go.

#book recommendations #recommended #recommendations #may #june #books #bookworm

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belovedalittlemore · 5 years ago

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CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER (2011) DIR. JOE JOHNSTON

june 13, 2020

topics i’m covering

movie itself

steve’s main relationships

steve + peggy (also w/ endgame!)

steve + bucky

agent carter + why she deserves more

marvel as an entity for entertainment, not the advancement of the industry

black panther at the oscars, and why it didn’t deserve to be there

the movie:

ok it’s not that bad, i definitely expected it to be worse. i didn’t really like the yellow ass color grading, like i felt like i needed to tell the movie “you can communicate 1930s without needing to make yourselves yellow”. i think my biggest two issues were the plot and natalie dormer’s character. starting with the plot, this movie was so jampacked with so many challenges i felt like i was watching 3 episodes of a tv show crammed into one. we started with the formation of steve rogers, then the rescue mission, then getting dr. zola (who played the villain in a sherlock episode and freaked me the FUCK out and now i can never look at him the same way), then killing schmidt (which didn’t even work because he ended up in iw + endgame??), then steve dying but then him not dying and waking up? there was just SO MUCH in so little time. second, what the FUCK was natalie’s character for. i love her but she was SO unnecessary. she simply served to add tension to steve and peggy’s relationship, which really only put them back like five minutes. that was never even cleared up, peggy just shot his shield and they kissed like 30 minutes later and everything was dandy.

steve and peggy:

god they’re so FUCKING CUTE and all they really care about is their country and finding the right person and i just watched the ending to endgame (a year later) and guess what? i STILL cannot handle it. thinking about how steve lived a whole life in the present but then also the 1930s but also not BAFFLES me and i don’t think about it but god that ending BROKE ME. i couldn’t listen to that song for a month without CRYING. in short, i probably will never watch endgame again.

also when i first watched it, i was BROKEN because that was a whole phase of my life; that was a DECADE of everyone’s life and it was over and it really hit me at the CREDITS. i was sobbing at the credits and thinking about how we’re never going to see steve or tony again.

anyway, back to peggy. honestly, one of the cutest, most solid relationships in the mcu. i just know that they never fight over anything and their favorite thing to do is dance and i imagine that steve makes her blush but not as much as she makes him blush and i just KNOW that steve would’ve been a huge part of the civil rights movement.

steve and bucky:

ok i’ve always heard about steve and bucky’s ~relationship~ and how they should’ve been gay but after finally watching the captain america trilogy, my only thought is REALLY???

like yeah, they’re great friends and all, and both of them are devastatingly attractive, and they love each other, but not romantically

honestly i feel like this ship really came about because in the other two movies, steve’s accepted that he’s never going to be with peggy, so the closest thing he can have from his old life is bucky and steve sees in bucky everything he ever wanted. and so, of course the audience loses sight of peggy as well and is like “stucky uwu”. but NO. peggy’s the greatest woman who ever lived and the better half of steve rogers and she DEF would’ve been able to lift mjolnir.

hot take: girls only wanted stucky to happen because they’ve never seen a real, wholesome, supportive male friendship in their lives because boys are too stuck inside their toxic masculinity bubbles to demonstrate true love for each other and so girls see stucky and think that they’re in love but really they’re just a great example of male friendship that no one sees anymore

agent peggy carter + why she deserves the world:

she’s so incredibly headstrong and marvelous and is so accountable for herself and calm and cool and collected and lovely in all of the best ways. i know she got a tv series (that lasted 2 seasons), but i feel like she should’ve gotten her own movie. she’s a great push for feminism, we would’ve gotten more steve content (maybe?), and who doesn’t love the 30s.

i just feel like the black widow movie doesn’t matter since she’s DEAD. like i don’t need to go back in time to see her origin story.

movie studios should’ve made pushes for female movies when obviously APPROPRIATE.

peggy carter? should’ve gotten her own movie after this one

black widow? needed the solo movie right before or after the first avengers; would’ve been great!

but now? it’s just unnecessary

marvel:

ever since we did our ranking, i’ve been thinking about marvel as a business and its role in the entertainment industry. the last time i watched thor: ragnarok, i remember thinking that it was a great movie, which it is(!), but it wasn’t the best. and after our ranking, i realized, it really is the best.

i guess i’m disappointed that marvel is really an entity for the blockbuster industry, and not at all for the advancement of the movie industry. i wish directors would be more creative and imaginative; take taika waititi, who took the least-liked set of movies and made it AMAZING. i feel like marvel needs to stop JUST using the russo brothers or that feige guy, whatever his name is, and try reaching out to new directors to incite creativity.

i was looking at a letterboxd list which had every mcu movie with the new releases and there’s going to be about FORTY (total) of them in the next four years, series and/or movie. at some point, we will get bored of the same formula OVER and OVER again.

look at james bond: no one really took them seriously until daniel craig, who (and of course, the abundant group of masterful moviemakers behind him) practically breathed new life and made them something to look forward to. the bond movies used to be a blockbuster, money-making venture, and now it’s taken seriously. i hope marvel does this soon, because in a couple years, their fanbase will become the diehard marvel comic-reading fans and the people who are too sucked in to let go.

black panther, and why it just doesn’t work:

don’t get me wrong, LOVED black panther. such a bold, great movie to finally(!!!) introduce black people into the mcu and done so well. HOWEVER, the movie itself fell a little flat. the whole villain plot? so eh. i thought klaue was way more interesting than killmonger, and they really just brushed him aside within five minutes.

it’s kind of like cmbyn in the fact that their visuals and sheer presence outshine EVERYTHING ELSE, especially in the first watch.

also, it got NOMINATED FOR BEST PICTURE. i totally understand the other awards it won (best soundtrack, costume design i think, and one other one) and that’s so amazing that marvel finally broke out of its blockbuster mold into the INDUSTRY

however, it got nominated for BEST PICTURE which is so WHAT THE FUCK (ok i’ll let the nom slide though, the 2019 picks were lowkey hella bad and this was the year that GREEN BOOK won)

if ANY marvel movie should’ve ever been nominated and/or won, i think it’s thor: ragnarok or iw; black panther just seemed like such a “look! we’re diverse, can’t you see?” type of move and i was NOT a fan

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emuftw · 6 years ago

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Dreamboy Fan theory (Part 1)

TW: mentions of physical abuse, animal abuse and depression

Quick intro! - So with the next episode being the season 1 finale, I thought it would be a good time to share my theory of what is going on at PepperHights. I wanted to share now before the finale comes around and totally proves me wrong but for once I oddly don’t mind. It also goes without saying it is just a fan-theory and it’s not meant to be taken too seriously. With that being said however, I do talk about the themes as tagged so be mindful whilst reading. One key note, going forward when I use “Dane” I will be referring to character Dane in the show. When talking about the real Dane, I will be referring to him as “Producer Dane” when talking about all things outside of the podcast.

Also, this is LONG! When I started this I was hoping for a post similar length to my transcription of the Instagram live. As I keep typing however I realise that to make this flow easier I have split this into two parts. Part 1 will talk about the general theme of “what’s going on” and my guess at how Season 1 will end. Part 2 will carry on with the key points that were mentioned before, but with focus on the characters and how it all links together along with their individual theory’s.

Dreamboy has been an amazing podcast from start to finish. From the music, Character Danes sex drive to the sheer horror which is woven in every episode, it is clear you can see why it was picked up but Night Vale Presents. However, after seven and a half episodes (and a holiday special) there is still a lot of mystery of “what” is going on in the show. As fans we know that there has been a build up to something big happening and with hints of Aliens, magic and the super natural taking place in most episodes. For me though, there seems to be one clear overriding theme that is taking place and that ISNT the idea of there being a giant fish, the fear of giant family corporations going to Jupiter and finding something, the dreams of death or even the sharing of dreams between two strangers.

It’s the horror that comes with mundane life and everyday people itself. For more clarity, I don’t think there is anything supernatural, Syfi or horror going on. Instead, I think this is a tale of people and the hardships of life and how it is perceived via tone which I am hoping to break down in this fan theory! Key themes here are things I have picked up though my own life experiences, what has been said on and off podcast, livestreams, and assumptions from what took place in the original off Broadway production/BTS episode and people who work on the podcast.

At the start of the podcast we are introduced to a morbid way of thinking with Dane’s idea of a supermarket is just one giant morgue of animals and dead plants. This creepy tone is continued throughout the whole story. It’s captivating, it’s engaging and its part of what makes the podcast great but there isn’t something that would count as a big “horror” or “bad guy”. Instead, it’s how Character Dane talks about the supermarket which makes it scary.

This use of Tone and description is used a lot to make us the listener gripped in the moment along with how we imagine and perceive what is being described to us, however, we havn’t yet seem to encounter one key thing which is actually “evidence” of something paranormal. Instead, a lot of what is happening can be put down as as the struggles of life and its affect on ones own personal mental health and personal life experiences that come with getting older as well as how we cope with the events around us. These can be seen in all our “main” characters Dane talks to such as Dane himself, Luke and Critch, all of whom I will talk about more in Part 2. (Note: I don’t include Characters such as Carol and Dan in this as whilst our leads have spoken to them, unfortunately they don’t seem to have a big impact on the story outside of the episodes they are featured in.)

A good example however, of how Danes descriptions of characters and tone can be seen as “something supernatural is going on” is how we perceive Jennifer and the Non-Girl Scouts. When we first meet Jennifer, Dane describes her as a “child who looks like she has been raised by her grandparents”. She is also later described as a “girl scout” and is frequently referred to as a “child”/ “kid”. In a cultural context, when talking about girl scouts, being from England I associated them with our equivalent, who are ages from 7-10 and when she mentions that she and the other two had a “slumber party” it furthers this idea of a young girl. This tone/description sets us up to believe she is very young, which is even more jarring once she opens her mouth and speaks about complex issues such as feminism and equality in their complexity but sophisticated manor. All these Ideas, and Tone, leads us to think that she is “creepy” and “up to something big” in a supernatural sence. However in episode 7 our perception of how we view Jenifer changes.

In the episode Dane asks “what is she twelve?” to which she corrects him and tell us she is actually 13. This greatly surprised me when she told us this, and yet at the same time, for the first time made her human. At 13, we instantly gain between 3-7 years of life experience, meaning by now she is starting to form her own personality and ideology, which is something we expect from a teenager. A teenager talking about toxic masculinity is less jarring than a child talking about it. Whilst people would perceive her as a “child” still, there is a big difference in maturity level and complexity thinking, which means we no longer have a “creepy child girl scout” on our hands, but rather a “young teenager who is making their own choices though understanding social situations”. In this episode have a very human moment of a teenager asking for help as well as frustration break down when Dane won’t give her the keys as he “knows” they won’t open the door. I get the impression this is not easy to do for her, and from the live stream we know she doesn’t like to be messed around. For the first time we have a very human moment where we see her struggles and vulnerability, rather than the creepy tone which has been set by Dane and his narrative.

So with the Idea set that we are dealing with real life instead of a big horror taking place, I would like to also address one of the key areas this applies to as well as what I believe is taking place. I would like to talk about Zoe the Zebra and what has actually happened.

For me personally, I believe that Zoe is already dead, but not for the reason you believe. Early on, in the first episode, we are told that Zoe is an old Zebra who is the Zoos start attraction. A bit of Basic googling shows us that in the wildlife, a zebra can realistically live for 10 years whilst in captivity they can live up to 40 years on record. If we assume that Zoe has never seen the wildlife and was bred in captivity, we can assume she was born into the Zoo around 1990 at the EARLIEST, meaning she’s a pretty old Zebra nearing 30 if Dreamboy is set in 2019. With the Zoo being popular but struggling for funds, and based off the other animals such as the monkey who needs to listen to opera to sleep, we can assume that Zoe did not have a suitable enclosure for her. An unsuitable environment along with being the “star” of the Zoo, it means she was also frequently surrounded by load noises, no enrichments/toys and could have been alone despite being a heard animal. These factors are all key contributors to animals developing some form of Stereotypical behaviour during her time at PepperHights.

(Quick definition break: Stereotypic behaviour is defined as a repetitive, invariant behaviour pattern with no obvious goal or function. Stereotypic behaviour is not seen in animals in the wild and is understood to be abnormal and is therefore a negative factor in conservation captive breeding. Common Stereotypical behaviour includes habits of repartition such as noise making, pacing in the same location and self-mutilation as a result of over grooming AKA not nice!).

Based on what I learned in my time working with animals, this behaviour can also lead to aggression when behaviour patterns are interrupted or the animal is dealing with something they are not familiar with (such as someone breaking into their cage late at night). This sadly what is likely lead to the death of Ian. Whilst in the story it has been said that Zoe’s fate is still to be decided via the judge later in the week, I believe Zoe is actually already dead due to Zoo’s protocol’s that occur in these situations. It is very common when there is an active risk of the safety of the members of public in regards to wild animals, whether they have activity hurt a member of public or not, is too shoot the animal dead on the scene.

I have seen this happen when animals have killed members of staff in Zoo’s, to just lynx’s escaping from enclosures and going into the country side with no interactions with the public at all. If we are to assume that the person who reported Ian’s death also knew the Zoo’s procedures, we can assume that Zoe, who in in a scare fit killed Ian on accident, was shot on the scene to prevent anyone else being harmed. It is also worth noting that currently we do not know if we have seen Zoe since the incident, only that we have heard her cries which could have easily been recorded and played over the speaker system. It is also easy to believe as since Critch has requested no one to be present at her death, Zoe is already dead but Critch wishes to hide that so that people still visits the Zoo to see Zoe one last time before she goes as so many people love’s her. As well as this, it would also explain why there is such a big push for the lost ocean, as their main attraction is already dead.

Going back to the original discussion of theme, This idea of an animal who is kept in a poor enclosure, driven crazy by the noise and consistent lack of respect to then only be added on with her death on the scene is obvious a lot more realistic than the “murderous Zebra” or even the “drag Queen Zebra” which is frequently used to describe the situation. Its sadness of the situation, from an animal never being kept in its natural environment which lead to a young persons death, to the fact that there is no formal closure for this animals death, which leads to the finale being less of a supernatural horror to more of a real life situation which we as society become numb to as we exist day to day.

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For now, this is all I have for part 1. The idea of nothing supernatural going on is something which seems to be something which is only slightly touched on with the “plot” of Dreamboy. In Part 2, the idea of personal hardships, challenges and how these can link to a more telling story is what I am hoping to cover as well as my own personal theories.

Will hopefully get part 2 up within the next couple of days but till then stay groovy!

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thekingdomheartsprincess · 6 years ago

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when kairi died part of me felt relieved

very long rant filled with run-on sentences, over-use of bold words, and over-use of italics. you’ve been warned

I’ve been holding off on my full review and thoughts on kh3 until after I get through my second playthrough. I will say, it was an overall great game and I was pleasantly surprised by a lot. I have my issues, but I’d like to hold off until I’m finished with my regular paced play through (not speedplay) before I write all my thoughts. However, one thing I really have to get out now is how absolutely disappointed and disgusted I am by kairi’s entire existence in kh3.

And just an fyi, I set the bar low going into this for her. I wasn’t expecting much, yet somehow, I was still let down harder than I thought was actually possible.To me, the highlight of kairi’s appearance in kh3 was probably going to be because she was training with axel. Therefore, with the reasoning that axel usually gets excessive screen time---you know, the guy that should have fake died twice before his actual fake death (which I’m not complaining about, just saying)...kairi would have by default gotten some of that extra relevance right??

Wrong... in a stunning turn of events they actually left axel to the side as well. He got a few good lines in, but at the end of the day he barely fights, does anything important, and somehow has his keyblade destroyed by xemnas in his first real battle with it. I’ll get back more to the truly ridiculous lack of keyblade skills later. While I’m still on the topic of axel though, let’s talk about kairi’s use as a tool to figure out axel’s feelings and xion. Like, no problems with the whole kidnapping thing, no deep connection making. Did a lot of us expect and fear that kairi would be used as a plot device for axel’s xion memories? Yes. Does it make it any better that we were prepared for it going into kh3? For me, yeah, but the real problem is it doesn’t stop there. And axel’s feelings and memories of xion were poorly included and barely mattered anyhow

Also the whole letter writing thing axel comments on, a sad excuse for not wanting to actually provide sokai interaction. “They’re more for herself”-bullshit tbh. Someone tell square enix that if they make me play another game where my girlfriend writes me letters and I can’t respond I’m gonna lose it. *cough ffxv cough* It was a sad excuse for trying to build up sokai before end game. Plus, bad writing aside, if my girl kairi is gonna be a romantic plot device forever; you could at least let her send sora those stupid letters. The poor girl is talking to him in her head. WHY

So much opportunity here to build up sokai before the end of the game. And you know what? I don’t really care about sokai anymore, or whether its canon, or if they have any moments at all in the game. But it you are going to use it as a plot device, you could at least put some effort into it. Sokai needs to be better if it is going to have such a huge direct impact on the ending of the game. Maybe this was difficult, because this really wasn’t the game for it. Everyone has a lot going on in this game, and for sora, his focus is really on getting the people connected to his heart back. He barely even talks about riku in the game! Which is completely justified, because the boy has a lot of stress on his shoulders and a lot going on. The sokai getting thrown in basically at the last minute of the game, is like white noise in the background...that shouldn’t have been there.

The paopu fruit scene felt uncomfortable and thrown in at the wrong moment. There was opportunity for this scene at the end of kh2, or before sora left the island again for 3d. Or if some effort was put into developing sokai throughout the game (which again, I don’t think this was the game for this) it could have worked. Instead, we got a scene which really wasn’t romantic in the slightest, and pretty much had “somebody or both of them is dying/being separated tomorrow” written all over it. The scene starts out of nowhere basically, riku is quite literally shoved to the side to talk to himself, kairi sort of dismisses romantic intentions when asking sora to share it with her, and sora sort of just nods his head and rolls with it. The best part, is the imagery relating to the drawings in the cave (which is admittedly beautiful). However, this is not the sokai paopu fruit scene 7 yr old me envisioned. While I certainly don’t expect to get what I wanted to see, this is almost an insult to all of the build up to this moment in previous games.

What would have been the only wonderful and meaningful sokai scene in the game, is the one where kairi is able to help sora basically escape death and light his way through the darkness or whatever. The whole “I’m going to keep you safe now” and “you make me feel stronger” thing is really sweet as an out of context scene if I knew nothing else about kh3. The problem is, this isn’t really true. Kairi doesn’t keep sora safe, and the limits of her strength seem to be in that one cutscene. Not to mention, this already happened. We literally saw this same thing happen in kh1-and it was a better scene.

Maybe I could believe kairi’s determination behind her words if she was able to even lift her keyblade when she’s being attacked, or put up a fight against her kidnapper (i mean come on, even belle got to elbow xaldin), or finish a battle against someone who was not an alternate version of herself (or remotely believably on xehanort’s side for more than a second). Seriously, she did more with her keyblade knocking out a few heartless in kh2. That scene was actually cooler. I am truly disgusted that I have to even think that. It’s not that I thought she would go up from kh2, but I surely didn’t think she would go soooooo far down.

They totally shot themselves in the foot with the whole merlin’s magic excuse. Axel and kairi show up as if they just got the keyblade 20 seconds before the keyblade war, yet supposedly they had unlimited time to train. Maybe we’ll get some bs excuse on how it “wasn’t exactly unlimited time” later, but seriously? If you were going to have both of them fail so miserably, you could have used the short training time as an excuse!! Why would you write yourself out of that excuse, just to give me these pathetic jokes of keyblade wielders. By all logical reasoning, if they had unlimited time to train, they should have both shown up stronger that xehanort and eraqus combined. Like did they just settle after they could shoot magic at x number of moving objects in merlin’s training facility???

She may not have done much, but by the time we saw her get mercilessly stabbed for no real logical reason I was relieved. Relieved that I might finally not have to watch this anymore, and can just go into all future kh games without having to worry about what they will do with her character. I want to say I was pissed, upset even, that they killed her off like that. Confused as to how this helps xehanort’s plan? Absolutely. I mean, wouldn’t that ruin his 7 princesses part 2 backup plan if he needed it? Wouldn’t the last key form as soon as he killed kairi? Were the 7 lights going to stop fighting him there? Was he just being a cruel dick? I don’t have the answers. But I will say that I didn’t actually get angry, until xehanort stole her fucking lines. “One sky, one destiny” She doesn’t even have that anymore. The significance of those lines, now can’t just be kairi’s but has to be shared with the man who killed her. Could it get any worse? Yes! Because sora has to go and do some strongly hinted form of self sacrifice for her again. Turning the shit show writing of kairi into probably the most detrimental part of the story.

Now, its playing such a huge role in kh3 and future kh games. It makes the major plot point of the ending of the game suffer. There’s no kairi for me to appreciate that would make me care about her dying, the one really good moment sora shares with kairi is hardly based in reality, and what’s supposed to be used as a way for sora to prove himself doesn’t really do that. He already sacrificed himself for kairi. What more is this proving? And with no excuse for kairi’s lack of training or presence in the game, I’m confused as to how this happened or why I’m supposed to care. However Nomura needed this to end up to set up future kh games, was this really the only way to do it?

I wish I could say I just personally cared this much about feminism in kingdom hearts, and that’s why I’m so disappointed by this complete and utter failure of writing a character, but that’s not even it. When I was little I loved kairi because she was like a new disney princess in a video game, and I was heartbroken when sora told her she couldn’t come with him for the rest of his adventure. That she would just “get in his way.” 23 year old me is still pissed and not letting go. Even more frustrating, is that square enix has (deliberately or not) ignored a large part of the fandom who just asked for a little bit better. The kairi bar was low, and square enix did the limbo rock under it. (bad joke i know, it’s 2:30 am and i should be sleeping)

I’ll shut up now, but be aware i’m screaming “and another thing about kairi in kh3!” every hour on the hour in my mind

#spoilers #kingdom hearts 3 spoilers #kh3 spoilers #kingdom hearts #kairi #kingdom hearts 3 #KH3 #square enix #i am going to be salty about this forever

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meow-at-meow-doc-com · 6 years ago

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“Man of the House”

That ep of Jane the virgin, hooooo boy

so let’s get this straight

1) Jane respectfully asked, as a parent, for Jorge to put his dishes away and not watch TV while Mateo was around, because it was directly affecting his behavior and causing his ADHD problems to worsen.

Sidenote: wasn’t he living there for months before this for the fake marriage? Pretty telling that he stops having any regard for his wife’s only grandkid & great-grandkid until the ring is on.

2) He gets really mad, apparantly, and tells his wife. He doesn’t relay the pretty reasonable requests she actually made, just that Jane was disrespectful. He does this instead of confronting Jane, or having a family meeting.

3) Alba gets mad at Jane, doesn’t really give her an opportunity to say what actually happened [Mateo had a meltdown and started misbehaving, because he saw “the man of the house” not following the rules]. She points out that she cooked and cleaned for Jane for years. Which is true, but also isn’t relevant to asking someone to put away their dishes or keeping the TV off around her son. Also Jane was a literal child for most of the years she was living with Alba and it’s never been shown that Jane is taking advantage of her parent’s free labor. So Alba was really responding to Jane being skeptical of the gender roles Alba & Jorge have - which, again, she said nothing about to Jorge.

4) Jane apologizes to Jorge, to keep the peace. He asks for a few small concessions, which are actually pretty reasonable by themselves - keeping things down at night, leaving the close spot for Alba. I don’t see anything wrong with asking a roommate for these concessions at all, but he also didn’t apologize for getting a third party to interfere [for no reason, since he has no problem having a reasonable conversation here, other than his passive-aggressive and patronizing tone], and we also don’t see any sign he’s actually going to make the changes Jane requested, so it doesn’t feel like a fair & respectful conversation.

Another thing here not addressed - Jorge said to Alba that Jane was being disrespectful and insulting to him, that’s never touched on. Asking a roommate to put their dishes away, especially in front of their easily impressionable son,is not insulting or disrespectful, especially when brought up in a 1-1 conversation like that. That’s a pretty basic polite thing to do. How long were those dishes going to sit there? Hours until Alba goes back home? Was Jane supposed to clean up after him for some reason? Him leaving dishes at the table was far more disrespectful and also, that’s how you get ants!

The watching TV thing was a little less of a normal request but... most families, especially ones that can afford a 40 inch HDTV have a second TV in their bedroom, or at least a laptop, or something than can watch TV off of. And this was for her child, who has problems with processing TV and other things and led directly to her son having meltdowns. Regardless, it’s not disrespectful or insulting to ask for that concession, people who live together should be allowed to have a healthy discussion about their wants and needs, bringing it up a healthy thing to do. Turning up the volume repeatedly to drown out your step great-grandkid’s tantrum was disrespectful though. You really care that little about your wife’s only great-grandkid? Just turn off the TV, pause it, or at least mute it. You don’t have to raise Mateo, but it would be nice if you wouldn't actively contribute to making it harder for him.

5) Jane apologizes to Alba for being judgey about the whole division of labor thing. Fair enough, Jane’s a nice person and loves her grandma and likes seeing her happy. During that apology, Alba says the whole completely unequal division of labor thing isn’t actually that unequal because while she does cook, clean, do the grocery shopping daily after her job, Jorge actually helps too! He does this by...

* handling telemarketers. I just hang up, i don’t think this really compares. It’s nice, but like, those should be a 1 min conversation or less “I’m not interested”.

* he makes all their dinner reservations. Again, this should be like a 2 min phone call, unless you get stuck on-hold. Nice of him to do, but i’d rather set up a dinner reservation than clean the bathrooms and do the dishes. I’d do pretty much anything other than do the dishes, but that’s neither here nor there.

* putting her slippers in front of the bed every day. That’s super sweet, but still probably only takes like 1-2 minutes every day. Considering meals tend to take 20+ minutes of work, usually involving standing up and actively monitoring, it’s just not really comparable.

That’s apparently her best examples she has of how their division of labor isn’t an unequal as it seems. 3 things that add up to probably 5 minutes, and two of the things aren’t even daily occurrences. Compared to apparently doing all the grocery shopping (Usually around a 30 min trip to me, at least), making most or all of their meals (20ish min per meal, plus snacks, but let’s call it 45 min/day and assume she has leftovers sometimes), and apparantly all the cleaning (jane has never been shown to shirk her duties, so i’m gonna go with 30 min/day, and assume it’s mostly dishes and laundry).

Which makes Jorge’s contributes like, hmm, 5 min/day, and Alba’s around an hour, rounding down and not even factoring in grocery runs. They both work too, although i don’t know if either of them works more than another.

Alba is definitely correct that if she wants to run her relationship that way, she should be allowed too. For example, some people find cleaning relaxing. It doesn’t make their contributions any less unequal, but it does change the context. She doesn’t say she actually enjoys cleaning or cooking, other than “doing things for the hubby” sort of implied in there, but you know. She could, maybe.

But that’s not really the issue. The issue is still that Jorge thinks asking for reasonable accommodations from people who have lived her longer than him is disrespectful and insulting. That’s a red flag by itself, plus his behavior suddenly turning to a manbaby who can’t do dishes after putting a ring on it is another red flag. The division of labor thing could make sense in a more equal relationship, but on top of these red flags, it points to repeated behavior that actually is taking advantage of Alba, just like Jane was concerned about.

Anyway, this whole thing was probably just a plot to get Jane to move out. But it really made me side-eye that his bad behaviors were ignored in favor of teaching Jane that “sometimes feminism is letting women be taken advantage of, because they want it” or something. They could have made this message less wishy-washy by having Jorge actually not be whiny tattletale and have an honest convo with Jane, and by having Jorge’s contributions be bigger & comparable.

#jane the virgin spoilers #spoilers #Jorge Garcia #jane the virgin

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bluephoenixdruidicprincess · 6 years ago

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Legacies 1x12, There's a Mummy on Main Street -- Review

I bring you another episode of Lega-Trash. And considering how this episode says it in the title -- it's all about mummies -- you would think I would like this episode since the Brendan Frasier Mummy films are my favorite films of all time (excluding 3, I refuse to acknowledge that film's existence) but this episode, real shocker, was beyond boring. This episode just kept dragging on and on. It brings shame to the Mummy genre.

This is going to be an honest review of my thoughts and feelings regarding Legacies, the spin-off of a spin-off that should never have come to pass, but here we are. I'm not a fan of this show, have never pretended to be one, so if you're looking for Legacies positivity, this is not the place for you. Move along, this is not meant for you. I'm very critical about this show. Keep in mind these are my thoughts and feelings about this mess of a show. Opinions are never right or wrong. I'm not telling you how to think and feel. You don't have to agree with my opinions but I would ask that you respect them, please. Also, spoilers for the episode. So if you haven't seen the episode yet, watch the episode and then come back...otherwise, read at your own risk. But let's be real here. I'm sure my followers who end up reading this have no desire to watch this show and use my ramblings in these reviews as a substitute for actually watching the show...those selfish jerks...just kidding, I love all my followers and please, only watch the show if you really want to. I'm making a sacrifice watching the show so you don't have to.

I honestly don't know what to say about this episode that I haven't said before. It's not even so much that Legacies is a "bad" show (well, I mean it is) but the real grievance I have with this show is just how damn boring it is. 10 minutes go by and you feel like it's been 30 minutes. Everytime I watch an episode, it's the longest 42 minutes of my life. Beyond all the rampant misogyny disguised as feminism, beyond all the lack of understanding pertaining to mental illness, beyond all the cringey dialogue, this is just a boring show to watch. The episodes are badly structured, it barely has a plot, and most of the characters are either dull and bland or just super annoying and unlikable (and in Hope's case, both). Really, these episodes should not be 42 minutes long. There's not enough story to the "monsters of the week" to warrant 42 minutes and the character drama occurring isn't interesting enough to hold my attention for the remainder of the time. I think what really bothers me about this show's formula is that the monsters have very little to do with the internal character struggles within the narrative. A good Motw show incorporates the monster as a tool to explore certain themes within the characters' development, plus also adding onto the show's seasonal mytharc and plot. But that isn't the case with the show. The monster and the character drama are always kept self-contained and separate from each other. And that's not a good formula for a MotW show and I think that's why the episodes feel stilted and badly structured. The episodes are missing a sense of cohesion that would make you enjoy an episode all the way through. And then you tack on the show's other problems and it just becomes a mess.

But anyway, enough with the rambling. What happened in this episode? Alaric feels guilty about letting a slug infect him and causing him to throw the urn into the river so he's on a mission to get the urn back. He realizes, somehow, that the urn is stuck in a dam near this small town so Alaric takes Dorian (the therapist's boyfriend), Emma (the therapist), Hope (because why wouldn't he) Kaleb (the teenage vampire who loves feeding on humans) and Josie and Lizzie. Don't ask me why Alaric thinks it's a good idea to bring teenagers along with him on this very dangerous mission, we all know he's a horrible headmaster. But anyway, the group ends up in this small town, Dorian goes scuba diving for the urn and there's a mummy on the loose going after the urn and bringing lots of African hornets to help it out on this venture. After this town gets attacked by hornets, some government operation shows up to give aid but it turns out these are the people in charge of Malivore. They ask for Alaric's assistance in dealing with the mummy (that's where the Charmed Ones come in) and compelling the townsfolk into forgetting everything (that's where Kaleb comes in). The mummy gets taken care of, it pops up for round two, it gets taken care of again. The government organization makes a vague threat about paying a visit to the school and Alaric and the teenagers leave. But not before getting the urn back as Kaleb compelled one of the government peeps to steal the urn and give it back to them. But unfortunately, they end up giving the urn back to the shady government organization as said organization is holding Dorian and Emma hostage. So this entire episode was a waste of time.

Now let's get into the drama of this episode because this show being a MotW show is a farce, this show is a soap opera, plain and simple.

So there's drama between the Charmed Ones and we're finally starting to see some sort of female something build between them but it's still pretty weak and pretty bland. And yes, I'm calling them the Charmed Ones because that what they are. JP doesn't have a single original thought in her head, we all know this. But basically Lizzie is angry with Hope for being on this trip with them because once again, Hope is infringing upon her time with her father, there's that abandonment trigger again we all know Lizzie has. Lizzie accuses Hope of setting a fire in Hope's room on purpose a few years back that lead to Lizzie losing father-daughter time with Alaric because Alaric then had to deal with the fallout on that. Hope is adamant that she did not set that fire, why would she because she also lost half of her belongings including the only drawing she ever made with her father. And Lizzie also accuses Hope of being responsible for spreading a horrible rumor about Lizzie's bipolar disorder as this fire incident was what lead to Lizzie's first manic episode. Hope swears up and down she did not set that fire and she certainly would never spread horrible rumors about Lizzie's disorder as she also hails from a crazy family and she could just as easily have these kinds of issues. And here's what I don't like about how the show approaches mental illness. Having a family who have displayed psychotic behavior causes you to be crazy. I don't like that. And I don't like that Hope feels she can compare her situation to Lizzie's. They're completely different situations. All the horrible things that the Mikaelsons did, that all came from vampirism. Being a vampire wasn't what made them horrible people who needed redemption. That was a product of specific situations, and really there's very little proof beyond Hope's self-entitled narcissistic personality that she's likely ever to display. Before the Mikaelsons became vampires, they were relatively stable. Hope is relatively stable. She's bland and irritating but stable. The things that the Mikaelsons did that were bad were a result of specific situations leading them to make those decisions, if Hope doesn't have those kinds of situations, it's entirely possible she won't display their kind of behavior. Basically, if Hope ever goes dark, it's most likely less of a trait she inherited through blood and more of a learned trait. What's going on with Lizzie is something that's completely different, this is something that's manifesting within her own body. This is a chemical imbalance inside of her brain (which is a popular theory among the medical community on what causes bipolar disorder) that causes her to make the decisions she does or lose control. I certainly don't excuse Lizzie for any of the things she does as a result of her disorder but what's going on with Hope and what's going on with Lizzie are two completely different things and should not be compared on the same level. Plus, I don't like the insinuation that because you have a crazy family, that means you're privy to bad behavior or a mental illness or on the flipside, if you don't have a crazy family and you have a mental illness, then you're just crazy.

But it's eventually revealed that Josie was the one who started the fire in Hope's room. Josie had left a love note in Hope's room basically saying she had a crush on Hope. Josie immediately regretted it and was ashamed for doing such a stupid thing but couldn't get back into Hope's room to get the note back so she used a fire spell to get rid of the note but the spell overshot and caused a massive fire. I don't understand why Josie had a hard time getting the note back considering all the insane things we've seen magic do in this franchise but I guess teleporting an object is just too much for this world's magic system, that's where the line is drawn. But wait, there's more to this drama. Josie felt so ashamed and didn't want Lizzie to find out that Josie actually spread the rumor about Lizzie's disorder and told Lizzie it was Hope. Her reasoning is that she was worried that if Lizzie ever found out about the note, Lizzie would try and destroy Hope because that's what Lizzie always does whenever Josie forms a connection with anyone else. So once again, we're making Hope and Josie these pure and innocent creatures and painting Lizzie in a horrible light. I just, I don't even know where to start. First off, Hope is super intrigued to learn that Josie had a crush on her and Josie's response was, "well, who wouldn't." Considering Hope has no friends and indeed in the previous episode, it was remarked on how weird it was to see her socializing and gasp! being friendly with other people -- I find this really hard to believe. And also, why is it necessary for everyone to love Hope? If you needed further proof that Hope is Elena 2.0, here it is. Everyone loves her for no apparent reason and it's remarked on as, "who wouldn't love Hope?". Well me, for starters, but that's beside the point. So moving on, while all this kind of sort of tracks and kind of sort of works even though it's at Lizzie's expense, it's not how I would've done it. Because Josie is continually becoming so one-note on how pure and perfect and innocent she is with her only flaw being her co-dependency, I would capitalize on her co-dependency flaw here. Here's how I would approach it. Josie was noticing that maybe Lizzie and Hope were starting to aknowledge eachother and starting to become friends and she got jealous. I actually could kind of see a potential playful teasing kind of frienship between Hope and Lizzie if cultivated. Josie has spent her entire life being so co-dependant on Lizzie that the prospect of Lizzie moving on and not needing her help anymore was a frightening thought for her. Josie exists, at least to her, to be there for Lizzie and Lizzie suddenly not being there and taking away Josie's sense of importance caused her to lash out a little. Maybe instead of a love letter, she sends a hate note or something saying to stay away from Lizzie but after she left the note, she immediately regretted it and was ashamed about it and but couldn't get into the room to get it back so she tries to use a spell to insinerate it but an actual fire starts, the fallout happens, Lizzie is angry they lost time with their father and out of Josie's own anger she makes a comment to Hope about Lizzie's disorder and it all goes from there, thus eternally making Lizzie despise Hope and Josie got what she wanted, Lizzie's continued dependance on her. Basically, I want to see Josie in more of a selfish light. I want to see that not only can she be selfish but it can also be petty and childish and vindictive much like Lizzie's behavior can be. While it makes sense that Lizzie's narcissism can play into jealousy, it also makes sense that Josie's co-dependancy can play into jealousy. Josie is selfish in the sense that she needs Lizzie to be dependent on her dependence and if Hope were to endanger that, Josie may have a difficult time being faced with the prospect if finding her own worth. Thsrd are selfless ramifications in co-dependency behavior but there are also selfish ramifications in co-dependent behavior.

We also get treated to this line said by Dorian while he and Emma are on a date. "You wouldn't have worn those shoes if you didn't like me a little." I don't speak for all women here but I don't choose to wear high heels for anyone else but me. I like the way they look on me, I like the way they make me feel, I don't do it for anyone else's gain but myself. You, good sir, can take your misogyny and shove it where the sun don't shine. And then it gets worse at the end of the episode where Emma comes clean about kissing Alaric while being infected with the slug. And this leads to Dorian punching Alaric and quitting. Good riddance, he won't be missed. But I'm sure he'll be back to rain more misogyny on this show. And the whole escalation to the punch is really weird. The slug doesn't possess you. It lowers your inhibitions which means there was a part of Emma that wanted to kiss Alaric. And I don't think Alaric even knew about Dorian. It was just two people getting caught up in the moment, I'm certainly not defending Alaric or Emma here but hey, sometimes it happens. Plus, I get the feeling Emma and Dorian haven't been together very long so was all that really necessary? Did we need to go all caveman and be all, "How dare you touch my woman, I must defend her honor and also prove she has no agency in her decisions". JP's feminism at her finest.

I'm also confused on the plot of this show. I don't really understand what Malivore will do if it's opened. It'll unleash all the monsters locked inside and somehow that brings an end to all supernatural creatures?

I'd give this episode a C. It's more of the same. A blah episode in a blah show.

#anti legacies #lega trash #lega-trash #legatrash

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