#i'm talking about mulder/scully and luke/lorelai

[emmaswanned]

watching gilmore girls and the xfiles simultaneously really throws into sharp relief how the mutual pining/idiots to lovers slowburn has FALLEN BY THE WAYSIDE and it's a travesty HONESTLY.

you mean when you have two characters who are obviously obviously obviously in love with each other and are doing EVERYTHING but saying that out loud, you don't want to drag that out for 5-10 agonizing seasons? you want to resolve that tension within ten EPISODES? COULD NOT BE ME. I LOVE THIS KIND OF PAIN.

[shimmershae]

Y'all go on and believe what you want to believe.  Really.  Do you and I'll do me.  Because I've been watching a love story unfold between one Carol Peletier and Daryl Dixon.  Yes, I said love story.  I've witnessed enough of them over the years to know what I'm talking about--Mulder and Scully, Roslin and Adama, John and Aeryn, Castle and Beckett, Abby and Kane, Luke and Lorelai, and so on and so forth.  I could honestly go all day with these but I won't because I think you all get the picture.  Point is, I know the tropes.  I know the trappings.  I know all about the pain of shipping because nobody gets a perfect path to happiness.  Nobody.  And what I've witnessed on my television, no matter what TIIC's agenda with TWD in this moment is right now?  Is Carol and Daryl falling in love with each other as only they can with their respective backgrounds.

I don't pretend to know what in the actual hell TIIC are hoping to accomplish besides ticking off plot points at this point, but that's what I've seen.

  No.  Absolutely not, conventional labels can't be placed on Carol and Daryl.  It's part of why I love them so fucking much and they have earned a permanent place in my heart no matter how intent Gimps and his incompetent lackeys are on bungling a relationship that was always too beautiful and sensitive for their comic-occupied brains. 

  But Carol and Daryl can not be forced into a platonic box, y'all.  Because they're friends, yeah.  Arguably, the best of friends.  But there's more to them than that.  They love each other.  Through deed and shared experiences and just knowing each other on the elemental level that they know each other on, they've fallen in love with each other on a deeper level than any of the other couples on the show, IMO.  Maybe they haven't expressed it in the conventional ways we've come to expect but we've already established that they defy convention, have we not? 

  Anyway.

 A little more than my two cents, not that anybody asked for them. 

  I've been watching a love story unfold, all this time.  One that's special and unique and soft and deserves more respect and care than it has been given these last several seasons.  And maybe TIIC have a plan.  An ill-thought out one for sure, but a plan nevertheless because, like I said, nobody gets a path to perfect happiness. 

  Too bad the ultimate payoff isn't going to be as sweet.  Because the thing about those unconventional love stories?  The usual tropes don't necessarily have the same impact and this latest obstacle these two must weather? 

  It wasn't fucking needed or wanted and it doesn't serve the story that originated with these two.  It isn't even about either of them individually and that's part of what's made being a viewer of this show and a fan of these two characters separately and together so frustrating. 

  It's why this Caryl fan is tired and won't be watching this season. 

  I won't give credence to something that makes little narrative sense. 

  I think, I hope, I won't be alone.