#it's also a grand slam final wtf

[zingaplanet]

Love knows no boundaries ppl

[liz-allyn]

Feeling greedy for your talents 📸 —v 🌻 mwah!

Oooh, thank you, Spicy @spidervee. You know what I'm greedy for? This beautiful AG right here.

Look at that baby face! Also wtf is he doing in this photo shoot? And who cares—look at his ARMS.

The more I stare at this picture, the more it becomes a different thing. It gets more complex with time. Like, it starts off as soft, innocent Peter Parker, but then there's something just slightly sinister in that look? So I'm gonna call this Workplace Rival!Peter.

enemies to lovers and something else sorta dark and nasty if you stare too hard at it, under the cut. go away if you're under 18 or you're too young to remember Phil of the Future on the Disney Channel.

Every war begins when one side fires a shot. In the case of the battle between you and Peter Parker, he’d admit that he’d taken the first one. It wasn’t his intention, but he struck a nerve.

It was during a staff meeting at The Daily Bugle. Since finally getting the staff photographer job, this was one more scheduled task that Peter had to juggle. 

On that fateful morning, he’d rushed into the meeting already in progress, ducking into the back and hoping to avoid J.J’s steel gaze. They were discussing what was going to be in Sunday’s issue. There was more room for feature stories and hot-topic debates. The juicier, the better. (And more profitable, since J.J. was pleased to put them behind a digital paywall).

That’s when Peter heard you chime in. “I’m interviewing Spider-Man,” you announced, to pen drops and quiet gasps in the pit. 

You—the cute little thing—bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, recently graduated top of your class at ESU’s journalism school. First tasked by Jonah to write an editorial calling for Spider-Man’s immediate arrest and for the public to stop coddling him. You huffed with disappointment at your assignment but still wrote a grand slam article. You pointed out the hypocrisy of local politicians who turn a blind eye to Spider-Man’s illegal vigilantism but refuse to decriminalize marijuana. Spider-Man gets a free pass while the police continue to sweep through impoverished neighborhoods and single-out minority populations as if they were hunting Jack the Ripper.

You.

You made a valid point. 

And just like that, you were the newest writer for The Daily Bugle. 

“Spider-Man’s Public Enemy Number One” Jonah proudly called you. 

You kept on writing the same anti-Spider-Man bullshit. It started to get a little far-fetched. 

No, Spider-Man was not secretly on the police’s payroll (unfortunately).

No, Spider-Man did not take kickbacks from the Mayor (he just doesn’t have enough evidence gathered yet to bring him down.)

No, Spider-Man does not torture chickens (that was a fucking accident and a misunderstanding and Peter would appreciate it if Mr. Cluck’s Chicken Shack would stop appropriating his IP in their ads to sell chicken sandwiches).

Jonah asked, and you delivered. 

Peter felt sorry for you, honestly. It must be hard being smart, and feisty, and adorable, and elbowing your way past senior writers to the front page. Despite how annoying it was to hear your articles constantly quoted on morning news talk shows. He felt genuinely sorry.

Until you turned out to be a little liar.

“Interview?” Another writer scoffed in disbelief. “With Spider-Man?”

Everyone turned to you, stunned. Waiting. As did Peter.

“Of course,” you stated with resolve.

Jonah’s face was lit up like a Christmas tree. Peter’s brain was melting. “Trash Sunday’s front page! Wait—when do you have this interview?”

“Um,” you replied, with the slightest bit of hesitation, “Friday night.”

“Trash Saturday’s front page!”

“Spider-Man wouldn’t interview you,” Peter blurted out. It was like a record screeching to a halt. All eyes turned to Peter, including yours. Burning with anger.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” you sneered.

It was a standoff. Peter immediately regretted opening his mouth. But it was done. “Well, y’know… I know the guy, and—”

You bit off. “You take pictures of him for money.”

“Well, yeah, but I’m… I’m also sorta—I know ‘em pretty well by now, and—”

“Are you his personal assistant, too?” you coldly replied. “Do you manage his appointments? Do you sync calendars, pick up his suit from the cleaners, and get him soy lattes?”

“Uh… I…” Peter didn’t know how to respond to that. Except that he was an almond milk kind of guy. He decided against adding that.

“Don’t worry about my leads,” you said, ending the conversation. The public part, anyway.

It was after the meeting when you dragged him into an empty cubicle and whispered a threat through gritted teeth. “Don’t you ever call me out like that in front of our colleagues again, do you hear me?”

“I’m just surprised, s’all,” Peter defended, keeping his voice low. “He always told me he’s weird around reporters. Considering how much shit you give ‘em, I’d think you’d be the last person he’d wanna talk to.”

“I disagree,” you shot back. “I think he’d welcome the discourse. Unless he’s a coward.”

His eyes flashed angrily. “Look, I know you’d love to build your whole career on his back,” he sneered, “you should reconsider your occupation if you have to lie about it.”

Your face turned red. “A liar? Really?”

“Yeah, s’what I said. I call ’fake news.’”

“That’s rich coming from you, Parker.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah, considering that you’ve been getting paid by the Bugle to lie about your photos for years!”

His heart skipped a beat. Suddenly wary. “Wha-what are you talkin’ about?”

“I checked the metadata on the last images you sent,” you sneered. “That bank robbery on Columbus? There’s no way that you could’ve taken those photos from the ground, with those settings, milliseconds apart. That means only one thing.”

Peter’s eyes went wide.

“Spider-Man took those photos of himself, and for some reason, he’s letting you take all the credit!”

Peter swallowed thickly to silence his sigh of relief.

“I bet it’s not so bad getting cash for your little charade!” You shoved your finger into his shoulder. “Must make you so popular with the ladies, being ‘friends with Spider-Man.’”

The lump in his throat bobbed. But that was all the evidence that you needed to know that you’d struck a nerve.

You glared at him. “How about this? Stay out of my way, Parker. And your secret’s safe with me.” You marched off, leaving a burning trail in your wake.

And that’s how the war escalated. That’s when his rivalry became an obsession. You were checking his metadata? (He can’t believe he forgot to wipe it on export.) Are you insane? What are you, a stalker?

Two could play at that game.

By Friday, you were visibly stressed, although you were an expert at not showing it. Peter could hear it in your heart from across the room.

By contrast, he was as relaxed as he’d ever been. Maybe a little excited, even. 

Peter heard a lot of things around the office. Gossip. Rumors. Too much personal information. 

Once he’d heard Ned talking about the details of the Bugle’s IT security and filtering system. Of course, Jonah would trust the cybersecurity of one of the most controversial publications in country... to one guy, in a chair. When asked directly, Ned filled Peter’s ear with tons of information about how the system worked and could monitor any computer connected to the wifi. All you needed was the IP address.

With this valuable information, Peter learned three things.

One. You were lying about having an interview with Spider-Man. He wasn’t exactly sure how you were going to get out of that one without throwing yourself off the Brooklyn Bridge. But Peter did see the email in your inbox about Jonah finally letting you take on different stories in addition to writing about Spider-Man, if you delivered a sold-out edition. 

The motive, he could understand. 

Two. Using the Bugle’s internet safety system (and Ned’s borrowed login), he was able to read your every keystroke. He could watch you through the webcam. He could even take control of your computer. Peter felt like a kid watching you freak out as the cursor on your screen started moving of its own accord as you typed in the middle of a paragraph. Your cursor pulled up a note, and the blinking line typed out a message to you.

TONIGHT. 11:30 PM. COME ALONE. 

- YOUR FRIENDLY, NEIGHBORHOOD PUBLIC ENEMY, SPIDER-MAN

Your face was priceless. You jumped up out of your chair and started looking left and right, with no idea that the messenger wasn’t even in the room.  

The message on screen vanished, and a set of numbers appeared instead. Coordinates. You grabbed a sticky note and started scribbling frantically. Once he was satisfied that you had them down, the note was deleted and you had control of your computer again. 

Peter knew you were smart, but you were also unable to turn down a challenge. You wanted to be a writer—a good one, and you’d do anything to be taken seriously. At least that’s what you’d say when you’d text that boring guy you were dating—Peter could figure out your phone’s IP address too. He was pretty sure that it wasn’t going to last long between you and boring man. And that led him to his third discovery.

Three. You were a great writer. 

At 11:00 PM, you were pacing a construction site anxiously. You checked the coordinates again and again, but they led you to an unfinished development of skyrise condominiums. The skeleton of the building soared into the sky at least 60 stories. A building without walls, the framework left exposed to high winds.

You thought this had to be a joke. You were seconds from turning back and going home when on your third lap around the block, you noticed the lock which secured the gate was broken. The gate swayed in the wind, chain ripped apart and discarded on the ground. On the gate was a lined sheet of paper with scribbled handwriting. 

47TH FLOOR.

The note was fixed to the gate by webs. 

A chill went down your spine. He wanted you to go up the elevator to the 47th floor. Of a building that hadn't been built yet. You stood at the cracked-open gate, bouncing on your toes, weighing your ambition versus your fear of heights. You bit your lip and tip-toed inside.

On your way up the lift, you prayed that 47 was one of the floors that was finished. It wasn’t. And once you timidly stepped out of the elevator shaft, you spotted the masked, red-and-blue figure leaning carelessly across a steel beam. 

You couldn’t believe your eyes. Spider-Man in the flesh, with arms pillowing his head, and nothing else but air beneath him and the unforgiving ground. You stopped in your tracks.

“I honestly wasn’t sure if you’d go through with it,” he greeted you casually. “I was worried. I’d hate to miss an opportunity to meet my favorite writer.” 

There was a slight chill in his tone. He could hear the way you gulped, probably realizing just how stupid this idea was. 

“Don’t worry, love,” he sat up straight and came to a stand on the beam. With a leap, he forward-flipped onto the exposed subflooring, landing with a thud. “I’m not planning on throwing you off the building,” he jested. “It would look a little suspicious.”

Your shoulders released some tension, but only a bit. “You... how...? How did you....?”

“Not so good with words now, are ya?” Spider-Man replied, sauntering closer to you. You were separated by the empty floorspace, but your feet were plastered to the ground by fear. “Heard you had a big interview with Spider-Man tonight. Hope you don’t mind if I join?”

You stared at him with wide eyes. “I... I’m... I didn’t...” You gulped again. “I-I tried to find you. I even looked through old photos at the Bugle for hours, trying to look for any clue—”

“So, if I didn’t show, you were just gonna... make the rest up?” He crossed his arms, leaning his weight on one hip.

“I-I’m sorry,” you blushed, genuinely. “I would’ve... I would’ve been nice. Respectful. Um, I wouldn’t have written anything, uh...” A breeze threatened to blow you over, and you caught yourself on a support beam. Squeezing your eyes shut, you continued with a tone of attrition. “I just— I-I didn’t think I’d get to actually meet you.”

Your hands were shaking. He remained a statue, gazing you with that expressionless mask. “No harm, no foul.” You watched him stroll to a stack of plywood as he hopped up on it to sit. “So let’s do this. I know you’ve got burning questions.”

You blinked in confusion, as if you’d forgotten what you were there to do. In a daze, you reached into your bag, pulling out a recorder. One that Spider-Man snapped out of your grasp with a line of webbing. You watched it crumple like an empty can as he crushed it mercilessly in his palm.

“Off the record,” he stated, unphased by the vandalism of your property. The recorder clattered to the floor and your eyes followed it down. “If it’s no difference to you, I already know what you’re going to ask.”

You glanced up at him, puzzled. He lifted a gloved hand and began counting on his long fingers. 

“Early 30s... Leo... Bi, and... honestly, it depends? I like being able to look into your eyes, that raw connection, y’know? But there’s something about doggy style that just... does it for me.” 

Your brow furrowed, face heating up. 

He pointed directly at you, “You nailed one thing, though. I’m definitely a giver. And I’m proud of that. Although I never necessarily came while eating someone out before.” Your jaw fell open as he tilted his head playfully, a lighthearted smirk in his voice. “Not yet, at least. Now. Do you want to take off your clothes, or should I just rip them off with my ‘rigid, gloved hands’?”

Your heart skipped for so long, he was certain that you died in that moment. Luckily, you roared back to life, a stuttering, babbling, frenetic ball of confusion.

“Oh, I’m sorry, which publication is this for?” he said with a chuckle. You were dumbstruck, unable to form words. “This is for your Spider-Man blog, right?”

In that moment, you did die. Every muscle in your body seized. Your breath caught in your throat. The horror on your face was absolutely delicious.

Peter knew that you were a much better writer than anyone gave you credit for. He’d spent the week monitoring your keystrokes and tracking your URLs. Ned told him that the system is designed only to catch obviously problematic URLs, and even then he only chooses to investigate half of them.

“Like, if you’re looking at PornTube from your work computer, obviously—that’s stupid and you’re gonna get caught. It’s the other sites, that are less obvious that, honestly sometimes it’s better just to let it slide. It becomes a whole thing,” Ned explained. “Because then, I’m having to go through Dennis from Accounting’s whole computer history for like, a year... make copies of his hard drive... figure out why he keeps typing the words ‘foot,’ ‘feet,’ ‘toe,’ and ‘toenail’ into his computer 70% of the time, and trust me... it’s better not to know.”

“What about a blog?” Peter asked, purposefully.

“Like Tumblr?” Ned scoffed. “Yeah, honestly, I’d let that be.”

“That is you, right?” Spider-Man asked you knowingly, with a cheshire grin hidden behind his mask. “You’re TheBlackCatxxx69.” Your eyes were so wide they could’ve swallowed the island of Manhattan. “You’re the one who writes all that Spider-Man erotica?” 

Your brow furrowed, automatically shaking your head. “Uh.... I....?”

“You’ve got quite the library. I’m impressed. Is this for Sinful Sunday or Thursday Thots?”

“I-I... don’t.... I don’t know...”

He was on his feet in moments, stalking toward you. “You mean you haven’t written dozens of tales about Spider-Man webbing you up and making you come on his fingers and on his... or, my tongue? You haven’t explicitly described in every juicy detail what it would be like to have my cock splitting you open on a rooftop?”

Every sentence came out darker and deeper than the last, and yet his voice was softer than a feather across your skin.

“You mean you don’t write naughty stories about being Daddy’s Good Girl while I sneak into your room and steal your innocence away?”

Peter stopped just inches from you, waiting for you to breathe again. You looked like you were going to pass out. Or drool. Both. He waited. Watched. Until your eyes got red. He could smell the salt of your tears even though you refused to let them fall. Your blood was pumping. Furiously. 

“Is this your idea of teaching me a lesson?” you whispered bitterly. You spun on your heel, legs wobbly, as you moved back towards the elevator. 

“Hey!” Peter called after you. 

You kept your eyes on the ground to keep from seeing the skyline. Or seeing anything at all. “I’ll stop writing about you,” you said, crossing the threshold of the elevator doors. "You win."

Your weight was pulled from your feet with the sound of a thwip. With a shriek, you were launched backward. He pulled you into his arms. You struggled against him, thrashing until he held you steady, your back to his chest. 

He could feel your pulse thrumming beneath his hands. The rage you felt wasn’t really directed at him, and you knew it. It was meant for you.

“I wasn’t trying to embarrass you,” he replied, extending an olive branch. He sounded so gentle compared to his sadistic vitriol moments before. 

You seethed. “So what is this? Payback? Blackmail? To get me to stop writing?” You felt like you were going to erupt, like a stick of dynamite in his hold. He heard you huff and pictured the pout on your face. You attempted to jerk away again, until he spun you around and pulled you up against his torso.

“Keep writing,” he replied, with genuineness in his voice. “You’re good at it. Just try to remember that you and I are on the same side? We’re both trying our best to fix things.” It was the sincerity in his voice that got to you. He was asking, not threatening. “Just think about maybe writing the truth once in a while?”

You scowled, about to take offense again, put paused before you blew up. You noted how your chest heaved against his. The proximity between you. His fingers gripped your upper arms, tight enough to leave a small mark. Your eyes locked on the emblem of his suit and the rigid muscles rippling beneath. You gazed around at the empty floor, a realization settling over you. 

Your eyes landed on a pair of sawhorses with a length of wood laid across. The board was secured to the bases with webbing. This was... familiar. All that was missing from the scene was you—your writhing, mewling, howling, naked form. 

“The construction worker request from two weeks back,” Peter explained. You stared up at him, jaw agape. “I figured we could start there?”

You pulled away from him and took a step backward, looking up in horror. But was it really horror? Peter waited. You considered.

The longest pause settled over you.

“I... I’m... seeing someone,” you replied, lifting your chin slightly.

Peter scoffed. “He doesn’t know about your blog.”

Your cheeks flushed and your brow furrowed. “What makes you think that?”

He snickered beneath the mask. “Because he doesn’t make you come like I do.”

A/N: Hey, now, there's a PART TWO.

Show your support for fandom writers! Cheer us on with a comment and/or reblog! And thank you 💜

[hakasims]

The Most Important Review of Every Single Luca Marinelli Film

Listen, I’m not here to tell you if a movie’s plot is well-structured or whatever, ok? I’m here for objective, factual data on how Luca Marinelli’s brand is adhered to in every movie he’s been in so far.

(all gifs by @weardes​)

La solitudine dei numeri primi (2010)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? No.

Does Luca get slapped? No. His life is hard enough as it is.

Is Luca naked? He’s wearing speedos in one scene, but he’s covered in s*lf-h*rm marks, it’s very sad and not sexy at all.

Is Luca gay? Hell if I know.

Is Luca a slut? He talks to like two people in the whole movie.

Lucameter: 2/100 pathetic (but like I get it it’s his first movie w/e)

L'ultimo terrestre (2011)

Does Luca smoke? Yes.

Does Luca sing? No, but Roberta is a captivating dancer.

Does Luca eat? No, though she takes a shot once.

Does Luca get slapped? Yes, but not in a fun way :(

Is Luca naked? No, but there are some thighs and belly with a mini skirt in between. No complaints.

Is Luca gay? Not enough data.

Is Luca a slut? No.

Lucameter: 1/100 horrible, Roberta deserved better

Waves (2011)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? Yes, drunkenly!

Does Luca eat? They just won’t let him put food into his mouth! Watching Gabriele trying and failing to eat is Hitchcock-level suspense, though it all comes to a very satisfying conclusion when the camera isn’t focusing on him for a second, and he friggin’ inhales the food off the table.

Does Luca get slapped? No, but he gets pushed around a lot.

Is Luca naked? No, but he does take off his shirt a couple of times. Also his legs are like completely hairless?? Has anyone ever noticed that? They shaved his legs!

Is Luca gay? No proof that he is, no proof that he isn’t.

Is Luca a slut? No, he is the sweetest purest cinnamon roll.

Lucameter: 37/100 it’s getting better

Nina (2011)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No, but he plays the cello and dances.

Does Luca eat? No.

Does Luca get slapped? No.

Is Luca naked? No, though even if he was, you wouldn’t be able to enjoy it because he never gets any close-ups or decent lighting.

Is Luca gay? He’s shown to be into ladies.

Is Luca a slut? Please, he’s barely even a character.

Lucameter: 0/100 unwatchable

Tutti i santi giorni (2012)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? Yes, and he cooks!

Does Luca get slapped? Yes, lightly, in a patronizing way.

Is Luca naked? Oh yes.

Is Luca gay? He’s religiously devoted to his lady love.

Is Luca a slut? Not so much a slut as a hella thirsty bitch.

Lucameter: 43/100 half down ponytail saves lives

Maria di Nazaret (2012)

Does Luca smoke? No, obviously.

Does Luca sing? No. He dances once - very clumsily.

Does Luca eat? No.

Does Luca get slapped? No, though he almost drops a house on himself.

Is Luca naked? Guys, it’s a Bible movie.

Is Luca gay? Come on, he’s Saint Joseph.

Is Luca a slut? Lol no.

Lucameter: -10/100 just for that hair

La grande bellezza (2013)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? No.

Does Luca get slapped? No.

Is Luca naked? Full frontal, but in a disturbing way. Red body paint is involved.

Is Luca gay? Who’s to say?

Is Luca a slut? Please.

Lucameter: 4/100 which is more than the number of his on-screen minutes

Il mondo fino in fondo (2013)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? Briefly; he mostly drinks.

Does Luca get slapped? No, but he gets a fruit thrown at him.

Is Luca naked? He’s never more naked than a T-shirt and underwear, but those fuzzy thighs strike back hard after Waves.

Is Luca gay? He’s married to a woman.

Is Luca a slut? I mean, he’s married but goes to a strip club anyway.

Lucameter: 12/100 though he looks really hot in this movie

Non essere cattivo (2015)

Does Luca smoke? Yes, a lot, and he does lots of harder stuff.

Does Luca sing? No, but boy does he dance.

Does Luca eat? He briefly chews on something, but he mostly drinks.

Does Luca get slapped? Yes, wonderfully, multiple times, so good.

Is Luca naked? Fully clothed the entire time.

Is Luca gay? He emanates just the most Gay Longing™

Is Luca a slut? Not actually in practice, but the vibe is there.

Lucameter: 86/100 would have been more if he’d had any nude scenes, but that butt in those jeans is very much appreciated

Lo chiamavano Jeeg Robot (2015)

Does Luca smoke? No, he takes care of his body!

Does Luca sing? Only in the best karaoke scene ever committed to screen. And a little in the car with his buddies. It’s wholesome.

Does Luca eat? He gets a whole ball of mozzarella shoved into his mouth. Luca Marinelli... is lactose intolerant.

Does Luca get slapped? No, but he gets sexy scratches on his face, so points for originality.

Is Luca naked? He’s got all the buttons of his shirt undone in one scene, and there’s also like a quarter of the butt.

Is Luca gay? He’s definitely not straight.

Is Luca a slut? He’s a slut for YouTube views and empowering female songs.

Lucameter: 97/100 I was missing The Slap but whatcha gonna do

Die Pfeiler der Macht (2016)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No, but he dances sluttily.

Does Luca eat? Yes, though all the food in this movie looks disgusting.

Does Luca get slapped? Very hard.

Is Luca naked? Not as naked as he should be considering the everything about him.

Is Luca gay? He fucks everything in this movie.

Is Luca a slut? He fucks everything in this movie.

Lucameter: 64/100 weak

Slam - Tutto per una ragazza (2016)

Does Luca smoke? Yes.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? No.

Does Luca get slapped? No.

Is Luca naked? He gives us a full butt moment.

Is Luca gay? Not in the slightest.

Is Luca a slut? Definitely, but it all happens off screen somewhere.

Lucameter: 34/100 the butt is doing all the work here

Il padre d'Italia (2017)

Does Luca smoke? Yes, a lot.

Does Luca sing? Yes, and he dances while singing!

Does Luca eat? No, but he drinks champagne like a fancy bitch.

Does Luca get slapped? Yes, by life.

Is Luca naked? We get everything in the first five minutes. Everything.

Is Luca gay? Yes, canonically and explicitly.

Is Luca a slut? No, he’s full of gay sin and self-loathing.

Lucameter: 99/100 glorious

Lasciati andare (2017)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? No.

Does Luca get slapped? He doesn’t have time for anything else but he always has time to get slapped.

Is Luca naked? Not in the slightest.

Is Luca gay? He just wants to be loved T__T

Is Luca a slut? The virgin vibes are stronger than in the Bible movie.

Lucameter: 8/100 it didn’t have to be this way

Una questione privata (2017)

Does Luca smoke? This movie is covered in smoke from Milton’s cigarettes. Seriously, he smokes all the time. Including the scene where he gets called ugly.

Does Luca sing? No, not even in the scene where he gets called ugly.

Does Luca eat? He drinks an egg, though not in the scene where he gets called ugly.

Does Luca get slapped? No. He gets called ugly, though.

Is Luca naked? No.

Is Luca gay? Strong bisexual vibes from this one.

Is Luca a slut? Again, major virgin energy.

Lucameter: 17/100 can you imagine they had the audacity to call him ugly???

Fabrizio De André - Principe libero (2018)

Does Luca smoke? In every scene. Every. Single. One.

Does Luca sing? Duh, while playing the guitar.

Does Luca eat? Yes.

Does Luca get slapped? No, everybody is soft for Fabrizio.

Is Luca naked? He’s wearing nothing but a bath towel for a whole scene.

Is Luca gay? He’s very much into ladies, although he’s got sizzling chemistry with every male character.

Is Luca a slut? He’s very into ladies.

Lucameter: 94/100 almost perfect

Trust (2018)

(it’s not a movie, but Primo is so iconic I can’t and shan’t leave him out)

Does Luca smoke? It’s the 70s and Italy, come on.

Does Luca sing? Unfortunately, he doesn’t, but he’s one hell of a dancer.

Does Luca eat? Munches on spaghetti like there’s no tomorrow.

Does Luca get slapped? Yes. And he doesn’t forget it.

Is Luca naked? Sadly no, but man does the camera love his butt hugged tightly by those slutty 1970s pants. Also balls. Just... just balls.

Is Luca gay? We don’t know for sure, but his whole vibe is kinda the exact opposite of heterosexuality.

Is Luca a slut? For money and power.

Lucameter: 82/100 would benefit from like a karaoke scene or something

Ricordi? (2018)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? Yes.

Does Luca get slapped? No.

Is Luca naked? Oh yes. And he fuuuuuuuuuuucks.

Is Luca gay? This relationship is so heterosexual the couple are literally called Him and Her.

Is Luca a slut? He fucks a lot, but somehow in a very unslutty way. He’s mostly just sad.

Lucameter: 51/100 and he’s called ugly again???

Martin Eden (2019)

Does Luca smoke? Yes.

Does Luca sing? Amazingly, yes, very softly. He also dances.

Does Luca eat? Yep.

Does Luca get slapped? Finally the slappee has become the slapper.

Is Luca naked? Man, I wish. He doesn’t even take his shirt off like wtf dude what did you build all that bigness for???

Is Luca gay? No, and I think he’d be happier if he were.

Is Luca a slut? No, and again, I think it’d have served him better to be a slut.

Lucameter: 62/100 it’s a fine movie that would’ve benefited from more trademark Luca stuff okay

The Old Guard (2020)

Does Luca smoke? No.

Does Luca sing? No.

Does Luca eat? Briefly.

Does Luca get slapped? A lot of violence happens in this movie, but not a single slap, ridiculous.

Is Luca naked? Shirtless, with a close-up on the nipple.

Is Luca gay? Oh, I don’t know, does being one half of the most wholesome and perfect gay couple count?

Is Luca a slut? How dare you. He’s been happily married for 900 years.

Lucameter: 25/100 none of Luca’s trademarks are present but the epicness of his immortal marriage warms me when I shiver in cold

[luccislegs]

hc Luffy joins the whitebeards before his own crew au? Like, something happened that forced him to leave the island righter after Ace and he went to look for his brother only to keep missing him and somehow find his way to the whitebeard's crew? (maybe one of their divisions was in paradise and picked him up, but he's very clear he'll leave one day to make his own crew and whitebeard is okay but lu is still his son) and when Ace finally joins the crew Lu's division comes back and Ace is like wtf

luffy isn’t entirely sure what happened, but he remembers clearly enough that bandits were involved. and now here he is, floating in a small rowboat in the middle of the east blue three years earlier than he intended. he’s very briefly concerned about what dadan and makino would think, but then his stomach rumbles.

it takes him a day or so, but he finally manages to reach an island. he knows for sure it isn’t his, but there’s at least food. he asks around a little about how he can get back, but then he catches wind that ace might be there. a little further digging reveals he’s already moved on and luffy huffs in disappointment.

it feels like decades that he’s chasing his brother’s dust, and he’s on the verge of giving up. from what he understood, ace was already well on his way into the grand line and luffy’s chances of reaching him before he does are slim. still, he stops for a break in logue town, because he’s always wanted to see the place of roger’s execution.

breaking the execution platform was not a part of his plan, but it sure is cool. it also attracts the attention of the marines, and luffy’s having a hard enough time escaping from them when he’s hoisted off his feet by a weird old guy with a weirder mustache.

“what do you think you’re doing, punk?” he asks, giving luffy a once over. he’s holding him up by the scruff of his vest, and he fixes on the straw hat on top of his head.

“i just wanted to see what roger saw. I didn’t know it would break,” luffy says, shrugging nonchalantly. “hey pops, could you let me go, i’m runnin’ from the marines.”

“no can do, son. you’re comin’ with us,” he answers and turns, leaving the marines to the rest of his crew. he knew that hat, and he wants to know how this runt has it.

one length conversation later, and whitebeard has convinced luffy to join his crew, on the condition that he would one day leave to start his own crew. whitebeard concedes it, but he’s relieved luffy had even agreed. the kid might act dumb, but it seemed even he realized that a fourteen year old wasn’t going to survive long on his own in the grand line. once he was ready, whitebeard would gladly let him strike out on his own.

he assigns luffy to one of the other divisions and doesn’t see him for a few months. in the meantime, he picks up another scruffy, angry teenager. he doesn’t recognize the kid at first, but as soon as he speaks his name whitebeard laughs. 

“i know someone who’s very interested to see you,” he tells the hot-head, who only glares at him while waiting for him to explain. but whitebeard leaves it hanging. if he thought that whitebeard had some interesting information, it might make him less likely to run off. “you’ll have to wait a few weeks, though. better make yourself comfortable.”

the day finally arrives, and ace is antsy, frantically pacing the deck of the moby dick while awaiting…whatever it was. at last, marco points out a ship on the horizon, giving ace a knowing grin. the ship finally pulls up alongside the moby, and lines are thrown, but still ace doesn’t see what’s so important.

then, from above, a weight lands on his shoulders, sending him crashing to the floor.

“ACE!” a voice screams in his ear. monkey arms wrap around him so tightly he can hardly breathe, but he recognizes that obnoxious breath.

“luffy?! what the hell are you doing here?” he asks, pulling luffy’s arm down from where it had wrapped around his eyes. he can’t see his younger brother on his back, but he knows exactly where to pinch to get him to remove his arms.

as soon as he’s free, he turns around and slams luffy into the deck of the ship, and luffy laughs loudly.

“it’s good to see you! i chased you through the whole east blue, before pops finally picked me up. man, have i got a story to tell you. but how did you end up here?” he asks, picking himself up.

“we’ve got time for that later,” marco interrupts, slinging an arm around both boys before leading them towards whitebeard. “right now, there’s a marine base that needs plundering. i hear they have a lot of food to spare.”

[nadziejastar]

Thoughts on Soranort?

“Hey, I got an idea. Ask your heart. See if it’s got a clue.”

“Well…my heart was aching. That’s why I kept going.”

It was almost too much to bear. The sorrow—the pain, and so many other feelings. A suffering so much greater than anything he’d ever known. Hatred, sadness, anger, jealousy, fear, resentment, anguish, envy, uncertainty, pain, despair. Who did these feelings come from? Roxas? That woman? Those two people called me Ven—maybe him? Or someone else?

“Oh… Thank you, Sora’s heart, for pushing him right into our clutches. Aren’t hearts great? Steer us wrong every time,” Xigbar remarked, mocking as ever.

Personally, I don’t think he would have made a good Nort. But that’s why he was the hero.

Sora was targeted as a vessel because he had pain inside of him. The pain wasn’t really his, though. It was the memories inside of him, which didn’t even belong to him. That’s why I think he’d make a pretty boring seeker of darkness, from a story standpoint. He’s better suited as the hero. I think almost all the Norts were handled VERY poorly, though. The Dark Seeker Saga just turned out to be a huge flop in the end. It was supposed to be all about healing pain. Not just for the missing guardians of light. But the seekers of darkness, too. There was a reason they all got Norted, which KH3 did a VERY poor job explaining. It was because they all had pain that led them to abandoning their heart.

Ansem’s mouth twisted into a smirk. “If he wavers from the path we lay, we destroy him.”

“But in that case…we’ll have to find ourselves another vessel.”

Xigbar barked a laugh. Another vessel…, he says, as if it’s nothing. Just one piece of their grand, far-reaching plan.

“That is why we never have just one iron in the fire,” Xemnas replied matter-of-factly.

KH3 was supposed to be all about Xehanort’s search for a replacement vessel after Sora failed in KH3D. Vessels are not easy to come by, so “reserve members” shouldn’t even be a thing. I think the person they were supposed to be talking about in this scene was Davy Jones. He was a perfect vessel because he didn’t have a heart, but he didn’t die. He cast away his heart because it caused him pain. He would have been like the Beast in KH2, where they were trying to get him to join he organization. 

This world could have felt like it was relevant to the main story. But Davy Jones’ heart got little focus and all anyone cared about was the stupid black box, which isn’t even relevant in this game. The whole idea of the seekers of darkness becoming vessels because of pain got very little attention. When you defeated them in the Keyblade Graveyard, there should have been a sense of healing for each character’s pain and a sense of resolution to their story. The sad remix of the organization music was SO GOOD. Instead, most of them ended on a cliffhanger, which is absurd.

And then there was the heart that nestled close to mine. There, it continued to quietly encourage me. If he hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t be here now, standing in front of his grave.

Master, did you forgive me? Or maybe I haven’t been forgiven yet and I’m only still here so I can atone? I know there are no answers to my questions and no one has to forgive me for my sins. Even entertaining the thought of being forgiven is so presumptuous of me. A weakness.

The only vessel handled even semi-decently was Terra. His personal pain was given a lot of focus in BBS, so his story didn’t feel particularly incomplete… except when it came to Eraqus. I don’t feel Terra got proper closure with him. Terra didn’t even know if Eraqus forgave him, which is just sad. Terra’s messed up relationship with Eraqus was the whole reason he fell to darkness. It was his doubt that Eraqus truly loved him like a son that made him so susceptible to manipulation. It broke my heart how Terra was reluctant to hug Eraqus at the end.

“Not your concern.” With those parting words, Xehanort strode away. Eraqus slammed a fist into the floor as he watched him go.

Why did I fail to stop him? Is it my fault? Where did I go wrong? Is the darkness itself what beguiled him so? Must this plague steal my dear friend from me?

Then you got Young and Master Xehanort. In BBS, people kinda saw Xehanort as Lord Voldemort. People couldn’t see how Terra could trust him, because he was so obviously evil. But he was human, too. He was Eraqus’s dear friend. I’d be willing to bet it was some personal pain with Eraqus that led to Xehanort falling to darkness completely. Xehanort had no backstory, though, so it was hard to understand why he gave up or why he and Eraqus seemed so happy together in the end.

Ansem talked about some kind of betrayal, but I had no idea what he was even referring to here. 

Xemnas also had pain. He had Terra’s memories, spent years looking for Ventus in the Chamber of Waking. He was lonely, though this is never explored in any way.

I think Luxord probably joined the organization voluntarily. But why? He isn’t loyal to Xemnas. I doubt his original backstory was being some amnesiac Keyblade wielder from the age of fairy tales. He hinted at some personal pain due to “compulsive behavior”. I’m sure he had a sad backstory that caused him to join for his own reasons.

Why am I in the Organization? Well, I mean, there’s lots of reasons, but—oh, right! I wanted friends, right? Oh, no. Wow, actually no, that sounded way uncool but… now I’m thinking back on it and I’m just like, yeah, I guess it kinda was like that, huh.

Aside from the whole old guys’ club going on, it kinda seems like there were a lotta tight-knit groups in the Organization. Y’know, like Axel and Saix, Marluxia and Larxene, Zexion and Vexen, and Xaldin and Lexaeus? And I guess in the end, I hung out with the old guy a lot.

Yeah, so it’s not like it’s a big deal, seriously that’s it. I hate fighting and jamming out is way more fun. Sad stuff, painful stuff, why would I wanna do anything like that?

Let’s assume that Demyx was supposed to be a real member of the true organization instead of Xion (which is what I believe). His Character File story hints that he had pain and also that he became very close to Luxord. Which makes sense because they were some of the only members left after Castle Oblivion. Axel spent all his time with Saix, Roxas, and Xion. So, Demyx and Luxord really had no one else, and probably hung out with each other a lot. So, Demyx might have joined because of Luxord. But this is never explored in any way and Demyx is just a plot device to deliver Replicas.

SYMBOLISM Strelitzia is seen as the flower of freedom, and also represents immortality and paradise.

In early trailers, Marluxia had green eyes in the Rapunzel world, meaning he was not even supposed to be fully Norted before the final battle. So, I think he did join the organization of his own free will. But he had personal pain that led up to it. The loss of his sister. She said she’d carry him on her back, then his final boss form in CoM has him riding atop this strange woman figure. All very interesting. This is something that should have been wrapped up in this saga, though.

Sigh, it was so much better when I had no heart. When I didn’t have to worry about things like liking someone. Becoming fond of something is painful. That’s why those feelings were taken advantage of.

I think Larxene loved Marluxia and wanted to be by his side. She didn’t even want to regain a heart because it caused her pain. There should have been resolution to that at the end of KH3 instead of leaving it dangling.

Xigbar had pain, too. He was constantly haunted by his memory of Ventus glaring at him. You could tell that he was jealous of the bonds the other characters had. He commits suicide at the end due to the guilt he has. I would have said that his story was handled well if it ended with his suicide. It was pretty sad. But they reversed it and made it out to be a ruse. Xigbar was just faking his entire personality the whole time and was really Luxu all along. WTF!? I just can’t…

I wanted to be like you. I was jealous of you. Who was I exactly? Did I even exist? I’m just a puppet with no heart whose fake memories were planted in my head.

I was made, I’m artificial, I’m a fake. What do I need to become a real person? Or rather, was I a real fake? I fell into the dark and wandered the world of darkness.

Riku Replica’s story wasn’t resolved well, either. He spends all of CoM being tormented about not being the real Riku and that no doubt leads him to joining the organization. But then after he’s defeated, he gets no closure to his identity crisis. Instead, another “good” Riku Replica comes and rips the “evil” Replica’s soul out (WTF?) and then that story is over. It becomes all about Namine at that point. He sacrifices his only chance at life for her, which is kinda weird and depressing. I would have preferred if Riku Replica gained some kind of peace with being a part of Riku and then going home into his heart, like Xion did at the end of Days.

Whereas Ven’s worries and suffering were proof of his growth, his proclivity toward the light, Vanitas’s own misery was merely a pitch-black morass that brought with it nothing but pain.

We’re so different, but I could feel you every step of the way. I bet you didn’t notice me at all. What does this battle between us mean to you? You probably don’t have a clue that it means our hearts are intertwining. The fight itself doesn’t matter. What’s important is that our struggle makes us feel the same things. You hate me for trying to hurt your friend now, right? And I hate you right back for having friends at all.

Never once is any attention given to Vanitas’s pain. He despised Ventus and was jealous of the fact that he had friends. All the Unversed came from his negative emotions. Ventus told him they were the same and that he needed to come home inside of his heart, but…he doesn’t? Instead of finding some kind of peace by going back to Ventus, he just… disappears. 

The person who probably suffered the most was Axel. Because he’s the one who forgot the most. Being forgotten and forgetting, they’re both painful.

Saix’s pain turned out to be a joke. He couldn’t find some random girl he spoke to a few times, boo hoo, such a sad tragic backstory. He had to be quickly turned into a good guy before the epilogue, so he only joined to “atone” not because of any pain. His real pain was supposed to be about his relationship with Lea.

Cancer is ruled by the Moon, the planet of receptivity. It’s the zodiac sign related to feeling and emotions in our hearts. Cancer is, in many ways, the most sensitive and vulnerable sign of the zodiac. They feel deeply, but they’re not sure what to do about their feelings.

Emotions tend to play a dominate role in the lives of people born under Cancer. Naturally defensive and sometimes afraid of being hurt, they tend to put their heart and soul into all their relationships, and are very faithful, loyal and loving partners. Cancer people are extremely sensitive to matters of the heart. It is easy to hurt their feelings and they become deeply emotionally wounded when wronged, and can take a long time getting over it.

Also, I just really like the idea of Saix as a Seeker of Darkness. Cancers have very delicate hearts and are very emotional people who are vulnerable to pain. 

[thunderheadfred]

Why I Love Spike But Also Hate Him A Lot: an unsolicited essay by me

OR: Why I personally relate to blood-sucking poseurs OR: dude what if I ever got high enough to rewrite season six?

(under a cut because this goes on for a while. also discourse frightens me)

Okay. I’m like twenty years late. But I’ve been rewatching BtVS s5 during my latest depression spiral and wandering against my better judgement into the Spuffy fic verse. Disclaimer that my grasp of the series’ larger canon is meh at best, and frankly I don’t care.

As usual, I have too many thoughts.

Spike is, hands-down, my favorite character on this show. Maybe one of my favorite characters, period. He’s just... good to watch. But listen. Secret poet or no, he was never an inherently good person. Meek and shy does not equal Buffy’s equal. I squirm at this apparently massively popular canon interpretation of his human character as some kind of adorable perfect cherub, as if William the Dipshit Poet is somehow preferable to Spike the Complicated Murderer or like, we should just automatically assume that cute shy white people who lived in 1880 London are default Lawful Good when in fact... ahahaa haaaa YIKES COLONIALISM?

I actually think the reason Spike is “more human” than other vampires (in the weird, contradictory Buffy soul-canon) is exactly because William was not Pure, he was a Pratt. Sweet? I guess. Loves his mum? He’s got that going for him. But that guy?? Is not Buffy’s long-lost true love, not a weepy ghost to be shoved into Spike’s Billy Idol cosplay bod at the last minute. In a show that, at its best, tries to give us a protagonist who fundamentally believes we must always make the choice to keep living mindfully, accountably, and with purpose... we get a love interest who is... Spike. A guy who, until the very end of his arc, acts as though he has zero fucking free will. Even though, through a combo of deliciously fun and inconsistent writing, Spike is apparently the only vampire in the Buffyverse who does.

I’ll get to that but first, let’s accept for a minute that Free Will + Buffy = good, and people who roll over and say “I had no choice” + Buffy = Mr. Pointy. This counts for her friends too, (*coughWILLOWcough*) and it’s one of the reasons I love the show despite its many textual problems. As a character piece, it’s great. People fail to take accountability for their behavior all the time. It’s an extraordinarily human flaw, one that rarely equals automatically evil, and I love that it can bite characters on the side of good, too. But that’s not the point of this, oh shit!

Okay. William, cute glasses aside, has no free will. He didn’t even sign up for the vampire thing, he just wanted to get felt up by a pretty girl who saw him cry and didn’t laugh at him. At every point, he was an immature, weak-willed, naive dreamer type who wanted nothing more than to be validated by his shitty friends. The vampirism made him a killer, yeah. But it also inadvertently gave a cowardly nobody a lot of good qualities. Now he’s a weirdly observant, relentlessly optimistic, fun-loving, sexually secure Cool Guy who gave up poetry for punk... but still tries too hard to impress his shitty friends. Basically, being a vampire made this guy a happier-but-still-undeniably-crappy version of himself, especially... considering all the murder. 

But now, let us transparently and metaphorically link cartoonish Vamp!Murder to addiction. Because wow, death in BtVS is either a manipulative authorial gut-punch or a dumb joke, and either way, it’s almost impossible to take seriously in this show, so let’s not.

How to make a remorseless bloodsucking fiend out of of “boo hoo I’m a bad writer and I wish some jerks thought I was cool?” Ha ha you can’t!  Turns out you basically recreate my early twenties but with more murder. Spike is a socially-dependent ADHD art school reject on a century-long avoidance bender. He’s a codependent, moon-eyed boyfriend who learns how to aggressively project not caring while caring Far Too Much, all while clinging to aesthetic as an identity. ALTHOUGH let us not deny that he 100% enjoyed all the killing - wtf so much killing - because for vampires, killing equals pleasure, and charming, “happy” addicts always justify the comforts of their vices. He talks the talk cuz fitting in is his whole deal, but he’s not actually in it for chaos and destruction or any high-falutin’ evil reason, or even really for eating delicious ladies but because, in the end, it feels good and the only girlfriend he’s ever had thinks eating people is cool. Even his whole (gorgeous, splendid to watch) episode-long speech about killing two slayers was written more for Buffy’s character arc than his; we don’t really know why he killed the slayers other than like, “Because they had a death wish I guess. Side note: it was fun.”

There wasn’t much legitimately vengeful or hateful stuff in sad little William for demon!Spike to work with, and apparently William’s soul-or-whatever moved about twelve inches over his left shoulder and stayed there, occasionally poking him for the next hundred years. So it should shock no one that he immediately switches sides when a) his girlfriend dumps him, b) his addiction suddenly hurts, and c) it’s time to impress a new friend group.

I get that Spike’s whole soul-getting between s6 and s7 has been interpreted in fanon as a grand romantic sacrifice (ehhhhhhhhhhhh) and I get why that’s tempting, but the show itself bungled that up way bad and I just can’t get behind it. R*pe idiocy aside, making it ultimately all about Buffy just kinda cheapens what could have been a really fucking powerful redemption arc, one that would have led to a far more satisfying love story. Especially from Buffy’s perspective. 

Okay listen.

We have a guy who has been playing the “duh, Vampire!” card for a century, pleasure-seeking and self-centered, pandering to various peer groups, murderous or otherwise, a happy addict, impervious to change. So when finally, after a HUNDRED SODDING YEARS of being a soulless, hilarious dick, Spike has consequences shoved into his gray matter by the government, he doesn’t change. At all. He just starts obsessing over another woman, doing what he thinks she wants. A woman he thinks will give him new pleasures, a new, perpetually fine status quo. But this woman is Buffy, whose identity is rock solid even though her life is constantly full of challenge and change and choices. She “rewards” Spike only when he makes willful, selfless decisions. And the rewards aren’t romantic, either. Not early on. Even in canon, she keeps rejecting him over and over again, for crystal clear reasons. Thank god. Because when he accepts that she’ll never have him, but still does the hard stuff anyway, he’s unwittingly starting to change. It’s not just Buffy. Buffy demands real personhood. Independence. Identity. Choice. 

Uh oh. She’s gotten to him, then. Though it starts out selfish, he still makes a CHOICE. Quite literally, he takes on the pain of self-improvement - first by embracing the consequences of his chip, later by going on his fancy sparkly soul quest. Buffy is the catalyst, no doubt, because once a poet always a poet and girls are pretty, but Spike’s path to improvement (if not redemption) was already there, laid out nice and neat. His narrative low point, the lightbulb moment that makes him want a soul again, should never have come out of a season of terrible backsliding, culminating in the shower scene we all regret.

It should have been The Gift. 

Death isn’t Buffy’s gift. It’s love. And not that simpering, easy kind of love that just says, “there there,” but the hard, truthful love that makes you want to keep getting that goddamn rock from the bottom of the hill. Yes, Spike’s arc should still be about Buffy, it’s Buffy’s show, but it should have been more about the hole she left behind. Not just in Spike but in the world. 

What’s left? This latest and greatest group of people who have so far RIGHTLY rejected a demon whose sole motivator seems to be comfort. And maybe when these particular people hit rock bottom, they have enough wisdom to see a monster down in the dark and recognize themselves. Maybe Dawn (whose humanizing effect on Spike has been nearly as important as his obsession with Buffy) shows him that rare, rare thing called Validation. And oh god, he realizes he’s never actually moved beyond trying to sell effulgence to Cecily Whatsherface, that he’s been sitting on his own grave for a hundred years, waiting for someone to coddle and fix him, and now the only woman who might have, the best woman, literally the one girl chosen one above all others... is gone. This would be a good time to die. 

Or...

...maybe there is no magic soul cave, maybe he tries to end it and makes the CHOICE not to. Chooses to stay and help, because what else is there? Then BAM! it just slams back into him in a way that hurts like you can’t even believe, because admitting how bad you’ve fucked up is the most painful moment of a lifetime and I’ve lived it and I wish I’d had a hellmouth to jump into, but the Scoobies pull him back, and he takes care of Dawn until life seems to have some meaning again, then Buffy comes out of the earth traumatized and broken and no one is better equipped to help her than a recovering Spike, not because he’s magically her rock but because he’s also learning how to roll his own rock and keep on climbing, because Camus ruined us all for metaphors...

THE END

Anyway. As a recovering addict and toxic person who has been struggling a lot recently... who wants to improve and be able to give more to the people I love, Spike has an arc that just like... cuts me deep, man. Especially because of what should have been.

[rhosinthorn]

Pumpkin Spice and Everything Nice?

‘I’m on a mission to find the best tasting pumpkin spice latte, want to join me?’

Sakura was rounding the corner of the student union when she heard the yelling.

“I’m on a mission to find the best tasting pumpkin spice latte!” a familiar looking upperclassmen was shouting from atop the chair dragged into the middle of the student union’s porch as others shuffled by as quickly as they could, averting their eyes. “Who wants to join me?”

Next to her, Sasuke hunched down even further in his sweatshirt, as if he was trying to disappear, tugging his hood up to cover his hair. “Why is it always me?” he groaned.

Snagging his sleeve before he could teleport away the way he always did when faced with uncomfortable situations, Sakura tugged him forward. “Come on grump,” she teased, heading for the doors of the student union. “You’ll be better once you’ve got some food in you.”

They had almost made it to the door when their luck ran out.

“Sasu-cakes!” Shisui crowed, abandoning his previous post in the center of the porch in favor of an easy victim. “I have a task for you!”

“No. No way, I have class.” Sasuke’s eyes were slightly wild, and his nervous twitch was back. Sakura had thought he had been trained out of it, but apparently one encounter with his cousin was enough to bring it back. “Find some other poor soul to be your victim.”

“But my little duckling,” Shisui wailed, draping himself all over his younger cousin, who froze immediately. “I need a buddy, and Itachi’s in class.”

“No.”

Before Shisui could throw a tantrum worthy of a three year old (Sakura knew he’d do it, she’d seen it before), Sakura intervened. “I’m free for the afternoon, so I’ll go with you,” she offered, conveniently leaving out the midterm she had the next day that she probably should be studying for. “Where do we start?”

“Here!” Shisui perked up immediately, abandoning Sasuke in favor of looping his arm through hers. “We’re starting with the Pit, and working our way around campus to finally finish up back here at Starbucks.”

Sasuke’s teeth grinding was almost audible as the trio made their way into the building.

He was still grinding his teeth as Shisui lounged in the chair next to him, rhapsodizing about the pumpkin spiced coffee clutched in his hand. Honestly, the elder Uchiha could put wine connoisseurs to shame, the way he talked about depth of flavor and notes...Sakura was almost impressed.

She’d be more impressed if she wasn’t constantly feeding Sasuke fresh chopsticks because he kept breaking them in irritation. Although, considering Shisui had been provoking him throughout the ten minutes they’d been seated, she was amazed those chopsticks hadn’t been used to stab someone.

Under the cover of the table, Sakura slid her phone out of her pocket and sent off a quick text.

[dr haruno] send sos 2 hot topic

[dr haruno] b4 he murders hamlet

It only took a quick second for it to vibrate in her hand, and she grinned as she saw the response.

[darwin award] kk

[darwin award] jailbreak 2 hard 2 arrange 2day

Half a second later, Sasuke’s phone, in clear display on the table, vibrated, and he lunged for it like a dying man to a life preserver.

“The idiot’s panicking over his calc exam,” he announced, already slamming the lid on his half-eaten fake chinese food and picking up his backpack. “I need to go rescue him before he jumps into the river.”

It wasn’t the best excuse either of them had ever come up with, but it worked. Before Shisui could really protest, Sakura was gathering her own garbage and motioning to Shisui. “Let’s head for the cafe in the library,” she suggested as Sasuke made his rapid exit. “I think they’ve got coffee and lattes, and I’ve been meaning to try their pumpkin chocolate chip bread.”

Obediently, Shisui allowed himself to be led away. “You made notes about what I was saying though, right?”

“Of course. What type of experiment would this be if it wasn’t properly recorded?”

The tables in the tiny cafe in the main library were crammed full of students panicking over midterms, so Shisui’s analysis of the coffee and latte that he had collected was witnessed by the crowd of desperate students filling the all-hours study space across from it.

On his thirteenth minute of lecturing, Sakura cast a wary glance at the students occupying the table across from them, several of whom looked suspiciously wired and as if they hadn’t left that table for three days, given the clutter, general unwashed appearance, and overall demeanor of a cornered wild animal. Given that they seemed about ready to let loose a hail of assorted school supplies if Shisui didn’t shut up, she escorted him quickly to the next location. Her biology professor was a hard-ass who would require her death certificate to allow her to retake the exam, and unfortunately, whatever the crazed students might do, it was improbable that they would manage homicide.

The cafe in the engineering building was much more secluded; most of the students cloistered in the adjacent computer labs with headphones, easily-portable snacks, and their own coffee makers in the room with them. Shisui was able to wax poetic about his latte in peace, as Sakura munched through her second slice of pumpkin-chocolate chip bread and made notes on Shisui’s oration while simultaneously running through her flashcards.

That is, until Shisui realized that he did not have her full attention and draped himself across her lap.

Startling in surprise, Sakura dropped her flashcards on his face, which was suddenly in her lap. The rest of him was sprawled out across the rest of the battered couch they had been sharing, and his latte had been set on the table in front of them. He was lucky that her legs, with her feet also on the table, had been pinned, so her reflexive twitch at finding him well inside her personal space hadn’t sent the drink flying.

“Sa-ku-ra,” he said, voice stretching out in a sing-song across the syllables of her name. “Are you paying attention to me?”

“You just said that this had less pumpkin and more cinnamon than the one at the library, but much less nutmeg than the one in the Pit, which is good because that one tasted like someone had dropped a bucket full of nutmeg in the coffee,” she recited dutifully, retrieving her flashcards. “See, I was listening.”

“But you were looking at something else,” Shisui wiggled as he whined, shifting his head to a more comfortable position on her thighs and relieving some of the pressure from where his shoulders had previously been. “I thought you liked spending time with me?”

The pout that followed should have been illegal for a fully grown twenty-something.

“Shisui,” Sakura began, trying to muster her resistance. “I do have an exam tomorrow, and as you can see, I am capable of multitasking.”

“But Sa-ku-ra,” he whined, commandeering her hand and placing it on his head. Obligingly, she ran her fingers through his hair. “I thought you wanted to spend time with me…”

Just then his phone beeped, and Sakura caught a glimpse of the screen as he pulled it out of his pocket.

[weasel] How’s your grand plan going? Has she hit you with anything yet?

Raising her eyebrow, Sakura glanced down at the Uchiha in her lap, who she was gratified to see looked somewhat sheepish.

“Tell him about the flashcards,” she recommended dryly, lifting his upper body just enough so that she could slip out from underneath him. “See if that gets you any sympathy. Ready to finish up at Starbucks?”

She should have expected that Starbucks would be the second most-crowded place on campus, given the proximity to midterms, but it at least allowed her to claim a comfortable armchair and keep an eye on the adjacent one while making Shisui wait in the line from hell. Spotting him sandwiched between a pair of sorority girls, who were busy making eyes at him and the frat boys in front of him, she delighted in the anguished look on his face.

Usually, he was probably one of the smoothest talkers on campus, able to charm, flatter, and cajole his way through any situation.

Stuck listening to trivial bullshit like the snippets she could hear, he seemed to be going slowly insane.

Serves him right, she thought with a smirk, reaching for her phone. Snapping a discreet shot of Shisui, she dropped it in the group chat she shared with her two best friends.

[dr haruno] <picture>

It only took a minute for Naruto to send back the picture, now covered in enough pastel hearts that it wouldn’t look out of place in a middle school girl’s locker. Sasuke’s response was a significantly subtler thumbs up.

[Hot Topic] y r u still there

[Hot Topic] u can run away

[Hot Topic] nobody would blame u

Before she could respond back, Naruto was back.

[darwin award] y u  make out w/hamlet

Glowering, Sakura punched out her response, unaware that the poor grad student who usually got stuck teaching her biology class was slowly backing away from the empty seat next to her, coffee clutched in his shaking hand.

[dr haruno] wtf

[dr haruno] i was not!!!

[dr haruno] who tf said i was????

Another chat notification popped up. Normally she had the notifications for the group chat from her dorm muted, but they had been organizing a movie night for yesterday so she had unmuted them. Opening the chat to mute it, she clenched her phone so hard she was certain the case was going to leave imprints on her skin.

[ramen king] <picture>

[ramen king] see

[ramen king] pictures don’t lie

[ramen king] u were totally making out w/hamlet

The picture was a grainy shot from somewhere behind the couch she had occupied at the coffee shop in the engineering building, taken probably as Shisui was busy flopping onto her lap. From the angle and the bad camera quality, it did sort of look as if there was something going on between them.

Before she could respond back to Naruto in either chat, the dorm chat exploded.

[k9 king] whoa sakura

[k9 king] u move fast

[k9 king] <picture>

This time it was another picture, taken moments later and from a different angle, showing Shisui’s head in her lap, turned towards her.

[bombshell] y didn’t u tell me?

[bombshell] he’s hot

[bombshell] + y r u letting him put his head in ur lap like that

Notifications for her private chat with Ino started going off as well, but Sakura was too distracted trying to put out the fire in the group chat to deal with her roommate.

[YOUTH!!!] y not me????

[YOUTH!!!] i was going 2 bring u flowers

[Hyuuga Neji] Shut up Lee.

[Hyuuga Neji] She’s been trying to politely refuse since you met.

[cinnamon roll] Neji! Be nice!

[mulan] stfu both of u. w2g S

[bombshell] do u think he would set me up w/his cousin?

[bombshell] either 1

[bombshell] we could double?

[mothman] You should shut up now Kiba. You might need to leave the country.

[firecracker] back off bitch, sasuke’s spoken for

Movement next to her drew her attention away from the shitstorm that Naruto had caused by not paying attention to which chat was open, and Sakura scowled as she saw the spare seat she had been saving be taken by a pair of frankly terrifying graduate students, one of who seemed to be currently sporting stitches. Deciding that discretion was the better part of valor in that case, she turned to look for another pair of empty seats.

“Hey, I brought your lemon loaf and tea,” Shisui announced as she was half-standing, eyeing a pair of chairs that were about to open. “Thanks for saving the seats.”

Before she knew it, he had set their drinks and food down, slid into the armchair she was attempting to vacate, and tugged her back onto his lap. Sakura squeaked in surprise, ashamed of the sound she made, and fell back into his chest as she lost her balance.

“Missed me that much?” Shisui teased gently, and popped a chunk of lemon loaf in her mouth when she opened it to respond. He was chewing on his own bite, she realized, and frowned at him around the lemon loaf.

“Taxes,” he replied as he swallowed. “Only fair. Now, onto the final test.”

Swallowing, Sakura grimaced as her phone blew up, vibrating so hard it fell off the arm of the chair and into the small space between them. Reaching for her tea, she took a sip, and then grabbed her phone, afraid of what she was going to find.

Shisui flinched as it vibrated again, spluttering on his coffee, but she ignored him as she scrolled past the argument over Sasuke that Ino was having with Naruto’s cousin, Lee’s wailing, Neji’s caustic put downs, Hinata’s pleas for peace...and then she found another picture.

[sharkboi] <picture>

[sharkboi] update: they’ve relocated to starbs

[sharkboi] + they’re cozy

[sharkboi] look @ the luv

[sharkboi] <picture>

[chef] did u kno that feeding the so w/the leftover half of a sweet sweetens the love?

[bombshell] <3

[mulan] <3

[cinnamon roll] <3

[k9 king] ur gross choji

[mothman] Shut up Kiba

[sharkboi] update

[sharkboi] totally just groped him in public

[sharkboi] <picture>

Her head shot up as she saw the blurry shot of her reaching for her phone, the actual action hidden by their bodies, only the suggestive trajectory of her hand remaining, enough to damn her in the chat.

[bombshell] getting frisky!

It only got worse after that, and Sakura closed her eyes and resolved to murder all of them at the earliest possible convenience.

“This one’s the winner,” Shisui declared, nodding to his latte. “Nothing can compete with the original.”

Caught completely off guard, Sakura stared at him wide-eyed until he indicated the drink. “Remember? The thing I’ve been dragging you around all afternoon for?”

His quest. “Right,” she said weakly, ignoring her phone as if vibrated furiously. “I’m glad you’ve figured it out.”

“Isn’t it grand?” Shisui declared, shoving another piece of lemon loaf into her mouth. “I had a lot of fun.”

“Sure,” Sakura scanned the crowded area, looking for Suigetsu. She may not be able to do anything about the pictures he’d already posted, but she could make sure he never would post again. “It was.”

She surprised herself by actually meaning it. Shisui had been...fun to be around. Not as crazy as she had remembered him being when they were all in high school, although Sasuke would probably disagree. They had spent a fun afternoon together, and the treats he bought her as bribes weren’t unwelcome either.

A phone beeped again, and he shot her an apologetic look as he jostled her getting it out of his pocket. There was a moment of silence, and then he whistled.

“Why did my cousin congratulate me on my first public groping?” he asked, and Sakura wanted to throw every single phone around them into the river.

“My hallmates are idiots,” she ground out from between gritted teeth. “And they’re all going to go home for winter break in matchboxes.”

“I think the kid over there with the white hair is spying on us,” Shisui said brightly, giving a wave. Sakura whipped about and made sure that the grin she shot Suigetsu was savage. The little shit was going to find out the hard way not to cross her.

“I’ll make sure he learns his lesson.”

“You really didn’t have to do this.”

“Of course I did,” Shisui protested, holding the door for her. “You kept me from being murdered by angry college students on three separate occasions. And don’t think I didn’t notice you letting Sasu-cakes escape by sacrificing yourself.”

“That’s what the pumpkin chocolate chip bread was for,” she pointed out, climbing the stairs to the fourth floor (what type of building has four floors, with wheelchair accessible bathrooms on the fourth floor, but no elevators? Really?) “And all of the other things I made you buy me.”

“Pfft,” the Uchiha flapped his hand at her. “Those were bribes to make you accurately record my notes on the lattes. Anyway, what kind of gentleman would I have been if I hadn’t seen you safely to your door?”

“The only dangerous thing in this dorm right now,” Sakura raised her voice so that anyone behind the closed doors would be sure to hear, “is me.”

Reaching her door at the end of the hall, she turned, key in the door, to look at Shisui. To her surprise, he was much closer than she expected, almost on top of her, a hungry look in his eyes.

“That was...far too attractive,” he mumbled, eyes fixed on her lips. “If you don’t want me to kiss you, speak now.”

Giving her a moment, he pressed forward, lips brushing hers. First gently, but then more insistently, caressing and coaxing her into willing participation. She had always known he was attractive, but had never figured he’d be interested in her, when he had his pick of the myriad of girls that surrounded him. After the disastrous crush on Sasuke that had thankfully subsided into unbreakable friendship, she had decided Uchiha’s were too much trouble to date, and instead worked on establishing an amicable working relationship with Shisui and Itachi, to make her life less boring when Naruto and Sasuke inevitably abandoned her during their squabbles.

Sakura found herself twining her hands in Shisui’s hair, the only Uchiha she knew that sported curls instead of the obnoxiously straight hair his cousins managed. As she tugged lightly on it, drawing him closer, he complied pressing her into the door as his hands came to rest on her hips.

In her pocket, her phone started vibrating again, but she was too busy kissing Shisui to care.

[sept-dix]

slam dunk

summary: high school basketball team star player lai guanlin and you a/n: requested; i love basketball x guanlin very much so thanks for requesting this heh

“y/n!!!” you see seonho waving his whole entire arms at you trying to get your attention from where you were in the stands

you acknowledged him with a small wave, horrified bc wtf that had attracted all the attention of the people around you too

tbh you weren’t really one to go for your school’s basketball games 

like 1) you don’t even know the rules of the game so what’s the point and 2) you didn’t know anyone from the team up til now anyway so it was just boring for you

however your friend seonho had just recently joined the team as a newbie and he was super jealous of all his teammate hyungs who had like literal fangirls screaming for them at every game

so of course he begged you to come to the game and pretend to be his fangirl 

never mind the fact that he wasn’t even playing he was literally the water boy lmao

but yes, so here you were at the game confused af and just cheering whenever the ball went into the hoop

and sometimes cheering for seonho when he got up to hand the players their water bottles lmaooo

tbh as the game progressed you started getting kind of absorbed in it

and you realised that there was this one super tall player from your school who was making a hell lot of hoops?

and the more you focused on it the more ridiculous they got like literally he’s so far from the hoop?

or sometimes he isn’t even facing the hoop for god’s sake does he have eyes on his back or something??

by the time the game ends with an obvious victory for your school thanks to this guy you’re pretty convinced that there has to be some sort of magic involved in this

anyways as everyone starts piling onto the court to congratulate the players you make your way to your bro seonho to say good job with the water 

when you get to him he’s super excited and hyped like 

“y/n did u SEE that one hoop that was out of this world?!!! and that one sick lay up from the third quarter?? omg” 

and you just let him fangirl to you because you’re a good person like that

but halfway he gets interrupted by one of his team players asking him to make his way somewhere for a brief team meeting

you look up at him and realise it’s the magic player from before so you’re like “hey!! good job just now it was so amazing to watch you play!”

and he just mumbles a “thanks” while shyly rubbing his neck

and you’re like aw that’s kinda cute bc you expected him to be more confident considering his skills 

but that was that 

a few days later you and seonho are at the tables outside your school’s cafeteria trying to finish up this economics project that you two are partners for

(trust you two to pick such a noisy spot to get work done lol)

but you guys are dying. like the project is impossible and you thought you didn’t understand what was going on in class but here’s seonho who isn’t even sure of your teacher’s name

so you’re ready for death and are about to just give up and ask your classmate friend for rescue when the magic player from the game the other day makes his way up to yall

apparently he has to pass seonho something but after he does he just stands around kind of awkwardly for a few seconds watching you two

and you’re like uh what

and seonho is like “hyung whats up” so the guy is just like “uh nothing i’m just waiting to meet a teacher but i have nothing else to do now so...”

“aw hyung join us!!! come here sit down!!” 

as if you didn’t have enough distractions smh

magic player is still shy and reserved but once you guys explain to him what you two were looking so frustrated over he offers to help

“wait so on top of being a magic player you’re also good at your studies??”

those two look at you like wtf is a magic player but the guy just nervously chuckles and is like “uh.. not really but,, yeah i guess?”

so with his help you guys get done with the project and by the end of it you’re thinking that perhaps this guy was the most capable person in your school

and after that there’s still time left before he has to meet his teacher so you three go over to shoot some hoops and it’s hilarious because you are as bad as magic player is good 

he tries teaching you from the basics but you insist on trying to score while facing away from the hoop from even just the first try bc that’s just the type of person you are

overall a good time & you’re lowkey irritated that on top of being super capable, magic player is also a nice person like wtf?? god really took his time on him

from that day onwards you magically start noticing him everywhere

like wtf you didn’t even know he was in your math class? but apparently he was

and now and then you see him walking down the halls and you think to yourself like wtf how have i never noticed him before he’s so tall

one day you’re in the cafeteria eating lunch with your bestie when suddenly your friend is like

“yo don’t turn behind now but guanlin keeps looking at you”

and you’re like who’s guanlin

and your friend is like wtf?? how do you not know who he is

so ofc you turn behind super fast to find out and guess who you see looking right at you

ofc it’s magic player

he averts his gaze right away when he realises you saw him though so you’re like huh what’s that all about

“does he like you?? dude does THE guanlin like you?”

you’re like wtf how did you get to that conclusion and btw he doesn’t even know me well

“know you WELL? but that means he does know you then?”

you can’t win

over the next few days your friend observes every single interaction between guanlin and you & comes to the grand final conclusion that he likes you although you keep denying it

bc as much as you thought he was super capable and nice and skilled and tall and handsome, you didn’t know him well enough

and also bc it would be embarrassing if you believed it but turns out he doesn’t like you lol

but your friend keeps insisting and tbh you feel yourself getting swayed by her

one day he asks you for a pencil during math class and you’re like ???

why he asking me when he could have asked the girl on his left side instead?? is my friend right DOES HE LIKE ME oh no

so you’re like ok. you gotta find out

you meet seonho after a while in your next economics class

and after the lesson ends you’re like “psst seonho just wanna know but has guanlin given his jersey to anyone yet?”

in your school a player giving his jersey to someone = i’m interested in you

and seonho waggles his eyebrows at you like “heyyy are you interested in guanlin hyung?”

it just ends up with you flustered and answerless so you just give up

but guess who walks by at that exact moment

yes ofc it’s guanlin

and to your absolute horror, seonho goes “HEY GUANLIN HYUNG!! y/n here just told me she likes you”

you’re like WHAT you’re completely mortified

and ready to murder seonho like wtf that boy’s really crossing his limits 

you’re about to make a run for it without even looking up to see guanlin’s reaction when suddenly seonho is like “ok now it’s up to you guys” and he just pushes you two together and he makes a run for it

you are prepared to never talk to him ever again 

and you’re plotting your revenge in your head when you hear guanlin go

“is that true?”

and you’re like what. uh. well is it true suddenly you’re confused about what you’re supposed to say

tbh you did kind of like him as a person,,

and if he was to confess you knew in your heart you wouldn’t turn him down

you don’t even dare to look up at him as you just kinda shrug and mutter something unintelligible

“you like me?”

why is he asking again kjfhdkjhgfj at this point you’re so flustered you’re sure none of this is real

so you just nod like you don’t even know anymore

so you hear a soft chuckle and he’s like “check your locker tomorrow morning” and he leaves

the whole day you’re out of it like wtf that might have been the most embarrassing moment

you had just told guanlin you liked him although you weren’t even sure

and why did you have to check your locker tomorrow morning? what did he mean?

alas, after several hours of mental torture and a nearly sleepless night

you arrive at school and open your locker with trembling hands

just to see a neatly folded jersey in it with a note on top of it

“come cheer for me instead of seonho next time”

[baejstyles]

What did you think of Wrestlemania last night?

overall, i really enjoyed mania last night!! minus the last two matches i thought it was really good.

the ending to the men’s battle royale was good and i really wasn’t expecting it! it’ll be interesting to see where they go with matt hardy and bray now.

the cruiserweight match was amazing and definitely was main card worthy. cedric and mustafa are so great together and although i was rooting for mustafa a lil, cedric alexander really deserved the win

the women’s battle royale was cool!! although the entrances were messy af, i loved the whole nxt vs the main roster thing, it’s a shame becky got eliminated so early tho. also i deadass thought bayley won lmfao

the triple threat ic match was good to kick start things off, i loved finn’s entrance and gear and seth’s too! all three men were involved all the way through and i’m glad seth finally got his grand slam

charlotte and asuka was great and although i didn’t really want charlotte to be the one to break asuka’s streak cause like i feel that title could have gone to someone who really needed a boost and a push in the women’s division. the moment after the match was a really nice touch also charlotte’s gear was amazing wtf

i didn’t really care for the us title match as a match with those 4 competitors is never going to be really amazing and exciting for me personally. i would have liked rusev to win but i’m fine with jinder

although i still don’t care for ronda i really enjoyed her match with kurt vs stephanie and triple h. lmao like it was just so silly at times and stephanie was so funny?? like idk i really enjoyed it though

the sd live tag team triple threat was pretty lame tbh. i didn’t want the bludgeon brothers to win cause like idk i just don’t like them that much. it sucks that the usos had to lose in their first wm match

john cena vs taker was unnecessary and that’s all i gotta say on that

dbry and shane vs kevin and sami wasn’t anything special tbh. it was great to see daniel bryan back in the ring again but it annoyed me that he was lying outside the ring for so long lmfao. i enjoyed his moments with sami too but they’re still fired? tf? like idgi

nia and alexa was alright, like neither of them are the most exciting wrestlers so i didn’t expect much. i’m happy nia won though and alexa’s reign of terror is finally over

aj vs shinsuke......... (i know this is going to be a very unpopular opinion and if anyone actually reads this pls don’t hate me this is just my opinion thank) i’ve seen a lot of people saying that match was underwhelming. whilst it still should have been the main event, shinsuke has been very average since coming up from nxt. unfortunately for me he’s all character and entrance which is fine but like... i don’t think he’s THAT good. and as my friend put it, it was like watching aj trying to get blood from a stone. i still enjoyed the match and it was pretty even. i totally didn’t expect aj to retain so that was a nice surprise for me lmao

braun vs the bar was wild af. imo it shouldn’t have been that high up in the card and whilst having that kid be braun’s partnet was fun and silly it just seems like an insult to the rest of the raw tag team division. you have plenty of brilliant tag teams that could have been the bar’s opponents but nooo... you gotta have braun do this smh

brock vs roman was WHACK. idk if it was just cause everyone was so sure that roman was going to defeat the evil and become universal champ. but like it was just so sad and disappointing. roman built and carried this feud on his own and it was just so weird to have the build up be that good for the match and outcome to be that disappointing it just doesn’t make sense 2 me

[mittensmorgul]

MITTENS *swoops in with tea* I need to borrow your brain. Doors. I don't remember Jared ever using that reaction to doors closing before this season, but now he's done that jump twice (both grantedly deserving of it) and both times he’s been very careful not to look at the door that’s been closed, which is giving me all kinds of feels; is this a new acting choice or is my memory fuzzy? Also I’m thinking I’m seeing a theme with Sam and doors closing on him (12.01, 12.03, 12.06, 12.07, 12.09).

AAH! Thank you for the tea. :D

Yeah, I don’t think Sam’s really had the “flinch at doors” reaction before either. But when have doors closing on him been this sort of plot-relevant theme?

And now I’m thinking back to s9 and s10 when oddly the plot-relevant thing was OPENING doors (or smashing them... remember all the Cas vs doors hilarity? And demon Dean with his hammer?) All those smashed doors prefaced the release of the Darkness.

Since the beginning of s12, Sam’s been dealing with a lot of issues surrounding captivity, both physical and emotional. (heeeeyyyy think of this as the comparison to s6 and be grateful that Sam’s at least got his soul this go-around. Maybe that accounts for the flinching... his soul’s not literally trapped in the Cage this time. Yay! Small favors!)

But back in s6, that IS where his soul spent the first half of the season... and then large chunks of him were trapped behind the wall in his head for the rest of the season. Sam’s captivity might be a lot more physical this time around, rather than metaphorical or spiritual, but he’s battling a lot of the same crises internally that he did in s6. From a decidedly more “whole” and balanced standpoint.

Not only did he flinch at the door slamming on him (both in12.09 and back when Mary left in 12.03), the bit of the old dude’s introductory speech in prison that got Sam’s attention was the bit about his preferred method of torture being nothing. Just silence, darkness, and isolation.

(I had an existential crisis while contemplating the previous paragraph, because I wanted to refer to the transcript for the exact wording, but then I remembered that I am supposed to be making this weeks’ transcript, and I haven’t done it yet, so I only have myself to blame here... I should probably get on that post haste...)

In show, who do we know who’s been locked away like that? Well, Lucifer for one. Amara for another. It didn’t do either of them any favors, you know? So in that respect, the threat of a closed door is carrying a lot of weight for Sam this season that it’s never had in the past. Remember at the end of s11 when he’d volunteered to take on the Mark himself? It’s all gotten a little more real for him now.

He’s been locked away, theoretically forgotten by everyone, in Toni’s torture basement. Physical torture didn’t phase him. What DID get to him was being locked away with no hope of escape. In that way, his captivity in 12.09 was an escalation of what he went through in 12.01 and 12.02. Locked up and key thrown away. It was a pretty bleak and hopeless situation.

Partly because, like his interrogation by the BMoL that was predicated on a huge boatload of WTF-inspired “facts,” the government dudes holding them in 12.09 were holding them based on a lot of “wrong facts.” Sam and Dean didn’t HAVE any good information to share with them. They were the guys who saved the world, even when the rest of the world didn’t realize it needed saving.

This season’s version of “the story is wrong” is finally focused outward into the human/hunter world, instead of being only a theme between Dean and Sam personally.

And all this reminds me of meta I’ve read in the distant past about the Grand Overarching Themes of past seasons, and how the seasons ended with alternately open and closed doors (on an escalating cosmic scale). And it seems that Dabb has taken that pattern of opening and closing back from the cosmic scale and put it into the extremely personal and metaphorical.

Gah, I’ve only seen the episode twice so far. I need to watch it again. because THEMES.

[disneydatass]

Wait, did you end up seeing tlj? If you did, would you mind sharing your thoughts?

yes i saw it. i’m not sure if you wanted just a general “was it good or bad” kinda thing or a deep analysis; so I'm gonna put all my thoughts under the cut. major spoilers @ anyone who hasn’t seen the film don't read.

•okay so starting off the film with the space battle instead of rey/luke i didn’t mind; however >3 minutes into the film and that real cheesy humor/bit with general hux felt so out of place...obviously the previous trilogies had humor laced throughout it but idk that bit just seemed like 5 year old childish humor?? not a major offense but again for the start of the film i hard warning bells going off already

• sassy poe, and leia not having any of his shit (but secretly loving it because it reminds her of han) i SO APPROVE/LOVE

• Leia is such a badass ilhsm!!! The whole using the force to vacuum suck herself to safety was beautifully shot and seeing it in 3D just added to the experience of not only this scene but the whole film

• Although obviously i don’t want leia to die, her not dying in this episode has me majorly concerned for how they are going to send her off in episode 9 (i know no one predicted carrie to leave us which is why they didn’t kill her off in this film) but i just so hope that they do my girl justice in the final piece of this trilogy 

•  I LOVE ROSE TICO

•no really, i just love her.

• Finn and rose’s whole adventure to cantonica (the las vegas casino planet) i liked and appreciated how it paralleled the greed and cruelty of people with money and how they obtained it that currently goes on in real life

• again not to sound like a broken record with words but i LOVE PHASMA SHE IS SO BADASS

• however i feel like that fight scene did not do either finn or phasma justice at all. i was more than ready to see finn “win” against his former boss but to have phasma just fall off a broken cliff essentially after only a few hits by finn left me a little disappointed. Again phasma was just so cool but finn’s rebel scum line was great

• Finn going in to sacrifice himself at the end was going to have me enraged, but rose putting a stop to all that bullshit was so needed. what was not needed tho was that kiss! not that i have anything against the ship (because i know that finnpoe is dream i will never live to see) the romantic relationship/kiss between them felt totally forced (ha..)

• Kylo is a whiny emo baby that i can not stand and hollywood owes me 10 grand for having to see a pale chicken in black tights

• Snoke felt like an absolute waste of a character. Obviously idc enough about him and i didn’t want him to live but he had so much build-up that his death felt anti-climatic (for a nerd comparison it felt exactly like what the 1oo did to the ice queen)

• Kylo killing the very mentor that everyone said was behind his darkness proved that kylo is beyond redemption tho so i am glad that they are continuing that he is villain because him all of a sudden turning good would be too unrealistic

• Kylo and Rey’s force skypecall/bonding was beyond terrible writing. The dialogue was so awkward/cringe on a galactic level 

• Rey going into the cave of darkness with that black mirror imagery was really cool visually but also left me feeling like “wtf was the point of that?” when there was no reveal

• It’s still hard for me to believe that Rey’s parent’s are just piece of shit nobodies. Everyone was waiting for something that we didn’t get. (idk if there is a bigger metaphor here saying that you don’t need to come from somewhere to be somebody but again it felt like they were building to something greater and didn’t deliver)

• LUKE SKYWALKER’S STORY ARC W.T.F.

• The entirety of the original star wars trilogy is that luke has an unwavering sense of moral good. He could not kill his father even after everything he has done, so to have him even attempt/think to kill his nephew felt so uncharacteristic (but i guess that was a plot twist they were going for??)

• Luke going back to farming on an island felt like a full circle moment from where he began and having yoda come back and burn sacred shit and making fun of luke i thought was a good callback to the originals 

• THE ENTIRE BATTLE ON CRAIT WAS PERFECTION

• Kylo trying to wipe out his sassy gay uncle to absolutely no avail was SO FANTASTIC

• I knew that something was going down when luke showed up with darker and shorter hair so i wasn’t surprised by that reveal of holographic force power but still---

• MY BOY KICKED ASS WHILE DOING YOGA FROM A PLANET AWAY

• Him evaporating after using so much force power felt like obi-wan in a new hope so i was satisfied with that ending (and i’m glad he got to reunite with leia before leaving)

• REY SLAMMING THE FALCON DOOR/CONNECTION ON KYLO FELT SO GOOD YALL

• The little boy with jedi powers and having hope was a good closing shot (it felt like they were trying to imply that like rey he doesn’t come from much but is extremely strong with the force--i know they are doing this just so they can make 20 more movies but still)

• With all that being said i did like it better than the force awakens and luke’s message of finding the in-between of good and bad is the perfect metaphor for how this film left me feeling

[bibliophileiz]

Jack bestows faith: A theory (now irrelevant, since Jack has lost his powers.)

Spoilers for Supernatural seasons 12 and 13 below the cut

Like you, I am frustrated that Jack's mind-control/manipulative/what were they anyway? powers are no more -- and without us ever really knowing what those powers were. (Or maybe you're not frustrated that Berens introduced this intriguing plot only for bucklemming and Dabb to ignore it in favor of resurrecting dead stunt angel No. 557 from Season 4 for no goddamn reason, but you definitely should be.) There was a debate about glowy-golden eyes and mind-whammying all last hiatus. There was discussion as to whether Jack was "brainwashing" Cas or just "influencing" him and what the differences between those two things would be. There was suggestion that the yellow eyes proved the Four Princes of Hell had all been nephilims. There was fierce debate as to whether all or any of that made Jack good or evil.

So we were all pretty disappointed that the only person who seemed to even remember that fetus!Jack used some sort of power on Cas to convince Cas to save him and ditch the Winchesters with Kelly was Berens Dean. In fact, Dean seems to have been the only person who ever cared at all.

Dean says near the end of Season 12 that Jack "sock-puppetted" Cas. In Season 13, Episode 3, he explodes at Sam, screaming that Jack "manipulated,” promising him paradise but only getting him killed. Then I think he spoke for most of the fandom when he finished the rant with "You may be able to forget about that, but I can't!"

But was Dean actually right? Did Jack use his powers to "sock-puppet" Cas or Kelly or any other character? We only see Jack use this power on five people. Each time he uses it, it causes the person he's influencing to immediately reverse course and do something that, at first glance, seems out of character, but is actually something that, I think, they really want to do -- or rather, hope is the right thing to do.

In other words, he gives them faith. Or, tunnel vision. Dealer's choice.

Faith vs. tunnel vision

Faith is a major theme in Supernatural, and it's particularly associated with God and angels. So it's natural that Jack, being related to both, could have some natural affinity toward bestowing faith on the people he cares about -- certainly the more his allies see of his powers, the more faith they have in him.

But that's not always a good thing.

In his book "Still Life With Woodpecker," Tom Robbins defined tunnel-vision the following way:

"Tunnel vision is a disease in which perception is restricted by ignorance and distorted by vested interest. Tunnel vision is caused by an optic fungus that multiplies when the brain is less energetic than the ego. It is complicated by exposure to politics. When a good idea is run through the filters and compressors of ordinary tunnel vision, it not only comes out reduced in scale and value but in its new dogmatic configuration produces effects the opposite of those for which it originally was intended." p. 86 (Bold emphasis mine.)

Faith is belief working in tandem with logic and hope. Tunnel vision is when the logic, and sometimes hope, are no longer involved. I explain these to say that when Jack "mind-whammies" someone, he's bestowing faith, but jamming it through so fast that the logic and hope don't have time to catch up before the character has time to do something, well, out of character.

WTF actually happened?

The first time we actually see Jack's powers in the wild (other than the time they set the Gideon Bible on fire, a bucklemming gag that didn't make any sense at the time and makes even less sense now) is in Robert Berens' and Meredith Glynn's episode "The Future..” Kelly has just learned that she will die giving birth to Satan's baby and that she will never be able to influence him to use whatever powers he has for good. Instead, she's afraid he'll be left to the devices of the archangel who raped her and the demon who is currently keeping her chained in a basement -- two sources of extreme evil planning to turn young Skywalker to the Dark Side. When Dagon unchains Kelly so Kelly can take a bath, Kelly fills the tub with water, gets in and slits her wrist.

But instead of dying -- or at least instead of staying dead -- Kelly is healed and/or brought back to life by her child. (I still don't know why he couldn't have done that after he was born, wtf Jack?) This gives her hope that he's actually good, even though Dagon and later Cas try to convince her Jack was acting out of self-interest. Later in the episode, after Cas has captured her and she's trying to convince him her baby can be good, her eyes glow yellow -- the baby's giving her a vision, and maybe adding some brainwashing to go with it.

While Kelly had thus far simply appeared to want to have and raise her baby in peace, she's now a mission to make sure the baby's powers are intact when he's born. Even when Sam and Dean offer to remove the baby's powers, she turns them down, kidnaps Cas and tells him to take her to the gate to Heaven, assuring him that the baby showed her if she just goes with him, everything will turn out okay.

Let's break down Kelly's thought process here. First of all, she gets pregnant with the devil's baby and appears to just want to have it in safety. Not an outlandish or grand goal by any means. And while I don't remember her ever expressly saying it, I think she's reasonably confident the baby won't be born inherently evil, like Cas seems to think. This is an act of faith -- deciding to become a parent is essentially that -- but it's tempered with logic and caution.

When she learns she'll die giving birth and that Dagon will most likely end up with her baby, her faith and hope are gone so suddenly that she tries to end her own and her baby’s lives -- the ultimate act of despair.

She changes her mind after the baby brings her back and gives her a vision telling her to follow Cas to Heaven. And when I say changes her mind, I don't mean, just decides to not attempt suicide again -- she goes from, presumably, wanting to be a single mom to wanting to Make Sure Baby Is Powerful Enough To Save The World. While Sam's plan to strip the baby of his powers has the potential to save her life (and is objectively a good idea anyway), she tells Sam and Dean that the baby being born with powers is "the only thing that matters." It's a complete 180 from that moment of despair when she tried to end her own and her child's lives.

Now let's look at the episode from Cas' point of view. Cas starts out in a pretty dark place. He's been working with Heaven -- always a bummer -- and is now going to have to betray the Winchesters, all to kill someone he doesn't believe deserves death. He steals the Colt from under Dean's pillow and heads to where Dagon is hiding Kelly.

At the critical moment, he can't bring himself to shoot Kelly. Instead, he takes her to a motel, and the rest of their scenes that episode are the debate about whether the baby's powers can be used for good.

You can tell Cas wants to believe Kelly -- he's looking for a reason not to kill her and the baby. I think if all the shit hadn't hit the fan at the end of the episode, Cas would have come around on his own -- certainly he was willing to consider Sam's plan.

Instead, he gets mind-whammied by the baby too, who gives him a "vision" of "paradise" and he does something completely out of character -- puts Sam and Dean to sleep, leaves them unconscious next to the gates of heaven and drives off into the night with a delighted Kelly.

Those are two sudden, bizarre shifts in behavior. Kelly went from suicidal to drank-the-Koolaid hopeful, while Cas' end demeanor is almost robotic. Those are two people who have clearly been affected by some strong BabyGodMagicJuice.

But they don't stay that way. The next time we see them, in the season finale, they're in Parents Preparing for Baby mode, which is to say they're hopeful and happy, but also stressed out, afraid and able to listen to Sam, Dean and Mary when they show up.

We're back to the difference between faith and tunnel-vision. If Jack had given them faith, it would explain why they made sudden course corrections from a point of hopelessness to where they were able to do something they wanted to do anyway -- in Kelly's case, have her baby, and in Cas' case, save the baby (and Kelly. Kelly is the sacrificial lamb in all this. RIP Kelly. I'm so sorry your useless son didn't resurrect you a second time like he did Cas.) But if it's slammed into them quickly by a self-interested, all-powerful fetus of limited understanding and who really, really just wants to not die, the logic and caution don't have time to catch up, so it becomes tunnel vision. Course correction from their path of despair is the only thing they can think of, so Kelly's willing to turn down Sam's plan and Cas is willing to leave the Winchesters unconscious outside Heaven where angels could find them.

It makes what Jack did not evil, as much as just something natural -- again, faith is a theme with God and angels, which Jack is a product of -- without quite having the control to know how much is too much.

It happens to Dean and Kaia too

Dabb may have forgotten about "The Future" but since Berens wrote it, he didn't forget it, and he used that same thing again in "The Bad Place" in Season 13. In that one, Jack uses his powers to show Dean and Sam a vision of Mary in Apocalypse World.

The next thing Dean does is profess he'll "get Mom back, no matter what." And he means it -- when Kaia says she won't help them, he pulls a gun on her and tells her to "get in the damn car." It's a terrifying moment and fabulous acting on Jensen Ackles' part -- I'm legitimately scared of him right there. To be fair, Dean has done similar things -- remember he pulled a gun on a bunch of LARPing nerds when he thought they were refusing to tell him where Charlie was in Season 8 -- but this scene is meant to give the viewer chills.

Again, it's tunnel vision. Dean has spent the entire season telling himself Mary is dead, but we know he doesn't quite believe it -- he tells Sam to keep the faith for both of them and starts to ask Billie if she knows whether Mary's alive. But he can't make himself believe. When Jack gives him the vision, it not only offers Dean proof, it gives him faith. But again, the logic and caution haven't had time to catch up when he pulls the gun on Kaia -- he's like a religious fanatic threatening heretics.

Likewise, Kaia has a change of heart in the episode after Jack shows her a vision. Kaia has spent her life thinking her powers are a curse. While we don't know for sure based on this episode, there's every reason to believe that at one point, she hoped to control her powers. She obviously wanted to know about it enough that she had a relationship with Derek, who loved using his Dreamwalking powers if his art is anything to go by. After Jack shows her a vision, she's willing to help the Winchesters.

Again, they sort of follow the pattern started in "The Future." Characters who start out in a bad place get a vision from Jack and suddenly have faith to do what they said at the beginning of the episode they wouldn't do. 

But as countless historical examples have shown, faith can turn to tunnel vision in a hurry. As Robbins said, a good idea subjected to tunnel vision can have drastic consequences, as these episodes show.

The one that got away

None of this explains Sam.

No, I didn't forget about Sam. Jack showed him the vision of Mary too, and Sam was trying to STOP Dean from forcing Kaia to Dreamwalk at gunpoint. In fact, of these five characters who get a vision from Jack, Sam is the only one who doesn't seem affected by it at all.

You could say it's a by-product of Sam being the Evil Chosen One with some leftover Lucifer grace, but that wouldn't explain how all of Jack's other powers work on Sam. More likely, I think Sam already has faith. Of the three main characters, Sam has always been the most hopeful, the most optimistic. He was the one who believed in faith healers and angels before Season 4, and he was the one who thought God could help fight Amara. And of course, he was the one who thought Mary could still be alive and that Jack could help find her. Sam didn't need Jack's powers -- he's had faith all along.

So what?

I agree. So what? Nobody bothered to explain this and Jack's powers are gone now. We have an hour until the new season airs and I highly doubt even Berens will try to address this again -- there's too many other problems the characters are trying to solve, too many other dropped plots from the mess that was the second half of Season 13.

But it's a good idea if it's what Berens was going for, and another example of this show coming up with intriguing plots that tie so well with theme and character development. Without his powers, Jack may need to find some faith this season, so the potential to continue this theme is definitely there.

[anon-and-stranger]

Fucked Up Dreams

I almost never have dreams. But recently I’ve had the weirdest and fucked up dreams. In this order...

1) I’m at a New Orleans street festival and it’s full of elves. Like the y’all woodland creatures ya know. And somehow I got pregnant? Go I get a call and someone on the other end is demanding to have my children and shit. So what do I do? I get on a boat George Washington style (like in that painting) with a giant belly and arrive at a island that’s supposed to be deserted. There I give birth to my “children” which this part get really fucked up. Their deep fried fish filets. I had two larger ones and a smaller one and I fed them to my parents who somehow got on the island. And it’s kinda funny cuz I realize I have humor in my dreams too. I said, “Be careful, they’re still hot, just cake out of the oven”.... WTF was this dream for?!

2) I was a little kid. My parents were bringing me and my younger sister to a resort. When we get there we pass this “art field” with a bunch of weird mazes and stuff. The building itself looks a bit run down so my parents pouch me and my sister towards the pool and told us to wait there for them. So she decided to lounge and I jumped in the pool. Paul Teutul Sr. (A old motorcycle dude with a big white mustache and a skull cap) saves me from drowning and we play in the pool until my parent call us again. So somehow we get into those really nice recliner movie theater seats and we order food. I really wanted steak but everyone else wanted pork or something. So somehow, for some unknown reason, I kill my great grandfather??? And I’m chased into the weird art maze thing with a security guard on my tail with a gun and a flashlight. So I’m avoiding the security guard while playing a modified and very dangerous game of hide-and-seek and I finally get the gun from the guard and I decide not to kill him. My dad (who is separated from my mom) comes over and just sighs and shakes his head and walks away as I follow. He tells me, “you’re lucky I’m easy on you” an my stepmom (who I swear hates me) comes over and glares at me for some reason and my dad is selling ice from an ice machine, like the ones in parking lots. So I walk away and my mom finds me and grabs my hand and says, “ so this is the story ok? He had a heart attack and you were trying to save him. And your a good girl because you didn’t kill Mr. Finc” (or something like that) and we go to the same exact spot but it’s a completely different building and it looks very nice, like a modern day panthanon or something but with doors. And we walk in and my mom is tapping her foot and checking her watch every 5 seconds and drags me down a hallway to a room. She opens the door and I assume she’s going to yell at someone but a long line of people walk out carrying cakes and stuff and my mom just “ahem”s and said, “I’d like to see you in MY office now” and a lady steps out as walks over a sliding closet door and my mom just glared at her and says no. The only thing I really get that’s going on is that she’s supposed to be a therapist or something.

3) so I was kidnaped by some crazy dude. He throws me and some other guy in a car and drives into the woods. There’s this wall there and he’s driving up a ramp on the side of it. Ya know, like the kind where it’s kinda flat and it lets you walk on top of the wall. So we go up this wall or whatever and there’s a cliff on the passenger side where I’m seated and a hill on the drivers side. He gets out once we reach the top and helps me get out of the car. Then he just walks around yelling something that sounds like a name and starts with an A but it was impossible for me to pronounce it. So I just sit there asking this crazy what he’s doing and he just replies with, “you’ll see” with a creepy grin. Eventually I see a bunch of faces peek out of some bushes and I hear marching or stomping or something. Next thing I know the kidnaper is gone and so it the boy he brought with us and a battle starts between elves (idk what’s up with me and elves) and there’s light ones and dark ones and their fighting each other and so I climb a tree about 1/2 way like a squirrel to avoid the fighting beneath me but then there’s some people fighting above me. But their standing on the tree sideways like it’s the ground. So I get back on the grand somebody shoves an axe of some kind into my arms and I’m attacked. So I fight. And I see a light female worrier get picked up and is slowly being crushed by some telekinesis power and another really muscular light elf chop his own arm off at the shoulder and keep fighting. Then apparently the leader of this war party is captured and bound by rope and the other elves can’t get it off so I use my axe and cut it off. I’d expect praise right? Nope. They don’t even thank me. So eventually the fight dies and they start walking away. I follow and I find someone who looks kind of familiar. I ask him what the hell was going on and where we were going and he just stares at me in confusion. Then he just starts to explain we were headed home. So it’s like this giant entourage of really y’all and pretty people walking through some slums now and towards downtown. I see some lady walk off to the side gripping her stomach and the guy was explaining that she was probably poisoned. So we keep walking and unfortunately we start to fall behind. It’s like they sped up without actually speeding up. So we try to catch back up and we succeed but we loose them again once we reach downtown. But he keeps walking and doesn’t even pay attention to traffic and walks right across roads and stuff. But people just slam on their breaks and get really mad and stuff and he just keeps walking not even looking at them. So I follow him and he starts to explain about races of elves and fey and such. Anyway we keep walking and we he says something like a lot of people at my school were of fey nature and there were even demons and such. So idk if inevwr got ‘home’ but the next day at school (Oran Academy) I start to see the pointy ears and strange eyes of others around me. Eventually I see Kyoya (idk why I have anime in here either) and I see the horns and shit cuz he’s called the Demon King within the Host club. So somehow I feint and I wake up with the Hitachin twins hovering over me. They also had pointy ears but they also had sharper teeth. They were pixies (funny cuz when they fought one called the other ‘sex pixie’). Unfortunately I woke up and never saw the end of this dream.

4) this one is a bit different from the others. Apparently my phone got hacked and my Snapchat story had a bunch of pictures I’ve never taken of me in poses I’ve never done with really strange captions like lyrics to songs I’ve never heard. So I look through my messages and stuff and it’s like I’m talking shit about myself as if I’m a completely different person. So I check my Instagram and same thing. But people were starting to ask if I was ok and stuff. Then there was a post on my account saying, “ if you hate this person follow me @ ANameIDontRemember (I don’t actually think I read the name of the account. But somehow I got into their account and I see messages of everyone saying some pretty mean stuff. Idk why this was so different but ya.

[mittensmorgul]

The State of the Dean

Round Two of the Great Meta Scavenger Hunt, aka the hold my beer meta challenge, invites us to rank either all the season premieres or all the season finale episodes according to whatever metric we choose. I originally had the notion that I’d write up something Very Serious about Dean’s association with family, and how that’s held him back, helped him move forward, or just how he’s grown over the years. But then I started throwing random cracky listicles directly at Lizbob and she pointed out that maybe instead of sending her season by season crack entries via the bubble message thingy, I should probably just post them here. This is my official entry, but I’ll be posting a(n even) crack(ier) entry, too (just for fun, not for points).

I could write a 12 (or 11 1/2) season long dissertation on the evolution of Dean’s feelings toward family and relationships, but that’s basically my blog. I’ve been informed that the entirety of a blog doesn’t qualify as a “listicle,” so I’ve chosen to select a very small snippet at the very end of each season finale to assess Dean’s state of mind season to season. Here we go!

(ranked as -/12, 1 being Dean’s personal best, and 12 being Dean’s personal worst)

1.22: Seeing as how he was unconscious in the back seat of the Impala and being rushed to the hospital, I think he was in a pretty grave state (hur hur grave). 7/12 just for the fact that he was literally unconscious and wouldn’t remember it anyway

2.22: On the surface, this seems like a VAST improvement over his state in 1.22. He’s walking upright and fully conscious, for one. He’d finally gotten revenge on the demon who’d killed his mother. He got to see John escape from Hell and head off toward, theoretically, heaven. Not everything was hunky-dory, of course. They’d managed to slam the Hellgate shut again, but not before a bunch of other demons escaped into the world. Oops? Oh, and there was the small matter involving the sale of his soul to hell and the fact he’s only got one year to live. Kinda problematic there, Dean. 3/12 (just for the Major Win Factor of killing Yellow Eyes. He’ll push the rest down until he can’t ignore it any longer, but for the time being it was a win)

3.16: The writer’s strike shortened season ended on a particularly low note for Dean. Torn apart by hellhounds and consigned to hell. Yes. A “low note” indeed. 12/12 i mean really how does it get worse than this?

4.22: Good news: Dean’s not in hell. Bad news: Hell came to Earth. That’s right, Lucifer’s on the loose. Also notable because of the MAJOR rift between Sam and Dean, trust issues, demon blood addiction, and hubris, basically. It’s not all bad, because at least Dean’s got a friend (oops until he’s blown up, but it’s okay. Cas will be fine in a day or two...) 9/12 LUCIFER IS WALKING THE DAMN EARTH FFS

5.22: Possibly worse than being in hell: thinking Sam is stuck in a small box in hell with Lucifer. It’s so bad that Dean essentially walks away from everything he’s ever known or loved to join the White Picket Fence league with a woman he’s spent a grand total of four days of his entire life with. Let me repeat: He gave up HIS ENTIRE LIFE to completely reinvent himself WITH SOMEONE HE BARELY KNEW. Just to save himself from having to think about the ~entirety of his life to that point~. Talk about fucking depressing. 12/12 yes this might be cheating but I couldn’t decide which would be worse for Dean-- Sam in Hell or him in Hell. So, tie.

6.22: Yeah, Cas’s plan to stop the Apocalypse Reboot worked, but with one VERY BIG DRAWBACK. Baby’s wrecked, Sam’s crazy, and Cas has literally let all that newfound power go straight to his head. Dean’s adrift again. No amount of juggling can keep all those balls in the air. (BALLS!) 8/12 Owie

7.23: Sure, he and Cas got Dick, but landed themselves in Purgatory for their troubles. So, one huge win, and one huge loss. 5/12 because hey, win! but also wtf gorilla wolves and Cas flaps off to who tf knows where

8.23: A little forgiveness, a little abandonment. He stopped Sam from finishing the Hell Trials, but Cas flew off before he could stop him from falling into Metatron’s trap, and now he’s got a half-dead Sammy, the nearly human King of Hell in his trunk, and no idea what happened to Cas. (honestly Dean here makes me think of Homer Simpson that time Lisa pushed his pig down the hill and he chased after it until it launched through the air shouting “It’s just a little airborne! It’s still good! It’s still good!” and that just makes me wanna cry okay) 10/12 for the most airborne roasted pigs ever at one time

9.23: *flish* but hey at least he’s not dead-dead, right? I think this is the one time where Dean *in that moment* (if we could interview Dean at the end of each season finale and ask his current state of mind) would’ve said he’d felt better than he ever had before. Because his feelings were kinda... non-existent. So while it was probably like a little vacation from the burden of being Dean Winchester for him, for us it meant five months of anguish (and laughing through our anguish with crack theories about him getting stuck in demon traps and getting tricked into drinking holy water) 2/12 (from Dean’s pov at least, at the time)

10.23: Well, he’d just killed Death, which is kind of one of those nervous laughter what the fuck have I done major life reevaluation moments in itself, but then ZAP the Mark of Cain is gone. He gets five minutes to feel good about all of that when oops, Something Is Seriously Wrong, and we have the Darkness. At least he’s 100% back to being himself after a year and a half fighting against the Mark... or is he? 4/12 for serving Death his last meal and finally getting free of the mark... sort of

11.23: He’s resigned himself to the fact that he needs to die, but then he manages to Dr. Phil God and the Darkness into reconciliation. Definitely a high point in Dean’s life. As far as he knows, all his friends and family are safe, even if said friends and family don’t know yet that HE’S safe. And that he’s bringing home an unexpected guest in the form of his resurrected mother. It’s all a little overwhelming and happy and he doesn’t exactly know where to even BEGIN processing it all.  1/12 for major successes all around (since he doesn’t know Sam’s been abducted yet)

BONUS: since we don’t know where the winds of s12 will blow, but we do know where the midseason finale left us:

12.08: MAJOR win on tossing Lucifer back into the cage. MAJOR loss on getting tossed into the human version of the cage. 6/12 for being pretty well balanced, the bad against the good.

So, to recap, season finales in order of Dean’s Personal Best to Dean’s Personal Worst:

s11

s9

s2

s10

s7

s12 (at the midseason finale)

s1

s6

s4

s8

and tied for last place, s3 and s5.