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nanikio · 2 years ago

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Dads bestfriends part 5

Blue Christmas

I'll have a blue Christmas without you I'll be so blue just thinking about you

The sound of Christmas music came blasting from down stairs, you heard you mother singing along to it a groan left your lips as the events from last night hit you how he left you standing alone. Again.

Your thoughts were soon interrupted by your mother barging your door open her cheerful grin greeting you "hey sweetheart just letting you know you should get ready we're having a Christmas party later"

You groaned in reply turning around stuffing your head into your pillow before feeling your mother rip your blanket from your bed, feeling the cold prickle your skin. You gave in lifting your head up, you were met with the bright light from your now open curtain.

Slipping out of bed you rubbed your eyes waking to the bathroom your feet padding against the cold floor, opening the door you made your way over to the sink, brushing your teeth and washing your self and relieving yourself.

Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree Won't be the same dear, if you're not here with me

Making you way back into your room, you slipped into some clothes and a comfy Christmas sweater fitting your current mood, it was something that would please your mother so win win.

Making your way down stairs the smell of freshly baked cookies filled the air, being drawn to the smell you entered the kitchen, expecting to see your mother until proven wrong it was Jacob. In leaning over the oven pulling out a tray of cookies and placing them on the side by the window allowing them to cool down.

Turning around he stopped at the sight of you, taking a step back he went to talk but the words died on his tongue.

You looked up at him the events from last night simmering in the back of your brain, you couldn't help but be angry but the more you looked at him and the stripe of flower across his cheek the more your heart ached for him.

And when those blue snowflakes start falling That's when those blue memories start calling

"Sweetheart" he almost whispered carful who heard "I'm sorry I left last night I just had to get back down to your dad I told him I wouldn't be long.. I didn't want him to get suspicious"

It was a valid point but it still hurt seeing him walk away. "It's whatever." You mumbled looking down at your hands that were picking away at the skin around your nails, something he noticed you did when you were nervous.

Feeling his calloused hand wrap around yours gently pulling your fingers away from your nails you looked up at him your eyes meeting.

You'll be doing all right With your Christmas of white But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

You pulled one of your hands from his and brought it up to his cheek whipping the flour off his cheek.

A smile took over his face followed by a small laugh, it was cut short when he heard someone start to walk towards the kitchen, one blink and he was across the room catering to the cookies.

Your heart dropped turning way from him and walking back into the living room.

Later that evening

You heard your mother greeting people and the low mumble of people pulling you out of your room, as soon as you made it down stairs you made your way into the kitchen grabbing your self a beer greeting people hugging them and wishing them a merry Christmas.

You made your way around the kitchen picking up little bits of food. Leaving the kitchen you were greeted by loud music and chatting crowds, people from your childhood who basically raised you and new faced of friends your parents made while you were away at uni.

Your eyes scanning the crowed they landed on him. He looked nice, he was in a nice looking outfit it wasn't anything fancy but it suited him, your cheeks flushed at the way he looked, that all stoped when your eye line followed his arm which was draped around a women, a beautiful blonde with glistening blue eyes. Your heart dropped to your stomach, seeing him whisper in her ear pulling her close to him.

You'll be doing alright With your christmas of white But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

Tears pricked your eyes, a sharp gasp left your lips, his eyes left hers and floated around the room, landing on your panic shot though his eyes pulling his arm away from the blonde she furrowed her brows following his gaze and landing upon you, her confused expression only deepened looking back at Jacob she said something your couldn't make it out over the music.

He didn't respond his gaze still on you burning into your eyes, his eyes broke you a single tear dribbled down your face turning away anger bubbled up Inside of you, rushing up stairs into your room slamming the door behind you.

You heard his voice it was strained and he knocked on your door "Darling it's me people open the door that wasn't what you thought it was"

Hearing him only made it worse the tears streamed down your cheeks.

A soft knock was heard a little while later with a broken please followed. ... It had been little over 10 minutes when you had stop crying, pulling your self out of bed you made your way over to the door saying to your self if he was still their you'd let him explain him self.

Yet he wasn't.

You guessed he went back to her, keeping her warm between his arms, and a soft kiss to her cheek.

And you'd be in your room, wishing it was you.

You'll be doing all right With your Christmas of white But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

#forbbiden love #olderf guy #dbf #dads bestfriend #lover #agegap #christmas

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starlightafterastorm · 4 years ago

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The Umbrella Academy Season 2

7/10

I feel the same way about Season 2 as I feel about the last episode of Season 1. It’s incredibly entertaining. It’s very heartwarming at times. But it is so much flash and action and style and very little substance. When I actually look deeper at the storylines and the characters it feels a bit hollow. Either we skipped SEVERAL STEPS of character development to get here, or we didn’t move forward at all.

This would have been a FANTASTIC Season 3 IF we had gotten a Season 2 full of good character development only for Season 3 to show a character regression before moving forward at the end.

There were SO MANY storylines in Season 2 and so many characters did literally nothing, twiddling their thumbs while more important stuff was happening with other siblings. And that’s the whole crux of the matter. The siblings spent far too much time separated, their storylines disjointed.

Season 1 had a premise. Dysfunctional but found family. And the end of Season 1 promised that they would actually try to address Vanya’s (and their own) trauma. Season 2 sideswerved HARD and did not meet that promise. Instead they gave Vanya an amnesia storyline to gloss over the painful parts of healing.

There were just so many lost opportunities. More issues with this season and what I would have liked to have seen instead under the cut. I uh... went on a rant.

The Plot

What they essentially did was a soft reboot that just re-treaded out Season 1 with slight differences which is why so many of the characters feel so stagnated. Most of them are not moving forward or are moving forward so slowly, what was the point?

Luthor:

moderate character growth. He has (mostly) broken free of Reginald Hargeeves’ influence and transferred his daddy issues onto any other older male. The underground fighting and being a body man for Jack Ruby was fine but having FIVE become his new daddy figure and then trying to figure out WHICH FIVE to listen to was absolute gold. Also him being heartbroken but SUPER RESPECTFUL of Allison’s relationship with Raymond was A+. I assume he was just as respectful when she was married to Patrick and kudos to him for being the only one to mention Claire all season. Gets points taken off because despite the end of Season 1 being about how to help Vanya process her trauma his immediate reaction to Vanya is to CONFRONT HER WITH A GUN BEHIND HIS BACK which he only puts away when he sees there’s a child in the barn with them. And then he just... walks away.

Yeah he just… is there quietly supporting everyone else this season. Not the best but not the worst.

Diego:

SO MUCH CHARACTER GROWTH. I AM PROUD OF HIM. SOMEHOW JUMPED UP TO ONE OF THE FAVES THIS SEASON. Might have had the best character growth in the whole season. He went to therapy for 75 days and came out of it willing to throw away numbers and be team zero and make amends with most of his siblings. Still snarky and mean and kind of an obsessive dumbass about JFK and went into his thing with Lila way too quickly but I really loved him being a foil to Five. I almost cried when his stutter came back.

Ok but my biggest complaint is that I would have liked to see his own struggles as a hispanic man in 1960’s Dallas, Texas. Tie it to Allison’s Civil Rights plot. Because he and LiIa are two clearly non-white people, Lila with a British accent of all things, in 1963 Dallas going to a fancy gala with rich white men and no one bats an eye. No one says anything to either of them. Not that I want them to be discriminated against but it’s weird to see that juxtaposed with Allison not even being allowed to go into a diner. Because racism towards hispanic men is well and alive in present day Dallas and it sure as hell would have been in 1963. Dallas specifically used to have a neighborhood called Little Mexico that reached peak population in the 60s but was slowly dismantled by gentrification. While not legally segregated, Mexican-American citizens were still considered second class citizens. Places like Woolworth’s (and probably that diner where Allison had the sit in) did not allow Mexican-Americans. Him being put into that asylum was definitely rooted in racism after showing violence, even after helping an old white lady, and screaming about the president being assassinated.

I don’t know how to tie that cleanly to Allison’s storyline considering he already had a lot going on with his plot but like… show us some representation of a history not usually taught. Especially since David Castenada is Mexican-American. It’s literally his history.

Allison:

Started off kind of strong and then... eh. I liked PARTS of her storyline. I really liked her getting involved with the Civil Rights movement. I loved her being taken in by the other women at the hair salon. But I think the reveal of her storyline came too late. We spent multiple episodes with her before getting to her flashback after landing in the 60’s and it should have come earlier if you wanted us to care more about the community she joined.

While I liked Raymond fine, I would have preferred he didn’t exist. Not for shipping or anything but just for the fact that you had such a strong beginning with Allison being saved by this group of black women who took her in and defended her that I feel like you could have built more into that. They had some great scenes with them supporting her after Raymond is arrested and crying out as Allison is being restrained by the police officer but then Raymond is angry at her and denounces her from the community and then nothing. Even after she tells Raymond the truth there isn’t another scene with Allison and the other women.

Allison didn’t need another relationship, sincere or not. Not after Patrick and Luthor. She needed scenes with the women, commiserating over her lost family, siblings and child. She needed the support of other women in order to learn how to support other women so she could learn from her mistakes with Claire and Vanya. And to learn how to use her powers responsibly.

Her whole arc from Seasons 1 and 2 is about not wanting to use her powers because she has a history of personal gain and escalating violence… but then she doesn’t use them at moments where they would be the most helpful. How great would a storyline have been about her using her powers to protect these other black women in the community? And about learning how to use her powers to de-escalate a situation without resorting to violence? (Every time Allison was in a situation I kept screaming at the tv “I HEARD A RUMOR YOU SAT IN A CORNER AND TIED YOUR HANDS TOGETHER”)

Also. Also. Also. Black women often have no voice. Even, or especially, in their own community. They get looked over because of the violence happening to black men or the non-diverse feminism of white women. Show us more about Allison literally having no voice and connecting with these women who metaphorically have no voice. We get such a small taste of it. I want more.

Klaus:

What did Klaus do all season? No seriously? What was the point of him?

I get that the cult is a very Klaus thing to do but then he gets smothered by them so he tries to dip out? Was there… supposed to be a lesson in codependency there? A lesson about creating a new accepting family? About being heard by people who support you but he prefers the Hargreeves who will snipe at him instead?

And he was so mean to Ben all season. ALL SEASON he was mean to Ben. Because Ben can’t leave him and he’s acting as his conscience. Which is fair because that gets annoying after 17 years but maybe you should listen to him a little? Maybe you shouldn’t be making him perform tricks for you to impress your cult?

The Dave storyline was sad and some of the most real moments from Klaus all season. Another storyline that… we knew where it was gonna go and how it was gonna end but I didn’t mind it so much. But if the point of his storyline was to learn to let go of his trauma and just of people he’s grieving in general, Dave AND BEN, then… how does the cult fit into it? I’m still trying to make sense of the cult plot point. It didn’t serve anything with Klaus and you didn’t need it to have Ben have feelings for and try to make a connection with a girl. There’s something there with the cult storyline they were maybe trying to get at and I don’t think they achieved it.

Also his sobriety. The reason Klaus is the way he is is because he takes the drugs and the drinks to not see ghosts. If he were sober for three years (why was he sober for three years? He was in a cult. He should have been off his rocker the whole time because him trying to get sober was to see Dave and Dave han’ died yet) why wasn’t he surrounded by other ghosts asking him for help the same way they were in S1? And then he just… throws his sobriety away. Because of heartbreak? Annoyance at the world and at Ben?

Five:

Repetitive. It’s just a retool of S1’s apocalypse storyline. Which. AGAIN. Five doesn’t even solve this second apocalypse! I stand by Rapaccini’s post saying that Five was meant to be on the stage with the gun in his hand in season one. And he should have been there trying to stop the apocalypse with Vanya in S2. Cool, great, love Diego being taken into the Time Commission. But Five’s the one who’s been putting the pieces together and trying to get them the briefcase and who’s been looking at the newspapers and watching the videos and whatnot. How did no one consider that the second apocalypse revolved around Vanya? Again. And it’s for the same reason: her storyline was removed from her siblings and no one was there to support her until literally the last moment. She was being tortured by the FBI for A WHILE. Did anyone even tell Five that Vaya was being tortured by the FBI? Whie he was having a slap fight with his older younger self?

Old!YoungerFIve vs Young!OlderFive was hilarious. I loved every moment of it except for the fact that at literally the same time Vanya was being tortured by the FBI. Why are you keeping FIve and Vanya so far apart? Their storylines should revolve around each other. They’re the literal lynchpins of the series.

Ben:

Sweet baby. Sweet sad ghost baby. He twiddled his thumbs with Klaus for a while but I don’t mind it as much because he’s so tied to Klaus. So of course Klaus twiddling his thumbs means Ben doesn’t really get to do anything. I like him trying to assert his dominance in their relationship. I love him learning how to possess Klaus and make a real connection with fruit and the mud and getting to see Diego and Vanya one last time. I legit cried during Vanya’s scene with him. I’m so glad that we don’t lose Justin MIn next season because I was very worried. I also was brought to tears when he sat there alone saying he misses his siblings. All of them. So much.

Vanya:

I don’t like amnesia plots and I don’t like infidelity plots. Those are personal squicks for me so I absolutely loathe Vanya’s storyline. Look. I get that Sissy is oppressed as a not straight woman in 60’s Texas and she’s struggling with a husband who is pretty terrible (but standard by 1960’s Texas POV) and her son is difficult. I get where they were trying to go with it. But that doesn’t justify her carrying on an affair with Vanya. She is still married and still sleeping with him while coercing Vanya into keeping their whatever a secret. I don’t consider illicit affairs behind another partner’s back to be romantic.

I did NOT like their kissing scene together because again, she’s married, they’re both drinking and Sissy is visibly upset and drunk and she makes the first move on Vanya after having known Vanya for a month with Vanya having amnesia and Sissy is Vanya’s employer. Vanya has been hired by Sissy to watch over her child in exchange for room and board so by all accounts there’s literally no place to go and no one for Vanya to turn to if it goes south. When. When it goes south. Sissy knew full well that she had no intention of putting in the effort to make their relationship a permanent and sustainable thing as she makes clear to Vanya later. It’s Vanya who puts in the effort to make their relationship a viable thing after they spend the night together. So there’s a power dynamic there that is not ok.

So many of those components DO NOT WORK FOR ME. I don’t like it and I don’t think anyone’s storyline benefited from it. Their relationship was just a whole lot of NOPE for me.

What was the point of Sissy’s relationship with Vanya. Because it swallows up Vanya’s whole plot and we’re never going to see Sissy again so why did it matter? Just to show Vanya is queer? Cool, I love it. That’s great for Vanya. Do it not this way. Not in a way that has some amnesia, coercion, power dynamic issues. She already had that in a worse way with Leonard.

Vanya did not need a relationship this season. Straight up. Just like Allison. Because if you want to show Vanya growing and healing from her trauma to allow her to love another man or woman after what Leonard did to her, GIVING HER AMNESIA AND WIPING IT ALL AWAY SO IT DOESN’T MATTER ISN’T HOW YOU DO IT.

Beyond that. There’s just so much of Vanya’s storyline that is off and terrible and doesn’t make sense. If the whole point of all of this was to have this interesting connection with Harlan because she… transfers some of her powers to him? Is able to connect with him? They’re both special? Then show us that! We weren’t shown that. At all. How capable was Vanya in taking care of Harlan? We’ve never seen her with other children before, let alone a child who is non-verbal and clearly needs special attention and care. We see Sissy struggling with Harlan at one point, did Vanya struggle? As someone who used to work with children, it’s HARD. Adding in non-verbal special children is even harder.

So show us more scenes where this non-verbal child is able to communicate his wants and needs with Vanya. Show us Vanya being able to handle his temper tantrums in a way that connects to Vanya struggling with her own temper because of her trauma even if she doesn’t remember it. Show us Vanya commiserating with this child over a family that doesn’t really understand him and a father who is neglectful at best. The biggest scene I can remember Harlan connecting with Vanya before the finale is when he puts his hands over hers but that’s HARLAN comforting VANYA because VANYA is upset. Which is an interesting moment but that’s due to Vanya’s upset over Sissy and not anything to do with Harlan himself.

Cycling back around to Vanya’s amnesia. Thanks, I hate it.

If you have to have this stupid amnesia storyline, especially if you’re going to have it revealed by Reginald in Vanya’s mind that she is purposefully suppressing the memories because it’s too traumatic, then you need to seed that through the rest of the season. We had one nightmare flashback. Her memories could have been triggered by Carl being a dick about Harlan. They could have been triggered by feeding Harlan a peanut butter and marshmallow sandwich. They could have been triggered by her taking Harlan downtown and passing by a music store. Vanya didn’t pick up the violin once this season and that’s a shame considering she’s the White Violin.

I just really don’t like amnesia plots. I made a post saying I am SO FUCKING TIRED of seeing women traumatized in media only for them to keep getting re-traumatized to show their strength or their trauma is swept under the rug. And they swept Vanya’s trauma under the rug. All of Vanya’s interactions don’t mean anything in Season 2. They’re surface level sweet but hollow because she doesn’t fucking remember so what’s the fucking point in them apologizing and being nice to her now? They can afford to do that because she can’t remember and she’s not angry. And the focus shifts AWAY from Vanya after she remembers and the compassion and empathy goes to a different female antagonist who is trying to kill them. Where was this “let’s circle around you and tell you that you are one of us and we’ll accept you even though you just made a huge effort to kill us and almost succeeded” scene for Vanya after they locked her up and she busted out to go to her concert?

#the umbrella academy #tua s2 #tua spoilers #vanya hargreeves #five hargreeves #ben hargeeves #allison hargreeves #diego hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #luthor hargreeves #long post

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