#totally get people wanting to make her better and erase that gross element of her character

[yuridovewing]

if i may be a little mean… i think the reason spottedleaf’s feelings come across as a “retcon” is because the erins didn’t care enough about her on her own to outright have her say “yes i love fireheart back”

[lesbianrobin]

☕️ max and billy?

so basically i think that their dynamic in s2 was REALLY interesting and one of the more compelling relationships in the show and i don't mean that in a gross weird way i mean it like. like abuse isn't always in parental or romantic relationships and it's so rare to see an abusive sibling relatonship in media that's treated seriously and not downplayed or treated as comedic. they weren't just bickering siblings! billy passed on the abuse he received from his father to max. he hurt her and did his best to terrorize her, and max was deeply afraid of him, and the whole thing just felt incredibly real, though upsetting and painful. when max sedates billy at the end of the season, threatens him with the bat, and is finally the one with the power in their relationship, when she threatens him and finally makes him feel the same terror he's been inflicting on her... i think that's truly one of the most cathartic and emotional moments in the whole show! so i think the max and billy relationship in s2 was pretty cool and interesting in terms of writing (and acting on sadie's part holy SHIT i still cry whenever i see her face in any given scene with billy).

s3.... yikes. yikes. i don't know WHAT the fuck happened there. it's like... okay so there's two ways to approach s3.

one is that the writers Completely fucked up and got lazy. since they wanted the emotional impact that usually comes with a "somebody's been possessed!" storyline, they just decided to downplay/erase the abusive elements of the max and billy dynamic and treat them like normal siblings, so they could have her be dismissive of the possibility that he might be possessed and then have her be totally devastated at his loss. that's why max seems to have basically forgotten that billy abused her. because that's the easiest storyline to write, and it's harder to think of how max might react with all the nuance of her and billy's relationship in play than it is to just treat them like normal siblings, and they didn't want to do the hard thing.

or, if you want to be charitable/twist canon in a way that makes a little bit more sense... maybe we're supposed to assume that billy's been Totally harmless since max turned the tables in s2, and that's why she acts the way she does. ever since she took him down and threatened him into submission, she's not afraid of him anymore. he hasn't bothered her ever since. he's just weird, not scary. the writers didn't forget about his abuse, they just want us to think max is... over it?

i don't know exactly how i feel about this interpretation. it does make a kind of sense, that max might no longer be afraid of billy if we assume he completely stopped behaving the way he did in s2, but i just can't see him doing that. in their daily lives, billy is still bigger than max, older and stronger and the one in charge, and she doesn't have any sedatives or spiked baseball bats lying around. even if he DID stop bothering her completely, i don't think her fear/wariness of him would go away to quite the extent it seems to have gone away in s3. like, even if max doesn't think billy is a threat to HER anymore, she absolutely should have been more on-board with the possibility that billy had done something to heather, considering how she knows firsthand that he can be incredibly violent when he doesn't get his way. if anything, i think that the initial disagreement between el and max during their investigation in s3 should have been max thinking that it was all billy hurting people vs el trying to convince her it was actually the mindflayer.

i'm not gonna argue with max attempting to reason with billy or mourning him, as i do think those are realistic responses for a kid in her situation. while he's hurt her and she doesn't like him, she IS still a kid who just wants a happy family and a brother who'll love her. especially if he stopped harming and threatening her after s2... it's not ridiculous to think that despite everything billy's done and despite her knowledge that he'll probably never change, max might still be hopeful for a future where he's better, a future where he'll be the big brother she wants and deserves (though she probably would never acknowledge this hope).

one thing i find interesting (and a point in favor of the st writers) is how billy was a big part of max's story in s3, but she was not a big part of his. seeing the memories of his mother that el brought out were enough to make billy rebel against the mindflayer, but he didn't even hesitate to punch max in the face all while she was begging him not to hurt her and her friends. el shows billy a brief scene of him meeting max, but this is not what breaks the mindflayer's hold. we don't see max again. the only person billy's ever truly loved is his mother. it's clear that the hope max holds out for billy is in vain; even if he lived, he would never be the brother she wants, because he just doesn't care about her.

if the writers had tried to pull some "see, he really DOES love her!" shit, i would have probably thrown up. in showing us that billy does not love max, they at least refute the idea that abusers do what they do out of love, or that abusers love their victims and are simply too troubled to stop their abusive behavior. all positive sentiment between max and billy comes from max, the vulnerable kid just wishing for someone to look out for her, and i think (despite the writers' other missteps in portraying that relationship in s3) that makes a lot of sense.

TL;DR billy was a piece of shit abuser who never loved max, and max is a vulnerable kid who hated him, yet kept hoping despite herself that maybe one day billy could become the brother she deserved. this relationship wasn't perfectly written, but it's still really compelling and i think it's a great vehicle for max's development.

thanks for asking!!!

[rosecorcoranwrites]

Editing Advice Part 3: Rewriting

Last time, we discussed how to address plot holes and keep world building internally consistent. Today, I will share my thoughts on rewriting, specifically on when you should rewrite, and when you should stop. I should mention, though, that parts 1, 2, and 3 of this series can and should be done simultaneously. That is, while you're rewriting, you can fix plot holes and issues with timing, and when you're looking at some inconsistencies in world building, you might find a section you need to rewrite. So the first answer to "when should I rewrite" is "when you have to fix the problems with continuity, world building, and plot".

But what about in general? First of all, what do I mean by rewriting? I'm not talking about tweaking a sentence here or there, or find/replacing a character's name, nor am I talking about changing the details of how a certain magical creature looks or wether the moon should be waxing or waning in one scene. I'm talking about full on changes to scenes, chapters, or entire books. This is hardcore stuff. Fun, but hardcore. First, let's talk about dealing with different drafts.

My Draft Philosophy

While some writers will tell you to completely scrap each old draft and literally rewrite each new one from scratch, I think this is utter madness. First of all—

and I realize I am only one of five writers ever to say this—your first draft is good! If it wasn't, then you shouldn't bother rewriting it and should move on to some other project. Is it perfect? Heck no! That's why we're shiny-ing it up. But it's good. There are good sentences, good turns of phrase, good exchanges and flow. What's more, there is heart; when you wrote it, you were feeling certain things that you won't be feeling if you completely rewrite it. Don't forget that, and don't throw it away.

Well, now that that's out of the way, what should you do with your first, or second, or third draft (did I mention I rewrote my third book four and a half times?). Save them each as a separate document! You never want to write over an old draft, because you might, even years down the line, think back on something that you can reuse from one of those old drafts. I'm speaking from experience here. Just as there are parts of your old drafts that you dislike, there will be parts of your new drafts that you end up not liking as much as what you had previously written. Computer memory is cheap, and writing time isn't. Save everything!

I'll even save each chapter of a to-be-rewritten/edited draft as its own document. This helps me break rewriting into chunks and, occasionally, rethink structure. Maybe the story would flow better if I moved this chapter before that one? Maybe I should break this long one into two short ones (separate documents will more easily show you the word count of each chapter). I'll even do this for particularly tricky scenes, saving only the scene into it's own document so I can really play around with it without fear of altering the rest of the chapter. When I'm done with the scene or chapter, I copy/paste it back into the larger draft of the whole book.

When to Rewrite

But how does one know when a scene or chapter should be rewritten, instead of changed a little. The simple answer is, when you don't love it. When you're reading through your book, happy as a clam, and suddenly there's a part that irks you, or feels off, or is kind of boring. That part needs to be rewritten rather than sent out into the world in a subpar fashion.

Obviously, you'll need to rewrite scenes that contain large continuity errors, internal inconsistencies, or plot holes, but there might be scenes that are perfectly serviceable that still don't sit right with you. They're not as good as they could be, and you know it. Rewriting, to me, is a very personal thing; you might even have beta readers who think your story is fine, but if you don't think it is, then it isn't.

Given the personal nature of the beast, it's hard to talk about it in generalities, so I'll instead deal with examples. I'll use my own writing, since I've done my share of rewrites for a number of different reasons.

Miscast Spells had it's major changes when I went from planning to drafting, so I didn't have too many rewrites, but I did significantly change the prologue; it was actually the last scene of that book that I wrote. Why did I rewrite it? Well, it was boring, so I spiffed it up, added more characterization, and actually showed Emmaline getting cursed during it (yes, that very important scene was not in the first draft!).

I would say I went through about three drafts of Outcast Shadows. The first one existed before I wrote Recast Light, and I didn't know how the trilogy ended. Sebastian had a bit of a different motivation for his actions ( he actually wanted to destroy Chiaroscuro! Yikes!), but when I started writing Recast Light and looking at Sebastian's character, this motive didn't ring true to who he was. This meant I had to do a major overhaul of his storyline, but it was obviously for the best. In the final draft, I rewrote particular scenes—when Sebastian first speaks to Millie in Chiaroscuro, when he explains about the threat facing the city, what happens between him and Alistair in the courtyard—in order to really emphasize character relationships and feelings. I wouldn't say the old versions of those scenes were bad, but they weren't what I wanted for the story overall. I didn't love them, and now I do.

And then there is Recast Light, the problem child. When I say I rewrote it four and a half times, I mean I basically changed half of what happens in the book, significantly, four times, and then tweaked the rest here and there (that's where the half comes from!). For example, in the first two drafts, there was an entire subplot involving Chiaroscuran anarchists; if you've read the book, you'll know that that is no longer a thing (though two of their members, Augustus and the Empress, remained in the story). Why did I cut it? It was random and added nothing to the story; I didn't love it.

Then there was Sebastian, my problem child within a problem child. In the first draft, he slept through most of the book (no, really!), and in the second draft, he was awake, but hardly interacted with the rest of the main characters (he was hanging out with the anarchists). It wasn't until the third draft that he finally joined everyone else like a proper main character. Why did I change it? A better question would be, why did I write it so poorly the first two times. It was so weird and not at all what I wanted that I couldn't let it stand.

Then, I overhauled the entire second half of the book between the third and fourth drafts (everything after chapter seven, for those of you who have read it). None of that was there before the final draft. I'm still shocked by this, and I'm the author! Why did I rewrite it? Several reasons. First, the way the main cast dealt with Alcea in the first drafts was totally deus ex machina. Gross! Second, none of it tied in enough with the first two books. It wasn't narratively satisfying, instead feeling thrown together. Sure, the story ended, but it wasn't how that story should have ended, given everything that came before it. I wanted to bring back elements from the other books so that the trilogy would feel like a cohesive whole.

As a side note, the above example is also a reason not to kill your darlings. I had always wanted a ballroom scene in my books, but could never find a place to put it that made sense. As I was writing my fourth draft, flailing around for a way to fix it, I shrugged my shoulders and said, "Eh, why not?", figuring that a ball scene couldn't hurt what was already massively suffering. So I wrote the scene, and suddenly everything fell into place: how Sebastian could naturally meet-up with the rest of the cast, what Alcea's endgame would be, and from there, what the characters would need to do to deal with her. It all fit, and all because I had a silly little pet project of cramming a ballroom scene into the book. Don't kill your darlings; use them.

When to Stop

Hopefully those examples can give you a feel for how to go about choosing when to rewrite, but then there is the opposite question: when should you stop?

This is actually an important question, because some writers never stop, and if you never stop, you'll never publish. Worse, still, are certain writers (usually poets) who continue to rewrite works that they've published! I feel like this is a case of the perfect being an enemy of the good, in that it is almost impossible to actually create a perfect story (there are, in fact, only four in existence: Fullmetal Alchemist, Coco, Erased, and Ghost Trick). What you need to realize is that you aren't going to send a perfect story out into the world and should instead aim to send out the best version of your story.

Thus, if the answer to "When should I rewrite something?" is "When you don't love it" then the answer to "When should I stop rewriting something" is "When you love it". When you read what you've written, or rewritten, and it makes you smile, or get excited. When you no longer feel annoyance or boredom or dissatisfaction at reading that scene or chapter. Again, this is pretty personal, so there aren't any specifics I can give you. Just pay attention to how you feel about your own writing; if you really love it, you probably don't need to rewrite it any further (though you might need two tweak it for continuity and world building and such).

A Few Other Tips and Tricks

Everyone has their own style of taking on the rewriting process. Some people use Track Changes, or different colors of font and highlights. Some people print their documents and make changes on the paper itself with a red pen. I would say to find whatever works for you.

My process is: I usually read each chapter through, changing what I can and marking other things for later review, usually using Track Changes. I will leave myself notes, like, "Check for continuity with Chapter 5" or "Is this clear?". If it's something that irks me, but I'm not sure why, I'll usually highlight the whole section for later review and rewriting. I will then move on to the next chapter and do the same thing, then return to my notes after going through the rest of the book.

When it comes to how to rewrite a scene, I will usually outline my thoughts on paper. I might chart out two possible scenarios and see which one works best, or enumerate how changing one thing will effect the rest of the events in the story. I like writing on paper because it's quick, impermanent, and easily scrapped. There's also something about moving my hands, using different colored ink, and seeing my ideas written out spatially that helps me think. It's a way of seeing the story from a different perspective that I find helpful.

And that's it for rewriting. We've covered the main chunk of the editing process, the hard part, if you will. All that's left is copyediting. See you next time!

[briangroth27]

Logan Review

The first X-men film is one of the few movies I’ve seen in theaters more than once and the first time would've been unforgettable even if the movie hadn’t blown my 14-year old mind: a fight between two adults broke out during the movie and one guy got flipped over the other’s head! A little old lady usher came down the aisle armed with a flashlight, whisper-shouting “There are kids in here!” and kicked them out. The movie itself was—and is—awesome, bringing characters I’d loved since the early 90s animated series to life while taking place squarely in our (slightly heightened) world. Even without nostalgia, X-men is still one of my favorite superhero movies and kicked off my favorite comic book film franchise (even if it also counts my least favorite superhero film, X-men The Last Stand, among its ranks). Among its other achievements, X-men included the perfectly-cast Patrick Stewart as Professor X and unlikely newcomer Hugh Jackman (who didn’t have the role until Dougray Scott got injured on Mission: Impossible 2, delaying filming and necessitating his replacement), who became the iconic Wolverine for me while maintaining the things that made the comic character—one of my favorite X-men—great (even when scripts like X-men Origins failed to live up to both Logan and Jackman’s potential). Seventeen years later, Logan has been announced as Jackman and Stewart’s final turn in these roles, and both of them made the most out of their final X-cursion into this world. Unfortunately, I think the film as a whole boasts strong performances but could’ve gone deeper into areas it only touches on. Jackman, Stewart, and newcomer Dafnee Keen are all outstanding! Stewart playing a broken Xavier was hard to see, but he was brilliantly layered and vulnerable. Keen has a very bright future ahead of her: she doesn't speak at all for the first half of the movie and her expressiveness is amazing; she might have been my favorite part. Jackman is great and gives it his all, but my problem is that we've seen nearly all his plot points before. Logan dealt with massive loss in both his previous solo movies and The Wolverine left him learning to hope for all the promise and good his immortality could bring to the world rather than feeling cursed for outliving his loved ones (such an original take on immortality that I’m annoyed it wasn’t followed up on). In Days of Future Past, he seemed at peace with himself, even in the midst of the apocalypse. But Logan opens with everything horrible once more and makes him learn to form new connections all over again. The new factor—Logan as a father—wasn't explored as much as I hoped it would be. It's there enough for me to be invested and emotionally affected, but I wanted more of Logan and Laura interacting and learning about each other (and Logan teaching her to fight the animal inside as he had years earlier would’ve been a fine arc). Still, I liked the levity that was in the script and the family bonds between Logan, Xavier, and Laura that are there worked well.

The villains were pretty thin, though Pierce (Boyd Holbrook) had charisma and presence; ultimately they served their purpose and I didn’t feel like I needed any more from them. The evil plan that was killing mutants off and controlling evolution was fine as a background element and didn't need to be more than it was. Caliban’s (Stephen Merchant) inclusion as a helper to Logan and Xavier felt random (though there are plot reasons for his powers later), and I didn’t feel a connection to him; I preferred the much more memorable and distinctive way the character was portrayed in X-men Apocalypse. Logan’s action is brutal and intense, but I didn't need to see this level of violence; the fights in The Wolverine were enough to show his fury. That's not a knock against the film, just me saying I wasn't ever begging to see more beheadings. It's what would really happen with mutants whose primary weapons are claws, so I get it and wasn’t grossed out by it. The touches of a sci-fi future worked well and felt like organic components of the world. The directing is on point, moving the pacing along at a good clip. The plot points are repetitive, but the writing is good on the whole. Logan has heart and hope, so it never felt overly depressing, except the mostly unspoken backstory and one scene with very unlucky bystanders. I was worried when several reviews called out how somber this was that it would be dark for no reason but the belief that grimness is somehow inherently better than light, and I didn’t come away thinking that was the case. I liked the callbacks to previous films (noting that despite Days of Future Past, at least the first two X-films and The Wolverine still happened in some form), but I really hope this is relegated to its own universe as the franchise continues. (Light spoilers for the rest of this paragraph) The world is in shambles just 3-6 years after DOFP’s happy ending? What purpose does that serve? What purpose did the X-Men serve? I liked the in-world comics, but the team should have accomplished more than just inspiring fiction (particularly given their being a metaphor for minorities—what kind of message is it that none of their heroes can save the day?). Speaking of the comics, I wish Logan took the time to deal with Logan and the team’s apparent fame—only two characters recognize him as famous and he never comments on being famous (or more specifically on being a mutant in the spotlight), except to say life wasn’t like the comics. Even Laura, an X-fan, doesn’t seem to take his comic book portrayal into account at all when dealing with him. It seems like a big missed opportunity to explore a new facet to his existence, and perhaps a more meta take on Jackman’s time in the role. Ultimately I enjoyed this and was very satisfied with the performances, but felt the material the actors were working with could’ve been more original. Had this been the first solo adventure for Logan, it would’ve been fantastic…but after seven movies where he was a major focus, I wish Jackman's last adventure could've had him in a totally different place emotionally. Still, just because it’s not exactly the movie I wanted to see doesn’t mean it’s a bad movie by any means. Logan's a well-crafted film with great performances from its three leads and definitely worth seeing!

4/5

I'm going to miss Jackman and his Wolverine a lot, even if he did overshadow other favorite characters of mine from time to time. He always felt like he truly loved the character and gave 150% to each film. I've been a fan since the first X-film and can't imagine anyone else in the role…I just hope they leave Logan out of future films and not recast, exploring the other X-men instead and not lessening the impact of Jackman and Stewart’s exits. We already have James McAvoy doing a great version of young Xavier, but Stewart will be missed all the same. His Xavier (along with his Captain Picard) are iconic bits of my youth that can’t be replicated or replaced. As much as I think Logan’s swan song could've been improved in some ways script-wise, Jackman and Stewart’s excellent performances definitely made an impact on me, as they have for almost two decades now.

So, thank you to both Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart for bringing these iconic characters to life for 17 years. I’ll miss you in this franchise, but I can’t wait to see what you do next!

Major Spoilers... -X-23 not being a clone was a change I totally understand for the purposes of the film and it didn’t bother me.

-I'm glad Dr. Rice (Richard E. Grant) wasn't Mr. Sinister (like Apocalypse’s post-credit scene seemed to indicate), so they can use him in X-men 7 instead; he’d have been wasted here. Hey, maybe a way to bring Laura into the “present” of the X-films would be to say that Logan isn’t the first time they’ve tried to make her.

-Was Xavier’s first psychic seizure, wherein he killed seven people—presumably the X-men at the mansion at the time—the film’s version of Onslaught?

-Xavier's death was so heartbreakingly tragic! I’m sorry to see him go, but what a finale for Stewart! He was the perfect Xavier.

-The biggest disappointment for me (after Logan’s repetitive arc) was that we didn’t get closure and/or reappearances by Wolverine-centric characters like Mariko, Yukio, and Sabretooth (and even Anna Paquin’s Rogue, though she was in the comic book). Creed at least could've swapped in for Caliban and accomplished the tracking he did; it would’ve been interesting to see Jackman and Liev Schreiber continue to develop the Logan/Creed relationship (by far the best part of Origins), adding to the film’s examination of families.

-I'm not sure how I feel about X-24 (who looked freakishly like Liev Schreiber at times!), but he was effective as a brawler. I guess I was expecting the Reavers to be more effective with their enhancements. I like the idea of Logan fighting the animal inside himself, but I feel like that was a fight for a movie or two ago (when Sabretooth would've filled that role). 

-Even if the backstory was needlessly nihilistic (not only Logan but Xavier too is fated to destroy everything he’s built? Really?), I'm glad there was a happy ending of sorts…at least a sense that not all hope is lost.

-I feel like they could've done more with Logan's death...this made perfect sense, but it also felt like par for the course for where his life was (and had always been). He never really grew out of his life being constant pain, loss, and fighting; never improved his prospects, or even his outlook (in fact it only got worse up until the end) for very long. I don't feel like he grew very much at all over these movies, since the time between this and previous films worked to erase the family he'd forged with the X-men in 1-DOFP and the peace he'd found in The Wolverine. I suppose this is paralleled with the Shane quotes about man not changing, but I wasn't fully satisfied with what this film did to his journey over the franchise. I’m much more emotionally affected by his and Xavier’s deaths than by the events that led to them. Of all the X-men, Logan has the most potential to change for the better (given he has arguably the darkest backstory), and that was squandered by making him go over the same lessons again…how many times can you break him down and watch him build himself up again?

-I teared up when Laura called Logan "daddy." That was heartbreaking.

-I knew they were going to make the cross an X and loved that they did.

-I would definitely be down for continuing the Wolverine series with Laura as the all-new lead!

[hawthornewhisperer]

Because I like theorizing about potential ships and you seem like the best person to go to for this, which do you find more intriguing? Bellamy/Echo or Bellamy/Luna? Personally, I'm really looking forward to seeing B&E interact/develop more as the season goes on. But then, I'm also curious about the potential between *peacefulLuna* and B struggling with trusting Grounders - to put it simply lol but I'd love to hear your thoughts on these 2 ships + potential!

You’re right nonny, I AM someone to come to with this because yesss let’s talk about pretty people mushing their faces together.  I’m gonna take this in two parts: what I think is most interesting, and what I think is the direction the show is most likely to go.

For me personally, as firehot as I think Bellamy/Echo could be, I think Bellamy/Luna is more interesting.  For one thing, the show has already done the “a grounder betrays a sky person, that sky person learns to forgive and love them anyway” twice now (cl.exa and memori), so I’d be up for something a little different this time around.  For another thing, Echo is responsible for the death of Gina, something the show didn’t handle very well the first time around (as Gina was clearly created just to be fridged and I thought you were better than that, show) and so I’d rather see the show handle that head on rather than just be like “idk, it’s war” because that’s lazy.  I also think “Bellamy learns to forgive Echo despite her being responsible for one of his major traumas” feels unnecessarily harsh on Bellamy, because everyone else on this show gets to make horrible mistakes and move on with lessons learned, but for some reason Bellamy has to pay for his mistakes first.  And that sort of storyline with Echo would feel like more of the same and again, I want something different.

Bellamy/Luna, however, presents far more intriguing options to me.  Luna has deliberately chosen non-violence despite the world she lives in, and I see Bellamy struggling with following that same path this season.  He wants to “deserve to survive” as it were, and I think exploring a relationship with Luna would give him the opportunity to figure out how to do that without it seeming like punishment/self-flagellation.  It would get across the same narrative of “Bellamy learns to trust grounders” that we’d get with Bellamy/Echo, but without the grossness of the show getting a boner for punishing Bellamy and not knowing what to do about Gina.  Nadia is also incredibly pretty, and I for one am a slut for “pretty people making out” and thus it checks that box for me too.

However, for almost the exact same reasons as I listed above, I do think the show is more likely to go with Bellamy/Echo.  I’m not entirely convinced that all the parallels we see are actually parallels so much as lazy writing, but “sky person forgives and loves a grounder despite betrayal” is definitely a story beat they seem to enjoy.  They’ve also clearly set up Bellamy and Echo as foils for one another, and their story is definitely being portrayed as “unfinished” for now, because “Do you think we’ll ever be able to trust each other/I doubt it” is what we call Very Unsubtle Foreshadowing, my friends.  In contrast, Bellamy barely seemed to interact with Luna in 314. In fact, I’m not sure they even had a conversation that didn’t include other people.  That sort of complete narrative indifference to a character dynamic indicates to me that it’s not a relationship they’re really interested in exploring (and before anyone mentions the set visit video from Seat42F, I took Bob’s answer about Luna to be more of a “uh, I didn’t plan on answering a question about her because we have almost no scenes together so I’m just gonna say something vague and non-committal” dodge than anything else.)

All of that being said, however: I’d still be surprised if Bellamy/Echo went explicitly romantic.  I would not rule out (and definitely wouldn’t be opposed to seeing) a scenario where Bellamy hits rock bottom and like, has grief/hatesex with Echo as a way of attempting to process the absolute mountain of feelings he’s dealing with right now, but the farthest I see his Echo feelings going this season is “downgraded from Hate Always to Grudgingly Trust.”  If we take 401 as the place setting episode for s4, wherein they lay out where each character is emotionally at the start of the season and what each character is going to have to overcome, here’s what we have for Bellamy:

Current Emotional State:

Concerned About Octavia

Concerned About Clarke

Does Not Trust Echo Even The Slightest Bit

Worried He Doesn’t Deserve To Survive

What He Needs To Achieve This Season:

Learn To Let Octavia Make Her Own Mistakes

Learn to Believe He Is A Good Person

Learn To Trust Echo/Not Hold a Grudge

Clarke????

If you notice, everything but Clarke from the “current emotional state” list was addressed explicitly (and verbally) by 401.  Clarke called out his worry about Octavia, Kane called out his worry about his soul, and Echo called out his distrust of her.  Given the clusterfuck of s3 and ships, I’m not at all surprised that they left Concerned About Clarke as the only element uncommented upon, because if a character calls that out then the Build Up To Canon Bellarke has officially begun.  And narratively, Le.xa died for the second time like, two hours ago, so I get why they felt it was too soon.  (Because it was!)  But the fact remains that the show repeatedly and bluntly emphasized “Bellamy is very worried about Clarke, even more so than he is worried about his sister, the one person he has consistently been shown to love above all others” throughout 401.  I highly suspect the show is laying the ground work for something involving Bellarke and they just didn’t want to get accused of erasing L.exa right out of the gates.  (And again: good.  Let Clarke grieve one love interest for a bit instead of immediately introducing a new one.  I disliked it in s2 and I’d dislike it now).  So I suspect that if Becho is introduced at all, it’s going to be introduced as a complicating factor on the way to canon Bellarke rather than True And Everlasting Love.

Okay, one last thing I want to say about speculation before I wrap this up: I have absolutely no idea if any of the above is true.  I could be totally wrong, because I don’t actually write the damn show.  So if you read this and got upset that I think Becho might happen in some form, take heart in the fact that I am not an actual authority on the s4 plot and therefore this spec carries absolutely zero weight in real terms.

But the same also goes for my “I think they are building to bellarke” theory as well.  I could be totally wrong.  As my dear friend once said about show speculation: it doesn’t count if you promise it to yourself.  I can look at the clues and say “I think this is what is going to happen,” but that’s all it means, okay? 

[amorremanet]

Arthur/moody, lucius/moody, lupin/snape?

the brutally honest ship opinions game

Arthur/Moody: ……okay, like, I have basically no positive feelings about Alastor Moody — I mean, I feel the same need to defend him from JKR’s ableist garbage that accidentally got me in too deep with Lockhart, but we are still talking about a guy who supports using Dementors on people and apparently dngaf about what someone’s done, just send ‘em all to fucking Azkaban (GOF ch. 30, the flashback of Moody we see in the first Pensieve scene)

who thinks that the best present you could give to a kid who’s lost his parents and just watched a classmate be murdered…… is going over a photo of the First War Order and telling him about how all of them died horribly and he doesn’t ever stop to think that this might not be the best idea (OOTP)

and who is legitimately less sensitive to other people’s needs and less dismissive of people who aren’t his exact model of “useful” than a literal fucking Death Eater one of the biggest points where Barty Crouch Jr. drops character in GOF is when he takes Neville to his office and gives him a pro-Herbology pep-talk, and goes, “so, hey, Longbottom, Professor Sprout said you’re super-good at this subject, why not pursue it,” because based on the actual canon about him? The real Alastor Moody would never do something like that.

Like, he might have the moment he has with Harry and Hermione, where he goes, “so, hey, both of you could be gr10 aurors if you wanted, you should think about it” because that, from Moody, would be a compliment, and Harry and Hermione more closely fit his own ideas of usefulness, but not so much the Neville moment)

��but seriously, do you hate him or something? Why else would you even dream of shipping him with Arthur Weasley? (okay, fine, I acquiesce that there is enough of a canonical basis for some people to roll with here, and I myself have made ships out of far less…… but seriously, why would you ship anybody with Arthur Weasley. Like…… wow, rude.)

Lucius/Moody: again, I’m not on the Alastor Moody fan-train or anything, but why would you even do this. Nobody deserves to be shipped with Lucius Malfoy, like? He’s not even an entertaining villain, he’s just pathetic. He’s a sad, pathetic fantasy-fascist who gets his kicks by bullying twelve-year-olds and torturing muggles who can’t defend themselves. He’s a complete waste of character space and forcing anyone to be in a ship with him is just unfathomably cruel

Lupin/Snape: meh, whatever. Like, it’s not my thing, but… *shrugs* meh?

Like, idk what you’re looking for here, nonny, but I’m guessing, based on the other two ships, that you’re looking for me to get cranky and ship-bashy and figured that Snu//pin was a good way to get there, since there are a lot of legitimate Problems with this ship in the text

But the thing is, I’m just under 900 years old (at least in fandom terms), and I remember the days back before HBP came out, when Snu//pin was the second-most popular Remus ship (after Wolfstar, to the surprise of no one), and was, in fact, so popular that it had its own private archive and got black-listed from most rarepair comms because it, “wasn’t really rare, just less popular than D//rarry, Wolfstar, Ro//mione, Dra//mione, H//inny, and J//ily”

—I mean, there was a short stretch before OOTP where I tried to make myself like it because there was a BNF whose art I loved, and she shipped Snu//pin, so I felt like I had to be missing something obvious and cool and because I was, like, twelve, I tried to make myself ship the thing. That didn’t work and I eventually just moved on, but one thing that I recall about the Snu//pin fandom that appears to still be more or less true, based on everything I’ve seen of the present-day Snu//pin fandom?

Is that they came out about the same as the Wolfstar fandom, in terms of how many shippers ignored or made excuses for #Problematic things about the ship vs. how many shippers work those things into the overall fabric of how they ship the thing, how many shippers LIKE the ship because of those Problematic parts and having the opportunity to explore them in fiction, how many shippers actively dive head-first into exploring those parts of the ships because that’s where they find the most engaging character interactions or whatever they’re into, etc.

For examples of what I mean when I say #Problematic things about the ships:

the fact that all three of them are self-loathing [human or werewolf] disasters who are often passively suicidal and either prone to acting out on those feelings (Sirius and Severus), or prone to repressing those feelings until they explode all over some innocent bystanders (Remus)

the fact that all three of them have suffered horrific abuse in their pasts — whether from their parents or other sources — and find ways to take it out on other people (Severus on his students, Sirius on Severus and Kreacher, and Remus on almost anyone who tries to get close to him, even as he makes it seem like he isn’t doing that)

Severus outing Remus as a werewolf because he’s upset and felt like punishing someone else for it, thereby leading to Remus tendering his resignation

the fact that Sirius assuming Remus had to be the spy would’ve been at least partially based on anti-werewolf prejudices, and Sirius still clearly had at least some of those prejudices on his own, because even if Peter totally manipulated them in his favor, there had to be something there for Peter to manipulate in the first place, so???

the fact that Remus doesn’t help shit anything, in any situation ever, with his habit of trying to weasel out of any Emotionally Difficult™ conversations and his tendency to mentally spin most situations so that everyone is going to leave him in the end anyway so it’s acceptable to shut down, close himself off, and pull stunts that more or less come down to, “totally up and bailing on everyone,” which is understandable, given his backstory, but dude, that doesn’t make it okay or helpful??

basically, “literally anything about the characters as individuals, or in terms of their interactions with each other — both past and present — that could potentially cause problems for either/both/any/all of them and potentially make the relationship unhealthy (or unhealthier than it already was, in the cases of Snu//pin and Snack because…… oh boy, let’s not even act like either of those — or any ship with Sev in it, for that matter — is ever going to be ‘healthy’ by any definition)”

So, like? Is Snupin #Problematic? Yes, definitely. Are some of its shippers prone to ship it in #Problematic ways? Oh, yes, absolutely (Hell, the BNF whose art I used to like even flat-out said things like, “Sirius would never be able to be there for Remus like Snape could” and… um? Even granted that this was pre-OOTP: ummm???)

But on the whole, Snu//pin shippers aren’t actually any worse about totally ignoring and/or excusing these elements of their ship than Wolfstar shippers are (and, actually, they might be doing better than a LOT of the present-day Wolfstar fandom, since I usually don’t see any more recently made Snu//pin that doesn’t grapple with at least some of the #Problematic elements of it — they don’t always do it well, but at least they’re trying, which counts for a lot, to me, because most people don’t even try — while most Wolfstar these days flat-out ignores all the #Problematic elements of Sirius and Remus as characters, and of their relationship, in the name of what often amounts to borderline-OOC caricatured fanon nonsense, so…)

(……Look, I love Wolfstar, and I have for longer than some people on this website have been alive. But I don’t love a lot of Wolfstar shippers, which has been the case since the beginning of my Wolfstar shipping

stayed the case when HBP came out and I was all, “Hey, guys? I don’t like this BS Remus/Tonks thing either, but can we NOT erase bisexuals or treat Tonks like garbage when we’re talking about it, it’s not her fault that Molly Weasley is a meddling nosy garbage buttinski who thinks it’s her job to play matchmaker to fully-grown adults who didn’t ask and don’t want her input,”

and is still the case as I’m over here, all like, “ugh, man, at least we used to have SOME people in this fandom who enjoyed reading Wolfstar angst, now it seems like nobody cares about anything unless it’s all fluff, all the time, with absolutely no room for anything else because god forbid you ever want to write about LGBTQ characters whose lives aren’t 5,000% perfect, that obviously must mean that you’re a gross fetishistic cishet and not, for example, a neurodivergent, mentally ill lesbian survivor who feels left out by the trend towards forcing every LGBTQ person to act like we’re happy, all the time, and to act like we’re only interested in fictional LGBTQ people who are perfectly 5,000% happy all the time

“and to decry any and all depictions of LGBTQ people being UNhappy as gross fetishistic straight people garbage even when they were actually created by and for LGBTQ people, only to be misappropriated by straight people, as if there’s no way you could possibly be LGBTQ and NOT feel ~used and maligned~ by depictions of LGBTQ people that are less than 5,000% perfectly happy, even when they are being created by other LGBTQ people, yeah? ……but yeah, no, clearly: the fact that I like angst obviously means that I am a straight person because no ~real~ LGBTQ person ever has any need for those ~gross negative feelings~ or fictional outlets for them, never mind how many LGBTQ people get excluded from our narratives and spaces by this bullshit bc lmao who cares amiright. ://”)

—anyway, my motto has been and remains, “It isn’t a question of WHAT you ship, it’s a question of HOW you ship it,” so hey. Snu//pin is not my thing (it’s not even as non-shippingly interesting to me as Sirius/Severus is, because I love how much those two hate each other while unwittingly being perfect foils for each other), but I don’t actually have any desire to ship-bash it and most Snu//pin shippers are okay with me because unless they’re actually doing anything that’s harmful to anyone else, it’s not my business what they ship

That said: “Snu//pin” is still one of the worst portmanteau ship names ever and it still sounds like a deadly virus or something, but *shrugs* Whatever, it’s not the shippers’ faults that their ship members’ names don’t smush up all that nicely