#it may have a bury your gays trope but considering the other topic of the mv i fuck with it

[honeyboychangbin]

i get one teeny tiny mv of gay people from the south and i think about it every second of my day

[ewaudreyhorne]

(this is a repost, due to a few messages i’ve had requesting this list be all in one post on tumblr and not split, so here you go - here’s a link to the wordpress and the original tumblr posts)

So, I’ve been thinking a while about Ted x Rebecca. Duh. However, to be specific, I’ve been thinking more about the likelihood that they’re endgame (is that a term we even use anymore? am I showing my age?). I’ve been in many fandoms, years of different ships have sailed by… I’ve done this game so many times - I’ve been properly burnt, many gays have been buried, many women have ‘ended up alone’ because they’re ‘strong and independent’ and romance and a healthy loving relationship would ‘ruin that’ (am willing to give the many examples if you want). 

I wanted to be pragmatic – because when I watched this show, I binged season 1 and 2 and I didn’t jump into any fandom nonsense until after and when I was watching – it seemed so obvious that they were going down the route of Ted x Rebecca that… I was properly shocked to see there’s quite a divide in the fandom (a lovely toxic split). I just didn’t…expect it? So, yeah, I wanted to create a combination of information that looks at… I guess almost everything? (I am, because of the person I am, going to focus on the fact that the intention is there – because I genuinely believe it is – whether the follow-through will happen…)

Anyway, welcome to:

Will Ted and Rebecca be endgame? (the listicle from Hell)

0. proof

I can’t take credit for this at all but just as I was putting parts 1 and 2 together into a post, I came across this post and it basically does an amazing job of collecting interview quotes, images to back up the quotes, just some really good stuff to dig your teeth into - honestly, read that and you probably wouldn’t even want to read the list below. 

1. duck and avoid

I have never met a bunch that will seemingly jump and hide behind a tree to avoid answering any tedbecca questions, but the writers (here’s looking at you jsuds et al.) are masters of the:

This could be disheartening but considering part 2 of this list… it’s very telling. It’s actually a safety thing, too, ‘cause they don’t have to promise the fans a. thing. If they avoid talking about it, hinting about it then they don’t have to follow through on anything. It protects the interest of the show – it’s not stupid… However, the second reason (my preferred, optimistic and what I hope is more likely) they won’t give anything away this way. The payoff will be so. much. better. If we’re getting moments like we’ve had already had in season 1 and 2, that is fine. It’ll work. So, there’s been no lingering touches, almost kisses, being (overtly) jealous over love interests, no friends exclaiming (yet) ‘oh my god, you like [Ted/Rebecca]’… what we’ve had is quite weighty topics and connections between the two. What I will say about the subtle parts of their relationship and why it works… chemistry, honey. These two have the chemistry to pull. it. off.  

It’s interesting, because the argument I see mostly against them as a couple is usually… that they make good friends. Which is absolutely true. They make amazing friends. The best. And as we all know, no good friends can ever get together. In fact, it is very important that all romantic relationships are based on couples not really being friends at all.

There’s actually a really great meta post on here which I recommend everyone also read - that kinda sums up the vibe of Ted x Rebecca perfectly, too 

[sidenote: I also want to mention, whilst we may not have had traditional will they/won’t they tropes - we’ve had massive gestures: most of the gala episode, the darts scene, helping with panic attacks (noticing them when nobody else does - twice), the biscuits, using the team to spell out ‘hi boss’ for absolutely no reason other than to make her smile, using tinsel to spell ‘hi ted’ for absolutely no reason other than to make him smile, singing at her father's funeral... ugh]

2. fake outs bastard fake outs

Okay, so, I know I mentioned above about like there’s been no ‘lingering touches’ or ‘almost kisses’ and any of the usual ‘oop’ tropes that typically we associate with will they/won’t they (cough het-)couples (I've mentioned some of the gestures they do do). This, the fake-outs… this is more of like a flip it and reverse it (shout out to Missy E) and more of a ‘wait, is it?’ Like I mentioned in the first point, this is like the part 2 to their not mentioning it in interviews etc. It’s another really smart way of holding their hands up and saying, ‘but we didn’t do anything’. It adds to the fact that later, once it’s canon, they can be like ‘did you enjoy these little hints and jokes and omg can you believe we made it like Rebecca was the one actually going to Ted’s room?!?!?’ but if they don’t make it canon – well, hot damn, it was Sassy at the door and Sam on the app and it’s not our fault we saw differently.

Look, the thing is… the bait and switch is sadly a thing (general queerbaiting for the last few decades, or the fact that I’ve not watched an episode of SVU in my life and even I want Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler to fuck and get married, jfc). Teasing the audiences is cute for the writers, it keeps them thirsty and well, come on, what’s more powerful than making people think/want something that “isn’t there”. Gaslight your audiences. Hot.

3. parallels, honey

The parallels and connections between the two is 100% in favour of tedbecca. PERIODTTTTT. It goes beyond ‘these two are both divorced’. We’re talking about two middle-aged people, their journeys are connected, and they meet at a pivotal point in both their lives - one has a rough marriage/divorce, the other has that sad soft divorce which is just as heart-breaking because: 

They are soulmates. Sorry about it. Jason and Hannah have both mentioned it. I’m not trying to be cute or blurt out a huge ‘they’re made for each other’ statement. Their souls… are connected. On purpose. Their grief follows a similar path. On the exact same goddamn day, to the year, something happens to these two people 4 thousand miles apart that links them. An event that changed and shaped who they became, the choices they made from that point on (especially in regards to the relationships they have). The fact that this moment links them and they aren’t even aware of it – firstly, A* storytelling and secondly that’s all for us. There’s a chance that organically that conversation will never come up between them on screen – it took both Rebecca and Ted decades to talk about it after years of trauma – (these were two breakthrough moments: Ted coming to understand his trauma and Rebecca coming to realise that she has trauma, but heck… that’s a season 3 problem) – anyway, the fact that they may never (at least on screen) talk about this is even more important, because we (the audience) were shown this not just to further our understanding of the characters but mostly to give us another example as to why they're connected.

Ted signs his divorce papers on the same day that would’ve been Rebecca’s wedding anniversary. Ted and Rebecca have their first rebound sex post-divorce on the same night. Season 1 and 2 mirroring “truth”-scenes. Rebecca not being ‘enough’ for Rupert, Ted being ‘too much’ for Michelle. There are even parallels between their relationship and the relationship between Roy and Keeley (this tweet thread will explain it better than I can). We could even go into colour-matching clothes in scenes (or complementary colours) but… look… it’s there.

4. fan service

The year is 2019, the pandemic? Not even a thought in our innocent minds. There stood Jaime Lannister and Brienne of Tarth, fucking (off camera, cowards) for half an episode and for what? Fuck all, that’s what. To give the fans something because at least they got something. I won’t get into it, not right now, it’s still raw - fan service, though. That’s what that was. Not that I’m saying it didn’t make sense for them to get together - but doing it for the impact of him leaving?

Look, it’s lazy storytelling. Supernatural fans know it. Game of Thrones fans know it (from fan service to... fan disservice, am I right?) So, what has this got to with Ted and Rebecca? I’ll be delving into a certain hard topic further on but... fan service could definitely be something that comes into play with these two.

There’s three that could happen and they all revolve around Ted leaving (ew, I know, we’ll talk about it later). We get the ‘declaration’ - ‘I love you’ before Ted gets on the plane. The kiss - probably just before he leaves (or near enough) or the worst one... the ‘you could come with me’ speech. The ‘throw caution to the wind but I actually know that’s not what you can do because you’ve created something wonderful here and I can’t actually expect you to give it up for me howeverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr’ speech. The opposite of this is the ‘you could stay’ conversation, which is always heart breaking, for the exact same reason. Unfortunately, one or all of these could play out. We could get a kiss in an earlier episode, a discussion later on when Ted doesn’t renew his contract and he ‘jokingly’ says ‘what if you came with me to Kansas?’ when she asks ‘what about... us?’ and then... the ‘I love you’ before he leaves, probably with a sweet little ‘I don’t know, Boss, maybe we’ll meet again’ and, I don’t know, bloody Vera Lynn plays in the background. 

It’s... a possibility. All of these will feed wonderfully into many years of fanfiction from a broken hearted bunch of humans that just wanted to see a nice healthy relationship play out.

(Also, and it’s so goddamn stupid I know but I do believe the fact Roy/Keeley have this healthy relationship in the show could be used as an excuse to have a little heartbreak where Ted and Rebecca are concerned - like ‘look, we gave you one, what you thought everyone was getting a happy ending? LOL')

(Oh, also also - as this show has been linked to rom-coms and Nora Ephron time and time again - it could very well be that they do get together but all we get is the romantic ‘kiss’ at the end. The ‘I wanted it to be you’ moment - not the best but...)

5. no chemistry: they’re just friends

Okay, so I mentioned earlier about how people think they work better as friends. Ironically, these are the same people that also tend to claim that Jason/Hannah have no on screen chemistry. I guess I’m going to have to do an impromptu science lesson - that’s no how it works, gang. When people do a chemistry test together it’s not a bloody casting couch situation - they don’t just walk into a room and fuck. It’s all about whether or not the chemistry is there to pull off authentic scenes. This goes from anger, friendship, love, hate... so, uh, you actually cannot claim that they have no chemistry and say that they work better as friends. You can’t. 

I see a lot of comparisons to Ron/Leslie (parks and rec) and Jack/Liz (30 rock). I know this is going to be painful to hear, guys but they also... had chemistry (and by chemistry I do mean, enough that the question of them getting together was something the writers/actors of both shows were asked if it was going to go that way). Now, I get it... Amy and Tina are both SNL alumni, it may be safe to argue that Jason wanted to create a show that had a similar sorta set-up, right? Yeah, sure, fine... A big difference is how the shows approach talking about these couples, the fact that the writers tend to avoid talking about Ted and Rebecca whereas in 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation any notion of romance between Ron/Leslie and Jack/Liz were. shot. down. and that in itself (see the first point) is very telling.

SEXISM. That got your attention? I wasn’t sure where to put this so I added it on. I’m just going further from an earlier point...  

So, sexism is actually an issue I think people have with tedbecca - not the sexism between them... but the type of man Ted is vs. the type of woman Rebecca is. I’ve seen comments about Rebecca being too much of a woman for Ted, one comment mentioned her being too ‘spicy’ for Ted. Now, I don’t know about you, but there’s something about Ted that screams that he has never had an issue with how much of a woman any woman is (or how much of anyone... anyone is). He’s very in touch with his masculinity, femininity and his own ignorance (always willing to learn) - this is where the sexism comes in... people want either someone unthreatening to Rebecca (i.e. someone that’s not a main character, maybe a bit boring) or someone who will dominate Rebecca (i.e. someone... like... oh, idk, her ex husband). I’m going to talk about Ted’s relationship with Sassy later (and I’ll talk about the character later, too) ‘cause I know people will be like ‘but she’s a whole lotta woman and I want Ted and her to get together xoxo’.

In this sense, the sexism works as a tool to make Ted not “man” enough for someone like Rebecca and Rebecca “too” much woman for someone like Ted (do not get me wrong, we’re not saying Ted isn’t a strong male character here, but he’s just not the right type of strong male character). Funny, in this case (unlike with their on-screen exes) Rebecca is too much and Ted is not enough... 

6. season 2

Season 2 as whole is very… it needs to be looked at. Ted and Rebecca don’t have as many moments together (at least arguably not alone). This could also be disheartening. After all, we’re watching a show so, we do need to be shown things (most of the time). However, like life, a good show can happen off camera. I’m going to focus for a moment on Nate’s storyline. Nick Mohammed posted an amazing tweet, where he goes through all the important (and intentional) decisions that were put in place for his character’s storyline. (in fact, that tweet alone should be enough to remind you that nothing is left to chance with the writers). There is one part of the tweet that stood out:

The divide and separation between Nate and Ted is very well thought out. It’s a part of his ‘demise’. Arguably, the same can be said for Rebecca and Ted. They both have different journeys that they go on through season 2 and, unfortunately, that keeps them on different paths. However, like I mentioned in point 3 – the show works to keep them connected, too. It’s intentional. Hannah Waddingham mentions it in an interview that she is aware that Ted and Rebecca didn’t have much screen time in season 2 – there is a big difference between how Rebecca and Nate perceive the distance with Ted, though. Nate feels betrayal but Rebecca se… wait, I’ll get there. Anyway, when Ted has his panic attack, Rebecca notices. Not only does she notice but her first thought is that she must get to him.

She leaves Ted a voicemail. Also, oh my God, okay, so I’m backtracking a little again, ‘cause as will they/won’t they go – missed/ignored voicemails is a good one (any fans of the newsroom in the house? you know what I’m talking about). Anyway, in the voicemail to Ted she both offers her concern and help and even asks for his aid in return. It’s safe to say, because as this whole point is about, this show is amazing at show don’t tell – that he didn’t respond to that message. In the next episode, we get this little exchange between the two. You know the one. The boot room moment. I’ll go through it, anyway. She enters the boot room, spots Keeley smoking, and joins her - Ted, off to the side, looks at her from the moment she enters, until she walks past him without sparing him a glance (ha haha ha, ouch, I’ll gif it below). Anyway, in that scene you can see how she keeps her eyes trained on Keeley, even as she sits, she’s in a position where her back is turned towards Ted (heck, even when she explains that the boot room is where they go to smoke, she’s directing what she’s saying to Higgins – a man who’s there with a smoking pipe… so already well aware of that – she only looks at Ted when he makes that ‘oh, really?’ disapproving Dad ‘hmm’ sound to that, and the cherry on top, he’s actually looking at Keeley not her in that moment).

It's one of those moments where you could easily miss it – because Rebecca’s not there being mean or cruel as she ignores Ted. Rebecca is absolutely in her right to be a little hurt by Ted’s avoidance – just like Ted was in his right not to… respond. He’s unwrapping a lot, it’s not something he’s able to work out yet it’s hardly something he can throw towards another person (he’s literally just starting therapy). Rebecca is protecting herself here (and because she understands Ted – she’s also not going to actively guilt him - plus in the conversation she makes a point to tell Keeley that she should open up and tell Roy about her issues with him and Ted actively argues against that - that it’s better to bottle things up, which she gives a knowing smile about... like I said, she understands Ted). You could even argue, that when Keeley leaves the room with Roy – as she’s left behind with Ted (and the others), there could be a moment before she or Ted leaves when she casually asks him if he’s okay (that’s very… Rebecca). Like Hannah said in the interview linked above “is [ted and Rebecca] have scenes where you don’t necessarily see them together, but you do see- the audience sees them together.”

Rebecca won’t hold it against him. That’s what I mean when I say the difference between Nate and Rebecca – she actively tried to help Ted and was, in fact, rejected – Nate didn’t even notice he was going through something (because Nate himself was going through a lot of internal dialogue where he was filling the gaps with negative shit because of his own damage – he was being left behind by Ted and because of his own relationship with his father, his (likely years) of bullying from football players that disrespected him… look, we’ll take a day to decode that speech he gives Ted in the last episode another day). Basically, Rebecca understands Ted. She gets him (soulmates, remember?). He’s so goddamn late to her father’s funeral, he walks in during her eulogy – just his presence is enough to get her started. Then he helps her get through it, too, ‘cause as Hannah says: ‘’It has to be Ted. It has to be Ted, even if he hasn't been there for the rest of the day, even if they haven't seen each other much on screen together at that point. It has to be Ted that picks her up and runs with it.” – and she takes the time afterwards to check in with him afterwards. Her Dad is dead, and she knows something isn’t right with him. She sees him.

I’ve got a section devoted to Sam later, but for now – it’s important that she goes to Ted when she admits she’s a little compromised when it comes to Sam’s future. Firstly, it’s holding herself accountable to what could be considered a mistake. As we also learned from Ted in this season – he won’t get involved in telling a friend when they’re in a relationship that is bad for them – so he just agrees with everything that she says about her relationship with Sam and when she asks for his advice, he’s earnest – because he sees her, too – and knows she’ll make the right choice… but it is her choice, in the end (and what is Ted if not someone who respects a woman’s right to choose - unlike certain men who like to make the choices for them).

7. the henry of it all: hello kansas

The elephant in the room. The enormous, adorable little, tiny elephant. Henry bloody Lasso. I’m not going to beat around the bush here. You want to know the biggest block in any Ted Lasso (person not show) ship? It’s that guy. He’s your problem. Well, more…where he is.

I’m going to take you on a brief (relevant and somewhat self-indulgent) interlude for a moment. Ashes to Ashes, sequel to Life on Mars, aired over a decade ago. Main character, Alex Drake (played by the wonderful Keeley Hawes), had a daughter, Molly. I’m not going to explain the plot of the show (or LoM) to you, but she ends up in the 1980s as a police officer and she has the goal to return home in the 2000s… to her daughter. This is where the Henry/Molly similarities lie. Both Henry and Molly represent, for the parents, an unavoidable fact: someone they love is in another place and they must return to them. For this reason, Alex Drake, despite the disgusting chemistry, fights any notion of romance with Gene Hunt because of that. She cannot, of course, allow herself to be emotionally compromised by doing something like… falling in love. [sidenote: This case is quite an extreme one, because basically… for her to stay in the 1980s… she’d have to be dead in the 2000s, leaving her daughter basically an orphan (deadbeat dad alert, heyyyyy) and wanting that for her, just so she could bang Gene Hunt was selfish (lol, we all wanted it, anyway). The reason it’s an extreme case – spoiler alert if you want to want and you haven’t – is she ended up dead anyway, not getting to be with her daughter, but also forced to ‘move on’ and not end up with Gene, either. I didn’t have to mention that, but it makes me angry over a decade later I just wanted to] The important part there was… Molly. She was a problem.

Molly, meet Henry. Of course, romance aside, Henry exists, like I said, to remind us that (along with all Ted’s other quirks, God bless him) that he is not from here. An important part of Ted is over 4k miles away. Ted’s kinda later in life bildungsroman journey – is all about coming to terms with his father and abandonment (even his platonic and romantic relationships and how he is with them, as mentioned in another point, is all down to his relationship with his dad’s life, death and everything that came afterwards). A very important scene happens in episode 6 of season 2. No, not the panic attack (although that is a very important scene) – no but it is a scene that links directly to his panic attack. It’s all about Henry and lunch. 

It sucks but, in this moment, Ted is an absent father. Not emotionally, don’t get me wrong, but he is someone who cannot fulfil his role as father to his son (right then). Like his father couldn’t. There’s a lot of layers here because, for one, Ted is a very loving and devoted father. He loves his son, every choice he made coming to England was for his family… full circle would be going back to Kansas to his family (I’m talking just Henry here, do not even get me started on Michelle/Ted getting back together – but I will, and it’s in another point below). Ted’s journey, the three act play aspect of the show (which could still be the case or maybe not ??? will anyone ever give as a straight answer ??), it feels like if we look at it optimistically – everyone will come out of it a better version of themselves from having known Ted (and similarly, he’ll be a better version of himself having known them)… so he’ll go back to Kansas and yeah… 

Okay, so there’s the argument that Ted will realise that he doesn’t have to be present to be… present. He is a good father. Henry isn’t suffering at all from the distance (except missing his Dad) and when he’s older, he can travel between the two – because what’s cooler than your Dad being absolutely loaded and living in London when you’re in school? I could talk about it more, but this one is firmly, I’d say, leaning more towards endgame for Ted is barbeque sauce and building Legos with his son.   

However, that doesn’t mean in regards to Rebecca and Ted’s potential relationship there isn’t another option. Rebecca is... disgustingly rich. She comes from money, married money - got at least a premier league football club from that marriage (and probably the money she brought in)... like this woman has a yacht, private jet and a personal driver for her Rolls-Royce (but when she’s feeling a little down to earth, she’ll jump in her range rover and river herself around). She is LOADED. It is safe to say that, she could afford to take a step back from her active role as owner of the football club and move? I mean, considering Higgins knows the ins and outs and take from example Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds owning Wrexham AFC (and both living and working in America)... it's not beyond the realm of possibility that she shifts gears. Not completely giving the club up of course (lest it feed into the 'picking a guy over your career' narrative - talking about you, Rachel Green).

8. sassy, sam and everyone between

They’re not important. Bye. The end.

8.1 sassy smurf xoxo

No, okay. Sassy. I’m not going to get into (much) of a character dissection. I think, I believe she is one of the weakest characters in the show. Not a thing I like to say about characters in Ted Lasso ‘cause the show is amazing with even the smallest characters. But Sassy? She’s like a rebellious Mary Sue. A ‘Mary Sue’ (just saying in case ppl don’t know) is basically a fictional character that is so perfect, she’s boring. So, by rebellious Mary Sue – what I mean is like, she’s got no layers, but we’re meant to be like ‘wow, look how fucking badass she is’. So yeah, by gosh, isn’t she fun? Isn’t she basically meant to show us what Rebecca could’ve been like? She’s an independent, supposedly amazing child psychologist that swears like a sailor but is also extremely pretty and confident and sexual and bold and... snooze (see what I mean, Mary Sue). In arguably one of my least favourite moments, she lets Keeley (and the audience) know that the ‘real Rebecca’ isn’t what we’ve all grown to know. Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s fine to imply someone who you’ve not seen in 6 years has changed (time, life and abusive relationships will do that) but the implication here is that she’s less. Fake. That doesn’t sit right with me. For an incredibly smart woman, seems to be a… well a bit of a shit friend…

Just in reference to Rebecca’s father’s funeral – Sassy is the only one that knew about what happened with Rebecca and her father and she’s about as supportive as a broken bra. That’s why she’s not important, imo. She’s not there for Rebecca. She’s there for Ted. 2/3 episodes she is in, is for Ted. She may be ‘Rebecca’s friend’. Someone who, technically, is the same ‘level’ as Rebecca but ‘undamaged’. Also divorced (just like Ted and Rebecca), also has a kid (unlike Rebecca but very much like Ted) and super interesting - she will willingly go and fuck a basic stranger with 0 invitation for… like… look, if we investigate it too much, it’s actually creepy (I still, to this day, cannot work out how she got Ted, the character we know, to fuck her – not because he’s not a sexual being, but imagining that conversation? It’s impossible).

Anywaaaaay, in a similar argument, the fuck happened at the funeral? She’s basically feral trying to get to Ted and it’s all about the sex (which, right, good on you jsuds, make you everyone knows your character has a big dick and knows how to use it – I appreciate it). Where does Nora go when she goes off with Ted? I know the assumption is that she goes and has a quick romp (what, in his flat? where it was in such a state? because he is – again – mentally very fragile?) – but I like the theory that they chatted… maybe she actually does have a degree in psychology (specialising in children but still) and puts it to some actual goddamn use? Maybe she spotted something in that moment where Ted helped Rebecca in her father’s funeral and asked him to look out for her? Maybe there is more to this character than… nothing… 

Also, ew, look, finding someone attractive because you like damaged things is in no way a ringing endorsement for a long-term relationship. Bye.

[sidenote: Nora ‘No Last Name’ - when I say Sassy is here for Ted, I mean it... her character even lacks a motherly attitude (gives off more ‘cool aunt’ vibes), Rebecca has that episode with Nora - where they re-bond after the time apart - and we get to see her in the role of motherly figure... but Sassy...??? it’s because, like I said, no layers... she can’t be too ‘motherly’ because then she’s not that cool, badass, confident, sexual being that forgives her friend after six years of silence because she’s just so good (i hope you realise that’s the implication there - rebecca: bad guy for cutting sassy out. sassy: good guy for coming to her rescue after she was divorced -- all knowledge, talk, discussion about the abuse she faced because of her husband is pushed aside, because... sassy is just... so cool, you know?)]

8.2 sweet sam

Look, I adore Sam. I love everything he stands for (very literally) and his enthusiasm and admiration for life. I really, truly think he is a wonderful character. I’m not going to get into him at all, really (okay, I will a little). He’s lovely, I wish him great storylines and lots more scenes in season 3. Just, uh… you know… maybe not screwing around with his boss.

Okay, first, Sam being outside Rebecca’s house at the end of episode 8? Before she texts him? If the situation was different, that could’ve been creepy… No shade, obviously, it’s played as romantic because it worked out perfectly but... when Rebecca said to Sam it could never happen again (after kissing him) and the way she says ‘I have to mean it’, she is pleading with him to respect her, respect her wishes because she doesn’t know if she can be strong enough to do so alone… him being there, waiting outside, not taking no for an answer... that doesn’t sound respectful... don’t get me wrong, her texting him is her flinging herself into a situation she knows she shouldn’t get into. It’s messy on both parts (and I mean... I assume intentionally).

Whilst we can call Sam a man, he is the very definition of a young man, his optimistic nature is both lovely and incredibly naïve. He’s got so much growing to do (although, I will say, I feel it’s slightly out of character for Sam to not respect Rebecca’s wishes, you know? but whatever). I don’t want to make this post exclusively about the age difference but… it is, sadly, incredibly important. Like, the power imbalance here? The actual life altering damage their relationship could do… And, unfortunately (unsurprisingly) it would fall more on Rebecca than Sam (sexism and a dash of ageism, baby). Rebecca’s life would be ruined… and for what? Sam is in the beginning of his career, if they went public/were found out... he could swap teams because people respect him for his talent in football... rebecca? she could lose everything... also, his goal is to end up back home playing football for his team – is Rebecca, who could be around 50 at that point going to be travelling back with him? Does she want to leave? What about marriage? Does she even want to get married again? Does he want to get married at all? Would he want kids?

Finding someone attractive. Being loved by someone like Sam, for someone like Rebecca, must be amazing. He is… wonderful. He finds her wonderful, too. She deserves that love but… okay, as romantic as ‘love at first sight’ or ‘true love’ or ‘hot chemistry’ can be… sometimes love all boils down to choices. Think Alexis and Ted (eyyy) in Schitts Creek, two people who make a choice – despite being in love, their relationship cannot continue, not if they are to continue to grow as people (also, fyi: that scene… ma’am, I am not strong).  Rebecca and Sam should make a choice... and thankfully, where they left it off, they could just line under the situation right there... we’ll see... 

8.3 everyone else

Now, there are some people that uh, think perhaps Ted and Michelle would get back together. I... cannot comment. I didn’t think that would even cross people’s minds. Uh, look, I get it. It’s like he had to come to the UK, become a better person to be... what? Become a lesser version of himself so his ex-wife would not find him unbearable and get back with him? Hmm. Sounds great. 

Don’t get me wrong, doesn’t that nuclear family image sound like just the perfect little Kansas life Ted always imagined he’d have? Sure. He did have it, though - and it didn’t work out... I don’t think therapy is going to make Ted change the fundamentals of who he is, just makes him understand why he is that way. So, the Michelle of it all - eh. Maybe she’ll come over and be like ‘omg, I want to try again’ and he’ll entertain the thought before realising that he is not in love with her any longer. (...maybe he’s in love with someone else, oh I don’t know... Sassy... hahaha kidding - always Rebecca).

I also read some fucker saying Rebecca anD RUPERT SHOULD GET BACK TOGETHER. Sir, that’s her abuser. No further discussion needed here. 

We also have Dr Sharon and Ted. Okay. Right. Look. He was her patient - do not get me wrong, there’s many a true (and fictional) story where the lines have been blurred and patients have gone on to (usually when they’re no longer patients) get with their therapists, psychologists or whatever-ists. Completely legal and mildly morally grey. It’s about the power imbalance, like how I mentioned with Sam/Rebecca, Sharon has the most vulnerable knowledge of Ted’s past and also the tools in which to deal with that - it could be great, ‘hey, my gf was my psychologist and now she helps with my panic attacks’ but in reality... she will always have something over Ted. Not intentionally, but that power exists... it’s why even, sadly, them being friends is a tricky thing to navigate.

I’d be open to Trent and Ted, if that was on the table... I won’t lie to you... wanna know why? Chemistry, baby. They got it (not always intentional, see?)

Also, okay, I know someone’s going to be like ‘omg but Ted had sex with naughty Mary Sue, therefore Rebecca can’t be with him’ but like, guys, come on... there’s a whole scene in season 1 about not judging someone on their sexual histories... 

Listen to Ted here:

Is that enough, do you think? I know this is incredibly bias and opinion based (I included references for a lot of it, though, okay... I’m bias but I’m also a fact checker). I tried for rational... eh, what can you do? Look... do I think the intention is there? Yes. Do I think there’s a very good chance it’ll happen? Yes. Do I also think it may not happen? Uh... I mentioned being bitten quite a few times, right? So, yeah... It genuinely may not happen... there’s a lot of factors here that could work against it, ugh... but it’s there. The most important thing is that. People who are shipping them aren’t pulling it out of their arses - if it seems like Ted and Rebecca getting together is ‘too obvious’ then I guess one day I’ll explain how storytelling works, too... anyway, if you got this far, god bless you 

[ouyangzizhensdad]

Mxtx is homophobic discussions seem to follow the same logic as mxtx hates women. Which is people taking what they *interpret* from the books and projecting that onto mxtx as a character analysis. Maybe she does hate women who knows, but how can you possibly tell from a translated work of her novel? Most of it's speculation at best, rumors at worst, and again given the fandom, the irony seems entirely lost the people having these takes.

Works of fiction do not allow us to necessarily draw clear conclusions about an author’s life or opinions. I especially hate the notion that most works of fiction are at heart autobiographical or that people will always write themselves into the main character, or write the romance they wish they had or the world they wished they lived in, etc. Just because that’s something some published authors do, and because that’s something fic writers often claim to be doing, does not translate that that’s the norm wrt fiction lmao.

That being said, it is impossible for authors not to write a part of themselves into their works, however that may manifest. Considering how taxing and time-consuming writing is, generally an author will be motivated by a need to say something or explore an idea or by the desire to see a particular story being told (again, not necessarily because it relates directly to their personal experiences or fantasies). How that translates into a work is not necessarily transparent, or might not transpire into the most obvious aspects of the work: for instance, as I’ve said before, when I first read MDZS, it seemed pretty obvious to me that MXTX wanted to say something about the netizen hivemind mentality and the inherent risks of netizen justice, which then means that I liken these thematic discussions to her own personal opinion. I might be wrong, and I have nothing conclusive to prove it except the way the theme of public opinion is explored within the story, but it was what the themes and narrative led me to believe. 

Sometimes part of the author manifests in an interest in particular topics; sometimes it shows up in details or in the way the specific story gets told; sometimes it's through an unexpected 'self-insert''. If we take the Titanic movie, for instance, the self-insert character is not Jack, but arguably the dude leading the ship wreck investigation, due to Cameron's obsession with deep sea exploration. The way we leave traces of our knowledge and views is also why it's pretty easy to tell whether the writer behind a Coffee Shop!AU has actually worked in a one before. One's experiences, interests, mindsets, opinions etc. all colour the way one tells a story.

It is also difficult to write and to not leave any traces of our biases, implicit or not, into our writing. I don’t necessarily blame people for reading a work and saying mmmmh does it say something about how the author views X? how does the author’s view on X inform their work? on a personal level, is it enough to turn me off from wanting to read the rest of this? does it prevent me from finding enjoyment or value in this work? My biggest issue is that the anti-MXTX people rarely display a real critical and nuanced engagement with the work, falling back instead on cookie-cutter approaches to literary analysis/media criticism that they do not seem to fully understand in the first place (re: the bury your gay trope)--and then use that as an opportunity to condemn the author based on their limited or faulty analysis. It's one thing to finish the book and say: well, there aren’t a lot of female characters with names in this book! Most of them do not interact with each others! Many of them die by the end of the book! But those things alone are not enough to draw any real conclusions about the work or the writers. Focusing on quantifying representation is bad analysis because it disregards context. 

Instead, one should pay attention to a myriad of questions, which include for instance : are the female characters one-dimensional? are they only archetypes? are there different and varied portrayals of women? are they only allowed to be saints or villains? do they have agency, ie, an impact on the narrative? could they be removed from the story and replaced by a sexy lamp? is their portrayal coherent with the social world they inhabit? could any male characters be changed to a female characters without needing to change their relationships with other characters or their part in the story? are they considered in the thematic explorations of the story? are their deaths gratuitous or needlessly graphic? etc. etc. And the conclusions we draw may then have more nuances than just plain condemnation. As for myself, I do find it weird that MXTX did not mention more female disciples in the Jiang sect (which was not segregated along gender lines like the Lans) and, in passing, WWX’s relationship with them. I do think she could have added in the background more discussion of contributions by female cultivators in the Sunshot campaign. I wish there had been a female Junior in the ragtag group of juniors although I am not sure how that would have affected their dynamic.

Do I think this means MXTX hates women? ....... no?

In fact, I’ve found that CQL kinda made the female characters we do have in MDZS less impactful and relevant with the changes they made, in parts just for the sake of giving them more screen time in the story. I’m writing something about Mianmian which will articulate my arguments, so look forward to that if that’s your cup of tea. 

MXTX chose to tell a story in which there are not as many female characters within a genre not generally centered upon female characters. Does that inherently say something about her? Since the people making these criticisms favour genres/fandoms not centered upon female characters themselves.... it’s a little pot, kettle, and all that. Can internalised sexism play a part in such preferences? It can, though it's hard to assess based only on the information we possess. But it’s mostly not very helpful: writing and reading and participating in fandom is not activism. If someone on the interwebs accused me of hating women or being homophobic for being involved in this fandom and for not hating MXTX based on her books, I’d have a good laugh about it because they could not find a single person who knows me in the real world to agree with them (though they could find many men to say that I’m a misandrist). 

Ultimately, even if MXTX were sexist, trying to find books written by authors whose biases never transpire into their works seems like a futile exercise. I don’t like how Jane Austen writes about women with chronic ills or about ‘g*psies’, for instance: does that mean that I think her work has no literary value or that I can’t enjoy them? No. That just means that I need to critically consume those parts of her work. 

Anon, if you didn’t make it until the end, I understand but otherwise I hope this long-ass answer was still entertaining to a degree!

[oumakokichi]

Do you think the protag swap would have worked better if it had switched to a character like Make or are the bad implications still there?

It’s kind of hard to say, honestly! I’m not actually sure that there is “one solution” to the problem of the bait-and-switch in chapter 1 which would have satisfied absolutely everyone.

If Kaede had lived instead of Saihara, I don’t think her character beliefs or motivations would have fit quite so well in a game like ndrv3—she’d have been fantastic as a Hope’s Peak-style protagonist, but the theme of truth and lies might not have resonated quite as much with her in later chapters. Meanwhile, as well-done as the chapter 1 twist was, Saihara living instead of Kaede still runs into the unfortunate trope of sacrificing a female character in order for a male character to have more development. It’s a really difficult decision, since I love both Saihara and Kaede quite a lot.

Personally, I really do like your idea! Having the focus in chapter 1 be on Maki and Kaede (the way quite a lot of promotional art of the game seemed to imply it would be, prior to the game’s release) would mean that we’d have still gotten a female protagonist in the mainline Danganronpa series, and it would have been really fun to see the two of them interacting more and Maki potentially opening up to Kaede and getting close to someone for the first time since her dead friend at the orphanage.

Still, if we assume that Maki would interact with Kaede for large portions of chapter 1 the way Saihara did in canon, some people might be unhappy with even this solution as it might potentially toe the line for the ‘bury your gays” trope. I am just a little less critical of this trope in Danganronpa as I would be in other series—considering most characters do die in the franchise overall, I’m not quite as upset at the high mortality rate of canon and/or heavily-implied LGBT characters in DR as I would be in a series that had less canon-typical death in it.

Still, I do understand where people come from when discussing this trope in DR. It’s very true that quite a lot of explicitly or implied-to-be gay characters in DR still die by the end, and that it’s rare to see them actually wind up getting a happy ending. Putting protagonists like Hinata or Saihara aside (with the both of them pretty explicitly confirmed bisexual by even the mere option for content like salmon mode, and the love hotels in Saihara’s case), characters like Ouma, Tenko, and Juzo all die pretty tragically. And while characters like Komaeda and Mikan may be technically alive by the end of dr3, they did also “die” within the VR world of sdr2.

This is why it’s sort of a tricky topic, trying to decide which trope to implement in order to deal with the bait-and-switch of chapter 1, because every person is probably going to react differently. I personally would have really loved to see a Maki-and-Kaede switch, but other people might specifically resent it for pulling this “bury your gays” trope. And still other people might be okay with the idea of one of the two girls passing away in a later chapter, but not in chapter 1 specifically, since it still wouldn’t give Kaede nearly as much time to shine as she might otherwise have if she were to pass away in say, chapter 5 or 6.

One other solution that’s very similar to yours that I’ve heard from someone else was the idea of Maki taking over Kaede’s role as the protagonist, but without either of them actually dying in the first chapter. The culprit would be someone else entirely, despite Kaede’s initially mistaken belief that it was her, but the fact that she lied and obscured information from the others (and even from the player) would still disqualify her from being a reliable narrator. So the idea is that she would willingly step down from being the leader of the group, and therefore the protagonist, while Maki would reluctantly take center stage from that point on.

Again, some people might have issues with this or even prefer a character death here to make it more “meaningful” or to give it more impact, but it’s pretty much a matter of personal preference by this point! For what it’s worth, I really quite like your idea anon, and I would honestly love to see some fanworks that tackle it!

Thank you for the really fun ask! In my opinion, it’s best to just look at any potential AU idea for chapter 1 as an AU for the entire game, and to wonder how this might affect later chapters and potential character interactions. Things would change quite a lot depending on whether Maki was the protagonist, and whether Kaede was dead or not, so it’d be really interesting to look at how those changes would sort of ripple out later on!

[thecaffeinebookwarrior]

More Female Characters to Avoid in Your Writing

A long while back, I typed up some posts ranting about characters and tropes I disliked.  These were Male and Female Characters to Avoid in Your Writing, and they’ve become my most popular posts yet.  Recently, I was struck by some topical inspiration, and decided it was time for a sequel!  

One again, these are my personal, subjective opinions!  No one dictates your writing or portrayals but you, and no one can or should decide how you consume fiction.  Also, as you may notice, I actually like most of the ladies below;  I just don’t like certain aspects of their portrayal.

Enjoy, and happy writing everybody! 

1.  The Daenerys (i.e. the spontaneous war criminal)

Image source

Who she is:

The formerly heroic Mother of Dragons, who randomly charbroiled a city full of innocent people.

Why it sucks:

I’m not even talking about this from a feminist standpoint, or how one of the most consistently heroic and powerful female characters took an abrupt and undignified backflip into the Dark Side.  I’m speaking from a writer’s standpoint.  

Regardless of whether you liked Daenerys, she was rivaled only by Jon and Brienne as the show’s most consistently heroic character  From locking away her dragon children to ensure the safety of her subjects, to freeing countless enslaved citizens, she’s spent a decade proving herself to be an altruistic and noble figure.  And then, in the final two episodes of the entire show, the writers dracarys-ed that shit.

For some comparison, just imagine how ridiculous it would be if Jon Snow suddenly went batshit and started hacking up citizens because he was feeling stressed.  That’s about as plausible as Dany’s sudden passion for genocide.

And for the record, I’m not opposed to Daenerys becoming Mad Queen.  If it was done properly. This would mean informing the actress far in advance so she could modify her portrayal accordingly (which they didn’t), and building up to it through foreshadowing and established attributes.  Not at the last fucking minute.

Honestly, the only characters who remained narratively consistent to the very end are Drogon and Ghost, who are both precious babies who did nothing wrong.  

How to avoid her:

Decide as early as possible where a character arc is going.  Contrary to what Game of Thrones seems to believe, the character arc is important.  It should have a beginning, challenges that incite development, and a satisfying conclusion that showcases how a character has changed and evolved.  

And if you didn’t decide early?  You still have to come up with a conclusion that makes sense for your character, and not slap on the most unexpected ending possible in the name of Subverting Expectations.

On that note?  Subverting expectations isn’t always a good thing, and a reader predicting your ending isn’t the worst possible outcome.  Focus on telling a good story.  

2.  The Rayon (i.e. the transgender stereotype)

Who she is:

A transgender woman (portrayed by the male, cisgender Jared Leto) dying slowly of AIDS in Dallas Buyer’s Club.  Her role in the narrative is to teach the supposedly heterosexual (more on that later) main character that queer people are human beings.  

Why it sucks:

Rayon is many things in Buyer’s Club, and most are firmly rooted in stereotypes.  She’s a sassy, flirtatious, clothing-obsessed, self-loathing, drug-addicted prostitute.   She’s hypersexual, but never treated as romantically desirable.  She’s tragic, but also one of the few consistently comedic characters in an otherwise bleak film. 

It’s her job to gently goad the main character into treating her with basic respect, but he never quite gets there.  He refers to her with male pronouns throughout the entire film, and never acknowledges her as a woman.  At one point, he aims a gun at her genitals and offers her a “sex change operation.”  Which, is supposed to be comedic.

This isn’t to say that there are no sassy, flirtatious, clothing-obsessed, self-loathing, drug-addicted transgender sex workers, nor is there anything wrong with “stereotypical” trans people.  It isn’t the job of the marginalized to dispel stereotypes.  And if real trans people had created and portrayed Rayon, she could have been a realistic, dynamic, and compelling character.

And I say “created” because Rayon is strictly fictional.  Outside of this film, she didn’t exist.  

“Well, at least they tried to offer representation!”  you protest.  “What else was it supposed to be about?  A straight dude in the AIDS epidemic?”

Well, no.  Though the main character, Ron Woodroof, is presented to us as a violently homophobic, transphobic, womanizing asshole, the real Woodroof was, by all accounts, kind-hearted, open-minded, and bisexual.  

What could have been a powerful story of a queer man defying his diagnosis, living joyfully and meaningfully, and helping to prolong the lives of countless AIDS-sufferers, was instead watered down to a story of a straight, pugnacious asshole and his stereotypical, long-suffering, transgender sidekick who dies to Teach Him Compassion.  

How to avoid her:

Read books by trans people.  Consume media they create or endorse.  

List of youtube channels created by trans people here, and 21 books for trans awareness month here.

Put out a special call for transgender beta readers to point out mistakes, misconceptions, and offer tips on an authentic portrayal.

Garner insight into their perspective and experiences, and give them personalities outside of being trans.  

3.  The Piper Chapman (i.e. the unflavored oatmeal)

GIF source

Who she is:

The “protagonist” of Orange is the New Black, and its least compelling character.  She and Larry are the sort of people who would ask me for a threesome on Tinder.  

Why it sucks:

Piper’s hook is that she’s a privileged, affluent white woman who unjustly finds herself in prison for -- well, for crimes she committed.  But expected to get away with, because, Privilege.

This isn’t to say Piper is boring.  She’s far from likable, but being likable and being boring aren’t the same thing.  In another series, watching a relatively cushioned, naive, bourgeoisie woman string along various significant others, thoughtlessly incite violence, and navigate an unfamiliar prison setting would make for thought-provoking and hilarious satire.  

But when compared to her charismatic supporting cast, with richly developed backstories, motivations, and relationships, she’s painfully bland.  I would much rather watch a series centered around Suzanne, Nikki, Taystee, Poussey, or even Pennsatucky.  They’re just more developed, opulent, enjoyable characters. 

It could be argued that Piper is the viewpoint character, whom the audience is supposed to relate to.  But I can assert that I don’t relate to Piper.  At all.  Her lack of empathy towards others -- such as leaving Alex after the death of her mother, cheating on her fiance, and inadvertently starting a *ahem* white power gang -- alienated me to her.  

Which might not be such a bad thing, but Piper is (supposedly) the protagonist.  We don’t need to like her, but we should probably be able to relate to her.

Or maybe I’m just jealous that hot women aren’t inexplicably fighting over me.

How to avoid her:

Your protagonist doesn’t have to be the most likable character in your story.  They don’t even necessarily have to be the most interesting character in your story.  And certainly not the most morally good, powerful, or knowledgeable.  But the viewpoint character is the character who we spend the most time with, and from whose eyes we perceive the story.  It’s important that we understand and relate to them emotionally.

Look at examples like BoJack Horseman, Holden Caulfield, Tony Soprano, Beatrix from Kill Bill, Mavis from Young Adult, Nadia from Russian Doll.  All are complex characters, with varying degrees of moral ambiguity.  Yet we can empathize with them emotionally and identify with them.  Even if we’ve never been in their situation, we see where they’re coming from.

4.  The Charlie (i.e. the dead lesbian)

Who she is:

One of the few recurring openly queer characters in the incredibly long-running Supernatural.  A lesbian who’s journey was (sort of) brought to an end when she was killed and dumped in a bathtub to incite drama.

Why it sucks:

I love Supernatural  but it can be remarkably tone deaf towards queer people, women, and marginalized groups.  Which, probably merits fixing, considering its following is largely comprised of queer people, women, and marginalized groups.  

I probably shouldn’t have to explain why killing off women and queer people for drama is Bad, but I’ll delve into its history a little:  from what I’ve read, censorship laws of the twentieth century forbade the portrayal of queer people unless they were ultimately killed or “reformed.”  This is why so much LGBTQ+ fiction is essentially gay tragedy porn, and why gays are so frequently buried to aid in the emotional narrative of their straight counterparts.  

That’s not to say queer people can never be killed off.  I might not have an issue with Charlie’s death (especially in a show as violent as Supernatural), if she weren’t the only openly queer character at the time.  

And there’s plenty of room for representation!  If Dean was openly bisexual, if angels were vocally confirmed to be nonbinary, and if there were more recurring, respectfully portrayed female and sapphic characters, Charlie’s death might not feel like such as slap in the face.  But as it is, it feels like a contribution to an ugly pattern.

In fairness, Supernatural has since improved in its portrayal of queer people:  two gay male hunters were introduced and given a happy ending, an alternate universe version of Charlie was introduced to the cast, and God is portrayed as a bisexual man.  

Yes.  All of that happened.  You have to see it to understand.

How to avoid her:

Educate yourself on the history of censorship in the LGBTQ+ community, as well as hate crimes and decreased life expectancy.  Make sure you aren’t contributing to the suffering of queer people.

If you have only one confirmed queer character in the midst of a very large cast, I’m inclined to think you need more.  You could say I’m BI-ased on the matter, though.

Look up “fridging,” and think about how many stories use the death of female characters to incite drama for men.

5.  The Allison (i.e. the reformed feminine)

GIF source

Who she is:

She’s one of the most interesting members of the Breakfast Club, and that’s saying something.  A self-proclaimed compulsive liar who will “do anything sexual” with or without the promise of a million dollars (as well as one of the most quotable characters in the film) she demonstrates the emotional pain and complexity that’s often ignored or shrugged off as teen angst.  

And then she gets a makeover and a hot boyfriend, and suddenly everything’s better.  

Why it sucks:

It would be one thing if Allison’s problem was that she didn’t feel pretty or desirable.  But she never (to my recollection) offers any indication of that, and that’s part of what makes her such a refreshing portrayal of insecurity.  She’s emotionally neglected by her parents, and that is appropriately treated as devastating.  

It’s a complex and beautifully-portrayed problem that deserved far more than such a superficial, slapped-on solution.

Similarly, there’s no reason why Allison is paired up with the jock at the end of the film.  Neither showed any romantic interest in one another until her unnecessary makeover.  

A much better ending to her arc would be her finding acceptance among her newfound friends, and finally garner the recognition and acknowledgement she never got from her parents. 

I was torn between using Allison for this example, or Sandy’s makeover from Grease.  In both, girls are encouraged to alter their appearances to solve plot-related problems.  And both were “fixed” to conform to some standard of femininity or feminine sexuality that they didn’t meet before.

How to avoid her:

If a character feels the need to change their appearance to accommodate others or be respected, that should probably be treated as a negative thing.

Your character’s appearance can be a good tool to represent emotional changes.  If they alter their appearance, there should be a meaningful reason behind it -- outside of fitting into societal norms or garnering the approval of others. 

A girl putting on makeup isn’t a groundbreaking plot point, and girls who don’t perform to standards of femininity aren’t broken or deficient.  They don’t need “correcting.”

[justgottafinishthischapter]

Tips on Writing LGBT Characters

As LGBT+ rights continue to make great strides in becoming normalized and accepted by widespread culture, LGBT people have started to pop up far more often in different forms of media. However, because LGBT people can vary wildly in experiences, locations, and beliefs, it can be tricky for someone to really have a good idea of what makes for good representation. Some would argue that it simply being acknowledged is enough, while others would argue that it needs to be a present part of the character, while others argue that it shouldn’t be the focus of the character and that their other traits should be emphasized on more. So, where should one start? Here are a few tips to lead the way.

If You Are Not LGBT, Do Not Make Your Story About Being LGBT - I’m not saying you can’t write an LGBT character if you yourself are not LGBT. A white person can’t really write a story about what it means to be black because it is an experience of life they have never experienced for themselves. If you want to write a story with an LGBT character, or better yet, a protagonist, that’s wonderful. But their sexuality, sex, or gender should not be a focal point of the narrative unless you know the experience first hand.

Not All People Use the Same Labels - Although the term queer is being reclaimed by some people in the LGBT community, there are those who still do not like the use of the word, and the same goes for other slurs. Like with the ‘n’ word for black people, some LGBT people feel fine using terms such as queer and fag when referring to themselves or friends who they know it doesn’t bother, but most LGBT people are mindful to remember that not everyone feels the same way about these harmful words.

Don’t Bury Your Gays - In the cinema that emerged from Hollywood following the censorship laws of the Hays Code in 1930, characters that were coded as homosexuals or otherwise ‘deviants’ from the social norm were punished, often with death. Themes of self-loathing were common, and it became extremely common for one or both members of a suspected homosexual couple in a movie to be killed by the end of the story, if not be portrayed as a sick monster or villain by the end. If they weren’t gunned down, their self-loathing boiled over and they took their own lives. So, if the only LGBT character in your story dies, consider killing off a different character, due to the particularly dark and troubled history of this trope. On a related note, if you’ve written a villain to be campy and effeminate in order to make them funny or look silly, you are once again playing into harmful stereotypes due to the frequency with which stereotypical homosexual behavior is used to code villains in order to make these behaviors look wrong and villainous.

Understand the Difference Between Stereotypical and Nuanced - In the public eye, the stereotype of the gay male is that he is campy and effeminate with a lack of interest in traditional masculinity, and that the lesbian female skins wild animals and fixes broken appliances with the same vigor she plays softball and chugs beer. However, it is fair to point out that some of this is truth in television, and there are people in the world who are just as stereotypical if not more-so than these depictions. So, where is the line between stereotypes and realistic characters? The difference comes in how it is intended. If the audience or reader is meant to laugh at the character because oh ha a man shouldn’t act like that, then the portrayal is harmful and stereotypical. If the only defining characteristic of the character is that they are LGBT, then that is not a well-written character. Being LGBT does not dictate one’s interests or hobbies. But don’t feel compelled to write the exact opposite of the stereotype either. Effeminate gay men are people too, and although they flood the media perception excessively, there’s still a difference to be found between a character written to be gay, and a character who just happens to be gay.

A Character’s Surroundings Will Impact Who They Are - Two gay men could be completely identical in every single way but end up extremely different due to a simple change in hometown. Aside from universal experiences such as coming to terms with one’s sexuality or the coming out process, not all LGBT people are going to be met with the same challenges or the same opportunities. Take for example a gay boy in high school. Imagine him going to a public school in New York City or Los Angeles where the mindset tends to be more liberal and the population size is far larger. In a school with a student body of 300,000 students, he’s far more likely to go to school with other LGBT people based simply on population density and statistics. He’s far more likely to get a boyfriend from his own school, be part of an at least decently sized Gay Straight Alliance, and can probably come out with less fear of rejection on the whole. Now compare and contrast to someone living in a small town in Wyoming. On the whole, Wyoming is one of the least populated states in America. That exact same gay boy may now find himself one of only maybe a small handful of LGBT people. If there’s only one other guy in his school or even worse, his town who also likes boys, the two may very well almost force themselves into a relationship in order to satisfy a need for physical or emotional intimacy. By the time they go away to college, they may have already clung to each other so much that it’s easier just to keep the relationship going than to try to find somebody new. Skip ahead a few more years, and they may have a very rocky marriage held together on the sole grounds that at one point in their lives, they were each other’s only options for romance, and that them both being LGBT was not enough to hold a relationship together. Taking these kinds of elements into consideration when constructing a narrative with an LGBT character can yield compelling stories if examined under the right circumstances.

The Pitfalls of Dating - As if backlash from society, faith, and media portrayal aren’t bad enough, one of the most annoying parts of being gay can be finding a partner. Continuing with the school example from before, imagine that in a class of 180 that 13 students are LGBT, of those, 6 are males, your gay male character and his only five options for a potential boyfriend. Factor in the possibilities of incompatible interests, physical attraction, and even popularity, and of those five options, he may only have eyes for one guy in the entire school. Then, what can he do when he finds out the only guy he’s interested in is already with someone else? Well he’s left with three options: try a different school, hope someone comes out of the closet, or get comfortable with being alone. This can also put a lot more pressure on the anxiety of asking someone out. If a straight guy asks a girl out, even if she rejects him, he’s got another 60 girls he could pursuit. When there’s only 5 guys available, and there’s a realistic chance that the ones he finds attractive won’t be interested in him, there’s a lot more lost if he dares ask his crush out and gets rejected. There’s also the fact that especially straight men may get angry and possibly even hostile should a gay guy express romantic interest in them, to the point where some gay men may feel afraid to ask a guy out unless they can either get a good feel for whether he’s likely to respond that way, or a clear sign that the man is a homosexual.

Coming Out Is A Deeply Personal Decision - A sort of unspoken cardinal rule among LGBT people is essentially, “Thou Shalt Not Out Thy Community”. Outing someone else is a taboo within LGBT culture, due to the sensitive nature of the topic, and because some may be at risk of their home lives or work lives being compromised by this information getting out, and others just don’t feel like sharing this aspect of their lives with others. Thus outing someone else, especially intentionally, is considered to be a very egregious offense.

Transgender and Drag are not the Same Thing - A transwoman is a woman who was Assigned Male At Birth and a transman is likewise a man who was Assigned Female At Birth. A Drag Queen is a man who dresses in women’s clothing as a form of entertainment. A Transwoman is a woman. A drag queen may use female pronouns on the stage, but when the dress comes off, the man underneath is still a man and still identifies as  man. A Transwoman is a woman no matter what kind of clothes she’s wearing or what she looks like.

[famous-aces]

Alfredo Guttero

Who: Alfredo Guttero

What: Artist and Art Promoter

Where: Argentinian (active in Argentina and throughout Western Europe) 

When: May 26, 1882 - December 1, 1932

(Image Description: Retrato del pintor, Victorica, 1929 [a self portrait]. It shows Guttero in his apartment. Outside is a very geometric skyline of smokestacks, steep roofs, and a brown sky. His room is slate colored and he sits in a chair in the foreground. He has a jacket thrown over the back of his chair. His pose is casual and he looks as if we [the viewer] have just distracted him from painting. He sits with his legs to one side, turned almost unnaturally toward the viewer. One leg is lifted slightly and one hand is on the chair's seat as if he is in the middle of turning completely to the viewer. He is a man with a receding hairline and a high forehead. He has a dark mustache and dark hair and low eyebrows. He is wearing a white shirt and bowtie and has his sleeves rolled up to the elbow and his collar is ruffled and loosened. The whole thing hangs very loose but you can still see some of his body's lines of musculature. His tie undone and hanging around his neck. His pants are ordinary and green/brown. His expression is calm but confident and he looks directly at the viewer. The colors are bold but not really bright. The style blends geometry and flatness and realism in a way I am explaining very poorly. End ID)

Guttero is not terribly well remembered today, which is too bad. Looking through his oeuvre I quite like his work. Maybe it is because he lacked the bombastic personality of many modernist artists, maybe it is due to his diversity of styles without one that seems to define his work, or maybe it is because he was one of so many talented artists of his generation. He was well renown in his era, however, and used his popularity and skill to foster the next generation of Argentinian artists.

Guttero's life began mundanely enough. He always loved art, appreciating it and creating it, but pursued a legal career instead. But he was unhappy with his life as a lawyer, so Guttero left it to become a painter. He pursued his dream and passion, inspired and pushed by other Argentine artists. In 1904 his reputation was good enough that the Argentinian government sponsored his move to Paris, then the epicenter of the truly exciting and revolutionary art world, its influence expanding outward. He studied there for a few years under Maurice Denis before appearing in the Salon.

He remained in Paris until 1916 when he began to travel extensively across Western Europe for more than a decade, first to Spain, then Germany, Austria, and beyond. He traveled to nearly every country in the area between the years of 1916 and 1927.  His work was shown in various exhibitions around the continent from being featured in the Salon in Paris to a major solo exhibition in Genoa.

After that he returned to Argentina for the first time since his initial departure in 1904. Guttero remained active in his native country including creating free art classes called, aptly enough, Cursos Libres de Arte Plástico, with other Argentine artists. During this time he focused on his work as an art promotor, perhaps even more than his own art. During this time he introduced and showed new Argentinian artists to a wider audience. Indeed he created an organization for this purpose: the Hall of Modern Painters. He was dedicated to promoting and preserving modern art in the face of a world growing increasingly dark and reactionary. He died young and without much warning.

His art is undeniably modernist but trickier to pin to a specific movement. He has many different styles he utilizes with different degrees of naturalism and curves vs geometry. His scenes are by and large mundane and human, he uses bright colors, often huge central subjects, kinetic poses and positions, modern settings, and by and large human or urban subjects. He often painted on plaster using a "cooked plaster" technique of his own devising.

(Image Description: Martigues for Charles Jacques [1909], a brightly colored painting showing a scene in a Martigues canal. It is not completely realistic nor completely geometric and abstract. He favors color over outlines. In the background is a bright blue sky interrupted by yellow buildings with tile roofs, maybe houses, lit by the unseen sun. One of the building's lower doors is open. There is a small tree to the far right. In the foreground in the sparkling water of the canal are several small work boats, probably fishing boats judging by the silvery nets lying over the hulls. On the right a boat is coming in, there is a pale skinned, dark haired man working on one of the nets. His sail is red and white. On the left is a pale man in an orange hat and yellow shirt. He is stooped and just by his pose appears older, both of the men are too far away for many identifying details. End ID)

Possible Orientation: Mspec ace, gay ace, or aroace with an aesthetic attraction to multiple genders. (I am so unsure I have changed "probable" to "possible.")

I admit this one is a stretch on my part.

I am classifying Guttero based largely on absence, i.e. the absence of a remembered/recorded spouse, sexual/romantic partner, or liasian. I have no quotes or historical documents to prove my point. I have none of his personal philosophy or writings to draw from. Just the fact that he dedicated his life to art more than human relationshipa. That this is something I have seen before: Cause and its role in the life of many aros/aces/aroaces (outlined in Weil's entry the other day) and the fact that he had no recorded romantic/sexual partners that I can find in hours of research.

This illustrates why it is so, so difficult to find aspecs in history. We are not, as aphobes believe, impossible to locate, there is externally visible evidence, but it is less obvious than most other orientations. And cishets would rather we didn't exist so we are often buried under excuses. The easiest ways to find them are 1) if they were notably "married to their job" in their lifetimes (e.g. Jeanette Rankin and Carter Woodson), they talked/wrote about it in some capacity (e.g. T.E. Lawrence or Frédéric Chopin), they were distrusted because of it (John Ruskin and James Barrie), they made it part of their persona (Nikola Tesla and Florence Nightingale), aside from that I really need to search deep into their personal lives. Information not always available.

And often even when people essentially say "I am aromantic and/or asexual" the general population will not accept that. After all Newton is often remembered as allo and gay, despite never expressing interest in men. Chopin is often listed as allo and bi. Rankin is often considered cishet but too deeply concerned with her work. Barrie gets called a pedophile despite showing no interest in children. For eccentric aspecs like Weil/Tesla/etc. their being aspec becomes part of their oddness. If they weren't Like That they would be allo. Their being aspec becomes a symptom of their weirdness and would be unacceptable in a "normal" person.

History with a capital H does not want to acknowledge aspecs and, as with other queer identities, will go to insane measures to erase them. But even other queer historians will do this to aspecs. I am shocked how many people do exactly to Newton/Lewis/and the like what cishet historians do to Alexander the Great. In the case of Alexander the cishets ignore the obvious accounts that he loved Hephestian in nearly every way possible and queer historians and history buffs call them out, then often the non-aspec ones look at Newton and Lewis who had no interest in men and say they must have been gay. And it isn't really just history, Tim Gunn is by his own admission both gay and ace and the second part of that statement is either erased or, even crazier, I have seen aphobes say that he is mistaken about his own identity.

Anyway the root cause of this lack of nuance in the discussion of sexual orientation is a long sidebar that this is not the place to explore. I have left Guttero behind paragraphs ago. I have written a lot about how aces and aros end up getting erased from history and this isn't about that.

This is about Guttero and the difficulty of finding aros and aces. The presence of something is so much easier to find than the alternative, obviously, like if Historical Figure X exclusively slept with/courted men and was a man we can say he was (most likely) gay. But if Historical Figure Y didn't sleep with anyone/court anyone it is harder to prove. This is obviously severely simplifying identity but for the purposes of this example I beg your apology.

Long Story Short: the absence of evidence of something is not proof of the absence of something. A lot of aphobes will point this out and utterly ignore the fact that sometimes it is.

So, Guttero. The only thing I can say conclusively is that he never married and he was romantically or sexually tied to anyone as far as I can find. He was, in his time, very active in the art world. If he had been involved someone would probably have taken note. Especially considering his art is often very appreciative of the human form, especially the male one, it would not be hard to believe he was allo and gay or mspec.

I am going to take his art another way putting some dusty analysis/critique/art history skills to good use. Here's the thing, those who follow me on my personal blog or even here know I find the Death of the Author extremely important but it is also extremely complicated (it was actually the topic of my senior thesis). I don't want to use an artist's work to talk about their personal lives because art is often not reflective of life, but there is always some cross contamination in one way or another. I am going to explain what I mean on a superficial level, using myself as an example so I can say this is 100% accurate. I love the found family trope, and I think those relationships are the best in the world. So whenever I write something you can be damned sure if I can get some found family goodness in there I will. What I am saying is, I don't love or even approve of everything I write about, but I do write about some things because I love them and want to explore them and experience them on some level. The same may be true for Guttero and the subjects he painted.

Guttero often pays a lot of attention to human form. Look at his work The Market (I couldn't find a large enough image to put it in this post) and you will see his appreciation for amab musculature and on the other side of the male spectrum...

(image description: Retrato de Lucien Cavarry [1911] It shows a thin, lanky, and well dressed young man reclining on a green floral patterned couch and a black pillow. He is pale with neat, dark hair. He has a shadow of 5 o'clock shadow on his super hero jaw. His suit is white, his slightly rumpled tie is black, as are his socks and polished shoes. One arm is across the back of the couch and a red and gold pillow the other is dangling. This style is very different from the other portraits I showed/referenced. Still a modern but more realistic style, more flowing, less geometric. The man is drop dead gorgeous by Western beauty standards. End ID)

As for women...he seems to find them colder, more distant, but there is still a physical appreciation there. (Linking Mujeres Indolentes so I don't get flagged for "female presenting nipples" or whatever Tumblr's BS is. [The name alone tells you a lot]). Or the somewhat judgemental gaze of the woman below:

(Image Description: Georgelina. It shows a portrait of a pretty young woman sitting in front of a field. She is pale and long and beautiful. She has red hair, sharp eyes, a long flowing white dress with a gold sash around her waist, and a white hat with a black bow that is blowing in the wind. She takes up most of the frame and her expression is challenging and she holds eye contact with the viewer. The colors are bright and she is almost porciline in color. The background is mostly flat planes of color. In style it is somewhere between the self portrait and the portrait of Cavarry. End ID.)

Not all of his portraits of women have them so sour/distant but they all have a sort of challenging look. Beauty tinged with something dangerous, while the men always seem more innocent.

So here is why I say aspec rather than allo using his work alone, none of his work is particularly sexually inviting even with the sexiness/physical European attractiveness. The men are bashful or unaware of the viewer, the women are certainly not interested.

And back to the self portrait at the top: Guttero is in a fairly sexy pose, but it is sexy without being sexual. He is rumpled but the thing he was doing was painting, there is a sexless explanation. He is looking at the viewer, but you are distracting him from working. At first glance I thought his legs were spread, but they are simply in motion so he can face his guest more comfortably. This all could mean nothing, but I found it striking that this is how he chose to depict himself, at first he appears to be inviting the viewer in for a more physical interaction, but then it seems he is doing exactly the opposite, his passionate energy has been instead put into painting.

And in reality toward the end of his life that was what he did. He dedicated himself to his own art and the art of others.

So again, this could mean nothing. But...it could mean he is aspec.

And that is how the person I am least sure about got the longest entry.

(image description: Elevadores [1928]. A painting showing a factory complex. There is a raised platform running around it and several buildings in bright colors. There is a tree to the right side and a green hill. The building in the near-center [lightly left] is red. The sky is yellow and blue, perhaps the unseen sun is rising up behind the right-hand buildings. In style it is mostly geometric and flat color. End ID.)

[sol1056]

Do you think Santos releasing that letter was a good idea? I've heard that the letter has made things worse because you now have one side that wants to blame the shippers/entitled fan (including the ones that don't bully cast and crew members) for making him write the letter while the other side see it as a "We're sorry that you felt that way. We "didn't know" that people would get that upset about it." What do you think he should've done?

I think had he not released some kind of a statement, he (and eventually Dreamworks) would face significant excoriation. The backlash was already threatening to spill over, and he released his statement at the last possible moment to sway that narrative. 

It’s not exactly a complex trope, either. To whit:

Do you have only two gay characters, who are in a relationship, and of which one dies by some unexpected and often traumatic event? YES.

Does the death happen under circumstances which all heterosexual characters manage to survive? YES. No other protagonists are shown grieving for previously-introduced, named, characters lost in the war.

Does the death render the surviving character grieving alone, possibly also suffering some level of guilt for having caused the death somehow? YES. To quote LM: 

Obviously, [Shiro] going to live with this guilt of never fully knowing if he brought this upon Earth. If he did not come back for the Blue Lion, if he had not started this whole Voltron resurgence, would the Galra have ever attacked? There’s definitely, I think, a level of guilt there… 

I mean, the entire thing is textbook, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg of the ways Shiro alone has suffered repeated brutal fates.

When it comes to the apology… I think it was remarkably damning (and thus possibly ignorant of the optics) with its honesty about the trope and their choice to use it, anyway. I also think every word was selected deliberately and carefully to cast their intentions in the best possible light, sprinkled with a sideways tone warning. The emphasis on those felt like de-centering the offense in favor of litigating the EPs’ side. 

To JDS’ credit, he was careful to avoid the “we’re sorry you were offended” non-apology. Whomever helped pen that letter was aware that would only make things worse. However, I remain troubled by the absence of any mention of the dead lesbian couple, or recognition of the implication of giving Shiro a terminal disease, or what it means to reduce Shiro to being the lone LGBT+ token. 

As for others’ reactions, I’m not surprised there are people who’d rather blame just about anyone than the EPs. When you get attached to a work, it can be hard to reconcile that with learning its creators intentionally chose to cause real and active harm. All the same, belittling those hurt as ‘entitled’ or ‘shippers’ and blaming them for causing any unrest is, bluntly, blaming the victims. 

On the plus side, if you meet someone who wants to argue that JDS was forced by the malice of entitled fans or whatever similar bullshit, now you know the truth about that person. They are not an ally of the LGBT+ community.

Look, I work to be as balanced as possible. I try to give at least some benefit of the doubt – for ignorance, if nothing else – when things go wrong. I do my best to consider all views, and use logic over emotion. Even the worst case may contain something to teach us, if we can only see it from the right angle. 

But there are some lines I have not drawn in the sand; I have etched them in concrete. And one of them is the Bury Your Gays trope. 

I lived in Washington D.C. during the AIDS crisis. I watched my community be decimated while no one else fucking cared. For years, the most you’d hear in mainstream media was an attitude that loss, grief, the unending pain of funeral after funeral after goddamn funeral was righteous punishment for being queer. Even these many years later, one of the rare ways to enrage me is “an innocent victim.” That phrase was only ever used for heterosexuals. Only they were innocent of guilt for being queer; only their suffering was unjustified, only they were worth mourning. 

So you’re just gonna have to excuse me if I take it a little personal when I’m forced to watch queer people – real or fictional – die. Again. Especially when the survivor’s grief becomes tragedy porn for people who live blissfully ignorant of the continuing toll of AIDS, bashings, gay panic murders, and suicide. And while I’m on the topic, if you think I was the only adult getting triggered by memories long-buried — of diagnosed friends abandoned by loved ones — you are dead wrong. 

Fortunately, I am not alone. Enough of us survived and somehow grew up and now have — in a change I really never thought I’d see in my lifetime — families of our own. Anyone thinking it one more twitter spat seriously underestimates us. I guarantee you there was more going on, even if the parts JDS saw were only on twitter. 

All together, I do feel the apology stopped short of two things: one, there was no consideration of the larger picture, given the story’s treatment of disabled and traumatized characters. Or how the story burdened a single character with disability and trauma, and then piled a failed mlm relationship on top, in the same episode as it reveals the character’s terminal disease. 

And two, I wanted action items, not a pat on the back as if anger from my community and our allies existed entirely for JDS’ life lesson. I would’ve liked something about what JDS would do differently, going forward.

Would he make a point of reaching out to our community, to get our insight, the next time he wishes to represent us? Would he get involved in Dreamworks’ diversity or Out program, and learn to be a better ally? Would he seek to work closer with us, to respect us as part of the audience, rather than dismissing our pain as a minor by-product of his story? 

And lastly, given the emotional context, if JDS and the staff were sincere, I’d like to hear they’re speaking up if they see someone blaming fans – of any stripe – for the EPs’ own actions. If JDS and Dreamworks are truly remorseful, it would behoove them to reject attempts to shift blame onto anyone else. After what they did to us — intentionally and knowingly – supporting the community is the absolute least they could do. 

[miss-watolock]

Watolock: Miss Sherlock, Queerbaiting, and Portrayals of WLW in Media

Queerbaiting and portrayals of WLW (Women who Love Women) in media deserve their own barrages of blogs dedicated solely to these topics, but I will be condensing and selecting some aspects that I feel are especially pertinent to Watolock in Miss Sherlock.

Disclaimer: I know queer is not a term that everyone in the community is comfortable using for themselves, and I in no way want to force this term upon anyone who rejects it. That being said, a lot of people in the LGBTQ+ community have reclaimed the term, so I will be using it here NOT as a slur in any way.

What is queerbaiting? The Wikipedia definition:

“Queerbaiting is the practice of hinting at, but then not actually depicting, a same-sex romantic relationship between characters in a work of fiction, mainly in film or television. The potential romance may be ignored, explicitly rejected or made fun of.

The derogatory term "queerbaiting" is meant to imply that this is done for the purpose of attracting ("baiting") a queer audience with the ultimately unrealized suggestion of relationships that appeal to them. The concept arose in and has been popularized through Internet discussions among the fandom of popular films and television series.”

Now for some background, we’re going to fast-forward to an infamous moment in WLW content history: Lexa’s death in The 1*0. I won’t write out the whole of what went down (too much), but I will focus on the aftermath that ensued. There was an online campaign that rallied around “LGBT Fans Deserve Better” and to my recollection, this is the first time I’ve personally witnessed the outrage of fandoms mobilizing a large number of people to reach people who weren’t even in these fandoms. The Bury Your Gays trope became a focal point in discussion for mainstream media representation what with people becoming more aware of how terribly LGBTQ+ characters are treated and the negative effects on LGBTQ+ viewers (I remember seeing how calls to LGBTQ+ teens suicide hotlines skyrocketed after Lexa’s death, etc.) 

This incident and the whole movement helped bring the prominence of how LGBTQ+ representation gets sidelined and has always been sideline to a mainstream consciousness. And while this issue harmful LGBTQ+ representation is very much still present , there have been strides that show even minute changes. For one, a variety of people actually talked about it, not just LGBTQ+ fans who were so easily ignored before. ClexaCon became a thing. Media with thoughtful and fleshed out representation like Moonlight and The Handmaiden are critically acclaimed. We have seen shows choose deliberate responses in how they interact with potential queerbaiting like with how Wynonna Earp specifically had Officer Haught wear a bulletproof vest that saved her life (even more pointed considering how Lexa was killed off by a stray bullet) and how Steven Universe, Adventure Time, Andi Mack, The Legend of Korra, and She-Ra: Princesses of Power all have overtly LGBTQ+ characters. 

I do think the issue of queerbaiting is especially prominent in Sherlock Holmes and related fandom, mainly because of BBC’s Sherlock. I avoided watching any of the show because that was the first thing I heard about it - the show queerbaits like none other but then yanks the rug right after with strong denials of queerbaiting and repeated statements that nothing like JohnLock will ever come to fruition. And as someone tired of shows alternating between queerbaiting to lock in a certain demographic of watchers and then having the token non-straight character only to kill them off in some manner (https://www.glaad.org/whereweareontv16). So many characters have died and note: a lot of them did not have to die. Seriously. It’s not that hard. There aren’t that many LGBTQ+ characters out there, and it’s telling that so many of them end up dead.

For Sherlock Holmes fandoms, you already feel the difference between BBC’s Sherlock and Miss Sherlock in how people frame the relationships between the Sherlock and Watsonian character. There are at least 3 allusions to JohnLock being in a gay relationship within the first episode and no one ever seems to question whether Watolock could be vaguely romantic. To be fair, with Miss Sherlock, you have the context where the legitimacy of wlw relationships in media are already so often questioned (’They’re just really good friends, the best of friends, who would die for each other and repeatedly profess that the other is their most important person) along with being in Japan, an Asian country that is not exactly the most progressive when it comes to LGBTQ+ issues. 

This ties into how society frames relationships between certain genders - man-woman must always be romantically linked, man-man that has any connection must be romantically linked because how else could you have a close relationship with anyone else as a man, and woman-woman must be friends only because the limits of friendship can be so stretched for women and not at all for men so that it is inconceivable that women could ever be together in a romantic notion. 

Back to Miss Sherlock because what’s been said in the previous paragraph can be disseminated in so many ways - I am reluctant to claim that Miss Sherlock has queerbait written into Watolock. I am however suspicious that HBOAsia as a TV network or the writers, producers, anyone involved in the show would not expect for people to interpret the relationship between Watolock as a shippable one given that they take cues from past Sherlock adaptations - all of which have interactions with fans who rabidly ship Sherlock and Watson.

https://twitter.com/search?l=&q=%23misssherlock%20from%3AHBOAsia&src=typd&lang=en is a link to HBOAsia’s twitter with the hashtag MissSherlock - and 3 of those involve Watolock.

https://twitter.com/HBOAsia/status/1009965542738878464 => basically I don’t believe at all that they didn’t expect this - maybe they didn’t expect how big the ship would be given that it is 2 Asian women together, maybeeeeeee, but I still don’t buy it. 

I guess I do appreciate them highlighting Watolock in a positive manner instead of shouting from the rooftops that it could never ever happen. But please don’t let this turn out to be like SwanQueen. Pls. 

For fans who ship wlw or mlm ships, there is always a lot of reading in between the lines, over-analyzing subtext, making our own fanon because canon would never recognize such ships as truly legitimate. It is tiring when the only options are to just be resigned to these characters never getting their happily ever afters and having fan-created content that canon content creators mock as ‘Cute. But that would never happen.’

This is a topic I tire of having to explain to people who could never really get just how painful and exhausting it is to sometimes have to interact with this kind of content for scraps of representation that no one should ever have to settle for. I appreciate Watolock as the non-queerbaiting form it is in at the moment because it’s true that the two have a special relationship in the show and have been recognized within and outside the show as such. I just hope that this show could possibly join the slim ranks of positive wlw media out there, or at the very least be a concrete stepping stone  of inspiration in paving the way for other shows that will be more willing to be overt and respectful with its LGBTQ+ representation. LGBTQ+ Fans Deserve Better. 

[holistically-gay-blog]

I’ve been thinking about Max’s decision to make Panto and Silas gay and their (current) ending to the story. I absolutely believe they will get a happy ending come episode 10 but my feelings still stand.  

Do I believe that Max wrote the story to be an intentional “fuck you” to lgbtq people in the fanbase? No. 

Do I think it was an insensitive story-writing choice and once brought up handled poorly? Yes. 

Silas and Panto, to me, represent the epitome of the gay community? Looking to bring peace and have happy lives without unwanted, unwarranted bigotry, and seeking approval from the people they love most. They weren’t do it because they were gay or because their world was homophobic, but the narrative and feelings behind it and a good metaphor. 

Seeing Panto was a big moment to me. A gay man, on TV, with pink hair. He resonated with me so much, I instantly fell in love. A validation of who I am (also a gay man with pink hair!!!) And I know others saw themselves in Panto and/or Silas too. A queer man of color? He was revolutionary. -- Even Tina, a woman who stated she was bi as if she was stating her hair color. With maybe 60 lgbtq characters out of hundreds on TV, this was incredible. Three whole explicitly canon lgbt main(ish) characters. Holy shit.

Fast forward to episode 9 and we’ve seen two of our three violently shot up dead (and one just violently shot). Do I think gay characters’ storylines should revolve around other things besides being gay? Yes. Do I think gay characters should be treated differently in a story than heterosexual ones? No. But you can’t say that killing two-thirds of your gay characters is treating them the same as straight ones. Were two-thirds of the heterosexual (or not explicitly lgbt) characters killed? The few gay characters were killed completely disproportionately and left many of us feeling heartbroken. Characters we could relate to more than any others we may have seen in any other media before were violently killed. How could we not be heartbroken? Finally hoping we have positive representation of ourselves only to be ripped from us, yet again. Time after time.

Max kind of eludes to the fact that Panto and Silas would have both died, whether they had been gay or not, and I almost wish at that point he would have made them straight. There would have been no proportionality issue with the gay characters. There would have been no negative feelings besides ‘oh they died that’s sad.” Instead, we have lgbt fans feeling discouraged and dejected. I think plot-wise the story makes sense and it makes sense that Panto and Silas died. I think it created motivation for Bart to continue on her path of the universe, for example. But the fact that they are gay taps into a cultural context that the straight characters don’t have. 

The writing went from a cool, relatively new idea on television - a gay fairy tale - and turned it into a trope. Any 30-second google search will show you that ‘Bury Your Gays’ is a problem in media. Romeo and Juliet is so overused and stereotypical, but it didn’t make it any more interesting by turning it into a different trope with much more serious cultural impact.

But you don’t have to be upset by it, at all. If you think it makes sense in the story and it doesn’t bother you, cool. People look at everything through their own personal filter, and it may not have offended or disheartened you. I was more taken aback by the shock factor during the episode than to think about what happened until I took a few moments through the past few days to think about it. Regardless of how you feel though, it’s undeniable that people were hurt by this writing choice, only to get sarcastic and less-that-desirable responses from Landis. That’s the part that bothers me the most. If he plans to revive them, then he never should have said anything. If he plans on keeping them dead then his responses were insensitive at best. Newsflash heterosexual man but if people are offended for legitimate reasons by your work, maybe consider why. Plenty of people weren’t being over-dramatic babies and have good reasons to be hurt and turned off by this decision. You are a writer, a voice of a show seen by hundreds of thousands. Your voice has power and influence over the ways people see themselves and others. Your work has meaning to a lot of people. That meaning should be considered carefully from many viewpoints.

Do I hate the show? No. Am I frustrated by the direction the story has taken and the way Max Landis responded to criticism on this topic? Absolutely. Do I plan on stopping watching/supporting/loving? Not at all.

I just wish writers realized the responsibility they had and the way they portray characters and what happens to them personally matters to more people than they can comprehend.

[zainapbaraketcaryl]

‘The Walking Dead’: The Importance of Caryl As a Romantic Ship

The Walking Dead’s Caryl may not seem as progressive as some other ships, but it’s still important!

It’s no secret that I am a huge shipper. It’s even less of a secret that Caryl is easily my OTP (okay fine, one of many but if we’re playing favorites Caryl is tops). And after “New Best Friends” (S7E10) I am 100% quality Caryl shipping trash. I won’t apologize, this has been a long time coming! With high expectations for a Caryl reunion on my mind, I found myself considering what is so important to me about these two fictional people getting together?

In an early draft of this piece, it was just a list of reasons I ship Caryl. The intent was just to list all the obvious ways (and there are many) to be to emotionally involved with Carol (Melissa McBride) and Daryl (Norman Reedus). But this ship is so much more than something like “101 Reasons to Ship Caryl” (but seriously don’t threaten me with a good time, that list would be epic!). It goes so much deeper than just stuff and thangs that making shipping fun.

And shipping is fun. It’s exciting to imagine the possibilities and varying dynamics that two characters bring to each other. But there’s something special when a ship really earns it. And Daryl and Carol have most assuredly earned it! They have always deserved happiness and they have never expressed being happier than when they are with each other.

Thinking about my not-so-short-list of reasons that Caryl is worth shipping I landed on one idea in particular. Caryl is important. It just is. Obviously, I have my reasons and it’s not enough to just say that. But it’s there’s a pureness in that sentiment. And it’s not important just because Daryl is so much more than just a “redneck” or that Carol – as an individual is completely fully fleshed out – is easily one of the best characters to ever grace our televisions. That honestly, goes without saying and for all The Walking Dead‘s meandering sometimes, I will always be thankful the showrunners kept her alive.

However, The Walking Dead doesn’t exactly have a history of being the most progressive show on TV. Thankfully, the show corrected a lot of its issues with the women, though not in enough time not to ensure that Lori (Sara Wayne Callies) and Andrea (Laurie Holden) wouldn’t be vilified forever. And let’s not forget they still felt the need to include Negan’s wives.

Up until very recently, it was like some kind of in-show joke that characters of color would be killed off to make way for the next one. Luckily, it appears the showrunners have done their best to stop that particular pattern. Except then there’s the antiquated but oft-employed “bury your gays” trope. I mean poor Tara (Alanna Masterson) has had to endure the deaths of multiple partners. And there’s plenty more problematic weeds we could pull out but we’d be here forever (but seriously why did Glenn (Steven Yeun) never get a bottle episode and did Michonne (Danai Gurira) ever have a last name because even Beyonce and Madonna have them, they just don’t need to use them?) and I have so many much more fun points to make!

But speaking directly to some of the lack of progressiveness is why a canon ship like Richonne is important. Please don’t mistake my bringing up Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and Michonne’s love as some kind of competition. I don’t want to have a ship measuring contest. And I’m not saying Caryl is any more important that Richonne. They are on equal footing for different reasons. But Richonne’s place in one of the most popular TV shows currently on air is noteworthy.

Representation matters! And it goes beyond putting a woman of color in the forefront of a show like The Walking Dead. Rick Grimes is the epitome of a TV show hero and I have seven seasons of annoying man-pain to prove it. And to have him create an organic romantic relationship with the show’s leading woman of color is so much more than visibility. It normalizes it. And it’s absolutely something that should be “normal” at this point (but sadly isn’t). And this fact is hardly the most important part of the Richonne bond (that would arguably be that Carl (Chandler Riggs) and Michonne totally adopted each other first and Rick was a bonus in all of that). But it’s still a major aspect of the ship and I hope the show continues to improve in similar directions.

Which brings me to Caryl. Because at this point you’re probably wondering what any of this has to do with them and why I wouldn’t think something like Carol and Morgan (Lennie James) or Carol and Ezekiel (Khary Payton) would be better. And I have those answers: 1) No! Morgan assaulted Carol and even though he saved her that will never be okay and 2) No! Carol has repeatedly told Ezekiel to leave her alone and he can’t seem to listen and it’s not okay.

The real question shouldn’t be why I would ship anything but Caryl. The real question is why you don’t ship it? Okay fine that’s not it either. The real real question is how is Caryl progressive?

The simplistic answer is that it isn’t. And on some level it’s just your basic vanilla heterosexual relationship. But for the record, typing that sentence physically hurt me because that’s just the bare minimum. The truth is Caryl is progressive. And the evidence is in every reason those who aren’t on board with the ship like to give for why Daryl and Carol don’t belong together.

As far as I’m concerned Daryl and Carol went canon when he ran to her in the season five premiere but some need more, though I struggle to imagine that anyone is in any doubt that there’s any other woman for Daryl Dixon after “New Best Friends” (S7Ep10). These two broken characters need each other. And Daryl physically cannot exist in a world where she doesn’t. It’s why he threatens Richard (Karl Makinen) and then chooses not to tell Carol about those they lost.

The Caryl bond came about through a shared understanding and similar experiences. As a domestic abuse survivor, The Walking Dead has made Carol a beacon of hope to all kinds of survivors. She has turned her struggles into strengths. Yes, even now, while she’s isolating herself and refusing to fight. Her love and her fear of loss are keeping her away and she is entitled to work through that. Here’s a little secret: PTSD doesn’t just go away. You learn to live with it. And while everyone in the group is coping in their own unique way they are all looking for something to hold onto to balance out all the devastation. Showing that both Daryl and Carol aren’t just surviving but thriving. It’s a narrative that is worth exploring because no other characters have been shown to be tortured as frequently and hurting as often as Daryl and Carol.

And if the survival aspect isn’t enough there’s even more significant visibility in Caryl being a romantic bond. I like to tell stories about all the times I’ve had conversations in real life about The Walking Dead. It’s pure water-cooler talk and it’s exciting when people you don’t expect mention being fans of the show. Following Glenn’s death, there were few places you could go where the show wasn’t being discussed. Among a group of acquaintances, it was the perfect conversation topic. During a lull, I quietly mentioned that Daryl loves Carol (okay it wasn’t so quietly because I have no chill). I didn’t expect anyone to agree with me. That’s what Tumblr is for! But what surprised me more was the very real, “Eww no, she’s a mom” reaction.

Now, I don’t have children, but I’m friends with plenty of people who do. We’re all around the same age and last I checked being a mom doesn’t all of a sudden render you unable to be seen as someone sexual. What in the world does Carol being a mom have to do with being a loving relationship with a man who clearly loves her back? Having children, caring for children and just being maternal in general doesn’t mean that that person is no longer physically attractive or that someone can’t be physically attracted to a mom.

Yes, Carol has been established a mom. But let’s look at those qualities: She’s older than a lot of women in the group. She likes to cook and she has taken on the actual title of “mom,” a title that has earned her utter heartbreak. Carol loves. She can’t help it. But moms still deserve romance!

Carol is also a badass and super cool and really really funny but she loves her family so much that she’s afraid to see them hurt. She so much can’t take it that she told Morgan to tell them she’s gone if he ever runs into Team Family again (and he did just that and Daryl looked soon sad and then was even more broken when he was finally able to ask her why she left!). But if she can be all those things then she can also be sexy. Furthermore, she can and is loved by Daryl – who is easily the show’s biggest female draw (that’s definitely a blanket statement but it is true for many just look at the merchandise, chances are Daryl is on it). This is important because there’s a ridiculous assumption that Daryl is a lot younger than Carol, which is also weird and inaccurate.

Back to that normalization thing I mentioned above, when did it become normal to use the fact that someone is a mom as a negative? Doesn’t that make Carol and Daryl that much more suited for each other? She’s not mothering him. In fact if anything Daryl is the more nurturing one when it’s the two of them than Carol is. He has a voice that he uses only for her! It’s just reached a point where it’s hard to argue that Carol and Daryl is nothing more than just a bond. It’s love. Never forget, Carol shut the door on Ezekiel and opened her door to Daryl.

The Walking Dead has a platform. It doesn’t always use it to its greatest effect but in a slow burn like Caryl, the intention isn’t subtle as all. And that makes this particular ship not just important but necessary.

https://hiddenremote.com/2017/02/19/walking-dead-importance-of-caryl-romantic-ship/

[aparticularbandit]

pulitzer, faulkner, dickinson, parchment please?

writer asks

pulitzer: tell about/link a piece where you fielt your writing was the best.

grind.  other than the ending.  and, like, i know most people don’t like it as much as my other stuff because emilio pov and whatever but i was and still am very happy with how it turned out.  i don’t think the coffee/sex/etc. metaphors are super anvillicious (they’re not particularly subtle but like? i’m proud of them?  they feel natural to the fic?) and i think it does what it was supposed to do and i actually like it.  i was really proud of grind when i wrote it and i’m still proud of it.

faulkner: what tropes do you LOVE writing? which ones are your guilty pleasure?

i...don’t really think about tropes when i’m writing?  and i don’t know the names for all of them. >woobie (LUISA FUCKING ALVER), knight in sour armor, determinator.

but story tropes....

trauma conga line.break the cutie.i did what i had to do and discussions around it.i love playing with sliding scales so sliding scale of idealism vs. cynicism is one of my particular favorites.  ^^...i also guilty pleasure graphic descriptions of body gore and playing around with cannibalism BUT i don’t think that’s in most of my fanfics.  might come up in a handful of dust.  probably definitely would’ve come up if i’d done the multi-chap expansion of body, body like i thought about doing oops.bandit likes writing dark topics how did bandit end up writing a lot of romance.

dickinson: what insecurities do you have about your own writing? what do you think you should improve on?

i suck at writing comedy.  i have a really hard time making my writing funny.  my jokes don’t hit.  when there are jokes.  i’m just not good at it.  (this is actually why i like ‘twas the night before Christmas so much - it actually makes me laugh.)

i’m also not great at having distinctive character voices in terms of dialogue.  if i have two similar characters talking at each other with no description and no dialogue tags - petra and rose, maybe - you should be able to tell them apart just by wording and how they speak and etc. and with my writing, i really don’t think you can.  i struggle with that a lot.

i’m not good at having my characters interacting with their surroundings.  i’ve gotten better at it,   but i have to actively fight to be conscious of it sometimes.

also trying to carry on conversations between three or more characters is really hard because inevitably i end up forgetting one or more characters being involved in the conversation.  but i think that’s just something that needs practicing and there’s fics that help with that a little bit.

also also my characters do tend to all feel the same...or similar.  (there’s a series i started that would have lampshaded that, actually, but that’s another story.)  i tend to have a handful of character types/themes and then variations on those themes.  how i write miss lint, for instance, feels a lot like how i used to write my very first original character.  luisa’s a lot like ara (who is...another character i go back to over and over and over).  rose takes some similarities from dana.  like - i can follow that.  idk.

parchment: how often do you or your personal life influence your writing?

i want to say not as much in fic as it does in novel stuff, but i don’t think that’s rightly true - it’s just...less blatant?  XD

my stories throughout high school and college (...and middle school) were very much hugely influenced by my life because that was how i worked through different situations or quandaries i was facing.  the book i consider my first novel was basically about a mixture of my ocd and my bpd - both of which were undiagnosed at the time - but in a fantastical sort of etc. setting.  crossroads may be super meta but it was also kind of sort of an allegory in how creations relate to a creator (but gets complicated from there because, given that it was metafiction, i didn’t want it to be strict allegory because...obvious reasons, God is God and bandit is not, etc.).  ara’s story was dealing with religious issues dealing with being gay (and also bury your gays trope...which is a combination of that and bandit just kills people in bandit’s stories - bandit used to be more whump inclined than romance inclined i blame the rpc and the roisa fandom).

i think it’s much less...like i said, much less blatant now than it was then.  XD

there are still definitely aspects of myself in each of my characters - i think, for me, it would be impossible to write these characters if i didn’t connect with them personally in some form or fashion, even the despicable ones (i know this is not true of all writers, but it is true, to some extent, of me).  some of them more than others (there’s a lot of me in my rose, and there’s a lot of me in my luisa, and there is significantly more of me in my miss lint, which is probably why i keep bringing her back).and there are definitely slightly more...relevant impacts - i was in iop when i started if you lived here, you’d be home now, which was definitely a huge part of wanting to write that part of luisa’s life.  i’d gotten out of a huge explosive fight with my mom when i started and posted the first chapter of luisa and the fox.so, uh, tl;dr - often.  frequently.  a lot.  just.  a little more subtle now than it used to be.  XD

[blueraith]

The way fandom characterizes certain characters...

Bothers me. I usually don’t speak out much against this stuff, preferring to ‘rectify’ these kinds of issues with fics of my own, and my own take on these certain characters. Characters that the fandom, for whatever reason, has decided that they don’t like and will portray them as terribly as possible.

Now, most of the time, this is done by warring ships. Those, I don’t particularly care about. Shipping wars have lasted forever, and I will easily write a fic or two about this kind of thing to fix my inner disquiet.

Parents, on the other hand, are the other. And this makes it so much harder for me to personally fix. I don’t know if it’s because fanfiction is written by a large number of young people, or what, but it’s clear that some of these authors can’t seem to recognize that problematic parental figures are not always abusive pieces of garbage with no redeeming qualities.

I have mommy issues the size of Texas. I know this. It’s typically the reason why, in my original work, the mother figures in my works are never the problem parent. It hits too close to home. I write what I wish I could have had. Which is probably depressing and a little pathetic, but it is how I’ve coped for a very long time.

I read an embarrassing amount of fanfiction. Typically because I am super Gay(TM) and have to depend on either dead ships (fucking bury your gays trope can go light itself on fire in a fucking dumpster) or crack ships. Either way, I’ve gotten ridiculously good at perusing and finding virtually anything I could possibly imagine by learning the most common ways people tag, summarize, or title their works. Usually, I will go into a specific fandom, read through the most recently updated stuff first, then get into the most kudos’d/favorited stuff next, then go into character tags, and then finally start searching additional tags or search terms for things that didn’t quite cure my itch for certain topics. This typically takes me a period of two weeks or so. After I’ve exhausted everything I could imagine, was interested in, or what was available, I leave for about four to six months, and then come back to start the process all over again.

Like I said, I read a shit ton of fanfiction. And I learn how the fandom thinks in broad strokes. There are fandom versions of certain characters. They are, for the most part, in character, but there’s this odd ‘fandom’ spin that writers of fanfiction have either created themselves or have latched onto and that thing will permeate throughout the entire section of the fandom. Be it a quote, behavior, or personality. One example would be Maggie, in a shit ton of fics, will find some way to mention that she’s a “detective, Danvers. I detect.” Like it’s her motto rather than a witty one-liner she said one episode and never mentioned again.

But that’s the most minor example of this issue. The most extreme would be the way the fandom characterizes Eliza Danvers. Now, I know her past. I know that she was hard on Alex. It was a plot arc that hit uncomfortably close to home for me. A mother who is far too hard on her eldest child and charges said child to take care of their younger sibling(s) to the detriment of their own well-being. It is a form of emotional abuse. One that I have, unfortunately, lived myself. Also the sheer, crippling fear of failure or of being a disappointment to said mother that Alex feels is another plot point that hits too close to the mark for me. The fact that Eliza acted as she did is not the issue I have with her role in fanfiction.

No, I have a huge problem with how most writers completely ignore her character arc and her continuing development with Alex and act as though she is still as awful as she had ever been at her worst. A low point that we only get the barest of glimpses of on screen in season 1. It’s maddening. Why? Because if my mother ever looked me in the eye and told me that she was proud of me and made a mistake in how she’s been treating me for the past several years, and then took steps to fix the problem, I’d fucking.... Shit, I don’t even know, guys. I’d be fucking ecstatic, to say the least. Because Eliza Danvers has been working on easing up on Alex. You can see it in what little we get of her in season 2.

(I may have also searched high and low for Alex and Eliza scenes on YouTube in order to find out if their relationship did indeed get any better. It did, btw.)

We can see the start of this in season 1, first of all, when Eliza breaks Myriad’s control over Alex by telling her how proud she and Jeremiah are of her. Without framing that pride around Kara. She specifically spoke only about Alex in that scene.

Season 2 Thanksgiving is rather telling in that Alex is still stressed out by her mom. And I don’t think that is because of any particular ugliness Eliza has shown her recently. Mostly because of her continuing actions in this season, but one also has to consider that, perhaps, Alex only got drunk in order to come out to her mom because she was emotionally scarred. This kind of trauma just doesn’t evaporate overnight. For god’s sake, Alex is like 27-28 and she still has a crippling fear of disappointing her mother. That’s not healthy, and it’s not something that will fix itself over a short period of time. I do not think Alex acted as she did because Eliza is still trying to be as hard on her as she used to be. (Not that I think she immediately turned perfect either, but that she has likely been working on being better.) But that’s not going to make a difference on the kind of emotional toll it has taken on Alex over the past 14 years.

And this suspicion of mine is further supported by just how freaking great Eliza was when Alex did actually come out to her. Eliza made some very specific word choices in that conversation. Alex has forever had an inferiority complex as far as her mother is concerned, but also as a more general flaw in her character. Eliza specifically calls her exceptional for a reason. I think she’s perfectly aware of how terrified Alex was to come out to her. For one thing, if she missed that Alex was really fucked up on Thanksgiving, then she’s super fucking blind because an infant could have spotted how hammered Alex was. And I think she did, because Eliza says that she knew Alex had been trying to tell her something. Not us. Not everyone at Thanksgiving. Her. Then there is the fact that Alex was moved to tears over her coming out, and that she had to choke out her fears that Eliza wouldn’t accept her. I mean, you can’t be any more clear than that in giving your parent the message that ‘you’ve made me really fucking terrified over whether or not you even love me.’ Eliza has proven to be very observant over these past two seasons. I don’t think she missed that firework display of insecurity that Alex set off there.

Then there’s the Danvers Family Reunion dinner in 2x14. First, we have Eliza giving Maggie a hug right off the bat, didn’t even blink an eye. I have no doubt that the only reason Alex went through with her extremely quick, yet hesitant, kiss on Maggie’s cheek right before that was because both Kara and Eliza supported her. She was stressed about Jeremiah in that scene, not Eliza, and I think that speaks for how their relationship has improved since her coming out. In that same episode, after Mon-el acts like an ass and accuses Jeremiah a few minutes later, Maggie is the first to bring Alex down from her anger, but if you watch Alex throughout the whole background of that scene, specifically as Jeremiah is walking Mon-el out, Alex is being comforted by Eliza. Again, more support that things are better between them. Alex could have easily stuck with Maggie in this scene. TV rarely does anything by accident. Eliza and Alex in the background together in this scene was done deliberately and it was developing their relationship further through body language. Specifically, I believe Eliza and Alex were facing each other, and Eliza was rubbing Alex’s arm in comfort. Doesn’t get much more clearer than that.

(Also, who the fuck accuses somebody of suspicious activity at their fucking family reunion? I know I’m behind in Supergirl, I’ve honestly not watched a ton of Mon-el simply because he is not a lesbian nor a sister of someone on this show. I am not about to unilaterally label him as a terrible person or anything because I know next to nothing about him. But for real. This scene gave me a bad taste in my mouth for him. Time and place, dude. Presumably, you at least have J’onn’s phone number. Call him up after dinner and share your concerns. Privately. Away from Jeremiah’s celebrating family. Jesus Christ.)

Anyway, the next thing I’m aware of, as far as Eliza scenes are concerned, is when Jeremiah goes through with the betrayal. She rushes into the DEO, and goes to Alex to comfort her. Kara is conspicuously absent in their conversation. She’s having her own conversation, but Alex was just in that same conversation with Kara. She was called away by Eliza by name. Eliza didn’t call out for both Kara and Alex. Just Alex. Because she probably knew that Alex would take Jeremiah’s betrayal much harder than Kara would.

I don’t know. I see this a lot. The 1OO have fanfic writers shitting on Abby. Vampire Academy has folks dumping on Janine. It seems parents are a sore spot for most folks. Trust me, I get it, but personally? I prefer to see these relationships improve, as they do in actual canon. (At least as far as Supergirl and VA are concerned. I have no idea about Abby and Clarke’s relationship because I didn’t get far enough in to find out.) Because it gives me a bit of catharsis that, even if it’s fiction, at least somebody is improving their relationships with their mothers. Because God only knows how much I want that for myself.

Whether its stories that repeatedly have Eliza holding Alex to ridiculous standards, standards she’s seemed to have abandoned for the most part in canon, or if it’s a high-school AU and they make Eliza really fucking homophobic (???? Like, that didn’t even happen in the show? Where does that come from????), there’s a lot of hate out there for her. And it bothers me. Because it’s extremely unlikely that I will be able to write something of my own over this subject in Alex’s voice. That’s the only way I’d be able to do it (because it would be Alex’s POV that I’m the most familiar with on this subject), and if I tried to go through with it, it would bring up a shit load of emotions that I am currently not able to deal with at the moment. This is a rare occurrence for me. I’m not used to having this kind of idea in my head and not being able to actually sit down and write it. I’ve compartmentalized a lot of shit I feel about my own mom, and even writing this rant has got me thinking too much about our relationship and the disappointment I know she will feel towards me very soon.

Okay, end of that paragraph. Can’t get into that. I don’t know. I don’t expect this to change anything. People will write what they will. I guess I’m wondering if I’m the only one who even thinks about this. I’ve been on a fic binge, I’ve seen this phenomenon a lot recently and it’s hit close to home and I’m feeling a bit fatigued over it. I harp on my less than perfect relationship with my mom enough in real life. I guess it feels more like a punch in the gut when I’m reading fanfic, have gotten like six chapters in, and suddenly “LOOK! LOOK HOW TERRIBLE THIS CHARACTER’S PARENT IS! aREN’T THEY THE WORST????” Like, yeah, I guess.... Because these scenes are almost always over the top. There’s no nuance. No one sticks up for anyone. It’s typically a scene of the parents just shitting on the kid, and geez.  As if I don’t already live that. I suppose this is how some people vent, but ohhh. It’s definitely not how I do it.

Maybe I’m just a tad more sensitive about this than usual.

[bellabooks]

3 Things TV Can Teach Gaming about Queer Storylines

Even though television had a head start on the first generation of video games, these two art forms have found themselves on an even playing field within the last decade. Graphically, games may have evolved a bit slower over the decades but, that didn’t stop them from leaving as much of a cultural mark on the world as popular TV shows. Motion capture technology has allowed games the ability to deliver cinematic experiences in a far more immersive setting. One thing that is truly holding back major video games from exploring a range of gender and sexual identity, is the production process. In many cases, big name game developers can take two to four years to produce one title, and that’s if they’re lucky. Television shows take far less time to produce and thus, have done more to advance stories of the queer community by simply providing more of them over time. This is not to say that games have not attempted to include queer characters at all. In fact, indie game developers have been leading the charge in intersectional diversity for years. The only time queer characters come close to being the sole lead of a multi-platform gaming franchise is if it���s a massive RPG and you get to create your own avatar. While these kinds of games are enjoyable, they do not provide the same definite representation that a game with a set protagonist does. If we look back at the Tomb Raider reboot we can see a clear example of an opportunity for representation that was missed. In a 2013 interview with Kill Screen, Rihanna Prachet stated that she wished she could make Lara Croft gay, and went on to make very clear points about representation beyond including more female characters in games: “Whenever anybody talks about a need for more female protagonists I say: “There’s a need for more female protagonists, but there’s a need for characters of different ethnicities, ages, sexual orientation, ability, et cetera.” We are very narrow when it comes to our characters.” This interview gave many fans, including myself, hope that the reboot would establish Lara Croft as queer, especially with Lara spending the first game rescuing her best friend Sam, whom she clearly had a deep connection with. Since this interview, we’ve had one more installment of the reboot that side stepped Lara’s sexuality entirely. This didn’t make the game any less enjoyable but the complete disconnect from the events of the first game was not unnoticed by fans. Not only was Sam nowhere to be found in game, her Wiki page stated that she was in a mental ward. Now with Pratchet leaving the post of lead writer for the third installment there is not much hope left that we may see a queer Lara Croft anytime soon. It’s my belief that if major game developers studied three key factors of how queer storylines have been handled well (and poorly) on TV, they may be more willing to consider writing queer protagonists. Maybe even some that fall under that “et cetera” category Pratchet was talking about nearly four years ago.   I find that most forms of mainstream entertainment relegate any serious exploration of gender identity to the fringes. Independent filmmakers, indie games devs, premium or non-cable TV networks. Billions, a Showtime original series, is introducing the first major genderqueer supporting character in a drama series. The character’s name is Taylor, and will be played by Asia Kate Dillon, an androgynous actor that identifies with they/them pronouns. In 2016, the now canceled MTV show, Faking It, featured many queer characters within one plot. It also had the first intersex character in a supporting role on a TV show. There are far more examples to pull from in television these days, with many shows including at least one queer character and sometimes even multiple queer storylines and once. It seems like an odd thing to dwell on because nobody ever says “look at all these hetero people in my plotline” but if we really think about the number of mainstream shows or movies in recent years with more than one or two queer protagonists who aren’t in a relationship with each other, it’s not as common. A current instance of this is Orange is the New Black. While not without its faults, there are a range of queer identities throughout the show. This does not make it exempt from failing its audience by killing off queer characters in misguided ways or failing to uphold a character’s sexual identity, however. Piper, the main character of the show, is clearly established as a bisexual woman through her various romances and yet, is never referred to directly as a bisexual. She is often referred to as a “former lesbian” “dyke” and so on, but she never corrects anyone. Oddly enough, the best onscreen conversation about bisexuality didn’t happen in a show like this, it happened on a now canceled show that aired on ABC family, Chasing Life. In episode seven of the second season of Chasing Life, Brenna Carver attends an LGBTQ club meeting and her bisexuality is brought up. The conversation that ensues showcases many of the most common misconceptions that bisexuals face. The conversation Brenna has reminded me of the conversation Krem in Dragon Age Inquisition has with the Inquisitor if they choose to have drinks with Iron Bull and his crew. The primary difference being that once the conversation is over in Dragon Age Inquisition, Krem turns back into NPC set dressing and in Chasing Life, Brenna is still a full-fledged member of the plot. Krem’s presence in Inquisition was incredibly important, but the impact he would have had if he had been a romanceable party member would have been astounding. Many people probably wouldn’t scoff at a trans male character like Krem at the helm of a major video game plot. Adding queer characters to a story is as important as actually utilizing them within it. It would also be ideal to include more than one queer character, to increase the likelihood that a queer character might end up alive at the resolution of a story. They often end up in shows or movies where “anyone can die” and due to the low number of queer people present, usually take the entirety of the stories queer representation with them if they get killed or written off. When this happens, it creates a bitter fan base and usually leads them to stop watching a show or seeing a filmmaker’s next 90-minute dramedy. It’s simple: don’t write queer storylines like an episode of Highlander. There can be more than one. Anyone who has spent any amount of time in the closet knows the depths to which one will claw at any scrap of positive representation they can identify with, even if that means reading into things only they can see. Often we are forced to create our own worlds within the restrictions put forth by the storytellers. Games like Final Fantasy XIII, while widely regarded as the most unfavorable game in the franchise, is also considered being the queerest one due to subtext. This is the result of the seemingly over-affectionate nature of characters Vanille and Fang. For those who didn’t pay too much attention to the development of the game, like me, you probably were unaware that Fang was first developed as a male character. This could explain why the relationship between Vanille and Fang reads as romantic. Intentional or not, if Fang had remained a male character, it’s highly likely that we wouldn’t be having debates over whether or not her and Vanille were a couple. We can only imagine the impact that game could have had if the relationship between them had been at the forefront. This “close female friendship” phenomenon is a very common form of subtext. A TV show notorious for subtext of this kind is Rizzoli and Isles. Ending in 2016 after seven seasons, plenty of beards and a hefty amount of queerbaiting, our heroines found themselves relaxing in a bed planning a trip to Paris together. Completely normal non-romantic behavior right? Let’s put things into perspective here. Bones, a show that has been on air since 2005, featured almost the same dynamic, a cop and a medical examiner working together with a rag tag group of scientists and detectives. The difference being that the heterosexual relationship between the two lead characters is acknowledged and fully actualized with them going on to marry each other in season 9 and even have children. Bones got to marry her quippy lovable detective friend, while Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles were constantly being bounced around to romantic storylines severely lacking in chemistry in order to deflect from the fact that they were perfect for each other. Had the relationship been made explicit it would have been the first major network detective show of its kind to put a queer female romance at the forefront. The resolution of the hero’s journey often relies on martyrdom or some other form of doom and gloom to wrap up a story. This is never more true than for the queer individual. If it wasn’t, then the Bury Your Gays Trope wouldn’t exist. It is very real, and self-explanatory but if you truly don’t know what it is, you’re one Google search away from being fully briefed on the topic. I’m one of those people who love a great ambiguous ending or twilight zone twist at the end of a story, but when it comes to queer characters, I would take riding off into the sunset over death any day. Games like The Last of Us provide us with Ellie, a queer supporting character who ultimately rises to equal footing with her male counterpart Joel but, her story is still rooted in tragedy. Many responses from showrunners have been that death is just part of the show and if we want to be treated like everyone else we should except it. Sure, that might make sense for Game of Thrones but not for shows like Last Tango in Halifax, which grew in popularity between 2013 and 2015, due to its inclusion of a genuine late-in-life coming out story and romance between two women. In the finale of the third season, Caroline marries her pregnant live-in girlfriend Kate, only to be widowed within 24 hours. Kate gets into a car accident off screen and dies, and a little piece of every fan rooting for them dies too. These types of “sudden death” storylines occur across television and film far too often. At a certain point, it stops being about just one character. Each new death rubs the salt deeper into an already open wound, a wound that constantly throbs with anger. An anger rooted in the fact that queer people have been around as long as there have been stories to tell and yet, we still live in a world that consistently fails at replicating our experiences. It’s 2017, and the only shows where there are well established queer female romances that will most likely not end with one of them dead are featured in shows like Wynonna Earp and Supergirl. Everyone involved in the creation of these two shows including the actors, has openly stated that they are invested in the characters that make up their queer representation, treating them as they would a heterosexual couple. SyFy even created an entire section of the Wynonna Earp website dedicated to the relationship between Waverly Earp and Nicole Haught. Games have the unique ability to sidestep the restraints of having to seek out crowd drawing actors or shooting in expensive locations because they can literally mold characters out of polygons and build their worlds out of code. This uniquely positions them to create something we have never seen before, someone we’ve never seen before. As Rhianna Pratchet put it: “Exploring something about what it means to be a gay character, bisexual character, transgender character, in games, that would create some interesting stories.” I couldn’t agree more http://dlvr.it/NKvGm1

[murasaki-murasame]

Danganronpa V3 Liveblog Part 2 [Chapter 1 - Daily Life]

Yeah I may as well put the rest of this under a read-more right from the start since I wanna get right into spoilers.

Just to jump right to the end of what I played because it’s the elephant in the room, I called Rantarou being the first death before the game even came out in Japan. But I think everyone did. It was really obvious that either he was going to survive for most/all of the game, or be killed off immediately to troll everyone because he’s set up as being so mysterious and presumably plot-important. I’m not really angry about it, but it’s just kinda funny that I called this nearly a year in advance. Thankfully the rest of the game should be less predictable than this, since this was the only real thing I confidently predicted back then. Also for the record I had no actual, genuine idea about this in advance, it was just a guess of mine.

It’s weird that in the demo version they had him [and Keebo] sit out of the trial, when he ended up not surviving long enough to take part in a trial in the main game.

Either way, it’s at least kinda amusing that he died immediately when he felt so similar to Komaeda. Obviously it’s still lame to see him die so soon, but at least his character played out differently to Komaeda.

[Also for the record I’m hoping that Kokichi saying ‘my dearest Rantarou’ was just him making an inappropriate joke, because hoo boy it was bad enough when DR3 ended with the Bury Your Gays trope. I’d be genuinely angry if this game STARTED with it. I’m pretty sure it’s just a joke, but it does remind me that Kokichi/Rantarou was actually a relatively popular crack ship in the fandom, at least back before the game came out in Japan]

I stopped playing directly when the investigation officially started [so technically I played a few minutes of the Deadly Life segment but that was because the game didn’t let me save for a while], so I can’t exactly speculate much about the case, and I don’t want to. I’ll save that for after I play the investigation, since I’ll actually have proper clues to work with then. I know that the investigation part will probably be a lot shorter than this part, but I want to take a break between it and the trial so that I get a chance to sit down and post some speculation before I go through the trial and figure out what happened. So my next post might be a bit short. Maybe. Knowing me, it probably won’t be.

Since I was scared this would happen, I tried to talk to him as much as possible, but I only managed to have one actual scene with him. I also had one with Shuichi. Now that Rantarou’s out the way, I guess Shuichi will be the person I prioritize most in free time events. Not sure who else I’d go with. I’m kinda curious about Keebo since his backstory seems interesting, but I dunno. I kinda want to see what Kokichi’s deal is, but part of me also feels like he’s probably gonna stick around for a long time so I’m less inclined to prioritize him. Maybe I should talk to Maki more, since she seems like the type who I’ll need to really get to know before I see more sides to them.

Overall, I was sorta surprised by how much I really liked this part. I mean, I’m a big fan of the series in general, but I’ve been a bit worried about whether or not I’d actually enjoy this game and it’s cast. Thankfully those fears are getting dissipated. I was also afraid that it’d feel too similar to the first two games, but there’s enough different things happening that it’s enjoyable.

One of the things that surprised me most was the motive. Or, well, motives. I did not expect the stakes to get so high that quickly. The whole idea of ‘the first murder will happen consequence-free’ is actually really interesting, and an effective way of motivating a murder. But it definitely makes Monokuma seem way more desperate than he used to be. Especially when, like a day after the first motive, he was like ‘oh and if nobody dies soon, you all die’. At that point he’s literally forcing people’s hands, more or less. Which isn’t a criticism, really. It’s an interesting approach to take. Especially since nobody ended up actually using that motive to kill. The whole part where nobody outed themselves as being Rantarou’s killer, and Monokuma announced that they’d hold a class trial in that case, was really intriguing. It’s really making it hard to guess at the culprit’s motive.

On a similar sort of note, I was not expecting the part where Ryoma suggested that somebody murder him so they could escape and find help. I thought at first that he’d just generally suggest the idea of someone going through with murdering someone, but I probably should have expected him to be all self-sacrificial, given his attitude. I said it last time, but I REALLY like Ryoma as a character thus far.

I said I wouldn’t speculate much about the murder, but lol I can’t help myself now that I’ve seen the body. I can only make vague judgments about it, though. Like how it seems pretty obvious that Rantarou wasn’t directly murdered by someone, but instead somebody probably set a metal ball on the bookcase so that it’d roll off and hit his head when it opened. Maybe that’s just my first guess because Kaede already brought up the idea of Rube Goldberg machines earlier in the chapter. It’d also explain how the murder will remain mysterious even with photographic evidence. There probably wasn’t anyone else in the room. I assume that Monokuma would still consider the identity of the hypothetical ball-placer to be the culprit, so then the big mystery is figuring out who did that, when there’s presumably no evidence. But then again the ball could have only, in this scenario, been placed on the bookcase after the equipment was set up, otherwise Shuichi would have noticed it at the time, or the alarm would have gone off. Unless he’s the killer, which I’m really doubting.

Ignoring the option of Shuichi being the killer, he and Kaede at least have alibis. I don’t know if anyone else would have. I’ve kinda forgotten if the equipment got placed early in the morning, or right before those two hid in the classroom, so I’m not sure what time frame to work with for this one, in terms of figuring out alibis.

I feel like the seven people who went to the game room are probably being set up as people who all have mutually-verified alibis, at least. Which leaves like seven other people.

Oh well, I won’t think about it too hard until I finish the investigation.

On the topic of Shuichi, I also really like him as a character. I liked him after the prologue, but learning a bit more of his story made me like him even more. He’s a really interesting take on a detective character. I’m glad he’s not just another Kirigiri. I can really get why he feels so uncomfortable about the idea of pursuing the truth, when he ended up exposing someone who did a revenge-killing for sympathetic reasons.

I also just really like his dynamic with Kaede. They’re just adorable and mutually supportive and I love it. I’m not gonna lie, I kinda low-key ship them already. I have low standards for this sorta thing, lol.

Kaede’s also pretty interesting as a protagonist, especially in terms of how people react to her. It was kinda sad seeing everyone [well, nearly everyone] hate her for being optimistic and leader-y and wanting everyone to keep trying to escape. Considering how it’s already giving her confidence issues, I wonder if that’ll be an ongoing thing, with most of the cast not wanting to be bossed around by her. I couldn’t really blame them after how the Death Road of Despair part went, but they still took it too far.

Also on that note, fuck the Death Road of Despair. That was so awful to experience. Considering how the story played out, I imagine that the game was genuinely rigged against you, and it sure as hell felt like it. I hope that if this game ever shows up again in a less evil context, the controls aren’t so weirdly floaty and hard to control. I kinda wish I could have recorded the way my reaction to it went from ‘oh this sounds simple, just run and rump’ to ‘wait the fuck why is everyone dead’ in ten seconds.

Anyway, I’m really enjoying seeing more of the characters, and seeing them start to form their own dynamics and stuff. It’s only just starting, but it’s already interesting to watch unfold. I’m especially surprised by how Tenko pretty much immediately got a crush on Himiko and is now just following her around and acting so excited about the idea of magic. It’s really endearing me to her.

This part also continued to reaffirm my love for Gonta. He’s an incredibly sweet boy who doesn’t deserve the death that he’s presumably going to experience. He tries his best.

I’m happy that Kaito is at least trying to be on Kaede’s side. He’s a good dude thus far.

Conversely, I probably should have expected that Maki would be rude and unsociable. I’ll probably still try and spend free time with her and get to know her, though. It makes me feel like there’s something really interesting under her cold exterior that I’d never get to see if I just avoided her.

Angie’s kinda starting to creep me out, which I wasn’t expecting. Like, the blood sacrifice joke was one thing, but now she’s talking about happily accepting imminent death because Atua will welcome her into his kingdom, or Atua punishing liars, and stuff. But then again she also unironically says bye-onara and that makes me really like her.

I guess I may as well comment on Rantarou’s character in general, since this might be my last time to. I wish I could have gotten to know him better, but the one event I had with him didn’t tell me much. I’m still not sure what to make of him. He’s also kinda creepy, but I still like him. I’m not gonna deny that most of my bias toward him is still because I love [most of] his design, though. I wonder if we’ll ever learn what his talent was, since that’s still a mystery. Maybe it’ll be a plot point during the trial. I’m also curious about the fact that he seemed to have some memories related to the Ultimate Hunt, which is still suspicious to me in general as a concept. I really can’t help but feel like this game is set in some future post-DR3 where the rest of society decided to criminalize talent or something. Or they had a grudge against the whole Ultimate Initiative, and Hope’s Peak Academy, and thus they decided to hunt down everyone related to it, or something. Who knows.

I’m really surprised by the fact that none of the characters have said anything about the implication of them being criminals, with how they’re in an academy for Gifted Juveniles. You’d think that’d raise some questions from them.

Also, I wonder if everyone’s labs are going to be actual places we can at least see on the map. I think thus far we can only see Kaede’s and Miu’s rooms. Maybe the rest will open up as time goes on. On the note of their labs, I should check and see if I can go to Kaede’s one now. I kinda forgot to check it out. I think I tried to check once but the plot was railroading me elsewhere and I forgot about it after that.

Oh, and before I forget, I didn’t miss that one line from one of the Monokubs where they were obviously teasing at what’s going on in the big picture, but basically blotting out the important info. I can’t quite remember exactly what he said, though, but I remember it seeming immediately important.

And also, on the note of Monokuma, that one Monokuma Theater joking about the idea of getting confused about what happened and in what part of a long-running franchise really felt like a self-deprecating joke about how long this series has gotten. [Also the Yokai Watch reference was pretty hilarious]

I guess that’s all I have to say for now. I’ll probably just play the investigation part tomorrow, even if it might be kinda short, and then I’ll do the trial the day after. I don’t really have any predictions about who the killer is, other than that Shuichi seems really damn suspicious right about now.