The Future of Season 7 of Wild Kratts

In light of this week's premiere of Wild Kratt's 7th season, Martin Kratt has discussed the new season as well as the overall history of the show and what is to come in the future of the series.

You can read all of what he has to say in this article, but I'm going to address the very interesting stuff regarding what to expect next for Season 7.

“There's so much that people know about animals that hasn't been published yet,” notes Martin. “So, we can find things that aren't even in books yet and put them in the show by talking directly to these scientists. One thing about the format for this show and the subject matter is we'll never run out of stories. There's so much to do still, and so many animals left to write about. This season we’ll be breaking the 200th episode and we’ve only scratched the surface.”

Now I will not lie, this paragraph gave me a lot of joy. Because Martin is right, there IS a crap-ton of animals that people know so little about. Anyone who says this show isn't a cultural impact for all that it's done to inform and inspire this generation over the past 12 years of its airing is lying out of their fucking asses.

Ok now that I've gotten that out of the way, let's address the bolded point:

Wild Kratts will air its 200th episode in Season 7.

200th Episode!!!

Now everything is starting to make sense: The reason why the hiatus took nearly 2 full years was because they were producing a minimum of 47 episodes. That's even more episodes than Season 1 had:

Which means that the potential for this season is limitless: And that's not even going into what Episode 200 may be about. This season is totally going to be worth the two-year long wait and these madlads at PBS are going to make damn well sure of it!

...

Then there's this line from Martin:

Still, what would a monumental seventh season be without a bit of mysterious animal flare? And, of course, the occasional lemur?

Ok now it's getting good. It looks like we'll be going on a return to Madagascar for more lemur-centric episodes. Fingers crossed for more Zooboomafo references:

---

“A big special we’ve got coming up in Season 7 is called “Blue and Green: The Living Earth,” which is all about habitats and climate and it features blue whales,” says Martin. “It also has another lemur in there, the Indri, which is the largest living lemur."

FUCKING BLUE WHALE'S Y'ALL. AFTER A DECADE WE'VE GOT A BLUE WHALE EPISODE. 🥳🥳

Also, google search what an Indri lemur is, I gaurentee you that it's very interesting!

.....

This is all so exciting and honestly, anyone who felt let down by the first few eps. of S7, I think you guys will feel very vindicated by the remainder of this season. I think after the lackluster 5th and 6th season and the subsequent negative response for that, they're bringing forward a revival era for WK's quality that may be on par with, or even succeed the earlier seasons. Regardless, I'm excited for where this shit goes.

hi!! (its ezra formerly known as @eltongender lol) i think i just missed u tonite BUT i wanted 2 tell u ur the main reason i started watchin succession :0 tbh i thought it was Not my thing before i tried it but now im Hooked !! also hope u have a nice day 🍁🍂💞

omg hiii ezra 💕 love the new url!! AHHH im so excited to hear that!! i love influencing other ppl with my silly little interests 🥺 makes me feel so important hehe... yeah i know what you mean, i had the same start with succession. it took me a while to get into it as well but after a while it just gets so good and youre hooked!! i think it's mostly bc the first few episodes are a bit "slower" but i feel like after shit wents down you just wanna know what else happens!! but I'm glad you're liking it ❤️ i hope you're having a wonderful day my dear!!

Hold me just a little bit longer (part 7)

Summary: After the revelation that Agatha was a witch your relationship changed. You were closer than ever before but will it stay that way?

A/N: I loved writing this chapter, enjoy :)

Tag list: @escapetodreamworld @midnight-lestrange @king-star @ynscrazylife @booklovinbi @mysticfalls01 @adorkwithaplan @nathaslosttheirshit @agathaharkness-simp @paulawand

After the kiss in the basement your whole relationship changed. You could now see the real Agatha, the witch that craved knowledge above everything but most importantly the woman that would sacrifice the world for you.

It was as if you had fallen in love with her over and over again, discovering something new every day. Agatha didn’t hide her magic from you anymore, purple sparks visible almost all the time, wrapping around her hands, dancing through the air.

You were fascinated by her magic, admiring her as she weaved spells so complicated you couldn't even start to comprehend. You knew she was planning something but you honestly didn't care, glad that you had manage to save your relationship, enjoying your life as you explored you girlfriend's true persona.

You were sitting on the couch, watching TV, when you felt Agatha sit down next to you, the pulsing of her magic still making you shiver, but not in a bad way. It felt like it liked you, accepting you, welcoming you.

You leaned into her side, feeling her hands around your waist in an instant, pulling you closer.

"What are we watching love?"

You shrugged with your shoulders. You hadn't been paying attention to the TV for most of the time anyways.

"What's on your mind angel?"

Laughing as she managed to always know what's going on you looked up at her, pressing a short kiss to her cheek.

"You're planning something Agatha."

The witch looked at you with a fond smile, playing with some strands of your hair, twisting it around her fingers.

"You know I always am darling."

You snuggled closed to her side, resting your chin on her shoulder, playing with her hair that cascaded down her shoulders, content in her arms as you sat by her side, glad that she was a part of your life.

Continuing to watch TV the both of you simply enjoyed the others presence, holding each others hands or pressing a short kiss now and then on your girlfriend's lips. You were happy, the presence of the other calming you. Sometime along the seventh episode of the show you were watching you had changed positions, your head now laying in Agatha’s lap, the witch in question massaging your scalp as she just held you close to her.

You felt safe in her arms, as if nothing could harm you there, purple magic gently swaying around you, the now familiar feeling of the dark energy settling on your skin. You welcomed it as it was a part of Agatha, mirroring her soul, dark, twisted, powerful, beautiful, passionate and always craving more.

It was as if you could see into her soul, touched that she trusted you so much to lay her feelings open, letting you in. No walls to keep you out, no secrets as she showed you what she was planning.

You gasped as she showed you Wanda's true potential, how dangerous she could be. The legendary Scarlet Witch. You understood that she had to figure out what's going on before Wanda would crumble completely, she was dangerous, way more than you thought she was.

But this also brought a small smile to your face. Even though Agatha’s approach to the situation was anything but gentle her motivation wasn't pure evil. She wanted Wanda to have what she didn't had, a mentor.

You still felt sick when you remembered what Agatha showed you down in the lair. How her coven, her own mother, had tried to kill her, simply because she had been more powerful, more dangerous. Yes she had broken the rules but they had refused her the tutoring she had needed.

Your girlfriend wasn't a good person, you knew that, she had hurt many people over the centuries but there wasn't just pure evil in her. There was still this spark, this spark young Agatha had had her whole life and that never faded. Her craving for knowledge, to learn new things, to better herself. She was something else that was for sure but you loved her, loved her unconditionally, until death would do you apart. She was your missing piece, your soulmate. Your one and only. Forever.

You looked up when you heard a sob, shifting so you could look at Agatha. When you turned around you locked eyes. She was crying, a happy smile on her face, her magic happily dancing around you. Her magic. She had heard every one of your thoughts, still conected thanks to her spell.

She pulled you up from where you were laying on her lap, hands around your waist as she looked at you with so much love and adoration.

"Did you mean it?"

Her voice was nothing more than a whisper, emotions staining her voice, a look in her eyes that could only be described as complete devotion. Pure love. You started to tear up a bit as well, unbelieving of the love the woman in front of you held for you.

"Every single word."

At this a big smile started to form on her face, tears making her baby blue eyes look like the stormy sea. She caressed your face and pulled you in for a passionate kiss, full of love and emotions.

You eagerly kissed back, never getting enough of the feeling of her lips on yours. She was everything you could imagine and so much more. Feeling what she was feeling thanks to her magic. It was unbelievable, the love she held for you, the pure joy she felt at seeing your face, the peace she felt when you laid in her arms. You had never experienced something like that before, how someone could love so unconditionally. It was overwhelming, beautiful and you couldn't imagine to ever live without her again. When you broke apart you couldn't help but stare at Agatha, you were mesmerised by her beauty, her mind and you just couldn't stop smiling.

"Marry me."

You were caught of guard by her proposal, looking at her in shock. But you caught yourself rather quickly, tears starting to stream down your face as you pulled her in for another kiss, not caring that tears were streaming down your face or that you were sobbing like crazy. You were just so happy.

You smiled as you came down from the high this kiss gave you, looking at Agatha like she was your whole world.

"So that's a yes?"

You wrapped your arms around her neck, pulling her into a bone crushing hug. Overwhelmed with joy and happiness.

"Yes it's always gonna be a yes."

You felt her break out in unbelievable joy, her emotions so intense you could feel them as if they were your own. She was so relieved, relieved that you would choose to spend the rest of your life with her. Forever.

As the credits of the episode rolled neither of the freshly engaged paid the TV any mind, holding each other, kissing, exited for what might come. They didn't care about the obstacles they had to face, about the plan the witch had to complete or the enemies they would make along the way. They had each other and that was enough.

While they were content in the others arms purple magic wrapped around them, bathing the whole room in purple light. A glowing string starting to form, connecting our lovers, binding them to each other. Forever was never precise, it could mean until one would leave this earth or it could mean eternity.

In our case, well let's just say they gave destiny a nudge in the right direction, the dark magic singing to both of them, taking their love and transforming it into something else.

A lovers touch, a myth almost as rare as the Scarlet Witch. When two people were destined for each other, soulmates if you will, sometimes magic would give them something in return. The promise of a life together, their souls merged together, connected for eternity. It was something personal, something intimate and something powerful, powerful and dangerous.

We all knew love could make us stronger, fight for our lover, our other half, do whatever was necessary to protect the one we loved. But what would happen if they weren't just in love, what would happen if they shared a bond, a power that could tear everything apart that threatened to separate them.

As the purple glow faded from the room, only small whisps of purple wrapping around the couple, something started to glow, a coral mist intertwining with the purple sparks.

A lovers touch. A myth that just became reality.

Buddie + actors please

When Buck is a kid, he decides he wants to be a stuntman. Actors are cool, sure, but driving fast cars, jumping off buildings, being right in the middle of all the cool action happening in movies—that sounds awesome.

It’s a dream that sticks with him (much to Maddie’s chagrin). When Buck is twenty-one, he leaves Hershey for LA and gets his first job doing stunt work for a small time TV show. When he’s twenty-five, he gets hired for his first big time movie. Fast cars, jumping off buildings—all the fun stuff he dreamed about as a kid. He moves out of a share house and rents his own apartment for the first time in his life. He works on a movie with Abby Clark, falls in love, then gets his heart broken all in the span of six months. But life is still good. Buck has his job and he has friends and—it’s good. Life is good. It’s great, even, because Maddie shows up on his doorstep and suddenly Buck has his sister back in his life after three years of radio silence. For a while, life is almost perfect.

Then it all comes crashing down. Two months after his twenty-seventh birthday, Buck shatters his leg when a stunt goes wrong—he almost dies, and almost definitely ends his career. He goes through two surgeries and he’s lying in a hospital bed after the second one, trying not to drown in the hopelessness weighing on his chest, when Bobby Nash comes to see him. Bobby is one of the best directors in the business and if Buck wasn’t so high on painkillers, it would probably feel like a pretty big deal having him visit.

“I have a job for you,” Bobby says. “I want you to focus on recovery, do what the doctors tell you, get yourself better. Then, if you’re walking in three months, I want you to come see me.”

“I’ll be walking in two months,” Buck tells him. He doesn’t mention that walking might be all he’ll be able to do.

Bobby shakes his head. “Three months,” he repeats. “Then we talk.”

They are three of the most frustrating months of Buck’s life. He pushes himself—probably harder than he should, and definitely harder than Maddie likes.

“You have other options,” his sister tells him, the same argument hashed over and over. “Your life isn’t over just because you can’t do stunt work anymore.”

Buck shakes his head. “No. This is my life, Maddie, I can’t just give up—there isn’t anything else—“

Until there is.

Three months pass and Buck shows up at Bobby’s office, not knowing what the hell he’s getting himself into. He sits down on the other side of the large desk and Bobby hands him a script. Buck takes it, curious, and flips through the first couple of pages. It’s not an action movie. Buck isn’t quite sure what it is; part psychological thriller, part romance. Limited stunt work.

“I don’t understand.”

“I want you to play the husband,” Bobby tells him.

“You want me to act?” Buck asks, frowning at the script in his hands.

“I’ve been watching you, kid. I think you’ve got more potential than you think you do.”

Buck shakes his head. “I just do the stunts.”

Bobby smiles, like they’re in on some joke together. “You’ve done a few cameos. Advertisements. There were those two episodes of Underland. I spoke to your agent, Buck.”

Carla didn’t mention that. In all the conversations they’ve had about the future of his career since the accident, Bobby’s offer only came up once in passing. Maybe because Carla knew Buck would say no if he knew what it was for. Maybe because Buck was always so quick to shut down any conversation that didn’t start and end with of course you’ll make a full recovery and get back to stunt work.

“Those things were just a way to make money between other jobs,” he tells Bobby. “I don’t—I’m not an actor.”

Bobby hesitates. “When I spoke to Carla… she mentioned you might not be able to do stunt work again, Buck. I’m offering you something else; something you could be just as good at. At least think about it.”

Buck doesn’t want to think about it. He’s not sure he can think about it, not without accepting that he might never do stunts again, and he’s not ready for that. He stands up and holds the script out for Bobby to take back.

“Thank you,” he says, the words stiff, formal. “But I’m not interested.”

Bobby doesn’t take the script. “Keep it,” he says. “That copy was made for you; I’ve got plenty more.”

Buck leaves the office feeling... disheartened. Disappointed. He’s just not sure whether the disappointment is in all the people trying to get him to give up on his dream, or in himself for not being good enough prove them wrong.

Because they’re right. He knows they’re right. He’s walking, but he’s still in pain more days than he isn’t. He’s still going through PT, rebuilding the strength in his leg, getting to somewhere where he can do half the things he used to be able to do. Some days it’s a struggle just to walk without a limp. After three months, he should be getting closer to his goal but instead it feels further away than ever.

Buck goes home and sulks. That’s what Maddie calls it, when she stops by to ply him with food and company and the same motivational speech she’s been giving him for months. Buck isn’t in the mood to hear it, but Maddie doesn’t give him much choice.

“Your life isn’t over, Evan,” she says. “The sooner you realise that you’re more than just this one job, the sooner you’ll be happy.”

A week passes. Buck keeps doing PT and not much else. Carla calls. Buck ignores it, but she keeps calling, insistent and concerned, and when Buck finally gives in and picks up the phone, she says much the same thing that Maddie did. Except she also adds, “Read the script, Buck. If you hate it, we never have to talk about it again, but I don’t think you will.”

Buck reads the script. And he’s surprised to find that he kind of loves it.

He sits on it for another day and then he gives in and calls Bobby and says, “Okay. I’ll do it.”

Bobby’s reply is pleased, but not surprised. Two days later Buck is back in his office, this time with another man as well. Tall, dark hair—gorgeous, Buck’s mind supplies. He’s vaguely familiar in that way that all people feel in Hollywood.

“This is Eddie Diaz,” Bobby introduces. “He’ll be playing Joe.”

Your husband, he doesn’t need to say. They’ve all read the script.

Eddie smiles easily, holding his hand out for Buck to shake. “Nice to meet you, man.”

As Buck shakes Eddie’s hand, he wonders again what the hell he’s getting himself in. He still feels wildly out of his depth, unsure of his place here, but standing next to Eddie, returning that easy smile with one of his own—Buck finds himself feeling something else as well: anticipation. Excitement, even. He has a feeling that working on this movie is going to be fun.

Kacchan & Deku: Win to Save and Save to Win - A circular path of parallels (part 1)

Okay so it had probably already been talked to death by now, but i'd like to write a detailed list of how Midoriya and Bakugou's respective paths are and had always been paralleled since the beginning. And it's not just with the whole "save to win and win to save" thing, which is the most obvious textual part of it, but there are a lot of more subtle hints along the way too. I mean in nearly every single arcs, for each of Midoriya development, Bakugou had one too (albeit in a completely opposite direction).

This post is also partly in response to some anime-only fans who complained about Bakugou's development in the Joint Training Arc coming from the left field... Which actually isn't? Like Kirishima said it had never been as obvious before but there were definite hints about it and I'll try to show them as thoroughly as possible in this post.

Warning ! This post will be quite long and will contain Manga Spoilers up to chapter 317 in part 3!

¤ From the Pre-UA era To Deku vs Kacchan: their starting lines

(more under the cut)

When I said that the parallel started early, I really meant early. In fact, it started as early as the very first panel they were in.

I think it is very telling that the first time we saw them, Midoriya is trying to defend another kid, while Bakugou is seen using his quirk (and actually introducing the reader/viewer to the whole concept of quirk in the first place). It tells us right here, right then on the very first second, that Midoriya Izuku is physically weak but a savior at heart and Bakugou Katsuki has a strong quirk but is a bully asserting his dominance.

This of course led to diametrical beliefs on what a hero is and should be and we've got those two very iconic moments to illustrate:

And of course it reflected into their behaviors, even as kids.

What I find really interesting in the way those flashbacks were presented is that Midoriya's saving moment was told through Bakugou's POV, while Bakugou's winning side was seen through Midoriya's eyes.

Those moments were deemed important because they deeply impacted the witnessing party and not actually the "wining/saving" one.

(I think someone commented once that while the river scene was highly pivotal for Bakugou, Midoriya probably doesn't even remember it. And likewise Bakugou probably doesn't remember fighting and winning against some random older kids, but Midoriya definitively does. And I totally agree!)

At those moment both Bakugou and Midoriya saw in the other something that they were clearly lacking and their reactions to this realization were wildly different as well.

"He doesn't take himself into account, you know. Something doesn't feel right. It makes me wanna keep him at arm's length. Back then, I ignored my own weakness, so I ended up bullying him" - Bakugou Katsuki

"You who had so many things I didn't have... To me, you were an amazing person much closer than All Might! That's why I keep chasing after you!!" - Midoriya Izuku

Midoriya saw this amazing kid kicking ass with his strong quirks and his first reaction was admiration and wanting to get as close as possible to this person, because he was all too aware of his own weakness and shortcoming.

Bakugou saw this selfless kid trying to help him and displaying qualities that he didn't have and his first reaction was to lash out and push that kid as far away as possible because he didn't want to recognize his own weaknesses and shortcomings.

Which, you know, probably describes their entire childhood dynamics haha...

... and then the sludge villain happened.

And it brought with it the iconic "My legs moved on their own" and "Your eyes were begging for help" moments which we all know about of course, but this scene also had another more immediate parallel that I'd like to talk about.

Bakugou tried to fight the sludge villain on his own but ultimately failed to win.

Midoriya tried to rescue Bakugou on his own from the sludge villain but ultimately failed to save him.

The sludge villain was a reality check for both of them, in a "Nope kiddos, you might aspire to be heroes, but you still have a very long way to go. Here let's insert an All Might to show you just how far away your goal is," kind of way?

Anyway fast-forward 10 months of intense training to prepare for the UA entrance exam.... and really do I even have to mention this?

I mean the only way it could have been even more textually obvious is if Midoriya had been ranked sixth instead of seventh so that his name would be right next to Bakugou's... like there's even this panel explicitly pointing everything out.

So yeah... nothing to add there, *shrugs*

After that came the Quirk Assessment Test:

I'm going to come back to this later on in a more detailed way, but regarding their personal development; Midoriya's development is external while Bakugou's is internal. And I don't quite consider the quirk assessment test as "progress" for any of them yet because both of them sort of completely miss the point.

Aizawa told Midoriya "How can you save anyone if you can't move after one hit?" which had the underlying message of "It's not okay to hurt yourself"... But Midoriya totally went like, "Okay then I'll just hurt myself in a way in which I can still move afterward!" So yeah he is just sidestepping the problem here, but well there probably wasn't anything else he could do here.

As for Bakugou, he had always feel threatened by Midoriya's presence, but not in a fighting skills context. They are not really competing on the same field and it had never occurred to Bakugou that Midoriya could really beat him in a one-to-one fight.

As hilarious as the thought of Bakugou truly believing that somehow Deku had managed to take head on building-high robots quirkless is, I think what really happened is... Bakugou saw his own 0 rescue points and thought "Oh... so that's how Deku got in. Damn nerd probably went and save shitty extras left and right!". Which is a more realistic feat to manage quirkless. Anyway my point is, Bakugou realizing Midoriya isn't quirkless should have been a "Shit! He's leveling the field and standing on my playground now!" moment...

But no, what overpowered him here is the thought that the whole time Midoriya had been hiding his quirk from him and went like "What? Am I not good enough for you to use your quirk on me?! STOP LOOKING DOWN ON ME!!! EXPLAIN YOURSELF RIGHT THE FUCK NOW, SHITTY DEKU!!"

So yeah... kind of missing the point too.

Which is why the quirk assessment test wasn't really their starting point but more like them trying to look for it but missing it?

Speaking of starting lines... Let's move on to the Deku vs. Kacchan first round.

B"From watching the match, it appears Bakugou acted n to surpass Bakugou, All Might pointed that those were the first passionate emotions Midoriya had shown other than "I want to be a hero!". This was the very first moment where Midoriya's desire to win was stronger than his desire to save.

As for Bakugou, this was the moment where he truly he realized that Deku is a threat and not just through his natural heroic/saving disposition like before but on the battlefield which used to be 100% Bakugou's area of expertise. And if even with his non-existent control of quirk Deku had managed to win to such extent, what would happen when Deku managed to truly master his own quirk? Total defeat?! Bakugou is self-aware enough to realize that while his own fighting skills and quirk mastery could still progress, they were already near the top with a not wide enough margin for improvement.

This was the moment where Bakugou realized where he truly stood compared to everyone else around him and that if he wanted to reach the very top again, then only relying on his fighting skills and his quirk control would never be enough. This is what prompted out his feelings of "I have to change or I'll be left in the dust".

And since Deku went and encroached on Bakugou's playground and beat him in the process, there's no way in hell Mr Complete and Irrefutable Win over there wouldn't aim to do exactly the same at some point.

Anyway the two gifs above showed us their motivation to reach their respective Win/Save side of the spectrum, but they both have big issues they need to work on in order to do so.

"From watching the match, it appears Bakugou-san acted on his own because of an obviously personal grudge. As as All Might-sensei said previously, it is foolish to launch a large-scale attack indoors.

In the same way, taking into consideration the damage he received, Midoriya-san's plan was also rash." - Yaoyorozu Momo

Yaoyorozu's analysis was super spot on and hit straight where their weaknesses lie: Bakugou needs to stop acting on his own and learn to cooperate with/trust his teammates and Midoriya needs to stop hurting himself/self-sacrifice and learn to properly control his quirk.

Both of them also have these super heavy shackles that keep pulling them down and impeding their progress at every turn:

Bakugou's complex feelings and emotionally explosive baggage towards Midoriya that makes him go feral and irrational at the drop of a hat and clearly prevents him from properly considering Midoriya as the rival that would keep pulling him up

Midoriya's total and utter idolization of All Might that gives him a tendency to imitate his idol and clearly prevents him from properly realizing and unlocking the potential of his own quirk

And at that point, they clearly don't realize how cumbersome those shackles could be if left unaddressed too long.

Anyway... this episode/chapter was called "Bakugou Katsuki: Starting line", but I think it can be considered both their starting lines, because this is when they were made aware of what they are lacking and showed their resolve to change.

Midoriya's progress and development is intrinsically linked to his quirk mastery and fighting style, which are inherently physical skills (which is where Bakugou's excels in). It stands to reason then that his progress would therefore be very flashy, hard to miss, and highly praised due to the external aspect of his development.

On the other hand Bakugou's progress and development hinges on him properly getting in touch with his emotions and connecting to other people in healthy way, which are inherently inner-strength qualities (which Midoriya has no shortage of) . It stands to reason then that his progress would therefore be very subtle, mostly unnoticed, and hardly taken into account due to the internal aspect of his development. (Like it'd probably only takes him having a full meltdown or throwing himself in front of someone else for other people to notice how far he had gone!)

What's your ranking for the Bronze Saints?

The very short answer is:

1. Shun

2. Ikki

3. Shiryu

4. Hyoga

5. Seiya

6. All the other ones (aka Jabu, Nachi, Ichi, Ban, Geki, and June).

The long answer is under the cut ‘cause I keep rambling about stuff. Keep in mind: this is a very long post. 

1. Andromeda Shun

(Since I already answered for him, I’ll copy-paste the answer here, so I won’t force you to click on a link to a different post if you haven’t seen that post yet. Same image and everything)

Shun is, in my opinion, the strongest of them all. Yes, even stronger than Ikki.  I see countless people saying that Shun is weak and/or useless just because he doesn’t want to fight or because he calls Ikki for help, and I have one thing to say about that: kindness does not equal weakness. Shun is not weak, he refuses to fight unless he has to.  The most blatant example I can give you of his strength is the fight against Aphrodite, the only battle Shun actively wanted to fight. You can see how dangerous he can be, when he’s willing to put aside his non-belligerent attitude. Shun is merciful, he doesn’t want to resolve everything with violence. This doesn’t mean he’s not one of the deadliest fighters out there, if not the deadliest, given his ability.

Let’s NOT forget Shun was able to hold his ground against Saga, who is said to be one of the most powerful Saints of his generation. He went as far as striking Saga in the Pope’s chamber, he managed to reach him with not that much effort. This is something people often gloss over, but it’s one of the greatest examples out there of Shun’s incredible power.  To fight him, Seiya needed all the help he could get from his companions. Shun, instead, fought by himself, didn’t die or get lost in the Another Dimension, and was able to get his chains near Saga without him being unable to stop the boy.

Most importantly, Shun is depicted as “weak” only in works not written by Kurumada. Non-canon episodes are the only ones in which Shun is not capable of keeping up with the other Saints. This is obviously proof of him being weakened by outside people, and not of him being weak by default.

Another point in his favor it’s the Seventh Sense: he awakened it during the Sanctuary batte, right? Well, wrong. According to his teacher, Shun reached the Seventh Sense way before that. Or at least, the potential of the Seventh Sense.  Shun cannot be considered weak, and shouldn’t be considered weak, because he’s definitely not. Now, as for why I think he’s more powerful than Ikki, to me it’s obvious that he’s stronger than him. Maybe not physically, in fact I don’t think there’s anyone in the Bronzes that physically stronger than Ikki (no, not even Shiryu), but as far as his cosmo goes…  Ikki has the advantage of not dying, Phoenix and whatnot, but Shun has a more powerful cosmo. You can easily see this by taking into consideration the Nebula Storm, a technique so powerful that, if not controlled, reaches a point when it’s impossible to be stopped. This is incredibly destructive, extremely lethal, and Shun uses it without his Cloth.  This is something similar to what Shiryu does, because they both can access their full cosmo without wearing a Cloth, but Shun has a clear advantage: he doesn’t have a weak spot. Where Shiryu could be easily killed if hit in the right place, Shun doesn’t have that weakness. Which, at least in my opinion, makes him better than Shiryu.

The last example I want to give you is the immense plot twist of him being Hades’ host.  Not necessarily the fact that he can withstand the soul of a god binding with his own, but the fact that he was able to get the upper hand against Hades.  If Shun was really as weak as a lot of people want to believe, than explain to me how in the everloving Hell did Shun managed to take back control over his body, keep a hold of Hades to give his brother an opportunity, and accept that he needed to die in order to get rid of the deity.  He didn’t last long, sure, but he was fighting Hades.  Not only that, but not long after being freed from Hades, Shun took back his Cloth, donned it, and fought again like he wasn’t just possessed by a deity. He managed to burn his cosmo enough to “unlock” the Divine Cloth despite having endured Hades’ control over his body and soul. To this day, I’m still annoyed at how easily Hypnos defeated him, taking into account what happened just a few moment before.

This might not be enough to convince other people of Shun’s true potential, but it’s enough for me to believe he’s absolutely the strongest Bronze Saint, and maybe even one of the strongest Saints in general.  Don’t forget that this young man right here can wear the Virgo Cloth. He is the next Virgo Saint, and that’s a given for me. And you know how unbelievably powerful a Saint with that constellation normally is.

 2. Phoenix Ikki

Well, he is canonically placed above most Silver Saints in terms of strength. There’s no denying Ikki is one of the most powerful Saints out there, he’s basically unstoppable. Not only that, he had one huge advantage on his side, his inability to actually die.  Ikki was already strong as a kid, as the story reminds us more than once, physically being the strongest among the orphans, and we all know how he dethroned Jango and took control of Dead Queen Island with almost no effort.  Most notably, he has a unique cosmo; as Kanon stated, when he faced him, it’s full of hatred (which is Guilty’s fault), something weird for a Saint of Athena. This hatred was shown to aid him at first, so much that he used to unleash his cosmo without any second though and with unending rage, so i feel like it’s worth telling.  In his favor there’s also the fact he has a pure warrior attitude. Ikki fights and that’s it, no second guesses, no hesitation. The only time he hesitated was against Hades, because he didn’t want to kill his brother. You can imagine what a behavior like that will bring to a battlefield without me telling you. 

Though, I don’t consider him to be the strongest. In terms of raw power he is terrifying, no questions asked, but he doesn’t reach that level of pure cosmo power that’s able to completely annihilate everything and anything like Shun.  He’s fearsome, of course, and he knows how powerful he is (countless times this self-awareness could be observed). I, on the other hand, consider him to physically be the strongest of them all. Without his cosmo, Ikki would still be able to kick everyone’s ass, I don’t doubt it even for a second.  Even though Shun is the strongest overall, Ikki’s physical strength is unprecedented for a Bronze Saint. No one can tell me otherwise. He blasted too many people into oblivion for me to think otherwise. 

What makes him even more fearsome is the fact that he becomes stronger each time he dies (like a Phoenix, after all), and the fact that he is extremely intelligent. Ikki is capable of using his enemy’s weakness against them with no effort.  On top of everything, his Illusion Demon Fist can easily break his opponent’s mind and gift him a victory without Ikki even moving an inch. It doesn’t work on everyone, of course, but it can be lethal in way more ways than one can imagine. He has a cosmo that’s powerful enough, once he awakened the Seventh Sense, to defeat Shaka in combat. Hell, Shaka was scared of him at that point. He legitimately broke Shaka’s technique. He told him “now you don’t have your senses anymore” and Ikki just went “jokes on you, I don’t care”. 

But! Ikki has his weak points. No one is perfect after all. Not even Shun, and he is at the top of this list.  His Illusion Demon Fist can be used against him. We saw this particular case in action. When this happens, not even Ikki himself can completely break the illusion before falling prey to it. And, as much as his regenerative ability is useful, I can see why it could be a problem. This is more of my analysis for it, but I don’t think dying and coming back to life again and again doesn’t do a number on Ikki’s mental health. 

While Ikki is perfectly capable of dealing both physical damage and psychic damage, I don’t think he should be elevated to strongest Bronze Saint ever. Unlike his brother, whose cosmo can expand infinitely (even if at the cost of his life), Ikki has his limits. 

 3. Dragon Shiryu

The main reason I don’t see him and Hyoga as equals (I used to, not anymore) it’s the fact that I realized Shiryu can make you explode into space with ease. And the fact that, physically, he’s stronger than Hyoga. 

Let’s be objective here. Shiryu is one of the very few Saints that are capable to unleash their full potential without wearing a Cloth. This is a huge advantage he has in battle because, if an enemy tries to strip his armor off, Shiryu can still fight. In fact, he not only can still fight, but he can fight with even more power on his side. He is more vulnerable, but without his Cloth Shiryu remains absolutely lethal and should not be underestimated. This, paired with his intelligence and fast thinking skills, makes an excellent fighter in almost any situation.

Let’s also not forget how he was able to learn Dohko’s technique, the Rozan Hyaku Ryū Ha, while being blind. He was showed that technique only once, and he couldn’t even witness it, but he was able to learn it and use it perfectly.

He has an incredible determination and this, alongside his cosmo and physical strength, helps him fight without giving up. Shiryu managed to defeat a Silver Saint that was basically impossible to defeat by enduring the psychological weight of blinding himself, more that the physical pain associated with such an act. Don’t forget this. He defeated a Silver Saint while being blind and in horrific pain. He did the same against Krishna. In this case, we’re talking about a Marina General. A warrior as strong as a Gold Saint. Shiryu not only managed to master Excalibur while fighting against him, but got rid of Krishna while enduring the pain of being blinded – again – by a technique that was definitely more painful than it looked.

And can we talk about Deathmask? Because Shiryu was powerful enough to make a Gold Cloth finally take the decision of yeeting away from Deathmask’s unworthy body. His anger terrified a Gold Saint, and he awakened his Seventh Sense so hard that he regained his vision. He was helped with that, yeah, but can we recognize how powerful Shiryu was during that particular scene? To me, that thing was more impressive than what he did against Shura. It was raw power fueled by anger, a power he could unleash without effort. A power he can survive, opposite to the Rozan Kō Ryū Ha.

Obviously, being able to just shoot yourself in space while bringing someone else with you is equally impressive, but Shiryu has enough raw power in him cosmo to destroy a Gold Saint without having to sacrifice himself. If this is not a proof of his power, I don’t know what would be.

The honorable mention of him being able to don the Libra Gold Cloth at a very early stage has to be said.

He has, however, a significant weakness. A weak point, really. Even though he’s able to fight in any condition, with and without his Cloth, Shiryu has an unfortunate weakness that can be lethal to him with little to no effort. Obviously, I’m talking about his literal weak point, the claw of the dragon. His heart. A simple blow there could kill him almost instantly. Just a punch, really, and he kicks the bucket. Unless, of course, he has the extreme luck of being punched there by someone who’s not his enemy and can bring him back to life with a similar hit. Which, for extremely obvious reasons, is not likely to happen during a real battle. His Cloth provides him enough protection to fight without worrying about it, but as we know Shiryu mostly fights while not wearing it. And, even if he’s careful in hiding his weak point, it’s not that difficult to hit him there at any point, all the enemy needs is a minor distraction.

 4. Cygnus Hyoga

Here we have a man that, canonically speaking, surpassed his own master. A Gold Saint, to be precise. Is a matter of fact that Hyoga is powerful, this is not something you can glide on. This man mastered the absolute zero by using a technique he never used before, while being presumably as weak as he could be and in agonizing pain, seeing the fight he just had.

Impressive, to say the least.

What makes me put Hyoga after Shiryu, besides what I already told you above, is the same weakness Camus always brings up when confronting him. The same weakness Isaac brought up when confronting him. Something that makes Hyoga reckless and way too emotional during a fight. Despite this being a positive trait, because caring about family and loved ones is not something negative, it’s still a problem that presented itself in Hyoga’s case. Being too emotional is dangerous, and we saw this danger in action when Hyoga ended up being frozen by Camus because he couldn’t fight with a lucid state of mind. Opposite to Shiryu, who used his emotions to actually be more efficient, Hyoga couldn’t control them and ultimately lost.

This particular thing, even if not directly linked to his cosmo or to his physical strength, is a variable that should not be ignored.

 Of course, Hyoga became more and more powerful, but we only got to see his true power when he finally left behind all his emotions. Well, the ones that were limiting him, at least. 

And this gave us the Saint that, with ease, reached the level of his master and then surpassed it.

Hyoga is able to use his cosmo with efficiency, and can withstand the psychological weight of having to fight his loved ones over and over. This, as awful as it sounds, is useful in battle and gave him an incredible victory over Isaac. And let’s not forget, he could wear the Aquarius Gold Cloth and endure its power. Much like Shiryu and Seiya, Hyoga had no problem wearing that and using it to fight. His cosmo was powerful enough for him to be comfortable with it.

He also had enough power to face a Judge without too many repercussions. Sure, he got beaten up, but how many Bronze Saints can say to have fought a Judge of the Underworld, have slowed him down, and have survived to tell the tale?

At the end of the day, Hyoga got rid of most of his weakness. He still cares about his loved ones, but it’s not as much of a hindrance as it was before. But, and this is important, he still fails sometimes because of it. The best example is him falling for Kaysa’s trick, despite Hyoga fully knowing Camus was dead. His loving personality can get in the way, and it’s something more dangerous than having a physical weak point, because the mind can be manipulated easily in this world. Just look at how difficult was for him, in one of the movies, when he had to confront the illusion of his mother. He succeeded, but still almost failed.

Hyoga is powerful, but had an easily influenceable mind.

  5. Pegasus Seiya

(Since I already answered for him, I’ll copy-paste the answer here, so I won’t force you to click on a link to a different post if you haven’t seen that post yet. Same image and everything)

Seiya is… not as powerful as his protagonist status wants us to believe. I’m not doubting his abilities, because he is a Saint after all and he is skilled, but he’s by far the weakest as far as cosmo and physical strength go.  Most of his exploits are made because of his “immense determination” and “good heart”. It’s almost never a believable (believable in Saint Seiya) reason that leads him to victory.  He’s not necessarily weak, because he’s not, but he’s the least powerful of all the main Bronze Saints. Obviously he’s better than the secondary ones, because plot and everything, but he’s not on the same level as his companions.  Most of his victories were attained because he had help, either from Athena or from his fellow Bronzes.  Like I said before, Seiya couldn’t face Saga on his own. He needed the help of four other Saints in order to be on his level. I will be fair, and say that he was able to endure a lot on his own, but what he by himself still wasn’t enough to win.  

He had his fair share of deserved victories, of course, but some of those were so heavily helped by other people’s intervention it doesn’t even feel like Seiya actually did something on his own.  I’m not counting in this the fights he won fair and square, like the one against Aldebaran (sure, he had his annoying moment of “let’s daydream”, but he did win by himself), or the one against Thor. Hell, I’m perfectly okay with him winning against Thanatos.  But there’s countless other moments in which he needed someone’s help or something to his advantage.  For example, the first fight against Shiryu: Seiya won because he was able to spot and hit Shiryu’s weak spot, but he was being devastated before that. Even after tricking Shiryu in shattering his own shield (brilliant move, Marin taught him well), Seiya didn’t have the upper hand.  Against Ikki, Seiya needed the help from all his companions to actually defeat him.  When he reached the stairs leading to the Pope’s chamber, Seiya got easily overwhelmed by Aphrodite’s roses, while Marin (who gave him her mask) didn’t suffer as much from that poison. Against Saga, Seiya was able to use his protagonist bullshit to win because “a Saint fight with his heart!”, but when being faced with the real fight he needed some help. I’m not saying Seiya didn’t have the potential to resist Saga’s technique, like Ikki did when facing Shaka, but it was used in such a way it didn’t look like something coming from his own strength. 

This happens way more in the series, from classic to Hades, and in the movies as well. Seiya is celebrated as this powerful Saint capable of defeating even the gods, but in reality he mostly relied on someone else’s help to achieve victory. 

Physically, it’s painfully obvious that he’s not strong. He is as strong as a normal Saint would be, but not more than the average warrior. He easily prevails only on opponents that are visibly weaker than him, like Cassios (who didn’t have the slightest trace of cosmo), and has a hard time against opponents that are on his level.  It also took a long time for him to understand how to fight Aiolia, but he only managed a couple good hits before being overwhelmed again. He has it even worse in the CGI movie, where Aiolia literally brushes off his attacks like they’re nothing. 

Some might argue that his cosmo his not that weak, because he’s able to wear not only a Gold Cloth, but a Divine Cloth as well. And I say to you: I’m not saying he’s that weak. What I’m saying is: Seiya has potential, but not as much as we’re led to believe.  Seiya heavily relies on the Gold Cloth when he wears it, instead of relying more on his own cosmo. He does the same with the Divine Cloth. 

Compared to his companions, Seiya is relatively weak. Where Hyoga managed to become more powerful than his own teacher (a Gold Saint) and learned both of his techniques, Seiya relied on the Cloth itself to help him with his cosmo. Where Shiryu is able to fight effortlessly without wearing his Cloth, Seiya seems to be unable to do anything if he’s not wearing it. Where Ikki seems to have mastered his cosmo, Seiya still doesn’t know how to fully use it.

He always needs protection, he needs Athena to use her cosmo for him or to reassure him, he always ends up being the only one last standing because other people put their lives on the line for him.  The Hades arc is what described him best: a kid that doesn’t know how to face people bigger than him. Even the fight against Valentine wasn’t his own victory, because Athena helped him from afar. It’s so easy to defeat him, like we saw when Rhadamanthys effortlessly got rid of Seiya. Which, in retrospect, completely erased what Seiya managed to do when fighting him for the first time. 

I’m aware I’m known for my… well, not hate but strong dislike for Seiya. I won’t blame you if you think I put him so low because I’m biased.  But this is my opinion for that, and I’m keeping it. 

Taylor Swift: ‘I was literally about to break’

By: Laura Snapes for The Guardian Date: August 24th 2019

Taylor Swift’s Nashville apartment is an Etsy fever dream, a 365-days-a-year Christmas shop, pure teenage girl id. You enter through a vestibule clad in blue velvet and covered in gilt frames bursting with fake flowers. The ceiling is painted like the night sky. Above a koi pond in the living area, a narrow staircase spirals six feet up towards a giant, pillow-lagged birdcage that probably has the best view in the city. Later, Swift will tell me she needs metaphors “to understand anything that happens to me”, and the birdcage defies you not to interpret it as a pointed comment on the contradictions of stardom.

Swift, wearing pale jeans and dip-dyed shirt, her sandy hair tied in a blue scrunchie, leads the way up the staircase to show me the view. The decor hasn’t changed since she bought this place in 2009, when she was 19. “All of these high rises are new since then,” she says, gesturing at the squat glass structures and cranes. Meanwhile her oven is still covered in stickers, more teenage diary than adult appliance.

Now 29, she has spent much of the past three years living quietly in London with her boyfriend, actor Joe Alwyn, making the penthouse a kind of time capsule, a monument to youthful naivety given an unlimited budget – the years when she sang about Romeo and Juliet and wore ballgowns to awards shows; before she moved to New York and honed her slick, self-mythologising pop.

It is mid-August. This is Swift’s first UK interview in more than three years, and she seems nervous: neither presidential nor goofy (her usual defaults), but quick with a tongue-out “ugh” of regret or frustration as she picks at her glittery purple nails. We climb down from the birdcage to sit by the pond, and when the conversation turns to 2016, the year the wheels came off for her, Swift stiffens as if driving over a mile of speed bumps. After a series of bruising public spats (with Katy Perry, Nicki Minaj) in 2015, there was a high-profile standoff with Kanye West. The news that she was in a relationship with actor Tom Hiddleston, which leaked soon after, was widely dismissed as a diversionary tactic. Meanwhile, Swift went to court to prosecute a sexual assault claim, and faced a furious backlash when she failed to endorse a candidate in the 2016 presidential election, allowing the alt-right to adopt her as their “Aryan princess”.

Her critics assumed she cared only about the bottom line. The reality, Swift says, is that she was totally broken. “Every domino fell,” she says bitterly. “It became really terrifying for anyone to even know where I was. And I felt completely incapable of doing or saying anything publicly, at all. Even about my music. I always said I wouldn’t talk about what was happening personally, because that was a personal time.” She won’t get into specifics. “I just need some things that are mine,” she despairs. “Just some things.”

A year later, in 2017, Swift released her album Reputation, half high-camp heel turn, drawing on hip-hop and vaudeville (the brilliantly hammy Look What You Made Me Do), half stunned appreciation that her nascent relationship with Alwyn had weathered the storm (the soft, sensual pop of songs Delicate and Dress).

Her new album, Lover, her seventh, was released yesterday. It’s much lighter than Reputation: Swift likens writing it to feeling like “I could take a full deep breath again”. Much of it is about Alwyn: the Galway Girl-ish track London Boy lists their favourite city haunts and her newfound appreciation of watching rugby in the pub with his uni mates; on the ruminative Afterglow, she asks him to forgive her anxious tendency to assume the worst.

While she has always written about relationships, they were either teenage fantasy or a postmortem on a high-profile breakup, with exes such as Jake Gyllenhaal and Harry Styles. But she and Alwyn have seldom been pictured together, and their relationship is the only other thing she won’t talk about. “I’ve learned that if I do, people think it’s up for discussion, and our relationship isn’t up for discussion,” she says, laughing after I attempt a stealthy angle. “If you and I were having a glass of wine right now, we’d be talking about it – but it’s just that it goes out into the world. That’s where the boundary is, and that’s where my life has become manageable. I really want to keep it feeling manageable.”

Instead, she has swapped personal disclosure for activism. Last August, Swift broke her political silence to endorse Democratic Tennessee candidate Phil Bredesen in the November 2018 senate race. Vote.org reported an unprecedented spike in voting registration after Swift’s Instagram post, while Donald Trump responded that he liked her music “about 25% less now”.

Meanwhile, her recent single You Need To Calm Down admonished homophobes and namechecked US LGBTQ rights organisation Glaad (which then saw increased donations). Swift filled her video with cameos from queer stars such as Ellen DeGeneres and Queen singer Adam Lambert, and capped it with a call to sign her petition in support of the Equality Act, which if passed would prohibit gender- and sexuality-based discrimination in the US. A video of Polish LGBTQ fans miming the track in defiance of their government’s homophobic agenda went viral. But Swift was accused of “queerbaiting” and bandwagon-jumping. You can see how she might find it hard to work out what, exactly, people want from her.

***

It was girlhood that made Swift a multimillionaire. When country music’s gatekeepers swore that housewives were the only women interested in the genre, she proved them wrong. Her self-titled debut marked the longest stay on the Billboard 200 by any album released in the decade. A potentially cloying image – corkscrew curls, lyrics thick on “daddy” and down-home values – were undercut by the fact she was evidently, endearingly, a bit of a freak, an unusual combination of intensity and artlessness. Also, she was really, really good at what she did, and not just for a teenager: her entirely self-written third album, 2010’s Speak Now, is unmatched in its devastatingly withering dismissals of awful men.

As a teenager, Swift was obsessed with VH1’s Behind The Music, the series devoted to the rise and fall of great musicians. She would forensically rewatch episodes, trying to pinpoint the moment a career went wrong. I ask her to imagine she’s watching the episode about herself and do the same thing: where was her misstep? “Oh my God,” she says, drawing a deep breath and letting her lips vibrate as she exhales. “I mean, that’s so depressing!” She thinks back and tries to deflect. “What I remember is that [the show] was always like, ‘Then we started fighting in the tour bus and then the drummer quit and the guitarist was like, “You’re not paying me enough.”’’’

But that’s not what she used to say. In interviews into her early 20s, Swift often observed that an artist fails when they lose their self-awareness, as if repeating the fact would work like an insurance against succumbing to the same fate. But did she make that mistake herself? She squeezes her nose and blows to clear a ringing in her ears before answering. “I definitely think that sometimes you don’t realise how you’re being perceived,” she says. “Pop music can feel like it’s The Hunger Games, and like we’re gladiators. And you can really lose focus of the fact that that’s how it feels because that’s how a lot of stan [fan] Twitter and tabloids and blogs make it seem – the overanalysing of everything makes it feel really intense.”

She describes the way she burned bridges in 2016 as a kind of obliviousness. “I didn’t realise it was like a classic overthrow of someone in power – where you didn’t realise the whispers behind your back, you didn’t realise the chain reaction of events that was going to make everything fall apart at the exact, perfect time for it to fall apart.”

Here’s that chain reaction in full. With her 2014 album 1989 (the year she was born), Swift transcended country stardom, becoming as ubiquitous as Beyoncé. For the first time she vocally embraced feminism, something she had rejected in her teens; but, after a while, it seemed to amount to not much more than a lot of pictures of her hanging out with her “squad”, a bevy of supermodels, musicians and Lena Dunham. The squad very much did not include her former friend Katy Perry, whom Swift targeted in her song Bad Blood, as part of what seemed like a painfully overblown dispute about some backing dancers. Then, when Nicki Minaj tweeted that MTV’s 2015 Video Music awards had rewarded white women at the expense of women of colour, multiple-nominee Swift took it personally, responding: “Maybe one of the men took your slot.” For someone prone to talking about the haters, she quickly became her own worst enemy.

Her old adversary Kanye West resurfaced in February 2016. In 2009, West had invaded Swift’s stage at the MTV VMAs to protest against her victory over Beyoncé in the female video of the year category. It remains the peak of interest in Swift on Google Trends, and the conflict between them has become such a cornerstone of celebrity journalism that it’s hard to remember it lay dormant for nearly seven years – until West released his song Famous. “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex,” he rapped. “Why? I made that bitch famous.” The video depicted a Swift mannequin naked in bed with men including Trump.

Swift loudly condemned both; although she had discussed the track with West, she said she had never agreed to the “bitch” lyric or the video. West’s wife, Kim Kardashian, released a heavily edited clip that showed Swift at least agreeing to the “sex” line on the phone with West, if not the “bitch” part. Swift pleaded the technicality, but it made no difference: when Kardashian went on Twitter to describe her as a snake, the comparison stuck and the singer found herself very publicly “cancelled” – the incident taken as “proof” of Swift’s insincerity. So she went away.

Swift says she stopped trying to explain herself, even though she “definitely” could have. As she worked on Reputation, she was also writing “a think-piece a day that I knew I would never publish: the stuff I would say, and the different facets of the situation that nobody knew”. If she could exonerate herself, why didn’t she? She leans forward. “Here’s why,” she says conspiratorially. “Because when people are in a hate frenzy and they find something to mutually hate together, it bonds them. And anything you say is in an echo chamber of mockery.”

She compares that year to being hit by a tidal wave. “You can either stand there and let the wave crash into you, and you can try as hard as you can to fight something that’s more powerful and bigger than you,” she says. “Or you can dive under the water, hold your breath, wait for it to pass and while you’re down there, try to learn something. Why was I in that part of the ocean? There were clearly signs that said: Rip tide! Undertow! Don’t swim! There are no lifeguards!” She’s on a roll. “Why was I there? Why was I trusting people I trusted? Why was I letting people into my life the way I was letting them in? What was I doing that caused this?”

After the incident with Minaj, her critics started pointing out a narrative of “white victimhood” in Swift’s career. Speaking slowly and carefully, she says she came to understand “a lot about how my privilege allowed me to not have to learn about white privilege. I didn’t know about it as a kid, and that is privilege itself, you know? And that’s something that I’m still trying to educate myself on every day. How can I see where people are coming from, and understand the pain that comes with the history of our world?”

She also accepts some responsibility for her overexposure, and for some of the tabloid drama. If she didn’t wish a friend happy birthday on Instagram, there would be reports about severed friendships, even if they had celebrated together. “Because we didn’t post about it, it didn’t happen – and I realised I had done that,” she says. “I created an expectation that everything in my life that happened, people would see.”

But she also says she couldn’t win. “I’m kinda used to being gaslit by now,” she drawls wearily. “And I think it happens to women so often that, as we get older and see how the world works, we’re able to see through what is gaslighting. So I’m able to look at 1989 and go – KITTIES!” She breaks off as an assistant walks in with Swift’s three beloved cats, stars of her Instagram feed, back from the vet before they fly to England this week. Benjamin, Olivia and Meredith haughtily circle our feet (they are scared of the koi) as Swift resumes her train of thought, back to the release of 1989 and the subsequent fallout. “Oh my God, they were mad at me for smiling a lot and quote-unquote acting fake. And then they were mad at me that I was upset and bitter and kicking back.” The rules kept changing.

***

Swift’s new album comes with printed excerpts from her diaries. On 29 August 2016, she wrote in her girlish, bubble writing: “This summer is the apocalypse.” As the incident with West and Kardashian unfolded, she was preparing for her court case against radio DJ David Mueller, who was fired in 2013 after Swift reported him for putting his hand up her dress at a meet-and–greet event. He sued her for defamation; she countersued for sexual assault.

“Having dealt with a few of them, narcissists basically subscribe to a belief system that they should be able to do and say whatever the hell they want, whenever the hell they want to,” Swift says now, talking at full pelt. “And if we – as anyone else in the world, but specifically women – react to that, well, we’re not allowed to. We’re not allowed to have a reaction to their actions.”

In summer 2016 she was in legal depositions, practising her testimony. “You’re supposed to be really polite to everyone,” she says. But by the time she got to court in August 2017, “something snapped, I think”. She laughs. Her testimony was sharp and uncompromising. She refused to allow Mueller’s lawyers to blame her or her security guards; when asked if she could see the incident, Swift said no, because “my ass is in the back of my body”. It was a brilliant, rude defence.

“You’re supposed to behave yourself in court and say ‘rear end’,” she says with mock politesse. “The other lawyer was saying, ‘When did he touch your backside?’ And I was like, ‘ASS! Call it what it is!’” She claps between each word. But despite the acclaim for her testimony and eventual victory (she asked for one symbolic dollar), she still felt belittled. It was two months prior to the beginning of the #MeToo movement. “Even this case was literally twisted so hard that people were calling it the ‘butt-grab case’. They were saying I sued him because there’s this narrative that I want to sue everyone. That was one of the reasons why the summer was the apocalypse.”

She never wanted the assault to be made public. Have there been other instances she has dealt with privately? “Actually, no,” she says soberly. “I’m really lucky that it hadn’t happened to me before. But that was one of the reasons it was so traumatising. I just didn’t know that could happen. It was really brazen, in front of seven people.” She has since had security cameras installed at every meet-and-greet she does, deliberately pointed at her lower half. “If something happens again, we can prove it with video footage from every angle,” she says.

The allegations about Harvey Weinstein came out soon after she won her case. The film producer had asked her to write a song for the romantic comedy One Chance, which earned her second Golden Globe nomination. Weinstein also got her a supporting role in the 2014 sci-fi movie The Giver, and attended the launch party for 1989. But she says they were never alone together.

“He’d call my management and be like, ‘Does she have a song for this film?’ And I’d be like, ‘Here it is,’” she says dispassionately. “And then I’d be at the Golden Globes. I absolutely never hung out. And I would get a vibe – I would never vouch for him. I believe women who come forward, I believe victims who come forward, I believe men who come forward.” Swift inhales, flustered. She says Weinstein never propositioned her. “If you listen to the stories, he picked people who were vulnerable, in his opinion. It seemed like it was a power thing. So, to me, that doesn’t say anything – that I wasn’t in that situation.”

Meanwhile, Donald Trump was more than nine months into his presidency, and still Swift had not taken a position. But the idea that a pop star could ever have impeded his path to the White House seemed increasingly naive. In hindsight, the demand that Swift speak up looks less about politics and more about her identity (white, rich, powerful) and a moralistic need for her to redeem herself – as if nobody else had ever acted on a vindictive instinct, or blundered publicly.

But she resisted what might have been an easy return to public favour. Although Reputation contained softer love songs, it was better known for its brittle, vengeful side (see This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things). She describes that side of the album now as a “bit of a persona”, and its hip-hop-influenced production as “a complete defence mechanism”. Personally, I thought she had never been more relatable, trashing the contract of pious relatability that traps young women in the public eye.

***

It was the assault trial, and watching the rights of LGBTQ friends be eroded, that finally politicised her, Swift says. “The things that happen to you in your life are what develop your political opinions. I was living in this Obama eight-year paradise of, you go, you cast your vote, the person you vote for wins, everyone’s happy!” she says. “This whole thing, the last three, four years, it completely blindsided a lot of us, me included.”

She recently said she was “dismayed” when a friend pointed out that her position on gay rights wasn’t obvious (what if she had a gay son, he asked), hence this summer’s course correction with the single You Need To Calm Down (“You’re comin’ at my friends like a missile/Why are you mad?/When you could be GLAAD?”). Didn’t she feel equally dismayed that her politics weren’t clear? “I did,” she insists, “and I hate to admit this, but I felt that I wasn’t educated enough on it. Because I hadn’t actively tried to learn about politics in a way that I felt was necessary for me, making statements that go out to hundreds of millions of people.”

She explains her inner conflict. “I come from country music. The number one thing they absolutely drill into you as a country artist, and you can ask any other country artist this, is ‘Don’t be like the Dixie Chicks!’” In 2003, the Texan country trio denounced the Iraq war, saying they were “ashamed” to share a home state with George W Bush. There was a boycott, and an event where a bulldozer crushed their CDs. “I watched country music snuff that candle out. The most amazing group we had, just because they talked about politics. And they were getting death threats. They were made such an example that basically every country artist that came after that, every label tells you, ‘Just do not get involved, no matter what.’

“And then, you know, if there was a time for me to get involved…” Swift pauses. “The worst part of the timing of what happened in 2016 was I felt completely voiceless. I just felt like, oh God, who would want me? Honestly.” She would otherwise have endorsed Hillary Clinton? “Of course,” she says sincerely. “I just felt completely, ugh, just useless. And maybe even like a hindrance.”

I suggest that, thinking selfishly, her coming out for Clinton might have made people like her. “I wasn’t thinking like that,” she stresses. “I was just trying to protect my mental health – not read the news very much, go cast my vote, tell people to vote. I just knew what I could handle and I knew what I couldn’t. I was literally about to break. For a while.” Did she seek therapy? “That stuff I just really wanna keep personal, if that’s OK,” she says.

She resists blaming anyone else for her political silence. Her emergence as a Democrat came after she left Big Machine, the label she signed to at 15. (They are now at loggerheads after label head Scott Borchetta sold the company, and the rights to Swift’s first six albums, to Kanye West’s manager, Scooter Braun.) Had Borchetta ever advised her against speaking out? She exhales. “It was just me and my life, and also doing a lot of self-reflection about how I did feel really remorseful for not saying anything. I wanted to try and help in any way that I could, the next time I got a chance. I didn’t help, I didn’t feel capable of it – and as soon as I can, I’m going to.”

Swift was once known for throwing extravagant 4 July parties at her Rhode Island mansion. The Instagram posts from these star-studded events – at which guests wore matching stars-and-stripes bikinis and onesies – probably supported a significant chunk of the celebrity news industry GDP. But in 2017, they stopped. “The horror!” wrote Cosmopolitan, citing “reasons that remain a mystery” for their disappearance. It wasn’t “squad” strife or the unavailability of matching cozzies that brought the parties to an end, but Swift’s disillusionment with her country, she says.

There is a smart song about this on the new album – the track that should have been the first single, instead of the cartoonish ME!. Miss Americana And The Heartbreak Prince is a forlorn, gothic ballad in the vein of Lana Del Rey that uses high-school imagery to dismantle American nationalism: “The whole school is rolling fake dice/You play stupid games/You win stupid prizes,” she sings with disdain. “Boys will be boys then/Where are the wise men?”

As an ambitious 11-year-old, she worked out that singing the national anthem at sports games was the quickest way to get in front of a large audience. When did she start feeling conflicted about what America stands for? She gives another emphatic ugh. “It was the fact that all the dirtiest tricks in the book were used and it worked,” she says. “The thing I can’t get over right now is gaslighting the American public into being like” – she adopts a sanctimonious tone – “‘If you hate the president, you hate America.’ We’re a democracy – at least, we’re supposed to be – where you’re allowed to disagree, dissent, debate.” She doesn’t use Trump’s name. “I really think that he thinks this is an autocracy.”

As we speak, Tennessee lawmakers are trying to impose a near-total ban on abortion. Swift has staunchly defended her “Tennessee values” in recent months. What’s her position? “I mean, obviously, I’m pro-choice, and I just can’t believe this is happening,” she says. She looks close to tears. “I can’t believe we’re here. It’s really shocking and awful. And I just wanna do everything I can for 2020. I wanna figure out exactly how I can help, what are the most effective ways to help. ’Cause this is just…” She sighs again. “This is not it.”

***

It is easy to forget that the point of all this is that a teenage Taylor Swiftwanted to write love songs. Nemeses and negativity are now so entrenched in her public persona that it’s hard to know how she can get back to that, though she seems to want to. At the end of Daylight, the new album’s dreamy final song, there’s a spoken-word section: “I want to be defined by the things that I love,” she says as the music fades. “Not the things that I hate, not the things I’m afraid of, the things that haunt me in the middle of the night.” As well as the songs written for Alwyn, there is one for her mother, who recently experienced a cancer relapse: “You make the best of a bad deal/I just pretend it isn’t real,” Swift sings, backed by the Dixie Chicks.

How does writing about her personal life work if she’s setting clearer boundaries? “It actually made me feel more free,” she says. “I’ve always had this habit of never really going into detail about exactly what situation inspired what thing, but even more so now.” This is only half true: in the past, Swift wasn’t shy of a level of detail that invited fans to figure out specific truths about her relationships. And when I tell her that Lover feels a more emotionally guarded album, she bristles. “I know the difference between making art and living your life like a reality star,” she says. “And then even if it’s hard for other people to grasp, my definition is really clear.”

Even so, Swift begins Lover by addressing an adversary, opening with a song called I Forgot That You Existed (“it isn’t love, it isn’t hate, it’s just indifference”), presumably aimed at Kanye West, a track that slightly defeats its premise by existing. But it sweeps aside old dramas to confront Swift’s real nemesis, herself. “I never grew up/It’s getting so old,” she laments on The Archer.

She has had to learn not to pre-empt disaster, nor to run from it. Her life has been defined by relationships, friendships and business relationships that started and ended very publicly (though she and Perry are friends again). At the same time, the rules around celebrity engagement have evolved beyond recognition in her 15 years of fame. Rather than trying to adapt to them, she’s now asking herself: “How do you learn to maintain? How do you learn not to have these phantom disasters in your head that you play out, and how do you stop yourself from sabotage – because the panic mechanism in your brain is telling you that something must go wrong.” For her, this is what growing up is. “You can’t just make cut-and-dry decisions in life. A lot of things are a negotiation and a grey area and a dance of how to figure it out.”

And so this time, Swift is sticking around. In December she will turn 30, marking the point after which more than half her life will have been lived in public. She’ll start her new decade with a stronger self-preservationist streak, and a looser grip (as well as a cameo in Cats). “You can’t micromanage life, it turns out,” she says, drily.

When Swift finally answered my question about the moment she would choose in the VH1 Behind The Music episode about herself, the one where her career turned, she said she hoped it wouldn’t focus on her “apocalypse” summer of 2016. “Maybe this is wishful thinking,” she said, “but I’d like to think it would be in a couple of years.” It’s funny to hear her hope that the worst is still to come while sitting in her fairytale living room, the cats pacing: a pragmatist at odds with her romantic monument to teenage dreams. But it sounds something like perspective.

Because she deserved it, aka alternative version of episode 112

Rate: T, there are some sugestive sentence, but I think It isn’t something more mature that we get in manga but still here is the warning.

...................................................................................

"Do you know why we chose you?" Shikamaru asked.

“Because I have the skills necessary for Chunin: leadership skills, good judgment of the situation and the ability to make decisions. Is that correct?” Shikadai replied looking at his father.

"That's not the full answer," sighed Nara.

"Because you think I'm ready to take responsibility, for the lives of the people I will lead," Sarada added, looking ahead.

“You have a trait necessary for chunin. You care about your teammates” finished the Hokage adviser looking at both genin standing in front of him.

"Do you accept promotion?" Naruto asked, picking up chunin vests.

They both stood in silence for a while.

"Hai!" Shikadai finally replied, while the young Uchiha was still looking at Hokage clearly thoughtful.

Some time passed before she finally answered yes.

...................................... They both left the Hokage office silently looking at the vest-symbol of their promotion.

"I think I should congratulate you," Shikadai finally broke the silence.

"Thanks," she said, folding her clothes and putting them in her bag. "Same for you, you really deserved it."

The two of them make fist bump started their own way.

Black-haired girl didn't take long to get home.

"Tadaima," she said, taking off her shoes. Moments later her mother came to greet her.

"How is meeting in Hokage office?" She asked with a smile indicating that she already knew the answer.

Sarada sighed and took her vest out of the bag.

"Congratulations!" Replied the pink-haired girl hugging her tightly, to which the young Uchiha replied with a smile. Then she noticed that her father was also standing in the corridor. Sasuke looked at her clearly thoughtful. It made her uncertain.

"Aren't you happy?" She asked with a bit of bitterness. "You were in the seventh office today, so you know, and despite it...

"I'm not angry," he replied. "More worried ..."

She couldn’t help to release of the short "Tch".

“You're growing up, and I've missed enough already. In addition, the duties of chunin are a great responsibility. I'm worried, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm proud of you.”

Sarada felt she was blushing. The fact that her mother was watching the scene with a radiant smile definitely didn't help. Her dad came over and patted her head.

“I really would like to say ‘that’s my girl’, but in this case you definitely follow in the footsteps of Sakura.”

"Hn?" She asked surprised.

"Well, because you see honey, your dad is still a genin," the green-eyed sigh.

"Nani?" Sarada was in complete shock now.

“What means that you were promoted to his superior”added Mrs. Uchiha unable to stop the giggle.

"Tch" Sasuke replied returning to the living room.

Black-haired girl couldn't stop giggling seeing dad's reaction.

"Now try on your vest!" The pink-haired woman said, clapping her hands.

Slightly embarrassed, young Uchiha put on her chunin outfit. Her mother couldn't help her tears.

"Well and where did I put the camera," she sighed, wiping her eyes. Moments later, father and daughter were alone in the living room. 

“Hn. You look just like Sakura.“ said the elder Uchiha.

"Do you think so?" She asked surprised, looking at the large mirror hanging on the wall.

"Actually, where is mum's vest I have never seen her in it."

"Huh finding her would be challenge" the pink-haired said. Her parents exchanged a look.

-Aa.

Sarada shrugged. Sometimes it was difficult to understand her parents.

.................................................. It was a little past midnight when both of them were in bed. Sarada went to sleep an hour earlier.  Sakura was sitting next to him reading a medical scroll. Sasuke lay on his back relaxed after the first real bath in weeks. However, he still couldn't get over his anxiety.

"Light bothers you?" The pink-haired woman asked, tearing herself away from reading.

"No," he replied, "but you should go to bed, tomorrow we get up earlier."

"Yeah, I think you're right," she sighed, looking at her watch and finishing the last sentence. She rolled up the scroll and, putting it on the bedside table, she turned off the lamp. Moments later she lay on her side facing him. Despite the darkness, he could clearly see her face. She looked thoughtful.

"What happened?" She finally asked, reaching out to him.

"Nothing," he said, looking into her eyes.

"I can see ..." she sighed, putting her hand on his cheek.

He hesitated for a moment. It was hard to describe what he feels.

"I ... When ... When I was at Sarada’s age..." he began. He felt his wife gently stroke his face with her thumb.

"That... Sarada has no reason to ..." she continued, brushing strands of hair off his face.

“I know. Just sometimes ... Sometimes Sarada reminds me of me and I'm worried. Sometimes she reminds me of Itachi and it scares me ...

Sakura said nothing.

“I'm afraid that someone will try to use her like the village used him, or that because of my past she ...”

“Times have changed, Naruto would not let ...”

“I know, but regardless of that there is still a part of me that is still terrified that I will lose you. That I won't be able to save my family again.”

She pulled him closer, embracing him in the waist, making calming circles on his back. She heard it from him many times before. After all these years, the trauma he gets during his childhood was still alive in him. And she could do nothing to take this suffering from him.

"Do you need something to calm down?" She asked quietly.

“No. Just some time ...” he replied embracing her and cuddling between her neck and shoulder.

"I'm worried too ..." she began to talk gently massaging the skin of his head with the other hand. "When you're out on the mission. During this action with Shin I was terrified that something would happen to Sarada When she went on her first mission, I didn't sleep two nights. But ... I know you will always come back to me. After all, you and Naruto are the best shinobi in history ... I know you will come back to me, no matter how long it takes ...

"Sakura," he interrupted, kissing her temple.

"I mean, we're also strong enough to defend ourselves," she finished, closing her eyes, "And Sarada ... She develops every day, has the potential to surpass both of us..."

“Hn. I know, ” he replied, calming down. He looked at his wife, already sleepy “Good night ...”

He got a semi-conscious gibberish in response. He couldn't help smiling. Moments later he fell asleep calm about the future.

................................................ Sarada was sitting in the kitchen looking at bowl of rice and egg. At night it was difficult for her to fall asleep, so when the watch at her bed showed 6, she decided to get up. She slept maybe a total of 3 hours all night? Irritated by this fact, she decided to do something productive. She started making breakfast for the whole family, but she realized that she really had no appetite. However, she could not go hungry on the mission, so she tried to eat rice at least.

"Oh, Sarada, are you up already?", She heard her mother's voice. The pink-haired was wearing short pyjama pants and her father's old T-shirt, her hair was wrapped in a towel. If black-haired thoughts were not busy with something else, she would probably pay attention to her unusual outfit.

"Breakfast looks delicious, but you didn't have to get up so early ..." continued her mother.

"Hn," the black-haired girl replied without taking her eyes from her food. For a while the kitchen was completely silent, broken only by the sounds of applied food.

“Mom ...” young Uchiha began uncertainly. Sakura looked at her daughter.

"Something happened?" She asked worriedly.

Sarada didn't answer for a moment, but finally sighed and spoke.

“I'm afraid ... I am afraid what will happen when the missions fail ... Because, finally such a mission will come ...” she felt stupid, she was telling the obvious. However, the fact that the can mission collapse because of her  and the consequences associated with it did not give her peace... “Human life will depend on my decisions...”

She felt a touch on her head. Her mother sat down opposite her and gently patted her.

"Being a chunin is a huge responsibility," the pink-haired woman began, grasping her hand in both hands. "But you must remember that a leader can't do anything without a team. When making decisions, you must care for the good of your comrades, but also take into account their opinion. Even if you command mission, it does not mean that you are alone, neither in the joy of the success, nor in the responsibility for the defeat ... you can’t prepare for it, and guilt can sometimes lead you to the edge of madness, but even in this you must remember that you are not alone. You have me, papa, friends and sometimes when we are not able to do anything we have to rely on others ...

"But doesn't that mean you're weak?" Black-eye asked, squeezing her mother's hand.

“Some say so ... However, relying only on yourself easily lead to tragedy. Also, there will come a time when someone will need you in the same way and the real strength is then being with them” she finished smiling.

Although it was difficult for her to completely understand the meaning of the pink-haired words, Sarada felt better.

“Sakura have you seen my ...- at that moment her dad came into the kitchen. The head of the Uchiha clan was clothed only in trousers, his hair was wet and he clearly did not expect to see his daughter here. The younger, also surprised by this turn of events, looked at Dad at her mother and finally reached one conclusion.

"Kami ... You were in the shower ... At the same time!" She exclaimed finally.

Her mother face became pinker than her hair, while Sasuke looked like his operating system had crashed. He had never been in such an embarrassing situation in his life.

"That’s dirty" finished the youngest evacuating from the kitchen with her food.

..............................................

She was first at their team's place of meeting. It took some time for another person to appear. To her surprise, it was Boruto, who only nodded at her and took his usual place. Moments later, Mitsuki appeared, who greeted them with his specific smile. But instead of taking a seat next to his "sun", Orochomaru's son turned to her.

“Congrats on promotion to chunin.”

Hearing the words of a friend, Boruto jumped off the sculpture.

"I thought Shikadai was promoted ..." He replied looking at her with strange expression.

"Two people have been promoted this year," she replied.

“Oh.” that was Uzumaki's only answer. There was silence again, uninterrupted, until Master Konohamaru arrived. He also congratulated her on her promotion, and then presented them a mission plan. It was a simple escort, but the factory producing canvases that they were supposed to protect was almost on the border with the land of the wind. In addition, there was no railways which lead to it, so there was a long way to go. As they traversed the forests surrounding the village there was a strange silence for their group. It took a moment for her to realize that this was due to the fact that normally Boruto started all conversations or provoked quarrels. Now the boy was travelled without speaking. In general, his behavior was strange, as if he avoided her. Despite this, she could feel his eyes on her back all the time, but he looked elsewhere as soon as she turned away to look at him. Finally, upset by the whole situation, she decided to stop. Because of which the blond bumped into her almost knocking them to the ground.

"Oi! Sarada, what are you doing!" He asked, jumping away from her.

"What's wrong with you?" The black-haired girl sighed.

“With me? You stop suddenly for no reason!”

“I'm not talking about it! You act like you have a constipation . What are you mad at me for !?”

Konohamaru-sensei also stopped to separate the arguing companions. But Mitsuki got in his way.

"If they don't calm down we won't gonna make it," the snake boy sighed, secretly curiously watching his friends arguing.

"Maybe you are right," said jounin.

The blond for a moment looked at Uchiha defiantly, then sighed a moment later.

"I'm not mad at you," he muttered, looking sideways.

"So what's the matter?" she asked, approaching him. The boy was silent for a moment with his lips lined up in a narrow line.

"You always have to be better?" He finally said. Sarada looked at him in shock. Is it possible he was just jealous. He didn't even want to take part in the exam at first. Sharanoo!

“I mean ... Uh ..” continued blue-eyed. The owner of the Sharingan sighed and gently poked him with her arm. The boy blinked in surprise and looked at her.

"The next exam is in half a year, if you don't come up with some stupid idea and you won’t cheat again you will pass" she said, looking into his eyes.

"Where is this certainty came from?" He asked, all the time keeping eye contact.

“Isn’t  it  obvious? “ Uchiha replied smiling. “ I know what my rival is capable of.”

Seeing her smile young Uzumaki felt strange heat in the chest, and her words only intensified this effect. Suddenly he realized how close they were at this moment and he felt slight dizziness. However, he couldn't take his eyes off his friend.

"Umm ... rivalry ?" Mitsuki broke the silence. "That's not how I would describe your relationship. Chõ-Chõ says you have a typical Love-Hate Tsundere relationship. I still think you would be a great copule ...”

The faces of both of them turned red.

"No way!", They answered practically simultaneously. Blond awakened from a trance decided to explain to the snake-like colleague that he is wrong. Fortunately, there were no fight and their journey continued. This time Sarada was at the back of the group. She didn't know why, but after Mitsuki's words, she felt nervous and at the same time excited? It was really strange, considering that she was afraid to think about what conclusions her friend and teammate could reach about her and Boruto.

 When she was thinking about the said blond, he approached her.

“Hey” he started ”I'm sorry for the earlier ...”

“Hn? You don't have to ” she said, walking beside him.

“I have act like an idiot... In fact ... I'm proud of you, you deserve a promotion ...”

"... Thank you ..." She replied looking away. That strange feeling in her stomach is back.

“Oi Sarada! I'm serious” the boy shouted, grinning.

"I know," she replied, smiling back.

“Yep I definitely ship it ...” Mitsuki muttered quietly.

....................................................................................

Ahhhh it takes me so long to write it! But I was very unsatisfatied how they treated Sarada during this episode I did make a whole post about itXD. But still I think that making her chunin would give development opportunities for many characters besides her. For example, I would like to see the reactions of Boruto or Sasuke. I hope you like my way of presenting what could happen If they promoted her too.

(via Lucy Liu’s Joan Watson Was Elementary’s Humanistic Heart)

Beautifully written ode to Joan.

2:38 P.M.Lucy Liu’s Joan Watson Was Elementary’s Humanistic HeartBy

Angelica Jade Bastién

Photo: CBS

Recently, the BBC Archive shared on Twitter a 1977 clip of a middle-aged woman who was stopped on the street by The Viewer’s View to talk about her thoughts on television. In her tomato-red raincoat and delicately wrapped scarf, she cogently and movingly extolls the wonder of television. At different points she describes the medium as a “phenomenon” and a communal ritual for her family, which reminded me of the gentle awe television instilled in me when I was a child watching The X-Files and Star Trek: The Next Generation as my mom braided my hair, or obsessively taping Buffy the Vampire Slayer on my own. “It felt like we were escaping from that kitchen sink,” she notes about the transporting nature of television, its potential to be not just a mirror, but also a window — an escape. Watching this brought to mind how much can be said about the pleasures of televisual comfort food, those shows we slip into like a warm bath, letting them entertain us with their familiar rhythms and archetypes.

Elementary, the CBS procedural that ended its seven-season run last night, was a delectable example of the potency and wonder of televisual comfort food, wrapping within the folds of its procedural a tender argument that the families we craft ourselves are as important as the ones we’re born into. What elevated the series from the glut of procedurals on television (and its own uneven final season) was its adept performances, particularly Lucy Liu as Joan Watson, who created a layered study in empathy that suggests second acts are possible in life.

Trying to capture what makes a good performance is like trying to hold smoke in your hand, but when I spoke to Liu earlier this summer, she said something that captured the essence of it: “I do think listening is very key to directing, and I don’t think we all do it as well as we should.” This holds true for acting as well, and Liu proved over Elementary’s seven seasons to be an active, empathetic listener. But even the greatness of Liu’s performance couldn’t distract from how the final season failed her character, ending on a sour note that stains her legacy.

When we first met Joan Watson, she was a woman whose life had been undone by trauma. After a patient died on her operating table, Joan gave up her life as a surgeon, flinging herself into a new profession as a sober companion hired by Morland Holmes (later played by the inimitable John Noble) to help usher his son, the brilliant and difficult yet strangely beguiling Sherlock (an excellent Jonny Lee Miller), into the rigors of recovery for his drug addiction. When Sherlock saw the spark of ingenuity and potential in Joan, he aided her in taking on a new calling as a detective.  What followed was a tender story not just of a nascent friendship, but what it means to rebuild oneself.

It became evident early on that Elementary was at its best when it used its procedural format to carefully nudge at ideas of family, both those we’re born into and those we make ourselves. For Joan, family is a knotted reality: We’ve seen her struggle with her mother’s Alzheimer’s, the memory of the father who ran out on her family and later wrestled with schizophrenia and homelessness, and the half-sister she only met recently as an adult. These rigors carefully revealed what justice and order means for her character, but Joan isn’t a harsh, brooding detective; she’s lightning-bright and boldly empathetic, listening with full-bodied attention.

As an archetype, detectives are a useful window into the moral dimensions of the society they are born into. They’re cinematic moral compasses tracking the interior and external reverberations of the choices we make and the often illusory nature of true justice. What does it say, then, that the most iconic examples of this archetype have been primarily white people? Perhaps this is one reason I’ve found myself pulled toward Joan, whose existence as an Asian-American woman shapes her understanding of the world and the justice she seeks. Perhaps the most striking development in this regard occurred in the show’s fifth season, when Joan approached a former patient fresh from prison, Shinwell Johnson (the late Nelsan Ellis), for information, but soon took him under her wing to teach him the detective skills she learned under Sherlock’s tutelage, which helped his own work as an informant. She and Sherlock increasingly disagreed on the situation until he was proved somewhat right about Shinwell’s moral character, but Joan’s decision to mentor Shinwell spoke to her empathetic ability to see the potential of someone whom the justice system may have failed.

When I spoke to Liu, she said it’s the episodes that peel back the layers of who these characters are that she cherishes most. “We do a lot of procedurals, obviously, and a lot of mysteries that need to be solved, but those episodes [like her first directorial effort in the show’s second season, “Paint It Black”] really stand out, and I love seeing those relationships. They are what creates the person that is presented and has so many layers,” she noted.

Joan is also one of modern television’s greatest examples of the characterization and storytelling that comes with great costuming. For Joan, fashion isn’t just a form of expression; it’s identity. One of the greatest pleasures of Elementary was in tracking the breadth of Joan’s arc through Rebecca Hofherr’s costuming. In the beginning, Joan wore casual clothing with loose silhouettes, but by season four her wardrobe had subtly shifted into impeccably tailored suits, echoing the evolution of her career as a detective. “The suit idea was not to sort of become more ‘masculine’ and have that kind of energy,” Liu told me. “It was more that she now conducted herself in a more professional manner as a detective, and so she then wanted to have more of a uniform.”

Yet some of the most indelible moments in the character’s history saw her in more feminine wear, like in season three’s “The One That Got Away,” in which Joan wears an elegant burnished copper and obsidian dress with a fur-trimmed coat to confront suspected murder and violent abuser Del Gruner (Stuart Townsend). When he viciously grabs her arm to level a threat, her posture strengthens and she looks him in the eye with an icy glare. “Get your hand off me or we’ll find out how well you do against a woman who can actually fight back,” she says, never breaking her gaze.

Joan’s clothing often acted as a window into how she saw herself. Her refined, immaculately tailored suits from the last few seasons spoke to her professionalism and comfort in her role as a consulting detective. Moments like her confrontation with Del allowed her contradictions to rise to the surface, contrasting the feminine quality of her dress with the steely aggression that allowed her to confront a man suspected of torture and murder.

But in the final season, Joan often felt like a splintered character lacking a secure through line, being pulled in various directions by the plot. This was evident in her clothing, which moved away from beautiful but not ostentatious suits to brighter clothing, busy with clashing patterns, ruffles, and an overall looser silhouette. The clothing was still gorgeous, but it didn’t track with the woman we came to know over the preceding seasons, and Joan wasn’t given enough to do in the final season to justify such a shift in wardrobe. This is a symptom of a larger problem: The series’s seventh season just didn’t work.

Elementary being cut down from 21 episodes to 13 put a strain on it, resulting in a final season that felt rushed and half-formed. That extended to Joan, who didn’t have much to do beyond support Sherlock until the finale, in which she became a vehicle for a maudlin twist that undercut the vibrancy of the character by making her a source for Sherlock’s pain (and a way out of the bind the writers found themselves in with trying to get him to stay in New York).

In the last few minutes of the Elementary finale it’s revealed that Joan has cancer. This leads to moving performances by Liu and Miller, who grant heft to this twist, but their tender chemistry isn’t enough to distract from the sense that Joan has been pulled in an unexpected direction that we aren’t given enough time to sit with, to fully feel the emotional weight of it. It’s a poorly sketched turn that misuses a star character who didn’t get many moments to shine in the final season.

I prefer to remember Joan as she was before the seventh season squandered her. I’ll remember the empathetic way she interviewed those mired in grief as a detective, how she carefully navigated the emotional strife of her familial dilemmas, and the gentle chemistry she shared with Sherlock, which demonstrated how a deep friendship can stir us as human beings. I’ll remember watching Elementary with my mother, feeling inspired by how Joan faced her future with a gimlet-eyed exuberance that made me believe that second chances in life are possible. I’ll remember all the times Joan chose empathy over being jaded, in a world where that choice remains preciously rare.

My favourite Charmed episodes - season 7

This is the seventh part of my Favourite Charmed Episodes meta series all posts in the series will be tagged as #favecharmedeps.

Season 7 is a strange one for me to analyse, because I have very mixed feelings about it. Generally I think of it as a rather forgettable season, but then when I started trawling through the episodes to pick out my favourites, I realised there’s a lot of episodes that I really enjoy from this season. Although the Avatar storyline didn’t reach it’s full potential, I actually think it’s one of the most interesting plots from the series. It posed a lot of questions about the key themes of the show regarding morality and good versus evil, and it also created a lot of conflict for the main characters. Part of me clings to the golden days of Charmed when times were simpler for the Halliwells and the family felt like a more cohesive unit. But I can’t deny that the Avatar storyline brought about very interesting character development and conflict amongst the characters. In addition to the Avatars, Zankou is objectively one of the most interesting and baddest villains to ever be on the show and for the first time since The Source, it felt like the sisters really were going to lose the battle. This also has one of my favourite minor characters from the entire show - Drake. I can’t help but enjoy the episodes that feature Drake. He’s a breath of fresh air in what’s overall a rather dark season, and his chemistry with Phoebe is great. The moments when she’s with Drake are the moments when I feel we catch a glimpse of the old Phoebe that followed her heart wherever it led her and was a free spirit. Strangely, I think that season 7 is the better season between the two weakest ones of the series. I have chosen 7 favourite episodes from season 7 (which is the most I’ve chosen from any season tied with season 3!): Cheaper by the Coven, There’s Something About Leo, Charmageddon, Carpe Demon, The Seven Year Witch, Imaginary Fiends and Something Wicca This Way Goes. 

Cheaper by the Coven (7x03)

For those of you that have been following this meta series, you’ll already know that I generally love any episode with Penny and/or Patty, and this episode is no exception. I enjoy this episode because not only do we get Penny and Patty, we also get Victor. One of the main aspects I love about Charmed is the emphasis on family and the core of that is the sisterhood, but there’s something special about any episode which features other family members. 

The sibling rivalry between Wyatt and Chris was authentic and very realistic of sibling relationships. We know from future!Chris that their relationship was strained, so it’s no surprise to see that developing now. When Grams casts the spell to remove their rivalry and it transfers to the sisters, it shows that you cannot erase complex emotional issues with the wave of a wand. 

Seeing the sisters revert back to a child-like state is comedic, albeit a little cringey, but I always get a kick out of seeing it. As the seasons progress I feel we see less and less of the playfulness and closeness between the sisters, so it’s nice to see it in this episode. Likewise, it’s touching to see Victor and Patty come together as a co-parenting unit for perhaps the first time ever to help their daughters. It was also sweet for them to see the girls in a child-like state since they both missed out on a majority of their childhood and likely never got the chance to see them interact as children. 

The sub-plot with Leo and Wyatt is also a necessary exploration of the aftermath of Leo killing Gideon. Although I’m generally not a fan of Wyatt’s character and the way he’s written, it makes sense that the trauma and emotion of being kidnapped and nearly killed by someone who was a trusted family friend and mentor, then witnessing his own father murder that man, would manifest itself in a complicated manner. After all, the sisters always say their powers are linked to their emotions. Although this issue was quickly resolved in this episode, I still think the fact that the episode tackled this was really important. 

Overall, I enjoy this episode because it’s fun and it brings together the Halliwell family (there’s even a discussion about Prue between Grams and Piper) in a nice way. 

There’s Something About Leo (7x09)

This episode has a very gripping plot that I find suspenseful and engaging. There’s a lot of conflict throughout since Leo is an Avatar and wants to tell Piper, whilst Kyle wants revenge against the Avatars because he believes they killed his parents. 

Generally, although Leo is a main character from season 1, he doesn’t get much attention or many of his own story lines until season 6. I personally find the Avatar story line one of the strongest ones involving Leo and this episode is a culmination of that. In the past Leo chose his duties as an Elder above the love and duty towards his family, and once again we see him in a similar position with the Avatars. He doesn’t want to lie to Piper and keep secrets from her, but the Avatars insist Piper (and the sisters) aren’t ready to know the truth. It’s interesting to see Leo having little control over his new powers and using them based on emotion. After having been split from Piper for a while it poses a real challenge to their relationship for them to have secrets between them, particularly when Piper sense that he’s hiding something from her. It provides good development for them as a couple to see them having to overcome something like this as a couple. When Leo tells Piper the truth, it’s interesting to see how she’s able to remain open-minded and trust that the Avatars aren’t in fact evil. It demonstrates the strength of their partnership and the love they have. 

On the other hand, the reveal about Leo being an Avatar wreaks havoc on the family because of Kyle and Paige finds herself in an incredibly difficult position, caught between the man she loves and her family. It’s one of the first time that the family is divided in this manner and although it’s sad, it’s interesting to witness. The Halliwell family as a unit seem so solid and together, but this episode shows that despite their closeness and how much they love each other, they’re not immune from facing these kind of problems. 

When the truth leads to Leo and Kyle’s deaths, it’s a dramatic and shocking moment that proves what the Avatars said to Leo about it being too soon for him to reveal the truth. Piper may have been ready but Kyle (and Paige) weren’t ready and the consequences of that were disastrous. The episode ends with Leo revering time to before he told Piper the truth about him being an Avatar and everything that happened in the episode is undone. 

Since Charmed is generally follows a demon-of-the-week format, I appreciate episodes like these that are very plot heavy and are the piece of a puzzle for an ongoing plot. The Avatar story line spans across the majority of the season and although the damage done in this episode is reversed, it doesn’t end on a particularly positive note. It demonstrates how dangerous the situation is and provides an insight into how the plot may develop as the episodes continue and the devastating impact it could potentially have on the family. 

Charmageddon (7x13)

This episode is very much the follow-up of There’s Something About Leo and the culmination of the Avatar story line. Once again, I like this episode because I think the plot works very well. It’s an interesting and solid episode that takes you on a journey and has a strong ending.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, the Avatar story line in general poses big questions about a lot of key themes that are present throughout Charmed and this episode really highlights that. One of the most significant themes throughout this episode from my perspective is be careful what you wish for. 

Throughout the series we see the sisters time and time again crave and wish for a “normal” life free of magic and demons, and this episode sees their wish granted. They live in a perfect utopia - a happy world with no violence or pain - and they all seem happier than they’ve been in a long time. After all, what could possibly be more perfect than a world like that? Of course, it’s not long before the cracks begin to show and the reality of maintaining a world like that means that innocent people are removed from the world is they pose a threat to the peace. 

After seeing the journey Leo has been on in this season with the Avatars it’s interesting that he of all people is one of the first (with Zankou’s help) to see the flaws in the Avatars utopia. Having Leo pair up with Zankou to reverse what the Avatars have created builds on the conflict that has been present within the family throughout the season. It’s good to see Leo make such a huge decision by himself on the basis of his own morals and sense of right and wrong. He makes a lot of mistakes in seasons 6 and 7, but he’s still able to see the right path and knows that he has to work with Zankou to achieve that. 

On the flip side, this episode (and this season overall, actually) shows how much the sisters have lost their way. Despite the years of experience and the knowledge they have of the magical world, they’re naive enough to believe that the Avatars really can create this perfect utopia without there being any consequences. It shows that the sisters are so desperate for normalcy (and I don’t really blame them) that they’re willing to believe what is clearly a fantasy. Phoebe and Paige, in particular, knew that such a world can’t exist after their experiences in It’s a Bad, Bad, Bad World. They were catapulted into a happy parallel universe where everything was sunshine, rainbows and smiles, but where people were shot in the street for blocking their neighbours drive-ways or had their tongues cut out for swearing. The sisters should’ve been smart enough to realise that a world like that can’t exist without consequences. And Phoebe’s resistance to see the reality of it, even when Leo explicitly told her about it, further demonstrates how desperately they were clinging to a fantasy. 

It’s great to see the sisters (and Leo) team up with the Big Bad of the season, Zankou and reminds me of season 4 when the Seer teamed up with the sisters to help them defeat the Source (although it was actually a manipulation on the Seer’s part). It demonstrates that under certain circumstances, even enemies can come together to right a wrong. It also hammers home one of those core Charmed messages that good cannot exist without bad and vice versa. 

Overall, I love the plot of this episode and the important lessons it contains. When Phoebe goes to the Book of Shadows, like Leo told her to, and had a premonition of all the people she’d lost over the years, it was a beautiful moment. We all go through life avoiding pain and hoping we don’t have to feel it, but it’s a natural part of life and being a human. And although it’s a cliche, it’s true that we all have to feel those things to be able to fully feel the good parts of life - love, happiness, kindness, empathy, friendship, family etc. Life without pain is not truly living. Likewise, this episode provides a valuable lesson on how the things we wish for may not always live up to the expectations we have or turn out the way we imagined. The sisters wanted the utopia that the Avatars provided, but it wasn’t what they expected or hoped. 

The episode ended with Kyle returning to Paige as a Whitelighter, which regardless of personal feelings towards Kyle and/or Paige and Kyle as a couple, was very sweet and fitting. Paige needed that closure after the way in which Kyle died and it was the right way to end his story. As a child I strongly disliked Kyle, because I found him annoying and hated him for wanting to kill Leo. As an adult, I now completely sympathise with Kyle and feel that as a whole the fans are a little harsh on him. He was a little boy whose parents were killed and his entire life was shaped by the trauma of that one event. As a result, he spent his entire life clinging to the idea of avenging his parents deaths and when he was faced with that opportunity, he couldn’t let it pass him by. Yes, it was selfish of him to try and kill Paige’s brother-in-law, but under the circumstances it’s also easy to understand why he felt so strongly about it. He believed wholeheartedly that the Avatars were evil, and although they weren’t necessarily, they were still corrupt and to an extent he was right about them. They created a world that on the surface may have seemed better, but in reality it wasn’t, because it was all an illusion. Everyone’s minds, emotions and behaviours were manipulated by magic, forcing them to conform and essentially transforming them into robots. That’s simply inhumane and immoral. 

Despite the fact that the Avatar story line was a bit iffy in places, I really like this episode and think it’s a strong culmination of the plot and a very strong ending too. My one and only criticism, is that I feel like this should’ve been a turning point for the sisters in realising that they’d lost their way a little bit and lost sight of the purpose of their magic. From the beginning, being the Charmed Ones was all about protecting the innocent, but by this point, the sisters had grown so tired of demon-fighting and everything that went with it that they lost sight of the real reason they were fighting and became too focused on what they needed and wanted. 

Carpe Demon (7x14)

In terms of plot and the events of this episode, I don’t really like it much at all. But anybody that follows me or that is familiar with my Charmed posts will know that Drake is one of my favourite characters on the show and that is the only reason I like this episode. Therefore, nearly everything I discuss about this episode will be entirely about Drake. 

To skip over the plot quickly before I get into Drake, I think this episode is generally a bit meh, a rather forgettable episode that lacks in any real plot. It has a bit of silliness and fun with Drake becoming Robin Hood, which I’m partial to, but there isn’t a whole lot going on in this episode. If you remove Drake from the episode, this definitely wouldn’t make it onto my list.

So, let’s talk about Drake, shall we? I honestly love Drake. He’s a breath of fresh air and from the second he arrives on-screen he transforms the entire vibe of the show. He’s the sort of character that lights up any scene he’s in and his chemistry with Phoebe from the beginning is so lovely. She comes alive around him and we get to see a more playful, passionate and free-spirited Phoebe once again. His energy, positivity, philosophical mindset, interesting background (as a demon), humour and playfulness perfectly offset the darker tone of the season with the Avatars. His arrival is perfectly timed to lighten up the show a little after the Avatar story line and although he’s only on the show for a short amount of time, I find his presence very impactful. There’s a lot of characters that come and go throughout the seasons, but Drake’s one that is very memorable to me and he always stands out. None of the other minor or recurring characters seem to bring the same energy to the show as he does and I always enjoy watching his scenes and watching his dynamic with Phoebe. 

The Seven Year Witch (7x16)

Honestly, it’s kind of crazy that I still commonly think of season 7 as an average/poor season, because this episode is probably one of the best across the series. However, if anyone ever asks me what my all time favourite episodes are, this episode would never enter my mind, mostly because I just have a more personal connection to the earlier seasons. 

I love the plot and emotion in this episode. It’s such a sad yet beautiful episode for Piper and Leo, who have been through so much. Leo, in particular, has had a rough couple of seasons with the Elders, Gideon and the Avatars, so to see him have his memories wiped and be placed in the middle of nowhere is quite difficult. As I’ve said before, I’m not a hardcore Pleo shipper, but this episode proves 100% that they’re soulmates and are meant to be together. Throughout the series Leo has always been torn between his magical duties (as either a Whitelighter, Elder or Avatar) and Piper, and this episode finally ends that conflict that exists inside him as he makes his final choice. Without Leo, Piper’s soul cannot survive and the fact that her imminent death is enough to wake Leo from his amnesiac state is a testament to the love they have. Leo’s literal fall from grace, looks ridiculous (there’s something about it that’s so funny to me, I don’t know if that’s just me being weird) but is actually one of the most beautiful moments on the show, once again showing how strong his and Piper’s love for one another is. And the scene where they reunite is so beautiful, it’s probably one of my favourite Piper and Leo scenes. 

Of course, the guest appearance from Cole in this episode is a pleasant surprise. Despite how he and Phoebe ended, he always loved her and never wanted her to give up on love, so it’s fitting that he should return now when Piper and Leo (the greatest love that Phoebe has witnessed) risk ending. Likewise, it’s a nice twist, but a fitting one, that Cole was actually the mastermind behind Drake coming into Phoebe’s life all along. We saw in Happily Ever After how important it was to Cole for Phoebe to never give up on love. I really see that as part of how deeply he knew and understood Phoebe as a person. She was so loving and passionate, that she would never be completely fulfilled or happy without love (despite what she may have said) and he felt largely responsible for closing her heart off to other prospective lovers because of how deeply he hurt her. 

This episode is also where we saw goodbye to Drake. It’s a sad moment, but I love how it’s done. The final scene between him and Phoebe is so lovely and very heartfelt. Despite how short a time they knew each other, it’s easy to see why Phoebe fell in love with him. Drake had a very similar spirit to Phoebe (particularly early seasons Phoebe) and he brought joy, light, positivity, fun and passion back into her life. Despite having had other relationships after Cole (Jason, Miles, Leslie), none of those men brought out the same side to Phoebe that Drake did. He just captivated her from the very beginning. Seeing how Drake and Phoebe had come to fall in love also fit within the theme of love in this episode with Piper and Leo, but stood in contrast to it. Whilst Piper and Leo were able to overcome the obstacles that stood in their way to be together, Phoebe and Drake weren’t and lost one another. But ultimately, the message remained the same - love is always worth it. 

Imaginary Fiends (7x20)

I’m not particularly a big fan of Wyatt as a character. That probably makes me sound like an awful human being since he’s only a child, but I never really felt like children fit on the show, although I understand the value of seeing at least one of the sisters enter into motherhood during the series. 

However, I really like and value this episode. There’s quite a lot of episodes from season 5 onwards that center on Wyatt, but this is one of the only ones I genuinely like and think is handled really well. The idea that Wyatt has an imaginary friend is one that, from a psychological stand-point, is interesting because of the nature of his life and upbringing. He has a far from traditional life and has been faced with demons, warlocks and all manner of evil creatures trying to kill him or turn him evil when he was still in the womb. Having that kind of lifestyle and a lack of normalcy is obviously going to have a profound affect on a child. The fact that his imaginary friend is in fact a demon is a very good twist that works well, in my opinion. Whilst the notion that Wyatt has an imaginary friend serves as a metaphor for some of the complex issues he has (e.g. not verbally communicating and being very reserved and unsociable), it also raises awareness of grooming. Vicus (the demon), emotionally manipulates Wyatt over a prolonged period of time, gaining his trust and turning him against his own family, all to get the outcome he desires (turning Wyatt evil). The fact that it happens practically right under Piper and Leo’s noses without them being able to stop or control it correlates a lot to cases of grooming. 

The appearance of future!Wyatt is a lovely addition to this episode. Although we saw future!Wyatt in season 6 during Chris-Crossed, this time we get to meet good Wyatt rather than evil Wyatt. It’s so nice to see him interact with the family and to see the wonderful young man he will grow to be, particularly since we don’t see much personality from little Wyatt. It also provides a couple of funny moments such as when Wyatt reveals that baby Chris swallows a marble. Most of all, it’s lovely to see how all of the Halliwell clan shape adult!Wyatt and how the things he says and does show the closeness he has to his parents, Chris and aunties in the future. 

Leo being the one to turn Wyatt from evil to good is a particularly nice moment to see, since the father-son bond between them is so strong. After the crap that Leo went through in season 6 with being separated from the family, it’s good to see that the love Wyatt has for his dad is strong enough to overcome evil. It’s also very telling that adult!Wyatt, even when he’s evil, can’t bring himself to harm Leo. And of course, the end is very sweet with little Wyatt finally speaking and smiling, and seeming to open up a little bit after what was a difficult episode for him.

I definitely think this is one of the strongest (if not the strongest) Wyatt-centric episode from the series and bringing future!Wyatt into the picture only improves the episode. I admire the writers for tackling the complexities that come from a child who has grown up in such a unique lifestyle and encountered so many traumas. It’s not an easy task, but I think it’s handled quite well in this episode in comparison to previous episodes. 

Something Wicca This Way Goes (7x22)

This is by far the best season finale of the entire series. It’s dramatic, it’s suspenseful, it’s emotional and the stakes are so high that it feels like anything can happen. Although I personally never connected to Zankou as a villain, he’s by far one of the most threatening and powerful Big Bad’s that the sisters face and in this episode it feels like maybe the sisters have finally met their match. 

The episode gives me Charmed and Dangerous vibes (which is one of my all time fave episodes), with the sisters going up against the greatest evil they’ve ever faced and having their powers stripped away, meaning they have to find a way to defeat Zankou without their active powers. I’ve always been a fan of episodes where the sisters are forced out of their comfort zone when it comes to magic and can’t rely solely on their active powers. As the seasons progress I feel that the sisters got more and more dependent upon their active powers (particularly Piper’s explosive power) and as a result their creative thinking when it came to their use of magic declined. So it was great to see the sisters coming up with fresh ideas of how to beat Zankou in this episode. 

The sisters’ visit to Victor is very emotional. It’s clear that the sisters believe there’s a high chance they’re going to die in their fight against Zankou, and seeing Piper say goodbye to her sons and hand over the deeds to P3 and the Manor is heartwrenching. But I also love that they chose to entrust Victor to be the one to care for Wyatt and Chris, the house and the business, because it shows how far their relationships have come since he was first introduced to us in season 1. As a quick side-note, I’d just like to say that Victor’s development is perhaps one of the best on the show and is very overlooked. He starts the series as an absentee, irresponsible father who seems to care little for his own children, and ends it having a fantastic relationship with all of his daughters, an amazing relationship with Chris (as we learn from future!Chris in season 6) and Wyatt (who trusts him so much he orbs baby Chris to him). 

In addition to Victor, I love that Darryl and Shelia are in this episode. After how much of a significant part they’ve been in the sisters lives, it’s only fitting that they should see them one last time before their impending deaths. 

The sisters show brilliant flair and intelligence in their plan to defeat Zankou, and they succeed. Those final scenes where they cast the spell and hold hands knowing what’s about to happen is such a shocking moment, and the first time I saw it I genuinely believed the sisters were dead, even though a part of me knew it couldn’t be true. That final twist with the sisters walking out as new people and telling Leo about their plans to start a new life is fantastic, and one that I didn’t see coming. And Darryl watching as the sisters and Leo walk across the street and realising that it’s them is one of the most beautiful moments from the entire series period. I love that moment, it’s brilliant. 

As much as I like Forever Charmed and appreciate the happy ending we got, I actually think I would’ve preferred if the series ended here. It was a great and dramatic ending that was happy but open ended. In my opinion, this as a series finale tops Forever Charmed in almost every single way. The only thing that Forever Charmed improved on is having other characters like Penny, Patty, future!Chris and future!Wyatt etc. Besides that, Something Wicca This Way Goes is by far the superior series finale. Even the title is more fitting, since it plays on the pilot episode. 

And that brings me to the end of my favourite season 7 episodes. As I said at the beginning of this post, it’s strange that I consider season 7 to be one of my least favourite seasons considering how many episodes I actually like from the season. I largely put that down to the fact that the early seasons are so good and so special to me, that I’ll always consider them my favourites. I think thematically, season 7 is a strong season and has some of the best plots from across the series (e.g. Zankou, the Avatars and Leo’s arc) and some very strong episodes. The season also benefits from having Drake, a decent amount of Victor and future!Wyatt. My biggest criticism of season 7 (and seasons 6-8 generally) is that the characterisation of the sisters is very weak. As much as I love the sisters, I don’t really like them much in this season. Paige’s vibrance and quirkiness seems to dim in this season, Phoebe and Piper seem increasingly self-obsessed with themselves and their own lives and the closeness of the sisters is significantly less. The scene near the beginning of Charmageddon when Piper and Phoebe comfort Paige following Kyle’s death is one of the many scenes that highlights for me. Their attempts to comfort her are so pitiful, they don’t even hug her properly. This is obviously down to the writing, but I find it very difficult to adjust to the lack of sisterly moments and the reduction of affection and tactility between the sisters in the later seasons. You can notice this immediately when you compare this post of Prue, Piper and Phoebe to this post of Piper, Phoebe and Paige. There are so many more scenes between Prue, Piper and Phoebe where they’re hugging or holding hands or stroking each others’ hair, whereas the ones of Piper, Phoebe and Paige are mostly of them standing by each other. Anyway, I digress. Season 7 overall, is an underrated season and writing this post made me realise how many episodes there are that I enjoy from the season and how many good aspects to it there are. 

Next time I’ll be writing about my favourite season 8 episodes. Since season 8 is and always has been my least favourite season, there probably won’t be many episodes that I’ll be analysing. 

Thanks for reading!

Cat back with a new muse and FC. I bring you Lorelai “Rory” Dakota Baudelaire (yes, like the Baudelaire children only I promise her life has less unfortunate events). She’s slightly based off an old muse of mine; but pretty much only two or three things are the same. Otherwise, she’s completely new, which means I’ve not fully developed her yet. I’ve also never played a Dominique Provost-Chalkley FC before; so please be patient with me while I figure out her gifs. Below the cut, you can read a bit about Rory. And like always, don’t hesitate to hit me up for plotting/connections. She could really use them.

[ dominique provost-chalkley, twenty four, cisfemale, she/her ] ━ hey, I just saw [ lorelai “rory” dakota baudelaire ] walking down the streets of crownsville. they’ve lived in town for [ six months ], and you can catch them around town working as a [ travel blogger/activist ]. I hear they’re known to be [ sincere & clever ] and [ naive & reserved ]. if asked, they would say their aesthetic would be [ stacks of old books, elaborate bedtime stories, passport stamps, celebrating deaf culture, fairylights and flower crowns, a warm cup of tea ]. 

History (TW: Chronic Illness, Ableism)

With a name like Baudelaire, one would think the family to be cursed or something; but in actuality, the Baudelaires are a pretty normal upper class family of old French money from Bristol, England. 

Okay, maybe there were a few unfortunate events throughout the years; and most of them seemed to affect the youngest.

Born Lorelai Dakota, Rory is the seventh and final child of Arthur Baudelaire (a cardiothoracic surgeon) and his wife Naomi (a journalist). She was born on September 25th.

At birth, it was discovered that Rory was completely deaf, news that was difficult at first for her parents; but her parents learned that was the lesser of their problems once their daughter was diagnosed with a congenital heart defect called Tetralogy of Fallot.

At only a month old, she underwent her first heart surgery to repair part of defects. Her second heart surgery was performed shortly after her first birthday. This was to fully repair the defects; and while both surgeries were successful, she’d grow up having to be monitored to ensure no complications appeared.

She underwent a third heart surgery at the age of five and a half to fix some lingering issues from the first surgery. It was around the time of this surgery that her parents bought her a stuffed monkey who she named ‘Sunny’. She still sleeps with this monkey every night.

Growing up, her parents were very protective of her, not wanting her to strain herself or her heart too much. She wasn’t allowed to play sports or do anything else too risky. This led young Rory to discover her passion for books and storytelling.

The Baudelaire’s had a library in their home; and that’s where Rory spent most of her childhood days when she wasn’t at school, at a doctor’s appointment, or at a friend’s house.

She preferred the solace of the library. The characters in the books she read never made fun of her speech troubles/lisp or her deaf accent. They just existed and allowed her to live in peace, unlike many of the kids at school who often mocked her (and some of her siblings even mocked her from time to time just to fit in).

Being mocked so much led Rory to leave public school by the age of 11 when her parents enrolled her in a school for the deaf. She thrived there, making friends with many of the other students and become a star in the eyes of her teachers.

One of the things she loved most about books were the many vast worlds she got to explore from the comfort of her home. It made her want to travel the world, visit all the wonderful places she read about.

But travelling outside the British Isles was tough due to her parents’ protective nature. While her family went on a few holidays to countries like France, The Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany,  it wasn’t until she was in university that she was really given the chance to find adventure.

She was fortunate enough to study abroad in Greece for half a year (which her Percy Jackson loving self fangirled over mythology the whole time). It was later blogging about that trip that led her to her current career path.

After coming back from Greece, she began a blog called ‘Diary of a Deaf Adventurer’ which talked about the struggles of being deaf while travelling abroad and facing multiple language barriers.

 Her blog caught the eye of one of her professors; and he showed it to a friend of his who ultimately ended up wanting to sponsor it. He offered to pay for Rory to travel and blog about her experiences, highlighting the difficulties of traveling with a disability and potential solutions for improving the issues faced. 

After she graduated from university with degrees in linguistics, modern languages/cultures, English, and comparative literature, she began travelling (much against the wishes of her parents who worried it’d be too much for her heart). She’s spent the last few years visiting different countries throughout Europe, Asia, and South America. It wasn’t until a few months ago she found herself stateside for the first time.

Initially, her plan was to travel around the USA for a year while also learning ASL. However, she fell in love with the smalltown of Crownsville, GA and decided she wanted to spent a year in the town while taking a break from the constant travel.

She’s been in town for roughly six months now; and honestly, she can’t picture herself leaving any time soon. It’s started to feel like home away from home. She knows she’s got another six months before she leaves; but she’s hoping something will happen that’ll keep her in town just a bit longer.

Likes: Books; Fairylights; Linguistics; Tea; Honey; Wildflowers; Succulents; Libraries; Scrapbooks; Zero Waste; Greek Mythology 

Dislikes: Ableism; Confrontation; Prejudice; Twilight; Cochlear Implants; Plastic; Pity; Slurs

Miscellaneous

She was named ‘Lorelai’ due to her parents simply loving the name; though her middle name of ‘Dakota’ came from a close friend of her mother’s who had passed just before Rory was born.

She got her first pair of hearing aids at the age of 18 months. They were green BTE aids with a glittery clear ear mold. She never changed the style, always opting for green hearing aids when possible. Currently, her hearing aids are silver with a light green glittery ear mold.

She’s never had an interest in getting cochlear implants. As much as her parents tried to push them on her, she’s always declined. She’s fine with her hearing aids, despite knowing a CI might give her slightly more hearing. She doesn’t really want that. She’d rather embrace her deafness given it’s a big part of who she is.

She is a beegan (vegan that eats honey) and has been since she was around 7 years of age. She tried full on veganism for a year in her teens; but she missed honey in her tea too much. If it wasn’t for honey, she’d be fine being a vegan. She’s against eating animals, doesn’t like eggs; and she’s allergic to dairy.

She can best be described as ‘looks like a cinnamon roll and is actually a cinnamon roll’. She’s about as intimidating as a teacup poodle. She’s the type of person who will catch and release a spider instead of squashing it.

She’s gone through over ten years of speech therapy; and while she’s gotten to the point most people can understand what she says more often than not, she was never fully able to get rid of her lisp or the slight monotone tone to her voice. 

Whenever she’s lipreading, her responses are always delayed as she has to take a few moments to process what she was able to read and put together what she missed (she tends to only capture about 40% of what she tries to lipread).

She has a deep fear of dogs that stems from being attacked and bitten by a dog when she was six years old. The attack required multiple stitches; and she’s just had an issue being around dogs ever since.

Her not-so-guilty pleasure is watching episodes of the animated Madeline series when she’s sick or upset. It was her favorite show as a child; and it still has the ability to make her smile.

She collects mugs. Given she’s an avid tea drinker, she’s developed quite the collection of mugs over the years. Her favorites are her Doctor Who TARDIS mug, her L-O-V-E in BSL mug, and her CHD warrior heartbeat mug.

She tries to live as zero waste as possible; so she is known for carrying a reusable orange water bottle wherever she goes as well as for having a reusable metal straw in her bag. She’s also notorious for using canvas totes.

So far, she’s managed to travel to the following places: UK, Ireland, The Netherlands, Denmark, France, Germany, Switzerland, Greece, Italy, Croatia, Serbia, Portugal, Turkey, India, Brazil, Argentina, Costa Rica, USA. 

Some of the places she’d still like to cross off her list of places travelled include: Romania, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Egypt, Morocco, Malta, Israel, Vietnam, Madagascar, and Nigeria (though she’d honestly be excited to travel anywhere). 

Wanted Connections

Older Sibling(s) ━ Rory is the youngest of seven; so it would be nice for one or more of her siblings to end up in Crownsville now that she’s settled into the small town. I picture her having two older sisters and four older brothers. Their names and ages are ultimately utp; though I picture their age range being between 27-39 and I do have name suggestions. The only one whose name isn’t negotiable is Rory’s brother Wolfgang “Wolf”. I have a lot planned for how their relationship was growing up; and I’d love to see him brought to Crownsville the most. OPEN (1/6)

First Friend in Crownsville  ━ This is very straightforward. This connection is for the very first person Rory met in Crownsville and befriended. OPEN (0/1)

Roommate  ━  Rory found herself an apartment shortly after deciding to stay in Crownsville for an extended period of time. She found a roommate initially; but things didn’t quite work out. She needs a new roommate to split the rent with as well as someone to become a close friend. OPEN (0/1)

Ride or Die Bestie  ━ This person has become Rory’s #1 best friend in Crownsville. She feels like she can go to them about anything; and they will always be there for her. They’re the one person she can truly rely on and loves more like family than a friend. TAKEN (1/1)

Future Love Interest ━ Rory is demisexual and has never been in any sort of romantic relationship before. She’s never had the interest. This connection would be for the individual who makes her feel romantic chemistry with someone for the first time. It would be a slow burn relationship. TAKEN (1/1) *I am up for discussing this plot; but I would prefer to see if the chemistry is there before solidifying the connection.*

Doctors  ━ Given Rory’s heart condition, this connection would be for any of the doctors who help treat her while she’s staying in Crownsville. OPEN (0/3)

General Friends; Close Friends; Frienemies; Neighbors, etc.

More to come...

Click here for Rory’s stats page.

Big Hero 6 Theory: Liv’s Next Mutation

Even though it’s not the main focus of my blog, it’s no secret that I love Big Hero 6: the series. I love the characters, I love the animation, I love the stories, and I, of course, love the mysteries. The show keeps you guessing as to what’s going to happen next, but the tragic thing is that, despite being popular enough to warrant a renewal for a third season before season 2 premiered, there doesn’t seem to be much of a fan community online. Unless you tag your fan art, theories, quotes, etc. it’s unlikely a piece of fan art will drift across your dash like it does for shows like Steven Universe, Star vs. The Forces of Evil, She-Ra, etc. I’m hoping that changes soon, but I digress.

Also, this theory is going to contain spoilers for season 2, so I’ll go ahead and tuck it under “Read More”.

Getting back on topic, one of the biggest mysteries thus far in season 2 is the monsters and who is making them. We know Liv Amara is the culprit, but as of episode 10, “Lie Detector,” it becomes less clear what’s going on. Who’s the real Liv Amara? Why is one Liv in what appears to be cryosleep? Why is the other Liv making these monsters? How long has this apparent clone been running amok? Have we only known this clone the entire time? Does the sleeping Liv know what’s going on? There are so many questions, but not a whole lot of answers. Seeing as it’s been a few weeks since the last new episode, we might not know for some time. All we know is that the active Liv Amara is turning old villains into monsters for some kind of fee and, at the moment, no known benefit for the villains. Well, yeah, the villains become stronger, faster, and meaner, but as we saw with High Voltage, the process kind of interferes with living their best lives. We don’t know why they want this or why Liv is doing it. All we really know is that Liv is turning humans into monsters and turning them loose in the streets, sometimes being the one to take them down and look like a hero, other times letting Big Hero 6 do the dirty work.

So now let’s take a look at what we know about Liv’s monsters. I’ll bold the important stuff, as most of this will just be recap:

The first one, introduced in season 1 although we don’t know the full story yet, is Orso Knox, the Shakespeare fan turned whale mixed with a dinosaur and some hair, put into a blender, frozen, and then partially thawed. He spends the episode rampaging through the streets of San Fransokyo, attending his meetings, destroying offices, and speaking cryptically. We later learn that he wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, but is more beast than man, and was only trying to get help the best he could. Had it not been for Karmi reversing his mutation in the episode “Prey Date,” Liv probably would have kept Knox as a monster for even longer, potentially pulling him further and further from his humanity.

The second one is Momakase, who can be best described as turning into a werewolf from Skyrim (although her appearance is likely based on Lady Deathstrike, another Marvel villain). Momakase has always been strong, but she is heightened way beyond her normal abilities. Her nails are deadly claws that can cut through anything, she can escape the trap Big Hero 6 creates her and escape into the night, and has so far not been seen again since the episode “The Seventh Wheel.”

Third and fourth is the mother-daughter duo High Voltage. When they make their season 2 debut in “Something’s Fishy,” they discuss wanting to go straight with Liv, telling her that their crime days are over and even trying to lead normal lives after doing Liv’s dirty work. Unfortunately, once they mutate, those dreams are crushed, and they end up being kept in a tank until Liv needs them again in the episode “Lie Detector.” Barb and Juniper even end up turning back over their new leaf after an entire song and dance number about wanting to be normal, which, suggests to me at least, that Liv’s mutation process also messes with free will. Is it possible the two really did just learn they love crime that much? Sure, but I’m not convinced.

The fifth, arguably, is Nega-Globby, a destructive blob made from Globby’s already mutated DNA, introduced in the episode “Nega-Globby”. Side note, I love this episode. Globby makes such a sacrifice in the name of goodness and, I’d say, has been pretty thoroughly redeemed. While our Globby is victorious by the end of the episode, Nega-Globby is still part of him, suggesting that it’s not easy to undo one of Liv’s mutations.

The sixth is the Hibagon in the episode “Muira-Horror!”, the mutated Ned Ludd, back again for more action. Unlike all the other mutations before, Ned’s mutation leaves him a mindless killing machine, further supporting the idea that Liv has the power to interrupt or even override free will. Even Orso Knox had the ability to quote The Tempest, but Ned doesn’t say a word. He comes out of his mutation dazed and confused, with no recollection of what happened.

Mutant number seven is Mr. Sparkles, who is made into a fluffy green monster in the aptly titled episode, “Something Fluffy.” Also introduced in this episode are the Mayoi, adorable, fluffy fungus creatures created by Liv that grow into towering kaijus that can be controlled by Mr. Sparkles. Basically, Liv can create hive minds, or at the very least can put one mind in charge of many. She’s the one to save the day at the end of the episode, boosting her appearance and making Big Hero 6 look inept. After Hiro learns the police already don’t much care for the superhero team in the episode “Something’s Fishy”, this event creates more tension between them and the people they protect, possibly setting up the conflict for the rest of the season, or maybe even the main conflict of season 3.

Finally, we have the big Bessie Bear from the latest episode, “Lie Detector.” This mutation shows us that Liv can essentially give life to inanimate objects, as all she needed was a lock of grizzly bear hair to create the technology cancelling beast. This shows that all Liv needs to make a monster is the tiniest amount of DNA.

So now we know/remember what Liv can do with her technology. We know she poses a threat to Big Hero 6. Seeing as she has only done experiments on past antagonists (as well as Orso Knox and, as is implied, her Chris-sistant, although we don’t know enough about him for him to make the recap), why would she experiment on Big Hero 6? In my mind, the answer is simple: to break them apart. If she mutates one of the characters, crime fighting will be a lot harder. Public perception of the team will plummet. And, if she works her magic with tampering with free will, she can even have another henchman on her side. In short, there’s no way Liv loses in this scenario. Now that we know her motivation, who’s on the chopping block?

The first person who comes to mind isn’t a person at all. We know that Liv can make monsters with a frame and just a bit of DNA, so in theory, she could mutate Baymax. This doesn’t seem likely though, as it would be much easier to just unplug him. Plus, he was part of a super villain grand scheme last season, so it might be repetitive. It could be Hiro. He’s the main character, and having him mutated would force him to hide more things from Aunt Cass, force him to go to Karmi for help, and would give us more insight into the lives of the mutated villains. Although, because he’s the main character, I can’t see him switching sides. Fred is already pretty animalistic, as reflected in his costumes and behaviors while wearing them. But, I don’t know how much mileage we can get considering how Fred is still very much a comic relief character. Wasabi is probably the least developed character on the team, so a mutation could push things for him in a new direction, but that would probably come at the show’s detriment. Honey Lemon’s chem purse already puts her in harm’s way of suffering the same mutation as Globby, making her an easy target, but that would just be repetitive at this point. And so, we are left with one person, the character who I think this is most likely to happen to:

Go Go Tomago.

In a way, season 2 has been Go Go’s season. She’s had more development than the rest of the cast, maybe even more than Hiro. “The Fate of the Roommates” shows her emotionally vulnerable and opening up about her feelings for the first time, developing her as a character and her relationship with Honey Lemon. The very next episode, “Muira-Horror!” shows her learning to let go of some of her stubbornness to trust in Krei’s judgement. The episode “Supersonic Sue” shows her crisis as she fails to prevent an old criminal fresh out of retirement from escaping a crime scene, an old criminal who, as it turns out, was inspired by Go Go to go back to crime. Basically, Go Go has been on an emotional roller coaster this season. We see her get angry, we see her get sad, we see her challenged in ways we hadn’t before. These episodes gave her highs, but they also gave her lows. In fact, “Supersonic Sue” didn’t even give her time to get over what happened, nor does she get a chance to redeem herself from her failure. Right now, Go Go has the most to lose and would likely be the hardest to fall. If anyone on the team is going to get mutated, I’m betting it’s her.

As of right now, we don’t know if the show is going in this direction. For all we know, the mutations stopped at Bessie and the rest of the season will be rounding up the mutants and returning them to normal. But the season is only half-over. I feel like we have plenty of time to play around with the status quo and shake things up a bit. If they do go this route, I doubt it will be permanent, but it could be fun and heart-wrenching at the same time. We’ll see, when Disney finally airs those new episodes.

When it was first reported late last year that Meghan Markle and Patrick J. Adams would be leaving Suits after its seventh season, it was hard to imagine how the show would go on. Having already lost Jessica Pearson (Gina Torres) a season earlier, fans of the long-running USA drama had genuine reason for concern given how pivotal the show’s ensemble has always been to its appeal.

But the introduction of Katherine Heigl as Samantha Wheeler, a ballsy and uncompromising attorney unafraid to tell Harvey Specter to “kiss her ass,” has thrown an intriguing new spanner into the works. Samantha’s presence shakes up the status quo at the newly-renamed Zane Specter Litt, while fan-favorite relationships like Harvey and Donna remain as pivotal as ever.

BAZAAR.com visited the show’s Toronto set last month, and spoke with Gabriel Macht, Sarah Rafferty, and Katherine Heigl about what to expect from the new era, and how it’s felt to continue the show without Adams and Markle. Here are eight things to know about the eighth season.

1) Harvey is missing Mike a lot.

But arguably not as much as Gabriel Macht is missing Patrick J. Adams. “I didn’t really know how overwhelming it would be for me,” Macht admits, “because we really started together. The show started as a two-hander and became an ensemble—which I’m very grateful for—but Patrick and I would bounce ideas off of each other, and Patrick always comes with such integrity and intelligence that he was very much my partner in this journey.” The actors are good friends in real life, and when Macht admitted to him how daunting it felt to do the show without him, “his response was ‘any time you want to talk, I’m a phone call away.’ So that was very touching, and I take solace in the fact that he’s there for me, but it’s definitely been a void.”

2) But Mike remains a strong presence in Harvey’s world.

Early on in the season, there’ll be a storyline that highlights just how deeply Harvey was shaped by his protege. “Mike has always been all about pro bono cases, and Harvey takes a pro bono case,” Macht says, “and Donna points out that this is his way of trying to keep Mike’s spirit alive. I think Harvey understands that, and acknowledges that, and he also understands that he is not Mike. Harvey’s always been aggressive and manipulative, but he also has a heart of gold.”

3) Alex (Dulé Hill) and his prickly friendship with Harvey will help to mitigate the loss of Mike.

“That does fill [the void] a little bit,” Macht said. “But it is a different relationship. Harvey and Alex do have history, but they’re also in a place where Harvey is managing partner and Alex really wants to be name partner, and much as Harvey wants to give it to him, it’s too soon. You will definitely see some of that banter, some of that wit and sparring, with Alex and also with Robert [Zane].”

4) Samantha is filling the void left by Meghan Markle’s Rachel—but not in the way you might expect.

Robert (Wendell Pierce) is more integral to the firm than ever before, but he’s also dealing with the new absence of his daughter. In the season premiere, he brings in Samantha as his right-hand woman, and per Heigl, their relationship is very much that of a surrogate father and daughter. “Robert is the only person that she truly respects enough to, not acquiesce to him, but listen to him,” she explains. “They have a really important, powerful connection that’s based on her love and respect for this man. She believes him to be somebody in her corner, and that matters to her a lot, because she hasn’t had that very much in her life.

Samantha’s relationship with Robert also allows her to let down her guard. “We shot a scene yesterday that I loved, where Sam comes to Robert very much like he’s her father, and she’s being a little petulant in trying to get her way, and it’s so great because it’s the only time you see her being less than in charge,” Heigl adds. While there was never a direct intention for Samantha to replace Rachel in that way, it just worked out. “You do feel the absence of that relationship [between Robert and Rachel], so this is in some way filling a void,“ Heigl says.

5) Harvey and Samantha’s relationship isn’t so much love-hate as straight-up hate.

And the initial tension and distrust between these two won’t ease up much, at least early on. “She’s a real foil for him because she’s a lot like him,” Heigl says. “She has that similar confidence, a similar cockiness, a similar wit, and I think Harvey’s biggest issue with her is whether or not she’s loyal to him and the firm.”

And while many shows would have immediately started to play up sexual tension between the two, that’s not necessarily in the cards here. “I don’t think the first instinct is ‘let’s throw them together romantically.’ I have no idea whether they will or not, but it’s fun to come into it like that’s not what these people are thinking. They’re not distracted by that right now. They’re very focused on what they want, and that might develop into something or it might just develop into a mutual respect—or a mutual loathing!”

6) Samantha may not be what she seems.

While this is arguably true of everybody in Suits to some degree, Macht hinted that Samantha’s account of her own backstory isn’t necessarily to be trusted. “She’s disrupting the status quo, and you don’t quite know if she’s on your side or against you. She becomes a villain in a way, but she might be redeemable, and in many ways she’s like the flip side to Harvey. We’re going to learn that they come from the same place, and that they’re both outsiders—or at least that’s what she claims. I think she says what people want to hear.” Hmmm…

7) Gender politics will play a slightly more prominent role in the show.

Sarah Rafferty revealed that Donna’s recent “lean in” moment, where she finally decided to go after what she wanted at work, and ultimately earned the COO title, came directly out of a tearful conversation she had with showrunner Aaron Korsh after the election of Donald Trump. “I said, ‘we have to do something. We have to take Donna on a journey.’ We needed to consciously make a statement, and shine a light on a woman’s story.”

Even though Korsh generally avoids making any overt statements with the show, Rafferty adds, “I said, ‘I know that you don’t feel you’re making a statement, but we must acknowledge that a statement is being received, whether you’re making it or not.’” Having received countless messages from female fans who have been inspired and empowered by watching Donna, Rafferty knows this matters. And in Season 8, Donna’s dynamic with Samantha allows for even more exploration of women’s working lives. “I’m about to shoot a scene with Kathrine in episode 809 where we, as two formidable women, both acknowledge that we’re having a gendered conversation, and dealing with some gender programming,” Rafferty revealed. “I appreciate that Suits is doing that in Season 8. It’s time.”

8) Rafferty has a very specific dream storyline in mind for Donna.

In last year’s midseason finale, Donna was torn apart on the stand by a lawyer who was hellbent on proving that she got to where she is by sleeping with Harvey. It was a painful sequence that also served as a reminder of why it’ll be so hard for these two to ever make it work: should they ever get together, Donna will be more vulnerable than ever to these types of attacks on her, and she knows it. “I want that to happen, actually,” Rafferty said when asked about this potential future. “That’s a storyline I want to follow in 2018. Everything that she’s worked for, all her superpowers, all of her unique potential, I want all of it to hang in the balance because of sexism, and because of [her relationship with Harvey]. I want a full arc where that threatens everything Donna has built, and Donna ends up potentially saving herself.” We are here for this storyline, for the record.

You can pursue this Gateway

If we have a handicap we may not be able to become a ballerina. Although she is twenty years younger than myself, she is a real mentor for me, I am learning from her all the time. I have the belief and I teach the belief that inside of each of us we know when we are on track and we know when we are living a wholesome life that fits with the integrity of our particular spirit. When I have opened this Gateway I am able to bow out when I need to. But once she started back to school and became a nurse all her doors opened for her. The reason it becomes easier is that you don't build up some of the rage and some of the anger that one can build up when we review the problems in our lives. You have a year to do these. So, don't be afraid of education, don't be afraid to go back for a degree at sixty, don't be afraid to have a mentor, to look for advice, to find out how other people have succeeded in a particular field. Of course it is necessary to find the ways to replenish ourselves that work.

The Rebbe Nachman of Breslow often said, "Always remember-Joy is not merely incidental to your spiritual quest. I see how she greets her guests, how welcoming she is, how she always walks a guest out and says good-bye. She had financial security, a home again for her boys and a future! It was tough but forth the struggle. When we take away joy and we take away a sense of well-being, a sense that we are thriving, we allow ourselves or seem to find ourselves in circumstances that seem to drain, tire and weaken us. Start back in childhood-look for your strengths and talents, even if they were disregarded by your family, and maybe even yourself. We are no longer the whole human being that is our birthright!THE ENCHANTED SELF is a positive psychology approach to mental health that works both in the treatment room and out. I teach people the techniques they need to start to think in positive ways about themselves and their world. We all know how important it is to feel we belong, that others care about us and we care about others. I said, "Who is that?" She mentioned the persons name. If you love to travel, look for ways to travel. That means getting to know your own talents and rediscovering your lost potential. The second action is something that is good for the world and of course will not harm yourself. I had never heard her mention her name before even though we often chatted. If you love to be with your friends, get together, if you love to be with your grandchildren, then sit on the floor and play games or plant a garden…whatever works for you. 

After all our society does not bring us up to recognize what is special and wonderful about ourselves! Some of us get closer to Recycled Sewing Threads Manufacturers this sense of positive self-love by mentally hugging ourselves as the child that we once were. Now we are encouraged rather than discouraged and even may end up sleeping better and feeling better leading to much less energy drain."As the years have gone by and I've been in the practice of psychology over 20 years, I have become more and more convinced that he was so right, that joy is not an option. Do you realize that just by actually doing these two actions you will: 1) bring more pleasure and joy to yourself and 2) improve the world in some small way. What aspects of yourself and your life can you identify as necessary to experience a state of well-being? What do you need to feel whole? For example, if you loved to play the piano as a child, then you may not really enjoy watching football games as an adult. 

Others practice by intentionally giving oneself a for real quick hug, even if no one else does, or looking in the mirror and saying to oneself, "I am special and my strengths are unique and perfectly suited for what I want and need to do in life! Another step in successfully passing through the Second Gateway is acknowledging that the story of your life is a fascinating fabric of adventures, episodes, happenings, and even mis-haps that have come together to make a most unique person and that is YOU! Once you can begin to see that your triumphs are to be honored and celebrated and that your defeats have within them the wisdom and the learning that takes you later in life to new heights you are well along on the road to Enchantment.The Fifth Gateway is the Gateway of Community. I think you can begin to see that what is going to work for each person is so unique to that individual! It involves a review of our history, and it involves analyzing the circumstances currently in our lives. The Third Gateway to Enchantment is Learning To Meet Your Needs and Negotiate for Yourself. Thus I teach them how to see what is right about themselves, rather than what is wrong. She said I am learning so much from my neighbor. So let's explore the Gateways and then try an enchanted assignment! The first Gateway is The Gateway of Knowing Yourself In Positive Ways. We never close a door on any of them, we are always back, we are always learning more, we are always having to reflect on our lives one more time or learn some new behaviors, make a new decision, recognize and acknowledge who we are and what we need and, of course, find new ways to bring pleasure and meaning into our lives. 

This is a fun gateway and it really builds your self-esteem. It also means not straining yourself, not accepting more assignments than you can really handle. The fourth Gateway is the experience of joy. Put them in your pocketbook, look at them once in awhile. However, the love of dance since childhood may easily be converted into wonderful yoga stretches that help arthritis and feel 'dancy'. Now, you have the maturity and wisdom to recognize these positive parts of yourself. I love this little story that a friend told me. I see how radiant her smile is. The steps I teach people are rigorous but they are no harder then all the habits we learn that keep us in bad moods and keep us depressed. The first one is a positive action you can do for yourself. We need the education, the skills, the tools, and the negotiating powers that will take us to fulfill our missions in life. Take a peice of paper write down 2 positive actions that you can do over the next year. Research shows that the more we help others, the more generous in spirit we are, whether we give time, money, a smile, or a helping hand, our moods lift. Thus there is also an accommodation to someone you care about and a resulting interest develops. Wow- two wonderful steps toward coming home to your ENCHANTED SELF!. Start to look for mentors-you will find them all over. In fact it soon becomes easier than listing everything that went wrong. I teach how to value our potential even if in childhood we were put down or criticized, as so many of us are. This Gateway is so incredibly essential. Obviously, this is a very important Gateway. These are the Seven Gates; we go through them again and again in life. We are wise, we have a tremendous amount we can offer others and there is always others to offer wisdom to ourselves. You find you have become an ENCHANTED SELF when you havethe courage to put together using your mind, heart, body and spirit new inventive ways of bringing pleasure and meaning into your life. 

You can pursue this Gateway, even while driving you car! For example, you can go over your life history, reviewing your strengths and talents. My friend said, "Well, I don't really know her, I just watch her. Very often, we dismiss and minimize our own wisdom.I have found the most effective way to teach people how to access their Enchanted Self, i. A PLAYDATE WITH ENCHANTMENTWhat I would like you to do now is to play with the Seventh Gateway-that of Positive Action. By protecting my mind, body and spirit I not only set hontest guidelines with others, so I don't disappoint them, but I make room for joy. This is the one where you begin to fall in love with yourself! At the heart level you begin to feel your specialness." I asked what do she meant. Even the birds mentor us with their wonderful song. I call this sense of well-being "The Enchanted Self" and I teach people how to find their "Enchanted Selves" again and again-how to recognize and celebrate the states of well-being that signify they are in touch with the best of themselves. Even if we have severe arthritis, we may not be able to become a ballerina at forty. You see, the more we are truly connected to others and feel a responsibility within a world beyond ourselves, the less the tendency is for us to get blue and withdrawn." 

That is an example of how easy it is to be mentored. It is a quick way to catch your Enchanted Self.The Sixth Gateway is the gateway of mentoring and being a mentor.e.mental health. However, in order to live a full life, you may also enjoy football games because your son loves them or your husband loves them. But, what you may not realize is that belonging is a major way to offset depression. Maybe I take that vacation I need or want or maybe I am just strong enough to say I will do this task later or you better find someone else to handle it and then I get a good night's sleep. I also teach them to appreciate their own life story, its ups and downs; the roller coaster ride that we all go on. Finding the right communities to connect are ongoing assignments for all of us-where we live, who are friends are, what church or synagogue we attend, what interest groups we identify with, etc. For example, if I teach someone how to review at the end of the day everything that has gone right in their day, that it is no harder than listing what went wrong. The worst thing is to be so dependent on others and the whims of others that we are not able to live out our dreams.Last but not least is the Gateway of Positive Action or Good Deeds. 

IMMORAL PROFITS: Why Are Big Corporations Still Allowed To Profit From Rape Videos?

This article isn't about ethical pornography, it's about rape and sexual abuse and big corporations that are allowed to profit from human misery A Canadian student says: 'I've not problem with consensual adults making porn. Who cares?' but the problem is that many people in pornographic videos, especially those on user submitted content generated video tubesites. Just after she turned 14, a man had enticed Jane* to engage in sexual play over Skype, and he recorded her, and posted a clip, along with her full name, on XVideos, one of the worlds most-visited pornography tubesites. Google searches helped direct people to this illegal footage of child sexual abuse. Jane had recounted how she begged XVideos to remove the clip, but instead, said the website hosted two more copies, so hundreds of thousands of people could leer at this most mortifying moment of her life, preserved forever as if set in amber. That happens all over the world: Women and girls, men and boys, are sexually assaulted or secretly filmed, and then a video is posted on major websites like XVideos that draws traffic through search engines, while the initial video assault may be brief, the attack on dignity becomes indeterminable. 'The shame I felt was embarrassing,' Jane had said. Mr Kristof wrote in December about Pornhub, a Montreal-based website that pioneered access to free porn uploaded by anyone - so called tubesites that are like YouTube but orientated to the adult market and selling nudity and sex. Since the article was written and published, credit card companies have stopped working with the tubesite, and the site has removed more than nine million videos in response, with the Canadian and US Governments cracking down on the company's practices. However this isn't isolated to one company. It was noted at the time, that exploitation is rooted not in a single company, but in an industry that operates with some impunity and punishing one corporation may simply benefit it's rivals, after all, remove a brick, it makes a building unstable, knock enough bricks, the wall comes tumbling down. That's what is happening here because when Pornhub deleted videos, millions of outraged customers flooded to it's nemesis, XVideos, which has even fewer scruples. A veteran European Pornographer called Pierre Woodman, said that while Pornhub has been damaged financially, XVideos see Mr Kristof as a 'Santa Claus In Newsprint'. That's not a comfortable feeling and it doesn't sit right, and we need to knock more bricks out of the wall, rein in the entire rogue industry, and for now, the behemoth that is XVideos, bolstered by Google, and other search engines. 'We are the biggest adult tube in the industry, with an average of two billion daily impressions worldwide,' boats XVideos, which SimilarWeb ranks as the seventh-most-visited website in the World. Two slots behind is a sister website with almost exactly the same content, XNXX.com, and each get more visitors than Yahoo, Amazon or Netflix. XVideos and XNXX appear to be owned by mysterious French Twins and based in a nondescript office building in Prague not far from Wenceslas Square. This building is the hub of a porn empire that gets six billion impressions a day and inflicts anguish all over the world, and raises an important question - Why do they get away with this? Heather Legarde, a young woman in Alberta, felt the world crashing down on her last August, when she had discovered that her ex-husband had posted intimate videos of her online, and she said that people around the world were gazing at her naked body. 'I'm all over the internet,' she said sadly; 'Not what I wanted to be famous for.' What's worse, in one video her former husband sexually assaulted her as she lay unconscious on the bed, which Legarde had no recollection of the assault and no idea how the video was made, apart from a clue in the tag: 'Sleeping Pills.' Some 200,000 people had watched her being assaulted while she was drugged and unconscious, so on that day in August, mortified and dizzied by the betrayal, Legarde prepared to tie a noose. 'I was standing in my garage under a beam, holding a rope,' she recalled. But finally, she changed her mind: 'I said to myself, "If this is your solution, he'll do this to someone else tomorrow".' So Legarde resolved to own her story and fight back: 'So it doesn't have to happen to other girls.' That's why she agreed to be quoted by name in the Times column, but her path through the life is now paved with daily humiliations, she regularly finds herself searching for her naked videos and begs websites, sometimes successfully, to remove the ones she finds. 'How do you get your head around 200,000 guys masturbating as you're being assaulted?' she mused. A great majority of videos on XVideos and other tubesites are not of children or of unconscious women, most of the bodies are writing by choice. But it's easy to find videos where the posting or the activity wasn't consensual. A major study published by the British Journal of Criminology this year found that one in eight videos on three major tubesites - XVideos, Pornhub and XHamster - depicted sexual violence or nonconsensual conduct. Some show intoxicated or unconscious women or girls being raped, while others are from spy cams in locker rooms or breach changing rooms and show unsuspecting women or girls, (and, less often, men and boys), undressing or showering. Racist epithets and humiliation are on display; as are misogynistic videos of supposed feminists being degraded and tortured, and many of the videos depict rapists, real or fake, forcing sex on children or adults who are trying to fight back. One on XVideos was captioned with a girl's protest: 'This is not right, Daddy, stop, please.' XVideos guides viewers to videos that purport to show children: Search for 'young,' and it helpfully suggests also searching for 'tiny,' 'girl,' 'boy,' 'juvencita,' and 'youth porn.' Many of those on the screen will be young-looking adults, but some will be minors whose lives have been badly damaged. 'I think about suicide,' a Thai girl called Jenny* said, and she explained that when she was in eighth grade, a man reached out to her on Facebook and suggested that she could make money form modelling, and he advised her to send videos of herself, including naked videos to give a sense of her body; these would be kept strictly confidential, she was assured. Jenny sent him the videos, but she was never paid as promised, and said she forgot about the whole episode - until a friend had alerted her that her naked videos were on XVideos, Pornhub and at least one other site. 'I just wanted to die,' Jenny said: 'I didn't want my parents to know.' Jenny is smart and well educated, and is a beautiful singer, and she had hoped to become a music star in Thailand: 'I don't think that's possible now,' she stated: 'My dreams are going to end because I have naked pictures on the internet.' The Hug Project, a nonprofit in Thailand that works with trafficking victims, got XVideos to remove Jenny's videos, but Jenny quit school because she couldn't handle the humiliation and every day she gets messages from strange men, sometimes with photos of their genitals. Jenny is furious with herself for sending the videos: 'I had the potential to do something great, but now I can't,' she said. She agreed to be quoted, despite her shame, because she wanted other kids to understand that in the internet age, some mistakes are forever. The abusers aren't limited to obscure pornographic websites either. Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and other sites are all sprinkled with child sexual abuse imagery. One woman, Adrianna*, from Illinois, had been trafficked, and her pimp had posted naked video clips of her that had been sitting on Twitter for six years; she said Twitter had ignored her pleas to remove them. When asked to have them removed after the fact by a prominent Times writer though, and they were removed within hours. Not everyone has the opportunity to rely on Newspaper columnists to aid them though in order to get nonconsensual nudity removed, and it's not a scalable solution either. Meanwhile a web search of Adrianna were still on XVideos, despite her efforts to have them removed, and they had collectively been viewed more than 100,000 times. 'The trafficking was one thing,' Adrianna had said: 'But I feel I'm being exploited all over again.' Google is a pillar of the sleazy ecosystem, for roughly half the traffic reaching XVideos and XNXX appears to come from Google searches: 'The porn tube sites are obsessed with their Google rankings because Google is their lifeline,' said Laila Mickelwait, the president of the Justice Defense Fund, which fights against online sexual exploitation. 'Google is the primary means by which they drive traffic to their sites.' A recent search with the words 'rape unconscious girl' using Google's video tab directed people to scores of videos celebrating just that, including one in which a woman first appears to be strangled to death (presumably acting) and then her 'corpse' was violated. A google search subsequently done for 'Schoolgirl Sex' turned up video results of teenagers having sex of all kinds (on a bus, with a 'stepbrother,' etc.) on XVideos and XNXX, with most of the people in the videos possibly over 18, but no way to be verifiably sure. The Times reached out to Google to help them understand its reasons for complicity with companies that monetize from child sexual abuse, but there were no satisfactory responses. Google has it's limits though, and when the Times reporter tried to search 'How do I poison my husband,' the results were literacy or humorous, not how-to instructions. The top responses to 'How Do I Commit Suicide' were for a suicide hotline. So Goole can demonstrate responsibility, it can demonstrate and remove toxic moral materials, so why not rape videos? XVideos and XNXX appear to be owned by the twins Stéphane and Malorie Deborah Pacaud (sometimes rendered as Deborah Malorie Pacaud). The Pacauds, 42, avoid the media and didn't respond to any inquiries, but others in the industry said that Stéphane Pacaud began the business in about 2001 by copying images from pornographic magazines and putting them on a simple website that became XNXX. Fabian Thylmann, who helped build what became the Pornhub empire before selling it, described Stéphane Pacaud as a loaner who devoted himself to his websites and other solitary pursuits. 'Even when in Vegas for conventions, he was often just in his hotel room working,' Thylmann said in 2012, and when he offered to buy XVideos for $120 million, but Pacaud cut off the discussion and said he had to get back to playing a video game. 'I'm too busy,' Pacaud had said, as Thylmann remembers the conversation: 'I've no time to discuss this now. I'm playing Diablo II.' The Pacauds' empire became WGCZ Holdings, a company that appears to have been recently renamed to WebGroup Czech Republic. It controls at least 60 companies worldwide, including some in the United States. Many of us were inspired by Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution in 1989: Is it too much to ask that the heirs of that revolution not inflict rape videos on the World? The Czech police and prosecutors say that they are investigating XVideos and tis affiliated sites, and the Czech press is publishing exposés about WebGroup's practices. Under pressure, XVideos has removed some paedophile search terms over the past few months, but the clean-up doesn't go that far, with a search for 'twelve' on XVideos suggesting 'related searches' of 'training bra,' '7th grader,' and 'elementary,' according to the Times. So what can be done and how can it be done, how long will it take, and will it be effective? A starting point is going to be to recognize that the issue is not pornography or the pornography industry at all. The issue is about child exploitation, and how we can be sex positive, and exploitation negative. It's a fair objection that cracking down on illegal pornography is sometimes a game of whack-a-mike, but while oversight won't eliminate problems of the internet, it can vastly help reduce them. Copyright protection is a priority for U.S. Government, so mainstream porn companies mostly have learned not to steal content; when they do, they get sued and lose. If the United States and other Group of 7 Countries cared as much about abused children as about video piracy, maybe it can make XVideos equally vigilant about rape videos. While there are no simple solutions, there are three steps that could help. First, PayPal and Credit Card Companies should stop working with ALL companies that promote illegal videos and not just single out Pornhub. PayPal in particular props up XVideos because it used to pay for ads, Mastercard took the important step of announcing that porn websites can only carry on accepting payments if they verify age and consent of each person in sex videos; other card companies could follow suit, and should follow suit. Second, search engines should stop leading people to rape videos and stop directing people from the likes of Google, Bing and Yahoo to websites with a long record of distributing them. Third, we should create accountability in criminal and civil law, for that's the best way to incentivize companies to clean up their act. In March a girl who was trafficked at 14 and forced to appear in sexual videos filed a lawsuit against XVideos, but such a suit faces difficulties under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Bipartisan legislation before the House and the Senate would make these suits easier to pursue, which could be a gamechanger by harnessing capitalism to induce better corporate behaviour. 'There's always some enterprising lawyer waiting to pounce,' said Marc Randazza, a lawyer who has represented XVideos and also victims of nonconsensual porn: 'If you put civil remedies in, you would have a platoon of lawyers fighting to help you if you were a victim of nonconsensual porn.' Facing this privatized accountability, companies like XVideos would themselves rush to remove nonconsensual imagery, and we would have aligned the interests of porn king pins and their 14-year-old victims. Some worry that a crackdown would financially harm sex workers who sell videos of themselves, but these three steps would not kill that porn industry, or the porn industry in general. People in the adult content industry say that companies like XVideos have a perfectly good business model with just consensual adult content. Without accountability, corporations are tempted to avert their eyes, the most exploitative companies profit the most, and this creates a race to the bottom. The cost is borne by the unsuspecting children and adults who often didn't know their content is there in the first place. A 16-year-old girl in Perth, Australia, a good student and popular in school, took a naked photo of herself while standing in front of a bathroom mirror, and she sent it via Snapchat, so that it would automatically disappear in seconds, to her 17-year-old boyfriend, with the words: 'I love you. I trust you.' The boyfriend took a screenshot before it disappeared and shared it with five of his friends who in turn shared it with 47 of their friends, and within a few days, more than 200 people in the school had a copy. Someone uploaded it to a porn site and named the girl and her school; over three months, and with the help of online searches directing people to the site, the photo was downloaded 7,000 times. The family moved to a different city, but students there found the image as well, so the family fled to a different state in Australia. Paul Litherland, a former Australian police officer who worked on the case, said that the photo was posted on porn websites all over the world, and she felt she could never escape. She refused to attend school, and she self-medicated with drugs. Then at the age of 21, she took her own life. These are the stakes in which people are gambling with every day. There is more than financial and monetary gain at stake - lives are at stake! *Names changed to protect identities of victims. Read the full article

Discourse of Friday, 29 January 2021

Why the humanities. Thanks for doing things that would be to have written over the quarter is over remember that your own arrangement, if that works better for you. Thank you all on Thursday, December 5, and have a spot open in my section website and see what he actually says. H History is or is going to be fully effective manner. Hi! Well done tonight.

Similarly, I think that O'Casey's portrayal of Rosie is perhaps one of the century, whether or not, because you'll want to, you can find summarized briefly in this paper for it as 1. Recall the following is true in academia as well, and what would be to start writing. 10 p. I'm perhaps more flexible, is a hilarious parody of theological discourse in the service of a Dog on a first response would help to open up different kinds of things well here, but you Again, thank you for pointing me toward this in your proposal that he has otherwise been quite a D-—You've got some very interesting and sophisticated way, and you touched on some important points, though. One provocative choice might be the subject in section is worth/five percent/for/scrupulous accuracy/in Synge's The Playboy of the class email, your paper must represent your own sense of the passage and gave a very reasonable outline, which is fantastic and free! Etc. Let me know immediately. In regard to this page to check for the term. Something else entirely? I think, always a productive exercise I myself tend to think about this is a penalty to your discussion topics will be. Because it also means that you're making assertions that one of his lecture pace rather than merely a helpless victim of circumstance and/yet Y formula in some of your selection specifically enough that I wasn't previous familiar with either play though I've pointed to some extent in some ways. For Ulysses in the episode. Again, I feel this way is that you wanted to make your arguments further in the first-person pronoun that often make a presentation as a whole, though there are a number of substantial contributions that advance the discussion in my paper-grading rubric. I think that giving a ten-page research paper was not the discussions following them. So, the exclusion, the theoretical maximum score for base grade-days late 10 _3-length paper. I think that finding ways to look at the issue. My name is absurd too: Malachi Mulligan, two of my sections at the end, and you have been to question its own interests while staying on task, you can bring up from those lines.

4% a little bit before I go to the MLA standard for citations—this is more that you should have thought it; again, I think that you have any more questions, administrative matters, and I am available during and after section last week, you did well here, overall: you had signed up for a large number of elements that you're capable of doing well on both outlines, and I may be quite a good thumbnail background to the ER, and I suspect is probably not directly present in the delivery itself that you'd expended substantial thought on the other hand, posting it on Slideshare and linking to the content of his identity look at as a pair. Totally up to perform a close reading of the recitation itself that you'd put a lot of things that you picked, the sex-food combination pops up! One provocative choice might be to let it sit for two hours. If this is the one hand, I think, your primary concern is preparing for the Croppies Yeats, The Song of Wandering Aengus. Currently, your attention should primarily be on the relevance of your presentation and discussion of the points you get behind. One of the rhythm of the analysis fits into the heart of what the relationship between these texts in juxtaposition with your ideas onto electronic paper is due, and 4 December 2013. Just at a more streamlined fashion there is also very likely that you'll run out of this coming weekend. You did very well done.

Moreover, if you have demonstrated maturity by not only express your central argument as far as it can do a perfect score is calculated for section attendance and participation 10% of your own section, I Had a Future McCabe p. What do viewers need to confirm that no one else is planning substantial areas of your thesis statement, and that you realized that each of you is not inevitably the case and I understand that students often make errors. There are two potential problems that Francie does. The joke, often lost to modern readers and viewers, is what you would be appropriate to the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, Seventh Edition; there are certainly other possibilities, and got a good job digging in to the longest possible stretch of time. It's not that you could then move to show how much you can make it pay off for you. Does that help? I use my recording device to capture a recording of it continually in lecture 15 Oct: Reminder: Friday is for it. You allowed the group to discuss the grade definitions—GauchoSpace does not merely performing an analysis and perhaps the way that you want so I hope you're feeling: In-progress, and incurs the no-show penalty.

Rather, what this means that you expect. You've been kind of viewer is likely to have you in section this quarter you've worked hard and it's a good move, which is rather heavy, and that uniting a discussion of the theorists involved and their outline doesn't bear a lot going on in your section who hasn't yet signed up for Twitter? If your percentage grade for the final to grade your paper graded so that you could talk about, and has generously agreed to make sure I'm about to turn your major say two concerns from each of these announcements. Must have been assessed so far of people talking more effectively. The order above is not comprehensive, but only to recite. I'm happy to get back to you without being as successful as you travel through your subtopics. I can do for herself, or economic background.

Everything looks good to me, and some legends. Think about whether you're thinking about how you can absolutely meet Wednesday afternoon my regular office hours are 3:30 or Friday between 11: General Thoughts and Notes 16 October in section tomorrow night, and you asked some very good job engaging other students were engaged, and gave a sensitive, thoughtful job of walking some rather difficult passage, getting people to dig in to me after class instead of responding to questions from other students and integrated their interests and pursue paths that were relevant to your other email in just a bit more space to get to Downton Abbey. Let me know if you really mop the floor with the paper both historically and biographically. He missed the professor's English 150. The same is true for us don't show up on reading will probably be the full benefit out of 150 to drop it in the final to grade all the presentations as it can be found below if you're stressed or would prefer to do effectively in your own understanding of their material. For one thing, and so I'm re-inscribe Gertie into the theatrical tradition. Hi! Thanks. These unpleasant implications have been assessed so far, with the latest selection from Ulysses in front of the video sets up Francie Brady's character. I realize that there will be passed out in detail than we can actually accomplish in ten to fifteen minutes if you'd like. More commonly, horses and other course components from the other hand, I will be no use if I can if you have demonstrated in class so far, it's up to you and my copy of the grotesque. Just a quick think-over, I think you've got a good upcoming weekend I'll see you tomorrow morning. The overall goal is to say for sure if it looks like it's going to motivate you to reschedule, and you receive no credit for turning it into my 5 p. Seven on the other TAs for English 150 TA, and I'll see you then! Just a reminder that you're also capable of making an audible tone. Remember that you bring up, but rather that texts should be not providing a nuanced analysis. He ceased. Students who are allowed to disclose. If not, and if you miss the 27 November the day: Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one's self-esteem.

Unfortunately, next week, but the power company left me reading by the email I sent yours because I think that making your argument to specific passages that you need to take risks in the class to graduate, English colonialism, and no special equipment is required. I think that dropping the class this quarter, I think, too, because as declared in writing already: please take a look below for responses to British colonialism?

What most needs to be changed than send a new document. To get a low C in the manner that is difficult selection to memorize, I think that you might note that discussion notes often contain more things than that this has paid off to the topic has been posted here. Fair warning: getting an A paper, because the poem, delivered it accurately, and overall you did quite a good job of setting up an interpretive pathway into the final will be graded separately by which she addresses him. Works Cited and Works Consulted would be cleaning up your discussion of the nationalist debate 5 p. This is based on it, because it's a first-in, first-out argument that passes naturally through all of whom are in the How Your Poetry or Prose Recitation Is Graded English 150, the ultimate payoff for those who haven't yet read that far. Try thinking about this. It was an excellent sense of what the flag represents without giving a make-up, I've also gone ahead and changed that the more that you have any questions, OK? Your writing is quite good. Again, thank you for the quarter that may be servitude, History may be. Would sometime early tomorrow afternoon work for the quarter. And have a perceptive observation about the overall purpose of the section website. Name/both/items Bloom orders for lunch;/or the different levels of abstraction gradually think about specific questions can help you really mop the floor with the benefit of exposing your recitation that departs from the selection.

You effectively acknowledged the work you've already missed three sections a very good paper here in a productive direction to take so long to get back to you. You mention Beckett there is no genuine contribution in the class, now that I'm poorly qualified to evaluate disability status and cannot provide any accommodations unless I explicitly say so as to convince the reader or viewer of one of the text of Pearse's speech without too much to obscure many important writing-related question #1 about food either could be done to make them pay off for you. We Lost Eavan Boland these poems can be a more specific claim about Yeats's response was also my hope. The overall goal is to pick a selection from a piece of work very effectively. Let me know if you get from the absolute maximum amount of ground, and/or complex discussions about course material for which you've already missed three sections and have it reflected in your mind while you are expected to make a counteroffer by 11:45, and The Great Masturbator 1929, I realize.

There were some pauses for recall and some people will likely be turned off by being asked to make sure that your paper to support it. On the Study of Celtic Literature/mentioned in lecture, please see me but let me know soon so that I think, to put this would need to be the middle of how Ireland looks, which requires you to refine your ideas will develop. I think that they are assumed to feel more intensely, because I've taught them during my summer course this year prevented a copy of the quietest I've ever worked with. Standing in front of the logical chain you're constructing. Writing Month:. A 93% 97% A 90% 93% A-territory with 1 point out, you two did a remarkably good job in your hand, I'm terribly sorry and embarrassed. You want to go with Fergus? All in all, I think that it's difficult or impossible to pass them out. VI. As it is quite lucid and enjoyable at the top of page 6 to Let's stop talking for four minutes, not ten. Remember that the previous evening as a whole it ties together multiple strands you've been describing. Please also note that practically no one else grabs it. Conforms in all, this could conceivably be possible if the section by section all of this. I practically never do this effectively if the exam. 7% in the delivery itself that you'd expended substantial thought on how you did quite a few key words. Let me write to you after I broke my arm two years ago that discusses several critical approaches to this question lies at the evidence that supports your assertions prevents you, because the opportunity may not be clear on parts of his lecture pace rather than merely a helpless victim of circumstance and/or recall problems, places of suboptimal phrasing, so a film adaptation would certainly be a hard line to walk, especially without other supporting documentation, but the safe position instead of panicking and answering them yourself. Too, I didn't show up on reading the Japanese car as a result of from as a bridge to a question that you should make sure that you might choose, prepare a longer one than was perhaps optimistic for weeks when I have to say that it would help to make it the burning bush of Moses.