#rewatching the prequels

[megamindsupremacy]

Padmé holds a supernova in the palm of her hands.

Across from her, lying in their shared bed, Anakin sleeps. His face is peaceful as she brushes her fingers through his hair, rubbing together golden-brown locks and letting them glide between her fingers. 

Anakin scares her, sometimes. Like when she sees him in propaganda clips, tearing through armies like paper. When she reviews his military plans that are far, far too risky, and it is already understood that he can pull them off flawlessly. When he snarls, blood splattered on his robes, and fights like a cornered, feral creature. When he looks at her, in their stolen moments, and she knows like she knows her mother’s face that he would - could - tear apart stars in her name. 

There are times that Anakin scares her. Even more terrifying are the times when he does not scare her.

Sometimes, Anakin looks at her, with an intensity that should terrify her, and instead it gives her a thrill like no other. Loving Anakin makes her feel loved. If Anakin asked, she would set fire to her life and run away with him into Wild Space. She would bomb the Senate Building and burn herself in its flames. She would follow him to Hell with no thought of returning. 

If Padmé asked, Anakin would level the galaxy. She knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he would destroy planets for her, and it makes her want to drag him in and kiss him until the stars explode.

Loving Anakin is like a rush. It’s like a high, it’s defiance, its rebellion, it’s romantic and freeing and the sensation of being caught in a riptide, swept out into the endless waves. Padmé loves Anakin like a sailor loves the sea, like the wind loves the sails. She loves Anakin. She loves their romance. She loves the thought of Anakin. Marrying him is screaming in the face of fifteen years of etiquette training and good manners and perfect-politician-Padmè. The possibility of being caught is a thrill. Nights like this, Padmé lays awake and imagines, vividly, their dramatic escape when their torrid romance comes to light. Perhaps they can journey out, beyond wild space, into the unknown. Maybe they can hide on Naboo, pretend to be commoners and live a normal life, whatever “normal” may be. She wouldn’t know. He wouldn’t either. They could build a normal, all for themselves. 

Anakin’s breath wisps across her face. She strokes his head again and reminds herself, I have a duty. They both do. She to the galaxy, he to his people. The Jedi saved Naboo and Padmé, and for that she owes them her life and loyalty. She knows Anakin feels the same. Her fantasies are just that - fantasies. There is no use planning for an unknown future, especially during a galaxy-defining war. They will survive, or they won’t. They will stay loyal to themselves and each other, but through it all, they will have each other.

In the palm of her hands, a supernova snores lightly. Padmè kisses his temple, closes her eyes, and drifts.

Read on Ao3

[rubinaitoart]

I’m gonna. I’m. Hmgodhwhxhsiwhfn. Diwjfbak. Help.

(/pos)

[allanalightwood]

do you think kanan ever thought about the clone who tried to convince him he was trying to help?

DO YOU THINK KANAN EVER ASKED REX ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT HE KNEW CLONE FORCE 99? DO YOU THINK HE ASKED REX IF HE KNEW GREY?????

.... DO YOU THINK. THAT BEFORE HE EVER EVEN MET REX, GREGOR, AND WOLFFE, HE THOUGHT ABOUT ALL THOSE SOLDIERS WHO CALLED HIM LITTLE COMMANDER AND CARRIED HIM ON THEIR SHOULDERS??? AND HOW THEY KILLED DEPA WITHOUT A SECOND THOUGHT?

and then rex explains to him what happened. order 66, the chips. everything. DO YOU THINK HE REGRETS ALL THE SHIT HE SAID ABT THE CLONES BECAUSE THE CLONES WERE HIS FRIENDS AND THEN HE FINDS OUT THEY COULDN'T DO ANYTHING TO STOP IT?

[person25]

i wholeheartedly believe the reason Anakin jumped even though he didn’t have the “high ground” was because he was 100% sure Obi-Wan wouldn’t hurt him like that

[hypacias]

There are no two people close enough that something cannot separate them. Some point at which they were never fully connected to begin with.

BLACK SAILS (2014 - 2017) • 4.08 “XXXVI”

[llithiaskyla]

guys i hate this so bad (lie) why did i have to stumble across these on pinterest

[heymeowmao]

一念关山 | A Journey to Love ° (๑•́ ⌓ •́)૭ ◟(•̀ ᴖ •́◟ )

[keelifallen]

[dontbelasagnax]

this has probably been done before but tell me in the tags how you got into codywan! 🧡🩵

[macaulaytwins]

do you ever have a “fell first” “fell harder” moment but it’s with you and one of your ships? like you get into them because of one character that you love and then slowly you fall for the other member of the ship just as hard as the first character?

[hickeygender]

of all the star wars movies, which of them do y'all 1) enjoy the most 2) consider the best quality and 3) think you've rewatched the most. add your answers in the reblogs or replies, i'm genuinely curious how much of an overlap there is within everyone's three answers. mine don't overlap at all! they're revenge of the sith, empire strikes back, and the force awakens :^)

[bagheerita]

So I read A Stitch in Time and one result of that which I was certainly not expecting was that I feel so much sympathy for Enabran Tain. Garak's life is a tragedy, but Tain's is a fucking black comedy.

I mean, he's a terrible person and an absolute shitbag, but can you imagine? You have this kid. You go to all the trouble of arranging for him to be raised in a family situation where he won't be rejected from society for being your bastard. You get him into the nicest indoctrination school where he can hobnob with plenty of uppercrust kids. You get him a job in your Order and all the proper training. And he's actually, like, really good at it. But he has this fatal flaw of being completely incapable of not making stupid, short-sighted, emotional decisions.

A scene I imagine has to have happened just prior to Garak and Tain's confrontation at the end of part II:

Like goddamn. When Tain asked "what's your plan for getting rid of her husband?" and Garak's just like "plan what plan." Dude. I'M disappointed, I can only imagine the guy who's job it is to know and plan for everything isn't at least as disappointed.

I know he didn't actually, but do you think there was ever a time when Tain wanted to be like, You know what. Just go back to Tolan and become a gardener. Join that illegal hippie cult. It's fine.

[spnfanficpond]

SPN Rewatch: FanFic Edition

Our goal is to rewatch the show with fanfic writing in mind. We want to look for all the places in canon where we could add a scene, show a scene from a certain character’s point of view, or change something to make things turn out differently. (We may also critique what the show writers did; that seems inevitable.)

Episodes we're discussing: 3.09 Malleus Maleficarum and 3.10 Dream a Little Dream of Me

What time will it be for you:

UTC - Saturday 17:00

Los Angeles - Saturday 9am

New York - Saturday noon

London - Saturday 5pm

New Delhi - 10:30pm

Melbourne - Sunday 4am

Who’s invited? All Pond members, including Turtles! You don’t have to be a writer to have an opinion on the episodes that could inspire a writer! Everyone has valuable opinions about the show and could spark conversation and inspiration.

Where will we meet? In the discord server.  (You must be a member to be in the Discord server. Not a member? Fill out this form here.) There is a special channel for us to chat in so we don’t disturb other chats happening at the same time.

How does it work? On our own, whenever we have time, we all watch two episodes of SPN. At the appointed time, we all get together and chat about them. Although we have several questions to consider and creative ideas for you to do if you want, there is no pressure to actually have answers to these questions or have created anything prior to the chat. Didn’t get to watch them? No biggie! We’ve all watched these episodes enough that we can probably talk about them without rewatching them!

More info under the cut!

What questions should we consider while we watch? We have a few questions you can keep in mind while you’re watching the episodes:

Are there any “fanfiction gaps” in this episode? Any places between scenes where a juicy story could happen? (For example, one scene ends at night, but the next scene begins during the day, and what did they do with all of that time?)

How would the episode be different if you changed one thing? What is changed is up to you. It could be as complex as a character making a different choice, or as simple or silly as someone wearing a funny hat throughout part or all of the episode.

What about this episode would you like to see happen differently? How would making that change affect future episodes?

List any parts of each episode that you think could be jumping-off points for a fic. Like, in the pilot, how did Sam meet their friend who was in the bar with them?

How would the episode be different if there were another character involved like a reader insert character?

Do any of the themes we've already discussed in The Archive (See the bottom of the doc under the heading "Thematic docs") show up in this episode? Does this episode bring up any new themes we should be watching out for in the future?

What else can we do before the chat? You can add any notes you have about the episodes we'll be discussing to The Archives! In addition, besides just discussing the fanfiction possibilities in every episode, we also want to encourage you to create things centered around the episodes we’re discussing and share them with the rest of us. Things like:

Write some meta about some part of the episode. What does this episode show us about one or more of the characters?

Write a fic based on the episode. Share a link to your fic in the discussion and we can talk about it!

Make a playlist that you feel reflects the mood of the episode.

Make some art or a photo collage or edits to go along with the episode.

We look forward to seeing everything you create! Be sure to tag us so we can reblog your work!

Have questions about this or anything else? Send us an ASK or send a private message to one of the admins below!

Admins:

Michelle - @mrswhozeewhatsis

Marie - @mariekoukie6661

MJ - @thoughtslikeaminefield

Mana - @manawhaat (Founder and Admin Emeritus)

[scarysanctuary]

whenever i hear people talk about how hated/mocked Hayden was back in the day for his work in the prequel trilogy, im just like well, hmm i cant relate, ive never hated him, because even though the movies werent great, and theres stuff to critique there, i think he suited the role as Anakin very well, and seeing as how we had plenty of good actors involved and even they werent able to showcase their skills to the upmost, methinks (and perhaps most rational people think) its the fault of the director and not the actor. oh and also he was unbelievably hot, so in conclusion v

[brightsunsmeanshello]

Anakin Skywalker: *slaughters an entire village of women and children “like animals”*

Fans: I can forgive that

Jar Jar Binks: *trips over his own feet at an importune time*

Fans: Oh my god, a Sith Lord

[gabityaby]

I think i cracked it, the reason everything produced in the times of the High Republic is soo good compared to modern Star Wars, tldr its because of pain.

See, in all the works that date during the High Republic (specifically during George's ownership of SW) there's this fearlessness to show pain and tragedy and death, and i know it sounds like "everything for the children these days is sanitized!" but think for a second if Revenge of the Sith would be something Disney would publish these days and that's your answer, but that's just a tangent meant to emphasize the difference between Og SW and new SW, because what Og SW had was strife, and you the viewer knew that, because every time you booted up KOTOR or played Phantom Menace you knew what was coming, you knew to expect the isle of happiness in which the characters lived to slowly sink beneath the waves of tragedy and you'll see it happen as the characters around the story just dug up their own fates, in very much George Lucas fashion, and THAT is what made the work and the small moments of levity to taste so much sweeter, because you see the characters who you've grown attached to suffer so un-justly that when you return to the good times you can't help but appreciate the good and mourn it's departure.

The reason new SW does not achieve this is because the characters are dealing with the aftermath of the destruction of the baddies, its the birth of the hope for the future, its when you look at the horizon at the END of the movie, yes new problems may arise but the big hurdle is done and Disney didn't cultivate the joy from the Alliance's victory as it should, because instead of giving us proper post-war optimism (as it fits the real life post WW2 countries counterparts and fantasy sci-fi proper) it stuck only with the brooding post-war trauma, and while yes, that is also a very realistic take it still lacked verily from the former and thus there is no reason why we should mourn a character's strife if that is all we've seen from them, its like watching paint dry, nothing particularly changes, just a new villain here and there, the new character discovers new powers, new info, but there is no resolution, no reward for their strife, and even if they were going for a bleak post-war future (which they didn't and it also doesn't fit SW's constant theme of hope for a better future) it still ends up looking incomplete for the mere reason that they don't want to shut the book in case they need to milk the cow some more.

My point with all this was not to bash new SW though, my point was to use it as a comparison to highlight how Og SW built itself on a foundation of hope, how it showed us the height before the fall, how it is possible to make Shakespeare in space and leave all of us with broken hearts and looking hopefully into the future.