#it’s not like Tay’s picking up Gun

[theflagscene]

I refused to believe that Tay was not wearing a damn piggy back saddle for the scene where he had to carry New for so long, New was seated way too perfectly with Tay standing far too straight for that to have been a piggy back where just New’s thighs were being held. To be carried that long and be seated the way he was, New would’ve needed Tay hands to be behind him to hold up New’s butt. So, Tay was wearing a daddy saddle, simple as that, I will not be swayed from this belief lol.

#cherry magic th #karanachi #taynew #New is too large for Tay to carry in that position comfortably #watch him struggle to carry New like that during their stage shows #they barely last 60 seconds before New jumps down because Tay is doubling over by then lol #they’re the same height and New is extremely muscular #it’s not like Tay’s picking up Gun #it’s not easy

[bestworstcase]

Thanks for your response ala Ruby & Yang, great stuff!

Idle aside, but do you have any thoughts on Yang's role as the sort of black sheep of the family by dint of Raven associations?

Cos like, Tai overtly favors Ruby, projects Raven onto Yang, resents Raven being rough up and is bad enough about reminders of her Yang feels she has to apologize for his negative reactions. Let alone his... Everything else.

Then there's Qrow who doesn't seem to interact with Yang over much at all and one of if not their most major interaction. Involves him straight up saying he thinks she's either a liar hurting people for fun or "crazy".

I recall someone I was chatting with wondering: Imagine doing everything you can to keep your family from breaking apart & being compared to the woman who left you when you were a baby?

Cos I do wonder how Yang feels about all that given she seems to downplay and or try to work around her family's issues when she can. Let alone what it says about the adults in the room.

smth i think about a lot is the way yang’s narrative about her childhood shifts between v2 to v5

’cause in v2 it’s: “it was tough. ruby was really torn up, my dad kind of shut down. it wasn’t long before i learned why…” all to provide context for this anecdote about putting ruby in a wagon and running away to find her mother. and then her conclusion is “my stubbornness should have gotten us killed that night.”

and while there is a degree here of yang framing the story to emphasize the point she wants blake to understand, it’s also very obvious in her delivery that the emotional reality of this memory for yang is “the time my stupidity and stubbornness almost got me and ruby eaten by grimm”—when she was [checks notes] like five, six years old, and regularly left at home unsupervised.

but in v5, it’s: “my mom left me. ruby’s mom left too. tai was always busy with school, and ruby couldn’t even talk yet; i had to pick up the pieces. i had to pick up the pieces. alone.”

aside from the telling slip (tai, not dad)—yang centers her own feelings and the harm this situation did to her this time. which is something she’s always felt but i don’t think she could have brought herself to say it out loud to anyone during the beacon arc, because it was pressed down under the guilt on display in burning the candle, the feeling of having been inadequate and too stubborn and too selfish and and and–

coughs quietly. “my stubbornness should have gotten us killed that night.” / “you were predictable. and… stubborn. and maybe a little boneheaded.” yang’s narrative about the wagon incident—which happened when she was five or six!—pinning the blame on the thing tai imagines to be her fatal flaw is…probably not coincidental. yang in v4 after a year of being loved by her team and supported by mentors like glynda / oobleck / port has the perspective to know that tai doesn’t know what he’s talking about; but as a small child who’d just had a terrifying near-death experience with her baby sister… 😶

it definitely had a big impact on the way yang sees herself

BUT i do read qrow's talk with yang in 3.8 pretty differently ->

because the context is: yang saw mercury attack her and struck back in self defense, then had like a dozen synthetic soldiers point guns in her face, then looked up and saw the replay footage of herself walking over to shoot a boy who was just kneeling on the ground. and some of the most powerful authority figures in the world are pushing this narrative that stress and adrenaline "clouded her judgment."

like this would make anyone doubt their sanity. bc holy shit.

yang, though...a couple weeks ago, yang after being knocked unconscious woke up and blearily saw someone she thought was her mother walk away from her and disappear in a flash of red light. she hasn't mentioned it to anyone, because it's just so bizarre—yang doesn't know about raven's semblance yet—she must have just been seeing things. right?

aside from raven (who isn't here) and yang (who believes she hallucinated), the only other person who knows that yang saw her mom on the train is qrow, because raven told him about it. he also knows that:

tai insisted on not telling yang ANYTHING about her mother, and qrow respected that up until now; so yang doesn't know about raven's semblance and can't make sense of what she saw.

salem's infiltrators are the same people who attacked amber, and qrow didn't get a good look at them because they seemingly vanished into thin air—pretty damn good chance that one of them has a semblance that manipulates what you see.

ozpin wants #2 kept secret, so yang has some very powerful people actively trying to convince her that she's crazy. ironwood is straight up gaslighting her.

qrow also—based on the first thing he says, which is "why'd you do it?"—seems to consider it a possibility that it is what it looked like but yang did have a good reason, and i actually do not think that is an outrageous thing for qrow specifically to think. because qrow was emotionally abused as a child, and he knows yang, and in the event that yang really did suddenly turn around and punch a guy who was kneeling on the ground, why would she do it?

glances at shay d. mann. well. maybe this kid has been harassing her? maybe he said something horrible or threatening to her and in the heat of the moment she just snapped? maybe "he attacked me, i saw him attack me" isn't really a lie per se, she's just scared that "he's been picking on me ever since he got here and he made a disgusting remark and i just couldn't take it anymore" won't be taken seriously? as in, he did attack her—verbally/emotionally.

it's probably worth asking, at least!

so, qrow leads with "why'd you do it?" in case there is some invisible reason justifying the apparent action. yang says "you know why." qrow goes okay, well, i only know what i saw, so you're either lying (i.e., yang had a reason she now isn't telling) or crazy (i.e., yang saw something different from reality that was very real to her).

she says "i'm not lying." qrow believes her: "crazy, got it."

at this point, he knows the most probable explanation is that one of salem's infiltrators fucked with her head. the inner circle's gaslighting doesn't sit right with him; he's not going to buck ozpin by telling her the truth outright, but he wants to make sure yang knows she isn't losing her mind. he also has all the info needed to guess that yang is actually really really scared that she might be crazy.

which is why he kicks off the wall and begins to pace around. the language he uses sounds dismissive, but his tone is mild and his body language implies "let's talk about it, let's figure this out."

leading to:

YANG: Who knows? Maybe I am. QROW: And here I thought your dark-haired friend was the emo one. YANG: I saw my mom. …I- I was in a lot of trouble, took a pretty hard hit. But when I came to, the person attacking me was gone, and I thought I saw… her. Her sword. Like the one in you and dad’s old picture. QROW: You’re not crazy, Yang. That was your mom, alright. Let me guess—she didn’t say a word, did she? YANG: How did you know that? QROW: I don't see my sister very often, but she does try to keep in touch... whenever it suits her. YANG: Wait—you mean you talk to her? That was real!? QROW: Yeah, she found me. Had a tip from my most recent assignment and wanted me to give you a message.

it's really telling that yang responds to him this way. 'cause we've seen how yang acts when she feels dismissed or belittled:

TAI: Well, "normal" is what you make of it. YANG: What is that supposed to mean? Do you want me to just pretend like nothing happened? I lost a part of me. A piece of me is gone. And it's never coming back. TAI: You're right. It's not coming back. But that doesn't have to stop you from becoming who you wanna be. You're Yang Xiao Long, my sunny little dragon. You can do whatever you put your mind to. So whenever you're ready to stop moping, and get back out there? I'll be there for you. YANG: I– I...

she freezes and shuts down! her teachers have to come to her rescue!—but when qrow goes "crazy, got it" and suggests she's being "emo," yang blurts out her big secret. i saw my mom. to me that suggests a level of trust and understanding that isn't there with tai: qrow says stuff like "okay, so you're crazy" and "here i thought your friend was the emo one" but what he means is "hey, i know something's really bugging you, tell me about it," and yang picks up what he's putting down.

it's akin to how ruby goes "did you miss me? DID YOU MISS ME??" and qrow's like "nope" and they both laugh. or the back-and-forth ribbing between him and the girls in 3.4. there's this layer of mild ironic meanness in the way qrow converses with his nieces that all of them are fluent in, and in this scene he's using that mode to signal that "crazy" is not off-limits, that it's okay to talk about openly.

crucially, there's a code-switch in the middle of the conversation: as soon as yang gets real and says "i saw my mom," qrow reflects that seriousness back to her. you're not crazy, that was your mom, she found me afterward and told me about it. it was real. you're okay. qrow's ability to do that—to shift into a more serious mode when irony isn't appropriate—is why yang can have this rapport with him that she doesn't have with tai, because tai isn't... being ironic when he says mean or dismissive things to her.

anyway, qrow passes on raven's terrible message and then kind of annotates it: "raven's got an interesting way of looking at the world that i don't particularly agree with, and she's dangerous." (which is a very diplomatic way of saying he thinks raven is full of shit. lol.) but then he connects this whole conversation about raven back to what happened after the match: "you're a tough egg, kiddo. don't let this tournament thing getcha down. you had a slip-up; sometimes bad things just happen."

implicitly: yang isn't crazy. what she saw on the train was real, a product of raven's personality and her semblance. sometimes bad things just happen. qrow believes that yang had the experience she says she did when she punched mercury. he doesn't know why she had that experience—yang doesn't either!—but he knows she isn't just "crazy." sometimes things that seem crazy are actually real.

remember what he tells the girls in 3.4? "you may be acting like huntresses, but you're not thinking like one." same thing here. he's telling yang, hey, you're not crazy, you know what you saw, but you don't know what or who caused you to see it. "you cut off the head of the king taijitu, but now the second head's calling the shots."

hint, hint.

it's subtler than the hints qrow drops for ruby in 3.12, but very much in the same vein, and yang is plenty smart enough to figure it out. she might... not have? in the couple of hours between this conversation and everything going to straight to hell, but if they'd had literally just one more day, just long enough for the wheels turning in yang's head to click together with what ruby heard from velvet about coco hallucinating during her and yatsu's 2v2 against emerald and mercury, she would've had it.

more... generally, i've never gotten the sense that qrow projects raven's flaws onto yang in the way that tai does; qrow is definitely a lot closer with ruby than yang, but i think that has less to do with favoritism on qrow's part than it does ruby thinking he's like the COOLEST uncle ever and wanting to use a scythe like he does.

'cause like, qrow isn't their parent, he doesn't live with them, he's not responsible for raising these kids like their dad is, so while he obviously did contribute to fucking them both up because: alcoholic, ultimately there just isn't the same degree of betrayal or emotional abandonment; he's not their dad. both times yang talks in detail about her childhood, it's "my mom left, ruby's mom left, tai wasn't really around, ruby couldn't even talk, i was alone"—she doesn't mention qrow. there isn't that deep hurt, that feeling that qrow is someone who left.

when he isn't drunk, yang seems to feel pretty okay around him, and qrow likewise treats her... honestly a lot better than tai does:

he stops by their dorm in v3 to hang out with both his nieces; yang is fully in sister mode—cheers for ruby to beat him until ruby loses, immediately shoves her out of the way like "my turn!! >:D"—and qrow ribs them both, takes ribbing from both of them in good humor, tells both of them "you two are gonna go far."

qrow nicknames to show affection; ruby is "pipsqueak," yang gets "firecracker."

we only see qrow's goodbye to ruby, but in 5.4 yang indicates that qrow came to talk to her before he left, too. she also has complete trust that he's keeping the promise he made to look after ruby.

yang, as noted, opens up to him about seeing her mom; she's also shocked that he's still in contact with raven and indignant that he didn't tell her sooner, but—unlike with tai—she doesn't seem surprised that qrow is willing to talk about raven in general.

which tracks with what tai says in 4.11: "despite asking him numerous times not to, i know qrow told you where you're mother's been at these days"—meaning, this was a point of contention between him and qrow. behind the scenes, while tai refused to discuss raven at all, qrow was going okay well, let me tell her then, she deserves to know. and then ultimately he just bit the bullet and told her behind tai's back. i wouldn't be surprised if it turned out qrow had been straight with yang that her dad wanted to be the one to tell her the important stuff, and he wanted to be respectful of that, but raven wasn't an off-limits topic.

general contrast between yang-tai and yang-qrow dynamics; for example both of them say almost verbatim "you've got a long way to go before you're ready for the real world" (3.4/4.4). from tai it's belittling, he's insulting her; from qrow, it's meant to encourage, it's "remember you're still new to this, you'll make mistakes, just keep learning, keep trying." (rwby does stuff like this all the time, refracting an idea in different directions to highlight contrasts between characters; ozpin's advice to ruby vs port's advice to weiss is another example.)

a lot of qrow's resentment toward raven is centered on her abandonment of yang: "did you know yang lost her arm? [...] rhetorical question, i know you know. it's just obnoxious that you'd bring up family and then carry on like your own daughter doesn't exist. [raven: "i saved her."] once. because that was your rule, right? real mom of the year material, sis." like he is PISSED on yang's behalf that raven won't even try.

my impression is that qrow—although a) often away on long missions in far away places and b) an alcoholic who sometimes got blind drunk and became a burden yang and ruby needed to take care of—when he did manage to be there, made a serious effort to connect with both of them. he ended up being closer to ruby bc she wanted to learn scythe-wielding, but i do think qrow would've trained yang too (or instead) if the girls had different combat interests.

and while his relationship with ruby has a mentorish aspect, i don't get the sense either of the girls see him as a parental figure: he wasn't part of their household, he traveled a lot, his alcoholism in combination with tai's neglect eroded the adult-child boundaries because they had to be responsible for him as often as the reverse. he's a friend who also happens to be related to them. and that's especially true for yang, because he wasn't her teacher.

(i know it's a... pretty common headcanon / fanon that qrow lived with them, but i really don't think that's supported by the text? whenever ruby or yang look back on their childhoods, the family unit is always them + tai, and qrow isolates himself out of fear that his semblance will injure those he cares about. plus ozpin sending him all over the place as the one member of team strq still active. it makes way more sense to think he lived alone, and visited when he had the chance. which is the main reason i'm WAY softer on him than on tai, 'cause qrow wasn't in a caretaker/parent role; at most he was an occasional babysitter. so while his incidents of turning up drunk on the doorstep contributed to the harm... it's like, it would absolutely have been better for them if qrow were sober, but that wouldn't have changed anything about their home life. they'd just have somewhat easier relationships with qrow.)

TO WRAP THIS BACK AROUND TO THE QUESTION, tai is unfairly judgmental and harsh with yang bc he projects his idea of her mom onto her; yang also has a better relationship with her mom's brother than she does with her dad. how do these two dynamics interact? how does yang feel about hearing from tai that she's too branwen, so to speak, while also getting along better with the branwen side of her family? how might that fuel her desire to find raven?

if her uncle treats her better than tai does, then... maybe her mom would too, if only yang could reach her?—obviously it's not rational, but like. i don't think five year old yang put her baby sister in a wagon and ran away to find her mom because she thought she would ask "why did you leave me?" and then get her answer and go home. as yang grew older and developed a more realistic perspective it shifted to "i just need to know why she left" and she projects that backward onto herself as a child, but at the time what she wanted, what she was looking for, was someone who would take care of them.

#never-ending heap of yang thoughts

[salamivx]

Hey! If you’re not too busy could I request some Tyler x fem reader angst? Maybe around the time the group finds him in the tree and the car ride to the school after that?

TURN BACK

MASTERLIST >

Other masterlists

Tyler Hernandez x F! Reader

warning. none?

(Not proofread)

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

All of us were disgusted at the sight of him being penetrated by the tree, Logan, Ben, Taylor and I couldn’t stand the scene as Ashlyn and Aiden helped Tyler off.

Ben had Tyler on his back, and Taylor was sobbing at what happened to her brother, approaching her I crouched down and put my hands on her shoulders as I gave her a comforting look, after I shared reassuring words with her Logan then killed a phantom, then Ashlyn suggested we go to the school.

We then arrived at the school Ashlyn asked how Tyler was doing, “ We stitched what we could and wrapped the rest. But so much was torn and broken… He keeps soaking through all the bandages and cloth. ” Taylor’s voice was shaky, looking down at her brother I couldn’t imagine the pain he went had to endure being stuck on the tree.

As we walked through the halls, Taylor leading us to the coaches room as she knew where he kept them since she always hung out with Tyler and the team, “ How much further? ” Ashlyn asked, “ Down this hallway and a couple more classrooms down. ” Right after that we all noticed that it seemed to get darker as we turned our heads we saw the phantom (spider phantom? Idfk) “ RUN! ” As soon as Ashlyn said that I snapped out of my trance and ran.

The phantom crashed its head into the window following us, I looked over at Ashlyn as she covered her ear with her hands, I looked over at Logan he seemed to be looking at it then with a swift turn he pulled out his gun and shot it in the eye left eye causing it to screech out in pain, turning to Taylor she seemed to get an idea she ran towards Aiden taking his shotgun she began to shoot at it.

“ Taylor what are you doing?! ” Ashlyn shouted, “KEEP SHOOTING! We need to injure it as much as we can! ” Taylor shouted back enough for as to hear, Logan pointed his gun to the phantom, “ … If the brain is located behind the eyes, then we might be able to at least paralyze it if we aim there. ��� All I could hear was gun shots before I saw it go limp but Taylor still kept shooting.

“ … Yea uh— Tay, it stopped moving. ” Aide gave her a big smile and a thumbs up she then put her gun down as Logan approached her, “ We need to hurry in case it recovers. ”

We got into the coaches office, “ Where are they?! ” Taylor yelled panic evident in her voice as everyone scurried around trying to find the key as Ben tried to help Tyler wound, “ Coach must’ve moved them again! ” Taylor said in a frustrated tone, “ Does he move them often? ” Asked Ashlyn“ Yea because idiots like Jay and Conner keep messing with them! ” Taylor started to get annoyed.

“ I feel a sense a of deja-vu. ” Aiden randomly said swinging his knife around, Logan then checked his watch, “ … We have 3 minutes left. ” Logan warned everyone, “ Aiden there’s a straggler. ” “ Yea, I can hear it running then with a swift move Aiden stabbed it in its face, “ Got it. ” Aiden had a big smile on his face.

“ Are there any more? ” Ashlyn questioned, “ I can’t see any? ” Aiden then popped his head out the door checking if there was more, suddenly a there was a big rumble cashing us to stumble a bit on our feet, “ Woah! ” “ Ah! ”, “ Everyone get under something! ” Ashlyn yelled at us as we all got under something, I whipped my head to where Aiden was my eyes widened, “ Shoot! ” Aiden yelled as Ashlyn got up and ran to him she lifted the rubble off of Aiden, “ Come on get him under something! ” Taylor yelled

as she picked him up and got under a table as did Ashlyn, from where I was Ashlyn was holding tight onto Aiden I could see Aiden’s face it looked like the phantoms, before I could say anything I blacked out.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

#x reader #female reader #sbg (webtoon) #sbg #aiden sbg #ben clark sbg #sbg taylor #sbg ben #sbg tyler #sbg spoilers #ashlyn sbg #logan sbg #sbg x Reader #tyler hernandez #Tyler Hernandez x Reader #comics #web comic #webtoon #webcomic #web

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - It’s My Birthday!

April 2023 Wk 4

Being a highly subjective assessment of one tiny corner of the interwebs. Organized by which ones (in each category) I’m enjoying most.

Ongoing Series - Thai

Step By Step (Thai Tues WeTV & Gaga) ep 2 of 10 (MDL says 12, but Gaga says 10) - Baby made a friend! Yay. I hope they stay friends. Up looks so good. Also, drama with exes! Excellent. This is awful grown up for a BL, esp a pulp. I think it may be more just a gay office romance than BL, but I love it no matter what. 

La Pluie (Sat iQIYI) ep 1 of 10 - I love it. Strange premise to get at the fated mates trope but it stars one of my top picks to get his own BL. Been waiting since TT2 for this boy to feature. Tai is cute. It’s good. Except the singing. But we can’t have it all. 

Our Skyy 2 (Star in My Mind) eps 3-4 - Dao is THE MOST SPOILED. But clearly Kluen prefers it that way. This was cute, but frankly a little bit boring. Kluen is clearly Thai for whipped. 8/10 

Future (Thai Sun YouTube & Gaga) ep 5 of 6 - they added an additional ep because, why not? It’s a soap not a story, it doesn’t matter. MOAR softness for usssss! Drama llama boys continue to be overdramatic to the point of melodramatic to the point of ludicrous-dramatic. 

Pastsenger (Thai Weds Gaga) ep 8 of 12 eps - This is not as good as My Engineer but Marc makes for a much better pair with Cooper. It’s still not great but hey… and then HE PICKED UP A GUITAR. NOOOOOO!!!!!

A Boss and a Babe (Fri YouTube) ep 9 of 12 - Is that a character in a GMMTV show actually trying to communicate? Say it isn’t so! Did you notice in order to calm Cher down Gun dropped to pom to put them on a more equal footing? Sweet. Cher is a tiny idiot for taking the blame for some random other coworker. Why? Omg this show. 

The Promise (Thai Weds YT & WeTV) ep 6 of 10 - So it was a real serious total kiss kiss with both very drunk. And that’s why he ran? Sigh. This show sucks. How can we root for this couple especially when the faen fatal (Boss) is THAT HOT and so sweet. (To be fair I can’t decide if I want Boss or his outfits more). Phu should just not come back, who needs him? So they really are going to just keep drawing this one premise out the whole show? 

Tin Tam Jai (Tues Gaga & iQIYI) ep 9 of 10 - yawn 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Our Dining Table AKA Bokura no Shokutaku (Japan Thurs Gaga) ep 4 of 10 - They are cutest EVER - charming and awkward and sweet. I love the way the state of the food is used as an illustration for the state of the emotions of the characters. The loneliness of heating up a solitary meal bought from a convenience store in the microwave. The joy of memory of shared meals. What a lovely show.  

The Eighth Sense (Korea Weds Viki) eps 9-10fin - To be honest, I was dreading this one. JH is such a first-time love bebe. I liked how realistic everybody’s behavior was to the university age bracket. We even got some proper boyfriends phase which is too damn cute for words. I do not think that JW should have made up with his evil friend. I love the way JW’s shoulders relax the moment he sees JH. This was really good show... 

One of the longest BLs Korea has given us and (like Blueming) it feels more atmospheric gay coming of age romance than strictly BL. It’s got a bit of an age gap, country boy/city boy, stellar acting, complex characters, and leads with good chemistry and tension. It’s a bit chewy and sticky and less perfect than most KBLs (do I detect a touch of Taiwan?). This one deployed BL tropes (messy eater, shoulder sleep, protective seme, there’s even some hyung-slinging) but front loaded them, with tons angst driving the 2nd half. This isn’t in the KBL bubble, there’s sharp edges and lots of triggers. For a BL the darkness of the content left me feeling unsettled but it did have a glorious ending and that counts for a lot. 9/10 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Happy Merry Ending (Korea Thurs Gaga) eps 1-2 of 8 - No shade (ha!) but I do think Leo would have been better in the role of the singer (SJ) but I’m okay with Dongwon. JH is a nice flirty bit of sunshine. SJ is clearly the most anxiety-riddled socially awkward broken baby evers. I’m not sure about this kinda angst, it’s not really my thing especially on the back of The Eighth Sense. Look, I’ve never been one for a fixer-upper. We shall see, I guess? This is the beauty of KBL, so short most of the time that it’s low commitment no matter my reservations. 

My Story (Pinoy Sat YouTube) ep 3 of 10 - it’s fine I guess? 

Naked Dinner AKA Zenra Meshi (Japan Fri Gaga) ep 3 of 12 - I guess the fetish matches are finding each other? How v Japan. Of course I like the conversation about names and protocols. 

It’s Airing But ...

Love Syndrome (Thai Sat WeTV) stopped at ep 2 of 12 - I’m just not into any aspect of it (except Lee Long Shi and I can watch him in Tin Tem Jai) - saving to binge if the end is solid.

Venus in the Sky (Sat YouTube) pilot/tester?) 0 of 10 - not entirely sure what’s up with this one distribution-wise, but the pilot was classic university-set pulp. I hope it happens because the leads are cute with good chemsitry and I thought it was fun. However, this pilot holds together as its own little short too.

Make a Wish (Thai Weds ?) stars Fluke Natouch (OhmFluke UWMA etc...) & Judo (The Miracle Of Teddy Bear) in a medical-fantasy. About a doctor who sees ghosts and a deity who resides in a Bodhi tree that earns merits whenever he fulfills a wish, based on a y-novel by Sammon (Manner of Death, Triage). Same as above.

Stormy Honeymoon (Vietnam) - I’m tired of these characters 

In Case You Missed It

Star Hunter dropped all their trailers for 2023 on their YT channel. Bit late in the year IMHO. Nothing really stuck out.

Big Dragon the movie = more of the same

True Moon = yet another loosely disguised attempt at the 2 Moons franchise?

Flirt Milk = standard pulp fodder, but they are cute

Acadex = The Eclipse + Destiny Seeker + Harry Potter 4 + The CW, as a movie that may not be BL 

Sunset Vibes = Big Dragon pair as a one night stand but “uh-oh he’s my boss!” I’m game. Maybe it’ll have a better story? Maybe it will have a plot? Maybe... oh who am I kidding. It’ll be high heat and that’s about all we can hope for. 

City of Stars AKA Fueangnakorn = An actor falls in love with a programmer and the narrative intends to “explore the ramifications of being public figure in the social network era who must endure critics, bullying, and defamation.” Looks like another Lovely Writer/Call It What You Want sort of thing.

The biggest shocker is how few they fielded of their original BL stable.

ALSO:

Love Senior = SOTUS but make it GL (I’m not mad about this one, it’s about flipping time. But it’s GL so I won’t track it, although I will watch it.)

Next Week Looks Like This:

Coming in May 2023:

5/1 House of Stars (Thai iQIYI) - An LGBTQ actor in love with an actor from another company, plus other wanna be stars all trapped in a doom house together. 

5/4 Love Mate (Korea Viki) 8 eps- Office romance between a team leader and a new employee who agree to date for 3 months to find true love, from the makers of Our Dating Sim.

5/18 - Starstruck (Korea ????) - A boy has had a crush on his childhood friend for a long time. Stars Zuho (Kpop SF9 - noted Good Egg) opposite rookie actor Kim In Sung (as the one with the crush). 

5/27 The Luminous Solution (Thai ????) 10 eps - Thana is having trouble at work and in his relationship. He can't seem to catch a break. So he makes a wish to change everything. But every wish has a price.

2023 forthcoming BL master post (see comments, some are inaccurate, NOT KEPT UPDATED)

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

I do like a tie (or nametag) grab kiss. (Boss & Babe) 

Our Skyy 2 SIMM ep summing it all up and reviewing itself.

Future the series, I like this reverse claiming thing. So cute. 

The boyfriends eps are the BEST eps. The Eighth Sense. 

I WANT BOSS’S OUTFITS. 

My favorite, “there is only one bed but we slept together on the floor anyway.” (The Promise) 

Now that is a claim that MUST be proved. 

Loves the little babies with their killer communication style. 

What do I always say about a BL that reviews itself? All from Destiny Seeker. (I’m getting caught up, I’ll post a review of the series when I’m done.)

(last week)

Current Kpop earworm? UO’s Restart 

#this week in BL #bl news #BL gossip #upcoming BL #new BL #best BL #BL reviews #korean bl #thai bl movie #Japanese BL #live action yaoi #Rakutan Viki #gagaoolala #GMMTV #pinoy bl #Our Skyy 2 #Pastsenger #A Boss and a Babe #Our Dining Table #Bokura no Shokutaku #The Eighth Sense #The Eighth Sense review #Happy Merry Ending #Zenra Meshi #Star Hunter Studio #Big Dragon the movie #True Moon #Flirt Milk #Sunset Vibes #City of Stars

[disregardcanon]

yellowjackets au where coach martinez lives through the crash. it does not, actually, make things better

bill martinez was a good soccer coach- a great one, even. he could call a play the other team never expected, spot talent at the middle school level and make for DAMN sure those girls kept playing in high school. he could pick captains with a talent for motivating the others and keeping a team together and keep his lowest achieving athletes scraping by in classes enough to keep the on the team. he could even drag all their butts through from states to nationals.

but coaching a soccer team is a lot different than trying to lead his girls, his boys, and his assistant coach through a survival situation in the wilderness.

he tries his hardest to maintain control over the situation, but there's a LOT of situation to control. coach scott's been seriously injured and no one but misty quigley has the time or mental space to help him deal with it, and beyond Making Sure that Ben Stays Alive, he doesn't have the mental space to deal with it, either. he's happy to delegate his assistant's care to the team manager. if ben tries to talk to him about how misty's poisoning him (that's absurd, scott. what would she get out of that?) or making romantic advances on him (well then, be a man and get her to stop? come on, scott, she's under five foot five inches. she's not even one of our PLAYERS and you're saying you can't hold her off? i have more important things to deal with here.)

he lets coach scott organize his Lets See Who's Gonna Hunt For Us party, and has him be in charge of it because ben's the one with the hunting experience, but he's also... very much Flexing His I'm Really In Charge Muscles. he reams both ben and travis new assholes about travis aiming the gun at natalie (and he does it with all the others there) and then he tries to talk ben out of appointing travis as the second hunter. ben refuses to have that talk in public, but bill's like look my son is Very Unstable and Highly Emotional and i don't think you should give him a gun. and i also don't want him spending that much time with natalie scatorrcio. i like her and i trust her with our lives, but someday we're going back to The Real World and she's going to die in a ditch and i'm trying to get travis to Not Fucking Do That. but ben thinks about how he's technically in charge of this choice and how bill told him to man up about misty quigley's behavior... so he puts the gun in travis's hands and dares bill to make a comment about it.

beyond trying to control his son's life and belittling his assistant coach, bill's biggest concerns are with the basics of survival, keeping jackie and tai in line, doing things that are probably helpful to keep travis from Behaving Like Travis and things that are Very Much Not Helpful for That, trying to get javi to integrate more with the group, and trying to figure out how much he can trust coach scott to back him up on any given decision.

he hates the seance idea, but lets jackie organize it because hopefully it will help with their team building. he tells travis and javi they should stay out of it, which makes travis go up immediately and makes javi sneak up. so that dad doesn't see and think badly of me

when tai decides to make her Wilderness Adventure, he decides to accompany the group because they might have more luck with him there. he tries to get travis to come with them and bring the gun, but coach scott digs his heels in about the gun staying with the group and the girls all... side with him... and travis refuses to come along. javi WANTS to, but bill won't let him because he says he won't be able to help and will be safer with his brother. who he makes eye contact with like if you don't protect your little brother i will be ending you, travis.

he goes on the expedition and tries to be in charge by virtue of being The Coach and The Adult, but van is just here to make sure tai doesn't die, mari and akilah are here for tai, and tai is still sore that he didn't make her captain. so if he doesn't do things HER way then he's just going to have to deal with doing them alone. (van gets her face eaten, coach loses an arm, and they make their way back with terrible injuries and their tails between their legs)

when they get back and get the injuries taken care of, laura lee announces her intentions to fly the plane to get them help. coach scott says that's a dumb idea and no one else is dying on his watch, but coach martinez says it's a great idea and he'll help her. and thus, the power struggle continues. he gets some information from laura lee about Visions that lottie's been having and goes. oh. oh shit. i forgot about the schizophrenia. he tries to talk to laura lee about how Lottie Is Probably Very Sick Right Now, and she doesn't listen, and then he tries to talk to lottie herself about it. lottie is starting to drink her wilderness koolaid and is like coach. i think that i have visions and i think the wilderness is telling me what we need to know to survive. he keeps it to himself for a while, but is like lottie matthews if you do anything stupid i'm going to tell EVERYONE! and that. is a very big point of tension.

jackie reveals that shauna is pregnant, he reams shauna a new asshole in public about how stupid that was and how clear he made the team protection requirements and how they could get it, and then he confronts both travis and coach scott about whether or not they got her pregnant. his son is very upset that he thinks he's sleeping with SHAUNA and didn't even notice what was happening with natalie, and the coach scott just. laughs at him. laughs right in his face. he's been beating misty quigley off of himself with a stick but he got shauna shipman pregnant. sure.

he tries to get jackie to participate more in being Alive, and she helps him and laura lee with the plane stuff more than anyone else.

when laura lee goes kablooey and lottie notices before it's started, a lot of the girls start to go Wilderness Prophet. bill notices that something's off about the energy but doesn't know what to do about it beyond. encouraging jackie's last attempt at teambuilding. the kids can have a dance if they want, right? he'll try to find something to get them free. something something something there still has to be SOMETHING

he doesn't attend the dance or eat any of the food. he stays inside and rakes through information in the books. he hears travis and jackie come in and wonders what the fuck's up with that, and then hears them upstairs and goes. shit. that's what's up. hopefully my reaming of travis made it so he used protection, at least, and then he hears a big group of the kids burst in and they start... the events. he gets the fuck up and opens the door to see what the hell's going on, but all he sees is- lottie shoving jackie in a closet and then they're passing his High As A Kite Son Around. and he's trying to get through to them to figure out WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING, but soon it's a hunt, chasing travis out the door. he runs out after them, trying to figure out what the hell is happening and how to stop it from happening, and he comes and tries to use his coach voice to get it to stop. but no one listens.

"you don't matter anymore" lottie tells him. he thinks about getting physical, but that's- shauna, holding a knife to his son's throat. it only stops because natalie scatorccio bursts out and makes them.

the girls finally disperse, finding different places to run off to, and travis left... collapsing. he doesn't want his dad around, of course he doesn't, even though he's high enough he barely knows what's happening beyond Not Dead Not Dead Not Dead. and natalie promises to make sure he's okay and then orders him (HIM!) to go find javi.

and he tries. he tears through the cabin, the meat shed, down by the lake, all the areas around the cabin, and finally he collapses in a pile of leaves and sleeps right there in the woods. when dawn breaks and wakes him up, he searches for hours again, but can't find him. he has to come back to try to eat and tell everyone that javi is, for sure, missing. he tries to get travis to join him on HIS search, but travis has decided that he and NATALIE are going to do it together. without his help. "i don't want you criticizing every move i make." he looks to natalie, please back me up, but she shrugs.

"dads aren't always good people. i'm not sure i trust you with him, either."

the girls killed a bear.

"no," coach says, "jackie is right. this isn't some sort of gift from the forest. lottie isn't a prophet." van glares. "well how do you know, coach? you couldn't protect us from those wolves. lottie's amulet kept all my LIMBS attached!"

"she has schizophrenia, vanessa, not psychic powers." the room falls silent.

"is that true?" van asks gently.

"i-" lottie's voice catches in her throat. she starts crying, and just... sits there. it's a yes.

"SEE!" bill demands, pointing towards her, "she's just off her meds. she tried to kill my son yesterday, are we really going to pretend she's some... forest jesus?"

coach scott glares. "coach, that's... really fucked up. you don't just- out a kid like that."

"that kid," coach says, gesturing wildly to lottie, "almost killed my son because of her psychiatric problems! she's dragging the rest of them in, and i thought they ought to know she's crazy."

suddenly, the confrontation here isn't jackie vs everyone else. it's coach martinez vs lottie matthews...

"vanessa-" a core member of the group. if she changed her tune, that could sway all of them.

"lottie should have gotten to tell us that herself," van says firmly, "and hell, what if it's made up? what if she's... always been magic?"

bill turns to taissa. "come on, taissa. surely YOU don't believe this?" taissa refuses to make eye contact. he can't try mari, because she's been falling under lottie's spell for months. akilah, mari, misty- all lost causes.

"shauna?" he asks. shauna moves a little closer to taissa. he doesn't even bother asking coach scott. they've been drifting further apart for this entire time. he can't trust his assistant to back him up on ANYTHING.

that leaves jackie taylor, his team captain. the girl who, when they crashed, could have gotten those girls to move mountains. maybe she still has some of that left.

"captain?" he asks cautiously.

jackie is angry at a lot of things and a lot of people. she doesn't want to be here, and she knows that shauna doesn't love her and she knows the girls wouldn't side with her the way they are with lottie.

but she's still a YELLOWJACKET. "that was lottie's secret to share."

some of the tension left in the room dissipates. maybe, just maybe, if natalie were still here she could make a difference. he knows that travis has poisoned her against him to some extent, but she's not that easily led. even if she didn't like him revealing lottie's diagnosis, she's against their insanity enough that she might agree they need to be cautious- that it's important information to have, to make sure the girls don't lead them to becoming some sort of pagan forest cult.

but natalie isn't here. travis isn't here, to show whether he'd side with his father or with the girls who assaulted him, and javi certainly isn't. because he and travis and natalie are the only ones who have even thought about searching for their youngest member.

"fine," he says, "if you'd prefer to let the girl who gets visions thank the forest for you, go ahead. i'm going to go find my son."

he freezes to death in the woods that very night, just a hundred feet away from the cabin. travis and natalie find his body when they leave again that morning for the hunt, and even though travis didn't like him and things just got worse in the wilderness... he bawls. he takes his father's ring for javi, when they finally find him, and they let the rest of the group know what happened.

jackie thinks about the fight she was about to have, about how she might have... gone outside and slept there, just to prove a point. she talks to shauna about it instead of letting it boil. it's still not pretty, but she lives longer.

lottie has to deal with the prophet thing even more, since this conflict very explicitly got the coach killed. if she doesn't lean into it... what else is left?

#yellowjackets #yellowjackets aus #bill martinez #travis martinez #lottie matthews #jackie taylor #van palmer #a journey through my drafts

[chaikachi]

Is it just me or do I find it funny that the Xiao Long-Rose family's ideas of flirting consist of awkwardly complimenting someone on their appearance?

Exhibit A, Ruby: Gently compliments Oscar's new combat gear (I swear the boy's heart must be fluttering at that point).

Exhibit B, Yang: Fumbles over calling Blake's new haircut good like the hopeless dork she is.

Makes you wonder if Tai and/or Summer/Raven went through the same thing and it's just... hereditary in this family lol!

It isn't just you. They're all certifiable dorks when it comes to flirting. 😭

With RG it's fine because Oscar's just as bad. "Woah, you have eyes." Very smooth there young man. He was absolutely on cloud nine when she complimented him tho. Look at the way his face brightens!!!

But with both Yang and Ruby, there is also??? The finger guns????

Really do have to wonder where they both picked it up from, cause it's getting ridiculous. Dork losers. Both of them. 😔

#both their love interests are just like #-heart eyes emoji- about it though #it is very endearing #ask #asks #anon #anono

[star-girl69]

Ultraviolence

Natalie Scatorccio x Fem!Reader

—-

a/n: double chapter today bc…. you’ll see… i hope you all enjoy!!

warnings: swearing, mentions of guns and bullets, animal death, mentions of blood, tell me if i missed anything!!

Chapter Eleven - This Hunger Has No End

Chapter Eleven - This Hunger Has No End

—-

1996-

This is how we do it!

The impromptu dance parties had been happening almost every night, a way to preserve normalcy. Jackie has first suggested it, but the rest of them had all agreed and soon- they were putting a music player in bucket, making it loud enough to project across the whole cabin.

You were still eating your dinner, the venison just as good as last night, easier to savor now that there wasn’t a rolling hunger in your stomach. The deer wouldn’t last much longer, but it would last long enough, you told yourself- until you could find another thing to kill.

The girls all danced and shouted, Coach snapping as a way of clapping, and you watched them all with a smile on your face. This felt like you weren’t in the woods. And maybe that was what you all needed.

Finally, the music started winding down, the voice becoming distorted until it stopped completely.

“Goddamn it,” Van panted, pick it up from the bucket and giving it a few hits. No music. “Has hitting something ever fixed it?”

“Maybe try blowing on it,” Mari said, and Van opened the side and did just so. Nothing was heard in the cabin besides for sharp creaking from upstairs, like a footstep.

Everyone stopped and looked up at the ceiling.

“Uh, the fuck was that?” Jackie asked.

“Wait, you heard it too?” Lottie says, her eyes wide.

“It was probably just a branch,” Taissa says, her voice commanding.

Mari gives her a look. “Inside, on the floor? What if it’s… you know, him?”

“What, the dead guy?”

“Um… yeah.”

“You know what it probably was?” Nat asks. “The dead guy’s missing fingers trying to find their way home.” She smiles and everyone scolds her, and you can’t help but laugh slightly, hiding behind your hand.

“You really have to encourage them?” Tai sighs.

“You gotta admit, it didn’t sound like it was on the roof.”

“Fine. Then it was just a rat, a raccoon, or something, I don’t know, it-”

“Shh,” Lottie says sharply, suddenly cutting Jackie off. She looks towards the ceiling. “Listen.”

“Oh, my God,” Tai mutters under her breath.

Everyone looks at the ceiling, including you.

While you won’t deny that the wilderness is a weird and scary place- ghosts? An animal is much more likely.

“Well I don’t hear it now,” Mark says after a moment.

Before the girls can start arguing again, Coach Ben interrupts.

“All right, all right. You know what I think it was? I think the ghost decided it was time to get some sleep. And we should probably do the same, yeah?”

“Yeah, I don’t know,” Van spoke, holding up the music player. And slowly, like a spill of water, the girls are dispersed and moved to their beds.

—-

Hunting was what you did most these days. You, Nat, and Travis would all hike out into the woods and look around for tracks and scratches in the trees- and while sometimes you did find markers that a deer was around, you never found it.

You were ready to go, holding your stomach because of your cramps- which most of the girls were also plagued with by now.

“Jackie,” Nat said, kicking her sleeping form. She groaned. “Jackie! Up and at ‘em, or something.”

“You got it right,” you say, smiling sarcastically, and she rolls her eyes, smiling as well.

“I’m so cold,” Jackie groans, looking like a blue blanket with her brown hair spilling out on top. “And I have cramps!” she said, finally rolling over and facing the two of you.

“No shit,” Nat scoffs. “We literally all have cramps.”

“I feel like I have appendicitis and I’m not in bed.” You start walking towards the door, excited for some fresh air- wondering if it will help you. “It’s no excuse, Jackie!” you shout over your shoulder.

Natalie chuckles. “Our periods have synced up,” she says to Jackie, nudging her one more time. “C’mon.”

She follows you out of the cabin, slinging the gun over her shoulder while you slip on your backpack.

“Hey,” Akilah says when Jackie finally comes outside. “Bloody soldiers on the left, breakfast on the right. Okay? Don’t mess ‘em up like Travis did,” she smiles.

“Okay,” he says, shooting her a look. “You guys are disgusting. I’m just-” he makes a gagging sound, and Akilah rolls her eyes.

“Shut up,”

—-

“Are we finally going?” Travis asks, looking at the “bloody soldiers” in disgust.

“Oh, don’t be so happy,” Natalie smiles. “Everywhere you go, the blood will follow you.”

He groans, but follows the two of you anyways, deep into the woods, looking for birds or something to shoot.

Travis goes first, resting the gun on the curve of a tree, staring at a large plain of thick shrubs, nothing comes out.

“Nothing,” he sighs after a minute, letting the gun fall.

“Ah, giving up makes sense.” She holds up the piece of paper you’ve been keeping track on. “You’re not too far behind to catch up.”

Travis is third, by a wide margin, and you can’t stop thinking about it and smiling. Even though he’s been nicer ever since that day on the plane, you can’t help but wonder how much this is hurting his ego.

“It’s not my fault your lady bloods are scaring all the prey away.”

“Wow,” you laugh, leaning down to touch the leaf of a small fern.

“You went there,” Nat says.

“Went there? I am surrounded on all sides That cabin is, like, the blood hive.” He reloads the gun.

She scoffs. “What’s the matter, Travis? Are you scared of our menses?”

“Never said that.”

She smiles, giving you her hand and helping tug you up from the ground. “Anyway, shouldn’t the smell of blood attract animals?”

“Uh, predators, maybe. But sure hunter-gatherer tribes used to make their women, like, hide in huts or whatever when they were on their periods?”

“Yeah, Travis, let’s talk about the logic of neanderthals or whatever,” you say.

“Yeah, I’m confused. Are you a zoologist or an anthropologist?”

He chuckles. “I’m pretty sure it was that so they wouldn’t ruin the hunt.”

“More like cause men needed something to blame their failures on.”

Travis looks at her and takes in a breath, turning back around towards the trees.

“Ouch. I guess that hasn’t changed.”

“Can he, like, forfeit his turn for being stupid?” Natalie smiles and wraps her arm around your waist, leaning against you, while you cross your arms, wanting to go back to the cabin.

Finally, the bird you’ve been stalking kicks up in flight. Travis fires a shot, and misses.

“Fuck,” he says, breathing heavily, and you and Natalie have to turn around to try and hide your laugh. “Whatever,” he spits, stalking off.

—-

You lay on your stomach next to Natalie, watching a small groundhog eat some leaves maybe 30 feet away.

She takes a deep breath and pulls the trigger. You shrink into yourself, expecting the sharp sound of a gunshot to come, but it doesn’t. Something clicks, and you look over to see Nat opening an empty chamber, which shouldn’t be empty.

“You cheater,” she says, turning to Travis who starts laughing, holding a bullet in his hand.

He does some weird trick you can barely even make out, and the bullet disappears from in between his fingers.

“Are you seriously doing magic right now?” you ask. “Major turn-off,” you sigh, flipping around so you’re laying on your back. You can hear Travis scoff. “Can we stay here for a minute? My stomach hurts.”

Natalie lays on her back next to you.

“Didn’t you tell Jackie that cramps are no excuse to stay in bed?”

Travis makes a gagging sound and walks away.

“Yeah, but like, this is is the woods. Not my bed.”

“Oh, okay,” she laughs. You rest in silence for another minute, you shoulder touching hers. “Appendicitis, though? Really?”

“I’m serious!” you say, drawing out the word in a groan, digging your feet into the dirt and turning your head to face her.

But she was already staring at you.

Her face is inches away from hers, the end of your noses brush, and you can feel her breath on your skin.

Her eyes are wide and bright blue, and you want to smile, to laugh and joke with her, but there’s something pulling you towards her, to just be like this.

You can hear branches rustle in the wind.

If you were to say her name, your lips would ghost across hers.

She’s been haunting you for so long, always right there, always a second too long, always thinking of her touch as soon as you had touched her.

Hunger has been something in your stomach you’re accustomed to. But this hunger, this one for her is different. It is a storm, in a way that you know it will never stop. There is no end in sight, no hope of food, of a savior.

You are starving and dying by the day, but this shaky friendship with her, that is what is barely keeping you alive.

The only savior you could possibly have is her.

And you’re in the wilderness, and you’re not stupid, and she looks and Travis and she cares about him. She dug up a dead body for him.

This is a hunger that will never stop, a violence inside of you that she could help you with, that you could share, but she won’t give it to you. She won’t ever give it to you, the girl with the gash across her face, the girl who barely speaks, the girl who is always second best even here in the wilderness.

It is never over, not when you’re too young to keep something like this, not when she is all that you have ever wanted, staying right in front of you for years.

Maybe it is the wilderness, the plane crash, but maybe it is just that you like looking at her, and you feel safe with her, and you want to hold her hand forever and wait for her.

“Guys!” Travis shouts, and you gasp and sit up, feeling stupid and embarrassed. Your mind was going to places that you wanted it to go. Not where it had to go.

“Y/N,” she whispers, reaching out for your hand, but you stand up. One of the bandages on your face comes loose.

“Sorry,” you say finally. “I-” But you can’t speak, you can’t lie to her, because you aren’t sorry.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for-” she smiles, so sweetly, like she’s watching her favorite TV show, like she’s watching the rain fall on a peaceful night.

But the thing about rain is that soon your boots will fill up with water, soon you hair will stick to your face, and soon it won’t be nice anymore- it won’t be peaceful.

But you’re violence and she’s violence, and a little more won’t hurt-

You have survived through so much together, and you can’t step forward like this just to lose her. Not here, not in the wilderness, not ever.

You are so hungry, so, so hungry, and there is no way you can ever feed it. No way you can ever make this go away. This hunger will never be over.

—-

taglist:

@sweetdayme4427 @dreaming-for-an-escape @peachydoki

#yellowjackets x reader #natalie scatorccio #natalie scatorccio x reader

[nuwildcat]

10 QL people I want carnally aesthetically

Sooooo as your local ace, I couldn't complete the lovely tag from @sunshinesanctuary with carnally, cause....I don't think that way. BUT with a little chit chat in DMs with @luckydragon10 I was able to cobble together a list of aesthetically pleasing people from Queer Love series.

Cool I'm going to start with the two who lured me into Thai BL cause why not.

**note the following gifs will not be the most flattering, but instead the most hilarious ones I find on tumblr's atrocious gif search.

10. Tan (Max Nattapol) - Manner of Death

What can I say, I like a good cheeky monkey who has no idea what to do with the pretty man that has just kissed him. He has his little shit face on here, and that's about all it takes to lure in my ace heart.

9. Bunn (Tul Pakorn) - Manner of Death

What an orange cat of a man. Like, what were you thinking was going to happen (spoiler he was checking for a gun I think? sus little bean) but that is a horrible way to go about that. Charmed the shit out of me from the get go, he absolutely deserves to be on this list. Also that shirt is doin' werk.

8. Phupha (Earth Pirapat) - A Tale of a Thousand Stars

Right, so, as far as aesthetics go, this man is already pretty, but then they stuck him in a uniform, and I've always been a sucker for a uniform. He gives gremlin vibes this entire show, despite the serious face that is just stuck like that. (I am starting to sense a pattern...).

7. Prapai (Fort Thitipong) - Love in the Air

What does this man do? Seemingly, nothing. He has way too much time on his hands and a clearly overworked secretary, but I will say the lack of brain cells and puppy dog eyes kinda worked for me. (not enough to finish the series, but I was digging him).

6. Jang Jae Young (Park Seo Ham) - Semantic Error

I love how freakishly tall this man is. Once again I have found an absolute terror of a man (this one totally has a golden heart) and latched onto him instantly. The fact that he came with a built in size difference is just the icing on the cake.

5. Choi Yu Na (Song Ji Oh) - Semantic Error

Ummm. Yeah Imma just let that gif speak for itself. Immaculate babe, just keep doing what you're doing.

OKAY from here on it's just KP I don't know what y'all were expecting otherwise.

4. Tay (Us Nititorn) - KinnPorsche the Series

My love affair with Tay is long standing and undying. This is the best I could do to find a silly gif of him. Honestly I think that speaks to why he is so high on the aesthetic list. Poor man lost in a google coin toss to Big 😭

3. Big (Nodt Nutthasid) - KinnPorsche the Series

That right there ladies and gentlemen, is peak bodyguard performance, losing your shit over the new kid. All jokes aside there's something about this man's face that makes me wanna stare at it from like every angle. Give this man another role so I can stare at him more, please.

2. Porsche (Apo Nattawin) - KinnPorsche the Series

Ahhh Apo and his amazing faces. There is a unique ability to demonstrate just how little is going on in a character's head, and Apo has it DOWN. Porsche my darling, aesthetically your a freaking masterpiece, but baby if you think too hard you might hurt yourself. (Yes I am aware the theme is getting worse). THAT BEING SAID. Holy shit when you clean this boy up he is a force to recon with. That green suit??? it haunts me. Aesthetics on point with this brat.

Kinn (Mile Phakphum) - KinnPorsche

Right so this last one was actually hard to pick between Porsche and Kinn, buuuuut if I'm going form a character aesthetic approach I have to give the #1 spot to Kinn. My man slays through the majority of this show with suits on point, and cocky faces galore. I kinda hate him a little bit for how long I had to scroll to find an unflattering gif. EVEN HERE HE LOOKS GOOD he just got his dick sucked too hard in a helicopter to pull off suave. *throws hands up in the air* I just wanna put him in my pocket and take him out and shake him every once and a while.

I am very late to this game but I am going to inflict this on a couple people I think who haven't been tagged and whose answers I would find amusing. @lady-guts @fairhairedkings @medievalraven @stoeptepel @dr-lemurr

Please feel no obligation to participate I just think y'all would have good hot-takes.

#tag game #boys love #girls love #queer love #kinnporsche the series #manner of death #semantic error #love in the air #I don't know what I'm doing here I'm too ace for this

[petals2fish]

1. Fortnight - functioning alcoholic 🥲 YOUR QUIET TREASON. All my mornings are Monday stuck in an endless February. POSTIC GENIUS. Magical move on drug YIKES. I love you you tis ruining my life. I touched you for only a fortnight but I touched you. “My husband is cheating I want to kill him.” MOOD. I love you it’s ruining my life. I’m calling ya but you won’t pick up. Went to Florida?!?! 🫡🫡🫡 thank you post Malone for your service.

2. The tortured poets department: “I’ve seen this episode but still loved the show.” Aka I THINK IVE SEEN THIS FILM BEFORE AND I DIDNT LIKE THE ENDING. “Who’s gonna love you if not me.” Lol “We’re modern idiots!!!!” JUSTICE FOR CHARLIE PUTH!!!! “A tattooed golden retriever” made me laugh out loud. “I chose this cyclone with you.” Is so Jily plz. “You’re not Dillion Thomas and I’m not patting smith.” Okay Tay. NO FUCKING BODY: 👍🏼 “Sometimes I wonder if you’ll screw this up with me.” Spoiler ‼️ he did. “Everyone we know understands why it’s meant to be.” I didn’t thanks. “Because we’re crazy.” Okay mood. HE PUT THE RING IN HER RING FINGER?!?! “CLOSEST IVE COME TO MY HEART EXPLODING?!?!” PLEASE?!?! “You left your typewriter at my apartment straight from the tortured poets department.” Five stars!!

3. My boy only breaks his favorite toys: ‘I’m queen of sandcastles he destroys.’ Jumps out at me. “Cause I knew too much.” WHAT DO YIU KNOW TAYLOR. “Should have known it was a matter of time.” Taylor is the queen of ignoring red flags. 🚩 This is a fun beat though besties. “Once I fix me, he’s gonna miss me.” YEAH. TELL EM BESTIE. “Stole my tortured heart and left all these broken parts. Told me I’m better off.” Sorry Taylor you were better off babes.

4. Down bad: NICER BEAT OKAY. “Dawn bad crying at the gym.” Mood. “Fuck it if I can’t have him I might just die.” No why is this so FUNNY. Like this is Matty we’re talking about for sure. “Everything forms out teenage petulance.” I mean yeah cause you were still developing a prefrontal cortex when you met him. “So fuck you if I can’t have us.” HAHAHAHAHAHA I LOVE THIS PART. Honestly I feel you Taylor, I’ve been dumb for a dumb boy before too. It’s okay.

5. So long London: EXCISE ME OPENING WITH A CHORAl. THESE KYRICS WHATLFHAKRHS FUCKKKKK. How much sad did you think I had??? Oh the tragedy?! So long London, you’ll find some one???? “You left me at the house by the heath.” “I stopped CPR”?!?! 😿😿 “YOU LET Me give all that you for free?!?!” SHE GAVE YOU A FUCKING GRAMMY YOGURT BOY AND YOU DIDNT EVEN WANT IT. “too graves, one gun?!” Good for you baby girl. “I’ll find someone” SHUT THE FUCK UP. I’m gonna throw up. Fuck fuck fuck. Taylor 😿😿😿😿 “I DIED ON THE ALTER” ALDBSKAHDBSJSKS NOOOOO. I’m crying. My Shakespeare queen. You’ll find someone RIPS at my heart.

6. But daddy I love him: “bedroom eyes like a remedy.” Fuck how many matty songs are we getting. This reminds me so much of a faith hill song. No I will not elaborate right now. Very country narrative. This one will be fun to scream in concert just for the “I’m having his baby…no I’m not!!!” Very chaotic. 4/5 stars.

7. Fresh out of the slammer: daily disappearing just to see him smile?!?! Girlie pop you really do lie to yourself don’t you??? “He was with her in dreams” I mean it’s really joeover. This song is fun, I like it, very chaotic as well. 5/5 stars.

8. Florida!!!: Florence my queen you make this song beautiful, I need more listens to deconstruct it though:

9. Guilty as skin: girl just write self insert fanfic if you want to fuck someone this badly (can’t wait to write and read fics based off this one hahahaha) 5/5 stars 🌟

10. Who’s afraid of little old me?: shit I’m crying. Fuck fuck fuck. She truly hates most of the new fans huh. Lmaooo SHE SINGS THIS IN ALL HER REGISTERS OMGGGG. It’s all her past selves screaming at us!!! Aldhaksjdka she’s so fucking clever

11. I can fix him no really I can: AHAHA THE ENDING KF THE SONG ALDBSKAHDKAJDHAKDHW SHE REALLY SAID “OH SHIT DAMN I FUCKED UP DIDNT I” 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

12. Loml: Joe Alwyn you need witness protection

13. I can do it with a broken heart: oh god this was hurts me more than so long London because it hits home for every damn time I had to preform on stage and then go cry in the shower between shows 🥲

14. The smallest man who ever lived: 🚨🚨🚨 found at the scene of the crime: Joe Alwyn's Small Dick

15. The alchemy: AHHHHHHH!!! HOLY FUCK WE GOT A TRAVIS SONG ALDBSLAHDBSKSJDBWKEHDBAKWJD HE GOT A SONG FUCK YESSSSS

16. CLARA BOW: the outro. The OUTRO. THE FUCKING OUTRO. I’m dead. 😵

Overall: I love it. I love it. I love it SO DAMN MICH. you can tell how much time and effort she put into production and story telling. FUCK. I love this album as much as I loved Folklore the first time I heard it!!

#petals talks #taylor swift #petals liveblogs ttpd #ttpd era #ttpd spoilers

[ae-azile]

You're Invited…

Event: Tankhun Theerapanyakul's 30th Birthday Extravaganza

Theme: Roaring 20s 

Place: Hum Bar

Date: November 25th, 2022 

The digitally curated invitation arrives as a group text on Kim's phone two weeks before the date in question. When it arrives, he is strumming a tune so melancholy that it makes him feel he isn't emotionally ready to put together lyrics for it yet. Kim isn't sure why he isn't ready. Writing sad songs over the last five months has been commonplace. So common that his agent has asked him several times if he is okay. Vice is more thoughtful than his record label. His record label has only asked if he could please just write a couple of happy bops for the new album, or at least one. 

His answer to Vice?

Of course I'm okay. Why would you think otherwise?

As for his answer to his record label?

No.

Regardless, neither answer seems to please them. Not that he is used to pleasing people, at least not the people who matter to him in some capacity. It has been a habit since Ma died, likely developing as a way to rebel against and to agitate Pa, only to spread like a disease. Pa wants a guard on him? Order the guard to leave or run away if they don't obey. Pa wants him to work a mission at seventeen? Kill the shitty ally who pointed a gun to his head to make Kim comply with his demands at an event when he was thirteen, all while letting their enemy walk free. Kinn finds out the reason Kim made that decision and strongly suggests Pa add a therapist to the roster, even though Pa always said no to doing that for Khun? Make the therapist rush out of the room in tears during their first and only session, then distance himself from an extremely concerned, desperate, and apologetic Kinn.

Chay finds out Kim used him to figure out just how terrible his father is? Pretend like he isn’t bothered and leave Chay heartbroken, only to end up heartbroken himself.

While that last one left a terrible taste in his mouth, it is clearly a tactic that mostly works for him. Look at all the lonely, sad, but high-quality music he is producing. He is curating a great album for someone to play as they write a suicide note. While Kim doesn't condone that, he thinks every person should have the perfect soundtrack for any poignant life event.

Porsche: Looking forward to it! Kinn and I will go shopping for our outfits this week. 🙂

Kinn: Couple coordinated? ❤️❤️❤️

Porsche: You know it 😁❤️

Tankhun: 🤮

Kim has to agree, but keeps his own vomiting emojis to himself. 

Tay: Time and I will be there too. Happy to celebrate with you! 

Tem: I'll be there as well.

Tay: 😐

Jom: See you guys there! 

Yok: Looking forward to decorating the bar and celebrating with you, Tankhun! 🙂💜🍾🥂

Kim isn't even sure how he got Tem's, Jom's, and Yok's numbers. He probably found them and added them to his contacts when he was obsessively researching Porsche's origins on a caffeine bender. Whatever. They are in his phone now. 

Unknown Number: Okay.

Porsche: You can come, but no drinking!!!

Fuck. It's Chay's new number. 

That has Kim going from passively watching the conversation on his phone to quickly picking it up to click on the group text list and go through everyone in the chat. He has all of them saved on his phone except for two numbers and the list isn't very long. Not surprising. Tankhun went from a popular boarding school student to a traumatized, agoraphobic shut-in who cut himself off from everyone outside of the family and his bodyguards. He is only coming back to himself - or developing a new version. It is a mix of the sharp, caring, and charismatic big brother he used to have and the eccentric and over-the-top persona he put on after the kidnapping. He is both recognizable and a complete stranger, and Kim has missed him so much. 

Not that he will say that out loud. 

But maybe he can show him. He can show him that he cares and that he loves him. Kim never stopped loving either of his brothers, despite the distance he put between himself and his family. He never wanted to distance himself from Tankhun. He would have taken Tankhun with him. Kim told him they could share an apartment, even when he knew Tankhun told Kinn about why he killed one of Pa’s allies. He never blamed Tankhun for that and he still doesn't. Tankhun had just wanted Kim to get the help he was denied, even though Kim clearly doesn’t need it. Kim had wanted (and still wants) his oldest brother with him so they could get away and put all their shit behind them. 

And Tankhun wouldn't leave. So Kim left alone and he stayed that way. Alone. 

But Kim can choose not to be alone, at least for one night. He didn't realize how alone he felt, not until he came to his senses and - unfortunately - Chay came to his senses too. Maybe a party will be good for him, even though parties are never good for him. Unless he is hired to perform at one, he doesn't want to be at them. Ever. 

Apparently Chay does. Chay is going and Kim hasn't seen him in person for months. That means Kim is going too. 

Kim: Count me in. 

Tankhun: HE SPEAKS. 😱

Kim: Did you want me to ignore your invitation? 

Tankhun: Of course I didn't. I just expected you to. You better dress up in a costume.

Kim: No.

Thankhun: 🙄 Fine. Just look nice. And ACT nice. Socialize. Do not stand in a corner all night. You deserve to have fun, believe it or not. 

No. He doesn't. But he doesn't say that.

Kim: Okay.

Tankhun: …Is everything alright?

Kim stares at the text.

Kim: Why?

Tankhun: Because you are agreeing to come to a party.

Kim: I have attended parties before. It isn't that absurd of a concept.

Tankhun: Because you haven't come to the compound in months and skipped Pa's birthday dinner. 

Kim: Why would I go to that?

Tankhun: Because he faked his death so Uncle Gun would force an attack and neither of them cared if their sons were killed in their violent feud. Because our father killed his brother. Because our cousin will likely never walk again. 

Kim: Haven't you hated Vegas for years?

Tankhun: And yet I cry every time I think of how he must be feeling. Even though I hated him for years, I loved him for much longer. 

Kim: Hm.

Tankhun: Kind of like you with Pa.

Kim: It's very different, but whatever.

Tankhun: Is that why you texted me privately to accept the invite? So Pa wouldn't see your text and be more likely to come too? I seriously doubt he will come, by the way. Hum Bar doesn't seem like his thing. 

That isn't why. However, it is a plus. 

Kim: Sure. 

Tankhun: Are you actually okay? Something seems wrong.

It's a question from his agent that he regularly answers with lies. Why can't he text a lie to Tankhun? He should be able to text a one worded lie to his brother, yet his finger and thumb won't cooperate. Chay always playfully picked on him when it came to how he texted, with his left thumb and right index finger. Kim had pointed out that not all people game to the extent where using both thumbs to communicate as their go-to. Kim beat him at speed texting out the lyrics to some random song, and Chay beat him at Mortal Kombat in retaliation. 

The memory makes Kim go lie down on the couch and stare at his reflection in the dark television screen, his phone left abandoned on the coffee table. An hour later, Tankhun lets himself into his apartment and Arm makes himself scarce by going into his kitchen to make dinner for the three of them.

Kim silently wishes him luck on that front. Other than some spices in the cabinet by the stove, coffee in the pantry, and a couple of takeout containers in the fridge from who knows how many days ago, he doesn't have much else to work with. 

"Lift your head up," Tankhun says, urging him until he has enough room to sit down so that Kim's head is falling in his lap, "Let's watch a movie." 

Whatever. 

The movie in question deals with a couple gradually becoming more and more estranged. Of course it does. There is no happy ending in sight, so it is just like slowly watching tragedy unfold. Tankhun - predictably - cries his eyes out. Kim - not so predictably - cries too. But he's more subtle about it. He is actually so subtle that his brother probably doesn't even notice. 

"Kim, what's going on with you?" Tankhun murmurs sadly as Kim's shoulders shake and he soaks Tankhun's pants leg with tears.

Fine. He does notice. But Kim still doesn't respond. 

----------------------------------------------------------------- 

He needs to look good for the party. The problem is, Kim always looks good. He isn't conceited, it's just a fact. Even when he was a child, everyone talked about how beautiful he was. Ma eventually tried to redirect those types of compliments by talking about his talent and how sweet he could be. But then Ma died and Khun had to take over on that front instead. And that's a hard responsibility to hold up when you're strapped to a gurney in the infirmary and being called crazy every other month. So Kinn got to be called the new heir, Khun got to be called crazy, and Kim had been left with pretty. It's probably the most preferable out of those three possibilities anyway. 

But while Chay was likely attracted to his looks, he had been drawn in by Kim's talent. He hung off every word and piece of advice Kim gave him during their lessons. He had the courage to ask him to be his tutor. Chay looked at him with admiration and respect before he ever looked at him with hearts in his eyes, despite the pictures of Kim on his bedroom wall revealing that Chay found him at least somewhat attractive before they got close.

Chay probably tore those down. He doesn't want to look at Kim anymore. Kim knows that. If Kim were a better person, he would skip the party. It would make Chay happy, and honestly? It would be on brand for Kim. 

But maybe Kim wants to go off brand for a while. Maybe his brand of being an aloof, mysterious, and loner musician is no longer doing him or anyone else favors. Maybe he is just tired of being him. 

And maybe that's why he finds an outfit that actually complies with the roaring 20s theme. A three piece suit, complete with a stupidly expensive pocket watch. 

He feels ridiculous. He doesn't feel like himself at all. 

Good.

Except Kim got dressed too early. He doesn’t want to go back to his apartment like this. And part of him knows that once he goes back home, he may lose the gull to go back out. So maybe he will continue acting out of character. Going to Hum Bar early to help his brother decorate seems out of character. 

So that's what he does.

"Kim?" Tankhun says as soon as he comes through the doors before his eyes widen, "What are you wearing?"

Kim looks down at his clothes, "Do you want me to get clothes from my car?"

"Nope, no need," Tankhun says, then comes over to put his arms around him, "You look very nice. Handsome, actually! What do you think of my tux?"

Kim gives his oldest brother a once over. Tankhun had strayed from his own personal norm even more than Kim did. 

"It looks great," Kim tells him, causing Tankhun to beam brightly, "What do you need help with?" 

"Well," Tankhun says, glancing behind him, "Arm and I are arranging the feather bouquets. Pol and Yok are stringing the black and gold ornaments together. Why don't you put together the placemats? We'll have dinner and cake first, then the fun can really begin. Thank you for coming."

"Wouldn't miss it," Kim says, even though that would normally be a lie. Tankhun hugs him again regardless, "Happy birthday, by the way." 

Tankhun gives him a small smile, then takes a step back, "I hope it is. Now, come on! Let me introduce you to Yok."

Kim has a weird urge to let Tankhun know he knows a lot about Yok, both from Chay's fond comments about her and Kim's own research (disowned by her family, knows four languages, and has a childhood sweetheart who pointedly left the country with their son once Yok came to terms with her gender and decided to transition, which explains why she is so protective over Porsche and Chay and mothers them).

Instead, he just nods and tries to smile warmly. She seems like a nice person. She deserves warmth. She is kind to Tankhun and a very welcoming presence. Going by her interactions with his brother, Arm, and Pol, she has made friends with them. Right now, she's laughing at some joke Pol made that Kim doesn't really get but she clearly does. 

Going by how closely Khun and Arm are talking, they seem closer too. 

Weird. Although, Arm is now Khun's head guard, so maybe it isn't. Yet for some reason, watching them makes Kim feel out of place. But he snaps himself out of even attempting to analyze the situation further. Tankhun has often befriended his guards, a habit that could be heartbreaking for his brother, but beneficial because it is hard to make friends when you don’t leave the house. Maybe he is just closer to Arm than he has been to any other guard.

He feels alone. 

When Pete walks through the door, Kim is actually relieved. Because as misplaced as Kim feels, Pete has to be feeling ten times worse. 

"Pete?" Tankhun says hopefully, only having eyes for his ex-head guard as Pete cautiously walks into the bar, "You never texted back. I thought…We didn't know if…"

Pete breathes in and gives Tankhun a sad smile, "I just wanted to stop by to give you your gift and tell you happy birthday."

Tankhun nods, then glances down at the wrapped gift and cards once Pete hands them over, "You could stay, you know."

Pete just shrugs, keeping the sad smile on his face, causing Arm to step in. 

"We miss you, Pete. So much," Arm tells him, coming to stand next to Tankhun, "Why don't you just stay for dinner?"

"...I can't," Pete says eventually, "Vegas and Macau are waiting in the car." 

"...Oh," Arm says quietly, then says nothing else. What else could he say? Kim wouldn't know how to handle it. Vegas has been a sensitive topic for Tankhun for years. And after what happened, there is no way-

Tankhun lets out an unbothered sound, "That's fine! If you're worried about Macau being underage, Chay is coming too! Chay is just a year older than Macau and he needs a friend with everything going on. I am sure Macau is in a similar situation. They can chat. Get to know each other."

It's a shocking offer to hear coming out of Tankhun's mouth, even by Kim's standards. Going by Pol's and Arm's expressions, they are flabbergasted by it. But despite the thoughtfulness of the offer, Kim doesn't like it. He doesn't like the idea of competing with Macau for Chay's attention. He needs to figure out a way to talk to him, and Macau being there will give Chay a reason to ignore Kim in favor of pointedly focusing on a new potential friend. Because Chay is really great at that now. Ignoring Kim. 

It is a selfish and stupid thought. Toxic too, because Tankhun is right. Chay deserves to have friends who understand what he is going through. But Kim is tired of trying to earn Chay's attention and he doesn't want to compete with Macau. He never did. 

"Vegas is still in the car," Pete says, looking away from Tankhun. 

Tankhun purses his lips, "This place is very accessible. No steps, wide doorways. Vegas should be fine to join us."

It's an even more shocking offer than inviting Macau. But it does show how desperate Tankhun is to have Pete here.

"He…" Pete starts, still looking off to the side, "Vegas is still getting used to things. He doesn't…The wheelchair is a sensitive topic for him. It is hard enough to get him to leave the house for appointments. I was lucky to get him to agree to his therapy intake this afternoon."

"Therapy intake?" Tankhun asks, his voice a murmur, "Porsche said Vegas has been in physical therapy since waking up from his coma. He said you told him Vegas goes on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays."

Pete nods, then clears his throat, "Not that kind of therapy."

Tankhun stares at him, then nods too, "Oh. That…That's good. He has probably needed that for a long time. And he probably especially needs it now."

"Probably so," Pete vaguely agrees, then glances down at the gifts, "One of those cards is from him. He…wanted to tell you happy birthday. Apologize. Get some things off his chest, I think. He had me read it to make sure it sounded okay. It's respectful. Heartfelt. Just…Make sure you read it with an open mind and when you are ready. Don't feel like you need to open it tonight. Enjoy your birthday. I know me showing up is probably stressful enough-" 

“It’s not stressful, Pete,” Tankhun says, his voice strained, “It’s appreciated. I invited you because I wanted you here. Almost everyone I invited is someone I want in attendance. Almost. But believe me, you are not the exception.”

If anyone else in the room knows who it is, they don’t comment on it. 

“Please stay?” Tankhun says, but Pete is already shaking his head, “Please?”

“...I’m sorry,” Pete tells him, his expression pained and guilty, “Maybe…Maybe I can call you soon? We can…We’ll catch up.”

Tankhun looks at Pete with teary eyes, then finally nods silently in agreement and accepts one last hug from him before Pete takes his leave.

“I just need a minute,” Tankhun mutters, then quickly walks to one of the bathrooms. Kim isn’t sure what to think when Arm only gives him two minutes before following him. A part of Kim wants to chew him out and tell him that his brother has a right to be alone if he needs it. But when Kim goes to the door to do just that, he overhears them. 

“I know,” he hears Arm murmur as Tankhun cries, “I know you wanted him to come.”

“He doesn’t even answer my texts!” Tankhun sobs, “I thought he was my friend. He was my o-only friend for so long! And he won’t even TALK to me!”

“Khun, a lot has happened,” Arm says gently, weirdly referring to his brother personally, “It’s only been a few months. We’re all still raw from everything. That includes Pete. Give him some time. I know you miss him. I miss him too.”

“This is Pa’s fault! Pa did this! I just…I don’t…”

“I know,” Arm says again when Tankhun trails off.

And as much as he wants to see if his brother is okay, Kim lets Arm handle him and goes to pull out his phone.

Kim: How are you doing?

Macau: Why?

Kim: Idk.

Macau only responds thirty minutes later.

Macau: Horrible. Better than ever. I don’t know, man. P’Pete is a fucking saint though. I don’t care if we’re Buddhists. He has earned sainthood because he is a miracle worker who is somehow making Hia happy despite the circumstances.

A minute later.

Macau: How are you doing?

Kim just presses down on Macau’s message and reacts to it with an abacus emoji. It’s the most random one he can find. He expects Macau to be confused or tell him he’s the weirdest person he has ever known. Like he did before, back when their mothers were alive and their brothers liked each other. 

Macau: That bad, huh?

Kim leaves him on read.

To read the rest of this one-shot, go to:

#kimchay #kinnporsche fanfic #kimchay fanfic #kimchay fic #kimchay fanfiction #kim theerapanyakul #porchay kittisawasd #kpts #implied ArmKhun #tw: depression #tw: implied abuse #tw: grief #heartbreak #getting back together #tw: eating issues #IWCCCIJLHWY #kinnporche the series #tankhun theerapanyakul #kinn theerapanyakul

[the-conversation-pod]

Welcome Back My Boyfriend!

AND WE'RE BACK!

It's finally time to discuss Our Skyy 2! We were playing hurt this night: Ben was still recovering from dental surgery (please forgive his voice during this episode) and Nini was nursing a headache. Still, it didn't stop us from discussing all eight shows and talking about the crossover for an hour!

Nini and Ben assess the entirety of Our Skyy 2 and rank the offerings from worst to first.

Listen on Apple Podcasts

Listen on Google Podcasts

Timestamps

The timestamps will now correspond to chapters on Spotify for easier navigation.

0:00 - Welcome 1:15 - Intro 6:07 - Vice Versa 14:23 - Star in My Mind 19:20 - Never Let Me Go 28:00 - A Boss and a Babe 36:45 - The Eclipse 49:50 - My School President 1:00:24 - Badd Buddy x A Tale of Thousand Stars 1:59:13 - Overall Score for Our Skyy 2

The Conversation: Now With Transcripts!

We received an accessibility request to include transcripts for the podcast. We are working with @ginnymoonbeam on providing the transcripts and @lurkingshan as an editor and proofreader.

We will endeavor to make the transcripts available when the episodes launch, and it is our goal to make them available for past episodes. When transcripts are available, we will attach them to the episode post (like this one) and put the transcript behind a Read More cut to cut down on scrolling.

Please send our volunteers your thanks!

0:00 - Welcome

Nini

Hello, hello! Your QL fandom aunty and uncle are here with giant sunglasses, brown liquor in a flask, a folded five-dollar bill to slip into your hand when no one is looking, lukewarm takes, occasional rides on the discourse, deep dives into artistry and the industry.

Ben

Lots of simping! I’m Ben.

Nini

I’m Nini.

Ben

And this is The Conversation. About once a season, we plan to swan in and shoot the shit on faves, flops, and trends that we’ve been noticing in the BL, GL, or QL Industry. Between seasons, you can find us typing way too many words on Tumblr.

1:15 - Intro

Nini

Hi, Ben. How are you tonight?

Ben

I'm battling my own body's slow recovery from dental surgery but it doesn't matter because we have so much to record so we're sticking to the schedule!

Nini

But, we're gonna be okay. You've got meds, I've got meds—a.k.a. beer—for this headache. We're gonna be fine. We're doing it live. So, what are we talking about tonight? We are talking about Our Skyy 2… What a journey. Ben, explain to the people the concept of Our Skyy.

Ben

Welcome back, my boyfriend! That's it. 

Nini

[laughs]

Ben

Jojo started this off and summed it up perfectly. Our Skyy originally served as a sort of epilogue project for the initial run of GMMTV BLs. 

In the first run we had the Puppy Honey crew with OffGun, the SOTUS pair with Krist and Singto, the InSun pair from My Dear Loser: Edge of 17, Tay and New from Kiss the series—before Dark Blue Kiss, and Drake and Frank from My Tee a.k.a. ‘Cause You're My Boy.

Nini

So, that's the concept of Our Skyy. So, when GMMTV put out its 2023 offerings last year: Surprise! Our Skyy 2. They are giving us epilogues for 2020, 2021, and some 2022 shows. We're gonna dive into these.

Ben

With the original Our Skyy it was kind of chaotic. So, every crew kind of just did what felt right for their characters. 

Like, Pete and Kao basically went on a date that was mostly uncomplicated—something their characters needed. 

OffGun did a body swap which was just so they could let Gun pick on Off for a bit. 

In and Sun got closure—unsurprising, Aof was on that one. 

‘Cause You're My Boy: they just kind of did just a hot mess that was weirdly endearing, which is exactly what their show was. 

And SOTUS did like the the next most logical thing for Arthit and Kongpob, which was them kinda saying goodbye as they were heading into a long distance form of their relationship because Kongpob was pursuing higher schooling outside of Thailand, if I remember correctly?

In a similar vein, this particular Our Skyy run that we're going to be talking about very much captured what I think the core spirit of the original work was, and each team came back to it—for the most part—with something to say that was consistent with their original offerings. 

Nini

Yep.

Ben

We went Never Let Me Go, Star in My Mind, The Eclipse, Vice Versa, My School President, A Boss and a Babe, Bad Buddy? and then A Tale of Thousand Stars.

Nini

I also think that the airing order was very interesting and maybe we'll get a little time to talk about how they chose to air what they did when they did. This Our Skyy, I think, wanted to lean a little bit into the crack. Every single outing had a little bit of a crack element to it—and I quite like that. I enjoyed that. I had fun with that—for the most part—and we'll get to the ones where I did not enjoy that.

Ben

I do think that the Our Skyy project leans into fan service, and not in an inherently negative way? They want the people who enjoyed this show to have fun coming back to the show, and it’s been notable for me that, for the most part, I found that if someone really liked the original show they also really liked their Our Skyy outing. So like, for those of you who've listened to me or followed me, you know what shows I didn't like or despised when they aired and—unsurprisingly—my takes are fairly consistent.

Nini

Maybe it's the corners of the internet that I've been perusing, which you always tell me to stop looking at…I feel like the more that people liked the OG show the more upset they were with the Our Skyy. Maybe that's just the people are being wrong on the internet corners of the internet that I like to occasionally look through. [laughs]

Ben

[laughs] I don't go there.

6:07 - Vice Versa

Nini

Let's delve into it. Let's start talking some specifics. So, if we're going from worst to first my worst without a doubt was the Vice Versa Our Skyy. I am on record as not having watched Vice Versa because I was not interested in Vice Versa. I have tried and failed so many times with Jittirain stories that I knew that I was not going to enjoy this one, and so I never watched the original. But, for the sake of the podcast, I watched every single Our Skyy including this one, except I did not finish this one. [laughs] I started watching it. I was mostly annoyed, and then something happened that just… I just said, “Oh, absolutely not,” and I stopped watching it.

So, the trope—the, the crack trope—for the Vice Versa Our Skyy; the fan fic-y, fan service-y trope is: Add a Kid. I think it's Puen? Puen and Talay have been together for a while now. They're working hard, working a lot. They don't have as much time for each other. And so Talay comes up with the idea of doing a month of special days where they pay very close attention to each other and they do special things together. And it's a really sweet idea and honestly if that had been it I would have been fine. There would have been no problem. 

But then they add a kid, and the way that they add a kid is what pisses me off. One of their friends… essentially delivers his nephew into the care of these strangers… so that they can play house? But it's also like a trick that Puen is playing on Talay. Because this kid just shows up at the house and Talay thinks that it might be his kid. Like, the, the setup of Vice Versa has always—as I have said before—every time I think I know what Vice Versa is about, Ben lets me know that I don't actually know what Vice Versa is about. But there's some way that Talay thinks that this kid is his somehow.

Ben

Would you like the context for why he believes that kid is his?

Nini

Sure, hit me with it!

Ben

So, they basically spend two years in the other world with Nanon and Ohm’s characters in their bodies. Ohm's character, Tess, is an asshole who absolutely ruined Talay’s life for the two years he was in his body. He sabotaged and ruined every personal and professional relationship that Talay had. 

When he got back to his own body he had to spend years fixing his own life. Which sucks, because while he was in Tess's body he basically fixed Tess's life. It's really upsetting for me that Puen, who claims to love Talay, who watched him suffer for all of the things that Tess did to his life would genuinely let Talay believe that Tess saddled him with the responsibility of an unplanned kid… because he thinks his boyfriend doesn't pay enough attention to him… like he makes his boyfriend work outside in a tent in Thailand to do graphic design on an iMac.

Nini

You were really really mad about the tent. [laughs] I remember when we were watching this. You were really pissed about the tent.

Ben

I'm—I'm not over it.

It's humid in Thailand! Why would he be outside with a Mac? Oh my God—

It's frustrating because… On the one hand, I understand the impulse of, like, how do we get these guys to consider a new form of domesticity together? But, like, why do we have to use an actual child? Why can't we use, like, a dog, or a cat? Not coercing a child into letting strangers bathe him, and treat him like he's their son, and sleep with him in their bed. It’s so, so weird… and really unhinged… and it made me like a bunch of characters even less than I already did! 

It was aggravating. It's frustrating because Puen did this through the whole show. Like, he doesn't trust Talay. He lies to him. He manipulates him. Talay and he are both in entertainment and Talay was against a huge deadline the night of Puen’s birthday, and he couldn't take a break from his work to meet his deadline to go do flirty, boyfriend things with Puen. 

Puen expressed this frustration directly the next day in a way that I thought was totally valid and then Talay goes, ‘You are correct. Here is the plan I've come up with for us to make sure that we don't take our own relationship for granted, and keep working at it.’ And they have a really great month doing cute boyfriend date things while trying to maintain their careers. And so the whole secret baby felt completely unnecessary. 

Like, we need something to happen for the plot to justify Jimmy, Neo, Aou, and Sea hanging out together. So, we have to introduce a secret baby, I guess? 

I hated it…[laughs] Like, people joke that I don't often give low scores because I don't usually watch crap. Like, if something is, like, really really bad out of the gate I am like, “Oof! I don't have time for this!” and I'll usually drop it these days, because I got too much to do. But, like, I gave the show a 3 because I was deeply put off by the coercion of a child and the audacity of it all. Because, like, you know what your boyfriend went through because of Tess. 

Why would you pull on that really traumatic thread from five years ago and make him believe that Tess had done this to him as well—knowing that Talay has a strong sense of responsibility, and would of course try to do right by a potential child. 

Like, it's hard to even talk about, like, any of the cute relationship things that may have come out of this because, like, they should divorce.

Nini

I did not enjoy this when it was revealed that the kid was…tricked. I turned it off, and I did not watch the end. 

For every special of Our Skyy, I gave it a drama score and a crack score. My drama score for this was a -5, because I was entirely unamused—like wholly unamused. This is not what I came to see in any way. I don't care if the kid is cute. I don't care if they're all cute together. They're literally using a child to fix their relationship—

Ben

And, explicitly, the child's parents did not know that this was happening.

Nini

—which makes it worse! So, I gave it a drama score of a -5, which is of course an overreaction but it's still getting a 0. Crack score, I gave it a 10, because it is actual crack? Like, this is probably the crackiest thing that happened in all of Our Skyy. But…it's not enjoyable as crack! So, let's give it a… 5 for crack… So, 0 for drama, 5 for crack gives it a score of 2.5, which sounds about correct.

Ben

Yeah, not good. 

Nini

Yeah.

Ben

Pass.

Nini

Not good. Tens or chops? One chop! 

Ben

Two chops!

[both laugh]

14:23 - Star in My Mind

Nini

Let's leave Vice Versa behind in the dustbin where it belongs and let's move on to the next on the list: Star in My Mind. Hoo! 

Ben

[laughs]

Nini

Ben, I can't even remember what happened, I was so bored watching these episodes, like, dead bored. Star in My Mind is also a show that I did not watch the OG show. So, I had no idea what it was about and was going in blind. And, I think that I was correct to not watch the OG show, because… if it was anything as boring as this, I didn't need to see it.

Ben

[sighs] So, the Star in My Mind special is basically just the gang going on a little vacation together, and then New tries to subvert the “You're together now. Let's throw in a jealousy element bit.” Like, you put a note on here that the trope for this one is “trick your friends into going on vacation.” 

So, their friends try to tease Daonuea into believing that maybe Kluen has eyes for some girl, and Daonuea gets jealous about this, and then a fight ensues and the friends get all upset. But we in the audience know that the guys are faking this fight. They knew what their friends were up to, but they were kind of flaking on this vacation. So, he uses this fake fight to force them to go on vacation with them. 

Whatever. 

Like, I think the part of this that was cute was New just throwing away the whole jealousy trope for BL, and then having the gay characters just be like, ‘Yeah, this is stupid. Anyway, we're going to absolutely use this against them because these bitches will not buy their tickets and I'm [gonna] force them to.” And, like, that part was kind of fun.

I'm in my breakup era with New right now. I can see, again, him trying to do something here. New is currently over BL. He’s tired of it. You can feel that in Star in My Mind. Like, he's completely bored with all of this. And so what could have been, like, at least a cute trip, just looks like five straight dudes hanging out in the woods for like an hour.

Nini

I think my notes say “it's two hours of a bunch of dudes vibing without vibes.”

Ben

Yeah, like, it wasn't great, and I don't really like coming for actors like that. But, Dunk is still uncomfortable with on-screen intimacy—or at least it feels like he is—particularly compared to Joong, who does not suffer from being camera shy when it comes to this kind of work. And so while I've seen them in behind-the-scenes stuff, and their variety stuff, and Joong and Dunk are great bros, I'm still struggling with Dunk as a romantic lead because he doesn't kiss well.

Nini

New didn't even phone this in. Like, I think he sent an email? Maybe it was a snail mail. 

This was just—it was boring, which I think might be worse than bad? What do we even say about it? 

Ben

Nothing! There is nothing to say! Like, Pawin was there. He didn't kiss anybody. [laughs]

Nini

I mean… that's really all that you can say about it. It was a waste of Pawin, like.

Probably the only thing that I enjoyed about this was Joong's several pissy faces when Khabkluen is salty because all his straight friends keep interrupting his gay couple time to hang out when all he wants to do is make out. And, like, the pissy faces that he makes are delightful, and they're the only reason this has a score. 

I give it a drama score of 3, because what was it even about? And I gave it a crack score of 4, and all four of those points are for Joong's pissy faces which I thoroughly enjoyed. So, It was a 3.5 for me not because it was bad but because it was boring.

Ben

I think a show has to be offensive to me in some way for me to go lower than 6 and Star in My Mind is not. It's just boring and because I've been in these gay streets a long time, I've been offended. A lot. And, I will accept boring. It's a 6. It's forgettable. We don't have to talk about it anymore.

Nini

And we will not.

Ben

[laughs]

19:20 - Never Let Me Go

Nini

We're going to move on to the actual fun and interesting ones now. [laughs] There's a definite quality bar in Our Skyy 2. There are Vice Versa and Star in My Mind, which are below the quality bar. And then there's everything else, which is above the quality bar. Now, we're talking about games of inches here. 

Never Let Me Go. So, the Never Let Me Go fanfic trope for Our Skyy was they did a time travel story that was also a—.

Ben

Fated mates.

Nini

—that was also a fated mates, and also a role reversal, and also like a body hopping. Like, there were—there was a lot going on here. It was not boring. Everybody was clearly having a fabulous time making this. And, I actually really enjoyed it. It was two episodes. I could have watched maybe four to six episodes of this no problem.

This was actually incredibly interesting. It was a lot of fun. Pawin, and Pond especially, clearly had a great time. 

Ben

That's true.

[both laugh]

Nini

Pond had a fabulous time. So, the plot of the Never Let Me Go special… You go ahead.

Ben

All right. So, it's been a couple of years since we left the boys in Never Let Me Go, and Nuengdiao has been studying elsewhere. He's coming back to Thailand, and Palm has quietly been setting up shop in Bangkok so that when Nuengdiao comes back to Thailand he can be closer to him. He doesn't want to just stay out by the beach because he wants to see his boyfriend more. 

[Cat begins wailing in the hallway near Ben’s mic]

Nuengdiao was a little bit caught off guard by this, and didn't like him making decisions for them. They run into a fortune teller who tells them that if they don't fix what was originally broken, they won't make it in this life, either. And then the fantasy hijinks kick in, where they are sent back in time to their original pairing… into the bodies of their past selves. And in their past—in their first past together where they become a couple—Palm is the rich lord, and Nuengdiao is essentially sold to him as a slave. Also, Pawin is there in an earlier version of his character. 

And so they have to play their roles. Palm is having way too much fun bossing Nuengdiao around. And also just trying to have sex with him in the past. Over the course of this they end up realizing that they have to help Pawin’'s character hook up with Mark Pahun's character, and so all of the girlies who've been waiting for that ship to reunite were fed. 

Nini is correct. Like, this ended up being really fun, because we got to see Palm and Nuengdiao kind of become like the gays who have it together for other gays.

Nini

It had that crack story but there was also another story going on alongside the crack which I really enjoyed—building on Nungdiao and Palm's actual OG series story—which is that Nuengdiao believes that Palm should make his life about himself, that he should make his decisions about the things that he wants to do without considering Neung. And that they can still be together but Palm shouldn't plan his life around him. When he comes back to Bangkok, it's to tell Palm essentially that he's decided that he's gonna stay away for a longer period of time. He's gonna do graduate school as well. 

And, this is actually a conflict between them that sort of leads into the whole time travel thing, but it's actually a really interesting conflict between them because it builds on their series story in a really interesting way. I enjoyed watching them navigate it and figure it out while they were also navigating and figuring out how the hell to get out of the past. I mean the internal logic of the story just about holds together. It's fun. It's enjoyable. It's emotional. 

Ben

If he looks at you for seven seconds he's into you and we're all like rooting for this under an umbrella.

Nini

It's fun. It's cute. It's got a little bit of a message to it. It's enjoyable. The characters feel like themselves. At one point we get a little montage of smash cuts of Nueng and Palm: they alternate crying over each other's dead bodies through the ages.

Ben

One of them definitely felt like a nod to Aof’s work where Jojo was poking fun at him.

Nini

They were actually dressed like Jim and Wen in Moonlight Chicken complete with Phuwin wearing sunglasses, his corpse wearing sunglasses at night when he's dead and Pond crying over him. It was really funny. It was delightful. That little smash cut montage was really fun and actually upped the crack score a little. Time travel is crack, no way about it. I was fully going to give it a good crack score anyway. But that little sequence upped the crack score by at least a point. It was just very funny. 

And then watching Pawin overexaggerate his “khrub’s” and fall in love with Mark Pahun's character, who's like a jewelry seller at the market. And then when they come back to the present and he's Phum again, they meet Phum at the house—which has been maintained—the lord's house has been maintained throughout the ages.

Ben

Because it had been passed down to his ancestors’ family now because they were all, like, gay besties together.

Nini

Yeah, and like, Phum and Mark Pahun's character are together in this life, too—and they're really cute—and Phum's like, “Yeah, I was a shit to you in high school. I'm sorry about that.” [laughs] It was nice. It was fun. It was enjoyable. I gave it a drama score of 7.5—I think that's reasonable for it. I gave it a crack score of 8.5 so it works out to an 8 for me, which I liked. I liked it.

Ben

I really liked a lot of this. I liked how much fun Phuwin and Pond had in the traditional garb that they were wearing. I like how much fun they had with how often they had to be shirtless. I really enjoyed them writing vows to each other in the past because they didn't know if they would be able to escape. Basically fully committed to each other. That was really beautiful, and not something I expected from Jojo. I was really surprised that Jojo did something that genuinely tender. That really worked for me.

I gave it an 8. It's one of those 8’s where it's, like, if you liked Never Let Me Go, this is going to make it feel a little bit better because the idea that the drama of Never Let Me Go is yet another instance of these two characters trying to be with each other across space and time is super romantic—and that's the kind of shit I love in my big dramas. And I was not expecting this particular show to make me go, “Wow,” [sighs] and look back at the, the original show and go, “Okay. I can see that.”

It was deeply enjoyable. If you liked Never Let Me Go enough, and you feel mildly dissatisfied by it, and you just kind of want some closure to walk away from, watch the special. I felt very good about Palm and Nuengdaio by the end of that, because they felt a little bit more grown. And I kind of like where they left the characters with Palm just being like, “Whatever, I have a rich boyfriend and I've worked very hard. I'm just gonna go hang out with you in Germany for a little while, and then we'll figure it out from there.” And I'm like, more power to you, bro.

Nini

It seemed like yes that they were just going to vibe and enjoy each other, And, after everything that those two went through? Sure! That seems like a great place to leave them. 

28:00 - A Boss and a Babe

Nini

Also in the, for me, 8 category—so there is a tie here—A Boss and a Babe. This kind of…surprised me, because I ended up, with the OG show, being really disappointed by where we landed with it. But I really liked the Our Skyy.

Ben

This is a little bit weird because I think in terms of whenever the rest of you hear this. We're actually, I think releasing this before the episode where we talk about A Boss and a Babe. So, spoilers, a bit, for that particular episode, but, uh, we were…less than impressed with A Boss and a Babe. 

Nini

For sure.

Ben

However, we actually had a decent time with their Our Skyy outing. Nini why don't you walk us through the setup for this particular outing. 

Nini

So, the fanfic trope for the A Boss and a Babe outing of Our Skyy is, I guess, “walk a mile in my shoes” kind of thing? Gun and Cher are happy together. They're sweet loving boyfriends… but the office is in shambles. Because Gun is stressed out and he's stressing everybody at work out. And because Cher knows everybody at work because he used to work there, he has been hipped to the fact that his man is stressing everybody else. And so he goes on a mission to try to get his man to stop stressing everybody at work out. 

So, trying to make him understand that he needs to dial it the fuck back. And the way that he eventually comes up with after trying a few other ways, is that they are going to spend a day walking a mile in each other's shoes. So, he is going to spend a day being the boss, and Gun is going to spend a day being the intern so that Gun gets an idea of the stresses that his employees go through. And Cher is just like whatever I'll just be the boss, and Gun is like, “Oh, it's not as easy as you think.” 

And it actually turns out really fun and interesting to watch them do this. Of course it's a weird, horny sex thing because everything is a weird, horny sex thing with these two. But [laughs] it's, it's fun. It's light. It's interesting. It's…enjoyable. It's a strong conflict. It's a stronger conflict than we get in the actual OG series. It works. I think it's that because it's so short New doesn't really have time to fuck it up.

Ben

[laughs] So, like, I was frustrated because Gun’s being kind of a difficult boss, but being fairly reasonable about why he's a difficult boss. He's like, “We work in a difficult industry where we spend a great deal of time working on something, and then we release it to the public, and then it can flop. And so I have been funding people's jobs for anywhere from two to 12 months working on a project, and we really need strong turnaround for this because these people's jobs are riding on the success of this. So they do need to take their jobs seriously, and when they are given feedback or are given specific directives, they need to accomplish those directives.” 

There's like really interesting tension there between, like, the boss's perspective of, “Y'all can be mad at me, but you want me to cut your checks, right?” versus, “Bro, we are not going to work well under these fucking conditions.” Like, that tension was delivered really well! Gun's perspective comes through in a way that doesn't feel pandering to anyone, and I was like he is a little bit off base in the way he talks to people, but the things he's concerned about are valid for where he sits.

It just pissed me off low-key because, like, we never figured out what Thyme’s whole deal was in the original show. Like, his friend who used to be part of the company. And it feels like that was his job here—was to be like the bridge between Gun and the team. To translate Gun’s directives and frustrations into directives for the team so they could accomplish them and to keep the team motivated. And, like, Cher was helping with that for a while but now that Cher is, like, doing other stuff, like, that has gone away. That's the biggest thing with this one. Like, this was such a solid concept that it made me even more annoyed at how the OG show just sort of fumbled every thread that they were holding.

Nini

Yeah, I have to agree. Like, the workplace conflict on this was really strong and solid, and the workplace stuff in the OG show was kind of weak. And part of the workplace stuff that was great in this was showing that, yeah, Gun does need a balancing force at work. But also, aside from that, surprisingly, Cher is not an idiot. [laughs] Like, Cher is actually pretty competent. He's not, like, ready, clearly, to be the boss of a place like this. But he's not an idiot. 

Like, one of the things that happens is that Gun tries to set him up a little bit by having, like, a client come in and try to, like, have a discussion and talk to him about, like, partnering on a game or something and like talking about ideas and all that kind of stuff. And at first you think that Cher is going to blow it. But then he delivers. He comes into the meeting. You know, he takes a minute to get his bearings and understand what's going on, but then he has actual good ideas? And he can speak to the people in a way that works for the business. 

So, it shows they could probably at some point in the future after Cher has learned more, they could probably run the business together. Because I think that they bring the different perspectives that's required, but, just like Ben said, that also makes me, like, really mad that we didn't get more of the Thyme stuff in the OG series because, to me, that feels like this was what Thyme’s role was. And that just completely got cast aside. So, on the one hand, I thought this was actually pretty good but, on the other hand, it made me think even less of the OG series and I was already struggling with the OG series.

Ben

[sighs] And that's where we are. It sucks because, like, again, like, Force and Book are good. And the cast of this particular show? Very good. They hold together an otherwise weak show but, man, you just really want to see what that cast looks like when they have a really good show under their belt.

Nini

Yeah, and this gives you, like, a kind of an ‘in’ to that. So my score: this was drama score of 8 because I thought it was a solid conflict. Well executed. I give it a crack score of 8 because, quite honestly, once the whole role reversal thing started. Like, if I worked for Gun’s company, I would have taken, like, vacation until that was over because it was just…It was a little too “bring your kinks to work” for me personally. 

[both laugh]

I would have been like, yeah I don't need to see this. I'm gonna take a day off, and tomorrow when I come back, hopefully everything will be normal. Combined like drama score 8 crack score 8 average 8. What did you give it? 

Ben

I gave it an 8, and we were joking with some of our other friends about how most of us gave it an 8, and I think it was ginnymoonbeam who was like, “We all gave it an 8, but these are all very different 8s.”

[both laugh]

Nini

Yes, that is definitely true. These are different 8s that we are giving it. My 8 is like, “Damn it. Now I got to go back and revise my score of the OG series and put it even lower.”

36:45 - The Eclipse

Nini

Moving along from the 8s and now we're starting to get into the top of tops. The top top top tops of the Our Skyy pantheon for me. And next up is The Eclipse. Ben, I'm [gonna] need you to give the people what we're talking about here.

Ben

The Eclipse picks up, it feels like, the summer after the boys have graduated from high school. So, they're away from Suppalo—we're not going to deal with any of the Suppalo nonsense anymore. It's just the two couples, Wat, and…Pawin's character for some reason, because he's always palling around them. They're getting together to help Wat shoot for a film project that he wants to submit to a competition. But we pick up, originally, with Akk and Ayan who were doing boyfriend things, and we are seeing the ongoing deprogramming of Akk continuing. And over the course of the filming for this, we see that Akk and Ayan are basically stand-ins for Golf's very complex ideas about the way our private and public lives inform each other, and how both are inherently political. 

Akk and Ayan over the course of this are having a struggle about whether or not they should care what other people think. Akk thinks that to be part of a civil society you do have to care about how your actions and behaviors impact other people. Ayan, who has seen what a civil society does to people, thinks that that is bullshit and that he should be more concerned about himself and the people he cares about, and not the nebulous feelings of others. And then calls Akk directly out at one point about how his concern for others turned him into the worst version of a cop possible.

And it gets really ugly when they're working on Wat’s film project. These two are having a truly fundamental struggle about whether or not the two of them are even compatible because they do not see eye-to-eye politically. You get the sense that Ayan hoped that, once freed from the Suppalo prefect thing, Akk would start to see things more his way. And Akk hoped that Ayan would stop fighting with him so much, because Akk really just wants to do soft, cuddly things with his boyfriend. But Ayan gets off on fighting with Akk. [laughs] So he is always antagonizing him for sex reasons. 

Nini

It's one of those early relationship conflicts when you're still figuring out how to be with each other. When you're dating at the beginning, you put your best foot forward. In this case, with the two of them, they put their absolute worst foot forward when they were getting together. But there's still that thing about the version of you when you're courting is…different, somewhat, than the version of you when you're not courting. For them, the issue is the version of them when they were courting was exactly who they are, but they didn't think that that was who they were. 

So, like you said, Ayan really thought that out of the pressure cooker of Suppalo, Akk would be a different person, and then he's, like, coming to realize: No, this is really just who he is. And Akk is having that same realization about Ayan. They have to decide essentially—and they do decide via Wat's film—whether what they are to each other is worth bridging that gap between them. The answer that they come to is: yes it is—in a really phenomenal scene that I enjoyed so much.

Ben

Let me tell you. First and Khaotung are just really, really good together. Like, it's amazing how they can play these two characters coming to a precipice of fundamental political disagreement to the point that they looked at each other and they're like, “Is this really who I'm going to be with?” And you can see this almost weird resignation as they turn to face each other and embrace, where there are no easy answers to this. 

They don't see eye to eye politically on a lot of really fundamental things, and yet they still want to choose each other each time. And that is delivered so well. Like, it's hard to watch The Eclipse with your brain off. I watched a lot of people try to do it during the original show and they struggled, because it is not a brains-off show. Golf has a lot to say about the state of their country and is using whatever platform they have to voice some of these ideas, most notably about how sitting on your phone writing mean tweets is not action. That you need to get into the work. That you have to get into the streets with other people. You have to participate in the work. Even if it's just in the support of getting the people who do do the work the tools and food they need to do the work. 

And it's really fascinating that even in this little two-part special, which as far as some people thought, was just First and Khaotung making out for two hours because these boys kissed a lot in this special, they managed to say a lot. Golf managed to express their deep love of Thai cinema with the references that Wat was playing out. 

It also managed to get across how much these two boys really like each other, and it was kind of fun to see Akk and Kan working their way out of their internalized homophobia. Like it was not surprising to me that Akk and Kan wanted to do a lot of touching with their boyfriends. 

Nini

I really liked how it all came together: how Golf used their love of not just Thai cinema but queer cinema to sort of pull the threads together of the fight that Akk and Ayan were having. The petty fight and the serious fight, because they were having a fight on two levels. They were having a petty fight about—well, maybe not petty—but they were having a surface level fight about Ayan   paying attention to Akk and being lovey-dovey and soft with him, versus Ayan wanting Akk to be tougher with him because that's what he likes. And then that going to the deep level of the political, and then, on top of that, that being pulled together by the concept of film. And then even throwing in for us a little side story about Wat and what film means to him, and how he's not necessarily supported by his family—but he kind of is a little bit but mostly not—and how he has things to say and he feels strongly about those things

Like, they managed to do a lot with very little in this special and I really, really enjoyed it. It was very deep for what it was. Very thinkable piece. I really liked it. And then on top of that, they also get to have a little bit of coming-of-age nostalgia moments about leaving high school and moving into the real world. There's so much packed into those two hours. I was really impressed with how much they managed to get in there and have it feel organic.

Ben

I was incredibly impressed by this entire outing.

Nini

I liked the special on its own. I liked it in connection to the OG show. I liked it as a continuation of the OG show. I liked the things that it had to say and the way that it carried through its themes. I was impressed by how much it managed to fit in. I gave it a drama score of 9.5. I really thought it was very, very good.

Ben

But there was singing so she took half a point.

[both laugh]

Nini

I gave it a crack score of 8. The trope really was I guess “secret surprise” because the frame that this is all put in is Ayan preparing a surprise for Akk’s birthday, but it's a secret surprise where he's pretending that he doesn't remember and he's not going to celebrate Akk’s birthday, which is a little weird which is why I took the half point off really, because I hate that secret surprise trope.

Ben

It's one of those things where I don't really like it for Akk, but if fits with Ayan’s sort of, like…Ayan is the queer kid who reads too much theory. Like, he knows more than you. And so he doesn't always see you, specifically. Like, he outs Thua in the first show thinking he's helping him. Like, he kind of is but, like, he outs Thua and oversteps, and it's the same thing here with Akk. Like, he wants to surprise Akk. Like I don't think you should be surprising Akk, because so much of his Suppalo experience is about being guided by the things that are not being said that he's supposed to just interpret. 

If you're trying to deprogram him, you need to not do that to him. And the reason why, like I—I mostly let it go is because, as dense as Ayan can kind of be because he's too fucking smart for his own good, when Akk admitted in, like, the first fifteen minutes of the show that he hoped that they were gonna do cute boyfriend frolicking in the fields and taking pictures together, and Ayan was like, “Oh, I thought you were just kidding about that.”  

And Akk was like, “No! I was serious.” 

It's like, “All right? Well shit! Grab your camera!” And they frolicked! 

Nini

[laughs]

Ben

He gave his boyfriend the cute boyfriend shit he wanted to do, even if he teased him a little bit about it first.

Nini

I did like that too. I like that they don't have it together yet but they're willing to listen, and they're willing to do what it takes, I think. But, like I said, I'm knocking out a half a point for the secret surprise because I hate that trope. The crack score is an 8 because there's these set of dream sequences which are homages to Thai film and queer film, and I thought they were delightful. There's the Brokeback Mountain one and then there's the Golden Eagle one which is a Thai film then there's the Ong Bak one which is another Thai film and then there's another—

Ben

If you have not seen Ong Bak and you like action film, please go see Ong Bak. 

Nini

I have not watched Ong Bak. Of course, Ben has because he's a boy. 

Ben

I am a boy! Tony Jaa is amazing!

Nini

[laughs] I really liked that Golf gets to throw that in there as well. And it's fun. The Golden Eagle one especially is delightful. [laughs] It really is. So that's 9.5 and 8. Let's call that an 8.75. Ooh the maths is coming back! It's coming back! An 8.75 for The Eclipse.

Ben, what’d you give it?

Ben

I gave it a 9 because it's really coherent and that mattered a lot for me, because we had watched a lot of—I don't remember the exact order—but I remember just not being, like, necessarily, like, great at this point because a bunch of them were kind of…stuffed…or boring…and this wasn't. I was fully engaged the whole time, because Golf has such clear ideas in their work and they're all working together at various levels that they really wanted us to not miss.

49:50 - My School President

Nini

Moving on from The Eclipse onto the next rung on the ladder up: My School President. So the My School President fan fiction trope was AU, alternate universe, for all of the characters. I had a fucking blast with this. Ben, explain to the people what happened.

Ben

I'm gonna pre-react to the criticism, unfortunately.

My School President is a high school story about pursuing your long-term crush and the final year of your high school experience. There was no way My School President was going to get an epilogue story. So instead they flipped the seats of a bunch of the characters. 

So, in this version of the My School President story, Gun is the school president and Tinn is the member of the school band. This time named Lion instead of Chinzhilla. Instead of Tiwson being the school president's best friend, they keep Por, who is his bestie in this. Tiwson is a member of the band. Sound and Win switch positions in this, where Sound is the long-term member of the band. Win is the new hot boy who shows up who they recruit. They also decide to flip Yo and Pat in the story with each other, even though they're still both in the band. Gim becomes the principal, and Photjanee becomes the operator of the milk ice cream bar. 

And in the process of this, like, the same beats from the show. We still hit them, but they play out very differently because the core characterization of these couples don't shift. Which forces us to reckon with certain aspects of the characters that kind of get glossed over in the idealism of the original My School President run. For example, Tinn is so much braver than Gun. Gun is kind of a coward who is gripped by an intense sense of self-doubt, and it starts off almost immediately. Like there's some political commentary with the way Gun is selected as the school president. 250 votes were cast by parents to make Gun the president instead of going through the school voting process instead, which works as a quick shorthand for the show, but also works as a commentary on Thai parliamentary politics.

And so like he's not the school president because he wants to help Tinn. He's just sort of pushed into the position by his mom, and so the moments that they hit along the way, like the dancing together scene. That plays out differently because Gun backs off and ends up dancing with someone else. The whole Questions thing they did to get close to film the thing goes differently because Gun won't ask Tinn directly, but Tinn does ask him, but Gun backs down. 

It was interesting because, like, everyone still chose each other. But, like, in a weird way Tiwson and Por were the strong couple of this outing, anchoring for the rest of them. 

Like, in the original show Tinn and Gun are so obviously together that the force of their mutual attraction sort of just creates opportunity for the rest of these relationships to bubble up. This time around, Tiwson and Por are working together in the background to help Tinn and Gun get together because they want to come out as a couple. Which I thought was an interesting switch-up as well.

Nini

I really enjoyed that, despite shifting the characters around in terms of their positions and roles, that the cores of the characters remained exactly the same. And you see how the same people living a different life would become a different person. Like you talk about Gun being kind of a coward and he is kind of a coward even in the OG show. Tinn’s the brave one, and Tinn has to be the brave one because Gun's the one who's gonna back down. But also the Gun of the alternate universe—the multiverse of cuteness as it is called—the Gun of the alternate universe hasn't spent his whole life on stage being judged and knocked back. And developing that thick skin that he talks to Tinn about in the OG series, so he is much less resilient than the Gun of the OG series. And that makes a difference in how he navigates his crush on Tinn. 

Similarly to that, Tinn in the AU has not had the strictness of the OG Photjanee forced on him the whole time. The strictness and the straight lace-ness because things are a little looser for him. And so he feels more able to take the ball and run with it when he realizes how he feels. They redo the scene of them spending the night at the school and walking around, and this is where Tinn turns the Gun and is like, “Look, do you like me?” which is something Tinn wouldn't necessarily have asked in the OG series. 

But then Gun, faced with the opportunity to actually lock it down with his crush. He says no and he runs away which is not a thing that Tinn would have done. If Gun had ginned up the, the actual courage to ask Tinn if he liked him Tinn would have been like [inhales] taken a deep breath and been like, “Hell yell, let’s date.” It's really interesting watching how they take the same characters and, just by moving their positions in the story, they create a story that's different. 

Ben

And yet all the people still choose each other. They basically state the big idea at one point. The Gun character says maybe in another lifetime things would have gone better, and the Por and Tiwson of this universe slap that idea down and go, “Yeah, but you're not in those universes. You're in this one. Make the most of the life you have.” 

Nini

I really enjoyed this outing. I enjoyed what they took the opportunity of the Our Skyy special to say and to do. I agree with you. I don't think that an epilogue would have worked. My School President is so of its setting. I do not think that moving the boys into college and following them there—I don't feel like I would have been interested in seeing that because that's not the point of My School President.

My tagline for My School President was “perfect high school romance” and I think that's where it should stay.

Okay, so my drama score for My School President was 9.5, and I took off a half point because nobody made out. And, I'm sorry, I am shallow. I wanted somebody to kiss in this special. I didn't care who. Just somebody. So I took off half a point. But the crack score is a 10 because I mean it's an AU. There is nothing crackier than that, so that works out to what, like a 9.75? Yeah, I'm good with that.

Ben

So, I gave this one a 9 because it was a little heady and My School President is not a really heady show for me. But the whole AU concept was. Now, I liked it, but in terms of, like, recommending it to the people who liked My School President, it's kind of hard because they wanted more of what they loved in My School President and this is not exactly that? So, I gave it a 9. 

But I'm also with Nini, like nobody kissed in this one. And, again, young actors. I'm totally fine with them not kissing, but…their characters in the original show have really specific kisses, and, if they were more experienced and veteran actors, we would have gotten a different type of kiss from these characters because they are coming at each other very differently. And we don't get to offer that particular comparison here. So, minor knock for me as well.

Nini

We didn't even get to talk about the best part which was them doing a fake music video for a fake Aof song that incorporated Aof’s top three hits in the music videos, which are He’s Coming to Me, Bad Buddy, and A Tale of Thousand Stars. 

Ben

We didn't even talk about that.

Nini

Tiw and Por got to do A Tale of Thousand Stars. Sound and Win get to do Bad Buddy. And Gun and Tinn get to do He’s Coming to Me. So they, they paid homage to their granddaddy in "Aof" Noppharnach Chaiyahwimhon. Three of the greatest GMMTV BLs, and also the ones that sort of set the stage for My School President.

1:00:24 - Bad Buddy x A Tale of Thousand Stars

Nini

Onto the main event, and the main event of Our Skyy 2 was "Aof" Noppharnach giving the finger to GMMTV and saying, “Fuck you, I get four episodes to talk about what I want. And what I want to talk about is queer elders coming to terms with themselves, and I'm going to use anybody I want to talk about that.” AKA the Bad Buddy - A Tale of Thousand Stars crossover event. 

Ben, break it down for the people.

Ben

Whereas every other one of these projects except for My School President was in many ways an epilogue this is a mixture of…it's an epilogue or a post-show story for Tian and Phupha, but for Pran and Pat it's set between Bad Buddy episode 11 and Bad Buddy episode 12. It's the senior year for Pat and Pran. They are still closeted and having to keep up the architecture-engineering rivalry, though it looks like they've tried to smooth things over over the years because most of the beef is about who's bringing…brooms to…the charity project now. [laughs] But they're having some consternation because both groups need to put on a play as part of their class president activities, and after the normal Bad Buddy hijinks kick in, Pran reveals that he wants to adapt Tian's diary A Tale of Thousand Stars into a play for the architecture school.

And once they decide to follow this route, their teacher says that, because they don't have permission from the people whose story this actually is, they need to go find them and get said permission. Pran decides that they're going to go to Pha Pun Dao to talk to them directly, tell them how important it is that they want to tell this particular story. 

Before they can leave, Pat is forced to hang out with his engineering buddies and, because he has to pretend like he doesn't like Pran, he says something akin to, “That Pran guy. He'd be useless without me. I'm always having to help him.” Pran felt some kind of way about that and decided to leave Pat behind and go to Pha Pun Dao himself—much to his own chagrin—because he loves that boy, and got so nervous when he was walking around by himself without Pat. 

And over the course of these four episodes, Pat and Pran learn a little bit more about themselves and their dynamic—but mostly they really help Tian and Phupha work past some really fundamental struggles that they were having as a couple that Pat and Pran realized that they had moved past a long time ago. 

This crossover really elevates both works because Aof is obsessed with the idea that queer people make each other better and, by the end of this, we as a fandom seem rather split about it because those of us who liked both A Tale of Thousand Stars and Bad Buddy were able to appreciate how both stories impact each other. But, it seems like if you were really only into one of those stories, you resented the crossover in one way or another.

Nini

I think that's one reaction to it, but, I mean, we've seen among the clowns even people who were really into Bad Buddy but not so into A Tale of Thousand Stars really coming around on Tian and Phupha by the end of the special. I don't think we have like a Vice Versa situation in that, and we can discuss all the reasons that might be, but I think that definitely the crossover has made people who maybe didn't appreciate A Tale of Thousand Stars as much really appreciate A Tale of Thousand Stars and Tian and Phupha more now.

Ben

So where do you want to pick up with the beginning of this discussion? 

Nini

I think I want to start with the idea one of our fellow clowns first espoused, and really sort of set me off on this thought process, that this special—this whole crossover—is all about Phupha. Because, of all four characters in the OG shows, the only character who didn't really get an arc  was Phupha—this is Phupha’s arc. How do you feel about that as an idea—as a concept?

Ben

Since we're gonna start here, I'm gonna come out swinging.

Nini

Do it.

Ben

If you hate that Phupha is the focus character of this particular special, I need you to examine whether or not you actually care about gay men.

Phupha is a poor, hyper-masculine, closeted gay man, who's older than the other characters. He's about 35 at this point. There are so many queer people out there that you're never going to know about because they cannot live their lives loudly. 

We're recording in June right now. Pride month. Phupha’s not gonna show up at Bangkok Pride because 1) he's not coming to Bangkok, and 2) that's just not the place where he feels safe. It's not the place where he feels seen. It's not where all of the quiet gays are gonna go, or where the gays who have to be closeted for one reason or another are going to be. And it's easy to forget them because they're boring or they're less fun. 

I like that the story ends up being about: “How do we help Phupha break out of his own shell a little bit and let Tian love him just a little bit more?”

Nini

Phupha is this sort of stoic, very stern, character. I mean they lampooned that a little bit in the OG series for A Tale of Thousand Stars, and they lampoon him a little bit in the beginning of the crossover here, deflating him a little bit—kind of puncturing the whole stoic seme thing. But this is kind of who he is. 

This is, as you say, he's older. He's got real responsibilities. He's got a community to protect. He's…got people that he cares about that he needs to take care of. He is not the kind of guy who is going to, like you say, go to Bangkok Pride. He is the kind of guy who maybe has some internalized homophobia that he's dealing with—definitely has some internalized homophobia that he's dealing with. He is that guy who is trying to do the right thing all the time. And so often the right thing means him subsuming his actual desires in some kind of idea of him denying himself being what's best for the community.

And one of the things that the crossover brings forward, particularly in the person of Pat, who is diametrically opposed to the idea of subsuming himself for anybody. He only does it for Pran, and only, like, grudgingly. But, to put somebody like Pat, who is just loud and proud and just completely does not care about any ideas of masculinity or propriety or anything like that, and put that character in conversation of any kind with Phupha. It's so delightful to watch that happen because, of course, Pat immediately gloms onto him. He follows him around like a duckling—he imprints on him. 

He's like, “Oh, yes, Stern Daddy. I really, really like this vibe that you're givin’ off here. I'm just going to follow you around and bother the fuck out of you.” 

I think it was wen-kexing-apologist who said that Pat's entire job in the special is to terrorize the local elder gay. I Love it.

Ben

Pat and Pran. They both looked at Phupha, looked at each other, and then both said at the same time ‘WOULD.’ 

[both laugh]

Nini

I did see that. That was funny because it's true. They hang a lampshade on it at two points 1) when Pran runs into Phupha for the first time—him really having, like, a gay boy moment. [laughs] Like, the whole, like, slow-motion, turn-around, like, gasping gay boy moment.

Ben

He's read the, the diary and he's like “I get it.” Immediately!

[both laugh]

Nini

And then, to have Pat's moment come, where—because Pat's flirtation language is competition. So, of course he basically challenges Phupha to a duel in the form of a drinking contest. And then they wake up shirtless next to each other and think that they might have maybe…done something— 

Ben

They definitely did some stuff.

Nini

They made out. Just a little bit. They kissed a little bit. 

But I—I loved that! I loved that they were both really into him. Like it was clear that they were both attracted to him. It was very gay and very fun. But also they're just like, “No, I get it.” They—they both looked and they were just like, “Tian, I get you. I understand why you live in this village with [both laugh] no running water, and you have to sleep under a mosquito net every night. I get you! I understand you because, for this man, I would do these things.” Like, they get it.

It's kind of delightful.

Ben

I like how, when Pran first gets to the village, and Phupha passes out, Tian runs up and Pran’s like ‘who are you’ and Tian's like, “No. Who the fuck are you?”

[Nini laughs]

Ben

And, like, if Tian had been allowed to have a knife…

Nini

Pran would have been stopped at that point—fully stabbed. “Like, who the fuck are you and why are you talking to my man?” [laughs] Like, Tian lives in the village because he doesn't want anybody else to see Phupha. 

[both laugh]

Nini

Because he knows the minute any of these whores take a look at his man, if it's going to be a problem. 

Ben

In terms of the serious stuff. So, they've shown up to convince them to sign these papers. Going into this Pat and Pran are fighting a little bit because Pran feels guilty, and part of this journey for him was maybe seeing, like, if he actually needed Pat as much as he does. And he learns very quickly that he is not at his best without Pat. 

It's funny because Pat always knew this. Pat seemed to know already. Like, he says it in like episode 5 of Bad Buddy that he was not at his best when Pran was gone. 

But Pran wants to prove he doesn't need Pat's help, and when Pran shows up to try and convince him to sign Tian's like, “Fuck yeah! I wrote the diary so people would…maybe want to become teachers and appreciate what I have out here. Absolutely!” Phupha's like, “No, y'all not going to present me as some lovesick fool on your little stage.” 

And then Pran tries to talk to Phupha a couple of times and fails massively at it. Tries to lie to Phupha. And then Pat blocks the shit out of that by calling out the bullshit right away, because he's pissed at Pran for running off without him. So he's sabotaging some of Pran's efforts. And it isn't until the two of them start working together that they actually start making any fucking progress because…that's who they are.

Nini

But I think there's also, like, a really valid point to the fact that Pran—he tries to talk to Phupha about it at first and Phupha is not having it. You're right. But one of the reasons that Phupha is not having it is because he's looking at these kids and he's thinking, “These kids do not understand me. These kids have no idea of what my life is like. These kids have no idea of what our lives are like. These kids have never faced any kind of serious challenge. These are two dumb kids. I'm not gonna give them time of day. They don't get to tell my story.” 

And then, by the end, the thing that actually gets Phupha to agree to let them tell his story…is Pran actually dropping the bullshit—as you said—and saying to him, “You think I don't know what it's like to feel insecure? You think I don't know what it's like to feel like my partner deserves better than me? You think I don't know what that feels like? Oh, believe you me, I know what that feels like.” 

And, because at this point Phupha has spent an enormous amount of time with Pat, he's like,

“Okay, yeah, maybe you do understand what I'm going through.” 

And the way that that works out in the end—and I mean we're kind of skipping back and forth through the story at this point—but the way that that works out at the end is Phupha saying, “Okay, you get to tell my story, but you have to tell my story because you understand me.” His condition for signing off on them doing the play is that they play the roles of him and Tian, because they understand him. I thought that was really—a really great way to follow that thread through the story. I really enjoyed that part.

Ben

I like the subtle way Aof played with our expectations about who would identify with who. Like, they made Tian and Pran resemble each other. Tian was like, “Fuck this twink,” right away as soon as Pran showed up. 

[Nini laughs]

But then, like, Pran helps him. Pran helps him in the class and Tian softens very quickly to Pran. 

Because of how physically macho Pat is—like, there's this expectation that he and Phupha are gonna be super similar to each other—and there's an interesting subtle commentary that Aof does there in that it's the more creative one, who's way too close to his mom, who's more like the hyper-masculine dude, because both of them are masking in their lives. 

Like, Phupha is hyper-masculine because that's what's expected of him. And like people pick at Phupha about this a little bit, but he is trying to live up to the role that he is told he's supposed to fulfill. And Pran also suffers under the expectations of who his mom expects him to be, and it's interesting for me that Aof, over the course of these three episodes when they're all together, Aof says Pran and Phupha have more in common because they are carrying so much homophobia on their shoulders, and that's why the two of them probably understand each other best.

Nini

Using the yaoi tropes again, a talk about who is the seme and who's the uke in the story in terms of who's the pursuer and who's the pursued, and…if you look at it, like, then you can clearly see that it's Tian and Pat who are aligned because Pat pursued Pran and Tian pursued Phupha. They are the semes even though it seems that Tian would be an uke. He's not. He actually pursued Phupha. 

So in the narrative sense. He's the seme. It's just very fun, this playing with the idea of what is a seme and what is an uke. And, again to use the yaoi terms—which you know I don't like to use ‘cause I don't really know the yaoi or rock with the yaoi. But, that idea of who is…pursuing the relationship, leading the relationship—like that's Tian and that's Pat. 

And in terms of who is being pulled along by their partner in a kind of a way that's Phupha and that’s Pran. So, I do like how Aof leans into this…because again, it subverts expectations in a particular kind of way. But also it makes so much sense. 

Ben

There's two subtle things that I really want to point out, and I want to talk about them a little.

First, Pat and Pran use titles for Tian and Phupha the whole time. And the other thing is about how nobody really knows anything about anybody in this. So, like, we're gonna call them Tian and Phupha, Pat and Pran, because we're inside of these people's stories with them. But it's interesting to me that Pran and Pat never cross a familiarity line with Tian and Phupha in the brief time they're with them. They refer to them as Teacher and Chief only the entire time.

Nini

I like that because it's a nod to their roles as adults because Pat and Pran are still kids. They're still college students, and Tian and Phupha are adults to them. But, in some ways, Pat and Pran have progressed much further in their relationship than Tian and Phupha have because they've been through more—just from the nature of their whole history. And they've crossed barriers and boundaries and, and parts of their relationship that Tian and Phupha are just confronting or haven't even confronted yet. And I liked that. 

I liked, also, that interplay of the younger ones being the ones to teach the older ones something. I really like that because I feel like that's what's happening now not just in—not just in queer circles—because that's definitely happening in queer circles. But also just in terms of generalization. Like, if you're not a complete douche and you're our age—well I say our age. I'm about 10 years older than Ben. Not ten, but…when you've crossed a certain Rubicon in the adulting game. Let's put it that way.

Right now. The kids are teaching us like a whole bunch of stuff as long as you're not a dick, like, and you remain open, the kids can teach you all kinds of shit that you never thought was possible to learn about yourself at this stage in your life. And I really like that Aof played with that because Aof’s about my age, and I like that he is the kind of person who understands that the young uns have things to teach us as well. Like, we have things to teach them—clearly and obviously—and we want to make a better world for them—clearly and obviously. But also, there's so much shit that we can learn from them when it comes to just fucking unclenching, because that's what happens here! Like, all of this is in service of Phupha just fucking unclenching. 

Ben

And this is what I mean about having other queer people, like it isn't just about your boyfriend. You need queer friends. Like, Tian blossoms almost immediately when he realizes that Pat and Pran are a couple—that they're not just friends. As soon as Pat flirts with him a little bit at breakfast and Pran shoves a spoon into his mouth, you can see Tian instantly relaxes and it's like, “Okay” and is more receptive to what these two are here for. And for Phupha. Like, yeah, it's one thing to just be into Tian and that be a thing, but to have someone like Pat roaming around actively flirting with him all the time, that also forced Phupha to reckon with who he is. 

And it's funny, because, like, Pat and Pran are actually closeted. They basically, like, admit it to Tian and Phupha as a sort of a de facto thing. But, like, the two of them are away from the world where they have to hide. So they're on top of each other. They're constantly touching each other. They're flirting constantly…

Nini

They're fucking in the tent twenty feet away from them. [laughs]

Ben

We'll get there in a second. We’ll be there in a second. [Nini laughs] But they're so obviously obsessed with each other. And like Nini said, like during the rescue bit, Kampung is not in the tent with them where he's supposed to be. And so the boys are like, “Oh, I guess the kid decided to go stay with Phupha and Tian. Great! My foot is hurting me because I twisted my ankle, but let's get it in!” And then in the morning Pat limps to breakfast asking, “What's my score for last night?”

Nini

I love that they just fuck their way through all their problems. It's delightful. I enjoy it.

Ben

One of the sad things with Tian and Phupha is…they have to keep waiting for the other person to be asleep to be affectionate with them, and that's one of the big things that I'm really glad that they start to work through towards the end of this. Like, I'm really proud of Phupha for listening to the man who he loves, and the person who is inspired by the man who he loves. 

Like, it’s so fascinating. Like—like Pran ran on this whole trip thinking he was Tian, met Phupha, realized he was Phupha, and was able to reach across that gap and say, “Please trust me. We got you.” And Phupha said, “Okay.” 

There's a lot of consternation in the fandom right now about taking score between Pat and Pran about who sacrifices more, or what should or shouldn't be said. I'm not particularly interested in that particular conversation. Pat and Pran love each other. They're adults. They've committed to each other. Sometimes you're gonna be with other gays and you're not going to understand how they work, and you just have to accept that their dynamic is their dynamic. It's not about who wins. It's about who cares for you—and they clearly care for each other.

Nini

I think part of what it is, as well, is—it sounds bad, but go with me on this right? I am a great proponent of therapy. I believe in it. I am in therapy. I have been in therapy for years. I recommend therapy to everybody. But there is a certain level of therapized that I think is not necessarily good for us…And that is as somebody who believes in the power of therapy to change and save lives. I think that this idea that everything is pathologized, that you always have to be on the lookout because somebody's trying to get you in some kind of way—I think that it can be harmful to relationships and to our understanding of relationships in certain ways, because not everything that is unbalanced or imbalanced is harmful. 

And I think that one of the problems that I'm having with…not so much the show, but the fandom reaction to it is…that yes, Pat and Pran’s relationship looks unbalanced from the outside. It probably is unbalanced in certain ways. But that doesn't mean that it's harmful. But there's this idea that because of—again this is a, a therapized lens that unbalanced equals harmful, and I don't think that's necessarily the case. 

One of the things that I really don't grok onto and, to be fair…I am very…I am a Bad Buddy fun. I am a Pat and Pran fan. I am a fan of the characters separately and together. And one of the things that…I am really personally sticky and icky about is this idea in certain parts…that Pat and Pran do not love each other equally, or Pran does not love Pat enough, or Pat loves Pran more—all these ideas of particular kind of imbalances between them. And my whole thing is—Who are they and what do they need and what do they want from each other? What does Pat actually need from Pran? Is he getting it? He absolutely is.

So this idea of keeping score between the characters—or keeping score in relationships in general if you, if you broaden out to the idea of relationships—I feel like it doesn't serve. I feel like it's…reductive. And I feel like looking at these characters through that lens is not the way that Aof is portraying these characters, or wants the audience to look at these characters. Because I think that Aof is a person who is…very tuned into certain ideas that he wants to portray—certain things that he wants to portray about queerness and queer community and queer relationships—and…I think that to reduce probably the greatest queer relationship that he has put on screen in Pat and Pran to score keeping, when score keeping is a part of their history that they have deliberately stepped away from because they were forced into it. I feel like it misunderstands what he's trying to do and say with these characters…

And that's just my opinion, and I will admit a hundred percent that I am very precious about these two particular characters. I'm very precious about a lot of Aof characters because I feel that Aof writes characters in a way that I understand them intrinsically. But these two characters in particular I feel very precious about. And, I feel like to see them like that in the context of somehow keeping score between them is to not see them at all.

Ben

Pat only cares about one score and he asks Pran for it directly every morning.

Nini

And that's a fact. [laughs]

Ben

And that's the big thing for me! Like, they were kind of having a fight and most of it was Pran’s insecurity because Pran is a little bit embarrassed about what he's asked Pat to do for him. And they get over that almost immediately. They get to Pha Pun Dao. They see Tian and Phupha and they're like, “Oh, man. These guys are older than us, but they're like…four episodes behind us. [laughs] So, we got to catch these gays up quick!” And they—they instantly get over whatever their beef is and they start playing out their kinks the way they always do. They start cosplaying as Tian and Phupha…and flirting with each other.

Nini

And they do in the end have a little bit of a resolution to their…really not much of a fight, fight. And, there's two resolutions, really. 

The first resolution is the resolution they get in Pha Pun Dao which is, “Look, I can't fucking live without you, and you can't fucking live without me, and we agree on that. So, let's dead the shit.” And they did! And it was fine, because the shit was never really live in terms of a fight being live in the first place. They were fucking their way through that whole fight…and that's how they deal with things, and it works for them, and it's fine. 

And then they get a second resolution that Phupha gives them—a gift—which is, “I get to be in the open with you, even if it's just on stage. I get to be a lover in public.” And it works for me.

Ben

They even tried to redeem Wai a little bit.

Nini

It's still fuck Wai forever in these parts.

Ben

[laughs] He doesn't drop the curtain this time. Instead, he's like, “Give the people the kiss they need!”

Nini

It's still fuck Wai forever in these parts. [laughs]

Ben

And it's interesting, too, in terms of that particular gift. It works out in a couple of ways because Phupha gets to see a bunch of people react to their story. People are loving it. Lesbians are crying over them. One of the lesbians is moaning, “Why don't they just fuck already!” 

[both laugh]

Ben

He gets to see people love them through this play, and then this gives Pran something that he's wanted: Pran his on socials after the play seeing people making fanvids about him and Pat. Which is something that he wants. He wants to be in the open with Pat because he knows that's what Pat wants, and this is the closest they're gonna get for now. And he is relieved to just see that. 

But again, Pat is not worried about that. He's like, “Oh good, good. Did you get what you want?” and he's like, “All right. Let's stop fucking around with all this other stuff. Can we kiss as ourselves now?” 

And they do!

Nini

We've talked a lot about Pat and Pran here and we've kind of scratched the surface on Tian and Phupha. But I really want to get into Phupha because the main thing that the special is doing is unlocking Phupha for the audience, because—like I said—all the other characters have had their arcs in the OG series that we're looking at. Only Phupha has really been holding the line, so to speak. 

And this is Phupha's unveiling. It's his opening. This is Phupha getting harassed by a baby gay. Terrorized, actually, by a baby gay. Realizing that, “Oh my god. The baby gays came to town, and they fucked in a tent twenty feet away from us, and the world didn't fucking end. So maybe…I, too, can fuck my man and the world won’t end.” 

[both laugh]

And then he proceeds to do just that.

Ben

I really like the way Aof went about doing it. Phupha primps himself up, rents an expensive vehicle, picks up Tian, and then goes with Tian to a cute cafe and lets Tian show him off a little bit, even if it made him a little bit nervous to be fawned over.

Nini

He let Tian, like, dress him up! Like, he let Tian take him shopping! He let Tian babygirl him a little bit. He let Tian spend a little money! It was nice!

Ben

That felt like a big deal because he mentioned it. He's like the money on one of these dishes could feed the village for a week in Pha Pun Dao, but he lets it go. Tian is actually a rich kid. This is part of what Phupha knows Tian gave up to be with him and so, when they're in Bangkok, he relents. He lets Tian dress him up like a Ken until Tian is satisfied with the look. And unsurprisingly, Tian chooses something very sleek, masculine, and comfortable for Phupha.

And then Phupha shows up and meets the parents. This is a huge deal too because Phupha was nervous about this because he feels like he took their son from them, and that he overstepped because Tian's dad was once a superior in the military. And all they say is, “We're gonna give you the thing that's most important to us. Take care of it.” And they acknowledge his filial piety to his father when Tian—when Phupha—admits that the reason he's a forest ranger is because his dad loved that mountain and felt a need to take care of it and the people who maintain it. And they were like, “Respect that.”

And then he proposes!

Nini

Okay y’all know how I feel about the BL weddings and the BL proposals. Y’all know that I am usually kind of, like, sitting in the corner, like, with my hands over my eyes. But this one, y'all, I was deep in my feelings. The tears came out. It was beautiful. I fucking loved this proposal. It was perfect.

Ben

I think I liked it because it wasn't a grand gesture in front of a bunch of people.

Nini

That's exactly why I liked it. [laughs]

Ben

It was for them. It was Phupha finally saying that he wasn't going to hold back anymore, and then they had loud obnoxious sex in the hotel room.

Nini

I just like that the loud obnoxious sex started like way before this. Like, the loud obnoxious sex started—like the idea of loud obnoxious sex of course was started by Pat, because that's Pat's entire brand. When he was walking around in the forest with Phupha, like, pretending to worry about Pran when he knows Pran is gonna be fine, and telling Phupha, like, “I mean I'm just going to sniff him out and, like, what do you mean you're not going to sniff out your man. Like, don't you know what he smells like? He smells so good.”

[both laugh]

Ben

You know, I don't think that's underlined really loudly in the show but like Pat says it quite plainly to Tian. He's like, “We don't need to go roaming around. Phupha’s experienced and good at his job, and Pran's really smart. We should really just stay here.”

[both laugh]

Like, nobody believes in Pran more than Pat.

Nini

Nobody. Absolutely nobody. Pat is like, “Listen. He's gonna be fine. I'm not particularly worried about him.” Like, both times. Both when he was wandering around in the woods with Phupha and when he was trying to get Tian to sit his ass down and be a heart patient like he's supposed to be. Both times he's just like, “I am not worried about Pran. Like, can we just focus on what the real problem is here. The real problem here is that your man is going unsniffed. Y’all are having a fight that y'all don't need to be having.” 

I loved Pat’s whole energy in Pha Pun Dao. He was just like, “I'm just gonna vibe. I'm just glad to be here. I like being able to be out in the open with Pran. We are literally a million miles away from Bangkok. I can just be out here and just love on Pran the way that I feel like lovin’ on Pran—” 

Ben

“I'm here to test the structural integrity of the teacher's house.”

Nini

All of that! “I'm here to fuck in a tent and ask the next morning if I did good.” He was just vibing the entire time, and then he got the bonus vibe of running into Phupha who he has—I'm sorry—a major fucking crush on. He does. It’s canon. We're gonna leave it at that. He brought the sex pest fairy godmother energy to Pha Pun Dao, and he's just like, “Listen, y'all are having a fight. Have you tried fucking about it? I have found that to be a very—”

[Ben laughs]

“—I found that to be very helpful method of solving problems. Y’all should just fuck! Give him a good old sniff. He smells real good. Have you noticed that?” 

And it works! Like, Phupha at first is like, “Oh my God, get this kid away from me.”

Ben

Pat said, “Dick is not magical. It doesn't fix you. But! You look like you could use a little bit of a stress release.”

[both laugh]

Nini

And he's not wrong. And I love that despite the fact that Phupha spends the entire time being like, “Oh my God, child, get away from me. You are so annoying.” The minute Patt leaves, he's just like, “Okay. I'm [gonna] try what the kid said.” 

And he does it!

Ben

He goes back to all of their most romantic moments that he downplayed previously and gives them to Tian. Tian doesn't even know what to do with it at first because they've been so cold for a while.

Nini

He takes Tian back to the waterfall, and he's just like, “You said that I sneaked to look at you and I did but I ain't sneaking now! I'ma look.” And then he goes further than that. He said, “Not only am I going to look. I am going to make sure that you get a good look.” 

Ben

[singsong] Take a good hard look!

Nini

And like, like you said at first Tian is like, “What is happening here?” because Phupha is being so open, which I don't think he's ever been before.

Ben

And, like, Phupha was kind of manipulative about it because he made Tian relent and so Tian thought he was being, like, punished at first. Like, Phupha was teasing him because Tian's never made his attraction really quiet.

And then they finally get the stern dicking they've been needing. And Phupha…steals a line from the kids: “What's my score for last night?”

Nini

It was so fun. And Tian is just like, “Your what?” Like, Tian is fully enjoying this and I love that for him because one of the things I think people forget throughout the course of A Tale of Thousand Stars is that the Tian who starts the tale—he's sexy! Tian at the beginning of the story, he's got this edge to him. The sexy edge, and that kinda gets whittled away a little bit in Pha Pun Dao. But, that's still who he is. 

And I like that at the end of the tale when we get here to the epilogue that he gets to be that again. He gets to pull out that sexy edge that is part of him and use it on his man. Like, he babygirls him, he takes him shopping, and then, when he lookin’ all nice, he leans into him and he be like, “You're real handsome. Do you have a boyfriend?” And I'm just like this is Tian! This is Tian that I remember!

Ben

And then he pushes Phupha in that bed, and he's like, “I've been waiting for five years. I'm ‘bout to get what's mine.”

[both laugh]

Nini

Phupha’s like, “What are you doing?” He's like, “Don't worry about it.” [laughs]

Ben

He’s like, “Don't worry about it, babygirl. I’ma take care of you tonight.”

[both laugh]

Nini

And I love that. I love that so much. Phupha is, like, panicked about it for a minute, and he's like [sighs]. He's decides. He's like, “Let go, let flow.” He's like, “All right. This how you want it?” and Tian's like, “Uh-huh,” and he's like, “All right, let's do this!” [laughs] I loved It. I loved it so much. 

I love that at this stage of his life Phupha just learns to like—you know what? He's like, “Sometimes you just gotta un-fucking-clench.” And he just, he lets it all go.

Ben

I don't usually like talking about sexual positions around here because…of the way people project onto them, but I really like the implication in the final scene that this might be the first time Phupha really switches with Tian in a way that's also him emotionally… because you do have to unclench if you want to enjoy that particular act.

Nini

[laughs] In more ways than one!

Ben

It works really well because of the proposal. Like, Phupha's putting it all in the line. He's actually putting himself on the line. And he's going to be a complete partner to Tian, and is also going to relent and let Tian have some of the things that he wants. 

Like Tian is happy in Pha Pun Dao. He doesn't hate their lives there. He just says, “I want you to come home and see my parents once a year. It's important to me. I just want you to come down for that. And when we're here, let me treat you nicely.” 

Like, even if their lives aren't gonna always be there—like Tian may someday have to take care of the responsibilities of his parents getting older. But, I feel better about them facing that now as two people who are fully committed to each other than Phupha’s whole waiting-for-the-other-shoe-to-drop thing all the time.

Nini

I just…really liked…getting to see…Phupha just…be… We never get to see him just be. Once he internalizes what Pat and Pran say to him, at every point from then what we see is him getting to just be. Yeah, in a slutty way—which I personally enjoy. But also just not worrying so much about what the things he's doing say about him. And yeah, there are, like, moments of that, like, when they get to the play and the curtain goes up, you see him starting to, like, freak out a little bit. But as the play goes on he relaxes.

I like that he leans into both the relaxed energy and the slutty energy, because I feel like the slutty energy is incredibly important. Like, one of the things that I really enjoyed about the final episode of the crossover was that mosquito net moment because—

Ben

Oh my God…finally.

Nini

That's so many things! That's Aof acknowledging that he was maybe slightly too precious with their sexuality in A Tale of Thousand Stars. That's Aof acknowledging that, maybe yeah, they should have kissed there. That's also Phupha acknowledging a bunch of stuff. That's also Tian getting to recast those moments in his mind.

Ben

I also love that Aof basically gave them the Bad Buddy post-credits scene.

Nini

Now, everybody’s saying that, but to me I just remember that the A Tale of Thousand Stars post-credits scene wasn't sideways either. Like, they wrastled in that A Tale of Thousand Stars post-credits scene. Like, Tian had to ask for the dick but he got it.

Ben

I'm just very satisfied by the outing this time.

Nini

I really, really enjoyed it, and I think that a lot of the Sturm und Drang around it is because of these ideas—again once again—these ideas about balance, and feeling like it was maybe unbalanced between Pat and Pran, and Tian and Phupha. But I don't think those ideas of balance are relevant to what Aof was trying to do here. I think that using Pat and Pran—who are a solid, established couple who we know are pulling through anything because we've seen their future already—using them as a conduit, or a catalyst, or a support to pull Tian and Phupha through a hurdle that could break them. I was fine with it in the end. 

Like, I went through a lot of like—you know. I mean, you know because you were in these discussions with me and you and the clowns, like, sort of pulling through, like, how we feel about this. 

Ben

Everybody else is having a difficult time. I was vibing so hard for like—[laughs] for like two weeks! Everybody else is like, “Oh I don't like this episode!!” Like, everybody was mad after episode 3! Me…I thought that episode was great. They're like, “I hate how long they were lost in the woods.” I'm like, “Well, that was the whole point.”

They were lost in the woods. They were all circling around an issue, and the issue is really simple. Like, just sit still and let other people find you. Because that's what you need to do, baby gays, sometimes, it's sit still so we can fucking find you! And help you!

[both laugh]

Ben

All right! Let's talk about the actors.

Nini

Watching these four get to vibe together. I want to see it. And not just the four of them vibing together, but…the…pairings because they gave us like a mix and match. So, they gave us every single pairing that you could get out of these four actors, and everyone was delightful and delectable. And I enjoyed every single one of them, but I particularly enjoyed pairing Ohm with Earth. 

Ben

I really liked… the pairing of Nanon and Mix, and I don't know what we need to do to see those two work together again, but I would like to see the two of them take on meaty characters together.

Nini

I mean they're gonna be in The Jungle together. 

Ben

Are they? Well well well…

Nini

Yeah, maybe you might have to watch The Jungle. [laughs]

Ben might have to watch a straight show!

Ben

No…we just did that! It sucked!

[both laugh]

Ben

I loved Mix in this. Like, we've seen MIx and Earth together a couple of times, and you talked about this during episode two. Their drunken walk home together felt like Phupha and Tian, not Jim and Wen.

Nini

They made it feel so different, even with similar framing, even with similar camera work, even with the same actors, and the same director. They made that moment feel completely different from Jim and Wen's moment doing the same activity, and I—hats off, I bow down. I appreciate actors—y’all know that.

Ben

I like how all four of them managed to make their dynamics feel lived in.

Like, Pat and Pran felt settled. Like, they have some long-term difficulties to deal with—some of which are never gonna go away—but it was kind of interesting for me knowing that they're rock solid by the end of BB 12 that you can see them starting to get there now. Where Pran is nervous that this can't work forever because Pat is too loud. He…needs to be loud about stuff.

But, like, you can see the signs here of them giving themselves openings. Here, like with the play, with Pat going home to his dad later and giving him the liquor that Pran got in Singapore, loudly climbing through Pran's window when he comes back to Bangkok…to go play with his guitar in his room.

Nini

Pat needs to be loud. Pran knows Pat needs to be loud. And the journey that they're setting off on through the special—I can't even say that it culminates in Bad Buddy 12 ‘cause it doesn't. It continues in Bad Buddy 12, but it culminates at some point in a future that we don't get to see. And there's something to be said about Aof putting that way-way off…and the things that he wants to say to the baby gays and the elder gays.

Hoo! Man, I've been feeling Aof lately. Like, Moonlight Chicken, like, unraveled something in me. And going back to some of his earlier works in the light of Moonlight Chicken because part of the whole point of the crossover—and of crossovers in general—but in this particular crossover is intertextuality. When we were talking about Bad Buddy. When we were, like, thick in the things of Bad Buddy. We're talking about text and subtext and metatext working together to tell this story, and the thing that didn't become a part of that story—there were hints of it, mostly in the Pa and Ink storyline—but the thing that was hinted at, but not really fully grasped onto, was intertextuality.

Like, the conversation that different pieces of art are having between themselves. And one thing that this special—that the crossover delves into now—is the intertextuality.

Ben

I particularly like it because you have two leads interacting with each other and I find that sometimes we can get a little too archetypical about the leads of shows. By forcing the audience to consider who Pat and Pran are relative to Tian and Phupha, it forces you to revisit how you've been viewing them the whole time. Like, Pran thinking that he was Tian, and us maybe getting a little too caught up in that. Because, like we called it at the end of the first episode! We're like, “Why does he look so much like Tian? That feels off.” And it was off! 

Oh. I wasn't trying to make a pun there.

He's not like Tian. Like, as soon as I saw them I was like, “Why would they compare him to Tian? He doesn't feel like Tian to me?” I was right! And so, we get to the end of this whole shebang, and I am having a blast. Like I'm watching people having to sort themselves out like “Did I like this? Did I not like this?” 

I was drinking a mojito, having a good time, after this ended. I was drunk at the reception hanging out with some lesbians.

Nini

I mean in the end is it not the place that you want to be? I feel like it all worked out super well, and one of the reasons that it worked out super well is that these two stories had to be in some ways told together. And yeah, one got a little subsumed to the other. But that's the way that it had to be at this point in time.

Ben

I think it was pragmatic.

Nini

Yeah, I think if we had caught up with them and done this crossover at a different stage in each of their relationships a different problem would have come to the surface, and maybe a different arrangement of the two couples might have happened. And that's also something that we need to think about in terms of the specifics of when in the story narrative and the timeline of the stories that Aof chose to set this particular crossover. 

When it comes to Aof I'm always thinking about what he's trying to do, because one of the things that has been very clear to me throughout his oeuvre, but particularly in Bad Buddy, is that…he is always going to tell the story that he wants to tell. He's not overly concerned about making it fit into certain narrative structures. He's not overly concerned about making it fit into audience expectations. He wants to tell certain stories, and that's what he's gonna do. And that was made very clear to me with Bad Buddy 12, because that defied every narrative expectation—every audience expectation—to speak a truth that Aof had on his spirit.

Ben

The other thing for me—this is the part where I’m gonna get a little bit grumpy again. It is expensive to make television. Like, the biggest thing that stands out to me with all of Our Skyy is how stripped-down all of it looked.

Like they filmed in like one or two locations at most it felt like half the time, and they had really short filming schedules, and everybody had to be good very quickly. There's not a lot of runup time. It feels like people just brought whatever they still had left from the last performance and they just ran with it. Everybody had to be really good, and it's expensive to film on that mountain. And so Aof needed to justify that particular crossover, by using the most potent talent he had.

Like, there's a huge Bad Buddy fandom. There's a pretty solid contingent of people who like A Tale of Thousand Stars. And for A Tale of Thousand Stars to get something good, he needed to merge the Bad Buddy budget with the Thousand Stars budget.

But also, they didn't want to touch their ending, which is why he sets Bad Buddy before its ending, but Tian and Phupha only at the beginning of their romance when we leave them. They have more work to do, so they can have an epilogue story that really hammers into some really interesting stuff, which we just spent the last hour or so talking about. 

But it's done really efficiently! Like for the most part we all seem to enjoy Our Skyy, and they manage to do that with their limited budget. Like Pat and Pran are in a different room because it's probably cheaper to use this room. There's less people in Pha Pun Dao this time. Au is running around in the background as an extra! Wasn't he the damn director of the Kwan and Riam play? [shushes] Don't pay attention to that. A bunch of guys are running around with masks on—that's probably just crew members!

Nini

I did sort of love that chewing gum and string energy these productions can bring that is really sort of the heart of the Our Skyy franchise. I feel like I like that because to me that means it's for the art. If you're going to do this on chewing gum and string it's because you really fucking care. Like if you're going to do a story like this on string and chewing gum, it's because you really want to tell this fucking story. And in the end that's where I land on the vast majority of Our Skyy 2.

Ben

So what's our final verdict on Our Skyy then? Worth it? Not worth it?

Nini

Before we get to our final verdict on our Our Skyy, we didn't give our final verdict on the crossover. 

Ben

Oh, it's a 10. [slams desk and laughs]

Nini

It's a 10! It's a 10! It's a 10! Let's just—let's just—let's let it go. Right? It's a 10 for drama and a 10 for crack because what is more cracky than a crossover? And so it averages out to 10. Have I got quibbles with it? Yes. Do they, in the grand scheme of things, matter to my enjoyment of it? Absolutely not. It's a 10—point blank period.

Ben

It didn't waste my time. They set out a really interesting premise: what if Tian published his diary? What if “lonely queer looking for meaning and community” Pran found it? What if he met them? What do they do if they meet each other? Like, they follow through on that in a way that gave us so much to talk about for two weeks. 

And it was fun seeing the whole fandom come alive and see people revisit characters! It was fun seeing people change their opinions on Phupha, and even Earth and Mix as the result of watching this. That was so much fun. 

Nini

It was delightful. It was enjoyable. It was meaningful. It was narratively enjoyable at least for me, it was a 10. I loved it and one of the things that I love most about it is that Pat gets to lick Pran's finger this time.

Ben

Oh my god.

Nini

I mean, it's just the slutiness of it all! Pat gets to lick Pran's finger. Phupha gets to touch his titties in a sexy kind of way. They get to make out with that damn mosquito net, and I enjoyed every single second of it. I laughed, I cried, I…felt warmth deep inside. 

1:59:13 - Overall Score for Our Skyy 2

Nini

All that said, in terms of the overall—let’s give an overall score for Our Skyy 2. Ben, what do you think?

Ben

With the caveat that you should only really engage with the Our Skyy content if you liked the original show, it's a 9. 

Like, I didn't like Vice Versa and I didn't like Star in My Mind when I watched them the first time, and so everything I didn't like about those shows was present in their Our Skyy offerings. I don't think it's very fair of me to be especially mean about their Our Skyy offerings when they are in line with what the audience has been taught to expect. If the audience likes that more power to them. But for the six shows that I genuinely liked, I had a good time with these. 

Like, the weakest shows in this that I had a hard time with on the front end were A Boss and a Babe and Never Let Me Go. And I really liked what Jojo did with Never Let Me Go, and I thought that A Boss and a Babe actually had a really interesting story this time. But I loved The Eclipse and I thought Golf was great with this outing. I thought the cast was great in The Eclipse outing, and I felt like that about Bad Buddy and A Tale of Thousand Stars, and I felt like that about My School President. 

I had a great time! It gets a 9 overall. Like, there are quibbles—it's not always the best thing, and it forces you to maybe look back at a show and alter the way you felt about it. And if you'd rather lock the show in a mental prism of where you last left it, maybe don't watch these offerings? But if you grow and change, and you kind of want to imagine what your characters are like if they also grow and change, then maybe it's worth checking out for you. 

It's a 9. Highly recommended.

Nini

For you, the score is always about a recommendation. For me, it's always about do I like this? How much do I like this? And for me, for the vast majority of Our Skyy, I fuckin’ loved it. So I also give it a 9. I don't have any caveats about recommending it to anybody or anything like that. I just had, for the most part, a whale of a fucking time. And so, it's a 9! I enjoyed myself! 

So kind of in our own form of intertextuality harkening back to our Season 2: Electric Boogaloo episode of the Spring Series, and talking about sequels. So, Ben, after Our Skyy 2, how are you feeling about sequels?

Ben

Enthusiastic? [laughs] I mean, come on, man, like, this was fucking good. We need to think about how these characters stay together. That can be so rewarding to think about and it's good for the audience to think about it. 

I hope we see Pat and Pran in 10 years after their little sprout has blossomed, and maybe they're considering something else. I'm totally down to return to characters every couple of years for check-ins. That totally works for me, and I think that there is value in transitioning the types of stories we tell with characters over time, because they're going to face a variety of situations over time, so it can be so, so rewarding for us as viewers to go on those new journeys with them.

Nini

How do I…feel about sequels? Again, it's the same way I always feel. I feel like when there's story still to tell, I'm ready to see it. I'm ready to hear it. And if I feel like there isn't anything left to say, then I'm not interested. That's largely where I landed with the Our Skyy episodes for the most part where I felt like there was story left to tell. I thoroughly enjoyed getting that story and then those, like Star in My Mind, where I felt like there was no story, I wasn’t really interested. 

So, do I feel pumped about sequels and the whole idea of following these boys into the “staying together” part of things? Yes, that's something that I'm always going to enjoy, and if that means conflict, I am fine with that. I enjoy watching them navigate that, whether the conflict is minor or  major, I am having a blast with that in my mind. 

And…I can't wait for Our Skyy 3. 

That is going to wrap us up on the Our Skyy 2 episode. Y'all are going to hear the edited version of this, but I just want you all to know that we've been talking for three hours, and we've been having a great time. See y’all in the next one. Say bye to the people, Ben.

Ben

Welcome back, my boyfriend!

Nini

[laughs] Bye.

#podcast #our skyy 2 #bad buddy #a tale of thousand stars #my school president #the eclipse #vice versa #star in my mind #never let me go #a boss and a babe #thai bl #bl series #ben and nini's conversations #the conversation #on art #season 3 #summer 2023 #summer series #Spotify

[negative-speedforce]

Eris has offered a combat lesson to each of your OCs - any weapon or fighting technique from throughout history. What fighting styles or weapons do your OCs choose to learn? Are there any who decline the lesson?

Siv: While she's already a fairly experienced fighter, they'd love to refresh on Muay Thai, since Eobard had them take classes in it as a teenager but haven't actually sparred with anyone in years without the intent to kill and/or maim, and they'd like to face off with a potential equal (Siv will probably get her ass kicked).

Hailey: Would love to learn how to fight with a spear or staff, since with her ghostly abilities + a little bit of additional technology to target her powers, she can use some minor cryokinesis and it would be convenient to know how to use that ability to fight with a giant-ass icicle

Jay: Would probably turn down the lesson, since he's not sure if it's accessible for a disabled person like himself. However, if he was absolutely sure, he'd love to learn how to do some kind of martial arts while in a wheelchair.

Cassandra: Would love to brush up on kickboxing (and she'd probably try to figure out how to adapt her fighting style to be able to fight in midair).

Esme: Mostly just wants to learn how to use self-defense in heels, since she's had a couple close calls walking home from clubs and she's tired of having to expose her powers every time someone tries to stalk her.

Gina: Would like to learn Tai Chi, mostly for health reasons but also so she can smack a bitch if they decide to mess with her

Arya: Mostly just looking for an excuse to spar with someone as ancient and experienced as themself, decides to take a lesson in knife fighting for the hell of it

Ember: Also wants to learn how to fight in heels, since most of the time they're dressed in drag anyway.

Cat: Prefers to use her wits and a gun, since she's physically rather small and weak, so she might turn down the lesson.

Kyle: Would love to do some wrestling! He's done it before, for a couple years in high school before he switched to football, and he'd love to pick it up again, since it was a lot of fun for him.

Max: Might turn it down, since he can summon his mech suits with just a press of his earrings and take care of any situation like that.

Eric: Prefers to use magic to fight rather than physical force, but he might take a Taekwondo class just for the fitness benefits.

Jacob: Acompanies Eric to his class, because he knows his husband is going to end up spraining SOMETHING because he has no idea what he's doing. This has happened many times before.

Khalil: Would love to learn boxing! He's always wanted to pick it up, but has always felt unwelcome in most classes because he's a rather feminine man and tends to get treated poorly by his classmates.

Antonio: Because he's literally twelve, he wants to learn Ninjitsu, and fight with a katana. His parents immediately object, but ngl I get the feeling that Eris is going to teach him anyway.

Reggie: Would love to learn how to use a shuriken, just for bragging rights with xer friends.

Ameerah: Immediately declines, she prefers her wits and her powers in order to take care of situations.

Rania: Would probably just want to learn some basic self-defense moves in case some idiot decided to try something on her walk home from work.

Director Hawke: Eris doesn't even get halfway through their offer before Hawke recognizes Eris as a metahuman, and a huge fight breaks out (never mind that metas and witches are almost genetically indistinguishable, she has to have her little group to hate)

Meredith: Would want to learn Kalaripayattu, since it's a lesser known martial art and it focuses both in armed and unarmed combat, both of which it would find useful.

Cory: Since Cory's pretty small, Mok Gar might be right up his alley, since it was designed to help a smaller, weaker person to overpower someone who is bigger and stronger.

Kelsie: Prefers not to get into violent altercations, and only uses her plant-based abilities to get out of situations. However, just for the knowledge, she'd want to learn how to use a trident.

Torryn: Is already highly trained in Jiu-Jitsu, but he'd love to take a class in order to refresh his skills and potentially learn any new moves that he didn't know about before.

Onnie: Is already a pretty skilled martial artist, but at Eobard's urging, she'd ask Eris to teach them Lethwei, since it's one of the most brutal, bloody martial arts in the world.

Pippa: Probably just wants to learn fencing, because she's always wanted to try it but never had the money. Also swords are cool.

Jessi: "Ew, no. This is genuine Balenciaga. Do I look like I want to get all sweaty in this?"

Hyun-Ki: Would probably be interested in learning Kendo, since while he doesn't really have a need to learn martial arts, given that he has bodyguards, swords are cool.

Marie: Would love to learn Okinawan Kobudo, since she's trying to get closer to her heritage after losing part of herself (memories, personality, etc) after her assimilation.

Liah: As a pacifist, she'd probably say 'no' right off the bat, though she might be convinced to learn how to use a shield in a purely defensive manner, in case someone tries to attack her.

Qiara: Is quite literally an all-powerful space god, and does not need to defend herself.

Soraya: Would love to learn Capoeira. While it's not the most useful martial art, Soraya is a former gymnast, and the complicated flips and moves would be right up her alley.

Thalia: Thalia would probably be interested in Hapkido, with its focus on both unarmed and armed combat.

Reyna: Would want to learn how to use nunchucks, purely for the bragging rights. Eris, please don't trust Reyna with any potentially lethal weapons. It's already bad enough with her having a lightsaber.

Laila: Probably turns down the offer, since she prefers to learn on her feet, and challenges Eris to a sparring match.

Athena: Athena would probably go for learning Junshi Sanda, so she can turn her already brutally competent fighting skills into a full-on weapon.

Pyrrha: Would love to learn Aikido, since she's already an extremely competent fighter, but she would love to learn some less violent methods of taking down an opponent that don't involve gruesome death.

Samira: Probably would turn down the offer, given that she considers herself far more of the brains than the brawns, and prefers not to get into physical altercations.

Aldrich: Would turn down the offer, since he does NOT want to be in the same room as someone else's blood if there was an injury.

Matt: Probably would say 'no' to Eris's offer, since he's pretty sure he'll fuck up his joints if he tries any crazy new moves.

Sohelia: Would be very interested in learning Eskrima, given its focus on handheld weapons. Even a couple inches more of distance between her and someone else's blood in a fight could mean life or death.

Vanessa: Would love to learn how to use a crossbow, since she's only seen them in movies and it looks like a really cool weapon to use.

Dolores: Since there's very low risk of her losing control and hurting someone, she'd love to learn archery.

Victorie: Would turn down the offer, since she does NOT want to be in the same room as someone else's blood if there was an injury.

Kayla: Took judo when she was younger, would like to take a refresher course so she can remember everything she learned back then.

Dori: Because they are a huge nerd, Dori would love to learn how to use the chakram, given that it's Xena the Warrior Princess's weapon of choice.

Ellis: Given that angels have no need for human martial arts, Ellis would graciously turn down Eris's offer, since they can just go all "Be not afraid" and scare any potential threats shitless.

Gabi: Isn't much of a martial arts kind of gal, but she would love to learn how to use a medieval broadsword, just so she can use one at the Ren Faire.

#ask revan #oc shit #practically-an-x-man

[lipstickmarks]

Big Bang Characters Favorite Taylor Swift Albums + General Swiftie Behavior

Amy - folklore girlie. screams “don’t call me kid, don’t call me baby, look at this godforsaken mess that you made me” at the top of her fucking lungs. honorable mention to evermore bc tolerate it reminds her of her relationship with her mom🙁 Also a speak now girlie bc amy definitely is the type of person to have an objecting at a wedding fantasy.

Sheldon - 1989. He loves all of taylor’s pop songs and gets a huge kick out of her using math in her announcements

Leonard - LOVER!!! Leonard is such a soft soul and a hopeless romantic. Lover resonates with him because he is so so so in love but has a lot of relationship anxiety (thinking Penny will leave him, assuming he’d never be happy again if she did) and I just know he had the most raw, full-body cry after listening to Afterglow because while Penny may be the more emotionally distant one, he has committed more tangible crimes against their relationship (kissing Mandy, hiding money from Penny, going behind her back to tell her dad she didn’t want kids). Lover reminds Leonard of his relationship with Penny: the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Penny - a stan since debut. Speaking as a girl who grew up in a rural area with country music loving parents, a lifelong Taylor Swift obsession is included in your welcome packet. I don’t think she’d have a favorite album in particular, just rocks out to everything. Debut, Fearless, and 1989 probably dominate her Spotify though.

Raj - how dare you make him pick. he is the swiftie to end all swifties. Saw her tour Red, Reputation, and absolutely had tickets to LoverFest and was so depressed when it was cancelled. Best believe he was fighting for his life in the ticketmaster queue for Eras tickets. He went to Eras twice. He’s the first to text the group chat about swiftie announcements and album drop theories (he was muted). Has the folklore cardigan. Gun to his head, folklore and Red are his top picks.

Howard - spends every weekend trying to find HD footage of the vigilante shit choreography. he wasn’t into taylor at first until raj was watching the reputation tour movie at his house and he got a glimpse of spicy tay. After that, he made a playlist of all her sexy songs (he and I are one)

Bernadette - REPUTATION. Bernie loves a good “fuck you” song. She also respects taylor as a business woman and is 100% behind her re-records. Top favorite songs are The Man, I Did Something Bad, and This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things

Stuart - like penny, no particular album is his favorite but he just loves all her depressing songs. he heard anti-hero on the speakers at the grocery store on day and went “yep, that’s me.” and downloaded the song on his iPod because stuart is absolutely the type to still have an iPod fucking nano in the 2020s

Denise - Fearless🫶🏻 she loves to sing out loud when the comic book store is closed.

Burt - he prefers her live shows and listens to the rock version of i knew you were trouble

#big bang theory #the big bang theory #big bang theory headcanons #sheldon cooper #amy farrah fowler #penny hofstadter #howard wolowitz #leonard hofstadter #bernadette rostenkowski #taylor swift #swiftie

[ctl-yuejie]

3 Will Be Free Rewatch - Epsiode 1

while I adored 3 Will Be Free when it came out, I believe I didn't pay proper attention to it (besides hardly anyone watching it on here) and now that I am also more familiar with jojo, I am looking forward to this rewatch

GMMTV really holds the title for great bar names (only beaten by TheLastGoodBar) Greatest MotherF*cker

I wonder how deliberate Joss' casting was since he not only was still young when this was filmed but he also feels very young. On one side GMMTV hasn't casted main characters over 30 for most of their series (which is now changing since so many of their ogs are around 30 now). I suppose he was mainly casted because of his physique fitting most closely to the other gogo boys but I cannot deny that I enjoy the extra layer of him looking visibly younger than the other two and his customers. They do mention that he is new to the job, so it could very well be that they are leaning into it.

- the card coming up with the '3 months later' and the three gun shots is a thing i can very much live with -

While I knew that the central set-up focuses on why Miw and Neo need money I forgot how central it is to most of the dialogue in the first episode. Not only the need for money in general but if and to what degree it is separated from happiness. Shin's dad wants affection as well and seems to try to include his new wife on an emotional level into the family beyond just wanting her status acknowledged. At the same, time, as soon as she crosses him he speaks of her like property.

With Miw it is interesting because we are shown that her mother needs more money. Still, she draws a hard line between hosting and prostitution which holds exactly as long as it needs for Shin and his friends to turn up. She does mention however that she cannot do it with random customers because she's not attracted to them. First sign that Shin might not just be a job for the money.

Equally curious whether Neo actually entertains Vanika honestly to some degree, since he could technically get more money out of her. Possibly his hard line of not wanting to become too dependant on her money.

The whole Neo Miw dynamic with them slut shaming each other and having differing opinions on what is the shameful way to earn money. No wonder they will fuck about it. 25.000 bhat is a hefty sum (even here where prices are higher than in thailand for sex)

I remember feeling unsure about Tay's acting during my first watch - even though he did improve since - but I very much enjoy his performance this time around (some of it is not that well-rounded, especially when he's in the same scene as Ssing. That man will put everything into the smallest amount of screen time). He is in the closet but doesn't seem too anxious about his friends setting him up to sleep with a woman. I think I will ponder this during future episodes. Why did he chose Miw though. As a reluctant hostess she might not be any good. It is possible he picked her assuming she would turn him down. But then, what is your plan b little gay boy? Shin also doesn't feel self-concious about being a virgin, his nervousness at Miw approaching him was very nicely done. Did they actually end up sleeping together? Do we know?

Max, my love, a short king! Gunsmile, it has been a long time. Jennie really should get bigger roles. I love her and the to men in this show, I only wish she'd gotten more scenes with Max since the diner scene is pretty iconic. And I can appreciate that Max's character is a gangster on the verge of turning into a wife guy. And how fucking scary his run after Joss is. Short kings, I tell you.

iconic scenes

the mustard on that fucking guy in the diner

all of the outfits (+ the stupid lollipop)

the move where Miew removes Shin's glasses and then playfully pulls them against her lips, very hot and novel move. will have to try it

the surprising softness of the scenes between Shin and Miw (even Miw seems surprised by their familiarity)

Joss voice breaking when he panics

Shin being so naive and polite asking for his wallet in the gogobar and sulking at the booth instead of getting out of that place

Neo covering Shin's mouth with his hand to keep him quiet. So hot.

random observations

there was a threesome teased with Kitty...Jojo...I think you have to deliver at some point...

the sound mixing etc isn't great, but better than some more recent shows - even with birds in the background

favourite bit: the connection Shin and Miw form even though they shouldn't feel this familiar and comfortable with each other

#3 will be free #yes i am doing a very slow rewatch instead of watching anything new

[thecatamaranlad]

15 OC Questions

Jumping on @ibuprofen-exe‘s open tag, and leaving this as an open tag for whoever wants to participate (except @justeliiijah, @twillprobably and @re-alku: I'm poking you guys with a stick egging you to do the thing). Please feel free to tag me—I would love to see your answers.

I'm going to write about Sam the Motorcycle Man (check my 'raptors' tag or 'sam the motorcycle man' tag) because he's FUN.

Are you named after anyone?

“Myself.”

2. When was the last time you cried?

”When I fucked up and Carla left. Then afterwards, when I got blindingly drunk trying not to think about it (it didn't work). Wait, no, I also cried after I heard she and Tai were safe from the tornado."

3. Do you have kids?

”Not unless you count Tai. ;)”

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot?

”Define "a lot". But yes.”

5. What's the first thing you notice about people?

”Whether or not they have cool tattoos or piercings. Also whether or not they seem queer in some way. I'm not trying to, it's just like a *finger guns* eyyy, you're my people kind of thing.”

6. What's your eye color?

”Gray, and not in the cool color-changing way.”

7. Scary movies or happy endings?

”Happy endings, I guess, but don't tell Carla I said that.”

8. Any special talents?

”I mean, I have a PhD, so I'm at least good at crying in front of a computer screen for years on end.”

9. Where were you born?

”South Carolina. Not going back."

10. What are your hobbies?

”Motorcycles and video games. Which I pick depends on the weather.”

11. Do you have any pets?

”No, but I have a parasocial relationship with my ex-roommate's cat. She's named after a hurricane, I have to love her.”

12. What sports do you play/have you played?

”I am 5 foot four on the dot and a huge geek. I do not play sports.”

13. How tall are you?

”See above. PSA: Don't fuck with short guys. I don't play sports but I can and will kick your ass.”

14. Favorite subject in school?

”All the sciences, but especially physics and meteorology. I should probably not find climate change as cool as I do. I also used to really like art and, believe it or not, literature."

15. Dream job?

“Having a steady job would be real nice. Bonus points if it pays decent. I guess I like making forecasts for people and trying to figure out where they can go to be safe... as long as they don't lose the connection with me in the middle of a damn tornado... There's a caravan that keeps asking me to sign on with them as their weatherman, but that would mean I couldn't go where I wanted to anymore. I've gotten used to being alone.”

Thank you for reading (⁠｡⁠･⁠ω⁠･⁠｡⁠)⁠ﾉ⁠♡

#my ocs #me writing a thing #sam the motorcycle man #tag game #raptors story

[disregardcanon]

yellowjackets disney's descendants au

okay so a quick run down of basic roles. these will not directly correspond to everything but it's a basic framework

how the roles line up

VKs

natalie as mal

jackie as evie

shauna as carlos

van as jay

crystal as dizzy tremaine

AKs

lottie as ben

tai as audrey

jeff as chad charming

misty as jane

laura lee as rapunzel and eugene's daughter <3

akilah as tai's best friend in auradon tiana and naveen's daughter. if she has a corresponding role it's probably lonnie?

mari is a madrigal who hates singing. absolutely ABHORS IT

coach martinez as the tourney coach who is also the coach from airbud because i think that's HILARIOUS.

airbud as dude the dog

travis and javi don't really have corresponding canon roles but they're here and i love them

okay so. here is The Vision

lottie has recently been given the crown of auradon. this is due to absentee parenting from king malcolm and his wife, who are off doing vacations because they had so much fairy tale bullshit over the course of their lives. queen charlotte the first decides that it's unfair for the children of the isle of the lost to suffer for the actions of their parents and does some research about who would be the best to invite to move to auradon to test out a relocation program.

tai is the daughter of sleeping beauty who has issues with supernatural sleepwalking, presumably a strange holdover from her mother's curse. she's not entirely sold on lottie's idea, but she tries to give it a chance, at least. if there's anyone who feels stifled by every bit of auradon's pomp and circumstance and Why Don't You Find a Nice Prince or Nobleman to Settle Down With? it's tai.

lottie, tai, akilah, laura lee, and mari are The Tourney Girls. there are some other extras out there but they are the main ones. airbud is the next most important player. he doesn't talk he's just there barking and being Amazing At The Game. travis is there but he hates it. like, absolutely HATES IT. he is so bad at tourney but there aren't enough good players for his dad not to have an excuse to make him play. tai akilah and mari really resent him for Being There, Sucking, laura lee is kind because she feels like she has to be, but lottie actually really likes him. she doesn't talk shit so travis talks nothing but shit. For Her

javi is always around just chilling in the stands and drawing. he goes to the attached auradon middle school.

misty wants to be the equipment manager and do lots of Cool Things TM for Cool People TM but her mom wants her to do certain fairy things. and she HATES IT.

okay so our VKs

natalie- okay so natalie is mal but she has a different backstory. maleficent did not want to deal with raising a kid, but since abortion does not exist in descendants, she dropped the kid off with her dad and peaced out. the dad was clayton from tarzan and natalie never knows who her biological mom is because her canon mom is around and married to clayton. things go basically the same as yellowjackets canon where a year before the events of descendants clayton is beating her step mom and nat gets the gun and he accidentally puts a bullet through his own head. her "step mom" that she never knew wasn't her bio mom throws her out on the streets with nothing but the name of her bio mom and nat, angry and hurting, goes directly to maleficent's lair. maleficent, who never wanted to have a child, is more than happy to have an angry, powerful teenager who presumably killed her shitty ex.

jackie is evie and mrs. taylor is the evil queen. she grows up with all of evie's Must Be Perfect Wonderful Wife conditioning, the knack for poisoning and subtle manipulation, and the love of fashion, but she has source of solace in-

shauna, from a narrative standpoint, is carlos. she's not cruella's daughter, though. shauna is the daughter of one of cruella's goons (take your pick). on the isle there is a very strong expectation that henchkids become henchmen, and this, of course, does NOT work for shauna shipman and her sixteen different complexes. her dad tries to conscript her into following around and doing cruella's kid's bidding at a young age, and it... does not work for her. she has a violent little outburst and then runs away, living on the street and killing animals to eat for a while. she finds jackie instead. perfect, wonderful, Almost Fit for Auradon princess jackie. they clump together and shauna moves into their castle, under the pretense that she's become jackie's handmaiden. (a princess needs a handmaiden, darling). this chafes too, but with jackie's insistence that it's not true, not their real relationship, not anything tangible, it's a lot easier to ignore. they go to school together everyday at the weird little isle school, and shauna is the top of their class. it's hard for that to feel like it matters, though, when the biggest currency in the outside world is fear and the biggest currency inside is Being Jackie. the resentment still happens and chafes, but it's just simmering. it won't boil over until auradon.

van, from a narrative standpoint, is jay, but she's the daughter of madam medusa from rescuers rather than jafar because. van is so white it could blind you. madam medusa has a junk shop just like she did in the world before the isle, and van spends a lot of her time super athletically stealing for it with a lot of parkour. her mother spends all the time she isn't running the shop collapsed on the couch, just like in van's canon. she doesn't really have anyone her own age until natalie, daughter of maleficent, starts upending the power structures on the island and she decides she wants in. they become fast friends, but it's always "second" and "commander", because van never met a power dynamic that she didn't jump on. they also try their hardest to make things as good as possible for the isle kids in their area, but they refuse to admit that. come on, and look weak? dumb

jackie and shauna end up with nat and van pretty soon after they become a They. natalie wrests control of the taylor castle from jackie's mother and the evil queen refuses to surrender, leading to a bitter siege. jackie and shauna finally come out to try to broker a surrender, but natalie steps on jackie's toes and then jackie turns from Perfect Princess to Top Tier Bitch. and then she's like oh shit oh shit oh sHIT i pissed off maleficent's daughter this is going to be-

and shauna's back here getting her hunting knife out like sure, maleficent's daughter might have magic but if she DIES first then she can't use it- and nat just laughs. boisterous, delighted laughter.

"i think this castle's already got a queen." then she glances over to shauna's no longer concealed knife. "maybe two?" they both blush.

natalie, feared daughter of maleficent, setting the isle into a chaos it hasn't known in more than a decade, holds out a hand.

"Truce?" she asks. then suddenly natandvan becomes natandvanandjackieandshauna and they have half the isle under their collective thumb.

but then the invitation comes from queen charlotte for four children to move to auradon, and suddenly maleficent, who is still the most powerful person on the isle, has a single, itsy bitsy favor to demand from the daughter she so kindly took in after her father's death. who she taught to wield the magic she barely knew existed, who she loved and cherished and fed and clothed-

and a plot to steal the blue fairy's wand and dismantle the barrier is born.

how things go in auradon

natalie is torn between what she feels she owes to her mother and the other denizens of the isle, her friends (who are the most important in this equation), and then her emerging feelings for lottie. lottie who is so kind and who trusts her and is trying so hard for her and her friends, who she's so attracted to but is just using (right, that's all this is? right????) who is trying to make her own shitty society better too.

jackie is finally in the land of the royals and is trying to put all that life training to good use, but it's not... really working. we have something resembling the chad plot with jeff and something resembling the doug plot with laura lee, who thinks that jackie is very kind and deserves to be treated better (though their relationship isn't romantic). shauna is standing at the sidelines and crossing her arms and pouting. fine! if jackie wants to get her heart broken by this dumb auradon boy be my guest! i'll just. go do something else. fuck you

shauna and van both join the tourney team, because it's part of their collective How to Infiltrate Auradon Society and Get Lottie's Good Graces plan. also because shauna is very angry right now and needs a physical outlet and van has been cooped up for too long and is gonna go crazy. they're both good enough to make it and travis is like FUCK YEAH I'M FREEEEEEEE

his dad is very upset about this but shauna and van are way better than him already and it's hard to justify making his son do something the kid doesn't want to when there are better options and the nepotism isn't even wanted.

shauna and javi become friends and she encourages his interest in art like. huh. wouldn't it have been nice to have one singular adult who was nice to me? and then does not examine it beyond that. shauna also befriends tai, who tries to show her all of the things auradon has to offer because shauna is the most obviously Intelligent TM of the isle kids.

van flirts with tai a lot, but neither of them make a lot of progress with that because tai is pretty closeted and van is. not trying as desperately as shauna to try to be acceptable TM here.

by the end of the movie, they all decide that they don't want to use the wand to burst the barrier and talk with lottie about ways to help the other kids integrate over here in auradon instead. lottienat happens first, taivan happens second after van starts to commit to being in auradon and tai starts to commit to Going Against Dumb Auradon Rules like Homophobia (I'M A PRINCESS DAMN IT) and learn more about what's up with her sleepwalking with van and also nat. it takes a really long time for jackie and shauna to work things out because jackie keeps trying to force things with prince jeff and shauna finds better uses of her time and energy than worrying about it, but eventually they come together too. and crystal comes too! and she and misty become besties. and misty does not do any insane things, thnx

#yellowjackets #yellowjackets aus #descendants #lottienat #taivan #jackieshauna