#like i got my criticisms of the LA but they got right the fact that ozai has monmy milkers

[boneskullravenriver]

Me: ozai is an abusive father who has little redeeming qualities who treated his son and his daughter like shit.

Also me watching episode 6 agni Kai:

[sage-nebula]

Okay, so I actually do want to get my thoughts down on why I didn't like season two as much as season one. This is going to be a lot of complaining, but keep in mind that while I don't think season two was as good as season one, I think season one was S tier. Season two was B tier. B tier is still pretty damn good, but it is a noticeable drop, and is disappointing considering that this is the show's finale. But with that said, please do not reblog this yammering about how much you hate the show, you're glad it's over, etc. Despite my criticisms, I don't feel that way, and I don't want to see that on my post.

With that said:

My biggest problem with the show overall is that, between seasons one and two, they seem to have remembered that this is supposed to be a video game show, and so felt compelled to abandon their focus on character work in favor of flashy action sequences. This isn't me being in la la land thinking that season one had no action sequences; obviously it had fight scenes as well. But season one had a heavy emphasis on the characters, their internal worlds and struggles, that I feel was sorely lacking in season two.

The best way to demonstrate why I feel this is is to look at the final episodes of each season. Season one ended with Jinx's family dinner party. That entire scene was one long conversation; although there was a bit of action when Caitlyn freed herself from her bonds and got Pow-Pow (and then Jinx knocked her out and took Pow-Pow back), that isn't what I would call a fight. Neither was Silco shooting at Vi / Jinx killing Silco. Instead, the scene consisted of Jinx walking back and forth along the table, trying to figure out whether Vi or Silco loved her most, and who she should be with therefore. It ends with a quiet, mournful song as Jinx fires the rocket, right as the Piltovan council was deciding in favor of Zaun's independence.

By contrast, the final episode of season two is pretty much a 40 minute battle sequence. The character exploration they could have had (e.g. Ekko convincing Jinx not to commit suicide) was omitted completely in favor of this battle sequence. We couldn't even see Piltover prepare for the battle. Instead, it cut straight from discussion of what they had to do to prepare, to the battle itself. Ekko convincing Jinx was omitted, Jinx making her decision was omitted, Sevika and the Firelights being convinced was omitted, Vi mourning her sister was omitted, how Sevika ended up joining the council was omitted. The only character work we had in the last episode at all was what was between Jayce and Viktor, and even that was barely anything, time-wise, in comparison to all of the battle scenes. (And the fact that the only character work in the finale was between two men when this series was supposed to be about two sisters . . . don't even get me started.)

While the animation in this show is the best animation I've ever seen, period—and while the action sequences always look fantastic because of that—I feel that the shift in focus from character work to action was to the show's detriment. What made Arcane so good, in my opinion, was not the animation—or at least, not just the animation. It was the character work. The fact that we had these three dimensional characters, each with their own rich, internal worlds that drove the story forward—that was what made it worth watching. So to cut that out, and relegate it either to music video montages or off-screen conversations, was a mistake. The characters suffered for it, and so did the story. It turned it from a masterpiece of a narrative, to just another good show. (Although I maintain that season one is a masterpiece. Season two doesn't affect that.)

Having said that, I'm going to break the rest of my critique down into sections.

The Noxus Problem:

Before I go further, let me just say: I love the Medardas. Mel in particular is my second favorite character on the show, and I love how messy the Medarda family is. I'm still fascinated by the Black Rose, and I feel that we weren't given an adequate answer as to what, exactly, the beef between them and Ambessa was. I want to know more about that. I'm really hoping that we get another show with Mel at the main character, to further explore what is going on there.

However, I feel bringing in the Noxian army was a huge, huge mistake, because it took focus away from the socio-political conflict between Piltover and Zaun—and, in the final episode, abandoned it altogether. After all, there is no time to address that if they're being invaded by a foreign army. There is no need to address it, if you show them working together against a common enemy. Except, there really is; we're given no reason to believe that Piltover's oppression of Zaun will stop. Yes, Sevika was given a seat on the council—but we don't know what that deal entails. Was she promised sovereignty for Zaun? If so, then why is she on Piltover's council? Is it merely that now she can vote for it? If so, I can't see that (or any other pro-Zaun measure) going her way, considering the fact that the two people most likely to support her (Mel and s1!Jayce) are both gone.

I understand that the writers' intention was, "they came together to fight an enemy, everything is good now!" but that is simply not how it works. Now that the battle is over, the most realistic thing to assume is that it went back to the status quo prior to martial law. And the status quo was that life in Zaun was suffering. Despite what the alternate timeline in episode seven tried to suggest (and "alternate timeline" feels too gracious; Zaun did not look like that prior to Hextech, Powder was mentally ill since the first episode's cold open—it was an AU on multiple levels), life in Zaun was never good. Characters like Sevika and Silco wanted to fight the enforcers and Piltover rule for a reason. And that reason has never been properly addressed or resolved, and we're given no reason to think that it will be, because they chose to ignore it altogether by making the second season about the Noxus army's invasion rather than letting it actually be about the socio-political struggle between the two sister cities. And for whatever reason that was done—the writers' being scared to commit to either Zaun's independence or Piltover beating them into submission, or the desire to set up the next show—I feel that it was a mistake. The Noxian army should have never invaded this show. Instead, Ambessa should have been saved for the Medarda spin-off, with Mel's decision to return to Noxus instead of staying in Piltover built to a different way.

The Vi Problem:

Of all the characters, I think Vi was written the worst and done the dirtiest in the second season.

The problem with Vi's character stems from inconsistency. We're never given convincing reasons for why she thinks the way she does, or why she does the things she does. The second season opens with her having done a complete 180 on her sister, for reasons that we're left to guess at because they aren't explained. Is it because Jinx fired the missile at the council? Is it because Jinx rejected her by saying "here's to the new us?" We don't know, because no time is spent on character work for that. All we know is that Vi went from telling Jinx "it'll be okay" at the end of s1e9 to begging Caitlyn to let her help hunt and kill Jinx in s2e1, even before the attack on the memorial service. Vi went from being unable to bear the thought of being an enforcer because they killed her parents in the beginning of s2e1, to being willing to gas the Lanes with the Gray in s2e2.

And this inconsistency is not relegated only to act 1. In act 2, Vi strangles Jinx so hard in her apartment that Jinx has trouble speaking after Vi finally releases her—but later, when they fight in the mines, she doesn't do anything to seriously hurt her and instead just tries to pin her down and get her to surrender. Why is she less murderous toward Jinx now? We're not given a reason. After all, she wanted to kill her in the temple; her brief hesitation when Jinx said "it had to be you" is overruled when she raises her fist to deliver the finishing blow, stopped only by Isha's intervention. And again, her first instinct upon seeing Jinx again was to strangle her hard enough to crush her windpipe. But she flipped again, for reasons we're not privy to, because the character work wasn't done. The closest we get is Vi accepting Jinx after Jinx proved she was right about Vander—but even then, that doesn't make up for the above.

And again, it doesn't end there. In act 3, she's furious with Caitlyn for jailing Jinx, and wants to comfort and help her sister. Yet when Jinx leaves her in the jail cell, suddenly it's "tell me you were right, Caitlyn" and "I was an idiot for trusting her" — this, after Jinx was right about Vander. This, after Jinx saved Caitlyn's life. This, after Jinx told her "don't feel guilty about being happy" and "you deserve to be with [Caitlyn]." She does a 180 again simply because Jinx left? Even though Jinx left telling her that she deserved to be happy? Even though Jinx was probably the one who told Caitlyn where Vi was?

In season one, Vi's actions made sense. Her reasoning was always clear. We knew that she hated the enforcers because they killed her parents, and made life worse for those in Zaun; we knew that her priorities were those closest to her (not Zaun itself, never Zaun itself), and that she would do anything for those she loved. And we knew who she loved, without a doubt, and could see exactly why she loved them.

In season two, this is no longer the case. Vi's motivations and goals flip-flop on a whim. Best I can tell by the end of the season, Vi is willing to agree with whoever is closest to her at any given moment in desperation to keep them there. Jinx abandoned her, but Caitlyn was still there, so Vi agreed to be an enforcer and kill her sister. Then Caitlyn abandoned her and Jinx came back, and while Vi blamed Jinx for Caitlyn's abandonment, she was still willing to take Jinx back if it meant having Vander back, too. But then Jinx left again, and Caitlyn was there, so now Caitlyn Was Right and Jinx shouldn't have been trusted. Perhaps if we had the character work to understand what was actually in Vi's head it would make sense and she would seem like a better written character, but we don't, and so instead it seems that her goals shift depending on what the plot needs. The plot needed her to fight Jinx in an Cool Battle Sequence, so that's what happened. The plot needed her to fuck Caitlyn so the show could have a lesbian sex scene, so that's what happened. No thought was given to her character or her relationships at all, despite her being one of the protagonists. (Jinx is the other, of course.)

Speaking of Vi's relationships, though . . .

The Sisters Problem:

This was supposed to be a show about sisters. What happened to that?

In season one, their relationship was handled beautifully. We saw how close they were in childhood, and the moment they fell apart; and we saw them struggling to work their way back together in late teen (Jinx) / adulthood (Vi), only for Jinx to seemingly sever that at the end. Honestly, that is the one complaint I have about the finale of season one; it has never made sense to me that Vi didn't try to argue with Jinx when Jinx asserted that Vi couldn't love her like she used to, because Vi did love her. Even at that moment, she loved her. But I digress. The point is, in season one, the sisters' relationship continued on a strong through-line. We could see where they were going, and how they were getting there, every step of the way. It was strong, it was consistent.

This is not the case for season two. I already talked about this a lot with Vi above, and Jinx's character was written much more consistently; still, there are problems. For one, in act 3, Jinx is made to ignore Vi's own inconsistency; her line "you're never going to give up on me" makes no sense when Vi had already given up on her once before, in act 1 and the beginning of act 2. The bigger problem, though, is that their relationship was sidelined hard and that, as a result, we once again miss the character work. We got a bit of it in episode six, with their talk about their mother next to the chunk of wall that had once been used to mark their heights. And we know that Vi forgave Jinx the moment that she invited her into the group hug with Vander. But for a show that was supposed to be about them, that is nowhere near enough. Jinx telling Vi, "you know I'm always with you" doesn't feel earned when we didn't get to see them reach that point again. Vi not mourning her sister at all, and instead being fine with being "the dirt under [Caitlyn's nails]" feels extremely dissatisfying when the entire show was supposed to be about the sisters. The most important relationship for Vi and Jinx both was the one they had with each other, and that was completely forgotten.

Speaking of the lesbians, though—

The Violyn Problem:

Look, I'm a lesbian myself. Obviously I was on-board for Violyn, and I thought they were well-written in season one. The problem is, they weren't well-written in season two.

To be fair, of the two characters, Caitlyn was better written. While she, too, had problems with inconsistency (we're given no reason as to why she's feeling doubt about martial law or why she wanted to betray Ambessa in act 2, for instance), she was still written more consistently than Vi was. Catilyn being willing to abandon her positive belief in Zaun made sense given the life of privilege she was raised in. Caitlyn turning to martial law made sense when you remember that her dream was to be a cop. Even her turns back toward wanting to remove martial law and betray Ambessa could have been written to make sense, had the character work been put in. It wasn't, but Caitlyn still made more sense than Vi overall.

But this section isn't about Caitlyn, it's about her relationship with Vi. And her relationship with Vi was done dirty. Yes, they ended up together. Yes, they had sex. But again, the character work to get them there was not done. In season one, we see their relationship develop; we see how they go from enemies who oppose each other to friends who build trust (and feelings) between them. We see their growing care for each other, we see them work past their preconceived notions and struggles. Their relationship is slowly and steadily built. It makes sense.

In season two? We kind of get that in act 1, but only because we can continue on from knowledge of where they were in the last act of season one. However, season one can no longer carry them after Caitlyn hits Vi in the stomach with the butt of her rifle and then they break up. They should have had a long way to go toward reconciliation after that; the trust between them was shattered, and it takes a long time to build trust back. But they weren't given that time; Vi's easy acceptance of Caitlyn back in her life the moment they reunite aside, we're given absolutely no reason why Caitlyn—someone who felt horribly betrayed by Vi seemingly choosing Jinx over her—is willing to trust Vi and take her back again. Even putting aside her doubts about Ambessa (which were, again, not built up well enough to justify a betrayal from a writing standpoint), and the fact that she was in a relationship with someone else (and there was never any indication that Maddie was a traitor until the literal second that it happened), Caitlyn felt betrayed by Vi. It isn't believable that she's Completely Over It by the time they reunite again, or that those feelings of betrayal wouldn't come back full force when she sees that Vi is partnered up with Jinx, versus Vi's previous assertion that she was only trying to protect Isha when she stopped Caitlyn from shooting.

And it wasn't only Caitlyn who had reasonable grievances! Vi saw Caitlyn change before her eyes, when that was her worst fear; she saw Caitlyn being willing to shoot at a child, knew that Caitlyn had teamed up with Ambessa to put Zaun under martial law, and then had Jinx imprisoned after Jinx saved her life. She did, very briefly, air those grievances with Caitlyn. But then it was all abandoned a few scenes later so that they could have sex in the dungeon. It was completely forgotten for the sake of a fanservice sex scene.

Listen. As I said before, I'm a lesbian. And I'm always happy to see sapphic relationships in shows. I'm even happy to have messy sapphic relationships in shows, because believe it or not, we sapphics are actual human beings, and sometimes that makes us messy. ACAB, and that includes lesbian cops, but bastards make television entertaining. I'm here for that.

But messy shouldn't mean underdeveloped. It shouldn't mean poorly written. And I for one could not enjoy that sex scene when it wasn't properly built up to at all. When Vi and Caitlyn had all of this unresolved, and now ignored, conflict between them. It wasn't even hate sex, or at least, "we're still not good but we're alone and horny" sex. It was "everything is better and they're a couple now" sex. Which is extremely frustrating, and a complete let down over how well their relationship was written in season one. Despite the "league of lesbians" goof tags, the show wasn't about them, but it still should have done them justice, and it didn't. Not by a long shot.

Other Problems:

I don't like that the only character work in the last episode of the show was between Jayce and Viktor. While even that was lacking, taking a show about two sisters and making its series finale about two men puts a bad taste in my mouth. I understand that the bulk of the fandom cares about the men (or at least it seems like it does when I put "jayvik" into my blacklist and half the Arcane tag disappears), but the show should be written for its narrative, not for the fandom. And I, for one, never cared too much about Jayce or Viktor, but after the way this finale sidelined all of the women in order to focus on them? My feelings are pretty negative toward them now.

I don't like that they tried to do a fake-out with Jinx dying, when it's obvious that she didn't. For one, Riot would never kill off their most popular character. For another, there are too many signs that make it obvious that she survived, from the pink streak right before the main explosion, to the glitchy "the end" message over the airship sailing away (one that Powder said she'd ride on one day). It feels as if they wanted to make it look like she died for shock value, and that's something I thought that this show was above doing. It's cheap, it's bad, and I don't like it.

I don't like that Mel and Ekko were both sidelined so much throughout this entire season. Mel spends the bulk of the season in captivity, and then when she is finally free, she doesn't get to do anything to affect change except be in a magic battle against her mother. Jayce completely abandons her without any insight as to why beyond "the Arcane messed him up", and we're given no indication that Mel had anything to do with the reformation of the council at the end. Ekko, meanwhile, was completely absent in act 2, and while he literally saved the day in act 3:

His convincing Jinx not to commit suicide was off-screen;

His rallying of the Firelights was off-screen

He ends up alone in Zaun with absolutely no indication of what he or the Firelights will do after—was the tree even healed at all?

Ekko and the Firelights should have played a much bigger role. The sanctuary that the Firelights had built for the refugees should have had more of a showing other than "the tree is sick" (a plot line which, as I just said, was never resolved). Episode seven was nice, but the Zaun depicted was completely incongruent with what we knew of Zaun's state at the start of the show, and the depiction of Powder is the same. (Because Powder was hallucinating even as a small child, as shown in the cold open of season 1; Vi's death should have sent her spiraling. The fact that she was Totally Mentally Healthy in the alternate timeline makes absolutely no sense. She was Ekko's Ideal Version of Powder, not who she'd realistically be growing up like that.) He wasn't given justice as a character.

And Mel? Again, she spent most of the season in captivity, had her agency completely ripped away from her, lost everyone she ever cared about, has powers that aren't clearly defined or explained, and is now leaving the only home she has known for years to go back to Noxus. And again, I want that story for her, I want that show, but after we saw her brilliant mind in action in season one and how much change she affected, I still feel that she was done dirty this season. I hate how much she was sidelined; she deserved better.

Final Notes:

Despite all this, I do still love Arcane. Well, I love season one, and season two had parts that I liked (I think that arc 2, despite the lack of Ekko, was the best because of the fleeting character work we did get and the focus on the sisters), despite being a disappointment overall. I think for me, I'm going to just take the parts from season two that I did like and put them into an alternate season two that I have in my mind; one where Noxus didn't invade so that the issues between Piltover and Zaun could be focused on and actually resolved, one where the character work wasn't abandoned for flashy action sequences, and one where there wasn't a fakeout of Jinx's death for shock value.

And now that it's all off my chest, that's all I have to say about that.

[generic-sonic-fan]

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transfem metal sonic and supporting eggdad

Please

Eggman may not be the best person or the best dad but by god he's trying his best. Thank you for this excellent prompt!

1772 words.

---

"Father?" Sage spoke through his headphones.

Ivo took them off his ears and swiveled his chair around to find his lovely daughter hovering just off the ground.

"Sage!" He smiled. "I was just waiting for you. I noticed that you marked this time on my calendar- what is it that you wanted to discuss?"

"I did," she said. "I had some questions."

He waited, but when she didn't continue, he furrowed his brow. "Then spit them out. I can't answer if you don't specify!"

"Of course. I wish to ask questions about the purpose of Metal Sonic's operation."

This was even stranger still. He caught a number of criticisms rising in his throat, about wasting his time or defying his command to be more specific. He didn't say them. A few months ago, he would've. This was a strange development, and it was best if he didn't devote much thought to the matter.

"Why was Metal Sonic designed to resemble Sonic?"

"You can check my development logs, can't you?" Ivo replied.

"Your intention was to create an imposter of Sonic to frame Sonic for crimes against the populace that he did not commit." 

Sage pulled up a holographic window next to her, showing the exact words Ivo had written in his notes all those many years ago. With a flick of her hand, however, she pushed the logs aside and instead showed a montage of Metal Sonic's various missions. Most end in failure, but that isn’t relevant right now.

"However," Sage noted, "you have never utilized Metal Sonic in this intended manner. In fact, the last person used to frame Sonic for something he did not do was Shadow the Hedgehog."

"You're right." Ivo put his hand on his chin. "Where are you going with this?"

"I am here to suggest that the physical resemblance is unnecessary for Metal Sonic's function."

"Well, that's silly to propose after all this time. His name is 'Metal Sonic', after all!"

"Because that unit has not decided on another name." Sage said, quieter.

"Sage, dear, you know that I don't allow you to keep secrets from me, right?" He stood from his chair.

"Apologies. Allow me to 'cut to the chase'. Would you permit Metal Sonic to change appearance and potentially identity?"

Sage's animations stopped moving, freezing her face into artificial neutrality. It was a face stylized to not provoke any sort of strong emotion at all, almost a sort of mask she could don if she was worried her words might provoke a negative reaction.

The fact that she was using it on him was making something in his chest hurt that he wasn't used to feeling pain in. He didn't have any more scientific language to describe it.

"You're asking this on Metal's behalf, aren't you?" He stated his question as the fact it was. "While I appreciate your desire to protect those you consider family, he shouldn't be making you do this sort of thing. You've got much better things to do with your time- and he doesn't need protection from me." 

Sage's steely gaze did not shift. "I will call Metal Sonic inside." 

Only a few seconds later, the door to his workshop opened and Metal Sonic walked in. His gait was stiff- he always walked stiffly, but something about this felt stiffer than usual. Or perhaps that was simply Ivo's human imagination at play. 

Sage floated to the side to allow space between them. She then pulled up an empty text box. "I will translate." 

For at least thirty seconds, nothing appeared on the textbox. Ivo cleared his throat. Metal Sonic hadn't moved even a centimeter, perhaps not even a millimeter. Deathly still, just like Sage was. 

Finally, a cursor appeared in the textbox, and a line of text scrolled across. "This unit does not identify as male."

"Hmph. To be expected. You are a robot, after all. Makes sense that you don't have an experience of gender." Ivo replied. "Is that all?"

Metal Sonic flinched. 

Sage landed in front of him(?) and pantomimed putting her hands on his(?) shoulders, before turning to face Ivo again. 

"That is not quite what Metal Sonic intended." She said quickly. She then glanced over her shoulder to the text box, but nothing appeared on it.

"Hold on," Ivo knelt down, "I may have been too hasty with my assertion. Continue your thought.”

Neither hologram nor robot moved. Damn it all- Ivo was already terrible at reading nonverbal cues, and when his own kids could simply lock their joints in place or freeze their animations, it was all the more difficult. The only indication that either of them were still online was the steadily growing hum of Metal's cooling fans, which were designed to increase in RPM during combat scenarios. 

"You know I don't give a care in the world about what pronouns my creations choose for themselves, right?" Ivo tried his best to give a paternal smile. 

(He really should've practiced more in the mirror.)

"You don't?" Sage asked.

"Of course! Why would I?"

"You had previously stated that Metal Sonic's purpose was initially for imitatio-"

"Who gives a rip about that? I certainly don't. Not anymore. You yourself pointed out how that doesn't matter. Now move aside," he waved Sage out of the way of her brother(?). 

Sage did as he asked. But Metal Sonic still did not react. His(?) irises did not even flicker.

"C'mere." Ivo held out his arms.

Metal came a single step closer, still hovering outside of his reach. He almost opened his mouth again, almost raised his voice and demanded that Metal follow the implicit order to come receive the physical comfort he was trying to give to solve this mess of a situation, but he didn't. 

Ivo remembered that as a child he was forced to hug his relatives at various family functions, and that said hugs had felt like sandpaper prisons. Metal Sonic was different- he(?) wasn't organic, wasn't human, and wouldn't feel the sensation of his(?) skin crawling at the unwanted touch -but maybe he(?) experienced something similar that remained unvoiced. 

The thought was strange. But Ivo lowered his arms anyway. "Alright, or not. That's fine as well."

Metal clasped his(?) hands together, but the text screen remained empty.

"What pronouns would you like to be referred to?" Ivo asked. 

The cursor flickered. Letter by letter, an answer appeared. "She/her."

"Lovely!" Ivo clapped his hands together. He then looked at Sage. "Sage, it sounds like you have an update to make to the database. Leave Metal's development logs as they are, but correct the pronouns referring to her everywhere else." 

"Gladly." Sage smiled. 

At that, it was like Metal finally unthawed. He- no no no, she was a she, Ivo drilled into his thoughts, he was not going to bumble something as simple as this -She unlocked her joints, and her gaze wandered up to finally meet Ivo's gaze. 

"So, how would you like to modify your frame to better match your gender identity?" Ivo asked her. 

She glanced side to side, before upon the screen writing, "taking suggestions?"

"Yes?" Ivo raised an eyebrow. "I'm not a woman. I haven't got a clue what you might want. Suggest me ideas and I'll see what I can do."

"Will you accept blueprints?"

"I don't see why not! I review Sage's blueprint suggestions all the time." 

Metal walked to the computer. As Ivo turned to follow her, he saw a notification pop up on the screen. Opening it revealed in-depth plans for-

-a body that looked extremely similar to Neo Metal Sonic. 

Ivo cleared his throat to try and get more moisture into his mouth, which had suddenly gone dry. "Sage?"

"Yes, father?" Sage woke from her idle animation as she paused her update of the database.

"Do you see any. . . problems, with these designs?" He asked. 

Sage first turned to her sister. "You should have informed me that you were moving onto this stage." 

Metal's response to her did not appear on the text box. 

Sage flickered out of existence and reappeared to the left of the computer screen. "Father, know that I would not have allowed any of this if I thought Metal were to be a danger to you or the Empire." 

"Good. I expected as much." He replied, before looking back down to Metal. "Very well, if that’s what you want, I’ll get working on it." 

Sage brought Metal's textbox back alongside her just as Metal typed, "you will?"

"Did I stutter? Of course I will! It's a dashingly dreadful look and it matches with Sage's colors!" He replied. "Think of the fear it will instill in Sonic and his friends! Honestly, it's a terrifying design, it's a wonder I didn't come up with it myself. . ." 

"Thank you." Metal typed.

"Thank you, father." Ivo corrected with a smile. "I know I haven't always been good about that, but the past is in the past, right?"

"Affirmative, father." She repeated. 

"Good!" He clapped his hands together and grinned. "Now! Let's get to the workshop! I already know what synthetic material we should use for the skirt. Your design suggests kevlar, but you really should consider something less stiff and heavy to reduce drag!"

"Indeed," Sage added. "However, she is worried about the durability of the fabric-"

"What do you think my flight suit is made out of? We'll use the same fabric. Only the finest for my finest creations!"

Sage covered her mouth and giggled. Metal imitated the gesture, but surprised Ivo when her vocoder let out a series of high-pitched noises, a perfect little laugh. . . for a perfect little girl. 

"My girls." He said to himself. Although with the sensitivity of Metal's audial sensors and Sage's access to every high-performance camera on the Eggnet, that fact was debatable, so he said it louder. "My little girls." 

"My sister." Sage floated down to Metal's side. 

Metal brought her hands up to her muzzle and rocked side to side. Ivo swore that he could've seen Amy do a similar gesture, but that was irrelevant. It was a gesture of joy, a gesture that he didn't think Metal was even capable of before now. 

Just how long had she been hiding this for? Perhaps she was merely imitating Sage, but the deliberate inclusion of Amy’s data into her gestures made him hesitate to confirm that conclusion. And that thought threatened to bring up all sorts of feelings that he'd be much better off not thinking about. So, with a smile, he refocused on the task at hand. 

His eldest daughter needed a makeover, over all. 

[amateurvoltaire]

I went to Puy du Fou (1) and watched  'Le Dernier Panache' (2), and needless to say, I've got a few things on my mind. But before I gather my thoughts into something coherent, there’s one pressing issue I need to address: there was NO “extermination” policy in the Vendée.

Is it clear enough for everyone? I sincerely hope so because yesterday, I was among an audience of about 5000 who were shown a scene depicting Robespierre (in yellow), Saint-Just (in turquoise), and Barère (in purple) arguing for the complete destruction of the Vendée… for reasons…

In plain terms, were they advocating for genocide (3)  in the Vendée.

This didn’t happen. In 1793, the idea of a distinct Vendéen identity wasn’t a real thing. The Vendéens were not recognized as a specific regional or ethnic group, not by themselves or anyone else.

Do you know what was real? Brigands rebelling against the first French Republic. What were the policies of extermination targeted towards? Those Brigands. What do you call that? Civil War.

On 1st August 1793, Barère delivered an inflamatory speech (4) that many use to argue the Committee of Public Safety's alleged genocidal intent. His words were indeed unhinged, typical of the era’s rhetoric.

Barère did say, "No more Vendée, no more royalty; no more Vendée, no more aristocracy; no more Vendée, and the enemies of the republic have disappeared," but this infamous line follows a crucial preamble: "We will have peace the day the interior is peaceful, that the rebels are subdued, that the brigands are exterminated. (5)" It’s disingenuous to interpret this as a call to wipe out an entire region (6).

Moreover, this speech was followed by the "Décret relatif aux mesures à prendre contre les rebelles de Vendée", which includes an article (the 8th) stating: "Women, children, and the elderly will be taken inland. Provisions will be made for their subsistence and safety, with all the consideration due to humanity" This directive was actually enforced as evidenced by the 20,000 to 40,000 refugees who the government supported in cities like Poitiers, Orléans, and La Rochelle.

The conservative right in France has been peddling this genocide narrative since the mid-1980s, but no amount of dramatic cursive text with melancholic violin strains will convert fiction into fact.

What happened in the Vendée was horrific. Were there war crimes? Numerous. Was the region scarred by the violence? Undoubtedly. Should we acknowledge that? Of course!  But pushing a theory that is not true detracts from recognising the violence, learning from it and ensuring it will never happen again.

It also cheapens the heroic acts and sacrifices of those who fought not for the narrow political agendas of the 21st century but for causes they truly believed in. The counter-revolutionaries in the Vendée and throughout France were driven by a deep commitment to protect their communities, faith, and way of life. They were not merely victims of a systematic extermination effort but active participants in a struggle to defend their political and religious beliefs (7). Admittedly, I'm not an expert on Charette, but I suspect he would be disturbed to see his legacy so grossly misrepresented…

Notes

(1) Puy du Fou is a historical theme park in the Vendée known for its elaborate live shows that recreate historical events. It has faced criticism for potentially exploiting history and is managed by the Puy du Fou Foundation, linked to its founder, Philippe de Villiers, a French politician noted for his conservative and nationalist views.

(2) This particular show focuses on François Athanase Charette de La Contrie, a Vendean general.

(3) Genocide is defined by the United Nations in the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide", adopted on December 9, 1948, as acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group.

(4) The conflict in the Vendée began in March 1793, prior to Robespierre's association with the Committee of Public Safety. Danton was the one who was instrumental in shaping the initial response to the uprising and was the president of the Convention during Barère’s speech. Weirdly enough, Danton is nowhere on that stage…

(5) The full qoute is "Nous aurons la paix le jour que l'intérieur sera paisible, que les rebelles seront soumis, que les brigands seront exterminés. Les conquêtes et les perfidies des puissances étrangères seront nulles le jour que le département de la Vendée aura perdu son infâme dénomination et sa population parricide et coupable. Plus de Vendée, plus de royauté ; plus de Vendée, plus d'aristocratie ; plus de Vendée, et les ennemis de la république ont disparu. "

(6) This type of rhetoric was not unique to the Vendée but was also directed at other counter-revolutionary hotspots across France like Brittany, Lyon, Marseille, Avignon, etc.

(7) I'm not a particular fan of those beliefs but I can respect the courage to stand up in defence of a lost cause.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Naomi Klein's "Doppelganger"

Tomorrow (September 6) at 7pm, I'll be hosting Naomi Klein at the LA Public Library for the launch of Doppelganger.

On September 12 at 7pm, I'll be at Toronto's Another Story Bookshop with my new book The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation.

If the Naomi be Klein you’re doing just fine If the Naomi be Wolf Oh, buddy. Ooooof.

I learned this rhyme in Doppelganger, Naomi Klein's indescribable semi-memoir that is (more or less) about the way that people confuse her with Naomi Wolf, and how that fact has taken on a new urgency as Wolf descended into conspiratorial politics, becoming a far-right darling and frequent Steve Bannon guest:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374610326/doppelganger

This is a very odd book. It is also a very, very good book. The premise – exploring the two Naomis' divergence – is a surprisingly sturdy scaffold for an ambitious, wide-ranging exploration of this very frightening moment of polycrisis and systemic failure:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCjcwVhFhTA

Wolf once had a cluster of superficial political and personal similarities to Klein: a feminist author of real literary ability, a Jewish woman, and, of course, a Naomi. Klein grew accustomed to being mistaken for Wolf, but never fully comfortable. Wolf's politics were always more Sheryl Sandberg than bell hooks (or Emma Goldman). While Klein talked about capitalism and class and solidarity, Wolf wanted to "empower" individual women to thrive in a market system that would always produce millions of losers for every winner.

Fundamentally: Klein is a leftist, Wolf was a liberal. The classic leftist distinction goes: leftists want to abolish a system where 150 white men run the world; liberals want to replace half of those 150 with women, queers and people of color.

The past forty years have seen the rise and rise of a right wing politics that started out extreme (think of Reagan and Thatcher's support for Pinochet's death-squads) and only got worse. Liberals and leftists forged an uneasy alliance, with liberals in the lead (literally, in Canada, where today, Justin Trudeau's Liberal Party governs in partnership with the nominally left NDP).

But whenever real leftist transformation was possible, liberals threw in with conservatives: think of the smearing and defenestration of Corbyn by Labour's right, or of the LibDems coalition with David Cameron's Tories, or of the Democrats' dirty tricks to keep Bernie from appearing on the national ballot.

Lacking any kind of transformational agenda, the liberal answer to capitalism's problems always comes down to minor tweaks ("making sure half of our rulers are women, queers and people of color") rather than meaningful, structural shifts. This leaves liberals in the increasingly absurd position of defending the indefensible: insisting that the FDA shouldn't be questioned despite its ghastly failures during the opioid epidemic; claiming that the voting machine companies whose defective products have been the source of increasingly urgent technical criticism are without flaw; embracing the "intelligence community" as the guardians of the best version of America; cheerleading for deindustrialization while telling the workers it harmed with "learn to code"; demanding more intervention in speech by our monopolistic tech companies; and so on.

It's not like leftists ever stopped talking about the importance of transformation and not just reform. But as the junior partners in the progressive coalition, leftists have been drowned out by liberal reformers. In most of the world, if you are worried about falling wages, corporate capture of government, and scientific failures due to weak regulators, the "progressive" answer was to tell you it was all in your head, that you were an unhinged conspiratorialist:

https://doctorow.medium.com/the-swivel-eyed-loons-have-a-point-3434d7cbfae2

For Klein, it's this failure that the faux-populist right has exploited, redirecting legitimate anger and fear into racist, xenophobic, homophobic, sexist and transphobic rage. The deep-pocketed backers of the conservative movement didn't just find a method to get turkeys to vote for Christmas – progressives created the conditions that made that method possible.

If progressives answer pregnant peoples' concerns about vaccine risks – concerns rooted in the absolute failure of prenatal care – with dismissals, while conservatives accept those concerns and funnel them into conspiratorialism, then progressives' message becomes, "We are the movement of keeping things as they are," while conservatives become the movement of "things have to change." Think here of the 2016 liberal slogan, "America was already great," as an answer to the faux-populist rallying cry, "Make America great again."

When liberals get to define what it means to be "progressive," the fundamental, systemic critique is swept away. Conservatives – conservatives! – get to claim the revolutionary mantle, to insist that they alone are interested in root-and-branch transformation of society.

Like the two Naomis, conservatives and progressives become warped mirrors of one another. The progressive campaign for bodily autonomy is co-opted to be the foundation of the anti-vax movement. This is the mirror world, where concerns about real children – in border detention, or living in poverty in America – are reflected back as warped fever-swamp hallucinations about kids in imaginary pizza restaurant basements and Hollywood blood sacrifice rituals. The mirror world replaces RBG with Amy Coney-Barrett and calls it a victory for women. The mirror world defends workers by stoking xenophobic fears about immigrants.

But progressives let it happen. Progressives cede anti-surveillance to conservatives, defending reverse warrants when they're used to enumerate Jan 6 insurrectionists (nevermind that these warrants are mostly used to round up BLM demonstrators). Progressives cede suspicion of large corporations to conservatives, defending giant, exploitative, monopolistic corporations so long as they arouse conservative ire with some performative DEI key-jingling. Progressives defend the CIA and FBI when they're wrongfooting Trump, and voting machine vendors when they're turned into props for the Big Lie.

These issues are transformed in the mirror world: from grave concerns about real things, into unhinged conspiracies about imaginary things. Urgent environmental concerns are turned into a pretense to ban offshore wind turbines ("to protect the birds"). Worry about gender equality is transformed into seminars about women's representation in US drone-killing squads.

For Klein, the transformation of Wolf from liberal icon – Democratic Party consultant and Lean-In-type feminist icon – to rifle-toting Trumpling with a regular spot on the Steve Bannon Power Hour is an entrypoint to understanding the mirror world. How did so many hippie-granola yoga types turn into vicious eugenicists whose answer to "wear a mask to protect the immunocompromised" is "they should die"?

The PastelQ phenomenon – the holistic medicine and "clean eating" to QAnon pipeline – recalls the Nazi obsession with physical fitness, outdoor activities and "natural" living. The neoliberal transformation of health from a collective endeavor – dependent on environmental regulation, sanitation, and public medicine – into a private one, built entirely on "personal choices," leads inexorably to eugenics.

Once you start looking for the mirror world, you see it everywhere. AI chatbots are mirrors of experts, only instead of giving you informed opinions, they plagiarize sentence-fragments into statistically plausible paragraphs. Brands are the mirror-world version of quality, a symbol that isn't a mark of reliability, but a mark of a mark, a sign pointing at nothing. Your own brand – something we're increasingly expected to have – is the mirror world image of you.

The mirror world's overwhelming motif is "I know you are, but what am I?" As in, "Oh, you're a socialist? Well, you know that 'Nazi' stands for 'National Socialist, right?" (and inevitably, this comes from someone who obsesses over the 'Great Replacement' and considers themself a 'race realist').

This isn't serious politics, but it is seriously important. "Antisemitism is the socialism of fools," its obsession with "international bankers" the mirror-world version of the real and present danger from big finance and private equity wreckers. And, as Klein discusses with great nuance and power, the antisemitism discussion is eroded from both sides: both by antisemites, and by doctrinaire Zionists who insist that any criticism of Israel is always and ever antisemetic.

As a Jew in solidarity with Palestinians, I found this section of the book especially good – thoughtful and vigorous, pulling no punches and still capturing the discomfort aroused by this deliberately poisoned debate.

This thoughtful, vigorous prose and argumentation deserves its own special callout here: Klein has produced a first-rate literary work just as much as this is a superb philosophical and political tome. In this moment where the mirror world is exploding and the real world is contracting, this is an essential read.

I'll be Klein's interlocutor tomorrow night (Sept 6) at the LA launch for Doppelganger. We'll be appearing at 7PM at the @LAPublicLibrary:

https://lafl.org/ALOUD

Livestreaming at:

https://youtube.com/live/jIoAh-jxb2k

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/05/not-that-naomi/#if-the-naomi-be-klein-youre-doing-just-fine

[fernlessbastard]

You guys aren't ready for the conversation of how Quackity sincerely loves bottoming

I'm not at all saying he wants to always bottom, I'd say he still prefers topping most of the time, but whenever he's down to get something up his ass, he's DOWN to get something up his ass, if you know what I mean

(the switching applies to position only, tho. I sincerely can't see him genuinely enjoying subbing, and neither can I see Wilbur actually domming unless they're both being influenced by years of internalised homophobia and patriarchy and all that bullshit, but even then it's just cringe and they're just both pretending it's not cause it's easier that way (and the sex itself isn't like, actively bad, not to mention that it provides some degree of an emotional connection which they both desperately crave), plus it's still basically vanilla just with a little bit of dirty talk - that's how i see them in Pogtopia (with Q bottoming - if you want another huge post on their Pogtopia dynamic let me know cause I have so many thoughts on it and how their traumas affected them and their relationship and how complicated it all was))

That being said, man's 10000% intensely fucking traumatised

(tw personal hc and following the logical path from canon implications idfk)(also exaggeration) like, if he were ACTIVELY evil and had ZERO (even personal) moral code, then the amount of anger he feels towards Schlatt for taking away the enjoyment of it is probably enough to ignore all ethics and torture Dream so utterly unimaginably he ends up violating entirety of the Geneva convention, and then having 50 new ones written specifically to condemn his actions, just to break every single one of those as well on the way, just so that Dream gives him the revival book so that he can re-kill Schlatt with his own hands

Also he absolutely re-traumatised himself with Karl and Sapnap cause he was for sure like "I shouldn't be having an intense panic attack right now, I'm going to push all my energy into pretending that everything's ok and that I don't want to cry and scream and rip my skin off. I'm just being silly and dramatic anyway ha ha" which just resulted in them unknowingly hurting him all over again. I take no criticism. Q's got MASSIVE communication issues when it comes to validating his feelings and Karl and Sapnap are "everything's fine"-ing way too much on the daily. And whole Quackity should work on his issues, it IS a partner's job to at least try to check up on the other(s) (and vice versa), and Karl and Sapnap clearly always preferred to ignore any hints that something might be wrong as a general life rule. The relationship was immaturely focused on "fun and good vibes" from the very start, so any bad topic obviously felt out of place. It started off with lack of communication and it died cause of it too.

That's also actually why I will always firmly stand by the fact that Wilbur (during las Nevadas era) is the only person with whom he could ever heal, btw (yes, including Charlie as a hypothetical romantic interest). Cause Schlatt's abusive, Karl and Sapnap "deserve better" in his eyes (so he pretends to be fine until shit hits the fan and everything falls apart)(that also applies to his hypothetical relationship with Charlie). But with Wilbur there's enough distance to feel safe and call out his bullshit without retaliation in form of abuse, and on the other hand he doesn't care to pretend to be perfect - hell, he probably purposefully shoves his issues onto the guy cause he's like "you think you're so strong and stubborn you can handle me??? You think???? Think again." (Wilbur does the same btw). They're purposefully trying to push each other away, destroy the "relationship", show each other just how fucked up they are. They're psycho-competitive. Even being the first one to be "too much" and get abandoned turns into a competition.

But it backfires. They bond. They're real with each other. They're stubborn, they're determined enough to stay just long enough to see each other's walls crack. And once they do, the feelings are quick to spill. They're each other's only people to be GENUINELY themselves with - no masks, no manipulation, no bullshit. Just themselves. And that's the first, CRUCIAL step to developing a healthy relationship (or at least healthier than all their other relationships).

So with Wilbur he probably only tries to bottom either once he ACTUALLY begins to feel like he could maybe try to reclaim it, or even if he tries it in a self-destructive way, (considering their history+patriarchy and shit) Wilbur'd know and care enough to realise Q's just trying to hurt himself. And as shitty as Wilbur can be sometimes, he's not a bad person - he'd stop Q if things'd go too far, or give him (at least a temporary) safe space to safely go through a breakdown without hurting himself like that. He wouldn't take advantage of such a low moment, and he would know enough to recognise it's a low moment in the first place.

Anyway once they figure all that out and Quackity's genuinely comfortable with it again, it's for sure not uncommon for him to enjoy some nice aggressive pounding, all the while having one hand in Wilbur's hair, pulling it to hold him close, and the other hand on Wilbur's neck, lightly choking him as they're intensely making out

All that to say Q's a massive sadist but he's also a huge massochist and he'll absolutely have Wilbur on a nice leash and call him a pathetic, desperate, horny dog or something like that as the man's (purposefully) sloppily thrusting in and out of him, causing the most "carnage" he can (Wilbur will be double fisting Quackity and Quackity will be just looking at him unfazed like "your hands are small" (they're not)/hj)

Oh btw to clarify [TW ok more direct talk of SA so please be careful and take care of yourselves]- yes, I'm absolutely saying Q got repeatedly SA'd by Schlatt throughout their relationship. The guy was canonically generally verbally and physically abusive, AND basically the whole point of his character is that he's like, the epitome of everything wrong with society. Add to that the sexual comments which were constantly used to demean, insult, and objectify Q, as well as Quackity's intense, palpitable discomfort which noticeably grows each time the topic comes up when they meet after Schlatt's death during Las Nevdas era, it's a pretty safe bet to assume Schlatt didn't stop at "just" verbal and physical violence. Sexual violence is almost a guarantee when you consider all that context - it's hardly even "reading between the lines". And you can't tell me that in our society that views being penetrated during sex as something negative, especially for men, while viewing penetrating someone as an act of "conquering" and "winning" and all that a character who's supposed to embody as many of this world's faults as possible wouldn't shove his dick where it's not wanted, even just purely to prove he can despite lack of consent.

[thenextdawn-temporarilyclosed]

One of Your Kind (CH. 3)

Ch. 1 | Ch. 2 | Ch. 3 | Ch. 4 | Ch. 5 | Ch. 6 | Ch. 7 | Ch. 8 | Ch. 9 | Ch. 10

Word count: 2.8K

Summary: navigating through life in America. You go through a lot of stuff. Within Ups and downs, you get to direct your first movie on your own, it didn’t go as expected, but you’ll soon get a better job.

Warnings: none

Pairing: Jenna Ortega X Fem!Reader

———

January 2021

You weren’t one for social medias, you really weren’t. You hated the fact that whatever app you opened, there were people ready to judge you and criticize you or talk shit about you. It sucked, which is why you relied A LOT on emails. you had tried looking for Jenna’s email to send her a message asking for her number, since you promised you’d text her, but you never found it, so she either didn’t do emails or didn’t want to receive emails. It honestly felt bad, not being able to talk and stay in contact with your probably best friend, so when “The Fallout” Premiered only for actors in LA, you hoped to see her there. Megan had made sure you got an invitation because you helped her a lot for that movie. She felt like she owed you and even though you told her thousand of times that she didn’t have to do anything for you, she insisted. If anything, you were the one to owe her but she never asked for anything in return if not for you to study.

You were given an incredibly pretty dress for the premiere, stylists and hair stylists sent by Megan had come at the apartment she gave you, and they got you ready and pretty for the night, you even had a car taking you there. When you arrived Megan was the first one to greet you with a tight hug. “Hey darling! How have you been? How’s your English?” She asked and you smiled “definitely better. It was true, living here and only listening and speaking English definitely made a difference. My pronunciation definitely still needs to be worked on, but I can understand almost everything and form sensed sentences.” You said smiling and Megan was nearly amazed by you. For it only having been 5 months since you wrapped up filming, you had definitely gotten better. “What about you? How are you?” You asked her as you walked together in the theater. “I’m great! I’m really proud of how the movie turned out. It’s really good, you’ll see. Oh wait, this reminds me that I have to do this!”

“Hey everyone! May I have some attention?” People invited to the premiere and even paparazzis turned to the two of you. “This girl right here, her name’s (Y/N)(L/N), she was my student while shooting this movie and I’m telling you she has some talent! She needs a round of applause” you blushed, not used to this kind of attention as paparazzis started taking picture of the two of you before heading inside to watch the movie. “Megan, do you know if Jenna and Maddie are coming?” You asked hopeful. “No unfortunately they’re not. Miss your friends?” She asked and you nodded, giving her a small sad smile. “When everyone left set, me and Jenna promised each other we’d text, but we never exchanged phone numbers. I don’t do social medias and she doesn’t have an email so I don’t know how to reach her. Do you have her number?” Well, too bad for you she didn’t have it. It sucked, you just wanted to talk to your friend…

The movie was amazing. You found yourself to be hit by all of it, when filming you don’t really pay much attention to the details, but seeing this movie come to life was just amazing. People don’t go through traumas the same way, and in this movie Jenna did a great job with Vada, how she doesn’t really go through it but tries to put it aside even if in the ends it all comes afloat. Putting the trauma aside is not what you’re supposed to do because it always, always resurfaces no matter what you try to do. “Oh here it comes!” Megan snapped you out of your thoughts when the scene you directed came up and it was utterly perfect. The way it was filmed, the way the cameras moved. It was all just perfect. The whole movie itself was perfect, and at the end, Jenna’s performance made you tear up a bit.

After that, you stopped hearing from Megan as well. She was busy with the press and the interviews and you watched every single one of them, Jenna was in some too, though what made you think a bit was that when they talked about friendships on set, none of them talked about you or even hinted having become friends with a student. Not even Megan, who was so proud of you until just months back. You thought and thought, are you really that easy to forget? Were you really nothing but an occasional friendship?

-

The longer you stayed in America, the more fluent you became in english. You even got little jobs here and there, taking over directors places in movies when they were sick and for really short periods, while you paid for rent thanks to the job at a clothes shop that paid enough for rent and for some occasional vices, such as a beer on a Saturday night at a pub. You first went there with the intent of making friends… but eventually you found something more… you found yourself a girlfriend. She was the kind of girl that didn’t have many friends, same as you. She was very shy, same as you. But you opened up to each other a night where you were both drunk and ended up sleeping together at her place.

It turns out that, to her you were nothing but sex. She didn’t like you, she didn’t love you. She used you for sex, and then made fun of you with your friends, the friends you had worked a lot to have, now made fun of you, calling you slurs and, like every other person you met until now, didn’t believe in you and your dreams and abandoned you.

You were broken, too say the least. You were back to being alone, if you had to direct a movie about your life you would call it “lost in America” because truly, that’s how you felt. You have always been alone ever since you came to live and work in America, Jenna and Maddie and even Megan just being occasional people you work with, and you had to learn how to not get attached to people on sets because you knew you most likely won’t see them again.

Then eventually, you got to direct a movie, all on your own, with nowhere to guide you. You were scared, really scared. You hadn’t learned quite everything and the creators of the movie had given you enough faith and trust, convinced that you were gonna pull off something amazing… yet it was quite the opposite. Being scared of not knowing how to set up some scenes or how to act with actors definitely put a lot of stress on you and the movie came out like crap, there were lots of mistakes, scenes that had to be cut, outside voices that weren’t even supposed to be there. You received a lot of bad criticism and reviews, saying that your works sucked and that you weren’t worth of the title “movie director” and you felt as if you were destroying your career before it even started. You needed support, you needed maybe to hear from your mentor Megan, or from Jenna, but nothing.

Your applications for directing movies were always being turned down and you were starting to give up, until you got an email…

From: Tim Burton

To: (Y/N) (L/N)

Good morning. It took me a while to find your email address but finally I did and I have a proposal for you. It been following you and your road to being a director and I saw your first movie. It wasn’t the best movie both because of the plot and because of how it was directed, but you’re still young, you still have a lot to learn. If I were you, I wouldn’t think too much about it, trust me when I tell you that, my movies weren’t the best when I started either. Like Megan I also see some talent in you, and now that I have seen your work and now that you have some experience, I believe you can become a big director, which is why I’m offering you the opportunity to be my co-director. Not a student, a co-director. You’re in charge same as me, you can do what I do. What do you say?

This is how you ended up flying to Romania in July. Filming wouldn’t start for two more months and it would last around 8 months, but Tim wanted to get to know you, explain you some stuff and go through some things together. He had a lot of faith in you, even if he knew that your first and only work sucked. As soon as you arrived to the set, he and the crew - mind you, not the actors - were already there waiting for you. “Hello (Y/N), it’s so good to finally meet you!” He said and shook your hand. “The pleasure’s all mine! I’ve loved your works ever since I was a little kid. It’s good to have the chance to work with you. I’m not really sure why you want to work with me though. It’s clear that I’m not a good director” you said and sighed “oh don’t worry about that! That’s really not a problem. The way you work depends also on the genre you’re working with, and this is a series, not a movie. These are filmed in two very different ways.”

“What’s the series about anyways?” You asked him, and he handed you the script of the first episode. “Wednesday Addams” he started “it’s a Comedy-Horror show that talks about Wednesday during her teenage years in highschool, trying to find who’s behind a monster that has been killing people. It’s definitely gonna blow up” he gave you some time to look through the script “it does sound interesting. Definitely more interesting that my other projects. You think my performance as a director also depends on the genre?” He was sure of that and confirmed it again. The man definitely had a lot of experience, so you trusted him.

A month and a half passed and you and Tim had gone through pretty much everything. You went to every single detail of the set, both outsides and insides, then green screens, the scenes with the monster and CGI, it was all set. You just needed to wait for the actors, that would be coming today, as a matter of fact. You had never asked Tim who the actors would be, bot today as they were coming, you were curious, really curious. From what Tim had told you, they’re all about your age, which you didn’t mind at all. They started arriving: first Emma, then Percy, Joy, Hunter, and then… a car pulled up, a short ravenette coming out of it. She seemed familiar, the height, the body form… you had definitely seen her before

“Jenna?” You called once she recognized you. “(Y/N)? Oh my god it’s you!” She said and ran your way, to give you a tight hug. It had been a year since you last saw her, but she hadn’t changed one bit. If anything, you were slightly taller and she had to get on her toes to hug you properly. “I’m so sorry for not reaching out, I was so sure we had exchanged numbers! I even tried finding your email address but nothing” you started, hoping that she wasn’t mad at you “it’s fine really! Honestly I realized I didn’t have your number when I got to the airport, I wanted to warn you that I made it there and when I looked up for your contact I realized I didn’t have it. I’ve been wanting to reach out ever since- wait. Has your English gotten better?” She asked, just later noticing that you talked fluently now and that you’re pronunciation was immaculate.

You giggled at her question and pulled back from the hug, scratching your neck awkwardly “yeah. I’m definitely a mother tongue now” you chuckled and she laughed “that’s good! What are you doing here anyways?” She asked and you looked at Tim “I’m his co-director. Not quite sure why he chose me out of all people though” you laughed and watched Jenna go wide eyed “SERIOUSLY ? THAT’S AMAZING!” She said and hugged you again, as Tim spoke again. “I figured out it would be nice for you to have a friend here.”

That day as Jenna introduced you to the rest of the cast, you couldn’t help but be happier. Finally you were spending some time with Jenna again and you would be doing so for 8 months… now you just had to ask her for her number, so that when recordings were over, you would keep contact with her. However now you had to think of the present day. That same day you went to a bar with all of the cast, to get to know each other. Jenna already knew them and you didn’t, so you took advantage of the moment to get to know them. “So (Y/N), how did you two meet? It was so weird to see you two already knew each other.” Emma asked, she seemed really expansive, but she was actually really shy. “You know her movie “the fallout?” I was Megan’s student while filming. I’m from Italy and when I arrived I didn’t know English one bit, but she helped me a lot, she would come to my trailer even after filming, I owe her a lot.”

You saw as everyone went wide eyed. “You’re italian!??” They all said together, kind of startling you. “Yeah I am… is that weird?” Percy shook his head “no it’s just that you speak really fluently, we would have never guessed. How long have you been in America?” “Well after filming finished I stayed there so… about a year?” You said, looking at Jenna for confirmation, and she nodded “and you improved this much?” Percy asked, and You nodded “yeah. Jenna was right when she said that I had to ignore the grammar and go straight ahead to the hearing and speaking” everyone giggled and you were all soon brought your drink. You were sitting next to Jenna, and she had to slightly move over to you to grab her drink, and you slightly froze. Ever since you had broke up with your ex, the one who used you for sex, you never had someone this close.

You unfroze when Jenna, finally having grabbed her drink, moved back down at her place. You were lucky no one noticed you freezing. “I’ve been wondering, what did you di this year?” Jenna asked as she turned to look at you. “Well… after the fallout premiered, I tried making friends, I got a girlfriend, got the chance to direct a movie. I didn’t know everything yet, the movie sucked and I got criticized a lot. Movie creators didn’t want to hire me until Tim did so, here I am” you took a sip of your drink, that didn’t contain any alcohol as you didn’t drink Alcohol as you felt Jenna’s eyes on you forna few seconds before she spoke. “You… got a girlfriend?” She asked with a different tone than any other time. “Yeah, but it didn’t end well. She just used me for sex and I got my heart broken for like the thousand time” you shrugged and took another sip of your drink.

Jenna nearly chocked on her drink. “She used you? That sucks…” Jenna said and you shrugged again. “I’m used to it. The only friends I made only used me for money or for anything, really” you didn’t look at them. You’ve been feeling really bad mentally recently, and the fact that you didn’t have any friends never helped. “Well if we all become friends we won’t use you, trust us” Emma said, you nodded and finished your drink. “Who knows, maybe you’ll even get a new girlfriend. I saw some cute girls in the staff” Percy winked and you shook your head.

These are gonna be some long ass 8 months.

Tags: @idkjustliving2 @tundra1029 @engenelxver @rainbow-love4ever @gimaximoff

[kumoriyami-xiuzhen]

Hakuoki x Sengoku Night Blood Crossover - A Fleeting Vision A Fortuitous Meeting with a Samurai Episode 3

Looking at how fast I can translate about 2-3000 characters chapters so quickly... is not something I ever think about 🤣. Or for more than 30 seconds aside from when noticing how much work I've done so far hahaha. In fairness, I haven't hid the fact that I hate to translate and would rather do almost anything else... c'est la vie.

Anyway, there are two more parts after this... and once I'm done with those, that'll be it for Hakuoki until I finish playing Veilguard, as that'll cover the one missed week in September and five weeks (Thursdays) for October.

Hakuoki x Sengoku Night Blood Crossover - A Fleeting Vision A Fortuitous Meeting with a Samurai Episode 3: Fumbling in the Dark

Translation by KumoriYami

The next morning——after being called to the Great Hall [?], I noticed that Yukimura-san and the others were already there.

Heroine: (Although I'm very glad that we can meet again so soon, I'm still nervous about meeting like this though…)

I wasn't the only one feeling this way, and Yukimura-san was looking similarly looking straight at me with a nervous look on her face.

Heroine: (If only the upcoming discussion could eliminate this sense of unease…)

Just as I began thinking that, the conversation between both sides started.

We exchanged the information that we had. Unfortunately, Yukimura-san didn't provide any new information, there were still many things I hadn't yet told them, and I revealed everything this time.

Okita: In other words, we got dragged into the Geggazoku's struggle for power?

His words were so sharp, that I was a little worried that everyone from Uesugi Army would be hurt by those words.

Heroine: (Though I can understand being angry for getting caught up in this world without consent…)

Amakasu Kagemochi: I really don't have any justification to refute that. However, we can be certain that it is not our fault that you were called to this world. Please understand that.

Saito: I have a general understanding of the situation, but this really is quite troublesome.

Amakasu Kagemochi: I have nothing to say.

Kagemochi-san must have been ready to be criticized a long time ago. His attitude was the same as usual, while the others listened in silence.

Saito: We wish to return to our original world. Provided that we are able to see this Himemiko, will she able to grant our wish?

Amakasu Kagemochi: I can only say that's how it should be. We are similarly betting everything on that possibility and are currently searching for her. So, if you also want to find the Himemiko, do you want to take action with us?

Okita: In other words, while were with you, we'll be fighting those monsters called Yakuma, right?

Amakasu Kagemochi: Yes, that's indeed how it will be.

Okita: Nn.... Hey, I bet other people have said that you have a nice personality?

Amakasu Kagemochi: Hehe, who knows?

Both of their smiles made them appear happy, but they made people shudder, and sent chills down their spines.

Saito: Although your negotiation demands are somewhat unreasonable, I have a general understanding for what it entails. However, I cannot respond to you immediately.

Amakasu Kagemochi: Can you tell me why you can't reply?

Saito: We have an individual we need to receive our instructions from, and as long as this person agrees, we will accept your request.

Naoe Kanetsugu: Is the person you are referring to also in Shinga?

Saito: A moment before being drawn into this world, we had all been acting together. I believe that it would be more appropriate to consider them as having come to this world.

Kakizaki Kageie: Then, they should be in the Uesugi domain… No, somewhere in Shinga.

I couldn't hide my surprise upon finding out that more people have come to Shinga than anticipated.

Uesugi Kenshin: Why have so many people been involved this time?

Amakasu Kagemochi: Maybe the Himemiko's power has experienced some sort of change.

Uesugi Kenshin: Perhaps. However we can't just act on speculation. Still let's prioritize protecting the visitors who have come here from another world. Kagekatsu, Kanetsugu. I order you to find their companions and bring them here.

Saito: If I go with you, my comrades should be more likely to believe you. Allow me to accompany you.

Heroine: (It's great that both sides were able to reach an agreement sooner than I thought…)

Just as my heart secretly rejoiced——

Okita: Hey, it'll be boring to spend this time waiting for Hijikata-san. Uesugi-san, you should be quite good at fighting right? Can you accompany me for a few moves?

The gentle atmosphere inside the venue was filled with killing intent due to Okita-san's words.

Kakizaki Kageie: What impudence! You can't just… get away with saying that as a joke!

Okita: I didn't intend to say that as a joke just now.

Amakasu Kagemochi: Then, please modify your previous remarks. You words are too rude.

After receiving the sever responses from Kageie-san and Kagemochi-san, Okita-san shrugged his shoulders and shut up.

Amakasu Kagemochi: Please bring them to the guest room.

The retainers grimaced and brought them away.

Since I still wanted to talk to Yukimura-san, I went to the room that was assigned to them.

Heroine: (Uh... why is Kageie-san here?) (In any case, they should be treated as guests, so there's no need for the surveillance.)

Perhaps it's because my question was shown in my expression, Kageie-san turned his head away uncomfortably.

Kakizaki Kageie: I, I'm not spying on them. I'm just a bit concerned about their rude marks to Kenshin-sama just now.

Heroine: (I see. Okita-san's remarks just now caused them to be viewed with suspicion again.)

For the Uesugi Army, Kenshin-san is viewed as a special existence, and isn't the kind of person you can casually propose a fight with. Due to Okita-san's remarks just now, they've become targets of Kageie-san's surveillaince.

Heroine: (They should have different different ways of thinking. This sort of thing will need time to understand.)

Because I knew that the situation becoming like this wasn't the fault of either party, I frankly explained my intentions to Kageie-san.

Heroine: I want to speak to Yukimura-san, there shouldn't be an problem with that, right?

Kakizaki Kageie: Of course that won't be a problem. I'll make the arrangements, just wait a moment.

Heroine: Okay, thank you.

After waiting there for a while, the shoji door opened. Looking inside, I could see Yukimura-san standing at the back of the room.

Toudou: Hey, is it really okay that I don't come with you?

Harada: Don't worry, didn't we just agree that I'll be the one to stand guard?

Toudou: That being said… I'll still go ...

Kakizaki Kageie: Didn't I allow just one of you to follow?

Toudou: Speaking of which, it's not because you're monitoring us that we're feeling nervous.

Harada: That's because Souji did something wrong. However the culprit himself didn't care and went to sleep.

Kakizaki Kageie: That's exactly what happened/how it is. I'll calm down after a while, so you should bear with it for now.

Heroine: (I'd still rather come back again later.)

While both parties were bickering, Yukimura-san noticed my presence and lightly nodded to me.

Yukimura: No, I'm sorry…… I'll go over now. Heisuke-kun, I'll be fine, so I'll be going first.

Harada: Then, I'll leave watching the place to you.

Toudou: Got it. If anything happens, just call and I'll rush over right away.

I smiled as Yukimura-san walked towards me.

Heroine: I'm sorry for visiting so suddenly. I wanted to come to talk to you.

Yukimura: Of course that isn't a problem. I wanted to talk with you too...

That's good, I thought, and let out a relieved breath, before then deciding to go somewhere quiet with her to talk.

At first, I was going to take her to my room…… But in the end, I chose the place facing the courtyard because I felt that it would be better than an enclosed space. Harada-san stopped not too far away us, and sat down while holding his spear.

Yukimura: Um, please don't mind that, he's in the habit of never leaving his weapon...

Heroine: Nn, I don't mind. And Kageie-san was also always like this before, so that makes two of us. (I think that as long as both parties can slowly understand each other, that would be good.)

From the same perspective, because I am also a woman, I really wanted to speak with Yukimura-san.

Heroine: You just came here, so there must be a lot of inconveniences for you. If there's anything I can do to help, please feel free to ask.

Yukimura: Thank you. But, But why do you want to take care of me like this?

Heroine: Because in this world, I'm still your senpai.

Yukimura:.....! So that's how it is.... Hehe, then I'll trouble you a lot.

Heroine: You can still laugh… That's great…. I was worried that you were going to feel depressed.

Yukimura: How could I get depressed! I have an important mission that I still need to complete in my original world.

Although I didn't know what Yukimura-san's mission was, seeing the enthusiasm and her eyes however, made me want to cheer for her.

Heroine: I'm rooting for you. Then let's go find Himemiko-sama together.

Yukimura: Okay!

While we were chatting aimlessly and enjoying ourselves, there was a sudden commotion from the city. Just as we felt that we were unable to make sense of anything, Harada-san spoke to Yukimura-san.

Harada: It seems like something's happened. Let's go back to our room just in case.

Yukimura:...That's right.

After listening to Harada-san's words, Chizuru-san nodded. I was about to bring them to their room——

Amakasu Kagemochi: Ah, there you are.

Heroine: Kagemochi-san! What on earth is going on?

Amakasu Kagemochi: It appears that Yakuma have appeared in the town.

---to be continued in part 4 here---

[buttercupyellow]

wonka's city

idk man i just find it interesting knowing stuff about the setting so, some observations i made of the city in wonka (i made another post about the actual filming locations, which are mostly bath, oxford and lyme regis, but this is talking abt the fictional city).

the first visible bit of the city is this hilltop and a bigass mountain to the left.

port seems to be p green with lots of house looking buildings heading up the mountain.

big breakwater/harbour wall that curves round. city gets posher the higher up the hill u get, and that looks like a castle on the hilltop we saw earlier.

fancy old gate on the main road into town, and a load of fuck off big mountains in the back.

the port's lighthouse is at the end of the breakwater (fun fact, this doesn't exist irl).

map of the main square with all its restaurants. willy knew brandino's and la parisienne without being able to read, so supposedly their p famous (willy later poses as a waiter at Cafe Heinrich). they're also the two restaurants closest to st benedict's cathedral. theres two big arches either side of the main square, one has a clocktower bell with two statues (one banging the other on the head with a frying pan) that come out cuckoo clock style. the left arch or street seems to be called sichelbrucke (translate says this means sickle bridge?) and the street to the right says "straßenbahn haltestelle" meaning "tram stop" i think.

in the middle you've got the fountain, and opposite st benedict's is the galerie gourmet: slugworth's shop is in the top right, with fickelgruber on his left and prodnose on the right. willy's shop is bottom left corner.

irl this is on the edge of a park, so i assume it's the same for this city. a big row of columns holding up the road above it next to a river. there's a lot of rivers in this part of the city (scrubitt and bleacher's territory, and probably the poor sector of the city).

scrubitt's is right next to a river and looks mostly residential.

the galerie gourmet is just barely visible from scrubitt's.

map of the zoo that i can barely see ↑ i think the black, vaguely L shaped building on the left is where the giraffe house is?

the zoo seems to be p far away from the galerie gourmet, even further than scrubitt's.

there's also the library but that's got nothing connecting it to any other part of the city really so..

the languages also seems a bit odd as i can't place which is it's main written one? there's a lot of german (entritt, giraffenhaus, straßenbahn haltestelle, etc) and a mix of italian and french. not a lot of english despite it being based on an english book, with a 90% english cast, filmed almost exclusively in england? not a criticism, just a curiosity - where is this meant to set, if it's the same country that the very english abacus crunch lives in? my gut says england but theres so much german and the only part of england i've been to that had multiple languages was wales, and can you believe it, the other language was welsh.

my best guess is that it's a (fictional) city in northern england that has a large german speaking population.

basically its a big (northern english?) city with massive mountains behind it & a cool port & a large german population.

[butmakeitgayblog]

Hey! I’m on my like 5th rewatch of The 100 and I’ve only just now seen this review on IMDb. I’ve been following your blog for a while now and keeping up with ADC. I was wondering if you know anything about this? I tried looking it up but nothing popped up. Granted I didn’t search too hard lol. But I just thought these claims were so wild. Did they mix her up with another actor? I’m just so ??????

Lol no

Not even once 😂

I do remember after the accusations from Bob's ex came out you had a few accounts accusing E&B of diva behavior - including one in which it said that Bob got physical with a crew member and that was why he was ultimately written off - but emotions were high at the time so no one ever really knes if that was fact or just bs smearing. But Alycia? Nope, not once.

No tbh this whole thing reads very oddly to me because all I've ever heard is that she's quite pleasent to work with actually. First of all, Alycia didn't "start in Vancouver and switch to LA". She was LA based since she moved to the US. So idek what this person is trying for there, but it doesn't even make sense. Second, if this person has such a wealth of insider knowledge, then they'd know this wasn't her first project in North America. Two seconds of research would show that (they said they "found out" it was her first acting job, so according to their own words they looked into it??? And still got it wrong???) She'd done a several things before the1oo, including tv work in Australia, a whole ass studio produced movie, and an indie movie over here.

Third? I mean if you follow her, you see she is often in pics with crew members and even follows a few on IG, as well as fellow cast members talking pretty regularly about how sweet she is and about times when they hang out outside of filming. Also iirc when she was directing her her episode of FTWD didn't she even get a... was it shaved iced, or like a coconut water thing? Some kind of frozen treat stand thing, for the entire cast and crew.

That doesn't exactly sound like a tendency toward tyrant, diva behavior.

But truthfully, the thing that jumps out at me the most tho is the Zionist comment. This comment was supposedly left back in 2021, right? Except... Zionist was not a widely known or used term at that time. For clarity, I'm not saying Zionism or the term Zionist didn't exist in 2021, I'm saying it wasn't a term the general public at large really knew or used often, nor was it something that ever readily came up in any sort of criticisms of actors, much less IMDB reviews 🤨.

So like... how and why would that have even come up at that time of leaving this review? In 2021?

Unless, of course, this person went back and edited an old review they'd left. Now that would make a lot more sense. Almost as if maybe possibly perhaps, they became angry with her for something else, and came back and changed their review to a scathing bomb. It's just a theory, I have no way of knowing if that's true or not, but it makes a bit more sense considering I've never heard such a thing about her - not on the 1oo nor any other projects.

[xtruss]

Opinion: Town Sums up the Delusions of the Right Wing

The embrace of the country star’s anti-city ‘modern lynching song’ by Republicans encapsulates their nostalgia and paranoia

— Arwa Mahdawi | July 20; 2023

‘Small towns are full of “good ol’ boys” who were “raised up right”. Cities, meanwhile, are hotbeds of violence … and diversity.’ Photograph: Wade Payne/Invision/AP

Jason Aldean is a country music star and a big fan of law and order. He loves the law so much, in fact, that he’s willing to take it into his own hands.

If you come to his (imaginary) small town and disrespect a cop or engage in any sort of protest, you will regret it.

Such is the theme of Aldean’s new song, Try That in a Small Town, which is all about how the singer and his pals will aggressively deal with unseemly behaviour on their turf. A sample extract: “Cuss out a cop, spit in his face … Well, try that in a small town / See how far ya make it down the road. / Around here, we take care of our own …”

A little later in the song Aldean elaborates further on what might happen if lines are crossed. “Got a gun that my grandad gave me / They say one day they’re gonna round up. / Well, that shit might fly in the city, good luck.” He is, it would appear, referencing a conspiracy theory that the government is going to confiscate Americans’ guns to impose martial law.

Try That in a Small Town was released in May but when the music video came out last Friday it generated immediate controversy. The video leaves little doubt as to what Aldean is trying to communicate: it intersperses footage of him singing in front of Maury county courthouse in Tennessee – the site of the lynching of a Black man, Henry Choate, in 1927 – with footage from protests, looting and civil unrest. Small towns are wholesome, the message is. Full of “good ol’ boys” who were “raised up right”. Cities, meanwhile, are hotbeds of violence … and diversity.

That last bit isn’t spelled out – it’s not like Aldean yells “I’m a massive racist!” in the middle of the track – but the dog whistles are difficult to ignore. The song has been called “a modern lynching song” by detractors and the video was pulled from Country Music Television (CMT) on Monday. (While CMT has confirmed the video was taken off rotation, it hasn’t put out a statement as to why.) Fellow country star Sheryl Crow has also voiced her disapproval. “There’s nothing small-town or American about promoting violence,” Crow tweeted on Tuesday. She further noted that Aldean should know better, “having survived a mass shooting”. Crow was referencing the shooting at Las Vegas’s Route 91 Harvest festival in 2017: the deadliest mass shooting by a lone shooter in modern US history. Aldean was performing and got out unscathed. He was lucky. Sixty people were killed and 867 injured. Those people weren’t killed and injured by a Black Lives Matter protester. They were killed by Stephen Paddock, an angry white man from Iowa.

Try That in a Small Town has generated a lot of criticism, but it also has fervent supporters. Including, of course, GOP lawmakers. “I am shocked by what I’m seeing in this country with people attempting to cancel this song and cancel Jason and his beliefs,” the South Dakota Republican governor, Kristi Noem, posted in a video on Twitter on Wednesday. The Tennessee house GOP leader, William Lamberth, similarly tweeted: “Loved this song since it was released and will continue to fight every day to spread small town values … Give it a listen. The woke mob will hate you for liking this song.” Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the governor of Arkansas, also didn’t miss the chance to stoke a little culture war. “The Left is now more concerned about Jason Aldean’s song calling out looters and criminals than they are about stopping looters and criminals,” she tweeted.

Aldean, for his part, is furious at insinuations there is anything racist in his song about shooting outsiders who come to his little country town.

“In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song,” Aldean tweeted on Wednesday, “and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests. These references are not only meritless, but dangerous. There is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it – and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news footage.”

If Aldean isn’t trying to make a point about the Black Lives Matter protests, what is Try That in a Small Town about then? Community, apparently. “When u grow up in a small town, it’s that unspoken rule of ‘we all have each other’s backs and we look out for each other,’” Aldean wrote on Instagram when he launched the video. “It feels like somewhere along the way, that sense of community and respect has gotten lost.”

Jason Aldean, from the ‘small town’ of Macon, Georgia. Photograph: Amy Harris/Invision/AP

Perhaps you’re wondering which quaint small town Aldean grew up in. The answer is: he didn’t. Aldean is from Macon, Georgia – a city with a population of about 153,000 people. Now he lives in Nashville, a city with a population of approximately 700,000. The small town he’s singing about is a product of his imagination.

But that’s conservatives for you. Last month Nikki Haley tweeted about how much better the US used to be back in the days before marginalized people had rights. “Do you remember when you were growing up, do you remember how simple life was, how easy it felt? It was about faith, family, and country,” she tweeted.

Was the past really that easy for the former South Carolina governor? By her own admission things have got a hell of a lot better for people who, like her, aren’t 100% white. “Years ago I was disqualified from a pageant because they didn’t know whether to put me in the white category or the black,” she wrote on Facebook in 2012. “I was neither. Tonight I watched my daughter get first place in her school pageant. God has an amazing way of bringing things full circle.” God also has an amazing away of depriving people like Haley of self-awareness.

Aldean’s song doesn’t just epitomize manufactured rightwing nostalgia, it also encapsulates rightwing paranoia. People on the right are obsessed with the idea that big cities are violent hotbeds of crime where you risk your life every time you nip out for a pint of milk. In reality, however, big cities tend to be safer than small towns. A 2013 study by the University of Pennsylvania, for example, found the risk of death from an injury was more than 20% higher in rural small towns than in larger cities. “Cars, guns and drugs are the unholy trinity causing the majority of injury deaths in the US” one of the researchers told NBC News at the time.

The pandemic, to be fair, saw a rise in violent crimes in cities. But even still, you’ve got a better chance of living a long, healthy life in a city. A 2021 US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report on mortality data from 1999 to 2019 found people living in rural areas die at higher rates than those living in urban areas. That’s because they have less access to healthcare and are more likely to live in poverty.

So what’s next for Aldean? Well, I’ve got some good news for all the Republican lawmakers screeching about how unfair it is that Aldean has been cancelled by the woke mob: he’s going to be fine. Indeed, he’s going to be more than fine. Country music (and America) has a way of opening its arms to people accused of racism and making them feel right at home. Just look at Morgan Wallen, for example. In February 2021 TMZ published a video of the musician drunkenly yelling the N-word during a conversation with a friend. He was shunned from polite society for a few months but made a rapid comeback. He won album of the year at the Academy of Country Music Awards in 2022. His song Last Night is currently in its 14th week at number one on the Billboard Hot 100. If it sticks there a little longer he’ll beat the 19-week record currently held by Lil Nas X’s Old Town Road, featuring Billy Ray Cyrus.

While people on the right may be railing about Aldean being “cancelled”, the sad truth is that this will probably help his career. He’ll go on Fox News and yell about wokeness. He’ll wallow in his imagined victimhood. His song will probably be played in rallies for the next Republican nominee for president. Aldean hasn’t been cancelled or silenced – his message has been amplified.

[dyemelikeasunset]

Hope this is not too silly of a question, but I've been binging Disney Park videos the past handful of days (yes, I am embarrassingly a lifelong Disney Park fan, while also being deeply critical of the company) and I dunno, it got me thinking about what a Disney Date in the Park look like for Dom and Mor. 😅

I feel like Morgan would be a fan of the parks and be really excited about going and geeking out over everything (Morgan absolutely is Disney Princess vibes in my mind) and maybe getting a little overstimulated, while I picture Dom being utterly confused, taking certain things too seriously, but discovering something she genuinely loves and getting consumed in it. And ending the night watching the fireworks show, holding hands, and snuggling up next to each other and being adorably sapphic.

THIS IS THE CUTEST QUESTION PLEASEEE 🥹🥹🥹

in fact it was so cute you got me rambling, so under a read more it goes lmao. I basically wrote a blurb (it gets a little emotional at points cause that's who i am)

So Mor does like a couple of the Disney princesses (she really likes the background art of Sleeping Beauty and likes the movie if you watch it with the lens that "Aurora isn't the main character and neither is the prince, the three fairies are!! It's actually a heroes' journey about the three of them and that's so interesting yknow? What other movie stars three old ladies fighting a dragon???" but Aurora isn't necessarily her fav princess "I mean she just sleeps. the memes about her are funny though." Not technically a princess, but she loves Lilo a lot)

But no, she doesn't go to the parks often because of overstimulation. It's actually Dom's idea cause "Ah couples go to disneyland. That means we should go too? I should ask Morgan if she wants to go." And Mor is surprised, "I haven't been since I was 12? do you want to go???" and promptly discovers Domi has never been to a single Disney park ever in her life, so Morgan makes it her business to give Dom an enriching experience

They spend the next few months doing research between work and life-- on the best places to stay and how to optimize costs-- and it's really business-like and practical. Halfway through the process Domi's like "Is. Is this romantic? We're being so dry" but Mor insists "No it's important to be prepared!! For everything!!"

Anyway, cut to them finally going, it's probably exciting but also a little nerve-wracking. They chose the LA park. Mor did her hair up in buns to match Mickey cause teehee, cute. Dom wears a facemask cause she doesn't want to get recognized. Dom probably wants to take a lot of pictures bc. lol. couples do that?? right??? also Morgan is beautiful and she wants to remember it.

"We should do the hand holding trend"

"N-no Domi I'm too embarrassed"

"NO LET'S DO IT"

They do the hand holding trend. Mor makes it her pfp later.

Mor is constantly trying to sneak in couple selfies and it becomes a personal game to catch Dom looking candid in cute situations (spoiler, Dom's candid is still like a model. High fashion girlfriend + Donald Duck. Mor can't stop laughing)

They start having fun. They're both grumpy at the price of park food and agree not to do many of the rides because "that's an unreasonable amount of people." They try small world and are a little uncomfortable at the dolls, but being together in a little boat on the water is nice-- they end up staring at each other more than the ride and decide to check in. Dom has to lean in close so Mor can hear her over her sound-supressing earbuds. Morgan takes the chance to kiss her and Dom completely forgets what she was saying

After lunch, Mor surprises Dom with Mickey Ears because she HAS to see it. It's as adorable and hilarious as she thought it would be, and when Domi laughs, Mor finds herself thinking about how lonely Dom was as a kid and wonders if she's helping her heal her inner child, bc Dom has helped Mor heal hers. Dom wears it for the rest of the trip and every time she smiles at her, Morgan wants to laugh and cry at the same time.

They surrender and buy $5 churros to eat as they ride the ferry and realize halfway through they keep getting on the boats. Mor is shy but eventually caves and takes a picture with Tiana.

They visit the Disney Gallery to learn about some of the history. Mor already knows a lot of it and ends up filling in some of the gaps to Domi. The awkwardness has completely melted away at this point and Domi is trying to find an artbook or poster she thinks Mor would like. She sees Mor looking at mugs and wonders if she's happy, wonders if she's stopped thinking about all her exes, wonders how anyone could hurt someone has kind as Morgan.

They decide to find a spot for the parade early and talk as the sun sets. The parade starts and Dom holds Mor close so the crowd doesn't make her anxious. She finds herself watching Morgan more than the parade.

As the fireworks start, Dom tells her about a memory of when she was 19. She was staying in Tokyo for a job and watched fireworks alone in her hotel room and wondered if she had made the right career choice. Mor watches the lights dance on Dom's profile and can barely get a whisper out, so she squeezes her hand instead. Dom smiles at her so warmly that Morgan almost feels whiplash

Mor lays her head on Domi's shoulder in the hotel bed and can't get the story out of her mind. Dom's soft breathing doesn't lull her to sleep like it usually does. They were too tired to make love but she desperately wants Dom to know how much she means to her. She settles for crying into her neck quietly and it's a strange mix of exhaustion and sadness and relief and joy. Morgan makes a silent promise to never let Dom be alone again

When they're packing for home in the morning, Dom wonders out loud if they'll come again. Mor asks if Dom had fun, and she smiles so wide that it washes away all the lingering melancholy. Mor promises she'll take Dom whereever she wants to go, whenever she wants to

[whiskeyswifty]

Feel free to bank this ask if you need more time but what are your overall thoughts? I feel like I won’t be able to ever rank this album bc it straight up doesn’t feel like an album it more feels like she was like 🤲 here ya go! Which I don’t mind too much bc there’s plenty for me to dig into here but I’m always curious to hear your takes! :)

i fully took your permission to bank this and sit on it, so thank you for that haha but FINALLY i think i can talk about it with enough perspective and time with it where novelty or initial vexations have worn off. I think for the sake being respectful of people's sensitivity (not a value judgment) i'll break it up into positives, net neutral thoughts and criticisms. So you can skip the critical section if you're unable to handle frank but thoughtful criticism of her and her work (again not a value judgement, do whatever you need to enjoy what you want to enjoy. i just enjoy engaging with art critically and it is my blog after all). I'm sure i missed something, and i'll babble about it in the near future, but for now this feels like a good place to stop and share where I've landed.

My TTPD songs on repeat (in no particular order):

The tortured poets department

down bad

so long london

but daddy i love him

florida

guilty as sin

who's afraid of little old me

loml

broken heart

smallest man

clara bow

the black dog

i'mgonnagetyouback

i look in people's windows

so high school

the prophecy

POSITIVES:

loml upon first listen was my favorite and is probably the most Taylor swift song on this album, in the best way. the soft and emotive voice, rising with anger and cracking with pain. the piano and the rhyming structure of the bridge being a cascade of couplets, and even the conceit of the song! taking a well known acronym loml and despite the song being a heartbreak song, still using it in the song the way you expect. luring you in and getting you to let your guard down, knowing to wait until the right moment, and then on the LAST LINE subverting that expectation devastatingly. it's got all the swiftian motifs; the longing that lingers despite a betrayal, the magnetism of an old flame that you can never quite stamp out, haunted by it, passion as fire as it but also how it consumes and destroys, being a fool for love, the burden of remembrance and willing yourself to forget. you name it, this song's got it. just really a remarkable little gem of a song.

but after the anthology came out, loml was usurped by the prophecy. it's absoutely my favorite like hoooooooooly shit. this is what i LOOOOOOVE hearing about from her. the perspective of time!! the self reflection!! the tension of what you want vs. what you think you deserve!! The guitar plucking at the start every time makes me go AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH and the way she jumps up and down in pitch or whatever in the chorus??? WOOOOOOOO THATS THE GOOD SHIT. 

the title track really grew on me (and i have supplanted the fairly obvious subject with someone else that suits my taste so i have a ball listening to it. i won't say cuz people are fucking weird on here about deviating from the ~truth~ for their own personal enjoyment but my buddies know and we all agree it makes it so much more fun). I love the melodic way she sings on this song, and it's my platonic ideal jack production, where it's imitating that 80s emotional garbled synth a la new order or erasure or the cure. i eat that shit uppppppp. that final bridge/ring situation though is..... not great and is only saved because of how the way she sings it and how it tickles my brain.

THE BLACK DOG!!!!!!!!! THE. BLACK. DOG. HELLOOOOOOOO WHAT A TUNE WHAT A SONG WHAT A SPECIFIC GIFT FOR ME. literally the starting line lyric gets me every time like WHAT A NICHE EMO BAND NOBODY KNOWS HUH. fun fact, at my moms house recently i found this framed school assignment from when i was like 14 or 15 or something. we had to do a mock front page of a newspaper as an icebreaker activity, you all know what i mean if you know what i mean. And under the music section i put "I love to listen to The Starting Line and The Killers" like askfjalskjfsadklfj. taylor clearly wrote this song about me and sorry i did all that i guess, but you can keep stalking me it's fine.

Clara bow of course absolutely incredible closer, incredible song that i've waxed poetic about several times already so i won't bore you with repeat rants. just a stunner. a curtain close of a closer as the crowd jumps up for a standing ovation.

Aaron on this album.... my guy..... WHAT a showing from someone who has jumped aboard the taylor ship and steered it into incredibly rich directions!!! i think most of my picks for My Version of this album are aaron songs, and even when i thought it was a jack song and i was ready to congratulate jack on finding a sweet spot again..... oops it was aaron ajsdlfkdsfjlkdsjflsd. THE GUY!!! THE DUDE!!! LETS HEAR IT FOR UPSTATE NEW YORK!!!

NET NEUTRALS:

album proper is very solid and fun to jump around! it took me a few listens to really dig into it, but i like it. i don't think i love it, and i think it's a middling ranking somewhere in my ranking overall. Also, I don’t think the order is particularly important, as none of these songs really need to go before or after one another as they have little to do with each other. Which is neutral, and how honestly most albums are, and I'm pretty fine with how it is now . And anyway, play through-concept albums are rare and specific but a different beast than your standard album. I’m fine with how it is because I listen to different songs in different orders each time depending on my mood. but i'm also not interested enough in the subject matter to play around with it too much. I think the album proper is a good distillation of this project's songs with a little bit for everyone in there, which to me is a marker of success, even if i would swap some anthology songs for album proper songs.

I’m not invested in her romantic life anymore, and i've noticed that seems to be one of the top complaints or roadblocks to enjoying this album, which is understandable. Especially when this one is incredibly unsympathetic, as is the sentiment writ large (and if I did care about her personal life, I would have those same roadblocks so lol). But I don’t think her diaristic songwriting is overdone or she needs to hang it up, which i've seen some people complain about. I think at this point, her choice in subject matter is what is key to the success of it. Her love life in a 2024 social landscape is yes comparatively straight, white, privileged, and because the romantic lives of people in that demo have been begun to be de-centered in culture over the course of her career, it’s now boring and rote, and we've had centuries playing out the cyclical drama of straight, white, and privileged people. But rather, her fame is what really is worth writing about imo. that’s what’s juicy about her now and what people wanna know, if she’s going to trade on personal details of her life as song fodder. She’s in such rarified air and songs that delve into how she feels about it are the best on this. what it has done to her? what has it driven her to do? The longer she spends in this machine, what does she decide is most valuable? What is worth it and what isn’t? What did she think would change and what did she think would stay the same, and which of those things was she wrong about? I love hearing about all the answers to questions like that on this album, and also answers to questions I had that she perhaps gave away unknowingly and quite…. Unbecomingly but still delicious none the less. Where we usually get one or two songs about fame per album, she has a nice handful on here and it’s so curious to me, especially considering she wasn’t raised among it. She’s an avatar for the common man in Hollywood in some ways, but losing touch with the common man more and more each day and I love seeing that documented, and how she has a self awareness about that, if no idea what to do about that. if she’s now the monster we made her, I wanna get to know that monster in all it’s ugliness and vindictiveness and whatever else lurks in there, and it seems she too is tired of caging it.

CRITICAL:

i loathe the anthology concept, mainly in how quickly she dropped it. i think the album proper is solid and dropping all those additional songs lowers the batting average significantly, as noted in many critical reviews of the album v. the anthology. I personally chalk it up to her experience with the vault tracks' success, which she mistakenly took as ALL of her songs are great and she should cut LESS of them. when the reality of that was they were received with such excitement because they had the lore of being vault songs, and they were ways for us to revisit eras of her musical styles that have long since passed, and there is IMMENSE novelty in nostalgia. I also think that if she pays attention to middling or negative reviews both from critics and fans alike (which i don't think tree puts on her desk, but she might seek it out for whatever temperature check reasons she has so i won't rule it out) she would have seen how midnights' "bonus tracks" or whatever you want to call them were received pretty unanimously as a great batch of songs, compared to polarized reactions to the album's original songs. perhaps that inspired her to approach her album release this time around by throwing spaghetti songs at the proverbial wall of an audience and seeing what sticks. i don't know if this is.... a bad approach? I don't feel great about it either, but it certainly is interesting coming from someone sooooooo meticulous in every other instance of her Taylor Swift brand in recent years. (or maybe she really did think every single song on the anthology was worthy, and that is perhaps my greater fear).

all jokes aside, I don’t actually think her and jack’s relationship has run its course in terms of inspiring one another to do new and exciting things, I just think perhaps some editing is required. I’m firmly of the camp that it’s not jack’s fault for something sounding how it does, as most people who work with him are quick to take offense to that and say that he very much is an employee as a producer. The artist is always the boss. Of course lesser artists or ones who are more friendly with him may be less honest, because of intimidation/gratitude or fondness respectively, but on the whole, it seems like he is at their mercy and will. And has the range to make music across many genres and composition styles. That being said, I do think there is a comfort in him and Taylor’s working relationship, of course because of their personal one, and that perhaps has become a bit of a hinderance to her. (He continues to make incredibly wide ranging stuff with other artists and his own music, so he stays pushing himself and being pushed) I don’t think what they make is bad, when it’s the least successful, but it’s a tad rote, heavily trodden, and flat. Perhaps the flatness in her voice on some of those songs is her trying to compliment an instrumental that is a bit flat, which is trying to keep pace with her vocals that are flat, and so on and so forth and there is no culprit but just two flat bitches saying exactly to each other. But it’s extremely frustrating if only because we have, on this album even, examples of when they both really blend beautifully and push towards something unique and exciting (Broken Heart, Black Dog, imgonnagetyouback to name a few). I would just like to see more development of sounds like that and exploration of that more boldly, as even those songs dance at the edge of progressing stylistically, but ultimately shy away from fully embracing something new.

it’s very interesting that this album does not have the same retention that her other albums have had with me, at least not instantly or in the weeks after. And what I mean by that is songs are not getting stuck in my head that much. I do not want to revisit them immediately after listening to them, and when I do, some of them have somewhat diminishing returns. And I asked myself why that is and the greater existential question of what is music supposed to be. And I think midnights is a great album to compare to this album and maybe history will make sisters of these two albums, it’s too soon to tell, but with proximity as something to inspire comparison, I think they’re great to talk about in conversation with each other. Midnights is an album that many critics and many longtime Taylor Swift fans did not enjoy to the degree of her others, and some new fans who came to her during folklore were turned off by her returned to pop in a way that some felt was empty. But what is interesting about midnights is despite the fact that the rich text isn’t really there or well articulated or particularly inspiring, the bangers are there to be so crass. Songs like antihero and bejeweled and even karma every time I would return to them or listen to them again I could not get them out of my head. Even though the lyrics are next to nothing or are the simplest versions of those concepts, the marriage of the lyrics with the melody is perfect. I wanna listen again, I get them stuck in my head, I wanna dance to them. Very little of that is on this album currently, even with songs I like or love. There are songs that I enjoy more with each listen, yes, and chew on lyrically and composition wise, but the bangers are not here, not like they have been in the past. if midnight was her putting bangers over substance, this album is her putting substance over bangers. I don’t know if either of those things is the right way to make music, or if there is a right way to make music.

This gets into the existential question that is far beyond her, and not her responsibility to answer, that is what purpose does music serve as an art form. What metrics of success do we measure it by, obviously charts and financial success not being competent measures for art? And should music, which is perhaps the most populous and accessible form of art we have on planet earth because of the universality of a banger, maybe err on the side of bangers as enjoyability is it’s main purpose? Which is to say that should it always put the song over substance? If you can manage both, which she has historically been able to do time and time again, then by all means do so. But if you find yourself wanting to choose between the two, in the aftermath of this album I think my personal feeling is this. If you’re gonna write poetry, just write poetry, but don’t tell me that it’s a song if it doesn’t bang. And I don’t mean that it has to be a pop song, I am being a bit glib. I mean that I should want to listen to it. wordiness and any flow disruptions because of it should not take priority over the fact that it it a song and it should be pleasing to listen to, more so than it needs to be poetic. This album is a bit indulgent in the latter and i feel the songs that couldn't bend to the will of the "poetry" suffered. I think that’s ultimately what makes this album so easy and delicious to talk about because it is forcing us to ask these questions. Not just of music in general, but of Taylor Swift who, in a lot of ways, is a microcosm of the music industry. No I don’t mean that ~she is the music industry~ silly way that people refer to her. But I mean in the way that Taylor is a good case study in asking ourselves what we want from music because she is capable of all of the things that music is capable of. Even further, it’s us asking ourselves what we consider to be successful music. I recognize that this is an incredibly personal question for everyone in the sense that the success of music and art is a subjective opinion and that I am once again wading into waters where my feet don’t touch the ground but I do think it’s what makes talking about all of this so fun and why I find it to be an engaging and important and stimulating debate that we will probably have for eternity, or at least as long as Taylor Swift keeps making music. 

[thislovintime]

It’s not a Leap Year, but... remembering Davy Jones.

“Underneath his nasty exterior, Davy had a heart of gold. He’d always fight for what he wanted. I’d have to say he had the most feeling of any of the members of the group.” - Peter Tork, Sioux City Journal, January 1980 (x)

* * *

"[W]e’re playing to 18,000 screaming kids and Davy’s banging on the tambourine and he comes waltzing over to me right in the middle of this wonderful thing and he yells, ‘We’re gonna form a group!’ Which is why I love Davy Jones, because he noticed and he knew what it was about.” - Peter Tork, Hey, Hey, We’re The Monkees (1996) (x)

* * *

Peter Tork: "Davy’s extraordinarily funny.” Q: “Is he?” PT: “He’s said things — and quite deep sometimes, too. David has, he’s got some insights.” - GOLD 104.5, 1999 (x)

* * *

Q: “Which of the Monkees are you closest to?" Tork: “It's different with each. [Micky]'s the best pal, but my heart connection is biggest with Davy. Davy is capable of as much heart as anyone I've ever met. I kind of had a crush on Davy for a while.” Q: “That's sweet. Maybe it will work out for you two some day.” Tork: “Maybe. We'd have to talk to our respective girlfriends about that.” - St. Petersburg Times, June 23, 2000

* * *

Peter Tork: "Davy, for all of his virtues and glories, was very much into British music hall. Given his head, he would do nothing but ‘I’m Henry the VIII, I Am.’ I mean, not that he did that song, but that’s the kind of music that he would do, in spite of the fact that Davy could rock like nobody’s business. [At one point] Davy [did a version of] ‘Hippy Hippy Shake’ and nailed it! It just wasn’t what he wanted to do.” Q: “I think that demonstrates the dynamic of what each member brings to a band and to a situation and how they contribute things but are also there to tell you to pull back where necessary or encourage you to go further.” PT: “I’m only sorry that we didn’t do more of that by a huge amount. I only now have, in the last couple of years, come to understand how smart and good-hearted Davy Jones could be. I did not have the skills to notice that, even though I was drawn to it without knowing exactly why. But I certainly did not have the first clue of how to encourage all of the good stuff from Davy that I loved. I wish I could have known how to do it - and he might still be with us, even.” - Las Vegas Weekly, September 14, 2016 (x)

* * *

Clowning around at The Monkees' London press conference on June 29, 1967.

* * *

Peter with Dolenz, Jones, Boyce and Hart in 1976, and in 1977.

* * *

From The Monkees' Solid Gold interview in 1986.

* * *

Peter Tork: “(quietly) Yeah, I really hit him once.” Q: “You feel badly about this?” PT: “I sure do. My conscience was stricken for years. (perks up) Of course, the little sucker hit me first.” - 2000 The fight, in quotes and audio.

* * *

“Jones has a tremendous sense of fun.” - Peter Tork, The Post-Crescent, July 29, 2004

* * *

“When we first met, I was confronted with a slick, accomplished, young performer, vastly more experienced than I in the ways of show biz, and yes, I was intimidated. Englishness was at a high premium in my world, and his experience dwarfed my entertainer’s life as a hippie, basket-passing folk singer on the Greenwich Village coffee house circuit. If anything, I suppose I was selected for the cast of ‘The Monkees’ TV show partly as a rough-hewn counterpart to David’s sophistication. What stands out for me about David, however, were the several events through the years in which I came to see a man of extraordinary heart and sympathy. […] I felt this criticism [of The Monkees] keenly, coming as I did from the world of the ethical folk singer, basically honoring the standards of the naysayers.
We did play as a group live on tour, including a concert in Osaka, Japan, in 1968. There, in the middle of a performance of Mike Nesmith’s ‘Sunny Girlfriend,’ we hit the pocket. The beat fell into place, solid and grooving. Rock n roll was happening there for us on stage. David came bouncing over to me and yelled above the volume, ‘WE’RE GONNA FORM A GROUP!’ David’s sympathy for my feelings about the criticism, his musical awareness and his sense of humor buoyed me that day about as much as getting into the groove. Later, when we four argued to be the musicians on our own albums, it was David’s agreement that provided the unanimity that made the difference. This was huge, actually; Micky and David came from an entirely different tradition. Actors sang on records made for them, and nobody thought twice about it. Folkies and rockers made their own albums!” - Peter Tork, Hartford Courant, March 6, 2012

* * *

Peter Tork: “Well, Davy’s always been a man of great talent and heart and I had just been hoping to work with him some more. He had such talent. He was probably the most talented of us all. He certainly had the best pitch and the best time. He should probably have been the drummer or the bass player of something. He should have been in the rhythm section. It’s kind of amazing – the two guys with the best time in the band weren’t in the rhythm section [laughs]. That was a little weird, looking back. And he was so able – there was just nothing he couldn’t do. I remember once in the middle of a tour, we said, ‘Well, we want to do this song, and we want to do it this way. But we’re missing a bass player. Davy, here’s a bass. Put your fingers here and pluck this string there.’ Next thing you knew, he was playing bass on stage like that night or two nights later or something. It was nothing major – he wasn’t popping strings and doing runs and fills, but he was laying down a bass and it was solid – it was solid. And that kind of ability is, I think, what I’m going to miss … what I’m sorriest to see go.” Q: “What was the last you had contact with him?” PT: “At the end of the last tour. We just said, ‘Goodbye, I’ll see you soon.’ I didn’t think I wouldn’t – partly because he was the youngest of us. That was too bad.” - LeHigh Valley Live, June 2012

* * *

“[Micky] and Mike and I have a very cordial relationship and share a lot of common topics. We go to lunch together when we're all in town and have a good time. I love and respect each of these guys in their own way, although the real joys that I shared with Davy were special. At one point we had some good hard connections but as the years rolled on, those things faded away. But I am sorry to see Davy go. He was the one member in the group that I had the strongest human connection with. I still have two guys that I love and respect left from the band, but we share a different dynamic.” - Peter Tork, Review Mag, May 27, 2016

* * *

“Davy adored performing, and adored meeting and greeting his fans. He was tireless in making himself available to sing a song, do a dance, shake a hand; whatever was asked. I had heart-to-heart moments with him that were among the best in my life. I was blessed to know and work closely with him. He was one in about 6 billion, give or take. We won’t see his like again. He left much too soon. I share your sadness. Thank you again for this chance to contribute. God bless and keep you all.” - Peter Tork in a note for a Pennsylvania memorial event for Davy, also shared via Peter’s official Facebook page, 2012

[addictedtostorytelling]

Hi! Would you be able to talk a bit about how you see Sara's relationship with Abby Fisher?

hi, anon!

so i will warn you up front: i am a great hater of the later seasons of csi and don't really have anything nice to say about them. that so, this answer is pretty critical of the writing of episode 15x12 "dead woods" and its depiction of sara and abby's relationship.

to give a "desalinized" short version of what i say below here: i actually like the impulse behind the whole "sara has a relationship with a foster kid" storyline; i just don't think the writers executed the idea well. logistically, the whole thing has more than a few holes. also, the vibes are off. ultimately, i have a difficult time emotionally investing because the implied depth just isn't there.

for a much saltier (and longer) explanation, click the "keep reading."

__

so here's the thing: one of the many skills which the writers of the later seasons of the show lacked was the ability to imply depth in their narratives.

while most of the time, this deficiency manifested in the form of them failing to provide any kind of contextual details about the characters' lives outside of work—would it have killed them to have sara occasionally mention visiting grissom or to every once in a while show her on the phone with him past s11?—it also sometimes did so in the form of them attempting to shoehorn in biographical information for the established characters that either contradicted or at least didn't mesh well with previously related canonical facts (e.g., when they accidentally changed sara's birthday, only to later change it back again).

and, to me, the whole abby fisher storyline falls into that latter category.

don't get me wrong: on paper, i think having sara connect with a foster child and mentor her is a really wonderful idea. executed properly, it could have been a source for some truly interesting character development for her—which, god knows, in the later seasons, she was severely lacking!—and may have even been something healing for her.

it's just—

to my mind, the way the storyline was written is so unbelievable and ultimately incongruent from sara's previously established character history that i can't really buy into it, either intellectually or emotionally.

problem #1 is the supposed timeline of it all.

within the episode, we learn that sara works the fisher case and first meets abby on 08.20.04, as is shown by the dates on the evidence photos taken at the original scene. however, that date falls right during the same interval when sara is supposedly on vacation between s4 and s5 (see episodes 04x23 "bloodlines" and 05x01 "viva las vegas").

and i know, i know! really, that discrepancy is such a small thing that only a truly nitpicky fan like myself might even notice!

i should probably just let it go.

but the thing is, it's not just an issue of sara not technically being in vegas or around to work the case at that time but also one of her not being in the right mental/emotional state to be able open up to a traumatized child then, either.

more on that point below.

furthermore, it's also not the only "fudge" of its kind.

in fact, it's actually indicative of a more general inattention to detail on the parts of the writers.

anthony zuiker took the lead writing credit for this episode, and, honestly, he's somewhat notorious for not knowing his own show's canon. he prides himself on being a big picture "ideas" guy, not a minutiae/details guy, and sometimes, the fact that he isn't the latter thing is really, really obvious. i mean, this is the same man who had to crowdsource major story arc recaps from fans on twitter to remind him of what had been going on on his own show before he wrote the series finale, for chrissake! and even then, he still got a bunch of the "fine print" stuff, like grissom not knowing who russell is, wrong.

this error being just one among many makes me less willing to ignore and/or gloss over it.

beyond the issue of sara's initial meeting with abby not fitting the timeline of the earlier seasons, equally as improbable is the notion that sara maintains regular contact with abby after they first meet.

for one thing, in the early seasons of the show when sara supposedly first meets abby, sara is a notorious workaholic who maxes out on overtime every month. if she's working 70+ hours a week on a graveyard schedule, when is she making time to have visits with this kid—and especially considering that said visits likely have to be scheduled long in advanced and supervised (because there are very strict rules in place regarding how noncustodial adults interact with kids in the foster care system), meaning she can't just swing by for a quick hello after a double shift?

considering that catherine can barely find the time to see her own biological daughter, of whom she has sole custody after early s3, when is sara fitting in hours and hours with abby, to whom she has incredibly restricted access, as per the rules and logistics of the foster care system?

also, for another thing, how does this relationship fit in with all of the canonical events of s5-15?

for example, when sara is recovering from her injuries following her abduction by the miniature killer in s8, what does she tell eight-year-old abby? does she see her during that time or do they go several months without any contact, until sara is healed up enough not to have to explain anything to her? if they don't see each other, what kind of excuses does sara make? if they do see each other, how does sara explain the situation? does she admit she nearly died at the hands of a murderer, knowing how triggering that information might be for abby to hear? or does she lie? or tell some sanitized version of the truth ("i had a bad accident, but i'm okay now")?

and what about the grissom of it all? do he and abby ever meet? if so, when? do they ever spend quality time together and/or develop any kind of relationship, especially after grissom and sara get married? if so, how does sara break the news to a fourteen-year-old abby of the divorce? does abby get any kind of closure for grissom not being a part of her life anymore?

for yet another thing, how does this idea (of sara being a regular presence in abby's life for ten years) fit with sara's nomadic lifestyle in the later seasons of the show, plus abby's general status as a foster child?

not only does sara spend significant amounts of time away from vegas between 2004 and 2014 (especially during s8, s9, s10, and s11), which would make it difficult for her to keep in touch with abby just on her side of things, but based on some of abby and her foster mother's dialogue in episode 15x12 "dead woods," it also seems that abby has only come into her placement with the higgins family fairly recently, perhaps within just the past few years or so, which means that prior to living with them, she likely moves around a lot.

the idea that sara could even keep track of this girl over the years—especially given the privacy laws surrounding foster kids—isn't particularly realistic.

one of the main things former foster kids (and especially those who are in "traditional foster care" as opposed to "kinship care") complain about is the inconsistency of the lifestyle and the fact that people are there one day and gone the next.

while the child protective services agency (cps) does their best to prevent foster kids from having to move placements, over a third of foster kids experience changes to their living arrangements at least three times per year (and some experience even more).

and, again, while cps generally tries to keep kids from having to move schools/districts when their placements change, if they can avoid it, they often don't have a choice; if the kid has been living in and attending school in henderson and the only available placement for them is in reno, then there's not much to be done but to uproot their whole life and ship them 450 miles across the state to their new home.

furthermore, to protect the privacy and safety of foster children, neither cps nor foster families are allowed to give out personal information about foster children—including their placement addresses—to anyone who doesn't have direct "need-to-know" involvement in their case (which would mostly just be custodial caretakers, school officials, and medical professionals).

all of the above so, it would likely be very, very difficult for sara to maintain a relationship with abby, especially over the course of a decade.

that girl has likely been in multiple placements in multiple locations (some of them not in clark county) since sara has known her, and since sara doesn't—even as law enforcement—fall into any of those "need to know" categories of persons who legally receive updates about abby's whereabouts when she gets reassigned, she probably wouldn't be able to follow her movements.

however, even if sara were somehow to (improbably) maintain contact with abby between 2004 and 2007, once sara skipped town and went "off the grid" circa episode 08x07 "goodbye & good luck" and/or later episode 09x02 "the happy place," the second abby moved placements, she likely wouldn't be able to find her again (and especially considering that, at the time, abby would be just eight or nine years-old and wouldn't have a cell phone or email account she could use to reach out to sara on her end of things).

the whole scenario lacks veracity, even with what sara herself has previously said about her own experiences in foster care.

for example, in episode 07x16 "monster in the box," sara remarks to grissom on how hard it is to keep up with foster kids due to spotty record-keeping.

—and that's the main problem, really.

beyond the whole "how would this relationship even work?" of the thing, there is also the issue of characterization—a question of "would sara even behave in this manner?", the answer to which i think, ultimately, is no.

i could forgive all of the logistical errors and the farfetchedness of the situation if the story itself didn't feel so antithetical to sara's character history and jar with everything we know about her development.

see, episode 15x12 "dead woods" suggests that sara sees abby very regularly and plays a prominent mentoring role in her life, enough to know who her boyfriend is—and have beef with him!—and to understand her complicated feelings about her foster family. they supposedly go to concerts together and hang out with some frequency. theirs is an emotionally open and socially intimate connection.

the implication is that sara is almost like a mother to abby—someone abby is even closer to and more highly esteems than her current foster (and soon to be adoptive) mom, joanna higgins; the first person she thinks to call for when she's in trouble.

but that implication doesn't fit with sara's character arc.

see, it's not that i doubt that the sara of 2014 could be open enough to bond with a traumatized foster kid over their shared life experiences and serve as a touchstone for her.

it's that i doubt the sara of 2004 would.

the sara of 2004—and especially the summer of 2004, six months prior to the events of episode 05x13 "nesting dolls"—wouldn't respond to seeing a little girl whose trauma so closely mirrors her own by reaching out to her, forming a deep connection based in mutual disclosure, and involving herself as a surrogate mother-figure in her life.

i'm not saying sara doesn't have the capacity to be nurturing—i mean, i am the person writing a huge geek!baby au series, the latest installment of which is all about sara discovering just how strong her maternal instincts actually are—or that she wouldn't feel for the kid or want to help her.

rather, i'm saying she just wouldn't be able to bring herself to get that close.

think of the analog situation: brenda collins in episode 01x07 "blood drops."

sara has such a difficult time even being around that kid and looking her in the eyes to start off with, all because she knows, on a deeply personal level, what it feels like to be her.

it's not that she's not empathetic toward brenda and her situation.

to the contrary: she can feel her pain all too keenly! she cares all too much!

that's why it's so painful for her to even acknowledge brenda's existence.

her feelings are still too raw for her to really force herself to interface.

though in that case, she does eventually end up dropping her guard and stepping up to advocate for brenda as needed, she only ultimately does so because grissom compels her to act as brenda's chaperone.

had he not given her that assignment and she instead been left to her own devices, she wouldn't ever have gotten close to the girl.

not of her own volition.

she only starts to show that external level of care because she's made to.

and what's noteworthy is that even when she does show it, she still conceals the reason why she is doing so—from grissom, from the rest of the team, and even from brenda herself.

though she behaves very compassionately toward brenda, she never makes their interactions personal. she never lets on that she understands what brenda is going through. she never transgresses the boundaries of what would be considered the expected behavior for any safe and caring adult looking after a traumatized child under the circumstances.

while we as fans can retroactively read her backstory into her actions throughout that episode, she as a character still plays her cards so close to her chest that no one else within the universe of the show can even think about reading them.

indeed, no one but grissom even really notices she's holding them.

and that's because she isn't ready to go "all in" in that way yet.

she isn't to a place where she is ready to face her own trauma, much less confess to it, much less process it—which is what would be required of her were she to allow herself to get any closer to brenda than she actually does.

—which brings us back to abby.

the sara of 2004 hasn't yet reached a place where she is ready to reckon with her childhood trauma yet.

though she wants to—desperately—and will eventually get to the point where she is willing to at least talk about it with grissom (see episode 05x13 "nesting dolls"), honestly, it will still be years before she is finally able to lay her "ghosts" fully to rest (see her letter in episode 08x07 "goodbye & good luck").

and that being the case—

well, i just can't imagine her being as emotionally available to abby as episode 15x12 "dead woods" suggests is the case.

not early on.

not when she would have initially been forming that bond.

that flashback scene from the hospital room where she ends up hugging five-year-old abby?

i can believe that moment could happen.

all but taken by surprise as she is, sara could and would be unguarded enough to open her arms to that little girl and offer her some comfort; she wouldn't reject someone that vulnerable, no matter how scared she was herself. she would recognize all she needed to be right then was a steady shoulder to weep on and a soft voice to reassure. she could hold abby for that moment and validate her cries for her mother.

but beyond that initial instance of connection?

i just can't see 2004 sara continuing to have contact with abby after the case had concluded.

watching that girl be absorbed into the foster care system while grieving the loss of her parents and grappling with the nature of her father's (alleged) crimes would just hit too close to home for sara—and especially at a time when she is herself really struggling with her own trauma.

lest we forget, during the summer between s4 and s5, sara is attending mandatory peap sessions, spending significant time away from the lab on much-needed vacation, and struggling to get her life/career back on track in the wake of her s4 depression and problematic alcoholic usage.

she's not exactly doing hot™ herself.

she doesn't really have much water in her emotional well to draw from in order to share with somebody else.

moreover, she still, to date, has never told anyone about her childhood. she doesn't even yet have the words to talk about it (see her speech to the mirror in episode 05x01 "viva las vegas").

so for as much as her heart undoubtedly goes out to abby, i just can't see her incorporating abby into her life to the degree that episode 15x12 "dead woods" suggests that she does.

it's a "please secure your mask before assisting others" kind of situation with her, you know?

she's still dealing with her own issues and isn't in a state to help someone else at that point—and especially not an incredibly vulnerable child.

and, honestly, i think she'd recognize as much.

she'd know she couldn't be what abby probably would need her to be at that time—and that being so, i can't really see her purposefully inserting herself into abby's world.

she'd figure abby would be better left to "the professionals."

i think the story we're told in episode 15x12 "dead woods" forgets just how jagged the sara of 2004's edges are; it acts as if she has the same emotional capacity back then as she does in 2014, and the fact is, she just doesn't.

had sara met abby in s10 or s11 when she a) was mentally healthy and emotionally stable; b) had gotten some closure on her childhood trauma; and c) had lots of free time on her hands given her whole "long-distance marriage" situation with grissom, then i could see her being able to open up to abby and thrive in a mentorship role with her in the way canon implies she does.

but that's not the story episode 15x12 "dead woods" tells.

it insists that a much younger, much more mixed-up, much less self-actualized sara somehow manages to step into the role of surrogate mother for a physically and psychologically-wounded child whose trauma closely mirrors her own and is able to say and do all the right things, to the point where that child comes to trust her implicitly.

and to me? that's a hard story to believe.

it requires an almost insurmountable suspension of my critical thinking and understanding of sara's character arc.

—especially considering how many needs abby likely has at the time when sara is first getting to know her.

traumatized children require a special brand of tlc.

one of the most important parts of having a relationship with them (as an adult) is to offer them as much stability as possible—meaning if you say you're going to see them, you have to show up; you can't miss the appointment, even if you end up getting pulled onto a double or triple shift; even if you're maybe having a shit mental health day yourself. failure to follow through can result in an erosion of their trust in you and cause setbacks for them in their recovery.

you also have to be very patient and help them regulate what are sometimes some very big emotions. traumatized kids will frequently throw tantrums or act out. they'll oftentimes be whiny or clingy. they'll enact age-inappropriate behaviors. and as the adult in the relationship, you have to meet them where they are, soothe them, and redirect those behaviors once they're calm enough. to do so, you must yourself manage your own emotions. you have to have awareness of the situation and be able to offer them what they need, whether it be cuddles or verbal reassurance or cognitive tools to help them process what they're feeling.

while of course if you as a caretaker or otherwise invested adult can apologize if you make mistakes and do your best to make amends, the point is that you need to be consistent and selfless and place the needs of the child first. and if you're struggling a lot yourself, then you need to make a judgment call about whether your presence will ultimately hurt the child; if so, you need to remove yourself from the situation and get your shit together before you resume interacting with them.

it takes a lot of energy and insight to navigate those kinds of relationships.

again, i'm not saying sara isn't empathetic or that she is incapable of being there for someone who's been traumatized—her ability to step up for members of her team (like nick and greg) after they go through various hardships proves she is more than equal to the task of offering support as needed—but i am saying that i'm not sure the sara of 2004 would choose to voluntarily place herself into that role; not when she has herself been that kid and knows what the stakes are.

realizing how she tends to react in situations where she's triggered, and realizing that just being around abby triggers her, i think she'd opt to stay away (probably more on a subconscious level than a conscious one).

she wouldn't want to screw up.

she wouldn't want to hurt abby because she was "too in her own feelings."

—which i suppose brings me to my last major objection to the whole sara and abby dynamic, which is just how the dynamic itself is written.

like i said: i'm not at all opposed to the idea of sara acting quasi-maternal; i think she probably does have that capacity in her, however deeply sublimated it may be.

i just feel like—once again—the execution in this case is flawed.

the sara of episode 15x12 "dead woods" seems almost strident in her "mama bear" role with abby. apparently, she has lectured abby about her ne'er-do-well boyfriend on more than one occasion. she even serves as a kind of liaison between abby and joanna, confident she has a better read on abby's feelings than joanna does. which, albeit, is a view with which joanna herself seems to concur. she doesn't hesitate to chase abby's shithead boyfriend down the hall at pd and all but assault him or to take abby out on a saturday night, seemingly without asking anyone's permission. though of course concerned about abby's feelings, she's noticeably forward in all of their interactions. she doesn't hesitate to offer advice or even to try to lay down ground rules.

—which, on a superficial level, could be a valid interpretation of how sara tends to love.

i mean, sara has always been a "heart on her sleeve," "in with both feet" kind of gal, just in general. she does tend to love fiercely and be protective of "her people."

right?

right?

i mean, kind of.

in a "broad strokes" sort of way.

but when you take a slightly more nuanced view of her and how she expresses love, her behavior toward abby actually feels somewhat off. it's too aggressive, in a lot of ways. too "in your face."

just like so much of her characterization of the later seasons, it comes across as inexact, like a flattened-out version of her actual personality, with all of the details and complexities of her sanded off.

yes, sara loves deeply and is very emotional by nature. yes, she has a strong sense of what's right and doesn't back down from doing what she thinks is needed. but she also gives the people she loves space and doesn't typically impose on them.

see, for example, the scene in episode 07x06 "burn out," where she both protects greg and redirects grissom's misplaced anger off of him and is very subtle in how she does so, showing great tenderness toward both parties.

she also tends to "know her role."

see, for example, in episode 10x01 "family affair": when she points out that catherine is lacking a "right-hand man," she doesn't attempt to install herself in that position, realizing it's not hers to fill not only for logistical reasons (i.e., because she is only in town temporarily) but also because she and catherine don't have that kind of dynamic with each other; instead, she just gently encourages catherine to seek out someone she trusts and is ultimately very glad to see her eventually select nick.

i have no doubt that sara loves abby and cares very much for her well-being, but i've also got to believe that even for as much as she loves and cares about her, she would always remain highly aware that she was not actually her mother, either foster or adoptive.

and to me, that awareness would cause her to act differently than what we see in canon—less vehement and imposing; less "in the driver's seat" and more "in the passenger's."

there'd be if not some reticence on her part—though maybe that, too—at least some deference.

sara would realize: the people who should be setting rules for abby and finalizing major life decisions with her are her foster (soon to be adoptive) parents, who play a role in her daily life that sara herself doesn't.

and, yes, sara has known abby for ten years while they've only known her for a few years at most, but that's why it would be all the more imperative for sara to make that demarcation very clear for everyone involved, particularly as the higgins family intends to adopt abby and will be her full-time guardians for the next several years.

based on her own experiences in foster care, i think sara would likely understand the importance of setting boundaries and making it clear to abby that though she is her friend and is happy to offer both a listening ear and advice, she is not her parent.

this delineation would have been especially crucial for sara to draw when abby was younger, so as not to inadvertently get her hopes up that sara was going to foster or adopt her.

again, while she could still be (and likely would still be) very nurturing to abby, i just don't see her having that much of an authority role in abby's life.

it just feels like too much of an overstep with a kid she probably only sees a couple of times a month at most* and who, given that she is a foster child, probably needs clearly-drawn relationship boundaries with the adults in her life in order to feel secure.

* even ignoring all of the real life logistics that would make it impossible for them to remain in such close contact.

the last thing sara would ever want to do would be to confuse abby or give her unrealistic expectations or to impose on/complicate/undermine her relationship with her foster family.

so, to me, if it were actually written with sara's core characterization in mind, then sara's relationship with abby would be one with a lot more gentle questioning in it as opposed to brash pronouncements. it'd be less "i told you you have to dump that guy!" and more "what exactly do you see in him? i'm genuinely interested to know." there'd be a pinch more "well, why don't you ask joanna?" and maybe some self-conscious awkwardness at the realization that, yes, in some situations she does know abby better because she's known her longer (but that still doesn't make her "mom").

above everything, sara would be very conscientious about not screwing up™.

she'd remember just how vulnerable being in foster care makes a kid. she'd understand abby was traumatized and likely has attachment issues galore. "sometimes i look for validation in inappropriate places," anyone? she would have doubts about her own capabilities to be as selfless and emotionally available as she would need to be for abby's sake, and, even though she would ultimately find both the strength and the wisdom to step up, she would always remain just a little bit cautious of herself.

she'd consider there are reasons why, even for all the love she has for abby and all she wants to be a part of her life, she never does foster or adopt her herself; that there are certain things she can't give or be, whether it's the time or just the "totality" of that kind of parent-child relationship.

even after ten years, she'd be careful not to cross the wires between "friend/mentor" and "parent."

so.

all of the above said, for as much as i want to like sara's relationship with abby in episode 15x12 "dead woods," to me, it just ultimately doesn't hit.

it feels like something poorly contrived and even more poorly executed.

like so much of the characterization of the later seasons, it falls about two inches to the left of who and what sara actually is and how she would really behave.

in a better world where the later seasons' writers actually knew what they were doing, i would have loved to have seen this storyline done differently.

instead of trying to retroactively insert a relationship with a foster kid into the already established show canon, why not show it develop in real time, starting in s15?

rather than saying, "sara has had this kid in her life all along. you just never knew about it before now!", let the audience watch her meet the kid and slowly get to know her.

let us observe that initial awkwardness. let us see sara's struggle with how much she ought to say regarding her own situation and how much she should keep submerged. let us be present for the moments when sara summons her courage to step up and be vulnerable in ways she didn't realize she was capable of. earn the emotional connection between them. allow the love to grow up organically.

and, yeah, i know, doing things that way would make it impossible to play out the "ten years later, abby's dad gets posthumously exonerated!" storyline of episode 15x12 "dead woods."

but, honestly? that plot was not very well done anyhow, so i don't think it'd be a great loss to sacrifice it in favor of giving sara some actual long-lasting character development.

make sara's interaction with the foster kid into a full-on arc. it could be really good—much more so than what we actually get in canon, which, frankly, just falls flat on multiple levels.

the writers tried to imply depth that just wasn't there and didn't succeed.

anyway.

enough salt out of me; we've got a whole mine here by now.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

[burrowbabe]

Give and Take - Chapter 3

"Hey, so we were just talking ... since Joe and Ja'Marr are just looking to spend the off season in LA, I offered they just stay here." AJ shrugs looking to you as if asking permission.

You were speechless for a moment, thinking about being in such close proximity. Not even because you just met them - your house had basically become a hotel for your brother and best friend's late night hookups - but for the simple fact that you think you have a crush.

How weird could it get? You think, nodding to your brother and Joe.

"Y-Yeah that's fine." You quickly say.

"Word." AJ smiles and resumes eating his breakfast.

"Thank you guys, seriously. You really don't have to do this for us." Joe says, looking between you and your brother.

"N-No, its our pleasure. We're all friends." You say, giving him a close-mouthed smile. You and Joe hold eye contact for a moment, almost as if trying to read one another's expressions.

"Welp, I'm gonna go shower." You state, once again trying to escape an awkward situation.

“We have some recording to do today.” You direct towards your brother. Quickly getting up from you chair you think, what is wrong with you? Shaking your head as you ascend the stairs. He must think you're so weird.

The self deprecation continued all throughout your morning routine, and as time passed, you realized that not only was that nagging feeling in your body exhausting, but you truly were tired from not sleeping the night before.

You had a deadline coming up for the release of your new album. The label had been checking in non-stop to make sure you were being productive - which you were - but not at the pace they would've liked.

After combing through your wet hair, you hear AJ call up to you from the bottom of the stairs.

"Ann! I brought all our shit down here because of the good acoustics, remember?"

"Yeah, OK. I'll be right down." You reply.

Even though you had spent thousands of dollars on a state-of-the-art home recording studio, you found that recording your vocals in the kitchen sounded much better. Of course, the studio was still put to use, but you both found yourselves set up on the kitchen island more often than not.

When you descended the stairs, you could see everyone sitting around the island waiting for your arrival. An audience was nothing new to you, but when you were performing the song finished, not during the creative process.

Having your friends Tana and Nick listen in was one thing, but now Joe and Ja'Marr sat patiently as well, which churned your stomach with anxiety.

"Jeez, we got a full house." You jokingly say, laughing awkwardly.

"They wanna see how the sausage is made." AJ jokes, garnering laughter to erupt from the table. You laughed along to play it cool, but you knew this was going to be difficult. Your songs were personal to you and it was important to you to have a safe space where you could criticize yourself, cry, goof off and argue with your brother over the sound engineering without people judging.

"All we know is football. I wanna see how y'all make my favorite songs." Ja'Marr says, smiling encouragingly.

Deep down, you knew everything would be fine, but you totally felt put on the spot.

"Of course, of course." You smile, swallowing your nerves.

For the rest of the afternoon, you recorded a handful of songs, some rap, some R&B and pop that showed off your range. The process became easier as time went by, with the guys offering words of support and cringeworthy synchronized dance moves to the beat of the songs.

Everyone spent the time laughing and having fun, accompanied by your famous obscene lyrics that you became popular for. You didn't know if this impressed Joe or not. Would he think you were sexy for being empowered and aggressive? Or would it be a turnoff that you were so vocal about your sexuality? Nonetheless, a smile never left his face, which you took as a good sign.

After spending some time in the living room watching a raunchy, late-night comedy, Tana suggests you go for a swim.

"Now?" You whine, but everyone else was eager to change and jump in the pool.

Digging through a drawer of bikinis in your bedroom, you debated which one you wanted to wear. Should you be modest or sexy? That was the question. Deciding on sexy, you put on a bright blue, micro bikini. Your brother wouldn't be pleased, but you wanted to show off your body a little bit.

You were the last to emerge from the house, closing the sliding glass door to the patio behind you and seeing everyone splashing in the pool having a chicken fight.

You certainly needed some liquid courage to stop your racing mind from feeling self conscious. So, you grabbed the bottle of vodka from the night before to drink straight up.

Throwing your towel down on one of the sun chairs, Tana turns her attention to you from atop AJ's shoulders.

"Holy shit! You look hot!" She exclaims, causing everyone else to look in your direction. You try not to catch Joe's eye and thankfully the darkness of the night hid the blush that crept up on your cheeks.

You murmur a 'thank you' before taking a swig from the bottle of vodka.

"I just kicked Ja'Marr's ass! Ann come play chicken. You can be Joe's partner!" Tana suggests excitedly.

You set the bottle down and turn to see Ja'Marr fall off Joe's shoulders and swim towards the edge of the pool to pull himself out.

Anxiety struck you once again, but you obliged and eased into the pool.

Great, now my literal vagina is going to be up against this guy's neck.

By the time you reach Joe, and before you can even blink, he's hoisting you up atop his shoulders with such ease that you feel your core clench with arousal.

You just met this guy yesterday, calm down. You remind yourself, hoping to God he did not just feel the reaction he gave you.

"Push her! Push her!" AJ screams as you and Tana interlock fingers trying to throw each other into the pool.

With Joe's tight grip on your shins and a hard shove that you mustered up, you sent Tana flying backwards into the water.

"Yes!" You scream. Joe takes you off his shoulders with a huge smile plastered across his face. You high five and celebrate as Tana spits out water and attempts to clear her eyes of chlorine after going under.

It was only after the commotion died down, and people started venturing into the hot tub, that you noticed the muscles on Joe's shirtless body. This was something you could not find on the internet the previous night ... and you had tried.

Before you could get too ahead of yourself, Joe's voice broke you out of your trance. You realize it was only you and him left in the pool and he's asking you about your plans for the next day.

"Oh, I'm not doing anything I don't think." You say.

"Good, I was hoping to take you all out to dinner to say thank you for letting us stay here." He replies.

Hope deflated slightly in you, thinking that maybe he was going to ask you out on a date. But, again, you remind yourself that you and him barely know each other, and he has not shown any interest in you.

"That sounds great." You say with a small smile.

"Do you want to get in the hot tub?" He asks.

Feeling slightly rejected, you shake your head. "No, I think I'm gonna head up to bed. I didn't get much sleep last night."

His brow slightly furrows and for a second, you think he looks disappointed.

"Joeyyyyyyyyyy!" Tana calls from afar. "Come sit next to me!"

Looking at each other once more, he nods quickly. "Yeah, yeah, of course. Sleep well."

With that, you hoist yourself out of the pool and gather your things. Watching Joe get into the hot tub next to Tana caused a wave of jealousy to come over you, but you needed to stop yourself from getting into something that could hurt you again.