Hey. Superman & Lois fandom. Let’s just agree right now that we’re gonna behave. Okay?

When they announce the new actor who’s playing Jonathan, we’re not gonna harass him. We’re not gonna drag him on social media. We’re not gonna whine that he could never hope to replace Elsass and he’s doomed from the start. We’re gonna go in to the new season with an open mind, and even if we miss Elsass and prefer his performance, we can express that opinion without being dicks about it.

I understand not wanting to see someone else in the role, and I know it will be hard to watch someone else playing a character you love. But whoever they find didn’t ask for any of this to happen and will be doing their best. It’s incredibly difficult to step into the shoes left by another actor, and to step into an established cast and family dynamic after two years. We the fandom absolutely cannot make it worse by being assholes.

Just... behave. Please.

Let's talk about what happened with Brookenji.

And no, I don't mean the fallout in Chaos Theory. I mean what happened in the original show. At least, what I believe happened. This is--mind you--total Conspiracy Board style speculation based on little pieces of evidence collected and gathered throughout my years looking into behind-the-scenes stuff and following social media. It would really help if I could find one particularly tweet, but I think it was deleted either in anticipation of spoilers or just because he regularly deletes them.

But...here's the one responsible for that:

Xi.

Xi was the Original Ben, as you can see. Young and nervous. While Ben was...

Well. Ben. Big Ben. But obviously the jock character. The tall, smarmy, rich white guy.

You may be able to see where this is going, but I submit this evidence to you from my memory, and you'll just have to trust me:

One of the showrunners of Camp Cretaceous tweeted ages ago (Season 1-2, well before Season 4 and the Nonsense), tweeted about how there's a disappointing lack of Asian romantic leads in media.

And you know what? He's right. Very much so! Think of ten major tentpole movies from the past thirty years and pull a Japanese, Korean, Chinese, or Vietnamese romantic lead. No, no, no, not the women! The men. An Asian man.

"Oh, well, Shang Chi--" no. Don't get cute.

The fact is, it's just...not a thing that happens. And I think one of the goals with Camp Cretaceous was to change that. Just like they struck ground with Yaz and Sammy being an interracial wlw romance in a children's cartoon, they were gonna put an Asian dude in the romantic partner position.

By now, you obviously see where this is going...and what happened:

If Xi had remained the scared kid, he would have fallen from the train. He would have grown in the jungle and emerged as a wild child. He would have an mmensely different feel in Season 3 where he was breaking away from the group and determining to stay on the island...until the end, when he bonded with the group.

And that is when Brooklynn--or Jules, rather--would have suddenly taken interest in him. Xi and Jules, the wild kid and the rich girl. It would be cute!

But they changed things and took them in a different direction--possibly pretty close to the time the show started. Which meant that the whole first half of the show barely had any setup planned for Kenji and Brooklynn, as they were now known...and they didn't really want to go with Ben and Brooklynn. Especially with how strong the dynamics between Ben and Bumpy and Ben and Darius became.

But they still had to set up the Brookenji romance, and the plans for OG Ben and his Rich Dad to shatter the group dynamic suddenly had to adjust...and you know what? Throwing the romantic strain into it was a pretty good idea! Not bad! But...with the timing of his arrival, the writers only had one season left to them. So they had to jam it all into one season, because there was a little race-swapping done at the last minute that wound up being super-crucial to the endgame.

And personally?

As messy as Brookenji was, I think it was better for them not to remain rigidly focused Xi-Jules and turn it into Ben-Brooklynn. While it would have neatly paired off everyone for the final seasons--Ben and Brooklynn having their Rich Girl/Wild Child romance, Kenji and Darius having their Friends-to-Brothers arc as Kenji betrays the group for his dad (SEE HOW SMOOTHLY THAT WORKS, TOO?), and Yaz and Sammy...well, you know...I think I like what we got with Ben a lot more.

But you can see how the original plan of broad strokes would have been a lot smoother. Turned out that the characters evolved more than planned. And obviously they could have stuck with the Kenji/Darius focus being the main fallout of the group...but that also sort of leaves Brooklynn high and dry with regards to the plot. What's she got left? Though, also...looking back on those seasons...even her romance with Kenji didn't do much for her. Probably because it wasn't really supposed to be a thing. We don't know what the plans for Jules were in the original script, but when those got ditched (PRESUMABLY. THIS IS ALL ME SPECULATING!!!), they had to scramble with her. Maybe she was supposed to have more parental issues. I dunno.

But whatever the truth is, I do still maintain that Kenji was written to be a romantic guy with that in mind. Listening to Brooklynn's color preferences, feeling awkward, being protective...eck, he even kept that rizz through to the new series:

But the bottom line is that Kenji isn't Xi. He didn't have the growth that was planned for Xi, which would have tsngentially influenced Brooklynn/Jules's sudden interest in him.

This is also one of the consequences that comes with having shows compressed and rushed so much in the modern era. If we'd been getting filler episodes over the seasons, they might have been able to start building Kenji and Brooklynn up during the E750 arc, if not sooner.

NOTE: I'm not sure what the scripting and planning timetables were with this show. But from what I've gathered, the characters were swapped well after the conceptual stages. And they made it work! There's still a coherent story! I think the sloppiness just came because they had to hurriedly change tracks on some parts, and we noticed.

TIS THE SEASON TO BE MERTHUR!

Just... Look at them!

I miss everything about this show. Even the very bad CGI and the weak-ass plot points/armour/conveniences/contrivances.

One Christmas Eve, almost 11 years ago, the entire Merlin fandom was butchered into tiny little distraught pieces. It didn’t matter if your favourite character was Merlin or Morgana, Gaius or Gwen. The showrunners held no qualms in destroying your dreams for Gwaine or Perce. The writers did not hold back in their aim to crucify the smile on your face, to forever turn it upside down. No ship was spared. All hopes for the show to finally commit to their original intent, to bring peace between peoples, to save Albion, to allow Merlin his freedom and Arthur the truth, was brought to a bitter, fatalistic end.

Not that I need to repeat this to you, you know what happened, but it’s worth reiterating that this travesty occurred… on Christmas Eve.

CHRISTMAS. EVE.

Christmas Eve.

The night before Christmas, the night before the day where all rules are broken and we can frolic like children around a decorated tree filled with twinkling lights, our collective hearts were shredded.

This event (once we recovered a tiny bit from the shock) gave birth to a plethora of astonishingly well written, poignant, devastating, hilarious fanfictions that had helped nurse our wounds, for nothing could TRULY heal (except a follow-up season with the original characters, come ON BBC) us.

After nearly 11 years of watching these brilliant entries grow, I never thought I’d jump on this bandwagon and write my own fic.

But I've had a few very shit years, as have many people around the world, and I started to wonder as we do when we want to prove magic can still happen.

My brain decided that it wanted my hands to write the most indulgent, likely over done fic in existence for the fandom. This thought stuck with me throughout the year – I was being STALKED by myself – and wouldn’t leave me the hell alone. This hasn’t happened in a long while.

Still… you’ll eyeroll at the idea. It's so OBVIOUS, I'm embarrassed by myself.

What if Arthur discovered Merlin’s magic from the get-go, from episode 1?

WAIT. Hear me out…

So, Merlin saves Arthur for the first time and Arthur SEES. He sees his eyes glow.

He knows he should tell his father, but his instincts are screaming at him. Honour is at stake. This stranger saved his life. How could he reward it with an execution? So, a chance needs to be given, doesn’t it? A chance for Merlin to give up magic forever and live a life of goodness, to turn away from evil and serve Arthur…

Except Arthur can’t help but wonder. About Magic, about Merlin and magic, about the law and all the whys attached and his place within this chain.

But he also can’t trust this peasant who cavorts with the devil, practices wickedness but smiles like a child and offers compassion to everyone. Someone so duplicitous must be dangerous… except Merlin’s an actual idiot! And it’s getting really difficult to keep his guard up.

But isn’t that how sorcerers work? They twist the mind with pleasing ideas, they tempt and coerce, they manipulate.

And slowly, Arthur finds himself being manipulated too. For how could he ever want to trust this man- but he does. He does.

And we’ve never been allowed to see Merlin deal with a S1 Arthur who’s in the ‘know’. Who’s forcing him to keep it secret, who’s threatening him with trial by fire, a young Arthur who’s ignorant, arrogant and so desperate to understand what he cannot trust.

Then there's the layers, royalty versus peasantry, friendship versus alliances, goals versus ideals.

I want to write a fic where this trust is built from the ground up. One of the things about the show that made it impossible for me to let it go is that the ‘relationship’ between Arthur and Merlin fits exactly zero categories, yet all of them.

Master and servant.

Friends

Family

Allies

Enemies

Romantic ideals

Platonic soulmates

Absolute Soulmates

I could go on. And it's one of those rare shows where the writing would be given more oomph if the males leads had dared cross a line or two.

Realistically, they weren't even friends. They were master and servant who'd become a little co-dependant. Arthur could never admit to anything more because of his station, but would he have been able to being completely himself around Merlin if he'd known the truth? We never see Arthur truly be himself. He wasn't allowed to be, not even with his wife. There was always a wall - it was how he was raised and any attempt to develop was killed by plot.

We never saw Merlin completely free, not with a single person. He started happy and healthy and innocent. A liar. He ended up bitter and terrified and angry and alone. Still a liar.

What would he have become if there'd been one person he could truly trust- not Gaius. Not a man already broken and brainwashed by his own self. A victim of the system just as much as he perpetuated the hate and completely unaware of the trap he lived in.

Many of the characters in the show have the versatility and potential to be written a trillion different ways, is it any wonder that fics continue to be written?

Well, I wanted to explore a slow burn development of trust, with Arthur learning how wrong he was, how much he’s trampled on, and all about the seemingly normal peasant boy who meant more to the world than Arthur could possibly understand. What would they have become if they’d been given the time, hm?

When they were young - yes, I'm going there - wild and free.

What of Morgana, what if she could have trusted? What if she could have understood? Would it have turned out differently? Would she have still become the other side of Uther's coin?

Would Merlin still have ended up alone?

There’s lots more I wanted to touch upon, it’s a big what if, but that’ll have to wait for another post.

I’m writing a 5 part prologue that occurs between episode 1 and 2. I’m hoping to release it for Christmas and then take the time to write the rest of the season.

Unless… you guys think it’s a waste of time? Let me know.

In the meantime, I’m STILL SUFFERING (fucking show) and it's making me write, write, write!

(gifs not mine)

Other than supercorp, would there have been any other kara romantic pairing you wouldn't have minded

lol anon that’s tricky again, because i honestly don’t trust the show would have handled any of them well! for a production that went to such lengths to pair off their characters, they really didn’t do so good with romantic arcs (it’s why i’m actually glad supercorp didn’t become canon don’t tell anyone)

i liked James, during season one (though i’m not a fan of love triangles unless they’re a leadup to a triad situation), but clearly the new showrunners did not. 

i could have liked Mon-El, if they had stuck with him being the comedic relief foundling from a conflicting culture rather than the immoral prince who needed to tear Kara down in order to feel better about himself. i remember rambling to a friend about how much more interesting it could have been if Daxam had turned out not to be the hellscape Kara’s parents had led her to believe it was—if it had been just another lie Kara took for objective truth, Kryptonian propaganda regarding a planet they were at odds with. it would have been another chance for the show to portray Kara coming to terms with the fact that her parents weren't perfect, paving the way for her to acknowledge that she doesn't need to be, either; but even better, it could have showed her dealing with cultural differences in a way that wouldn’t have been too heavy handed or on the nose for american audiences. it also would likely have made Mon-El come off as much less of an asshole, which, you know. bonus, if they wanted us to buy them as a romantic match, and to mourn along with Kara when she had to send him away.

(William was a mistake from the start. he literally feels like a guy shoved on stage during the final scene of the play with no instruction given beyond ‘you’re the romantic interest now, stand there and look pretty!’)

and, you know. this could easily be misconstrued as a vindictive sort of ‘if i can’t have supercorp i don’t want Kara dating anyone at all’, but honestly, i’m genuinely attached to the idea of possibly alloromantic, definitely asexual Kara Zor-El. 

i know it’s even less likely that the cw would have gone with an ace main character than it would have been for them to make supercorp canon, but yeah, in my mind—and this is absolutely shaped by what they actually showed in canon—both of those scenarios would have made the most sense. and—again, completely out of the scope of any cw show—how interesting would it have been to at least explore Kara’s attitudes toward the emphasis most human cultures place on sexuality vs her Kryptonian upbringing (not to mention her alien DNA)?

—☆   CHRISTINA   ||   @fallesto​   ♢

You boys need a new boss, a better boss A maniacal, terrifying boss with a hands-on, not-afraid-to-torture-people management style.

HAHA. It didn’t hurt anymore - nothing hurt anymore. She had been AFRAID of what was happening to her. The loss of her BABY was the lowest moment of her life, it was when she fell into the DARKNESS. When she thought all was LOST to her. ONE BAD DAY. That was it, but as much as she wanted to DIE in that hospital. But someone had SAVED her, got BLOOD to her at the last moment possible and when she left the hospital, it was with a skip in her step and a SMILE on her face, the worst day of her life had TURNED into the best day of her life. It had started SMALL, barely noticeable. Her skin flaking, her hair slowly losing its color, her eyes looking DIFFERENT like SOMEONE else's. Her mood would change at any MOMENT, her LAUGHTER could not be controlled and at that BOARD MEETING, there was NO holding back, NO hiding, NO pretending, she just let it all OUT and there was NO going back now.

“You mean ME and YOU - look at ALL the NASTIES you have BROUGHT here for ME. What ya been FEEDING them - other GOONS?” It was the WORST parts of the JOKER, the extreme characteristics dialed right up to the MAX. Every single trait he had, amplified. All stuck in this BODY and ready to BURST. The NEED to be the BEST. The HUNGER for the POWER. The POSSESSIVENESS of HARLEY. The DRIVE to BEAT Batman. The amount of time she had been here, she had developed Stockholm Syndrome on the WORST person POSSIBLE - Batman, but now with FREEDOM - it was slowly LATCHING onto the JESTER.

“Tell YOUR men to KILL Robin on SIGHT, to CRIPPLE and then BLUDGEON Nightwing when they see him and to LEAVE Batman ALONE - I want him ALL to myself.”

NOT A SHOWRUNNER. 

But the blonde made for a good SECOND-IN-COMMAND.

She had the trust and loyalty and if Harley hadn’t brought ALL of them together ,   if they hadn’t managed to sneak away from the Batman TOGETHER then this would have been for nothing.   Harley had EARNT her spot in front of Christina ,   the last remaining piece of his LEGACY.   Something Harley had tried to guard with her life.   She’d had people SURROUNDING her ,   and Henry Adams had tried his best to convince Batman that he was still SANE.   It had been a process ,   a plan ,   followed to the LETTER before she’d been betrayed once more.   Maybe that was the PROBLEM with the virus ,   the very last thing it NEEDED was a betrayal ,   and over and over again she’d been the VICTIM of that.   But this time things were going to be different.   Harley was going to get HER way ,   and even if Christina hadn’t been her Joker ,   she was still A JOKER ,   and that meant Harley had something to live for.

❝ I THINK we can do this together an’ prove ‘em all WRONG !! ❞   Harley bit her lip ,   looking at her new partner with ADMIRATION.   If only she had the courage to pull off something SIMILAR.   It wasn’t likely ,   but Harley knew that where she stood wasn’t about giving ORDERS ,   but passing down messages.   She wasn’t the CREATIVE mind behind it all and where she stood was exactly where she WANTED to be.   ❝ But this is all for you and I think it’s what he WANTED.   For all of us to be together.   Now I know that things went WRONG and I’mma sorry it isn’t you and ALL of ‘em because someone didn’t know how to stay in his place but PLEASE.   I need to be here with you and we can DO this.   I’ve been trying on my own but I’m ,   we ,   are nothing without a JOKER.   These people ,   they’re your men now. ❞   She SALUTED ,   her gun resting against her body ,   barrel pointed UPWARDS.   ❝ C’mon then boys !!   We got some birdies to catch !! ❞

did you watch lucifer season six and what are your thoughts pls and ty

Ahaha. Yes. Yes I did watch it. Then I cried for a literal hour and attempted to compose myself, only to start crying again when I lay down and kept on thinking about it. Then I had more feelings. Then I slept like the dead due to emotional trauma. Then I reblogged gifsets and had More feelings. Then @buffaluff and @flynnanimal watched it and also required emotional support due to drowning in their own tears. So, uh... we're all fine here now. How are you?

My main takeaway from the final season was the sheer amount of love for the characters, story, and fans that you could feel shining through all the episodes, and which made SUCH a refreshing change. I had feelings in my tags the other day about how a show about the devil was constantly goofy, hopeful, loving, and uplifting, rather than all the grimdark nonsense they could have easily done with it. (As I said, just imagine it as written by the GOT idiots?? NO THANK YOU.) The writing really loved everyone and wanted to give them a proper ending and emotional journey, and it wanted to show the fans that they weren't stupid for having invested six seasons of effort and emotion into this, and just... that is so much rarer than it should be? Compare all the movies and TV shows that treat their fans like the enemy, that want to outsmart them at all costs even if it means changing major plot elements, that ferociously guard spoilers and think that "shock value" means good writing, by throwing hackneyed cliche upon cliche and making everything Depressing, and just... Lucifer had its hiccups and slow points and missteps, of course, but I am SO glad they didn't do that. The entire show consisted of Lucifer slowly but steadily progressing toward being a better man, despite mistakes and setbacks and sometimes a little too much will-they-won't-they. (Season 3 was the only one where I got bored and skipped over the filler episodes with Pierce/Lucifer/Chloe in order to get to the end).

That is an essentially simple premise, but they stuck to it, and they didn't try to create more drama by randomly wrecking what they had already established. I wrote a fic all the way back in mid-season 2 (In Nomine Patris) that ended up predicting quite a few of the future characters who had not yet appeared on the show at that time, including Eve, Michael, and Azrael, and several plot points, including the very major one of Lucifer returning to hell for the sake of his daughter with Chloe. And while this might mean that I am just that good at guessing TV shows (I would like to think this....) it also means that the writers set expectations, followed through on those expectations, and didn't suddenly derail everything or turn it totally on its head just for the sake of cheap shocks. As we can all attest, they certainly caused PLENTY of drama, anguish, pain, and suffering, but they did it in a way that remained faithful to the overall premises of the story and the characters, and wanted to see them become the best versions of themselves. I cried my eyes out at the end and then thought, "hey, I might want to watch the whole series again," which, if you ask me, is the mark of doing your job right. There have been so few TV endings recently where I didn't immediately swear off the whole thing or have to pretend that canon didn't exist, so yeah.

As I said, it was just refreshing to watch something that had that essential deep generosity at its core, where the message is that everyone is worthy of love if they make the hard and painful effort to change and become better, and that even if earthly things feel small next to all this messy celestial drama, they still matter, and that you are loved no matter what. I loved that Amenadiel became God and Lucifer returned to hell as a choice in order to help all the trapped souls be able to work through their guilt and go to heaven. There were obviously certain echoes of The Good Place in that ending; I don't know if it was something they had planned all along or if the success of TGP, another series asking deep questions about life, death, morality, and human nature within the framework of a goofy heaven-and-hell sitcom, influenced it, but either way, it worked so well. Even if it tore my heart out and stomped on it on the ground, it was fitting and oh so lovely to see Lucifer, once the most selfish being in the entire universe, following in Linda's footsteps and becoming selflessly dedicated to helping other people. Just. Chef's kiss.

And of course, Deckerstar. The Hades and Persephone vibes were IMMACULATE this season, and while it did take Lucifer and Chloe the best part of four seasons to get together, they never significantly backslid, never had third-party issues or cheap cheating storylines once they were officially a couple, and Tom Ellis and Lauren German REALLY killed it this season in particular. It was never easy for them and sometimes the drama went on a little too long over the course of said six seasons, but the love story was beautiful and incredibly meaningful and always true to the fact that the actors and characters and writers (not to mention the fans) all loved it so much. They were so much the emotional heart of this, and when they went to hell together in episode 6x03 (where they turned into cartoons because wHAT even IS this show), Joe Henderson said in an interview that this was to give the fans a view into Lucifer and Chloe's future (after) lives post-6x10, and to offer them a basis to write fanfiction. I mean... the showrunner saying to the fans "here, we love you, have something to write fic about!" is likewise pretty shockingly rare. It's again an example of how this show always audaciously poked fun at itself, never took itself TOO seriously, and was always welcoming its fans and the people who loved it to do so, rather than making them feel stupid or taking joy in wrecking beloved characters or plots.

Obviously, I loved Rory, the badass lesbian half-angel goth Deckerstar child straight out of My Immortal (seriously, she was SO edgy, it was amazing), because of the fact that Lucifer's entire arc was always about feeling abandoned by his father and that he was going to have to face it for himself. Dorky Devil Dad Lucifer trying his absolute HARDEST to bond with his daughter was simultaneously hilarious, adorable, and heart-wrenching, and yet again, the Growth. We all remember when he could barely tolerate Trixie touching him, and now we're here. Also, any variation whatsoever of "this is just a brief moment of time that we must be apart, love is eternal and stronger than death and we will never really leave each other" as a line is guaranteed to make me bawl my eyes out. So that was fun.

I got a big kick out of Ghost Dan running around and trying to get everyone to see him, and had feelings about seeing him in heaven with Charlotte and his beloved Pudding Pops at the end. I had feelings about how they handled Ella finding out the truth (or rather demanding to know why nobody had told her) and of course, I obviously loved Maze and Eve and their goth/femme wedding and the fact that they got a good three-season romantic arc (indeed, I wanted more of them). My god, Trixie is SO BIG, she used to be a tiny little nugget. I love that Linda was the moral and emotional rock all along, from the first episode to the very last, and that Amenadiel was Deeply Vindicated when Charlie's wings appeared at his first birthday party. I love how Lucifer in s6 is absolute thousands of light years from Lucifer in s1. And as ever, Chloe was Perfect. I am happy that I spent six seasons with these characters and saw them become better, and that I was never made to feel like an idiot for trusting the writers to end everything in a beautiful and emotional way. Because, well. They did. Sure, maybe I could go back and pick at a plotline here or a detail there, but I don't terribly feel the need to do so? It might not have been perfect, but it was perfect, and I am so grateful that it existed.

Might Zuko's behavior in DoBS put Mai and Ty Lee under suspicion and in danger? Since they're his and Azula's known associates, he's openly committing very high treason and deliberating pissing Ozai off, and he did everything possible to destroy Azula's standing, basically accusing her of treason and damaging her ability to protect her and her friends.

Realistically speaking? Or even just in an "actions have consequences" way?

Yeah, that's the kind of thing that gets associates arrested or disappeared. Mai isn't just Zuko's "known associate", she's his girlfriend, and thus a walking security risk if Zuko's compromised. And both her and Ty Lee were present at Ba Sing Se, which means you could reasonably charge them with conspiracy and say that they also knew that Zuko (and Azula) was lying.

Honestly, given what we know of Ozai and given the sequence of events, it's very hard to imagine that Azula didn't get hit with major consequences and punishment. It probably took every shred of goodwill Azula had to keep Mai and Ty Lee out of it and trusted enough to stay at her side instead of getting thrown into prison.

And then Boiling Rock happens. Now think about Boiling Rock from the perspective of an Azula who stuck her neck out in a very real way to keep Mai and Ty Lee safe, to keep them out of jail because of Zuko's actions.

Because this is when Azula stops pulling her punches on Zuko. She doesn't have any spare capital left to burn. Because if Azula was able to convince Ozai to not send Mai and Ty Lee to prison or the executioner's block for Zuko's treason, and then they turned on Azula like that?

Of course Ozai stops telling Azula things. Of course she loses his favor. Of course he leaves her behind.

(I don't remember if we ever see Azula in short sleeves after DoBS and certainly not after Boiling Rock. Or anything other than a full robe in her room or full-coverage heavy armor. I don't think the showrunners intended anything by that, but there is a very bleak reading of that.)

Zuko threw Azula under the bus in a big way, and in doing so, started the process of smashing every defense she had.

I don't think that Zuko was wrong in leaving, in breaking away. I don't think he should have stayed. Sometimes you have to be selfish and choose yourself first. But I wish that the narrative didn't pretend Zuko's redemption came without cost. I really wish the narrative didn't leave us with the implication that the cost of his redemption was paid for by the invisible women and girls he left behind.

Hello I am the “what is billions about” anon pls share ur thoughts as well I am listening

hello!! i have many thoughts and milo covered quite a few of them in their answer (which i’m sure you checked out already but maybe someone Else reading this hasn’t yet, who’s to say) so i’m basically gonna supplement that post / give a slightly more structured Season By Season breakdown of What Is Billions, Anyway. spoilers, naturally.

first, an Overall Statement, on which i’m going to quote one of the billions showrunners, brian koppelman (here he’s also speaking for the other billions showrunner / his creative partner, david levien), on what he hopes people take away from the show:

I think that people love to watch hyper-intelligent, hyper-verbal people who are charismatic and charming, and who really love what they do, and who love being in this contest and this game.

For us, what we’re interested in, is why America is willing to substitute verbal acuity, charm, power and wealth for true qualities of character, like kindness and empathy? We hope that by watching the show and getting off on it when these characters do really bad things, it makes us all wonder why we’re rooting for them sometimes.

these characters are forever gunning to speak in the most obscure references and quickest witticisms of anyone in the room, to give the most inspirational off-the-cuff monologues, to indulge in the best meals and the most expensive luxuries — and constantly saying and doing horrible things to one another and to total strangers, because they can. so that’s a major Theme to keep in mind. (we talk about brian and david quite a bit. authorly intentions are interesting.)

season one sets up The World Of Billions and the tangled relationships between the three initial leads. bobby “axe” axelrod is a rich & successful hedge fund ceo who’s widely loved in nyc for famously surviving 9/11 and engaging in philanthropy. chuck rhoades is a ruthless us attorney in manhattan who prosecutes financial crime but has, until now, avoided going after axe and his hedge fund, axe capital, despite axe’s reputation for Shady Dealings. wendy rhoades is chuck’s wife, and axe capital’s on-call performance coach / therapist and axe’s bff. (allegedly. i’m rarely convinced that their friendship is as Real And Weird And Deep as we’re meant to believe, but we are meant to believe it.) chuck can’t deal with his wife being best friends with some other guy, let alone some guy who’s doing finance crimes, so once he resolves to Take Axe Down, he spends most of the season figuring out how, with the help of two assistant us attorneys, kate sacker and bryan connerty. axe doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong, and can’t deal with any man getting more of wendy’s attention than he does, so he spends most of the season fighting back. (let’s also note that axe has a wife, lara, who is at best uneasy about wendy’s sway over him.) 

chuck uses his power to do a lot of questionable things, up to and including stealing wendy’s notes on her axe capital patients, ostensibly in the service of justice. axe uses his wealth to do a lot of questionable things, up to and including letting one of his employees die to protect axe from prosecution when he could have extended the employee’s life, so he can keep making money. (also, we — and many, many people in nyc — find out that axe made his fortune off of 9/11 and tried to keep it buried for 14 years. he’s not so well loved after that.) the season ends with wendy deciding she’s sick of both of them, quitting her job at axe capital, and kicking chuck out of the house, followed by axe & chuck meeting face to face to yell about how much they hate each other and how they’ve both lost wendy by being so exquisitely terrible.

so this is the world that taylor mason (the most important character, as you know) walks into. rich men make their wealth of off suffering and death; powerful men abuse their public trust for personal ends; and the lives and wellbeing of everyone else turn on the whims of the rich and powerful and whatever years-long personal grudges they feel like satisfying today. (and sometimes, rich and powerful people will walk up to each other and say things like “What’s the point of having fuck you money if you never say fuck you?” and “You’re sure to become President of the Libertarian Club of Danbury Federal Prison.”)

season two introduces us to taylor and demonstrates that it’s not so easy for axe & chuck to become disentangled from wendy, or one another. early on, axe, chuck, & wendy are all under legal scrutiny due to the circumstances of chuck stealing wendy’s notes and wendy leaving axe capital. when axe is introduced to taylor by mafee, their mentor, and recognizes their brilliance, he enlists them to help attack another hedge fund ceo who wendy’s chosen to work for (and who is generally awful); chuck, who’s in danger of being fired, holds onto his job by successfully prosecuting (with the assistance of connerty and sacker) a prominent banker who’s also a friend of axe. axe decides to invest in a poor town in upstate new york, as a favor to a family friend, and puts taylor on figuring out if it’s a good deal; chuck is pushed to run for governor by his father, chuck senior, and senior sabotages a deal that would have brought a lot of money to the upstate town, which means a lot of money potentially lost for axe capital. (taylor, perhaps surprisingly, calls for stripping the town for all it’s worth to make up the loss.)

taylor gains favor with axe, gets used to a life of increasing wealth and power, finds themself on connerty’s radar, and starts to see the personal costs of doing business at axe capital. chuck & axe set their sights on one another again, which isn’t helped by axe finally managing to hire back wendy, a deal that strains chuck and wendy’s ongoing attempt to repair their marriage and hastens the crumbling of axe and lara’s marriage. (other than axe, the only person happy to see wendy back at axe capital is taylor — the two properly meet for the first time and click immediately.) chuck convinces senior to invest in a company, ice juice, that chuck’s best friend, ira schirmer, has also invested in, knowing that axe will try to ruin the company to hurt chuck and profit from its ruin — he does, and chuck gets it all on camera. wendy is again stuck in the middle, without knowing what chuck is planning, and decides to take a chunk of the profits axe is making. axe gets arrested, and wendy & chuck go home together, but only after axe sets taylor up to lead axe capital in his absence, lies about coming home to lara, and hugs wendy goodbye while chuck watches.

season three elevates taylor to more and more power, while setting axe against them — and, shockingly, on the same side as chuck — for the first time. axe is frustrated about the ice juice case and about having to give up his right to trade in order for axe capital, under taylor’s leadership and (allegedly) without axe’s input, to do business at all. (he’s also frustrated about lara deciding to divorce him, but it’s on the back burner, really.) chuck isn’t doing much better — senior and ira now hate him for using them as bait for axe; the new attorney general, jock jeffcoat, is forcing him (and sacker, who’s now his right hand attorney) to take on cases he hates in order to keep his job; and connerty, who’s supposed to be leading the ice juice case against axe, keeps finding evidence that points to chuck’s involvement. while taylor is in charge of axe cap, and with wendy advising them, they get accustomed to doing things their own way & dealing with crises, decide to hire quantitative analysts (aka quants! hello winston!) to help develop an algorithm that will change how axe capital does business, fend off / work around axe’s repeated attempts to make their decisions for them, and grow disillusioned with the culture of axe capital. (an example: taylor, and everyone at axe capital, watch a man die in an explosion on live television, and almost everyone around them starts cheering because they’ll make money off of it.)

chuck & axe are both fighting to make sure the other guy goes down over ice juice — until the news of wendy’s involvement gets out, and they have to work together to keep her safe and out of jail. (their plan to do this involves putting mafee in the line of fire, which taylor picks up on and confronts wendy about.) once the case is resolved, and chuck, axe, & wendy all get off scot-free, chuck reconciles with senior & ira and fires connerty for daring to come after him, and axe returns to axe capital and knocks taylor off their perch, back to being a regular employee. axe prepares to raise new money for axe capital, while undoing much of taylor’s work and belittling them and their requests for input and autonomy. chuck gives up his run for governor and tries to get jeffcoat out of office. but both of them are blindsided by betrayal — axe by taylor starting their own hedge fund, taylor mason capital, with the money raised for axe capital, and chuck by connerty and sacker siding with jeffcoat to get chuck fired. with chuck no longer the us attorney, he and wendy agree he’s got nothing against axe, and the three of them meet to start planning their retribution.

season four focuses on everyone’s desire for revenge against someone else, particularly axe & wendy’s separate but related desires for revenge against taylor. axe is trying to crush taylor & their company any way he can (sometimes with the assistance of his new girlfriend, rebecca cantu), and firing / threatening anyone at axe capital who gets in touch with them, because he can’t bear to let them succeed. chuck is running for state attorney general, because he needs a position of power to go after connerty, who’s now the us attorney, and jeffcoat. axe & chuck make a deal: if axe helps chuck get elected, chuck will make sure taylor is arrested. (“arrested for what?” axe doesn’t care what. just crimes.) wendy is helping both axe & chuck with their respective goals and feeling vindictive herself because she believes taylor took advantage of her empathy for them to put them in a position to start their own fund. taylor does well fending off axe’s attacks at first, with the help of mafee, their coo sara hammon, and other new employees. then their father, douglas mason, comes to visit, and three things become clear: 1) their relationship is difficult because he has almost no respect for them 2) they’re desperate for his approval 3) he’s come to see them because he wants their financial support for a personal project.

chuck wins his election, with axe’s help and with a very personal public speech. once in office, he agrees to help senior with a real estate deal; his legally questionable “help” catches the attention of connerty, sacker, and jeffcoat, who go to equally questionable lengths to prove that chuck is doing crimes. (an example: breaking into senior’s apartment to steal evidence from his biometrically locked safe.) wendy, who’s angry about her inclusion in chuck’s very personal speech, reaches out to taylor to talk. she learns that taylor is funding douglas’s personal project and, using her knowledge of their strained relationship from therapy sessions with taylor, works with axe to force taylor to kill the project. douglas walks out; taylor is devastated and wants some revenge of their own. (so does sara, who reports wendy for medical malpractice.) taylor attacks a company owned by rebecca, and axe supports her, until rebecca & taylor cut both their losses by cutting a deal. this makes axe so mad that he destroys the company instead, alienating rebecca and bankrupting taylor mason capital. chuck & senior’s real estate deal turns out to be a trap for connerty and jeffcoat (but not sacker, because she’s too smart for that), and it succeeds. however, chuck was supposed to be helping wendy keep her medical license; when she finds out that he didn’t do a thing, she walks out on him and into axe’s apartment. chuck, who was already sick of axe, “arrests” taylor and tells them that, though axe wants him to blackmail taylor into returning to axe capital, chuck wants them to go back as his operative to take axe down. taylor agrees to all sides of this deal, and returns to axe capital with their employees in tow, intending to just wait it out until axe and chuck destroy one another.

season five forces the leads to deal with the messes they made in season four, and smashes up & reforms the relationships of that season. axe, who’s feeling adrift after reaching a net worth of $10 billion and not feeling happy about it, is going in all directions at once. he decides that fellow deca-billionaire mike prince, who keeps swiping things he wants, is his new arch-nemesis; he applies for a bank charter for axe capital so he’ll never have to work again; he hires a artist, nico tanner, to paint for him on commission. the only thing he doesn’t do is run axe capital, even with the return of taylor, who he said he wanted around to help him make better plays, and their confession to him that they came back in collaboration with chuck. axe & chuck are ostensibly still allies, but chuck, with sacker behind him, is trying every angle he can think of to send axe to jail and prevent him from getting a bank charter. taylor, who’s struggling to achieve anything under the weight of appeasing both axe & chuck and the interference of other axe capital people in taylor mason capital’s work, teams up with wendy to win over investors and reinvents their fund as taylor mason carbon, focused on environmentally friendly investing. wendy and chuck get divorced, but are still entangled by shared assets and familial commitments; wendy and tanner take to one another romantically, axe finds out, and as we recall from season one, axe can’t deal with any man getting more of wendy’s attention than he does; and all of taylor’s employees are suspicious of wendy and her intentions.

season five hasn’t yet been filmed or aired in full thanks to covid, but where we’ve left off, axe has lost out on his bank charter, discovered that taylor and wendy teamed up with prince, and deliberately driven a wedge between axe & tanner, all in one night. it seems likely that wendy’s soon going to be as alienated from axe as she already is from chuck, and probable or at least possible that there’s more to taylor’s partnership with wendy than we’re led to believe. but we really have no idea what’s going to happen or even when we’re going to see it happen, and in a way that’s the best description of billions anyone could give.

SpaceBattles Poster Hangwind on why He-Man isn't the main character and why matters and how

Now, in the time of this thread being down, I have had several more thoughts. Starfox5 tagging you in so you can respond if you want to. I felt dissatisfied with those arguing that He-Man was a main character despite his death but I couldn't quite figure out how to put what I was feeling into words. It wasn't until I read a Spiderman fanfiction that it struck me. He-Man isn't really a character for most of this, even a supporting one. Instead, he is an event. He's Uncle Ben. Think about it. Spiderman, Peter Parker, is always referencing Uncle Ben. He's always quoting him, wondering what he would do, wishing he were there. He's always having flashbacks in cartoon terms. But does that make the Spiderman comics "all about Uncle Ben"? Of course not! And there's actually a very specific reason for that: it isn't who Uncle Ben was that is important, so much as how he died. In fact, Uncle Ben's profile has undergone multiple different revisions over the years without truly affecting the core story of Spiderman simply because he isn't actually a character, he's a set piece. The true value is in the inciting event and the lingering effects of his death. Same thing with He-Man. He went from a main character to a background event in the show. He had part of an episode of actual agency, then he just became another set piece. And right when it looked like he might be about to regain said agency, Smith had Skeletor at least look like he was removing it again. Now, let's take the Spiderman comparison further. With Uncle Ben, Peter took the death as a lesson and became a better person. He became more caring, more involved, more heroic than he was before. A tragedy turned to good. If we had gotten that sort of journey from Teela, I would still be upset about Smith's bullshit bait and switch, but I could at least have enjoyed it on its own merits. But they couldn't even get that right. Instead, Teela takes He-Man's death and did the exact opposite, making things worse for everyone around her. Instead of stepping up and showing what she was made of, she stepped away. I suppose that shows what she was made of, yes, but it's brown and smelly. We didn't get Spiderman. We got someone emotionally immature, narcissistic, bitterly holding onto a grudge for years, utterly convinced of her own righteousness, and so tunneled in on her own perspective that she literally had to have Andra drag her into saving the world. It says a lot that she was objectively worse at that point than fricking EVIL-Lynne. But you know what? There is a person just like that in Spiderman. I just wasn't expecting the origin story of J Jonah Jameson in He-Man. And certainly not with Teela! Seriously, the parallels are ridiculous. Both are self-centered, bitter, entitled problems who honestly can't understand why they shouldn't have the right to extremely dangerous secrets. despite the fact that the secret getting out causes problems and gets people killed. And that is the thing that I think Starfox5 doesn't get. I don't hate OG Teela. I actually really liked her in most of her incarnations. She's an interesting character, acting as both a straight man to a fairly wild cast as well as having the core of the brash and wild warrior in herself. She was the up and comer, the warrior that both wants to get stuck in while also needing to be reliable to do her job. Frankly, I'm not surprised that Teela became the Man-At-Arms. That was a fairly natural advancement for the character, even if I would have preferred a couple of episodes of "show, don't tell". Honestly, I'm not sure that they even told us in particular what event lead to her being promoted? I hate THIS VERSION of Teela because it destroys and perverts her character. That steadiness? She walked away when things went wrong. The passion and brash nature that used to be a great driver for her personality are now used as a poison for her personality. I am DEEPLY unimpressed with them not actually using He-Man but...maybe he got off easily? Because what they

did to Teela was outright painful. Honestly, it comes from a place of not really getting the core concept of He-Man, an intensely and unapologetically positive show. Ultimately, in order to use Teela in the future, I honestly think that her character is going to have to utterly ignore this show's existence. And that's a problem. XXX Split for shift in topic XXX Now, talking about the future. I don't trust Kevin when he says that "there is going to be so much He-Man" in the next five episodes. I suspect that it is going to end with Adam being permanently de-powered, Teela as the Sorceress, and Andra as the new Champion. Partially because I wouldn't trust Kevin at this point if he said "Grass is green". Notably, while he has said several times that there are going to have a big fight in episode seven, he has been suspiciously silent about things after that. This sets off every instinct I have, given the way he used essentially a single episode to make it look like He-Man was actually central to the story. Yeah, I have no faith in them. BUT! For the purposes of argumentation, let's say that the second half of the season is great and exactly what we expect. That actually leads to two problems: First is that the first five episodes have no real reason to exist. They basically end up as the unwanted extra bits, like the bone of a steak. You kind of resent paying for that dead weight. Except in this case, they handed us a massive steaming bone with barely any (man) meat on it, then told us "Don't worry, the next course will definitely be better! You just have to pay again for it!" It is hilarious to see various people both on the forum and not that absolutely rail against big businesses on a regular basis defending predatory practices from big toy and streaming corporations. But there is a worse problem. And that is what an excellent back half of the season will do to Teela's character. One of the showrunners, Wood I think, mentioned that his vision for this series was breaking the characters down to see what makes them heroic. And if suddenly Teela pulls her shit together and returns to being a tolerable, good, or even great character, that makes the answer...Adam. Yup. Apparently, she isn't much of a hero on her own, needing to be dragged into saving the world kicking and screaming. But when Adam is around, hey hero time! That's just not where I think the character should go or how she has been designed. There are ways to do MOTU without He-Man right. First, you need to actually advertise it that way and not have literally every piece of merchandise, most of the trailers, and the FUCKING DIRECTOR focusing on He-Man. Think about a novel; if I picked one up with an obvious Clancy-esque cover, a summary that sounds like a technothriller, and has been put in the Action section, I am going to be pissed if it turns out to be a Kenyon novel. Even though I actually enjoy some of her stuff, it isn't what I wanted when I bought it. Second, you cannot have Teela be a narcissistic deserter. She should have been a hero and commander, holding the kingdom together and forging new ways of doing things even as all the various magics, both war and utility, slowly failed. Seriously, there is so MUCH more that could have been done there. This? This is ultimately very pretty trash.

Spoiler-Filled Reaction to the 1st Ep of TFATWS: ‘New World Order’ ...

Okay, so I may switch up and do weekly recaps via audio. Either way, I’m getting something out before the weekend is up... Still!...  It’s a been a few days, so I can go a bit more in depth with my thoughts on that pilot ep.

~ So, that opening was quiet and down-to-earth. For me, it was hammering home not only the humbleness of Sam (despite the bravado, the man is naive in his optimism and *not* superpowered), but being stuck in his initial thoughts about the shield.   ...That it didn’t feel like it belonged to him. Sam’s personality, has been established as super-loyal and almost childlike in his feelings that things will work out and doing the right thing because it’s right (which is why he didn’t get paid enough BTW naive pride). 

-which comes into play w/ his conflict w/ his sister later... I’ll come back to that.

~ We jump into a dangerous mission that shows off Falcon’s personality. He’s gonna get it done with style and optimism even when working with equipment that needs a few updates.  The stunt coordination here was fantastic!  I legit whewed! aloud at Balroc paragliding into *multiple* helicopters... Sam’s hair-pin turns milimeters from canyon rock, propellers, and rockets... ~ I *loved* Torres’ fanboying. It felt like a parallel to Sam fanboying Cap, in CA:WS and evoked the well-established superhero trope of a person *marveling* aloud at what you’re doing making it so. much. cooler. (as an oldhead, the random black dude emoting about Superman’s suit after he comes out of a phonebooth, in the Reeves movie, is my earliest memory of this trope). ~ Then we see the Tunisia titlecard, which yea! it didn’t just say Africa, but ehh, once again “yellow tint” is code for “exotic” country full of brown people. It did cut through the typically more alt-right-tinged military propaganda w/ the Tunisian man thanking Sam for saving his wife, the bare minimum of humanization... but it saved the scene from just “backdropping” the people/culture w/o any humanity, at all, as is typical... That and the way these two BIPOC spoke to one another (there is a certain kind of rapport we non-white folk have w/ each other) was my first hint...that this showrunner ain’t a white dude. The joking about him knowing Arabic...like cheering/teasing when we show our range to one another.  Mainly, this interaction was to show that Sam is to Torres what Steve was to Sam in some ways...with a bit more “brazen kid” on Torres’ part, along w/ introing the idea of the Flagsmashers. ~ Then, naive Sam decides to donate the shield to the Smithsonian...because he doesn’t feel like he’s earned it and because in his mind it still belongs to Cap and because he’s out here trusting this governement even after all the B.S. he’s done lived through.  Even Rhodey was having his doubts... Maybe being around during the blip makes a person more savvy and cynical, IDK. ~ So, then we see Buck in therapy and since I’ve been through trauma, I know that mindset.  Sticking to routine is a big “win”.  Not really caring about anything beyond the bare essentials (yall saw that man’s apartment). And the feeling of being displaced would be amplified by the fact that this man is more so than anyone who has existed(!).  ~ I noticed that Seb leaned into his Rom-Merican accent, which was a great acting choice, it evokes his sense of having traveled without a solid sense of self in a place, because he was essentially, asleep all those decades, while the brainwashed aspect of himself was enslaved to Hydra. I LOVE his therapist.   Fannishness for a cute guy, means a lot of people don’t like her being “mean” to him... But I’mma tell you, as someone who actually has been in therapy for a good bit, you *need* someone who will call you on your bullshit so you can properly work on it.  I love that she’s also a vet and there’s nothing cutesy and coddling in a male-gazey sexy or motherly way. She’s doing her fucking job and not letting his ass slide. To me, that read as a hat-tip to a woman drecting this. So, we see Buck manifest his trauma w/ profound discomfort in his own skin.  He doesn’t know how to interact anymore, how to swagger in this strange time and place (because dude had all kinds of 1940′s swagger and juice back in CA:TFA) So, he’s just awkwardly honest, and beating himself up for that. But... he’s still alive, so he totally perked up in the presence of this attractive server and Yori notices and like so many old people, just busted his chops and skipped all the what he wasn’t gonna do and did it for him, w/ Leah’s confidant acceptance -ahhh, I luv her!- as an assist. ~ Then we flip back to Sam in Delacroix and we meet his sister and his nephews and his community(!) which really nails down Sam the man, the person, the human apart from his underwritten assists to the Avengers. We see that Sarah knows and loves this naively optimistic ‘I will find a way to fix it because it’s the right thing to do’ hard-headed brother.... but good-God! he doesn’t know shit about real-world day-to-day struggle... If you’ve seen Anthony Mackie in The Hurt Locker... one of the big themes explored, is how tough it is for vets who have been through explosions and firefights in another country... to adjust to day-to-day struggle in “normal life”. THAT is what Buck’s therapist was calling out when she said BULLSHIT to him saying he wanted peace (lol, no he doesn’t, like Sam he wants that righeous kind of adrenalin only being in action for “good” gives) and what Sarah is frustrated w/ is regarding him not understanding or respecting the kind of struggle she had to deal w/. ~ As an aside I *loved* her *nose-scratch* “Can I talk to you for a minute??” Whew! That is a black-ass way to let you know someone is pissed w/ you and wants to hash all the shit out. That’s why Sam avoided it, lol... ~ So, the date with Leah, who does all the right things...Goes terribly, because Buck is still too deep in his trauma focus on anything about how great she is.   Note, that just about everything that happened on that date reminded him of aspects of his trauma to the point where Buck, (being an absolute dick!) just fucking, walks out on her!!  I NEED her to chew his ass out for that and I need him to *not* be able to make it up to her (and I’d also love some fanfic, where Buck actually does *ahem* treat her well... I know Asian women be shorted in fanfic too!) ~ So, he goes to Yori’s apartment and stares like an obvious knucklehead (still dealing w/ being stuck in his trauma) at the alter to the man who was just in the way of that brainwashed aspect of himself, pays for the lunch and walks off...AND, NOTE!!  YORI DID NOTICE ALL THIS. So, this will eventually come to a head...yikes! ~ Then we’re back to Sam, and Sarah who tries to have that talk, but old boy ain’t trying to hear it. Insisting that he’s the man to swoop in and save the boat and the business *sigh* by some magic (hanging with magical beings...will do that, I guess). And Sarah smartly is just frustrated and skeptical, but lets him go on and try and fail in the same ways she already did so. many. times... in those five years. ~ And then we see bb Torres being brazen kid stupid amateur spy w/ the Flagsmashers. I honestly thought old masked dude stomped him to death, at first... The camera pan showed the cliched dead-man pose, after all.  I guess he pulled that (super!)stomp, which means... Flagsmashers aren’t the lethal villians here IMO.   I think they escaped from the *real* villian. ~ And then comes some real world racist bullshit... This scene at the bank *nails* a particular kind of frustratingly infuriating racism that is common. Where they will act like they are doing you a favor because they like and want something from you... but still won’t serve you in the same way they would a white person. It’s this strange willfullly “I like you negroes, you entertain me! -but fuck you -but I still like you!” patronizing thing that we know all too well. *whew!* That was real. And then that heartbreaking scene where after Sarah rightly told-ya-so’s.  -Sam is working on that mess of an engine and reality *finally* sets in when the key  didn’t even attempt to turnover.

~ Then Torres messages Sam (and he’s alive!) and we all know Sam knows these Flasgsmashers got super-serum, but isn’t saying. Even TORRES knows (bless his heart). ~ And from there we go straight to the U.S. government rubbing salty dirt in Sam’s wound with the new/fake Cap holding the shield aloft and winking like “It’s mine now, bitch!”. ---And the credits, I won’t get into except to say if you want ALL the spoilers in the credits, watch that linked video, I posted earlier. But they are SIGNIFICANT spoilers.

ST: TNG Watchthrough Episodes 17-20.

Home Soil: So from what I’ve read, this would be Gene Roddenberry’s final episode as showrunner before getting replaced by writer Maurice Hurly. I won’t comment on the behind the scenes drama and such that caused it because it was decades ago and not relevant for a First Watchthrough post, but since this is the last I wanted to make note of it. My thoughts? It was okay. This is very much borrowing from the TOS episode Devil in the Dark (the one with the Horta) with the plot being of an alien presence killing humans... but only because the humans were unknowingly causing it harm. It’s done fine enough, not being any better or worst than when TOS did it, but that’s about it. It does executed it a little differently with the events and the alien is FAR less willing to comply than the Horta was at first and ends with the alien backing down, but refusing contact with humans for three centuries, which DOES make it a nice contrast to how Devil in the Dark ended. It’s not great. It’s not horrible. It’s just okay with the biggest criticism being pulling too much from TOS again. Look, I love TOS and so far TNG hasn’t passed it. I outright have a 30 disc Blu-Ray set coming in the next few days of all the TOS material, including TAS and the films. If I want to revisit TOS, I’ll go watch it or read fanfiction or heck, go watch AOS. TNG has remained painfully average or not good at this point because it’s trying to retain what TOS had, despite it being over 20 years later and even the TOS films had changed how it did things compared to the show. Whatever one feels about Roddenberry, his removal I hope helped push TNG away from TOS and let it carve it’s own identity while still honoring what TOS had stood for, and according to history it did. Not sure if we’ll see the quality go up in these final few S1 episodes, but still. Sorry, felt appropriate to finally get this out here. Going back to the episode, it’s perfectly fine and it delivers it’s message well, and hey it’s not always a bad idea to showcase the same themes as the previous incarnation in a spinoff especially fi a relevant one/gets shown to viewers who hadn’t seen that TOS episode. Not the best, not the worst, and that’s not such a bad way to end up. 3/5.

Coming of Age: Alright Wesley, it took a bit but you’re starting to grow on me. So we have Wesley going through a test to get into the Academy while Picard and the crew are dealing with some rough interrogations and Picard being painted as an incompetent captain by the interrogator. They don’t seem that connected, but infact the latter is a test for Picard to determine if e’s ready for a promotion. I like how they bring up Picard’s actions in past continuity that WOULD present him as at least fallible to major error, ignoring certain conditions that caused it to begin with and how he got them out of the situation. Like I said, this was one of Wesley’s better episodes. While doing well with testing, his worry about the psyche test and not knowing his own fear and therefore worried about what the test will unleash upon him is very relatable. Heck his talk with Worf was a really nice scene, especially with Worf outright stating that only fools fear nothing which in turns add more depth and dimensions to the Klingons. The reveal fo his greatest fear, while I wish he had hesitated a little bit more, made perfect sense and he acted as a true Starfleet Officer. Which since this was before Undiscovered Country, is a VERY positive development. Picard guiding a kid who made a stupid decision was also good and shows why he’s a good captain, and his talk to him as well as encouraging a disappointed Wesley at the end was a nice moment to cap the episode off with. As far as Wesley goes, he may still be presented as too competent and intelligent, but he is more likeable and the testing setting allows him to shine like this without, again, affecting the adult characters. Plus text anxiety is super relatable haha. Now of course due to Status Quo is God, Wesley fails, but he takes it well and proved that he will be ready for it in the future. It was a pretty nice episode all in all. Nothing spectacular, but I enjoyed it, neither plot overpowered the other, had a good theme of one’s integrity as a person/doing your best, good use of past continuity, and it really shows the best in characters like Picard, Wesley, and the crew’s loyalty to the former. 4/5.

Heart of Glory: Back in TOS, the Klingons were depicted as war-loving jerks. They weren’t without some depth and episodes like Day of the Dove did attempt to give them a bit more positive limelight, but it wasn’t enough to overpower the one-dimensional characterization. The films were a bit better, Undiscovered Country especialy, but that one hadn’t been made yet and they still stuck with the ruthless characterization, just changed up the makeup to make them look more alien like. It was weird sicne whenever I ddi watch TNG back when that’s all I knew of Star Trek, Worf never came across like a ruthless warmonger but like an honorable warrior which made him stand-out amongst the cast for me (that and because I freakin’ love Michael Dorn due to his animation voice over work, anyone else remember I.M. Weasel? XD). So now we get an episode where Worf gets to interact with other Klingons. I lift a brow at Worf not knowing about most Klingon customs when he seemed perfectly knowledgeable about i in past episodes. Maybe that wad due tot he shift after getting rid of Roddenberry/ IDK, but these kinds of retcons happens sometimes. This was an interesting one for sure. The Klingons are much better presented here than the entirety of TOS, showing more of their culture/customs and compared to Worf, who was raised by humans and therefore not fully in touch with his people and their ways. This is probably one of, if not the first time he’s interacted with his full culture and naturally he’d want to interact with them and learn more now that he has the chance. There’s the themes of one growing in another culture, how they adapt while still trying to be part of that culture, and finding one’s own path. There is the question on why Worf wans’t just returned tot he Klingons as a child and IDK if they address it down the line, but that type of life and struggle with identity/culture clash due to upbringing IS real and VERY relatable. I’m really glad to see the Klingons fleshed out past their TOS depiction and it’s overall respected by the cast, showing how far things have come since Kirk’s time. It fleshes out Worf’s character a great deal and makes him more likable/relatable and giving him a very realistic struggle, and in the end he stands by his beliefs and even gets the respect and offer to serve with Klingons in the future by Klingon Captain K’Nera. Very much glad that I watched this one~ 4/5.

The Arsenal of Freedom: Oh boy, war machines that killed everything! That theme never gets old! I’m not joking, with how modern warfare and technology are growing and being sold for profit, it feels like it just keeps getting more and more relevant. There’s a lot of tension in this one with Yar, Data, and Riker dealing with the arsenal that is intelligent and they’re unable to be beamed up, the ship getting attacked with Geordi in command and the Chief Engineer (they seem to go through a LOT of those this season, guess they couldn’t handle the strain of acting as miracle workers like Scotty) being an asshole to him, and Crusher injured with Picard trying to keep her alive and not get killed. Seriously, I loved Geordi here for being an effective acting commanding officer during a VERY intense situation AND telling off the Chief Engineer without even so much as raising is voice while encouraging the other officers. Badass and admirable. The away team scenes were also good with everyone being plain awesome~ Crusher having to explain to Picard how to treat her injuries while she’s in obvious pain was really good character stuff and Thank God that they avoided indulging in the obvious shipping fodder. I know they’ve hinted a little at Picard/Crusher... but I’m not really interested in it int he romantic sense at least currently. It comes off as a Captain and CMO trusting the other (not quite the same as say... Kirk and McCoy, but the trust is very much strong here plus Picard and Crusher should be allowed to form their own dynamic) and that’s the kind of interaction I live for~! It feels like everyone got a moment to shine, even Troi checking on Geordi’s mental well-being and letting him express some of his nervousness was really nice. And of course the arsenal having destroyed their own creators... like I said, a theme that just seems to grow more and more in relevance. Like I said above, some themes are necessary to repeat, and this one very much qualifies. But yeah this was great for it’s tensions, the characters being all great especially Geordi, and it’s themes (even fi IDK how intentional it was) being a huge reminder of the dangers of modernized warfare/using warfare for profit. It doesn’t go well. 4.5/5.

Okay, it’s late in the season, but we are FINALLY getting somewhere! The characters have truly grown on me and their characterizations are getting better (i.e. Picard is still a serious captain, but is very much warming up and not as cold as he was early on), the stories are steadily improving, and even with what I said about the first one, I really enjoyed this batch of episodes! Only five remain in the season, and the plan is to knock ‘em all out tomorrow. Might take a day or two off before tarting Season 2, but golly I’m finally feeling excited~!

5, 20, 23, and 28 for the fic questions (or any combination thereof!). Thank you!

Bonnie!  I swear, you and @coffeeandchemicals are absolutely determined to feed my ego.  I already like talking about myself a little too much 😂

5.)  Do you write from start to finish or do you hop around?

Man, does anybody write from start to finish?  And if so, can they tell me how they do it?  :P  Sure, for smaller fics I’ll sometimes know more or less where I’m going, but having dipped my toe in the long-form waters, I’ve found that I rarely know exactly how it’s going to turn out.  This is why I love Scrivener—the ability to put each scene in a separate file and move them around is key, plus if there’s something missing I can create a file, put it in roughly the right place, and type a quick description of what goes there.  More than once I’ve had a scene that I thought would fit at the start of the story go at the end, or vice versa.  (The first time Neil Gaiman wrote for Doctor Who, he talked about having to do multiple rewrites as the showrunners switched around where in the season his episode was going to go, so as to make it fit the season-long arc—I feel that especially now, having had to do the same thing multiple times with some scenes.  At least I don’t also have budgetary limitations to think about.)

20.)  Do you set yourself deadlines or goals?

Historically I haven’t, because I had very little faith in myself to stick to them—as the tumblr post goes, “I can’t do self-imposed deadlines because I know the guy who imposed them and he’s full of shit.”  But lately I’ve gotten better about sticking to them; maybe I have more faith in myself, or maybe I just have a better idea of my abilities.  Though sometimes I’ve surprised myself—some weeks back, stuck with a morass of individual scenes and no clear arc, I gave myself a week to come up with a reasonable outline for Act III, and much to my surprise it all fell into place on Friday.  Currently my goal is to finish Act III by the time I start my new job in mid-January; it may be a bit of a stretch, but I’m hoping to surprise myself again. 🤞🤞

23.)  Is there a trope you will never write?

hrm.  I doubt I’m ever going to write a hard rape scene—which might seem odd, given how much I like to hang out in the fuzzy grey area of dubcon/hate-sex, but frankly I don’t find it dramatically interesting and the various potentially-interesting things that can come of it have all been done far too badly far too many times to count.  I’m also not particularly fond of A/B/O, though I totally get why other people like it—it’s just not my thing personally.  Still, I’m not going to say never...I’m a big believer in the idea that you can write a good story about anything, if you find the truth in it.

28.)  Best part of writing fanfic?

The lack of expectation.  That sounds snooty as all hell, and I really don’t mean it to be—I genuinely love that about the fandom realm.  I spend so much time holding myself to ridiculously high standards, to the point where I’ve often ended up choking off my own creativity.  But fandom inspires me—because even if I’m mentally comparing my work to such-and-such author, I know most of my readers aren’t (or if they are, they’re polite enough not to say so)—they’re just happy to have more fic to read.  I can’t tell you how often that’s helped to get me past the fear-of-imperfection choke point, especially in the early stages of writing.

This is, relatedly, also why I’m such a hardliner for the “no unsolicited criticism” aspect of fandom culture—writers are also readers.  We can tell where our stories don’t hold up, or if we’re not sure, we generally have friends we trust whom we can ask for an honest opinion.  Negative comments, even well-intentioned ones, stick in our minds and make it harder to overcome that fear the next time, which means fewer fanworks, which makes everyone sadder.

send me 2020 wrapup fic writer asks!

On September 13th, 2005, a new show made its debut on the WB. It was about two brothers whose lives were flipped upside down the day their mother was murdered by a demon. It had a small budget, a small cast, and a small crew, but the people involved were dedicated. They wanted to do everything they could to make sure the story of Sam and Dean Winchester was told. They wanted to show us the true power of family in the darkest of times. Little did any of them know just how much of a legacy they would create, and just how much of a family their following would come to be.

I was four years old when Supernatural first came on the air. I had no concept of any show beyond Blue’s Clues, Lazy Town, and the Disney Channel. I was a smart kid, but a kid nonetheless, and Supernatural just wasn’t something I was ready for. As I grew up, Supernatural achieved milestone after milestone. It made it through the channel change to the CW. It survived a writer’s strike in its third season. And in April of 2010, it hit its 100th episode milestone. As it neared the end of its fifth season, Eric Kripke’s original storyline had been told, and it seemed as if the show would end, then and there. But it didn’t. Instead, it continued beyond its originally scheduled timeline, taking on a new showrunner in its sixth season and continuing for years after. And in 2011, in the middle of said sixth season, it finally made its way onto my radar.

Tenzin Tsekye and I have been best friends for fourteen years, so we’ve spent a lot of time together. We’ve had hundreds of sleepovers, shared a million memories, and watched thousands of shows and movies together. So when, at one of our many sleepovers, she suggested that we watch an episode of something called “Supernatural”, I trusted her. She knows what I watch, she knows how I am. I was bound to like it. Except there was one problem. She insisted on watching this one episode that she really liked (Family Remains) that was smack dab in the middle of season four, and I was not having it. I told her that we had to start from the beginning. I didn’t know anything about this show, so how could I possibly watch an episode in the middle of its fourth season? It wouldn’t make any sense to me. She kept assuring me that it didn’t have anything to do with the main plot (a concept I now know as “Monster of the Week”), and that I would love it. But I wasn’t convinced, and I was persistent. I told her that if we weren’t going to start from the beginning, I wouldn’t watch it at all.

We argued about it for at least an hour, and finally, I backed down. I said that we could watch the season four episode only if we went back and watched the first episode afterwards. She agreed. After we watched Family Remains, she stuck to our agreement and we watched the pilot. And then we watched the second episode. And the third. And the fourth. And my entire life was changed forever.

It still baffles me to this day how close I came to never starting Supernatural to begin with. I thank Tenzin all the time for being so stubborn on that night. Who knows what my life would be like today if she hadn’t been? Looking back, it’s hard for me to picture a time before I started watching Supernatural--so much so that pinpointing when, exactly, it became the obsession that it is today is near impossible. But what follows is a rough timeline of events based on the major things I do remember.

Tenzin and I never wound up watching the rest of the show together. Instead, I brought the show up to my dad. It took a while, since we were both pretty busy, but by the next year, Supernatural had become our new thing. I was a busy middle schooler, so it was often hard to fit in watching more than one episode on the days we spent together, which meant it was slow-going for a while, but we did our best. Luckily, the fact that we weren’t binging it all at once meant that we were able to avoid a lot of the cliffhangers, (which, looking back at it now, makes me feel very lucky), and it gradually became my favorite show of all time. By the time Season 9 was on the air, in 2014, we had caught up on all eight seasons on Netflix, and I was hooked and ready for more.

We didn’t have cable, so instead, we watched every episode a few days after they aired once they came on Hulu (I didn’t learn about cwtv.com until much later), and it was at this point that I really started to dive into the fandom. Now that I was caught up, I was able to look up fandom content as I pleased without worrying about spoilers. I guess you could say this is when the obsession truly kicked in.

As I came up on my teen years, Supernatural became my life. I started requesting even more Supernatural merchandise as birthday gifts, Christmas presents, and everything in between, and I would wear the gifts I got anywhere I could. Within a few months, I discovered the world of fan fiction, and within a year, I grew confident and excited enough to start writing my own. I started watching video compilations not just of the show, but of the cast--behind the scenes videos, bloopers, convention videos, and so much more. I joined Facebook groups about the show and finally started interacting with other fans, making all kinds of friendships along the way.

On top of that, as the tenth season came to a close with no signs of the show stopping, my mom finally caved in to my babbling and excitement and started watching the show with me. We started back at the Pilot (which, for me, was probably about my fifth re-watch at that point), and we made it all the way to about mid-season five just as the eleventh season was getting ready to air.

And then a truly amazing thing happened.

For my 16th birthday, that same amazing mother bought me tickets to the Supernatural Convention in Chicago.

To put it lightly, I was excited. Very excited.

On the weekend of September 9th, 2016, just a week before my birthday, I got to meet the Supernatural cast for the first time. And that convention experience was one of the best things that has ever happened to me.

When we were on our way to the convention, I was really just excited that I’d finally get to meet these celebrities--these HOT celebrities--that I’d seen on the big screen for the last few years. At this point, they were basically idols to me, and even having the chance to see them in person was the best thing I could’ve asked for. But when I got to that convention, I was hit with something even better than I could’ve hoped for.

I say all the time that the SPN Family is a different fandom than any other. There’s a special feeling throughout our fandom that, as someone who is in multiple fandoms, I have not been able to feel anywhere else. When I try to explain that to people, nobody gets it. Even my mom, when I first started talking about it, kind of shrugged it off like it was nothing. But when we got to that convention, she felt it too. The air is different. The second you walk into a room of fellow Supernatural fans, you feel comfortable. You feel welcome.

That first convention, my mom didn’t really come with me to the panels. She took some photo ops with me, but being as far behind as she was, she didn’t want to spoil things for herself too much, so I spent the majority of the convention by myself, at a mere fifteen years old. But I never felt scared or alone or apprehensive. I made friends immediately. The people I was sitting next to, the people I stood in line with, basically anyone I came in contact with struck up a conversation with me, and it would end with Facebook usernames, Twitter handles, or even phone numbers being exchanged to contact each other in the future. It was insane. I’d never been in an environment like that before, and I loved it. And the openness didn’t stop there.

When it came time to meet the actual members of the Supernatural cast, they were just as kind and wonderful to talk to. At every panel, the guests were so eager to interact with fans, and many of them even stepped off the stage to come say hi to fans who were in line to ask them questions. Even the three main stars, Jensen, Jared, and Misha--who had to stay on the stage for security reasons--did everything they could to bond with fans and make them smile or laugh, and it was beautiful. And that transcended beyond the panels.

That Sunday, my mom and I had a photo op with Jensen and Jared, and let me tell you, I was crazy nervous. I mean, these were huge celebrities and people that I really looked up to, and I was about to get a photo with them. Plus, Jensen was my very first celebrity crush and all-time favorite actor at the time (he still is, to be honest). The whole thing was crazy nerve-wracking.

After standing in line for a bit, it was finally our turn, and as my mom and I stepped up, and I turned to Jensen to tell him what we wanted for the photo, I completely froze up. My brain told me to say: “We want to do a squishy hug photo.” But what came out instead was something more along the lines of “hug please photo hug?” To say the least, I was blushing with embarrassment for several hours afterwards. But despite my nerves and fangirling, Jensen just smiled at me, and he gave me a little chuckle, and said: “sure thing, sweetheart”, which, of course, made me fall apart even more. Nonetheless, the photo happened, and at the end of it all, Jensen gave me one more reassuring little rub on the back, plus a second hug and a last smile before we headed off and away from the duo.

It took me hours to process the whole thing, but at the end of it all, I was so happy and relieved.

Jensen could’ve been cold. He could’ve given me a weird look for freaking out so much. He could’ve even just done the picture and gotten it over with. But he didn’t. He went the extra mile to make sure I knew that my nerves were okay, and they were understandable, but that he wasn’t judging, and he was okay with it. And that really says something.

After that, I went to a convention every year (excluding this year, for obvious reasons). I’ve been to four conventions in all, and every single year, the experience has only gotten better, because I’ve gotten more confident and comfortable around the actors--all because of that special energy.

In 2017, I was picked to sing karaoke with several of the actors from the show...on stage...in front of a huge crowd of Supernatural fans. For those of you who know me pretty well, you know that I have terrible stage fright when it comes to singing in front of people. I get super nervous, and the nerves just get higher with bigger crowds. But that night, to my surprise, I was great. Not only did I sing the classic “Wanted Dead or Alive” in front of hundreds of people, but I got to sing and dance with some of my favorite actors--and I was confident about it. When I was on that stage, dancing with the actors and singing with the fandom, I felt good.

It wasn’t until long after I was done that it hit me what had just happened, and I couldn’t believe it. All of my years of performing in theater productions and talent shows, and I had never been as confident as I had been on that karaoke night. I still have the video on my phone, and I smile at it in disbelief every time I watch it.

My confidence only grew from there. In 2018, I decided to submit to the convention’s fandom music video contest. I spent many hours and many days putting together an edit for Team Free Will 2.0. I was super particular about the timing--beats had to hit scene changes exactly right, lyrics had to line up with the scenes being shown, and I really wanted to tell a good story. When I finally finished the edit, I showed it to my dad--who’s been doing films his entire life--to get his opinion, and he was super impressed. Even though he had stopped watching the show around Season 11 (luckily, my mom was caught up at this point, so she and I were able to watch it together), he really loved what I had done with the edit. (He actually wound up loving it so much that he asked me to edit several projects for him later, including a music video, film production, and theater trailer, opening a door for me in life--one I never would’ve found without Supernatural.)

I submitted it to the Denver convention, and months later, when I was finally able to attend said convention in August of 2018, I was nervous, but excited. As my convention experience went on, I kind of forgot that I had submitted an edit, instead enjoying my time with my new Supernatural friends, the actors, and, now that she was caught up, my mom. But on the third day, they announced the winner, and to be perfectly honest, I didn’t hear what name they said, but we all kind of assumed that it hadn’t been me, which was a little disappointing, but I didn’t let it get me down. But then, while I was talking to my friend, I heard the tell-tale notes of the opening of “This is Me”--the song I had used for the edit--and my head whipped to the screen faster than it ever has for anything. Sure enough, in the #1 spot, was my music video edit.

Needless to say, I kind of lost my mind. I ran up to the front to claim my certificate--including the gift certificate for $100 of Supernatural merchandise--and couldn’t stop jumping up and down. And my friends that I’d made at the convention that year were jumping right along with me. It was a beautiful moment.

By the time the 2019 Chicago convention rolled around, I had grown really comfortable with the whole cast, crew, and fandom, and 2019 was one of my best experiences yet. I submitted another video edit and got second place. I sang the Ghostbusters theme (Hillywood style, of course) with a friend at karaoke night. I even managed to ask every actor a question at their panels without stuttering, even bantering back and forth with a few of them. At autograph tables, I managed to have full-fledged conversations with some of the actors, and at my photo op with Jensen and Jared, I actually told both of them exactly what we wanted to do for the picture without stuttering over my words.

In any other fandom, I don’t think I would’ve been able to do that. But the actors and the fans make that entire convention so comfortable and easy to get through, no matter how nervous you are, and that’s one of the many things I love about this show.

Sadly, though, there was also something else that happened in 2019.

On March 22nd, 2019, Jensen, Jared, and Misha made the announcement that all Supernatural fans were hoping would never come. On Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and everything in between, Jensen Ackles said the words we’d all been fearing: “Though we’re very very excited about moving into our fifteenth season, it will be our last.”

I was in Europe when I found out--Barcelona, to be specific--and to say that the news put a damper on my vacation would be an understatement. I was in tears, and I know many of my fellow Supernatural fans were too. This show had always struggled with ratings, but it had always pushed through, hitting milestone after milestone. So when the news finally came that it would be coming to a close, after a whopping 327 episodes, it shocked us all.

But even knowing it was ending, the cast, crew, and entire fandom were quick to note that it would never be far away. While the Winchester brothers would take their final ride in (what was supposed to be) May of 2020, it didn’t mean that the fandom would die. While news spread from actors to fans to, frankly, the entire world, we all rallied together, knowing that, as Jensen put it so well, “the show might end, but what it has built, this will never end”.

So we prepared for the end. I did my ten day countdown leading up to the premiere, and as the cast counted down each of their lasts on social media, we counted down each of our lasts watching the show.

And then 2020 happened, and everything changed. COVID-19 shut everything down, including production on Supernatural, and with only two episodes left for the cast to film (plus four that still needed post-production), it looked like Supernatural wasn’t gonna be able to end after all. They aired the completed first thirteen episodes of the season, and then it went on hiatus. I think, at the time, a lot of us were worried. What if something happened? What if they weren’t able to finish? What if, after fifteen years, the show had to be cancelled because of a pandemic?

But Supernatural’s never given up, and the pandemic was no exception. For the cast and crew, this was just another obstacle in the long line of obstacles that Supernatural has made it through over the years. And in August of 2020, Jared and Jensen went back to set--along with several other actors--and finished the Winchesters’ long legacy. And on October 8th, 2020, Season 15.5 began airing on the CW, and our long goodbye to a show we’ve all loved for years started all over again.

And now here we are.

I’m sure you’re asking me why all of this matters. I just gave you a complete rundown of the Supernatural timeline from the day I started it, and I haven’t even gotten to the point. So, here’s my point.

This is what my life has been for the last nine years. I was eleven years old when I finally discovered Supernatural, and now I’m twenty, and my life has changed so much.

Supernatural has taught me things that no other elements of my life possibly could. It’s brought out parts of my personality that I never would’ve discovered otherwise.

Supernatural has made me who I am today.

Supernatural has gotten me more involved on social media, even going so far as to create my own content to share.

Supernatural has influenced other things I watch. Now, I try to find shows, movies, and even books that have some of the same themes as this show because I love them so much.

Supernatural got me connected with GISH, which helped me feel more comfortable going out of my comfort zone and being a little (okay, a lot) weird.

Supernatural made me proud to be a fangirl, giving me the chance to express my interests publicly and feel free from judgement.

Supernatural gave me some amazing new friendships, and strengthened the relationships I already had with friends and family.

Supernatural brought out my creative side. From fan fiction writing, to photo collages, to video editing, this show has given me more ways to express myself than I ever could’ve hoped, and it’s opened so many doors for me in the process.

Supernatural has taught me so many lessons and mantras that I will cherish and keep with me forever. Between never giving up, spreading love and kindness, knowing that family always has your back, and not being afraid to be who you are, the show and its cast have given me confidence and strength that I will never forget.

For those of you out there who still think that Supernatural is “just a show”, this is what I present. When I first started Supernatural, I thought the same thing. But over the years, it has become so much more to me than that, and I know that the entire fandom agrees.

With Supernatural ending, a small piece of everyone in the fandom is ending with it, but deep down, we all know that this show will always be with us, and the legacy it’s leaving behind is something that will never be forgotten.

Supernatural has been through a lot, just like it’s two main characters; but, like Sam and Dean, it has never given up, and it has saved so many people’s lives in the process.

I feel so honored to have been even a small part of such an incredible journey.

Thank you, Supernatural.

Thank you, Supernatural cast and crew.

Thank you for making your fifteen years in this world matter.

Thank you for teaching all of us what it means to be human.

Thank you for showing us that we can continue to fight for ourselves and others no matter what the world throws at us.

Thank you for making every single one of us feel special and worth something.

You have changed my life, and the lives of so many others, more than you can possibly imagine by teaching us all that we truly can “carry on”.

On September 13th, 2005, an era began.

On November 19th, 2020, that era will end.

But its legacy will last forever.

“No doubt, endings are hard. But then again, nothing ever really ends, does it?”

CAOS Part 3 - review

Uh, okay, so I think by now, we all know this show is terrible. Netflix gives showrunners a lot of creative freedom, and I think, for better writers, you could get some really interesting content, but they just seem to keep giving these assholes who wrote the travesty called Riverdale, so many opportunities to make more shitty television, and I feel like they really deserve to be limited in their ability to create/write if not stopped completely and thrown into a well with Julie Plec.  Anyway, I’ll try to break this down as best as I can into different piles of shit and this will contain spoilers:

Characters

Prudence and Ambrose

So, to be really honest, I watch this show exclusively for Prudence and Ambrose. Because, well, look at them: 

I wish they had more chemistry because they are super hot together, and I still ship it. A young Black couple? On TV? In this sea of shitty interracial relationships? I’ll take it. Anyway, of course, the progression of their relationship is ridiculous and frustrating. Ambrose decides at the last minute, not to kill Father Blackwood because he has a weird time egg thing that they don’t really understand, also he has the twins under some weird mind control for no clear reason, so they stay their hands. It doesn’t make sense, but it becomes clear, Father Blackwood has an insane amount of plot armour and ultimately would have to serve as a vessel for Satan. Father Blackwood uses the manipulated mind of the other weird sister to sic her on the coven, and she ends up killing Dorkus, whom Prudence finds. She then blames Ambrose for not allowing her to kill FB, and they break up. Now...this would kinda make sense, if not for the fact that they trapped one of the pagan witches and forced her to change everyone back, but no one bothered to do anything about the mentally ill witch who you all strapped up for a reason? Lol ok. Seems like an oversight on your part Prudence, but...okay. Clearly manufactured breakups are exhausting, especially since [young] Black couples with no serious relationship dysfunction are now an endangered species. It’s also frustrating because we barely got to see them....*be* together, especially after they returned home. 

Nick & Sabrina

So, I know from the beginning, we were supposed to believe that Nick and Sabrina had that kind of, Bad Guy, seduces the girl Good Girl, luring her into the dark side, hot, intense, passionate relationship. But their lack of chemistry and really shitty acting just made them really dry (which I get into here). I don’t believe them, and I definitely don’t believe that Sabrina would, once again, break a shit ton of rules to get Nick back. I just don’t buy that they had that kind of an intense, desperately in love, kind relationship, because they do not look all that comfortable around each other, much less in love. 

I personally find Sabrina utterly unlikeable as a main character, largely because who IS she? She has no personality, she just does whatever the plot needs her to do in the moment, and the actress makes Sabrina appear smug and unremorseful while she fucks up everyone’s lives. There is a lot of exposition of everyone telling us she’s this power hungry, manipulative character, but we never see that. She just does stuff and everyone is all “Sabrina how could you?!” and there are never, ever any consequences. I would have liked to see her push so hard to get Nick back and the struggle being, sure she wants him back, but mostly she’s doing it because she can. But that’s not what happens. 

So Nick ends up in this weird drug addiction, alcohol, sex demon spiral because he has parts of Satan still in him and it all just falls so flat and lame, because this show is SO bad at pacing, and these actors suck, so nothing is believable. The idea of him scrubbing his club foot, having nightmares, suffering PTSD, is fine, the execution was trash. Nick sees Caliban and Sabrina have one interaction and he’s like WELL, GUESS I GOTTA CHEAT. And just ends up in some S&M situation with sex demons and heavily self medicating, but none of this has any weight, and we don’t really see him...spiralling. He just immediately resorts to these things and it has no real impact on anyone or even him really, and that’s it. 

Harvey and Roz

Uh, they’re probably the most confusing match here, because there is no lead up to their relationship, there’s not suggestion, there’s no pacing. Just BOOM, we’re into each other now. BOOM, Roz is the only sexually active person in her friend group (lol of course the Black girl is sexually active. Gotta maintain white innocence at all costs), so she’s just ready to jump Harvey’s bones any second now. So of course, the show punishes her by having the pagans turn her to stone. And as if that’s not bad enough...

Which I talk about here and here, because honestly I’m just sick of this show’s antiblackness.  Theo & that other guy

So I was watching this unfold like, yeeaahh, they’re gonna make the trans guy get with the enemy aren’t they? And yes, they did. Cool, they didn’t kill him off, but I’m still perplexed at how Theo isn’t even a little upset that this guy was basically sent to infiltrate his friend group and sat by while his people harmed Theo’s friends, and also...used him? Like...we just...are gonna...gloss over that because he changed his mind? Lol ok. Sure.

Mambo Marie and suddenly Zelda?

I...I mean her name is Mambo Marie. I love the idea of Black witches finding Black spirituality and magicks through Vodun and a Hatian Priestess. But they quickly undo that, by ensuring that Mambo Marie only teaches Prudence in the presence of these white witches. And we see her...doing...an African drum circle (eye roll), only to be interrupted by the High Priestess of White Feminism, Zelda Spellman. It quickly devolves into thinly veiled racism where Zelda doesn’t trust Marie because she’s Catholic (says the woman who worships Satan, has an anti Pope and prays to Lilith with the same prayer for Mary mother of Jesus? LOL. Not even unpacking the fact that Vodun is an African spirituality having 0 roots in catholicism WHITE WRITERS). Then suddenly, out of nowhere, Marie and Zelda are a thing for no reason? After the way Zelda treated her? Why did Marie even stay? This isn’t her problem. This is a white witch problem. Okay. That’s too much to unpack. 

Plot

So, my biggest problem with almost all Netflix English programming is that they are so obsessed with aesthetics, and don’t pay enough attention to actual character chemistry, plot, story flow, details, pacing etc. Like...things that actually make stories interesting to watch. So they slap all these people together and throw them into aesthetically pleasing backgrounds, shake it up with so much exposition that nothing actually happens, and are like BEHOLD A STORY. And CAOS is *especially* guilty for this.

First of all those musical breaks were annoying as fuck. Musicals serve 2 story functions: advancing the plot or telling a story. These musical numbers did neither and were honestly ridiculously gratuitous, highly annoying and totally pointless.

What time of year is this? Why are we having pep rallies and how the fuck and when did Sabrina and Roz join the cheeleading squad, and why?

for the aesthetics and not for any real plot reason. It just seems stupid because now I don’t know how much time has passed between Nick going to hell and this, because you’re all handling it like it’s been a few weeks and is still relatively fresh, but suddenly, Theo, Harvey and Roz are in a garage band? You’re a cheerleader? For what? Since when? Why? These choices introduce more questions than they answer and serve no narrative purpose. So much wasted time on shit that doesn’t matter. 

Sabrina is supposed to be fighting Caliban (who is literally the only person she has chemistry with on this show and they killed him bc ofc they did), for her seat on the throne, and yet the trials only seem to come up when it’s convenient, and also seem to be directly related to her dealings with her coven, which is also convenient.  I’m so confused about Satan. His powers come from being a celestial being, and so, because his coven mistreats him he’s like...lol okay, well fuck you guys and goes through all these convoluted small motions to greatly inconvenience them and withdraws his powers? This is so petty and pathetic. Also, what’s the point? He could just wipe them out and start over, instead of skulking around inside FB then suddenly decides to track down Lilith. Again, convoluted. This plot is all over the place. Why does Satan need Sabrina to be Queen of Hell in the first place? He seems perfectly healthy. Why can’t he just rule it? Like...that makes no sense. What is he gonna do? Retire? WHAT is going ON?

How did Sabrina come back in time to herself stuck in stone? Is that trip to Pontius Pilate (lol) supposed to have created a loophole for her to save herself and everyone? This is giving me hardcore Twilight Breaking Dawn vibes, where, the show finally, FINALLY gets interesting, there’s real stakes, shit is actually happening instead of everyone talking about things happening (Hilda ending up killing her fiance was literally the only time I felt something watching this show because it was genuinely sad, and well acted, and Hilda coming through with that doll at the end was pretty disturbing, I’ll give them that), and ofc, Sabrina goes back in time and undoes it all. Lol. Okay. God forbid there be real consequences to anything on this show.

Final thoughts

Once again, the white feminism runs high on this show. They treat this Black Vodun Priestess Marie, like garbage, allude to her “foreign” magic, but Marie is sitting here like “we’re not men, we’re women, let’s work together.” This is why I hate white writers writing for Black characters. Black characters should have Black motivations, and a Black Vodun Priestess, should know that white women and Black women do not have aligned motivations just because they share a gender. Once they started with the bullshit right from her arrival, she should have handed Prudence her card and peaced tf out. Instead she tolerates the isolation, ostracization and thinly veiled racism...and decides to stay, and help. WHY? Marie has gained nothing by sticking around helping these ungrateful ass witches. I honestly would have preferred Prudence asking her to stay to learn more about Vodun, and them building a mentor/mentee type of relationship, especially since Prudence was the one who invited her and stepped to Zelda to defend her. I want(ed) to see that relationship go somewhere. The deliberate denial of healthy Black female friendships on tv is frustrating.

 These witches finally finding their power in their ancestors and I donno, some female creator or whatever, reminds me of white women “finding” wicca and praying to “Gaia”, (reminds me of BTVS s4 when Willow joins the wicca group) which is basically what happened but lol okay whatever. I guess they aren’t satanic witches anymore. Lol, I love how Harvey and Roz and Theo are teenagers, human teenagers, who have lead largely normal teenage lives up until this point, but see their loved ones tortured, deformed or murdered in hell, with basically no residual issues, and are all like, YES, let’s roll up on these adults with shotguns and swords and kill the FUCK outta these people!! That absolutely sounds normal! Like...what? Lol. God this is just so bad.

Also, I’m so confused by this aesthetic choice for Sabrina as Queen of Hell. Like what the fuck. Why is she dressed like a Victorian era queen, with shoulder and a broken rib bodice? What?!

This show is truly awful, this season made no more sense than the last two and now that Prudence and Ambrose aren’t together, I might be done watching. 

-20/10

This Batwoman news might be the single stupidest thing a network/showrunner has done in a while.

Batwoman is Kate Kane.

This is not the Green Lanten corps or some future version of Batman. (And even in the future, Bruce Wayne is still Batman.)

I admit that RR wasn't my favorite choice because I was worried about her acting chops, but you know what she had the right look. I appreciated that they went with a visible and very out member of the LGBTQ community.

The show itself got stronger throughout the season and the rest of the cast is very strong and I'm invested in those stories. The idea that they are going to change Batwoman destroys those relationships.

I honestly don't understand why a recast is not the appropriate and best route. And let's be real if they cast a straight actress or de-gay Batwoman then the show needs to be cancelled. In truth, I'm not sure it survives without Kate Kane anyway.

Hollywood is a mess as it is, so they have time to get this right. But I have to say that the choice to not simply just do a recast would be a ridiculous mistake.

Just some thoughts.

***update*** 7.15.22

So, this popped up on my dash today some two years later and I just had to sit back and kind of giggle at myself. Wow, talk about a whole 180.

I've reached a place in my life where I feel like it's absolutely important to be able to acknowledge when you were dead wrong about something. And man, when I say I was pleasantly wrong I absolutely mean it.

The truth is, of course, there can be more than one Batwoman! Hell, I accept that there are 15 Batmans, 9 Robins, 7 Spider-people, and like 4 Thors, so why couldn't I accept more than one Batwoman!

In retrospect, I was hurt and in my feelings, and like a myopic fanboi I missed the big picture. When Elegy came out I was coming into my own as a young queer woman, out on her own, fully out, and screaming it to the rafters. KK was super important to me because of that at the time. When CW decided to do Batwoman I was extremely excited, and then they cast RR. Well, then I deflated like a basketball left in the basement corner for too long because I knew that woman couldn't act to save her life and welp...

I stuck with the show for the most part though because of the other characters: Sophie, Mary, Alice, and Luke. The idea of not having KK to keep those stories relevant bothered me and I couldn't see the possibilities.

And then the news came that not only would Ryan Wilder still be Queer, but she was going to be Black and I have no shame in saying that that changed the possibilities for me. To be able to get a Queer superhero and a Black woman and to be Batwoman!

I've written about how worried I was and how I was still unsure, but I really wanted it to work it out even if I didn't trust the CW (and yes, I was right not to trust them!).

Two years later, I'm trying to burn down CW because they took away my Batwoman, and guess what, I don't mean KK. I'm always going to love and appreciate KK because I had never had that before, but what Javicia and crew were able to do with Ryan Wilder and Batwoman reminded me of why we gravitate towards these stories anyway.

I'm still holding out hope that HBO will give this show and these characters the final season they deserve and I also hope Ryan gets to keep the cowl in the comics.

Tl/dr: I was super duper wrong about recasting KK, and having Ryan Wilder don the cowl turned out to be an amazing decision and she deserves to be called Batwoman just as much as KK. There is room for all of these voices. Glad I figured that out.

Daenerys Targaryen is the main character of GoT… by accident

(Credit where credit is due: I am building on meta I’ve seen floating around fandom in other places)

Game of Thrones is now Daenerys’ story. Before S8, GoT arguably had three main characters: Dany, Jon, and Tyrion. But S8 retroactively changes that and the story is now Dany’s and Dany’s alone.

Every single character (with one exception I’ll get to later) who survives to S8 has their entire narratives and character arcs hijacked and redirected into serving Dany’s narrative. Everyone and everything is diverted into maneuvering Dany to her end point. The entire overarching story, and all the characters’ individual stories that comprise it, warps and bends itself completely out of shape in service to the Mad Queen reveal.

Jon’s parentage and Targaryen heritage are only relevant because of how they impact Dany’s arc and mental state. The Long Night must precede the fall of King’s Landing because Jorah must die in order to further weaken Dany’s mental stability and further isolate her from “good” advice, and also to put her and her forces in a generally more vulnerable position. Arya kills the Night King  try to undermine Dany’s status as the Savior and minimize Dany’s importance to the North. Sansa mistrusts and hates Dany for no reason other than feeding the conflict between Dany and the North, while feeding into Dany’s own trust issues and paranoia. Jaime can’t get redemption because a character we care about has to die in the King’s Landing firestorm doing something “noble” (i.e. protecting his sister-lover). The travesty that is the characterization of Varys and Tyrion is solely in the service of the Mad Queen narrative (there’s more than enough meta on that already in existence, I don’t feel the need to add much to it).

The whole entire story warps around Dany’s supposed villain arc. Every character has their individual arc trajectories, which had been painstakingly laid out over seven seasons, completely dismantled and reassembled with only one goal: Dany’s demise. Every characters’ story is now subordinate to Dany’s.

This also means that since the end of all these characters’ narratives is the sole purpose of bringing about Dany’s death, this retroactively means that their arcs in their entirety, across the whole eight seasons of GoT’s run, are now about Dany. Making Daenerys Targaryen the sole main character of Game of Thrones, because she is the epicenter that the entire narrative revolves around.

And the best part is that this was done completely by accident and through the sheer incompetence of the showrunners. They were so desperate to vilify Dany and had also imposed such a strict and completely artificial time constraint on themselves, that they had to wreck their whole story to make it happen and as an (I’m very confident) unforeseen consequence the whole story is now about Dany and no one else.

This is why, in the last half of the final episode after Dany’s death, the show and all its characters feel strangely and suddenly…rudderless. The whole reason for being of the show and every last one of its surviving characters is dead, taking all the heart and the meaning with her, and now we’re stuck watching a bunch of characters just kinda jangling pointlessly around inside an empty, vacuous narrative devoid of meaning.

That’s why the second half of the finale feels so odd and it’s so difficult to stay engaged with it, and ultimately its why the ending Stark Victory Montage falls incredibly flat, ringing absolutely hollow despite Ramin Djawadi’s best musical efforts to try and force the audience to feel something--or just anything at this point.

And so, that is how D&D, in their petty small-minded zeal to destroy a female character whose religious imagery and savior narrative had spun wildly out of their control making her more popular than their white male faves, accidentally made Daenerys Targaryen the main character of their show, while they were actually trying to vilify and discard her like garbage, in a twist of dramatic irony.

They also retroactively made Dany a tragically maligned messianic figure, because they utterly failed to actually vilify her or make her the Mad Queen. They worked so hard to make every character around her incessantly talk about nothing but her madness, bending every character to serving her narrative, but then “kinda forgot” to write her as Actually Mad. All they succeeded in doing is painting her as a ruthless military commander who mercilessly refuses to accept an enemy’s surrender, which sure, is morally yikes, but is not a sign of actual madness.

A great example of just how bad this laziness in the writing gets is the way D&D use quasi-nazi-esque imagery to hurriedly frame Dany as Evil in the last episode, but don’t actually fill that imagery with content to match. Dany isn’t proposing racial cleansing (stop calling the destruction of King’s Landing genocide, omfg. Words mean things. And destroying a city =/= attempting to wipe out an entire race. Get off my lawn) or presenting the Unsullied or Dothraki (or herself an a Valyrian) as the Master Race; she’s not spewing nazi propaganda. She’s talking about conquering the world, but many leaders throughout history have had that goal, and they weren’t nazis by default. But D&D still use that cheap visual shorthand to try and quickly prejudice the audience against Dany, because they “kinda forgot” to write her an actual villain arc.

So, not only is everything now about her, but Dany is now a tragic failed messianic figure, Jon is now her Judas who literally betrays her with a kiss, and she is murdered by characters and a narrative that have framed her as Mad while in actual fact she is not. So, not only is this now The Story of Daenerys Targaryen, it is specifically The Tragedy of Daenerys Targaryen. By accident.

Now, for that one exception I of spoke of earlier. The only character in S8 to not have their whole arc hijacked in service to Dany’s tragedy, and the reason Cleganebowl is so satisfying, is Sandor Clegane. His arc remains purely his own and he remains on the trajectory he had been on since the beginning.

Complaints that S8 “throws out Sandor’s character development,” opining that S6 was somehow about “redeeming” him from his vengeance quest, must be from people who…didn’t actually watch S6.

Sure, the Hound encounters a septon (I refuse to call him Meribald) with whom he forms a fledgling bond, and this septon opines that “violence is a disease” and “you don’t cure a disease by giving it to more people,” sure. But then when the guy is murdered by rogues from the Brotherhood, Sandor immediately picks up an axe, tracks them all down, and murders them gruesomely in an act of vengeance, effectively spreading the disease of violence to yet more people.

This ain’t a guy who just turned away from his path of vengeance; this is a guy who’s just reestablished that vengeance is his whole entire arc. S7 also supports this, by having Sandor confront his brother in the Dragon Pit and declare, “You know who’s coming for you. You’ve always known.”

So, S8 Cleganebowl was not “out of nowhere” and was completely in keeping with where Sandor, on the show, was always headed.

Sandor Clegane’s arc remains his own in S8, he’s never sidetracked by hand-wringing about Dany’s “madness” or plotting Dany’s downfall, and he remains on the track he has always been on, which is why his arc resolution is so satisfying (even if we can debate the morality or thematic soundness/faithfulness to the books’ anti-vengeance themes). Although he does die in Dany’s firestorm at King’s Landing, which fire he and his brother burn in is arbitrary. Sandor Clegane is the only character with an arc that stays clear of Dany’s blast radius.

Literally every other characters’ arc gets caught in that blast radius, which is why Dany takes down not only the entire show but all of its characters (save one) with her, and retroactively becomes its main character.