#this is NOT an anti alec post and i refuse to tag it that way

[buffyspeak]

“now i’m gonna go tell MY sister that she still has future” i honestly get where alec’s coming from and he tends to lash out with the most hurtful thing he can think of when HE’S hurt (and even then, post s1 it becomes rarer and rarer) but . oof. low blow.

[flower-of-the-desert]

2x02 vs 2x20

This has been sitting in my drafts for some time because I wasnt sure if I wanted to post it or not but the recent asks I got made me think might as well. This post explores only one example of the way Alec’s relationships with Magnus and Jace are written and portrayed but that example speaks for the whole of those relationships so I think it’s a good way to show my issues with both ships in general and why I feel there is an imbalance in M@lec in a way that does a disservice to Magnus and thus I, as a Magnus fan first and foremost, am not happy with his relationship with Alec.

Note: I’ve tagged this clearly as anti-M@lec and Jalec only so if it appears in the M@lec tag it’s because tumblr is being stupid again and not because I’ve done it on purpose. So dont bother coming into my ask box telling me what a terrible human being I am for tagging it M@lec. Because I havent.

I’ve started catching up on the episodes of s02 I missed and I just got to Alec’s I cant live without him line from 2x02 and the parallel between that and the scene at the end of the season jumped right out and I’ve been thinking about it.

I mentioned this in my post after the episode but when Alec told Magnus he couldnt live without him, I was... confused for the most part. Like it’s such a romantic deeply emotional line that should invoke at least some kind of emotional responce in the viewer but for me there was nothing of the kind. Why? Because I dont believe it’s true. I dont believe Alec cant live without Magnus because I havent been shown this in the time they’ve been apart. What I have seen is Alec acting like an entitled arrogant ass who continued to ask favours of Magnus without so much as a guilty look only to then turned around and not subtly at all push him away when there was nothing Magnus could do for him. What I have seen is Alec apologizing like a little kid who was forced to say sorry even though he didnt know why he should and didnt feel bad at all. What I have seen is Alec going about his business like nothing too out of the ordinary is going on and looking mildly annoyed at most that his pet warlock/booty call is refusing him now. I did not, in fact, see a man who couldnt live without the love of his life.

And ok, maybe someone will tell me that’s just how Alec is. He doesnt show all his emotions, doesnt get all weepy and sad, he’s the boss, he has to keep it together, etc. Which cool, ok. That could have been an answer enough (although on the other hand, I dont care how reserve a guy is, there are times when he should show some emotion if the show expects me to believe him when he says stuff like this later on) if we didnt have the exact same situation with Jace and Alec’s completely different reaction to losing him instead of Magnus. Which brings me to 2x02.

When Alec said I cant live without Jace, I didnt stop. I didnt question it. I wasnt confused where it was coming from because I had just spent two episode watching Alec going completely out of his mind over Jace. I saw Alec snap and yell and get angry at pretty much everyone whom he percieved as standing between him and Jace - Magnus, Lydia, Izzy, his mom, Clary. Even the closest people to him, his family, werent excluded from his temper. I saw him trying to take control of the whole Institute just so he’d be the first to know any new info about Jace. I saw him standing up to his mother, to the new head of the Institute, to the direct orders of the Clave to defend Jace. I saw him being willing and demanding to undergo dangerous painful procedures with life-threatening consequences in order to find Jace. So when he said I cant live without him? I believed it. Because I saw the evidence of it. The same way I believed Magnus saying he couldnt do anything without thinking of Alec - because again, I saw that. The show took the time to show me all of that.

All of this tells me that Alec is completely capable of having and expressing strong deep emoitons about people he cares enough about. It just seems that Magnus isnt one of them. Because when it comes to Alec’s end of things in their relationship? Apparently I’m just supposed to take him up on his word as there isnt much of anything else to show me how he feels. Or doesnt feel, as the case may be.

In conclusion: this parallel does no favours to M@lec and if anyting it once again shows the difference between Alec’s feelings for Jace/his family vs his feelings for Magnus. And lemme tell you, Magnus does not come out the winner of that comparison. Not even close. And that is my issue with this relationship - the fact that I cant honestly believe Alec loves Magnus as much as Magnus loves Alec and that pisses me off the most because Magnus deserves so much more than what Alec seems willing to give him.

And this is why I find Jalec way more believable (in the sense that I can believe Alec loves Jace) and “properly” written (again in the sense of words being proven by actions and not like objective writing quality or whatever) - because the show actually shows me Alec being in love with Jace while not really doing the same towards Magnus.