#i would say that's like!! implicitly a pretty weird way to write gay people!

[keister-meister]

I'm currently watching the Bohemian Rhapsody film and it's got me thinking about how silly it is that this whole 70's rock aesthetic has become practically inseparable from the popular Marauders era fanon.

Like... we all know what the Marauders era looks like in a lot of fanon. Everything is kind of sepia, the Marauders wear nothing but bell-bottom jeans and t-shirts and denim and leather jackets, they rock those fluffy, shaggy 70's 'dos, light up a cigarette like every five minutes and maybe most importantly, they spend their free time listening to whatever the author's/OP's favorite popular 70's band is on a muggle record player whenever they're not busy participating in muggle protests for gay rights.

What's up with making the Marauders basically muggles in all but name only? Aside from projection? We know at least two of them were pureblood wizards, the third was a half-blood who grew up in the wizarding world (Remus had to hide being a wizard AND a werewolf – what are the chances that his parents would have allowed him to hang out with muggle children?) and the fourth was most likely either pureblood or half-blood. Point is... they all grew up in the wizarding culture, as far as we know, and whatever muggle influence Remus as a half-blood would have had from his mother would certainly not have included current fashion and popular music – those are things youth get from peers.

The boys likely wouldn't have had much contact with muggle culture until Hogwarts... but from what we know from canon, there doesn't seem to be much muggle culture in Hogwarts either. The kids from wizarding backgrounds just stick to their own things, and the muggle-borns seem to mostly adapt to the wizarding world. Also, muggle technology doesn't work in Hogwarts, so that's it for music records, movies and TV-shows being shared.

We also know from canon that the wizards as whole just aren't keen on integrating or adapting aspects of the muggle world into theirs, even if it was possible. They still write on parchment with quills and ink, FFS. Arthur Weasley was apparently the most notable connoisseur of muggle culture, yet he didn't even remember the word "telephone" correctly. While Harry's generation of wizard youth is said to dress in muggle clothes outside Hogwarts (which I assume was Rowling's way of making Harry's generation in particular more relatable to the reader), we are shown that adult/older wizards are mostly clueless about muggle clothing... to the point of old men wearing floral night dresses (no judging tho).

All I'm saying is... if the wizard society as a whole – not just the few pureblood fanatics – wasn't pretty much unreceptive of the ways of the muggle world, there's just no way they would have that medieval/victorian thing going on in the late 20th century. They would not wear robes and cloaks as everyday clothes. They would have debit cards instead of carrying gold around, they would write with mechanical pencils and they would definitely use some magic-powered version of a cell phone instead of... sending an owl or putting their head in a fireplace. Dumbledore would not be seen as the progressive icon he apparently is just because he thinks it would be evil to kick muggle-born magical people into concentration camps to be executed. IDK, the bar is pretty low.

The fact that the wizards haven't adopted many modern muggle inventions and ways of doing things even when they would be more convenient suggests that valuing tradition is something that is implicitly taught to all wizards. They either see their own ways as superior, or just don't feel compelled to change what is familiar just because something else might be more efficient or convenient. And it makes sense because isn't this how humans work a lot of the time when it comes to new, unfamiliar things, although maybe less extreme? Like, how America as a whole is still mostly averse to bidets, despite the fact that rinsing your ass with water is obviously a better way to clean up than just smearing around with a dry piece of paper? (Sorry for the shitty example.)

This is why I feel like the Marauders wouldn't be anywhere near as "muggle" as they are usually portrayed in fanon. I don't see any reason why they would be so different from Harry, Ron and Hermione – none of whom were into muggle things in canon, despite being "progressive" and despite two of them actually having been raised in the muggle world before Hogwarts. Teenagers don't tend to become invested in popular culture like fashion and music until after the age of 11, and these kids spend all but two(?) months a year at Hogwarts surrounded by wizarding culture. Since the expectation is that they stay in the wizarding world, why would they be interested in keeping up with the trends of the muggle world? I can see this being important enough for someone who is muggle-born and maintains close relationships in the muggle world, but for purebloods? No way.

Anyway, we know there are wizarding musicians (although maybe two were mentioned), wizarding games, wizarding fashion, wizarding literature, wizarding magazines, wizarding sports... so why not get creative and expand on that, instead of making everyone basically muggle? Like, it's interesting that most fic writers don't take the chance to explore the possibilities of wizarding youth culture beyond what is shown in the books. What if there was a wizarding band that had the same vibe as Queen or ABBA or the Sex Pistols or whatever band you want the Marauders to like? What if instead of everyone just smoking regular muggle cigarettes, there was some different habit that was popular with the wizard kids? Wizard drugs?

I guess people love the idea of Marauders being the definition of cool, but we forget that what is cool to us is generally stupid or insignificant to wizards, and what is cool for wizards is just... silly fairytale nonsense to us. The Marauders who wear like... high-collared Diricawl feather cloaks and smoke Purple Pixie grass or whatever through a nostril pipe while listening to some band called the Bad Goblins, or whatever whimsical things Rowling would probably come up with, just don't scream "cool guys" to us like the Marauders smoking cigs and wearing leather jackets do.

IDK, let's just be real, the canon Marauders would be scoffing at bad-tasting muggle cancer sticks, laughing at how silly muggles look in their bell-bottoms, listening to weird wizarding music... what's so wrong with that?

#the marauders #marauders fanon #marauders era #pro snape #<that one is because i know a lot of frequenters in that tag will agree with this

[cant-think-of-anything]

I think part of the reason that there’s such a dissonance between what kind of character Matthew is ~supposed~ to have and what kind of poor traits shine through, especially in his treatment of Alastair, is not just because of CC’s poor handling of alcoholism (and, in my opinion, mental health issues and depression) but also because: Our first introduction to these characters happened a long ways before some major changes to TLH.

Namely… Alastair and Cordelia were basically white in CC’s original planning. There’s just no way around that. Their flower cards, where they’re not just whitewashed but purely white, prove that (and they STILL haven’t been updated, by the way.)

Also, Alastair’s hair: in CoG it was dyed blond, and CC wrote it off implicitly as a racism thing when she decided he was Persian (which I guess happened after the short story where we met Alastair and before TLH) , which would have been fine it if it was an arc written better. Except, I don’t think she realized that it would make Matthew’s comments about Alastair inherently and obviously racist, being a white author. And I doubt that it will be dealt with and named or even acknowledged outright in the final TLH installment.

Kind of the same thing with Cordelia. I’m not saying POC can’t have like red hair because obviously POC don’t come in a prepackaged set of five or six traits that are all configured randomly, but something has always rubbed me the wrong way about the way that CC writes the majority of her POC and especially WOC as exotic. I mean, Kamala as a character is to me a special favorite (even though CC did her dirty and didn’t do a good job portraying her character or intersectional identity) but I rolled my eyes so hard when she had lighter brown or “amber” eyes in canon or officially commissioned art. With Cordelia, I know CC once said she uses henna to redden her hair which is great for her, and I guess I have less of a bone to pick with that because it’s semi(?) realistic, but still. Also the fact that so much of her description as a beautiful person comes from her hair. Again that’s cool, and women of color should be loved wholly including being loved for the parts of them that they freely change (such as Cordelia’s hair) but… the proportion of the fixation on her hair as what makes her lovely rubs me the wrong way sometimes. I feel like it’s sometimes an out from CC making the ~scandalous~ decision that a woman of color can be beautiful because of the traits she is born with. Idk it’s just for me I had this long standing repulsion towards my colorings and my facial structure and white girls would tell me I was whiny about it and then I finally began to piece together things like “Eurocentric beauty standards.”

Going on a tangent slightly, but something else that bothered me was when Anna insulted Cordelia after buying her those dresses and everyone kinda treating it as a compliment? And just cause Cordelia, a fictional teenager, didn’t get mad about it doesn’t mean readers of color can’t see the underlying racism behind “Cordelia looks MUCH better in these dresses which are SUITED for her skin tone.”

I think that narrative could have been handled much better: if it was Cordelia picking out her own clothes as an act of maturity and self-realization and ownership, if Cordelia herself said (in a different way lol) “Damn right I can wear lavender ruffles if I want to and crimp my hair but I’m not going to let white fashion prevent me from outshining everyone because dark skinned women INVENTED jewel tones.” And I think some people will argue that Cordelia’s context makes this too self aware of a development but I would say that it would have been a powerful part of her development outside of her relationships, especially considering that she’s supposed to be a main protagonist. Full arcs for the win baby!

But even aside from all that what bothered me about Anna’s dresses was the fact that it was a white woman showing the “truth” or the “right way” or “saving” a woman of color, a trope which I don’t think CC intended but committed nonetheless. I think from a white author POV the thinking was “Anna is such a free bohemian who lives true to herself and she’s going to help Cordelia become that way too,” which irks me because I feel like that just worked against CC in terms of POC rep and also because that same ideology is used in an attempt to make Anna’s treatment of Kamala justified even though Anna as an out person, with racial and economic privilege and the support of an extensive and powerful family network, pressured and tormented Kamala into coming out.

I have a lot of thoughts on that relationship, mainly: it shouldn’t have been dragged out this long because from the beginning, Every Exquisite Thing, it was clear they were looking for different things. And if CC had left it at that and let them go on their separate ways after a week of knowing each other that would have been fine: Kamala can’t do an out and proud relationship and Anna doesn’t want secrecy, so they’ll develop on their own. And then later Kamala’s pursuit of Anna in the actual TLH books was I think meant to be a thing about “the lengths you’ll go for true love” but it felt forced. Honestly… It just feels icky. like this woman of color is just so hung up on this white woman who abuses her repeatedly and can’t handle her own misogyny and internalizations. And I hate that because both had such awesome potential! To me it’s less that I dislike Anna ( I’d need a whole other post to explain that) and more that I dislike CC for wanting so bad to claim sapphic rep but not wanting to put in the effort to portray it effectively- and pretty much all that entails is writing the relationship without acting like it exists in a pseudo-vacuum where the history and realities of interracial relationships and queerphobia don’t exist in the way we obviously recognize and experience.

And characters like Cordelia and Alastair are amazing and have so much potential; I think the true origin of the problems with their portrayal is that they weren’t really intended as POC or even queer representation in the first place. I don’t know if Cassie would have taken a different approach to her characterization had she known Alastair would be a brown gay man when she first introduced him, but I hope it would have at least made her more conscientious of the inherent application of colonialism and racism in her storytelling from that point onward.

I want to finally add that I’m not saying any portrayal of racism is bad. I’m saying that the racism in the story is not part of a conscious framework that critiques racism appropriately. I think CC wrote the beginnings of the narrative, decided she was going to develop the diversity point content, and then either didn’t look back at the older content to analyze it and the other (white characters) through a new lens of race and outsiderness and queer personhood, or she looked at it and didn’t know what to do with it, or looked at it and didn’t care.

Sorry this got so long! Thanks for listening.

- A.

I feel like CC handled everything poorly in regards to characters who had a lot of potential.

The fact that Cordelia and Alastair are both originally white and it's so obvious in the way every bit of racism is handled by the characters. Matthew's comments in CLS are very important and they should've been handled with the same severity that Alastair's words were. CC changing the characters to POC was a big decision and when she did so she should've went back and actually read her own material. I can assure you that it will not be handled in CHOT, my expectations for CC recognizing the importance and gravity in the words she writes regarding racism or any of her "implied racism" bullshit have gone to the ground.

Because while golden eyes are obviously so easy to write when discussing discrimination obviously racism is out of the question /j

THAT'S EXACTLY IT, women of color in these books are so pathetically rare that on the rare occurrence that she does write them they should all be given these features that aren't as common in POC and written as more beautiful because of those features. I read CHOG after I became more appreciative of my ethnic features but if I had read this a year or so ago? Or even if I had read it after just feeling insecure in general? It would've been awful. The implication is that the lighter features in POC are the most beautiful, with Cordelia's red hair being put on a higher pedestal than her dark eyes and Kamala's eyes being focused on more than her hair (because I literally went back and counted the numbers to prove it and it's exactly what happens.)

I'm sure Cordelia's hair is stunning, but it's the way that when she's described (or more accurately being sexualized) it is just her hair and body that is shown, not the color of her skin or the color of her eyes.

God the pastel thing pisses me off so much. It's not even that Anna tells Cordelia that she would look better in darker colors it's that she says it suits her skin tone. Implying that anyone with brown skin should be barred from wearing pastels. And Kamala? In the few times she is described, she's wearing dark colors or champagne gold, never light blue or purple or pink WHICH HONESTLY SUITS HER PERSONALITY. It's also the way that the dresses Anna sent her are described to be more revealing- it's weird. Anna barely knew her when she started dictating everything that Cordelia could put on her body.

“Damn right I can wear lavender ruffles if I want to and crimp my hair but I’m not going to let white fashion prevent me from outshining everyone because dark skinned women INVENTED jewel tones.”

I literally would have loved that. It recognizes that she doesn't need to follow these "rules" on what to wear but still shows her choosing what she wants to wear without making all the darker skinned readers feel like they can't wear a certain color.

I think what some people fail to realize is that these books are also aimed at upper elementary and middle school and a middle schooler with dark skin reading something like that? In a book with characters they love? It's going to be so harmful

Someone else mentioned that CC said Kamanna's relationship was complicated because Kamala didn't defend Anna: Defend her FROM WHAT? Literally what is there to threaten Anna?

These books are filled with tokenism and then praised for it. The idea of Kamala X Anna has so much potential but they're portrayed in such a toxic way. Throughout the last through books Kamala puts herself through so much guilt and regret and turmoil just for Anna to literally use her, blame her, and cast her aside. And it's so fucking annoying because it pushes this idea that this woman of color who was terrified and in an extremely vulnerable position is in the wrong for choosing her safety and presents them as guilty and shameful for doing such a thing.

I would disagree, the portrayal of racism is bad, because it is used at random points in the story and never brought up again, if you interduce racism take it seriously it's not the kind of thing you're meant to half-ass in a book thousands of people will read

I agree on everything else though, so much of these books are incredibly harmful and they are presented to a young audience so it's overall just a gross situation

Thank you for the ask though! I loved answering this, if you ever have anything else you're more than welcome to come back <3

#kamala joshi #alastair carstairs #cordelia carstairs #tw racism #tw sexualization of minors #tw sexualization #anti anna lightwood #anon #asks #tw swearing #long post #tlh #anti cc #the last hours #let me know if i missed a tag #also let me know if i got anything wrong

[ordinaryschmuck]

Starkid Musicals Ranked from Worst to Best

Salutations to you, random people on the internet who most certainly won’t read this. I am an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and draw comics and cartoons.

Welp. I finally did it. I've watched the entire Starkid musical library, and I must say, most of these plays fit my writing style perfectly:

Humor that is cynical yet random

Leaning in with comedy while sprinkling in some well-executed drama

An understanding that any type of story works as long as the cast of varying personalities of characters is dynamic enough to result in some phenomenal chemistry.

This is in almost all of their plays, excelled through fantastic writing and stellar performances driving the overall quality. And it inspired me not only to review each musical, but also ranking them all from worst to best. Or, more accurately, least good to most good. Because even at their "worst," Starkid still provides a funny, enjoyable experience that will keep you laughing with its comedy and your toes tapping with its catchy music. So strap in as I go in-depth into how Starkid proves how they are the masters of humor and melody.

(I'll also provide links to each musical, which is all for free on YouTube, so you can check them out yourselves. Just know that their early work is impossible to enjoy without subtitles, so you might want to have Closed Captions on when watching.)

#12-Holy Musical B@man-Everything about this play makes it seem like it's the weakest to me. The jokes, songs, and characters in Holy Musical B@tman just don't hit as hard as Starkid's other plays. It's still good, but compared to their best, the cracks show a lot more. That is, except for the ending. Not only is there a great speech that shows what makes superheroes so beloved, but "Super Friends" might just be my favorite finale song Starkid has ever put out. Holy Musical B@tman may not be the best, but it's at least worth the time.

#11-Firebringer-This was stupid. Really stupid. Funny as f**k, but still pretty stupid. Although I will give credit to one of the central pairings being LGBTQA+...Even though it makes little to no sense based on the characters' previous interactions. But in fairness, Starkid really sucks at writing good romantic relationships, so at least Firebringer has the benefit of being gay. And as we all know: The gayer, the better. The play is still stupid, though.

#10-Me and My Dick-The world in this musical makes little to no sense. Penises and vaginas are sentient and can communicate with their humans. And yet the penises and vaginas can also talk with each other, form relationships, leave their humans, and reinsert themselves into others--Yeah, it makes no sense...But, DAMN, is it funny! Every joke and innuendo Me and My Dick has about human anatomy works, and I could not stop laughing at each of them. Especially the names that were given to the vaginas, which are just...I mean, I'm laughing just by thinking about them. That should tell you how funny they are. This play might be illogical in every way, but if you turn your brain off and watch it for the humor, you'll definitely be in for something fun.

#9-ANI: A Parody-What's weird about ANI is that its best qualities are also weaknesses. A good chunk of the jokes are hilarious and expertly delivered. The issue is that most of them are about taking potshots at the Star Wars prequels, which might be the laziest jokes to make in a Star Wars parody. Then there's the soundtrack, having several songs that are a bop to listen to. The problem is that ANI suffers from the same issues as Tarzan and Brother Bear: Yes, technically, it is a musical, but it's one where none of the characters sing, and some people in the background do all the singing instead. It's all an odd balancing act of quality content made through questionable choices. ANI is still an entertaining play, but the force isn't as strong with this one.

#8-Black Friday-This might be the least funny play that Starkid has ever put out. Not just because it leans extra hard into drama, which was pretty effective during certain scenes. It's just when there are jokes in Black Friday, they tend to fall flatter more here than they did in other plays. Also, the plot of Black Friday might not be the best one to play straight. The serious moments work best when focusing on the characters and their personal struggles, but through the big bad that's supposed to be threatening? Not so much. Even if it was meant to be funny, well, I wasn't laughing. And believe it or not, I consider that to be the best judge of whether or not something is funny. That being said, while Black Friday isn't the most humorous Starkid musical, it's still pretty good. The characters are excellent, the songs are awesome, and the story is somewhat easy to follow. I would have appreciated a few more laughs, but I can respect these talented people wanting to challenge their strengths.

#7-Starship-This play feels very...Disney. It follows a familiar formula we've seen several times: The main character wants more than what he has in his crappy life, miraculously gets the exact thing he wants, falls in love with a girl in a short amount of time, faces off against a campy/over the top villain, realizes the hand he's been dealt isn't so bad, and in the end, gets what he wants anyway. Starship is still pretty entertaining through its jokes, characters, and songs, but it also feels weird that Starkid leans into these tropes when they would eventually make a much better play by making fun of them. The end result is not bad in the slightest, but it's also nowhere near their best.

#6-A Very Potter Musical-Starkid's first production, and boy, what a start to something wonderful. Every one of their gimmicks and motifs is present in A Very Potter Musical. The use of parody to playfully mock characters and stories they love, making songs that are as funny as they are emotional, and creating characters that work because of their lines and the actors' performances. Oh, and also, it's funny. And it’s not just through a parody angle, like making Cedric be a perfect boy who's always smiling. It's also funny through its jokes that work, even if you ignore the fact that it’s a parody altogether. Case in point, there are these two bits, one involving Voldemort and Beatrix with the other involving Ron and Hermoine, that are written and delivered so well that I was in tears much more than with any other Starkid play. When watching A Very Potter Musical, you'll not only understand how parody works, but you'll also gain an understanding of why Starkid turned out as successful as they did.

#5-The Trail to Oregon-What can I say? I'm a sucker for comedic dysfunctional families. And seeing a family of idiots make their way to Oregon via The Oregon Trail parody? Yeah, that's a win for me. The play may be another family road trip narrative, which some people might get sick of at this point. But because the dynamics and comedic chemistry everyone has with each other are on point, the end result proves that you don't need an original story to tell an entertaining one. Although I will say that out of all of Starkid's productions, The Trail to Oregon has by far the worst ending. Without giving anything away, the play spends way too much time on this one stupid joke that any of the characters could make. Comedy is defined by personalities, as are most things, so making the joke work for anyone is a bad move when this one, in particular, doesn't fit as well for some characters as it would for others. Plus, the finale song "Naked in a Lake" is a really poor choice to cap off this musical. It's catchy, but to me, a finale song should encapsulate everything about the story, characters, and themes. Not paying off a joke that I honestly wouldn't want the payoff for. So while the ending could have used a lot more polish, that doesn't change how The Trail to Oregon is a pretty funny play that I won't mind revisiting when I have the chance.

#4-A Very Potter Sequel-Hey, sometimes a sequel is better than the original. Sure some jokes don't land, and some story beats aren't as impactful as they thought they were (Serious Black's introduction, for example), but there are far more improvements to this play than the last one. The performances are stronger, the jokes are funnier, the music is catchier, and the characters are much more entertaining in this play than in A Very Potter Musical. Especially new additions like Lupin and Lucious Malfoy, who provide great comedy and sublime drama at times. And Umbridge. Sweet Mother of all that is holy, Umbridge. While A Very Potter Sequel never made me laugh to tears as the first play did, twice, Professor Umbridge carries the comedy so well that she surpasses all of that. Plus, on top of it all, this play nails its ending through a bittersweet note that really captures what makes Hogwarts so special to these characters. I always feel like Starkid's plays tend to lose steam during the last few minutes, but A Very Potter Sequel is one of the few instances that it just builds and builds to a perfect ending. A Very Potter Sequel might not always hit the right marks, but the results are just magical when it does get it right.

#3-The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals-This one is pretty clever. The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals is one of those stories that manages to be explicitly hilarious yet implicitly disturbing. For instance, people suddenly bursting into perfectly choreographed musical numbers in a world where songs are exclusively diegetic is pretty funny (especially through the characters' reactions to it). However, knowing what happens to these people and why they sing and dance so expertly helps make the whole situation pretty dire. It's an excellent balancing act that not many stories can accomplish. And while The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals leans one way or the other at times, it's still all handled really well. Oh, and also, you know how most people say the villain song is the best one in any musical? Well, technically speaking, nearly every song in The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals is the villain song. Including the finale, which is just too brilliant for me not to give a round of applause. If you're a person who unfortunately doesn't like musicals either, I'd say be more than willing to give this one a chance. It's funny, catchy, and if you think of the implications, pretty damn disturbing.

#2-A Very Potter Senior Year-...You know how Avengers: Endgame is a bit of a mess, yet people still love it for how much of a perfect (sort of) finale it is? It's the same regard with A Very Potter Senior Year in my eyes. It's far from a masterpiece, but the many, many solid scenes that cap off this series help make me willing to overlook the mistakes. The characters, callbacks, and overall message about how things end was done so expertly well that I physically can’t hate this one. I can understand how it's more of an ok play when compared to the rest of Starkid's productions, but sometimes, ok is wonderful.

#1-Twisted: An Untold Story of a Royal Vizier-...It's Twisted. Everyone loves Twisted! And how could they not? Everything about this play just screams Starkid at their best. The comedy is uproarious, added with the fantastic delivery of the actors and the characters' personalities. Everyone feels as though they have one step in reality and the other in insanity. This, to me, seems like the best type of character work when going for the parody angle. Parody is about giving slight yet snide remarks toward the work you're mocking, which I feel works best when characters drop the suspension of disbelief audiences have when enjoying such a story. And Twisted definitely nails its satire in not only poking fun at Aladdin but also making jokes towards Disney as a brand. From their movies to their inside jokes to their formulas to even their corporate dealings with Pixar, nothing about Disney is sacred in Twisted. But on top of being funny, Twisted might just be the most successful Starkid has been with telling some really compelling drama. The jokes allow themselves to take a back seat to let serious moments play out, and even comedy is added, it provides more for the experience rather than taking anything away. You see this not only through the actors giving it their all but even through some really gorgeous and heart wrenching musical numbers. Oh, and also, Twisted has the best Starkid soundtrack, featuring songs that are epic, funny, and, as I said, heartbreaking. You cannot get better than this and, if you want to get a friend interested in Starkid as a whole, this might be the play for them. Scheherazade may have a thousand tales, but his one is a tale I wouldn't mind hearing for a thousand nights.

And that's about how I feel about Starkid and each and every one of their plays. Odds are your ranking would be much different from mine, and I'm all for that differing opinions. Feel free to make your own ranking if you want because I'm honestly curious where fans would place these plays above or below others. I'm relatively new to enjoying their work, so I have no idea what the consensus is. I do know one thing, though: If Starkid can still be incredibly entertaining through over ten years of content, then I am excited to see what they can accomplish next in another ten years.

#starkid #holy musical b@man #firebringer #me and my dick #ani: a parody #black friday #a very potter trilogy #the trail to oregon #the guy who didn't like musicals #twisted: the untold story of a royal vizier

[semper-legens]

90. Scythe, by Neal Shusterman

Owned?: No, library Page count: 443 My summary: What if nobody died any more? Disease, injury, age...all has been cured. But with a growing population, some people must go. And for that, there are the scythes. The only way to die is to be gleaned by a scythe - so when Citra and Rowan are chosen to be apprentices, they are not sure how to feel. But the scythes are not as impartial as they are meant to be, and Citra and Rowan soon find themselves in a deadly game, for which the price of losing is death. My rating: 4/5 My commentary:

Scythe! I hear that this is one of those particularly well-liked YA series, but I had literally never heard of it before my friend recommended it. Neal Shusterman was known to me, however - I read the Skinjacker trilogy when I was a kid and loved it, and also I read Unwind, which sure was a book. I didn’t realise any of that before getting halfway through, though. On the whole - fun, ambitious, inventive, not without its worldbuilding problems but still a good time overall.

Let’s start with our protagonists, Citra and Rowan. First off - there was an early scene where they were all ‘I’m not gonna fall in love with you’ ‘No chance of that’, and I was so hoping that meant that one or both of them would end up being gay. Alas, they kissed later, it was weird and gratuitous and I didn’t like it. Anyway. Citra and Rowan seemed to me to be reasonably standard YA protagonists - not bad or anything, just without much to distinguish them from all the other YA protags I’ve read. They were plucky, opinionated, determined, compassionate, and not bad protagonists or anything, I just couldn’t get really invested? 

So let’s move on to other characters. And by characters, I mean character, and by character, I mean Scythe Faraday. I love him. Maybe it’s just the fact that I’m a sucker for an opinionated mentor character in general, but I really clicked with him. He was awesome. I think the fact that we don’t learn a lot about him is a factor here - there’s an element of mystery, of filling in the blanks about him. Curie, Citra’s second mentor, had much the same effect on me - I liked how they were contrasted to show different approaches to the work of a scythe.

There’s many things I could say about the worldbuilding in this novel, and believe me, I’m gonna. One feature I’ve found in Shusterman’s writing is that he’s incredibly inventive and imaginative, but doesn’t necessarily think through the implications of his worldbuilding. This book’s a good example - it’s the future, we cured death, and ethnicity is measured with percentages like an ancestry.com report...but it’s still a pretty heteronormative world (no non-straight relationships are mentioned), everyone’s a binary gender and implicitly cis, and the culture seems pretty much the same as normal American culture with a few outliers. Religion’s not a thing any more either, apart from cults that worship sound called ‘tone cults’. That last feels like a very pretty Western, culturally-Christian (though wikipedia tells me Shusterman is Jewish, so there’s that) thing, the idea that We Are Better Off Without Any Religions At All. Because the world is presented as something of a utopia, or at least not quite a dystopia-masked-as-utopia. Death is cured, people have better quality of life, and the scythes may be corrupt but its a corruption that can be solved. So the idea that religions don’t exist, gender norms are still a thing, and ethnicity isn’t a Big Deal feels like the product of a certain outlook that I don’t quite get on with. 

And, you know, I talked a bit about this being a standard YA, so I need to mention how it surprised me. There were a few plot points throughout that really shook things up for me - first, the deadly competition between Rowan and Citra, although granted that’s on the back of the book, then what happens to Faraday, then Rowan going rogue towards the end - and took me completely by surprise, I wasn’t expecting them. Maybe because I was expecting a more standard novel, I had my guard down? Whatever the reason, I was pleasantly surprised by the way they shook up the status quo and added something new to the ongoing story - though I did think Citra’s little journey was wrapped up way too quickly for the climax.

Overall, I liked it! If I saw the sequels in the library, I’d probably pick ‘em up.

#Scythe #Neal Shusterman #book blogging #book blog #bookblr #4

[sebastianshaw]

Rando Munday ramblings! For new followers, on Munday sometimes I just post a bunch of personal stuff I normally wouldn’t. Not usually anything intimately personal, more like random thoughts and news that just isn’t relevant to the blog in any way, not related to X-Men or RP or writing in general, etc. ....there’s a lot of Hannibal today, sorry, I’m rewatching it.

- I definitely wanna have a pair of critters named Hannibal and Hasdrubal at some point, maybe if there's a third I'd name him Hamilcar. I know everyone will think I named them after Hannibal Lector but actually these are really common names from Ancient Carthage. Like if you look at Carthagian history and records, everyone is Hannibal, Hasdrubal, or Hamilcar, it's like John, James, and Jim. I'd prefer the pair, though, since Hannibal and Hasdrubal were a pair of brothers and famous historical figures, so it would feel much more like a "set" that way (whereas they did not have a brother called Hamilcar) - Speaking of Hannibal Lector, I knew he was based on a real person, but I did not realize that person was a gay Mexican man. That’s...an interesting example of gay history, for sure. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, Thomas Harris (the writer of the books that the films and later the TV series were based on) based Hannibal on a surgeon he met while interviewing an inmate at prison for another novel. This surgeon was so intelligent and charismatic that Harris implicitly assumed that he was a doctor in the employ of the prison. Nope---the doctor was an inmate himself. Harris was so shaken by the encounter that it inspired him to create Hannibal Lector, who, in contrast to the typical media portrayals of serial killers as uncontrolled lunatic slashers like Michael Myers or Leatherface, is a charming, culture, charismatic intellectual. To protect the man’s identity, Harris called him “Dr. Salazar” in interviews, so that was always how I knew him. I just now learned not only was his real name Alfredo Balli Trevino, but his victim was Jesus Castillo Rangel, his male lover. Harris describes him as a small, lithe man with dark red hair and, unsurprisingly, “a certain elegance about him”. Though Trevino was given the death penalty for his crimes, his sentence was commuted to 20 years and he was released in either 1980 or 1981. He died in in 2009 when he was 81 years old. He reportedly spent the last years of his life helping the poor and elderly, and he expressed deep regret for his “dark past”---which I suppose makes sense, since his crime was that he killed a lover in a fit of rage during an argument, whereas Hannibal simply killed people in cold blood whom he had no attachment to because he liked eating them (something Trevino never did) and to punish them for rudeness. - I’ve decided to stop buying silk, unless it's from a thrift store and thus my money won't go to supporting sericulture. Ahimsa silk isn't an option either, the bugs aren't technically killed but they're not treated well either. I know it might seem weird to eat meat and wear leather and yet not want to purchase something that hurt moths and larva, but...I have to eat meat for medical reasons, and my leather purchases is limited to boots that I then keep for YEARS AND YEARS so it's very sparing. There's really no such thing as a cruelty-free diet or lifestyle, whether that cruelty is suffered by animals or by other humans, but I can still make choices that at least lesson some small aspect of harm. I need to eat meat, I don't need real silk. ...Haven only wears bamboo silk for this reason and when this came up with Shaw, he absolutely thought she was fucking with him, like even SHE can’t be THIS insane, NO ONE ACTUALLY CARES ABOUT BUGS WTF - The books nearest to me right now are “Women Who Run With The Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype ” by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Romantic Period, “X-Men: The Legacy Quest Trilogy” by Steve Lyons, two  horror anthologies, the script for “M. Butterfly” by David Henry Hwang, “The Spanish Riding School of Vienna: Tour of America 2005″ book I got from when I went to see the Lippizanner horses perform, and a big beautiful leatherbound English translation of “The Flowers of Evil” by Charles Baudelaire. This is...this is a summary of my whole personality, sans rodents. Also god I need to clean my room. - Something I've noticed is that many sci-fi horror films that do the whole "science went too far against nature!!!" thing....don't actually have the problem result from the lack of ethics involved or because the scientists did something "unnatural", it happens because they didn't follow basic safety precautions, lab protocol, common sense, etc. "Splice" for instance, is a really good example---the problem isn't that they made a part-human hybrid, that's not why shit goes wrong, shit goes wrong because the two scientists act like idiots, adopt the creation as a child, hide it in their barn instead of a sterile controlled environment, and then one of them HAS SEX WITH IT. Or in "The Fly" the problem isn't that Brundle invented a teleporter, it's that he tested it ON HIMSELF while he was ALL ALONE. Even in "Jurassic Park" the issue is less that dinosaurs are breeding and more the result of a disgruntled worker who was given way too much power over being able to run things, and thus shut them down when he wants to. So many "science gone wrong!" movies end up not really being condemnations of science itself, so much as depicting scientists as utter dumbasses. Which, on the one hand, I do like, because I dislike the notion of condemning scientific progress just because it seems icky or creepy or "goes against nature" (so do vaccines, I still like those!) But on the other hand, the movies don't FRAME it as "this is the result of failure to practice science safely and sensibly" they frame it as "they should never have attempted such an unnatural thing and this disaster is punishment for a moral sin" even though the issue doesn't happen because what the scientists did was "wrong" it happens because they do something DUMB. - Bringing it back to Hannibal, I reached the episode where Margot Verger first appears, and if I have one big disappointment about the Hannibal series, it's Margot. In the books, she's a huge butch lesbian, literally and figuratively. In the TV series, she's a pretty femme fashionista like all the other women, and she fucks Will in order to get pregnant. At the time this came out in 2013, I tried to be all resigned and fair-minded about this. I was like "ok, well, they didn't want to be offensive with a stereotype, and I guess that's fair, I guess not hurting people matters more to me than getting the horseback-riding bulldyke hearthrob of my high school years on-screen at last" but you know what? No. Firstly, butch lesbians deserve representation too. How many have you ever seen onscreen, let alone in a mainstream media production? Sure, it's a stereotype, but it's not an inherently negative one, they just get treated that way in media because society sees it that way. But the way to handle butch lesbians and femme gay men and so on isn't to erase them from the screen, it's to start writing them as human beings and not caricatures or jokes or monsters. Margot is a fleshed-out human being, she's nuanced and twisted and hurt like everyone else in this series, she would be PERFECT for that. She wouldn't be just a butch lesbian, she'd be a CHARACTER who just also happens to be a butch lesbian. I don't really think she was changed to avoid "hurting" lesbians, I think she was changed because the director, gay man or not, clearly has a way he wants the women in his series to look (they're all fashion plates, all have long hair, all very sophisticated, etc) and book Margot didn't fit his aesthetic, his design if you will. Because god forbid we just make her a DAPPER dyke, right? Back to having sex with Will, which most certainly did NOT happen in the books...that's not bad itself in a VACUUM, fucking men to get a baby is something real-life lesbians do, I had a friend in college who was actually conceived that way, but like...no media exists in a vacuum, and there is very little depiction of lesbians in media that doesn't feature them fucking men for SOME reason or another. They want a baby, or they start the story with a boyfriend, or they're actually bisexual, or they're even raped, but there's always SOME reason we have to watch a guy fucking them and it's frankly distressing. Like, remember Irene Adler in BBC's Sherlock? It's a pattern. And I'm not saying lesbians who have had a sexual past with men, or who were the victims of sexual violence by men, don't deserve representation, I would never say that, those are very common experiences, I'm not saying "gold stars only", I'm saying that there is a strong pattern in media where it seems almost obligatory that a lesbian has to have sex with or be attracted to men at some point, while comparatively the opposite case, where a lesbian is depicted as exclusively and only attracted to and "with" other women, is seldom there. And it's just kind of a kick in the nads for me, as I think it was for a lot of other lesbians, butch or not, that a gay director took an opportunity like Margot Verger and turned her into just another attractive lipstick lesbian that is okay with having sex with the male protagonist as a treat tee hee (Spoiler: She does end up with Alana though, which I appreciate)

#out of shirt #munday #mun monday

[phanomeheart]

Creator tag

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 favourite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2019. Tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

Thanks so much for tagging me @etceteraseverywhere!

This was the first year that I ever posted any fic, so it’s nice/wild to be able to participate! I’m still not 100% sure how I feel about posting my writing, but it did get me to actually fully finish a story (9 of them!) for the first time in my life, and folks have been so generous with their interactions with them, so overall I’d say it’s been a positive experience. 

I also just wanna say a big thank you to @phandomficfests​ and @phanfictionevents​ cuz 8 of 9 of the fics I posted this year were for fests and I don’t think I would have had posted nearly as many (or possibly any) without the external motivation/deadline.

Below the cut cuz it got long, of course:

1. Growing Pains (T, 6.3k): Sometimes Fi thinks about how her life would be different if she had been born a boy.

My first fic and my first fem!dnp fic! I signed up for the fest to give myself a deadline and motivation and then realized writing about dnp as women was a lot harder than I’d anticipated given my own complicated relationship with womanhood. It wound up being 6k words essentially about my own journey with gender identity as told through an afab/genderqueer Phil, but people were very very kind about it and some phanfic authors who I admire a lot commented on it/reblogged it and that was so incredibly encouraging and wonderful as a first time poster.

2. Effort at Speech Between Two People (T, 2.1k): Learning a new lover is like learning a whole nother language, Phil’s mother had told him once.

My weird middle child. I wrote this fic in one sitting after listening to the poem of the same name on OursPoetic and I thought it came out kinda weird, maybe not the easiest to read, but was in the style that I like to read and write in and was just plain fun to write in a way writing hadn’t been in a while. I got a few very kind comments on it though, and I still think it’s an interesting topic.

3. just a piece of paper (G, 2.5k): Phil doesn't think marriage is just a piece of paper.

I wrote this in honor of my biggest phandom pet peeve. I just think Phil is a romantic and thinks that marriage is more than just a piece of paper. Though part of the ending is a little funny/out of date now in the post BIG/whatever Phil’s initialism is universe. 

4. turn a little faster (the world will follow after) (T, 3.7k): It takes Phil longer than perhaps it should to wrap his head around the idea of marriage. Not the concept itself—that’s pretty basic and hard to escape if you’ve ever seen a commercial or watched a movie or spoken to another person ever. One man, one woman, promising to love each other forever, build a family, have kids, make a life. That is how you construct your future, the world tells him over and over, implicitly and explicitly, surrounding him with examples of the right way to do it. It's a roadmap to success and happiness, pre-planned, waiting patiently for him to begin. One he can’t quite seem to find the you are here marker on.

I just love me some gay introspection, what can I say? Another self-indulgent queer one.

5. like a perhaps hand (which comes carefully out of nowhere) (T, 33.5k): Dan is in his second year of uni studying law– or he would be if he hadn’t failed his resits. After being talked into a semester-long leave of absence to get his life in order, he takes a job at the café of a local botanic garden through a flatmate’s family connection. Or so he thinks.

This was for the spring exchange fest and I fell in love with two of the prompts I got, and decided to combine botanic gardens and magical realism. The genre was a bit out of my comfort zone and a lot of it was written very last minute because of some life stuff going on and good old fashioned procrastination, so I’m always worried about how it came out. But a handful of people were and continue to be so incredibly kind and generous with their engagement with it and it has meant the world to me and shown me all of the wonderful possibilities of people being invested in something you created.

I’ve been off tumblr all day and have no idea who’s been tagged (@velvetnautilus? @babethepig? @itsmyusualphannie? @geniusphilester?). Do it if you’d like to! 

#my fic #2019 #it was nice to reflect in a more positive way #i do think that posting poses some challenges for me #and i'm going to try to be a bit more purposeful going forward if i continue to post past my committed prb fic #but there have been some very lovely things about it for sure #tysm to everyone who's been so kind <3 #another goal for 2020: get better at summaries if I post more fic #and use betas more/more effectively

[hipsofsteel]

bro you gotta tell me more about chris

Gladly! The dad man is important to me. And so, we meet…

Christopher “Chris” Lewis Joseph, personification of Eastern Oregon/Nyo!Oregon

Credit to crikadelic, who will not be tagged in this post for reasons.

Physical Description

At 5′10, with dark brown hair, dark brown eyes, and a slightly olive skin tone, Chris is a very good looking man. He’s got well trimmed facial hair that can be a bit scruffy and thin, but he maintains it well. He’s well muscled from his work as a cattle rancher, and general farmwork. He is half Nez Perce (Nimiipuu) and half English, born in the area of present day Joseph, Oregon in 1806, and celebrates his birthday on February 14th.

Chris’s face claim is model Julian Schratter. He has no voice claims at the moment.

Personality

Christopher and Beverly were cut from the same cloth in some respects. Controlling either of them is nearly impossible. He’s a force of nature when he wants to be, stubborn and insistent and nearly impossible to be forced to do something he refuses to do. He’s as free-spirited and wild as he wants to be.

At the same time, he shows a remarkable degree of caution and thoughtful behavior that his twin sister tends to lack. If not caught in an urgent situation or in his own whirlwind of passions, he approaches things with well-thought out responses and is a calm and collected and highly intelligent man. He’s a great person to go to for advice.

He’s also very attached to those he forms close relationships with, either as family or friends. He’ll always have his twin sister’s back, and anyone who finds themselves in the position of being “adopted” as his child has just gained an ally and parental figure who will love them and defend them endlessly. Although, dispute it as he does, he does have a favorite child (Adam).

Sexuality and Gender

Behold, the one and only heterosexual cisgender OC I’ve made for my States. Chris is an incredible ally however, who openly supports all his friends and family.

Also, his type of women is as follows, so I promise you can trust him.

And he means it.

Religion

Chris has a personally styled fusion between Christianity and the indigenous religions he was raised around on the Columbian Plateau. He is not really big on explaining his faith as it’s a deeply personal and conflicting matter even for himself, so I don’t have much more to say than that for him. However, one of his two most irreplaceable objects he owns is a copy of Henry Harmon Spalding’s translation of the Book of Matthew into Nez Perce. Take from that what you will.

Employment

Chris has previously made his living as a farmer and for a brief while as a blacksmith, but nowadays, he owns a cattle range and is a full-time rancher, with a large range area in Central/Eastern Oregon. He also raises horses on the side, both as a secondary income and to continue traditions of horse breeding he was raised in with the Nez Perce.

Pets

I’ll try to keep this brief, but Chris has seven animals he considers close pets/his long lifespan has affected theirs, so I’ll divide it into sections.

Dogs

Zip and Lucky

Zip is Chris’s working dog, a purebred blue heeler who knows how to move a cow herd as well as he knows that when Chris puts on dark and clean pants, he’s leaving the house for meetings (sadness) and when he puts on less nice “farm” pants, they’re working stock that day (happiness!)

Lucky is based on Rincon, the dog owned by Chris’s faceclaim. Lucky is a beloved pet mutt and gets to come with Chris and Zip to work cattle, although his main job is to sit and stay since he has zero Cow Sense.

Horses

Jackrabbit, Strawberry, Juniper, and Celilo

Is Chris a dog or cat person? Neither, he’s a horse person (followed by dogs).

Jackrabbit is Chris’s horse he’s had the longest, serving as Chris’s warhorse during his youth. He’s one of the fastest horses any of the western states own, and he’s very selective about who’s allowed to ride him (Christopher, Beverly, Adam, and Helen are the only people who can). He’s a wild tempered buckskin Nez Perce Horse stallion.

Strawberry is a red roan Appaloosa that Chris has had nearly as long as he’s had Jackrabbit. She’s a gentle mare and very good with people.

Juniper is a Kiger Mustang mare, slightly more testy than Strawberry, and more prone to being spooked, but she’s a good horse.

Celilo is a palomino American Quarter Horse gelding, bought to be a reliable pack-horse for Chris. He’s as gentle as Strawberry and loves people.

Jackrabbits

Little Lady or “Lady”

Once upon a time, Chris and Juniper accidentally spooked a mother jackrabbit into the claws of a hawk, and then nearly immediately found her babies. Chris raised the three kits and released them into the wild shortly afterwards, but Lady stuck around his house. She appears pretty reliably every year, and seems to have been affected by his long lifespan, so he gave her a name and treats her a bit more like a pet than anything else.

He loves to joke that Jackrabbit met an actual jackrabbit, and everyone around him glares at him.

Relationships with other States

Family first

Western Oregon/Oregon

Credit to crikadelic again.

Sometimes, your twin sister is a lumberjack lesbian (quite literally on both counts) with arms made of steel and one hell of a right hook. Also she’s way more liberal than you, and politically you get dragged along with whatever she wants.

Ironically, once upon a time, Beverly wasn’t the main personification of the Oregon Territory. It wasn’t until American settlement picked up that the power of the state swung to her. Before then, Christopher held most of the power, but this was also when the Oregon Territory including all of Washington, Idaho, parts of Montana and Wyoming, and since Chris was entirely east of the Cascades, well, it made sense that he held the upper hand. Only later as the size of the land they represented shrank did power trade hands.

As independent as Beverly is, and as willing to tell her twin to fuck off, they have a very close relationship. They tell each other off, and sparks fly between them quite often, with Beverly usually being the one to storm off while Chris remains a wall of a human being. But they’ll quietly make up out of sight later, and then be right back to joking around and teasing each other.

And when it comes to advice, Beverly has no closer confidant than her twin, and often shows him the vulnerability that no one else sees. They trust each other implicitly, knowing that despite their differences, they won’t lead the other astray. No one could ask for a better twin sister.

Eastern Washington/Nyo!Washington

Credit to ME! 

First off, he’s the one on the right, the one on the left is Idaho (we’ll get to him in a bit).

Adam Landes-Bush is the original cause of a radiation of dad energy that seeps from Christopher at pretty much every moment of every day. After retrieving Adam from the Whitman Mission shortly after the Whitman Massacre, Chris basically said “My weird looking white kid now” and ran with it.

He and Adam had to learn to live together fast with help from Helen, as Adam is mute, and Helen taught them both Plains Sign Talk. But Chris adored Adam and taught him how to shoot, hunt, ride, and accepted his limitations when he hit them. He did his best to give Adam a good life, even when it meant sending him away from impending war to live with Martha, who he barely knew then.

They remain close, sharing more culturally with each other and Idaho than they sometimes do with the western halves of their states. Chris was the first person Adam came out to, and the fact that Chris instantly accepted allowed him to embrace his identity as a gay man in a time that it was socially, at best, simply not talked about. Chris would and has killed to protect this boy, and would gladly do so again.

Western Washington/Washington

Credit to crikadelic

Martha, Adam’s younger sister, views Christopher as a father figure, and so, in turn, he’s a little nicer to her than he is to Beverly sometimes.

Christopher and Martha met at a crossroads in both their lives. Christopher had been involved in the Nez Perce War and come home feeling lost and alone. Beverly had taken off around the same time to run wild in the Southwest, leaving a still very young Martha to fend for herself and Clark, and now Adam. Martha was struggling to handle the load, and Christopher needed to find his place in this unfamiliar world, and fast.

They were able to cooperate quickly, Chris taking on the workload of the farm and helping with Clark, allowing Martha and Adam to start growing and learning the responsibilities they needed to run a state. And in exchange, Martha taught Chris how to read and write English, and helped him improve his skills in speaking the language. 

To this day, they haven’t forgotten this point in their lives, and tend to critique each other much more carefully than they critique the other halves of their states.

End of Family, onto other states

Idaho

Credit to crikadelic

Ah, Clark Ashley, who exists in the most interesting little place in Chris’s mind. He’s friends with this guy, almost a father figure, hell, helped raise the little twerp. At the same time, he’s made Adam cry before, so he could also wring his neck. 

Clark and Chris have a very good and amiable relationship in general, and enjoy the other’s company. Clark admires Chris a lot, and Chris views him like a much younger version of Beverly, carrying many of her same qualities of extreme stubbornness and rampant emotions, as much as Clark will say he’s nothing like her.

However, the root of Chris’s constant problems with Clark relies mainly on one fact. Clark’s internalized homophobia at himself that affects his and Adam’s relationship, which has swayed from deeply involved romance to barely tolerating being in the same room. When Clark and Adam get into spats with their push me, pull you, almost a relationship, Chris gets caught in the middle, and always takes Adam’s side in the fight. He’s tried to even discourage them from pursuing each other at times to end the constant back and forth, but it’s never worked.

However, as Clark’s started to accept himself in the 21st century, Chris has been the one person who’s been able to reassure him that , yes, for some crazy reason, Adam still likes you, and Chris thinks that this time, for real, Clark is unlearning the toxic culture he absorbed. So, he wishes that crazy kid lots of luck.

Southern California/California

Credit to crikadelic

To say Roberto and Christopher are antagonistic would be the nicest way of putting it. Despite pretty much being of equal levels of importance to Beverly in her family, they cannot tolerate each other.

Roberto blamed Christopher for some of the worst of Beverly’s behaviors in the 1870s and 1880s, and Christopher blamed Roberto for stifling Beverly so much that she hadn’t been able to emotionally mature. Both arguments had some validity, and yet, a divide in opinions had begun.

Nowadays, Chris and Roberto are mainly antagonistic on pure principle. Chris represents a part of Oregon that is noticeably more red, and Roberto represents 55 blue electoral college votes. Chris has been considerably affected by Californication (large real estate development projects generally seen as similar to those in California), and Roberto sees him as very set in the past and unable to move forward.

Let’s just say Beverly has to work out the holiday seating arrangements very carefully.

Montana

Credit to crikadelic

Helen Rankin has been a friend since Chris met her when the Nez Perce went to trade with the Crow. She taught him sign, became an unofficial mother figure to Adam, and, much later on, officially involved with Christopher himself (they dated from 1898 to 1927).

They’re close friends and allies still. Helen’s as strong as a mountain in more ways than one, and one of the few people who can sway Chris when he’s a storm of emotions. She can be just as stubborn as him, and yet he admires her just as she is, and she feels the same about him. She’s saved his ass so many times, and he’s saved hers a few himself. If they needed the other there, they’d be there in a heartbeat.

They also additionally have an “unofficial” daughter to accompany their unofficial son in Adam. I’ve been developing a Missoula, Montana OC (Mariah Welch), and she’s been heavily influenced by Chris over the years, and is about as damn close to him as Adam. 

A quick note

Before I move on to my next section, I have been tinkering with my canon in the last several months, after a friend who had allowed me to entwine my Statetalia canon very heavily with theirs ghosted me, and this has affected this character significantly.

Christopher had been involved with their Nyo!Texas in the modern day, with Helen as his best friend. However, no longer comfortable with using this person’s OCs, I have yet to decide if Chris and Helen have, in the last few years, rekindled their relationship, or if my own Texas OC, who is a woman and in the earliest stages of development, is in a romantic relationship with him. This is going to take a long while to decide for personal reasons, and I’m okay with that.

Other States-Brief Thoughts

Northern California/Nyo!California- Inexplicably, he likes Alejandra way more than Roberto. Probably because of their little side project for the independent state of Jefferson.

Kansas- Nowhere near as antagonistic as Beverly and Evelyn’s relationship. He will agree with Evelyn to a certain point, but then he has to start defending his sister. Anyhow, she’s cute.

Nebraska- Logan’s a decent guy to have a drink with, definitely would have been a good guy for Adam if Adam hadn’t been so focused on Clark. IF he and Helen don’t end up getting back together in canon, he’s lowkey pushing for Helen and Logan to get together.

New York- Literally irrelevant to him, why are you asking for an opinion on that jackass?

Texas- Absolutely one amazing, ass-kicking woman, with the gift of aim from the gods, a smoking hot body, and God, she could step on him frankly. (I reiterate, my Texas OC is in development and this is subject to change).

RANDOM FACTS

-Sniper man! Christopher has served as a sniper for several wars. The Nez Perce were noted marksmen during the Nez Perce War, and one of the US’s most noted snipers was from Eastern Oregon. 

-Additionally, Christopher has always served in the US Marine Corps when he’s been fighting for the US.

-He originally was given the same last name as Beverly, Joseph-Astor. He dropped Astor following the Nez Perce War as an act of protest.

-Chris has two “paired” names from when I created his character. Beverly’s middle name is Columbia, so Christopher and Columbia, after Christopher Columbus (something neither of them is very thrilled about nowadays), and his middle name of Lewis pairs with Idaho’s first name, Clark, in honor of that famous expedition.

-Has a knife that was from Lewis and Clark’s Corps of Discovery as a trading item. It’s his second most irreplaceable object.

-Speaks Nez Perce (Niimi'ipuutímt), Chinook Jargon, Crow, Plains Sign Talk, ASL, Russian, German, Spanish, Basque, and English. 

-Has the most currently established tattoos out of any of my OCs.

#casuallyeatingrocks #oc chris #aph oregon #hws oregon #nyo oregon #ask hipsofsteel #long post

[gravitationallychallengedrabbits]

The Gay Agenda Ch. 2

Step Two: How to Make Friends With Pretty Girls Without being awkward

So I found out a few weeks later through the normal gossip chains that the girl who my shopping cart had tried to murder a few weeks prior had transferred to my school. Apparently her family had moved here from the upper part of the States to California; specifically to my part of California. Not that I owned a specific part of California, my bank account would laugh at me and jump off a cliff.

The whole school was buzzing; the cheer squad wondered if she was any good at vaulting, the teachers hoped she was a good student, and the boys (those who paid attention or even cared) hoped she was nice to look at.

She didn’t show up until two weeks after the rumor had circulated, which made everyone wonder if that’s what it was - just another rumor. I didn’t really believe it either. Mostly because there was no way that she was coming to our school. At this point, I would have convinced myself that the whole incident at the store was a hallucination, if it weren’t for the huge bruise on my arm and elbow. It still hurt to bend.

Despite that, she didn’t seem like the type to stay in one place for too long. I’m not sure why I knew this, just that I did. There was something in the way she walked and talked and dressed - completely different from this sub-par suburban area.

It wasn’t as if she had been unnaturally beautiful; in fact, she had looked like any other ordinary girl. Dark hair, pretty eyes, darker complexion. She was wearing jeans, green converse, her hair pulled into a ponytail. I had no idea why I couldn’t get her out of my head. I wanted to be her friend. I wanted to gush about her to everyone - but I was sure my boyfriend wouldn’t appreciate that. He was the jealous type.

Why did she even bother me so much, anyways? I shouldn’t have cared so much. I mean, sure, I did crash into her with the dignity of a goose in a windstorm, but whatever.

Back to the rumor thing. Nobody seemed to care after a week or two when she didn’t show up, until the day that she did. Imagine my surprise when I walked into Chemistry to see her sitting up front beside one of the cheerleaders, Chelsea. They were talking, Chelsea gesturing animatedly while Vanessa smiled politely.

The boys, it seemed, had the same idea as Chelsea. Or, roughly the same idea. I didn’t get the impression that she was implicitly into Vanessa, but that might have only been because her boyfriend was a giant and a senior who practically oozed testosterone. All of the boys were giving their best efforts at flirting. Vanessa, on the other hand, didn’t seem to openly realize this. But that only gave them more ammo. It resulted in flexing muscles, jutting chins, and giving her smiles that more resembled leers than actual smiles.

For a moment, I was jealous of their effortless proximity, which was making my face do something weird. It was like I was sucking a lemon. There were so many lemons in my face at the moment. Why was I jealous? Ugh. I had only run the girl over, it didn’t matter. She probably didn’t even remember me.

I shoulder my bag, walking to the front of the class to ask about an assignment I needed to make up, going about my business. As you do. All I had to do was turn around and make it to my seat, suffer through another day of school, and then I could be done.

But when I walk past the flock of boys, she looks up at me, at me, and smiles so brightly that God must’ve used a supernova to create this woman. “Eden Marie Jones.” She says, in that amused tone she’d had at the grocery store only a couple days ago.

“Hi,” I stop in my tracks and wave awkwardly. The boys look up at me like I had grown four more heads, or maybe I had shown up wearing a potato sack as clothes. I hadn’t, had I? A quick pat to the hair insures that, no, I only had the one head, and yeah, I was still wearing my normal leggings-and-sweater ensemble.

Before she could answer me with more than a smile, the teacher claps his thick, beefy hands together. “Alright, alright. Calm down, kids. Take your seats and we can start role.”

The boys give me evil looks for taking up their precious time, Chelsea gives me a cheerful smile, and class disperses. It takes me a moment to figure out what I was doing, but I get to my seat eventually.

Chemistry was usually uneventful, except  this was the rare occasion that something new had happened to the school. In this case, it was Vanessa. During what was supposed to be lab-taking and note-writing (when our teacher left the room to go flirt with the married secretary, under the pretense of making copies), the boys left their seats to chat Vanessa up again.

To be completely honest, the lot of them looked like strutting roosters. Ridiculous and awkward. I watch a moment, turning back to my work after a bit. It reminded me of my boyfriend when he was with all of his friends.

However hard they tried, Vanessa was too busy playing on her phone or flipping through the textbook. I admired that. Besides, a lot of these boys had girlfriends, or acted like they owned the world with their snapbacks and sagging pants.

Their antics continued for a while until it was obvious she wasn’t gonna spare them any time or even look up. The class was pretty quiet after that.

At the end of the day I went home and still couldn’t get her off my mind. If anything, her being in the same class as I was only made things worse. I don’t know what it was, but the sheer gravity of her was yanking me in, and I found myself thinking like a desperate kid who wants to be best friends with their favorite singer when they grow up. Except, she was a real person.

Honestly, though, I don’t even know how I’d talk to her. Language wasn’t my thing. That’s why my boyfriend and I got along most times. He talked, I listened, and that was that. Most of the time. I stood up for myself a lot.

However, befriending people was going to have to become a strong suit so I didn’t turn into some awkward, creepy kid who stared longingly at someone and hoping they would notice them. This wasn’t terrible fanfiction written by an emotional sixth grader.

⤐♡⬷

I couldn’t sleep. Tossing and turning in bed was worse than lying awake. For one thing, your body hurts a ton after moving so much. Second, my cat was an eternal flame of anger and rage because my legs were moving and she wasn’t happy about it. For the record, a sore body and bitten toes are not a great way to fall asleep.

Why was I so restless, you ask? You probably already know the answer to that, because my life is full of predictable twists and turns.

I was so frustrated. How hard was it to be asleep? We could think about other things, brain! We can have better dreams, brain! Just go to sleep. Please. Please. I’m begging you. I will do anything.

At this point, I was even willing to go through and silently relive every embarrassing moment I had ever experienced in my short seventeen years of life. There were a lot. Mostly in the middle school department. Really, though, who doesn’t wish they could forget those three painful years?

Unfortunately for me, my mind liked to think more about girls I had mowed over in the supermarket, and the fact that it was weird to think about girls I had mowed over in the supermarket. I was reminded of just how weird it was to obsess over people like this multiple times. After a lot more tossing and turning, eventually I got up and decided to venture down the creaky stairs.

I was hoping maybe I could find some spiritual enlightenment, but Oreos and a Coke sounded pretty rad, too. Either was a better alternative to laying in bed, staring at the sticky glow-in-the-dark stars on my ceiling and trying to will death upon myself.

To my surprise and slight horror, mom was still up when I made it down the stairs, busily emptying out the contents of the refrigerator. A fresh wave of guilt and something rather uncomfortable replaces my desire for junk food. Could mom read minds? I know that they can see out of the backs of their heads (or maybe my mom just liked to repeat “Eden, Ezra, knock it off!” every few minutes when we were kids).

I chance a look at the clock, hoping it was a reasonable time so that a lecture would be more mild. 2:48 in the AM. Just my luck. I brace myself for the reminder that I had to be up for school in exactly three hours and twelve minutes.

“What are you doing up?” My mother asks. I have to say that I was both unsurprised and silently dreading her next words. She sounded irritated, but her face seemed to be more tired than anything.

Her honey blonde hair was piled messily on her head, streaked with more grey. Her blue eyes seemed to be encased in a few more wrinkles, and even more weighed down with worry lines on her forehead. I think my mother had been pretty, once.

Not to sound rude, or anything! Everyone is pretty in their own way, and all that. She seems like she would be a pretty person. If only it weren’t for the apparent signs of early aging and stress that weathered her face.

For as long as I could remember, my mom had always looked like she was exhausted, just having rolled out of bed. It was almost like the one hangover I’d had in my life; complete with the dark circles and sluggish attitude. My mom had a permanent hangover, but not from alcohol. Just from life.

“Nothin’.” I answer finally, walking over to the cabinet and pulling out a couple packets of mini oreos. When she raises one eyebrow, her mouth twisting at the edges, I add a slightly better explanation. “I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d try eating something.”

“Oreos are hardly a good bedtime snack,” She sighs, with no real conviction. By the time my little brother had turned thirteen, she’d given up on trying to police us with things like cheese and celery sticks. This was only a formality.

I shrug. “Yeah, well. Teenager cravings and all that.”

She grunts in reply, blowing a part of her choppy bangs out of her face. I half expect her to say something else, but she turns back to clearing the old leftovers and tupperware from the massive cavity that was our fridge.

“So,” I clear my throat, sliding past her and reaching for a can of soda. “What’re you doing in the kitchen at two in the morning?”

She glances over at me over the rim of her square glasses. “Something smells in here. I couldn’t go to bed with the thought of it in my head.”

This earns a nod from me, and silence for a moment while I busy myself with opening my oreos. “Makes sense, I guess.”

“How was school?” She asks after a moment, pulling out a tupperware and opening it to sniff the contents. Instantly, her face contorts into an expression of disgust.

“It was good,” I shrug, leaning against the counter. “There’s a new girl.” I add, stuffing my face with oreos. My mom gives me a flat look at the lack of manners she had tried to teach me. I smile sheepishly, sure that my teeth are covered in black cookie crumbs.

“Oh, that’s nice. Are you two friends?” She asks, once again huffing softly to blow that choppy section of bangs out of her eyes.

“Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I think. I saw her in the store a couple weeks ago.” I lift a shoulder, popping the tab on the can of Coke. “She’s pretty cool.”

“That’s good.” My mom says, gesturing for me to pull the garbage can over. I kick it to her, wincing when it makes a loud noise. She gives me a look that says what did you think would happen?

I continue after we both are silent. Mom scrapes the nasty food into the garbage can. The grandfather clock in the living room informs us that it’s three in the morning. Distantly, I wonder if I should go to bed, but also I don’t feel like it’s fair to leave my mom in the kitchen alone.

“She’s got this really pretty, curly hair and a little bit of an accent - Mexican, maybe? - and she’s so nice.” I start up again, sipping my drink and coughing when the bubbles go up my nose. “All the boys are trying to get her attention, of course. Which is stupid.”

“Has Nathan said anything about it?” Mom asks, looking up at me, concerned.

I push my hair out of my eyes, shaking my head. “Nah, he’s still away on vacation with his family. I’m not too worried about that.” Not yet, I add to myself.

Don’t get me wrong, my boyfriend is… nice, but he does some pretty questionable stuff when it comes to other girls. There were rumors a few times that he cheated on me, but I’m not sure that I trust rumors. I’ve never asked him because that’s just a fight I don’t want to have.

Really, our relationship was more of an arrangement between our parents. His family goes to the same church as I do, so when he asked me out I kind of felt obligated to say yes. My mom adores him and his parents, my dad is kind of indifferent.

So, dating Nathan has become an obligation and a chore. I should dump him.

This isn’t the first time I’ve thought something like this. The only reason I haven’t yet is that I’m not sure how it’ll impact the family. Tension will definitely tinge my parents’ and his parents’ relationship, and I don’t know that I have the energy to deal with something like that.

“You should probably go to bed, sweets.” My moms voice cuts through my thoughts, and I jump.

“What? Oh, yeah. Probably.” I dump the rest of the oreos into my mouth, chug the rest of my soda, and burp magnificently. Probably an eight out of ten, if I do say so myself.

“Need any help?” I offer, after a moment of giggling at my mother’s annoyed, although fond, glance.

“No, I’m alright. I’m almost through here, and I hear that you guys have a quiz tomorrow.”

“Ugh, mom,” I groan, tossing my trash in their respective bins, but pushing off the counter anyways. “Please don’t remind me. I’m trying to erase that from my mind.”

“Mhmm.” She hums, rolling her eyes. I grin, leaning over and kissing her cheek.

“Night, mom.”

“Night, Eden,” She smiles. “I love you.”

“Love you, mom.”

I start the trek upstairs, my mind finally quiet enough to where I think I could fall asleep. Something in me whispers that it wasn’t going to last long.

Thank you for reading the second chapter of The Gay Agenda!  Please give it a like if you enjoy reading this, and reblog with how you found it in a comment or in the tags!

#queer oc #oc #original character #original plot #self publishing #social experiment #marketing experiment #marketing #building fanbase #please reblog #please read #pride month #lgbtpride #pride #lesbians #lesbian #lgbtlove #lgbta+ #the gay agenda experiment #gay #coming out #gay community #the gay struggle #chapter 2

[kateanddevinreview]

A Christmas Prince

In Which Kate and Devin review Netflix’s new Christmas movie and utterly fail at avoiding spoilers.

Kate: So where do we start?! Devin: Pick a movie to talk about? Kate: Top of the list is Christmas Prince. It was terrible; from start to finish it was filled with cliches and things that didn't make sense Devin:  I liked the movie! Kate: You can like the movie that is fine. I enjoyed watching the movie? But only because it was so bad. Devin: I really like the izombie girl and she was super weird in this, almost soft spoken or something? Kate: She was weird, but she made it more enjoyable to me just because I like her. Devin: I would probably have been much less forgiving of this movie without her Kate: Prince was handsome, but I've already forgotten his name. Devin: Really? I thought he was eh. Kate: Not as handsome as in the next movie (spoliers!), but he was very princely I thought. Devin: I mean prince looked very british? But I don't find that attractive Kate: I guess I don't mean particularly attractive to me, but generically attractive. As in, I think more people would say he was very attractive than would say he was average. His acting was pretty blah though. His sister's hair was on point? Devin: Fair. She reminded me of the bitchy girl in willy wonka though. Kate: OMG, yes. She was very reminiscent of the bitchy girl. Devin: Was she the bitchy girl? Kate: I don't think she was? But definitely reminded me of her Devin: Hold on I am imdb-ing her Kate: Holding Devin:  Okay well searching “willy wonka and the chocolate factory” failed, because that is not the title. And you're right it's a totally different girl. Devin: Moving on, loved the queen lady, possibly because she's in it for all of 5 minutes. Kate: She was pretty good, very severe looking. But you could tell it was grief? (Spoiler: the king is dead) Devin: It's in the plot description, I don't think it's a spoiler. Kate: Oh is it? I didn't read the plot description. Devin: Also he's been dead for like a year Kate: Well fine Devin: No okay I lied. But it is revealed in like the first 10 minutes. Kate: It is a very major point in the plot. Kate: So actor choice I give it 8 christmas trees. Generally they all fit in and izombie girl made me willing to watch it. Devin: Yeah, out of 10 I'd say 8 is probably where I land too. Kate: Cool, consensus! Devin: I still really love that she has both family and friends and contacts them throughout the movie, like a normal person. Oh! And I liked that she called her boss to be like "hey, so, uh, what should I do?" Kate: That's true, the movie gets bonus points for concocting a real life around their protagonist. Devin: This is not a spoiler I don't think? But what the hell was with the scene where he saves her from wolves? Kate: Yes! That fit in nowhere? Wait, I mean, actually, when you think about how fast the plot moved, it progressed over only 2 weeks and ends with (Definitely spoiler) him proposing. Kate: Maybe attack by wolves was the instigating ‘falling in love quickly’ event? All the adrenaline? Devin: Oh yeah the timeline of this movie makes no sense. Also: how did she saddle and steal that horse if she was going to fall off so easy? Kate: How did she know how to ride a horse at all? Devin: Right? Kate: Clearly we are missing some important backstory here Devin: Was she from New York? Or do I just assume that's where all movie characters from a city live? Kate: I think the second, but I don't actually know where she was from. Her friend being super gay does suggest New York to me though.   Kate: Back to ratings, I'm going to give this one a low grade on Christmas-iness. I think the plot could have progressed absolutely the exact same way without being set over Christmas, using a birthday or something. I give it only 1 reindeer. Do they ever say how the King dies? Devin: I assume either illness or age… actually I feel like the king got cancer, but that could be 100% a lie. Kate: Doesn't matter because it’s not christmas related. Devin: Cold. Did you think the mom was old to have a daughter as young as Emily? I can't actually remember how old she looked. Kate: I really wondered about that. She looked a little old but my dad has a friend who got pregnant at 50, so physically it’s possible. And the sister was what, between 9-12? Devin: Probably Kate: So if mom was 55 in the movie that seems doable Devin: Ok. Also the king was a dick "hehe I will continue to lie to my only son about his parentage, EVEN THOUGH I KNOW I AM DYING AND ALSO HE IS A GROWN ASS MAN AND IT AFFECTS THE POLITICS OF MY KINGDOM and then I will HIDE THIS VERY IMPORTANT LEGALLY BINDING DECREE to be found after my death and definitely for sure followed even though honestly no one has to listen to a dead guy. And the only hint they have is my shitty riddle poetry" Kate: I still very much doubt the legality of the paper "it has the king's seal on it" no thank you. That's not how I like my laws made Devin: Like doesn't he need that notarized or looked at by a council or some shit? Also, it's not even a decree, it just says "I love my son lots, just not enough to tell him the truth". Kate: And if he did, wouldn't that person have come forward when he died? So fucking weird, he was a dick, you're right. Devin: What modern day country is this anyway? Kate: A shitty European one. Devin: Like, fake country, yes. But I assumed they were using maybe England as a template or something. Kate: It seemed a little like they were. But a much smaller country than England? Devin: Are there still ruling monarchies? In real life? Kate: Yes? Saudi Arabia? Devin: Hmm, I don't know enough about Saudi Arabian law to determine if death bed messages hidden in acorns are legally binding. Kate: Well, one of their princes just murdered a bunch of their other princes, so probably not. Kate: Oh hey, apparently Monaco is a country that still has a ruling monarch. Devin: Huh Kate: There are others but I don't think we need to get into all that. Just go read the wiki people. Devin: I mentioned while I was watching, but I still resent her dramatic race to stop the coronation when she easily could have called the palace. Kate: You have cellphones! Use them! Devin: It would have saved at *least* half an hour. Kate: Trope! That goes in the trope category. I'm giving the plot like 2 eggnogs, maybe tropes like 4 jingle bells. Devin: Yeah the trope meter was off the scale in this movie. Kate: Like, I liked some of the tropes? Which is why it’s a little higher for me. But damn. All of them. Devin: Tropes can be good, they just threw a lot of them in there. Kate: They made a list of tropes and then made a movie around them. Devin: Clumsy female lead. Kate: Ugh. Hate that. Devin: "hehe oops, was this OBVIOUSLY EXPENSIVE VASE important?" Kate: Everything in a castle is expensive! Sick sister Devin: Mean kid just wants friendship. Kate: Ugh, the mean kid/friendship one is another pet peeve. Devin:  She goes from "I will kill you in your sleep" to "I trust you implicitly" in, like, a single scene. Kate: The sister warmed up to her in like 4 hours! That's not how it works! Have them bond over something silly right to begin with! Many movies do that well. Devin: If you need them to be friends for the plot, just don't make her mean to start! skip straight to friendship! Kate: Yes! Dead father. Dead mother Devin: Secret adoption Kate: Father who owns a restaurant that you have to go work at. Devin: Shaved his beard and suddenly she thinks he's hot Kate: Oh yes! Secretly not a playboy? Devin: Also he stole her taxi for seemingly no reason. Kate: I didn't really get that bit to be honest. Devin: Just to be a dick? Kate: Yeah, that was such a dick move. That was never addressed and she just forgave completely just because he's a prince. Devin: It's like they couldn't decide until halfway through if they wanted him to be nice or not. Also wanting to bone is not the same as love. Kate: Very true. It seemed like it just went on and on to me. I'd be like, surely this movie is wrapping up soon. And then it kept going. Devin: I definitely shouted at you "dear god look in the acorn!" for a solid hour of that movie Kate: You did. Over and over. You picked up on it the very first scene and you were cooking at the same time! Devin: It was so obviously a box! I have honestly no idea where she got the birth certificate from though. Or how bitchy love rival girl found it. I never learned her name Kate: Oh, so she literally just found the birth certificate in a desk at the lodge they went to after the wolves. It might have been a sort of secret compartment? But not very secret. Devin: lol what? Kate: And then bitchy rival girl searched her rooms. Devin: Rude Kate: Which was a huge invasion of privacy. Devin: If I was a secret reporter I would definitely lock that away. Kate: Right! They were like, spread out on her bed. Devin: Then again a 10 year old cracked her laptop password Kate: hahaha, I forgot that part, so dumb, just so dumb. Devin: She's honestly a terrible reporter Kate: Yeah, plot definitely only gets 2 eggnogs. I mean, she wasn't really a reporter. Devin: She sort of was? Kate: She was an editor who wanted to be a reporter. Devin: Yeah, fair. Kate: But clearly she was better at writing than reporting I would say. Devin: She did get the assignment. Kate: Cause no one else was available! Devin: What percentage of her getting that assignment was her boss hoping the prince would sleep with her? Kate: At least 75% Devin: "You lied your way into the palace? Goooooood. I stuffed some condoms in your luggage. No, no reason. Wink." Kate: OMG! Her boss was such a sleeze. Or at least it felt that way to me. Devin: I mean wasn't it a tabloid magazine? Kate: It must have been. Devin: iZombie was very naive. Kate: Soooooooo naive. How? She's an adult. Devin: A very sheltered adult. Kate: She works for a tabloid! Devin: Ok I think maybe it's final scoring time Kate: Ok, you wrap. Tell me how you feel? Devin: Probably a 3/10 for plot, 8/10 for actor choices, 4/10 for acting, uh, like 2/10 for Christmas-ness, 6/10 for ending? 2/10 for tropes? Kate: I think I’d go a little lower on the ending - 4 gift bags. It was pretty fucking weird, but it did end happy? And that's important in a christmas movie. Devin: It was weird, but I feel like I am very forgiving as long as it's happy. Split the difference and say 5? Kate: Sure, 5 gift bags. Devin: What would you give it overall? Kate: Overall it’s not a movie I would recommend unless you specifically like one of the following: the girl from izombie, movies about fake royal families or .... I can't think of a third thing Devin: Acorns Kate: Or acorns - if you really have a thing for super obvious plot devices, this movie is for you! Overall possibly 4 christmas's I suppose Devin: Aww, so low? Kate: Yeah, sorry. Devin: No you're fine. Kate: How many christmas's would you give the Christmas Prince? Devin: I was thinking a 6. Kate: I think 6 is perfectly acceptable. If you'd given it an 8 I would question. Devin: Never. Kate: Oh no! We forgot to judge the title! Devin: It's a terrible title. 0 sleigh bells. Kate: Yeah, 0 sleigh bells for the title. I think it was so we would realize it was supposed to be a christmas movie. Devin: Probably. The Christmas [Noun] is just so boring. Kate: The Christmas King would have made more sense? Devin: Hmm, I do like the Christmas King better. Kate: Because of the coronation plot line. That we didn't get into at all in this review. But whatever, go watch the movie. Devin: Yeah. Kate: You know it has something to do with acorns. Devin: Or don't watch it. Kate: Or don't.

#a christmas prince #kate and devin review #spoilers

[violet--minds-blog]

Why Bisexual Rep Is Important

Piper Gibson | March 17, 2017 (Note: This was written on September 23, 2016, so anything that has occurred in the shows mentioned in terms of representation may be missing. If so please let me know and I’ll correct it!) In honor of Bisexual Visibility Day, I wrote a little something. And if you’re curious why this day is named for visibility, not celebration or appreciation, then just read on.

So, it’s not that I didn’t know gay people existed when I was a kid.

I knew. I grew up watching Friends, after all; Ross’s ex-wife Carol and her partner Susan were lesbians. I watched Ellen with my grandma. When Glee first aired I was in eighth grade. I knew that there were people out there that were gay, and we had family friends that are gay that I’d met once or twice. But I had no fucking clue about anything else, and I definitely didn’t know what the hell “bisexual” meant until I was in my teens.

I don’t have a specific memory of learning about the word, but there was certainly a few years of a gap between gaining the knowledge and applying it to myself. I figured it out somewhere around junior year of high school, and came out to my parents in the winter of my senior year. All that time I’d liked girls and hadn’t accepted it, hadn’t let myself feel it. The first time I was suicidal l was twelve, and it was because I had a crush on a girl and didn’t know what to do or how to feel about it.

This is why bisexual representation matters. Because even though I’d seen representations for lesbians and gay men as a kid, I’d never seen me on television. I’d never even heard the word bisexual as an identifying word on tv or in the movies before. (I still haven’t.) Sure, I’d heard the word-- like in Glee, when Blaine is questioning his sexuality and says he might be bisexual, and Kurt, a gay man, replies angrily, “Bisexual is a term that gay guys in high school use when they wanna hold hands with girls and feel like a normal person for a change.” That was the first time I heard the word bisexual on television, is still the only example I can remember, and that’s the message I got about who I was. I was fake. I was a lie. In fact, the word wasn’t even applicable to me-- I wasn’t a gay guy, I was a girl and I was confused and looking for validation. And the media spit in my face.

As far as representation goes, bisexual people have it pretty rough. There is a theme in media, a very dangerous theme, that implicitly shows characters are bisexual and explicitly tells the audience they’re straight. I have example after example of this, files of queerbaiting I’ve stowed in my head for years.

Dean Winchester from Supernatural holds all of his long-standing emotional relationships with men, bonds best with men, is shown to be attracted to men, and only sleeps with/dates women. He is a “womanizer” and his relationships with women never last, whereas he works at his relationships with the men in his life. He cares deeply for them and sacrifices everything for them, but he’s not bi. He’s straight, he sleeps with women, see?

Steve Rogers, AKA Captain America, has healthy, strong, intense relationships with men and women. He’s “not good with girls,” but he’s good with his absolute best friend Bucky, who he’s known since childhood and holds above all else. He falls in love with Peggy Carter, yes, and their brief relationship is important and real, but he also drops everything and flies into enemy lines to rescue Bucky. He becomes a completely different person from grief when he believes Bucky to be dead. When Bucky comes back as a brainwashed soldier and doesn’t know Steve, Steve won’t fight him, and is prepared to die rather than hurt this man who doesn’t even remember him. He drops the shield and stops being Captain America because the alternative is losing Bucky. The writers and actors and media all call Bucky and Steve’s arc a “love story,” but insist that they’re both straight. Peggy happened, right? Bucky slept with loads of women, right?

One of the biggest examples of queerbaiting, BBC’s Sherlock, shows John Watson have relationships with women but above all put Sherlock first, caring for him and supporting him and loving him like he would a boyfriend. He’s Sherlock’s only friend and confidant and they live together and share their whole lives together, but somehow this doesn’t matter because he has relationships with women. There’s even a scene where he yells that he’s not gay, which I remember watching and thinking, “you don’t have to be gay to like the same gender.” But he marries a girl, right? He’s not gay, so what does it matter?

I have so many more examples. Jessica Jones (from the Marvel show of the same name) and her best friend Trish act like ex-girlfriends, are treated by the show as ex-girlfriends, and the first season ends with Jessica saying something she never does-- “I love you”-- to Trish and embracing her. This by all accounts looks like them getting back together, but they both have male romantic interests, so none of that matters. Merlin and Arthur from Merlin have an epic love story and sacrifice life and limb for each other, but they both get girlfriends and eventually, wives. Harry Potter is very into both Draco Malfoy and Cedric Diggory throughout the books but dates only women and marries Ginny in the end. Even in How to Get Away With Murder, where Annalise Keating has explicit relationships with women and men and is very clearly bisexual, they still haven’t said the word out loud. It’s a very scary word, apparently.

Something dangerous happens when media implicitly grants a community representation but doesn’t give them explicitly stated, canon representation. We are told we are shameful. We are told we are bad and dirty and must be kept secret. And when we have the gall to point out how obvious it is for us that these characters are bisexual like we are-- because those in the LGBTQ+ community are taught to read subtext and interpret media for ourselves from a young age-- the general public laughs in our faces. They call us “crazy fans” (which, okay, is super dismissing and dehumanizing and ableist) and tell us that actually, we’re fetishizing these characters, and we need to stop.

It’s different for queer people. There is no explicit bisexual representation. But when I see Jessica Jones look at her best friend the same way I looked at female friends of mine when I was twelve? When I see Merlin and Arthur look into each other’s eyes and smile the same way me and my girlfriend do? It feels the same. It’s just not straight. And the writers of these characters know it. They know it and they use it, because we’re starving for validation and we’ll take anything. They write these scenes, these loving glances, purposely, then turn around and tell us our beloved characters are straight. Why would they not be? They have girlfriends and boyfriends, after all. Nevermind what that says to bisexual men who lean towards dating women and feel weird and shameful about their attraction to men, who watch Supernatural and wonder why they relate so much to Dean. Nevermind what that says to bisexual women who watch women on screen be physically affectionate and loving towards each other and who are told that this is strictly platonic; female friends are all like this, and it’s definitely not romantic.

Television does not seem to understand the possibility of being attracted to more than one gender. For me, someone who’s loved every gender since I can remember, it seems strange to only like one gender. I love boys and I love girls and I love everyone in between, and this isn’t taken away by me currently dating a girl. I wasn’t straight when I dated a boy in high school, and I’m not a lesbian now. But in television, you’re a straight woman if you date men. You’re a straight man if you date women. Nothing else matters, especially not your long-standing, emotional, loving relationships with the same gender.

There is a problem in the media with being afraid of this word. I’d like to know why that is. More and more shows are including gay characters now, giving them girlfriends and boyfriends and plotlines and interesting stories. (We won’t touch on the “bury your gays” trope here.) But there’s still so, so, so little explicitly defined bisexual characters. If they’re bi, this is shown, not told. We learn they’re bi from them kissing boys and girls, not by them mentioning it. This is a clear distinction, and it’s important to note. I can’t think of a single example of something I’ve watched or read where a character said themselves that they were bisexual. Self-identifying, strongly and confidently, is important. Not being outed, not just showing their identity by making out with multiple genders, and not saying a stupid cop-out like “well, sexuality is fluid” or “I’m not straight or gay, I’m just… y’know.”

No. Young bisexuals don’t know. Young me didn’t know. If I had been watching TV and heard someone call themselves bisexual, proud and clear, I’d have sat up. I’d have listened. I wouldn’t have had to watch show after show, movie after movie, read book after book and gone to my other queer friends, saying with raised eyebrows, “This is fucking gay, right? I’m not the only one?”

We see your implicit representation and we want better. We deserve better. We demand better, for us and for young bisexuals, their stomachs sinking every time they watch TV and a joke is made about two characters of the same gender being “too close.” My stomach sank when I was a kid and I watched Joey and Chandler hug and say “We do this too much, don’t we?” and break apart.

I didn’t know why then, but I do now. And I-- we-- deserve better.

And to not end this on a sad note, I do have hope. I am tired of queerbaiting and biphobia, but I have hope. When I was a kid I had nothing-- at the very least now, I have characters on TV who kiss people of multiple genders. Eventually they’ll be allowed to say that they’re bisexual out loud, but for now I have confirmation from show runners that I was right, that they are bi. For now I have amazing bisexual Youtubers like Dodie Clark and Chris Kendall and Alayna Fender. For now I have Korra from Legend of Korra and Jack Zimmermann from Check, Please! (READ IT HERE) and Annalise Keating from How to Get Away With Murder. For now I hold the little rep I have close to my heart and wait for a better time, a time when “bisexual” is not a scary word to say on television or in movies. After all, we have all these angry bisexuals with no representation and a fierce desire to see themselves in media. That’s just a recipe for shit to get done.

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