#if you want to further analyze each episode with this interpretation and what they could say about blitz

[flower-boi16]

A Reason For Why Blitzo May Love Stolas

Blitzo has a fear of being alone. That is something that firmly is established in Truth Seekers' acid trip sequence, and as Moxxie says here:

" I believe your subconscious is trying to tell you that you simply cannot fathom proper intimacy, but... also crave it as well. It's rather unfortunate, sir, considering it's often how you treat those who stand by you... such as myself"

Blitzo wants closeness and intimacy. He wants a close reletionship and is afraid of lossing anymore people around him due to his past truama and the fact he already screwed over all his past reletionships with Fizz, Barbie, and Verosika.

He wants someone to be close to him, someone to give any kind of close reletionship, he doesn't want to end up alone...even if he has to be chained to that person to be close to them.

The hallucination that Truth Seeker shows that Blitzo is drawn to Stolas but feels chained to him as well, that he's shackled to Stolas due to the deal, while Moxxie says that line I showed earlier about Blitzo not being able to fathom proper intimacy but also craving it as well.

Meaning that, until the show gives any other reason, Blitzo fell in love with Stolas due to his past truama and fears of being alone, so he can cling onto the close reletionship that he has and not be alone, to have some form of intimacy even if he is frequently dehumanized and treated as sex object by Stolas and made uncomfortable around him constantly and even gets coerced by him.

Despite that all, he still has an attacthment to Stolas because he's one of the few things to a close relationship he has now, because he doesn't want to end up alone. Even Stolas is abusing him....he still wants to stay...because he doesn't want to end up alone.

So basically, Blitzo fell in an unhealthly love with Stolas due to his craving of wanting a real relationship born from his truama. It's a reason but...it's not a particularly healthy one, nor do I think it's a reason that the show wants you to think.

The healthy reason the show wants you to believe is that Stolas offers Blitzo real, genuine affection...but we've never seen that dynamic. Sure, Stolas does love Blitz, but most of their interactions throughout the first season are of Stolas making sexual remarks to Blitzo and Blitz being uncomfortable with it, there is no healthy reason for why Blitz would fall in love with someone who treats him that way even if it was unintional.

The show provides so little reason to believe why Blitz has feelings for Stolas that interpretations that suggest that Blitz just gained Stockholm syndrome are honestly not that far-fetched. If you go into later episodes with this interpretation I just layed out in mind then a lot of the scenes regarding Blitz showing affection to Stolas get painted in a far more negative and unhealthly light.

There is direct evidince for this interpretation based on what Blitz's character is established to be and what the imagery Truth Seekers presents to us is. So Blitzo's love for Stolas is born out of an desire that came from his truama, and based on how Stolas treats Blitz...it's not a healthly one.

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s7 episode 17 “all things” thoughts

i’m SO EXCITED to see what this episode brings!!

here is what i know: gillian wrote it, it’s buddhist-y, and there might be MSR? and also from the description, i see that we will be learning more about a scully ex, and she has fascinatingly terrible taste in men, so i’m excited to see what this brings 

no delay. let’s get started.

i’m READY.

(post episode thoughts: your girl, in fact, was NOT ready.

woah... there is so much to analyze and contemplate here, and i will be doing so for years to come, which is obviously very exciting. the first thing that stuck out to me after finishing the episode was that scully was severely taken advantage of by this predatory guy, and then i made a post to see if i was the only one who thought that, which sparked some good discussion. since i talked about it there, i'll try not to go too into depth here.

but. god. the way that we live our days is how we live our lives. and the looking into the past to realize what could have been and how things worked out now... gestures vaguely. I CAN'T PUT IT INTO WORDS, I JUST FEEL A MILLION EMOTIONS. this episode is about MSR being soulmates. about friendship and love and devotion. and realizing what you have is a gift, and that what could have been is unknowable, and dwelling on it is a rejection of the divine. and it is about opening yourself up to new connections. and lots of other things, too, that make this post incredibly long)

let's go

scully is here!!! putting on a shirt! fixing her hair. “time passes in moments… moments which, rushing past, define the path of a life just as surely as they lead towards its end. how rarely do we stop to examine that path, to see the reasons why all things happen, to consider whether the path we take in life is our own making or simply one into which we drift with eyes closed”

damn. that’s heavy. she's tossing on a jacket.

“but what if we could stop, pause to take stock of each precious moment before it passes?”

why do i get the sense this episode is gonna alter my worldview forever…?

“might we then see the endless forks in the road that have shaped a life? and, seeing those choices, choose another path?”

there’s a guy in her bed. actually, i don’t think it’s her bed. there’s a guy in a bed. MULDER!!!!! SLEEPY!!!!

INTRO TIME

OH BITCH…… what are the implications of that monologue with that imagery…. like... they hooked up and she’s upset about it??? wishing they had done it before??? or wishing it didn’t happen???

FUUUUCK.

(author's note: luckily, i rewatched the beginning after i finished the episode, and the opening monologue comes off a lot more peaceful and content knowing what happens beforehand rather than the angst you associate with it having seen just that imagery and not knowing the context behind it. and for that, i raise the finest of toasts to excellent writing)

he was sound asleep, LMAOOOO. insomnia cured…. 

shortened intro, i clock thee once again. 

i’m so…. i don’t even know what i feel. a lot of things.

moby is playing. and slides are being played. this took place 63 hours before the opening incident, btw. it’s not clear if mulder is just listening to the radio and that is what was on, or if he went out of his way to buy a moby CD. please choose whichever interpretation pleases you more.

he was grooving!!! but she turned the music off to tell him that this person drowned. and pulls a salad out of a bag. she does not seem happy.

THIS GIRL DROWNED ON MARGARITA TRYING TO RECREATE THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT, LMAOOOO, oh that is just deeply unfortunate. scully does not want to investigate any further, even if mulder does!! 

but they have bigger fish to fry: he shows her a picture of computer generated crop circles, asking her, aren't they beautiful? and she hands him a sub. so basically AI made the crop circles.

he takes a bite of sub and tries explain the dramatic increase “in size and complexity of circle design” throughout the years

also, he is in a sweater, not a suit. this is worth noting, as are all other small details i observe.

she just wants to put her dressing on her salad, lmaoooo, she does not give a fuck. so he throws in “and i’m not wearing any pants right now” which gets NO response, bahaha! she's got things on her mind!!! other than crop circles!!!

she seems upset.

OH SHE WROTE AND DIRECTED THIS??? PURRRRRRRR! i knew about the writing, but not about the directing.

STAB that salad while he rambles about crop circles. 

she claims she is listening. he wants to go to england TONIGHT, where more crop circles will appear as the computer program predicted, and he bought two tickets. she doesn’t CARE!! she wants to take a BATH, and she has PAPERWORK, and this has NOTHING to do with the FBI.

he is so taken aback. he says he’ll cancel her ticket.

that was harsh of her, BUT i’m not saying i wouldn’t do the same. he just ASSUMED she would want to go. and on a saturday!!! absolutely not!

(very interesting to once again see mulder barreling ahead in ahab-mode without consulting her opinion, assuming she will fall in line. oh, girl. there is so much to unpack there. it seems to me like a mixture of his self-centered devotion to the project and him being unable to invite her more formally into his life so he keeps relying on work as a crutch to bring them together)

“look, we’re always running. we’re always chasing the next big thing. why don’t you ever just stay still?” “i wouldn’t know what i’d be missing” 

GOD. allow me to rip my clothing in grief real quick. it's not like SHE knows what she would be missing either- she just thinks it is something she needs. she wants to drink wine with him and chat.

he leaves. she goes to the hospital. goes to pick up a folder. time slows down. 

she opens the folder and it’s…. a scan of some sort. from d. waterston. not the margarita girl. she is taken aback. she wants the autopsy results. the nurse apologizes. 

scully asks if the person on the x ray was dr. daniel waterston. and the nurse says yes. she is concerned. and walks to the room. where a doctor is saying there is nothing to worry about to a woman in there. scully sneaks around… and she goes in. 

pulls back the curtain with glassy eyes. approaches slowly. a man is on a breathing tube. a single tear rolls down his face. 

the doctor returns, and asks her to step in the hallway. he introduces himself to her- did she say her name was scully? dr. waterston’s mentioned you, he says. “i’m sorry, you must be mistaken” “no, you were a student of his, right?” she changes the subject 

(author's note: and the fact that he MENTIONED her to his DOCTOR just further creeps me tf out!!!!!! i should have known at this point what i was getting into!! i mean, i thought it was weird at the time, but i didn't know how weird it would get!!)

his condition is serious, but treatable. scully says he is remarkable, and goes home before the doctor pressures her further to stick around.

back at her apartment, she has a mac! it's blue and boxy. and she gets a phone call. “you came to see him” “who is this?” “margaret waterston” “maggie. is everything all right?” <- is she his wife?? “well that depends, doesn’t it?” “i’m sorry?”

she referred to her as “maggie”, so clearly they know each other… “whatever”, maggie says

“dr. kopeikan told my father you were here, and now he wants to see you” ohhh, she’s his daughter!!! “look, it’s your choice, but if you come, that doesn’t mean i accept you being in his life” <- DAMN.

another call is coming through. maggie hangs up. it’s mulder, and a movie is playing at his house- did he put a TV in front of his bed? still adjusting to him having a bed, tbh.

he wants her to go pick up some photos of more alleged crop circles after he heads out for his flight. but more time is slowing down. she says she’s out for the evening. asks him to leave the address on the machine, and she’ll try for him.

she goes back to the hospital. lots of people are in this room, surrounding a patient. “i’m sorry, i have the wrong room”, she says. it’s okay, one of them replies kindly. she walks out. there is gentle music playing.

now she goes to the right room with dr. waterston inside. maggie storms out when scully approaches. she walks in, quietly, before saying hi. “so i have to lock eyes with the devil for you to grace me with your presence?” 

he seems so much older than her. OH, and he calls her "dana". i don’t like that. i mean, i know that is probably what he called her when they knew each other, but it feels so wrong to the audience.

she says he’s lucky he made that diagnosis. “luck has nothing to do with it, dana. it’s what doctors do every day. you may have forgotten that” <- OHHHH, so rude??? just genuinely nasty.

she says “daniel…” in a very warning tone. then asks why he happened to be in washington. she goes to sit and he grabs her hand. she looks uncomfortable. 

��how’s the FBI?” “is that why you wanted to see me? to remind me once again what a bad choice i made?” <- ohhh, there is some tension here. 

he kisses her hand and then places it on his cheek. “believe me, my motivation is far more selfish than that” <- i don’t like this…

she says he scares her. “i scare you…. because i represent that which is ingrained, not only in your mind but in your heart- that which you secretly long for” <- that seems… very presumptuous. but she’s avoiding eye contact like she’s guilty of what he describes.

he never accepted her reason for leaving, saying it was an excuse. “i can’t believe the FBI is a passion. not like medicine” <- NO ONE ASKED YOU?

she gets up, saying she’s sorry she came. but he rubs a hand on her face. she just wanted to make sure he was okay. he says he knows how difficult it was to walk through that door- but she did, and that says something. which further sets off my creep alarm.

she leaves, perhaps thoroughly uncomfortable like i am. when her phone rings. it’s mulder. he has an address for the american taoist healing center to go and pick up the photos he mentioned earlier. “and she researches crop circles?” <- lmao

OH, it’s taoist, not buddhist! well, there can be overlap in these practices.

(the themes of the episode were, in fact, vaguely both❤️you could probably write a whole piece on this episode and the idea of surrendering to the dao, but that's a job for another day)

and then she nearly hits someone as a pedestrian walks right in front of her car. time slows once more as she presses on the brakes. the woman turns and smiles at her. scully is so confused.

what does sidewalk woman know…..?

mulder is calling out to see if she is still there. 

she pulls in at a big house and rings the doorbell. it was a woman who was at the hospital earlier that day! must be from the wrong room she walked into. they remember each other. scully says she is here on behalf of her partner to pick up some photos. her name is colleen azar, and she asks scully if she would like to come in.

scully says no- she needs some fresh air, which prompts colleen to worry. scully claims she's shaken from a near car accident. been there, sister.

but colleen says it isn't nothing- car accidents come from us not paying attention to something. scully wants to get out of there, saying she doesn’t have much time. 

“you think what we do is a little ridiculous, don’t you?” “uh, to be honest, i don’t know exactly what it is that you do” “but you’ve already formed a judgement about it” <- ohhhh… she clocked her tea immediately

“i really should be going”

“there is a greater intelligence in all things”, says colleen without looking up from her papers. “accidents- or near accidents- often remind us that we need to keep our mind open to the lesson it gives”

scully licks her lips. colleen hands her the paper and says to slow down. then shuts the door on her.

scully drops all of the papers, and time slows as she picks them up, including a crop circle of the heart chakra. then her phone rings again.

she’s back at the hospital with daniel. “ah, hurricane scully has arrived” “i was summoned” <- what does he want with her?! he wants someone to back up his treatment theory, because the doctor won't listen to him

scully points out that prednisone won’t complicate cardiac arrhythmia, not if it’s just a short burst, which waterston says “there” to, as if it proves his point. the doctor leaves.

maggie is furious. “you come off so rational, but maybe you know less than you think” ohhh… is this a “you’re not my REAL mom” sort of situation? she storms out. waterston says she’s been through some difficult times. scully asks how she found out. waterston says he did things he wasn’t proud of.

“things got bad at home after…” “bad how?” “i haven’t been completely honest with you. it was hard for me… when you walked away. shut down from my family. and needless to say, it was very difficult for barbara” "you divorced”

SCULLY WAS WITH A MARRIED MAN?!! WHAAAAT.

“only after an interminable period of discomfort for us both” “where did you go?” “here. washington” “almost ten years ago” “daniel… you didn’t move here for me?” “i didn’t mean for it to happen this way, of course” she's crying. “oh, god. you’ve come at such a strange time” “i know. you have a life” “i don’t know what i have”, she laughs

she points out that she would have never known he was here if it wasn’t for a mix up in the folder she came to retrieve

“i want everything i should want at this time of my life. maybe i want the life i didn’t choose” <- oh... ouch...

he reaches out to her… she presses his hand against hers. and they grasp each other. she cries against him, his fingers running through her hair. when his monitor starts to go off. he's flat-lining. she’s doing compressions. yelling for a nurse.

woah. that is major tea. scully was with a MARRIED PROFESSOR???? gag.

the nurse rushes in while she’s doing doctory stuff, shocking his chest- where is his doctor in this hospital?! i mean, i trust her to get the job done, but she’s off the clock! she’s freaking tf out. they get a pulse going. and she’s panicking. 

she goes back to the house from before- colleen's taoist place. someone else answers the door and asks if she wants to come in. scully says no, but this stranger only opens the door wider so she basically has to, lmao. she’s walking around. looking at the various contraptions. 

oh! colleen and this other lady smooch! okay! now that i see her in the light, i realize that colleen is very, very pretty.

scully says she’s very sorry for being rude the other day, and she doesn’t know what colleen does. she wanted to ask her about something she said. they sit down together.

she starts to open up, saying her friend is ill, and she thinks he may be dying of a more serious condition than anyone realizes. "friend"- interesting word choice there. colleen starts to explain layers of energy, consciousness, and aura. if you witness this, truths come out little to do with science and much to do with faith.

“what are you saying that i saw?” “pain. and where there’s pain, there’s a need for healing- physically, mentally, or spiritually” 

colleen says shame, guilt, and fear create imbalance, and it makes you forget who you are. she rests a hand on her knee and asks if she would like tea. i wonder what shame, guilt, and fear scully is holding onto. being with this man?

scully is fidgeting with one of her many gadgets when colleen asks if she has ever had moments when everything seems clear- when time seems to expand. scully says yes. “you may be more open to things than you think- it’s just a matter of what you do with it” <- well, that is an assessment on scully's character i would agree with.

they sip tea. colleen used to be a doctor. she thought she was happy, but she was cut off from the world and from herself, dying inside

OH. OUCH…. the scully parallels...

she was hiding her relationship with the woman scully saw earlier, then she was diagnosed with cancer, which got her attention. made her realize the field had no meaning for her, so she left it, and it helped her be happy. only when he she saw a healer who helped her release shame did her cancer go into remission.

everything happens for a reason, colleen says. 

wow. that is heavy. also love that gillian had the pen for one episode and said "this show needs some lesbians". and she was absolutely correct.

scully goes back to see daniel with some tulips, but maggie asks if she’s happy. “you can’t. he’s in a coma” “since when?” “since about two minutes after you supposedly saved his life” <- OHHHHH MY GOD? is she implying malpractice?

maggie blocks her from entering. “do you have any idea the hell you’ve created in our lives?” “maggie, to be honest, i left so that there wouldn’t be hell in your lives” “don’t try to be reasonable with me. i am so sick of being reasonable. you moved on, but we’ve had to live with what you left behind”

so maggie is mad at her for leaving her dad- even though he was cheating on her mom to be with her?? and she thinks her leaving broke him?? or is it more of a "this is all your fault for even getting with him in the first place", although, let's be clear, maggie does not seem that much younger than scully, she has to realize how creepy the whole thing is... maybe she blames her for "awakening" that part of her father, so to speak...

(author's note: this scene makes so much more sense in the original version of the episode we didn't get to see, which is a shame, because based on what was explained to me in that other post i mentioned, the original version sounded a lot more compelling, especially through the lens of scully grappling with her shame and guilt. oh well. what can you do?)

she looks so sad. more moby is playing as she leaves. damn. moby really was the soundtrack of the time, huh? i've lived my whole life moby-less until now.

she’s walking away slowly, flowers in hand. walking past a temple. incense or smoke or something blows by her. it’s an apothecary. she wanders into the woman from before who she almost hit!! she's running after her. following her into a building. 

inside there are lots of plants. and then a door. is this a temple? she pushes the door open. finds cushions and candles and a statue of the buddha. it is very beautiful.

she falls to her knees. closes her eyes. breathing in, rocking back and forth. flashbacks of her life play- her father, her mother, her sister. then, waterston laying down. his heart pumping. his lips moving- his eyes opening. she gasps and opens her eyes, which are filled with tears. the buddha stature stares down at her. 

did she…. manifest that? is he better now?

back at the hospital, someone is trying to clear blocked chakras from waterston. his doctor enters- “dr. scully, who do you think you are?” (um, how about she's the woman that did CPR on him while you were doing god knows what? don't blame his coma on her, where tf were you?)

she's with colleen. they’re doing an alternative approach to healing. the doctor tells her she is wasting her time- but she just wants to help. she says it so quietly and honestly. it seems like nothing else was working. “with all due respect, that is not for you to assess”, he says- it is for his medical team and his family.

maggie tells her to continue- if it isn’t hurting him, we should be open to it, she explains. the chakra man says there is nothing more to do- he is ready to move on, but he needs to do something before he does so. scully turns to maggie. more moby plays.

she goes home, getting in a bathrobe. then, she’s in a suit. sees herself in the hospital bed, dying. and is awoken by a phone call.

it’s maggie. she wants her to come to the hospital right away and immediate hangs up before she can ask any questions.

waterston is awake, asking if she thought he would give up so easy. she approaches him. tells him he was slipping away. he makes a snide comment about her “voodoo ritual”, but he doesn’t want to talk about that. they need to talk about what happens next for us. what does he mean by "for us"?

scully spoke at length with maggie. “it’s time… you took responsibility for the hurt you caused in your family”. she says it’s no accident he got sick.

“dana… it was only to be with you. you are all i live for” “maybe the reason you’re alive right now is to make up for that”

she says she’s not the same person, and she wouldn’t have known that if she hadn’t seen him again. 

maggie was listening to all of this. and scully leaves before she enters the room. 

god. what a graceful response from scully. i would have probably told him to choke and enjoy hell. but she does something to save his life, he's nasty, and then expects that after 10 years, they will somehow find a way to be together. her saying that he needs to make up for only living for her is such a careful word choice.

scully is standing outside of the hospital with her arms crossed. time is slow. she sees the woman she nearly hit again. and runs after her. but it’s mulder? he says he was looking for her. 

so that woman was some sort of divine apparition, maybe...

he says nothing happened in england- no crop circles. “maybe sometimes nothing happens for a reason, mulder” “come on, i’ll make you some tea” oh. my heart. it's melting again.

“i just find it hard to believe” “what part?” “the part where i go away for two days and your whole life changes” 

their feet are up on his table, the light from his fish tank shining on their faces

“mm, i didn’t say my whole life changed” “you speaking to god in a buddhist temple. god speaking back” “mm, and i didn’t say god spoke back. i said that i had some kind of a vision”

this is so open and vulnerable and unlike them. she must have told him everything about waterston.

she goes quiet. “what is it?”, he asks. and again, oh my god, it's so gentle.

“i once considered spending my whole life with this man. what i would have missed.” oh man... her saying this as she sits next to him on the couch.. hold on, hold on....

“i don’t think you can know. i mean, how many different lives would we be leading if we made different choices. we… we don’t know”

“what if there was only one choice… and all the other ones were wrong? and there were signs along the way to pay attention to?” man... hold on, hold on...

“mm. and all the… choices would then lead to this very moment. one wrong turn, and we wouldn’t be sitting here together" he's serious, but then he's almost laughing: "well, that says a lot. says a lot, a lot, a lot. i mean, that's probably more than we should be getting into at this late hour”

but when he turns to see what her reaction is, she's asleep on his shoulder. he brushes her hair back. wraps her up in a blanket. and gets up. we pan over the fish tank and see a little UFO toy in there. and is that a tiny buddha on his shelf?

wait. i have to rewatch that scene or i might die.

she just falls asleep, LMFAOOO. oh, poor sleepy thing, so tired from going through all of that over the past 2 days, and so prone to falling asleep easily even on the best of days. OHHH, and his smile falls when he realizes that. he just... looks at her. so lovingly.

SO WAIT. did she fall asleep on his couch and they didn’t actually hook up?! i have to go watch the beginning again, sorry, LMAOOOO

well, no. she is putting on her clothes in the beginning. and she fell asleep wearing them. so she definitely took them off. she’s watching him in his bed. 

so yes. hook up CONFIRMED.

which is something i thought i saw about this episode, but i wasn’t 100% sure, LMAOOO

okay. i don’t know what to think!!

crazy scully lore reveal!!!! so, it seems that she was dating her professor, who was quite frankly obsessed with her. at first, i thought it was a consensual thing- hence my shock that scully knew he had a wife- but like… him moving to DC ten years earlier??? saying that she was all he loved? and also, can you ethically date someone who controls if you pass or fail a class?? that just seems… super fucking predatory.

okay, i made an entirely separate post to address that point which i linked to at the very top, because if i didn’t, i would probably spend the whole rest of this analysis on it. and we have plenty to cover. but i agree with other's assessment that she probably thought it was an equal relationship at the time- she was young, but not that young, thinking she was ready for something as serious as an affair, not seeing that he was holding all the cards in his hand... yeah. a lot to be said there about the power dynamics and scully trying to prove herself by diving into a relationship with a much older, more established man. and he probably did that to a ton of students, too- made them feel special and mature. gosh. it is really very icky. like i said, her telling him to own up to his mistakes was a very measured response.

also, it is still a shitty thing to do to have an affair, don't get me wrong. i'm not trying to make scully seem innocent, but it is clear she was being manipulated and this wasn't an evenly balanced power dynamic- this was pretty damn predatory. since that is the direction they went with- her willingly dating a man who was married instead of her breaking it off when he learned he was- i feel that could have been more fleshed out. it makes far more sense in the original context. time constraints, sure, but still. the whole plot with maggie would have made a lot more sense had they gone in the original direction.

so. other than that.

GOD. scully driving back to colleen’s place because she wanted to apologize for being rude and because something she said was sticking with her... she is just so kind. and honest. and curious.

and opening up to a stranger because she was so desperate for answers, but also because they had this connection that she initially didn't want to pursue, preferring to stay in her old ways… sharing tea, admitting her biases, listening to her story. spinning her gadget in the kitchen. colleen coming out to her and to the world. god.

and regardless of how you want to characterize the exact nature of what was going on between her and waterston, he was creepy and rude and nasty to her, and it was hard for her to be around him, but she told him he needs to admit to the pain he caused his family. GOD. standing up to him like that… fuck. that’s just SUCH an enormous thing, and you could tell it dominated such a large part of her youth and her outlook on her life since. how she really thought that she made the wrong choice at first, how she rested her head on his chest, and how she realized no- i like the life i've built, i can't live in the past wondering what could have been when i have the here and now, and what a gift it is.

and she had a long talk with maggie… even though maggie was so furious with her and even blamed scully for him falling into a coma on top of breaking apart their family… she talked with her and they agreed that he did things wrong and he needed to apologize. 

scully is so kind.

she let mulder have it at the beginning of the episode, but if it was saturday and my partner bought me tickets to england without consulting me, i can’t say i would behave any better. and she has kept voicing her dissatisfaction, but he doesn’t know how to respond, so he simply dodges it. for years now this has been happening! of course nothing would get better between the conversation in the car in dreamland and that moment! 

but even if she snapped at him and even if he deserved it, and even if he drives her crazy so often, she found him in the form of a messenger. some divine intervention. how many other times has he been placed in her life by some sort of angel?

and then she told him everything, and he listened and he joked and she got more and more open, until she fell asleep and he tucked her in. so carefully. the way he was looking at her… god.

and then… they hooked up. i'm curious as to how that went. she falls asleep on his couch, and either wakes him up, or he was still awake, and then what? do they talk more? does she cut straight to the chase? was there a conversation beforehand about what it would mean for them moving forward, and what they mean to each other, and why do this now- because she realized what she had in front of her and it couldn't wait any longer? is this finally going to be the "staying still" she has wished for- just acknowledging how they feel rather than barreling ahead so they don't have to talk about it?

does that mean they’re canon and together for real? does that mean they’ll actually start, you know, acknowledging their feelings for each other? because lord knows that they haven’t been able to do that until now. will they have to hide it from all of their coworkers and skinner? is there going to be an awkward phase of feeling what this “thing” is out? going on a first real date? trying to call each other “honey” and laughing at how strange it sounds?

or is it “just” sex for now? would that be any better than the circle they have already been elaborately dancing in for the last 7 years? or will it make things MORE complicated? or is this a one time moment of weakness/clarity thing going on? what is it going to be like the next time they see each other?

so much to play with here.

but all of this ignores the real heart of the episode, which is scully opening herself up to the spiritual. we have seen her dives into catholicism before- she was, at some point, almost attending mass regularly- but she was open to change. to any sort of answers. the visual of her sitting before the buddha with her cross necklace on was super powerful. actually trying a chakra healing cleanse on waterston because colleen said it might help. the idea of the divine coming in many forms- how interesting to consider that through scully's eyes.

listening and learning to colleen and the universe out of a genuine curiosity- and some desperation thrown in there too, because doing things as she has done them hasn’t been working. exploring the non-scientific. looking into new belief systems. feeling rather than rationalizing. accepting the guilt and the pain and the shame of what she did and what could have been and working through it. having a vision. and all of those things are so incredibly personal, but she chooses to tell mulder about them despite knowing his reaction would be incredulous. and he is shocked, but he treats her gently. he can read between the lines.

and all of this happening because of a series of coincidences- the wrong folder, the near accident, dropping the papers. wisdom in all things. fuck.

god. it is just brilliant. there’s a lot i still have to sit with and parse out, and i’m in no rush to do it, because i have plenty of time to analyze. but it was really great. i am so happy for scully. i hope that things go well for them from now on, but i’m no fool. 

did moby have a stake in this episode? i gotta say, i had never heard a moby song before this show. all i know about him is that he’s bald, vegan, and claimed to date natalie portman and she was like, wtf is he talking about, that never happened. but now i have been given many moby songs in this show. i don’t really care for them, but i understand.

so, once again i am convinced that the actors of this show understand their characters far more than any of the writers do, and we should let them cook more often. alas! this happened 25 years ago and i wasn't there to stand outside the studio with signs and voice my opinions.

please tell me all of your thoughts on this episode. if this isn't the longest writeup i've ever made, it is very close. did you like it? what did you think about her ventures into the spiritual? i know it won't happen again, but i would love to see more of colleen. how do you think the getting together part went? please do share. and if you have fic of what happened next, that would be swell, too.

[aegor-bamfsteel]

Why do you think Grrm mentioned that Sansa shared responsibility in Ned's death? Especially when he wrote it in a way that Sansa had no idea about things going on and she had no agency.

I’m not a psychologist, nor do I know GRRM personally, so I’m not the best person to ask about what motivated him. All I can do is analyze what he’s said in interviews (gathered by the tireless butterflies-dragons) about Sansa.

The first time he mentions Sansa with ties to Ned’s death is a 1999 SSM: “The way I see it, it is not a case of all or nothing. No single person is to blame for Ned’s downfall. Sansa played a role, certainly, but it would be unfair to put all the blame on her. But it would also be unfair to exonerate her.” because she knew about the ship she and Arya would be sent on. I’d really like to know what the original question was, to see if he was correcting the asker’s interpretation or going along with it. He concludes the passage by saying “It’s gratifying to know I have readers who care so much, although if truth be told sometimes I get the scary feeling that you people know these books better than I do…” which (while complimentary to the meta writers who comb over each word) does point to the idea he doesn’t always remember what he wrote and instead leans on a popular fandom interpretation. Further evidence of this is when in 2001, a fan asks if Sansa misremembering the name of Joffrey’s sword was intentional; and he says it was, meant to foreshadow a bigger lapse in her memory…but all along, it was Arya who had misremembered the name in the text, and GRRM forgot what he wrote.

The last time GRRM says Sansa shares blame for Ned’s death was a 2000 interview promoting ASOS, in which he says “She has become more sympathetic [than in AGOT], partly because she comes to accept responsibility for her part in her father’s death.” I don’t remember the part (or what part), but I do remember her being beaten in front of the court by the Kingsguard for the crime of being Robb’s sister. I think we should also take note of the dates in which GRRM said these things. 1999 and 2000, so over 20 years ago; it’s so long ago, I doubt he remembers these quotes (and if he does, circumstantial evidence implies he regrets it). Because much more recently (and with more impact on the franchise), he wrote the Season 1 episode 8 “The Pointy End”, in which Sansa going to Cersei is omitted entirely. Instead, it’s made clear she was manipulated into writing the letter to Robb, and she makes excuses for Ned to Joffrey, getting a promise that Ned will be spared if he bends the knee. If GRRM wanted to keep Sansa telling Cersei, he could’ve, but instead adds a scene where Sansa gets Joffrey to promise (in the books she just thinks about it). I think the adaptation change indicates that by ~2011 he didn’t want people to blame Sansa at all, and the part of the fandom that hates on her to the point they consider her irredeemable is blowing things out of proportion. While Sansa is blamed for helping Cersei in the text in ACOK and AFFC, that comes from Cersei herself who is an unreliable narrator and very full of herself (she claims in the ACOK passage that Ned and Renly were plotting together, when…no; and I’m sure sending Loras to Dragonstone as in the AFFC passage will backfire). I’m just saying, unless I get more recent interviews where GRRM blames her, I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt (which is rare for me, so you know I’m serious) that he just forgot what he wrote so went with a then-popular fan interpretation, but later regretted it when he saw how it was used to hate on Sansa, and wrote an adaptation wherein she did everything she could to help Ned.

[boschlowtxt]

I absolutely love your character analysis'. I kinda wanna hear what you think about that scene when Willow was in the hallway with Boscha (the S3, ep3). Your character analysis'are so reasonable and fun to read! Especially since I really like both Willow and Boscha and I love the way you sympathise with them!!

Sorry this took me a really long time to answer! I wanted to add screenshots but I was really lazy lol.

That said, allow me to analyze the entire scene line by line.

"Trouble with your team, captain half-a-witch?"

This is the first time Boscha has ever called Willow half-a-witch. The closest she has ever gotten before this episode was "Only real witches allowed." This, along with the fact that Willow was already incredibly stressed in this scene, makes the line hit much harder. But also note, Boscha also acknowledges Willow as a captain. While obviously sarcastic, it is also her acknowledging that in a way, they are similar, but only from her POV. Which is further proven by the next line.

"Leading isn't easy, is it? All your time is spent helping the team, keeping people from fighting, and Titan forbid you show any weakness. Everything else falls apart."

This is obviously, all Boscha's self-projection. Firstly, because she's mostly using sports lingo, and clearly doesn't know the full context as to why Willow is stressed. Furthermore, Willow isn't really the "captain" of her friends because that's not how her friend group works. Boscha only knows how to see things from her own perspective.

"Not now, Boscha."

This is Willow's warning shot. She can feel that Boscha is trying to back her up into an uncomfortable spot, and force her to answer questions that she very much can't answer. Especially not to her. But Boscha keeps going.

"If you want my advice..."

"Advice? From you? You have been nothing but petty and mean to me since I met you."

And there, Boscha clearly isn't going to listen, so Willow allows herself to snap back. This I feel is a great "show, don't tell" of Willow's self-restraint. Even in the next few lines...

"...You want me to give up? You want me to admit how stressed I am? What advice could you possibly give me?"

She shows some sense of giving Boscha the benefit of the doubt. While obviously, she doesn't want to deal with Boscha's bullshit at that moment with her giving up and admitting how stressed she is lines, she still gives her room to explain herself, if she really does want to give advice.

But note the vines. It's actually not very clear whether or not the vines were intentional since we also saw her dealing with vines in the photo room scene due to stress. But she's also visibly backing Boscha up against the locker so it might be intentional on her part to essentially "scare" Boscha into backing down.

Additionally, this is also Willow self-projecting in the scene. Willow indirectly admits she is incredibly stressed, but frames admitting it as negative and well, weakness. In a way, they understand each other because they're afraid of showing weakness.

It's actually justified that Willow would immediately assume that Boscha would attack her for things that she felt insecure about at that moment. It's been months since she's been put in the position to be exposed for her insecurities again, so coupled with her dads missing and feeling like she's failing her friends, we can see where she's coming from.

Lastly, if you listen very closely, it actually sounds like she's emphasizing me which can be interpreted as her saying "We are nothing alike." She very easily could've emphasized you instead, as in, "How could you understand me?" But the placement of the emphasis frames it as "Nobody understands what I'm going through." Which is common behavior for those who are emotionally repressed.

"Actually, I was going to advise you to watch your back."

I bet you didn't notice Boscha's face in the first frame of the next shot! It's a very "blink and you'll miss it" moment. But I love this because it shows how horrified Boscha is by Willow. Her confidence is all a facade. (I love how this also implies that while Willow was scaring her, that was the expression Willow was actually looking at the whole time. I'm sure that must've felt very satisfying on Willow's part.)

But then her facade comes back, but only because we can assume Kiki and Roka have just stepped behind Willow, which I think highlights a very important part of Boscha. She's only as powerful as the people she knows. She's only powerful when she has people to command. She's only powerful when she's friends with Amity.

It's actually very hard to say whether or not this was Boscha's plan this whole time because it would be delving into assumptions rather than hard evidence from the show.

"You never know when your opponent is gonna strike."

For this shot I would just like to analyze their faces, and the overall composition in general, because the show loves using angles to emphasize power! Roka is of course the biggest in this shot, even going off camera, establishing them as the most powerful. But I think it's also important to note how Willow is actually bigger than Boscha in this shot. You can say it's all because of perspective, but it would've been just as easy to make them the same size especially since Boscha is taller than Willow anyways. Boscha was the bait to get Willow distracted.

All this to say, I love how this shot is framed because it shows how Willow was backing Boscha up into a corner before being ambushed. She does have power over Boscha now! The only reason Boscha is so smug is because Roka was there to protect her. Willow also puts her vines down because she was so caught off guard by what Boscha said. Now she feels powerless in this situation. She's not even mad or upset. She just accepted that it was her fault for being boxed in.

Which perfectly sets up her breakdown in the detention pit... I suppose...

My Thoughts

I wish we could've seen more conversation between them tbh! I think my one problem with TOH is that they didn't take Boscha AND Willow seriously enough in the episode. Boscha's "arc" was kinda just resolved in the "I just wanna do normal things, and look great" line, which kinda took away the impact imo? What I love about this scene is how the crew actually took them seriously! The vibe was great. the music was tense. Their motivations, goals, vulnerabilities, etc were clear! I wish I could say that for the rest of the episode, but I'll take whatever I can get lol. I love their onscreen chemistry together because it really triggers some internal motivation between them. They both felt like active characters in the scene. They both had decisions and motivations. Boscha wanted to piss Willow off. And Willow wanted Boscha to shut up.

I wonder what the show has in store for them next episode considering the "Don't think this means I'm finished with you!" line later in the episode.

[psychotakublabs]

“Through the Looking Glass Ruins” definitely gave us more Lumity than we all expected and the B-plot of Amity and Luz’s story in this episode was written very well. Their awkward interactions and new found feelings for each other pave a way for LGBTQ young love in animation. It also gives us Luz and Amity character development, small hints at insecurities and conflicting emotions, and normalizing queer teen romances. I have seen multiple interpretations and analyses of their plot and I wanna analyze Luz and Amity from the three important scenes: Inside the Library, Outside the Library, and Blight Manor.

Inside the Library

First we have Luz knocking on Gus’s door to use Gus’s library card. It seems this is not the first time as she admits she isn’t hiding her crush very well and Gus agrees. Although she is going to the library to find Philip’s journal on the portal, she does get sidetracked with her crush on Amity. Even the twins notice both have a crush on each other but instead of teasing them about it, they just leave them alone. It seems everyone knows Luz and Amity have feelings for each other except those two and not because they are oblivious about it. It’s because Amity is still trying to figure out her own feelings and Luz isn’t sure if Amity likes her back or is afraid of losing her friendship because of these feelings.

Amity and Luz’s interactions are awkward and anxious because they have a crush on each other. That is completely normal in young love and it’s done very well here. They become flustered and weird when seeing each other and once in close contact with each other immediately separate. This is very well written and boarded becaused it normalizes queer crushes. Usually it's either the two characters fall in love immediately with no development or it's one sided. Not with Amity and Luz as they are confused lovestruck teenagers who are navigating these new found feelings for each other. Like a lot of teens, having a crush is confusing and awkward and having two queer characters (Luz is bisexual and Amity is lesbian) having developing feelings and normlazing those interactions shows queer teens and kids it's normal and okay to have these feelings.

Most interesting in their adventures in the library is the Amity and Luz character development.

First off Luz becomes less impulsive of her actions because she worries about Amity losing her job. While at the doorway to the Forbidden Stacks, Luz reassures herself and says she will find another way. After her conversation with Amity in the Forbidden Stacks, she says they should head back and doesn't want to push Amity. Usually Luz is impulsive in her actions. In the Human Realm, she does things without thinking first and that's caused a lot of trouble for others. Because she knows Amity could lose her job if caught, Luz thinks before diving into danger so she doesn't hurt Amity. This is development for Luz because it shows her thinking about her actions before doing so and how it might affect others. This isn't the first time either she has shown this development but it's very prominent in this episode and shows how much she cares about Amity.

Amity has become more impulsive in her actions lately. Despite knowing she could lose her job in the library, she still helps Luz in getting into the Forbidden Stacks. This irrational behavior is because of Amity's feelings towards Luz. When Luz mentions a possible date with Amity to the Human Realm, she ignores Luz's hesitation to go further and rushes to get the diary, dragging Luz with her. Amity is worried about losing her job but pushes through because she knows how important this diary is to Luz and her feelings for her cloud her rational judgment (not ignoring her development throughout the series that has also impacted her but just focusing on the episode).

Outside the Library

After Amity is fired, Luz immediately apologizes but Amity stops her. Both have become upset from the incident but for different reasons. (This analysis/interpretation mostly comes from halcyonhyacinth on Twitter and Tumblr. I highly recommend following her. Awesome writer!) (https://psychotakublabs.tumblr.com/post/656478634193928192/all-of-this-this-scene-was-so-powerful-and-well)

Amity is upset because she did lose her job but also because of her conflicting emotions and actions. "Being around you makes me do stupid things and I wish it didn't." Amity was raised in a family environment that emphasised high standards and perfection. Before Luz showed up, she had to be perfect to live up to her parent's expectations and had to think about her actions as well as control her emotions. However, Luz has changed her perspectives on life and Amity's new found feelings for Luz makes her become more impulsive to help Luz. Because Luz is her first crush, she is still navigating these feelings that make her do the opposite of what she normally does. Amity has every right to be upset because she lost her job and somewhat blames Luz for it because of her new found feelings. It's not till she sees Luz cry and hears her say she does the same does she realize her feelings may not be strange and one sided. Now lots have interpreted this interaction as a confession which is a part of it. But it is more of a confession of vulnerability and confusion than love, but that doesn’t mean it could have come out as having feelings for one another as well. Another part of Amity’s reactions is how Amity has affected Luz to the point she is upset as well (maybe even thinking her words hurt Luz) and that her feelings and actions are similar. Instead of taking her frustration out on Luz, she decides to go home to calm down and think more about her feelings. Amity is still dealing with her budding feelings towards Luz and it's understandable why she is so upset both from being fired and her conflicting emotions.

Luz is afraid she will lose Amity because she got her fired. After Amity says she does stupid things when around Luz and wish she didn’t do them, Luz is so upset she cries. This is probably related to her experiences in the Human Realm. In the Human Realm, Luz’s impulsive actions have freaked out others and is used to others pushing her away. Luz is starting to develop feelings for Amity and she is scared she has pushed her away because of her reckless behavior. This is different from the Human Realm because Luz truly cares for Amity and doesn’t want to lose her as a friend. Luz tries to reassure Amity she is not the only one who acts rash. When Amity leaves, Luz pushes her insecurities and sadness aside to get Amity’s job back. We are seeing more of Luz’s insecurities from the Human Realm throughout Season 2. For example, Luz feels guilty about Eda losing her powers and goes on a life threatening journey to make it up to her in “Separate Tides”. This probably stemmed from her experiences with her mom in the Human Realm whenever she got in trouble and burdened her mother. In “Through the Looking Glass Ruins”, fear of losing Amity comes from her experience of others pushing her away and is afraid it will happen with Amity. Luz has a lot of self-blame because of her prolonged experiences in the Human Realm. However, Luz pushes those feelings down to make it up to Amity by getting her job back. Although Luz did mess up and cost Amity her job, she is willing to amend her mistakes not only to make Amity happy but because she truly cares for her even if she loses her as a friend.

Blight Manor

Amity and Emira have a heart to heart conversation about Amity’s feelings towards Luz. She confesses that these new feelings towards Luz are confusing and scare her because she has never had these thoughts and emotions before. Emira reassures her it’s okay to have these feelings since it makes her happier. After brushing her hair, Emira notices Amity is still conflicted and brings up her roots showing and offering to re-dye her hair. Amity decides to cut and dye her hair purple. This is important in Amity’s development because she wants to be independent from her mother’s control and become the person she wants to be by doing something she wants. Even if she will get in trouble or others don’t like it, she is willing to have a fresh start as the person she wants to be. In fiction and real life, changing hair styles can be symbolic of changing one’s self and a powerful message of being who you want to be. What may seem like a small step is actually a huge achievement for Amity because changing her hair, that was once being forced to dye green for color coordination by her mother, to a shorter cut and purple color is her way of acting on her own and being the person she wants to be.

Luz was ready to face rejection from Amity but was willing to at least give her job back. Luz has shown time and time again how far she will go to help her friends. She even understood why Amity would want to push her away and was prepared for it. What she was not prepared for was seeing Amity’s new look. After explaining how she got Amity’s job back, Amity notices the echo mouse and Luz catches the little pest. After seeing the echo mouse shows Philip’s first diary entry, Luz thanks the mouse and hopes they can be friends. It’s great to see how far Luz will go to help her friends, even if she is the one who caused the mistake.

After Amity notices Luz’s kindness (looking at her library card), she decides to be bold and give Luz a kiss on the cheek. Both are shocked at what just happened. Amity becomes flustered, bids Luz farewell “forever”, and wonders why she kissed Luz on the cheek. Again, Amity is still confused with her crush on Luz and needs time to sort those feelings out. Luz becomes more smitten with Amity and falls to the ground. She probably never thought Amity would reciprocate her feelings or think Amity may have the same feelings. In the Human Realm, Luz is used to being pushed away and Amity kissing her on the cheek is so shocking, she goes weak and falls on her knees. This is a first for Luz as well as she is navigating her feelings towards Amity. Both may know they have feelings towards each other. However, neither one is going to admit it for a while because these feelings are new to them. For Amity, her crush is entirely new to her and she has to figure out what they are and how she wants to move forward with them. With Luz, her feelings towards Amity are mostly about accepting the fact it’s not one-sided and to figure out how she wants to act on these feelings. Both need to navigate their own feelings first before moving further in their relationship. I am curious as to how they will interact after that scene, because both have to realize that kiss was beyond platonic and it may get more awkward for them later in the series. We will have to wait a while before getting more Lumity progress in “The Owl House”

The Lumity in this episode was written and animated very well and is important for viewers and future animated series. First off, is the fact a Disney animated series shows a main cast progressing as an LGBTQ couple in the middle of a series. LGTBQ couples/soon-to-be couples/characters in children’s animation are usually confirmed at the end of the series, never confirmed at all but hinted (queerbaiting), background characters with little screen time, villains, or killed off. It’s both unbelievable yet wonderful to see an LGBTQ couple, especially with two teen characters, become canon. Not imaginative from fanfiction or made canon in comics but in the series at the beginning of Season 2. This is huge because not many networks, let alone one as big as Disney, have confirmed an LGBTQ character and couple early on in a show. I have hope that it will give inspiration to other major studios to follow suit with more stories with representation like “The Owl House”. One of my favorite aspects of Lumity in the series is it normalizes queer young love. This includes the complexities of newfound feelings of young love and navigation of first love. There is little to no animated series, at least in children’s animation, that have characters like Amity and Luz having feelings for each other and navigating those feelings in the middle of the series. It shows queer children and teens it’s okay to feel this way because it’s normal! Just like how it is normal for heterosexual teens to have the same feelings and actions to young love. To some it may not be a big deal, but as someone who came out as a lesbian at age 13 (2006-2007) and lives off of cartoons, anime, manga, comics, and books, there was basically nothing that felt close to how my high school experiences of young romance were. It is very refreshing and hopeful to see young LGTBQ youth see a Disney show have canon queer characters and the main cast a canon queer couple with normalized and realistic experiences. How it’s confusing but wonderful to have these feelings like everyone else. “The Owl House” continues to push the boundaries of children’s animation and the queer representation is continuing to be phenominal and wonderful!

[jonsa101]

Do you think when Max double back and said “we never talked about it” do you think Helen took it as yes finally he’s opening up and that’s why she hug him and laugh that relieved laugh? And then she asked him that question and she realize he still doesn’t get it??

Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!!! This is a great question and such a hard one to answer as well! I’ve honestly considered a lot of scenarios in my mind about where Helen’s mind was at before and after the hug. I have gone back and forth about it but after analyzing it for awhile these are my final thoughts on it.

In my last ask I got from @abriaashley, I had mentioned that there was a very brief moment in that rooftop scene that reminded of me their rooftop scene in 1.17. Before I answered this ask, I took a couple days to really make sure that I knew what I was talking about but after analyzing it I know without a shadow of doubt this is the exact same expression. To me, this brief moment below is the most important key in understanding everything that happened during and after their hug.

But in order to understand why Helen has this expression on her face, we need to first examine the scene where we saw this expression first. In episode 1.17, Max and Helen are having a conversation within a conversation about their relationship. Everything is subtext but essentially Helen tells Max that she needs to “triage,” she can’t be his “all of the above” and that she’s removing herself as his doctor. Of course Max is upset by this and with his wonderful Freudian slip he reveals his true heart’s desire when he says...

But what if I want you?

After this declaration, we get this expression on her face and then Helen STICKS TO HER RESOLVE!

In the context of this scene, Helen’s expression here tells me two things:

Max telling her “what if I want want you” is exactly what she wants to hear. She clearly has feelings for him and hearing that is supposed to tempt and sway her resolve. But based on their current circumstances the idea of them is simply not possible and it’s heart aching.

She clearly doesn’t want to do what she’s about to do in this moment but she’s BUILDING UP THE WILL POWER to do what she feels she has to do!

This is my interpretation of why Helen has that expression on her face. When I look at episode 3.10 where Helen has that same look before she hugs Max, I think the same reasons apply for this moment as well. As an avid Sharpwin shipper it’s easy to fan girl about these intimate moments and get carried away but when you logically look at their scene and the scene that took place right before, hopefully what I explain will make perfect sense to you.

Before Max and Helen’s moment on the roof, Helen had a GUT-WRENCHING scene with her niece. Mina is still heavily grieving her father and this explains so much of why she’s also had a lot of behavioral issues. She’s suffering emotionally and is desperately trying to find some semblance of peace and healing. Shanthi Sekaran, the writer for this episode, said the inspiration for this scene was Micaheanglo’s Pieta and how fitting it was for this moment between them.

“Pieta” which translates to pity or compassion, shows the the Virgin Mary compassionately holding on to the dead body of Jesus as she sorrowfully contemplates the death of her beloved son.

Like this sculpture, Helen compassionately holds Mina and comforts her as Mina is overcome with her grief and as Helen is trying to empathize with the depths of Mina’s sorrow! It’s just such a beautiful thing to witness and why I’m hoping Mina sticks around for the long haul. There’s so much emotional investment already and in this moment of their lives, they desperately NEED EACH OTHER! So when you look at everything from a wholistic perspective and you look at the chain of events that led Helen to be on that rooftop in the first place, does it LOGICALLY make sense that Helen would be in the headspace to address her relationship with Max or even kiss him? Nooooooooo!!!!

It doesn’t make sense!

If anything, her actions in this scene is a reflection of what she did earlier with Cassian when she broke up with him. As she made her niece first priority with Cassian, she is essentially making her niece first priority again with Max, despite being in love with him!

Let’s breakdown 3.10’s rooftop scene so y’all can know where I’m coming from.

Part 1 of this scene is Max and Helen discussing parenting and him emotionally supporting her when she feels like she had a parenting fail. This should have been the first clue for us to understand how this moment between them would play out because this issue with Mina was the main thing that was clearly plaguing her mind!

In part 2 of this scene, Max turns to leave and then after briefly hesitating, he turns around says

“I’m sorry about Cassian.”

As soon as he says this we see this same expression we saw in 1.17. Then Max continues and says.

I don’t know what to...say. I mean, we never talk about it.”

Y’all I said this in my last ask but this is a really big deal! This is Max’s first attempt to bring up the elephant in the room between them and it’s something that he’s never attempted to address before. Helen knows this is a big deal too and she knows where this conversation was headed. Hence why before the conversation could even go anywhere, Helen cut him off with a hug!

Like I said at the beginning of this post, the expression Helen makes before the hug is the key to understanding this scene in it’s entirety! Similar to 1.17 I believe the same reasons apply for her expression in 3.10 but vary slightly.

Once again, what Max is saying is exactly what Helen wants to hear but also what she’s been waiting for him to do! Unlike in season 1, Max and Helen are in completely different circumstances than they were back then. Subconsciously, they had feelings back then but now they are both fully aware that they’re in love with each other. The massive elephant in the room exists between them because they don’t talk about their feelings and they’re to afraid to voice that they’re in love with each other. There is no doubt in my mind that Max finally being able to at least broach the topic is something that she has always wanted Max to do. They seemingly don’t have anything that’s holding them back from being together but based by how I see it, the heart aching look on Helen’s face tells me that in Helen’s mind it’s essential she puts her sole focus into Mina, even if this is something she’s always wanted. (This Is KEY!)

Like 1.17, I think Helen was building up that will power to tell him that she’s happy that their friends even though she’s in love with him. That hug between them was a lot of things. It was deeply loving and heartfelt. It was cathartic with pent-up angst and longing semi-released but most of all, it was desperate and supportive. Despite this, I also believe that this hug was used to avoid a conversation that Helen didn’t want to have. If she allowed that conversation to go any further she would have 100% been swayed and would have probably given into her feelings. But Helen didn’t want to be swayed. She wanted to stick to her resolve that Mina is her first priority! Is this a problematic mindset? Yes! But after that emotionally charged moment with Mina I can see how Helen might think she’s making the right decision.

Also, I’m convinced that if Mina’s breakdown didn’t happen before Max and Helen’s moment on the rooftop, they would have probably had that conversation. But since it did happen, it totally plays a role in what transpires between Helen and Max.

For the moments after they hug this is how I interpret those interactions:

When Helen says to Max “what you said earlier” initially I thought she was referring to something he said earlier in the day. Now that I’ve taken a couple of days to really think about it, I just don’t think that makes sense. Again, after Helen’s moment with Mina, I don’t think she was in the headspace at all to talk about her feelings for him. This scene was more so about Max stepping up and being emotionally supportive of her and I think what’s she’s actually referring to is Max saying “But it helps not to be alone.” In that moment Helen recognized that Max will unequivocally support her and I think that’s something she’s incredibly grateful for. When Max responds with “what did I say?,” I genuinely believe he’s not thinking straight because he so overwhelmed and overjoyed to have Helen in his arms. Also, I think naturally he asks that question because he wants to know for future reference what he needs to keep saying to keep her in his arms 🥰.That look that she gives Max before she tells him that she’s really glad that they’re friends isn’t necessarily a look of disappointment because of Max. After I watched it again, that look to me is more so of a look of “I hate that I’m doing this but I have to do this.” As she is gazing into his eyes, it’s her final push to stick to her resolve! Her mind was already made up and she was going to see that decision through.

Y’all I’m going to wrap this up here because this ask wasn’t supposed to be a meta but ended up that way! Lol! Though these are my opinions on what transpired in 3.10 that doesn’t change my opinion of how I see things unfolding for Sharpwin this season. I just think it’s important to put scenes in proper context. Though Helen might have said that they’re friends, it is so evident that she is clearly in love with him. Like Max, she can’t pretend or neglect her personal wants and needs forever! The great sleeping bear of her desire stirred and is wide awake! Sooner rather than later that bear needs to be fed!

Feel free to reach out to me through my Dms on Tumblr or on Twitter! @oyindaodewale. Also my ask box is always open! 🥰

None of the Gifs in this post are mine!

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

(pt 1) i really enjoy all your atla analyses & you've done a great job breaking down the usual arguments re how eip shows that kataang shouldn't have happened. i'm curious about your take on one specific argument that i just saw today, in an analysis of the show by a zker that was otherwise quite good and respectful (i know you've already talked about eip a lot, so no problem if you don't feel like rehashing). the premise: aang didn't just pressure katara in eip, he threatened her.

(pt 2) they point to when katara joins aang & asks if he’s alright: “aang: no, i’m not! i hate this play! katara: i know it’s upsetting, but it sounds like you’re overreacting. aang: overreacting? if i hadn’t blocked my chakra, i’d probably be in the avatar state right now!” the suggestion is he’s threatening her when he says ‘i’d probably be in the avatar state right now’ to describe his anger. i think this take exaggerates and oversimplifies it, but interested in your thoughts on it.

Hello my friend!! It is true I am Old inside and don’t like rehashing dhdlksjslks BUT your comments on my posts are always incredibly kind and insightful so I am more than willing to do a bit of rehashing for you 🥰 Besides! I’ve seen this general take before a few times and it’s always irked me for the exact reason you point out - it simultaneously exaggerates and oversimplifies the situation (and honestly that’s an impressive duality since it’s seemingly contradictory, so hats off to them lmaooo) - and now is as good a time as any to address it. So, for starters, let’s go ahead and get the excerpt they love to focus on so much:

Cut to Aang standing alone on a balcony. Katara enters and walks up to him.

Katara: Are you all right?

Aang: [Angered.] No, I’m not! I hate this play! [Yanks his hat off and throws it on the ground.]

Katara: I know it’s upsetting, but it sounds like you’re overreacting.

Aang: Overreacting? If I hadn’t blocked my chakra, I’d probably be in the Avatar State right now!

Here’s the thing about so-called analyses of this excerpt: in a manner extremely convenient to the poster, they never seek to contextualize this moment. (I mean, to do so would deplatform their entire “argument” - perhaps that’s why they avoid performing a full analysis?) So let’s avoid that pitfall from the start.

Firstly, below are some links to related posts; I’m going to do my best to summarize the most relevant parts, but for anyone who desires greater detail, I gotchu 😤

This post explains why EIP (the play, lol) is imperialist propaganda and is intended to belittle the entire Gaang.

This post explains how Aang never acted “entitled” to Katara’s affections, particularly in regard to EIP.

This post breaks down the infamous EIP kiss like Snopes Fact Checker, covering common misconceptions, important perspectives to consider, etc.

Alright. With that out the way, it’s time for some context.

Aang and Katara have this conversation on the balcony after watching 95% of “The Boy in the Iceberg,” a play chock-full of Fire Nation propaganda that demeans the entire Gaang in order to prop up the Fire Nation as superior (hence why the play ends with Ozai’s victory). Here is my general breakdown of Aang and Katara’s treatment in particular from a previous post:

- katara, an indigenous woman, is highly sexualized and portrayed as overly dramatic and tearful, because the fire nation objectifies women not of their own people and views them as less intelligent and less emotionally stable

- aang, the avatar, the sole survivor of the fire nation’s genocide of the air nomads who is incredibly in-touch with his spirituality and femininity, is portrayed as an overly-airy and immature woman. the fire nation portrays him with a female actor to demean him (like, that’s classic imperialistic propagandist tactics) and furthermore writing his character as a childish airhead reinforces the fire nation sentiment that the air nomads were weak, foolish people who did not deserve to exist in their world

In other words, these kids have just watched almost an entire play that preys upon their insecurities and depicts them using racist and sexist stereotypes about their respective nations. It is completely understandable that tensions might run a little high and that their interactions would not be as balanced as usual (Katara and Aang have a great track record of communicating well with each other, as it happens!).

So we have to keep that in mind when examining the aforementioned excerpt. But there are other factors to consider, too! Namely: they are kids. Children. Teens. Aang is 12, Katara is 14.

If we want to be scientific, a person’s brain doesn’t finish developing until they are 25, lmao, and the preteen/teen years are when the prefrontal cortex that controls “rationality,” “judgement,” “forethought,” etc. is still developing. This doesn’t mean Aang and Katara are irrational and make poor decisions 24/7 (obviously not), but it does mean that in an intense, highly emotional situation, like after watching a play that intentionally demeans them and depicts them as inferior, they are more likely to overreact, more likely to be emotional, and more likely to make mistakes. Like, I’m serious, lol. “Teens process information with the amygdala.” That’s part of the brain that helps control emotions! It’s why teens sometimes struggle to articulate what we’re thinking, especially in situations that require instinct/impulse and quick decisions, because we’re really feeling whenever we make those choices. Acting more on emotion. Our brains simply haven’t finished developing the decision-making parts, lmao.

In sum: Aang and Katara are both kids, not adults, and should be interpreted as such. This doesn’t negate their intelligence, because they are both incredibly smart and Aang is arguably the wisest of the Gaang, but they are human. Young humans. They have emotions, and we should not be so cruel as to assume they’d never act on them.

So taking that all together, we can now acknowledge the high stress Aang and Katara are under, understand why they might be upset (*cough* imperialist propaganda is hurtful *cough*), and examine how their youth might play into their emotional reactions. And funny thing - all analyses that come to the conclusion of Aang “threatening” Katara here do not usually bother with this context. I can’t imagine why!

And you know what, let’s add one more piece of context: Sokka states that Aang left the theater “like, ten minutes ago,” which is what cues Katara to go look for him on the balcony. The reason I mention this line is because to me, it suggests Aang knew he was more worked up than usual! He chose to separate himself from his friends so he could process his frustration! He did not take his anger at the play out on them; instead, he purposefully took time and space to be alone.

With that in mind, I don’t understand at all how Aang’s Avatar state quote could be interpreted as a threat? Canonly, Aang is someone who was aware enough of his frustration to separate himself from the others - yet the logical next step is him threatening Katara as a result? He knew his intense emotions were because of the play (which he says himself), so the logical conclusion is that he then pinned the fault on Katara? What?? Sorry, that interpretation has no textual basis, lmao. But I digress!

Aang tells Katara, “If I hadn’t blocked my chakra, I’d probably be in the Avatar State right now!” As you said, this is the line people point to in an attempt to justify their (baseless) conclusion that Aang is “threatening” Katara. So let’s bring in the two key pieces of context: imperialist propaganda and age. Given that Aang is 12, and given that Aang has just watched almost a full play that demeans him and everything his people stood for (and let’s not forget it also mocks his and Katara’s love for each other)…

His reaction is understandable. An exaggeration and needlessly dramatic, but understandable. He feels vulnerable and insecure and Aang is human. He is human and flawed and he overreacts here and I love that A:TLA shows how even our heroes, even people who are truly good at heart and in soul, can get overly upset (especially given the aforementioned circumstances!). Would Aang actually be in the Avatar state at that moment, had it been possible? Of course not! He’s young and he’s hurt and as such he says something dramatic to convey his anxieties and frustrations. The line is not meant to be taken literally, and seeing people do so despite all the factors that should be taken into consideration when analyzing it… Cue a long, tired sigh from me and so many other A:TLA fans.

And to be honest? I cannot fathom how people watch this episode and come to the conclusion that Aang is “threatening” Katara. To me, this episode - besides being a recap episode - is one that humanizes our cast even further. Aang snaps at Katara, kisses her when he shouldn’t (which the story appropriately treats as wrong). Katara pushes down her true feelings and retreats into herself, afraid to start a relationship with the boy she loves because she’s already lost him once before and can’t bear to do so again. Zuko further confronts the hurt he’s enacted upon others, especially upon Iroh. Toph practices being vulnerable and accepting vulnerability from others by conversing with Zuko. Sokka witnesses how others have erased his contributions and labelled him as nothing more than the token nonbender in the group. Even Suki learns that she is not the only person who holds a place in Sokka’s heart and that she can never replace what he has lost.

To watch this episode where our heroes must come to terms with how the Fire Nation deems them inherently inferior, with how they have more fights to overcome in the future with the Fire Nation than a single war, and to come to the conclusion that… that what, Aang is abusive? A monster? Irredeemable? That he would threaten his best friend, someone he loves in every way?

Wow. That says more than enough about the viewer, doesn’t it?

[inhonoredglory]

I thought this needed to be its own post, since it’s a huge meta and I really loved writing it.

The following is my attempt to analyze the symbolism and staging of @tenyai​ ‘s impeccable storyboards to Douxie and Merlin’s farewell, in the final episode of Wizards: Tales of Arcadia.

Teny, your boards and the thoughtfulness, heart, and passion you put into them have legit inspired me to take up boarding as a truly narrative, imaginative, and character-driven art. Thank you for these and for all the love. Your skill and craftsmanship and sincerity of emotion come shining through in these arts, and it warms my heart and fills me with absolute joy. I’ve been in awe of your handle of cinematographic symbolism ever since you teased so much meaning out of the final scene in Killahead Part 2, and I’ve changed my entire view on how to analyze scenes and characters on screen because of it. I cannot wait to see your analysis of this scene. It’s rich and powerful in ways I cannot even express.

People, please go check out her boards on her blog and at her professional portfolio on the website in her bio!!

______

Waking up in Merlin’s Study

First up, parallelisms… Merlin’s study is the symbol of everything Douxie is aspiring to in his life. It’s the heart of Merlin’s knowledge, his position as a master and a wizard. It’s full of things Douxie is off-limits to (like the safe or the time map), as we saw in the second episode. He’s always been a student and an inferior in this room; that’s why he considers it an ironic Hell. But unlike in “Dragon’s Den,” when he wakes up in this room on the floor, scared and confused––here instead, he wakes up on the table, surrounded by Merlin’s books, Merlin’s knowledge. And he’s much more comfortable and relaxed. Symbolically, he’s not scrubbing the floor anymore as an inferior.

I almost want to say that Merlin’s tables represent the places where Merlin crafts and makes things––like in “History in the Making” when he is shown making the amulet over one of the tables in his study. But in this case, the person Merlin had a hand in crafting was Douxie. And being a father to Douxie, by saving him from the streets, is Merlin’s greatest accomplishment. He may have saved Douxie, but Douxie took on a life of his own and surpassed Merlin’s wisdom, in a way much like the amulet took on a foresight far more wise than Merlin could have ever predicted (choosing a human to be the Trollhunter, despite Merlin’s belief that a human wasn’t enough).

Walking to the Light

After Douxie wakes up, we get the walk towards the Light, with Merlin starting out in the Light and by the end of this scene, falling into Shadow. Symbolizing Douxie’s growth and perception of Merlin, and symbolizing Merlin’s position as Master Wizard of this realm and his willful relinquishing of that role to Douxie. At first, Douxie wakes up, thinking about his past in this room and all the service he did for his master––who in this shot appears as a hazy halo-ed vision speaking down at him from the unattainable glow: “Hello there, boy,” said with the kind of judgmental snide Douxie’s used to from Merlin.

Then they start walking and then we hit the window at the far end of the room, a kind of apex in the parabolic staging of Douxie and Merlin’s movement through the scene––with the arc going from the back of the room and the table, to the window, and swinging again to the back, this time from the right side of the room. Merlin’s dialogue when we hit the window is important. He’s first talking about how he’s dead and vaporized into soot, etc, and then he opens the time map and asks, “The question really is, Why are you here?” A charged, thematically rich question placed right when we see the mingle of blue and green light from the time map’s lenses––the mingling of these two’s lives through the ages, the summation of all Douxie’s insecurities and all Merlin’s expectations, all Douxie’s greatest mistakes and his greatest triumphs.

Why Are You Here?

Why is he here? At this point, Douxie’s finally let go, he’s accepted Merlin’s death, accepted the title of successor, accepted his gifts and powers and heroism. And he’s accepted that death is part of the job of Master Wizard if it means saving those he’s sworn to protect. So why is he here? Because he’s done everything and more that a true Master Wizard is supposed to do. He’s equalled Merlin, nay––surpassed him in heroism, wisdom, and responsibility. The mingling of the time map’s lights symbolizes that Douxie has achieved everything Merlin represented to him, and more.

And then Douxie touches the Light, looking out into the glow of the hereafter, saying nothing (I love that and makes me crave for his thoughts).

There’s something so fundamentally and chillingly introspective and metaphysical here in this shot for me. It comes on the heels of not only “Why are you here” but also “I am most certainly dead. You saw me vaporize into soot.” Cuz that’s what happens when we all go, isn’t it? You might be the wisest person on this earth, mastered all there is to know about life, become the greatest wizard, lived a thousand years and more, and still in the end, you will die, and to the dust you will return. Maybe Douxie’s thinking, Am I here because I’m dead too? Because my body is gone, because somewhere out there beyond the stained glass is the explanation of the mystery of what happens when we die? Because even if you master life, there is no mastery over death, because none of us will ever feel what it truly is to be on the other side until we get there?

Separate and Equal

Symbolically, with the lighting, it also means Douxie’s touched Wisdom/Maturity in a way. If the hazy glow of Merlin at the start was from this Light, from this Unattainable Essence––then by the time of this staging’s apex, Douxie has achieved what Merlin has. He’s touched the thing that he has sought for so long. He too can be framed by the Light of the person he wanted to be. So now, we see Douxie talking back to Merlin, and not being silent anymore.

Merlin and Douxie are on the same plane now––as equals. We get the vitally important shot of them side by side, Douxie laughing off Merlin’s disapproval, both of them framed by the Light, both of them standing on their own, balanced by the pillars and the light, each of them solid and independent, separate and equal.

Douxie’s Need for Validation

And then we get to the other side of the parabola, the shift in Merlin’s dialogue from disapproval to one of admiration and pride. “I can see you no longer need my validation.”

This line kills me, because you can see in Douxie’s face that yes, he does. Oh how he desperately wants it. But he’s worked so hard to NOT need it, so that he can grow and flourish. And Douxie falls back into that quiet again, waiting on Merlin’s every word, because his rebellious veneer is stripped right now. Merlin’s hitting on the core of his needs, the source of his insecurity. In the film version, he’s even holding his hands together in front of him, and if that body language means anything to me, it’s Douxie feeling small and childlike again, needing and wanting something from his Dad but not having the courage to tell him.

Staging-wise, Douxie’s still very much following Merlin. He’s behind him, chasing after him, looking up to him. The “ancient Draconic” stand-off was the first and most important show of Douxie’s growth, born from Douxie’s own gumption and sass, when Merlin for the first time in this scene walked up to *Douxie* instead of the other way around, even if it was to judge him:

But like any good hero’s journey, after one win, our hero gets a setback, a reminder of his failures, before he wins again. And this time, it’s Douxie feeling like this latest monologue from Merlin is again some kind of judgement, some kind of backhanded lecture. Would his show of strength and independence fall on deaf ears?

“Remember when I told you that magic is mastery over life?” Merlin says, holding up an alchemy bottle and then a book––tools of the trade, spellcraft and tricks. All the things Merlin taught him. In a huge way, Merlin wasn’t there for the real lessons Douxie learned to become truly wise. Douxie became strong and selfless and kind because he had to, because those were the ways he knew in his heart would take him on the path to reaching that wisdom of life Merlin was talking about. I wonder if there’s something to the fact that once Merlin starts saying, “Nine hundred years you’ve guarded this realm…” he puts the book away––putting away his own knowledge and symbolically recognizing that Douxie’s wisdom has taken him far past Merlin’s own teachings, and that in the 900 years that went by, Douxie has guarded this realm with a mastery of life all his own.

In the final version, the moment Merlin says, “You’ve disrupted time, freed ancient beasts,” that’s when Douxie drops his hands, stops walking, and looks down––a brushstroke reminder of his guilt on doing these things, things that Merlin disapproved of, but things Merlin is now seeing as good and right things to do.

And then we get to the shot of the amulet blueprints, and the wonderful crowning statement of Douxie’s morality: “You’ve… fought to save one life at the risk of countless others.” Meaning Jim, meaning the very person who inspired Douxie to take his selflessness that one step further and set aside his own life so that he could save everyone. Because every life is precious. I find it fascinating that on this line in the boards, Douxie silently fist-slams the table, disappointment all over his face. While Merlin, now in Shadow, has a look of wistful regret.

This shot is so pack full of meaning, and I keep adding to this interpretation...

Douxie for so long has been stripped down for everything he’s done, been criticized by Merlin for being different from him. In some ways, he thinks this latest monologue is more of the same, more ways in which he’s disappointed his father. And clearly, despite his growth, it still hurts him.

And it hurts him that while Merlin is talking about saving Jim’s life, Douxie never really was able to save him. Douxie died while Jim was still corrupted. He died only seeing Jim lose himself to the Green Knight. He never saw Claire’s heroism in bringing Jim back. Personally, Douxie failed.

But even more than that, it hurts him that for all his love for Merlin, he could not save him. He might give his life to save the world, but he cannot bring Merlin back from the grave. Every life is precious and he would risk countless to save just one. But he couldn’t save the one that meant the most to him.

Merlin recognizing he’s wronged Douxie

In the end, Merlin here isn’t talking Douxie down, even as he’s pointing out their differences. He’s in awe at this idealism Douxie possesses. He’s not criticizing him, he’s not being wry or ironic. Merlin looks up at the portrait, knowing that it wasn’t him who gave Douxie this outlook on life. It wasn’t his harsh treatment that gave Douxie his beautiful soul. Douxie had it all along, and Merlin was too dense to see it and nourish it.

So what Merlin says next hits even deeper––

“And yet, despite such relentless hardships…” Merlin’s looking up at the portrait. He’s looking at himself. He’s looking at everything he’s done to Douxie that’s burdened his son with that guilt, that insecurity, that fear, that emotional abandonment. He’s acknowledging here his part in the trauma of Douxie’s life, and his regret is that all this time, it was Douxie who was the better man than he was.

And then we get the symbolic shot––“Despite such relentless hardships, you managed to protect those dearest to you”––with Merlin in Shadow and Douxie lit from behind with the Light. A reversal of the opening shot of this scene, when it was Merlin in the Light and Douxie, unsettled, in the Shadow. This is finally Merlin laying down his ego, seeing in Douxie the strength and force of love and protectiveness he never had. The very thing Merlin didn’t do, when he didn’t protect Douxie all those years, when he let his son down, when he left him and ignored him and took him for granted. When he didn’t give the person dearest to him the love he deserved.

Resolution

And finally, it’s Merlin walking *up* to Douxie, Merlin falling in Douxie’s shadow, and Douxie being once and finally again on an equal plane with his master and peer. “My Hisirdoux, what a life you’ve lived. What a wizard you’ve become.” This is the climax of Douxie’s parabolic hero’s journey in this room. Merlin has at long last given to him what he desperately needed to hear––pure, unadulterated pride in his father’s eyes, and an honest and sincere expression of love, kindness, and emotion.

It’s too much for Douxie’s desperate heart, and he collapses into his father’s arms, releasing 900 years of pent-up emotions and need.

(Is that symbolically why Merlin’s always in armor and Douxie never had any––cuz he’s fragile and bare in the face of Merlin’s cold, callous exterior?)

After that hug (waaaah TEARS, every. freaking. time), we once again are treated to the Light symbolism. First again to show how equal these two men are––Merlin importantly a step down from his son, with the light behind Douxie. And then to show the time map, glimmering with a calm, peaceful, happy equality.

Life and Death

And now we’re in scene denouement, as Merlin and Douxie walk to the end of the parabola (past the first table and eventually out the door). Fascinatingly, in the boards, Douxie glances around the room and then his eyes I believe land on the table he woke up in earlier, before the scene cuts and we get a shot of that same table, panning up to reveal Merlin and Douxie facing the doorway to the hereafter.

And in my brain, it’s like we’ve come full circle in Douxie’s life arc. If waking on your back is birth, snarking about your tough childhood, and now after all you’ve gone through, you look back on that time at the end of your days, ready to face what comes after death…. (well, that’s what it means to me anyway).

Douxie’s fully prepared to leave the mortal world. That’s how far he’s come in his maturity. He closes his eyes, accepting the unknown and resting in the confidence of who he is.

The Hero’s Journey

But like any good hero’s journey, the end isn’t to leave the ordinary world with the boon of your new knowledge and wisdom. It is to return to your home and share that knowledge with others, to use what you have gained and become a teacher and protector for your family and community.

Merlin gives him one last lesson, one last parting gift to tell him, Hey, you have more power than you even imagine you possess. Your rebellious spirit made you who you are today, and it’s what will keep you alive and fighting because it’s your gift and how you protect the world. Your way.

Merlin’s parting sign of the horns is the cherry on top of this whole thing, a perfectly subtle way of Merlin acknowledging who Douxie is, accepting it, and celebrating it. Saying goodbye to his son in a language meant for him. Douxie’s tears at the end (wish they got into the final oof!) speaks volumes to his beautifully mingled emotions––amusement at Merlin’s gesture and a poignant love that he did it for him. I tear up just thinking about the look on Douxie’s face and what it all means in his heart.

Anyway, that’s a wrap, folks. I love Douxie with my entire soul. Thank you for sharing these boards, Teny, and for putting your heart and tears into this masterwork of a scene. (I listened to “Moving On” to write this for the Mood and guhh, it’s a tear-jerker gosh.) This fandom is incredibly lucky to be the recipients of your favorite sequence in your career to date. It’s been an absolute pleasure to see your work and feel the heart you poured into them.

[papirlife]

Chipin’ In

Okay so I’ve had minimal exposure to this game from the start, and I only just finished the main quest line enough to get to Chipin In and I am SPEECHLESS. So please find my interpretation of chipin in from my V’s perspective. But feel free to comment because honestly I think it could really apply to any V’s out there and I like analyzing stuff. Fair warning this is LONG, you have been warned.

So in my canon game, by this point V and Johnny have worked together enough to build up a strong sense of camaraderie. While V never truly hated Johnny, even if they were wary of him at the start, what with their rough introduction, by this point, V’s started to tentatively trust him, and even rely on him in some situations. They’ve started to feel comfortable in his presence, and been more open with their thoughts, ideas, emotions because despite sharing a brain, they’ve still kept their guard up as best they can.

My V ( Vendetta) is a very distant person, they like keeping to themselves, they don’t like to drink because they hate being out of their senses, the only time they willingly touched alcohol was at Jackie’s funeral, as a way to honour him and pay their respects. Other than indulging in the occasional smoke, to settle their nerves and get Johnny to stop gripping so much they’re very reserved, solitary and not at all interested in such things.

So to have enough trust in Johnny after they realized he kept them safe when they blacked out and when he gave them his tags to allow him to take this step and settle his past once and for all, only for him to go and completely throw in their face sent them reeling.

They were scared outta their mind when they woke up in the motel room. V didn’t know where they were, the relic was acting up, they were half dressed, and their brain felt like it was gonna vibrate out of their skull. The only familiar thing they saw was Rogue, and that wasn’t really helpful because at this point they weren’t terribly fond of her. They respected her, and admired her skills but they ABSOLUTELY DID NOT wanna wake up in a shitty room with her looming over them.

When the pieces start falling together and the events of last night start coming back to them, V is just numb, and their not sure if it’s because of their emotions or if it’s because of the remains of whatever the hell Johnny swallowed the night prior. Either way when he makes an appearance V just wants him GONE, he’s the last person they wanna see. During their conversation in the motel, he’s shocked that they didn’t trust him still, and V is just...not having it because their trust in him before this wasn’t solid, giving him control had been as much of test for him as it was for them, and he blew it by violating their faith in him, lying to them not once but again and again and then violating their body despite knowing their reservations. And the fact, that he was being a prick when they woke, making it out to seem that THEY were the one’s overreacting, was just icing on the cake.

After the brief conversational the motel, V just gives him the silent treatment, they ignore him, they don’t acknowledge him, don’t turn in his direction if he shows up, they’re just on autopilot and the only thing they want is to go home.

V was FURIOUS; they were hurt, upset, frustrated, but they were also angry at themselves for trusting him. They get home, and just break down because they’re overwhelmed, the last few weeks have been rough and this was just the straw that broke the camel’s back and they feel like an idiot for it all. To top it off, they also have to acknowledge that they we’re starting to feel something FOR Johnny; not love, at least not yet, but that’s likely where it was headed and it just makes everything so much worse because V had tried to ignore those emotions up until now, and they had a suspicion that Johnny has as well but this episode brought everything to the surface and made them face it head on.

The best part is Johnny has a front row seat to all of this, and when V breaks, down he really starts to feel like shit too because it’s the first time in his life that he gets to the experience the emotion behind all the pain he caused not just to V but to everyone who dared to care about him, who tried to get through to him. And he hates it.

Eventually V, starts to become a little more clear headed, and then they start thinking and that’s when the doubts set in. They start doubting everything between them and Johnny, each interaction and conversation, every word he spoke to them at Pistis Sophia, the dog tags he gave them as a show his trust, his potential sacrifice, his regard for them and their safety, the friendship and sense of camaraderie they had built up together; all of it gets thrown out the window because now the the only thing V can think is “how much of it was a lie? How much has he manipulated me into helping him, liking him, agreeing with him? How much, if any of it was true?”

Because, in their mind, had he really cared about them, he would have been honest, upfront or he wouldn’t have done something like this in the first place regardless of wether it was intentional or not.

Meanwhile, Johnny’s freaking out, V’s not holding anything back, they’re letting him read their thoughts loud and clear because right now they could care less about anything he has to say to them and Johnny is freaking the fuck out because damn it, this isn’t what he wanted, this isn’t how it was supposed to go, that promise, the tags it was all true, and it’s all he can give them because he’s got nothing else to show them that he does care.

It’s when V gets up off the floor, and locks the tags away in a safe in their armory, that the panic sets in and Johnny is just going like fuckfuckfuckfuck.

When Rogue calls, after a whole day of not speaking to him or really anyone for that matter, Johnny fully expects V to call off the hunt on Smasher, and he knows that Rogue won’t go after him alone. But to his shock, V agrees and heads down to the Afterlife, to work out the details because they made him a promise and unlike him they inteended to keep it. And Johnny hopes to god that maybe yesterday was just a fluke, maybe they can just forget the whole thing, never talk about it again and just be normal.

But he knows in the back of his mind that that’s not gonna happen because while V is still keeping their end of the bargain, he can still feel how hurt they are because of him and this is just further confirmed because when Rogue’s presents them with the jacket, V thanks her, but asks if they can just leave it in the trunk for now. They continue to ignore him, and just try and get through the night as quickly as possible.

They’re trying to numb their emotions, numb the hurt. But it comes to a head during the confrontation with Grayson because V can’t ignore how they feel, they can’t pretend that they don’t care about Johnny, that they don’t care about his life, his mistakes, his past. That they don’t care and about what happened to him, or what will happen to him depending on how all this pans out. Which is why V gets defensive when Grayson starts talking crap, starts stalling or making a mockery of Johnny’s legacy.

And this is what kinda prompts Johnny to make an attempt to fix his mess, because up until now he fpthought that V likely hated him for what he’d done. But seeing them getting protective, defending him, gives him a little hope that maybe, just maybe he can salvage this.

When V gets into the Porsche and heads to the Oil Fields, when they hear the shear amount of pain and disappointment and remorse in Johnny’s, they mark his place in the field, and decide that while yes they’re hurt, they don’t hate him, they doubt they could ever hate him.

Some part of Johnny still hopes that he didn’t colossally fuck up, which is why he tentatively says that their friendship is the one thing he hasn’t managed to ruin but he knows he’s put a permanent dent in their relationship, which is why I think that if you choose not to confront him he thinks you’re being insincere, because throughout the whole quest, from every interaction they have together, you can tell that V is upset because of what happened, and he knows because they share an intimacy that could never hide this fact from him so if you suggest otherwise it feels like you’re just avoiding the elephant in the room.

But he recognizes his mistake after V points it out, he understands that he did them wrong, that he had no right to use them, use their body the way he did, and the dealbreaker here is that he recognizes it and he apologizes and asks them for a second chance. And V truly forgives him, because the apology in and of itself is a miracle, because the old Johnny would never even think to apologize, just let the wound sit and fester and ignore the emotional trauma that came with it. But this Johnny, the one here and now, has grown and he wants to set things right, with Rogue, with Kerry and especially with V. And V sees this, sees the remorse, hears his apology, and decides that yes, this Johnny deserves a second chance. And in my canon, this is a turning point in their relationship, and it’s where they start to develop something like love for each other, even if they don’t t realize it just yet.

[akira-emberheart]

songs I'd like to assign to the glee kids (part I)

Note: I'm pretty well known for making playlists and more playlists, and ever since seeing this post by @cracktastic about assigning, for the 100th episode, the least expected song to the least expected character, I've found myself craving to hear specific characters sing specific songs.

(I've also started another separate list to add on to that post I mentioned, but that will be a post for another day)

So after going through my music library, I came up with a small list of songs for each character that I would love to hear them sing, for various reasons, which i'll do my best to explain.

This got really long really fast, because I like to get into meta and over analyze - I'm also just very passionate about music. For that reason, I'll do 5 songs at a time for a specific character, and I'll be putting a read more.

Also, please be gentle with me - I've watched Glee a year ago, and it's entirely possible I may be missing or confusing scenes and storylines in my head. If I do, let me know!

If you read this and find yourself thinking of songs and scenarios as well, do share them with me! I'm working on actual Spotify Playlists as well.

So let's get into it -

for Kurt Hummel

> Re: Stacks by Bon Iver

"This is not the sound of a new man

or crispy realization

It's the sound of the unlocking and the lift away

Your love will be

Safe with me"

This is probably one of my favorite songs ever, and I first thought about it for Kurt after realising how beautiful his voice would sound in it, because of its crystal clear and poised quality. (I liked it so much I included it in a scene on my fanfic too).

If you don't know Bon Iver, or the history of this song, it's the last track in an album full of more..."depressing" songs. It's also the one that has a throughout tone of hope, of recovery after a hard ordeal, of taking some first steps to a better place.

I imagine it would be a good song for him around the time he meets Blaine - when the Karovsky situation is nearly over, and he starts looking back on his school year - Burt's heart attack, the bullying - and, now with Blaine in his life, and a renewed self confidence, he's finally able to confidently step into a better phase of his life and heal from all he went through.

I see this one being sung in a quiet moment of reflection, when he's alone. Maybe in the choir room, or even outdoors in a nice garden. In my fanfic I wrote it in a different context, in Blaine's room at night, so I guess that works in my head too.

***

> Enchanted by Taylor Swift

"I'm wonderstruck

Blushing all the way home

I'll spend forever wondering if you knew

I was enchanted to meet you"

I'm very fascinated with Kurt's whole storyline in S2 - things start off so rough for him, but when Blaine comes along, and when Kurt is able to grow and shift more and assuming the person he really is, things start looking up. I chose this song for what it promises, and also because I can imagine it in Kurts lower singing register and it seems like a good one for him. Also, yes, I was a kid who owned Speak Now. Sue me.

This song is about first meeting someone very special, and that happens to be the beginning of Klaine. With the almost whispered lyrics, the slowly crescent ambiance and rhythm, it really encapsulates the feeling of everything stopping when you lay eyes in that one special person, and the flooding rush of emotions that happens right after.

Kurt had no idea how much an unsuspecting visit to a rival show coir school would change his life, even less in the midst of the situation he was in. It also seems fitting for Kurt and his early relationship with Blaine because of some specific lyrics ("This is me praying now / This was the very first page / Not where the storyline ends"). Enchanted tells the story of a special first meeting, and hints at something special to come, from the perspective of someone who is awestruck for someone.

Like the one above, this one would fit in early S2, possibly in EP6, after Kurt and Blaine's meeting at Dalton Academy. When he's back home, alone in his room, daydreaming, or when he's back at McKinley in that same afternoon.

***

> Gonna Get Over You by Sara Bareilles

"Oooh, how am I gonna get over you? I'll be alright, just not tonight But someday. Hey, I wish you'd want me to stay I'll be alright, just not tonight"

My main reason for choosing this one is because I think it fits very very well with Kurt's voice, and musical taste - its a very vibrant and poppy song, despite the more depressing theme - a post breakup promise of getting over it.

I first thought of it for S4, soon after the Breakup™, but paying close attention to the lyrics (I do tend to get stuck on just the melody sometimes), it makes more sense to place this on during the S6 Breakup - when Kurt finds out about Blaine dating Karovsky, after deciding he wants Blaine back.

So it's a hard situation for him, as we see from his breakdown in the bathroom (poor Kurt!), and he really has to come to terms with the mistakes he made (and the mistakes they both made as a couple), pick himself up, and move on.

I imagine this one being sung during an outing with Rachel, when she's trying to cheer him up and lift him up a little from his depression. My brain readily produces an image of a sunny street or a shopping mall that the two of them walk through, Kurt with some nice vivid colored clothes, finally being able to smile and ready to perhaps start moving on, or at least ready to start considering he will be okay.

***

> Killer Queen by Queen

"She keeps her Moet et Chandon

In her pretty cabinet

"Let them eat cake", she says

Just like Marie Antoinette"

This song just reminds me of Kurt. It's one of my all time favorites from Queen, and ever since watching Glee, these two are just connected in my mind. Voice wise, Kurt could definitely handle it.

It's apparently about a "high class prostitute"(? Freddie's word's, not mine), but still paints a pretty and dainty picture, and you can almost picture a porcelain faced lady in her best clothes, delicately smoking a cigarette. It also contains words that probably only Kurt can pronounce out of everyone in the glee club.

Many Queen songs were sung on Glee, but I don't think there was ever a Queen episode. For this one, I suggest a headcanon scenario, maybe during S3, when Mr. Shuester decides to have a Queen week - and Kurt isn't known for going with the obvious choices. He wants to be classy, edgy and impressive, and he sings in front of everyone, half in the choir room, half in the auditorium, perhaps with some fancy decoration and dancers behind him.

***

> The Answer by Kodaline

"You might think you found the one

Until your heart gets ripped and torn

Yeah, I used to feel bad, I used to feel like that

I still feel a bit like that"

This is another one that I picked immediately solely based on Kurt's voice - I really do like his voice with just a quiet, discrete instrumental. Looking into it further, I decided it could really work for Kurt's character.

I didn't go very deep into the intended meaning of the song, because it definitely has space for different interpretations. I choose to go with the breakup one. These lyrics here reminded me a little of the S4 breakup storyline - "We all fall down from the highest clouds / to the lowest ground" - makes me think how well Kurt's life was going once he arrived in New York, with the internship, his apartment situation with Rachel, a new and exciting place where he could freely be himself... and then he's completely blindsided by Blaine's cheating. He goes from being ecstatic and excited at Blaine's appearance, looking forward to share with him all the great things he just discovered, when Blaine's confession sends him to a well of despair, doubt and loneliness. The lyrics "You might think you found the one / until your heart gets ripped and torn" - reinforce the whole situation.

I can see him singing this not long after the breakup, on one more sleepless night, maybe walking alone through the streets of New York, or maybe in a montage of his busy daily routine, while he just gets through the day with a whole lot of emptiness weighing on his chest.

[vowled]

Unpopular Opinion: Johnlock edition

So, I am, as invariably suggested by my blog and username, a major Sherlock fan. I absolutely love it. The first time I watched it, I immediately related to it, and my peabag brain instantly saw a friend in John Watson. Sherlock’s character, on the other hand, was quite unconventional to me. I couldn’t bring myself to quite like him for the first 2 episodes. He was.....different. I knew I wanted to watch the series just for the dynamic duo and their and sweet friendship. The cases I couldn’t at first care for much, but eventually that changed too. I always was completely amazed by how well they had managed to adapt the series to the 21st century and their subtle winks to the original canon too was quite impressive. Eventually, I fell in love with it, and proceeded to watch the entire series thrice. in a row. I was, and still am, completely obsessed. 

Then came the thought, which was also somehow initially suggested subtly by the show itself, ” What if Sherlock and John are in Love?” I must agree, I had read too many conspiracy theories about certain celebs being closeted to not come up with that question. 

At first it was just a thought. But then, critical analyses on tumblr came up. I couldn’t stop reading them?! and so many of them were thought-provoking and persuasive and honestly, I was living for it. The phone = heart theory is still one of the best Theories I’ve read among all the fandoms I’ve ever been in. And that is just one among many. JohnLock was everywhere. Other ships were persistent, but none could reach the amount of fervor as JohnLock. And I was living for it too. I still really enjoy all the adorable fanfics and the ever-interesting theories, and honestly, at this point, my motto is “I’ll find homoerotic subtext even if it kills me”.

Shipping is ok, shipping is good. But here’s the deal we need to talk about:  we shouldn’t justify our ships to the point of interpreting every action as romantic. This propagates unrealistic expectations and results in harmful stereotypes.

Yes, I’m talking about the unending debate on Johnlock. 

From season one itself, Johnlock was phenomenal. It is widely argued that  the show-runners themselves inserted subtle hints, and hence, birthed this beast on their own. The Sherlock fandom remains one of the oldest fandoms in the world, with its beginnings rooted in the Nineteenth Century when ASiS was published, and since then many have argued about the latent homosexual subtext embedded into the writing, my point here being people have been shipping Johnlock for well over a hundred years. Hence, It’s not really a surprise that people are still drawn to this ship. But to be shipped by this magnitude of people? This invariably suggests that there’s material provided to us by the creators themselves that is very blatantly obvious about the relationship. And while in most cases shipping two characters is completely okay in itself, according to me, shipping Johnlock has further validation in the fact that there is proof of intent of it becoming canon eventually (at least in the first two seasons).

Like I said before, shipping is OK, shipping is good. 

But is shipping okay if we take it to the point of over-analysing every move?

Sherlock is a comfort character for me. God knows half of my maladaptive daydreams are about him being a father figure towards me. My entire twitter tl and Tumblr dashboard is stuffed with cutesy or angsty things about him, and that’s great! But being in the fandom for about eight months, I’ve realised how this sort of feed eventually resulted in me completely forgetting the original storyline, and more importantly, in me forgetting how flawed a character Sherlock is!

Everyone(including me, the first time) freaks out in HLV because of how Sherlock isn’t listed as John’s pressure point. I, however, think we should question ourselves: Why should John still consider Sherlock that tantalizingly close to himself as he was in the beginning? John learnt his best friend had died, and he decided to do the bravest thing he could: make peace with it and move on. BUT NO! The Ghost of the man who loved him returned from the grave to haunt him! Here I talk about the other possible reasons why Sherlock wasn’t a pressure point for John in HLV. 

I am tired of this constant sugarcoating of Sherlock’s character. I am tired of seeing constant posts about how Sweet and caring Sherlock is and how much he loves John and how he loved her more than Mary. I am done with over analysis of every single shot where Sherlock looks at John, completely done. This shot below? It’s been overused for so many fanfics and cheesy romantic lines that I forgot that it’s supposed to be a look of GUILT.

Anyone who knows me knows that I love sherlock so dearly because he’s a very unlikeable character. That is precisely what sets him so far apart from the other characters. Sherlock started off with a hateful and dismissive character, but through the course of the events he undergoes a lot of emotional development. And that is truly noteworthy. In TFP he said for Mycroft, “ He did the best he could (for Eurus)...” and that is truly sentimental. This sort of development is always heartwarming.

What I want people to understand is that Analysis is, obviously, important. And CRITICAL ANALYSIS more so. And it’s saddening to see so many people glossing over the critical part of the analysis. Why is it so wrong to point out HOW HURTFUL SHERLOCK’S ACTIONS TOWARDS JOHN HAVE BEEN?  Why is it wrong to to point out Johnlockers borderline bully other shippers? 

Can we finally talk about the problematic aspects of Johnlock, or rather Johnlockers?

Even though I’m relatively new to the fandom, I’ve noticed how dismissive people are of anything negative said about Sherlock. In the beginning, it was endearing, really; but now I see this pattern of constantly singing praises of Sherlock’s character, and it has lead me to realize how detrimental it can be to the relatively younger audiences. Sherlock is Rude, period. There’s no question about it. And this constant glorifying of his rudeness and arrogance and dismissing it as  a quirk could very well possibly give the impression that arrogance and vanity are in fact not so bad, and hell, it might make one seem a little cooler even ! Oh, don’t be mad if I act like my comfort character ! I’m quirky like that !

Constant bashing of the creators. And when I say constant, I mean it. This sort of bashing about is never-ending. And when I say this, I don’t mean that the creators were perfect; some of their mistakes were, quite frankly, blatantly ignorant ( like Irene the Canon Lesbian falling for Sherlock), but I don’t see enough people praising it for what it is. Even now there is so much slander against the creators ( and personally I feel bad for Mark Gatiss because he’s actually on twitter and is constantly spammed). Is it really a surprise that the creators hate the fans and especially the Johnlockers? Was it supposed to be so shocking when Martin said that being in the show wasn’t very fun anymore because of the fans?

We just don’t actually analyze anymore! I get that we haven’t got any new content for FOUR muheffing years but please I literally don’t see anything that’s actually interesting or analytical anymore and that kills me because that was the reason I joined this fandom- to read and comprehend the subtext, and the AMAZING META!  All I see are cute couple-ish pics of ben and Martin and tbh we can do so much better than that?!

Johnlockers have so much actual stuff to talk about? There is literally so much going on Subtextually, and yet all I see is people losing their mind over any interaction between Sherlock and John. This is so unfair! AND it’s detrimental too! With people painting every interaction as romantic in nature, the younger teenagers in this fandom who might not have experienced Love or Attraction may glean unrealistic ideas about them! It is difficult as it is to navigate oneself through romantic entanglements, let alone being fed such rose-colored ideas! And I say this because although I don’t know much about the audience on Tumblr, but Stan Twitter is like, (at least) 50 percent teenager-fuelled. It actually isn’t healthy for them at all.

Stop with the Benedict-worshipping for God’s sakes. Are you only in here because of him? We all get it, he’s absolutely stunning but come on, we’re here for the stories too right?

Romantic love is important, no doubt. But you know what’s completely overlooked? The platonic sort of love. And it’s tiring. Sherlock and Molly/Janine/Irene/John are all amazing duos and each pair has it’s own uniqueness and tang to it! Let’s not constantly dissect everything in the name of shipping, shall we?

lol looking back at it, I feel like it’s a vent rant for the prevailing circumstances on Stan Twitter. I apologize if anything I said hurt anyone, it wasn’t meant to. I completely understand that shipping people is for...recreation (?) but this was just my opinion. Let me know what you think about it!

[aaknopf]

Today we present a preview of a major new biography of Sylvia Plath, Red Comet, coming this fall. Through committed investigative scholarship, Heather Clark is able to offer the most extensively researched and nuanced view yet of a poet whose influence grows with each new generation of readers. Clark is the first biographer to draw upon all of Plath's surviving letters, including fourteen newly discovered letters Plath sent to her psychiatrist in 1961-63, and to draw extensively on her unpublished diaries, calendars, and poetry manuscripts. She is also the first to have had full, unfettered access to Ted Hughes's unpublished diaries and poetry manuscripts, allowing her to present a balanced and humane view of this remarkable creative marriage (and its unravelling) from both sides. She is able to present significant new findings about Plath's whereabouts and her state of health on the weekend leading up to her death. With these and many other "firsts," Clark's approach to Plath is to chart the course of this brilliant poet's development, highlighting her literary and intellectual growth rather than her undoing. Here, we offer a passage from Clark's prologue to the biography, followed by lines from one of Plath's celebrated "bee poems."

from Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath

The Oxford professor Hermione Lee, Virginia Woolf’s biographer, has written, “Women writers whose lives involved abuse, mental-illness, self-harm, suicide, have often been treated, biographically, as victims or psychological case-histories first and as professional writers second.” This is especially true of Sylvia Plath, who has become cultural shorthand for female hysteria. When we see a female character reading The Bell Jar in a movie, we know she will make trouble. As the critic Maggie Nelson reminds us, “to be called the Sylvia Plath of anything is a bad thing.” Nelson reminds us, too, that a woman who explores depression in her art isn’t perceived as “a shamanistic voyager to the dark side, but a ‘madwoman in the attic,’ an abject spectacle.” Perhaps this is why Woody Allen teased Diane Keaton for reading Plath’s seminal collection Ariel in Annie Hall. Or why, in the 1980s, a prominent reviewer cracked his favorite Plath joke as he reviewed Plath’s Pulitzer Prize–winning Collected Poems: “ ‘Why did SP cross the road?’ ‘To be struck by an oncoming vehicle.’ ” Male writers who kill themselves are rarely subject to such black humor: there are no dinner-party jokes about David Foster Wallace.

Since her suicide in 1963, Sylvia Plath has become a paradoxical symbol of female power and helplessness whose life has been subsumed by her afterlife. Caught in the limbo between icon and cliché, she has been mythologized and pathologized in movies, television, and biographies as a high priestess of poetry, obsessed with death. These distortions gained momentum in the 1960s when Ariel was published. Most reviewers didn’t know what to make of the burning, pulsating metaphors in poems like “Lady Lazarus” or the chilly imagery of “Edge.” Time called the book a “jet of flame from a literary dragon who in the last months of her life breathed a burning river of bale across the literary landscape.” The Washington Post dubbed Plath a “snake lady of misery” in an article entitled “The Cult of Plath.” Robert Lowell, in his introduction to Ariel, characterized Plath as Medea, hurtling toward her own destruction.

Recent scholarship has deepened our understanding of Plath as a master of performance and irony. Yet the critical work done on Plath has not sufficiently altered her popular, clichéd image as the Marilyn Monroe of the literati. Melodramatic portraits of Plath as a crazed poetic priestess are still with us. Her most recent biographer called her “a sorceress who had the power to attract men with a flash of her intense eyes, a tortured soul whose only destiny was death by her own hand.” He wrote that she “aspired to transform herself into a psychotic deity.” These caricatures have calcified over time into the popular, reductive version of Sylvia Plath we all know: the suicidal writer of The Bell Jar whose cultish devotees are black-clad young women. (“Sylvia Plath: The Muse of Teen Angst,” reads the title of a 2003 article in Psychology Today.) Plath thought herself a different kind of “sorceress”: “I am a damn good high priestess of the intellect,” she wrote her friend Mel Woody in July 1954.

Elizabeth Hardwick once wrote of Sylvia Plath, “when the curtain goes down, it is her own dead body there on the stage, sacrificed to her own plot.” Yet to suggest that Plath’s suicide was some sort of grand finale only perpetuates the Plath myth that simplifies our understanding of her work and her life. Sylvia Plath was one of the most highly educated women of her generation, an academic superstar and perennial prizewinner. Even after a suicide attempt and several months at McLean Hospital, she still managed to graduate from Smith College summa cum laude. She was accepted to graduate programs in English at Columbia, Oxford, and Radcliffe and won a Fulbright Fellowship to Cambridge, where she graduated with high honors. She was so brilliant that Smith asked her to return to teach in their English department without a PhD. Her mastery of English literature’s past and present intimidated her students and even her fellow poets. In Robert Lowell’s 1959 creative writing seminar, Plath’s peers remembered how easily she picked up on obscure literary allusions. “ ‘It reminds me of Empson,’ Sylvia would say . . . ‘It reminds me of Herbert.’ ‘Perhaps the early Marianne Moore?’ ” Later, Plath made small talk with T. S. Eliot and Stephen Spender at London cocktail parties, where she was the model of wit and decorum.

Very few friends realized that she struggled with depression, which revealed itself episodically. In college, she aced her exams, drank in moderation, dressed sharply, and dated men from Yale and Amherst. She struck most as the proverbial golden girl. But when severe depression struck, she saw no way out. In 1953, a depressive episode led to botched electroshock therapy sessions at a notorious asylum. Plath told her friend Ellie Friedman that she had been led to the shock room and “electrocuted.” “She told me that it was like being murdered, it was the most horrific thing in the world for her. She said, ‘If this should ever happen to me again, I will kill myself.’ ” Plath attempted suicide rather than endure further tortures.

In 1963, the stressors were different. A looming divorce, single motherhood, loneliness, illness, and a brutally cold winter fueled the final depression that would take her life. Plath had been a victim of psychiatric mismanagement and negligence at age twenty, and she was terrified of depression’s “cures,” as she wrote in her last letter to her psychiatrist—shock treatment, insulin injections, institutionalization, “a mental hospital, lobotomies.” It is no accident that Plath killed herself on the day she was supposed to enter a British psychiatric ward.

Sylvia Plath did not think of herself as a depressive. She considered herself strong, passionate, intelligent, determined, and brave, like a character in a D. H. Lawrence novel. She was tough-minded and filled her journal with exhortations to work harder—evidence, others have said, of her pathological, neurotic perfectionism. Another interpretation is that she was—like many male writers—simply ambitious, eager to make her mark on the world. She knew that depression was her greatest adversary, the one thing that could hold her back. She distrusted psychiatry—especially male psychiatrists—and tried to understand her own depression intellectually through the work of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Virginia Woolf, Thomas Mann, Erich Fromm, and others. Self-medication, for Plath, meant analyzing the idea of a schizoid self in her honors thesis on The Brothers Karamazov.

Bitter experience taught her how to accommodate depression—exploit it, even—in her art. “There is an increasing market for mental-hospital stuff. I am a fool if I don’t relive, or recreate it,” she wrote in her journal. The remark sounds trite, but her writing on depression was profound. Her own immigrant family background and experience at McLean gave her insight into the lives of the outcast. Plath would fill her late work, sometimes controversially, with the disenfranchised—women, the mentally ill, refugees, political dissidents, Jews, prisoners, divorcées, mothers. As she matured, she became more determined to speak out on their behalf. In The Bell Jar, one of the greatest protest novels of the twentieth century, she probed the link between insanity and repression. Like Allen Ginsberg’s Howl, the novel exposed a repressive Cold War America that could drive even the “best minds” of a generation crazy. Are you really sick, Plath asks, or has your society made you so? She never romanticized depression and death; she did not swoon into darkness. Rather, she delineated the cold, blank atmospherics of depression, without flinching. Plath’s ability to resurface after her depressive episodes gave her courage to explore, as Ted Hughes put it, “psychological depth, very lucidly focused and lit.” The themes of rebirth and renewal are as central to her poems as depression, rage, and destruction.

“What happens to a dream deferred?” Langston Hughes asked in his poem “Harlem.” Did it “crust and sugar over—/ like a syrupy sweet?” For most women of Plath’s generation, it did. But Plath was determined to follow her literary vocation. She dreaded the condescending label of “lady poet,” and she had no intention of remaining unmarried and childless like Marianne Moore and Elizabeth Bishop. She wanted to be a wife, mother, and poet—a “triple-threat woman,” as she put it to a friend. These spheres hardly ever overlapped in the sexist era in which she was trapped, but for a time, she achieved all three goals.

They thought death was worth it, but I Have a self to recover, a queen. Is she dead, is she sleeping? Where has she been, With her lion-red body, her wings of glass?

Now she is flying More terrible than she ever was, red Scar in the sky, red comet Over the engine that killed her— The mausoleum, the wax house.

from “Stings” by Sylvia Plath

More on this book and author:

Learn more about Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath by Heather Clark

Learn more about Heather Clark

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[probablyobsessingovertv]

My Opinions on Varchie, Bughead, and Barchie’s Chemistry

I know a lot of my fellow Varchie/Bughead shippers strongly dislike Barchie. One of their biggest arguments against the pairing is that they lack development over the past four seasons and that seemingly, this cheating scandal has come out of nowhere with very little warning or sense attached, which I agree with. It does feel like Betty and Archie’s (especially romantic) relationship has been very minimally developed over the last few years, making this seem sudden, unexpected, and in my personal opinion, not logical. Especially considering how good, strong, and healthy Betty and Jughead’s, and Veronica and Archie’s relationships appeared in S4. I didn’t really think that we were headed for infidelity or dishonesty, secrecy or betrayal. Not at all. I understand and respect why, from a drama and entertainment standpoint, it was done, but within the story, to me, it just doesn’t really make much sense. I hope most Varchies/Bugheads/ maybe even some Barchies or “on the fence” Barchies at least, could agree with that.

Another major argument for the anti-Barchies is the lack of chemistry shared between the characters and even more so, the actors, KJ and Lili. Now I don’t totally disagree with this, however, I believe there are different forms of chemistry that actors can display.

(Before I begin, this is entirely my opinion, with my terminology and categorizations, my ideas of where each fits, etc. All me, no actual research done other than looking at scenes of Riverdale to find examples. It is 1000% okay to disagree with me or to think about this differently. This is just my interpretation as a long-time teen drama tv watcher and someone that spends way too much time analyzing fictional characters, actors, and relationships of all kinds. I have no expertise or credibility in this. I’m just doing it for fun. Also, I believe this can be true in all industries and all relationships, not only in entertainment or on a fictional tv show/movie.)

First, there is Working chemistry. As in two people or a group that just make sense when they are together. There is a natural ease and comfortability between actors that makes those scenes flow well and makes the actors’ portrayal of the friendships/relationships their characters have a lot more believable and enjoyable to watch. KJ, Lili, Cami, Cole, Mads, Vanessa, Casey, etc, all possess this chemistry with each other. It’s obvious that they enjoy working with each other. They enjoy each other as people and that comes out on screen very well I think. Their irl close friendships and trust between each other definitely make this a lot easier and more authentic in the show as well as in interviews and promos for sure, which is one of the reasons I’m really drawn to this show. (Examples: Core 4 scenes at Pop’s, group scenes in musical episodes, the family groupings, the romantic pairings, one on one friendships like Betty and Veronica, Archie and Jughead, Kevin and Betty, Cheryl and Veronica, the list goes on.)

Emotional/Relational chemistry is similar to working chemistry, but I think it’s a level deeper. This can occur between short-lived romantic relationships, such as a character’s rebound or fling, along with family members, friends, neighbors, etc. I most commonly associate this kind of chemistry with primarily words and sometimes actions or deeds. Childhood best friends are a really good example of this to me, such as Betty and Archie in my mind. This chemistry means that actors/characters deeply trust each other and this trust has usually been built up and developed over the course of many years. The people involved are usually very comfortable with each other, again, trust one another in scenes, and depend on each other. A huge characteristic of relationships that include emotional chemistry is the ability of these characters to be vulnerable with one another, to have deep, meaningful conversation, know how to comfort one another, and the desire to protect, be there for, support, and look after each other. I like to call these brother-sister relationships sometimes.

Though most serious romances possess a large amount of emotional chemistry, a relationship that contains solely an emotional bond cannot progress further, such as a lasting, healthy romance. In my opinion, this is where Barchie’s relationship can be categorized.

Consequently, I greatly disagree with anyone who says KJ and Lili don’t have any chemistry with each other whatsoever. In nearly all of their scenes since S1, we can see that Betty and Archie care deeply for each other. They really trust each other. They feel safe and comfortable with one another and feel the need to protect the other from any kind of harm or danger. They have been there for each other through some very painful and difficult circumstances and have been constant sources of comfort and safety for each other since they were children. They grew up together. They know so much about one another and have been through so much together. KJ and Lili do a fantastic job with this kind of chemistry. Very emotionally driven scenes, scenes of saying what the other needs to hear, being a shoulder for the other to lean or cry on, giving advice to help each other through the trouble they face in their lives, having a good time together, being emotionally vulnerable and honest, showing up when the other needs them, and occasionally letting their emotions get the better of them and, in Archie and Betty’s case, believing that chemistry is a different kind than it really is. (Ex. Archie helping Betty calm down after the Black Hood and breaking up with Jughead for her in S2, 3x5 Archie’s escape when Betty gets him out of the pipe and hugs him, Betty working with Mary and Sierra on Archie’s case to prove him innocent, the glances out their windows. Look, they have good emotional/relational chemistry is what I’m trying to say.)

However, Betty and Archie have only ever kissed while broken up with or in a fight with the character they are most associated with romantically. (And the plan to help Jughead in S4, but that doesn’t count since it didn’t really have any romantic intention and was purely (at least initially) a ploy to distract everyone from the truth of Jughead being alive.) KJ Apa and Lili Reinhart have amazing emotional chemistry. It’s obvious that they care about and trust each other as real life people as well as their characters. They are clearly close in real life and have a pretty similar relationship to Betty and Archie from my observation. KJ and Cami also have phenomenal emotional chemistry with clearly a very deep trust or at the very least, the front of one, between each other as people and scene partners. Cole and Lili obviously do as well, and I could argue that the majority of actors on Riverdale share this emotional chemistry with many of their costars.

What I believe KJ and Lili, not particularly to fault of either of them, lack, is Physical, Sexual, and/or Romantic chemistry. I believe this is the only kind of chemistry that can’t be forced or faked. Physical chemistry is most often displayed in serious, long-term dating relationships and marriages, but can also show up in various other relationships in some circumstances. This usually comes in handy when actors/characters are kissing, hugging, holding hands, innocently touching like rubbing hands, holding faces or playing with hair. This can also be in the forms of heart eyes, certain smiles or flirty glances, etc. I see this as very intentional and almost second nature to most actors portraying couples. Actors with a lot of physical chemistry have to be incredibly comfortable with and trusting of each other. As has been said on countless occasions, lots of romantic scenes in films and tv are very very staged so making them look authentic, unplanned, attractive, and believable is a whole nother level of talent and trust in my opinion.

Most pairs of physically compatible actors tend to come up with their own ideas and improv some “coupley” gestures or ways of showing affection towards each other’s characters in ways that make sense for the story, those characters’ individual personalities, and the relationships between them. The first couple on Riverdale that I think of with strong romantic/physical chemistry is Archie and Veronica. KJ and Cami being the actors that portray them, of course. They have incredible physical chemistry and Varchie are also often seen as an overall very physical couple, constantly wanting to be near and touch each other. Yes, they also kiss, make out, and even have sex often on the show, but their physical chemistry really shows in the little things if you ask me. The overall show of physical affection displayed towards each other is truly so beautiful and looks so real and believable on screen. It’s especially obvious when actors are so comfortable and so invested in their characters that they come up with their own little moments for their couple that they know fans will enjoy. For KJ and Cami, they seem to find 100 different little ways to hold hands or to be very affectionate by touching each other’s hair and having specific movements or gestures they do every time they kiss that real life couples would definitely have, and overall using pretty simple facial expressions and body language to portray the love and the very believable (to me) relationship between Archie and Veronica.

Cole and Lili’s portrayal of Betty and Jughead is also very physically authentic, such as when Cole kisses Lili’s forehead or how she was laying on him in the season 4 Halloween episode. Vanessa and Mads and Choni have great physical chemistry too, due to how much they trust each other and how comfortable and close they are with each other in real life as best friends. Some of those little moments could be suggested by the director, but I know many of the small things are not scripted or directed. I do believe that genuine, physical chemistry is natural and cannot be fabricated. It sure can be exaggerated or diminished by good actors, but it really can’t be entirely faked without being very obvious in my mind.. All this to say, I believe that Betty and Archie lack that physical/romantic connection and I personally think KJ and Lili just don’t naturally have the same level of that chemistry as they do with Cami and Cole. Again, that is not remotely a diss to either actor. Some pairings just don’t work like others do and that’s not because the actors are incapable or “not talented enough” to portray it.

The casting team struck gold with KJ and Cami’s and Lili and Cole’s chemistry and that is very rare to find, especially for an entire cast to be so authentically compatible with each other. In conclusion, I am not completely against the idea of Betty and Archie as a couple, but I’m just not a huge fan of it because I don’t think it would be as realistic or believable as Varchie and Bughead are, solely based on the natural, romantic chemistry the actors have with each other. Not to mention the story and what makes the most sense in that regard.

TL; DR: I don’t blame you. This is my mind at 2am. Basically, I believe there are three major levels of chemistry between people, especially actors and the characters they portray.

1) Working Chemistry: pretty much people (actors) that genuinely like one another, get along, and make the relationships of their characters believable and enjoyable on screen. (aka the entire cast of Riverdale)

2) Emotional/Relational Chemistry: Kind of similar to working, but a level deeper. I refer to these as “sibling/family-esque” relationships. Usually expressed through words and sometimes actions or deeds. This is where I personally believe Betty/Archie’s relationship is.

3) Physical/Sexual/Romantic Chemistry: Everything from flirty glances to making staged romance scenes look authentic, to coming up with sweet little gestures to show affection. I believe this cannot be faked/forced entirely. Physical chemistry is something I believe Veronica/Archie and Betty/Jughead display incredibly well. In my opinion, this is what Barchie lacks. Both the characters and the actors that play them. Not dissing either of them, they’re obviously phenomenal actors and KJ/Lili have amazing emotional chemistry, I just personally think the romantic chemistry between them isn’t as strong as KJ/Cami, Cole/Lili, Madelaine/Vanessa, etc.

*If you made it this far, you’re also in too deep with this show. I’m kidding, I love you. Thank you for reading all of this. I would absolutely love to hear what you think.*

Also, thank you Freya @loverofthor-2 for proofreading and encouraging me to post my brain dump yet again. ❤️

[mashounen2003]

Meditations about the Prime Directive

Ah... The Prime Directive. Perhaps, the most controversial of Star Trek. Before we start talking about it, I think we should remember a little.

The Original Series was broadcast between 1966 and 1969, in the middle of the Vietnam War. The Prime Directive, then called "General Order One" or "Non-Interference Directive", had been created to send the message the USA should stop interfering in other countries' affairs in the way they did (and still would do to this day, despite all the wake-up calls); it's worth mentioning that, on many occasions, the "General Order One" didn't sound exactly like a law or something that should be strictly enforced, but more like a principle that should guide the Starfleet captains, or at least something that makes them leave their personal feelings aside and evaluate if what they do is the right thing or not.

On the other hand, there was also an episode called "A Taste of Armageddon", where the societies of two planets (namely, Eminiar VII and Vendikar) were fighting a war, but instead of fighting directly on the battlefield (or should I call it “battlespace”?), they used computers to calculate casualties on both sides and kill the unfortunate "chosen"; in that chapter, Kirk and Spock intervene in the internal affairs of both planets and destroy the computer. There were similar situations in episodes such as "The Return of the Archons" and "Patterns of Force". These chapters would be a way to send a message more or less similar to "If you find a world ruled or inhabited by huge motherf***ers, doing nothing is worse than interfering."

Then, this would be the meaning of the Prime Directive: except for cases where the inhabitants of a planet are killing each other or something similar and doing nothing is several times morally worse than your intervention, interfering in the affairs of another planet without enough development is wrong. It seems simple enough, an open and closed case, right?

But some dilemmas have arisen in this regard: already in the Original Series, Kirk usually broke the Prime Directive, regardless of whether each case really merited it in the same way as in "A Taste of Armageddon", to the point that one could interpret that as a message that more or less says "The USA's intervention in other countries is fine, no matter what". People began to debate what the First Directive actually means, the subsequent series and films of Star Trek delved further into that topic, and now there's this definition:

The Prime Directive prohibits Starfleet personnel and spacecraft from interfering in the normal development of any society and mandates that any Starfleet vessel or crew member is expendable to prevent violation of this rule.

As the right of each sentient species to live in accordance with its normal cultural evolution is considered sacred, no Starfleet personnel may interfere with the normal and healthy development of alien life and culture. Such interference includes introducing superior knowledge, strength, or technology to a world whose society is incapable of handling such advantages wisely. Starfleet personnel may not violate this Prime Directive, even to save their lives and/or their ship, unless they are acting to right an earlier violation or accidental contamination of the said culture. This directive takes precedence over any and all other considerations and carries with it the highest moral obligation.

A rather imprecise definition, if one begins to analyze it. Several times it was emphasized the Prime Directive only applies in those peoples that still ain’t capable of FTL (faster than light) travel and don't know about the existence of life outside their own world, but apparently, it applies to many more cases. This is already demonstrated in "A Taste of Armageddon", where the Prime Directive is applied when both the inhabitants of Eminiar VII and Vendikar are already clearly capable of travelling through space, have made contact with other worlds' civilizations and probably know the Federation exists too. Another case where this seems to be the case is the episode "Symbiosis", which isn’t of the Original Series but of its successor, The Next Generation.

In "Symbiosis", there's a planet whose people seem to be suffering from a disease (I no longer remember their name, but I'm gonna call it "Beta"), and another planet supplying them with a medicine that seems to cure that disease or at least alleviate its symptoms (I don't remember its name either, so I'll call it "Alpha"); Dr Crusher finds out that what Alpha is supplying is only a placebo and makes Beta's inhabitants depend on Alpha's. She demands Picard intervene and stop this monstrosity, but the captain tells her it's not right because it'd be an intervention in internal affairs of planets outside the Federation and thus it'd violate the Prime Directive. Anyway, Picard ends up finding a way to temporarily stop the drug traffic from Alpha to Beta, without theoretically breaking the Prime Directive.

This would mean this rule is also enforced partially in the diplomatic sphere, in the relationship with planets that are already capable of FTL travel, which also brings it closer to the purpose with which Roddenberry conceived it: to send the message that a country's interference in others' affairs is wrong, no matter what. But then, what definition should we believe? Is the Prime Directive enforced only to planets inhabited by peoples who don't know of the existence of life in other worlds and can't do FTL travels? Or is it enforced in the relationships with any world and society outside the Federation?

Then there are questions about whether this rule could actually be enforced in practice, for real: if it's imposed only on the Starfleet personnel, what happens if the interference is made by a freighter’s crew or just a citizen with their own starship? Shouldn't that be prohibited too, if one really wanna avoid interference and cultural contamination?

Another question. It's stated Starfleet can only interact with an alien society when they develop FTL travel, not only because they'll inevitably contact other species in one way or another after achieving this, but also because it's taken for granted a civilization that achieves such a thing is already mentally ready to relate to people from other worlds and receive superior knowledge, strength and technology from them. But is this actually accurate? Within the Star Trek universe, it's clear the Klingons were not mentally ready for this when inventing the own warp drive by themselves; if they had been, they'd not have been a conquering empire. On the other hand, as I said before, a society with FTL travel technology will contact aliens in one way or another; therefore, if a violent conquering people like the Klingons invent the warp drive or something like that, your isolation won't prevent them from eventually developing new weapons of mass destruction, finding your world and trying to conquer it and/or destroy you. Since we also have no way of knowing what criteria to use to define when a society is ready, the invention of means to do FTL travel is still the only reasonable limit between an alien society we can contact with and one we can't.

Another thing: following this idea of "not interfering with the normal evolution of another species", the Federation could easily not contact that species and ensure they dunno of its existence; however, the Federation could still be interfering with the future natural evolution of that same species, by incorporating into its territory the space around their planet or by exploiting the nearby reserves of various resources (for example, minerals inside asteroids). Even if those aliens didn't wage war for it when they developed their own warp drive and learned what the Federation did, they'd still feel forced to join the Federation to have access to at least a portion of those resources; and even if those aliens had no problem with it, there’s this problem: the Prime Directive could easily be summarized as "you must leave everything as it was before you were there, as if you had never been there", so Humanity should never explore space outside the Solar System and the whole Federation would be breaking the Prime Directive by merely existing.

There are people on the Internet who argue that the Federation is fascist or "human supremacist" and considers inferior to those alien societies without a warp drive, while using the Prime Directive as a legal basis for this. As if they wanted to draw a parallel between the discrimination carried out by the Nazis in real life, based on absurd criteria such as race and involving the extermination and exploitation of millions of people, and the Prime Directive of Star Trek, created so that the Future's Humanity doesn't repeat the mistakes committed throughout their past when travelling through space and interacting with aliens. These "fan" theories are usually based on something said by a Klingon delegate called Azetbur in a dialogue with Pavel Chekov in The Undiscovered Country, the sixth film.

Chekov: "We do believe all planets have a sovereign claim to inalienable human rights."

Azetbur: "Inalien... If only you could hear yourselves? 'Human rights'. Why the very name is racist. The Federation is no more than a Homo Sapiens only club."

And that dialogue continues...

Kerla (another Klingon delegate): "In any case, we know where this is leading: the annihilation of our culture."

McCoy: "That's not true!"

Okay, it's assumed people on the 23rd century -two centuries after their first contact with aliens and a century after the Federation was founded- should already have at their disposal a new word designating all sentient beings. It'd have been enough if Chekov had said "inalienable rights, inherent in every sentient being", even if it sounded a bit clumsy! But let's suppose it was just a slip of the tongue (either from the writers or the actor), and let's focus our attention on what Azetbur said: it's as much or more tendentious than that line of Chekov (if the latter's line can even be called "tendentious"), especially when the Klingon Empire is something far worse than "a Klingon only club", paraphrasing her.

There are those who claim that, in the universe of Star Trek, the Federation is sinisterly similar to the Borgs: it seeks to destroy the individuality of the Klingon people, by absorbing their culture and mixing it with the interplanetary amalgam the Federation's culture already is, ignoring the Federation’s moral code and way of life shouldn't be considered inherently better than the Klingons’. This would justify what T'Kuvma did at the beginning of the series Discovery: to unite the Klingon Great Houses and wage war against the Federation as soon as the latter made contact with them.

Other theories say the Federation resembles the USA much more than what's usually thought and there's some "depraved human supremacist plan" behind every time Humanity contacts with some alien world. Once again, making comparisons between Star Trek and real life, when the only thing sustaining this are the theories and interpretations of the audience itself.

Yeah... Bullshit. It’s not a bad thing to make comparisons between Star Trek and real life, but Star Trek is supposed to talk about how we can be better, not about how we can be the same jerks we're already being. It's all right with thinking carefully if our own value system is actually better than that of other peoples by default, but Moral Relativism has a limit and what's mentioned in the previous paragraphs goes too far. The perfect answer to this is in that same dialogue I quoted before, just a few seconds after Azetbur and Kerla said their lines:

Chang: "'To be, or not to be!' That is the question which preoccupies our people, Captain Kirk... We need breathing room."

Kirk: "Earth, Hitler, 1938."

Chang: "I beg your pardon?"

God, that was one of Kirk's best moments... Comparing what Chang said with the Nazi idea of Lebensraum or "living space".

There's a thing called "Paradox of Tolerance": in a nutshell, if you're tolerant with everyone, even with the Nazis and other intolerant pieces of crap, there'll come a day when those intolerant will subdue or destroy others, take power and destroy Tolerance itself. Humanity and the Federation in Star Trek may not have a value system better than that of other peoples and saving other peoples by stopping the Klingon advance isn’t morally good, but the "Ethics of Ethics" (I call it that because here we're studying whether it's right or wrong to apply the human morality when exploring space and relating to aliens) has no relevance here, because it'd be impossible to do something morally good in such a situation: if you told the Klingons "Halt! Up to here you have arrived!" and saved their potential victims, you'd be interfering, but if you didn't, the situation of the Paradox of Tolerance would be fulfilled, and you'd also do the opposite of what defines you as a human being, by allowing the Klingons to harm other peoples and perhaps also interfere in whatever may be called "normal development". Using Star Trek terminology, this is an ethical Kobayashi Maru.

And this brings us to another question... It's about Destiny, and about the role of each being in the Universe.

What would be the natural, normal or healthy evolution of a culture? How could we know if the Destiny of an alien civilization ain't to be visited by anyone until the FTL travel can be made, or to be contacted by people like the Federation, or to be conquered by people like the Klingons? How do we know if our role as Humanity is to protect the natural evolution of a planet and its people? If the Klingons are allowed to be themselves and conquer others, wouldn't it be right for the Federation to also be themselves and establish peaceful relations with other planets, always seeking the best for both these planets and for the Federation, guiding themselves by their own value system? If an underdeveloped civilization is about to suffer their extinction due to a natural disaster on their planet, and a starship's crew is able to help them without revealing their own existence, how can it be known the Destiny of that civilization is being extinguished while the starship doesn't intervene? Couldn't being saved by that starship also be what Destiny had dictated for that civilization?

Once upon a time, there was a controversial chapter of The Next Generation called "Pen Pals": Picard and the others find a planet on the verge of suffering a global cataclysm that will make it uninhabitable, and at the same time, Data establishes a friendship with a little girl from that planet through radio messages or something like that; the android asks that planet's inhabitants be saved, by taking advantage of the fact that the ship is capable of doing it without anyone on that planet even knowing they were saved, but his captain argues this would break the Prime Directive because they'd be playing God and interfering with that planet's natural evolution. In the end, Picard and the others save the people of that planet anyway, by finding a "loophole" in the First Directive and intentionally interpreting the little girl's messages to Data as a distress call.

And no, I ain't talking about how Data is, as on so many other occasions, ironically more human than everyone else on the Enterprise-D.

One could oppose saving the people of a planet in that situation, arguing that starship shouldn't have been there and that civilization wasn't destined to be saved, but you could also say there's no way to know what's the Destiny of anyone or anything. In the same way, you can't know if the Destiny of that civilization is to receive a benefactor's interference, nor can you know if their Destiny is to be conquered by the Klingons or be saved by the Federation or be the setting for a chapter of Doctor Who or whatever. If using your power to save those people was a way of playing God, refusing to use that power and letting that natural disaster destroy them would be a way of playing God too.

If a starship and its crew are in a situation similar to that in which the Enterprise-D was in "Pen Pals", the only thing the captain could really count on to make a decision is the judgment of the whole crew and of themself.  The crew’s morality and value system may not be impartial, but those of any other are not either, and when their morality and value system are used in order to make a decision, it'll not be done because that morality and that value system are the best or are considered the best, but because it's the only thing available.

Since we're talking about something where everyone has the same ability to make a decision regardless of their rank, the best thing would be that the decision to make is as democratic as possible. If it's urgent, only the starship's crew should be called to vote; if there's still a long time available to think about it better, the government of the country or planet from which that starship comes should be notified about this, and that government should then request that the matter be evaluated by a special committee appointed for that purpose, by the Parliament or by the people themselves through a plebiscite, depending on how much time is left.

So... I guess that's it for now. It'd be a pleasure to know your opinions on this topic.

(Why do I have the feeling millions of Trekkies will only pour their hatred in the replies?)

[aggressivelearningai]

Data Management and Visualization Submission - 1

STEP 1: Choose a data set that you would like to work with. ==> I am going ahead with the gap-minder dataset.

STEP 2. Identify a specific topic of interest

==> I want to understand few correlation between different aspects like 'Alcoholism'<=>'Mortality Rate', 'High GDP'<=>'Mortality rate' and other such relations and see that the dataset provides enough information for me to answer this question.

Additionally, I am interested in understanding what factors are required to be considered such that the interpretation holds any real value. Moreover, I would like to understand few other questions like:

1) How to go upon looking for the factors that actually matter in real life.

2) When to know that we have found enough number of factors for our analysis.

3) What type of pre-analysis is needed in order for us to make sure that now one can proceed with the data collection part.

4) How to perform the feasibility analysis of our question of interest or research? By feasibility, I meant how much time and other resources that we should invest in finding some fruitful results. Does this even a thing in real life?

STEP 3. Prepare a codebook of your own (i.e., print individual pages or copy screen and paste into a new document) from the larger codebook that includes the questions/items/variables that measure your selected topics.)

==> The gap miner dataset is not very big. Because of this reason I do not have to create the separate codebook as I am will consider all the variables mentioned for analyzing different relationship and see if there is multiple stage connection

The dataset has in total of 16 variables of which one is non-numerical or categorical. And all together there are 213 records.

STEP 4. Identify a second topic that you would like to explore in terms of its association with your original topic.

==> As I mentioned before that I will be doing multiple analysis due tot he size of the dataset being small and will try to find the bigger picture of what is happening behind the curtains.

STEP 5. Add questions/items/variables documenting this second topic to your personal codebook.

==> The questions that I would like to get the answers from the analysis are:

1) How is the country mortality rate correlated with the alcohol consumption?

2) How is the income correlated with the alcohol consumption rate. Does this consumption have any connection with stress (suicide rate) whatsoever?

3) What strongly moves the Breast Cancer in female rate?

4) Does suicide rate has any correlation with the employment rate?

5) Is there any relation with the internet use with the co2 emissions?

6) I believe that oil user rate will have the strong +ve correlation with the CO2 emissions, but I will want to find that out too.

STEP 6. Perform a literature review to see what research has been previously done on this topic. Use sites such as Google Scholar (http://scholar.google.com) to search for published academic work in the area(s) of interest. Try to find multiple sources, and take note of basic bibliographic information.

==> Literature Review for above mentioned questions:

1) How is the country mortality rate correlated with the alcohol consumption?

High (but not low or moderate) alcohol intake was associated with increased mortality (HR, 1.31; 95% CI, 1.04–1.66). Heavy episodic drinking was also associated with increased mortality (HR, 1.54; 95% CI, 1.27–1.87)

In conclusion, this meta-analysis confirms the hazards of excess drinking but also indicates the existence of potential windows of alcohol intake that may confer a net beneficial effect of drinking, at least in terms of survival, both in men and in women. Heavy drinkers should be urged to cut their consumption, but people who already regularly consume low to moderate amounts of alcohol should be encouraged to continue.

2) How is the income correlated with the alcohol consumption rate. Does this consumption have any connection with stress (suicide rate) whatsoever?

Research on the long-term associations between SES and alcohol outcomes has shown inconsistent correlations between snapshots of childhood SES and later alcohol outcomes. In contrast, a relatively consistent, inverse association seems to exist between long-term trajectories of SES and alcohol outcomes, with downward SES trajectories predicting heavier subsequent drinking and greater negative alcohol-related consequences. Further studies involving more sophisticated longitudinal analytic methods (e.g., cross-lagged panel modeling) are needed to more explicitly test and establish the nature of the complex transactional dependencies between the trajectories of SES and alcohol outcomes over time.

3) What strongly moves the Breast Cancer in female rate?

The incidence of breast cancer in developed countries and its death in less developed countries is high. Increasing the HDI, along with the increased screening program in these countries, can help to identify and reduce the mortality of this disease. Increasing the level of education and awareness of women is also one of the health priorities in this area that can be effective in reducing mortality in patient.

The prevalence of obesity and physical inactivity was high within the GCCCs, but the majority of the included studies found no positive correlation between obesity or physical inactivity and BC. A high proportion of women in this study were pre-menopausal which could contribute to the negative findings.

4) Does suicide rate has any correlation with the employment rate?

Being unemployed was associated with a twofold to threefold increased relative risk of death by suicide, compared with being employed. About half of this association might be attributable to confounding by mental illness.

The link between unemployment rates and suicide is a very important measure of the impact of the economic crisis. However, behind these statistics lie personal and family tragedies, the long-term impact of which is difficult to measure.

The global suicide rate is steadily falling, from a high of 38 percent in 1994 to just 11 percent in 2018. However, the opposite is true for Mexico as suicide rates have been rising over the past 40 years, but little literature discusses the reason. From an empirical study, the paper's primary contribution is finding that the economic growth directly negatively affects the unemployment rate, at the same time, the unemployment rate and suicide rate are positive bidirectional causality in Mexico. Moreover, we find that adding the variable of economic growth rate as a control variable, unemployment rate, suicide rate, and the economic growth rate exists long relationship under non-linear conditions.

5) Is there any relation with the internet use with the co2 emissions?

Even before the Covid-19 epidemic, the electricity consumption of the internet represented as much as that of Great Britain! Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) accounted for 6 to 10% of global electricity consumption, or 4% of our greenhouse gas emissions. And this figure increases by 5 to 7% each year!

In terms of greenhouse gas emissions, internet use accounts for 3.7% of global emissions, i.e. the equivalent of all air traffic in the world. And this figure is expected to double by 2025 (excluding the Covid-19 effect). In concrete terms, this represents, for the internet alone, an average of 400 g of CO2 emitted per inhabitant each year.

But this is only an average: access to ICT varies greatly from one region of the world to another. Emissions per person are therefore much higher in an industrialized and highly 'connected' country. And they are only increasing.

STEP 7. Based on your literature review, develop a hypothesis about what you believe the association might be between these topics. Be sure to integrate the specific variables you selected into the hypothesis.

==> The Hypothesis that I have developed from the literature review that I have done are as follows:

1) How is the country mortality rate correlated with the alcohol consumption?

With the increase in consumption of alcohol rate the mortality rate will increase.

2) How is the income correlated with the alcohol consumption rate. Does this consumption have any connection with stress (suicide rate) whatsoever?

Lower the income of a person more are the chances that the person will resort to alcohol for getting the stress relieved

3) What strongly moves the Breast Cancer in female rate?

The income of a person and the literacy rate of the country should lower the mortality rate of breast cancer in a women.

4) Does suicide rate has any correlation with the employment rate?

based on what I read, I believe that unemployment has the positive correlation with the suicide rate in a country

5) Is there any relation with the internet use with the co2 emissions?

Yes, there is and should be positive correlation between the usage of internet and the carbon emissions.

6) I believe that oil user rate will have the strong +ve correlation with the CO2 emissions, but I will want to find that out too.

I think this is too obvious to be true, now is the time to find out

[toddandersvn]

wuh oh i’m being a nerd on main again!

it’s well known that besse is a master of his art and sana’s trailer showed to be no different. I was left baffled and fascinated by it, so i analyzed the skamit season 4 trailer almost frame by frame and here is what i came up with (also i guess this is my entry for @skamitaliafandomevents week two day one: predictions a very late entry please forgive me i rly wanted to do this before the season started) 

also i just enjoy doing these i’m not a film student so i might be completely wrong so if you want to correct me or add anything please do:))

everything is under the cut... enter at your own risk;)

In this scene we can see a green backlit Sana on a phone call saying that she is italian as well. Green can be used to symbolize envy and/or jealousy, which in this case could be interpreted as Sana’s wish to be considered italian, and her “jealousy” of whoever is on the other side of that phone call for fitting in. Jealousy is in quotes because the backlighting can also suggest that it’s in the back of her head, not really apparent to others and even maybe to her. Green also has a history of being used to represent evil in Disney villains (evil step-mother’s eyes in Cinderella, Scar’s cove in Lion King, Dr. Facilier’s spirits in The Princess and The Frog and many more). If we take this scene from the point of view of the other person of the phone call, Sana could be seen as a villain due to stereotypes against muslims and the anger in Sana’s voice.

In the trailer, this scene was cut in two (well three, but one doesn’t really matter here), but if we watch the trailer in .25x speed like a maniac you can see that they probably fit together. In the first shot we see a blue backlit Sana hiding in a bathroom praying. Blue is usually used to show sadness and pensiveness, and as i said above, the backlit can represent the back of her mind, or her neglecting it, hiding how she truly feels. Knowing the background/back story for this clip, which i can only imagine is the clip at the end of the first episode, she is hiding from everyone at the party to prey, and this physical hiding can be used to emphasize emotional hiding.

The next moment in that clip is the camera panning from the blue backlit scene to an orange frontlit scene, which emphasizes contrast as orange and blue are two complementary colours. Orange is used to show interest and optimism, which can be how she feels towards Malik, which leads me to think the shadow we see could be him. However, it can also symbolize vigilance, which can also be her feelings towards the couple making out and bursting in, if besse follows the original storyline.

Sana is looking longingly at Malik surrounded by grass, which is a lighter, warm green that can represent admiration, trust and acceptance. She is staring at him from a distance, which is a very passive way of acting, staying in the shadows, in her black outfit which is a symbol for modesty in islam, basically she is keeping her feelings for herself. Another colour important in islam and relevant to his scene as well is green. Green in islam symbolizes paradise, which Malik just so happens to be surrounded by…. i see you Sana, i do, you can’t fool me

Le matte are by the canal trying to cheer Sana up, in a very cool toned scene. Cool tones can represent sadness and or detachment, which Sana is probably feeling at this point towards the girl squad or herself, given that they are trying to cheer Sana up. Them comforting with a rather cool toned scene can indicate this scene is either pre-falling out or a reconciliation scene.

What stood up for me in the trailer is the drastic contrast between when Sana is alone or with Malik with very warm and loving tones, and when she is with the girl squad with rather cool tones. This reinforces and supports Sana’s feelings of feeling like she doesn’t belong, or has to tone down who she is in order to be friends with them.

This scene is airy and light, which represents pure and heartfelt feelings and peace. Both characters are smiling at each other, which only emphasizes these assumptions. The next shot is in the kitchen that can imply domesticity and comfort, as well as the blue tones from the hijab and walls that represent pensiveness and shyness. It passes the vibe check.

In this scene Sana is wearing a warm yellow hijab that can represent serenity and joy. This particularly stands out from the black one we are used to see her wear and have seen her wear around Malik earlier. She is in a greenhouse surrounded by nature, the green of admiration and growth but also the green of paradise. She is also surrounded by windows that can indicate she has moved to an active way of acting, instead of staring from a distance. This assumption is supported by her waving at Malik through the window. She is letting herself go through the mortifying ordeal of being known, which is a huge change from her usual secretive self and first few dark shots of the trailer.

Here Besse used a wide angle lens most likely to show the surroundings, or lackthereof, of the two characters. Both of them are alone and isolated together. At this moment in time, there are no outside factors matter, it is just them and their thoughts. i imagine this is the scene when malik tells Sana about the nico x mikael kiss, which is a very pivotal chapter point in the season and it is important to show them alone and Sana having to “reset” her thoughts.

Again, they are surrounded by green/lime: trust and acceptance, which links to the talk they are having with malik choosing accpetance> religion and stopping believing in Allah.

When her and her friends are sitting on the couch, they are mostly dressed in blue, all looking awkward/embarrassed. It is possible that it is sadness/grief from them having to share the house in Mykonos, as the audio over that scene suggests, but then again it could also just be from the two characters we can see on the mirror kissing. I’m obsessed and i watched and rewatched and i’m almost 100% sure the girl is Covitti, which by elimination process lets me think the guy is Canecoso, which justifies the awkwardness on Eva and Silvia’s face.

When Sana is on her bed calling Ele, she is leaning against her green wall, but looking towards a warm orange light. This can be seen as many things related to her finally accepting her feelings for malik. She can move from the shadows to the light (from staring longingly to actually talking to him), moving from a passive to an active way of acting (like going to see him with her yellow hijab) and lastly moving from green jealousy to orange happiness. All of these clues lead me to think this clip happens before the greenhouse house clip. POETIC F*CKING CINEMA I COULD COLLAPSE

I’m assuming this is the karaoke equivalent party, because of the way it is lit. If it is, it would be the party where both of Sana’s worlds (her brother & friends and her school friends) meet. We can see some scenes of clashing in the trailer, however having the scene lit up with red and green, two complementary (opposite on the colour wheel) colours, it prepares the audience  for a contrast. It can be a contrast of feelings, but in this case i’m lead to think it’s of background, and probably ideas as well, if it follows the OG. A justification of the use of green and red could be the feelings associated with each colour, like red with anger/annoyance and red with surprise. I won’t spoon feed you and tell you why but you get it.

In this scene, we see Sana and Malik in a street with a lit up red cross in the background. It can be seen as reference to Romeo + Juliet by Baz Luhrmann, but also as a reference to the OG with the OHN. In the OG, isak is running away from a blue cross, running away from the sadness he’d been feeling for the past days and weeks, which is a contrast both in colour, direction and pace to Sana walking with Malik towards a red cross, walking towards romance.  It is for that reason i think this will be their date scene towards the end of the season. Also, they are walking and not running which can symbolize them taking it slow, and deciding to be friends again before anything else. It looks like the cross is also moving towards them as well, which can symbolize a middle ground/finding a balance between her religion and her country’s religion. Besse you magnificent bastard i love you, vibe check passed.

Sana is submerging herself in a pool, with oddly very blue water. This oddly blue water matching her burking makes the colour stand out and can highlight its importance in the scene. Blue can symbolize shyness, it can symbolize peace, stability, and tranquility, depending on the shade and hue, but in this case this turquoise signifies the latter. She is letting herself float in it, bathing and soaking it in, and her face is at peace, which only strengthens my assumptions that this clip happens towards the end once everything is almost resolved.

And that’s all i came up with. I also think that the beach clips will be the last episode and they will all be from different povs, but that’s just wishful thinking at this point i’m sure. These are all obviously theories, however i think it is fascinating how Besse chose so many different colours as well as different way of lighting the scene to convey Sana’s emotions and feelings at different moments of the seasons. I am probably a clown about most of it but that’s just part of the skam experience, but either way i am very hyped to see the master at it again!

i’m repeating it here again, but if you have things to add or further questions please let me know i’d be more than happy to read what you have to say!🌻 that’s all have a great day:))