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curious-minx · 4 years

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Entering into a new dawn of Corporatist Neoliberalism, all while leaving behind a rising Fascist Empire. A solid Bob’s Burgers and a surprisingly decent Simpsons is your reward.

“Fast Time Capsules at Wagstaff School” once again finds the show operating in the territory it does best: A Poignant twee commentary with the junior Belchers and a nearly pointless sideplot with the adult Belchers that actually sports a satisfying conclusion. The ingredients of a quality kids subplot requires a touch of Tina having the conflict of wielding too much power passed down to her by Mr. Frond whose mere appearance reliably bumps an episode up a notch. This episode not only also weaves the usual Tammy and Jocelyn jealousy games with Tina but also splashes two other of Tina’s peers into the mix: Jim Gaffigan’s Kelsey Grammar indebted Henry Haber and girl friend Sasmina voiced by National Treasure Aparna Nancherla. The episode focuses primarily on Tina’s gatekeeping of the contents of the Wagstaff time capsule. A particularly timely concept for a year where history is a constant 24/7 newsfeed of dramatic historical importance.

I fold up my muted pink streaked swimming trunks and put them into my personal time capsule. No way will I ever be braving a public beach or swimming hole. The act of exposing any amount of flesh during a pandemic is unthinkable, but in another 50 years I am sure there will be a lot more living to do. The episode goes even further in poignancy with layering a coinciding Louise conflict over a pair of Boyz4Now lands a lot differently in these Quarantined Times. Never have I related to Louise and her desire to go see a cute pop group sing in an intimate live setting, singing such hits like “Your Heart Fell On The Floor, Let Me Get It For You,” a level of cuteness not even Belle and Sebastian or The Magnetic Fields could probably come up with. The main plot moves along with a clean efficiency of storytelling bringing Louise and Tina conspiring together using their combined sister brain to retrieve the tickets, but due to further conflicting interests. The episode concludes with the characters taking their personal losses and rolling with the punches, which is another central sweet spot. Earlier on the series I felt like the Belcher family were constantly losing and being put down upon by the world around them. The pendulum of justice remains in flux giving the Belchers and friends minor victories, but the last image of this episode really gets to me. The sight of group of kids in a parking lot bonding by singing the hit “Someday We’ll Spoon” as it plays off in the distance. Another song title that hits so much harder than it ever could have without the rampaging socially distanced disease.

“If you see a cop, whistle!” - Teddie, and me whenever I see a cop because I always make sure to harass and wolf whistle at cops like they were a piece of construction worker street meat.

One of my new favorite Bobspressions.

The B plot with Bob and Linda is essentially that Bob can whistle, but Linda cannot, although Linda can roll her R’s. This teasing and taunting domestic squabble is cushioned by the looming gentle omnipresence of Teddie. Teddie, Bob and Linda are a solid trio and play off each other as characters really well and the repartee between the characters feels a lot looser than it has in past episodes of this season. The subplot culminates in Teddie making one of my favorite comedic moves being dependent on his parasocial relationship with Bob and Linda’s marriage. Teddie is the friend that believes in the love of his friends’ marriage more so than his own friends do and it’s always pretty touching to see Teddie play that card. The adults largely stay completely static inside a one-shot of the restaurant with Bob in the kitchen window, but there is a discernible rise and fall conflict between Bob and Linda that culminates with simple silly sweetness. Once again the adults are left fuddling around in their comfortable boxes and squares they have created for themselves, while the children are foisted out in the world having to deal with Future.

One other particularly timely one-off joke that the writers would have no way of knowing how timely and off-putting it would be is when Eugene makes a reference to Sean Connery. Gene compares Linda to the late actor responding to Linda on her R syllable rolling flexing. I am sure the writer of the episode felt some kind of something with this episode airing a week after the man died.

This episode is a Boyz4.5(4)Now.

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Thankfully this next episode of the Simpsons did not trot out Mr. James Bont. Episode 5 of Season 32 “The Seven Beer Itch” is a rebound episode from the last three exhausting conceptual excursions. I failed to do a write up on the Season 32 premiere episode, “Undercover Burns,” which I give a Pass (A Pass btw means that you won’t be harmed passing this show through your system, whereas Skip speaks for itself). Both the season opener and this fifth episode are just Simpsons episodes based in and around Springfield. No historical role-play or contrived literary surrogate puppet shows. This episode initially begins filling the viewer with “Simpsons on Holiday” dread opening the episode with The Groundskeeper Willie serving as the episode’s narrator. What’s completely confounding is that Willie has no bearing on the plot of this episode in any way whatsoever other than the fact that both he and UK Treasure Olivia Coleman are both from across the Pond.

The Simpsons have become one of the most musical series on television, and frankly it saps away the energy of the when songs pile on top of one another. I know I should be more wickedly delighted by having The Gosh Dang Favourite singing a pub song to Homer at Moe’s Tavern, but instead these songs make me go dead inside. Especially when Dan Castellaneta has to be a total diva belching out melodies with honey voiced Barney. Maybe if the songs were relegated to once a season or specifically to the ending credit sequence a la Bob’s Burgers that would be one thing, but a song (or three! Or five!) per episode is simply too busy. Then again “busy” describes everything about the Simpsons in 2020. The show continues to astound me visually with Springfields starry purple skies, brief glimpses of London clock towers served up alongside Marge and kids trip to Martha’s Vineyard. We even take a pit stop in California with Olivia Coleman’s Lily doing a forced, weirdly gentle riff with Leonard DiCaprio (who goes uncredited, making matters even stranger). Overall, modern Simpsons is the nicest looking adult animated sitcom around until Tuca and Bertie comes back on air. That being the said the plots of each episode feel like they are being pulled out of a magic foam wizard’s hat stuffed to the brim with Simpsons conceits. This week the writer’s pull Homer Seduction from out of the hat.

The Homer seduction plot can be traced back as early as Season 3 with the episode “Colonel Homer.” This episode more or less grafts its main plot swapping out a Pretty Country Singer with a Charming British Lady. The songs in “Colonel Homer” were actively related to the plot with country star Lurleen Lumpkins becoming infatuated with Homer Simpson, because he’s, he’s a simple and um sweet man. Homer has fidelity! 32 plus years on the air and Homer still remains the kind of man that will still choose his wife over whatever hot piece of Academy Award Winning voiced action comes his way.

I will end this review with this image of Homer giving us viewers come hither and fuck me eyes. Imagine an artist sitting down and drawing Homer Simpson giving you this coquettish glance and try not feeling sick with existential dread:

This episode deserves a Pass.

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Addendum:

A response to Digital Spy and hand wringing queerness out of a cartoon child

The article in question is available here.

The journalist of this article insistence that Lisa be a LGTBQ+ icon is understandable, but taking umbrage with Yeardely Smith’ for saying that she views Lisa as a child is queasy and infuriating. Smith isn’t a Karen trying to rob Lisa of her Queer freedom. Lisa’s queerness is innate and subtly woven into the character and explicitly spelled out in future glimpses of the character. I really shutter to think what the Simpsons mostly white and male writers room would concoct for a “queering” of Lisa. Dissecting and analyzing a cartoon child’s sexuality is all fun and games, but the world is also dying and full of real life children, not cartoon characters, in pain far more worthy of our concern. I would much rather there be support for Queer artist making their own adult animated sitcom and let Lisa Simpson just be a little girl that loves as Yeardely Smith calls “girly things.” Interpret this literally. Lisa is a cartoon girl living in a cartoon world and she’ll probably grow up to be a nonbinary polyamorous Super Computer or Sax Master General.

If you haven't already I strongly recommend readers check out Smith’s appearance on the currently defunct podcast Harmontown. In the episode “I Was A Simpson” she comes across as charming and thoughtful and worth a listen. She’s not someone that strikes me as a hateful advocate of queer erasure. She strikes me as a cagey performer not wanting to nail down too many concrete details about her character. Ultimately the writers and Smith know Lisa is a queer character, but unless the show is willing to hire a LGBTQ+ writer to help create a Queer Coming of Age centric coming of age episode I am content with having her identity be nudged and winked at in glimpses of the future and left at that. Good grief.

#Tv #Tv series #TV review #bob's burgers #the simpsons #2020 #fall 2020 #fox #animation domination #Oliva Coleman #feminism #lgbt representation #lgbt discourse #lgbt #harmontown

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stalkyou4ever · 7 years

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Pretty Little Liars Endgame Theory - A.D. is Spencer’s Twin (and Wren), and Charlotte’s Killer is Melissa

POSTED 6/06/2017 - Before 7x17 Aired

PLL blogs - Reblog for a follow! I want to lay out the evidence that is personally convincing to me for my (hopefully) final PLL theory. I believe fully that Melissa is Charlotte’s killer. That seems clear to me. As for A.D., I’m less certain, but I’m willing to commit to the theory that Spencer has a twin who is A.D. and Wren is her ally. I’m still somewhat hesitant to be completely gung-ho about this theory, as there are multiple notes I will make that show the theory is shaky, but there is still a significant amount of evidence that points me to that conclusion anyway, whereas no other theory I’ve considered has evidence quite as convincing.

Most of everything here is not all too original (most of my own thinking is really just in the ‘Melissa is Charlotte’s killer’ section) but I hope my straight-to-the-point bulleting format will be useful to see the best evidence for these theories laid out in one place. Even if no one reads this, I wanted a record to show that this was my theory in case I turn out to be correct.

To start off, I believe this to be absolutely true:

Charlotte was in the bell tower the night of her death to marry the love of her life, Archer Dunhill. She was holding the flowers that she took from Alison’s house because they were acting as her wedding bouquet.

Evidence for this: Charlotte’s death was eerily similar to Spencer’s college paper she wrote for her criminology class, as revealed in 6x12. And in the murder that Spencer’s essay was about, the victim was specifically killed on her wedding night. The only explanation for PLL’s random inclusion of this detail (seriously, there was no good reason for it unless it’s this) is that it was hinting that Charlotte was getting married that night.

Evidence for Melissa being Charlotte’s killer:

As we learned in 6x17, Charlotte had called Wren and told him about Melissa’s involvement in Bethany’s death, which caused Wren to end their engagement. Melissa was furious with Charlotte for doing this. Therefore, to get her revenge, Melissa killed Charlotte on her wedding night out of spite for Charlotte ruining Melissa’s relationship and chance at marriage.

^ One more point about that. This makes sense because it is basically the ultimate culmination of Melissa’s character. She has been defined throughout the entire series by her anger with Spencer for stealing or messing around with both Ian and Wren. Melissa is basically cursed with having her relationships ruined by female family members (Charlotte being her cousin). Charlotte ruining Melissa’s engagement to Wren finally caused Melissa to snap and take physical revenge - the final explosion after 5.5 seasons of being wronged.

In 6x16-17, we learn that Charlotte’s murder weapon was a hollow rod with a rectangular opening on the end, which perfectly describes Melissa’s broken luggage handle. A.D. gets their hands on it in 6x17 and that’s the last we heard of it. Also, Melissa lied about her arrival to Rosewood (she was actually in Rosewood secretly at the time Charlotte was killed). It hasn’t been explained why she lied.

Seasons ago, there was a flashback of Melissa and CeCe seemingly fighting the night that Alison was buried and Bethany was killed. This flashback has never been adequately explained. There was a brief suggestion that the flashback is unreliable because it was Jason’s memory and he was high that night, and Charlotte said in 6x10 that it couldn’t have been her with Melissa, so Jason simply must have seen Bethany with her instead. I just don’t believe either of these cheap cop-outs; the latter doesn’t even make sense as Melissa definitely did not talk to Bethany that night. Which means it was surely CeCe and Melissa fighting. We have no idea why (could the N.A.T. Club explain it?) but clearly Melissa and Charlotte have had a history of conflict that is STILL shrouded in mystery (and ready to be explained in the series finale!)

Melissa and CeCe were also on that boat together in Cape May, if CeCe is to be believed that Melissa took the photo. The fact that the show still hasn’t delved into these two characters’ connection makes me believe it will be a topic of the series finale, which means Melissa has to have SOME role in relation to Charlotte, and being her killer would certainly be a big payoff to that.

It’s been proven time and time again that Melissa has always tried her best to protect Spencer (such as burying Bethany because she thought it was Alison whom Spencer had killed). With Spencer’s former tormenter released from Welby, killing Charlotte could have been one more effort of Melissa’s to protect Spencer from being tortured again.

*NOTE: I realize that this may seem a little TOO obvious, what with Melissa actually being an in-show suspect of being the killer. When the Liars suspect someone out loud, that usually means the suspect is not the culprit. But these circumstances are different. Usually, the suspect is ruled out within a few episodes so the Liars can move on to a new one. The Melissa suspicion was expressed but then dropped from the show with no resolution, and it was long enough before the series finale to not be the freshest thing on general fans’ minds. Its resolution will come in the finale when Melissa is finally back and revealed as Charlotte’s killer.

Also: Remember when Marlene literally showed CeCe in a black hoodie in 4x11 spying on Ezria and then never elaborated on that until she was revealed to be ‘A’? She gave us the answer far before the reveal and never brought it up again so fans wouldn’t think about it much. Same thing Marlene is doing here again with Melissa.

Now for A.D. theories. Even though I think Wren is only an ally to A.D., I’m going to lay out evidence as if he actually IS A.D.

Evidence for Wren being A.D.:

A.D.’s main goal seems to be to expose whoever killed Charlotte. This means, logically, that A.D. cared for Charlotte and was possibly close with her. As far back as Season 3, we learned that Wren was helping CeCe get into Radley by faking her identification badges (which PLL conveniently reminded us of during the Spencer-Ezra-Wren scene in 7x15). Sounds like something a friend would do for another friend. Charlotte also called Wren over the 5-year time jump to tell him about Melissa’s involvement in Bethany’s death. Why would she call him and try to help him by enlightening him to his fiancée’s secret, unless Charlotte and Wren were friends? They clearly have a (platonic) relationship that has not been explained whatsoever on this show. Not much time left to explain it except for in the series finale when it’s revealed that Wren and Charlotte were super close and he’s avenging her death!

How many times has Executive Producer Joseph Dougherty told us “all roads lead to Radley”? Wren literally worked there, giving him access to any files and information he needed to become as knowledgeable about Spencer’s origin with Mary Drake as A.D. is. How did A.D. get their hands on Mary’s letter to Spencer (as seen in 7x11)? Wren could’ve gotten it when working in Radley. Also, there was that whole deal with Radley’s basement in 6B. In 6x20, we learned that the Records Room in the basement was turned into a secret room and all the records were taken except for one file of Mary’s. 6x16 ended with A.D. messing with electrical switches down there, so A.D. clearly knew about the room and probably took the files. The show tried to distract us with Sara Harvey seemingly being the only one who knew about the basement, but Sara’s dead, and Wren would know about it too since he worked there.

A.D. has consistently been associated with a doctor aesthetic. Rubber blue gloves have been a staple feature of A.D.’s outfits since early 6B and A.D. seemed to be in full doctor garb at the end of 6x11 in their scene with Jenna. Hanna was also forced to perform surgery on the life-sized doll of herself in 7x13. Archer is dead, so that leaves Wren as the last suspicious doctor character.

Wren’s last pre-S7 appearances had him looking extremely suspicious in 4x10. Drawing what seemed to be Red Coat. Eyeing Hanna and Caleb angrily from his car. Calling someone and saying “We have a problem. I’ll take care of my end, you take care of yours.” (It would make sense if it was Charlotte on the other end of that phone call). Eddie Lamb didn’t trust him and then vanished forever. Mona didn’t trust him, and when has Mona ever been wrong? There’s only one last chance to explain this never-resolved character development - with an A.D. reveal in the series finale.

Also in 4x10, Wren was trying really hard to stop Eddie Lamb from bringing a book to Spencer’s Radley room, at the same time that Spencer was doing her ‘A’ duty of kidnapping Malcolm. How could Wren have known that Spencer wasn’t in her room unless he knew she was working for ‘A’ (Charlotte at the time) and wanted to stop Eddie from messing that up?

On at least two occasions (as recently as 7x15), Wren has enjoyed the same drink that ‘A’ has been shown to enjoy. A clue for the observant fans. http://morethantheseashes.tumblr.com/post/161412457232/stalkyou4ever-damn-it

At this point, I feel like the show has had too many random connections to London/the UK for it to not have some significance. Archer being secretly British and a (fake) doctor could really be foreshadowing for a connection to Wren. They could be brothers or friends. Maybe Archer learned how to fake being a doctor from Wren. Maybe Charlotte and Archer met through their mutual relationships with Wren. I’m actually not the biggest fan of this theory that Archer and Wren are connected because I don’t think Archer was really working for A.D., but I have to throw it out there. It’s possible that he was, and it would be a logical reveal for Wren to then be A.D.

There’ve been a million bird references on this show. They’re everywhere. You can look up the posts and theories on that yourself. A wren is a type of bird, so there’s that. Maybe subtle hinting by the writers, maybe not.

If Melissa is Charlotte’s killer, as I really believe her to be, there’d be some poetry to Wren, Melissa’s ex-love interest, being A.D. against her.

This is obviously arguable, but I feel like Spencer and Hanna have gotten the brunt of A.D.’s actions (besides the horrible assault situation with Emison). Wren has the closest connections to Spencer and Hanna, having kissed both of them and ultimately being rejected by both.

* One problem I have is that Wren still doesn’t seem to have that great of a motivation for hating the Liars so much, other than believing them to be a part of Charlotte’s murder. Still not strong enough to warrant all THIS imo. But perhaps more will be revealed in the finale about his motivation that I can’t foresee.

** The truth of the matter is: Wren WILL be revealed as an antagonist of some sort in the series finale. I hope we can all agree on that much. Even if he’s not A.D., I guarantee with certainty that he is involved in the antagonist side of this mystery somehow. Most of the evidence I just listed above could apply just as well to him being A.D.’s right-hand man, which is more what I’m leaning toward. The only thing that still confounds me at that point is A.D.’s doctor theme. Why on earth would anyone else be wearing doctor’s clothes all the time?

Evidence for Spencer’s Twin being A.D.:

Obviously, the dream/hallucination scene in 7x01 that Hanna has of Spencer seemed off when it first aired and people have ran with it as evidence of Spencer having a twin. There’s the fact that the Spencer in the scene was not rocking the post-time jump bangs that Spencer has, but I’m less interested in that and more concerned about the fact that the dream-Spencer mentions A.D. to Hanna. Uber ‘A’ did not start using the name A.D. until Hanna was kidnapped, meaning, realistically, Hanna could not have dreamed Spencer saying “A.D.” because she hadn’t been exposed to that moniker yet. It could only really be explained if it wasn’t a dream at all, but Spencer’s twin (A.D.) talking to Hanna IRL. “Spencer” also asks Hanna who killed Charlotte in that scene. That’s exactly the information A.D. wanted and kidnapped Hanna for. 3 things in this one scene that hint at a twin.

In Spencer’s 7x13 ping-pong match with Marco, she switches to her left hand to make her winning shot. But we know Spencer is right-handed. A clue that Spencer’s twin is left-handed?

In 7x08, the ex-Radley doctor Dr. Cochran told Sparia that he delivered “two of [Mary’s] babies.” That specific wording suggests that Spencer and Charlotte were just two of some unknown greater number of babies that Mary Drake had. He also mentions that the baby he delivered years after Charlotte went into the care of protective services. We know Spencer went immediately into Veronica’s hands so that baby couldn’t have been Spencer….

In 7x15, we all felt something was off about Spencer’s scene with Wren and Ezra. She seemed slightly jumpy and nervous about being caught with Wren, asking Ezra not to tell anyone she was with Wren, not even her friends. The scene also felt weird because it took place immediately after a scene in which Spencer was elsewhere looking to meet up with Mary Drake, but was caught by Marco. There may have been a small time jump for her to get to the airport, but it sure didn’t feel like it. AND she wasn’t wearing the same clothes she had just been wearing in the previous scene (her trench coat was nowhere to be found). Combine all this with the theory I just went through of Wren maybe being A.D. or a helper, and that scene could have just been two A.D. partners-in-crime meeting up to talk shop.

When asked if we’ve met A.D., Tyler Blackburn said “You kind of have.” This quote haunts me. He wouldn’t have said this if A.D. is just a regular character we know. A.D. has to be some sort of twin, or secret family member, or SOMETHING. This also makes me doubt that Wren is REALLY A.D. - he may just be a subservient partner to A.D.

MY PROBLEMS WITH THIS THEORY:

As much as I love the idea of Spencer having a twin who’s A.D., I also recognize its faults.

The things pointed out about Hanna’s 7x01 dream scene could be explained by simple pragmatic reasoning. The lack of bangs could just be Marlene’s choice of having Hanna dream of Spencer how she used to look in high school, since most of Hanna’s memories of Spencer would have her looking like that. The mention of A.D. could really just be a mistake on the writers’ part. They probably really wanted to be consistent with using A.D. since it was new and they were writing 7x01 fresh off a hiatus where they could have forgotten that detail. Spencer asking Hanna who killed Charlotte could just be Hanna’s manifestation of wanting to know that answer herself since it got her kidnapped.

Same thing with the ping-pong match. Her switching hands could be completely arbitrary. It really runs the risk of just being fans’ wishful thinking reading into that.

When Dr. Cochran mentions “two of her babies,” he says it in a way that sounds like he really didn’t know much about Mary’s birthing history besides the two he delivered. It was flippant in a way that made it sound like he wasn’t actively suggesting she had more than two babies; he just said “two of” in case she had more than two, but he didn’t actually know either way.

Also, and this is a kicker in my opinion, if Mary had twins for her second birth, wouldn’t Cochran have delivered BOTH twin babies? He would have said he delivered 3 of Mary’s babies then. (We KNOW Charlotte was one of the babies he delivered). It doesn’t make sense that he’d deliver Spencer’s twin but not Spencer herself at the same time. They wouldn’t switch doctors like that. This is the biggest flaw in the theory for me.

But, despite these flaws, there sure is reason to believe that Spencer’s twin is A.D. and Wren is her right-hand-man. At this point, I’m not willing to say that the twin is also Bethany Young, as one popular theory suggests. There seems to be a lot of pure speculation and wishful thinking that went into that specific theory. I’m not saying it’s definitely false, but I’d need at least one clue that’s more solid to make me really believe that.

As for motivation, I don’t care to theorize on that much. Theories usually lose me when they get into motivation because they’re almost always based on pure speculation and very little evidence. The simple answer is that Charlotte and Spencer’s twin were siblings and Twincer cared a lot about Charlotte and wants to avenge her death. This is good enough for me for now. (I expect more in the finale though). This would probably mean Charlotte had a relationship with Twincer in order to build this bond, as the twin clearly does not feel much of a bond with Spencer.

Thank you for reading! Feel free to discuss with me! I’d love to before the show ends.

Thank you to the amazing Pretty Little Liars fandom, whom I’ve been a part of for over 5 years now. Can’t believe my last theory ever has been posted! I sincerely hope everyone enjoys the series finale to the fullest extent. Enjoy the gAme!

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