#the fact that this transcends different groups’ fandoms is huge

[leejeongz]

i’d try anything for those 7 boys at this point

[kitkatwinchester]

On September 13th, 2005, a new show made its debut on the WB. It was about two brothers whose lives were flipped upside down the day their mother was murdered by a demon. It had a small budget, a small cast, and a small crew, but the people involved were dedicated. They wanted to do everything they could to make sure the story of Sam and Dean Winchester was told. They wanted to show us the true power of family in the darkest of times. Little did any of them know just how much of a legacy they would create, and just how much of a family their following would come to be.

I was four years old when Supernatural first came on the air. I had no concept of any show beyond Blue’s Clues, Lazy Town, and the Disney Channel. I was a smart kid, but a kid nonetheless, and Supernatural just wasn’t something I was ready for. As I grew up, Supernatural achieved milestone after milestone. It made it through the channel change to the CW. It survived a writer’s strike in its third season. And in April of 2010, it hit its 100th episode milestone. As it neared the end of its fifth season, Eric Kripke’s original storyline had been told, and it seemed as if the show would end, then and there. But it didn’t. Instead, it continued beyond its originally scheduled timeline, taking on a new showrunner in its sixth season and continuing for years after. And in 2011, in the middle of said sixth season, it finally made its way onto my radar.

Tenzin Tsekye and I have been best friends for fourteen years, so we’ve spent a lot of time together. We’ve had hundreds of sleepovers, shared a million memories, and watched thousands of shows and movies together. So when, at one of our many sleepovers, she suggested that we watch an episode of something called “Supernatural”, I trusted her. She knows what I watch, she knows how I am. I was bound to like it. Except there was one problem. She insisted on watching this one episode that she really liked (Family Remains) that was smack dab in the middle of season four, and I was not having it. I told her that we had to start from the beginning. I didn’t know anything about this show, so how could I possibly watch an episode in the middle of its fourth season? It wouldn’t make any sense to me. She kept assuring me that it didn’t have anything to do with the main plot (a concept I now know as “Monster of the Week”), and that I would love it. But I wasn’t convinced, and I was persistent. I told her that if we weren’t going to start from the beginning, I wouldn’t watch it at all.

We argued about it for at least an hour, and finally, I backed down. I said that we could watch the season four episode only if we went back and watched the first episode afterwards. She agreed. After we watched Family Remains, she stuck to our agreement and we watched the pilot. And then we watched the second episode. And the third. And the fourth. And my entire life was changed forever.

It still baffles me to this day how close I came to never starting Supernatural to begin with. I thank Tenzin all the time for being so stubborn on that night. Who knows what my life would be like today if she hadn’t been? Looking back, it’s hard for me to picture a time before I started watching Supernatural--so much so that pinpointing when, exactly, it became the obsession that it is today is near impossible. But what follows is a rough timeline of events based on the major things I do remember.

Tenzin and I never wound up watching the rest of the show together. Instead, I brought the show up to my dad. It took a while, since we were both pretty busy, but by the next year, Supernatural had become our new thing. I was a busy middle schooler, so it was often hard to fit in watching more than one episode on the days we spent together, which meant it was slow-going for a while, but we did our best. Luckily, the fact that we weren’t binging it all at once meant that we were able to avoid a lot of the cliffhangers, (which, looking back at it now, makes me feel very lucky), and it gradually became my favorite show of all time. By the time Season 9 was on the air, in 2014, we had caught up on all eight seasons on Netflix, and I was hooked and ready for more.

We didn’t have cable, so instead, we watched every episode a few days after they aired once they came on Hulu (I didn’t learn about cwtv.com until much later), and it was at this point that I really started to dive into the fandom. Now that I was caught up, I was able to look up fandom content as I pleased without worrying about spoilers. I guess you could say this is when the obsession truly kicked in.

As I came up on my teen years, Supernatural became my life. I started requesting even more Supernatural merchandise as birthday gifts, Christmas presents, and everything in between, and I would wear the gifts I got anywhere I could. Within a few months, I discovered the world of fan fiction, and within a year, I grew confident and excited enough to start writing my own. I started watching video compilations not just of the show, but of the cast--behind the scenes videos, bloopers, convention videos, and so much more. I joined Facebook groups about the show and finally started interacting with other fans, making all kinds of friendships along the way.

On top of that, as the tenth season came to a close with no signs of the show stopping, my mom finally caved in to my babbling and excitement and started watching the show with me. We started back at the Pilot (which, for me, was probably about my fifth re-watch at that point), and we made it all the way to about mid-season five just as the eleventh season was getting ready to air.

And then a truly amazing thing happened.

For my 16th birthday, that same amazing mother bought me tickets to the Supernatural Convention in Chicago.

To put it lightly, I was excited. Very excited.

On the weekend of September 9th, 2016, just a week before my birthday, I got to meet the Supernatural cast for the first time. And that convention experience was one of the best things that has ever happened to me.

When we were on our way to the convention, I was really just excited that I’d finally get to meet these celebrities--these HOT celebrities--that I’d seen on the big screen for the last few years. At this point, they were basically idols to me, and even having the chance to see them in person was the best thing I could’ve asked for. But when I got to that convention, I was hit with something even better than I could’ve hoped for.

I say all the time that the SPN Family is a different fandom than any other. There’s a special feeling throughout our fandom that, as someone who is in multiple fandoms, I have not been able to feel anywhere else. When I try to explain that to people, nobody gets it. Even my mom, when I first started talking about it, kind of shrugged it off like it was nothing. But when we got to that convention, she felt it too. The air is different. The second you walk into a room of fellow Supernatural fans, you feel comfortable. You feel welcome.

That first convention, my mom didn’t really come with me to the panels. She took some photo ops with me, but being as far behind as she was, she didn’t want to spoil things for herself too much, so I spent the majority of the convention by myself, at a mere fifteen years old. But I never felt scared or alone or apprehensive. I made friends immediately. The people I was sitting next to, the people I stood in line with, basically anyone I came in contact with struck up a conversation with me, and it would end with Facebook usernames, Twitter handles, or even phone numbers being exchanged to contact each other in the future. It was insane. I’d never been in an environment like that before, and I loved it. And the openness didn’t stop there.

When it came time to meet the actual members of the Supernatural cast, they were just as kind and wonderful to talk to. At every panel, the guests were so eager to interact with fans, and many of them even stepped off the stage to come say hi to fans who were in line to ask them questions. Even the three main stars, Jensen, Jared, and Misha--who had to stay on the stage for security reasons--did everything they could to bond with fans and make them smile or laugh, and it was beautiful. And that transcended beyond the panels.

That Sunday, my mom and I had a photo op with Jensen and Jared, and let me tell you, I was crazy nervous. I mean, these were huge celebrities and people that I really looked up to, and I was about to get a photo with them. Plus, Jensen was my very first celebrity crush and all-time favorite actor at the time (he still is, to be honest). The whole thing was crazy nerve-wracking.

After standing in line for a bit, it was finally our turn, and as my mom and I stepped up, and I turned to Jensen to tell him what we wanted for the photo, I completely froze up. My brain told me to say: “We want to do a squishy hug photo.” But what came out instead was something more along the lines of “hug please photo hug?” To say the least, I was blushing with embarrassment for several hours afterwards. But despite my nerves and fangirling, Jensen just smiled at me, and he gave me a little chuckle, and said: “sure thing, sweetheart”, which, of course, made me fall apart even more. Nonetheless, the photo happened, and at the end of it all, Jensen gave me one more reassuring little rub on the back, plus a second hug and a last smile before we headed off and away from the duo.

It took me hours to process the whole thing, but at the end of it all, I was so happy and relieved.

Jensen could’ve been cold. He could’ve given me a weird look for freaking out so much. He could’ve even just done the picture and gotten it over with. But he didn’t. He went the extra mile to make sure I knew that my nerves were okay, and they were understandable, but that he wasn’t judging, and he was okay with it. And that really says something.

After that, I went to a convention every year (excluding this year, for obvious reasons). I’ve been to four conventions in all, and every single year, the experience has only gotten better, because I’ve gotten more confident and comfortable around the actors--all because of that special energy.

In 2017, I was picked to sing karaoke with several of the actors from the show...on stage...in front of a huge crowd of Supernatural fans. For those of you who know me pretty well, you know that I have terrible stage fright when it comes to singing in front of people. I get super nervous, and the nerves just get higher with bigger crowds. But that night, to my surprise, I was great. Not only did I sing the classic “Wanted Dead or Alive” in front of hundreds of people, but I got to sing and dance with some of my favorite actors--and I was confident about it. When I was on that stage, dancing with the actors and singing with the fandom, I felt good.

It wasn’t until long after I was done that it hit me what had just happened, and I couldn’t believe it. All of my years of performing in theater productions and talent shows, and I had never been as confident as I had been on that karaoke night. I still have the video on my phone, and I smile at it in disbelief every time I watch it.

My confidence only grew from there. In 2018, I decided to submit to the convention’s fandom music video contest. I spent many hours and many days putting together an edit for Team Free Will 2.0. I was super particular about the timing--beats had to hit scene changes exactly right, lyrics had to line up with the scenes being shown, and I really wanted to tell a good story. When I finally finished the edit, I showed it to my dad--who’s been doing films his entire life--to get his opinion, and he was super impressed. Even though he had stopped watching the show around Season 11 (luckily, my mom was caught up at this point, so she and I were able to watch it together), he really loved what I had done with the edit. (He actually wound up loving it so much that he asked me to edit several projects for him later, including a music video, film production, and theater trailer, opening a door for me in life--one I never would’ve found without Supernatural.)

I submitted it to the Denver convention, and months later, when I was finally able to attend said convention in August of 2018, I was nervous, but excited. As my convention experience went on, I kind of forgot that I had submitted an edit, instead enjoying my time with my new Supernatural friends, the actors, and, now that she was caught up, my mom. But on the third day, they announced the winner, and to be perfectly honest, I didn’t hear what name they said, but we all kind of assumed that it hadn’t been me, which was a little disappointing, but I didn’t let it get me down. But then, while I was talking to my friend, I heard the tell-tale notes of the opening of “This is Me”--the song I had used for the edit--and my head whipped to the screen faster than it ever has for anything. Sure enough, in the #1 spot, was my music video edit.

Needless to say, I kind of lost my mind. I ran up to the front to claim my certificate--including the gift certificate for $100 of Supernatural merchandise--and couldn’t stop jumping up and down. And my friends that I’d made at the convention that year were jumping right along with me. It was a beautiful moment.

By the time the 2019 Chicago convention rolled around, I had grown really comfortable with the whole cast, crew, and fandom, and 2019 was one of my best experiences yet. I submitted another video edit and got second place. I sang the Ghostbusters theme (Hillywood style, of course) with a friend at karaoke night. I even managed to ask every actor a question at their panels without stuttering, even bantering back and forth with a few of them. At autograph tables, I managed to have full-fledged conversations with some of the actors, and at my photo op with Jensen and Jared, I actually told both of them exactly what we wanted to do for the picture without stuttering over my words.

In any other fandom, I don’t think I would’ve been able to do that. But the actors and the fans make that entire convention so comfortable and easy to get through, no matter how nervous you are, and that’s one of the many things I love about this show.

Sadly, though, there was also something else that happened in 2019.

On March 22nd, 2019, Jensen, Jared, and Misha made the announcement that all Supernatural fans were hoping would never come. On Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and everything in between, Jensen Ackles said the words we’d all been fearing: “Though we’re very very excited about moving into our fifteenth season, it will be our last.”

I was in Europe when I found out--Barcelona, to be specific--and to say that the news put a damper on my vacation would be an understatement. I was in tears, and I know many of my fellow Supernatural fans were too. This show had always struggled with ratings, but it had always pushed through, hitting milestone after milestone. So when the news finally came that it would be coming to a close, after a whopping 327 episodes, it shocked us all.

But even knowing it was ending, the cast, crew, and entire fandom were quick to note that it would never be far away. While the Winchester brothers would take their final ride in (what was supposed to be) May of 2020, it didn’t mean that the fandom would die. While news spread from actors to fans to, frankly, the entire world, we all rallied together, knowing that, as Jensen put it so well, “the show might end, but what it has built, this will never end”.

So we prepared for the end. I did my ten day countdown leading up to the premiere, and as the cast counted down each of their lasts on social media, we counted down each of our lasts watching the show.

And then 2020 happened, and everything changed. COVID-19 shut everything down, including production on Supernatural, and with only two episodes left for the cast to film (plus four that still needed post-production), it looked like Supernatural wasn’t gonna be able to end after all. They aired the completed first thirteen episodes of the season, and then it went on hiatus. I think, at the time, a lot of us were worried. What if something happened? What if they weren’t able to finish? What if, after fifteen years, the show had to be cancelled because of a pandemic?

But Supernatural’s never given up, and the pandemic was no exception. For the cast and crew, this was just another obstacle in the long line of obstacles that Supernatural has made it through over the years. And in August of 2020, Jared and Jensen went back to set--along with several other actors--and finished the Winchesters’ long legacy. And on October 8th, 2020, Season 15.5 began airing on the CW, and our long goodbye to a show we’ve all loved for years started all over again.

And now here we are.

I’m sure you’re asking me why all of this matters. I just gave you a complete rundown of the Supernatural timeline from the day I started it, and I haven’t even gotten to the point. So, here’s my point.

This is what my life has been for the last nine years. I was eleven years old when I finally discovered Supernatural, and now I’m twenty, and my life has changed so much.

Supernatural has taught me things that no other elements of my life possibly could. It’s brought out parts of my personality that I never would’ve discovered otherwise.

Supernatural has made me who I am today.

Supernatural has gotten me more involved on social media, even going so far as to create my own content to share.

Supernatural has influenced other things I watch. Now, I try to find shows, movies, and even books that have some of the same themes as this show because I love them so much.

Supernatural got me connected with GISH, which helped me feel more comfortable going out of my comfort zone and being a little (okay, a lot) weird.

Supernatural made me proud to be a fangirl, giving me the chance to express my interests publicly and feel free from judgement.

Supernatural gave me some amazing new friendships, and strengthened the relationships I already had with friends and family.

Supernatural brought out my creative side. From fan fiction writing, to photo collages, to video editing, this show has given me more ways to express myself than I ever could’ve hoped, and it’s opened so many doors for me in the process.

Supernatural has taught me so many lessons and mantras that I will cherish and keep with me forever. Between never giving up, spreading love and kindness, knowing that family always has your back, and not being afraid to be who you are, the show and its cast have given me confidence and strength that I will never forget.

For those of you out there who still think that Supernatural is “just a show”, this is what I present. When I first started Supernatural, I thought the same thing. But over the years, it has become so much more to me than that, and I know that the entire fandom agrees.

With Supernatural ending, a small piece of everyone in the fandom is ending with it, but deep down, we all know that this show will always be with us, and the legacy it’s leaving behind is something that will never be forgotten.

Supernatural has been through a lot, just like it’s two main characters; but, like Sam and Dean, it has never given up, and it has saved so many people’s lives in the process.

I feel so honored to have been even a small part of such an incredible journey.

Thank you, Supernatural.

Thank you, Supernatural cast and crew.

Thank you for making your fifteen years in this world matter.

Thank you for teaching all of us what it means to be human.

Thank you for showing us that we can continue to fight for ourselves and others no matter what the world throws at us.

Thank you for making every single one of us feel special and worth something.

You have changed my life, and the lives of so many others, more than you can possibly imagine by teaching us all that we truly can “carry on”.

On September 13th, 2005, an era began.

On November 19th, 2020, that era will end.

But its legacy will last forever.

“No doubt, endings are hard. But then again, nothing ever really ends, does it?”

[bnrobertson1]

EXCELLENCE IN PRODUCT PLACEMENT

Death Stranding* is a wowing mind-fuck of an experience, surreal and mundane and draining and invigorating. Unafraid to constantly show you Norman Reedus’ bare ass while pontificating on the nature of modern existence, the game is unlike any before it, a venerable nightmare for marketing people and gamers expecting something more tried-and-true. 

Choose a Caption!: “I intend to help all of humanity through these apocalyptic times. But first, a peek of me bottom for the ladies.” -OR- Reedus Rump: Kojima’s Metal Gear-esque Weapon to Appeal to Women. 

Death Stranding is also the host to the best piece of product placement in recent memory. The product? Monster mahfucking Energy** drink, a (demonic?) elixir that boosts main character Sam’s stamina when consumed- a life-giving tonic with only 160g of sugar. You don’t drink water in the game, you drink Monster. Hell yes. For a game about wandering the wreckage of a nuclear-ish event, it’s a masterful touch, eloquently capturing our need as humans to technologically improve everything (yes, even the liquid responsible for life), a destructive compulsion that is the vertebrae and driver of the game’s narrative. Many in the press find this shameless money-grab to be tasteless, but the fact Coca-Cola (a corporation!) undoubtedly paid millions to get it so prominently in the game only speaks to its preposterous-yet-probable presence. It’s probably too subtle to be a Kojima-nod to the futuristic satire of Idiocracy, but Monster Energy will undoubtedly go down as the real world’s Brawndo (just without the electrolytes).    

*More Thoughts on Death Stranding (BEWARE NON-SENSICAL SPOILERS): God Bless Hideo Kojima, the man goes for it. Arguably video game’s most beloved auteur and inarguably the one who most wants to be referred to as “Kubrikickian” and/or “enigmatic,” the mastermind behind the beloved Metal Gear games proves incapable of working small or with gloves with his Death Stranding, leaving both fingerprints all throughout and editors’ calls unreturned. Hours-long cut scenes waxing philosophical about technology’s dooming yet liberating role in our future? Check. 4th wall breaking, star-fucking pop culture references? Check. Singular gameplay whose laborious nature quite soundly proves larger points about things ranging from literary theory to the gig economy? Check. Check. Check.

But between the preposterous acronyms, convoluted packing systems, and Conan O’ Brien cameos, there glimmers dots of genius. Those willing to wade through the oft- incomprehensible industrial-military-complex babble are rewarded with “Holy Shit” moments, those boundary and/or sense exploding things of which Kojima is King. Death Stranding is no different, and although the game never reaches the heights of the Metal Gear games, there are specific parts that unleashed that goosebump wave of awesomeness. The bolo gun that wraps up your enemies instead of killing them, your ability to hog tie the unsuspecting with an elastic strand, the focus on oil and blood as the life force of all things- these are but some of the elements of the game that really work, dripping into the game at just the rate where you keep interested but not overwhelmed.

But the best moment in the game is in a cut-scene where your baby companion (did I mention Kojima is weird?) literally stops bullets with its mind to save you. Now, the prior sentence shouldn’t make sense, and probably doesn’t. But the real nonsensical thing is just how powerful it hit. In a game about loneliness and the brutal nature of existence, this self-less act is totally unexpected but gives you the real feeling that someone has got your back (even if it proves to be a futile gesture). It’s effect was reminiscent of similar film sequences. After about 15-months of Covid I would say the point was comforting in a way I was not anticipating whatsoever. 

Being the only one of my friends insane enough to finish the game’s deliberate but nonetheless grotesquely overlong runtime (60+ hours of fetch quests!), my fellow Metal Gear fans have asked: is it worth playing? To which I really don’t know the answer. It’s absolutely bold and tries to tell a tale that could only be told in the video game medium, but then again, video games aren’t particularly great ways of telling stories. At points it felt like its design was made to be played in the pandemic: it’s time-consuming, meditative, and at times utterly mind-numbing. At its peaks, the game is reminiscent of Grandaddy’s The Sophtware Slump, another generally somber post-technological tale, albeit with less alcoholic robots and more characters named things like Die-Hardman. It’s not nearly as *fun* as other AAA titles, but then again the diametrically different approach of Doom Eternal didn’t inspire a couple thousand words.    

**I can’t remember my first cigarette, beer, or kiss but I do remember the first time I had a Monster Energy drink. Due to some mental, emotional, and physical deficiencies, I was unable to fly for about 6 months- just the thought of driving to the airport turned my anxiety- and palm sweat- on like a firehose. But knowing this fear was simply incompatible with modern life, I gave myself a building block of a goal- make a flight from my then-home of Austin to somewhere close enough that I could rent a car and drive home. I chose Dallas because I had an incentive: to see obscure musical group Nine Inch Nails*** performing at one of the Metroplex’s many arenas.

Getting on the plane took some assistance- specifically in the form of about 2 grams of Alprazolam. The barbiturate calm pressed the right buttons beautifully, having me giggling about clouds as opposed to obsessing about how we were in a speeding steel cylinder 7 miles above the surface of the earth. But when we landed in Dallas about 30 minutes later, the ease evolved into a potent sleepiness. Which is fine if you’re headed to a hotel, or virtually anywhere else in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, but not so much when you’re about to see an Industrial concert with 8,000 other people not exactly known for their chill. Plodding along, I finally made it to the concert, hoping to order a Red Bull as big as its namesake to get me out of blah bliss and into banging. The venue only sold Coke products, so in my apathetic exhaustion, I decided to order a Monster, an energy drink to that point I identified with redneck culture and thus avoided. Finding the whole thing pretty funny- and strongly buzzing off the fact that I had somehow faced my fear and gotten on an airplane- I figured there was probably no better place on earth to try a tall boy Monster Energy Drink Zero Sugar than FUCKING DALLAS, ie, the Monster Energy Drink of America.

The flavor I ordered was in a white can and poured out looked like some sort of large sea mammal had just bricked into a cup. Disgusted but not discouraged, I grabbed the glowing goblet like it was the reins of a dragon and took it by its mighty wing, by which I mean swig. Surprisingly tasty, I thought. Not the Pepsi-fied version of Red Bull I was fearing. The house lights then were dimmed, indicating it was game time. I wisely bought another Monster and went into the show, thinking 32 oz of liquid electricity was exactly what I needed to match Reznor’s energy.

You’re goddamn right I took a picture of my first Monster! 

Whatever chemistry was going on in my body was probably bad, because it felt awesome. Even though Nine Inch Nails had performed a majority of my favorite stuff the night before (their first of two nights in Dallas), the concert was as engrossing as was hoped- the loudness and lights simultaneously pummeling and transcendent. While it goes without saying that it wasn’t for everyone, the entire 3-hour ride back to Austin I was laughing like a maniac, having won a small battle (flying) and getting a big reward for my efforts (NIN). So, when anybody asks me what the ludicrously huge can of white can of energy drink I’m proudly, obnoxiously enjoying tastes like I am genuine when I tell them: “Carbonated Capri-Sun. And Courage.”      

*** I had been scared of NIN growing up too, specifically the video for “Closer” which made my 10 year old guts squirm like worms with its hanging meat and imagery that was confusingly gory yet sexual. I also went to a conservative all-boys school where wearing NIN stuff was rarely allowed, and when it was you’d be shamed by one of the change-petrified cliques that ran the place. My position softened a bit after the landmark Johnny Cash cover of “Hurt,” but what confirmed my fandom was when I heard “The Hand that Feeds” on a Chicago strip-club sound system- since then, they have soundtracked much of my life. Lesson: There lies wisdom in Strip Clubs.      

[themostrandomfandom]

hi! i'm new to the fandom (i know i'm crazy late to the game but better late than never hahah) and i just finished the last season of glee. i asked one of my friends about the season 4 finale and she said i should ask you because you'll definitely have insight. basically, i know santana went back to ohio at the drop of a hat for britt, but, how come she was so sad when brittany gave her pre regionals speech? like, if anything shouldn't she be excited that she's moving closer to her?

Hey, @sitandsingtoyou​!

Sorry it has taken me so long to reply to this ask. It’s been an intense couple of weeks for me outside of the internet.

Welcome to the fandom!

So for a full rundown of Santana’s emotions during episode 4x22, I’ll refer you to this post. The stuff about Santana’s reaction to Brittany’s speech is near the end.

The TL;DR version of what I say there is basically that Santana is a huge cry baby, and she doesn’t only cry when she’s sad. Any time she feels a lot of emotions—whether those emotions are positive or negative or mixed—she bursts into tears. It’s part of her reactive temperament. In the scene you mention, Santana cries because she just has so many feelings that she doesn’t know what to do with them all.

We can break those feelings down after the cut.

_________

On one level, Santana’s tears are sympathetic: she cries because Brittany is crying and because she understands the gravity of the moment.  

On another level, Santana is just overwhelmed because she is so proud of and happy for Brittany. 

Santana has always known that Brittany is a genius, but the rest of the world by and large hasn’t. For years, Santana has watched everyone from Sue Sylvester to Artie Abrams to Will Schuester disparage Brittany’s intelligence and treat her like an imbecile. She’s seen the toll this kind of treatment has taken on Brittany’s self-esteem, and it has broken her heart. 

Of course, Santana has tried as much as she can to build Brittany up and validate her intelligence, but doing so has proven a difficult task, as for every one time Santana has given Brittany a compliment, three or four other people have insulted her. 

Furthermore, ever since Santana graduated and Brittany didn’t, Santana hasn’t been around to be that positive voice in Brittany’s ear. In her second senior year, Brittany has only been hearing the negative stuff, which Santana has learned about through the grapevine but not had the proximity or social position to counter. It’s killed Santana knowing that for the past several months, basically everyone and their dog has been treating Brittany like she’s an idiot. 

So for as much as Brittany has wanted to be taken seriously and have her smarts acknowledged, Santana has also wanted those things for her just as much, if not more so. Having a committee of math professors from one of the most prestigious universities in the country finally corroborate Brittany’s genius absolutely means the world to Santana because now someone else is seeing what she has always seen and backing up all the claims she’s made. She’s just so happy that Brittany has gotten the validation she’s always longed for and that Brittany doesn’t just have to take her word for it anymore. 

Santana has always known that Brittany is special, and hearing Brittany say that she can finally believe in her own specialness feels like such a victory. Santana loves Brittany so much, and she has always just wanted Brittany to love herself, too. The fact that Brittany can stand up in front of the New Directions and say the things she does causes Santana’s heart to burst from relief and joy and pride.

So that’s one reason Santana’s crying.

Another reason she’s crying is because the future is still so uncertain for her and Brittany, and so she’s a little bit scared.

As stated above, she is absolutely thrilled that Brittany is finally having her genius recognized, but she also can’t help but worry about how everything will pan out for her and Brittany now that they are once again heading down two very different paths.

Yes, Cambridge is closer to NYC than Lima is in a physical sense, but, socially, there is still going to be a lot of distance between what Brittany is doing as a math genius at MIT and what Santana is doing as, well, not a math genius in NYC.

Santana’s storyline throughout S4 is all about how she doesn’t know what she wants to do with her life, whether it’s to perform as a singer or dancer or do something else entirely. She’s been surrounded by a group of very driven people, and while they’ve all seemed to know exactly what they want to do with the rest of their lives, she hasn’t. She dropped out of college and kind of fell into a waitressing gig by accident, and she’s been untethered and drifting ever since.

Secretly, she hoped that once Brittany graduated from WMHS, they would be reunited, and Brittany would help her sort her shit out or at least they could sort their shit out together.

The only thing she was sure she wanted for herself was to be together with Brittany again after Brittany graduated.

But now Brittany is jetting off to MIT, and Santana has no idea what that means in terms of “them.”

Just in regards to time frame, Brittany could be at MIT anywhere from four to thirteen years, depending on how many degrees she pursues. Honestly, Santana might be willing to move to Cambridge to be with Brittany while she completes her studies, but would Brittany even want that? 

On a social level, Brittany is going to be meeting all sorts of new people—many of whom will be geniuses like she is—and getting exposed to tons of new ideas, and who knows if she’ll even want to get back together with her high school girlfriend (who is of average intelligence) when everything is said and done? Maybe she’ll meet someone else whose IQ is off the charts and discover that she gels with that person more than she ever did Santana.

It’s in Santana’s nature to worry about all kinds of scenarios, so even though her happiness for Brittany’s success is genuine, she is also not without fears about what may become of her and Brittany in the long run.

Distance has proven a bane for them before, so even though Cambridge is only four hours away from NYC (as opposed to Lima, which is nine), there’s still a lot to be overcome, and Santana can’t help but wonder if she is sending Brittany off to a new life she may never be part of.

So she cries because she is thinking that maybe this moment is—in a way—a final goodbye. She doesn’t want to detract from the magnitude of Brittany’s accomplishment, but she also can’t help but feel her heart breaking a little bit because what if this hug is it? What if she never gets another chance to be with Brittany again?

Another (related) reason why she cries is due to the nature of what Brittany says/doesn’t say to her.

When episode 4x22 first aired, some fans were disappointed that Brittany didn’t actually make a speech to Santana in the same way she did to her other exes, and outside the universe of the show, there is definite merit to their critiques, particularly as Brittany had (to that point in the show) so often been silenced regarding her feelings for and relationship with Santana.

But just on the level of what is happening inside the universe of the show, Brittany’s silence speaks louder than her words ever could and she says more to Santana with just one embrace than she does to Sam and Artie with her rambling verbal goodbyes.

There is so much love in that moment, in Brittany saying “And then there’s Santana—” before choking up so much she can’t speak another word, and in Santana reassuring her she doesn’t actually have to say anything (because, for all her fears and doubts, Santana does, underneath it all, understand in a way that transcends language how Brittany really feels about her), and in both of them falling into a tight, rib-locking embrace and sobbing onto each other’s shoulders.

The emotions both girls are feeling are too big for words. There’s too much history between them. Too much devotion and care and belief and hope and tenderness and private longing and love.

So they cry.

Ultimately, there are all sorts of emotions mixed into Santana’s fears, but the most prominent emotion of all is love. 

Santana just loves Brittany so much, and one of her most consistent character traits is that whenever she tries to really express the full depth of that love, she cries. That’s the case at the Hurt Locker and after “Songbird” and when Brittany first confirms to her that they’re actually dating and when they break up and when Brittany sends her off to New York, and it’s also the case here.

Santana is basically a big softie, and just thinking about how much she loves Brittany brings a lump to her throat and tears to her eyes.

So, yes, there is sadness in the moment because it’s a goodbye, and Santana is somewhat fearful, but she is also proud and hopeful and in love, too—that last part more than anything—and that’s why she is so quick to cry on Brittany’s shoulder. There’s just too much love in her heart to keep everything inside.

Thanks for the question!

[hopeless-namjin]

To the asshole who decided “Hey, its a great idea to assume I know what the A.R.M.Y.s in Europe feel”, fuck you. Also, kindly fuck off. Who are you to determine if someone is a loyal stan? Who are you to comment on where someone decides to stream their videos?

I quote you, word for word, “Yeah, youre definitely a fake fan”. Fandoms of all different groups and icons have always claimed themselves to be like one huge family, especially with our fandom, where the entire fandom tries to coordinate events, stream together, break records, all for BTS. By stating that someone in this fandom, who has done as much as any other fan in her own ability to help BTS achieve their dreams, is a fake fan, you are the one who is the fake fan. Because you are creating a crack between the tightly-knit fabric of this fandom, saying that someone who clearly cares about the group as much as you do, doesn’t. You’re driving a wall between parts of the fandom. Which is obviously not good for the fandom. In fact, you are the one who is harming the fandom and BTS.

Honestly, people streaming in different countries rather than focusing on streaming in only one country is actually extremely important for the sake of BTS’ success. BTS has said that good music transcends all barriers, be it country, culture or language. They want to be able to spread their music and share their messages on an international scale. And, in case you didn’t already know, international scale IS NOT EQUIVALENT TO AMERICA. WOW. WHAT A CONCEPT. People streaming in different countries alone is testament to BTS’ popularity and success, and rather than only focusing on breaking the records in one country, which is NOT EQUIVALENT TO THE ENTIRE INTERNATIONAL POPULATION, it is better that A.R.M.Y. streams in different countries, especially because we have the ability to. All the more we should try to show how popular they actually are internationally. US =/= international popularity. For them to truly be popular internationally, having them top charts all over the world is better than only topping charts in one country.

You may tell me that “One of BTS’ biggest goals is to get to Hot 100 on Billboard”, and so everything else isn’t as important. As I said before, the fandom is getting larger and larger by the day, and our ability to stream and break records isn’t as limited any more. Especially after BBMAs, the size of the US A.R.M.Y. has increased exponentially, and I believe that they have the capability to stream and get BTS on the charts without requiring that much help from the rest of the world. Which is why it is now better to stream in other places. Law of diminishing returns, you know.

Now we wait for more claims and accusations and goodness knows what else. Just keep in mind to proof read your facts and at the very least, make a small attempt to not only make claims and narcissistic, self-righteous comments. No one likes that, you see. :D

~pissed hyper

(im sending it here cuz its too long to fit in the inbox and i dont want to send 5 different messages)

All of the above ^

Streaming is important, from all parts of the world. Otherwise people will never see just how far BTS’ popularity stretch.

-Hel

(Also this was perfect. Thank you for saying what i wanted to a little more eloquently)

[idolizerp]

LOADING INFORMATION ON CELESTE’S  LEAD VOCAL, LEAD DANCE BAE SOHO...

IDOL DETAILS

STAGENAME: N/A CURRENT AGE: 25 DEBUT AGE: 20 TRAINEE SINCE AGE: 19 COMPANY: 99 SECONDARY SKILL: N/A

IDOL PROFILE

NICKNAME(S): 알모소 - an abbreviation of even if you know her, you don’t (and the final syllable of her name), due to the fact that she has an enigmatic personality that is more quiet than the traditional “4-D image” but still maintains that off the wall unpredictability. One moment cutesy and cringey, the next moment cuttingly observant and savage, then the epitome of “노잼” or no fun at all. she can express herself in a very avante garde, off the wall, almost blank paper manner, and just as quickly can twist into something quite clever and creative. INSPIRATION: soho’s performative inspiration, as given to the mcs who ask for such information, is that she was just the biggest fan of Diamant and Royal-T and Clover and as a result had been inspired to audition for KJH after only a few months of dance training, hoping charisma could carry her through. SPECIAL TALENTS:

instrumental- she can play and compose on the piano, as well as production abilities on various synthesizers. she has a talent for quickly transposing music across keys, which is almost never useful in her daily idol life. she is most proficient with the piano though she once attempted to learn guitar (she lost interest quickly) and more specifically these days in terms of the keyboard and style-adjacent synthesizers.

jingle creation- she can make a quick and catchy jingle for almost anything, and often spends her time narrating her life via song unintentionally and inadvertently, much to the chagrin of those around her.  she will occasionally produce these into snippets uploaded on soundcloud. her most “successful” of these was an 8-bit midi-filled jingle about the blessing that is milk tea.

PUBG and fortnite dances - she is exceptionally skilled at performing dances from the popular games, for better or for worse, and is more than happy to break this talent out on camera. whether her group-mates want for her to do this or not.

NOTABLE FACTS:

soho is skilled in musical composition and arrangements and has dabbled in a various instruments. she is more proficient with the piano than the guitar, these days, as she’s largely relied on the latter as she moves into beat-making and production. her specializations (electropop, lofi, and related remixes) are thoroughly non-marketable in the mainstream.

soho is a social media guru, with an established presence on youtube, soundcloud, and an active twitter/instagram outreach. she is active as well on Vlive on a regular basis. she does reviews of producing equipment, reviews of instruments, covers, “let’s play” style videos, and various vlogs/live broadcasts. This began during the ending days of vixen and continued through her hiatus (intermittently). it was put on pause until 2017, when 99 entertainment began allowing her more public opportunities.

soho debuted at 16 under KJH’s girl group Vixen, as the lead dancer and lead vocalist. she faced a rather significant scandal which was (mercifully enough) quickly eclipsed by the huge scandal that plagued the main rapper of the group, eventually leading to the disbanding of the group entirely. she was a fresh 19 at the time. In the following months, she began training with 99 Ent.

IDOL GOALS

SHORT-TERM GOALS:

without the group of celeste, without the support of her company, soho has very little claim to fame. she functions best as part of a group musically, and has no illusions otherwise.  perhaps surprisingly, as a girl eagerly and actively producing music, she is fully disinterested in pursuing a serious career as a solo musician, in the realm of one managed by her company. the music she produces is not public friendly and is in essence a passion project, and she has no interest in having to compromise that to become marketable, performable, or so on. she’d consider djing or working on soundtracks, or even simply continuing to put out content on soundcloud or youtube to scratch that creative itch.

LONG-TERM GOALS:

soho is all about the long game, putting together bits and pieces,  to build an empire, a cult of personality. by diversifying across platform, she’s building a niche, marketing herself in a way few others are attempting. she hopes to establish herself as a personality foremost, rather than pinning herself to a particular talent. she has made strides in acting, largely in niche productions which she intends to continue, and has made more significant progress in hosting. she would love, truthfully, to have a radio show of her own, to continue entertaining via vlogs, sketch comedy, and other media on her youtube channel, and to establish herself as a personal brand capable of remaining self sustaining.

IDOL IMAGE

“it’s all about those eyes,” they told her as they prepared her styling for debut. the image board was decorated in pictures of bob cuts, wispy bangs, lavenders and whites and grays. soft colors for a soft girl, a honeyed blonde  color for her hair. “you’re like bambi, just look at you,” they’d said. it had been carefully followed with, “just keep your mouth shut.” see, here’s the catch. bae soho is all personality. she’s all charisma, all charm. now, granted, she’s not entirely untalented. granted, it’s not a natural talent that she has, for dance or for vocals. but she’s been training for years, had been thirteen when kjh picked her up and she’d been active as an idol since sixteen. she had to have made some improvements over time for that, or else she’d have been just plain lazy. and bae soho is anything but lazy. truthfully, soho has an easy nature to her, bright and charming and just weird enough to make her utterly approachable. some of the girls in the group are pretty to the point of blinding, stunning to the point of awe inspiring. soho isn’t ugly by any stretch (is any idol?) but there is a softness, a cuteness to her appeal that makes her, ultimately, seem just on the edge of attainable. it helps that she is a self professed nerd, that she’ll wander down tangential fields of though, or make a truly terrible pun that kills the mood dead in the water. she’s halfway between quirky and downright odd, a comfortable niche of different but not alienating. she’d be an easy choice to speak up on shows. and yet - silence is the name of the game at first. shut lips, smiling eyes, charming reactions.

there is, of course, a reason for the silence.

this isn’t soho’s first rodeo. she’s done the variety bit. she’s been on stage. she spent three years as remi of vixen, with a very different image. dark dyed hair and black rimmed eyes, fierce expressions and a fiery sweetness and spunkiness to nod towards her age, she debuted at sixteen. and by nineteen it was over. the video leak had been the first blow, hastily written off as a lookalike, but the main rapper’s indiscretions shortly thereafter had been the nail in the coffin.

so her move into 99 entertainment had been predicated on a drastic change in image, promotional name, and appearance. she sheds her natural hair color, the characteristic long, straight lengths of it, even the stage name the world knew her by. reinvented, she is soho now, with soft honey blond hair and big bambi eyes,  and she is quiet and sweet and just a little bit silly, a little bit cheeky. a surprising dash of innocence and insight peppered here and there. they need her to wait. bide her time. and she does.

not completely silently, of course, but she waits. she records songs she saves for a dormant soundcloud. she does the occasional youtube video, and her outreach on twitter and instagram is,  at least, largely unrestricted. fans adore her for her quick wit and how rapidly she picks up on and proliferates the memes and in jokes of the fandom, growing a reputation for having a secret stan account somewhere. to them she’s relatable, attainable, not a distant fairy princess but a sweet girl in shimmering blush colors.

and with time, this changes too.

with time, they give her freedom, inch by inch. she grows her hair out long once more. the image they impose on the group shifts and with it soho pivots, as any good idol, any good actress must. she laters quirk and cuteness onto the sex appeal, a lovely charm to offset the lurid twists. she begins to open up more on variety - or rather, to let out more of what’s been lurking beneath the surface, that poorly restrained oddness and appeal. bit by bit, she’s allowed to flourish, to shine, once more, as years of distance grow between her and vixen’s remi, now but a figment in the distance. (except - she wakes in a cold  sweat, every so often. except - she still checks her name on portal sites obsessively. except - she still feels ill at ease in her own skin, under the scrutiny of others when she’s descended from the stage and from the brilliant lights that protect and obscure.) she’s ethereal, surreal, she’s creepy, she’s cute. she’s sexy, in the way of shadows and mystery and the promise of the unknown. bambi eyes become haunting, sparkle with playful knowing instead of sweetness and innocence.

it becomes wrapped into her image. bae soho, your soft goth girlfriend. bae soho, your weird gamer girl next door, who can put away a pizza in record time and still look cute doing it. bae soho, who writes songs that sound like nintendo lofi remixes. bae soho, with shelves full of books from horror manga to russian classics. bae soho,  who you can never quite pin down. bae soho, who runs the gamut from a smooth honey voice on a radio show to tongue in cheek sketch comedy produced for her youtube channel.

she doesn’t mind the shift in concept. feels like she’s done it all now, from girl crush to angelic school girl innocence to playful sexy to straight up sexy. she can handle it, she figures. she intends to transcend image. celeste is her bread and butter, her lifeblood, but it’s also the means to an end. she’s in no way musically infatuated and the loyalty she feels to the group is more practical than loving. without celeste she has no platform. with celeste she has a springboard, a cache, a growing brand reputation that will put her on the map. she has the resources and the freedom to pursue the music she does care about as a pure passion project, to create the sketches and vlogs and gaming content she desires with professional aide, and the connections to make her way in the industry in a way she’d never be able to do on her own, as a soloist, or in a smaller company. she’s been on the otherside of the looking glass, languishing as a nugu and struggling for footing, and while they may not have had a first win they’re not exactly in the pits, so she’ll take it. any step forward is a step up.

and bae soho is aiming for the stars.  

IDOL HISTORY

the stars do not fortel her coming in the literal sense, but her mother has a pregnancy dream, the kind old grandmothers will say is prophetic, a dream of the milky way in the sky overhead, a dream of laying on her back on the hillside of her hometown out in the countryside, long since left behind. a dream of the inky blackness over head and a sense of something both ominous and promising. to soho this sounds more like a stress dream than anything else, but she also enjoys the idea that her mother knew, even as she was unborn, that soho herself would be some eldritch horror, some mystical being.

she isn’t, of course. soho is a normal baby, albeit on the cuter side. she grows into a relatively normal toddler as well, precocious and strange as most toddlers are, with an apparent lack of fear that alarmed her more timid mother. nothing phased soho, not the dark, not needles, not snakes nor spiders. at the influence of her older brothers, she spent as much time tramping around in the muddy fields around their house as she did inside, and when inside her mind roamed the hills and mountains in flights of fancy.

she was a whimsical child, bound up in impossibilities, in hopes, in daydreams and mysticism. easily influenced by whatever media she consumed, the girl voraciously wrapped herself into fantasy worlds, books and television and movies the most common culprits. but with the dawn of the video game era, the bae household was filled with the enthusiastic shrieks of over-excited children, crowded around a controller- lost in hyrule or the johto region or any number of other pixelated universes filled with magic, mystery, and lore.

the games quickly revealed many things about soho: she was fanciful and flighty, she was obsessive, she was sneaky and scheming, she was a perfectionist. and above all else, she was yearning, a desperation to reach out to something other than the world around her. she wanted the promise of more that came from such worlds, from fantasies and dreams. she wanted to be the chosen one, wielding a special blade or never-before-seen magical powers. head firmly lodged in the clouds, she was able to ignore, for quite some time, the unravelling of their lives.

you see the bae family had hit dire financial straits, and slowly the wear and tear of it began to show in the falling apart bandaid fixes on the plumbing, the windows, the wallpapering of their home. her father became a ghost, drifting in and out of the house too early, too late, barely heard from nor seen.

eventually relocation was in order, and they were forced to leave their little world behind. moving from the countryside of gyeonggi to the heart of seoul was tumultuous to say the least, and relocating from a more spacious (albeit falling apart old) home to a cramped villa apartment was almost impossible. for a girl born to run and explore the energy she was left with in this pent up, new lifestyle had her acting out in more ways than one. her performance at school suffered as she moved into middle school and she had a number of behavioral problems. in the hope of mitigating this and expending some of her energy (and getting her out of the house) her parents scraped up the money to put her in dance classes, which she had expressed some interest in prior.

by the time she was thirteen, she was auditioning for her first entertainment companies.

kjh was the first to offer her a contract, and while she initially thought to hold out to audition with the bigger names first, she found promise in how readily they accepted her in with open arms, talking of a new sort of image, a powerful and hard hitting concept that would make even jinx look weak. she liked the sound of that - she wanted that kind of power, wanted to immerse herself in the fantasy of the rich and famous, and so she begged her parents to okay the trainee contract.

debuting only three years later was, at the time, a blessing. vixen wasn’t the most popular right out of the gate, but soho knew they had promise. potential. as their main rapper greedily grabbed up attention for herself, soho knew in her heart she herself would win the world over if she were just given a chance, and set out to make that a possibility - at any cost, by any means.

overtime it worked, gradually picking up attention, mostly for her maturing visuals and for her natural charisma, more so than anything else, but she wasn’t picky. landing a role on the breakout show heroes certainly came to her aid, and she was experiencing a modest upswing in her popularity, slowly growing her career.

and then the video leaked.

she knew she was ruined.  

she had to be.

a video like that, pictures like that, suggestive to the extreme. did it matter if it was her or not? the public was certain, and her name was finally rocketing up the search engines. barely past her nineteenth birthday everything was falling apart.

and then, it all got worse.

when the scandal of their main rapper broke, her first reaction was “at least i didn’t try to blackmail anyone” - there was a sort of comfort in the mutual destruction of it. at least they were both fucking up. at least her scandal was being overshadowed. as more and more details came out, as it went to a trial, as the company brought them in to disband them, she watched her carefully crafted fantasy fall apart around her.

she fragmented. left to live with her parents, in that just-barely-better apartment she’d managed to buy for them with the next-to-nothing she’d earned (it was easy to upgrade them from almost nothing to barely something, even on the shoestring budget of a rookie idol).  she was twenty years old and knew herself to be an abject failure, truly and completely.

it wasn’t until they begged her into at least getting back into dance that she slowly woke back up, became herself again. she had little interest in dancing, these days, but being surrounded by music at least helped. and when a scout from 99 reached out to her, she even considered it.

eventually, she accepted the offer. she had to put the past behind her. she had to try again. training all over again was an exercise in humiliation, and she knew all too well what was said about her in whispers, behind her back. and strangely, it helped, inured her to the criticisms, created in her a brazen and bullheaded spirit of competition and obsessive drive that earned her a spot in the debuting group.

bae soho was reimagined in the image of the new group. fairylike innocence was the name of the game, and for a girl with pretty, fair skin and big bambi eyes, that was easy enough to pull off. a golden blonde hue was designated for her hair and blush, peachy pinks became her signature. it was hardly something she minded, the freshness of it all, but it felt like aging backwards, to go from long teal and black hair and thick liner, combat boots and fishnets to all of this frill and silk. but then, that was half the point of her little makeover. to erase the sins of remi and relegate them to obscurity, to present soho as a pretty, new package to be parceled out and consumed. safe and sweet.  be a rookie again, be bashful and eager at once, be bright and charming and also, you know, quiet. be quiet. stand back a little.

she does.

and in time she blossoms. in time the past fades, along with the memory of vixen, replaced in the eyes of the public by a thousand other girls, a hundred other scandals, myriad contenders for the attention of  the multitudes. and as vixen and remi are forgotten, soho is given room to rise. it begins slow at first, lifting her twitter and instagram bans. and she takes to them like a fish to water, scours the fancafes and the tags and the fan accounts. likes memes and leaves comments and makes post after post. she becomes relatable, a presence that they can understand, quirky and a little odd, in an endearing way. she tells offbeat stories and lets the members share her embarrassing truths, like how she once ate only kimchi jigae for a solid month, from the same restaurant. they talk about her video gaming obsession and her propensity to sacrifice sleep for more hours scrolling aimless on the internet.

next, they let her begin using youtube. they give her the resources first for simple things, vlogs. she takes fans into the daily life of members, shows them snippets of life backstage, of waiting room antics, of the wall sized bookshelf filled with novels and manga in her room. she introduces them to the row of succulents on her windowsill and laments her failed attempt to grow daisies. in time, the company allocates her greater resources. she does more now, faux interviews and staged cooking shows, soft prank videos on the girls and hidden cameras, she graduates gradually to sketches, comedy bits, reviews of games, let’s plays, and streams.

the last step is letting her take her soundcloud back, and she begins to put up her silly jingles first, because the humor is relatable. moves into the wordless lo-fi video game-esque tracks next, with titles that tell stories and album art she’s drawn herself, pixel perfect, fantastical, whimsical, a little surreal.

they let her back onto tv. she picks up a few guest roles here and there, she drops a commercial for a video game where she gets to be made into a character and cosplays to her heart’s content.there’s even a webdrama after awhile, about girl’s in a gaming company, because 99 has come to see that allowing her to lean into this nerdy cutie sexy girl angle is only going to help them out, hit a niche market far removed from anyone who might be inclined to bring up certain youthful indiscretions. as the group matures, her career itself grows, her opportunities rise. she picks up more  lines, bit by bit. her practice begins to pay off.

she’s always been a performer but she’s becoming an entertainer, someone known for an ability to smooth the way between segments, a bright spot in the shows she heads onto. she’s becoming someone considered competent enough, at least, even if most of the attention is on her pretty face, her unexpected expressions, on the instagram video of pubg dances that goes viral. there’s a reversal charm to a girl like her being such an odd duckling, and 99 is content to milk it for now, to see how far the strangeness of bae soho will take them.