#⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › visuals ( show. )

[aughts]

b. blake.

#⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › visuals ( book. ) #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › visuals ( show. ) #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › study. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › aesthetic. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › desires. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › headcanons. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › writing ( book. ) #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › writing ( show. ) #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. octavia. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. clarke. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. murphy. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. wells. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. echo. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. kane. #⋄ * ✿ ⋄ * BELLAMY BLAKE. › dyn. raven.

[alyssaforevermore]

Hounded ↦ Bellamy Blake 1. Pilot

Synopsis: After being locked away for eight months, Athena Kane alongside 99 other criminals is sent to the ground to find out if it's survivable. The ground was the dream, but who knew it would turn out to be a nightmare?

Show: The 100

Pairings: Bellamy Blake x OC

Warnings: major series spoilers (full series will be covered), use of profanity, descriptions of violence, death, blood and gore, and mentions of drugs and alcohol.

Masterlist

The cement floor of my cell was cold against my legs, the sensation searing through the fabric of my jeans. I had sat here many times over the last few months, visualizing myself being blasted into space. It was a morbid thought, but one I could never seem to shake.

My cellmate Octavia let out a heavy sigh, pulling me from my thoughts. I examined her, lying across her cot on her stomach, her feet swaying back and forth in the air as she reread one of the few books she had for the hundredth time.

As I watched Octavia, an alarm began to sound within Skybox, causing Octavia to close her book and sit on the edge of her cot.

"What's going on out there?"

I stood from my place on the ground, making my way over to our cell door. Peeking through the bars, I noticed guards piling in the main doors, opening cells and dragging people out of them.

"The guards, they're removing people," I spoke, my voice shaking.

Octavia stood up. "Moving people? Moving them where?"

I shrugged. "I have no idea."

We both watched the guards remove more and more people before finally, two reached our cell. Octavia and I stepped back, allowing the guards to enter. The first guard to enter carried a case with him.

"Prisoners 395 and 530, stand facing the wall." One of the guards said.

Octavia and I complied, as the other guard asked us to extend our dominant hands. Octavia extended her right arm, while I extended my left. The guards reached into the case, pulling out large metal wristbands and placing them around our wrists.

"What's going on? Neither of us is eighteen yet."

Eighteen. That was when we'd be up for reevaluation, the council deciding whether or not we'd be floated.

"No questions." One of the guards responded, pulling me away from the wall. "Let's go, both of you."

Octavia and I exited our cell, the place we'd called home for nearly a year now, entering the chaos that was Skybox. There were long lines of teenagers, most younger than myself, on each side, on all levels. We followed the line all the way out of Skybox, into a long corridor.

"I want to speak with my father," I said, turning to face the guard behind me. "Marcus Kane, he's on the council."

The guard stared at me, his face expressionless. "Keep moving."

"No," I spoke, a glare appearing across my face. "Where is my father?"

The guard pulled out his shock baton, extending it. "I said, keep moving."

Not wanting to go through being shocked again, I took a deep breath, turning back around and continuing to follow the line. Eventually, the guards who had taken Octavia and I disappeared, more guards lining the path to wherever we were going.

The further I get down the line, I finally see it. One of the Ark's guards were scanning identification cards before ushering them onto... a dropship?

A dropship.

"Holy shit," I mumbled to myself. "They're sending us to the ground."

...

"Prisoners of The Ark, hear me now." I listened on as Chancellor Jaha appeared on several screens within the dropship.

Octavia and I had been separated, sent to different levels of the dropship. Looking around, I didn't recognize many faces, only a few from Earth Skills.

"You've been given a second chance, and as your , it is my hope that you see this as not just a chance for you, but a chance for all of us, indeed for mankind itself." He continued. "We have no idea what is waiting for you down there. If the odds of survival were better, we would've sent others. Frankly, we're sending you because your crimes have made you expendable."

The sound of booing filled the dropship.

"The drop site has been chosen carefully. Before the last war, was a military base built within a mountain. It was to be stocked with enough non-perishables to sustain three hundred people for up to two years. If you survive this mission, your crimes will be forgiven, your records wiped clean."

Chancellor Jaha continued on, though I began to tune it out. All I could think about was my father. Did he know about this? He had to have known, him being one of the Chancellor's closet allies on the Ark.

As the thought of my father's involvement drifted from my mind, the dropship jolted, sending my head forward, then back against the seat with brutal force. The dropship continued to shake, as screams filled the air.

"What's happening?" A girl called out.

I had the same question.

The shaking lasted several minutes before finally, the dropship crashed. Everyone remained silent, unsure if we'd actually landed. After a few moments, people began unbuckling themselves, rushing towards the dropship doors.

I was one of the last to unbuckle myself, wanting to avoid the rush. By the time I had arrived, nearly everyone within the dropship was surrounding the door. As I peeked through the crowd, I spotted Octavia standing by the door, next to a taller boy I'd never seen before.

"Where's your wristband?" I knew that voice.

Octavia spun around to face someone out of my view. "Do you mind? I haven't seen my brother in over a year."

While sharing a cell with Octavia, she'd told me many stories about her brother Bellamy. I almost wouldn't have believed she even had one, if she didn't bring him up so often. It was sweet though. I'd always wished I could've had a sibling.

That was against the law on the Ark.

"No one has a brother," someone spoke.

"That's Octavia Blake, the girl they found hidden under the floor!"

I watched as Octavia lunged forward, Bellamy grabbing her arm. "Octavia, no. Let's give them something else to remember you by."

By now, I'd pushed my way further through the crowd.

"Yeah?" Octavia asked, looking back at her brother. "Like what?"

Bellamy smirked. "Like being the first person on the ground in a hundred years."

With those words, Bellamy reached over and grabbed the dropship door's handle, pulling it down. There was a faint bang before the door slowly began lowering, creating a platform that led to the ground.

It was beautiful, more so than I ever could've imagined. The ground was covered in grass, just like I'd seen in books on the Ark. Trees surrounded us, nearly covering the clear blue sky above us entirely.

I watched as Octavia slowly made her way down the platform, looking back at her brother. He gave her a reassuring nod, and Octavia in turn took a deep breath before jumping off of the platform, her feet colliding with the ground.

We all watched her as she looked around, silent for a few moments. Finally, Octavia threw her hands in the air.

"We're back, bitches!"

Cheers erupted through the dropship, delinquents spilling out around Octavia and running through the forest surrounding us. I slowly made my way down the platform, bracing myself as if I expected to burst into flames the second I touched the ground.

Octavia looked back at me, smiling. "What are you waiting for?"

I jumped from the platform, my boots meeting the hard ground. "Oh my god... We're really here."

Octavia squealed, pulling me in for a hug. "No more tiny cells and uncomfortable beds for us."

"Well, I imagine uncomfortable beds aren't quite out of the picture yet." I laughed.

"You're probably right." Octavia shrugged with a giggle.

Octavia rushed off to catch up with Bellamy, while I stood in place, taking everything in. As I looked around, my eyes fell upon the girl whose voice I recognized earlier; Clarke Griffin, my childhood best friend.

Clarke stood by the edge of a cliff, staring down at the map in her hands. A tall boy with medium-length brown hair stood next to her. Based on the look upon her face, I figured I should head over there.

"Clarke?"

Clarke turned around, her eyes widening. "Athena?"

I couldn't help but smile. It had been a year since I'd spoken to Clarke, and she looked exactly the same today as she did then. I remembered hearing stories of Clarke being arrested, the reasons often varying, but I never actually thought those rumours were true.

"What's with the map?" I finally asked.

Clarke took a deep breath. "Do you two see that peak over there?"

Both I and the boy nodded.

"Mount Weather," Clarke said. "There's a radiation-soaked forest between us and our next meal. They dropped us on the wrong damn mountain."

"Please tell me you're joking?"

Clarke shook her head. "I wish I was."

"We've got problems-" Wells Jaha, the son the Chancellor, spoke as he reached our little group. He stopped as his eyes landed on me. "Athena?"

I blinked, confusion setting over me. "Wells? What the hell did you do to get sent down here?"

"Don't ask." Wells shook his head, before continuing. "We've got problems. The communication system is dead. I went to the roof. A dozen panels are missing. Heat fried the wires."

"Well, all that matters right now is getting to Mount Weather," Clarke responded, marching closer to the dropship. She spread her map out on one of the wings. "See? This is us." Clarke pointed to a spot on the map. "This is where we need to get to if we want to survive." She moved her finger across the map.

"Where'd you learn to do that?" Wells asked.

Clarke's face turned pale as she looked away.

Wells sighed. "Your father."

The two remained silent, as another boy with a pair of goggles strapped to his head approached. He leaned over Clarke's shoulder, surveying the map.

"Cool, a map." He spoke, looking Clarke up and down. "They got a bar in this town? I'll buy you a beer."

Wells lightly pushed the boy back. "Do you mind?"

"Woah." The boy spoke, holding his hands up.

"Hey, hands off of him." I turned to see a group of boys approaching. "He's with us." The rest of the delinquents were also gathered around us.

"Relax," Wells spoke, stepping back. "We're just trying to find out where we are."

"We're on the ground," Bellamy spoke. "Is that not good enough for you?"

"We need to find Mount Weather. You heard my father's message. That has to be our first priority."

"Screw your father," Octavia called out. "What, you think you're in charge here? You and your little princess?" She was staring at Clarke.

Clarke shook her head. "Do you think we care who's in charge? We need to get to Mount Weather not because the Chancellor said so, but because the longer we wait, the hungrier we'll get and the harder it'll be. How long do you think we'll last without those supplies? We're looking at a twenty-mile trek. So if we want to get there before dark, we need to leave now."

"I've got a better idea," Bellamy responded. "You two go, find it for us. Let the privileged do the hard work for a change."

Everyone around us cheered.

"You're not listening, we all need to go!" Wells urged. "Athena?"

Before I could respond, another boy spoke. "Athena Kane? You're Marcus Kane's daughter!"

"Your father floated my mother!"

"And my father!"

"Mine too!"

I looked at Wells, narrowing my eyes.

Wells shook it off. "We have to go, now."

"Look at this everybody," A boy stepped forward. "The Chancellor of Earth."

"You think that's funny?" Wells asked.

"No," The boy responded, kicking Wells in the leg and watching him fall to the ground. "But that sure was."

Cheers erupted through the forest, people begging them to fight.

"Come on, Wells." The boy egged him on.

Wells stood up, getting into a fighting stance. Before any swings could be thrown, the medium-length haired boy jumped from the top of the dropship, landing between them.

"The kids got one leg." He spoke to the boy. "Why don't you wait until it's a fair fight?"

"Hey, spacewalker!" Octavia called out. "Rescue me next."

People began to laugh, the crowd dispersing. Bellamy grabbed Octavia's arm, pulling her away.

"Uh," The boy spoke to Clarke. "So, Mount Weather? When do we leave?"

"Right now," Clarke replied, looking at Wells. "Finn and I will be back tomorrow with food."

"How are the two of you going to carry enough food for a hundred people?"

Finn looked around, grabbing goggles boy and another. "Four of us."

"Sounds like a party!" Octavia had rejoined the group. "Count me in."

"What are you doing?" Bellamy asked.

Octavia rolled her eyes. "Going for a walk."

Clarke suddenly reached for Finn's hand. "Were you trying to take this off?"

The wristband.

"Yeah, so?"

"Well, I don't know. Do you want the people you love to think you're dead? Do you want them to follow you down here in two months? Because they won't if they think we're dying."

Finn nodded. "Okay."

"Now, let's go."

"Wait," I spoke up. "I'm coming with you."

Clarke grabbed my hand, leading me away slightly. "I need you to stay here."

"Why?"

"Wells can hardly walk and I need someone to help him keep an eye on things here. I know it's been forever since we've talked, but I trust you a hell of a lot more than anyone else here." Clarke spoke, her eyes shifting to Wells for a moment.

I smiled. "I don't know if I should take that as a compliment."

She smiled back. "You got this?"

I nodded. "Be safe."

Clarke and I made our way back to the group. She grabbed a bag before looking at Wells, who sat on the ground leaning against the dropship. "You really shouldn't have come here, Wells."

With that, Clarke headed off into the forest alongside Finn, Octavia, and the two other boys I'd yet to meet.

I looked at Wells, frowning. "Let's get you into the dropship so you can rest your foot in peace."

...

A few hours later, I found myself returning to camp after going on a water run, my efforts having been futile. Just as I was about to reach the camp, I spotted Wells gathering sticks. He had also been searching for water the last I'd seen him.

"No luck?"

Wells looked up, startled. "No, you?"

I shook my head. "There's gotta be water somewhere."

"Just not anywhere near us," Wells sighed. "Want to give me a hand with these?"

I picked up a pile of sticks, following Wells towards the dropship. We began dropping them in an already started pile when footsteps came up behind us.

"Find any water yet?" It was the same boy who had tried to fight Wells earlier. I recently learned his name was John Murphy. He stood beside another boy, also named John.

"No, not yet-" Wells paused, his face going pale before he quickly pulled himself back together. "I'm going back out if you want to come."

I followed Wells' gaze, spotting something carved into the dropship: first son, first to dye.

"You know, my father begged for mercy in the airlock chamber before your father floated him," Murphy spoke, his eyes narrowed in on Wells.

Wells shook his head, pushing past the pair. "You spelt die wrong, geniuses."

I attempted to follow Wells, though both boys blocked my way. "Where do you think you're going? Don't think we haven't forgotten about what your father did."

Shaking my head, I took a step back. "That was my father's doing, not mine. The same goes for Wells. Feel free to take it up with them when they come down here though. I'll be the last to stop you."

Murphy looked me up and down for a moment before a smirk crept across his face. He didn't say anything, simply stepping out of my way. I took it as an opportunity to join Wells, who still stood just a few paces behind them.

"We're not safe here, Athena," Wells whispered.

"No, we're not," I agreed. "There's nothing you or I can do about it, not until Clarke and the others get back. We just have to lay low, watch each other's backs, like the good old days."

Wells smiled. "I'd give anything to go back there right now."

I let out a small, shaking breath. "You and me both."

...

Wells and I spent the rest of the afternoon searching for water, with no luck. As we came closer to the camp, I stopped. Noticing my absence from beside him, Wells also stopped, turning around to face me.

"Can I ask you something?" Wells nodded. "What happened with Clarke? I heard stories in lockup but never from anyone who had actually been there."

Wells was quiet for a moment, kicking his feet around in the dirt. "Her father discovered a flaw in the Ark. That they're running out of air. He wanted to go public with it."

"But he didn't?"

"Clarke found out and told me, and a few days later her father was arrested."

My heart sank into my stomach. "You told your father, didn't you?"

Wells shook his head. "It wasn't me, but Clarke thinks it was."

"So he was floated?" I was having a hard time processing all of this.

"Yeah," Wells responded. "Clarke saw it happen, and then she was arrested too."

I shook my head. "I had no idea..."

"That was kinda the point," Wells mumbled.

I frowned. "You haven't told Clarke it wasn't you, have you?"

"I can't tell her, Athena," Wells said, not able to look me in the eye.

"Why not?"

Wells once again fell silent. "It was her mother."

My eyes grew wide. "You're sure?"

"It wasn't me and I'm the only one Clarke told. Do you really think she'd expect her mother to turn her father in?" Wells asked. "I can't tell her. It would break her, especially now."

"So you let her hate you..."

Wells frowned. "Better than her hating her mother."

I smiled softly. "You're a really good friend, you know that?"

Before Wells could respond, the sound of screams filled the air. They were coming from the camp. Both of us looked at each other before hurrying our way back. By the time we arrived, there was a large crowd surrounding the campfire.

We both pushed our way through the crowd, spotting Murphy prying off a girl named Fox's wristband. She winced as the wristband popped off, and Murphy tossed it into the fire.

"Who's next?" Bellamy asked.

"What the hell are you doing?" Wells asked, his eyebrows furrowed.

Bellamy smirked. "We're liberating ourselves. What does it look like?"

"It looks like you're trying to kill us all." I hissed.

"The communication system is dead. These wristbands are all we got. Take them off, and the Ark will think we're dying, that it's not safe for them to follow." Wells added.

"That's the point, Chancellor," Bellamy replied. "We can take care of ourselves, can't we?"

Everyone around them cheered.

"Do you think this is a game? Those aren't just our friends and our parents up there. They're our farmers, our doctors, our engineers." Wells shouted, looking around the crowd. "I don't care what he tells you. We won't survive here on our own, and besides, if it really is safe, how could you not want the rest of our people to come down?"

"My people are already down here," Bellamy replied. "Those people locked my people up. Those people killed my mother for the crime of having a second child. Your father did that."

Wells shook his head. "My father didn't write the laws."

"No, he enforced them, but not anymore, not here. Here there are no laws. Here, we do whatever the hell we want, whenever the hell we want. Now, you two don't have to like it. You can even try to stop it or change it, kill me even. You know why?" Bellamy's smirk only grew wider. "Whatever the hell we want."

"Whatever the hell we want!" Murphy cheered.

Everyone began chanting around us, repeating those five words over and over again. I couldn't believe it. How could they all be so stupid? So selfish? They were going to get all of us killed.

Suddenly, I felt a speck of water hit my bare arm. Then another, and another. Then, water began falling from the sky rapidly.

"It's rain," A girl called out. "Real rain!"

The cheering began once again, as I lifted my head to stare at the sky, letting the rain wash over my face. It was as if all of my previous worries washed away for a few moments.

"We need to collect this," Wells spoke up, yanking me from my bliss.

Bellamy smiled. "Whatever the hell you want."

----

AN: I hope you all enjoyed the first chapter! I have chapters 1-10 written already, so I'm just catching up on posting them all. If you'd like to request to be tagged in future chapters, you can do so here. Please be sure to like and reblog <3

#bellamy blake; hounded #the 100 #the 100 fanfiction #the 100 fan fiction #bellamy blake #bellamy blake fanfiction #bellamy blake fan fiction

[stormkpr]

10 things I love about The 100 (and 10 things I hate about it)

10 things i love about The 100:

The characters

And way the show makes me  care about all the characters. I kind of love them. Once I was at a party and the song “Radioactive” came on, and I got teary. I explained why. My friends thought it was hilarious.

The settings. Although the worldbuilding was not perfect, it was good. Each episode could have launched a thousand fanfics

Although I believe many storylines were way too rushed, still this show had some great plots. I rewatched 5x2 The Red Queen recently and could only say “Damn this is good TV”

I already did a post on the ships I love. So I’ll just name them again. Bellarke. Memori. Mackson. Niytavia. SeaMechanic. Kabby. Marper.  

Some really really good non-romantic relationships too. Do I have to list them all? I can’t, but here are some. Monty and Jasper. Sinclair and Raven. Octavia and Indra. Kane and Indra. Octavia and Diyoza. Raven and Memori. Bellamy and Murphy. Bellamy and Miller. Roan and Clarke. Kane and the Blakes until the writers said screw it. 900 more.

The ending of S5. Which most of the fandom seems good with regarding as the real ending. I cry every time.

Raven and Octavia being badasses the whole way through. And shoutout to Indra for also being a badass, for 6 seasons

The music, the visuals, the direction. Top notch.

LGBT representation and strong female representation. Not enough POC representation though

Fanfics. There have been some amazing ones

10 things I hate about The 100:

Bellamy’s death

In fact, so many of the deaths were brutal. No, I didn’t expect sunshine and rainbows when I decided to watch a post-apocalyptic show. But damn. Lexa, Lincoln, Sinclair, Jasper, Roan, Luna, Kane, Abby. At least Marper’s deaths brought in a new era of hope for everyone else

Six seasons of lead up to Bellarke and it doesn’t happen

I want less rushing through a plot and more character interactions

The time skip after Praimfaiya didn’t do us any favors. Neither did the overall pacing - six months from 1x1 to Praimfaiya, then a timeskip, then it’s back to rushing. 

Not enough. Of anything. I want more backstory on all the characters

The way that some characters barely interacted at all (Octavia and Raven. Murphy and Octavia. And don’t get me started on the “secondary” characters. I want more than 1 scene showing Gaia and Miller’s friendship thank you!)

So many things that were teased or hinted at or “could have been” but never did and just got dropped. Examples? Too many. Niytavia for one thing. Reply to this post and list 100 others because if I start listing more I will scream

After S5, they never seemed to know what to do with Raven.

I love Mackson and I wanted more than the crumbs we got

#the 100 #the best of the 100 #you can probably guess that i still love this show despite all its fuckups #yes i know that at least one of these lists has more than 10 items on it #also the way they just drop Bryan - i love Mackson but you can't just make Bryan disappear wtf

[byneddiedingo]

Blind Alley (Charles Vidor, 1939). 

Cast: Chester Morris, Ralph Bellamy, Ann Dvorak, Joan Perry, Melville Cooper, Rose Stradner, John Eldredge, Ann Doran, Marc Lawrence, Stanley Brown, Scotty Beckett, Milburn Stone, Marie Blake. Screenplay: Philip MacDonald, Michael Blankfort, Albert Duffy, based on a play by James Warwick. Cinematography: Lucien Ballard. Art direction: Lionel Banks. Film editing: Otto Meyer. Music: George Parrish.

Blind Alley has a familiar setup: a killer on the run from the cops takes a family hostage in their own home. Chester Morris plays the killer, Hal Wilson, who moves in on the Shelby household, whose head is a college professor and psychiatrist played by Ralph Bellamy. Wilson, it turns out, is a psychopath, plagued by a recurrent dream, and Dr. Shelby sees the opportunity to disarm him by using the tools of psychotherapy. It works, sort of, in a rather too simplistic fashion, as the shrink decodes the symbolism of Wilson's dream as a traumatic event from his childhood that the killer has been repressing. The movie is a little stagy, as any adaptation of a play to screen is likely to be, but it's tidy enough in its storytelling that I didn't mind the obvious curtain lines and creaky attempts to "open out" the action -- for example, by visualizing the contents of Wilson's nightmare. It's nice to see Bellamy playing something other than a stooge for Cary Grant, as he did so memorably in The Awful Truth (Leo McCarey, 1937) and His Girl Friday (Howard Hawks, 1941). Morris is given to chewing the scenery but Ann Dvorak is good as his moll, Mary, who knows how to handle him well enough that Shelby can work his cure. The movie is sometimes cited as one of the first film noirs, which only shows how flexible any definition of that genre has to be.

viewed November 9, 2020

#Blind Alley

[skaikruzayden]

skaikruzayden ( noun ): zayden hunter, an original character from the cw show the 100. low activity independent blog. discord is available upon request. MINORS / PERSONALS DO NOT INTERACT. please note all follows & asks will come from @carp3diems! penned by ceejay.

highly affiliated: @powerstationed && @guiltye ( bellamy blake )

other blogs: @carp3diems @hcllchesters @dcwsonscreek @m0bhit

carrd memes visuals wanted plots

#( pinned post. )

[hedaswarrior]

The script was just posted and ‘certain people’ are saying that Bellamy’s face didn’t look hopeful and the scene didn’t read that way. Well, first, let’s look at what was written....

It doesn’t say that Bellamy had a ‘look of hope’ on his face.... it says he has a feeling of hope in his chest. Aka: his heart.

How do you act a “feeling” of hope? What does that look like?? Is it an act? A facial expression? What does a hopeful facial expression look like?? Do you even attempt a hopeful facial expression in a dimly lit shot??

Instead of just a facial expression to show the hope welling in his heart, it was shown through an action. The action of putting his hand over the hand of the woman he loves; the woman who has his heart. A woman he feared he would never see again. “We found each other in a cage. Whatever happens, I know we’ll find each other again”. They faced so many obstacles since they last saw each other, and they both feared the other was dead on multiple occasions. He touches her; she’s real. She’s really there. She saved him. The hope Bellamy feels in his heart — the hope for winning the war and having peace — is shown through seeing Echo again. He hoped he would see her again and he did. If the hope to see her again came true, maybe his hope to win the war and have peace will too.

#becho #bellamy blake #there. #its actually a pretty beautiful way of showing his hope #its an actor and director’s job to bring the script to life and ‘fill in the blanks’ visually #things that are written on paper. things like feelings and other expressions

[strawbaeries]

b. blake

#❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › visuals. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › musings. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › aesthetics. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › inbox. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › headcanons. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › desires. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › main v. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › writings. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › show v. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. octavia. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. clarke. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. wells. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. raven. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. lily. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. murphy. ❫ #❪ ⁎ * bellamy blake. › ft. echo. ❫

[rivertalesien]

Hold up Im seeing everyone celebrating Clexa endgame but you say that is not what happened? I will not watch but I want to understand. Who is Clarke hugging? Why is it not Lexa? Why would they do this?

To answer your last question first: because Jason Rothenberg is a petty son of a bitch. 

No, this was not anything even close to a Clexa endgame. It wasn’t “ambiguous” either.  

The story, it turns out, was very literal with the “higher beings are judging us and we have to pass their test or the human race is toast.”  

This ridiculous scenario has rules: if you are alive when Judgement Day happens, you get to “transcend” with these higher beings. If you are not alive, you don’t. You are just dead. No afterlife, nothing. You’re gone. Forever. By those rules, Bellamy Blake and Charmaine Diyoza are gone, forever. So is everyone else who ever died on this show.  

But the Commanders never died. They lived on in the Flame. We were given a lot of teasing over the years, until last season when the Flame appeared to be destroyed, but we know the code of at least one Commander survived: Sheidheda. His code managed to jump into Russell Prime’s mind drive and he took over. 

The fate of the other Commanders was never commented upon.

But we were given hope by Gabriel Santiago who believed that the Flame could be repaired. And we saw it in the process of repair in the previous episode. Hope restored.

And then...shot down again. Did any of the Commander’s code get moved anywhere else? The Eligius IV mainframe? Someone else’s mind drive (like Clarke’s)? We’ll never know. They never brought it up. So the assumption is...Lexa, along with all the other Commanders we never knew, were killed, for good, when Gabriel Santiago shot and destroyed the Flame.

He didn’t have to do that. It didn’t really accomplish anything. Cadogan still got the information from it. In fact, he got to torture Madi instead, torture her right into a stroke. Nice. 

But it does mean that Lexa could never transcend. And she was so close, too.  

She and the other Commanders never got a say in their fate. Cruel and unusual punishment, to say the least.

No say in their fate.

And it could have gone in the right direction, since, you know, they got Alycia Debnam-Carey to come back and play the avatar version.

They could have done it. Lexa transcends with everyone else, then chooses not to leave Clarke behind and gets sent back to Earth. Simple. 

And you’d still have the whole Black Mirror of it, too, but remember, Rothenberg thinks pain is “delicious.”

So, instead, Alycia appears as one of the Higher Beings, a judge who decides the fate of humankind. She appears as “Lexa” though Clarke knows it isn’t her, and their scenes are limited to this Lexa-copy judging Clarke’s actions, something Lexa herself never did. 

Passing hypocritical judgement on others is what these Higher Beings do and we’re just supposed to accept it. Nice.

So no, she wasn’t hugging Lexa, just some formless thing utilizing the same conditions as the Kree’s Supreme Intelligence, taking a form of someone most important to you (Raven sees Abby, strangely enough, not say, Monty, whom she spent six years in space with). 

Lexa is dead. She gets no afterlife.  

Clarke and her friends are trapped on Earth, unable to have children or to transcend again. When they die, they will just...die too. And the only reason Clarke wasn’t allowed to transcend? She committed murder during the test. Meanwhile, we see Sheidheda, who started the “war” transcending. Nice.

No one won anything, except the visual spectacle of seeing Alycia Debnam-Carey in costume again, getting a hug from Clarke (and, for some, the unnecessary confirmation that Lexa was the person she loved the most). For fans celebrating, a lot of it is just the sticking it to the blarkes that is so satisfying. And it is. But it’s still pretty empty. 

But anyone saying ADC’s appearance is fan service isn’t wrong. That’s all it is. 

It isn’t “honoring” Clexa, that isn’t what JR was doing (if he was, he wouldn’t have had Gabriel shoot and destroy the Flame), its telling the audience that begged and pleaded and waited so long that absolutely nothing matters to this guy. Not even the quality of the story. 

He answered nothing in it. He let go of story thread after story thread. Character after character. Nothing mattered. Not even Madi. 

We don’t even get to know what “transcendence” really is. Maybe everyone just turned into a glowy Groot and didn’t really go anywhere. He took this show out in the weakest way anyone could have. 

In the prequel, Rothenberg shit on his own invention, the Grounders, by removing all their agency of survival and identity. He diminished everything about this show. 

Nihilism is almost too polite a word for it. 

Nothing about it deserves “celebration” except for the fans who saw “higher things” and made their own magic out of it. May they continue. 

#questions #the 100 #lexa #clarke griffin #clexa #season 7 #spoilers #jason rothenberg #may the fan writers reign and rebuild #because this just left the worst taste behind

[barnesbabee]

If ATEEZ were The100 Characters...

A/N: Ok this was actually kinda hard to make ‘cause everyone goes crazy on this show but here it is...

Seonghwa -> Lexa kom Trikru look very very scary while doing their job actually adorable will die and kill for their loved ones without even questioning anything. good leaders (Seonghwa as the oldest taking care of others) visuals actually scary when messed with gay but don’t look gay Hongjoong -> Clarke Griffin leader spirit wild creative if they want it they fight for it hardworking as fuck born to be a leader Yunho -> Emori just wasnt world peace a literal fucking angel God I love them so much will do anything for the ones day love just want everybody to be safe and happy DO NOT RECEIVE ENOUGH ATTENTION. PAY THEM MORE ATTENTION hella smart snappy in the perfect moments Yeosang -> John Murphy sarcastic little shit loves their friends but no sappy things pls feelings get hurt but he will never show it fucking stubborn (throwback when Seonghwa told Yeosang not to flip the egg, but he proceeded to do so and the egg fell on the floor) Mingi -> Bellamy Blake just the biggest hearts they’re so kind and so sweet and so openly caring for people  also they’re both massive wtf  I love them but DO NOT LET PEOPLE GET IN YOUR HEAD BELLAMY YOU MASSIVE IDIOT HOW DID YOU JOIN A CULT- deserve all the happiness in the world look intimidating but they’re like teeny tiny puppies best hugs for sure San -> Octavia Blake kinda crazy ngl let their feelings guide them instead of their brain  hella fit jesus they are gorgeous  very strong emotionally fucking stubborn  can be a lot of work to handle.... very lovable tho, all they do was for the ones they love  full of love to give (Octavia is a romantic just look at the way she treated all her lovers God she’s amazing) let them be happy pls

Wooyoung -> Jasper 100000% let feelings control them  kind of idiotic (in a good way) but we love them  so so loud, w h y deserve better don’t let people get in your head you are amazing bby just, the purest souls, don’t deserve all this evil happy pill among the bad things  Jongho -> Raven Reyes  they might look tiny but they have a fierce personality if they’re currently not the best in the room, the will be. hella competitive like to show off lots of love to give but don’t know how -14/10 in showing emotions skill try their hardest all the time  just wants to be appreciated kinda awkward sometimes 

P.S: I wanted to squish Indra in here but no one is as badass and untouchable as Indra I’m sorry 

#ateez #the 100 #the100 #ateez scenario #ateez scenarios #seonghwa #hongjoong #yunho #yeosang #mingi #san #wooyoung #jongho

[shemakesmusic-uk]

HARD FEELINGS, the new collaborative project of Hot Chip's Joe Goddard and Amy Douglas, have signed to Domino and unveiled their debut outing 'Holding On Too Long' which is teamed with a Katie Paul-directed video. Douglas says of their debut single, "'Holding On Too Long' is the common denominator of the entire musical union of Amy and Joe. In this "opera of sad bangers" here is its key aria, its "Un Bel Di" from Madame Butterfly or the "Mad Scene" from Lucia Di Lammermour, the unforgettable moment of the story wherein our heroine stands up defiantly and has her moment to wail, scream and cry her pain and fury centre stage to the world." HARD FEELINGS was formed after Goddard reached out to Douglas on Twitter after hearing her work, and simply asking: "Amy, can we make a thing?" [via Line Of Best Fit]

After recently announcing her debut album Flaw Flower is due June 25 via Illegal Data, London-based musician Harriet Zoe Pittard, aka Zoee, is sharing another slice of her multi-faceted art-pop sounds with her new single'Host'. Speaking about the track, Zoee said "‘Host’ describes the disconcertingly replicant-like nature of a once starry-eyed lover who becomes increasingly detached. The video is inspired by The Twilight Zone and was shot on location in a forest close to where I grew up in Berkshire."

Nashville-based songwriter Madi Diaz releases 'Nervous,' a new single about recognizing unhealthy coping mechanisms. The song’s frank lyrics are bellied by infectious guitar and Diaz’s buoyant voice: “I know why I lie to myself // I’m not really looking to get healthy // I have so many perspectives I’m losing perspective I make me nervous.” The accompanying video was shot in Nashville and directed by Jordan Bellamy. It was inspired by and includes an homage to the final scene of Andrei Tarkovsky's film The Stalker, a film that has always resonated with Diaz through its otherworldly nature, as well as its thoughtful and often anxiety inducing pace. “You know when you hold a mirror up to a mirror and you get an infinite amount of reflections from every angle? That’s what ‘Nervous’ is about,” says Diaz. “It’s when you’re in a loop of looking at yourself from every vantage point until you’re caught up in your own tangled web of bullshit. It’s about catching yourself acting out your crazy and you’re finally self-aware enough to see it, but you’re still out of your body enough and curious enough to watch yourself do it.”

Buzzy duo XVOTO have announced that their eagerly-awaited debut EP will be arriving on June 4 on One Two Many. Sharing new single ‘Friends’ alongside the news, Jazz Alonso explains that the track is rooted in “the people who have irreversibly changed you and then having to pretend you’re unphased by them when you’re in the same room. Meanwhile you’re trying to work out what your new boundaries are: can you talk about the past? Can you cry together? Can you show how much pain you’re in around them? ‘If you fish me, I’ll play dead’ means: if you make a move, I’ll pretend I’m dead inside and don’t want you back.” Accompanied by a new vid, Jazz adds, “For this video I always imagined an aquarium because of the fish lyrics and because I think looking at fish in a tank is a really nice symbol of looking back at a relationship: you’ll always have your take on it and feel you have control over that narrative cause it’s a memory, but the reality is that truth is fluid and moves. You’re not looking at an image, you’re looking at something that’s alive. Then the scenes of us getting tattooed on our backs are symbols for something beautiful that scars you - you might move on from something but it’ll still inform the way you move forward. In the video there’s some cheating, some reminiscing, some beauty and some pain.” [via DIY]

Ashe has released new cut 'Me Without You' as the latest singe off her debut album Ashlyn. It comes teamed with a Jason Lester-directed video. Ashe says of the new single, "'Me Without You' is my follow up to 'Moral Of The Story'. It's saying you thought that I needed you to be who I am. There is my past relationship...I had multiple people... You know, assumed that I needed them in my life to feel confident or to be me and "Me Without You" is just this record that's like, ‘Ooh, I am so good on my own'." [via Line Of Best Fit]

Mia Nicolai is a true internationalist. Born in Amsterdam to a Russian mother, she learned from a young age to move between languages and cultures, accepting them as equal. This all fuels her future-pop vision, a trans-genre approach laden with colour, one that picks from multiple sources. New single 'People Pleaser' is a surging, coherent, ultra-potent offering, a song that dwells on identity, and the processes by which it is defined. "This song is about the journey towards finding yourself," she explains. "It can be very difficult to be true to your inner values when all you do is please the people around you instead of your inner needs. I’ve always come across as a strong-minded person. But in reality, I’m capable of helping everyone BUT myself. At some point I felt so uncomfortable in my own skin that I couldn’t even breathe properly..." We're able to share the dazzling new video, directed by Isabelle Griffioen and produced by That’s What She Set. A surreal but completely engaging experience, it embodies everything Mia Nicolai sets out to do - put people on the back foot, and alert them to her presence. [via Clash]

Singer-songwriter Gracie Abrams has shared her poignant new single 'Mess It Up' and its accompanying video via Interscope Records. Directed by Matty Peacock, the video for 'Mess It Up' finds Abrams attempting to bake a cake and repeatedly dropping the gorgeously frosted final product on the ground. That bittersweet back-and-forth between determination and disappointment is a perfect match for Abrams’s incisive lyrics, which simultaneously convey a deep longing for forgiveness and an unshakable sense of frustration. Produced by and co-written with her frequent collaborator Blake Slatkin, the track’s stark guitar work and driving rhythms slowly take on a powerful momentum, ultimately building to a sweetly triumphant climax. [via Vacancy]

Vocalist and guitarist Maya Delilah shares the visuals for her new single 'Need A Word With Cupid'. The track unravels into a punchy number that gives you a hit of both dopamine and female empowerment. Written about realising your worth after a relationship breakup, Maya’s lyrics are little witty statements that we can all use to remind ourselves who the hell we are. “Last Tuesday morning I just realised you’re shit” – it’s the truth. The video sees her waiting in cupid’s reception ready to get her money back because, damn, this boy was not worth her energy. At. All. 'Need A Word With Cupid' is a brilliant narrative that’s not only relatable but also incredibly good. Brimming with smooth guitar tones and a catchy beat, this is a single that leaves you wanting so much more. A self-love anthem for the modern woman, 'Need A Word With Cupid' is an indie-pop bop. Maya says: “'Need A Word With Cupid' was written after my breakup when I felt a sudden hit of empowerment after the realisation that my ex was not worth another tear over. It’s an energetic and uplifting song with soul influences and of course a guitar solo to end.“ [via LOCK]

With her debut EP Digital Meadow arriving on May 28, Dora Jar is sharing the video for her single ‘Multiply’. “I am my truest form when I am changing shape, morphing sounds, and shifting my point of view,” she says of the forthcoming EP. “This project is an exploration of my impulse to shape-shift. That’s my ambition.” [via DIY]

Telenova's new-arriving single 'Tranquilize' makes it two-from-two for the band, deeper solidifying their rich blend of sounds while showing how it can move into further areas, taking on new energies - or emphasising other energies - as more songs come to light. 'Tranquillize', for example, has a heavier weighting on that live instrumentation, giving the song this more alt-pop-meets-R&B spin when combined with Angeline's brilliant-as-ever vocals. As she explains, the single was the first for Telenova, written on the day they began working with one another. "I was actually flicking through a thesaurus and the word ‘Tranquilize’ jumped out at me, it just rang so nicely on the tongue and was so inherently visceral," she says. "I was humming gibberish over the hypnotic Rhodes chords that Josh had laid down, and we heard what sounded like ‘Poseidon’s on the water’ - it was the first time in a writing session with Ed and Josh, and the first time I’d been in a writing session where a poetic, literary lyric idea like that wasn’t shunned and coined as ‘unrelatable’.  It resonated. We followed the thread, playing into Siren mythology as a metaphor for falling in love - the power of attraction to transfix and tranquillize you." The single also arrives with an official video clip, directed by Angeline - solidifying her multi-talented craft. "I wanted to capture the world of the song in a Lynchian-inspired dreamscape - starry-eyed and a little unhinged - but like, David Lynch meets Gucci," she says. [via Pilerats]

International superstar P!nk has more than two decades of experience topping the global pop charts, and she is here to continue her reign with the new single 'All I Know So Far'. 'All I Know So Far' was produced by pop mastermind Greg Kurstin and co-written with the songwriting duo Benj Pasek & Justin Paul. The single comes off of her upcoming album All I Know So Far: Setlist, due out on RCA Records on May 21. The accompanying video for 'All I Know So Far' tells Pink’s life story with help from Cher, Judith Light, and Carey Hart. The visuals, directed by longtime collaborator Dave Meyers, also features an appearance from her daughter Willow. The new album will feature live recordings from her 2019 'Beautiful Trauma World Tour' along with a recording of her highly-buzzed MTV Video Vanguard Award acceptance speech. P!nk’s daughter Willow will also make an appearance on the album with the song 'Cover Me in Sunshine', which the singer previously shared back in February. [via Consequence]

#videos of the week #hard feelings #zoee #madi diaz #xvoto #ashe #mia nicolai #gracie abrams #maya delilah #dora jar #telenova #p!nk

[travllingbunny]

The 100: 7x04 Hesperides

The first quarter of season 7 is kind of like the first quarter of season 2 on steroids - everyone separated in several groups in different locations, looking for each other and having no idea where the others really are, while the show is doing world-building and introducing information about the main threat, setting up the main story that will really kick into gear later.

The main difference is, of course, that in season 2 we saw all of the characters, pretty much in every episode. But now, Bellamy has been missing since his disappearance early in 7x01 (which, of course, is mostly due to external reasons), and we have been in the dark about Octavia’s fate since she was pulled back to Bardo in 6x13, and have only seen her in flashbacks. Clarke, Octavia and Raven have had episodes centered on them (the first, second and third one, respectively), but there has been no or very little of Octavia in the other three episodes, and even Clarke has taken somewhat of a back seat in the last 3 episodes. 

In the meantime, the B-list characters from the main cast - Echo, Gabriel and Hope - have taken center stage and gotten their own great stories. Hope, in particular, has been the character with the most focus in these early episodes - which isn’t that surprising as the show has to quickly give her all the fleshing out, backstory and development that other characters have had seasons to build. And we’ve gotten new characters - guest stars developed over just one episode or one scene - who have been given enough characterization and sympathetic qualities to make their deaths feel tragic and emotional (Hatch, Dev, Orlando).

No, I don’t think that this is a sign of the show focusing more on supporting characters and sidelining its protagonists in the final season, as some fans have been complaining and freaking out about. I’m sure that the mains will soon take center stage again, which is why their storylines this season are just starting or have been set up - while other characters have been given this early stage of season 7 to shine and get a lot of the story now. Another way those smaller stories feel relevant is that they are full of parallels and callbacks to the bigger stories from previous seasons.

I’m still not sure what relevance the title exactly has for this episode, and I’m not convinced that it is just supposed to be about 7x04. Yes, Hesperides were three maidens in a garden - like Octavia, Diyoza and Hope, and it was the topic of a cute exchange between Octavia and Hope (another Blake sibling teaching kids about the Greco-Roman mythology), but what are the “golden apples” that Hesperides were guarding and that Heracles/Hercules had to steal as one of his tasks? The only really valuable object on Skyring is the Anomaly Stone. But if that it what it’s about, that’s not something that has happened yet. Or do golden apples stand for something less tangible, like family, love, trust? Were Gabriel, Echo and Hope a new Hesperides trio (even though calling Gabriel a maiden in any sense of the word is a bit of a stretch), with Orlando as the dragon guarding the garden, or they thieves? I have no idea. I’m going to wait for the rest of the season to maybe give an answer. Maybe we’ll come back to the story of Hercules stealing the apples. That story also includes Atlas (who literally carries the weight of the world), and I wouldn’t be surprised if he is referenced, too.

Worldbuilding

The biggest takeaway from this episode for me were the really strong hints supporting the theory - which I’ve firmly believed in - that the Disciples are an off-shoot of Second Dawn and that their leader, the mysterious Shepherd, is Bill Cadogan. We learn that Disciples have different levels and that the highest one (?) appears to be “Level 12″ - which is reminiscent of the Second Dawn’s “12th seal”. Orlando prays to the “Shepherd, who delivered us from the fire that consumed the Earth”.

One of the most interesting parts of this episode was learning about the planets connected to the Anomaly (which we have a bit more info on than the characters do, thanks to the opening titles!) - which I’ve covered here. (Yes, the planet which was offline is Earth.) 

There are thousands of Disciples, highly trained soldiers, guarding the “fortress”, as Orlando called it. They are highly trained and dangerous - better fighters than pretty much anyone we’ve met. However, they have apparently never been in a battle - at least not the current generations.  They are preparing for something they call “the last war that mankind will ever wage”/”the war to end all wars” (?). Now, who could this war possibly be with, and why do they think they need Clarke as a weapon to win it? It sure can’t be anyone on Sanctum - Wonkru has dwindled to about 400 people, and everyone from Sanctum (from Prime guards to CoG) are pretty incompetent and terrible at fighting. Unless the war is just metaphorical, there must be some other people on one of the planets... Maybe the Eligius people and the Second Dawn are two different factions after all?

The Disciples are incredibly technologically advanced (which may not be so surprising, considering the fact that - if Bardo time is faster than Sanctum, and I think it must be, their society has existed for much, much longer than 230 years - and they have an amazing SciFi technique called memory capture. Which explains how they knew about Bellamy, Echo and Gabriel in 7x01.

The layout of Bardo - drawn by Orlando - provides a lot of info about the life there: there are living quarters, a galley/mess hall (it’s interesting that they use the word “galley” - which is normally used for the kitchen on a ship, train or aircraft), cell blocks, training quarters, arboretum, and so on; we see the first mention of “conductors” - presumably people who manage the travel via the Anomaly Stone - and the most interesting part: there are cryo labs, and “Shepherd” is mentioned in relation to them. Like everyone else, I immediately thought about it being a way for Cadogan to be still alive. 

Because of that, I’m starting to revise my earlier theory about Cadogan being on Etherea (which I speculate to be the planet closest to the black hole, with the ‘slowest’ time) - but now I think that maybe some other people are there, who may be seen as enemies of the Disciples? 

The Skyring trio and Orlando

The first 3 episodes have had the “Previously on” spoken by different cast members (Eliza, Marie and Luisa), which I feel is going to happen throughout the season. But this is the first episode of season 7 with no “Previously on”.

Instead, the episode opened on Hope’s 7 minute backstory scene. If this was an earlier season and some of the main characters we’ve known from the start were involved, it would take at least an entire episode. But this scene was a really well done montage, with little dialogue and done through visuals and a well chosen song (”Hymn” by Joel Porter), representing 10 years that Hope spent on Sanctum, her budding relationship with a Disciple/prisoner Dev - the first male and only the third person she’s ever met in her life, who became something of a father figure for her, and the one who trained her to fight and taught her about Bardo. We have met Dev before - as a corpse, and it was easy to guess from the state he was in that he was killed by Disciples while letting Hope escape. We don’t know anything about his life before he was sent to Skyring for a 10 years sentence - such as, what he was punished for. Maybe Dev (who was Level 7) was never such a true believer as Orlando. And in that case, it would have been easier for him to decide to devote his life to helping this child find her family. Of course, family bonds forged that way - as the only two people, an adult taking care of a child who’s been left alone - must be incredibly strong. 

One of the reasons why this scene worked so well and created so much sympathy for a character we see for only a few minutes, is that it told a story similar to stories we have seen before with the main characters. It was a lot like Madi and Clarke, especially the part where the child was initially hostile and the adult had to break the ice (Clarke did it with a drawing of Madi, Dev ate the paint berries that aren’t good to eat - probably intentionally, since I think he must have heard Hope yelling he shouldn’t eat them - so Hope would take care of him). And Clarke’s relationship with Madi was, in itself, something that paralleled Bellamy’s pseudo-paternal relationship with his younger sister. Octavia’s relationship with Hope was also something that made her understand her brother better. And Dev was reminiscent of Bellamy, especially with the knife throwing scene, which is reminiscent of Bellamy and Charlotte. Except for the fact that Hope was not murderous - unlike Charlotte, who was already incredibly damaged. In fact, Hope not being able to kill, freezing and not joining the battle (unlike Madi, who was able to kill to save Clarke - but Madi had been taught to fight and defend herself against Flamekeepers as enemies) that she had been preparing for, was the reason why Dev got killed. 

We still need to see one final part of Hope’s backstory - what happened when she got to Bardo, how she found a “friend on the inside”, how she made a deal with Anders, why the Disciples have orders to kill her on sight. Until then, we don’t know if killing a Disciple to save Echo was the first time Hope has killed someone. But I think it probably was, because it was an important moment for her - a replay of her old trauma, with her not hesitating this time and being able to protect a friend she’s spent years with. Hope has been trying to be tough, but we already saw in 7x02 that there was a lot of vulnerability, insecurity and lack of experience behind that. Echo called her out on not being able to be a killer in 7x02. Based on her experience, Hope would probably agree with Echo’s mantra that “Hesitation is death” (which it was, for the original Echo and not for AshEcho). Her mother probably wouldn’t be too happy for her, since she wanted - pretty unrealistically, unless Hope was to live away from the human race - to keep her away from the kind of life she used to have. Diyoza even kept her past a secret from Hope - before Gabriel put a foot in his mouth in more ways than one and mentioned Diyoza’s past as a Navy SEAL and terrorist (or “freedom fighter”. PoTAto- poTAYto).

As it turns out, the main plot of the episode was a replay and ironic contrast to the opening scene. It was a bit weird that Hope suggested getting close to Orlando, saying “Trust me, I’ve done this before” - as if she had deliberately manipulated Dev to become close to her, which I really don’t think was the case. (I’d also say that it’s weird that Echo - a spy - was not the one thinking along these lines, but had to be convinced by Hope and Gabriel. But the show has always portrayed Echo as a fighter/assassin rather than an actual spy, who gets close to people and gathers intel.) Hope. Echo, Gabriel and Orlando spent 5 years together, and must have gotten at least somewhat close to each other and to him. He trained them, like Dev trained Hope. But they started to get close to him on purpose, as a part of their plan, pretending to be a happy family and hoping he would want to join in. Which proved right. Orlando also felt protective of Hope, like Dev, which they also used as bait. However, he realized he was being played - proving smarter and less gullible than they had assumed - but agreed to everything anyway, somewhat out of loneliness and desire for human contact and relationships (maybe the same kind he had on Bardo with the people he trained). Maybe he was hoping that he could influence them enough, just like they were hoping - or at least Gabriel was - to be able to change his mind and make him less devoted to his faith. Gabriel’s points about false gods and blind faith seemed to strike a chord, but he still stuck to his faith - maybe because this was all he had ever known.

But after 5 years together, at least some of the bonds must have been real. However, everyone kept their own agenda, and the prior bonds remained the strongest - including Orlando’s attachments to the Disciples he had trained. Echo’s main allegiance remains Bellamy, Hope hopes to save her mother and Aunty O, and Echo thinks that they are still not “his (Orlando’s) people”*.   It’s interesting that we saw these people spend time together on screen and get closer, with funny and warm moments, the kind we don’t often get in this show, but they do not seem to be a real family at the end - in contrast to Spacekru: with them, we were told multiple times hat they had become a close family unit, although we never saw that process on screen. So it would seem that bonding worked better during the 6 years of peace and boredom in space, than during the 5 years of peace and boredom on Skyring. (Or did it? I would argue that Spacekru being “close family” was never quite convincing and was only used as a plot device to create conflict between Bellamy and Clarke or Bellamy and Octavia, but that it’s the relationships that pre-dated the Ring that proved to be the strongest.)

* Out of the 4 people on Skyring, Gabriel is the only one doesn’t really seem to have any strong emotional attachments at the moment, after Josephine’s death, and is there apparently mostly for his scientific curiosity about the Anomaly. We only see Gabriel react emotionally when loses his temper, to the point of becoming physically violent to Orlando. (Which is in character - remember that he killed Eduardo in anger?)

Let’s talk a bit more about Echo.

One of the things that struck me about Echo’s interactions with Hope and Gabriel this season is that she has more chemistry with them than we have seen her have with anyone before, especially a lot more than she’s ever had with Bellamy, and that she’s also showing a lot more personality: we see her joking, showing some sass (I would think it’s the new writer - Niylah has also suddenly became sassy and made snarky remarks in this episode - but she’s also had those moments in 7x02), she is perceptive of Hope’s emotional states. Now to be fair, though she never really glued so well on screen with the Spacekru, we did see her joke around with Monty and banter with Murphy or Raven. But, since they have become an item, always becomes incredibly bland around Bellamy - as it his presence turns her into her role as a follower/soldier/servant. It’s not something that Bellamy does on purpose, it’s just the fact that Echo has picked him as her King and gravitates towards him that way. 

In 7x01, her own subconscious was telling her (just as it did in 6x02 during the red sun eclipse) that she needs Bellamy because she wouldn’t have anyone to follow without him, and questioned if her devotion to him is really about love, or about her need to have a purpose (reminding her that she was so loyal to Queen Nia that she betrayed “the man she now claims to love”). In that context, her single-minded focus on saving Bellamy (”I wouldn’t know what to do without him”) sounds less romantic and more unhealthy, something she needs to learn to grow out of. This is the second season in which she has a lot of interaction with a character whose main trait is blind faith and devotion to a master - in season 6 it was Jade, now it’s Orlando. Echo’s words to Orlando - “It must be hard to dedicate your whole life to something that may never come" sounds ominously like something that may apply to herself.

A comparison between Echo and Finn in season 2 has crossed my mind, but to make things clear - I don’t think their actions are similar. Finn became deranged and killed a lot of unarmed people for no reason; Echo is just being herself, once again, repeating old patterns. But the similarity is in the fact that they are obsessed - in a way that may not be too healthy - with saving a love interest, who may end up being not too happy about it. I don’t know if Echo’s actions at the end of this episode will be brought up between her and Bellamy and if he will learn about them - but the facts are that a) he has consistently shown he cares, loves, needs Clarke more and values her take on morality (or her at her best - because Clarke has not always stuck to it in the past, but has started off that way and has been trying to live by it since the end of season 5) as something he tries to live by, and b) he has been committed to “doing better” and not repeating old mistakes since season 4, while Echo is usually suggesting solutions based on killing and violence, which Bellamy almost always rejects, and Echo falls in line, because Bellamy is the leader.

But left to her own devices, even after spending 11 years in peace, whenever trouble arises, Echo tends to fall back to her upbringing by Azgeda and Queen Nia: “Hesitation is death”. While her circumstances have changed so much since season 4, she has remained fundamentally the same in many ways. It’s not that she doesn’t feel compassion (when she has to hurt someone she has some connection to - she looked sad when she was leaving Orlando. Just as she looked sad when she thought Octavia was dead and had to bring the news to Bellamy in S4), but that doesn’t change her fundamental belief in what should be done. Did she need to kill the four unconscious Disciples? That’s debatable. (It depends on whether you think they could have used the Anomaly Stone to jump back to Bardo - even if they had taken or destroyed all their suits - in time to catch Echo, Hope and Gabriel. But this possibility wasn’t even mentioned by Echo and the others.) What’s certain is that she thought she had to: she knew she had to leave Orlando, because he was too upset by the death of someone he had trained (even though, to be fair, Echo had told him something like that might happen); he could have told the Disciples about them; when there is a threat that can stop you, you must eliminate it. She only left Orlando alive because of their bond, but what she did was even worse as it made him commit suicide. 

Again, I don’t know if Orlando could have used the Anomaly Stone to jump to Bardo, or if he really would have had to spend years alone, again, as Gabriel assumed. But I think the main reason for his suicide was the fact that, because he had let himself trust these people - maybe out of loneliness - he had indirectly caused deaths of Disciples he had trained and cared about. In any case, the show managed to make this character sympathetic in such a short amount of screentime, and make his fate really tragic, in a dark twist after an episode that often felt lighthearted. (I felt really sorry for the guy - kudos to the actor, Darren Moore.) Echo, Gabriel and Hope did not anticipate this, so they will probably feel terrible when they find out. And Hope and Gabriel are responsible, too, because, in spite of their objections, they went along with it.

If Hope killing to save Echo was a replay of her trauma with a different outcome, Echo has replayed her own trauma with the same outcome: she had to kill her friend to save herself. And all she has learned from it is that she has to do the same, every time. Only, we can’t blame her for what she was forced to do to save her own life as an abused child. This time, however, she did not kill in self-defense or battle, but afterwards, when the Disciples were already unconscious. Her betrayal of Orlando also recalled her betrayal of Bellamy in season 3. She had not spent more than a tiny amount of time around Bellamy then, but he considered her a friend he could trust, and she used his trust and got people he cared about and people he felt responsible for killed, causing him to feel enormous guilt. 

Now, I’ve seen the argument that Echo doesn’t need redemption, because her story is about finding independence instead of being a follower. But it can be about both. Her story may not have so far been about “doing better” - although she has heard Monty’s message together with everyone else, and repeated the words “I guess it’s time to do better” during the battle in 6x13 (only after Bellamy has made his decision what to do). But that makes her stick like a sore thumb in a show where the last two seasons have been based on that idea - doing better, not repeating old mistakes. It means that she needs not just to find her independence, but to rethink her methods and world view. I don’t subscribe to the idea that being a follower absolves one of every responsibility for carrying out their master’s orders. The Nuremberg defense, “I was following orders”,is not considered a good defense in court. It’s even less so in terms of morality and personal responsibility. Now, it’s true that a lot of fans hate Echo and tend to judge her more harshly than the other characters - but at least a part of the reason for that is the fact that the show has done very little to have her face the consequences of her actions, as opposed to most of the other characters. Characters who held a similar view of “kill or be killed” have been reviled and killed off (Charles Pike says Hi). In the show, Bellamy has been called out on, physically punished, felt enormously guilty and had a long redemption arc for participating in the killing of an armed, experienced and dangerous army (who may not have been a threat, but it’s understandable why he and Pike considered them a threat), which was considered incredibly evil just because said warriors were killed while sleeping (which makes no sense, but OK) - even though he also was not in charge, Pike was. And Bellamy never used the “following orders” defense and instead felt responsible and did his best to change and do better. In season 5, he was the one who opposed to idea of killing Eligius prisoners who were in cryo sleep (while Echo, like Murphy, supported the idea). Echo has now killed Disciples while they were unconscious. Back in season 3, Echo facilitated and supported a mass murder of civilians done not because of any threat or misguided wish to protect her people, but as a part of a scheme to give her clan more political power. 

Now, it may be argued that Echo didn’t have a choice to disobey - but we later saw, throughout season 4, when Nia was dead and Echo did not have to answer to her, that Echo was still constantly opting for violence and killing as the first option, often as a preemptive strike: killing a leader from another clan for just opposing her plan in public, egging on Roan to kill Clarke and the rest of the Sky people, when they haven't done anything to her or Azgeda and they weren't threatening her or them, telling Roan they betrayed him, kidnapping Bellamy and killing another Arker who was captured with Bellamy - for no reason. She didn’t even need to kill Ryker in season 6, either, regardless of whether we think he deserved it or not. And we have never seen Echo renounce Queen Nia’s legacy (which, lest we forget, is the legacy of someone who practiced genocide - including killing children - and slavery.) In season 4, she was always telling Roan he should be more ruthless, more like his mother, and she was still repeating things learned from her in season 6.

There was a character on Agents of SHIELD that Echo reminds me of (I won’t say his name for spoilers, for AoS fans should easily guess who I mean). This character also had a very tragic backstory - traumatic childhood, abuse, an evil mentor who was emotionally abusive to them but conditioned them to be blindly loyal and commit all sorts of crimes out of that loyalty, career as a spy/assassin who gets close to people and betrays and kills, pathological need for a leader to give them orders, or for some sort of a purpose, a tendency to resolve problems with violence. This character had a passionate fanbase who argued that, as a victim of abuse, he deserved a second chance, but the writers and most of the fandom was adamant that it was not enough to absolve him of responsibility for his crimes as an adult. The 100 is a show that is much more likely to give characters second chances and redeem them. But it’s also a show that normally makes characters work for it. To make Echo the one exception to the rule and give her a get-out-of-jail free card, declaring she doesn’t need to be held personally responsible for her actions, and that she doesn’t need to work to change and do better, would be both inconsistent with the overall themes of the show. and a huge disservice to Echo as a character.

Clarke & co. at Sanctum

It’s kind of funny that, before this season of t100 started, people thought/were worried Bellamy would recklessly jump into the Anomaly after Octavia - but instead, he was taken, and everyone else is recklessly jumping into the Anomaly without knowing where exactly they'll end up. Immediately planet hopping without any supplies or suits with oxygen wasn’t the wisest decision! I was wondering, like many people, why they did not at least take the suits from the dead Disciples. But someone on Twitter has pointed out that the suits probably got damaged by the blast from the energy weapon Raven took from the dead Disciple, which makes it all make more sense. For the rest, I can explain it by the urgency of the situation - they knew that more Disciples would be coming soon. (And the urgency turned out to be very justified - as a Disciple turned off the Anomaly Stone shortly after.) And I have no problem believing that Clarke is that desperate to find Bellamy “her people”. 

..Who are we kidding? If it was just Octavia, Echo and Gabriel, she’d still want to save them, but I don’t think she’d be immediately hopping to another planet without knowing for sure if it’s even survivable, and without saying goodbye to Madi. Some people were bothered that Clarke’s choice wasn’t played more emotionally and that she didn’t specifically mention Bellamy - but I disagree, because this is nothing new. For so many seasons, we’ve seen Clarke talking only in terms of saving “her people” or “her friends” even when everyone knew that Bellamy was the one she’s most emotionally attached to by far. (Going back to season 2 and “You care about him” - “I care about all of them” - “But you worry about him more.) I don’t need this spelled out right now. Maybe the show could have immediately delved a bit deeper into everyone’s reasons for planet hopping, but maybe they didn’t need to because we hopefully will see more of their emotions in the upcoming episodes, especially when they get stuck on the ice planet with a really nice name that kind of means “Hell” or “Purgatory”.

I didn’t take their cavalier remarks like “why not” and “this planet sucks anyway” seriously. What makes a lot more sense is if Niylah mostly wants to save Octavia - since we know how devoted she is to her. Miller may in particular feel he owes Bellamy to save him now, since he did not in season 5, which he felt guilty for and apologized about. And maybe that argument he had with Jackson in the previous episode (aka a few hours earlier) opened some wounds from Blodreina days, since Miller reacted by saying he isn’t just a follower. For Jordan, I suppose it may be a chance to participate in the heroic adventures of the group he’s only heard stories about. Raven has all sorts of reasons,  from saving her friends, to her scientific curiosity and love of space-faring adventures, to the fact that a part of her would probably want to be as far away from Sanctum and ‘the scene of the crime’ right now. 

I certainly hope that we delve more into everyone’s emotions and psychology in upcoming episodes, especially Clarke’s. She tends to try to keep her emotions inside, until they explode (and she beats up Russell and burns down the palace), and this has especially been the case this season. The Bellamy-shaped hole In the show has affected her - she isn’t able to be fully vulnerable with anyone the way she was with him (as recently as their hug in the season 6 finale). In this episode, it felt like she was mostly seen from the outside - we can take a good guess how she feels because of her actions, but it feels like she is seen from other people’s POV - whether her friends’ or the Disciples. From Niylah (who knows her well) saying “of course she is” when people were surprised she would go and risk her safety and freedom and maybe life when she was told they have her people, to Captain Meredith saying their intel on her is “smart, brave, willing to risk her life, not willing to risk the lives of her friends” (that must have come from Bellamy’s and Octavia’s memories), to Jordan announcing “Ladies and gentlemen, Clarke Griffin has left the planet”. (She is, after all, a legend for him especially, he was raised on stories about her. Raven is another legend for him, so he announced her the same way “Ladies and gentlemen, Raven Reyes”.)

But let’s go back to the beginning. I’ve seen people criticize the episode for “not showing the moment they realized Bellamy and others were missing”. I don't know why anyone thinks they would have realized they were missing before. This episode takes place very soon after the end of the previous one. (Clarke even hadn’t seen Raven after she had been beaten up by Nikki.) Bellamy, Octavia, Echo and Gabriel have been gone for about a day and a half at this point. Maybe they would have wondered “when are they coming back?”, but I don’t think they would have seen a reason to be worried - before a foraging party found a dead body of an unknown person with a mysterious suit and helmet. Which was followed by the mysterious people showing up and asking to talk to Clarke.

Raven is haunted by guilt throughout this episode (which makes perfect sense to me, as she has never really had to deal with being directly responsible for deaths in this way, let alone of people she knows), including a hallucination of irradiated Hatch, and Lindsey’s acting was really good.I loved her conversation with Clarke, where Clarke gave her a simple advice, from her own experience, which says a lot about how she has been able to go on: you will not forget the faces of those you’ve killed (we’ve seen Clarke be haunted by hallucinations of Finn and see dead, irradiated Maya in her mindspace), but think of the faces of all the people you have saved. I’m looking forward to more of Clarke/Raven bonding in S7.

I know I sound like a broken record, but one character whose characterization I don’t know how to feel about is Jordan, because of the way the show has been skirting around the issue of whether he has been brainwashed or not. But that may just be me being influenced by the fact that so many people are arguing he is not brainwashed, just because he doesn’t believe in the divinity of the Primes. But 1) he has undergone the process, 2) become weirdly attached and close to his brainwasher Trey and the other ‘Devout’, 3) formed a strange attachment to Priya’s mind drive and started blaming people for her death - seemingly forgetting about his actual dead girlfriend Delilah and her death, 4) is hanging out with people who worship his girlfriend’s murderers, while seemingly paying no attention to her grieving parents, and 5) did a 180 from despising the Primes as murderers to defending their society as “peaceful” and “happy” and spouting similar Prime propaganda BS (which we had previously heard from Josephine), blaming Earthkru for destroying that fake paradise. He does it again here, in an off-hand comment (“before we screwed up”), which sounds like he blames his friends for... what? Not being OK with Clarke being murdered and bodysnatched and trying to save her? Apart from Madi - who was under Sheidheda’s influence - all the others did was try to save Clarke and try to save themselves from getting burned at the stake, while also trying not to kill people. And now, we see Jordan happily plan to save Clarke from getting captured and having her memory extracted, or Miller, Niylah and Gaia killed, by having Raven kill 8 people, which bothered her a lot (especially with her recent experience getting Hatch and 3 other people killed), but didn’t seem to bother Jordan. Now, I’m not saying it should - it’s defending your friends - but how can he do that and at the same time blame his friends for trying to save Clarke from a much worse situation? He’s like two completely different people when he is with the Devout or says anything about them or the Primes, and when he is away from them (when he suddenly stops being annoying and saying absurd things). Either he is showing consequences of brainwashing by the Devout, or he is a terribly written, inconsistent character.

I wish we had seen a scene between Jackson and Miller (which must have been deleted, going by the promo pictures), before Miller abruptly left. He probably didn’t know he would be going to another planet, but he knew he would be risking his life, so some sort of a goodbye could have taken place. At least, with the fact that Jackson was present when they discovered the body of the Disciple, at least someone in Sanctum has some idea what happened, now that Gaia got kidnapped and would not be able to go and tell Madi, Jackson and everyone what happened to Clarke, Miller, Raven, Jordan and Niylah, in addition to Bellamy, Echo, Octavia and Gabriel. But the people in Sanctum are still going to be wondering what happened to all those people (now including Gaia) who are just gone. 

Did Clarke get to take the note? It wasn’t clear in the episode itself. If she had it, I wonder what Orlando wrote in it and if this would give her more info or just be more confusing. If he just said something like, there were three of them, two women and one man, she could assume those were Bellamy, Octavia and Echo - but she was already finding Meredith’s info hard to believe and thought he was lying. Everyone thought Bellamy shoot the Disciple they found, because he was the only one with a gun - which Echo actually took in 7x01, before losing it in the trip to Skyring - but all that happened doesn’t sound like something he’d do.

As I expected since the trailer came out, Gaia offered to be the one to stay behind take care of Madi and warn the others. (The show had to build a friendship and trust between Clarke and her to make it believable that Clarke would feel Madi would be safe with her, and so people wouldn’t criticize Clarke too much for leaving. Not that this is helping much, since she’s already getting some criticism thrown at her in the Facebook group.) But her getting kidnapped by a Disciple means that 1) Madi would have to face Sheidheda without the help of her former Flamekeeper, 2) people in Sanctum would have far less idea of what’s going on, and 3) Clarke and co. had no idea about it when they left, thinking that their people are relatively safe in Sanctum. At least Gaia didn’t need to warn them about the Disciples coming for them - since the Disciple has deactivated the Anomaly Stone. So, now Sanctum is offline, too.

Where is everyone now?

Octavia was pulled back to Bardo at the end of 6x13 and we still haven’t seen her in the present

Bellamy was kidnapped and taken to Bardo in 7x01 and we haven’t seen him since

Diyoza was already on Bardo as a captive

Echo, Hope and Gabriel jumped to Bardo from Skyring

Gaia has been kidnapped by a Disciple and taken to another planet - maybe Bardo, but maybe not (and I’m not sure how the Disciple even could have taken her to Bardo, when the Anomaly Stone had been set to Nakara, and the Disciple just turned if off, as far as I could see?)

Clarke, Raven, Jordan, Miller and Niylah jumped to a random planet and ended up on Nakara, the ice planet

Murphy, Emori, Madi, Indra and Jackson remained on Sanctum, together with Russell!Sheidheda, broken Wonkru, about 400 of them (including the Sangedakru - who worship Sheidheda), angry and hurt Nikki and 31 other Eligius prisoners, the Devout who still worship Russell and the Primes, and the Children of Gabriel, who want him dead.

Timeline: The 100 writers are indeed bad at math, or aren’t too bothered about making the timeline fit, and this is also clear in this episode.

Meredith, during his first meeting with Clarke, only told her "Your people killed 3 of mine" and told her to hurry "Where your friends are, time runs much faster. Every second counts". Which sounded like he only knew what they did on Sanctum,  and made it sound like they were still on Skyring (I'm sure time runs faster on Bardo than on Sanctum, too, but the time differential is not as extreme, so "every second counts" is a bit too dramatic. They'd only be a few hours older if they were on Bardo.)  

Which only makes sense from the Doylist perspective - the writers didn't want the audience to be spoiled on what happens in the Skyring storyline. But it makes no sense from the Watsonian perspective - Meredith should already know that they killed 5 more of his people and jumped.  Because those 5 years were about 2 minutes on Sanctum - so, it all happened a day earlier, in the timeline of 7x01. Logically, Meredith and his team must have known everything and then have been sent to Sanctum.

Body count: The Disciples are really dying a lot this season: 3 in 7x01, and in this episode, 5 more killed on Skyring (1 by Hope, 4 by Echo), 8 including Meredith killed on Sanctum by Raven, Orlando (reportedly) committed suicide. 17 dead Disciples since the start of the season.

In the flashback - 4 Disciple dieds: Dev killed 2, was mortally wounded by a third, but managed to detonate a grenade and kill his killer.

Rating: 8.5

#the 100 #the 100 7x04 #hesperides #the 100 season 7 #clarke griffin #hope diyoza #echo kom azgeda #gabriel santiago #raven reyes

[blodreina-noumou]

The 100 7x03 - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The Good

Memori continues to delight and visually satisfy. I just love everything about them. They look so good in their Prime outfits. Their banter is always so adorable (“didn’t pay attention, huh?” “yeah, don’t ruin my rep,”) and there are truly the most ride-or-die pairing on the entire show. Pretty much all of my favorite moments from this episode came from them. The flirting on the bed, including Raven walking in (b/c that’s always been hilarious and always will be,) the way John supported Emori throughout as she got sicker and sicker - I just love them so much. I don’t think my heart has pounded nearly so much this season as it did when Emori was struggling with the core, and Murphy was anxiously keeping time for her.

Raven got a storyline. Yay. Aha.

Unpopular opinion, but I am really digging the Claia vibes in a big way.

Also continue to enjoy Indra’s role as the “too old for this shit” veteran who’s desperately trying to keep her idealistic daughters (b/c she’s clearly adopted Clarke now, too,) from ruining everything with their emotional speeches and appeals.

The Bad

Raven’s storyline was hard to watch. I’ve never agreed with the idea that she was on a moral high horse, or only saw things in black and white. I’ve always seen that as an incorrect fandom interpretation, so it was weird to see it happen so explicitly and violently in a storyline for her. She already did some version of this with Floukru back in s4, remember? She was in charge of rationing, and she had to be the bad guy, and then Murphy stole the medicine and she realized that things weren’t as simple as she was trying to force them to be. This was the exact same storyline but with much higher stakes for Raven directly, and I’m just...tired of seeing Raven in physical pain. There are more ways to inflict suffering on someone than torturing and/or beating the shit out of them.

Raven’s line about: “Go do what you’re good at and be Emori’s moral anchor,” was weird. I always kind of thought of it as the other way around. Or, that, at the very least, that Emori and Murphy are each other’s moral anchors. Idk, it just landed weird on me. There was a lot about this episode that landed weird on me.

Somebody at Sanctum should’ve mentioned AnomalyKru by now. Indra, Gaia, and Niylah (where is she???) should be wondering where Octavia is. Clarke, Murphy, Raven, and Emori should all be wondering where Bellamy and Echo are. Somebody should’ve noticed that Gabriel/Xavier is missing. The fact that nobody at Sanctum has mentioned anything about their missing friends is just getting more and more awkward.

Also, side note, how is this timing going to line up? Octavia ran into the Anomaly, then popped back out, seconds later, ten years older. If several days have passed on Sanctum, doesn’t that mean that AnomalyKru is dead by now? I’m assuming everyone will line up together eventually, somehow. We don’t know exactly how time on Bardo works in relation to Sanctum yet, and I think that’s the key to figuring out how the timing is all going to work out. Or it will be confusing forever. We’ll see.

The Ugly

This was a filler episode. Blatantly. And the character development that happened didn’t feel meaningful or fresh enough to justify it.

There is too much happening in this show right now. Way too much. And I only care about a fraction of it. Throwing in the problem with the reactor melting down this episode felt especially unnecessary in light of ALL the other conflict. It felt very contrived, all just to give Raven a storyline where she’s responsible for some deaths, with Murphy and Emori involved as supporting characters/to contradict her questionable morals. I enjoyed having those characters on screen, a lot, but I would’ve enjoyed it more if this vignette had more impact on the greater story. I suppose we’ll see how it plays out, now that Raven has a new enemy.

I don’t care about Sheidheda. Nothing about him thus far has made me give even the tiniest shit about him. He should’ve died for good last season. I’m assuming he’s a big part of the backdoor pilot, which is why he’s still around. I’m not thrilled.

Regardless, with so much going on, these episodes are starting to feel like a slog, and the story is really dragging, especiallly compared to s6 and s5. This show really has a pacing problem imo - it’s either rushed or plodding. Very little inbetween. I care a lot more about the mystery of the Anomaly and what happened to the Blakes than I do anything that’s happening at Sanctum.

It was a pretty meh episode for me. Definitely underwhelming, in light of how much I enjoyed last week. But things can only pick up from here...right?

#the 100 spoilers #the 100 s7 #the 100 7x03 #the 100 reactions

[lightcomingthroughthedarkness]

would you rather Bellarke get together (kiss sex love confession the entire thing) but then Bellamy dies or no romantic Bellarke at all but Bellamy lives?

You are asking me to choose between the only reason I'm still watching Bellarke scenes on this show; the POSSIBILITY of a VISUAL Bellarke kiss or my undying and unwavering love for Bellamy Blake?

This is evil, nonny.

Since I don't think Bellarke will do any of those things either way, I'd rather Bellamy lives in the end. At least I can drop this show knowing my baby is alive in a virtual fictional universe somewhere.

What would you choose?

#bellarke #bellamy blake #ask answered

[otp-armada]

I am not looking forward to these flashbacks. 

To date, we’ve had four onscreen kisses shared between Bellamy and Echo with additional, smaller moments of other forms of intimacy. I’d rather the show refrain from adding more tally marks to the count. 

If humans were gifted with the capacity for purging unwanted memories, then all this discomfort would be a moot point. I suppose there’s always alcohol as a fallback option, but not even the prospect of temporary amnesia is worth destroying my liver. Turning to alcohol to drown my B/E-related sorrows would probably qualify more as self-harm than self-help.

I’d much prefer to cut directly to an imminent breakup scene without the pomp and circumstance of an agonized Echo’s trip down memory lane. 

If anything, supplying us with visual evidence on how happy they were together is an even sadder remark on the state of B/E’s fragility, knowing it took 0.001 seconds for the mere mention of Clarke’s name to bring it all to ruin. No collection of past happy moments shared on the Ring erases the fractures in their relationship that occur between them afterward, originating with the revelation of a still-living Clarke. I'd be an absolute fool to believe otherwise. 

But if Jason deems a tour of their greatest hits as necessary to the story, I trust his judgment. Showing us B/E's origins as their romantic relationship begins to fall apart in real-time brings it full circle, and it lends gravitas to the story he's telling with Echo. With this particular arc, the bigger picture is still Echo's evolution. It's not about B/E.  

Once season 7 started, there was a visible shift in how Jason utilized B/E.  Whereas seasons 5 and 6 primarily used B/E as the third leg in a love triangle designed to keep a pining Bellarke apart, season 7 uses their master-spy dynamic to bolster Echo's development almost exclusively. Post-season 6, Bellarke is so primed to get together, one honest admission of mutual feelings without Echo as an obstacle and BOOM. Canon couple. 

Echo has a more extensive role than girl-to-be-dumped, and I'm not upset over it. She gets to stand up as a character after the majority of her life has been marked by slavery for her crown, and I'm not upset over it. As indemnification for the loss of her relationship, this orphan-turned-soldier is finding her place in a supportive, loving family while developing a sense of identity and independence, and I'm not upset over it.

I would’ve preferred Jason found a way to take her on this path without B/E remaining intact this far into the final season and theoretically for the foreseeable episodes. I would always choose to end them sooner rather than later, given a choice. But I understand why Jason didn't. 

Echo can’t very well outgrow a master-spy complex if there is no master to her spy. And as much as I hate it, the romantic aspect of B/E is a believable, convenient tool to keep this complex in place until her story comes to fruition. Would Echo act so extremely in service to a recent ex-boyfriend who left her for another woman? Probably not. As far as I can tell, the pinnacle of her arc is the moment she realizes she has to break free from Bellamy. So narrative structure demands B/E stay together, however technically, long enough for her to break those chains. 

I was initially excited about the flashbacks, if only because I took them as a sign of an impending breakup. But the timing doesn't pan out. Aside from the logistics of Echo and Bellamy presumably on separate worlds, and with her thinking him dead, we've only just reached the point where Echo might start to ask herself those hard questions she's been avoiding. She must have noticed a change in her relationship. Between Psychosis!Emori, B/E's 6x04 fight, and Anomaly!Roan, she's had enough cause for doubt. But I think she's suppressed any urge to reflect upon it for a number of reasons. Love. Continued hope they'll last. War. A mission to save him. It took a lot of meticulous maneuvering to corner Echo to this point. Now that we're here, I don't think Jason would pull a reverse Uno card in a 40-minute episode. It seems more likely that he will let her continue to stew in her emotions. Either she'll keep sinking until she hits rock bottom, or she'll start learning how to swim. 

Jason could always prove me wrong. And if I am, I'd never be happier for him to do so. If I'm not? It's at times like this when I am reminded of the resolution I made at the end of season 6- rest easy in the comfort of knowing B/E will meet its inevitable end but do not try to speculate when that might be. Attempting to discern the specifics of "when" brings one only misery. 

Jason’s signature sometimes-too-fast, other-times-too-slow pacing, is often liable to tempt one into ripping their own hair out. That being said, I’ve seen enough of this show to trust in his ability to tell a damn good story. Faith in his competency for the craft just requires on our part, the patience of a saint. 

If nothing else, it isn’t my story to tell, so I’ll just have to suck it up and find a way to deal with any disappointments I may feel. Or I can try to find the value within the story told. It's a better alternative than to be left bitter. No promises, though.

Maybe Echo’s actions against the Disciples aren’t reprehensible, considering the people she’s killing are those complicit in kidnapping and torturing her people. But Orlando was a good, honorable man whose naïveté convinced him to play for the wrong team, yet helped our heroes when he didn’t have to. Not unlike Shaw, whom Echo sold to Diyoza to fulfill her mission. But I assume “We are not his people” is residual mistrust leftover from Ryker’s betrayal of her. She miscalculated the feelings of one possible defector before, she won’t make the same mistake twice. 

If she was able to save Bellamy in the end, I’m sure she’d be able to justify the spilled blood it took to get there. But Orlando suffered at her hands for nothing, and she may not be overly concerned with morality, but she cares for the people she grows close to. Unless the episode proves otherwise, I’d like to think Orlando’s fate will weigh heavily on her. 

They may not have been close. But five years in close quarters with only a few people akin to friends for comfort, it'd be hard not to feel the slightest bit attached.

Those of us who believe in Bellarke know Echo is the third-party obstacle in a love triangle. But what is far more interesting is the role she played in the seasons-long Blake siblings struggle. 

Echo was persona non grata to both siblings following her and Octavia's mountaintop fight. Six years later, she highlights the difference in the siblings' maturities. Whereas Bellamy has learned to embrace empathy and forgiveness with open arms, Octavia is cold and unyielding. On a more personal note, B/E represents Octavia's persistent unwillingness to respect Bellamy as his own person, with needs and wants independent of her. 

After her soul searching on Skyring, I thought she had buried the hatchet, as per her lack of vitriol in her 6x12 conversation with Bellamy, and enthusiastically joining forces with Echo in 6x13. Maybe she did. But Octavia has also proven herself an unreliable narrator, and Hope feels indignation on her aunt's behalf. Whatever the case, there's a reason why the dialogue keeps referencing Echo and Octavia's hostile history. And I think it's building to a head in 7x07. 

I think mutual love for Bellamy is healing the divide between them when Echo is at her most fractured. She's isolated from Bellamy and the rest of Spacekru. Left in pain and seeking retribution as Octavia did, which, as we know, is where it all went wrong for the latter. Octavia, more than most, is in the best position to empathize with what Echo is currently feeling and how pain can destroy her if she lets it consume her. 

If Octavia can remind Echo she's not alone, if a former enemy can convince her she belongs and welcome her with open arms- as her brother did before her- it might do well in healing some broken piece inside of her. And it would be a roundabout display of Octavia's newfound maturity. This is good for both of them. This spiral she is in will require her to look inward. Since her fixation with Bellamy is partly what landed her in this mess, absolution cannot come from him. She can only find it in herself if she wants it. But I'd be glad if Octavia can help see her through it. This is what I mean about seeking value in the story told. We're so concerned about Octavia calling Echo family, about the possibility of it legitimizing B/E, it doesn't occur to us that it's about the characters themselves. And B/E is only a vehicle used to bring us there. It's easier to see when not consumed by automatic seething rage, as typical of our fellow Bellarke compatriots, for anything remotely associated with Echo.

If my heart and mind weren’t chanting “BELLARKEBELLARKEBELLARKE,” there’s a good chance I’d be able to better appreciate the complexities B/E gives to the development of the four characters it directly impacts. 

Our side of fandom has made lots of accusations about B/E since 5x01. It’s a forgettable, physical relationship worth little to Bellamy. B/E is unhealthy for reasons x, y, and z. We generate a different example in every episode. Click slideshow for more details. But the fact of the matter is, much of this isn't true. Until Echo went postal, B/E wasn’t unhealthy. Bellamy just had a greater love for Clarke. Up until their ending scene in 6x04, there was nothing they couldn’t come back from together, if both committed themselves fully, no more walls. It's not a particularly popular train of thought among us, but Jason absolutely could've written B/E as an endgame pairing. And all it would take to deliver a final killing blow is the inclusion of a single damning scene.

We can gripe over the length of time they've stayed together. But, in spite of what most people think about every new B/E development and Bellarke separation, Jason has never actually dropped an ax on Bellarke. Hope persists.

Jason is responsible for the development of dozens of characters, major plots, and dozens of smaller subplots. But our fandom reduced the story chiefly to Bellarke's romance. Our villains are those who stand in their way. Namely Echo, the only outside love interest to be an official obstacle. We fashioned Echo as our enemy. In lieu of removing her from the narrative (which is not in our power to do), we've done everything within our purview to diminish her. If Jason won't treat B/E and Echo as the jokes we know they are, we'll do it ourselves. Minimizing her role in the story makes it a hell of a lot easier to erase a character we'd rather didn't exist for our preferred ship to advance.

Lord knows how many times we've claimed she has no story. That absent relevance or substantial bearing, she's there simply because Jason is partial to her for some elusive reason. But the reality is, we never looked for her story because we wanted to be able to claim its inexistence. We wanted to be able to say she's frivolous to the story, and by extension, to Bellamy. We want to be able to dismantle B/E when it appears Jason doesn't. Except he is and has been doing so since day one. 

Months ago, on a whim, when I was feeling benevolent towards Echo, I wrote a long post HERE giving her the benefit of the doubt, and I said:

In the grand scheme of the story, I think this is the purpose Echo serves, to represent the part that says, “We’re all human. No matter what tribe we belong to, we fight for the same reasons. We love the same way. When you leave allegiances aside, when you see someone for who they are at their core, an enemy today can become a friend tomorrow.”

True peace, a series-long running theme for our heroes, begins with embracing former outsiders like Echo and Emori. Easy to lose sight of this when focused on ship wars. 

It is perfectly acceptable not to love all the components of a story. It is understandable to focus your attention on those select segments you find appealing. But a tunnel-visioned mindset lands you in trouble when you become resentful at the reminders that a story is a composite of more moving pieces than just the parts you like. And when you forget that screentime allotted to developing those pieces ahead of what you favor is permissible. Everything on a show has its time, all in due course. 

On the other hand, B/E shippers overinflate their ship's significance. They take canon and twist it to say, "Look at how strong B/E is, Bellarke could never. B/E is endgame, and Blorkes are delusional." Their conclusion of an epic love is another bias-based fandom interpretation that doesn’t hold water, either. 

I think the reality of B/E lies somewhere in a muddled middle of these two extremes. 

One last point, and I'll get off my soapbox. Despite what the melodramatic diatribe in my opening paragraph suggests, B/E is never as atrocious as fandom makes them out to be. Greater fandom treats anything remotely associated with B/E as the next great catastrophe. And as it turns out, it never really is.  

 Tagging @sometimesrosy, because I think, after years of combating opinions you don’t agree with, it might be a refreshing change of pace to know some of us do have more balanced views regarding B/E. If I do say so myself.

#hmmm how i tag this in a way that will land me in the least amount of hot water? #the 100 meta #with a side order of #fandom wank #long post #the 100 #bellarke #b/e #c/b/e #the 100 season 7 #my post

[theatresteph]

Happy BFSN & BFGD!

Tagged by @queenofwhateverwewant @clarkcsbellamy thank you!

Just woke up and thought I’d just take the photo in bed cause I’m not ashamed of the way I look in the morning. It’s been a pretty good week since I’ve properly restarted uni, though I was disappointed to find out that I was only 3 points shy of receiving a credit instead of a pass for my political science course last semester. It just made me angry and upset with myself because I need to always be trying to achieve the best marks so that I can qualify to study abroad in New York in my final year, and I just kicked myself for thinking that “what if those 3 points are the difference between myself and someone else being chosen?”. Obviously I’m overthinking and my course coordinator told me not to be too hard on myself because I still passed and this really will have no major impact because I passed, therefore I’ve qualified to progress with the major, but my high school taught me to be incapable of accepting less than my best when it comes to writing and social science. Oh well.

I’m disappointed that we didn’t get a proper Bellarke talk and that so much was cut from the Blake sibling scene in last week’s episode, but we can all agree that it was visually stunning and everyone killed it so I’m immensely proud of Bob, and definitely looking forward to seeing his and Eliza’s episodes next year! As always, hoping for a Becho breakup and Bellarke confession/kiss asap, but I’d really like if Becho could breakup tonight just cause they’re finally going to reunite and obviously the chemistry will suck as always. 🤞

I’m grateful for Beliza, who are proof that soulmates are real, for Bellarke, who fill my life with the best kind of joy and pain, for my irl friends and family, who love and appreciate me even though I’m annoyingly obsessed with this show that none of them care about, and finally for my Bellarke fam, cause you guys get me through the pain of endlessly waiting and help me hold out hope. Wearing my Bellarke t-shirt as usual and looking forward to 6x12!

Tagging @clarkgriffon @bellamy-is-a-cupcake-in-love @historyofbellarke @sometimesrosy @choose-wonkru @hostagetakerandhistraitor @katkomskaikru @redstringbellarke @rebelprincessblake. Let me know if you don’t want to be tagged.

[truthbeetoldmedia]

The 100 6x11 “Ashes to Ashes” Review

Trust is hard to come by in a civilization built on lies. In “Ashes to Ashes”, Clarke, Bellamy and Octavia are forced to come up with a plan quick that will appease the Children of Gabriel and save their people in Sanctum while Echo, Gaia, Miller and Murphy forge their own respective plans to get out of the sacred city alive. 

Not only is the story in this episode captivating, thanks to veteran writer Charmaine DeGrate, but the acting and visuals are stunning as well — all due to Bob Morley’s natural talent in his directorial debut. He has definitely proven himself a force in front of and behind the camera, and I know I speak for the entire The 100 fandom when I say I cannot wait to see where his career takes him.

For now though, we are lucky to have him as our Bellamy Blake, who particularly shines in this episode as he faces Octavia and acts as the mastermind behind the plan that aligns them with the Children of Gabriel. That is until Clarke has other, more selfless plans, of course. 

For Monty

Upon waking up as 100% Clarke Griffin, our protagonist has a very different outlook on life. While in the mindspace, she was forced to face her demons in the form of people from her past who knew she could do better. Monty in particular helped Clarke to realize that violence isn’t always the answer. So, when Clarke comes to and realizes her people are still in Sanctum, she is dead set on masquerading as Josephine to get into the city and save them. 

We as the audience get to see that changed and evolved Clarke inside the mindspace come to fruition in the “real world” and witness the satisfying tension it causes between her and Bellamy. Bellamy, who has spent much of the season fighting tooth and nail to get Clarke back finally has her by his side again. So naturally, when she wants to thrust herself back into a dangerous situation, he isn’t a huge fan. 

Though it was disappointing that the two only briefly discussed the lengths Bellamy went to to save Clarke before refocusing their attention on the rest of their people, this is how it has always been. As frustrating as it is, they live in a post-apocalyptic world where there isn’t much time at all to discuss feelings and desires. After the ending scene of 6x10 in which we felt how desperately Bellamy needs Clarke by his side, it’s undeniable that they need to find the time to sit down and have a longer conversation someday about what it actually means that they will risk everything, including the safety of the people they love, to save the other (hint: It is absolutely not platonic). However, as we are approaching the end of the season and tensions are coming to a head, it doesn’t appear that they will find that time anytime soon. 

Regardless, just seeing Clarke and Bellamy back together, working through the problem in front of them side by side was much needed after a season of Clarke mostly existing only inside her own head. Clarke and Bellamy are co-leaders first and foremost, and as such are a force to be reckoned with. Though it pains Bellamy to consider the consequences of Clarke getting caught in Sanctum, he knows that this is what must be done — what Monty would do. 

Monty continues to be their moral compass this season as they try to work towards peace. Though this moon has thrown them for a loop more than once in their attempts to start anew and be better, our heroes know they must do so even when the temptation to get revenge is stronger than ever. Doing what is right is not always the easier route, but it’s still the one that should be taken. 

While callbacks to characters long gone can sometimes be tiring, this season has done a beautiful job at emphasizing the important roles they played and continue to play in the lives of the characters still standing. While Murphy is terrified of facing his mortality, we know through Monty, Maya, Jake and even Pike that dying does not mean you cease to matter. The impact you had on people while you were alive remains. 

And so, Clarke faces her own mortality head on for the greater good. If she doesn’t, she knows her people will likely die. While I’ve missed Clarke deeply, her returning to the screen in such a powerful way almost makes it worth it. She’s evolved into a whole new kind of hero. Just when I thought it was impossible, I love her even more.

The 10-Year-Lie

While brainstorming a plan that will lower the radiation shield and get Bellamy, Clarke and Octavia’s people out of Sanctum, the group is confronted by the Children of Gabriel. They believe that Gabriel is still Xavier, and that he and “the old man” are protecting Josephine, thus betraying their anti-Prime regime. When they discover that Gabriel has bodysnatched Xavier, and has secretly existed in this form for 10 years, the Children of Gabriel are understandably upset. 

Layla, the sister of Xavier, helps add an interesting layer to the story. As Bellamy and Octavia work through their tarnished sibling relationship, she must mourn the fact that she’ll never get the chance to do the same, as her brother is gone forever. Layla’s hurt and anger is palpable as she must cooperate with Gabriel in order to destroy the Primes. 

We also get to see more of how the Primes are directly hurting people and tearing people apart, even though they believe what they are doing is right. The 100 has always placed emphasis on the grey area between right and wrong, a space that many if not all of the characters on this show have occupied at some point in time. The view of the Primes as godly figures and the cold war between the believers in Sanctum and the nonbelievers in the forest once again highlights that grey area. Both believe they are right, and neither are willing to budge. 

Also interesting is Gabriel’s role in all of this. Though he has notoriously led an anti-Primes movement, he is still alive in yet another body. We get little insight as to why he was resurrected 10 years ago, only that it was done by a man named Eduardo without his consent. This explains why he’s been hiding for so long, pretending to be Xavier. Though this season has largely been about redemption for characters like Octavia and Clarke who we know to have done bad things in the past, Gabriel needs to redeem himself as well. He has his own demons that he must face by helping to rescue the innocent and unwilling before they become hosts.

What is still undetermined is whether he will go along with Clarke’s peaceful plan, or aid the Children of Gabriel in killing the remaining Primes. While Clarke and Bellamy have a moral compass in the form of Monty guiding them, he does not. Though he has agreed to side with Clarke, we know how quickly characters on this show can switch allegiances when it is convenient for them. So, Gabriel is certainly a wild card.

A Spy Named Ash 

Back in Sanctum, Russell and Co. waste no time finding a new host for Simone’s mind drive. Echo, who has just been betrayed by Ryker while attempting to assassinate Russell and save her friends, is the chosen one. 

As Ryker prepares to kill her, Echo stalls, offering up a backstory that gives the audience an important little tidbit of information: Echo isn’t the name she was born with. As a child living under Queen Nia’s rule in the Ice Nation, or Azgeda, Ash was forced to kill her friend, Echo, and assume her identity before a trip to a neighboring kingdom. 

She tells the tale through tears, seemingly still guilty that she was not able to spare her friend’s life. However, when Gaia and Miller (a dream team, might I add) come to her rescue, Echo reminds Ryker of something Queen Nia taught her, right as she plunges a spear into his heart: hesitation is death. 

While this was an unexpected “badass” moment, it completely alters the importance of Echo’s story. While watching the flashback, we’re supposed to feel bad for Echo who was forced to kill someone close to her at such a young age. We believe that this provides more depth to her character, shows her as more than just a spy with good aim. 

However, Echo does not redeem herself by doing better as so many others have done this season. Instead, she takes the easier route, revenge, and kills Ryker. 

While this may be smart and cunning, it makes all of Echo’s flashes of vulnerability up until this point seem ingenuine. If this moment, an important glimpse into her traumatic past, was only a ploy to set her up for revenge, how are we as the audience expected to interpret any moments of warmth or vulnerability from her as anything other than manipulative? I want so badly to like Echo and to see her become a well-rounded character, but unfortunately this flashback only aided me in viewing her as cold-hearted, one-note character. 

The “badass female warrior” trope is only entertaining up to a certain point. If Echo is to continue being a part of the story the writers are telling, she needs an emotional facelift. And pronto. In a season constructed around the idea of facing one’s demons, there’s no reason Echo couldn’t have done the same — and shown some real depth in the process. 

My Sister, not My Responsibility

While dangerous, Sanctum sure is beautiful. I’ll give it that. While foraging for the toxic mushrooms needed to make a bomb with the same hallucinatory properties as the red sun, Bellamy and Octavia get a much-needed opportunity to hash things out in a glowing cave.

Octavia has changed since going into the anomaly and facing her demons, the most significant of which was her brother and what she put him through. She knows that she cannot expect Bellamy to forgive her for the person she became in his absence over those six years, but she also needs him to know that she’s turned over a new leaf. 

It’s understandably difficult for Bellamy to believe that she could have changed so much in such a short amount of time, but it’s clear that he sees some sort of shift. While Bellamy refuses to forgive and forget, he does offer up a satisfying line, delivered perfectly by Bob Morley: “You are my sister, but you’re not my responsibility, not anymore.” 

For Octavia, Bellamy was her moral compass. She needed his guidance, although this is the first time she’s admitting that. The Blake siblings have been through a lot. At times, their tumultuous relationship has felt exhausting. Bellamy’s recognition that Octavia is still his sister, but that she’s not his to guide anymore is something that has been a long time coming, perhaps too long. Though they still have a lot to work through, when and if they ever find a moment of peace, this moment felt satisfying. Bellamy is no longer running away from Octavia and pretending she doesn’t exist, and Octavia is taking responsibility for her actions. 

Marie and Bob’s acting in this scene was impeccable and really brought this relationship back to life. This scene was probably my favorite of the entire night, purely because we got to see a pairing that has been missing all season return. And, perhaps more importantly, Bellamy was able to definitively tell his sister that he doesn’t forgive her for her abusive behavior, and doesn’t have to. 

From this point forward, Octavia will have to continue on her journey of redemption by herself, without that moral compass she claims to need so badly. Her demons are perhaps the darkest of all, so it will be interesting to say the least to see if she can reach some form of enlightenment or if she will fall back into her old ways. 

The Unsung Heroes 

An unexpected yet delightful pairing this episode was Miller and Gaia. These two minor characters got the chance to shine through and bounce off each other in ways I never knew I needed. Gaia helps Miller to forgive himself for following Octavia despite her wicked ways, telling him that mistakes can be forgiven, it’s not learning from them that cannot be. 

This line parallels Gaia greatly to Monty, whose only wish for his people was to be the good guys moving forward. While Monty is the moral compass for Bellamy, Clarke and Octavia in the forest, Gaia is that same moral compass in Sanctum. 

She and Miller escape their holding cell and manage to save Echo, but not before she’s been made into a nightblood. Gaia notices this right away as she’s untying her, and in true Gaia fashion is stunned. 

I can’t help but wonder if Echo’s nightblood is a setup for something greater. Will she take the chip and become commander? I don’t think so. More plausible, I think, is that she will have to lower the radiation shield. Of course this means something would have to happen to Clarke and/or Raven that would hinder them from being able to do so themselves. 

While Gaia and Miller got their chance to be unsung heroes in this episode, perhaps Echo will get that same chance soon, possibly redeeming herself. Though this is equal parts speculation and wishful thinking, The 100 is unpredictable. Regardless, I would like to see Gaia and Miller become best friends and continue being a dream team, please and thank you. 

Caught in the Middle

Poor Murphy, always finding himself caught between a rock and a hard place. Then again though, as Russell puts it, he’s willing to do whatever and align with whoever in order to save himself. While Murphy takes offense to this, he can’t necessarily deny it. 

However, there’s a shift in Murphy’s thought process that is visible when Russell warns him there will be consequences for not bringing Josephine back alive. Murphy assumes he will be killed, “an eye for an eye”. He seems genuinely accepting of this. It’s only when Russell says Emori will be killed that Murphy’s face changes. 

Murphy has always been a selfish person. Arguably, Emori changed that about him the moment they fell in love. In Season 4, he fought to make sure she would not be killed in the radiation chamber. Similarly, she refused to leave him to die on earth at the end of Season 5. The two are willing to die if it means dying by the side of the person they love. 

However, this is the first time we’ve seen Murphy really accept his own death as he recognizes Russell’s deal for what it is, immortality versus mortality. He still wants to live forever by Emori’s side, but if one of them has to die to save the other, he wants it to be him. 

I’m still waiting for Murphy to change sides as he does so well and become the hero we all know he can be (see: him helping to save Clarke in Season 3). This time though, perhaps he will stay on the “good” side and take Monty’s words to heart. 

Murphy’s internal battle with his mortality has been so interesting to watch, and has been perhaps my favorite storyline to come out of Sanctum’s body-snatching ways. He’s known as a cockroach for a reason, but does he want that to be his legacy? Though he’s high up on my list of characters most likely to die this season, I sincerely hope he sticks around purely because I want to see him accept his mortality and live with it.  

This is The 100 though, so I’m not holding my breath that he will get a happy ending. After all, does anyone ever get that on this show? 

The Academy Award Goes to: 

You’ve seen Clarke, Josephine, Josephine pretending to be Clarke, and a Clarke and Josephine combo. Can I interest you in Clarke as Josephine? 

Realizing that the only way to avoid killing innocent people is to lower the radiation shield before the less intense bomb is set off, Clarke knows she must pretend to be Josephine and do it herself. Clarke parallels Bellamy from Season 2 as the inside man, and she certainly isn’t expecting what she finds when she returns to Sanctum. 

Madi is strapped down and being drained of her bone marrow to allow for the creation of more hosts, including one for Simone, Josephine’s mother. Clarke takes on perhaps the greatest acting feat of all time when she tells Madi that she is Josephine, and that Clarke is gone forever. She must be apathetic as Madi struggles in place, promising to avenge her death. 

I genuinely expected Clarke to break in this moment, and I’m sure there will be many moments like it in the near future. Clarke knows she must remain undercover if she wants to save the lives of all her people, including Madi, but that’s her child strapped down and being used as a medical experiment. 

It has been such a joy to watch Eliza Taylor’s range this season as she’s taken on the challenge of not only playing two entirely different characters, but playing them as each other as well. She’s really done an incredible job with it and shown just how talented she is (though just her as Clarke was enough to prove that). With Eliza announcing that she’ll be directing next season, I’m already excited for what’s to come after Season 6 is over. However, we still have two more episodes to get through in which I’m positive she’ll shine in front of the camera like she’s done all season long. 

Final Thoughts

In his first episode as a director, Bob Morley really knocked it out of the park. Everything came together to showcase the story in the best way possible, with the actors shining through in their performances. It’s unsuprising that so many cast members have been singing Bob’s praises since before the episode even aired. Hopefully we will get more episodes directed by him in the future!

As far as the story goes, this episode was pretty on par with the excellent writing that’s been delivered to us all season long. Clarke has been set up to once again save the day, but will she be able to? It’s those unexpected yet expected twists that make this show so great. We know that something is going to go wrong with this plan, we just don’t know what. 

With Clarke and Murphy back in Sanctum, almost everyone is in the same place again. The stories are starting to intertwine, with Abby’s bone marrow solution incapacitating Madi and thus throwing an unexpected wrench in Clarke’s plans to stay cool and undercover. Meanwhile, Murphy has further aligned himself with Russell and the Primes and will likely be a key player in determining the fate of his people. Does this mean more Clarke/Josephine and Murphy? Sign me up. 

And then there’s Bellamy and Octavia who are still with the Children of Gabriel and Gabriel himself. These two will really have to work together to save those they love and avoid a bloodbath. Octavia’s redemption, incoming. 

After all is said and done, Bellamy is going to have to face what he did as well though. He cannot sweep under the rug the fact that he left everyone else behind to get Clarke back. Even if it was in the best interest for his people, his focus at the time was on saving Clarke. 

This episode did give us a few breathers amidst the chaos for characters to work through their personal issues, and I’m hoping that we’ll get more of that after the climax of the finale. If the story is to move forward, the characters' relationships need to change, whatever that means for each respective pairing. 

Interpret that however you wish. 

With two hours of Season 6 left to go, I think this episode ultimately did its job. It forced the characters as well as us to consider how this is all going to end, and if they can really follow Monty’s advice and do better. 

Next episode, the penultimate, will launch us head first into the action and thrill The 100 does so well with that morally grey area growing even bigger. I can’t wait!

Stray Thoughts

Where is Jordan? It makes no sense that he suddenly disappeared, especially having played such an integral role in the first half of the season.

Bellamy hiding his tears after talking to Octavia really got to me. Bob Morley truly is a force in front of and behind the camera.

Speaking of acting, can we talk about Eliza Taylor playing Clarke playing Josephine? Incredible. That “Boo hoo” was everything.

That parallel between Clarke pulling the gag out of Bellamy’s mouth and him doing the same to her in 3x02 was something I never knew I needed until now. *Chef’s kiss*

Gaia must be protected at all costs. That is all. 

Jessica’s episode rating: 🐝🐝🐝.5

The 100 airs Tuesdays at 9/8c on the CW.

#The 100 #Ashes to Ashes