#there's a lot of parallels in both the in universe systemic abuse and the audience's reaction to those who fight against it

[constantvariations]

Thinking about making the intro to my Adam essay a comparison to Dragon Age's Anders/blood mages. Pray that I can keep focused and not go on tangents about the Everything

[anthurak]

Something that I’ve found makes theorizing for Loona a lot of fun is that for the most part, her entire background is one big black-box up to when Blitzo adopted her. Like we have no idea how long Loona was in that orphanage, or WHAT landed her in that orphanage, or what she was doing BEFORE that. The only thing we can say for certain is that things were BAD for her. As in, right up there with what we’ve seen from Blitzo and Moxxie in the fucked-up department. Possibly even worse.

Now sure, we can see some similarities to Blitzo in Loona, such as how she uses an abrasive personality to keep people at a safe distance, which could be a clue that Loona went through something similar to her father. But the thing is, we can just as easily point to most similarities as things Loona has picked up from Blitzo in the four-ish years since he adopted her.

It's also worth noting that Blitzo has almost certainly sees a lot of similarities between himself and Loona. BUT, it's worth keeping in mind that this is likewise almost certainly simply due to their first meeting absolutely SLAMMING Blitzo's sympathetic trauma response button. I wouldn't be surprised at all if it turns out that many of the seeming parallels between these two are largely surface level, and the deeper we dive into Loona's past, the more differences we'll find.

At this point, I’d say the only specific hint we might have towards something in Loona’s background is her oddly detailed and specific hypothetical shitty family she describes in Murder Family. After all, we now have two cases of seemingly inconsequential lines from that episode ("Maybe like a shitty dad... or a mob family. That's understandable", "We're just killing a mother. We're ruining a family") turning out to be major hints to a character’s background.

And the funny thing is, I get the feeling that this is all quite deliberate as a writing choice. As in, nobody else both in-series and the audience is meant to actually know anything about Loona’s background. Like I think it’s a pretty safe bet that not even Blitzo actually knows anything specific about Loona’s past before he adopted her. Loona has always been closed-off, and I get the sense that Loona starting to bond/open-up to Blitzo is something VERY recent. So I really doubt Loona has ever felt comfortable letting anything slip to Blitzo about her past.

Which all gives me the since that Loona’s backstory is going to make for a significant reveal both in and out of universe. Particularly given that at this point we have a pretty good sense of Blitzo’s, Moxxie’s and Millie’s backgrounds, but barely more than a HINT at Loona’s. It all gives me the vibe of something Vivzie and co. are keeping under-wraps in the background before springing it on us when we least expect it.

As far as specific theories/headcanons go, I’ve personally got two in mind:

Theory 1: EXTREMELY Shitty Family. Loona was given up by her parents pretty much at birth for adoption, and the family that took her in was actually super abusive. Tying into her line in Murder Family, Loona got set on fire a lot. Eventually, Loona either got away or outright killed her tormentors to escape, after which she ended up in the orphanage system.

Theory 2: Freaky Cult Shit. Loona was born into some really messed up cult and got subjected to some pretty fucked-up shit before she managed to get away, probably killing quite a few people in the process. Personally, I prefer this one as it has more potential as a plotline in the present of the show, and could tie nicely into a few of the subtler details of Loona’s character, such as her being a clear prodigy when it comes to magic, and her oddly specific thematic ties to the Goetic Grimoire...

[itsthenovelteafactor]

Superhero Gothic

Thanks to everyone who responded to my previous post (special shoutout to @jeyfeather1234 💛 ) about superheroes and gothic media! I know it’s been, like, a month, but here we go.

Here’s a bit of a look into some common gothic themes, and how they apply to Doom Patrol, The Boys, Watchmen (2019), and The Umbrella Academy. This one’s a bit long, not gonna lie, but I hope you enjoy! 

Part I: Let’s Talk About Gothic Media

There is not actually an all-encompassing definition for gothic media, or even a universally agreed-upon one. You’re probably familiar with some well-known gothic works (think Dracula, Frankenstein, Edgar Allen Poe, Stephen King) but there is a lot of debate on what exactly makes them gothic. 

There are some common themes in gothic works, though: families/characters under the control of a tyrannical paterfamilias, the crumbling of the established order/estate, long-buried secrets that have consequences in the present, and supernatural events that are stand-ins for/reflective of the emotional state/past actions of the characters. 

(Note: these aren’t all the themes of gothic works or even most of them, but for purposes here, I’d like to limit this analysis to them. I’d love to talk about other themes/ideas, though, if anyone has them. 😊)

So… superheroes (quick overview in case you haven’t watched any of them… spoiler warnings for the rest of this discussion)

Doom Patrol:

Five misfit superhumans attempt to rescue their mentor figure when he is kidnapped by an old enemy.

They are very, very bad at it.

Also features a singing horse head, a sentient nonbinary teleporting street (who is by far the best character) and the narrator is the fourth-wall breaking series villain. 

Beautifully weird but will also emotionally devastate you. Criminally underrated, tbh.

Watchmen (2019):

Story takes place after the canon of the graphic novel which is too much to summarize.

Alternate history (that should really feel more fictitious than it does) where white supremacist organization the Seventh Cavalry, masked police officers, and former superheroes in hiding all collide in Tulsa Oklahoma

Swept the Emmys this year and ABSOLUTELY DESERVED TO

The Umbrella Academy:

Washed up former child superheroes are forced to reunite when their father dies under mysterious circumstances 

Time travel, dysfunctional siblings, and a killer soundtrack

Basically a family drama with the superhero story as secondary (complimentary)

Probably the most obviously gothic of all of these it is aesthetic AF 

The Boys: 

Superheroes exist but they are corporate sellouts under the control of evil company Not-Amazon (AKA Vought)

Regular human protagonists try to hold them accountable for their actions with varying (read: usually minimal) success

Yes, it’s the one from those weird ads earlier this year

Billy Joel!! 

Part II: Niles Caulder, Ozymandias, and Other Terrible Father Figures

The Tyrannical Paterfamilias: 

Does not always mean a father figure explicitly, often relating to the notion of a patriarchal tradition, or family inheritance that plays a role in controlling the main characters. 

Sometimes, it is a father figure. 

Sometimes, it is a representative of patriarchal tradition/male head of pseudo-family unit.

So, uh, role call: 

Reginald Hargreeves (even in death) holds power over his children, and has shaped all of them into the adults they have become, and that drives the majority of the conflict. Each of the major character individually grapples with the after-effects of his abuse. Luther feels the need to be the leader and protect everyone and alienates his allies as a consequence. Diego constantly asserts himself as a hero (often to dangerous extremes) because it is the only way he was ever valued. Allison has to teach herself boundaries and responsible use of her powers after he encouraged her to abuse them for years. Klaus turns to drugs to cope with his childhood trauma. Five disobeyed his father with disastrous consequences and is constantly fighting to not become him. Vanya spent her entire childhood in the background, and never learned to assert herself in a healthy way. Thanks, Reggie.

Homelander says that The Seven are like a family. While whether or not this is accurate (it isn’t) is up for debate, he does occupy the tyrannical paterfamilias roles incredibly well. Homelander controls every member of the Seven, threatening them and their loved ones whenever they step out of line (read: do not do exactly what he wants in the exact way he wants them to do it.) He is also very closely tied with conservative/patriarchal rhetoric in-universe and at one point dates a literal Nazi. 

William Butcher less evil than most of the other characters on this list but the bar is also like, on the ground. Butcher tries to control the Boys in a similar way (Butcher and Homelander are character foils, okay? it’s actually pretty neat). He’s perfectly willing to sacrifice them in pursuit of his own goals, disregards their points of view and the well-being of their loved ones, and tries to cut loose anyone who disagrees with his methods (recall when Hughie tried to rescue his friends at the end of s1 and Butcher… punched him in the face? Yeah, that.) The difference is that the Boys can push back against his without being, you know, brutally murdered. (And also the Butcher isn’t a literal monster; I’m not anti-Butcher, okay? He’s an interesting character and the fact that he seems constantly on the verge of becoming that which he hates most is part of what makes him interesting.)

Guess what, folks? It’s hating Niles Caulder hours. He engineered accidents to turn the main characters into his test subjects, and then kept them conveniently hidden away in his large manor. Stole their autonomy and independence but paints himself as a benevolent father figure. And that’s not even including what he does to his actual daughter, Dorothy. He’s terrified of her growing up (read: becoming a young woman) and so he locks her away for almost 100 years and, when she is freed, yells at her constantly and makes her terrified of showing any signs of maturation (even though she’s 111 and clearly tired of being written off as a child).

The relationship between Ozymandias and his daughter, Lady Trieu, is integral to the final act of Watchmen. Heralded as the “smartest man in the world,” Ozymandias refused to acknowledge his daughter as his until he needed something from her. While Lady Trieu is more self-sufficient and independent than some of the applications of this trope, she goes to great lengths to prove herself, first to him, and then to herself when he rejects her.

Part III: Been a Long Time Gone (Constantinople) 

Gothic fiction is often associated with change, and particularly, the collapse of established systems of power. For example, many works like The House of the Seven Gables and The Fall of the House of Usher take place in old, crumbling manor houses. There is a reason for this! These kinds of estates are remnants of a past that is irreversibly gone, and their continued presence in decrypt forms serves as a reminder. 

Each of the four series takes place at a moment, either on a wide scale or on a personal scale (or both!), in which an established order is being questioned, and the constant reminders of that failed order are used to gothic effect.

The Umbrella Academy plays this most directly (In fact, there are TONS of parallels between the end of s1 of TUA and House of Usher that I don’t have the time to get into right now... lmk if you want that meta). We can see the Hargreeves mansion as a very literal example of this. While not worn down, the house is notably both very large and very empty. Shelves are filled with merchandise for a superhero team that disbanded over a decade prior, and portraits of a family that no longer speaks to each other. None of the family members ever seem truly comfortable or at ease in the house, and for good reason - every back corner is a reminder of their incredibly traumatic childhood. 

In The Boys, the story begins with the fridging death of the main character’s girlfriend, Robin, at the hands of a member of the Seven, a group of heroes so ingrained in the public consciousness that when they later hide out in a costume shop, literally every single costume is for one of Vought’s heroes. The Seven represent the system in power, which, at the disposal of Not-Amazon means corporate greed, shallow altruism, and the cultivation of public personas at the expense of actual humanity. 

From that moment on, the sheer presence of The Seven on everything from public billboards to breakfast cereal is a remainder for Hughie (and the audience) that this established system doesn’t work and is based on lies, which serves this effect on a personal level. In the broader scale, however, we also see that the Seven themselves are fracturing under an unsustainable business model. Even their name, “The Seven” starts to seem a bit dated when halfway through season one through the end of season two there are notably... less than seven of them. 

The main characters in Doom Patrol are all in recovery after the accidents that irreversibly changed their lives. We see through flashbacks the people that they used to be, and the difference is striking. They were each established in their own elements: Cliff a famous race-car driver, Rita a world renowned actress, Larry a hero pilot, Jane was involved in counter-cultural movements, Vic was a student and athlete. The foundations upon which their worlds were established are completely decimated by the accidents, and now they (save Vic and sometimes Jane) live mostly in isolation in Niles’ manor house, an estate that is far larger than would be necessary to comfortably house a group of their size.

And you feel the emptiness, both in the manor, and in the lives of the characters. They have barely created a shadow version of their own existence when the series starts, so fragile that a simple trip into town devolves into utter chaos. 

Angela Abar of Watchmen has also constructed a life following the terrifying act of terrorism on the White Night. It’s a bit of a double life, and we see that the balancing act is challenging for her, even before the story truly begins. The death of Judd Crawford, and the revelation about him that follows is not only traumatizing on a personal level (but it definitely is that), but also upsets her understanding of the world. People she’s come to trust are not just dishonest but truly monstrous. And the more Angela learns about what has been happening, the more her understanding of the world begins to unravel. Her memories, and the memories of those around her are cast in a much more sinister light, and the effect is genuinely chilling. 

Part IV: “I’m the Little Girl Who Threw the Brick in the Air”

In episode 3 of Watchmen, Laurie contacts Dr. Manhattan on the cosmic phone booth to tell him a joke. It’s a version of what TVTropes calls the “brick joke,” and it relies on set up taking place early on, other stuff happening, and then the response coming at an unexpected moment. 

So, yeah. Events of the past/buried secrets resurfacing with consequences in the present.

Continuing with the theme from Watchmen, the entire series is punctuated with the way the past and the present intertwine, with elements from both the original Watchmen graphic novel, and actual American history. One of the things we talked a lot about in my gothic lit class was the manner in which the overhanging specter of past atrocities casts a shadow over the present, and how many works cannot help but have gothic themes because there are so many horrifying things in the past that cannot be ignored, and provide both context and nuance for the discussions we have in the present. No series tackles these topics quite so directly (and with as much care) as Watchmen. (note: it does not always make for easy viewing, but if you’re in a place where you feel like you can engage with that kind of material, I highly recommend the show.)

In Doom Patrol, the past actions of the characters very much control the storyline (see: previous discussion of Niles Caulder), but the character whose storyline I want to talk about here is Rita (partially for plot reasons and partially because I just love Rita, okay?). We learn when we first meet Rita that in the past she was... not a great person. We know that the trauma of the accident that gave her her powers has changed her, we also know that she still holds on to the guilt and that her guilt has limited the scope of her world for years, but we don’t know what exactly it is that she’s done. 

Enter Mr. Nobody, all-powerful narrator who is not just aware of Rita’s greatest sins, but perfectly capable of manifesting reminders of them into the story. She is confronted with empty cradles, and the sound of crying children in the background of many scenes and we see how much it effects her, without a full understanding of why it does (see: The Tell-Tale Heart). Her past begins to haunt her physically, and she begins to crumble in response to it, until finally she is forced to confide in a stranger (and thus the audience). The past actions do not just inform the audience of Rita’s character - they show up to influence her behavior in the present. 

The ending of The Umbrella Academy season 1 is super evocative of the gothic genre with Vanya breaking open the soundproof chamber (wherein she was silenced for years) and rising from the basement to destroy the last remnants of the Hargreeves legacy (which would be awesome if the last remnants of the Hargreeves legacy didn’t include the rest of her family). Pretty much every mistake the siblings make over the course of the season feeds together to create the finale, but the primary cause isn’t something any of them actually did. It all ties back to Reginald Hargreeves’ complete inability to be nice to children. Any children. His own and random strangers that need help. 

In The Boys, while the extent to which people are making f-ed up choices in the present cannot be expressed enough, we see through the characters of Homelander that many of the present difficulties are a result of past mistakes. Particularly, the profit-seeking corruption within Vought. We learn in s1 through Vogelbaum that Homelander was raised in a lab by Vought as an experiment, only to be unceremoniously thrust into the spotlight and told he was a superhero (which... does not justify a single one of his actions but is still a major yikes). As the head scientist of the project, Vogelbaum is very aware that ignoring his conscious if the name of research has essentially created the biggest threat their world has ever seen. 

(Seriously y’all just stop raising your super kids in isolation) 

Part V: Put Them Together, and They’re the MF-ing Spice Girls 

Having the environment respond to characters’ emotions/mental states is pretty common in gothic works (it was a dark and stormy night = someone is probably not doing super well). One of the advantages of the genre’s tendency towards the supernatural is that, often, those elements of the stories, as well, are reflections of the main ideas of a work of fiction (see: Stephen King’s really unsubtle period metaphors).

Because all of these shows have a ton of supernatural/scifi elements by virtue of being, well, superhero shows, I thought it would be easier (and more fun!) to come up with a short list of elements, what they mean, and what cases they might apply to.

1. A Nonlinear Experience of Time

The Umbrella Academy: legitimately about time travel. Characters are attempting to fix the timeline but are unable to because they are both mentally and sometimes literally stuck in the past. 

Watchmen: In the episode This Extraordinary Being, Angela experiences firsthand the experiences of her grandfather, under the influence of a drug called Nostalgia. The episode touches on many themes, one of which being the impact of generational trauma in marginalized communities. Throughout the series, Dr. Manhatten is cursed with experiencing all time at once, and the episode A God Walks into Abar illustrates that, because of this, he is constantly facing the consequences of particular actions before, after, and while he is preforming him.

Doom Patrol: Mr. Nobody is able to physically travel to one of Jane’s flashbacks via his fourth-wall breaking powers, and gives Dr. Harrison an ultimatum for the future. 

What it implies: Events, particularly events that evoke guilt or conflict, are not as rooted in the past as one would like to think.

2. Powers/Abilities that reflect personal trauma/failings

Doom Patrol: Larry’s abilities/bond with the Negative Spirit have made it so that he is constantly covering himself with bandages/avoiding other people, which reflects his experiences having to hide his identity as a gay man in the 50/60s. Rita forced herself to walk a thin line, betraying everything in pursuit of her image; her abilities require constant effort to keep her entire body from becoming misshapen and out of control. Vic’s father with boundary issues can literally control his perception of the world through his cybernetic enhancements. Dorothy’s abilities manifest as imaginary friends because she was kept isolated for years at a time. 

The Umbrella Academy: pretty much all of the kids’ powers are representative of the interpersonal skills they were never able to develop. Luther is super-durable but also the most emotionally vulnerable of the group. Five can teleport and time travel but always seems to be too late to stop things. Diego can manipulate the trajectory of projectiles but cannot escape the path his father set out for him, not matter how much he resents it. Vanya always forced herself to stay quiet until the sound literally explodes out of her.

The Boys: Annie’s abilities allow her to control light, but she struggles (in the beginning) to bring to light the horrible things done to her behind closed doors. 

Watchmen: Not technically a power, but Looking Glass’ mirror-mask is a constant reminder of the hall of mirrors that both saved his life and traumatized him forever. 

What it implies: from a story perspective, these allow for an exploration of trauma/guilt to occur on a scale much larger than people simply talking about their problems (as if anyone on any of these shows knows how to talk about their problems...) It also means that the trauma/guilt of the characters takes on a physical form that is able to haunt them, and constantly remind them/hold them accountable for their past actions.

3. Diluted Sense of Reality:

Doom Patrol: The first season is narrated by its main villain, and throughout the season we see that the act of narration itself has an impact on the story.

Watchmen: The event that kicks off the plot of the story is hinged upon a paradox introduced by Angela near the end of the series when trying to speak to her Grandfather in the past through Dr. Manhattan.

The Umbrella Academy: The pair of episodes in season 1, The Day that Wasn’t and The Day That Was take the same point in time and explore two possible avenue for the future from there, with The Day that Wasn’t ending with the events of the entire episode being completely erased from the timeline.

What it implies: you can’t necessarily trust everything you see, even from the audience perspective, giving them a position not unlike that of the characters. The character’s uncertainty and confusion is magnified and reflected in the world that surrounds them.

Other examples: an apocalypse (The Umbrella Academy, Doom Patrol, Watchmen (of a sort)), ghosts (The Umbrella Academy - hi, Ben!), immortality/invulnerability (Watchmen, Doom Patrol, The Boys), and characters that look significantly younger than they actually are (The Boys, The Umbrella Academy, Doom Patrol). 

Part VI: Why Did You Write a Literal Essay Don’t You Have Real Schoolwork (yes... shhhhh...)

And... there you have it. I don’t really have some grand conclusion here. This is (clearly) far from a complete analysis but it is the most my finals-week brain can concoct at the moment. 

If you have other ideas, let me know! You can always add to the notes or message me – my inbox is always open!  If you got this far, thank you so much for taking the time to read this! Much love! ❤️

[kittyprincessofcats]

I love both shows (Spop and Su) but I wanted to ask about some things you’ve said:

“Can’t believe “It’s okay for fans to be disappointed when oppressive dictators who’ve murdered millions and have tried to kill the protagonists before get forgiven without having to face consequences” is a so hard to understand for some people, but here we are”

“So did Steven Univerae end with the Diamonds in prison where they should be, or did I do well to stop watching when I did?”

With that logic can’t the very same thing be said and applied to She ra regarding Catra?

“So did She ra end with Catra in prison where she should be, or did I do well to stop watching when I did?”

Hi there. First of all, I want to say sorry for taking so long answer this. January’s been a very busy month for me and I literally just didn’t have the time to write the kind of reply I think this ask deserves.

Next, I want to make a few things clear just so we’re on the same page:

I love both shows as well and nothing I’m about to say is intended to be seen as hate against Steven Universe. SU meant a lot to me and I was a big fan of it for many years. Change Your Mind disappointed me a lot as an episode and as a finale, precisely because I didn’t want the Diamonds to get any sort of redemption, but just because it was a dealbreaker for *me*, that doesn’t mean I harbor any ill feelings towards the fans or writers of the show. None of this is meant to be a personal attack against anyone who worked on this show or likes it.

I stopped watching SU after CYM, so this post will ignore anything beyond that. I have not seen the SU movie or Steven Universe Future and I don’t intend to. Please don’t try to convince me otherwise. I’m not comfortable watching more.

I wrote the posts you quoted because I got quite a few rude messages after I said I didn’t like Change Your Mind and that I don’t want to keep watching SU. The first one was a response to people who were giving me a hard time for not liking the Diamond redemption – it wasn’t me saying that /no one/ should like it, just that my feelings on it were valid as well and people shouldn’t badger me about it.

In that sense, YES you could say the same thing about Catra! If someone wanted to stop watching SPOP because Catra’s redemption made them uncomfortable (maybe because they knew someone like her in real life or something similar), that’d be absolutely fine! I’d never send them the kind of messages I got or try to pressure them into continuing a show they’re not comfortable continuing. Because respecting real people is more important than a show or a fictional character.

I’ll be honest: I’m a little tired of justifying my feelings about the SU finale to people. But I believe you’re asking out of genuine curiosity and I haven’t made too many posts defending Catra yet, so I’ll try to analyze this step by step for you – and anyone else who might be curious.

So, without further ado: Here’s my essay on why Catra’s redemption works for me but the Diamonds’ doesn’t.

Short explanation: Because if you compare the scale of their actions, their motivations, what’s supposed to make them sympathetic to the audience, their build-up, and how their respective redemptions are handled, then the Diamonds aren’t an equivalent to Catra – they’re an equivalent to Horde Prime. And if SPOP had suddenly redeemed Horde Prime at the last minute after building him up as the big bad, I wouldn’t have liked that either.

Long (very long) explanation under the cut

Okay, let’s get into this in detail.

1.     The scale of their actions

Let’s look at the evil stuff these characters have done first.

The Diamonds: Created an intergalactic empire, conquered millions of planets (destroying all life of them in the process) for millions of years, created a strict caste system in which all gems only have one function to follow and where Pearls are essentially slaves who have to obey every order, persecute and send shattering robonoids after gems that don’t fit into the system or fuse outside of their caste (off-colors), created a human zoo and kidnapped people for it, shattered anyone who wasn’t loyal to them, bubbled all the Rose Quartzes, created the Cluster and the other fusion experiments out of the shards of their fallen enemies (essentially torturing them for all eternity), corrupted all the gems on Earth, including those that were loyal to them. And that’s just what we get told upfront in the show. We’re talking about intergalactic dictators with no respect for life who will ruthlessly kill anyone who gets in their way.

Catra: Helped Hordak conquer one (1) planet. Bad, yes – but not nearly on the same scale as devoting eons to conquering entire galaxies. Also, Catra isn’t the one who founded the Horde in the first place; she just happened to grow up there (likely because she was taken from her real home as a baby) and was raised with their ideals. The Diamonds, on the other hand *are* the people who started their empire.

So yeah, the Diamonds aren’t Catra – they’re Horde Prime. He’s the one who founded the intergalactic Horde and destroyed millions of planets. (There’s even a whole parallel about how both Horde Prime and White Diamond think they’re perfect and everyone should be like them…)

Now, you could argue that Catra opening the portal was a crime on a larger scale. But even that would have likely only destroyed Etheria – one planet, not millions. The scale we’re talking about is still way smaller than Horde Prime’s or the Diamonds’ actions.

Catra’s other “crimes” in the show are things like being a toxic friend, manipulating and lying to people. Those are things I’m going to ignore for this post, since you specifically asked if Catra shouldn’t be in prison for her crimes. Being a toxic friend is bad and all, but it’s not actually something illegal that you can get thrown in jail for, so it’s irrelevant for this discussion. And it still wouldn’t be on the scale of the Diamonds, who, let me repeat, have destroyed countless galaxies.

2.     Motivations for their actions

“But what about *why* they did all of those things? Isn’t that relevant?” It is, and I’m glad you asked. Let’s have a look.

Catra: Catra grew up in the Horde through no fault of her own and was mistreated and abused her whole life to the point where survival and safety became her primary motivations. She was treated as second best to Adora, filling her with a desire to prove herself. She got told as a child that she’s only worth “keeping around” if Adora values her, so she tied her self-worth to Adora’s approval. She feels betrayed when Adora leaves the Horde, because she interprets it as Adora caring more about strangers than about her. She stays with the Horde because they’re the devil she knows, because she wants to prove herself and because she’s hurt about the only person who ever showed her kindness leaving her. She grew up without a proper parental figure and without ever learning what healthy relationships are supposed to work like, so it’s understandable why she has no concept of it. She opens the portal because she sees her abuser working with (and seemingly being accepted by) her enemies and that knowledge makes her feel powerless to the point where she’d do anything to get back at them. She’s been abused and victimized her entire life and all of her actions are a direct result of that. Catra thinks that if she gains enough power, it’ll finally give her the safety and approval she craves.

In general, Catra’s story always makes it clear that she’s a victim of physical and emotional abuse who never learned what healthy relationships are supposed to look like and who’s lashing out in the only way she knows how. Some people might disagree on this, but I personally never had a point in the show where I couldn’t relate to her or couldn’t understand why she’s doing a certain thing. SPOP did a brilliant job of making sure that even at her lowest point, Catra’s actions are still understandable when you think from her point of view.

The Diamonds: … Uhm yeah, I’m drawing a blank here. Unless there’s some explanation in the movie or SU Future, we never actually learn why they did any of what they did. We get an explanation for some of their deeds – that they created the zoo because they thought Pink wanted it, that they corrupted the gems as revenge for Pink’s supposed death – but what the show never goes into is the real problem: Why they’re dictators in the first place. Why they consider themselves superior to other gems. Why they shatter anyone who doesn’t fit it, etc. They’re just dictators… because they’re dictators. We never get to understand their motivations.

And just to be clear – I think that in itself is perfectly fine. I don’t think SU should have had to give us any more explanation than that. SPOP also never explains why Horde Prime conquers other planets in the first place. He just does it because he’s evil and power-hungry and the show needs an antagonist. I think not giving a villain a deeper motivation is fine – if you’re not planning to redeem them.

3.     What makes them sympathetic

Catra: I pretty much explained this already. We’re told from season 1 that Catra was abused by Shadow Weaver, that Adora was the only person who cared about her, that she was always treated like she was second-best. Heck, there’s an entire backstory episode just about everything Catra’s been through. We’re meant to feel bad for her, even when she’s evil. We’re meant to cheer for her when she stands up to Shadow Weaver and defeats her. We’re meant to feel for her when Shadow Weaver stabs her in the back and Hordak sends her to the Crimson Waste. Her entire breakdown is meant to be tragic and engaging. When you’ve watched a character suffer so much through no/little fault of their own, when you’ve watched them stand up to bigger villains in a way that makes you root for them, it makes sense that you want them to eventually get their happy ending.

The Diamonds: I realize in retrospect that the writers probably meant for us to feel bad for the Diamonds, too. Like when they’re grieving Pink, during What’s the Use of Feeling, Blue?, or when they complain how stressed they are in Change Your Mind. But the thing is… it just didn’t work for me. After the show spent all that time showing us all the death, despair, and destructions the Diamonds had caused, after it was made clear that the Crystal Gems had lost multiple friends and allies to them, it just didn’t make me feel sympathetic that the diamonds had lost one (1) person. So what if someone shattered Pink for being a dictator? The Diamonds themselves have shattered millions of gems and now that it’s someone they care about I was suddenly meant to feel bad for them? I didn’t.

When That Will Be All first aired, I loved What’s the Use of Feeling, Blue? – because I thought the show was doing this brilliant thing where they show that evil people can still have loved ones and have feelings but that doesn’t make them less evil. Every horrible person in history had feelings and loved ones. That doesn’t excuse their actions. In retrospect I find it disappointing to know that we were meant start feeling bad for the Diamonds due to their grief for Pink, that we were meant to see Pink/Rose as the evil one for starting a rebellion against them, that we were supposed to believe Bismuth was in the wrong. Rebelling against a dictatorship is a good thing. Standing up for equality is a good thing. I don’t like that the show suddenly tried to spread this message that conflict is always bad even when you’re actively fighting against tyranny and oppression. What happened to the Crystal Gems and their cause? What happened to the Steven from season 1 who reassured Lapis that “They’re mean, and that’s why we *have to* fight them”? And no, the “but being a dictator is so stressful, please feel bad for us” part didn’t work for me either.

4.     A well-written redemption arc

For a well-written redemption arc, a character needs to actually regret what they’ve done and realize they were wrong. Then they need to put in the effort to be better from now. They need to… actually change. And then they need to do things that make up for their actions.

Catra: We get to see Catra go through an amazing character arc that culminates in her redemption and her eventual love-confession to Adora. The entire arc that was built for her over 5 seasons leads up to that moment and it’s so satisfying when it finally happens because it makes sense. We get to see her make big mistakes, get to see how she finally even scares Scorpia away, how Scorpia leaving breaks her, how Double Trouble gives her a harsh but needed lecture, how she understands that she and Glimmer aren’t so different, how she finally remembers Adora and decides to save her. We see her regret her actions as early as season 1, when she feels visibly bad after leaving Adora on the cliff in the temple. In season 4, she has nightmares about Entrapta and feels guilty for what she did to her and for opening the portal.

And from the moment she decides to change, she’s willing to make huge personal sacrifices to make up for her actions: She sacrifices herself to save Glimmer, gets tortured, mind-controlled and nearly dies in the process. The heroes saving her doesn’t come from nowhere and their forgiveness is well-earned because she was willing to put herself on the line to save someone else. She then keeps helping the heroes, apologizes to everyone she’s hurt, is again willing to sacrifice herself for Adora in the finale, and finally saves the entire universe from Horde Prime by staying with Adora and confessing her love to her. If we’re trying to be realistic about this – I’d say saving the whole universe from an intergalactic dictator would at least dramatically shorten her prison sentence? So no, I don’t think Catra should have ended up in prison.

The Diamonds: So the thing about their redemption arc is… they don’t really have one. We’re just kind of meant to forgive them out of the blue. Steven and the Crystal Gems ask the Diamonds for help to cure the corrupted gems and they manage to convince them, but there’s never any point where the Diamonds regret their actions. They only start to regret their actions towards Steven and Pink, but there’s never even an ounce of regret for what they did to anyone else. The Cluster? The deaths? The millions of destroyed planets and civilization? The humans and Rose Quartzes in the zoo? The presumably thousands of off-colors fighting for their lives underground on homeworld every second? That’s all swept under the rug in the finale. And therefore, the Diamonds can’t even get to the point where they make sacrifices for someone else or do anything that would lead me to forgive them, because they’re not even at a point where they realize they’ve done anything wrong. The show treats them like they’re redeemed in the end, but they’re not. Everything they’ve done just gets ignored.

5.     Being held accountable for their actions

Another thing that’s important for redemption arcs is that the heroes don’t just ignore what a character has done and act like it never happened.

Catra: SPOP never shies away from admitting that Catra has done bad things. Even after her heroic sacrifice, the other characters don’t just all forgive Catra at once. Adora still calls her out when she’s being selfish, some of other princesses are resentful towards her, Frosta punches her in the face, etc. One heroic sacrifice isn’t enough: You see Catra constantly working on herself afterwards and doing what she can to become a better person and make up for her actions. And most importantly, those actions are addressed in the show. (Arguably they could have addressed what happened to Angella again, but overall Catra’s actions get acknowledged in the show.)

The Diamonds: My other big problem with SU suddenly acting like the Diamonds are redeemed is that their actions never get addressed. People act like when I say I wanted the Diamonds to be held accountable that means I wanted Steven to shatter them in cold blood – no, I just wanted Steven to at least *say* that what they’re doing is wrong. Like I said, all of their actions other than corrupting gems and treating Steven & Pink badly completely get swept under the rug in Change Your Mind. It’s like we’re meant to assume that everything else will be fine now just because Steven managed to convince the Diamonds to do one (1) thing for him. What will happen to their colonies now? What about the humans and Rose Quartzes in the zoo? What about all the off-colors fighting for their lives underground on homeworld? What about the enslaved Pearls and the class system? None of that ever gets addressed in the finale – we’re just supposed to take that happy ending at face value and believe that all the other stuff will get fixed now, even though the show never says that!

(Before you tell me how any of that gets addressed in the movie or in Steven Universe Future – I don’t care. SU Future is a new show that takes place after a timeskip. The movie is also a separate thing. SU should make sense as a show on its own and it doesn’t. Change Your Mind was presented as a finale and therefore should wrap up the most important plots and it didn’t.)

For all we know after watching CYM, Steven doesn’t actually care about anything the Diamonds have done. He’s sitting on their shoulders and laughing with them in the end and we’re meant to take that as a happy ending. For all we know, there’s still an oppressive class system and gems getting shattered for not fitting into it on homeworld. The Cluster’s still suffering. The Pearls are still slaves. The Diamonds are still dictators and that aspect never changed – because it’s never addressed. When White Pearl regains consciousness, Steven says “Welcome Back”, but nothing in this episode ever implies that she’s not still WD’s slave. When Lars and the Off-colors arrive on Earth, the fact that they’re terrified of the Diamonds is played for laughs. The finale revolves only around Steven’s feelings while Garnet and Pearl never get a moment of standing up to the people who hurt them.

“But Steven needed the Diamonds’ help the heal the corrupted gems!”

Yes, that’s the in-universe explanation. But a writer still invented that rule. And even so, they could have added a scene where Steven takes the Crystal Gems aside and tells them “Hey, I know these people killed many of your friends, enslaved and persecuted you, but I just want you to know that I don’t actually like them or consider them family and I’m only doing this to help the corrupted gems. You’re my real family.”

6.     Identifying with their victims

I don’t remember who made that post, but there was a post on Tumblr somewhere that said that how likely someone is to forgive a villain often depends on how much they identify with the people that villain has hurt. And if I’m being very honest, that’s what a lot of my hate for the Diamonds boils down to:

The Diamonds don’t appear in Steven Universe until way later in the show. The way we first learn about them is indirect. We know the Crystal Gems fought a war against someone and are hiding on Earth from someone, but that someone doesn’t get a face until way later. By that point, we’ve already been told that fusions like Garnet are illegal on homeworld, that Pearls are considered lesser gems, and that Amethyst would be defective by homeworld’s standards. And all of those things made me personally sympathize with the Crystal Gems and their found family of misfits – and it made me angry at whoever did all of this to them. You can easily read the discrimination Ruby and Sapphire faced for their relationship as a metaphor for homophobia or prejudice against interracial relationships, the discrimination Pearl faces as racism or classism and how Amethyst is treated as ableism.

(Getting personal here for a moment: I’m gay and my parents are from a homophobic country that’s run by a dictator, so I strongly identified with Garnet and how she can’t go back to homeworld because she wouldn’t be allowed to exist as her true self there. Am I maybe reading too much into the show there? Yeah. But honestly, if the Diamonds’ redemption relies on people not identifying with the Crystal Gems – aka the literal protagonists of the show – too much, then maybe it’s just not a good idea. Yeah, maybe if I hadn’t identified with the CGs so strongly, I wouldn’t have minded the Diamond redemption – but it also means I’d have never loved SU as much in the first place.)

What I’m saying is that we first learn about the Diamonds from the point of view of the people they oppressed, persecuted, and tried to kill. We also meet the off-colors and learn about their plight, how they had to spend eons hiding from robots that want to kill them, how they believe the way they are is wrong, etc. We see the Cluster, the people in the zoo etc. and get told the Diamonds did all of this. And then Change Your Mind expects us to suddenly randomly forgive them with no build-up and be okay with Steven calling them “family” over the actual people who raised him.

Catra, on the other hand, is first introduced to us as Adora’s best friend. We get to meet her from the point of view of the protagonist who obviously loves her. Throughout their separation and their struggle, the relationship between these two characters drives the show. Their episodes together are emotional and well-written and make the audience root for them to eventually find their way back together again. We meet her as an abuse-victim who thinks her best friend left her, and we get so many reasons to sympathize with her before she ever hurts anyone.

(And yeah, it helps that the show never lets us personally meet any of the people from the lands she conquered. Yes, we feel bad for Scorpia and all that – but again, being a toxic friend isn’t actually a crime. And yes, we feel bad for Entrapta - but so does Catra, and Entrapta ends up being fine and forgiving her.)

7.     A satisfying ending for a show

This is more general, but SU didn’t have a satisfying conclusion imo, because almost none of the things that needed fixing were ever addressed. We’re meant to take “but the Diamonds say please and thank you now” as a good conclusion without getting to the part where they murder people every day. For all we know, Steven doesn’t even care about that part because the writers never made him act like he does.

And yes, I realize that the Diamonds are meant to be a metaphor for a conservative family that finally learns to accept their queer child (Steven), but that metaphor just didn’t work for me (a queer child of an unaccepting family) at all. Because they’re not presented as an unaccepting family: The show spent 4 seasons building them up as dictators and the ultimate big bad, only to drop the “they’re related to Steven” thing in there last minute and sweep the other stuff under the rug. We’ve also spent 5 seasons seeing the Crystal Gems, the people who literally raised him, as Steven’s family, so suddenly giving that title to their oppressors feels super wrong to me.

To give you a comparison, imagine the following ending for She-Ra: Near the end of season 5, Adora suddenly finds out she’s Horde Prime’s long-lost granddaughter. After calling him out for treating her/her parents badly, he finally regrets that part of his actions and promises to leave Etheria alone so Adora and her friends can live there in peace. However, he’s still going to conquer and destroy the rest of the universe and keep Hordak and the other clones mind-controlled. Adora is fine with this and you see her and Horde Prime laughing together in the end. Catra and all the other people Horde Prime chipped and tortured are seen being okay with him now because as long as Adora, the main character, is happy all the hurt Horde Prime caused anyone else doesn’t matter. When the Star Siblings show up on Etheria while fleeing from the Horde army, the fact that they’re scared of Horde Prime is played for laughs. The End.

… Sounds pretty stupid, doesn’t it? I’m glad SPOP had the guts to just let Adora kill Horde Prime instead. Because some people are not redeemable, and that’s an important lesson, too.

Anyways, I’ve been rambling for too long. The bottom line is: The Diamonds are way more comparable to Horde Prime than to Catra. The scale of their actions is the same as that of Horde Prime, their motivations are never explained, we never get any reasons to sympathize with them, the main characters have all been victims of their regime, their redemption arc is nonexistent, they never get called out for their actions and the way their story is concluded is just badly written and leaves way too many factors unaddressed. They get forgiven without ever even being sorry and the Crystal Gems never get a moment to shine and stand up to them. So yes, I consider them irredeemable and was disappointed the show didn’t end with them getting imprisoned at least. (I was kind of hoping for a Homeworld revolution where everyone finally stands up to them, but… *sigh*.) If the show was going to redeem them, they should have at least done it properly by actually showing them have a change of heart and making them try to make up for their actions, instead of letting us assume that all happened off-screen.

Catra on the other hand gets presented as someone to root for from the beginning. She’s only in the Horde due to unfortunate circumstances, got abused and mistreated her whole life, is motivated by a desperate attempt to prove herself and make sure she doesn’t get hurt again, and never committed crimes on the same scale as the Diamonds. Her change of heart is believable and what her arc has been building up to for 4 seasons, she makes great personal sacrifices for Glimmer and Adora, gets held accountable for her actions, helps save the entire universe and is a character who has already suffered her entire life – so yes, I strongly believe that she deserves to live a happy, free, and peaceful life after the show.

[ilonga]

rise of skywalker and sequels salt time, y’all

things I’m salty about in the rise of skywalker and the star wars sequels, in no particular order:

- Finn was sidelined 

- FINN WAS SIDELINED

- he was such an interesting character with so much potential (a stormtrooper who deserted!! pretty sure that was the first time we’d ever seen that!!), and it was all ignored and he was turned into background noise for what?? kylo ren??

- seriously! after TFA, the movies should have explored his backstroy! we should have seen his stormtrooper past affect him!! maybe a stormtrooper revolution!! he should have had a CHARACTER ARC!

- also his force-sensitivity being turned into a joke and comic relief was frankly insulting

- they could have done so many things with that side of the character (even though it was kind of out of nowhere)! parallels between finn and rey, finn questioning his identity, the whole a former stormptrooper being force sensitive thing should have been explored!

- Poe was sidelined

- Poe was a spice runner for no reason?? 1) isn’t that a rude stereotype, and 2) Poe is not Han Solo 2.0!! he was his own, different character!

- Finn/Poe didn’t happen

- gonna be salty about that forever, though I guess I saw it coming :( (it’s disney, what did I expect?)

- but they gave Poe a straight love interest that we’d never heard of before this movie and who he had like two lines of dialogue with just to rub it in?? like, really?

- they completely forgot Rose existed

- like, listen, I wasn’t the biggest fan of the finnrose kiss either, but you can’t just pretend it didn’t happen and hope everyone forgets about it

- and sure, rose’s introduction and character in TLJ was a bit clumsy

- BUT YOU CAN’T JUST IGNORE HER AND PRETEND SHE DIDN’T HAPPEN

- she had a lot of potential as a character, and interesting backstory, a practical pragmatic personality, and a lot of ways she could play off the other characters

- TROS could have been where we saw Rose grow as a character and really shine

- instead, she was forgotten

- ugh

- REY PALPATINE WAS THE DUMBEST FRICKING THING OKAY--

- like, first of all, palpatine coming back for some reason somehow was the most ridiculous direction this movie could have gone and didn’t work, at all

- their enemy for the first TWO MOVIES was the First Order and Kylo Ren

- they had a huge moment in TLJ where the Resistance is steadily being destroyed and they won’t last long against the First Order

- now they’re supposed to take on the First Order and a now-supposedly-immortal emperor palpatine who has a collection of unmanned star destroyers he can control for some reason??

- both of them at once? the resistance is barely alive as is, now you’re adding an OP extra army + sith lord to the mix?

- I mean, this is ridiculous. Palpatine’s dead. Anakin’s big sacrifice in return of the jedi was KILLING palpatine. now he’s back, and the resistance somehow realises he’s back and decides he’s enemy #1 now?

- how did the resistance find out a dead sith lord came back to life on a remote planet anyways?

- and WHAT ABOUT, YOU KNOW, THE FIRST ORDER? AND KYLO REN?

- Kylo Ren, who they finally decided was going to be the main villain in TLJ (even with that stupid “rey trying to redeem the mass murderer” plot going on in the background), and now they don’t have the guts to commit to making him evil (which he was for the LAST TWO MOVIES AND THE MAJORITY OF TROS)

- so, since they weren’t committed enough to make Kylo a villain like he actually was and didn’t have the groundwork for a redemption, they just decided to ignore the fact that he was evil and hope it would go away

- like, are we going to forget that he literally MURDERED HIS DAD, HAN SOLO

- or that he and his first order destroyed a whole SYSTEM OF PLANETS? filled with billions of innocent people?

- he personally tortured Poe, he personally tortured Rey, and he was complicit in a system that kidnapped Finn, took him from his family, and brainwashed him

- not to mention that one of the opening scenes of TROS was him literally massacring people

- but no!! it’s all fine now, bc he looked at his dad’s ghost a little sadly and got a new lightsaber color

- like, no. he isn’t “redeemed” because he’s decided he has the hots for rey. heck, that makes it even worse. he’s been trying to manipulate her for all three movies, he’s gaslighted her, he’s threatened her, he’s hurt the people she cares about. NONE OF THAT IS OKAY. and it’s even less okay that all of his evil deeds can be written off because rey’s “”love”” for him “healed” him or whatever the fuck they want us to think

- and why would they have Rey HEAL him? after SHE stabbed him? in what universe does that make sense?? even if rey didn’t defeat him fairly bc he was distracted or whatever, this is still the supreme leader of the army rey and the rebels are trying to defeat. like, rey, are you a part of the resistance or not? it doesn’t matter if he was “nicer” to you than the rest of the rebels. He’s still your ENEMY. Your “”empathy”” here helps no one, least of all yourself. Kylo Ren dead would have been a massive victory for the resistance--maybe they’d even have had a chance against the first order then! you know, the first order? the enemy you were fighting for the last two movies? 

- is this the message you want to be sending to young girls in the audience? that it’s ok if their partner hurts them, hurts other people, is a bad person in general, because their love can “”heal”” him? and that eventually, he’ll turn good if you just try hard enough?

- this is how people wind up in abusive relationships!! that shit is NOT okay

- and the kiss is ridiculous for the same reasons. you don’t owe kylo ren anything, rey. Not in the least for “rescuing” from a situation that was pretty much created bc of him. He’s the one who teamed up with palpatine at the beginning of the movie, remember?

- sometimes I feel like this movie forgot that kylo ren is, you know, a bad person, which the other two movies spent their entire runtime showing us

- like darth vader’s sacrifice was one thing. first of all, it was for his son, his child, and secondly, vader was very much under the power of the emperor and debatably had the mindset of a slave

- kylo ren, on the other hand, was completely under his own power. HE was making the choices, and calling the shots. HE murdered Snoke. And he died for a girl he was manipulating and gaslighting constantly and that he didn’t have much of a connection to other than “the force”

- like, darth vader’s��“”redemption”” definitely wasn’t perfect either. you can argue that him killing the emperor and sacrificing him self to save his son didn’t negate any of his actions or him being a bad person. but it was definitely more meaningful and better handled.

- and let’s talk about rey

- I will forever be bitter that rey didn’t get a meaningful character arc and character growth

- which is so disappointing because she was SUCH an interesting (& mysterious) character with so much potential in TFA

- I feel like, in making her palpatine, which was pretty out of nowhere and contrary to the last jedi, they were so busy trying to fit her heritage into the movie in a way that sort of made sense that they forgot to make the movie about her growing as a character and person

- couldn’t they at least have given her her own lightsaber?

- I mean, her being a palpatine is already ridiculous because since when does palpatine have a son? (clone, whatever) And since when did that son have some sort of epic struggle where he refuses to join palpatine and runs away? and when did that son find someone he fell in love with, and have a daughter? and then subsequently abandon her, a seven-ish year old, on a dangerous desert planet? (I mean, wasn’t palpatine dead by then anyways?)

- it just doesn’t fit with the already established star wars universe. we already know palpatine’s story (well, not the beginning of it, but enough). It was movies 1-6, clone wars, and rebels. if he had had a son that had a luke-esque struggle against the darkside, it would have shown up.

- it just doesn’t fit

- but anyways, back to rey

- I guess they were trying to give her some luke-style struggle where she struggles with her heritage and a pull to the darkside that she has to ultimately triumph over? but it doesn’t work

- one, because she never HAS any struggle with the dark side. shooting lightning out of your fingers out of nowhere doesn’t count (and wasn’t that a ridiculous scene. it was more comical than anything else, which is definitely not what they were going for)

- a struggle with the darkside is about being tempted to give into anger, fear, and hatred, and struggling not to do the wrong things and turn evil. In luke’s story, we SAW that. we also saw luke’s horror and eventual acceptance of his heritage, which we never really saw with rey. It was just like, “okay, guess I’m a palpatine?” and it wasn’t nearly as impactful bc palpatine had been dead for the past thirty-ish years. as a contrast, vader was a living and very present villain who the heroes had to contend with, and it was personal for most of them.

- so I guess they tried to make that her character arc, but it didn’t work. so we were left with a stale character who didn’t really have any meaningful victories or losses.

- is she really a “”mary sue”” like everyone’s claiming if they never really made the story about her?

- I think that was the biggest thing that was so unsatisfying about the sequels

- she was hyped up to be the first real mainstream female jedi protagonist (obviously clone wars got there first, but movies are definitely more mainstream than a show, sorry cw :( ), but she never really got a journey, struggles, or real triumphs. which is such a shame because she was this really empowering character in TFA that I was so excited to see more! but her trilogy-wide character arc just wasn’t satsifying

- I wanted to see her really struggle, and rise above her struggles! I wanted her to have meaningful triumphs!

- also I don’t think she ever got injured either, which is definitely a deviation from the star wars trilogy pattern. that’s kinda strange. (luke lost his hand & got electrocuted, han got frozen in carbonite, leia got tortured & shot, anakin got, well, a LOT of injuries, but even before becoming darth vader w/ the foregone conclusion, he had his arm cut off, padme was pretty heavily injured on genosis, and obi-wan was injured in the fight against dooku)

- yup

- also the sith wayfinder was kinda dumb, and I never felt like there were real stakes in TROS

- and let’s address the rey skywalker thing: ok, fine, I get what they were trying to say, kind of

- and I’m not foaming at the mouth about it like some people are. I’m fairly indifferent

- but it would have been a lot more meaningful if rey had had like, a really close, deep relationship with Leia and Luke, so she could say that she and they considered her a skywalker

- but she didn’t have that sort of relationship with them, not really. Sure, she and leia were friends on-screen, but that was it. and luke didn’t really seem to like her all that much. 

- so like, “meh”

- especially since Leia’s technically a Solo or an Organa, so that line working really relied on her relationship with Luke, which wasn’t strong enough

- yea, so that’s that

- the “jedi voices” scene was pretty cool though (AAAAH AHSOKA!! AND ANAKIN!! AND ALL THE OTHER JEDI!!), and I liked her yellow lightsaber (although she could have built her own lightsaber at the BEGINNING OF THE MOVIE, instead of carrying luke’s the whole time)

there are things I like about the sequels, mind you. a lot of things!! but there’s a lot I was disappointed in too.

congrats if you got this far, that was a LOT of salt

[flicksnfilms]

Loki: 1st Season (2021)

Plot premise:  “Loki,” the mercurial villain Loki resumes his role as the God of Mischief in a new series that takes place after the events of “Avengers: Endgame.”

Network: Marvel Studios Episodes (and episode length): 6 (40-50 mins) Creator: Michael Waldron  Cast: Tom Hiddleston, Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Sophia Di Martino IMDB | RottenTomatoes

± There’s tons of good content in the A plot with questions and a whole journey beginning from when alternate timeline 2012 Loki escapes from New York. It’s super interesting and really pulls a lot of lore and reframes things from MCU Phase 1-3, slowly transforming the audience expectation, readying us for the future of the MCU in Phase 4 and beyond. They’re really building a solid foundation with these Disney+ series.

Meanwhile the B plot, like WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier before it, is a wonderful character study in an intimate way we don’t usually get in the movies (because of all the constraints of a movie). Where in Wandavision we saw grief and coping, TFATWS showed systemic racism, PTSD, displacement and the resulting quality of life, Loki weaves in him dealing with childhood conditioning and emotional abuse (mostly, if not exclusively from Odin). It’s fascinating getting to see Tom Hiddleston tackle both that and the resulting self-worth and identity issues that Loki hides. It’s definitely a journey. I also wasn’t expecting to like Owen Wilson in this as much as I did. 

[SPOILERS? Sorta?] That... wasn’t the ending i expected? With 2 series out that have been mostly self contained and wrap up in their limited runs, I kind of didn’t see it coming. It’s got tons of implications though and oh so many ways it can go with the subject of parallel timelines and universes. I’m interested in seeing how this impacts the coming MCU projects since it doesn’t seem like Loki season 2 is coming out in the next year or 2 (I only assume cause the release schedule is pretty full already for the studio). 

[areas51-666]

Possibly SPOILERS for JOKER

Had a lot of thoughts after seeing Joker. I went into it with some concerns about how the message of the film might inspire some of the more questionable fans of the Joker. A sympathetic murderer isn't a good thing, especially with "mentally ill lone wolf gunmen" in the USA.

The desperate actions of Arthur/The Joker, are not sympathetic, he murders people, murder is bad. This is the DC universe, we know the Joker is the villain, Bruce Wayne is in this film and we know the Batman is a hero. However the film has a lot of shades of grey. The events that turn Arthur into the Joker should create sympathy, he's mentally ill, he's poor, he's been abused, he's a victim of society. He's not the only one though, riots are stirred up (credited to the murders of the Joker), other people struggling to get by in poverty, while the rich (embodied by Thomas Wayne) tell them they're clowns who are jealous of the rich and need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

This film puts us in a strange place, we're not supposed to sympathise with the Joker, but he's kinda on the side of the marginalized poor, and with the context of DC/Batman, I guess we're supposed to be on the side of Thomas Wayne.

But I have another angle. If Joker is a parallel of the sort of white supremacist lone gunmen that have been terrorising the USA, this film could be read as equating those gunmen with anti-capitalist protests. That's bad, anti-capitalism is a good thing, white supremacy is dog-shit (the absolute worst). However both have grown from the same mistreatment, the white supremacist feels like he has to prove himself in the shitty system (The Joker just wants to make people laugh), and the rioters just want to undo the corruption and marginalisation that has been inflicted on them by the rich. The rioters are fighting a good cause, the Joker is a dickhead who is lashing out.

This is getting a bit rambly, and I don't know if these thoughts ever crossed the minds of the film makers. Like all media, the audience can all consume it differently, and I hope people can manage to watch it without thinking the Joker's murdering is justified, or that anti-capitalists are bad.

TLDR: According to the Joker, the world is shit, and it is. However, murdering random people shouldn't inspire you, holding the rich accountable for the mistreatment of the poor should.

[thisweekingundamwing]

TWIGW RoundUp (August 11th - 17th)

Greetings Everyone! Here’s your roundup of contributions for this week. Check out their stuff and show them some love!😊💖 

~Mod TB

Fanfiction:

@amberlyinviolet, Knife in Hand (Ch. 31) / Ch. 32 / Ch. 33 

Rating: Explicit

Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Trowa Barton/Duo Maxwell

Characters: Trowa Barton, Duo Maxwell, Heero Yuy, Zechs Merquise, Chang Wufei, Relena Peacecraft, Quatre Raberba Winner, Dorothy Catalonia, Howard (Gundam Wing), Original Characters

Additional Tags: Implied Childhood Sexual Abuse, Consent Issues, Organized Crime, Assassination, child trafficking, Past Abuse, Federal Agents, Abuse of Power, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Gender Issues

Summary: When Duo learns there's a hit out on him, he turns to the only person in Chicago he believes capable of helping him. But will the cost of the Broker's help be too high?

@anaranesindanarie, The Life of Nanashi: Who am I? (Ch. 1)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Trowa Barton/Duo Maxwell

Characters: Trowa Barton, Original Trowa Barton, Doktor S (Gundam Wing), Duo Maxwell, Quatre Raberba Winner, Heero Yuy, Chang Wufei, Catherine Bloom, Howard (Gundam Wing)

Additional Tags: Angst, Searching, Trying to find oneself, Names, Belonging

Summary: All Nanashi has ever wanted is to belong. Believing a name is what he is missing, he tightly grasps the first one he is given.

Earth Bound (Ch. 2)

Rating: Mature

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationships: Duo Maxwell/Quatre Raberba Winner, Trowa Barton/Duo Maxwell/Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei/Heero Yuy

Characters: Duo Maxwell, Quatre Raberba Winner, Trowa Barton, Chang Wufei, Heero Yuy, Catherine Bloom

Additional Tags: Supernatural - Freeform, Alternate Universe, Fantasy, Smut, Angst, not sorry

Summary: Trapped in a human body, Duo Maxwell must uncover a way to unblock his powers before he finds everything ripped from him again. Who will pay the price? What will Duo decide? For @fadedsepiascribbles

@bailong05, All the King’s Horses (Ch. 7)

Rating: Mature

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: F/M

Fandoms: Xiaolin Showdown (Cartoon), Gundam Wing

Relationships: Jack Spicer/Chase Young, Chang Wufei/Original Female Character(s)

Characters: Jack Spicer, Chase Young (Xiaolin Showdown), Chang Wufei

Additional Tags: fem!Jack, mentions of physical abuse, Mentions of Emotional Abuse, Mentions of Sexual Harassment, Panic Attacks, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Mentions of War, Trauma, Psychological Trauma, Childhood Trauma, Healing, Crossover

Summary: Chase and Wufei's relationship seems to be better now, but what about Chase and Jack's?

@bobo-is-tha-bomb, The Bodyguard Ch. 13 / Ch. 14 / Ch. 15 / Ch. 16 / Ch. 17

Rating: Mature

No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationships: Heero Yuy/Reader (You)

Characters: Heero Yuy, Relena Peacecraft

Additional Tags: Romance, Drama, Violence, Mild Sexual Content

Summary: When death threats start to get serious, Preventer sends an Agent to protect you. But this man might be more dangerous to you than any death threat. HeeroxReader.

Forgive and Forget (Ch. 2)

Rating: Explicit

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: F/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Duo Maxwell/Reader

Characters: Duo Maxwell, Heero Yuy, Chang Wufei, Sally Po

Additional Tags: Romance, Drama, Angst, Violence, Lemon, Reader-Insert

Summary: You’d infiltrate Preventer and expose that fact that it employed and protected terrorists. But that mission proves to be quite a challenge, all information regarding personnel carefully guarded. And the challenge becomes even greater when you meet Special Agent Duo Maxwell. He is pretty much the man of your dreams, all devilish charm, good looks, and bravado. And he kisses like the Devil. You are swept under and recklessly pursue and affair with him. But there is still your double agenda, and that is bound to make everything come crashing down around you. Especially when you find out that Duo is not exactly the man he said he was… DuoxReader

The Dream is Still Alive (Ch. 2)

Rating: Mature

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: F/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationships: Wufei Chang/Reader, Relena Peacecraft/Heero Yuy

Characters: Wufei Chang, Reader, Heero Yuy, Relena Peacecraft, Duo Maxwell, Lady Une

Additional Tags: Romance, Drama, Angst, Lemon, Lime, Reader-Insert, Violence

Summary: Three years ago, your feelings for him had cost you your job at Preventer. On top of that you gained his contempt. When an old enemy you helped putting behind bars escapes prison, your paths cross again. Forced under his protection, your old feelings for him resurface but you are determined not to get hurt again. But the spark is back, and there are no rules and regulations to hold you back this time. And maybe, just maybe, he might be willing to give in as well. WufeixReader

What’s going on Fanfiction wise (6)

Doii, Precogmare (Ch. 8) / Ch. 9

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationships: Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy, Trowa Barton/Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei/Sally Po

Characters: Duo Maxwell, Heero Yuy, Quatre Raberba Winner, Trowa Barton, Chang Wufei, Sally Po, Relena Peacecraft

Additional Tags: Get Together, Mission Gone Wrong

Summary: A mission gone wrong shows Duo the future that awaits them. Could he stop it on time? Can he protect Relena and the other pilots while keeping his secrets hidden? *Wrote it ages ago, never published it. A lot of cursing and references to violence, death, blood and suicide. It's a Heero and Duo get together, background 03x04 and 05xS*

@duointherain, Beneath: Cornflakes (Ch. 3)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/M, M/M, Multi, Other

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Characters: Duo Maxwell, Heero Yuy, Mareen Darlian, Relena Peacecraft, Chang Wufei, Trowa Barton, Quatre Raberba Winner

Summary: Relena’s mom takes them shopping.

Beneath: Western Civ 101

Rating: General Audiences

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Characters: Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell

Summary: This is just fluff. We had an evacuation at my job, so Duo gets one at his. Just Heero being a good and loving husband.

Beneath: Cornflakes: The New Kid (Ch. 1)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Graphic Depictions Of Violence

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Characters: Duo Maxwell, Relena Peacecraft, Maureen Darlian, Heero Yuy

Additional Tags: School, Mental Health Issues

Summary: Duo goes back to school, to real school, not like hiding, but really back to school... The school by the lake, the one he and Relena nearly blew up with the elephant toothpaste.

@helmistress, The Legend of Shinigami (mini announcement - mun stuff) 

@janaverse, Stickies From Heero (Part 12)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationships: Heero Yuy & Duo Maxwell, Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy, 1+2+1, 1x2x1 - Relationship

Characters: Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell

Additional Tags: Get Together, Friendship, Eventual Sap, Eventual Implied Sexual Content, Mentions of Trowa ⋆ Quatre ⋆ Wufei ⋆ Relena ⋆ Sally - for now

Summary: heero and duo are in their mid-20's and are sharing a house. they are both working as preventers, but are not on the same work schedule. duo initiated this unique form of communication and heero has fully embraced it. [ these are images of the actual notes that heero leaves for duo on their refrigerator. ]

@ladyunebarton, The fundamentals of caring (Ch. 11)

Rating: Mature

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: M/M

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Relationship: Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Characters: Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Chang Wufei, Trowa Barton, Quatre Raberba Winner, OC - Character, Relena Peacecraft

Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, parenting, Adoption, Kid Fic, Adopted Children, Childhood Memories, Romance, Friends to Lovers, Slow Burn, First Time

Summary: After a fire on an Orphanage left three kids without a home. Heero and Duo decide to take them into their own for the mean time. But this decision will make them reconsider where they are and what they want from life.

luvsanime02, Moments

Rating: General Audiences

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: Gen

Fandom: Gundam Wing

Character: Hilde Schbeiker

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern SettingIntrospectionMild Languagebad weekCocktail Friday

Summary: Hilde isn’t sure if this party is the best decision that she’s ever made.

Skarla, Send in the Clowns (Ch. 7)

Rating: General Audiences

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: Gen

Fandoms: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Gundam Wing

Characters: Clint Barton, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Sam Wilson (Marvel), Jane Foster (Marvel), Darcy Lewis, Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton

Additional Tags: Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Parallel Universes, birthday present fic, Post CATWS

Summary: Clint Barton had a secret, one that he had been carrying for so long that it didn’t even really seem like a secret anymore. It was just another thing in the long list of things that he didn’t talk about, along with his time in Korea or that mission in Budapest. The trouble was, now that Shield was in tatters with every third agent loyal to Hydra and being hunted like the rats that they were, his helpful support system had evaporated along with his second favourite bow and his salary. For Scarly13.

@terrablaze514, Fic inspo / Cat adoption video ( @seitou @softnocturne @gundayo )

Shampoo & Conditioner - Snippet Saturday

Rating: T (for pending violence, group discord)

Pairings: 3x4 (implied), 4x5 (if you squint)

Summary: All Hail the Pineapple Express! A blessing and a curse… [preview of Ch. 3]

@thehiddenbaroness, Resurrecting the Viper (Ch. 31)

Rating: Mature

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category: Gen

Fandoms: 機動戦士ガンダム 鉄血のオルフェンズ | Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, Gundam Wing

Characters: Orga Itsuka, Eugene Sevenstark, Mikazuki Augus, Merribit Stapleton, Norba Shino, Akihiro Altland, McGillis Fareed, Original Female Character(s), Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Naze Turbine

Additional Tags: Action/Adventure, Crossover of a kind, Science Fiction, Cryogenics, Revenge, Drama, Political Intrigue, Canon Compliant

Summary: Following a routine visit to Vingolf, Orga, Mikazuki and Merribit are surprised by the sudden appearance of a practically naked, injured woman. Although Artima seems to have full recollection of who she is, she does not seem to understand the outside world. Against Orga's better judgment, the Isaribi is soon entangled in Artima's quest to find and destroy her old mobile suit - and discover both she and it are relics from over three hundred years ago that could hold the key to Tekkadan's future.

Fanart:  

@babygray-dam, Duo Maxwell 

@bluesquishylemon, Title: No Name

Source: Gundam Wing; character Trowa Barton

Media: Colored versions marker on 8.5x11 computer paper, line drawing pen on 14x17 Bristol 6-27-17; computer corrections 8-11-19

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing or any character associated; I also do not earn any financial compensation for this fanart.

Request: Please credit this artist for this work when reposting - thanks!

@duointherain, Duo Maxwell 

@elfbingo, Gundam Wing pilots representing Iron-Blooded Orphans (forwarded by @disturbed02girl )

@fenorange, Gundam SEED/Wing Crossover 

@gundayo, Trowa & Quatre - Inside Jokes 

@gundayum, Heero and Quatre (Muppets spoof) | Relena and Heero (Muppets spoof #2) | Duo & Wufei (Muppets spoof #3) | Trowaupagus |Duo and his daughter (AU) 

kacfrog711, Duo at gunpoint - FIFTEEN 2011 (forwarded by @disturbed02girl )

@kenrik, Heero x Relena 

***Please don’t remove artist credit, nor repost without permission.

Photosets/Screenshots/GIFs:

@animethingsandstuff, Heero Yuy 

@capyper-land, Relena Darlian (Frozen Teardrop)

@disturbed02girl, Duo Maxwell & Professor G (Glory of the Losers) (2) | Duo becomes The God of Death (GoL) | Trowa Barton & Catherine Bloom (GoL) | Chang Wufei (GoL) | Trowa Barton | Epyon (GoL) | How 1+/x2 really started (GoL) 

@gundamfight, Gundam Cross War

@its-more-than-just-a-fantasy, Duo Maxwell

@janaverse, Heero, Duo and Trowa (Endless Waltz) ((Bruh…)) | Duo Maxwell (Endless Waltz) (2) (3) (4) (Stoned? Nah… Dreamy) Drool for Sally surprising Duo (5) (6) (Young Duo) | Heero Yuy (Endless Waltz) (2) (3) (Young Heero) (4) (Young Heero #2) (#3) | Heero and Duo (EW) (2) (3) (4) (Love Only You doujinshi) = (front cover of LOY) | Zechs Merquise (EW) (2) | Chang Wufei (EW) | Little Heero & Odin Lowe (Episode Zero) :’( | Heero and Duo (Ground Zero) (2) | Nanashi (Young Trowa) (EW) (2) | Quatre Raberba Winner (EW) (2) (3) | Trowa Barton (EW) (2) | Young Quatre (EW) | Heero Yuy (Operation 1) | Heero or Duo? After dispute with Wufei and Trowa (EW) | Lady Une (EW) | Noin and Une (EW) | Quatre and Rashid (EW) | Sandrock Custom (EW) | Deathscythe Hell Custom (EW) 

Quotes:

@incorrectgundamwingquotes, Heero and Quatre | On the Lunar Base | Heero and Relena ((On a date)) |  Duo and Quatre (2) (3) | Heero, Wufei, Duo and Trowa | Heero Yuy | Trowa and Cathy | Heero and Duo (2) (3) ((Glee spoof))**Sounds a lot like my HC Duo** | Wufei and Trowa ((During Mariemaia’s rebellion)) | Sally and Heero | Heero and Trowa (#3 is truly spiteful) | At Preventers HQ (2) | Little Q and Little H versus their dads | Chang Wufei | Duo, Quatre and Trowa (2)| Duo versus enemy | Sharing a safehouse | 2x6x2 | Duo and Trowa | 1x2x1 | After Duo sneaks on to the Sweeper ship | Submission by @timelordnomad

MoodBoards/Aesthetics:

@janaverse, 1x2x1 sticker 

@rx-79bluedestiny, Build kit boxes

Videos/AMVs:

@eostreofthedawn, MSA:GW - Sowing Discord (by Operation Meatier via YouTube)

@softnocturne, Just Communication 2015 Live (archived by ANime++) | White Reflection by Two-Mix (Official Music Video)  

Wen, Just Communication (cover) - forwarded by @softnocturne

Headcanons:

@sweetgoufbrah, Trowa running looks like…

@terrablaze514, A Crazy Sleepover (Freedom Fighters AU)  

Memes:

@incorrectgundamwingquotes, Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, Episode 2 

Gunpla:

@christianmswanson, Tallgeese ii | Wing Zero 

@gundayum, Mini Deathscythe (so adorable!) #1 (#2 here) | Wing Zero (2) (3) 

Calendar Events: 

@gundam-wing-bingo, Gundam Wingo is a GO! Sign up for your card here (and ensure your blog’s submissions box is open).

@gundamzine, Rhythm Generation: Shooting Stars

Mod Rounds / FAQ / The Measure of a Year (Bonus details, forwarded by @lemontrash )/ Schedule

@zineapps @zine-scene @zinefeed @zinewatch @zinesubmissions @fandomzines @zinefans

@gwcocktailfriday, Cocktail Friday (due August 23rd, between 3pm - 5pm in your timezone)

@thisweekingundamevents, Mini Bang: Unorthodox Undercover Work!

^ Mini Bang Rules / FAQ / Dates to remember ^

1st Check-in: August 17th (due August 24th). This check-in is for Writers.

All participants are encouraged to contact @helmistress in case of dropouts, Beta Reader changes, etc.

@seasons-of-gundamwing thanks all who participated in “Summer of Zechs 2019” this year! Links to fanworks are being posted.

[nellie-elizabeth]

Really long and rambling Queliot analysis...

Okay, so I have some Queliot Thoughts that I wanted to write out before the finale murders us all. This isn't discourse about the show's handling of queer rep. I have thoughts about that too, but this is more about the relationship and how I view it in universe, not in terms of the writing/authorial intent. This gets very long so I'll put it under the cut.

Also I wrote this quickly and didn’t really edit for content so seriously please be warned... this is kind of a mess. Here goes.

I'm such a fan of angst and obviously I love all of the angst-y interpretations of everything post-3x05 given the conversation we learn about in 4x05. But before I saw 4x05, I always sort of had this different interpretation of Queliot in the aftermath of the mosaic timeline, and I find it really compelling.

So, Q and Eliot get their memories of the mosaic timeline back, and it's obviously really emotional and intense for them both, but their memories aren't necessarily crystal clear. Some things feel incredibly real and immediate, but other things feel like they happened in a dream, or under water, or just slightly... off. But without realizing it, totally subconsciously, they just sort of... operate like a couple. Not in terms of confessing their love or holding hands or anything obvious like that, but they're just so comfortable and in sync with each other. Their minds are used to living in close quarters, sharing a bed, sharing the little pains and joys of everyday life, and so they just keep doing it without meaning to. We as the audience get to see that play out in 3x06. Eliot doesn't even think about what he's doing, he just straightens Q's clothes for him, and they lean into each other on instinct, El giving Q that little forehead kiss. (Obviously in light of Eliot's rejection, that scene seems super sad to us now, but I also like the idea that it's just an ingrained instinct for them to behave that way).

We know, from a writing standpoint, that the revelation in 4x05 wasn't something that was planned all along, it was developed as they were writing that episode. That means that the majority of season 3 doesn't take it into account. So, when Q is being tormented by the depression key, none of his insecurities or self-loathing are tied back to Eliot, and the rejection he has just faced. But if you go with this interpretation, Q doesn't feel insecure about Eliot. I kind of love the idea that even though Eliot regrets what he said to Q, he wasn't 100% wrong, either.

Now, by that I don't mean that Eliot was right when he said they wouldn't choose each other. That was hurtful, and it sucks that El didn't trust Q to know his own mind in terms of his sexuality in particular. I absolutely think Eliot owes Q an apology. But there's that moment when Eliot reminds Q that they've just been hit by 50 years of emotions all at once. I think there's some truth to the idea that jumping in to a serious relationship would have been a mistake. (I want to pause and say that my head-canon is all in service of an eventual Queliot endgame, OF COURSE). Q and El remember this life they've lived together, but I don't think that those 50 years have stuck entirely in their minds and their development, if that makes sense. This goes back to my theory that their memories, while real, retain a certain element of dream-like or hazy quality to them.

In that moment, if Eliot had said yes to Q in the throne room, they probably would have been so happy. For a while. But I think Eliot would freak out any time something came up that they hadn't had to deal with in the mosaic timeline. I think Q would be too nostalgic for a life they never lived, and I think the pressure to replicate or repeat that life would have torn them up inside. Let's say that in the moment, Q is crushed by Eliot's rejection, and El hates himself so much for being a coward that he locks that memory inside of himself and never thinks about it.

And let's say that the next day, Quentin has had some time to think about it, and he decides that his relationship with Eliot is good. It's always going to be good because it always has been. They can be together, be a couple, or not - and neither option is going to ruin their long and loving life together. Neither option could possibly cause a rift in something so fundamental and true in both of their lives. Eliot and Quentin are not ordinary friends, and that was true long before the quest took them into Fillory of the past, and it will be true long after, no matter what.

Think about their relationship - when they meet in season one, they are both deeply damaged people. They do a very destructive thing under the influence of the emotion potions and Eliot's substance abuse, and have sex with each other and with Margo. And while this causes huge problems for Alice and Q, and while Margo and Q have their falling out over it, Eliot and Q seem... fine. They never really have an on-screen apology or reconciliation, because they didn't have a falling out. Q yells at Eliot in that scene in 1x12, but El is way too fucked up and in his own head to really care. As Eliot heals his own issues, he and Q come out of the whole thing stronger than ever. They've been loving and supporting each other since they met, and I think when you compare their friendship to the other ones in Q's life, it's really the most stable, consistent support system he has. Obviously Alice really loves him, and obviously Julia is awesome and they get to a really good place eventually too... but Eliot is really the only character with whom Q doesn't have a lot of bumpy road to travel.

So Q is disappointed that Eliot doesn't think they should give their relationship a shot, but Q also knows Eliot really well. Maybe he doesn't fully understand that Eliot regrets rejecting him, because Q's not a mind-reader, but I think Q does know that Eliot loves him, and that's something he can be confident about, no matter how that love manifests.

Throughout the rest of season 3, Eliot is repressing the fact that he fucked up and he wishes he could be with Q, but Q is quietly, contentedly, finding ways to move on from the hopes he briefly had that maybe he and Eliot could be together. Q will always love Eliot, and if he knew how Eliot was feeling, he'd probably fight for them and all that... but his heart isn't shattered into a million pieces or anything. He gets to be Eliot's friend. He gets to love him always, and that's enough for him.

The end of season three arrives, and Q makes his choice to sacrifice himself and stay with the monster. So many people have tied this decision to Queliot, saying that Q was willing to give up his freedom because he had nothing to live for, since Eliot doesn't want him. In my less angst-y interpretation, Q is being a hero. He's making a sacrifice. I also think, applying Queliot to the decision, he feels like he's already had a wonderful, full life. He got to experience marriage and fatherhood and growing old. That ties in with his conversation with his dad. He's willing to sacrifice a lot to bring magic back, because in some ways he's not sacrificing anything. It's obviously not a happy thought, spending eternity in a castle with a scary monster, but it's something he's genuinely willing to do. Eliot, on the other hand, is not in the same good place emotionally that Quentin is. He's simmering with love and regret over the loss of his loving partnership with Q, in a way that Q doesn't understand because he took Eliot's rejection mostly at face value, and forgave him and moved on from it in a mostly healthy way. That's why Eliot can't respect Q's choice, and shoots the monster with the god-killing bullet. He can't stand the thought of never seeing Q again.

Flash-forward to 4x05. Q is in a really bad place because his dad is dead and he believes Eliot is dead, not to mention all the drama with Alice suddenly showing up again, and then Eliot does The Thing - he breaks through and he says "proof of concept" and he says "peaches and plums," and Q is so fucking relieved and he loves Eliot so fucking much, and now he has hope, a desperate, frantic hope, of saving Eliot's life. I think the whiplash of losing Eliot and then the potential of getting him back is probably enough to stir up a lot of the emotions that Q thought he had put to rest. But, in keeping with what I've written above, Q hasn't been harboring a broken heart all this time. He's been in love with Eliot, sure, but that was a settled part of him, something true but dormant, if that makes sense. We can't forget that when 4x05 starts, Q believes that Eliot is dead, and hasn't seen Alice since her terrible betrayal. During the course of one single episode, Alice is back in his life, and he talks to Eliot, discovering the chance to get him back. These are his two main love interests of the show, and there's definitely a parallel being drawn with the fact that they're both suddenly back in his life at the exact same time.

I want to take a moment to say that I don't actually have a big problem, character-and-plot-wise, with Qualice. If Queliot had never been introduced in canon, I'd probably root for them. I don't think I would have been an avid and passionate shipper, or anything, but I'd find the story compelling. In fact, I still do find it compelling, I just no longer root for them to end up together. There are so many stories with the will-they-won't-they element, but there's something cool and slightly different about Qualice, in my opinion. We don't have to wait long for the "will they." They do, half way through the first season of the show. And then they break up in a spectacularly dramatic way, and Alice dies shortly afterwards. For the rest of the show thus far, their romantic plot thread has been about seeing if they can crawl their way back to what they once had, and even if they get there, is it what they remember? Are they the same people who fell in love with each other? Often in genre shows, where death is impermanent, the deaths of major characters are there for plot reasons, they're there for angst reasons, but often the lasting effect of something like that doesn't really play out. Here, the ramifications of Q and Alice's relationship from season 1 are only just starting to get unpacked here at the end of season 4. Some people might find that incredibly aggravating, because they're sick and tired of the relationship, but I actually find it compelling, as long as they don't erase Alice's development for the sake of her love for Q.

We also have to remember that the story's not over yet. Q and Alice trying again makes perfect sense to me, given everything that's happened on the show so far. But it also makes perfect sense to me that they finally work out that while they will always love each other deeply, they aren't going to make it as a couple. If we look at how I've imagined Q's inner thoughts and feelings since 3x05 happened, he's not wallowing in misery over Eliot. He loves him, but he loves Alice too, and he doesn't think that Eliot is an option for him right now. Maybe the "proof of concept" thing threw him for a loop, but Q has known all along that Eliot loves him... that was never a question in his mind. He still believes that Eliot decided not to be with him, despite the fact that they love each other. And Alice? Alice was his first love. Alice is someone who he hurt deeply, and who hurt him deeply in return, and Q likes to fix things. He wants to fix this, and I say it makes perfect sense for him to give it a try.

So how would I go from here, if I were in charge of the show? Well, let's assume that Q, Alice, and Eliot all actually walk out of the finale tomorrow alive. I'm not sure I think that's likely, but let's pretend. Obviously we get an awesome reunion hug, and tears and joy and Margo is there and Eliot gets to cuddle with her and with Q and everyone cries.

So now we’re in season 5. Eliot learns that Q and Alice are together now, and while he's disappointed, he decides to follow through with the promise he made to Memory!Q when he was trapped. He pulls Q aside and tells him he's sorry for what happened when Q asked him to be with him. Q is a bit startled at the apology, and Eliot explains that he deeply regrets being so dismissive. Eliot isn't sure if the two of them would have worked together or not, but that's not the point. Q was being open and vulnerable and honest, and Eliot brushed it aside. He downplayed the importance of their life together on the mosaic quest, and he hates himself for making Q think he was alone in his feelings. Q tells Eliot that he understands, and he's happy to think that maybe now they can share their memories of their life together without this barrier between them. Q leaves the conversation at first feeling like he's gotten some closure, and Eliot is wrestling with a totally unfamiliar feeling of jealousy and heartbreak as he watches Q and Alice go on with rebuilding their romance. (In my head-canon, Eliot was never jealous of Arielle and the three of them were in a totally happy, loving, devoted poly relationship, so Eliot has truly never felt jealous of anyone over Q before).

But then, because this is The Magicians, some magic shenanigans brings some stuff to light. We've seen the show do stuff with sex magic before, with Q and Alice, and there was Penny-23 worshiping Julia, so I would want there to be a scenario where maybe sex magic was required, but there's a twist about it being between life-time lovers, or something. Or maybe it's a truth serum that forces people to reveal any and all secrets, so Alice and the rest of the gang finally learn about the mosaic timeline. Something magic-y and plot-important-y happens that forces Q and Eliot to talk and think more about the mosaic timeline, in some form, and Eliot, either out of necessity because of the magic, or because of the emotions it brings up, confesses to Q that he's still in love with him and wants to be with him.

Q is shocked, and confused, because he felt like he had reconciled his love for Eliot and his love for Alice in his mind. He loves them both, and since Eliot doesn't want to be with him like that, it was okay for him to love them both and try to build a life with Alice. But now? Suddenly realizing that Eliot is an actual option for him? It hits him that he really wants that, that he had it backwards. He thought Alice was the love of this life, and Eliot was the love of a life he once lived. But instead, Alice is the memory of something he once had that made him really happy, and Eliot is the here-and-now. But he's made a commitment to Alice, so he's incredibly torn. I want Alice to be the one to dump Q. She realizes that he's thinking about staying with her out of obligation, and she tells him she deserves better than that, and runs into Kady's arms and decides that she needs to be single for a while, and continue to work on redeeming herself and finding her purpose and goals in life.

But now, see, Eliot is insecure because he thinks if Q chooses to be with him now, it's only because Alice decided not to be with him. It goes back to the whole "not when we have a choice" thing. We'd have a couple of conversations, some insecurities and doubts, and then some other dramatic plot-y thing would happen where Eliot or Q are in danger and the other one has to do something heroic to save them, and there's a desperate thank-god-you're-alive kiss, and that leads to an honest conversation and a decision to try and see where their relationship might take them.

Aaaannnd... scene.

This ended up way longer than I thought it would... lol. Congrats if you actually got to the end. I think the reason I felt compelled to write this is that I wanted to see a way of writing Queliot that felt actually true to the character development we've seen on the show thus far. When I'm reading fic, you can bet I LOVE reading about how Quentin is madly in love with Eliot, and Alice is a non-factor, or how Q and Eliot have both been silently pining ever since 3x05... but that doesn't square with the canon of the show. How do we reconcile what we've actually seen on screen, in terms of Quentin's character development, and Eliot's and Alice's as well? I think the above analysis is as sound as any other I've seen, and if the show actually follows through on the Queliot build-up, it would be an organic way for them to start to bring that relationship to the forefront without betraying Q's canonical and on-going love for Alice, and the fact that there's no hard textual evidence to support the idea that Q and El have actually been pining for each other this whole time. Just because they've got other people in their lives, even other loves, doesn't mean they couldn't still end up getting together on this show.

Fingers fucking crossed.

[22degreehalo]

The thing is...there are some kinds of works that are inherently harmful. If someone makes a work that was specifically intended to prove to people that women are inferior and that abusing them is what they really want, that will hurt people. That is the kind of work that we ought to call out loudly and boycott.

But there are some kinds of works that we critique not because they’re inherently bad, but because they contribute to a greater trend. A work where a woman is abused but ends up forgiving her boyfriend and they end up a happy couple? It’d be entirely possible to read that story as commenting on forgiveness and the power of a person to change, but in our current climate, it simply adds too much to a general ideology that women ought to simply endure abuse for it to be entirely innocent.

Because works do give off messages whether they mean to or not. Yes, fiction is fiction, but people don’t consume media the same way they watch a fireworks show, ooh-ing and ahh-ing over the pretty colours. Stories are expected to reflect reality unless otherwise noted. That’s why we’re okay with the existence of White Walkers in Game of Thrones (noted!), but if a character’s beloved father died and they were acting totally happy two minutes later without anyone in-universe acting like it was weird, people would criticise it, because we assume the characters will function the way we’re familiar with humans working. (On the other hand, if that happened, and it was deliberately done to set up a twist that the character was an android not programmed to feel sorrow, the audience would feel relief that their instincts were right, and it would become good writing again!) So if a creator naturally assumes that men can abuse their girlfriends and still be good people, they could end up writing a narrative where that happens without thinking twice about it, and this would probably validate the other men who think the same, because we understand that works of fiction are created by humans and not sprung from the ether.

But. The fact that a plotline or character type or whatever else contributes to a worrying belief system doesn’t mean it’s without value. And sometimes, examining those worrying beliefs can be a value in itself. The point is, humans need to be able to explore those kinds of ideas sometimes - because while it’s harmful to one community it’s helpful to another (e.g. storylines where a girl who previously liked boys realises she’s a lesbian can be hurtful to bi girls but great for lesbians who’ve dealt with coercive heterosexuality), or because the creator is a part of the group harmed by the ideology and they need to work through their own thoughts and feelings on the subject, or just because the creator just happens to get a lot of genuine joy and satisfaction out of it. (And while that may seem minor, remember that the world is fucked up and sometimes we all just need to grab the tiny handfuls of happiness where we can get them.)

So: how do we do that ethically?

That’s not an easy question to answer, and honestly, there’s no way to do it for everyone. Take arguments over the treatment of women in A Song of Ice and Fire - some will argue that the novel does really well in depicting the impact of patriarchy on women from the parallel real-world time period, up to and including the internalised sexism that results, while others will complain that it’s just a load of unnecessary tragedy porn and that the sexist themes are played straight more often than subverted. And a lot of it really goes down to opinion - some are angry about the treatment of women historically and want a work that admits that without glossing over the uncomfortable details, while others just want a place they can go where they don’t have to think about misogyny for five minutes. And a lot of women will feel both ways at different points! But the point is, a lot of the way people feel about this just goes to how much goodwill they extend or feel the creator has earned - the same exact scene could be harrowingly realistic from one creator but disgustingly unnecessary from another.

And, obviously, a good rule of thumb is not to throw other groups under the bus while following your own salvation - it’s one thing to create a work that, if it hurts anyone, will hurt you, and another entirely to wave away any harm done to some other group of people. But once you bring in intersectionality, and the issue I mentioned above about some things being important narratives for some groups but damaging to others, it gets a lot more complicated.

However, I do have some things I believe help. One is a clear separation between works which are attempting to portray the world realistically or healthily, and those that are specifically written to appeal to the need for these dangerous tropes. So I honestly don’t think too much of a romance app that lets you get into a relationship that would be reasonably considered dodgy and unhealthy if it were portrayed as ideal, because romance stories are meant to appeal to certain romantic and power fantasies (because, paradoxically, being so amazing that a dangerous man falls in love with you and changes himself for you IS a power fantasy in a way) rather than send important messages about the world. Reach is another important one - again, I think better of an app that you need to go out of your way to find than a TV show whose commercials blast all over for anyone to see. 

And thaaat’s where fanfiction comes in. Because fanfiction, to me, is perfectly suited to be the mechanism whereby these troubling narratives can be put forward. It’s largely created and consumed by young queer women, who are largely the group we’d normally say would be harmed by these tropes - giving them total control over them, to poke and prod at and examine and consider their feelings about, while supporting and educating one another, is SO much more safe than just leaving them, particularly the young ones, at the mercy of the mainstream media. And because of that, the reach is tiny - a typical short fanfic may be read by a hundred people. A TV show is more likely to register its views in the tens of thousands, and movies even more than that. If someone screws up badly, or writes something that could be harmful to a lot of people? It’s pretty containable. And fanfiction, more than any other kind of consumable product I have seen in any existence ever, is extremely heavily tagged and warned-for, even setting aside how much you can tell about a fic just by knowing the characters and pairing in it. It’s pretty hard to get into a fic without knowing what’s going to be in it unless you’re deliberately trying.

So, that’s where I stand on the anti issue. People cannot be constant role models, never committing any action or thinking any thought that could express an ideology that could be harmful to some group. We all have dark thoughts and feelings and exploring those through creative work alongside people in similar experiences can be extremely helpful. We need to have SOMEWHERE for it. And fanfiction is by far the best place I’ve seen.

Which isn’t to say that I think all fanworks are great or that no themes should be challenged. God, no. There are common themes I find very uncomfortable or worrying, and there are some that I think should be classed closer to the first category of harmful tropes than the latter. (Plus, when it comes to things like racism which are much less likely to be personally relevant to the creator, I’m okay with much stricter criticism.) But I think that by far the best way to deal with these is through education. Yes, there are many young people in fandom who are not going to be as good as adults at determining a fantasy trope from an admirable goal - but they’re just as likely to be the ones writing these things as reading them, so going after creators is likely to do more harm than good. Instead, we should circulate posts about abuse and consent and healthy relationships, making very clear to point out any common fanfic tropes that contradict good practice without morally condemming those who engage in writing those things. Even small things like adding notes can make a big difference - e.g. ‘character X is being quite pushy in this fic because he’s a teenager and is stressed and doesn’t know how to do this right - I wrote it this way because it felt more realistic, but wanted to warn you in case you might feel uncomfortable with it’. And, honestly? When I was a teenager in fandom, I saw these kinds of posts all the time - most of my sex ed beyond the basics was from older fandom people making posts calling out silly fanfic sex tropes and explaining how to write realistic porn. I feel like I see them less often these days, so maybe they should come back.

Aaaand on top of everything else I am 100% against bullying and harassment as a solution to any problem, if only because I have lost any faith in the ability of people on this website to recognise an actually bad and dangerous person so I would honestly just rather nix this as a tool even to be considered. (And, again, given that anti bullies almost always end up going after the exact people who are supposed to be harmed by these tropes - young queer women and/or neurodivergent people and abuse survivors writing about their own experiences - I am especially disapproving of such a tool in this specific case.)

aaaaaaaaaaanyway tl;dr: we shouldn’t judge fanfic by the same standards as mass media, we can criticise tropes without holding that a work has no redeeming value, we need spaces where we can safely explore dark themes, and fanfiction is probably one of the least harmful ways it’s possible to do that. We should respond through education and extremely aggressive tagging, not by sending death threats to csa survivors for working through their pain together.

[yahoosodapop]

The flaws in The Last Jedi

I love the movie.  It was surprisingly deep after you get over the initial shock and overwhelming sensation of being thrust multiple concepts in a span of 2.45 hours.

Seems like the vocal ‘minority’ is all over the online reviews for this movie.  I say vocal because I’ve seen this thing happen so many times...when a certain group doesn’t want like something the actively trash metacritic or any other public review systems.   So I’ve learned to ignore it.

But let’s be honest, the movie is without its flaws.

Let’s go through the 3 major plot points and what I felt was lacking in them:

1.  Resistance on the run

Leia is grooming Poe to lead.  She say’s it herself when she berates him about his decision to sacrifice a very hefty chunk of their fleet to a ill-thought of bombing run.

“I see dead heroes.  No leaders.”

Cut to Admiral Holdo, who Poe appears to woo over but eventually she shuts him out - asking him to be patient and trust the leadership.  Poe doesn’t trust her and in turn instigates a mutiny on board.

I was...WTF Poe?!?

I get it, this story arc was learning about leadership.  But at some point, he is insufferable.  Being all flirty and cocky to get on Holdo’s good side and once she spurred him, he ended up as a mutineer.   They played his cocky pilot without a brain scenario too much that Oscar Isaac’s face can no longer save me from being annoyed at his character.

When Holdo sacrificed herself in the end...WOW...that was the leader that the resistance truly needed.  She had a plan all along.  It’s too bad that Poe is now the leader of the rebels...after having such a fantastic character with Holdo, I feel let down.  Bring back Holdo!  I don’t care about Akbar, Holdo is much better!

This whole sequence...I don’t know --- I found it boring, irritating and I just wanted to get it over.

2.  Canto Bight

Finn wakes up...

Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?  Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?    Where is Rey?   Where is Rey?

And later on it turned to...

I’m doing this so I can run away with Rey.   I’m doing this so I can run away with Rey.   I’m doing this so I can run away with Rey.   I’m doing this so I can run away with Rey.   I’m doing this so I can run away with Rey. 

Again it was annoying.  

Finn held no allegiance to anyone except himself and Rey.  To some extent, DJ was introduced as a parallel to Finn --- having no allegiance to anyone except himself and money.   DJ is the man that Finn could become.  A coward.

Parts of the Canto Bight sequence felt too long and too unnecessary.   That whole bit about the racing creatures, the kids, the chase sequence...it felt too long.   And when they get to the ship it gets boring --- even when they land on the Snoak’s ship...it just felt dull overall.

DJ could have been an excellent character.   He could have delivered the war duality on a better level (Lord knows Benico Del Toro has the acting chops  for anything)...perhaps had they talked more in the prison cell rather than all the other things that happened in Canto Bight that might have made more sense.  But that much needed duality discussion on the ship and later on Snoak’s ship- fell flat.  In the end most people do not need to question the status quo.  It is what, it is.  Bad guys and good guys.

And Rose...really a fantastic character who had a big crush on Finn due to his heroic exploits.  I loved the moment when she shocked Finn ~ you go girl!!!  

She gives some interesting insights on Canto Bight...but once again it falls flat.   She delivers one of the best lines in the movie in the end as she saves Finn --- and I find myself asking...what has he ever done to deserve that from you because ‘Rey! Rey Rey! Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey!!!!’

And the fight with Phasma...it was so anti-climactic that I am so sad they had wasted Gwendoline Christie.   Once again...Finn wins by pure luck.  It wasn’t a showdown of epic proportions --- it was accidental whimper to the end.

And I am getting annoyed by BB-8 deus ex machina droid.  Not even R2 could have done those miracles.

Finn in TLJ is no different from Finn in TFA.  I’m expecting his first line to Rey in the third movie as "Run away with me, Rey.”

3.  The balance and the Force

a.k.a The real story that Rian Johnson wanted to tell but somehow he had to talk about the other guys too...

I’m not going to talk about Reylo here because that is the best part of the movie for me - and you can see how much Rian Johnson enjoyed himself with that but let’s get down to business - the people who are hating the movie have reasons that all boil down to Luke’s characterization (not exactly the ‘abusive’ ship known as Reylo *gasp*!!!)

The first time I watched it, I was upset that Rian Johnson dragged my childhood hero / my favorite SW characters through the mud.    No wonder Mark Hamill was upset before when he first read the script...  Well Mark is ok now after having several debates with Rian himself...but none of us have the luxury of that...

Later on, you understand why Luke turned out the way he did and why he wanted the Jedi to end.  But it takes A LOT of thinking.

They needed a lot of time, scenes and dialogue to convey what happened to Luke.  And there were a lot of things in Ach-To that were too unnecessary and should just have been converted to Luke talking or showing Rey what’s going on.

Rather than that long and unnecessary bit about Luke’s adventures in Ach-To... The Green Milk... Those annoying Porgs (whose only purpose was for us to say awwwww...and I wish Chewie just ate them)... All that walking with nothing going on...That terribly long sequence with Rey and the mirror (I understand why the mirror sequence is important but it was too long).

All that wasted time could have been used to tell us more about our battered hero, Luke.

Hell take in all those annoying sequences from Poe and Finn’s story arcs and just focus on the most controversial and heartbreaking realization in this movie...Luke is not perfect.

The moments that should have explained Luke, prior to the startling revelation about what happened between him and Ben, were condensed to 3 lessons (with each lesson probably having 2 measly minutes of dialogue).   

Lesson 1:  The Force both light and dark.  It doesn’t give damn if you’re a Jedi or a Sith.  It balances itself.

Lesson 2:  The way of the Jedi is wrong.  (really MORE explanation should have been given here.  I think Rian should have thrown in visual flashbacks on how the Jedi effed up to hammer the point home.)    In fact, they could have dumped the whole duality of war concept here.  With Luke explaining how the good guys and bad guys are the same.    

Lesson 3: Failure is the greatest teacher.  Of course, Rey doesn’t hear this lesson but she experiences it later on when she fails to bring back Ben (partly her fault).  But this is highlighted with Yoda and Luke having a conversation...again it wasn’t that well done and it should have been more substantial.

Perhaps if those 3 lessons were given more importance, the audience may have more time to understand a humanized version Luke rather than outright reject what happened to him.

Of course the end is not without hope:

- Poe is slowly learning to become a leader and he better be since Leia won’t be in Ep IX and they killed a perfectly fantastic character with Holdo.  No more of Poe/Holdo dynamic of gaining trust with an icky ‘you tell me your secrets and I’ll tell you mine...” vibe.  It’s more ‘Hi I’m Poe and nice to meet you force weapon Rey.”

- Finn is attempting to pick a side. Of course, after the customary ‘Reeeeeeeeey~~~!’ reunion, we see him actually giving time to plain unextraordinary normal Rose.  (And I live for the moment when Finn actually ends up in a relationship it’s not with super girl Rey and realize how super normal girls can be.)

- And Luke.  Gives hope to his sister that Ben is still there and that Han didn’t die in vain.  He cements his failure by death and at the same time tell’s Ben that he will always be with him.  Cue in ‘Ben Solo redemption attempt Part II’ via Force Ghost Luke.

I love the movie.  I really did.  And I might watch it again on IMAX if I find time during the holidays.  But I understand the outrage.   We are used to movies that we just ingest for entertainment and forget.  The last two movies I saw prior to TLJ were Justice League and Thor Ragnarok - purely popcorn movies where mI throw my brain out of the window to enjoy.   Rian Johnson tried to give SW a deeper meaning but at the same time it can only be done by challenging what most people hold true for Star Wars.   Even if Rian had the perfect movie cut, it would still not be enough to satisfy the weight of the fanboy expectation...

...

With Luke being unable to handle the weight of the universe’s expectation of him being the savior of the galaxy being a metaphor for what’s been going on with the SW franchise.

[newstfionline]

The Catalonia Crisis Also Divides Spain’s Media

By Raphael Minder, NY Times, Oct. 25, 2017

BARCELONA, Spain--If Spain has not split in two, its media almost has. There, the struggle over the restive region of Catalonia plays out in parallel universes.

From Madrid, the region’s secessionist drive is portrayed as an act of sedition deserving to be put down. In Catalonia, the narrative is more about aspirations for self-determination by a people with a distinct identity.

“We’ve got parallel story lines led by extremist representations that are filled with clichés,” said Enric Hernàndez, the editor of the Barcelona-based newspaper El Periódico.

The central government in Madrid may soon try to align those narratives by taking charge of Catalonia’s public broadcasters, Catalunya Radio and its larger sister television company, TV3.

The move could come as soon as this weekend, after another tense and unpredictable round in the standoff. The Catalan Parliament will meet Thursday to review a possible declaration of independence, a day before the Spanish Senate is expected to approve a raft of emergency measures under Article 155 of the Constitution to give Madrid direct control over the region.

Among those measures, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy wants to guarantee “truthful, objective and balanced” coverage in Catalonia.

Such a media takeover would be a direct strike at Catalan institutions that have been instrumental in promoting a separate culture and language. It would also put the Spanish government on a path toward reducing media freedom in ways that worry many Spaniards, even beyond Catalonia.

But the prospect has left Catalan citizens and journalists especially anxious. Not least among them is Vicent Sanchis, the general manager of TV3, who said it would return Spain to “a dark period,” when the dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco censored information.

“When a government says that it will take charge of a television station, I know that this is something very serious,” said Mr. Sanchis, who wrote his doctoral thesis about Franco’s censorship.

Since last weekend, the Catalan broadcaster has received messages of solidarity from the staff committees of rival television stations, including Spanish national television, where some employees have been openly criticizing their own coverage of the conflict.

Ignacio Escolar, the editor of eldiario.es, a Madrid-based online publication, wrote that TV3 “isn’t my model of public television,” but that he was shocked by what he described as the cynicism of Mr. Rajoy’s government in demanding “truthful” coverage.

Spain’s national television station, which is led by a central government appointee, runs news bulletins that have become “obscenely manipulated,” Mr. Escolar claimed.

Perhaps the outlet with the most at stake for Catalans is TV3, which was begun in 1983 as an ambitious regional television project that Catalonia’s leader at the time, Jordi Pujol, used to reinstall the Catalan language, which was banned under Franco’s dictatorship.

Since then, TV3 has spawned a generation of Catalan producers who built their own media companies, in both Catalonia and the rest of Spain.

“TV3 was a decisive element in the construction of the new Catalan identity and society that Pujol wanted, but it also became part of a powerful system of clientelism,” said Josep Maria Martí Font, a Catalan journalist and former foreign correspondent for the newspaper El País.

Antonio García Ferreras, who runs a politics show on La Sexta, a Madrid-based television channel, argued that Catalonia’s independence movement had been “light years ahead” of its opponents, in terms of promoting its separatist project on every possible platform.

“The same ideology has been sold in every clever way possible, including on TV3’s children and food shows,” Mr. García Ferreras claimed. “I think the independence movement is perhaps now a victim of its communications success, having made people really believe that independence could soon become a reality.”

In Madrid, on the other hand, he added, “we’re now seeing a large part of the media respond in a way that is forceful but also disrespectful, building up an audience that seems happy to hear denigrating views about Catalonia.”

As the standoff has reached a boiling point, some columnists and pundits have resigned or been pushed aside, while warning against mounting extremism in the news media.

This month, Joan López Alegre, a Catalan university professor of communications, left alongside another regular pundit on TV3, signing off with an opinion article in El País headlined “Farewell to the circus of hatred.”

Mr. López Alegre argued in an interview that it would not be “illogical” for Mr. Rajoy’s government to take control of a Catalan broadcaster that had been “pushing not only a political project against Madrid, but also working to create a conflict within Catalan society, using public money.”

The conflict has put journalists on both sides under huge pressure, also because it often feels extremely personal.

Susanna Griso is a journalist who comes from Barcelona but has worked for the past 20 years in Madrid for the Antena 3 channel. She recently choked back tears on live television while arguing with a Catalan mayor about whether Spanish police officers should be stationed in her town.

“These are extreme circumstances when you’re giving opinions about an issue that affects your family and those you love,” Ms. Griso said. “From the media coverage, it often now looks as if we’re already living in different states, but real life is a lot more complicated than that.”

Mr. Martí Font, the former El País journalist, noted that the gap in the narrative was “galactic” on social media, where several videos have gone viral showing Spanish police officers and officials either celebrating and insulting Catalans or receiving abuse from them.

He forecast that Mr. Rajoy’s government would use Article 155 to squeeze the Catalan broadcaster financially rather than risk the controversial removal of key staff members.

“Money talks and it’s easier to turn off the tap to change an editorial line rather than enforce censorship, as we’ve seen with the problems of some newspapers dealing with their debt holders,” he said.

Mr. Sanchis, the general manager of TV3, acknowledged that his company could not survive without public money. The Catalan government pays 230 million euros, or about $272 million, of TV3’s annual €300 million budget.

Madrid has already used the stick to force Catalan media into line.

Last month, it warned that it would prosecute media companies that advertised the independence referendum. Ara, a Catalan newspaper that is committed to holding an independence referendum, heeded the warning.

“Some readers were unhappy, but we took this decision not only to protect our newspaper but also to stay sound and alive now,” said Salvador Garcia Ruiz, Ara’s chief executive.

[chimepunk]

What novels or book series would you recommend?

oh fuckin boy dude so many. 90% of what i read is either gay or scifi/fantasy or both, and some are technically for a younger audience but still great, so thats what most of this is which hopefully you’re cool with here goes

this got super long so i’m putting it under a cut. bolded titles are the ones that i’m super recommending, though i love them all

novels

the coldest girl in coldtown by holly black - vampires! a trans character! a bi character! one of the most novel approaches to vampires in fiction that i’ve seen! 10/10 would recommend

the darkest part of the forest by holly black - again, holly black is one of my favorite authors. this one’s got faeries (the proper vaguely unsettling kind that i’m all about) magical music, girls embracing their sexuality, girls being knights, interesting sibling dynamics, and a super cute m/m pairing

les miserables by victor hugo - ok yeah, it’s like 1400 pages long and historical fiction, but i love les mis a lot ok. it’s gotta be on this list just because it owns my ass. it’s like a old drunk french man trying to tell you about the june rebellion but he keeps getting distracted by things like people’s personal lives, the intricacies of the parisian underworld, and how much he wants to fuck the sewers. it’s wonderful

the night circus by erin morgenstern - magical circus that mysteriously appears for days at a time and then vanishes? a competition between young magicians drawn out for years? a wide variety of fascinating side characters? (i will say that the synopsis available for the book is somewhat misleading, as it’s actually less about our two protags and more about the circus itself. but that’s what makes it so enchanting)

the song of achilles by madeleine miller - retelling of patroclus and achilles story to be explicitly romantic. will make you feel like you’re floating on clouds and then rapidly crush your soul. sort of a happy ending? but it’s still a tragedy. their ending is the same as it was in the illiad so if you’re not prepared for that then maybe don’t read

good omens by neil gaiman and terry pratchett - a demon who’s not very good at being a demon and an angel who just wants to collect his books in peace thank you very much try to sabotage the end of times. absolutely hilarious

fairy and folktales of the irish peasantry by w.b. yeats - the best collection of irish faerie stories by one of my favorite poets. if you like creepy and tricky faeries i would def recommend checking these out

rootabaga stories by carl sandburg - another collection of folktales, this time inspired by the american midwest. kinda weird, kinda zany, very neat

the poison eaters by holly black - a short story collection of faery stories that are sometimes creepy, sometimes touching, sometimes gay. my personal favorite is about a library science student who finds a book collection where the characters come out at night and interact, but they’re all really great

series:

alex rider adventures by anthony horowitz - teenager gets recruited by MI6 as a spy, has incredibly high success rate, gets pretty fucked up along the way but damn those one liners tho, maybe have some self preservation alex? just a thought

all for the game by nora sakavic - about a fake sport called exy that’s kind of like indoor lacrosse but more violent. contains: crime families, found families, an aspec protag, girls kicking ass, unhealthy levels of sass, wonderful slowburn m/m that you can’t even see coming for a long while, and a happy ending for everyone!! i came for the gays and ended up reading all three books in two days. also you can get the whole series for less than five bucks on kindle! (note: tw for rape, physical abuse, torture, ptsd, child abuse, drug use, alcoholism, some use of slurs, mentions of past self harm, mental illness)

artemis fowl by eoin colfer - more faeries, but this time they live underground and are way more technologically advanced than humans. the first book focuses on our anti-hero trying to catch one and steal their gold, and they quickly become allies and solve faerie related cases together!! one of my favorite series growing up, and i cried in the middle of the hallway at school when i finished the last book

camp half-blood series by rick riordan - does rick riordan write a lot of mythology books? yes. do i love them all? yes. neurodivergent kids! kids from a huge range of racial and ethnic backgrounds! queer kids! collect them all! ft. greco-roman mythology and a lot of stupid jokes

emelan series by tamora pierce - ok this is easily one of my favorite series of all time. non-western high fantasy setting (picture greece/turkey, china, tibet, mongolia, scandinavia, etc type settings), following four young mages who have unique kinds of magic as they train and grow their skills and become powerful in their own right. only one of the kids is definitely white (jury’s still out on sandry), one is a lesbian, one is ace, one is pan, all four are raised by a loving f/f couple, body diversity, one of the best found families i’ve ever read, feminism, discussion of racism, classism, cultural identity, war, and so much more. it’s so so good and so under-appreciated please read all of the emelan books 

the dark is rising sequence by susan cooper - full disclosure i have not finished this series yet but i’ve re-read the first book a million times. it’s a neat take on arthurian mythology, with dark forces trying to take over and kids getting shit done

diviners by libba bray - psychic teenagers in 1920s new york! i’m a slut for prohibition, but these are also super fun and have likable and real characters, and doesn’t only focus on wealthy white people having parties which is nice. the occult! government conspiracies! historical references! genuinely scary situations! it’s rad!

the enchanted forest chronicles by patricia c. wrede - i adore this series so so much. it’s about a princess who’s father keeps telling her that she can’t have hobbies like fencing or cooking or conjugating latin verbs because they’re unladylike and insists that she marry this doofus prince that she couldn’t care less about. so she runs away and volunteers to work for a dragon and proceeds to send away all the princes that try to rescue her. it’s genuinely funny, has a really neat magic system in the later books, great female friendships, cats, dragons who have no time for your gender roles, and wizards who are the most ridiculous group of antagonists you will ever see

the infernal devices by cassandra clare - i really really do not like the author of this series but it also broke me so it must go on the list. if you’re familiar with the mortal instruments or shadowhunters on freeform, it’s set in that universe in the 1870s in london and it’s very steampunk and very angsty and it made me cry a lot

the kane chronicles by rick riordan - see: camp half-blood series but egyptian

fablehaven by brandon mull - oooooh fuck me up i love this series. this is another one meant for slightly younger readers but all of brandon mull’s series are so wildly imaginative and i’m a slut for world building so. the premise is basically that there are secret preserves all over the world that house magical creatures, and five of these preserves have vaults with artifacts that when brought together make a key to this massive demon prison. an evil society called the society of the evening star is trying to get the artifacts to open the prison, and a different group who is allied with the preserves called the knights of the dawn is trying to get to them first to prevent this from happening. there are dragons, light and dark powers, crazy convoluted vaults to get through, and some really cool creatures and characters

beyonders by brandon mull - this guy again! this one’s about a parallel world called lyrian that people on earth can only get to through small liminal windows, and usually can’t get back through. the story follows two kids, jason and rachel, who get stuck in lyrian and end up becoming major members of the resistance against the evil emperor maldor. just like fablehaven, the world building is insane and you’ll fall in love with all the characters. this is yet another series that made me cry in the middle of class when i finished it

the kingkiller chronicle by patrick rothfuss - this is series is long as all fuck and the last book isn’t out yet but it’s my #1 favorite series of all time. i found out about it bc a cashier at a local grocery store held up the line to write it down for me and i never went back. parts of it are achingly, hauntingly beautiful, other parts are hilarious enough to leave you in stitches, others make you want to pull your hair out. there’s sass, recklessness, beautiful and deadly girls, an overwhelming love and emphasis on the importance of music and storytelling, magic that’s more like science, ethnic adversity, student loans, a thing that might be a cow or might be a dragon depending on who you ask, and more quotable lines than you could dream of. the audiobook by nick podehl is also fabulous, and lin manuel miranda is producing and adapting it for the screen and maybe stage at some point in the future!

a modern faerie tale by holly black - guys. i love holly black. almost everything she’s ever written is on this list. this one is fairly self explanatory by the title, but it’s gritty and dark and has those lovely creepy faeries that she’s so great at writing. also a surprising m/m couple in the last book, both of whom are characters in the other two installments. (tw for drug use/addiction, brief sexual assault, and probably other things that i can’t remember right now)

the raven cycle by maggie stiefvater - also in my top 3 favorite series of all time, i cannot begin to describe this series. i first read it while up in the nc mountains which improved the experience to a surprising degree, but it’s stuck with me for the last several years. basically 5 teenagers go in search of a dead welsh king, but along the way there is magic, psychics, ghosts, a sentient forest, dreams becoming reality, curses, teenage shenanigans, classic cars, swearing, church, kisses and not kisses, illict hand holding, a baby crow, bisexuality, a death list, hitmen, and nicknames and it will consume your heart before you know what’s happening to you (tw child abuse, implied sexual assault, substance abuse, dissociation, mentions of past suicide attempts, body horror, gore, and disturbing scenes esp. in the last book)

six of crows by leigh bardugo - a team of criminals band together to break into an impossible fortress, fall in love, con an entire city, and get rich. set in the same universe as the grisha trilogy (which is also good but not as good as soc), this is basically a heist followed by a con, but pulled off by ruthless teenagers and with the help of magic

curseworker trilogy by holly black - crime families, magic that can only done through touch so everyone wears gloves, moral ambiguity, and a twisted romance. one of holly black’s best and most underrated series

baccano! by ryohgo narita - this is a japanese light novel series which has been adapted into an anime, but is much more extensive in print. the plot is extremely convoluted, but an absolute ride spanning several centuries, although the bulk of it is in the 1930s in nyc and chicago. there’s an elixir of immortality, crime families, trains, a solipsistic assassin and his mute assassin gf, serial killers, a demon with a catch phrase, murder, explosions, adorable couples, gambling, a gang leader named jacuzzi who is always terrified, killer corporations, and much much more

no.6 by asuka asano - another japanse series, this time focusing on two boys, one who grew up in a utopian city, the other who grew up outside the walls after the city destroyed his life. they meet when they’re 12 years old, and several years later, they’re reunited when the outsider rescues the city boy from arrest. they, along with a pimp and a nonbinary dog hotel owner, try to expose and overthrow the government. also ft. drag performances, mice who like shakespeare, killer bees, and boys falling in love.

the merlin saga by t.a. barron - my favorite take on arthurian mythology, chronicling merlin as he comes into his power. there’s a vividly magical island, giants, amulets, talking trees, stones that will try to swallow you, a swamp witch, celtic deities, huge wicker hats, poetry, new kinds of fruit, people that are also deer, and human’s long lost wings.

[riddlez213]

As I write this it is the end of summer and while I have had a little break and have had some fun I knew my coming back was inevitable because while I love what I do on this blog and what I do outside of it with the same skill set I thought it would be a great idea to do something different. I’m going to find out the backstory of Heath Ledger’s Joker. I am a huge comicbook fan and I love Batman for not only his amazing detective skills not put forth in many works but also his rogues gallery and every character’s amazing psyche. And then there is the best comicbook movie of all time “The Dark Knight” and it goes astray from the source material with a perfect and in some way better interpretation of the Joker played by Heath Ledger. But as the original Joker is this one also has a lack of backstory even more so that the original and for the 10 years after its release people have theorized and theorized without much skill into case work and they’ve gotten pretty far but today I put forth my theory or theories depending on how you look at it and with actual evidence that is solid and a little bit of assumption but not nearly as much as some theories on this go. In the movie he kills 28 to 35 people so definitely on the mass murder scale but also displays signs of something far sinister with his preference of knives making him seem more like a serial killer. His ratio of actual intelligence and social manipulativeness and also other display signs of antisocial personality disorder puts him on the definite psychopath side but some aspects such as sexual promiscuity and superficial charm are not present and also his teenage and marriage history isn’t known but I would assume that he would have had trouble as a teenager especially if he was indeed abused in his childhood. so this doesn’t actually put him at the top of the psychopath spectrum but it is worse because he doesn’t care about anyone from his nihilist point of view including himself. He sees himself as a vessel that chaos can come from or be a part of. This means he doesn’t care about hygiene or his looks in the traditional sense. He very much does care about his looks but he doesn’t want to be seen as attractive he wants to be seen as crazy or a freak because he doesn’t believe himself to be and wants to show people how they are the same as him but also in doing that they would realize they are extremely crazy just like him. So technically speaking he isn’t completely psychopathic just like he tries to make sure he is undiagnosable to not only show that every system is a list of flaws but also that he is unpredictable and represents uncertainty. Many comic book characters follow a similar path such as the punisher, batman, and I’m sure many others. Regardless he would definitely be leveled as legally insane but possibly not in our world but I’ll get to that in a moment. Legally insane means that you were not aware of your actions in the event of a crime and is a very slim amount of courthouse cases that it is even discussed in. Especially since on the outside it is hard to not identify him as crazy but instead is extremely intelligent and an amazing specimen of research if it is even possible. In the DC universe these terms seem to be tossed around more and it is probably because there are a lot more criminals out there than in this world and also that they have more faith in their treatment because of Arkham Asylum’s large amount of support financially and in terms of workers. In this world he is obviously not insane because although he is aware of his actions he doesn’t really know right from wrong because of his hatred for all people but in a way he does still know right and wrong and this is obviously not a case of him not aware of his own actions because he isn’t say a schizophrenic. From how “The Dark Knight Rises” was suppose to go before the death of Heath Ledger the Joker was definitely going to bust out of Arkham and face batman again and even if he was put in a mental hospital the first time around in this world the second time he wouldn’t be so lucky because if they keep putting him in an asylum and he keeps breaking out we would just execute his ass and batman wouldn’t even have to worry about breaking his one rule. This would especially be showing how intelligent he is in order to escape and he could possibly escape from Blackgate prison or one of our real world prisons I don’t know. Another aspect I think might be apparent in this joker is his “hypersanity” which in the comics is joker’s ability to realize he’s in a comicbook which could be true. He could realize he’s in a movie or comicbook as well because if there are infinite parallel universes like theoretical physics suggests then there is a parallel universe where he is in a comicbook or a movie and this is the one where he is in a movie. In fact there is a universe where you are in a comicbook or where we are all in a comicbook and to him it makes everything a joke and if we all thought like that all the time we would be in the same purple shoes he is. Alright enough on the criminal profile I think it’s time for some actual possible origins. The first thing I looked at were the scars. They are hypertrophic scars and his scars are actually called a glasgow smile that was actually in the Black Dahlia case and a few other famous ones. It is usually followed with a stabbing or kick to the stomach so when the victim screams they rip the “smile” open so if we saw him shirtless and saw that it would be a definite 99% proof he did not do this to himself. but instead I will have to go with 98%. Here are pictures of the scars

The red circles indicate the tearing of the actual cuts themselves. The black is just a cut below the mouth that seems accidental. And overall both sides of the smile are not even. This seems to have been done by a different person or people because if he did this himself he would have obviously used a mirror and wouldn’t make these mistakes if he would have taken his time. These type of scars take 3 years to heal. This means he had at least 3 years before he went to go create chaos in Gotham. We know that the Joker had only been active from the end of batman begins into the dark knight because at the end of batman begins Gordon shows Batman a Joker card explaining who he is briefly. So this means he had his scars before he even considered himself the Joker. As Gordon shows Batman the card he explains how Batman could make way for villains with a taste for the theatrical like him which is a perfect segue into saying that Joker probably saw what scarecrow and Batman did in Batman Begins and in seeing there are other “freaks” out there became one himself and it is deeply embedded in the comics that there can be no batman without joker and vice versa. But how does Batman use all his detective skills (although most of the tech he used was incorrect in terms of forensics) and still not be able to identify the Joker? Well everything about him had been deleted without a trace. But how does someone achieve this in the real world? Well in a missing persons case or some other crime someone is obviously missing and after 7 to 8 years they are considered legally dead but even if you are legally dead you were still once a person and therefore still have records. The most likely of something like this to happen would come from the government or even the military because they are the system and they do it all the time. That brings me to the theory itself. I believe that the Joker was indeed a soldier overseas but instead was tortured by his fellow soldiers for probably doing something they didn’t agree with probably brought about through something he did morally whether it be not allowing something illegal to happen or killing an innocent person on purpose. either way he is tortured and given his scars and left for dead and erased from ever existing. He survives and makes his way back to society whether he ran from home to Gotham or lived there originally. He then becomes homeless living on the streets until discovering someone he relates to: Batman. He then finds his way through the ranks of the criminal underworld messing with the rest of the mob and eventually making the bank heist we see in the beginning of The Dark Knight. This is why in the beginning of the movie we see all the crime bosses discuss who stole their money and Salvatore Maroni states “Stupid whack job, wears a cheap purple suit and makeup. He’s not the problem.” And we even see this cheap purple suit in the beginning where the threading is even coming undone because of its age in the bank heist. You can even tell how different the makeup looks when he is in the bank heist to when he is talking to the crime bosses with his famous pencil trick. Also in the interrogation scene he states “what would I do without you go back to ripping off mob dealers?” implying that he had done it multiple times in the past. This even explains why he says to two face he only did everything with some gas and a couple of bullets because in his mind that’s what it felt like to him and it persuades the audience and two face because overall it didn’t seem like a lot of actual traditional power even though we see a rocket launcher and 28 to 35 dead. This would add even more to the idea he suffers PTSD making it extremely possible he doesn’t even remember where he came from like he is in the comics. And PTSD can effects the hippocampus creating short term and long term memory loss. He even states he is like a dog chasing cars and that he wouldn’t know what to do if he caught one. But something else that I found very interesting is that he definitely knows who Batman is because also in the interrogation scene he says to Batman “You know for a while there I thought you really were Dent. The way you threw yourself after her.” and “Does Harvey know about you and his little…” and finally “choose between one wife or the other. Your friend district attorney or his blushing bride to be.” The reason he knows torture methods is probably because he did it while he was in war because he tells batman not to start with the head when batman bangs his head against the table. In fact him wanting to be a clown or freak possibly comes from how he may have been viewed in war with his fellow soldiers. He could have even been, in a way, similar to or the same as the comedian in The Watchmen comics since they both share the same ideology. This means since his second explanation of his scars was false then the other one is probably false too. But he still mentions how he hated his father when even not talking about his scars and it seems likely a psychopath like him came from that kind of background because most psychopaths come from that. When he states that even when a truck load of soldiers is blown up it’s all part of the plan that is probably because he witnessed it happen but he would have looked a lot different if that happened to him. In the dark knight manual it states the GCPD think he could have been an Arkham escapee and a victim or Dr. Krane (Scarecrow). This is possible but I don’t think Joker is very afraid of everything and Arkham wouldn’t really have the ability to erase records from existence and in fact they would probably have copies of all of it. So what do you think? Do I seem correct or just as crazy as Joker himself? What would you like me to investigate next? I say this was definitely a fun thing to work on.

  -Riddlez

File 19: The Joker Files As I write this it is the end of summer and while I have had a little break and have had some fun I knew my coming back was inevitable because while I love what I do on this blog and what I do outside of it with the same skill set I thought it would be a great idea to do something different.