#the visceral physical reaction to this betrayal
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#hotdedit#house of the dragon#rhaenicent#rhaenyra targaryen#rhaenys targaryen#myedit#hotd spoilers#im depressed#the visceral physical reaction to this betrayal
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Note: This is unedited and I think I missed a section, I haven’t had the best week so this is what it ended up with. I might not do one of these for episode 11, even though I try to only focus on the episode at hand and not what I think may happen or any possibilities, because PromNont typically only have a few scenes I’m starting to fear I’ll have to do a lot of repeating if I do an overall analysis at the end (which is usually my style). I don’t know, we’ll see.
PromNont Episode 10
This episode once again has two promnont scenes and as usual the first scene informs the second. Both scenes are about revelation and both feature big emotional breakdowns from Nont - the first being rage and the second being anguish. Unfortunately, Nant is still in the mix of both scenes.
Rage is defined as violent, uncontrollable anger and if there is one word to describe what takes place in the opening sequence it would be that word. The timing for this reveal couldn’t be any worse. In the matter of minutes Nont has emotionally gone from thinking he was gonna have a peaceful night with Prom to discovering a secret that went against everything he thought about Prom to seeing the news about the discovery of his brother’s dead body. That bit about Prom is very important because the thing that filled their relationship with tension, Prom’s love for Nant, was the same thing that made Prom feel like a safe space when it came to the case. Who better to understand Nont’s upset, his drive, than the man in love with his brother. Though the two had a mutually beneficial relationship, Prom hadn’t let down his twin the way the Baddies had - because he was in love with him there was no way he’d have hurt him. Yet, this reveal says otherwise. The video he had seen and had such a visceral reaction to because he perceived it as violent even outside the aspect of murder, says otherwise.
I feel in the moment Nont tried to keep his rage about Nant. About how the betrayal from Prom was upon his brother, rather than focusing on how the lie was a betrayal to him. He tries to distance himself emotionally by not focusing on what Prom has done to him. On the surface I’d even say he succeeded.
When he confronts Prom it is to ask how he could hurt Nant when he was supposed to love him. When Nont has sought revenge for his brother it has always been about matching what was done to his twin - sacrificing parts of himself to meet the necessary violence required. So when he attacks Prom physically it of course is somewhat comparable to the Mask Dog video. However, I say he only succeeds on the surface because when he drags Prom across the room to see the evidence that he was the last person with his brother, he makes it clear he’s not interested in hearing explanations, he’s not interested in being rationalized out of his rage. The thing about Nont and this case is that the violence has always been negotiable, you tell him what you know about what happened to his brother and you can come out unharmed because the violence isn’t something he desires, it's used as a tool to get to the truth about his twin. But here in this moment the violence is non-negotiable, even as Prom is offering an explanation Nont doesn’t want it because he may be able to give an explanation for the clip, for Nant, but that would do nothing for the offense against Nont. So though he tries to keep the focus on Nant, his own emotion about Prom and the announcement of his brother's body snowballs everything and makes it worse. Every hit has a bout of frustration behind it and Prom is on the receiving end for all of it.
Anguish is defined as severe mental or physical pain or suffering and I think this is how I’d describe the second scene between Prom and Nont. This time the focus is on letting Nont’s emotionalism be at the surface rather than him trying to repress them to focus on what Nant suffered. No matter if consciously or subconsciously, Nont shows up at Playboyy because he hadn’t heard Prom’s explanation - there's no way he thought Playboyy was the best place to communicate with / to his dead brother, he's at Playboyy cause Prom is at Playboyy. The thing about Prom and Nont relationship conversations is there's always a lot exchanged but very little actually spoken - this sequence is no different.
Prom explains that he didn’t hurt Nant that the video was just roleplay but he doesn’t get a reaction until he confesses that he was there when Nant made the video faking his death. Prom claims that he feared telling Nont the truth about the mask because he didn't want to be misunderstood and Nont’s response is a beat silence before saying that instead Prom had rather made him the idiot for the longest while. The silence held as much communication as his rebuttal because this was a lie Prom stuck to for months, months of Nont confiding in Prom that he was uncomfortable with the things he was doing, the things he was learning about himself while on the path to finding the truth of his brother. Months of Nont being honest with Prom about everything, thinking they were of a like mind, and Prom telling him little to no truth. There in the silence is a mocking of all of Prom’s most audacious moments. Moments like giving him the gun to confront Nuth, though he knew he hadn't harmed his brother. Moments like consoling him over a brother he knew wasn’t dead. In each of their own ways, Prom and Nant made Nont and everyone else a part of a sadistic game.
And when Prom tried to apologize about not telling the truth about Nant’s disappearance because maybe Nont wouldn't have wasted time, Nont cuts him off with a concise, “Never Mind.” Nevermind because he's not interested in having THAT conversation. Maybe is such a weighted word because maybe Nont wouldn’t have wasted time. Maybe Non’t wouldn’t have subjected himself to some of the things he did to get answers. Maybe Nant could've been found alive. Maybe, maybe, maybe…Never mind because what's done is done and can’t be undone. Never mind because it doesn’t matter anyway, it can’t matter.
There's no elation after these explanations because no, Prom hadn’t hurt Nant, he’d hurt Nont. If anything he'd shown himself to be abundantly loyal to his brother even in the face of Nont breaking. Nant has always held position between them but Nont thought the bond had atleast been authentic but even that seems a waste in the face of Prom never having chosen him, never having thought of the affects on him. Everything hes done seems a waste, Prom has made a fool of him, and his brother is dead. I think he blames himself for that last bit because it was bad enough when he thought Nant wnt into hiding himself but to learn that he asked for assistance from Prom but never felt comfortable mentioning anything to him, his twin. Again its one of those things where everything is rolling into one because not only is he finding out how deeply Prom an Nant were working together in these choices but also having to question how his brother must’ve of thought of him or felt about him to not not tell him anything, to go into hiding instead of flying out to him. How he must seem as a sibling in the eyes of his twin.
Nont is exhausted, he's worn down and he’s decided he’s done. He’s already told the Baddies that he’s booked a flight home for next week and now he’s letting Prom know he’s finished. The case is closed. Or atleast it is until Prom stops Nont and tells him that he doesn’t want him to think he’s the bad guy. It is at this moment that Nont decides to carry out the case and see what led to his brother’s demise.
I say that not only because this bit of dialogue is the only thing that happens between him saying he’s done and Zouey finding him digging into the investigation again, but because this is consistent with them. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen Prom convince Nont to stay the course, Nont himself having thanked Prom for helping him maintain that goal. And while I don’t think that was Prom’s motive behind what he says, it is the only due course to make it happen. Nont may not truly think Prom has anything to do with killing his brother but with the evidence of him being the last known person to see Nant alive, with only his story to go off of, and with the list of lies between them the only way to really erase the possibility of Prom having harmed Nant and of being the bad guy is to solve the case and discover the full truth.
Even though he doesn’t turn back nor respond to Prom, the decision to continue is made right there at Playboyy. They haven't reconciled, there's so much shit between them, and yet he knows he's gonna do this for Prom, for Nant, and yes in part for himself. There's exhaustion in that cry, no one wants this to be over the way Nont does. There's heartbreak in that cry. While Prom is left with his choices, once again watching someone he cares about walk out with only the certainty that things have irrevocably changed.
Nont goes through 3 stages this episode. He starts off high energy and very active with rage. In the midsection however, he’s almost catatonic, it’s like he’s lost all will to fight. He’s broken and in anguish. In the end he’s revitalized, refocused and driven to find ish the goal of finding the truth about his brother once again. However, if the truth is gonna be something cathartic or push him further past his breaking point has yet to be seen.
While Nant faking his death and going into hiding has been on my theory list from the get go and Prom knowing Nont wasn't Nant has been set in stone for me ever since the wine episode - it wasn’t until the release of the teaser photos that I realized I hadn’t considered the possibility of Prom having helped Nant. The possibility didn’t really coincide with how I thought Nant viewed Prom which was more of an afterthought. If I had to assume anyone that he’d choose to help him in a bind I would’ve chosen Zouey who he was said to have a tight bond with and understood him the best originally. However, we don’t know how Nant felt about anyone truly because we’ve only ever gotten third party opinions of who he was and how he may have felt. Even if he did actually see Prom as an afterthought, who better to help you and carry your secret than the man who fancied himself in love with you, the man whose nose was so open he’d do anything for you? Prom…my poor idiot baby.
I wanna sum up his lesson as playing stupid games and winning silly prizes but I don’t think that would be fair or do it justice at all. There's something to be said about the way one chooses to treat others when they are not emotionally connected to them because while I can understand the desire to cling to Nont with the hopes that he’d find his brother and even somewhat of using him as a temporary replacement at first, there's always repercussions to devaluing someone - def if you later come to actually value them.
That's where Prom is now, standing in the muck of it having to face the consequences of his own actions. He understands that though which is why he doesn’t fight back in the first sequence and why he doesn’t make any big declarations in the second. Prom was never gonna be honest and tell Nont the truth even outside the aspect of loyalty to Nant. He tends to try to adapt to the other person and fit where they need / want him and then go with the flow, taking anything the other person is willing to give while allowing his mind to build a fantasy to make up for the rest. That’s what he’d done with Nant and he was no different when it came to trying to take up space in Nont’s life. Prom thinking their relationship was only to be temporary (even after coming to the realizations of his feelings being stronger for Nont) isn’t outlandish when Nont has always set the precedent for it to be so. When he’s always drawn lines and set boundaries. Of course he didn’t speak up even when he knew Nont was gonna get evidence from his father’s connections because selfishly he wanted to ride out the relationship for as long as he possibly could rather than be forthcoming and end it weeks, days, hours earlier. He was gonna take what he could while he could.
A lot of people question why Prom doesn’t seem to care that Nant is dead & question if theres still a possibility of him being the killer - as someone who has a secret murder theory for every character including Prom and even Nont, I get it considering he did start watching the news like he was waiting for a body and seems to lack big emotional expression. However, I do think there could be character traits and elements that could explain his emotional choices somewhat, including the fact that Prom has always been somewhat impassive. I’d question which character’s perspective could be used to witness him emote said grief - he doesn’t have much time with the other characters as he doesn’t even seem close to anyone outside of Nant/Nont. And emoting said grief to Nont likely seems inappropriate and a terrible idea for now considering he desires Nont romantically and his feelings for Nant has and still continues to be a tension between them. Again I also think its that one track mindedness Prom has when it comes to interest in someone. The same one track mindedness that had him devaluing Nont in place of continued loyalty to Nant is the same one track mindedness that allows him not to make his grief the focus when trying to explain himself to Nont. Similarly to the others, his grief is likely also mixed with a bit of guilt, as is the recurring theme of how the actions and inactions of those around Nant may have contributed to his death.
Afterthoughts: I’m not surprised where we leave off with Promnont this episode. In the dream sequence analysis, I’d already settled on the possibility of Prom having more than one secret to reveal and the possibility of it bringing on the separation point of their relationship. Up until that point they’d yet to experience a break in their relationship the way the other pairings had.
The question is how do they reconcile - I’m sure it’ll be quick because no one in this series stands strong they're all “my man, my man, my man" and forgive without much effort. Idk if I want Nont to make him work for it or if I just want some happy PromNont scenes since were close to the end. I still worry about them in the long run because the Nant thing has been consistent and while Prom chose Nont subconsciously during the dream that hasn’t happened on a conscious level and now with Nant ``gone” how would Nont ever come to feel Prom is wanting to move forward with him for any reason other than Nant no longer being an option.
As long as Nont has that flight booked imma be worried…I NEED my PromNont endgame. Nont need to cancel the ticket or Prom needs to buy one. Are there more surprises and twist - I can think of a possible few but I actually hope not because I just want some Promnont scenes. We know the least about these two (and Nant arguably since everything we know about him is through 3rd party opinion) and haven’t gotten much of who they would be as a pair outside of the stressors of the case.
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Round 1D - Bracket Six [Dimension 20 NPC of All Time]
Lord Calroy Cruller vs Baron from the Baronies
Propaganda under the cut (Contains major spoilers for A Crown of Candy)
Lord Calroy Cruller - He/him
Campaign: A Crown of Candy
Who is he?
Lord Calroy "Cal" Cruller is the Marquis of Muffinfield, and King Amethar's best friend and right hand. He is also officially recognized as the ruler of Candia for a time, after staging a coup against House Rocks, until they return to Castle Candy with allies to overthrow him again.
Why is he the NPC of All Time?
No npc leaves a lasting impression more than Calroy. From his physical design to his charming personality, wonderful inside jokes and intense plot twist he is an incredible, one of a kind character. No npc has such an epic backstabbing speech, nor such impressive pants. He charmed us all and his betrayal impacted not just King Amethar but the audience as well. His secret genius plan, his murder attempt against the king, his killer one liners. Nobody beats it. In the background from the very beginning, he is an essential part to a crown of candy and helped give us the most badass survival of any player. Amethar for sure should have died there, and yet he survived. Calroy MAKES a crown of candy. He elevates it to a truly glorious game-of-thrones-but-better story full of the perfect traitorous secrets and blindsides the show needed. Nobody can beat that.
Baron from the Baronies - They/them, it/its and he/him
Campaign: Fantasy High Sophmore Year
Who is it?
Baron is a nightmare entity that resides in an unknown mirror dimension. It was created from Riz's lies, perpetuated by the curse of the Coin, when he pretends to be dating someone from The Baronies named Baron.
Why are they the NPC of All Time?
He’s genuinely frightening, and is so very fun to quote and imitate. Yeah, out of the gate, he’s a creepy little guy, but then it turns out he represents the fear of being alone and being left behind by your friends?? Terrifying, gut wrenching, incredible. You don’t often see such a visceral reaction from the intrepid heroes to an npc but Baron really aced that.
Most frightening NPC. Little Victorian mannequin creature who picks apart your deepest fears. I love him.
That little skeleton boy lives in everyone's head rent-free. Who wouldn't want Roëmænce Partnær living in their head rent free.
He's creepy, he's the manifestation of Roz's aroace fears, what more could you ask for? Truly an iconic scene
#dimension 20#dimension 20 bracket#dimension20npcofalltime#dimension 20 tournament#d20#fantasy high#fantasy high sophomore year#a crown of candy#acoc spoilers#acoc
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FIC REC WEEK 16 – DARK FIC
AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT: Kiyaar
It's incredible just how much suffering Kiyaar can pack into a single fic. Their writing is so raw and visceral that it almost evokes a physical reaction in me, it pulls me in every time. Whenever I need my fix of whump and heartbreak, I head straight to their AO3, because their fics are amazing.
Here's some of their work that I think you should check out:
Take My Body Home
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: E
Words: 11,444
Tags: Rape, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Superior Iron Man
Summary: After the events of Superior Iron Man, Tony sells Extremis to the highest bidder and finds himself living as an expatriate in Russia.
Steve's never been good at letting go.
Reasons why I love it:
Oh my fucking god, that ending?? My heart is crushed, holy shit. So many lines get crossed, there's so much agony, not just physical but emotional, and it kept my eyes glued to my screen the entire time. This fic HURTS, and if you can handle it, I highly recommend it!
5, 4, 3, 2, 1
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: M
Words: 2,410
Tags: Major Character Death, Survivor's Guilt, Body Horror
Summary: In another world, on another Earth, the Superhuman Civil War has a darker, bloodier end.
Reasons why I love it:
I've always been fascinated by the Civil Warrior, and this take on his story just breaks my heart. That scene after he first uses the reality gem - chills. I love those last few paragraphs more than I can say. This fic is amazing, and I hope you check it out for yourself!
Rusted Wheel, or How the Civil War Might Have Ended
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: T
Words: 3,183
Tags: Major Character Death, Canon Divergence, Civil War
Summary: Tony was on the steps of the Courthouse and took the bullets for Steve.
Reasons why I love it:
Urgh, I cry. As if the Courthouse Steps weren't already angsty enough, this just wrecked me all over again. I always love role reversal what ifs, and this one is really good. Grab some tissues and give this one a go, it's amazing!
Our Love Is a Ghost That the Others Can't See
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: M
Words: 11,726
Tags: Extremis, Depression, Hallucinations
Summary: Post-Civil War, canon-divergent from Director of SHIELD.
In Tony’s dreams, he is back in the street, in a crater, the city on fire around him. Steve kneels over him and beats him to within an inch of his life.
It’s his favorite place to be, these days.
Reasons why I love it:
Jesus Christ, this fic is P-A-I-N-F-U-L. If you like to suffer, this is definitely the one for you. I loved every second of it - the Tony whump, his hallucinations, that ending - it's all brilliant. If you can handle some graphic violence and heart-shattering angst, then definitely give this one a shot!
Accretion
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: E
Words: 8,840
Tags: Rape, Torture, Captivity
Summary: No one is coming, he thinks. Tony is busy, and even if he wasn't - Steve has been discarded. He never ranked first, did he. He doesn't know what he was to Tony beyond convenient. Tony is out there dealing with this, somewhere, on the edge of his own mountain, using one of his wondrous and terrible inventions, shaving off another piece of his soul.
He wonders how many incursions this is. If Tony lies to himself to get through the day. If he loses sleep at night about it.
No, he decides.
Reasons why I love it:
Pain. I am in pain. This fic perfectly encapsulates all the complexities of Steve and Tony's relationship, all the betrayal and hurt hanging over their heads. Everything about this fic just breaks my heart in the best possible way. Definitely give this one a read, it's amazing!
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Top 5 episodes of TXF that you dislike
Thanks for asking @scullys-scalpel! I had to go through the episode list to remind myself of the ones I didn't like, and there were more than I was aware of (looking at you seasons 9 and 11...). BUT I was asked for my top 5 dislikes, so I went with the ones I have a visceral negative reaction to.
1. #Gender Bender (#s1e14)
I first watched this episode when I very, very young (like we're talking 10 years old) and I just thought it was so fucked up on so many levels LOL. Not only did the whole sex-pheromone/handing touching thing weird me out but I was also very unsettled by Scully throwing up after escaping Brother Andrew's seduction (I mean, I get it). I have a weird phobia around vomiting and combined with this ep's weirdness my anxiety was ratcheted up, so it's not one that I have revisited.
2. #The Gift (#s8e11)
Which brings me to this ep lol. I just can't. I could barely get through the first airing and haven't watched it since.
3. #Firewalker (#s2e09)
I am putting this ep on my list because of how much it terrified me as a kid. I was about 11 years old when it aired and it gave me such nightmares LOL. I had built it up so much in my mind that I avoided it in syndication and hadn't watched it since its first airing. That is, until I was showing the series to my husband and he made me watch it. Now, as an adult, it is much-less scary than I remembered but I nevertheless still turned my head when the spores burst through people's necks. The scene that absolutely terrifies me (still to this day) is when Scully finds an infected Jesse who is making those inhuman gasping sounds. It's a shame that this episode resides in my fear-centre as I completely missed the fact that Bradley Whitford played Trepkos until this most recent viewing.
4. #Roadrunners (#s8e04)
The saving grace of this episode is, of course, Gillan's acting but that's really about it. I remember thinking "what the hell did I just watch?" after it aired. The concept is just so bizarre and I thought it was ill-timed what with Scully's pregnancy. I'm sure that the writers thought that it only enhanced the urgency of the storyline by putting her and her unborn child's life in peril, but after having just come off the nail-biting season premiere, I thought it was too much, too soon to put Scully through that trauma. Not to mention that such physical trauma would likely put her pregnancy in serious jeopardy. It was just such an ill-conceived episode.
5. #En Ami (#s7e15)
I immediately disliked this episode from the first time it aired as it raised very serious questions about Scully's consent and bodily autonomy, that weren't really dealt with (until that infamous, completely inappropriate, retcon job in season 11, which was such a cop-out IMO). I was well into highschool when this aired and even then I remember being so disturbed by the implications that Scully was drugged and later undressed (and god knows what else) by CSM while she was unconscious. Not only that, but I thought the whole 'adventure' was completely out of character for her and such a slap in the face to Mulder. Sure, he's ditched her countless times before without rhyme or reason, but what she did was beyond the pale: no matter her so-called 'for humanity' motivation, she went off with the ONE PERSON who has SINGLE-HANDEDLY orchestrated so much destruction in Mulder's life. Obviously this created some very serious tension between them (that, I have to admit, is handled so deliciously in fanfic), but I found it jarring that there could be this level of betrayal in one episode (so shortly after Mulder lost his mother and put the mystery of his sister to rest) and a (presumed) consummation of their relationship a mere two episodes later. It just doesn't compute for me. I understand that the impetus for this episode was Bill Davis wanting an opportunity to work more with Gillian, and kudos to that I guess, but the storyline and its implications are so problematic that I just can't respect it.
And there you have it! My top 5 most disliked X Files episodes. Thanks for reading :-)
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I was thinking earlier about Richey’s interest in Yukio Mishima and also just the general venn diagram of queer/mentally ill/leftist/artist types who share an interest in Mishima despite his political leanings which while not outright blatant are still present in his books.
And I think a major theme in all of Mishima’s works is the experience of having intense, unwanted or uncomfortable feelings or thoughts that create a feeling of vulnerability/weakness/otherness and learning to or forcing oneself to control them.
Part of the interest in Mishima of course is the poetic beauty of his writing style and the way he turns the mundane into something very lovely, but I think that desire to control discomfort is a really big part of the interest in his works.
Another theme that arises is the cutting down or betrayal of figures of admiration. The realization that someone or something you look up to or admire or idealize isn’t what you thought they were, is flawed, is disappointing, etc. But instead of moving on, so often the reaction of the character is the desire to do something about it, to destroy the flawed thing or to deface it further or to expose its flaws to others or whatever. And that seems powerful too, the realization that the world isn’t always satisfactory and the acknowledgement that there is a desire to react to that betrayal.
But I think of the themes in JFPL especially (like the lyrics to All Is Vanity) and other thoughts or lyrics by Richey remind me so much of that desire for control over unwanted thoughts or uncomfortable feelings. Not to mention the acknowledgement of beauty in the visceral as well as conventional beauty as something that can have a negative rather than positive effect. It all reminds me of the ways in which Richey seemed to view self-control and view physical beauty and view personal strength in a more philosophical and/or aesthetic way.
#squash rambles#anyway these thoughts came out of nowhere and this is very rambly#i would love to know if richey read genet
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What hurt will Elaine never forgive? How old (and how minor or major) is this hurt? How much does it affect her life?
There's a lot of hurt that Elaine has been through. Physically, mentally, and emotionally, she has absolutely been through the ringer. Though I could talk about a lot of things, such as never forgiving herself for killing someone or never forgiving the Mageseekers... There's one betrayal that comes to mind the most.
Her parents.
Her mother and father are Demacian, and yes they are still alive and well. What they did to their oldest daughter has not affected them negatively at all. Her existence did affect them socially, though, since magic clearly runs in their family, right?
Still- They're the ones who turned the mage in. No one else knew about the incident. They didn't even know anything had happened until they checked on their children outside and found them both shellshock-terrified.
When her mother asked her what was wrong, Elaine's reaction was visceral. Imagine a heavily traumatized five year old trying to explain that she had just aged someone to dust with magic while not knowing anything about death, magic, or anything else about the situation.
A kid trusts their parents to confide in, right? Especially after something so scary.
But of course, her childish trust was misplaced. Her parents also hated mages and magic for no other reason than that was how they had been raised. Couldn't have a mage in the family, so they took her to the Mageseekers themselves. Elaine only survived her imprisonment because she was docile and though they put that necklace on her like a collar, they couldn't bring themselves to kill a crying child. At least, not the ones that were put in charge of her.
So she grew up in a very unkind place, made sick by the necklace and listening to what happened to other mages that tried to fight back.
She has never and will never forgive her parents for this. It affected her severely in that she either cannot trust easily or, in the case that someone readily shows her kindness, she gets attached very quickly. It's also what led her to not have a whole lot of self-preservation or self-esteem, as she was regularly told that her life was a mistake. She regularly feels unlovable and, until Lee Sin in her Collared Kindness verse, she never really understood what it was to feel any amount of being loved.
For being as kind as she is, Elaine is heavily traumatized and very, very emotionally damaged. A lot of her kindness comes from not wanting others to hurt like she does.
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i am sitting in the park. my eyes are closed, the sound of murmuring crowds and chirping birds overtake my waking mind. i am imagining the hills from my dream.
but upon this canvas, i am also thinking about my lifelong inferiority complex, & how it has not only sabotaged my relationships in the past, but almost certainly wounded me in ways that are now perhaps beyond reconcile. i am thinking about... my love being built on chasing that which i feel i am inferior to. i am thinking about... all the times i have desperately tried to mold myself into the shape of someone else in an attempt to reach what i perceived to be their ease of beauty. i am thinking about... age 9, being constantly compared negatively by my parents to my cousins, who were athletic & thin. i am thinking about... age 10, where i for the first time received the visceral fear - heavy suspicion - that everyone around me found me totally physically and mentally repulsive. i am thinking about... being thrown into a ditch by the other kids at age 11.
for a moment... i close my eyes(well, tighten more heavily their already closed nature, anyway), & imagine hurting those who i feel, in my darkest moments, are superior to me in almost every way. & for a brief moment, it brings me a sense of peace. but the peace quickly & violently corrodes into a sense of panic & grief. all at once i am completely distraught & bereaved by my own capacity for flippant cruelty, i feel almost as if i actually killed them, considering viscerally about how i love them & how they love me & how much of a betrayal this had all been. i am almost brought to tears. i have to get up & shove my way through the crowd in order to descend down to the (artificial) riverbank & be totally alone with only my own sniffling. it felt like attending a funeral for my own self, down there. profound dolour & remorse, that i can't quite explain.
but, i don't think that the situation is really that simple. i don't think that one should take the above situation as a sign that there exists some latent psychopathic murderous intent in me that's struggling at all times to be released. & i don't think it really corresponds to a degree of violent cruelty that i wish to inflict upon the people i care about, no...
because i don't think i was actually imagining killing them, the people themselves who i felt totally inferior to in some perverse fashion - i feel that i was imagining killing the emotions that i inspired again & again within myself, the inferiority, the second-guessing, the contortion, the cruelty, reflected through the mirror of their most obvious manifestation. i sincerely believe i would rather kill myself than consciously inflict harm on another person.
& in a sense... i feel that i wasn't even actively thinking about it. my mind conjured the thought completely independently of my own volition - & did so deliberately, almost as if to spite me, to attempt to have the thoughts erroneously show up in my body language or sour my mood. to attempt to convince me, subjectively, that i am having these thoughts sincerely rather than by its own imposed prescription. i feel that my completely dispossessed reaction really reflects the reality of the situation...
i've really been growing concerned over it. i think it makes me feel like a horrible person, because i can't bear the thought of housing that type of hate within myself... i don't want to think about that - i don't want to even entertain the thought that it's possible.
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Why Stanford Pines from Gravity Falls is Autistic, and Why It Matters
Here’s a meta I consider long overdue; the title says it all. I’ve analyzed Ford and why he resonates with me for over three years and casually lived in his head close to that magic number, six, but I’ve never addressed this fundamental reason. I’m not the only one who reads Ford as autistic, so I figured we deserve a lengthy manifesto. Now more than ever, we need stories of unconditional acceptance instead of voyeuristic awareness; April is the cruelest month.
Normally this is where I’d disclaim I’m no medical professional, but I don’t feel like enforcing normalcy. Autistic people are foremost experts on our own experience, and we don’t need analyses this extensive for permission to see ourselves in fictional characters. This analysis is also not concerned with authorial intent; in fiction as in reality, we’re here whether you want us or not.
I’ve divided this meta between various criteria Ford meets. Overly long post incoming, press j to pay respects.
Motor control issues
Let’s start tenuously before getting into weightier evidence - why suggest that a character who runs and jumps well into his sixties may have motor control issues? Because they can improve with practice, and Ford is markedly unathletic early in life. He’s introduced stumbling from trying to un-board the cave and insisting “I can keep up!” (dogear that). Factor in his D- in gym and the way he reads during boxing lessons intended to protect both boys from bullies, and it seems that Ford only became physically adept when forced to fend for himself without Stan.
Eye contact
Ford frequently averts eye contact during tense moments, which admittedly could indicate typical fraught emotions as much as a breakdown of performance. His deathglare toward Stan and intense gaze talking to Dipper could more strongly indicate that he makes eye contact consciously and counterintuitively, because he sees it as an assertion of power (hence his discomfort under Bill’s gaze). Ford’s shifty eyes post-betrayal, signature surprised owlface, thousand-yard stare thinking of “the dark weird road [he travels]”, and unchanging expression as he hugs Fiddleford and doesn’t register Stan are additional animation tics implying he breaks eye contact easily.
Physical contact
Ford seems to have a complicated relationship with touch like many autistic people. He easily startles at Stan unexpectedly touching his shoulder (as kids, first reunion) or grabbing him (Fearamid fight, end credits). Touch aversion may explain his visceral reaction to Bill violating his personal space with mock affection.
Ford appears more comfortable initiating than receiving touch, especially arms’-length nudges and shoulder touches; the kids’ surprise at his adorable tackle-hug suggests it’s uncharacteristic. He also expects a handshake when Fiddleford goes in for a hug, misreading his body language and cue to “come here.”
Stimming
The animation emphasizes Ford’s hands in all their six-fingered glory, giving him unique repetitive mannerisms that can be interpreted as stimming. These include rapping his fingers nervously over the journal (“The Last Mabelcorn”), rolling the DD&MD die, twirling his gun, and wiggling his fingers (narrating DD&MD, taunting Bill).
Pressure stimming could explain why Ford wears heavy clothes throughout his life. This comes to represent his guardedness, as he wears the fewest layers while content with Stan and Gravity Falls and the most while trusting no one, but it may have literally resulted from PTSD compounding his stimming so that he only feels safe weighted down. In the end he keeps the sweater, unburdened but still holding to that feeling of security. Likewise, Ford’s pattern of puffing his chest (especially in danger) may be a pressure stim to anchor himself, holding back the fear and weightlessness he feels inside.
Comfort objects
Ford has saved his coat and childhood photo of himself and Stan for over 30 years, suggesting a grounding attachment to them. He clearly shows a more-than-professional attachment to his journals, embracing his hands -his identity- through them even literally as he sleeps holding one to his heart (just as Bill starts toying with it). Writing in the journals is Ford’s coping mechanism when “I’m not sure I am who I am” and “I JUST DON’T KNOW ANYMORE”. That panicked “you don’t understand!” is putting it lightly.
Sensory issues
Ford has a pattern of shielding his ears in stressful situations: Bill whispering in his mind, his pre-fight argument with Stan, his nightmares, and his confrontation with Dipper. (“Everyone, plug your ears!” he demonstrates despite knowing the memory gun won’t affect him.) In addition to blocking noise under stress, his hands apparently ground him by clutching his coat, journal, and (during Stan’s amnesia) his neck and wrists stigmatized by the chains.
Contrast Ford fnord playing Bavarian Fire Drill with the agents and his dumbfounded response to the kids crowding him, and it’s clear he gets overwhelmed under pressure; Stan may have steered attention away from him for Ford’s comfort as much as his own. At the kids’ birthday we see that Ford has practice slipping out of crowds, literally relying on Stan for support when all eyes are on him.
Conversely, Ford shares many autistic people’s unusual tolerances or otherwise has difficulty communicating discomfort. Based on “cycloptopus roll” in the journal, Ford has no problem eating something Stan says “smells like if death could barf”. He tolerates heat when shaving with fire and wearing heavy clothes all the time (possibly to prevent sensory overload, as it’s always the same sweater unlike Mabel). Ford also shows only momentary discomfort being shot, knocked unconscious, crushed under rubble, chained, and electrocuted, which... same? “Stop thinking” and “focus on your intellect and control your fear” are exactly the self-regulation measures we develop to tolerate sensory overload.
Executive dysfunction
Autistic people often experience executive dysfunction due to our singlemindedness toward goals, which Ford exhibits in spades. He jumps into major decisions (sending Stan away both times, apprenticeship, quantum destabilizer) without thinking of setbacks or long-term consequences and resists changing plans (frustration at research roadblocks, inability to adjust opinions of Stan). His aggrieved “we just need to lay low and think of a plan” reflects a conscious difficulty with planning that negates his mental health.
Ford evidently subordinates his needs in pursuing goals, his rooms a mess in 1982 and 2012 as he wears out and sleeps in clothes desperately projecting his academic identity. Lighting his face on fire because “it's much faster than shaving” resembles flawed shortcuts we use to maintain hygiene against executive dysfunction.
Meltdowns
Ford’s paranoid breakdown shows signs of involving meltdowns. In addition to his defensive body language, when Stan applies pressure Ford suddenly loses all patience, filter, and ability to articulate what “you don’t understand” (his suffering, what the journal means to him). Meltdowns stem from pain, and he’s “up against [and has] been through” more than enough.
I’ve seen Ford’s confrontation of Dipper interpreted as a panic attack before, and I think it can also read as a meltdown. First we see Ford’s spiraling mile-a-minute thoughts (while asleep), then he’s urgently demanding the rift and yelling defensively (“I was gonna say please, kid!”) -exactly how it feels when the walls close in and our words fall away. In appealing to Dipper’s rationality, Ford talks them both down.
Ford has also hurt himself under stress, punching the blackboard and his head (while cursing his metal plate in the finale).
Difficulty reading social cues
“I haven't been in this dimension for a really long time” = Ford’s A+ excuse for not knowing if it’s “still” normal for kids to say “greetings” or have weapons, when ironically it never was. He also thinks mind control can be used “responsibly”, presumably with consent as Bill normalized to him before.
For all of Ford’s insecurities about how people perceive him, he’s often oblivious to it. He doesn’t register Dipper’s unease at him shaving with fire, being unsure the aliens are dead, or jumping with the magnet gun. He brushes off Stan saying “he’s lost his mind”, then meets his demands for thanks with a blunt “what?” -for once more confused than angry. Based on his awkward laughter before a girl throws punch on him at prom, it seems Ford’s lack of social skills contributed to his difficulty making friends growing up.
Empathy
Autistic people often experience unusually high or low empathy, even fluctuating between both; Ford evidently lacks and/or suppresses empathy in his fight with Stan, the person closest to him. Without intending harm he jumps to conclusions and won’t hear Stan’s side, thinks tactlessly appealing to their sailing dream or giving Stan until the end of the summer will incentivize him leaving, and does not realize Stan is homeless until called on it. Ford often displays the autistic tendency to speak without a filter - he’s right that codependency stifles individuality, but calling it “suffocating”? Blunt as a left-hook. Perhaps Bill ensnared him promising a relationship of shared interests where he’d sooner decode ciphers than emotions.
There’s a case for Ford being hyperempathetic with difficulty expressing it. He makes half-steps toward reconciliation that only anger Stan more: offering to share his fun with DD&MD, fixing the lightbulb, giving Dipper the mind control tie to help Stan win the election. One standout response is his sincere laughter at Stan’s “my brain isn’t good for anything”: he knows the feeling, but it sounds absurd coming from a socially adept person he values, so he affirms Stan’s worth by intuitively treating this statement like the joke it is.
Whether sympathy or empathy, Ford’s care for others shines through his concerted effort to seem aloof and cut them off. He repeats “I’m sorry Fiddleford” in his mind nonstop, his tale recounting the insensitive things he said but not how he desperately held Fiddleford in the unfiltered later flashback. He relates to Dipper’s interests, insecurities, and drive enough to hastily propose “a dream come true”. He knows exactly how to reassure Mabel without even knowing how the unicorns affected her, thinking she’ll be fine alone because her “magnetic personality” ranges beyond his weirdness magnetism.
Above all, Ford shows uncommon agape toward anomalies and all mankind. Even after their falling-out, Fiddleford affirms that Ford only wanted to help a world so often unkind to him.
Language
Ford displays many autistic speech patterns, such as declarative statements and an odd mix of formal and colloquial speech (“not with a bang but with a... boop-boop”, “the symbols needn’t all be literal, Dipper. It just has to be someone cool in the face of danger”). We often suspend the point of sentences with context for fear of misunderstanding, sometimes creating more (“when fighting a Gremloblin, use water”, anyone?) Ford shares our related tendency to get overly precise, second-guessing the correctness of everything he says (“or you could just roll an eight”, “floppy disks, and 8-tracks... right?”, “sometimes the strangest things in the world are right under our noses... and our feet, in this particular instance”). In the last example, Ford mixes his metaphor by understanding it better literally.
Ford has a sense of humor familiar to many autistic people, which includes indulging humor to himself (in the journals) instead of strictly sharing it. He shares our penchant for puns (“he’s gourd-geous!”, “one giant headache!”) and double meanings (“someone cool”, “the most peculiar dream”). Ford characteristically makes deadpan remarks (“just going to ignore that”, “so this is an emergency”, “I did mention that the fate of the universe is at stake, didn't I?”, “NLOO PH SOHDVH”) but draws the line at mockery (“he doesn't make fun of me all the time the way you and Grunkle Stan do”) - many of us concur, for hyperempathy or knowing how it feels.
He also invents his own secret languages... nuff said.
Infodumping
Does a whole book of exposition count? “Lost prehistoric life forms!” and “Mesoamerican gold!” and “Pirate ghosts!” are the words of a child with no filter about sharing everything interesting he’s read, and the journals are punctuated with equal enthusiasm. Then there’s his “cutting-edge programs and multi-dimensional paradigm theory!” ramble, DD&MD and magnet gun facts, and hostile takeover of Stan’s role as exposition fairy; Mabel’s unicorn hair quest only happens because Ford goes on a tangent about it.
Infodumping is also the only sensible explanation for why Ford mentions the barrier equation. Besides self-endangerment. Bill got under Ford’s skin not by promising power, but regression to a friendship where he felt safe sharing what he loved.
Literal/logical thinking
Ford emphatically takes things at face value. He feels compelled to defensively answer absurd questions like “Is there an owl in this bag?” and “The world's most confusing game of hopscotch?” Ford is earnest to a fault, walking into Stan’s conversational traps by nerding out about what he loves; like many autistic people, he instinctively says what he means and assumes everyone else works the same way. This makes him terrible at subterfuge: barely tricking the agents under amnesia, blurting out acknowledgment of the kids and barrier equation to Bill, and delivering a stilted “don’t do it, Ford, it’ll destroy the universe!” as “Stan” (who plays him much more convincingly after 30 years’ practice). Correcting Stan’s grammar to get back at him, Ford cannot tolerate incorrectness in language or behavior.
Logical thinking leads Ford to black-and-white views of people and situations - most self-destructively, “TRUST NO ONE”. He assumes malice due to difficulty factoring in others’ emotions or miscommunication. “You did this because you couldn't handle me going to college on my own!″ is a logical statement based on true premises, but assumes that Stan acted rationally to sabotage Ford. Stan tactlessly making it about their sailing dream instead of apologizing only solidifies it. Growing up with someone who means well but can’t say what he means, and no frame of reference for friendship outside codependency, it’s no wonder “a being with answers” worms his way into Ford’s mind and poisons it.
If you’ve followed these autistic heuristics thus far, that brings us to...
Special interests (or, why Ford’s autistic narrative matters)
First, honorable mention to Dungeons, Dungeons, & More Dungeons: after 30 years away he drops world-saving work to play it, quotes it from memory, and shares encyclopedic knowledge (“Prime-statistical anomalies over 37 but not exceeding 51!”, “The Impossibeast! Hey, I thought they banned this character!”)
And of course, mocking its fantastical monetary system!!! is a hatecrime unto his soul. (“At least I’m not all keyed up to watch a kids’ show”, he says with no qualms enjoying “Giggle Time Bouncy Boots” and other “childish” things; the threat of infantilization is real so he projects it back.)
Now, the big one: Ford’s singular, intense interest in anomalies drives the development of his career, art, and very identity.
“As if his abnormally high IQ wasn't enough, he also had a rare birth defect: six fingers on each hand. Which might have explained his obsession with sci-fi mystery weirdness.” I have argued that Ford’s ostracism cannot solely explain his patterns of abnormal behavior; now I propose that Ford’s autism and polydactyly are twin anomalies defining his central arc of alienation and belonging. Both constitute an experience unrelatable beyond reference to his peers, beyond words except those he’s internalized as their self-narrating zoo exhibit: “I am a freak.” But when Ford’s mirroring of Stan breaks down, when he accepts he can’t be normal and embraces it, finding a place “where weirdos like me fit in” lights up his eyes and world.
His light only falters knowing that indeed, “his abnormally high IQ wasn’t enough” for most of the world. Like many autistic people, Ford is labeled “gifted”: a state where his passion becomes “our ticket out of this dump”, “I worked so hard!” a basis for worth. “In a place like that, I had to work twice as hard” hits different for all of us who’ve had to be the perfect savant to justify our existence. We get to thinking that we have to save the world, that if people mistreat us it’s because we didn’t perform enough exceptionalism to deserve better. But if someone is dedicated to dehumanizing you, trying to prove them wrong means absorbing the idea they could be right.
It’s in this state that Ford absorbs Bill and vice versa. Bill repeats what everyone says about Ford’s intelligence, but without making him “earn” it until enough frog-boiling that “smart guy” or “IQ” become his identity - for Bill to give as easily as take away. Bill exploits Ford’s need for companionship he shouldn’t have to “earn”, then insidiously reinforces the idea he does. And Bill betrays Ford, Bill abuses Ford, Bill others Ford through the interests he pretended to support, Bill causes Ford to trust no one because Ford can see him in everyone. Autistic people know this demon well, whether it’s a person or our internalizing voice or both, but it’s as inexplicable to the allistic world as the quiet violence we endure every day - voiceless yet present as the journal’s disappearing ink.
Ford’s consuming need for people to be what they seem and say what they mean culminates in the dramatic irony that he doesn’t hear Stan (never what he seems) say “I didn’t mean it!” Instead he only hears “it”, one of the worst things an autistic person can hear: he’s not the brother Stan wanted him to be and his “dumb mysteries” -his identity- prevent him from loving his family correctly. For him and so many of us, these are the last words before abjection into nothing.
...until they aren’t. Until Ford returns, driven underground but emerging when Dipper shares his light. Until the dramatic irony that Ford blaming himself for Bill’s abuse and lamenting how “easy” it was absolves him to both characters and audience, who see it for the injustice it is. Until his abuser’s final threat is to violate his mind and weirdness magnetism with it (sound familiar?) and Ford heroically guards both. Until Ford and Stan can finally step into each other’s shoes, finally validate unacknowledged experiences of abuse. That’s when Ford regains trust - when Stan’s actions speak louder than words (from him or his dark mirror, Bill) and Ford finally hears he’s worthy of love without having to give any part of himself in return.
Most importantly: Ford only embraces his special interest, only advocates acceptance of his difference with more dignity as he asks Stan for a second chance they both know he deserves. Ford doesn’t have to change who he is and the narrative rewards him for it. He doesn’t have to be “grateful” as if his life’s worth is a debt; any notion that he “owes” his gifts to anyone burns with the journals. He doesn’t have to fight back even when it seems impossible and do those things the world said he never could (but damn he delivers anyway). He only has to realize he can’t and doesn’t have to expect perfection from anyone, most of all himself, to find belonging.
The Mystery in the Mystery Shack is not a puzzle to be solved. He’s a complexity of infinite sides and infinite outcomes. This reading of his story matters because we matter; his narrative speaks to an unspoken desperation and self-actualization we know ineffably. Like any marginalized group, autistic people deserve better than abjection or exploitation or conditional acceptance based on “respectability” or what we can do for others. We deserve to reclaim the stories where we see the patterns of our lives - whether in the text’s words or 3k of our own. Until the rest of the world does its part in changing for us, we’ll carve out our own belonging wherever weirdness magnetism draws us; we’ll find our own Gravity Falls.
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hi op what are your thoughts on uhhhh *spins wheel* sasha's season 2b arc (hope that's not too broad a subject)
edit: putting this under a cut bc it got LONG but. enjoy (???)
okay I gotta start by saying I didn't expect the depth of it at ALL; I knew Sash was featured prominently in the ending episodes of s2 based off of what my friend informed me, but like. I was not expecting 4.5 episodes to be almost ENTIRELY centered on their character arc and design (the .5 being the first half of True Colors).
that being said, I think Sash's 2b arc is PHENOMENAL bc of the way the nuance in it is written so incredibly well. this character is about to perform the most antagonistic move that they've pulled in the whole series so far, which is the act of betraying both Anne and Marcy in order to support Grime and get them home safe, if they so choose to go home (as an aside, I think at this point Sash has probably decided that she likes it more in Amphibia than back home, and there's one line that I'll get to that seems to be VERYYYY indicative of that. and if this is the case, it makes sense to me why Sasha would want to help Grime at all and why they don't really seem quite eager to follow Anne and Marcy back home. but! important to note that they still give those two the choice to go back if they wish, because at the end of the day Sash loves them and wouldn't try to force them to stay). and yet we see!! this back and forth!! this FIGHT that's happening in their mind, the way there's a flash of guilt they express at the very end of The Third Temple directly after confirming to Grime that things are still going according to plan, their convo w Anne at the end of The Dinner, the entire plot arc of BotB, and ofc the Sashanne duel in True Colors. I want to make an analysis post for each of these episodes because they're so fucking PACKED w shit to analyze, but I'll try my best to touch on all points here.
obviously we first learn of Sasha's plans to betray Anne and Marcy in The Third Temple. but what's important is that throughout the entire episode, there's several points where Sash switches back and forth between manipulation and honesty. I can talk abt this w confidence just based off of the whole. *gestures vaguely at myself.* but Sasha's initial apology in this episode was sheer manipulation, I think we all know that. however, when Sasha has to do their final test in the temple, those few lines they exchange w Anne in the moments before they raise themself up off the floor and launch themself into battle... those were genuine. they know they've been a shitty friend, and they're willing to accept that. so you have this game, almost, where Sash keeps flipping between putting on a mask to ensure they can keep up their facade until Grime secures the city and genuinely acknowledging their behavior and knowing that what they are doing is not going to sit well w Anne and Marcy.
so with that, The Third Temple sets the premise for the rest of the episodes of the season as far as Sasha's character arc. The Dinner is such a good fucking episode to follow with, because it hammers in the fact that Sasha has not changed. what it ALSO hammers in is she is still acting in her own self-interest - to put it in her words, she wants to get the friendship back under control. they still lash out, they still have a short fuse, they're still heavily opinionated and rough around the edges and prickly because this is an environment where they feel threatened. they're finally reuniting with the two people that mean the absolute most to them, only to realize they've been left out of the narrative. also not for nothing, but their trauma in Reunion got joked about in this episode which led to them blowing up over it, and like. I'm giving that one a pass bc man. anyway. at the end of the episode they say they like who they are, but it's said with a frown, which I think is fucking GENIUS. because there's an actual meaning to this line - they don't ACTUALLY like who they are. we have plenty of evidence that they don't like themself. what they MEAN is that they don't want to change, because that would mean giving up a security that they need in order to keep themself together. AND THIS IS DEMONSTRATED CRYSTAL CLEAR IN BOTB. they literally PURPOSEFULLY detach themself from Anne and Marcy bc they know they want control but they ALSO know that their behavior is just going to hurt the other two, so instead of compromising, they just go hey I'm gonna do my thing and you guys can do yours. and we'll both get what we want. and if that's not evidence that this character is fucking GRAPPLING with how to grow and change as a person, idk what is
and then. sigh. we get to True Colors. ofc Sash goes through on their betrayal - they're loyal to a fucking T once you dig beneath the surface, and they wouldn't just not follow through for Grime. what is absolutely KEY here is the fact that they are still leaving room for their friends' best interests, as in they're not trapping them in Amphibia but rather explaining how they're gonna help Grime take over, implying they'll go back home once they're done, but if Anne and Marcy wanna go back now, that's cool. if she didn't give a fuck abt their wellbeing, she'd just keep them there w her. but she doesn't. and then Anne starts retaliating, and. well. we ALL know Sasha does NOT do well with criticism of any kind. so they just go okay I'll send you back now then (and this is STILL an action motivated by what they think is best for Anne). BUT THE LINE. OHHHH THE SUPER IMPORTANT LINE THAT MADE MY HEAD SNAP UP AND MADE ME PHYSICALLY GO "YIKES" OUT LOUD. is Sasha saying "say hi to your parents for me." it's like a goddamn full-on sucker punch packed into one sentence - seven words, and all of a sudden we know for sure this kid does not have a good home life. I could go into elaboration on Sasha and the way she views familial ties throughout the show, but I won't bc that's gonna take this already super long answer and make it even worse. regardless, Sasha has once again flipped the switch and is indulging in their worst behaviors, which is full on controlling and holding power to act on what THEY think is best in the moment. and the moment Anne snaps, the moment Anne yells about Sasha being a horrible person, literally EVERYTHING shifts and the reaction from Sasha is VISCERAL. and what I mean by that is. it's not just the look in their eyes at those words. it's not just the sudden and complete loss of meaning, of self, of motivation after they've lost Anne's support. it's not just the way they stare at their own reflection in a sword that represents the color of the person they're trying their hardest to protect. it's the way that for the rest of the goddamn episode, they spend it trying to do the one thing they fear the most: giving up control. I'm gonna elaborate on this whole aspect in a different ask bc I was asked abt it, but the way Sasha acts towards Anne after the fallout, especially at the beginning of the duel and during the confrontation w Andrias, is fucking monumental. they struggle so much with how to change their own behavior, yet the very moment they lose the support of the people they've been trying so hard to love and care for in their roundabout way, they can change the way they act. because who the fuck is Sasha Waybright without Anne Boonchuy and Marcy Wu? in her mind, no one. she doesn't have any idea of who she is outside of this, so ofc she can act differently when she's thrown out in the cold. after all, it doesn't take much to warp an identity that doesn't exist.
tldr; god. how do I sum this up. Sash's 2b arc is smth that's incredibly intricate and complex from the way they constantly flip between desperately needing control and feeling guilty that this is the way they need to live. and True Colors is able to finally demonstrate to us the final piece in how they operate - without their friends, they lose sense of who they are, and their personality comes undone. in 4.5 episodes the writers managed to give us 1000 aspects to their character that we hadn't gotten to explore, and we can see that Sasha was never meant to be the villain. so. final review is that's some good shit👍
#this is so so so so long holy shit anon I am sorry#but the s2 2b arc is like. oh my god it sure is smth#PLEASE GOD IT'S 2:56 AM. I HAVE CLASS AT 9:30 GMFMDMDM#why do I do this shit to myself#sasha waybright#amphibia#anonymous#ask#long post
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DEB season 3 rewatch episode 1 - favorite clip
Samstag 12:13 - The Morning After
I think the first clip of the season is amazing at introducing us to Matteo’s POV, but this clip does even more to fully cement us within his perspective, and in such a surprisingly quiet way. In the first clip, we meet Matteo as he exists in group settings, and there is A LOT to learn from that, but here, we meet him in a delicate moment all to himself. It’s incredibly revealing about the person with which we’re about to embark on this 10 week journey, and it reveals all of that in a way that wonderfully reflects Matteo’s own personality and general vibe. We learn a lot from the first party clip, yes, but this feels so much more Matteo. Rather than this being the second clip of the season, I would actually rather think of this as the second half of the first clip. The second half of our introduction to who Matteo really is.
This clip always elicits such a visceral reaction from me. It feels so raw and vulnerable in a way that is very characteristic for Matteo’s season (at least in the way I see it), and it’s also just so quintessentially Skam to me: being with a character when they first wake up, when they’re at their most uninhibited, peering into the moments that they would edit out if they saw the raw footage. If I had to choose a few scenes to sum up the overall vibe and themes of this season, I would definitely include this clip because of its quiet yet incredibly intense show of emotion.
So what exactly do we learn about Matteo in this clip?
First, we learn that Matteo is EMOTIONAL, but in this quiet and tender way. Quiet, not to be mistaken with dispassionate. The longing that Matteo feels when he wakes up next to Jonas is just so palpable. I will never get over the moment when he lets his eyes flutter shut as he’s barely touching Jonas, letting himself revel in this fantasy for just a second. Then he’s met with a heartbreak that you can assume is not new for Matteo when he looks down at the number scribbled on Jonas’ arm. But even though he knows it’s coming, it still feels like a punch in the gut, a betrayal, even. Another reminder of his crushing loneliness. And then the way that he needs to very quickly reign in all of that emotion when Hans walks in just perfectly captures so much of Matteo’s struggle and the way that I tend to read his character. He feels A LOT but doesn’t often outwardly express those feelings to other people.
Second, we learn that Matteo is ISOLATED, both emotionally and physically. The emotional part of it is not really by choice: he didn’t choose to be going through an identity crisis that makes him feel separated not only from his friends, but also from himself. He’s still dealing with these unrequited feelings for Jonas, he literally just escaped from his childhood home at 17 (?), he most likely has some undiagnosed mental health issues, it’s A LOT. And it just is what it is. That definitely seems to be Matteo’s attitude about it, anyway. So in lieu of this emotional isolation that he’s feeling, he often makes a point of literally distancing himself from situations with others, possibly as a subconscious way of making his external environment match his internal one. Throughout the season, Matteo tends to stand/sit apart from others or even just blatantly walk away from people, as he does in this clip while Hans, Jonas, and Linn pose for a group photo.
This is also one of many moments in the season that is both comedic and tinged with sadness, which is a theme that I tend to read as yet another reflection of Matteo’s personality. He’s a goofy little shit, but he definitely also has some neurotic tendencies. There’s a sad irony in the fact that Jonas seems more involved with the flatshare than Matteo is. Even Linn, who definitely isn’t the most social person, sticks around and humors Hans. Meanwhile, Matteo doesn’t even have the energy to joke around and pose for a stupid picture.
So through this one little clip, we learn that Matteo is quiet, sensitive, lonely, tired, and isolated, and we’re also introduced to this melancholic, subdued tone that reflects all of that and will persist throughout the season. We know that this season is going to be a balance of humor and some pretty deep emotion. We know that Matteo is a very different type of Isak, one that warrants such a different introduction to his POV. And that brings me to my last point about this clip: it’s original!! Druck really shines when its making original content, no matter how small or seemingly inconsequential it is. Since this clip so brilliantly and subtly introduces us to so many aspects of Matteo’s character, it makes sense that it is singularly Matteo’s.
In conclusion: Druck really did that.
#druck#matteo florenzi#druck experience bot#deb#druck season 3 rewatch#jonas augustin#og druck#druck s3
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While we’re on the subject of “Family First” (lol were we?), watching it now for the first time since “She”/”Daughters”/Season 17, with part of the pain dulled knowing that the ship was righted, as it were, and that everyone is now safe and sound and together at last--
What is really striking, when you unpack the unbearable grief of it all, is just how palpable Tony’s love of Ziva is throughout the whole episode.
From the moment in the previous episode that they figure out that Ziva is on Jacob Scott’s hit list, to the last scene in FF where Tony makes his exit forever, you see just how unbreakable that bond is.
At this point in the series, he hasn’t talked to Ziva in almost three years, has had no indication from her that she wants any contact, has ostensibly tried to “move on” for his own sake (even though it took him actual years to get to that point). But the second he realizes Ziva is in danger, he’s vaulted right back into her orbit. The guy who’s gone to the ends of the earth for her (twice) rears his head, and nothing is going to get in his way. It doesn’t matter that he hasn’t heard from her in years, could believe she wants nothing to do with him, could be protected by people closer to home. When he knows she might be in trouble, he’s the wild card.
[cut because this got waaaaay long]
And it’s even more revealing, because this isn’t like season 10, where they had a rift over Adam, but were still forced to be together and deal with their shit, as ugly as it was. So even if he was angry with her, it was still easy to tell Parsons that Ziva was his best friend and he would protect her at all costs, even when she hurt him. By season 13, they really may as well have been on different planets. We know he loved her, loves her, will always love her, but he’d resigned himself to the fact that she was gone and wasn’t coming back, and he was going to have to figure out a way to live without her. He wasn’t happy about it, and wasn’t doing a good job about it because even when he tried dating again, it was obvious how goddamn lonely he was. He didn’t make sense without her. And while he was trying his best to grow as a person and help himself heal, which was admirable, he was on his way to living with a wounded heart for the rest of his life.
But then they see her name on that screen, and it’s like no time has passed, and they’re back on a mission to save her from the boogeyman yet again. Then Trent Kort comes in and pushes all the right buttons with the “girlfriend” crack, because he knows them, too, and again, it’s like we’ve been launched back into season 9-10, even without her physically there.
It’s everything. From the way he goes after Kort in the bullpen (and no one tries to stop him) when he thinks he’s willfully putting Ziva’s life in danger (I mean, good call, Tony), to the way the pin drops at the end of “Dead Letter” when he sees the news about the fire at her farmhouse on TV and you see his vision tunnelling. From the way he says, “If that’s Ziva, I’ve gotta go” like nothing else exists in that moment, to the way Gibbs is already ahead of them and pushing him to go, and McGee already has his plane ticket ready for him because they know there isn’t a force in the world that’s going to stop Tony from going after Ziva. How he’s antsy at the apartment, packing for a trip that must feel way too familiar like he’s been thrown back three years, but can’t shake the feeling that she’s still out there, somewhere, because she always is. And when McGee and Abby break the news to him that she’s gone, his whole world shatters. And not in the big, dramatic breakdown (which comes next), but in the absolute shock that takes over his body that his worst nightmare is coming true.
Of course, there’s the “All hands on deck” scene, which wrecked us all, and is still probably one of the best moments of acting of Michael Weatherly’s career. (I go back and forth of my favourite moment of his being that scene or the orchard scene in PPF.) It’s not just the visceral pain of it all, the anger and the anguish. It’s that it’s so, so raw and primordial. Tony is running on pure id, all emotion and no rational thought at that moment. He’s drowning and he doesn’t want to come up; he wants to go down and be swallowed whole. You can see the absolute fear all over his face and in his whole body. This is his worst nightmare, has always been his worst nightmare since she came into his life. Somewhere you have to think that in the last three years, part of him has always worried that something would happen to her and he wouldn’t be there to help, or even worse, wouldn’t know about it until it was too late, and that has finally come to pass.
Tony isn’t a guy who loses control very often; he acts like a playboy or a class clown, but even that is often an act to hide who he really is. He keeps his emotions tightly wound, which is why the brief flashes we get occasionally (for instance, when he calls Ziva out on Adam) hit so hard, because he doesn’t usually get his feelings get the best of him, good or bad. But this scene throws that all out the window; Ziva is the one thing that makes him lose control, makes him follow his heart instead of lock it up tight. And the idea that she is gone forever unleashes every one of those feelings he’s repressed his entire life into the abyss.
It’s in the way he slams his fists on his desk because he hurts and it’s in his warpath. it’s the way his eyes are absolutely wild like they’ve never been, unfocused and unhinged. It’s the way he will yell at anyone in the vicinity because every ounce of pain is begging to escape from his chest. It’s the way his voice hitches when he gets brought back down to earth, because the anguish constantly wrestles with the anger. And this time, I noticed that once Senior shows up and tells him to come home to catch his bearings, just for one night, he subtly shakes his head, almost like a child, because he cannot, absolutely cannot, believe what he is hearing. And going home, alone, is only going to bring it home that this is very, very real. It’s masterful. (Makes me wish MW had gotten more meat like this during his tenure on the show, because boy, can he bring it, when given the chance.)
Then, of course, there’s the Tali reveal, which is a while other post -- it’s bullshit and we all know it, but it happened and all’s well that ends well, now -- and again, we get all these subtle glimpses into their relationship, even through other people. The way nobody doubts that if Ziva had a daughter it could be anyone’s but Tony’s, because, of course they would have a baby. And it may be three years, but Tony knows Ziva and he knows that whatever they had, it was real, which is why he doesn’t doubt for a second that Tali is his. (I resent the fact that I have to write this sentence out because IT SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THIS WAY SHOW but it is what it is) It’s been years, and if he’s moved on then maybe she has too, but he realizes how old she is and how the dates line up and he knows how Tali came to be. They may be fucked up, but they had something that summer and that fall and it was theirs alone.
There’s only a slight tinge of anger when he finds out; I’m sure there was a lot more of it later on, when the dust settled and the shock wore off. But his first reaction isn’t to lash out: his first reaction is to embrace Tali and devote himself to her wholeheartedly. (The first scene of them together after he introduction is the two of them playing like they’ve known each other her whole life. They could have played up the awkward new dad route until the photo scene, but instead kid-phobic Tony instantly bonded with Tali.) Even if Tali weren’t his, she was absolutely Ziva’s, and that alone would have been enough for him to love her and want to protect her. The fact that she was theirs, that made them two halves of a whole.
From that moment on, Tony no longer keeps his Ziva feelings inside anymore. To be fair, he’d actually been pretty open about them ever since he came back from Israel in season 11, from his discussion with Gibbs about feeling like he made the wrong choice coming back (only it wasn’t him who made the choice), to the one with Abby about missing Ziva but needing to move on, to every little moment in between where he refers to his healing and his terrible year without her and how he feels restless (the subtext meaning, without her). But whatever tenuous lock was on his Ziva-fault, her loss breaks it open, and every feeling bubbles to the surface.
We see the unbearable grief at her death (or, “death” -- THANK YOU SEASON 16), absolutely played like that of a lover and not just a friend. (See the different reactions of McGee or Jimmy or Ducky or Abby, compared to Tony’s.) The shock and betrayal of finding out he’s a father and had no chance to be one, but still seeing the importance of stepping up and almost relief because at least he still has part of her to hold onto. The way he smells her scarf, an act of such intimacy you almost feel like a voyeur watching him breathe her in. The way he slowly comes to terms with it when he’s with McGee -- the reality setting in and the doubts creeping in about why Ziva kept Tali from him, how maybe she didn’t fully trust him, but that doesn’t matter, because he loved her. Goddamn, did he love her. McGee may be shocked about what Tony and Ziva were getting up to after hours, but one thing he does know is that they absolutely loved each other.
We see it in how tender he is with Tali; Tony is a good man and would do right by any orphaned child who needed protection in a scary time, but knowing Tali is his daughter and Ziva’s daughter makes her the most precious thing in the world to him from the get-go. From the moment he meets her, you can see that he vows to take care of her the way Ziva would have wanted. Because he loves her and while he just met Tali, he knows instantly that he loves her, too. And loving Tali is how her can honour his love of Ziva.
I absolutely hate the scene where they take down Trent Kort. I will always hate it. I may hate Trent Kort, but I hate unnecessary use of force even more, and always have, and this has always been a scene that horrifies me. That being said, the important part of it is when he declares that “[ZIva] was my family.” It’s important that he says it to Kort, because Kort has always needled both he and Ziva about their relationship since his first appearance, and he used that against Tony in the previous episode. He needed Kort to see just what he destroyed by (supposedly) killing her, that this was not at all a professional beef that was about to go down, but absolutely a personal one.
And it’s finally an admission of what he and Ziva were to each other. They weren’t just colleagues, or partners, or even friends (although they were all of those things and they were all important). They were family; they became intertwined in a way that made them inextricable from each other. Season 10 showed us this in spades, and “PPF,” while a punch in the gut, was basically an hour-long tribute to it. (As much as I hate how Ziva left, the orchard scene and the tarmac scene are two of the most beautiful scenes of their relationship. They are acts of devotion.) They were everything to each other, and all Tali did was become a representation of it. Becoming parents didn’t make them a family, it only entrenched it. They were each other’s family long before that. By the time Abby implores him to understand, he’s realized that in his own way, he did know. It just got lost for awhile.
In a way, “Family First” is a bookend to “Past, Present and Future,” albeit not necessarily in the way want. In PPF, Tony was so desperate to commit to Ziva, to make a home with her and love her the way he knew was ready for, to make a life with her, but she wasn’t ready, and that was the tragedy of it all. In FF, he does finally get to make that commitment to her, by way of Tali. Like he tells Gibbs, he’s now everything to her, and by doing so he’s finally everything to Ziva, too. It’s all backwards, of course, but Tali is everything he wanted in that orchard: she is their family. All those moments where he doubted whether he made the right choice, whether he should go back and ask Ziva to give them another chance, if staying would have made them happier-- ultimately, Tali makes that choice for them, and he does go back to find their home. It’s not in the way he, or any of us, wanted, but she is his answer. And he knows how much Ziva loved Tali, and that must tell him that somewhere, she loved him, too. And while the weight of his grief must press on him like a boulder, another weight that had been on his shoulders since PPF lifts, because he knows, finally, that he is loved.
Of course, the infuriating thing is that it took MW’s exit for the show to finally acknowledge it. And it took them killing off Ziva for them to get ready to show it. I can’t help but think how much the show would have benefitted if they’d leaned into these feelings and developments years earlier, how much richer the story would have been, how many amazing performances we could have witnessed, when every dangerous situation would have even deeper layers by virtue of the added weight of Ziva and Tony’s love for each other. I’m not talking about them making out all the time (although I wouldn’t say no ngl), but every dangerous situation, every life-threatening mission, every near-miss or serious injury to unfold-- we could have gotten some grade-A performances from these actors. Imagine even a fraction of MW’s range in the “all hands on deck” scene in a situation where Ziva’s life is threatened? Imagine Ziva’s barely-contained rage if someone harmed Tony? Imagine episode codas where we get those quiet moments of love as an antidote to whatever horror happened in the case, how much the characters could expand from acknowledging the love and support they have, instead of dancing around the word?
So, in conclusion, it sucks that this is how we had to see it, but if they had to make MW’s final episode all about Ziva, I’m glad they at least acknowledged the elephant in the room, which was that Tony was hopelessly in love with Ziva and had been for ages, even when they were oceans apart. We saw the beginning of it in PPF where he begged her to come home, where she told him he was loved-- but finally we saw the words out of his mouth, not that we needed them. But what I’m saying is that the show finally let Tony say those words out loud, voice the emotions he was feeling and lay them out in the open for everyone to see.
Luckily, now, we can watch the episode through a different lens. It still hurts, because this was not the way it should have been. There was no way Ziva should have been pregnant and alone and raised Tony’s child without him for nearly three years, and there was no way Tony should have been deprived of that and only found out after she died. But now we know that the show basically wrote its own fix-it fic on itself to try to salvage some of this story, and I’m grateful. None of this is the way we wanted it, but on the other hand, they could have let it be. They could have doubled-down on it and made her really, really dead and have Tony move on without her. Instead, it’s canon that they love each other and are finally together for their happy ever after, so I’ll take what I can get.
Because Tony really loves Ziva, and Ziva really loves Tony, and that is the thread that holds this whole thing together.
#in this essay i will#tiva#tiva discourse#family first#season 13#I HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS STILL#SET ME FREE#it's been four years#don't you think this is enough?#i want to get on with my life lmao#LET TIVA BE HAPPY 2020#this is a long ramble that goes nowhere sorry#i just spent two hours on this lmao#i was gonna try to get back to my fic i abandoned months ago#guess not
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The Double Bind in Scorpio, Aquarius, and Pisces
Scorpio - Mars and Pluto type
It’s possible in this case for one’s early life to be dominated by Mars and progresses into Pluto with age
~Predominantly Mars type Scorpio
Instinctual and prophetic
Overtly marks personal territory in social environments
Energy is very viscerally based and transmutes sexually when directed to the object of desire. Sex is visceral, lustful, impassioned, ravaging, physically based
The intuition is focused toward exhuming connections with other people, settling for nothing less than magnificent
Defence is the best form of attack, often conditioned by an early life of directing energy and inner resources into survival or betrayal at the hands of carnality
Old wounds burn like hell when touched
Transforms from the victim to the victor, uses the ashes from the past as fuel to burn the desired future alive.
Undergoes intense inner work devouring passion, energy, desire, and rage into an opportunity for slaying contaminated and regressive parts of themselves rather than re-enacting these wars in daily life
Destructive impulses, trouble with moderation, must learn to control the power of the will or be controlled by it
~Predominantly Pluto type Scorpio
The need to go astray, to be destroyed, an extremely private, distant, passionate, turbulent expedition
Operate from the deepest trenches of the human condition.
Psychic and intuitive The creative cauldron is full of ingredients that bring rebirth into form
Recognises the futility of narrow pursuits.
Can live in repetitive cycles of chaos, or one can charter sensitivity toward conscious transformation of the whole spirit. As new energy flows, perspective must become renewed
Sex is spiritually and emotionally intimate, exposing, painful, impassioned, transforming, orgasm is reunion with infinity.
Preference for solitude, often lonely
When strong desires arise from the unconscious, the forces, needs, and actions become so intense it can produce the impression of a ‘quasi will,’ or sense being controlled by larger internal or external forces
The angel, the defender of good, the good will of god, and the destroyer of hexes and curses sent by evil
Aquarius - Saturn and Uranus type
~Predominantly Saturn type Aquarius - Melancholic
Investigative, insightful, considerate depth awareness
Fixed in beliefs and convictions often to a self-righteous degree
Copious self-reflection builds the bridge that connects intuition and grand ideas with rationality. Honest, humane, receptive though commonly with a distant or sterile quality
Socially composed and difficult to gauge, very internalised within their own heads, may feel as though they can never truly be touched, being locked way from the body and the world, this sort of fear i will float away and get lost forever in space
Pedantic and compulsive energetic temperament. Melancholic in order to be in touch with deeper mysteries, inner light can be haunted by gloomy shadows, reprimanded for dreaming. Privacy and containment creates a strangeness that intrigues others. Interested in the human mind, can make for great psychiatrists or psychoanalysts with the capacity to separate fact from emotional reactions and view people through theoretic, abstract, or symbolic frameworks
~Predominantly Uranus type Aquarius - Nervous
Creative liveliness and limitless conception of ideas. Often highly attune to vibrations in air, making them naturally musical
Can be misunderstood, often bringing unique gifts and talents
Free spirited, independent, original thinkers, rebel belles.
Rapid cycling, mental, and nervous energetic temperament, mental activity is perpetually active, chaotic, inspiring, and creative, appear
It looks like they haven’t slept very much, naturally produces ‘shock value’
Very transfixed in their own ideas and abstract concepts, day dreams days
Possible lack of internal stability or firm awareness of identity, unsettled, unpredictable, lives on the edge of change and surprise
Love communicates more effectively in general and inclusive connections, rather than 1:1.
Great appreciation for collective and friendship experiences like music festivals, social organisations, and special interest groups
Pisces - Jupiter and Neptune type
~Predominantly Jupiter type Pisces
Compassionate, charitable, comedic, experienced, insightful
Ecstasy and terror, untamed and blessed deliverance
Clairvoyant and philosophical intelligence
Spiritual Pilgrim, active in spiritual and faith-based groups, may be extremely spiritually disciplined, fanatical, or completely lax in spiritual practice
Great love of nature, the animal kingdom
Healing physicians, over generous with others - commonly taken advantage of
Excessive by nature - especially for any momentary hypnotic, romance, or sex, enjoys celebrating all things existence, subject to blind belief
Experiences grand elation and dreams for the future, followed by paralysing lows where the future is broken
Very exposed and intimate with the human condition, actively seeks to repair wrongs and make up for mistakes
~Predominantly Neptune type Pisces
An ocean of feelings and sensations, major emotional shifts precipitated by minimal external force
Generally seeking an existence, identity, and purpose beyond human-
Mystique or glamour, the appearance and take on many forms and faces. can say one thing and do another, quite distracted and vague
Absorbs the unformed visions floating in shared dreams and fantasies, gives rise to art that captures the collective subconscious and mesmerises with long lost visuals, feelings, and symbols
Drawn towards experiencing altered states of consciousness
Empathic to a painful degree, must consciously work on developing interpersonal boundaries, preference for solitude
Often lonely exiled or misunderstood, enchanted, and inspired to surrender and let the Divine work through them,
Analgesic and healing, bring unique gifts to humanity
Can be chronically drained, unstable
Cherry
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The Cat
I’m about 9 minutes into the movie Bright, and all the criticisms are kind of crystalizing. But one of the things that’s killing me is how they’re setting up the MC, Daryl Ward.
My bet is that the film makers thought they were setting up Ward as the cat. And they’re not.
The Cat is the term for a story abstraction from the book Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder and its sequels.
The Cat itself, is something (and it can be nearly anything that the audience will value) in need of aid that doesn’t HAVE to get it. A random cat up a tree can be the Cat. The cat that belongs to the person you want to get with, who has promised carnal relations if their cat is returned, can’t be the Cat because there is a significant reason and reward beyond simple morality for it to be helped.
If a character saves the Cat, gives it aid, helps it out, etc. when it’s just out of the goodness of the heart, that character is defined in audience perception as heroic. Most action stories will have the MC Save the Cat! in some way within the first few scenes. It’s a short hand way to show that they are “good.” And if you have a Save the Cat! moment then followed by them doing something “bad” you’ve SHOWN the audience the trajectory of the story: this person is a good person underneath but they’ve gone astray and need to find their heroism again to save the day. You’ve told the story in miniature. So it’s very useful.
But that’s not the only way to use the Cat.
In many stories the main character IS the Cat. The story in the first few scenes shows a moment where the character is clearly in need of aid and doesn’t really quite get what they need. They get enough maybe to survive but no one is saving them. This signals to the audience that this story is about growth and confidence. The MC will start out in a relatively helpless state and figure out how to come to their own rescue.
One of my all time favorite examples of that is the movie Ms. Congeniality. The opening scene, which is only about 90 seconds, is playing hard with the Cat.
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The set up starts with the typical over the top Save the Cat set up. Our hero is going to ride into the rescue, save the cat, and be awesome. And then it turns. She’s not saving the cat, remember, the cat is something helped without reward, and she very much wants a reward. She IS the Cat. The real person in need of aid in this microsmic story is her. And she doesn’t get it. To keep going, she turns to her strengths and just barrels through. But, again, in miniature, this scene has told us everything we need to know about the trajectory of her story. She has all of the wrong kind of power, she uses it to mask her need, and what she is going to have to find is the “impossible” how to get what she really needs and how to draw helpers to her.
That’s the power of being the Cat. It draws sympathy. It paints expectations. And it communicates problems very clearly.
Unfortunately, many storytellers seem to believe that injury and/or pain is enough to make a character the Cat, and that just isn’t so. Cats are about choices and character trajectories. So, if you have someone shot in the first few minutes of a story, even though, yes, they NEED help and yes, they’re going to continue to need help to get back to where they were or better, it’s a non optional help. It carries with it its own reward. They’re better for no other reason than that they are recovering.
Go back to Ms. Congeniality and that’s not true. Her “saving” doesn’t intrinsically give her her reward. It gives her the key to then go out and get what she wants. They’re two separate goals. And that’s why it works. Her choice gives her another choice and that gives her her happy ending. If the story was merely a search for feminine power and getting it, it just wouldn’t feel as satisfying because it wouldn’t get the resonance of WHY feminine power is a necessity for her. As a really excellent rule of thumb, think of the Cat as representing the NEED of a character which must be fulfilled in order for them to get what they WANT. This allows for both happy and sad endings that are satisfying because they each deliver on the premise, even if it is a radically different outcome.
Ms. Congeniality has four fundamental outcomes arcing from that initial scene.
She can get the Feminine Power she needs and a boyfriend she wants - that’s a happy comedic story.
She can get the Feminine Power she needs but not get a boyfriend - that’s an “unhappy” comedic story, which can still be funny if she still pops the new not-boyfriend in the nose, happy and unhappy are textures as much as anything.
She can FAIL to get the Feminine Power she needs but get a boyfriend who appreciates her for who she really is - “happy” tragedy. Remember that comedy and tragedy in the literary sense don’t mean funny and tear jerker. Comedy means “what makes you sick but you get better” it’s about having trouble obtaining a goal but getting it in the end. Tragedy means “what kills you,” it’s about not being able to ever obtain the goal. So this kind of ending is really about saying that the goal was stupid all along.
She can Fail to get the Feminine Power she needs and because of that FAIL to get any boyfriend she might want. This is the pure tragedy. It’s both “sad” and tragic. She gets nothing. BUT this can still be funny. If you watch them closely, a LOT of slapstick comedies conform to this architecture. The characters enter the story as fools and leave the story as fools without having been enlightened one wit.
My extreme suspicion is that Bright wants to set up this kind of situation. Since the first thing we see of Officer Ward is that he feels under threat. All of his motions are indicative of someone who recognizes he is in extreme but non-immediate danger. He’s waiting for it. And then he’s shot. And then he’s clearly still having issues after he has recovered because his wife is urging him out of bed in the afternoon. He is the Cat, right?
Well, there is another relationship to the Cat that I think they’ve actually set up harder and is overriding that narrative.
Kick the Cat
You don’t usually see Kick the Cat in genre fiction. And there’s a very good reason. Genre fiction tends to lean toward “physical” action. By which I mean that the main conflicts of the plot happen outside of the Main Character’s body. The characters either go out and do something or something comes into their lives and forces them to do something. So, even though character growth is likely necessary and choices will be based on what they learn about themselves as people, that is expressed through the exterior plot. The Detective goes and solves and crime and that action results in the Detective’s change. Which means that internal character change is relatively harder to show because it doesn’t take center stage.
This means that a flawed person becoming a kind person works. But a deeply flawed, nearly broken person, who needs to grow into a kind person usually doesn’t. Because genre fiction doesn’t have enough cameras in that area where you can show it.
So when it happens in Genre Fiction, Kicking the Cat is generally an announcement that said character who does it is one of the villains and the reader should prep themselves for the sudden and inevitable betrayal.
Now that isn’t as true in Literary Fiction. Because Literary Fiction is the opposite of Genre Fiction in this way. Instead of the conflict generally being “physical”, the conflict in Literary Fiction is generally “mental.” The main conflict happens inside the body of the Main Character. So the majority of the action and most of the cameras are there. So Literary Fiction allows that kind of deep, essentially broken, flaw because it gives the story the space and insight to work with it. So it’s not as necessarily a trumpeting warning that you’re dealing with a villain. It can mean that this MC has a long way to go to fix themselves, if they can make it at all.
Unfortunately for Bright, it’s a Genre Film. AND I think that this is much more what they’re broadcasting. Remember I’ve only seen nine minutes so far. But the first nine minutes are saying a lot.
The opening credits play out over a visual depiction of a race war between the Orcs and the Police. This is, in visual language, the announcement that the Orcs are poor and oppressed and should be read as the equivalent of POC in our own world.
Ward, played by Will Smith, could open up a whole can of worms with that reading, and there’s clearly some intent to considering his neighbors are absolutely what you would see in a shot of the ghetto in another movie, but instead we go pretty much straight to:
He kills a fairy. It’s not depicted as innocent, it’s clearly a pest. But it’s also not exactly powerful. He kills it with a zealous slap of a broom. This is very plausibly the Cat. Especially with the reaction from his neighbors, who also have zero affection for the fairy but all react viscerally to Ward’s aggression. The essential problem with Cats as devices is that the audience takes them in subconsciously. There’s no opportunity for a sophisticated discussion when butts are in the seats. So the only way to control what the audience thinks is to be careful not to send conflicting messages. And this is a doozy. If it is read as a Kick the Cat moment, which I’ll be honest I am seeing it as, I can’t see Ward as the hero after this. I am waiting for his sudden and inevitable betrayal because he is absolutely one of the cops meant to be depicted up in the graffiti that slid past during the opening credits.
At this point, I’m not looking for his redemption. I’m looking for how he is going to pose a problem for the advancement for the story. Which makes him a villain and not a hero.
Worse, this is set between two discussions about his partner. I have to admit what I was really expecting was an action packed version of:
Not really the comedy aspect but that his partner was new and they had to work through their problems to get along and be their best.
There’s a reason that’s pretty much the gold standard. Because learning to get along is a standard useful storyline and commands both characters to grow. It’s the same basic dynamic as a Romance. The joy is in seeing people figure out how to click together in spite of their difficulties. The tension is ‘will they / won’t they?’ and you know they will but it’s very entertaining to see them work it out.
But that’s not what’s going on in Bright.
By the time the movie starts, Ward and Jakoby are already partners. Coming in in media res communicates that this isn’t really a story about a relationship forming. Which means they can’t really show the full arc of a relationship, and so that’s unlikely to be the focus of the story. Which communicates to the audience that they should have reason to doubt any kind of ‘will they.’
This is cemented by the three conversations immediately around the fairy killing. Ward explains to his wife that Orcs are different, not stupid, just that they think different. It is not him actually saying that the Orc isn’t stupid compared to a human just that they’re naturally different and can’t be held to the same standard.
He then tries to give that as a lesson to his daughter. Orcs are different so you have to keep Orcs in their proper mental categorization.
At which point Jakoby shows up again.
He is not welcome. Pretty much at all.
But here’s the thing, like his initial introduction:
Jakoby is depicted as kind and considerate. Up to where I’ve stopped, I haven’t seen him commit a single act of even aggression. He wants to know what kind of sauce Ward wants on his burrito.
He wants to pick up Ward to help him along. He responds with affection and magnanimous giving to Ward’s daughter. In other words, he’s coming across as the innocent in all this. Which really starts to qualify him for the Cat category. That may be ruined in the next ten minutes but right now, I’m looking at a guy who has been insulted and yelled at for doing nothing, who has only shown concern and kindness, and who exists around a framework of his established partner killing a fairy. If Jakoby is a Cat, then what I’m being taught to worry about by what the film is presenting is that Ward is going to try take him down. Because maybe tomorrow, Orc Lives Don’t Matter.
I’m being taught by the first 9 minutes that Ward is, at best, a potential villain. But that the story is going to be from his point of view. And it’s just not a great look. And I would suspect that’s a lot of what people were responding to when this movie first hit: that it is setting up a very unpleasant story line that usually doesn’t play out in the type of story that it is.
So, no matter how it works out in Bright, which I am probably now returning to, when it comes time for you to work with your own story, be aware of the messages you’re sending and what story arcs you’re selling. Cats as an abstract concept, no matter what they are, exist whether you love or hate Blake Snyder. They existed long before he coined the name. At an even deeper level it’s simply that your character’s actions and events in a story naturally carry a “moral” weight. We, as an audience, expect what your characters do to be representative of who they are, for good and ill. Where what they do conflicts with who they are, we’ll expect an explanation and a counterbalance. So be wary of doing something else. Sending the wrong message with the wrong set up can drive away audiences who would be perfectly content with your story without the conflicting information.
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today on “jess talks for 3 hours about a scene that aired a decade ago” i would like to talk about the bathroom scene in reunion
we all know it’s is iconic but can we talk specifically about the ACTING and CAMERAWORK
it's mainly about Tony because while Ziva is leading the conversation and being really brave and open, accepting her wrongdoing and making admissions about how she sees the world, Tony is the one leading the scene through his complex reactions and body language in response to what she says. the conflict he shows is incredible
the use of the mirror as a barrier between them and a way to reflect what Tony is thinking!! it's artistry!!
Much rambling below >>
I watched ncis in real time from season 5. The Aliyah/TorC arc though is what made me fall in love with the show. I remember I skipped school to watch TorC when it came out. It’s this arc that for me separates NCIS from other similar crime/procedural shows. Not to sound wanky, but I think the way it was portrayed is pretty unique to this genre. The emotions are so real, everything is so intense and visceral. I can't explain why (for example) Tony and Ziva's confrontation in Israel in Aliyah feels so raw and different to anything else I've watched on tv, but it does. This storyline rests upon a couple of fantastically portrayed scenes between the two of them (the 'are you jealous' scene in Legend, the Aliyah confrontation, the reunion in TorC). And this scene I'm about to go into is another great example. It's the feeling that gets portrayed, how visceral it is, that made this arc outstanding.
The most interesting thing about this scene to me is how, after the nutter butter staring in the bullpen, Tony can barely look at Ziva. It’s (presumably) the first time they’ve been properly alone since the confrontation in Aliyah, and he is cornered. It’s like he knows there’s no escape - she has followed him determined to talk about what they have been very strictly ~Not Talking About~, and he isn’t sure what she’s going to say. Several times he turns his head towards her, but his eyes never actually reach her until near the end of the scene. He’s awkward, and uncomfortable, and very un-Tony.
This starts when he first realises Ziva is behind him. They begin to talk and like I said, while he looks over his shoulder a few times, he doesn’t actually look at her.
As he walks over to the sink, he gives her the briefest of glances before again looking away.
Ziva seems to notice his reluctance, because before she starts to talk she looks at him twice as though for reassurance.
This is something Ziva does with Tony quite often - the most notable examples that come to mind are in Kill Ari, before she tells him about Tali, and in A Desperate Man, when Tony tells her she’ll “find somebody someday”. It’s what she does when she’s trying to gauge Tony’s emotions and how he is going to react to something.
The early tone of the conversation is just that - conversational, though there is a little barb behind it particularly when Ziva points out that Tony was violating protocol. A few times Tony turns to look at her, but he never actually meets her eyes (one time he flicks water at her, another he turns to her but looks downwards). The way he almost can’t help himself but interrupt her here is another sign of him avoiding confronting this issue - he’s making comments about “I wasn’t standing” and “double-parked” to avoid Ziva getting to the point she’s arriving at
The use of the mirror throughout this scene is fantastic. We get one of them in the foreground but can still see the reactions of the other - it shows the disconnect between them at this point, how they are basically in two different realms. Very reminiscent of in Aliyah when Ziva looks at the reflection in the door and sees Tony approaching her before they have their argument.
While Ziva is still talking, Tony braces his arms on the sink like he’s bracing himself for the conversation. He is still avoiding looking at her. His face here is the most telling thing about this whole scene. He looks really hurt and shut-off, when have we ever seen Tony look like he does here? He’s not only not looking at her but it’s like he’s physically forcing himself not to. I think this is most interesting because even though this is essentially the end of the arc, throughout this whole Rivkin storyline this moment is the first time we actually get a real first-hand insight into Tony’s feelings surrounding Ziva (+ Rivkin and Eli) accusing him of doing what he did out of jealousy. It’s the first time we get a proper view into how much it hurt him.
Ziva says it doesn’t matter what happened to Michael and Tony says in a whisper “so what does”. We know by now that that is the voice Tony uses when he’s hurt - like he can’t say it out loud so he whispers it (see also: “we must have different interpretations”)
Ziva puts her arm inbetween his and moves her head to try to force him to look. The whole time she is seeking his gaze. She can sense he is avoiding her eyeline - and thus avoiding the conversation, but she needs to get these words out. “That you had my back. That you have always had my back. And that I was... wrong, to question your motives.”
The good stuff!!!
the camerawork here uggghhhh. Tony comes into focus staring at her through the mirror after she says this line - her admission of wrongdoing after so many months. This is halfway through the scene and yet is the first time he actually looks at her face, can look her in the eye, though there is still a literal barrier between them. He seems almost incredulous. Looks away from her again, almost immediately. He wants to listen but it’s like he’s fighting with himself - as though he thinks that if he looks at her he’s not going to be able to stay strong and get his answer like he clearly wanted to. Still whispering, "so why did you?”
Tony’s reaction when Ziva says Ari’s name is the moment his defences crumble. He immediately exhales and looks down - he wasn’t expecting her to be open like that. It’s almost like it takes the wind out of his sails. Though she did it in a conversational way, Ziva has been brutally honest about the pedestal she placed Tony on and why she couldn’t bear to put her trust in him in case she lost him or was betrayed by him like so many other important people in her life.
After Ziva's admission, Tony’s demeanour completely changes. He opens up. The slight smile, then he turns to her. His voice is back to normal now, no more of that hurt whisper, and there’s a little hint of a tease in it. Him turning towards her is the equivalent of an olive branch. “I thought you weren’t sure what to say” is a very veiled way of him confirming that what she said was what he needed to hear.
Ziva looks hopeful when Tony turns around, but also kind of looks like she might be about to cry. She still has no read on the situation. Just like us, she’s never seen Tony how he was in this scene - so determined not to engage, so closed off from her. Tony looks at her for a while, trying to find the right thing to say, and in the end apologises. (fwiw I think Tony was right to say sorry even if he ultimately did the right thing with regards to Rivkin)
Ziva immediately shoots it down. She can see that Tony is allowing for bridges to be rebuilt, but to do that she has to say her piece and get everything off her chest.
When Ziva approaches him to kiss his cheek, Tony is immediately stoic again. Still doesn’t want her to see what he’s thinking, still allowing her to do/say what she needs to after the beginning of the scene when he was interrupting and being kind of churlish to put her off. The way he doesn't look at her or react in any way when she kisses him or tries to catch his eye when she pulls back is just incredible. WHY ARE THEY THE WORST?
The end of this scene is so interesting. Ziva says something that triggers Tony’s thoughts about the case, and he seeks out her touch. He grabs her face and glances at her lips when he calls her a genius, and it’s like subconsciously he’s acknowledging that there is still something between them. It seems like nothing, like a throwaway connection to the next scene, but I honestly think it’s really important to their relationship going forward. It’s basically the reassurance Ziva needs that, if nothing else, she and Tony can still work together. Even after the hurt and the betrayal and the being-held-prisoner, he still can’t help but reach out to her.
anyway in summary i love this scene
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And I Will Follow: A Reylo Fic
Fresh off the major decision to abandon the dark side, Ben Solo follows an overwhelmed and wildly conflicted Rey to Ahch-To after their battle on the wreckage of the Death Star. Thankfully, Ben Solo knows a thing or two about internal conflict.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/22040071/chapters/52601182
Part 1 of 3: Boil in my Veins
She’s screaming. A visceral, yet empty sound, a punch at the air with no strength behind it.
Kylo Ren’s TIE fighter Whisper smolders before her in a twisted heap of melted metal and steaming rain-licked flames.
She has already flung every small rock or pebble within her reach, her hands now resorting to ripping great fistfuls of wet grass and dirt from the ground around her and flinging them at the smoking TIE, each clump punctuating another frustrated yell.
She is soaked through, and would be freezing if she could feel anything but the consuming tearing inside her, the feeling of her own soul being tugged and shredded by great fingers---old, shriveled, claw-like---scraping in time with the pounding of her heart against her ribcage trying to break her very bones. Her blood is boiling and raging, fire in her veins burning her from the inside out. Her throat is worn raw from screaming, trying to force the fire out through her mouth, her breathing now coming in ragged gasps and sobs. Her muddy fingers jerk to her hip, grasping the cold metal of the lightsaber’s hilt. She glares at it. I’m not your hero.
Her dirty fingernails scrape along the casing. No one wants her, no one cares about Rey from Nowhere. The Jedi, the Resistance, all of them. They just wanted a hero, a vessel for their hope. But that isn’t me. They all must have thought it all so prodigious, finding a desert scavenger, a no one so empty and ready for them to fill with all of their problems, their expectations, their hope. But they didn’t realize that she had her own soul, one that was now forced to the furthest corner of her being, trapped and ignored. Alone.
The loneliness of the desert was nothing to this feeling. She knew why Kylo Ren’s saber raged and flickered so wildly. He felt like this all the time, conflicted, abandoned, lost. It was a desperate feeling, an isolating force. She understood his explosive anger. How could anyone keep such pain inside indefinitely. They couldn’t. She couldn’t.
She winds her arm back ready to fling the saber into the heart of the fire, but a tug in her gut, a steadying hand reaching through the Force, freezes her on the edge of motion. His voice brushes through her mind before the sound of it reaches her ears.
“Wait.”
She wants to be angry, even angrier than she is now, something that feels quite impossible. She wants to turn all her anger back against him and lash him with it, striking over and over until he leaves her alone. Because everything is too much. She wants to scream at him to go away, to kill her, to...to...do something. Something to make it all just stop.
But she doesn’t speak. Doesn’t strike. Doesn’t run. Doesn’t move.
Rey can feel him approaching, his heavy boots sinking into the muddy Ahch-To soil. She doesn’t bother asking how he found her. She had stolen his TIE to get here so she wouldn’t be surprised if it had a tracker of some sort. But beyond that, he always seemed to find her, despite his claim that she was hard to track down. It was irritating and inconvenient and right now, strangely comforting.
He stops a few feet behind her. She wants to hide her red eyes and tear stains. She wonders if he heard her screaming. She knows he must have. She wants to be embarrassed, humiliated even. But there is nothing. His presence has burned out the fire of her conflict for the moment. She feels empty, drained. Nothing, you’re nothing. And she thinks for a moment that maybe it is better to be nothing.
But not to me.
Rey doesn’t turn to face him, she doesn’t appear to have heard his whisper through the bond. She is too lost in her own conflict. The gravity of her pain tugs downward and she sinks to her knees. Mud stains her leggings, seeping through to join the chilly rain percolating against her skin. Her hands, still clutching Anakin’s saber, fall to her lap.
******
He can feel every emotion in her, each one a shard of glass, shrapnel embedded in her bones, her mind, her spirit. The sorrow and confusion, the frustration, the anger--- all of it radiates off of her in waves, an overwhelming tide pressing against Ben’s mind through their bond.
He is glad she has not tried to attack him yet. With his saber now at the bottom of the sea he doesn’t foresee a duel with an emotionally compromised, lightsaber wielding Jedi playing out in his favor. Yet it is disconcerting, seeing her like this. He knows Rey does not belong on her knees before anyone, him least of all .
He can see her shoulders shaking, from cold or tears he does not know, but neither are promising options. Ben’s fists open and close at his sides, fingers rubbing together as he wrestles with the strange, not entirely unwelcome, desire to reach out to her.
******
She feels him move away from her, walking off towards the TIE he’d used to follow her. Her limbs are too heavy, and the pain pulses again, still hot in her veins, chaining her to the ground. She doesn’t even flinch when he approaches again. He stands barely two strides behind, looming over her. A mountain over a tree. She wonders if he might kill her. Her mind lingers on the question of whether or not she would stop him if he tried. She feels him tense, both physically and internally, as this thought flows across the bond to him.
He had not attacked her on the wreckage of the Death Star; not one of his moves during their duel was an offensive strike. He’d executed only the necessary blocks and parries to keep her raging strikes from slicing him through. He hadn���t wanted to fight her. Something she can feel him emphasize with a light brush against her memory now. It is an odd thought, but then perhaps not. He had asked her to join him. To be his ally. To be his...something.
She knows they both felt the loss of Leia through the Force in that moment on the wreckage. Their grief mingles together in the bond now, as it had in the moments after the initial shock. Rey had regretted striking him; she had run him through with his own saber while he was distracted. It was wrong. It wasn’t her way. She had felt wrong for the entirety of the fight, like someone was inside her body twisting her limbs on marionette strings. She had been striking blind, unconcerned with who or what was on the receiving end, like a wild animal lashing out in pain. But the clear voice of Leia whispering her son’s name had cut away the haze of rage, severing the puppet strings inside her, freeing her of the dark influence. But in the aftermath Rey was left soaked and drained, empty and ashamed, her hand on the hilt of the saber that had burned a hole through Leia’s son’s chest and a matching one through her soul.
Anyone else would have died instantly from such a wound. But a fragile thread of life had held him there and Rey had known it must be Leia. And she had never been more grateful. She recalls, again, his face in that moment. He’d looked so lost, so innocent. Just a child who had lost his mother, the same face she had worn watching her parents fly away all those years ago. She could see the ghost of another emotion in his eyes in that moment, even when he wasn’t looking at her. Betrayal, hurt. The same look from the throne room when she had reached for the lightsaber instead of his hand.
The moment she saw his wound, her remaining defenses had crumbled. If she was cracking before, she shattered then. There was no strength left in her to put up walls, to keep him from reading her every thought, her every feeling. Even now she knew he could feel her exhaustion, her conflict, her rage, her grief, her fear, all of it as he could then. Healing him drained her further than she thought possible; she was still unsure how she had managed to stay conscious long enough to reach Ahch-To at all.
The next memory has its own gravity, pressing her so hard into the ground that she has to brace her hands in the mud to keep from falling forward; the lightsaber slips into the grass and rolls away as she recalls how her traitorous mouth had given him the last thing that was hers and hers alone. The last secret she had kept behind her thickest walls.
“I did want to take your hand...Ben’s hand.”
And there it was. The truth.
It was right, noble even, to want to save him, to want to retrieve him from the grasp of the dark side and return him triumphantly to the light. But it was also a lie.
Somewhere along the way, her motivations had changed. She no longer cared what side he was on. She no longer cared what side she was on. She knew only that she wanted them to be on the same one. And if that meant going to his side instead of bringing him to hers, there was a part of her that felt that would be just as good. But she had known it was wrong. Wrong to want that. Wrong to be content with such a choice. Yet, even the final straw that kept her from taking his hand was a selfish one. She’d sensed his instability, known that the life he was offering would be the death of them both. Known she would lose the flash of Ben Solo she had finally found to Kylo Ren and then she would be lost along with him. No. That was Kylo Ren’s offer behind Ben’s hand. She would not go along and watch anyone, including Kylo Ren, take Ben from her.
She had been startled, afraid of the sudden possessiveness with which she had regarded Ben Solo in that moment. She didn’t want him to belong to the dark side, not because it was evil or wrong, but because she wanted him to belong to her. With her.
Unable to stay and face his reaction to the truth her selfishness alongside everything else warring inside her, she’d fled. Both in the throne room and on the Death Star she had run away.
And he had followed.
******
Now Ben stands no more than two feet behind her. His presence cast over her, a shadow not reliant on sunlight. Her thoughts and emotions beat away at him, tidal waves against sea cliffs.
The grief of his mother’s loss still hangs around him, clinging to him like his soaked clothes. Her grief mingling with it. He pushes it away, allowing it to stand beside him, separate but not far off. He knows he can’t do anything to help either of them if he lets it hold him too tight.
He watches her thoughts play freely across her mind, the bond open, her will too weak to put up walls against him, just like on the wreckage. He senses the memory of her desire to go with him. He allows it to wash over him, a quiet warmth taking root in his bones.
She had wanted to take his hand. Wanted to join him.
Power was the wrong thing to offer her; he knows it now. Rey didn’t want a galaxy. Rey wanted a home. Rey wanted someone to hold on to her and never let go. She wanted someone to come into her life and take root, grow strong, and stubbornly refuse to be dug up. He’d chosen the wrong angle. Chosen to appeal to her as a hero rather than a human. Yes, Rey was a hero, maybe even his hero. But being a hero couldn’t fix loneliness. Real, marrow-deep, loneliness, the kind etched in muscle and bone, the kind that needed a lifetime of companionship and love to heal.
The gathered from her memories that the temptation of his offer had not been the power to be heroic, to influence, but rather to be by someone’s side. To have someone be by her side. To take a hand, not as a contract of power, but as a gesture of connectedness, of comfort.
He could see now that Rey had, even for the briefest moment, desired to put aside the right thing, the good thing, the heroic thing in favor of the one thing she wanted most. The one thing Ben Solo, not Kylo Ren, had to give. And the guilt was eating her alive.
The guilt of a hero who stopped caring about being one when offered her greatest wish. She had wanted to go with him, light or dark it had not mattered---a thought that caught his breath up a tied almost giddy knots in his stomach. He had once told her she was not alone, and she had believed him. Trusted him, even, to be someone who would not allow her to feel alone. And the temptation of never feeling alone again was almost enough to make her abandon the fight to bring him to the light.
He could tell that her admission of these things to him on the wreckage of the Death Star was no small thing. The shame attached to the memory, even now, was unmistakable. He found, strangely, that this sparked the greatest hatred for the Resistance he had ever felt. They had placed her on a pedestal, hailed her as their hero, and added far more than the recommended dose of responsibility. They had put this pressure on her to always choose good over herself. It made him think of Snoke, Palpatine, even Hux. With them there was always some greater cause, something more important than what he felt or wanted. He knew how she felt, probably more than anyone else.
A dyad indeed.
She shivers again.
He steps closer, crouching behind her. He unfurls his cloak, retrieved from the TIE, at least a little drier than the both of them, and drapes it over her shoulders.
He feels her force signature flicker as he waves his hand, tipping her mind gently into unconsciousness. It doesn’t take much. He catches her by the shoulders as she tips forward, and draws her into his arms as he had in the woods after their first meeting. He extends his hand again, summoning his grandfather’s lightsaber and tucking it into his belt before rising from the mud with Rey in his arms.
With a gentle probing, he extracts the location of the huts Luke and the caretakers once inhabited and sets off towards them. Smoke from the burning heap that was once his faithful TIE Whisper curls behind him, a faint echo of some dark voice floats with it. The Wayfinder. He will return for it once Rey is settled and warm.
He marches along, long strides carrying him across the muddy hills; he feels Rey’s stir. He pauses, adjusting her in his arms and tucking his cape around her more snugly.
Her hand comes to rest against his chest, just over his heart as it pounds behind his ribs, leaping towards her fingers. He forgets to breathe. But then the fitful expression twisting her features fades slightly, creases of worry smoothing away with each beat of his heart against her fingertips.
No one but the sea catches his tiny smile.
Next Part
#reylo#reylo fic#ben solo#ben x rey#reyben#rey#star wars tros#tros spoilers#tros fix it#reylo fanfic#reylo fanfiction#reylo fic rec#my writing#reylo fix it
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