#important to note there are absolutely zero romances all of this is platonic

[havenesc]

heyyyy if you had any more thoughts about rancher jason’s cool rancher friends. twould not be opposed to hearing them 👀👀

oh my god boy do i ever have any info about them,,,,

(the jason rancher au)

Kacey is 25 and has been ranching his whole life, just in various spots around the country. He's the Responsible One, the one who is most dependable and most experienced when stuff gets tough. He gets Jason's first real true cowboy hat as a gift for like, congrats on passing the trial run, now you're one of us. He's a good egg, classic cowboy mf. He is also a very wicked prankster and never ever say dare to him in a game of truth or dare.

Goose is 26 and he is also a good egg, just a bit meaner -- he likes taking the piss out of Jason being a city kid at first, and he has a short fuse when tensions get high, but he's also always trying to teach Jason something with good intentions and quickly takes him under his wing. Always checking in on him, always giving him a hard time. He's a shameless flirt and the kind of ranch hand people have the stereotype for why you do not date ranch hands. He makes Jason feel homesick.

Laura is the closest in age -- she's 20, where Jason (who is moonlighting as a 21 year old) is only 19, but an old soul. She is partially deaf and tends to lean towards stoicism by nature. Jason is a pro at dealing with stoic people, so he knows she may not necessarily dislike him, but they become fast friends when she makes an offhanded comment about hating her dad and Jason's like man preaching to the choir. They joke that Laura is the Boss' favorite child, though they're not related.

Some little things:

Rookie Initiation is sending the new kid (Jason) out to tag a calf knowing mama cow is the Fuck Around, Find Out kind of cow. The other hands also have to bail Jason out of this.

In the beginning, Jason buys a few things for working on the range, but it's not nearly enough. Goose ends up loaning him some clothes and outfitter supplies until he can take him into town and help him appropriately prepare for winter.

Cowboy Jousting.

Once a month they attend the rodeo in town. Goose is a bullrider. Eventually, somehow, someway, he also gets Jason up on a bull.

Kacey loooooves to cook, and likes to do it often, which means they all end up sitting around the hand encampment just trading stories a lot of evenings.

[It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia Title Card] The Hands Introduce Jason To Hotwire

Laura has a horse named Barbie. Barbie is a mean bitch. Barbie is a cowbiter. Barbie has nailed Jason in the thigh with a kick in a way that makes him invent new curse words and revive forgotten ones. And Barbie is Laura's little princess.

Sometimes they go camping!! A little Treat. An Excursion.

There are a lot of ranch dogs, but Kacey is very soft on an australian cattle dog puppy. Everyone knows you're not supposed to let the "outside dogs" inside, but everyone ALSO knows Kacey brings that damn dog with him everywhere and definitely lets him sleep on his bed.

Goose is really good at constellations. Someone will point at a random scattering of stars and Goose will squint for a few seconds, name it if it exists, and start the story that is associated with it. (He'll also just make shit up though.)

Jason ends up getting into mounted shooting when Kacey starts practicing, and they end up trading off a lot of tips!!

When Bruce inevitably comes around, Laura aims a rifle at him and not even the other two hands can call her off. Because she might not say much but she listens a lot and she knows the tremble in Jason's voice when he mentions Bruce ain't from missing him.

[psychicdisaster]

Alright then, here is my take on the whole shipping discourse in this fandom.

As someone who headcanons that Saiki is aroace with zero romantic or sexual attraction, I think it’s not my job to police anyone who likes to ship him with other characters. I can respect others who do so (and sometimes I find their ideas to be very interesting), and so can you. It’s not like getting angry over this will fix the problem over night.

I do wish less of the fandom was about shipping, because I think that the platonic relationships are the backbone of the series and are worth exploring. Despite that, I absolutely love seeing what people think about different pairings because the fandom is so creative.

It’s important to note that although Saiki says he has no interest in romance, he is written to be an unreliable narrator, meaning it’s hard to tell whether he is explicitly aroace coded or not. I like to think he is, but I don’t think others are wrong for disagreeing.

However, I do understand why someone would be upset with all of this. It is a bit frustrating to see a character you see as aroace be shipped left and right. In that case, it’s best to block users/tags that you are not interested in. Blocking something really isn’t serious, it’s simply a way to make this platform more enjoyable to you.

Anyway, I think this discourse is a bit useless. Let people see the character how they’d like. There’s no use arguing with each other. I think we can learn to respect different opinions.

[sugar-satin]

All Info Regarding Roleplay!

→ Writing Style

Preferred Point of View:

I use third person limited only! I know my characters actions and thoughts and internal feelings, but I do not like when my roleplay partner takes over my oc! Please do not think or act for my character as I won't do that for you either! (This does not apply to us ooc if you are the type to send content because you think it's very my-oc etc.!)

Narrative Tone:

I use a lot of terms and slang that are improper depending on the character I am writing, but for the most part I try to maintain a romantic and whimsical tone. I prefer airy, lofty, flowery uses of words when the scene calls for it! And I'm perfectly fine with a simple, brisk, response as well (if warranted).

Pacing:

Slow burn is my favorite element of roleplay! Feeling like you're waiting for the latest new episode of your favorite show to drop is half the fun of a good plot! I am the type of roleplayer who does not mind making a server for our roleplay, therefore if you start to get bored of the "canon" plot we can start another slow burn that's new, or even create a rushed romance, in the form of an au!!

Detail Level:

I'm very detailed and I don't expect that of any of my rp partners consistently! I would absolutely love if you were, but I am not picky whatsoever! Please just make sure the parts that truly count in our story are accurately detailed and written, so that I can give you a proper thought out reply that makes us both happy!

Dialogue Style:

I tend to write as much as I can! I'm flexible depending on my partner. I've been on a roleplay hiatus for quite some time, so I'm currently getting used to roleplaying with people again. I never stopped writing however, so my hopes is I'll get back to where I was! Typically I can give multi-paragraph responses, when I have the time and privacy I can push the Discord character limit- double it even! But if my partner needs less and less detail, we can arrange for it instantly! Just communicate:)

→ Roleplay Dynamics:

Preferred Roleplay Type:

I stick to 1x1 pairings, because of the tendency to crave that romantic energy in the plot, but that doesn't limit me to creating intense detail for our 1x1! I focus on one pairing, but I put more focus on detail and add many side characters that become canon to the character of choice.

Posting Frequency:

I'm a student in the Midwest, and I'm at school from 8am to 3pm CST! HOWEVER, I am nearly completed and I have 2 hours of break combined up there when I'm bored! Class can sometimes move slow, and I'll have time to communicate ooc with you of course! Once I'm home, I have a lack of schoolwork so I've very attentive to replies towards 3:30pm CST until around 11:30pm/12am!!

Communication Style OOC:

This is important! When we chat I'll be asking for the password to make sure you read this part ^^ Keep reading did it! Please note that I prefer to have rp partners that really get into the plot of our two characters! If we can't have some small talk here and there ooc, AT LEAST about our characters, I don't think we'll be a good match! I'm not forcing you to be my friend, but we have to have some platonic chemistry to write together and enjoy it! Bonus points the password is star if we have our own server (for channels to put ooc, headcanons, memes, future plot ideas, fcs, etc)

→ Content

Content Boundaries:

I will not play any minor with an adult vice versa! I also refuse to roleplay anything medieval, seeing as I have zero experience. I don't like playing fantasy creatures aside from the typical, I'm willing to hear you out but please don't be upset if I don't want to! I'm open to dead dove, just no minors PLEASE.

Trigger Warnings/Topics to Avoid:

I love angst and realness, I have no real triggers or topics to avoid! If you have any triggers or topics I should avoid please make sure you have them listed!!

Romance and Relationships:

I can play mxm pairings and mxf pairings! For men I have a hard time writing more shy/timid/'cute' characters and they're typically flawed (not overly), rougher, men. In mxf pairings I will only write the female character, and I can flesh out the character more compared to her male counterpart. Please do not ask me to play outside of these pairing preferences!

→ Collaboration Preferences:

Plot Development:

I welcome collaborative, pre-planned, and improvisational! We can create it together, one of us can provide one (we can always tweak it), or we can see where things go! I would very much prefer the first two though!!!

Character Development:

If you have an oc ready that is perfectly fine but please know that I am back after a hiatus and I only have a few that I'm currently working on!! I will ask if you have a preference for faceclaim type, but know I prefer realistic faceclaims! I welcome anime and drawn OCs but I don't like picrews. Like I enjoy them for funsies but please don't use soley a picrew.

World-Building:

Please try to be descriptive with how you envision the scene playing out!! I l-o-v-e taking time to build up the world our characters live in. Even if it's just "modern day [insert obtainable real place]", I want to know what the people in that place are like, the goers on the sidewalk, what the scene looks like in detail when it rains, the way the pavement is cracked or not, I DON'T CARE just be descriptive.

Preferred Level of Planning (e.g., detailed plotting, minimal planning):

Both make me equally as happy!!! I'm very fast to come up with plots off the top of my head if needed, I just need to know if you'd like to avoid "dead dove " content and your preference for cliches or not!!!!

→ Technical Preferences:

Platform for Roleplay:

I only use Discord for roleplay! Add me at cemeterydoggy <3 Cold adds and dms are welcomed here.

Language and Grammar Expectations:

Please use capitals and punctuation, correct any mistakes I genuinely cannot understand. I'm really not like anal about any of this, of course just... I don't know... don't do *this* I'm not character ai.

→ Additional Information:

Experience Level:

I'm 20 and I'm fairly confident I've been "roleplaying" since I was like 12 - I will not lie. In middle school I was a beginner, in the beginning of highschool I was plotting and writing ALL the time, and by the end of highschool I had no more time to... and a MASSIVE loss of motivation. I stopped writing OCs and plots, but I never stopped writing.

Interests Outside of Roleplay:

Rick and Morty, BBC Sherlock, Romance Books, Writing, Poetry, Video Essays, Icebergs, Deep Dives, Podcasts, Gardening, Cooking/Baking (from scratch), Bread Baking, Marine Biology, Paleontology, Zoology.

Any Special Requests/Requirements:

I'd like to say that I'm a little socially awkward because I'm neurodivergent, but my experience is still there. I can give you detail and a story I just need my partners to be a little patient and easy going (preferably not dry).

[lvthkllr]

Buckle up kiddos because this might make y’all mad.

(Please excuse the scattered nature of my ramblings, I am just trying to get my thoughts off my chest.)

So I'm relatively new to tumblr & Ao3, and in exploring some of my favorite fandoms—both past & present—I've discovered that there are very passionate shippers of non-canon couples in fandoms that I have been part of for years.

Now I'm not completely blind, I have always been aware that there are people who ship non-canon couples like Penelope & Eloise, Harry & Hermione, Glinda & Elphaba, Steve & Bucky, Meredith & Alex, etc. However, I find myself getting slightly annoyed by these ships because I've noticed a pattern with all of them ... they are all characters who share a close platonic bond that many of them describe as a sibling relationship.

On a surface level it's not hard to figure out why these ships come about: many real life romances begin as friendships, a good edit can make any two people look like a couple, people are always going to have their own readings of a piece of media, actors will sometimes choose to imply romantic feelings even when it's not in the script, or media can be viewed very differently outside of the time period of it's inception. But I think that this phenomenon actually has more to do with fandoms—and society in general—placing a heavy importance on romantic love over platonic love.

As someone who has been exploring aromanticism not only as a concept but possibly as a label for myself, it has become glaring how preoccupied fandoms are with creating romantic relationships to “strengthen” the connection between two characters despite the writers having already created a strong bond between them.

Overall, I have never been nor will I ever be someone who polices fandoms and how people choose to participate in those fandoms. If you are a shipper of one of the couples above or any other popular non-canon ships I am in no way trying to insult you. HOWEVER, I do feel platonic soulmates are such an undervalued part of fandoms that often get overshadowed by this need to define deep friendship as secretly romantic.

As a quick side note, I do want to mention that a lot of popular non-canon ships are mlm or wlw, and I have absolutely ZERO issues with queer ships/relationships on screen or in fanfiction, but something about fandoms constantly speculating on the sexuality of characters who’s sexuality is not explicitly labeled in the original media feels like a move in the wrong direction for queer representation on screen.

[canonrpfinder]

🔪 SUPERNATURAL??? in 2024??? apparently, yeah... 🔪

heyyyyyy soooooo..... as it turns out, Ya Boi is back on his Supernatural bender for the first time in ten years. you know how it goes; you need something to watch in the bg, you get way too invested, and... the rest is history.

● so, what am I looking for?

CC x CC, M x M for the most part. I'm looking to write either my Dean Winchester against your Castiel aka DESTIEL, or possibly my Gabriel against your... someone. preferred dynamics against Gabriel are either Dean or Lucifer, possibly the rest of the angels - not very picky, I guess most of the dynamics I'm looking for just involve Dean atm, hah. definitely open to, say, a platonic, family themed thread around Dean and Bobby as well. please note that I have zero interest in wincest and that on my current rewatch I'm currently only at season 5; I've watched it up to 9 before and I've been thoroughly spoiled for the rest, though, so no worries about that!

(as a sidenote, I'm super into rareships - my Pamela against your Ash, anyone???)

● about me, then: I'm 32, trans guy, residing in Europe. 15+ years of writing experience and I come equipped with samples. I prefer to write over discord in a shared a server. open to tupperbox though I don't require it! I typically write multiple paragraphs; I don't think it's possible to even get a reply under two paragraphs minimum out of me. third person prose, past tense preferred. good grammar is a must, though I'm forgiving of small mistakes. normally I reply daily, though depending on how life is (as you do) results may vary and I'll try to keep you updated. hoping for something similar! I'm super open to AUs, crossovers, different timelines, multiple threads and so on! my absolute favorite thing to write is romance with plot, with some smut tossed in. I prefer my porn with plot and prefer complex settings and relationship to sexuality rather than just mindless, emotionless humping. some pain, some fluff, some terrible angst and passionate love. a nice, healthy balance of things with love perservering through the challenges. like mentioned, I'm open to smut as well as dead dove topics; we can discuss triggers and limits in dms! not interested in toxic ships or looking to double.

finally, I hope you're a minimum of 25 years old. if you made it all the way to the bottom and remain interested, great! drop this post a like and I will surely find you! no worries about committing before you even know how I operate; my blog has links that will tell you everything I know and, upon first message, I will drop all the important info your way anyway so you may simply ghost me if it's not your thing.

look forward to hearing from you!!

✒️

[sarahsworldwideweb]

Unpopular opinion: SE Hinton is not homophobic. At the very least, she’s not homophobic for not wanting people to ship Johnny and Dallas. The Outsiders isn’t a romance novel. It’s about class warfare, identity, and coming of age. If gay people relate to the characters because of their mannerisms, home life, etc, that’s all well and dandy. You can relate to and empathize with a character/person without needing to have every part of your identity match with theirs. Straight people can relate to and empathize with gay people, and vice versa. One singular aspect of your identity does not completely define you as a person (ironically, that’s like, the main message of The Outsiders but I digress). At the end of the day Hinton can’t stop people from shipping her characters or head canoning them as gay. But she gave her honest answer to the question of whether or not Johnny and Dallas were gay/had feelings for each other, and the answer was no. She wrote the fucking book, guys. She was a 16 year old living in 1960’s Tulsa, Oklahoma. I’m sorry, but I don’t think adding gay representation into her book was at the forefront of her mind. Another thing to note is that this book was based on her real life experience as a teenager! The events and characters in The Outsiders are directly based on real events and real people (obviously dramatized, but my point still stands). Claiming that Hinton is homophobic for being honest about her intentions when writing these characters is absolutely ridiculous. Also, once again, The Outsiders isn’t a romance novel. If the only thoughts you have about the book after reading it is whether or not Johnny and Dallas were romantically involved, you need to work on your critical reading and thinking skills.

Editing to add something: Two very important things I forgot to mention! 1) Johnny and Dallas both canonically like women! Like it’s directly mentioned Dallas had a girlfriend in the book. Even though Johnny didn’t have a girlfriend, it was very heavily implied he was attracted to women. Ignoring that when claiming that they’re queer coded is so weird. I guess they could be bisexual, but there’s zero textual evidence alluding to that. 2) if Johnny and Dallas’s relationship was romantic, that would undermine integral aspects of Dally’s character. Dallas is cold to the world. He likes (kind of) the other greasers, but the only person he loves (PLATONICALLY) is Johnny. Johnny is like a little brother to Dallas, he sees parts of himself in Johnny, but he also recognizes that he’s different, softer. He wants Johnny to keep that softness and not become cold to the world like himself. If that relationship was romantic it would COMPLETELY change their dynamic and ultimately the purpose of Dallas’s character. Dallas is an example to Ponyboy and Johnny of what not to become, not what they should be desiring. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

[riovidalupdates]

Analyzing Hosie Both Together and Seperately (1/?):

[note: other shippers might deflate moments that have occurred and even suggest that this ship is more friendship/sisterly, but that’s to be expected. all of us shippers are pretty bias when it comes to our ship, so i am not judging. aside from that, i will uses specific points from other ships as a way to emphasize how hosie works. meaning that i am not deflecting other ship moments, but merely using them as a different perspective. i respect all ships and apologize if i say anything wrong.]

1. Camera shots:

The videographer/s who is/are in control of the camer, do a magnificent job at capturing our hosie moments. Why? While yes, we watch Hope and Josie provide interactions, spoken words, and emotions that make us swoon for them, we have to acknowledge how we see that and situations that make us love them.

A cameraman/woman’s job to create the feeling of what the writers want us to feel is how the scene(s) is/are shot. So, why does the director feel the need to have scenes up close to Josie and Hope when they stare at one another if Hosie isn’t at all romantic? Because the way these scenes are shot, it gives the scenes depth that Hosie’s relationship might run deeper than just a friendship. The slowmo and the constant back and forth from one to the other Like, gaaaaAAAYYYYY.

2. Chemistry:

The outright chemistry that Danielle and Kaylee absolutely have in general is beyond amazing. Their easy going flow of actions with each other help bring out the emotions that Hosie has within each other. In other words, when they communicate, joke around, hangout, and simply enjoy each other’s company, it radiates off of them and is easily seen on Hosie.

How does chemistry work in terms of Hosie? First and foremost, the bEST chemistry within Legacies will always be, and I mean ALWAYS be, between the twins, because the sisters have a whole bond the will always be deeper than the others. Period. We love powerful sisters. Anyway, that’s not what we’re focusing on because Hosie is our focus. So, for these two, there has to be a structure for a relationship to work between characters. Especially if they’re both a prime character to the story, show, or movie.

What is the romantic chemistry? Romantic chemistry obtains the value of attraction, a pull that brings one person to another. The thing is attraction comes in all types, but it varies from person to person. Specifically there are four factors of attraction that displays key romance. They are: Physical attraction, Intellectual attraction, social attraction, and emotional attraction. Now, these can all lead to a great platonic relationship; however, that happens when it’s normally just one of these keys (it can be all four, bur the likelyhood of that is 3/10; it’s rare). Romantic relationships are intimate and usually exist with the presence of three or all of these types of attractions—emotional attraction being the prime essential.

Hope and Josie immediately cross off 3 of those keys. They are intellectual, social, and the big one...EMOTIONAL attraction. Now, before you wonder why I didn’t add physical attraction, it’s between there is and yet there isn’t. But it doesn’t mean Hosie won’t get it written in to be more emphasized. There are episodes that highlight each of the attractions I stated and I will continue to explain and provide examples the further I go on, but for now lets go to our next point. Yeah?

3. Klaus’ Approval:

Joseph and Candice have admitted to loving Hosie, and if Joseph was to approve anyone for Hope, it’d be Josie.

That’s it. That’s-that is the big man giving the people his approval for his little wolf. SO LETS EAT ICECREAM AND SOB ABOUT HOW HOSIE HAS APPROVAL FROM KLAUS MIKAELSON.

4. Stares + hand holding:

So obviously these two are not the only ones who have their moments with handholding and stares. At least each ships has had one moment of that, but I will state that Hosie has a strong overrule when it comes to stares and handholding. Really it’s the stares that get us, but I will explain both holding of the hands and their stares. Also, emotional and physical attraction does come to play with these (the physical attraction is small but it does play an important role when I get to it).

Handholding really only occurs when it comes to spells that they both do when the other needs help. So, while their handholding isn’t out of desire or could be considered as romantic, there are other ways with how they could perform the spells. Josie doesn’t need to siphon magic through holding hands with Hope, but she does anyway and it’s just a thing that Hosies have fallen in love with and I can’t argue with that because it’s adorable. There have been specific moments with their handholding that has more physical attraction compared to the others.

In the alternate universe when it’s Lizzie’s second wish, after Hope comes to the school, Josie is instantly infatuated with her. When they leave the school, if you pay attention, Josie and Hope hold hands (rather tightly and flirtatiously) showing physical attraction. An addition to that physical attraction, when they’re at the Mikaelson boarding school, Hosie goes to the couch. So, when Lizzie looks in on both of them, they are both obviously flirting, but it’s their hands that works it charms onto Hosies. THEY ARE BASICALLY CANON IN THE ALT. REALITIES. Oh, the second time Lizzie checks in one them, Hope’s hand placement on Josie’s thigh is pure...oof. Chef’s kiss. That is physical attraction because it shows desire of them wanting to have the other’s touch, but it hints a bit of sexual attraction, so yeah. The downside of these though is that they’re all in a different reality rather than their actual world, so zero stars. But don’t let it deflate the idea that it could happen.

The second major factor of pure physical attraction that was shown occurred specifically in episode 7 of season two when Josie took Hope’s hand in hers. This is when you add in the camera shot, and both the physical and emotional attraction. This moment itself held its intimacy. Why? The shot focuses on the gentle hold that Josie takes when she grabs Hope’s hand. It had to have a meaning for it to be worth getting its own scene. Not only is it seen, but the emotion behind provides the value of the intimacy. What is the emotion? The emotion is comfort, security, and care. So, while those portray the scene as simply platonic, when analyzing the purity of this, it is in fact more than platonic. They hold hands until they break the contact when they go in for a hug. The level of physical attraction here is not purely because they wanted it (or maybe they did) but it was to give sincerity that Josie was showing. She held onto Hope to say she was there for her and she wasn’t leaving, nor did she want Hope to leave. All spoken without using words. It’s also really gay and lots of people expected them to kiss because Of their close proximity...so if you got that idea (even if you don’t ship them), then it was shown to be a bit more than friends.

Now, moving to the stares. Oh the Hosie stares. How much gayer can they be? Like? Listen, these stares are not only shown more than a few times, they occur quite a lot, but each of these stares share one thing: an emotional attraction.

The amount of emotional connection Hosie have in their eyes run for miles and miles. The emotions are felt through their eyes when they stare. Each emotion can be felt when you look in their eyes. Happiness, disappointment, hurt, guilt, worry, care, and genuine love (whether it be friendly or more). Each of these have been expressed by their eyes. Thus, connecting them in the style of soulmates and slow burn. Seriously, both seasons have expressed and emphasized on the looks greatly which brings us to question what the reasons are if they aren’t meant to have their own relationship storyline?

Going back to episode 7 of season two. The moment Hope stated she missed Josie, the pain she was feeling was displayed as tears threatened to fall. They’re fully on display when she tells Josie that if she continues to bring more pain to her, that she wouldn’t stay. When the camera turns to Josie, it’s clear that she too had tears but for a different reason. Her reason being that she wanted Hope to know she was worth holding onto. That she cared and was upset to see Hope in the way that she was. It made the scene beautiful and developed what could be an upcoming romance.

When Josie and Hope shared their own moment after Josie admitted to Hope about her crush, it really gave a strong leap to Hosie rising. Especially when Hope gives Josie a longing stare after asking the girl about crushing on her. There was pure admiration and a glimpse of reciprocal feelings (of course the answer that explains the look she gave is in episode 6 of season two). Not only did it give a statement but it left that teasing sensation that we hate, yet desire because its telling a story that is slowly dropping answers to our questions, so I’m not against anything that is happening in the show for now. In return, Josie practically looked back at Hope in the same manner with the same emotions. This moment gave us love and timidity that was heartfelt and warm. It was cute and created question whether Hosie would happen or not.

One more prime example I will use is episode 15 of season two. When dark Josie decides to fight against Hope, the moment Josie came back for a mere second. The look in her eyes when seeing the tribrid was filled with worry and unsureness. Hope when she notice Josie Josie, her eyes contained concern and hope. She knew that Josie was still inside, and was fighting back. Maybe not enough, but enough to ensure she was there and trying which is what helps build their connection. Again, this is emotional connection and it is the element that a relationship has to have for it to build into more depth.

I understand that there are more scenes, but one, there are so many that I cannot go over because it would extend this way more than it already it, two, I only picked the stares that provided the most meaning and value that added to their relationship. These were prime scenes that I absolutely think is a great way to slowly iniate a relationship.

- okay, that is the end of part 1 out of how ever many of these it will take to get my point across, but please keep in mind that this is only my analysis based off my observations and understand of relationships. they’re also theories which means what i believe could happen might not. i wanted to provide description for those who might not understand fully as to why hosie would be great romantically. there’s so much to talk about and yeah. anyway, thanks for taking the time to read. :)

[pass-the-bechdel]

Marvel Cinematic Universe: Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?

Yes, once.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Seven (30.43% of cast).

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Sixteen.

Positive Content Rating:

Three.

General Film Quality:

Significantly flawed, and well-known in fandom for it. Unpopular opinion? I still think it’s better than the first Avengers film.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) UNDER THE CUT:

Passing the Bechdel:

Natasha and Laura pass in a single-line trade. It’s sooo close to not counting.

Female characters:

Natasha Romanoff.

Wanda Maximoff.

Maria Hill.

Helen Cho.

Peggy Carter.

Laura Barton.

FRIDAY.

Male characters:

Tony Stark.

Steve Rogers.

JARVIS.

Thor.

Clint Barton.

Strucker.

Pietro Maximoff.

Bruce Banner.

Ultron.

Sam Wilson.

James Rhodes.

Ulysses Klaue.

Heimdall.

Nick Fury.

Erik Selvig.

Vision.

OTHER NOTES:

Everyone talking about Strucker like we already know who he is...

The “Shit!”/”Language!” gag was funnier before they hung a lantern on it. Not least because it takes almost a full minute before Tony harks back to it (fifty seconds, actually. I checked). If you’re gonna make a Thing out of it, you gotta follow up immediately, not after fifty seconds of cutting around to different character intros and action shots and a whole lot of other dialogue. 

Urrgghh, ok, I’m going to break my standing rule about not discussing source material, because we gotta acknowledge the colossal wrongness of re-writing the Maximoff twins - canonically Jewish Romani - as willing volunteers in a Nazi science experiment. It gets worse the more you think about it. There are a few things about this movie which generated significant negative outcry, and this incredibly offensive decision is one of them.

Tony and Thor fighting over who has a better girlfriend does have a certain charm to it. If you’re gonna have a testosterone-off, it might as well be about how great your partner is.

I got a zero out of ten on this out-of-nowhere forced romance crap with Natasha and Bruce. We’ll come back to this later.

“I will be reinstituting Prima Nocta,” Tony declares, as he prepares to lift Thor’s hammer and thereby theoretically take charge of the Nine Realms. Primae noctis (believed to in fact be a myth) refers to a supposed Dark-Ages law that granted lords the ‘right’ to take the virginity of any newlywed peasant woman who lived on their land. So, this is a wonderful little rape joke from Tony (or, y’know, not so little, since primae noctis in reality would make Tony a serial rapist). Ha ha ha ha. Hilarious. Good one.

I’m really mad about the parts here that are total garbage, because mostly, the revels sequence has a nice low-key quality to it, good solid team dynamics. 

I can’t fucking believe that they played the ‘and then Bruce falls with his face in Natasha’s cleavage!’ gag. I cannot believe it. Is this a disgusting frat-boy comedy from the nineties?

Honestly, Tony, just shut up and admit that you KNEW from the get-go that it was wrong to try and make Ultron happen (that is why you kept it secret from everyone else to begin with); don’t try to defend the decision now that you’ve got a ‘murderbot’ on your hands. Take responsibility for a bad choice instead of talking shit about how you had to and everyone else is just too short-sighted, damn it! 

Andy Serkis is delightful.

The Iron Man/Hulk fight absolutely KILLS the momentum of this film. It goes for way the fuck too long (eight minutes) and has no narrative significance at all. Pro tip for action scenes: they should always be driving the story somewhere. You can pull off eighty minutes of action so long as your plot is advancing alongside/within it.

Also, Iron Man causes a huge amount of additional damage during this fight, in the service of the aforementioned pointless action. His efforts to minimise Hulk’s effects are extremely poor, and calling in his relief organisation to clean up after the fact does not negate that. 

Gotta love that throwing a wife and kids at Hawkeye at the same time as we suddenly start pushing this Natasha/Bruce thing. That’s not transparent at all. I also understand this to be a major deviation from Clint’s identity in the comics, and very unpopular with fans for that reason, but regardless; reinventing him as a family man to reset the romantic blather after baiting fans with the possibility of Clint/Natasha in the first Avengers movie is such a shitty move. I was not invested in the ship myself and would have loved to have them reinforce the just-friends relationship between Hawkeye and Black Widow, because there are not enough platonic friendships between compatible men and women in fiction, but 'they’re not interested in each other because they’re busy with someone else!’ is a weak reinforcement indeed. Less forced romances, and definitely less token wifey who exists for no other Goddamn reason at all. This comes out of nowhere, and not in a clever-surprise kind of way.

“You still think you’re the only monster on the team?” Natasha says, after telling Bruce about her sterilisation. This earned a HUGE backlash, and for good reason - despite all arguments about how what Natasha meant was that her being raised to be an assassin makes her a monster, the direct implication of her words as they are phrased and as the discussion is structured is that her inability to have children makes her monstrous, and that’s deeply offensive. It’s also completely in keeping with a narrative which is often played out against women, in which their value as people is attributed directly to their ability to produce offspring, so it’s not even like this outrageous implication of monstrosity - the corruption of what it means to be female! - is that unusual. It’s awful, but not unusual. Add on the fact that 1) Natasha’s nightmare-flashes specifically foregrounded her sterilisation over all other details of her training, supporting the idea that she believes that it’s what makes her irredeemable (instead of, y’know, all the murdering and stuff), and 2) this is Joss Whedon’s work and he is OBSESSED with highlighting the womanhood of his female characters and treating it like their defining trait while also variously punishing them for it, and you’ve got every reason to interpret this terrible fucking line as exactly the heinous thing it (presumably, unwittingly) seems to be. 

Steve ripping a log in half with his bare hands is the funniest thing in this whole movie.

Thor’s brief side-adventure with Erik Selvig is pretty out-of-place. He just...goes for a swim in a convenient magic pond that Selvig chances to know about. Seems normal.

Ultron is full of such boring, empty rhetoric. Reminds me of Loki in The Avengers, with all that sound-and-fury. 

I love Paul Bettany.

Man, they sure do find Natasha instantly. It’s almost like making a damsel-in-distress of her who needs to be rescued by the team was completely meaningless...

Breaking my no-BTS rule (since I already have done for this movie at this point) because it’s well-known how Joss Whedon ordered Elizabeth Olsen not to show exertion or ‘ugly emotion’ on her face in this film, because God forbid she compromise her attractiveness by being human. Joss Whedon is not human; he’s fucking trash. 

The final fight sure does just, y’know, get to a point where it ends. They really did not ratchet up the tension over the course of the Sokovia conflict, it just goes along until it stops (also, they say Sokovia is a country, but then they never call the city anything else, it’s just Sokovia. Is the city conveniently named after the country (very confusing), or is it a city-country, like The Vatican? I kinda assume it’s option three, which is that no one bothered to care because it’s just some fake European placeholder anyway and we’re not supposed to notice such a dumb oversight).

“I was born yesterday.” This is the best quip in this whole thinks-it-is-way-wittier-than-it-is movie.

Helen Cho deserved better than to be a prop rapidly dismissed and then just trotted past at the end for an ‘oh, she survived, btw’. 

Back when I reviewed the first Avengers movie, I said that I considered that film to be heavily overrated, so maybe it’s not such a surprise that I actually like this one better. The two primary problems I had with that first film were the overly simplistic plot, and the fact that most of the characters were OOC compared to previous films, and this movie does do better on both scores, so I feel more engaged by it, and less annoyed. That said...this movie has still got a lot of problems, and those include iffy characterisation and a plot with various holes, nonsensical complications, and conveniently ignored or smoothed-down dynamics. When I say I like this movie better than the first one, I mean just that: I like this better. That does not mean I am here to sing its praises. 

The tacked-on romance is part of the problem - for Clint as well as Natasha (but especially for Natasha). After Hawkeye was so heavily under-used in the first film (and his slightly-ambiguous relationship with Black Widow was the only human element that made him a character instead of a prop), Age of Ultron attempts to compensate by giving Clint a personal life, in the form of a magically-appearing heavily-pregnant wife and a pair of nameless children. The function of this family appears to be 1) to give Clint a reason to not be interested in Natasha, and 2) to ‘humanise’ him by giving him something to fight for and get home to, because we all know nothing legitimises a character quite like some otherwise-irrelevant dependents. Want a man to seem lovable and important? Give him a pregnant wife. That’s what women are for, anyway, right? To enhance a man’s story? In this case, to provide a man whose purpose in the story has been contested with insta-personality, because ‘he’s secretly a family man, ooh, twist!’ is way better than having to spend time on giving him something to do in the plot that is actually meaningful in some way. Great logic. Makes Hawkeye super dynamic, right? 

Natasha, unsurprisingly, is hit much, much harder. As the only female avenger and one of only two prominent female characters in a cast which has seven-to-nine male characters of equal or greater importance/screen time (YMMV on whether or not you think Fury and Vision count for that list), the pressure is already on for Natasha to be served up a quality narrative, because if she doesn’t get one, well...she doesn’t have six-to-eight alternative characters to pull the weight for her gender. The best solve for this problem would be to avoid the ‘Token Woman’ cliche in the first place, but since we missed that boat...not having the personal story of your only primary female character revolve completely around her womanhood and her catering to heteronormative expectations of a love interest would have been a good choice. This weird, forced, chemistry-free thing with Bruce Banner? Was the worst thing they could have used to define Natasha’s presence in the film. It sticks out like a sore thumb every time they have an awkward interaction, and it leads in to that atrocious ‘monstrous infertility’ element (though that particular egregious mistake could have been included with or without a romantic blunder, it...probably wouldn’t be, and we’d all be the better off). Even the Hulk-whisperer part of the relationship - while not awful on its own with all the unnecessary romance and Unresolved Sexual Not-Tension removed - serves to highlight Natasha’s female-ness by making her the soft maternal figure for the team, because God forbid one of the other male members of the team be asked to ASMR-speak to the Hulk while delicately caressing his hand. If Natasha’s presence in the first Avengers film leaned too heavily on her gender identity as a defining trait (and it did), this movie doesn’t fix that problem at all: it doubles down on it. 

The good news for most of the excess of male characters is, they by-and-large don’t feel as OOC as they did in the first film. The boorish romantic entanglement aside, Bruce Banner is still a naturalistic character highlight (all credit to Mark Ruffalo, who probably doesn’t know how to turn in a bad performance in the first place), and Thor’s dialogue is way less ridiculous this time ‘round, so he lands a lot closer to his personality from previous films simply by virtue of sounding like the same guy (unfortunately, the plot does not have the faintest idea what it wants to do with him as a character). Steve Rogers is still being written as if being Captain America is his character, which is a fundamental misunderstanding of his identity, albeit one which conveniently allows him to behave in a stereotypical self-righteously bland manner, thus avoiding the need for any nuance in his perspective or actions. This borderline fanfic-flamer ‘Captain America is my least favourite character so I’m going to write him as a boring stick-in-the-mud and then hopefully no one else will like him either!’ approach doesn’t grate quite as badly as it did in the first Avengers, and it can’t cancel out the innate level-headed charm of Chris Evans, so as disappointing as the bias is, it’s still a better balance here than it was last time. The one character who is not so flatteringly handled, however? Also happens to be the one who was arguably handled best last time, and unfortunately, he’s the one who is essentially treated as the ‘lead’. 

The big problem for Tony Stark is that this movie is not interested in digging in to the pathos of any character, it’s all-flash-no-substance on that front, and Tony really, really needed a less heavy-handed slathering of ‘afraid of what might come (feat. messiah complex)’ to motivate his actions and reactions in this film, because without any exploration he’s basically just a billionaire kid playing with matches. If this were an Iron Man film (either the first or third one, anyway), we’d get into some tasty deconstruction of Tony’s mental state and confront his hubris, etc, and - crucially, most crucial of all, it’s a mainstay of all his past stories in the MCU - Tony would own up to his mistakes, listen to the advice of those around him, and take contrite steps toward fixing the problem not just in the direct sense of ‘beating the bad guy’, but also in the personal and emotional sense of working on his own flaws and making amends with the people he hurt along the way. This movie offers none of that. To begin with, Tony’s ‘I know best and I will not be taking any questions’ approach to creating Ultron feels like a significant step backwards in his character development so far (Iron Man 3 was specifically about addressing his PTSD and associated tumultuous emotions surrounding the fear of imminent alien invasion, so his reactionary and secretive behaviour in this film feels particularly out-of-touch with a mental reality Tony has been explicitly working on for the past couple of years); Tony is actively aware that it’s a bad call and thus hides it from the other Avengers until it’s too late, and then he’s bizarrely unrepentant about his mistake. Worst of all, he actually attempts to repeat that mistake, only worse, late in the film (the fact that his idiotic ‘mad scientist’ pep talk actually convinces Bruce to help him again is the weakest character moment for Bruce outside of the aforementioned romance crap). The plot rewards Tony’s second, far worse mistake, in the creation of Vision, who turns out to be ‘worthy of wielding Thor’s Hammer’ and whatnot and conveniently provides every necessary skill to defeat Ultron in a deus ex machina so overt you could use it as a textbook example, so even though Tony had absolutely no way of knowing that he’d get a good result this time and almost every reason to believe he’d just compound the existing problem, his reckless disregard for the literal safety of the planet is treated like a good thing because it happens to work out this time, and they just kinda sweep under the rug the fact that Tony is playing God (and being uncharacteristically stupid and selfish about it - in other films, Tony is normally only reckless with his own safety, and it’s when his actions spill out into unintended consequences for others that he realises the error of his ways and cues up a positive learning curve; it’s what makes him palatable). At the end of the film, once Ultron is gone and Tony has thrown some dispassionate wads of cash into ‘relief efforts’, he strolls and quips and eventually drives off into the sunset in his expensive car, with nary a mention of, I dunno, maybe a little guilty conscience? Maybe a hint of having learned a valuable lesson? The closest he gets is just suggesting that it might be time he retires from Avenging, but neither he nor anyone else lets on that there’s a need for serious self-reflection. The Tony Stark in this movie is the nightmarish male-fantasy version of the character, the playboy with the cool tech and no limits who does whatever he wants and then...literally rides off into the sunset in the end, no muss, no fuss. He’s kinda like a complete reversion to his original self, pre-Iron Man, frittering money around and designing weapons of mass destruction while convincing himself he’s bringing peace to the world one explosion at a time, but that Tony has no business here, seven years of character development down the track.

While we’re talking iffy characterisation, we should also segue into plot, and that’s something we can do easily enough by looking at our villain, Ultron. Calling Ultron an actual character feels...ambitious. He’s a CGI robot full of empty rhetoric and, you guessed it, more of those quips that this movie has in place of any meaningful dialogue. I’d call him self-fellating, but he ain’t got nothing to fellate, so instead he just blathers a lot in a manner that sounds vaguely poetically intelligent but is, upon a moment’s consideration, just vapid nonsense (much like Loki in the first Avengers, as noted above, but at least Loki had the benefit of a flesh-and-blood actor delivering his lines with conviction; James Spader does solid work as the voice of Ultron, but trying to make a CGI robot who spouts a school-kid’s attempt at edgy philosophy sound like a genuine menace is an uphill battle). Speaking of genuine menace, I assume the reason the film is called Age of Ultron is because A Couple of Days of Ultron Causing Disturbances in a Handful of Specific Locations was too much. For all the big talk (and there is..so much), Ultron doesn’t get up to all that much trouble, most notably in the sense that he apparently has his code all over the internet and yet he doesn’t bother stirring up a single ounce of chaos with that ungodly power. Why bother including this as an element of the character if it achieves zero story? Is it purely to make Ultron seem ~unstoppable~ because he keeps downloading into new robots? Because it didn’t really land, y’all. They try to play it like a big victory for the good guys when Vision burns Ultron out of the ‘net, but in context it’s meaningless because he didn’t do anything while he was there. Pretty much everything about Ultron was all talk, little to no action - even a whole bunch of the trouble he did cause happened off-screen, with Maria Hill just popping in to let us know that ‘there are reports of metal men stealing shit’. Cheers, cool. And you know, Ultron makes a song and dance about how he’s going to save the world by ‘ending the Avengers’, but then he...does not pursue that at all. He tries to make himself a pretty body, the Avengers thwart him, and then he enacts a doomsday machine to destroy all life on Earth. Like every other aspect of the character, the whole ‘end the Avengers’ schtick is just white noise, there’s no meaning in it. Ultron is just a same-old-same ‘What if Artificial Intelligence wants to WIPE US OUT?!’ cliche, and maybe that’s what he was in the comics too, I don’t know, but it’s the job of the film to tell that story in a dynamic way, and they had two and a half hours to do it. And yet.

There should be more to this than a nondescript placeholder villain concept and a series of action set pieces that just kinda happen until they stop. At least the first Avengers had some variety in each of its action sequences, using the location and the different skills and weapons of its antagonists, whereas this one is just ‘there are robots and the good guys punched and shot them until they were all broken, the end’. Even making the city fly in the end doesn’t actually make it interesting, not least because the characters spend most of their time running around the (weirdly, perfectly stable) streets not having to deal with any consequences of being up in the air anyway, and the doomsday device is too nebulous to ratchet up any real tension about figuring out how to deal with it. The conflicts with the Maximoff twins have at least some spark of life in them, but the characters themselves are treated to an over-simplified and very contrived narrative arc that uses what they do and what they know more as plot devices than as details of actual people’s lives, leading to a cheap death for Pietro so that Wanda will be distracted enough to abandon the big ol’ doomsday button, and it’s just all so convenient. There’s no heart in any of it, and it makes the moments that try to have heart all the more embarrassing and out-of-place (don’t even get me started on what a prescribed attempt at tugging the heart-strings it is to have Hawkeye name his magnificently well-timed newborn after Pietro, because DAMN). When I said I liked this movie better than the first Avengers, I meant just that: I like this better. That’s not to suggest that it is significantly better in any sense, because it isn’t, and I can’t even argue that this one has a better story, because honestly, it doesn’t. The first film made more sense, it was just less interesting to watch, and the things about it that were contrived were contrived in different ways. The first film was weaker and more irritating on character, and character is always the most important part of a story for me, so as annoyed as I am by the major character blunders in Age of Ultron, I’m still not as annoyed as I was after The Avengers. That is damning with the faintest of praise; this is just not a particularly good movie, it makes a poor use of its cast at the best of times, delivers a sub-par action extravaganza, and the script is not half as witty as it gleefully convinces itself that it is. It comes as no surprise, I’m sure, that I am very glad a certain writer/director departed the franchise after disappointing everyone with this outing. I say I like this better than the first Avengers, but gee, it’s a close call.

[yukipri]

I know you ship Yuuri with most of the characters and you mentioned that Yuri No Ice will have many ships, but does that include Victor x Yurio? Not that I totally hate the ship and I'd still read Yuri No Ice if you decide to add that ship, it's just not my cup of tea so I'd like to prepare myself sort of? ^^; I hope you don't mind me asking.

The following is stated right under the key on the Inferno Masterpost:

“*REGARDING SHIPS: This whole AU can be viewed as shippy or as non shippy as you like. Keep in mind that this is a “vampire” AU of sorts and expect some eroticism. (Note that the creator ships Everyone x Yuuri so hints of that if you choose to see them ^ ^;)”

In other words, depending on how you personally want to see it, Inferno can have absolutely zero shipping, the erotic scenes can be read purely as “feeding for survival” etc, or it can be seen as quite shippy. In general, I think you can tell from the synopsis and what little there is out of the comic, but it is not at ALL a romance-centered story but focuses heavily on plot, individual character development, and world building. As with canon there are important themes of Love, but I am very much including and perhaps even prioritizing platonic in that. Then there’s the fact that given the society or rather lack thereof that they’re in, nothing’s really defining romantic vs. platonic so boundaries are blurred everywhere.

More on that from a similar/related ask HERE.

[pass-the-bechdel]

Continuum season one full review

How many episodes pass the Bechdel test?

80% (eight of ten)

What is the average percentage per episode of female characters with names and lines?

30.6%  

How many episodes have a cast that is at least 40% female?

One, episode 1.05, “A Test of Time” (41.18%)

How many episodes have a cast that is less than 20% female?

Zero.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Twenty-two. Seven who appear in more than one episode, five who appear in at least half the episodes, and one who appears in every episode.

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Forty-four. Fifteen who appear in more than one episode, eleven who appear in at least half the episodes, and three who appear in every episode.

Positive Content Status:

Perfectly average, with nothing terrible, but nothing of note, either.  (average rating of 3.0)

General Season Quality:

Solid. It attempts to merge police procedural element with a more serialized narrative, and generally succeeds at both.  It is also clearly a series that realizes the potential of its premise and is interested in exploring it in depth.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) under the cut:

Let’s talk about heroes.

Heroism, in stories set in versions of Earth that are meant to resemble ours—see: the MCU, Supergirl, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, earthbound Doctor Who stories not set in the future—tends to be associated with maintaining the status quo. As disruptive as heroes often are by nature and necessity, they generally don’t work to change things for the better in a general way, but rather, to ensure things don’t get worse. Society, by implication, becomes “good enough”—something worth keeping around as is. This tendency is occasionally questioned—not surprising, given all the ways the status quo isn’t actually good for many people—but the story’s internal rules mean that the conclusion is often a half-hearted “eh, what other option is there?” with the occasional “but that way lies tyranny!” While this stance isn’t entirely without reason, it’s also often frustrating. Inaction and tyranny aren’t the only choices, so why pretend that they are?  

This right here is one of the main reasons why I really appreciate Continuum, and why I would probably do so even if the show weren’t as consistently solid as it is.  It is a show entirely built around the idea that the status quo is untenable, and that trying to keep things as they are can only bring about the destruction of the human race at the hands of the 1%.  While it’s far from the only series with a social conscience, it is one of the very few to declare that what is needed is massive, widespread and disruptive social change. That it does so while also being a police procedural, a genre that tends to be almost inextricably tied to conservative politics and an affinity for the status quo, is all the more impressive.  

I’m fascinated by stories about people vs. the future—it’s the absolute impossibility of the struggle that gets me. I mean, how do you fight change? Sarah Connors’ battle wasn’t just about deadly people-killing robots; it was a fight against progress, a refusal to acknowledge that humans will continue to advance technologically no matter what you do, and  “winning,” in those terms, meant undoing the previous fifty years of existence. Team Machine’s battle against Samaritan hit the same points: in the end, if didn’t matter whether one particular artificial super-intelligence was atomized, because another would take its place—maybe not soon but eventually.  

While Liber8’s struggle has some similarities to these fights, it is, in the end, fundamentally different. The Corporate Congress and the mass demotion of actual people to second-class citizens isn’t inevitable the way the advent of artificial super-intelligences is. There’s no reason why humanity can’t continue progressing technologically AND choose not to bring back indentured servitude. If the terrible future happens, it’s not because the arc of humanity inevitably bends towards corporate dystopia, but because the people in positions to change things…didn’t. Also, while artificial super-intelligences are still years away, Continuum’s apocalyptic future isn’t really the future at all.  Corporations aren’t going to wait fifty years before they choose to actively reduce people’s freedoms in order to obtain ever greater profits; it’s what they’re doing at this very moment.  Liber8’s battle is much more urgent and immediate, and that ups the difficulty level of the storytelling immeasurably—it would have been very easy for the series to fuck it all up.  

Fortunately, Continuum, for the most part, hasn’t.  It’s not perfect—its theory of oppression largely ignores the role of marginalized identities, and how these shape the way oppression is performed and perceived (and no, making most of Liber8’s members people of color isn’t enough to address this)—but the series’ heart and storytelling instincts appear to be where they need to be. They actually care about the issues at play, and that’s mostly evidenced in the fact that it treats Liber8’s fight as legitimate.  It could have been the easiest thing in the world for Continuum to be the story of cop vs. terrorists FROM THE FUTURE!, and for Liber8’s motives to be nothing more than the motivation to get the story going, or a cover for more traditional nefariousness. Instead, it is the whole point. Continuum is a series about getting from point A to point B, and about just how complicated things can get.

Speaking of complicated: Kiera Cameron.

While Kiera is very much a genre show protagonist—Continuum is very much a genre show—she actually reminds me more of a character from an entirely different sort of story—The Good Wife’s Alicia Florrick.   This is a good thing, since Alicia is one of the best protagonists on television and I love her for many of the reasons I love Kiera. I love that she’s an introvert who doesn’t make friends easily. I like that she likes systems, and feels most comfortable inside them. I like that she is fundamentally selfish. I like that neither she nor the series is exactly concerned about her being approachable or cool. Perhaps most importantly, I like that while the series is never short of sympathy for her, it is also very clear that her goal is completely incompatible with the good future.  

Unfortunately, none of the show’s other female characters manage to equal Kiera, or even come close. While there’s no glaring missteps I can identify in the show’s female representation—aside from the usual ones—there’s no real revelations, either: Sonya, Garza, and Betty, are, for the moment, just alright. Somewhat ironically, the one-shot female characters do better than the more promising ones, in part because they’re more numerous and varied, and in part because the series can’t afford to punt their development to a future date. While this feels like the result of circumstance rather than intention—with so much to cover and so little time to do so, something had to give—that’s really just an excuse. There’s no reason why the characters who got prioritized this season had to mostly be men.  

If there is something noteworthy in the way Continuum approaches gender, it is in Kiera’s relationship with Carlos, which is my favorite dynamic in the show. While I tend to look askance at calls for more purely platonic relationships between sexually compatible characters—I’m not often confident they’re made in good faith—I do like the idea in theory, and this relationship is an excellent proof of concept. Kiera and Carlos could get together. There’s tons of evidence that they’re compatible, and he’s a better person than Kellogg or—ugh!—Alec.  Heck, there’s absolutely no evidence here that they aren’t going to get together in the future. But it’s not happening now, and neither the characters or the show think there’s anything wrong with that or that it makes their relationship somehow lesser.  It isn’t that romance isn’t important or it’s incompatible with depth or great storytelling and character development; the elements of the relationship that I like— push and pull, between people who disagree on a lot but respect each other and are more than willing to meet each other halfway—could easily still be there if they were together. It’s just that sometimes, it doesn’t need to be there.

(I’m team Kiera / no one, myself.)

Kiera’s relationship with Alec, meanwhile, is not nearly as compelling, in large part because Alec is the element of the show that least works.  I understand his place in the narrative, and I can totally see how a character like him would end up eventually helping create the corporate dystopia, but this doesn’t make the present-day version of the character and his immaturity any easier to take (his future self is fine). He’s not intolerable, and I like the family drama that surrounds him—the best episode of the season is all about the Saddlers and Randols—but he’s also not great, and given just how many characters and concepts are fighting for attention, that’s something the series can’t afford.  

To mix metaphors, Continuum is a high-wire act, juggling so many balls that it is in constant danger of collapse. There’s a let’s-prevent-the-terrible-future time travel narrative, with all the usual complications of time travel stories. There’s a good half-dozen fish-out-of-water narratives.  There’s a traditional police procedural, except that it also involves future technology. There’s an exploration of class warfare and capitalism, and the evolving roles of activism and terrorism within it. There’s family drama. Taken together, it’s arguably more than can be properly explored in ten episodes, and that the series did as well as it did is genuinely surprising. While I’m not sure it can keep up the balancing act indefinitely as it continues, I’m interested in seeing how long it lasts.