#when this came up previously I said something about it being a huge Nerd Fight | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ladyartemesia · 4 years ago

Note

Yooo your love story straight out seems like an e2l slow burn tumblr fic. Do you have any plans using at as a plot?? I would def read it 👀

I don’t know if I would truly call it enemies-to-lovers because—although I got irritated with him and his behavior and did snap at him from time to time—we were not really enemies. In fact we were barely friends for most of the years we knew each other—

Well.

Ok. So that’s not totally true...

We fought online constantly. From the time we graduated college (where his crush first developed and I routinely forgot his name) the two of us were always fighting on social media—usually about politics—and occasionally about other things but both of us were too smart to ever truly get the better of each other so there was a grudging respect, (his mom said he used to yell at his computer screen about me). We had it OUT several times online even though we rarely—if ever—spoke in person.

My poor sweet boy DID get himself in trouble over me in more ways than one though—even if we’re weren’t close yet...

His college girlfriend set him up to fail asked him who he would date if the two of them weren’t together and he answered immediately—vehemently—

“Viola. I would definitely date Viola if I could.”

🤦🏻‍♀️ (oh...honey...no)

(That would become a huge THING in their relationship. Every time they got into a fight his ex would shout “why don’t you just go date VIOLA then?!”—When he married me he said he felt like a real winner in that particular collection of conflicts. Playing the long game I guess 🤣😂)

Back then I was all about the music/dramatic arts scene and I was dating a string of empty headed pretty boys who bored me nigh unto death because I was young and completely stupid.

In contrast my someday-boo was painfully quiet and shy (though not really with me because he was too busy trying to prove me wrong), but everyone who met him or spoke to him really liked him and respected him.

After college we were were still in the same extended social circle (and—as previously mentioned—fighting online), but I went to grad school and my not-yet-husband decided to chill for awhile and take a job as a landscaper while he figured his life out and... here’s where it gets complicated because...

—that’s where the girls came in. You see... he’s always been a really nice guy... maybe a little too nice 🤦🏻‍♀️

The term fuqboi tends to conjure up impressions of a cocky frat bro who slyly shags his way through a mountain of willing women with disconnected efficiency and a subtext of emotional constipation.

But that would not be the case here.

You see my husband is a listener. He’s an INFP. He, unlike many of his brethren, understands emotions and can really make a woman feel seen. Combine that with his good looks, brilliant mind, and broody nerditude and you have a recipe for women who were ‘just friends’ randomly dropping to their knees (and a lot more) for him.

Never one to stand in the way of a lady’s dreams, pre-me-hubby figured that if they were that determined to (*insert miscellaneous sexy stuff here*) with him then—well—he’d let them.

I mean why not, right? No harm done.

Wrong. 🤬

And here is where our paths truly began to merge (in the real world) for the first time.

As the FOURTH girl (just in my friend group) he graciously allowed (🤦🏻‍♀️) to have her wicked way with him sobbed in my arms, I became determined to put this ridiculous man-child IN his PLACE—this time in the tactile world as well as the virtual one.

...Poor Liz

She realized that he had absolutely no desire whatsoever to be in a relationship with anything other than his WoW account and she was insistent that he had broken her heart.

So I cornered him and we had it out. (Call me meddlesome, but to be fair he was four friends deep at this point.)

The problem was that... the more I talked to him...the more he was not really what I expected... I found myself...oddly...intrigued?

Later it would come out that I was the first girl—ever—that he actually pursued. And I was not even aware of it for like the first three months.

He was pretty slick after all when it came down to it.

That man convinced me to ‘help him’ with women—to make sure he didn’t get himself into another situation where some girl with heart eyes was tearing off his clothes and expecting commitment.

HE ASKED ME TO BE HIS ‘EXCUSE.’

🤦🏻‍♀️(...I know. I’m an idiot.)

“We can hang out. You’ll teach me how to spot if a girl is about to catch feelings and take off my pants. And I will have an excuse when they call as to why we can’t hang out” (—and ...they really were always calling. It was wild.)

....I mean he WAS shy! It SEEMED plausible!

So yeah my dim self agreed to it. (🤦🏻‍♀️)

I considered it a valiant attempt to save the rest of my social circle from the most clueless ‘accidental’ fuqboi on planet earth and maybe even an opportunity to teach him how to be a real human being and what not.

And before you think ‘fake dating’—we weren’t. We were just hanging out as friends. You see when I went to yell at him (and chased him down after he laughed at me and tried to escape) we ended up talking in his car for like four hours. And then that happened like three more times randomly so... I... actually... wanted... to be his friend... 🤷🏻‍♀️

I was still 110% not interested romantically.

Your girl (me) was after some bland banker dude (🤦🏻‍♀️) and so I blissfully fell into friendship with my actual soulmate without a single second thought. And I never worried about either of us catching feelings because I had a crush on someone else and he had heavily implied that I was not his type. (He told me later that I just assumed this and he simply never corrected me 🙄)

I don’t remember falling for him. I never decided to. I never thought about it...

But one day after the whole crew was hanging out at a restaurant (and the waiter kept giving me free drinks which may have pissed my once-and-future man off) the two of us went out to his car to have our customary three hour post-chill chat...

I was teasing him about something—some girl he was still attempting to untangle himself from—and I said—as had become my habit (seriously I said this so many times as a joke)—“It’s too bad I’m not your type—you could just tell her you have a girlfriend.”

(Now. I know what you’re thinking. But I was still firmly on team platonic ok! I was just a flirt. And maybe part of me was starting to feel weird things about him—but those feelings weren’t like anything I recognized so I thought I just needed to cut back on sugar or something.)

(Have I mentioned I’m an idiot?)

ANYWAYS he looked me right in the eye. So serious. And instead of saying “that’s too bad”—LIKE he ALWAYS did—he said—

“You...are my type, Viola... You’re exactly my type.”

To which I responded—“....What? No I’m not. You said I wasn’t.”

“Never said that. You assumed.”

“You LET me!”

—followed by a good ten minutes of me having an existential crisis/yelling at him for allowing me to believe he didn’t find me attractive and lulling me into a false sense of security. He was infuriatingly unapologetic.

At the end of it all he asked me to give him—give us—a chance.

And I agreed to go out on a few dates with him (mostly to prove to myself that there was nothing there).

(🤦🏻‍♀️)

The only thing I ended up proving was that I was wrong about what I wanted and even more wrong about what I needed.

You see...

Those weird feelings turned out to be love.

(🤦🏻‍♀️)

And it was a really special experience to sit in a room full of girls who had cried in my arms over him—girls I had lectured repeatedly on the dangers of his heartless ways— and admit that I was his girlfriend.

🤦🏻‍♀️

Love was—and continues to be—nothing like I expected and frankly I couldn’t be happier.

... to answer your questions

1. I have considered writing a fic based on our story called Broken Road. The title is taken from an old Rascal Flatts song that—as insanely cheesy as it is—really reminds me of us. Don’t know if I will actually write this. Thought about it a lot though.

2. Tags I would use for this story?

#enemies-to-lovers / #idiots-to-lovers / #college au / #outgoing!fem reader(me) x shy nerd!accidental fuqboi / #reader is also a huge nerd actually / #she’s just a loud one / #frenemies-to-lovers / #the love is requited / #they’re just idiots / #pining (his) / denial (mine) / #reader has terrible taste in men / #except for that last one / #she really redeemed herself there at the end

#wow #it was really cool to write all this out actually #my love story #well part of it anyways #it’s still ongoing #via💋viola

134 notes · View notes

veronicamarsconfessions · 5 years ago

Link

I was hugely excited by the announcement that a fourth season of teen noir show Veronica Mars was going to be made, nearly fifteen years after the show’s initial air date (and cancellation after three seasons), and five years after the crowdfunded movie came out. As soon as the show dropped on Hulu (or Stan, if you’re in Australia like me) – a week earlier than initially slated, I rushed to watch it. And I was so distraught by the ending that it genuinely took two days for my mood to return to something even vaguely resembling ‘okay’.

For those of you who haven’t seen it *SPOILERS FROM HERE ON*,

season four has Veronica (Kristen Bell) chasing down a serial bomber who seems to be trying to destroy the Spring Break business in Neptune. It turns out that the first bomb was set by property developer ‘Big’ Dick Casablancas, trying to destroy the Spring Break business in order to buy the waterfront properties cheaply, and the subsequent bombs were set by a pizza delivery man, Penn Epner (Patton Oswalt), who fancies himself a detective and is out to find glory after he is initially ridiculed for his public accusation of an incorrect suspect. The season itself had several issues (one of them being some seriously murky motivations behind Epner’s behaviour, like, if he really was that much of a genius, why was he a pizza delivery man?, and that the people ultimately behind the crimes are more or less ‘hidden in plain sight’ all along, which is a disappointing departure from the way the initial seasons cleverly hid the villain until quite late in proceedings). However, the issue for which there is not enough therapy in the world to appease me is the season’s last-minute killing off of reformed bad-boy and Veronica’s long-time boyfriend, Logan Echolls (Jason Dohring), right after they finally got married.

Series creator and showrunner, Rob Thomas, justified this decision by saying ‘I know this seems crazy or harsh but Veronica is at her best when she’s an underdog and I don’t know that there’s much to root for if she’s now got a perfect relationship. I need to keep her fighting and I need to keep her a little bit uncomfortable in order to have a show. There’s nothing funny or interesting about perfection.’

Except that’s a deeply flawed understanding of how relationships function, and a deeply messed up thing to push on to people.

It’s fair to acknowledge that once the ‘will-they-won’t-they’ is resolved, TV shows often decline in quality, or at the very least, significantly depart from the original formula which made them into such beloved hits at their beginning. But there are two significant issues with this: First, the assumption that TV shows must remain the same in order to be good. There are some interesting observations that the job of the sitcom episode (in particular) is to return all characters to more or less their original starting points. While that is broadly true, TV shows, like life, need to evolve in order to stay interesting, and as across seasons, audiences grow alongside the characters they watch evolve and mature.

Nevertheless, it was fair for Thomas to note that the characterisation of Veronica is someone who is embittered and cynical about people’s fidelity and inherent goodness – after all, when we first meet her at the age of sixteen, her best friend has been brutally murdered, she’s been raped, her alcoholic mother has upped and left, and her adored father and moral compass has been socially ostracised for a) doing his job and b) being not super wealthy. It’s a lot. Veronica’s very understandable trust issues are compounded by the moonlighting she does as a P.I where, to she regularly sees people cheating on one another and generally behaving in unpleasant ways. So it’s reasonable to point out that for Veronica, the notion of the ‘happily ever after’ is a deeply uncomfortable one. But to keep her in the same mindset as she was at aged 16 is to deny her the capacity to grow as a character.

It’s fair that there was a desire to avoid repeating the pattern previously established (withdrawn/bitter etc), but – and here is my ultimate point – that could have been avoided.

Some of the most complex and interesting storylines come from couples who get together and have to navigate relationships; compromising to fit together, find a way to make it work. Think about the evolution of Niles and Daphne’s relationship in Frasier (and leave aside some of the aspects to his earlier infatuation with her that seem distinctly distasteful in a post-#metoo world). While much of the humour between them in earlier seasons was because of his unrealised ardour for her, after they became a couple, the hardships they navigated through being a couple, and the deepening richness of their relationship that was both romantic and based in friendship, produced some truly hilarious moments. Similarly, one of my (and our fabulous Chief Nerd, Elise’s) favourite TV shows, Chuck, *SPOILER* has the two leads get together in season 3. The show was no lesser for that fact because as Chuck and Sarah’s relationship deepened, they explored facets of themselves that they hadn’t previously shown – it provided more material for the writers, not less.

One of my favourite articles on the ending of Veronica Mars, season four, pointed out that Logan has the most interesting character development because he works to better himself – he has come a long way from the miscreant teenager who organised ‘bum fights’, and he had the potential to become an even more interesting character. How this interacted with Veronica’s cynicism could have provided significant fodder for more story.

But, giving full credit to Rob Thomas for a moment here, the show is called Veronica Mars, not Logan Echolls. So the decision to axe Logan was made to push Veronica’s character development forward, especially given the shows position as a gender-flipped noir which so often has the embittered, cynical detective dealing with the ongoing pain of a tragically killed love.

But the problem is that I can’t actually see how this is going to do anything but ossify Veronica’s primary characteristics: bitter, a hardnosed and reckless desire to catch the bad guy at any cost. Moreover, in most of the noir detective stories, this love has died before we meet the hard-bitten detective.

Thomas said to The Hollywood Reporter, “Moving forward, we’re going to really build around [the idea that] the case is the thing and less of the soap opera of Veronica’s life.” Except Veronica Mars is all about character. Her interactions with her father, Keith (Enrico Colantoni) and the genuine bond of affection between them evokes some of the show’s most poignant interactions. Her internal struggle when the pursuit of justice comes up against questions of morality is inherent grounded in her character. One of its most interest aspects across the years is that Veronica is often wrong. She falsely accuses people (including Logan himself), she behaves badly, she takes her friends for granted, and she can be reckless to the point where she endangers herself and someone has to come in and rescue her (case in point: wandering into the base of an Irish gang that had a particular grudge against her father). So to strip away the elements to the story that allow for depiction and consideration of those complexities would be to lose much of the show’s point.

There’s also a part of me that feels the way in which Logan was killed feels personal. Logan and Veronica were never initially meant to get together, but in the first episodes, the chemistry between the characters, and Kristen Bell and Jason Dohring was so profound that it was written in. I might be putting on my tin foil hat to say this, but it feels as though Thomas resented the manner in which LoVe became such a pivotal part of the Veronica Mars ‘brand’. What really underpins that for me is that the way the series sent off other characters was considered, and gave them a certain ‘exit’. The way in which Logan was killed off feels almost like an afterthought, made more so by some of the questions that arise from the manner. How did he know that she would be in it when it actually blew up? Moreover, the convenience of him leaving a voicemail for his therapist about why he wanted to marry Veronica (why exactly would he call his therapist to tell him about his epiphany? Who has that kind of relationship with their therapist?), and this woman’s decision to keep it from Veronica for a year seems weirdly contrived. Because it was.

However, to be fair, one could claim that the season mistreated some of its other characters, too. Tina Majorino who plays Cindy ‘Mac’ Mackenzie specifically noted that she did not want to return because she did not want her character to be sidelined. Similarly, the complexity to Eli ‘Weevil’ Navaro’s character was stripped away, as was the depth of his relationship with Veronica. What’s worse is that this could have been a really interesting storyline; why he decided to walk away from the court case which would have seen him awarded with compensation for what happened to him in the movie. While we are told that his wife left him along with his child, prompting him to return to his old gang-running ways, the depth of his grief and the reputable life he lost were never really portrayed. Honestly, I would have preferred that rather than the convoluted storyline that involved Mexican cartel hitmen.

But beyond my argument as a writer as to why Logan’s death was a totally unnecessary element to bring in, it also feels like a real slap in the face to fans. I’ve previously talked about the relationship this show has with its fans. Realistically, season 4…hell, the movie, only existed because of the love and support fans showed the show.

Any narrative material exists to interact with fans. Obviously, there is a fine line that can cross into blatant pandering, and there is also a trend that offers a ‘gritty’ or ‘sad’ end (ie the tragic death of the lover), but it’s a balance.

The Veronica Mars movie was very much fan service – it was, after all, fan funded. Much of the movie’s contents and storyline were determined by what Thomas was seeing from fan comments on social media, noting “I did have an idea of things people wanted to see, characters I wanted to get an appearance in, whether it felt extraneous or not.” He added, “there’s no way in the world we would have had a fan-funded movie and I would have killed Logan,” he added.

In the same interview, he said, “I fear that leaning into the high school soap that the show started out as is a losing proposition, that it will start feeling nostalgic rather than vital. If Kristen [Bell] and I want to make more of these Veronica Mars mysteries, I think it’s going to survive best as a true mystery show with a badass PI at the center of it, and I think that works better if the PI doesn’t have a boyfriend.”

Yet for a show whose who schtick was challenging the noir detective genre, it seems the prospect that someone fundamentally gritty and damaged can also have a relationship that the struggle to be healthy was simply a bridge too far.

And at the crux of it, what really frustrates me – as a fan, and as a writer – is that for Thomas, it simply felt too hard to give Logan and Veronica an enduring relationship, and it if wasn’t too difficult, then he perceived it destroyed some fundamental part of the show by making it emotionally sappy. If that’s the dichotomy in which Thomas thinks, then Veronica Mars is no longer the show which attracted its die-hard following of fans and may as well be a different show with a similar premise.

#Veronica Mars #Rob Thomas #Kristen Bell #Logan Echolls #Jason Dohring #news

42 notes · View notes

apassintohell · 5 years ago

Text

of lava and insects

Thatcher belongs to @rebsrebsrebsrebs who continues to ruin me

Featuring Briar, Satan and Thatcher being nerds about lava bugs

Briar squints through a thick cloud of steam as they pick their way through piles of rubble. Ahead of them, Satan is a muted wash of gray they fight to keep track of. Even demon sight is limited beneath the ever shifting weather of the volcanic mountains they stand on.

They swipe at their face in an attempt to clear some of the sweat that lines their skin; in the end they only manage to smear more dust across their forehead. They're sticky under the oppressive heat that surrounds them and far from pleased with the way their clothes stick to them.

This trip sucks, Kes declares.

You're not the one on the outside.

You were thinking it!

Satan glances back at them and nods towards a split in the rock ahead. It's a tight squeeze when they try to follow after him. The rock catches at their clothes and threatens to keep them in its harsh embrace.

They stumble out onto the other side and crash into Satan with a groan.

"Are you alright?"

"Just imagining all the ways I'm going to demand Thatcher make up for this," Briar says without heat.

They glance up at Satan to find him looking just as worse off as them. His hair is practically grey with dust and they can't help the burst of laughter that escapes them.

"What?"

"We've finally done it. We made one of you go grey and we weren't even trying." They grin up at him as their fingers wipe away some of the dust on his cheek. "To think all it took was a hike."

"Scaling Mount Ignislia is hardly a hike," he says wryly. "we've been at this for hours."

"Don't remind me." Briar takes the reprieve from the weather as a chance to stretch some of the ache from their limbs. Clinging to the side of the mountain while wind and heat tried to launch them into the abyss below wasn't exactly the easiest thing in the world.

Their shoulders ache and they grimace at their dirty and cracked claws. Asmodeus was sure to give them Hell for that later.

"We're almost there. This cave system should lead us down into the lava pits."

"And you're sure I won't burn up?"

Briar falls into step beside him as the trail slopes downwards.

"We've already tested it. Your humanity will not effect you physically." He catches their hand to give it a gentle squeeze. "Are you worried?"

"I just don't want to invite Thatcher into my head only for them to witness my death."

Briar lets out a soft sigh and swallows around their dry throat. The flask Solomon had given them is welcome, especially considering its ever-full state.

"Nothing will happen to either of you."

Seconded.

Briar's lips twitch. "Now you've got Kes being sappy."

You know what? I take it back.

They laugh, undaunted by the chill in her voice. They know better now. "So these scoria things are really found in lava? Thatcher said there was a legend about them."

"An old story claims that they were once normal insects that feasted on the fallen corpse of a race of fire demons that's long since perished. They inherited their ability to live in Mount Ignislia through the consumption."

They're already aware of the fact and they both know it. Briar has listened to Thatcher ramble enough to have the theories and facts about their current bug hunt memorized.

Hearing Satan break it all down again is simply a distraction from their nerves. They're going to be the one that has to wade into fire, after all. They can't open Satan's mind to Thatcher, it's not how the bond works.

"We're here."

Briar looks ahead into the darkness and finds a growing orange glow. It creeps up over the rocks and eliminates the shadows the further they walk into its reach.

The sound of something bubbling fills their ears and with it comes the fast rise of heat and steam. Every breath in feels heavy until Briar is forced to transform out of sheer self preservation. Beside them, Satan follows suit.

"Holy shit."

Briar's eyes are wide as they take in the channels of lava that stretch out before them. A deep purple rock weaves in between streams and pools like spiderwebs. It shines above the glow of what would have previously been Briar's death.

Satan moves to help slice their clothes away from their body when their own fingers shake. Fabric will only burn and the last thing they need is another distraction.

He presses a kiss to their shoulder. "You'll be fine, love. If something happens I'll get you out."

Briar lets out a soft breath and accepts the vial he presses into their hands; nectar from a rare plant that grows in the lava fields the scoria hibernate in.

They step up to the edge of the nearest pool and submerge themselves. It's hot, startlingly so, as if they'd turned the water in the shower on full blast before giving their body a chance to adjust. It does not, however, burn.

They swim to the surface with a gasp and stare up at Satan with wide eyes.

"Holy shit." They lift a hand and watch streams of lava slip off of their skin. "Holy shit, it worked!"

"I told you it would." Satan sits beside the pool and smiles at them. He glows with the caves around them; nothing less than otherworldly. "I'll wait here."

Of course. They'd come for a reason, after all.

Briar swims to one of the purple arches of rock and doesn't allow themselves to think of what's lurking where they can't see it. They hoist themselves up onto a smooth edge and leave their lower body submerged.

The cork to the vial is pulled out with their teeth; immediately a sweet scent fills their nose. They pour the mixture into their hand and let it drip down into the orange pool below before they can second guess themself.

"This better work," they mutter before closing their eyes.

Kes welcomes them as they recede into themselves. She's by their side as they follow the lines of their bonds, searching for the right tether. Thatcher's is especially bright, as always, and they follow the long line of it all the way back to where they wait in the Devildom.

The markings that wrap around their forehead and fall down over their closed eyes light up in gold as they make contact.

"Thatcher," they murmur. "I'm here."

It's a lot like trying to fill a glass up to the very brim of its spilling point. They coax Thatcher's sense of self out of their body and into Briar's.

The next time they breathe they feel too full, too contained in their own skin--

Briar.

--the heaviness eases as they recede into the background.

Their eyes open to stare down in wonder at the lava that laps at their waist. Their lips part but it is not Briar who speaks.

"This is--you made it!"

Briar stretches out beneath their awe like a pleased cat.

Did you really doubt we wouldn't?

They wouldn't turn back, Kes grumbles. They're stubborn.

"I know."

The affection warms the cheeks of Briar's body. There's nowhere to hide with Thatcher's soul pressed up against their own. They're laid bare and it's still far too overwhelming.

Don't forget your bugs.

Something brushes against their legs. Thatcher looks down in surprise to find the lava around them roiling.

"Briar? Thatcher?" Satan meets their eyes across the pool. "Get further up onto the rocks. We don't know what they'll do."

Briar is distantly aware of Thatcher moving their limbs but it's with a detached sort of acknowledgement. It's not unlike dissociating but they trust Thatcher.

The nectar drips down their hand and smears itself onto the rocks as their body leaves the warmth of the pool. Their hair plasters itself to their back as they watch large shapes break through the thick lower layers of the pool.

Briar is glad that Thatcher is in control when the first scoria--sccorialismn, Thatcher corrects--breaks the surface with a screech that sends goosebumps out over their skin.

It's huge, with a hard outershell that gleams nearly iridescent in the right light. It's easily as big as Satan, with long feathered antennae that twitch in their direction. Briar flinches internally when it swims over to their rock easily. It looks like a strange sort of hybrid moth--if a moth were as big as a man with glowing red eyes and lava dripping from its shell.

"It's a male," Thatcher whispers when the armor plating on its back shifts to give way to a set of large patterned wings.

More burst free from the pools, though the male slowly creeping up their rock is the largest.

Didn't they eat demons?!

Well, yes, in theory--

I'm a demon, Thatcher!

They both freeze as a low clicking bounces off of the walls. It's loud, enough for them both to feel it all the way down in their bones. It softens into a low rumble when he finds the first spill of nectar.

He doesn't--seem aggressive.

We can always blast him if we need to, Kes points out.

We're not hurting him, we're the ones that came here!

Technically I did, Briar drawls.

My point still stands.

Thatcher's eyes fly up to stare into one of the sccorialismn's eyes as his proboscis flicks out to taste the nectar still on their palm.

"Hey," Thatcher whispers. "I'm not going to hurt you."

A soft chitter comes from behind them as a much smaller female crawls up to inspect their guest.

The panic Briar would normally be feeling is muted with Thatcher in control of their body. It's a relief all its own.

"They're just curious. I'm sure they don't get many visitors." They glance over at Satan and find him going through a similar inspection.

The female at their back feels over the back of their hair. She lets out what could almost be a confused click when it reveals itself to not be lava.

Satan said they're more intelligent than normal bugs, right?

"Supposedly. They do seem to react differently than most other insects." Their fingers flex as the male chases after the last drops of nectar. When he finds no more his head dips, close enough that his anntenae brush against the top of their head.

They're motionless under his observation. Once satisfied, he rears back with a soft cry and plunges back into the pool. The rest of them follow after, leaving Thatcher and Satan alone once more.

"That was--"

Nerd, Briar says before they can finish.

Thatcher laughs breathlessly and swims back over to Satan.

"Thank you," they say, to both of them. "Really. I'm going to put everything in my journal before I forget but--I really appreciate it."

Briar guides them back to their own body with one last pulse of affection. They feel almost deflated when they come back to the front of their body. They stretch out to settle back into their own skin before smiling tiredly at Satan.

"Ready to head back?"

"Yes, I'd like to shower all this dust off."

Briar pulls on the clothes he offers and casts one last glance back at the abandoned pools.

"Let's get back to our resident nerd, I’m sure they’ll have questions."

Satan chuckles as their hands find one another. “Undoubtably. You look like you enjoyed yourself too.”

“It’s hard not to appreciate the creepy crawlies when Thatcher is in your head.” They tap their temple and feel a pulse of awareness run through their body. They can almost taste the brightness of Thatcher’s enthusiasm. “...it wasn’t so bad, I guess.”

“We’ll talk you around into coming to the spider sanctuary, yet.”

Briar shudders. “Ugg, you wish! Get moving before I’m tempted to throw you into one of the pools!”

His laughter is soft as he increases the pace; they fight a smile.

If Thatcher was the one doing it...

Maybe one day.

#i researched moths for this #and lava crickets #squints at thatcher #obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me mcs #other mcs #rebs #my writing #briar story tag #thatcher and briar #satan

7 notes · View notes

wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 5 years ago

Text

Michael After Midnight: TGWTG Anniversary Crossovers

I think enough time has passed where I can talk about these films without looking like I’m jumping on a trend.

Back when it was, you know, an actual thing, Channel Awesome would every so often gather together and make a big-as anniversary film to celebrate the site. The movies would always be these massive doorstoppers where everyone would be running around in Halloween costumes of whatever character they liked the most that fit the theme and fighting some random villain. None of this ever really tied in to their work, and none of this even remotely had anything to do with reviews. It was all just hanging around with friends and having dumb fun, and when I was younger I kind of just accepted that.

But certain revelations have made that dubious. No one was having fun making these. Everyone was miserable, except perhaps Doug Walker, who was just utterly oblivious to the plight of his coworkers. There was seedy stuff going on, people were pretty much being tortured and abused, and it’s a wonder anyone was ever able to feign enjoyment in any of their scenes. And looking back on these movies I used to remember fondly, I have to say… they kind of really, legitimately suck ass. These three films – Kickassia, Suburban Knights, and To Boldly Flee – are just legitimately painful and depressing to sit through, for reasons both meta and writing-wise.

The biggest problem with all of them is their humor, which is a pretty big problem when you’re starring a bunch of comedians, some of whom can be legitimately funny. The worst bits tend to revolve around the mind-boggling number of references they cram into each script; To Boldly Flee and Suburban Knights are much worse in this regard, as they have all of the actors literally dressed up as their favorite characters, but there are two examples of this sort of thing that shine as the worst examples of all. The first is Lindsay Ellis doing a Sarah Palin impersonation in Kickassia; Palin was such a flash-in-the-pan politician that it instantly dates the whole movie, and I don’t know if it was just bad writing, lack of direction, or what, but Ellis just fails to make this joke work at all. Like I know I can’t expect this to be as funny as Iron Sky’s Palin riffing, but still, it’s just sad.

The absolute worst, however, is JO in To Boldly Flee as Ed from Cowboy Bepob… at least that’s who I think he’s supposed to be playing. I know nothing about Cowboy Bebop and have outright refused to ever watch it because if Ed is anything like how JO played her, I’m going to fucking hate the whole show, Steve Blum and Melissa Fahn be damned. JO’s portrayal is whiny, hyper, annoying, manic, obnoxious… there’s not a single positive thing that can be said. His performance of the character is pretty much the poster child for just how absolutely awful these movies could get.

There’s also a lot of jokes where the punchline is basically just “this guy’s body/genitalia is funny, teehee.” Suburban Knights and To Boldly Flee have some truly awful examples of this, such as the numerous upskirts Doug Walker gets as Link and the infamous Spoony Dune scene. But even that isn’t the worst of it. The worst of it comes from the frequent states of near-nudity that Justin “JewWario” Carmichael would find himself in throughout these films. To Boldly Flee has him channeling George Takei and fencing without his shirt on, which is bad enough, but Suburban Knights has perhaps the worst scene of all, in any of these films, though only with hindsight.

For those of you not familiar, JewWario was outed as a creepy sexual predator during the whole #ChangeTheChannel fiasco. The guy groomed young women and did god knows what else during his time on the site, with none of his coworkers any the wiser and the management doing their best to cover it up; in fact, everyone only found out because the suits who owned CA made a huge blunder during their rebuttal of the claims of its former employees. With all of that context, please try and rewatch Suburban Knights’ climax in which JewWario helps save the day by revealing his penis to everyone. This right here is Keyser Soze levels of “uncomfortable in hindsight.”

The stories aren’t much better, and often fall into the same sort of issues that The Angry Video Game Nerd movie fell into, in that nothing in these films really showcases why we love the reviewers; Kickassia infamously has the Dr. Insano twist, as one example of how they botched this. All of these movies just feel too epic in scope and don’t really try to incorporate anything that we love about these reviewers into the films. Only To Boldly Flee really does anything right in that regard, as it throws back to everything from oneshot Nostalgia Critic villains to the Todd-Lindsay-Lupa love triangle to Phelous dying… the real problem is you have to actually sit through To Boldly Flee to see that. The movies go for these epic plots where the reviewers do cool shit like take over micronations (Kickassia), quest for powerful artifacts (Suburban Knights), or deal with extremely heavy-handed and hamfisted allegories for internet privacy bills (To Boldly Flee). You’d think maybe throwing a bunch of comedians into an epic plot like any of these could lead to some funny jokes, or maybe some sort of Monty Python-esque parody, but no, instead these comedians decide to revel in melodrama and try to genuinely act, with EXTREMELY mixed results. It doesn’t help that some of these people just aren’t even remotely funny when they’re trying to be.

Here’s the thing with The Angry Video Game Nerd’s movie, in comparison to these, though: it may have had this epic, ridiculous, goofy plot involving Area 51, kaiju, aliens, and crappy Atari games buried in a landfill, but the entire plot was building up to, and ultimately delivered on, the promise of the long-awaited review of the E.T. game. For all the film’s flaws, Rolfe knew what we loved about the Nerd, he knew what the fans wanted, and by god did he give it to them in the silliest, most epic way possible. Even if I didn’t love the film, the fact Rolfe knew why we’d want to see a feature-length Nerd film in the first place speaks volumes about how he understands that he can do what will make him happy artistically and still show the fans what they want to see.

These movies from the Channel Awesome crew don’t seem to get that at all. They don’t build up to a review. They don’t build up to them discovering the worst movie or song or whatever they review. They’re all very straightforward genre comedies where they can make a bunch of shallow, Seltzer & Friedberg-esque “Look at this thing that exists! That’s a joke right?” references. Aside from seeing your favorite reviewers in a goofy plot like this, where is there any bit of the reason you watch these people in the first place? Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if they were playing characters instead of them playing themselves, in their internet reviewer personas; at least then you wouldn’t be watching Brad Jones stumbling around in a Darth Vader helmet and think to yourself miserably “God I wish that poor guy was watching another E.T. porno.”

So there are some positives in these films, shockingly enough. Brad Jones is consistently good across the entire ‘trilogy,’ especially in Kickassia where he has the good sense to walk out on all the bullshit for a while. Maybe it’s just because these films got me interested in him, but I definitely think he does a good job. The same can be said for a lot of the actors, such as the bad guy in Suburban Knights and Ma-Ti’s actor; they manage to deliver at least solid performances in spite of the films. And then there are the James Rolfe cameos, and it’s just always good to see Rolfe in general.

To Boldly Flee, despite its reputation, actually has a lot of genuinely good bits. For instance, the distraction song is actually a really solid musical number. Linkara, Doug, and Spoony actually play really well off of each other, so when they have their three idiot villains team up they at least get some decently good moments. And other reviewers I generally like such as Phelous or Todd do a solid job, and frankly in To Boldly Flee Doug Walker does show some impressive dramatic acting… but it’s in service of a character who has previously been portrayed as a petulant, whiny, self-serving, egotistical manchild, so it almost feels like he’s playing a totally different character. Still, credit where credit is due.

None of these films succeed at what they want to. Ostensibly, they are supposed to be celebrating the site and the friendship of the reviewers, but as I mentioned, there’s no reviewing, there’s nothing that indicates what the site is about, and they all just come off as ego-stroking self-congratulatory wanking. None of these films were worth the pain and suffering that the cast and crew had to go through to produce these, and watching them at all these days is especially hard knowing that a lot of these people are smiling and joking through pain, stress, and abuse. It’s sick.

Kickassia may be the most competent, but that isn’t saying much at all. Aside from the whole Palin bit, this one has a simple, straightforward plot and is relatively down-to-earth, and it almost feels like it really was just a bunch of friends making a shitty low budget action movie in the desert… something sadly undermined by reality. Suburban Knights is probably one of the most uncomfortable to sit through due to jokes like Film Brain saying he’d eat Kinley Mochrie’s “pea-ness” (this was before she came out mind you) and the numerous jokes surrounding JewWario’s junk, but it almost works, like it nearly comes close to being a dumb epic fantasy comedy, but it just frequently shoots itself in the foot with the bad writing and acting and its overreliance on references.

To Boldly Flee is, to put it absolutely simple, a hot mess. This film is an utter trainwreck from start to finish. It is the Battlefield Earth of internet review movies, a bloated, messy, overly long dumpster fire with some of the most nightmarish behind-the-scenes stories and horrendous financial mismanagement you could ever imagine. But where Battlefield Earth is at least unintentionally funny, this film… is not. This film just makes you feel bad for everyone involved, it makes your heart ache for all the poor reviewers who had to suffer under the miserable conditions, it makes you question Doug Walker’s sanity in thinking he could turn his screeching manchild of a reviewer into some tragic martyr in a total 180 from how he had always been portrayed prior. None of these three films are worth sitting through, but I think To Boldly Flee is, with hindsight, the one least worth sitting through, which is a truly incredible accomplishment.

It’s kind of tragic. I still like a lot of the reviewers who took part in these – Todd, Linkara, Phelous, Brad Jones, and even Doug to some extent (though that’s an unpopular opinion these days) – but I just can’t muster up any forgiveness for these films anymore. And I don’t blame any of the people in it (except maybe Doug); most of them were there out of obligation or friendship or what have you. These films are just a monument to hubris, ignorance, broken friendships, horrible management, and wanton cruelty to those who called you friends.

See that picture up there at the top? With all of them gathered together like friends? God, how I wish that were the reality. How I wish that picture accurately reflected life, that they were all pals having a good time and that these films were something they were proud of. But behind that picture are stories all of them could tell of hurt, betrayal, resentment, anger, contempt, and some very unspeakable things in Carmichael’s case. I wish the sort of world a surface level glance at that picture shows you existed, where the crew of TGWTG all had a blast making these shitty movies together, because at least in that case I could find a sort of ironic enjoyment in them. But reality has gone out of its way to undermine any of that.

#Michael After Midnight #Review #Movie review #Channel Awesome #TGWTG #That Guy with the Glasses #Kickassia #Suburban Knights #To Boldly Flee #Internet reviewers

14 notes · View notes

emosnakeboy · 6 years ago

Text

I’ve Done Everything to Deserve This (Version #1)

Prompt: I’ve done everything to deserve this, but why here, why now, why in front of him? (found it on my dash by @thrown-out-pasta) (am going to write second different one because this prompt speaks to me) Ship: Romanic/Pining Logince, mentions of Logicality Warnings: angst was implied. humiliation, hatred, bullying, mentions of maybe home abuse, etc

Roman really did try his best to be a good person.

It didn’t look like it from the outside, but then again, not everyone can be overly friendly like that kid Patton O’Connor. The idiot was going to get himself hurt one day from being too outgoing. He was fairly new. He hadn’t learned his lesson yet. Roman had been trying to teach him, to show him what would happen to him if he didn’t reign himself in a little. He showed O’Conner as quickly as he could, bringing up his own old memories in the process. He went light on him, very light by the school bullies’ standards. He didn’t wanna hurt the kid. Just... warn him. He’d left Patton in the bathroom after, the kid shaking with sobs as he tended to his few wounds, a foreboding message playing in his head: just step back, or it’ll only be worse for you.

That was a far kinder treatment than that emo kid had received. The freak was always drawing. Roman hadn’t exactly seen it as a bad thing when he first noticed it, but when he noticed emo boy wearing long sleeves and lots of makeup, he resolved that the bullies had determined that he needed the punishment. Roman didn’t want to get beat up. Roman did what he had to. He really hoped the bullies would never find his love of theater.

Timber Creek High School was an awful place. Roman wished it wasn’t like this, but if you didn’t agree with them, then they didn’t agree with you. And if they didn’t agree with you...

... you’d be sorry.

Today wasn’t at all going in Roman’s favor. He’d been late to class due to the stupid rain, and that had earned him a detention. He tried to stay on the bullies’... less bad side... but unless there was a nerdier kid in detention, Roman would be getting a nice beating from them today.

That Patton kid seemed like a good option. If he could get O’Connor into detention, he’d escape unscathed.

He managed to do just that at lunch, and in a very public and fun manner. Roman had it all worked out, and he used a variety of clues to perfect his plan.

Patton O’Connor had a very obvious crush on Logan Torres, a huge nerd (that Roman may or may not have also had a very obvious crush on) who used his lunch to study in the cafeteria. That bit of information was crucial. Logan didn’t usually eat in the cafeteria; Roman had observed this in the years he’d spent at Timber Creek High. Patton would have no idea. Logan spent this particular lunch period next to Emo Kid, although both of them remained silent as Logan read his books and Emo Kid doodled away. Roman made sure to sit at a table in between Patton and Logan, yet not too far away from either of them. He also made sure to bring a paper airplane to lunch.

The airplane hit Patton in the back of the head, and as he turned around to pick it up from the floor Roman smiled. Roman watched Patton mouth the words that he’d written: Any chance you could toss something to eat over here? I’m rather famished, but I can’t afford to buy anything to eat today. -Logan T. He watched Patton’s face light up, watched Patton take half of his probably-homemade PB&J sandwich without thinking, watched Patton ready his right arm -

Splat. The sandwich hit emo kid in the back of the head. He wheeled around, anger apparent on his face. O’Connor blanched as Emo Kid took a scoop of baked beans off his lunch tray with his hands and threw it at Patton full-force. It hit the poor kid square in the face, splattering on the other once-peppy kids seated around Patton.

Only a few more seconds had passed before it was an all-out food fight.

Roman sat back and laughed at the chaos he’d caused. He didn’t want to get too involved; oh no, that would ruin the rest of his plan.

A teacher soon stopped the fight. “Who started all of this?!” she yelled, looking around at the kids in the room. Many flinched away from her glare.

Roman assumed an innocent demeanor, raising his hand slightly and pointing towards Patton. “O’Conner threw the first sandwich, Miss.”

The teacher didn’t acknowledge Roman’s presence. Instead, she rounded on Patton, who was terrified, shaking, and covered in baked beans.. “Detention, O’Connor. For the rest of the week.” Roman held in a snicker as she whirled around and left the room.

He thought he was home clear.

Then the end of the day came.

Roman was packing his things up, ready for detention now that he wasn’t going to get beat up. Maybe he’d be able to get some homework done before he had to go back home to the woman he had to call “mother”. Maybe his day wasn’t so bad.

He was just about to head to room 421 for detention when he was shoved against a line of lockers abruptly. “Price, you’re in for it now,” a menacing voice hissed as firm hands held him in place by his shoulder and throat. The hall around them suddenly seemed alive with curious teenagers who wanted to know what had happened.

“What... did I... do?” Roman gasped out, winded and almost unable to breathe. He made eye contact with the person holding him to the wall, and he felt his heart stop at the sight.

Remy. One of them.

Roman was toast.

“How. dare. you.” Remy seethed, his dark eyes glimmering angrily from behind his sunglasses. “You framed him. I watched you do it. Probably also the one to beat him up a few weeks ago.”

“Wh...at?”

Remy’s lips curled in disgust. “You hurt my cousin. Got ‘im landed in detention, too. You’re screwed, Price.”

It clicked in Roman’s head suddenly. Remy O’Connor. Patton O’Connor. Cousins. And probably why Patton never really had more bruises after that one lesson Roman had taught him.

Oh, god, Roman was royally screwed.

“Didn’t.... know,” Roman gasped, his hand moving up to the hand on his throat. “Pl..ease....”

“Price, I dunno why you did what you did- wait... just one second. I bet that’s why, isn’t it? You were worried that he was gonna... I can’t believe it.”

Believe what? Roman thought bleakly, his vision beginning to spot. I did what I did to keep him safe. And to protect myself from this.

“You thought he was gonna try to take Torres’s heart, didn’t you?”

A string of curses flew through Roman’s brain. He only could hope that Logan wasn’t around, couldn’t see what was happening, and hadn’t heard that last statement. He could hear the people whispering around him, and he realized that it didn’t matter. Logan would hear about it anyway.

Remy leaned in close to Roman’s ear. “See you in detention, Price,” he said, his voice cold and promising. Terror shot down Roman’s spine. Remy released Roman suddenly, and he dropped to the floor in a limp mess. He bit his lip, hard, to keep from crying out as Remy kicked him in the ribcage. Tears sprung to his eyes as he tasted blood in his mouth. He let his eyes fall shut as he lay there, feeling helpless. He heard the crowd dying down, and he could pick out Remy’s unmistakable footsteps in the mess of people leaving the previously-excited area.

After a few minutes, Roman opened his eyes and struggled to sit up. He winced at a stabbing pain in his chest, hoping that nothing was broken yet. That pain didn’t seem to hurt at all when he saw the only person remaining in the hall.

Logan. Fricking. Torres.

I’ve done everything to deserve this, but why here, why now, why in front of him?

He stared down at Roman, eyes wide and face unreadable. Roman couldn’t look away from his gaze, wondering what was going on behind that emotionless mask he wore. Did he feel sorry for Roman? Would he want to help him?

“You... you’re a monster.” The words pierced his heart. Logan’s expression darkened. “You’d really hurt someone just because you’re scared of them taking me? You.. don’t even have me. You’re a terrible person. Maybe next time you should just, I dunno, ask me out before beating up an innocent kid over it. Maybe I would’ve said yes before today.” As if this wasn’t bad enough, Logan finished with one last blow that rang through Roman’s ears throughout the rest of his beating.

“I’ll never say yes to you.”

oof i never write angst or logince can you tell

whatever here you go tumblr do what you will

some people who wanted to be tagged/who might like this:

@romanochez @adultmorelikeadolt @romanticsanders @theeternalspace

#logince #sanders sides #angst #tw bullying #tw abuse #tw blood #logince angst #unresolved angst #thomas sanders #prompt #one sided crush #what even #im so tired #goodnight tumblr

17 notes · View notes

stressful-and-deathy · 7 years ago

Text

each step draws us closer to the aisle

hello, this is the thing that has been consuming my mind, soul and time. it’s the first time i’m writing a multichapter fic so let’s see how this goes. let me know what you guys think!

Summary: “Hey, babe.

Because I’m an amazing work AND life partner, I know you pretty well.

That means I knew there’d be a very high chance you’d be getting all nervous and stressed out about things going right right now. But listen, that’s not your job today, okay? The only thing you have to do is show up and marry me. Let your mom and Kylie and the rest of the wedding party put out the fires and try to relax a bit.

I made you something that I hope will help you do that.

Don’t press play until you turn the first page. And no peeking!”

song #1 - and we go a little something like this

read on ao3 or click on keep reading below!

Amy Santiago is getting married today.

In just a few hours she’ll walk down the aisle, stand by Jake’s side, vow to be his wife and take him as her husband.

There’s absolutely no reason to be nervous.

Expect for the fact that a swarm of bees have taken over the flowers, her dress hasn’t arrived yet and there was a leak in the room where the ceremony will take place. But it’s okay. She’s Amy Santiago. She’s got this. She just needs to turn on her extreme high-strung mode and deal with this because there’s no way in hell she’s letting anything go wrong with her wedding.

But when she sits down, takes three deep breaths and tries to focus, her mind is still blank. She’s looking at herself in the huge mirror in the room where she’s supposed to be getting ready, still wearing a bathrobe and a towel wrapped around her head. And everything around her is absolute chaos.

Gina and Rosa are fighting over who was responsible for the dress and whose fault it is that it isn’t here yet. Kylie is yelling at someone over the phone about the flowers and her mother is so drunk that she’s about to make the girl hired to be the master of ceremony cry because she doesn’t speak spanish. There are shoes everywhere, garment bags all around the floor and makeup products on every single surface imaginable.

Wasn’t this moment supposed to be as relaxing as possible? Weren’t they supposed to be drinking bellinis (a normal amount), telling jokes and stories about Amy and how she and Jake are perfect for each other? Were they not supposed to be doing everything to calm her nerves?

Amy feels the panic begin to rise and decides she will go outside, get some fresh air and come back with a refreshed perspective. Yes, that’s it. She just needs to get out of that room.

But as soon as she opens the door, she sees Terry on the doorway, about to knock.

The first thing she notices is that he’s crying. A lot. Literally, full on sobbing. The second thing she notices is that he’s holding a big white square box. Oh, great. She thinks - Something else is wrong.

“Terry, take a deep breath and tell me what’s the problem. Is everything okay with Jake?”

“N-n-no. It’s nothing. It’s just that… that…that...” - And there he goes again. She lost him.

Amy’s about to turn around and ask Gina to scare the Sarge into talking when she hears it.

“Santiago.” - This single word makes her automatically stand up straighter.

Captain Holt steps up beside Terry and takes the box from him. Yeah, this really can’t be good.

“Sergeant, I think I should take it from here.” - And Terry just nods and walks aways, still crying. “You must excuse Sergeant Jeffords, he is extremely emotional today. He keeps saying quote my work babies are all grown up and getting married to each other unquote. But, there’s nothing to be worried about really. Peralta just asked us to bring you your wedding gift.” He says, handing Amy the box.

“Oh. Thank you, Captain. I’ve already sent mine or I would’ve asked you to take it to him.” - She says while taking the box from his hands.

“He has gotten it and believe me, I don’t think I have ever seen him as excited. And you know that’s saying something.” - Amy smiles and slightly shakes her head. She would’ve given anything to see his reaction.

“Well, I should let you finish getting ready. Excuse me.” When she’s about to close the door, she hears him again.

“Oh, and Amy. I’m very glad you and Jake are getting married. The love you two share is unique and will bring you much joy. You’re both very lucky to have found each other.

He leaves and Amy lingers for a while on the doorway, letting the words of her mentor sink in.

When Amy finally goes back to the room, reality washes over her again. Everything is still a mess but she’s still not ready to deal with that right now. So, she decides to do what any mature adult would do: lock herself in the bathroom (believe it or not, the most peaceful environment she could find) and open her present.

She sits on the ground and opens the box, curiosity through the roof.

The first thing she sees is a handwritten note from Jake sitting on top of baby blue tissue paper. It reads:

Hey, babe.

Because I’m an amazing work AND life partner, I know you pretty well.

I made you something that I hope will help you do that.

Don’t press play until you turn the first page. And no peeking!

She already knew she would love whatever came out of that box, and when she removed the paper, she found his cellphone (she recognized it from the huge crack on the screen), connected to headphones on top of more tissue paper.

She took the phone, put on the headphones and unlocked it. It opened to a spotify playlist titled From A to Jay and Amy was already smiling wide when she removed the last sheet of tissue paper to reveal what was underneath it.

And oh, boy.

Jake had made a scrapbook.

She takes it from the box and when she gets a good look at the title, she’s giggling. “The Peraltiago Story”. After the bartender had named that drink after them, Jake started using the term to refer to the both of them any chance he could.

After settling the scrapbook on her lap, she turns the page and grabs the phone to press play.

The second the beats of “Funky Cold Medina” start playing, Amy’s full on laughing. She already knew what this was about and just like every time she hears that song, her mind goes back to her first few weeks at the 99.

After the most awkward first encounter she had ever had with human being thanks to Charles, both Jake and Amy tended to avoid being alone with each other as much as they could. That’s why, Amy recalls, she’d been nervous when they worked on their very first case together. A case that, as luck would have it, required long hours of staking out in Jake’s old Mustang.

At first they were quiet, talking only when absolutely necessary and looking at everything except at each other. But, within 15 minutes of sitting in a car in silence, Jake’s restlessness got the best of him and he pressed play on the very old cassette player on the console and Funky Cold Medina started playing. Amy rolled her eyes but didn’t say anything as Jake followed the beat of the song on the steering wheel with his hands.

Then the song ended.

Then it started again.

The reason Captain Holt had said “you can’t work with Jake Peralta for three years without knowing what the Funky Cold Medina is” a few years ago was because that goddamn cassingle was stuck in the deck and Jake didn’t see that as a problem at all.

That meant that any person who was lucky enough to sit in his car for any period of time would be listening to Funky Cold Medina over and over and over again.

Amy tried to endure it, she really did. But around the time the song played for a fourth time, her annoyance was through the roof and she kindly asked “Detective Peralta” to turn off the music.

Unfortunately for her, she had not managed to hide her discontentment very well and that was her undoing. Amy remembered Jake’s eyes actually start to sparkle as he realized how pissed off she was and all of sudden, he had a target.

“No. It’s my car, I’m driving, I get to choose what I want to listen.”

“First of all, you’re not choosing what you want listen. You’re choosing to listen to the most irritating song on the planet repeatedly for no reason other than to annoy me. Second of all, your “car” stinks. I bet this this hasn’t been cleaned in about a year, at least.” Amy said as she moved to shut the thing down.

“I’m going to ignore those very rude things you just said. So, you like bets, huh? Let’s play a game. Every round I win, I get one play. Every round you win, you get 5 minutes of silence.”

Amy didn’t bat an eye.

“30”

“20”

“Deal. What game?”

“Hm… Oh, I know. Two truths and one lie. You’re the new girl, gotta prove your detecting abilities to the best detective of the 99th Precinct.”

“I have to prove absolutely nothing to you.”

“Okayyyyy. Should I go first?”

They played the game for the duration of the stake out. That’s how he found out about her seven brothers, her teeth brushing obsession and her eleven straight birthdays at the planetarium. That’s how she found out about his horrifying eating habits, his six massage chairs and about pineapples.

He had thought she was a nerd.

She had thought he was a mess.

Now they were getting married.

God. Amy thinks, as she catches up with the present time and focuses her attention on the previously forgotten scrapbook on her lap, the song still playing through the headphones.

As her eyes ran over the page, her smile grew wider. Amy had no idea how Jake managed to do this but he had actually found the outtakes of the first official portrait of the 99th Precinct Squad after Amy joined them. It was a few day after their first stake out together and ever since then, they had fallen into a comfortable dynamic. He’d tease her, she’d hit back, and vice versa.

The day that portrait was taken, Jake had done his very best to screw up as many takes as possible, making Amy as annoyed as possible. Under the title “SONG #1” (written in his painfully ugly handwriting), there were about seven of those discarded pictures attached to the page with what Amy recognized as some of the washi tapes from her stationary collection. In each one of them Jake had the silliest face imaginable and Amy had an increasing frown.

She rolled her eyes at the memory. It was okay, though. The next day she came in earlier and reorganized Jake’s desk. His absolute panic at the pristine conditions of his workplace was incredibly satisfying to Amy.

The song ended and Amy startled when she realized there was someone banging on the bathroom door.

“Amy?”

Rosa.

She pressed pause before the next song started playing.

#this is why i haven't written anything else these last few weeks #including the prompts in my inbox #but i will get to them soon!!#anyways #i hope you like this #jake x amy #peraltiago #b99 #b99 fic #jake x amy fic #b99 fanfic #my writing #my stuff

66 notes · View notes

acertaincritic · 7 years ago

Text

The Last Jedi - Opinion

To say that I have mixed feelings about this movie would be a serious understatement. I have a chaos in my head, a tangle of let-down hopes, pleasant surprises, and above all else, my inner critic’s ramblings. One thing I can say for sure – it’s better than “The Force Awakens”. But I guess it doesn’t tell you much, eh? Well, let’s try and unpack this mess, shall we?

Heavy spoilers under the cut.

But I mean it.

I. Do. Not. Hold. Back.

Where do we start when all the words fail us? How do we begin to describe the infinity? Eh, I don’t know. But for this movie, let’s start with all the good things, and then dive right into the bad stuff. Pretty much like “The Last Jedi” does.

So… Characters. I was surprised to find that I actually came to like Finn in this movie. He’s proactive, he’s heroic, he’s got motivation – a solid character now, that guy. Rose I liked too, and Poe, and of course good ol’ Leia. Luke was outstanding, and even more so Kylo Ren. Almost every character (see who’s missing?) got better by miles; I was sincerely afraid for some of them, and sad to see others go. Whoever was the screenwriter, they’re definitely praiseworthy.

Next. Special effects, camera work, music… But I don’t really have to list these, do I? What else do we expect from a high-budget Disney movie these days? Scene writing – and directing – was pretty good too. An example: we pick up with Rey just where she ended in the last movie: offering Anakin’s lightsaber to Luke on a forgotten island… He takes it, and then throws it away like nothing – brilliant! That’s the last thing the viewer expects, but at the very same, it aligns very well with Jedi’s ideal of not getting attached to things. To Luke, a Jedi Master, this lightsaber means nothing. It’s a little twist, but a twist that makes sense.

There’s plenty of other fun moments too. Luke teaching Rey the first lesson about the Force? With a blade of grass? I cracked a smile then, and at many other occasions too. Unfortunately, at some point creators seem to have got lost in the form, and stopped caring about the substance – more on that in a second.

Kylo-Rey talks. I loved it. Even more I loved the way Luke-Kylo past was revealed, complete with the little tweaks. When Luke first gives his lie about how he just went to Kylo to talk, this is what we see on screen – a memory he wants to remember. When it’s Kylo’s turn, we see Luke from his POV – a mad killer ready to strike. When we finally get to know the truth, we can see how both the versions came to be, and the whole picture makes an awful lot of sense.

Kylo and Rey vs Snoke. There are problems with this scene, undoubtedly, but overall I would be willing to forget them if not for what followed. Before that, though – the way Kylo killed Snoke was just perfect. I was holding my fingers crossed the entire sequence, and was not let down. Just. Why couldn’t the movie end right then and there?

That would be this. All the pleasant surprises listed above. Should I let my inner critic speak now? And heck, he has a lot to say…

Troublesome worldbuilding and inconsistencies

This is something that I care the least for, when compared to the other stuff, but it’s still a huge problem. See, there are things in this movie that just don’t make sense, or render the past actions laughable. The most obvious thing – destroying a super big imperial ship by jumping into hyperspace for a split of second, then dropping out of it. And I ask – if that’s possible, why didn’t we see any other character do it? Where’re the hyper-drive based missiles, why didn’t the Rebellion use this trick anytime before? Judging by the scale of destruction, they could’ve easily destroyed a Death Star with it – no need for a suicidal mission for a few dozens of pilots, let’s just send a single kamikaze. Bah, if a human can do it, then all the more a droid or a well-programmed computer. We see the ball take control of an imperial walker after all, why can’t it steer a ship as well? No need for anyone to die, let’s just keep building droids and ships with hyper-drive… Oh no, actually, the Empire can do it as well! Look how funny the battle scenes look now – like two fleets of comets raining against each other. Well.

Time flow is another serious problem. We know that the plot is supposed to take 18 hours – and yet Rey manages not only to spend at least a day on Luke’s planet (it feels like much longer), but also to return to the Rebellion in time for her facedown with Snoke and Kylo. What happened? Previously, even travelling by hyperspace took long hours; now it functions like teleportation.

There’re many other problems like this, and I’m sure you’ll find science nerds to list ‘em all. I’ll stop at this – I believe you see the point. And, like I said, this is the least of the problems.

The Force and its philosophy

Long story short, the Force is pretty much omnipotent right now. The sky is the limit! No, wait, actually, the sky is but a little obstacle… After all, Luke’s got no problems fighting Kylo through the Force when he’s in some faraway point of the galaxy. The creators were careful enough not to show us any actual map, but even assuming that they were barely a system away, these are still light years apart. Even in the Prequel Trilogy, for all its flashy somersaults and prophetic dreams, Force Users were not wizards. They could fall to the fire of a few blasters, and they weren’t able to do much against a full unit of fighters. But here? Who cares! Everything can be done, starting with reading one’s entire mind, finishing at surviving in the vacuum for long minutes and even levitating to safety. Basically Jedi are the new Superman of the galaxy, ugh.

Don’t get me wrong. I like magic, and I like the concept of the Force as something more mystical than just ‘microorganisms living in one’s body’. Previously I was often irritated that the characters don’t use it as often as they could, or that they do something outstanding one moment to forget about it twenty minutes later. But here? Here the creators went over the top, then climbed up the Mount Everest, and then decided that they’re still too low. The perfect balance of Force abilities I found in “The Rebels” seasons one and two – here it’s completely broken.

Speaking about the balance… the philosophy is a problem as well. It’s clearly established that the balance of the Force means both the Dark Side and the Light Side. That when there’s great light, there’s also great darkness. The problem is, it doesn’t make sense. If that was the balance, then what about the Chosen One? Why would Jedi wait for him, knowing that he would have to destroy them? Bah, is there any sense fighting for the Light then? We know for sure that the evil will only rise again, because ~balance~. What kind of message is that?

See, previously, the balance of the Force was the Light Side. The Jedi’s philosophy was to surrender to the will of the Force, to preserve harmony. The Dark Side, on the other hand, was extracting your will over the Force. Literally forcing events to go your way. This was why Jedi had various colors of lightsabers, and the Sith only red. This was why Sith’s eyes would change color – to reflect that what they were doing wasn’t natural. Bah, eventually their bodies would rot and turn ugly, distorted. The Light Side Users didn’t suffer that.

Now it’s all over the place. And it doesn’t make sense. Honestly, I never found the idea of surrendering to an outside will compelling, but at least it was consisted and provided a great explanation as to why the Sith are evil, and the Jedi good. Sure, you can say that the Jedi Order eventually rotted and let Darth Sidious rise – but it was because of their complacency and tendency to choose meddling in the politics over guarding the galaxy, not because something was inherently wrong with their philosophy. Now it’s because it was necessary for the balance, apparently.

Structure problems

Putting the clumsy worldbuilding aside, the first two-thirds of the movie are really great. The characters get development. We learn about what happened between Luke and Kylo. Kylo and Rey are having their strange conversations, really enjoyable to watch and adding depth to both of them. Then their showdown with Snoke – and what a twist, Kylo kills his evil master in a clever moment of badassery. And the fight! And Finn and Rose get captured! And the rebel ships are being destroyed one by one! But eventually Kylo and Rey win – what a great finale!

Just that… it’s not the finale yet. There’s another twist – Kylo’s not good after all, he killed his master only to take his place! And the imperial ship got cut in half by a kamikaze attack, so Finn and Rose have to run away ASAP! And the rebels reach their old base, hurray! What a great fina–

No, wait! The baze is now under attack by Kylo! And nobody responds to the rebels’ call for help, and they’re trapped inside, they have to destroy the big-ass cannon that the imperials have brought, and Finn is ready to commit suicide to do so, what a great f–

But wait! Finn is saved by Rose, and Luke suddenly comes for the rescue, now he’s facing against Kylo, and–

Do you see it? There’s no finale in this movie. There’re a good few sequences that would work very well as the finale, if they stood alone. But they don’t – they come one by one, with little to no break in between. The first one’s great, the second a surprise, but the third is tiresome, and the fourth straight-out irritating. You just can’t hold your viewer on the edge for so long – they want a conclusion, not an endless cycle of ‘they almost made it but...’ And I must say, the twists are very cheap too. No foreshadowing whatsoever, no satisfaction when they happen – all save the Snoke scene. Why the creators didn’t decide to go through with what the story was clearly building up to is beyond me. It was perfect, it was interesting, it was against the tropes – and yet they turned around in the last moment. It’s like an overly elaborate matryoshka doll. You unpack a layer after a layer, at first interested but then progressively more annoyed, hoping to finally find the last, whole doll – but in the end there’s nothing inside, just empty air.

Seriously, I felt like the creators were jumping at me from behind the corner, crying, ‘Surprise!’, in their childish belief thinking that they are being clever. But you can laugh at a cheap trick like this once, twice, maybe even thrice – then you’ll find that you’ve had enough. You don’t want every corner to be a playground for the insistent kid. Pulling things out of your ass is not a plot twist.

Just too many unfulfilled promises. After this crazy ride, we ended up just where we started, with a very cliche ending. I can’t even express how massively disappointed I am.

Rey

When I was a child, I dreamt of a female Jedi, you know? I imagined countless little stories of kinda-my-insert training, and eagerly pinpointed female Jedi among the fallen ones in the “Revenge of the Sith” to prove to myself that it was possible.

Nevertheless, Rey is by far the worst Star Wars lead I have ever seen.

She’s nothing. She has no character at all. No writing, no backstory, no motivation to be a hero. Luke wanted to be a Jedi because he wanted to be like his father – and then he had to grow and mature when he discovered his father’s true identity. Rey doesn’t grow, doesn’t mature. You can’t grow something that is nonexistent in the first place.

Why did Rey help Finn and the rebels in “The Force Awakens”? Even Rose has her reasons – she gives us a story of how Empire destroyed her home planet. But what did Empire do to Rey? Nothing. It was her parents who left her on Jakku as a slave. Sure, she wanted to be free, have adventures, just like Luke. But she didn’t have to join rebellion for that. She could’ve just left them once she got off Jakku, become a smuggler, bah, an imperial officer even. Why not?

To Luke, Empire was what killed his father. He wanted revenge, in some extent, I’m certain. Sure, that conviction turned out to be false – but he didn’t know about it when he left Tatooine with Obi-Wan and Han Solo. Rey doesn’t have a motivation. There’s just this weak ‘because everybody can see that Empire is EVUIL, mwhahaha.’ But really, this is a meta reason and as such, should not be considered at all. We as the audience can see it – Rey cannot.

Worse, even. In the second movie, Luke had to face his own Dark Side. First in the cave, where he failed, then in the form of Darth Vader who turned out to be his father – the man Luke had strived to imitate. He thought that it meant becoming a hero, just to discover that he was so, oh so wrong. But at this point he had grown close with the rebellion, with Leia and Han. He had other reasons to fight.

Rey didn’t change in this movie. What was the point of her cave scene? She went in there, saw some funny vision, and went out. No shock, nothing learned. ‘But, Critic,’ you may say, ‘she had an arc this time – she wanted to find out who her parents are!’

No. Just no. Yes, it was mentioned several times, but it was also 100% superficial. It was as if the creators realized that hey, our protagonist is completely bland, we need to give her something – and decided that of course, searching for her parents would be the right thing. Luke had something similar, right? The problem is, this searching in no way reflects in Rey’s actions.

Had it really been an integral part of Rey’s character, she would have taken Kylo’s hand.

Why not? She supposedly struggled to accept the truth that her parents were nobody, that they sold her and then died somewhere away, that they didn’t want her – and here’s the guy that does want her, that begs her to join him. Why shouldn’t she take his offer? From what she knew, Luke abandoned his mission and preferred staying on his tiny island to saving the galaxy. Why shouldn’t she join Kylo, who had just saved her from Snoke, with whom she had faced against multiple opponents?

There’s only one reason – because it’s not what heroes do. But Rey has no reason to be a hero! Bah, she didn’t even need to learn from anybody, she was a perfect good girl from the start. She’s the one lecturing Luke about his duties, not the other way round. Even Yoda states that she already knows what it means to be a Jedi. How? Why? How dare you ask! She’s super powerful because, uhm, ah… I know! Because balance! Because when Dark Kylo grows stronger, then so does Rey, because she’s his counterpart in the Light.

Don’t you find it ironic? The creators pretty much admitted that Kylo was the one who did all the heavy lifting. Rey’s power isn’t something she achieved – she was given it by the Force for the sake of ill-understood balance, because Kylo worked hard to grow more powerful.

Blah. And the creators probably congratulate themselves on writing a strong female lead. How condescending can you get? I want a female Jedi as the lead – but I want a female Jedi who is a character, not a mere plot device with a ‘woman’ slapped on the back as her only characteristic. I’ll eagerly wait for one – right now, I can only turn to “Clone Wars” and Ahsoka.

That would be all. I’m pretty sure that I missed plenty of things – but I feel fulfilled nonetheless. Thank you for reading so far, and may the Salt be with you. Always.

#the last jedi #star wars #rey #kylo ren #luke skywalker #opinion #analysis

14 notes · View notes