#specifically fergus
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Rowena & Crowley back the wrong horse, over and over and over...
Everyone remembers Rowena's tragic clinging to Lucifer in season 11, and how it ended up for her. Upon learning she's the only one that can put him back in the cage, Lucifer pragmatically snaps her neck--a form of cold, indifferent insurance:
Ah, the tragedy of Rowena's desire to have security. Rowena wanted to be loved and protected by Fergus's father. She wanted to be appreciated and protected by Lucifer.
Crowley remarks that she's always looking for the biggest, baddest beast in the room to hide behind.
///
In 11x23 Alpha and Omega, we see Rowena cozying up to her newest target, Chuck:
ROWENA: [Crowley mocks her as she speaks] Charles, I'll put the kettle on. My mom always said, there's nothing a nice wee cup of tea can't fix.
...
CROWLEY: It's what she does. Find someone with power...cozies up...digs the claws in. [As he’s talking, Crowley walks over to a cabinet, opens a door and takes out a bottle of Craig]
CHUCK: Hmm. Yeah, well, I'm not helping anyone right now, obviously. She's been...nice.
CROWLEY: For now.
Funny sidenote: As Rowena moves in on Chuck, getting sweet on him, she starts calling him "Charles," a little nugget for how she'll later call Sam "Samuel," and Cas, "Hello, Castiel."
///
Ahem. Anyway. The thing is, that yes, Rowena totally does this. We can't really blame her when we look at the tragic happenstances of her life. During the course of the series, we see her make numerous moves to gain favor will powerful beings:
SEASON 10
We see her volleying to make Crowley sit upon a stronger, more secure throne.
SEASON 11
We see her cozying up to Lucifer and getting killed for her trouble.
Next, we see her coming back from the dead to move in on Amara.
She's kind of playing both sides, but she gets sweet on Amara here: "Oh, I can be useful...And even if it is born out of my own self-interest, I-- I care about you. I'm someone you can talk with. Confide in. Have you... have you ever had that? Oh, you don't have to be (alone), darlin'!"
Then, as I mentioned above, she cozies up to Chuck, and Crowley snarls many a nasty word about her.
SEASON 12
We find Rowena trying to date rich men and lying about her background, painting herself as a posh, well-to-do ballerina.
In an abrupt about-face to insulting Cas (she called him a fish in season 10), we see that Rowena has flipped on her appraisal of him.
Now, Castiel is super hot. He's "the handsome, strong angel," an ideal partner/protector. So, she hits on him. A lot.
Despite her memory of "Cas's face" as Lucifer snapped her neck, her dogged attraction to Cas blooms sometime in season 12.
Perhaps, it's when she and Cas and Fergus are hunting Lucifer together.
(In the same time frame, Crowley is also hanging off Cas's arm, keeping him company, trying to be oddly "cutesy," singing in the car, etc. It's...hilarious. You get the mental picture of them both trying their hardest to get his attention.)
SEASON 13
Season 13 brings us her library tryst with Gabriel.
She says she's motivated by trying to heal his wounded virility/grace/pride, but it's at least partially about his status as an archangel.
And of course, there's security in Sam(uel), but it's all twisted up with him being her executioner, not just her protector.
But in being her "destiny," he also functions as her security. It's very complex. (And kinda sexy.)
SEASON 14
Rowena will hit on Cas as later as season 14's Ouroboros, saying his full name in a similar coo to how she says, "Charles and Samuel." -> "Hello, Castiel."
Castiel, for his part, tends to be a little flustered by her, straightening up and saying, "Hello," back.
SEASON 15
Finally, in season 15, somewhat hilariously, Rowena moves in on Arthur Ketch.
But it's a little different this time, reflecting a more confident, in-control, and emotionally integrated Rowena.
She seems to be genuinely interested in him for his wry, science-loving personality. They banter.
She and Ketch mutually harass Dean for details about the other, like schoolyard crushes.
They had a battle connection in the past, have fought together and helped one another re: resurrection spells, but it is only now that they’re healthy and healed that they can actually see each other.
Rowena throws Dean a breathless, thankful look when he saves Ketch (for her).
She’s reformed, Ketch is reformed. It’s heartbreaking just how excited she is about him. He instills a her hope in her, for the future. (But he won’t sell out his friends. He dies. She won’t let the world die, so she dies, too.)
///
But Crowley does the same friggin' thing, doesn't he? He is so her child, a tragic mini-Rowena, despite his efforts to look like a big, bad Hell-king. 💔
SEASON 5
When we meet him, we see him backing the Winchesters re:the Colt.
In his early appearance, he does this because he thinks Lucifer is going to wipe out demon-kind.
That gamble goes okay for Crowley, mostly.
SEASON 6
Sometime in this timeframe, he is given the role of Hell-king as a consolation prize, by Ramiel, prince of Hell, who honestly doesn't give a fuck.
In season 6, Crowley backs Castiel. Cas's got magnetism and sex appeal.
As the original "angel's angel" in Heaven, he's a strong frontrunner in Heaven's Civil War simply by popularity alone. So, Cas is the horse Crowley decides to bet on.
Then, Cas turns out to be duplicitous, cunning, and too devoted to his human family to be controlled. He’s way more than Crowley can handle.
There are glimmers of this power imbalance, when Cas on occasion has had enough of Crowley's innuendo-laden threats, like when Cas snaps and crushes him into a wall, for example. But on the whole, Crowley ignores this. It's his tragic hubris.
Eventually, Cas overwhelms him and seizes power, and the whole thing turns out to be a frightening blow to his position.
So, Crowley goes running to his brother Raphael, which is another bad gamble, as Castiel straight-up kills him, and Crowley is forced to flee and go into hiding.
SEASON 7-8
In seasons 7-8, Crowley vies for control of the prophet Kevin, torturing and killing those around him.
He makes sure to kill Meg, who is in his mind a Lucifer loyalist (she's actually a Castiel loyalist at this point, but the Lucifer label sticks).
SEASON 9
In season 9, Crowley arranges a series of events to allow him to dangle Dean to Cain in a bid to transform Dean and destroy Abbadon, the newest threat to his position.
(Crowley won't suggest taking the mark on his own; he won't risk his own neck.) Afterwards, he scoops Dean up, like spoils of war, a dark parallel to the pimp-demon in Girls, Girls, Girls (and Randy).
SEASON 10
In season 10, this bites him in the ass, too.
Demon Dean proves too much to handle, a liability on the job, as he refuses to perform the cold, capitalistic mercenary duties of Hell.
"The little prat’s bad for business. He’s uncontrollable. Must be the Mark."
In a scene similar to Cas crunching Crowley into a wall, Dean throws Crowley down. Demon Dean will not be cowed by Crowley, and he will not be a sidekick, little bitch, or Queen to be "controlled."
So, Crowley goes running to his brother, Sam. He “sells him out" to Sam.
And Crowley goes running to revive Castiel again, to deal with the problem-that-solved-his-original-Abbadon-problem.
And around and around Crowley goes.
Despite everything, Crowley softens to Dean. Crowley's a little bit human now, and it shows. As he softens, his mother appears, making things so much more complicated.
SEASON 11
Crowley tries to muster up the glory of his former evil self--he kills a bunch of swingers for no reason.
Then, Crowley sees a new opportunity to sway a powerful being, and we get Crowley unsuccessfully trying to mold Amara as his newest weapon of mass destruction.
Like with Demon Dean, he strikes fast to scoop her up when she's “vulnerable” and "new,” to get her under his sphere of influence.
Then, it goes badly, as this always does for Crowley. Amara breaks Uncle Crowley's arm and runs away.
In this season, Crowley goes to bat for Cas again, trying to detach him from Lucifer and screeching angrily at Cas as Lucifer beats Crowley up.
In fact, in that brief moment before Crowley even goes to bat, he's actually smiling at Dean and Cas as they reunite, as Dean says, “Cas, we don't have a whole lot of time, okay?"
Crowley is a softie. Cas is his kinda-friend, and Crowley wants Dean to be happy. Crowley's changed.
At the end of the season, we briefly see Crowley complaining about Rowena cozying up to Chuck, while he moves to cozy up to Billie. (Really, Crowley? Stop doing the thing that gets you burned, man.)
SEASON 12
Enter season 12, and Crowley works with his mom again. He and Rowena form an uneasy alliance, and both begin to see family in a slightly new light.
They trust each other a little more, and they hurt each other to try and solve their mutual pain re: Oskar and Gavin.
Hilariously, they both start seeing Castiel in a new light this season. It's like, in watching his devotion and chivalry to his family, and as their understanding of family shifts, they've mutually decided that he's dependable and thus desireable. (The "blue-collar, family-oriented soldier.")
So yeah, season 12 finds Crowley cozying up to Castiel again in order to fight Lucfier--with Crowley being overly friendly and flirty and sing-song to the point that Cas just might bash his own head in.
(In this same timeframe, Rowena warms to Cas, so you have this implication that they're both hanging off his arms adoringly, and he is tired as fuck of dealing with them. I'm sure Cas's tendency to get a little flustered and sweet with Rowena is something that would drive Crowley insane on multiple levels.)
Crowley even risks his life for Cas against Vince!Lucifer. (He wants Cas to be his friend so badly in this era, oof.)
Then, he saves Cas against Ramiel, thanks in large part to his bond with Dean, and Dean thanks him for it.
Crowley, like Rowena, will take any form love. Any friendship. Any comradery. Even scraps. They've got the same neurosis.
Anyway, in season 12 we also have the team-up of the century, where Crowley works with his mother to send Lucifer back to the cage. Victory!
And Crowley has another fatal misstep. His last one ever, perhaps. He thinks, yet again, that he can outsmart another overpowered beast in order to buy his own security.
And so, he locks Lucifer in Nick's body, Ma'lak box-like, and tries to out-bark and out-dominate him.
Horribly, Lucifer doesn't even appear that upset. Horribly, even when he's being humiliated, the demons under Crowley flock to Lucifer. (It's not fair!)
Lucifer even seems quietly amused, like he's waiting for his moment to strike, just as Cas behaved in season 6, quietly tolerating Crowley's goading because he was not actually threatened by him.
(Crowley is no Azazel or Dagon or Ramiel or even Asmodeus.)
And it's fatal. It goes badly. Crowley's gleeful crowing of brains-versus-brawn blows up in his face.
He escapes by the skin of his teeth, and goes running, tail tucked, to tell the Winchesters what he's wrought.
Sam and Dean are horrified, realizing that Jack, Kelly, and Cas are in danger, and so they speed towards them in hopes of warning them in time.
Crowley seems a little hysterical and fatalistic, deciding to back the Winchesters one last time, because, "life is meaningless," and "what's the point of it all."
Crowley lost everything for a job he hated, so he commits suicide, because he's tired and worn down.
He has become like Raphael, "we just want it to be over."
Crowley falls to nihilism.
And Rowena despairs. 💔💔💔
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(Text Attributions// Supernatural scripts here via @spnscripthunt. Transcripts are located here via SPNWiki. Visit their Tumblr to donate.)
#i really do love rowena and crowley#trying to write about their specific hangups more as it relates to power and safety and class#i find the most fascinating thing about them to be their bids for power and security and their continued failures against the ruling elite#and how they consistently bite off more than they can chew#tragic#spn + class#spn + class mobility#rowena + class#crowley + career#spn vs nihilism#fergus & rowena#crowley & rowena#macleods as eternal outsiders#i won't bring metatron into this one but know that i am also thinking of metatron and sam in relation to this topic - i always am
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Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About The Crow Road, But Couldn't Get Through it To Find Out
Co-written by dbacklot and cheeseplants
WARNING: SPOILERS EVERYWHERE!!
Overall Premise: Books are clearly important to Good Omens and Neil & team have left us Clues. In S2E2, the xray trivia highlights a list of books they would like the audience to read. But even more specifically, there are names of certain books on the back of the chairs in the theater in the opening credits. Those books are: The Tale of Two Cities, Pride & Prejudice, and The Crow Road - twice!
What might this mean? One theory is that the chairs represent the seasons. The body swap in S1 is similar to how Carton, in Tale of Two Cities, takes his doppleganger's place in jail, sacrificing his life so Darnay could go free and be with his family.
Pride & Prejudice is clearly referenced in S2, with Crowley's proposal as a sort of mirror to Darcy's first proposal. (There's probably a whole lot more to unpack there - and if you like Austen, here are some thoughts about Aziraphale's favorite book, Persuasion, and how it may relate to the characters.)
BACK to The Crow Road. The title is shown on two chairs in the opening sequence, suggesting that it is related to both S2 and S3. Furthermore, we see the book multiple times in the show and it's the book Muriel reads at the end. As an aside, Neil Gaiman and Iain Banks were very good friends. Iain Banks died over a decade ago, so it is also likely a bit of a tribute to his friend.
So let's dig in and see why perhaps Neil keeps holding this book up and shouting Clue!
Side note: The book is long and most of the action happens in the final third, which can make it a hard read for folks. There's also a lot of characters and it can be tricky to remember how they are all related. There is a family tree BUT it has spoilers.
The Name: The Crow Road is a phrase used by the grandmother to indicate someone has died, ie - he's gone the crow road.
The Plot: This is the story of Prentice growing up with his immediate and extended family in Scotland. His Uncle Rory disappears in his early childhood. Some family members choose to believe Rory is still alive. After a hook-up with his Uncle Rory's former girlfriend as a young adult, Prentice starts gathering journals and writings from his missing Uncle Rory, who was (for a few years) a successful writer and traveler. Prentice eventually learns that 1) another Uncle, Fergus, had murdered his own wife and covered it up as a car accident and 2) Rory had figured this out and confronted him. Fergus then murdered Rory, hid all the evidence, and hired an acquaintance (who also traveled) to send matchboxes from bars across the world to Prentice's father, Kenneth. Kenneth, believed - as Fergus intended - that these were messages from Rory, indicating he was still alive.
Stylistically, Prentice's childhood memories and fragments from Rory's journals are interspersed throughout the book, much like the minisodes are in S2. It can take the reader a while to figure out who is telling the story or where this information is coming from. It is also unclear how reliable Rory is as narrator - perhaps this also plays into S2.
What it Might Mean:
Fergus could represent the Metatron. He is very powerful, rich, and conservative; he lives in a castle (Heaven?) and wants authority. Fergus also murders two relatives and hides those murders; the murder of his wife may have been inspired by jealousy over her sleeping with another man, an event which may or may not have happened.
Fergus also sets up fake messages!! The matchbooks are red herrings to make it look like Rory is still alive. As the Metatron relays messages from God, I can't get over the possibilities here. We have seen God speaking directly as recently as Job, but are the other messages real?
I can't help but wonder if the matchbooks and their use as messages inspired Neil to use the matchbook in S2. The matchbook in S2, incidentally, connects to all three minisodes - the quote from Job, 41:19 (reversed 1941), and the matchbox is from the Resurrectionists pub. So the matchbook contains not only Gabriel’s memories but refers to Azi’s as well?
Much of the book is about this missing uncle. Is a character (or their memory) missing in S3? I have theories, but its too soon to tell.
There's also an interesting theme of Prentice collecting his Uncle Rory's writings and records, including sending some corrupted computer discs to an expert in America to try to restore them. Given the emphasis on records ("It contains information in a tuneful way") and journals in S2, not to mention this trivia nugget - my brain is itching that there's a connection there.
Faith & Beliefs: The book talks about Faith a lot. Prentice believes in God and his father Kenneth doesn’t. And Kenneth doesn’t just reject religion, he wants his children to reject religion too. Prentice on the other hand desperately wants something to believe in - especially after a friend's death in an accident. This leads to a huge fall out - they end up not talking over it.
"'I mean, what's the big argument? Can't you just agree to disagree?'
'No; we disagree about that,' I shook my head. 'Seriously; it doesnt' work that way; neither of us can leave it alone. There's almost nothing either of us can say that can't be taken the wrong way, with a bit of imagination. It's like being married.'" (Ch 7)
Kennth seemingly taunts God - he climbs a church during a lightning storm and is struck dead. His uncle Hamish (one of Kenneth’s brothers) also represents the extreme version of Faith and ends up running a sort of cult, at least until Kenneth’s death.
What it Might Mean: The thread they pull through a lot is about meaning, and whether you can have meaning in life without God. Prentice gains Faith because his friend died senselessly; he wonders how can you have a world be so cruel. There must be a reason for it (this is sort of Az coded), and he turns to God to create the meaning for him.
BUT Kenneth’s argument is that you don’t need Faith for the world to have meaning (or at least that is my reading). It is wonderful because it is inherently meaningless (this is very existentialist, but I do think that’s the point). That Faith doesn’t do that, and just means you are looking outwards without looking at what is right in front of you. Which again, could be a Crowley way of looking at it, or at least where he is headed. Life is good as life, and doesn’t need God to make it so.
Hamish represents someone putting so much meaning into Faith that they lose all sense of Joy, he becomes distant. (One of my favorite scenes is Hamish doing a jigsaw puzzle with the pieces upside down - and cutting the pieces with scissors if they don’t fit right!)
The Romantic Relationships: Prentice is infatuated with a cousin (second cousin?), Verity. She is described as beautiful, in white/light colors, pure, lives with Uncle Fergus in the castle. There are legends around her birth - she was conceived under a tree during a storm. She is unattainable and eventually ends up with Prentice's older brother.
Ash, on the other hand, is almost literally the girl next door and Prentice’s long-term best friend. Her family is poorer and maybe has some domestic violence issues. She's always there for Prentice - literally a shoulder to cry on, sharing a bottle of whiskey, helping him sober up after said whiskey. There's obvious romantic tension from Ash’s side but she never pushes him and instead guides him along. And the book ends with a romantic resolution that feels very much like the final fifteen - except with a happier ending.
“- and I still didn’t feel I could tell her how I felt about her because she was going away now, and how could I suddenly say I love you when I’d never said it to anybody in my life before? How could I say it now especially, the night before she was due to leave? It would look like I was trying to make her stay, or just get her into bed. It would probably wreck this one precious evening that we did have, and upset her, confuse her, even hurt her, and I didn’t want to do any of that.” (Ch 13)
They finally kiss and spend the night together, both confessing their love. Ash has to leave the next morning to pursue a career opportunity in New York; Prentice is sad that she goes but re-dedicating himself to his studies and working towards a relationship together.
What it Might Mean: To me, Verity is very Heaven-coded and Ash is very Hell-coded. A big part of Prentice's arc (Prentice may represent Azi here) is getting over his blind infatuation with Verity and realizing the value and love he has with Ash. However, they also need to be apart and grow a bit before they can be together.
Other thoughts? Connections? Would love to hear your theories!!
@cheeseplants
#good omens#good omens s2#good omens 2#good omens thoughts#final fifteen#good omens meta#the crow road
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Helloooooo again! Hope you are doing well! I have a request for some fics and I was wondering if you happen to know if there are any where Aziraphale and Crowley get married in Vegas after a drunk night (this is a very specific niche so if you can’t find any that is perfectly ok!) and it doesn’t even have to be in Vegas, just accidental marriage fics are cool too. Thank you!
Hi! Here are some drunken Las Vegas marriage fics...
to have and to hold, probably by seventhstar (G)
They have long, drawn out arguments about this, if they can even be termed arguments; onlookers inevitably describe their tone of voice as 'fond' and their mode of communication as 'bickering'. The wine is passed back and forth between them. Marriage, Aziraphale argues, is divine. It's about love. It's about making promises, and keeping them. It's about faith and hope and devotion.
Marriage, Crowley replies, is infernal. It gives two people who love each other endless opportunities to ruin it. It's about power and money and pain; it's caused more evil than it ever has good.
Or, the one where they get drunk married in Las Vegas.
Waking Up In Vegas by Supergeek21 (T)
Crowley and Aziraphale wake up hungover after a night out in Vegas.
Ouroboros by FriendOfLoki (T)
“We should get married!” Crowley blurts out. His face is burning the moment the words leave his mouth and enter into the night. He’s not quite sure how he got here.
Or, the story of how Aziraphale and Crowley drunkenly marry each other one night in Las Vegas.
Oops! by Mimsynims (E)
This must be a dream. A fantastic, soul-crushing dream. That’s the only explanation. Right?
“Aziraphale, did you hear me?”
Bugger. Not a dream. “Pardon, what was that?” Aziraphale reluctantly dragged his eyes from the simple yet perfect ring on his left hand. A ring that matched the one on Crowley’s left hand. His friend, Crowley.
Best friends Aziraphale and Crowley are on holiday in Las Vegas. After a getting a bit too drunk the night before, they wake up with wedding rings on their fingers. Sounds like it should be easily dealt with, or is it..?
Veni Vino Vegas (I Came, I Got Drunk, I Got Married) by A_N_D (T)
After a whirlwind drunken evening, author Az Fell came home from Rom-Con without his heirloom pinkie ring – but with a wedding license from a 24-hour Las Vegas chapel. Elsewhere, book fan Tony Crowley woke up with a hangover, vague memories, and a brand new ring he’s only seen in author photos.
Mutually attracted, mutually terrified the other one thinks it was all a regrettable mistake, they turn to their dear but anonymous online friend to vent and ask for advice.
…Maybe they should tell each other their screennames someday.
Waking Up Married by Caedmon (E)
"So you’re telling me that my options are either to convince this man I just met and drunkenly married to stay married to me for six months or lose two thirds of a billion pounds?”
“That’s exactly what I’m telling you,” Fergus said.
“Fucking shit,” Crowley spat.
He hung up the phone and stared at it for a moment before rubbing his eyes with his fists. Now his job would be twice as hard. He needed to talk Aziraphale into staying married for six months. Should he try begging or bribing? This was a huge ask, and Aziraphale would be well within his rights to tell Crowley to fuck off. But Crowley was prepared to offer him pretty much anything, up to half of the trust, if that’s what it took. He didn’t care.
But that was only part of his concern. Even if he got insanely lucky and Aziraphale agreed to stay legally married to him for the next six months, how the hell was he going to talk Aziraphale into dating him during that time? And was it foolish to even try?
One thing at a time, he decided. First, he needed to convince Aziraphale to stay legally married to him. Then he could set about wooing his husband. He hoped.
- Mod D
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i dont even know where to start that fergus list is hilarious. no cleopatra but absolutely yang gufei and tomoe so specifically being married isnt an issue. no nero because her vibes are so cursed that fergus can sense the potential trainwreck a mile away but tamamo is fine. astolfo is always included in the 'female looking' category so them being absent here means fergus would not fuck astolfo (especially since caenis is included here). a good chunk of women who would murder him without a second thought are there but perfectly nice charlotte corday is where he draws the line because she's the first in a long time to instill the fear of death in him. nitocris and sheba are fair game for animal ear girls but NO suzuka. he would fuck quetz and martha and astraea but not himiko meaning theres a certain degree of violent holy woman he would just not survive. regular medea and summer wu are included but no medea lily or regular wu and yet also helena is here so i GUESS he can just sense if someone is like mentally mature? which means he also specifically just does not like shuten. so many of these servants are incredible red flags for any sort of physical or romantic relationship but fergus mac roich would fucking die before he has any sort of lust for everyones friend sei shonagon
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Diesel Does It Some More
A thing I think is sort of overlooked about Diesel is that he is one of the few characters in the series who gets genuine development over the course of the show. Some characters get that over the course of two episodes, particularly if they are a one-off, but Diesel is the only one who got development slowly - so slowly - over the course of several seasons.
I have a longer, different post coming about his early history on Sodor so we're not gonna talk about Duck v. Diesel here. This post concerns what happens after the point at which we can assume Sir Topham Hatt finally gave in and bought Diesel outright, securing his place on the NWR's roster.
Effectively, what this means is Diesel is no longer in danger of being sent away, but it also means he has to invest more in his relationships with other engines because it's a small island.
He's not been well prepared for this on the Other Railway. Luckily he has tons of time to learn.
The first few seasons after his acquisition are rocky. Diesel needs to show he deserves his place on Sodor, but he usually tries to accomplish this by undermining other engines which is not conductive to getting the work done ("Fergus Breaks the Rules"). He's also still telling them that steam engines will be scrapped ("Thomas to the Rescue", "Squeak, Rattle and Roll"), which is obviously not true on Sodor but is often an effective way of achieving his first method. (It's also, I think, important to note that the punishment for the thing with Fergus was being sent to work at the smelter's, which is where 'Arry and Bert work, but that's an entire other post too. It set him back, let's just say.)
From here on out, though, Diesel is sometimes treated by the narrative neutrally rather than as a villain. In "Respect for Gordon" he's making fun of Gordon, but so is Emily so that's not really a comment on him so much (also he does this by facetiously wishing Gordon well which is an interesting and funny twist on that). He's the villain in "Emily and the Special Coaches" but it comes about that he's behaved this way because his accomplishment of shunting the most trucks in a day has been overlooked and he's acknowledged for it by the end of the episode.
In "Thomas and the Billboard", Diesel is actually the victim of circumstance (and his own reputation, let's be real). During a photoshoot for a billboard, Diesel is directed by the photographer to move forward and he accidentally obscures Thomas from the shot. Later, when Thomas sees the billboard, he assumes Diesel blocked him on purpose. Shit happens, the billboard has to be redone anyway, but this time, Thomas deliberately does not tell Diesel about the rescheduled shoot. Thomas keeps stalling the reshoot to keep Diesel from finding out about it, which in turn keeps all the other engines off their jobs as well. It later turns out the Diesel was doing the priority stuff they were all supposed to be doing and was now late to do his own jobs.
So to sum up, Diesel is the only one doing his fkn job today and Thomas is trying to fuck him over all unbeknownst. Fascinating! Thomas does apologize eventually and everyone gets to be on the billboard.
Then you got "Don't Go Back" where Diesel keeps goading Thomas into - more or less - friendly races that end up causing confusion and delay. The episode concludes with them setting out on another race so the takeaway isn't that Diesel was actually out to make trouble so much as just show he was better than Thomas.
These are all from the model series. I don't necessarily think there was any sort of organized effort to make Diesel more friendly here. One might even attribute this to the show seemingly forgetting who certain characters were. I'm pretty sure the show bible at this point specifically said he was a villain. Still, there's a cohesion to it and they're doing interesting things with the expectations. (Also, as an aside, Diesel being the only one doing his work also happened in "Diesel Does It Again" so that's not exactly out of character, hilariously enough.)
Diesel gets sidelined to cameos for a while as the show transitions to CGI, but he does have one notable outing in which he's desperate for the approval of children and commandeers a bunch of other engines' seemingly better freight to get it ("Diesel's Special Delivery"). This episode is sort of ??? but I do like the end where Diesel's boring utilitarian freight (slate to repair their school's roof) is actually what the children want. It's not a full treatise on steam/diesel relations, but most people probably think the Class 08 is boring compared to steam engines so if you're choosing to see this as a metaphor, then it's nice the functional freight got the appreciation in the end.
And this is where shit starts getting real interesting!
Day of the Diesels is... it's not a good movie. I won't lie and tell you that. But it does do very interesting things with the diesel vs. steam concept. It points out things that would happen on Sodor as a logical conclusion of dieselization on the mainland (things that look much more unfair than they are in a show that prefers to disregard that part of the lore) and I love how they re-conceptualized Diesel 10 from his Thomas and the Magic Railroad debut. That stuff deserves its own essay, but the important thing about Day of the Diesels today is that it's the first time we see a steam engine really giving Diesel the benefit of the doubt.
The engine in question is Percy and he's ideally suited to extend this olive branch. As far as steam engines go, he's got the least status among them. He pulls the mail train, but even the Pride of the Line is treated as beneath most of the other steam engines. He also lacks a pedigree. Granted, most of Hatt's early acquisitions have dubious claims to lineage but Percy's just a straight up mongrel with no discernible builder. And most exploitable, many the other steam engines don't treat Percy with much respect either. Even Thomas is blowing him off in the movie, which is what gives the diesels their opportunity.
It's no accident that the diesels choose Percy as the target for their appeal and it's no accident they enlist Diesel to reel him in. Diesel is convincing, persuasive, and knows the motions of sympathy even if he doesn't quite manage empathy.
Unfortunately, the second Percy arrives at the Dieselworks, they literally put Diesel on a shelf and Diesel 10 takes over.
But the point is, Percy is now an ally of diesel equity and he's got a sort of acquaintance with Diesel himself (aside from it undoubtedly being Percy's idea to strike rather than work with Diesel, who he'd only just met at that point). And it comes back around later.
In "Percy and the Calliope", Percy and Diesel are tasked with taking a busted-ass calliope to the smelter's, but Percy wants to see if it can be fixed. Diesel disparages the operation the whole time... but he does go along with every single thing that Percy wants to try too. Even after Percy insulted him by mistaking his squeaking axles for the Monster of Brendham six episodes earlier.
"Disappearing Diesels" is when the effort to actually develop him starts in earnest. Up to now, things have just been kind of moving along in a lazy and convenient sort of way. Diesel gets to approach the possibility of being cool as a matter of deus ex machina. This episode marks the first time they actually put a specific thing in that they reach back for later to show he's learned something.
In this episode, Diesel convinces all the other diesels to hide from Paxton. And Paxton, not being too bright, comes to the conclusion that all the diesels on Sodor have disappeared. He searches all over Sodor until he happens upon Diesel at the docks. Diesel runs from him but because he spends so fuel evading Paxton, he runs dry on the line. Paxton then shunts Diesel to the next station to get refueled which Diesel does not understand because this is surely not a thing that he would do.
"That's what friends are for," says Paxton.
That evening, Diesel takes the berth next to Paxton's and, though he cannot bring himself to say thank you, he does give him a pained little smile.
The next season, we've got "Wild Water Rescue", in which Diesel commandeers a job Percy was given because he thinks he's going to get his picture in the newspaper. He sends Percy to an abandoned quarry instead where Percy runs himself into a pond and puts out his firebox. Later, Diesel (after finding that the photo was only of Search and Rescue vehicles) goes to find Percy and tries to pull him out, only to flood his own generator too.
And as they are sitting there in that pond, Diesel makes a valiant effort to actually apologize to Percy. He can't quite get the word "Sorry" out of his mouth and he's interrupted by the entire Sodor Search and Rescue before he could manage it. Unlike the thank you he owed to Paxton in "Disappearing Diesels" though, he's actually making an effort here for Percy.
And Percy knows what's up. Percy knows what's good! The next day, he visits Diesel in the Dieselworks to thank him for trying to rescue him (even if Diesel tricked him in the first place) and to show him that he did get his photo in the paper.
Couple seasons later, there's "Springtime for Diesel" where he bumps Daisy so hard that her springs sprong. She has to go to the Dieselworks and it takes so long to get replacement springs in for her that rumors start circulating that she may have to be scrapped. Diesel feels terrible about this and goes to visit her. She pretends to be asleep though, which permits Diesel to actually say that he's sorry this time. With the words and everything!
He's then quick to excuse his behavior by saying that he's mean to other engines because they're mean to him and they blame him for everything, but that he likes Daisy and wishes he could make everything right again. He's resigned though that after this, she's probably not going to want to be his friend.
When Daisy does get her new springs, Diesel is the first to meet her on the tracks. She doesn't directly acknowledge his apology because I think she does get that's a big step for him and she doesn't want to call attention to it. She does tell him though that if he wants to be friends, he has to change his ways.
And he does!
...until literally the next episode where he's trying to start shit between her and Harvey, but Diesel is as Diesel does.
Finally - finally! - in "Sonny's Second Chance", Diesel comes full circle and takes responsibility for his mischief in order to save Sonny from being sent away.
In this episode, Sonny (a steam engine who arrived in the company of a pair of thieves) has been offered the chance to stay and work on Sodor, but only if he proves himself trustworthy and Useful. He finds however that though he tries to be helpful, his actions are interpreted in bad faith by other engines, leaving him ripe for exploitation by a certain engine who knows that song and dance by heart.
Diesel tricks Sonny into hauling his cars to the dump, but they're actually having fun together.
But Diesel fucks it up 'cause of course. On his next job, he brags to Percy that he tricked Sonny into pulling his fish cars, but Sonny overhears. He storms off to deliver the cars and Diesel, realizing he's fucked another friendship, chases after him, but gets switched onto a siding, derails, and almost falls into a Class 08-sized grave. Sonny (who has notably quick reflexes demonstrated both here and earlier when he bumped James out from under falling watermelons) is able to hook a tow chain on and pull Diesel away from the hole. He accidentally derails his own fish cars by backing up so fast, but he catches Diesel before he falls in.
And Diesel thanks him for it! No hesitation, no hemming and hawwing. And. AND! He also admits that he did not deserve to be rescued. Look at my boy! Look at him GO! And Sonny! Sonny tells him straight up, "No, probably not." Which, gangster. "Consider it a second chance." A second chance! For Diesel! No one's ever actually given him one of those before.
Then Sir Topham Hatt rolls up and - in form we've not seen Hatt Bullshit in for quite some time - looks upon this scene and focuses his attentions on clearly the most pressing and important thing: "What's going on here? And what are those fish doing on the tracks?"
Sonny takes responsibility for the fish, and Hatt is all "Well, you've had your chance. I did say you'd have to leave if-"
"No!" interrupts Diesel. And he begs Hatt not to send Sonny away. And admits that everything was his fault. And tells Hatt that Sonny saved him.
"Is this true?" Hatt asks in his blithe Hatt Bullshit way. And it is, so Hatt declares that Sonny can stay and word gets around that Sonny's a hero.
Then they cancelled the show so we never get to see him again!
I'm real fuckin' mad about it honestly because not only was Sonny's episode the culmination of a seasons' long character arc for Diesel, but Sonny is such a uniquely perfect character to give Diesel a proper friend, which I'd argue he never got. Paxton is too trusting, Percy has better options, Daisy obviously isn't going to be BFF's with this guy.
Sonny was so uniquely positioned to be a good friend for Diesel. He's new so he doesn't have existing relationships to interfere with or a long history of previous slights to overlook. He's already committed to giving Diesel a second chance at getting this friend thing right, but he's not forgiving or naive the way Percy and Paxton are. Sonny suffers from the same problems of reputation that Diesel does but is determined to overcome them, which Diesel has never had motivation or incentive to do before. They'd be good accountabili-buddies that way. And perhaps most importantly, Sonny is a steam engine so he'd be closing that old diesel vs. steam gap once and for all.
That Diesel actually fessed up to keep a steam engine on Sodor is something on its own. The implication is that Diesel has found something compelling and resonant about this guy that copping to his bullshit is preferable to Sonny being sent away. If you're keeping dieselization in the back of your mind, you perhaps know there's not many other places anymore for such an engine to go.
What a turnaround for the guy who first arrived on Sodor bragging about how revolutionary he was.
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Most people agree that John should move on with his life, let go of Jamie and find happiness in a real relationship. But there are some takes on this subject that really piss me off.
I’m sorry but “oh I know John will never love someone like/more than he loves Jamie, but I really wish he could find a great guy and have a nice relationship with him!!” is not the good argument that you think it is.
That’s not getting over Jamie, that’s settling for second best. Well, he can’t have Jamie, poor thing! So he will have to take someone else who he won’t love as much as he loves Jamie but at least he will have someone to cuddle with at night 🥺
Why can’t John actually get over Jamie?? Why should he settle for the second best? Worse, why should his partner accept being the second choice??
I damn well don’t want John loving someone else like he loves Jamie because that shit is completely unhealthy imo, but I know that’s not what people mean.
Jamie being the superior god-like man that everyone is in love with/is attracted to/wants to fuck is kinda ridiculous imho, but I understand the appeal that a character like that has for the audience of a romance book/show. But to put Jamie so high up in a pedestal and to think that John should be forever in love with him and not ever get over him because oh lord nothing is comparable to King-of-Men-Jamie is… a choice.
Listen. I know that’s on Diana. She is the one who wrote John like this. But I wish people would be more critical of Diana’s writing of him instead of swallowing that shit up like it’s chocolate. Everyone knows how problematic the books can be regarding certain topics, this is just another one of these things.
Instead of accepting that John won’t ever get over Jamie/won’t ever love someone as much as he loves Jamie, you should be asking yourself: why is that Diana writes him like this? Why does she insist in the stereotypical cliché of the gay man having unrequited feelings for his straight best friend? Why can’t John truly move on and stop having romantic feelings for Jamie? Why should Jamie be John’s greatest love?
Outlander is essentially a romance (idgaf about what DG says). Love of all types is a running theme: not only romantic love, but the love that exists within family and friendship. And yes, there’s a lot of platonic/friendship kind of love between J/J.
But romantic love specifically has a huge role in this story. We have straight couples left and right in this series: Claire and Jamie, Bree and Roger, Fergus and Marsali, Ian and Rachel, Dottie and Denzell, Hal and Minnie, Jenny and Ian, hell, even Brian and Ellen are getting a spin-off.
So I’m sorry but it’s really freaking weird that, in the middle of all this, people say that John (the character with his own book series and one of the main POV characters in the main series, mind you) won’t ever be able to love someone like he loves Jamie, or more than he loves Jamie. It’s really freaking weird that people say that John has to settle with second best — because that’s essentially what’s being said every time someone says that John won’t ever love someone like he loves Jamie but he should find someone else to be in a relationship with anyway.
All of that for what? Keep the cliché of the gay dude in love with his straight best friend and who never moves on? C’mon now. Don’t piss me off.
#it’s almost like some john fans don’t want to see him in a happy relationship at all#bc what’s up with this insistence on keeping john in love with jamie even in a relationship with someone else??#i need y’all to bffr#like this is not an attack on j/j shippers#mostly bc most of them actually want john to move on in canon lol#but i see ppl that don’t even ship j/j saying this which makes 0 sense to me#like if you actually want to see john moving on with his life then why you wanna keep him in love with jamie?#again i’m talking about canon#outlander#outlander meta#lord john grey#john grey#jamie fraser#james fraser#anti diana gabaldon#lgbtq+#lgbtq representation#lgbtq representation in media
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How Brave Does Character
Brave is my favourite Pixar film, and one of my favourite Disney films. A lot of the reason behind this is how impeccably the film does characters, by which I mean everyone in this film manages to be both a caricature and a very real person at the same time.
Let me explain.
SPOILERS AHEAD
So, let's start with the side characters. The terrible triplets are fun, but I'd like to focus on the clansmen.
These are so interesting. They are, of course, archetypes. They are the overbearing fathers who hate each other and their three sons, but these are remarkably realistic people. They aren't limited to specific actions, and they bring about the nuances in each other through acting as foils for each other.
And, yes, these nuances are used for comedy a ton of the time, but they aren't just that, they develop over time. Their competition between each other actively changes them.
Although, here's something fascinating. The sons show a completely different demeanor when not under the pressure of their parents. Young Macintosh (Right) relaxes and loses his uptight demeanor, Young MacGuffin (Middle) comes completely out of his shell, and Young Dingwall is, well he doesn't change too much, but he is noticeably more aware of his surroundings when not around his father.
The sons befriend each other and develop a rapport. They do this before anybody else in the entire story, proving that harmony between the clans and between individuals is possible.
Fergus and Elinor follow the same line of thinking, but they bring about different sides of each other through understanding. Both characters feel their freest when they are around each other. Elinor is more open to talking out her emotions around her husband, for example. And it is important to realise this, because when she gets turned into a bear, this dynamic gets shifted notably.
Finally, there is Merida, and her relationship with her mother. I keep bringing up these characters in contrast with each other because that is how character gets displayed. If a person is only in the same situation over and over again, you only see one facet of that character.
So, Merida is an aromantic character. This is important to understand because it is part of the driving conflict of the film. Merida has no interest in marriage or love, and her mother cannot accept that. The story explores the search for these characters to understand each other, and while it centres on Merida's confrontation with consequences and fate, Elinor coming to terms with her daughter's identity. Essentially, the story is derived from character conflict.
But these characters also reveal elements of each other through both their conflict and their teamwork. They reveal each other's inability to show accountable through their conflict (Merida insists everything is not her fault, and Elinor is pathologically incapable of directly answering a question), but they also show each other's adaptability and are catalysts for each other's growth.
Brave is a character drama first and foremost, so all conflict is driven by characters butting heads with each other. I say all conflict, and there is one character I am yet to mention.
"Last time I did this was for a prince. He demanded I give him the strength of ten men, and he gave me this for a spell. A spell that would change his fate."
Mor'du features what I like to call the Firelord Ozai school of character writing. He isn't a character, he's a force of nature, an evil thing to overcome. But he is a person, and everything about him can be inferred by the relationships he has. In this case, the thematic relationship between him and Merida. Both wanted to change their fate, both separated themselves from their families in a rage. Merida was able to reconnect with her mother, you can assume by Mor'du's ursine appearance that he was not able to do the same.
Even in the shot above, Mor'du the character is in shadow, because the nuances of his identity don't matter. The important part, and the part that the light highlights, is the axe. His actions are what's important, specifically the actions that mirror Merida's, and we can learn everything we need about him from that narrative symmetry.
At first glance, all the characters in Brave are archetypes. The rebellious teenager, the strict mother, etc. But it is through interactions with each other that these characters become people. And that is reflected in the theme of the film. It is only through each other, that you can express yourself freely and change for the better. Otherwise, you are floundering with the same choices, and you can never, ever, change your own fate.
I might put up another post soon about Brave's use of Scottish mythology and how that works with the theme of fate, so if you're interested in that, stick around.
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@kimberleyjean ok, you asked for this, its cursed and I'm sorry.
So first off I'm NOT going to try to explain what Supernatural is. Its a garbage fire, and I am unfortunate enough to be one of the feral, touch-starved gays to live in said garbage fire. Its the best show ever but all of its accidental, its the worst show ever in terms of anything that was done on purpose, etc etc. You're on tumblr you know the drill
Anyway, before GOs2's "Final Fifteen", the ONLY connections between GO and SPN were:
A demon in spn is named Crowley, in an homage to GO Crowley. They are alike, but they are NOT the same character and I don't think it can be argued that they're the same person in different forms (bc with demons that would be possible). They are however both Scottish, greasy and have a deep disrespect for authority. I do HAVE a theory/hc connecting the two Crowleys but that's another post for another day. Weirdly, SPN!Crowley (who I'm going to call Fergus from here on out, bc even though nobody in spn or the fandom calls him that, it is his canonical first name) has very little to do with anything I'm about to say. Just fyi, he exists.
Secondly, The Hillywood show did a Supernatural parody back in 2014-ish. I will link it below if you're curious, but again not much in this video is ACTUALLY RELEVANT to what I'm about to say (however, Fergus is there. He's the Scottish guy)
youtube
However, the specific arcs of Supernatural that SURROUND the season/topic this parody is centered on (Mark of Cain arc, ~s9-10) are where the coincidences get weird, and ok now I do have to talk about Supernatural a bit.
mmmfffff. Okay so the Metatron is a greasy, annoying, manipulative, power-hungry bastard who lies every time he speaks, wants full rule over Heaven and will control anyone and wreck anything he can to get there....
...and I'm talking about the version of the Metatron from Supernatural. LONG tldr, Dean (buzz cut, older brother, guy who's in love with an angel, the guy who says the news headlines in the Destiel meme) takes this thing/curse/whole other mess called the "Mark of Cain" to kill this kinda super-powerful arch-demon called Abaddon (more on her later), and blah blah blah Supernatural Happens For A Bit, and due to the Mark's curse making Dean act like a total psycho (and also, its implied, slowly turning him into a demon) they try to get help from the Metatron, who had been locked up after... well.
-when God was no longer contacting heaven, Metatron ran away from Heaven and hid on earth because he thought that the angels would use the Word of God (which the Metatron holds) "wrong" or something
-later, took advantage of strife & power vacuums in Heaven to manipulate Cas (angel, deeply autistic, the guy who says "I love you" in the destiel meme, in love with Dean) into doing a spell that CAUSED ALL OF THE ANGELS IN HEAVEN TO FALL, for no reason other than the Metatron is an actual pissbaby.
anyway, Metatron claims he can help Dean, that was a lie (shocking, I know), Metatron pulls some bs including basically stealing Cas' life-force (a second time. the first time was when he was ALREADY fucking w Cas as mentioned above) and runs off back to heaven... along with Gadreel, who he has manipulated/convinced to help him take power in Heaven.
who's Gadreel?
well. he's the angel who let the Serpent (or in this canon, just Lucifer) into the Garden of Eden, and he was cast into Hell to be tortured forever or something as punishment. However, after Metatron's earlier all-the-angels-falling scheme, Gadreel (for reasons I'm not too sure of tbh) took the name/identity of a VERY highly-regarded and powerful angel named Ezekiel, who died of his injuries during the fall
^this last part is a detail I try hard not to think about. this is because the names and roles are JUST similar enough to GO's Ineffable Husbands for the implications make me very, very sad.
Anyway, Gadreel had been around spn canon before, posing as Ezekiel, possessing Sam blah blah blah shit happened
Anyway this is a whole lot of words to say that the season/s of SPN that The Hillywood Show was parodying were the seasons where the Metatron was a main villain, and attempted/temporarily succeeded in taking power in Heaven BY MANIPULATING THE GUY WHO LET THE DEVIL INTO THE GARDEN OF EDEN
and then The Hillywood Show (who tbh I almost feel bad for lmao like BRUH) got signed to produce the parody/teaser/release date announcement for GOs2. Where the Metatron...
yeah.
yeahhhhhh
I would have LOVED to see the Hillywood Show team's live and immediate reaction to the Final Fifteen because I can't even imagine what must have been going through their heads.
ah yes. the FUCKING Metatron
oh also in spn, the Metatron (its complicated but basically)severely/fatally wounds Cas, and straight-up KILLS Dean, but Dean resurrects as a demon (for a few eps at least), meaning that Metatron DID technically try, and almost succeeded in, killing both members of an angel/demon gay couple, if only bc timing lined up so that Metatron was an antagonist in the arcs where Dean was turning into a demon.
so yeah
anyway I mentioned we'd get back to Abaddon so here's those major spoilers I mentioned. I'm fairly sure these are real spoilers and not theories, since my source is wikipedia
that's the whole article, there's not much else on her on wiki (though I should really do more research on Muriel). I think I heard Neil say somewhere that he created Muriel because "he wanted an angel character, from Heaven, who was 'just nice'" but idk if anything specific has ever been said about her name.
anyway that's why the Metatron gave Muriel that book "The Crow Road" in the Final 15, why he likes her so much, and why he's having her stay on earth
"The Crow Road" is a book about the nature of Death, and Metatron is, for lack of a better/less problematic word, grooming Muriel for the role of angel of Death in the apocalypse (Abaddon being a VERY prominent figure in revelations, for those who weren't aware)
...so on top of all the other Supernatural/Hillywood-Specific coincidences, sure, let's have Abaddon too.
uhhhhh
yeah
#I also found a canon-adjacent “Explanation” for the Coffee Theory if you're interested in that as well.#its not canon and its never gonna be canon but imho it explains it just believably enough to make for some VERY good fic/hc inspo#hint: its nothing to do with the almonds (afaik)#longpost#supernatural#YIKES#the metatron#gomens#good omens season 2#GOs2#final fifteen#hillywood show#Youtube
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thinking about Brave again (specifically how the movie begins and ends with Merida and Elinor playing together, as well as how when Merida has a flashback about the time she still has a good relationship with her mother, she goes all the way back to when she’s still a wee kid who gets to play with her wooden horse while being watched over by Elinor) and realizing that... holy shit, maybe Merida’s love language has been the act of play this entire time?
Act of play, like... something close to quality time, where there is an element of togetherness, but also not quite like it because it strictly revolves around the act of playing and all kinds of activities she views as fun OR letting her loved ones have their fun.
I think we can see this in practice through her interactions with her father and her brothers. With Fergus, she is allowed to do all sorts of things she finds exciting like archery, sword-fighting (which we can see in the Cutting Class short), falconry, and general goofing around. In all of these instances, she is shown to enjoy herself and her father’s company—which in turn bleeds into a sense of favoritism from Merida’s side; it’s clear throughout the movie that she gets along better with Fergus than with Elinor. In the triplets’ case, it’s the other way around: she’s the one who keeps them entertained by telling stories (which can be seen during the dinner scene) and lets them have their fun by not getting in the way of their pranks (despite it being hinted that they sometimes listen to her, making Merida the one with the ability to stop them if she only say the word—which in turn implies that she probably find some of those pranks funny as well). When Merida is particularly close with a family member, she is shown to either 1) do activities she perceives as fun with them, or 2) let them have fun in their own way.
Compare this to how Elinor treats Merida: how she ignores Merida’s tales of her latest excursion (the dinner scene), how she does not join Merida and Fergus during their outings (i.e: the falconry scene), and how she restricts Merida’s general freedom to relax and just have fun by always hounding on her about Princess etiquettes and manners. If we take into account this headcanon that Merida views the act of play as a love language, then Elinor is basically depriving Merida of the only way to connect with her mother emotionally.
(This is not to say that Elinor is an entirely bad parent. It’s clear that she does invest her time, care, and efforts into her daughter; an act that is motivated by both maternal love and political duties as a queen who has to educate her offspring into rulers. Not to mention the movie never shows her to be stingy with affectionate endearments toward Merida either. It just happens that Merida initially didn’t understand all of that as an act of love from her mother, and instead translates it as only Elinor being a controlling parent. This mother and daughter pair is just not speaking the same language.)
This is also probably why the river scene—where Merida and her mother caught fish together and played around for the first time in (probably) years—is what prompted Merida to make this expression:
It’s only after they genuinely had fun together that Merida has a fleeting thought to herself: that maybe this strained relationship she has with her mom is still salvageable after all. And what happened before this, again? What helped her come to this conclusion? Merida and her loved one, playing together!
#guess whos braveposting againnn#brave#pixar brave#disney brave#merida#queen elinor#headcanon#my analysis#rotbtd#?? idc i want this tagged that way
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Ace, what is some underrated whump in your opinion? Thank you for all of your gorgeous gifs!
Oh okay do you mean like specific whumpy scenes/shows I think are underrated or like tropes? I'm gonna answer both how about that lol. Also thank you!! i'm so glad you like them!
Okay so some tropes I love but I think are totally underrated are :
A good lip quiver when the whumpee is trying not to cry
The aftermath of a near drowning. So often a character nearly drowns and then they're fine. Where are my chest infections and secondary drownings and coughing and all that comes with inhaling a shit ton of water
checking a whumpees fever by placing the back of your hand against their forehead
historical whump!!! of any era!! But i'd love to see more of like post Industrial Revolution whump (so after like 1840)
plane crashes
being ostracized from a group can make for great emotional whump
royalty whump
whumpees who get aggressive during recovery
FAMILIAL OR PLATONIC WHUMP RELATIONSHIPS
incompetent caretakers. just caretakers who have no fucking clue what they're doing but you know they try
being impaled ut it's gone through and trapped the whumpeed to the wall or ground or something
sleepy!! sleepy whump is the best and so underrated
Riley Poole (National Treasure), Jack Carter (Eureka), Will Gorski (Sense8), Dwight Enys (Poldark), Mon El (Supergirl), Pete Lattimer (Warehouse 13), Fergus Fraser (Outlander), Jack Robinson (Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries), Michael Westen (Burn Notice), and August Booth (Once Upon a Time) are underrated whumpees. I am in desperate need for more whump fanfics of these characters.
As for tv shows: Eureka is highly underrated whump show. I wish more people watched this show. Not only is there great whump for a bunch of characters (Jack is always getting whumped tbh) but the potential and fic ideas are GREAT.
Forever is also a whumpy show that is severely underrated! I mean that dude literally dies nearly every episode. The whump is amazing and I need content even though this show has been over for ages now.
Legend of the Seeker is also highly underrated as a whumpy tv show. I miss it so much.
And can we talk about period dramas because they got some good whump too.
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i just wish to inform you that i am insane about tristan. as an avid cousland stan he compels me in ways i cannot fully put into words. does he have interests outside of the courtly duties he had to learn? like does he care for battle strategies and such?? what is his opinion on loghain??
yes he has a very well-rounded noble education, combat too!! despite knowing the kind of life he was intended for, they couldn’t blatantly leave him out without risking questions, they couldn’t risk him being the only heir left and untrained if anything happened to fergus, and also i suspect bryce has no idea how else to interact with a child. between that, his magical training, and his noble education, tristan barely had any time for interests of his own, and it’s almost lucky he’s a creature of boundless roaring unspent energy. he’s intelligent, chivalrous; though he’s not nearly as talkative after the events of the origin, he’s wry and charming and he should be well-spoken and well-read enough to hold his own when asked to speak on anything. i’m drawing on, like, chivalric archetypes, courtier ideals, and even, idk, regency novel style standards for the “accomplished lady”. he can charm, he can entertain guests, he can rule, he can fight, he can play music, he can cast judgement, he can write, he can settle land disputes, he can cast walking bomb, and hell, he can even dance
physically, these days, he doesn’t train as much as he did as a boy hoping he could convince his father of a few things, but he still maintains his fitness. a little more vanity in that than dedication to combat, though, lmao. it mayyy be more about looks nowadays than actual strength. also just about being a big wolf in a small cage who is so foundationally bored. the same way cousland’s mabari acts up in the castle because it’s a war dog playing nursemaid. you gotta pace along the bars of your enclosure sometimes, because eventually you run out of books to read and catastrophically bad ideas of who to sleep with. he has a high-ish con score for a mage that i would put down to the above
as for loghain, he was a hero of his as a child. i think a specific part of tristan’s background is being raised on glorified tales of the rebellion and idealising that, romanticising it, and coming to understand that he would never be permitted to achieve anything like the warlike standard that had been set up for him. (he has such bad luck with this. he used to be genuinely fond of arl howe because his visits meant news from outside highever and stories from the old days.) anyway, with loghain, tristan also likes the idea of a historically great “right hand man” somewhat in the shadow of his king’s greatness, because tristan believed he would always be effectively that to his teyrn father and brother. at ostagar he’s spitting mad at cailan, and only his respect for loghain has him following the plan. tristan’s not got quite the head for pitched battle strategy—that was one of the things he was explicitly not really trained for—but he’s educated in history, he’s as good as you’ll find in siege warfare, etc. similar to alistair, he has every good, knowledgeable, evidence-backed reason to trust in the ostagar strategy. afterwards, he can barely react to loghain’s actions. it’s something of a quiet final death knell for the person he used to be, the things he used to believe in, when he wakes up in flemeth’s hut. howe could be an anomaly; loghain can’t
but it’s worth saying that if tristan said what he wants to say to loghain about ostagar—that if he had any heart, any honour, he’d have stayed with cailan, died with cailan if necessary—he’s not really talking about loghain. or ostagar. survivor’s guilt is a bitch
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I love the recurrent fic theme that Adam and Fergus go do consultancy work for the Greens post 2016.
It's especially funny when Adam's doing it because the dude's gone clear across the political spectrum and like is it because he ultimately has no true political beliefs or did he get accidentally radicalised from five years of close working with the Conservative party
I also love it when they're specifically working for Rachel Fawcett because subtle crossovers are amazing
#the thick of it#adam kenyon/fergus williams#adam/fergus#toi#adam kenyon#fergus williams#thick of it
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I was asked what it would have been like if Andrew and Fergus had both survived. Actually I described this here, but for storytelling I preferred to stick to my specific plot-logic. It was such a defining point for this generation that they couldn't both survive. Also they are rather similar as fathers, with Andrew being Fergus' role model. Fergus could never have imagined grieving Andrew's reaction to Matt and would have been appalled if he had witnessed it (in fact he was). But of course Andrew wouldn't have been in such a dark place if he hadn't lost his son. With Andrew around, Fergus might have felt more like an older brother to Matt and followed his father's lead most of the time.
Much more interesting, from a storyteller's point of view is the rather explosive scenario in which both Andrew and Fiona's father survived. Both Fiona and AU-Fergus are optimistically convinced that their late fathers would soon have come to love their unusual grandson. Actually though, Mr Kennaugh would have been less than happy with his in-laws in the first place. He would have vetoed Matt being named after him and tried to fetch Fiona home after he was born. Andrew would have had ample opportunity to defend his son and grandson.
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I don't think Demo gets enough love, I'll submit him for inbox/headcanon trick or treating :)
He strikes me as an animal person!
Specifically cats and birds. I feel like he’d own a pair of bengal cat, names Fergus and Ada.
Ada is the black bengal and Fergus is the snow lynx one!
As for birds, I think he’d own a Hyacinth Macaw named Hagis.
#tf2#team fortress 2#tf2 demoman#tf2 headcanons#demoman headcanon#4oh4headcanonsnotfound#tf2 demo headcanons
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Test Run
Fandom: rotbtd | Characters: Merida, Rapunzel, Hiccup, Jack Frost
Prompt(s): Merida, Favorite AU
Word count: 1851 | Warnings: None | Read on AO3
Summary: While giving her new gear a test run, Merida nearly dies and winds up meeting several budding heroes. Some more impressive than others.
Author's Note: I wrote this for the third week's prompts of the 2023 Big Four Fest, which were Merida and Favorite AUs. My favorite au is a very specific one by lucidorange on tumblr, and it's based around the larger superhero au. Unfortunately, the creator of the au deleted their tumblr account a while back, so everything I know about the au is thanks to the wayback machine and reblogs of the comic. (You can find part 1 here)
I tried to give the triplets more unique personalities while still staying in line with the au versions. I hope you enjoy!
---
Merida DunBroch, daughter of the wildly successful owner and CEO of DunBroch Technologies, Fergus DunBroch, was doing her homework.
Or, that’s what she was supposed to be doing.
In reality, she was perched on a flat roof thirty stories up, the lights of the city shining like stars below her. It was beautiful, and the wind gently caressing her face only added to the serenity. Unfortunately, it was currently being ruined by multiple voices jabbering in her ear. Tuning back in, she found that they were still going on about features and safety and blah, blah, blah. Pretty much everything she didn’t care about.
“—and if you notice sparks, tell us immediately and drop the—”
“If you’re done yapping,” she interrupted, grip tightening on her bow, “I’m gonna take this gear for a spin now.”
“Be careful,” buzzed one of the three nearly identical voices in her ear. Her amazing sister-senses told her it was Hubert. “This is just a test run — we don’t know if there are any glitches with the suit or bow.”
A second voice — Hamish — piped up, “Not that there will be any, considering we made it.”
“Don’t encourage her,” Harris broke in.
Merida rose, a wolfish grin spreading across her face as she looked to the ground below. So, so far below. “When have I ever needed encouragement?”
Three matching groans reached her ears, but she barely heard them over the rush of wind as she stepped over the edge—
And started free-falling.
All she could hear was the roaring of air in her ears as it whipped strands of hair out of her ponytail and stole the breath from her lungs. Her gut was long gone, left behind on the rooftop. The city lights pulsed brighter, getting ever closer. To most this would be a nightmare. But to her…to her it was exhilarating.
Sadly, all good things must come to an end. Grasping an arrow from her quiver, she drew her bow, changing the setting to “Zipline” with a flick of her thumb. Ah, the beauty of having genius inventor brothers. Aiming for a nearby building, Merida fired.
And was promptly disappointed.
Yes, the arrow flew true, arching through the air with the precision only a master could give, but it did so without the intended zipline attached. Leaving Merida still falling to her doom.
Okay, so maybe she should have checked that feature before jumping off a building.
A lump of panic rose in her throat. “Uh, guys?”
“Don’t tell me you’ve already broken it,” came Harris’s response.
Oh, she was never going to live this down, was she? “I, uh. Might be about to die.”
There was silence on the other end. All at once, her brothers’ voices came pouring over each other in crackling mayhem.
“It hasn’t even been five minutes—”
“—You are so irresponsible—”
“—More inheritance for me!”
Gritting her teeth, she was about to cut through their chatter when something soft and golden wrapped itself around her waist and promptly yanked her to the side. She was no longer falling, but being swung like a pendulum. Grabbing at the fabric that led away from her waist into the dark of the night, she realized it wasn’t fabric at all. It was thousands of strands of golden hair.
What in the bloody hell…?
A moment later she was dropped — surprisingly gently — onto another roof, much lower than the one she had originally been on. The hair loosened and fell away, disappearing in a flash.
“I don’t know what happened,” said a voice from the shadows, “or what you’re going through, but killing yourself isn’t the answer.”
Merida sprung to her feet, narrowed eyes scanning her surroundings. It seemed to be the roof of an apartment building, with a box-like entrance to a stairwell in one corner. And yet, no sign of whoever had— wait, there! There, in the shadows of the entrance, was a girl, parts of her golden hair somehow still managing to gleam in the dark, giving away her position.
Her hair…
Calling it long would have been an understatement. “Long” gave the impression that the hair went down to her waist, maybe a little ways past. But the mass of yellow didn’t stop there. It went to her feet, and then continued off, spilling over the edge of the building like a waterfall of spun gold.
“Are you okay?” The girl asked again, her voice just as soft as her hair had been.
“‘m fine. And I wasn’t trying to kill myself.“
The girl stepped out of the shadows, confusion making furrows in her brow. They looked out of place, and Merida had the sudden urge to smooth them out. “Then what were you doing?”
“Testing out my gear.” She motioned to herself and the bow that was still in her hand.
The girl’s green eyes lit up with understanding. “Oh! You’re like me then!”
“Like you?”
“Yeah, you know. Superhero, vigilante, whatever you want to call it.” She flashed a grin, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “This is so cool! I’ve been working alone for so long — well, not really alone, I mean I’m technically working alongside the police but that’s nothing like having an actual partner — not that you’re going to be my partner, I didn’t mean to imply—”
“Whoa, slow your horses!” Everything was suddenly falling into place, from the freaky hair to the large purple crown perched on the girl’s head. “You’re Swift, aren’t you? The vigilante people are claiming is running around?”
The girl — Swift — nodded. “Yes, that’s me.”
“I thought you were an urban legend!”
“Nope, I’m real.” The smile on her face grew ever wider. “And so are you! Ohhh, this is so cool!”
Despite herself, Merida could feel one of her eyebrows raising. This was…not how she had expected her first meeting with a vigilante to go. Granted, she had never really thought about it before, but Swift had a strangely innocent demeanor about her. She wasn’t remotely hardened or threatening.
Three loud beeps sounded from Swift’s pocket. She withdrew what looked to be a burner phone and grimaced at whatever was displayed on the screen. “Sorry, I gotta go. There’s a fire downtown and a…dragon?” She squinted at the screen. “I think that’s a typo.”
Merida perked up. A fire and possibly also a dragon? That would be a perfect test run for the gear! Never mind the fact that her original test run had almost ended in her own demise. “Mind if I come with you?”
The look on Swift’s face could only be described as ecstatic. “Of course! But, uh…since you’re having some issues with your equipment, would you like me to carry you? It’ll be faster that way.”
Well, she certainly didn’t want to die or get left behind. “Sure.”
Golden hair came whipping up and around her waist, and a second later she was swinging through the air again. It took all her willpower to suppress a scream. From the way the city was whizzing past below, she had been right to agree to Swift’s offer. She would have been left in the dust long ago otherwise.
Soon the sound of sirens and the sight of orange light licking the night sky reached her senses. As well as…Snow?
A moment later the two of them were safe on the ground outside a burning apartment building, above which was a dark cloud. From the cloud fell a flurry of flakes, killing the fire slowly but surely.
Swift frowned. “That’s…weird. It’s the middle of September.”
Merida’s comm piece crackled to life. “So…are you still there?” Came Hamish’s voice. “I need to know if I won the bet or not.”
She rolled her eyes. “Yes, I’m here.” At Swift’s quizzical look, she gestured to her ear. “‘m talking to my brothers, sorry.”
“Dang it. Wait, are you with someone?”
“Just another hero I met. Turns out that vigilante, Swift, is real.” Merida followed said hero as she ran towards the entrance. “And now we’re gonna stop a—” she broke off at the sound of shattering glass.
The two girls skidded to a halt as a large black bundle landed in front of them. It was metallic, and as it slowly uncurled itself they realized what it was.
It was a metal dragon.
The craftsmanship was astounding. From the textured metal and leather to the glowing green lights that constituted eyes. There was an air of intelligence in them, making Merida second-guess whether it was really insentient or not.
The reason for its previous ball-like state became evident as well. Clutched between its paws — talons? — was a child. Covered in ash and smoke, Merida could barely make out where the kid’s dark skin ended and the gray smudges began.
“That’s the last of them!” Called a voice from above. A moment later a brown-haired teenage boy dressed in black and green landed a little ways away, not noticing the two heroines.
All at once, the fire went out. Instead of flickering flames, the building was now covered in layers of frost and ice.
Merida gawked at the now blue-tinted structure. Just how many super-powered people are running around in this city?!
Swift was helping the dragon move the poor girl to a safe spot for when the paramedics would arrive, acting as if this kind of thing happened every day. And hey, maybe it did. Before Merida could decide what to do to help, another boy landed next to the first, this one seeming to float down with effortless ease. His blue eyes were locked on her as he pulled down his hood, revealing a shock of white hair.
He grinned. “Hey, look at that! We’ve got an audience.”
The Brunet turned, finally noticing her. He flinched, shooting a glare at his companion. “Jack! You said we wouldn’t be noticed!”
“Actually, I said we wouldn’t get in the papers. Big difference.” He was in front of her in a flash, lifting off of the ground like a leaf on a breeze. “That’s some outfit you got there. Who are you?”
Merida pursed her lips. She certainly wasn’t giving this weirdo her name. If she was going to be a vigilante like Swift, she’d need an alias. “Atlas,” she finally answered. “And what are you two supposed to be? Dragon Boy and Frosty the Snowman?”
The brunet made a noise akin to a broken squeaky toy. Jack only smiled wider. “Close. The name’s Frost. And you can call my sidekick whatever you like.”
“I am not your sidekick!”
Merida sighed internally. These two yahoos were obviously just playing around — although the metal dragon was pretty impressive.
“Well, aren’t you Miss Popular,” Harris’s voice rang in her ear. “Just how many people have you met tonight?”
She had forgotten her comm was on during that whole exchange. Great. She turned away from Frost and his sidekick/partner/friend and whispered through clenched teeth, “Shush. I’ll tell you all about it when I get back. I promise.”
“You better. We’re already making popcorn.”
#frosted words#rotbtd#bigfourfest2023#superhero au#modern au#merida dunbroch#rapunzel#hiccup haddock#jack frost#fanfiction#ao3 link
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fergus would not fuck shuten not because he knows he would die or anything (he welcomes AND relishes the challenge) nor even that he would not enjoy it (it is shuten fucking douji she got that gorilla grip chokehold) but shuten specifically would rend his package asunder to keep for herself since she likes to both collect and eat things that interest her (and the meat that caused civil wars would do it) and fergus wants to prevent a second tain bo cualinge from happening if medb starts a civil war over who gets access to the irish salami
#he resists the temptations of the oni slam fest. for Us.#say thank you fergus#fgo#zerav meme#fergus mac roich
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