#it's not really anti feyre

[thrumbolt]

It will never stop being amusing to me that the warning Ianthe gives Tamlin in the beginning of ACOMAF about how Feyre will get either killed or abducted by other high lords and kept for breeding essentially came true.

How Feyre ended up exactly how she feared she would with Tamlin: A waifu who does basically nothing except have her little art studio and her little desk job and pops out babies for the high lord. Sure, what you want in life can change and consent makes all the difference, but it is still an absolutely WILD narrative choice.

[shadowqueenjude]

Still makes me laugh that Feyre was all shocked and impressed that Lucien didn’t back down from the Inner Circle when he grew up with Beron as a father; sir he is experienced. To him, Rhys is child’s play.

[littlefeltsparrow]

My hunch is that Sarah J Maas genuinely doesn’t get how much of a violation it was for Rhysand to lie by omission to Feyre about her pregnancy. Maas, like many other fans, most likely views his actions as wrong, but ultimately forgivable. In other words, she sees it as a white lie of omission that was ultimately done because Rhysand loves Feyre and cares so much about her well-being that he’d do anything to keep her happy. This is why Rhysand is so easily forgiven and why his actions are swept under the rug.

What she doesn’t comprehend is the frightening implication that Rhysand can commandeer Feyre’s healthcare based on his own personal judgement and get their friends to back him up on it. She doesn’t grasp how him omitting that information effectively prevents Feyre from making an informed choice, and why that amounts to reproductive abuse. Furthermore, she ignores how infantilizing it is for him to treat Feyre like she’s so mentally fragile that she cannot be trusted with her own medical information.

Rhysand is her little good boy, so she’d never have him do anything she didn’t think was forgivable.

[ofbreathandflame-archive]

I've always, always, always, argued that SJM's racism is intentional. People undermine the conversation about racism in SJM by arguing that her racism is just a little, fickle mistake. I really aggressively need to push back against this point - I don't think SJM is an idiot blonde woman who does not recognize the racism in her writing. If anything the reason why I've persisted this long talking about the problems in her story is because I was initially taken aback by just how intentional the racism is.

For example, the Illyrians. We talk about how ambiguous they are, but I think its one of the biggest examples of intentionality in the texts. The Illyrians purposely operate in this realm of uncertainty. Whether or not they are actually men of color has always been a moot point - it's about the intentionality of creating this race of men that embody these very weird, intentional traits. SJM knew that she wanted these men to be dark, violent, and warrior-like, but she also don't want them to be specifically categorized as men of color because the story simply doesn't see these men of color as desirable (see: Tarquin, Helion, Thesan - think about how they are characterized). It's also why I've argued that the story purposely doesn't associate the Illyrians as lesser fae, even though for all intent and purposes they are. The Illyrians are simultaneously the best (leathers, weapons, fighting) and the worst (culture, misogyny, hyperviolent). The story is also very intentional about how it characterizes the Illyrians concerning Rhys. Emerie just so happens to be the only one of her entire friend group that's not drop-dead gorgeous; notice how Amren is also described similarly when she is introduced initially. Everyone in the IC is gorgeous, beautiful, the most beautiful, but Amren the only explicit person of color, is described as being just plain.

The point is that these are very intentional writing choices - eerily specific, in my opinion. SJM is very intentional about the ways in which she chooses to 'represent' people of color in her series (see: Nehemia, Sorcha, Nesryn, Nuala, Cerridwen, Emerie, Fury, etc). Even think about the ways in which characters like Alis border on minstrelsy in their depiction. It's not just the representation, its the way certain traits are aligned with certain people, specifically people of color. I remember I made a post on my last blog about the ways in which SJM has her characters of color operate in this permanent semi-disposable position. There is always a way in which their white (white-passing) peers are always explicitly better (see: Hunt/Baxian, Helion/Nesta, Tarquin/Feyre, Yrene/Aelin - I have words for this one too).

In short, I don't think SJM is ignorant - not in the way people think. I actually think she is much smarter than even her own fans give her credit for and its why both her own stories and booktok/tube/gram have honestly gotten worse. I feel like oft times the pro and anti sides are just observing the same things (literally - the arguments are identical), but the difference is the pro sides don't think its a big deal partially because they believe that SJM is a whimsy white women who just can't understand she's wrong. Its why the argue that SJM is 'working to get better' even though she's written, at this point, over fifteen books.

[1800naveen]

I can't take it seriously.

Feyre crying into her eggs as Rhysand reads off how Nesta spent is wild.

You're telling me Feyre Archeron, High Lady of the night court, defender of the rainbow, curse breaker, savior of Prythian, is crying because her sister spent money??

And these guys are rich too. Mor literally said that she could go on a spree and not make a dent in her money. (Where in the hell do they get their money??)

THIS SERIES IS SO GOOFY, I CAN'T-

(Feyre when her sister spends her mate's money even though they're rich):

[starrbirrd]

I think probably the saddest thing about Feyre is that she genuinely has no friends of her own. Her "friend group" was loyal to her husband hundreds of years before she was born and have proven more than once that they still defer to him over her. The one friend she might have had (Lucien) has been completely estranged from her. I've said it before and I'll say it again, the Feyre in ACOSF is living ACOTAR Feyre's worst nightmare.

[feyres-divorce-lawyer]

related, i truly believe that any stan gunning for an adaptation don’t realize acotar’s success is dependent on the fact that it’s textual and not visual. like with text, interpretation shapes understanding but with video you can’t really look at feyre getting drugged and being forced to dance over and over again and say “oh yeah this is helping her” like acotar will not survive contact with the general public

[gwandas]

Underrated hilarious aspect of Rhysand’s “mask” being that no other High Lord needs to do all that.

He’s acting like he has to act like a villain and mistreat 2/3 of his court to rule it when that doesn’t seem to be true anywhere else? Why are we acting like Velaris is so great when I’d honestly rather be one of Thesan or Helion’s subjects.

The only High Lord who might be worse than him is Beron who is actually evil. Which says… something about Rhys I fear.

[dippedinmelancholy]

Something about both Nesta and Elain having dreams of the continent and of travel in some capacity. The freedom and utter fucking dream of a woman in the era the human realms (and honestly the fae realms too) having the funds and freedom to do so, how rare it is as women have very little place outside of homemakers and wives. Nesta and Elain both having dreams of finding themselves and happiness after a childhood of trauma of watching their mother die horribly, their father broken, and losing everything they ever had with truly their only hope of escape being marriage. Nesta and Elain finally on the cusp of reaching for their dreams, of having the space to find themselves and their dreams without the terror of starvation and endlessly cold winters that brought the threat of death every year. Nesta and Elain, taken from their beds by cruel soldiers who mocked and abused them. Nesta and Elain, nothing more than pawns in Hybern’s attempt to get allies in the human realms. Nesta and Elain watching their dreams shatter into nothingness as they are violated, boiled alive, reshaped into a thing that once enslaved their entire race of people. Nesta and Elain, shoved into a home high reaching into the skies with no escape, no contact with their sister, surrounded by the monstrous race that enslaved them, both victims to this new, horrible alien power in their veins. Nesta and Elain, pawns to their sister and her new “family”, only welcome as long as they play nicely. Nesta and Elain, stripped of their dreams, watching everything they once wanted ripped away. Nesta and Elain, beautiful and immortal, but nothing more than pawns against the men they never asked to be connected to. Nesta and Elain, who’s stomachs don’t tremble in hunger, but a new starvation settled deep in the marrow of their bones, a hunger that will never be sated, because they will forever be pawns to these fae monsters. Forever trapped. Forever indebted.

There’s no freedom for those the cauldron reshapes. Only death and a place in a game they never wanted to play. There are no dreams now, only hunger for what they will never have again. They will never see the world, they will never know what freedom tastes like. There is no escape from the sins of their childhood, no escape from the men or court a monstrous entity tied them to without permission. There is only expectation and the death of all they were.

[goldenspringmornings]

oh god I don’t know how I hadn’t actually noticed before but fey/sand really got married after knowing each other for five months how does this series keep being worse than twilight😭😭

[deathbealady]

This is going to be a sort of incomplete bunch of thoughts, but:

I know that the 500+ year age gap between Feyre and Rhysand is like, Not Good, but I think a huge factor in why Feysand manages to work is because despite his big age, Rhysand’s mental/emotional maturity is not much more evolved than Feyre. (The whole IC is kind of like this, in fact, but I’m not going to get into that rn)

Ultimately, I think Feyre and Tamlin couldn’t have worked out in the long run, because for all of his own faults and shortcomings, Tamlin as an individual was/is already much more mature than Feyre, and that’s a gap that’s hard to bridge.

As it is, Feyre has a gigantic chip on her shoulder as the youngest sister who lacked the education of her sisters, so I think there’s a lot to be said about the weird feelings of inferiority she likely had around Tamlin. Like, I think it’s part of why Feyre wouldn’t accept Tamlin’s offers to help her learn to read, but she accepted the lessons with Rhysand; it’s like she perceived Tamlin’s higher level of maturity as placing him above her, therefore his default state meant he was “looking down on her” even if that wasn’t the case. It’s similar to how she said Nesta as her older sister wouldn’t have deigned to help her learn to read. It’s also arguably part of why people see a lot more initial chemistry between Feyre and Lucien in ACOTAR. Feyre warmed up to Lucien faster because he was being snarky and a dick, and that was easier for her to navigate than the quiet brooding of Tamlin

Anyway, like Lucien in ACOTAR, Rhysand’s offers to help in ACOMAF were similarly snarky and kind of immature in a way that essentially was disarming for Feyre, so she was more inclined to accept his help. In this sense, Rhysand and Feyre are definitely equals, just perhaps not the way that SJM intended

[ladydeath-vanserra]

remember when Tamlin set the sisters up financially so they could find stability after Feyre was taken without prompting or asking but then Rhys promises to keep the sisters safe after he and Feyre ask for their help, Feyre who had also said she'd make them help if she had to, and then he failed to keep that promise and it led to them being murdered bec I do

[separatist-apologist]

Feyre: Rhysand is my mate and I'm telling you this to your face.

Also Feyre: If you try and break my mating bond, I'm going to ruin your life.

Also Feyre: If you drag me back to Spring against my will, I'll destroy everything you love.

Tamlin: Break her mating bond so I can drag her back to Spring and we can start over.

Also Tamlin: I can't believe you destroyed everything I love and ruined my life!

[novaricewrites]

If Magic Chooses-

So we know the magic in Prythian ties the land, Courts, and the High Lords and can be vaguely sentient (as with the Cauldron).

It's unclear how it chooses the High Lords but the magic seems to be deliberate and adheres faithfully to whoever it chooses. Even Amarantha couldn't fully access it despite all that she did - she could only prevent the Lords from using it against her.

So imagine if this was explored.

E.g: The time when Feyre and the IC stole the Book of Breathings from the Summer Court as guests - literally committing a crime worthy of a magical death sentence. This then left the Summer Court open to Hybern's invasion, further enabled by what Feyre did in the Spring Court.

This didn't just harm the High Lords. It harmed the Courts in a major way. The very land and the people living in there were devastated by it. And it must have caused mass turmoil that even the magic sensed.

So imagine because of this intricate connection to the land, the people and the High Lords - it caused Feyre's bond to the Spring and Summer magic to become hard to control or even the magic rejecting her.

The kernels of magic are technically still the High Lords'. They're not Feyre's magic but were gifted like handing her a scale off their essence. And it would make sense if the magic reacted to the state of the High Lords (and deeper the courts themselves) if they experienced deep, visceral emotions & damage thanks to Feyre.

Magic being fickle about who wields it would sort of suit the capriciousness of Faeries. It would also require Feyre to use her wits and sense to navigate situations instead of resorting to the Feysand tactics of Lie, Steal and Justify.

It would give actual consequences and gravity to her actions, and add depth to why her being a Made Fae is a big deal. She is now attached via these kernels of magic to the land in a way that she can't run from. Just as High Lords (even those reluctant like Tamlin are).

Just the plot potential and character development. And the internal conflict over actions that we never got.

[azrielsbreedingkink]

Guys did you know Feyre is actually a selfish whore who is an unreliable narrator? Obviously why SJM had her be the main POV for 4/5 books in this series, cause having an unreliable narrator is exactly what she intended!

/s

[alicentsaegon]

Can we talk how lukewarm Feysand is as an enemies to lovers ship because I am TIRED of their relationshiop being labelled as such. Enemies to lovers is not him tormenting her for 1/3 of book one and then them becoming allies in the first 100 pages of the second 700 page book. That's not enemies to lovers