#I have Opinions about some of amanda's Opinions esp in season 1 - she cares about status - she hints she was an outsider

[variousqueerthings]

sort of a musing on Amanda LaRusso

Amanda was never good at “caring” the way people expected a good little girl to care. She got bored with other peoples problems quickly. 

She was biting too. Never good at pretending. Always got to the point. Realized early on that you were a winner or a loser, and that she hadn’t been born on the winning side. It wasn’t until she started to get older and figured out how to tailor herself to others’ expectations - a bit of wit, a tight dress, a smile to mitigate the sting of her words - that she began to change all that.

It was wrong, anyway. All those people who thought she was cold or whatever. Women were meant to be emotional and empathetic and she wasn’t those things, but she did care. She cared about not fitting in, she cared about making something for herself, she cared about smoothing down her rough edges until they were invisible, unless she wanted to cut you. Sometimes she even cared for whatever boyfriend or girlfriend she kept around for longer than a month, extended her little bubble around them until they burst it and she had to excise them. 

And she cared about Daniel. She hadn’t even wanted to care about Daniel, but he got under your skin in some incalculable way (she’d learn years later just how many peoples skins he’d gotten under, so she could be forgiven for falling into his endearingly unintentional trap). 

She’d started out competitive, thinking about all the ways to win, but she was always practical. They worked better together. Best sales team in the valley. Getting married made sense. He was on the way up and so was she. They’d pull each other up. They were attracted to each other (he was a giver from the beginning - a rare gem amongst men). And she cared about him. That made him practically unique until the kids came along.

Mr Miyagi was an odd, but welcome addition. That was another thing about Daniel. Apart from the family he didn’t bring any baggage with him (she thought back then). Amanda could deal with the fact that his mom and her didn’t like each other too much. Daniel was all hers. Miyagi was unobtrusively present in everything that Daniel did. He grounded Daniel into something less flighty than Amanda suspected he would be if left to his own devices. 

Amanda did the rest. 

Smoothed out some of his rough edges the way she’d smoothed out her own. Best sales team in the valley, best dealership in the valley, a perfect couple. A kid was an expectation too, to cement that picture; one that she felt fine about, because Daniel wasn’t the kinda guy who’d push her into some mothering, “caring” role once the baby was born.

Not that she didn’t care. 

From the moment she saw Sam, she thought: This one might be yours, but I’ll make sure she doesn’t get hurt like me. She’ll learn to smooth out her edges much quicker, be the kind of girl who doesn’t get left out. The kind of girl who doesn’t make the mistake of trying to be too much herself. She’ll be fine. 

I won’t let anyone hurt her.

#is this kinda aromantic amanda? #what I'm saying is that daniel might have A Type and that type has at some point fantasized about squashing him like a bug #I have Opinions about some of amanda's Opinions esp in season 1 - she cares about status - she hints she was an outsider #she doesn't recognise the red flags of sam's friends or kyler #she doesn't have a lot of patience for daniel's various crises (to some extent understandable but also I'm not sure she always listens #when what he's saying is the truth.. but vice versa daniel's truth is often obfuscated so... two way street right) #she doesn't appear to have any friends -- much like daniel #unlike daniel she ALSO doesn't seem to have family? #once she realises that *this is serious* it's like a facade is dropped in terms of her going over to hit kreese #amanda larusso #ck #cobra kai #fck i forgot to add those tags earlier #anyway - point being her concern is with appearances a lot of the time #but she's got an acerbic shortness to her as well #I hc she's wearing a respectability mask under which is a much more feral girl #also I want to see much more amanda and sam -- sam is a daddy's girl 100% but amanda's brand of parenting is interesting to dig into

[droidmom]

Give you a character: (only because her pretty face is there as your icon) Helen Magnus. ♡♡

Ty!

Why I like them: She’s rly pretty and badass and smart and she’s brunette Amanda Tapping with a British accent and she’s just somehow really relatable despite her problems deriving from being immortal?? I’m just really gay and I project onto her a lot.  

Why I don’t: Even her flaws I love and understand? I just wish she would take care of herself sometimes 

Favorite episode: So so many. Probably episodes like Requiem, Next Tuesday, Veritas, Out of the Blue, and The Depths? I rly love getting to know her on such a personal level or see her have to be vulnerable, we just hardly see it unless she’s in a really messed up situation. I also really loved Breach because it was just an hour of her beating up Adam Worth in an abandoned warehouse and also getting radiation poisoning in the process. OH AND MONSOON FOR OBVIOUS REASONS. And anything involving the past like Normandy or Tempus. I keep thinking of more to add so I’m just gonna end it here before I list every single episode without realizing it.

Favorite season/movie: I really can’t say honestly. Every season had something different development or elements to love. I guess season 2 maybe? It really expanded her place in the world, revealing more and more about the secrets she’s kept and seeing the lengths she’ll go to to do what she thinks is right. Seeing her cope with Ashley’s death throughout it was difficult but also a really good part of it as well. 

Favorite line: “I have lived longer than any human has the right to” comes to mind but there are loads more 

Favorite outfit: God so many. I’m still sorting through my liveblog notes for this show but I did write down every time I nearly cried over her outfit, so I’m slowly compiling a list of the absolute best to make a gifset out of someday. (Update: I looked at what I had so far and apparently I freaked out over her outfit nearly every episode.)

OTP: I’m not obsessed with any pairings surprisingly, but I def favor Helen/Charlotte. I also rly liked Helen/James (depends on the time period) and Helen/Sally. She and Kate had some... really interesting scenes as well.  

Brotp: Helen/James for earlier years, Helen/Biggie for later years 

Head Canon: 1. Her being immortal lets me cross Sanctuary over with a million different shows so I really want a past protege to have been George Challenger from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World (mainly the 1999 TV show version). Esp since she knew the inspiration for Sherlock, it’s entirely possible she could have known Challenger’s as well.  2. She, at least once in her life, had nipple piercings, because apparently, they were a trend back in Victorian days. A friend and I have a whole crossover idea of Sanctuary and some other Victorian-era shows solely founded on these characters bonding over having nipple piercings. Plus, if Henry has them he had to have gotten the idea from somewhere. 

Unpopular opinion: Hmmmmm I wasn't super into shipping her and Nikola at first because I had some problems with the way some things went down and I didn’t want her to have to deal with those back then? BUT I do think it developed nicely over time. I don’t know if I ship it but I definitely like it a lot more now. 

A wish: She gets to be happy for more than 3 minutes. And maybe gets to make out with more girls. Preferably Charlotte.

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: Ashley coming back because then she’d have to lose her all over again I was going to make a fic vid where Ash survived but that reason kept me from it

5 words to best describe them: Stubborn, badass, reckless, independent (maybe too independent at times), dedicated 

My nickname for them: I usually just scream “wife” when she’s on screen 

#sanctuary tag #tinknevertalks