TROP s2 ep7. A rant.
Firstly, this episode has been such a joy to watch, secondly, my heart rate is concerning.
Galadriel:
I loved the scene where she was in the cage, completely ready to die, because she wants to make things right. The scene with Celebrimbor was fantastic, at any moment I expected it to actually be Sauron, but the gentle way she talks to him and held his face like a child broke my heart. Phenomenal acting on both sides and the music was also amazing. Her kindness towards Arondir broke me. Her advising him against seeking out Adar was pure irony given her hunt against Sauron.
Galadriel sneaking around in that orc cloak was so stressful, even though we know she lives.
She seems kinder than in previous episodes, perhaps a result of no longer being around the ring? Or maybe she's just realising everything is going wrong. Either way, can't wait to see where her character goes next.
Elrond:
This guy. I loved how at first he looked ready for battle, but that he was also terribly afraid. But something seemed to switch in his character when his horse was killed and his pure anger there really shocked me. Also absolute savage for sending that orc flying.
I would like to take a moment to admire that he pauses to briefly mourn his horse.
The stunts that he performed are insane in this episode, and I love how Arondir keeps him safe throughout the later part of the battle.
"Durin will come" was such an important part to me, Elrond really looks like a young boy, as if he were sat on the beach during the third kinslaying again. I think the way that was portrayed was breathtaking.
And how he sits, looking up at Adar, completely ready to give in, broke me, he is utterly defeated. He has been abandoned once more (I know there were reasons but that's probably how Elrond feels). He then tries to stab Adar, but it is clear from where he aims for that he doesn't want to kill Adar, he wants to hurt him. His sigh when Adar got the ring kind of made me laugh, he's so done with all this crap.
I can't wait to see the aftermath of this.
Minor characters:
Camnir: so glad he was not in this episode or I would have cried.
Vorohil: please let this guy live. I will be sad.
Rian: I am sad. But absolute props to her for that savage arrow in her final moments.
Narvi: he just watched his kin be killed by his own king...let Narvi be ok.
Celebrimbor:
Ow. I hurt. Charles Edwards is an absolute gem, no he may not "look right" for Celebrimbor, but his potrayal of Celebrimbors descent was amazing.
Also, props to the set team for the scene where the forge transforms into its true state.
He tries so hard to fight against Sauron, he literally cuts his own thumb off. His own. Thumb. And when he's caught by the guards, he tries so hard to explain. I was so scared they'd just hand him back to Sauron until Galadriel showed her face.
I feel like I need to mention Mirdania. She was another product of Sauron's deception. Her death was horrifying and...I just can't even. Her naivety to believe "Annatar" about Celebrimbor, a man she greatly admired, was so sad, and then for her to spend her last moments believing that Celebrimbor had killed her? Ouch.
Celebrimbor tried so hard to escape, only to do what a true lord of Eregion would do, return to the only place he could protect it from, and the place he had just escaped. His bravery really shines through, and in the end it is he who comforts Galadriel.
ps: shot on the left is fantastic.
Sauron:
Still a bitch. But now with Darth Vader powers for some reason. Probably about to destroy Alderaan. I have no more to say.
Adar:
Yea I'm expecting a full orc rebellion next episode. He doesn't care as much as he did about his children which is why they were loyal to him in the first place. Glûg stayed behind when the others went to fight so I think that says a lot. It'll be interesting to see where that goes. I also hate him now because Arondir.
Durin:
Durin's speech was so middle-earthy I loved it. And then it goes to shit. I love that he got Narvi on side. The scene where he sees Elrond again means so much to me, there has not been enough of these two in this series and I really hope ep8 rectifies that, particularly after what happened (or rather, didn't happen) on the battlefield.
I love that Durin admires Elrond's new hair, as he should, it is fabulous. ALSO WHERE IS DISA. I swear if Disa dies, then I do too.
Look at this dwarf in his element. Also eff his dad, his dad is a prick.
He's really starting to come into his own, fighting against the evil. And you can see later how much his father's actions hurt him because not only does it mean he can't aid Eregion, but his father has killed dwarves. His own kind.
Amazon, please be kind to Durin next episode.
Gil-Galad:
Not much to say except from look at this boi in all his regalia. Love it when you see a monarch actually in the fighting, makes you like them. Especially as Gil-Galad has not been the most likeable chap this series.
Arondir:
Anyone needs me, I will be crying. That's all I have to say.
Overall thoughts on episode:
Battle sequence was 10/10. The effort put into this show amazes me. Fantastic acting from everyone, namely Charles Edwards, Charlie Vickers, Robert Aramayo and Morfydd Clark (ok fine, everyone). Well done to all the stunt horses as well, such good horses. Bear McCreary's soudntrack shone this episode, including so many characters themes. Also the last ballad of Damrod in the credits!
I am both anticipating and dreading next episode. What will happen with Celebrimbor? And what of Khazad-Dum? How will Adar use the ring? And will we need a box of tissues?
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my god the revisionist history in this fandom sometimes, like. i guess some part of me should be glad that people watching it in 2023 can watch supernatural and say, this show was not queerbaiting, dean and cas are obviously together and anyone who watches it should know, and the confession was redundant and useless, but.
guys.
i'm not saying this undercut the work of many writers who spent years layering in details of queer subtext, parallel storylines, and meaningful moments between dean and cas. those things exist—alongside actively homophobic text, yes, but they exist, and they are important—hugely so to me. but there is a reason why destiel is a case study in academic works on queerbaiting. there's a wink and a nudge that comes with a lot of the queer subtext in the 2000s and 2010s, where creators can allude to their characters being queer either by having other characters joke about them or by putting them in queer situations, but the audience is supposed to be in on the ‘joke’ and nothing is meant to come of it. nothing was meant to come of the queer subtext on supernatural. it was always meant to be queerbaiting.
i'm going to call out season eight/season nine era specifically because it was mentioned in one of the posts i'm vaguing (if you see this—i just didn’t want to reblog yours to be grumpy and contrary so i made my own—no ill will!). watching supernatural as season eight aired was actively painful because you would see these parallels between sam and amelia and dean and cas; you’d watch the writers layer in romantic tropes for dean and cas; you’d have dean on his knees, bloody, saying “this isn’t you, i need you;” you’d have all the deans cas was brainwashed to kill; you’d have “he’s in love…………………with humanity”—and then a fan would go up on stage in a convention and ask a simple question about the relationship between dean and cas and get eviscerated. that's if you manage to get a question about them past the censors—oh! because questions about ‘destiel’ were literally banned.
a teenager says she’s bisexual and is booed by the convention audience and dismissed by jensen ackles (“i'm gonna pretend i don’t know what you asked,’ as i seem to recall him saying) for saying she sees a lot of herself in dean and asking if he might be bi. homophobic jokes from the actors. big, blow-out fights between fans and creators. a bigwig getting on twitter and calling fans delusional for pointing out what was actively happening between the characters and what it implies (this is where misha collins’s “your not crazy” tweet came in, and let me tell you people held onto that one like it was a lifeline—because it was). people quit the fandom then, a lot of them, because of how vicious it was. people would send anon hate to destiel shippers telling them to kill themselves while literally quoting jared and jensen’s nasty comments on dean and cas. after that point, even the show started trying to dismantle some of the affection between dean and cas after that point (cue someone asking about the relationship between the characters and jensen saying they don’t really have one this season, and it’s refreshing because the dean and cas thing has been blown out of proportion).
as someone who was a young adult and had imprinted on this show like a baby duckling, it was just a straight up bad time. and i'm sorry, you cannot say that just because there was a subtextually queer connection between dean and cas at that point, the show wasn’t queerbaiting. if the creators cannot respond to polite questions about the basic queer subtext of their show, that’s queerbaiting. it just is.
and as for the confession? it was hugely important. and half of what made the confession powerful actually was “in just saying it,” not just for the characters, but also given the fraught context of the show. in speaking it, they made it real in a way that it wasn’t before simply because of the cultural context it exists in. they said the thing that they had forbidden.
when i say ‘unparalleled media experience’ when talking about supernatural, i really do mean it. never have i seen a show so actively hateful towards its fans turn around and say, no, we were wrong, you were right (and then weirdly try to reverse it after the show ended????). i stopped breathing when cas started his confession because, after the pain that came from season eight and nine, i never thought they would get as close to explicitly stated destiel again. and then they did it. they said that right there. after all those years.
dean should have kissed him.
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It’s rare that you can see a person’s heart diluted into a single song, but that’s what Bron-Yr-Aur is. Nothing more and nothing less than Jimmy’s heart laid bare, the pure emotions that lay hidden beneath that guarded exterior. I consider this one of the most beautiful pieces in Led Zeppelin’s discography, and indeed one of the most beautiful pieces of music I’ve ever heard, period. I tend to forgive artists more than their fair share of problematic behaviors in life, because of the beauty they put back into the world, the sweet purity of music that touches the soul in a way nothing else can. With Bron-Yr-Aur Jimmy created a subtle masterpiece, gently drawing you into a time and place of love, peace and light. You can feel how special the place was to him, and how strongly the emotions he felt there impacted him. There is magick in this melody.
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