#obviously liam has a lot more going on as a character but let me have my stupid meme for now

[dontmixpaintinyourcoffee]

This duo is very funny to me (just finished Arc 1)

Local Haunted Man + Buff Dandy. Problems ensue. May or may not be caused by them. May or may not be solved

[pennamenotfound]

I feel like one of the reasons that the Bells Hells are so interesting and compelling to me is that they’re all so angry. Anger is so interesting to me because of its volatility. The way it can, more than any other emotion, be twisted. Think of how much more volatile Percy was in campaign one because of his revenge boner than Caleb in campaign two with his deepset guilt and grief.  

And like, sure, we had anger before in the other campaigns.

Like Percy was super angry obviously, and Vex had her rage, and Scanlan had his moment (what’s my mother’s name) in Campaign one, and you could probably pull moments for the rest of Vox Machina. Grog’s a barbarian, he rages all the time. Plus with his herd. Okay, sure. Vax certainly had his moments. Keyleth at Raishan. (I don’t think Pike realy had any real anger moments in her arc.) But their stories don’t rely on their anger as much as Percy and Vex, and not nearly as much as Bells Hells. 

In the Mighty Nein, there’s Beau who is super angry at the world, justifiably so, but the rest of the party not so much. Caleb and Yasha are guilt and grief. Cad’s faith. Jester definitely had her problems with emotion, but anger wasn’t really part of it so much as learning to let herself feel something other than happy. Fjord’s journey to Melora was much more about introspection, Veth’s journey back to herself was certainly emotionally taxing for her, but it’s back to greif and loss for her. Kingsley is all about discovery, and Essek was about finding friendship. 

But Bells Hells. They’re all so angry. With maybe the exception of Chetney, but he’s also a werewolf which is its own sort of instability. 

Ashton’s a given---Tal’s so good at anger in his characters. Perfect punk, angry at the world, angry at their situation. *chef’s kiss* perfect barbarian

Imogen has such rage bubbling. “We’re gonna sunder you, Delilah Briarwood” for one, but also, with her mother. With her powers. 

Fearne with her parents. The way she was discovering her anger had so much potential, and I really wanted to see her actually throw some fireballs or something.

Orym. I saw the look on Liam’s face when he had that insight check whisper from Tuldus. Dude, Otohan and the Ruby Vanguard killed his husband and his dad (I know, father in law, but Orym says dad.) He’s the nice one, he’s said it before himself, but... under the surface, i think he’s got some rage in him. 

FCG. Oh, FCG, with their unpredictable rage mode. Trying so desperately to be the caretaker when they don’t even know what they are. The professor in Yios gave him a lot of good information, but there’s a lot they don’t know. 

For me, with FCG and Orym both, it’s a lot of aren’t you tired of being nice? Don’t you want to go apeshit?

And then Laudna. Laudna, with the most to be angry about. She was murdered by the Briarwoods, and spent the next thirty years with her murderer in her head. Looking like a corpse. Not knowing if she was dead or alive. Being chased out of towns all over Tal’Dorei until she ran all the way to Marquet. No friends, even before she died, before Imogen. And she’s really the most interesting to me. Because we don’t see a lot of rage with her. Even with Percy in Whitestone, it’s forgiveness. It’s understanding. The only time I remember in the campaign her really being angry was when FCG turned on the party that time, and that was related to Delilah’s manipulations. 

Orym said once something like she had the worst thing out of all of them happen, and yet she’s the happiest, and how is that? And she goes, well, because the worst thing that’s happened to me already happened. 

And it’s so interesting to me because we could, in another universe, have another Ashton in Laudna. Because, really, very similar things happened to them. Both died. Both put back together not quite right, not quite in control of their situation. Feared, even. 

But she’s so loving, caring, and not wrathful, and honestly, I’d kind of love to see some anger from her. And I think we might see it if Imogen gets hurt.

Anyway i’m unhinged about bells hells. I love vox machina and mighty nein but I’ve connected most to bells hells because I’ve been watching CR since CR3 started, and I love my angy bois. 

[positivexcellence]

‘Walker’: Jared Padalecki on ‘Hot & Heavy’ Cordell and Geri, What’s Next With The Jackal

Finally! You’re back. It’s been forever! And we’re still looking for The Jackal?

Jared Padalecki: Yeah. We had a little five-month time lapse just to allow for all the strike stuff, but it’s still the same storyline. We pick up in the same storyline, for sure, with some time passed. Obviously, Cordell and Geri [Odette Annable] are a little more, um, advanced, than they were. [Laughs] Stella’s [Violet Brinson] back to college, and Augie’s [Kale Culley] back to nearing the end of high school. But The Jackal has reared its ugly head once again, and we got to go figure out what’s going on.

And you’ve been going without Cassie for five months, so it’s you and Trey, which is a pretty cool partnership.

Super cool. Yeah, Cassie was on our FBI task force, and she comes back to let us know what she’s been up to and to kind of say, “Hey, there’s something we might need your help on.” We all love her and miss her and are wondering where she stands. Is she going to stay or go? But Trey and James and Walker have been running amuck in her absence. [Laughs]

And how is her return going to change things? She comes back a little different, too.

She does. She’s had a little different experience and has had a taste of what might be available to her. And she has a different set of expectations. Obviously, she’s welcomed back with open arms from our other characters, but it’s sort of like, “Okay, well, we don’t know where she stands.” We want to be respectful of what she wants and what she needs to do, and we all secretly hope that she’s going to stick around.

And we’ve got a full-blown relationship going on with Geri and Cordi. They’re living together. How’s that going?

Yeah, I think it’s going well. They seem to be hot and heavy, and I’m glad that nothing happened in the five months between the wedding and Episode 401 to kind of sideline that. But that’s not to say that something won’t sideline that within Season 4. [Laughs]

Of course! Because he’s taking on this case, dealing with a serial killer, and I’ve watched enough TV and movies to know that when the good guys take on a serial killer, serial killers tend to target the people their pursuers love most.

You’re too good at this, Damian. [Laughs]

So this is putting a target on a lot of people?

Oh, yeah.

And how will Geri factor into this? Because you can’t just have her hanging out at the house. What is she going to get to do?

Well, good point. She has some stuff of her own going on this season that she needs to care of. And let’s just say that Walker has never been the best about admitting what is going on in his head. Probably something that the astute writers have noticed about [me] and just weaved into Cordell. [Laughs] But we certainly see Geri as sort of a grounding force and guiding light who is trying to figure out things like, “Well, these characters seem to be different, and this person isn’t really responding the way I expected or when I expected.” So we kind of see her as the lighthouse that’s saying, “Hey, you seem to have stuff going on.” Meanwhile, she’s also juggling kind of new responsibilities with Augie and Stella. Stella’s an adult and Augie’s almost an adult, so she’s not overbearing by any means, and she’ll always be “Aunt Geri” to some degree, but she’s taken on a lot and is doing it very well.

We see Stella relying on Liam (Keegan Allen) during all the trauma that she’s dealing with following the home invasion. Will Geri help out with that? Because I feel like Stella definitely at this point needs a mom.

Yes, she does. And Stella has a great arc this season. Let’s just say that many times this season, people accuse Stella of being just like her father. [Laughs] Oh, yeah. Stella is great at keeping secrets as well and keeping struggles to herself. So just like Walker has a tough time reaching out for help, we think Stella may have unfortunately learned that from her dad.

And how is Walker going to handle the fact that his daughter has been counting on Liam with all this stuff that’s been going on and he hasn’t been brought into the loop?

I think he understands more. Unlike prior seasons, I think Walker understands that his daughter’s now an adult, even though he doesn’t like it. It’s new for him. He spent 18 years with his daughter as his child, and now he’s kind of a year or two in to his daughter being an adult and able to make her own decisions. She needs to be responsible, and so I think Walker gives Stella a little leeway, hoping that she’ll remain the kind of stalwart that she’s always been. And then I think he realizes that maybe even though she’s surrounded by friends and family who are there for whatever she needs, that maybe she has a little bit too much Cordell Walker inside of her.

And Augie going into the military? This is a big step for a young man, and as much as a father would want his son to follow in those footsteps, it’s also like, this is a very dangerous line that he wants to get involved with.

For sure. Augie is coming into his own and has some ideas. He’s always been the kid who wanted to grow up a little bit too fast. And frankly, with the passing of his mom and his father being a Texas ranger who’s been abducted and had the house broken into and kind of always been in danger, I think he grew up long before the prospect of turning 18. But he wants to prove that he is an adult in his own right and that he has these ideas about how to secure his future. So Walker is trying to walk that line between, “I know you’ve been through a lot, you’ve been through more than most 70 year olds have been through,” and “Let’s tap the brakes, buddy.” And this is not disrespectful. This is my job as a dad, but I think also Walker finds that, because his profession is in law enforcement, sometimes he can come across a bit more harsh than he intends to.

Understandable, since it’s his kid! I will say, at the beginning of the season, this is probably the happiest we’ve seen Cordi. He’s eating a massive amount of steak. He’s in love again. He has put the ghost of his late wife to rest. The kids are growing up, he’s kind of reclaiming his own life again. Can he have this all, can he be happy?

Oh, Damian, you know TV better than that! Hell no. [Laughs]

He can have a lot sometimes and some a lot of times, but one of the things that [showrunner] Anna Fricke and I talked about from the get-go was trying to make sure that this version of Walker was more similar to life than just a TV version of a [person]. We never sought out to go like, “Well, it’s the end of episode, I roundhouse kicked somebody and now everything’s okay. Let’s all high-five!” This is more like, “Well, what did I miss while trying to get the bad guy? Oh, I missed my daughter’s graduation. Oh, I missed her birthday. I missed this. Oh, I didn’t call back my live-in partner that I was supposed to.”

And so there’s no pure win and there is no pure loss. So I think with Walker, though happy now, his life happens in seasons and not like TV seasons. Walker’s had some hard times and now is an easy time, but life is difficult, and Walker finds that out.

Still, it’s nice to see him getting to enjoy being the hero he is more than usual. Especially with Captain James. This season, the drama is his and Cordi gets to be there for him and support him.

Yeah. That is very true, and it’s great. Yeah, I agree all around. I think Walker is going to find out who he is in good times, which he hasn’t had a whole lot of chance to explore yet. And as with anything, if you haven’t had a lot of experience, you might not be as good at it as you would’ve hoped. We’ve all seen that Walker can be great in times of struggle. He’s had some reps in the gym as far as that arena goes. But let’s see who he is when there’s no bad guy to chase right now — especially when that bad guy might be strengthening themselves in preparation for when the Rangers come after them.

Before you go, was there anything that you’ve gotten to do this season that you just are so excited for people to see?

Big time. We’ve had a lot of fun, fun stuff. There’s something, unfortunately it’s the finale, so I can’t talk about it—I’ll call you privately [Laughs]—but I will say, in the first episode, we have a really fun sequence. We got to do a car-chase sequence in the back of a big rig.

And funny behind-the-scenes fact that no one knows about: During the Longhorns playoff game on New Year’s Day, I was walking around barefoot, my brother and his kids were over, and they were all playing and stupidly, I grabbed a piece of pizza and tried to run back to the couch to watch the game and I kicked my coffee table on accident! So I had a broken toe for the first three episodes and before shooting that sequence and for a couple episodes after, I would have to ice my foot, throw a sock on real fast, shove it into my cowboy boot, and run around park garages and throw myself around. Yeah, so that was fun. [Laughs] We laughed about it afterwards, but it was just hard to get the boot on and off.

They couldn’t shoot around the boot?!

I didn’t want to complain. We’d all been out of work for nine months because of the strike and everything. So I was like, I got it. I’m not going to complain about this. The show finally can go on, and I’m going to go like “Ouch, my toe hurts”? No, thank you! [Laughs]

TVInsider

[vaguely-concerned]

so sad that we didn't get a follow up game for andromeda if for no other reason then because I never got to play out the full arc of my ryder looking hauntedly at himself in the mirror realizing he very much is his father's son in more ways than he's strictly comfortable with

(by default sara always seems to me to be the twin who's the most obviously like alec -- with small variances based on how you play her if she's the PC twin, she's always presented as more driven, competetive and academically minded than scott, who's framed in the family dynamic more as the underachiever/slacker fuckup twin. as an example, see: the conversation you have with alec about the sibling who's in coma at the beginning of the game. when you're scott they bond over joking that sara would be so pissed to be out of commission because she's been planning to be the first to scale every mountain, and when you're sara it's that scott never liked to get up in the morning anyway, how typical of him. (even in jest I feel like this indicates a slightly unpleasant dynamic where one of the few reliable tactics that work for sara to get connection with her dad is for both of them to turn on scott to mock him. which like. very real type of interpersonal dynamic that exists, and one of the character aspects I like the most in andromeda for all that it's uncomfortable, it feels quite subtle and well observed.) you can make sara a bit more neurotic/nervous and awkward and/or charmingly dorky when playing as her and you can make scott a bit more serious, but these aspects of the characters hold true no matter what. which for the record I absolutely love! it's the thing the hawke family also provides in da2, being able to see the dynamics that lead to your character being the way they are alllll the way back and building on it.

hOWEVER with my scott. this apparent disconnect between himself and his dad in terms of character traits (and the lack of communication in that relationship that stood in the way of letting him see that his father was a lot of other things behind the fragile hard outer shell of him than he wanted to show) means that as time goes on scott is fucking blindsided by all the common traits that start popping up under pressure. which you can actually start to introduce in the game itself, too -- if you choose mostly the logical and casual options, it's almost freaky how much ryder starts to sound like a younger and more irreverent version of their dad. (the most interesting version of liam's loyalty quest for me is actually the one where you go full professional and chew him out afterwards, and as liam storms off you can practically SEE ryder arrive at the thought 'oh my god I have become my father' in real time fhdsakj. in general some of the most interesting moments in me:a to me happen when you manage to break away from video game people pleaser mode.)

especially the things alec was willing to do to not lose his wife, to not be alone, he'd rather she be alive and pissed with him than gone forever because that's how desperately he needed her to exist... I think one day scott will look up and go '...oh fuck' at realizing the lengths he would go for someone he loves, and that he has the means to do it too and would make his father's (very bad to be clear) choice all over again if push came to shove. keeping horrible secrets is just the family tradition what does it matter if the weight of them grows heavier and heavier to bear over the years these are family heirlooms you know. I mean, my guy romanced reyes, so you already know he's got something deeply deeply wrong with him lol but this horrors of love side of him only adds to it. scott ryder got his fundamental lack of inner peace from his father and his social skills and abysmal taste in men from his mother

[lunaslogs]

My Thoughts On Teen Wolf: The Movie

This is COMPLETELY my opinion and if you disagree, that is completely fine.

Unpopular Opinion: I actually really like the movie but that's mainly because I didn't even take it that seriously. It felt more like a comedy to me than it did a drama. I found myself laughing during parts I shouldn't have been laughing at. Eli getting taken by the Oni after he says "I can do this", Lydia yelling Allison's name, Scott's little entry montage when he exits the car before saving the little girl, Mr. Harris' reveal, literally any time Peter spoke, etc.

Most people call it a dumpster fire and a completely different universe from the show but personally, I don't really care.

I HAVE WATCHED THE ENTIRE SERIES BEFORE WATCHING THE MOVIE! So, I am familiar with all of the recurring characters from the series. I will admit, I wanted to see more of Hikari. Her character seemed very interesting. We got to see a little bit of her personality pop out in the beginning of the movie in the restaurant. A little bit of googling tells me that her and Liam are "good friends" and I kinda want to see their friendship more.

I think the only parts that truly disappointed me was Derek's death and the ending. Anyone who watched the show before watching the movie obviously felt a way about Derek dying and that includes me as well. But I didn't take it all that badly. It was more so the fact that his first beta, his uncle, his niece, and his son ALL watched him die and couldn't do anything to stop it. Like, that kinda killed me inside a little bit.

The ending where the guy goes "we've heard plenty of stories about teenage werewolves, there's always a new one" disappointed the hell out of me because they make it seem like there's going to be a sequel or continuation following Eli's storyline. While that would be ABSOLUTELY AMAZING, everybody in the TW fandom and their mother knows that it's not happening and that's the disappointing part. It would be freaking great to see Eli become the wolf his father believed he could be but we aren't getting that and even if it DID hypothetically come to fruition, knowing how most people feel about the writing of the movie, Eli's development wouldn't be done justice.

I get what people mean when they say that the writers completely screwed with Jackson's whole character and made him "dumb." This man's whole supernatural persona and his abilities were an entire plotline for a WHOLE season of the show and he even said that he has claws that can release paralytic venom and somehow, he didn't think to use it to his advantage? Granted, the movie takes place 15 years into the future where most of the characters that had already been established thanks to the show hadn't been in Beacon Hills or dabbled into the supernatural world in over half a decade. Not to mention that the time Jackson's character had exited the show, it was only season 2. So for him, it's almost 20 years. The Nogitsune plot appeared in the second half of Season 3 when he was already gone so he didn't exactly have a clue what he was up against. As far as supernatural ability, that can be excused. However, the naivety is a little... concerning. He was still funny as hell to watch, though.

Scallison amnesia plotline was a little bit mid but the montage of their memories together after Lydia yelled out Allison's name (which I laughed at, by the way) was kinda cute and jogged my memory a bit on the earlier seasons of Teen Wolf. Season 1 Scallison was honestly my favorite era of them and I think for a lot of Scallison shippers as well so seeing that made me a wee bit happy. Personally, I did like Allison better with Isaac but that's another story for another day.

Overall: I like it. But maybe cuz I don't take it all that serious and I just watch it to watch it. Eli must be protected at all costs, I want more Hikari and Liam interactions, let Jackson embrace the kanima completely, and live laugh love Roscoe Stilinski.

This is Luna, logging off!

[freeuselandonorris]

F1 Ask Game

thank you @bright-and-burning and @goingxmissing for the tags!!

Who is your favorite driver?: i go back and forth between lando and oscar! i think lando has my heart the most though, honestly, goblin child that he is.

Do you have other favorite drivers?: i love lewis, i love charles, i still have a soft spot for max and daniel although definitely not to the extent i used to... but honestly i'm kind of fond of most of the grid and its peripheral characters (including the previous generation of ex-drivers like nico (i used to be OBSESSED with nico when he was driving for merc!), jenson et al) and the up-and-comers like liam, ollie, kimi. i just like drivers!

Who is your least favorite driver?: there's nobody i really hate, but i'm less keen on perez and hulkenberg. fernando annoyed me for a while when he was just waltzing into random other series, nabbing the best car and winning everything and then fucking off again when he was trying to catch the triple crown, but i find him pretty funny these days.

Do you pull for drivers or do you like teams as well?: i think @goingxmissing made a very good point that liking a driver generally means you end up liking the people around them too, but i'm generally a driver not a team person. i'm papayapilled currently because my two favourite drivers are with them, but i wouldn't particularly follow mclaren regardless of who drives for them (i'm also less than impresed with some of the choices they've made recently, but let's not get into that.)

If you like teams, what team do you pull for?: mclaren obviously, and i am very fond of mercedes although that's a deeply frustrating endeavour at the moment. but yeah, none of the teams are particularly meaningful to me.

How long have you been into F1?: well, i guess technically we're talking about 25 years lmao. i started watching when i was a kid because my mum loved mika hakkinen, so i have fond childhood memories of watching the hakkinen v schumacher years and being fascinated by it. but in terms of watching it by my own volition, this is the 11th straight year i've been watching. mental.

What got you into F1?: see above for the original inspiration! but i came back to it in 2013 because i started working as a subtitler for live tv and one of the channels we covered happened to be sky F1 (so yeah i basically got paid to watch F1. it was great.) a few months of covering the 2013 season - the fabled "multi-21" season of seb and mark nearly killing each other - and i was hooked.

Do you enjoy Fanfic/RPF?: oh yes lmao.

How do you view new fans?: having survived the wilderness years where nobody gave a fuck about F1 and many of the fans were middle aged "well actually..." men, it fills me with joy to see so many younger and more diverse fans coming to the sport. sometimes i see takes that make it pretty clear there's a lack of understanding of the history or previous context of the sport, but so what? we all started somewhere.

If you could take over as team principal for any team, who would it be and why?: oh my god, i don't think i'd want to, it looks stressful as fuck lmao. i'd quite like to be a strategist though, if only i had any capacity for it. maybe for merc. i'd like to work under toto (ahem).

Are your friends and family into F1 as well?: yes! my mum, obviously. a lot of my non-F1 friends (i.e. friends i didn't meet through motorsports fandom) are also into it to varying degrees, and i'm lucky enough to have forced quite a big group of people on here into being my actual real life friends now too. i'm very lucky.

Are you open to talking to other fans/making friends?: yes!! i am not always brilliant at responding to DMs in a timely fashion (i get very easily overwhelmed when i have lots of unread messages lmao) but i love the anons in my inbox and it still makes me so happy when people send me messages saying something (...usually piss related lmao) reminded them of me 🥹

i feel like everyone has maybe been tagged already...? if not comment and i will tag u!

[nebulacollege]

Replies

I wanted to write a big reply, but then realised that I can add a couple of short ones as well. Under the cut there is a more spoiler-y question and my awkward ramble.

Anonymous asked:

When you say Edmund gets more pushy and physical….👀

Ikr? Very hot of him... he’s a terrible combination with all three of the boys, they’ll end up doing many interesting things (unless Liam falls asleep). Niall is a terrible match for him.

Anonymous asked:

I’m imagining Niall pulling out all the stops with flirting and the person purposely playing dumb. Not sure if Edmund would do this but it would be funny

Aw, how rude! Edmund would actually try to ignore all the advances if Niall tries to do something like that, so you’re pretty close! However, as soon as it doesn’t stick, Niall would drop this immediately. He has a very high self-esteem and it’s very humiliating for him to beg for someone’s attention and being desperate, that’s why he’s usually very subtle with his first steps. He also hates being made fun of, and not in an Edmund’s way. He doesn’t want to be in a victim of “point and laugh” types of scenario...

Anonymous asked:

I, too, am the Ultimate Eater 😔

>:3c Now you have to fight for this title!

Anonymous asked:

Is anyone a virgin? How much experience does everyone have?

None whatsoever! Nobody’s even kissed before! It’s more or less a spoiler (? I guess...), so I’ll say that only one of them is not a virgin and has plenty of experience. I’m not going to say who, but it’s super easy to guess. Let’s keep it a secret.

Anonymous asked:

I’m a bit curious, are any of your characters similar to you or ryu? Do they have some of either of your traits?

+

Anonymous asked:

Do you or ryu share any traits in common with the boys? Are there any you’re the most similar to?

There are, although this is kinda awkward to say.

The whole topic of “death” that surrounds Edmund is something that has been bothering me for years, that’s why when creating the character I wanted to make him an embodiment of impending doom. I constantly think about everything disappearing, about how life can go wrong in an instant, about nobody really caring about you and your death, about how you finally die when the last person who knows about your existence also passes away and your traces in life become lost forever, about no life after death, about the death of the people I care about and other fun thoughts that include ending everything (those became slightly better until this year happened, making it almost as bad as it was before), and Edmund’s personality also includes such qualities as giving up and weird ways of self-punishment. He, of course, has other qualities as well, and they influence his actions a lot, but his depressed state is something I want to explore using my own train of thought. Not sure how well it’s going to be implemented, but that’s the idea, at least. There’re also things like being mostly negative about everything, being somewhat provocative and making passive-aggressive statements. He also avoids big groups of people and being a centre of attention. There’s probably more, but that’s what I can think about.

And just in case, he’s not a self-insert or anything! I tried my best to make him his own character, I think I even succeeded in that considering how fun Ryu and I find him to be. He’s an ultimate bottom bitch, which is perfect for our entertainment. These points of self-reflection are just surface level, and I don’t even know how his writing will turn out in the end.

Since I’m also a bottom bitch, none of the other characters are similar to me in any way... 😭

Ryu, obviously, has the most shared qualities with Ned. Well, ryu = dragons, so that’s an easy connection. That’s why their house is built on hierarchies, they follow rules and do other boring things that they find important. Ned is like my love letter to Ryu? Now this whole ordeal sounds even worse lol I swear he’s his own character as well! orz But they do share a lot of traits like being introverted and quiet but still being a part of social situations for some reason, they’re very direct and straightforward, so they don’t really get any hints you throw at them. They’re hardworking and can grind the most tedious work to an insane level out of pure stubbornness. They’re both lawful (neutral lol), so they do follow the rules, but also the only rules they really respect are the ones they have in their head. Everyone should strive to earn their respect, that’s how they judge people. Everything should match their idea of a thing, so they get grouped together. Not to say both of them are rigid or close-minded! Maybe Ned is a little bit like that, but he has time to learn more about the world around him. We used to joke a lot about Ryu liking the “system”, whatever that means (probably the way things are in general), and Ned and his house represent the idea of a strict system as well. They group everyone into categories of being close people and outsiders, basically, and they’re very protective of the people they consider close and are very suspicious of outsiders. They’re also greedy lol

I know Ryu doesn’t sound like that, and all I’ve described doesn’t sound like Ryu at all, which is funny, because Ryu is a genuinely sweet and amicable person. Ned too, tbh. They’re both ISTJ, so that should clear the confusion (?).

These are more of the outlines for Ned, of course, and, same as Edmund, I’m not sure how much of this is going to end up in my boy. It’s more like taking same-ish and familiar concepts of both of us and creating something new in characters and playing with the idea.

Niall’s also hardworking, which is also close to Ryu. He doesn’t give up, and an optimist? That’s what they have in common to some degree.

Liam is just... there. I don’t think he has anything in common to either of us, although his ability to get bored quickly is something I have...

Niall, Ned and Liam are the answer to the “who would be a perfect top for our ultimate bottom?” question.

[mayasdeluca]

Tbh I think they're exagerating the "centric" and it just means "bigger screentime" (as Travis, beccket, Jack(?)

I do think Vic's one is *closing* on 7x5, probably she's breaking down-getting better in the same one or at least implying she gonna seek for help. For me 7x4 was all Andy and building up for Vic, Ben, Becckett and Maya's possible breakdwon (a teasing)

As for Carina let's see.those damn news...id say were just learning about the news bc it seems packed but the synopsis says "maya helps carina navigate" so im curious

I agree...people get so caught up in the word 'centric' when really it could just mean the character has more screentime than they may have normally or something big is happening in their storyline. It's an ensemble cast so there's always going to be multiple things happening in an episode. Especially this season when they have so many storylines to progress and wrap up. They haven't really had a 'centric' episode that focused on one character and other characters weren't really in it besides one scene since Travis' in Season 4 (or the Ben/Dean one when they were in the water, I forget what episode that was) I wanna say so that's obviously not happening this season when there's too much to do with everyone.

Yeah I'm curious about this news too and how much Marina we're actually getting tomorrow because it seems like there's a lot going on but you're right that it says Maya helps her navigate it so they must find out and at least talk about it a little bit. I'm also wondering if we see a FaceTime call with Maya and Carina/Liam with Maya at work before she walks in to everyone being all depressed? It looks like she was in the lounge room on her own and was all happy so that would be cute if we get that.

[meggoreads]

Meg Thinks: Fourth Wing

So, I finally read the second coming of Christ on BookTok. Let's talk about Rebecca Yarros' Fourth Wing. (Warning: possible spoilers ahead)

First, I was fully under the impression that this was firmly in the adult fantasy genre, but it was a YA fantasy with a NA hat on.

Did I still read it all in two days? Yes. 👀 But maybe it was easy to fly through because I've read these scenes thousands of times before.

It was a trope heavy book that is marketed as about dragons but the dragons take up maybe 10% of the book and feel more like comic relief characters. (They were still my favorite)

Since the author says this is going to be a 5-6 book series, I’m hoping this first book was her finding her footing and each book gets progressively better, but seeing as how the next book is already slated to come out before she's had a chance to read literally any of the constructive criticism, I highly doubt it. (I mean, I'll probably still end up reading it because I vehemently hate being out of the loop)

Things I Liked:

The dragons, obviously

The bonds and the signets

Liam :,(

Things That Need To Be Improved:

The romance, it was boring. Stop leading me on with "This guy literally hates my guts and wants to murder me" only for him to have been in love with the FMC the entire time. I also hate when the main love interests get together in the first book. Where was the build-up???

Relationships and general characterization. Aside from Violet, Xaden, Liam, and Dain, I know next to nothing about any of the characters. Why should I care about any of them? The book was so large, but we barely got any scenes of Violet getting to know her squadmates. Or she could reminisce on her past with Dain, her mother/sister/brother.

Rhiannon seems so suspicious. Please write her better.

Violet's condition. What is it? How does it effect her day to day life?

World-building. I'm not hating on it as much as everyone else is because it's fantasy and the author can do whatever they want. I just think we need more lore because all I'm imagining is Attack on Titan with dragons instead of titans.

Things I Didn't Like:

I'm not a fan of the MMC's name starting with an X (or Z) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Griffins. Without spoiling the ending, how are we supposed to believe griffins have any kind of power against literal dragons??

What even is the Gauntlet? T_T

There was a lot of complaints about the cursing which I didn't notice in the first half of the book, but it was very heavy in the second half and quite jarring

Show Don't Tell. Show us how Violet is smart. Stop telling the reader everything.

I felt like I was reading AoT, Divergent, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and any SJM book all in one. It's fine to take inspiration, but this was just... a lot.

(Also this is what I imagined the Venin looking like)

Overall, it was a fairly addicting read and even if something is not a literary masterpiece, I like being a part of the book community and getting in on all of the memes and discussion. Which can be harder to find for more of the well written books in the YA/NA/Adult Fantasy circles.

Here's to hoping Book 2 has more dragons and a better storyline.

[fireheartedpup]

Has Jaal been asked for the character breakdown yet?

No, you're the only one!

How I feel about this character

Apparently, I'm a sucker for characters who call me darling. Best video game boo until Astarion came along. I want so much more of Angaran culture. Help.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Me. Obviously.

I can ship anyone with anyone, but Peebee makes a strong case I think. They find each other fascinating, and I think it would be interesting.

Cora would play into Jaal's romanticism, and he might be able to help her relax. It's so funny how he asks everyone what their hobbies are and he doesn't understand he's on a ship with people who traveled to an entirely different galaxy because they are workaholics. He would learn about roses for her, and she'd really like being a part of his family (she hadn't seen her parents for years before their spaceship went missing.)

He and Vetra are pretty sweet to each other. She likes the lotion he traded her. I haven't actually thought as much about this game since Baldur's Gate came out, so I don't have a lot more to say at the moment. I'll come back to you my beloved

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Liam. Even if you don't say fuck canon I do what I want, it's an excellent brotp. They take an active interest in each other's cultures, and Liam is pretty good at emotional intelligence when he wants to be.

He and Gil are an underrated pairing imo. Gil helps him build technology that'll let him watch movies the way an Angaran would--by feeling the emotions of the actors through the screen.

I don't know how that's going to work with non-Angaran media, since no one else has the same bioelectrics, but it's a sweet gesture.

My unpopular opinion about this character

He's a bit immature sometimes. The Angaran focus on expressing all of your emotions means he sometimes jumps the gun a bit.

I'm not sure Evfra actually sent him when he came to meet the protagonist. I think he had a say in that decision. And I think he overstepped, and that he and Evfra went a bit too far in making Aya a military state. Paaran Shie was right--she had that in hand, and he should have left the initial meeting to the diplomats. She's not exactly untrained. I think this is one reason she and Evfra butt heads, and I would have a lot to say about it if I were there.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

More. Please give me my alien back. I want more of him. Please. When is the next game coming

[dragonknightofsummerset]

@lizzybeth1986 An excellent read, sorry it took me a while to get to this but I was taking notes again lol to make sure I didn't forget my initial response

To start, the ridiculous reactions I would see in regards to Aurora from Open Heart, just because she wasn't immediately friendly to MC, I do blame how PB handled the limited responses MC had to her, but fandom racism definitely didn't help, and you see this with Shane from Platinum, and Zoey from QB, like the audacity for fandom to be mad at them when they had reason to react the way they did. But as you said, these are just few of the characters that aren't even allowed to be mean or cold towards MC (& in the case of Shane & Zoey, not allowed to be mad at MC) unlike white characters.

As for the situations in MOTY & ACOR, I was more invested in MOTY storywise, but was still shocked with what Vanessa & Guy were allowed to get away with, versus Xanthe not receiving the same protections MC had in ACOR. I can see how all this leads up to the: Allowed behavior of white women vs Expected behavior of nonwhite women in TRR.

Now getting into Madeleine's character, I also though that she was being set up to be the one behind the attack on MC, especially with the dialogue, "Savour these moments. You may never hear this phrase again." Before the chapter reveal in TRR2, I had even used this dialogue as a reasoning as to why I suspected her. I found it strange that it turned out to be Penelope in the end.

^^^ I hadn't noticed just how much of TRR2, especially before they get to New York, is showing/telling us how Madeleine would not make a good queen, I mostly remember Liam's comparisons of the MC and Madeleine over any of other hints we get that she isn't patriotic and whatever other bullshit PB wanted to sell us in TRR3 and onwards.

When it comes to her treatment of Hana, I mostly remember the chocolate incident rather than all the threats she made to send her home, even though it always pissed me off how she talked to Hana in either ch2 or ch3 of book 2, which also leads me to getting pissed off that Drake is the one who tells us Liam & Hana's sides of the events after MC was taken away. Despite having a clear dislike of Madeleine and the way she treated her ladies in waiting, I don't remember how obviously (now that I see everything put together) power hungry & extreme her actions were.

Even to this day, the way Fandom talks about Hana drives me insane, people refuse to actually learn anything about her and continue to pin her as boring, just because she's sweet, and don't get me started on how many of these same people then go around saying they wish Olivia was an LI 🙄

"Olivia is upgraded to cosplaying spymaster," lmao, this caught me off guard, I cracked up when I first read it.

Hadn't connected the dots before with how little it made sense to paint Madeleine as a patriot when she betrays the MC, resulting in the heir getting kidnapped, just because MC wasn't nice to her. I can't believe she was only fired from her job and not stripped of her lands and titles, she let the heir get kidnapped, correction, she helps the heir get kidnapped, how is this patriotism PB? It's treason!

Admittedly, my opinion of Madeleine has changed a lot as the series aired. I didn't like her, thought she was the one who set MC up, disliked how she treated Hana, but unfortunately by book 3 I had forgotten just how bad the chocolate incident, & her treatment of Hana prior to that, was, and fell for the retconning done in book 3, but with more rereads, and having read through TRH, I am back to hating her, like there is no way I could see myself liking Madeleine in this series. And it's disgusting that the writers wanted to pair her up with Hana. There is only 1 apology at the end of TRR3 but it just falls flat with the behavior she exhibits in TRH, and because the writers never gave Hana the space to talk or react about everything Madeleine had done to her. Hana truly deserves better.

Hana and Madeleine: When You Reward Your Favourite Bully with One of Her Victims

Series - TRR's Alternative LIs: The "Romances" That Didn't Happen

Previous - Maxwell and Penelope: When You Like the Side Character So Much, You Gift Her A Shiny New LI

A/N1: Apologies, again, for the length of this. There was so much damn retconning to wade through that it felt like a rollercoaster to write. There is also not going to be a lot of Hana in this, as I needed to unravel so many inconsistencies in Madeleine's writing. I also didn't want this to become a repeat of my essay series on Hana (which you can read here).

CW: Descriptions of bullying and intimidation, as well as dismissiveness of the same both in canon and from fandom. A mention of the 'infertility' plotline written for Hana in TRH1. Mentions of parental abuse and neglect.

In every other essay in this series, it's been important for me to analyse the potential of the pairings TRR went for. No matter how badly PB handled them later on, one could find promise in the possibilities of these pairings, and if written well they could result in a sweet, happy ending for the LIs we didn't marry. With a better sense of balance from the writers and less vitriol and double standards (in some cases) from the fandom, they could have worked.

Not so for this pairing.

In the case of Hana and Madeleine,it would have been far far better if this pairing had never happened at all. The problem wasn't just in the development; the roots of such a pairing itself were rotten.

(White) Female Antagonists

Before I delve into the characters involved in this pairing, it's important we take another deep dive into a narrative practice we often see with PB. Their blatant favouring of specifically white female antagonists.

Now, it's not as if white men in antagonistic roles don't get favourable writing from their teams and adulation from sections of the fandom (one has to only look at some of the posts Gaius Augustine of BB, Caleb of Hero, and Kane of TE got - just to name a few). But we also often see fans of such white women decry the (very little compared to their black counterparts) condemnation that their faves get for their actions in comparison to both antagonistic and romanceable white men. Such readers often neglect to acknowledge exactly how much the narrative bends over backwards to accomodate them, in a way that they never have done for even mildly hostile/wary black and brown women. And often this is with ample support and encouragement within the fandom itself.

One cannot even pretend this is a recent development. The early books had their fair share of white-woman-adulation and you can see some of the patterns that would solidify in PB discourse already take shape in their early books.

One excellent example of this is TCaTF. Compare the treatment that white women like Helene Leventis, Hex and Zenobia Nevrakis are given, to what Rowan Thorn - a black woman - gets. Helene is allowed to escape never to return, or join Kenna, despite being the woman who killed her mentor and close friend Gabriel. Hex is well known in the series for her sadistic torture devices and for destroying an extremely prosperous kingdom. Yet, she is captured - alive - and there are two options that allow her a bit more mercy, and only one that recommends the harshest of punishments. Rowan in the meantime only betrays Kenna if the latter is an absolute tyrant to her, and letting her go if she betrays her is touted as a failure. Her loyalty doesn't ensure she will live like Diavolos' does - you can in fact leave her to die if you don't have enough diamonds/prestige points.

The Freshman was an improvement on this: even if Becca Davenport started out as a classic college mean girl, her redemption arc involved her needing to work to regain trust with the group and her best friend Madison, regardless of the MC's fondness of her. Her housemates immediately set her straight when she lashes out at them at the beginning of TS, and Becca has to plan for almost a-book-and-a-half to get her friendship with Madison back to normal again.

Sadly, this is something that rarely ever happened again. Discrepancies in character treatment became more and more obvious as the years passed. Books where black and brown women behaved even mildly unimpressed or catty with the MC, showed them either suffering grievous fates or written out of the narrative (eg. Scarlett not even getting a proper future in the VoS bonus scene) or being mistrusted and misunderstood constantly by the MC and their friends (Aurora). Books where white women could cause grievous harm depicted them being let off without so much as a slap on the wrist (eg. Aunt Mallory of RoE being rewarded with a happy life, a man and reconciliation with the niece she tried to kill and the daughter she emotionally abused).

(Screenshots from SavageLordBarlow's YouTube channel)

Perhaps the worst and most obvious case to date was that of Vanessa Blackwood of MoTY, who called a young child "guttersnipe" within minutes of encountering her, outed a lesbian teacher, encouraged her son's bullying, provided legal counsel to the MC's ex husband just to see the woman suffer, and engineered a plot to frame the MC for theft so she could lose her job. Once Vanessa had crossed her limits, PB ensured they laid on the sympathy narrative thick, having her show sad faces when the MC scolded her in a paywall scene, punishing only her brown lackey (both the white people involved - Vanessa and Guy - are never named when Tallulah is exposed, even though she literally stole jewellery and framed the MC for them). In the series finale, Vanessa was rewarded with a cushy diamond scene where the MC can choose (in what is the understatement of the century) to call her "classist and a little bit racist" - all she is given at the end of the book is an extremely softball form of criticism.

Compare this to Xanthe of ACOR, who had far less power, who was repeatedly slut shamed by the MC and others for doing her job, and whose end was met in a "comical" scene that implied she'd been sold into sexual slavery while two black members of her scholae gloated over her plight (in a manner so uncharacteristic of them that even players who didn't necessarily like Xanthe were shocked. I would highly recommend you read @cassiopeiacorvus' excellent essay on her, "Xanthe: Courtesan, Rival, Pawn").

In an essay I'd written years ago, I'd noted the following:

"Check out who the narrative rewards you for treating well, as opposed to who will be made to support you either way.

You're allowed to show basic decency to a black or brown woman. But you're expected to show kindness, understanding and empathy to a white woman, and richly rewarded if you do. In some cases you will also face consequences if you don't. (Fandom - take note of the difference, and be sure not to forget it)."

Madeleine Amaranath is probably one of the best examples of this - with blatant retcons, unfounded adulation and obvious pandering lasting over five books.

Rules of Engagement

When we look at the full cast of TRR, we find at least six characters who are callbacks to its sister series, Rules of Engagement. Leo, Constantine, Regina, Bastien, Madeleine and Rashad (the last one was an addition from TRR2 onwards). Part of TRR's appeal as a series was its ability to reference the earlier one through these characters, but this time from the PoV of Leo's younger brother instead.

Madeleine appeared in only 2 chapters in RoE. She was Leo's fiancée, in an arranged match that not only their parents but their citizens expected, unfazed by the "commoners" Leo brought to his bed and secure in the knowledge that no matter who he slept with she would eventually become his Queen. Leo dashes these expectations, however, by abdicating his claim to the throne - whether the RoE MC chooses him or not.

At this point - when TRR was barely even a concept - Leo was a clear fan favourite. Players liked the idea of romancing a rogue prince from a fictional European country; it meant they could revel in the luxury of touching royalty, while being away from all the hard, unsavoury parts. The Madeleine angle provided them with a rival to fight off, and at the time that was all that mattered.

Was Leo's behaviour in RoE, towards both the RoE MC and Madeleine, dishonest? Definitely, but not many seemed to care much at the time and it hardly created a dent in his fanbase (most of the criticisms against him and his cheating ways and irresponsibility would emerge later - when the Leo stans became Drake stans, and it was more convenient to badmouth Liam's family).

Jeffrey Herdman, a Junior Game Writer with Pixelberry for over 7 years, was a part of both the RoE and TRR teams, and proudly admitted in the TRR2 pre-release interview, to being the one in charge of writing Madeleine:

Q: Very funny. (Just so we're clear, Jeffrey is joking. Sort of.) Out of curiosity, who's your favorite character to write in The Royal Romance?

Jeffrey: Madeleine. It's fun to write someone who's constantly trying to spin a situation to their benefit, and making power plays along the way. I've actually been writing for Madeleine since her appearance in Rules of Engagement: Book 2, so we're practically besties.

Excerpt from The Royal Romance: Book 2 Interview

(If we were to compare this adulation of the character from Jeffrey, to the person who wrote Hana - head writer Jennifer Young, you'd find a surprising difference. In this very interview Jennifer talks about enjoying the process of writing Hana, but pointed to Drake as her favourite LI - "In my personal game, my love interest is definitely Drake, and I totally make Kara write him just so I can read his scenes and enjoy the romance. =)".

Perhaps if Jennifer had spent less time fawning over Drake, and more time doing Hana's story justice, that LI wouldn't be stuck in a situation where the team constantly erased her experiences and history to benefit their favourites)

When you look at Jeffrey's open admiration of Madeleine, and trace her fairly choppy and largely incoherent narrative journey through the books...a lot of things begin to make sense.

TRR1 - Would a TRR1 Madeleine Have Been A Better Fit for Hana?

When you look at the first book, you can tell that the possibility of any of the other alternative pairings besides Liam and Olivia wasn't really entertained. There is no buildup at all for Maxwell x Penelope, Drake x Kiara - and not even a single direct interaction between fellow competitors Hana and Madeleine. In fact, TRR2 often had to cover up for the lack of interaction in certain cases by making the alternative LI come up with justifications for why they weren't approaching the LI before.

There is maybe one implied interaction between Hana and Madeleine, that I don't think even the writers paid much attention to at the time. In the pie baking scene in Applewood, Hana is assigned to Madeleine's team if the MC doesn't take her along. Whichever group Hana is in, she is in charge of the pie design.

In the diamond scene, she takes the MC's suggestions and gives her advice on the amount of apples required for the filling. Given that she gives credit to the MC (in front of Queen Regina) in this option, and doesn't not do the same for Madeleine, it is likely that she was allowed to decorate for the other team, but not with much input from the captain.

This pie has a rose design, which is beautiful but lacks the intricacy and the challenge of the Cordonian Royal Seal, which the MC can suggest in the diamond scene. It's possible that by default, Madeleine handled the baking herself (since Penelope couldn't even boil water and in fact is so distracted she unwittingly helps sabotage the pie), and Hana was assigned strictly decoration duties. But even these possibilities rely on conjecture and guesswork, with no real dialogue or interaction shown.

There are no other scenes where the two women talk or do anything together. Hana may be present in one or two scenes where Madeleine is speaking (such as the dining scene in Ch 17 where Madeleine tells the court ladies about the upcoming Engagement Tour), but the two never directly engage with each other. It's more likely that (like Maxwell and Penelope, or Drake and Kiara), the writers may have thought of Hana and Madeleine only in the second or third book - more likely the third, but there are possible hints in TRR2 if you squint.

Hana is an interesting anomaly among the cast of TRR. She is both Cordonian and foreigner; the ways of the Cordonian court are, in equal parts, both familiar and confusing to her. This serves as an double-edged advantage to the MC - Hana is both skilled and knowledgeable enough to ease her into the culture, and isolated and vulnerable enough for the MC to step up as a hero on occasion. We also find out in Lythikos (TRR1 Ch 7) that she was so deep in the closet that she couldn't fully articulate her struggle to love the romantic English noble who wanted to marry her, in the presence of the woman she was slowly beginning to love. Within the competition itself, Hana is shown having a hard time finding people who will associate with her, often shown left out of events and her yacht party abandoned during the Regatta. The broken engagement could have a hand in making her appear to be struggling in the competition, but tbh Olivia is the only one who brings it up. Overall, she does well in the competition, but gets little credit for the same.

Madeleine is the polar opposite of this. Even though the ladies of the court initially view her with a mixture of pity and respect (due to her broken engagement with Leo, and her position as a Countess and winner of the previous season), their views on Madeleine once she enters the competition range from anger (Olivia), to speculation (Kiara and Penelope), to indifference and later suspicion (the MC).

Madeleine comes into the social season with several advantages: her pedigree and her years of experience at court. Both Bertrand and the MC note that Madeleine hails from a "powerful family" and "is immersed in the intrigues and maneuverings of courtly life", and therefore the MC is cautioned by Applewood to pay more attention to her than to Olivia. If the MC fails to win court favour, both Penelope and Kiara show allegiance to Madeleine. Where Hana is shown to be vulnerable despite her skills, charm and intelligence, Madeleine is meant to be viewed with respect even by her peers - and expected not to return that respect to others unless they're the king and queen.

I often view the Madeleine of Book 1 (and early TRR2), and the Madeleine of the latter half of Book 2, as two separate people (more on that in the next section). Early Madeleine was depicted as a clear threat. While she does nothing too out-of-pocket during the competition, her threats to the MC once she is (optionally) the favourite frontrunner, her singular focus on only the king and queen (and largely ignoring the Prince), and inability to respectfully lose, ensure that the reader registers her as a figure of danger early on. The first time she (optionally) faces an obvious loss and sees the MC crowned as Apple Queen, Madeleine tells her to "savour these moments. You may never hear the phrase again".

Her very extreme attempts to belatedly win Liam's favour after ignoring him the entire season (we later find out that she barged into his sleeping quarters the previous night and suggested the arrangement that Liam speaks about in TRR2), earns her speculative looks from the MC and wariness from Liam himself. Given that the outcome was so different in TRR2 but the buildup to said outcome was so rushed and chaotic, there is a 70/30 chance that Madeleine's buildup in Book 1 was meant to highlight her as someone with the capability to harm the MC, rather than just as a red herring. At the very most, Book 1 would highlight her as powerful, with the intention that Book 2 would follow through with showing her as a cog in a very vicious machine.

But because Madeleine's actions in TRR1 don't result in any direct harm, it's honestly hard to envision her as dangerous beyond the subtle threats (that people could brush off as basic rivalry) and rank classism.

Would Hana's pairing with the Madeleine of TRR1 have worked? It's equally hard to say. If we take only Book 1 into account, and ignore the very real possibility of a threat that Madeleine represents, there's a sliver of a chance that such a pairing could work...if Madeleine works on herself. At this point she hasn't manifested as a direct threat to Hana in a way that, say, Olivia has - and all the MC has at this point are theories and speculation. You'd have to probably change half of Madeleine's characterization, but it could be workable if the foundation for such a pairing was mutual respect from the start.

Still, when you take into consideration that Madeleine being involved in the plot against the MC was a very legitimate possibility, it's hard to see any opening for this pairing. Even Penelope - whose coddling from the narrative knew no limits - was no longer entertained as a potential alternative romance for an LI the moment her role in the plot was uncovered. If any harm was done to the MC, and Madeleine was found to be behind it, there is no way Hana would even be allowed to entertain the thought of her as an alternative LI at all.

You see - hurting Hana is no big deal. But hurting the MC and still getting an LI to show interest in you? Now that would be beyond the pale!

Madeleine: A Red Herring...Or A Villain Retconned?

As I have mentioned earlier, there is one writer - who has seniority in the company because of his many years there, who has always been in charge of Madeleine's writing, and who has always loved writing her. On close inspection one can say for certain that Jeffrey Herdman had a fair bit of sway in the team itself, especially from the fact that one of his weirdest writing suggestions - the MC's supposed obsession with hats - was retained in the books as a gag for a very, very long time (TRF finale livestream interview). When you take both Jeffrey's sway in the team, and the writing of Madeleine in TRR2 and 3 (and beyond), one can make several educated guesses about what Madeleine was built up to be, and how that changed midway.

Plenty of fan posts written in the gap between TRR1's finale and TRR2's release, took for granted that Madeleine would have some role to play in the plot against the MC. While one may assume this was due to "jealousy" from players or "hate for a bitchy character", there were enough signs in TRR1 and 2 that this was the route the narrative was initially planning to take with her.

The MC does voice suspicions of Madeleine in the first book - mostly after Madeleine herself voices threats to the MC during the Apple Queen ceremony. Madeleine also looks apprehensive at the (optional) public support Liam shows towards the MC at the Beaumont estate, and even shows him a suspiciously huge amount of attention at the Coronation. The MC even confronts Madeleine during the Coronation festivities when she gets a note threatening her to withdraw from the competition, believing it was sent by the latter. But beyond this, Madeleine's own words in TRR1 often sound ominous and laced with subtle threats. Still - going by just TRR1's evidence, Madeleine could still work as a good red herring, since she's not exactly crossed a clear line with anyone yet.

TRR2 seems to go in one direction when it comes to Madeleine's arc, then makes a sharp pivot in the opposite direction post Chs 7 and 8. The first half of the book has both the MC and Liam regard her with doubt and suspicion, especially when the MC learns that Madeleine had come to Liam's rooms the night before the Coronation, and insisted he continue the relationship with the MC on the sly while making her the queen. The book presents several contrasts between Madeleine and the MC, presenting their possible ruling styles and envisioning how each woman would fare as a future queen.

In a diamond scene in TRR2 Ch 4, Liam asks the MC how she would handle a plate of curry chicken falling on someone - an incident that has already occurred in some playthroughs to Madeleine (who got recognizably frustrated and called the whole episode "a disaster"). In contrast, the MC can claim she would either defuse the situation with humour or help clear the mess - both of which establish that unlike Madeleine the MC knows how to adapt to different situations, and prefers to find a solution rather than take her frustrations out on everyone else. Liam points out the differences between the two women as the MC "having perspective... every gaffe isn't a disaster".

Multiple scenes in the story focus on Madeleine's rigidity, her inability to adapt, her hunger for power, her belief that becoming queen gives her a free pass to be a tyrant, her hubris that allows her to outright harm some of her ladies in waiting and believe she will never face consequences, and her overall lack of real impact during her own engagement tour (only if the MC fails miserably does the Italian statesman Francesco even mention Madeleine). A lot of this buildup indicates that she won't be as effective a queen as other characters claim she will be.

Her overall behaviour in the first half of TRR2 seems to highlight overconfidence, and a willingness to overstep every possible boundary in the belief that nothing will now prevent her from getting what she wants ("the best part about being Queen is that I don't have to explain myself to anyone. Including you."). Even though she isn't queen yet, both Madeleine and everyone around her behave as if she has already been crowned! That kind of overconfidence - especially from someone who should know better than anyone that winning the competition doesn't necessarily mean she'll be crowned - makes more sense when she is aware that there are powerful people (like the former king and her aunt, the former queen) to back her.

There is also the fact that Penelope's involvement in the plot never got any proper buildup. There is just one scene, in TRR2 Ch 6, where she speaks about feeling uncomfortable at parties and balls, and how much she hates crowds. The reveal of her being the culprit is in Ch 7; the reveal of her social anxiety is in Ch 8. Before this, you have zero indicators of her being involved in this level of deception - even though her history of "social anxiety" should have ideally made that kind of subterfuge difficult, and she should have been able to leave a few tells, signalling her guilt. It is very clear on rereads that Penelope's involvement in the plot was a last-minute narrative decision.

But perhaps the strongest evidence that TRR2 was originally meant to establish Madeleine as part of the plot against the MC, is a line from the very first scene of the book. When a confused MC asks Bertrand how it's possible for Liam to break his engagement, Bertrand mentions a constitutional provision:

"The king is able to change his selection in specific cases for the good of the nation". The MC being proven as framed and unfairly disgraced achieves very little in this context, because the focus is clearly on the king's final choice. This means that the engagement cannot be voided on the basis of the MC being innocent, but on the basis of Madeleine being unfit for the role.

What happens to this "constitutional clause" once Penelope is declared the culprit among the court ladies rather than Madeleine? It disappears completely. If she was really meant to be a red herring from the start, the team would never have added this line in the first place. Nor would they have left the "buildup" for Penelope's anxiety till Ch 6, just one chapter before her reveal. If Madeleine was really meant to be a mere red herring from the start, there would have been more than just one crumb presented for that trail.

It is highly possible that the team had plans for Madeleine to be involved in the plot, or in something shady enough to justify breaking the engagement. It is just as highly possible that Jeffrey, the writer in charge of her character, allowed his favouritism for that character to dictate his writing of her, and convinced the team to change the trajectory of the story to benefit her.

Hana and Madeleine - The First Half of TRR2

Most of the interactions between Hana and Madeleine in TRR2 are overshadowed by one incident in Ch 7 - the one most popularly known as "the chocolate incident". Madeleine was already not too popular as a character when this scene came out, but her admission that she wanted to break Hana crossed enough of a line that a number of players would bring it up as a reason for why they couldn't ever like her, no matter how often she was retconned in canon.

A common misconception made about the "chocolate incident" from Madeleine lovers and haters alike, is that it's viewed as a singular episode rather than as an escalation in an ongoing pattern of threats that Madeleine was already making to Hana.

Viewing it as an isolated incident is precisely what allowed both Madeleine stans, and the canon narrative itself, to severely downplay what Madeleine did, and what she openly declared she would continue doing to Hana. Therefore, it is essential to look into Hana and Madeleine's interactions before Ch 7, as well as the context behind Hana's return to court and the very real and grave threat that Madeleine represents to Hana specifically.

To do this, we must first look into how Hana's return to court (after her parents forced her to leave post Coronation) is depicted. There are two versions of this story - Madeleine's version...and the truth.

Madeleine's Version: "If it wasn't for me, she'd still be on the other side of the world. I've heard dogs remember those who feed them. I hope you'll keep this in mind and remember that dear Hana is here by my personal invitation". This is a half-truth at best and ironically, this is the version Hana sticks to. She is never allowed to tell us differently.

The truth, as said by Liam to Hana post Coronation: "I am the King of Cordonia. I'm sure Lady Madeleine knows that if she wants to keep our engagement, she'll have to give me something. Perhaps I can convince her to make you part of her court". Hana never gets to tell us this. That honour is given to Drake!

Even after the MC (optionally) gets to know this truth, she never talks to Hana about it, and Hana is never allowed to veer from Madeleine's narrative even in private. In the process, Madeleine gets to use her half-truth as a form of blackmail - threatening Hana at least twice to send her back to China if she paces even one toe out of Madeleine's arbitrary line.

In TRR2 Ch 4, Madeleine is shown antagonizing her entire court (ordering Penelope to get lemonade and comparing her to dogs, telling Kiara to exoticize herself by not speaking in English [which itself has colonial/Orientalist connotations]). But none is more ominous and disturbing than her subtle threat to Hana before introducing her to the two suitors:

Being sent back to her parents is a terrifying prospect for Hana...for two reasons. For one, Hana is committed to being there for the MC, to contributing to her investigation (and she does! Massively. Perhaps more than anyone else in the group). For another, she is just beginning to realize what a damaging environment her parents' house is, and she also knows they are already growing suspicious that she hasn't found another suitor yet. By the end of this conversation, Hana is visibly distraught... to the point of needing moral support (something she rarely asks for herself).

Remember - this is an arbitrary rule Madeleine comes up with, that applies only to Hana. In the same conversation, neither Kiara nor Penelope are placed under this kind of pressure. Though Penelope claims in Ch 6 that her parents won't allow her to come home if she doesn't get a suitor, Madeleine doesn't levy any other threats of this nature on her (she harms Penelope in other ways).

Madeleine is aware that Liam was the one responsible for Hana's return. It is implied that she is also aware that neither Liam nor Hana can say this in public. By this coin, she'd know that she shouldn't be the one who can take a call on sending Hana back - Liam is. Yet she issues this sort of a threat, and worse still...is allowed to get away with it through Hana and the MC's silence, both in private and in public.

Unlike the MC and Olivia, the other three ladies of the court are present in official positions to the future Queen, and are expected to publicly pledge loyalty to her. The narrative of TRR2 alone seems to give the King's fiancèe powers and influences similar to an actual Queen Consort's. And Hana, Kiara and Penelope aren't just random "court members" - they are Madeleine's ladies-in-waiting. They cannot even speak to certain people unless she approves of it (Ch 1), she orders them around with the disrespect that many in that nobility reserve for their servants (Penelope in Ch 4), she publicly humiliates and insults them if they make a single mistake (eg. Penelope not getting a metallic dress in time for the bachelorette), and she can get away with causing them grievous harm (Hana). There is no actual point to any of this behaviour - it achieves nothing and (by the narrative parameters of the third book) is actually foolish, because Madeleine's actions could cost the royal family their relationship with the Great Houses. Neither the MC nor Liam (the actual monarch), would be allowed by the narrative later to abuse their power the way Madeleine can, in a position that isn't even hers yet!

It is easy to view Madeleine's interactions with Hana and Penelope especially, as just some regular mean-girls shit, with all the excuses, justifications and crocodile tears that the fandom can shower on said white/white-passing mean girls. Canon itself encourages this reading when they use the word "hazing" to describe what Madeleine put Hana through. But when we speak of Madeleine's behaviour in her engagement tour that way, we miss a very important aspect of her dynamic with these two women. They are no longer competitors or mere allies. They are not just people she knows in court.

They are not Madeleine's equals. They are her employees. She is directly in a position of immense, unquestioned and unchecked power over them. Publicly, she has the authority to invite them into her court, and to throw them out of their jobs. It is from that lens, that we must view her behaviour, especially in Ch 7.

The "Chocolate Incident" and Its Aftermath

Another reason to believe Jeffrey's favouritism for Madeleine allowed for an actual change in the story, is the way this above scene - and the ones preceding it - were handled immediately in both the immediate and long-term aftermath.

Often dubbed "the chocolate incident", this scene takes place in Italy (the first stop of the engagement tour) during Madeleine's bachelorette. For anyone who has forgotten the incident, Madeleine's ladies-in-waiting are supposed to organize different fun activities for her bachelorette, and the MC uses each event as both a PR exercise and an opportunity to check the credit cards of the ladies.

The final activity is Hana's, an intricately-planned chocolate fondue party complete with chocolate-themed games and treats. If one reads too much between the lines, one could maybe notice the tiniest sliver of a romantic hint in Hana's conversation with the MC over her confusing an actual bachelorette party with the show The Bachelorette (It is just as possible tho - if not more - that this is a comic aside pointing to Hana's lack of exposure to modern media).

However, things take a turn for the worst at this juncture. Madeleine heavily berates Hana for not knowing that she is "allergic to chocolate", accusing her of an attempt to murder and even threatening to remove her from her position in court. This leaves Hana so distraught that she ruins her own dress in the process, and is damn near inconsolable. The MC can - if she chooses - comfort Hana along with their friends. At the end of the night, a heavily drunk Madeleine gleefully admits she lied about the allergy and gloats about wanting to keep hurting Hana till she breaks, because she "wants to have a little fun".

She claims, when asked why, that it's because "everyone wants something, but the nice ones like Hana don't even have the decency to act like it". Which sounds like the sort of sick logic that fandom often happily accepts from their favourite white antagonists, where they can project whatever sob story they want to make such a reasoning palatable. Such attempts ignore the fact that Madeleine is torturing someone for supposed "duplicity" when she is herself well-known for being insincere.

Later, when it was convenient for the fandom to hate on Hana, she would be either blamed for the torture Madeleine put her through (because she was "weak" or "too nice", or that she was "spineless and deserved this treatment". I even saw posts that claimed it "wasn't that bad" (in the case of one particularly memorable instance, a Madeleine stan went so far as to say, agreeing with a post expressing a fondness for Madeleine: "...before anyone mentions the chocolate prank: Did Hana die, tho?"). Some also tried to reason that it was fair for Madeleine to target Hana, either to showcase her "wiles" or because of her sad sad childhood.

As I pointed out earlier, every single one of these takes tend to downplay Madeleine's bullying/abuse so that it sounds more like a schoolyard squabble that happened only once, rather than a person in power consistently placing their employee's job under threat, with the stated intention of harming them mentally and emotionally on a regular basis, until they experienced a breakdown. The center of this conflict isn't about different people with different approaches. Nor is it about court maneuvering or wiles because honestly, nothing worthwhile was achieved through Madeleine's abuse, and she had no purpose for doing those things beyond deriving a sick pleasure from other people's suffering.

It isn't about nice vs tough, nor ambitious vs generous, nor "naive" vs "jaded". It is about a gross power imbalance. An imbalance that results in the exploitation of the more vulnerable party...which is later brushed aside by the one who claims to be the latter's "friend" like it means nothing.

Structure wise, one can see striking similarities between this chapter, and TRR1's Ch 7, where the MC can view Olivia in a new light in the first half of the chapter, but be disturbed by her vindictive nature by the end of it. Here too, the MC comes into the investigation of the credit cards fully expecting to see Madeleine as the culprit. Over the course of the evening she finds Madeleine treating her ladies-in-waiting badly, but also calling out the press for targeting only the MC but staying silent on Tariq's involvement (ironically, Madeleine herself didn't exactly believe the MC if she tells her she was set up). She is also shocked when she realises Madeleine isn't the culprit at the club. Still, the court is given a rude shock when Hana is accused of putting Madeleine's life in danger.

Clearly the aim of such a chapter was to make the MC soften a little towards Madeleine, while still keeping some of the antagonistic tension. However, the more direct impact of Madeleine's huge ego trip on Hana made the harm far more visible than Olivia's jibes towards a woman who was far away...plus the scenes that followed in the former sequence centered Drake, far more than the ones in the latter that involved comforting Hana.

Madeleine's bullying also clashes - quite conveniently - with the reveal of Penelope's betrayal, so that the latter overshadows what Hana went through altogether.

It is important to note at this point that the MC is the only person not directly tied in an alliance to Madeleine (besides Olivia and Maxwell, who are then missing at the fashion show backstage scene in Paris) who knows Madeleine's intentions towards Hana. She is the only person present at the event in Paris, who knows that Madeleine intended to continue harassing her until she broke. Hana herself is never made fully aware of this, and if she is left in a vulnerable, dangerous position while on her mission to support the MC's investigation - then the fault lies to a large extent with the MC for keeping silent, rather than protecting her friend from someone who fully intended to hurt her.

I say this because in France (Ch 8), the MC's exposing of Madeleine is by choice, rather than default (this essay has a full breakdown of said scene). Moreover, the option where the MC can "expose" her will result in Madeleine lying about the act being an "official hazing" she does for all her ladies-in-waiting. Not only does the MC neglect to contest Madeleine's claims (or even tell Hana the full truth in secret), she also parrots Madeleine's lie in a conversation with Adeleide in NY, as if it were the truth (Ch 14).

Remember how I mentioned Jeffrey - the writer who was in charge of Madeleine's scenes and sang her praises in TRR2's pre-release interview? His influence here is obvious in the way the narrative sharply pivots away from Madeleine's characterization so far, to engage in a full-blown pity party.

The abuses of her power (towards Hana and Penelope in particular) stop. The parallels that canon makes between Madeleine and the MC as future Queens, stop. No reference, ever, is made of her actions before Ch 8.

For over seven chapters, Madeleine largely fades into the background - sometimes there will be scenes where she is present, but without any dialogue or actions. Sometimes she may make a catty move like getting the MC to pick up her wedding ring, but from a safe distance. Because she doesn't openly antagonize anyone or show up much in Chs 9-15, the sense of distance could allow some to soften in their memories of her. Especially when the only strong reminders of Madeleine in these chapters come from Adeleide, her mother.

Adeleide is an important cog in the machinery that resulted in the retconning of Madeleine's character in TRR2. Without her, Patriotic!Madeleine wouldn't have become canon. Adeleide sets the stage for this extremely inaccurate reading of her, with complaints on two occasions about how Madeleine is "putting too much pressure on herself" and working too hard. Which contradicts her very real actions in Applewood and Italy, where she regularly antagonized her entire court and where she doesn't get much notable approval from foreign dignitaries (Signor Francesco) unless the MC is that bad.

The narrative, at this point, expects us to view her with sympathy, as someone who could have been "an excellent queen" (Adeleide's words, not mine). The stage is clearly set so that we pity her when Liam calls off the engagement and she loses this position, that we can see her loss as "unfair". It ensures that there is an overflow of sympathy for Madeleine's plight, especially since she had already lost her chance to become Queen once before with Leo. By this point, many readers had actually forgotten the "chocolate incident" altogether, and were more than willing to view Madeleine as a patriot who wasn't given her due. A description that, ironically, more accurately fits Hana.

Is Hana Really Just A Nice Girl who Never Fights Back?

As I mentioned before, Hana's "niceness" and "weakness" were sometimes presented in fandom as justifications/reasons for Madeleine's bullying of her, often in an attempt to shift blame or make it sound like Madeleine's stated "reasons" (in TRR2 Ch 7) to hurt her were legitimate. Almost as if to say that Hana was targeted because she presents herself as an easy target.

To be clear, I don't subscribe to such a train of thought myself. Different people react to bullies and abusers in different ways - and not being able to push back aggressively in tense situations doesn't make anyone a lesser person. In fact, canon itself doesn't mind providing a "weaker" person protection against someone like Madeleine...as long as that person is Penelope. So we cannot even claim that Hana's "weakness" is why Madeleine targets her, or why the MC shouldn't have to protect Hana better.

Canon also doesn't help much in this respect, especially with their preferences for the meaner white women. In fact the narrative doesn't even allow Hana the chance to speak up in private against Madeleine's half-truths about her return, and she is made to easily accept Madeleine's "hazing" excuse. Let's not even get into how she speaks about Madeleine in TRR3. Additionally, no one in Hana's own friend group provides adequate protection or support - they stay silent where it counts.

But is Hana really that incapable of fighting for herself? According to the finale of TRR1, no.

Even though the scene is hidden behind a paywall, Hana's pushback against Olivia's treatment of her during the social season is strong, decisive and done entirely on her own initiative, with no prompting or involvement from the MC. She is honest about the ways in which Olivia has hurt her, but also makes it clear that Olivia's opinions and vitriol no longer matter - effectively reclaiming her own power in the process.

Such a scene is a clear indicator that Hana is capable of pushing back, and isn't afraid to speak truth to power - as early as TRR1. While one could say that as a diamond scene, it is possible that it can't be fully shown as canon - there are ways the writers know how to incorporate such things. Often, they have managed to write in similar scenes or the same information into free scenes later on (eg. the selling of Liam's bachelor party photos, which wasn't even that important to the story of TRR2). Hana could have had a free pushback scene with Olivia if the writers really wanted to give her one.

That aside, it's safe to say that there is a precedent for Hana being able to fight back before TRR2, and canon could have found ways to ensure that she could safely do so with Madeleine too. Or at least have more protection and care from her friend group, if her position as lady-in-waiting prevented her from speaking out. Penelope got to demand protection later on, after all - and she wasn't even our friend.

We must also take into account the positions of power that Madeleine, Olivia and later even the MC hold. Madeleine is a countess in line to become queen in TRR2. Olivia is a duchess, and the MC herself is given this honour in Book 2. Hana - despite her skills, knowledge and charm - never gets lands, nor a title unless she marries the MC. Hana's experience in Cordonia isn't just about "other women" being mean to her with the MC being "not like other girls" - all three of the above women are in positions of power over her, and even the nicest of them uses her more often than she helps.

TRR2 doesn't exactly build Hana and Madeleine as a pair. In hindsight one can read romantic hints into Madeleine's mocking usage of the word "darling" around Hana, Hana's attempt to replicate The Bachelorette for Madeleine's bachelorette party, and read parallels into both their toxic family histories (particularly Hana with her mother and Madeleine with her father). But there is no actual romantic content there that one could find with the other three pairs, which leads me to believe that Hana and Madeleine was only taken seriously as a romantic prospect in TRR3.

How did Madeleine become the final romantic choice for Hana, and no one else? Because the relationship was never made Hana's benefit - it was for Madeleine's. Given all the evidence laid out about TRR1!Madeleine, TRR2!Madeleine and including hints that she may have actually been written as the villain at some point, it's more likely that Madeleine's main writer ensured some changes in the writing of his favourite character midway into the story, resulting in her staying longer in court and several retcons that painted her as a tragic heroine and completely erased any actions that contradicted such a narrative.

This specific narrative also seems to draw upon a narrative trope that is seen sometimes in certain stories featuring queer couples - the Armoured Closted Gay. It is employed often enough, mostly to show the pervasiveness and immense pressure heteronormativity can have on some queer people - that sometimes, they hate themselves for not adhering to the norm and therefore project that self-hatred onto people like them. PB had done a similar kind of story in TF and ILITW - with Zig and an aggressive teammate Manny (but with discussions on sexual harassment and about being closeted) and with Lily Oritz and her crush Britney. Unlike Zig's and Lily's cases though, this sort of narrative hardly centers on Hana.

Hana is hardly treated as a person in her own right in this narrative. She is treated as a "consolation prize" for Madeleine's "good behaviour" and "hard work". Which is still a really, really hard story to sell when one of the characters states outright that they'd abuse their power over the other till she breaks.

So how does PB get back from that kind of cruelty, and convert it into an actual romance?

Madeleine in TRR3 - The Royal Retcon

(In order: MC complimenting Madeleine to Godfrey (Ch 3), response to Madeleine's "send my regards to Hana (Ch 9), Madeleine asking for a dance (Ch 16), Optional response about memories of Madeleine's bachelorette in Hana's Vegas diamond scene (Ch 16))

By gaslighting an entire fandom, of course.

TRR3 requires us at the very start to do two things - to recruit Madeleine into replacing Justin as our press secretary, and to convince her family to join the Unity Tour so that Cordonia knows its nobility stands with the Crown. Until this point, we've only had hints of Madeleine's so-called "patriotism", mostly from Adeleide. TRR3 Ch 3 goes full force on this reading: having Madeleine claim (in the most positive option) that all her efforts to become queen was "for my people...it was always for Cordonia", having Hana claim that Madeleine "would mostly likely take a bullet for Liam... because you'd never leave Cordonia without a King". Coupled with Godfrey and Adeleide's toxic family dynamics, the story is set to push forward a narrative where we are meant to sympathize with her and preferably downplay her behaviour from the previous book.

Throughout Madeleine's tenure as press sec, we are expected to laud her "work" - even though the truth is that she makes our work harder by giving us heavy folders and 100 note cards of materials just minutes before our meetings, and leaving out important information (like Zeke) for us to scramble about and find. Where during her time as future queen, her ladies-in-waiting were expected to have every detail perfect as per her desires otherwise face her wrath - as our employee, we are expected to appreciate efforts alone, and be lenient when she doesn't follow our rules (eg. wearing gold for our bachelorette when she was supposed to wear muted colours, trying to sneak in a white dress to our wedding). Most of our responses to her "work" involve fulsome praise, or at most a very light criticism that still claims she's good at her job (she isn't). And it isn't just the MC - even Justin (who recommended her) and Hana are made to sing her praises.

Having canon claim Madeleine does a good job when she actually doesn't is... frustrating, but not as awful as the retconning they do for her past behaviour. But it is part of a pattern that whitewashes Madeleine altogether so the readers can consider her deserving of the rewards that the narrative so badly wants to give her, whether her actual conduct matches up to these fulsome praises or not.

One clear tactic that is used to achieve this, was to have the person she harmed the most, speak of her in glowing terms. In TRR3 Ch 3, you have at least two instances during the "Cordonia's Most" game where Hana uses the game to compliment Madeleine. Here, she compliments Madeleine on knowing how to "charm a crowd...her confidence and poise", and claims her to be very patriotic. If the MC refuses to coddle Madeleine during their private conversation, the onus to be kind to her rests solely on Hana's shoulders, where she is required to say, "maybe it's time to see if you can catch more flies with honey". Hana is also shown wanting to include Madeleine in group activities (TRR3 Ch 6, before going to the spa), in the same way she tried to include Olivia in TRR2. When we're shown a Hana who is not only willing but enthusiastic to speak to Madeleine, it further encourages the reader to befriend her - almost as if to say, "if Hana doesn't mind being friendly with her, why should you?".

And this wouldn't be possible at all if canon was honest about Madeleine's conduct in TRR2. So much about Madeleine's advice to us in TRR3 directly contradicts her own behaviour as future queen in TRR2 ("having an entourage isn't about vanity...it's about support"). Had canon actually been honest about her conduct, this statement would be viewed as extremely ironic, a huge portion of the blame for Penelope's reluctance to return to court would be (rightly) placed on Madeleine's shoulders and we would be able to call her out specifically on her tyrannical behaviour as future queen, as well as her inability to adjust her work to suit her client now. We would not be placing Madeleine on a pedestal ad nauseum, or paying much attention to her childish complaints that her "efforts" are going unappreciated.

Whenever the early part of the engagement tour is referenced, it is spoken of in the vaguest, most milquetoast terms. The narrative will speak vaguely of "meanness", but never actually specify what Madeleine did. The closest we get to any sort of confirmation of this is in the Costume Gala (Ch 9) if the MC warns Madeleine to stay away from Hana...and even there, the MC just says she did "mean things". Which is the mildest possible way I have seen of someone describing a person who gloated about breaking Hana. Like the word "hazing" from the previous book, all these vague references leave it to the readers' faint memories, or imagination, to figure out what Madeleine did.

But all of these are just hints at best, and most of what we could assume of the writers' intentions came largely from guesswork. There was constantly a sense of something not being right, but many of us at the time couldn't completely articulate it. That is, until Ch 16, and only if we pressed a specific option in the Vegas diamond scene, in just Hana's playthrough:

Unlike the previous scenes - which were mostly attempts to obfuscate the events of the previous book - this scene replaces what actually happened with blatant lies. Not only does it wipe out entirely what Madeleine did, replacing it with a casual comment from Hana about her "fun side", it also smears Kiara for something she didn't do at all during the bachelorette (for clarity, Kiara found out she was a great dancer, and looked quite annoyed if the MC chose a wrong dialogue option as an excuse to see her card. The MC never saw her lashing out at Penelope during this event). Even if the MC and Hana were so drunk that night that they wouldn't remember events clearly (which isn't how they're depicted at all when the "chocolate incident" took place), it wouldn't be replaced with things that never actually happened. The writers were more than ready to throw Kiara under the bus to make Madeleine look better, and have those lies come out of Hana's mouth (and mind you, Hana liked Kiara so much she chose her to be her MoH in Ch 18 of her playthrough, so it can't even have been spite towards Kiara on her part).

In contrast, Penelope is allowed to be open about Madeleine's mistreatment of her. In fact she cites it as the main reason for her reluctance to return to court, and even complains at the MC if the latter asks her if she didn't get the memo on the bachelorette dress code in TRR3 Ch 16 ("oh no, no, it's like Madeleine all over again!"). The group is required to protect her from Madeleine; in Ch 4, when Penelope is upset at the very sight of Madeleine, Drake comes to her rescue and reassures her ("She's with us, Penelope. We won't let her bite."). While Madeleine herself is protected from any consequences for what she did to Penelope (besides an optional tiny jibe in Ch 4), the MC and her group are required to reassure her that they will never allow it to happen again. In a very disgusting contrast, the narrative pushes Hana at the forefront of the diamond scene with Madeleine, without ever considering her comfort or safety around the person who wanted to break her. Not only does the group involve her without ever asking her if she wants to be part of it - Drake and Maxwell safely distance themselves when the time comes for Madeleine to speak personally about her troubles, and the MC can choose not to be sympathetic in certain dialogue options. Which means that the onus to comfort and persuade her is largely on Hana's shoulders. We must also remember that, unlike Penelope, Hana is deprived of the full truth of Madeleine's intentions in the last book too.

Where the writers were ready to at least admit that Madeleine's behaviour affected Penelope deeply, they went to the extent of completely rewriting the narrative of her TRR2 bachelorette to erase what she put Hana through.

The "Romance" in TRR3

(First four screenshots from my playthroughs, next four from the Adventure...Romance...Thrills YouTube Channel, and the final row's screenshots from the Annabelle Lee YouTube channel and the Skylia YouTube channel)

The Hana and Madeleine "romance" is hinted at in 5 scenes (4 in other playthroughs, and just one in Hana's own). As with most of the other romances, Madeleine's feelings are the most prominent. To the more romance-coded overtures, Hana's reaction is usually shock and disbelief, with a small suspicion over whether Madeleine is doing this to trick her into humiliation later. But the narrative gives her very little opportunity to even talk about anything related to Madeleine, especially anything negative. You do have a scene at the finale that is meant to provide closure, but not in a romantic way. This scene is very different from the others, and in some ways puts an end to the possibility of this relationship happening anytime soon.

How did we get from those scenes to this final one in Ch 22? It would be useful to look at the scenes, within the timeline of TRR3's release and with the context of fandom reactions.

1. The "Cordonia's Most" Scene (Ch 3)

This diamond scene is written to give the MC/reader a bit of background on Madeleine's past and family, which will prove useful later when she has to convince the Amaranths to fix their relationship with each other. It is set against the background of a drinking game where an asker can quiz everyone else about who would be the most likely to do a particular action. Hana references Madeleine twice in the game (in a very complimentary manner), and Madeleine references Hana once. It was her comment about Hana being "stupidly sweet and perfect" that caught the attention of some readers and made them wonder if that was the route PB was planning to take with Hana. This dialogue shows up in Hana's route as well.

In later chapters, we see instances of Hana trying to include Madeleine in group activities...such as in Ch 6 where she invites the latter to come with them to the spa after the football match with Jiro and Camellia.

2 and 3. Cross-Referencing Each Other at Costume Gala (Ch 9)

This is a very interesting development, at an equally interesting time. Around the time Ch 9 released (end-April 2018), PB announced that TRR's team would be taking a hiatus, mostly to work on "some exciting stuff" during that break. It also gave them the time to work on certain things the fandom was demanding, and do away with others due to stan vitriol (Kiara's attraction towards Drake being one of them). The next chapter would only appear a month and a half later (mid-June).

Ch 9 sneaked in a scene that hinted at Hana and Madeleine as a romance option, but in a way that made it very hard for players to notice on a casual read. The scene is split in two parts: the MC can choose to speak to either Hana and Olivia, or Maxwell, Justin and Madeleine. Hana and Olivia's scene shows the two commenting on Gala outfits, which kickstarts a conversation about diplomacy vs bluntness. The latter option explores a variety of topics, mostly revolving around an appreciation for Madeleine's "great work".

Both Hana and Madeleine reference each other in their scenes. Hana's dialogue depends on whether the MC is her fiancèe or not; in other playthroughs, she admires Madeleine's costume, the compliment on her good looks very personal. In her own playthrough, she compliments Kiara's outfit but in a more distant fashion ("subtle and clever, just like her...very well-chosen"). In Madeleine's scene (which is the same across playthroughs), the ending involves her telling the MC to "send my regards to Hana", in response to which she can choose a line of questioning (which ranges from "protective towards Hana" to largely indifferent. In all three options, thankfully, the MC can close with "don't let me catch you antagonizing her", but that really is one small mercy in a pile of blatant retconning.

What marks Hana's dialogue about Madeleine as an LI-specific option, is that she says something entirely different if the MC is getting married to her. This is an indication that the dialogue was intended to be read as romantic, and that it couldn't be said by an LI who was already in love and ready to marry the MC. Pretty much in the same way that Olivia in Liam's playthrough cannot hold his hand in Applewood or dance with him in Vegas.

I wrote an essay on this at the time - both on the possibility of the pairing and why it was a bad idea - and the overall response I received at the time was mixed. Those who remembered exactly what went down at Madeleine's bachelorette and weren't her fans hated the prospect, but some weren't as convinced and some refused to believe it would happen. So there was some pushback for it, citing Madeleine's "chocolate incident" (thankfully, since there were players who had forgotten about it), but it was very low-key and didn't gain much traction.

4. An Offer to Dance in Vegas (Ch 16)

The most obvious indication of Hana and Madeleine being a romantic possibility was in the Vegas chapter. It was impossible to miss for people who didn't romance Hana. This scene, again, featured only in playthroughs where Hana wasn't getting married - which meant that many Hana-romancers didn't get to know of this pairing unless they were told by a friend or saw any such posts on their dash (some even found out years later, to their shock and dismay).

The mild pushback from Ch 9 resulted in a scene where the writers could be emboldened to continue writing this pairing, but confirm (in the vaguest possible way) that Madeleine treated Hana badly. Madeleine's non-apology "apology" really reads more like an attempt to get into Hana's pants than actual regret, and is followed by a reaction from Hana that is confusing in its mildness. Hana is surprised at the offer to dance, asking Madeleine whether she's trying to trick her. While the mild suspicion is a slight improvement from Hana's fulsome praise and enthusiastic attempts to involve Madeleine in group stuff in previous chapters, it still downplays what Hana suffered at Madeleine's hands by making her present the weakest, most milquetoast examples of "fooling someone", examples that pale miserably in comparison to what Madeleine actually put Hana through.

With both the "stupidly sweet and perfect" dialogue and this scene, you'll notice that Madeleine is not only the one who initiates the conversation, but is also the only one with an actual voice in these exchanges. Forget having an opinion on whether she wants to have anything to do with Madeleine or not - the narrative doesn't even give poor Hana the opportunity to properly react beyond mere shock.

There was a stronger reaction to this scene than to the Ch 9 one, because it was way more visible (though you could avoid it just by letting Madeleine stay in her hotel) with Madeleine's romantic intentions on full display. Her asking Hana for a dance immediately after the no apology made it pretty obvious. Players who didn't see the Ch 9 scenes or who didn't believe the divergences meant anything, now couldn't deny that this was positioned as an alternative romance. Additionally by this time, those who forgot about the "chocolate incident" did get reminded of the exact scene, so the vagueness with which Madeleine "addressed" her actions in TRR2 felt criminally inadequate for a number of readers.

Most of us, however, didn't know about the retcon in Hana's Vegas scene, until years later. Those who didn't do Hana's playthrough would have had no idea, and those who did more likely chose the more romantic options.

5. "Jealous?" (Ch 20)

This scene is unique in that the option shows up across all playthroughs, but the specific reaction only shows up in two of them. It's understandable that Hana stans would have missed this - the dialogue is an option, the response is very fleeting and you would have to look through the same option in other playthroughs to recognise the variations.

In the cases of both Drake and Maxwell, Madeleine's response to this jibe from the MC is "ugh, please". Dismissive, almost mocking the idea that she would have any interest in them. In Liam's and Hana's cases, she appears shocked for a minute, then composes herself and gives a more neutral response ("I...I refuse to dignify such a ridiculous question with a response"). In Liam's case, one can safely assume that even though she had no romantic interest in him, she was still on the verge of marrying Liam and that alone would make the situation awkward. In Hana's case there is really no other reason for her to feel that awkward besides having lingering feelings that she cannot suppress.

While this version of the scene doesn't feature in playthroughs where she is single at all, it's still a very strong indicator of authorial intent. Even in the face of backlash against the pairing, the writers clearly wanted to continue hinting at the possibility, if they were slipping in hints of Madeleine's feelings for Hana as late as Ch 20 (just two chapters before the finale). The most plausible theory for this inclusion would be that the backlash was a lot more than it was after Ch 9, but not entirely enough to do away without the pairing completely...yet.

6. "I Wanted To Break You" (Ch 22)

No one knows what happened between Chs 20 and 22, and there's little I can think of that would account for such a quick change in such a short span of time. The finale has a scene featuring Hana and Madeleine, that begins by drawing more obvious parallels between the two women and their families (until now, the parallels were not as pronounced. It's not exactly a great parallel to begin with, since Madeleine has at least one supportive parent and doesn't get punished to the extent that Hana has been, if she openly protests against her parents' methods. But in TRR3 the narrative sometimes does use Hana's toxic parental situation as a parallel to garner sympathy for Madeleine's).

However, once the parents are out of the picture, the attention then turns to Hana and Madeleine, setting the stage for either a romantic confession or a full apology. This time, canon opts to go for the latter.

Unlike all the others, this scene is bluntly specific not just about what Madeleine did but what exactly her intentions were. It has her use the word "break"; it has her actually say the word "sorry". It allowed Hana, for the first time, to fully hear the truth about the harm Madeleine planned to wreck on her. And most importantly, it also allowed Hana her own voice in response to Madeleine's revelations, making it very clear to her that her forgiveness needed to be earned, over a period of time.

The dialogues used to talk about Madeleine's bachelorette in the finale are poles apart from the language they'd used earlier ("hazing", "put my ladies through their paces", "mean things", "refuse to coddle", "wronged"). The finale scene was a more accurate return to the original language and purpose of that bachelorette scene. In fact it sounds less like what canon had been attempting to gaslight their readers into believing thus far, and even seemed to borrow verbatim from the language of the readers who closely followed this issue.

One could call it a good closure scene on the surface level...but there are many, many problems with it.

One was the reaction of the MC. Her angry "excuse me?" in response to Madeleine's confession is still a very obvious retcon. It may have been done to preserve the myth that the MC is a good friend/wife to Hana, but reads as extremely dishonest when you remember that canonically, the MC knew the truth about Madeleine's intentions the whole time and just chose to leave Hana in the dark. It's an attempt to make the MC seem protective that ultimately rings false.

Another is the excuse Madeleine gives for why she targeted Hana. "I wanted to push Hana too far, and for her to drop the nice-girl act once and for all! Only, it isn't an act, is it?" My response when I first read this was "if Hana was faking it...so what. So fucking what. Who was she harming". Coming from the reigning queen of duplicity herself, Madeleine is really not in a position to be judging anyone for putting up a front. This also ties into the hollowness of the motives PB tried to belatedly cook up for TRR2 Madeleine's bullying - no matter what canon says to whitewash her actions, her attempts achieved nothing, did no good for Cordonia, and would likely have led to a very fractured court if the Unity Tour was held while she was queen.

Ultimately, the possibility of this pairing becoming canon was laid to rest in the final chapter. One could interpret Madeleine's promise of a starting gesture ("know that if anyone at court gives you trouble, I can make them regret it") as a possible opening to something more, but considering the earlier backlash, that was unlikely.

TRH - Madeleine Gets The Penelope Treatment, Hana Gets Her Entire Childhood History Retconned.

An interesting development that came up when TRH dropped was the departure of Jeffrey Herdman from the team, most likely because he was heavily involved in the writing of its Renaissance-era spin-off The Royal Masquerade. He would return, by TRF (he is part of their finale livestream), but by then his pet favourite character was likely gone.

TRH has a different set of circumstances, and different power dynamics. The MC is settled into marriage and trying for a child, the LIs are working in the council, Olivia is upgraded to cosplaying spymaster and the side characters go on with their lives. The first book of TRH seemed to do a surface-level recognition of some of the complaints certain readers had in previous books, but their favourites and the people who wouldn't get much attention or appreciation, remained the same.

TRH1 was a time when the writers praised Hana and claimed in a livestream that she was the kind of LI they would love to marry, but also where they gave her a condition that (inaccurately) made her unable to safely carry children (just for the MC to be the mother of the heir) and forced her to be immediately okay with that fate. As the sequel series progressed over the course of 4 books, the erasure of all that Hana was in the past was subtle and insidious - the narrative often compared her to Olivia and found her lesser, she was never allowed to even mention her home place China and worst of all - the writing completely retconned the emotional abuse she suffered at home by claiming it emerged from loving protection, from wanting to keep their daughter away from a cult. And even though Hana's discovery of her sexuality was described by Kara as a "journey that she's still on", no attempts were ever made to show her exploring what she likes romantically, or to show her dating. We don't know if she's involved with anyone, we don't know where she lives, we learn very little of her interests beyond what benefits the MC at any given moment, and the narrative never fails to remind us that they like Olivia more than they like her. Hell, they still encourage Olivia to keep insulting and degrading Hana! Hardly the behaviour of writers who love a character so much they would marry them irl, honestly.

On the other hand, Madeleine wasn't very prominent in TRH1, but gained notoriety in the next two books. The first book has her occasionally engage in inappropriate, invasive badgering of the MC to get pregnant quickly, and she continues to pretend that her doing whatever she likes without ever consulting the person in charge is professional behaviour (eg. Setting up the presscon about the MC's pregnancy announcement. She never even considers whether the MC would be comfortable announcing this pregnancy or not at this time). She gets to deliver a small bit of foreshadowing in the second half of the book (an early hint about Queen Eleanor's pregnancy, though Madeleine's awareness of it hardly makes sense when you look at the entire TRH series, and it never comes up as a point again). Her father being exposed as the traitor who poisoned the former queen builds up to a storyline that benefits her the most in the long run.

Hana is given one chapter where she can call Madeleine out on her entitlement (Savannah's bachelorette). She doesn't insult or berate Madeleine in TRH1 Ch 7, but is refreshingly no-nonsense and will not put up with Madeleine's constant whining about an event she had invited herself to. It's a small, cold comfort, since Hana's actions here are tied to making Savannah's bachelorette a success rather than for herself - but it's still gratifying to see Hana in a position where she can call people out without having to worry about the repercussions. Especially when the narrative disrespects Hana in so, so many other ways for the rest of the series.

In the same chapter, the ladies of the court are given an opportunity to talk about their love lives. Of the four, two women can speak about the people they like (Penelope about Ezekiel by default, and Olivia about Liam if you choose), and one only mentions him by name if the MC is married to someone else (Kiara, about Drake, if you choose to ask her over Madeleine). Madeleine doesn't mention anyone at all, insisting that marriage is something she will only consider for the benefit of her country or estate. This was a relief to players who feared that PB might attempt to push the possibility of romance between Madeleine and Hana again.

Though Madeleine doesn't get the romance that PB so desperately wanted to gift her in the last series, and she isn't given any further romances...the narrative clearly wasn't done pandering to her, even though Jeffrey was not officially a part of the team.

Remember how in the previous essay, we explored the levels to which PB encouraged players to coddle Penelope? Entire chapters would be spent just making her feel comfortable and safe, in encouraging her to help us. No actual initiative or enthusiasm from her end, even if her actions caused the problem or there were lives and reputations at stake. No, Penelope's comfort and happiness should be front and center.

Now think of that treatment, but on steroids and lasting for two whole books. That's what Madeleine's story - starting from TRH2 - looks like.

TRH1 ends with the reveal that Madeleine's father, Godfrey, was involved in the assassination of Liam's mother Eleanor. So a certain amount of narrative focus on Madeleine was expected, perhaps. But the second book doesn't stop at just that.

We are not merely asked to be kind to Madeleine. No, kindness towards Madeleine is expected of us. The warning issued in TRH2 Ch 4 promises "consequences", which means we know straight off the bat that we will be punished if we're not nice enough. It insists we take note of her "fragile state", and give her the mercy and compassion she had never given to anyone in her court.

To give Madeleine the smallest of credits, she acknowledges this just two chapters prior to the oath ("in the past, our positions were once reversed and I was...unkind to you. I had no reason to expect any kindness from you..."). However, this admission does sound disingenuous in the face of the narrative's implicit demand that we treat her nicely. Because if she did recognise her own past behaviour in TRR2 esp as hurtful, and herself as not exactly deserving of kindness, then it makes no sense for her to judge people for behaving exactly as she expected. A genuine redemption arc would have been one where she understood no one owed her kindness after what she'd done, and still determinedly forged ahead to do good for her country. After all, the narrative wanted us so badly to believe this woman was patriotic, right? If her "patriotic spirit" was so tied to her ego that you needed to pamper and praise her every five minutes, just for her to not support such an obviously-foolish tyrant as Bartie Sr, then it can't have been as strong as canon so vehemently claimed.

TRH tracks our "treatment" of Madeleine over 2 books and 10 distinct scenes. Of these, 6 scenes allow us to choose between kind responses and unkind ones, 2 others require the player to choose one among multiple options of people, and 2 scenes are check-in dialogues rather than actual choices (which means that the player doesn't choose an option, they just find out through such scenes whether they are winning Madeleine's favour or not). I imagine that the first category is the most important, with the second being options that you don't necessarily need to choose Madeleine for if you want to go for one of the others, as long as you pressed enough "kind" options.

To elaborate, here's the breakdown:

Kind/Unkind Responses

- House Amaranth's pledge (TRH2 Ch 4). Notably, the "most hurtful" one doesn't even accuse her of anything - it just tells her that the family needs to earn back the Crown's trust. Compare that to Madeleine's accusations to Hana that she was trying to kill her and deserved to lose her position in court. You know, the cruel treatment that some Madeleine stans claimed "wasn't that bad".

- Carrying the Heir's train at Anointing Ball or not (Ch 5)

- Deciphering Madeleine's conversation with Godfrey on his boat (ie whether she is betraying or helping the MC) (Ch 6)

- Acknowledging Madeleine's help in capturing Godfrey, at the Gratitude Ball (Ch 7)

- Gently encouraging Madeleine into being Penelope's bridal attendant, rather than mocking her (TRH3 Ch 2). There is no longer any need to acknowledge Penelope's earlier fear of Madeleine - we are expected to forget entirely that she was the main reason why Penelope didn't want to return to court in TRR3.

- Trusting Madeleine to help with investigations at Fydelia (Ch 6)

Choosing Among Multiple People:

- Speaking about loyalty before making a pledge to the Heir. Other ladies of the house are also presented as choices (TRH 2 Ch 14)

- Babysitting the Heir during Fox Hunt. Other choices are Regina and Savannah (TRH3 Ch 10)

Relationship Check-in:

- The way Madeleine greets you at Fydelia (Warm Welcome/Cold Front) (TRH3 Ch 6)

- Whether Madeleine helps you escape with the Heir in Ch 13, or allows the child to get kidnapped by Godfrey in Ch 15 (Desparate Times/What Goes Around)

The ending of TRH3 has Madeleine either thriving and inheriting her mother's estate, or being merely fired from her job in Royal Communications (a better punishment would have been to strip the entire Amaranth family of their lands, but I digress). She is notably absent in TRF, possibly because she wasn't entirely very popular to start with and two whole books of coddling her didn't exactly help matters either. As one of the junior writers in the TRF team said, "some people exiled her so..."

The first few opportunities to win her over, notably emerge from attempts Madeleine makes to assure the Crown/MC of House Amaranth's loyalty, and you will find that even at an early stage she expects to be included in sensitive discussions that call for discretion, and to be constantly praised for her efforts. Let me give a reminder, again, that she hardly ever gave any praise to the women working for her, and in fact punished them just to keep them constantly in fear of her.

I know it sounds like I'm labouring too much on this point, but it's important to understand just how much effort the narrative had put into coddling this one woman. Chapters and chapters of branch coding, writing two routes, title cards, dialogues, rewards and consequences.

This is similar to the way the narrative encouraged kindness and sympathy towards Penelope, but it's now over a lengthier period of time and with more drastic consequences. We were required to coddle Penelope over a chapter each in three specific books, or be deprived of her support/help. We are required to constantly shower Madeleine with praise and sweet words over the course of 31 chapters, or she will help an unscrupulous Regent-Elect kidnap our child. She will even openly accept that the only reason she put a mere child through that, was because we weren't nice to her ("Wouldn't you have done the same to me? You've made it abundantly clear you see me as the enemy").

But if the MC deserved a punishment this cruel for just mocking Madeleine at every turn, then what punishments should Madeleine get for what she put her own ladies-in-waiting through? What should she get for planning to "break" one of her courtiers? A second broken engagement doesn't seem entirely enough by such parameters.

Then again - as I said before, the narrative deliberately shifted the goal posts for what a potential royal could and couldn't get away with, in the time between Madeleine's engagement tour and the MC's marriage, for this very reason. So that Madeleine would never have to face the kind of constant censure the MC and Liam would face regularly. Among characters in canon, or among largely biased stans in the fandom. Speaking of which...

Fandom

Madeleine's popularity has always been a mixed bag, ever since TRR2. By TRR2, there were people who loved her for what they thought were her craftiness and wiles, some who suspected her to be involved in the plot against the MC, and a number of Liam stans had reactions that ranged from stanning, to indifferent (after all, both Liam and Madeleine showed a mutual disinterest towards each other), to slightly jealous (after all, she was still his fiancée).

But it was Madeleine's treatment of Hana in Ch 7 that definitely crossed a line for quite a few. It was so unwarranted, and her justification for this act so inarguably cruel, that it turned several people off her immediately. The way canon dealt with this was to make her feature less in the story until the memory of the "chocolate incident" was faded and almost forgotten, and then encourage fans to sympathize with her.

The gamble definitely worked, with plenty of help from hardcore Madeleine stans who often downplayed what happened to Hana ("a prank", "making Hana cry just once" were some of the terms used to describe it). By TRR3, I recall having to remind some of my mutuals what actually happened in this scene - their own recollections of it were that vague. The Hana and Madeleine ship would have died a far quicker death if more people remembered this incident as it was shown, and not as narrative wanted us to remember it (and also, if more people cared that it was Hana being hurt, rather than their fave white girl/boy).

Madeleine gained some popularity among the wlw crowd - a couple of them did have a soft spot for stoic, aggressive or women often labelled as "bitchy" (I know a few who also showed a similar amount of love for ACOR's Xanthe or BB's Priya, to be fair...but the adulation for the white female antagonists was a lot more), and Madeleine clearly fit that bill.

A point that often came up from Madeleine stans who were wlw (and reiterated with other mean-girl characters) was that grey-shaded and villanous male characters weren't subject to as much censure as their favourites were. While there is truth to such an argument, it fails to take into account the role race often plays in the way some "mean" women are loved and certain others are scorned. Madeleine clearly did not have the scale of hate that a Xanthe or even a Kiara (who isn't even on the same level) got. In fact when it suited them, many in the fandom were more than ready to view Madeleine as a victim when Liam broke his engagement with her.

Madeleine's "patriotism" - as I've now clearly established - was a retcon made to erase the worst aspects of her characterization. Sometimes it was used to make people feel sorry for her losses, other times it was made to cover up her actual behaviour in TRR2. But there were very few readers who didn't consider it an undeniable fact. Even among those who were indifferent towards her. For instance, in an anon ask that compared Madeleine and QB's Poppy, a poster responded that "the difference between the two was that Madeleine had a sense of duty, and Poppy was just petty". In TRH3, players who claimed that "we can all agree Madeleine is fully redeemed" when she worked with the MC to protect the child from Bartie Sr, stayed mysteriously silent when the other consequence (her helping in the child's kidnapping because she didn't like the MC's pettiness) showed up.

And while these responses could be attributed to the way canon gassed Madeleine up in TRR2 and 3, some of these players had no problem nitpicking the political savvy or work of certain other (CoC) characters, esp Liam (often bashing them for "throwing parties every day", even though the general populace was depicted as being happy with their rule and influence. Mind you, no prompting from PB was necessary to bash these characters). So why were these parameters never applied to Madeleine? Why was practically no one asking what the political relevance of her bullying (as future Queen) was, or why we were expected to sing her praises for poor time management or terrible work ethics towards her boss, or ask what work she actually did in canon as Royal Comms Director? (There is a reference or two to the position, but you aren't shown that many instances of her doing much work). For quite a few, the fact that she walked around with a job title in TRH was more than enough (somehow Kiara never got this kind of fandom treatment despite being part of the Diplomatic Liaisons department).

How does this adulation for such a heavily retconned character, affect the way the Hana and Madeleine ship was viewed? For one, it meant that readers bought into the retcons easily enough that Hana's pairing with her was seen as an extension of her "redemption arc" by some.

Take the example of the various posts that argue in favour of this pairing, or fic that features them as a couple - a lot of them center Madeleine: her pain, her history, her reasons, the correctness of giving her a reward. Hana is barely mentioned or given much attention in these arguments - and often when she has any sort of voice, it is only there to humanize Madeleine. Supporters of this pair often took stances that were either ready to throw Hana under the bus, act like she hardly mattered, or treat her like some sort of blank slate to scribble their adulation for Madeleine over.

Hana is often viewed as less worthy of a focus - she is often the benevolent saint who forgives Madeleine because she "worked so hard to be better". Often it never matters to get into detail why Hana thought Madeleine earned her forgiveness, what Hana's perspective was, what journey she went through to get such a point. Because if Hana's journey really mattered in such a ship, the most pressing questions would revolve around why Hana should ever trust a person who wanted to break her in the first place. Why she should feel safe around such a person. Why her own friend group wouldn't want to protect her from such a person.

Some readers would bring up their parallels as daughters brought up in families that didn't value them, but neglect to take into account the nuances of those dynamics (Madeleine's mother at least wanted to be supportive, and no matter how bad things got, Madeleine was never in danger of being disowned. Hana was, repeatedly). Nor is it fully honest about how Madeleine was comfortable being a perpetrator of abuse, in contrast to Hana's own deep discomfort with the idea of controlling her partner.

In certain cases, I can maybe see this attitude in fandom emerging from an acceptance of the narrative's retcons as truth. But I also think there were as many readers who were just inclined to liking the mean white girl, and finding justifications and excuses for her behaviour.

Fandom's attitudes towards Hana herself often played a small role in how Hana's end of this story was ignored too. When TRR3 fucked up her arc phenomenally (by rushing her parents' turnaround from disowning her to supporting her in Ch 15), it became popular to view Hana as a lesser character, and the "meaner" white women as better. People who wanted other options for female LI often took their frustrations out on her, calling her "weak", servile and submissive, dismissing her honest accounts of the treatment she faced even from her own parents as "whining". If that was the way people preferred to view her emotionally abusive childhood...then what can one expect from such a fandom when she was being outright bullied?

Fandom was already comfortable with the idea of erasing Hana in their content, or replacing her with either their fave white girl (or an equally white OC esp in their fanfic - but more on that in a future Hana essay). So neglecting to center her in what would have been her only canonical alternative romance wouldn't be too difficult for some people.

Which merits the question...is there a way to write about (or write fic for) such a pairing, in a way that centers Hana, respects her story, makes it clear that she has the right to never forgive Madeleine no matter what she does to "earn" it - if that was what she wanted? I highly doubt it. You'd have to completely change Madeleine for that to happen, and that would more likely result in a situation where you were too busy working on her as a character, to give Hana the attention and focus she deserved.

And that's a real pity, because there's plenty to explore about Hana if you actually take the effort to look.

Conclusion

In a lot of ways, once the team had decided upon making Madeleine into a more positive character, they tried to draw a little from Olivia's arc to replicate its success. You can see some of these parallels in the way TRR2 structured the bachelorette as a semi-callback to the childhood- reveal-mocking-Savannah sequences in TRR1 Ch 7. Both chapters gave you reasons to start seeing these women in a different light, while still feeling free to dislike them. In both chapters they also targeted LIs - the only difference was that Drake's diamond scene post that confrontation centered him, and Hana's parallel diamond scene a book later...centered everyone else.

That attempt in TRR2 didn't work for several reasons - the timing wasn't right, Madeleine's cruelty had gone too far for some, the retconning hoodwinked quite a few people but not enough.

So when they tried to pair her up with the victim of her bullying, and twisted canon to make it happen - enough readers emerged to call it out, enough people pushed back by Ch 16, and the possibility of this alternative pairing garnered enough dislike that not only did the writers have to backtrack, but they also had to wipe away their past retcons and write in a scene where Madeleine gave Hana the full, unvarnished truth about the "chocolate incident". Hana was, thankfully, given a chance to give Madeleine her most polite "no".

And although that ship would never be brought up again, the team (even without Madeleine's top writer Jeffrey) still attempted to make pampering and uncritically praising her a narrative priority. She gained a bit more popularity during this time period - quite a few were inclined to feel sorry for her (especially considering the way her father's crimes affected her social standing) and saw only what happened if you were consistently nice to her.

But there was also a significant section of people who were tired of the constant coddling, and who didn't like that it was demanded of the player (when there were far more deserving WOC in the same book, who didn't get this level of kindness). It was significant enough that Madeleine wasn't given any scenes in the final book, and the writers cited her lack of popularity as a reason why.

As a Hana fan myself, it was a relief to see Hana not be paired up with her bully. But it was also immensely disheartening for me to see that "ship" get as far as it did, and to see the narrative do so much more work for Madeleine, than they did for Hana even in the follow up series. It was even more disheartening to see so many in fandom follow suit.

--

By now, we have explored 3 out of the 4 alternative pairings that TRR put forward for the LIs. They all vary in terms of buildup, attention, and payoff. But there are several things that are common about them. They all have either significant histories with the LI, or the narrative thinks they share something in common. The moment an "alternative" option ends up harming the MC, they are no longer suitable as an option because of the LI's loyalty towards her.

But perhaps the most common factor among the three women we have explored so far is how the LI is expected to treat the alternate, no matter how jealous the MC is allowed to get, no matter what the alternate themselves may have done in the past. The alternate is supposed to be treated well. With respect, with kindness, with compassion.

Betrayal doesn't allow an LI to treat their alternate badly. Bad behaviour doesn't allow an LI to treat their alternate badly. Disregarding consent doesn't allow an LI to treat their alternate badly. Classism doesn't allow an LI to treat their alternate badly. Not loving them back doesn't allow it either. Not even extreme levels of bullying...allows an LI to disrespect them.

In the next essay, we will see if any of these rules apply to our last alternative LI - Kiara.

Next: Drake and Kiara.

[iatethepomegranate]

Matthew Mercer, Will, and Player/Character Needs in C3e34

Now that I've typed out the Will/Orym scene including Matt's narration, I have feelings. Namely, how Matt used this scene to satisfy player and character needs in a situation where there was potential for the two to conflict. I will also probably ramble about Will as a character in another post because he fascinates me more with every piece of info we get about him.

Obviously, spoilers for c3e34 are here.

We're at a stage in the game where no one's stories are really complete. Once the decision is made to resurrect a character and the roll succeeds, it then becomes Matt's job to weave a satisfactory scene for a player/character in a way that allows their story to continue, while respecting the way that character is feeling in the moment.

With Ashley/Fearne, Matt didn't have to give her too much. Fearne is a creature of whim and everyone she loves is alive, as far as we know. Matt did offer a confusing and even a little scary peek of an afterlife for her, which Fearne naturally rejected.

Liam/Orym needed more. Because clearly Liam wanted Orym's story to continue, but Orym died with a heavy sense of failure and defeat. And he was clearly hoping to see Will and Derrig again. He had very valid reasons to throw in the towel.

Orym knew that he needed to go back, but he was so torn between a task he was carrying out for the sake of his loved ones, and between getting to stay with them (Will and Derrig both) after having lost them under horrific, violent circumstances that still haunt him to this day.

So, what did Matt do? He gave Liam the tragic reunion scene, knowing he would eat it right up, but he didn't stop at Will telling Orym to go back.

He had Will choose for him.

In sparing Orym from that heartbreaking decision, Liam is able to continue this story. Would Orym have chosen to go back if he'd had to make the choice himself? Probably, especially if Will was still telling him to.

But Orym has been through a lot, and I imagine Liam and Matt discussed at length the balance between what Orym's narrative needed vs what Orym himself needed as a character. Orym needed to be pushed (i.e. lovingly tossed) by the very person whose death put him on this path to begin with.

As a result, we can already see Orym rallying himself, digging deep to give himself and the Hells fresh motivation and drive to keep pushing onward. He was quite assertive in the remainder of the episode, offering up huge solutions (let's go Kiki!) and even stepping in to threaten Treshi when their designated intimidator fell short.

Is it all sunshine and rainbows for Orym from here? Of course the fuck not. But this decision to have Will take charge in that scene and do what would have shattered Orym to do has not only allowed his story to continue, but to do so in a way that galvanises him.

I also foresee Orym potentially opening up to the rest of the Hells about Will in the not-too-distant future, especially since he's indicating feeling kinship with Imogen over the way she's feeling and acting about Laudna's (hopefully fixable) death.

[umbralundertaker]

alright doing this now before i chicken out again.

With the way ONEs plot is set up, giving characters specific classpects is honestly a bit reductive, what with how it explores the different ways people react to one situation, rather than the other way around (which is more conducive to assigning classpects). Its also really hard to classpect ONE characters because of how little source material there is to work with, so I'll likely only do the very most important characters.

Character analysis under the cut. If you have any ideas please let me know!!

Even with the characters we could consider the Main ones, it's difficult to get a good grasp on their aspect, let alone their class. Bryce, Liam and Amelia ultimately could all have the same aspect and just different classes.

I feel like either Liam or Bryce is a Doom player, and I'm really leaning on Bryce. Sure awful stuff happens to Liam, but he is a lot more proactive about fixing those things. Bryce is aswell, but Bryce seems more resigned to his life sucking. When he gets a good job and starts actually enjoying his life, he clings onto that hope that the plane isnt real because he knows that if the plane is real, bad things would inevitably happen to him again.

Amelia and Liam gave me a bit of trouble... I'm still unsure about them. I was tossing the idea of one of them being a Void player around, and was thinking that Amelia was the Void player because we dont know SHIT about her, and it seems she doesnt know shit about herself either.

Something a friend suggested though, is that Amelia is a Space player. Space players' tendencies of being crucial to the plot, but still being far away and on the surface ineffectual describes her quite well. Also see my post about how Amelia is almost always interrupted during her speeches, which gives off the sense that she's distant in the eyes of the plot. I'm still quite flexible on what her aspect is though so if you have any ideas I'm all ears

Liam being a Void player is something I'm still thinking about. Another thing that I've mentioned in a previous post is that Void players do not act mysterious or seem like the type of people to keep secrets, rather they seem like they have nothing to hide at all. Although we know more about Liam than we do Amelia, we know juuust enough about Liam so he's not suspicious. But when you think about it, it's hard to name some of his defining traits, like his life or family beforehand.

Void fits him okay, but there may be an aspect that fits him even more. Blood is a bit of a cop out because every protag is Blood coded, but I can't think of much else other than Hope, which has some merit but ehhh the vibes are off.

I don't know where to even begin with Airy. Something important to me is that (though I am willing to hear someone out on this) he is not a master class. A big part of his character and also ONE as a whole is that he's just some guy, so him being The Most Important or The Least Important character would go against that.

I'm thinking Airy is maybe a Time player? It's quite an active aspect for someone as lethargic as him, but he has a lot of power in his position and actually does a whole lot of stuff when you think about it. As for his class, I think he'd be a Rouge. A more passive class, to offset how proactive his aspect is with how unmotivated his personality is, as well as a relocation class, for someone who steals people's lives (their Time) for his own benefit.

He could just as well be a Bard, and that's actually almost what I ended up going with, but I believe the stealing portion of the Rouge class is important to Airy's character.

Stone is a Light player obviously. There's a good chance they're the master class, a Muse, but hmm something is off about it to me that I can't explain. I'm open to other ideas.

Charlotte being a Life player is both funny and fitting, though Hope or maybe even Mind/Heart fits her determination as well. As for her class, maybe Mage would fit, because of her whole 'learning from her mistakes' thing.

Miscellaneous characters... Stella might be a Sylph of Rage, because of the grief she presumably caused Bryce at her dissappearance (passively creating rage/unrest), and Rage players commonly have different facets of their personality they show to different people (like Gamzee), she is quite annoyed with their mom but seems to treat Bryce well and with respect. Can you tell how hard im reaching here

Owen would be a Breath player I think, because of his dichotomy of being carefree and empowered to do what he wishes in direct contrast to Liam. I think Oscar would also be a Light player because uhhh numbers. Also he gave Liam and Bryce information.

[eponymous-rose]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E131 (March 30, 2021)

Tonight’s guests are Liam O’Brien and Sam Riegel!

Brian points out that a lot of Caleb’s greatest fears have come to pass. Liam: “It’s funny, because he’d kind of believed for a while that those things weren’t going to happen. After a while, he got complacent.” He notes that it was extra wild because everything with Trent popped up again in the midst of that complacency. And how did it feel to be defiant toward Trent? “I think Trent successfully made Caleb question if Caleb really was in control“ at the dinner party. “I feel like anything that I do is part of his plans for me, or is that just gaslighting? I’m legitimately scared of that dude.” Sam: “Of Matt?” Liam: “Sure.” He highlights the disconnect between knowing that the M9 is mechanically powerful and could possibly defeat Trent in a dice-and-stats battle, versus fearing him in a story sense and being convinced he can do almost anything.

Sam, on Luc’s death: “That was brutal, man. Matt Mercer is a-- he hates children! Clearly. He actively sought to kill a child in the campaign in as brutal a way as possible. He hates children and wants them dead. Canon. No, but to RP, that was horrible.” He highlights that so much of Veth’s arc has been about trying to get back to her family. “We had to choose something and we thought we were making the right choice. It was all Veth’s fault, and it was pretty rotten. My heart was beating pretty fast, and I certainly didn’t want to have my son die live on the stream. I don’t know what Veth would have done. That’s the end, that’s over. It’s almost worse than when your own character would die. This is something that would also kill Veth.” After the episode was over: “just shaken. I also didn’t know what to do next! That felt like a turning-point moment for my character, weirdly so close to what we assume to be the end arc of this campaign. I texted Matt later that night and was like, that’s it, Veth’s out, I’m tapping out.”

There’s an interlude in which Sam discovers a new dream to record an episode of this show from his Peloton. Dani informs him that she will not be inviting him back.

On Astrid, Liam: “I literally don’t know what she’s doing. I know that she’s dangerous, she always was ambitious, and there’s not been a moment where Caleb let his guard down with her. He’s not trying to reestablish what they had. He cares for the both of them, for Astrid and Eodwulf. He thinks about it a lot, still. He can’t tell how much she buys into everything that she experienced and is now living as a full-grown adult. He suspects that she’s bought in and is not going to change things, because she believes in the system, as much as he’d like to peel her away. He does believe that they want what’s best for the Empire, and stopping whatever wants to come vomiting out of a hole in the frozen north is good for everyone. And they’re powerful. They’re not trustworthy, obviously. But there’s enough at stake to make it worth it. He could imagine a situation where they fight each other to the death.” He was convinced Astrid was going to stop them when they left the tower and was really shocked when she held back. Sam: “Not me! I’ve trusted Astrid since day one. She’s the greatest! I sent a letter to her, she’s very nice, I think you guys would be a nice couple. I believe every word she says.”

On having to decide on Veth deciding to go off and save the world after Luc’s death. “Like I said, I was ready to be done. And then I decided somewhere in there that that’s not very D&D. So I thought I’d leave it up to somebody else, so I asked Caduceus to decide for me, essentially. She knows she’s putting her other family in danger if she doesn’t go. It’s an impossible choice, you know?” Liam: “I love watching you grapple with it, because you’re a lovely father and love your kids.”

On the Sanatorium, Sam: “That was brutal, man. Matt lulls you into a sense of complacency. We’d forgotten that Caleb was a stone-cold killer! It had been a while since he went on a murder spree. Still got it!” Liam: “I never meant for this character to be perfect sunshine.” Brian: “You don’t say.” Liam: “He’s very not-perfect, and I think in his brain, he was going in with the impression that they needed to get in and get out as soon as possible. The place is crawling with people with magic ability, and I didn’t have faith that we wouldn’t be sussed out or something wasn’t going to blow an illusion.” Everything was about getting out of there as fast as possible.

Did the conversation with Yeza help with Veth’s decision? “First of all, every conversation with Yeza is a beautiful one. Every time she talks to Yeza, it makes her feel good. In some ways, she’s gotten to the point now where she knows Yeza’s going to be supportive, she knows he’s going to allow her to do what she wants, but maybe that’s too much. Maybe she needs to not listen to him, basically, and be like, no, you need to be selfish now, dude, you need to say ‘come home, I’m sick of you leaving’. At a certain point, being supportive can turn into being enabling.”

Cosplay of the Week: Jester in the snow! (liljerbear47, photography by kairiceleste on Instagram)

On Trent’s motivations for chasing Caleb: “I really don’t know. The simplest explanation is to just hammer down the nail that’s sticking up. It has crossed his mind that all high-level wizards are in danger of their own ambition and egos, so it’s occurred to him that Trent might have the same kind of ideas that Halas had in the past, and maybe Caleb was always meant to be another body to jump into. Maybe in some sick, disgusting, twisted way, he wants him to be his successor. I am thinking of the next campaign, without getting too deep in, trying to do something that is much more ride-along. Caleb is very, very specific, and I thought long and hard about all the different pieces on the chessboard for him. For campaign three, I’m looking forward to seeing what happens.”

Dani: “Do I need to be keeping lore on your fucking ads?”

On the cursed dagger: “It was a tricky one, because in campaign one, one of the characters was under the influence of a cursed weapon, but it interacted with him and he knew what it was and what it did. And it affected his gameplay as a character. For me, Veth didn’t know what it was, ever. I as a player knew what it was doing, but Veth didn’t know at all. So it was kind of like my dirty, dark secret for many months. I knew this thing was coming perilously close to killing me, but my character didn’t know enough to bring it up to her friends. Nobody ever asked! So I was like, well, I guess this thing’s just going to kill me one day, and it’s kind of going to be a surprise.” Liam: “Sam, you love danger and self-destruction so much, you might as well be Mollymauk.”

On the fight in Yasha’s sequence, Sam: “You gotta put a character in your storm giant creature. It was so fun! It was so great of Matt to involve us in this encounter. It would’ve been fun just to watch, because Matt would have made it amazing and Ashley was sweating bullets, which is always fun to watch.” Sam notes he felt guilty, but Liam was going for the kill. Liam: “Matt’s gotta be careful about giving me that kind of story beat. I do not fucking care, I just fucking flip, I’m like, well, I’m going to destroy you, and I have no qualms about it. It’s too much fun!”

The Beau/Yasha tower date was in part inspired by not being able to give gifts as easily this last year. “This thing that we do together is a gift, but I love finding these moments, like the book for Jester and the tower for Yasha and for Beau. I really just wanted to give both of them a little magic for a night. I wanted them to leave this-- we’re trying to be as entertaining as possible, but shit is having an effect on all of us too, and I wanted them to have an escape, a great place to escape to.”

Fan Art of the Week: an amazing group shot, plus Marion, Yeza, and Luc! (vocaz on Twitter)

On choosing Essek over Trent, Liam: “It would have been so interesting and awful and great! Essek and Astrid and Eodwulf are everything that Bren used to be attracted to that are terrible for him. Essek, hopefully he can with time find a way out of the hole that he dug himself into, but it was only two months ago where he was found out and his ambitions came crashing down around him. Long-term, I have high hopes for him, but I think it’s going to be hard.” In contrast, Astrid and Eodwulf are still “deep in the shit. It would have been really hard to navigate, but fun to play at the table. We made the right choice with what we went with. Essek’s just getting started, and Caleb doesn’t trust him entirely, because he was burned so hard not too long ago. He’s still more trustworthy than the other three. So it’s the better choice. While Caleb has all these ties on the other side, they’re really fucking dangerous. So if you have to choose, you choose Essek. But fuck that die.” Sam: “Veth, much like Sam Riegel, makes instant decisions about whether to trust someone or not and sticks to it forever. Astrid, 100% trust. Eodwulf, 100% distrust. Essek, completely distrust. I still don’t think he’s a good guy. Ikithon? Trust. 100%. Because you know where he’s coming forward, you know what he wants. I still want him dead, but I trust him.”

On Veth’s post-adventuring plans: “Veth is probably still too in it right now to think about what comes next. I, Sam Riegel, have a good idea of what I want Veth to do post-campaign.” Brian: “Maybe you shouldn’t tell us. Save it for the show!” Sam: “All she knows is she can’t do this anymore. It’s very unhealthy to be battle-wounded every other day. It’s fun for a while, but college has to end at some point, and she’s gotta go home.”

On Frumpkin changing appearance and returning to the Feywild: “I don’t know what I’m going to do, but the way it feels now for Caleb is that he feels too enmeshed in everything that has happened, and too much good has happened, and too much needs to happened, that that really narcissistic, selfish goal has the risk of harming everything else, which is more important. And that’s how he looks at it now. So he’s gearing towards letting everything from the beginning of the campaign, and where he started, go, and trying to figure out what use he’s going to be now and what he’s going to do if they’re not all dead. If Matt throws that shit down, I don’t know what I will do, I think about it a lot. But turning Frumpkin white and saying you’re free either way is him preparing to let go of everything he’s been holding on to for a really long time. He’s addicted to that idea that he can fix himself, and we’ll see if that hard choice gets presented, what he might do. But where he stands now, he doesn’t think that’s going to be reality, and he sees a way that he can be of use that he never really anticipated before, so he’s slowly shifting gears towards living with the pain he was trying to remove.”

On the last request scene and confidence heading into Aeor, Sam: “I feel like that’s a good request. I think all of us realized that if we die, that probably bodes badly for the world. I feel like all of us are at a point now as characters and as friends, that the first order of business would be to take care of everybody else’s shit, although we probably have different ideas of how to do that.” Liam: “I want the Empire to be healed, Caleb has all these memories of his parents and what they wanted for the world, and he wants that too. It’s clearly not in place now, the system needs to be broken and replaced. That could be a part of Caleb’s sunset. I don’t want Caleb to die, so maybe he can work on that after. As everything starts to shake out and we start heading towards our destiny, Caleb’s just free-floating. He’s not even going after the same thing he started for. So he’s looking at Veth’s family, and Luc specifically, and seeing that’s me, that’s a little boy in the Empire.”

[theninth09]

i wanted to add onto this.

in s5b when theo is with malia and braeden and braeden points her gun at him and says "he tried to kill scott." theo smirks and says "technically i did kill scott." hes completely unbothered by the accusation, seems happy to provoke her even further even though she just pointed a gun at him. he doesnt care to deny that he killed someone, is eager to point out that he did kill scott.

in s6a after liam brings him back and tells him that he should feel some remorse for killing josh and tracy, theo dryly replies "i just put them back the way i found them." he doesnt care to defend himself, doesnt try to lie. liam literally threatened him with the sword a few minutes ago, he has all the power in that situation. theo couldve stayed quiet or said something to please liam, considering liam could immediately put him back in the ground. instead, he yet again says something provocative.

in s6b when liam attacks gabe in the locker room, theo is the one to bring up his own history of being a murderer. "at least let me help. im the one with experience here." and then goes on about how to cover up the murder.

he doesnt ever shy away from admitting that hes killed. hes ruthless and cold and uncaring about it, even happy to point it out. he doesnt argue, doesnt try to manipulate people into believing something else. hes completely fine with telling the truth. even in situations where it would benefit him to shut up or at least try and not be an asshole.

so why would he be that agitated over stiles claiming that he killed his sister?

"but tumblr user theninth09" i hear you say "after liam brings him back and hayden tells him 'you killed your sister, remember?' theo basically agrees by saying 'im gonna kill you too.'"

well, yes. let me reiterate: i think he holds a lot of guilt over taras death. im not sure how that whole prison thing works, but he couldve gotten haunted by other people he killed or gotten tortured by a phantom of the dread doctors or whatever else. instead, its his sister until he breaks and tells her that she doesnt have to stop. once hes free, hes disoriented. he panics, attacks liam and has to ask where his sister is because he doesnt know whats going on, he doesnt understand yet that hes not imprisoned anymore. hes scared. hes at his most vulnerable.

so yeah, he agrees. he falls back onto what he knows: lashing out, being aggressive, threatening to kill people. and he just spent an eternity (literally) getting his heart ripped out of his chest by his sister, as punishment and revenge. obviously hes convinced that hes responsible for her death.

i dont think him agreeing with hayden is indication for him actually having killed tara.

do i think that all of this is canon/that the writers thought about it like that? no, not really. i think they couldve handled theos character (and literally every other character) a lot better, because if you just watch tw without obsessing over it like i have, this isnt all that obvious. and especially if you dont like theo because of what he did, it feels nitpicky and fanon to say that he didnt kill his sister, bc the show kinda wants you to believe that he did. itd just make A Lot more sense for his character if he didnt.

people dont actually believe that theo killed his sister, do they?

like okay. the entire pack and probably theo himself think that hes responsible for her death, but the pack hates him and doesnt trust him for valid reasons and theo is traumatized and holds guilt over her death so hes probably convinced himself that he did kill her. i just dont believe thats true.

in s5b when hes with stiles in the tunnels (i forgot why they're down there but whatever) and stiles tells him "oh yeah, the guy that killed his own sister when he was nine?" and theo argues back "yeah. i was nine. i had no idea what was going on." and that he also still believed santa exists so obviously he believed the dread doctors when they told him she wanted him to have his heart.

first of all: this is s5b. hes long dropped his act and he has no reason to lie in this moment. he knows that stiles wont fall for his lies and hes stopped lying and transitioned into threatening and intimidating anyway. theres no good reason for theo to lie to stiles here: theres no actual benefit that would come from that.

and his behavior points towards him telling the truth. instead of deflecting or making a joke, or any of the stuff he usually does to get his way, he starts explaining and defending himself. he seems almost agitated that stiles claims that he did kill tara and argues why he didnt.

and ofc stiles doesnt believe him and tells him "i think you pushed her. i think you liked it." which is, sorry, utter bullshit. i understand why stiles says this (yk. theo killed his bffie and all that) but i think stiles is purposely turning everything that he knows about theo into something evil. he doesnt want to believe that theo was a victim of his circumstances, because that would make him human, that would explain why he became the person that he is. its easier to fall back onto the "hes just purely evil" argument, because then he can hate theo for what he did.

stiles is smart. thats his whole thing. thats his whole thing with theo, that he was "smart enough not to trust him" as theo says to the sheriff in s6a. stiles knows that theo was a child, that its likely that theo got manipulated and groomed by the dread doctors. but, i think, he decides not to care about that, to ignore that. he hates theo and he wants to hate theo, but if he starts looking at the reasons for why he did what he did, he'll begin to understand him. and while he'll still never forgive theo, that will reduce this fury he has for him because, newsflash, theo was a CHILD.

people argue that tw doesnt show us enough of his back story to back this up and yeah, i kinda agree. we dont get enough of his story because teen wolf ALWAYS does this. with every character. they insinuate something, they start something interesting that could give their characters depth and then they abandon it and its like the characters just forget about it. all this show has is small details for fans to focus on if you want to analyze anything, because this show is objectively not good enough to actually do that.

+ theo is a side character. he wasnt even meant to stay as long as he did and cody did his best to work with the material. if your argument is that theres missing context and only vaguely shown stuff, im sorry but thats so stupid. thats not a good argument for in canon. "oh but we never see theo do this or that" HES A SIDE CHARACTER. he wasnt even supposed to come back! and tw is not a very good show! obviously they added more depth to his character in s6 because cody came back. like yeah theres stuff that doesnt make sense (like the show saying he didnt have a heart condition), because his back story got added as an afterthought in s6. you cant only look at s5 and judge his character based on that. his depth comes from s6 and its not the characters fault that the show has bad writing.

and if you simply dont like theo, cool. i dont like a bunch of characters in tw. but i find this argument that hes actually evil and deserved getting tortured and whatever exhausting and annoying.

if you dont have empathy for his character in s6 bc you just hate him, fine. i dont care. but if you're talking about this in a more analytical way? fuck off. he was a child, the show points towards him getting groomed and abused by the dread doctors and guess what? even during his villain arc, hes still a child. yes he should take responsibility for what he did, im not excusing any of that stuff. but theres reasons for why he did all that.

and again, dumb tv logic reasons, but most of the villains getting away unscathed, fucking peter hale and deucalion being allowed to just kinda wander around while theo is in an eternal time loop of torture? like this technically erases the packs rule of not killing because i dont think its weird for me to argue that getting non-stop tortured without the ability to die is objectively worse than actually dying. and yeah, tv logic, but if you think that (in canon, not just bc you personally dont like theo) he deserved that, idk. weird. very weird.

[where-theres-smoak-2]

The Royals Series Review

So I’ve kind of gotten into this habit of watching random stuff on Netflix and some of it is at least a few years old which is fun because now I am becoming obsessed with shows where the fandom isn’t as active anymore. Anyway I just spent the last couple of days binge watching all 4 seasons of The Royals and here is what I thought of it, warning there are spoilers.

 Boy was this series a wild ride. I mean it was comically absurd at times but in a good way. There were times when it was dark and suspenseful but other times where I was just laughing at how absurdly funny it was. I do think season 1 and 2 were the better seasons although all of the seasons had good things and moments in them. The characters were also great, I even came to love some of the characters I disliked in the first season like Helena and Cyrus. I think all the characters were complex and interesting and their journey’s are mostly well written. But I am going to just talk about the few negative things really quickly. 

I do feel like when Ophelia was written out in the beginning of season 2 her absence did hurt the show a bit. It didn’t make it unwatchable necessarily but her absence was felt. And huge spoilers here but it was felt more than ever after her father was revealed to be the one who killed King Simon. I remember when that reveal came and the resulting death of Ted I just kept wondering about Ophelia because now she had lost both her parents, she must have felt so many emotions, shock at what her father had done, guilt that it was her father that had killed Liam’s, someone who she cared and loved deeply. Grief at losing her father. But we never see any of it we just get told that she had disconnected her phone and social media and moved house. So I just felt kind of unsatisfied and like something was missing. After watching the whole series I did do some research into the show and learnt that the actress left because she wanted to go to college and didn’t have time to do both, which is fair enough, but it was still a shame because I do think it had a jarring effect on the show. I also find out that the show was based on, or inspired by, the book Falling for Hamlet by Michelle Ray which is a modern retelling of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. In the book Ophelia is the main character and the story is told from her pov. I think this is part of why Ophelia’s absence is felt so much, because in season 1 it felt like she was the protagonist. Obviously there were many main characters with the royal family and the show was also largely about the royal family, but I also feel like she was like our narrator leading us through the story, we were learning about the world through her. So when she left there was this shift that I do think was noticeable.  Also complete side note but the show being inspired by Hamlet does explain why many of the characters talk to the ‘ghost’ of Simon. As it kept happening when the characters seemed to be under alot of emotional stress I did think they were losing it a bit, now I understand that its that link to Hamlet so it makes a whole lot more sense once you know that. The other negative is most likely just me, but in the beginning of the series I struggled with the fact that it was the UK monarchy, I think that definitely pulled me out of the emersion alot and I would have rathered they be the royal family of a fictional place. But as the seasons went on I did get over it so it wasn’t  a deal breaker. 

The Ships

So every show has those ships you love and those you hate. So here are some of my thoughts on the romantic relationships within the show. I do think the show switched between these relationships a bit too much. Like you think there is something going on between a particular pair and then suddenly out of the blue some other character will show up and its like oh actually this person is like the love of this person’s life and they have a really deep bond, but then that person will suddenly disappear out the plot again. But lets go through the relationships and I’ll hopefully explain that better.

Liam's Love Interests

Ok I really, really brought into the romance between Liam and Ophelia. To me I think it was intended to be the main romance of the series before the actress left. I loved their first meeting and there was something very wholesome and pure about their romance. I thought their scenes were downright adorable but they also had that passion and I think it was all very believable. I think the actors had great chemistry too. It was that classic tale of the ordinary girl who falls for the prince and gets swept up in the whirlwind of Royal life and has to question what she really wants and whether she can take being a part of such a high profile life. The prince also wonders what he wants, does he want to be the King and do his duty to his family or does he want to run away from it all and live a normal life with the girl he loves. But I think the show did a good job of not making it too cheesy. Unfortunately it did feel very unfinished. Especially when you had Liam saying things along the line of  ‘we’ll have our someday.’ When they part. It very much had an air of we are only parting for now but at some point we’ll be together. But that never happens. I don’t know if the show had continued whether they would have eventually brought Ophelia back or not but I do admit I wish that they had brought her back as I don’t think I ever really got over their love story. I think it didn’t help that I never really bought into any of Liam’s other love interests. For me personally I just thought they were lacking. With Willow it felt kind of one sided where Willow definitely had feelings Liam, and whilst for a moment it looked like Liam might have feelings for Willow the show instead suddenly introduces Kathryn as his love interest. Which is what I meant about how they suddenly do switcheroos on you. Because it seemed like they were setting up Willow and Liam but then it was suddenly all about Liam and this girl we had never seen before. When it came to Liam and Kathryn though I do feel like they were trying to recapture the story that Liam and Ophelia had. Its again that ordinary girl who falls for a prince and has to decide if she wants to be part of his world on not. Only with Kathryn they also added in that plot that she was the ex girlfriend of his brother. The other thing is that Kathryn does initially choose Robert over Liam and it very much felt like she only went back to Liam because Robert turned out to be a dick and threw her aside in a very disgusting way that did make me feel bad for Kathryn and made me hate Robert. Don’t get me wrong the relationship between Kathryn and Liam wasn’t terrible, I just didn’t buy into it like I did Liam and Ophelia. I think part of this was again because Ophelia and Liam were presented as being this epic love story and Liam would say these heartfelt very loving things about someday being together, so when Liam starts to say these similar things to Kathryn it, I don’t know, they kind of lose their punch a bit and seem a little more disingenuous because they’ve been said to another girl before, if that makes sense? Also I think part of the problem is I don’t think Kathryn’s character was fleshed out enough. It felt more like she was just there to cause drama between the two brothers and be a love interest for Liam. We don’t really learn much about her as a person. Like with Ophelia we learn things about her past, we learn about her losing her mother, we see her relationship with her father and how he is protective of her and she works through challenges she has with him, we learn that she wants to be a dancer and has a dream of going to new york to audition for a dance school. With Willow too we learn things about her past, like how her mother gave up aristocracy to marry for love, there is the whole social media storyline too and how she comes to work at the palace, we learn about the, I think it was her grandfather, who gave her the music box with the fairytale castle that played Fur Elise. But I don’t feel like we really learn anything about Kathryn outside of her relationship with the brothers. Even her scenes with her family members are centred around her relationship with the princes. We seem to know very little about her life outside of Robert and Liam, unless I am forgetting some information. But yeah when it comes to Liam I definitely liked him the most with Ophelia. 

Eleanor’s Love interests. 

So with Eleanor they also sometimes did that whole sudden switcheroo with the love interests, though it wasn’t quite as bad as with Liam. Obviously her main love interest was Jasper. Here’s the thing with these guys though, their start was so toxic when you think about it, I mean he drugged her then blackmailed her whilst trying to steal from her in some big con he had thought up with his then girlfriend. He even slept with her mother. Yet despite that I couldn’t help but love them together and route for them. I mean I do think it helps that it was hardly the craziest, wackiest thing to happen on this show. I know its a controversial subject but I see this, I think fairly new, opinion that you shouldn’t ship anything that is toxic, like even a little bit toxic, but I don’t agree with that, one because its fiction and so you give more leeway to fictional characters than you would real people but also because I recognise that most of the time these toxic actions are there to create drama which was definitely the case here. So even though they did not have the best start they did grow into a very loving and healthy couple who learnt to be honest and trust each other and that was a fun but also often painful journey to watch. I really did find myself rooting for them and to be honest after Ophelia left, ending Opheliam, I mostly kept watching for Jaspenor. But like I said they also did randomly introduce new love interests for Eleanor as well, namely Beck. I didn’t mind Beck at first I even thought they had good chemistry, I did find his introduction very sudden because it was right when they seemed to still be developing Jasper and Eleanor. Like with Kathryn and Liam I think it was a bit mind twisting because they seem to have very deep feelings for each other but we are meeting this new character well into the relationship so its like playing catch up. But its established that Beck was Eleanor’s first love. I think I started to turn off Beck a bit because whilst he was a good person I do feel like he judged Eleanor in a way that Jasper didn’t when it came to the drugs and alcohol. At times it did feel a bit like Beck wanted to change her. I do think he wanted the best for her but he just didn’t go about it the best way. But I did come to really dislike him when he turned up in I think season 3 when Jasper and Eleanor were together and just started saying Jasper was below him and that kind of attitude of you are common and I am noble so I am better than you. The other kind of love interest was Mandy/Samantha who was Jasper’s girlfriend who he planned the con with in the first place. But she was the literal worse who really used Eleanor. Unlike Jasper she didn’t seem to have any remorse for what she did and it left Eleanor crushed and mistrustful of everyone after. But definitely her best love interest was with Jasper. I just loved that they both grew together and they were two people who I think were really struggling in the beginning of the series but who developed as individuals as well as together as a couple. The whole writing love letters to each other and leaving them in the book was the cutest too. 

Robert, Kathryn and Willow

So with Robert at first I kind of felt bad for everyone involved in the love triangle. I mean Robert seemed to genuinely love Kathryn and he talks about how he only got off that Island because he kept seeing her and that gave him the strength to keep going. He was very convincing. I also felt bad for Kathryn and Liam because they were in this impossible situation where they thought he was dead now he has shown back up and they have mixed feelings because on one hand they are overjoyed he’s alive but on the other hand they feel guilty about having feelings for each other. It did remind me a little bit of the love triangle in Pearl Harbour. That being said Robert really does act like a total dick when he sleeps with and then discards Kathryn, especially as she had chosen him. Also I wasn’t all that thrilled with the whole love triangle thing as bad as I felt for everyone involved at first. Which brings me to Willow. Because of the nature of Robert’s character it is very difficult to figure out if he had genuine feelings for Willow at all. There were times when it did feel genuine and where it seemed like he really did love her but then there were times where I was sure he was just using and playing with her. Maybe some of that was because he seemed to really love Kathryn and seemed genuine with her until he just threw her away to mess with his brother and hurt her. I also didn’t like how he seemed unwillingly to share things with her and this idea of her being seen and not heard. He clearly didn’t want a partnership when it came to the monarchy he wanted her to look pretty and make them look good and kind. But one of the things I really disliked about the kind of love square of Liam, Willow, Kathryn and Robert was how it pitted the two women against each other. Like there are a couple of moments where they have this antagonism and tension between them. Like when Willow confronts Kathryn about showing up at the dinner and then at the tribute to Simon because both events had a connection to Willow and Robert’s engagement and it seemed like Willow felt insecure and threatened by Kathryn. I also felt like Willow judged Kathryn alot for having feelings for both brothers when she herself also at some point had romantic feelings for both brothers. I just didn’t like the pitting of the two women against each other at all. But ultimately we’ll never know if Robert genuinely has feelings for Willow or not because it seemed like Willow was going to help with the dethroning of Robert but then he asked to speak with her and she decided to marry him instead. We don’t know what he said to her that changed her mind or how genuine it was, like I said there were times when it seemed like he had real feelings but the character is so shady its hard to trust him.  

Helena’s Love Interests

So Helena actually has a kind of beautiful yet tragic backstory that involves her falling in love with a stable boy but then giving him up to do her duty by her family and marry the king. I must admit it did make me feel bad for her and a part of me was really rooting for them. But it was complicated because Simon was a nice and genuine man and it was clear that he was hurt by her affair with Alistair. But it also did get to me when Helena told her story to Eleanor and said she would have been happy to marry a man with a pebble as an engagement ring. I think it was kind of sad that they never got their happy ever after, Helena really did screw that one up. But there was another of Helena’s relationships I did really like and that was the one she had with her new Lord Chamberlain Spencer. I think he seemed to really care about her and wanted her to be happy and she did seem happy when he was there, until Robert clearly got rid of him. The other one of note is when she starts sleeping with Prince Sebastian but we later find out he was giving information to Robert. Helena just seemed really unlucky when it came to love and I will admit that as the seasons went on I did hope to see her happy but it just never worked out for her. 

Cyrus and Violet

Cyrus only really has one meaningful and honest relationship and that is with Violet. I did love these two together and I do think that she really helped him grow and change. I think it was obvious that they did love each other, she was really there for him when he had the cancer. It was a new side of Cyrus’ character that we had never seen before. I felt so bad and sad for him when she goes missing. I was so excited that she showed up again in the last episode but it made the cancellation of the show even worse because we’ll never know where she was or why her car was found abandoned with blood in it. 

Character thoughts

Ok so I have talked about the ships and liked and didn’t like so now I figured I would do a quick run down of my thoughts on the characters. 

Ophelia- I loved her when she was on the show and was so disappointed when she left. As I said before I do think it left me unsatisfied that we never really got to see the rest of her story and never got to see her get a happy ever after with Liam. But she was a really sweet and quirky, she often got herself into awkward situations but that just made her endearing, I also think that despite her having a few mishaps like throwing up and falling into flower bushes in front of her princely crush, she had a fire about her. She wasn’t a push over and she stood her ground when the Queen told her to discourage the relationship with her son, she also stood her ground with Cyrus and Gemma. It was nice to see a character that could be both really sweet and dorky, sometimes insecure but who also could stand up for herself.  

Liam- This is another character that I loved. I liked that he started out as just this playboy prince how liked to party and have fun but then as he grows in confidence actually does inspire a nation. He had some darker moments but I think he would have made a truly amazing King because he really did care about his country and people and he wanted to help others. Again its another thing that sucked about the show being cancelled because I’ve just spent the entirety of the show waiting to see Liam as King. I feel like that had to be the natural part of his journey, it really did feel like that was where his journey was heading. So it was disappointing not to get to see him reach the throne and his true potential. 

Eleanor- I think Eleanor had one of the best character arcs on the show. She starts out as the rebellious princess who feels like she has no place in the royal family and who copes with it all by going out and doing drugs and getting herself into the tabloids. But as time goes on you see her grow in confidence and find her place, she becomes someone who is an integral part of the family and she does alot for the monarchy’s image and also helps with alot of charities because she realises the influence she has can really help people, we also watch her go from being very mistrustful of people and pushing them away to being open and honest with them and it was a beautiful journey to watch.    

Jasper- This is another character that had a great arc. I think it complimented Eleanor’s arc really well too. He starts out as a con man and ends up as a knighted hero. He’s also someone who really comes to learn to trust others instead of lone wolfing it. He is the kind of character that you really do come to love and root for because he not only wants to change and overcome his past but he does. 

Helena- So she is one of those characters where there were times I really hated her, mostly when she lied about the twins’ paternity test, I mean that’s a despicable thing to do to your children. But over time she grew and changed and it became obvious that she loved her children and did want what was best for them. I think she was very damaged by her own mother and being forced into marrying Simon instead of the man she loved. Her backstory and the fact that she does change makes her the sympathetic character, even if at times she can be a bit of train wreck. 

Cyrus- I hated Cyrus in the beginning of the show, like really hated him. But I will admit as the series went on I did develop a strange affection for him and he became the character that I loved to hate. I mean he was diabolical at times but I can’t lie that he was also absolutely hilarious whilst being diabolical. There were also moments were he did show true emotion that made me see a softer and more  sympathetic side to him. 

Simon- For the short time we had him I really did like Simon. It was obvious that he really cared about his family and that they were more important to him than anything else. It was their happiness that he wanted and he really did want the best for his country too. I was so sad when he died but I am happy that they kept his memory and spirit alive throughout the rest of the series. 

Robert- This is probably harsh but I liked Robert alot more when he was dead. When he was dead he was this kind of hero, he was the loving brother that his siblings looked up to and the dutiful son that his parents loved. He was the prince that the nation loved. Then they brought him back from the dead and he was a power hungry dick who may or may not have had a hand in his father’s murder, I’m still a bit unclear on that. But he is someone who was willing to put his people at risk to gain power and when he disbanded the parliament he pretty much became a dictator. He seems to have a lot of hubris and a old fashioned way of looking at things, I didn’t like his opinion about how there should only be one voice allowed, the king’s/his. I think Simon was right when he said that Robert would never make a good king.

Ted- I really liked Ted in the start. He seemed to be a decent guy who took his job seriously and loved his daughter. I was so shocked when I found out he was the one who killed Simon. To be honest I do think it could have been better written because I am still a little unclear on what his motive was. I think it was because his wife got killed but I felt like that had happened a while ago so why did he wait as long as he did? But then he also seemed to be becoming a bit unhinged as he kept seeing her ghost everywhere. I think what made it so shocking was that he did seem to care about Liam and was really there for him in the aftermath of Simon’s death. I think that really messed with Liam’s head alot because they did have a good bond so it just added to the betrayal. 

So yeah those are my random thoughts on The Royals. To finish off I would just like to mention some things in particular that I found really embraced the show’s comedic wackiness. I loved the FML running gag, I also really liked how the characters would go ‘this place is so weird’ whenever things got particularly wacky. Speaking of I did really love how wacky it got at times, like it really was bizarre in a good way. A few stand out moments from the top of my head was when Ophelia shot Ashok in the leg with the ceremonial bow, Helena stealing Cyrus’ testicle, Jasper’s dad showing up disguised as the Italian count and then admitting to shooting Jasper to ‘help him get the girl back’. When they put on In the Air Tonight whilst planning their coup and then all stop to do the drum solo. After Liam attacks Beck falling into the throne room full of people and then Robert says they are going to be incredibly British and act like that didn’t just happen, as a Brit I really relate to this and I adopt this practice often. Willow tripping on LSD and running about the Palace pretending to be a ghost and trying to drown Helena in a vat of chocolatey goodness. I definitely enjoyed this series and thought it was a good watch. I do think it was worth the watch even if it does end on a cliff-hanger and very suddenly. Boy I hope there is some good fanfiction I can go read now.