#its the gay people sucking and fucking terrible decisions show

[laesas]

I need everyone to start tagging their Only Friends meta, if only so I can more effectively blacklist people's pseudo-intellectual garbage

[lol-jackles]

austinite opinion on the Ackles leaving this godforsaken city —

if I were jensen I would take my family and leave too. Austin has had its issues over several years and the infrastructure can’t take the strain of its population much longer, and then covid was added on top. their kids are getting older and even a rich kid’s school options suck. the traffic is just straight up dangerous w/ very high rates of drunk driving and weird aggressive stuff, its like a vehicular manslaughter competition even in nice residential areas. What’s the point in having a nanny take the kids for the day if you’re worrying they’ll get hit by a truck on a crosswalk on the way to the park????

the city’s terrible policies on homelessness mean even in upscale neighborhoods theres problems related to people camping or dumping trash and a lot of weird violence and mental health crises, and the city has resources for probably only 15% of its homeless population and the mayor and gov are eager to make decisions that make the problem worse like they’re hoping homeless people will just die off. in 2018 the entire county’s water supply was //full of rotting clams// and was unusable for a week, and then in the ice storm this year the state’s privatized power grid failed, and even the padaleckis had bursting pipes and dead animals.

6th St and Rainey St are garbage and violent and tbh I’m surprised it’s taken this long to trigger a mass shooting like the recent one on 6th, not to mention it’s more public that there are high rates of sexual assault downtown and at UT and the DA just…doesn’t attempt to prosecute at all.

Jared’s roofied scuffle on 6th looks shocking from an outside POV but if you’re local it’s mundane. And I do think he was roofied, I showed the videos to a family member with a law enforcement background and he agreed. whether he was or not, that kind of crap happens two or three dozen times a night downtown thurs-sat and there were extra cops downtown that night bc it was halloween and extra crazy. Local people mostly got a kick out of it happening to jared like it was a down to earth kinda thing.

I know it doesn’t seem like privileged people should gaf or be affected by most of this but it sucks the fun out of anywhere you go here unless you gtfo out of the city (which is why the brewery is actually in a great location, right on the main route to big day tripping attractions) like yeah, theres all this quirky stuff to do in Austin but when a gay couple is nearly beat to death on open popular Rainey St and a homeless guy throws himself off a restaurant on SoCo during lunch rush it’s a fucking bummer.

And then you add covid and police violence on top of all that, and all the tourism/SXSW/ACL revenue and entertainment is tanked and that definitely derailed some of the Ackles’ plans, like the B&B they bought. but even if 2020 was a normal year those events are so congested now they aren’t very enjoyable even if you’re VIP.

but property taxes are the main thing: before they sold the lake house, tax laws about lakeshore property changed— previously it was barely taxed if at all bc of an old law from when no one wanted to build on the lakeshore like 40 yrs ago. Suddenly that untapped property tax potential is under a political microscope and I was like, I bet the Ackles will move and the Padaleckis won’t bc their property isn’t on the lake…and within a year the Ackles sold the lake house. absolutely not a coincidence.

so regardless of the state of their marriage (I really don’t buy what’s said about their marriage) austin isn’t what it was 10-15 years ago. They probably shouldn’t come back lol

Colorado is not far behind being turned into a shithole thanks to the Democrats running the state.  Whenever Democrats control a city it always turns into a shithole.

"How Decades Of Democratic Rule Ruined Some Of Our Finest Cities" https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/how-decades-of-democratic-rule-ruined-some-of-our-finest-cities/

[takerfoxx]

In response to JK Rowling and Joss Whedon, my (former) idols

I really didn’t want to have to do this.

So in addition to…=gestures vaguely=…all of that, the last few months have been kind of sucky when it comes to learning some really unpleasant things about artists that I looked up to, admired, and was in fact inspired by. I’ve already spoken about the Speaking Out movement revealing a lot of ugly behavior from various wrestlers, some of which I was big fans of, and then later we got Chris Jericho being a full-on MAGA. Yeah, that all sucked. But those were just performers whose work I enjoyed watching. The one that really hurt were writers who I deeply admired, whose stories I love, and who I was heavily influenced by.

The first, of course, was finding out that JK Rowling, the author of perhaps the single biggest YA fantasy series of all time Harry Potter, is a TERF. This really sucked for a number of reasons. Firstly, I really like Harry Potter! I mean, I’m not a super fan or anything. I came into it when things were kind of dying down, like the whole book series had already been released and there were only a few movies left, but I still really enjoyed it, have all the books and movies and a fair amount of merchandise swag, including a nifty wand I got at Universal Studios. Shit, I got two replicas of the Sword of Griffyindor, thanks to them screwing up my order in my favor and sending me a duplicate! They’re on my wall right across from me as I type this!

But in addition to writing a book series I really liked, JK Rowling was supposed to be one the good guys. She’s been vocally progressive, often openly comes down on British right-wing nonsense, has supported various persecuted minorities, and is on record as being one of the few self-made billionaires to actually stop being a billionaire for a time because she donated so much money to charity. And while we mock it now, her revealing Dumbledore as gay was a huge deal at the time. Plus, she cultivated this reputation as Auntie Jo, that cool, supportive aunt we all wanted.

But for a while her stock has been dropping. Her preference for confirming “representation” via tweets instead of explicitly putting it in the text of her stories has raised the question of queer-baiting, especially with a whole-ass movie with a young Dumbledore and Grindelwald to make their relationship explicit but failing to do so. The whole Nagini thing from the latest Fantastic Beasts movie was pretty gross. And re-examination of various problematic elements from the original novels has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. Now, none of these really looked to be intentionally malicious, of course. Just about everyone’s early work will have problematic elements; that’s just how people work. And the later stuff smacked more of ignorance than anything. But after all this time, it’s like, c’mon. You should know better by now.

But the biggie came when her transphobic views finally came to light. Now, this one had been brewing for a while, due to some questionable likes and statements on her twitter. But then she decided to just go public and published what essentially amounts to a TERF manifesto, one with a very “love the sinner, hate the sin” condescending attitude and had a real persecution complex air to it.

Now, I’m not going to go into detail about what the manifesto was about, what the circumstances surrounding it were, or how wrong it was. It’s already been raked over the coals, dissected, answered, and debunked in detail by people far more qualified than me, so odds are, you’re already well aware of its contents and the subsequent rebuttals. But the gist of it comes down to her basically believing that transwomen are actually cis men claiming to be trans so as to infiltrate and invade female-only spaces.

Yeah.

Okay, that’s gross, but…why? Why is someone so noted for being progressive and wanting to foster an inclusive environment making this the hill of exclusion that she wants to die on?

Well, that’s where things get tricky. She mentions that prior to Harry Potter, her first marriage was highly physically and sexually abusive, and when she escaped from that, she had no place to go, leading her to be homeless for a time.

Oh.

Well, that makes sense. Someone goes through a highly traumatic experience with a member of the opposite sex, has no support structure when she escapes it, is left to fend for herself, only to suddenly get rocketed into fame, fortune, and influence, which in turn leads to a Never Again mentality. She was hurt, no one was there to help her, and now she’s afraid of men invading women-only spaces to victimize others like she was victimized. So…literally transphobic. Literally a Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist.

Guys, this is so fucked up. Like, how do you even approach something like this? She’s a victim in every sense of the word, so of course she’s going to have physiological damage and a warped view of things. I mean, if I found out that a close friend of mine went through the same thing and had the same prejudices, I would be nothing but sympathetic! I mean, I’d still do what I can to convince her to overcome those prejudices, but I’d still show sympathy and support for what she went through.

Abuse warps people. There’s a reason why so many abusers are abuse survivors themselves. It makes you terrified of being hurt again and often causes people to adopt toxic behaviors, beliefs, and reactions to protect themselves. I’ve already talked about it at length while discussing She-Ra and its own handling of the cycle of abuse, which included franks discussions of Catra’s horrible behavior, why she was the way she was, while never losing sympathy for her and rooting for her to overcome it. So if JK Rowling is an abuse survivor, is it really right to come down on her for having warped views because of that abuse?

But that’s the problem. See, she isn’t your troubled friend that you’re trying to help. She isn’t your cousin Leslie who’s a really sweet person but unfortunately adopted some bad ideals due to trauma suffered. She JK freakin’ ROWLING, one of the most famous, wealthy, and influential women in the world. She has a platform of millions, if not billions, which means her voice lends credibility to her bigoted beliefs. Alt-righters and other TERFs have already swooped upon this for giving validation to their awful beliefs, which puts trans people even more at risk. And as horrible as Rowling’s experiences might have been, the trans community is often the victim of far worse, and they don’t have a mountain of money and an army of defenders to protect them like she does. I’ve said it time and time again: just because you’re a victim, that doesn’t give you the right to victimize others! And bringing things back to Catra, as much as I loved her redemption in the final season, she was still a TERRIBLE PERSON for a huge chunk of the show, one that needed to be stood up to and stopped.

So yeah. That’s the messiness that is JK Rowling.

Now, let’s talk about the one that really hurts. Let’s talk about Joss Whedon.

I’ve made no secret of what a huge Whedon fan I am. Unlike Rowling, I was a HUUUUUGE superfan. Seeing Serenity for the first time in theaters was akin to a religious awakening to me as a storyteller, making it one of my top three movies of all time. Firefly is my favorite show ever. And I adored Buffy, Angel, and Dollhouse as well. I love Cabin in the Woods and The Avengers. The very first fanfic I ever wrote was a Firefly fanfic that disappeared along with my old laptop. I know his style isn’t for everyone, but I cannot understate how much of a personal inspiration he is to me as a writer.

And like Rowling, Joss was supposed to be one of the good guys! Buffy was monumental in pushing the needle when it came to female empowerment. Will and Tara were groundbreaking as a gay couple. He’s been outspoken for years about his feminist views and beliefs and was seen as one of the most prominent and influential feminist voices in Hollywood!

And then things started to go bad.

One day he was on top of the world, the mastermind behind the first two Avenger movies. And the next, it seemed like he was in freefall. It’s hard to really pinpoint exactly when the change took place. Some would say him being brought in as a last-minute substitute for Zack Snyder to take over on Justice League after Snyder had to leave due to family tragedy, and the subsequent awful critical reception to that film tarnishing his image, even if those were very unique circumstances that couldn’t really be blamed on him. Others might point to Age of Ultron’s less than stellar reception, as well as criticism of some questionable jokes and certain creative decisions regarding the character of Black Widow, which then led to a more critical examination of how Whedon continues to write female characters, as while his work might have been revolutionary in the 90’s, his failure to evolve with the times had meant that many of his portrayals are now woefully outdated and problematic, with his vision for a Batgirl movie getting hit with a lot of backlash as a result.

Again, I’m not going to go into too much detail, as this is all public knowledge and can be easily looked up, but overall it seemed that Whedon entered into a period where he was getting criticized more than he was celebrated, and his image of a guaranteed hit maker was now in doubt.

But all of this wasn’t the big problem. All creators go through rises and slumps, and everyone hits points where they get hit with a barrage of criticism; that’s just part of being a public creative figure, especially a progressive one. And had nothing happened after, it would have probably faded, got forgotten, and Whedon would have moved onto the next project with no fuss.

But as it turned out, it wasn’t just a minor slump in his career. Instead, it was the priming of the pump.

In 2016, Whedon divorced his wife of sixteen years, Kai Cole, and in an open letter, Kai Cole accused him of being a serial cheater, who would have affairs with a great many women, from co-workers, to actresses, to friends, to even his fans. And in addition to raising questions of him possibly abusing his position as showrunner to elicit sex from those working on his projects, there also is the ugly question of how could someone who speaks so highly of women then go and backstab the person who was supposed to be the most important woman in his life, as well as lying to her and denying her the autonomy of deciding whether or not she even wanted to continue to have a relationship with him?

Furthermore, Whedon himself has not explicitly denied these accusations, and comments made by him seem only to confirm them.

Now if you’ll recall, I reacted publicly to this news, and despite my admiration of Whedon’s work, I came down on Kai Cole’s side, and stated that while things like marriage issues and infidelity were no one’s business but that of the couple’s, it did raise a lot of uncomfortable questions about how Whedon treated the women in his life and he really needed to get his shit in order.

But hey, a messy private life and a guy falling into temptation isn’t that big of a deal, right? Plenty of creators also go through multiple marriages and have problems staying faithful and still continue making great art. We’re all human, it’s a stressful job, and this shit just happens, right? Sure, it’s gross and a shitty thing to do, but ain’t no business of ours, right?

In late 2020, actor Ray Fisher, who played the role of Cyborg in Justice League, openly accused Joss Whedon of fostering a hostile work environment, claiming that the director’s behavior was abusive and unprofessional, and that Whedon in turn was protected by DC executives.

DC and Warner Bros. came down against Fisher, claiming they had done an internal investigation that turned up no evidence of wrongdoing (yeah, sure they did), and soon Fisher was out as Cyborg, apparently for rocking the boat.

But then Charisma Carpenter, noted for her important role as Cordelia Chase in both Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, then spoke up, claiming to be inspired by Fisher in doing so. She described Whedon did indeed foster a hostile work environment on his projects, that his often acted in a toxic manner, from asking incredibly invasive and inappropriate questions regarding her pregnancy to insulting her on set. She said that she made excuses for him for years, but after undergoing a lot of therapy and reading what Ray Fisher had to say, she felt compelled to speak out.

And this just open the floodgates. Other actors and actresses also came forward, some with stories of their own, others to offer support. Even Buffy herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar, confirmed Carpenter’s stories and said that she no longer wanted to be associated with Whedon. Michelle Trachtenberg, who played the character of Dawn, stated that she also experienced toxic treatment from Whedon despite her being a minor at the time, and says that the set had a rule that Whedon wasn’t allowed to be alone with her again, which really raises some sickening questions of what happened the first time. Even male stars have spoken out, from words of support and apologies for not speaking up earlier from Anthony Stewart Head and David Boreanaz, to an earlier interview with James Marsters, in which he described being terrified of Whedon, mainly due to an instance when Whedon was frustrated with the popularity of Marsters’s character of Spike messing with his plans and physically and verbally taking it out on the actor. There have been many corroborating stories of Whedon being casually cruel on set, on seemingly taking delight in making his fellow show writers cry, and even the man himself admitting to enjoying fostering a hostile work environment during his director commentary of the Avengers. We’ve joked about Whedon’s supposed sadism for years, but that was in regards to how he treated the characters in his stories, not the people helping him make them!

So yeah. That’s the problem with Joss Whedon.

So, do I think that Joss Whedon is somehow some kind of sociopath who lied about his feminist principles and deliberately put on a progressive façade specifically to get into a position of power so he could torment people? No, of course not. I think he was sincere about his beliefs, and I do think he didn’t realize the wrongness of his behavior. But that’s kind of the problem. See, it’s one thing to have kind of a trollishness to your nature, a sort of sadistic side. No one can help that. But when someone with that quality gets put into a position of power in which they are protected by both the higher-ups and their legions of fans, they are allowed to mistreat and continue to mistreat people. And by never suffering any consequences, that sort of toxic behavior becomes internalized, becomes a habit, becomes their moda operandi. And when you’re constantly getting praised as a creative genius and a wonderful feminist voice, any self-criticism just gets wiped away, and you think yourself above reproach, leading to what Joss Whedon became and went on being.

And you know what scares me the most about this particular issue? It’s not that I am a fan of his stories. It’s that I can so easily see myself turning out the same way.

Look, I’ll be upfront about it: I’m kind of a sadist myself. You’ve seen it in my stories, you’ve seen me gloating after a particularly dark plot twist makes my readers freak out. That sort of stuff is fun to me. There’s a reason why I have a much easier time in the dark and violent scenes, because I’m channeling something ugly within me. We all have a dark side, and this is mine.

But UNLIKE Whedon, that doesn’t carry over to how I treat people in real life (unless Monopoly or Mario Party are involved, then it’s fair game). Maybe it’s because I wasn’t given the sort of power and praise he did so early, and I was always taught to be considerate of other people’s feelings, but if I ever find out that I hurt another person or went too fair, I feel TERRIBLE, and it just throws me off all day until I apologize. Even if I don’t notice right away that what I said or did wasn’t cool (autistic, remember?), when it’s pointed out to me and I have some time to think on it, yeah, the guilt is on and I make a point to apologize to whoever I’ve hurt. I’ve even made a point to apologize to members of my family for inconsiderate stuff I said years ago as a little punk kid because it wouldn’t stop bugging me.

So maybe Whedon got too big, too fast. Maybe putting people on these sorts of pedestals, especially progressive ones, is ultimately a bad thing.

So where does this leave us? How are we to treat JK Rowling and Joss Whedon, one who developed a lot of transphobia due to abuse suffered while the other became a toxic individual due to unchecked control and a lack of consequences? Can we still enjoy their stories despite them now being colored by their creators’ falls from grace? Can we separate the art from the artist, or do we have to do a clean split?

Honestly, I feel that has to come down to the individual. I can’t remove the influence Rowling and Whedon have had on me as a storyteller, and I still highly respect both of their talents despite taking major issue with their problems as people. And I’m not going go throw away all of my Harry Potter or Firefly stuff. Because that’s my stuff. It has value to me, it doesn’t represent the issues with their creators, and a lot of it was gifts from people who are dear to me. Though I do think it’ll be a long time before I return to either of their work, as I just don’t have the stomach for it now.

But I will be avoiding any projects they have in the future. I don’t want to put money in their pockets that might go on to support their toxic beliefs or behavior. And as for royalties for their past work that would also support the cast and crew of the Harry Potter films or those who worked on Whedon’s shows who do not deserve to lose money because we don’t want any of that money going to the creators? Er, that question is a little above my paygrade. I don’t know. You’ll have to all decide for yourselves. As for me, I still have a lot of thinking to do.

Regardless though, if I or anyone else is still able to enjoy their work, then it’s important to not divorce what these people said or did from the art they created, even if it makes enjoying that art less fun. It’s important to be critical about what we enjoy, to acknowledge the bad aspects along with the good, and open up discussion of those elements, because that’s what mature adults are supposed to do. 

And as for JK Rowling and Joss Whedon, whose stories I love, whose talent I admire, and whose past good work I’ll happily acknowledge, I do hope they both experience some sort of realization and enter into a period of self-examination that leads to them getting help for their issues, for Rowling to get help in coming to terms with her trauma and realizing that she’s wrong about the trans community and a full apology, and for Whedon to also come to terms with his toxic behavior and how he treats people, for him to make no excuse for what he did and sincerely apologize to those he hurt and work on bettering himself, as well as them both examining some of the more problematic tropes still present in their works. Because despite everything, I do feel that they can still be a creative force of good, and it would be a shame if they let themselves self-destruct.

But if not, then if it comes down to choosing between Rowling and the protecting the trans community, if it comes down between choosing between letting Whedon continue to make shows and protecting actors and writers from his abusive behavior, then I know who I’m siding with, and it ain’t the two individuals this whole essay is about. No story, no matter how good, no matter how creative, is worth letting sacrificing vulnerable people in order for it to be made.

[galaxyshine24-7]

Things I didn't like about Stranger Things Season 3

Now don't get me wrong I love Stranger Things. Its been such a fun ride and inspired me with its 80's feel and DnD vibe. I adored it and still do, I'm so excited for season 4 and can't wait to see the gang again. However when season 3 came out and I watched it certain things didn't sit well with me. So I guess I'm just getting them off my chest. Now reminder these are my opinions if you think something different that is completely fine. I'm just venting at this point and might view things differently from others. So read on if you want.

Spoilers Ahead

Relationships

My biggest struggle watching this season was how they handled relationships. Either how they where handled, or how they weren't handled, or things I see people overlook when it comes to them that should be addressed. So I shall go down the line on what I didn't like and analyze them.

Nancy and Johnathan

Over the seasons I have fallen in love with Nancy's character. I like how the show played into stereotypical 80's tropes. Nancy was the mean older sister, but soon turned into a badass sharp shooter. In this season her character wavered for me a bit. I still love her don't get me wrong, but I was upset a bit how she handled her and Johnathan's situation at the job.

I felt like neither Nancy or Johnathan really talked about how the other made them feel or really get that they understood anyone's plight with the dialogue we where given.

With Nancy is wanting to get on the case and find out what is happening. She wanted to shut up those rude assholes in her office and I applaud her for that. However during that time I don't think she was truly listening to Johnathan's concerns. Now say what you want about Johnathan, I do feel like at the end of the day that he loves and cares for Nancy and will back her up when he can, but in this case we the audience see him become frustrated when he gets fired from a job he really needs to support his family. Now mind you Johnathan had a bad time at the job too, but him being made fun of is something he has grown a thick skin too has seen in previous seasons. He explains to Nancy that his family doesn't come from much money. Honestly him and Will have the lowest income in the friend group compared to the other kids and to me watching them struggle through the seasons compared to the other kids homes. With Nancy she was going off to college and wouldn't need this job for long with how accomplished she is between the high schoolers we know she is probably the only one with plans on going to college. I was a bit upset she didn't consider Johnathan's emotions and situation beforehand discovering what was going one with the rats.

Now Johnathan isn't innocent either he should have been more compassionate with her problems since this was something she wasn't used too getting in a work place. He should have talked to her more and communicated, heck maybe try to find a different job together. With Nancy she admits to her mom how she was unfair to Johnathan. When she then meets him again they didn't have that dialogue with each other at all, instead a few quick lines that left me in a weird place. It felt unfinished and I was not convinced either really talked through it. It felt unfinished and left a weird taste in my mouth in regards with the two. All and all I just wish it was handled better, but I can say that about most things on this list.

Max and Eleven

Now when these two started hanging out I was excited I think their cute and I'm glade El got a friend who is a girl. Its fun to see them talk to each other and bond going on adventures, however I started to raise a brow at Max's behavior and advice. Now side note I know they are children and they are not going to be right about things like relationships all the time. I get that I really do, however I'm still pissed she gave El terrible advice, and I don't think she was fully held accountable for her and El spying on people which is not okay powers or not. I'm glade they started to find about about Billy, but they weren't looking for that and stumbled upon it from spying on others. Its just something they shouldn't do in general to be honest.

Max supports and cares about El I just believe she wasn't the greatest of friends in terms of relationship advice and how she acted towards Mike and the others. Max was projecting her experience with relationships onto El's and Mike's and it did not end well at all. It was up to El at the end of the day to make her own decisions and speak to Mike to fully understand the situation and talk to each other. I understand why people praise and love the relationship, but also don't see its faults or the problems it had. When I found out Max and Lucas break up every other week I was like "are you serious, and you went around giving El advice, and didn't see anything wrong with that?!" I don't think Max ever talked to El about it or El talk to Max more about it, and then there's the whole thing with Mike that I can talk about later.

I just feel like Max wasn't solely positive in her and El's relationship, and I wished El tried to find answers on her own instead of listening to everyone.

(P.S. When Max showed El Wonder Women which is nice. Max makes a comment when El points out Wonder Women and she said. "This is why you can't hang out with Mike all the time." I first I was like okay, showing El a female superhero is cool. However I got to thinking Wonder Women and El don't have much in common besides being women. Mike gave her Grand Master Yoda and he has more in common with El then Wonder Women does. In terms of powers and such Yoda fits more with El, and El is the wisest and level headed out of most of the kids in my opinion. I'm upset at the writers when they seem to forgot Mike gave her a hero more like her in what she can do and who she is. They should've chose someone like Jean Grey who uses her mind and is a red head like Max, it would've made more sense. She appeared in 1963 so Jean would have fit. Also maybe Mike showed her Yoda and thought more about what he does and says that reminds him of El then thinking about what gender she was. Just a thought I guess.)

The Friends Group

Now with age I understand relationships change and mature esxpecliy through friends. This is shown with Lucas and Mike wanting to hang out girlfriends and Dustin having his own thing with Steve. I can see why the writers did this to have different storylines going on but it was weird. You would think after all they been through, they wouldn't get has distanced as they did. It didn't feel like the group was whole and then at the end of the day Will moves. Mike and Lucas where distracted by their own relationships which I can understand, but the whole argument with Mike and Will was strange. You have these kids who fought tooth and nail to get Will back and they can barely give him the time of day?! I get you have girlfriends and such, but come on. It seemed out of character for this group after so much they went through together and to get Will back. The argument with Will and Mike was heartfelt and you could feel Will's plight and Mike's, I guess I was just upset out how distant it was, and how the kids just brushed each other off for their own drama when we've seen many times that they don't do that to this degree.

Characters

There where many characters I either had problems with how they where written or felt like there could've been more.

Mike

Mike's character I feel like was shit on a lot in this season from characters and some of the fanbase. Now I will say upfront that I like Mike, heck I like most of the characters in this show. They got faults and positives that I can see and understand. This season with Mike I feel like his character didn't get the understanding from the other seasons. He's either the bad guy, or the grumpy kid who brushes off all his friends for El. Mike is shown growing his relationship with El and trying his best to be a good boyfriend and protect her. It upsets me when people don't look at the all aspects of a character and see their flaws and good traits. With Mike we have seen this kid put his fucking life on the line for his friends and become distraught when he loses El someone he loves dearly. Its understandable why he is a grumpy mess during the last season, he sat and tried to reach out to El for 353 days when she left. He lost her for a whole year and never stopped trying to see if she was out there, just like for Will he never gave up.

It doesn't surprise me that Mike wanted to do all he can to protect El no matter what so he doesn't loose her again. However when Max starts accusing him of wanting to control her, basically saying he is trying to treat El like property it made my blood boil. We has the audience saw him fight for El and protect El, and never stop looking for El. Then getting this whole "women are a different species," narrative between him and Lucas. How the writers went about that was weird to me seemed a bit forced. For two guys we know fought along along side El and saw her has equal and feel for her, too oh women are a different species we can't understand them at all didn't make the much sense by how hard they where pushing it.

It kind of sucks to hear people hate Mike. Like if you do that's fine, its all good. I just feel like his character doesn't get a fair review at times. Will gets brought up a lot from what I seen. I agree that Mike was being insensitive and like I said before doesn't make sense to brush off Will like that after all they went through. People like to talk about the whole "Its not my fault you don't like girls." Side note I don't believe Will is gay. If you do go for it, I just see the situation a bit different. Will just came out of a very traumatic event and just wants to go back to normal just like the old times with his friends and the hurt he experiences with them all moving on and being not what he remembered. They where not what they used to be. With Mike he is growing up and moving on and in a fit of anger he tells Will its not his fault he doesn't like the relationships him and the others are forming. Like he saying its not his fault Will isn't growing up, and moving on. insensitive yes, but I can understand where both are coming from and dealing with different problems.

Mike isn't a prefect character, and he makes mistakes. I just felt like towards the beginning of the season till some of the end he wasn't treated the best writing wise.

Max

When I first met Max she was such a fun character I love them bringing her into the group. She is fiery and compassionate and I think she brings something new to the group of kids. I think she still does. In the third season I just had a lot of problems with her and her attitudes.

I have already explained her part in El and her relationship. I guess her attitudes towards Mike and Lucas I was upset about.

Lucas and Max didn't get lots of screen time to showcase there relationship more, but by the whole they break up every week detail and attitudes towards each other I don't think its that solely positive to be honest with the scenes we got.

Her attitudes towards Mike made me pissed off a bit. Yes, Mike should not have lied and Max is right to call it out, but to go to say he is controlling El and these other terrible things. To the audience we know that is not true seeing Mike goes to the ends of the Earth for El and Max knows how deeply her disappearance effected him. Mike stood in front of her and his friends from Max's abusive brother Billy. However in the third season she gets a whiff of him lying its like she has nothing to give him the benefit of the doubt on. When in fact she does. She reduces him to a controlling and lying boyfriend, and yes pushes that idea onto El and it just rubs me in the wrong way. I was very upset with Max and how the writers where treating some moments like something to praise. El dumping Mike was sad and upsetting I didn't find it very funny, but hey that's just me. She had El spy on people esxpecliy the boys and I feel she really doesn't get many consequences for it. However Mike is treated like a monster after getting threatened by Hooper and lying about it. He should not have lied of course, I just don't feel like they got equal treatment for their actions, and yes I know there kids they are stupid at times. I can still call out bad behavior and warning flags.

Billy Hargrove

Billy was wasted potential on the writers part. His character is a very known presence in the last two seasons. When you find out about his past and El reaching out to him, I feel like him sacrificing himself for the group and living could have been such a good example of character growth and getting better, and I feel like his story was cut to short for how much time and effort was put into his character. He was bad yes very bad, but with this latest season you got to see little sparks of his character come out more, his good sides. Billy Hargrove was wasted potential and I really hope they hold the dad accountable for his abuse in the next season, and also the mom. She was a victim yes, but she should not have left her son with to be emotionally and I believe physically damaged by his dad. His death should have consequences that all parties need to hear and see. If they really brush him under the rug I'll be pretty upset.

Alexi

I love his character and I just miss him is all.

That is just some of my thoughts on the third season I hear people say is one of the poorly written seasons of Stranger Things. Has much as I love the things in it. It has some writing issues and characterization where I would have to agree.

Welp those are just some of my thoughts. Love them or hate them its is what it is at the end of the day. I hope whoever is reading this has a nice day. Peace

[drunklander]

Drunj!Der Yells About Outlander

Thoughts on Ep. 506

STAY AT HOOOOOOOME!!!!!

Ok, now that that’s out of the way... I kind of liked this episode. Which surprised me. Because usually I find myself neutral at best. But, considering how much I’ve hated disliked the last few seasons, I guess that feeling mostly neutral means this season has been better? The bar is low, y’all.

Could 1000% still use more Claire though. And more Jamie and Claire. And yes I know I’m saying that in the recap for an episode where the two of them bang.

I said what I said.

The title card’s powder blocker thingy looks like a plague doctor mask. We should bring those back. I found a box that had a bunch of them in it in the closet at my office once. That was weird. Also, stay the fuck at home and 6′ away from people if you have to go out on a supply run or take a walk.

Ooo, a flashback! I miss Scotland.

“Whom do I address, sir?” “I am Samuel Torrington,” said the guy who is most def *not* Samuel Torrington.

I know I shouldn’t laugh because of what’s about to happen, but looool at the girl for stepping in the literal one spot of mud.

Well that was dumb. Why the fuck would you run in between your dad and the guy he’s clearly gonna shoot?

I mean, it’s super sad, I guess. But also hella dumb.

Ah, a lavender pillow. Yes, I know it’s from the book. But between this and the BJR stuff, it’s like, do they know other smells exist?

But yeah, guess I shouldn’t talk since I have lavender hand soap, lavender lotion, lavender tea and a lavender candle.

It’s the best smell.

Ok, I get why Murcasta can’t be endgame. That was a good decision. But including Innes BeCaUsE tHe BoOk is dumb af. They got to the right decision to break up Murcasta, but for the wrong fucking reason.

Like, seriously though, can we please take a moment to appreciate how dumb this is? Like, book!Innes is from Ardsmuir. He’s been part of the squad. He’s basically one of Jamie’s most trusted friends. And he marries Jocasta. Show!Innes is literally some dude we’ve never heard of until last week because the fucking writers were like oh, Jocasta has to marry someone named Duncan Innes. Guess we should make that happen, out of the blue, for no other reason. Lazy idiots...

Jocasta has better handwriting than I do and I can fucking see what I’m doing.

Also lol at her straight up ignoring Roger saying that Jemmy won’t take her money.

Cut to Jemmy crying about the fact that he is now a participant in chattel slavery. I feel you, Jem.

Oh, it’s a cold? Ok fine, but also the whole chattel slavery thing.

ADSOOOOO! Such a good lil floofer! Look how nice he is, bringing them that excellent bug! WHO’S A GOOD KITTY? YOUUU ARE!

I really like Claire’s necklace. Also Claire’s neck. Also Claire’s collarbones. Also Claire. Can we have more Claire please? And less manpain in general?

D’awww, Lord John Grey the awkward gay. GIVE HIM AN APPROPRIATE BOYFRIEND ALREADY, YOU COWARDS.

Tryon is such a fucking douche. So is Quincy Arbuckle.

Well, it might not prevent tumultuous and riotous assembly, but not hanging out in groups larger than 10 sounds like a greAT FUCKING IDEA RIGHT NOW.

STAY AT HOOOOOOOOOOOOME. (If you are able to, and if you have to go to work, WASH YOUR HAAAAAAAAAAAANDS.)

Fergus, Marsali and Bree standing around this room being disappointed with Roger is A Mood™.

Team Give Fergus and Marsali More to Do

Oh, you’ve never been comfortable in your big fancy mansion? Poor you. *plays the world’s smallest violin*

News spreads slowly in/from the backcountry except, apparently, Claire’s medical advice.

Claire Fraser said reproductive rights!!! *ups monthly donation to Planned Parenthood*

The casting for Wylie is fucking perfect. Like kudos to the casting folks again.

I cared more about the Regulator shit in the show than the book because Murtz, but all the “Oh it’s happening! JK, it’s not! JK, it is!” that they took from the book is making me care less about it. Just happen already or fuck off.

Yes, I know it’s gonna happen next week.

Roger shoveling shit makes me happy. Because it’s gross and I do not like Roger.

“You keep shoveling your shit.” -- The Fandom Bree

Wylie should be a caricature with how fucking terrible he is, but let’s be real. We've all run into a guy like that.

Oh, Claire’s rings.

I did some mental gymnastics years ago to try to wrap my brain around why Claire would still wear an emotionally abusive piece of shit’s Fred’s ring. And the fact that the books and the show are like nope, she just likes Fred, drives me up a fucking wall every time.

“He must have been quite the man to inspire such devotion after all these years.” “Nah, he was an asshole. A complete and utter piece of shit. And instead of going with that and all the complexities it brings, we continue to gaslight the audience that he was a Good Dude. Instead of using the ring as a symbol of something more than fucking Fred, we just keep on pretending he didn’t suck.”

I hate everyone involved with refusing to acknowledge how shitty Fred was.

There is literally only one smuggler in the Carolinas.

DO NOT GO WITH THE CREEPY MAN TO A SECOND LOCATION. CLAIRE, THIS IS BEING A WOMAN 101. NEVER GO WITH A CREEP TO A SECOND LOCATION.

“I get a biblical plague.” You get what you deserve, Rog.

Jamie, chill with the extra testosterone. Just punch the bro or something.

Also don’t fucking blame the victim, asshole.

Literalol at Bree showing the women her like stick and sheet fan thing and then cut to all the people with just little squares, barely doing anything.

“Don’t stop! Keep your fires going!” *everyone stops and just stares at the bugs*

Gonna go ahead and take this time to remind folks that’s it’s fucking gross to get married on a plantation. Don’t do that thing.

I know a guy who is like proud of the fact that he’s an asshole. He talks about it like it’s one of his defining traits. This scene with Wylie being like “buddy, I love my shitty reputation” reminds he of that guy. I cannot fucking stand that guy.

*ignores Claire’s feelings about Fred’s dumb ring and headcanons in my own reasons instead because I cannot even with this nonsense anymore*

Ah, the Lindsays like Roger now. I still do not like Roger.

I fucking love this whole Murcasta scene. Can we get one of these for Jamie and Claire? I miss them having big sweeping scenes that have time to breathe and unfold and all the good shit like Murcasta gets here.

The show keeps trying to deny it, but scenes like this are where it’s strongest. But it refuses to accept that this is its lane and keeps trying to go elsewhere.

I miss Jamie and Claire.

I miss the MacKenzies.

I wanna give Jocasta a hug. She’s still trash for enslaving people, though.

Maria Doyle Kennedy is a goddamn treasure. Seriously, her casting was the best choice the show made in years.

That and saving Murtz, of course.

So fucking glad they cut the creepy-ass foot thing.

Jamie, you’re drunk, but read the fucking room. Claire’s right. Just because she says shit from the future all the time doesn’t negate the fact that she’s right about you right now. Also, seriously? You’re taking *this* opportunity to call her out?

Buddy deserved that slap.

Look, I’m always down for the Frasers to fuck. More Fraser fucking, I say. But this is just another instance like their fight at Lallybroch where the fight itself is never actually resolved like it should be. They just fuck about it and magically everything is ok again. Le sigh.

Murcasta gets a big long scene with time to breathe and talk through everything and it’s riveting af. But Jamie and Claire never get that anymore and it pisses me off tbh.

Stop shoehorning in book lines! She can’t see shit through all the skirts and stuff!

I miss the Lallybroch ring. What did they ever end up doing with it? It’s floating around somewhere.

Bonnet is so evil to 11 about fucking everything that it makes him boring. We get it. You’re a bad guy. Do you also have a tiny dick or something that you’re overcompensating for?

Can we please wrap this Bonnet shit up this season? I swear if they drag it out as long as they do in the books I’m gonna be rull annoyed.

Ok so now the war is actually gonna for real happen and I’m like legit out of fucks to give about it because Murtz aside, they’ve done the “it’s coming, jk!” fake out too many times...

Can they try to hang Murtz instead? Because I swear spending half a season with emo!Roger is cruel and unusual punishment.

[tothebrighterend]

The Magicians

TV, like people, is complicated. Sometimes it treats you well other times it hurts you, sometimes it shows you that love is possible, sometimes it beats the shit out of you. 

The Magicians was a show about magic. The main character, Quentin Coldwater, was a depressed bisexual whose life was saved when he found magic. And through magic came friends and tragedy and love. And in Season 4 of the show, a season where the love between him and his best friend Elliot was heavily teased, they killed him. 

Quentin’s death was just for shock value, it was ugly it was bad. This man we had followed for four years, who we had seen overcome so much, who we loved, was dead for nothing. The decision would kill the show. 

I watched Season 5 for...closure I guess? I loved these characters and I guess I wanted to believe that Q would return. And there were some good episodes, particularly the ones where the gang destroyed the moon and Elliot had to argue with whales. The performances were good, especially Margo and Elliot who are fantastic. The finale was exciting, Fillory was destroyed but everyone survived, a new world was born, the future was kinda bright. But Quentin could have been there. He should have been there...but he wasn’t. 

The gay energy in The Magicians was one of its strongest attributes. And they tossed it out the window like it never mattered. They built up Elliot and Quentin like a cathedral and then burned it all away. They stabbed the soul of the show in the back and it was never gonna be the same. The momentum died, so many fans just gave up and I can’t blame them. Gay people deserve better, we deserve happy endings. A part of me was glad the show didn’t get renewed for season six and I know that’s mean, I know it’s not the casts fault or the crew, but all it takes is one terrible writing decision to sink everything and it fucking sucks. 

I guess what I am trying to say is that you can love something even if it hurts you, even if it doesn’t really deserve you. I love The Magicians, more for what it once was than for what it became. The Under Pressure sing-a-long, Margo’s desert journey, the episode where Q and Elliot grew old together and were in love. It wasn’t perfect but for a long time it was good, and maybe that’s enough.

[miasswier]

miasswier’s ultimate glee ranking: no 25

25: Diva

Written by: Brad Falchuk Directed by: Paris Barclay

Overall Thoughts: The entertainment value in this episode is fantastic. Part of why it’s so high up in my list is because I genuinely feel it’s one of Glee’s strongest episodes. Something you will already know if you’ve read my previous reviews is that something I greatly value in an episode is how obvious it is that Glee is an ensemble show. Here, we get four fantastic storylines, all of which are given equal screen time. I love when Glee does this, because 1) it means the show isn’t entirely focusing on Rachel and 2) it gives every viewer a little bit of something. Don’t like Kurt and Rachel? That’s okay, because they’re only 25% of the episode. Tired of the Blaine/Tina stuff? All good! It’s just 25% of the episode. Plus, from a subjective point of view, I enjoy all the storylines this episode. Also, no newbies, and no Finchel drama.  So extra bonus for that! Oh, and also, the music is fantastic.

What I Like:

As already mentioned, this episode is divided up into four stories, and they all get equal screen time (or, at least they do a good job of making it seem that way). Unlike “Dream On”, though, which also followed a similar format, this episode manages to include many of its protagonists throughout the stories. I mean, Blaine, Tina, Kurt, Rachel, Brittany, Santana, Sam, Emma, and Finn all get the spotlight, and Sue, Artie and Unique get some moments too. Compare that to just Will, Bryan, Rachel, Jesse, Tina, and Artie with a little bit of Shelby in “Dream On”. It just makes for a stronger episode.

THE MUSIC. I’ll talk about that more later.

Kurt calling Rachel the fuck out, and putting her in her place. As I’ve mentioned before, it can be exhausting sometimes watching Rachel just get everything handed to her time and time again, so its nice to see her lose every now and again.

Rachel is the one who apologizes to Kurt, and not the other way around. Although I do have issues with that final scene between them, I do really appreciate that they didn’t make Kurt apologize for making Rachel see she is not the only talented person in the world. Even though the scene completely revolved around her and making her feel better, Rachel was still the one who said she was sorry, therefore admitting that Kurt was right to knock her down a peg.

In a similar vein, it’s refreshing to see Rachel acknowledge her flaws, and for once actually vocalize that she has a serious problem of putting her ambition before her friendships. It sucks that this doesn’t stick and that by the time she does achieve fame she becomes exactly what she was so afraid of becoming – and unapologetically so.

Kurt is so epically sassy in this episode oh my god. One of my all time favourite Kurt Hummel episodes. The way he so easily destroys Rachel, and her legion of sycophants makes my life.

There’s only like, one scene with them, but I always thought Kurt and Adam were cute.

I really appreciated that they included Rachel telling those two guys that Kurt earned his spot at NYADA just as much as they did. Like I already said, it’s nice when she actually manages to put her friendships above of her ambition.

Emma’s giant-ass wedding to-do list.

“I know Will trusts me, but I’m a Libra. I can’t do this.”

Finn helping Emma out with her wedding stuff, and Emma helping Finn out as well. They make a good team, those two!

The scene at the end where Brittany tells Santana that she isn’t going to break up with Sam. Glee has a really serious problem when they write love triangles, and that is that very often they take away the agency of whoever is being “fought” over (Exhibit A: Jake, Ryder, and Marley). They do that here, but they do include a scene where Brittany takes her agency back. She makes a decision, and she stands by it. Even though season four Brittany drives me up the fucking wall, you can already see the hints of maturity she will gain by season five.

Although most of her actions are questionable in this episode, it is cute that Santana wants to take the job with Sue just to be closer to Brittany.

Sam sticking up for Brittany and their relationship (even if I don’t really understand why given how the events in “Naked” unfolded).

Blaine is the fucking cutest. Don’t even talk to me. When Tina calls him a “precious Tiger Beat shrinky dink” I almost died because what a fucking accurate description of Blaine Anderson.

His little smirk after “Don’t Stop Me Now”, plus his continuous repition of “um, guys can be divas” is the fucking best.

Sam saying he won’t hit a girl always makes me laugh cause like, lmao, bitch thinks he can beat Santana fucking Lopez in a fight.

Tina’s sassy “Don’t even worry about it” after absolutely killing “Hung Up”.

Tina winning the Diva-Off and Brittany shouting “She never wins anything!”

I actually think the Emma and Finn kiss made for excellent shock value.

Tina is in both my likes and dislikes of this episode. As you may have gleaned from past reviews, I’m basically the only person on the planet who actually enjoyed Tina’s take-charge attitude season four onward, and in a lot of ways felt it very merited. I mean, her reaction to seeing Santana show up yet again? It’s fair. She sat in the back of Glee for three fucking years, watching Rachel win solo after solo (and the few she didn’t get go to Mercedes, Santana, and Kurt), and barely complained. Now, it’s her turn. It’s her senior year. And who keeps getting the spotlight? A fucking sophomore, and a girl who doesn’t even attend the school anymore. It’s totally fair that she’s annoyed. It’s fair that she wants to be the girl who kicks down the door and gets what she wants. I think she was completely in her right to act the way she did in this specific regard. However…

What I Don’t Like:

… I hate that the thing she is taking charge of is her desire to be in a relationship with Blaine rather than her desire to be the star of the glee club. Again, I am probably one of the only people who wasn’t annoyed when they first introduced the Tina crushing on Blaine storyline, but by the time I was finished with this episode, I was done. They turned it from “this is something that happens so we want to showcase that” into “I deserve the love of this gay man because I did something he never asked me to do”. Blaine didn’t ask Tina to look after him, and therefore its kind of ridiculous that she would be so upset that he didn’t fall into her arms because of it. Also, she’s acting like he told her to go fuck herself once he got better, which isn’t what happened. He thanked her. He helped her pick out a song. He can be seen very clearly enjoying her performance of “Hung Up”. So why the hell did Glee make Tina act like she somehow deserved his romantic love? She knew he was gay. He literally just reminded her that he was gay and would never be interested in women in this very episode. I hate that they went in this direction with this story, because honestly? It could have been one of their sweetest, most relatable storylines. I mean, who hasn’t fallen in love with someone who can’t love them back? But instead they acted as though Blaine was the bad guy even though Tina literally rubbed vapo-rub on his chest while he was fucking asleep (to this day I have to look away when that scene comes on because it makes me genuinely furious). So like, on one hand I can appreciate what they were doing with Tina’s character, but on the other hand I simply cannot support her behaviour in this episode. It’s absolutely appalling, and the fact that Blaine not only apologizes to her, but asks her to be his date to Will and Emma’s wedding, effectively rewarding her for her terrible behaviour? God, it pisses me off. I’m so glad he blows her off to make out with Kurt in the next episode.

On top of all of that, Tina also makes both homophobic and transphobic comments in this episode. It’s so annoying to dislike Tina in an episode that I otherwise enjoy so fucking much, because she’s legit one of my favourite characters. I just really hate how they dealt with this whole thing.

Sue’s racist comment about Santana’s mom.

Santana and Sam basically taking Brittany’s desires out of the equation by fighting about her via song, as though Brittany dating Sam wasn’t enough indication of who she was going to chose.

While what I said in the above section about the Kurt/Rachel end scene still stands, it has always annoyed me that Rachel threw such a massive fucking pity party after losing literally one competition to her best fucking friend that said best friend – whose entire goal in this episode was to knock her down a peg – has to build her back up and basically say “fuck everything I said before, you’re the most amazing person ever and the world should revolve around you always”. At least he didn’t apologize.

That comment Rachel makes about all of her confidence being built on beating Kurt in “Wheels”. See, this is why I have such a hard time with Hummelberry. What kind of fucked up friendship is built on the foundation of “All of my confidence comes from the fact that I am better than you” like what the literal fuck?!

This isn’t a huge one, but I think the episode would have had stronger shock value if the Finn/Emma scene came after “Girl on Fire”. I think ending on that note would have left the audience with the biggest shock. Having a whole other scene and musical performance after just kind of softens the blow.

Songs:

Diva: Starting off strong with a fantastic group number. Unique kills it, of course, as does Tina. When they first revealed who would be singing this song, I thought Brittany was an odd choice to include, but she honestly sounds fantastic. My only wish is that you could hear Blaine more than you can. Also, I find Kitty and Marley kind of hilarious in this performance, because it’s so obvious that they are not on the same level as the other four. I don’t actually know why they felt the need to include them.

Don’t Stop Me Now: An awesome song, and an awesome cover. It also makes me incredibly happy that Blaine chose this particular song to prove that guys can be divas. It’s not just him that’s the diva, it’s Freddie Mercury as well. Such a fantastic choice.

Nutbush City Limits: This is the only song I’m not so crazy about. I think Santana sounds a bit odd in this song, like its just slightly out of her range and she’s straining a bit too hard to reach it. Also, I know this song is technically considered Rock, but it has a bit too much of a country vibe for me.

Make No Mistake (She’s Mine): I’m not a fan of the actual lyrics of this song, as the two singers are literally fighting about someone who is clearly cheating on both of them. That being said, Sam and Santana sound absolutely fantastic together, and I really enjoy the flow of this song.

Bring Him Home: Another strong song. I think Kurt was way better than Rachel, but that’s just me. My only frustration is that Rachel gets the final note. It feels like she always gets the last say in these things.

Hung Up: This is probably Tina’s strongest solo in the entire course of the show. She absolutely kills it, and the performance is amazing. It’s too bad that there’s such shitty motive behind it, but seriously, this song is amazing.

Girl on Fire: A really strong vocal performance, with a mediocre visual performance. Why was Glee so obsessed with having people sing in the auditorium and in the choir room? The end of it is good, with her finally leaving McKinley behind and going to New York, but the beginning is so lackluster. It’s disappointing considering what an amazing cover of an already amazing song it is.

Final Thoughts: I know there seems to be a lot of negatives in this review considering how high up this episode is on my list, but honestly, its one of my favourites. Obviously there’s stuff I don’t like, but the stuff I do like far outweighs the stuff I don’t. Plus, it’s just a strong episode, even from an objective standpoint.

[trans-shuichisaihara]

fake it till (we) make it - Scene 2

have i mentioned that i love kokichi? he’s such a little shit and i love that

(read on ao3)

Once his scattered mind begins to calm down, his first response is to shout, “What the hell’re you talking about?!”

Kokichi blinks at him, light fluttering of his eyelashes. “I meannnn, let’s fuck around with the tabloids and stuff. I’m bored and they all annoy me to no end, so I wanna pull a prank on them.”

Okay, he gets that, but- “Why with me?!”

“Becaaause,” he sighs out, “Everyone except Shuichi sucks and he’s going on tour next week. Plus he’s just a terrible actor. You at least have that going for you.” He then grins. “Plus, people eat shit like this up - you know, where the hero and the villain get together? That’s a really popular trope.”

“Dude, that was one time! And what happens when we have to film the sequel?!”

“You act as if this’ll last that long; it’s only gonna be like, maybe a month or two at max.”

A bead of sweat rolls down his face. “If it’s gonna be that short, then why can’t you find someone else?!”

Kokichi raises a brow at him. “Like who? No one would be thrilled to and you know it.”

“Well, uh-” He sputters. C’mon, there has to be someone- “What, what about that one guy, uh, Rantaro Amami?” There’d been some sort of rumor about them once, right?

“Taken. He’s a model anyway, always busy running around in a different circle. Only met him because his girlfriend was working on one of my sets designing outfits.” He sighs loudly, propping his chin on his hand. “He is really cute though...”

“Okay, uh, well...” He trails off awkwardly, trying to think of some other answer to give him. “What the hell do I get out of this? I’m not gonna ruin my reputation or anything just ‘cause you wanna screw around.”

“We’re not gonna fuck, so don’t worry about that.” Kaito has to bite back a reaction to the likely purposefully wrong interpretation of his words. “And I know people think I suck, but pretending to date me isn't going to ruin your rep, so...” He pauses for a long moment, before grinning as wide as he can. “You should just man up and help me prove the media is stupid as hell. I mean, I’m sure you hate them too, and you’re not scared of them, riiiight?”

Fuck. “Like hell I am,” he growls, massaging his temples, “I’ll do it, alright? You happy?”

He nods, grin still plastered across his face. “Yep! See you after your beauty rest, babe!” He winks and blows him a kiss.

An uncomfortable feeling immediately fills him. “Never call me that ever again and maybe I’ll sleep nightmare-free.”

“No promises!” He sings and turns away from Kaito before an argument can start, flopping back down on the couch and pulling out his phone to end all further conversation. He shakes his head and leaves Kokichi be; he has shit to do this evening, he needs at least some rest before his manager starts blowing up his phone asking where he is.

Stardom sucks when no one trusts your ability to get yourself dressed and show up with enough time for the makeup crew to do their thing.

He locks his bedroom door - just in case Kokichi decides he’s bored enough that he’s going to come and pester him more - before closing his curtains tightly to block out the morning sun that’ll soon rise. He then lies in bed for at least half an hour, despite his desire to just pass out into the realm of sleep.

Unfortunately, the tension building in his mind from his sudden deal with Kokichi makes it hard to do such a thing.

He can’t stop thinking about how the world will react to them dating. He’s not scared, it’s just- Even if it’s fake, no one would know that until it’s over, and even then it’s doubtful anyone would believe it. That’s just how fans were. He runs his hands down his face, exasperated with Kokichi, but also with himself; why the hell’d he just let himself get dragged into this?

His sleep ends up being restless, broken apart by frequent reawakening and his phone buzzing insistently. He isn’t in the mood to deal with whatever they need, so he throws his pillow over his head and ignores it.

After an unsatisfying 6 hours of sleep, he wakes up for real a bit before noon, body sluggish as he showers and throws on some shorts and a tee. He idly checks his texts as he’s making his way downstairs, astounded at the mess that was created while he slept.

Kokichi Owoma @real_ouma tweeted:

hanging out with the bae @kaitomomota #firstdate

Along with the heart emojis following the message, attached is that dumb selfie he wanted to take, which makes Kaito wonder if that was his goal all along. He pinches the bridge of his nose; the tweet already has well over 10 thousand likes and nearly half as many retweets, along with a fair number of replies. Most of them calling B.S. on it, which is a bit relieving.

He’s about to check the rest of his texts when he notices that Kokichi didn’t leave after he went to bed. Instead, he passed out on the couch, one of Kaito’s space-patterned comforters that he’s almost positive was in his bedroom closet pulled around him tightly. He’s tempted to wake him up and scold him for informing the world without permission, but he can’t be bothered. A sleeping Kokichi is a quiet Kokichi, after all.

He turns his attention back to his phone. Most of his texts are from his friends that have seen the tweet and are informing him of its existence. He doesn’t really post on his twitter, so it’s understandable that they would feel the need to let him know.

His manager is trying to give him advice for dealing with dealing with false rumors and offering to help make a public statement to shut it down, which causes him to sigh. If he has to guess, this looks like Kokichi attempting to stop him from backing out, and it works; it’d be more of a hassle to deny the rumors than to play along, after all.

He honestly doesn’t want to deal with any of this celebrity shit. He just wants to star in cool sci-fi films and be able to afford living in L.A. where all his friends are.

So, instead of answering any of the texts, he takes a picture of Kokichi sleeping for blackmail or something, then grabs his leftovers out of the fridge and tosses it in the microwave. He then sits down, pulling up the tweet again before making the decision to retweet it without any comments. Before he can regret it, he turns the notifications on his phone off and sets it aside, instead starting to make a grocery list for his upcoming trip to the store.

He’s contemplating getting them delivered instead when his lunch finishes with a loud beep, followed by a thud from the other room. He holds back a sigh; the silence he desired didn’t last nearly long enough.

“Huh?” In the living room, Kokichi hauls himself up, hair sticking up all over the place as he blinks sleep out of his eyes. In the time it takes him to grab a plate and dump his heated meal onto it, he reaches fully awake status and hurries into the kitchen to bother him. “Oh, you’re finally up!” His own phone is in his hands as he sits down in the chair next to his. “Did you see the-” For a moment, his face goes flat, before bouncing back to excited. “Oh, you retweeted it! Did you like it too?”

“Nah,” he answers, shoveling a bite of food into his mouth. After swallowing, he continues with, “By the way, thanks for that; had everyone and their mother blowing up my phone while I was sleeping.”

“You’re welcome!” He doesn’t miss a beat as he scrolls through the comments. “Hmm, it’s gonna take a lot of work to convince everyone. Care if I post about you getting ready for your day?”

“I do, actually; that’s really fuckin’ weird and won’t convince anyone of anything except that you’re a creep.”

He pouts. “Fine. But we really should talk about how we’re gonna do this.”

He scratches at the stubble along his jaw. “I guess. I’m not gonna make any gushy tweets or anything like that, before you ask.”

He hums. “Wasn’t gonna suggest anything like that. Let’s say... We’ve been officially dating for two weeks, keeping things on the down low, before we decided to come out about it last night.”

He coughs as an epiphany hits him. Fuck, he has to deal with that aspect of the media on him. “Dammit, I didn’t even think about that part. The media’s gonna be all over me for being, for being gay! Which, well, you know, isn’t a bad thing to be, but-” He can’t exactly say he isn’t when he went through that whole shebang in college, but he wasn’t wanting the world to know that.

Kokichi shrugs. “It was going to happen eventually. I mean, people have been suspecting you are since at least last winter due to the vague gay subplot going on in your latest film.”

Kaito’s forehead falls into his hand, covering his eyes. “God, can’t people tell the difference between fiction and reality anymore? That’s a fucking character-”

Kokichi’s phone rings, cutting him off. The two of them look towards it, Kokichi quirking a brow. “Oh, it’s Toujou, one sec.” He turns away from Kaito and answers the call with an obnoxiously fake shout of, “Good morning, Mom!”

Kaito rolls his eyes; he doesn’t know how Kokichi can address Director Kirumi Toujou like that. She’s scary intense when on set. He’s worked with her for two movies - both of them great, but both of them grueling to film due to her perfectionism and no-nonsense aura. He can hardly believe she’s only two years older than them with how huge the difference in maturity is.

To avoid eavesdropping on his conversation, Kaito gets up and begins to clean up his lunch and what remains of what was technically their breakfast, seeing as Kokichi didn’t bother to. He doesn’t mind doing household chores like this, honestly; he had to do them regularly while living with his grandparents. He’s faintly aware of eyes in his back as he tears up the pizza box to fit into his trash can and moves to begin washing the handful of dishes in the sink.

Finally, a loud sigh sounds from the other side of the kitchen, and he pauses to give him a glance. His phone is facedown, so the conversation is likely over. “What happened?”

“She wants me to come in today. Apparently, one of the cameramen screwed up on the shot we did a few days ago and she just noticed it and it’s bugging her. Important scene and all that.” He waves his hand. Kaito feels sorta bad for him; all scenes were important scenes to her, so this was likely not an actual emergency.

“Just one scene, right? Hopefully you won’t be there too long, then.” One scene could still take hours, but it’s still likely to be shorter than a full session.

“Dunno. You know how it is.” He stands, stretching. “Welp, good luck with your day. Interview tonight, right?”

“Damn, yeah.” He shuts the water off, drying his hands as Kokichi looks around for his car keys. “You know they’re gonna be all over me because of your tweet.”

“Good. Play along. If they ask you who made the first move, I asked you out, and you accepted because I’m ‘kinda cute’ - those exact words. If they ask, ‘only kinda?’, you respond by seeming embarrassed.” He finally locates and plucks up his keys from the ground in front of the sofa, almost hidden by the blanket draped along the side of the couch and onto the floor. “Honestly, it should be too easy to fool them.”

He has a whole script ready, huh. “Man, who died and made you director?”

“Unfortunately, no one; the universe isn't that kind as to rid the world of any of them,” he dramatically says, before he shakes his head and returns to a more neutral tone, “Anyway, I'll be back tonight; we can discuss the schematics of our act then. Don't say anything unnecessary, be vague, they can fill in any gaps themselves. Got it?”

He responds by shooing Kokichi out of his house. “Yeah yeah, don't worry. It'll be fine; I'm not stupid.”

[latinalesbi]

The good trouble account doesn’t even follow the moms or boys lol so much for the family

Yes, they tag Sherri and Teri in posts. They are such users.

Anonymous said:                                                                      Cringe at some of the fans of the show I really do. On twitter for the 1st time in ages Joanna baits them. BB has gone quiet thank god. They’ve all moved on people. They got bored of writing for the moms-never really knew what to do with them s3 onwards. They wanted Maia front and center that’s evident, the spin off was their idea. The amount of new characters on their new show means money wasn’t the real issue. They’ve moved studios to cut costs. They gave up on Teri and Sherri thats the truth.

Yes, this officially makes Joanna the worst one. How she gonna tell a FAN that if she raises 30 MILLION dollars, she’ll produce the show. Bitch please. SHUT Up. She makes me so angry. They went along with whatever Freeform wanted. It’s so sad. They didn’t want the older lesbians and that’s a fact. These women weren’t sleeping around getting down with multiple women and they weren’t young things (yeah I am looking at you Bold Type and their male gaze), Freeform had no room to make a couple like Stef and Lena, front and center.

Anonymous said:                                                                      If only they had realised the storm their decision would’ve caused both Fform and the creators of the fosters. I think had they realised their new shows cloak & dagger etc would do as badly as they have they would have sanctioned a season 6. In fact I’m sure. They need the viewing figures. If the creators really wanted to go down the line of the spin off they could have run both show concurrently, that would’ve appeased every1. Like Blackish and Grownish do now Wonder if that idea ever came up?    

I think maybe you are right. Grownish came in like a hit, and that’s around the time they announced cancellation, but it’s clear now: Freeform show suck. No one wants to watch this network. The Fosters was a product of ABC F and Freeform hated it for that.

Anonymous said:                                                                      Roll my eyes at people on twitter telling us we should support this new show as The Fosters was a family and fam supports fam. Dear lord they don’t seem to get the fact that this so called family behind the scenes betrayed each other. They negotiated behind the back of Teri Sherri and the guys and left them blindsided by the decision. Bradley Peter Maia Cierra and Joanna were all complicit in that. Their ‘family’ lost their jobs whilst they not only kept theirs but no doubt got pay rises. Asses!            

Anyone who wants to sell me that shit, can go fuck themselves. What a waste of energy. This wasn’t a family, this was a job, people got fucked over, I want to see the backstabbers crash and burn.

Anonymous said:                                                                      It was the Callie show for the past two seasons. Literally everything that could happen to a person happened to her lol! They didn’t really have a use for the other characters anymore. The only reason they are bringing Cierra -Marianna on board for the new show is that they are good friends in real life. I really believe that. Can’t believe they are producers too, the former cast must have been shocked at that. It’s like a double kick in the balls.          

I agree with that and that’s why this real life friendship has an end date. It will always be Maia and guest. If production money is all she cares about then maybe it will last. However, if the limelight she seeks, then she will be disappointed.

Anonymous said:                                                                      I loved the first few seasons of The Fosters. It was so family orientated. I loved the relationship between Stef and Calli it was what I wished for if Im honest. The show became too political for me at the end, they lost a little of what made it special.

I’ve said it before, the Trump election ruined the country and specifically this show. I needed escapism, ok. Is that ok to say? This show was built on that fantasy of a life. Suddenly, everything was about Trump even though on their timeline, he hadn’t been elected. They should have left the fosters alone and made a political show elsewhere.

Anonymous said:                                                                      Thought of watching Good Trouble every week and who is Callie going to save next urgh!They’ll be lots of new young, good looking characters, lots of sex no doubt which is funny considering the moms were barely allowed to touch towards the end. The creators zoned out. They wanted this new show, probably preferred writing for the girls etc. If you read articles at the beginning of The Fosters in 2013 they were so enthused about Stef and Lena, excited to talk about their stories, its worlds apart.          

Well Bradley got divorced and clearly didn’t believe in marriage anymore. He bought himself a young boyfriend and everyone got bored of stef and lena, except the audience. Sadly. It also shows how fake they are. They are actors selling a product. Ultimately, they didn’t really care, they just thought that’s what the network wanted to hear then.

P.S. Just don’t watch troubled shows.

Anonymous said:                                                                      They harp on & boast about their social justice storylines and how this will continue when the real injustice happened on their show in front of all of us. They kept the 2 straight characters and let go the 2 older women who happened to play lesbians and their gay son. These were the characters that had the most social impact & brought the most awareness to the show at the beginning. They gave people hope and a feeling they were being listened too. It’s so sad tptb seem to have forgotten that.            

And their stupid show’s tag is going to an invade a rightfully political tag about a black activist. People looking for this will bump into white savior callie. This isn’t progressive, it’s the typical erasure that happens to lesbians.

Anonymous said:                                                                      The thing that has arisen, if that’s the right word 😂 is the huge love everyone has for Sherri and Teri and their characters Stef and Lena. They truly made a difference to people’s lives. That will never change no matter what the powers that be decide is best for themselves and their network. Maybe Callie and Marianna stories on this spinoff will be worthy but it will never compare to the real affect Teri and Sherri had on so many people. They’re loved universally and that will never go away. X  

History will tell, and no one will remember Good Trouble. No one. 

Anonymous said:                                                                      Famous in Love might not be cancelled after all now. What a joke. Could you imagine how much they are paying Bella Thorne, the ratings are shit and yet they are considering keeping it on the air yet cancel the Fosters, the highest rating show? They just want to keep Marlene King sweet no doubt, she’s got her PLL spinoff coming. It’s all trash, the network and the creators of the Fosters. In a few years time the Fosters will still be talked about, maybe then they’ll appreciate Sherri and Teri.             

It was. Thank god. Next, Bold Type and next cancel the network.

Anonymous said:                                                                      If it was a money thing why didn’t they just skim down the amount of guest characters they brought in and go back to family stories? There were so many new characters every week we couldn’t keep up & made the show feel disjointed, we didn’t have any loyalty to them. Getting rid of the boys and the moms will have saved them money, yes, they’ve moved studios too so that’s a cost cut. But then they’ve cast a load of new characters for the spin off and made the girls ep’s. Something isn’t right.             

It was not a money thing at all. They want to say that but it’s not. It was about older women and how Freeform can’t sell that. Or rather, about how they don’t know how to sell it.

Anonymous said:                                                                      Don’t worry peeps. They will realise their mistakes. The Fosters was the family. When that started to be phased out we stayed around honestly due to the connection we’d built with the characters and the those that played them. You don’t build that loyalty up overnight. They didn’t think about the fans, if they did they’d have known dumping some of the cast and picking others was a non starter. Go out on a high as the family you began with, that’s what they should have done. Everyone or no-one.             

Exactly. I think the good feelings would have remained if they hadn’t betrayed the family. Now things are tainted.

Anonymous said:                                                                      They thought we’d all continue to watch. The apathy towards us as fans is staggering. Unless they manage to generate a whole new sector of viewers which they won’t, their ratings are going to suffer hugely. They will lose so many of us. Some will be intrigued by the first ep, after that and realising the rest of the cast are really no more it will slide off. They created and had something special, this spinoff tarnished it for me.             

The thing fans aren’t really a thing to these people. The noise people make on twitter is completely just that for them, background noise. That’s why I enjoyed when someone ruffles their feathers. When truth comes close to home, they react. If Freeform knew how to create a  hit, they would have done so by now. The Fosters was successful because of the fanbase it had built from the ABCF days. Hours of politics, the law and callie. No thanks.

Anonymous said:                                                                      If their idea of family is to forsake their fellow cast then who’d want to be a part of that? Sellouts pure and simple, money over ‘family.’             

That’s it. Nothing else.

Anonymous said:                                                                      I watch the ratings for shows, it was odd to me when the decision was made. The Fosters at that point was their highest rated show both live figure and the delayed viewing. And yes most def their most stable show. Sirens had since done well. Grownish dropped, Cloak & Dagger, started well-ish but then dropped. The Bold Type has always been low and Famous in Love- terrible. Last season it always beat Shadowhunters too. That show had a big international deal to be fair. Really strange decision.           

And yet they canned Shadowhunters. If there was a show I could believe had some weird cult following online, it would be that. They didn’t care either. I don’t know what Freeform is aiming for. Race to the bottom with them.

Anonymous said:                                                                      My thinking: Teri and Sherri had the highest salaries. Fform knew the ratings were good. Thought Maia and Cierra with their social media following were popular and therefore could lead a show thus save money by getting rid of Teri and Sherri and it wouldn’t affect the ratings. They didn’t realise the demographic of audience was vast. People watched the show for a variety of reasons. They should have done some polling before making the decision, would have been clear pretty quick. Amateur network             

I don’t know. They made maia and cierra more money as producers then they would have with The Fosters. It’s almost as if those 2 were the problem with money. They were demanding so much, the network couldn’t afford to pay anyone else much. The network is trash. I will live to see it die.

[girlonfilmmovies]

Welcome to Friend Island: "Love Island US Season 3" and the Gaping Sores of America

So I foolishly thought that in the new year of 2021, the world would be in a better place than it was the previous year. After all, we were coming out of the "worst" of the most horrifying pandemic of the past century, a middling presidency that at that point served only a wealth of TV soundbites and less actual damage to the political system, and we were looking forward to a brighter future and a return to what some hoped would be "normal". The past was the past, and this was going to be a new moment.

Oh how naïve we all were.

As of this writing Covid-19 cases are hitting staggering new highs in the southern US, with Florida (of course) somehow hitting a record amount despite vaccines being easily available in the country for months. The death rates are at almost the same as last year. The middling disaster of the 45th president had one more trick up its sleeve, a firebomb brewing for dozens of years that went off in one of the most embarrassing fiascos of American political history. Misinformation has already implanted itself so thoroughly among half the country that people would rather die than admit they were wrong; the spread of such chaos being happily spat out through the algorithms of corporations only intent on raking in dollar signs. All the potential benefits that could have come from this once-in-a-lifetime moment are being briskly swept away: offices demanding their employees come back, no respect given to science and healthcare workers, the country's clearly weak infrastructure forced right back into action as if we didn't just see its gaping holes. The earth is dying and the people who actually have the resources do something about it instead have kickstarted a capitalist space race.

2021 has gone to show that old, toxic habits die hard.

Sigh.

Yeah, I watched Love Island again.

Despite my... let's say mixed feelings regarding last year's shitshow, I couldn't help but admit that it was the closest thing that I've had to appointment viewing TV that I've had in a long time. In an era of streaming and DVR boxes, it's a bit of an actual feat to get someone who works a fulltime job (especially one with erratic scheduling) to go out of their way to watch something the second it premieres. Love Island brings the family together, so they can engage in our favorite pastime: pointing and laughing at young, dumb, fame hungry cis-hets.

Plus, the second season had offered a fascinating glance at how to contend with a pandemic while also trying to stage a typical dumb reality show. The tropical island villa was swapped for a luxurious hotel rooftop in Las Vegas -- a literal ivory tower of ignorant hedonism looking down upon a plagued nation. You could feel the sexual tension of the hot, hyper-sexual adults forced without physical contact for months finally allowed to relieve themselves the only way they know how: toxic relationships. It was trying so hard to be an oasis in a desert yearning for frivolous content, but the façade was clearly visible to the point of satire. It was a wonderful thing to experience firsthand as what I originally thought as merely me dipping my toes into the genre.

Season 2 was the show that we deserved at the time, a funhouse mirror reflecting all the callous stupidity that had led us to this moment in world history. It attempted to offer a happy ending, a look towards the future: a black couple finally winning a reality show, a first for such a mainstream program (both of them actually kind of turned out to suck, but shhhh...).

It also allowed America to completely break the hearts of people while watching them fall apart live on TV. It was cruel, it was stupid, but most of all, it was fun as hell.

Season 3 is not about torturing the competitors. It's about torturing us.

In all fairness, there were a couple of lovely positive developments for the series this season. While still struggling with racial diversity a little bit, as evidenced by them casting only one very specific kind of black man like five times, strides are being taken elsewhere in the lane of body diversity. Alana makes her debut as literally the first woman on this show who isn't a size 0-2, looking absolutely gorgeous in every single shot.

The almost aggressively heteronormative nature of the show is slowly being shaken by a more openly queer cast than previously expected -- multiple bisexual/pansexual contestants participated, even though there wasn't any overtly queer romance shown (also almost all of them were women, with them describing their sexualities being confined to streaming exclusive episodes, which isn't... great). It's certainly a step in the right direction for a show that unceremoniously shuffled off the only queer member of the Season 2 cast overnight once the internet found his gay porn shoot. Ironically, they also ended up booting off the most openly queer member of this cast too, the purple haired proudly pansexual TikTok-er Leslie, but for the more legal reason of smuggling weed into the villa.

It's not terribly surprising that both Alana and Leslie garnered a lot of positive attention both inside and outside of the villa -- they stand out so much against the otherwise predictable casting that we've come to expect from this show and white American media in general. Alana is a woman with actual curves who looks stunningly gorgeous in comparison to the monotonous supermodel figures of everyone else. Leslie almost falls into a stereotype from the way she appears: dyed purple hair, tattooed all over, obviously queer, vaping weed constantly, exuding the kind of chaotic yet weirdly fun energy that only a former stripper can. Yet she obviously grabbed the attention of the contestants because while people like her abound in real life, in the fantasy land of reality TV she's an absolute rarity, a far cry from the sanitized beauty pageant-esque standards that they seem to pluck girls from. The men are still dumb, bland, boneheaded idiots in this show, but by offering some actual variety, they get to actually pursue people they aren't "traditionally" supposed to, while an outsider audience member like me gets to see women like herself be offered up for titillation in the same way "conventionally attractive" women are.

It's kind of cool, even if it is just playing into the icky sexualization of everyone, but hey...progress?

In an odd "two steps forward, one step back" kind of situation, the show has somewhat dialed down the outrageously toxic relationships of last year into a more relatively subdued level of toxicity. Gaslighting/cheating is at least kept to a relative low in this season compared to the nightmare that was last year, although this year's ratio depends on how much of that corresponds with sexy Columbian boy Will's obviously flimsy grasp of the intricacies of the English language. He continued to be plagued by the cliquey-ness of the cast until the very end but his genuinely sweet couple with Kyra still did enough to sneak into the final two.

The actual main problem this year was an almost unbearably long love triangle between Cash, Trina, and Cinco that refused to solve itself for nearly a month. Cash and Cinco perennially kept flip-flopping in their feelings for each other, bouncing between failed partnerships despite so obviously being into each other. Trina ended up roped in as Cinco's partner for a while, a constant victim of his own lack of courage to make up his damn mind. Cash, freshly single and in horny jail (aka Casa Amor), coupled up with the handsome and mysterious Charlie.

Now we need to discuss how bizarre Charlie as a cast member. Not only is he the only member who is, looks, and acts like an actual adult, but he also seems to show no adherence to the rules of reality TV: he's very relaxed and unassuming, seems genuinely uninterested in the "game" aspects of the show, and only perks up during rare moments of actual romantic potential. He's a fascinating spanner to throw into the machine of Love Island, and once Cinco was eliminated in the competition, Charlie had to sit there while Cash only continued to openly and aggressively pine for a man who isn't even her current partner. Proving once again to be an anomaly in the cast, he actually decided to do something about this: he unceremoniously dumped fan favorite Cash like a sack of bricks, sending her home while hooking up with the previously mentioned Alana. This smart decision was met derisively by viewers, despite him being the only person there who actually acted like a fucking adult for once. Ironically, this got him and Alana into the finals, where they finished in last place with the same trademark lack of enthusiasm that we've come to expect from him.

I suppose now we need to uncork the problem of the season and by extension the franchise as a whole. You might have read that previous situation and thought, "gee, a fan favorite got tossed aside while a guy that everyone hated ended up making it into the final four? That seems weird."

But by that point it really wasn't at all.

See, the problem with the voting is that you don't usually get to pick who goes; the audience only gets to pick who to prevent getting kicked. At that point, the audience control is out of our hands and now into the contestants', and if there's one thing we all learned in high school it's that cliques are very much a thing. The contestants seemed dead set on booting anybody who was new the second they had the chance, so many potentially exciting people were so quickly thrown out. Instead of the exciting potential we could have seen, we got a love triangle sucking anyone nearby into doom, with everyone else being a relatively stable couple or part of the Jeremy/Korey wishy-washy railway. Casa Amor was an absolute bust, with people making half-assed couplings despite still being in love with somebody else (it speaks a lot to the weakness of the Casa Amor men that Olivia literally preferred to come back single than with any of those planks of wood).

Part of the problem did rely on factors that nobody could control at all though. "Romance novel come to life" Slade seemed like a threat with his rugged handsomeness, twangy accent, and classic southern charm, but had to quickly leave due to ambiguous family troubles. Similarly, the nearly perfect Josh and Shannon, who seemed like an obvious shoo-in winner by virtue of being probably the only actual relationship on the show, had to depart in the middle of the night due to the tragic death of Josh's sister. Aforementioned chaotic pansexual Leslie was unceremoniously removed in the middle of the night once they had realized that her classic vape pen was actually full of weed, an especially tragic circumstance considering she basically had Cinco wrapped around her finger and was about to bring that love triangle crashing down (also tragic because she has gone on record saying that she was fully crushing on Genny while they were both in there, robbing us of any potential of a queer couple).

But part of the pain as always has to do with how the producers control everything no matter what: what we see, what we hear, who gets the villain edit and who gets the hero edit. It's why they seem to play Jeremy as dumb hot surfer bro instead of the actual funny and charming guy he is. It's why Trina was treated as a bitch and Cash as a woeful victim despite the roles more often than not lining up the other way around. And most embarrassingly, it's how the biggest joke couple of the show ended up winning it all.

Now, look at this picture right here: the poses, the awkward hand holding, the very strange smiles between those two. No, this is not a picture of two teenagers going to prom together who just met only five minutes ago and are taking pictures on their parents' front lawn; these two are the winners of season 3, the supposedly "strongest" couple on the show. This is Olivia and Korey.

Korey is a charming boyish sweetheart by way of an absolute fucking dumbass. He's sort of like last year's beloved and wonderfully stupid Carrington: a very sweet and nice teenager who seems to have "13 Going on 30"-ed his way into an adult body. He's childish in a way that's very cute and friendly but also woefully unattractive to anyone who's an adult. Just like Carrington, he notched up a staggering amount of dates with pretty much every single beautiful woman that came into the villa, all seemingly very interested in him. Carrington, for as dumb and childish as he is, could bag anyone because he was outrageously confident too. Korey on the other hand seems incapable of making any decision, following any girl who pays him the time of day like a little puppy, constantly looking up to her with his big puppy dog eyes. It's very telling that for all the dates he had, almost none of them actually went anywhere because it's just not that appealing to anyone. If you're looking to win, he's not someone who can scheme and play the game. If you're looking for love, he's not going to cut it because he can't seem to even understand the concept of romance. If you're looking for a friend, he's probably the best damn one you'll get in that villa -- but as constantly established by everyone, this show isn't called Friend Island.

Olivia is a bit of a thornier subject. She habitually couples up with people that you can kind of tell she's not at all into. She started the first half relatively unassuming and not particularly interested in the men that she was supposedly attracted to. But you could basically see her panties drop when Slade walked in, ready for him to pull her up into the saddle and ride away into the sunset. But his sudden departure only left her more empty, desperately grasping onto whatever random attraction she could. She went off to Casa Amor single and had the gall to come back without coupling up with any of them (although once again, they really dropped the ball with the men compared to the stunning Casa Amor women). And somehow in the midst of all this wishy washy mess, she finally settled on the one single man who she hadn't coupled up with and supposedly suddenly had feelings for: lonely, little Korey.

As a watcher of two seasons of this shit, I've seen a lot of fake relationships, but this one is just ridiculous. The chemistry is really nonexistent; she seems more annoyed or at best partially amused whenever he tries to say anything genuinely sweet to her. She reacts like how you would when a little kid tries to tell you they have a crush on you, an adult: you just kind of go, "aw, cute, thank you!" and walk away chuckling. It's genuinely comedic in how tragic it is, a boy who thinks he's finally found someone when all she's found is a trip to the bank.

And what did the editors do? They tried their very best to sell this as genuine, as actual romance. We know what romance is -- we basically saw it with Shannon and Josh, and to a lesser extent Will and Kyra. And yet they whipped out that expert level edit to say, "wow, look at these two lovebirds, huh?" It's ridiculous, especially since only in the final episode did they suddenly remember that Jeremy and the stunning Bailey (aka the combination of Gal Godot and Ashley Judd circa-2001) were an actual couple and even they looked more real than the winning couple.

Love Island is, if nothing else, a reflection of America.

It's an outdated tradition desperately grasping to what's left of the typical western idea of romance. No matter how many beauty pageant contestants they pick, men like women who aren't size 2s, or with natural hair/skin, or with family-friendly occupations. Women are probably tired of the big muscle bound hunks they usually put on here, the nearly identical men that they seem to cast every single season who have all the looks but zero of the confidence or personality.

It's an example of how our choices are an illusion, how our influence can be easily overwritten by those in charge. Votes that don't matter when they change the rules on the fly, ripping out the actual choice of the people in favor of letting them decide what stays and what goes.

It's a testament that even in the face of a viral pandemic that's quickly turning into part two, as the lives of millions are being further destroyed across the world, there will always be some asshole who has more than you and looks better than you, vacationing on a tropical island stolen from its people, ignorant of everything else that's happening around them.

Love Island hates everyone. It hates it's contestants. It hates the viewers. It hates change. It hates me.

But I do still kind of love it.

[evilback-wards]

Day 1( don't. Read it's crap)

Heart Shaped Box prompt for Chemical Warfare Babies

… . .

…

.

Bing.

Surrounding Colline were suits. Large suits that had their cuffs tucked in. And the suits and Colline were in a carbon copy of the Oval Office: the assumed pinnacle of governmental grout.  Whispers were beginning to become full on conversations, mixing joy and hatred to copulate bureaucracy. The room was made with the construction of the original Oval Office in mind: wooden furnishings with uncomfortable couches, yellow curtains, flags from the galaxys’ visiting for todays discussion, old paintings from Earth, and, per the tradition of the planet, vibrate velvet blue fur to keep temperatures warm.

“You know, these humans didn’t know shit. They just existed. It’s kind of adorable,” says a suit, blue one—cuffs hidden by the darkness naturally exuded by their species. Blue dark suit darkness speaks to flapper imitator. The flapper imitator has the roaring 20’s down to the overabundance of happiness before a terrible downfall.

“So much can be learned from them! I’m excited for the fanfare that’s promised for today. Planet 00242192 always has the best shows,” flapper imitator said, fanning itself with some nearby wind. Ah—Colline was just about done dolling herself up for the show. Colline was a suit but also rare personnel that practiced the Earth culture seriously.

There was no light speed fast enough, quick enough, hurried enough to get the Earth stockholders into a room quicker than today. There was an e-mail that was pushed out that stressed the importance of everyone answering her communication. And the stockholders knew not to fudge their chance to speak to their cash cow—and came dressed for the occasion.

Besides flapper imitator, darkness creator, logic deeper, power steeper, gravel keeper, and naval peeker went more for tropes for their manifestations. Ones physical manifestations can leave a lot to be desired if chosen incorrectly on a planet. Colline was a tough customer—judging critically based on ones physical manifestations. It could be assumed that Colline would buy your stock just for matching the wrong century of sock with hair piece.

There was a long allotment for sound in English chatter, allowing the awkward language to leave from whatever orifice the creature utilized for speaking.  Colline stayed silent. Colline was listening for the truth, whatever that may be.

But, once Colline started tapping on the large light box, which triggered the lighting in the room to be lowered completely, people hushed themselves. It was now time for the show.

Dear Diary:

I had sex with a lot of people today. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that. But people forgive pretty easily, right? People will pass you on the street and forgive you for uglying the landscape? People will nod to you even when they are disgusting by the stench of your existence? Remember, if someone holds their nose against their clothing, you’re repulsive. You need to leave them right away. Humans have a tendency of keeping things too nice. Don’t be that way. If you hate someone let them know right away. So the proper fighting can happen. I’ve been dragged along the concrete too long with so many of my clients. They claim I’m ‘love at first sight’ when it’s really ‘cum at first sight’.

Not to knock my knack of doing things to sexually stimulate the creatures, but it gets tiring. Suck Suck. Fuck Fuck. It becomes natural. I am natural. So, I guess I talked myself out of feeling guilty for being an escort—yay! Now I can move on to write more interesting things.

My latest conquest is of someone at my same level. His name is CJ(god knows what that stands for) Byrant. He enjoys escorts as much as anyone. He runs through about fifty every seven days(a week!) and pays each of them handsomely to keep their mouths shut. I heard the last escort that tried to make a scandal happened became the next murder mystery scandal. Ah—I love me a good scandal! That person is dead because they spoke improperly. This person is tortured for being too honest. I love scandals! They are the hole to human virtue.

This is getting rambly, but since it’s MY DIARY, I can be rambly. Hm. New conquest: CJ Byrant likes his escorts like he likes his government: easy to leave in the late afternoon and hard to come in during the mornings. Get it? Yeah—a gay joke I think that was. But that’s just not any type of gay joke—it’s a funny one! I hope. Is my existence making you want to kill yourself yet? If so, I apologize, if not, what is wrong with you? I am extremely cringy and filled with too much hope. The best I have to aspire for is waking up with fresh egg whites on my tits. Maybe there’s a druggie cig hanging from my lower lip that CJ takes drags out of sometimes. I hope I’m good enough to be a night escort. Those are the best—the people make you breakfast usually and ask if that’s how humans would do it. The best thing about humans is that you just don’t know what they would do—they’re born with their own will and predetermined set of ignorance. It’s so cute!

Anyway, I am struggling right now. CJ Byrant is a tough cookie. I’ve been making sure my ass is in the perfect view of his eyesight. But he just clears his throat or insists that “he’ll get that”. What type of government official does he think he is? That’s really silly, you know, to have this façade of being such a respectful man only to turn out to be the kind of guy that needs to cum twice in your eyes and scrub your face into the concrete and call you his long lost rapist. Whoops. Secrets are being let out tonight. I apologize.

CJ Byrant thinks me being an Earth-informed person makes it okay. It makes him okay to treat me like a human male but—hold it—he doesn’t reap the benefits of having such an Earth-human-whore to push around. I could be his little blow doll. My mouth is already open way too often. That’s why I pay men to close it with their intimates. Or sometimes with an object or five if they’re feeling excitable that day.

I love being this whore life has made me to be. It’s easy, easy money, easy way of living. I just can’t think too hard or I’ll burst into tears. Ahh!—Thinking should hurt me! I wish each time I had a critical thought someone hit me upside the head with a brick. I shouldn’t be allowed to think—no, never—thinking is bad. These guys, when they look for escorts, look for the dumbest and best manifested. I need to retain my own view of my life as much as possible. I can’t let CJ treat me like the garden tool I am. Now I’m making puns—I must be reaching critical mass of funnies.

Ahh, it’s been nice writing this, but around now, I need to make a bad decision. Just like the cycle of abuse, a clock, a never-ending cycle of wander and blunders, I must do something completely terrible. Because that’s how Earth-human-whores act. And I love being an Earth-human-whore.

 The lights come back. The suits are struggling to retain a boisterous laughter. The suits flicker into manifestations of humans, a nice spread between the centuries. Colline smiles as she raises her digital grey camera.

“God, that was hoot! The girl is so brain-dead she can’t even keep secrets out of her diary! It’s like her vagina wrote the entire thing,” Flapper imitator says, with her lips out. Smoke drags itself past her lips and into the Oval Offices’ space. Other creatures struggle to retain their laughter and comments. Colline remains silent, snapping pictures of everyone at their moments of happiness, dressed down in their humanoid dresses. Their barcodes showing—oh sweet barcodes! These are important. I’ll explain why they’re important.

 Barcodes are assigned to every creature created on the planet known as 00242192. The English pronunciation of the numerical expression is often shortened as Capital Pra. Pra is a weird name, isn’t it, for this shit to be occurring on? With blue velvet carpet to be in a Oval Office to keep up temperature—because—humans are too stupid to find out how to work machines to heat them better.

Barcodes, okay, back to the point. Barcodes are assigned to anyone born on this planet as a discreet and personal number. Buuuut. Because anything created is sentient and has their own free will, and to keep privacy up, the placements of the barcode is random. Sometimes you’re lucky and its on your left ass check if you ever manifest an ass cheek. Issue one: Sometimes you’ll manifest and manifest and you can’t find the barcode of yours for the life of you. Issue two: If you don’t know what the fuck your barcode is, well, you’re screwed.  Your mark as a Triple O’ 9 and told to fuck off into the darkness. You’re labeled as uncooperative in this nook of the galaxy or universe or whatever you wanna see this place as.

Barcodes are an arrangements of lines from 5 cm to 5 inches that can be as short as 2 and as long as fifty on ones body. What—why are people born with these—the best answer I can give you is that that’s just how the machine works. And no one knows why. Maybe no one wants to know why. But anyway.

Barcodes are used to keep track of the population and employment of people born on Pra. And, to be more culturally sensitive, what percentage of people follow what culture. As a new born jelly mass, you don’t know anything. You don’t even know that your jelly form is offensive as you’re basically just a naked new born baby without culture! SO, let’s review:

1.Born as a jelly with a barcode

2. Get culture

3. ???

4. You live until you die under your cultures conditions

Sounds simple, but people like to make it complicated as shit. Like, who the hell even wants to stick to one culture? Who would want to? Even subcultures of your culture get boring. So many people just up and switch cultures when it gets close to their time. Some beings born with 3 barcodes still exist because they’re “lifers” for culture.

[nebulawriter]

Blind Review GoT S7E2: Stormborn

okay I’m an idiot and forgot to make dinner BEFORE the show, so I’ll have to pause partway through

oooh more about tyrells and martells. and Jorah. Nice. 

Yes, lets begin

opening music nice!

I am seriously surprised the Kings Landing sigil hasn’t changed to a lion. DRAGONSTONE!!! oh, goin’ back to Pyke, kay. WINTERFELL!!! I wonder if we’ll actually see castle black this time. I am excited about Oldtown. Its still weird having NO Essos. *shrug*

greyjoys? but WHICH--oh nevermind, its dragonstone.

wow this scene is dark. very smart, Dany. But they do really not like Cersei, thats true. 

This is the first time we’ve seen Dany and Varys talking. Like, we’ve SEEN them, but, hm. 

FUCK MY TILAPIA

has been flipped

Grill him. Grill Varys hard. I want answers. 

Its a good speech, Varys. and even sounds earnest. but not telling. 

And a better response, Daenerys. on both accounts. 

Oh god Melisandre. OH GOD MELISANDRE. listen. What the fuck are you doing here. 

seriously though I wouldn’t be so trusting of her, Dany. Like. Yikeseroni. 

THANK YOU MISSENDEI! I’m so glad they included that translation. 

Prophecies ARE dangerous, arent they?

EYYY its your old friend, Tyrion! 

Tyrion is right. plus, then he’d see his wife again. 

Mmm. Not sure if Jon’ll like that. 

Dinner’s ready, forgive me if comments are lighter. 

eyyy jon’s going to sansa for advice.

cersei’s kinda twisting the truth there

shit, whos this guy, I recognize him. 

Qyburn you shady fuck

Ohhhh it was Tarly. Is that a different actor for his son? or has there been a time jump?

ew, you want Dad Tarly as your general?

THATS WHAT I SAID ARCH MAESTER

try using dragon glass. Do you still have dragon glass, sam?

Sam, c’mon! talk to him! you knew his dad! I--oh. Oh, Sam in the books heard lord Mormont’s last words about wishing Jorah would join the nights watch. Hm. 

Ho fuck. Thats a big dragon skull. 

MMM NO. NO NO. DO NOT LIKE. NO. 

If any of them die, I expect it to be Rhaegal. 

Ooooh, shade, Tyrion. 

I don’t like Ellaria as much of Arianne in the book. 

wait, casterly rock? Are they gonna go to--AAHA! THATS WHAT THAT WAS IN THE TRAILER. 

Its a good plan. too good, somethings gonna go wrong. 

Olenna? good. 

Dany vs. Olenna. Thats a lot of sharp tongues. 

Mmmm. Nice words, Olenna, but. Also. No. 

Missendei and Grey Worm are splitting up?! :(

oh, call ‘em out Missendei. not a weakness. 

Is this the awkward sex scene. Sex...less scene? 

AWWWW GREY WORM!

Whoa Missendei. Whoa. Nelly. 

They gonna do some prosthetics or something? or just not show. 

Butt. 

yeah, thats what I thought. I mean, I didn’t expect them to make him, ya know, cut, but it might have been some equality thing.

Okay then. and this is where the asexual in the room sits awkwardly. 

ha. Is it “A song of Ice and Fire?” hows that for a title. 

(use dragon glass, Sam)

Oh Jorah. 

Sam, you are not inspiring confidence. 

remove it with dragon glass? maybe? or...not. 

oh nelly EEWWWWWWWWWW EWWWWW SAM WHY ARE YOUR SCENES ALWAYS THE GROSSEST!!!!!

Ew Ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew 

Thats a terrible transition. 

Oh! Hey! Hot pie! Arya, come on, thats meant for someone else. 

ARYA THATS SOME TERRIBLE dark humor. just. dark humor. 

She hasn’t heard! Omg! Sansa’s there too!

Decisions now, huh, Arya. North, or South. 

North! Reunion?! PLEASE?! GOD I NEED IT LIKE AIR

guessing thats not her. 

Oooh, raven from Sam!

Maybe not bend the knee. But a compromise? just saying. 

OH! OH PUT SANSA IN CHARGE WHILE YOUR GONE! THATS PERFECT!

uh-oh. Even Lyanna’s against you. 

You’re gonna send Sansa in your place, aren’t ya? 

HA! CALLED IT! 

A good choice. 

Petyr likes it WAY too much. But I had originally thought he would send Sansa down to Dragonstone. which, leaving Jon alone with Petyr is bad OH LIKE THIS PETYR GET AWAY FROM HIM. 

Petyr, you’re a sick, sick man. You’re arguably more responsible for killing him than most people. 

Jon, don’t kill him. I mean, I know the temptation is strong, but now is not the time, nor the place. 

Oh yes he is. 

Jon. Time. Place. I love you my gryffindor son but calm the bloody hell down. Sansa can handle herself. 

Not sure if sending Davos is the best solution though....I mean, not that he knows who’s down there, but. Hm. 

Petyr, you can fuck the fuck off. 

Arya could kill Petyr. That’d be cool. 

Oh god. Oh god is this...my dad hinted at something and this is the best I can think of. Is it....could it be....I think it is. Who else could it be? but why isn’t she with....hm. 

NYMERIA?! please? where is she? 

Is your friend! 

HOLY FUCK NYMERIA’S HUGE! 

touching reunion please and no biting or leaving. 

Awwwww.....:( better than nothing, I never thought we’d see her again. 

That’s not you? what does? what does that mean?

Ellaria/Yara I am here for it. I appreciate Yara being protective of her brother while also really gay. 

Yara’s shrug is everything. 

Aw dammit. 

Ah yes, scene in the trailer. Euron?

Well thats just going to make the battle really confusing. 

Oh no. Oh no if he takes out all the greyjoys. Its too early, and they’re separate from Dany. Thats....thats really not good. 

Please don’t kill all of them please I really like Yara. and I want Theon to know about Ramsay. And god, the Dornish...

Shit...its too perfect. But also...just...really, really bad. Best case they still lose a lot of ships. 

Fuck and we’re really late in the episode. Please don’t end on cliffhangar. Please. Oh god....

One of the sisters is gonna die, not sure which one. 

No, Obara! That sucks. Kill him! oh fuck! not that one too! 

Not all three! AND REALLY NOT ELLARIA PLEASE

oh no...she’s the gift...isn’t she? The wedding gift for Cersei. 

KILL! HIM! YARA!

FUCKFUCKFUCKFUCK!

THEON HELP YOUR SISTER OUT! PLEASE!PKEASEPLEASEPLEASE DONT

dont do this dont do this dont do this no no no no no no no. don’t kill your lesbian game of thrones. Please dont do this. or bisexual, still. 

THEON No, Theon’s gotta be...doing something, right? no? oh fuck. Yara......

fucking....hell game of thrones....thats....not.....good

[tessatechaitea]

Teen Titans #6

Nobody wants Aqualad on the team. NOBODY!

I guess whoever escaped was in prison for fucking puppies and butterflies.

The Review! The issue begins with Damian watching a news report about the escaped convicts. The report immediately goes from the convicts to shark attacks being up four hundred percent. So that means there have been, like, four shark attacks this year? I suppose there could be more if she's just talking about shark attacks in general along the entire coast of California. But I'm assuming she specifically means the Bay Area. Why would the Teen Titans care if people were being eaten by sharks in San Diego? That's not their territory! Let Animal Man take care of that shit. Anyway, that probably means the shark attacks and the prison break have more in common than anybody suspects. Was King Shark ever arrested for fucking puppies and butterflies? Damian is spending quality time with Goliath because, in comic book terms, Goliath isn't a boring pet. I'd like to see Damian have some loving interactions with Batcow. I'm beginning to think he takes Batcow for granted.

If Benjamin Percy hadn't written so many comic books about how racism is bad, I might look side-eye at that "yo."

Remember how Vibe was written in the eighties? Sometimes white male writers trying to write an authentic minority character stray a little too far into the field of stereotypes. Unless Percy just thinks adding "yo" to the end of a statement is just how young people speak. I can accept that. What I can't accept is that he wants to try to capture how young people speak. It's impossible! It's so unauthentic in so many ways that you'd be better off not to bother. Using terms to identify with a particular group isn't the sole territory of young people, of course. Everybody does it to prove their in-group credentials. I mean, I don't, of course! I'm so unique, I make up my own words! That's probably why nobody can fucking understand my intelligent and wise digressions.

Is throwing up in my mouth due to the phrase "mouth orgasm" a mouth orgasm? Because if it is, I am spent.

Beast Boy serves a vegetarian meal because it's his turn to cook. Everybody disrespects his decision and Wally runs off to steal some pizzas. What a bunch of assholes. It's one night per week! Fucking respect Beast Boy's dietary choices! Granted, his tofu platter might be terrible. But it isn't terrible simply because it's tofu. Nobody even tastes it to see if it's any good! It looks like deep fried tofu chunks in some kind of curry sauce. And if that's what it is, I'll have seconds! After my mouth wakes up from the nap caused by the orgasm. After lunch, Titans Island is invaded by a reporter seeking a totally non-hit piece about the new group of heroes bringing serious danger to San Francisco residents while selfishly blocking those residents' ocean view. I hope she makes them look terrible! Her name is Bonnie Chung and she's probably a devotee of Brother Blood. That's how things work in Teen Titans comic books, right?! Bonnie, live on the air, calls the West Coast "the Best Coast." She also says the Teen Titans tower is "the freshest, hottest, superhero pad on the planet." She must be the member of staff who does the local fluff pieces to make it seem like their city is the most exciting city to live in. Also, she might be a fraud because she works for KARE Channel 7. Excuse me, comic book. But I grew up in the Bay Area and Channel 7 is KGO. This comic book is so unrealistic. Beast Boy gives Bonnie a tour of Titans Tower while proving he's a lech and an asshole who can't go two minutes without sexually harassing a female member of the team or humiliating a male member. Some people reading might think he's hilarious. But then those people don't have to live with him. I wonder how many pairs of Raven's panties he has hidden under his mattress? I was going to say "Starfire's panties" but I doubt she wears them. Also, panties. That word is almost as ludicrous as finger-banging and lovemaking. Meanwhile in landlocked New Mexico, Aqualad is fucking with his poor fish! He's all, "I have power over you! Ah ha ha ha! Bend to my will!" Also, his name is Jackson Hyde. That has to be one of the most dangerous last names. How many Hydes die each year when a maniac or tiger is running loose on the streets and somebody yells, "Hide! Hide!" Everybody hides but the Hyde is all, "Yeah? What dude?", as he casually turns and gets brutally devoured or chopped up, respectively. I mean, non-respectively, unless the maniac is a cannibal and the tiger has carving knives tied to its paws.

He's trying hard to be different because he's a teenager! Duh!

So Aqualad is gay. The above panel is the third panel after he's been introduced. You have to get that sexuality thing out there as quickly as possible before all the heteros start believing the character is one of them by default. Percy's reveal here is as good a way to do it as I've seen even if the writer part of me always bristles at the way sexuality has to be mentioned as quickly as possible. Since it's an unseen component of a person's make-up, it obviously needs to be mentioned to be known. Remember, there were decades and decades of comic books where gay characters just didn't exist and gay fans just had to read into every detail as best they could to find a hero they could point to and say, "See? Totally gay!" If sexuality isn't mentioned, the status quo will assume heterosexuality. At some point in the future, writers will be able to introduce a team of young superheroes without instantly calling out which ones like to fuck which other ones and people reading won't automatically assume they're all hetero. It'll be a much more exciting time of fan speculation and intrigue because non-hetero sexuality won't be taboo; it will just be accepted. Until then, just get used to somebody pointing out that a character isn't heterosexual as quickly as possible. Look, there's still some mystery to what Aqualad's penis is up to. He might also like to fuck women! And fish!

How about keeping him safe by backing his play and flipping the fuck out on anybody who disrespects him rather than trying to convince him to not be the best Jackson Hyde he can be? Which — let's face it — isn't going to be that great considering he's Aqualad.

Meanwhile back at the interview slash tour, Bonnie Chung is all, "This was a great interview. It's totes going to go viral! You're going to be so famous!" Then she disappears into the Bay, hopefully to never be seen again because she's been eaten by a shark. Oh, that interruption didn't last long. And I guess Beast Boy didn't care that Bonnie disappeared under the water because the scene shifts back to New Mexico where Aqualad is already talking about the Teen Titans tour video that went viral (I guess KARE didn't really care either? They have a whole hour between five and six that they need to fill!). Some hero Beast Boy turned out to be! Did he forget he could have turned into a penguin and followed after her? Sure, he didn't see her disappear under the water. But he did see her scarf lying on the water. He couldn't even bother to investigate? So back in New Mexico where Aqualad has seen the viral video and is all jazzed about maybe being a Teen Titan, he decides to show his boyfriend his powers. His boyfriend decides to treat Aqualad like a pariah because why not? The guy is already dating a dark skinned gay guy with weird mutant tattoos. You can't expect him to accept much more than that! He's all, "Dude! I know we were just talking about how my dad doesn't accept me for who I am and how it sucks but, um, you know what? I can't accept you for who you are, freak!" Aqualad decides to move to San Francisco. That's like Mecca for gays! I hope that wasn't disrespectful to Mecca and/or fucking other guys in the ass! I bet the main people I offended with that last sentence were lesbians because I didn't account for them with that whole fucking other guys in the ass thing. But adding something more would have ruined the flow of that super intelligent and wise statement! Meanwhile, the Teen Titans are attacked by King Shark. He must want Beast Boy so he can ask him to turn into a puppy or a butterfly. The Ranking! No change! This has all the aspects of Teen Titans comic books that drive me completely crazy. That being said, it's one of the better incarnations so far!

[imyourliquor-youremypoison]

Off Limits (Skam - Chris x OC) Part 9

Pairing: Chris x OC

Synopsis: Mara Magnusson has always had everything she ever wanted in her life, except for one thing. The boyish charm of her brother’s childhood friend had wrecked her poor heart and ruined her for any other guy – you can trust her, she has tried. She could see the way he looked at her, though she knew there were rules about not hitting on your best friend’s little sister. Luckily for her, there were no restrictions when it was the other way around.

Word count: 1.9k

A/N: This is absolutely not what I intended to write when I first planned this chapter, but it was either that or a shorter version of this + a second scene with a time jump of a few hours. I don’t like to do that in the middle of a chapter, especially since they are so short. It also turned out significantly fluffier than I thought/wished. It’s so... idk, soft? I’m blaming the playlist I was listening to while writing (it’s this one!), next chapter won’t be as slow paced.

MASTERLIST 

Part 8 <<<< >>>> Part 10

“I almost miss seeing them eye-fuck at this point,” Chris complained before sitting down next to Mara at the school library.

The old lady sitting at the front desk glared at him from under her glasses, and Chris gave her an apologetic smile.

“Will and Noora?” Mara asked in a hushed tone, closing her book and looking at him.

Barely anyone ever came to the library when it wasn't exam period, but they remained cautious and tried not to show there was anything more than friendship between them. Though Chris couldn't hold back from gently lifting Mara's chin with two fingers, enjoying the short contact while it lasted.

“Who else? Will just shut a door to my face to make out with Noora in an empty classroom. Not to brag or anything, but we're much better at keeping our relationship a secret than they are,” he answered, whispering this time.

“That's because he doesn't try to hide it from you,” Mara said matter-of-factly. “Don't you ever want to tell him? Sometimes I forget why we're hiding in the first place.”

“Because you're off limits and I broke the cardinal rule of friendship by going for my best friend's little sister, and also I'm too pretty to be forever disfigured by your brother,” Chris listed all the reasons why it would be a terrible idea to come clean to William.

“Just wear a helmet,” Mara replied in a sarcastic tone. “We've been sneaking in and out and lying to everyone for almost four months now.”

“I know...” Chris sighed in defeat.

As much as he would like to joke about it, he too was getting tired of constantly having to watch over his shoulder and lie to his friends. Especially about Mara. For the first time in his life he was dating a girl he actually wanted to be seen with, and by a sick twist of fate, he wasn't allowed to.

“Let's not think about it,” Mara decided for them both. “Russ time is coming, have you received your russebukse1 yet?”

“Last week yeah. I'll send you a picture,” he said with a wink. “I'll be wearing this and nothing else.”

“It's a relief to know that you'll always be true to yourself, Chris,” Mara laughed fondly before remembering they had to keep quiet. “Will you stop by tonight?”

“I have to do something with the boys first but sure,” he seemed to think about how long it'll take him. “I'll always make time for you.”

Mara's heart jumped in her chest but she tried not to let it show through her expression. It was the closest thing Chris had ever said to actually voicing his feelings for her. She wasn't one for openly displaying her feelings and she didn't like it when her partner did it either. Never in her wildest dreams did she think Chris was the kind of person to talk about sentiments, but whenever he said something sweet, it stirred something within her.

“I want to kiss you so bad right now,” she admitted as she concealed a bitten laugh. She shouldn't have to hold back from kissing her own boyfriend.

“Why don't you?” He asked, leaning over the table and smiling seductively, one of his eyebrows raised in question.

“You know why,” Mara said. “And because the old lady is staring at us, I bet she's just waiting for something like that to happen, it'll give her a reason to yell at us.”

“William and Noora do it all the time, why should we behave at school if they don't?” Chris asked, making a very good point.

“Wanna get naughty with me in a dark corner?” Mara smirked leaning a little closer toward Chris.

If anyone else than the librarian were watching them, they'd see right away that these two were together. But no one was there except a girl at the far of the room, her nose dived in her book.

“Fuck yes,” Chris admitted, vehemently showing his frustration because he couldn't do so as he pleased. “And you know what else I want to do? I want to take you out.”

Mara practically snorted – not out of disdain, rather out of sheer surprise and disbelief.

“Like a date?”

“Exactly. A date.” Chris nodded and without thinking about it, his hands move onto the table to cover hers and grazed over her knuckles. “It'll probably suck because I've never done this before, but we'll get better with practice.”

“Do you realize what you're saying?” Mara had to make sure he fully understood what he was saying. “We've been secretly seeing each other for months-”

“We're not seeing each other!” He frowned in dislike when the words tumbled down Mara's lips. “As far as I'm concerned, you're my girlfriend. We kiss, we laugh together, we fuck, we sleep together, we support each other, we do everything but formalize it. I-”

The next words remained stuck in the back of his throat. He wasn't going to say that, Mara knew it.

“I know,” she said. “I feel the same.”

The truth was that neither of them was frustrated the way William and Noora were. Those two were sexually frustrated, because sneaking off to an empty room at school and making out on a desk was the closest they ever got to reaching third base, but it wasn't the case for Mara and Chris. They had sex, they kissed, they slept in like any other couple. They had it all except the small things. They couldn't touch in public, they couldn't kiss good morning when they arrived at school, they couldn't go out after school. They craved something a drastically different than Will and Noora. It was easy finding a room void of people and stealing a few kisses, they had been doing so for months. But no amount of physical intimacy would replace the total and utter satisfaction of being able to sit on your boyfriend's lap in a room full of people who didn't care.

Meanwhile, their fellow students started coming up with far-fetched theories about what was going on for P-Chris to deny his attention to all the girls that hit on him at parties. Mara they were used to see alone because everyone knew she only dated guys from other schools, or older boys. But Chris had never been out of the spotlight for very long. Rumors began to pop up here and there.

“Come with me,” Mara said and gestured Chris to follow her as she stored her book back on its shelf and left the library under the librarian's nasty glares.

It was twenty past eleven, everyone was either in class or outside, but the hallways were empty, not a sound was to be heard apart from that of the chalk hitting the blackboard coming from the classrooms. Mara took Chris' hand, and he looked at her with a stunned expression, his mouth slightly agape.

“We're alone here,” she told him. “Let's pretend for just a minute that we're a normal couple, yeah?”

He didn't answer, instead he smiled at her and let go of her hand to wrap his arm around her shoulders pulling her close enough to kiss her temple. It was so simple, and so nice. Mara almost tripped on her feet when Chris had pulled her to his side and she giggled silently, bringing an arm around his waist as she snuggled his side in a way she had wanted to for a long time.

“I'm sorry we have to hide all the time,” Chris apologized though it wasn't his fault.

“Don't be. Better this than nothing at all,” Mara reassured him, letting her head rest against his shoulder and breathing in his scent. Chris smelled of expensive perfume and something else, something fresh she couldn't quite put her finger on.

She wouldn't trade her relationship with Chris for anything in the world. Nothing could make her regret her decision to tell him she liked him that night at the party. No matter how close she was with her brother, Mara would never give up her own aspirations and dreams for William's personal preference. If he didn't approve of her romantic interest, then he would just have to deal with it and suck it up because Chris was not going anywhere. But there was no need to tempt fate and make things worse than they might turn out if Will found out in his own time and place.

“Hey, want to hear a good one?” Mara asked, trying to move to a lighter subject.

“Shoot.”

“Noora's friend - I heard them talk about you this morning in the hallway when I was at my locker -  one of them, Eva I think, has a theory on your sudden and weird behavior with girls!” Mara rolled her eyes at that and Chris smiled this smile she loved so much and that creased the corner of his eyes. “It's my favorite so far, really, it's very imaginative.”

“Just tell me already!”

“She thinks you're gay, and that you're secretly seeing this first year guy, Isak?” Mara wasn't sure about the name, but when she heard 'Chris' and 'gay' in the same sentence this morning, she almost chocked on thin air.

“Fuck, I thought I was being discrete about it!” Chris swore and for a second, Mara thought he was just joking along, but then she realized he was being serious and pulled back to give him a hard glare. “It's not that, Mara!” He laughed when he realized how it might have sounded. “Last week Isak's friend, Jonas, got jumped by the Yakuza guys. They've been after us for a while now and I told him to keep in touch if anything happened.”

“Anything I should be worried about?”

“I don't think so,” Chris said.

That was a huge difference between Chris and everyone else: he didn't lie. He didn't care about being blunt or indelicate, he just told the plain, cold truth. If there was any danger, he would have told her. But just like sometimes he looked at a situation on too bright a side.

“Someone's coming,” he added, quickly removing his arm from around Mara.

She was cold where Chris' arm rested second ago, and the abruptness of the separating almost felt painful. It wasn't supposed to be like this. They shouldn't have to act like they were guilty of something. Soon enough, a group of three girls walked through a door and their short but blessed moment of intimacy was over. A regretful gaze and sheepish smile was all they could give each other now that they had a public, however small it was.

“Still want to take me on a date?” Mara whispered.

“Tonight?” He asked, waiting for her to nod. “I'll pick you up at seven sharp. I'll text you before I leave so you can join me outside.”

“Deal. Don't be late.”

She smiled and with a wink and a twirl, she was out, leaving him in the hallway, completely oblivious to the way he watched her leave until she was out of sight.

1Russ overall

A/N: Don’t forget that reviews are a writer’s payment for their work! It’s always nice to come home to a few nice messages :) don’t be afraid to message me I’m thirsty for friends and attention

[thcpcnguin-blog]

TFLN Starters

{90 textsfromlastnight text starters}

[text]: i need to stop establishing animals as safe words. Giraffe and Penguin are really awkward words to say during sex [text]: I'm committing myself to dance. Also, I'm unsure if you said space party sounded lame because dude was old, but I hope you're over it because I love space, and I love David Bowie and I love to dance, and you need to embrace this with me. [text]: i have nothing going on in my life. unless a toxic love triangle with netflix and jack daniels counts. [text]: You were a cyclone of alcohol and bad decisions - like a gay Tazmanian devil [text]: learned the hard way that breakfast jack daniels is a lot stronger than lunch or dinner jack daniels. [text]: alcohol and riverdancing are a dangerous mix. have a spraind ankle. i die now [text]: im getting a BJ in a closet and a penguin just handed me a bong [text]: Got a snapchat from Megan last night showing you sobbing about a burrito on the floor with Dan in the background trying not to laugh his ass off [text]: He kept spanking me and talking about biomedical science. [text]: oh, well, if you all need a good laugh, by all means endanger my life. [text]: For breaking and entering. I think neighbor dan cared more about me puking in his backseat than the surprise of me waking up there [text]: He carried you out but the best part is you kept saying "can't I keep dancing" as you were gushing blood [text]: Whatever. We're stealing a penguin. Your not allowed near him... You did this to yourself. [text]: I don't know when he had the time to do it but he dug a hole in our basement like the shawshank redemption [text]: He broke his arm in a fistfight with the bouncer. it was neat. [text]: I'm sorry for what I said when I was orgasming [text]: He says the sweetest things but also that he wants to choke me when we fuck so it's kinda perfect. [text]: Your vagina is not a steamboat from the 1800's [text]: As long as there aren't any pictures of me humping the penguin, we are good, [text]: Vacuum the place before you go out of town there are random glitter cocks everywhere [text]: long story short, the bouquet was used as a sacrificial torch [text]: And by not handle it I mean it makes me want to sit on his face [text]: MIND BOGGLER: batman and jesus are the same person. Think about it. [text]: I'm sorry about the spring break comment. I won't make anymore pornos, I promise. [text]: I hate him but I love him for what he does which is me [text]: they asked me about my neuroscience major and I said 'the brain is the outer space of the body' and passed out. it appears my ivy league education is not going to waste [text]: my goal was to make out with as many people dressed as batman as possible. I have my priorities. [text]: Did we do drunk science last night? There's tequila in the test tubes... [text]: You didn't try to help me when I fell on the dance floor. She brought me cupcakes. You're a shitty friend, suck your own dick. [text]: also, what is the correct term for a shit ton of clowns? [text]: "Stranger danger aquaman" were the last words i remember. help me. [text]: no homo or anything but the way you were dancing with that girl gave me a boner [text]: It's one of the many facets of my drunken alter egos. I'm like substance abuse batman. [text]: Being hungover in this office is the actual worst. Like they look at me and know I was wasted at 1 am, karaokeing Billy Idol at a gay bar. [text]: i'm not a human right now. not even a dancer. [text]: I bet your mom's never met a girl who's thrown up at the presidential inauguration before though. [text]: I will teach you the ways of the ho life, my little gay grasshopper. [text]: Holy cold harsh reality of sobriety batman [text]: I am an emotionally compromised bisexual. [text]: so I guess it's not okay to mix vodka and ..everything and then proceed to offer a lap dance to ...everyone. [text]: Just banged your ex. So it really is 'him, not you' in that he's gay. Rodeo champion gay. [text]: I thought the Bane mask would really repel dudes but instead I ended up grinding on a frat dude that whispered "bad bitch contest, you in first place" in my ear in a Batman voice [text]: It began the way the best stories do—with some naïve jackasses in a place they had no business being at. [text]: I'm the kind of gay who carries his anxiety medication in case the club scene gets too fierce [text]: His ex told me that she wanted me to "take care of" him but from the way she said it I couldn't tell if she wants me to look after him or murder him. [text]: I was working er so they smashed a vodka bottle over dan's head so they'd have an excuse to visit [text]: Holy sore nipples Batman [text]: He;s fine. He just kept saying "hurricane Gordon is coming to shore" and flexed his muscles a lot. [text]: after I lost so many games of beer pong they made me be a troll, I sat under the table and told riddles while retrieving balls. [text]: hell hath no fury like a questionably-gay best friend scorned [text]: Quick question—how good are you at digging holes? I mean, besides the one you've dug for yourself. asking for a friend [text]: Just asphyxiate me and toss my corpse in the Ocean. It'll be easier than whatever the next four or eight years will bring. [text]: If you fuck up my birthday by dying I will kick your fucking corpse. [text]: I have a drinking game planned. Were gunna watch empire records. Everytime they say rex manning we have to take a shot [text]: OK. i'm going to add "riddle me this, brodawg" to the list of things i'm never gonna say to my boss again while i'm high. [text]: I DO have hobbies! I drink. I drink more. I catfish men on Grindr with photos of guys who are less attractive than me. I listen to Lovecraftian podcasts. I'm very well-rounded. [text]: I mean, I'm shallow, narcissistic, and selfish, but I'm an amazing friend sometimes [text]: I sang him a lovely rendition of 'So Long and Thanks For All the Fish", but replaced fish with dick. [text]: Between randomly bursting into tears and the reappearance of my lost sex drive, this break up has left me bizarrely damp. [text]: I'm slightly more gay than I thought. I'd go so far as to say I'm a top. [text]: party started at 10. cops are coming to shut us down now and its 11. i already lostmy underwear and im wearing a sparkly thong on my haed. this has to be some kinda record. [text]: i found you laying on the floor staring at the ceiling and you kept muttering "why" in various inflections. [text]: CNN just did a special on how to do heroin safely.. I recorded it for us [text]: Eddy, if you don't want to roll play then say so. This is just obnoxious [text]: you called me and cried until i agreed to record a rap about our lives with you [text]: He left his umbrella behind in my bed to 'keep me company', then stole my front door key before he went to work [text]: you know you're in deep when you watch fear and loathing in las vegas and every damn scene is relatable. [text]: for the record, you never really realize how drunk you still are until you get on rollerskates... [text]: I watch one musical on Netflix, and the "Suggested for you" section is literally almost the entire gay movie category. I feel profiled, and netflixs' accuracy about my sexuality is both impressive and offensive. [text]: ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS FOR YOU TO SHUT THE FUCK UP FOR ONCE [text]: 2016 was supposed to be my year of being a ho, but I guess 2017 might be too. [text]: You drunk? Cause I have a terrible idea... [text]: Eventually the creepy theater major quirks will come out. Probably in bed. Like role playing as the Phantom of the Opera [text]: Oh dear. If we're both hearing alien sounds then perhaps they're real. [text]: Actually I was drinking whiskey straight from 3 bottles, but that is neither here nor there. [text]: He left, I think he got uncomfortable when I started singing 'oompah oompah doodley do, I have a special riddle for you' [text]: Can we just get drunk and watch the Birdcage please I have no tolerance for straight men today [text]: Came home to my roommate drinking a 40 in the shower. Chugging with his hair still fully shampoo'd. [text]: People are talking politics and I have had 9 mimosas [text]: You leaned over to me in the elevator and whispered "how long do I have to pretend to be sober?" [text]: Vibrator fell off the top of the dresser and hit me. This might be the most embarrassing black eye incident ever [text]: I think we’re only still together so we can make each other miserable [text]: Girl you know I'm an advocate of debauchery but you might wanna check yoself. [text]: don't worry, i'm not mad. i'm just angry. and furious. and about to set your ass on fire. [text]: Sharknado 3 is going to bring us to alcoghol poisonign [text]: That’s not a That's not a current picture, because if you look deep enough into my eyes you can still see morals. Not these days. [text]: The cop told me I was the prettiest guy he'd arrested in a while. I'm still not sure if it was a come on or not. [text]: Reports of my death were greatly exaggerated. [text]: He literally chugged a bottle of wine in under 2 minutes. Stood up, said "fuck what ya heard" and stabbed the bottle into their drywall. [text]: We are 100% horrible people, and im extremely happy we are friends

[strawberryspeachy]

Pretty sure I wrote on here how I walk on eggshells around my grandfather and I kinda started feeling bad about not trusting him lately cause he’s been being nice to me

Well like. I still did. But after basically cleaning and barn mixed with what would top the hoarders tv show... finally thinking for the first time in my life I could relax... a couple months later followed by that rug I’ve been fearing being ripped out from under me... in fact being ripped out from under me

I had my first emotionally loud panic attack yesterday. Promptly followed by being told that he doesn’t care if I have any place to leave and telling me that I’m crap.

And yeah. See. That’s exactly why that feeling has never gone away.

I remember one time after college I don’t remember what was happening but I was upset and he was mad at me and I think I flinched or something and he screamed at me “what have I ever done to you?! I’ve never hit you!” And he’s right. He’s never hit. Threatened to? Yes. Grabbed his belt and stormed over at me? Yea. Actually hit me? No.

It’s annoying that that’s the qualifier of abuse. Being hit.

I’ve already bitched about how psychologically my family’s fucked me up. How every time something new happens it teaches me why I react to other things a certain messed up way based on how I was treated in the past. It sucks. It sucked. And it will forever continue to suck.

I bitch on here super long posts because they just go into my endless blog somewhere on the internet. Instead of 100 page document taking up memory on my computer. In attempt to not bother my friends with it. Which I haven’t entirely done this time. I reached out to my friends for help. Instead of that 2 of them are no longer my friends and the rest ignore me.

I can’t kill myself. Nothing painless works. I don’t have the means for the for sure methods. As in like they require a perscription or the perfect weather. Or a contraption that doesn’t exist because. You’re allowed to be homeless. You’re allowed to starve if it’s because you can’t afford food. You’re allowed to be poisoned by chemicals rich companies produce. You’re allowed to suffer. You’re allowed to suffer so much that you die. But don’t you dare pull the trigger yourself. Don’t you dare make something that helps people escape. That’s immoral. That’s instigating. That’s against the law.

The internet is still flipping the fuck out because a tv show implied you’re actions might negatively affect someone’s mind so much that they kill themself. And at the same time mad that a tv show showed the life of a suicide because ill instigate others??? How can you fight with both : don’t blame bullying for suicide./ don’t talk about suicide or else it’ll cause suicide.

I’m all over the place here. It’s whatever. My page is probably gonna be taken down cause tumblrs censoring shit and there’s ppl on YouTube bitching about the same shit as above. Like holly fuck. When ppl say ppl are triggered by everything these days it’s normally about how they can’t tell jokes about different races or gays or whatever else they feel superior to. But like ugh. It is kinda true. God forbid you put your opinion on the internet. Not even on someone’s page. Just there. Just somewhere ppl can find it. Someone disagrees and doesn’t like that it’s there.

Anyway.

Every time bs happens with my family I start to wonder what I would be like if I weren’t brought up in such a toxic environment.

In the past year or so I wonder how my brain has changed when I get mad at someone because. My mother has a nasty habit of getting mad at someone and then attack them personally. Say you knocked her drink over or something. She won’t just get mad that you knocked her drink over and be like what the heck I rlly wanted that - can you get me a new one. No. She’ll tell you how you’re always the most inconsiderate person ever. SHE HATES YOU. YOU RUIN HER LIFE! You fucking bitch what the hell is wrong with you?! Why do you WANT to make her miserable?!?

For YEARS I’ve been getting mad and pointing out. It doesn’t matter if you upset about something. Be upset. Say something. But stop attacking people on a personal level every time you get mad.

A fucking year ago my mom (grandmom) was still doing okish. A year ago I was the only one taking care of my mom and really even giving a fuck..... complaint for another post.

But my mom was destroying the house. She was collecting trash. And breaking things and stealing stuff. It’s what ppl with dementia do. And it got super freaking frustrating to say the least. My mother instead of being like. You’re ripped up my sandwitch. Not cool! ——— instead would scream the same things I wrote above at my mom and tell her how she was the worst parent ever and how she’s always been doing these things to ruin her life and how she’s so stupid for every decision she’s ever made ect ect ect

Keep in mind. My mom had 3 kids who she took care of. Maybe not the best parent. But a good and loving parent. And then she took care of me becauseeeee my mother decided I was only good as a get out of jail card and opted to be a coke addict hanging out with actual criminals till I was ending high school.

So many times I told her she needs to stop talking to mom like that. She needs to stop talking to me like what. How would she feel if every time someone got mad at her they called her a fucking bitch and brought up everything that’s ever bugged them about her and called her scum for it. She swore ppl already did that. So I started doing it to her. For the first few months she just got extra mad. Even though I pointed out that’s exactly what she always did to us. Isn’t this worse than just being upset about something.

Did she change. No. She just doubled down on it. And now I just react to her in the same way she treats me.

How this started is lost on everyone in my family. It’s just more “she she’s exactly like her mother” cause even though I was a super good kid. I was always just like my mother to the rest of my family.

And to pull this back. I don’t rlly get to see anyone. I’m stuck here. I have no money. Basically no friends. Nothing. And I’ve begun to wonder. When I think about ppl when I’m upset with them. Has just this year of personally attacking someone to match their tone taken its toll on how I react?

It honestly doesn’t even matter at this point. I feel like I should realize that lonely kid I was making up things to play in the backyard is all I’ll ever be. Those dreams of actually being part of something. Having ppl who care about me for me. That’s not gonna happen.

I was looking for a recipe I sent my aunt in the beginning of college. I found it in our fb messages but not before scrolling through the copy pastes from that demon roommate I had that year.... I consciously was nothing but nice to that girl. I talked to her when she talked to me and didn’t intrude on her when she didn’t talk to me. I was positive. I invited her when I went places. I introduced her to the ppl I talked to. I didn’t say anything when she broke my stuff or woke me up or had her bf and sister over every weekend. ONE TIME while I’m sleeping and she starts having sex in the bunk above me for the 4th time I say outloud pls stop... then follow that up later alone with an apology and tell her to just ask me to give her private time. She she committed herself to trying to turn all my friends against me. Getting my crush to stop talking to me. Turning my entire floor against me. Telling my ra that I made her uncomfortable to be in the room and yelled at her and several other things I’ve repressed from that convo with my ra while I was in shock that she said so many mean things about me and I never even knew she hated me. Wondering what did I do? I guess I heard it in the ways that she complained that I looked good in jeans. I guess I heard it in the way she got mad that her bf wanted to watch the tv show I head headphones in for and asked if I could take them out so he could watch too when she wanted him to do something. I guess it was in the way that when she met my friends she immediately spoke in just Korean till they asked her to speak in English since I couldn’t understand. I guess i should have known when she got mad at me for not being as resentful toward my family as she was toward hers at the time. I guess I should have known when she would look at me sometimes and I’d wonder why the look felt like she hated me. Cause she did. I’m dumb and didn’t know and I continued trying so hard to be overly nice and considerate toward someone who wasn’t satisfied targeting the ppl around me. But instead wanted everyone on fb to know how absolutely terrible and awful I was.

And I still hate her. And she’s in the back of my mind every time I think about what happens when I’m nice. But reading those. It hurt all over again.