#i never watched s3 bc it happened?? in the middle of a fucking season?????

[inanimatestrawberry]

its been 4 years. do i rewatch IIs2 to watch the new episode.

[ashesandhalefire]

two weeks later and i'm still blindingly angry over all of this and it feels so unbelievably stupid to be This Upset about a television show about aliens that's on the god damned CW network but here i am!!!!

venting below the cut bc i need to get this shit out of my brain

this season has been so frustrating and seeing all of the "oh, but the hand holding scene was nice!" and the "i'm glad they finally mentioned the song!" reactions have just grated on me so much because for me it just wasn't remotely good enough. i know people want to talk about the stuff that makes them happy and not get bogged down in the bullshit, but i'm tired of having to find the silver lining, of having to give them the benefit of the doubt, of doing these mental gymnastics to put a positive spin of "well at least we got this."

compared to the previous seasons, the version of malex that we got in s3 feels entirely soulless to me.

like, we start with these characters having been apart for a year, and they don't even get a real reunion. max and liz get this whole extended Only People In the Universe moment outside the crashdown where it's all about the emotional impact of seeing each other again after so long while still harboring all these unresolved feelings for each other. the night we motherfucking met is playing. but malex get this stupid 'watch you make out with your non-boyfriend from afar' scene, and then they never talk about it! it's never addressed! what is that??? you set up this angsty moment to get vlamis to cry on camera but you didn't think it was important for the characters to follow up on that emotion at some point??

we never even find out what was happening in that year they spent apart. we get this vague explanation of alex 'handling' project shepherd, but we never find out what that means. what it actually means is that the writers were bored with it and had no idea what to do with it after making the Worst Possible Decision to kill jesse off in the s2 finale in the Dumbest Fucking Way, so they just fucking wrote it out. but they didn't take into consideration that a FULL YEAR is a long time to be working on DISMANTLING A SECRET DISBANDED GOVERNMENT OPERATION TO KIDNAP, IMPRISON, TORTURE, AND EXPERIMENT ON ALIEN LIFE FORMS. what the FUCK was alex doing??? how the fuck big was project shepherd?? and why was kyle not involved???

so alex is off doing whatever he's doing, and michael is in roswell, apparently learning to deflect questions in the mindscape and just waiting for alex to come back. have they spoken since michael left in the middle of the song? unknown. does he know that alex has apparently had this casual relationship with forrest going for the last year? apparently not!!!! so michael and alex presumably haven't spoken in a year, but michael has decided that the time is Now and that's just all there is to it. reason is not important.

so in the aftermath of The Non-Reunion michael gets to be the Sad Boy again but alex is also a Slightly Sad Boy now, and then we get the actual reunion three goddamn days later. and tbh i don't like how tyler and vlamis played the drive-in scene. it was too hostile and aggravated for a reunion scene. and tbh it wasn't written as a reunion because the writers couldn't be bothered to dedicate a scene to their relationship that clarified where they stood with each other like echo got. instead we got michael's trauma being dumped onto alex again and alex being ridiculously harsh about it in return, and we're supposed to say thank you because of the Supreme Character Growth that they didn't just immediately tell each other to fuck off and die. which tbh they probably SHOULD have been telling each other to fuck off because they hadn't spoken in a year and they were both being shitty.

and then we wait another few episodes and they're fighting again and there's even more of the same miscommunication that comes off as unbelievably cruel, and then we end on this cliffhanger note of michael being right outside the building where alex is being held at gunpoint, and it all amounts to nothing. they go their separate ways again without speaking.

and then they finally do work together, and michael's like FUCK YOU, YOU LIAR and alex is like everything i have done i have done for you [eyebrow wiggle] and i'm just supposed to be like yeah! yeah that random flirtatious energy fucking tracks! who gives a shit about the fact that season two ended with alex singing a love song dedicated to michael in a crowded bar and michael walked out in the middle and alex took that as signalling that whatever relationship they had was over and started making out with someone else in public and didn't speak to michael for a year! who cares that michael spent a year apparently believing that he and alex were going to be getting back together and had no idea that alex was actually dating forrest! who cares that these characters weren't remotely on the same page when we left them and weren't remotely on the same page when we picked them back up and we didn't remotely see them getting on the same page during the season! they're there!

and then not only are we suddenly getting this version of alex that is supremely confident in the direction of his relationship with michael, but we get alex saying "i'm doing what i'm doing because i'm doing it for our future" and michael just fucking stares at him. no fucking reaction. idk what vlamis was going for there, but it was flat as fuck. this is the first time all season - IN EPISODE MOTHERFUCKING EIGHT - that michael has had any clear indication that alex still wants to be with him. and there's NO REACTION.

so we romanticize alex's military service a little, hit a man with a truck, and we're back to making out! whoohoo! that really makes all of the shit from seasons one and two totally worth it! it's not like their issues have always been deeply rooted in communication and shared trauma and i was waiting for them to talk to each other about literally any of the things that have kept them apart for a decade! alex grabbed michael's hand and promised to tell him about a useless alien artifact! that's basically the same thing!

so now they're back together and alex works on the machine and almost dies and michael swoops in with the 'i've always got you!' and that's a nice line but it ultimately means nothing. that's not a thing for them because they're almost never around at the same time for michael to have to save alex from anything. there was the kidnapping (which was majorly fumbled) and this lockheart machine thing. that's it. 'always' my ass. again, all flash, no substance. and it doesn't even come back in the end! we don't even have alex in danger by the end of the season to say, see, he did save him again! haha! that's fun!

and now it's like 'oh look they have breakfast at alex's house!' okay, fine. 'oh look they have a talk in michael's bunker!' okay, fine. 'oh look they have a talk in alex's house.' OKAY FINE. but it's taken ten episodes in this season and they're barely saying anything real to each other. alex tells michael not to be afraid of his past, which is either hilariously un-self-aware or intentionally using himself as a reference point (neither being made implicit or explicit by the dialogue!) like, okay, fun role reversal, but this isn't the catharsis i've been waiting for from them. this may be surprising, but i haven't actually been waiting two and two-thirds seasons for michael and alex to unpack michael's secret biological parentage. and the show can't decide where michael's self-worth issues come from: is it from his time in foster care? is it because of his newly discovered parentage? is it because of the secret alien ability he's apparently had since he was eighteen but never mentioned and/or used? so i don't even know how to unpack all of that and/or how it has affected his relationship with alex because they keep saying "it's this. but he's working through this now <3. actually it's this, but he's working through this now <3. actually, we lied, it's actually this, which he's been hiding for a decade and is working through now <3."

and the conversation on the couch is nothing. it's just nothing. at the time, it was like, oh, great, they're saying things to each other! but i look at what they're actually saying, and it's fucking NOTHING.

first we get this weird "my actual family" line that throws me because michael and alex actually HAD a whole exchange about family in 1x12 that we have still not touched on again. so it's fine that they're trying to say that alex helped him find his tried, but it's careless and sloppy to word it in a way that makes me go, wait, what? alex stood in a building that was about to blow up and said michael was his family, and michael has never talked about that again, and now we're going to talk about dallas being his real family? not even max at least?

and the rest of the conversation is just more nothing.

michael says what amounts to "hey, last season sucked for us! felt bad, scoob! this version (which has not actually amounted to a whole lot thus far) feels better (for reasons we cannot and will not put into words). but it's also * ~ * ~ C O S M I C ~ * ~ * lest anyone think we're forgetting our motif.'

also they lean really heavily on this "we're not the same kids we were in high school" narrative, and i think it's weird because the problem wasn't really with those kids. those are the kids that fell in love. those are the kids that saw each other suffering and offered each other kindness even though the world had doled out an endless supply of cruelty to each of them. and yeah, they got fucked up at the end and made bad choices and didn't know how to cope, but i still think the phrasing was doing a lot less than they thought.

and then michael calls back to the song like that was a moment they would both be thinking of fondly and not like alex should be like "oh, you remember that? because you kinda WALKED OUT IN THE MIDDLE AND WE NEVER TALKED ABOUT IT" and then he does the hated full name direct address that haunts my nightmares.

(and this is a stupid thing because i like the kiss just fine but it's also filmed so strangely??? like the whole scene is this intense closeup of the two of them on the couch and just really pushed in, and then the kiss feels like they're both sitting straight on the couch and trying to turn their heads as far as they can to make out and it's like... why would you do it this way?)

and then the Scandalous S-rated eight seconds, half of which are blurry because of max. will his crimes never stop.

so the situation is currently that michael and alex are having sex on a couch while max is calling to tell them that liz, heath, and the racist sheriff nobody gives a shit about have been kidnapped. but the next time we see michael, he is at a tactical strategy planning session with EVERYONE EXCEPT HIS LITERAL WAR VETERAN BOYFRIEND. and there's no mention of alex, despite the fact that michael must have been with alex when he found out. alex just POOF disappears from the narrative for an episode, and then we wrap up with whatever the fuck those last two episodes were.

alex "i would burn the world down" manes doesn't go looking for michael when he's kidnapped, despite the fact that he already tracked jones once and in the very next episode isobel and rosa are like 'yeah we all use find my friends lol.' alex "i would burn the world down" manes is relegated to poking the outside of the lockheart machine with a screwdriver and giving max a pep talk during their MAYBE THIRD(???) scene together EVER while his boyfriend is bleeding out somewhere. michael 'i always got you' guerin doesn't have a single scene with alex after frantically having his stomach wound sealed up with office supplies because he's so worried that jones has gone after alex to get the lockheart machine. what the fuck is that.

and then we get more tinkering with a radio alone in the bunker because apparently it's all alex is good for. i don't know why he would innately be good at this in the first place, but apparently he's now Designated Radio Repair Guy. but this conversation at least gets closer to what i want with michael saying that he's afraid they're only getting the beginning of something. if they'd actually expanded on the fact that they've both wasted a lot of time, it would have been great!

but instead it comes back to this drama that tbh i struggled to understand the emotional weight of so late in the season. like, my problem is that i just don't understand why michael cares so much that jones is his dad. and maybe that's coming from a privileged place! but michael is thirty years old and jones is a literal supervillain and michael is like WILL I STILL LOVE MYSELF IF I HAVE TO KILL HIM (which wasn't even a thing. liz was going to kill him with The Science from The Spores from The Lab That Got Burned Down By Max or whatever.) and like... yes, you should still love yourself. you don't know this man AT ALL and he has literally murdered HUNDREDS IF NOT THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE and you are IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE WHO HAS AN EVIL FATHER and should GET THE POINT BY NOW. but maybe that's just me lacking empathy, idk.

then, in the crime of crimes, the i love you gets cut off! for no reason! why is this still not something they're saying to each other??

and then via the various means the teleportation that 3x12 and 3x13 regularly employ, alex is back at deep sky to tase max to save kyle but doesn't actually hitch a ride with max and kyle when they saddle up and ride out to the Big Battle. and then when literally everyone is hanging out at the bar, alex is still Off Tinkering With The Machine. and then we get this stupid fucking scene in front of the statue that AGAIN means NOTHING.

we have not unpacked michael's trauma about his hand in a meaningful way. they tore down the shed, but they haven't said two words about what happened inside. michael hasn't talked about max healing him without his consent. have they even talked about the bunker fight? i have such a headache that i honestly can't remember. but 3x13 is alex unwrapping the handana because it's time for the Beautiful Moment of walking hand in hand down an empty street with the massive specter of jesse's untarnished reputation looming over them forever. oh, sorry, i mean-- they beat him!

this is the so-called cosmic romance? this is the relationship that's being given equal weight to echo in the narrative? this is the journey i had to be patient for?

sorry but how many times do i have to kiss the ring before i can call bullshit

there was no equal treatment, no equal importance.

echo got shit this season but all of the characters were CONSTANTLY bringing it up. there is a CONSTANT awareness of the importance liz and max hold in each other's lives, and that is NOT true for michael and alex unless the character in question is a villain who is throwing the relationship back in their faces. michael and maria were constantly constantly together in group scenes, constantly being talked about by other characters. isobel and liz couldn't keep their goddamn opinions to themselves. alex and forrest kissed twice in public and went on like two or three on screen dates and had the 'we're sprawled out in bed' scene. meanwhile, we don't even know for sure which characters know that michael and alex are back together because almost every single one of their moments - romantic or otherwise - takes place totally isolated from everyone else.

so they barely have scenes, they have no real meaningful conversations about their relationship, their getting back together development is a speedrun from fighting to making out with no real emotional beats, and they don't even try to integrate their relationship into the overarching plot. why am i supposed to say thank you for any of that??

[piratemadi]

please make your critical post of supernatural those are literally the only posts about supernatural i care about, especially since i side eye the heck out of the many people who give supernatural a pass because they ship two boring white dudes (dean and castiel) PLEASE

omg ok nobody make fun of me for posting an earnest criticism of this show i enjoy critical analysis and being a hater

i think most of why this show sucks has already been covered pretty thoroughly but these r the main things abt it that piss ME off.

the racism runs so SO deep. supernatural is supposed to be an exploration of americana thru horror (and i’ll give them that. like the idea of deconstructing america and all its fallacies thru horror is genius and in competent hands it would be absolutely incredible. but anyway) but it only really scrapes the surface of what is inherently horrific about americana! something like that is supposed to be an INTERROGATION of monstrosity and how america (and western society more broadly) creates monsters out of human beings and how white christian morals are established as the ONLY acceptable morals and how anyone who falls outside of those norms (non christian, non white, lgbt, people with substance use disorders, prisoners, the poor, indigenous people/cultures etc) are monsterized, so to speak, because of an oppressive and unloving colonial society. like u cannot have a horror narrative abt monsters attacking family values and white suburban life without invoking some very old and racist conventions! but instead of subverting that supernatural just reinforces it! it consistently fails to make any kind of real statement because the most demonized parts of society are the people who are also treated the WORST in canon! native american beliefs are stolen and turned into stupid bogeymen without the show ever featuring a native character or seriously grappling with the inherent violence of america as a colonial state, black men are consistently portrayed as angry and evil while black women are treated like shit (dean’s happy ending at the end of s5 is with a white woman he fucked one time instead of with the black woman who he was in love with??), impoverished people are mostly ignored and when they’re not theyre monsters (theres one episode centered around a poor rural family that commits murder and cannibalism. no supernatural stuff or monsters. just poor people. thats the scare).

theres this consistent fixation on preserving american suburbia, on saving “normal” (read: white middle class) people and it sets up this dynamic of like. the “real world” is the white middle class and then there’s hunters including our mains who defend that “real world” against monsters and demons, which is just Everything Else. and the writers PRETEND to struggle w the question of monsters and what makes one but they just toss it around without ever actually committing to answering that question with compassion or narrative coherency. they have multiple episodes about characters who were raised human, who want to be human, but have to be killed because of an inherent evil nature. there’s a plot in the early seasons about how one of the main characters has demonic powers, and instead of saying that doesnt make him inherently bad and he’s allowed to fully access all parts of himself without being fundamentally evil, they consistently frame intrinsically neutral traits as inherently evil specifically because they go against a christian ideal of morality! and eventually he learns to suppress these powers and that’s that!

and then it establishes christianity as the guiding principle of america, not in a way of like “american culture and history is deeply steeped in white supremacist protestantism that has led to incredibly fucked up views on god and love and morality and thats what we have to deal with as people who live here”, but in a way of like “the christian god is real and he’s a white guy who fucking hates you.” which like. Ok. they bastardize and trivialize any religions that arent christian while building the entire series on christianity. Ok. like i guess its possible to write stories about white christianity without implying that every other religion is full of shit but supernatural did not do that on any level

its also just. really poorly written. i genuinely loved the first season i thought it was really well paced and that the characters were introduced really well like the first season is a GOOD horror story in terms of family as horror and the inherent terror of americana. but the pacing and the character development started tripping up in s2. by s3 they started raising the stakes Exponentially which honestly is such a kiss of death for good fiction like every season mounting a bigger badder antagonist than the last one is the surest way to kill a story bc it means the earlier entries in that story become basically meaningless in the face of the new bad guy. u dont need to raise the stakes to write a good story! a well written story abt the horror and drama of a close knit and unhealthy family caught up in something they don’t really understand isn’t Less emotionally resonant than, like, having to stop the world from ending, because at the end of the day its Fiction and none of it matters beyond what u can make the audience really Feel. im not gonna feel sorrow if 7 billion fake little people die. i didnt cry when the death star blew up whatever planet it blew up. what DOES make me feel sorrow is a few truly well written characters whose relationships are complicated and tragic and whose motivations i can understand and whose inner lives i can imagine. raising the stakes destroys a good story and thats exactly what happened to supernatural (not that the racism and misogyny and american protestant moralizing wasn’t killing it already)

also, the misogyny makes the female characters basically impossible to watch. like not a single person on that show is a good actor (except sterling k brown love u king u were the best actor that show ever saw) but they didnt even give any of the women anything to work with. its literally so cringey to watch any woman onscreen except maybe like. bela talbot and she was treated like utter shit.

god. you know that expression dont fall in love with potential? i dont do that w people i do it w fiction. i came off black sails and the untamed and frankenstein and i watched the first couple seasons of supernatural with my friend and it was like...there was so much room for it to SAY something about monsters and how society creates them thru violence and how deeply horrific american protestantism is. like theres so many questions and concepts that it brought up that it never actually SAID something about. shithole of wasted potential. and yeah dean and castiel is stupid there i said it

[gra-sonas]

I really wish people would stop saying that they want Malex endgame but support A/F because Alex deserves a little bit of "love" or "happiness". It's just such a weird choice of words imo. Do they think he is not going to be loved and happy with the love of his life who he is cosmically connected to and the random guy he's known for two days is his only chance. Also I don't believe someone can be truly happy in a relationship if they are in love with someone else.

I don't believe someone can be truly happy in a relationship if they are in love with someone else.

Exactly!

I mean, after S2 I kinda understand where people are coming from who just want happiness for Alex.

The show kept Alex in a rather “unhappy” place during S2, he wasn’t allowed to “move on” or have some fun with Forrest while Michael was occupied elsewhere. And they ended the season on such a dumb note for Malex - Michael walking out in the middle of a LOVE SONG in which Alex stated that he doesn’t want to keep score anymore, that he wants to meet in the middle, and that he’s ready to be with Michael. Michael was also made to leave before he could hear that in Alex’s eyes, Michael is the best of him. 

That’s the former show runner’s “gas-lighting” in full force. For 2 years, she was  relentless to tell us (on the show and social media), that all the trauma and misery that happened to them in their past makes them “not good” for each other, and that they are “not ready” to be with each other, no matter how much they CLEARLY still love each other.

It’s complete and utter garbage imo, and such a warped idea of “love”.

“Love is messy!” is what we were told. And while that can be true (on TV in particular, the more messy, the more ~entertaining 🙃SureJan.gif), love is also the power that helps people overcome differences, helps healing old wounds, and it’s a driving force behind forgiveness.

So far, Alex and Michael have never been allowed to even attempt to be together and live their love. They’ve been denied conversations, they’ve been denied a chance to work on making a relationship possible. But sure, they are “not good for each other”. Only being with other people will provide them with “happiness” and help them develop into the people they have to be in order to be “good enough” for each other. Give me a fucking break. 🙄

I know, this is TV, but it’s driving me up the wall. So far, they haven’t done what rl people would do: TALK. I mean, sure, they’ve talked, but they never had much of a real lengthy conversation about them, they’ve never really looked at all the trauma and what made them hurt each other over the years (esp. now that the alien secret is out of the way and they are free to talk about everything) and whether there’s a way they might be able to overcome what’s in the past to make it work in the present and future.

Blaaaah, enough with this bullshit. Instead of keeping them apart and making them be with other people, I’d much rather see them work things out between them. That would be way more satisfying to watch than half a season of Alex being with Forrest - for what? To go on a date with a guy he’ll truly love? To have a temporary boyfriend he’ll never fully commit to or can be open with? To have some “lighthearted fun” for once in his life bc being with Michael can never be that (a notion I 100% reject)?

I absolutely don’t dislike Forrest as a character, and I could’ve lived with a Forlex relationship happening in S2, but I don’t want it in S3. I just have zero interest in them as a couple, I have zilch interest in the “triangle” this creates (again), and I don’t want what little time we have (10 episodes out of 13) seen wasted on a relationship that won’t go anywhere.

The only way Alex and Michael can fix things between them, is by spending time with each other and talking about them and everything that happened in the past. They won’t do that, while Alex is in a relationship with someone else. 

Nah, I’m happy to welcome Forrest back as Alex’s friend (no benefits), he could be the connection to Deep Sky (not to make him a bad guy, we know nothing about DS, they still could turn out to be allies or whatnot), all fine by me, I just don’t want a Forlex relationship that will inevitably take away precious screentime from Malex.

[asotin]

what're your thoughts on castlevania (the netflix show, not the game, ive never played the game) what do you like, what don't you like? make it as long as you want. i don't care if i have to scroll for 5 minutes. go feral (personally trevor is extremely hot and i would like to date sypha. i'm not really into alucard's whole sickly victorian child aesthetic, yknow?)

oh god this is way too long, but you did say to make it as long as i want, and i have a lot of thoughts that i need to inflict on the world

i played two castlevania games, both from the nintendo gameboy era, so please don’t get mad at me, gamers

details below the cut, but since i’ll be talking about season three, i need to preface this with content warnings for mentions of: graphic violence, rape and sexual violence, racism, and the holocaust

before i get into it, i usually don’t go for alucard-type characters either, but knowing that he was redesigned to be bishounen sexy specifically because the boring, middle aged man look he originally had in the games wasn’t appealing makes me enjoy him. and he’s fun with trevor and sypha

do like:

the voice acting

it’s all good. i can’t think of any characters whose voices were awkward or fit poorly. they don't make sypha’s va use the standard flat affect or false high voice women tend to be assigned, trevor sounds suitably worn out but not monotone, and alucard sounds exhausted but in a sexy way

and the spanish dub is killer, arguably superior

the animation & design

it isn’t full-on artsy, but it’s definitely got a distinctive style that’s easy to look at. the color use and effects are gorgeous. it’s a story set in the medieval era, and the mixture of desaturated and oversaturated elements works so well with that

dracula’s castle and the belmont bunker aren't revolutionary in design, but they didn't need to be. they're suitably creepy and empty, and i enjoyed them

the monsters were unique enough to have obvious different types, and the scene where a monster commits blasphemy in a church by accusing a priest of committing blasphemy was good writing

lisa

she shows up to a stranger’s spooky home and scolds him for being rude. she really looked an ancient vampire in the face, told him he had no manners, then had a kid with him. what a phenomenal woman. 11/10, no notes

“start with me, and i’ll start with you.” you know what? i’d fall in love, too

dracula

this ancient, unfriendly vampire let a human woman walk into his home and tell him he’s got no manners. and that made him fall in love with her. just like that. lisa walked in and handed him his ass, and dracula thought “oh i love her”. and when she was killed (more on this in the bad section), he raised literal hell to destroy the world for doing it

speaking of lisa being killed, it fucks me up that it happened because she convinced him to leave the castle and experience the world. he left her alone to see what she loved so much, only to come back and find that the people he’d come to like- the people lisa had loved so much it drove her to help in a way that got her killed- had burned her at the stake. i love a good tragedy, and that’s good tragedy

the way he weeps when he has to fight alucard?? during a showdown in their home?? the “i must already be dead” moment in alucard’s childhood bedroom??? when he speaks to lisa about killing their boy, her greatest gift to him??? poetic cinema.

the trio’s dynamic

three bisexuals with two total brain cells and only alucard bothers using them. incredible

i went so hard for this ot3. it's right there and so good

sypha

she initially seems to be assigned the role of the adult™️ ie she's the only woman and gets stuck being responsible, but surprise! she’s just as annoying and dumb as alucard and trevor. she dropped a castle she didn’t understand on the ground and didn’t think too hard about it. then she argued about breaking it. i love her

if we don’t get an ot3, then she needs to have a dumb gf

alucard

he's got a stupidly low neckline and lower pants. they really leaned into ayami kojima’s redesign, as they should have. his little curl annoys me, though. why the fuck does he have a random section of hair that’s like three inches long when the rest is shoulder length or longer? love that he really looks like lisa

if you say he's canonically bisexual and polyamorous, no he isn't. yes he is. no he isn't :)

trevor

disgusting. a nasty man whose appearance mirrors his state of mind. he's 50 mental illnesses in a dirty jacket and his coping mechanism is… alcohol? maybe? he’s a mess, and i dig it

him trying his trick of kneeing alucard in the balls during their fight? and finding out it doesn't work? (which…… why doesn't it……?) juvenile but suitable

hector

his love of animals makes him my favorite. normally, i won’t touch anything with this much animal death, but i’m willing to set that aside because hector loves them so much. he’s so sweet and kind, and he loves his monster pets

yes he sided with dracula and has some really fucked up ideas about what constitutes humane treatment of people, and yet i love him. 11/10, but i have a lot of notes

isaac

i support him, including his murdering and his decision to support dracula. dracula throwing him out of the castle to save him was so cruel in that it was an attempt at kindness from a man who hated the whole world, but it was against isaac’s wishes

his time with the captain was great

idk enough about islam to know if he's portrayed correctly and haven’t seen any complaints, but given the show’s track record……… i wouldn’t be surprised if it’s not great

the forging

very cool. fresh and interesting! hector creating pet friends is cute and heartbreaking. love isaac for his dedication to reducing, reusing, and recycling

season 2’s big battle with all those vampires

the new version of “bloody tears” is phenomenal

this goes back to the animation, but listen……. it's so good. i loved the smoke vampire, and alucard’s fluid wolf transformations. his flying sword looked really good, and incorporating them together? super good to watch. and trevor’s whip?

the type and level of violence are suitable for what it is. it would be weird for a gritty show like this to be bloodless, but i don't think it would work if it were bloody to the extent of a slasher. it's also more clean violence, if that makes sense. you don’t linger just to look at gore; you see it because stabbing someone spills blood. the games weren't about extended, gritty scenes of realistic murder, so the show sticking with quick, slice and dice type fights fit with what i remembered of them

please watch this fight if you don’t remember it or haven’t seen it (part 1, part 2)

trevor’s whips

trevor’s weapons don’t follow the physics of normal whips, and they shouldn't. they’re heavily stylized and clearly a fantasy weapon, but they still have rules that they (mostly) have to obey. his morning star-whip hybrid in particular is so good 

it’s easy to follow, too. a lot of times, speedy weapons disappear, which is an understandable effect but one i find boring because there’s nothing for me to do. i’m just sitting on my ass with nothing to do

trevor’s whips don’t disappear. they’re fast, but you can always see them. and they have weight! you can see them slow down and gain speed. i don’t need physics to be real; i want movement to be pleasing, and that’s exactly what i get with the whips

don’t like:

fridging lisa

she could have been kidnapped (possibly make dracula think she was dead bc people want to lure out her scary demon husband, idk), then s2 could have ended with her and dracula reuniting as he died. she and alucard go on a trip together to attempt to make amends for the pain dracula wrought in lisa’s name. orrrr she dies a tragic death with him and we’re left to hope that they find each other in the afterlife. do vampires get to go to the afterlife? can alucard reintegrate? can he be happy with his new friends? or will he go back to his crypt and sleep again? will he ever be rediscovered? if so, what will he do? deep questions. i would prefer to cogitate on these instead of experiencing the shitshow that is s3

season 3

they should have ended it with dracula’s death. the quality of storytelling goes down immediately. just plummets. i’m sure there were problems in the first two seasons, but this one is so bad, i genuinely can’t remember

but i may as well get specific, so here we go:

abandoning alucard

trevor and sypha leave their friend alone in his childhood home where he just killed his father. where they helped him kill his father who, as i’ve said too many times, raised literal hell to get revenge for people burning alucard’s mother to death

yt they don’t talk about alucard. they don’t make any plans to touch base ever again. trevor’s entire family got killed. sypha’s culture, from which she’s now estranged, is family-centric. if ever two people should give a shit about alucard and know why alucard shouldn’t be left on his own, it's them

so what the hell is going on?

trevor and sypha’s relationship

look. it could be good. it would be better with alucard but they could be together and it could work fine

but this……….

trevor hates what they're doing. he hates traveling around and fighting. he's clearly tired and deeply depressed

sypha not only doesn't care enough to address it (did they forget the first two seasons?? sypha is annoying partly because she doesn't stop poking people) she might not even notice? yes, she's having fun, but trevor is basically dead on his feet in front of her

racism

hector, sumi, and taka all got done dirty 

sumi and taka

i hate the way they died. i hate that i’m certain that the plot won’t bring japan back into the narrative (or if it does, i don’t trust it not to be shitty). i hate the fact that by killing them off, i’m not going to get any more of them. they were interesting!!

speaking of the japanese vampire: the biphobia, arguably, given what happens with alucard

the addition of sexual violence

i don’t need or want lenore. if all she’d done was manipulate hector, i could have lived with that. she’s a villain, so she does bad things. that’s the point. but what she did was a massive escalation. we hadn’t had any sexual violence, and then the last few episodes gave us 

tumblr feminists who love her for how she treated hector need to be quarantined until their brain worms have been cured

everything that happens to hector

what was this shit? why did i open my netflix app and tap castlevania and find them making this man walk around naked in the cold to torture him? and starving him? he got manipulated, degraded, chained up, collared like an animal, and raped. and why? to show us how bad lenore is? that the other vampires are bad because they let her do it? i didn’t sign up for this

the holocaust reference

the imagery at the end of s3 when it’s revealed that the judge has been killing people he’s decided are undeserving to live and collecting their shoes in that barn was chillingly close to images of shoes taken from victims of the holocaust. there's no reason to invoke the holocaust here. it’s unnecessary and in bad taste

[xianglingslesbian]

oh I'll give u a character alright: Izuki, Kiyoshi, Riko and Aomine <333 technically that's four, but what goes around comes around (I'll keep this circle of love goin forever buddy)

VICCCC ily my man <33 thank u!!! aight putting this under a cut bc it got long

Izuki

Why I like them: izuki’s just overall so amazing! he inspires me to give my best in the stuff i do, and although it sounds a bit silly i try to be a person that he’d be proud of. his puns are hilarious and well-thought-out (as a person who loves words and word jokes, i’m naturally drawn to him lol). they’re also a way to take the heat off the team, he’s so hardworking and never views obstacles as obstacles, rather as hills he must climb to find newer skies. he’s also rather clever and employs his brains to great effect when his body fails him! izuki embodies the meaning of ‘eagle’ in the truest sense - waiting to strike when the time is right and not failing when it is.

Why I don’t: *sweats* can’t really think of a reason i don’t like izuki, at all??? i guess he can overwork himself a lot and tends to keep his true emotions hidden which could lead to misunderstandings between friends (although this is totally headcanon territory lol)... i also didn’t like the ableist comment he passed on hayama (“i’m just glad you weren’t smarter than me”). but i think he can (and will!) grow from that kind of stuff, he is that kind of person so yeah no particular reason for me to dislike him at all

Favorite episode (scene if movie): how dare you make me pick s3 e8 izuki vs kasamatsu, hands down. i know its like cliche or whatever but that moment just told me so much about izuki as a character? he’s willing to do what it takes to win, he’s adaptable and dependable and he doesn’t let shit get him down ever. it’s gorgeous

Favorite season/movie: s3, he got some fantastic moments in there!! although i will say i loved the spotlighting he got in s1 in the seihō match

Favorite line: “Fear isn't a bad thing. There are some things that can only be done by cowards.” this is first of all such a nice thing to say. ‘fear is not bad’ is just... so fucking wise? keep in mind that this boy is 17, i’ve met 30 year olds who are less mature. secondly it feels like izu’s speaking from experience?? like he has a lot to be scared of, i’m sure. particularly of falling behind and being a burden to his teammates. but it’s that ‘cowardice’ that drives him to practice so so hard. that visceral terror of weighing on seirin is what pushes izuki beyond his limits - which is why here he can empathise with furi’s fear, and knows how best to employ it.

Favorite outfit: look i hate last game w/ a passion but that lil tie/shirt/hoodie thing he had going? that was literally so cute. izuki in general has a p great fashion sense but his last game outfit takes the cake <3

OTP: hyuuizu oh my god i could talk for years about them but since this post is gonna be very long i’ll refrain. just. they are perfect they are fucking perfect

Brotp: kiyoizu!! kiyoshi is izuki’s biggest enabler and i love that for him <3

Head Canon: izuki can be very very passive aggressive when he’s angry at someone/sad and gets cold and withdrawn. it’s not fun to experience but tbh if you upset him you probably deserve it

Unpopular opinion: izuki should’ve been naturally better in canon. it’s not fair to shaft him and give the ‘trier’ thing off to himuro. that being said i am p happy with who he is as a person

A wish: i want to know how izuki felt after middle school! izuki’s and riko’s backstory focuses so much on hyuuga its dumb >:( he also would’ve been demoralised but he didn’t quit bball and i would like to know his thought process!

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: i. uh. i guess izu quitting basketball. because i genuinely cannot see that happening. it brings him so much joy, he should never stop cold turkey. i can imagine old man izuki hobbling about a court giving little kids pointers and making them laugh T-T

5 words to best describe them: “big brain caffeine-powered clown baby” 

My nickname for them: babyzuki/izu/shunshun

Kiyoshi

Why I like them: lots of reasons! kiyoshi is an admirable person. he’s strong, yet friendly and gentle, and he loves his team above all else, which i just find beautiful. i find his manipulative side also pretty cool, bc it shows off how multifaceted he is.

Why I don’t: this is more of a fandom reason but i really dislike how kiyoshi is always said to have had the greatest impact in hyuuga’s story. he badgered and manipulated hyuuga, and while some may argue hyuuga needed that push, it only worked bc hyuuga had had time to think about shit. he’d also been given space by riko and izuki (two integral parts of his life whom the fandom looooves to sideline for uwu kiyo//hyuu). 

Favorite episode (scene if movie): yousen match (can’t pick the episodes)! i loved the backstory we got for kiyo vs mura and i loved how kiyoshi was willing to smile and play but also refused to lose. he truly stole the show despite kagami being the one to finally take down murasakibara, it was gorgeous <3

Favorite season/movie: s2 for sure. kiyoshi wasn’t allowed to shine much after yousen imo - all the focus was on hyuuga kagami and kuroko, and to a lesser extent izuki. not complaining, but yeah

Favorite line: “Let’s go have some fun.” i know it’s kinda cliche but i do love how kiyoshi’s always thinking about playing a good game and enjoying basketball. he wants to play because he loves it and as someone who loves a sport as much as kiyoshi loves b-ball, that love is so poignant and tender

Favorite outfit: practice clothes! kiyoshi looks great in pink <3

OTP: kiyohana. hateshipping amirite ;)

Brotp: kiyohyuu! i love them as friends so so much <3

Head Canon: kiyoshi is half-iranian on his mother’s side and is muslim. i won’t say too much because i am not muslim myself, i need to do more research into this but i’ve had this headcanon for quite a while now!

Unpopular opinion: he should be bullied more for the fact that his canon power is having yaoi hands

A wish: kiyo finds something he loves as much as b-ball. he can’t canonically play at this level again, so if he found another sport/competition/anything, it’d be amazing

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: he should never become demoralised. kiyoshi at heart is a dreamer, so let him dream, let him look towards tomorrow with a smile always

5 words to best describe them: “useless dreamy dumbass cheerleader clown”

My nickname for them: kiyoyo, bc my feelings about him have yo-yoed a lot lmao

Riko

Why I like them: im a lesbian, next. /j i love her because she’s so tenacious and driven. yet she’s also kind and gentle, and never loses her humanity. she cares, and she cares hard. she’s so fucking smart too like... coaching a hs basketball team at 17 against players of NBA calibre and making them win? i could never. seirin without riko is nothing.

Why I don’t: i dont like the constant slapstick of her beating up her boys. also, i dislike how the narrative forces her to act ‘feminine’ and then has the boys think of it as nothing. like first of all if someone like her offered me a kiss i would so take 100, and secondly... why is a girl’s worth so tied to her femininity? it’s awful

Favorite episode (scene if movie): her sending in furi vs kaijō, early in s3. it was an exceedingly smart move that could have only come from her knowing her players’ strengths and weaknesses intimately, and being a brilliant coach. just amazing <3

Favorite season/movie: all of them! riko has some amazing moments each season, so i can’t really pick

Favorite line: “Humans grow. Don't act like you understand when you don't even realize that!” here, riko knows and knows well that she is in her element. momoi might have the data, but riko understands adaptability and knows how to predict stuff. in that way, one can draw parallels between takao vs izuki and momoi vs riko: takao and momoi are recon experts, whereas riko and izuki are strategists. momoi uses raw data; riko manipulates the data to her advantage

Favorite outfit: idk if this is exactly an outfit but her glasses are so cute oh my gosh. (i’d kill to see her in a leather jacket tho)

OTP: rikomomo!!! i’m 100% sure that momoi’s fixation w/riko’s boobs is just... repressed lesbian sentiments. also sports girlfriends gimme

Brotp: hyuuizuriko. i hc that hyuuizu were tgt since elementary school and riko joined them in middle school so... childhood friends feels!

Head Canon: riko knows how to shoot a gun. her father owns one so it makes sense

Unpopular opinion: riko does not need to have bigger boobs in fanart. please stop sexualising a 17 year old girl

A wish: white suit riko please

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: her ever leaving behind sports in any way shape or form. it’s her thing. in the same vein, she should never have to change herself or become more traditionally feminine to be ‘appealing’

5 words to best describe them: perfect perfect perfect perfect perfect

My nickname for them: ai/riri

Aomine

Why I like them: aomine is just a pure, hurting young man that deserves help. he’s passionate, and his fire died down out of no fault of his own. that fire’s reignition through kagami is one of my favorite scenes <3

Why I don’t: he’s perverted as hell and i dislike that. it plays into the ‘brutish dark-skinned pervert’ stereotype which is yikes. also i thought we were done with pervs in anime

Favorite episode (scene if movie): s2 seirin v touou when kagami enters the zone!! aomine’s finally happy and it’s so amazing to watch <3

Favorite season/movie: s2, he finally got happiness and peace of mind

Favorite line: “You’re the best!” there’s just so much of pure joy in this line. he’s so so beside himself that he finally has someone he won’t destroy. kagami sees aomine the person, and that person is so happy, it’s beautiful

Favorite outfit: the leather jacket from the finale lmaooo he looked so cute

OTP: AOKAGA BABY i could write an essay tbh

Brotp: aomomo!! theyre such good friends and bi/lesbian solidarity too!

Head Canon: aomine cannot dance. he has stepped on kagami’s feet multiple times. he has also attempted to twerk when drunk. kuroko recorded the whole thing and uses it as blackmail in case the puppy eyes and “but aomine-kun you didn’t fist bump me back” don’t work

Unpopular opinion: more a fandom thing, but you all need to stop making aomine the aggressive/possessive top/‘seme’. it’s racist as fuck

A wish: aomine goes pro. it’ll be amazing for him, a huge challenge and kagami will be there too so its a win-win ;)

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: he quits again/b-ball loses its allure. aomine at heart is someone who needs passion to drive him so i just want that passion to always burn bright within him

5 words to best describe them: “bastard baby needs a hug”

My nickname for them: dai-chan, momoi rubbed off on me

[initiumseries]

Which parts of BTVS did you not like and how would you have changed them?

Yes! Great question. 

So, if I’m being honest, most, if not all, of my issues with BTVS start after she graduates high school. I feel like the show lost the magic of the Scoobies bond and the older they got, the more distance we had from them as characters, the more OOC it felt like everyone started behaving, So, I’ll start with s4, buckle in this is gonna be long lol.

Season 4

So as usual, I like the idea of season 4. The gang has graduated, they’re growing up, and trying to find their place in such a big pond. On top of that, the Initiative is on campus (which makes sense, you can’t just blow up a high school and there are no repercussions for that, and it’s kinda cool the idea of instead of a govn’t lockdown, they infiltrate Sunnydale and are running experiments to weaponize demons. Clever, fun. I like it.), and ofc Buffy’s given up having a normal life, but now she just wants a normal relationship, and doesn’t even get that. I’m on board. Especially the idea that the gang inadvertently drifts away from each other because that’s real. That happens when you go away to college, even if you go away together. So my issues, are rooted in the details. 

Maggie Walsh turned into this weird obsessive surrogate mother, who wanted to get Buffy out of the way, except the execution was so sloppy. I LIKED commanding, no nonsense, bitch monster from hell Maggie Walsh, and I would have liked to see that follow through in how she attempts to dispose of Buffy, and how she handles Riley. She becomes this soft, weirdly maternal unhinged force after trying to kill Buffy, and I don’t really understand why. I would have liked to see more of that motherly role, while still rooted in that commander in chief sort of aura she exudes when we first meet her, when it comes to Riley. I also thought her death came too soon, like they just didn’t know what to do with her after she executed her function *coughs in the Anointed One* of creating tension between Buffy and Riley (which, honestly, his being in the Initiative at all would have been enough conflict if they had leaned into that without stuffing so much stuff in there). I definitely would have had Maggie maintain that strength and authority, while softening where necessary to emotionally manipulate Riley. I’d make it really clear that Riley is deeply confused because we believe the hold she has on him, and withdrawal on the drugs would have been a nice touch, but I think it came too soon. Which leads me directly into: 

Super cool. I remember when I first watched this on TV and the gang finally rebonded (after a HILARIOUS episode of them finally addressing their conflicts), they’d reached the climax with the Initiative and Adam and Buffy does a very Sailor Moon thing of all the different emotional strengths of her friends bond together to give her enough power to defeat Adam. LOVE IT. 

Except what’s the point? Prof. Walsh created Adam...for what exactly? We never really get a clear, salient reason for that, bc they kill her, and Adam’s exposition is...not sufficient to explain why she had an off the books project to stitch together a...demon son. It’s weird and especially because Adam doesn’t really do all that much, it really leaves me wondering like, what was the point? For me, I feel like, instead of making Adam a spectator for a lot of the drama that takes place in s4, I would have preferred him be the driving force. behind most things. 

Also: Riley’s Black friend would not have been such an angry misogynistic raging asshole because I’m tired of Black people being The Worst to make the white characters look better, more reasonable.

I would have needed a stronger explanation for Adam trying to turn Riley into...whatever that was. 

Willow would have been bi and I absolutely would have, if I went in that direction, had a much more fleshed out discovery of that fact (Because in this world Seth wouldn’t have left lol). I also would have made sure Willow and the actress who played Tara would have had the chemistry they deserved.  

Anya would not have stayed in Sunnydale. She would have left. She was a poor man’s Cordelia and had 0 character growth or interest. 

Season 5

Again, love the ideas. Suddenly Buffy has a sister we ALL knew wasn’t there before? A God shows up? What I love(d) about Buffy is that the escalations felt so natural? Like it didn’t feel like the show was like HoW dO wE oUtDo oURsElVes aGaIN?! It felt more organic like, well, yeah, the govnt. Oh shit, a GOD? D A M N! And Glory had personality! She was crazy! And it also matches alongside Buffy’s coming to grips with her own abilities. She’s one of the oldest slayers on record at this point, watching her in s1 and in s5 you SEE, her skill level is above and beyond, and now she meets a foe that still provides such a challenge, Buffy is scared. LOVE IT.

So Spike, getting neutered, was interesting at first, but it really starts to wear out its welcome for me, about this time. My problem being, he poses so little of a threat, that all his scenes start to feel like filler and not like they’re driving the plot forward in any useful way. His obsession with Buffy becoming sexual, was INLINE for Spike, but I liked Spike because he was a DICK, he was also dangerous, and after a lot of hilarious moments in S4, watching his basically creep around Buffy’s house and try to manipulate her into spending time together (which felt soooo pathetic to me in a way I didn’t like) and like, the Buffy bot (fucking ew) all season was just, not a fun time. I think, for me, I would have had Spike maintain his dignity as a character and I absolutely would not have had him threaten Dru’s life to drive home his obsession for Buffy. Ew. Yuck. Cringe. I just think there had to be more that Spike could do this season than run around chasing Buffy’s coattails. 

One again, Tara/Willow. Tara had no character development (even in an episode that was created to provide her with development? I definitely would have made use of that episode to create more ACTUAL depth for her character) so then to turn around and have her become mindless for basically the REST of the season, is just, rude lol. And because they have no chemistry and their relationship feels so...baseless, when this moment happens, I don’t feel anything. I don’t believe WIllow would be this angry, this heartbroken, this devastated that she’d take in such dark magicks and blindly go after Glory. I’d believe it if it were Oz, but Tara/Willow do not get the same level of build up and relationship establishing for me to buy this. I would have changed that.

Unpopular opinion, but I also would have made Dawn less of an UTTERLY irritating, shrill, whiny, screaming white tween. I get it, she was supposed to be the baby. But I get nothing from watching a white girl who is mostly just bored and irritated with her life, start shoplifting from her sister’s friends and in general, because she’s kinda sad sometimes. Get a grip. The only time I feel bad for her is when she finds out she’s not real. Actual problems. Wicked, I’m on board. But I think I would have just made her less fucking annoying and whiny and a lot more sympathetic. She still could have been frustrating and bratty, but in a way that was a bit more likeable, so that in those moments where she’s *genuinely* struggling, you feel for her on a broader scope. I would not have made her do all of those incredibly infuriating, incredibly stupid things, like running away in the middle of a dangerous situation. Because it ends up reading to me, like Buffy’s anger, frustration and criticisms of Dawn aren’t her being too hard on her as the eldest, as the Slayer, but accurate because Dawn is a horrendous nightmare of a new human being with no real redeeming qualities. Definitely a better ways to execute that. 

Also, I feel like this season is where the Scoobies drift again, but this time we aren’t really addressing it? Buffy’s dealing with Joyce getting sick, Riley being a POS, Spike stalking her, and she never leans on Willow for any of it. They never even really talk about any of the things going on. It’s such a missed opportunity to lean back into the core gang navigating growing up together. Willow is now basically the guardian of her new partner, and again, we don’t really see WIllow lean on Buffy at all. And Giles is preparing to leave, which, to me, felt organic. He felt like Buffy had outgrown him, but I think he was also trying to rediscover himself, but is pulled back into being a Watcher and he seems both grateful and disappointed. I would have liked to, I donno, make that a little clearer. Also what is Xander doing at this point? He’s outgrown his usefulness as well, so he kinda just becomes a hanger’s on. If Xander doesn’t just leave Sunnydale after s3 or 4. He needs to do *something*, he should have been reintegrated into the group in a new way if it wasn’t through school. 

Season 6 

This is so hard. I feel like this season is just, SO dark, SO heavy, and absent the levity that had been established up til s4. But it’s also really earned. Buffy is going through it. The layers are wonderful. I LOVE IT. But I also needed like...emotional breaks? And this is also kinda where I needed the scoobies to feel like scoobies, and trying to figure out how to help their friend.  Xander and Willow have been friends their entire lives, and season 3 really fleshes out that emotional shorthand they have, but it’s so quickly abandoned in s4 and onward. Suddenly Willow/Xander feel like strangers with Anya and Tara between them. I feel like there should have been more moments of Xander and Willow just..being, and struggling with Buffy’s loss together in a way that only the two of them really understand because like Buffy said Xander has a piece of her that Oz, and so then Tara, can’t reach. That should be a constant thoroughline. Xander should have been the first person to see something wasn’t quite right with Willow and the magic. 

Giles should have left earlier to give more time between him leaving and Buffy coming back. I like the idea of Giles beginning to build a life for himself in England and literally dropping everything once he found out Buffy was back. I emotionally hate the conflict of Willow threatening Giles, but I like it as a character development issue, and Giles definitely should have side eyed Willow, maybe even brought up his concerns later with Xander. 

I think I also would have had Spike leave Sunnydale and come back when Buffy does. I didn’t need a reformed Spike, and it would have been interesting to see him ingratiate himself with the group now that Buffy is back, and he’s the only one who sees how much pain she’s in. 

I HATED Warren and the group. The disgustingly overwhelming and unchecked misogyny and Warren was INSANELY unlikeable. I don’t need to like him, but I needed some catharsis way before we got it. He was HORRENDOUS. 

Even in death, Tara is bland. 

Willow’s magic addiction legit comes out of nowhere. I needed more organic build up than Amy, who has been a rat for like 3 years, suddenly being like “hey I know this guys who can give us magic drugs!” 

The chasm between Willow and Buffy this season would have hit if they hadn’t been distant since s3. 

I think we needed the seeds for Dark!Willow planted a lot earlier like I described. 

Also a lot more evidence that Willow was running away from her nerdy past because when it comes up here, it’s completely left field.

This would have hit harder if they still felt close. 

Season 7

Fuck man, the whole thing was awful. But I ESPECIALLY would have thrown out that left field retcon of Buffy having been in an asylum. I lost sleep over that shit lol.

 But I would have totally rewritten season 7. If Spike’s involvement was necessary (it wasn’t), then I absolutely would not have had her defend him against Wood and Giles. I would have had her treat him extremely coolly. Like a tool they require. There would have been *some* level of redemption for him that was believable within the confines of his character, but not so much that we forget he’s an assaulter.

 The Potentials would have been WAY fucking less horrendously annoying and I really would have leaned into conflict avoidance with the scoobies that reaches a peak when Xander loses his eye. Giles and Buffy would have renegotiated their adult parent/child relationship in a far healthier way and we would have had a lot more interiority with Buffy like we’ve had, pretty much since the show’s inception. 

Angel would have been there when Buffy was isolated and alone, not Spike. Because #bangel4lyfe lmao. They still woulda kissed as a “greeting” lol. Buffy would not have told Spike she loved him, or that she ever loved him. She woulda told that dude thank you and dipped out of the cave lol. 

[littlespoonevan]

same anon, i’ve watched teen wolf since i was in middle school, which was 8-9 years ago and i’ve always shipped stydia. i never understood the sterek ship so are you able to explain why you ship it (if you do ship it lol)

welp, you’re in luck, anon! because i actually wrote a 7.5k meta on why i ship sterek back in the day when i was trying to explain it to my friend lmao. i wrote it after 3b so nothing from s4 is included but i figure it’s got all the major stuff! now i absolutely don’t expect you to read all of that (but i’ve linked it if you’re curious) so let me try and write you a more concise explanation right now asjkdfha

for context, i also started watching teen wolf 8 years ago but i guess i’m a little older than you because i was going into my final year of school at the time. i found out about teen wolf from tumblr so naturally, i was Very aware of sterek before starting the show. (i didn’t know all that much though bc from the way people were talking i legit thought they were together but also thought scott was derek for a hot minute there lmao). they’re not the reason why i started watching and within 20 minutes of starting the show i realised they were Not in fact together and that lydia was sort of set up as stiles’ love interest.

i’ve never had problem with stydia at all. like i said, i expected them to end up together and bc i knew sterek wouldn’t become canon - no matter how much i wanted it to - i was actually very capable of multishipping back then lol (for instance, i really liked stiles/erica, stiles/cora and derek/paige, derek/braeden). my reasons for not really shipping stydia romantically mainly lay in the fact that jackson and lydia - fucked up, though they were - absolutely owned my heart and that stiles and lydia’s friendship dynamic that was set up in s3 was so Special to me that i really didn’t want it to change????

but anyway! that’s not why you’re here, i just really wanted to make it clear that i fully Respect your preference for stydia (i actually had a rl friend who shipped stydia but read sterek fic bc she thought it was really well written lmao) and that i don’t disregard the importance of lydia in stiles’ life whatsoever. so with that in mind, here’s some of the reasons why i personally was so taken with sterek over any other ship:

i love that it was an accident. like it truly was the circumstance of the show in s1 that if jackson and lydia had scenes together and scott and allison had scenes together then stiles and derek were sort of thrown together by circumstance and convenience as a result. and y’know, it’s a pretty standard dynamic: comedic foils whose comedy comes from the fact that they’re So polar opposite from the outside and that they’d never interact under normal circumstances. and like, there’s no doubt they annoy the shit out of each other in the beginning ok they truly do but idk if it’s hoech and dylan’s friendship bleeding through or what but there was something so Fun about their scenes always???????? like they always made me smile/laugh without fail from the very first time i watched and i personally feel like they bounce off each other so, so well, i just enjoyed watching them, y’know? and i do think it’s that natural chemistry that initially intrigued people to it as a ship (and the fact that that chemistry sort of came out of nowhere too? like no one was doing stiles/derek chemistry reads in the auditions lol)

they’re always saving each other. look, we all love a good enemies to lovers story and if tw were a fic and not a show, sterek had the perfect potential for that. i’m lifting what i’m about to say straight from that meta i wrote years back but i can’t think of a better way to describe this; they’ve got this actions vs words pattern throughout their development. definitely the first two seasons but also a bit in s3 too. so like, with derek getting shot with wolf’s bane, with derek realising peter’s the alpha and stiles is alone with him, with isaac almost attacking stiles on the full moon, with stiles holding derek up in the pool - they argue in or before all of these scenes. and especially early on they’re p much always threatening each other. but when it comes down to the moment of urgency when one of them might seriously get hurt/die, the other person always steps in and saves them???????? and it’s just So interesting bc it hints at the fact they actually might care for each other more than they’re willing to admit (to quote cora hale @ stiles stilinski: “why do you care?”). or if nothing else, it teaches them to trust each other which is so important for highlighting how their dynamic changes as time goes on? because this sort of leads into that final scene of 3b where derek imagines stiles when kate kidnaps him and a lot of people headcannoned after that that stiles was derek’s anchor or at least acted as his anchor in that particular moment :’)

they understand each other. i said earlier they were foils bc they appeared like opposites and, in a lot of ways, they are but ooooh boy in terms of personal trauma and guilt i feel like they identify with each other A Lot. we know derek blames himself for the fire bc of kate and we also know stiles blames himself for his mother’s death from his hallucination in 2x09 (and then later o,n though it’s not discussed much, he obviously carries guilt for what happened w the nogitsune) and i think that feeling of guilt and just the idea of them both losing family members at all puts them on a really interesting footing where they inherently understand this core aspect of one another bc it’s something they both feel (also catch me screaming at stiles knowing what happened with kate and referencing it to derek in 3x10 but scott not finding out til 4x02 rip)

and look, i could go on and on about the other things i love about them, about how beautifully their dynamic could’ve evolved along the enemies to loves trajectory if given the chance, but i think this is long enough already and i think these are probably my main three reasons :) like i said, if you want something more in depth, feel free to look through the meta i wrote previously (or ask me about a specific ep)! i don’t expect this to make you change your mind and suddenly start shipping them but hopefully it shed s a bit of light on why others do :D <3

[angelhummel]

wanted to get out some britt/ana thoughts before bed and they’re all negative so if you don’t wanna read them don’t read them. i’ll even put it below a cut so you’ve got no excuse if you want to avoid. anyway i don’t want your rebuttal or whatever klaine insult anon message you might send in retaliation bc i’ll delete it without answering like i have the last few so save us all the trouble. thanks in advance 

ANYWAy of course i’ve been thinking about this before in the wake of me realizing how much i absolutely hate brittany and how she is the worst character on the show for me. but watching thetrophymuncher react to the show for the first time as someone who’s never seen or i suppose even heard about it, and seeing the issues he points out, makes it that much more obvious to me

i’ll spare everyone my rehashing of why brittany is the worst character on the show. i know i’ve talked about it enough. but besides the fact that she is literally less consistent than quinn, she also just. does nothing. and to me, that’s part of why britt/ana fans think they have the perfect relationship 

i keep thinking back to the one gifset i saw that was that shady ass “happy anniversary britt/ana and klaine!” gifset that was all of britt/ana’s best moments side by side with klaine’s worst moments. and idk why but the one i remember the most is the wss cast list going up. and brittany is smiling and hugging santana and kurt is hugging blaine but also >gasp!< kurt isn’t 110% thrilled bc he also wanted the part of tony and he has conflicting feelings. the fucking rat bastard

brittany’s wants never conflict with santana’s because she has no wants. she’s a boring character and it makes their relationship boring. we’ve heard it a million times that no one wants to watch two characters sit around saying “i love you” all day but that is literally all they do. am i saying they need to fight to make things interesting? no. but no couple is going to get along 100% of the time. they’re going to butt heads eventually. i mean, they will if they’re actual individuals with their own thoughts and opinions, at least 

i hope this doesn’t come as a shock to anyone, but you are not your best self in high school. people grow and they change and that’s okay. it’s allowed, actually. but brittany and santana are such enablers of one another’s shitty behavior. they let each other be as selfish and bitchy and mean as they want and they don’t care. they let each other go unchecked and are just like “well we’re hot so it’s okay”. and the fandom is the same goddamn way, which is why i dislike them as much i dislike the ship 

circling back around to ttm’s reactions because that’s what made me want to word vomit this all up in the first place. when brittany was running for class president and he’s like “oh this will add a lot to her character”. It didn’t. During I Kissed A Girl and Santana’s coming out, he’s like “oh i thought they would at least focus some on Brittany and their relationship”. They didn’t. They have no scenes together, Brittany has no lines, Brittany doesn’t even sing the other part of the I Kissed A Girl duet!! 

Brittany has no conflict or arguments with Santana or anyone else because it would literally be like arguing with a rock. She is a blank slate that only comes to life to deliver some cringe one liner that creates an awkward silence before everyone moves on with their lives. The writers put no thought into her and it shows over and over again. And fans will jump through hoops explaining why she’s an amazing character and Britt/ana is an amazing ship, because all they care about is two hot girls making out

And the shit that Brittany gets away with in regards to Santana is absolutely astounding. Season one, she literally outs herself and Santana to half their friends, in the middle of a crowded school hallway. No repercussions because we had to save it for s3 when the same thing happened but this time It’s Serious. In s3 she literally leaks hers and Santana’s sex tape to the entire world (which, hello, child pornography?) and in s4 Santana says that tape will literally follow her for her entire life. But no, it was a totes sweet gesture and her heart was in the right place. And the whole thing about Brittany deciding which college to sign Santana up for and sending in the applications without telling her and giving Santana absolutely no say in her own future? I’ll tell you THAT never sat right with me, never will. And the one that re-sparked this whole feeling for Britt/ana is the gem of a moment in s3 where Brittany takes part in Mr. Schuester’s offensive as fuck number where he’s a bullfighter and she’s literally dressed up as a bull running and dancing across the stage while he sings. Bc y’know, culture 

And Santana delivers that whole speech about how offensive it is that he’s perpetuating these stereotypes and he’s so clueless that he really doesn’t know better. So where’s this for Brittany? We’re just ignoring her? I mean yeah we are, because she’s nothing. It’s like the whole thing of people trying to say she’s the sweet summer child too good for this world too pure naive little lamb that must be protected, but she’s also the math genius epic troll that’s always three steps ahead of everyone else. And that’s what makes me hate Britt/ana no matter how you slice it, and even dislike Santana when she’s with Brittany. Either Brittany is too naive to know what’s going on, and therefore Santana is taking advantage of her (“Which isn’t cheating because..?” “The plumbing’s different”). Or Brittany knows exactly what she’s doing at all times and is the one who’s manipulating Santana because, idk, she’s the fucking puppet master genius or whatever the fuck. Either way, she does some shitty, shady, stupid as fuck shit and gets away with it bc all people care about is two hot girls making out

Anyway wow look how long that was and how much I rambled. If anyone reads all of this I will be shocked. But like I said I just wanted to get some thoughts out and I don’t care for whatever argument you have against this bc it really just does not matter to me. Okay thanks goodnight x

[turbofhag]

I’m going to gripe a bit at length about the ending of Harley Quinn S2, since it aired on Friday. These were all originally tweets that I’ve copied and pasted over. I’m putting this under a cut since there’s spoilers. 

So, the pivotal part of my complaint: Harlivy is canon now. And that's awesome! I've been hoping that's where the show was going to go since S1E1. For most of S1, it felt like that was the direction it was heading, and I loved it. But were any gay people actually writing this? I ask because, you know what gay people DON'T want to see? Relationships that start out as weird tension, become a drunken mistake, and then get hastily slapped together - at the expense of someone else's happiness, that we're guided to feel sympathy for.

The ENTIRE TIME, the show was working on the idea that Kite Man = goofy & weird, pretty immature, but ultimately well-meaning (in context), enthusiastic, kinda traumatized (by his parents), and deserving of something better. Some of this was played for humor - but not completely. The joke AT FIRST was that Ivy was out of his league. But over time, they actually form a meaningful connection, that was tied in with Ivy processing her own trauma and trust issues - and for a comedy show, HQ actually did a decent job of connecting & showing these things.

I was never, at any point, really into the idea that Ivy + Kite Man could be a legit thing. Ivy's connection w/Harley always seemed stronger, despite Harley having growing to do (which she did - most of S1 was her processing her breakup. Done pretty well. Felt thorough.) But it seemed like the show wanted to stick to the idea that Ivy+Kite Man was viable. It spent a lot of effort exploring that & showing growth, showing support for each other, really making a case for it.

I chalked it up to the usual comp-het stuff and moved on, somewhat disappointed bc I was, as I mentioned, rooting for Harlivy, but frankly any gay person is used to this. 2 characters have a DEEP bond, but they don't end up together, because we've gotta have a straight romance.

But then - after all that - suddenly the show pivots to push for Harlivy after all. REALLY quickly. ABSURDLY quickly - to the point where it actually feels like it was a last-minute decision. The leadup of this essentially happens over the course of just a few steps:

-Ivy+Harley escape from Bane's pit and kiss in relief. 

-They brush this under the rug & chalk it up to emotions running high.

-They get drunk & fuck a couple times @ Ivy's bachelorette party. Ivy expresses some regret, but somewhat passively ('oh, dammit. not again' esque)

-Harley VERY SUDDENLY realizes she's in love w/Ivy 

-Ivy VERY BRIEFLY admits they COULD have a relationship, but that Harley is too emotionally reckless. 

-Harley goes back and forth on wanting to prove she's trustworthy, or accepting that and moving on.

-Kite Man finds out, is sad. Ivy tries to prove she's dedicated to him. They attempt to get married anyway. 

-Wedding is crashed, Kite Man changes his mind & breaks up w/Ivy. 

-Ivy basically goes "Oh well!" and she and Harley escape together, deciding they're a couple immediately.

It looks a little long when you see it listed in like that, but all of that takes place over essentially just a few episodes - out of 26 total - and EVERYTHING after Kite Man finds out happens in 1 episode, alongside a bunch of other show-typical shenanigans.

It's very jarring in a show that took an entire season and a half to let Harley emotionally process everything that happened with the Joker. They set an emotional pace for themselves (that I thought worked really well!) and then threw it into a blender. To go from that level of pacing and emotional depth to everything that happened with Harley and Ivy in the last half of season 2 makes the entire thing feel incredibly rushed and underdeveloped. It's a huge shame.

I can tell that the show was heading towards them being together from the beginning - there's definitely groundwork - but it feels like all that work was supposed to pay off not by the end of S2, but by the end of S3.

For a show that was incredibly dedicated to exploring a character's inner emotional process, and showing them struggle through multiple stages of emotional healing, it sure feels like they didn't want to spend that time with ANY character for the last part of S2. Ivy goes RIGHT from processing that her trust issues stem from emotional neglect from her father to doing absolutely no inner reflection on what she feels and why. It doesn't match the established pace, and it makes the whole scenario seem REALLY sloppy.

Essentially, it feels like they slapped a series of quick-fixes on a HUGELY important scenario they have been building up to this whole time, with the biggest and messiest being Kite Man deciding halfway through the wedding (& in the middle of an anxiety fit) to call it off. He says "You don't really want this, and I deserve better." Ivy admits that he's right, and then goes to Harley, and tells her she loves her. 

 And that's. It.

There's no inner reflection on Ivy's part about the differences between the lives she and Kite Man each want. There's no delving into how her past trauma plays into how she responded to his love. There's not any spoken reason for why she loves Harley - just that she "gets" her.

At the end of the season, the show's message is: these 2 women are perfect for each other, and the thing in the way of their love is gone. Happy ending! But the 'thing' in the way was a character they spent 2 seasons building up to be sympathetic. The show literally shows that the only way for this relationship to exist is at the expense of another person's happiness, and it's SUPER uncomfortable. It doesn't make sense, and it's frankly painful for a gay person to watch, since this is the only gay relationship in the show.

Kite Man gets cheated on and lied to by a person he's entirely dedicated himself to, someone he shared vulnerability and emotional development with. The show spends a lot of time on that development, but then doesn't develop the relationship away at all. It's not a pendulum swinging the same arc back another way. It's more like a bird being shot out of the sky. 

I feel like in this way, the show is cannibalizing itself - it's smashing its own efforts, in order to get to point B.

I don't want to see gay rep that's show to be at the expense of someone else's happiness. I want gay rep that has meaning and development, the same as the straight rep in the show. This wasn't that. This was slapdash as fuck.

This was INCREDIBLY fucking rambly so here's the tl;dr: 

 Endgame Harlivy wasn't given the same development as the rest of the show, and instead felt rushed, uncared-for, and actually mean-spirited. I'd love to write a 'fix' for it. The setup was good, after all. But, well....we’ll see. 

Anyway. Don’t watch the HQ show for Harlivy. Watch it for Bane. And Killer Croc knitting “GOD’S DEAD” beanies. But mostly Bane.

[thegeminisage]

5 headcanons for Arthur, Merlin, Morgana, and Gwen

ANON I LOVE YOU thank u

im doing these in reverse order bc i wanna save the best 4 last

GWEN:

i think she genuinely enjoys taking care of people. it’s a role she’s forced into a lot - she takes care of her dad, elyan, morgana, uther, even merlin and arthur once in awhile, even HUNITH - but i think she’s the kind of person who finds genuine fulfillment in doing that kind of thing (she picked FLOWERS for morgana just because), and if she hadn’t been the blacksmith’s daughter she would have made a fine apprentice to gaius herself

she’s a better rider than you. and arthur. and elyan. and morgana. and everybody

we never hear word one about gwen’s mom but i like to imagine she died just before gwen and morgana met (which i’m assuming happened shortly after morgana came to camelot) - and gwen, who had just lost a mother, could easily sympathize with morgana, who had just lost a father and was somewhere new and unfamiliar - and that’s why they became such fast friends

gwen is probably a few years older than morgana - i like to think she was morgana’s maidservant from the start, but i don’t think they would have let her be a maidservant to the king’s ward at age 10, so maybe she’s 3ish years older - not so much older she strays into big sister territory, but old enough to do the job required of her

nobody among the knights/guards really knew what to make of gwen or arthur’s feelings for gwen because she’s ??? just a serving girl ??? like they didn’t dislike her exactly and they respected arthur’s choice for the most part but they also didn’t know anything about her and couldn’t see why the fuck arthur would make such a stir over her when it would be so much easier not to. this changes 100% after gwen’s shenanigans with smuggling leon out of camelot; leon comes back singing her praises like ok ok i GET HER now y’all ain’t gonna believe how she got me outta that cell and on leon’s word (and because she’s elyan’s brother and he’s a knight now too) everybody else warms up to her too

MORGANA:

this is practically canon but she’s a lesbian, obviously. gwen was the first girl she had a crush on

this isn’t a headcanon exactly but i wish bbc merlin had had a better budget because you know who deserved a black cat familiar? morgana. like, aithusa made a wonderful foil to merlin’s relationship w/ kilgarrah and i would not wish aithusa’s fate on any creature let alone some poor innocent cat, but also, the IMAGERY...it could have been so good

this is also sort of canon but i think she dresses expressively, hence the goth look after she goes evil. @dellesayah​ & i joke about her “evil girl eyeliner” in season 3 but honestly look the way the girl wears 100% black in s4 and s5 i think the eyeliner was her own private expression of her inner angry goth post-poisoning when she still had to be wearing those colorful dresses to fool everybody into thinking she was the same good girl morgana in s3

same age as arthur. idk why most fics have her being older - tho i admit her being older but still not being able to inherit the crown is a VALID source of her rage - but if she was born w/ magic is makes the most sense for her to have been born after the purge started, aka after arthur. i guess it depends on when you think uther cheated on his wife lol. but i never really thought of morgana and arthur as having like an older/younger sibling thing - to me they were more like twins, so definitely within a year of his age, whether it’s slightly older or younger depends on how you feel that day i guess

wintertime birthday. i think arthur has a summertime birthday (more on that below) so it makes her a nice balance to him in that way

MERLIN:

the Most doting son ever. i imagine he had a few difficult teenage years (being a warlock and all) and that he still gets himself into trouble out of sheer stupidity sometimes but aside from that he was probably really well-behaved for the most part just because he didn’t wanna make his mama sad

autumn birthday, since we went there with morgana (to complete the quad in Balance, gwen’s would definitely have to be in the spring)

ok i know colin morgan had to like put on a nice “proper” english accent for the show because katie mcgrath didn’t have one but in my heart merlin sounds like a HICK (whatever the ye olde englishe/modern british version of hick sounds like, he’s it) and his accent only gets worse for all the time they’re at ealdor. like arthur THOUGHT it was bad he probably picked on merlin about it all the time but he had NO IDEA how bad it gets! none! and EVERYBODY in ealdor sounds like that except somehow EVEN WORSE! gwen and morgana think it’s UTTERLY charming but arthur is SO GLAD to get back to camelot and away from all that nonsense! and so then ok when they meet balinor in s2 (who speaks like a normal human being) he listens to merlin talk for 5 minutes and IMMEDIATELY knows exactly where the fuck he’s from. #hicksrepresent

merlin SAYS and BELIEVES he understands magic should only be used for great deeds blah blah blah but when he gets overworked and short on time, yeah, that armor’s gonna be polishing itself while he works on 4 other things at once - he just gets better at not being caught. it’s a great deed to keep arthur’s armor in peak condition, right? arthur says he’s a terrible servant but actually being magically aided he winds up being like...really good at his job, once he gets into the swing of it. he’s just fucking insubordinate always 24/7

*** ****** no i will not be taking constructive criticism

ARTHUR:

he knew they lied to him in 2.08. he always knew. canon evidence supports this in 4.03 he says “i lost both my parents to magic” listen to me he ALWAYS KNEW!!!

canon also semi-supports a summertime birthday - i read somewhere once that they made it a point to only show camelot in spring thru early fall so they didn’t have to explain why there wasn’t snow on the ground. arthur’s coming of age ceremony (which i assumed either followed or preceeded his birthday) was in the middle of season 1, which would have been mid or late summer, hence: arthur is a summer baby.

i really like the gay!arthur headcanon but i also think he and gwen have incredible chemistry and i really like their relationship so like...maybe gay with one genuine exception. also that boy EMBODIES internalized homophobia :( poor lad

fond of DOGS and sometimes HORSES but refuses to show it because that’s not very manly of him. he’s too into hunting to truly be an Animal Person but since you don’t hunt dogs or horses generally he has a very very secret soft spot

the writers didnt do this on purpose but in my heart i believe the reason he was willing to risk SO much to save mordred in 1.08 was because of what he did to that druid camp from 4.10......like at first yeah he tries to be hard-hearted about it & just do his fuckin job but i think once his conscience was tripped he couldn’t stand to see a druid kid die again under his watch for no good reason. he’d’ve never agreed otherwise, not even for a kid. he wouldn’t have ratted morgana out but he wouldn’t have helped her either

(send me a character & i’ll give you 5 headcanons)

[jancys-blue-bayou]

Yeah so Stranger Things 3 was painfully bad

Yeah yeah big negative post about ST3 coming up. Just... holy shit, my expectations weren’t exactly high but jesus I didn’t think it’d be this bad. Wow. Mindboggling to think it was made by the same dudes who made season 1, it feels like a different show. Some of the worst writing I’ve seen in a long while, parts of season 3. This got very long because it was very bad so it’s under the cut. Starting with the few positives and then away we go...

Of course there were bright spots, I thought what we got of Jancy was generally good (just wish there had been more of it. Just like... more lines between them, a few moments could’ve gone on longer...like after the awesome hospital fight scene jesus just let them fucking desperately embrace and profess their love for each other, it was awesome how they relentlessly kept going at the monster to save the other but can we please just have a few more seconds for a comfort moment after?) I liked how they handled the fight btw, apart from the Oliver Twist comment yeah yeah heat of the moment but still felt OOC with that loa a blow. Nancy and Karen scene was nice and um... well Max and El bonding was nice. And um... Mr Clarke! And I kind of dig Murray.

My main issues with it:

- The product placement. Jesus Christ. Okay, ST has always been a show with noticeable product placement. But it’s gone from things like a Coke can prominently on display on a table in s1 (El crushing it with her mind) to literally having a straight up ad for Coca Cola in the middle of a tense scene. That’s the big offender that made me go wow you’re really doing this to yourselves huh, there are many others ofc (everything at the mall ofc, Slurpees being in hyperfocus for a bit, and a lengthy talk about Burger King. These smaller things one by one wasn’t the worst but all combined jesus it was too much, all added together and then bam the Coke commercial was wow... Congrats on the like 80 sponsorship deals and esp the new ST themed arcade hall by Coca Cola hope it was worth completely selling out for.

- Relatedly, the original fucking song. Holy christ talk about jumping the shark. That was the oddest, cringiest, weirdest shit I’ve seen in a long time. Gaten’s a great singer don’t get me wrong, but there’s a time and place for it and an original song stuffed into the middle of the tense climax of the season is not it Duffers. Just a blatant cash cow, hoping to bring in more money via the song.

- Robin. Sorry but holy cow what a Mary Sue. Hey here’s this super cool girl who’s cool™ and funny™ and super smart™ and NOT Nancy (like they seriously for real said in a scene, they actually for real had to pit Robin and Nancy against each other for no reason). And she conveniently has these specific skills needed for the plot (which she gets involved with for no real motivation other than having nothing better to do, lazy writing). Said skills were so over the top unrealistic it completely sucked me out of it. To start with, this random girl in small town Indiana in 1985 speaking French, Spanish and Italian um... does Hawkins High have the most amazing language department or what? Very un-american in that case... and okay then, her knowing those languages wouldn’t help jackshit with understanding Russian. Russian is a notoriously difficult language to learn and it is not related to the Romance languages at all, Robin knowing those languages and oh, having “a good ear” bc she’s in band (?!??! what?!) wouldn’t help her at all. Having the alphabets on the wall and listening to strange words in a foreign language she has no understanding of would never work. No way for her to understand what is she’s hearing, what letters are in the words just, nothing. It’s completely ridiculous. The good thing is she’s a lesbian, crushing Stobin that made me LOL. Btw, I don’t get what age they were writing her as? She’s still in school but later says she and Steve was in the same class, and she knows who Nancy is but Nancy, who is still in school, doesn’t know her even though presumably they’d be in the same year at little Hawkins High? Was it just sloppy writing or what?

- Too. Much. Plotting. What happened to “this season is about the characters” um there was just so much plot stuff and action sequences and barely any character driven moments at all. Those intimate moments that made s1 amazing. Generally regarding plots felt the Russian plot was messy and not well-written also what happened to the US government as the big bad? Unless they’re setting up a big Cold War thing for s4. And felt the zombie thing was wasted, could’ve been used differently like I’d have thought it’d be used like the MF spreading it’s influence over vaster areas and being harder to keep track of etc.

- Too little Will. Will’s whole thing with feeling left out etc was just dropped halfway through it felt very undercooked. His arc was just dropped wtf.

- NO BYERS FAMILY INTERACTIONS WTF. The sequence in the first episode when Jancy has overslept and Joyce wipes the lipstick off Jonathan was cute (but could’ve been even cuter I’d have preferred a short fluffy Jancy moment here just as they wake up before they realize they overslept, bc we didn’t get much pure fluff, and then it’d been awesome if Joyce would’ve just called Nancy into the house to mess with them). But like... that’s kind of it. For the Byers family. Talking to each other in the whole season. When they partnered Jancy with the kids many thought awesome we’ll get Byers bros talking and teaming up (and Nancy and Mike) but there was just nothing. Not even a family hug after the battle at the mall, just Joyce hugging Will, with all this tightknit little family has been through you telling me Jonathan wouldn’t join in?

- No Will and El bonding wtf? SUCH a wasted opportunity. They’ve built this unique awesome connection over s1 and s2 and now in s3 would finally be able to bond normally for real and... nothing.

- Turning Hopper back into an even bigger jerk than he was at the start of the show, neglecting all his character development. What was the point of the whole El and Hopper thing they devoted so much time to in s2 if Hopper’s back at it with the yelling and all now? And jeez his constant whining to Joyce about every man she interacts with holy christ that got annoying. Generally Hopper was such an annoying asshole this season I was so tired of him by the time he “died”.

- TOO MANY CHARACTERS. Jeez, I know I’m on about it all the time but jesus christ there is way way too many characters in this for 8 episodes which hurts the narrative and screentime for interesting characters is just... yeah.

- Speaking of screentime, did we really need that many identical generic fight scenes between Hopper and the Russian guy? Jesus Christ it’s so boring watching fight scenes like that, so repetitive (compare to the hospital fight scene which was dynamic and awesome). Also regarding screentime did we really need to devote so incredibly much of it to Steve and Robin being comedic relief while drugged? Yeah yeah mix light and dark and all that but jesus christ at that point in the narrative shit has hit the fan lean into the dark.

- Totally expected of course but still, the furthering of Steve Memeington. My god they actually had him literally call himself daddy... christ.

- The Billy and Karen/all the other middle age women remains gross and bad in a billion ways. Also completely pointless for the plot, they could’ve come up with any other way to get Billy to the factory. And what did it give Karen in development? Just the realization that yeah I’m tired of my husband but I’m not leaving my family and I’ll stick with him just ‘cause? Okay but did we need her almost sleeping with a kid a year older than her daughter for that? Icky. Also the editing of the scene where Billy hits her was so weird. Also that was weird as fuck.

- The ending. Okay christ my main gripe with this is because of a point above: No Byers family interaction at all! Joyce and Hopper talk briefly about her thinking about moving once or twice but she never talks about it with her kids... obviously she did in the timegap but we need to see that to build to the thing. Having no Byers interactions the whole season and then just oop we’re moving is so weird. I’m also not sure if Joyce’s motivation for moving (her bad memories of Hawkins) would be enough. For sure an argument for it, but an argument against is the one Hopper presents to her (and though he’s not around still there’s still a support system around them there, especially for her kids which she loves above all). Speaking of her loving her kids above all, she knows they love their friends/girlfriend/boyfriend to bits, have walked through fire with them and are each others support system as mentioned, would Joyce really just uproot them from that? There’s also some purely practical things that stuck out to me immediately: the timeskip for the epilogue makes it so they move when the schoolyear is already well under way and Jonathan has started senior year, feel bad for Jonathan there in a number of ways. Also, how the hell did Joyce manage to sell her house and what did it fetch? Her rundown house on the outskirts of a now infamous town with an incredibly bad rep? Even if the buyer bought it for the land the land doesn’t look special, just find it hard to believe she could get much for it. And where did they move? Where did she find a place? And work? Did she have something lined up or? I guess we’ll see.

- Oh and speaking of work, that was another thing that was just dropped, the mall killing downtown and the protests just fell out of the story. But, with what happened to the mall wouldn’t business come back to downtown (possibly reason for Joyce to want to stay if Melvald’s going out of business was another reason to move).

- Sorry but Mileven took way too much space.

- Again, no Jonathan and Will actual brothers bonding. But a whole lot of Steve and Dustin meme fanservice wank.

- Erica is just the sassy black girl trope non stop the whole season and nothing else and it’s so grating and... I was gonna say disappointing but I had no faith in the Duffers regarding this. Just because a bit character becomes a meme doesn’t mean they need to become a main. *cough* Steve *cough cough* Sorry.

- Last but not least, the woobiefication of Billy. Uggggghhhh. Disgusting. And having Max cry over him WTF?!?!?!?!?! staaaaaaahp.

[applecherry108]

first of all hooooooooolyyyy shiitttt

FUCK tungle. it took like 30 tries to log in on desktop. admittedly, i was using the wrong password at first, BUT, even when i remembered the right one it kept giving me shit. This is what i get for being L337 i guess... -_-

anyways, im only on desktop so i can add a readmore to say:

i just,,,,,hate voltron. okay? It sucked. it fucking sucked. i watched the first season and it was like, okay yeah, this has potential. and then s2 was like, okay yeah not as good but maybe s3 will pick up...

s3 didn’t pick up. it was just one long death spiral by the same idiots who fucked up the atla sequel. i hate their writing, i hate their story plots, i hate how they butcher any good ideas they have, and i especially hate their inability to have good character AND plot development happen at the same time.

I got swept up in storm of klance and that’s about it. i have soft spots for other ships but at the end of the day i don’t care. i just don.t fucking,,, care???

the fandom is a mess, the crew was a mess, everything was a fucking mess from the get go.

Like who tf is this show written for?? it has to be for like, 8-10 year olds. It has to be. Everything is just so....stupid. Nothing is ever properly explained, motivations never really given, everyone is just a 2 dimensional cardboard cutout of a trope. And that pisses me off so much bc like??? other shows aimed at young kids can still have great world building. they can have good world building and characters and overall story and still be cheesy and a lil dumb. cheesy and a lil dumb is completely fine!! but voltron is just so...godammn... BORING!! it’s like i WANT to like the characters but its just so goddamn hard when everybody is so fucking flat. by all rights, i should want to marry allura. shes everything i loved when i was little, from her color pallet to her princesshood to her white fucking hair!! i should LOVE allura but i don’t!! i kind of hate her. why?? i don’t know!! shes so...boring! and flat! and fucking PASSIVE! everything in this show lands so fucking flat holy shit.

pidge at matts “grave”? yikes, that was second hand hard to watch for like.... “oooh this is so serious!” but the buildup wasnt there...it was kind of funny tbh... and HELLA awkward...

don’t get me started on lance and hunk. bolin was my favorite look character for the first few episodes and then he got knocked to Comic Relief and had maybe two (2) importantish moments. he/they may be part of the main cast but they’re not main characters. they feel like background props to the Actual Main characters.

which brings me to keith.

FUCK keith.

that’s my reaction after every! new! season!! is just,, FUCK keith. god the show functioned SO WELL without him. he’s just so...idk. i also don’t care. what was his character arc anyway? it SHOULD have been about learning to love and trust others but we only get that in lip service and speed run character development (i hate the quantum abyss...so much... like yeah, who cares about SHOWING our characters mature, let’s just tell that it happened in afucking montage.) if keith were a properly developed character he shouldve remained PASSIONATE and idk, run support?? that boy SHOULD have piloted red, end of story. period. keith doesn’t need to lead he needs to learn to TRUST others and that insludes trusting other WITH HIS LIFE. i won’t rant about how we should have had black paladin lance, but keith should have never ever been black paladin. even after he “matures” he still sucks at. he’s this awful,,little,, Shiro 2.0. and I hate it. i ahte it and i hate shiro just a little bit. even though he was arguably the most likeable character, he shouldve stayed dead. or missing. or whatever. he didn’t need to come back and they didnt need to make keith a little offbrand clone of him. i ESPECIALLY hate that they aged keith up 2 years for no goddamn reason other than to make him the Adult (tm). keith’s dedication to others was gre4at, but it should have, and im failing for this word here so forgive me, climaxed? cresscendo’d? whatever. /resulted/ in him playing support. not leader. lone wolf keith doesn’t need how to lead his pack, he needed to learn to HELP his pack. to be a TEAM PLAYER. he didn’t want the responsibility of leading bc guess what?? some people hate leading!! there’s nothing wrong with wanting to be support! keith’s entire arc is a huge mess of missed opportunities and a grand illustration that he is lm’s and jds’ favorite, just like fucking mako.

i won’t rant about mako, but just know i fucking hate him and the special treatment he gets, and good LORD does keith take over mako. keith isn’t space zuko he’s space mako and it fucking SHOWS.

okay, i’m losing steam here, but like.... so apple, why tf where u voltron 24/7 if you hated it so much? because homestuck was over and i needed a new hyperfixation. and i really had to force it for vld tbh. and at the end of the day, it wasn’t so much about the show itself as the potential of klance (or sheith, up until s3). between the interviews, the coding, the fucking EVERYTHING--it really felt like it could be canon. i knew in my heart it was queer baiting but i had HOPE dammit. hope that this could be killer representation, hope that these characters would delvelopment into something incredible. again, there was so much POTENTIAL. and all of it was wasted. everything really came to a head during the fucking game show episode. it was like lm and lds giving everyone who likes lance the middle finger, really driving home that “no no, he IS just stupid. he’s the comic releif. there’s nothing deeper about him and no one will stand up for him bc they all think of him as such.” and that just....broke my heart. we were so...SO close to lance actually mattering but nope! bolin’d again! and what was his purpose in s8? why to be an accessory to allura of course!

i’ve seen a lot of people really divorce themselves from canon and live solely for fanon, esp fanon klance but like.... i can’t. i just can’t. it’s so fucking hard to work with these cardboard characters. you can only draw so much depth onto them, you know? until the very last moments they had potential, but then it all got snuffed out. but who cares about canon? why bother with it? because! we don’t have a solid consistent fanon version of them! no one sat down and delivered the ten commandments of “here’s what we agree k and l are actually like” it’s stupid and it sucks because everyone has their own little differences and its so so tiring to basically be interacting with minutely different ocs all the goddamn time. canon matters bc it gives everyone the same base to work with. like a cooking showing with the same basket ingredients, but now it’s like.... ya’ll don’t wanna use the mandatory ingredients (and why would you? those canon ingredients are like, a century egg and spoiled sardines, they’re awful.)

okay, and im at work and just came back to this and dont remember my train of thought so like... what really threw all this into sharp clarity was the recent steven universe episodes. they were so...GOOD. so fucking good. so much plot and foreshadowing coming to a head. it was such a wonderfully satisfying payoff that it made me remember what a GOOD show is like, how vld is so very very /bad/. the difference is fucking striking. where one is an intricately woven tale with excellent character development and clear story AND character arcs, that can progress AT THE SAME TIME, one is a hacked together flaming dumpster firing that constantly falls flat and doesn’t know where its going or why. and it s so BORING! like fight scenes can be amazing! they can be well coreographed and tense! and we as the audience can be anxious about the outcome! and vld just wasn’t that! it was boring repetetive action in the least exciting way. and where su set up a lot of potential, holy shit they DELIVERED on that potential. not just for rep, but for characters! for story! for plain ol simple character interactions! and then, again, two dimensional cardboard cutouts.

and now with this difference in good vs bad show so very clearly highlighted for me, i just.... i can’t, anymore, with vld. it sucks. it sucked and i can’t pretend or force a fixation with it that just isn’t there, and truthfully, probably never was. maybe that’s why i’ve been struggling to finish my fic, struggling ever since i posted the last chapter, ever since s7, which, again, that game show was really the nail in the coffin as far as holding onto any hope that this tire fire would ever pick up. like a physically feel ill trying to finishing this stupid fic bc i don’t care so hard. i don’t care and i just... really want to be over it. im sick of seeing it everywhere, im sick of the drama, of the Discourse. like all fandoms have their issues, but hold fuck does vld fandom have a massive Purity problem. like, god, let people ship whatever. who cares. die mad about it.

like homestuck, idk if i’ll ever fully ween myself off vld but i want to move on. i want to enjoy Other Things without having this lackluster weight on my shoulders. and more than anything, i want to stop feeling like im obligated to like the same shit as i did two years ago, or last year, or hell, last week! feel free to unfollow, but yeah i just.... really needed to let this out in a proper post and not in the misc tags somewhere.

[gra-sonas]

Hiiii! What are you thoughts about RNM finale! How do you feel about it? I'm glad Alex was happy and I kind of understand why Micha walked out in the middle of the song even though I know some people didn't like it... Anyways! Hope you have a great day! 😁

Hi nonnie!

Am I having a great day, running on roughly 2 hours of sleep and sheer force of will? Debatable. :P

I’ve been listening to Tyler’s song all day tho, that has definitely improved my mood significantly. I’ll never be over the beauty that is this Malex song. WE GOT A MALEX SONG, Y’ALL!!!! And Tyler’s voice... yeah, the absolute best thing ever. I’m at peace just listening to him. 🥰

WOULD YOU COME HOME is without a doubt the best thing of this episode, the best thing of the season tbh. With that being said, I wrote down some more things.

Putting this incoherent mess behind a cut tho (I’m LJ years old, it’s a cut, not a Read More :P), fingers cross Tumblr doesn’t botch the damn thing.

Hmmmm, I’ll admit that last night (I watched live at 3am, which probably was NOT the best idea, but then I’m an adult, what else am I supposed to do other than make TERRIBLE LIFE CHOICES...), I really hated it.

Nothing made sense, too many questions were left unanswered, Malex were robbed of saying “I love you” to each other first, they were also robbed of an opportunity to talk (dear god, when will they finally TALK, it’s literally all I want), Michael was made to leave IN THE MIDDLE OF THE LOVE LETTER ALEX WAS SINGING TO HIM IN PUBLIC (omfg, I’m still so fucking PISSED about that, I’m FUMING) by the writers just to keep the ~drama going, Malex were robbed of a first public kiss, in one moment at the bar it looks like Michael took the handkerchief off, but there’s no way of telling whether they simply forgot to put it on him, or if it was deliberate and he actually took it off and we were robbed of that very significant moment.

Also ngl, Jesse’s death? Underwhelming. I mean, I’m glad he’s finally gone, but his whole storyline this season was underwhelming and so was his death. Oh well, underwhelming is my rating of S2 overall, guess it makes sense for this super villain to go out with a meh instead of a bang.

Blah, I'm still not super happy about the finale, and I especially wanted Michael to hear the WHOLE song, mainly the final two lines

You were the best of me You are the best of me

but since we can’t have nice things it’s not surprising that I’m not a huge fan. At least it wasn’t as devastating as 1x13, or as gross and triggering in 2x06, small mercies, I guess :P

Ngl, the Forlex kiss didn’t spark joy for me personally. I’m a mono shipper, and just like I hated seeing Michael kiss someone else, I hated seeing Alex do the same. But I understand why he did it. Michael left halfway through the song, and Alex was so relieved and proud of himself that he sang it, and Forrest was right there (wearing his Deep Sky ring 👀).

And hey, Alex asked and Forrest gave enthusiastic consent, I appreciate that very much!

I also really liked that Alex and Michael got to destroy the damn shed. I absolutely ADORE that Gregory was there when Alex sang,  alive and looking like the proudest big brother ever (like you don’t even know HOW MUCH I love him!!! ). Tanner’s such an amazing addition to the cast and I hope we’ll get to see him more often next season!

I’m glad that neither Alex or Michael were burdened with Jesse’s death, I hate that Gregory is carrying that burden now, but he seems to be better equipped for it, and I think he’ll be okay living with it.

Also a glimmer of hope for my baby Flint and a possible redemption arc? I like it (mainly bc I adore Kiowa, I just want him back).

The Echo breakup was long overdue, IDK, I haven’t cared that much about them as a couple for a long time, they’ve been lying to each other throughout most of the season, insofar it makes perfect sense that they go their separate ways now.

Rrrrosaaaaaa!!! My girl, I’m so damn PROUD of her!!!! She’s doing absolutely amazing, and I hope they’ll bring Iris back for her in S3 as a real friend. She deserves to spend time with people other than the “alien circle” at large.

M/M breakup... let’s just say I’m glad that particular nightmare is finally OVER. Time for Michael to work on himself. He didn’t get much opportunity to do that all season.

I’m a bit worried that due to the larger time jump between S2 and 3 we’ll either not get to see much of his development, or - even worse - he hasn’t worked on himself when we meet him again. That’s why I really rather hate S2 for him as a character. Oh well, that’s something to worry about in a year, I guess.

KYLE. I was happy about the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it Kylex moment, but overall S2′s done him dirty. Constantly sidelined, stuck in a relationship I still don’t care about even a little bit. And now Liz even played “god” and saved Steph (which in itself is a good thing, but Liz has been doing this all season, and no one’s stopped her, and I find that worrisome.) I guess with Steph being saved she’s also going to be in S3? Meh, I couldn’t care less, but also something to worry about next year.

Isobel didn’t get to do all that much this episode, but I love her, she’s had an amazing journey this season, and I feel she’s in a really good place right now. GOOD FOR HER!

SANDERS! Not in this episode, but damn, I love him, and I’m SO glad that MICHAEL’S DAD HAS BEEN INTRODUCED TO US THIS SEASON!

Jenna & Charlie AAAAAAHHHHHHHH, I’m so happy for them! And I’m excited to hopefully see both of them again next season! They are amazing, and as a duo a force to be reckoned with! Excited for Riley’s show Hightown to be renewed, still hope she’ll find time to travel to Santa Fe to be in several episodes of RNM.

Max... Ngl, I’m not a fan of the character. Never have been. And while Max 2.0 was nicer than Max 1.0, I never really warmed up to him. Let’s see how things with “Mr. Jones” and Max will go next season.

Maria... Let’s see how things with her go next season. Maybe she’ll finally be allowed to have a storyline that doesn’t revolve around other people.

Circling back to Alex. I love him, I love him the most. He’s on par with my other favorite character of all time (Derek Hale, in case that wasn’t clear). He’s so important to me, and Tyler did the most exquisite job playing him. S2′s been a difficult season for him and I hated that for him.

The writers held him back at almost every turn, he wasn’t allowed to move on, instead Michael got to “dump” Alex every second episode. Man, it got old real fast. But Alex’s resilience finally hammered it home to Michael, that Alex is not leaving again. He’s right there, and he’ll even show up when Michael calls him. New experience for him, I’m sure.

IDK, this whole season was such a mess, so many things that weren’t resolved in the end, the lack of a main plot kept bothering me, and I hated that some of my favorite S1 friendships were completely sidelined.

I hate that an entire season was wasted on Malex being apart, especially wasted for Michael who had a lot of shit on his plate I hoped he’d get a chance at working through (at least in part) in S2, but that didn’t happen. He had some lightbulb moments, but overall he’s still pretty much in the same spot he was at the beginning of the season.

And while I agree that he’s not ready to be with Alex atm, I hate that he did not communicate that to Alex properly, and instead left halfway through Alex’s song.

IDK, I just feel like pretty much every fanfic writer in our fandom would’ve done a better job at writing them this season, they would’ve been allowed to move forward separately, but still towards a common goal.

I know, they are endgame, there’s no doubt about that, but I’m TIRED of them not talking. And especially after Alex’s performance.

Either way, I don’t think any of this makes much sense, coherent thoughts, I don’t have them atm. I’ll need more time to think things through, and maybe my overall negative opinion of this season won’t be quite so negative anymore. Who knows.

I’ve always wondered whether I’d feel like finally watching S2 once I know how it ends, and right now I can answer that question with a firm NO. Canon exhausts me. I’m looking forward to fandom getting time to take a deep breath and process this season. 

I’m excited that we get to take care of the characters for the next year. It’s time for some good development, for tons of fics where Malex actually talk to each other, where Gregory is an awesome brother, Sanders adopts Michael and a million other things.

If there’s one thing I’m grateful for is, that the finale didn’t ruin Malex entirely. I’d been really worried about that.

THEY ARE OURS AGAIN, FOLKS! \0/