#// had to go back to my old ways of being a productive meta writer lol (playing fire emblem while i write works surprisingly well)
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Headcanon - Masks; Lorelei & Anzhelina
Of all my muses that have any sort of "mask", Lorelei and Anzhelina are the two that are heavily tied to their various masks, for similar reasons as well. With both, they were heavily traumatized and learned early on in their lives that in order to be heard, sometimes one had to wear a mask. Not only that, but both use their masks as a way to hide who they are when they are alone / to hide facets of their truest selves that show a vulnerability or weakness that could be used against them.
Lorelei
Their mask is their prickliness, the side of them that is biting words and the sort of attitude that generally pushes people away. After watching the fall of Khaenri'ah, especially as their vision of the fall went ignored by those in power at the time, Lorelei (once they regained those memories) fixated on making sure that people would listen to them in the future should they ever have another vision like that. Now that they are on their 5th life, the way they learned how to do that was by being loud and sharp, more aggressive than they used to be, and far more prickly than they ever once dreamed of being.
(putting the rest under the cut because just Lorelei's part got long)
Their mask thusly hides the personality they had back during their first life, as well as the softer sides to them. Deep down, Lorelei just wants to be heard, and to know that there are those who like being around them even when they are...difficult to handle (imagine growing up as an oracle. Their home life was...not the best, and even after joining the ranks of the "wise" (who I imagine were like Sages), they still were treated kindly for their visions, but that was it). They are quite capable of being soft and nice, but they've been relying on their mask for so long, and they only know of one surviving friend from Khaenri'ah, that they are now somewhat scared to show what's underneath the mask to anyone else. Now, acts of kindness are not common (from the perspectives of others) but are something of a rarity (whereas before they often were openly, easily kind).
While Lorelei is genuinely not bothered by not having a huge amount of friends, their mask is now so integral to what they are like as a person, that they now almost have to fight their own sense of self in order to try and be softer, kinder, and more palatable to the people who they do genuinely want to be friends with. As much as they may try to act like they aren't bothered by it, loneliness is something that they have been dealing with for so long, sometimes the weight of it is crushing, and they wish they had an easier time in satisfying their need for company. Unfortunately, this feeling does sometimes cause them to lean even more heavily into their mask.
Beneath it all, they're hurt, scared to lose anyone else they care about and thusly are scared to try and reach out to make more connections. In truth, they are quiet the poet & musician at heart, but even those hobbies and habits they have built up over the years are still held deep in private where the softness to them cannot be used to hurt them. The sharp words and wit are still very much a part of them now, but it is not the only to them - just the side they are most willing to show to everyone.
Anzhelina
Her mask is porcelain and politeness, soft and perfect as is expected of an aristocrats child. With the weight of turning over her own parents to the Fatui for their planned betrayal, her acceptance into the Fatui ranks, and all of the pressures that had been put on her during her childhood, Anzhelina's mask is all about showing to the world the perfect person who has everything under control. In truth, there's so much chaos below the surface of the mask that when she's alone, or when the mask happens to break around someone else, all of the emotions that she usually represses (unless a situation calls for a certain emotional response) come pouring out with the force of a hurricane. Her normally impeccably cold and perfect expression will shatter all the fear, anxiety (something she knows intimately), and everything else will show (she often cries when her mask breaks, if only because she needs a break from wearing the mask so that she can actually feel the things she needs to).
Given her life as a diplomat / politician / aristocrat, her mask is often a genuine asset to her work, something that she usually tries her best to view as a boon given that it can help her in furthering the work and will of the Tsaritsa. She is capable of mingling with people of all sorts of social rank and class, and she knows just how powerful the right word in the right tone of voice can be to someone. Similar to Lorelei, Anzhelina often just wants to be heard in her true voice, the side of her that she has all but strangled into submission that way her voice can be used as the mouthpiece of the Tsaritsa, or any of the Harbingers in need of such a thing.
There are some days where she isn't even certain if she knows what she wants anymore because of how tired her truest sense of self (her voice) is from trying to speak, trying to find anyone willing to listen to her, but constantly being pushed aside in order to ensure that her duty is fulfilled first and foremost. This is why her mask must break on occasion, that way she can remember that she is in fact a person first, and a member of the Fatui second.
#about lorelei.#about anzhelina.#ooc || out of stars#// had to go back to my old ways of being a productive meta writer lol (playing fire emblem while i write works surprisingly well)#// anywho *holds up anzhelina and lorelei* i just think they're neat#anzhelina. headcanons.#lorelei. headcanons.
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Here's something I'd love your take on: I read a meta recently (would link it but I can't remember where, ack) that suggested that Sam is able to forgive John in later seasons because a) he's had the whole "family making unilateral decisions for your own good" thing repeatedly shoved down his throat, and b) whatever John did under this umbrella in their childhoods, Dean has done far worse by that point, and Sam HAS to forgive him so by extension he can't really be mad at John anymore (1/2)
(2/2) As someone who has admittedly only seen bits and pieces of the later seasons, this seems to jive with Sam losing a lot of his characteristic early-seasons anger, letting Dean call the shots almost all the time even when he thinks it's the wrong move, and moments of sympathy for John (contrasted w/Dean's growing resentment, which is so interesting!). But! I got some big ol' gaps in my spn comprehension, so was curious if you had any thoughts on this dynamic
wow okay long answer warning! i got carried away and forgot how to use punctuation. nobody is obligated to read all of this lol and the biggest part of the answer is behind a cut. anyway!!
first things first: i think a big thing to remember with sam’s characterization in later seasons is that it’s like...not there, and when it is there, it’s sometimes flat and inconsistent. because dean became sole the main protagonist after the first 8 (arguably the first 5 or even first 2) seasons, sam sort of got demoted to “side character we don’t know what to do with” along with cas and crowley. they all had good arcs pop up now and then (sam had some fun stuff going on with lucifer in s11 and s13) but most of the time the writers either don’t know how to give him a meaningful characterization or don’t care (or both). so we have to do a lot of that work ourselves.
so, for example, when we talk about sam losing his anger, i like to read it as him OVERCOMING that anger to avoid becoming his father (which may even be where some of the seemingly sympathetic comments come from, because he’s trying to be forgiving instead of angry), but really...it’s that the writers forgot he had anger issues. in-universe explanation vs irl explanation, yk? and i think pretty much all meta about sam in late seasons is written through that lens, whether the writer of that meta knows it or not. including this one! i can’t prove any of this shit, it’s my personal reading, i’m making it up. like there were just SO many different people involved in the production of supernatural that there was a lot of conflict and contradictions in things like continuity and characterization. (most of the writers room hadn’t even seen every episode!) so there’s not one definitive way to go about it. in many ways it makes the characters more nuanced and in many other ways it makes me fucking insane.
as for sam and john and whether or not sam forgives him, i’m actually glad you asked because this has been driving me nuts for a long time and it took me SO LONG to pin it down - sam’s relationship with john is very different to dean’s, and i couldn’t figure out WHY. it’s not that he was “abused less,” it’s not that he loved john less or was less hurt by his actions, so why doesn’t he seem as INVESTED in everything that happened to them as kids? like he says in season 14 he had to learn to let it go and that it was all a lifetime ago for him. meanwhile i think dean still deals with it every day. he’s still stewing in it to some degree 24/7. so like what’s the difference??
i think it comes down to two things. firstly, that while dean didn’t have anybody parenting him except john (and mary, but only for a very short time that he could actually remember), SAM’S parents were john AND DEAN. most of the time dean was the one raising sam, and in fact he arguably did way more parenting of sam than john did. so the person that made dean feel safe and like he could fight back against monsters, the person he was grateful to, was john. but the person who made SAM feel safest was dean. he doesn’t have that same gratitude towards john that dean does and he never will, because of how john made him feel alienated and excluded from their family growing up. dean’s resentment of john is so tangled up in this very deep and unconditional love and gratitude for him that sam just doesn’t have.
secondly, i think dean has a serious case of “i can fix him” re: john that sam doesn’t have and possibly never had. john just never showed sam the same kind of inclusion and warmth and trust that he showed dean (however rarely he showed it, and however fucked up it was). i think sam figured out very very early on that their quest for yellow eyes was either a long shot or straight up impossible, and that they couldn’t waste their entire lives doing it, and that even if the demon died, john was never going to change. dean 100% drank the koolaid - he really truly believed in a world where someday they’d kill the demon and all retire from the life and be normal and be a family again, because that’s what john said and dean took his father’s word as gospel. sam knew better.
so i think what sam did was just disengage. partially because he felt he couldn’t afford to nurse that kind of anger and not become either his father or lucifer, and partially because even though sam loved john, still loves john, he never needed him the way dean did, because sam had dean. so it doesn’t hurt him as much to just “gray rock” it. i think if sam stopped and really dug into it he’d find that he’s still quite angry (probably more angry on dean’s behalf than his own, at least at first, because in his mind he was able to move past it and dean was not, dean had it worse, HIS OWN trauma isn’t real etc etc), but he doesn’t do that because he doesn’t want to be that angry, and possibly even thinks that if he brought it up dean would jump to john’s defense and it would cause a fight, which the opposite of what a gray rock does.
as for being forced to forgive john because if he didn’t he would also have to condemn dean...i don’t think i buy that at all. sam is fine making dean his exception and he allows dean to get away with a lot of deeply horrible shit he would condemn other people for. partially because he’s dean and sam loves him, but in my ~personal reading~ of sam, this is also because once sam became an adult the weight of everything dean did and had to give up to raise him really sank in, and part of him felt guilty (even though sam arguably didn’t have a childhood either). you know how kids take care of their parents in old age to repay them for raising them? that’s sort of how sam is with dean in later seasons - he implies multiple times that he would leave the hunting life forever and not look back if it weren’t for dean.
and as a side note - sorry, this is only tangentially related - dean implies several times in later seasons that the job is where he finds his sense of accomplishment and self-esteem and meaning - he believes the world is a better place because of what he and sam do, and even though he doesn’t always like DOING the job, he likes the outcome. it’s weird because this is as close as we see dean get to even HAVING self esteem. sam, emotionally intelligent, would have picked up on that - and since he and dean have both tried to leave the life multiple times and have always come to regret it, i also think part of sam believes you CAN’T escape - certainly SAM could never escape so long as dean was still in it, because whether he meant to or not dean would always pull him back in. and part of dean doesn’t really want to escape because he’s made his peace with it. so sam stays, and i think even if he can’t find the same meaning in the job that dean does, he finds a lot of meaning in being there for dean. (this, like gray rocking, is also consistent with the seasons where sam’s sole character trait is caring about dean lol. but i’m happy enough to read it in a kinder and less bitter/resentful way.)
it IS worth noting i think that the most forgiving sam ever was about john was in the adam episode, where he said he understood why he was the way he was and why he did what he did, and when dean said they were alike sam decided to take it as a compliment. sam in season 4 is arguably at one of his lowest points - struggling with addiction, consumed by anger and hatred and the need for revenge. he WAS like john in many ways, and i think he justified what john was doing because it also justified what HE was doing. but what he was doing led to breaking lucifer out of hell and the apocalypse that followed, which is why i like to think sam worked so hard to reign in his anger afterward - both to avoid his fate and avoid becoming his father.
in short: i don’t think sam has actually forgiven john so much as disengaged from him and moved past it. because if he DID engage with it, it’d bring up a whole lot of stuff he didn’t feel prepared to deal with. one of the risks of gray rocking things is doing it to the point that you lose touch with your own wants and needs and personality, so i think by late seasons sam’s repression, which is much more sneaky and quiet than dean’s, has settled in to the point where he’s like “yeah whatever” about dad out of sheer self preservation - because otherwise, he’d end up going crazy about it like dean does. i think it’d do him a hell of a lot of good to be able to get to shout at john and finally say his piece/ he’s really afraid of his own anger, but i think it’d be healthy for him to get back in touch with some of it.
[spn masterpost]
#liz answers asks#bimbonaparte#sam winchester#john winchester#liz makes stuff#liz's spn stuff#liz's meta#whew this was a long one sorry.#i am so glad you have the same icon on tumblr and ao3 i was replying TO YOUR COMMENT when i got this ask <3#fun cool coincidences!!!!!#anyway i didn't want to mention my fic but like this is why i had him yell in my fic. it's good for him#for himself and for dean he deserves to feel angry
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Dude your writing is so stunning. I was gonna ask if you took any creative writing courses or something and saw you majored in literature so like no wonder lol. I wish to write as good as you but as someone who wants to drop out of college I dont see that happening. Anyway you're awesome and I hope you have a good day 💙💙
I am going to tell you a secret.
I did not learn how to write like this in college.
Most of my creative writing classes (and I only took 4) taught me to read. They were all workshops, and collaborative, and I learned how to read a piece of writing and identify what it was about--and that’s very different from identifying what the writer intended to write. It taught me to read a story about an adult whose divorced mother is remarrying and say, “Okay, but I don’t think that this story is about the capitalist recompartmentalization of families the way that the title seems to indicate. I think that the questions posed by the premise are ‘where are my roots? where does my identity come from? what dynamics do I retreat to when I need to feel safe, and what do I do when that refuge is taken away?’“ And identifying what a story is actually about is a very important part of the writing and revision process. Workshops also taught me to take critique without taking it personally, and to assess what was a critique worth taking, and whether the giver knew what they were talking about and what their opinion is worth.
Most of my literature courses taught me to think critically--in the sense of “identify this and examine what it means.” What does it mean, in Parable of the Sower, that empathy can be weaponized and used to incapacitate others? What does it mean, in RENT, that Benny is offering the protagonists jobs in their fields and they’re eschewing in favor of authenticity and integrity? What does Watership Down have to say about the nature-vs.-nurture argument and its limitations?
But I did not learn how to write like this in college. I learned how to write like this from fandom.
Some things came pre-loaded. I like writing dialogue, and I’ve been told I’m good at it, and I think it’s because eventually I worked out that nobody ever manages to say exactly what they mean and communication is frequently less like an arrow aiming for a target and more like a small boat bumping up against a dock while the people onboard try to tie their ropes to secure it. I like characters over action, and that’s reflected in the stories I tell--all very heavy character-driven stories, where the ratio of introspection to actual events is very high.
Z. Z. Packer’s “Drinking Coffee Elsewhere” taught me to appreciate the way that characterization leads to action; but I never put that into practice until I went on (forgive me) tumblr and started reading meta. dear-wormwoods is one of my biggest sources of Eddie characterization meta, and that has influenced my fics more than anything else in fandom, though we’ve never spoken. When I was reading bagginshield, I read avelera’s meta for them.
But I’ve also found that many of the best meta writers (that I’ve found anyway) are also the best writers I’ve read. I went straight from avelera’s bagginshield literary analysis to their Pacific Rim fanfiction “the only way out is down” and reading their commentary on how they shaped the work during revision. I read amarguerite’s “Some Friendlier Sky” (Les Miserables fanfiction) and then “An Ever-Fixed Mark” (Pride and Prejudice) and I started asking her questions--”you compare Courfeyrac to a cat, and then Mr. Darcy to a cat, even though they’re very different characters. What’s the thought process there?” and she told me and we talked about it. I read chrononautical’s “A Road from the Garden” (The Hobbit) and went line by line picking out the things I liked in the comment, and I had this sudden epiphany about how Tolkien shows the dwarves as sets of brothers, which means that they are technically a race of brothers in their presentation, so it was GENIUS to play around with the brother dynamic in a work like that and reflect on how frequently an individual will tolerate mistreatment of themselves that they would never permit to happen to someone they loved--like, say, a brother.
I learned the basics of literary criticism and critical analysis from college, and from reading the western canon and trying to pick apart things that were useful to me. But it’s so much easier when everything is written in vernacular instead of faux-detached academic writing, and when everyone involved is genuinely excited about and dedicated to the work instead of being forced to dwell on The Old Man and the Sea yet again, and when there’s space for people to go back and forth analyzing and agreeing or saying “but what if” or rejecting and are just united by this love of the content or the characters or the book or the history.
You can learn to write like--well, you would write like you, not like me, that’s how style is. But you don’t have to go to college to do it. My current style is not the product of the institution that gave me my degree--it’s the product of more recent years’ immersion in fanfiction (and more recently some traditionally published original work) and music and content I get for free online. And you can also get a circle of people who are happy to write together, read each other’s work, comment on each other’s strengths and the things they like, make suggestions as to how to improve things. You don’t have to do that in college. You just have to read and write a lot, and the things that you read will influence what writing you produce, and in identifying what you like about the things you read and how they do the things they do, you will be able to look at your own work critically and shape it more towards your satisfaction.
The work I’m writing for IT is some of the best work of my life. TTHAEL is the first long work I’ve completed to my satisfaction. Indelicate is the first thing I’ve written that I feel is really exemplary of my style. Margot’s Room is the first self-contained short work I’ve completed to my satisfaction--and the first explicit sexual content I’ve written that I’m happy with both level of detail and atmosphere. Even Automatic-Mechanical-Pneumatic--which I wrote and posted in the same day, so it’s more of a draft--I look at it and recognize it has pacing issues (you can tell I was racing a clock to get the words out), some of the symbolism is too overt because the characters are too self-aware of it, at one point I tripped up and referred to a character by the real-world inspiration--but that’s a solid draft and it has good parts.
You don’t have to go to college to learn to write. Writing is a skill, and writing is work. And there are advantages that people in colleges have re: networking and libraries and available resources and professors who are being paid to give you feedback. But no institution is going to put you through a four-year program and at the end you’ll come out a “finished” writer, with no more room to improve. That’s something you have to do on your own.
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Hi Angel! I've been a big fan of yours since HCM, and so I wanted to express my concern for your wellbeing. There was that big break when you took a month or so to finish HCM before posting it in quick succession, in order to not have to deal with the comments. Now, from what you've been writing in the notes to Dorne Rights, it looks like you are experiencing something similar. The selfish fan in me wants you to keep writing and keep posting, but the basic human in me is more worried that (1/2)
you are unhappy. Nothing is worth making yourself unhappy over, particularly not something that’s meant to give you pleasure. A favourite author of mine back in the days of my Spike/Angel obsession had a disclaimer on her stories telling readers to please not leave feedback of any kind, not even constructive criticism, on her fics because she finds them unhelpful. Her comment section was full of chats about various topics in that fandom, rather than her own fiction. Might help. (2/2)
Hello! I really appreciate this message, because you’re right: fanfic writing isn’t good for me.
(lol putting this beneath the cut because it’s way too long)
It’s actually my experience in this fandom that has made me realize that writing in general probably isn’t good for me, but unfortunately I feel a drive to it and can’t seem to stop myself from thinking I’ll one day get published, so that’s a bit of a downer. The truth is that I’m naturally disposed toward thinking that I’m shit, my words are shit, and every thought I’ve ever had is unoriginal and poorly written. It’s always been like that, from the time I wrote my first attempt at fiction at 7 years old to now at 31. It takes a lot for me to share my writing with people. I started writing fic at 14, basically as soon as I discovered that I wasn’t the only person composing stories about Han and Leia in their free time. I’m sure that my fics were horrendous. I give myself a hard time now, but 14 year old me probably deserved it even more. But there were sweet people on the internet who encouraged me (and lied to me) and told me that my stories were good, and that made a huge difference.
(that and my freshman year english teacher, who was very very cute and earnest and young and made me feel like I could actually be a writer.)
I’ve never been a part of a fandom before. Discourse and meta and long discussions about canon events have never interested me. I’ve said that before, and it remains true! I consume what canon there is, and sometimes I like it, and sometimes I hate it. Sometimes I’m so dissatisfied with it that I need to write something, and so I do. I don’t think I’ve ever written fic for something that I found entirely satisfactory. The extension of my being part of an actual fandom in the past was probably reblogging a few gifsets and recommending it to friends. I’ve just never had that sort of communal experience. This, the J/B fandom, was my first time really getting into it. It’s the first time I’ve ever made friends online that weren’t just frequent commenters on long multichapter fics! It has been exciting and I’m grateful for it! It’s just also probably not good for me.
It’s just, like, every time I post something, I’m fighting a very loud and very desperate voice in my head that’s saying “you’re shit and you shouldn’t bother”. It’s why I’m so good at writing first drafts of novels but so, so bad at getting past the second. It’s why I usually post fics only until I’ve worked out my frustrations: one or two fics per fandom and then ghosting away forever. It’s very hard to defy that voice and post something anyway, and this fandom experience has taught me that no matter HOW many stories I post, I’m ALWAYS going to have to fight that voice. And it’s gotten actively stronger. “You’re not what this fandom wants” “You’re not good at this” “Everyone’s just being nice” “You’ve overstayed your welcome”. Paying attention, often by accident, to the discourse and the metas only makes it worse, because my brain automatically turns to “well YOU don’t write them like that. That means you’re wrong”. I can tell myself as many times as I want that I myself like many different interpretations of J/B! My brain goes “yeah, but you’re just an idiot who doesn’t know any better. There’s a right way, and you’re not doing it”.
THIS IS ALL SO DRAMATIC! But it’s just the truth! Every time I post something, it’s against my nature. NO ONE outside of fandom reads my writing! I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve allowed my close friends and family to read things. So while it may seem like, idk, like I should just be able to get over it, negative comments, or even SLIGHTLY critical comments, really hit me hard. For all the positive feedback I get (and I really AM super grateful for it, and it means the world to me), those few critical voices seem louder because they’re agreeing with what I have already known about myself. And so it feels almost like a victory, but a shitty one. “Ha! I was right this whole time! I AM a shit writer, and I’ve for some reason tricked those other people into thinking I’m good!”
For a long time (much longer than I’ve ever written for any other fandom, obviously), I was able to shove it to the side. The J/B fandom HAS been super good to me, and they HAVE been wonderful about giving me feedback and making me feel welcome and included. But those negative voices are just SO LOUD to me, even though I know logically that they shouldn’t be.
It would be easy to point to a specific problem and say that my issues will be fixed if only I can address that. I do it CONSTANTLY. Maybe if I stopped tagging other relationships. Maybe if I stopped tagging other characters. Maybe if I tagged my works super specifically. Maybe if I made author’s notes about how I’m a shit writer and people shouldn’t expect things from me. Maybe if I just wrote “THIS STORY IS WRITTEN ALREADY AND IM JUST EDITING AS I GO! PLEASE DONT SUGGEST THINGS!” I just feel like, increasingly, I want fewer and fewer eyes on my fics. It’s the opposite of the problem I thought I would have. But my confidence took a huge hit with HCM, and then I was finally feeling good enough to post Dorne Rights. It was probably a mistake!
idk, maybe it’s just all the shit that’s going on in the world + in my personal life. Maybe it’s just time. Maybe I’m just running out of inspiration. But the positive voices aren’t loud enough to drown out my own negative self-voice this time, and so I’ve been trying to figure out how to handle it. Part of me wants to delete Dorne Rights with the intention of reworking it and maybe posting it again down the line with fewer tags and a lot more reminders that people can write their own stories if they don’t like mine. Part of me wants to just do a HCM and post it all at once so that I can leave the finished product up (even if I now think the entire thing is garbage). Part of me wants to stop writing fic entirely, at least until the next time I watch something with an ending so bad it fucks me up. I think my solution will probably be a massive step back from fandom for a little while. I’ve been feeling a drive to work on my original stuff, and I should probably lean into that. I would like to still write and post J/B, once I find the inspiration, but I’m tired of feeling like this is a job. I think I got so deeply sunk into this attitude of “I NEED to write and post constantly because these people want me to, and they actually like what I write!!” that I stopped writing things because I wanted to write them and started writing them because I wanted to write things for other people, to make other people happy, and so that they could tell me that I’m not a shit writer at all.
I should make it clear that I do intend to write my JB fic swap thing FOR SURE. I will drag that story out of myself no matter what. But in general it’s probably just healthier for me to not spend so much time On Here especially, and on fic in general.
#this got maudlin and it's way too dramatic but whatever#it's been a long time coming tbh#im sorry for turning your ask into this lmao#it was not my intention when i started to answer it#but then I just kept typing#ladywinterbottom
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Star Trek TOS First Time Viewing Reaction - S2E2: Who Mourns for Adonais?
DISCLAIMER: I have seen some TNG and Voyager when I was a child and later the AOS movies as a teenager. I felt quarantine time was the right moment to begin the ambitious project “Star Trek marathon 2020/(2021?20??)”, meaning I’m going to watch all of Star Trek starting with TOS finishing with Disco (or maybe we have Strange New Worlds by the time I catch up haha). I started TOS last month and I AM LIVING. IT’S AWESOME and sparks so much joy. I decided I could just write up my thoughts as I am viewing it for the first time as a memory of the experience, not knowing most episodes at all. So, there we go.
Spoilers obviously - just in case somebody else is 50 years late like me, haha.
Opening scene: Scotty flirts with a female lieutenant on the bridge. So far so cute. What about the dialogue from Bones and Kirk accompanying this scene though?
MCCOY: I'm not sure I like that, Jim.
KIRK: Why, Bones? Scotty's a good man.
MCCOY: And he thinks he's the right man for her, but I'm not sure she thinks he's the right man. On the other hand, she's a woman. All woman. One day she'll find the right man and off she'll go, out of the service.
KIRK: I like to think of it not so much losing an officer as gaining
SCOTT: Come along.
(He and Carolyn enter the turbolift.)
KIRK: Actually, I'm losing an officer.
like - what? I had to rewatch this scene to fully understand what they’re saying. I think it’s interesting that, despite TOS being like 50 years old now, I find it easy to forget we’re actually in the 60s/70s when binge watching. Watching it now is sometimes a weird meta experience as you tend to overlook elements that were considered super futuristic in the 60s but are perfectly normal now, so that you actually miss some FUTURISTIC elements because you’re living those aspects of FUTURE already. Yes, of course women quitting their jobs after marriage still happens, but it is not considered a “rule” or “natural order of events” anymore, and is (talking from a western perspective) more of a choice and you would not assume this happening automatically. Especially if you produced an utopian sci-fi series today, that concept would probably not be included. Anyway, it’s pretty interesting that female Starfleet members seem to drop out of service after marriage and it is not considered something a captain or anyone can do something about in the future (I mean, apparently the men still continue their service? I only have divorced Bones for reference so far though).
Anyway, TLDR, I am not judging the 60s relics as they are a product of their time, I think they are rather an interesting addition to the viewing experience in 2020, considering the writers did think this concept would persist in the far future. Back to the episode.
IS THAT A GIANT HAND IN SPACE
I love that Chekov casually assumes he has hallucinations - like bro do you have reasons to believe that and what did you do in your free time
This hand really kills me. I also could not believe what I am seeing but I love it
Spock stating he is not offended because you need emotions to be offended - interesting, Spock, so what happened when Kirk pulled a yo mama joke on you in that Paradise Hippie Love Romance Pollen episode (man that was a gem of an episode)
Chekov has one of the most HILARIOUS lines in that episode (next to having one of the most hilarious hairstyles, his hairstyle looks like an interesting over the top take on the Beatles haircut and his head looks so much like a mushroom I feel like he has a side job in Mario Kart):
APOLLO: Search your most distant memories, those of the thousands of years past, and I am there. Your fathers knew me, and your father's fathers. I am Apollo.
CHEKOV: And I am the tsar of all the Russias.
KIRK: Mister Chekov.
CHEKOV: I'm sorry, Captain. I never met a god before.
Chekov be sassy to gods
I can’t let this haircut go, as it got me thinking: Is there a hairdresser on the Enterprise?
That’s a thing to explore
What gossip that person might hear sign me up
So, the guy really is the God Apollo huh
Costume note 1: That toga Apollo wears is SO SMALL like - “SIR nice to meet you but you’re REVEALING THINGS please sit with more modesty OR - NO NOT LIKE THAT”
Costume note 1, addition: Nice to see the ratio of revealing costumes of men & women wearing sexy revealing clothing in this episode is very equal
Apollo really has a worshipping kink huh
But as a Greek god you probably have that
Also where ARE the other gods? Like he just casually says they are all gone... “with the wind” but... why? Did they suffer from worship withdrawal like he does now?
Also: I really LOVE the concept they introduced that the Ancient Greek gods were just a bunch of space travellers visiting Earth who decided to chill there for a while and be all powerful and worshipped. But as Kirk says in the end they were a huge factor for mankind to move to the Golden Age, which is a cool thought.
Seriously what a fun premise? I would watch that as a series. Hera, Artemis, Zeus, Apollo etc. all chilling on their ship and having fights and romances and space adventures on strange planets. I imagine them being a really chaotic and high-maintenance bunch though
Thinking about it, Apollo said he was a demi-god with a human mother (if I understood that correctly) so basically he was born on Earth and never saw (what I assumed is) their home planet until he was an adult and they returned (why did they return?)? But the Enterprise crew defeats him by finding out his “god powers” are actually originating from the temple structure on the planet, so does that work long distance then?? Like they could access their home planet powers from far away...? And not the powers themselves are passed down by genes but rather the access to it? Or is it that they need worship to thrive (like that’s why it worked on Earth and they just need a temple?) Questions over questions. Love the concept overall.
Kirk, Scotty and Chekov talking about energy patterns and science and how to defeat Apollo (also Chekov you’re such a smart boy! and he says he is only 22 in this episode awwW and the others are looking at him like - wow a child is with us) and Bones just randomly... grabs a bowl of fruit, holds it a bit and puts it aside - as I saw no note for that in the script I think it was improvised by Kelley... but why? Like was somebody from the staff whispering last minute “oh no that bowl is ruining the shot take it away subtly if you can”? It really startled me but it’s kinda funny.
Chekovs hair is even more FLUFFY and voluminous in this scene like did they bring the Enterprise’s hairdresser with them? (It’s cute)
CHEKOV: Perhaps if I assisted.
KIRK: How old are you?
CHEKOV: Twenty two, sir.
KIRK: Then I'd better handle it.
Also I like protective Scotty in this episode. I think it is one of the first times he really gets some character development and proper screen time
Kirk being choked by Apollo is on the thin line of really intense acting and passing into Shatners school of overacting but - it works so I am giving a thumbs up for very INTENSE acting
I feel somebody shouted at him “MORE INTENSE” “MORE MOANING” “INTENSITYYY” “BE MORE CHOKED”
Lieutenant Carolyn is kind of a weak character and is pretty much the embodiment of a 60s ideal of a woman but HELL she is beautiful
Costume Note 3: I actually like the cut of her costume, it is an imaginative take on the toga and also sexy - I was surprised they aired it like that tbh - like from one side it looks like she is topless really
Costume Note 3 addition: but then HOW did they fix it? Like she’s not wearing any kind of bra and the fabric is not attached to anything so I guess they glued it to her skin in a lot of places huh - also there is a scene with a storm and a strong wind where I feel the way she tries to protect and cover herself is not just acting but really an attempt by the actress to catch her costume from flying away and not trusting the glue the costume people used
I don’t want to imagine how many wardrobe malfunctions she had with that costume and how many times she stood there topless in front of everyone so... idk
I guess same goes for Apollos costume lol so fair
On a more positive note on the portrayal of women is Uhura’s role here. Her in that mechanics uniform building a bypass circuit in that crammed space under her console (she still has her full hairdo which gets all squished oh NO and the hairdresser is down on the planet fixing Chekovs mushroom!) - you go girl
UHURA: Mister Spock, I haven't done anything like this in years. If it isn't done just right, I could blow the entire communications system. It's very delicate work, sir.
SPOCK: I can think no one better equipped to handle it, Miss Uhura. Please proceed.
Thumbs up for the supporting Spock.
Also I love every time Spock takes over the Bridge. It’s so cool.
So that’s all! Overall a campy episode at first look but I was pleasantly surprised by the concept of the Greek Gods being space travellers etc. Thumbs up for that giant hand too (pun intended). I like to imagine that like with episodes that play in a middle-age setting they just had a set from another movie lying around and thought - how can we make this a strange planet - but that’s really part of the charme of it for me.
This was a long text huh.
BONUS QUOTE (or rather BONES QUOTE?) - as it was my favorite:
MCCOY: To coin a phrase, fascinating.
#star trek tos#star trek marathon 2020#star trek#star trek episode reaction#star trek tos s2#star trek tos s2e2#who mourns for adonais
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freddy vs jason appreciation hours
This gon be a long ass post, summary at the bottom
Okay so basically this movie gets shidded the fuck on and y’know what I think too harshly. I think it did an amazing job bringing all of our slasher wet-dreams to life. And that’s one thing I really wanna stress throughout my incoherent internet rambling: bringing to life our fantasy. Cuz, y’see, I used to think this movie was garbo like many others, until like 4 years ago when I was watching it during a Halloween marathon, and I looked up from my computer and just saw Freddy and Jason, two of my favorite characters of all time, on the same screen together, beating the living shit out of each other. All my issues with it just kinda melted away and I really appreciated what I was looking at, and since then it climbed from the bottom of my list to easily in my top 5 for both franchises.
The fact that this movie even got made is a miracle. I’m just grateful that we even got to see this match brought to life at all. Just overcoming the rights issue between two major companies was a major hurdle to cross. Once that was settled, they could have just slapped together any shitty old movie they wanted and made a gazillion bucks no matter what. The title alone, Freddy vs Jason, would sell tickets, even if the actual movie was just two hand puppets smacking eachother for an hour and a half. But, no. New Line acquired the rights to Jason around 1992, and they immediately began work on the crossover. The only reason they made Jason Goes to Hell was because they had to wait for Wes Craven to finish New Nightmare first. That’s 11 years of development hell. They went through 10 scripts before they found one they liked, not to mention an innumerable amount of pitches. That’s an incredible amount of effort for a cheap slasher film. They spent thousands on the project before it even went into pre-production. Michael De Luca, the president of production at New Line, was an extreme fan of both franchises and really wanted to get it right.
New Line Cinema get’s a lot of flack for it’s treatment of the Friday franchise, and yeah, when you send Jason up his sisters coochie and into outerspace I can see why, but after reading more into the companies history with Jason, I don’t get the impression it was all cynicism. Even if you think the final product is dookie, you gotta give them some credit for the amount of dedication they put in for this project. And, you gotta remember, even though they produced far better films, Paramount was pretty much ashamed of their creation and ditched it as soon as it began making them less money.
Now I’m gonna talk about some of the actual problems with the movie itself. The main two are also both directed at our maggot-infested son. If you’re as much of a raging fan as I am to the point where you write essays for like 10 people to read on a website that hates tiddies you already know what I’m talking about.
Let’s start with the fear-of-water debacle. This part pisses off the Friday camp, and for good reason. Any quick look at the past 10 movies shows you it’s just not true. Jason practically exists in water. He’s like the human version of Godzilla. But, in reality, Jason was never afraid of water in the movie. The screenplay writers have confirmed that it wasn’t a fear of water itself, but of drowning. And, well, we know that Jason shouldn’t be afraid of that either, being chained to the bottom of a lake for years on end’n all. But, even then, it’s not quite that simple. What Freddy is doing is exploiting Jason’s subconscious mind and the memory of the last time Jason ever felt fear: when he was a child, drowning. This is why Jason reverts back to a child, and then Freddy returns to the memory of his drowning in 1957. Ronny Yu went a much more metaphoric route in portraying this, but you can still kind of make it out. If you notice, even Jason seems surprised at his sudden refusal to chop through the stream of water. It’s not like he didn’t see it before he pulled his arm back. And, then, immediately after, we see Jason wading through Crystal Lake dragging a body, and at the end of the movie raises out of the water in New Blood fashion. So, it’s clear that even in the same movie, Jason was never intended to be afraid of water.
Now, let’s talk about our gift-from-god Kane Hodder. As much as I love the final film, I hate how New Line treated our star man. This is the one thing I can’t really defend about the movie. No one still really knows why Kane was dropped, everyone involved just pointing fingers at each other, probably because whoever really did make the decision is afraid of Kane’s tree trunk arms. Even Sean Cunningham and other people deeply involved with the project were shocked they didn’t use Kane. For my two cents, I don’t think it’s one person or one specific reason to point to, but rather a whole bunch. In large part, I think Ronny Yu not being a fan of the franchise prior has a lot to do with it. He just didn’t realize that Kane was so beloved by the fanbase. Ken Kirzinger said that he initially auditioned to be stunt coordinator, and Ronny immediately asked him to play Jason, saying something around the lines of “you’re exactly what I’m looking for.” I can see why New Line would want someone with no connection to the franchises, as to bring in a fresh take, but for something like this, which is pretty much just a fanboy movie, it would have been better to grab someone who was also a fan. As to why New Line didn’t tell Kane Hodder they were going with someone else, I dunno. We probably will never know who was responsible for that lol. As disappointing as it is, I think Ken did a fine job (although I think he was a little too stiff), and I don’t think we should dismiss the entire film for it alone.
This post is getting way longer than I anticipated. If you’re still here, hi, I hope your day is going well.
Those art the only complaints, though, of course. Something I hear often is that the final fight is fantastic, but the rest of the movie sucks. I can’t really argue with that since it’s really vague, but I can say that, to me, the rest of the movie is great fun. Even if Freddy only has one kill, he has plenty of screen-time, all pretty good (and the one kill he does get in is great). And Jason’s stuff is all great too. The cornfield rave, the hospital chase, all good shid imo. But really that just comes down to personal taste.
Another thing I can’t really argue about are the characters being bland. Yeah, not much to say there. But honestly, I don’t think they’re terrible by any means (Kia dropping the f-bomb is tho). I have a feeling this complaint comes more from the Nightmare camp, since that series is home to much more compelling characters. Being more of a Friday fan, it just doesn’t bother me. 11 movies in, I’m used to bland characters lmao. Although, I do think Mark was a pretty interesting character. His relationship with his brother is pretty great.
One strange phenomenon I also see is that Freddy fans tend to complain that it feels too much like a Friday the 13th movie, while Jason fans say it feels too much like A Nightmare on Elm Street movie. And it’s not just me, either; this is also discussed briefly in Dustin McNeill’s fantastic book Slash of the Titans: The Road to Freddy vs Jason. If anything, this just feels like a testament to how well the movie blended the tones of both franchises.
The movie does also get too silly at times, but I think they did a decent job of reigning Freddy’s goofiness back to, I’d say, Nightmare 4 levels. Which is alright by me.
nOW ONTO THE GOOD SHIT,
We’re almost there. I swear. As I just mentioned, the movie masterfully blends both franchises. The movie has the plot of a Nightmare film, with Freddy pulling the strings, but has the bodycount (and characters lol) of a Jason film. Just because the plot is very Freddy oriented doesn’t mean Jason is left in his shadow, and just because Jason gets most of the kills doesn’t mean Freddy doesn’t get his time to shine either (the movie has plenty of Nightmare sequences, even if he only kills one). Complaints about Freddy only getting one kill are odd to me, since that’s the entire point of the movie. Jason is stealing Freddy’s kills. The ending, really, symbolizes what I mean. It’s the best possible way to end it. Jason rises from the water, holding Freddy’s head, making you think he’s the victor, but- nope! Freddy winks at the camera, and then the Nightmare jingle plays, mixed in with Jason’s iconic ki ki ki ma ma ma, perfectly balancing both franchises.
I’ve seen people complain about the ending, but I honestly think it’s genius. If you had Jason win, Friday fans would be mad; if you had Freddy win, Nightmare fans would be mad. Instead, not only is it really cool, but with the ending we got, the viewers themselves are allowed to decide who won, no answer being particularly wrong. To this day, people still debate who came out victorious.
Beyond that, the plot itself is such a great way to bring both characters together. Previous scripts had such convoluted ways of doing so, some involving the Apocalypse, some going meta like New Nightmare, and some just making no fucking sense at all. The Shannon/Swift draft does such a great job of keeping it simple. I love the idea of Springwood covering up Freddy’s existence, rendering him powerless. Not only is it the closest anyone’s ever gotten to actually defeating Freddy, but it also presents to the viewer a complex moral dilemma. Locking the kids away in Westin Hills is horribly cruel, unable to even see their family, but at the same time, if they didn’t, more kids would die at Freddy’s hand. To me, it’s really interesting.
The final thing I have to say, is that it’s just a boat load of fun. You can’t not have a fan orgasm watching the final battle (although they really shouldn’t have had Laurie interrupt the fight). It’s literally everything I ever wanted lmao, and I’m just eternally grateful that we got to see this match play out on our screens rather than just our minds before Robert Englund got too old. Again, seeing two of my favorite characters ever on the same screen is just awesome. In my opinion, I think it’s the best crossover-versus movie out there.
Some people just don’t like the movie and that’s fine, you can’t please everyone. I’m just dishing out why I love it so much, since it’s so vastly regarded as one of the worst of the series. You don’t see too much love out there for it, so I thought I’d spice it up.
TL:DR, I think this movie was such a wonderful love letter to the fans, and while it’s far from perfect, I think people really need to give it a second chance and look at it from a different perspective. It wasn’t made cynically, it wasn’t disrespectful to Jason, and it did a great job of bringing our fanboy and fangirl fantasies to life.
#freddy vs jason#jason voorhees#freddy krueger#friday the 13th#a nightmare on elm street#new line cinema#this was long as fuck#slash of the titans: the road to freddy vs jason
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SPN 10x05: “Fan Fiction”
As a former theatre kid, this episode brings me so much joy.
“Ghost? Meet Winchester.”
There’s our girl!
“Where is the Samulet?”
“Oh! I took it off. It kept hitting me in the lips, and...”
“That amulet is the symbol of the Winchesters' brotherly love!”
!!!
“There is too much drama in the drama department.” Well...yeah.
“Why couldn't they just do ‘Godspell’ like good little skanks ? Instead it's this... awful, unbelievable horror story. Hmm! Like that stuff really happens! Huh, theater is about life, you know? Truth! Truth! Where is the truth in ‘Supernatural’?”
What the fuck kind of teacher is this??
I had a theater teacher who told us theatre was magic. I think she would’ve liked Marie’s play about Supernatural.
There she goes.
“I mean, it's close, but it's just.... It needs a little more grrrr!”
Our very special title card.
“Sundown” by Gordon Lightfoot
Our beautiful Baby.
Dean awake before Sam? A shocker.
“A teacher in an all girls school went missing in Flint, Michigan. She was heading to her car, disappeared, and nobody's seen her since.”
“Dean, there's nothing here that even remotely suggest there is a case.”
“There is nothing that even remotely suggest there isn't a case. Boom!”
Logic!
Hell yes!
Thank you, thank you, thank you Robbie Thompson.
“Ugh, theater kids. Great.”
“What? I was a theater kid.”
“Barely. You did ‘Our Town’, which was cool. But then, you did that crappy musical.”
“The - ‘Oklahoma’? Hugh Jackman got cast off of ‘Oklahoma’.”
“You ran tech, Wolverine.”
Hey, Techies are just as important as the actors.
They missed the huge banner advertising the show??
hahahaha, their faces are hilarious. Granted, if I found out someone made a musical about my life, I’d be speechless too.
“If there is case... It probably has something to do with all of this.” It has everything to do with it.
Marie, writer/director, and Maeve, the stage manager. (Fun fact: I was a stage manager once! Lots of fun, work, and telling people to shut up and pay attention.)
“I'm Special Agent Smith. This is my partner, Special Agent -”
“Smith.”
“Smith. No relation.”
Again with the joke.
There’s plenty of singing in Supernatural, mostly from you, Dean.
“If there was singing, it would be classic rock. Not this Andrew Floyd Webber crap -”
“Andrew Lloyd Webber.”
Love the improv correction.
Don’t shoot down “Carry on Wayward Son”, Sam.
I also had a theater teacher who went through a divorce.
“Maeve, right? You're the stage manager?”
“And I understudy Jody Mills.”
Maeve would make a great Jody!
“I'm gonna throw up.” Shush, Dean.
“I mean, I gotta say, it's kind of charming. The production value, and the...” I love Sam’s sincere interest tho.
Rule #1: You never touch the props.
“Why are they standing so close together?”
“Um...Reasons.”
“You know they're brothers, right?”
“Well, duh! But... Subtext.”
We gotta address that.
“You know, back when I did tech in school, we had two CD decks-”
“I'm sorry, I have to go sign the delivery.”
Aww Sam! I would love to hear his theater stories.
Pfft, Sam.
“There's no space in Supernatural.” We got close to it...
“Chuck stopped writing after ‘Swan Song’. I just- I couldn't leave it the way that it was! I mean, Dean not hunting anymore, living with Lisa?! Sam, somehow back from Hell, but not with Dean?! So, I wrote my own ending.” I don’t blame her.
“Dean becomes a woman.” Would still wanna see that happen in an episode.
“So, Sam came back from Hell. But without a soul. Then, Cas brought in a bunch of Leviathans from Purgatory. They lost Bobby. And then, Cas and Dean got stuck in Purgatory, Sam hit a dog. They met a prophet named Kevin, they lost him too. Then Sam endured a series of trials, in an attempt to close the gates of Hell. Which nearly cost him his life. Then Dean? Dean became a demon. Knight of Hell, actually.”
S6-9 summary, courtesy of Dean.
Here comes the second hand embarrassment.
“That is some of the worst fan fiction that I've ever heard ! I mean, seriously, I don't know where your friend found this garbage!” Oof, I still don’t like that.
“Siobhan and Kristen are a couple in real life. Although, we do explore the nature of Destiel in act two.”
“Sorry, what?”
“Oh, it's just subtext ! But, then again, you know, you can't spell subtext without.... s-e-x.”
!!!!!
Hi, Jensen.
“I don’t understand.”
“Me either.”
“I mean, shouldn't it be... Deastiel?”
LMAO SAM.
“You know... How about Sastiel? Samstiel?”
“Ok, alright. You know what? You're gonna do that thing, where you just shut the hell up. Forever.”
Teasing brother, Sam.
“This whole musical thing, everything, it's... It's all a coincidence? There is no case?” When is it ever just a coincidence?
“Get in the car!”
!!!!!!!
BUT HE NEVER DENIED IT THOO, that’s all i’m saying.
“You know, we should've done ‘The Outsiders’, like I told you.”
Maggie’s the second person to get kidnapped.
“I called the cops, and a bunch of adults just told me I have an overactive imagination.” :(
“It is all real. And so are we. I'm Sam Winchester. That's Dean.” NO NO NO.
“You guys are way too old to be Sam or Dean.”
“Oh, yeah!”
“More of a Bobby/Rufus combo? Maybe.”
How old do they think Sam and Dean should be???
“We are what the books called hunters.” They believe that.
First guess: a tulpa.
“How do you kill an idea?”
“Well, in ‘Hell House’, Sam and Dean burnt the house down, to take out the one tulpa they hunted.”
Correct!
“Gird your loins. It's horrifying.” Umm...okay.
I love how reluctant Marie was to burn her prop.
“What?”
“It’s not a tulpa.”
“Say it one more time, but just a little bit more Arnold--”
LMAO, Dean.
Calliope.
“According to the lore, Calliope manifests creatures from the story she's tuned into.”
The show must go on.
An understandable panic attack over the possibility of getting eaten.
“Is Marie gonna get eaten?” Shush.
I love when Dean calls people “champ”. It’s so sweet and endearing.
“If Sam and Dean were real, they wouldn't back down from a fight. Especially my sweet, brave, selfless Sam. There's nothing he can't do.” !!!
“I used this for my one-woman ‘Orphan Black’ show, last year.” Marie is the theater kid I would’ve lowkey wanted to be.
“Writer. Director. Actor. I'm gonna Barbra Streisand this bitch.” FUCK YES! KICK IT IN THE ASS!
Dean fixing Stage!Cas’ tie!!
Funny Sam asked for Chuck...
“Oh! I-I, I love him. I do! But honestly, the whole author introducing himself into the narrative thing, it's just not my favorite. I kind of hate the meta stories.” I politely disagree.
“Alright, listen up, girls. Now, you're all here, because you love ‘Supernatural’.”
“Actually, I was hoping we'd do ‘Wicked’.”
“I want you to get out there, and I want you to stand as close as she wants you to, and I want you to put as much sub and add text, as you possibly can. There is no other road. No other way. No day, but today.”
“Did he just quote ‘Rent’?”
“Not enough to get us into trouble.”
“Ghooooost-facerssss!” This episode just adds wonderful years to my lifespan.
You know what I would pay to watch this play in full???
“The Road So Far”
There it is.
The misunderstood thumbs up, lmao.
Sam goes bye bye.
Maggie and the teacher.
They were in the school’s basement.
Hello, Calliope.
“I’ll Just Wait Here Then”
Nothing makes me more emotional than seeing the audience fall in love Stage!Cas, much like we did with our real Cas.
“If I have to sit through that second act, one more time... There's robots, and tentacles, and space. I can't even.” lol
“A Single Man Tear”
That exorcism special effect is so wonderful! I can see how they do it now, but from the audience’s POV, it’s absolutely magical.
What the hell did the audience think Dean was doing??
“We're through the looking glass, here, people. Strike the wendigo set, let's prep the priests costumes. And Sarah? Get understudies into hair and makeup.” Maeve’s a A+ stage manager.
“Supernatural has everything. Life. Death. Resurrection. Redemption. But above all, family. All sorts of music you can really tap your toe to. It isn't some meandering piece of genre dreck. It's... epic!” Agreed.
Stage!Dean is a pro if she could keep singing with everything going on in the background.
lmao at the one guy putting on his poncho.
Original Stage!Sam knocks out Calliope.
Understudy!Sam kills the Scarecrow.
Sam kills Calliope. A trifecta of Sam Awesomeness.
RIP Calliope. Killed by Sam.
The audience must be wondering how they managed to do that for years.
“Take a bow, Sammy.” Take a bow too, Dean.
“Thanks for saving my friends.”
“Sure.”
“You know? If you'd cut your hair a little, you'd make a pretty good Dean.”
Aww.
“Dean? You never should've thrown this away.” YYYEEESSS
“It never really worked. And, I don't need a symbol to remind me how I feel about my brother, so...”
“Just take it. Jerk.”
“Bitch.”
I love Dean’s panic when he realizes he just called a teenage girl a “bitch” without meaning to, lmaoo.
Take it away Stage!Winchesters!
Let me tell you, I literally bursted into tears when they started singing “Carry On Wayward Son”. It’s beautifully done.
Starting with Stage!Mary, who is more or less Square 1 of the entire story.
i remember a lot of people being upset about Cas not being part of the family lineup at the end, and I get it. But if Marie was only going off of the first 5 seasons, it makes sense that she didn’t see Cas as family yet because Sam and Dean didn’t see Cas as family yet. They’re just one year shy of that.
BUT the same girl who plays Cas is on stage as Adam, a technical Winchester. You could say Cas took over Adam’s role as the third Winchester “brother” because canonically speaking, that’s the highest title Sam and Dean have given Cas.
“Who's that?”
“Oh, that's Adam. John Winchester's other kid. He's still trapped in the cage, in Hell. With Lucifer.”
lmaooo. Awkward.
“Don’t you cry no more.” I sing, while crying.
I wish he had kept the Samulet Part 2 on there.
A picture perfect ending.
...One last surprise.
“Oh my gosh! But wait... That means that- Calliope came for me or for-?” Did Marie know who he was?
I thought it was Cas...
I legit lost my goddamn mind when I saw him.
A perfect episode of Supernatural, in my most humble opinion.
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[The Shortest Distance] - extended author’s notes and meta
Watch this space! Instead of making a whole new post for each chapter, I'll be compiling everything here as I post the chapters. [Updated 27th January 2019]
Rating: M for language and explicit sexual content. TW for mentions of eating disorders and anxiety
Genre: Slice of Life/Angst/Friendship/Humour/Hurt/Comfort/Fluff/Romance/Friends to Lovers
Couples: Marley Rose/Quinn Fabray (main), side Santana Lopez/Rachel Berry, side Finn Hudson/Brittany Pierce, side Wade "Unique" Adams/OMC
Pairings: Marley Rose/Quinn Fabray, mentioned Marley Rose/Jake Puckerman, Rachel Berry/Quinn Fabray friendship, Quinn Fabray/Santana Lopez friendship, Marley Rose/Wade "Unique" Adams friendship, all the friendships okay
Summary: It starts with a friendship composed of books, lazy summer afternoons, and understanding; and blossoms into more. Slowburn Fabrose. Season 4 canon divergence!AU.
Links: FF.net | AO3
On the origins:
This. Work. Took. Too. Long.
Seriously, the plot got written, scrapped, revived and revised, scrapped, etc. far too many times to count. From being a slight supernatural!AU like For You I'd Burn the Length and Breadth of Sky, to a fic running parallel to canon, to a canon fix-it fic... I'd all but thrown in the towel on this. Most of it only existed in a scraps folder in my Google Drive, and I'd go add more unconnected scraps whenever I needed a break from other WIPs.
Eventually, the scraps accumulated such that there was some semblance of plot, and I got very fond of some long scenes; enough that there was motivation to turn it into a fic on its own.
On the writing process:
A few scraps and loose ends from my other Fabrose fic found their way inside, but quickly grew into their own thing. I think the reason why I've struggled so much with this fic is because I don't have a good handle of Marley's character. I'll be the first to admit that I don't even like many of the canon main characters, and that my headcanons are mostly derived from other fanfic, but there isn't much Marley in the first place, meaning I had to work hard lol.
Most of the actual writing took place in transit, on my weeny iPhone 6s screen, with my overworked thumbs. Not something I recommend to casual writers. I upgraded my phone! Now I have a much larger screen for on-the-go writing, and a new mechanical keyboard for editing/more stream-of-consciousness ramblings.
On the chapter titles:
A special mention! I don't think I've written much about how I choose my fic titles; I think it's because half the time it's a slapdash process, and the other half comes with a lot of thinking.
I love music, and it shows when I use plenty of song lyrics in fics and titles. My taste in music is pretty eclectic, but I can assure you that I actually like all the songs I pick for my writing, and I'm not just picking random profound-sounding lyrics off the Interwebs lol.
I do have a few criteria for picking song lyrics. One, it has to be relevant to the subject lol. Two, it has to have some depth which alludes to whatever hidden message is in the fic. Three, of course it's something I actually enjoy, as mentioned earlier. I think this is really important because I do pick up music recommendations from fanfic, and treasure them for the positive assocations brought from fic I've enjoyed. I think it's important to do the same.
Instead of linking endlessly, I've created a YouTube playlist collecting all the music used in this fic. Find it here.
Prologue: Title is from Marina and the Diamonds. I loved her first album Electra Heart and not because she was covered on Glee; Marina has this punchy, catchy style with awesome lyrics. She later released Froot, another genius work that needs a lot more attention than it's gotten.
Part One: Another Marina and the Diamonds lyric. Can I just take this opportunity to plug her album?
Part Two: Sam Smith, my love. His music always makes me want to write the angstiest, most heartbreaking things. He's one of the few artists out there now who writes the most obscure and complicated feelings into music.
Part Three: This was supposed to be the title of the entire fic, but I forgot lol. I like the Charles Bukowski quote better, but at the very least this wonderful song from Leonard Cohen gets a mention.
Part Four: Very different in tone from all the previous songs mentioned. I found the Arctic Monkeys' lyrics to be deep and intriguing, which is interesting compared to their melodies and catchy beat.
Part Five: This was a struggle! There are so many good songs out there with really great lyrics that could fit into the chapter and the themes I was going for, but in the end, I went back to Lea (as I tend to do for my fics). I wanted that aimless feeling Marley has for most of the chapter.
Part Six: I love Yellowcard. I've been a fan for more than a decade, for their excellent lyrics and wonderful melodies, their instrumentation and their creativity. Most of their songs deal with heartbreak, so it's rare that I come across a song of theirs that encapsulates so well what I wanted to convey in their early relationship.
Part Seven: One of my best buddies, IRL and in fandom, loves K-pop. She's been trying to brainwash me for years, and so far she's been having quite a lot of success; I've written a few things that are inspired by K-pop lyrics. The inspiration for this fic came from a new song from Mamamoo, which is made up of four very talented ladies.
Part Eight: I haven't been discovering music for a while, but Paramore's latest album was a pretty refreshing find. I was looking for something light that described the mood of this chapter.
Part Nine: Apparently, Vienna Teng's work has been something of a mainstay in fandom; which makes sense, with her poignant lyrics and soulful piano ballads. I discovered her through the Studio Ghibli fanfics written by Saddletank, who makes extensive use of her music with great effect.
Part Ten: I discovered the genius of Fleetwood Mac through Glee. It was the perfect time, now that I was going through things IRL that made the music relatable and meaningful. While not one of my favourite songs, the lyrics resonate best with the chapter.
Part Eleven: William Ryan Key (better known as the frontman of the pop-punk band Yellowcard) recently launched a solo career. He writes the gentlest, most profound acoustic ballads I have ever heard. Most of what I envision Marley's music to be is his work (with elements of Kina Grannis' artistry and Sara Bareilles' lyrics), and I would pay good money to hear Melissa actually perform his songs.
Part Twelve: Those who read my fics can definitely tell that I'm a massive Sara Bareilles fan. The woman is a delightful human being, and an immensely talented singer-songwriter (is it obvious I have a thing for talented people?). Again, the reasons for picking songs is really to set the mood and atmosphere for the chapter; the lyrics may or may not be directly relevant to the story.
Part Thirteen: Kina Grannis recently rose to fame performing a cover of Elvis' Can't Help Fallin' in Love With You in the movie Crazy Rich Asians. I love her style and interpretation of songs.
Part Fourteen: It's rare when canon and fanon intersect, and I'm always very happy to make a big production out of it. I loved Melissa's performance of this song, and I was actively looking for some way I could give it a nod. And so when I was writing this chapter, I listened to it on repeat.
Part Fifteen: It's always nice when things work out :) earlier I had a Marley song, and now it's Quinn's turn (conveniently ignoring Puck's part lol). While Marley's part was about taking the plunge, Quinn's was about getting over past hurts and building a stronger relationship.
Epilogue: I've used Sara Bareilles' music plenty of times in my work. Normally, I hate reusing music, but it was impossible to pass up the opportunity to use this beautiful song to wrap up a giant labour of love.
General Meta:
Prologue-Part One: These two chapters were intended to set the tone of the early relationship between canon!Marley and canon!Quinn, which then contrasts their new/old relationship when they meet again a few years later. They establish a friendship out of common interests (and a lack of anything better to do) which I think also gets them to understand each other a little better. I hope.
I took this opportunity to also set the friendship between Marley and Unique. Strong female (?) friendships are something always lacking in Glee, and I wanted to pay homage to these two awesome ladies. Also, Unique and Marley's friendship acts as a foil to the one Quinn and Marley start to forge here - because, clearly, the latter two are gonna end up together lol.
Part Two: Rachel gets introduced! Again, more comparing and contrasting: Quinn and Rachel's friendship vs Marley and Unique's, Quinn and Marley's friendship vs Quinn and Rachel's. Our girls also start to open up to each other. Recently, I've been following Chuck Palahniuk's writing advice (which I have printed out and stuck on my wall): Instead of characters knowing anything, you must now present the details that allow the reader to know them. Instead of a character wanting something, you must now describe the thing so that the reader wants it.
Part Three: A bit more background, a bit more development. In the previous chapter Marley opened up to Quinn about her eating disorder, in this one Quinn starts to open up about some of her past. It was hard writing this one mostly because Marley, unlike Rachel, wasn't privy to a lot of the things Quinn went through (this plays a big part in their relationship after they get together later down the line).
Rachel and Santana are together in this one! I would say more stuff about foils, comparing and constrasting, but by now you should've noticed it's something I do a lot. It's crucial that they're together in this fic because the girls do help our clueless pair move things along.
Also, I think y'all are pleased that I finally had Quinn dump her (off-screen) boyfriend lol.
Part Four: I loved writing this chapter. Now that we've established the friendship between our girls, I panned out a bit to cover more of the world they live in, and the people and events that shape their lives. It was a bit of a challenge since Quinn is now working, and Marley still a college student, but I hope I've done a decent job.
I get the feeling y'all hate me for putting Marley with some random man, but I think it's important. Marley is still very underdeveloped as a character herself, with loads of confused feelings. She needs to mature a little more emotionally, make decisions for herself, experience a little heartbreak, before she can be ready for an emotional minefield like Quinn Fabray.
It's not a coincidence that Quinn's ex is named Blake, and Marley's (soon to be ex?) is named Alex, by the way... Also, speaking of names, it will likely never be mentioned in the fic but Stan's full first name is Æthelstan (poor dude). Valentino is an arowana because of that fantastic expression. I headcanon that he's always judging the goings-on in that apartment.
Part Five: THEY FINALLY KISSED ALKSFHO
In which the girls take a step forward after nearly 60k+ words of slowburn - trust me, it was killing me almost as much as it was killing you guys. But I was trying to make it was organic as possible, and as y'all know Marley doesn't have much of a stable romantic background to draw from, and her closest role models are all certifiably insane.
There are a lot of challenges upcoming for them, which I will have to spend a good deal of time delineating. I am really invested in these two at this point.
Part Six: After all that slowburn, my brain kinda went into overdrive. The draft I had for this fic originally ended here, but I couldn't do that to you guys aren't you glad I didn't. So the first half came into being, with its gratituous fluff and their friends' reactions.
The second half came while I was developing Millie's reaction; I wanted to make a comparison between Millie and Judy as single moms. But to be a foil to how open Millie is, Judy had to be the bad mom. I hadn't intended her to come off as so cruel, but she's not truly evil. Quinn has to get her sharp tongue from somewhere LOL.
Also! Finn and Brittany! I gave them a brief moment in my other fic For You I'd Burn the Length and Breadth of Sky but killed Finn off uwu. I've been fond of this rarepair for a long time now, and it seemed fitting to put another rarepair into this fic. Additionally, I am such a sucker for couple angst, like the Rachel/Santana/Finn/Brittany dynamic. They really deserve a fic of their own, the poor things, but we'll see how it goes. This fic is primarily a Marley/Quinn, and will remain that way because I lack the mental capacity and patience to write a fic with two main couples without wanting to gouge my eyes out.
Some of you active and astute readers might notice a lot of mentions of stuff foreshadowed earlier in the fic, with extremely tiny throwaway moments being revisited in this chapter. I assure you this wasn't intentional, and I'm in no way the awesome and masterful writer all this makes me out to be.
Part Seven: Dear god, I was so busy with life I totally forgot to write the author's notes for this chapter... Anyway, the entire thing is about tying up loose ends. They're dealing with their problems while the shadow of Marley leaving hangs over them, and making the best of their time together.
And yes! I heard a lot of happy squeals when this fic finally earned its M rating. For those of you who are wondering about the sudden sexytimes in the middle of bigger issues, well... let's just say that it has consequences.
On a side note, I hope none of you out there were rooting for Marley to stay in NY. Don't worry, this is a romance fic, and there will be a happy ending.
Part Eight: When you don't have time to update the author's notes when you update the story... This was a pretty interesting chapter to write. Mostly because I was figuring out how they build up after the loose ends in the previous chapter have been taken care of.
Not really knowing Marley's canon character has been an obstacle in writing this fic, right from the beginning. She's also not a popular fanfic character but I do like a challenge.
Can you tell I watched La La Land as research for life in LA for this chapter? The music has been pretty stuck in my head too but none of it really fit the mood for this chapter, so I was forced to omit it. But yes, some of the bits and locales in the movie sneak into this fic.
Part Nine: Quinn's trip to LA, and the various things they get up to. Lots of indulgent fluff and smut, and a dash of plot at the end...
Part Ten: I love the friendship Marley and Santana have in this story. My headcanon for Santana is that she's the tough, worldly big sister type, and she's taken Marley under her wing. This is my attempt at advancing the plot by exploring the conflict in the long-distance relationship, with plenty of Marley-Santana-Rachel interaction (and throwing in loads of foreshadowing). Since there's so much heavy content, there's plenty of fluff to go around, padding the spaces between character development and plot. The Skype cooking idea was taken directly from my real life :)
Part Eleven: Mostly fallout from the drama in the previous chapter, and more advancement of the plot. It's intentional that there's so much drama, because it's something they both have (thanks canon) and I believe it's important for a healthy long-term relationship that they are able to resolve it. Also, Shelby is a convenient villain here, though I loved putting Beth into the mix, and having the characters react to the non-canon pairings in this fic. Doctor C makes a reappearance, as does Millie. Their growing absence from the main story is also intentional; Marley is growing into a character of her own, and she becomes less reliant on them.
Part Twelve: Initially I thought this chapter was going to be filler ahead of the big decision, but I was wrong. There was so much plot in this one ugh. I wanted Finn and Brittany to get their turn in the spotlight, but it had to be relevant to the plot as well. I wanted Marley to show us how much she'd grown over the course of the story, and from her canon self.
Part Thirteen: A lot of people thought they'd broken up in the previous chapter. I made them properly break up in this one >:) I wasn't going for a big dramatic shake-up or anything; the point was that people have relationship troubles. A lot of people have difficulty being an us, and this was supposed to be the result of the major cracks hinted at earlier, and the final part of their development as individuals before they can be in a relationship with each other. There's a lot of fluff and recovery; they have to break up to figure out how to be together, if that makes sense (but they do get their happy ending!)
Part Fourteen: The timeskip is important. It shows how far they've come, and the difference in how they now interact. While I can't show you how much Quinn's grown since this fic is from Marley's POV, I put as much of it into the story as humanly possible, and without making Marley into some mind-reading alien. Things are different now. The first break-up was necessary to put their past behind, and by getting together again, they're both prepared to work hard to grow from that. I do believe that it was absolutely necessary for them to break up to know exactly what they've lost.
Part Fifteen: The idea for this chapter came when watching Bones, and when talking to some friends. I needed to have them overcome what happened in the past, and symbolically walk forward together. Then I remembered a throwaway line about Rachel workshopping Jesse St James' musical, and the chapter pretty much wrote itself from there.
Epilogue: Not much in this one, honestly. I wanted to tie up loose ends, represent them moving forward without hesitation, and bring the story to a conclusion worthy of such a long journey. The smut was a bonus treat for everyone that's been following this.
On Marley Rose:
Confession: I don't watch Supergirl. There's only so much my poor heart can take from shipping non-canon lesbian couples who have a ton of onscreen chemistry, but who are paired off with guys. Bitter? Not I
So I take canon!Marley, pad her personality with a lot of extrapolation, add a hearty dose of logical explanation for inexplicable quirks from canon, and toss her into this fic to do a lot of growing up. If this sounds like a recipe, I think I'm too hungry.
Melissa's current turn on Broadway is inspiring a lot of the fic's direction.
On Quinn Fabray:
If it isn't already obvious that I'm in love with Quinn Fabray (and Dianna Agron for giving her so much depth), this fic should just help you reach that conclusion lol. no thanks to R*** M*****
The other Fabrose I wrote is from Quinn's POV, who basically spends the whole time sorting out her issues and stumbling into something she had never imagined could happen to her. This one is from Marley's POV, and also features her sorting out a ton of personal issues.
A lot of Quinn's character and experiences with her mother is taken from real life LOL.
#fabrose#quinn fabray/marley rose#quinn fabray#marley rose#fanfic#my writing#yumi_michiyo#the shortest distance#glee#fanfiction#music
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Watercress Team Interviews: Tutty, the Writing Director!
Introduce yourself!
Code name is Tutty The Fruity. I'm a 25 year old Public History major. My hobbies include long walks on the beach, monster girls, and puzzles. I've been reading visual novels since university years and have more recently entered the indie scene as a writer foremost.
What do you do for Watercress?
Primarily serving as a writer, I've also jumped around in various internal affairs roles and the odd directorial role. I'm currently back on as a Writing Director, with the responsibility to better organize writers, ensure work is produced regular and finishes with a stamp of quality assurance, and resolve creative differences when they arise.
How long have you been working for Watercress?
I joined the studio on February 15, 2015, which puts me among the veterans of the group (though I still see myself as an overachieving newcomer). There were some breaks involved in that time, but it's been mostly consistent all the way through.
What country are you from?
Canada, Ontario specifically. It's a great country I wouldn't think much about leaving anytime soon, though I might consider ditching Ontario for greener pastures out west. The provincial government is beyond incompetent.
Which game are you proudest of?
People have responded well to Palinurus, so that's probably the safest bet. Most of my writing for that project was accomplished within a week, with 2500 word writing sessions on a nightly basis. It turned out quite decent, all things considered. I'm a self-critical sort of person, so I try to be modest about most things, and still think there's more to be done in the future.
Have you worked on any projects outside of Watercress?
I've taken commissioned writing projects for several clients during my time away from Watercress, though I probably can't elaborate further without breaking NDA. One of them is actually scheduled for release this August, so that's exciting! And the other has a demo right now. It's gratifying to see one's work become manifest in an actual product. Other than those, like many creators, I'm working on a few personal projects on my own time.
What’s your day job?
I juggle writing commissions with a minimum-wage job in the service industry. Not exactly glamourous work, but I'm saving up to go back to school for a Bachelor's, followed as PhD. Steady income is important, and it also puts money aside for commissions.
What is frustrating about working at the studio?
Generally a lot of the frustrations come from the sheer number of people involved, so there's no shortage of confusion. When getting accustomed to studio work, being a self-motivator and taking initiative is oftentimes a habit to work on. Establishing clearer communication lines and keeping them strong in an environment with higher turnover is definitely a challenge, though a push towards monetization may mitigate some of that.
What is rewarding about working at the studio?
I enjoy working on teams that equally pitch in, and when brainstorms click it's a fun thing. For many creators, finding that kind of environment is exceedingly difficult, so it's nice that people find a way to express themselves without our group.
What do you want fans to gain from our games?
I don't have any solid expectations for fans since I try to focus on things I would enjoy writing. If they had a good time, all the better. I have something of an ego so it's a little gratifying to see praise offered from reviewers, haha!
Do you have any pets?
Four cats. Family's kind of crazy. There've been seven cats for the holidays at one point. Also a tank of fish but that's irrelevant.
What are your top three favorite video games (besides ours, of course)?
Narrowing it down to three is pretty damn hard, uhh… I grew up with Mario, and Super Mario World was my first game. I revisit it regularly. Umineko no Naku Koro ni is a standout among visual novels with the best soundtrack in anything, as well as strong, highly meta commentary on storytelling, mystery and fantasy. I often cite Katawa Shoujo as a personal fav, as a Japanese-inspired VN that carries itself on strong pacing (this one's an inspiration for most people who end up with our studio). I'm gonna throw in Paper Mario as well (Umineko is barely a game, let's be real lol) as one of my earliest examples of strong world-building and is a perennial favourite of mine.
What are your top three favorite bands?
I adore The Protoman as a rock opera and eagerly await their release of Act III (which will be a while, but I can wait a long time). Josh Groban has an excellent baritone which is smooth on the ears. And Barenaked Ladies is always the nice audio equivalent of comfort food, since they're a band I grew up with. Honourable mention to Porter Robinson, incorporating storytelling and electronica in nice ways.
Any parting remarks?
2016 was a pretty rough year for me so I'm working hard to make sure 2017 is a better one, be moderately excited!!
Like what you heard? Check out Tutty on twitter!
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