#just a writer telling you youre supposed to be scared of what is ultimately functionally nothing because they wont yell you shit

[arolesbianism]

Was trying to figure out what my favorite abnos are and made a tier list to figure it out and realized I like dream of a black swan Way more than I thought I did

[brawltogethernow]

So, I don't think I've ever asked you this... what IS the whole point of the Spider-Sense? It really seems like something that only exists for writers to ignore or work around when they want to inject Legit Tension into a story.

I’ve thought about this power so much, but never with an eye to defend its right to exist, so I needed to think about this. The results could be more concise.

Ironically, given the question, I have to say its main purpose is to ramp up tension. But it’s also a highly variable multitool that a skilled creative team can use for...pretty much anything. It does everything the writer wants it to, while for its wielder always falls just short of doing enough.

I went looking through my photos for a really generic, classic-looking example to use as an image to head this topic, but then I ran into the time Peter absolutely did not reimburse this man for his stolen McDonald’s, so have that instead.

A Scare Chord, But You Can Draw It

That one post that says the spider-sense is just super-anxiety isn’t, like, wrong. It’s a very anxious, dramatic storytelling tool originally designed for a very anxious, dramatic protagonist. I find it speaks to the overall tone of the franchise that some characters are functionally psychics, but with a psychic ability that only points out problems.

Spidey sense pinging? There’s danger, be stressed! Broken? Now the lead won’t even KNOW when there’s a problem, scary! Single character is immune to it? That’s an invisible knife in the dark oh my god what the fuck what the fU--

Like its counterpart in garden variety anxiety, the only time the spider-sense reduces tension is in the middle of a crisis. But in the wish fulfillmenty way that you want in an adventure story to justify exaggerated action sequences, the same way enhanced strength or durability does. Also like those, it would theoretically make someone much safer to have it, but it exists in the story to let your character navigate into and weather more dangerous situations.

For its basic role in a story, a danger sense is a snappy way to rile up both the reader and the protagonist that doesn’t offer much information beyond that it’s time to sit smart because shit is about to go down.

Spidey comic canon is all over the board in quality and genre, and it started needing to subvert its formulas before the creators got a handle on what those formulas even were, and basically no one has read anything approaching most of it at this point, so for consistent examples of a really bare bones use of this power in storytelling, I’d point to the property that’s done the best job yet of boiling down the mechanics of Spider-Man to their absolute most basic essentials for adaptation to a compelling monster of the week TV series.

Or as you probably know it, Danny Phantom. DON’T BOO, I’M RIGHT.

DP is Spider-Man with about 2/3 of the serial numbers filed off and no death (ironically), and Danny’s ghost sense is the most proof in the formula example of what the spidey sense is for: It’s a big sign held up for the viewer that says, “Something is wrong! Pay attention!” Effectively a visual scare chord. It’s about That Drama. And it works, which won it a consistent place in the show’s formula. We’re talking several times an episode here.

So why does it work?

It’s a little counterintuitive, but it’s strong storytelling to tell your audience that something bad is going to happen before it does. A vague, punchy spoiler transforms the ignorant calm before a conflict into a tense moment of anticipation. ...And it makes sure people don’t fail to absorb the beginning of said conflict because they weren’t prepared to shift gears when the scene did. Shock is a valuable tool, too, but treating it like a staple is how you burn out your audience instead of keeping them engaged. Not to go after an easy target, but you need to know how to manage your audience’s alarm if you don’t want to end up like Game of Thrones.

The limits of the spider-sense also keep you on your toes when handled by a smart writer. It tells Peter (everyone’s is a little different, so I’m going to cite the og) about threats to his person, but it doesn’t elaborate with any details when it’s not already obvious why, what kind, and from what. And it doesn’t warn him about anything else-- Which is a pretty critical gap when you zoom out and look at his hero career’s successes and failures and conclude that it’s definitely why he’s lived as long as he has acting the way he does, but was useless as he failed to save a string of people he’d have much rather had live on than him.

(Any long-running superhero mythos has these incidents, but with Peter they’re important to the core themes.)

And since this power is by plot for plot (or because it’s roughly agreed it only really blares about threats that check at least two boxes of being major, immediate, or physical), it always kicks in enough to register when the danger is bearing down...when it’s too late to actually do anything about it if “anything” is a more complex action than “dodge”.

Really? Not until the elevator doors started to open?

That Distinctive, Crunchy Spider Flavor

The spider-sense and its little pen squiggles go hand in hand with wallcrawling (and its unique and instantly identifiable associated body language) to make the Spider-Person powerset enduringly iconic and elevate characters with it from being generic mid-level super-bricks. Visually, but also in how it shapes the story.

I said it can share a narrative role with super strength. But when you end a fight and go home, super strength continues to make your character feel powerful, probably safer than they’d be otherwise, maybe dangerous.

The spider-sense just keeps blaring, “Something’s wrong! Something’s wrong! God, why aren’t you doing something about this!?”

Pretty morose thing to live with, for a safety net! Kind of a double edged sword you have there! Could be constantly being hyperattuned to problems would prime you for a negative outlook on life. Kind of seems like a power that would make it impossible for a moral person to take a day off, leading them into a beleaguered and resentful yet dutiful attitude about the whole superhero gig! Might build up to some of the core traits of this mythos, maybe! Might lead to a lot of fifteen minute retirement stories, or something. Might even be a built in ‘great responsibility’ alarm that gets you a main character who as a rule is not going to stop fighting until he physically cannot fight anymore.

Certainly not apropos of anything, just throwing this short lived barely-a-joke tagline up for fun.

One of my personal favorite things about stories with superpowers is keeping in mind how they cause the people who have them to act in unusual ways outside of fights, so when you tell me that these people have an entire extra sense that tells them when the gas in their house is leaking through a barely useful hot/cold warning system that never turns off, I’m like, eyes emojis, popcorn out, notebook open, listening intently, spectacles on, the whole deal.

It also contributes to Peter Parker’s personality in a way I really enjoy: It allows him to act like an irrational maniac. When you know exactly when a situation becomes dangerous and how much, normal levels of caution go out the window and absolutely nothing you do makes sense from an exterior standpoint anymore. That’s the good shit. I would like to see more exploration of how the non-Parker characters experiencing the world in this incredibly altered way bounce in response.

It’s also one of many tools in this franchise hauling the reader into relating more closely with the main character. The backbone of classic Spidey is probably being in on secrets only Peter and the reader know which completely reframe how one views the situation on the page. It’s just a big irony mine for the whole first decade. A convenient way to inform the reader and the lead that something is bad news that’s not perceivable to any other characters is youth-with-a-big-exciting-secret catnip.

Another point for tension, there, in that being aware of danger is not synonymous with being able to act on it. If there’s no visible reason for you to be acting strange, well...you’re just going to have to sit tight and sweat, aren’t you? Some gratuitous head wiggles never hurt when setting up that type of conflict.

Have I mentioned that they look cool? Simultaneously punchy and distinctive, with a respectable amount of leeway for artists to get creative with and still coming up with something easily recognizable? And pretty easy to intuit the meaning of even without the long-winded explanations common in the days when people wrote comics with the intent that someone could come in cold on any random issue and follow along okay, I think, although the mechanic has been deeply ingrained in popular culture for so long that I can’t really say for sure.

It was also useful back in the day when no artists drew the eyes on the Spider-Man mask as emoting and were conveying the lead’s expressions entirely through body language and panel composition. If you wiggle enough squiggles, you don’t need eyebrows.

Take This Handwave and Never Ask Me a Logistical Question Again

This ability patches plot holes faster than people can pick them open AND it can act as an excuse to get any plot rolling you can think of if paired with one meddling protagonist who doesn’t know how to mind their own business. Buy it now for only $19.99 (in four installments; that’s four installments of $19.99).

Why can a teenager win a six on one fight against other superhumans? Well, the spider-sense is the ultimate edge in combat, duh.

Why can Peter websling? Why doesn’t everyone websling? Well, the spider-sense is keeping him from eating flagpole when he violently flings himself across New York in a way neither man nor spider was ever meant to move.

How are we supposed to get him involved with the plot this week???? Well, that crate FELT dangerous, so he’s going to investigate it. Oh, dip, it was full of guns and radioactive snakes! Probably shouldn’t have opened that!

Yeah, okay, but why isn’t it fixing everything, then? Isn’t it supposed to be why Peter has never accidentally unmasked in front of somebody? ('Nother entry for this section, take a shot.) That’s crazy sensitive! How does he still have any problems!? Is everything bad that’s ever happened to characters with this powerset bad writing!? --Listen, I think as people with uncanny senses that can tell us whether we are in danger with accuracy that varies from incredible to approximate (I am talking about the five senses that most people have), we should all know better than to underestimate our ability to tune them out or interpret them wrong and fuck ourselves up anyway. I honestly find this part completely realistic.

*SLAPS ROOF OF SPIDER-SENSE* YOU CAN FIT SO MANY STORIES IN THIS THING

The spider-sense is a clean branch into...whatever. There is the exact right balance of structure and wishy-washiness to build off of. A sample selection of whatevers that have been built:

It’s sci-fi and spy gadgets when Peter builds technology that can interface with it.

It’s quasi-mystical when Kaine and Annie-May get stronger versions of it that give them literal psychic visions, or when you want to get mythological and start talking about all the spider-characters being part of a grand web of fate.

Kaine loses his and it becomes symbolic of a future newly unbound by constraints, entangled thematically with the improved physical health he picked up at the same time -- a loss presented as a gain.

Peter loses his and almost dies 782 times in one afternoon because that didn’t make the people he provoked when he had it stop trying to kill him, and also because he isn’t about to start “””taking the subway’’��”’ “‘’“”to work”””’’” like some kind of loser who doesn’t get a heads up when he’s about to hit a pigeon at 50mph.

Peter’s starts tuning into his wife’s anxiety and it’s a tool in a relationship study.

It starts pinging whenever Peter’s near his boss who’s secretly been replaced by a shapeshifter and he IGNORES IT because his boss is enough of an asshole that that doesn’t strike him as weird; now it’s a comedy/irony tool.

Into the Spider-Verse made it this beautiful poetic thing connecting all the spider-heroes in the multiverse and stacked up a story on it about instant connection, loss, and incredibly unlikely strangers becoming a found family. It was also aesthetic as FUCK. Remember the scene where Miles just hears barely intelligible whispering that’s all lines people say later in the film and then his own voice very clearly says “look out” and then the room explodes?? Fuck!!!!

Venom becomes immune to it after hitchhiking to Earth in Peter’s bone juice and it makes him a unique threat while telling a more-homoerotic-than-I-assume-was-originally-intended story about violation and how close relationships can be dangerous when they go sour.

It doesn’t work on people you trust for maximum soap opera energy. Love the innate tragedy of this feature coming up.

IN CONCLUSION I don’t have much patience for writers who don’t take advantage of it, never mind feel they need to write around it.

[thesummerstorms]

Rev Recaps Hard Contact (Chapter 17)

CW: series typical violence. discussion of a passage where the author decided to use a common slur against transgender people as an abbreviation of “Trandoshan”, which, what the fuck. 

TL;DR Recap: Hokan freaks because he doesn’t know how the commandos got in & he can’t get through the bulkeads to where Uthan is trapped with them. Atin and Darman get into a brief, intense fight against some Separatist personnel before capturing Uthan. Hokan finally manages to get the bulkheads down, but all that’s left are some of Uthan’s staff.

Beginning Kal Count: 32 Ending Kal Count: 35

Hokan, naturally, doesn’t take well to the fact that Darman and Atin finally breached his supposedly secure facility. In fact, he still has no idea how it happened; however, with the various blast doors down, he can’t get to Uthan or her team to figure it out, much less solve the problem. It’s revealed that the bulkheads were lowered automatically when Darman and Atin cranked up the other security door; it’s a precautionary measure on the computer’s part. What that means is Atin and Darman are cornered with Uthan and the Separatist fighters, at least unless they can escape through their previous tunnel, but Hokan also can’t get it to kill them.

The man also has an ego. 

His new favorite Lt. promises to keep trying to override security to raise the doors. Hokan tries a crowbar, but the gap is only about the size of a piece of paper flimsi, so it doesn’t work and he throws it to the floor and has a momentary fit. He doesn’t have explosives, so he pulls out surprisingly he can’t immediately cut through.

I’m very interested to know what the hell that door is made of, but given the kind of work Uthan is doing, I suppose it makes sense to Jedi-proof your entrance to the best of your ability. Still, it had to be REALLY expensive.

With Hokan otherwise occupied, we cut back to Darman and Atin, who are also not having a fun time, but more because Uthan is armed with a Verpine gun and has a few Separatist officer friends hanging around and their only way out is back out the tunnel into the sewers that they just dug.

CW: Canon usage of a word that is also a slur against transgender people.

There are some great small moments here, but unfortunately this whole POV section is liberally salted with the usage of the word “Trannie” disguised used as a short-form of “Trandoshan”. I barely remember 2004 and I had literally only just turned 10, so I have no idea what kind of prevalence there was to the knowledge that this was, in fact, a slur. 

But even if I wanted to look into that, that a) assume that KT literally ever thought to look into other people’s perspectives as a writer and would have cared or b) ask me to believe that a white English woman with strong conservative isolationist tendencies who writes books with pervasive misogyny and heteronormativity wouldn’t have purposefully slid that in under the radar.

And it really doesn’t matter in the end, because ultimately you still have the book you have. I’m just going to have to settle for minimizing my screencaps for this section because I don’t feel like endlessly repeating the word without need.

Back to plot:

Dar tells Niner that they have Uthan cornered but she has a gun on her. Niner tells her, essentially, to scare her into dropping it because Verpine rifles are fragile. I have no irl knowledge of guns to compare this to. Niner says that if Darman and Atin need help capturing Uthan, that’s probably too bad, because he and Fi will have a hell of a time getting in. Majestic is the only thing currently firing on the surface, but Niner’s hesitant about using the battering ram on the front door when Dar asks. Dar consents to trying to evac Uthan out the drains first, but wants Niner and Fi busting in to be the back up plan.

Oh, Fi. But that disagreement goes nowhere as Atin hears something and he and Darman realize Uthan isn’t alone. Since the only folks on Darman’s side are with Niner, that means that these are Separatist fighters. Darman is generally pissed, and apparently I’ve missed something about a locking door somewhere or misunderstood part of the scene, because we get this line:

Okay. Door opens. No Uthan. Door has Trandoshan thugs. Dar is in close contact range with said thugs.

Darman and the and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

Darman feels like he just hit a brick wall, despite his armor, and only manages to make the first Trandoshan stumble. The second Trandoshan starts to advance on him with a knife, but looks at his armor for a second “bewildered”. Fair.

Lmao. There’s actually kind of a neat fight scene that follows, but I’m not screencapping any of it because word usage. Darman body charges the Trandoshan at ramming speed and tries to stab him in the throat with the vibroknife built into his gauntlet, but the Trandoshan grabs his wrist and is trying to stab Darman at the same time. Darman chooses that moment to wonder, “Hey- are our bodysuits stab proof? I don’t remember.” So since obviously that’s not a great risk to be taking, he uses “bar-brawl tactics that Skirata made sure they all learned” (Kal Count increase to 33) and kicks the Trandoshan in the shin followed by stomping on his instep. That loosens the Trandoshan’s grip enough that Dar can stab him, which he does “over and over, not sure what he was hitting” until the Trandoshan stops screaming. He notes that “Skirata was right. Stabbing someone was a slow way to kill them.” (Kal Count 34.)

He turns around and sees Atin covered in Trandoshan blood, but otherwise okay. Darman is about to explode the door in to get to Uthan, and Atin pulls out the Trandoshan shotgun array blaster.

Darman uses explosive to blow the lock on Uthans door, tosses in some EMP grenades, and they rush in.

“He had become used to Etain’s resilience.” Okay, y’all had to know I wanted to make a note of that. It’s good to have some positives acknowledged occasionally. Darman comms Niner and Fi “whoops” loud enough to hurt his ears. Darman realizes that Atin has killed three more Trandoshans and a lab assistant. There’s some weird shit there about the lab tech not being pretty anymore and Dar wondering if she’s Uthan’s daughter, which honestly makes zero fucking sense, especially since Darman apparently didn’t see her alive. Darman tries to ask how many staff Uthan has, Uthan groggily says something about them murdering her assistant-

and weirdly, Atin seems to be having a tiny moment of doubt now, as he’s staring at the bodies. It’s subtle, since we aren’t in his POV, but I think he’s having the same kid of reaction Dar had earlier in the book:

“Almost to himself”. I don’t know, I could be reading a lot into a tiny phrase where there’s nothing, but ... in the context of discussing how the book handles various characters reacting to killing, it caught my attention. Darman, on the other hand, currently has no fucks left to give.

.... okay. 

Darman asks again about the staff, and:

You know, I could do with out the Kal Count increase (35) but at the same time, I agree with Darman. It’s very, very rich for someone working on biogenic weapons to trot out the “They’re civilians” thing. Darman comms back, gets confirmation from Niner that he doesn’t need to capture Uthan’s staff. They gag and restrain her, Darman literally throws her over his shoulder, and now they have to find their way out of the tunnels with a captive scientist in tow. Darman is worried they’ll get lost.

We cut to Hokan, whose staff is finally getting the doors from their end open, too little too late.

Hurati, again, is the lieutenant Hokan had murder the previous lieutenant because Hokan didn’t like him. But the “whether he wanted to admit it or not, he actually cared what happened to him” line is weirdly funny to me?  Hurati, admittedly, has managed to override all the doors, so all the security bulkheads AND the front door open at once, which is bound to earn him favor. But then we get:

Even the weirdest, most extreme, got-kicked-out-of-Death-Watch-because-they-couldn’t-function Mandalorians have an adoptive instinct. Or rather, that’s how I’m choosing to read this line, because it’s funny to me. 

Hokan finds the rest of Uthan’s team, but can’t confirm whether any virus samples survived, and Uthan is already gone. He seems to be finally waking up to the situation, as we end with this quote:

:)

[lost-eternity]

@dreaming-about-starfleet

Do you like Marvel? I wrote this thing a while back so this is a repost but I was kinda hoping you would offer feedback writer to writer?

Control -Loki x Reader- ONESHOT

This is a Loki x Reader one-shot where the reader is a psychologist.

~

TW: self-harm, and certain mental illnesses. 

SONG FIC: Control by Halsey

His eyes are blue. 

     Touched by ethereal storm clouds, as cold as a tumultuous sea. Eyes that sing of empty promises and pretty lies, an infamously alluring gaze that drags you fathoms below their icy depths. Eyes that leave you to drown there, writhing in your misplaced trust. You had never seen any emotion in them other than contempt. But at that time, they had burned with the passion of a roaring flame. Uncontrolled in their path of desecration, consuming all they touch in the twin flames of hate. 

     His eyes still haunted you, plaguing your dreams like a wretched banshee caterwauling into the night; calling out for your demise. And yes, they would be your demise. It didn’t take much intellect to figure that out. Despite all of the flashing signs, the warnings- you couldn’t help but feel drawn in. The fog behind that cerulean gaze concealed a mystery of a man with motives and morals all to his own. A man that equal parts thrills and scares you, and ultimately beckons you deeper into his sea. Honey-filled words coat your instincts, cajoling you further into a diminished stupor. It is a sour lesson to swallow but invaluable nonetheless; sweetest tongue has sharpest tooth. 

        “Doctor!” Stark’s gravely tone shook you from your apparent languor and silenced your mental musings. Lifting your chin up, you found yourself once again revisiting your surroundings. You were positioned at a metal table, spread before you were the remnants of the sandwich you had been eating for lunch. Although it appeared you were the last one to finish. With the exception of Tony Stark, the rest of the cafeteria was devoid of S.H.I.E.L.D agents. Stark loomed above you, wearing an incredulous expression upon his insufferably smug brow. 

“Tin-man.” You greeted him with a flat tone, gazing down at your rather unappealing sandwich. “Have you finally found your heart?”

“Ha-ha,” Tony remarked callously in response to your pun, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Fury wants to see you, Doc.” 

You bowed your head, staring impassively at your hands. “I’ve told you. Just call me Y/n.”

A smirk tugged the edges of Tony’s mouth upwards. “But you’re a doctor.” Although his tone conveyed reminiscence, you knew it was just a guise for the triumph. 

“Of psychology,“ you scoffed, now unable to hide your amusement. “We both know I am not a real doctor.” 

Tony only chuckled at your disdained tone. With a grandiose swooping gesture of his hands, Stark dipped his head in mockery. “As you say, Y/n.”

        You resisted the urge to roll your eyes as you rose to your feet. Your sandwich remained neglected upon the cold metal table whilst you brushed out your immaculate white lab coat. While it was true you didn’t consider yourself a real doctor, you spent a good chunk of your time in the lab with Bruce. Of course, the man’s got a stick up his ass, as Tony likes to say, and only seems to care about safety precautions and lab etiquette. Hence the lab coat. You ducked past Tony, smirking to yourself. You knew that Bruce would blow his top if he found out that you had been eating food in his spare lab coat. 

Pausing mid-stride, you twisted your head around to appraise Stark. He was lingering behind, leaning smugly against the table, his head tilted to one side. 

“You coming?” You cooed, folding your arms over your chest.

“To talk to Fury? Nu-huh. The man sounded pissed enough as is.” 

That dulled the playful mirth in your gaze. “Pissed?” You echoed then sighed for what felt like the thousandth time that day. “Good to know.” Swinging around, you scrambled at a brisk pace down the hall. Nicholas Fury was a terrifying man with a sharp stare and equally sharp tongue. You did not want to contribute to his current moodlet by being tardy.

        As you hurried down the hallway you found yourself plunging deeper into your own thoughts, caught up in a tidal wave of passing fancies. You had learnt to embrace the wind of your mind, like a brief gust before returning to a calm sea. 

        Your ideas drifted back to the conversation you just had with Tony. You recounted his posture, the way he tensely held his shoulders, forcing them upright. How he inclined his head towards you, but still unable to meet your eye. You knew that something was on his mind, and you were tempted to inquire about it once Fury dismissed you… and after you have spoken with him.

Stark liked to fancy himself an anomaly. He would strut around wearing a dazzling smile and an aloof attitude. He used his biting wit and sarcastic remarks as a mask of which to hide behind. All his life he had been treated coldly, expected to depend on only himself and to discount others. This had lead to a vicious cycle of self-dependent cynicism. You recognised this tendency the moment you first met him all those months ago. You had tried to break it, you introduced him to cognitive therapy, to journaling, painting and other methods of self-expression. However, the man had proven himself to be quite stubborn and dismissed you. He rejected your outstretched hand in favour of a bottle of scotch whilst proclaiming: "I’m hungry. Where’s the scotch?”

        You knew that Stark’s alcohol dependency was a coping mechanism for some form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. You hadn’t been around long enough to figure out what stemmed this, but you figured that it was a culmination of many different elements. The others weren’t of much help and you eventually learnt not to ask questions. Instead, you could only be a bystander to Tony’s self-destructive habits as he continuously searched for the solution to his problems at the bottom of an empty glass. You knew that you couldn’t help him. Not unless he wanted to be helped. And as mentioned earlier, Tony only helps himself. 

        You pulled yourself from your thoughts as you arrived at an unmarked door. Gathering your sense of courage you reached out, placing your fingertips upon the metallic surface of a recently polished door handle. You must have been shuffling your feet because the contact sent an electric charge crackling through your fingertips and raising the hair along your arm. Taking in a final breath, you flicked your wrist and the door swung open.

        The room itself was sparsely decorated. Beams of light interrupted by the blinds along the windows poured into the otherwise darkened chamber. They illuminated swirls of dust, twisting together in some erratic and tumultuous dance.  All furniture had been pushed off towards the sides, opening a central area where the man himself stood. Nick Fury, looking as intimidating as ever. Fortunately, his back was to you, and his glowering stare directed towards one of the windows. You weren’t certain, but you could have sworn that he was idly following the path of one of the floating dust particles as it drifted across the room. Clearing your throat, you announced your presence. A heavy silence fell between the two of you. 

        You were the first to break. “Are you trying to intimidate me?”

There was another pause, causing an empty feeling to open up in the pit of your stomach. It brought you back to your grade school years, trepidatiously lingering in the principal's office and fidgeting under his cold stare.  Had you said something wrong? Were you in trouble? Fury’s shoulder spasmed slightly, it took you a few seconds to realise that he was laughing. “Is it working?” He asked.

“Uh. Yes.” You admitted, making your way over to one of the disregarded chairs. You straddled the chair, leaning your chest and arms against the backboard. “I suppose that is why you’re standing in a semi-empty room with the lights turned off.” A nervous chuckle slipped past your lips. “You, uh, wanted to see me, er, sir?” 

“I did.” Fury, at last, turned around to face you. Shadows clustered along his jaw and nose as the byproduct of the backlighting from the closed windows. 

        You leaned slightly back in your chair. You would not ever be able to quite get used to the threatening eye patch he wore to cover his lost eye. He never talked about how he lost it, and you never were foolish enough to ask. It was probably a traumatising tale, and you knew better than to dig up long-buried memories (if only you knew the truth about the cat named Goose). 

“You’ve been spending an awful lot of time with him, Miss Y/n. Why don’t you tell me how that is going for you.” With a dramatised grunt, Fury sat down across from you.

“Uh. What do you mean, sir?” You blinked, quickly withdrawing. Your boisterousness from earlier dropped in the presence of your superiors. You enjoyed your job as the therapist for the Avengers, you weren’t about to lose it. 

A contemplative sigh fell from Fury’s lips. “Loki. You keep informing me that you are progressing with our… special guest, and yet I see no evidence as such.”

        A look of bewilderment clouded your face. You stitched your eyebrows together, curling your hands into a fist by your sides. Loki, the Asgardian self-proclaimed god was quite an aberration. Perhaps it was because you were attempting to define an alien’s psychology in human terms. Or because his mind functioned differently than a human’s. Regardless of the reason, it simply wasn’t working. You had everyone else on the team figured out, even Director Fury himself. But Loki? The man posed a mystery. A convoluted figure who wrapped himself in shrouds, hiding his motives behind complex word puzzles and mind games. It called to you, drawing you in, challenging you. Taunting you. 

        Over the past few months, you have had many sessions with him, each one bringing you closer to cracking him. Each breakthrough sent a wave of euphoria coursing through your veins, and you began to truly understand him. This god… this eternal being. You understood him in a way no one else did. And he understood you. You could see it in his eyes, the way he ever so slightly perks up when you entered the room. How loosely he speaks with you now. He doesn’t speak with anyone else that way. Just you.

Only you. 

“I am so close, sir.” You reported, schooling your features into an expression of apathy despite the stirrings you felt in your heart. “I just need more time.”

“Time? We’ve given you plenty of time.” Fury remarked, stiffly crossing his arms. “Now we need results. Elsewise we might have to terminate your little experiment.” 

You couldn’t help the emotion rising to your voice. “No! I can help him. I swear. I can change him. He is salvageable. He is just… wounded.”

“You can’t save every wounded creature you find on the roadside, Miss Y/n.” The Director consoled her despite the graveness of his tone. “To even try would be an exhaust on our resources and personnel.” 

“I can save this one.” You stated firmly, your tone unwavering. “I am not going to give up on him.” 

Director Fury met your unfaltering gaze, scrutinising it for any possible hint of doubt. He finally sighed in resignation, shoulders slouching slightly. “Very well. You get one more session. And if you don’t have any intel for us by then, we are pulling the plug.”

“Yes, sir.” You crumbled forward, relief resting heavily on your back. “Thank you, sir.”

“It’s best to be off now. You’re on the clock.”  Fury drawled in a taunting tone.

Quickly springing to your feet, you inclined your head towards Fury in a brief nod before scrambling off down the hall.

        Loki’s holding cell was deep under the facility. It boasted an impressive array of mechanisms to ensure his complacency and idleness. The original design was intended for the Hulk in case he ever lost control within the walls of S.H.I.E.L.D. Loki had taken up residence shortly prior to its construction and was moved there on orders from Agent Coulson. After a few failed escape attempts, Loki seemed uncharacteristically docile. This was when Fury had ordered you to begin sessions with the Asgardian due to your background in psychology. Fury wanted to know anything that could be used against him, but you, instead, wanted to try and save him from his inner demons. 

        From the first moment you laid eyes on him, you recognised his tortured soul. From the information Thor had provided you, you sympathised with the god of mischief. Kings have a tendency to cast a long shadow, plunging anyone underneath them into unrecognised darkness. And Loki didn’t want to be complacent in life only to die forgotten. A sentiment to which you deeply relate. 

        Pressing your identification card up against the smooth surface of the scanner you watched as the heavy-set doors slid open before you. You stepped into a large rectangular room. In its centre stood a large glass tube, reinforced with some science whoo-haa you did not quite understand. 

        He sat on the floor, his hair immaculately slicked back as always. Obsidian curls covered his shoulder, outlining his sculpted face like an experienced artist’s masterful brushstrokes. Those piercing cerulean eyes passively gazing towards you, his expression unreadable. 

Your raven-haired prince.

“You’re unusually quiet.” You remarked as you stepped towards his enclosure. You took a seat in the padded armchair left for your comfort, crossing your legs neatly. 

“What do you want me to say?” Came the croaked response after a moment of hesitation. “You sit there, gawking at me from outside my cage. Like I am a zoo animal here for your entertainment. I am a god. You should be my monkey.” 

His sharp tone caught you by surprise. You redirected your attention towards him, lifting your chin slightly. “Is that really what you think?”

“You don’t deny it.” This time, he did not miss a single beat. 

“Ah.” A ghost of a smile appeared on your face. “I see now.”

Loki’s carefully crafted smirk faltered, his brows knitting together in a perplexed expression.

"You want me to be your "monkey". Your pet. Something you can keep on a leash. A creature whose life and decisions you have complete control over. Is that right?" A satisfied smirk curled your lip.

Loki gave no response.

“This is about control.” You continued matter-of-factly. “That is what your domineering display on Earth was. A last-ditch effort for control.”

The smirk died on his lips. He turned his head away and scoffed. “Like you can understand me.”

“You really are quite simple, though.” You couldn’t resist the urge to speak in a haughty tone as you picked yourself up from the couch. “Ooh, yes. I definitely have it now. All your life you have been cast to the side lines. The people around you making your decisions for you. What you should eat, where you should sleep, who you should communicate with. As such are the duties of a prince. But in the end… you don’t even get to control who ascends to the throne. It is Thor. It was always Thor. You were just a ploy, a desperate grab for peace in a time of war. So they disregarded you. They sent you away to find them a fortune. Because in the end, you were just a pawn in their games.” 

“Shut up.” Loki’s lips curled back in a menacing sneer. “You don’t know anything!”

“Aggression is a method of deflection.” You remarked as you slowly paced your way around the glass. His eyes followed your movement, poised like a cat waiting to strike. You continued, undismayed. “That’s why you came here, huh? You needed an outlet. Someone to exercise complete control over. And it felt good, didn’t it? Gaining the one thing that you have been deprived of all these years. But then it was all taken from you. And now you’re here, helpless and without any control. And it’s driving you mad. Tell me, Loki, who is in control?”

No response.

Provoked, you asked again, your voice louder this time. “Who is in control?”

“I said, shut up!” Loki barked, the entire room within the glass confines flickered momentarily. 

You took a step back. It was subtle, and if you were dealing with anyone else, you would have thought that it was a trick of the light. But this was Loki. Narrowing your eyes, you whirled around to face the deadpan god. “What did you do?”

If he realised he had been caught, he showed no sign of it. “How do you mean?” That self-assured smirk gradually worked his way back onto his face.

“Remove the illusion, Loki.” You breathed, pressing a palm against the glass.

“Are you sure of that request?” Loki drawled.

Your steely glare was the only answer he needed. Sighing, Loki lowered his gaze. His form flickered a few times before vanishing altogether and what you saw in his place caused you to draw in a shuddering breath.

        The food you had provided him that morning had been cast aside. The silver tray turned over and smears of blood mixed with cereal stained the glass walls. Loki himself appeared even worse. His pristine complexion was marred by a busted lip, crimson liquid split out of large gashes in his knuckles. His parts of his hair, caked with blood and mats he been ripped from his very scalp and lay forgotten across the stained tile floor. Loki, observing your shocked expression laughed dryly. “And now you see me.” He croaked hoarsely.

“What did you do to yourself?” Your question was spoken in a tone hardly above a whisper, causing your stomach to clench at the sight. 

You were left unanswered as Loki slid his gaze away, focusing it on his arm where a bead of blood trickled across his skin.

“You’re… hurting yourself.” You frowned as you gently placed your fingers against the glass. 

“Because of you,” Loki answered gruffly, still not returning your stare.

“Why?” You breathed, furrowing your brows together. 

“I hate you.” He nearly spat out the words, his shoulders heaving in the strain. “I hate your stupid face, I hate the way you dissect me like some rat. I hate your eyes. And I hate that I can’t get you out of my damn head! Why do you have to follow me in my dreams? Why can’t you just leave me alone?!” 

There was a heavy blanket of silence that settled between the two of you. A pressing and suffocating silence that muffled your thoughts. You felt speechless, the pressure of the tension felt nearly asphyxiating and sent your mind reeling. You were jostled from your stupor when you noticed the blood running from his wrists, delicate skin broken under the white-knuckle grip of his nails.

“Stop that.” You demanded in a hushed tone.

He didn’t reply.

“I said, stop it!” You snapped and quickly slammed your keycard against the side of the containment cell. The doors slid open and you rushed inside. You slammed Loki up against the wall and slid your slender fingers underneath his bloody ones. 

Panting heavily the two of you stared at each other, you with fear and him with contempt. Slowly, you came to realise his proximity and leaned back, turning away.

“Why… would you do that?” Loki rasped, his eyes narrowed.

“Because. You need help.” You replied, negating the waver in your tone as you gained enough courage to look back at him.

“What do you even care?” Loki retorted. “I’m a monster.” 

“I should be scared of you.” You phrased the statement more as a question, despite your situation, you couldn’t find it within you to be fearful.

Loki slowly looked up, his breath ghosting over your face as you two peered at each other. “Yes.” He replied shakily.

You leaned closer, your lips grazing against his. “Really?” You whispered softly.

        What ensued was a moment of indescribable elation. His lips met yours, they molded softly against you. His free hand trailed up your leg, snaking around your waist and tugging you against his chest. You could feel his heartbeat against your clavicle, a steady and slow rhythm that greatly juxtaposed your own racing heart.

How could he be so calm? 

        You didn’t have much time to ponder this when a sudden weight sent you flying off him and slamming into the glass wall behind you. Red hot pain spiked through your spine, causing your limbs and other extremities to prickle with the feeling of needles. It wasn’t long before Loki was on top of you, pinning you callously against the glass.

“Y-you’re hurting me.” You stammered as you squirmed, your arms feebly tapping against his back.

“Good.” Loki snarled, his breath ghosting over your ear. In a haze of golden light, the illusion melted away from Loki’s previously haggard form. Your heart caught in your throat as the bloodstains dissipated from the walls and Loki revealed his usual composed, pristine appearance.

You finally spoke, visible confusion painted across your face. “L-Loki?”

        The prince regarded you coldly, reaching into your pocket, he retrieved your keycard. The realisation dawned on you slightly too late. You opened your mouth, but the cry died in your throat as he clamped his hand over your mouth. Then he brought his lips against your ear. “You’re goddamn right, you should be scared of me.” Spinning on his heels, Loki stalked towards the exit. 

Making one last attempt to salvage the situation, you made a sprint towards Loki. 

        With one fluid movement, the Asgardian swiped your keycard against the control panel and the doors swung shut before you, trapping you inside the high-security chamber. 

“Hey!” You cried out, tears pricking the edges of your vision. You slammed your fist against the transparent casing. You battered against it over and over again until your knuckles blackened and each strike sent a bolt of pain jolting up your arm. 

        Still screaming his name, you watched Loki stroll towards the chamber exit, twirling your keycard along with his fingertips playfully. If he heard your shrieks, he paid no heed and merrily continued on his path. He paused by the elevator doors, punching in his desired floor number. With a tilt of his head, he slowly began to turn around, those blue eyes once again fixating onto you. A twisted smirk distorted his handsome features.

        You watched in horror as Loki’s form rippled. Without once breaking eye-contact he assumed your form. You found yourself glaring back at the man who stole your face, who was wearing your skin and flashing your smile. In a voice eerily similar to your own, Loki spoke one final time.

        “Who is in control?”

‘Dii-iing!’

[zrw]

Letter 1.0.1

><

I'm writing this to you on Thanksgiving Day, it felt fitting despite us not celebrating it, so instead I will be wishing you a merry Christmas. A tad bit older photo added for depth, immersion and personalization while reading. None of it is scripted in any way, the idea is to make me emotional & it will all be written on the go. Make sure you read it all, and you will never hear from me again. Please do respect my terms also and do not under any circumstances share this letter or it's contents with anybody. Remember, only you will truly understand the context and true meaning of this letter. Quite likely it will change your whole perspective on me, but it won't matter anymore. If you think you're the bigger victim and believe you've had it worse than me & that you've suffered more and dealt with more... well, a bit of a free of charge reality check for you... you're dead wrong. I'm the one who is being tormented maniacally and brutally every other night, to the point where I simply don't know what's real and what's not. Scared of living life, kind of. It's clear to all I made a mistake last year. No weasely lies and fabrications in this letter, this is the Me you've longed to finally see. Anxiety through the roof, among other things/issues. I'm deeply sorry, Annie. Bless you & bless me, more importantly. Please tell me you forgive me. Do not dare to share any of the contents of this said letter with anybody, be a grown-up and act like one for once, you live all alone, now try and impress me, it's far too personal, a glimpse of me, and meant for you alone. Only you will understand the context of this letter. You're not exactly the golden carrot of the yield, but this one should be fairly easy to follow - Keep it to yourself, and stay quiet about this, I'm begging you. You're not legally obligated to do anything, this is your life and you make the rules, you're a good and kind gal, you're by no means a bloodthirsty vampire like some of them, and as I made very clear it wouldn't be fruitful & would shortly after turn into a proper clown fiesta, and possibly a meaningless waste of government resources. You wouldn't gain anything at all from this. I was going to say let me know if you need anything, and I'll gladly donate a fair sum to your PayPal, and it kind of made me realize that is something that would be morally and legally wrong of me to do, it wouldn't feel like a donation, it would almost feel like I'm trying to buy you and win you over, after causing this much pain to your heart, which I deeply regret. (I'll pay for your nsfw future cosplays maybe? Jkjk, leave that avenue to the twonks who'd actually find pleasure in doing that.) I don't donate much anyways online, if I'd donate it'd have to be an actual animal charity, I feel like when people think of charity they instantly think of like some Cancer Foundation or elderly/orphan fund, not that those are not fair causes, it's just that some dying/sick animals really need our support too, and they're just as worthy. After this i'm doing my own thing & staying away from you, promise. I'm a great citizen, mind my own business and never cause trouble. I just needed for my own sake to send something meaningful and pure your way. Everything that you will see here comes from the heart & I will do my best to be as honest as humanly possible. Whenever I begin working on these long 50,000 word essays I always tend to fear that I forget something crucial or run out of time, so let's hope it doesn't happen this time around. The writer usually spends 10 times the time and effort the reader does, so please do sit down, get comfy, and please read all of this letter. This is going on your SC and Tumblr & will be deleted once the timer on my stream deck reaches zero, you have a tendency to take photos and eventually show them to outsiders, this will ensure it's a one-off, and for your eyes only. It is mainly to apologize to you, among other things. To make you realize that in just 3 years time I'll be completely "reformed", as they say. If you must know "breaking the law" to say sorry could be considered as... noble, in most countries at least. Without a doubt in my mind they'd love for us to bury the hatchet and shake hands, but after this "letter" to you I am actually done with you altogether, and you'll not be hearing from me ever again... unless fate says otherwise. Do remember that this and me apologizing to you for being an awful male, this was mostly done so I can live, function and mentally function like a normal human being again, I will get to that later on in the letter, all you should know now is that it was more of a ME thing, and less of a YOU thing, if that makes sense. Needless to say I have 8 VPNs total with unlimited data running on all of my systems including 2 iPads, laptops, and even phones, to ensure that my IP is impossible to find and non-existent. Just a quick pitch, you could've used common sense to figure that one out yourself. Naturally somebody as wealthy as me would be untouchable, at least in the virtual world, where everything is simple and made easy. I am quite clever, yes, yes I am indeed. But I would not use it for evil deeds, deep inside I am a shockingly kind and nice guy. Oh, you were looking for a bad boy? We can talk, my dear, you know full well that I'd be/become anything for you. No candlelit dinners so I can compliment your cheekbones? You have kept your eyes open, and tonight your knowledge of me is getting greater and greater. You could write a book about us. It almost feels like deja-vu, I've been here studying and doing research on you, now I'm giving you the sheer opportunity to do the same. And 4 years after first talking to you online (in 2014), I, I touched your cat's black fluffy tail once, and catbug, she ran right away, it almost looked like she did a tiny leap forward before running. Yes, it was her 100%. I'm a shining star, just waiting to unlock my full potential, it will happen when the right time comes, you can never rush such things. My financial status would only indicate I have great things waiting for me and a brimming bright future ahead of me, should I play all my cards right, I do adore graveyards, but there is no reason at all why I should perish in the next 5-15 years. I can only hope that you're smart enough to not mention any of this to your mom, I realize you two are close, but being a grown-up means you know what to mention to somebody and what is better left unsaid. Wiser to let this one go and keep it to yourself, no need to waste government resources, and do understand that being fortunate and getting me potentially taken to a mental asylum for 3 weeks would not benefit you in the slightest, I've made it very clear that I don't associate myself with social outcasts, and we of course are done for good after this bit, so let's make it count. Being respectful is calling you a lady even though I full well know it's a girl in sheep's clothing I've been dealing with, hard to tame, always needs to have it her way, borderline blunt at times.. how come Annie the girl does not have a feminine soul, a bit odd, perhaps I do rest my case. You certainly are special, as your mom would say, she means you're not like the other girls. You're way different & not necessarily in a good way. Wanted you & Nora for the experience... Do find you both quite boring, even on the dating spectrum, she's the snappy one, you're the calm one. Will surely do better in the future. As far as I go... I'm your little ghost. I'm a spirit, roughly 500 years ago people like me were considered as and called witches, simply since we were ahead of our time. As you know there are good and bad spirits, I would stand somewhere in the middle as a classic inbetweener I've always been, casually swaying towards either or, but ultimately staying put in the middle. Some days I hate you, other days I love you... Yet here I am ending this "letter" to you with the words "I Love You", and perhaps "Muah" on top of that should I feel classy enough, as always, on the cheek, one final time. Do remember that I will always remain near you & overseer your doings, we don't need to interact, in fact it would be silly to think we can't co-exist in eachother's hearts. When you get the strange feeling that you can't find the explanation for, perhaps it's just me, and nothing more. It's been a sheer clown fiesta witnessing the names and things you've called me thus far. What's new, right? At the very least you don't take me for a joke anymore, which is wise of you, since I'm not. The casual 21st century term "stalker" simply insults me. Even somebody with as little intellect as you would know that stalkers are for years, spirits are for lifetime. I'm nothing less than a S-P-I-R-I-T, one with high capability & intellectual intelligence. I've never commented on your idiocy or your weird friends (90% of them are weird), I'm awfully passive and neutral. I've never insulted/talked-down-on the soyboys, e-slags, pre-mature losers, weebs, memers, or entitled punks you interact with every now and then. No point including the 16-21 year old boys and girls in that category, as I understand how these underage and barely of age children follow you, and you see yourself as their "mama" and friend, not strange in the slightest, not the harvest of living inside of a box for the majority of your life, when fantasy is taking over, sis. Those kids are the only community you have left... surely it would be cruel to let them off the hook, you can't let them go, some of them still see you as a role model! ~ I suppose you could say I'm on a whole different level, and people like me tend to not notice people who are "less". But good luck to them, perhaps some day they too will get themselves out of their holes and start moving towards things that actually matter. Speaking of which... God bless Great Britain if you actually end up scoring an actual decently paying job after all your studies. I would donate a fair few braincells to you... If I didn't have such a bright future ahead of me. In a universe where employers and companies actually did background checks on people before hiring, a silly bean like you would never score anything worthwhile. Personal assistant for a single individual would probably be your peak. Back to me... I am a millionaire, as you expected, seeing as how doors just open and close for me and my kind. I never worked even a day for what I have, but the people before me certainly did. Even more wealthy now in fact, as of last year, now that my professor and casual alcoholic of a grandpa is finally under ground, he was respected by many, but his lifestyle choices were hilariously fractured. See? We (are) similar, kind of. Ah, how I hate drinking and alcohol, I literally drink only twice a year and always feel guilty after, I hate people that consume alcohol in the spirit of the party at clubs or live concerts, and those who tend to constantly drown their sorrow and unhappiness into the bottle. I adore a good coffee and tea though. Living a promising life of luxury, hence the 3 years I will take to improve myself, improve my body to the maximum for the sex appeal and quality of life, get your name 'Annie' with a mini thorny rose underneath tattoo'd on my left arm, so I can take you to places and talk to you, enjoy your company & so I would never forget you (not that there is a chance in hell I'd actually ever do, of course, hahaha.), dye my hair pale/pastel color, purple in 2020, letting it heavily fade to soft pink, After that focus on the pastel spectrum of colors, re-do my driver's license, own a 40k car, but have not driven anything in 3-4 years, begin buying land and potentially own more land, farmhouses, households, countryside villas and mansions than some of the more wealthier businessmen in my area; as you can tell "owning" things & writing are two big passions of mine, the latter for expressing myself and influencing others, and so is real estate, country and marketing to an extent, legally change my first name to something sleek such as Jed, Jed Nei... or you know whatever else that feels unique and not-so-common; pick a powerful name that people will remember (and fear, jkjk), basically get my life on the line/on the rails and get a woman who will massage my strong pectorals with oil every Sunday morning only to ensure I will be more than ready to take on the next week. I adore romance, but still feel that death is the most romantic thing out there. Now of course she could cook for me just fine, but i'd actually really want to taste something you've cooked, as long as you do the cooking with just an apron on and absolutely nothing underneath. Oh Annie, unlocking your true potential would be a really easy task for me. You like cherry blossoms, I on the other hand like 400 year old oak trees. However our worlds could of collided & you could of been my sweetheart under the bright sun and moon. Currently own 2 countryside 2 floor homes and plenty of actual land around them, looking to expand in the future of course. Imagine leaving your silly big city life behind. Imagine laying there (on a hill) naked on the grass in the middle of the day, or relaxing in the bikini, depending how confident you are with your own body, and breast size, I also would not be totally satisfied if mine looked so "below average", but god does your bottom/bum make up for it. Loads of flowers that I can gather and give you, or put in your hair, plenty of forests nearby perfect for mushroom picking, hiking or picnics, loads of plants, fruit bushes, ponds, fruit trees, acorn trees ideal for climbing, farmland, greenhouse, ponds big enough for swimming, cyan blue skies large and wide enough for any balloon or kite you may want to play around with. Or if that’s not entirely your cup of tea then we can plan our big vacation to the Canary Islands in Spain, whatever you like, as long as you stay with me forever. You're a sweet creature and I'm certain we could of started something unique & exciting together, but that's all gone now, i'm still certain that I could of loved you right and shown you extreme passion, to go to bed with you and make you feel happy, loved & excited for the next day, our next day together in paradise. This is not a fantasy tale/dream, this could of potentially been our reality, assuming I would accomplish all my goals, and you willing to leave your current life for me. But why dwell on what could of been, I will never feed you fresh strawberries straight from the greenhouse, I will never "own" you, you will never be my girl, my companion, my life's purpose. I see now why I felt so heavily against friendship with you... being your friend considering the things I had planned for us, that would only lead to romance and love, that friendship would be over so quick you could not even call it one. Oh, and, I can be very sensual and passionate at times. And possibly start a IRL vlogging channel on Youtube in 3 years time, just to influence & motivate others and to portray my lifelong journey to greatness with the dozen obstacles I had to face and overcome along the way, making it all even more bittersweet, especially the main final goal, which if you can recall is to become the biggest standalone landowner/businessman in my area. Maybe you'll randomly stumble across the channel one day & wonder what could of been & what you missed out on, not only that but you'd also visually see the beautiful landscape and things I talked about earlier. Oh and I'll definitely purchase at least one or two more expensive cars, driving around with just one specific car all the time, obviously being somebody who clearly is able to afford another one, it feels kind of lame. P.S I've never ever actually been obsessed with you. You were just a girl I liked because of a few key factors/reasons. Plus we seemingly have dozens of things in common.And we have reached the part where I'll try and explain why writing this was needed for me, and my mentality; Are you a demon baby/girl? If not keep reading and don't even think about showing this letter to anybody else. If you are however... Come with me & with the assistance of our genitals let's try and produce a demon child. A bit NSFW, but we're 25 and nobody else is going to see this (Right? Good gal.), so I'd so-so-so take you raw on the floor in every single position imaginable, your front hole would naturally be so loose afterwards that no guy would want to or feel comfortable with doing it with you anymore. White stuff would go in both 'A' and 'V' holes several times to ensure pregnancy is triggered. Jeez, having and making a baby with you would be so unbelievably sexy. Anyways, back on the topic we go, so me and my issues I've been dealing it... I mentioned it at the start & will do it again... If you think you've been affected by this or you've had it worse/suffered more than me... Well think again. Ever since earlier this year I've had horrible anxiety, hearing unnatural beings and things talk to me and gradually hearing their voices around me. I don't think I'm losing my mind or going crazy, but this does all feel very real to me. Always closing my door at night, not even trying to, it just comes naturally to me to do it, much like a habit. I fell in a deep pit, and I'm so sorry to you, I really do apologize, my dear. My darling Annie. now my situation is being abused and i'm being taken advantage of by these demons/ghosts/shades, I'm now shaking for no reason, it's not even cold in here, it's awful. Psst, I'm not a monster. Imagine being too messed up mentally to go to the grocery store/supermarket alone & having to call your mom and tell her to bring you some food and supplies - telling her that the reason for it is that you have a massive headache right now & that you're unable to get out of bed. Yikes, that does sound bad. And to make it even worse, it has happened more than once. I feel like I need a 12-hour nap after sending this letter your way, feel a bit odd all of sudden, please read it all, it's a glimpse of me and my story and life. I can only hope that I will feel better and be able to go back to living my life like a normal human being now that I threw everything out there and apologized to you. I will leave you be now. It's a peek into my life essentially. I really do adore your tight little pale pink p*ssy, and Nora’s all the same, you gals are & stay important to me. Please do respect my terms and do not under any circumstances share this letter or it's contents with anybody. All the best to you and your family. I Love You. Muah. 💞

[rock-and-compass]

Okay my thoughts on the season finale… (as posted in the ABC advisory group)

If this wasn’t Jennifer Morrison’s (as good as) Last episode I would probably be fine with it, another rinse and repeat finale with a one group of people occupied doing one thing in one place while another group is kept busy elsewhere doing something else. It was very like what we’ve seen in the season finales in recent years – very formulaic. And I guess, with so many of the cast members departing and this being touted so heavily as “the final battle” I guess I just expected more. And that’s my mistake; I own that. I’m starting to think that Once Upon a Time is not a show that should be thought about on any level. It is fast food storytelling. You enjoy it at the time but ultimately, it’s not very satisfying and if you think about it too closely you’re likely to feel regret. I think you’re supposed to enjoy the surface level of the show but not concern yourself with the depth. And this is a huge and sad realisation for someone who has watched the show from the beginning and spent the last four seasons writing about and analysing the episodes in depth – sometimes writing thousands of words about one episode. It wasn’t always like this though and it makes me sad.

My biggest problem with the episode was the disconnectedness between the two sides of the story. We see the people transported back to the Enchanted Forest do various things – there’s collapsing worlds, there is a hunt for a bean, Regina is trying to do magic for …reasons. But ultimately nothing that those stuck in the Enchanted Forest does has any purpose whatsoever – it’s mindless busywork to keep them occupied and out of the way. Why didn’t Hook use the bean? Why didn’t he throw it on the ground and create a portal and get back to Emma quickly like Snow told him to? How nice it would have been to get a pay-off on Emma’s brief flashes of memory of her wedding day, Hooks image burning in the book, with him coming through a bean portal and Emma feeling a strange stab of recognition for this man and then them Kissing to restore her memories. Then Emma and Killian would have gotten their TLK! I feel so sad that so many couples got one, some that didn’t really deserve one (Hades and Zelena, I’m looking at you!) except for Emma and her true love. They still could have had their season one inversion of Henry giving Emma a TLK to save her life after the fight with Gideon (even though I think, and I am a mother, it’s really, really weird for a child to give their parent a true love’s kiss.). It would have connected the two parts of the story beautifully and it would have given purpose to the Enchanted Forrest side of the story and just improved the whole episode overall. I can’t help but think the episode would have been more entertaining and more of a parallel to season one if the curse had kept everyone in Storybrooke and robbed them of their memories – Henry still could have been the sole believer (I guess it was the book or his author role that kept him exempt?) and given him more purpose, more people to try to get through to… And maybe Emma wouldn’t have had to do the strange and oddly fast (8hour round trip!) visit to Boston. Ultimately, I felt there was no connection between why it was so important to separate Emma from her family and the realisation that she was never alone and the battle with Gideon and the curse . . . and yeah.

The Black-fairy was a big anti-climax. I knew she would be. She literally functioned as a Regina-substitute and I can’t help but wonder if, as this was the ending that A&E envisioned from the start, it was supposed to be Regina in the end. It would have made a hell of a lot more sense! I really believe the show was derailed from its purpose with, not by the befriending of Regina as a tactic to defeat her … but that that tactic worked so efficiently and without question. Regina’s redemption felt like a slap-up whitewash and somewhere along the line the writers became too scared to challenge the character. She got away with everything she ever did with no consequence. It’s hardly a satisfying story. Fairy tales are about good versus evil. With good supposed to win after trial and hardship. It’s a shame that Regina was never put through the same trials and challenge that say, Rumple or Hook or even Emma and the Charmings’ were put through. Seeing the dwarves paint “Queen” on her door and bowing to her was sickening. She is not a queen, she is a usurper. At the very least she should have admitted this as part of her “redemption”. The very least. All I could think when there was the shot of her looking at the red apple at the end, was that she must be very pleased with herself. She Won. She won everything. Her evil plans and schemes paid off big time – she’s rich, powerful, she apparently “owns” a town, the people now love her, she has a son, friends and a sister and she never had to pay the price for any of the terrible things she did. It’s not logical to expect people would just ‘get over’ decades of abuse and torment. It’s not fair on the people she hurt. Not to mention that her clone also rides off happily ever after into the sunset? Of all the unnecessary inclusions in the finale the presence of Regina 2.0 was the worst. She dominated and nearly killed the show; I seriously hope that this is the last we see of her. In this new-look season seven, I really hope that they make Henry’s nemesis, whoever that may be, his nemesis. And keep it that way. Don’t make Henry befriend him (or her)! Enmity is a good thing to keep between enemies. It drives a story, it gives purpose – it gives the audience someone to root for. And as ironic as this sounds – it doesn’t divide. People may love a villain but they love them for being a villain and they love the hero for standing up to them. It makes a much better story than making your protagonist sweep the past under the carpet, and put their blinkers on about every questionable thing that their nemesis is doing. And don’t turn Henry’s archenemy into a sainted Mary-sue (or Bobby-Stu) who is annoying and sanctimonious while at the same time being self-centred and selfish and boring and rendering themselves superfluous to the point where every appearance in the story feels like a shoehorn…

The ending of the episode was nice, but a bit twee. Everyone got a happy ending. Yay. I guess. Whether they deserved it or not. Belle, why wouldn’t you have taken that newly babyfied Gideon and run for the hills? I liked that Rumple did the right thing in the end but it was too little too late for that marriage – and with Belle not coming back next season, surely a melancholy bittersweet parting of the ways would have been more appropriate for them? As it is, it feels very much like all these Happy Beginnings that have been gifted to everyone are going to be ripped out from under us with the departing characters. Its’ inevitable. I will be incredibly sad if Emma Swan is killed off to move the story forward. But I won’t be surprised. I’m not sure the writers gave us enough of a hook to pique our interest with the duplication of the original story at the end… the show felt very much done. I felt a sense of relief that it’s over. That I can finally stop thinking about and worrying about these characters. Before the finale, I was fully intending to keep watching – I like Colin O’Donoghue and the Character of Killian Jones so I am predisposed to continue…. But that ending, it made me feel a sense of ambivalence. I’m not sure I can be bothered re-investing without the guarantee of a decent return. If Emma was back, I would be back. No doubt. But with how I’m feeling at the moment, there will have to be some very interesting information released over the hiatus to get me back and they will have to tell us something, some crumbs, instead of this nonsensical evasive “wait and see” discourse.

[renaroo]

Double Time (5/24)

Disclaimer: Red vs Blue and related characters are the property of Rooster Teeth. Warnings: Language, Canon-typical violence Pairings: Tuckington, Chex Rating: T Synopsis: [Hero Time Sequel] After the events of Hero Time, the city and Blood Gulch are prepared for the true return of superheroes in a big way. But while Washington is attempting to adjust to a new relationship and a new living arrangement, the call of new heroes and a new mayor mean major changes for his professional life as well as his personal one. How will the balance of values fare when his new partners come to test everything he’s made of.

A/N: Things may seem a bit slow right now but if you’ve read Texas Time and Hero Time, I’m sure you’re well aware of what that means for the upcoming chapters ; ) 

Special thanks to @secretlystephaniebrown, @freshzombiewriter, @a-taller-tale, @icefrozenover, @analiarvb, @washingtonstub, Yin, @ashleystlawrence​, @thepheonixqueen​, @nooryes127, @whimsical-writer​, and @notatroll7​ on AO3 and tumblr for the wonderful feed back! I truly appreciate it more than you know.

When You Have It All

"You said yes!?” 

Washington wasn’t exactly sure why Church seemed to practically manifest himself during circumstances that would make him completely unhelpful, but it was a talent that he ultimately had to acknowledge.

It was difficult to gauge what Tucker’s exact reaction might have been without Church’s input, but since it was there, Wash found himself being stared down by his partner, arms crossed and dissatisfaction radiating from him. 

“Did you at least figure out how much info they have on me? On Junior?” Tucker asked critically. “You’re the one that said that we couldn’t let anyone ever know about Junior’s origins. If they know--”

“Junior will be fine,” Wash assured him. “I’ll keep him by me at all times.”

At first, Tucker’s look was nothing short of blank confusion.

Then it was outrage.

“What the fuck does that mean!?” he cried out.

“Tucker, dude, if he sold you guys out, I can build something to vaporize him. Like a giant blender or something,” Church assured Tucker. It was only half sarcasm, which probably should have alarmed Washington more than he was currently allowing it to. 

“Can I talk to you alone?” Wash asked pointedly to Tucker. 

“Why?” Tucker asked critically.

“Because this is a...” Wash pinched between his eyes and sighed. “There’s just something about Church that gives me a headache. Alright? I said it.”

“Hey, fuck you, buddy,” Church said waggling a finger in Wash’s direction. “I’m the best friend. I literally passed up on eternal life and heaven and all that shit to return to these stupid bastards and lead them through their grief and sorrow.”

“You’re not a ghost!” Wash snapped for what felt like the hundredth time in the last six months. “There is no such thing as ghosts--”

“Dude, how can you say that there’s no such thing as ghosts when you’re a cat-person, I gave birth to a not-alien, and you just signed yourself up to be a drill sergeant for a superhero boot camp?” Tucker demanded. “I feel like there’s not much shit left off the table at this point!”

“Ghosts that can only possess electrical objects are off the table because it doesn’t make sense! Technology and the paranormal don’t function together in that way,” Wash declared. “There’s rules!”

Tucker waved his hand and rolled his eyes. “Rules suck.”

“Yeah, fuck rules,” Church snickered.

"It’s about Junior!” Wash finally blurted out, all but silencing Tucker and Church all at once. 

Church glanced between the two of them a few times before raising his hands and turning to walk the rest of the way out of the room. “Right, officially not involved with this one, guys. I’ll grace you with my presence later.”

For his part, Tucker didn’t immediately start screaming. He just looked horrified -- and the fact that he was the cause of such an expression, even incidentally, rocked Washington to his core. It nearly made him sick. 

“What do you mean it’s about Junior?” Tucker asked darkly. 

“It’s part of the arrangement I made, for my services to the mayors,” he explained with some restraint. He was trying his level best to chose each and every word carefully, meaningfully. 

But that, of course, would never stop Tucker from being Tucker. “Dude, that makes it sound like you’re some sort of prostitute for the mayors.”

“What?” Wash asked, baffled. “No -- no it doesn’t. No one would hear that and think ‘prostitution’ except you.”

“Me and anyone who has watched pornography,” Tucker commented with some relaxation working its way back into his shoulders. The bantering seemed to be getting him back into his zone. “But, no, really. If this has been an open arrangement and you haven’t told me this whole time--”

“As glad as I am that you’re not freaking out still,” Wash said slowly, “let’s move this conversation and concern back to Junior.”

Tucker stared at him for a moment before shaking his head and letting out a huff of laughter. “Fuck, Wash. You still don’t get it, do you?” he asked. 

“Get what?” Wash asked.

“I’m joking and being myself because being a parent? I have a baseline of terrified, twenty-four-seven. That’s just how you learn to exist,” Tucker explained flatly. “I only joke about shit I really care about.”

Washington couldn’t help the frown that tugged at the corners of his mouth at that statement. It was so against his own philosophy in life, but he knew he had to respect it on some level -- or at least put it on the back burner to question Tucker more thoroughly on later. 

“I’m just trying to explain that when I struck that deal with the mayors about training these young superheroes, I was sure to let them know that I was only going to do it if I had permission to add to the team,” Wash explained. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Tucker asked, just being obtuse at that point.

“It means that I can add Junior to the roster,” Wash explained. “Keep him by my side, keep him safe--”

Tucker held up a hand to silence Wash. Wash’s mouth closed with an audible click.

“Hold the fuck up,” Tucker gritted out, eyes burning into Wash. “You... You volunteered my son for a government program without consulting me first!?”

Surprised at the outburst, Washington looked at Tucker in confusion. “No, not--”

“You can’t.. I can’t believe you’d...” Tucker pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a groan like he was about to have a full migraine. He then glared at Washington with everything in him. “Wash, this is overstepping. We’ve been together for six months!”

Shaking his head, Wash was confused. “How is this overstepping? And how is that any small increment of time?”

“Because you don’t get to make decisions for Junior!” Tucker near yelled. “He’s my son, Wash! And you’re the one who scared the shit out of me about people finding out about him when I didn’t care before! Now you’re handing him over to the Man!?”

Throwing up his hands, Wash was literally lost on how they got to the current point. “Okay, first off, local government is more than a few steps removed from the Man, Tucker--”

“God, you really don’t get it, I think I’m going to be sick,” Tucker wheezed, putting his hands on his knees and wheezing. “Oh my god. We’ll have to move states. Need new names--”

“Tucker, calm down! I didn’t even tell them who I wanted on the team yet!” Wash cried out. “And I definitely didn’t reveal what relation my future additions were going to have to me. I do understand how to maintain private identities, believe it or not.”

Tucker’s grip on his knees tightened and he looked up, full glare on. “What?” he asked. “Why the fuck are you breaking news to me like this? Just to be dramatic? Oh my fucking god, that’s not how you break news to people, you asshole!”

"I genuinely have no idea what these reactions I’m getting from you are, Tucker,” Wash explained. 

“You are so sucked into the superhero mindset you don’t pause for a second and think ‘hey, how do I not give my boyfriend a goddamn heart attack?’” Tucker accused. 

“I do not,” Wash replied. “And I’m still confused about what exactly I did wrong here--”

“You’re the absolute worst, oh my god,” Tucker groaned. “So you were going to ask me permission for signing Junior up for this extremely bad idea all along.”

Wash blinked. “Based on your reaction, I’m thinking that’s.... the right answer,” he said plainly.

“You weren’t!” Tucker cried out again.

“I can’t take this emotional flip flopping,” Washington warned him.

“Well it’s not like we’re in a car you can roll out of!” Tucker snapped.

“Okay, okay, I should not make decisions like this without family input,” Wash replied. “I get it. I’m learning my boundaries -- I just was thinking from the superhero side of things and what would be best for getting Junior for whatever comes in the future for him--”

“Bow chicka bow wow.”

Washington gave Tucker a highly unimpressed look. “That’s your own son.”

“I know, I felt dirty the second it came out of my mouth,” Tucker said with a wave of his hand. “But yes. Good. I can get past this if you’ve learned to promise to not make these kinds of sweeping decisions without my input again.”

“I won’t,” Wash promised.

“Especially since I have some amazing, kickass, awesome ideas to help this situation that will make you kick yourself for not having brought me in sooner,” Tucker announced.

Curious, Wash tilted his head. “What do you mean?” 

“I mean, I have some extra suggestions on who you should add to this team, and as resident Dad, I think my opinion weighs pretty heavily in all of this.”

“Suggestions?” Wash asked. “Like who?”

Tucker smirked. “When’s the last time you asked Tex for a favor?”

Washington immediately regretted everything.

[thecoroutfitters]

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Who Gives a F**k About Charlie Keeper

by Wardog

Tuesday, 09 June 2009

Wardog painfully reviews the self-published Who Is Charlie Keeper.~

I’ve had a busy few weeks. I’ve alphabetised all my socks, de-weeded the back garden and taken a vacation in Vienna but it’s finally got to the point of no return: I think I’m going to have to bring myself to review Who Is Charlie Keeper. I really don’t want Ferretbrain to become the place self-published books come to die, but thus far every self-published book I've read has only renewed my faith in the publishing industry. WICK, as you may have gathered, is a self-published young adult fantasy novel, and it’s, uhh, well...

Come back Jim. All is forgiven.

WICK is borderline unreadable and almost uncertainly unreviewable. Basically, imagine someone came up to you and said “Hey there, I’ve got you a car, come check it out.” And then it turned out the car had no wheels. Yes, maybe, the colour is rather nice, and its fitted with a CD player and sunroof, and the engine might be basically functional but ultimately what you’ve still got there is a car with no wheels.

So, Charlie Keeper is a

mysterious

sassy 12 year old girl who lives in a mysterious house with her amnesiac grandmother because her parents have mysteriously disappeared. Between having her inheritance stolen by the evil lawyer Mr Crow and buying a puppy with her best friend, she is chased into the alternative world of Bellania by the malignant Lord Bane. In which it becomes quickly apparent that Bad Shit Is Going Down and the fate of the world rests upon Charlie Keeper’s reluctant, 12 year old shoulders. There are good guys, bad guys, dragons, adventures,

Quidditch

K’changa, etc etc.

Putting aside for the moment, the fact that WICK is a car without wheels (and I will contextualise this metaphor in a moment), let me try to come up with something positive to say about it. Well, the original artwork that accompanies it is genuinely fabulous. In fact, if the book was even half as good as the art, we’d be laughing. Also Marcus Alexander has a remarkably good ear for dialogue, somehow navigating the spiked pit of accent and dialect without looking like a fool or reducing his characters to offensive stereotype. He’s a sample from Jensen the (Jamaican?) Treman: “Ah’s a Treman. Sweetheart, Ah’ can see yer education is sorely lacking. Who’s yer teacher? Whoever he is, he ain’t doing a proper job. Tell me, little Hippotomai, an’ don’t stomp yer feetsies at me, do ya know wot a Stoman is, or a Human? Eh?” You’d think it would get grating but, somehow, it never does. Overall, WICK romps along at a reasonable pace, and there’s lot of incident, danger and adventure. It’s certainly a colourful book, and it seems to be revelling in its own over-the-top exuberance. You know you’re dealing with a Proper villain when he massacres his own minions and gets all caps-locky about setbacks.

Unfortunately, all this counts for absolutely nothing because there are too many basic problems with the book. Firstly the style itself. I don’t know to what extent we’re dealing with a major slew of typos or if Marcus Alexander genuinely hates commas and wants them to suffer and die at his hands, but the grammar and the syntax through WICK are irregular at best and downright wrong at worst. I’ve skimmed about the internet looking for other responses to it and most of them are positive: “The author's odd use of justification adds extra weight and punctuation on actions, emotive points and speech patterns bringing not just the story but also the characters very much to life. Indeed the book is quite unusual as a whole entity but I would be the first to point out that it connects with today's ambience, fashion and prosetic style.” Hmmmm. Possibly I’m just hideously hidebound but the style is simply neither controlled nor consistent enough to support this interpretation. Here’s a sample:

Powerful muscles bunched and tensed. With long smooth bounds the creature took off. As it ran past the eerily silent columns it realized, with a sinking feeling that it would never reach this mysterious family member in time, the distance was too great. It sensed days of travels lay between the two and it could sense that whatever danger threatened it’s [sic] sibling, was already perilously close.

Or another:

Charlie answering his call, hurried to the lawyer’s study, she knew better than to keep him waiting. Walking straight up to the large leather bound desk she took up a pen and without needing to be asked signed the papers offered by Mr. Crow. She knew she should at least ask what she was signing but she remembered the first time she had plucked up courage to query him; Crow had fallen into such rage, striking her and screaming, that now she dared not question.

And the punctuation lightly and seemingly randomly scattered around the dialogue is enough to bring tears to my eyes:

“Fool! Grab her!” roared the giant, Crow made a lunge for her but tripped over his braces, “Idiot! Dogs come to me, come, your Master commands it.”

It’s more than commas where they shouldn’t be and conspicuous by their absence where they should. Although Alexander occasionally gets off a vivid description or a well-turned phrase, it seems more by luck than judgement a lot of the time and his writing often bogs down in repetition, cliché and an over-reliance on adjectives. Seriously, no noun connected to Mr Crow is allowed out of doors unprefaced by a “skinny”. So Mr Crow is thin, right? I get it. I get it. Please have mercy on me.

I’m no editor but there are equally fundamental issues with the structure of the book itself. The pacing is wobbly to say the least with the narrative either practically thrown into reverse while Charlie eats some spiced bread or we are forced to witness yet another interminable game of K’changa (I hate you JK Rowling, I hate you so much. I yearn for those halcyon days in which children’s books were allowed to exist that did not contain detailed descriptions of spurious sporting activities) and then speeding so rapidly through a succession of incidents that it’s enough to make you get motion sickness. The POV, equally, veers around all over the place and, dialogue aside, the characterisation – especially of Charlie – wavers too. She seems to be scared when the narrative prefers that she’s scared, and feisty when it’s time for her to be feisty. Furthermore, her famed “big mouth” barely lives up to its reputation for causing trouble. Maybe it’s just because she doesn’t have an accent but she seems like a complete void for most of the narrative. We’re told about her qualities (and, of course, her undeniable specialness) but we rarely seem them in action in a way that could make us care about her, or even be remotely interested in her. Alexander’s descriptions of scenery and action are at least nudging towards competence, but the emotional side of it all is completely flat:

Charlie, cheeks blushing uncontrollably, stared into the eyes of the woman who was supposed to be her guardian. Never had she felt such a hate so complete, never had such an anger awoken within her heart. Charlie, that very instant felt something deep within her move and change, something within her soul sickened and died and in its place something darker was born. This was a moment that would be etched eternally into her mind.

She gets over it. She kind of like de Sade’s Justine that way – ill-defined, unchanging and unaffected.

I can’t even in good conscience say that WICK has promise: until it gets some wheels, it ain’t going nowhere. I found it a real struggle to read, partially because I was mourning every tortured comma but also because whatever is good about it is completely eclipsed by its major and fundamental problems.Themes:

Books

,

Sci-fi / Fantasy

,

Young Adult / Children

,

Self-Published

~

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~Comments (

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Rami

at 12:51 on 2009-06-09Ouch. From those excerpts, it seems like a pretty painful read -- but then, I like my grammar to be in more or less the right place. There's a place for bending the rules, but ignoring them like that just makes me wonder if they know the rules in the first place. And looking like you don't know how to write is not, IMHO, a good way to be taken seriously as a writer.

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Arthur B

at 13:12 on 2009-06-09Not only does the author have a strange way with commas, he also seems to urgently need to be introduced to a semicolon or two. Harsh as I was about Jim Bernheimer, but for the most part (aside from the odd "victim's fund" gaffe) his prose was readable, at least in the sense that it was capable of being read without getting a headache.

Maybe it's just because I'm a lawgeek, but does anyone else find it odd that Charlie is asked to sign contract when she's well below the age where she can actually enter binding agreements in the first place, and when there's a grandmother handy who is presumably legally capable of doing all that for her? Mr Crow seems to be as incompetent as he is corrupt.

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Sonia Mitchell

at 23:15 on 2009-06-09I love this review. And feel pity for everyone involved.

It actually sounds a bit Neil Gaiman-ey in intention, though I'm obviously not going to read it and see.

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Wardog

at 14:52 on 2009-06-18Actually this review makes me feel guilty as hell - panning something is never fun, but really, it was all in good conscience I could do.

[mrsbluebertgreggleson]

“Bring ‘Em Back Alive”

-100 for Lucifer trying to get what is technically his little sister to play strip poker with him. What a classy characterization we have going here.

+10 because I like Sister Annaby's outfit.

+20 for when Lucifer flipped his eyes red and said "He's a PRIORITY" to try to spook Duma and she was... very much not intimidated. She's just like, "*sigh* *fake smile* Of course!" like he's her annoying boss. I love this angel. She'd better live.

+30 for the "You sure that's what this is about? You sure it's not... personal?" about AU Charlie because oh MAN I could feel the editors just itching to drop like 10 flashbacks in that pause. Thank you guys, for the restraint.

+5 for when Dean was getting jumped because I really wanted him to look up and see Ketch hiding behind a tree, just peering out at him and cocking his eyebrow. Dean should probably know the importance of being stealthy since he's been hunting since he was a teenager, but I'll let this one slide because Sam and Dean usually are pretty inelegant in their approach to hunting, lol.

-5 for Dean: "Where were you going to take me?" Slaver: "You think I'm going to tell you?" Dean: *shoots him right in the stinkin knee* Slaver: "AAAAH!! ... okay, all right." Like dude you are SO composed, you should be crying like a baby into that snow and blubbering out answers.

-20 because it’s weird to me that the writers explore the fallout of Gabriel’s torture trauma but not so much Sam and Dean’s. Angels canonically per S4 can’t be tortured but degraced ones can and degracing is canonically extremely painful as well, so Gabriel being traumatized I can believe, and I can headcanon an explanation on torture in Hell affecting the mind differently than torture on Earth to justify why Sam and Dean are even remotely functional, but the show itself doesn’t really touch on this and really, after all the angst and suffering the Winchesters have undergone, they really should be allowed to fall apart and build back up. It’d be cathartic for the audience. The fanficcers do a way better job exploring this and I really wish the show writers would show at least some instances of Sam and Dean dealing with their issues in the day-to-day and trying to handle it as best they can. Otherwise it’s just a Trauma Conga Line and it’s harder to care about bad things happening to them when we know it’s gonna be like water off a duck’s back and never really addressed/handled.

-20 So Gabriel faked his death well enough to fool Lucifer and also God? I'd think either one of them would be able to tell whether Lucifer was killing the real deal... I mean the fake Gabriel's death looked very permanent so maybe Gabriel created a lesser angel replica of himself to bite it so the light show would convince everyone, but... idk that explanation is not a great explanation to me, I would've preferred it if he'd really died and then been resurrected (maybe from Cass waking up, maybe somehow that woke up Gabriel too and in his newly resurrected state Gabriel got captured). I also just really like how the big explanation does not at all try to explain how presumably fully powered and crafty Gabriel got captured by Lucifer's weakest creation. I have to assume he found some spell similar to the one Crowley used on Lucifer, to enslave an archangel; it's just weird that they glossed over it so completely.

-5 Also dinging them for the “Hammer of the Gods” flashbacks. Just a little, because it has been eight seasons since it happened, but still, I count it as excessive flashbacking.

-5 because that Exorcist's girl “demon” voice was very unfitting and goofy.

-10 for "Your wound might be more serious than we thought." HE GOT SHOT, DUDE. Like TV is usually pretty flippant with how serious gunshot wounds are if they're not in the heart/head, but I'm pretty sure in real life Dean would be bleeding to death no matter where he got shot, lol. Let's assume they patched him up offscreen with some secret MoL magic trick that kept him from dying.

-5 because I'm surprised Dean doesn't fight Ketch more on the cure. I think Ketch is probably honest here, but Dean obviously didn't trust him a whole hell of a lot - and Ketch could easily be poisoning him or something. I guess he figures Ketch is his only shot, he's Ketch's ride home and route to possible redemption, and Sam and Cass would kill Ketch if he came back alone, but still, Dean doesn’t forgive easily, likes to be stubborn, and give people a hard time. It’s to advance the plot faster but still a little OOC that he didn’t at least give a token protest.

-10 because shouldn’t the BMoL already know about the Winchesters' connection to Charlie? Even though they were supposed to be all researched about the Winchesters and went through their bunker and belongings and never found anything out about her?

-30 because THERE'S the sad Dean-Charlie flashbacks. I’m taking back all my restraint points.

+5 Now I want Ketch to feel bad about killing Mick, because Mick was the only cool BMoL. Five points in remembrance, cheers, mate.

-10 because what the hell, Dean is all cool with Ketch now, even after everything? That's weird, he usually holds onto grudges like a mofo. Is it because Ketch has a thing for Mary and Dean wants someone for his mom to live with? I... wouldn't think Dean would want his mom to be with anyone other than his dad, and I especially wouldn't think Ketch. It's weird Dean is doing such a turn-around on this guy he was eager to kill. Between Ketch and Benny, I guess there's just something about washed out, dirty pocket universes that makes Dean click with the guy he's with.

-5 for Sam's Inconvenient Auto-Speakerphone Phone

-5 because Sam should’ve just fuckin hung up on Asmodeus after Asmodeus was like “DON’T YOU DAHR HANG UP”. That would've been such a power move. Just keep pissing off King Dedede while he's riled.

+10 because Sister Annaby is really pretty, dang. I do like that healer-for-pay business she set up in the last (?) episode she was in, it was a good idea for Earth-bound angels. I just wish she weren't stuck in a storyline with Lucifer because he's just... the worst (or that the had not named her so similarly to my poor lost Anna). If they'd used her in a separate role and spent more time on the healer-for-pay thing, for example, that could've been a cool nugget.

-5 Shouldn't the angels have known and called her by her real name instead of "Charlie Bradbury"?

-50 ABADDON SHOULD HAVE ATTACKED THE BUNKER, DAMN IT. She should've known where it was after her first episode, she wanted the things in it, and we got a demon break-in this episode. I’m still so mad that the writers in S8/S9 didn’t do this, and I’m taking it out on this episode! MANNN.

-30 lol Sam's like, "I'm warding the bunker!" You should always have the bunker warded, my dude! Otherwise you're sitting ducks staying in one unprotected spot.

+15 Sam and Cass were sitting close enough during Asmodeus's attack that for one second I really thought one of them would reach out and hold the other one's hand while they were dying. I don't know why I thought that because the writers would never in a million years do that, but it would've been touching (and also because it would be so funny to see the fandom explode).

+100 Don't have to listen to Asmodeus ever again, yeeeee. I'm just disappointed he didn't die via punch-to-the-heart so that his killer could pull their arm out, smack their lips, and say "Finger-lickin' good", the ultimate final and best joke.

-50 Dean's whole emotional, angry blowout at the end, Sam and Cass standing all silent and scared, and I'm just thinking of "The Thing" like, "If you cared so much, maybe you should've read more fucking books last episode to help your mom sooner, Dean." Like my dude, don’t get mad that your brother and friend restored Gabriel (he also killed Asmodeus, who would’ve killed them if Gabriel wasn’t all juiced up? and SINCE he was all juiced up, how were they supposed to stop him? I get Dean’s upset and frustrated because it seems they’re all out of options, but it really seems like he’s not getting that they’re only alive because of that, and lashing out at them because he’s frustrated, which is one of his worse character traits), another one will probably fall into your lap in like... four episodes? whenever the next big plot advancement needs to happen. It’s been awhile so I don’t remember if Lucifer got his archangel grace still or not, but I think he’s recharged by now, so they can just concentrate on tracking him down. Or hey, maybe convince Rowena to pop the Cage back open and snatch some of your Michael’s grace. I just wish character development meant addressing Dean’s anger issues so that Dean’s loved ones maybe don’t flinch and get scared whenever he gets mad. Not a good look for a heroic character.

To sum it up: Pure plot episode. We were teased the idea of Dean and Ketch in Apocalypse World saving Mary and Jack, but somehow ending up too far away (is the portal opening up in different spots going to come up again?) and saving AU Charlie instead. Dean bonding so quickly with Ketch seemed hinky considering their past; since it seems like Dean might have a snarky frenemyship with Ketch in the future like the one he had with Crowley, I guess Ketch is gonna die by the end of this season since Death Equals Redemption and we need a reason for Dean to look stoically sad. I think it would’ve been more fun to leave Dean trapped in Apocalypse World to get more POV on it for the audience, maybe see some other old characters, and reunite with Jack and Mary.

Meanwhile, Gabriel recovered enough to kill the Big Bad. Sleep well, sweet Prince. You were the only thing I was looking forward to going into the season and I had high hopes you’d be cool, and much like Dagon, you were not. Hopefully the next demon Big Bad is better - maybe a white-eyed demon, so we can find out what those were compared to Knights and Princes? ... but only if it doesn’t finish ruining the demon mythos for me. I’m surprised they repowered Gabriel so quickly since I thought they brought him back to be a fan favorite member of Team Free Will and that means he can’t be too powerful, but part of his appeal is that he can snap his fingers and do whatever zany thing he wants, which would be considerably harder to pull off if he were powerless. I’m still kinda surprised that they went the route of bringing him back the way they did, but until we see more of him, I’ll have to wait to see if it was worth it in terms of character development. Still kinda weird they never explained how Asmodeus got him.

Grade: -140 Kentucky Fried Demons in the Empty

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