#those showrunners just really hated women it's so fucking obvious

[bonesandthebees]

man I'm glad I decided to read a game of thrones as a way to take notes for how to write rose... I just read about a huge battle with thousands of soldiers and it was so well done... now am I going to write a battle? no fucking way I don't hate myself that much but I know HOW to execute it in a very easy to visualize way and that's what's important

[nakedmonkey]

i know this discussion has been a while but i think its very telling and we should talk abt how the quality of hacks and the representation dropped from season 1 to season 2, becoming lesbophobic and misogynistic and now the show is widely known for being loved mostly by gay men and not lesbians...

I was waiting to answer this when I had more time to really think about how to answer it because I don't want to start a thing where we do the "gay men vs lesbians" arguments because then it always turns into the oppression olympics and I just do not have the energy, but I will say that there is an argument to be made about what you're saying.

I've actually been finding it really difficult to watch the show get all these awards/nominations for season two, not just because I feel the material was not even a fraction of what season 1 was, but because like...the episodes they have submitted for certain categories are the ones that I hated the most. I am not enjoying the cast and showrunners bending over backwards to pat themselves on the back for "representation", particularly in episode 4, and frankly it's really put me off to the show in general, which is heartbreaking because season 1 was just so fucking special. Anyway, c'est la vie etc., curate your own fandom experience yadda yadda yadda - it's very easy to just not look at the tag tbh.

HOWEVER

Season 2 does feel like it's comedy for a certain group of people, and I don't know that it's gay men specifically, but whoever they're trying to please, it's people who love their stereotypes, particularly those that harm lesbians, and going by how much the show has blown up this season despite the obvious downgrade in writing, they've hit the nail on the head, and JPL seem happy about that, so.

Also, I didn't read a single bad review that called them out for the lesbophobia (aside from mine) and I am frankly shocked, but whatever, mainstream media audiences will never (not yet anyway) willingly consume content about women, let alone queer women, that isn't degrading to some degree. I do hope the conversation keeps going in fandom spaces, because I do think it's necessary. And I hope people remain just a tiny bit critical when season 3 comes.

It's not representation if they're looking down at some of us. Just saying.

[sailorbadger]

The Fandom’s Least Favorite Character - an analysis on Kate

Kate is probably the most hated character in the Robin Hood fandom. Not even probably, she is the one who consistently gets the most hate. So, what has she done? Did she commit several murders? Did she kill off a beloved character? Did she do something so problematic that she deserves to burn in hell? Did she do war crimes? No, her biggest sin is existing among unfair circumstances.

The title of this post is kind of a lie. This analysis is not really about Kate as a character, but about how she is written, how the narrative presents her and how this all affects the fandom’s treatment of her. I started writing this because I am sick of seeing so much unnecessary hate for Kate. This is just me commenting on larger trends I have witnessed and a decade’s worth of frustrations finally being written out. If you do recognize yourself from some of my descriptions, I hope that this post will give you something to think about, but just know that this is not meant for any one person in particular.

I’m not going to try to convince anyone to think of Kate as their favorite character. I’m not even trying to make anyone like her. I’m just trying to see why she is so hated within the fandom. So, let’s start off with how it all began. Grab some snacks, you’re going to need them; this is a long one.

 Introduction: Is it all Merlin’s fault?

To understand the context in which Kate was introduced to the show, let’s first look at where we left off at the end of season 2. I’ll start with the in-universe changes first. The biggest change obviously is that Gisborne murdered Marian. This altered the whole course of the show. Marian was such a central part of not only the show but also the Robin Hood legends, that at that point it was obvious that things were going to change. Will and Djaq left the show as well. Them leaving is not as dramatic of a change for the show’s narrative since they were not as central as Marian, but they did make up one third of the gang. This meant that there was a need for new characters to be introduced in season 3.

In our world, things changed between seasons 2 and 3 as well. There was a larger gap in production than before (with seasons 1 and 2 coming out in consecutive years and there being a gap year between seasons 2 and 3), and some of the people working on the show left or were replaced. Robin Hood’s spot on the BBC schedule was taken over by Merlin for 2008 so I guess we could blame that show for everything that went wrong in season 3. (I’m obviously joking here but conspiracy theories are welcome.)

The most important change in my opinion – and I think this is even more important to how season 3 turned out than anything that happened in-universe in season 2 – is the fact that Dominic Minghella was no longer writing or producing the show. It’s surprising to me that the fandom as a whole doesn’t ever really talk about this, when in many other fandoms creators or showrunners leaving the show are usually a big deal and mark the end of an era. I myself only found out about Minghella’s departure from the show before season 3 this year, but it seems to explain a lot on why season 3 felt so different from seasons 1 and 2.

With all that out of the way, the stage is set, and it is time to look at how exactly Kate came into the show.

 Six boots, two feet

Season 3 starts off with my least favorite episode of the whole show (see my episode ranking for more details). It tries its best to address the events of the season 2 finale, but in a way that will let it quickly get to the season 3 storylines. Unfortunately, the things that happened at the end of the previous season were so important that they would have needed several episodes to cover the full impact of the events.

Kate herself is introduced in episode 2. She is immediately given a reason to hate the villains and join the fight when her brother dies. She doesn’t join the outlaws right away, but when she does, she essentially has to take over three roles at once. I do not think it’s a coincidence that I think episode 4 is Kate’s best episode and that she’s at her best before she actually joins the gang. That is the point in the show when she is allowed to be her own character rather than someone who is trying to fill a void.

Like I said, Kate has three roles to take over; she gets Djaq’s spot in the gang as “the girl one”, Will’s role as “the peasant with personal connections to the people’s suffering” (and interestingly, since Kate’s family is around, her connection could have been even stronger than Will’s) and Marian’s as “the love interest”. Since the season 2 finale got rid of both of the only female characters in the show, it was inevitable that they would eventually be replaced if the show wanted to include any romantic storylines (it was, after all, 2009, so queer representation was out of the question). With three pairs of boots to fill, and only two feet, it should not come as a surprise to anyone that Kate can’t possibly do it all alone. The show does introduce Tuck and Isabella as well to help fill the gaps, but I think Kate gets labeled as “the replacement” far more often than the other two.

 A triangle without a base is just an angle

Kate had all the potential for a good plotline. Her brother died, making her hungry for revenge, yet this part of her is only sprinkled in every now and then instead of being a part of her character arc. Instead, she is made a part of not one, not two, but three love triangles.

I’ll start with the Much/Kate/Allan one. Spoiler alert: it doesn’t actually exist. All sides of this “triangle” are… weird. The writers try to frame it as a legitimate love triangle, when only one person in it seems to have any real feelings for another character. Much is shown to be interested in Kate, but we as the audience are never given a reason for why he likes her or even how he fell for her. I guess we’ll just have to take his “I fall in love very easily” (from 2x4) quite literally. Kate does not seem to have any romantic feelings for Much, and she seems oblivious to his feelings as well.

To be honest, I don’t think Kate ever really saw Allan as an option either. At best I could admit that maybe she had a slight attraction to him, but I never got the impression that it was something she would seriously pursue. I don’t think Allan was seriously interested in Kate either. His flirting with her is quite similar to his joke-y flirting with Marian and Djaq. My friend and I talked at length about this, but Allan doesn’t seem like the type of person to flirt for real. This could be a whole analysis on its own, so I won’t go too deep into it here. But I don’t think Allan considers Kate a legitimate romantic option.

So, this “love triangle” only exists in Much’s head and in the narrative the writers try to force on the audience. The Kate/Allan side of it is practically dropped the minute Kate/Robin becomes a thing.

Then there is the Much/Kate/Robin/Isabella triangle that is not a triangle either. I already covered Much/Kate for the most part, so I won’t go into it. Since the Robin/Isabella relationship is not that central to Kate’s character, I won’t bore you and myself by going through it that deeply. The buildup for that relationship is practically nonexistent, and so is the end of it. The whole Robin/Isabella relationship feels forced, because the writers didn’t know how to properly replace Marian while coming up with something new.

Kate’s crush on Robin seems to develop out of nowhere as well. It looks like a pattern when it comes to romances this season. Robin himself doesn’t appear to have any romantic interest towards Kate until he and Isabella “break up”. After that point, their relationship progresses way too fast. It doesn’t help that they seem to have no chemistry between them, and Robin treats Kate like a child and then five seconds later proceeds to make out with her.

Honestly, if Kate had to have a romance with a character on the show (and with it being 2009 obviously they could not fulfil my dreams of Kate being bi but that’s beside the point), it should have been with Archer. The two of them had more chemistry in the 30 seconds they worked together in 3x12 than Robin and Kate had the entire season. It would have also made me far less uncomfortable, since the characters would have been closer in age. Which brings me to my next point.

 “There is only one thing worse than a rapist – a child”

How old is Kate supposed to be? Seriously, this show can’t seem to make its mind about her. In general, I do not trust anyone’s age on this show unless it’s been stated somewhere. I know some people try to base the characters’ ages on the actors’ real ages, but to that I say, “fuck that”. Archer is the best example of the fact that this show did not even try to cast people who are the right age, or even look the part. (Seriously, he does not look even close to being 20.)

That being said, Kate is written like she is both 15 and 25 at the same time. I don’t know if the writers had a specific age in mind when they were writing her, but there is a huge difference between those ages. I think it’s the most reasonable thing to assume that she’s in her late teens, maybe at most in her very early twenties. She is still living with her family (I know that most women at the time married in their 20s but it’s not like this show is concerned with historical accuracy) and her behavior is a little immature at times. With all that said, I hope it doesn’t come as a surprise to anyone that I find it incredibly uncomfortable that all the men that are presented as possible love interests to her are fully grown men.

It is the most obvious in Robin and Kate’s scenes. Like I said earlier, Robin treats Kate like a child and speaks to her in a condescending way, only to then make out with her in the same scene. I must wonder why the writers didn’t just age up Kate. I think it would have been more interesting to make her someone who is already married, and instead of losing her brother, it would be her husband that dies. Of course, I would prefer it if Kate didn’t have to be a part of any of these love triangles to begin with but aging her up would have made the dynamics far less uncomfortable. (I do have to also point out the fact that Meg is also written like she is a teen girl. The show then tries to pair her off with Gisborne, who is even older than the men Kate is being forced into love triangles with. So… yikes.)

 Let’s take a break, drink some water

Let’s take a moment to recap what we’ve learned here. First of all, Kate entered the show in unfair circumstances and with only two feet to fill three pairs of boots. She was only ever allowed to be a part romance plots, and she didn’t get a proper character arc of her own. In general, the women in this season were not written well (not that seasons 1 and 2 were the height of feminist television either), and they were reduced to being love interests or tools to further the male character’s plotlines. Without Dominic Minghella involved and with a full year between seasons 2 and 3, the show lost some of its charm. Unfortunately, this meant that Kate was not the best written character. But I do not think she deserves all the hate the fandom has given her over the years.

 Interlude: Doctor Death

Before I get too much into how the fandom has reacted to Kate over the years, I feel like I should explain my own history with this show and the fandom surrounding it.

I started watching the show when it was first airing here on TV. It was some time during season 2, and once I had seen my very first episode, I watched all the following ones as well. With the finale, there was a problem. I had seen 2x12 and knew that the final episode of the season would air the next week. I was so excited for it, but then my mother decided that we would all go out and have dinner. I kept looking at the clock all day, hoping I would make it home in time. I got home just to see the credits rolling. I’m still a little bitter about it.

After this, I was desperate to see how the season ended. I’ll remind you that this was before it was common for shows to be put online officially. Streaming wasn’t really a thing yet. I did the only thing I knew what to do; I went to YouTube. The thing is, I did not know that what I had been watching was the second season of the show. So, you can imagine my confusion, when I find the very grainy version of 1x13 on YouTube and start watching it. Eventually I figured out my mistake and watched 2x13. At some point I watched season 1 as well, but I honestly don’t have that many memories of when I first watched this show. My clearest memory is being betrayed by my own mother when she forced me to go out for dinner.

Since I do not remember what year this all happened in, I did some googling and if I’m correct, season 2 aired here for the first time in the summer of 2009, with reruns in the summer of 2010. Because I have no other memories for context, I can’t say whether or not season 3 was even out in the UK at the time. Anyway, I did not watch season 3 for a few years. I also didn’t engage with the fandom until 2012, when I joined Tumblr. (A side note: while trying to find out when season 2 aired, I found the episode titles and descriptions. Apparently 2x4’s Finnish title was Doctor Death. There were some real gems on that list but this one was my favorite.)

Over the years, I had read bits and pieces about season 3 on the internet. I was still upset about the end of season 2, and the things I read did not make me want to watch season 3. Sometime in 2012-2013 I finally gave in and watched season 3. I was mostly disappointed by the season as a whole, and as for Kate specifically, I found her annoying. In the fandom, I went along with the Kate-hate that was popular in the fandom at the time.

I did a full rewatch of the show with my friend in 2016–2017. During that time, I didn’t hate Kate as much as I did before. Maybe it was that I had a fresh perspective, maybe it was that I had matured in those few years. Who knows? I was mostly disappointed by the bad writing. Even back then, I wished that Kate had been given a proper chance.

The next proper rewatch of the whole series I did was this past winter. I watched the show in a non-chronological order with someone who had never seen it before. This time, I was angry at the writers and found myself half-ironically becoming a Kate-stan. I also began to really pay attention to how the fandom has talked about her over the years and was unnerved by the hate has she gotten.

So, here we are. Time to take a look at how the fandom has treated Kate. Most of this will be based on my own experiences and memories, so if someone else has a different point of view to offer (especially from the early days of the fandom while the show was still ongoing), feel free to comment! I just wanted to give you my own history with the fandom to show that I have indeed been around for most of the fandom’s history.

 The hate-train for Kate-town leaves from platform 4

It seems that from the very beginning, Kate was disliked. I remember reading negative comments about her way back in the early 2010s (I would try to look for examples, but I just spent 30 minutes trying to find out when season 2 first aired here and it’s currently 1am so I am not spending any more time googling right now). There are fics that make fun of her and how badly she was written, and most of the jokes and dislike about season 3 seem to always come back to her. This attitude has been present in the fandom in other contexts as well. Over the years, the hate towards Kate has come and gone along with the popularity of the fandom.

Every once in a while, someone has tried to either write Kate better or even see her as a character that was let down by the writers. Mostly this has not led to any significant change in the fandom’s attitudes. I feel like whenever some of the older fans outgrow their Kate-hate by either just maturing and realizing it’s pointless or just not wanting to waste their time making fun of her, new fans come in and start the whole thing all over again.

I am grateful, however, that the general consensus in the fandom seems to be (at least in the year 2021) that the actress is not to blame for Kate’s faults. It still does make me uncomfortable that people go so far as to cross out her face on pictured etc. just to show how much they hate the character. This hate that Kate gets feels very misogynistic at times and is at least partially the result of the show’s misogynistic writing, but the actress deserves no negativity for playing Kate.

 What about Isabella?

One thing that is very interesting to note is that while both Kate and Isabella were newcomers in season 3 and were both replacements for Marian in the sense that they were love interests for Robin, only Kate has received a significant amount of hate over the years. So why does the fandom not hate Isabella?

I think that a big reason for why Isabella is tolerated – not necessarily liked, I haven’t seen too many people genuinely enjoying her character – better than Kate is the way the narrative treats them. Kate is essentially forced down our throats. The show is so desperate for us to like her that they end up making her unlikeable. Isabella, on the other hand, is eventually made into a villain, and thus we’re not meant to sympathize with her in the end anyway. (I could write a whole rant about how Isabella’s treatment in the narrative is bad but let’s not do it here.) Isabella also has the advantage of being Gisborne’s sister, so her backstory ties better into already existing characters. I think it’s reasonable to say that Gisborne being a fan-favorite in certain parts of the fandom doesn’t hurt Isabella’s case either.

Isabella is also only involved with Robin, while the show keeps pairing Kate off (unsuccessfully) with almost half the cast. I think she was written in a way that reminds people of Mary Sues, and considering how fandoms tend to not like characters like that, it’s no surprise that Kate got all the hate she did.

 Murder and being annoying – they’re the same thing, right?

So why exactly does the fandom hate Kate so much? Obviously, the writing is a big reason. Season 3 is not written well, which means that Kate is not written well either. She doesn’t really get a storyline of her own, and instead her main purpose is to be someone else’s love interest. I would also add that Kate doesn’t really get hate for her personality. Most of the hate that she gets in terms of character traits revolves around her being annoying, but that’s not really a personality trait. So I think the issue is not her personality, but her role.

The next reason won’t surprise anyone who has spent as much time in fandoms as I have: Fandoms do not like female characters. Well, I should probably rephrase that. Fandoms tend to hate female characters more easily than male characters. I’m not going to analyze too deeply on why this is, as I’m sure someone has already done research on this with references to actual feminist theory. There is a lot of internalized misogyny in fandoms, and female characters get hate for even the slightest wrongdoing, while male characters who commit far worse crimes often have a strong fanbase that will defend them despite these flaws, especially if said male character is played by a conventionally attractive man.

Kate is also blamed for things such as breaking Much’s heart, even though she was never really aware of Much’s feelings in the first place, so it was definitely not intentional. She’s blamed for every small wrongdoing in a way other characters in the show are not. I’ve seen people criticize Kate for small things that she has not even done on purpose. Some of these people then also go on to ignore the fact that Gisborne has committed several murders, taken part in the oppression of the poor and done many many more atrocious things, and paint him as a more sympathetic character than Kate. I understand if you do not like Kate, but it feels misogynistic that the female characters are held to different standards than the male characters. I can already hear some of the Gisborne-fans saying “but I acknowledge his actions and think what he did was wrong! I just find him to be a misunderstood and/or interesting character”. To those people I will just say: Why are you not applying this same logic for Kate? Why are you making outright hateful comments about her? If you don’t like her, why not just ignore her? If you are a Gisborne-fan and have never made these comments about Kate, this obviously doesn’t apply to you. And even if you aren’t a Gisborne-fan, but you do recognize this way of thinking in yourself in regard to some other character, I encourage you to think about it critically. I just used Gisborne as an example since I know he’s perhaps the most popular male character in the fandom (at least if Ao3’s numbers are anything to go by). I’ve also seen a similar attitude from a lot of Allan-fans, though in their case the hypocrisy is often not as obvious, but I’ll return to Allan in a moment.

Many female characters end up getting hate because they get in the way of a popular (often m/m) ship. In this regard, Kate is kind of an outlier since she doesn’t exactly do that, since there isn’t really a ship to get in the way of. Sure, she’s eventually paired off with Robin, but Marian is already dead by the time she shows up, and if people were truly bothered by someone other than Marian trying to get Robin’s attention, they would also hate Isabella with the same intensity. I do think there is one “ship” Kate does come in the middle of, and here’s where we get back to Allan.

Now, the ship Kate does get in the middle of is not in fact canonical. I am of course talking about the popular Allan/OC trope. If you go on Ao3 or Fanfiction.net, you won’t have a hard time finding fics where Allan is paired with an OC. This is understandable, seeing that the show only has four main female characters to begin with, one of whom is already in a love triangle with other people, one of whom canonically ends up with someone else, one of whom is actively hated by the fandom and one of whom just does not interact with Allan.

I want to make it clear that I think it’s fine if people want to come up with their own OCs for the purpose of shipping them with existing characters, it’s just not my thing, especially when those OCs are any level of self-inserts. (I personally don’t feel the need to ship Allan romantically with anyone. I just tend to not like OCs in any fandom.) Since Kate is presented as a potential love-interest for Allan, I think many fans who would rather see Allan with their own character or even themselves view Kate as an obstacle or a threat.

As you may see, this fandom, like many others, unfortunately treats the women in the show differently from the men. Male characters like Gisborne are viewed as redeemable so long as they are attractive, but Kate is irredeemable for… breaking Much’s heart and/or getting in the way of Robin/Marian or Allan/OC? This is something that really bothers me. I don’t mind the fact that people don’t like Kate, it’s the extensive hate she gets that makes me uncomfortable.

 Conclusion: Where do we go from here?

Like I said in the beginning, I am not asking anyone to say Kate is their favorite character or to even like her. I just wanted to provide some things for people to think about regarding how they treat female characters. I think it’s about time the fandom took a proper look at itself and critically thought about how it speaks about female characters. It’s 2021, let’s not hate on female characters just for being a little annoying or getting in the way of shipping.

I haven’t seen the fandom analyze that much why season 3 is the way it is. I would love to see some meta about how Dominic Minghella’s departure and other behind the scenes factors contributed to the story and aesthetics of season 3. I would also love to see some actual analysis on the season 3 characters that isn’t focused on tearing them down. If the fandom never made another post about how terrible Kate is without providing any actual reasons, I would be happy. I can sort of understand this immature hatred coming from 15-year-olds, but I’m disappointed to say that I have seen fully grown adults tearing down Kate in this quite misogynistic way. I know that many people do not intend for their dislike of Kate to come across as misogynistic, but it does not erase the fact that that is how many of those hateful comments appear.

I think Kate had a lot of potential. Season 3 had a lot of potential. It is quite a move to kill Marian in the middle of a Robin Hood story, so they had the chance to take the story to all kinds of places. Unfortunately, the season 3 we ended up with was not of the same quality as the previous seasons. Instead of just hating on the characters or story in general, I think we should focus on really analyzing the season, and even coming up with our own ways of improving it. Many people have already done this (though unfortunately many of these attempts also include thinly veiled hatred towards Kate. It’s your story, why are you not treating her any better than the actual writers of the show?), but there’s always room for more takes.

At this point I will shamelessly advertise my own “Kate should have been the new Nightwatchman” theory and my Nightwatchman-fic. I wrote the latter in a way that would let it be a part of canon if necessary. I think that by refocusing the story and shifting the way we read the text, we can find new aspects of season 3, and perhaps even enjoy it more. That is what happened to me during my latest rewatch, and all it took was watching it in a non-chronological order and talking about it with someone who had never seen the show.  

I’m not trying to gatekeep the fandom and say that only thought-provoking analysis or fix-it fanfiction is allowed. I just feel like people should be more conscious of the message they are sending out when they write hateful comments about Kate, censor her name or even cross out her face from pictures. Is it actually funny? Are you contributing something to the conversation? Is it actual criticism or just hate for the sake of hate? You don’t have to start writing posts in the defense of Kate, but you can just start ignoring her. It’s not that difficult. It’s fine to make jokes, but let’s start thinking about what our jokes say about us.

I once more want to emphasize that this is not a callout post I wrote with any one person in mind. So, if you felt offended when I was talking about Gisborne-fans, Allan/OC-shippers or Kate-haters in general, I can assure you that this post was not about you personally. This is not about any individual person. I’m just commenting on trends in the fandom I have noticed over the years. I don’t think any of you have committed any sins or that you need to be cancelled. I just hope that if you did feel guilty reading this, you’ll realize that maybe this post was something you definitely needed to read. As a woman, I would love it if this fandom worked on getting rid of its internalized misogyny.

I’m not claiming to be right on all of this, in fact I have a lot of bad opinions as well. I hope this post has provided people with things to think about. Feel free to use this as a starting point for your own meta or analysis. I’ll end my rant here, and leave you with this thought:

Kate had a lot of potential to be a good character. She did not let us down. The writers did.

[pochapal]

I hate doctor 11 but ive never been able to explain why in like words lmao. He feels like such a mary sue character imo and like theres something about his characterisation that was always just really ineffective (like the stuff about fishfingers and custard or whatever it was). Imo i'd love to hear you give top 5 worst things about the 11 era because i rlly just love when it gets torn apart

i hold nothing but a seething contempt and loathing for that man. every time he appeared on screen i felt ready to snap like a riled up chimpanzee in my enclosure. i am frothing at the mouth and overcome with a desire to start flinging heavy objects. this might be incoherent and inconsistent but i started this rewatch in feb 2020 and only finished this week so i got through 11′s episodes last august/september time and i refuse to revisit it to jog my memory or fact check anything i’m saying here because this man does not deserve the space in my mind for that.

the first thing is i can’t fucking STAND the quirky whimsy timey wimey bit he has going on all of the time. i can’t even say this is because this is a kids show and i was a teen and then adult when i first properly watched him but actually!! when i was eleven years old i’d sleep over at a friend’s house most weekends and it always coincided with the airing of a new season 5 episode and i remember we watched the finale with the dumb time hopping to get out of the box prison that was never explained and didn’t make sense and i thought at the time “this is really stupid”. and before that my only other doctor who exposure was watching the david tennant christmas specials with another friend and throughout childhood my only opinion on doctor who was “this is a tv show that is not for me but is one that all the boys i am friends with like so i will put up with it to maintain our friendships” but at least those episodes were both suspenseful and engaging enough to keep me watching all the way through. like who the fuck does an end of the world sci fi plot and approaches it with an “oopsy woopsy i am a funny little alien man who is going to stop you all by making you do a hecking silly” like it’s unneeded and self-parodies an already cheesy show to the point where it becomes unwatchable and makes it impossible to ever take this man seriously.

next thing that downright sucks ass so badly is the stupid fucking overwritten constantly escalating plotlines. like everything from season 5 up until his regeneration at the end of season 7 is meant to be this grand interconnected cosmic plot about how...the doctor trying to bring back his planet will end the universe or something so all the top powers across all of reality tried again and again to stop him from doing that except he doesn’t know what’s going on so he keeps thwarting these people who supposedly mean good?? i mean i sure don’t fucking know what they were trying to say!! like for some reason we never get the doctor suddenly becomes this superdemon that threatens everything so these people (whoever they are) decide to, in sequence: suck him through a time rift to erase him from existence, trap him in a prison and remake a universe without him, take his companion’s baby and turn her into a perfectly trained doctor killer, form two(!!) secret societies to hunt him throughout history that are only stopped by his companion splintering herself across his personal timeline to protect him, and repeatedly cause reality collapsing events because it’s a kinder outcome for the universe than what he will do. this grand and terrible event turns out to be...he spends a few hundred years chilling by a rift that leads to his home planet and protects a few generations of children from monsters which convinces them to give him infinite regeneration power then fuck off back to their pocket universe. and it’s like!! what is the point of anything that happens in this man’s era when everything is always “the darkest moment” or whatever the fuck!! i don’t care!! we never get a compelling reason to believe this bumbling clown of a man could ever be a universal threat!! the whole thing is so dumb i hate it!!!

thing number three i hate is how the eleventh doctor is ALSO characterised as this abrasive egotistic male supergenius to the point where he becomes genuinely indistinguishable from bbc sherlock. genuinely who enjoyed seeing this guy constantly tell people their tiny human minds can’t comprehend what he’s doing and then basically just wave his magic wand to solve whatever problem each episode is facing. 2012 is the year of human sin because this fucking shitsmear character archetype somehow became both a redditor role model AND a tumblr sexyman and it’s like!! nobody is enjoying this stop making this seem cool! him saying timey wimey thing any time he does anything is frustrating and dumb and locks the viewer out of giving a fuck about anything that is happening! smartest man in the room syndrome is a disease and the eleventh doctor is terminal with it. like remember how they established river as an accomplished scientist (when she wasn’t being a child soldier or a time paradox or whatever the fuck) and every time that came up mr doctor eleven man was like “oh this thing is obvious because i’m a genius and you didn’t realise because your brain is tiny so get out of the way and let the grownups think” or that time it turned out amy had been replaced with a slime clone for half the season and the doctor chewed rory (audience surrogate) out for somehow not realising this fact we didn’t know right from the start and like. this served no purpose other than to draw into severe question why the doctor is also this super beloved magical figure implicitly trusted by all children everywhere like. mr steven moffat is totally allergic to writing and solving mysteries in his tv show and fuck you for wanting to figure things out as you go along based on the new evidence you uncover at strategic plot intervals just let this asshole man use magical thinking to reveal he knew the answer all along and you’re a fucking idiot for not also realising this thing which had no basis or precedent anywhere else in the show.

speaking of dumb things let us not forget the absolute shitshow that was minority representation in this era. i’m not even talking about the low hanging fruit of how genuinely unironically sexist amy and clara were written where each episode moffat either seemed to loathe them or was incredibly horny over them and they had no character growth or arc or fucking anything. i’m talking about how fucking shit terrible the incidental representation was. god remember how every single fucking gay person who appeared in this era was written as one incredibly fucking stupid joke and how the women were all either sexy dominatrix, feeble girl in love, or Mother (or all three in some really terrible cases) and i’m not qualified to talk about this but also how incredibly white this era was and how on two separate occasions we had monarchs reimagined as sexy girlbosses with a gun played by black women who the doctor leched over. nothing about any of this was good ESPECIALLY coming off the back of rtd who was surprisingly forward thinking for 2005 and did a really good job of positing travel with the doctor as queer allegory. in comparison moffat gave us THE MOST heterosexual shlock i’ve ever had to endure. amy and rory could have been interesting characters were they not hemmed into this domestic bickering young straight married couple bullshit that was in no way changed or altered by traveling with the doctor except for the quasi incestuous river song reveal that was dumb and bad and stupid.

the last major mega gripe i have with the series is moffat’s fucking jingoistic boner for british military aesthetics. this carried over throughout his entire tenure as showrunner but was super terrible vomit inducing in eleven’s era. the unironic admiration for ww2 britain and winston churchill is downright wretched. are you incapable of telling a second world war story outside of churchill’s london and plucky blitz fighters. shit gives me hives so badly. and then!!! that weird church owned army that features in the future that end up being bad not for the concept of what basically amounts to an imperialistic intergalactic rendition of the fucking crusades but because they’re part of the nonsense go nowhere puzzlebox narrative that says the doctor is a not good man who will do bad things to the universe :(. remember how rtd’s doctor was a freshly traumatised man hot off the war criminal press who time and time again vehemently refuses to engage in military violence, but who tragically inadvertently turns every one of his companions into soldiers in his own personal army, and he has this moment of complete horror at the realisation and it is this which causes the downward spiral that ends in 10′s regeneration. and then how there’s this cringe line about how there’s a force of people who are “the doctor’s army, always ready to fight his battles when he’s not around” or some shit and then it turns out this is actually massive literal military operation and we’re meant to celebrate this. fuck off.

bonus round because this needs to be said but i have never hated anything like i hated that fucking human tardis episode. everything about it induced violent anger in me from the sickening overindulgence of that softgoth dark whimsy helena bonham carter tim burton aesthetic to the bafflingly terrible evil carny stereotype of those junk scavengers to the overblown sudden tragic shipbait romance of human tardis and the doctor. every word out of her mouth was trite shit and the fact that the death of her body was presented as this super emotional dramatic scene despite there being no buy in or incentive to care and the fact that every single person on tumblr in 2012 ate that shit up like it was fucking gourmet. i loathe every single thing about that episode so much.

[the-desolated-quill]

A Good Man Goes To War - Doctor Who blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

It’s been a long time since I’ve seen A Good Man Goes To War. I remember at the time thinking it was dumb, but I had forgotten just how dumb it actually was until now. I’ve seen bad Doctor Who before. I’ve seen stupid Doctor Who before. But A Good Man Goes To War reaches new levels of bollocks I didn’t even think was possible to reach. It’s really quite astounding.

So Amy is trapped on Demon’s Run with Eye Patch Lady about to steal her child. And already we’ve hit our first problem. I’ve mentioned in the past how rubbish Moffat is at writing female characters, and this episode is where its most obvious. Eye Patch Lady is taking her baby away and all Amy does in response is throw sassy putdowns at people. Now if someone were to take away my child, I’d be in fucking hysterics. I’d be shouting and screaming and trying to put up a fight. But as I’ve said in the past, Amy isn’t a character. She’s a plot device. And Moffat writes her as such. She is pretty much nothing but a walking womb.

Meanwhile the Doctor is travelling around time and space and calling in markers in order to save Amy. And here is our second problem. Does this sound like the Doctor to you? Expecting favours from people as a repayment for helping them out in the past? Again, I find myself asking, has Steven Moffat ever actually watched Doctor Who before? The Doctor helps people because it’s the right thing to do. He doesn’t do it with the cynical expectation that they’ll return the favour at some point down the line. It’s just wildly out of character for him.

I suppose I’d be a little more comfortable with it if we actually got to know the Paternoster Gang. Find out how they met the Doctor and why they feel they owe him a favour, but we don’t. For some strange reason people really seem to like the Paternoster Gang, but for the life of me I can’t see why. They’re complete non-entities. There’s nothing remotely interesting about them. Strax is basically just the shit comic relief, diminishing any possible threat the Sontarans could have in future stories with every unfunny one liner, and we learn precisely fuck all about Madame Vastra or Jenny other than they’re gay (on a side note, why do they keep casting Neve McIntosh to play Silurians? Don’t get me wrong. She’s a good actor, but the Silurians aren’t like the Sontarans. They’re not clones).

At this point it seems appropriate to talk about LGBT representation. Specifically how rubbish Moffat is at doing it. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful that Moffat is willing to put gay characters into his stories, but the way he does it is a tad dodgy to say the least. See, when you’re writing a gay character, there needs to be a lot more to them than just being gay. Russell T Davies understood that perfectly. There were a number of queer characters during his tenure as showrunner, most notably Captain Jack Harkness, and they were all written fairly well for the most part. What I especially appreciated was how their sexuality was never the primary focus. Rather it was just another aspect to their character. Look at Jack Harkness. He’s openly pansexual, but they never make a big deal out of it. It’s just casually mentioned and treated as any other character trait. Plus there’s a lot more to Jack than just being pan. He’s an outgoing adventurer. He seeks redemption for his conman days. He puts on a cheery facade to hide the dark traumas he went through during his long, immortal life. This is good LGBT representation because what it does is it normalises his sexuality. The show treats him as any other character. There’s nothing special or different about him. He’s no different from a heterosexual person. He just has different sexual preferences, and that’s fine. There’s nothing wrong or strange about that, and so the show doesn’t treat it as such. I think that’s a really good message to send to kids.

Then we come to the Moffat era. Madame Vastra and Jenny are gay. That’s their sole defining character traits. That’s not representation. That’s tokenism. Whereas the queer characters of the RTD era felt like real people, the ones in the Moffat era feel like cardboard cutouts with the word ‘gay’ written on their foreheads. And it just gets worse when those two Cleric marines show up:

“We're the Thin Fat Gay Married Anglican Marines. Why would we need names as well?”

Ugh! Okay, let me tell you precisely why I hate this line so much. It’s incredibly important, particularly in a kids show, to represent and normalise the LGBT community. My issue is this. If being gay is perfectly normal (which of course it is)... why is Moffat drawing so much attention to it? That would be like me making a big fuss about the colour of the sky. The only reason you would do that is if there’s something unusual about it, which is precisely the opposite thing you should be conveying. It’s heavily implied that the Thin Fat Gay Couple are the only ones who are gay, and that’s treated as a novelty. They’re such a novelty in fact that they don’t even have names. The reason I hate this so much is because they’re not characters in their own right. Rather they’re the equivalent of a carnival sideshow attraction with Moffat as the ringmaster inviting spectators to pay tuppence to poke the freaks in the cages. Rather than putting in the effort to write gay characters that are actually well developed and complex, he’s just using these shallow caricatures to boast about how seemingly progressive he is. He’s more bothered about winning brownie points and massaging his own ego rather than providing compelling representation for minority figures. 

He treats his female characters the same way. He boasts about how strong Amy and River Song are, but they’re really not. Yes they’re seemingly independent at first glance, but they very frequently fall into the same, tired old sexist tropes we’ve seen dozens of times before and we never actually learn anything significant about them outside of their lives with the Doctor. Look at this very episode. Amy loses her baby, but she never reacts in a believable or empathetic way. She just resorts to her sassy putdowns and pointing guns at people because that’s the only way Moffat knows how to write women. In fact Amy isn’t even that independent. In a rather telling scene, the Doctor asks Rory’s permission to hug Amy as though she’s Rory’s property as opposed to the strong, independent woman she apparently is. Moffat keeps insisting he’s a feminist and yet he doesn’t see anything wrong with a woman not being able to hug another man without her husband’s permission first.

This is the biggest reason why I hate Moffat as a writer so much. It goes beyond the plot hole riddled stories, the convoluted series arcs and the bad characterisation. Moffat is a man more concerned with looking progressive rather than actually being progressive.

So anyway, the Doctor and Rory (who is dressed in his Roman gear for some stupid reason) manage to save Amy without a single drop of blood being spilt (you know, if you don’t count the Clerics that got killed by the Headless Monks during the Doctor’s deception or the millions of Cybermen that the Doctor kills just to make a point. Brief side note, why would the Cybermen know or care where Amy is? Okay their Legion monitors everything in that particular quadrant, but somehow I doubt that extends to pregnant women. Plus it’s highly unlikely the Cybermen would want to divulge any information after you’ve just blown them up).

Actually it’s a shame that the Headless Monks were wasted on this stupid series arc because I actually thought they were a pretty cool idea. The theology is well thought out and it could have potentially served as a damning criticism of organised religion (thinking from the heart as opposed to the head. I like it). Instead we get treated to more bollocks. So the Monks, Clerics, Silence and Eye Patch Lady have all teamed up to kill the Doctor because apparently he’s a very bad man. Why do they think that?

I don’t know! I’ve got no fucking idea! I mean I’m not going to pretend that the Doctor is a saint, but if you want us to believe he’s a dangerous warrior, you’re going to have to show us some actual evidence. And that’s the problem. There isn’t any. Yes the Doctor has killed, but it’s always been for the greater good. To help others who couldn’t defend themselves. He may not be perfect, but he’s a good man at heart. Unless you give me a compelling reason to believe otherwise, I’m just going to snort and roll my eyes. Obviously Moffat isn’t giving us the full story until much later, but all it does is negatively impact this one. Basically, in this episode, the only reason we’re given as to why Eye Patch Lady thinks the Doctor is evil is ‘trust me. He just is.’ Not good enough.

Also, if you want to kill the Doctor, WHY NOT JUST KILL HIM?! He’s standing right there! Don’t let him finish his monologue! Just shoot the fucker! (Also raise your hand if you saw the Flesh baby plot twist coming. If you didn’t, you’re lying).

And it just gets worse when River shows up at the end to lecture the Doctor about how he’s too violent.

Now I’ll repeat that.

River Song, the gun toting archaeologist who massacred a bunch of Silence in her last appearance and clearly enjoyed every minute of it, is chastising the Doctor for being too violent. Fuck off!

And then the moment none of us have been waiting for. Who is River Song? She’s Amy’s daughter.

Um... I mean... OOOOOOH! Well I did NOT see THAT coming! And here’s me thinking she was Rassilon’s second cousin! Silly me!

Yeah, not only was this head thuddingly obvious what with the aquatic surnames and everything, but also Moffat gave the game away right at the beginning. Melody Pond. get it? Give me fucking strength.

What’s even weirder is that the focus is all out of whack. The reveal is directed more at the Doctor than Amy and Rory (you know, her parents). But why would the Doctor care? And more to the point, why should we care? Okay, River Song is Amy and Rory’s daughter. That’s some interesting information, but that’s hardly mid-season finale material. What we really care about is who River is in relation to the Doctor. And I suspect that’s what the Doctor is more concerned with too. And while I think of it, how is the Doctor learning about River’s true parentage constitute as ‘his darkest day?’ He doesn’t seem to take the news badly or anything. In fact the opposite.

It’s all so mind-bogglingly stupid. A Good Man Goes To War represents the point where Moffat officially starts to disappear up his own arsehole, weaving a convoluted web of bullshit whilst forgetting all the ingredients that make a good story. The answers we’re provided for some of the series arc mysteries are painfully obvious, unsatisfactory and just plain daft, none of the characters act like actual people or behave in a believable way, and crucially I don’t give a shit about anything that’s happening onscreen because at no point does Moffat ever give me a reason to care. Better get used to this folks because these issues are going to become the staple of the Moffat era going forward.

[lesmotsincompris]

Thoughts on Game of Thrones S07E07

It’s over. It doesn’t mean we won’t hear about the show anymore, as mainstream media tends to make a huge noise over every little rumour for the upcoming season, but at least we now have some distance between ourselves and a new episode of GoT. Let’s enjoy it.

I’ve heard that the critics are back to praising the show, which surprises me but also doesn’t. On the surprised side, I’ll give that this was better than S07E06, but it was still far from a good episode overall. On the unsurprised (but disappointed nevertheless) side, people praising GoT despite all the inconsistent characterizations, plot contrivances, awful dialogue, and shoddy worldbuilding isn’t exactly new. If this season was the breaking point for only a handful of people, I’m already happy.

We had an extra long episode and I have no idea why. There was a lot of stalling, especially in the King’s Landing subplot. It’s amazing how D&D can put useless crap on screen and actually relevant events and character development offscreen. Priorities.

I’ll probably post a season review at some point, but for Sunday’s episode here’s what I have:

King’s Landing

I’m gonna be honest: I watched this episode yesterday and I barely remember most of the dialogue now. This isn’t a very good effect for one of the most relevant gatherings in your entire series, but that’s hardly the first time one of the show-exclusive “big moments” didn’t work for me.

Part of the reason for that is the conga line of contrivances that led to this meeting. The removal of Aegon’s storyline from the books left Daenerys and Cersei to fight each other, with the septsplosion last season and the show-only Lannister poverty making the odds even worse for Cersei. To give the Lannisters a chance, D&D had #TeamDany coming up with stupid plan after stupid plan. Even so, they still have two dragons and the bigger army, while Cersei’s Golden Company is a Narrow Sea away; they could have ended the war in this episode if they wanted to. Why didn’t they try this instead of a truce?

You can argue this would weaken their forces against the army of dead, except: a) Dany accepted the idea of a truce even before she was fully convinced of said army’s existence; b) they should know better than to trust Cersei Lannister. Despite Cersei’s inconsistent characterization (Lena Headey is a goddess doing wonders with that character), I think we can all agree that nobody expected her to suddenly work for the good guys. The characters don’t know Cersei had her own pet zombie, but we do (and apparently everybody around her, since she keeps calling him Ser Gregor?) so the presence of the wight is hardly a game changer.

Other than that, there was a lot of walking and stalling and characters restating the same things they said before. Not very exciting. Though I legit enjoyed Qyburn’s necromancer bonner when he saw the wight.

But see, here’s a problem: we got more emphasis on secondary characters like Qyburn, Bronn, or the Hound than more important characters like Daenerys or Brienne. The Hound in particular got a lot of screen time this season and there was some heavy CleganeBowl foreshadowing, because of course D&D would do CleganeBowl. That’s why I keep calling the character “Hound” and not “Sandor”. What’s even character development. Or themes.

Brienne of Tarth said “fuck loyalty”. What’s next, Sansa Stark murdering a man out of revenge and smirking at the sound of his screams? Oh wait... 

What is Euron still doing in the story? There was a lot of teasing that he would be worse than Ramsay, but for the moment we got nothing. He’s Littlefinger 2.0: a shadow of his book self, damned because the showrunners don’t know what to do with him and can only think of stupid subplots to keep him around for some mysterious reason.

Cersei and Tyrion meeting is another evidence of how talented Headey and Dinklage are, yet the scene accomplished very little in terms of storytelling and characterization. The show barely explored the emotional consequences of Tywin’s murder for Tyrion, nearly dropping this entirely after season five, so it’s hard to feel it when he claims to hate himself for it. Shae got it even worse and her murder was forgotten altogether, something that I should have seen coming back in season four when they Greedo-ed her death scene.

It’s hard to believe Cersei would pass a chance of killing Tyrion, even without the valonqar prophecy. Why did they do this? It makes Cersei even more inconsistent (they’re certainly not gonna redeem her character or anything) and makes Tyrion’s plot armor even more obvious. This was the show that seven seasons ago would have responded Tyrion’s “give him the order” with “Ser Gregor, kill him”, followed by Tyrion dead. Ned and Robb Stark did not die for this.

Speaking of Ned, I can’t stand those references to R+L=J (A?). Seriously, guys, this isn’t clever, especially not in a show with so many dick jokes. We got it the first ten times.

Jon is an essentially good character in the books, but the show is trying to make him a saint. A dumb saint, of course, because again being honorable and honest is framed as stupidity and cleverness is something evil. Just a reminder: Ned Stark lied too. In fact, one of his biggest lies became this show’s hero, but I don’t expect D&D to notice that.

I still don’t know wtf they want with the Cersei pregnancy subplot. Cersei and Jaime seemed to have broken up for good, but we thought that before and we were wrong. Particularly when Cersei became the personification of Jaime’s worst nightmares, performing the act that he broke his vows to prevent. But hey, nothing stands in the way of true love, right?

Speaking of true love, the show romance of Jon and Daenerys is finally a worse love story than Twilight.

Things I legit enjoyed: the snow falling in King’s Landing. A bit sudden, but still a beautiful sequence.

Dragonstone

Everything about Theon was infuriating.

First we had more fellating of Jon, with both him and Theon stating their characters and motivations. This is lazy writing, pure and simple. If the audience isn’t already aware of Theon’s identity conflict, D&D have done a poor job as writers and this scene won’t fix it.

Here’s another thing: as much as I love the Starks, Theon doesn’t owe them anything. He wasn’t a bastard or a ward, he was a hostage. He was taken to Winterfell specifically so Ned could kill him in retaliation in case Balon did anything stupid (something he was likely to do because Balon).

Plus we already had Theon realizing the Starks were his true family back in season… three? Four? This shouldn’t come as a huge revelation, and least of all from Jon. What’s the emotional significance of Theon and Jon’s relationship in the show? This moment, if we needed it, should have happened with Sansa or Bran, two Stark kids he had an actual on screen relationship with.

Worse, how does Theon claims his place among the Ironborn? With toxic masculinity! The fight scene was overly long, entirely unnecessary, and terribly offensive. I missed the whole kick-in-the-crotch thing and I’m glad I did because I might have thrown something at my TV. D&D have a repulsive track record in dealing with trauma and PTSD, and Theon’s in particular, but this was a whole new level. Mutilation and torture aren’t funny and shouldn’t be used as a joke. I can’t believe I have to actually say this!

Ugh, fuck this show.

Winterfell

I have to confess actually I enjoyed the Winterfell scenes, despite everything that led to them.

Again the show is damned by the poor foundation they establish for their big moments. Yes, watching Littlefinger exposed by Sansa is almost wish fulfillment, but there’s no reason this shouldn’t have happened earlier this season other than the writers really, really wanting to save it for the last episode. In order to achieve that, they came with the stupidest subplot of the entire series, putting Sansa and Arya against each other for reasons you can find only in the most insane and misogynistic posts on Reddit.

There’s no way to take this back. We have no indication that Arya and Sansa were pretending to fight this whole time and a few clues that they weren’t, so in the end Arya still threatened to rip her sister’s face off. This is disturbing and I refuse to ignore it. Yes, having the two sisters finally bonding is nice for a change, but nothing will give me back the brain cells that I lost watching the Winterfell plot this season.

Again women bond over murder, but at least this time they did it better: a public trial, with all of Littlefinger’s crimes listed, a clean execution, and no smirks of empowerment.

There are also minor nitpicks, such as Bran’s visions now counting as evidence, the fact that nobody had any reaction to Littlefinger’s crimes or execution, Sansa calling herself stupid, or the old “one Stark sister couldn’t have survived what the other did” debate. Get out of fuckin’ westeros.org forums, D&D!

Everybody misses Ned, but not Catelyn. Or Robb. Or Raccoon.

On a boat/Dornish lush forest

Boatsex did not live up to its hype. This was supposed to be the culmination of Jon and Daenerys’ feelings for each other, and… well, now that I phrase it this way, it was: it was just as bland and forced as all of their interactions this season. I thought I would remember Team America’s sex scene and I wasn’t disappointed with myself.

The editing was kinda weird too, jumping straight to some auntie fucking, with a seemingly jealous Tyrion lurking and a Robot-Bran voice over completing the creepiness. Okay.

So. The R+L=J revelation. There’s so much wrong with this scene I would need a whole essay tearing it apart. In fact, I may actually write one later this week. That’s how angry I am. A little preview, then.

We often speculate what show events will be or won’t be in the books in some form. Stannis burning Shireen or “hold the door” are likely to happen, though under very different circumstances. R+L=J is one of such events, and we know this revelation will happen in the books too. Among all fan theories, this is the strongest, considered canon by most readers.

It won’t happen in the books like this. There’s a lot about this scene that directly contradicts canon, both book and show. Maybe D&D don’t realize this because they’re hacks, but that hardly makes things better. This isn’t the first deliberate change to the source material, of course, but it’s one of the easiest to avoid and one with terrible implications.

First things first: Robert’s Rebellion didn’t just happen because Rhaegar abducted Lyanna, it happened because Aerys murdered Rickard and Brandon Stark when they demanded answers on this abduction, and then requested Ned and Robert’s heads. In doing so Aerys gave the middle finger to the entire feudal contract in the worst possible way, so he had to be removed. That Lyanna and Rhaegar loved each other doesn’t change this in the slightest. The Rebellion was still entirely justified.

So. Love. Maybe Rhaegar and Lyanna loved each other, but how long did it last? The murder of Rickard and Brandon Stark is show canon too. At some point Rhaegar learned about this, because the fight at the Trident happened. You know, Ragger was such a great guy that he decided the best course of action was to leave a pregnant Lyanna isolated in a tower and go fight defending his mad father. All of that is also show canon, by the way.

At what point did Lyanna learned that her father-in-law murdered her father and brother? Was she in a baby-making mood after that? If she never learned, it’s also bad because Rhaegar knew, and then we have rape by omission. If she did learn, at some point she became a prisoner in a tower.

Even if somehow there’s an explanation for all this that makes Rhaegar come out as a good guy, there’s still the fact that he was a 20-something, married and with two children, and the fuckin’ crown prince. There’s a huge power imbalance in their relationship, so in the best case scenario we have a dubious consent.

All that is to say: don’t romanticize Rhaegar and Lyanna. Don’t romanticize because Rhaegar was a douchebag and even if Lyanna was on board in the beginning, at some point she deeply regretted this.

Not happy with that, the show was also extra cruel with Elia Martell. It’s almost ironic, given that show-favorite Oberyn Martell gave his life so that the suffering of his sister Elia was acknowledged. D&D didn’t learn their lesson.

Before Rhaegar ran away with Lyanna, he and Elia had two children, one of them a boy named Aegon. This was also established in the show, including Aegon’s name. Aegon was the heir to the crown, but dissolving the marriage between Rhaegar and Elia means disinheriting him and his sister, thus removing House Martell from the succession line. Quite shitty, huh? It doesn’t even make sense politically, since Rhaegar would lose the only major house supporting him. I can’t see what he would gain with that, we have no indication he hated Elia and his kids that much, and Targ polygamy was a thing the show could totally have used if they really wanted Jon as a legit child. Oh no, but he must be a child of monogamous true love.

Worse, he must bear Aegon’s name. Why would Rhaegar have two children named Aegon? That’s just plain stupid. I can’t help but think they wanted this so Jon could bear Aegon the Conqueror’s name, a name fit of a true hero. Not honorable nice foster father Jon Arryn, no. That’s not heroic enough.

When I watch a bad show, I like to play a game: what’s the worse thing they may want with a scene?

With this one I got: they want to romanticize rape, erase a woman of color and her children, and turn Jon into the most cliche fantasy hero possible, precisely the type of character ASOIAF goes out of its way to criticize. But as much as this last part infuriates me, the first two are still more offensive, and frankly dangerous.

Fuck you, D&D. Fuck you with a Valyrian sword. I’m done with tolerating your unfortunate implications.

There’s something rotten in fantasy if we still cheer this kind of narrative.

Oh yeah, and the Wall fell. It was pretty. All very predictable too. The only thing surprising me in this show is how gross it can be to give us the most white-centered, male-centered cliche fantasy story possible. Maybe it is all about cocks in the end.

[serenagaywaterford]

19) what else. I think it irritates people that such a smart, skillful woman is so vile in some many other ways." But I mean, isn't this what makes her such a multi-layered and realistic antagonist? A lot of us have met RL women like her at some point. Which is kinda disturbing when you notice the similarities. n) "Rationally, I’m pretty sure she’s aware [that Nicole isn't hers] "Oh, she definitely does. But admitting that would mean admitting so much more: that she went to all of that trouble

20) "I really have no idea about Horace. I would guess he was a Guardian? What else can you be promoted from? Eye?" Maybe an Angel. Although they haven't mentioned those in the series yet. p) "I don’t totally doubt that they see Serena as more valuable as a source of intel/propaganda than to hold her accountable" This is within the realm of possibilities and a pretty good take. (Btw, it reminds me of 'Netgirl_y2k''s fic, heh.) r) "Of course there would be viewers praising a mob if they kill

21) Serena" Of this I have no doubt. -_- s) "Personally speaking, I don’t want Serena killed. Other characters, I hope die in painful ways. *coughfredcough*" i don't want her to die either! Tbh, if they actually gave her a violent death, it would feel like a punch in the gut, bc I'm too attached to her character already, lol. Personally, I want her to live and atone for her crimes. And maybe get a life imprisonment? (@Anon 2, I agree with you on this.) I'm still a bit cautious, bc I wanna see

22) where they're going with her arc first. As for Fred? I don't really care what happens to him, lol. t) In a way I actually feel sorry for Serena, even if she did get herself into this disaster, and she’s perpetuated it in the worse possible way she could. Like, her growing desperation and loneliness and need for connection as Gilead goes on is actually… sad?" I feel the same way about her and I mean, wasn't this the point of her arc in the last half of S2?

------

Yeah. Meeting those sorts of people IRL is a bit terrifying? Like, there are even some conservative politicians (Canadian) that I can think of that bother me cos for the most part, I feel their ideology to be despicable. But there are other things about them that are good? Like, yes, I hate you for most of your existence but I can’t say you’re totally evil cos those other things you do/say are actually really solid. It’s such a conflict. Like there was one Tory that was an EXCELLENT speaker, so fucking smart, really amazing woman--if she hadn’t had her priorities all ass-backwards. Like, GIRL, you could be doing SO MUCH GOOD for us, but you’re taking that dumbass, repressive route instead. And, I’ll have to admit, a few of the policies/bills or whatever she put forth were good for women (x) (x). It’s just....A MESS. Like... look at that POTENTIAL. But no, you have to be not nice instead (anti-abortion/anti-choice, anti-social finding, pro-capitalist, anti-environment, pro-big business, anti-harm reduction, anti-marijuana, etc).

(But then, ofc, there are women that I just flat out can’t stand or simply terrify/disgust me with their ideas. I just do not understand how they exist at all. Like what planet do they inhabit? Which is why I read Andrea Dworkin’s “Right Wing Women” and I gotta say, it makes A LOT of sense about getting into these sorts of women’s heads. And deffo gives a perspective without asking anybody to sympathise or agree with them. Cos, Dworkin is very much NOT right-wing and can’t stand them either.)

Re: Horace. I’d really like them to address Angels as such. Like, I guess they’re there but they’ve never been referred to as such. Again, it seems like THT doesn’t really want to get into the nitty gritty details.

I think... yeah. Tuello’s whole thing was implying that Serena would not be punished much, if at all, for her participation in Gilead. Which could mean either a) she’s far more valuable as a tool, or, b) the US is unaware of her role in the bombing. (Hell, we’re not even clear on her role other than she and Fred fantasised about it. And FRED suggested it to the SOJ.) OR, he could just have been lying. 

I’m sure the US has no idea what Serena’s actually been up to in Gilead, and they’re not really going to go after her for suggesting Fred attack those kids who shot at her, assaulting people or kidnapping or baby stealing--cos really... they can’t? They wouldn’t know any of that other than the babystealing cos that’s just part of the society down there. They likely know she’s a co-conspirator cos obvs she’s Fred Waterford’s outspoken, anti-feminist, riot-causing wife. She’s not some shrinking violet. 

I think a lot of people want her punished for EVERYTHING. But legally, I don’t see how she can be. The majority of those terrible things we see her do, nobody knows about other than her, June, Rita, Fred and Nick. The US/Canadian govt certainly doesn’t. Nobody knows about the execution of the kids, except Fred and those dudes that were with him. And again, her crime technically was only insinuating Fred should do something. She can’t really be put on trial for creating Gilead, because she didn’t? That was all the SOJ. Sure, she “helped write the laws”, whatever the fuck that means, lol. Not exactly a solid foundation for a war criminal charge.

The standard for war crimes is actually really high, with a big burden of proof. As much as WE may know that Serena may fit the bill here, for a democratic nation they may not have the evidence to charge her with it. (I was just watching some Nazi documentary lol). If they can prove she was behind blowing up Congress, then that is something they could use for sure.

And pretty sure the US can’t charge her with any of the things she’s done IN Gilead. You can’t just take someone from another country and charge them with like domestic abuse in yours for something they did in theirs where it’s not illegal -- unless it’s an international crime or war crime. The US, when it comes down to it, doesn’t seem to have A LOT to go on so it seems like she’d be more valuable as propaganda and intelligence, rather than making an example of her. It’s like racketeering for the mob. To them, likely Serena is a little (or more like medium) fish when they want to catch the BIG fish (aka bring down Gilead).

Non-judicial “justice” is likely the only option for Serena being punished for the things she’s done within Gilead. My personal thought is to have her suffer similarly. Like have her experience some of the things she’s done to others, via some means. Is that fair/just? Likely not technically. I mean, it gets so complicated.

But I mean, it all depends what comes out in coming seasons about Serena’s exact involvement in things she did against the law IN the USA, when it was still that.

(Yes, I mean, I feel that fic is basically the sort of thing Tuello was hinting at. And it’s really not unheard of for the first defectors to get all sorts of plea deals and such, especially if they’re valuable in other ways. The sheer number of Nazi war criminals who went on to live perfectly fine lives in the US, UK, etc is actually shocking to me. And then I think of the sorts of disgusting plea deals they make with serial killers here. Karla Homolka, I’m looking at you, you disgusting creature. She’s out there living her life all free and shit, even though she is a literal monster.)

“Tbh, if they actually gave her a violent death, it would feel like a punch in the gut, bc I'm too attached to her character already, lol. Personally, I want her to live and atone for her crimes.“

Same, same, same. I think a violent death for her would... just be so... incoherent with the show’s main themes in a way? Despite the vocal viewership’s bloodlust for her. But hey, that’s me. And like you say, a lot of this is pretty premature because we have no idea what they’re doing with her arc. My opinions could all change with more info, and depending what she does/experiences in the meantime. Who knows! What a ride lol.

“As for Fred? I don't really care what happens to him, lol.“

EXACTLY. Honestly? I don’t care about him much at all. I hate him. But as long as he doesn’t get off scott-free, I don’t really care. This story isn’t about him.

Lol, I’d like to think that was the point of her late-S2 arc... but apparently we’re in the minority for seeing that lol. Though from interviews, I believe that is what the showrunners were going for. Seems obvious to me, haha!