#which is exactly how good queerbait should be imo

[lloydfrontera]

so i was crying about javier always greeting lloyd with "it's been a while master lloyd" regardless of how long it's been since they last talked, about lloyd telling him they're gonna be mistaken for the cowherd and the weaver girl if someone hears javier say that to him and lloyd knowing exactly how long it's been since he and javier met in person, down to the very day, "107 years, 7 months and 17 days". as one does. and then i got curious about whether there was any significance to the fact there's so many sevens in that number and i-

right. yeah cool that's. that's really. such. such a funny coincidence. yeah. really swell. what. what are the chances of that uh.

[wellofdean]

Sorry ,for me personally, it has to be out loud acknowledge to even remotely make up for how badly they treated fans over the years, the out loud queerbaiting in one breath and mocking in the next. The in text gay jokes, sexism and homophobia. The digs at their own fans.

They want the credit without having to do it. Again. They want the pat on the back they need to earn it this time.

Years of baiting for views and profit needs a payoff imo. Sorry people downplaying how important the canonization of this ship in particular is just hurts to see over and over. Stop letting them off the hook please. You deserve more. We all do.

It’s important. It does matter.

The cas/destiel hope baiting continued with the Winchesters and that’s why I’m at a put up or shut up moment with Jensen and the writers. He and Danneel kept the hype up every week that the show was airing all the while knowing cas doesn’t even get a name drop. He’s not even hinted at. Mary/john paralleled destiel so many times yet refused to call it want it was.

They could have shut it down week one, they interacted on tweeter a lot during airing and knew what fans thought there was going to be an acknowledgment or hint that never happened. They are smart people, they saw the speculation and hype but didn’t step in with a gentle ‘sorry guys this is about the new crew’ they fanned the hope instead with ‘something big happens’ that was just dean meeting the new team.

Loved the Winchesters as a show, sad it got dropped cause I loved the new cast so much. That said the baiting hurt and wasn’t necessary, the show was good.

Everyone is looking back with rose colored glasses and rewriting history. But things were ugly with the spn team/cast/writers at times. The homophobia was pretty out loud in a way it was allowed to be in the early 00s. They’ve grown and that’s wonderful but it still happened.

They need to earn the praise they want imo. No hate! Glad you are happy! just feels a little unfair to say we should all let them off the hook again and be happy with nothing while praising the benevolent straights. Just my two cents 😅💚💙

I want to answer this sympathetically, because I know it's disappointing that no one has been willing to just say "Dean and Cas are gay for each other" out loud, and I don't think there are many people in this fandom who picked up what the narrative was putting down, and were not disappointed in the finale for LOADS of reasons, only one of them being that Dean never had the chance to acknowledge what Cas said to him. I understand your feelings, my anonymous friend, I really do. I too found the end of Supernatural deeply frustrating, because they managed to erase the meaningful journeys of every single character, not just Dean, though what they did with Dean was the worst. I completely understand wanting them to JUST FUCKING SAY IT. I do. I get you. I simply do not agree.

My argument, which I have made many, many times, is that what you want is THERE in the narrative. They made Cas Dean's ride or die, they made it obvious that Dean can't carry on without Cas -- that the loss of Cas means Dean loses his will to live. That was explicit. They made it clear that more than anyone else, EVEN Sam, Cas is essential to him. They structured the narrative around Dean and Cas's emotional beats. They let Cas say the obvious thing out loud, and then showed us Dean behaving exactly as Dean would in a situation like that -- in the midst of his existential crisis about who he is and whether he has ever had free will, and with the world falling around them -- they showed us Dean unable to speak, unable to respond but overwhelmed with emotion. Like, remember that when Mary died when Dean was four, he was unable to speak? Is it really so hard to imagine that he loves Cas with all his heart? To read love in Dean's watery eyes, and the way he chokes down his heart and begs Cas not to do this? Not to being saying goodbye? I mean... I CAN DO THAT MATH. Literally everything about the story supports it. IT IS THERE.

Fandom always argues: if Cas were a woman, we wouldn't have any questions, so what I am just wondering is, why do we have questions again? Is it because we (homophobically) can't just see it for what it is because it's gay? Because, when it's gay we lose our ability to interpret narrative, and we need to be told, like we are 5 years old, what's happening in a perfectly obvious story? Or, is it a skill issue? Is it because we need the creators of the story to affirm our interpretation? We need the actors to just TELL US what they meant when they did that thing with their faces? Do we need their permission to understand it for what it is?

I've said many times that calling what happened on Supernatural 'queerbaiting' because no one ever made out or fucked on the maps table is really offensive to me actually. Don't you know that there are queer people in this world who never get to live their truths? Who just ache and yearn and want, and never get to have? Like, that there are in fact queer people who are afraid to say what they feel, or who don't understand or embrace who they really are and what they really need until it's too late? Are those not QUEER EXPERIENCES? I love Dean and I love that story because it's queer as hell and it makes ME feel seen, because I am like him! I am a queer person of his age who didn't ask myself those questions seriously enough in time! My own queerness is very fucking real, and it is UNLIVED. That HAPPENS to actual queer humans, and like, it's not queerbaiting when it's just queer, but didn't tell you the queer story YOU wanted it to tell. You saw years of tease? I saw years of choices, and love, and accretion of deep wells of emotion. I saw a clear romance, and a character becoming. It was a story I needed, AS A QUEER PERSON.

And the Winchesters was just joyful if you went in with that understanding of the previous story. It was like getting an A+ in Supernatural week after week from Dean himself. I can accept that the stars didn't align for Cas/Misha to come back in the first season, accept that if he were coming back, it needed to be more than a cameo to make it right, and that it didn't work out. I am so sad it was cancelled, but I can accept that it was leading someplace it didn't get to go. That's not queerbaiting, either! It's telling a story that was aborted, and I think if you don't see that, then that is DEFINITELY a skill issue.

I'm not looking back with rose coloured glasses; Supernatural is fresh in my mind. I watched it again without the internal pressure of expectations that aren't going to be met, and let it tell me what it was really doing all along. I am happy. It's a really compelling, deeply romantic, deeply queer story. I don't need permission from anyone involved to think that, and I don't need it explained to me. I understand wanting it to just be fully explicit, but I would not trade the story it did tell for a simpler, less engaging one, that asked less of me. I love it very much AS IT IS.

And, please: point me to this fabled abuse of fans. I have never really seen an example of it that is not easily debunked with a little bit of context.

[musclesandhammering]

Every Single Issue I Have With S*lki (It’s Not Just The Selfcest)

Here goes. I threatened to post this a few days ago and never did, but I just saw a s*lki stan Twitter account claim that Loki caring about Sylvie more than the whole multiverse was a Good And Romantic thing and it pushed me over the fucking edge, so now you all have to read this. I’ve divided it into categories cause there’s just THAT much.

OOC Bullshit

• First and foremost, no amount of mental gymnastics you do will ever make me believe that this specific Loki- the one that just invaded New York, that just came off a year of Thanos Torture, that just got done being influenced by the sceptre, that was literally in the middle of a crisis already, and then on top of that went through all the trauma of Ep 1- would even be worried about a romantic relationship. That would be the furthest thing from his mind. Go back and watch how he acted in Avengers- you think that guy would abandon his previous mission to become a snivelling simp for a girl he’d just met 3 days prior? Yeah, there’s no universe in which that makes sense.

• “It’s very in character for Loki to fall in love with himself lololol-“ NO, it’s literally not. Out of all the characters in the mcu, I don’t think I can think of anyone that genuinely hates themselves more than Loki. He even referred to all his other male variants as “monsters” and said meeting them was “a nightmare” in this series. He’s got so much self-loathing, plus the fact that he genuinely thinks himself to be an evil backstabbing scourge- so there’s no evidence at all suggesting that he would ever develop a fondness for, or even be inclined to trust, another version of himself, after only knowing them for 3 days.

• Building on that, the whole concept of Loki falling in love with a version of himself just feeds into the annoying ass misconception that he’s a narcissist. No matter which way you stack it, he’s not. If you’re referring to NPD, he doesn’t fit the criteria, and if you’re saying “narcissist” just as a slang term meaning “selfish and arrogant”, that still doesn’t accurately describe him. But when creators like Waldron and Herron do things like having him fall in love with himself, it makes it so much easier for casual viewers to think that he is.

Shitty LGBT Rep

• It’s kinda sus that Loki’s are allegedly genderfluid and yet the only female-presenting variant we see (and apparently the only female-presenting variant there is, cause the male Loki’s all seemed unfamiliar with the concept) is treated as some kind of mind-bogglingly special paradox. Also very sus that, out of all the Loki variants, the one our Loki falls in love with just so happens to be the only female one. What a coincidence.

• The fact that the creators of the show went around bragging about Loki’s bisexuality and Marvel purposefully (lbr) allowed stories about Loki possibly having a male love interest to circulate, specifically enticing queer viewers to watch the show (you know, the definition of queerbaiting), and then instead of having a male love interest (Loki was the first queer main character, so it was the perfect opportunity) they gave us *gestures to this dumpster fire* this… it’s just a middle finger to LGBT fans. The fact that they would rather have this relationship with all its myriad of problems than have a gay relationship is just……. Very telling.

• While him being with a woman obviously doesn’t refute his bisexuality, the fact that they showed/talked about him being interested in 3 different women (flight attendant, Sylvie, Sif) and never even hinted at him being attracted to a man, definitely makes it seem like they were trying to cover up his bisexuality to smooth things over with the more homophobic viewers. You know? It’s like “I know you’re pissed that we sorta confirmed Loki as bi, so we promise we’ll never mention it again! Or even hint at it! As a matter of fact, we’ll give him lots of female lovies and make him seem as straight as possible! That’ll take your mind off of that horrible crumb of queer rep, right? Please please please keep giving us your money!!!”

• Aside from all the other issues, at its core, the biggest reason why I think I’m so irritated with s*lki is that it took one of the most interesting, complex, and diverse characters in cinema atm and squished him into a tired ass unnecessary heteronormative subplot…. Like literally every. single. other. protagonist. ever. Loki is such a unique character, and it’s so so so incredibly disappointing that they stuck him into that same boring cookie cutter romance that happens to every other character in every other movie I’ve ever seen. It’s a disservice, and it’s honestly just not compelling or entertaining at all.

Thematic Issues Galore

• His arc didn’t need a romance. With anyone. It was unnecessary and it didn’t make sense plot-wise. In fact, one of the reasons he was my fav prior to this was because he was the only big-name mcu character whose story wasn’t muddied-up by a romance that didn’t need to be there. So much for that.

• He wasn’t emotionally ready for a romantic relationship with anyone. Hell, just a genuine friendship would’ve been pushing it for him at this point. He was in such a bad state that any relationship he got into would’ve been toxic and unhealthy for both him and the other person, and it doesn’t make sense why the writers would want to put him in one when there were so many cons and essentially no pros (other than “Uwu aren’t they cute together”).

• Sylvie’s character in general was unnecessary and Loki’s character was robbed just by her being there. The whole show became about her post-Ep 2. They spent most of the time giving her backstory, building her up, telling us how awesome she is, trying to convince us to like her, etc when what they really needed to be doing was building Loki up- cause I gotta say, if I had to describe TVA!Loki in a few words, they would be Flat, Boring, and Weak.

• The romance overtakes the plot. They spend time portraying their supposed connection that could’ve been spent adding depth and complexity to literally any of the characters. They make the big Nexus Event them giving each other googly eyes on Lamentis when it could’ve been so many other way more profound things that speak to the fundamental nature of Loki’s. They have the climax of the finale be “oh no she betrayed him to kill He Who Remains” when it could’ve been something way more compelling (Loki having a moral crisis over whether or not to kill HWR, Loki contemplating the state of the multiverse and weighing the pros and cons of freedom vs order, Loki looking into some What If situations and getting emotional about what could’ve been regarding his family, Loki realising the gravity of HWR’s offer and finally coming to terms with how important he is to the universal cycle, etc etc). The entire plot suffered in favour of a romance that half of us didn’t even want.

• It essentially reduced all of Loki’s potential character growth down to “He did it for his crush.” He seemed to at least have some motivations of his own in Ep 1-2 (feeble as they were) but after Sylvie showed up in Ep 3, literally every action he took was just him being a simp for her. Why did he lie in the interrogation? To try to protect Sylvie. Why did he fight the minutemen and Timekeepers? To survive kinda, but mostly cause it was important to Sylvie. Why did he get pruned? Cause he got distracted trying to confess his crush to Sylvie. Why did he try to get out of The Void? Cause he thought Sylvie needed him. Why did he stay in The Void? Cause Sylvie was staying. Why did he try to enchant Alioth? Cause Sylvie told him to. Why did the multiverse get cracked open, leading to an infinite number of Kangs waging war on all of existence? Cause Loki didn’t wanna hurt Sylvie in their fight at the Citadel and then get distracted by her kissing him. It’s uninteresting and honestly pretty embarrassing.

• Throughout their “relationship arc” the writers do their absolute damndest to convince us that we should like Sylvie more than Loki. And you know what? It’s the most hypocritical shit I’ve ever seen. They preach and preach about how Sylvie’s life has been so difficult/we should feel bad for her/she had it so bad/poor poor sylvie/she had it SO much worse than pampered prince Loki…. But then they never even touch on any of Loki’s trauma of hardships (the ones that have been ignored for literally 3 movies now). They frame Sylvie as a good person and a Freedom Fighter after she spent literal decades/centuries mass-murdering brainwashed TVA agents and showing exactly zero remorse for it….. but then they make it their mission to constantly remind us that Loki is a terrible person and constantly put him in situations where he’s forced to acknowledge his wrongdoings/show remorse/admit to how “evil” he is for being a mass murderer for like 2 years. They show him on-screen having a wider range of powers than her, and perpetuate his whole shtick of being a “master manipulator” or whatever….. But then they make Sylvie “the brawn” more competent, intelligent, and physically capable than him. Tell me how it’s a good thing for a ship to be so narratively biased toward one character.

Missed Opportunities

• If they absolutely had to have a romance subplot, then they could’ve paired Loki with one of the characters that have already been established OR one of the characters that were a big part of the whole TVA storyline anyway. It would’ve been so interesting if they’d revealed that Loki had a history with some of the players from previous films (Sif and Fandral both come to mind). It also would’ve been really interesting if they’d given Loki a love interest that actually had some allegiance to the TVA as a whole (Mobius maybe, but not necessarily. It also could’ve been Renslayer or B-15). Hell, imo it would’ve been cool if they’d followed through with that “See you again someday” line that he said to the flight attendant in Ep 1. ALL of these characters have way more chemistry with him than Sylvie, and they were also already relevant to the plot without wasting half the show to give background info on them.

• If they absolutely had to have a hetero-presenting love story involving an enchantress-type figure, then there’s a whole Enchantress (Amora) that was actually Loki’s love interest in the comics. Plus, fans have been screaming for Amora to appear in the mcu for years. Plus, Tom literally pitched an Amora/Loki storyline way back in 2012-13. Also, Lorelei (another enchantress) is also one of Loki’s love interests in the comics, and she already exists in the mcu (she was on Agents of SHIELD). There were several different established characters for them to choose from. Creating a whole knew amalgamation of a character and going with the “she’s a Loki variant” storyline was just completely unnecessary and made no sense.

• They completely robbed us of a Chaos Twins dynamic. Had they handled Sylvie better and not forced her and Loki to smooch, the two of them could’ve had a really really complex and interesting sibling relationship. Loki could’ve stepped into Thor’s shoes and sort of used that new role to gain some self importance, and Sylvie could’ve finally had somebody to look out for her/teach her magic/be there for her. It would’ve been very aesthetically pleasing, the vibes would’ve been out of this world, it would’ve been way more profound than this bs, and frankly it would’ve been much more entertaining to watch.

• Loki’s relationship (read: obsession) with Sylvie completely overshadows all Loki’s other relationships in the show. Loki and Mobius were literally the focal point of the series in Ep 1-2, but after Sylvie showed up in Ep 3, they barely had any interactions with each other, and Mobius pretty much faded to the background entirely. Loki had the beginnings of a pretty interesting antagonistic relationship with Renslayer (with her wanting him pruned, then arguing with Mobius that he couldn’t be trusted), but after Sylvie showed up the dynamic shifted to focus on the history between her and Ravonna. Loki and B-15 started off very badly and openly disliked each other throughout Ep 1-2, and then in the end of Ep 2, Loki showed a little bit of concern for her when she was possessed, hinting that they might be inching toward a reconciliation- especially considering how obvious it was that Loki was gonna uncover the TVA’s sins eventually. There was so much potential for him to be the one to give her her memories back and convince her to change sides, but no, of course that honor went to Sylvie. In fact, after Sylvie showed up, Loki and B-15 never even spoke to each other again.

Various S*lki Fails

• If they were trying to convince us that this affection was mutual, they completely failed. There’s nothing I’ve seen that even hints at Sylvie feeling the same way about Loki that he does about her. At most, I’d say she has a slight endearment to him. She finds him likeable and she’s grudgingly fond of him, but she definitely isn’t in love with the guy. Maybe she thinks he’s cute and hopes that he gets out of this mess alright, but her mission obviously comes before him- whereas, it’s been confirmed multiple times that Loki cares about her above anything else. She doesn’t trust him, she looks at him like he’s an incompetent fool half the time, she shows little to no reaction during most of his confession moments, and she kissed him as a means to distract him so that she could get him out of her way. Look, all I’m saying is, when you get into a relationship where one of you is way more invested than the other, it never ends well.

• This goes without saying for a lot of us, but the selfcest is just straight up odd and cringey. If you’re cool with that sort of thing, fine! People can ship what they want! But don’t pretend it’s not at least a little bit uncomfortable. Yes, I know they’re not technically siblings so it’s not technically incest, and they’re also not technically the exact same person, but they’re similar enough that it makes things weird. And yes I know selfcest can’t happen in real life, so there’s no way to judge it morally, but neither can most of the other stuff that happens in these shows/movies (the Snap, Loki destroying jotunheim, superhero with powers being held accountable, mind control) and yet we still find ways to judge their morality, because they all mirror real-world events. (The snap= genocide; Loki destroying Jotunheim= bombing other countries; superhero accountability= weapons accountability; mind control= grooming and coercion). And lbr the closest real-world mirror to two versions of the same person (who may or may not share DNA, family, backgrounds, physical and emotion characteristics) being romantically involved with one another is incest. And you can be ok with that if you want- that’s your prerogative- but don’t get pissy just cause a lot of us are squicked out by it.

• The whole mirror metaphor (learning self love via each other) thing just fell completely flat. First of all, having Loki learn to love himself by looking at someone who mirrors him did not, in any way shape or form, require them to be romantically involved. But they were. Of course. Secondly, the creators have contradicted themselves so many times on whether Loki and Sylvie are the same or not, that it doesn’t even really register to the viewer that the mirroring thing was what they were going for. Finally, Loki and Sylvie are shown to have so little in common- and to have only the most bare minimum of similarities personality-wise- that it doesn’t even make sense that Loki would “learn to love himself through loving her”. Like? They’re nothing alike. So how would he make the connection that he himself is actually pretty cool, based on her alone? There’s virtually nothing in her that reflects him.

• I know the objective of the entire show was to convince us of how awesome and unique Sylvie is, but honestly her relationship with Loki just did the opposite. A hallmark of a Mary Sue is having her constantly upstage the male lead, and then having him instantly fall madly in love with her anyway. And that’s.. exactly what happened here. Everything they’re doing to try to force her character to be more stan-able is really just forcing her to look more like their self-insert OC. Which is exactly what she is. It would’ve been so much more satisfying if she didn’t have to try so hard to look cool, if they didn’t have to try so hard to make her backstory tear-inducing, if they didn’t have to turn our protagonist into a snivelling simp just to prove how incredible she supposedly is. Very much #GirlBoss energy and we all know how performative and cheap that is.

• The entire thing was too rushed, there was too little build-up, and it was nowhere near believable. As stated above, it’s ridiculously unlikely that Loki would canonically even be interested in Sylvie, and this show did nothing to explain why he was. He just suddenly was. There was nothing they showed us as viewers that would justify a guy as closed-off and preoccupied as Loki falling head-over-heels for a girl he just met. Their was no explanation, no big revelation, no reasoning, it just… kinda happened. And I’m also severely skeptical of any love story that has the characters go in this deep after only 3 45-minute episodes of exposition.

I’m sure there’s other stuff, so if anyone thinks of anything, let me know and I’ll be more than happy to add it. Tagging @janetsnakehole02 @raifenlf @natures-marvel and @brightredsunset800 for expressing interest. This is all your faults.

[icharchivist]

Your reblog reminded me of the time years ago (2018? 2019?) when I saw someone on twitter say that lancelot/vane was queerbait and I just stared at my screen like that tails meme because I couldn't believe what I was reading

Oh my goddddd

i'm so tired i swear i'm so tired of those things oh my god. oh my gooooood.

I've seen legit Queerbaitings, like, the ones that are from Markettings to the audience fooling us into watching straight shit. It's its own very nasty thing that is different from ship tease and i wish people would understand that.

I especially hate when this framing is attributed to mobage of the type of granblue because it's usually down to the DNA of the game that they're doing that. They usually can't exactly confirm stuff (unless they have to make a big story around it) because they use it also to "tease" self insert shipping with those characters.

They're trying to appeal to demographic that cares about shipping other characters together AND those who ship themselves with the characters in question.

As such i find it especially to be a bad faith critic to call it queerbaiting. Whenever you find this approach tasteful or not, it's mostly a brand of fanservice, but you're expected to know it when you interreact with it.

Queerbaiting is the cast and crew and marketting looking at you directly telling you "don't worry we'll totally give you rep those two chara especially are totally going to be rep for you" and then it never happens. like i'm thinking about the trailer for Riverdale that showed a lesbian kiss without context, so you would be intrigued, and then you watch the episode and you learn they only kissed to try to shock the audience in a staged show, and the person they did it in front of literally calls them out about how "girls kissing isn't as shocking anymore you know". and then the two girls involved in the kiss move on to flirt with guys they end up dating the rest of the show instead. Like. That's textbook Queerbaiting. It doesn't matter that this show has rep, it doesn't matter if ship are teased left and right, it doesn't even matter that they kissed for shock in the episode itself, what matters is that the promo was saying "hey, there's rep for you <3" and then you watch and you realize it's a lie.

There's a subtle line sometimes with just, implied romantic connection toward the show that is then never resolved, which imo, can count or can not count, depends really on context, but even there it gets more blurry (and it also is good to take into account that queerbaiting =/= queercoding from a place where they're not allowed by the studios to go this direction).

but for Mobage i'm really uninterested with any discussion of queerbaiting since imo it feels like people are genuinely refusing to engage with the fact the game is requesting you to interreact differently with its characters than you would watching a TV show. Not all media consumtions come to the same effort.

But also i should mention that the context of the post i reblogged is that people are now using "queerbaiting" to refer to real life people and that's genuinely horrifying, above any fandom petty discussion on it.

This post refers to the fact that the lead actor of Heartstopper, a TV show focusing a gay couple between two teens, was forcefully outed on twitter after people harrassed him for "queerbaiting" everyone by "pretending to be gay on TV while he's likely straight irl" and therefore he's.... baiting people by acting??? somehow???

Even if he was straight this attitude would be unacceptable, but what resulted was that this 19yo was so exhausted by the harassments and bullying he had to come out on twitter.

No real people owe you a coming out. No real people are queerbaiting you. Queerbaiting is a specific media framework you cannot use on people. Real life people don't gain anything by pretending to be queer. People involved in this harassments campaign better be ashamed of their behavior because this is vile.

And in general i'm really annoyed with how specific media analysis/critic framework are being used as means to specifically interreact with real life people while removed from the media analysis context. People are doing the same with Death of the Author which is annoying me to no end but that's another can of worm.

But the Queerbaiting thing is genuinely hurting people and i'm genuinely so angry at those people.

so, yeah, i say it again: i am begging people to learn what words mean. You're just diluting what useful expression mean and make them lose their impact and it is becoming exhausting.

[nonsensegnomes]

hi I trust your taste and opinion. A, is succession any good, and B, should I watch it

oh thank you <3 altho i’m afraid you must be the first person to still think i've any taste after seeing my blog, i mean We Post Supernatural Here Sir asjwdwehdewhfefasdhjsidq

okay so you posed this as two different questions so i'll try and answer it like that & keep the replies separated as objective vs subjective altho i guess tl;dr is: Yes lmao

A) so the annoying thing for me as like. a practicing contrarian, is i do have to admit that this show is exactly as good as tumblr & the academy & all your friends & probably your great-grandfather's ghost have already told you it is. the dialogue is hilarious and horrendous but also so naturalistic that it can kind of lull you into thinking that it's a normal way of speaking for an hour; the satire is so well-pronounced in a way it could only be after getting smoothed out by precursor shows like the thick of it & peep show, and yet there's real emotion beating at the heart of it which never gets undercut to serve a Point; the soundtrack adds so much weight to every moment that somehow the scenes you're most excited by can be the ones where the characters are Just Walking Somewhere; and turns out all that obscene wealth IS obscenely good to look at.

     so, unfortunately all the awards thrown at it are incredibly deserved, and if i weren’t currently (re)watching the sopranos & the wire i’d be one of those people up in arms about how it’s the most special-est tv show to ever deign to fit onto our screens – as it is i Do think it’s the best one airing atm, and it’s def going to find its place quite high up in the canon of prestige tv! (although i do think ppl overestimate the lear influence; they’re just riffing off of similar themes guys!!)

B) as to whether you’d personally like it! well,, listen as a fellow shameless & spn enjoyer, it really is like barely a question; like you know those moments in early seasons shameless when their lives would be doing okay for a moment + then monica would arrive back and just absolutely Bulldoze through the kids’ emotional stability until it’s one crying knotted-up mess that dredges up every toxic part of every family relationship? yeah that happens like every 2nd episode on succession and you’d think it would get old, And It Doesn’t!!! also watching kendall roy like zombie-shuffle through s2 was one of the most deeply satisfying & painful experiences i’ve had watching tv, so like. if you’re trying to figure out why treasured mutuals are making you look at gifsets of droopy old men.... it’s the poor little meow meow effect for SUREEE, and the only way out of that is through so you might as well join in!!

     my word of caution would be that obviously this site can lead you astray in getting into it For Gay Reasons. like, some fun repressed characterisation makes it so pretty much every roy sibling (plus tomgreg obvs, and ig excluding connor?) has SOMETHING homoerotic going on, but i don’t think it’s a service to the story to be engaging with it Only on that level; there’s a lot they’re saying deliberately which is far more interesting! (e.g. roman imo is written as not at all attracted to women, but it serves the show far better if he never addresses this directly/‘comes out’ & instead continues forcing himself into these sexual relationships with them anyway)

     on the other hand... i’m not saying they WON’T do tomgreg bc like. shit’s getting wild (but to be clear if they don’t i never said this – queerbait who?) on the OTHER other hand: If kenstew has a million fans, then I am one of them. If kenstew has ten fans, then I am one of them. If kenstew has only one fan then that is me. If kenstew has no fans, then that means I am no longer on earth. If the world is against kenstew, then I am against the world

also gonna link some classic posts here bc i think a lot of the people just now getting into the show may not have seen these Gems, which is a pity! & also they might form nice little samplers if you want to try a bite of this show!! i'll put them in increasing order of how much canon you'll need to be familiar with so you can avoid spoilers:

Rejected Lyrics to HBO’s Succession Theme

My [29F] husband [31M] has become obsessed with taking over his dad’s company since watching Succession on HBO

waystar royco IS monsters inc

succession if it were real life tiktok + pt 2 (ik there're more but i am Not tracking them down rn!)

logan has the m&ms

the first scene i ever watched oh my GOD what an introduction to this show

notes on Number-One-Girl-ism

kendall roy’s bathroom breakdown but with paper bag playing

THEE classic tomlette moment

it's rotten work / yeah it really fucking is!

not to me not if it's you. but fuck you're looking at potential corporate manslaughter

tomshiv forever <3

s2 kendall really needed to hang out with paddington bear

tomgreg cruel summer amv

does your mother know amv

The California Pizza Kitchen Controversy

the camera as a character video essay

john berryman ‘dream song 29’

saturn devouring his son >:)

ACTUAL king lear parallels

well, kendall, you’ve done it now… amv

anyway come back after you’ve seen to the s2 finale & stream laura marling’s hope in the air – sound of the summer!

(and i am actually contractually obliged to suggest that if you do end up enjoying kendall roy, perhaps try him in girlboss princess of a space-fish-war flavour?)

[raviposting]

Okay so I’ve seen a lot of conflicting responses to Buddie this episode, from it being clear to people that they’re getting together, to thinking the writers have unintentionally messed things up to thinking it’s purely queerbait.

And I get the different responses, I do - tbh I’m somehow in two camps, where I simultaneously believe it’s a slowburn but I also think it’s bait. And those are two very different opinions to have and it got me thinking about why we have these different responses as fans to the possibility of a queer ship (namely two men who would presumably be bi/pan) being canon. 

While people talk about how it’s just people wanting two characters to kiss or entitled fans - sure, that’s existent in every fandom, but I think there’s also a very real fear from queer fans who don’t want to get their hopes up and I d on’t love how the conversation has shifted to calling queer fans stupid for having hope, so I kind of wanted to break it down into 3 aspects that I’ve noticed: 

How writers portray bi characters and why that makes fans hesitant to have hope

What queerbait actually means as a concept

How much “slowburn” has changed in procedurals

1. How writers portray bi characters

Something I’ve thought about a lot are the bi characters I’ve seen on TV - Darryl (CEG), Sara Lance (Arrow), Lucifer (Lucifer), just to name a few. These are great characters imo and I think you’d have a fun time watching but a thing to note is that all these characters were established as bi within the first season of their respective shows and they all fairly quickly fell into a clear romantic ship as well (with the exception of Sara as she spanned multiple shows). It may have taken time for them to say the word bisexual, but it was still clear these characters were queer fairly quickly on. You could maybe argue that Lucifer was a slowburn, but then (while it does not take away from him being bi/pan so do not use this as an excuse to be shitty about him) it’s a m/f ship which is still not the point of my post, to find a m/m or f/f ship that has that same treatment.

Some writers have done it - like for Valencia in CEG, or Petra in JTV - when they saw that fans read them this way, but trying to find those characters were few and far between, and when I looked at popular queerbait ships (whether or not they actually are queerbait) it’s usually ships where the characters are largely viewed as bisexual. A lot of times this also comes with pushback from both straight and to be frank, other queer fans as well. Straight fans don’t always see the signs that queer fans do, so to them a queer character who hasn’t been explicitly clear from the start comes out of nowhere. And what I’ve seen from certain queer fans are concerns that people aren’t appreciating the canon queer characters in a show - and I think there is a conversation to be had about that, but I don’t think the response should also be about then demanding less representation for people either. 

If we go back to 911, people talk a lot about how it has canon queer characters, which it definitely does - Michael, Hen, Josh, Karen, and David are all canonically gay/lesbian and that’s awesome, and we absolutely should talk about fans (white fans in particular) ignoring these characters. It also does not change the fact that none of these characters are bisexual and that is the representation people are looking for. Both of these things are true - these characters are often under appreciated in canon AND people deserve bisexual representation. They don’t contradict each other and to act like one negates the other does a huge disservice.

And even if a character was made bisexual in the canon text we don’t get that slowburn. This may be true for things like Leverage, or LOK, but there’s also a real fact of censorship that affected these shows and the fact that general audiences may not understand the queer text tjat the writers intended. It doesn’t make the writing any less wonderful or the ships any less poignant or beautiful or important, and there’s ofc shows like She Ra that made this more obvious (or the.....mess that was Supernatural that made it. Half true?) but these are still real things that should be acknowledged on why people are so hesitant to call it slowburn - because it’s something most queer fans haven’t SEEN DONE, because m/f ships will get that care for slowburn when it’s done but it’s not done for m/m or f/f ships in that same capacity.

2. What queerbait is

This one’s fun because I don’t think many people understand what it is, but queerbait is very dependent on the intentions of the writers/creators/etc. - which tbh can be hard to gauge, because a genuine intention that ended up not happening or someone baiting fans or someone trying to support all ships and not be rude all have very different intentions but to a fan who only sees bits and pieces of this person on social media, it can be hard to gauge.

Honestly with how much the 4th wall gets broken because of social media now I’d personally say we’ve probably moved into a different definition of queerbait - unintentional vs intentional - because we’re at a point where a show knows what ships are popular and at what level of excitement fans are for it - but that being said, there’s still a clear spectrum of intent. And imo? I don’t think 911 has that intent of queerbait - whether it’s a slowburn or they have a different vision for buddie that I (probably) won’t agree with remains to be seen, but this show usually treats its storylines with care. Are they perfect at it? No, definitely not, I definitely think that they’ve dropped the ball a few times (especially with just how many characters they have lmao), but they also clearly do their storylines with earnest and with genuine care for these characters.

Is 911 getting them together? I want to say yes. I don’t think this was always the plan, just something that they decided along the way, but I also don’t think that changes anything about the ship. A lot of people point to Tim Minear being vague about the ship, or the actors and their interpretations, but 1. We have no idea what they’ve been told about Buddie moving forward and 2. No show runner is going to spoil their show that much. 911 may be keeping quiet because they have a different plan for buddie, sure, but also maybe because they’re still figuring out how exactly they want to do this and/or they want to make this slowburn and don’t want to give it away.

3. Slowburn in procedurals

I feel like this is something that procedurals have started shying away from, but slowburns used to be very common - Bones, Castle, their ships didn’t get together for literal years, but that’s just not something that many shows do nowadays, even for m/f ships. Even things like Deckerstar will have the characters get together after ~3 seasons and explore the relationship onwards, whereas a few years ago, y ou’d pr obably be watching a sh ow and it’d take them 7 seasons to get together. My assumption for this is that shows are afraid  of getting canceled, but there’s been a pretty big shift in getting a couple together after say, 6 seasons to now getting them together about halfway through the show. I don’t think either one is bad or good - in good writers’ hands, either can be amazing - but that shift has made it so that a lot of younger fans in particular, I think, don’t fully recognize slowburn when they see it.

911 as a show tends to run pretty fast - it kind of has to with its depth of characters they have - but when they do have slower running storylines they really do make use of that as well. Bobby’s addiction is something that’s always going to be present in his character, May’s suicide attempt was brought up again front and center after 3 seasons, even Chim’s dynamic with the Lees was brought up again and it was reinforced again that they’re his family. There are certain storylines that have to be continuous and aren’t a one and done type of thing, and that includes Buck and Eddie, especially if you want to establish them as queer to a general audience who doesn’t think about these things.

And honestly, despite my fears, I think they are laying groundwork there. We have Buck learning to be more confident in his relationships, we have Eddie ready to date and learning to follow his own heart, we have Buck and Eddie both establishing that Buck is family and will always be there for Christopher. These are pretty big steps to do for a ship and we’ll obviously have to see how the show goes forward but they’ve already insinuated Eddie and Ana are breaking up, I’m sure Taylor and Buck may last a season and be over, but we do have to see what this next season brings. Do I think they’d say this? No, definitely not.

tl;dr: 

911 is a show with good viewership, but there’s always a possibility they can’t continue with their season and then their promises would feel like a lie. Or they may still be hammering out the details as this season hasn’t been written. Or they may just simply not want to spoil their show,  or they don’t want people criticizing a story before it’s finished, all of these could be reasons. The showrunners, writers, actors, ultimately they owe nothing to us as a fandom to potentially spoil their series, or do something, change it or their schedule for it, and get accused of bait. 

But it also doesn’t change why fans are wary of this storyline either, and I wish people would have more nuance and compassion for fans who are worried about queerbait (whether they think it’s not queerbait and dislike people worrying about it or if they do and are calling people idiots for believing it). There’s a lot of reasons why fans are wary and don’t want to have hope, and it’s not necessarily about 911 specifically as it is a pattern of writing seen in other pieces that have fans worried. These things can all coexist and I wish we as fandom in general could acknowledge that, because pretending that they don’t and criticizing each other/people’s intentions or knowledge when they have certain expectations also doesn’t do much to help.

[gra-sonas]

It doesn't feel wrong to you that Tyler and Michael are making money of a gay relationship that has been so blatantly queerbait in canon? They're playing to be gay for pay at this point. Especially Vlamis who is straight but making money of playing gay with Tyler idk idk

If I’d get a dollar for every time I get an ask like this whenever there’s a new merch drop on the horizon... I would’ve been able to buy the tie dye COSMIC hoodie after all. 🙃

First of all, it’s never been queerbaiting. It’s only queerbaiting when a possible queer relationship is teased and implied, but never made canon. Malex are canon tho. Explicitly, no-doubt-about-it canon. On screen. 

They’ve been treated badly by the writers (well, ONE writer/show runner with micromanaging issues), absolutely. S2 especially was a shit show in that regard. But just because they are currently not together, it’s not queerbaiting. 

And wow, actors being paid to play characters who might not be exactly as they themself are in real life. I’m shocked!

I’m a huge fan of casting queer actors for queer roles, don’t get me wrong, but asking someone about their sexuality is not permitted during the casting process. So unless an actor’s already “out and proud”, there’s no legal way to determine whether someone’s queer. :/ I wish I knew how this could be handled better in the future (which it certainly should), but I don’t know about a good solution for this atm. I hope there’ll be more effort put into casting queer actors in queer roles tho, just like I hope for more queer writers in writers rooms everywhere.

As for Vlamis, yes, he’s straight, but he’s shown to be a vocal ally of the LGBTQIA+ family (Wah wah wah, I know, he made some unfortunate remarks in 2019 while promoting M/M, but he apologized, and he’s made it clear through his words and actions since, that he’s willing to listen and learn. Everyone makes mistakes, the willingness to do better is what counts tho imo. It’s a thing of the past in my book. Sue me). He’s also a great actor who portrays Michael with immense passion and care. I couldn’t think of a more wonderful Michael, and his chemistry with Tyler’s out of this world cosmic, they are Malex. 

So, do I, a queer person, have a problem with them making money from selling Malex merch? Nope, I don’t. 

If you (or anyone else) are not comfortable with the idea of buying “queer” things from a straight dude tho? I’ve got great news: you don’t have to! You can just completely ignore it. Ignore him. Unfollow him on IG for the time being, or permanently. It’s 100% up to you to not making him a dime. 🙂

Oh, and for the record, Vlamis is playing BISEXUAL with Tyler. I insist 💖💜💙 (Michael’s bisexual, not gay. Alex on the other hand (even though he’s being portrayed by a bisexual man) is gay).

[4sweetrevenge]

idk what shows you watch but your favorite TV show for the ask game?:)

fghsd i guess?? teen wolf?? idk if its my FAVOURITE but its UP THERE

my all-time ultimate fave character: it’s a HEAVY tie between theo and liam but?? it probably has to go to theo just based on how much i love a good redemption arc!!! he’s decently complex and i wish they had more time to dive into which of his actions were genuinely driven by him and which he was manipulated into doing by the dread doctors, as well as how being like. ‘adopted’ by the dread doctors at such a young age affected his psyche!!! i just love that dude!!!

a character I didn’t used to like but now do: dfgh for some reason i just?? didnt like lydia the first time i watched it?? but shes actually PERFECT i just didnt like some parts of her storyline

a character I’m indifferent about: i Refuse to care about derek. like hes cool but i Refuse.

a character who deserved better: ALLISON....

a ship I’ve never been able to get into: imo i never liked st/ydia bc im SICK of the ‘nerdy guy chases after hot girl and keeps flirting with her and wont take no for an answer until shes eventually worn down enough to give him a chance’ which they arent EXACTLY but they did start out like that and it just... rly rubbed me the wrong way!! (also she was in lesbians with allison I Said What I Said)

a ship I’ve never been able to get over: WHERE ARE MY THIAM RIGHTS.... S8 WOULDVE BEEN THEIRS MAN

a cute, low-key ship: corey and mason are just!!! adorable!!! ily canon gays!!!

an unpopular ship but I still enjoyed it: malia and kira baby... lets go lesbians!!!

a ship that was totally wrong and never should have happened: god the parrish/lydia storyline was Fucked i dont care WHAT anyone says

my favourite storyline/moment: i really loved theo’s redemption arc!! and i wish they’d made an 8th season bc i wanted to see it go further!!!

a storyline that never should have been written: THE PARRISH/LYDIA THING GOD

my first thoughts on the show: idk man. werewolves are cool.

my thoughts now: I Have Complicated Feelings About The Amount Of Queerbaiting This Show Contains But I Did Overall Enjoy It And Wish My Favourite Characters Got More Development

send me a tv series and i’ll answer these questions about it

[lusciakoushiro]

Long time no salt

Well we know that’s not true, two months and DW still hasn’t said anything to the fans about Season 8 and apparently that is okay with them since they not only dropped the last five minutes of their series on Youtube on the official Voltron twitter like two weeks after it dropped, they have now said that the comics will continue, however they will not diverge from the cannon ending. Ya know, that thing the fans are mostly upset over?

I have said my piece on three different platforms on why I have such a disdain for this season, so I won’t do it again. For my own health and sanity I won’t. But the lack of acknowledgement to the fans’ concerns is rather alarming. I, among others, were hopeful that if the comics continued they could show something diverging slightly from cannon, but truth of the matter is I knew that was never going to happen. With news of something being set within season 8, it makes it feel like this is their way to fix things, but not in a good way. Season 8 in of itself tried to “fix” what some had out cried over, crying “queerbait” and “bury your gays”. This is why Ezor is alive, even though the narrative displays otherwise (seriously, Zethrid would not be so petty if Ezor just up and left). And I would like to think it was on purpose that the audio description said Adam and not Curtis since Adam’s death was something a lot of people got salty over. Season 8 literally took every last thing that got complained about and blown so far out of proportion that it was just a badly written fan fic of a mess. 

Because of DW’s silence it feels like this announcement of the comics continuing is going to be a band-aid and try to hold together what story they tried to tell; such as showing Shiro and Curtis together. I have stated before that if they did show this within the series it would have been a little less of a harsh gut punch since it showed development, but to do it now? Nope! Still a gut punch because now they are trying to say they care about that aspect of Shiro’s story. Would they put Shiro and Keith’s friendship back in? Probably not, cause then you would have to ask why in the show did they act like strangers, but suddenly buddies again. They could redeem Lotor, but I am unsure of how and frankly there is no fixing what happened with Allura and to a lesser extent Lance. Allura would have to spiral still to get the ending they had come up with. Aside from Lance being more assertive to reassure her she isn’t alone and has family, there isn’t much to add for the mess they gave us. There is a slight and I mean SLIGHT possibility that the ending they refer to is just Allura’s death and the ending is set where the Lions take off and ignore the Epilogue, but I doubt it.

It was also stated that if they go beyond volume four that it would be post cannon and there would be surprises for fans. So that brings up a question; what stories are you gonna tell with using season 8′s ending? Truthfully I can only think of one and that is them going after the Lions. A new enemy shows up and we see Vehicle Voltron? I mean that can happen, but the Paladins imo don’t really fit the bill for it even if Pidge was designing them. What happens with the Atlas? Shiro’s ending said “He found his happiness and gave up the fight” which means he isn’t gonna do anything and just be in the background. Hunk was a diplomat so he has a place, Pidge was still creating as I said she designed the Vehicle Voltron. Keith is out helping people, but could still fight and most certainly would given cause to. But Lance? He seems pretty closed off on that farm of his unless it’s to celebrate Allura. Just looking at him at the end in that card made me sad, like he’ll be depressed forever at his loss, a loss that should never had happened. They could use the MFEs and the Holts overall, but let’s be honest, as good of characters that they are, we want the Paladins.

The other thing to note here is the tone the comics have. The comics are side stories set within certain seasons; the first two taking place in, I believe, seasons 1 and 2 and volume three taking place in season 5. The thing all of the volumes have in common is that they are quite light hearted, focusing on humor. The first two volumes, imo, fit well for their seasons. But volume three for me really missed its mark, not just for the humor, but in the opportunity missed as well. Seasons 4-6 had Keith away from team Voltron with snippets here and there, there was no reason that there couldn’t have been a chapter/issue where it showed the Blades working with the Paladins on their plan. Instead, and this is where I kind feel the comics fall flat, the story focused on Pidge, Hunk and Lance.... for the third time. It was a refreshing pace in the first volume and even the second, but the third? This might be due to, as I said, the nature of them being light hearted and they are the youngest so therefore you get funny from them, even though we know all the characters are capable of such. But the tone for season 8 in of itself is quite dark and heavy, despite having three filler/fun episodes. So for the volume set within season 8, what story are you going to tell? Because the comic brings in a much different audience for the tone it has set verses the one the show has. Yes, people did buy the comics because it was Voltron, but it doesn’t mean they enjoyed them or kept up with it.

I just can’t wrap my head around any of this as a good idea from any angle I look at it from. It says a lot about a company who seemed to have washed there hands of the show and not say anything about the fans who are genuinely upset that it gets announced that the comics will continue with the show’s horrible ending narrative in tact. While the publisher of said comics issued a statement regarding the issue, though what they said doesn’t give me much hope. “Working closely with Dreamworks” doesn’t exactly spark confidence in me... 

As of right now, I really don’t want to support this, at all. Does it have me curious? Oh hells yes, because you see above I can’t figure out logically what they could do for story and something that won’t make them look like self riotous clowns. Whether it was DW that wanted the statements that were issued by the EPs after season 7 or that the EPs felt the need to address it is unclear to me, but the fact is; THEY DID IT. And after Season 8, this is far, far worse, with no proper damage control, it is extremely hard to trust them as a business.