#sam wears daisy dukes

[samanddean76]

Title: Money Back Guarantee

Ship: Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester

Word Count: 694 | Rating: Explicit

Major Warnings: None Apply

Tags: Stanford Era, Dancer Sam Winchester, Customer Dean Winchester, Anal Plug, Sam Wears Daisy Dukes, Dean Appreciates The View, Sex in/on the Impala, Top Dean Winchester/Bottom Sam Winchester, Kinktober 2024, Kinktober Prompt: XXX-Store Viewing Booth

Summary: Sam needs a little money to cover his expenses while at Stanford. It's all good until the night the window shade raises and reveals a familiar face.

Written for @masoena 's October 27th Kinktober prompt of XXX-Store Viewing Booth.

Story on AO3.

[sethsclearwater]

synopsis: human!reader is paul’s imprint (very much ignoring each other at this point because of tensions between the wolves and cullens) and they get sent to seattle to pretend to be a married couple and spy on victoria and riley at a nightclub. they get back to the hotel and realize there’s only one bed, bickering and fluff ensue 

warnings: smutty themes

word count: 5.56k

…

“why don’t we just send emmett and y/n?” edward suggested and you choked on your drink at the thought, shaking your head. you all were gathered in the cullen’s kitchen, all of the cullens plus bella, jacob, sam, and paul were currently in attendance while you discussed sending a pair up to spy on victoria and riley in seattle.

carlisle spared you a sympathetic glance before turning his attention back to edward, “we can’t send emmett. she knows what all of us look like.” carlisle explained, the rest of the vampires letting out sighs. you rolled your eyes, getting up and going to the fridge to get a bottle of water while everyone threw out some more ideas.

“why not y/n and paul?” sam suggested, both you and paul making choking sounds at the thought, “she doesn’t know what either of them look like and you know paul wouldn’t let anything happen to y/n.” sam explained and you looked over to carlisle who seemed to be pondering it for a moment before nodding.

it was well known at this point that you were paul’s imprint, something neither you nor him seemed to be too appreciative of seeing as the tensions between the wolves and cullens were pretty high as always. unfortunately, the imprint bond resulted in both of you needing to be near each other most of the time or else you’d end up in an unreasonable amount of emotional pain over the separation. 

you were fuming with him when you found out, both of you now unable to have any kind of meaningful romantic relationship with anyone outside of each other because of the tether binding the two of you together as “soulmates.” 

“i think that’s our best option at this point. you two should get ready. i’ll book a hotel room and you two can take the volvo up there, you’ll need to leave soon if you want to get there tonight.” carlisle explained and you whined, looking over to paul who looked just as disturbed as you by the whole idea. 

“did you put this idea in his head?” you asked paul who shook his head, scoffing at you.

“you think i put the idea in his head? i’m not anymore interested in this then you are princess.” paul rolled his eyes and you huffed before heading upstairs, alice following shortly after you to help you pack a bag. 

while she packed your bag, rosalie came upstairs to explain the plan to you, “do you know what you’re supposed to be doing tonight?” she asked as she took a seat at the vanity in your room and you shook your head, “so carlisle and sam need the two of you to go into the trinity nightclub and you’re going to have to act like you like him. it’s a couple’s club and they’re gonna kick you out if you’re acting like you hate him the whole time. if anyone asks about your relationship, you got married last fall and your name is y/n lahote, got it?” she explained and you huffed, nodding, not at all excited about the idea of being paul’s wife for the night.

“victoria and riley should be there. do not interact with either of them - carlisle and sam just need the two of you to get eyes on them, paul should be able to hear anything they’re talking about so you just need to make sure that you’re playing the part. it shouldn’t take too long and then you two can go back to the hotel. as long as nothing else happens you two should be good to come back in the morning then, okay?” she asked and you nodded, turning as alice called your name.

she was standing in the entry of the closet, holding up a black lace bodysuit and a pair of daisy dukes and you nearly choked, “oh i am not wearing-” you started but she just shushed you, tossing it into your bag.

“it’s a nightclub y/n! you have to look the part. besides, paul’ll be matching you. you two’ll look great together!” she exclaimed happily and you rolled your eyes as she explained paul was supposedly going to be wearing a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt to compliment you. 

“this is going to be miserable.” you groaned, walking back down the stairs, alice following close behind with your bag. paul was apparently much quicker than you to pack and already had the car started, waiting rather impatiently inside while carlisle and sam went over the plan with him. 

while alice got your bag in the trunk, you got into the passenger seat. “so just make sure nothing happens to her, okay?” carlisle finished and paul rolled his eyes, nodding.

“couldn’t even if i wanted to.” he grumbled and you laughed softly, happy to know he was just as miserable as you were over the whole ordeal. you got your seatbelt on and grabbed your phone to put some music on while paul rolled the window up and got the GPS setup. 

as you two pulled out, you could faintly make out the sound of jacob, embry, emmett, and jasper laughing with each other over how mad you and paul looked. “doja cat?” paul groaned as you turned on your music.

“do you argue about everything? jesus christ-” you groaned, rolling your eyes at him as you slumped down in the seat. 

the 3 and a half hour drive to seattle was nothing short of misery. it was mostly silent between you and paul aside from when he’d make a comment about your music choices. by the time you had arrived at the hotel, you were dying to get out of the car and get some air. paul parked the car, turning to you “put this on, yea?” he asked, handing you an engagement ring and you scoffed, shaking your head.

“what are you? delusional?” you gawked at him and he rolled his eyes, grabbing your hand and putting it on your finger himself despite your protests. both of you found yourselves at a loss for words when you felt him grab your hand, neither of you used to the tingling sensation that accompanied him touching you. 

paul was the first to break the silence, “we’re supposed to be married. suck it up and act like it, would you?” he deadpanned before releasing your hand and you rolled your eyes, quickly hopping out of the car. while you headed inside, paul carried both of your bags in shortly behind you.

“hi!” the lady at the front desk greeted the two of you as paul handed your bags to the bellman to bring to your room, “what’s the name on your reservation?” she asked softly and you smiled.

“y/n y/l/n.” you said and paul quickly cut you off, wrapping his arm around your waist and pulling you to his side. 

you just about slapped him but stopped yourself when you realized you were the one that fucked up, “y/n lahote.” he clarified, “just got married a few months ago.” he explained, pressing a soft kiss to the top of your head.

you were more mad that something in you enjoyed the feeling of him touching you than you were that he was touching you in the first place, “oh congratulations! what a beautiful ring.” she mused, taking your hand to look at the ring paul had put on you just a few minutes prior. “you two make a beautiful couple.” she continued, “any babies yet?” she asked softly, smiling as she released your hand and worked at checking the two of you in.

you looked up at paul anxiously who just smiled, “we’re working on it.” he explained, smiling as the front desk lady beamed at the two of you.

“oh well we have to upgrade you to our couple’s suite. you two will love it! definitely should help with that.” she winked at you and you felt your cheeks heating up, paul’s grip on your waist tightening. 

“thank you.” paul said softly, taking the keycard from her as she handed it to him.

“anytime. we’ll have someone bring some champagne up later tonight then we’ll leave you two to it!” she winked at you again and you forced yourself to smile at her, quietly thanking her as well as paul guided you over to the elevator.

the ride up the elevator was more or less silent and you allowed paul to keep his hand around your waist the whole way up, only squirming out of his grasp when you got into the room. “what the fuck was that?” you whipped around to hiss at him when he closed the door behind him.

“don’t even start with me - you seriously need to get it together if we’re gonna go out tonight.” he snapped back at you, rolling his eyes. 

you let out a frustrated sigh, realizing he was right, before grabbing your bag and heading into the bathroom, shutting the door behind you so you could cool yourself off and get changed in peace. you quickly got changed into alice’s outfit for you and, although you were well aware you looked absolutely phenomenal in it, you had little interest in dressing up for paul. 

while you were doing your hair and makeup, paul knocked on the door, “how long are you gonna take? we have to be there in 30 minutes.” he explained, still sounding just as grumpy as he did when you two got there.

“‘m almost done.” you explained, pulling the door open so you could glare at him. he sucked in a breath when he saw you, clearly trying not to stare but failing miserably as he looked you up and down.

scoffing, you shut the door on him again which had him rolling his eyes on the other side of the door, “just- just hurry up, yea?” he asked, a bit softer than before.

“give me like 5 minutes.” you said back, quickly finishing your hair and makeup before heading back out to grab your shoes. 

alice was definitely right in her outfit choices, you and paul did look like a couple and he looked… attractive? you caught yourself staring at him a bit too long which he quickly noticed and teasingly offered you the same scoff you had given him just a few minutes prior, “c’mon princess,” paul said, loving taunting you with that stupid petname 

you just rolled your eyes, huffing as you got up and followed him out of the hotel room. the ride back down the elevator was short and paul wrapped his hand around your waist when the doors opened, anchoring you to his side as the two of you walked out.

you smiled at the front desk lady who waved to the two of you on your way out, “have fun mister and misses lahote!” she called as you exited.

refraining from rolling your eyes, you curled into paul’s side as the frigid outside air hit your exposed skin. neither of you acknowledged it when paul pulled you closer to him, instead just making the quick walk over to the club.

as you stepped instead, you could hear the music blasting and the heat immediately helped heat you up. paul slid his hand into the back pocket of your shorts which nearly had you whipping around to slap him but you remained committed to the role, allowing him to lead you over to the bar. 

“c’mere.” he murmured, grabbing your hips and lifting you up onto one of the stools and stepping inbetween your thighs. you bit back a snarky comment, instead just allowing him to scan the room to see if he could identify victoria or riley. 

apparently he couldn’t and after a moment you started to get a bit impatient, “can we go dance?” you asked, already knowing there was no way in hell he’d let you go alone.

“absolutely not.” he said, not paying any particular attention to you as he looked over his shoulder when your favorite redhead and her boytoy entered the dancefloor, “nevermind. let’s go.” his grip on your hips tightened as he lifted you off the barstool, allowing you to take his hand and tug him onto the dancefloor.

the crowd of people forced you and paul to be chest and chest when you finally got onto the dancefloor, “can you not look so stiff? you look like you hate me.” you said, rolling your eyes as paul shushed you, clearly trying to listen to whatever victoria and riley were talking about.

all the couples around you had their hands all over each other and you and paul looked… quite the opposite and apparently one of the other guys on the dancefloor noticed and made his way over to the two of you. you mentally facepalmed yourself as you tried to figure out a way of what you knew was going to be an awkward situation but couldn’t think of anything before he started talking, “miss can i just say you are looking so fucking sexy right now? such a shame that your man isn’t paying you any mind,” he said as he slid his hand into your back pocket. you tensed up and paul turned his attention back to you.

“if you don’t take your hand off of her ass in the next 3 seconds you will lose that hand.” paul threatened, giving him a look that you could only define as somewhere between furious and over-protective. the guy rolled his eyes at paul which neither of you took too kindly to. 

“i think the lady can make decisions for herself, right sexy?” he asked you and you looked up at paul anxiously, not sure what to do.

paul grabbed his hand and pulled it out of your back pocket, squeezing it a bit too hard for the guy and had him letting out a low whine, “okay, okay for fuck’s sake i got it man-” he tried to reason but paul didn’t seem to be too particularly phased by his pain, squeezing his wrist harder.

“paul-” you warned when you felt him beginning to shake a bit and you placed your hand on his abdomen which quickly pulled him back to you. the guy quickly walked away when paul released his hand. 

“you okay?” paul asked in a much softer tone than he normally used to talk to you in, he almost seemed genuinely concerned for your wellbeing, something you quickly chalked up to him pretending to be your husband for the night.

“‘m fine.” you murmured, looking away from him and over to victoria and riley who had moved over to some of the couches in the lounge area. 

paul slid his hand up to your jaw, prompting you to look back up at him, “okay. you tell me if you want to leave, yea?” he asked and you nodded, letting out a heavy sigh. he had never asked if you were okay before or ever really seemed too particularly concerned about your emotional well being so this was new. you stopped yourself before you could think any more about it, reminding yourself he was only doing all this because of your whole husband/wife charade for the night. 

“we need to go over there.” he said back in his normal tone of indifference, spinning your around and guiding you over to the lounge area where quite literally every single couple over there was in a heated makeout session. 

paul sat down on one of the open loveseats, pulling you into his lap in the process. you looked around at all the other couples, quickly figuring out how to fit in with them before you moved so you were straddling paul’s lap, taking his hands and sliding them over your hips.

you ran your hands up his chest, stopping when you cupped his face in your hands, both of you scanning each other’s features in an attempt to read what was going through each of your minds. knowing you were easily going to blow your cover if you didn’t get into it soon, you just offered paul a small nod of permission which he thankfully picked up on.

he slid one of his hands onto your lower back to stabilize you and knotted the other in your hair, pulling you close to him so your lips just barely touched. your whole body felt like it was on edge as you slowly melted into the kiss.

he tightened his grip on you, pulling you closer to him as he kissed you. your mind was foggy with thoughts of him. being so close to him - even if it was just for some stupid act - had you all sorts of emotional and you could hardly focus on anything other than how good paul’s body felt against yours. 

he pulled back after a moment, closing his eyes and taking a few deep breaths and you watched him nervously, not sure if you did something wrong. you dropped your hips back into his lap but paul stopped you, gripping your hip when it suddenly clicked together and you looked down to see the large tent in his jeans.

you couldn’t help the giggle that left your lips, happy to know he was more down bad about the whole ordeal than you were. paul opened his eyes to glare at you, “don’t even start with me princess,” paul threatened and you just smiled innocently at him.

“i don’t think i know what you mean paul.” you whispered, running one of your hands down his chest, slowing down as you got to his lower abdomen, teasingly dancing your fingers along the denim material on his jeans. 

paul’s breath hitched in his throat when your fingers just barely grazed over the bulge in his jeans, “don’t start something you can’t finish.” paul warned and you giggled again, running your hand back up his chest to wrap around his neck.

paul let out a relieved sigh when you decided to stop teasing him, running his hands back up your sides, “what a beautiful ring!” a woman’s voice called and you looked over to see a woman who looked to be a little older than you and paul sitting down next to the two of you, “can i see?” she asked softly and you looked up at paul who nodded.

you smiled softly, offering the woman your hand, “wow that’s absolutely beautiful. how long have you two been married?” she asked looking between the two of you.

“just a few months now.” paul explained, “the misses over here wanted a long engagement.” he teased, pinching your side which had you squirming in his lap, knowing how irritated it would make him, the two of you apparently each deciding to do your damnedest to make the other miserable. 

“oh how lovely.” she cooed, “you two make a beautiful couple. any babies yet?” she asked softly and paul apparently saw his opportunity to get back at you and ran with it.

“that’s funny you ask. we’ve actually been trying since the honeymoon.” he explained, “she’s been begging for me to put a baby in her if you know what i mean.” he teased, both of them laughing. if looks could kill, paul most definitely would’ve been dead with the way you were glaring daggers at him.

the woman squeezed your hand gently, “you would look absolutely stunning with his baby my love. pregnancy would suit you well.” she mused and you forced a smile.

“thank you.” you whispered, knowing your cheeks were definitely bright pink by now with how mortified you were over the whole ordeal. 

“well i must be going now. it was so lovely meeting the two of you.” she said softly, pressing a kiss to the top of your hand before getting up and leaving. 

you turned your attention back to paul who could not have looked more satisfied with himself, “don’t even think about it princess.” paul teased, knowing how badly you wanted to chew him out right now but couldn’t for risk of blowing your cover.

you sucked in a threatening breath and paul just rolled his eyes at you before looking over to victoria and riley who seemed to be wrapping their night up, “c’mon let’s go.” paul murmured, lifting you off of him and helping you stand before guiding you out of the club. 

the walk back to the hotel was short but frigid, paul kept his arm wrapped around you the whole time and you deluded yourself into believing it was because he actually felt anything for you. neither of you said much on the walk back, probably because you both were wondering what the hell you just did together in that club.

you kicked off your shoes as soon as you got back to the hotel room, immediately heading into the bathroom so you could shower. it wasn’t until you were stepping out of the shower that you realized you left your pajamas in the other room. huffing, you wrapped a towel around yourself and headed back out to the bedroom where paul was sat down on the edge of the bed on the phone with sam.

“shut your eyes you clown.” you snapped at paul when you noticed he was ogling you again. he just rolled his eyes, dramatically covering his eyes while you grabbed your clothes and quickly changed. 

“you done yet?” he asked and you hummed. happy with your answer, he headed into the bathroom, putting sam on speaker phone while he got in the shower. it wasn’t long until he came back out, wearing just a pair of sweatpants and now off the phone with sam.

you crossed your arms over your chest, looking him up and down dramatically in an attempt to show your disapproval of him, “you are not sleeping in the same bed as me like that.” you deadpanned and he just rolled his eyes.

“are you always so dramatic?” he asked as he pulled a shirt out of his bag, pulling it on as he waited for your response.

you just huffed, “only for you paul,” you muttered, rolling your eyes as you got under the covers and leaned against the headboard so you could put something on tv. 

paul sighed, sitting down on the bed next to you, “hgtv?” he asked, groaning as you turned it on and laid down, content to listen to that in the background while you fell asleep.

“you can put whatever on once i’m asleep.” you grumbled, closing your eyes as you attempted to fall asleep. 

“sweet dreams princess.” paul grumbled back, getting back up to do who knows what. you fell asleep pretty quickly, exhausted from the long day.

sometime during the night, you woke up shivering. upset with how cold you were, you got up, turning the lights on as you went to the thermostat which paul apparently took issue with, “what are you doing?” he groaned as he woke up and threw his arm over his eyes.

“it’s freezing in here.” you said softly, attempting to mess around with the thermostat which didn’t work at all. seeing it wasn’t working, you groaned and picked up the phone, calling the front desk and asked them if they could turn up the heat. 

they were quick to let you know that it was a system issue and everyone’s heat was broken. “jus’ c’mere.” paul groaned when you hung up the phone, opening his arms for you, clearly wanting to get back to sleep.

“absolutely not.” you deadpanned, more paranoid that if you did cuddle with him it’d make your feelings for him worse than they already were.

“have fun being up all night then.” he grumbled, slapping the light switch back off, quickly going back to sleep. you huffed, determined not to need him at all but quickly realized it was going to be a long night as it was only 1 in the morning and it wasn’t getting warmer anytime soon.

you thought through the pros and cons in your head. you couldn’t deny how much your body and heart wanted him but your brain kept screaming at you not to do anything with him for fear of catching feelings for him. “it’s way too late for that.” you thought to yourself as you realized how quickly you had fallen for the man who imprinted on you, effectively tethering the two of you together for the rest of both of your lives.

“paul?” you murmured after a moment and he hummed, not opening his eyes to look at you.

“cold?” he asked teasingly, a smile quickly covering his face and you mentally cursed yourself for not getting carlisle to turn you into a vampire already so you wouldn’t be in this situation. 

“yea.” you whispered and he chuckled softly. 

“c’mere.” he murmured, opening his arms which you quickly crawled into, allowing him to pull you close to his chest, “better?” he asked softly after a moment and you nodded.

a few moments of silence went by before you decided to break it, “is it always going to feel like this?” you murmured softly and he opened his eyes to look down at you.

“what do you mean?” he asked, much softer than he usually was with you. you gnawed at your bottom lip as you tried to figure out how to clarify.

“us.” you whispered, “is it always going to hurt?” you asked and he frowned at you, also taking a moment to think of his response.

he took in a deep breath before responding, “if we’re not together then yea. it probably always will.” he explained softly and you nodded, bottom lip warbling as you tried to figure out what to say to that.

“do you think we ever could?” you whispered, peeking up at him nervously, “be together i mean.” you clarified, not sure what to expect from him.

paul sucked in another deep breath, both of you treading very carefully, “we could. but i think you hate me a little too much for that.” he explained softly and you furrowed your eyebrows as you looked up at him, confused by his response.

“hate you?” you murmured incredulously, “i only hate that you make my heart hurt so much.” you explained softly, “and i hate that you make it hard to be away from you. and i hate that it hurts whenever we’re separated. and i hate that i’m addicted to how it feels when you touch me.” you explained, figuring now was as good a time as any to finally let him know how you felt about him.

paul seemed a bit taken aback by your confession, his eyes softening as he processed what you said to him, “you don’t hate me?” he murmured after a moment and you shook your head.

“i don’t think i could hate you if i tried.” you whispered and he nodded, his grip tightening around you for a moment.

“then yea. we could be together if you wanted.” he explained softly, gently rubbing circles against your shoulder blade with his thumb.

you nodded, pulling your bottom lip between your teeth as you tried to think of what to say next, “can we try?” you asked softly and he nodded slowly, gently running his free hand up your back and into your hair to run his fingers through it.

he scanned your features, waiting for you to give him a small nod before he pressed his lips to yours for the second time that night, except this time he meant it. you tightened your fists on his shirt, tugging him closer to you which he happily obliged to. paul rolled over so he was ontop of you and settled comfortably between your thighs which you quickly wrapped around him, tugging him down to kiss you again as you slid one of your hands up his chest to wrap around the back of his neck, holding him close to you.

a soft knock at the door pulled you both out of your makeout session, paul pulling apart from you as the two of you caught your breaths, “i’ll get it.” he murmured, pressing another soft kiss to your lips before getting out of the bed and padding over to the door. 

you couldn’t hear too well but it sounded like someone from the hotel was there to drop off some blankets. the conversation was short lived and paul came back over a few moments later, handing you a blanket, “apparently the heat really is out.” he explained as you spread the blanket out on the top covers, paul getting back into the bed with you and quickly pulled you back into his chest.

“we should get some sleep.” you whispered, peeking up at him and he nodded in agreement, pressing a soft kiss to your forehead as you curled further into his chest. 

“definitely should.” he reiterated, allowing you to roll over so he was spooning you, only letting out a soft chuckle when you took his arm and pulled it over you so he had you caged in his embrace. it didn’t take long for both of you to drift off, much happier knowing that the two of you settled your feelings for one another.

the next morning you woke up to the sound of paul’s phone ringing. you let out a groan, rolling over so you could bury your face in the crook of paul’s arm as he blindly reached around for his phone, quickly picking up the facetime call from sam.

“hey sam,” paul muttered groggily and you just groaned, not at all interested in being up so early in the morning. you weren’t paying too much attention to what they were saying but did hear paul agreeing to drive back asap, “yea, yea we’ll get going in a minute.” he explained, gently squeezing your side in an attempt to wake you up a bit more.

they quickly said their goodbyes before paul hung up, “you up?” he asked softly, running his hand up and down your side as he waiting for your response.

you hummed, nodding as you sat up, groggily knuckling at your eyes, “they need us to head back soon, apparently something happened.” he explained and you groaned, rolling over so you were straddling paul’s waist, quickly leaning down to press a soft kiss to his lips before getting off of him.

paul just chuckled as you headed into the bathroom to change, both of you getting ready quickly before heading downstairs to check-out where the check-in lady was happily waiting for the two of you, “mister and misses lahote!” she beamed as the two of you walked over, “how was everything?” she asked and you looked up at paul who pressed his lips to your forehead for a quick kiss.

“great, thank you.” he said softly, handing her the key so she could finish checking you guys out.

“that’s lovely to hear. well i’m hoping i’ll see you two back here in 9 months with a baby then!” she teased and you blushed, your cheeks quickly heating up to a bright pink at her comment. paul just chuckled and squeezed your side.

“we can hope.” he responded teasingly, smiling at her before you waved your goodbyes and headed back out to the car. 

the ride back to forks felt shorter than the way there seeing as paul encouraged you to go back to sleep on the way back, sensing how tired you were through the bond. about 20 minutes before you got back, you woke up, groggily trying to figure out what was going on, “we’re almost back.” paul said softly when he realized you had woken up.

you nodded, blearily knuckling at your eyes, “what are we gonna tell them?” you mumbled as you woke up, now realizing that you’d need to tell the pack and cullens that you two finally decided to try and embrace the imprint instead of rejecting it.

“sam already knows so i’m guessing he told everyone.” paul explained and that was enough to wake you all the rest of the way up.

you looked over at him confused and he just laughed softly, “he saw you on facetime when you rolled over this morning.” he explained and you groaned, slumping back down in the seat.

“well that solves that problem i guess.” you said softly, both of you laughing softly. 

when you got back to the cullen’s house, you and paul were quite relentlessly teased about the whole thing for about 5 minutes before sam and carlisle put a stop to it, allowing you and paul to go upstairs to one of the spare bedrooms and catch up on the rest of the sleep that you had missed out on thanks to your long night out. 

[greedandenby]

I know everyone wants to see rockstar!Lestat in daisy dukes and fishnets (i wouldn't complain) but something about Thin White Duke-era Bowie just... Idk, I want to see Sam prancing around like a pony wearing this.

I would also be absolutely fine with this:

[ao3wincest]

Money Back Guarantee

read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/tWoK6lk by SamandDean76 Sam needs a little money to cover his expenses while at Stanford. It's all good until the night the window shade raises and reveals a familiar face. Words: 694, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English Series: Part 35 of SPN Kinktober 2024 Fandoms: Supernatural (TV 2005) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Categories: M/M Characters: Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester Relationships: Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester Additional Tags: Stanford Era (Supernatural), Dancer Sam Winchester, Customer Dean Winchester, Anal Plug, Sam Wears Daisy Dukes, Dean Appreciates The View, Sex in/on the Impala (Supernatural), Top Dean Winchester/Bottom Sam Winchester, Kinktober 2024, Kinktober Prompt: XXX-Store Viewing Booth read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/tWoK6lk

[dirigibleplumbing]

Dean wearing a shirt that says “Thicc Thighs Save Lives” and when someone calls him on him having chicken bowlegs he calls Cas over and presents Cas' tree trunks in person OR pulls up a picture Dean took of Cas washing Baby in cut off short shorts (both the washing and the photo op were Cas' birthday present to Dean. Dean has versions of the picture with crouched him in the frame doing the 🙏 pose. Poor Sam had to take these pictures)

I will continue to go on the record as loving beefy Cas but... for context, my spouse is basically “Benny LaFitte but Bigger.” they work a skilled labor physically demanding job and their love language is food and their comfort is food. their thighs are 2-3 times larger that Cas’s, and their shoulders at least 1.5 wider. they have to go up a size in both shirts (to accommodate the shoulders) and pants (to accommodate the thighs) and hardly any button-downs fit them correctly. to me, that’s what qualifies as “tree trunk thighs” and “broad shoulders.” whenever I read about Cas’s “broad shoulders” in fic I have to glaze over and pretend it said something else.

that said you and everyone else is entitled to their opinion of what constitutes true thiccness! and I agree with everything else you said! YES Dean in a “thicc thighs save lives” tee, YES he gets called on his chicken bowlegs, YES he calls Cas over and shows off those... yum... oak sapling thighs :P and pulls out the pic of Cas washing Baby in daisy dukes

also lol at Sam having to take the pics

[scoobydoodean]

I don't intend this as samcrit as much as I intend it as 2000s era crit and writer crit (Heart is actually... really hard to watch for very much unintended reasons). Because I think they thought they wrote Sam as a progressive person to some extent? But I also think they did want Sam to have a judgmental streak when it comes to Dean (and sometimes people Dean hangs out with face the fallout of that). Which makes separating out the intended narrative from the unintended difficult in some ways.

But it is funny when fanon casts Sam as this progressive feminist king when this is how he pictures a woman who drinks alone at a bar and dares to converse with his brother and share a few drinks with him:

Fishnets, daisy dukes, and a crop top.

Uses french phrases with bad pronunciation while introducing herself.

Nearly throws up on herself because she can't hold down her purple nurples.

Named "Starla"—a name Sam clearly perceives in a negative light—though there's nothing wrong with that name! It's a cool name! But it also wasn't her actual name according to Dean.

Versus Dean about this woman:

She was a graduate student studying anthropology and folklore.

They were discussing local ghost stories.

She was wearing a black dress, heels, and black tights.

Neither of them were drunk. They DID drink purple nurples together but they weren't guzzling them by the dozen.

And of COURSE both are "tall tales". Dean quickly alters the story to begin mocking Sam for butting in, and Bobby's job is to find the truth "somewhere in the middle". But they clearly perceive this woman in very different ways. One of them is weirdly judgmental about this woman and it's the alleged feminist king.

The thing is that Sam making fun of his brother in "Tall Tales" by describing the girl he was hanging out with as a stupid, sloppy, mannerless drunk makes Sam look like a pent up virgin incel complaining about women who consort with Chads.

[heavnofhell]

Can I be a damsel in distress so Sam Winchester can save me?

[tekkai]

@sappy-secrets My favorite in-law tagged me! Thank you Sam!!!

Nickname: Angel is my most common name, but lately I prefer Lucifer cause cringe culture is dead and ima kinnie. Max/Maxilla/Wolfy are all great too! 

Zodiac: Sun: Cancer, Moon: Taurus,  Asc: Virgo

Height: 5’4

Last thing I googled: Apparently “Hydrogen Oxygen Not Included” I’m struggling with managing gasses if anyone can help me lol

Song stuck in my head: Lullaby - Nickelback, no judgment but they make me hella nostalgic lol.  

Number of followers: I have so much love for all 163 of you amazing people

Average amount of sleep: 10-12? I love my sleep and will go to bed early to maximize the amount of time I spend unconscious.  

Lucky number: 369 is the perfect number and I’m lowkey obsessed. 

Dream job: I’m 4 yrs in and reconsidering my pre-vet degree... I’ve done animal rescue for 7 years and am just emotionally burnt out. Lately I’ve been considering working as a species curator of taxidermy. Or anything I can study the critters and have minimum contact with the public would be great. :/

Currently wearing: daisy dukes and a tank top. It’s too d*mn hot here. 

Favorite song: This changes by the moment but ‘Born Again by Beast in Black’ has never gotten old. 

Favorite instrument: Guitar, I know it’s cliche but my dad used to play his all the time when I was growing up. 

Aesthetic: My whole aesthetic is just ‘desert witch’. Lots of western and occult themes.

Favorite author: Michael Crichton will always have a special place in my heart.

Favorite animal noise: Coyote screaming at 3am howls or that happy little noise horses make when they greet their human friends.

Random: I have been on and off this hell site for years and only yesterday did I learn you can turn off infinite scroll on your dash

Tagging, only if yall want of-course!: @narutohighschoolreunion @haven-improper @holographiq-ships @fireemlmblem @hellagayselfshipping @speedypizzabread @shinobishiba @shirorabu @justafictionalthing @fictocurrency @spacedogships @cryptidships @hockeyselfship @mina-ships @shygirlselfship @sickgirlgia @heatobrienswife @ofieugogyshz @robinss-support @virus-selfship @neon-amante @littlegreeklover @cozyships @falling-through-the-pages @self-shippin-shipper

[cake-writes]

Little Lies (Kentucky)

Pairings: Steve x Reader // Bucky x Reader (mentioned)

Chapter Warnings: Angst, Smut, Fluff, Oral (Receiving), 18+

Summary: You went to Bucky when you wanted punishment. He’d be rough with you because he understood your self-loathing, and he’d leave bruises on your hips that wouldn’t go away for a week. You loved it. He didn’t.

You went to Steve when you wanted reassurance. You went to him because he liked to whisper sweet, sweet things into your ear as he made love to you. He’d tell you that you were perfect and amazing and beautiful. Then you’d get your fill, just far too much of it. He cared too much.

It all came to a head when the three of you went on a mission together. You’d done it a hundred times, even during this mess of a situation, and still neither of them was any the wiser. Your little lies always slipped right through the cracks - until one night, they didn’t.

Master List

August 2015

Kentucky was absolutely sweltering. It was a hot summer, for one, and for two, Steve was from Brooklyn. He wasn’t used to such sticky, uncomfortable heat because New York summers were much milder than this and Germany’s were much of the same. He wasn’t used to the humidity, either, even after you’d managed to wrangle him into a tank top, cargo shorts, and flip-flops. It was much less stifling than his uniform or even his civvies, but he felt out of place in such bizarre, 21st century clothing.

Then again, that was exactly the point. He was undercover. You both were.

You, on the other hand, seemed right in your element as the two of you unloaded the moving van you’d just picked up a few miles away from one of Tony’s associates. It was stocked full of boxes – mostly empty ones, just for show – along with a couple pieces of furniture: table and chairs, a small sofa, and a bed.

You were wearing a tee shirt with some faded band logo on it – Steve didn’t recognize it – and a pair of short denim shorts. Those he recognized only because Sam had teased you about them right before the two of you left the compound – called them ‘Daisy Dukes,’ whatever that meant. You’d just winked at Sam, made a lasso motion with your hands and cheered, “yee-haw,” like a cowgirl. Then you and Sam shared a laugh. It was a reference that Steve clearly didn’t get, but that was fine. It gave him something to think about, to distract him from how short those shorts really were.

The flight to Kentucky had been fine. You hammed it up a bit, already putting on the newlywed façade – told the flight attendant that you’d just gotten married and darlin’, isn’t my new hubby just the greatest? and it flustered him. You were showing him off. Even if it wasn’t real, he couldn’t help but preen a little.

That said, there was no doubt in his mind that someone else would have better suited the role than him. The decision wasn’t up to him, though; there had quite literally been a vote to see who should take this mission, and he’d been selected the prime candidate because of course he was. Everyone thought it would be hilarious to shove you and him together in a box for a couple weeks, like some warped version of Seven Minutes in Heaven: you, the scandalous minx you were, and him, the prude.

Steve didn’t mind it, really. He was actually a little excited for it. Nervous, too. He was in love with you, had been for months now. He knew should have said no to the mission because of the clear conflict of interest but he didn’t.

His attraction to you started out as an objective appreciation for the way you could handle yourself in the field. He noticed the glimmer you got in your eyes from a fight, when you did something perfectly or landed a particularly good blow or when he saved your ass at the last minute. He noticed the excited flush that came over your cheeks and the mischievous look you got when you fought alongside him, the two of you working together so well that it was almost like an elaborate dance.  

He’d had always known how attractive you were in other ways, too. Every now and then, he’d catch the slip of a bra strap, or you’d lean over and your shirt would accidentally reveal far too much cleavage. Sometimes, you’d wear a short, tight dress and go out to a nightclub with Natasha, and he could barely keep his eyes off of you. Other times, the hint of your thong peeked out of the top of your tac pants. Not often.

He tried not to look. You drove him crazy.

The mission itself was the easy part. The two of you were undercover in this small Kentucky town to find out where some particularly important intel had been downloaded. Tony’s satellites had only been able to pinpoint it to a one block radius, which coincidentally was smack dab in the middle of suburbia.

Your new residence was a charming little house at the end of a cul-de-sac, two bedrooms, one bath. A white picket fence bordered the yard, with pretty pink and purple flowers blooming under the windowsills and in the front garden. The exterior was painted light blue and it seemed a bit older, likely heritage – almost looked like something from his childhood, if he was being honest.

The moment Steve saw it – really, truly took it in – it made him stop in his tracks.

Some people actually got to have lives like this. They married, settled down, popped out a couple of kids, maybe got a dog. They had normal, ordinary lives. He wondered for a moment if this was what it felt like.

Your shoulder brushed against his as you made your way up the paved driveway, carrying a big box. You were humming some tune he didn’t recognize. He just stood there like an idiot, watching you as you went inside to add the box to the ever-growing pile and when you came back out, you waved at someone – one of the nosy neighbours, no doubt.

Then you gave him a sweet smile. “Honey?”

God, the word was so, so sweet on your tongue and it made his heart race. Somehow, he managed to get out an easy, “Yeah, sweetheart?”

It felt so strange and unfamiliar to use such words of adoration for you, but he certainly didn’t mind it in the least. It felt nice. While he called you ‘doll’ every now and then out of habit, he tried not to out of respect for you. Now he didn’t need to hold back.

“Do you wanna come help me with this? I can’t lift it.”

“Of course,” he responded, readjusting his grip on the box in his arms before he started up the walkway.

You waited for him at the door. When he got there, you gave him another one of those sweet, disarming smiles, and then you kissed him on the cheek, batting your eyelashes at him.

It was an act, of course, to appease the nosy neighbours and it also helped the two of you blend in. You were just trying to sell the story, and he knew that – but this was a terrible idea. He wasn’t sure how long it would to take to finish the mission, but he hoped it was sooner rather than later. You were going to be the death of him with the pet names, the southern drawl, the skimpy outfits and, just – you.

The house was pretty much already stocked with anything either of you would need. There were two bedrooms, one for each of you, but you’d have to share a bathroom. That was fine, because you’d done it plenty of times before during other missions. It was actually pretty nice that you had your own rooms, for once, because you usually had to share a single motel room or set up camp somewhere outside.

The first night, you ordered takeout because that was pretty much a moving day tradition. The two of you joked around like usual and talked about all sorts of things, but none of them were really personal. You kept the conversation breezy and light, even when it drifted to the mission at hand. Over beer and pizza, the two of you developed a plan to canvas the area. You’d distract the neighbours while Steve got into their homes and searched for the intel. Easy as pie.

Quite literally.

Steve was a heavy sleeper, but he woke to the smell of warm apple pie wafting through the house. It was still relatively early, sun just rising above the horizon, but you were already putting the plan into action.

When he came downstairs, he caught a particularly nice view of your ass as you leaned over to pull the pie from the oven. You weren’t wearing those short denim shorts anymore, but a pair of tight high-waisted jeans and a crop top.

“Mornin’, sugar,” you said with a wink.

It caught him off guard. He remembered that the two of you were undercover, but it wasn’t necessary behind closed doors like this. You were purposely trying to get a rise out of him.

He gave you a deadpan look, but he still felt his cheeks flush and, when he saw your eyes shine mischievously, he knew you’d noticed it too.

“Didn’t realize apple pie counted as breakfast nowadays,” he commented.

“Come on, Cap. We deep fry everything nowadays. Of course it’s breakfast,” you told him, laughing. He studied your face for a moment, and then, when he actually went to reach for the freshly baked pie, like this was yet some more knowledge that he’d never learnt while he was frozen – you gently pulled his hand away. “Oh, no, I’m sorry, Rogers. It’s for our cover.”

You rarely apologized for anything, but for this – for him, you did. The fact that he’d been frozen for so many years wasn’t something to joke about to you, even if it was unintentional. You hadn’t meant to make a joke of it.

Steve looked a little surprised by that. It didn’t really bother him all that much when people made jokes at his expense. Sensitive topic, absolutely, but the jokes were never malicious and he knew that. It was more prodding fun at the fact that while yes, he’d certainly missed a lot, it also meant that people were looking out for him, suggesting to him things that he should look into.

Your warm fingers lingered on his hand just a little longer than they should have.

He shook his head. “Don’t worry. I’m used to it. There’s a lot of stuff I need to catch up on.”

“Got a list going, huh?” you teased.

“Yeah, actually,” he said with a grin, pulling a small notebook out of his pocket. “Sure do.”

That morning, the two of you went through his list one by one, and you gave some comments and suggestions of your own. Instead of writing them himself, like he usually did, he relinquished the pen and paper to you.

Steve inadvertently wound up saving those notes, and on particularly bad days, he found himself studying every curve of your handwriting, like it held whatever answer he was seeking.

Over the next few days, he came to realize that you were purposely fucking with him.

You’d always been a tee shirt and jeans kind of girl, at least in the couple of years he’d known you, but for this mission all you wore were cute, dainty outfits. You started wearing floral dresses or the occasional blouse and skirt, paired with light makeup and heels. You hardly ever wore makeup or heels unless you were going out with Natasha.

You were playing a character. He knew that. But seeing you in such a different light, so sweet and girly, it did something to him. It sparked something in him – or maybe it just added fuel to the fire that was already burning for you.

He’d always treated you respectfully, at least he liked to think so. Even though he’d had an undeniable attraction to you for a long time – longer than he’d been in love with you – he’d always treated you like an agent first and a woman second. Seeing you like this, though, it made that an extremely difficult task to accomplish, especially when you were calling him, “Honey,” and “Baby,” and introducing him to your new neighbours as your husband.

He loved seeing that ring on your left ring finger. There was a matching one on his, and a large part of him wished it was real.

After about a week, neither of you had made any headway in your mission yet. The two of you had tried multiple residences nearby, now, but no luck so far. It became routine, almost, the way you went about your days.

Steve was a morning person. He woke early to go for a run, much earlier than you, even before the sun started to rise. The small house you shared was a little older, and the floorboards creaked as he crept past your room to go downstairs in the early hours. It never failed to wake you, but hearing the gentle creaking every morning soon became a comfort that you never realized you’d miss until after it was gone.

You, on the other hand, were a night owl. You stayed up late on the sofa downstairs, using your work tablet to investigate new leads and potential suspects well after Steve went to bed. Of course, that only did so much to distract you from the fact that the eerie quiet of the small town got to you. It made you relive memories you’d rather forget.

When you were alone, that was when you suffered most. Unfortunately, Bucky wasn’t here to help you. You’d only recently discovered how good he was at making you forget, but for this, you’d just have to make do on your own like you’d done for so long already.

It was more difficult than ever before.

You followed Steve up to bed once, with every intention of starting something you knew you shouldn’t. He was in the middle of brushing his teeth when he found you standing at the top of the stairs, staring at him in a way that just a little bit unsettling.

He pulled his toothbrush from his mouth and asked, “What’s the matter, doll?”

He was too sweet. You lost your nerve.

“Forgot my phone,” you said blankly, before you held it up like it was proof that your intention hadn’t been anything but innocuous.  

Steve just shrugged and went back to brushing his teeth, completely oblivious as to what you’d nearly done. You’d nearly crossed a line that shouldn’t be crossed. Not again. You’d already done it with Bucky. You didn’t need to do it with Steve, too.

Despite it all, some nights you needed to be held – especially here in this awful quiet town that made it so easy for you to lose yourself in your memories. You needed to be treated sweetly, and in a lot of ways, Steve did that for you. Not intentionally, of course; just a kind look here, a gentle hand on your lower back there, not to mention the praise he offered you sometimes. He often told you after missions that you’d done a good job.

Good job. From his lips, it almost sounded like he was saying good girl.

What really did it for you, though, was that you didn’t even have to say a thing for Steve to know you were doing your best. He didn’t know you, not really, aside from one single side of you that he knew almost too well – the small part of you that wanted his praise, along with his acceptance of your mistakes. Steve had seen you make a number of them over the past couple of years, and despite them all, he always treated you so kindly. He never judged you or blamed you for them.

You never, ever let anyone else see you that way, let alone Bucky because if he did, then he’d have seen far too much. You only let people have a glimpse of who you truly were here and there, because if they saw too many sides of you, then they’d be able to piece together who you really were deep down. It wasn’t pretty.

You offered Bucky the dangerous, broken part of yourself, the one that killed and murdered and didn’t feel a lick of remorse. You got him to punish you, ruin you, break you, because that was what that part of you deserved – and he was so, so good at it. You loved him for it. You thanked him. That side of you well and truly belonged to him. You never showed it to anyone else.  

Not that you’d ever tell him that.

The other part of you that Steve got to see – the sweet, clueless girl who did her best and it just wasn’t good enough sometimes – that part of you was all his.

Not that you’d ever tell him that, either.

Your weakest point was always late at night when you were alone. You found yourself coming closer and closer to climbing into Steve’s bed more frequently as the days passed, but you held strong. Somehow, you managed.

Sometimes you stopped yourself when you got to the top of the stairs, staring at his closed bedroom door. Other times, you found yourself in his bedroom, taking in every bit of his peaceful, sleeping face. Once and only once, you ran your fingers through his hair and pressed a soft kiss to his forehead. On that particular night, you very nearly hadn’t stopped there – but you managed.

You always managed.

During the day, you put on a façade just like you’d always done. It was routine. It almost felt normal to do this – to cohabitate, to get groceries and toilet paper, to worry about how your lemon bars were going to turn out today – but you never let yourself fall too deep into that normal, ordinary line of thinking because you knew how hard it would be to pull yourself out of it.

Every day, Steve went for an early morning jog, and after he’d come back and showered, you finally started to rouse. By the time you sluggishly made your way downstairs, he was in the kitchen fixing breakfast for the two of you. He never failed to have a hot cup of coffee waiting for you with the exact amount of cream and sugar you liked.

It was the same every day, and some part of you – that sweet, clueless girl – loved every part of it. The normalcy. The domesticity.  

Your pet names for each other started to become insufferable in the best way. You used to greet him with normal ones – honey, baby, sweetheart – and he did the same. As the days passed, though, in private the two of you got more and more ridiculous to the point that you made each other laugh with them. And, every now and then when one of them slipped out in public, it only added to your newlywed persona.

“Good morning, honeybun,” you said airily, taking a seat at the counter where you’d plugged in your work tablet the night before.  

Steve gave you a grin just like he always did when you said a particularly silly one. “Morning, gorgeous.”

He didn’t blush as easily anymore when he said such sweet things to you. You assumed that he must have just gotten used to it, but it was a little bit disappointing. You loved to rile him up.

As he dished up two plates of pancakes, you took a sip of the coffee he made for you and scrolled through the new intel from HQ that had come through during the night. There wasn’t much, just another potential location to check out.

After a quick breakfast, Steve did check it out, and it was yet another dead end. It was well into the afternoon by the time he was finished. On your side of things, you spent the day distracting the residents of that particular home so that Steve could get in and out unseen.  

You met up a block away, and on your way back to your new home, you remembered that you needed to pick something up for dinner. The two of you took a detour to the corner store where you usually got your groceries.

Steve was wearing his favourite baseball cap and sunglasses, and you were in a particularly flattering sundress and wedge heels. The mid-afternoon weather was lovely – hot, but not quite as sweltering as most other days. It was nice.

It was almost second nature at this point for you to reach out and lace your fingers with his. The first time you’d done it, he looked surprised as hell and the flush that came across his face made your heart race. Now, he just offered you a small smile and pressed a kiss to the back of your hand like he’d done it a thousand times before.

It still made your heart race.  

All things considered, it seemed like a normal day – except it wasn’t. You should have noticed the extra staff at the corner store. You should have noticed the bulk around their waists – guns – but you didn’t. You were too focused on what to make for dinner. For the first time in a very, very long time, you let your guard down. You forgot.

Steve did notice, but it took him a little longer than normal, too. When you felt his familiar hand on your lower back press against you just a little more firmly, you immediately knew something was up but you continued to act like everything was just peachy, even when he whispered into your ear, “We need to go.”

You didn’t have to be told twice. You grabbed a couple of random things from the shelves: two tins of beans, a bag of chips, and a candy bar, and then the two of you made your way to the register. You paid in cash. Steve carried the bag for you on the way out.

It wasn’t difficult to notice the two men on your tail. Your cover was blown. Somehow, your cover was blown and you hadn’t even fucking noticed because you were too distracted by this newlywed façade. You were too distracted by what it felt like to be normal.

Steve took your small hand in his free one, then, and gave you a gentle squeeze – as if to reassure you. When you glanced over at him, the way he smiled at you made your heart flutter just a little.

This isn’t your fault. Stop worrying. It’ll be fine.

You believed him.  

You made your way to another house, one that had no cars in the driveway and no garage. Hopefully no one was home. It was some random residence a couple of blocks away from your safe house, but you picked the lock so quickly that it looked like you were just opening the door with a regular key. Then you and Steve walked inside like that was where you’d been living this whole time.

You watched from the second-floor window as the two men on your trail radioed something in, probably your location – and then you both slipped out the back and hopped the fence. It was a little higher than you’d normally be able to scale, and Steve helped lift you over. He put his hands around your waist to lift you up, first, but you still couldn’t quite reach, so you quickly told him, “Grab my ass, Rogers.”

Steve’s grip noticeably faltered at your request and your sundress fluttered in the breeze, but he did as you asked – slid his hands from your waist to your barely-covered ass and soft thighs, which provided just enough height and leverage to finally pull yourself over the fence.

When you landed on the other side, you felt like you’d just run a marathon. His touch had been so hot, almost burning, and he’d gripped you so firmly, so close to where you’d been wanting him to touch you for what felt like ages that wet, sticky heat had started to pool in between your legs.

Neither of you discussed it.

The run home was fast, but silent and uncomfortable. You didn’t speak much, and neither did he. You shared a dinner of canned beans and potato chips, but neither of you had much of an appetite. You needed to figure out what to do, now, but you barely had a chance to discuss it when the loud sound of an explosion shook your quaint little safe house.

You both immediately knew what it was.

The perp – whoever the hell it was – had blown up the house the two of you had gone to earlier. It wasn’t your house. It belonged to some random family. You could recall seeing their photos on the walls, a happy family of four.

Steve said something to you, but it didn’t really register. He pulled on his uniform and went to check it out. That didn’t really register, either. All you could focus on was the fact that you’d very likely gotten people killed because you’d been too stupid and distracted to notice that your cover was blown.

By the time he returned, you had turned on the news to find that the explosion was being blamed on a gas leak. The grim expression on his face told you that definitely wasn’t the case, but you already knew that.

A couple more hours passed in silence as you stared blankly at the television. You weren’t watching it. You weren’t paying attention at all. Instead, you were reliving every single mistake in your career and as much as Steve desperately wanted to reach out and hold you, help you feel better, ease your pain, he didn’t.

Things like this always hit you hard, but you never wanted comfort. You always had to handle it yourself. He’d tried in the past to help – told you that it wasn’t your fault, gently rubbed your back – and you’d shoved him away. You didn’t want to be coddled. You didn’t need it.

Except tonight, you did.

Steve went to bed first, sometime after eleven. It wasn’t that the night’s events didn’t bother him, because they certainly did. He’d just experienced things like this a lot more than you, especially during the war, and he knew how to compartmentalize. Somehow, he could still sleep at night, whereas he knew you probably wouldn’t get a wink of it.

He’d help you pack in the morning. He’d contact HQ. He’d write up the mission report. He’d do all of it for you, because he loved you. He’d do anything for you.

Sometime in the middle of the night, you stopped resisting your impulses. You crept up the stairs and, for a brief moment, paused as you stared at Steve’s closed bedroom door for what was probably the umpteenth time.

Your heartbeat was pounding in your ears as you slowly turned the doorknob and stepped inside.

The moonlight was streaming through the open curtains onto the bed, where you found him fast asleep. Of course he was. He’d always been a heavy sleeper, even now.

You brushed away a few strands of hair stuck to his forehead, and he almost seemed to lean into your touch; then you trailed your fingers down his bare chest, further south, pushing his sheets back along the way. The only thing he was wearing was a pair of soft plaid sleep pants that you’d teased him about once – said they suited him, the old man he was.

Right now, though, they were almost too low on his hips. Must have shifted sometime during the night.

His skin was damp to the touch from the summer heat. As your eyes trailed over him in the moonlight, you had a fleeting thought of how perfect he was and you stopped holding yourself back.

Your lips were hot on the sweat-slicked skin of his abdomen. He tasted like salt and smelled like heaven – like soap and fresh laundry, clean, with the slightest undertone of musk.

It turned you on.

You kissed your way up his body until he stirred with the softest, quietest moan, his muscles shifting under your touch. You didn’t stop. Instead, you met his dazed, half-lidded eyes with a sinful smile.

“Wait, wait,” he breathed, fumbling to take your hands into his. His voice was rough from sleep. “Talk to me, doll. Please.”

You didn’t.  

Instead, you nudged your dress out of the way and straddled his hips, which let you feel exactly how much you’d affected him. His cock was rock hard and straining against his pajama pants, and you did nothing to soothe it. Instead, you rolled your hips against him.

“Sweetheart,” he groaned, his head lulling back against the pillow. “It’s been a bad night. We shouldn’t.”

He didn’t mean it.

When you laced your fingers with his, he was so receptive – squeezed your hands right back, especially when you leaned down to kiss him. Your breasts nearly spilled out of your bra when they fell against his chest. With your dress half-unbuttoned, you saw his eyes flicker down to your cleavage for a split second before he looked back up at your face in awe, cheeks flushed, lips parted.

You kissed him, then, softly and sweetly, and sighed against his mouth, “Make me forget.”

Almost instantly, his hands left yours to cup the sides of your face, and he kissed you so deeply, so passionately that all you could think about was him. His lips were soft, but his kisses weren’t, especially when his tongue swept into your mouth as if to claim you, make you his, make you forget.

Then he trailed his fingers down the sides of your body, feeling every inch of you against him before they settled on your hips. He held you in place as he ground his hips up into yours, and you gasped against his mouth, relishing in the feeling of his hard cock against your folds – clothed or not.

The way he gathered you in his arms and lay you down on your back was sweet and gentle. He peppered kisses down your neck and torso as he finished unbuttoning your dress, before it was off entirely, discarded haphazardly to the floor – and then he sat back on his heels to just look at you.

You weren’t fully revealed to him yet, still wearing a lacy peach-pink bra and panties, but you felt absolutely naked in front of him. You were attractive, you knew that much – but the way his eyes took in every single one of your curves made your face flush like that stupid, clueless girl that had gotten people killed tonight.  

“You’re beautiful,” he whispered as he leaned in to kiss you again.

Something about the way he said it made you want him even more and you whined – actually whined – against his lips, “Baby, please.”  

Jesus Christ, he could have come right then.

Instead, he pulled away just enough to press a kiss to your stomach, your navel, your hip – and then he tugged your panties down and off before he buried his face between your thighs. He’d been wanting to worship your body for ages, and you deserved it now more than ever.

Your reaction was immediate. You gasped and writhed against his mouth, so much that he had to firmly hook his arms around your legs to hold you in place. You were so god damn responsive and it drove him crazy, especially when you gripped his hair in your fingers and pulled him closer to grind your perfect pussy against his face.

The taste of you was intoxicating – sweet, just a little tart – and he barely even realized what he was doing when he slid two fingers inside of you. Not one to start like he normally would have, but two, because you were so fucking soaked and desperate for him already.

“Stevie,” you whimpered when he curled his fingers up in a particular spot that sent you reeling.

God, he loved the sound of his name on your lips.

“Does that feel good?” he cooed against your slick folds, his hot breath sending a chill through you.

“Yeah,” you responded breathily, and you whimpered when he did it again. “Yeah, honey, just like that—”

Honey.

The word spurred him on and he went right back to devouring you, his tongue circling your clit as his fingers curled roughly against your g-spot over and over. It brought you higher and higher and higher until he couldn’t hold you down anymore and your back arched off the sheets, legs shaking against his shoulders as you came with a sharp cry.

When you collapsed back against the sheets, he crawled up your body to see your flushed, fucked-out face. Before he kissed you again, he went to wipe his mouth with the back of his hand out of consideration for you – but instead, you tugged on his arm and pulled him down to settle in between your thighs.

“Kiss me like that,” you told him, and he readily complied. You could taste yourself on his lips, but you didn’t care; all you cared about was the sharp breath he took in as you slid your hand into his pants and wrapped your fingers around him. His cock was hot, thick, and heavy in your palm, and you wanted him inside of you.

Your other hand slid his pajama pants down just enough to pull him out entirely, and then you ran the head of his cock back and forth through your slick folds.

Steve broke away from the kiss to lean his forehead against your shoulder. His voice was unsteady when he started, “If you’re not sure—”

But you just wrapped your legs around his waist, then, and used the leverage to drag him inside of you. All you could manage was the tip because of the angle, but at your eagerness, he actually growled – deep and feral before he slid the rest of the way inside in one fluid motion.

“Fuck, Stevie,” you gasped, “You feel so good—”

Then his lips were on yours again, swallowing every single word you wanted to say. He wasn’t rough, but he wasn’t exactly gentle either as his hips rocked into yours so easily – almost like this was meant to happen, like the two of you should have been doing this all along. His tongue dominated your mouth as his hands caressed your body all over, palming your breasts, your hips, your thighs as he made love to you.

That’s exactly what it was. You knew it, and he did, too.

The realization of that brought you to the brink almost in an instant.

When he hiked one of your legs up higher around his waist, you felt even closer – both to him, and to your orgasm. It was intimate. It was perfect. The new angle was incredibly deep, and his cock reached spots inside of you that you’d never even known about before.

You broke away from his mouth to bury your face in his shoulder, arms wrapped tight around his neck. “I’m close, god, I’m so fucking close, Steve—”

Judging by the way he was throbbing so much inside you, he was close, too. His breath was hot on the shell of your ear when he rasped, “Where do you want it?”

“Inside,” you gasped, your nails digging into his back. “Fill me up, honey, please.”

His hands gripped your thighs even more firmly as he held you in place, his thrusts stuttering just a little at the knowledge that you didn’t want him to pull out, no—you wanted him to come inside you. You wanted him to fill you up. You wanted him to give you every single fucking drop of his cum.

“Fuck, Steve, I’m coming, I’m coming—” you babbled mindlessly against his neck, wrapping your legs around him even tighter as you reached your peak, pleasure cascading around you in waves.

Those breathless moans paired with your walls clenching down on him so tightly were what pushed him over the edge, and he buried himself to the hilt, filling you up just like you’d begged him for with a groan of your name right into your ear. It might have been the sexiest thing you’d ever heard in your life, but your mind was blissfully blank.

He left to get you a washcloth to clean up – the two of you had made a mess after all – and unlike how you’d been with Bucky, you let Steve take care of you. You needed it.

After he wiped you clean, you curled so snugly into his side, using his chest as a pillow. He pressed gentle kisses to the crown of your head and muttered sweet nothings to you, and his soothing voice eased you to sleep.

For the first time in a very long time, Steve overslept.

At first, he thought he forgot to turn on his alarm. Then he remembered that it automatically set itself every morning. He didn’t forget to turn it on. 

You’d purposely turned it off.

He knew that because by the time he woke, you were gone. He found a note from you downstairs, on the kitchen counter where you used to have breakfast every morning.

Headed to my next mission. See you around, Rogers.

It was that same curly handwriting as what you’d written in his little notebook. He recognized it in an instant, but when he realized what you meant by it – that this was a one-time thing, a moment of weakness, a lapse of judgement – he couldn’t say it didn’t sting.

What hurt worse was that, when he tried calling you, it went straight to voicemail and when he sent you texts, you read and then ignored them.

You brushed him off, because you got what you wanted.

He made you forget.

Master List

[the--blackdahlia]

The Hunters Chapter 8

Title: The Hunters Chapter 8

Summary: What happens when four idiots get together? Nikki's looking for his dad. Tommy's trying to get out of his mom's shadow. Vince is along for the ride. And Mick is just trying to keep them alive. Which is harder than it sounds when then Winchesters join the fray.

Warnings: Language, violence, m/m smut, canon divergence, character deaths (temporarily), wincest if you squint (may add more tags as I go)

Mick had the map as Nikki drove his Barracuda towards Marigold. Mick was being a pretty good guide, and his conversation was interesting to say the least.

“So, you play guitar?” Nikki asked.

“Yep,” Mick nodded.

“Cool. I play bass,” Nikk told him. “I want to be like Kiss someday.”

“Kiss sucks,” Mick grumbled. Nikki looked over at him for a brief moment.

“Take that back!” Nikki snapped at him.

“Why? It’s my opinion. And in my opinion, they suck,” Mick shrugged.

“I can’t believe I let you in my car,” Nikki shook his head.

“Oh, don’t be dramatic,” Mick looked down at the map. “I mean, Aerosmith is pretty cool.”

“Yeah…”

They rode in silence for a little bit before Nikki spoke up again.

“So, is your name really Mick Mars?” He asked.

“No, I changed it some time ago to stand out from other guitarists. See a crazy name? You’re gonna remember it. And it can’t be a shitty name. Because shitty names go nowhere. I’ve been in so many bands with shitty names. And how many of those bands are still around?” Mick looked over at Nikki. “Your name really Nikki Sixx?”

“No,” Nikki smirked a little at the memory of burning his old ID.

Frankie died just the other night…

“Changed it because I hated it. No big,” Nikki shrugged.

“Fair enough. I know how that feels,” Mick sighed. Something about what he said made Nikki think there was more to Mick Mars than he was letting on. “So Marigold is a small town. Not very many residents.”

“I see,” Nikki nodded.

“So, I guess we go into town and question some locals,” Mick told him. “Do you have a badge?”

“What kind of hunter do you think I am?” Nikki laughed. “Open the glove compartment. I’ve got a box with my different ID’s in them.” Mick opened the glove compartment and pulled out the box, flipping through them.

“Aren’t some of these a little obvious?” Mick asked. “Agent Bowie?”

“I haven’t used that one yet,” Nikki admitted. “But I have other ones.” Mick nodded and flicked through each before he picked one out for Nikki.

“Okay, I think Agent A. Cooper and Agent G. Harrison will work,” Mick told him, getting their badges ready as they pulled into Marigold.

“Did you see all those apple trees?” Nikki asked. “I didn’t even know that we grew apples in California.” Mick just shrugged. He just hoped that what they were wearing could pass as agents. Because they really didn’t have time to change into anything else right now.

****

“I’m starting to think that you and Dean are really brothers,” Sam groaned as Vince sang along to another song. Tommy stared out the window. “Does he do this all the time?”

“The entire time I’ve known him. He thinks he’s a musical gift or something,” Tommy smirked over at Vince.

“You’re just jealous that my talent outshines yours. I mean, you play the drums. I’m the face of bands man,” Vince laughed. “So Sam, how old are you?”

“Uh, nineteen,” Sam told them. “Just turned it in May.”

“No way. Dude, he’s just a few months older than you,” Vince laughed, nudging Tommy. “You got a lot in common. Long hair, about the same age, have cooler people as a brother or brother figure. It’s perfect.” Tommy knew what Vince was trying to do. The same thing he had been trying to do all the time Tommy knew him. Be his wingman.

“Yeah, that’s cool,” Tommy sighed. He knew Vince meant well, but it got a little annoying when he tried to set him up all the time. “How you doing back there Sam?”

“Well, these backseats were made for more of a Daisy Duke, where as I have the stature of a Bo,” Sam tried to stretch his legs. “It’s not too much farther to Marigold, is it?”

“Depends on how fast I want to drive,” Vince told him. “You might be built like Bo, but I have all his skills and looks.” Vince shot a smirk at Tommy.

“Yeah, really starting to think you’re Dean’s actual brother,” Sam shook his head and looked out the window as they drove, mapping out all the scenery. Tommy was doing the same, leaving Vince to sing along with every song on his many mixtapes.

****

“Agent Harrison, and this is my partner Agent Cooper,” Mick explained as him and Nikki stood in front of a man named Scotty. Mick had gotten from Bobby that Dean had used the name John Bonham while there, but they didn’t have a picture to use. “We’re investigating the disappearance of a Mr. John Bonham. He was last seen in this area.”

“Only John Bonham I’ve ever heard of plays drums for Led Zeppelin,” Scotty told them.

“So you haven’t seen him?” Nikki asked. Mick was impressed at the professionalism that seemed to take over Nikki’s body.

“Can’t say I have,” Scotty laughed a little. “It’s a small town. We tend to know when new people come through.”

“So you don’t know anything about the other disappearances in the area?” Mick asked. Nikki noticed a slight shift in Scotty’s persona. Not one that would be terribly noticeable, but Nikki had always been one to catch that.

“Disappearances?” He asked. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You know what Agent Harrison, I think we might do lunch here,” Nikki told him. “It’s a pretty charming town after all.” He gave Mick a tiny wink. “Say, when do you start selling apples?”

“Not for a few more months,” Scotty eyed them wearily.

“That’s just a shame. Would’ve loved to go out there and picked some,” Nikki told him. “Come on, let’s go get some food.” Him and Mick left Scotty standing there, staring at him.

“He lying?” Mick asked.

“Yep,” Nikki nodded.

“What are we going to do?” Mick asked.

“We’ll wait until night and go look,” Nikki told him. “Let’s get some lunch. The apple pie looks amazing.”

Forever Tags: @anathewierdo​ @dekahg​ @marvel-af-imagines​ @feelmyroarrrr​ @nanie5​ @imboredsueme​ @gemini0410​ @aiaranradnay​ @babypink224221​ @mogarukes​ @xxwarhawk​ @sandlee44​ @shatteredabby​ @caswinchester2000​ @supernaturalwincestsblog​ @lauravic​ @mrsambroserollinsacklesmgk​ @teller258316​ @horrorpxnk​ @tommyleeownsme​ @marvelismylifffe​

Supernatural Tags: @bandobsession98​ @mrsdeanfuckingwinchester​ @fangirlsencyclopaediaofweirdness​ @ilovetardis​ @missihart23​ @cloudyskylines​ @sams-serialkiller-fetish​ @theas-bedtime-stories​ @huntingfreewill​ @ocholove​ @princessofthefandomrealm​ @getbackhonkycatt​ @flamencodiva​

Motley Crue Tags: @primal-screamer​ @waywardprincess666​ @twistnet​ @saint-of-los-angeles​ @vader-kai​ @motleyfuckingcruee​ @sharon6713​ @kawennote09​ @2dead2function​ @nikkisixxwiththebass​ @iamtiber-andtiberismusic​ @jayprettymuchomw​ @charlyallise​ @you-know-im-a-dreamer​ @sweet-dreams-on-butterfly-wings​ @estxxmotley​ @arianareirg​ @the-normal-potato​ @nikki-sixxtynine​ @jjjjjjjoshdun​ @just-a-normal-fangirl18​ @stella20131991​ @tarahell​ @wowilovenikkisixx​ @i-want-to-shoot-myself​ @motleycrueee​ @sams-serialkiller-fetish​ @getbackhonkycatt​ @are-you-reddie54321​ @flamencodiva​ @scarecrowmax​ @major-tom-is-a-junky​ @anyasthoughts​ @bandaids-not-groupies​ @ilovetomkeiferslips​ @kaitieskidmore1​ @useyourillusion​

The Hunters Tags: @rock-n-roller-coasters​

[the-devils-former-angel]

You’re a really close friend of my sibling/parent/cousin/roommate but we also really hit it off? (@wayward-fxckups)(anyone)

Meg was excited to go over to her best friend's house for the weekend. Since Ellen and Bobby got married, joanna had been busy moving her stuff to the new family home.

Meg was promised a weekend by the pool featuring Ellen's pies and Bobby's grilling. What she didn't expect was jo's cousins - and Bobby's surrogate sons- Dean and Sam Winchester to be there. Meg knew she didn't have a shot with either if them but that didn't stop her from late night fantasies where she was the filling of a Winchester sandwich. She suddenly wished she came over wearing more than her bikini top and daisy dukes.

@wayward-fxckups

[okay-klepto]

How about a sexy calendar?

This was way back when Kerberos was in its infant stages, still just sort of an idea floating around

Well, some members of staff are trying to get people more hyped about missions

Maybe there was a change in management or some failed trials and experiments, but morale had been on the decline for a while, and the people on the Kerberos team needed to rally others’ support for this soon-to-be project

It takes some real thought as to how to get other members of staff around the Garrison on board for upcoming projects and eventually Kerberos

Maybe they could also do something to raise a bit of cash for small things

So what idea gets thrown against the wall and sticks?

A Kerberos Crew Sexy Pin-Up Calendar

Obviously

Bc the Galaxy Garrison is also a school and there are certain regulations that need to be followed (and they’re adults with common sense), there can’t be any actual nudity

But shirts are optional

So it’s more like a “Sexy” Kerberos Calendar

A sensual calendar

A suggestive calendar

Some of the people working on the beginnings of Kerberos volunteer to be models, and of course the members of the flight crew need to pose for this as well

They throw out a bunch of ridiculous and risque ideas, ranging from scenes to poses to outfits

They get twelve planned out for the different months, then throw in some extras as bonus content

bc why not?

And, like girls, they just want to have fun

Matt goes FULL California Gurls Candy Land with glitter Daisy Dukes and lollipop pasties, maybe even some crazy shoes and neon/pastel wigs

They make a little psychedelic candy land for him and he poses with the candy and on the cotton candy clouds

He’s smearing whipped cream all over himself and deep-throating lollipops

And choking right after

Matt hooks his leg around one of the candy cane trees and gives it a long, full-tongue lick while giving bedroom eyes to the camera

He regrets it immediately after

Sam Holt plays the classic role of the Sexy Science Teacher, wearing just a lab coat and pants while doing experiments in a classroom

He also does Sexy Santa for the December page

There are bikini scenes with the lady volunteers, most of the photos being them sensually lounging around the pool or at the beach

Then there are some of them splashing each other or throwing water balloons or just sitting eating ice creams or going way to hard at volleyball

The middle-aged male engineers (who have been at the Garrison since like the beginning of time) throw on women’s “sexy version” costumes while the female engineers wear the regular counterparts for the October page

It’s just a good, light-hearted time all around

People are posing in their underwear with puppies and kittens

Others have on aprons and are doing sexy cooking and housework

Movie themed scenes (me: *thinks about young Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones) and holidays and some people posing on motorcycles or next to muscle cars

It’s amazing since everyone pretty much has a plain, unimpressive body but they just throw that aside to have a good time

But then there’s Shiro

Takashi “God Among Men” Shirogane

I mean

It’s no secret that Shiro is in great shape

Everyone knows he’s just outstandingly handsome and ridiculously muscular

But there’s just something - something - about putting him in old-school basketball short-shorts, oiling him up, and giving him a weightlifting scene to pose for

He’s just all glistening skin as he benches hundreds of pounds, juicy ass threatening to tear his shorts as he dips low for squats

He gives the camera bedroom eyes as he sits with his legs wide and leans on his knee to do bicep curls

He flicks the hair out of his eyes as he runs on the treadmill, exposing a sweat-covered neck

Everyone is in shock, but Shiro is nervous and embarrassed as hell before, during, and after the entire shoot

He thinks he’s should be wearing a little bit more and that his nipples are sticking out and that he’s being just too much

(He shouldn’t be, they are but who cares, and he’s not)

(Thank you Matt for encouraging him)

They also give him the page for February (bc it’s his birth month), and he’s dressed up in a well-fitted three-piece suit in a candle-lit dining room scene with a bottle of wine in his hand for Valentine’s Day

It was really just supposed to be him posing like he’s eating dinner with someone special, having chocolates and wine

But then someone (Matt) suggests something in the bedroom...

And then Shiro is completely topless, sprawled out on a silk-sheet and rose-petal covered bed with a rose in his mouth, looking up at the camera with his eyes half-lidded

They also somehow manage to get him to pose in jean booty shorts and a white tank top for a sexy car washing scene as the cover of the calendar

That is a favorite

(bc Shiro would TOTALLY win a wet t-shirt contest if the opportunity arose)

(And those booty shorts only covered like half his ass)

They also have whole group shoots

One is Baywatch themed

(Shiro somehow ended up being the only one in a speedo)

 And the other is Sexy Santa with Sexy Elves

They even manage to get Iverson to be in one of the photos, though he’s not doing much sexy posing

But hey, it’s still funny

When the calendar comes out, it’s a BIG HIT

Almost everyone on staff buys one just bc they think it’s funny

And there’s one in nearly every teachers’ lounge at the Garrison

Some students try to get their hands on a copy or two or try to sneak into a teachers’ lounge to see the photos

Bc the calendars are not for students and they should not be seeing some of their teachers in such attire or in such poses

It’s mainly Shiro people want to see

So even though it wasn’t really on brand with the Garrison and they didn’t take it super seriously, the calendar turns out to be a very effective way to get people excited about new programs and projects

Thank you for coming to my Tedx Talk 

[weeklyhumorist]

Other Crazy QAnon Conspiracy Theories

Miniature golf is an ancient ritual intended to contact bloodthirsty demons from the netherworld, who are usually happy to partake in a round or two of miniature golf themselves.

Diet soda contains billions of nanites that compel drinkers to wear Daisy Duke shorts to church.

Watching The 700 Club while high on prescription cough syrup is a human’s closet way to approximate nirvana on Earth.

Indoor plumbing is the first step on the rocky road to intercourse with Satan and his minions.

Kirk Cameron damned his soul to eternal hellfire for appearing on a sitcom with a character named “Boner”.

Wearing a necklace of gluten around your neck will ward off Democrats.

Socialists hold wet t-shirt contents using the tears of Jesus.

All proceeds from Planned Parenthood are used to keep old Benny Hill episodes playing on a loop on Vietnamese television.

When modern music hurts your head, it’s because the songs enrage the lice in your hair, which then angrily attack your head and skull.

The morning after pill is used by extraterrestrials to track and monitor Earth females who “might like to party”.

Sam Elliott’s mustache hides the serial number that proves, once and for all, that he’s a clone.

When Democrats hold their blood orgies, the snack platters that are set out for guests are comprised of bargain brand cheeses and crackers.

Other Crazy QAnon Conspiracy Theories was originally published on Weekly Humorist

[bucky-barfs]

Let There Be Cowgirls

Let There Be Cowgirls(½): A Captain America Fanfiction

Relationship:  Steve x Reader, Bucky x Reader

Summary: Bucky has been cleared to start going out on social gatherings and Steve has been cleared to start forming intimate relationships. So what happens when they go to a bar and meet you?

Warnings: Drinking, mention of threesome, mention of military service.

Word Count: 3,840

Author’s Note: I’ve never in my life tried to write this perspective before. I typically stick to third person omniscient, sorry if this sucks. This is the first part of a two-shot  Reader x Steve, Reader x Bucky threesome. The second will most likely be gratuitous smut. Also, this happens in a post Civil War perfect land where nobody is in jail and everyone is mostly happy.

Bucky was not sure how he ended up here. He was only cleared to go out earlier that day, upon hearing the news Clint and Sam had immediately insisted on taking him out. Steve had of course followed and for good measure, Natasha had come too, just to keep an eye on her boys.

It had been a rough few months of therapy, all of the Avengers were in therapy, but Bucky had it the most frequently. His therapist had suggested a few weeks ago that he start pushing out of his comfort zone, first suggesting that he simply head a few floors down and grab a coffee from the Starbucks in the tower.

Next suggesting he try something other than plain black coffee, which had opened him up to a world of sweets he had never known before. In his time, sweets were rationed and everything was bland. Now he could get anything and everything he wanted, in fact, he had one time. He had asked the barista for one pump of everything, it hadn’t been good, but he had simply been excited by the thought.

A few weeks later, she had told him how proud of him she was and cleared him to leave the tower. Which usually meant Sam and Steve dragged him to some nearby food cart or nearby eatery. It was fine like that, it kept his human interaction minimal while also allowing him to slowly get used to the idea of being seen.

That had initially been his biggest issue; he had lived in the shadows for so long he hadn’t known how to stop. Going outside in broad daylight, even just to head to the deli on the corner was a huge step for him. It had terrified him at first, but Sam and Steve had been his rocks.

The two men had never faltered, and though his relationship with Sam appeared to be rocky, it was incredibly beneficial to him. The teasing and refusal to tiptoe around him had helped immensely; Sam treated him as if he was human. Whereas Steve still edged around him, afraid of upsetting him or setting him off.

Steve’s same therapist had given him the go-ahead weeks ago to start working on forming intimate relationships. Which had led to Clint and Sam attempting to take him to a strip club, as if that’s where relationships were formed.

Earlier that day Bucky’s therapist had proudly declared that she thought he was fit enough to go out socially. Which was how Sam concluded that Bucky and Steve needed to go to a bar. Clint had immediately jumped on board, excitedly planning the night out with his fellow bird. Steve had been apprehensive, partially because he himself was still iffy about going out.

According to Sam and Clint, they had chosen this bar, a country themed bar, because it was simple. The people there were mostly polite and while the music wasn’t what the boys had been used to, it was much better than that weird beeping shit. Most of the bar was retired military and traveling people who were in the rodeo or something related.

The former assassin was hunched over in the corner of the bar eyeing the drink in front of him with contempt. Clint had hurriedly ordered it for him before ditching the group to head after some girl in daisy dukes. Steve sat beside him, blinking at the odd drink in front of him. Neither man cared for the taste; however, they suspected it might be some type of beer.

They noticed the bartender slide over to their side of the bar, you eyed them curiously as you set a drink down in front of a man a few stools away. Bucky instinctively tensed and Steve immediately sat up straighter as you walked over to them.

“Evenin’ fellas. Your drinks okay?” You asked, your voice sounding like honey. The southern lilt in it was thick as you kept your voice low.

Both men shuddered; they could practically feel your words on their skin. Your accent seemed to caress them, the gentle inflection in your tone making them feel like you actually might care about their orders. You were definitely good at your job.

“Uh, what is it that we’re drinking?” Steve asked, his face wrinkling as he forced himself to take another sip.

You cocked her head and smiled softly. Your black, silver studded cowboy hat tilting forward and nearly falling in your face. “You’re with the blonde guy right? With the arms?” You murmured jerking your chin towards where Clint was dancing with some blonde-haired woman.

“Yeah.” Steve answered, though he was a little confused about the arms part. Didn’t everyone have arms? Well… maybe not everyone.

“It’s an IPA. Beer, but in my opinion, not good beer.” You chuckled softly before pulling their drinks away from them. “They’ve only picked up traction within the last few years; mostly hipsters drink ‘em.”

Hipsters was not a term that Bucky recognized, however, it made a small amount of sense to him. He could use context clues to guess the meaning, though he was off by about a mile. If the beer had only become popular within the last few years, then that explained a lot.

Steve, however, recognized the term immediately. Natasha had jokingly called him one when they donned disguises and ran from Hydra several years ago. She had spent the next ten minutes trying to explain to him what a hipster was.

“You fellas like whiskey?” You asked casually, turning back to the shelf behind you to catalogue the bottles. Bucky took note of how your long hair swished just above your jean-clad ass. He was sure every part of you was carefully crafted so you could get the best tips; your movements were friendly, but deliberate. You were clearly a woman who had perfected her art.

Steve raised an eyebrow at Bucky, silently asking him if he liked whiskey. Back in the day, they had, but they weren’t sure if they liked any new brands. Steve knew he liked what Tony drank, but he had a feeling that it was excessively expensive and that a place like this most likely wouldn’t carry it.

“Yeah.” Bucky answered gruffly, much to Steve’s surprise.

Steve shot him an odd look that was only met with a shrug. His therapist had told him to interact with people more, so he was doing as he had been told. Plus, you were a bartender, which meant you were kind of like the Baristas he had befriended.  

Both men summerized that you were cute; with your grey and red flannel tied up into a crop top with low-rise black jeans. If the sound of your footsteps was any indication, you were most likely wearing cowboy boots much like everyone else in the bar.

“Alright, well let’s see what we’ve got, yeah?” You shot them a cheeky smile over your shoulder as you pulled down five different bottles of whiskey.

“By the way,” You started as you set the bottles down in front of them, quickly finishing by introducing yourself.

“Steve.” The blonde man replied, giving you a hesitant smile.

The sincerity in his eyes made you melt. You weren’t technically supposed to take customers home, but boy did you want to share a handsy cab ride with this one. It wasn’t the bars rule, it was your own personal rule.

Bird Dog Blackberry, Bird Dog Peach, Cutty Sark, Wild Turkey, Old Grand-dad. Bucky mentally catalogued. Cutty Sark and Old Grand-dad seemed familiar, he liked familiar. However, he was supposed to try new things.

“Bucky.” The dark haired one mumbled.

“Alright, let’s start with Old Grand-Dad. It’s a classic. It’s been around since the 1840s, it’s a Kentucky bourbon. It’s got classic whiskey notes and this sucker is 100 proof. It’s got a sweet, but savory taste going on. I give it to all the whiskey snobs who tell me to surprise them.”  You poured them each a small amount in disposable cups. Both men tried it, both pleasantly surprised by the familiar taste of it.

“Next, Wild Turkey. My least favorite whiskey, ever. But, some people swear by it.” You wrinkled your nose as you took back their cups and poured a small amount in. “It’s been around since the 1940s, it’s also a Kentucky bourbon. Now this one is 101 and proof. It’s got a smokier and grittier flavor that sticks around in the back of your throat.  Most people prefer it with a bit of water. But it’s best in mixed drinks.”

Both men drank their cups, this time pulling slight faces. Maybe in the past they would have liked it, but both men had become spoiled by modern day sweets. The gritty flavor of this one just was not cutting it for them.

“Now, Cutty Sark. It’s a Scottish whisky from the 1920s. It’s also 100 proof. This one is soft, has less of a charred taste and is medium bodied so it doesn’t linger. It’s a good basic whisky.” You shrugged as you slid the drinks over to them. They enjoyed this one more, it was softer. Neither man really liked the lingering taste that the previous one had left.

“Don’t you have other customers?” Steve asked apprehensively, there were quite a few other people in the bar.

You shook your head, “They can get their drinks from Cash.” You waved your hand dismissively before shooting them a devilish look. “Besides, I like pleasing my customers.” You finished off with a wink in Bucky’s direction.

Cash was your fellow bartender, who because he lacked the proper assets -ahem, boobs- did not make as much in tips as you. However, he was a kickass bartender and the regulars loved him. 

“Alright, Bird Dog is a newer whiskey. It’s also a Kentucky Bourbon, but it’s only 86 proof. Bird Dog is known for its flavored whiskeys. If you have a sweet tooth this is the whiskey for you. Personally, the blackberry one is my favorite. Now, this isn’t like those fruity pink colored cocktails, this may be sweet, but it’s still whiskey.” You decided to pour them the peach one first.

Steve’s eyes widened as he drank it, while Bucky simply stared at it suspiciously after finishing his. It was delicious, yet both men felt slightly betrayed that they preferred this new age sweet whiskey to their familiar Old Grand-Dad.

Bucky was sure he’d found love when he tried the blackberry one, while Steve preferred the peach. Something about the sweetness of it mixing with the woody flavor of the bourbon made his taste buds sing.

You grinned as they grudgingly admitted their approval of the drinks. “Neat or on the rocks?” Both men chose neat, which lead to their plastic cups being disposed of and replaced with glass tumblers.

“I’ll be back to check on y’all in a bit.” You said before sashaying away from them and walking over to a group of undeniably drunk men at the other end of the bar.

“She was nice.” Steve mused quietly.

Bucky grunted in reply. You had been very nice to be so patient with them; of course, your motives were most likely tip related. It still made him feel warm inside, or maybe that was just the sweet whiskey he was sipping.

“She’s cute.” Natasha said casually, admiring her nails.

Steve and Bucky both jumped a little, neither had noticed Natasha show up.

“Where did you come from?” Steve asked, stuttering slightly. Natasha was one of the few people who could sneak up on him, and it hadn’t helped that maybe he had been a bit distracted by the cute bartender.

“Since Wild Turkey.” She snarked, spinning her seat to lean her back against the bar so she could analyze the crowd. Steve’s cheeks reddened and Bucky’s eyes narrowed at her revelation. “I think she likes you.” She didn’t bother specifying which of them.

The dark haired man immediately wanted to change the subject and clearly, Natasha was talking about Steve. Which, maybe, disappointed him. “What’re you drinking?” Bucky questioned, pointing to her mason jar.

Natasha eyed it curiously as if she was seeing it for the first time. “A Cowboy Killer.” She sent a smirk in the soldier’s direction.

The blond super soldier squinted at Natasha’s head. “Where did that hat come from?” She hadn’t shown up in a cowboy hat, but now she was wearing a sleek black one, perched easily on her red curls.

“A cowboy gave it to me.” She stated simply.

“Gave?” Bucky asked, raising a brow and shooting her a lopsided grin.

She looked offended for a minute before standing up and narrowing her eyes. “… Yes.” The redhead walked away, venturing back out into the fray.

“Hey, man? What’s that?” Sam asked, materializing out of seemingly nowhere between the two soldier’s.

Bucky tried to stop himself from making a snarky remark, but was just a little too late. “A drink.” He replied wrinkling his nose at the lanky man.

“It’s called Bird Dog Whiskey.” Steve answered, shooting Bucky a disapproving look. He held his cup out to Sam, offering the other man a sip.

After savoring the taste for a second Sam blinked, confusion taking over his features. “Why does it taste like peaches?”

“It’s peach flavored whiskey.” Bucky snapped, an implied ‘duh’ at the end of his sentence.

Steve sighed, giving up on trying mediating. He wasn’t entirely sure how the two’s relationship worked. They seemed to antagonize each other to no end, sometimes he feared they would start throwing punches. But, oddly enough, it seemed to work for them. Bucky seemed genuinely at ease around Sam, which filled Steve with a great sense of relief.

There was a few minutes of bickering before You approached them again right as the song changed. The new song singing something about God making cowgirls.

“Hey, soldier’s. Y’all still doing okay?” You leaned against the counter, maybe, just maybe, slightly showing off your exposed cleavage. It came with the job, but you also just kind wanted them to check the girls out.

Steve looked at you incredulously, “How’d you know?” After noticing how you were leaning against the bar his cheeks flushed and he began staring at the wall directly behind you.

Bucky risked a glance at your chest before swallowing thickly and averting his eyes the wall beside him. 

Mission accomplished. You thought smugly.

“Most of my family is military. I recognize it in your eyes.” You shot a slightly sad look at Steve and Bucky, causing both men to shudder. For a second you placed your hand on Steve’s, before straightening up again behind the bar. 

You would have done the same thing to Bucky, but you were getting the feeling that he wasn’t a fan of being touched.

You then brought your warm eyes to rest on Sam. “Airman.” You nodded at him.

“Okay, that’s impressive.” Sam said, tipping his beer bottle in your direction. “I’m Sam.” He gave you a charming grin as he settled into the seat Natasha had abandoned beside Steve.

Instead of immediately replying, you refilled the men’s drinks, not even needing to double check that you was pouring the right drinks. You answered with your name, giving him a curt smile.

Your expression brightened as you looked over at Bucky, he was continuously sweeping his too long hair behind his ears. Every few seconds the strands would fall back into his face, causing him to get slightly frustrated. The faint gleam of his metal hand could be seen as it rested on the bar, gently holding his cup. He had spent the last few months carefully practicing with holding breakable things, just to make sure his left arm wasn’t completely destructive.

“Interesting name.” Sam laughed, giving you a flirty look that you didn’t bother acknowledging. You already had your eyes on someone, or someone’s.

You kept your eyes on Bucky. “I have a non-traditional family.”

Suddenly, your hand appeared in front of him holding a black hair tie. “Take it.” You said, giving him a gentle smile.

 Instead of immediately grabbing the hair tie Bucky set his glass down and dropped his arm to his lap, not wanting to scare you. He smiled apprehensively back as he gently plucked the hair tie from your outstretched hand, making sure to use his right hand. He still didn’t pick up his drinks at Starbucks using his left-hand. He was still too worried about its destructive properties to risk touching anyone else with it.

Truthfully, as you watched him put his hair up all you could thing about was threading your fingers through the strands and giving them a good hard yank.

Your eyes darted to a man several stools down from them, sitting with a group of friends, all of them drinking beer. He had a prosthetic hand and leg that went from the thigh down. Immediately your eyes returned to Bucky, giving him a warm look. What you had tried to portray was that this was a safe place, you hoped he understood.

Steve watched this short exchange, his eyes softening as Bucky hesitantly wrapped his metal hand around the glass again. He was already planning on how to invite you to lunch, once he saw something that made his friend happy he tended to leap on it.

Sam had already backed off; clearly noticing the vibes you were putting out were not for him. They seemed to be for Bucky, or maybe Steve? However, he could still ask you questions that he knew Bucky and Steve would never ask. Just as a little help to his friends.

“How old are you?” He asked giving the two a cheeky grin as your back was turned. Both replied with frowns, though Bucky’s looked slightly more murderous than Steve’s.

“Twenty-six. But, my birthday is in a few weeks.” You replied casually as you tidied up behind the bar.

Sam thought it over for a minute, before reaching for his phone and quickly typing a few things into google. “So you’re a Taurus? You know that means you’re really compatible with Cancers and Pisces.”

You turned and raised an eyebrow as you dried a tumbler. “Yeah? You know any?”

“These two.” He replied, cheekily pointing his thumbs at his two companions.

Steve and Bucky had honestly no idea if they were actually what Sam said they were. Wanda sometimes read them their horoscopes, but it was usually in one ear and out the other.

You looked Steve and Bucky over before giving Sam an unimpressed look. “Yeah? What are you? Their wingman?” God, you hoped he was.

Steve and Bucky both snorted, oh if only you knew that’s exactly what Sam was.

“You could say that. So, which one do you think you’re taking home tonight?” That one got him an under the table smack from Steve who was now looking anywhere but at you.

Bucky was staring into his glass, already knowing the answer.

“Por que no los dos?” You answered with a wicked grin.

Steve and Sam were rusty at best with their Spanish, but Bucky had been trained in multiple languages and was fluent. His eyes widened comically as he stared at you, his mouth slightly agape.

Women now were so forward, he saw that every time he went anywhere with Steve. Women would throw themselves at the blonde super soldier, which usually left Bucky sitting on the sidelines. He supposed that was how Steve had felt all those years.

“Shit.” Sam said, laughing. “She speaks Spanish. I need to get Nat over here to translate.” The phrase sounded weirdly familiar to him, but he couldn’t place it.

Bucky considered offering up the translation, but he decided to be selfish and keep it to himself. Your words made him feel warm, girls didn’t like him anymore, Steve was the desirable one now. But you had wanted both, which meant Steve and Bucky.

“Did someone call me?” Nat asked, walking back over to the bar. She had been observing from the sidelines while babysitting a drunk Clint. She hadn’t heard anything that was said, due to the drunk man’s babbling, aside from her own name.

“Hey, Nat! I need you to transla-” Sam started only to be cut off by Clint.

“Well, hello, cowgirl.” Clint slurred, sauntering up to the bar. He shot an easy smile towards you. It was clear that he was decently intoxicated; such was to be expected as they had now been at the bar for almost two hours. “Whose bed are your boots gonna be under tonight?”

You wrinkled your nose slightly. “Referencing a Shania Twain song about cheating to hit on me, classy.”

“Classy is all I kno-” Clint started. He was cut off as a burp rose in his throat, which he released, burping loudly near your face.

“Good one, Clint.” Sam groaned, shaking his head disdainfully.

Steve immediately started apologizing for his friend. You were used to it, in fact worse had happened, much worse. You resisted the urge to shudder at the memory of a customer defecating on the bar.

The man felt another burp coming up, only to realize at the last second that this one felt suspiciously like more than a burp. In an instant you were holding a small yellow puke bag in front of him, which Clint graciously accepted.

“Sorry, boys, I think we’ve gotta go.” Natasha said apologetically.

The others reluctantly got up, Steve pulling out his wallet. “How much do we owe you?”  He motioned to Sam, himself, and Bucky. Natasha and Clint had set up a tab as soon as they walked in the door.

“Free for some fellow Bird Dog lovers.” You replied with a wink. “Which means you have to pay, Sam.” Your tone was teasing.

“Damn you, woman.” The former Airman replied, shaking his head.

Steve pulled out three twenties, “Then take these as a tip.” He gave you his signature all-American-boy smile that unbeknownst to him usually caused the panties to drop.

“I’ll see you again soon.” You replied, grinning as you slid the money into your back pocket. You leaned against the counter as you watched the group gently guide their drunk friend out.

You were a little disappointed that they had to leave, but you were confident that they would return.

Steve drove them back, Bucky sitting up front with Sam and Natasha sat in the back on either side of Clint.

“Man, I’m telling you, I was this close to sealing the deal for them.” Sam said, shaking his head ruefully as he glared at Clint.

“I’m so-sorry. I ruined Bucky’s only chance of getting laid- I’m the worst friend.” Clint drunkenly whined. He continued on, babbling nonsense while Natasha simply chuckled and gently patted his arm.

“We’ll just have to go back then.” Natasha said casually.

“By the way, Nat, what does ‘por que no los dos?’ mean?” Sam asked.

“Taco…commercial.” Clint mumbled.

“It means ‘Why not both?’” Both Natasha and Bucky supplied at the same time.

Steve accidentally tapped the brakes too hard, causing them to lurch to a stop at a red light. His cheeks were bright red and he coughed to cover up his embarrassment.

“Shit! From the taco commercial!” Sam exclaimed. “That’s where I know it from!”

Clint let out a loud wail, “I ruined their only chance at a threesome! I’m the worst!”

The car erupted into laughter. Steve continued coughing while Bucky chortled under his breath; Natasha laughed a full belly laugh and Sam simply let out a pained laugh as he shook his head.

“We’ll definitely have to go back then.” Natasha said as the laughter died down. There was mumbled agreement from the others in the car.

[aion-rsa]

Upcoming Must-See Movies in 2021

https://ift.tt/2XPPY8Z

It’s 2021. Finally. If you’re reading this, it means you’ve hopefully gotten through the wreckage of last year unscathed and are ready for a brighter future. And if you’re also a movie lover, this certainly includes a trip (or 20) back to the cinemas.

Sure, theaters were technically open in some places last fall, but the moviegoing season has largely remained dormant since March 2020. Yet given good news about vaccines starting to become available, and an absolutely stacked 2021 movie release calendar, we have reasons to be cautiously optimistic.

Indeed, 2021 promises many of the most anticipated films from last year, plus new surprises. From the superhero variety like Black Widow to the art house with Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch, 2021 could be a much needed respite. So below is just a sampling of what to expect from the year to come…

The Little Things

January 29

One of the year’s earliest high profile releases is also the first of WB’s film slate on HBO Max. The Little Things is a serial killer thriller in the old school mold. It also boasts a brutally talented cast that includes Denzel Washington and Rami Malek as the detectives, and Jared Leto as the killer. As the latest movie from John Lee Hancock (The Founder, The Alamo), this looks like the type of star-led seediness that used to dominate the multiplex.

Maclolm and Marie

February 5

Assassination Nation writer-director Sam Levinson returns for a decidedly stripped down and intimate character study about two people on the threshold of their lives changing–and perhaps splitting apart. With Zendaya and John David Washington in roles unlike anything we’ve seen the pair in before, they play a couple returning home after the premiere of Malcolm’s (Washington) first movie. He’s on the cusp of life-changing success as a director, but when confronted by Marie about past secrets and hard truths… the night takes a turn.

Judas and the Black Messiah

February 12

It’s kind of hard to wrap one’s head around the annual “Oscar race” in a year when little trophies don’t seem so damn important, but Warner Bros. feels strongly enough about this movie that it’s getting it into theaters and on HBO Max right in the thick of the pandemic-delayed awards season. And judging by the marketing, it’s bringing heat with it.

Shaka King directs and co-writes the story of Fred Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya), who became the chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party in the late 1960s and was murdered in cold blood by police in 1969. LaKeith Stanfield plays William O’Neal, a petty criminal who agreed to help the FBI take Hampton down. This promises to be incendiary, relevant material — and it’s almost here.

Minari

February 12

Lee Isaac Chung directs Steven Yeun–now fully shaking off his years as Glenn on The Walking Dead–in this semi-autobiographical film about a South Korean family struggling to settle down in rural America in the 1980s. Premiering nearly a year ago at the Sundance Film Festival, where it won both the U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize and the U.S. Dramatic Audience Award, Minari had a quick one-week virtual release in December, with a number of critics placing it on their Top 10 lists for 2020.

Its story of immigration and assimilation currently has a perfect 100 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes, with critics lauding its heart, grace, and sensitivity. A few of ours also considered it among 2020’s best.

Nomadland

February 19

Utilizing both actors and real people, director Chloé Zhao (The Rider, Marvel’s upcoming Eternals) chronicles the lives of America’s “forgotten people” as they travel the West searching for work, companionship and community. A brilliant Frances McDormand stars as Fern, a woman in her mid-60s who lost her husband, her house, and her entire previous existence when her town literally vanished following the closure of its sole factory.

Zhao’s film quietly flows from despair to optimism and back to despair again, the hardscrabble lives of its itinerant cast (many of them actual nomads) foregrounded against often stunning–if lonely–vistas of the vast, empty American countryside.

I Care a Lot

February 19

A solid cast, led by Rosamund Pike, Peter Dinklage, Chris Messina, and Dianne Wiest, star in this satirical crime drama from director J. Blakeson (The Disappearance of Alice Creed). Pike plays Marla, a con artist whose scam is getting herself named legal guardian of her elderly marks and then draining their assets while sticking them in nursing homes. She’s ruthless and efficient at it, until she meets a woman (Wiest) whose ties to a crime boss (Dinklage) may prove too much of a challenge for the wily Marla. It was one of our favorites out of Toronto last year.

The Father

February 26

Anthony Hopkins gives a mesmerizing, and deeply tragic, performance as Anthony, an elderly British man whose descent into dementia is reflected by the film itself, which plays with time, setting, and continuity until both Anthony and the viewer can no longer tell what is real and what is not. Olivia Colman is equally moving as his daughter, who wants to get on with her own life even as she watches her father’s disintegrate in front of her.

We saw The Father last year at the AFI Fest and it ended up being a favorite of 2020; Hopkins is unforgettable in this bracing, heartbreaking work, which is stunningly adapted by first-time director Florian Zeller from his own award-winning play.

Chaos Walking

March 5

This constantly postponed sci-fi project has become one of those “we’ll believe it when we see it” films until it actually comes out. Shot nearly three and a half years ago by director Doug Liman, Chaos Walking has undergone extensive reshoots and was at one point reportedly deemed unreleasable.

Based on the book The Knife of Letting Go, it places Tom Holland (Spider-Man: Far From Home) and Daisy Ridley (The Rise of Skywalker) on a distant planet where Ridley, the only woman, can hear the thoughts of all the men due to a mysterious force called the Noise.

Raya and the Last Dragon

March 5

Longtime Walt Disney Animation Studios head of story, Paul Briggs (Frozen), will make his directorial debut on this original Disney animated fantasy, which draws upon Eastern traditions to tell the tale of a young warrior who goes searching for the world’s last dragon in the mysterious land of Kumandra. Cassie Steele will voice Raya while Awkwafina (The Farewell) will portray Sisu the dragon.

Disney Animation has been nearly invincible in recent years with other hits like Moana and Zootopia, so watch for this one to be another major hit for the Mouse.

Coming 2 America

March 5

The notion of whether nostalgia-based properties are still viable has cropped up repeatedly in the last few years. However, streaming, which is where Coming 2 America finds itself headed post-COVID, makes golden oldies much safer. This sequel—based on a 32-year-old comedy that was one of Eddie Murphy’s most financially successful hits—sees Murphy back as Prince Akeem, of course, along with Arsenio Hall returning as his loyal friend Semmi.

The plot revolves around Akeem’s discovery, just as he is about to be crowned king, that he has a long-lost son living in the States (we’re not sure how that happened, but let’s just go with it). That, of course, necessitates another visit to our shores—that is, if Akeem and Semmi presumably don’t get stopped at the border. The film reunites Murphy with Dolemite is My Name director Craig Brewer, so perhaps they can make some cutting-edge social comedy out of this?

The King’s Man

March 12

This might be a weird thing to say: but has World War I ever seemed so stylish? It is with Matthew Vaughn at the helm.

An origin story of sorts for the organization that gave us Colin Firth and the umbrella, The King’s Man is a father and son yarn where Ralph Fiennes’ Duke of Oxford is reluctant about his son Conrad (Harris Dickinson) joining the war effort. But they’ll both be up to it as the Duke launches an intelligence gathering agency independent from any government. It also includes Gemma Arterton, Matthew Goode, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as charter members.

Oh, and did we mention they fight Rasputin?

Godzilla vs. Kong

March 26

Here we are, at last at the big punch up between Godzilla and King Kong. They both wear a crown, but in the film that Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures have been building toward since 2014, only one can walk away with the title of the king of all the monsters.

Admittedly, not everyone loved the last American Godzilla movie, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, but we sure did. Still, Godzilla vs. Kong should be a different animal with Adam Wingard (You’re Next, The Guest) taking over directorial duties. It also has a stacked cast with some familiar faces (Kyle Chandler, Millie Bobby Brown, and Ziyi Zhang) and plenty of new ones (Alexander Skarsgård, Eiza González, Danai Gurira, Lance Reddick, and more).

It’ll probably be better than the original, right? And hey with its HBO Max rollout, questions of a poor box office run sure are conveniently mooted!

No Time to Die

April 2

Nothing lasts forever, and the Daniel Craig era of James Bond is coming to an end… hopefully in 2021. In fact, delays notwithstanding, it’s a bit of a surprise Craig is getting an official swan song with this movie after the star said he’d rather “slash his wrists” before doing another one. Well, we’re glad he didn’t, just as we’re hopeful for his final installment in the tuxedo.

Director Cary Joji Fukunaga is a newcomer to the franchise, but that might be a good thing after how tired Spectre felt, and Fukunaga has done sterling work in the past on True Detective and Maniac. He also looks to bring the curtain down on the whole Craig oeuvre by picking up on the last movie’s lingering threads, such as 007 driving off into the sunset with Léa Seydoux’s Madeleine Swann, while introducing new ones that include Rami Malek as Bond villain Safin and Ana de Armas as new Bond girl Paloma. Yay for the Knives Out reunion!

Mortal Kombat

April 16

Not to be deterred by the relative failure of Sony’s Monster Hunter in theaters at the tail end of 2020, Warner Bros. is giving this venerable video game franchise another shot at live-action cinematic glory after two previous tries in the 1990s. Director Simon McQuoid makes his feature debut while the script comes from Dave Callaham (Wonder Woman 1984, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) and the cast includes a number of actors you’ve seen in other films but can’t quite place.

The plot? Who knows! But we’re guessing it will feature gods, demons, and warriors battling for control of the 18 realms in various fighting tournaments. What else do you want?

A Quiet Place Part II

April 23

The sequel to one of 2018’s biggest surprises, A Quiet Place Part II comes with major expectations. And few may hold it to a higher standard than writer-director John Krasinski. Despite (spoiler) the death of his character in the first film, Krasinski returns behind the camera for the sequel after saying he wouldn’t. The story he came up with apparently was too good to pass up.

The film again stars Emily Blunt as the often silenced mother of a vulnerable family, which includes son Marcus (Noah Jupe) and deaf daughter Regan (Millicent Simmonds). However, now that they know how to kill the eagle-eared alien monsters who’ve taken over their planet, the cast has grown to include Cillian Murphy and Djimon Hounsou. While the film has been delayed due to the coronavirus outbreak, trust us that it’ll be worth the wait. Is it finally time for… resistance?

Last Night in Soho

April 23

Fresh off the success of 2017’s Baby Driver (his biggest commercial hit to date), iconoclastic British director Edgar Wright returns with what is described as a psychological and possibly time-bending horror thriller set in London. Whether this features Wright’s trademark self-aware humor remains to be seen, but since the film is said to be inspired by dread-inducing genre classics like Repulsion and Don’t Look Now, he might be going for a different effect this time.

The cast, of course, is outstanding: upstarts Anya Taylor-Joy (Queen’s Gambit) and Thomasin McKenzie (Jojo Rabbit) will face off with Matt Smith (Doctor Who), and British legends Diana Rigg and Terence Stamp. And the truth is we’re never going to miss one of Wright’s movies. Taylor-Joy talked to us here about finding her 1960s lounge singer voice for the film.

Black Widow

May 7

Some would charitably say it arrives a decade late, but Black Widow is finally getting her own movie. This is fairly remarkable considering she became street pizza in Avengers: Endgame, but this movie fits snugly between the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War. It also promises to be the most pared down Marvel Studios movie since 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and that’s a good thing.

In the film, Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff is on the run after burning her bridges with the U.S. government and UN. This brings her back to the spy games she thought she’d escaped from her youth, and back in the orbit of her “sister” Yelena (Florence Pugh). Old wounds are ripped open, old Soviet foes, including David Harbour as the Red Guardian and Rachel Weisz as Nat and Yelena’s girlhood instructor, are revealed, and many a fight sequence with minimal CGI will be executed.

How’s that for a real start to Phase 4? Of course that’s still assuming this comes out before The Eternals after it was delayed, again, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Spiral

May 21

Chris Rock has co-written the story for a new take on the Saw franchise. Never thought we’d write those words! The fact that it also stars Rock, as well as Samuel L. Jackson, is likewise head-turning. It looks like they’re going for legitimate horror with Darren Lynn Bousman attached to direct after helming three of the Saw sequels, and its grisly pre-COVID trailer from last year.

Hopefully this will be better than most of the franchise that came before, and given the heavily David Fincher-influenced tone of the first trailer, we’re willing to cross our fingers and play this game.

Free Guy

May 21

What would you do if you discovered that you were just a background character in an open world video game—and that the game was soon about to go offline? That’s the premise of this existential sci-fi comedy from director Shawn Levy, best known for the Night at the Museum series and as an executive producer and director on Stranger Things. Ryan Reynolds stars as Guy, a bank teller who discovers that his life is not what he thought it was, and in fact isn’t even real—or is it? We’ve seen a preview of footage, so we’d suggest you think Truman Show, if Truman was trapped in Grand Theft Auto.

F9

May 28

Just when you thought this never-say-die franchise had shown us everything it could possibly dream up, it ups the stakes one more time: the ninth entry in the Fast and Furious saga (excluding 2019’s Hobbs and Shaw) will reportedly take Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his cohorts into space as they battle Dom’s long-lost brother Jakob (John Cena, making a long-overdue debut in this series). Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Jordana Brewster, Helen Mirren, and Charlize Theron all also return, as does director Justin Lin, who took a two-film break from his signature series. Expect to see the required physics-defying stunts, logic-defying action and even more talk about “family” than usual.

Cruella

May 28

Since Disney has already made an animated 101 Dalmatians in 1961 and a live-action remake in 1996, it is apparently time to tell the story again Maleficent-style. Hence we now focus on the viewpoint of iconic villainess Cruella de Vil, played this time by Emma Stone. She’s joined in the movie by Emma Thompson, Paul Walter Hauser, and Mark Strong, with direction handled by Craig Gillespie (sort of a step down from 2017’s I, Tonya, if you ask us).

The story has been updated to the 1970s, but Cruella–now a fashion designer–still covets the fur of dogs for her creations. This is a Mouse House joint, so don’t expect it to get too dark, and don’t be completely surprised if it ends up as a premium on Disney+ in lieu of its already delayed theatrical release.

Infinite

May 28

This sci-fi yarn from director Antoine Fuqua (The Equalizer) stars Mark Wahlberg as a man experiencing what he thinks are hallucinations, but which turn out to be memories from past lives. He soon learns that there is a secret society of people just like him, except that they have total recall of their past identities and have acted to change the course of history throughout the centuries.

Based on the novel The Reincarnationist Papers by D. Eric Maikranz, this was originally a post-Marvel vehicle for Chris Evans. He dropped out, and the combination of Fuqua and Wahlberg hints at something more action-oriented than the rather cerebral premise suggests. The film also stars Sophie Cookson, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Dylan O’Brien.

The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It

June 4

James Wan is already directing a new horror film this year so he’s stepping away from the directorial duties on the third film based on the paranormal investigations of Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga). That task has fallen to Michael Chaves (The Curse of La Llorona), so expect plenty of the same Wan Universe touches: heavy atmosphere, superb use of sound, and shocking, eerie visuals.

Details are scarce, but the plot—like the other two Conjuring films—is taken from the true-life case of a man who went on trial for murder and said as his defense that he was possessed by a demon when he committed his crimes. That’s all we know for now, except that, intriguingly, Mitchell Hoog and Megan Ashley Brown have been cast as younger versions of the Warrens.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife

June 11

With the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot criticized (fairly) for its lack of imagination and castigated (unfairly as hell) for its all-female ghost-hunting crew, director Jason Reitman–finally cashing in on the family name by returning to the brand his dad Ivan directed to glory in 1984–has crafted a direct sequel to the original films.

Read more

Books

Ghostbusters: Afterlife – Who is Ivo Shandor?

By Gavin Jasper

Movies

The Greatest Movie Sequels Never Made

By Jack Beresford

Set 30 years later, Afterlife follows a family who move to a small town only to discover that they have a long-secret connection to the OG Ghostbusters. Carrie Coon (The Leftovers), Finn Wolfhard (Stranger Things) and Paul Rudd (Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania) star alongside charter cast members Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Sigourney Weaver, Annie Potts, and, yes, Bill Murray.

In the Heights

June 18

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first Broadway hit musical gets the big screen treatment (by way of HBO Max) from director Jon M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians). Set in Washington Heights over the course of a three-day heat wave, the plot and ensemble cast carry echoes of both Rent and Do the Right Thing. While a success on the stage—if not quite the cultural phenomenon that Miranda’s next show, Hamilton—it remains to be seen whether In the Heights can strike a chord with streaming audiences.

Luca

June 18

Continuing its current run of all-new, non-sequel original films started in 2020 with Onward and Soul, Pixar will unveil Luca this summer. Directed by Enrico Casarosa–making his feature debut after 18 years with the animation powerhouse–the film tells the story of a friendship between a human being and a sea monster (disguised as another human child) on the Italian Riviera. That’s about all we have on it for now, except that the cast includes Drake Bell and John Ratzenberger.

Pixar’s recent track record has included masterpieces like Inside Out, solid sequels like Toy Story 4, and shakier propositions like The Incredibles 2, but we don’t have any indication yet of what to expect from Luca.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage

June 25

Can anyone honestly say that 2018’s Venom was a “good” movie? A batshit insane movie, yes, and perhaps even an entertaining one in its own nutty way, but good or not, it made nearly a billion bucks at the box office so here we are.

Tom Hardy will return to peel more scenery down with his teeth as both Eddie Brock and his fanged, towering alien symbiote while Woody Harrelson will fulfill his destiny and play Cletus Kasady, aka Carnage, the perfected hybrid of psychopathic serial killer and red pile of vicious alien goo. Let the carnage begin!

Top Gun: Maverick

July 2

It’s been 34 years since Tom Cruise first soared through the skies as hotshot pilot Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, and he’ll take to the air once more in a sequel that also features Val Kilmer, Jennifer Connelly, Miles Teller, Jon Hamm, and more. The flying and action sequences from director Joseph Kosinski (who worked with Cruise on Oblivion) will undoubtedly be first-rate, but the studio (Paramount) has to be nervous after seeing one nostalgia-based franchise after another (Blade Runner, Charlie’s Angels, Terminator, The Shining) crash and burn recently.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

July 10

With Shang-Chi, Marvel Studios hopes to do for Asian culture what the company did with the groundbreaking Black Panther nearly three years ago: create another superhero epic with a non-white lead and a mythology steeped in a non-Western culture. Simu Liu stars in the title role as the “master of kung fu,” who must do battle with the nefarious Ten Rings organization and its leader, the Mandarin (the “real” one, not the imposter from Iron Man 3, played here by the legendary Tony Leung). Director Destin Daniel Cretton (Just Mercy) will open up a whole new corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe with this story and character, whose origins stretch back to 1973.

The Forever Purge

July 9

One day nearly eight years ago, you went to see a low-budget dystopian sci-fi/horror flick called The Purge, and the next thing you know, it’s 2021 and you’re getting ready to see the fifth and allegedly final entry in the series (which has also spawned a TV show). Written by creator James DeMonaco and directed by Everardo Gout, the film will once again focus on the title event, an annual 12-hour national bacchanal in which all crime, even murder, is legal. How this ends the story, and where and when it falls into the context of the rest of the films, remains a secret for now. Filming was completed back in February 2020, with the film’s release delayed from last summer by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Space Jam: A New Legacy

July 16

There are two types of folks when it comes to the original Space Jam of 1996: those who were between the ages of three and 11 when it came out, and everyone else. In one camp it is an unsightly relic of ‘90s cross-promotional cheese; in the other, it’s a sports movie classic. Luckily for kids today, NBA star LeBron James was 11 for most of ’96, and he’s bringing back the hoops and the Looney Tunes in Space Jam: A New Legacy.

The film will be among the many Warner Bros. pics premieres on HBO Max and in theaters this year, and it will see King James share above-the-title credits with Bugs Bunny. All is as it should be.

Uncharted

July 16

An Uncharted movie has been a long time coming. How long you might ask? Well, when the idea of an Uncharted movie first started getting bandied around Hollywood, the earliest game in the series just launched to rave reviews in the PlayStation 3’s first year. We’re now on PlayStation 5(!), and Mark Wahlberg has gone from angling to play young hero Nathan Drake to starring his wisecracking sidekick, Victor “Sully” Sullivan.

Still, we’re here with an Uncharted movie finally in the can. Directed by Ruben Fleischer (Zombieland, Venom), the video game movie stars everyone’s favorite web-head, Tom Holland, as Drake, a pseudo-modern day Indiana Jones. Whether it lives up to that older franchise’s storied legacy remains to be seen (especially given its gaming roots), but one thing’s for sure, Holland will get to show off more gymnast skill thanks to Uncharted’s famous parkour iconography.

The Tomorrow War

July 23

An original IP attempting to be a summer blockbuster? As we live and breathe. The Tomorrow War marks director Chris McKay’s first foray into live-action after helming The Lego Batman Movie. The film stars Chris Pratt as a soldier from the past who’s been “drafted by scientists” to the present in order to fight off an alien invasion overwhelming our future’s military. One might ask why said scientists didn’t use their fancy-schmancy time traveling shenanigans to warn about the impending aliens, but here we are.

Jungle Cruise

July 30

Disney dips into its theme park rides again as a source for a movie, hoping that the Pirates of the Caribbean lightning will strike once more. This time it’s the famous Adventureland riverboat ride, which is free enough of a real narrative that one has to wonder why some five screenwriters (at least) worked on the movie’s script.

Jaume Collet-Serra (The Shallows) directs stars Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt down this particular river, as they battle wild animals and a competing expedition in their search for a tree with miraculous healing powers. The comic chemistry between Johnson and Blunt is key here, especially if they really can mimic Bogie and Hepburn in the similarly plotted The African Queen. If they can sell that, Disney might just have a new water-based franchise to replace their sinking Pirates ship.

The Green Knight

July 30

David Lowery, the singular director behind A Ghost Story and The Old Man & the Gun, helmed a fantasy adaptation of the Arthurian legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And his take on the material was apparently strong enough to entice A24 to produce it. Not much else is yet known about the film other than its cast, which includes Dev Patel, Alicia Vikander, Ralph Ineson, and Kate Dickie–and that it’s another casualty of COVID, with its 2020 release date being delayed last year. So this is one we’re definitely going to keep an eye on.

The Suicide Squad

August 6

Arguably the most high-profile of the WB films being transitioned to HBO Max, The Suicide Squad is James Gunn’s soft-reboot of the previous one-film franchise. It’s kind of funny WB went in that direction when the first movie generated more than $740 million, but when the reviews and word of mouth were that toxic… well, you get the guy who did Guardians of the Galaxy to fix things.

Read more

TV

Peacemaker: Suicide Squad Spinoff With John Cena Coming to HBO Max

By Mike Cecchini

Movies

The Suicide Squad Trailer Promises James Gunn’s “1970s War Movie”

By David Crow

Elements from the original movie are still here, most notably Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn and Viola Davis’ Amanda Waller, but the film promises to be weirder, meaner, and also sillier. The first points are proven by its expected R-rating, and the latter is underscored by its giant talking Great White Shark. Okay, we’ll bite.

Deep Water

August 13

Seedy erotic thrillers and neo noirs bathed in shadows and sex are largely considered a thing of the past—specifically 1980s and ‘90s Hollywood cinema. Maybe that’s why Deep Water hooked Adrian Lyne (Fatal Attraction, Indecent Proposal) to direct. The throwback is based on a 1957 novel by the legendary Patricia Highsmith (The Talented Mr. Ripley), and it pits a disenchanted married couple against each other, with the bored pair playing mind games that leave friends and acquaintances dead. That the couple in question is played by Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas, who’ve since become a real life item, will probably get plenty of attention close to release.

Respect

August 13

Respect is the long-awaited biopic of the legendary Aretha Franklin, with the Queen of Soul herself involved in its development for years until her death in August 2018. Authorized biopics always make one wonder how accurate the film will be, but then again, Aretha had nothing to be ashamed of. Hers was a life well-lived, her voice almost beyond human comprehension, and the only thing now is to see whether star Jennifer Hudson (Franklin’s personal choice) and director Liesl Tommy (making her feature debut) can do the Queen justice.

Candyman

August 27

In some ways it’s surprising that it’s taken this long—28 years, notwithstanding a couple of sequels—to seriously revisit the original Candyman. Director Bernard Rose’s original adaptation of the Clive Baker story, “The Forbidden,” is still relevant and effective today. Back then, the film touched on urban legends, poverty, and segregation: themes that are still ripe for exploration through a genre touchstone today.

After her breathtaking feature directorial debut, Little Woods, Nia DaCosta helmed this bloody reboot while working from a screenplay co-written by Jordan Peele (Get Out). That’s a powerful combination, even before news came down DaCosta was helming Captain Marvel 2. And with an actor on-the-cusp of mega-stardom, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, picking up Tony Todd’s gnarly hook, this is one to watch out for.

The Beatles: Get Back

August 27

Peter Jackson seems to enjoy making films about what inspired him in his youth: The Lord of the Rings, King Kong, his grandfather’s World War I service informing They Shall Not Grow Old. So perhaps it was inevitable he’d make a film about the greatest youth icon of his generation, the Beatles. In truth, The Beatles: Get Back is a challenge to a previous documentary named Let It Be, and the general pop culture image it painted.

That 1970 doc by Michael Lindsay-Hogg zeroed in on the band’s final released album, Let It Be (although it was recorded before Abbey Road). Now, using previously unseen footage, Jackson seeks to challenge the narrative that the album was created entirely from a place of animosity among the bandmates, or that the Beatles had long lost their camaraderie by the end of road. Embracing the original title of the album, “Get Back,” Jackson wants to get back to where he thinks the band’s image once belonged.

Death on the Nile

September 17

Murder on the Orient Express (2017) became a surprise hit for director and star Kenneth Branagh. Who knew that audiences would still be interested in an 83-year-old mystery novel about an eccentric Belgian detective with one hell of a mustache? Luckily, Agatha Christie featured Poirot in some 32 other novels, of which Death on the Nile is one of the most famous, so here we are.

Branagh once again directs and stars as Poirot, this time investigating a murder aboard a steamer sailing down Egypt’s famous river. The cast includes Gal Gadot, Armie Hammer, Letitia Wright, Tom Bateman, Ali Fazal, Annette Bening, Rose Leslie, and Russell Brand. Expect more lavish locales, scandalous revelations, the firing of a pistol or two, and, yes, more shots of that stunning Poirot facial hair.

The Many Saints of Newark

September 24

The idea of a prequel to anything always fills us with trepidation, and re-opening a nearly perfect property like The Sopranos makes the prospect even less appetizing. But Sopranos creator David Chase has apparently wanted to explore the back history of his iconic crime family for some time, and there certainly seems to be a rich tapestry of characters and events that have only been hinted at in the series.

Directed by series veteran Alan Taylor (Thor: The Dark World), The Many Saints of Newark stars Alessandro Nivola as Dickie Moltisanti (Christopher’s father), along with Jon Bernthal, Vera Farmiga, Corey Stoll, Ray Liotta, and others. But the most fascinating casting is that of Michael Gandolfini—James’ son—as the younger version of the character with which his late dad made pop culture history. For that alone, we’ll be there on opening night… even if that just means HBO Max!

Dune

October 1

Could third time be the charm for Frank Herbert’s complex novel of the far future, long acknowledged as one of the greatest—if most difficult to read—milestones in all of science fiction? David Lynch’s 1984 version was, to be charitable, an honorable mess, while the 2000 Sci-Fi Channel miniseries was decent and faithful, but limited in scope. Now director Denis Villeneuve (Blade Runner 2049, Arrival) is pulling out all the stops—even breaking the story into two movies to give the proper space.

Read more

Movies

Dune Trailer Breakdown and Analysis

By Mike Cecchini

Movies

What Alejandro Jodorowsky Thinks of the New Dune Trailer

By Mike Cecchini and 1 other

On the surface, the plot is simple: as galactic powers vie for control of the only planet that produces a substance capable of allowing interstellar flight, a young messiah emerges to lead that planet’s people to freedom. But this tale is dense with multiple layers of politics, metaphysics, mysticism, and hard science.

Villeneuve has assembled a jaw-dropping cast, including Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård, Dave Bautista, Zendaya, Charlotte Rampling, Jason Momoa, and Javier Bardem, and if he pulls this off, just hand him every sci-fi novel ever written. Particularly, if relations between the director and WB remain strained…

Morbius

October 8

Following the monstrous (pun intended) success of Venom, Sony Pictures is making its second attempt to mine Spider-Man’s universe of villains with the dark tale of Dr. Michael Morbius (Jared Leto), whose efforts to cure himself of a fatal blood disease turn him instead into a blood-drinking anti-hero. Morbius has been lurking around the Marvel Comics canon since 1971, often either sparring or teaming with Spidey, and it remains uncertain whether he’s got the cache to carry a movie on his own. In addition, can Leto wash away the bad taste left behind by his tattooed and grilled Joker in Suicide Squad?

Halloween Kills

October 15

2018’s outstanding reboot of the long-running horror franchise—which saw David Gordon Green (Stronger) direct Jamie Lee Curtis in a reprise of her most famous role—was a tremendous hit. So in classic Halloween fashion, two more sequels were put into production (the second, Halloween Ends, will be out in 2022… hopefully).

Read more

Movies

Halloween: A Legacy Unmasked

By David Crow

Movies

How Jason Blum Changed Horror Movies

By Rosie Fletcher

Curtis is back as Laurie Strode, along with Judy Greer as her daughter, Andi Matichak as her granddaughter, and Nick Castle sharing Michael Myers duties with James Jude Courtney. Kyle Richards and Charles Cyphers, meanwhile, will reprise their roles as Lindsey Wallace and former sheriff Leigh Brackett from the original 1978 Halloween (Anthony Michael Hall will play the adult version of Tommy Doyle). The plot remains a mystery, but we’re pretty sure it will involve yet another confrontation between Laurie and a rampaging Myers.

The Last Duel

October 15

What was once among the most anticipated films of 2020, The Last Duel is the historical epic prestige project marked by reunions: Ridley Scott returns to his passion for period drama and violence; Matt Damon and Ben Affleck work together for the first time in ages as both actors and writers; and the film also unites each with themes that were just as potent in the medieval world as today: One knight (Damon) in King Charles VI’s court accuses another who’s his best friend (Adam Driver) of raping his wife (Jodie Comer). Oh, and Affleck plays the King of France.

With obviously harrowing—and uncomfortable—themes that resonate today, The Last Duel is based on an actual trial by combat from the 14th century, and is a film Affleck and Damon co-wrote with Nicole Holofcener (Can You Ever Forgive Me?). It’s strong material, and could prove to be one of the year’s most riveting or misjudged films. Until then, it has our full attention.

Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins

October 22

While the idea of a Hasbro Movie Universe seems to be kind of idling at the moment, corners of that hypothetical cinematic empire remain active. One such brand is G.I. Joe, which will launch its first spin-off in this origin story of one of the team’s most popular characters. Much of his early background remains mysterious, so there’s room to create a fairly original story while incorporating lore and characters already established in the G.I. Joe mythos.

Neither of the previous G.I. Joe features (The Rise of Cobra and Retaliation) have been much good, so we can probably expect the same level of quality from this one. Director Robert Schwentke (the last two Divergent movies) doesn’t inspire much excitement either. On the other hand, Henry Golding (Crazy Rich Asians) will star in the title role, and having Iko Uwais (The Raid) and Samara Weaving (Ready or Not) on board isn’t too bad either.

Eternals

November 5

Based on a Marvel Comics series by the legendary Jack Kirby, the now long-forthcoming Eternals centers around an ancient race of powerful beings who must protect the Earth against their destructive counterparts (and genetic cousins), the Deviants. Director Chloe Zhao (fresh off the awards season buzzy Nomadland) takes her first swing at epic studio filmmaking, working with a cast that includes Angelina Jolie, Gemma Chan, Kit Harington, Salma Hayek, Richard Madden, Brian Tyree Henry, and more.

Read more

Movies

Upcoming Marvel Movies Release Dates: MCU Phase 4 Schedule, Cast, and Story Details

By Mike Cecchini and 1 other

Movies

The Incredible Hulk’s Diminished Legacy in the Marvel Cinematic Universe

By Gavin Jasper

In many ways, Eternals represents another huge creative risk for Marvel Studios: It’s a big, cosmic ensemble film introducing an ensemble that the vast majority of the public has never heard of. But then, it’s sort of in the same position as Guardians of the Galaxy from way back in 2014, and we all know what happened there.

Elvis

November 5

Obviously we’ve all seen musical biopics before—too many after Walk Hard broke the formula down—but Elvis promises to be something different. A new passion project from Baz Luhrmann, the filmmaker behind Moulin Rouge!, Romeo + Juliet, and The Great Gatsby, Elvis is expected to be a radically stylized account of Elvis Presley’s rise to all shook up fame. With an impressive cast that includes Tom Hanks as manager “Colonel” Tom Parker and Kelvin Harrison Jr. as B.B. King, and with up-and-comer Austin Butler as the King of Rock and Roll himself, it should be a hell of a show.

King Richard

November 19

Will Smith’s King Richard promises to be a different kind of biographical film coming down the pipe. Rather than being told from the vantage of professional tennis playing stars Venus and Serena Williams, King Richard centers on their father and coach, Richard Williams. It’s an interesting choice to focus on the male father instead of the game-changing Black daughters, but we’ll see if there’s a strong creative reason for the approach soon enough. The film is directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (Monsters and Men, Joe Bell).

Mission: Impossible 7

November 19

Once upon a time, the appeal of the Mission: Impossible movies was to see different directors offer their own take on Tom Cruise running through death-defying stunts. But then Christopher McQuarrie had to come along and make the best one in franchise history (twice). First there was Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation and then Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Now McQuarrie and company have set up their own separate quartet of films with recurring original characters like new franchise MVP Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson) across four films.

Read more

Movies

Audio Surfaces of Tom Cruise Raging on the Set of Mission: Impossible 7

By Kirsten Howard

Movies

Mission: Impossible 7 – What’s Next for the Franchise?

By David Crow

Thus enters M:I7, the third McQuarrie joint in the series and first half of a pair of incoming sequels filmed together. The first-half of this two-parter sees the whole crew back together, including Cruise’s Ethan Hunt, Ilsa, Benji (Simon Pegg), Luther (Ving Rhames), and CIA Director Erika Sloane (Angela Bassett). They’re also being joined by Hayley Atwell and Pom Klementieff, but really we’re all just eager to see what kind of insane stunts they can do to top the HALO jump in the last one.

West Side Story

December 10

Steven Spielberg has just two remakes on his directorial resume: Always (1989) and War of the Worlds (2005). While the former is mostly forgotten and the latter was an adaptation of a story that has been filmed many times, his upcoming reimagining of West Side Story will undoubtedly be directly compared to Robert Wise’s iconic 1961 screen version of this classic musical.

A few numbers in previous films aside, Spielberg has never directed a full-blown musical before, let alone one associated with such powerhouse songs and dance numbers. His version, with a script by Tony Kushner, is said to stay closer to the original Broadway show than the 1961 film—but with its themes of love struggling to cross divides created by hate and bigotry, don’t be surprised if it’s just as hard-hitting in 2021. Certainly would’ve devastated last year….

Spider-Man 3

December 17

Sony has finally gotten to a “Spider-Man 3” again in their oft-rebooted franchise crown jewel (technically though this film is still untitled). That proved to be a stumbling block the first time it occurred with Tobey Maguire in the red and blues, but the company seems undaunted since Tom Holland’s third outing is expected to bring Maguire back—him and just about everyone else too.

Read more

Movies

Spider-Man 3: Charlie Cox Daredevil Return Would Redeem the Marvel Netflix Universe

By Joseph Baxter

Movies

Spider-Man 3 Adds Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange

By Joseph Baxter

With a multiverse plot ripped straight from the arguably best Spidey movie ever, 2018’s Into the Spider-Verse, Holland’s third outing is bringing back Maguire, Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man, Alfred Molina as Doc Ock, Jamie Foxx as Electro (eh), and probably more. It’s a Spidey crossover extravaganza that’s only missing a Spider-Ham. But just you wait…

The Matrix 4

December 22

Rebooting or continuing The Matrix series has always been a tough proposition. While the original Matrix film is one of the landmark achievements in science fiction and early digital effects filmmaking in the 1990s, its sequels were… less celebrated. In fact, directors Lily and Lana Wachowski were publicly wary about the idea of ever going back to the series. And yet, here we are with Lana (alone) helming a project that’s been a longtime priority for Warner Bros.

Read more

Movies

The Matrix 4: Laurence Fishburne “Wasn’t Invited” to Reprise Morpheus Role

By John Saavedra

Movies

The Matrix 4 Already Happened: Revisiting The Matrix Online

By John Saavedra

The Matrix 4 also brings back Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Jada Pinkett Smith. This is curious since Reeves and Moss’ characters died at the end of the Matrix trilogy—and also because Laurence Fishburne’s Morpheus did not, yet he wasn’t asked back. We cannot say we’re thrilled about the prospect of more adventures in Zion after the disappointment of the first two sequels, but we’d be lying if we didn’t admit we’re still curious to see the story that brought Lana back to this future.

The French Dispatch

TBA

Wes Anderson has a new film coming out. Better still, it is another live-action film. While Anderson’s use of animation is singular, it’s been seven years since The Grand Budapest Hotel, which we maintain is one of the best movies of the last decade. Anderson  is working with Timothée Chalamet and Cristoph Waltz for the first time with this film, as well as several familiar faces including Saoirse Ronan, Willem Dafoe, Tilda Swinton, Léa Seydoux, Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, Jason Schwartzman, and, of course, Bill Murray.

The French Dispatch is set deep in the 20th century during the peak of modern journalism, it brings to life a series of fictional stories in a fictional magazine, published in a fictional French city. We suspect though, if Anderson’s last two live-action movies are any indication, it’ll have more than fiction on its mind–especially since it’s inspired by actual New Yorker stories, and the journalists who wrote them! We missed it in 2020, so here’s hoping it really does go to print in 2021!

Other interesting movies that may come out in 2021 but do not yet have release dates: Next Goal Wins, Don’t Worry Darling, Nightmare Alley, Antlers, Blonde, The Northman, Resident Evil, Red Notice, Those Who Wish Me Dead, Army of the Dead.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

The post Upcoming Must-See Movies in 2021 appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2NfKJ0o