Inequivalent Exchange

So, idk how people feel about Chloe overall — honestly, idk for sure how I feel about Chloe overall, since the amount I like her varies across the show — but I’ve been rewatching Lucifer season 2 and I can’t help but find her a touch selfish.  Specifically, I’m talking about the period of time from s2e5 “Weaponizer” to s2e7 “My Little Monkey.”

I mean, in 2x6 something is clearly off with Lucifer.  While the audience knows that this is because Lucifer is grieving/feeling guilty over Uriel’s death; Chloe doesn’t know this, but she does notice it (which would be kinda hard to miss, tbh, since he was so very different from how he usually is).  Her response, though, is principally to rebuke him for letting it affect the case, rather than trying to figure out what’s wrong.  It isn’t until he is more seriously, obviously acting out that she actually tries to figure out what’s wrong, and, even then, she’s still chewing him out for not being focused on the case the way he usually is.

Meanwhile, you have 2x7, where she’s having personal issues because of the complications relating to her father’s murder, and she lets it completely possess her.  She breaks protocol repeatedly (following Joe Fields around once he was released, continuing to work a case where she clearly had a conflict of interest, etc) and is exceedingly focused on the things causing her personal distress.

To be clear, the purpose of this post is not about criticism or support of specific measures of coping with personal difficulty; I am not arguing about whether the treatment she receives or the treatment Lucifer receives is the “right” treatment.  This post is however intended to point out that she’s being a touch hypocritical.  She expects Lucifer to follow protocol and remain focused on the case while he’s dealing with his issues, and yet she gets a free pass on rule-breaking and snippy behavior because she’s dealing with stuff relating to her dad.  It’s like he’s not allowed to have issues that affect his mental state, but she is.

I just find it kinda ridiculous that Lucifer sitting there having a mental breakdown complete with suicidal wishes and potent self-hatred is dismissed as inconvenient across multiple episodes, while she gets an entire episode of my issues take priority over everything.

@suncaptor's Birthday Event Sam & Lucifer // Sam & Dean You know I'd never hurt you. Not really.

image description: scene comparisons between "The Benders," "Simon Said," "Free to Be You and Me," "Sam, Interrupted," "Swan Song," "Hello, Cruel World," "The Born-Again Identity," "Citizen Fang," "I Think I'm Gonna Like It Here," and "Let the Good Times Roll"

1x15: Sam is trapped behind iron bars, and Dean tells him, “Must be getting a little rusty there, kiddo.”

5x22: While possessing Sam, Lucifer looks into the mirror to tell him, “You got me all wrong, kiddo.”

7x02: Dean looks at Sam and says, “Oh, you think I’m Dean. Right.” He grins and then the hallucination changes, morphing into Lucifer. 

9x01: In Sam’s mind, Death watches as Dean puts a hand on Sam’s shoulder, saying, “Come on.” Then he begins to glow with light, and Sam looks confused as his face morphs into that of Gadreel’s vessel.

5x11: A psychologist opens Dean’s file, and says, “You’re my paranoid schizophrenic with narcissistic personality disorder and religious psychosis.” Dean looks rattled listening to this diagnosis.

7x17: Sam is on his bed at a hospital, and the hallucination of Lucifer sits behind him reading from a large book, saying, “Narcissistic personality disorder. Okay, now, this one I could have.”

5x03: Dreaming, Sam turns over in bed and jolts, surprised to see Jessica. She smiles at him and says, “Hey, baby. I missed you.” 

8x09: Sam sits in a bar and takes out his phone, considering the text message he believed was sent by Amelia. The text reads: [Sam, I need your help. Come quick]

2x05: Dean glances at Sam and away while driving the Impala. He slaps a hand on Sam’s leg and offers a weak smile, saying, “You’ve always been a freak.”

13x23: Lucifer tries to avoid bringing Maggie back to life at Jack’s request, saying, “Right, well, Sam’s always been… sorta different.” He smirks.

kripke: show creator; seasons 1-5 showrunner; wrote or co-wrote 1x01 pilot, 1x02 wendigo, 1x09 home, 1x16 shadow, 1x22 devil’s trap, 2x01 in my time of dying, 2x22 all hell breaks loose part two, 3x01 the magnificent seven, 3x16 no rest for the wicked, 4x01 lazarus rising, 4x07 it's the great pumpkin, sam winchester, 4x10 heaven and hell (story), 4x22 lucifer rising, 5x01 sympathy for the devil, 5x09 the real ghostbusters, 5x22 swan song, 6x22 the man who knew too much; directed 2x20 what is and what should never be, 4x22 lucifer rising

gamble: seasons 6-7 showrunner; wrote or co-wrote 1x03 dead in the water, 1x12 faith, 1x14 nightmare, 1x21 salvation, 2x03 bloodlust, 2x08 crossroad blues, 2x13 houses of the holy, 2x17 heart, 2x21 all hell breaks loose part one, 3x02 the kids are alright, 3x07 fresh blood, 3x10 dream a little dream of me, 3x12 jus in bello, 3x15 time is on my side, 4x02 are you there god? it’s me, dean winchester, 4x09 i know what you did last summer, 4x17 it’s a terrible life, 4x21 when the levee breaks, 5x02 good god, y'all, 5x07 the curious case of dean winchester, 5x13 the song remains the same, 5x21 two minutes to midnight, 6x01 exile on main st, 6x11 appointment in samarra, 6x21 let it bleed, 7x01 meet the new boss, 7x10 death's door, 7x17 the born-again identity, 7x23 survival of the fittest

edlund: wrote 2x05 simon said, 2x12 nightshifter, 2x18 hollywood babylon, 3x03 bad day at black rock, 3x09 malleus maleficarum, 3x13 ghostfacers, 4x05 monster movie, 4x08 wishful thinking, 4x16 on the head of a pin, 5x04 the end, 5x10 abandon all hope, 5x14 my bloody valentine, 5x20 the devil you know, 6x03 the third man, 6x09 clap your hands if you believe, 6x15 the french mistake, 6x20 the man who would be king, 7x02 hello cruel world, 7x09 how to win friends and influence monsters, 7x15 repo man, 7x21 reading is fundamental, 8x05 blood brother, 8x13 everybody hates hitler, 8x21 the great escapist; directed 6x20 the man who would be king, 7x21 reading is fundamental

justice for sam

If the spnepisodebracket craze has shown us anything, it's that the supernatural fanbase is extremely divided, with the lowly sam stan seemingly at the bottom of the pile. sam is always last in polls, so this is a bracket for the 10% or so who always votes for him. because yeah, there's 327 episodes of Supernatural, but how many are popular because of a dean or destiel moment? how many good episodes are drowned out because they focus on sam?

i've chosen, with some crowdsourced peer review (special thanks to @spneveryseason, @suncaptor, and @ambersock!) 125 episodes that are Sam Relevant. Some are extremely sam-centric, some just have a shot where sam looks like he's being crucified that gives me brain worms -- i tried to be generous about it to keep a relatively even seasons distribution! matchups will be random and polls will last 24 hours each. in the tradition of @spnepisodebracket (who this is obviously inspired by and would not be possible without!) i'll try to rb a gifset for every episode in the poll!

a final note: no this is not that serious but the criteria for voting here should be how good the episode is as a SAM episode, not as anything else, so please vote accordingly! i am making this for people who actually enjoy sam and if that is not you, then this is not the poll for you!

with that out of the way, here is the compiled list of episodes! voting starts this sammy sunday, 3/26!

Season 1 Pilot (1x01) Bloody Mary (1x05) Home (1x09) Asylum (1x10) Scarecrow (1x11) Nightmare (1x14) Shadow (1x16) Provenance (1x19) Salvation (1x21) Devil's Trap (1x22) Season 2 Simon Said (2x05) Croatoan (2x09) Hunted (2x10) Playthings (2x11) Houses of the Holy (2x13) Born Under a Bad Sign (2x14) Heart (2x17) All Hell Breaks Loose Part 1 (2x21) All Hell Breaks Loose Part 2 (2x22) Season 3 Bad Day at Black Rock (3x03) A Very Supernatural Christmas (3x08) Mystery Spot (3x11) Jus In Bello (3x12) Time is On My Side (3x15) Season 4 Metamorphosis (4x04) It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester (4x07) I Know What You Did Last Summer (4x09) After School Special (4x13) On the Head of a Pin (4x16) It's a Terrible Life (4x17) Jump the Shark (4x19) When the Levee Breaks (4x21) Lucifer Rising (4x22) Season 5 Good God, Y'all! (5x02) Free to be You and Me (5x03) Changing Channels (5x08) Sam, Interrupted (5x11) Swap Meat (5x12) The Song Remains the Same (5x13) My Bloody Valentine (5x14) Dark Side of the Moon (5x16) 99 Problems (5x17) Two Minutes to Midnight (5x21) Swan Song (5x22) Season 6 Exile on Main St. (6x01) You Can't Handle the Truth (6x06) Family Matters (6x07) Clap Your Hands if You Believe (6x09) Caged Heat (6x10) Appointment in Samarra (6x11) Like a Virgin (6x12) Unforgiven (6x13) The French Mistake (6x15) The Man Who Knew Too Much (6x22) Season 7 Meet the New Boss (7x01) Hello, Cruel World (7x02) The Girl Next Door (7x03) Season 7, Time for a Wedding! (7x08) Plucky Pennywhistle's Magic Menagerie (7x14) Repo Man (7x15) Out with the Old (7x16) The Born-Again Identity (7x17) Season 8 We Need to Talk About Kevin (8x01) Hunteri Heroici (8x08) Trial and Error (8x14) Taxi Driver (8x19) Pac-Man Fever (8x20) The Great Escapist (8x21) Clip Show (8x21) Sacrifice (8x23) Season 9 Holy Terror (9x09) Road Trip (9x10) First Born (9x11) The Purge (9x13) Meta Fiction (9x18) Season 10 Black (10x01) Soul Survivor (10x03) Fan Fiction (10x05) Inside Man (10x17) Book of the Damned (10x18) The Werther Project (10x19) The Prisoner (10x22) Brother's Keeper (10x23) Season 11 Form and Void (11x02) Baby (11x04) Just My Imagination (11x08) Oh Brother Where Art Thou (11x09) The Devil in the Details (11x10) Into the Mystic (11x11) Ouroborus (11x14) Red Meat (11x17) Don't Call Me Shurley (11x20) Season 12 Keep Calm and Carry On (12x01) Mamma Mia (12x02) American Nightmare (12x04) Rock Never Dies (12x07) The Raid (12x14) Who We Are (12x22) Season 13 Lost and Found (13x01) Patience (13x03) The Big Empty (13x04) Various & Sundry Villains (13x12) A Most Holy Man (13x15) Funeralia (13x19) Beat the Devil (13x21) Exodus (13x22) Let the Good Times Roll (13x23) Season 14 Stranger in a Strange Land (14x01) Mint Condition (14x04) Nightmare Logic (14x05) Byzantium (14x08) Prophet and Loss (14x12) Lebanon (14x13) Peace of Mind (14x15) Game Night (14x17) Moriah (14x20) Season 15 Back and to the Future (15x01) Atomic Monsters (15x04) The Rupture (15x03) Golden Time (15x06) The Gamblers (15x11) Unity (15x17) Inherit the Earth (15x19) Finale: Carry On (15x20)

Edits: Bugs (1x08) will be added, polls will not be completely random bc im not doing this for science im doing this to see a good episode win and my randomizer pit when the levee breaks against swan song in round 1

No. 31 A LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL: Comfort

Stargate SG-1 2x05 | One Day At A Time 3x12 | Supernatural 11x16 | Downton Abbey 6x08 | Graceland 3x08 | M*A*S*H 7x23 | Supergirl 3x07 | Burn notice 7x07 | Iron Man 3 | Sense8 2x02 | Numb3rs 5x23 | Man of Steel | Lucifer 6x10 | Ted Lasso 1x07 | Hannibal 1x13 | Once Upon a Time 6x12 | Criminal Minds 11x11 | The Umbrella Academy 1x08 | Legends of Tomorrow 2x14 | The Sandman 1x01 | Kenobi 1x04 | Buffy the Vampire Slayer 3x21 | Forever 1x11 | Once Upon a Time 4x17

@whumptober @whumptober-archive

Collection Summary: A Deckerstar drabble collection. Collection title from lyrics from October by George Ogilvie.

Ch. 4 - I'm fine

Chapter Summary: A missing scene moment from the end of 2x04 to the beginning of 2x05. Lucifer arrives at the hospital to check on Chloe after her accident.

-/-

“Lucifer, I’m fine.” She needs him to stay calm or stay still or do the opposite of whatever his line of thinking is right now – or ever. The last thing she needs is him swirling into the hospital room with his Lucifer flourish and embellishment and just overall him.

read the rest here

tell me that the canon of RE1 and 0 combined is kinda stupid so I can toss the parts that annoy me out the window (after finding the suitable alternatives)

so i can write the fic set before during and after the incident (ending it around when Chris leaves)

and the fic idea is mostly the fault of these two random things (well images)

and this scene from Lucifer at the end of 2x05 after he redacted

and one fairly random trilogy to be inspired by but those ladies got shit done and if i wanted to go off book because of general paranoia over shit like possibility of zombie outbreak i would talk to that group of old ladies

This is too freaking funny. If this isn't just so them, I don't know what is. Her face, the eyeroll, the clenched fists. You can almost hear her say: "Lord give me strength, or I'm going to strangle your son."

oh my fucking god he killed uriel.... his hands are SHAKING i-

Oh my god i just finished episode 5

...SPN Lucifer never looks like that after a fight send help I may cry

Uriel Doing What has to be Done

“Just because he told us his plan doesn’t mean that’s his plan. It’s Uriel.”

I’ve been thinking about Uriel. And I’ve been wondering how much of the pattern he could see at any given moment. Because he’s an angel; an immortal. A human minute is not the same to an immortal being who doesn’t have to live within the concept of a lifespan of perhaps 80-90 years. Does Uriel see patterns of days? Yes; he claims pressing the key will kill Chloe in two days. Does he see months? Years? Is it a clue that, when talking about Mum, he says, “She’s been here, what? Three minutes? Now you’re already defending her.”

Because here’s the real question: Why does Uriel bring Azrael’s blade to Earth? (And why, for that matter, does Azrael let him? Death is always watching.) We, the audience, think it’s because he’s going to use it to kill Mum. We think that because it’s the conclusion Lucifer jumps to, and even though we have seen Lucifer jump to many many wrong conclusions in the past, we believe him. Not only that, Uriel’s very appearance, I believe, plays on audience-held prejudices and biases. 

Before Uriel, every celestial we meet is tall and strong and beautiful. We trust Lucifer because he’s our POV character, even though we know that his own feelings and emotions and history make him an unreliable narrator. We have seen the beautiful favorite son, firstborn angel Amenadiel fall in slow motion and then crawl haltingly back toward the light. We’ve seen Amenadiel do good things and we trust him, too, especially when Lucifer grows to trust him.

When Uriel shows up, he’s shorter and thicker than either Lucifer or Amenadiel. His human form is older; he is not young and beautiful, his clothes are drab and either too baggy or too tight. And if first impressions don’t ensure we already dislike him, Lucifer’s attitude toward Uriel takes us the rest of the way---disparaging Uriel’s trenchcoat as “pe/do/phile chic,” for example. That’s a laden word.

We, the audience, think we know what Lucifer thinks he knows: Uriel has come to hurt Chloe. Like Lucifer, we love Chloe and hate anyone who would hurt her. We distrust Uriel because his clothes, his appearance, his New York accent, his Mafiaesque vibe, like relying on ‘accidents’ to get what he wants and ensure his outcomes (Hell, the actor’s connection to The Sopranos) encourage us to. Kimo breaks legs for the Mob in the same episode we’ve got an Italian American actor known for major gangster-related roles pulling strings; these things are rarely coincidental with the Lucifer writers.

This episode is about appearances. Lying about them. Changing them. Pretending to be something you’re not. Amenadiel pretends to still be a powerful angel; Chloe pretends she’s not as upset about the accident as she is; Kimo pretends he still has movie star money; Jamie Lee pretends she still loves Kimo; the manager pretends he has Kimo’s best interests at heart; Kimo and Wesley pretend to be enemies; Chloe reads Coraline--appearances!!--to Trixie. What is Uriel pretending to be? How, perhaps, is his appearance at odds with his truth?

Uriel pulls out Azrael’s blade after explaining, “Dad’ll do the same thing [forgive Mum], he’ll let his guard down, and then she’ll destroy him. I need to make sure that doesn’t happen.” If we look at the events of “God Johnson,” this is exactly what happens. The God we see in God Johnson may not be the full power of the Almighty, but we know He has some of God’s essence, some of His memories. It’s not just the healing power of life; God knows Lucifer as Samael without prompting. And we know that iteration of God is willing to forgive. Mum is the one we know isn’t interested in forgiveness because she tells us again and again that she’s got an axe to grind and boy she can’t wait to get at the sharpener.

God, after all, is still an enigma---as “The Weaponizer” reminds us with Lucifer’s angry speech about how no one knows what He wants, and the various grace notes peppered throughout the episode reminding us everyone is essentially blind when it comes to God’s actual wants/plans/needs---”Nobody bloody knows because the selfish bastard won’t just tell us!” That this is immediately followed by “There’s my Lightbringer” in an episode that is going to introduce us to the flaming sword is not a coincidence. Mum means Lightbringer as truthbringer, I think; shedding light in the darkness. It’s one of the many meanings of Lucifer’s name and his insistence on never lying.

But back to Lucifer and Uriel at the church. Lucifer is the one who points out it’s Azrael’s blade; he explains its power; he says, “No Heaven, no Hell, just gone.”

Uriel replies, “Finally a moment of clarity between us.”

But is it the clarity we, the audience, think it is? Is it the death we (and Lucifer) assume Uriel is planning? Because when we get to the finale (Uriel says, “Maybe I’m working up to a big finale.”), isn’t that what happens? Lucifer slices open the universe and Mum leaves. No Heaven. No Hell. Just gone.

Lucifer, still assuming Uriel intends to use the blade on Mum, says, “You’ve gone completely insane, brother.”

And Uriel says, “I’m doing what has to be done, and you’ve run out of time. I don’t care about your deal with Dad, I don’t care about your little human, but it’s obvious you care for her a tad more than you do Mom. Now, all I need to do is hit this one little key, right here. A sequence will begin and two days from now, your cute little human will finally die. So, Lucifer, you can either let that happen or you can give me Mom. Last chance. You choose.” 

The bolding is mine; I’ll come back to it in a moment. But first, here’s the thing: Uriel doesn’t tell us what it is he cares about, not in so many words. What can we infer? That he doesn’t want Heaven to go to war. He doesn’t want the Universe to be destroyed by Mum and Dad fighting. He looked up to his siblings and kept trying to play with them, even when they rejected him, and even when, as Lucifer says, it was “strange, considering he already knew what the outcome would be.” So what is he doing here? Revenge? I don’t think so. That’s Mum’s thing. He could’ve killed Amenadiel. He could’ve used Azrael’s blade on Lucifer.

Why does Uriel bring Azrael’s blade to Earth? If it’s to “kill” Mum, why are his last words to Lucifer about “the piece”? If Uriel’s plan was to avoid Mum returning to Heaven, being forgiven, destroying Dad (and possibly the Universe in the process, including his siblings), why would he tell Lucifer what he needs to know to fix the flaming sword? The cut-through-the-gates-of-Heaven, maybe-Lucifer-would’ve-succeeded-in-his-rebellion-if-he’d-had-it flaming sword?

What if Uriel saw a different outcome all along?

Back to Uriel’s monologue, then, and his actions on Earth. These actions seem focused on Lucifer; he only deals with Amenadiel because Lucifer adds that variable. He doesn’t seek Amenadiel out. There, I think, we see the actions of the frustrated, stubborn, rejected little boy whose siblings never played with him. But I don’t think that kind of vengeance (or even justice, some might say) is why Uriel involves himself. I think, on some level, Uriel believes Lucifer is the only one who can come close to understanding him (though I wonder if Uriel and Azrael didn’t hatch part of this plan together, both being young and small and not the best or brightest or most beautiful). 

Think about it. If Uriel was always rejected and excluded, who of his siblings can now understand that best of all? He needs Lucifer to help him but he also knows he can’t just ask Lucifer to help him; Lucifer is paranoid and distrustful. Lucifer might say no. The pattern might change. Perhaps Uriel has seen all the ways it will never work just to ask.

So Uriel goads him. Finds his weaknesses. Plays on them. Exactly like Mum is doing to Lucifer. Only Uriel’s doing it to try and save everything, whereas Mum is doing it to get Lucifer and Amenadiel to help her “retake” Heaven; war is always implied. Death is always implied. Patricide is implied. 

In their fight, Uriel says, “Patterns are tricky like that; it takes time to get a real sense of them.” He looks Lucifer in the eyes. “I needed to study you a bit.”

Again, we assume because Lucifer assumes that Uriel means he had to study Lucifer’s fighting style. But I don’t think that’s it---at least, not all of it. Uriel arranges the car accident; he watches Lucifer’s reaction to it. Uriel arranges the confrontation between Kimo and Chloe; he watches Lucifer’s reaction to it. Uriel gives Lucifer an ultimatum (Lucifer, who once rebelled against the Creator of the Universe because Lucifer asked, “Why can’t I choose my own way?” and Dad said, “Because I said so.”). 

Uriel goads Lucifer, knowing damned well that goading Lucifer is usually an efficient way to get him to do something. Tell him he can’t. Insult the things he loves to get his ire up; Lucifer is impulsive and protective. Uriel suspected Chloe was a weakness---or, perhaps, even a source of change that makes Lucifer better. So he insults her, belittles her, attacks her, knowing Lucifer will shoot from the hip. Uriel says he doesn’t care about her; he says he doesn’t care about Lucifer’s ‘deal with Dad’---we know Lucifer loves Chloe; we know Lucifer values the honor inherent in keeping his deals above all things. These words are very precise jabs at Lucifer’s weaknesses, his Achilles heels. Uriel knows what he’s doing. And Lucifer doesn’t see it; he falls for the “trap;” he lets his anger drive him. (Later, Uriel also mocks and insults Mazikeen---Lucifer’s favorite---but again, though he has the chance, he does not kill her. He’s still trying to push Lucifer toward an action.)

But Uriel does give Lucifer what he most desires; choice---at least he says he does. The thing Lucifer wanted so badly that he ended up rebelling and being banished from Heaven for it. Here, too, a parallel between Lucifer and Uriel: Uriel is making choices here, something that would never have happened Before. He still looks up to his brother, still wants to be like him.

Mum says, “He’s not going to give up until he has either me or that detective.” Asked to make this choice, Lucifer says, “I refuse to believe that. There is always another way.”

“If anyone can find it,” says Mum, “it’s you.”

Because hasn’t that always been Lucifer’s role? To find loopholes? Other ways? To do the unexpected?

And believe it or not, I think Lucifer’s ability to find other ways is what Uriel was counting on, too.

“Your pride was always going to be your undoing,” Uriel tells Amenadiel. (And doesn’t everyone think/know that pride is Lucifer’s thing too? Pride goeth, doesn’t it?)

Ultimately, pride is Uriel’s undoing, too. Like every other celestial we’ve met, Uriel underestimates the intensity of Lucifer’s loyalty to those he loves, human or not. Because the celestials don’t “get” Lucifer’s (or God’s!) fascination with humanity, relegating them to the equivalent of toys or pets, they do not understand the lengths Lucifer will go to in protecting them. When Lucifer kills Uriel (because it’s the only other choice he sees, and Uriel has goaded him relentlessly into thinking this is true), and Uriel says, “I didn’t see this coming,” it’s proof that Uriel---with all his patterns, all his prescience---still failed to accept that his celestial brother, his brightest brother, could possibly care enough about humanity to do the unthinkable.

Perhaps in the pattern Uriel thought most likely, Lucifer ended up working with him to build the flaming sword and banish Mum with it after they traversed this path. Perhaps he believed (wrongly, always wrongly) that he could manipulate Lucifer successfully (the way so many others have tried and failed to do). Perhaps he didn’t understand that his brother does not negotiate with terrorists, especially those who hold the safety of his loved ones hostage. Uriel says he will take both Mum and the detective; he says, “You can’t stop me, brother.” 

Getting Lucifer to act by telling him what he can and cannot do. 

And in that final moment, I think Uriel understands. In studying Lucifer, he missed the most important lesson. His brother isn’t the man he once was; he’s changed. And this changed Lucifer might have been reasoned with. This changed Lucifer might have helped. 

And so Uriel tells this changed Lucifer, “The piece is here,” hoping that Lucifer will pick up the thread of the pattern that should have been, the one where everyone is saved, where Mum gets her own universe, where his family doesn’t go to war with one another, where there’s no Heaven, no Hell, just gone.

Uriel just won’t be there to enjoy it. In this pattern, his is the sacrifice that makes the best outcome possible. Hell, maybe he did know that all along, too. How sad that would be. To be your worst self in order to make the best outcome happen. When Uriel says, “You’re lucky I would never use Azrael’s blade on you, brother,” is he planting the idea that becomes Lucifer using Azrael’s blade on him? How much of the pattern has he seen?

And I would like to believe, from one rejected brother to another, Uriel does see that his own actions led to this fratricide---and that he regrets it, because in making his brother a murderer, Uriel has potentially undone all the work that has gone into changing Lucifer for the better since last they met. (They call each other brother so often, even though they are, on the surface, enemies here. Brothers. Something that could have been and now never will. Even in dying---forever removed from existence---Uriel reaches for his brother, entrusts him with information. And somewhere in Lucifer’s subconscious this gets stored not as a lie, but as help---because otherwise, HellUriel wouldn’t be able to “tell” Lucifer what he needs to be thinking about.)

Pride goeth before the Fall, and in this case, the Fall is a very final one---and perhaps neither Lucifer nor his brother actually “got what they deserved,” no matter what Maze says. (“The prick got what he deserved.” Lucifer doesn’t think of him as a prick here, no. “He was my brother,” he says, tortured. “What have I done?”)

And in a world without Chloe Decker, without Linda Martin, without people who love him back, I think Lucifer might’ve fallen all over again after killing Uriel. But he doesn’t. And that’s a change, too. A really damned important one.

2x05 // 3x14

Lucifer being impressed by Chloe’s obscure knowledge of things

No. 24 FIGHT, FLIGHT, OR FREEZE: Blood Covered Hands

Hannibal 2x10 | Mr. Robot 2x12 | The Royals 4x01 | Beauty and the Beast 2x09 | Daredevil 3x07 | Safe House (2012) | Lucifer 2x05 | Teen Wolf 2x19 | Bones 11x01 | The O.C. 4x15 | Hawaii Five-0 6x25 | Constantine 1x09 | Lord of the Rings: Return of the King | Lucifer 4x01 | Supernatural 11x17 | Scream (1996) | Lucifer 4x05 | The Outfit (2022) | Hawaii Five-0 10x14 | Killjoys 1x07 | The Following 1x03 | The Hitman's Bodyguard | The A-Team 5x13 | Hannibal 3x13 | The Umbrella Academy 1x05 | Sense8 2x12 | Poldark 4x07 | Prodigal Son 1x11

@whumptober @whumptober-archive

Sth that got me thinking since S4 was what Amenadiel said to Linda in 4x04:

- How are we supposed to keep an angel baby safe?

- I don’t know. I’ve never seen one before. No one has. You see, angels, we didn’t grow up. We just appeared fully formed. That’s how Mom and Dad created us.

And it’s somehow in contrast to what Mom and Lucifer said in 2x05.

Lucifer to Amenadiel: “Growing up...well, we all looked up to you.”

Mom to Lucifer: “Uriel was so small when he was a child. All he ever wanted was to play with you and the older kids.”

It makes sense that angels weren’t created as babies. Because Mom and Dad are celestials and don’t have a form. But Amenadiel says that they never grew up while both Lucifer and Mom said that they did and they were once kids. So were they created as children? Or did Amenadiel mean they appeared fully formed as adults? Because if that’s what Amenadiel meant it would be a retcon. I’m really confused by this. Any thoughts?

all that pain and misery. and loneliness. and it just made him kind.