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terapsina · 1 year ago

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Now that the writers and actors strike is about to begin being felt (and as we wait for those greedy billion dollar companies who are refusing to negotiate fair pay and conditions to give up) here's 10 of my favorite (all around best) fully finished older series you should definitely check out if you haven't watched.

I mean it, these are the shows with continuously great writing and a satisfying endings that manage to actually deliver on their promises.

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1. Leverage - (containing 5 seasons, or 77 episodes) - trailer here.

Hitter, Hacker, Grifter, Thief and Mastermind. Heists and cons. Stealing from the rich and giving to their victims. They provide... leverage.

Meant for anyone who enjoys bad guys being the best good guys, who will burn down the lives of evil CEOs and then gloat in the background. Very satisfying.

Hands down the best example of a found family trope I've ever seen on screen. Barring none.

2. Killjoys - (containing 5 seasons, or 50 episodes) - trailer here.

Space Bounty Hunters. Another case of found family trope. Bisexual space princess assassin. Quippy sentient ship. Green alien goo. Evil lesbians (but like... in a good way). The warrant is all.

More seriously though, it's a story about three killjoys and the bounties they go after. Initially. And then they have to save the entire Quad from some very terrifying... stuff.

Contains one of the best friendships I've ever seen on television.

3. Orphan Black - (containing 5 seasons, or 50 episodes) - trailer here.

Found family trope but with clones.

Low level grifter sees a woman who looks exactly like her kill herself and plans to take over her identity long enough to cash out. Except then there's two other women who also look exactly like her. And apparently they're all clones and someone's killing them.

Enter a global conspiracy. Human experimentation. Lots of clone shenanigans. Some serial killings. And a few murders 💖.

4. Person of Interest - (containing 5 seasons, or 103 episodes) - trailer here.

Okay I'm beginning to see how I might have a found family trope issue.

Former CIA agent gets recruited by a reclusive billionaire computer programmer who developed a... machine that can predict acts of terror before they happen. But it also predicts 'irrelevant' acts of violence that will result in someone's death.

Unless someone interferes.

I'd really like to spoil some stuff to get you all to watch this one. But I'm going to maintain self control and just mention that early on they get a dog named Bear. Bear is a very good boy. Watch it for Bear.

Also for excellent commentary on rights of privacy, government surveillance and what does 'greater good' even mean? But mostly Bear.

5. 12 Monkeys - (containing 4 seasons, or 47 episodes) - trailer here.

The very best time travel show out there. What starts out as a confusing mess of causality basically exploding, by the end of the series all makes complete and total sense.

(when that final timey-whimey loop slid into place and revealed the entire pattern it was like a choir of angels started singing in the back of my head. It was freaking glorious).

Anyway, a man from a post apocalyptic future travels into the past to stop a plague from decimating nearly the entire world population.

He has the name of the man who released the virus and it's supposed to be a single trip. One trip. One bullet. Simple. Done.

Except then things keep escalating, and escalating until time begins eating its own tail and it might start looking like the end of the world might be a better ending than erasing all of time and space from reality.

Because when our guys screw it up, they screw it up GOOD.

And oh yeah... found family.

6. The Good Place - (containing 4 seasons, or 53 episodes) - trailer here.

A self-proclaimed Arizona dirtbag opens her eyes and finds out that she's dead and got accepted in the Good Place. Except that as soon as she arrives the Good Place starts glitching, and she really, REALLY needs to become a better person before she can be found out and kicked out to the Bad Place.

Luckily her assigned soulmate was a professor of ethics and moral philosophy.

One of the funniest, most thoughtful and clever comedies I've ever watched. Ever. The characters are delightful and by the time the final minute rolled around I had sobbed my heart out multiple times (which, as we all know, is a sign of the very best comedies out there).

As for the question of whether or not this too contains Found Fami- Yes! Obviously, yes.

7. Avatar: the Last Airbender - (containing 3 seasons, or 61 episodes) - intro here (couldn't locate the trailer but it's basically the same thing in this case).

The four nations lived in harmony. Until the Fire Nation attacked.

It's been a hundred years since the beginning of the war when two kids from the Southern Water Tribe find a boy frozen in ice and wake him up. A boy who's able to bend all four elements... though not very well.

Enter multi-nation flying road trip (thank you Appa, we love you most of all) as they try to find teachers for the Avatar and save the world.

Includes found family (shut up), amazing fight scenes, the most heartfelt and vivid characters ever, and the best example of a redemption arc actually done well.

8. Love Between Fairy and Devil - (containing 1 season, or 36 episodes) - trailer here.

This one gutted me. I'm saying this as a compliment. But it had to be said. Completely destroyed me. I just haven't been the same.

A love story between an Orchid Fairy and the leader of the Moon Tribe that starts out with her accidentally releasing him from millennia long imprisonment and then takes you through the caleidoscope of all possible human emotions (it's a body-swap comedy through the first part, then a romcom, then a dramatic romantic tale, and finally a tragic love story).

But it's such a satisfying slow burn.

And it carries this... humanity through the whole thing that makes it so visceral.

If you're a romantic who's very tired of instalove and characters dropping all their morals because 'ooh, attractive person' then you've got to watch this. Because this story does NOT take the easy road there.

(my more extensive rec for this series can be found here)

9. Star Wars: The Clone Wars - (containing 7 seasons, or 133 episodes) - fanmade trailer here (it was better than any of the official ones).

This series did so much. Introduced Ahsoka Tano, and made us love her. Gave names and faces and souls to the Clone Troopers (okay, it's the same face but you know what I mean), to a point where their endings during Order 66 destroyed me just as much as the ending of the Jedi Order. And somehow made me both love Anakin AND be a million times more angry with him.

There are some arcs in this series that might be a bit weaker. But there were some... god, there's a reason I love Clone Wars more than any other series or trilogy in this universe. And I'm not even a little ashamed to say it.

Must watch for Disaster Lineage shenanigans; for the vod'e; AND for the Jedi (who did their best okay? They always did their best 😭💔).

(and on the subject of found family... do I even need to comment)

10. Nikita - (containing 4 seasons, or 73 episodes) - trailer here.

A rogue assassin that escaped Division - covert government agency that takes recruits out of prison, fakes their deaths and then forces them to become spies and assassins - has come back to take it down. Brick by brick if she has to. With guns and explosives too when that works better.

Contains soooo many cool fight scenes. Is full of incredible characters you'll fall in love with (and hate with) very quickly. And most of all has an incredibly complex relationship of mentorship and friendship between two women that holds both great admiration and betrayal, real care and love as well as rage and hatred, forgiveness, mutual respect and an unbreakable kind of bond that so very rarely involves even one female character on TV, let alone two.

(as usual, found family tropes up the wazzoo).

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In conclusion. We all know there's going to be a large space between seasons of our favorite shows now (and some shows that aren't going to survive it). Let's fill that space with some excellent TV we haven't had a chance to see yet.

And direct the blame for the wait towards the right place (i.e. the studios).

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balkanradfem · 3 months ago

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I have an update, for people invested in the story of me vs the attractive woman who moved into the building, who I cannot figure out. I still don't know if she's interested in women, if she likes me at all. She has short hair and is 9 years older than me which makes her irresistible.

So my main point of confusion was that she always reacted extremely friendly to me, even as far as yelling my name excitedly and waving when she sees me, but then when we talk she talks to me as if I'm a small child maybe, using words you'd use with children. So I've been on the fence on whether she just sees me as a small lost child who needs attention, or if I could potentially ask her out. I've met her a few times more, only briefly, but one of those times she called my name in an iteration that means small, she added a suffix that you would add to a child's name. (She added '-ica' to my name, for croatian speakers).

And this was too much for me, I had to draw a line at the small iteration of my name, I do not enjoy being viewed as a child, and will not have a crush on someone who makes me feel like I'm not a grownup >: (. So I decided, this is a lost cause romantically, I'm no longer into her, she obviously sees me as a child. It's fair, I also see anyone 9 years younger than me as a tiny baby who I can only be friends with, but I do think that's very cool of lesbians, that we're the exact opposite of pedophiles.

So I calmed down about her, but then I thought, okay, now that I'm not having my brain scrambled by the yearning, I could actually try to ask her to come over so I can meet her and see if we could be friends. She still acted very sweet towards me, one day I opened the door of the building, she was standing right outside, and jumped when I said 'Hi!' loudly. I apologized for scaring her, and she said 'It's okay, I just wasn't even hoping for you.'

How am I supposed to deal with that. That is adorable. I had to go immediately that day, but I decided to calm down, and wait for an opportunity to see if I can get to know her better.

The opportunity came today! I stumbled on her while biking outside, got her attention, and then told her 'Hey, you seem like an interesting person, and I'd love to sit down and talk to you sometimes, I want to know more about you. Could I invite you over for tea?'. And she said, 'Okay, give me your number!', and then she realized, she didn't take her phone with, because it was raining. I grabbed my phone to take her number, but my battery was 1% and the screen was too dark to see. We were both standing there without functional phones, laughing at ourselves. Then she grabbed a pen from her bag, asked me to give her my hand, and wrote her number on it. I've never had a woman write down her number on my hand! It was a great experience. She stopped to ask if it was hurting me, and I was smiling and giggling because I was thrilled, and told her to keep writing. Her handwriting is very neat! I promised to quick-call her as soon as I got home, so her phone will have my number as well.

So now I have her number on my hand, and I did give her a very short ring, so she has my number too. Now I'm nervous! I cleaned up the place because I don't know when she's going to come over, and I'm plagued by the anxiety that I won't be able to offer her a sweet treat because I never make any. I gave her an open invitation so she can just randomly decide to come and I will seem like a person with no food in my kitchen because I only make food when I'm hungry and then eat it immediately. Do you think pan-fried apples is an acceptable treat for a guest? I'm being so normal about this.

#lesbian experiences #lesbian story #getting a womans number!#after giving up on crush

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cattimeswithjellie · 6 months ago

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Stream Recap ZombieCleo, 6-23-24

((Did I jump the queue with this one and stay up especially late finishing it specifically because DocM77 asked on Twitter for someone to go over the stream with a fine-toothed comb and give him the salient details? MAYBE. I just hope I can figure out a way to get it to him so he sees it. Anyway, it's stupidly late, have a stream recap in which Scar's audio is a main character that never appears.))

0:00 Cleo opens the stream on the Hermitcraft server. She greets the False raiders and the chatters who were already here, even as she types to False in the game chat. She asks False if she is tired, False replies that she is boiling. Cleo suggests living in Scotland, where it is cool in both a literal and metaphorical sense. Cleo asks Chat if they are good. She herself thinks Chat is great because they are here. Cleo does not know if False shows appreciation for her chat enough, but promises that False does really appreciate them, probably. Chat appreciates False. Ren enters the server and gets an OMG HI from Cleo in chat. Cleo and Ren agree they need to play Plate Up again soon. Cleo will also drag False along on this Plate Up adventure, whether she wants to or not.

3:00 A chatter plays hydration check, so Cleo takes a drink and gives chat a bonus posture check as well. A chatter asks which is Cleo’s favorite punctuation mark. Cleo says it is the interrobang (‽) because it is great. The plan for today is to try and do some planning with Chat’s help, because Chat is smart and Cleo hasn’t got a plan. Cleo is also very concerned that Chat engage in self-care activities. They go full-screen vtuber to lead a mini stretching session and tell Chat they are important and loved.

5:10 The plan-planning process requires some signs. Cleo goes to get some while talking about how nice it is to live in Scotland where it’s not so hot. They thank subs and donos and try to make heart-hands after a nice message, but realize they have not put on their hand sensors. Maybe later for that. A chatter plays the Hotdogs On Your Face song. Mrs. Tango raids into the stream. Cleo goes full-screen again to welcome the raiders and give them the same niceness and self-care message. Cleo is feeling especially nurturing today and Chat is vibing with it.

8:20 Cleo stares at the sign she was about to place down and write the plan on, but she has forgotten it. She thanks subs and donos instead and remembers the plan. The plan is to plan out the city and mark places for Shrubberies, which must be pronounced in Knights that Say Ni fashion ((a reference to the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail.)), and other important landmarks. NJCoffeeJunkie raids in, but Cleo’s not doing the nurturing thing a third time in ten minutes. A chatter plays sour jelly bean.

10:30 Cameron, Cleo’s lead mod and partner, raids in. Cleo gives in and gives the full-screen nurturing self-care speech again. Cleo finally writes “Granery Food Storage” on the sign, declaring that she is not a teacher anymore and doesn’t need to spell. She shares the plan for the granary building and says hi to Scar in game chat. More thanks to subs and donos. A chatter suggests Scar has a power beyond this world, Cleo wouldn’t go that far but does agree that Scar is pretty dangerous. ((In Season 9, Joe Hills made it a point to greet Scar whenever he logged on, because otherwise Scar had a tendency to drop by his build and murder him. This may have had a lasting effect on Hermit behavior patterns.)) Cleo has a video coming out tomorrow that also involves Skizz and Joel, and it’s going to be fun.

14:20 Cleo shows off how they have spawn-proofed their front lawn area, mostly using glow lichen, which they insist must be pronounced with a short I sound, as in “finger-lickin’” because otherwise it sounds stupid. A chatter announces they came out to their parents and shouts out the gays. Cleo shouts out the gays, lesbians and all other groups and wishes everyone happy pride. They trail off when they realize that Ren has made a stone… “upside-down T” in one of the marked-off building squares. Cleo takes down the definitely-only-an-upside-down-T and replaces it with a sign declaring it the medical tent/emergency room area. Chat is not sure it was just a T. Cleo marks another square for Delivery of Supplies, right in front of the mailbox.

17:00 Cleo makes a big square for the Tavern, which will also be the town meeting hall. When the drama happens (and she doesn’t mean Theatre Kid Ren), they can come in here and plan. Cleo thinks about what else is needed. A boat dock maybe. Chat agrees that if D&D has taught them anything, it is that a tavern is the best place to make plans. Cleo agrees. Chat also suggests an armory. During this time, Cleo also seems to perceive that it is evening and tries to sleep. It does not work. Eventually Cleo realizes it is still daytime and is a bit confused. Chat suggests that night is an illusion. Cleo thinks about the best place to put an armory without blocking the sight lines of the little town. Chat suggests a school as well, but a town on a war footing does not need a school. She sketches out an armory and puts up a sign for where the docks will be.

22:50 Cleo starts trying to sleep again. She taps the bed for about 25 seconds before finally being allowed to sleep. A kitchen tent might be good on the hill, so that gets sketched out as well. A retaining wall for the hill will probably show up at some point. A chatter asks what era the village is supposed to be, Cleo says it’s going to be Magipunk. There will be motorbikes and magic robots. There might be some ruins as well. A chatter asks about the pile of Ren and False heads in the middle of the build area, Cleo says that’s Ren and False being Ren and False. A chatter suggests adding a watchtower, but that would be on top of the hill and Cleo has other plans for that area.

28:30 A chatter says that Scar needs help. Cleo says that if Scar needs help, Scar can ask for help. It is not polite to go into other peoples’ streams and ask for help for other people. Chat suggests a junkyard or scrap heap, but Cleo thinks this community is very into recycling and mending because they haven’t got much stuff. There will be a bunch of barracks tents, those get squares. Cleo needs one more big building. Chat makes a lot of suggestions. Cleo has run out of yellow wool to make plan squares with. They head to the shopping district.

31:40 Cleo hits up Wool Street and buys four stacks of yellow wool, then goes home. Wool Street does not have an ender chest, a clear violation of the Cub Rule, but Cleo pays anyway. Chat is becoming extremely distracted by whatever is happening in Scar’s stream, to the point where Cleo’s mod bans the word “Scar” temporarily. If Scar needs help, Cleo reiterates, Scar can speak to her himself. ((If this were a video recap, there would be a smash cut here to Scar’s stream, where his profound audio issues are currently causing everything he says to turn into an unbearable auditory hellscape until he is reduced to pantomime and beatboxing just to interact with his Chat. But Cleo has no way of knowing this.))

34:10 Chat finally comes up with the good suggestion of a campfire area in the center of town. Cleo agrees with this and decides a longhouse to go with it will do the trick. They begin sketching it out when Scar puts “cLEO!” “where are yyou?” into the chat. Cleo tells him they are at their base. Chat is extremely riled up by now, telling Cleo to run, to escape, pain is coming, prepare your ears. Cameron has caught wind of what is actually happening and tells Cleo it’s not good. Cleo does not know why they should be expected to run from Scar.

35:30 Scar approaches on foot, wearing his Poe Poe skin and hat. He doesn’t say anything. Cleo says hi to him several times. He continues not to say anything. Cameron lets Cleo know that Scar’s mic is looping all desktop audio. Cleo tells Scar that he’s wonderful and she wants him to know that, but the whole no-sound thing is actually extra-creepy. She suggests that she could make things much worse by going and getting her horns.

36:30 Ren flies in, playing one of his own horns. He is clearly well-informed about the situation and intends to make it as terrible as possible. “Burning in my ears,” he sings, “the mic is echoing! It is absolutely pain, in the earholes!” Scar flies away. Cleo admits she can’t hear Scar at all, but the song has her laughing. Ren says that he and his stream are watching Scar’s stream and it is _wild._ Cleo’s Chat is in emoji-only time out right now because talking about other streams is both against the rules and all anybody wants to do. Scar flies back to the waiting pair and Ren immediately begins chanting the beginning of “My Name Is” but he doesn’t actually know the words and mostly improvises. Cleo congratulates Scar on getting her stream put into emote-only. Scar does not respond ((partly because everything Cleo says is being shredded into the nonsense avalanche of sound looping on Scar’s stream and partially because Scar also hasn’t figured out how to unmute his mic in his current OBS configuration)). Scar flies away again.

38:00 Ren and Cleo discuss the wildness of the current situation. Cameron knows what is wrong with Scar’s audio equipment, but there’s nothing they can actually do. It’s not as though they can reach through the computer and get into Scar’s audio equipment. Scar flies back, having successfully unmuted at least, and yells at them to help him. Cleo reiterates that they can’t, while Ren begins beatboxing. Cleo tells Scar he needs to reboot, but there is no way that is getting through overtop the terrible audio mess that Ren is creating. “If I say something I just echo!” Scar yells. “Echo, echo, echo!” Ren starts beatboxing again, because he is terrible. Scar flies away again. Cleo tells Ren he is mean. Funny, but mean. They are both laughing pretty hard.

40:10 In the spirit of attempting to actually be helpful, Cleo begins writing Cam’s suggestion about the problem into game chat, but is interrupted by Scar flying back while singing “Have you heard the take of Mr. Kirkland and his four-pound pie?” Ren adds backup vocals. Cleo is trying really hard to impart some actual information but it is totally buried under the audio barrage that is completely inaudible on this stream. Cleo tells Scar that he is the best, he has completely derailed everything. That isn’t bad, it’s just funny. Cleo spends a lot of streams just listening to Scar.

41:50 Ren apparently closes or mutes Scar’s stream and heaves a sigh, saying he really feels like he’s been somewhere else. Cleo bets Scar wishes he were somewhere else. A chatter plays sour jellybean. Cleo says the funniest part is when Scar unmutes suddenly to say something. Ren begins playing his guitar over his mic. “It’s getting WORSE!” Scar yells suddenly and flies away again. “You’re a mean, mean man,” Cleo tells Ren. The two of them agree that this is pretty satisfying karma for all the trolling Scar has ever done to them. Cleo shows off some of the planning they have been doing with all the wool squares. Ren looks at the 3x3 square marked off for a tent and suggests dubiously that it is a small space for a tent. Cleo assures him it’ll be fine, it’ll be made out of pants. It takes Ren a minute for figure out that the tent will be an armor stand sculpture, not a build. He thinks it’s cool.

44:30 Scar returns once more! Ren and Cleo sing to him. He flies away again. Ren turns on the stream and reports that the audio is definitely not fixed. He tells Cleo that when Scar comes back, they need to hit him with some Bohemian Rhapsody. Cleo agrees, so long as Ren handles the high parts. Ren wants to do the low parts. They practice. Cleo does have a little uncertainty on the high notes and neither of them are sure of the words, but they do a credible job. Chat is very enthusiastic about it.

46:00 Scar comes back again. His audio is still not fixed. Ren and Cleo sing to him. Chat speculates on how many horns could be made just from the shenanigans of the past thirty minutes. They forget the words and jump ahead to the “MAMAAAA” portion. Cleo decides to actually be helpful and tabs out to start sending information and screenshots from Cameron to Scar that might help fix his problem. While Cleo is tabbed out, there is no visual indicator like a menu screen but the game does freeze, leading to the strange phenomenon of Scar audibly being killed by a drowned, complete with hitting and screaming, while appearing completely fine and motionless onscreen. Chat is confused.

47:30 Cleo tabs back into the game to find the drowned attacking them now. They scold it for being on land and kill it, then survey the bits and piece Scar left scattered around as Ren tries in vain to describe the complete audio chaos that is Scar’s stream. Cleo spots Scar’s _enormous_ Poe Poe hat and starts laughing. Neither of them have any inventory space to pick up any of the scattered belongings. Ren makes a chest and does his best while thinking about other songs that he can loop into Scar’s audio purgatory. He asks Cleo if she knows a song that he describes completely as “Dadadadada, dadadadadada.” Cleo does know it enough to dadada along. ((Chat identifies the song as Sandstorm, by Darude.)) He collects up the Poe Poe hat and puts it on. The effect is striking, especially considering that his skin already has glasses. Cleo is impressed. She tells Ren she’s never said this to anyone before, but he should be a member of the Poe Poe.

49:50 Scar returns, naked but for his spare wings. He asks timorously if he can have his things. It seems possible for a moment that Scar’s audio issues are corrected, but no luck. Ren throws back all of Scar’s items, then absolutely engulfs him in the monstrous entity that is the Poe Poe hat. Cleo dissolves in laughter again. Ren starts in with Sandstorm. Cleo tells Scar that she doesn’t mind if he kills Scar. Scar says Ren might have his axe. Ren does, and throws it back while still “dadadadadada”-ing. Scar sets off several flight rockets, apparently just to add to the chaos Cleo cannot hear. Cleo tells Scar he is awesome, but whatever he is going through, she cannot relate. It is funny that Ren is being the menace right now, she says, because usually that’s Scar’s job. There’s a moment of silence, then Cleo asks Ren how long he thinks it’ll be before Scar mutes them. “Let’s keep complimenting me,” Scar suggests instead. “I like that part.” Ren starts playing guitar again. In chat, Cameron is clearly itching for a way to actually reach through the computer and fix Scar’s audio equipment.

51:50 Scar thinks he’s figured something out. He’s only getting one echo now, which is a big improvement from the four or five he’s been hearing. Cleo asks if Scar’s done the troubleshooting Cam suggested. Scar says he tried, but he’s not seeing any of the stuff Cam said he should see. Ren whispers to his Chat that he thinks they muted him. Cleo says they did not, they’re just ignoring him. Cleo reminds him that they are trying to be nice to Scar, which is quite difficult. Ren doesn’t know anything about that, he is trying to make loop tracks.

52:20 “Oh, like this is your Woodstock,” Cleo realizes. Ren agrees. “What about wood?” Scar asks. Cleo sighs and asks why Scar is like this, but Scar has clearly gotten an immediate dose of karma in the form of an innuendo that will not stop looping in his audio feed. He regrets everything. Cleo asks with some disbelief if he actually understands what he just said. Scar says he does because it won’t stop repeating in his ears. If he hears one more thing about wood he’ll go crazy! Cleo has had an epiphany. Could this be Scar’s conscience, a force that simply repeats the exact things he says back to him?

53:00 Cleo tries to help Scar disable desktop audio. This helps, but does not eliminate the problem. Cleo and Cam believe it is desktop audio and Scar is just not finding the correct source. Ren begins chanting the “How much wood would a woodchuck chuck” rhyme, because he is terrible. Scar gives up and leans into it, telling Ren to do the woodchuck thing again. Clearly those two are hearing a lot that Cleo is not hearing right now.

54:50 Scar is silent for a moment, then comes back and says he may have figured it out. “Oh?” Cleo asks. Scar asks if hypothetically, someone were to have three open sources of their own stream in the background on their desktop, could that cause this. Cleo answers “yes” in the carefully controlled voice of someone who wants to say so very, very much more. In the chat, Cameron has been reduced to ellipses. Cleo reminds Scar that the very first thing they asked him was if he had his stream open in the background. Scar admits he had three tabs of his stream open, but they were minimized so he didn’t see them. Apparently he had some trouble linking when he was trying to tweet out his stream start, and that eventually led to… all of this. Chat is melting down. Ren tells Scar “You are easily in my top ten favorite humans.” Scar cannot hear him because, on top of everything else, he is working with a broken pair of headphones old enough to be starting intermediate school in the fall. Ren types it into the game chat.

56:00 Scar adjusts Ren’s audio and tells him he has pumped him up so he can hear better. Cleo says Ren does not need pumping up, that Ren comes fully inflated at all times. Chat wants a clip of that immediately. Scar claims that nothing like this has ever happened to him before. Cleo says at least they know what the problem was now: ineptitude! Ren admits that he gave up on helping immediately and embraced the chaos. Cleo tries to say that they could help a little by passing along Cameron’s advice, but is interrupted by Scar audibly dropping his headset. Chat is just having the best time right now.

57:20 Cleo asks Scar if he’s going to get a new headset. He says “not yet” in the vocal tone of a talking dog who knows he is the one who ate all the ham. She asks why and he explains he hasn’t decided what he wants yet, and also he hates spending money. Exasperated, Cleo reminds him that this is his JOB. Scar snicker laughs and says he was thinking today that he probably does need to have a burial for this headset. He can bury it in the garage. She suggests “burying” it with a ten pound hammer. Scar says he gets sentimental and weird and very specific things: his sunglasses and this headset. He’s had the headset longer than he’s been on Hermitcraft! ((Scar joined Hermitcraft in Season 4, which started in early 2016, meaning that the headset is a minimum of eight years old and probably older.)) Cleo is appalled and insists that this proves the exact point she was trying to make. At some point the headset was good but now it is ancient and diseased and needs to be put out of its misery. Scar insists that it’s not diseased because he has replaced the ear cups several times. A brief discussion of the Headset of Theseus ensues before Cleo rejects the whole premise.

59:30 Cleo points out that if Scar’s headset is over ten years old, he is going to hear _so much_ better when it is replaces. Scar insists that it’s a good headset and gets very nostalgic about how many Hermitcraft meetings have come through that headset, but Cleo would rather not. Ren suggests that Scar needsto take the headset in a field and deal with it Office Space style. ((A famous scene in the movie Office Space involves smashing a printer to bits with a bat.)) This actually seems to appeal to Scar. The three also discuss the merits and risks of a viking funeral for the headphones. Scar likes the idea because it involves a flaming arrow. Apparently Scar did some archery when he was young and even got a couple bullseyes. His archery career was ended when his brother broke the windows on the shed with an arrow and got the bow taken away. Ren says he is scared of bow and arrows because of a time in boarding school where an older boy bullied the new kids by shooting an arrow straight into the air and making them run away from it.

1:02:00 Scar shoots an arrow into the air to illustrate the story. Ren says that brings back painful memories, yes. Scar tells them that this is the first arrow of the new HotGuy bow, because he fell into lava again yesterday and lost everything. Chat is still pretty hung up on Ren’s story. Cleo sighs that at some point they are going to just have to give Scar some kind of frequent flier discount at the bookshop. Scar clears his throat and says it’s nice that Cleo mentioned that because there is a situation where some snails stole all his diamonds… Cleo asks if he stole books from the shop. He insists that it wasn’t stealing because he is going to pay it back! He paid half at the time and the other half is on layaway, which in his mind apparently involves getting to take the items before you have finished paying for them. Cleo insists that they can’t get a new trophy with layaway diamonds!

1:02:40 Scar and Cleo find common ground over the fact that they are both currently the plaintiffs in server lawsuits. Scar is embroiled in a dispute with some snails and a man named Big Ron who may or may not be Mumbo, while Cleo is suing Doc for killing a pig they had a special emotional attachment to. Cleo’s suin’ papers have been delivered and Ren should expect a subpoena at any point. Ren says he’s not going to appear in court for less than a stack of diamonds, suggesting he is not super-familiar with the subpoena power in general and “things a witness should probably not say” in specific. Scar, confused, asks if Ren is Cleo’s lawyer. Cleo clarifies that Ren is a witness. Skizz is Cleo’s lawyer. Scar is sorry to hear that and offers his condolences to Cleo. Cleo says it’s fine because the other lawyer is Joe. She is also not going to say what she did to the judge. She clears her throat and moves on.

1:03:30 Ren reiterates the fact that if Cleo were to see her way clear to making a substantial amount of diamonds appear in Ren’s mailbox, he might just become a very enthusiastic and helpful witness. Cleo insists that all she really wants is for Doc to suffer. Ren says he just wants to make some profit off the situation. Cleo asks points out that Ren is supposed to be married to Doc. Scar agrees and says that it’s not right to get in the middle between family. He asks Cleo if this is about the pig. “Yeah, it’s about the pig,” Cleo admits, sounding a bit embarrassed about it at this point. Cleo is suing for intentional infliction of emotional distress.

1:04:10 Ren informs Scar that there was A MURDER. Scar knows about the murder, it’s tied into his investigation and he has zero leads and he doesn’t know what to do because Doc is expecting results! Cleo is confused until Scar clarifies that as a member of the Poe Poe, he is charged with investigating the diamond ore thefts that were the instigating incident for the pig murder but he has zero leads and he doesn’t know what to do. Ren immediately tells Scar he’s barking up the wrong tree because Ren of course knows absolutely nothing about the diamond snitcher and can be of no help whatsoever. Scar finds that immediate reaction very suspicious. Cleo doesn’t know from suspicions or diamond filchers, all they know is that there’s a diamond thief and it caused their pig to die. Ren admits that it is possible that his quick denial might have sounded a bit suspicious.

1:05:20 Ren admits that he was trying so hard to sound not-suspicious that he accidentally wrapped right back around to suspicious again. Scar laughs and tells him he “pulled an Impulse,” referencing Impulse’s frequent behavior from Friday Night Among Us streams. Scar decides that he has a new prime suspect. Cleo is not sure Doc will believe Ren took the diamonds. Ren says he couldn’t have thought of the prank and even if he had, he wouldn’t have the follow-through to actually do it. Cleo thinks about it and decides yeah, Ren probably doesn’t have the energy. Scar laughs and protests that he already used that as his excuse and nobody believes him!

1:06:20 Cleo says it can’t be her because she has no energy or patience to poke Doc and then have to listen to Doc rant on and on about how terrible the punishment raining down is going to be, only to have him never deliver. Ren wants to plead his case some more, but Scar is too busy laughing at Cleo’s declaration. He agrees that Doc did dole out some punishment last season, but that the threats are mostly bluster. He does a very terrible Doc impression. Cleo does another Doc impression that is also terrible but in a different way. Scar goes to sleep and Cleo points out that this area is mob proofed. Ren points out that Scar literally just died to a zombie. Cleo has to admit that’s true, but it was a water zombie. Scar points out that he died and they both just LET IT HAPPEN. Cleo protests that she was tabbed out. Ren says he was too busy looping.

1:07:40 Cleo offers Ren the opportunity to tell his story and prove his innocence. Ren goes back to the distant days of Season 8 when he and Doc were living in each others’ pockets, basically in voice chat all day long. Cleo offers condolences for that, but thinks it might make Ren more likely to want to commit a crime. Ren insists no, the opposite! He offers as character evidence the fact that False won Demise this year in part because Ren decided not to target her at the end of the game and in fact helped her although he had no reason to do so. Ren is very loyal to his particular people, and Doc is one of them, so therefore QED Ren cannot possibly be the ore snatcher.

1:08:50 “So you’re saying it’s False,” Scar summarizes. Cleo agrees that is what they got from the story as well. Ren insists that False is way too busy to be doing ore snatching with all the river building, etc. Cleo agrees that this is true, except that Ren just told them it was False. “Did I?” he asks, bewildered. Scar and Cleo both heard it. Scar says sometimes you just need to stop talking because you just keep digging, a subject he himself is well-versed in. Cleo says Ren is incapable of stopping talking. Ren suggests pulling footage of several Among Us streams to prove something about his character, but Cleo interrupts, saying that if they’re pulling footage, Cleo can just pull the bit showing Ren killing the pig. Cleo corrects herself a moment later to say Doc killing the pig, but Ren seizes on the slip as the reason innocent folks like himself get sent to jail. Chat is going to clip that and then everyone is going to think he’s the pig murderer. The soundbite where he says “I’m the pig murderer” in a low sinister voice probably will also not help his clip issues.

1:10:30 Scar moves the conversation along by suggesting more Hermits as potential suspects. This turns into an incredibly lengthy and wide-ranging conversation that is much more concisely summed up in the Reddit document devoted to it. Cub eventually joins in as well to defend himself from some accusations against himself and to throw out some of his own. Joe comes along as well a little later but is less interested in levying accusations and more interested in litigating the unfairness of the fact that he had the idea to mess with the diamond ore first but someone else ran with it and has caused a commotion that could have been his. The conversation lasts for nearly an hour.

2:06:00 The argument turns to whether or not a sophisticated redstoner would be required in order to snatch the ores out of Doc’s machine without breaking it. ((There was an early belief that Ore Snatch #2 did break the machine, but careful video analysis reveals that Doc simply did not notice the ore when it was first removed and that the machine remained unbroken until later on when Ren and Scar came over during Ren’s stream and Ren poked at it. That is actually how the armor stand deployed and the inventory shifted.)) Most of the Hermits present claim to have not even seen the redstone circuitry in question, so a field trip is obviously in order. They all fly over to the armor trim shop.

2:07:20 Scar plays the Poe Poe Siren horn as they fly to the shop, which probably makes this an official Poe Poe visit of some sort. They land outside the shop and Ren worries about spoilers, but most of the shop has been around for awhile. Scar gets distracted by a wandering trader while the rest of the group goes into the shop to look around. Ren points out one of the circuits where a replaced ore block is still visible, commenting that looking down into the circuitry is enough to make him feel panicky. Cleo looks at the armor stands instead and mostly feels offended. Joe points out that most of the redstone circuitry is inert while the machine is not active. As long as one doesn’t touch a block that is powered or, like, pseudopowered? He cannot remember the correct word ((possibly something to do with quasiconnectivity?)) but as long as someone wasn’t removing a block that powered something, they should be able to do it with no trouble.

2:08:20 Cleo abandons the redstone discussion to fiddle with the armor stands that are particularly offending her. One statue has the arm buried inside the chest and that is just unacceptable. She fixes the armor stand to give the statue a more natural posture. Joe says that surely it’s fine and Doc definitely will not get upset about people adjusting things in this room, of all places. Cleo scoffs and says Doc won’t know. The others begin discussing whether the shop is actually open for business, with Joe deliberately muddying the waters by pointing out that the shop must be open because it has no door or anything keeping people from walking inside. Cleo continues making small adjustments to the postures of the statues and is busy with a fish-headed model when suddenly the alarm goes off. It is impossible to tell from Cleo’s perspective who broke the block that triggered the alarm, but all the Hermits who entered the building are still on the main sales floor when she turns around to look. ((Ren’s POV on this is also useless as he was freecamming into the redstone, but Scar’s stream POV shows that Cub placed a magma block at the top of the front doorframe of the shop and broke it, which triggered the alarm. It’s not clear what Cub was doing, but “being a smartass about the is-the-shop-open question” is a fairly safe bet.))

2:09:10 Ren warns everyone to stay up top as the alarm system is dangerous. Scar immediately notices that there is now a Warden in the depths of the machine. Cleo laughs and reminds everyone to be quiet. All the Hermits mill around on the glass display floor to try and get a glimpse of the Warden. Scar asks why it’s not attacking them all. Cleo suggests that it might be distracted by the noise of the alarm itself. Ren says it’s just climbing the stairs and they’d better get going. The world turns black. The Hermits flee.

2:10:20 The Hermits regroup on the grassy lawn well outside Doc’s shop. Cleo is still laughing pretty hard. Ren says “So yeah, that’s the scene of the crime.” Cub wonders if the wandering trader will be killed by the warden. Scar is worried; that trader has gilded blackstone miniblocks and Scar wants him alive. The Warden does not appear to be making an appearance now that everyone has left, though. Cub, Joe and Scar head back towards the building to see what’s happening inside, but Cub and Scar turn back well before the door, driven back by the obnoxious noises of the alarm. Joe goes straight into the building. Ren speculates why someone would want to investigate now, if not to find better ways to get in later. Scar points out that with the alarm already tripped, it’s basically free game now until Doc resets it. Joe only stays inside for a few moments before coming back out. Scar shoots an arrow at him but doesn’t connect.

2:11:40 Somewhat belatedly, the group starts to wonder what triggered the alarm. Cleo suggests that surely someone must have gone down into the redstone. Ren suddenly wonders whether freecam possibly could’ve activated it. Cub pooh-poohs that idea but nobody else is sure. Ren says it’s not a very good alarm if it can trigger just from a customer entering the shop. ((Ren is acting like he doesn’t know what triggers the alarm, which is strange since he helped test it and should know full well that it is breaking blocks.)) Chat knows that the alarm trigger is breaking blocks. Cub admits he placed and broke some magma blocks. Cleo demands to know whether they can set off the alarm so easily, by just setting down a block and breaking it. They are going to annoy Doc _so much _ with this knowledge. Scar suddenly realizes that this means there is very little effective way to pay for items in the shop, since pulling a wallet from a shulker box, placing it down and picking it up again would trigger the alarm. It is not, they decide, a very good alarm system.

2:12:40 Cub decides he’s going in. The others stay outside and talk about whether or not they were scared of the warden, a bell curve that seems to have a lot to do with how much they played the lower levels of Decked Out 2. Cub types in chat that it’s fine, then flies back and tells them that he did get blasted. “Nice,” Cleo compliments. Cleo is of two minds whether they should all keep their mouths shut or leave some kind of sign at the door for Doc. Scar is worried about property damage, but the sonic shriek does not break blocks, only players. Cleo does like the idea of Doc thinking his alarm caught the culprit, then getting linked to the stream and realizing it is just a bunch of bumbling Hermits. They also think it is funny that now the Glitcher actually can do anything they want in the next few hours until the alarm is reset. Nobody else knows the name “The Glitcher,” or at least they are pretending not to. Cleo consults with Chat and passes along the knowledge that the name The Glitcher was provided to Doc on a sign after one of the ore thefts. Scar thinks that this new name sounds a lot like the work of one Cubfan and plays his Darth Vader breathing horn in an attempt to intimidate him into a confession. It does not work. In the background, Joe has left the group and gone back towards the shop, but drops out of sight at the base of the sand pile and eventually flies back around to rejoin the group without actually going inside.

2:15:10 Cub pushes the Grian and/or Scar theory again, but that’s been discussed before. Ren decides that after an hour and fifteen minutes, they are not even a tiny bit closer to figuring out whodunnit. But there is a warden in the shop now, so that’s something? Scar thinks that a warden has got to be bad for Doc’s business, right? Cleo doesn’t believe that Doc cares at all about the success of his business, mostly because he’s being paid in sand. Doc is just being dramatic. Cub circles back around to “The Glitcher” and the quotation marks around it are audible. He asks if it’s true there was a sign. He and Scar both want to see a screenshot from Chat. Chat thinks Cub is pretending a little too hard.

02:17:00 Cleo and Ren both suggest putting up signs purporting to be from the Glitcher, solely for the purpose of trolling Doc. Scar insists that they cannot do that, he is the investigator and he is supposed to be _helping._ Ren thinks it would be very funny to have a sign reading “Soz for tripping your alarm, -The Pincer” (Or Pincher, it’s hard to say.)) Cleo gives him a sign and tells him to have at it. Scar protests loudly again and says they can’t do that. Ren clearly considers it, but then says he cannot do it either, he is Doc’s husband. Cleo grabs the sign and runs for the shop.

2:18:40 Cleo braves the terrible noises of the shop to place a sign in the doorway reading “LOL, Failed Again!” Ren is right behind her and protests that she didn’t add the part about The Pincer. She agrees she did not, because that is LAME. Scar gets the screenshot he wanted from his Discord chat and suddenly remembers Doc talking about these signs. Apparently Doc saw that there was a misspelling on one of the signs and (in Scar’s words) decided to blame the dumbest guy in the crew. Cub also believes that a misspelled sign points in Scar’s direction. The new sign is not going to serve well as a piece of evidence, given that there is a lot of stream evidence about who placed it and why and when, but Cleo doesn’t care. Doc deserves to be wound up, he murdered Cleo’s pig.

2:19:50 Ren has to admit that even though Doc is his husband, he does have something to answer for when it comes to Pig Murder. Scar is paying attention to his chat for once, he tells the others to hang on because an investigation is taking place in his Discord. While Scar is so ostentatiously distracted, Cleo begins handing out a few judicious gifts of diamonds, though the stream lag inherent in a bunch of hermits together leaves a lot of room for them to steal from one another. Cleo becomes convinced that Joe has become the recipient of diamonds they intended to go elsewhere and begins beating him like a pinata in the hopes they will disgorge. In the background, Scar announces that his chat believes Big Salmon is behind the whole thing, but he has no idea what that means. Joe flies away. Scar swears he saw Grian walking around near Doc’s shop, but Cleo has no POV angle to confirm or deny that. Cameron informs Cleo that Ren got the diamonds and is lying about it. Cleo congratuates Grian on some excellent trolling. They go up to the shop, but do not find Grian. Cleo thinks that sneaking in under everyone’s noses for trolling is huge Grian energy.

2:22:20 Ren finds a sign on the sand store that was not there earlier. “Sorry about your alarm, Scar, Chief Investigator.” Scar swears he did not put it there, and indeed he would’ve had a very hard time doing so because he has been moving and talking with the group basically the entire time. Ren insists the sign is there, and it was even glow-inked. Cub says that must’ve been Grian, so Grian is a suspect too. Even as he says it, Joe throws a handful of glow inks out of his inventory and onto the ground. Scar notices it right away. Cleo points the finger at Joe. Joe says he said ten minutes ago that he was going to put up a sign on Scar’s behalf apologizing for the alarm, but nobody ever listens to him. Cleo laughs and says they love it when a plan comes together, they just wish it was theirs. The others are skeptical. Scar points out that Cleo is really pumping the ego of whoever did this and that’s a little suspicious. Cleo says that if they were the culprit, they would’ve told everyone. Joe points out that Cleo could’ve told everyone and it might not have changed anything. After all, Joe told everyone he was going to place the sign and nobody listened to that! Cleo points out that people actually listen to them.

2:24:30 Scar has a thought, forgets it immediately, then immediately remembers it again. He wants to know why his Chat is so insistent that it is Beef. ((Scar’s chat is very devoted to the Big Salmon Theory.)) Why would it be Beef? Cleo laughs and says every single one of them knows why it isn’t Beef right now, and that Beef is too busy to be getting up to any kind of shenanigans. The others agree and warn Scar not to say anything or else there will be real trouble. Scar suggests that Beef’s gonna have a beef with him, but he doesn’t offer any further hints. ((Cleo is obliquely referring to an announcement Beef will make the next day; he and his wife are expecting their first child and thus Beef has way bigger salmon to fry than moonlighting as the Ore Snatcher.)) Cub explains that Beef was part of the Big Salmon consortium that feuded with Doc and Big Wood at the start of the season, but that feud is pretty much over now. They all admire the Big Salmon floating in the Hourglass.

2:26:00 Scar reports that his Chat has turned around on the Beef question, they believe Cleo that it cannot be Beef. The group goes back to trying to decide who the Ore Snatcher actually is, aside from Joe who is still mad it isn’t him. They each go around the circle and give Scar a theory, but none of them seem better supported than the others. Scar says this is all useless, but he’s going to go get a search warrant to search everyone’s storage systems. Ren asks if Scar is going to search his own storage system, perchance? Scar says he’ll have Doc do it. Ren is satisfied by that. Cleo says that’ll definitely work, because nobody on this server except the culprit has deepslate diamond ore, surely.

2:29:00 Scar’s favorite theory is that it was Doc himself, causing drama by stealing his own diamonds. The others think that’s a funny theory. Joe says his favorite theory is that the Scicraft guys got in touch with Karin, Doc’s partner, and gave her detailed instructions on how to carry out the thefts in retribution for unspecified petty wrongs. Whenever Doc is out of the house with Doccy, she’s sneaking onto the server with his account and stealing the diamonds based on detailed tutorials. Scar loves this idea. Ren asks if that means Karin has to come to court. Nobody is sure if she even has a Minecraft account. She might have to make one to come to court.

2:30:40 Cleo laughs and suggests that this has all been a big ploy to jump-start Karin’s YouTube career. Joe is taken by this idea and suggests it would be an amazing spinoff series, Karin and Mrs. Tango and Lizzie Shadow-Beans, but they’re all thieves. Ren puts forth a suggestion from his chat that maybe it _is_ Lizzie, pranking Doc when Joel is out of the house. Cleo thinks Karin is a more likely suspect than Lizzie. Scar admits it’s unlikely, but hilarious. Cleo says that now it is imperative that some Hermit’s spouse begins pranking the server. Joe says that now that his fiance Badgerspanner has heard that, she’s going to demand to be able to do it. Cleo laughs and points out that Joe will get blamed for that. Joe cheerfully announces that he knows, and it’s just going to make more work for Cleo because she’s going to have to explain to him why, when everybody thought it was a funny idea during this stream. Scar suddenly chimes in with “Desperate Hermitwives” from his Chat.

2:32:50 Cleo wants to wrap up, but she stays long enough to hear one more Bdubs theory. Ren wants to know what better way there could be to get people into the court for lawsuits than by causing a bunch of trouble? Cub likes that idea, but Cleo and Scar argue about whether the court actually costs money. Cub is still accusing Scar though, saying that nobody has more to gain from crimes on the server than the Poe Poe. Scar protests, saying he and Bdubs are the Judicial system and devoted to stopping crime! Because the police are never corrupt, right? The argument continues for a moment until Scar finally says “I touched Doc’s boring machine, I blew it up, I banged it too hard, and I’m not interested in banging Doc’s redstone anymore.”

2:34:35 There is a moment of silence. Cleo announces she is leaving. It’s been a lovely stream, they should do this again sometime never. She flies away laughing and insisting that nobody should ever ask Scar why, because No. Cleo apologizes to Chat for getting nothing useful done, but Chat clearly does not care. Cleo goes back to full screen to thank subs and donos, then says that even though she didn’t plan a lot, she did technically plan the plan, which was the plan all along. So that’s something. Cleo raids into Rendog and (with a brief interruption from Joe and his train whistle) ends their stream.

#hermitcraft #stream recap #zombiecleo #docm77 #goodtimeswithscar #rendog #cubfan135 #joe hills

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unnaturalequilibrium · 2 months ago

Text

Capítulo 1

- Mafin rewatch (Sueños de Libertad)

I'm doing a rewatch and I want to dump my thoughts. We'll see how far I get. Block me, or the tag if it gets too annoying.

There’s something about a show establishing itself. It's like marmalade toast slipping out of your clumsy hand and falling to its doom. Sweet, but messy. The exposition that just gets splashed across the screen at every instance. Everything has to be explained as you enter this new world and they try to build it in front of you. It might be a little sticky then and there, but surprisingly nostalgic once you go back and already know all of the building blocks by name. And I can’t quite put my finger on why, but there’s something about the music in this episode that gives me sort of Beauty and the Beast vibes. If one of the colony girls burst out into song I wouldn’t really have been that surprised, it would feel natural and like she is only doing what the habitat required of her. Don’t really know who’d be who in this rendition though, except for Mateo who is clearly Chip and Gaspar who can be no one but Cogsworth.

Also, I kind of love that Marta’s first line of the entire show is about being disgusted by the straights making out in front of her breakfast. That’s my little lesbian in the making. It’s almost as good as Fina’s first introduction as the moody oaf who can’t keep a single emotion off her face even if her life depended on it. And why do I feel such strange warmth at that first two shot of them behind the cash register at the store? I don’t know, but I do. Almost as much warmth as the fact that they are the only ones in the opening credits that come with a pre-established link before there even is one.

Is that the virgin Mary above Fina’s bed? My applause for being able to find a statue that looks like its scissoring its hands together while still being able to pull off Catholicism. In another time and Universe closer to our own contemporary world - Fina would have bought that statue on her own and shamelessly have referred to it as her scissor sister. This is my headcanon and I'm sticking with it.

Marta taking care of her little brother is warming my heart. This neat businesswoman with a kind of regal disposition and she just throws his bag over her shoulder and carries on like no big whup. I like that they break up the somewhat stuck up facade she has by teasing that there's more there if you just focus for a couple of seconds longer.

Aww, jealous and guarded Fina with her box of secret sapphic letters. This is such a contrast to the Fina we know and love, but also one hundred percent is the very same. That mood, oh how I love that mood.

They’re establishing Marta's absent husband and she really doesn’t bat an eye at the fact that he’s off somewhere in Manila. Doing rugged things and not being her problem. Alas, you sweet summer child (I whisper at her, but mostly also to remind myself of what's to come).

Marta really does start off as the mediator between her brothers, I am looking forward to the development and shift in those relationships.

I love how there wasn’t a single bone of subtle in Fina’s gay introduction. The woman practically lost her jaw at a shapely ankle and fidgeted like a frantic frisky teenager when she finally managed to tear her eyes away from Petra. It’s kind of glorious that they spent no time beating around this bush. Straight to the gay point.

Isidro is established as a weather-worn relationship Yoda from the getgo. He sees people and their relationships. It’s kind of sweet actually. He’s the driver, this scruffy old man, but somehow is the one that cuts through to the core of people’s emotions without hardly any effort. I like that from day one he's the one they turn to as a confidante, Fina, Digna and even Damian later on.

There wasn’t actually a whole lot of Marta in this episode. There’s almost as much Fina and she’s clearly a supporting character. It’s kind of interesting. Especially as what we see of Marta is someone who bends to those around her, she’s got a straight back, but she moves in relation to those around her and doesn’t seem to have a lot of personal agency. Very interesting considering where they’re going to be taking her. Fitting. Yeah, this is going to be fun. Fun for me at least.

#mafin rewatch #mafin #sueños de libertad

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harrypotterfuryroad · 4 months ago

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What was your journey with all this? Did you at one point blindly agree and then learn new things that changed your mind (like I did) or were you skeptical from the start?

so i was never all in, but i had plenty of friends that were, and when it first started taking off in my social circles (2013ish) i tried my best to keep up with the lingo and be supportive. after all there's a lot of stuff i know i don't understand and who am i to discredit people's lived experiences? my degrees are all in biology so i never bought into the "humans can change sex actually" line, but if the wishful thinking made someone's life easier then sure fine i guess.

the cracks first started to show for me when nonbinary started popping up as a concept. broadly i understood what it was trying to do, but my two instant questions were "isn't everyone a little masculine and a little feminine?" and "if people are uncomfortable with being sorted into box A or box B, how does building box C help them?" i kept asking (out of genuine curiosity) and no one could give me an answer that made sense. obviously i could rattle off now about how this is because the whole thing is built on stereotypes but i was still trying to smile and nod my way through it at the time

my time in my phd program really solidified things for me for a couple reasons. like obv it overlapped with the general rise to prominence of all of this so it was kinda hard to miss, but also i was in an area with a really strong gay community so i got to see firsthand how it took root and grew from there. i saw a prominent local lesbian activist get ousted from my city's lgbt council for butting heads with a tim, and i saw the gradual shift from gay men being super comfortable playing around with the boundaries of dress and behavior to continuous questioning if someone is "one of the dolls" now because he wore a dress once

but also my phd was specifically about a lot of the issues that pop up in this whole debate, like social stress, adolescent development, sex differences in adulthood, and even a little bit about how social media is replacing normal social interaction but isn't meeting the same needs, so i'm watching all this happen while i'm reading papers from as early as the 70s that are basically predicting these exact patterns (then covid hit and amplified everything i was already seeing)

basically i just got more comfortable recognizing when someone is scientifically illiterate but really good at projecting confidence. i had a couple friends who were on lupron (for its on-label use, not as a puberty blocker) and each one had a terrible time, with really intolerable side effects. i looked into it more and it turns out these side effects are really common, which made me think this is a drug that made it through clinical trials but hadn't really taken off commercially so the company is trying to clean up its image or find a new market for it (something we were trained to notice in my phd program). then the drug started getting touted as safe and reversible for kids, and i just finally let myself feel comfortable getting angry about that. if you're saying this drug is safe, you're either lying or uninformed. lupron is the same story as viagra (where its more well-known use wasn't its initial intended use) but with all the leverage of the biggest social justice movement of the day, and it doesn't take much to recognize that without that clout there's no way to positively spin the junk data it's producing

other things i looked into more where the party line falls apart as soon as you screen out the spin: the trans murder rate, the trans suicide rate, prevalence and mechanisms of DSDs, the impact of adolescent testosterone levels on adult physical performance, neurological correlates of gender identity, and what a chromosome is

#and this is all on a conceptual level #not even getting into how all of this instantly turns into harm for other people

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pasta-in-the-pudding · 6 months ago

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When requests are open;3 jeff, ben, (im sorry i love them) and child reader maybe 12/13? that is the biggest troublemaker ever. Like this kid has put jeffs WHITE hoodie in the washer with sallys PINK dress and they scared Ben to make him lose his game😭 like they are the definition of chaos and they do not think when they speak, they are very flirty with others, they also tried hitting on jane once.. butttt that dont matter rn. But like put this damn child on a leash‼️ (sorry for yapping:c)

-🎀

Summary: Various creeps with a trouble maker child reader headcanons

Genre: Fluff

Warnings: None

A/n: I changed up the format a bit idkkk

Credits- Any creepypasta characters used- Creepypasta, Divider- waspsribbon

Oh lord

Oh lordy lord

Let's get one thing straight, due to you being a trouble maker, you aren't allowed in a lot of places

For example, you aren't allowed to be anywhere near "perfectionist" creeps, creeps with anger issues, or the more "scary" creeps

Both for your own safety and for the mental wellbeing of said creeps

This being said, you still find ways to have fun

Despite being not allowed around Jeff, you can still get your hands on his hoodie when he leaves it out on the couch by mistake

And of course, being such good friends with Sally, she doesn't say no to you giving her favorite dress a wash

Jeff is confused, because he can't find his hoodie anywhere, no matter how hard he looks

Someone suggests that he check the laundry, because it isn't uncommon for other's clothes to end up in someone else's laundry

Then, all the whole manor hears "You're fucking kidding!" as Jeff discovers his hoodie, dyed a shade of light pink

Seeing Sally's dress in there with it, he assumes that it's sally's fault

So he storms up to Sally's room, holding up his hoodie and going "You think this is funny?"

Sally doesn't like being yelled at, so she almost immediately starts crying, trying to explain that it wasn't her that put her dress in there with his hoodie

All the while, you giggle at the mischif

You are allowed around Ben, as he doesn't pose a threat to you in any way

And because of how emotionless he is, you like to try and find ways to get a reaction out of him

He almost always seems to catch on to what you are doing though, so you never get the chance to actually put your plan into action

But this time, he is distracted by Toby talking to him while he plays video games

He is trying to beat his current high score, so the tensions are high

You see your chance and sneak up on him, to which he is none the wiser

You then wait until he is very focused, before screaming right by his ear, making him jump and lose the game

As the "Game over" tune plays on the screen, he just stares at you, absolutely bewildered that you would do such a thing to him

Ben's a pretty chill guy, but the number one unspoken rule with him is DONT fuck with his video games

Toby is also shocked, stating "There's no way that just happened"

Ben doesn't even know what to do

He's just so shocked that somebody would do that

He is still silent as you laugh and walk away

You are allowed around Jane, as she is one of the caretakers of the manor

Jane gets flirted with a lot, mostly by the men of the manor despite her being a lesbian

They promptly get either told off or a middle finger in their face

Even though she's used to being flirted with at this point, she would have never expected to be flirted with by a child

As she brings you your breakfast, you look up at her and say "You know, if we got married i'd cook for you everyday"

She thinks you are just being a sweet kid at this point, so she replies "Aw, how sweet! You're too young to marry me though, silly"

Another day, she is dressed up as she is going to a party, to which you say "Jane, you really are a sight for sore eyes"

She is flabbergasted, like where did you hear that????

She just awkwardly laughs before walking away

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honest-cat · 19 days ago

Text

[source]

alright, so let me get this straight. you're saying that you would recommend the LISA games over Utena despite those games:

showing a girl hanging herself on the title screen (Painful and Joyful),

making you play as a girl whose thoughts are occupied by her abuser (First), (the ending shows she even forgot what her own mother looks like, as her visage was replaced by her abusive father's,)

regularly using bloody violence to support its story and themes (Painful and Joyful),

having creatures with grotesque body horror (Painful and Joyful),

having a mechanic that can permanently kill party members (Painful),

and uses the dismemberment of its main character as a mechanic that directly effects gameplay (Painful).

meanwhile, Utena has:

a whimsical and epic opening with an appropriately themed song to match the visuals,

NO bloody violence, the worst that happens is a few teenagers slap each other (which Lily herself uses as an example as being unpleasant to watch, that pussy) and get into sword fights where the goal is to knock off the rose they're wearing,

has very fantastic and eccentric moments that the LISA series does not have because it is just that kind of game,

and does contain abuse, but is more indirect and symbolic about it than LISA is.

and I KNOW it's the abuse and violence that disturbs you about Utena, because it's one of the drawbacks you listed in your media literacy video: [source]

to be fair to you, you did state that Utena takes a long time to "get to the point" and makes the abuse harder to stomach, but that is a you problem, Lily. most people can stomach Utena because it isn't entrenched in blood, violence, and abuse of all kinds like the LISA series. I'm sorry you're too impatient to sit through 39 episodes of a 90s anime, but that is not Utena's fault.

hell, remember when you said an Utena game would play like Kingdom Hearts, and that those two series have a lot of similarities to each other? I do. [source 1] [source 2] [source 3]

why are you recommending LISA and not Kingdom Hearts? hell, why are you even comparing Utena to a thing you like when you said Utena was the worst anime you've watched and watching it again was such a miserable experience? do you dislike Utena because it didn't give you a fluffy lesbian rom-com? how come you barely talk about the LISA series but talk more in-depth about Utena recently? is this to get back at Sai? do you only like and recommend the LISA series because hbomberguy said it was good like 7 years ago?

I have many questions that will go unanswered, but that's on-par for someone like Lily. she refuses to elaborate on her points, and that's a problem when you decided your job is critiquing art. you have to be able to clearly communicate your thoughts, and even now, Lily herself still struggles to do so and instead pins the blame on people who just want her to explain what she's going on about. it's very disappointing.

#gigas txt #lily orchard

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queermania · 2 years ago

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Wait wait wait. Jensen picked the writer who gave Dean a lesbian best friend and made him a nerd to be the show runner for his little fixit fic show? This is amazing!

when you look at robbie's run of episodes (that he wrote specifically, not produced or was the executive story editor on), a very specific version of supernatural and dean starts to emerge and it is insanity-inducing. here's a very brief rundown of the episodes robbie wrote:

slash fiction -swayze always gets a pass -dean singing air supply -"it's like eating self-righteousness' -the creation and introduction of frank devereaux -"applications for sainthood" -dean letting sam go

time after time -"what are you gonna look up more anime or are you strictly into dick now?" -dean being a nerdy little fanboy about eliott ness (and checking out a dude in a uniform but that was probably jacting joices) -dean getting excited about dressing up in period clothing!! -understanding that rufus matters and that family isn't just blood -original sam is milf!bait (and he's into it) truther -actually writing grief in nuanced ways -dean is smart and resourceful actually! -your future is "covered in thick black ooze" (which i know is just a very lucky coincidence but i don't care!)

the girl with the dungeons and dragons tattoo -CHARLIE!!! he gave us charlie. he said "actually what if hardcore fans were cool and fun and GAY and they were dean's new best friend" -charlie/dean/security guard flirting split screen -"she's kinda like the little sister I never wanted." "how does a high-school dropout become one of the brightest minds…" -basically this entire episode is just "be gay, do crime" and i love that for me specifically

bitten -not my favorite episode but as @ilarual says "it's very fun in how it illustrates Robbie's willingness to play with form, since it's all done as found footage" -and as @doctorprofessorsong says it "has the concept of monsters aren’t always bad guys" -and apparently it contains a brokeback reference? my memory of this episode is hovering at around 1% tbh but you get it

larp and the real girl -dressing dean up in little outfits AGAIN -and he likes it!!! -and he likes being a nerd! (dean is getting into it and sam is the one who is unamused mr serious guy!!!!) -and charlie is dean's new best friend! -"belladonna" "the pornstar?" -"did you break up with someone too?" -honestly you already know all of it. this is a fan favorite for a reason. what more can i say about this episode??

goodbye stranger -yes robbie was the first writer to try to give us a destiel love confession -cas practicing killing dean over and over and over and still not being able to do it when it comes down to it -"what broke the connection?" gee i wonder -first episode writing cas and he nailed the sort of unintentional deadpan humor that makes cas so lovable ("would it kill you to watch a movie? read a book?" "a movie, no, but with a book with the proper spells—yeah, it could theoretically kill me.") -"if he's so sketchy then why are you praying to him?" -pizza man reference -"do you really think we can trust megstiel?" (we get both megstiel and jealous!dean) -dean quoting lord of the rings (because he's a nerd! and he reads!) -meg roasting the shit out of sam for the amelia stuff -etc

pac-man fever -charlie reading the carver edlund books -charlie and dean being besties/getting a montage -dean telling charlie that what happened with her parents wasn't her fault/understanding the guilt she feels -"i love you" "i know" -"what about castiel? he seems helpful, and dreamy" -again, putting dean in little outfits -charlie knows how to shoot/aim a gun

slumber party -dorothy!! -oz!!! -look, is this episode cheesy? yes. but it's fun and it's so obviously a love letter to the oz source material and i love that about robbie. he does his research and he commits

first born -cain!!!! -drowley team up!!!!! ("friends. besties, actually." im sorry but drowley means so much to me personally and this is the start of their beautiful bromance) -"this is by far the dumbest idea you've ever had." "yeah, well, it's early" -cas liked pb&js!! jelly, not jam. he found jam unsettling!! -"you have a guinea pig? where?" -"you're a terrible liar?" "that is not true. i once deceived and betrayed both you and your brother." -just. sastiel shenanigans (and hugs!) -"she only asked for one thing." "to stop" -anyway. you get it.

meta fiction -dean and cas phone call smiles!! they LIKE each other -metatron media dump -"what makes a story work? is it the plot, the characters, the text? the subtext? and who gives a story meaning? is the writer? or you?" -i think it's important to note that robbie who wrote gabriel faking his own death -cas noticing something is wrong with dean pretty much instantly and then discovering the mark of cain

fan fiction -i mean. come on. -"although we do explore the nature of destiel in act two." -"you can't spell subtext without s-e-x" -sam being such a younger brother and trolling dean about "destiel" -"BM scene" -dean "you know they're brothers, right?"-ing the w*ncest stuff but just being flustered about the destiel stuff ayyyy -dean casually referencing andrew lloyd webber -"transformative fiction" -"i want you to put as much sub into that text as you possibly can" -dean quoting rent -the samulet is back! -"i have my version, and you have yours." -"he took away our own free will" <- about john!! -THE RETURN OF CHUCK!

there's no place like home -"i forgive you dean" "yeah well i don't" "i know, kinda your move" -"you hurt my friend" -"you lied to me" "you lied to yourself. that's kinda your move." -i mean. robbie just gets it, ya know?

book of the damned -cas being a huge bitch (love that) -sam being the excessively codependent one -cas and charlie get to meet! -found family goodness if only for a little bit!!

angel heart -ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!! -"i got it at the hot topical" (and claire keeping grumpy cat) -no seriously. dean and cas went birthday present shopping together for claire and they did it at a mall -castiel feeling guilt for what he did to the novak family (and amelia recognizing that cas has changed/grown) -"you were both troubled teens. you speak her language." -"bring your daughter to work day" -"i'm saying she might be stronger on her own." which is a controversial line but i think it says something really significant about how dean feels about his childhood "in fact you're not anything to her except a constant reminder of someone that's gone." -mini golf!!!!!! dean and claire bonding!!!! -the introduction of the grigori, a class of angels which may or may not be important at some point -claire roasting the shit out of dean with "you seem pretty old" <3 -"happy birthday. don't shoot me."

baby -do i really need to explain anything about this one? -"okay first of all, never use swayze's name in vain, okay? ever." -"mistakes were made" -dean having a dream about john teaching him to drive but under normal and appropriate circumstances -werepire…. ghoulpyre… -honestly just the whole episde. you know what i'm talking about. the unique perspective. the insight into their day-to-day lives. the moments that live in between.

into the mystic -eileen! my best friend eileen! -dean x mildred otp -remembering sam's lucifer/hell trauma -the whole "follow your heart" speech -"banshees go after the vulnerable, so why'd it go after you?" -dean recognizing there's something off with cas -but really the most important thing here is EILEEN

safe house -bobby and rufus!!!! -i repeat BOBBY AND RUFUS!!!! -"were you ever nice?" "1985. worst year of my life." -robbie just really GETS that this show is more fun when it's not centered entirely on the brothers. -bobby referring to sam and dean as his boys -timey wimey shenanigans -there were some interesting implications in this episode too but i'm losing steam here so i'm gonna let you rewatch and figure it out lol

don't call me shurley -the reveal of chuck as god!!!! -bisexual chuck -dean does sam's laundry (sometimes with beer) -chuck is a shitty egotistical writer -he also plays the guitar and: "i like front row seats. you know, i figured i'd hide out in plain sight." -"i thought if i could show my sister that there was something more than just us, something better than us, then maybe she'd change. maybe she'd stop being… her. but every time I'd build a new world, she'd destroy it." -"the world would still be spinning with demon dean in it but sam couldn't have that though could he?" -"you were gonna choose amara over me."

so. yeah. jensen chose THIS GUY to helm the winchesters. bold move, sir. full respect.

also, this tweet always makes me crack up

one of us! one of us! one of us!

#replies #anonymous #robbie thompson #mp

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amf-studios · 5 months ago

Text

You know what? I'm bored. Let's stur the pot a little. @mystic-warriors already has a series on "what your favorite yokai says about you" so this is:

What your favorite yokai watch ship says about you; wild accusation edition!

(Take all of this with a grain of salt.)

Natie(Nate x Katie): you're boring. You ship the Canon ships in everything because you lack imagination, and you probably love Shadowside, and we're made when Katie wasn't initially playable in 3

Nailey(Nate x hailey): you're ideal relationship dynamic is wacky hijinks in which shenanigans ensue. Yokai watch 3 is probably your favorite game, and you're likely a weeb.

Bucknate: you're ideal relationship dynamic is wacky hijinks in which shenanigans ensue. Yokai watch 3 is probably your favorite game, and you're likely gay or a fujoshi

Bucknaily(Buck x Nate x Hailey): you're ideal relationship dynamic is the three stooges. And 3 is definitely your favorite game.

Kailey(Katie x Hailey): be it lesbian or bi, you are of the opinion there is no universe in which Hailey Anne Thomas is straight

Beddie(bear x Eddie): you ship the leftovers since you know they're never gonna be as important as the other guys

Lucanate(Nate x lucas): you think lucas desperately deserved more screen time

Keiyuto(keita/Nate x Yuto): you really like the second movie, and it amazes you more people don't bring up the time Nate talked someone out of suicide.

Jailey(Hailey x Jessica) same as the Kailey shippers, but you acknowledge mainline Hailey and Katie have never properly met.

Hailibel(Hailey x Isabel): same as the kailey shippers, but you're ideal relationship dynamic is nerd x prep.

Nate x blizzaria: you're probably a Japanese fan, Blizzaria is your favorite yokai, and you subsist purely on fanart.

Damonate(Nate x Damona): same as the last one just switch out the ice bitch. You also probably prefer goths, are aware Nate is canonically attracted to aggressive women... or you're name is Chiaki amf studios. XP

Nate x Toiletta: you acknowledge that Toiletta has a pretty screwed up backstory due to being Hanako-San, and want good things for her.

Katie x Venoct: you are just the Blizzaria x Nate shippers but with the opposite genders, and an unhealthy attachment to Sasuke.

Katie x kyubi: you ship this out of pity for Kyubi. This is a pity ship.

Most Manjimutt ships: jail.

Manjimutt x mermother: you either really like that one episode of the reboot, or your a couple of my friends who hate how the anime portrayed Manjimutt and want to give him something good.(you know who you are.)

Arachnius x toadel dude: i don't think there's anything I can say that hasn't already been said about you.

Robonyan x B3-NK1: you're either gay, a fujoshi, or you just respect they managed to have a robot cat get pegged on a shos that aired on DISNEY.

And that's about all I can think of right now :P.

If this post does well enough I'll think of more

#yokai watch #yo kai watch #yo-kai watch #nate adams #katie forester #hailey anne thomas #ykw

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maxdibert · 2 months ago

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Do you think that the fact that most Harry Potter fanfics have gay couples as pairings (to the detriment of straight or lesbian couples) is because people have difficulty writing f/f characters as strong and m/f as equals or is this due to underrepresentation? of women in books?

This is an interesting question, especially because it’s not limited to the Harry Potter fandom; it’s actually quite widespread in all fandoms, particularly those where there are either very few female characters, or where the female characters play much more secondary roles than the male ones. I think nowadays, with the (slow, but ongoing) effort being made to foster representation, these sorts of things might go more unnoticed. But in series or franchises from fifteen or twenty years ago (we’re talking early 2000s here, no need to go all the way back to the '80s), it was pretty common for m/m pairings to prevail over the canon het couples and, of course, far above f/f couples, which are basically the ugly ducklings of most fandoms—and this isn’t just a coincidence.

The Harry Potter case is especially interesting to me because it’s a series written by a woman where, in fact, there are quite a few female characters, and one of the most important in the whole series (Hermione) is a girl. She’s not only the most significant female character but is also the only one truly developed, with depth and a gradual evolution throughout the books. The rest of the women are either unimportant secondary characters, villains, or merely “placeholder” girlfriends for Harry who only becomes relevant in the last two books (and yes, I’m talking about Ginny, who I find unbearable. J.K. Rowling’s forced attempt to keep Harry in the Weasley family shoves us with this girl who’s meant nothing throughout the story and is then given this “pick me” girl personality—please don’t count me among the other girls—which not only has aged terribly, but I already found it repulsive back then).

I’m bringing up Hermione because it’s not just that she’s the most important girl in the story; she’s also the token character who is constantly paired with every male character in the saga, including men who are twenty years her senior and are her professors, father figures, or fathers of her schoolmates. And this is really interesting because it’s not that Hermione “matches” with everyone or could remain in character if paired with Sirius or Snape; it’s simply that Hermione is the only genuinely complex, three-dimensional female character in the entire series. So, if people choose to create non-canon pairings between canon characters, she’s the easiest choice because she’s got substance and a basis to build on. The rest of the female characters are mere shadows or are relegated to the role of villains or mothers. And if we talk about the younger female characters, it’s a real hair-puller.

Sure, Rowling doesn’t give recurring characters much emphasis in general, but for every ten things you know about a male character, you only know one about their female equivalent. If you know little about Dean Thomas, you know even less about Parvati Patil, just as an example. And all those secondary characters with a bit more screen time ultimately end up being someone’s girlfriend or wife. For example, Fleur, who is also the only one who doesn’t make much of a mark during the Triwizard Tournament (what a coincidence—the three guys stand out, and she doesn’t). We then only see her as Bill’s girlfriend and eventual wife. And the other semi-relevant female characters despise her for being beautiful, only accepting her when she proves she’s a devoted, loyal woman to her husband, no matter what happens to him, even if he’s scarred or turns into a werewolf. This vision of a beautiful, confident woman as merely a sexualized figure (as initially presented) or a threat to other women (as happens later), who can only prove her worth as a woman who conforms to “proper” standards by renouncing her feminine essence to become a wife, is typical of a misogynistic, male gaze often found in fiction. It’s quite striking here because it’s a woman writing the story, yet she still falls into the same old tropes.

Then there’s Tonks, shown as an Auror, an independent woman with her own job, who’s “cool” because she’s “not like other girls” with her colorful hair and Metamorphmagus powers. But all that gets overshadowed when she suddenly becomes a simp for Lupin, who, on top of it all, abandons her after she becomes pregnant, yet she forgives him because love conquers all. Excuse me? This is the female representation you get in the series. Because the rest are mothers: Lily is a saint who sacrifices her life for her son, Molly Weasley is basically a tradwife, and Narcissa Malfoy is only worthy of some respect when she risks everything for Draco. Again, we know much more about their husbands than we do about them; we know more about the men in their lives than we do about them. Their husbands have deeper backstories, richer histories.

Take Lily, for example. We know nothing about her. The little we do know comes from Snape’s memories, and it’s tiny compared to everything we know about James throughout the series. We know so much about James that we can debate endlessly about whether he was truly a good guy or a jerk, and this despite the fact that both are dead at the start of the story and Lily’s relationship with Harry is supposedly more central to the plot. Yet James is more fleshed out! James had friends, friends who talk about him, who tell his son about their youthful adventures. James was someone outside of being a father and husband; Lily wasn’t. Lily is Petunia’s sister, Harry’s mother, Snape’s lost love/friend, and James’ crush and future wife—period. That’s it. Did Lily not have friends of her own? Didn’t she hang out with other girls in her year? Didn’t she have relationships beyond Severus? Why is there not a single friend of Lily’s in the entire saga who can tell Harry what his mother was like? We have not one, but two friends of James, a traitor, and an enemy. But for Lily? Nothing. Only Snape, whose relationship with Lily isn’t even revealed until the final book.

All the Weasleys, except Ginny, are boys. We know things about all or most of the Weasleys, and they have significant moments in the story despite being secondary characters. There are no recurring female counterparts who show up as consistently. Harry’s female classmates don’t interest him, or only come up when Hermione criticizes them. Generally speaking, the female characters have a lot of shortcomings compared to the male characters at any level of the story.

All this to say, while you could argue there’s female representation in the story, is there really? The only girl from the Marauder’s era is Lily. Mary McDonald is mentioned, but we know nothing about her. The rest of the female characters in that fandom are invented—names that pop up randomly in the books with no physical description, no substance, no relevance to the plot. They’re practically OCs thrown into fanfics because all that exists is Lily and the name of some supposed friend of hers who we never hear from again. There’s very little material to work with. And even though Harry’s generation has more girls, they aren’t significant enough for people to be interested in them because there are more boys, and the boys are much better developed. So, people either dive into slash or create OCs because there isn’t much else to hold onto. And if we talk about the reasons behind the lack of f/f pairings, it boils down to the same thing: if it’s hard enough with het couples because, aside from Hermione, Ginny, or Luna, it’s hard to find anything to work with among the female characters, imagine trying with two women.

Of course, I also think it’s largely because there’s zero LGBTQ representation in these stories, but back then, LGBTQ representation was practically non-existent in all children’s/young adult fiction. Although, seeing where J.K. Rowling stands on these issues now, I doubt she’d have done much differently in that regard today.

What I’m saying is that I’ve seen time and time again that when a fandom has well-developed female characters who actually matter, people do work with them. Take “A Song of Ice and Fire,” for example: we’re talking about a story with a ton of male characters, but every single female character has a point of view, a backstory, and a way of seeing the world. You get to know each of them, even the less important ones. If you dive into that fandom, you’ll see all kinds of het pairings and plenty of f/f pairings too. And this is a medieval fantasy saga with plenty of misogyny, but the reality is that it has a very powerful and diverse cast, full of women, each of whom is her own person with a story, ambitions, and a journey—and that gives you something to work with, which is not the case with Harry Potter. But it’s not exclusive to that saga; if you look at fandoms like Naruto, which hit their peak around the same time, it’s the same thing. Ultimately, the common thread I see (besides the fact that we live in a patriarchal society that usually ignores women in fiction, even when it’s by female authors) across all these fandoms where m/m dominates over any other pairing is precisely the lack of female characters or, if there are enough, the fact that their development ranges from minimal to nonexistent.

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