#sherlock bbc and supernatural combined

[bipedalembarrassment]

What possible reason other than immense faggotry, could they have had for opening an episode with Hawkeye telling BJ he looks cute shirtless?

WHAT HETERO EXPLANATION IS THERE

[fairytales-and-folklore]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Thank you for the tag @marimbles! ♥️ No pressure tags: @litfeathers @lollytea @ashanimus @greyhavenisback @princecharmingwinks @tails89 @nutellarghh @ash-mcj @childlikegoblinqueen @daydreams-and-honeybees @avatarmerida @asarcasticwitch @sailahina @secretly-of-course @sapphic--kiwi @haystarlight @zyrafowe-sny @peachytea04 @slightecho

1. How many works do you have on AO3? just hit 100 last month!

2. What's your total AO3 word count? 479,814

3. What fandoms do you write for? I've dabbled in quite a few over the years, but the ones I've written the most fics for are doctor who (eleven/amy) teen wolf (sterek) and the owl house (huntlow)

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos? Error 404: Brain Cell Not Found (teen wolf | sterek) You Always Want What You're Running From (sleepy hollow | ichabbie) What To Do When Your Emotionally Constipated Werewolf Boyfriend Gets Cursed By A Witch: A Guide (teen wolf | sterek) Gold Rush (the owl house | huntlow) Lovesick (the owl house | huntlow) 5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? I do! Every kind comment means so much to me, so I always take the time to respond to all of them (though I'm not always great at getting to them on time.)

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Hmm probably The Courtesan and the Writer (doctor who | eleven/amy) I used to dabble in angst a bit more when I first started writing fic, but these days all my fics are pretty much guaranteed to have a happy ending, because real life is hard enough lol

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Pretty much all my fics have happy endings, but one of the happiest I wrote would probably be my huntlow college AU Until You Meet Someone Who Makes The Fall Feel Like Flying

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I wouldn't call it outright hate, but I have gotten a handful of rude comments over the years (complaining that I don't post often enough, telling me my headcanons are wrong, telling me how they think my story should have ended — one time someone yelled at me in all caps because I said that a character chilled red wine lol that one was wild)

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do! Smut is fun. Mine is typically more focused on the emotional aspect than the physical, is usually the result of a long tension-fueled slow burn buildup, and is usually tooth-rottingly fluffy, soft, and sweet.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I have! Back in the days where superwholock plagued tumblr, I wrote one of the silliest cross-overs imaginable, combining doctor who, torchwood, bbc sherlock, supernatural, the avengers, and sleepy hollow: Lords, Gods, and Madmen

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yup 🙃

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I have! But most of them never saw the light of day 😂 one that did is called An Eggcellent Morning For Cooking Lessons co-written with @ash-mcj @tails89 and @nutellarghh

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

I think my top three ships are reflected in who I've written the most fic for: huntlow, sterek, and the eleventh doctor/amy pond

15. What's a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

Luckily, everything that's posted to AO3 is finished, but at this point I'm thinking I'll probably never get around to writing the little nightmares, reylo, and captain swan WIPs I've had sitting in my drafts since 2019

16. What are your writing strengths?

I've been told I capture the characters really well, which means a lot to me. I've also been told that my writing is cozy and comforting and fills people with warm fuzzy feelings, which is always nice to hear 🥰

17. What are your writing weaknesses? I will sit there and agonize over the same paragraph trying to make it sound perfect instead of just letting the writing flow, so sometimes a fic will be in the works for a very long time until it's finally ready to be posted (by which time I'm probably sick of it and never want to look at it again 😂)

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I've dabbled in this a little bit, but it's usually been plot-relevant, like a character learning to speak the language (i.e. when Hunter tried to learn Spanish in Being Human.) When I do write in another language, I always do my best to research and try to get the translations as accurate as possible, and I always include the English translation either in the fic itself or as an author's note so readers don't have to break away from my fic to google anything. (And also so that they know what my intention was, on the off-chance I translated something wrong and accidentally wrote something offensive.) 19. First fandom you wrote for?

Does anyone remember that vampire show that came out back in like 2009? Moonlight? Yeah, that one lol

20. Favourite fic you've ever written? God, that's like asking me to pick my favorite child. Okay fine, it's Until You Meet Someone Who Makes The Fall Feel Like Flying

[ilistentogirlinred]

a bunch of ideas for essays i have

ESSAY IDEAS:

fandom and parasocial relationships with celebs

primarily musicians

KPOP!!!

shipping

how this effects the idols themselves

and the fans perception of idols

“delulu”

competitive nature

groups

positions

obsession

racism

infantilisation

“maknaes”

lisa, jungkook

ONE DIRECTION

fucking larries

obsession

FITTH HARMONY

SWIFTIES

the idolisation

white feminism?

performative activism

NOT SEEING CELEBS AS REAL PEOPLE WITH FEELINGS!!!

mysoginy in fandom culture

internalised mysogyny

mysogyny in the works themselves

how that is internalised

the prevalence of m/m ships

patriarchy!

boo

KPOP!!!

shipping

how this effects the idols themselves

+ their friendships with each other

and the fans perception of idols

homophobia in the industry

“delulu”

competitive nature

groups

positions

obsession

racism

non fans who dislike the industry/fans

infantilisation

“maknaes”

lisa (crazy horse)

jungkook (seven, etc)

DEBUTING ACTUAL CHILDREN

THOSE ARE CHILDREN WTF DUDE

SHE IS BARELY 14

SHE IS 13

SHE WAS 12 WHEN SHE WAS ON THE SHOW

possible human rights violations?

work hours

neglect

mental health issues

suicides

beomhan therapy video (managers)

homophobia in the industry

if an idol comes out, fans will treat it as “proof” that their ship is “canon”

or will just be outright homophobic

FANSERVICE

its not gay but…

influence of fandom on modern media

queerbaiting/queercoding to attract an audience

destiel

teen wolf

bbc sherlock

tropes

enemies to lovers

DONE WRONG

queer rep in media

queerbaiting/coding to attract viewers

supernatural, sherlock

destiel, johnlock

teen wolf

queer coding in disney!

accidental?

LUCA!!!

cultural differences?

anime

YOI, SK8, Haikyuu

Naruto

superwholock -> ourgoodshadows

early 2000s/2010s YA dystopia plague, ya books in general

hunger games

marketing

movies

divergent!!!

bad

no second half of the third one lmao

maze runner

technically first!

LOVE TRIANGLES

twilight (either read or consult ms elloy, mya, etc)

hunger games

“big strong guy” vs “childhood friend”

predictable

repetitive

c’mon guys make it gay for once

try a conga line love triangle

that resolves itself with polyamory?

SPORTS ANIME

why is it so popular?

fandom, duh.

ok but why?

easy. gay anime boys

why is sports anime so gay?

power of friendship?

close bonds between people of the same gender

lack of characters from the opposite gender so less heterosexuality and f/m ships

but thats fandomy

the inherent homoeroticism of sharing a locker room

referring back to friendship/close bonds

BLUE LOCK

HOLY CRAP BLUE LOCK

its gayer than haikyuu but there’s no power of friendship really

there are very close bonds and strange definitions of attraction tho

bachisagi, reonagi, ryusae

REONAGI SHOUJO SPINOFF

attraction -> obsession

soccer -> dream -> lack of care about self

RYUSAE FUCKED UP IDEA OF (and perception) ATTRACTION

soccer = attraction, bond, romance/sex, etc.

BACK TO HAIKYUU

rivalries

rivalry -> close friendship

mirrors enemies to lovers very slightly

tis the power of friendship

power of friendship combined with coming of age?

YUURI ON ICE!

the canon gays

SK8 the infinity

queer coding?

QUEERCODING IN ANIME

is it all perceived and unintended due to differences in cultural upbringing?

possibly but the undertones are still very much there

maybe its censorship? who knows

killugon -> possibly find sources

the homoerotic queer-coded rivalry or friendship

established from the start

sasunaru, kagehina, bakudeku, renga, killugon, fucking soukoku, etc

also tsukkiyama, matchablossom, leopika, etc

SOUKOKU (and the rest of bsd)

the irl authors - were they queer?

FIND SOURCES!!!

[3-2-whump]

Ask game timeeee!

For all four dudes (or whoever ya want)! 😉

🍁- What's this oc's favorite genre of movies/tv shows/books/etc?

🌼- What's your favorite thing about this oc?

💐- Where is this oc's favorite place to relax?

New ask game here

🍁 Khaled: as lame as it may sound, he really likes sports animes or slice of life stories, especially the ones portraying a small team everyone underestimates rising to the top. It’s inspiring, and it functions as escapism.

Tom: loved all the cult classics of the 80’s and 90’s (Bill and Ted series, Ferris Bueler’s Day Off, etc), with a touch of Tim Burton films like Edward Scissorhands and The Nightmare Before Christmas. Nowadays you’ll catch him reading a self-help book about business and finance more often than not, but he had a phase where he loved to read about Japanese history (Sengoku Jidai era stuff)

Nico: is a huge nerd, believe it or not. Loves Star Wars, even the new stuff, loves Lord of the Rings, Supernatural, and BBC’s Sherlock, and adores reading paperback mystery thrillers. He also likes to branch out and try new books and genres, if the dust jacket summary seems appealing to him.

Julio: has grown to appreciate his mom’s telenovelas, reluctant as he is to admit it 😂 He’s generally a sitcom kind of guy, someone who would stay up at night to watch That 70’s Show and late night comedy specials. He loves reading all sorts of things, but you’re more likely to see his nose in a glossy-paged magazine than a literal book.

🌼 My favorite thing about Khaled is his character design, because he’s kind of an amalgamation of all things I find sexy and cute.

My favorite thing about Tom is his backstory, and all the complex layers of fuckery that make him the shambling mess of a human being we know today. Of course it doesn’t excuse what he’s currently doing, but it adds depth to his actions.

My favorite thing about Nico is he’s a combination of my irl partner and one of my coworkers, which makes him feel very real to me.

My favorite thing about Julio is also his character design, but more so his personality. I love that guy, and I hope to be like him most days.

💐 Khaled: Julio’s garage is his preferred place where he can truly relax, even if he’s rolled under a car hood and changing out some oil

Tom: yeah, I’m giving you the SFW answer here, but his favorite place to relax is in his living room, on the couch looking out over the city through the wide windows, with a whiskey in hand and Khaled curled up at his feet

Nico: relaxes outside or at the gym, when he jogs and just lets his mind go blank

Julio: he’s a pretty chill dude already, idk where he relaxes or if he’s got a favorite place, per se. I think he best relaxes where he feels the safest, be it in the garage, or at his mom’s apartment, or anywhere else I haven’t yet thought of.

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

Something about the white heterosexual male gaze being so prolific (ie seeing white straight man characters as agents with active inner lives and motivations and seeing women, poc, and queers as unknowable things to be acted upon or events to advance the character development of those straight white guys)

Something about that perspective being so prolific and even enforced by things like the hayse code and also just by studios and publishing agencies deciding that other kinds of stories aren't marketable so there being a dearth of media for other kinds of people.

Something about mainstream media training us to see things from the perspective of white men who present themselves as masculine to the detriment of all other perspectives.

Something about OFMD going out of it's way to subvert those expectations.

Something about how in most media a man like Ed would only be there inform a man like Izzy's story but in this show Izzy is only there to inform Ed's story

Something about them keeping Izzy's queerness subtextual while explicitly confirming other character's sexualities so they can have their cake (give us a queer coded villain, make him jealously motivated and psychosexually obsessed with Ed and make jokes about that, make him a more sympathetic villain than the badminton twins for example, make all pirates gay by default) and eat it too (make him a villain in a story about overcoming toxic masculinity, make him the character we're used to relating too and then making him explicitly wrong in order to subvert that expectation)

Something about OFMD trying to subvert our expectations backfiring in some ways, at least as far as the fandom goes, because of , deeply ingrained those expectations are.

Something about the long history of queer coding to subvert obstacles to telling queer stories.

Something about BBC Sherlock and Supernatural and other shows of that description and queerbating specifically geared towards fandom

Something about those last two things combined with being starved for queer content completely destroying people's brains in terms of being able to tell the difference between headcannon, subtext, and text (three different things) when it comes to queerness in media.

Something about how the brilliance of Izzy Hands as a character, and a function of the narrative just flies over people's heads in favor of woobifying him.

Something about how I personally feel like a redemption arc (something that fandoms really enjoy) would be the wrong move for Izzy and that has nothing to do with me disliking him (I don't actually, love to hate? maybe. but actually hate? Definitely not)

Like I've connected the two dots, it could be that deep, ect.

Do you guys understand what I'm saying?

[bestsiblingstournament]

People who were in the last round and will not be allowed again

Katniss & Prim (Hunger Games)

Chip & Dale (Disney)

Theo & Apollo (First Kill)

Mario & Luigi (the Super Mario Brothers)

DiNozzo & McGee (NCIS)

Mike & Nancy (Stranger Things)

Pugsley & Wednesday (the Addams Family / Wednesday)

Wanda & Pietro (MCU)

Lemon & Tangerine (Bullet Train)

Maja & Alejandro (Heroes)

Sonic & Tails (Sonic the Hedgehog)

Thor & Loki (mythology)

Thor & Loki (MCU)

Katara & Sokka (Avatar the Last Airbender)

Charlie & Torri (Heartstopper)

Peter & Nathan (Heroes)

Anna & Elsa (Frozen)

Henry & Piper (Henry Danger)

Cuphead & Mugman (The Cuphead Show)

Nebula & Gamora (MCU)

Sherlock & Mycroft (BBC Sherlock)

Tadashi & Hiro (Big Hero 6)

Wolverine & Sabertooth (Marvel)

Missy & Sheldon (Young Sheldon / The Big Bang Theory)

Dexter & Deedee (Dexter's Labratory)

Emily & Sophie (Elvendale)

Buffy & Dawn (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

Mabel & Dipper (Gravity Falls)

Luke & Leia (Star Wars)

Sam & Dean (Supernatural)

Remus & Romulus (mythology)

Ben & Gwen (Ben Ten)

Any combination of Lucy, Susan, Ed & Peter (Narnia)

T'Challa & Shuri (MCU)

Zack & Ivy (Carmen Sandiego)

Tom & Jerry (Tom & Jerry)

Shaggy & Scooby (Scooby-dooby-doo)

Asterix & Obelix (Asterix & Obelix)

[kitchfit]

Year in Review: TV Shows

¡Feliz Dia de los Reyes! And Happy New Year! And also happy belated Hanukkah, Christmas, Yule, Bodhi, Kwanzaa and Diso, probably some other holidays. BOXING DAY. You all get a gift! And it's the same thing you ask for every year that I know you love so so much: Unwarranted opinions about tv shows from a stranger on the internet! I am truly generous.

Shadow and Bone s1-2

Confession: I grew up with these books. It’s one of the only book series I snatched up as soon as they were released, and to this day I will read anything Leigh Bardugo slaps my face with, so I was ecstatic to discover they were making a Netflix adaptation. And damn one thing I cannot critique is the casting for this series. Jessie Mei Li pulls off the classic orphan chosen one YA protagonist so well without being cliche, which is also something Bardugo was able to do in the books. And Freddy Carter and Kit Young have just become Kaz and Jesper in my head, replacing whatever image I had of those characters originally. Also evil Prince Caspian is hot!

Season one is genuinely a fantastic adaptation. They seamlessly combine the storylines of Shadow and Bone and Six of Crows. The gaps in pacing from the first book have had their slack picked up by these lovable criminals playing out a similar storyline to their first book, with Alina taking the place of the Grisha scientist as their object of kidnapping. Everything plays out so fluidly that I was enamored with my first and second watch through.

Season two on the other hand is messy as all hell. They try to adapt multiple books into one storyline like season one, but none of them blend in well together. The bastardized Crooked Kingdom plot (which was my favorite in the series) is completely disconnected from Alina’s story to the point it felt confusing and exhausting each time they went back to it, while the Siege and Storm and the Rise and Ruin plotlines are so rushed I could barely follow what was supposed to be happening. Plus they added their own ending, which is fine conceptually, I get them wanting to do their own thing, but I wish they either just adapted the books, or committed to making something original, instead of this clustered amalgamation.

The Owl House s3

Everyone knows this is a show that deserves MINIMUM six seasons and a movie. The world is incredibly fun and versatile, and the characters are fascinating and enjoyable to watch. But Disney is homophobic and lame and Oh My Shit is that Steamboat Willy making out with Oswald the Rabbit?? Holy Shit. I can’t believe that’s canon now! Thank you Bob Igor. 

That being said the writers and animators did a fantastic job on tight storytelling in these last two seasons. A lot of shows that aren’t given enough space to tell their story will cut out “filler” content to shove all the dramatic moments they want in your face (looking at you Voltron), but Owl House strikes a nice balance between slice of life character episodes and the more plot focused episodes in the short time they have. There’s so many background details and one off lines that create an intricate backstory that adds both to the lore and the motivations of our deadly Puritan villain. It also delivers on a fantastic ending that works both as a definitive end to the series or the jumpstart to a sequel if it ever gets graced with a renewal.

Merlin s1-5

Back in the day this show was grouped in among the other popular BBC shows at the time + Supernatural, and thus it gets a similar reputation nowadays as a queer-baity overrated show that goes on for too long. I don’t think that’s wholly undeserved, but Merlin is leagues better than either Supernatural or Sherlock and is much more consistent in delivering quality episodes than even New Who, though that last one is higher quality overall imo.

The cast all give a fantastic performance as their characters go through some genuinely well written character arcs, especially Anthony Head as Uther who blends goofy freak with hateable bigot so well that his antagonism commands the flow of the entire first three seasons. Like what’s his fucking problem? After he gets out of the picture however the pacing does tank as the plot forces out about three near identical Morgana takes over Camelot conflicts.

This show is also campy as all hell, and blends together lighthearted comedic episodes alongside extremely well written dramatic plots pretty well, though it occasionally stoops to some tonally dissonant melodrama. Uther falls in love with a farting witch like two episodes before Morgause nearly kills Arthur. I do think the will-they-won’t-they between Merlin and Arthur was written intentionally, and while their friendship is enjoyable to watch develop, the answer is obviously Won’t, because gay people don’t exist in Camelot times. Also Guinevere’s characterization fucking tanks in the last season for no reason at all, but it does have a good ending overall.

Dragon Ball Z Kai s1-4

Every year I make my dad watch a shonen anime all the way through. In 2020 it was Jojo’s, 2021 it was Hunter X Hunter, last year it was Naruto (Ocean Cut), and this year it was Dragon Ball Z Kai. So far there’s been no losers, he’s loved all of them (though he got burnt out on Part 5 of Jojo’s). It took a bit for him to get into Dragon Ball; the Saiyan saga did not hold his interest until the Vegeta fight, but he was thoroughly engaged through the Frieza saga and ESPECIALLY the Cell saga. He told me Cell is the most evil villain in all of the anime I forced this 49 year old to watch. I myself had never watched all of Dragon Ball Z in order before this year, and I’m happy to say most of it holds up, at least in Kai.

Season one is overall hard to rewatch from the beginning, since after Goku’s death we get several episodes of mindless training and running on Snake Way that we already know won’t pay off, but damn the cinematography and choreography in that first Vegeta fight is genuinely stunning and I can probably rewatch that anytime. Season two on Namek pulls off writing without Goku much better. There’s a strong sense of tension as all of these different conflicts barely miss each other: Frieza’s army killing off the already small population of Namekians as Vegeta, Gohan, and Krillin are searching for the Dragon Balls. Writing Vegeta as a secondary protagonist in this arc despite still being a violent jackass is genius and this whole section is thoroughly engaging. Pacing grinds to a crawl when the Ginyu Force show up, and I’m sad to say this continues into the Frieza fight. It’s a good fight, but after the Supper Saying shows up they could have ended things pretty quickly, but the fight draws on and on until even Goku gets bored. 

The Cell saga is easily peak Dragon Ball. This is the season Saturday morning cartoons would replay over and over again, so it's the one I’m most familiar with, and damn it I see why they did that. It’s a fun, messy time travel story that focuses on the development of our two biggest protagonists. Goku and Krillin? Nah fuck them I mean Gohan and Vegeta. We get conclusions to their character arcs that are so bombastically enjoyable that Toriyama NEARLY approaches good writing.

Season 4 on the other hand can’t decide whether it wants to be a continuation or its own thing and it shows in the pacing. The Buu saga is way too fucking long for no reason, the stakes rise to an absurd extreme and towards the end none of the characters seem to take any real notice. Goku lets his own son die to save a dog and an old man and then laughs it off as a brain fart. I like Majin Vegeta and regular Buu but everything afterwards overstays its welcome.

Castlevania s1-2

It’s kind of insane to me how good this show is. It takes the plot of an NES game with minimal dialogue and cool set pieces and transforms it into an epic ensemble story where every character has a fascinating arc to explore, not to mention animated BEAUTIFULLY. The show does NOT hold back on gore, but at the same time pulls it off with elegance so the blood and guts don’t feel gratuitous. Castlevania 3 was also my favorite as a kid despite never having finished it so it was personally very satisfying to see this one adapted. 

The relationship between Trevor, Alucard, and Sypha is also adorable and one of my mainstays when I think of fictional Polyamorous couples. Their dynamics are further developed in the latter seasons, but the Dracula fight is so stellar that I was satisfied with ending it there for now, I still need to watch the Rondo of Blood anime.

My Adventures With Superman s1

This show was so cute! And also very vindicating after Snyder’s Superman changed every depiction of the character into a deconstruction on whether helping people is good or evil. Or maybe those were the only ones I saw after that. I was introduced to Superman through the Justice League cartoon and that will always be my primary understanding of the guy, so it’s nice to see Clark written in a similar light. 

However, it’s Lois Lane that really takes center stage in this show. I mean it’s her adventures after all. She is NOTHING like any previous Lois Lane and is an essential brand new character, and she plays off of Clark’s personality SUPER well and their romance is adorable to see develop. I saw a lot of comparisons of her character to Luz and honestly I see the resemblance, not only in design but in dialogue. Which is fine I like Luz, but it forces me to compare it to the Owl House. 

While this show also has very little time to tell its story, unlike TOH it’s paced like shit. Every episode that they put out is fantastic, but all of them feel like the conclusion to a grand story arc, rather than 10 episodes in succession of each other. They introduced multiverse shit in episode SEVEN. And while I love the new design of Mr. Mxldsjdnsk (especially considering I had just finished Dragon Ball Z), they did not earn that shit. This is obviously a production problem I can’t blame on the writers, but this is a show clearly designed as a slice of life with action thrown in, it needs cute fillery episodes, dammit. STOP RUSHING EVERYTHING.

King of the Hill s1

I don’t know if it's a controversial take to say King of the Hill is easily the best adult-oriented American cartoon, right? I think everyone should be on the same page on this. Like the Simpsons is way too long to be objectively good anymore. Maybe Futurama outclasses it but like. Family Guy? American Dad? BIG MOutH? None of those even have jokes. King of the Hill manages to not only be hilarious as all hell, but also tell a meaningful story.

As someone who has grown up in the relative south (Not Texas) I see it as both a satire, celebration, and deconstruction of the culture of rural America. Most episodes focus on Hank trying to give Bobby a meaningful childhood and teach him valuable lessons, but in the process realizing that the culture he grew up in kind of fucked him up a bit, and instead of digging his heels in and refusing to change, he alters his behavior and views for the sake of his son. Bobby himself is a lovable goofball who shows off the fun of growing up as some country hick. Watch this clip of Bobby playing spin the bottle right fucking now.

Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake s1

ANOTHER PIECE OF MEDIA CAPITALIZING ON THE MULTIVERSE TREND LETS GO. I spoke before about the inherent metafiction in Multiverse narratives. I think Fionna and Cake understands that aspect well, which makes sense as in Adventure Time the Multiverse had already been an established fact. This sequel is more of an elaboration on previous world-building from the original, rather than following the trends of Marvel or whoever. It also makes me care about two characters I couldn’t give a shit about in the original, that being the title protagonists. They were cute in Adventure Time, but in my first watch through I really couldn’t be bothered with the watered down, gender-swapped variants of our main dudes, and in this show they basically discard all those episodes anyways! Cool!

Their arcs follow the existential nightmare of being people from a “noncanon, illegitimate” universe, and their quest to bring magic back to their world. It’s a compelling narrative and their differences and similarities with Finn and Jake are genuinely fun to compare and contrast while also being fun characters in their own right. I like the realization Fionna has midway through the series that the violent adventures she craved are actually kind of horrifying, and the simple quiet life she used to have was nice. I’m excited to see what the writers have in store for the both of them in the future.

But the real meat of this season comes in the deconstruction of the fan favorite character, Simon Ice King. Fionna and Cake was his fanfiction, after all, though that gets somewhat retconned. He was already a tragic figure in the original, and the final season gave him a bittersweet ending: his sanity returned but now eternally separated from his wife by her Eldritch transformation. This show gives his character the space and time to process exactly what the hell he’s supposed to do with his life now as well as understand the problems he and Betty had when they were in a relationship. I’m glad to see Simon finally get something far more resembling a happy ending than he ever got in the original.

Adventure Time s1-7

This is a show that I would describe as “high patience, high reward.” It’s not something I truly got into until college, as I was put off by what I saw as Lolz Random humor I was trying to distance myself from as a Cool Mature Teenager™. I still had a hard time getting through the first couple seasons in my first watch-through, but it was an easy show to put on in the background while doing research for papers. Eventually I was hooked and sped through all of it at blinding speeds. 

Fionna and Cake inspired me to revisit the show, and I’m happy to say I have a higher tolerance for the aspects of the show I found obnoxious the first time around. The wacky mathy-math lingo of the characters generally fades into the background and builds a distinct vocabulary of this goofy sci-fi fantasy world. It was also fun to see how aspects of the earlier episodes inspired later developments of the world, like the Zombie Businessmen establishing a possible dystopian setting for our goofball protagonists.

Unlike my first viewing, the pace breaker actually started around season five. Their are some fantastic episodes in this period of the show, but overall the world stops developing as fast and each episode acts more as an exploration of the characters. It’s nice to spend more time with all of these weirdos, but it’s made it tough to binge. That’s actually a positive now that I think about it. 

I like Finn a lot. I like that he’s flawed and he fails all the time, it makes it more enjoyable to see him mature as a person. If any episode encapsulates his personality the most, I think it’s the Hall of Egress, where Finn is trapped in a dungeon that resets every time he opens his eyes. It’s probably my favorite episode in the entire show, and plays to all of AT’s strengths: a great mix of comedy and introspection without ever being melodramatic

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off

I was initially disappointed with this show when I realized it wasn’t a direct adaptation of the original comic. It plays this fact as a twist, playing out the first volume in its entirety until the very end, where SPOILERS Scott Fucking Dies. The “Takes Off” part was literal: that dude is Gone. The second episode even plays this for laughs as Envy Adams has a spontaneous concert over his funeral and no one besides Ramona seems to care that their friend exploded. It felt like a cruel joke making fun of fans of the original. 

I’m glad I pushed through, though, as all of this was a ploy to put Ramona in the center stage, changing the goalpost of Beat Up the Seven Evil Exes to Investigate the Seven Evil Exes for possible murder/kidnapping motives Columbo-style. In most of the adaptations, Ramona is always playing off of Scott’s dumbass behavior, and it takes a while to truly dig into her personality. Putting her center-stage gives the audience an immediate view into her character and she may be the most likable she’s ever been. 

This show works as a sequel to the original through some time-travel shenanigans, and brings back series creator Brian Lee O’Malley, as well as the cast from the movie. This whole deal, if the rumor is true, apparently came out of Michael Cera responding to a group email meme with the og cast a decade late with “That’s funny,” and got everyone talking again. With that in mind it changes my view on the show as a whole, it's not a cruel joke, it’s a love letter to everything that came before it. 

I do still have a couple complaints, mostly that a few characters are heavily flanderized, namely Wallace and Scott himself, but like. That’s fine. How many times have we seen these characters explored? Like what 5 times now? I’m fine with them taking a comedic back seat to explore the dynamics of the rest of the cast. It’s also really satisfying to see all the exes get meaningful character arcs, which they never really got in the other versions of SP including the original. It makes me want to see what else they might have in store, but there are no plans for a continuation. Probably because that cast listing was expensive as hell. Do you know how much Chris Evans voice acting costs??? $7.50/hour AT LEAST.

Bee and Puppycat s2

Damn this show is so comfy. Everything from the characters, the music, the voice acting, the animation style, the COLORS! Even when the show hits the dramatic button it never stops being such a delight. It’s also longer than I remember, and gives a lot of time for every plotline to unfold. There’s intrigue and mystery surrounding every inch of this Mario Galaxy-ass setting, and it never fully reveals its hand, but that never takes away from the simple, slice-of-life story about two roommates taking part time jobs to make ends meet.

There’s a heavy theme of responsibility and young adulthood with all of the characters, which is also super relatable to me rn. The most responsible character in this show is the six-year old landlord with WAY too much on his shoulders. I like the dynamics with the Wizard family, I feel they present very realistic sibling relationships overall.

I tried checking out season 1 on youtube. I’ve heard people call it a continuation, but season 2 really is just a reimagining of this short youtube series. It’s only an hour long but for some reason it failed to grasp me. It’s somewhat tonally different, and the romantic tension between Bee and Deckard is weird to me after watching season 2. I’m glad they abandoned that as a plotline.

And those are all the shows I watched this year. LAST YEAR. I did not finish this when I wanted to, so to speed things up I’m gonna skip over the final movie list. Long story short Coraline rules, Home Alone 2 is violent and funny, Love Actually Hugh Grant is hot, and Christmas Vacation SUCKS. Fuck National Lampoon all my homies Hate national lampoon. Next time I will be doing the final games list. Wahoo!

[maigetheplatypus57]

Also I'm freaking nosy so if you want put in when your fandom phase/obsession/hyperfixation/etc. start and end (or if you're still in the fandom presently) in the tags

[aerialworms]

Hiya! Thank you for responding to my poll about DDDNE! You are the first person to explicitly call out that you see “so don’t complain” as judgy, and I expected that to happen MUCH earlier in this poll’s circulation. May I ask what fandom(s) you tend to read in? Again, thank you for your contribution to Science!!!

Huh, that's wild! I assumed others would have put that before I did, too. I currently tend to read Supernatural fic, but I used to read Good Omens, Jeeves and Wooster, BBC Sherlock, and Original/Granada Sherlock Holmes. I rarely see it actually used, but I tend to read older fics - most of the fics I've read that used it have been fairly recent, like the last 5 or so years if I had to estimate?

For your data: I learned about DDDNE on Tumblr about 8 years ago, where the post I read explained that it usually goes hand in hand with Don't Like; Don't Read as a reminder that the reader is responsible for curating their experience, and after you've read the tags, it's your choice whether to continue or not. I've never seen it as a moral judgement on the reader or the author, just an acknowledgement that the subject matter of the fic is not for everyone and readers are responsible for curating their own reading experience.

The reason I took issue with the phrasing of "so don't complain" is that if I were ever to use it, I would mean it like "this fic contains some heavy stuff, so double-check the tags and make sure you know what you're getting into" and that's how I interpret it when I see fics tagged with it. It's not really "so don't complain," more like "so if you read the tags, see that this fic contains something you find upsetting, and still choose to read it, that's on you, I warned you, and it's not fair to be angry at me for it." No shade on either party, just a reminder that you're in charge of your media experience, and that the writer has done their best to warn you of what's inside. Completely neutral in my mind.

It's handy to me because sometimes I forget to/just skim-read the tags before clicking on a fic, and that tag being there reminds me to double-check for potential triggers. Of course, it's only useful when combined with appropriate tagging. A fic just tagged with "Dead Dove Do Not Eat" with no additional tags is like a sign just saying "Danger!" - I'm just gonna back away and find somewhere else to go.

(although I'll admit I have sometimes, out of curiosity, clicked through to a dead dove fic where I've seen it's completely untagged or tagged for something that squicks me, and then when it inevitably does squick me I'm just like welp. Shouldn't have done that! and click back out. Not judging the author, just knowing my limits!)

[spokelseskladden]

when i was in middle school I had a friend who hyperfixated on supernatural, while I personally hyperfixated on doctor who. we both casually watched bbc sherlock. I never watched supernatural, she never watched doctor who, and that's how we somehow avoided getting into superwholock despite our combined interests

[jemariel]

2, 4, 11 and 16 for the ask game!

Hi!! Thanks for the ask!

2. Where did you first post your fics?

I first posted my fics on fanfiction.net where you can still find them under the same username if you're so inclined. I don't recommend it. Then I posted to some livejournal communities and one to the Kirk/Spock Side By Side e-zine, then back to livejournal and then finally to Ao3.

4. What fandoms have you written for?

Oh gosh. Let me think. I wrote some Highlander the series) stuff but it never saw the light of day. My first actual posted fic was for Kevin Smith's Dogma, but I wouldn't say I wrote for that fandom. For the most part, it's been: Harry Potter, Star Trek TOS, Torchwood, BBC's Sherlock, Supernatural, and Our Flag Means Death. (And I have more written for spn than all the other fandoms combined, probably several times over.)

11. What's an idea for a fic you've had that you'll probably never write?

OOOOOO good question. Up until recently I would have said my demon Dean story, because I've wanted to write that for years but couldn't figure out a good actual story for it, it was just a collection of vague ideas. But. BUT! That one is actually germinating, so... stay tuned.

The actual answer, in this case, is probably the second half of my college AU I started writing way back in the day. I had a whole thing planned, got a few stories in and ran out of juice for it, and realized that I much prefer writing individual stories rather than series, so. That one's almost certainly not going anywhere past where they're at now.

16. What are you favorite characters to write?

I mean the obvious answer here is Dean and Cas, but besides them..... I really enjoy Claire, Charlie, and Meg for various reasons. Claire is fun to project own teenage struggles on; Charlie is a useful foil for literally anything I need to say to Dean; and Meg is just chaos. I'm looking forward to playing with Rowena in the story I'm working on now. I haven't spent nearly enough time with her in my writing so far.

Thanks for the asks!! (If anybody else would like to ask questions, here's the list)

[ebaeschnbliah]

FROM WATER TO WATER ... THE SIX THATCHERS

An attempt to unravel the Sherlock BBC Tapestry based on metaphorical reading

As mentioned in previous posts, this modern Sherlock Holmes adaptation seems to tell the story about the great detective in several cycles. In a very Matroshka-like way one cycle always leads to another. Based on the idea that The Sign of Three serves as the big turning point of the whole story, everything that happens before can be viewed as the basic cycle, the first cycle of the show. The following episodes, His Last Vow and The Abominable Bride, both individually take up certain motives prior to the ‘turning point’ in TSOT, in which Sherlock’s great ‘I’m in love’ revelation happens. 

The HLV-cycle (On behalf of AMO) focuses mainly on the ‘twin starting points’ of the story - ASIP&ASIB. The episode spans a bridge between the beginning and end of this modern adaptation as well as the beginning and end of the original canon tales. The following TAB-cycle (From plane to plane) takes Sherlock back to the Victorian Era, the time of Sherlock Holmes’ birth as a literary character. This episode deals first and foremost with the crux of the matter around which Sherlock’s whole case actually revolves. Jim, John and a supernatural monster from hell, represented by hound and bride, are brought right onto centre stage. At the end of this Victorian detour Sherlock willingly dares to face the challenge of the Reichenbach Cauldron - Rich Brook’s Cauldron - Jim’s Cauldron (Pot-Kettle-Cauldron). Baker Street 221b becomes a surreal place where two parallel worlds exist side by side and Sherlock takes up the investigations regarding his ‘pink case’ again in yet another cycle. 

TBC below the cut .....

Series Four of Sherlock BBC consists, as usual, of three parts. It starts with The Six Thatchers, an episode that is significantly placed under the signs of water and change. Once again Sherlock deals with several main themes from previous episodes. Most noticable among them are a turbulent five-part case, very similar to the one in TGG, there are clear Baskerville-Thatcher-Hound connections, a differently revenge/hiatus repetition and  Mary’s death in the presence of sharks, that mirrors Sherlock’s from HLV. Those themes aren’t just repeated though, they get changed as well. Rewritten one might say. The motive of ‘rewritten and changed stories’ is even used as introduction for this episode. It starts with the announcement that the shooting at Appledore has been altered as a means to bring Sherlock back to London again ... back into the game. Immediately afterwards, alongside with the opening credits, Sherlock tells his childhood story ‘Appointment in Samarra’ while he walks through the tunnels of the London Aquarium. Later in the episode Mycroft explains that his little brother never liked that particular story and therefore changed it into ‘Appointment in Sumatra’, in which the main character never meets death but survives, becomes a pirate instead and is perfectly fine.

Themes from previous episodes ... repeated and changed:

THE GREAT GAME ... that’s undoubtly the episode from which a great part of the TST structure (five to six) has been taken. More detailed information about the busts and their owners can be found in  Who’s a fan of Maggie T?  and Batches of six  

TGG:  Five pips in combination with six bombs connect the cases and two out of six bombs explode. TST:  Five bust owner and six busts connect the cases and all six busts get smashed.

TGG:  Sherlock is targeted by Jim the bomber. Revenge seems to be the motive but an actual reason for Jim’s obsession with Sherlock is never given. TST:  Mary is targeted by Ajay the bust smasher. The motive is clearly revenge, although unjustified in Mary’s case, as it turns out later.  (A little story in Ypsilons)

TGG:  The first bomb explodes, destroyes an empty house and leads to Carl, a boy who had a fit in the water and drowned. TST:  The first smashed bust is linked to an explosion that destroyes a car and leads to Charlie, a boy who had a fit in this car, died and burned.

TGG:  The third pip is linked to the only case in which the victiom gets killed by Jim the bomber. TST:  The third bust owner is the only one who gets killed by Ajay the bust smasher.

TGG:  Sherlock aims his gun at the last bomb but the explosion is supended because of a phone call. TST:  Sherlock is the one who smashes the last bust and reveals its secret.

TGG:   Sherlock, Jim and John meet next to a swimming pool. A memory stick gets thrown into it.  TST:   Sherlock and Ajay meet near a swimming pool in Jack’s house (Jack=diminutive of John). A memory stick is found next to it.

THE HOUNDS OF BASKERVILLE ... again the creators of the show play with the double meaning of names/words while the trail of something ‘airborne’ leads to a hound/dog.  The smell of the hound

THOB:  Margaret Thatcher makes an appearance in the form of six books owned by the facility’s commander (“The Downing Street Years” + one, two, three, four, five separate biographies of Thatcher) and ‘Maggie’ turns out to be the password which provides access to the informations about project HOUND. Sherlock knows exactly who Margaret Thatcher is.  TST:   Six Thatcher busts, owned by five people, get smashed. Sherlock doesn’t know anything about Margaret Thatcher nor her profession as PM anymore. Instead the original meaning of the word 'thatcher’ seems to have been moved into focus now ... in the sense of ‘to thatch=to cover’ ... and the busts seem to represent masks/facades that are breaking and crumbling.

THOB:  An aerosol triggers the vision of a monstrous hound and affected by it, Sherlock comes face to face with the imagined ‘monster hound’ in Dewer’s Hollow, which is explained as ‘an ancient name for the Devil’. TST:  Sherlock sniffs on a note and affected by the smell, he remembers his lost childhood dog Redbeard and fragments of a melody that will later lead him to Sherrinford, a place that is called a ‘map reference for hell’.

THE REICHENBACH FALL ... it’s always the ‘fall’ and it’s always John and Jim around which the story revolves. And each new version of the ‘fall’ reappears in a new and different setting. (Developement of the fall)

TRF:  Sherlock and Jim meet for their great confrontation on Bart’s roof, while John has to watch from the street below. It’s solely a contest of words. Both men successfully talk each other into suicide. Jim shoots himself and Sherlock takes the fall down from the roof to save his friends. TAB: Sherlock and Jim fight at the edge of the Reichenbach Falls. At first Jim gains the upper hand but then John turns up and with Sherlock’s approval, he kicks Jim over the edge of the waterfall. Then, out of his free will, Sherlock follwos Jim down the Falls. John stays behind. TST: The joint fall of Sherlock and Ajay into the swimmingpool in Jack’s (John’s) house looks very much like another version of the previous Reichenbach Fall confrontations. This time the famous fight takes place against a background of waves in the shape of snowcapped mountains (swiss alps) and a small artificial waterfall (Reichenbach Falls) that gushes into the swimming pool. The water of the pool seems to boil as in a heated cauldron because of both men’s fierce fighting. 

TRF:  Sherlock goes undercover to protect his ‘family’ and to confront Jim’s remaining network alone. Only Mycroft and Molly are in on his plan. TST: Mary goes undercover to protect her new ‘family’ and to confront Ajay alone, who once had been part of her former ‘family’. Unlike Sherlock, she leaves an explaining letter to John.

TRF:   By the end of the episode Sherlock and Jim are ‘dead’ because both men commit suicide. Sherlock’s is faked, Jim’s is still an open question. For the rest of the show he exist solely on electronic data, a memory device that seems to resemble brain memory (’You can’t kill an idea, can you? Not once it’s made a home there.’) TST:   By the end of the episode Mary and Ajay are dead as well. Like Sherlock, Mary sacrifices her life for her ‘family’. She gets shot by a character who seems to be linked to Mycroft (Vivian Norbury).  Ajay gets shot out of nowhere and without any explanation by some unknown police officer.

TRF:  The first Reichenbach solution includes a mask of Sherlock’s face that is used as disguise for Jim. (This is revealed in TEH but thematically it belongs to TRF) TST:  Dr Barnicot’s smashed Thatcher bust covers half of Sherlock’s face like a mask before it starts crumbling down. 

THE EMPTY HEARSE ... Sherlock works through the consequences of the fall once more in a different setting. Now Mary, the facade, takes Sherlock’s place.  (Mary’s hiatus)

TEH:  Sherlock’s hiatus ends somewhere in Serbia, east of GB. TST:  Mary’s hiatus ends in Morocco, west of GB (same longitude as Ireland)

TEH:  Sherlock is brought back from hiatus by Mycroft and no one else is informed, TST:  Mary is brought back from hiatus by Sherlock and John. Mycroft is informed and waits for their return in London.

TEH:  Sherlock prevents the explosion of a bomb at the forgotten Underground station ‘Sumatra Road’ that would destroy the Houses of Parliament. TST:  Mycroft tells that Sherlock once changed the story ‘Appointment in Samarra’ into ‘Apointment in Sumatra’ and Sherlock is walking on a road now ‘that will become a river with only one destination’.

TEH:  The phrase ‘mind the gap’ can be heard linked to the doorbell-sound of train ethusiast Howard Shilcott. He provides the vital clue that reveals the bomber who wants to blow up the Houses of Parliament. TST:  Sherlock notices an ‘ugly gap’ where the first Thatcher bust is missing. This starts the bust-smasher case, which leads not only to Ajay but also unveils a very clever double-agent, who betrayes the government.

HIS LAST VOW ...  in parts this episode is already an altered repetition of ASIB. (Strange similarities   On behalf of AMO). In an altered version Sherlock is once again confronted with dangerous women. 

ASIB:  Sherlock is confronted with Irene. She lives an undercover life under a false identity and blackmails the government. HLV:  Sherlock is confronted with Mary. She lives a private life under a false identity at John’s side, while secretly working for the government (stated in TAB). TST:  Sherlock and Mary are confronted with Vivian Norbury. She officially works for the government, while secretly spending her privat life as a double agent, caring for her own profit.

HLV:  Sherlock is shot by Mary, who is a cat lover. Sherlock assumes that the gun she used to shoot him is a ‘CAT’ (a brand of that name doesn’t exist). TST:  Mary is shot by Vivian Norbury who is a cat lover and owns three cats.

HLV:  The location of the shooting is located high up on the top floor of a London office building with big glass windows and the owner is introduced as ‘shark’. TST:  The location of the shooting is located below ground in the London Aquarium, surrounded by the big glass windows of shark tanks.

ABOUT KILLINGS AND THERAPISTS

A very interesting change happens in TST regarding the characters ‘killed’ by Sherlock in previous episodes.

TRF:   Sherlock kills Jim (the bomber) by talking him into suicide. HLV:   Sherlock kills Magnussen in HLV. This incident is oficcially altered by the government in TST. In the new version a nameless ‘squaddie’ with an itchy trigger finger kills Magnussen. TST:  Neither Sherlock nor Mary (his facade), kill Ajay (the bust smasher).  Ajay gets shot by a nameless police officer who suddenly turns up out of nowhere (’I’m not a policeman’ says Sherlock in the same episode).

But the most significant change happens regarding Ella Thompson, John’s therapist from the beginning of the story in ASIP. 

ASIP:  The episode starts with John who awakens from a distressing nightmare of the war in the East and later visits his therapist Ella. She advices him to write a blog about everything that happens to him. TST:  Near the end of the episode it is Sherlock who visits John’s therapist Ella to get her advice about John. In the very next episode it will turn out that Sherlock has taken over John’s blog and a new therapist enters the stage.

The main themes of TST are undoubtedly ‘rewritten and changed stories’ along with a strong ‘water’ connection (emotions). The episode beginns with Sherlock mirrored in the big glass window of a shark tank, reaches its climax in front of the same shark tanks in the London Aquarium and it ends with Sherlock completely surrounded by blue water ... obviously walking a road that becomes a river.

The overall impression of this episode strongly leads to the assumption that Sherlock is - after he followed Jim down the waterfall in TAB - still deeply submerged in the floods of the Reichenbach Cauldron ... Rich Brook’s Cauldron ... Jim’s Cauldron. And the road Sherlock has chosen to walk will again take him back to the very start of the story in ASIP - to John, bad nights, therapists and a talkative serial killer.

From the beginning, then .....

.

Thanks @callie-ariane​ for the scripts

July, 2022

[gffa]

hi this whole supernatural and putin election is all over my dash right now but I have never watched spn, so I have no idea what's going on there. can you pleaseee help me?? I saw you posting about it lol

Hi!  Yeah, I have a post about it here, but basically (AS MUCH AS MY KNOWLEDGE CAN BE, GIVEN THAT I REALLY ONLY READ MESSAGE BOARD THREADS ABOUT THE WANK HAPPENINGS): - We’re all super stressed from Quarantine Brain + Doomscrolling through the election news/lack of news - Supernatural is a long-running show (15 seasons now) that has been around so long, that there are frequent jokes about how it’ll never die, etc. - There are two characters on the show, Dean Winchester (main character) and Castiel (second tier main character) who are shipped together as one of the most popular pairings, their smushname being “Destiel”. - Supernatural is also notorious for being pretty homophobic (from the actors, from the writing of the show, etc.) in a low-key but very “you can feel it way” (and some of the actors have been pretty shitty, from what I’ve heard?), so like literally nobody outside of diehard shippers expected this, despite that the chemistry between them was Something Else. - The show has always been popular, as well as one of the characters/actors on it (Castiel) has an incredibly devoted fan base, but it’s nothing like it was back in 2013, when Misha Collins (the actor who plays the character, generally more supportive of queer stuff, I think?) was IMMENSELY popular, to the point that there was a tumblr “event” scheduled where a bunch of people changed their icons to this one pic of him, then also reblogged the pic a lot, photoshopped the pic onto other gifs to make them Castiel pics, etc., to the point that a lot of people saw NOTHING BUT Misha Collins’ face on their dash all day.  This was called “Mishapocalypse”. - Sidenote:  Within the Destiel fandom, a/b/o tropes are extremely popular, often times with omega!Castiel.  You’ll see that come up in jokes around sometimes, too. - Sidenote x2:  For awhile, it was incredibly popular on tumblr to combine three live action television shows that had a lot of overlap in their audiences:  BBC’s Sherlock, Doctor Who, and Supernatural.  The combination of these three (whether graphics or just talking about crossovers or whatever) became something of a fandom unto itself, called Superwholock.  When I tag all these posts with “Superputinelection”, it’s a reference to how three things were mashed together like the TV shows. - So, okay, this show has been on forever, it’s low-key-to-high-key homophobic, nobody expects anything even from the final season.  Jokes get bandied around like “Destiel will become canon before we get any election results.” - AND THEN DESTIEL BECOMES IMPLIED CANON TONIGHT???  WHILE WE’RE STILL WAITING FOR ELECTION RESULTS???? - Castiel basically confesses his feelings to Dean (the other character in the ship), he directly says, “I love you.” and then immediately is killed and sent to SUPER HELL precisely BECAUSE his love for Dean made him happy, so like it’s (implied) canon gay AND homophobia in the same scene!  Amazing!  (A lot of people also really find Dean’s actor’s face in the scene to be super uncomfortable/showing the actor’s distaste for anything gay, but I don’t have an opinion on that because I’m not into the fandom deep enough to know.  Just that that’s what people are referring to.) - With so many people posting gifs/caps from the confession scene from SPN, it’s basically putting the same image of Castiel’s face all over our dashes and timelines again, which isn’t intentional but BOY DOES IT RESEMBLE THE MISHAPOCALYPSE. - AND THEN, LIKE WITHIN AN HOUR OF THAT, WHILE PEOPLE ARE ALREADY LOSING THEIR GODDAMNED MINDS, THERE’S A NEWS STORY  (well, rumors at the time, but apparently it’s been confirmed? the BBC had a story about it up ETA:  As Mid points out, that BBC article is about something else and I can’t access the NYP one, but I’m not getting google results for it) ABOUT HOW PUTIN IS GOING TO BE RESIGNING. All combined together, it’s been a rollercoaster ride to hell tonight.

[handsmotif]

The Queercoding of Pinky and the Brain

This originally was just me infodumping to my friends on discord, but I decided it might be interesting to some people on here, so I polished it up and made it an actual essay lmao

To start, we’re going to break this into 2 sections -- the relationship between the mice, and Pinky’s relationship with gender, because queercoding doesn’t just mean gay!

For a 90′s show, Pinky and the Brain (and its mother show, Animaniacs) was very progressive for its time! But there were still lots of things that they couldn’t slip by censors, and thus, that’s where we have to read between the lines. And that is something I wanted to clarify here before we dive in, the actual meaning of queercoding. It’s NOT the same as queerbaiting. Queerbaiting is when the people producing certain media purposefully dangle the possibility of queer representation to lure in audiences (most prominent examples are BBC Sherlock, Riverdale, and Supernatural I GUESS? who knows abt that last one anymore), but never follow through, purely for profit. Queercoding is when media producers WANT to write in queer representation, but can’t, usually because the censors won’t let them. So, they must resort to subtext. (example: the policemen from Gravity Falls) It could also be unintentional, simply assigning certain characteristics associated with the LGBT community to characters. (example: Bugs Bunny, many Disney villains) Either way, it heavily relies on the audience picking up subtext, but whether it’s malicious or not varies, depending on the media. Bugs Bunny is an example of positive accidental queercoding, while a lot of Disney villains are negative examples.

Now, to actually discuss the gay little mice! Pinky and the Brain, whether it be intentional or not (based off comments from Maurice LaMarche, Rob Paulsen, and Tom Ruegger, signs strongly point to intentional, but it’s never been explicitly confirmed), is an example of positive queercoding.

There are many moments that I could pick out to discuss here, but we’ll start with some VERY on the nose gay metaphors. 

Remember Romy? If you don’t, that’s their actual biological son! Romy came about due to a cloning accident, where their DNA got combined and spat him out. 

There’s SO many things I could say about Romy. Every appearance he makes has an overarching gay metaphor as the plot. His first appearance in the episode Brinky (yeah it’s literally titled their ship name), it deals with his dads (WHICH I ALSO WANT TO POINT OUT, he DOES call them both dad, and they do both call him their son) disapproving of the fact that he wants to leave home and not follow in their footsteps of taking over the world. Brain even goes as far as disowning him whenever he tells him, which is certainly something a lot of queer people can unfortunately relate to. Also seen a lot in this episode is Pinky and Brain arguing even more than a married couple than usual, which pushes Romy away even further. Later, when Romy eventually does leave, and Brain starts to regret chasing him away, he tries desperately to reach out to him, but Romy doesn’t want anything to do with him. They end up tracking him down to an apartment building, where Romy is now living with his human girlfriend. When questioned about their relationship, the girlfriend, named Bunny, goes off on a tangent about how people shouldn’t judge others based on labels or relationships (hello?), and that Brain needs to be more tolerant. Brain apologizes and Romy forgives him. Happy ending.

Romy’s only other appearance is in the comics. Essentially, the plot of this one is that Brain wants to become the president of the local high school’s PTA, but he needs Romy’s help to make it look like he has a normal home life. He also enlists the help of Billie, the obligatory Woman introduced to make sure Brain doesn’t look as gay as he actually is, that he has a crush on. She pretends to be his girlfriend, and Pinky pretends to be Romy’s uncle, while they make up the story that Romy’s actual mother was lost at sea. Because if the organization found out that Brain has a son with a MAN??? THINK of the controversy! Anyway, the plan works, and Brain actually manages to get elected as president. Throughout this though, Pinky gets WEIRDLY jealous that Brain keeps brushing him aside for Billie. To the point where during Brain’s inauguration, Pinky actually dresses up as the wife/mother lost at sea and storms into the room.

[ID: Comic panels of Pinky, Brain, and Romy on stage at the inauguration ceremony. Pinky busts into room wearing drag, saying, “Yoo hoo! I’m back from years lost at sea to be with my son and ungrateful husband! Narf!” He then hugs Romy, while glaring at Brain. He goes on to say, “I’ll stand by your side, even though you left me behind!” The people in the audience begin to question this, saying, “Oh great fuzzy bangs!”, “What’d she say?!”, “He deserted her to be with that other woman!”, “What kind of monster is he?!”. Brain then rips off Pinky’s wig and says, “This isn’t my wife! This isn’t even a woman! It’s my roommate, Pinky.” Pinky replies, “Well, yes... But Romy really is my son! Poit!” And Brain responds, “N-Nonsense! He’s my son!” More people in the audience angrily speak up, saying, “What’s that?”, “He lives with a guy who likes to dress up in women’s clothing and the both claim to be that kid’s father!”, “Grumble! Mutter!” /END ID]

Needless to say, this doesn’t end well for them. What we can conclude from this is that homophobia exists in the Pinky and the Brain universe, and our characters are directly affected by it.

Moving on, And-There-Was-Only-One-Bed is a pretty common occurrence with these two. Their cage is big, they have plenty of room for two beds, but? They choose to sleep together? Even in some times where this has been inconsistent and they DO have separate beds, they’re always RIGHT next to each other. (what if we put our minecraft beds together ❤😳)

I would like to mention the episode, You’ll Never Eat Food Pellets In This Town Again! This episode is interesting to say the least. Deals with a lot of the meta of the show. Anyway. In this episode, Brain has a nightmare that he’s in a loveless marriage with Billie. You know, the woman he’s supposed to have a crush on. In the end, he wakes up from the nightmare in the same bed as Pinky.

Speaking of female love interests, Pinky is seen having multiple relationships with characters of different species. Any time this is brought up by Brain, Pinky counters with Brain being too intolerant. An honorable mention with this is in Wakko’s Wish, when Pinky is with Pharfignewton, and Brain’s constant pestering about their relationship could be read as jealousy. Pinky needs a mousy date, after all!

Something else I would like to mention is in one episode (I forget what it’s called, I’ll try to look it up later and edit this), Brain is applying for a job. The employer asks Brain if he’s married, and Brain hesitates before saying he “has a roommate,” but that he’s occupied with his own things, which then cuts to a shot of Pinky applying lipstick.

Leading into part two of this essay, Pinky’s relationship with gender! Pinky has always been very gender nonconforming, and loves to wear dresses, do his makeup, and make himself look pretty. For the most part, this is played pretty straight, and not as a gag, like a lot of shows tend to do! It’s just a casual fact about him that he likes to present femininely sometimes.

This does play into their taking over the world plans pretty often, where Pinky wears drag, usually either to sneak into somewhere. Like in one of their earliest appearances on Animaniacs, Noah’s Lark, where they pose as a couple to board Noah’s, and I quote, “love boat.” After boarding, Noah says to himself, “Who am I to judge?” Okay. Yeah. Alright. Anyway.

I actually had less to say on this than I thought I did, but I wanted to make sure to emphasize that Pinky at the very least is coded as being Not Quite Cis, and that he’s played a key part in helping a lot of people watching the show figure out that they’re also Not Quite Cis. 

Wrapping this up because I’m hungry, but I want to throw in some more honorable mentions that I really do not see any type of cishet explanations for:

They literally go on a romantic date at a very fancy restaurant in Brain’s Night Off. This is played extremely casually, and the only remark from anyone that they receive is that they are “much smaller than the usual clients.”

Pinky, on at least one occasion, daydreams about him and Brain being a married couple, and wanting to be a housewife (the original malewife ❤)

There’s an issue in the comics where Pinky has a crush on another male mouse, and when Brain gets annoyed, Pinky reassures him that he thinks Brain is cute and quite the catch too

Brain attempting to kiss Pinky in the reboot??????

Brain actually did conquer the world once in the Halloween special, because Pinky made a deal with the devil for it, and thus Pinky got sent to hell! Brain actually went to hell and gave up the world to bring him back

Brain was extremely close to conquering the world once more in the Christmas special, but after reading what Pinky’s feelings for him were (nothing romantic, just Pinky basically just praising Brain for being so hardworking and an amazing mouse, and lamenting that he never gets anything for it), he gets so emotional that he sabotages himself and wishes everyone a Merry Christmas instead

TLDR; these mice are very queer and need therapy, and are probably the most heavily queercoded characters that I can think of in children’s media.

[sobeautifullyobsessed]

Fic writing lightning round:

-What fandoms have you written fics for?

-Do you have any original stuff?

-What's your oldest fic?

-What story are you most proud of?

-What stories are in the works?

-Where can I read your stuff?

Thank you soooooooo much for asking - I treasure (and always take full advantage of) any chance I have to pimp talk about my work!!! Seriously, if I don't, who will?😉

-What fandoms have you written fics for? Doctor Strange, BBC Sherlock (both modern day and Victorian), Star Trek Into Darkness (for Khan, ofc), War Horse (Major Jamie Stewart), The Hollow Crown (for Richard Plantagenet, the future Richard lll), Benedict Cumberbatch AUs

-Do you have any original stuff? A work based on an RP that petered out, so one character is not of my creation, but he has been fleshed out to fill the needs of the story I am telling. Scarlett and the Professor, from my sideblog @wide-eyedscottishlass.

edit by the amazing @strangelock221b 💜💙💜

-What's your oldest fic? Well, I have an untitled Star Trek fanfic from when I was a teen, never finished and never shared with a single soul (although I’ve written about the plot here on tumblr, ‘cuz it was pretty damn cool). But the first I ever published was Sherlock x OFC, entitled That Certain Piece. I count it as one of the bravest acts of my life, to finally share something I’d written--especially as I had the ‘nerve’ to pair a canon character with an original character.

-What story are you most proud of? Right now, I’d have to say Scarlett and the Professor. It combines that older man educating younger woman trope with a sinful soul being loved by a soul of the light (so much so, that he eventually begins to change his decadent ways) trope. With bloodborne supernatural ties that stretch back generations, honest love, and the best erotica I’ve written to date. I haven’t updated in months, though, which leaves me frustrated with myself--and hoping the spark returns soon.

-What stories are in the works? I have about a dozen WIPs, but those which I’m ‘actively’ working on are:  She Wore Gardenias In Her Hair (Stephen Strange x Female Reader), a Defender Strange x Female Reader series called No Defense for the Heart, Scarlett and the Professor, and The One That Got Away (a Benedict Cumberbatch Theatre AU). With strong yearnings to revisit Of Magic, Miracles and Moonlight (Stephen Strange x OFC), A Khan By Any Other Name (Khan x OFC), and The Secret of Salvation (Jamie Stewart x OFC).

-Where can I read your stuff? Most of what I’ve written is available on AO3, except for She Wore Gardenias In Her Hair (link in previous question) and Scarlett and the Professor (on my sideblog only). I also have a Doctor Strange Masterlist - though it is overdue for an update as it’s missing some one-shots from the past several months.

[mirjam-writes]

Good Omens Fic Rec: The Ineffable Game

The Ineffable Game by WorseOmens ( @worse0mens )

Rated: Not Rated (no sexual stuff, but some graphic violence)

Fandoms: Good Omens, Sherlock (BBC)

Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley, John’s onesided crush on Aziraphale and later Implied Johnlock.

Words: 65 002

Summary (by the author)

Sherlock and John are no longer the only crime-solving disaster duo in London. After Sherlock unknowingly wrongs a demon, he finds himself with two mysterious rivals in the detective scene. For Crowley and Aziraphale, it's just a bit of fun, but they end up learning more about human nature than they bargained for.

(BBC Sherlock/Good Omens crossover; The Ineffable Husbands try their hand at consulting detective work)

This is at least third WorseOmens’ fic I’m recommending, but they just manage to write stuff that delights me (I happen to love Outsider POVs), and this is also the best Good Omens/Sherlock crossover I have read! This has two sequels which handle a lot more epic themes, but this first one is my absolute favourite and I have reread it multiple times.

It all starts from something utterly insignificant. Sherlock does something only a little stupid, which annoys Crowley. Aziraphale and Crowley make a plan to annoy Sherlock back, and suddenly things start getting out of hand rather spectacularly.

Sherlock’s confusion over Aziraphale and Crowley is so delightful to read! His deductions are so close, as close as a human who adamantly refuses to believe in anything supernatural can get, but for that same reason also so wrong! And John thinking Aziraphale is ex military (he kind of is) so they have shared experiences (well not really) and getting confused about everything. Aaaa! This is the kind of stuff the best GO outsider pov fics are about! Sherlock is the perfect character for this!

At first they compete over cases, then they end up working together on some of them and finally Sherlock starts digging into Aziraphale’s and Crowley’s past and ends up with even more confusion and wildly wrong ideas. My face hurts because I grin and smile so much when reading this piece of art!

The fic changes from SH&JW pov to A&C pov and back, so it’s not completely outsider pov, but even from A&C pov Sherlock’s bafflement over them is so fun to read! And of course the husbands have to tease him a bit about it, because well of course,

For Aziraphale’s and Crowley’s part this is an established relationship fic, and I really love how they are depicted here. It’s not just a bed of roses, they have their disagreements, problems and insecurities, and they even fight sometimes, but they work through them, they respect each other and the story gives a strong feeling that nothing or no-one can come between them. But that is of course not obvious to SH or JW, who, at some point, also question their relationship based on insufficient data. That, of course, also gets a bit out of hand, when at one point SH and JW fully believe C has murdered A (which couldn’t be farther from the truth).

All in all, a perfect outsider pov fic combining two of my favourite fandoms. 

The epilogue ties the story so neatly with the Sherlock canon and Sherlock’s fall that I refuse to believe this wasn’t exactly what happened.