#looks like hes about to fuck roseanne good and hard
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The Righteous Gemstones is what happened if Jim Bakker had actually loved Tammy Faye and not just use her as a tool to gain more money and power.
This is all based on having binged season 1 in a single day, FYI. I have seen nothing of season 2.
Eli LOVES Amiee-Leigh. LOVES. And, my god, John Goodman, the fact you do not have an emmy for this show (and several other shows) is a goddamn crime.
But. Seriously, Danny McBride wrote the an ACTUAL love story between Eli and Amiee-Leigh that is what Tammy Faye Baker DESERVED to have in her own marriage (Jim Bakker can fucking choke).
But even more than that, Danny McBride has said he wasn't writing a show about making fun of religion; he was writing a show about looking at hypocricy, and jesus fuck me, my dude, you fucking nailed it. Aimee-Leigh and Eli are true believers. Kelvin is a true believer. They are surrounded by somewhat-true (I think Jesse means well) to just full-on fucking with you (Judy, my queen) believers. But also, it's not so easily black and white. Jesse grew up the first son of a prominent religious family with fame and money. Judy grew up the first daughter of the same family. And that's a fucking hard difference to experience. Meanwhile, Kelvin shows up later--after the money's made--and is (in my opinion) absolutely coded the queerest southern gospel queer to ever queer but who has not ever activated the queer. And I'm not even sure at the end of season one that he realizes he WANTS to activate the queer. But there's a YEARNING between him and Keefe that fucking kneecaps me for its perfection of queer yearning in conservative religious circles.
I digress.
Look, I grew up an hour south of Branson, Missouri, okay. Uncle Baby Billy telling Aimee-Leigh they were gonna end their tour in Branson made me laugh my fucking ass off. Because Uncle Baby Billy and Aimee-Leigh are what would have happened if Donny and Marie Osmond were fucking snakes.
(Sidenote: I absolutely think that the mainstream LDS is a fucking cult. I think several mainstream versions of Christianity (Assemblies of God) put cult tactics to work to scare people into staying, but if I gotta choose which one to stop before the other, I'm going after the LDS because it IS a cult.)
But the other thing about Aimee-Leigh and Baby Billy is that Aimee-Leigh isn't trying to trick people into giving her money via charisma whereas Baby Billy absolutely IS. He uses his own sister--a true believer--to try and make it happen. And Aimee-Leigh, bless Danny McBride and the writing staff--have her light him up like a July 4th display.
It's fucking fascinating to me that John Goodman has repeatedly played a loving, caring, understanding, respectful, and ADORING husband to women who hold their own power. He did it on Roseanne. He did it on Alpha House. He's doing it on Righteous Gemstones.
And Aimee-Leigh's pre-pilot death doesn't feel gross or reductive. It feels like a genuine grief that's been simmering in a family for a bit. She's remembered with deep fondness and respect. She's noted as being the one to teach the most important lessons (don't turn your back on family) while also being shown--in flashback--of having boundaries (Baby Billy lies to her to try and get her to tour; she finds out and shuts down the tour). Aimee-Leigh is an angel in the eyes of the family because she was a good fucking person. But she's also no longer there to stop them from doing stupid shit.
Why does Baby Billy get to take over the new satellite church in the former Sears in the mall (a fucking hilarious repeated joke I would like to frame, btw). Because Eli is doing what he THINKS Aimee-Leigh would have wanted him to do; give her brother another chance. But we also see in the flashback episode that 1) Eli adores Aimee-Leigh and will do whatever she thinks is best for herself (fucking good) and 2) That Aimee-Leigh utterly understands that Baby Billy is a fucking asshole. No fucking way would Aimee-Leigh, were she alive to have an opinion, agree to give Baby Billy any power within their megachurch structure. Send him cash? Probably. Give him power? Absolutely not.
And that's one of the great things about The Righteous Gemstones. It's not a cut and dried joke about religion or southerners or southern families or any of that shit. It's an in-depth and respectful view of a family. Aimee-Leigh would NEVER want Baby Billy to have power in the church because he's proven he's not in it for the right reasons. But Eli, grieving widower of an adored wife who also adored him, he wants to make space for the black sheep of the family because Aimee-Leigh said, "You should never turn your back on family," and when you're dealing with the memory of someone, it's common to wipe out the common sense caveat of "Unless it's that butthole brother of mine who lied to me."
Beyond that, I could sit here and name so many fucking moments in season one that showed depth and thought from the characters. The one I'll concentrate on for the moment is Jesse's Easter Sunday sermon that focuses on what Judas must have been feeling as Jesus rose from the dead.
Contextually, it's a commentary on Jesse lying about not fucking around on his wife and on Gideon, Jesse's oldest son, hiding the fact he blackmailed his own father.
But also, Easter is the sermon that is ALWAYS about forgiveness. That's kind of the whole fucking bag of it. Jesus died to forgive our sins. So, forgiveness is key to being a good Christian. Except that rather and do the usual sermon about "Jesus died for you, so live for him," Jesse steps on that stage and takes a turn that would NOT be welcome in a megachurch. "How did Judas feel? What was it like for Judas to know he'd done what he did?"
Megachurch audiences do NOT want to feel for Judas because megachurch audiences want black and white morality. Jesus was good. Judas was bad.
But, in the world of The Righteous Gemstones, a hypocrite fuck of a megachurch preacher can step up to the pulpit and give a complicated and interesting sermon on forgiving Judas. Because he is genuinely realizing and questioning why he thinks he's untouchable.
That's why the show is so fucking good. It doesn't mock faith or religion. It jams pointy things against hypocrites and shows that either they learn and grow, or they refuse to learn and pay the price.
I remind you, at the end of this post, that I'm an atheist. I'm not here to convince anyone to get into religion. But I grew up utterly drowning in exactly this sort of religion The Righteous Gemstones investigates, and I will always, always, ALWAYS put my time and hope behind people who seem to be truly trying to do their best, and that's the story Danny McBride and his team are telling.
Even Baby Billy, the fucking asshole, is doing the best he can. He's just literally the worst goddamn fuckboy in the whole shitty system.
#the righteous gemstones#uncle baby billy#eli gemstone#amy-leigh gemstone#gemstone kids#you fucking idiots#i love all of you#megachurches
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My Cast For A Modern Day Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare
This topic has been on my mind since the 2010 remake of the original A Nightmare on Elm Street came out, due to all of those rumors circulating from around that time of a sequel to said remake, which would combine Freddy's Revenge and Dream Warriors together...somehow? Anyway, I got to thinking about a potential Freddy's Dead remake, and what that would look like/who the potential cast would be for such a thing.
For this casting list, I will:
Not be trying to rewrite the characters I'm casting. For example, I'm not going to say that Spencer's genderfluid/gay/has ADHD because those are things that I headcanon him to have, and they're not brought up in the canon of the original movie.
Not be rewriting the plot of Freddy's Dead. That is not the point of this post at all, and also that is at least an AU fic on AO3's worth of writing, and I'm already trying to plan that out.
Make my choices based on an actor's visual resemblance to the original characters mostly. If there are other resemblances, such as personality or vocal, I will point those out too.
Not be including any cameo characters (ie. Alice Cooper as Mr. Underwood or Roseanne and Tom Arnold as that crazy Springwood couple) because there are too many, they are insignificant, and we'd be here for a while. I also will not be recasting Freddy himself, as I have an attachment to Robert Englund's Freddy.
THESE CHOICES ARE PURELY MY OPINION! If you don't agree with my decisions, or if you actually have another actor/actress for the character I list, feel free to leave them in the replies.
Okay, with all the disclaimers and explanations out of the way, let's start things off here with the main four teenagers. So that's John Doe, Carlos Rodriguez, Spencer Lewis and Tracy Swan.
John Doe - Joe Keery
Starting off with the blank slate fake protagonist character probably wasn't a good idea, but here we go. Totally didn't have same problem as I did with Tracy /s. I actually had Jake T. Austin in this slot last night, but after sleeping on it, and doing the other three teenagers, I changed my mind and decided to look at other options. Looking at those other options led me to Joe Keery, specifically when he played Steve Harrington in Stranger Things.
Freddy's Dead's John Doe really isn't out of Joe Keery's wheelhouse when you think about it. He played Steve Harrington, a teenager who fought the modern day equivalent to Freddy Krueger, and John Doe died by the actual character of Freddy Krueger. The physical resemblance between them is clearly there, Joe's hair is a little longer, and he has a slightly smaller face shape, but that's about the only differences I can see. John Doe and Steve also deal with people not believing them when referring to supernatural happenings that are currently occurring/literal fucking demons wrecking havoc on a town they're from. Also John is canonically the oldest teenager in the movie, being 18 years old, and Steve was 19 during Stranger Things season 4. So Joe Keery is no stranger to playing characters younger than he is in real life.
Carlos Rodriguez - Omar Rudberg
Do I even need to explain? LOOK AT THIS PHYSICAL RESEMBLANCE! THEY ARE THE EXACT SAME PERSON???? IT'S SO UNCANNY!!
When I first saw Omar Rudberg in Young Royals pictures and gifs, I literally only saw a modern version of Carlos. Then I discovered this picture of him in this outfit on Pinterest, and I remembered this outfit Carlos wore in the beginning of Freddy's Dead, and it only solidified my brain's decision for me.
Here's a bonus pic of Omar in a hoodie that's very similar in hue to the one Carlos wears for the rest of the movie :)
Speaking of Young Royals...
Spencer Lewis - Edvin Ryding
Y'all I had such a hard time with Spencer. There was almost no one that looked like Spencer in the modern age, which is surprising given that long hair on guys is still a fairly popular trend, but I finally decided to give this imaginary recasted role to Edvin Ryding. While Edvin may not look exactly like a young Breckin Meyer, he still has that essence of Spencer's general appearance, in my opinion. Also, Edvin has already partially played Spencer's character type in Young Royals as Prince Wilhelm. By character type, I mean someone of an affluent background struggling with being themselves and rebelling against the traditions, standards, and or expectations set by those before them. Also Omar Rudberg is Carlos in this imaginary recasting, so Edvin being here also just seems right for that reason.
Tracy Swan - Hunter Schafer
Ah Tracy...Tracy, Tracy Tracy. You were a challenge too, but for the opposite reason of Spencer. While Spencer had almost no one that looked even remotely like him, you had WAY TOO MANY options for me to pick from, I essentially went from a drought to a flood. Anyways, I chose Hunter Schafer for the role of Tracy mainly for her appearance, plus Jules Vaughn looks like a girl who can whoop an ass despite looking like a twig. Also, Hunter just has that natural look on her face that screams "I don't give a flying fuck about what you're saying, leave me the fuck alone."
Moving on to the two main adult figures in the movie, beyond the kids' parents and Freddy because I already said I'm not including them here, Dr. Maggie Burnham and Doc (why the hell did they not give him a real name????)
Dr. Maggie Burnham - Winona Ryder
I have no other justification for this than physical resemblance. I mean, this could also be my brain processing voices weirdly, but Lisa Zane and Winona Ryder sound extremely similar to each other. Winona Ryder was also a 90's staple actress, so I felt like it would be appropriate for a remake/recasting for an early 90's movie to include her. She's already playing a motherly/authoritarian role to a bunch of kids that aren't hers in Stranger Things, too, so that checks out. No, including her and Joe Keery in the same list was not intentional.
Doc - Eamonn Walker
(I used this pic of Eamonn because almost every time we see Doc he's in the gym training with Tracy.)
I already knew this one was going to be difficult, as no one can truly replace the great Yaphet Kotto. However, for this recasting I had to, so for Doc I chose Eamonn Walker! For those who don't recognize Eamonn, he plays Chief Boden on Chicago Fire. I only know who he is because my mother is obsessed with the Chicago trilogy of shows. I will make the note that Eamonn and Yaphet once again sound very similar to me.
So there's my modern day recasting of the main six characters of Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare! Like I said, I wasn't going to include Freddy himself, or any of the cameo characters. We would have been here forever if I were to do that, and this recasting alone took me two days to do, so yeah.
((Since I'm a masochist if you want to know who I'd cast as the kids' parents in the modern day, lmk))
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he's so hot
#why does he look like he's about to put me over his knee#sir that lap looks mighty comfy and empty ngl#looks like he just told you a dirty joke#either that or he's flirting#or he told another dad joke to piss roseanne off#candleking#ztarvokwrites#onepiece#galdino#looks like hes about to fuck roseanne good and hard#:)
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Competition
Blackpink Rosé x Male Reader
8325 words
categories - smut, rough sex, oral, degradation, dirty talk, daddy kink, voyeurism
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read on AFF
read on AO3
Rosé just wanted to enjoy her day off.
There she was at her favorite cafe with her best friend, sipping on her iced americano on a hot summer day, trying to ignore Jennie’s annoying habit of guessing the dick size of every young guy that walked into the cafe.
“Six inches...eight inches…” Jennie quietly said, subtlety pointing at each man entering.
“No, wait...nine inches. He’s definitely packing.”
“Can you stop being a slut for five seconds?” Rosé asked, loudly slurping on her drink.
“Have you met me?” Jennie laughed.
“Sadly yes,” Rosé teased. “Your legs are like a convenience store, they never close.”
Jennie stuck her tongue out. “You’re just jealous that I get dicked down more. Oh, that guy definitely has a huge cock.”
“Are you trying to beat your record? Getting fucked by four guys wasn’t enough? Unnie, save some cock for the rest of us.”
“There’s plenty here to go around. Like a dick buffet."
“God, you really are a whore. You do know you don't actually need dick to survive?"
“You’re just saying that because not every guy will drop his pants for you.”
Rosé scoffed. “Is that so? You think I couldn’t pick any cute guy here to suck off in the bathroom?”
“That’s too easy, there’s nothing but hot guys here. You need a real challenge.”
“I’ll take whatever you can throw at me.”
“You’re on then. Follow me.”
✦✦
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Jennie asked.
“I’m not backing down,” Rosé said.
“Fine. Two rules, and you must accept both.”
“No problem.”
“The first - the next guy who shows up. It doesn’t matter who - you drop to your knees and you suck him off.“
“That’s it? The bathroom is right there, this will be a cakewalk.”
“Bathroom? Sorry, Rosie, that’s off-limits. That’s too easy. You suck his fucking dick right here.”
“What? Are you out of your fucking mind?” Rosé said exasperatedly.
“Too scared? Don’t worry I’ll keep an eye out.”
“Fine, whatever. What’s the second rule?”
“No swallowing. I know that’ll be difficult for a little cumslut like you.”
Rosé scoffed. “What do I do when he cums then?”
“That’s not my problem, you figure it out,” Jennie laughed.
“Fine. You’re on you whore.“
✦✦
You had one plan for the day, pick up new clothes for work, and head out. Your favorite department store was always crowded after work, so you took the morning off, needing to run other errands at the same time anyways. You used your time to shop early first thing, seeing very little people getting in your way.
Heading towards the section you always browsed, you walked with purpose, but before reaching your destination you were stopped as you heard a voice to your left.
“H-hi!”
You saw what caused the interruption - two gorgeous women to your left, one slightly skinnier than the other with colorful hair in a variety of pink and purple hues.
“Hi? Uh, can I help you, ladies?”
The girl with the purple hair smiled. “Well, in a way. I’m here to help you.”
Her voice was accentuated by an incredibly sexy Australian accent, were it not for that you would have completely ignored her. You didn’t really know what she was talking about or what she wanted but you weren’t that interested anyway.
“I’m sorry but I’m pretty busy right now,” you replied.
“Oh, this won’t take long. Well...it might depending on you,” she playfully said with a giggle.
“You’re stalling, Rosie,” the dark-haired woman said.
“If you’re trying to sell me something I’m not interested, I’m just here to pick some things up for work,” you said.
“We’re not!” she responded.
“Rosie-”
“How you’d like to get your dick sucked today?” She abruptly asked, throwing you completely off-guard.
“I’m sorry, what?”
She smiled again. “It’s still pretty early. Wouldn’t you like to start your day off by having a pretty girl sucking your cock?”
You were stunned. “I-I, I don’t even know you-”
“Well, my name is Roseanne, but you can call me Rosé. This is my friend Jennie, but you don’t have to pay attention to her.” Not simply just Rose, but Rosé. You might have rolled your eyes were you not looking in their direction.
“What the fuck-” Jennie complained.
“It’s not every day you get an offer like this, is it? If you’re not interested in a little you know...” she said, making a jerking off motion and miming her cheek being full.
“I’ll just leave you alone and find someone else.”
“Wait. Hold on-”
“See? Told you he’d be interested, “ Jennie said.
“I’m very good at it,” Rosé smirked, sweetening the pot. Well, how could you refuse an offer like that?
“So you’ll just blow me...just like that?”
“Of course,” Rosé eagerly responded.
“Why? I’m just a stranger.”
“That’s part of the fun. Does it really matter why?”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“Come on then,” Rosé said as she offered her hand and whisked you away to a faraway part of the department.
“This will do nicely,” she said.
“Wait. Here? There’s like two bathrooms right over there”
“Bathrooms are against the rules,” Jennie interrupted.
“Rules?”
“We’re just having some friendly competition,” Rosé said.
You hesitated. “We could get caught, arrested or who knows what else.“
“Isn’t that also part of the fun? The thrill of getting caught? Besides, I’ll be making you feel so good you won’t even be thinking of anything else. ” Rosé said with a flirty smile.
“I’ll be a really good lookout,“ Jennie said.
“Look, do you want me to suck your dick or not? I’m not gonna ask again,” Rosé asked impatiently.
“O-of course I do.”
It was a rather secluded area in the corner of the men’s department. High shelves and mannequins dressed better than you ever had blocked most of the view, and Jennie found herself in a rather perfect position to keep an eye out for anyone who would ruin the fun.
Still, you couldn’t help but feel nervous as Rosé slowly lowered her body down until her knees hit the carpet, positioning herself in front of a rack of expensive-looking sports jackets that obscured the view as she grabbed a hairband off her wrist and used it to tie her hair up into a messy ponytail.
“Relax,” Rosé reassured as she began unfastening your pants, dragging your zipper down as if in slow motion as she looked up, giving you a good look at her natural features. Rosé was so beautiful to look at. Her eyes were gorgeous, her full pink lips looked so kissable as you braced yourself, knowing you were about to feel them on your body.
She yanked your pants down to your ankles, and her eyes were drawn to the forming bulge in your boxers as she licked her lips. Grabbing a handful of crotch she rubbed at your cock through the restricting fabric of your underwear, planning her next move as she traced the outline of your hardening shaft.
“What should I call you?” she pondered.
“Well, I do have a name. It’s- “
“No names,” she bluntly interrupted. “If you tell me your name then you won’t be a stranger anymore.”
Rosé grabbed the waistband of your boxers and pulled them down in one swift swooping motion, releasing your trapped cock and briefly avoiding getting smacked in the face with it.
“Wow,” she said full of surprise as her eyes grew wide at the sight of your unleashed shaft.
“Can I call you...Daddy?” Rosé asked as she grabbed your dick and squeezed gently, stroking slowly as her fingers wrapped around your hard throbbing shaft.
“Call me anything you like.”
“Okay. You have a really nice cock, daddy.”
The second time she used the word you felt a tingle up your spine.
“That’s a little overboard, Rosie,” Jennie teased as she overheard.
“Just shut up and do your job,” she fired back.
And there you were, trying to process it all. Your pants down to your ankles in the middle of a fucking department store, being jerked off by a girl you had met no less than five minutes ago. Her innocent face was at odds with what she was doing, and you weren’t sure why you had landed such an opportunity, but quite frankly you didn’t care and were going to enjoy every moment.
Rosé watched the look in your eyes as she stroked your cock, spitting on your shaft to help lubricate it as she twisted her soft delicate hand as she squeezed and pumped up and down, making you leak all over her fingers. She enjoyed it all too much, it was as if she was testing you to see how long you could hold out until you felt her lips.
The moment you felt her wet tongue pressing flat against your shaft, gently brushing up from base to tip you groaned louder than expected, feeling the wetness of her saliva being left in the form of a thin sheen all over your cock.
Rosé did not miss a spot, flicking up and down every inch of your shaft before she found your swollen sensitive tip and began swirling around it in a way she had done many times before, collecting your pre-cum as her tongue gathered every drop that leaked out of your slit.
Her sparkling eyes looked up once more as if to ask if you were ready, although nothing could prepare you for the next few moments. Giving a chaste kiss on the very tip of your shaft, Rosé wettened her lips and they parted as they wrapped around your cock and you felt yourself entering the warmth of Rosé’s mouth.
“F-fuck,” you moaned, as her pretty lips sealed around the head of your cock, gently sucking your tip while keeping a hand stroking your shaft.
She began to bob her head as her lips went deeper down your shaft and retracted back, giving you deep satisfying pleasure as her lips slowly sucked you off at a slow sensual pace.
"That feels fucking amazing."
"I taught her everything she knows," Jennie butted in.
"Oh please," Rosé said, rolling her eyes."I give way better head than you. You just go for quantity over quality."
Your eyebrow furrowed, letting her know you didn’t know what she meant by that.
“Jennie sucked four guys off in a bathroom once. And they all fucked her after that.”
“You girls are wild.”
“We just like to have fun,” Jennie replied.
The warmth of Rosé’s mouth returned, as the pace of her blowjob changed dramatically, slobbering all over your cock as she used one hand to stroke your cock in a corkscrew motion while the other fondled your balls.
“They feel so full, daddy. Seems like you have a lot of cum for me.”
It didn’t take long until Rosé was taking most of you inside her mouth, slurping on your cock like she had missed breakfast and was starving. Her lips felt so soft and her mouth felt so wet, you’d had to admit this was easily one of the best blowjobs you’d ever had.
“God, you’re really good at this,” you admitted, encouraging Rosé as she slapped your cock on her wet pink tongue before licking all around it.
“I’m glad you like it, daddy.”
Her lips tightened around your shaft as she slurped and moaned around your cock, loud enough to make you remember you were very much not in a place designed for such a lewd act, trusting Jennie to keep an eye out.
Rosé bobbed her head faster as she gave long, deep satisfying strokes with her plump lips, moving closer to the end of your cock each time.
“This is my favorite part,” she said with a sly smile, adding more suction and saliva with every movement until her lips met your base and she began deepthroating you, causing you to hit the back of her tight throat and groaned in pleasure.
“Oh f-fuuck,” you moaned, throwing your head back.
The time for slow and sensual was over, as Rosé swallowed up your cock, messily sucking on it with her hungry mouth as she braced herself on your thighs, keeping the oral onslaught on your cock at full potential.
“I hope you’re almost done with him, Rosie. I keep seeing more and more people,” Jennie said.
“Oh, I think we’re getting to the finish line. You’re close aren’t you, daddy?”
You weren’t given a chance to respond as you felt your cock hit the back of Rosé’s tight warm throat, maintaining constant eye contact as she took you deep down as you would fit. Her lips hit your base with every stroke and she moved rapidly from base to tip and then the reverse, not once feeling the need to come up for air as pleasured your cock, wildly bobbing her head up and down to draw out your orgasm.
You closed your eyes almost involuntarily. Savoring the way Rosé’s soft lips traveled up and down your shaft, leaving a trail of saliva and the hungrily slurp of her lips and her wet tongue playing around with the underside of your needy shaft.
There wasn’t a chance in hell you were going to last much longer, and you were thankful for that as Rosé sucked the life out of your cock, that knot in your belly tightening more and more by the second.
“I...I’m gonna cum.”
Rosé’s eyes lit up as she pulled your cock out of her mouth, furiously jerking you off in anticipation. You waited for her to open her mouth back up again, surely she wasn’t going to let you-
“She’s not allowed to swallow,” Jennie explained as she approached for a closer look at the action, interrupting your thoughts.
“Another rule?” you asked. Jennie nodded. “You sure have a lot of rules.”
“Just have to keep it interesting. We do this a lot, “ Jennie smirked.
Rosé kept the pressure on your cock as she stroked even faster, the gears turning in her head as she realized that without the ability to keep your cum contained in her pretty mouth that there weren’t a whole lot of places for your cum to go. Except for all over her.
“I can’t wait for you to explode, daddy.”
You just stood there, practically motionless as you watched Rosé jerking you off furiously, one stroking your cock while the other fondled your balls, doing everything she could to drain your balls as fast as possible.
Watching the eagerness in your eyes, you felt every stroke through your entire body, the faster and longer she stroked the deeper your breathing became until you gave into the pleasure.
“Oh god, I’m-”
You groaned louder than you were expecting as you erupted all over Rosé’s stunning innocent features. Rosé leaned forward as her face collected thick milky strands of hot cum everywhere, painting her forehead and cheeks, her cute nose, and her pink lips. You felt all the tension in your body being released all at once as Rosé milked every last drop onto her beautiful face, her expression in awe at how much of your load she had covered herself in.
Rosé smiled widely and proudly, cleaning off the remains of your cock clean and feeling a wetness between her thighs forming at the task she had just performed in public.
“We should go. It’s getting busier,” Jennie said.
“I’ll just head to the bathroom and then we can leave-”
Jennie looked down at the girl with her face covered in your cum. “Bathroom? Did you forget already?”
“You said I couldn’t use it to suck his cock in,” Rosé said as she stood, feeling the weight of your load as it began dripping down her face.
“Well, you can’t use it to clean up either. And no using your shirt either. “
“Jennie, what the fuck? Aren’t you taking this a bit too far?”
“Am I? You wanted to dethrone me, didn’t you? Then you’ll walk outside with this messy fucking load all over your slutty face.”
Rosé sighed, frustrated, and dumbfounded.
“You can’t be fucking serious. Look at me, I’m a mess.”
“Hey, you agreed to this. You can clean yourself off when we get to the car, I’ll bring it around front. Now, give him your number before anything, and I’ll meet you there,” Jennie said as she gave Rosé’s cum-stained face a long lick, sampling a bit of your semen and licking her lips.
“You taste good. It was nice meeting you,” she smiled and headed off in her own direction.
“Jennie!” Rosé yelled, realizing she was powerless to do anything at this point. She couldn’t waste any more time as you grabbed your phone and handed it to her as she inputted her digits into it, calling herself as you heard the vibration of her phone in your pocket.
“I’ll see you later,” she said with a nervous smile as she hurriedly exited the department, trying to avoid anyone and everyone as she was still covered with you as she stepped into a waiting car idling by the entrance.
✦✦
You don’t remember what time it was, but you felt the buzz of your phone going off twice as you stared up at the ceiling, resting from both the day's events and an unusually long day of work.
There were two messages as you checked your phone, both from the girl named Rosé which you had met earlier as part of your lucky day. The first was a full-body selfie, showing herself still in the same outfit from before.
The second message was an address.
These clothes are annoying me, daddy. Come take them off of me.
Well, you certainly weren’t going to refuse such an offer.
Twenty minutes later you arrived at her apartment, both excited and nervous to see her again.
“Rosie, your dick appointment is here,” Jennie said as you knocked on the door as she unexpectedly answered it.
“Oh, hi, daddy!” Rosé excitedly said as she scurried to the door. Jennie verbally groaned. “Are you still going to call him that?”
“Yes. You don’t mind do you, daddy?” Rosé said playfully. While her outfit remained the same, you clearly noticed the lack of a bra, not that you minded.
“Not at all.”
“See, I thought so. Okay, time for you to go, Jennie. I’m sure like twelve guys are waiting in a public bathroom somewhere to give you all a facial again.”
“It was only four. And you think I'm going to miss out on all the fun?” Jennie said.
Rosé rolled her eyes. “Well, I’m not going to let him fuck you too if that’s what you’re thinking. His cock is too nice to share with your slutty ass.”
“You selfish whore.”
“Find your own cock, Jennie, this one is all mine.” Rosé smiled.
“Fine,” Jennie huffed, as she grabbed something out of Rosé’s back pocket. “But I’m going to be nice and help out. Might as well put this new phone to good use, hm Rosie?”
“Oh my god, you’re so annoying. Can’t you go be a slut somewhere else?”
Jennie turned her attention towards you. “Look, if you’re going to have a hot night with this little slut, wouldn’t you like to be able to replay it over and over?”
“That does sound nice…”
“I’m sorry you have to deal with her, daddy,” Rosé sighed. “Fine, but you don’t get to touch him, and stay out of the way.”
“I’ll be just like a ghost.”
You weren’t expecting a second pair of eyes, but given the circumstances in how you met Rosé, you felt like anything could happen with these two.
Rosé grabbed your hand and led you to the bedroom while Jennie followed.
“I’ll give you two time to warm up before I start recording,” Jennie smugly said.
“How generous,” Rosé sarcastically replied.
You felt a bit awkward with Jennie in the room, even though hours ago she had watched you give this gorgeous woman with the sexiest accent a huge facial in public.
“Just ignore her,” Rosé said as she brought you closer to the bed and wrapped her arms around your neck, planting her soft lips against yours, lips you missed feeling on your cock already. Rosé tasted sweet, and you wanted more as you engaged her lips again, your tongues dancing around as your hands wrapped around her slender waist.
You both carefully climbed the bed, with her petite body under yours you couldn’t help but want to uncover more of it, you needed to see every inch of it.
“Can I take this off?” you asked, gently tugging on the material of her shirt.
“Of course, daddy. That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it? Take it all off me.”
She smiled and you crashed your lips against hers again as you grabbed the hem of her shirt and hastily removed it from her body, tossing it away as fast as you could as you admired her bare torso and her small, but perky tits.
“God, you’re so gorgeous,” you said as your mouth watered.
“Are you just going to stare?” she teased.
“I just might,“ you replied, not knowing where you wanted to start. You kissed her again, this time rougher, forgoing passion for lust as you sucked on her bottom lip as you wanted to devour every inch of this girl's body.
“Fuck, you really are sexy. You make me want to ruin you,” you growled, as you brought your lips to the side of her neck and licked up and down it before parking your lips against her sensitive skin, earning your first moan of the night.
“I won’t stop you, daddy.”
You kept your lips sucking away on her neck, hungrily eating up every bit of her sensitive warm flesh you found there with every desire to mark her. Sharing lustful stares, you slowly peeled yourself from her neck before moving down, kissing her collarbone, her chest, her breasts, and her tight stomach, falling completely in love with her body.
“I’m definitely going to ruin you.”
Rosé blushed as you moved your lips back to her chest, sucking on her nipples that had already hardened.
“Things are getting spicy now,” Jennie commented, as she readied Rosé’s phone, and prepared to play camerawoman.
“Just pretend like I'm not here.”
It was rather easy to forget about Jennie’s presence, given the infatuation you had already had with Rosé’s tight body as you continued sucking on her perky tits, biting on her nipples, and slurping on them as her cute whiny moans filled your ears.
Unlike your earlier shenanigans in the department store, you were going to take your time here, using your time freely to explore every inch and surface of Rosé, not leaving a part of her body without your lips touching it.
It didn’t take long for Rosé to melt at your touch as you kept a nipple in between your lips as a hand began travelling south. You slipped a hand in between her slender thighs, actually surprised with the fact that she still had underwear on as you pushed against her core and felt a piece of thin fabric impeding your progress.
Rosé gasped as you pushed two fingers against her underwear, pressing against her clothed pussy and you could feel an obvious wetness already. You withdrew your mouth from her tits rubbing circles against her clothed core and seeing the lust and desire in her pretty sparkling eyes.
“F-fuck, daddy,” Rosé said as she gave another desperate gasp. Exposing her weakness, you felt obliged to take advantage of it as you hiked up her tight red skirt and revealed the lavender pair of panties that almost matched the color of her hair, taking note of the very prominent wet spot front and center.
“You’re drenched, Miss Rosie,” taking advantage of the cute nickname for the first time, spreading her thighs wider and nudging your nose against the wet spot, taking in her intoxicating aroma and giving a lick across the damp spot that caused her breath to hitch and her hips to buck.
“Sensitive are we?” you asked teasingly, giving another short lick and then nothing, just staring at the anticipation in Rosé’s dazzling round eyes.
You barely knew this girl hours ago, and you still didn’t, but you knew you needed to turn her into a puddle, an absolute squirming mess. Maybe it was the fact that her friend Jennie was involved in this little romp, filming the reaction on her face that you felt obligated to up the ante.
Rosé’s thighs were surprisingly full considering her body type, plenty to work with as you began kissing up and down each thigh tenderly, planting a trail of kisses on her pale flushed skin as you felt the fabric of her panties becoming wetter by the moment.
“God, do you have to tease me so much, daddy?” She whined as you began to replace soft kisses with long delicate licks, tasting the warmth of her soft sensitive skin.
“Of course,” you said, responding with messier licks that turned into bites, wanting to mark every part of her body. If she was this needy now, you couldn’t wait to see how she reacted with your head in between her thighs.
This was too much fun really, making her squirm with every touch but you grew a bit hungry, with the only thing that could satisfy your appetite inches apart from your lips. Giving a delicate kiss to Rosé’s wet center that made her jerk, you hooked your fingers into the waistband of her ruined panties, and with her lifting her ass up you slid them down her incredibly long and sexy legs, tossing them at Jennie who was not amused at your antics.
Words did describe how beautiful Rosé’s pussy looked. Absolutely perfect in every way, pink, shaved, and appetizing as could be as the soft flesh between her spread thighs was abundantly coated with her nectar that you were dying to have a taste.
“God, you look so delicious. You look good enough to eat,” you said, admiring the view her wet pink pussy gave, your mouth continuing to water with each second you stared between her legs.
“Then taste me, daddy,” she pleaded, but you weren’t going to make it easy for her. There wouldn’t be any fun in that as you began sucking on one of her thighs, running your hand up and down the other, and switching sides until she was falling apart.
“D-daddy, please,” she whined, as you sucked on her skin deeper, before removing your lips from her marked thighs and licking your lips at what you saw ready for you.
“Please what?”
“Please eat me,” she said, but you weren’t convinced, planting more kisses on her thighs and ultimately one on her pussy, blowing hot air aimed at her clit as her whole body jerked.
“F-fuck, daddy, p-lease.”
You quite enjoyed the control you held over her, wanting to give her just a sample of what was in store as you gave one slow, long lick up her drenched slit, hearing a loud needy moan as you tasted her for the first time.
“Like, this, baby?”
“Y-yes, daddy. More.”
“I didn’t hear a please. Daddy wants you to beg.”
“P-please, daddy. Please let me feel that tongue inside my pussy, please, please daddy.”
Her begging really turned you on. You didn’t know whether to make her continue or not, but you figured she had enough for the time being as you almost ripped her skirt off her petite body licked in between her folds slowly, gathering every bit of honey to taste on your tongue.
“Oh f-fuck, daddyyy…” she moaned with that ridiculously sexy accent, and you wanted to hear more and quickly grew tired of teasing, eating Rosé out like she was your last fucking meal. You explored her delicious pussy with your tongue, licking every inch of her cunt and lapping up her juices on your lips as you began to feel her soft thighs slowly closing around your face.
Feeling a warm thigh on either side caressing your face you looked up at Rosé as you devoured her pussy, seeing her mouth agape as you licked everywhere you could before taking her sensitive clit between your lips, taking a few swipes before bringing it into your mouth and sucking on it loudly.
“Oh fuuuck, daddy, you eat me so well, you really know how to use that fucking tongue,” she said, her thighs shaking around your head.
Rosé sure was something. All you knew about her was her name, that she looked amazing naked and she gave amazing head, and also both her and her friend really liked to have a lot of sex. You also knew she was the most delicious thing you’ve ever tasted, her taste unforgettable and you wanted it lingering on your tongue forever.
“You taste so fucking good,” you growled out as you continued to feast on her sensitive pussy, burying your face between her thighs as you felt her small hands grabbing onto your head and pulling on your hair as you lapped at her leaking hole, trying to get more of her juices into your mouth.
The more you ate her out the more you wanted her, feeling her dripping cunt smearing all over your face, every lick inside her pussy earning a cute whiny moan, and the way you could feel her body reacting to your touch you could tell she was close.
You kept your lips surrounding her clit, running your hands all over her body while you brought two fingers inside her wet hole and curled them, hitting her spot and making her lose it. Her back arched as you furiously rocked your fingers inside her tight cunt, trying to make her hit her peak as fast as possible.
“D-daddy, p-please don’t stop, I’m almost there,” she whimpered, and you did everything in your power to bring her there. Rubbing at her core and sloppily slurping on her clit, feeling the warm thighs around your head vibrating in time with your fingers, and soon after Rosé came.
Her juices gushed into your mouth and you felt the whole bed shaking in response to her climax. Keeping your fingers buried in her leaking cunt and your lips wrapped tightly on her swollen clit, her whole body turned to jelly and rendering herself out of breath.
Jennie kept the camera focused on her o-face, getting a closeup view of the intense orgasm that had just run its course through her body.
“G-god, you’re amazing,“ Rosé breathlessly said as you kissed up her body and brought your fingers into her mouth. Without even asking, she sucked on them, tasting her own juices and needily slurped on them, cleaning them off.
Rosé didn’t stop, even after the taste of herself no longer lingered on your fingers, her lips and tongue continued slurping away and couldn’t get enough, revealing one of her weaknesses to you.
“You really are such a needy little slut,” Jennie said, keeping Rosé's glazed over eyes in perfect frame.
“I wanna taste your cock again, daddy,” Rosé said, cutely pouting, wanting the same thing as you flipped positions. She quickly stripped your shirt off and slipped her delicate hand inside your shorts and began stroking your cock.
You continued to intoxicate yourself with the taste of Rosé’s lips as her small hand pumped you up and down, finding that slow rhythm that built you up, leaving you wanting more.
“Then suck my cock,” you demanded, and her eyes beamed at your command, instantly wanting to obey.
“I’ll do more than that, daddy,” she seductively said as your pants and boxers were removed in a flash, matching her state of undress as her eyes admired your cock, hard as could be.
Rosé didn’t waste time diving into your cock, freely stroking it as her naked body laid down flat on her stomach and spread your legs, licking up and down hungrily all over your shaft and leaving a sheen of saliva all over.
Her attention changed as Rosé brought her mouth to your balls, kissing each one tenderly before she brought them into her mouth individually, licking and sucking each tenderly as she stroked your cock, causing you to moan even louder.
“You must really like his cock, Rosie. Not that I blame you,” Jennie said as she aimed the phone carefully to make sure she didn’t miss a single section of the action.
“I do. I love daddy's cock,” Rosé said as she nudged her nose against your balls and sucked even more before she covered your shaft in a plethora of kisses from base to tip, making sure not to miss a spot untouched by her beautiful soft lips.
“Daddy…” Rosé said, pausing afterward. “I want you to fuck my throat.”
The erotic words you had just heard was anything but surprising, yet you wanted to hear her repeat it. Not just because you wanted to hear her confirming what she wanted, because you wanted just to hear it again.
“What was that?”
With her hands stroking your cock Rosé repeated her request. “Fuck my throat, daddy.”
Rosé’s lips pulled into a needy smile as you took your cock from her and took control, rubbing your tip all over her soft lips, smearing your leaking precum all over her sinful mouth.
“Slap my pretty face with that fucking cock, daddy.”
Rosé had said a lot of filthy things that day, but this had to be one of your favorites. With your cock rock fucking hard, you slapped her cute face several times, your tip striking her cheeks and leaving more precum as you heard her pretty moans after each soft impact.
Desperately needing more out of Rosé’s mouth, you pushed half of your shaft back in her mouth, roughly grabbing the back of her head and shoved her all the way down your base as you began to fuck her warm pretty mouth.
You picked up speed right away and harshly rammed your cock down Rosé’s throat, feeling it tightening as you hit the back of it and instantly causing a series of gags.
Rosé’s eyes looked straight at you as she maintained perfect eye contact, slurping and gagging on every inch of your shaft as you used her for your own pleasure, fucking her mouth like a toy and causing your shaft to be drenched with her saliva in a matter of seconds.
“Choke on that fucking dick,” Jennie said as you increased your speed, your slippery cock moving in and out of her open mouth with ease, her eyes beginning to water as her drool smeared all over her lips and chin.
“Fuck, that feels so good, baby,” you moaned after a series of harsher thrusts, your balls slapping against her pretty face. Soon the sounds of Rosé gagging on your cock matched your rhythm, and you gave in to your animalistic desires as you used both hands and repeatedly drove every inch of your needy cock down her messy warm mouth.
“Such a messy little slut aren’t you, Rosie? You’re really taking that cock well.” Jennie said.
You continued to moan as you fucked Rosé’s pretty drool-covered face, the look in her eyes not only encouraging you to continue but letting you know that she was getting off on this just as much as you were.
With your hands running through her hair you pulled her all the way down and held her all the way against your base, debating on whether you wanted to unload deep down her throat but opting to keep her held there with her throat stuffed with every inch, earning more sinful gags as you furiously fucked her throat mercilessly.
Holding her down again and again, you lengthened the time pressing her face against your crotch, not letting go until Rosé tapped on your thigh repeatedly and you weakened your grip slowly and released her.
Rosé gradually withdrew your cock from her mouth and smiled widely as she gasped for air, rubbing your cock all over her already messy face.
“Did that feel good, daddy?”
"It felt amazing."
“Good, I want you to feel even better. Come fuck me, daddy," she said with a lustful smile.
“How do you want it, baby?”
“Just like this,” Rosé said as she turned around and faced the foot of the bed, giving Jennie the perfect angle and getting onto her hands and knees as she looked back with desire in her eyes, shaking her cute little ass.
You gathered yourself as you positioned behind her naked bent over body, running your hands all over her and giving her ass a quick slap, hearing her gasp loudly.
"Fuck me, daddy," she whined and you weren't going to keep her waiting as you rubbed your tip against her folds, feeling her wetness spreading all over your cock.
"You're so wet, baby," you said as you pushed against her entrance, feeling her tightness and warmth inviting you inside.
"Put it in, daddy. Don't you dare be gentle."
Holding onto one of her hips, you slowly pushed inside Rosé and groaned as you entered her, feeling her intense tightness and warmth squeezing your cock.
"Fuck, you're tight," you moaned as you pushed deeper, more wetness surrounding your cock as Rosé scrambled to grab onto the edge of the mattress.
"Oh f-fuck, fill me with cock, daddy."
With one more thrust you, bottomed her out and fully parted her hot wet flesh, grabbing both hips tightly and began fucking her from behind without hesitation, earning several gasps and moans.
"Stretch her out with that fucking dick," Jennie hissed as you built up a rhythm, earning loud moans from Rosé as you pumped in and out of her tight dripping cunt.
"Oh fuck, daddy!"
You quickly upped the pace, giving long deep strokes inside Rose's tight wet pussy, her dripping pink lips gripping your cock with every full thrust.
"God, you're so fucking tight, baby," you said as you flattened your palm and struck her tight ass, rippling the flesh as she shrieked in response.
"She is, isn't she? Even after all the cocks she's had inside her," Jennie smirked.
Rosé ignored her, opting instead of gaining more pleasure as she pushed her hips against you, wanting to take more of your cock as possible.
"Pound me, daddy," she begged as you began slamming your cock deep inside her tight cunt, rocking the bed with every thrust.
"Oh god yes," she moaned, as your hips smacked against her petite frame, giving harsher and faster thrusts as the sounds of hot flesh slapping against hot flesh filled the room.
Running your hands all over Rose's sexy tight body you felt the sweat misting over her soft skin as you pounded into her, listening to every cute moan and whimper that came out of her lips.
"More, daddy. I need more, please," Rosé begged, her cheeks smacking as you drove your cock harshly inside her, juices leaking down her thighs and dripping onto your shaft and balls.
Rosé’s hot wet flesh felt so heavenly wrapped around your shaft as you leaned forward and wrapped your fingers around the short ponytail she still had equipped, pulling back on it as you used even more force to fuck her, causing the bed to creak violently.
You immediately felt her walls clenching tighter as you kept a tight grip on her hair, giving her ass several smacks as it jiggled each time deliciously with every impact.
“Slap my fucking ass, daddy. Harder.”
You did as asked as you began to up your pace even more, raising your palm and giving repeated spanks, squeezing her tender flesh at the end of your impact to add extra oomph until both of her delicious cheeks were painted bright red with your handprints, feeling her walls tightening and pulsating each time.
“You like taking this cock like a good little slut?” you asked, keeping a handful of her pretty hair as you continued to spank her ass, giving her the deepest thrusts you could summon.
“Oh-oh fuck, yes I do, daddy! Don’t stop fucking me!”
Nothing could stop you from drilling into her tight body, using her tight wet cunt as if it was just a toy for you to fuck. Every thrust into Rosé felt wetter and tighter, her moans increasing in length and volume to confirm her satisfaction. She mirrored your thrusts, continuing to push backward and timing the movement of her body as she held onto the bed for dear life, trying to get your cock as deep as possible in her.
You gave her sore red cheeks a break, keeping the harsh grip on her ponytail as you felt sweat dripping off your forehead, focusing only on the wetness and warmth of Rosé’s pussy as you gave her everything you had, her tight walls pulsating in response.
“Oh fuck, daddy, I’m going to cum!”
Rosé’s words made you fuck her as fast as you could, slamming her tight cunt and filling her with cock as her walls tightened even more, almost painfully so.
“Cum for me, baby. All over my fucking cock.”
Looking straight into the camera Rosé moaned and came on command as you felt even more wetness as you harshly pumped inside her pussy, losing control as she gushed all over your cock.
Your drenched cock threatened to slip out but the warm tightness of her hole kept you buried inside her as her body shook in response, her juices spilling liberally out of her warm hole and staining her thighs, your cock and the bedsheets underneath that were already a beautiful mess.
You fucked her straight through her orgasm, abruptly letting go of her hair as she fell forward and gasped for air as she tried to recover her senses and stabilize her tired breathing.
“You must be getting close, daddy,” Rosé weakly said.
“I am, baby, but I can fuck you all night.”
You withdrew out of her tight pussy, the act of pulling out almost made her climax again. Using her hips you turned her over as she laid onto her back and spread her legs for you, showing just how wet she was and played with her pretty pussy.
Rosé was more than ready to continue, but you wanted to earn it and rubbed your cock through her slippery pink lips, her warm flesh even wetter after her climax. You smirked and slapped her pussy with your hard shaft, the wet sounds of her flesh evident.
"Daddy…" she whined.
"Want it?" you asked, teasing penetration by nudging your cock against her entrance several times but withdrawing at the final moment.
“Y-yes, daddy. I need your cock inside me again."
“Then beg for it. Beg for it like a good little slut."
“Please fuck me, daddy. Shove your big hard cock in my tight cunt and stretch my pretty little hole, please, daddy, fuck me like the needy slut I am daddy, please.“
You loved hearing her beg as much as she loved begging and you were eager to reward Rosé for her efforts. Not wanting just to fuck her in a simple position, you opted for something different as you grabbed her legs up and lifted them in the air, bending her knees.
Rosé looked lustfully into your eyes, hugging the back of her knees to assist and keep her legs in the air, allowing you to focus on her dripping cunt.
"I'm going to enjoy ruining you, baby," you said and slid every inch inside Rosé who gasped in surprise, throwing her head back as you felt her pussy clenching around your shaft.
Rosé didn't have a chance to adjust to your cock as you placed a palm on each of her thighs and started thrusting, immediately bottoming her out as you began fucking her balls deep at a rapid pace.
The addicting squeeze her pussy gave drove you crazy as you used her body, only concerned with how good you felt.
"Fuck, you’re such a tight little slut, Rosie," you growled, pounding her deep and stretching her tight walls out as wide as you could.
Every thrust was smooth and pleasurable as could be, aided by the intense wetness of her slick-filled walls and driving your cock deep as you could possibly go.
"Oh fuck, daddy! Don't stop! Please don't stop fucking me like this, use my pussy for your own pleasure!"
"Fuck this cheap little whore so hard she can't walk for a week," Jennie spoke up.
"Is that what you want, baby?" you asked. Rosé nodded needily, unlocking more of your animalistic urges.
"Yes! Pound my tight slutty pussy, daddy. I'm just a pretty little fucktoy for you to use and ruin!"
"That's all you are, isn't it? Just a cute little cum dump for daddy?"
"Yes, daddy! I'm nothing but a hole for you to empty your load. Please keep fucking me, daddy!
The vulgarity spilling out of Rosé's naughty mouth heightened your arousal as you gave more aggressive thrusts, pistoning your hips and keeping the rhythm harsh enough as the flesh of your body loudly smacked against her own.
"So fucking wet, baby. Am I turning you on that much?"
"Y-yes, daddy! You're fucking me so deep, I love it. Don't stop until your cum is inside me!"
Every stroke inside Rosé felt better than the last, her pussy felt so fucking heavenly, so hot, tight, and wet around your shaft that you couldn't see yourself lasting that much longer.
"I love fucking you so much, baby. Your pussy feels so fucking good, I might cum soon."
"Please do, daddy! Fill your little slut's pussy with all of your cum!"
You didn't dare stray from your position, giving your all and continuing to grasp Rosé's warm thighs and slamming so harshly into her cunt you were worried her bed might break.
"Take that fucking cock. Take all of it you whore!" you hissed. It wouldn't be much longer now.
You watched the lust and need in her eyes, savoring the way her wet tight walls felt as you drilled her cunt, giving the deepest thrusts you could muster and felt your body tensing up.
With sweat liberally dripping down your forehead you used up all your leftover stamina and gave Rosé your final thrusts, fucking her as hard and deep as possible at a breakneck pace with her pussy squeezing your cock harshly and urging your release.
"Rosie I'm-"
You couldn’t even finish your sentence, groaning and grunting loudly as you exploded, pumping Rosé full of your thick creamy load deep inside her cunt, finding relief as you emptied everything into her body.
You kept thrusting until her pussy had milked your cock completely dry, filling her hole to the brim and watching the lust overtaking her features.
"Daddy...it feels so warm and thick…" Rosé said, her expression equal parts exhaustion and satisfaction.
Resting inside Rosé you didn't want to ever leave the comforting warmth of her pussy, but also wanted to see the load you had just deposited, catching your breath.
Eventually, you slowly pulled out an inch at a time as Jennie prepared to capture it all.
The moment your cock withdrew from her pussy your cum began leaking out as Jennie found the perfect angle to capture the dripping creampie slowly leaking from her freshly fucked pussy.
"Fuck, Rosie, you made him cum a lot."
Rosé tiredly smiled, both at you and the camera.
"Daddy must really like fucking me."
"I do, fuck I really do," you said, exhausted
"Hold this?" Jennie asked, handing you her phone. You watched through the phone screen as Jennie positioned her face between Rosé's thighs, hungrily sucking your cum out of her Rose's cunt, cleaning up her creamy pussy.
"Hey, you slut! That's my load," Rosé complained in between moans.
"Not anymore," Jennie smiled, continuing to give her pussy repeated licks to collect your cum on her tongue before swallowing it all down.
Rosé climbed off the bed and dropped to her knees, sucking your entire length clean. She didn't want to let Jennie get a chance to get the drop on her, licking every drop.
"Thank you," Jennie said as she retrieved Rose's phone from you, aiming the camera one final time at an exhausted Rosé.
“Wave to the camera, Rosie.”
“Thank you, daddy, for giving me such a good pounding, “ Rosé said as she waved cutely, and Jennie ended the recording.
“Ok, hurry and send him a copy. His number is in there already," Rosé said.
“But which daddy is he saved under?” Jennie teased.
“I only have one you whore."
“For now. There he is.”
There was a moment of silence.
“Shit, I-”
“What?” Rosé asked.
“I might have just sent it to everyone-”
"You better be fucking kidding-”
Jennie smiled. “Of course I am. I only sent it to him, Jisoo, and Lisa.”
“You what?!”
“It’s not like they haven’t seen you getting fucked before. You want them to miss out on the fun?"
Rosé huffed. “Fine, whatever. At least ask me next time, bitch.”
“Fine, you big baby.”
Rosé turned her attention to you. “You’re not tired yet, are you, daddy?” she asked, gripping your still rigid cock and giving slow delicate strokes.
“You’re still hard?” Rosé asked, surprised.
“Guess you’re just that hot, baby.”
“Well, I’m glad, daddy. Because you’re not done with me. I could use a nice relaxing shower. Join me?”
“I’d love to.”
Rosé smiled and led you by your cock to the bathroom.
“You too Jennie. This camera is waterproof, you know? This’ll be the perfect time to test it.”
"Fine, but I'm not getting left out this time."
#blackpink smut#kpop smut#rose#blackpink#male reader#reader insert#kpop fanfic#kpop fanfiction#rose smut
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You know what I want?
Domestic Stucky. In Westview. Hear me out.
(First of all, Endg*me can go fuck itself. Steve’s whole thing? Never happened. Forget about it. Wipe if from your mind. We’re rewriting that shit.)
(Also, this isn’t a fic even though I know it starts out looking like one lol. This is just stream of consciousness thoughts. I would put way more effort into actual writing)
The weeks after the final snap were hard.
Bucky was back, and it felt like every weight that had been dragging Steve down for the past 5 years was lifted. He was mentally and physically exhausted, but his soulmate, his best friend, was at his side again, pulling him into a warm hug, tight and breathtaking.
It was still hard; Steve was a very different man than he had been 5 years ago, but Bucky was calm and understanding. There was still much to mourn for, too. Tony and Nat were gone. Any sense of stability that had been established during those 5 years was immediately destroyed, and Steve was sure it would take many more years to try to fix the damage.
And Wanda. When Wanda was snapped back into existence, her grief was palpable. What had been 5 terrible years for him had been 5 minutes of bliss for her, relief that she wouldn’t have to try to live in a world without Vision. Steve knew the feeling. Even though he didn’t quite understand Wanda and Vision’s relationship (he was a robot?), he can’t really judge because he’s been pining after his childhood best friend for the better part of a century and still hasn’t managed to do anything about it.
To be brought back to life was the worst trick you could play on Wanda. Her sense of peace was snatched away from her and she was throttled back into a world that had nothing in it for her. Everyone she loved was dead. Her powers still deemed her a threat, even if she had played a crucial role in the fight against Thanos.
Steve wanted to be selfish and just run away with Bucky, but he couldn’t leave Wanda, who had become the little sister he never had.
He worried about her. Even as those who had been snapped away started to come to terms with the fact that 5 years had passed, Wanda wandered around, just a shell of her former self. Sometimes she fell into fits of rage and despair, using her powers to smash everything in her room at the compound or snapping at anyone who tried to distract her. Most of the time she was just blank.
Just a month after the return from the blip, Wanda strolls into the kitchen and announces that she’s going to S.W.O.R.D. headquarters. Steve’s head snaps up. Her eyes are hard and determined, and Steve belatedly realizes that every muscle in her body is tense as she readies herself to fight anyone who tries to stop her. Sam is the first to speak up.
“Okay, kid,” he breathes out nonchalantly, “you need anyone to go with you?” Sam is good like that. Always knowing what to say to make someone feel comfortable and cared about, but not coddled.
“No,” Wanda grits out. A breath, and then, softer, “thank you.”
Glancing around to see if anyone else had any objections, Wanda walks out of the compound.
Steve lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he was still holding, but the room is still tense. He whips around to Bucky, eyes wide with concern.
Before he can even say anything, Bucky reaches out and puts a hand on his shoulder, “Don’t worry. Come on, we’ll watch out for her.”
So, with a tight smile, Steve stands up and lets Bucky lead the two of them out.
It’s not until they are halfway down the street in an inconspicuous car, trailing a little ways behind Wanda’s red sedan that it occurs to Steve to ask what they’re doing.
“We’re just going to follow her to make sure she’s alright, pal. S.W.O.R.D. has Vision’s body, and it’s not a good idea for her to be alone, even if she thinks it’s best.”
“She’ll be mad if she realizes what we’re doing.”
“Good thing one of us is a reformed Russian spy,” he smirks.
Steve’s heart skips a beat at that familiar face, one that he hadn’t thought he’d ever see again, and blushes, ducking his head. If Bucky notices, he doesn’t say. They carry on in a comfortable silence.
As they pull into the S.W.O.R.D. parking lot, Steve watches Wanda march into the headquarters. He turns to Bucky, "Are we going to follow her in?"
"You can't, that's for sure." Steve scowls. "It's not entirely your fault, pal, but you're don't exactly blend in easily. But I'll go in to keep an eye on her if you want me to."
Steve considers the offer for the moment. As much as he wanted to watch out for Wanda, he knew that if she found out, it would hurt her more. She would think that he didn't trust her, and that he was following her to make sure that she didn't lose control of her powers and hurt people. He didn't want to make her feel more ostracized than she already was.
"No, we'll just wait," he says, shaking his head. His eyes never leave the entrance to S.W.O.R.D. headquarters.
The wait for Wanda feels excruciatingly long. Steve doesn't trust that S.W.O.R.D. is any better than S.H.I.E.L.D., and he honestly has no idea what they've been doing with Vision's body for the last 5 years. A renewed sense of guilt washes over him. If he had tried to fight S.W.O.R.D. harder for Vision's body, Wanda wouldn't be here, fighting through her grief to see him one last time. After the snap, Steve didn't feel like he could waste his dwindling energy scrutinizing S.W.O.R.D's every move, but he now wishes he had. He could have spared her this pain.
Sensing the anxiety bubbling up within him, Bucky reaches out, pulling Steve's hand into his own. "It's not your fault, Steve," he reminds him gently. Steve squeezes his hand in response.
Wanda walks out of S.W.O.R.D. headquarters 20 minutes later. She seems drained and tired, but her expression reveals nothing. They wait again before following her out of the lot.
When she turns right, away from the direction of the compound where he assumed she would return, Steve frowns. "Where is she going? The compound's the other way."
Bucky shrugs. "I guess we'll see."
Steve has no idea where they are until he sees a sign declaring "Welcome to New Jersey!" not far down the highway.
"What the hell is she going to Jersey for?" Bucky gasps, pulling a loud laugh from Steve's chest. It's absurd and ridiculous, but it reminds Steve of when they were kids in Brooklyn, shitting on the Yankees and the state's annoying accent, among the plethora of other abhorrent traits about New Jersey. Bucky starts laughing with him, shaking his head.
They finally arrive in a small, run-down town called Westview. Steve can't imagine why Wanda would come here.
Her red sedan comes to a stop in front of an empty plot of land, and she steps out, clutching a folded piece of paper to her chest.
"Oh, Christ... Shit," Bucky mutters. Steve is about to ask what he's thinking when he finally sees Wanda's walls crumble.
Her shoulders shake with the force of her sobs, and she falls to her knees with a cry of desperation. A red orb of her twists around her body and Steve shoves the door to the car open, desperate to get to Wanda.
"Steve!" he hears Bucky cry out behind him, and it's the last thing he hears before Wanda's powers implode around her, and his vision is blotted with red.
Remember! Wanda made all of her characters in the hex as similar to their actual lives as possible to ease her control of them! SO, it's only natural that her powers would pick up on the fact that Steve and Bucky are very obviously pining for each other and put them in a loving relationship while they are in the hex. Since they are both under Wanda's control, their storyline would happen mostly independently from what we see in WandaVision. I wouldn't have there be any smut (since I'm not talented enough or comfortable writing it myself) so there wouldn't be any non-con or any serious dub-con while they are in the hex. The idea is that both of them want everything that they are made to do (be partners, hold hands, kiss, do other couple-y stuff), but they are concerned because they think the other would feel disgusted and not want it.
There unfortunately were not any gay characters on TV in the 50s and 60s, so I would write these two "episodes" with loose ties to other sitcoms from those decades and do some research into how gay couples lived during these time periods. Basically, reimagine my own 50s and 60s sitcoms with realistic portrayals of a gay couple.
For the other decades, I would then base their relationship off of those actually depicted in sitcoms from that time.
It should be noted that, while I have actually watch a lot of old sitcoms, I haven't watched many of the ones I mention. If I every decide to write this, I would do a lot more research on these shows (and watch some episodes!)
70's - I would likely draw from Barney Miller, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, and Soap.
80's - Roseanne is pretty iconic, but I would be a little hesitant to write it after all of the controversy a couple years ago. Love, Sidney may also work, but I don't know enough about the show.
90's - Will & Grace, of course! I don't know anything about Northern Exposure, but the little bit of research I've done suggests that also may be a source of inspiration.
2000 through early 2010s - It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Modern Family. (I loved The War At Home, but it doesn't really fit)
When Wanda releases everyone from the hex, Bucky and Steve had some serious miscommunication issues and angst. Both feeling exceedingly guilty about their actions, despite the fact that they had no control over them. They got a taste for what domestic life would be like together, and they are frustrated that they enjoyed it since they believe the other one did not. When Wanda explains that her powers gave everyone jobs, relationships and roles in society that were equally comparable to those they had in real life, Bucky and Steve both realize that the hex would not have put them in a relationship if it wasn't what the other also wanted. Yay! They make-up (and make-out, lol).
I seriously want to write this, but I really don't have the confidence that I will be able to execute it as I imagine it. If someone wants to work on it with me (be it we both write it or you just want to offer some brainstorming help/story guidance), I would be thrilled! Just so long as there isn't any pressure to get it done in a time crunch. I just want this writing experience to be fun! Also, if you are interested, I swear I’m a better writer than what was just exhibited, but I really only spent an hour or so on it, so it’s obviously not my best work.
Anyway, if you have any thoughts, suggestions, advice etc or just want to scream about WandaVision and/or Stucky, please feel free to PM me or stop by my inbox. It would make my day :)
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Chapter 2
WE ARE THE LOVESICK GIIIIIIIIIiiiiiIiiiiiiIIIIIIRLSSSSS
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“Wait, so let me get this straight. Do you want to date this guy? Or do you just wanna fuck him?”
“_____, please stop fucking athletes. You have a type and it’s shitty men who have two brain cells.”
“OKAY,” you yelled. “I get it! I like my men that know how to juggle balls and can juggle me! IS THAT CRIME?!”
“No! But what about some cute English major? Or a sociology one? You like sociology!” Jisoo insisted.
“First of all bitch, English majors are pretentious so how dare you,” you snapped, “Have you not seen You? Everyone knows to stay away from them. And sociology majors are only good for arguing on Twitter. They suck at sex.”
“Um fuck you? I’m a sociology major and I--” Jennie started
You interrupted her, “I do not need to know about you and Jisoo’s sex life. Please. Not all of us like romantic candlelit sex. I want someone to choke me and degrade me! I love being degraded! Have either of you been thrown around? Or tried orgasm denial?”
Jisoo scowled. “No, you freak. Some of us don’t like being rough.”
“Yeah,” Jennie sniffed. “There’s nothing wrong with vanilla sex. So what if I like to have my room smell like A Thousand Wishes and have Alina Baraz playing while I’m fucking? Also, who wants to have their orgasm be denied? Isn’t that, like, the opposite of what someone would want in sex?”
You gaped at her, “Oh my god. I’m going to ignore that last question and focus on what’s more disturbing. Are you serious, bitch? A Thousand Wishes is the scent you pick from Bath and Body Works? There are better ones.”
“Ooo, really? Which ones do you recommend?” Jennie lights up as she asks.
“Okay, you need to try---”
“Oh my god, can we focus?!” Jisoo hisses. She looks between you and her girlfriend and sighs when you both turn to her with incredulous faces.
Of course both of you thought she was crazy for interrupting the conversation.
“Look, _____” Jisoo sighs, “You don���t think this is a bad idea? You work with this guy. What if it makes things awkward?”
“It won’t,” you dismiss while waving a hand around, “He’s chill. I’m chill. We’re both grown and can handle sleeping together while staying… colleagues. Acquaintances. Whatever the hell we are.”
Jisoo and Jennie shared a look. They both knew that once you set your sights on someone, it was only a matter of time until you sunk your claws into them. Their warnings were only going to fly right over your head. Usually, your friends would admire how determined you are when you want to achieve something and wouldn’t let anyone deter you. Any other day they would admire your perseverance.
Today wasn’t that day.
You saw the look that the couple in front of you shared and immediately tensed up.
“Look, I know what you two are thinking,” you say with your brows furrowing, “He seems like just my type. But I’ll be careful. If I feel myself getting too…. too close or feeling like it’s too much I’ll stop.”
Jisoo immediately softened her face and spoke gently. “_____, I’m not trying to control you. Neither is Jennie. We both love you, you know that. You’re like our sister and daughter all in one. We just know of Xuxi’s reputation and want you to tread carefully, okay?”
You looked at her with wide eyes, “What do you mean?”
It wasn’t that they were upset over you sleeping around, far from it actually. You were a big girl who could do whatever and whoever you wanted. Hell, they often played wing woman and set you up with guys they knew you would like.
They were just worried about you. You were the baby of the group with a personality that someone could easily take advantage of. It’s not like you were the type to run at the first sign of romance, in fact, you enjoyed it.
You, whether you admitted it or not, were secretly a hopeless romantic. You were okay with having casual sex, but if it went anything farther then that..
Well.
You fall hard. You loved the idea of love no matter how much of a realist you forced yourself to be. You liked making connections and building relationships with people that made you laugh, it was a part of your charm. You gave away your heart too easily when it came to relationships, and they had been there to pick up the pieces quite a few times. You gave your all to someone and it hurt them seeing someone do wrong by you.
Your friends were only worried about you because they both knew of Huang Xuxi.
And they both knew he was exactly the type of guy who could charm you and would fall for immediately.
Jennie moved to sit by you and cuddled closer, “Look, yeah he’s a nice guy. Everyone knows that. But… he’s just a player. Sure he’s transparent with every girl he sleeps with, but that doesn’t mean he treats girls nicely. And you deserve to be treated nicely. Or I’ll kick his fucking ass and set his car on fire.”
Jennie beamed at you when she finished speaking. You felt your heart warm at the threat. She absolutely would follow through with it and knowing you had a friend who would go that far for you made you feel safe and secure.
“Me too, Jennifer. If I didn’t know you and Jisoo are practically soulmates I would say the same thing. But since you two are basically the last piece of evidence that proves love exists, I’ll settle for something else. So if any one of those girls on the cheer team give you the slightest bit of attitude I’ll slap them.”
Jisoo smiled seeing the exchange. For right now, they’ll put Huang Xuxi onto the backburner.
“Anyways, let’s go back to what we all came here for. The semester starts next week and the Theta Chi house is working with the Sigma Kappa girls to throw the first party. So obviously we need to look sexy as fuck. Especially _____ and Lisa. You both have cobwebs and dust collecting on your vaginas that I can see.”
“What the fuck” you gasped, “Ten told me the same thing! It’s literally been a month. Cmon, that’s not even that long.”
“Yeah well, for a university student it is. Especially for someone hot like you. Even more so when we take your track record into consideration. Your virginity is basically putting itself together again like the ashes of the ones that died in Infinity War,” Rosie said as she walked into the apartment with Lisa towing in right behind her.
You jumped at their entrance then scowled after her comment sunk in, “Leave me alone, Roseanne,”
Rosie glared at you for the use of her full first name as she sat down across from you.
“When was the last time you got laid?” you taunted, “We haven’t heard any hoe stories from you either!”
Rosie perked up, “Last night, actually. I went on a date with Jungkook and went back to his apartment. Mingyu says hi, by the way. Did you know they were roommates?”
“UGH,” you groaned. “Of course you get laid by one of the hottest dudes there is. And he’s nice! What the fuck! Save some for us bitch!”
Rosie laughed and looked down, her cheeks flushing a pretty pink.
Immediately everyone got quiet and stared at her.
“Rosé,” Lisa drawls out slowly, “Do you actually like this guy?”
Rosie sobered up quickly and looked around at each of you.
“Okay, look,” she says slowly, “I’m gonna be honest with you guys. I--”
“Oh my god,” you interject with a groan. You throw yourself onto the couch and cover your eyes with your arm, “Everyone is falling in love except me! I haven’t even had sex in so long! Not even oral!”
“I didn’t even finish yet!” Rosie says exasperated.
“Yes, but you’re Rosé, everyone falls in love with you on the first date. And if this guy didn’t then I’ll kill him. Because you’re pretty and perfect and deserve the world. Why wouldn’t he fall in love right away? The fuck.”
Rosie flushes but sends you a shy smile either way.
“As I was saying, I actually have been going on dates with Jungkook but didn’t say anything because I actually like this guy. I was worried he just wanted to hit it and quit it, that’s why I never mentioned it. I would’ve been so embarrassed if that happened and I gushed about how much I like him but… I think it’s going well. I hope he asks to be exclusive soon,” she finishes with a whisper.
You suddenly sit up straight and smack the sofa. Your friends jump at the sudden action when you open your mouth and say “I’ll shove my foot up his ass if he doesn’t ask you to be his girlfriend, Rosie. I don’t give a fuck how hot he is, you’re way hotter and have a line of people knocking at your door.”
Lisa blinks, “Okay, _____. You are at a ten right now and need to take it to a two. Not everything needs to turn into a wannabe WWE match, but I agree. Rosie, if he doesn't ask you to be exclusive within the next month, drop him.”
“Okay,” Rosie sighs while looking down and playing with the hem of her dress, “I just haven’t liked someone like this in a while and I’m just… yeah. But enough about me! There’s nothing to get sad about! We have more important issues to focus on. Like _____ and Lisa being the reborn virgins of the group. Ironic since you two are the biggest hoes I know.”
Lisa groans, “I know. I’ve just been so stressed with the dance team and summer school. I haven’t had time to even rest and now the semester is starting? Bitch..” she shakes her head without finishing.
Jennie gets up and claps her hands, “Well, what are we waiting for? The Theta Chi party is the perfect time and place for you two to get some. It’s coming up soon and we need to start pampering now. It doesn’t even need to be for hooking up, it can be a good luck present for the semester starting. Now c'mon, get your shit” she says grabbing yours and Lisa’s arms and yanking you two up, “if we leave right now we can make it to the salon as a walk-in. I’ll pay for everything.”
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The final days leading up to a new semester were tiring. You had a short timeframe in which you had to get your financial aid sorted out, make sure you sent out the emails that needed to be sent, talked to your manager about your schedule, and mentally prepare yourself.
On top of all the stress you had going on outside of work, work itself had been incredibly busy. With the upcoming start of a new school year, the store had been filled to the brim with snot nosed kids, demanding parents, and hoards of teenagers all looking for the perfect shoe. You had asked for more hours to get some extra cash, but you were starting to regret it. With the back to back scheduling and long shifts, there was no time for you to sit down and breathe.
Fortunately today, you were scheduled to do sorting in the back for the majority of your shift. Which meant you had to take inventory for an hour and sit around on your phone for the rest of it.
As you were counting how many black high tops Converses there were left and cursing the middle schoolers who never failed to sell them out early every year, you failed to notice someone walking in.
“Hey, _____. You need some help?” Jaehyun asked.
You tensed up immediately after hearing the voice and mentally cursed yourself for not washing your hair last night or doing your full makeup routine.
At least you had the decency to put on your eyebrows.
“Oh hey, Jaehyun. I didn’t know you were scheduled for today. How was your vacation?” you asked while putting on a fake smile.
Jaehyun was one of your coworkers, and also your ex-boyfriend. The funny, sweet basketball player had been working at Foot Locker way longer than you and had been the one to train you. He was the one to take you under his wing and introduce you to everyone, offered to buy you something to eat whenever you forgot to bring lunch, and the type of guy to bring everyone who was scheduled with him a drink from Starbucks.
He was everyone’s work crush, including yours.
Until he cheated on you.
“It was good,” he grinned at you, “I missed my grandparents and the rest of my family, so it was nice to see them again. But the weather here is much better than back home.”
“I’m glad you got to see them!” you said with a tone that was obvious you felt anything but glad for him.
As you were thinking about how to somehow get out of this conversation while not getting scolded by your manager for abandoning your task, Jaehyun was busy looking you up and down. The summer had definitely done you good, even if you had spent most of it at work. It hadn’t been that long since he last saw you but your skin was glowing and sun-kissed, even more than usual. There was also definitely much more ass in your jeans than from what he remembers. You already had a nice one to begin with, something he took note of whenever you climbed up the ladder to get a box of shoes too high for you in the backroom.
He remembered when you first walked into Foot Locker for an interview. It was nearly impossible not to notice you. You walked into any room and instantly commanded the attention of everyone within your vicinity. With your sun-kissed glowing skin and a gleaming smile, you had everyone watching you all the time.
The funny part was that you barely even noticed it.
Jaehyun knew of you before you had even submitted an application. Of course he knew of the pretty psychology student who nearly always got the top scores and didn’t have a stick up their ass for it. You were always willing to lend a helping hand and had the patience to explain theories and concepts for hours to someone who didn’t have a clue.
Don’t get him wrong, you were far from a pushover, and more often than not he would overhear you tell classmates the many ways you would shove a textbook up their ass if they tried to copy off you or didn’t at least try to put in an effort.
It was evident that you weren’t a pushover or afraid to ask for what you wanted. You just took a while to warm up to people and let them in close enough to see the bratty side of you.
He was lucky enough to be one of those you let in, but he had to go and fuck it all up.
Jaehyun tried again, “So, how was your summer?”
You didn’t have the time or energy for this shit. “Jaehyun,” you said sharply. “I’ve been incredibly stressed with trying to juggle my summer class, work, and social life if you’re that desperate to know. I don’t need--”
Jaehyun cut you off, “_____, I’m sorry. I just want to talk to you and explain, please.”
Conversation with Jaehyun once came as natural as breathing to you. There used to be a time where he could ask the world from you and you would do anything to give it to him. He was the person you looked forward to seeing the most, the one you wanted to see right when you woke up and before you fell asleep. And at one point he was.
You were never blind to how attractive he is. Jaehyun, with the sweet smile and tall, lean build was the kind of guy who could get people to stop and stare whenever he walked by. Hell, you had seen it happen nearly every time the both of you went walking to the food court.
After all, he was Jung Jaehyun, a university basketball player.
Which was just a kind way to say he was a fuckboy.
To make it even worse, he was a fucking frat boy. Which meant he had a reputation of sleeping his way through campus.
When he was the one to ask you out first, you had told yourself that it was just a way for him to get into your bed. After the second, third, and fourth date, you still mistook his advances as him trying to be kind to you before he hit it and quit. It was a month into the dates that he asked you to be his girlfriend. Even then, you were very cautious at the beginning of your relationship. You had dealt with your fair share of playboys like Jaehyun and weren’t afraid to bust their balls.
You actually enjoyed knocking men down a peg or two.
But Jaehyun was nothing if not persistent. He made an effort to spend as much time with you as possible and get to know you on an intimate level. The constant sleepovers at your place and late-night talks had both of you falling in love, fast and hard.
To this day, you still didn’t know why he cheated on you.
Jaehyun interrupted your thoughts, “_____?”
You shook your thoughts away, “Yeah?”
“I asked if you had any plans for the last week of summer?”
You sighed, “Look, Jaehun. I’m just exhausted thinking about the semester starting. But I’m trying to distract myself from thinking about school and worry about my social life instead. So yes, I do have plans to go out and yes, it is to the same party your frat is hosting. But I’m not going for you, so do not approach me or talk to me. Don’t even look at me. I have bigger things to worry about and I do not want to deal with the stupid questions from your stupid friends.
“Like what?”
“Like what, what?”
Jaehyun scrunched his face in confusion, “You said you had bigger things to worry about. Is everything okay? Are your brothers good?”
As much as you hated to admit it, your heart fluttered. Jaehyun knew how much you cared about your younger brothers. He loved them just as much as you and liked going with you whenever you visited home, “Well yes but---”
“That’s good,” Jaehyun lets out a breath. “Look _____, I know you don’t owe me anything. I know I fucked up real bad, but please let me just explain everything. I want you to know what happened. I valued our relationship above everything and it meant the world to me. I know it might not have looked like it but--”
You snorted. Good for him, he’s self-aware.
Jaehyun flushed at your laugh. He deserved it but tried again “_____, please---”
Every sad look he sent you was sending you over the edge. Who did he think you were? You weren’t the type to let people step all over you like regardless of what Jaehyun thought. As mildly insulted as you felt over how little he thought of you, you didn’t have the type to tear a new one into him. You had shit to do or else your manager would be pissed.
“Jaehyun, I can’t do this.”
“_____, what---”
“_____.”
Jumping at the sudden mention of your name, you had failed to notice a tall figure standing only feet away from Jaehyun during the conversation between the two of you.
“Xuxi,” you breathed out.
Jaehyun frowned, “Xuxi?”
“Xuxi,” the man himself said. Xuxi was staring at you with something dark, something that made you tense up and on edge for what his next move would be. He had been sent to the back to clock in and help you out with inventory when he noticed that the door was left slightly open. Xuxi had stopped when he heard Jaehyun’s voice and the exasperated tone in your voice.
When Xuxi realized Jaehyun was the one in there with you, he felt that ugly jealous feeling crawl up his chest. He didn’t want to closely examine why it was there. You weren’t his. The two of you hadn’t been close enough for him to consider you as his, but he still didn’t like the idea of you being stuck in a room with Jaehyun.
Xuxi didn’t want to harbor any ill feelings towards Jaehyun; he was his frat brother and Xuxi never had an issue with him. He already owed Jaehyun one for getting him a job here but after finding out what went down between the two of you, he lost respect for Jaehyun.
Xuxi was self-aware that he wasn’t the most romantic guy on campus nor was he the type to go steady with someone, but he would never string a girl along or cheat on her. He respected them enough to be upfront from the beginning of what he wanted and wouldn’t harbor any ill feelings if they refused to sleep with him afterward. He tried to be gentle with everyone who ever tried to pursue something serious with him.
It wasn’t well known across campus that Jaehyun and you were a couple, which confused him at first. He didn’t know why both of you kept it under wraps. If he was dating you, he’d make sure to broadcast out to the entire city. You were one of the sweetest girls he’s ever met. You weren’t stuck up or mean to anyone. He didn’t think you were aware of it, but you and he were in the same department. While you were in the Child Studies department only for a minor, he had it for his major so he spent quite a bit of time in the building. Xuxi would often see you helping out underclassmen who were very clearly overwhelmed, sharing your notes to classmates, and talking to the professors as if they were your friends. He liked seeing you brighten up the department every time you walked in.
To add the cherry on top, you were stunning. Immediately a heat curled up in his stomach when he thought about how good you looked. God, he would’ve been blind to not see how utterly gorgeous you were. Those long, toned legs and pouty lips had him captivated since day one. As well as those big, wide doe eyes of yours that gave you an innocent look when he knew you were the complete opposite.
“Hey man, how were the new soccer recruits? I swear the only times I’ve seen you in the house were when you came back tired and hungry,” Jaehyun laughed, oblivious to the growing tension in the room.
The two of you broke eye contact as Jaehyun went to give Xuxi that stupid one-armed hug boys do. You felt your entire face flush and looked at the floor while you wallowed in the embarrassment of knowing Xuxi knew you and Jaehyun had a messy breakup.
You went back to counting shoes or at least pretending to. Frankly, you had no idea what the hell it was that you were doing before Jaehyun walked in, but you were damned sure that was the last time you opened your fat mouth like that ever again at work.
“_____, you miss me?” Xuxi said.
What.
The hell is he saying, you thought.
Bracing yourself, you turned around to face him. They had moved closer to the wall with Xuxi leaning against it like he owned the damn place.
“Um. Yes,” you blinked.
Xuxi smirked at you and walked up to you. You tensed up and subconsciously held your breath for whatever his next move would be.
“C'mon don’t be like that, baby, “Xuxi said. He walked up to you and put an arm around your shoulders, “I missed you. Thought about you every time Coach let me take a break.”
You flushed at the endearment but made no move to refuse his arm. Or correct him. You had no clue what he was playing at but a guy as hot as Xuxi was calling you baby, so you didn’t have an issue with it.
You scowled up at him, “Shut up, lying ass. I heard your Coach rarely ever gives you guys breaks. Last time I heard the admin ladies talking about how some kid’s mom was threatening to sue.”
“Well that story is true,” he said grinning down at you, “but I’d never lie to you. Not to my favorite girl.”
You felt yourself blushing again at him calling you baby and for the way he was looking down at you. With him that close to you and looking down with that smile of his, you’ve never been more aware of how handsome Xuxi is.
“Oh, and Jaehyun? I heard Manager was looking for you out on the floor. Apparently, you’ve been gone for too long,” Xuxi said, giving him a smile that Jaehyun knew was strained.
Jaehyun clenched his jaw. He didn’t like the way you got all shy around Xuxi or the way your entire demeanor caused him to do a double-take. He’s seen you like this before.
It was the way you were when you used to be in love with him.
“You should get going, Jaehyun. The manager isn’t in a really good mood today. She gave me an attitude for not having the size some kid wanted. Does she not know by now that we always sell the Converses early?” you said. You rolled your eyes and continued ranting, blissfully unaware of the tension growing between the two boys.
Jaehyun saw Xuxi’s hand almost brushing your breast and could tell you either had no clue, or used to it by now.
“Yeah Jaehyun, better hurry,” Xuxi said innocently.
“Fine. But, _____,” Jaehyun walked up to you with a determined look on his face. He grabbed your wrist and gently yanked you out from under Xuxi. “I just want to talk to you. Give me just one opportunity and you’ll never see me again, okay? You already know about the party at Theta Chi. Promise me you’ll go?”
You nod. You were staring at him with a flustered look that made his heart ache.
Jaehyun leaned down to whisper, “Go look for me there, okay? Just one last time, please.”
His lips brushed against your ear before he quickly walked away. You were left stumbling for the words to reply with when he just left.
What the hell was that?
Clearing your throat, you turned around to face Xuxi who was leaning against the wall, again. This time though he had his arms crossed and was staring at the door Jaehyun exited out of. When he heard you, he directed his blank gaze to you.
There was a brief silence that felt oddly tense to you.
What the fuck was this kid’s problem, you thought.
You raised an eyebrow at him when it was clear he was just going to stare at you with a bitchy face and that made you on edge. Especially since you didn’t put in an effort to look good today
“What?,” you snapped, “Do I have something on my face?”
He didn’t reply to you right away. He searched your face for a bit until he pushed himself off the wall and walked up to you.
One of his hands comes up to your chin and grabs it gently, forcing you to look up at him. Your breath immediately stilled at his touch. His hands were so warm and so big that you were willing to bet they were bigger than your face. You tried to distract yourself with that thought so you wouldn’t focus on how insanely gorgeous he was up close, but that didn’t settle well with him.
He squeezed you so gently that you almost didn’t feel it, but you did.
When you met his gaze, he finally spoke.
“You good?” he asked. You could feel his breath tickle your lips. You were so captivated by his own lips being that close to yours that you didn’t answer until he squeezed you again. You nodded as a reply, too dazed to actually talk.
He gave you a grin and continued, “Don’t look for Jaehyun, okay? I got you. Whatever it is you need or want, I got you for it. Not him.”
You stared up at him with a surprised and innocent look on his face that only served to make him want to wreck you.
Xuxi still had a grip on you, “Good girl. I’ll come looking for you. You don’t need to go after anyone. I’ll do it. You understand me, right? You get what I’m saying?”
You avert your gaze as the words he said made you feel things that far too inappropriate for the workplace.
It had been so long for you, evident in the sudden dampness you felt between your legs that came right after he called you a good girl.
“That’s good. Of course my girl understands, you always do so good in everything. Now I’m gonna go back out there and do my job. Remember what I said, okay?”
Xuxi lets you go but of course he doesn’t do it simply. Of course he doesn’t. Simple isn’t in this man’s vocabulary. This man just had to call you a good girl and his girl in the fucking storage room at work. He just had to drag his hand down and let it trace the hollows of your throat first before stepping back and walking away from you.
You let all the tensions you didn’t know you had out of your body as you sink into the only chair there is. You don’t think about what could happen at work that much, or at all really, but you for sure never saw Huang Xuxi making you wet while on the job.
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btw the xuxi in this is xuxi during the beginning of super m promos... u know... with the nice glowing brown skin and light brown hair.... whew...
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Top 10 Thanksgiving Episodes
Happy Thanksgiving Everybody! Time to eat a ton, pass out, and watch MST3K and all that. And since I already covered most of the general stuff about how diffrent this holiday is in my Loud House Review, and to reitarate to anyone having a big, 20 or so people crammed in a room thanksgiving this year
For the rest of us like all of the big three of Holidays, thanksgivings also the time for some classic episodes of television. Granted most shows stick to one, with some exceptions like friends, roseanne and new girl, but most make their one count. Thanksgiving may not be as big as the holidays it’s sandwitched in between, to the point christmas is slowly but surely trying to swallow it whole, but it’s still a time for family, fighting, and food that brings plenty of opprotunity for greatness and even with a smaller pool, I stiill had signifigant trouble narrowing down my list to 10. But I stand by what I got it wittled down to. This is my top 10 thanksgiving episodes! And for my regular readers, there’s a suprising lack of animation but i’m more than willing ot go outside that and now’s the right time, asi’m currently having a black friday sale with reviews marked down by two bucks to just 3 dollars for an episode of any tv show. Yes it’s a shameless plug but since when have I ever had shame? So with that in mind let’s chow down, it’s my top 10 thanksgiving episodes!
10. Pangs (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
Buffy is as a show I REALLY need to revisit. While lately, what with the abuse he did that we can’t get details on when making justice league or his you know cheating on his wife on and off over a decade, I’m not at all a fan of series creator Joss Whedon, Buffy itself is still a classic in my eyes.
The tale of a teenager given the role of the Slayer, a chosen female asskicker given moderate super powers and the duty to defend the world from vampires and other ghouls. The show dealt with the usual teen superhero stuff, ballancing asskicking with saving the world and arguably codified the genre, to the point I hold it at least partially responsible for the bigger wave of teen heroes in the 2000′s in animation and comics. The show had smart dialouge, metaphors, mythology and a rich, and vibrant cast. Sure some things haven’t aged well like an adult vampire dating a teenager or the really dated ways Willow’s sexuality were handled, as groundbreaking as it was, from barely letting her kiss her girlfriend or be shown being intimate iwth her, or just entirley shutting out the posiblity she’s bisexual. But a few age wrinkles aside the show is still good and I still need to rewatch it and that includes our number 10 pangs, one of hte most memorable and well done thanksgiving specials and one fo the shows more comedy moments.
It’s thanksgiving, and Buffys mom’s going out of town, so she decides to hold thanksgiving at Giles place to bring her slowly drifting surrogate family together. Naturally given the way things usually go for our Slayer, she has a hard time of it as Willow chafes at celebrating colonolsim, Giles dosen’t get what the big fuss is about that or the meal being british, and Spike shows up looking for protection from season big bads the initiative, a secret military unit that’s chipped him so he can’t harm humans, so he has no way to eat and spends the mal tied to a chair. Oh and of course, a vengeful native american spriti from the chumash tribe has given Xander syphilis and killed a currator as revenge for his people’s suffering, so now Buffy has to fight a ghost bear if she want sa happy thanksgiving. Also Angel is back in town and being kind of a dick, but hey it leads to a good episode of his spinoff so whatever.
Pangs is just a fun episode, not only does it do well by not ignoring american colonalisim, but it just has a fun energy to it as Buffy desperately tries to have a good thanksgiving, Spike instnatly proves his worth as an addition to the gang both chemstiry and comedy wise, and we of course get this classic moment.
It had to fight it’s way onto the list, but pangs is a holiday dish worthy of sinking your fangs into.
9. The Dressing (Aqua Teen Hunger Force)
Speaking of nutty fun thanksgiving episodes.. this one is simply that. I love Aqua Teen Hunger force.. even if like a lot of comedy shows it drooped in later seasons, it still has it’s classics earlier on and even later on has a few gems. But on the earlier on side we have their utterly bonkers and delightful thanksgiving episode “The Dressing”, a sequel to the Christmas Episode “The Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from The Future”, which itself is an utter classic, but we’ll possibly get to that in december’s list.
The Aqua Teens are having Thanksgiving with Carl, whose naturally onlyt here for the free food and staying outside. it’s also days before or after, with black colored frito pie,a t urkey, and whatever else their broke selves could scrounge up.
However, naturally, like Buffy a normal day for the Aqua Teens just isn’t complete without some weird shit happening, thanksgiving gets interrupted by the cybernetic ghost of Christmas past fromt he future, whose transformed himself into a turkey and wants to save their turkey so it can lead a rebellion in the bizzare hilarious distopian hellscape he comes from. This of course leads to him getting drunk, eating all their food and later showing up with a laser sock to murder carl after the episodes over. It’s just a fun time, a really funny episode and one of the teens more memorable outings. Not a lot to say here, it’s just really damn funny.
8. Arnold’s Thanksgiving (Hey Arnold!)
Anoter classic I really need to revist but that more than earns his place here. Hey Arnold.. is easily one of the best animated shows ever. I say that with no hyperbole as it handled slice of life well while still getting dramatic when needed to, and is easily the gold standard for slice of life children’s cartoons to this day. And naturally it’s holiday specials were great, and I only r eally haven’t revisited them because they also hurt.. a lot. So unsuprisingly this one makes the list.
IT’s thanksgiving and given how chaotic things are for both Arnold and Helga’s families, our heroes are miserable. Arnold would understandably like just once to have thanksgiving on thanksgiving, his family instead doing fourth of july due to his grandmother being who she is. And Helga naturally is ignored and mistrteated as usual since her sisters home and her dad and alchoholic mother ignore her as usual even when she’s not around. What i’m saying is while Arnold’s issue is understandable, helga always wins a “whose got the shitter life” contest.
So the two flee to their teacher Mr Simmons, a character I genuinely loved and loved even more finding out he was gay as an adult, as he was a kind , supportive teacher who could be a bit softhearted but wasn’t afraid to step the fuck up when needed. But they find his thanksgiving isn’t much better, as his Mother and wont’ stop sniping at his boyfriend peter and clearly isn’t entirely comfortable with her son’s sexuality, his friend keeps snapping at peter and mooching off him, and his uncle.. well he’s just a loud asshole who wants turkey.. The kids naturally realize the meaning of the holiday, reconclie with their families who DID take genuine steps to make up for them being gone and missed them, all is well. It just shows nobody’s family is perfect, and is well done in that but also shows why thanksgiving has grown beyond it’s roots: It’s a day for families to get together and even if they may fight, recognize why they love one another. I also give the show balls for heavily imiplying a character is gay and not slapping a girlfriend on him or any of the usual bollocks: Simmons just very clearly is gay and it’s as transparent as the show could get at the time, with the show making it crystal clear years later with the revivial movie. Nice. We’ll have more servings of thanksgiving classics after the cut.
7. Slapsgiving (How I Met Your Mother)
Oh How I Met Your Mother. You started out really good but boy did that go downhill fast and land in a nuclear inferno didn’t it? But I can bitch about the How I Met Your Mother Ending some other time, and probably will. In the show’s prime before they decided to stick with an ending no one wanted anymore, it was pretty great and while season 1′s also impressive Thanksgiving outing “Belly Full of Turkey” was considered, there was ultimately one slaptastic king when it came to Thanksgiving: Slapsgiving.
Naturally for this show Slapsgiving ties into the show’s suprisngly deep and rich lore: The season before this, Marshall and Barney made a “Slap Bet”, which is exactly what it says on the tin: A bet where the winner slaps the looser. And due to Barney prematurely slapping Marshall, Marshall got 5 penalty slaps to be dolled out whenever, one in that episode and another in a coda to another. For his next one though Marshall decided to outdo himself and set up a counter.. and it all comes down to thanskgiving.
So we get a good ten minutes of Jason Siegel making meancing slap based refrences while NPH’s barney cowers in fear before Marshall’s wife lily pumps the breaks on the bet as comissoner.. only to reconsider when Barney makes the mistake of tormenting Marshall over it, resuling in the inevitible, and in THE thanksgiving song.
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Basically it’s what happen when you give three really funny people a subplot together. Magic happens. The subplot is not bad either as a pre-totallyinsufferabledouchebag Ted hooks up with Robin again over lingering feelings and thanksgiving prep and the two have to deal with that... though it’s mostly funny for Robin’s new boyfriend, who Future Ted acknowledges is barely older than them, but admits to remembering as decrept old man, which results in a 30 something’s dialouge coming out of a very old man and me laughing very hard. A simple joke but one that really works. Overall a slaptacular good time.
6. Two Turkeys (Brooklyn Nine-Nine)
NINE NINE BITCHES! I’m honestly shocked I haven’t talked about Brooklyn Nine Nine on here already, but it’s easily one of the best sitcoms in recent memory, if not of all time. It has one of the best ensemble casts, great jokes and timing, yet still ballances things out with a sense of realisim beneath the madness> It’s also noticable for holding it’s officers more accountable than most real world police departments, to the point all scripts that were written up for next season were thrown out post George Floyd. It’s truly a joy to watch.
So naturally they’ve had their share of Holiday episodes, with them easily having the best crop of halloween episodes since roseanne with their annual heists, and having some pretty damn memorable christmases, opening with this:
So naturally thanksgiving is no exception, with it’s last two being the best and it being a really hard choice wether to go with season 4′s “Detective Santiago” or this one. But as good as the other ep was.. this one inched it out for good reason.
The episode’s split into two equally good, equally hilarious plot lines. In the B-Plot, the 99′s Captain Raymond Holt, one of the best characters in sitcom history and gay icon, and his husband Kevin take their annual trip to get a pie for Holt’s families thanksgiving and come back with the well crafted pie, even if both prefer their food nice and bland. But the pie go missing and Captain Holt procedes to hilariously drill into each of the other members of the 99 and uncovering holes int their previous thanksgving stories with Rosa’s being suprisingly heartwarming (She’s going to a humilating minons on ice show with her family because they reconnected in jail.. setting up the equally awesome “Game Night” episode where she comes out.) and Boyle’s being utterly pathetic as you’d expect (Cooking his son mac and cheese because he’ll eat nothing else and declaring him a “basic bitch”). The solution however ends up being heartwarming as the culprit is actually Kevin, who hated the pie.. as did Raymond who suggests just taking the drive anyway because they enjoy the silent ride there and back every year. It may be boring to us.. but it’s preicious and really sweet all the same.. as it is hilarous when Kevin treats this as a big endugence and seems turned on by that. What i’m saying is these men are couple goals and Marc Evan Jakcson was awesome long before ducktlaes.
The main plot is also great, as Jake and Amy, now engaged after this year’s halloween episode which is also , coincidentally, the series best, try to unite their families. It just goes about as well as you’d expect as Amy’s are type a control freaks, jake’s mom is a retired hippie school teacher and his dad is a human disaster area who has to be told to put on pants, cheated on his mom constantly, somehow got her back, and in general is barely functional on a good day. The families do bond breifly but things ineveitbly break down, hilarity and severed limbs insue and family comes together. IT’s just a funny, well done 20 mintues that’s also really damn sweet, with this plot ending with Amy’s dad accepting the chaos as that’s’ts what you do with family. Also jake naturally finds out he has a ton of step siblings as his dad was and still is a man whore. Happy Thanksgiving!
5. Bart Vs Thanksgiving (The SImpsons)
Let’s face it: if you follow my reviews at all you knew this was coming. While not one I go back to due to being an emotional kidney punch, i’d be doing this list a diservice if this classic wasn’t on there.
In a nutshell, Bart starts a petty fight with Lisa over her centerpiece that ends with it in the fireplace, Bart sent to his room till he apologizes, and Bart seething insiting he did no wrong. It takes a visit to the homeless shelter after running away, and ending up on the news, to realize what an ass he’s been and one nightmarish dream sequence later, seriously why do you think I don’t revisit this one that often? This thing has traumatized me since I was a kid and unlike the slap song I will not be showing it to you, has a heartwarming reconcliation with his sister on the roof. It’s just a nice, sweet special that gets the holiday just right and i’d expect nothing less from Golden Age Simpsons.
4. A Deep Fried Korean Thanksgiving (Gilmore Girls)
Another show I need to talk about more, Gilmore Girls is fucking awesome. The story of a woman who ran away pregnant at age 16 and built her own life for her daughter in the quirky town of stars hollow who finds herself reconnecting with her parents in present day against her will.. is really good stuff. Funny, heartfelt and really damn well acted with one hell of a cast, the show is part of me and I make no bones about that, so it’s big thanksgiving outing naturally belongs on here.
The premise is simple: Rory and Loreli end up having to go to four diffrent thanksgivings, which even for big eaters like them is a massive task, each unique and entertaining. The main event of course is Suki’s, where everyone’s faviorite chef agreed to let her husband cook the turkey.. of course with the plan to sneak in mid cooking and add her own touches. This gets foiled when Jackson and his family decide to deep fry the thing.. probably in part because Jackson knows his wife well and knows what she was planning. Though over the night while our heroines are at their other meals, it devolves into them deepfrying everything they can get their hand son including a shoe, and Suki getting plastered to tolerate it.
While not topping it the other meals and the sheer lunacy of four thanksigvings in one day, are still memorable: There’s the natural posh one at Richards and Emilys, the dour joyless one at The Kims where Mrs Kim forces the band to play the whole time and forces our heroines to eat food as joyless as Mrs. Kim, and Lukes for a nice round of Rory grappling with having PDA with her boyfirend Jess before resolving it at the end. Also dean’s a jackass. No one is suprised. Jess isn’t one at this stage in his character which is. Also Kirk adopts a cat that slowly pushes him out of his own house which works comedically becaus Sean Gunn is a national treasure. Overall a really good episode and if you have netflix and haven’t checked the series out, this is a good one to try out.
3. The Thanksgiving Special (Regular Show)
I already talked about this one in my top 11 Regular Show episodes so i’ll try to be brief. In a nutshell Mordecai and Rigby destroy thanksgiving and genuinelly feeling bad about it, scramble to win a thanksgiving bird from a Thanksgiving Song Contest, going up against an all star super group comissioned by Donald Trump. Yes really. Meanwhile Muscle Man and High Five Ghost go to get sides and the rest of the park staff’s attemtps to get a turkey are thwarted by a bunch of thanksgiving reinactors who go unexplained in any way shape or form which given how rare that is for regular show, which usually has some sort of explination for the madness, just makes it funnier. It ends with a REALLY touching song, a fight on a blimp with outgoing president trump, and a truly heartwarming thanksgiving meal. All in all a nice special that combines the shows madcap nature with the genuine warm fuzzies of thanksgiving.
2. We Gather Together (Roseanne)
Another series I need to talk about more.. and another series where one of the creators has turned out to be a terrible human being. Seriously Roseanne Barr is is a terible person, she deserved to be removed from her show, and while the Conner’s isn’t GREAT it’s still FAR better without her. That being said I will still stick up for the original as she wasn’t the only one involved (indeed the aformentioned Joss Whedon worked on the show breifly and Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman Paladino not only worked there but later adapted one of Roseanne’s insane antics, making all the writers wear caps with a number instead of referring to them by name , to Gilmore Girls.). Her being a bad person even then dosen’t change the fact that the show is sitcom gold, one of my faviorite shows, and a true classic. And this episode helps showcase WHY.
What makes this episode special, even among Roseanne episodes is it’s structure: While there are things going on it’s mostly a free floating day in the Families life and thus feels like your there with them through thanksgiving. It feels genuine, like past thanksgivings i’ve remembered: Everyone has their own stuff going on, they all eat, and there’s naturally a big blowup.. and one that eveyrone else ignores to eat which I can relate to. That authenticity really elevates the episode and is why I seek it out every year.
That’s not to say nothing happens, it just flows in and out like it would in a normal thanksgiving. Roseanne deals with her parents, a pre-abuser version of her dad and her overbearing nightmare of a mother beverly, and the inevetible blow up when Bev’s needling about Jackie’s life goes too far , prompting Jackie to reveal her new job as a police officer before bursting into tears, all to Roseanne’s annoyance. Rosie also moves them to a hotel despite an attempted guilt trip from her mom.
Speaking of Mom’s we see Dan’s for the only time before the later seasons and the utterly terrible last season, a professional career woman whose moved on well from her ex and brought her new boyfriend there. Ed, despite some comptemplation over it is firmly accepting and instead starts flirting with the Conner’s friend Crystal. Dan, being overprotective because of his Daddy Issues, but ed cals him out on it “Being lonely is a hell of a lot for two people to have in common, you woudln’t knwo anything abotu that son, and I pray to god you never do” A great caper to a fantastic episode.. one I thought was going to top the list... THOUGHT is the key word here...
1. Turkey in A Can (Bob’s Burgers)
This one is. Bob’s Burgers is one of the best things to come out of the 2010′s and i’ve fallen way too far behind on it, so I can’t say if any thanksgivings after thankshoarding top this one.. what I can say is this one is the gold standard for thanksgiving episodes, and is filled with great stuffing.
Thanksgiving is Bob’s holiday. Being a chef he loves the chance to go all out, and really flex his muscles for his families when it comes to cooking up a storm, and it’s endearing when bob gets just as nuts as his family. But this year someone keeps flushing his turkeys down the toilet despite his best efforts, so while Louise hilariously tries to solve things to proe it wasn’t her (though it’s entirely fair they thought it was her consdering.. everything), while LInda, Gene and LInda’s flighty sister Gale try to write THE thanksgiving song. And while it’s no you just got slapped, damn if they didn’t succeed.
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Sailors in your mouth indeed. It leads to plenty of great jokes the best being the guy at the Deli Counter thinking Bob’s into him and bob not being sure how to respond, but being mildly recpetive. But the climax is what makes the episode as when Bob falls asleep we find his medication has been making him sleepwalk.. and thus put the turkey s int he toilet, as Tina’s desire to be at the Grown Up Table, itslef a REALLY funny runner as you’d expect, has him panicking internally and thus reliving her potty training. The episode ends with Bob letting her come to the adults table, and a rather heartwarming thanksgiving feast. All in all an excellent episode. It also leads to the chaos seen above whic hif htat’s not thanksgiving, I don’t know what is.
Have a happy thanksgiving and check out my black friday sale! Until then there’s always another rainbow!
#thanksgiving#top 10#bob's burgers#gilmore girls#buffy the vampire slayer#aqua teen hunger force#hey arnold#how I met your mother#the simpsons#roseanne#regular show#brooklyn nine nine#brooklyn 99#99
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Obey Me! Brothers as songs from BLACKPINK’S ‘The Album’
I’ve been listening to the album on loop since its release. All the songs SLAPS. Eventually I came up with this so yeah let’s get started.
(All English lyrics are taken from genius.com)
Lucifer: How You Like That
This one is pretty obvious.
First single from the album, first track, multiple records hit upon its release - idk sounds pretty much like “the mighty first-born” to me
The song is basically about escaping a toxic relationship. You know who else has a toxic relationship? That’s right, Mr. Godly Daddy Issues. He literally started a war against his dad.
“Again in such a dark place, light up the sky” & “In such a darker place, shine like the stars” is literally the Morningstar himself in Devildom and no one can change my mind on this. Fact.
Pridey McPrideface moment: “Look at you, now look at me”
There’s this line in the lyrics: “The day I went down with my wings lost/ Those dark days when I was trapped”, which I think fully represents his fall from heaven. Also queen Roseanne Park NAILED this scene in the MV:
Yep. That’s the fall of an Archangel for me.
Mammon: You Never Know
Tbh I’ve had a hard time deciding on Mammon’s song.
But then these lyrics hit me: “The words that everyone said so easily/ Maybe you can hear it soon/ I've heard enough I've heard enough/ Of the things that I'm not”
Mammon is constantly harassed by his brothers for being stupid. Sure, he might lack common sense, but it doesn’t give the brothers the full authority to shame him like that.
“But you'll never know unless you walk in my shoеs/ You'll never know, my tangled strings/ 'Causе everybody sees what they wanna see/ It's easier to judge me than to believe” That’s our classic misunderstood tsundere right there.
He’s probably the one who’s gonna stick with MC until the very end (y’all know how clingy he can be). “Even if the whole world changes/ I'm still the same”
Also remember during the Lamp event, he was the first one to say that he’d rather be with MC instead of ruling the world? Yeah, the line hits right there.
At the same time, his feelings for MC? Y O U N E V E R K N O W
(But everyone does eventually)
Leviathan: Love To Hate Me
“Kinda sad that you always been like that/ See me making waves and you don't like that” Levi usually gets emotional because of mangas/animes/video games (and I wouldn’t be surprised if he would actually flood the House Of Lamentation). And how many times do we see the brothers complain about that throughout the storyline? Countless.
“Only thing I think about is big stacks” except the stacks are Ruri-chan goods.
Notice how Levi is the one who gets involved in family drama the least (unless his video games are the direct cause for them)? Sounds a lot like “I keep it light/ No, no, no drama in my life”.
Classic introvert line: “I need you? Nah, I been good lately/ Blowin' up, workin' busy” because who the fuck needs people when you can binge watch animes and blow shits up in video games all day?
Poor boy keeps chasing Mammon because of the debt. “I'm takin' back what you've taken from me” yeah you go boy.
Satan: Pretty Savage.
The song title speaks for itself.
Satan is definitely a pretty boy (fight me, I dare you). He shows off a friendly smile way too often that people sometimes forget that he’s the Avatar Of Wrath.
And yeah, he can be pretty savage.
He HATES being compared to Lucifer. “It seems similar, but we are different from the core”. He loathes it even more if people start calling him by his bRoThEr’s name. “If you get our name wrong, ddu-du-ddu-du hit” aka prepare for the wrath of kitty boyo.
Did I mention how he loves messing up Lucifer’s life? That’s exactly what “Yeah, we some bitches you can't manage/ I make this difficult thing again” means.
When he gets angry, well “You better run, run, run”.
This whole song just fits him perfectly.
Well, except for the “I wore something similar to you, but it looks better on me” part because this man has absolutely no fashion sense.
Asmodeus: Bet You Wanna
“MC I know you want meeeeee”
Horny song for a horny demon boyo.
Asmodeus is beautiful and he knows it. He’s undeniably the most confident demon in Devildom. He knows his looks are on another level. “Uh, I'm gonna make you go blind/ Every time I walk, my hips, they don't lie”
He’s also a party animal full of energy. Anywhere he goes, he’s gonna make sure all eyes are on him. “You wanna run with my love, I know you wanna/ From the club to the tub, you said you wanna/ Give me an all night hug, I bet you wanna”
And of course, the song screams his signature trait: his lust. “Let's do what we both desire/ On God, like I'm in the choir/ I bet you if you make me sweat, I'll still be on fire” Yeah mister, thank you for announcing your desire to have such intense sex that you’ll moan like a whole choir. Totally useful information.
Also imagine Asmo singing along to this with Cardi B.
The S A S S tho.
Beelzebub: Ice Cream
Another obvious one.
“Wow, a food-themed song! Totally fits the Avatar Of Gluttony perfectly!”
That’s what you think, right? Well, there’s actually more to that.
At first glance, we all think that Ice Cream is just another summer song with cheerful and light-hearted beats, right? But haha SIKE BITCH it’s actually a horny song.
It’s even more horny than Bet You Wanna. See the lyrics for yourself.
And Beel, he may appear as a totally friendly demon who craves food 24/7 at first.
But as we go deeper into the storyline, we realise that he’s actually not nice and naive like we thought.
His personality has darker aspects (aka depressing memories) along with a needy side.
How many times were MC asked to feed him (and then given the option to have a passionate kiss with him) during the storyline? Idk, I lost count already.
Also I’m sure that 80% of this fandom wouldn’t mind being a hoe for him.
Belphegor: Crazy For You
(SPOILERS FOR LESSON 16)
Oh boy, here comes the yandere vibes.
Belphie’s love is extremely obsessive. “If you're my (hu)man, I want you to myself”.
When he was trapped in the attic, he knew he needed a plan to get out. And he knew that plan would eventually trigger Lucifer so much. But he proceeded anyway and approached MC first, because all he needed then was their attention. “I know I'll have enemies long as you're into me/ But I don't care 'cause I got what I need”
Being the natural cunning demon he is, he knows how to manipulate MC into helping him. “I saw you/ And knew what I was trying to do/ I had to play it rеal, real smooth/ And once I finally made my move/ I went crazy over you”
Remember what he did to MC after lesson 16? Cow boyo began pining to us like crazy. That part was so smooth I almost forgot he choked us to death. (Admit it, some of you actually forgot about it.)
Like Jennie sang, “Feels wrong but it's right, right?”
#obey me#obey me!#shall we date#obey me lucifer#obey me mammon#obey me leviathan#obey me satan#obey me asmodeus#obey me beelzebub#obey me belphegor#obey me shall we date#blackpink#blackpink the album#the album#otome game
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Roman
A/N: I wrote more fic because polotics and because the bees made me
Warnings: transphobia, horrible parenting, Remus being Remus, t-slur, swearing, crying, purposeful misgendering, tell me if there are more!
Ships: none
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Roman checked his bag one more time. He needed to make sure he had everything.
Shuffling through his bag he let out a long sigh before rushing into his bathroom. He was forgetting about toothpaste and toothbrush.
"You sure you got everything? And you remember the code to use if it goes bad?" Jasmine, Romans best friend, said over the phone.
"Yeah, Jazz. I triple checked everything." Roman announced, placing his toothbrush in his bag along with his toothpaste.
"Good, did you forget your sword?" Jazz asked. She knew how much he loved his sword.
"Nope! In my bag. Along with my keys, my masculine clothes, my binder -thanks for that, again. You're amazing- brush, shampoo, school stuff, my charger, toothbrush and toothpaste." He checked off.
The girl chuckled. "Good. Can't forget that shampoo. I would let you borrow mine but my kinky ass hair shampoo is not gonna work with that white-boy hair you got." She said, smirk evident in her tone.
"Oh ha ha," he mocked. She was always doing that but he didn't actually mind.
"Now," she got serious again. "Tell me the plan one more time."
"Okay," he took a seat on his bed. "I'mma put my stuff in my car and come out to my mom after dinner. If she reacts badly then I text you the code word-"
"Which is?" She interrupted.
"Chicken butt. Then I drive to your house and stay at your place until my dad gets back from his trip. Then I tell him. If he reacts the same as my mom then I stay at your place. If he reacts how we think he will then I can just stay with my dad permanently. If my mom reacts well then I just stay at my place and tell my dad when he gets back." Roman explained, one more time. He knew this plan to heart, they've been planning it since he first told her when he was thirteen that he wasn't a girl.
"Good. Good luck out there, soldier. I gotta go prepare your room in case she reacts the way we assume. Love ya, bye!" She hung up.
Roman let out one more sigh before he heard a knock on his door. He looked up and saw his younger brother, Remus, standing there.
"What do you want, peasant?" Roman asked, earning a glare from the younger boy.
"Two things. One; what's that stuff on your bed? Two; dinner time." He said in his sing-song voice.
"None of your damn business and okay. I'll be down in a sec." Roman shot back. He didn't want his brother to know anything. He'd tell his mom immediately and the plan will have to happen early.
"I would be nicer to me if I were you or I'll cut off your boobs, slice them up, bake them in a pie and feed it to you." The 12 year old hissed before flipping him the bird and running off downstairs.
Roman grabbed his stuff and went downstairs, passed the kitchen and outside to his car. He got it from his dad when he first turned sixteen a couple months ago. It was old and not the best but it was his most prized possession for he knew that his father had been saving up the money since Roman was eight so he'd be able to have it for his sixteenth.
Quickly, he placed his backpack in the passenger seat and briskly walked back inside.
"Why'd you go outside?" His mother, Aleiya, asked. Her perfectly sculpted eyebrow raised as if asking him what he was up to this time.
Roman looked down at his phone in his hand. "I just left my phone in my car." He lied through his teeth. He's gotten good at it, being an actor and all.
His mother just gave him a slight nod before telling him to go hurry up and wash his hands.
After a quick prayer the family started eating. Remus went on and on about his day, saying a lot of… questionable things.
"-and I was sitting in class thinking 'hey? What would it be like if I tied up my teacher by his ankles and shove chalk so far up his a-"
"Okay! That's enough out of you." His mother pointedly stared at Remus. Remus just shrugged before going back to his food.
"Roseanne, sweety, how was your day?" His mother asked. Roman just shrugged before shoving more food in his face. He was too busy going over all the different scenarios in his head to answer.
"Oh! Mom! I wanted to tell you something!" Remus spoke up once more. His mother turned to her youngest child and told him to go on, although to keep it pg.
"Y'know that dick RoRo wants?I know where we can get him one. I know a guy," He said, simply. His wide, kinda-but-not-really innocent smile on his face. Absolutely no idea about what he had just done.
Romans eyes widened while his mothers darkened.
"Remus, sweety," she asked, so sweet it was sickening. "What do you mean by that?" She asked, venom dripping in her words. Roman tensed up.
"Y'know? The dick that Roman wants. I know where we can find one!" Remus said, pointing at Roman.
His mother's face twisted into something down right nasty.
"Remus, sweety ...who's Roman?" She asked, glaring daggers at Roman just across the table.
Remus giggled as if this was the funniest thing he'd ever heard.
"You're looking at him, silly….oh, wait. He was gonna tell you after dinner, right? That was the plan you and Jazz band were talking about...hm, oh well." He rushed, shrugging it off as if it were that simple. Roman kinda wished it could be.
"Anyway, can I have a worm and Beetlejuice shake for desse-"
"Rose." She said, voice hard and angry as she cut off Remus.
"Is what Rem saying...true?" Roman just opened and closed his mouth, looking like a fish out of water.
"Is. It. True!" She yelled at him, standing up from her seat and slamming her hands down on the table. Remus flinched. Roman looked at his food.
"Yes." He murmured. That's where shit hit the fan.
"Get out of my damn house."
"What?" Both Roman and Remus squeaked. Remus didn't know this would happen. He….he thought he was helping. Not getting his older brother thrown out.
"You heard me, tranny. Get out of my damn house. This ain't no pride parade. Get your shit and leave!" She spat, sitting back down and glaring at Roman.
And with a huff and a glare, Roman left the table.
Remus stared as his brother shoved back the seat and stormed out of the house, making sure to slam the door as loud as possible.
Everything went according to plan. Roman texted Jasmine and went to her house, struggling not to cry on the drive over. The minute she opened the door he was in her arms, sobbing. She rubbed his back and told him to let it all out.
That was the first night Remus cried himself to sleep.
-
After a few days, Romans dad came back home. Roman texted him, asking to meet at a coffee shop so he could explain why he wasn't at his mother's.
Remus had told him that their mother refused to even acknowledge she had another child so their dad was really confused.
"Hey, dad! Over here!" Roman called, waving to his father when he saw him enter the shop.
The man in question, Paul, walked over to the table and took a seat right across from him.
Just looking at the pair you could tell they were related. Roman got most of his looks from his dad. He got his dad's dark brown eyes with specks of gold. He also got his dad's light brown, almost blonde hair. He got his tan, sun kissed skin and his splatter of freckles. The only thing he got from his mom was his smile.
He gave Roman a politeful hello and asked how he's been. They had a small conversation before his dad asked the big question.
"So ..why'd your mother kick you out?" His dad asked, setting his phone down on the table. Roman took a gulp before he started to explain the events of a couple nights ago. His dad didn't say a thing while he talked. He only nodded his head and let him explain.
"So…." His father started when Roman was all done explaining. "What I'm hearing is that whole thing when you wanted to be called Roman….that wasn't a phase?" His father asked, pressing his lips together.
Roman nodded his head.
"Well ...okay then. So, your name is Roman now and you're a boy?"
"Uhm..well yeah. I mean, I guess I've always been a boy really," Roman rubbed his neck and looked down at a stain on the table. " I guess I just realised that I was one." He said, a small smile on his face as he looked back up at his dad.
"And when did you realize this?"
"Uhm, when I was thirteen, I think,"
"Geez, kid. Thirteen? That's some time.."
"Heh...yeah…"
"And that's why you've been buying all those guys clothes-"
"Yep"
"And acting more suspicious. Never letting me see your phone or anything-"
"Uh-huh"
"Wow," his father sighed. "I….I don't know what to say,"
"Look, dad," Roman started. "I know it's weird and new and stuff but I need you to know that I'm not gonna just stop being trans. This is who I am and...if you don't like it then...well then I guess you won't see me for a while." Roman said, putting on a brave face even though he was absolutely petrified.
His father's eyes widened before he started shaking his head. "Kid! Of course you're not gonna stop and I would never make you! I….I know I'm not the most...what's the word? Uhm-"
"Educated?" Roman tried, hope blossoming in his chest.
"Yeah. I'm not the most educated person on the planet but...you're my kid. I'm not gonna stop loving you just because the hospital got it wrong," his father smiled, tearing up a bit at the thought that his da-...son would ever think he could ever not love him.
Roman smiled from ear to ear, practically vibrating in his seat at the amount of joy he was feeling. He launched himself into his dad's arms, crying happy tears as he thanked him over and over. People in the coffee shop who had been overhearing beamed at the father and son as they both laughed and hugged.
After Roman pulled himself together they left, both grabbing a pastry on the way out.
-
After that Roman decided to stay with his dad for the rest of...well, as long as he stays at home. They had to get his mother's permission but all she said was;
"I don't fucking care what the hell you do with that bitch! She's not my 'son'. I had a daughter, not whatever that is. Do whatever you want with her! Throw her in a garbage can and let the rats have at her, I don't care. Now stop asking me."
Let's just say, there was no argument and Roman was legally allowed to stay with his dad full time. Soon after, though, Remus came along. He says it was because his mom became a bit bitchy and annoying after he told her he was gay, and that was a big reason but he had been planning to runaway and live with his dad ever since Romans mother kicked him out.
Life wasn't perfect and Roman still had his days, but with the help of his dad, brother, and friends he was able to get through it.
(He even got himself a boyfriend, but that's a story for another day)
#this took way too long#ugh#roman angst#slight remus angst#tw remus#tw crying#tw swearing#tw transphobia#tw bad parents#remus didnt mean to do it#he thought he was helping#also patton isnt the dad cus i didnt think#hed mistake roman going by a different nae as just a phase#sander sides fic#tw the duke#tw t-slur#also sorry im on mobile so yeah#tw misgendering
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my brain: you have other things you could be writing that are more important-
me: FUCK you here’s an essay about shit that’s can’t even happen
anyway fuckin uhhhh here’s my ideas about what Fire Emblem: Awakening would be like if it were remade for the switch using Fire Emblem: Three House’s mechanics
oh yeah and spoilers for awakening duh
i’m gonna go over the characters and most stuff first sooooo
[also, likes, dislikes, and closest allies ended up being filled in later after a lot of stuff was already done, it’s probably noticable so i figured i’d say so anyway]
1: Robin
strengths: sword and black magic (because those are the weapons used by Robin’s starting class)
weaknesses: none (because in Awakening Robin can change to literally any class they want)
“canon” class progression: commoner -> [unique class] tactician -> [unique class] grandmaster -> [unique class] manakete GRIMA TIME BABY
likes: strategy, books
dislikes: not having memories
closest allies: Chrom and Lissa
they’re the protag so they don’t really get anything else ahsjdfkhsdj sorry
2: Chrom
strengths: sword and lance
weaknesses: black magic
hidden talent: riding (I really like paladin chrom)
“canon” class progression: noble -> myrmidon -> [unique class] lord -> [unique class] great lord
likes: training, helping people
dislikes: formalities, bandits
closest allies: Robin, Lissa, and Frederick
dining hall: likes all kinds of meats, likes oranges (HAHA CHROM EATS UNPEELED ORANGES GET IT-), dislikes sweets
lost items: broken lance, torn cape, orange
gifts: training weight, smoked meat, riding boots, and legends of chivalry
3: Lissa
strengths: white magic, black magic, and lances
weaknesses: axes and heavy armor
hidden talent: axe
“canon” class progression: noble -> monk -> priest -> bishop
likes: pranks, fancy comforts
dislikes: bugs, the outdoors
closest allies: Chrom, Frederick, and Maribelle
dining hall: likes sweets, dislikes “gamey” meats
lost items: miniature frog statue, childish drawing (flavor text would say that it’s old and it’s implied the drawing is of her, chrom, and emmeryn when they were little)
gifts: armored bear stuffy, hair clip, tasty baked treat
4: Frederick
strengths: lance, axe, riding, and heavy armor
weaknesses: white magic
hidden talent: flying, black magic (FIRE, BABY)
“canon” class progression: noble -> soldier -> cavalry -> paladin -> great knight
likes: training, fire
dislikes: strangers
closest allies: Chrom and Lissa
dining hall: likes healthy meals, dislikes sweets and the more “gamey” meats
lost items: nothing. does this look like a man who would lose anything in his life? no. never. he’s the only real adult around here and the only haver of brain cells.
gifts: training weight, riding boots, ceremonial sword
5: Sully
strengths: lance, sword, riding, and brawling
weaknesses: authority
hidden talent: heavy armor
“canon” class progression: commoner -> soldier -> cavalry -> paladin
likes: training
dislikes: flirts
closest allies: Stahl, Miriel, and Vaike
dining hall: likes meats
lost items: coming up with lost items is hard, not all of these characters are much fleshed out and trust me i tried when i was super into awakening i very specifically went and tried to get as many supports as possible and there is like, almost NO lore about sully that sticks out to me which is a damn shame. a damn shame.
gifts: training weight, riding boots, smoked meat
6: Virion
strengths: bow
weaknesses: brawling and axe
hidden talent: flying and axe
“canon” class progression: noble -> fighter -> archer -> sniper
likes: ladies, tea
dislikes: savagery
closest allies: Sully and Cherche
dining hall: likes fancy meals
lost items: embroidered handkerchief, letter about Roseanne (i don’t know if i spelled that right, but it’s where he’s from), unused lipstick (for the same reasons as sylvain. You Know Why.)
gifts: board game, legends of chivalry, floral adornment, exotic spices, tea leaves
7: Teach Vaike
strengths: axe and brawling
weaknesses: riding and flying
hidden talent: sword
“canon” class progression: commoner -> fighter -> barbarian -> warrior
likes: being strong
dislikes: thinking too hard
closest allies: Chrom and Sully
dining hall: likes meats, dislikes vegetables
lost items: i got nothing
gifts: training weight, smoked meat
8: Stahl
strengths: lance, sword, and riding
weaknesses: axe
“canon” class progression: commoner -> soldier -> cavalry -> paladin
likes/dislikes: idk dude this man is just a normal guy that’s his thing
closest allies: Sully, Kellam, and Sumia
dining hall: likes everything
lost items: idk
gifts: smoked meat, tasty baked treat, armored bear stuffy
9: Miriel
strengths: black magic and sword
weaknesses: heavy armor and axe
hidden talent: white magic
“canon” class progression: noble -> monk -> mage -> warlock
likes: research, science
dislikes: things that get in the way of research
closest allies: Sully and Donnel
dining hall: likes vegetables, dislikes sweets
lost items: book on arithmetic, glasses, a test tube with unknown contents
gifts: board game, history of ylisse
10: Sumia
strengths: flying and lance
weaknesses: brawling and heavy armor
hidden talent: sword
“canon” class progression: commoner -> soldier -> pegasus knight -> falcon knight
likes: baking, reading, flower fortunes, Chrom
dislikes: being so clumsy
closest allies: Cordelia, Chrom, and Stahl
dining hall: likes sweets and baked goods, dislikes “gamey” meats
lost items: pegasus hairclip, hairbrush, training lance, hand knit purse, a book on how to be more confident
gifts: riding boots, armored bear stuffy, floral adornment, hairclip
11: Kellam
strengths: heavy armor, lance, and sword
weaknesses: authority
hidden talent: bow
“canon” class progression: commoner -> soldier -> armored knight -> fortress knight
likes: when people notice him
dislikes: the fact that he’s practically invisible
closest allies: Stahl
dining hall: no particular likes or dislikes
lost items: once again i have no ideas
gifts: armored bear stuffy
12: Lon’qu
strengths: sword and bow
weaknesses: heavy armor and white magic
“canon” class progression: commoner -> myrmidon -> mercenary -> swordmaster
likes: swords, training
dislikes: women (but isn’t a misogynist, we swear - nintendo) (it’s the trauma)
closest allies: Basillio
dining hall: no particular likes or dislikes
lost items: i feel bad about how often no ideas come to me for these
gifts: ceremonial sword, dagger, whetstone
13: Maribelle
strengths: white magic, riding, and black magic
weaknesses: heavy armor, axe, and brawling
hidden talent: lance
“canon” class progression: noble -> monk -> priest -> bishop
likes: tea, nobility
dislikes: informality
closest allies: Lissa, Ricken, and Olivia
dining hall: likes fancy meals and sweets, dislikes everything else
lost items: fancy teacup, laced parasol, heart-shaped hairclips
gifts: armored bear stuffy, handkerchief, tasty baked treat, floral adornment, tea leaves
14: Panne
strengths: beaststone and brawling
weaknesses: sword, lance, and axe
hidden talent: sword
“canon” class progression: commoner -> [unique class] taguel
likes: the outdoors, nature, animals
dislikes: humans
closest allies: n/a
dining hall: likes vegetables and especially carrots, dislikes sweets
lost items: herb potion
gifts: pretty much any plant or seed
15: Gaius
strengths: sword, brawling, and bow
weaknesses: white magic
hidden talent: axe
“canon” class progression: commoner -> myrmidon -> thief -> assassin
likes: candy, sweets, gold
dislikes: talking about his past, taking things seriously
closest allies: Chrom and Lissa
dining hall: REALLY likes sweets
lost items: bag of candies, muddy cape, lock pick
gifts: tasty baked treat, dagger
16: Cordelia
strengths: flying, lance, and black magic
weaknesses: axe and brawling
hidden talent: riding
“canon” class progression: commoner -> soldier -> pegasus knight -> falcon knight
likes: cleaning and keeping things tidy, looking after others, being hardworking, Chrom
dislikes: messes, feeling useless
closest allies: Chrom and Sumia
dining hall: no real likes or dislikes; is good with anything
lost items: handcrafted javelin, charm necklace
gifts: riding boots, legends of chivalry, whetstone
17: Nowi
strengths: dragonstone
weaknesses: heavy armor and riding
hidden talent: black magic
“canon” class progression: commoner -> [unique class] manakete
likes: playing, adventuring, shiny rocks, fun, kids
dislikes: being serious
closest allies: Gregor
dining hall: likes sweets, dislikes vegetables and bitter meals
lost items: colorful stone, dragon-scale scarf, talon-clippings
gifts: armored bear stuffy, tasty baked treat, gemstone beads
18: Gregor
strengths: sword and axe
weaknesses: white magic and black magic
“canon” class progression: commoner -> myrmidon -> mercenary -> hero
likes: gold, alcohol
dislikes: n/a
closest allies: Nowi and Anna
dining hall: likes meat
lost items: nothing comes to mind
gifts: armored bear stuffy, ceremonial sword, whetstone, smoked meat
19: Libra
strengths: white magic and axe
weaknesses: heavy armor
hidden talents: black magic
“canon” class progression: commoner -> monk -> priest -> bishop
likes: praying, the goddess
dislikes: his parents, his childhood
closest allies: Chrom and Lissa
dining hall: no specific likes or dislikes
lost items: offering to the goddess
gifts: goddess statuette, armored bear stuffy (these characters are all just soft bitches who want the bear stuffy i guess)
20: Tharja
strengths: black magic, lance, and sword
weaknesses: heavy armor, authority, and white magic
hidden talent: heavy armor (always blew my mind that she could reclass into an armor knight. all the classes in the world and THAT was an option for her???)
“canon” class progression: commoner -> monk -> dark mage -> dark bishop (In This House We Live In The Timeline Where Dark Mage Wasn’t Weirdly Gender Locked) (but otherwise the alternate would obviously be mage -> warlock)
likes: hexes, Robin
dislikes: sunshine, being cheerful
closest allies: Robin
dining hall: likes bitter foods, dislikes sweets
lost items: voodoo doll, hexing instruments, potion ingredients
gifts: board game, coffee beans, pitcher plant
21: Olivia
strengths: sword and lance
weaknesses: heavy armor, authority, and brawling
hidden talent: flying
“canon” class progression: commoner -> myrmidon -> thief -> [unique class] dancer
likes: dancing, art
dislikes: interacting with people
closest allies: Maribelle, Chrom, and Basillio
dining hall: likes sweets
lost items: a book on dancing technique, a handcrafted model of a theater
gifts: armored bear stuffy, sheet music, lily, tea leaves
22: Cherche
strenths: lance, axe, authority, and flying
weaknesses: white magic
hidden talent: white magic
“canon” class progression: commoner -> fighter -> barbarian -> wyvern rider -> wyvern lord
likes: wyverns
dislikes: Virion (only half joking, probably)
closest allies: Virion
dining hall: no specific likes or dislikes
lost items: wyvern wing grooming comb, book on wyvern care, tales of the legendary warrior minerva
gifts: riding boots, legends of chivalry, tea leaves
23: Henry
strengths: sword, black magic, riding, and flying
weaknesses: heavy armor, brawling, authority, and axe
hidden talent: axe
“canon” class progression: commoner -> monk -> dark mage -> dark bishop
likes: blood, hexes, scary things, animals
dislikes: his parents
closest allies: Ricken and Tharja
dining hall: likes sweets and bitter foods (interesting combo I know), dislikes meats
lost items: shiny knickknacks (probably got them from the crows), comb for brushing horses, bloody hexing instruments (not to be confused with Tharja’s, nonbloody, hexing instruments)
gifts: armored bear stuffy, fishing float
24: Say’ri
strengths: sword, bow, and flying
weaknesses: black magic, riding, and axe
hidden talent: black magic
“canon” class progression: noble -> myrmidon -> mercenary -> swordmaster
likes: Yen’fay
dislikes: Yen’fay (it’s a complicated sibling relationship)
closest allies: Tiki
dining hall: likes chon’sin dishes
lost items: no, sorry, got nothing
gifts: ceremonial sword, exotic spices, board game
25: Flavia
strengths: axe, sword, and brawling
weaknesses: flying, riding, and lance
“canon” class progression: noble -> fighter -> barbarian -> warrior
likes: n/a
dislikes: n/a
closest allies: Basillio
dining hall: likes meat, dislikes vegetables
lost items: this lady has like, less supports than what i can count on my hand. there is zero material or lore to really work with. no.
gifts: training weight, smoked meat, dagger
26: Basillio
strengths: axe, sword, and brawling
weaknesses: white magic and riding
“canon” class progression: noble -> fighter -> barbarian -> hero (yes i swapped Basillio and Flavia’s classes. why? idk i felt like it. it doesn’t change all that much in the bigger picture i think)
likes: n/a
dislikes: n/a
closest allies: Lon’qu, Olivia, and Flavia
dining hall: likes bitter foods, dislikes sweets
lost items: the fucking stone that goes in the fire emblem, maybe?
gifts: whetstone, training weight, ceremonial sword
27: Donnel
strengths: lance, sword, and axe
weaknesses: white magic, black magic, and authority
"canon” class progression: commoner -> myrmidon -> mercenary -> hero
likes: farming, learning, hunting
dislikes: n/a
closest allies: Lissa, Olivia, and Chrom
dining hall: no specific likes or dislikes
lost items: dirty handkerchief, handmade pendant, hunting snare
gifts: riding boots, legends of chivalry, armored bear stuffy
28: Anna
strengths: sword, white magic, and bow
weaknesses: authority and heavy armor
"canon” class progression: commoner -> myrmidon -> thief -> assassin
likes: money, making money
dislikes: losing money
closest allies: Gregor
dining hall: no specific likes or dislikes
lost items: a book on get rich quick schemes, a family portrait depicting all the other annas
gifts: she will take anything because she’s gonna resell it for a higher price. we all know it.
29: Tiki
strengths: dragonstone, flying, and black magic
weaknesses: none
hidden talent: white magic
“canon” class progression: noble -> [unique class] manakete
likes: sleep, the goddess, Marth
dislikes: people interrupting her naps
closest allies: Say’ri, Lucina, and Robin
dining hall: no specific likes or dislikes
lost items: probably something related to marth, a feather pillow
gifts: tasty baked treat, smoked meat, goddess statuette, ceremonial sword
i mISSED RICKEN WAY BACK WHERE MARIBELLE WAS, OH FUCK, SHIT
30: Ricken (sweet sweet boy i’m so fuckin sorry i forgot you)
strengths: black magic and white magic
weaknesses: sword, lance, axe, and heavy armor
hidden talent: sword
“canon” class progression: noblel -> monk -> mage -> warlock
likes: magic
dislikes: being treated like a child
closest allies: Henry
dining hall: likes sweets, dislikes bitter foods
lost items: a book on magic study
gifts: armored bear stuffy, tasty baked treat
yo i am way too tired this is gonna be a multi-part post now this is part one, part two is gonna be next gen units, and part three is gonna be non-character stuff
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WE ARE FINALLY, TRULY CAMLESS!
Season 9 Episode 6 Recap
First and foremost, I want to single out Noel Fisher for being a truly class act and returning to this demon show to give fans what happiness he could-the ONLY happiness a lot of fans have found here, myself included, in a very long time.
Next a serious piece of appreciation to Cameron Monaghan. I know he worked hard on what little they gave him to do in the past few years, and I’m thankful he had Gotham to work on to actually use his talent while mired down in the stinky swamp this show has become. In another actor’s hands, I don’t know that Gallavich would’ve been as captivating as it was-without Noel I know it wouldn’t have been, but Cam does deserve credit for bringing the other half of the couple to life-when they were on screen together, they had an undeniable magic happening.
Finally to any of the “fans” that are thinking or posting that we got this actually pretty shitty prison endgame because people pestered the show producers, writers, and actors too much to “bring Mickey back” may I please direct you to watch the early episode (I believe it was in Season 1, but certainly no later than S2) where Lip tells Ian prison must be a gay man’s dream with all the tattoos and unlimited sex partners. THAT is John Wells’ perception of gay men and it has been since long before he even thought of breaking Ian and Mickey up, let alone bringing Mickey back.
Personally I’m supremely disappointed this gay couple, like so many others, did not get a free and truly happy ending in canon, even though my friends know I predicted this could very well be all we got in the end. FFS it’s the year twenty gayteen-couldn’t ONE iconic gay couple be given a nice, normal happy ending? John Wells is a fucking dinosaur. He needs to go to a sensitivity training camp run by Dan Levy, Emily Andras, and Ryan Murphy.
Anyway-my last recap (baring a miracle) of this shit show is under the cut
(screen cap credit: justmikhailothings)
This episode was brought to us by White Castle. I’d like to think they gave every dime they got from them to pay Noel, but I’m sure it went to the other “big name” guest stars.
Also the show was (disappointingly) written by Nancy “Ratfucker” Pimental, so you know it’s gonna be bad.
The show begins with Ian putting his stuff away up in the attic and claiming he wants to eat a shitload of White Castle. Sure, whatever. Everyone is trying to offer ideas of what they should all do on his last day of freedom, but suddenly THIS Ian is talking and making decisions for himself. WHERE HAS HE BEEN THE PAST 4 SEASONS? He only appears when Mickey’s about...
Debbie offers to bring him to a gay bar to “get laid” (flashing back to Monica in S3, ugh-it was a bad idea then, it’s a bad idea now), Ian says, “Pretty sure I’ll get laid a lot in prison.” He says it with a grim expression, but considering how they end the show/who his cellmate is, he should be so lucky.
Frank pretty much ignores Ian in the scene, and they certainly don’t interact. Frank recommends Ian should read James Joyce’s Ulysses in prison, but other than the fact that it’s by an Irish writer and it’s extremely long and dense to get through (aka it’ll take Ian some time to do it), I don’t know if there’s any significance to his suggesting it.
This scene with just a throwaway send off from Macy seems to be in line with John Wells’ vision to have the series fade away with the characters going about their daily lives rather than end, but I really think both Cam and WHM were screwed out of not having a final scene together with just the two of them. Their comedy timing was always the best out of Macy and all the Gallagher kids. The lack of respect is just astounding-especially since the show wasted so much time on rando actors/characters we’re never going to see again.
The rest of Frank’s story this week takes place with Liam in tow again and it’s just dumb and boring.
The next scene shows Fiona and Bored looking at an apartment-they’re going to move in together (why? And when was this decided? Not that I care, but they could’ve cut a scene of them bickering to show a scene where they arrived at a decision together for once). It makes absolutely no sense-they have Fiona’s whole place to themselves, why waste $3000 a month living in some other apartment all to themselves? Just because it has two bathrooms? Do they shit that much?
And then, ooh, bad news for Fiona-her business partners require her to kick in another 25 grand or their investment will be dead in the water. I still don’t know how she went from having $50K to invest to $100K, so this new twist is just more bullshit that I can’t care about.
Then there’s a scene where we have to see Carl’s new girlfriend’s head in Ian’s lap. WTF. We need to see Mickey’s head there-or better yet, Ian using Mickey’s perfect thighs as a pillow.
There’s a couple of boring, unfunny bits of the nun and then the priest (is it supposed to be hilarious that the dad from Full House is spewing out sex scenario names Nancy must’ve googled?) from Kev and Vee’s kids’ preschool with a dildo. Seriously, Nance, not even close to funny, probably time to put yourself out to pasture, old girl. This show has used dildos as a sight gag so many times at this point there’s just nothing more to do with them except maybe shove them up the writers’ asses.
Lip’s storyline this week is something out of very, very bad fan fiction: A movie star comes to their house! Cuz, that happens, okay? I’m sure studios and billion dollar make up companies don’t run any kind of background check on people they hire to babysit their clients-why would they? It’s not like a crazed fan would rape/maim/kill the object of their obsession or anything. ANYONE can be a star minder for one day, surely.
BORING ALERT: Lip has a couple more running scenes this week, because no one got enough of that last episode. This week the least they could’ve done was play the Friends theme song over the endless footage where he’s chasing Courtney Cox around on location in Chicago.
While watching, I was wondering if Courtney’s role was written for her or they just settled for her when Roseanne Barr was suddenly unavailable-the stuff they had her say and do (except for the sprinting) seemed like it was written for a more jaded motherly type-but I’m jumping ahead. Since we DID get CC, here’s a couple of stray observations. 1. She looks like a rich man’s Emmy Rossum, and 2. was part of the purpose of her storyline to throw shade at Jennifer Aniston? Her character is named Jen Wagner, and there’s this whole dumb thing where Nancy’s trying to make, “Face it, you’re gorgeous” happen as her make up commercials’ tag line-which was reminiscent of Aniston’s ads for L’Oreal that stated “I’m/you’re worth it”.
Meanwhile, after Fi gets the devastating news that she needs to come up with more money she tries to get out of taking the new apartment with Bored by lying to him and telling him she smelled mold there-HE RESTORES OLD HOUSES/BUILDINGS FOR A LIVING why does Nancy think that was a clever lie for Fiona to come up with? How stupid is Fi supposed to be?
Back at the Gallaghers, Ian is practicing self defense moves with Carl and Kelly to prevent someone from raping him at knife point. Everyone’s flipping each other in these scenes and it just felt like they wanted to give their stunt coordinator (and Cam’s double) a lot of (boring) shit to do this week...Ian’s final scenes being played out with this meaningless newbie (who Carl will probably wind up killing or dumping or both) made me very sad. I guess maybe it was to build dramatic tension for when Ian’s in his cell later and the door slides open before he turns around. But it’s lame because the scenes play like he’s JUST realizing prison’s rapey.
Someone knocks at the door-my heart started racing but it wasn’t Mickey. A guy who wasn’t in the jail scenes tells Ian Joselito sent him. Ian starts asking him about the guys he was in county lock up with-WHO CARES. The guy tells him the couple he’s asking about broke up when one of them got out and Nancy throws in a line about long distance relationships not working. Joselito sent this Antonio guy to give Ian an “in-depth safety orientation about Beckman Correctional” before they send him up.
Antonio draws Ian a map of the facility and tells him the areas to avoid, then draws a big circle with Mickey Mouse ears on it and tells him that’s “Disneyland” and he can get all good things there-smooth blowies, weed, Snickers...I’m sure ol’ Nancy thought she was being clever, but it just took me out of the scene hearing Antonio say “Disney” at least three times-reminded me of Cam’s publicity stunt “coming out date” there last year.
Fi comes in and asks if anyone has any money (shades of S4 when Ian gave her his Fairy Tail tips) and that she needs 25 grand. She’s so stupid. And she’s honestly that out of touch with the family that she thinks maybe one of them has thousands of dollars they could give her? (although, if she had only gotten to Lip before he tried to buy Xan...)
Fiona tells Ian, “Don’t forget, I’m driving you to prison tomorrow.” And that’s the last time they see each other. So much for family, eh, Nance?
A huge time waster of a scene where Kev and Vee pack up all their sex toys and then another drawn out scene of them throwing the stuff off a bridge happen. Seriously, these are Cameron’s final moments on this shit show-they couldn’t think of anything for him to do? This was all screen time Cam and Noel could have had, SHOULD have had!
I have to recap this next bit because it was beyond belief unrealistic-Frank steals a bicycle and goes following Katey Sagal and her ex-husband when they leave the hospital in an Audi-and Frank manages to keep up with them all the way to their nice neighborhood that must be some distance away since it was daylight when they left and dark when they get to their door. Frank. On a bicycle. Kept up. YOU’RE SUCH A DUMB FUCK, NANCY.
Then there’s more White Castle with the money shot of the food and packaging all over the Gallagher kitchen table. Courtney gets to make a bulimia joke Nancy wrote into the scene. Hope you weren’t looking for a Guest Starring Emmy, CC.
Ian tells a “Carl story” about him puncturing his scrotum (on purpose) with a screwdriver when he was a kid. Carl must have the most mangled dick and scrotum on the planet between his several botched circumcisions and now this. Kelly asks him if that’s why he has “that scar”. You know what, Nance? While some people do in fact find scars sexy, self inflicted ones on scrotums don’t make that list.
Debbie comes in, recognizes “the chick from the make up ads” having dinner with them. I’m sorry-having WHITE CASTLE with them. Now everyone else sees it too, and Kelly insists that CC says “the” line that Nancy made up to make happen-why do they keep trying to make meaningless things A Thing?
After dinner, Jen is giving Ian advice about prison: “Find a hobby, it makes time go so much faster.” Ian asks, “Did you learn that from one of your movies?” and she says she did 48 hours for DUI (hey, just like Ethan, Nancy!). Jen really needed to get into making TP paper mache to get through 2 days?
Debbie, desperate to make shit about her says, “Maybe I should go to prison too. It seems like the only way I’ll find a real relationship.” WHY are they acting like Ian’s going away on a single’s cruise?
Jen says to Debs that’s not true and Debbie says it is, that she’s unlucky in love (when the fuck has she ever been “in love”?)...”men, women...”
Jen tells her she’s a special woman (how the fuck does she know?) and that she doesn’t want just anyone, she wants somebody “who gets you” and then for the second time in two weeks an older woman, without determining if Debbie is of age, pulls her into a kiss and the others (Ian, Lip, Carl, Kelly) stare like, “WTF?” The kiss ends and Debbie looks all amazed like she did after the Mel kiss, but then Jen looks at everyone and says, “I played a lesbian once in a movie.” And that’s what your research into that role led you to believe lesbians do? Kiss random teens when they’re whining? Lip starts the “Face it” line and everyone else chips in with “you’re gorgeous” and everyone laughs and I don’t get why it’s funny or even why it’s supposed to be funny. Seemed like they were trying to drive home the point that ACTORS only PLAY gay characters, but no matter how convincing they seem, they are in reality the much more “preferable” heterosexuals we can feel safe with and really want them to be. Fuck you, Shameless.
Also, Courtney/Jen is three times older than Debbie-CC is 54 irl and Debs is forever 17 now, so more Kash vibes for anyone who was missing those. Also perpetuates the writer room’s fantasy that hot young actors would find middle and past middle age folks suitable sex partners.
Fi goes to Patsy’s Pies and there’s another hysterically lame scene where she opens the office safe and is counting out money-I don’t know how much a place like Patsy’s rakes in (or keeps in their safe) but I would think it would take a long time to accumulate 25K in CASH in this day and age of debit and credit cards. She abandons that bad idea and winds up going down to the docks and drinking with a Patsy’s employee and reciting all her “mo money” problems while he counters with the facts that his car’s been repossessed and that he and his moms are being evicted from the projects. Then the guy kisses drunk Fi but she tells him she has a boyfriend and that she has to apologize for lying to him (although, really, the underlying implication is she has to apologizing for never seeing that he’s always right about her being a dumb woman who has no head for business decisions).
Lip and Ian have their last one on one scene. After the movie star mom for a day leaves, Ian’s fake smoking on the front steps and Lip joins him. Lip gives him money for his commissary account and Ian says, “I’ll pay you back,” (but not thank you) and Lip says, “No you won’t,” and I’m at home saying, “Lip, why are you being such a dick?” Ian goes to hand him the lit cigarette, but pulls it away when Lip reaches for it, but then gives it to him and rubs his shoulder. I guess this is supposed to signal to us that they’ve said everything that’s needed to be said? Except we’ve been watching and we know Lip is supposed to be a mouthy motherfucker and in the old days they would’ve had actual conversations that they DID NOT have at all-all their conversations this season have been short and awkward. Ian’s been made into a fucking mute now, even in these final moments.
Their last scene should’ve been in their room, in their beds-Ian can’t sleep and they talk things out in the dark like the brothers they used to be, but no. Can’t have that.
The Fiona drama finding out Bored has a wife, kid, and house and then drunkenly smashing up her leased vehicle is so “bad soap opera” I can’t believe this show is still on the air. If we were supposed to cry for Fiona as her make up and fake blood ran down her face after her millionth time of being let down by a guy everyone else could see was an ass from the start-well, we just didn’t.
Next day the Gallaghers are waiting in the living room for Fiona to take Ian to prison. Kev steps up to drive them all in his truck.
They get there, get out, and Ian looks around, then says to his family, “All right. I thought Geneva and some of the others would be here but...” Thank christ they weren’t!!! The show/Ian wasted too much time on those randos as it was. However, credit where credit is due-the show got us all the way through this swan song arc without bringing up Terror once! But I digress, back to our scene. Carl says, “You can only count on family, dude.” I scream BULLSHIT at my TV screen.
Debbie says, “I’m gonna miss you.”
Group hug. Kev says, “Don’t get too raped in there, aight?” Everybody breaks apart, the moment ruined. Kev says he doesn’t know what to say in these situations (and clearly no one can improvise but Noel). Vee says, “How about goodbye and I love you?”
Kev says, “Goodbye, man. I love you.”
Ian says, “I love you guys too.” Wasting it on the wrong fucking people! All of them-except Kev and Vee who never voiced an opinion-didn’t care if went to prison!
Ian looks at Lip, walks over to him. “Hey, uh, thanks for being my brother.”
Lip, still a dick, says, “Never had a choice.” That’s right, bitch-you didn’t get to choose to play the interesting gay brother, you got cast as the dick know-it-all who never cared about anyone but himself.
During this entire farewell scene I was sitting at home, strangely unmoved. I felt nothing watching it, probably because everyone was such an asshole about Ian going to prison all season, plus never caring about what he was doing all last season, plus the fact that none of these characters are the characters we first got to know. It hasn’t been a case of character growth and development, it’s been character assassination and retconning.
Ian breaks the hug. “All right. See you guys.” He goes to the gate, shows his papers, gets let in through the gate, waves to his family as he walks past the fence, walks into the prison, slaps his phone (wouldn’t he just give that to Lip to hold on to? Battery’s gonna be dead by the time he gets out) and watch (probably ditto on the watch battery) onto a counter, strips down so we see one last quick shot of his naked ass (what, no cavity search? And just how long has it been since we’ve seen his unclothed ass anyway?), and a glimpse of the boob tattoo.
Next we see him in his yellow “I Love You, Philip Morris” jumpsuit, carrying his bedding through the GP. He’s attracting “fresh meat” attention and Cam actually does a really good job of looking a bit scared while trying to look tough and “don’t fuck with me”-there’s a vulnerability there, but he’s not overplaying it, and he’s certainly not overplaying the fronting. His acting was really powerful in that scene.
They put him in his cell and slam the door and he winces a little at the sound, then he sadly looks at his 6X8 foot (or whatever the dimensions are) room, puts his bedding pile on the top bunk and leaves his hands up there and lets his head hang down. He hears the door slide open behind him again and gets this, “Ugh, here we go,” expression on his face and turns around to see it’s Mickey standing there.
Me at home: Not what I wanted for end game but I’m still thrilled to see the man, the myth, the legend again anyway. He’s all beefy still from when he was shooting Fonzo and looking good.
Ian’s looking at him like he’s not sure he’s really there.
Mickey mildly says, “I rolled on the cartel I was working for and in exchange guess who gets to pick where he gets locked up?”
Ian’s got tears in his eyes now and says, “Holy fuck.”
“Oh hey-I got bottom,” Mickey says as he points to the lower bunk. Then he walks past Ian and says, “So...you’re on top,” in a bit of a sing-songy voice.
He flops down onto the bunk, puts his hand behind his head-and check out the gifs closely, especially on Twitter-in the jumpsuit you can see the outline of his dick and it “twitches in interest” as the fan fics say (don’t know if Noel did it by adjusting his thigh, don’t know if it was intentional or what-but it was a sight to see whatever the case). He does a lip lick/bite combination, Ian’s face lights up a bit and he gives a smile, he crawls onto the bunk on top of Mickey, pinning his hand down while Mickey smiles softly, they gaze at each other a beat, Ian gently strokes Mickey’s cheek, Mickey wraps his free hand behind Ian’s neck, their noses boop, and Ian sort of gently thrusts into a kiss (it was good-definitely had a bit of a sexual vibe to it), which Mickey expertly returns. It was a very good kiss, tender and loving, but that scene needed words, needed Ian to say SOMETHING to Mickey-needed an “I’m sorry” and a “thank you for always being here for me” and exchanged I love yous. Neither of these boys are ever told they’re loved! JFC, nine seasons and the show couldn’t manage to work mutual ILYs in ONCE? Fuck you, Shameless. They didn’t even say each other’s NAMES!
Mickey (and Noel) looked so fucking good lying there-relaxed and happy, finally back with his love where he’s always belonged. Even when his eyes are closed, they’re perfect. The angle the scene was shot at, we see more of Mickey’s microexpressions than Ian’s.
An after the credits began scene of them lying in an afterglow embrace would’ve been nice. Mickey could’ve mocked Ian’s hair (give us one last “Fire Crotch” you cowards!) and boob tattoo (or offered to fix that for him while they’re in the joint).
Mickey’s got new ink on his forearm we never see clearly. Until and unless we’re told otherwise, I’m saying it’s a big ginger root ;) Bam.
On a personal note, and not to rain on anybody’s parade, while I believe 100% in Drunk Crew Guy and what he said, I really don’t see us getting another scene in the finale. This show’s attention span is down to nothing now, and I can’t see them dragging these guys back out now that they’ve given us (shitty) endgame. I don’t think enough time will have passed to let them out of prison by then, I think those final episodes are going to be about Fiona leaving and not Ian and Mickey getting to Mexico-and I can’t really see Mickey being able to go back there now that he’s crossed a cartel. My feeling is the show filmed 2 possible endings using Noel to choose from-one ending with them in Mexico and the other being the one we got. They probably ripped off The Shawshank Redemption too much with a Mexico ending and decided to go with this “original” idea instead. I’d love nothing more than to be wrong, and to get one more scene of these two free and happy. Cam’s question mark at the end of his farewell post and the fact that I do trust everything DCG said leaves a spark of hope burning in my heart, but hopefully I can back away from endless online speculation and theories about it over the next 5 months. If it happens, beautiful. If it doesn’t, at least we got one last look at Mickey and he’s getting dicked down and the love he’s always deserved, even if I hate the fact they’re locked up and will be in danger whenever they’re not in their cell-not to mention this is the shitty way gay love stories get handled in general, but I must not go down that path again in this recap.
I want to add that Mickey didn’t sound all that “Mickey” in his scene, but maybe he didn’t need his swagger and was being more “real” to let Ian know he had a choice (as always, Mickey didn’t force himself on Ian-he let him come to him). And kudos to Cam for not doing his hideous Chicago accent for most of the episode.
There WAS love and chemistry in that final scene. Just sucks that we don’t get it anywhere else in the show and they wasted so much time last night that could’ve been given to Cameron and Noel.
But hey, I’m finally free of recapping ;) While I’m sorry the Gallavich parts are now over, I’m not sorry I can finally quit missing what we used to get while watching what the show now does. Mickey and Ian are back together now, so, fuck you, Shameless.
#Recap#Ian's final episode#Season Nein#Nobody wants it#Queue#Hopefully I'll be sound asleep when the episode ends
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Anonymous Questions, Insufficient Answers
That’s a topic that grinds on me a little, on the ol’ insides so I don’t know that there’s anything I’ve ever read that I’ve enjoyed on the topic, not enough to recommend. It’s just too messy a topic. I don’t trust anybody that’s really got an “answer” on that one entirely. I didn’t read the Harriot thing but I’m probably close to that-- "I’m just muddling through-- the world is sad-- leave me alone” seems like the only thing that makes any sense you can say.
Or I mean... I’m not sure I’m a “good person” or can lay any title to that, at least. I’ve long had a real hatred of this posture people have online that they’re the Good Guys. I find that lack of humility disturbing. Or I mean, they are living BORING lives because there’s something to be said for being a little bit of a bad person, on weekends or what have you (Ladies).
Or heck, I’m a lawyer-- if I get some disgruntled client out there that starts yelling this, that or the other thing about how I’m “bad” or whatever... that would put me in a very awkward situation, for a lot of different reasons. It’d be hard to respond to that in all the ways I’d want to, for a variety of reasons. But then what happens? People online, they don’t have any conception of how slippery or elusive the “truth” can be, not like a lawyer does anyways.
People believe whatever. If one person says something, they go “well there you go that’s the truth, one person’s enough because there’s no such thing as liars, the only liars are white men, that’s a sane position for me to take.” That’s the essence of Yelp’s entire fucking business model.
So yeah, I think about how easily it could be for me to get disqualified as a person or “cancelled” or whatever the lingo is...
Christopher McQuarrie had a thing in an interview the other day:
The only thing that shitty social media is going to be bad for is shitty social media. Filmmakers are always going to make movies. They are just going to make themselves less available to that. For me, the value of Twitter and why I signed up for it originally is so I could get ahead of inaccurate press. That was my opportunity to very quickly issue a correction when I read stuff that was wrong. I now realize that value is outstripped 1000 fold by the fact that you don’t even need to say the wrong thing to say the wrong thing anymore. It doesn’t matter what you said, the internet tells you what you meant. And that all comes from the fact that nobody is reading what you said, they are reading what they’ve come to complain about.
I’ve seen a little bit of that. When you write something people don’t like, some ax-grindy weirdo will link to you like “look at this asshole” (if you’re lucky enough to have them link to what you wrote and you don’t have some low-reading-comprehension moron trying to paraphrase something they hallucinated that you said). And then people who read these weirdos, it’s twitter so they’re playing the “one up” game so like they’ll be like “yeah, you’re right he’s a word salad barbarian”, trying to plus the original insult because that’s really the game of social media, it’s “Yes And” for the stupid and the rejected. Because they’re hate-clicking and most hate-clicking is just lonely people’s idea of socializing. And those people think you’re supposed to take them seriously...? Haha.
So I mean, there’s a ton of unasked questions-- whether you’re really evaluating who people are with reasonable criteria, or if you really know the facts ou think about people if they’ve ejected from your “conversation” or decided not to waste their time debating with people they don’t respect, or if you’re just going along with the awful gravity of some conversation that’s beneath you... Especially with people who are dead and not around to defend themselves. (I was a celebrity’s lawyer after they died once-- that is a whole story, not one I can tell but a whole story, what people do after someone dies...).
When gross dudes online are like “innocent until proven guilty”, I don’t agree obviously because I know how the system’s broken. It’s worse than people know. But the idea some of them might be trying to express of “hey maybe don’t rush to judgment” has been proven out to be the best policy time and time again. And yet I don’t think it’s one that people are doing, myself sometimes included... I’m as bad as anybody. But.
Our criteria of how we even decide who an “awful person” is just seems broken.
Besides that, with cases that are relatively clear-cut...
I avoid some stuff and not other stuff, and there’s not a whole lot of rhyme or reason to it, but it’s too messy to have hard, fast rules. Some stuff makes me feel too dirty (DC comics, anyone who made a Watchmen sequel, I skipped Incredibles 2 on purpose, Louis CK shit); other shit that’s probably just as indefensible probably to someone out there, or even to me even on an “intellectual” level, it doesn’t make me fucking blink one second, not even a heartbeat (David Foster Wallace, Tom Cruise, David Letterman, the sax music of Bill Clinton).
If Woody Allen put out a banger tomorrow (and he’s put them out late in the game before-- I liked Midnight in Paris anyways), I’d go. I wouldn’t feel the least bit bad about going. And I know I’m in the minority there-- I know my position on that one is not great.
Is that right? Is that wrong? *World’s longest shrug* I don’t have some deluded opinion of how much I matter or how miserable I have to live to win whatever fucking purity contest the internet thinks it’s having. I do that “I’m not giving those assholes my money” thing too, but you know, you gotta have that little voice in your head going “hey Rockefeller, you only cost them $5″, I guess, or you’re an insane person-- or worse, you’re a fucking Yelp reviewer.
But whatever “only you can prevent forest fires” noise that the Smokey D. Bears on the internet are selling here, I’m not really buying. Or that whole thing where people go “oh well I don’t have to deal with bad people because there’s so much great shit in the world and I’ll just do the great shit”, like they’re a fucking decadent French king... That just seems like a dodge to me. That just seems so empty. It reduces everything down to equally-valid empty and meaningless bemusements, which if that’s all art is for anybody, jesus christ, maybe we have a deeper problem here. If there’s no difference in how you spend your time amusing yourself between shit and shinola, hasn’t there been some kind of failure in our culture at some level??? (I mean, and also -- there really isn’t that much great shit in the world! People just have shitty taste, if it’s all the same to them!)
But on the other hand, I don’t know-- some people have to get got. Do you want to live a life without any standards at all? Roseanne-- had to get got. Louis CK had to get got-- retaliating against people’s careers for complaining about you jerking off in front of them? He had to get got. Every single person in animation is fucking pond scum-- something had to be said. Orson Scott Card-- fuck that guy; people should harass his ass forever-- some nerd being like “I like that hatemongers’s glorified episode of star war, though”, whatever that guy’s sci-fi bullshit was, I think we’re right to roll our eyes at those nerds. All the comic book people with their dumb “the villain turned out to be a guy pretending to be a girl” comics-- people should yell at those assholes if they’re getting fucking murdered about that kinda imagery, especially if every goddamn last comic creator’s suddenly going to fake like they’re goddamn woke now to sell their bullshit. An entirely reasonable percentage of the Me Too assholes had to get got, even if not all of them.
Critical thinking without taking any kind of action based on that thinking ... then, it’s just masturbation, right? So even my “I’m just muddling through here”, I recognize as inherently unsatisfying. There’s a certain amount of hypocrisy inherent to adult life that I think you gotta forgive yourself for. But there’s also right and wrong, so I can’t just be like 100% none of it matters internet sucks bro either. You have to have some lines otherwise what the fuck are you...?
I just know whatever the answer is, you’re not going to get it off someone else on the internet, though. Some killjoy being like “oh you’re experiencing joy over a spy movie? Let me blow your mind: Tom Cruise is in a cult-- yeah I said it” like you’re seeing online lately-- I mean, the funny part of the internet is how persuasive the biggest shitheads think they are. (Myself included!) A weird amount of the internet thinks “Are you experiencing intense joy or sadness? Well here’s why you shouldn’t according to me, a braniac” is persuasive. You know, whatever the answer is, I just know I’m not going to get it from being around those friendless dorks. Too-online types drew the lines around them so tight the only movies they could watch were the Lady Ghostbusters and Oprah’s Wrinkle in Time! I’d watch a snuff movie before I saw Oprah wrinkle time. So I don’t know.
Like, the question presupposes our current cultural atmosphere as being particularly long-lasting. I don’t think that’s going to be true in even the short term. The backlash to this moment’s already started. Because the internet-- nothing gets differentiated because of how we consume opinions. If all opinions are 280 characters, then someone complaining about Aziz or Al Franken gets consumed the same way as someone complaining about Les Moonves or Harvey Weinstein, even though no one sane is saying those aren’t different situations. But I think there have been enough things in the former category where reasonable minds can differ (I guess you’d have to lump in Hardwick in the former category, even if I might not share their analysis on that one)(James Gunn’s a weird one-- I just think he’s obnoxious generally but that’s a weird one, how people process that one), and that those things have planted seeds for some kind of backlash that’s coming, even to the good stuff. That’s what I’m spooked by anyways...
(Though yeah, acknowledging that... the people wanting the backlash the most are all the broken failures online who were never willing to hear anything anybody anywhere had to say to begin with, if it interfered with their living weak lives of a sort of sneering complacency, but...)
Or there’s plenty of older stuff you can point to-- that you know disregards that ... setting the issue of trolls to one side, there are people who want to believe in a kind of free speech. Giving people who want comedy Nanette instead and telling them that their comedy is wrong and evil and too racist and has to be attacked constantly, and Nanette’s the future of jokes instead-- I mean, that’s literally what the nerd-society tried to do in Demolition Man; we use to root for people who did that kinda thing to be demolition-ed by John Spartan and/or Simon Phoenix.
Those people want a distorted kind of free speech, sure-- people sure tend to only really want to protect the speech they agree with and that comforts their status quos; it’s not fair; life’s not fair; etc. But at least they want to believe that they believe in free speech, and I think people being overly dismissive to that (and a lot of people online are very dismissive of that) are ... they’re maybe overestimating their cultural capital.
A backlash has certainly started out there but I don’t think that it’s fully here yet or what it looks like when it is, how ugly it looks, if it looks somehow uglier than Trumpism or what, but. (That’d be the worry). Or I don’t know how undeserved it is because... people have picked a lot of fucking stupid fights these last however-many years. Or at least fights people generally just aren’t ready for, if you want to be polite about it. Wokeness is too exhausting; what’s that Harris Wittells line? “Motherfuckers wanna laugh.”
I don’t know. Not an easy world. Not a lot of easy answers out there.
I’m not on the same place on this question from one minute to the next let alone one day to the next, and I don’t really know how anyone is, basically. I’m all over the map. It’s too confusing. I find it very confusing.
I still think about this show pretty constantly, considering it’s been a while.
The discussion around the ending... about who’s the dreamer or whatever-- it’s just not what I think about when I think about the show, trying to solve it that way.
There’s a popular essay floating around how the whole thing is Agent Cooper’s dream and the ending is the “real world” and blah blah blah that...
I see the appeal of that essay, certainly. It’s a solid essay. But the idea that the universe we see at the end is any more real than any other constructed-realities we see in Twin Peaks strikes me as fundamentally disagreeable. Especially because we see doppelgangers in the so-called real world, or the whole... the circumstances of how Cooper finds Laura in the second world are themselves so noir and exaggerated, that... I’m just sticking with my gnostic reading of the ending-- that wherever Cooper is, at the end, it too is an illusion.
I mean, yeah, I get it-- he cast the real people who live in the house-- I get it. I just am not as moved by that point as other people, I guess. Yeah, it’s the real people who live in the house but as soon as he put a camera in front of them, whatever he was showing us became inherently unreal. I don’t know if that’s too head-up-my-ass but...
But Laura realizes Cooper is lost before she screams? Yeah, that’s how I felt that, definitely. I’m open to readings that Cooper is realizing something important at the end and not just revealing that he’s lost and not trustworthy, but when I watch it, I feel like we’re watching the latter -- we’re watching something dark happening.
I feel for the people who liked the ending to the movie though so I really like people who try to figure out ways to keep that ending intact for themselves...
My favorite people are the ones who are like “actually it’s all a mission and Cooper’s remembering his mission at the end, and that’s what the very first scene of Season 3 means and I can figure it out using this deck of playing cards and a box of red velvet cupcakes.” I like the people who become Cooper throwing rocks at bottles to try to solve this TV show, even if I think they’re full of shit, too. I like hearing their theories the most, people who treat it as a fantasy novel, even if I think they’re the furthest off from any kind of truth...
The people I feel saddest for are people who bought that Mark Frost book though. I mean, come on. I know he co-created the show and co-wrote that season but... nah.
For me, the thing I think about more with that show even a year later is just how images wash over you. Like, when you see Big Ed at the end of that episode by himself, and he lights the thing on fire -- and his actions don’t match his own reflection. Or Gordon answering the door and when he answers the door, he gets gripped by this painful-seeming image of Laura Palmer that he hallucinates. Charlyne Yi screaming on that floor. Just how elemental the images are... That was what really hit me with that show when it aired, and it’s the stuff I think about more than the ending even now, though the ending, that scream is ... the peak of those moments, without question. The thing you understand without needing an “explanation.” I’ve been thinking a lot how that’s been a thread to the stuff I care about mostly lately, I guess-- with Atlanta or Fleabag being big other examples...
I saw the first season and thought it would end where I understand the second season ended. So I was annoyed with the ending of that first season when it just sort of farted at the end, instead of going to the place I thought it needed to go (and where I understand they’ve only just now taken the show). The whole “prestige = one story told slow” thing in TV (and comics) bores me pretty fast... So, just on a “superhero nerd” level, I was bored because it didn’t deliver the arc that I wanted it to at the speed I was going at.
And on a “fan of good shit” level... The thing I think you like is the thing I think I dislike where ... the “now we’re doing Lynch” of it feels very conscious and calculated to me. It just doesn’t feel genuine.
David Foster Wallace (who’s now culturally-verboten post-Me Too, supposedly, but...), he had a thing I always think about in a interview he did on Bookworm-- I’ve thought about it on a regular basis ever since I heard it-- which is that ... an artistic transaction has to feel like a gift, otherwise it’s just something corporate and a business transaction. He phrased it better and more elaborately than that, but. Legion just feels like this very calculated commercialization of stuff I like more, in service to an underlying product that’s really about nothing... “We’re weird like Lynch but to tell you a story about this awesome quirky superhero you can cosplay as, instead of molested girls.”
Legion’s like when the bacon people suddenly all decided that they could sell more bacon by calling it “applewood bacon.” Ooooh, applewood bacon. It’s just a Marvel show, though. Those all suck.
It’s the opposite of the Lynch thing for me where I don’t feel like it’s about understanding things on a visceral level -- it’s about, like, going “oh it’s the Shadow King” or “Oh it’s the astral plane” and there being some tidy explanation that will be provided at some point that explains everything and makes the essential horror of the unexplainable go away. (Which I think some people would call a defiency of the superhero genre, as a whole, but I don’t think that’s necessarily true at all... see, e.g., The Enigma...)
(If people who love superhero comics on purely theoretical grounds didn’t have The Enigma to point to, what would we do???)
Plus, too much Michel Gondry in there. I like Eternal Sunshine but hard pass on that guy otherwise...
And I was just underwhelmed by Noah Hawley, though I keep hearing from different sources that Fargo Season 2 is the one to go with... I couldn’t watch Fargo season 1, episode 1. Like, within 5 minutes besides my huge aesthetic displeasure with it as a Coens fan, I thought it was pedestrian thinking putting on the clothes of cooler shit to obscure how dull it was.
Which was what I thought of Legion by the end. That for all it’s little cuteness with style, it was just Poor Man’s Claremont. I read enough Poor Man’s Claremont to last me a lifetime. Including from Chris Claremont. So.
... for tumblr posts??? Huh. I don’t know what the answer to that is. I don’t know that it’s ever the same thing all that consistently. And for me, writing and rewriting kinda happen simultaneously, just because I’m fast and sloppy...? I’m just kind of fucking around mostly, but I usually try to glance at something before I hit post because I don’t trust myself very much, so. But sometimes I don’t (and trouble ensues!).
Sometimes it’s like “Oh I spot the joke now” kind of stuff, where I’ll go back and take out all the stuff that’s after the punchline. But I don’t worry over the quality of my prose or whatever... If i cared about my prose when writing this stuff, there’d be a lot less “likes” and “you knows”... I throat-clear like an asshole, which should probably bother me more than it does, but...
I’ll edit more after I hit post than when I’m writing. I know I do that...
You know, if you write anything, sometimes you write stuff down and you look at it and go “Hmmm, do i really believe that?” And the answer’s no so then you delete all that shit. But... is that “editing” or just part of writing or...?
There are “I’m a real writer” guys online that are really sad because, you know, their shit is all boring to read because they don’t do any of their thinking on the page. So I know I sort of pity those folks, generally. But.
That is a question that never occurred to me. Writing process for tumblr posts... huh!
There’s not much of any kind of rewriting if I’m posting from my phone because I don’t know how to move the cursor good on an iphone though. Anytime I’m in an airport or at the grocery store or.... there’ve been times I’ve written whole things on a street because I didn’t want to forget the part I thought would be fun to type... But I don’t understand how to use the iPhone good since I’m aged so those don’t get fussed with as much as I would at a desktop. Hm.
The first one’s a likable damn movie. I didn’t see the second-- never got to it.
I spent years obsessed with what they did with Slap Shot-- I spent years obsessed with sports comedies generally, and Slap Shot’s the best sports comedy there is, to me.
So there’s no topping that for my affections, but that first Goon’s still a likable, likable movie.
Yeaaaaaaaaah. It very much was. Here that is if anyone missed it before.
Thanks for recommendations like this generally though!! Hugely amusing to get them.
It’s pretty good. It’s got a lot of good stuff in it.
I don’t know that I loved the big twist, though. I understand why they went that direction-- it makes sense narratively and thematically and ... The math works. It’s a very coherent choice. But just aesthetically, I was into the movie up until that point, and didn’t feel like I needed it to go that far for me to have liked it...? I liked the politics of the movie, and I get exactly why it needed to be that way. So I respect it. And I enjoyed that whole scene of Armie Hammer laying out his plan very, very much (I’m very much on Team Armie Hammer after Free Fire, i.e. the movie only I liked).
I wished I loved it more than I respected it, is all. But I’m really shallow-- it’s hard to imagine my favorite movie this year isn’t going to be Mission Impossible, at this point, and that movie’s not about anything half as interesting thematically (though I have a personal fascination in how Tom Cruise’s movies are all about navigating excellence)...
I liked that they randomly shit on Michel Gondry though. That made me laugh. I don’t even know I could articulate why I don’t like him (I remember him seeming like a dick in some comics his ex-girlfriend made, but...). I don’t know. Mike Mills and Spike Jonze and Joseph Kahn and a whole mess of people >>> Gondry, though, as far as the music video director generation of filmmakers go...
Mostly I avoid those conversations, I think...
If I’m at work, it’s not my place to argue with people I’m trying to help. It’s a pretty inappropriate subject matter for any kinda casual chit-chat. Politics, religion-- it’s just not appropriate conversation usually. It comes up-- but I’m not going to sit and try to correct anybody. You know, I just hear people out and then get on with whatever it is we’re doing. A couple times I’ve had Republican clients (both times, all-time favorite clients) ask me why I went the other way and I sketched it out for them, but not to change their minds or anything-- just sketching how I got where I got to. But arguing? I would never.
You know: some clients are Trump fans; other clients are conspiracy people; a lot of folks were really affected by that Me Too. None of them come to us to see me jump out of a cake holding sparklers screaming SOCIALISM at the top of my lungs.
And you know-- what’s the harm of just hearing people out? In the actual world, some good, decent folks voted for Trump. I don’t share their analysis of the world, but... in actual life, no harm in hearing those folks out. I don’t become impure if their words go in my earholes, or anything.
Or a lot of people... a lot of people just have to live in the world. Like, I know people who have jobs some internet loudmouth might go on a lecture about, but if you’re hanging out with them, you really just want to hear what life’s like from their end, if you’re curious. You don’t want to be going “Thread!” over beers, or whatever. People are living their lives-- they don’t need me judging them at a bar.
Girls... I still don’t even know what to fucking do and I’m goddamn old, though. I usually avoid any kinda chit-chat as a rule, because I think that’s the smart play. But on the other hand, you really want to know as soon as possible if someone you’re interested in is also interested in, like, the poetry of Sebastian Gorka because that can dive-bomb a very nice evening into the side of a fucking mountain in minute. I sure haven’t figured out how to thread that needle, and goddammit, I really should have by now how is it that I don’t have any of this shit figured out yet?? That’s gone wrong on me so I’m pretty spooked there, and not really a font of any great advice. That’s a source of some anxiety, and I live in a blue state. (Though apparently not blue enough!)
I don’t know-- I just think it’s a rude topic, usually.
Anyways, facts... Facts are just a weird subject right now. Every fact you ever want to know is on your phone somewhere. Who cares if you can remember something anymore? It’s all on your phone. I don’t know anything anymore-- my memory’s for shit-- talking to me lately, that experience is mostly comprised of people watching me stopping mid-sentence trying to remember the name of an actor of a movie I saw some uncertain number of years ago whose title I can’t recall and my recollection of the plot is hazy and most likely incorrect. But I got google on my phone so what does it matter?
But also on the internet is the opposite of that fact which someone out there believes. Like, your friends can Actually you but what’s the source of their info? Could be something valid-- could just be some nutcase. And by nutcase, I’d include the New York Times under that at this point. Their opinion section? Useless old nutcases. And that’s the New York Times. So how much do facts even matter anymore??? If you could come out of 2016 thinking knowing facts mattered, after watching how they were herding opinion writers around in those e-mails...
I mean, as a lawyer, you become very acquainted with the idea that there are two sides to just about anything, and a skilled professional can argue either side, too, so... They’ve been making fun of the Pod Save America jackasses lately on Chapo or that lady mocking Dan Pfieffer to his fucking face on his dumb podcast. I think those Pod guys are deeply useless. But one of the points that got made is ... They read from one of those jackass’s books about how important it is for these liberal douchebags to “know the facts better than your racist grandma” or whatever and “let’s always be the folks with facts on our side so we win arguments by being super-honorable about how factually accurate we are.”
And as soon as I heard that I just started yelling at my car stereo, out loud in my car, like almost swerving off my road yelling out loud. Because it’s fucking stupid bullshit. The facts don’t fucking matter in political arguments, not if you don’t have a story around those facts that makes sense to people, and helps them explain their lives. It’s real neat if you’re the most factually accurate loser in the history of losers-- maybe you can get ribbon for that from somebody. But you can’t just Poindexter your way through arguments and expect more than a fucking ribbons because facts aren’t persuasion.
You look at jackasses like those nards during that last election cycle, clinging to their little fucking slanted fact-check websites-- it didn’t fucking matter because one side was telling a story about America that made sense to people, however awful a story, however awful some of those people were, and the other side’s response to that was just saying “America’s always been great, Love trumps hate” bloopity-bloop fucking nonsense. You can’t fact-check your way out of that...
And they didn’t learn any lesson from that because the best story those Pod Save America jackasses could still come up with is “maybe people will like us more if we extra-extra-extra try hard at convincing them we’re some encyclopedia brown fucking nerds”.
People talk about that like it’s some defect in the conversation but they’re missing the point-- people want to be ruled by people, not bloodless chart-spouting effete assholes with the best powerpoints. There is a part of the game that’s very much about the story people tell themselves, about who they are and what they want, and I don’t think that part is necessarily a defect of the process. The people yelling about facts thought they could avoid getting any icky politics into their policies. But the entire exercise is political because we don’t live in some fucking computer-run technocracy. And nor should we, so...
A lot of the internet is people who think they can avoid telling stories people want to hear if they just lecture them. “What if instead of finding a narrative that helps people make sense of their lives and our common humanity, we just yell THREAD and link to some 50 tweet thing from some joyless prick about how white people are bad and the only good thing in the world is the tremendous laughs we got from Nanette?” My suspicion is that’s not going to work...
You know, I just think what's more useful generally is having some kinda ideology that lets you groups facts together and gives you a stepping stone to analyze information that comes at you. It’s hard to imagine in the abstract though because some basic level of information is helpful to have... nobody knows every fact.
But that said, if your facts are wrong, maybe just hear out the fact. Maybe you have uninformed opinions? Beats me. Maybe your opinions should change.
Or you want to see why they’re using that fact-- arguments have premises. You know, how are arguments constructed? In law school, they teach iRAC-- issue, rule, analysis, conclusion. Here’s the issue, here’s the rule that applies to that issue, here’s a bunch of facts we apply that rule to and he’s our conclusion based on applying the rule to the facts. So if you’re weak on facts, you can check if they’re applying the same rule to those facts that you are... Somebody who argues unemployment statistics, the rules they’re applying are, like, “employment = good regardless of the nature of the employment” or “economic statistics meaningful reflect how people actually feel about their lives”... questionable rules! They’re applying rules that might arguably be the wrong rules, so even if you don’t know the facts about the statistics, you can look beyond the statistics...
But I don’t know-- my gut just says, if this is time you’re spending with friends, you should just focus on enjoying being with friends. Life’s too short. A lot of times I see these people online who are just relentlessly unpersuasive, talking about how they’re going to win over their racist Uncle finally this Thanksgiving and it just... I just gotta think there are more productive political operations in the world than that.
The “goodbye, chic” scene is top 10 scenes of this year in TV so far, even if the rest of the episode / show wasn’t great. I just loved that moment...
My complaint about season 1 was definitely “not enough sex, not enough murders” and then season 2 was like “what if there was a serial killer that was really angry about how horny these teens are”. Good move!
One episode was just the teens listening to each other having loud sex with one another in a cabin, until the mob came and murdered people who were conveniently located outside of their sex cabin...? What????
My favorite thing about season 2 of Riverdale though was after Betty stripped off her clothes while listening to the Donnie Darko soundtrack at a motorcycle club, I went online to see people’s reactions. And most of them were like “omg” or “girrrrrl no” but then one out of 10, maybe one out of 20, was someone going “How old is her character supposed to be i thought she was only supposed to be 12 years old.”
I love that super-minority of people watching this entirely ludicrous scene, suddenly doing the math in their head and realizing like oh shit they should be ashamed of themselves...
Oh, another favorite scene-- when Jughead carves an entire mass of flesh off a lady who wronged his street gang using a switchblade...?
I thought that was pretty entertaining.
Yeah, big thumbs up to season 2.
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Frank Zappa’s Son Ahmet Talks Legacy, Labels, and His Father’s Inventions
https://ift.tt/3bB8HvB
Frank Zappa, who died in 1993, is one of the least understood artists of the 20th Century, which is ironic because he was also the most prolific. Introduced to the world as a bicycle-playing artiste concrète sitting naked on a toilet, he was a harmonic genius who experimented with sonic assault weapons and visual subversions. Frank Zappa was the Nikola Tesla of music. Alex Winter’s documentary ZAPPA, which is now available to watch in the UK and Ireland on Altitude.film, clarifies many of the contradictions by highlighting Zappa’s primary focus. The Mothers of Invention bandleader was a composer.
As such, Frank was also a cultural ambassador, a hero of free expression, a hysterical satirist, and a guitar virtuoso. He was celebrated in the Czech Republic after the Velvet Revolution, and castigated by parental control mongers in America. But even Frank knew his rep enough to drop an album series called Shut Up and Play Your Guitar. It should be compulsory listening for anyone who’s ever put fingers to strings.
For the documentary, Frank’s widow Gail Zappa gave Winter unfettered access to the family vault. The son of “the Son of Mr. Greenjeans” gave him the combination. Ahmet Zappa and his sister Diva became the central scrutinizers of the Zappa Family Trust after Gail died of lung cancer in 2016. Ahmet is a film producer, author and an actor who appeared on Growing Pains, Roseanne, MadTV, and the films Jack Frost and Ready to Rumble. He is also a musician and songwriter. Like his sister Moon, he collaborated with his father, and like all his siblings, he appeared on Zappa releases. Ahmet and his brother Dweezil recorded together, and now each bring their own flavors to the soup of their father’s compositions.
Ahmet, who is an executive producer on ZAPPA, spoke with Den of Geek about the documentary, the vaults, the inventions and other family treasures.
Den of Geek: In a project like this, what kind of things do you learn about your father that you hadn’t expected?
Ahmet Zappa: Not too much on new facts. Through the process of, I guess, preserving not just the video and the audio, you just find things that you just think are awesome, new music or just different things that Frank says that it will have meaning to other people one would hope. It’s a hard way to answer that question because it was a very emotional journey. So, it was more bittersweet in that I feel so blessed to have all this media because I feel like it’s a consolation prize because I lost my mother and father. It’s not a solid replacement, it’s a blessing to have it because it makes me remember them and feel closer to them.
They were pretty forthcoming with a lot of the conversations. We were able to participate and our parents would talk to us about everything. Maybe the biggest mystery was just how many chicks my dad boned. That was surprising. That wasn’t great news, you know what I mean? But I guess it’s rock and roll. I was really naïve to think that that maybe wasn’t going on, but I learned that.
How did you react when you first saw the finished film?
I just loved it. I burst into tears. Similar kind of bittersweet reaction. It’s so emotional and the things that just kind of wrecked me were seeing Frank in pain after he had been attacked after the concert he did at the Rainbow in London. Just seeing my mother being protective of Frank, even crossing the street. Little things like that are so ingrained in how protective my mother was and remembering the effects that my dad had after that accident. A lot of back pain, it forever changed his voice because he almost died. I mean, that part really, really got to me.
Of course, the pride that I have in what an artist Frank was, the champion of artist rights. I’m so biased because I feel like I’m so inside, but I try to give good answers. For me it’s all good. I’ve known Alex for many, many, many years. When he called me up one day and was like, “Hey, how come there hasn’t been an official bio doc on your dad?”
I explained to him, “Well, lots of people have tried and it just wouldn’t go the distance because of the approach and you’d have to speak with my mother.”
I just watched Gail and Alex strike up this pretty fast and deep relationship and I was delighted that Gail felt the way I felt. It did take a lot of trust to have someone embark on telling the story about someone who’s so near and dear to you.
Gail was like, “Look, Alex, the story that you want to tell, you’re going to want and need to have full access to the vault.” That was when I knew, “Oh, this is game on. Gail’s really feeling this.”
Then when I was speaking with Gail, “Look, if we’re going to do this, we want to be able to champion and support Alex because it’s his movie.” He had director’s cut. That part was really important to Gail and I to just tell the story that you want to tell but make it an honest story. Don’t hold anything back. You have access, you have free rein.
I think that was a scary moment, but we had such faith in Alex and I love the end result. I think he did a very loving, caring job. I think that people have a great sense, when they see this documentary, of what it’s like to be a composer, the life of a composer and the extraordinary life that Frank led. I really think it’s a pretty well-rounded, awesome film. But then again, I’m biased.
Being a fan of your father’s sense of humor, I thought the documentary itself was just an elaborate scheme to get him to pay for the remastering.
The truth of the matter is we went into the vault and his jaw dropped. We’re like, “Okay, let’s start.” He didn’t have funding for the doc. He came to the house videotaping Gail. Then when we were looking at the footage of the tapes in the vault, and Alex having a bit of a background, and I was really naïve to this, to be totally honest, of, “Hey, is this media being stored right?”
It was in, as much as we could, a temperature-controlled massive room, just the shelf life of the tape itself was disintegrating. In that process, it became pretty evident that if we can’t save the media, it will be lost forever. The fan base, the gratitude that I have towards the people that came to the rescue of the media is extraordinary.
That was definitely not something that we were too aware of. Alex, having done Kickstarters and those types of campaigns, [said] “Well, maybe we should try to do this because it is so expensive to preserve that media.” Alex convinced me. Gail had passed after he was doing interviews and when we got into the nitty-gritty. Joe Travers, our vaultmeister, on a regular basis, will have to bake tapes in a Ronco food dehydrator. We’re aware of that kind of stuff falling apart, but it’s a whole other pail of fish when you’re having to transfer these tapes that we don’t even have the machines, in many cases, to even play them back on. To get the media off of it, that was a whole other stress point. I’m so grateful that we preserved what we could.
Besides the video and the audio, were there anything like screenplays or maybe the skits Frank wrote for the Saturday Night Live that were never produced?
Oh, yeah. There’s lots of stuff in there. Gail and Frank, they never really threw anything away. We’re always finding things here or there. I found early versions of this project that Frank was working on called “Christmas in New Jersey” which was pretty hilarious. A lot of elements from Thing-Fish were there and other little bits of connection.
I found a lot of his early artwork that blows me away. Cool stuff. That’ll eventually, I would hope, see the light of day. I found this amazing piece of sheet music. I think Frank must have accidentally dripped a bunch of ink all over it and he just then turned that into this awesome dude playing the Congo drums on it. It’s just crazy.
Frank’s penmanship and the way that he would even write music is beautiful to see. Then you throw in him just fucking around with some of the artwork. Even yesterday, we found some really awesome artwork on some of the old letterhead from United Mutations that Captain Beefheart was working on. This must have been at the time that they were probably working on Trout Mask Replica.
It’s kind of bananas, right? You think about someone who passed away really early at 52 and the body of work? I don’t know of another artist who really accomplished as much art as my father. Whether you like his art or not is not the point. It’s that he was just 24 hours a day. Just seemed to be this machine and he just burned the candle at both ends.
It seems that he and Prince were the only artists to ever be in trouble for having too much music.
Yeah, I kind of agree with you. When I talk about it, people are like, “Well, he’s made so much of it.” I’ve also had business dealings where people are like, “Well, there’s just so much. If you have so much, I don’t know, I’ll give you 10 cents on the dollar because there’s so much.”
You’re like, “I don’t think it works that way.”
The movie’s opening in the UK. Can you tell any difference between American and an overseas fan?
I just think Europe, overall, has just a greater appreciation of not just Frank’s music but music and art in general. They have a much longer history of appreciating the artistic endeavors of the individual. I do think that there’s a big audience out there. I’m curious, I’m excited it’s finally coming out overseas because I think people will really enjoy the film. Frank has always had a massive European audience.
The documentary opens with the Czech Republic and Frank was very surprised at his renown. Can you tell me a little bit why Zappa Music had a special classification?
I just remember, as it was happening, the people would express if you have so little money and you were going to buy music, which is kind of extraordinary, they just weren’t leaning towards, I guess, more commercial artists. There must have been a different level of attention and appreciation, I should say, for music with different time signatures and that was more exploratory versus, again, a pop record.
I think it was more the value of how much music you could get on a record and how different it was. Maybe there’s something in that mindset over there in how, again, the arts just overall have a greater level of importance. I think it’s just the greatest that they respected Frank and his music represents freedom over there which is so cool.
Do you think it was the intricacy of the music that made your father’s music so dangerous or do you think it’s how he took serious things so unseriously?
Probably all of it. I think it’s a combination of both, in my humble opinion.
The entire State Department seemed to come out to block his appointment as Czech liaison. Why did they find him particularly frightening, threatening?
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Culture
None of This Would Be Happening If Frank Zappa Had Been President
By Tony Sokol
I just think that maybe his points of view, although at the time so progressive, but I think that that was maybe a massive negative, where today it’s not that. I think that Frank really changed things for the better with his points of view and expressing, to me, what just feels like common sense.
I grew up in this really progressive household and I remember people thinking that we were so odd. We were like The Addams Family because of the attention our parents would give us and the freedoms that we had and how they supported our individual creativity and all of that. When I would have friends over, they would relish that environment, but I guess the parents, it’s like, “You’ve got to work within this box,” and then Frank was not that person.
ZAPPA tells a story about your sister slipping a note to introduce herself. I was wondering if this opened up an era of collaboration with your father that might not have opened if she hadn’t done that.
I don’t think so. Maybe. But from my point of view, and, again, Moon is seven years older than me, I think for what she needed emotionally, that kind of connection, that was definitely a way to connect. At that same time, Moon was singing on that song “Jumbo Go Away” and I was in the studio singing on “Drafted Again” with Moon. Then later on she did “Valley Girl.”
I don’t know what came first because there was always so much music happening in the house. There were a handful of times where Frank would say, “Okay, I’m going to record you guys. Go get the piano.” There are tapes in the vault of us just playing music. If we had family members over that were funny or exhibited some interesting talent or something, he was like, “Hey, come down to the studio and record it.” He was really present in that way if you got his attention.
Did he watch you practice, monitor your musical progress or give you tips?
I wanted a drum set. He was like, “Ah.” I really was always interested in the drums. Then weirdly he was like, “Why don’t you play the saxophone?” He let me play around on some of the instruments. There weren’t really any kind of restrictions in that way.
I guess the most interesting musical conversations I had with him was over doo-wop. He would play me a lot of his favorite doo-wop records. He was like, “Can you sing like this?” The super falsettos. We were actually talking about doing some doo-wop music and I was going to do some vocals. This is when he was really sick and working overtime and getting as much time as he could. That’s a bummer that we never got to get in the studio and work on that stuff.
That’s when he told me about the fun story. Gail loved Howlin’ Wolf and so did Frank. I was like, “Well, what else do you guys like?” That’s when they started playing me doo-wop and talked about The Persuasions. What an incredible story that is.
Are there any other rock documentaries that you appreciate now having finished ZAPPA?
Yeah, there’s lots that I appreciate for different reasons. One that was really interesting to me just because I’m a big fan of his, but the Harry Nilsson doc I enjoyed. I just love him. I still wish that they would have collaborated. Maybe they did. Maybe I’ll discover that. I love Harry Nillson. His music is kick ass.
What’s happening with The Bizarre World of Frank Zappa?
What’s happening with the world of touring on the planet? We were getting ready to go out again. It’s an expensive show. It’s really technologically intense. It’s costly to ship everything around. You got to be really specific and careful with the routing and also mindful of the band. How many days can you play? We were getting ready to go back out again. Yeah. Just the state of the world.
We were going to do the Zappa Band and King Crimson. We had announced that even. That got pushed. We have every intention of picking both of those things up again.
They’re very different experiences. The Bizarre World is a multimedia extravaganza. When the guys are just playing, they’re playing a bunch of shows. I love those guys. I love all the musicians that played with Frank. Just a shitty situation with COVID.
When we can, we try to do things that help the music community in need. That’s been a lot of my focus when possible to do what we can to give back.
When you’re auditioning musicians to play, do you make them go through musical acrobatics?
For Frank’s music, yeah. You have to play it right. For me, the kind of music I write, it’s not anywhere near as challenging as the stuff Frank was working on. I mostly work with people that worked with Frank. They get it right.
Joe Travers is incredible. Scott Thunes is incredible. Honestly, they can speak to it a lot better than I can as musicians. They worked in the capacity, Scott is the scoremeister in prepping the band and running rehearsals. That’s more of, as an example, someone more qualified than me is the one who’s going to be able to explain if someone’s doing it right or wrong.
There’s lots of variations of the same songs, how they were played. So much of it is about an artist’s individual way of the groove that they lock into with the band. You might have a version of a track that is played pretty straightforward and then there’s a reggae version. You’ve got to have a tight band. Lots of rehearsing goes into pulling off the music sounding professionally played. It’s not something that you’re just like, “Yeah, I’ll meet you on Tuesday. We’ll rehearse for a couple of hours and then let’s jam.” It always takes more time with Frank’s music.
Are you more of a fan of prog music than you are of any other genre?
I certainly appreciate prog music. I have a hard time with the labels. I think people might categorize some of Frank’s music as prog. I just don’t love the name prog rock. To me it’s all rock. I love odd time signatures and I like melody, so I gravitate towards a lot of different musicians. I’m just more of a rock fan and I use that for whatever reason as an overall way to describe what I listen to.
I love heavy metal. To me it’s all rock music. Electrified instruments and interesting singers and I love that. I don’t have a bunch of rap records or hip hop. That’s not a lot of my music collection. I’m just more into people plugging in and threshing their bass, drums, guitar, and great vocalists.
I covered the “Framing Britney Spears” documentary. While I was doing it, your and Dweezil’s version of “Baby, One More Time” was on heavy rotation. How did you pick that song? As a conservator of an artist’s trust, would you have any advice for her?
I haven’t seen the doc and I don’t know. I can’t really speak to her situation. From what little I know from the TMZ-style news is that there’s, I guess, some health concerns there. None of us really know the truth unless you’re in it. I send her lots of positivity and hopefully that all gets sorted out for her.
As it pertains to the “Hit Me Baby, One More Time” track, I was working on Ready to Rumble. It was a wrestling movie. They wanted me to have that song in the film. The music supervisor on the film [Mike Flicker], mentioned the Britney Spears track and I was like, “Oh, that’s so funny. I had won Say What Karaoke.” I was working at MTV and someone dropped out of participating. I was hosting something else up there and they were like, “Oh my god, would you consider getting into this and doing a Britney song?”
I was like, “Yeah, sure. Do you have a crazy outfit?” So, I put on a wig and some sparkly spandex thing. I was like, “Hey, check it out. If you want, I can do a version like this.” Then I was like, “Hey, Dweezil, do you want to do this track?” That’s really how it came about.
I just watched the Miami Vice episode with your father in it last night.
The worst stunt double of all time was him jumping in the water. The cut is just so bad. It’s not my favorite performance of his. I don’t know if he was really comfortable in those situations, or, maybe he was. I know he wasn’t winning a Daytime Emmy or Nighttime Emmy for that performance.
How do you choose which of your father’s music comes out?
We listen to the fan base and have internal conversations and try to think about, “What period haven’t we explored?” Because we’re always uncovering new things, so there might be, “Oh, look, we just found this track on this record or on these tapes.” It’s a pretty natural, holistic, organic way of picking to be honest. We’re always listening for new things and listening to the fan base.
Do you have a favorite performance or favorite period of your father’s?
The ’70s, really. I was born in ’74, so that music and that time and that band I was always around. That’s my earliest music that was being played for me. I was raised on that. I’m just partial to the rocking ’70s.
We know a lot of things that Frank enjoyed just from his songs. We know that he likes B-movies because of cheapness. What are some of the things he enjoyed which might come as a surprise?
He loved animation. We had talked about that. Maybe that will surprise some people. We made recently this beer called “Why Does It Hurt When IPA” where we gave all the proceeds to the music community in need. So, people will ask, “But Frank didn’t drink.” I think people would be surprised to know that he did enjoy beers. He had his favorite ones. He didn’t have a beer or a glass of wine every day, but certainly there were occasions where he would.
He liked Peter Jackson’s movies a lot. He loved Terry Gilliam, though. His favorite is Time Bandits. Brazil might be one of his all-time favorite movies. That was a must watch, right up there with The Brainiac which is not directed by Terry Gilliam. That was a Mexican horror film that was played a lot in our house.
I read that you and your father talked about holograms before they were even a thing. Can you tell me how that conversation brought you into the work with Eyellusion?
Frank talked about it even in his book The Real Frank Zappa Book. He wanted to start his own hologram business and started in earnest developing, trying to launch his business. As a kid, just talking to me about his thoughts and the benefits and getting something like that going.
One aspect was, “Hey, there’s going to be a show that’s out there touring of the music with these holograms, but I’m here in LA and I don’t have to travel.” There’s that. Or the show could go out and he could be home working. That was like, “Whoa!” It felt like the holodeck on Star Trek in what he was describing and how far he was going.
He was even talking about being able to broadcast in the atmosphere. Having some kind of projection system that he was trying to figure out the specifications of that with some people from, I guess, military friends on my mom’s side of the family. Lots of forward-thinking concepts that people at the time must have imagined, “That’s so far out.” Then fast forward to today with displays and with different software and machinery and all of it really became a possibility.
cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });
I was really excited and inspired to try to work on something that Frank really wanted to have happen. I have lots of audio of him talking about, singing about holograms, making references to holograms. He loved animation. It was really fun to put that show together.
ZAPPA is available on on-demand platforms in the U.S. and the UK at Altitude.film.
The post Frank Zappa’s Son Ahmet Talks Legacy, Labels, and His Father’s Inventions appeared first on Den of Geek.
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Chapter 1: Tattered Hearts and Tattoos
Summary: Tattoos hold so many meanings, but they also hold memories, stories and emotions; pain, wonder, awe
Dean Winchester x OFC (Marina)
Trigger Warning!
Child abuse, abuse, cheating, language, angst, sad, tearjerking backstory, child favouritism, just overall sad
Previous: Intro - Innocence
Chapter 1: Walls
Word Count: 1,166
Previously:
In her unconscious state, Marina didn’t hear her brother apologise to her. Nor did she hear her parents stop fighting after her mother had ran off again.
She didn’t hear anything.
Now:
And as the years flew by and she grew up, grew taller and stronger against the beatings, she watched as her mother snuck around, drawn to her phone as she left for work three hours earlier, coming home late after work. When her mother had hopped into the shower, phone on the charger, the hunter in-training had leapt at the chance to find out why she was acting so weird. What she saw and read on that phone was the beginning of her heart breaking, the day she began to construct an iron wall around her heart.
The days that followed were filled with tense looks and sleepless nights. Her mother was cheating on her father. When she brought up the fact to her father, he simply looked at her and shook his head. Almost as if he just didn’t want to know anymore, a look of pure defeat and heartbreak causing her own heart to slowly crack. Another wall went up, made from the gut-wrenching look of complete defeat, the glass slid into place.
“Are you cheating on dad?”
That one question, as straightforward as it was, had caused the house to go quiet. Sitting at the dinner table, with no dad, Marina looked her mother in the eye, gaze not wavering as she stared, the brown of her eyes completely consumed by black rage.
The fight that followed was loud, bloody and gruesome.
The defensive tone of her mother confirmed everything as she began to stutter, face flushed in guilt as she looked towards her son, who was looking at her with disgust evident on his face. As Marina repeated the question, all hell broke loose as plates were thrown, cutlery clattering to the floor as the yells began.
But instead of hiding with her brother, Marina stood fast, knocking the chair back, voice raised and face turning red.
“How could you break this family apart? How could you do this to us, to your kids? Sleeping with some, some fucking piece of shit just so you could feel better!”
As the curses left her mouth, there was no going back. All the anger and hatred from years of being abused came rushing to the surface, slithering out of the dark corners of her mind. She was on a warpath and she wasn’t going to stop until her mother was in shreds at her feet. Another wall wrapped around her heart, this one was made from earth and stone; stronger and unmoving like a mountain.
“You have no right to speak to me that way young lady!”
“I have every fucking right! He is out there saving people and you’re here acting like a brat! People are dying because of those monsters mom! Children are dying, and dad saves them...but you get huffy because he doesn’t come home. Well what about us?
We’re kids! Of course we want him home. But we know that he’s out there for the greater good. How could you cheat on him? We’ve known since the beginning, we just want to know why? Why even bother pretending like everything’s alright when it’s not.
Why not just fucking end it and save us all the pain...all of this betrayal.”
As the words left her mouth, she watched as her mother trembled in shame before she picked up her phone, dialing and unknown number. The room was silent for all of 10 minutes before the front door opened with a bang.
That’s all that Marina can remember from that night. She woke up in a hospital with her brother, asleep at her side, his head next to her hand. It took her a month to recover, with multiple visits back for rehab. Her leg had been broken in three different places, ribs broken, bruises scattered her body and the various cuts to her face would suggest that she’d been in a cage fight. Though the sulfur that was left behind left little to the imagination.
But, as she later found out, that wasn’t true.
Tyler had told her that a group of men had stormed the house, attacking her as he was grabbed by their mother, safe from the dispute. And despite the obvious pain she was in, Marina smiled at her big brother, a small one, but a smile nonetheless.
“At least you weren’t hurt.”
Once she was cleared and completely healed, she returned home with her brother. It was squeaky clean, the bleach smell burning her nostrils as she padded to her room. Once the door was shut, Marina took out the brand new leather journal her father had gifted her for Christmas. And she wrote down everything that had happened. Wrote down the location of the emergency bag of cash she’d stashed incase something happened. Wrote down everything her father had taught her about drifting from place to place, about how to protect herself.
When she turned 13, she added another wall around her crumbling heart, the structure only growing as more metal was added, sealed tight with a lock, the key having been tossed somewhere dark. On a particularly hard hunt, both Marina and Tyler were witness to the death of their father. Having knocked both siblings out, the ghoul had free reign for at least 10 minutes, and by the time Marina had come to, her father’s blood had run cold. After organising the remains of his body onto a pyre, the brother and sister set their father alight, giving him a hunter’s funeral.
The drive home was silent, filled with nothing, not even the comforting lull of music from the radio. With dull eyes, both brother and sister kept their gaze focused on the road, not even acknowledging the dark cloud that began to gather around the tops of their heads. They knew of the coming storms, and tried as best they could to prepare for the forthcoming danger.
When they returned home with the news, silence was all that was met. And then anger. Directed at both children, Lauren Roseanne Cooper became a living, raging storm; frustrated and angry tears streamed down her face as the world was drenched in red. As usual, the whimpering mess that was Marina huddled against the wall, her hand clenched tight around her big brothers, hoping to outlast the pain. But like always, through the blood, sweat and tears...the darkness became a welcoming friend, arms open and willing to take away the pain, if not for a little while.
When she regained consciousness, she clutched desperately at the sheets of the hospital bed, searching for the comforting weight of her brother’s hand.
Looking around the light blue room, Marina’s eyes searched for a figure that wasn’t there; but was at home, safe and sound with a loving, doting mother to wait on hand and foot.
Just like that, all the walls that had been built over time…
Solidified.
And became as permanent as the scars on her body; tattoos that told the story of her young life.
A/N: And that is it for chapter 1!!!! I was at work all day today trying to get over the massive writer’s block I’ve had since last week >.< But hopefully this will suffice...this was written on 4 hours of sleep after an 11 hour work day...so hehe enjoy!!!!
Please again, don’t be afraid to tell me what you think, send me a PM or just leave a reply cuz it’s almost like drinking 10 cups of coffee for me hehe.
As always thank you for taking the time to read this, I really do appreciate it. I can’t wait to see how this turns out!! We’re slowly building to seeing the boys again, almost!!
Until next time lovelies!!
- Ninz
#angsttw: abusetw: languagedean winchesterdean winchester x ofcthe feelsstrong female characterstrong female protagonisthunterspn#angst#tw: abuse#language#dean winchester#dean winchester x ofc#the feels#major feels#strong feel#sad#female protagonist#female hunter#character death#spn#supernatural#omc death#violence#crying
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The Casagrandes Reviews: Operation Dad
In my first look at The Casagrandes, We meet Ronnie Anne and Bobby’s dad Arturo as Ronnie tries to get him to start working in the city to be closer to them.. and when a genuine honest appeal dosen’t work, shenanigans will have to do. Dad stuff under the cut.
This is one i’ve had in the works since my labor day catchup binge of shows, but kept getting pushed back either due to regular coverage or specifically timed things like the bi visalblity day review of “What Was Missing. And with Halloween next month, my time to cover this is running out a bit and I feel it’s a great place to start covering this show so, pitter patter.
The Casagrandes didn’t really hook me in at first: It did have two things going for it: An intresting premise A blended family coming together, with our heroine and her big bro being fish out of water in a new family situation. Wheras with the Loud House Lincoln, and by extension most of his sisters, is used to how his house runs, knows the score and knows how to manuvre around it, Ronnie Anne was being dropped into a new situation, with people she KNEW, but only likely from seeing them breifly. It’s one thing to see your cousin once or twice a year, as I did with mine at that age, it’s another to live with them. It had a lot of potential.
The other thing was Bobby Santiago, Ronnie Anne’s brother, and one of my faviorite characters across both shows, an endlessly nice guy who while suffering from a terminal case of dumbass, is utterly likeable, helped by his VA Carlos PenaVega, with the spinoff and i’ts build up only fleshing him out more by giving him his job at the Mercado, and showing he has serious buisness acumen in addition to his many other talents.
But what made me wary was the lead: Ronnie Anne didn’t get the best intro on the loud house. You know this, I know this. We all know this. No sense beating around the bush: She was a bully, who had a crush on lincoln and masked it by pummeling him. And this was seen as okay by the show which isn’t as suprising in hindsight as Chris Savino clearly has messed up views about women and harassment, and is thankfully no longer part of this. She did get slightly better once she actually showed up, getting genuine chemstiry with Lincoln and being shown underneath the bully exteriror was a pretty nice kid who shared his intress. Granted it wasn’t perfect as the show madei t clear he was terrified of her, but it did at least also make it clear he no longer had a reason to be, and while she’d prank her boyfriend, or assits his sister during her dark time once a year in doing it, and if your wondering if i’m ever going to watch or cover the april fools episodes .. yeah i’m just waiting you know.. for april fools.
My point is it was kinda mixed and their solution was to soften her up a bit but also act like she and LIncoln weren’t intrested in each other all of a sudden instead of you know, dealing with her past actions and having her make up for them. It was sloppy is what i’m saying and the character while not bad wasn’t in the best positoin to tkae the reigns of her own show. They did add some intresting depth with the move though, showing that Ronnie Anne and Bobby were often on their own, and that Maria moved them to the casagrande household simply because she felt her daughter would be happier NOT having to be the strong one or take care of herself all the time and actually have someone look out for her instead. It was a good emotional reason for hte move and both casagrandes showed up ocasoinally, mostly Bobbi whose still with Lori to this day as seen in the season 5 premiere.
It was an okay foundatoin but it would depend on what they did with her character.. and i’m glad to say.. they made it work. The show still has rough edges, mostly having the same problem ducktales and the loud house itself had during season 1 of juggling such a large cast: Most of them outside of Ronnie Anen and Bobby have only gotten 1 episode, and even then CJ feels underutlized despite being amazing, while the adults outside the grandparents feel underutlized.
Buuut the show is funny, intresting, has good pacing and unlike the loud house, having already learned that lesson, while Ronnie Anne does get more episodes than the rest of the family, it does feel more like an ensemble show and the focus on her feels less like the show not knowing what it has and more like easing the viewers into the rest of the cast by using her as a viewpoint.
Ronnie herself is better, the bully aspects gone. She can still take care of herself, and is still fairly indpentent and clever, but she’s got a sharp sense of humor and a clear love of her family and the fish out of water aspect I hoped for, while not used a ton, still comes up in intresting ways.
Overall i’d say the show is off to a good start.. and it has Melissa Joan Heart and Ken Jeong as a married couple and let’s Ken play a diffrent role for once: A dorky, kind dad instaed of any degree of lunatic. That being said given his character her’s last name is Chang, I can’t help but think this and community are in the same universe and that the Changs have just had to put up with whatever insane phase Senor Chang was going througha t the time every time he visted. I mean i’d love to hear Sid tell ronnie anne the time her uncle came over in a napoleon outfit and revaled he’d taken over his community college with the help of a bunch of children.
But i’m getting off topic, I gots an episdoe to cover and out of the ones I watched this felt both like a great re-introduction into the cast and was easily one fo the best with a great emotional core and great jokes and LOTS to dig into. So i’ve jawjacked enough, pitter pater. Again!
It’s with this episode we properly meet Arturo Santiago, Ronnie Anne and Bobby’s father, Maria’s ex, and owner of one hell of a beard. Ronnie mentioned him back in friended aka the pilot because fuck that airing structure but not the time or place for that moving on.
We see he video chats his daughter once a day, though today she made hte mistake of doing so on a crowded subway while with her best friend and future wife Sid. NOW we can talk about Sid.
Sid was introduced in Friended! over on the loud houd house as part of that mini arc I keep yelling about and will again and again. Sid is Ronnie Anne’s clyde: A best friend whose there as her sidekick, emotoinal support and resident goofus, being a bit of a weirdo and given i’m a giant ass weirdo, you can see why I like her/want to keep her safe from the nightmare that is at last half this fandom. Plus she and ronnie anne are adorable together and have more chemstiry than she and lincoln did.. thoguh the two do have OT3 energy together in his one episode, but that’s for another time.
Anyways as Sid helps her rangle wifi by them by doing the mecha shiva we soon find out Arturo is coming home! Home lord he’s been off in Peru for too longggg. Point is Ronnie Anne is excited, Bobby is excited, everyone’s excited except for Hector who hates him.. and honestly I can see why the contrast. For everyone else, Arturo is a charming, friendly guy who genuinely loves his kids and only is away from them because he has a lot of important work to do and even with that is still an active part of their lives. Buuuut Hector likely sees it diffrently and is likely homing in more on the fact Arturo is barely there in person for his kids and left Maria to do all the raising them by herself, with her own demanding job.
It’s not a black and white situation is what i’m saying and.. I genuinely love that. It’s a complex thing to deal with: A parent who isn’t there for his kids but it’s hard to say if he’s being selfish or not. He’s not david from roseanne doing this so he can feel good about not wanting to deal with being a father or the death of his brother, Arturo genuinely just wants to help those who need him, even if he has to sacrifice a lot to do it.
Ronnie Anne naturally wants him to move here though and convince him during his visit, and her plan nicely shows off the duality of her charcter: She’s clever and can easily think things through, as his originzation has it’s home office in Great Lakes City so he could still help those in need, just more from the organizational end, as well as i’m assuming GLC’s own homeless and needy. But she also has an 11 year olds understading of complex issues and thus thinks the easiest way to convince him is to take him on a fun daddy daughter day that will make him love the city. Bobby is less optimistic about the plan though.. and that’s because he’s been through this with Arturo already. Granted his job for him was at weenier on a stick because it’s bobby, the boy is a peach of a human being but has the plkanning skills and common sense of a basset hound on qualudes. He just sugest she enjoy the time. And this says a lot about BOBBY too: He’s used to his dad being out of his life, he’s probably been gone for most of it and while he loves him, he’s had ot get used to the fact he’s probably never going to be regularly in his life and while he understands why his sister’s trying this he wants to spare her the pain he went through. It’s interactions like this that to me show the series at it’s best and what it could be: deeper character interactions that really let the characters and voice cast shine, that still mix well with the usual nonsense.
Arturo arrives and everyone loves him.. and again it’s easy to see why: he’s kind, friendly and to the kids, he’s their cool uncle who lives in another country and as someone with one of those, It does feel neat. Hell he was my cool uncle when he just lived in chicago or seattle, but somehow he had to top those by moving to fricking ireland. So I get where they come from and really relate to it.. I mean I met mine in high school, my family tree is complicated, but still.
So while everyone but Hector is happily remeetinmg their uncle Maria shows up. And it’s awkward, the two not knowing how to greet each other, but it’s very obvious Maria and Arturo are on good terms, it’s just hard when theres so much history there.
Speaking of Maria let’s talk about her since this is one of her only scene’s this episode. Maria is one of my faviorites. She isn’t used a ton, but this is more excusable than it is with the Casagrande parents, as the whole point of Maria uprooting her kids to Great Lakes City was to give them company and someone to take care of them while Maria worked the long and varied hours of being a nurse. She’s a good parent, who just picked a rough career, and made the hard decision to uproot her kids, not for her sake, as it can’t be easy living with both your elderly parents, your sister and her husband not to mention 5 kids, a giant adorable pupper and an obnoxious parrot, but so they’d be happy.. which given Ronnie Anne went from having no friends and largely having to be the rock in the house, to having a sizeable friend group plus her cousins, as well as generally being happy while Bobby went from bouncing from job to job to running the family buisness and planning to expand it when he gets older. She’s a good gentle person who still makes time for her kids, and I wish we saw more of her with her spotlight episode, which was about Ronnie Anne trying to spend more time with her, being one of my faviorites so far. I also like the fact that for once in a cartoon a parent with a time sink of a career isn’t demonized for trying to put food on the table and rather than just quit or have a mean boss or the usual cliches, Maria just found a way her kids wouldn’t be alone. She’s awesome.
Ronnie Anne first tries showing him how great the city is with home cooking and a warm bed, but the first while nice is something he still gets, and the latter in a nice touch is just.. too soft for him. Ronnie meant well, but understadably he’s just not used to it and makes a cot under the stars instead.. he’s not trying to be ungreatful, he’s just sued to it.
Anyways Ronnie indeed takes him on a montage, with some cab headbonks beacause why use an uber that’s cheeper and safer huh? Anyways our father and daughter do have a montage, and hector gets beaten up by a luchadore because this promotion apparently dosen’t get not to attack the crowd. They really need to stop booking that guy.
Ending on our article image, which is really sweet and a real beautiful shot, Ronnie Anne finally gets to her Ronnie Plan. First Arturo cycles through two diffrent assumptions about what she’s asking him about. He first thinks she’s about to tell him about a special boy or girl in his life, his exact words. He backspaces to include that. She says no which.. I guess okay you have other things in mind but you can’t put off him meeting Sid forever. That aside I do think it’s a good indication Ronnie Anne might be bi, and both her parents just easily accepted it which is great. I could be reading too much into this, and I probably am, but I’ve thought I was before on nickeodeon and look how legend of korra ended.
The next is just hilarious as Arturo tries to let her down gently that he’s not getting back with maria which Ronnie Anne agrees with and was not remotely her point, but I do like as it shows their well and truly done, and it’s nice to see that sort of dynamic with a divorced couple in fiction where it’s not because of lingering sexual tension or anything, just that their apart but have kids to think about and presumibly the split was amicable if again still awkward. Finally Ronnie asks him.. but he gently refuses, since the people he helped need him as much as he wants to stay.. but part of what makes Arturo likeable, especially since he’s in the REALLY throny situation of not being in his kid’s lives in person despite having the opprountiy now, is that he genuinely tries to compromoise, saying he’ll try to up the calls to two a day, and he’ll visit more often. Ronnie Anne sadly and half heartdly says it’s fine and walks off.
So Ronnie Anne vents to that girlfriend she apparently dosen’t have that he cares more about her patients than him and Sid sidgests that part of that is simple: He dosen’t feel she and bobby need him since, as I pointed out earlier, their doing better than ever. So Ronnie Anne intitates a second Ronnie Plan: to convince him she’s a troubled youth and get him to stay and reasssmbles her cousins to help.
Before we move onto this plan that’s totally a good idea and not a borderline Zach Morris evil scheme, let’s talk about those cousins real quick. Quick fire: CJ is really great, a sweet kid and I wish they’d use him more and generally do nto get why they don’t, Carlota is fine but not all that defined at this point but Alexa PenaVega tries.. and why yes it is kinda weird Carlos PenaVega’s wife and the former star of spy kids is playing his sister. And Carl.. I don’t likes him. I just don’t. He did give me a really good episode, which we’ll be covering next month, but he’s just a little asshole with out the charm of fellow little asshole Louie Duck, who alsos cams people but actually gets consqeunces more often.
That quickfire done Carl does a forgery which depsite me being eh on him, clearly, is a funny bit, to make Ronnie Anne look like she’s failing, but that fails as you’d expect when he can help her with that from Peru.
So it’s on to the actual plan: Which really boils down to this.
I mean.. that’s essentially the plan convince him she’s running with a dangerous crowd and is breaking bad, dressing up in punk clothes and making a scene at breakfast. She also gets a really neat new haircut, similar to luna’s but spiky which.. why isn’t this her normal hair? and why dosen’t she at least keep the cool leather jacket? I always get annoyed when a character’s temporary costume change is even better than their default design and htey fail to realize it but whatever.
IT starts to work a little but clearly a breakfast tauntrum won’t be enough so Ronnie Anne enlists Sid.. who is frightend,d osen’t recognize her and dosen’t want to get shoved into a locker. .. who hurt you.. tell me.. I have a box to deliver. Just let me pop a quick H on there real quick.
Anyways, once Sid realizes “Oh that’s not a bully come to shove me in a locker that’s just my girlfriend in the middle of a zack morris grade elabroate manipulative scheme”, which happens once a week their fine, she comes up with one last plan: Have her friends, who are neat but need more filling out, dress up like punks bullying her friend sameer.
This plan.. makes no sense. For one she was already a bully back home.. granted it was because she liked the kid, which no just no, but it’s heavily implied she did the same to the rest of the lincrew too. .which aside from Rusty isn’t a good look. I mean his face is punchable and he mocked hte idea of them being together despite next season hitting on Lincoln’s sisters, there’s a 1:1 chance he hit on her and she shoved him in a locker as is the natural response to anyone getting asked out by that goober. No matter how hard the show tries to pretend that didn’t happen it did. If her bullying kids didn’t get him to move home back in royal woods it won’t work now.
So they had behind the fish market for their plan, Arturo is directed there.. and sees through it. I mean she’s probably sent him pictures of her friends, he knows who they are and no amount of costumes is going to fix that. I mean you really only changed Nikki’s hair. Why not just have a dance fight. i’m legitly asking dance fights are rad and this reminds me of the venture bros episode where hank, to impress his date, has billy and white pretend to be a street gang to impress his date. Just do that for sid instead of trying to gaslight your dad into staying.
But no while he pulls her into the car, Arturo knows this was a stunt and asks why. When Ronnie Anne tearfully reveals she just wanted him to stay.. he hugs his child.. and agrees. He realizes that if she’s willing to go to these lengths to get him to stay, she must REALLY miss her papa. So he plans to call the office to transfer.
But then while helping her dad unpack, Ronnie Anne finds something and we get another emotional scene: Ronnie Anne finds the letters he got from the various kids he’s helped, and is moved to tears. Props to Izabella Alvarez for her performance here as she reads the letter and realizes just what her dad’s work does ,and why it means so much to him. He truly helps those who need it and she decides she can’t take that awy from it: Sure her dad won’t be around.. but other kids need her dad more. She has a big family, she misses her dad.. but she can live without her dad. They need a doctor.
So Arutro heads out with a tearful goodbye and Ronnie Anne leaves him a scrapbook of their time together. We then cut to the Santiago sibs playing cards, and being sad about their dad and all that.. when Arturo calls.. and then shows up in person. He took the Headquarters job after all, though a close friend of his we met earlier in the episode but I ddin’t mention will be taking over in Peru, and from earlier clearly wanted to get back out in the field, so it all works out. And it’s a nice character moment; Arturo realizes while his work is important, and as mentioned he does make sure a compient replacment will continue it.. his family can be too and it’s okay to think of himself and them for once. As I said he’ll still be able to help just in a diffrent way and there are probably needy kids who need him here too, if not in the same ways obviously as a doctors without borders type project. So eveyrone shares a group hug and even Hector bursts into tears. And Maria comes in wondering what she missed whiel Sergio asks who wants to tell her. oh sergio.. why didn’t you stay away when you ran away in a future episode.
Final Thoughts:
Not much more to say. It’s a well done episode with high emotinal stakes, great acting and some great jokes I didn’t get to, and while the plot of “Make absent parent stay by pretending things are bad’ isn’t new, it’s done well enough here. Overall just a really good episode that shows what this show can do and why it’s unique family setup makes for intresting stories a lot of shows can’t tell, and validates this spinoffs existnace. The episode also really fleshes out Ronnie Anne’s character, and givne Arutro’s been gone since the divorce if not longer, it’s resonable to supsect her earlier bullying might have been lashing out at her parents divorce. It’s just good stuff. Keep an eye peeeld to this blog for my regular loud house and ducktales coverage , and some more casagrandes this october. ANd until then, Go Team Venture!
#the casagrandes#ronnie anne santiago#arturo santiago#bobby santiago#maria santiago#sid chang#cj casagrande#carl casagrande#carlota casagrande#the loud house#reviews#animation
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5 Reasons Why The Middle Class Doesn’t Understand Poverty
Poverty is a well-worn subject here at Cracked. John Cheese has talked about it a lot, C. Coville discussed legal loopholes that can screw the poor, and we’ve also covered myths the media perpetrates. And now it’s my turn to moderately wealthsplain the subject.
Unlike John and others, I grew up one year’s worth of acoustic guitar lessons away from being the most stereotypical middle-class white kid ever. I didn’t take yearly vacations to private islands to hunt men for sport, but I also never wanted for clothes and video games. And while us suburban kids were taught that it’s good to help the poor, we were also accidentally taught to treat them with disdain. Here’s how.
5
We’re Constantly Told That “Money Can’t Buy Happiness”
If you’re friends with the right kind of insufferable people on social media, you’ve probably seen pictures like this:
Pinterest
Or these:
Simple Reminders
Quotesgram
How profound, guy with countless fans and a net worth of 150 million.
Or, God help us, this:
It’s all variations on the same theme: Money can’t buy happiness, true wealth comes from friendship and experiences, you don’t need the solid gold butt plug when the polymer one feels identical inside of you, etc. Movies teach it, music teaches it, our parents teach it — money is useless if you aren’t living. It’s not an inherently bad message, but try telling people at the homeless shelter to count the blessings that money can’t buy, and see how long it takes before you’ll feel blessed that you can afford health insurance.
Outside of images that the Care Bears would find insipid, “Money can’t buy happiness” is what middle-class people tell each other when someone is trying to decide between two different jobs. “I make 70k right now and the new gig only plays 60k, so I wouldn’t be able to travel as much. But I’d have more free time to play Ultimate, the benefits are better, and there’s no way my new manager could be any worse than my current one.” That’s an important decision to the person making it, but they’re debating between two different kinds of comfort. It’s safely assumed that the money they will need to exist will always be there. It would be nice to have more — to be able to go to more restaurants or to justify buying a second Roomba because deep down you know that the first one is lonely — but there’s always enough to keep the lights on and the kitchen stocked.
You may have seen the study that claimed $70,000 a year is the ideal salary — after that, more money generally doesn’t make you happier. Well, that’s great news for people hovering around that benchmark, but if you’re poor, more money will abso-fucking-lutely make you happier. More money means healthier food, or a chance to get out of the house and have some fun. It can mean knowing the rent is paid for next month, or being able to afford medication.
The middle class isn’t immune to money problems, especially if there are kids in the mix. Getting laid off at the wrong time sucks, no matter what your income is. But the middle-class people with money problems I’ve known were generally suffering from self-inflicted wounds. They had no savings because they wanted the new car or the luxury vacation. They wanted one of those experiences they were constantly told was more important than money, because the money for day-to-day necessities was always there, right up until it wasn’t.
That’s part of the reason, I think, so many middle-class people laugh at campaigns to raise the minimum wage. “You want 15 bucks an hour to flip burgers? How about you just hold off on the new TV until you get a real job?” The middle class generally fluctuates between being able to afford a nice vacation one year and having to settle for a few trips to the movies the next. The poor can fluctuate between paying bills and being out on the street. But the idea that such essentials could just go unpaid is unfathomable, right up until you experience it.
4
We’re Taught To Associate Low-Paying Jobs With Failure
When I was growing up, there was never a question of whether or not I was going to college. That’s partially because the idea of my spindly idiot ass learning a technical trade or doing manual labor is the first step in creating an “Epic Fail!!!” YouTube video, but mostly because my parents had a fund set up for me. (It helped that I live in a country where a post-secondary education doesn’t cost roughly eight quadrillion dollars a semester.)
So jobs that didn’t require a degree were presented to us as warning signs. “You better study hard, or else you’re going to end up just like that bull masturbator for the rest of your life! And I didn’t intend that pun, so don’t giggle!” Becoming a janitor or a gas station attendant or an internet comedy writer would have been considered a disappointment, an inability to take advantage of the gifts that were offered to us. Poverty was considered a moral failing.
No one ever just came out and said that, but the implication was always there. We tend to assume that other people are basically like us until they prove otherwise, which is why I’m constantly shocked to discover that most people don’t like my favorite homoerotic golf academy anime, Wood Strokes. So we were never taught that working as a dishwasher or a grocery store clerk or a sperm bank fluffer could be an important stepping stone for someone with a different background than us. We were also never taught that, you know, it’s still a goddamn job where someone shows up and puts work in and gets paid for their time. They were always just associated with squandered potential.
And man, when you hear that message constantly, it’s hard to shake. It’s easy to glance at a middle-aged dude working the checkout counter and automatically think “Well, I bet he’s not the brightest guy around” or “Oh shit, is that what happened to Matthew Lawrence?” It’s not malicious — not initially. Being told to take advantage of your opportunities is not a bad message. But when that message is driven into you for decades, it creates a stigma around certain jobs. And from some people, it produces plenty of snide remarks about how the people working those jobs should get better ones, as if the person who’s been a server for seven years has never considered just popping down to the job store and picking up a career in architecture.
Janitors and baristas keep society running as much as anyone else. If all of America’s coffee shops shut down for a day, the country would experience a nationwide narcolepsy epidemic crossed with The Purge. But when you grow up in the middle class, the only thing you’re taught about such jobs is that you should get one as a teenager to build character, and then thank God that you’ll never have to work one again as long as you don’t fuck up in life. And as long as we consider that a sign of our superior work ethic instead of birth luck, we’re going to keep dismissing as pathetic the jobs we’d all get angry about if they vanished tomorrow.
3
There Are Always Certain Things We Take For Granted
An education isn’t the only thing that most middle-class kids can assume they’ll get. A car to borrow, a phone, 20 bucks for when you really want to take a girl to what you assumed was a bad movie so you could make out in the back row but then it turns out that she’s actually super into the plot of Gigli and wants to focus on it even though you were all set to reach second base and so you end up getting a confused erection to Al Pacino and it inadvertently shapes your formative years … you know, all the little things that are part of growing up in Middle America.
That’s the end result of assuming that a good job awaits you, and that money is for throwing at problems and buying pizza instead of something to stress out about. Water heater broke? No worries, we’ll just have to eat in the rest of the month to make up for it. Shoes all worn out? Well, you can’t go to school like that, so go get some new ones. Gone on a losing streak at the Pokemon Card League and the groupies have started drifting off to the other players? Better pick up a few booster packs to get back in the game. You know you can’t get greedy and start buying Armani, but as long as your needs are modest, the money will always be there.
So the idea of 20 bucks making or breaking someone is impossible to appreciate. It’s just not a concept that clicks in our heads. It makes sense on a logical level, sure — you need money, and you don’t have it, and that sucks. But when you’re raised in comfort, you can’t put yourself in that head space emotionally. You can’t understand the stress, or the fear that you might not be able to feed your kids. The closest we can get is watching Gwyneth Paltrow try and hilariously fail to live on a tiny food budget before going back to her $4,000 kale cleanses. That’s kind of like empathy, right?
And because it’s tough to relate to, it’s tough to talk about. If someone tells me that they never got Christmas presents growing up, all I can respond with is “Uh, yeah, that sounds like it sucked. Well … one time my grandma accidentally got me Super Murpio 67, so … I hear you.” Starting a conversation with a bunch of middle-class people about poverty is like bringing up Trayvon Martin at a country club. Everyone trips over everyone else’s words to talk about how tragic it is, but then they distance themselves from the problem and the “buts” start coming out. And to further compound the issue …
2
We Don’t Witness Poverty, So We Don’t Understand It
When I was growing up, my exposure to poverty was largely limited to sitcom families who would talk about how poor they were, but were still able to go on a wacky adventure every week. The Simpsons kept running into money troubles in their early years, but their house looked the same as mine. Even the family from Roseanne, the classic working-class sitcom, owned a house that’s a palace compared to what a lot of people live in. The problem with portraying poverty in sitcoms is that it’s hard to get laughs out of eviction and early deaths caused by crippling medical debt, so the lesson always ends up being “Poor people struggle with money sometimes, but in the end they always get by, and they have lots of laughs while doing it!” Sitcoms make being poor look fun.
Beyond that, once or twice a year, I’d go to some kid’s birthday party and notice that his house was a lot smaller and more run down than mine. One of the kids who always got talked about in a slightly different tone of voice by the adults. I never gave it much thought because we went to the same school and both liked Nintendo — how different could our lives possibly be? Maybe I’d see a story on the news that would put a positive spin on the issue. (“Look at how many volunteers with beautiful families showed up to the soup kitchen to help feed these filthy hobos!”) Beyond that, the middle class just doesn’t think about poverty.
We’re always looking up, always wanting to go to the Christmas party at the rich friend’s house so we can get a taste of what we’re aspiring to. There’s rarely a reason to go to the poor part of town. Tell jokes about it, sure, but go? We never have to leave the bubble, so we never learn what real poverty looks like. Poor people become invisible, this mysterious Other, a group that serves you food, and in return, you throw a couple of non-perishables and toys into donation bins for them over the holidays.
Oh yeah, the middle class loves to donate food and toys and clothes and gently used ball gags and all sorts of other crap that we weren’t using anyway. Food banks actually need money far more than they need your creamed corn that’s going to expire in two weeks, because money just goes further. But people who will gladly part with 12 boxes of Kraft Mac and Cheese and some Funyuns they found under the sofa get leery when it comes to handing over money, even though we’re supposedly under the impression that we don’t need it ourselves to be happy.
That’s partially just because it’s more satisfying to give stuff instead of money — you can imagine some happy kid playing with your old Lego, and you get to clean out your closet. But remember, we’re taught that the poor are stupid and lazy. We sit around telling each other stories about how our friend’s cousin’s boyfriend knows a guy who spent his welfare check on beer and weed. These are campfire horror stories for the most tedious suburbanites, and they’re told in the hot tubs that they probably shouldn’t have bought until the next mortgage payment cleared. We can’t trust those people with money, because if they were smart enough to manage it properly, they’d be smart enough to have a better job. Also, they probably all have hooks for hands and murder teenagers while they’re making out in their cars. Hey, we learn so little about poor people that it’s just as believable.
1
We’re Taught To See Ourselves As The Victims
I’ve known people with movie theaters in their homes and four cars in their garage who are convinced that society is against them, that life is a gloomy parade of suffering because their property taxes went up a bit. That’s stereotypical rich people behavior, but it’s there in the middle class too, in subtler ways. I live in a city where the economy revolves around a boom and bust industry, so people tend to make good money while complaining about taxes for a few years, then get laid off and go on government benefits for a while, and then get a new job and go back to complaining about the government. And if you watch the cycle, you see the same “us against the world” mentality, just with fewer BMWs in the mix.
When middle-class people get laid off and go on welfare, they blame the economy, or their former employer, or the government. They never blame themselves. And they shouldn’t! Much like a whale’s erection, economies are big, confusing things that can’t be controlled by the average person. It’s not like they left photocopies of their asshole on the boss’ desk. They paid into the welfare system with their taxes when times were good, and now they’re using the system for exactly what it’s intended: helping you out when you’re unlucky. It’s bridging the gap until you, a hard-working person who just caught a tough break, gets another job.
Except when poor people use the system, it’s none of those things. Suddenly they’re not getting help; they’re just dumb, lazy leeches. Plenty of middle-class people are more empathetic and generous than I’ll ever be, but the worst instinct of the middle class is to blame the system when the system fails us, then lecture poor people when the system fails them. I’ve heard the condescending explanations about how the world really works (which usually come out after a few beers when no actual poor people are around because the speaker would never be brave enough to say it to their faces) more times than I can count.
The middle class has a weird relationship with the rich — we alternate between complaining about them and wishing we were them. Money can’t buy happiness, but a yacht certainly wouldn’t hurt matters. Even if we don’t like the rich, there’s always the pipe dream that we could be them. But no one dreams about being poor, unless you’re into an incredibly specific kind of role-playing.
Being poor is a problem (practically, not morally), and a problem is either the fault of the person or the fault of circumstances beyond their control. The latter means we in the middle class might have to do something about it — or, God forbid, reflect upon our lifestyles, which is just the worst. It’s much, much easier to assume that we’re fine, that ultra-rich politicians and celebrities and investment bankers are the ones being condescending and awful to the poor, but also that poor people could probably stand to work a little harder. So, uh … sorry about all of that. I’ll donate some food at Christmas, though!
Mark is on Twitter and has a book that’s made him rich in experience.
For more, check out 5 Things Nobody Tells You About Being Poor and 4 Common Morals Designed to Keep You Poor.
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from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/5-reasons-why-the-middle-class-doesnt-understand-poverty-2/
from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/183082791437
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