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#but technically you could insert whatever ship u want into that idea
lassieposting · 3 years
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I'm mad at myself for asking this but 💘 skug/alt!Serpine
WHEEZES
U CONVERTED
send me 💘 + A SHIP and i’ll tell you—
where they first met and how
KOTW.
Then, after Skug refuses to kill Serpine at the end of SOW, China spitefully makes him responsible for Serpine's behaviour while he's living in Roarhaven. "Parole officer" isn't part of Skug's job description but honestly he doesn't trust anyone else to make sure Serpine doesn't slip the leash, so
how long their ‘flirting’ phase was before feelings got involved
I mean, Serpine literally gets his dick out in their very first scene together, and he throws his towel over Val's head so it clearly wasn't for her benefit.
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My headcanon is that he did have the hots for his own dimension's Skulduggery before he died. But Serpine has a very warped experience of emotions - he's not insane, and he's not a complete psychopath, but he has very low empathy, an obsessive personality, a considerable sadistic streak and a tendency to be jealous, narcissistic and manipulative. So his crush on Skug was more like an unhealthy fixation - hatred and lust and humiliation and the need to control, all tangled together.
On Skug's side...he has a few lines that read as flirty, in a D/S kind of way. But honestly I don't think this was deliberate. I get the impression he's actually imitating how Serpine spoke to him when he was the prisoner. Serpine's entire arc in SOW can be condensed down to "microdosing on what he put Skug through before killing him". He's surrounded by enemies who want him dead, he loses a body part, he's beaten up, he's humiliated, he's cut off from his magic - and he hates it. I get the vibe that this isn't lost on Skug, and he's repeating things Serpine once mockingly said to him just to rub it in.
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who fell for who first ( if applicable )
Serpine.
I have him converting to the Church of the Faceless as a teenager, so he's spent his entire adult life surrounded by other selfish, scheming social climbers who'd sell him to Satan for a corn chip. His relationship history is chock full of psychopaths. He's used to betrayal and being used by his partners - such is life, as a bad guy.
So Skug protecting him during the Leibniz mission makes quite an impact. He even says himself that Skug has every reason to hate him and want to make him suffer - which is an attempt at empathy considerably deeper than anything we've seen from him before - but he's still shocked and devastated when Skug cuts his hand off. He genuinely expected Skug to decide to fight their way out rather than harm him. To me, that says he's come to rely on having Skug in his corner, which is a security net he is decidedly not used to having.
He doesn't necessarily express it very well? His feelings are complicated, and he doesn't understand most of them. A good part of him still hates Skug, just as a good part of Skug will always hate him. But his fixation on Skug shifts a bit - rather than obsessing over him as an enemy, he obsesses over him as an ally. He starts wanting Skug's approval and digging for praise, he gets sulky and jealous if Skug implies he doesn't trust him or goes to someone else for help or information instead, and he starts trying to insert himself into Skug's life.
Basically, he's gotten over that he spent the past 300 years as Skug's enemy, so Skug needs to be over it too. Right now. And it's unreasonable and unfair that he isn't over it.
where their first date was and what it was like
Skug is willing to acknowledge that if they were a couple, which they're not, because they're arch enemies, then maybe, if you really had to look at anything they do as "a date" then...perhaps the first time they went to the opera could in some way be considered their first date. But it wasn't. Because they're not together. He doesn't even like Serpine. Valkyrie just doesn't appreciate "yowling" and he had nobody else to go with because all his friends are dead.
Serpine will agree with this - but only because he knows that announcing that he lowkey considers their three day torture extravaganza to be their first date would go down like a lead balloon.
who asks who out and how ( with a sign? spelled out on a cake? just a simple ‘will you go out with me’? )
They never have a "going steady" discussion. It's just
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if they keep / kept their relationship secret or let everyone know right away
They're adamant that there's nothing to let anyone know about. They spend a lot of time together, and sometimes Serpine helps with cases, and they angry fuck sometimes, and Skug keeps a few shirts and a toothbrush at Serpine's apartment, but they're not a couple.
who’s more dominant
Skug. Serpine will die mad about it. He complains constantly about how much he gets manhandled during the Leibniz mission, how undignified it is to be cut off from his magic, how everyone tells him to shut up every time he tries to join in a conversation, he hates you all, remember that time he killed people you all cared about?
Unfortunately, Serpine is a massively subby bottom, so dom!Skug makes him deeply horny and even more angry about it. He's the epitome of "Stop looking at my fucking boner when we fight."
where their first kiss was and what it was like
It's New Year's. Serpine is out at a bar with some of his student neighbours because, why not. Skug is at the same bar, questioning the staff about a grizzly murder. The usual. Serpine goes over to say hello and make fun of him for Always Working and tell him he should chill out on occasion because isn't it your fucking birthday and you're still at work??? They're still talking when the countdown finishes and everyone around them starts kissing, which is a completely new concept to Serpine because that tradition wasn't part of the Leibniz dimension's New Year's festivities, so he just sort of panics because everyone else is doing it, grabs Skug by the front of his coat and goes for it.
Skug freezes, because who would know how to react when the man who killed you once tries to go to town on your fake face, and then gets his shit together and promptly arrests Serpine for assaulting a Sanctuary official, because he's petty and he can and Nef needs to learn some fucking boundaries.
They end up lowkey working on the case together through the bars of the temporary holding cell, and although neither of them would admit it, they actually have a good time. At the end of the night Skug relents, lets him out for "good behaviour" and gives him a lift home.
how into pda they are
Serpine is hugely into PDA. He likes a possessive, jealous partner, he's got a bit of an exhibitionistic streak, and ultimately he wants to be wanted enough to be fought over.
Unfortunately for him, Skug is not a PDA fan in the slightest. Serpine finds this bitterly disappointing.
where their usual ‘date spot’ is ( if applicable )
A Roarhaven restaurant with a live jazz band. Serpine likes the food, Skug likes the music, and it's public - so neither of them feels wrongfooted and vulnerable in the other one's territory. Although, as Serpine likes to point out, it would be a bit difficult to torture and dismember a man in his student accommodation apartment. If he can hear Maddie-across-the-hall having muffled sex with her latest beau from the far side of his flat , he's pretty sure the entire building would hear Skug fighting his way out of whatever diabolical trap he seems to think has been set for him every time he comes over.
who’s more protective
Skug is more obviously protective - he protects Serpine almost the entire time in Leibniz, rows with China in defence of his freedom, and (however reluctantly) steps up to help him settle in Roarhaven. But Serpine is territorial, and he can be surprisingly proactive about it. If Skug comes home injured, he can always tell - no matter how much he tries to hide it - because he's seen Skug at his very worst, he knows what 'trying to mask pain' looks like in the set of that jaw and the grit in that voice. He doesn't like anyone else playing with his toys, so sometimes he'll get very angry and lash out at whoever damaged Skug in the first place.
(He also tends to hover at the clinic like a particularly irritating bad smell. He insists it's because he just finds Skug's pain amusing. He's not concerned. Not in the slightest. He doesn't care at all. No, he will not go home.)
how long it is before they sleep together ( can be as in ‘had sex’ or as in ‘shared a bed’ )
They first hook up a few months after returning from Leibniz, but it's a half-dressed up-against-a-wall sort of thing and neither of them sticks around for pillow talk. They don't actually share a bed - as in, fall asleep together - until at least a year later. Technically, the first time they fall asleep together, they're on a stakeout and Serpine dozes off on Skug's shoulder, then wakes up with a cricked neck.
if they argue about anything
Literally everything, 90% of their interactions are arguing. Bickering and snark is the only way they know how to communicate.
who leaves more marks ( lipstick, hickeys, scratchmarks etc. )
Serpine loves leaving marks and doesn't mind getting them, either. He's territorial and has an exhibitionist streak, so he likes everyone knowing who he belongs to, and he's deeply thirsty over the idea of everyone knowing Skug belongs to him.
Unfortunately, Skug is not easy to leave marks on. Any hickies he gives the facade will disappear as soon as Skug turns it off. Some of his scars still show, though - the ones that scored his bones - so at least there's that.
who steals whose clothes and how often
They're not too different in size, so they could probably both get away with it, but everything Skug owns was tailored for him and Nef is narrower in the shoulders, so Skug's shirts don't look quite right on him. That doesn't stop him borrowing a couple to wear around the house, though. He has no stored wealth in this dimension, so he's wearing off the rack until he can get his feet under him again, and Skug's shirts are all obnoxiously fine fabric. It would be silly not to steal a few.
how they cuddle ( spooning? facing each other? )
They're not that cuddly. They do have occasional moments of softness, but it's more likely to be, like. A shoulder bump. Fixing each other's shirt collar. Tending an injury with a minimum of mockery. They do a fair bit of this when no one's watching, though.
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what their favourite nonsexual activity is
Bickering.
They also both like working cases. The Sanctuary won't officially hire Serpine because he is who he is, but when Skug hits a dead end in a case or has something that's really frustrating him, they'll go over it together. 400 years of enmity aside, their minds work in similar ways, and they're both very good at that sort of thing - if they hadn't met on opposite sides of the battlefield, they probably would have gotten along very well.
how long they stay mad at each other
They've never actually not been mad at each other. They're just all each other has left because all their friends are dead.
what their usual coffee / tea orders are
Initially, both black - maximum stimulants for Skug, maximum edginess for Serpine. But then he discovers Starbucks, and all the fancy things mortals are doing with coffee these days, and starts branching out into what Skug calls "frilly froufrou nonsense". After that his drinks are like 95% sugar and syrup.
if they ever split up and / or get back together
They never officially split up. This is mostly because neither of them will admit being together in the first place. They absolutely go through phases of being far more enemies than fuckbuddies, and they know how to push each other's buttons and hurt each other like no one else. This ship is comedic and incredibly toxic in turns.
what their shared living space is like ( messy? clean? what kind of decor? )
They don't live together. Serpine has no idea where Skug lives, and Skug wants to keep it that way. Serpine's flat is technically student accommodation - he just needed somewhere the landlord was too young to remember him from the war - so when Skug crashes there it's usually cramped and noisy and there's a revolving door of neighbours knocking on to ask to borrow some milk/loo roll/"hey, you're old, help me with my history thesis?"/"Are you coming out tonight?"
All Serpine's neighbours think he's a sex worker - to them, he seems to have a different well-dressed sugar daddy staying over every week. They keep trying to set him up an OnlyFans. Skug finds all this very amusing.
what their first christmas / hanukkah / etc as a couple was like
Christmas was banned in Leibniz (as a religious holiday of a banned religion) so Nef hasn't celebrated since he converted in his teens, but he gets into it, because it's an excuse for a party and nobody is policing him. Skug is his usual grinchy grouchy self. Nef also celebrates several holidays that Skug isn't familiar with that were commonplace in Leibniz, but are only observed by strict Faceless worshippers in Roarhaven.
what their names are in each other’s phones
Skug is an old man about his contacts, so Nef is just "Nefarian Serpine".
Serpine, on the other hand, has recently discovered emojis, so Skug is "💀🍆".
who falls asleep first and who wakes up first
Who falls asleep first varies; Serpine is a night owl and likes to go to bed in the early hours of the morning, but Skug has some really fucked up working hours, so a lot of the time he's awake long after even the night owls have gone to bed. But it's always Skug who wakes up first - Serpine is Absolutely Not a morning person. He fits right in with the students in his building who have to be coaxed from under the quilt by the smell of frying bacon.
Skug, because he enjoys the odd opportunity to be an asshole, will sometimes wake him with a cup of coffee, and sometimes by holding a flame up to the fire alarm. Variety is the spice of life, Nefarian, didn't anyone ever tell you that?
who’s the big spoon / little spoon
Cuddling is fairly new to Serpine. He's always enjoyed sex, but he has a solid tendency to jump into bed with the enemy - as shown by his laundry list of Resistance conquests - so he's never really gone for relationships where cuddling is a thing. He's more into the "forbidden passion" sort of dynamic.
Skug is a cuddler, but not so much in this particular relationship, for obvious and understandable reasons. Serpine does figure out though that he can burrow under Skug's arm while he's half-asleep or in a postcoital fugue state and Skug will just sort of let him, so he's probably the little spoon.
who hogs the bathroom
Both of them.
Serpine lives in a tiny one bed flat in a student building. His bathroom is miniscule. And when Skug stays over, they're both crammed in there first thing, Serpine trying to shave and do his hair and Skug elbowing him out of the way to cycle through facades until he finds one that's handsome enough to leave the house in. They bicker horrendously the entire time. It's a logistical nightmare.
who kills the spiders / takes them outside
Nef kills them. Not because he knows Skug's not a fan, but because he's not allowed to torment humans anymore, so. Last time he checked, killing spiders wasn't an arrestable offence, Skulduggery, stop looking at him like that.
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canongf-archive · 3 years
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hi liv!!! im writing a self ship fic for myself and,,,it’s not going well. I’m so caught up in the technical part of it I’m not having fun and it just feelings like a chore now. and I’m also scared it won’t be good enough at all. i could really use some help. thank u and take care of ur self. your f/os love you! -🥮
!!! hi nonnie !!! 💗
ok first. i want you to take a deep breath. save what you have, and close the document. don’t just minimize it. close it! take a break from it. it can be so easy to get so invested in your work where you’re almost. too invested in your work. and it just gets harder and harder the more you try to force progress. so take a break. leave it alone for a little while. do something else.
it doesn’t have to be a super long break if you don’t want it to! maybe you give it an hour or two and you’re ready to get back at it. maybe you want a night of sleep before you return to it. maybe a week goes by and you can stand to let another week go by. that’s all fine! you’ll return to it when you’re ready!
sometimes taking a break from it is all i need to regain the spark i had when i first started a piece. and sometimes that’s enough! but sometimes i need to start the whole thing over. don’t delete anything you already have, just open a new document and start over from there. i’ll get so attached to something i’ve written but sometimes the thing i’ve written limits where i can go with it! so i open a new page and i start over, not having to worry about making anything work with stuff i already have. it’s just a new blank slate to put things on. you can open 50 new documents to do this. there’s no limit. 
also! one of my favorite writing tips is one that i got from my mom forever ago and it has stuck with me for years. WRITE THE PARTS YOU WANT TO WRITE!!! i used to get SO in my head about this because i wanted to write in chronological order or i felt like i needed to earn the right to write that scene that i was really looking forward to but. you don’t. if you have an idea for a kiss or a conversation and you just can’t for the life of you figure out how to get there, don’t get there. don’t spend time thinking about how to work up to it, just write the scene you want to write and work out from there! 
having fun with it is honestly the only reason to write self insert fic. i’m telling you this right now. and there is nothing wrong with wanting it to be good, of course we want what we create to be good! but i think it’s important that we are our own worst critics. very rarely do we ever think our finished work is as perfect as it can be. and if you’re not even enjoying the process, then there’s no point! because if you’re not having fun but you’re striving towards perfection, you’re gonna have a lousy time. but if you’re having fun and you’re letting go of your expectations, then you’re opening yourself up to freedom and growth and the joy of the human experience of creating for the sake of creating!!!
anon, this is just a lot of words for. be nice to yourself! take breaks! let yourself enjoy the process, whatever the process looks like for you! and know that whatever you create will be good just because it’s made by you. 💗
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mysteryprone · 4 years
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oc questions 1-5 about alina and 6-10 about cal .......
asks for oc writers. / selectively accepting.
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FOR ALINA:
When did you create your muse?
early august 2017 at the same time as mila and karina (cause i think konstantin came a bit later even tho mary had his concept from the start ) 💕 
officially i posted her stats on august 5th 2017 so . i guess that’s the Day 
Where did you find inspiration for your muse?
we just love the comet ensemble and connected ocs here …. and honestly i don’t even remember how we collectively decided they’d all be criminals but somehow we did and i also don’t remember where the tour guide/pickpocket thing came from so long story short my memory is useless
but it was mostly just from watching the comet ensemble and how they interact with each other and the audience (and i definitely was able to get a more solid idea after i saw it and could see what courtney does live and up close) and there’s so many little stories that the ensemble created every night and their own little things they did that i wanted to be able to create something with that
Tell us something about the world/universe in which your muse lives.
while i kinda just default to writing a general modern au, her main verse IS technically NOT modern day and actually some anachronistic wild mix of modern times and 1812 due to them being originally based off of great comet, which in itself is also a very anachronistic 1812 so basically I Do What I Want 
but one very fun thing is that in the area where karina and alina live there is one very popular club that the two of them frequent quite often and one of its main events is a weekly leather night. it’s exactly what it sounds like. thank u that’s all
What’s your favourite headcanon about your muse?
i don’t think i have a favourite headcanon specifically but one thing that i do love about alina is that she just loves using pet names for ppl??? be it jst using diminutives (regardless of if she Should be or not cause this dumbass does not respect authority) or like traditional pet names (she is definitely a babe/baby person but she’ll also call people shit like sugar and cutie). sometimes it’s an actual display of affection and sometimes it’s just her being annoying and it is often unclear which one it is and i think thats very sexy of her 
What’s something only very few people know about your muse?
uuuh maybe that she’s got a lot of love in her? she really tries to make it seem like she Doesn’t and she’s heartless and doesn’t care about anyone but she is so fiercely loyal to her little found family (karina, milana, konstantin) and the few close friends she does have and would without hesitation die or kill for them. she projects coldness all the time even around most of these people and sometimes she even manages to convince herself that she’s really that unfeeling but she’s got a lot of love in her for the people that manage to slip through the cracks in her walls and once she loves you she won’t stop.
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FOR CAL:
Are there parts of your muse that resemble parts of yourself?
oh fuckin absolutely . absolutely. we are going to just Skip over the fact that we have the same hair cause i think i subconsciously got brittain ashford’s haircut in 2016 ANYWAY 
both cal and i are very musically inclined first of all? i am much more than she is but music is a v important part of both of our lives/childhoods (also i took inspo for her dad playing rock music when she was a kid and it becoming a solid part of her childhood memories from my own parents lol). we also are both introverted and anxious though luckily i am not NEARLY as nervous as she is because i’ve really fucked my poor girl up but we definitely have like shyness and stuff like that in common. also we’re both greek but that’s literally just because i wanted to have a muse in a similar family situation to mine cause write what you know or whatever
How many face claims do you have or have you had for your muse?
two!! her original fc was miss brittain ashford cause she’s partly inspired by her music and then since i already have a muse here with her as an fc (sonya) and i didn’t want to have doubles i switched her to stef! 
How did you choose the name for your muse?
since i grew up in a greek family i’ve just kinda been Surrounded by greek names and i find them really pretty? so once i’d decided she was gonna be greek i decided to pick from some of the ones that i like most and calliope won the battle! (and second place daphne went to her roommate so it all works out)
a fun bonus is that calliope is the name of a muse and cal’s whole character kinda revolves around the Arts 
If your muse could be a canon character in any fandom, which fandom would you choose?
it’s very hard for me to picture her anywhere specific cause she’s just like a pretty normal character who could fit into pretty much any like? mostly reality based story set in modern times? so she’s really easy to insert anywhere, especially slice of life stories.
Do you ship your muse with any canon characters?
nothing like . endgame ship or whatever but me and @mtrock have a nice lil verse for a high school ship that evolves into a really solid friendship and saves them both from the toxic relationships they have in high school in their canon! we love and stan! 
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nothingneverforever · 7 years
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Remember Me (2010)
Hmm
It would be accurate to say that I hated this almost wholeheartedly until the last and extremely rushed act when there was some actual, on-screen emotion that didn’t leave implied connections to be made by the viewer, but then this emotion was still very thin anyway and hinged totally on the viewer’s own associative understanding of the 9/11 attacks and less so on loss in general, so perhaps it is better to simply say that I hated this, period.
I remember avoiding this back when it was first released (on DVD at least, I didn’t go to the cinemas for anything besides crap back in 2010. Not that this film isn’t crap….cos it is) for some reason, I think maybe it was rated M18 or something and strangely for an early teen I did usually dutifully avoid such rated films because I didn’t (and still don’t) like explicit scariness or sexualness in any form. And then later on when I had lost interest in the genre (drama/romance?) but gained interest in Robert Pattinson, I still avoided this because it looked dumb. Anyway, we’ve made it here today and I sit eating my nice lentil dinner having just finished the film. So let’s go !
Okay firstly… I am not surprised at all at its 27% rotten tomatoes rating lol
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Maybe it’s personal to me, but I really hate playfighting couples. I talked about it <<here>> briefly, exactly 2 years ago in my Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) review:
This scene, of Clementine and Joel play-fighting got me rather angry. I hate hate hate it when couples, people, do dangerous shit for fun.
^Lmao, rather angry wtf? The writing sucks lol hate it…… But this still stands; in Remember Me the playfighting is not ‘dangerous’ as it was in Eternal Sunshine, but equally successful in making me rather angry in its annoying grossness. Is it unfair for me to find it childish?! Like the fuck??? Where’s the fun in getting each other wet and forcing each other into submission in the shower?! And as complained about to Jade, self-aware, intertextual, referential, whatever the term for it is, scenes, dialogues, films, are as annoying as ones done in earnest.
Okay this playfighting scene was a one off, but it is absolutely extrapolate-able and gives insight to why Ally’s character was so phony and wobbly. Ally ultimately stands for nothing, all her quirks don’t create a whole, and as a result we can anticipate nothing from her nor can we actually feel for her at all. That I have dessert before the main scene was shockingly out of place because its manic pixie dream girl brazenness and eccentricity don’t present itself anywhere else. Full transcript of her dumbass dialogue (re: why she has dessert before the main. Substituting their names with Girl/Guy cos that’s literally all they are, their chemistry is so absent and their connection so fucking blah that they are any and every guy/girl ever):
GIRL: I just don't see the point in waiting. What if l die eating my vindaloo?
GUY: Is that probable?
GIRL: It's possible. Embolism bursts, asteroid hits the restaurant. I'd die without having eaten the one thing l wanted most.
GUY: l mean, the odds are...
GIRL: Tell you what. Guarantee me, swear to me on your eternal soul that l make it through my entre, and I'll wait. Before you answer, if l die, you're gonna have to live the rest of your life knowing not only did you lie to me, but you denied me of my one last indulgence. My last wish. Are you prepared to shoulder that kind of responsibility to prove a point?
If you feel like that second bit (swear to me on your eternal soul etc etc ad nauseam) went on for far longer than its logical reach, you’re right, and you’re lucky you didn’t have to sit through it. “Are you prepared to shoulder that kind of responsibility to prove a point?” - eh, i don’t remember anyone but you having a dumbass point you were desperate to prove, unprovoked?? I don’t know, I don’t think this is specific to the film’s storytelling or scriptwriting, I just generally am averse to such people in real life (same with the playfighting issue I guess). Like Jade said when I complained about this scene to her, it reminded of her Zoe Kazan’s character in What If? (2013) which we barely emerged from alive. Fuck that film lol seriously. Sorry I made yall sit through it… But Daniel Rafcliffe is so nice :’( Okay but how should I best describe these increasingly commonplace female characters? Manic pixie dream girl doesn’t suffice anymore (lmao I googled MPDG just so I could get ideas of other prototypes and wiki lists Belle from the 1991 Beauty and the Beast as one?!), and I feel that they do belong to a specific type. Just reading the dialogue above, don’t a handful of other annoyingass “””not like other girls””” girls from film come to mind? I don’t know, does ‘fake-witty’ cover enough ground? Like Jade says, why do people even enjoy these characters? Just because they are different from what is commonly shown doesn’t make them more endearing or likable or even remotely realistic surely?
In general, MPDGs are dangerous because their blinded male lovers don’t seem them in any real measure, more as designs of their own, existing to imbue their own lives with all they are missing. But in Remember Me, we don’t even get to see how Guy sees Girl, much less see her for our own selves. Guy and Girl barely share a meaningful eyeline, I can’t recall a single intimate or perfectly honest conversation, which leads me to……
UGH I’m tired of big screen romances having their highs shown almost exclusively through physical intimacy, because this message is completely toxic, and this is not just me spreading my asexual agenda honestly? Seriously, how much of a copout is it for the connection to be, you know, ambling on just fine, nothing special or sparkly, until that one kiss or that one morning-after with a camera pan of the girl’s bare back kissed with soft dusty morning sunlight and the guy looking at her from the window with some kind of stupidass serious contemplation? Can we not be led to believe that this is how connections are formed, that you know someone when you know their body? It’s like that song, Suzanne by Leonard Cohen , that Leila used to play over and over when we sat alone at the pagoda every Tuesday, an hour early for our organic farming sessions, which I now love because it reminds me of those nice sunny times and nice sunny Leila who I loved so much, but bleghhh this line plz stop: And you know that she will trust you/For you've touched her perfect body with your mind.
I know, it’s obvious, Guy and Girl here are each other’s safe places in a world where so much is messy and dark for them, etc etc etc, but we don’t get a sense of the warmth at all, we don’t see how much they love/need/appreciate each other or why.
Conclusion: I do not ship Guy and Girl because there was literally nothing to go off on and therefore the entire emotional premise cannot stand and we cannot love anyone or anything we see on screen.
Moving on~
Okay it’s unfair to compare the two just because of the 9/11 relevance, but seeing this reminded me of When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman that I read in 2011. It remains one of my all-time favourite books, and I remember liking it so much I lent it to Rebecca, and then later Nichole, and Krysia, and maybe some others. Lol cute memories, being in school, with girls, nice girls, wearing a uniform, sitting outside the class on the steps by the grass patch…2011 was chill as hell. ANYWAY the book changed my life and I remember sobbing in my bed when I first read it, because 9/11 being woven into the storyline felt authentic and necessary and actually helpful to our understanding of its characters – what little I’ve read of the critiques of Remember Me from Rotten Tomatoes decry its opportunist, ‘piggybacking’ of the tragedy. I’m sure everything I feel about the cheapness of the 9/11 insertion has already been written about, and my arms /shoulders hurt from my heaviest clean and press sets ever last night, so let me look for something that speaks what is in my heart.
Okie, found something close enough:
I hate this movie. I hate it a lot. And I want to spoil the ending right here but I won't. I want you to go feel the same feeling of being sucker-punched that I anti-enjoyed in the final minutes when THE BIG SURPRISE ENDING takes place. Because it's cheap. And shallow. And manipulative in a way that's not heartwarming or cute or moving. It's just gross and infuriating. It's also pretty easy to predict: a rug-pulling, emotionally pornographic climax of tragedy-kitsch that will come to you early if you're willing to pay attention to small details here and there, things the movie just puts in the background or touches on briefly, creating a timeline and an inevitable outcome that it finally shoves in your face with a big, "TA-DAAAH! TIME TO CRY EVERYONE! DO IT! NOW!"  (source)
Ah this doesn’t fit in anywhere else so here is an important stand-alone comment: fuck the opening of the film! Honestly is it naiveté that I don’t believe something like that would happen? Okay not that it would never, but it’s certainly not probable? Who the fuck shoots the individual, a mother to a young (and present!) girl no less, they successfully rob and are getting away comfortably from? I don’t wanna be this person but………..it seemed damn racist lol
Okay so obviously it’s the cheapest technique in the book but I am a sucker for voiceovers, especially ones that open and/or close films (I’m sure there’s a technical term for this, but whatever). Okay well not all, the dumbass fake deep quotes that the Twilight series open with are, well, dumbass. But the film series still rocks :-) fight me if u disagree :-)  But okay the point is that Remember Me ends with Tyler (whose life we know to have just been taken by the 9/11 attacks) and this stupidly moving voiceover narration:
Whatever you do in life will be insignificant, but it's very important that you do it, because nobody else will. Like when someone comes into your life, and half of you says, "You're nowhere near ready," but the other half says, "Make her yours forever." Michael, Caroline asked me what l would say if I knew you could hear me. I said l do know. "I love you. God, l miss you. And I forgive you."
Sorry but…………..that is just truly so stupidly moving. :’( I need my inspiration spoon-fed with zero subtlety, and this did just that. I will indeed do all I want to in life! Nobody else will! I’m gonna make her mine forever! And I truly miss and love everyone who has ever been in my life!
Since we’re on the positives now let me also generously add that there was in fact a lot of potential in the film. Which…naturally….only made it all the more disappointing. But, okay, there was a lot of richness in the subplots. Maybe too much, because it was slightly stifling, how little space they were given. But that’s only realistic right? That one guy and one girl should have at any time a hundred other things going on in their lives that aren’t played out on centre stage. So that’s good, yay. Robert Pattinson’s sister’s narrative especially was quite unique, subtle, engaging, and all in all a nice character to follow. It taught me things about the various ways in which mettle presents itself in different people, and made me want to know how to stand my ground more convincingly. I have a long way to go in denouncing cowardice. Again, I think the voiceovers helped in this respect. Pushes the viewer just enough while holding them back in the right ways, deepening roots while inspiring upward growth. Nice!  
Okay I think I’m done……..gtg eat lunch
No offence but Miley Cyrus’ new song Malibu contains and inspires ten times the emotion that this film did. This being said, I did cry in one of the final shots, of Pierce Brosnan bringing his daughter round (presumably) the Met. Only cos he’s a good actor though. Like everything else in the final act of the film, his character’s growth was very heavy-handed and traditional but he played it well. Also Malibu rocks. Also I need to stop listening to pop music :’( save me!
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